by Wang Ping

The ones in the brain
that allow us to make decisions, not just
about what to order for lunch, but about basic perceptions —
making sense of the flood of signals coming from the eyes
or hearts, struggling for balance, juggling
between time and space, two houses across
the river of stars. Eye of the storm —
the small chime turns in the cloud, its copper heart
swinging left to right, right to left.
The old lawn mower roars with fresh gas,
and the grass, smelling like hay rolling into the sea,
brings tears to the eyes. “She weeps when she thinks of
her lover at sunset,” her son confirms.
How does a heart heal? The answer may lie
in the inner swarm, tangled, running ahead of time.
How does our brain see what we see?
Or feel? How do we not run from pain, but stand
face to face? It’s been four months since April,
the cruelest of all. The trees are still green,
and birds still singing, but the grass is littered
with thorny shells of acorns, biting hands and feet
as I dig weeds with a steak knife. Every day,
I must learn how to live again, or love
between woodpeckers’ knocking and bleeding twilight.
Breathe. Hands under thighs.
I wish you only goodness and safety.
I wish all sentient beings good and safe — is my prayer
for you, for us. Our bodies apart, but the minds
still twine, with hearts as a metronome, ticking ¾ time.
I have taken off my watch long ago. Our hammock
hangs between the mesh of rope and net of lights,
flickering from the far north.

by Wang Ping

We surrender
Even if we don’t know how
No thought
No thunder
No flight from hope to despair
No silence
No sorrow
Time folds and unfolds
No joy
No despair
No origin or end
The story flowers at its own pace
Dark and light
Good and evil
Its energy hinges
On our perception
Trees do not know truth or lies
They’re just trees
Full of the sap for life
No red
No blue
No white or black
In the absence of color
A rainbow

by Craig Evenson

will hold, for life in general,
the way an appended amen suspends
a second thought,
but won’t explain
how it moves in oceans

oceans, since nothing is seen
to enclose them,
defined by the things fallen
into them
and how they sink,
no place but down
to bear themselves
and whatever they hold in their teeth

how how, exactly,
we breathe ourselves into our sins
until we float.

by Leonore Hildebrandt

I worry about gutters,
the washed–out road, corroded pipes.
And squirrels — they are everywhere —
on edge, just like me.

“Go home,” I yell at the neighbor’s dogs.
Naked–pink, they scramble into the woods.

And what is wild about berry–fields?
My friend and I walk the barrens,
the esters and kettle holes
look different — almost rearranged —

with the sweep of new roads, piled rock,
machinery and warning signs.

My neighbor breeds the dogs
in kennels — all day they yip and wail.
Finally the plumber shows up,
tells me about his blocked arteries.

Landforms can be read, flow rates measured.
Go touch the wind to see how it blows.