by James K. Zimmerman

I lie
            between two pillows

the whole bed is mine
                        tonight

you are not here

I dream of sleep
            in a meadow of clouds
                        nimbus
                        and cirrus

stars dare not sow their
pale, demanding light
in the furrows of my forehead

I sleep in dreams
            between two pillows
soft breasts I lie
                        between

but the breathing is
            my breath
the softness my own
the darkness, yours

the silence
                                   ours

you are not here
                        tonight

by Preston Hood

Before the dead crawl out, I stitch it up
with the white line of my thinking
& watch the sunrise.  I enter the mist
though a wall of pain, tingle all over
when I breathe.  A woman’s lovely hips
flash across the day.  I divide

time into quarter moons,
halved apples,
hours of need & love.  I Listen
to the music – trumpeted lilies,
the mathematical beat
squeezed between tit & birdsong:
right now, right now.

by Bill Edmondson

Is not a town
But commemoration
Of blankety –blank
A few two – story houses
Some trailers    a road
Angling up under white oak
To a tidy cemetery    Baileys mainly
Who no longer live there
Tapped corpses tucked intact
And above these bones    composed
Bouquets propped by the pale

Beyond    for miles outside this plot
Under the constant fallen leaves
Under grass flowing down to the Mississippi
Chips    slivers    fragments of skull    whole bones
Reassemble
The river reverses
Blood rushes back

by Bill Edmondson

Abandoned by a careless sailor
Cast out on this verge of a dash
Little larger than a sand bar
They’re driven to shelter by gouging beaks
Hide in scrub in dunes
Where they find abundant grass    and multiply
In time    take dominion

But later    there’s no more space
Some are crowded into the sea
Where dark shadows gorge

Grasses    bushes    gnawed below the quick
They turn their gentle eyes on one another
Any drop of blood from a scuffle
They’re like red – ass    raggedy – ass chickens
Torn apart    this is how they learn
To eat their newborn