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I can forgive myself for leaving him where he was, but I can’t forgive myself for spending one whole year in depressed rage, forbidding anyone from saying her name in front of me. For three hundred and sixty-seven days and nights I lived in a world washed free of colorsContinue Reading

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The rain has come.I no longer know what exactly the color of Light has behind its transparency.I don’t remember the sound of the wind blowing in my sleep.There is a closed door somewhere that someone wants to open, but cannot.All the noises are mixed up together, someone is shouting,But it’sContinue Reading

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A gorillazooed in a kindly habitatnot quite likeits mountained ownrecently cradled a fallenhuman infant, unused to heightsand jarred from its slipaway from mother’s arms.The gorilla, a mother herself, understood yowling when she heard it. She set the child before the keeper’s gate, assuming kindshould goimmaculate to kind,knowing the bandied creaturewouldContinue Reading

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Outside,The sun has set,The atmosphere is freezingTo the surface for the night,While mining rovers trundleHome through frostedRegolith. Inside,The air ducts hum,Recycled water flows throughHydroponic gardens under lights.A systems check confirms thatAll is well insideThe airlock. Elsewhere,On Planet Earth,It’s said they walk on grass,Enjoying sunshine as their right. She sighs, andContinue Reading

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I’m here to fetch things that float up,Devoted to the murk of ocean, No hint whatever it isA few feet below, Where iridescence wavesBefore vanishing. I come to this dockEach morning And imagineA flounder, the wise seer, Gazing from his abyssThrough tricks of light At the stranger craning his neckInContinue Reading

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Carolyn Adams’ poetry and art have appeared in Steam Ticket, Cimarron Review, Evening Street Review, Dissident Voice, and Blueline Magazine, among others. Having authored four chapbooks, her full-length volume is forthcoming from Fernwood Press. She has been twice nominated for both Best of the Net and a Pushcart prize. SheContinue Reading

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Inspired by “The Cape.” In the wind of the beach, I climbed into the gorilla.  Its skin hung down like an immense human cape.                –Ben Crowley The Ape  My father always knocked on my door. ‘Perchance, the ape is in?’ He opened my door and helped me into theContinue Reading

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the symphony of bugs buzzing around our brightbodies. the spray acrid as gasoline over our arms,legs, torsos, faces scrunched like zipper spokes. the wind hesitating before reaching to touchthe leaves, our hair sticky with sweat beinglifted briefly before settling again. a reflection telescope takes time to temperature adjust.nothing to doContinue Reading

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As a child, my favorite summertime souvenir wasNot seashells or sand crabs butThe tar that stuck to my salty feetLike a sailor’s tattoosAnd I’d dance upon the web-like shadow ofThe water treatment plantThat I mistook as part of the refineryIn hopes of staining myself permanently My efforts were no matchContinue Reading

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Mostly land and wind here.Barns, silos, woodframe housesfloat on a sea of plowed fields.It’s the last of winter,not quite spring. A storm’s blown in tonight,gusts slashing the house, crashingthe dead aspen onto the dairy shed roof.Thunder rattles the loose sashin the kitchen window.Lightning rips tears in the black sky-plain above.OutContinue Reading