The Stills are Silent Aimee Morales Philippines He travels. Hispictures are his wayof taking me. He has alwaystaken me. Cambodia.Cotabato.China.That’s just the letter C. I see what he wantsme to see. Outside the frames:a sigh, a lightchuckle,lilting exclamation....
Flee, Flee from Babylon (- გაიქეცი ბაბილონიდან!) Dato Magradze Georgia Translated by Gabriel Griffin. Hello? Can’t hear you,your voice – comes and goesnetwork connection is lousythe signal weak – I’m at the meeting.Hold on, there’s a babel of voicesall talking...
Fertile Land (ბარაქიანი მიწა): A Symphony in Six Parts Dato Magradze Georgia Translated by Gabriel Griffin. To the luminous memoryof Georgia’s great writer,Otar Chkheidze,who gave us,along with other masterpieces,the translation of The Waste Land by T.S.Eliot. I. The...
Dawn’s Blossom (Ανθός Αυγής) Nicolas D. Sampson UK Good dayBeautiful day SimpleMysterious You flare upSo vital — a blossom In abundant Light ***** ΚαλημέραΌμορφη μέρα Απλή Μυστήρια ΦουντώνειςΔυναμώνεις Ανθίζεις στοΆπλετο φως Nicolas D. Sampson is...
Syracuse, Siracusa Joan Leotta USA Sunrise often meansstanding at the front doorin Syracuse, New York.looking across the highwayat the sun coloring over cornfields with layer upon layer of golden rays. But this particular morningI am in Siracusa, Sicily,looking...
Mustard Flower LA Jones USA The instructor is quoting Yeats. Behind him a painting of a naked woman, her legs lifted so that most of her torso is hidden,a tiny bit of dark curl peeking between her legs. ...
First View of the Ponte Vecchio Joan Leotta USA I watched a stream of humans from both banksflow toward its golden presence.Once on the bridge, mysimple joy becamewatching others stroll.More than an Arno crossing,Ponte Vecchio is itself a destination.While in...
Eastern Light Matthew Monte USA Held aloft in canopies of green Cicada droneLight takes as its ownSummer timbreAt my window Down hereI watch day’s approachSlowly unravel the secret lifeOf plants And live without effortGleaning life from lightFiltering downThe canopy...
Early Morning Lorraine Caputo Latin America EARLY MORNING27 January 1997 / Mexico City (Buenavista Train Station) Down the still-black streets,bowed under the weight of my pack.Half-empty city buses pass by. At one stop a block from the station,a group gets off and...
Phthalocyanine: Between Cities Rick Mullin USA The Hudson, blue now as the glassy shore,resolves to an atonal island’s chord,a boat-length segment in the atmosphere.One trader falls into the morning wind, alarming echoes in the ferry wake.Another stranger on her...
Paris Photograph Lisa Macaione USA Dusk blue.Down the RueSoufflot, EiffelTower shimmerslike champagneon a candlelit table.I am twenty-three,American, cameraclicking at the distant landmark, pedestrians cross cobblestones at Place du Panthéon, my girlhood...
confessions made in this sj kim-ryu USA sj kim-ryu is a Guest Contributor to Panorama. EXPLORE OUR CURRENT ISSUE FEATURED THE PHILIPPINES The Unnamed and the Unspeakable Sarge Lacuesta Philippines IMAGERY Yan Wang Preston: Interview and Images Matthew Webb England...
Big Bodies Ismail Bala Nigeria It is almost dark. In the river the frog croak, and the innocent grass have pushed forth their many alluring trap, and the water is tremulous. It is difficult sometimes, dear Lord, to be cheerful. I am more mildly made than the small...
Artists in the Honeycomb Sabrina Ghaus USA after June Jordan honeycomb in the water – one second breath is like living must be aggression slow it down. slow. it will stop. like a mourning dove will howl and moan. one day without her eggs and she could call it off,...
