VINAIGRETTE
edited by Layla Maher
Sara Falkstad
Sara Falkstad (b 1982) is a poet, teacher and artist based in the West of Sweden. She has attended writing courses at the Mid Sweden University, Bona folkhögskola and Österlens folkhögskola, as well as the Seamus Heaney Centre Poetry Summer School at Queen’s University Belfast. Her poetry has been published in various Swedish journals and her book of poetry De enhjärtbladiga (“The Monocots”) was released in 2020.
harvest season
of course I dreamed
of honeybees last night.
of how you finally
showed me your innermost.
we extracted the state of intoxication
in long hungry gulps
I leaned into the centrifugal force
and your inclination to try anything.
they think it’s because of a parasite,
this death. we have to do it all ourselves.
the pollination. the brushing.
during these hot summer mornings,
we uncap, extract, devour
that sickening sweet gold.
leaving us with sugar on our breaths
and the sticky lips smiles of queens.
Michelle Rochniak
Michelle Rochniak (she/they) is a Greek mythology-obsessed poet from Wallingford, CT (USA). She majors in professional writing and minors in women’s studies at Western Connecticut State University. They are also a 2022 CT Collegiate Poet with the Connecticut Poetry Circuit. Current pubs include Gleam, Celestite Poetry, and Aothen Magazine. Follow her on Instagram @shell.songs and Twitter @shellroch!
you sure are daedalus’s daughter
1. the rose absorbed you when it latched its petals shut at sunset and i am the bee meant to
pull you out
2. how do i reach my little bee legs down to pull you out if the pollen will cover me in
thorns
a. what if the whole flower becomes thorns
b. what if you are thorns
3. she is the worm tucked in by her grandmother’s dirt and her slime catches your eye
before my fuzz reaches your peripherals the next dawn
4. i am but a little bee bombling along bazombling along
a. the worm undulates
b. everyone takes the worm seriously
5. the pollinatee rejects the pollinator and the pollinator wiggles its body in the sky like the
hideous pink cylinder in the ground in an attempt to discover who it could have been
6. i fly up to my hive two feet away and find the map of flowers in the garden and use my
little bee legs to stipple an X on your face
7. the queen hears about what i did and she demotes me from worker to beggar
a. she doesn’t like turning away valuable resources
b. she spat the nectar someone kissed into her mouth at my face
8. i am so crunchy i think as i leave the hive what if i fell on the ground right now and
someone stepped on me
9. would they include my death in their asmr video
a. would bees go viral on tiktok
b. would the end imprison their ears in bliss
10. i fly past you for the last time and your parasitic pollen floats on to my stripes and i know
you don’t mean it because you fastened your petals to your stigma when i emerged
11. the worm watches me fly towards the sun and my wings do not melt
a. i will travel many many many many times her length in a year
b. she will never leave the thermal squeeze of her family
12. the sun opens its mouth and tells me that i do not belong outside of the ozone
13. i wiggle waggle woggle in its face and let a scream out of my bee lips for the first time
14. now i can exist
a. now i can
b.
Jannah Yusuf Al-Jamil
Jannah Yusuf Al-Jamil has done a few interesting things: make some bad rice, write a few poems, and co-found antinarrative zine. Find their work in Fahmidan, Overheard, IMPOSTOR, Pollux Journal, and at jannahyusufaljamil.carrd.co.
my works: a garden, an oven, a crown
after Kaveh Akbar / after Percy Bysshe Shelley / after Ocean Vuong
today I’ve decided to be
King of Kings, scampering around my garden of
tomato vines and too-big zucchini,
blooming yeast to trap into
a gluten matrix. I am a creator! here are my works —
half-baked poems and over-baked bread,
hollow when you knock on it. hey,
[knocks on skull], can
you get me out of here? despair! I am tripping
on the weeds I refused to pull because
I wanted to prove that I could grow something,
anything. blow the dandelion fluff
for me; it is a witness. heaven is
a garden — God knows his audience. when I was thirteen,
I plead a prayer: let me be good. for my lesson today,
I am learning to learn how
to learn, to soak in sunshine like
this cherry tomato which never
turned red. the language of my parents’ parents
is one that never got its own alphabet; instead it stole
from Persian or Arabic. in that sense,
I have always been a thief. it’s ironic that the one creation
that I cannot forfeit as much as I hate it (it’s
poetry, every poet hates poetry) is simply
written words all in purposeful lines. ‘creation’ as a word comes from late Middle English, when it was attributed to
the divine. ‘despair’ comes from Latin,
a combination of ‘down from’ (de) and ‘to hope’ (sperare). in that sense I reject royalty and nobility; crown a new King of Kings,
I am looking to tear my creation from my work
and to hope. the zucchini and the tomatoes will make
a fine meal with the freshly baked bread, even though its crust is burnt — in my peasanthood I will finally savor my magnum opus, not sell it.
John Reed
John Reed is the author of three novels, one book of poetry, two non-fiction illustrated projects, one project of poetry/theater, and one book of history/narrative non-fiction; published in (selected) Artforum, Art in America, the Believer, the PEN Poetry Series, Gawker, Slate, the Paris Review, the Times Literary Supplement, Vice, The New York Times, Harpers; anthologized in (selected) Best American Essays; Director of The New School University MFA in Creative Writing. More at: easyreeder.com
Party Tricks
You really had all the best party tricks.
Like that time you pulled me into a hat.
Nevermind the delight when I climbed out.
And what a fantabulous cabinet
of curiosities. That one display.
Not only the prince pauper, rag and bone,
but a perfect twin in the pauper prince,
shoes and watch and a better bicyclette,
and just as broken and shining a trophy.
You, with your baton and ringmaster tails,
standing at the top of the stairs, Pinot
Noir and another walk-up sublet,
and candy bowls filled with wooden matches.
