Poetry

*Mogadishu Blues (For Zuleikha) By Wale Adebanwi “Soomaali been ma maahmaah do ” [Somalis don't say a false proverb] – a Somali proverb I He bathes his soul in the waters of her eyes. He washes his sorrows in the oceans of her dreams. He takes...

Of Sonia             My heart-woman is Sonia, no other. Her mouth is sweet; her you-know-what is sweet; Her breast is sweetbread; her thighs are sweetmeat. She is champion ivory, dreamy...

Biography of My Father, the Printer I swept, the day after my father died, a thousand pounds of scrap—plates, rods, wires, gears— with an industrial broom three feet wide. I didn’t have the energy for tears. I hurled reams of 90lb cover stock...

Who Then Ever Will Bring Morning? At 6 am God used the belfry. The sweep, sonorous of angels, skinned off the blanket and opened my eyes for view the window drew near. I found the street in vernal trees, not one sunken as on mornings from the...

Behind the buttercups Behind the buttercup bramble The pines stood tall and straight The crunch of cones underfoot Yellow puffs of pollen in the spring We climbed the trees sticky handed Fragrant sap gummed bark and sweat Climbed with fierce...