A Trip to Zanzibar Anjiya Sulaiman Canada An island a heart of weathered stone, ninety minutes from the sovereign shore. Step into its warm embrace, listen to the winds carried with the ocean salt; They whisper stories of conqueror and conquered, regrowth from sand...
Euclid Avenue in Spring Heather Hallberg Yanda USA Today the six lanes on the road are uncluttered. A chorus of cars falls into place – twenty-seven miles an hour to miss the red lights – filing past Monday’s rubbish: buckets dizzy with overdue medical school...
Syria Jennifer Zeynab Joukhadar USA EXPLORE OUR CURRENT ISSUE EDITOR’S CHOICE EDITORIAL COMMENTARY Nigerians Travel: Travel Beyond National Geographic Richard Ali Nigeria BOOKS In Conversation with Andrew Evans Ernest White II USA IN MEMORIAM The Essence of...
Havana Dylan Brennan Ireland-Mexico after Graham Greene The shelves in the art deco bookshop are empty. We walk down to the malecón to bear witness to the slow erosion of the day as the metallic sky rusts into horizon. A man is lost in his tenor saxophone and the...
Chokoza and Dead Things Lydia Kasese Tanzania A man at work today said to me, “Umenichokoza” Meaning: you have provoked me/ Meaning: You have offended me/ Meaning: my small breasts flailing around in my white halter neck top have aroused him. The woman that sits alone...
Green Apples and Winter Strawberries Jeongyre Choi South Korea Because the bus stopped there a green apple on a street stall came to me summer now gone its face was shining next to a watermelon out of season, since I was looking, the green apple was greener Its naval...
Atlases & Almanacs Tina Zafreen Alam Bangladesh-Canada liberation is concentric circles shifting landscapes and geography bringing what is out in and pushing what is in out. active displacement/replacement lives in movement, relationship—dynamic (dynamism)....
Drinking Midnight in the Afternoon Adina Kopinsky Israel We picked blueberries instead of brambles, our fingers bled black juice— we were babies suckled on midnight milk. The afternoon smelled of cobbler, smelled of store-bought cream cresting into peaks— the sun...
They Are Not Brown Roofs, They Are Rusted David Ishaya Osu Nigeria 1. Ibadan, running splash of rust and gold-flung and scattered among seven hills like broken china in the sun I first visited Ibadan in a poem, in the J.P. Clark poem quoted above. I hadn’t quite...
Hanoi Aliya Kinzel USA The lady with the good squid Came to bake it on her clay pot stove In front of our low plastic chairs at the corner bia hoi Just past Mao’s Red Lounge Where the scooters grazed carbon monoxide Over our relaxed elbows and knees After we had drunk...
On Not Seeing Rocher Percé Anne Swannell Canada Expectations. Absences. Out there—somewhere in the fog— a chunk of rock we’ve come all across the country to see. What we believe is there—have been told is there— have seen photographs of— is swathed in many-layered...
Witch Adura Ojo England [ i ] She, of the ellipsis flying broom night witch sun-dance seas breathing sky cruise liners panting smiles white teeth the allure of a travel case packed tight on herbs and adventure sage of sweat like she cares for a dirty martini rusty...
Directions to the Six Virgins Karen G. Berry USA Pause while crossing the Ponte del Diavolo. Look into the ravine of stone walls set by Caesar’s orders. A hundred feet below, the Natizone crawls slow and sleepy through Cividale and black catfish nibble, suspended...
Kabul Bashir Sakhawarz Switzerland I know a city with tall trees as tall as the tower of Babylon cursing each other. Water flows on the shoulders of the city people carry water of sorrow from poison rivers to their home. I know a city built with fear I know a city...
Adlewyrchiad Mewn Ffenest Trên/Reflection in a Train Window Elan Grug Muse Wales Gwibia gwinllannoedd ar hyd fy ngwyneb yn rhesi hir o winwydd llwydwyrdd, gwyrdd fel afon, sy’n torri cwysi hir yngngwastadeddau ‘moch. Ac ynun llif dros fy ngwefusau daw daear ocr,...
