By Francisco Muñoz Soler

Hatred strikes them incessantly
who pay the price for the sin
of being different or believing differently,

an everyday cruelty
sheltered by stigmas
that trivializes the horror,

hatred which perseveres, seduces,
permeating the weak
offering them identity and refuge,

a country reduced to ashes
where wounds germinate
and the sun is always distant.

By Francisco Muñoz Soler

How difficult, how difficult
to come back home
from the heart of paradise,
tonight we honor Aleixandre
by the seaside
at the beautiful Palmeral de las Sorpresas
the palm grove
located where once there was a silo
when the poet enjoyed.

Bringing memories
makes me fragile
and to return along the path of beauty
just with my answers,
amplifies the opposed voices
and imprints of kiss and caresses
installed in my mind
makes my feel more orphan
as more beautiful is the night.

And tonight the zenith
is radiating more bright, Aleixandre
with his palette of verses
covers the sea, the air and the people
of the city of paradise.

by Dan Murphy

In high school Math, we studied imaginary numbers,
searched for imaginary solutions
to problems without real answers.
We chain–smoked Camels out a dorm window fan
in New England winter, asking what it meant

under blacklight to feel alive. In Cosmology
we had to identify stars and myths, many already burnt out.
In Religious Philosophy, every author we read was dead,
and they’d written about it, but before, when they were alive.
After I had found you, dead, hanging with questions

you and I could not answer, they told me you’d listened
in another room to Cathedrals — a song we loved together —
on repeat. Then your sneakers tip–toed. Then your mouth
quieted with foam. You became an image, then, no longer
yourself,
but a brief residue of light that holds moments

as in an old photograph or a textbook of History
that is both true and false, like the light of a star
no one else has seen or named. I retur
to that song Cathedrals now and again, as if I’m mapping
the notes that spoke to you. As though I’m listening

to my own death, each word a star to which I draw
my own myth. I found out, after, that imaginary numbers serve
a purpose: when used to manipulate sound, they can decompose
space and time, such that one whisper can be heard,
alone, among a whole chapel of wailing.

N.B. The poem “After / Math” originally appeared in the Winter 2023 issue of The Café Review and was errantly attributed to a poet by the same name whose work was also included in that issue. This reprint appears as acorrection, along with the author’s correct CV in the contributors’ section.

by A.D. Winans

you can find them in the back room
poised for a quick exit
they’re the first poets to read
and the first to leave
they always carry a loose–leaf
notebook with them
always have a pretty young girl
hanging on to their arm

there is always one who claims
to have known Kerouac or Ginsberg
to have slept with one or both
two or three live with the Gods
another two or three claim to be God

two ex–junkies one homosexual
one drag queen with too much mascara
two sad eyed women rubbing their hands
when they’d prefer to be rubbing something else

always a drop out from the Beat Generation
a hold over from the Hippie days
a woman with short hair
a nervous poet with a tic
a refugee from the drug set
a failed poet who drops names
faster than an auctioneer

one poet who reviews poetry
one poet who is an editor
one poet who wants to be an editor
one Messiah and one visiting
out of town star