Improvisation: the London Dervish Bijan Omrani England I could be a dervish in the streets Of London town. As if in rags I trod The desert ways from Baghdad on to Samarkand, And found a heaven ravelled up in every grain Of sand, so too, here, along the streets that...
Three Cups of Tea Jasmine Gui Canada Nothing is a straight line; rows are just cuts pieced together and always bending somewhere. This is the rockbed of camellia, he sweeps, to sunhat days lined with fading. Monsoons wear everything down to crow’s feet, he squints,...
The Queen of Doughnuts Candace Pearson USA The young homeless guy with mountain-man beard camped outside the library, his makeshift bed fenced by towers of paperbacks, asks my name. When I say, Candace, he shouts, You’re a Queen! That means you can eat as many...
The Medically Important Poisonous Snakes of Malaysia Karen Skofield USA Snakes could be anywhere, which means everywhere. We kid sandwich: parent leading, kid kid, parent trailing. It’s hard to watch where all the feet go, all the hands. Don’t grab the vines. Don’t...
Mealtimes Christina Thatcher Wales Everything I eat in Malaysia sticks to my back teeth as if to brand me, say I’ve finally tasted travel— the swallowing heat of the East its foreign fishes, steaming meats. The glued-in food others me. Tells me I’m...
The Weight of Suicide Andrew C. Brown England Brambles scream to an angry sky, piles of debris are free to love stripped stolen motorbike here, scorned forlorn unicorn there randomly scattered toys, their faces full of memory the colour of ashes. Welcome...
Soroche Susana Case USA What is the calculus of altitude and allure in this place where, until the volcano spewed ash and covered it, the old lake of the Cotocollaos travelled so far to sea level? In Quito, The Bullfighter’s ghost has slipped from the asylum to wander...
The Mysterious Case of Him Deirdre Hines Ireland Of all the waters we could have chosen to scheme by, it was always Rogers Burn that caught us diving with boys or fishing with worms pierced by bent nappy pins sinking down into the silt of shoelace elastic line; that...
Poet in Jungle Sarah Sutro USA heading for the Amazon, past the great volcano Coto Paxi, muzzle of a giant animal rising 19,000 feet from its base, snow covered, waiting to pounce resting, waiting: jaguar. superhighway leading to rainforest, mountains on all sides, we...
Gift Fruit Maaja Wentz Canada I can speak Japanese in this poem, and My mind will touch yours so We both understand the custom of gift fruit. Baskets perfumed with juicy red and gold, Unspotted and fraught with meaning Polished and inviting to your lips and teeth....
Pickles Allyson Jeffredo USA As the sourness subdues my craving, the pickle bites memory into my tongue. When I was 12, I would chase pickles with creamy whole-milk, feel the milk shock my teeth like someone hooked jumper cables up to each tooth. My mom saw my...
The Places Uche Nduka USA A laundry list is its own ultimate beauty. Licking the core of this breakup. Your sternum’s craft and transcendence. You’ve just enhanced my taste for intellection. A fantasy hive where seduction grows. You project your desires...
Building the Great Wall Stephanie Han USA There are bodies, selves we cast aside to build the Great Wall. Our home crumbled; we shored up our stake. Tiles, dirt, glass, sticks, the rubble of new lives. A pig’s head. A porcelain tub. A bicycle. A golf club. Cleaning...
The Moon Emmanuel-Abdalmasih Samson Nigeria For Adebiyi Olusolape Last night the moon was a bow. I thought if only I could place my arrow in it I could kill all that lurked in the dark. I thought if only I could push it off from the shore to float seaward, I could...
C’est Grande Monde Okwudili Nebeolisa Nigeria Madagascar was pulling out of Africa, clumps of calcified ground ferried on water, following the windward trail that produces another year, row upon row of harbours. Even to the man walking by the beach his steps...
Kansas to Colorado Judy Kirkwood USA We wake to a mist That clouds the river road, Hovers over a field Of soft-spun spiders’ nests. Blackbirds beat and skirt The trees, streak over hay bales Spread out in dry fields like matchboxes Burning the mist into a gold blaze....
Indian Head Massage Kathleen McCracken Northern Ireland After I have travelled your scalp for twenty-two and a half minutes dissolving the knots smoothing the cramped furrows of pain you ask me what I think about when I stroke your brows and press your temples what...
Navajo John Hicks USA She was a child, not much older than I, facing the sheep she was herding across this dirt road. Outdoor work crusted on her shoulders. I watched from the back seat of our steel oasis, its hood ornaments a chrome-winged Pontiac. In a remote part...
Nyamata Genocide Memorial Sarah Dickenson Snyder USA Piled on the pews—a hideous laundry stacked and stained (the twenty-two years of blood rust unbreathable), their bodies vanished. But not their clothes— bloodied shirts, graying pants, sagging skirts. Underground...
Nude Ascending the Welkin Uche Ogbuji Nigeria Candle flame on cold pillar tallow, Wick bent to dip of our wings, Lighting up naught over naught of our lift, Stretched days direct most things. How I nearly screwed my eye for an eye, Mistook your first chill...
The Painting Chika Onyanezi Nigeria All these for my lover: A rocket science Telescopes A map of Jupiter And a lantern — Burning from the lips I love you and you know it A man soaring with time On his waist Swirling, dancing Dangling from sky to sky Jerking off...
The Artist as Diplomat Robbi Nester USA After American Mihrab, an installation in ceramic and wood by Sandow Birk and Elyse Pignolet When the ordinary has become too safe, too stale, we are advised to make it strange, to look again, and magnify until the edges blur,...
Festa de São João Kevin Cutrer USA They tell me the banked fires on every street corner tonight reveal in smoke and tears the face of the one you are meant to marry. Countless ancestors peered through ribbons of soot, starlight blurs in their eyes, to look upon the...
Water-Gazers* Elizabeth Schulz USA On the pier in the harbour of Guinea-Bissau on the coast of West Africa, where cashews are shipped, and cocaine arrives daily, they wait through the day. The woman in a long blue dress, the man in a torn brown shirt, the boy in...
Anastasia maps Devi S. Laskar USA Each night my handiwork charts Calypso’s serenade, the arrival of things that can only be made from scratch, a second language learned by the precisionist as she struggles with asps and the correct pronunciation of ochre. Every...
Other skins Shebana Coelho USA I love the snake that stifles my breath I have built him bit by bit all these years fleshed him with fear so he moves slick and when the skin falls I store it in a cave with other skins But when this winter comes it will come...
Moreton Bay David Eggleton New Zealand When it’s stinking hot at twelve o’clock, earthy aromas rise and vent. Something’s conjured in a gutbucket and tossed bloodily in a wok to quarrel with a guzzle of noodles. Somewhere, someone faces the...
Dots of lineage lines Unoma Azuah Nigeria The night is a long gulp it does not quench a thirst but it lingers dripping down a place where panic sets up shop I am in a market of minds plying wares of eggs cracked open and bleeding white in a polar plain I am...
A blessing, a question Patricia Spears Jones USA Today a poet makes a blessing on the poets, the mountains, temple bells, the aspen ringing. Athletic White people carry coffee cups or sports gear. Their boys gleefully play in mini hockey rinks. Is it bliss...
Who am I? Bashir Sakhawarz Switzerland Born in Kabul behind mountain walls I didn’t know that one day I pack the world under my skin I will find my shadow in Uganda my religion in Belize my name in Kosovo. Who am I? And how far would I go? It was my uncle, not...
Rain Dato Magradze Georgia Translated by Victoria Field and Natalia Bukia Peters Rain drops roll down my face, freedom is so close, when rain encourages you to live, the whole universe is your building plot. Frontiers of every country disappear, no need...
May 1st, Dinas Dinlle Elan Grug Muse Wales Translated by Elan Grug Muse Moon chasing cats, chasing Shadows, chasing tail ends of dreams into satin-slippered cottongrass. Raindrops, chasing teardrops, chasing yellow eyes and field mice round the corners...
