C.B. Wamble

David Earl Williams picks up where Cummings left off and continues on from there, soliloquizing like an enlightened maniac as he goes. He can be absurd and whimsical, serious and surreal, and even somber and reflective in his syntax-twisted musings, a hard skill to master, one which even the method’s pioneers seemed to struggle with. Yet Williams pulls it off with ease. Walking the streets of his contorted fantasies, he wallows in the mud and mire, fornicates with the women, and as Lowell with his callous proclamations at the end of The Dolphin, is aware of and yet unmoved by the blood on his hands. And so Williams joins the ranks of this publication’s favorite contemporary poets, not just with this example of his poetic prowess, but with an overwhelming majority of his work.

WSIMG | David Earl Williams

Bathing in the miasma of urban decay, Theophilus Kwek transmogrifies ingeniously the disillusion of Zhou Hongxing. As time’s corrosion taints the trajectory of a tedious existence, sedative vices stand tall against the city’s towering wastes, attempting to lead man astray, and yet still, through all the refuse and decadence, the sublimity of the earth worms through. Hongxing and Kwek come together to form a poem that is thematically ubiquitous. As man struggles to make sense of a world so inexorably flawed, some way, somehow, one still finds himself flabbergasted by its overwhelming beauty.

Cordite Poetry Review | Zhou Hongxing Translated by Theophilus Kwek

RJ Lambert sings the brawls of the bucolic scene, where cocks fight with men and time is measured by the lifespan of meat. This poem is memorable all the way through, strutting down the page with the swagger of a rooster and roosting in one’s mind like a catchy tune. Lambert’s herky-jerky rhythm is a knock-out punch, accentuating the weight of the verse’s many quotable lines while still floating effortlessly off the tongue. The poet has gained himself a new reader, and the English language a new puissant power ballad from the American pastoral.

Black Fork Review | RJ Lambert

Cat Woodward is playing cat and mouse with the reader, though whatever the poet is hiding, the music makes it worth the chase. Her voice is strange, a wary whisper, unwilling to let the reader put the puzzle together, to gather anything beyond the immaculate and cryptic symphony, but therein lies the poem’s magic. It’s a cacophony of images and sensations united in a swift movement, though something almost sinister seems to be diffused throughout the stanzas, something animal and alert; Joyce in a slasher film, monologuing. This is just to say, Woodward has composed a poem of extraordinary depth, one that I will be rereading for years to come.

Amberflora | Cat Woodward

Gabriel Antonio Reed’s fanatical love resembles one of Caddy Compson’s soliloquies disassembled into stanzas. I am by no means saying that the poem is derivative, in fact, Reed composes with such a tactful distinction that the poem seems to teeter perfectly on a tightrope between chaos and order. It takes a rare talent to form a coda from platitudes, but Reed manages it with a poetic savoir faire I’ve only seen in Faulkner. The poet knows when to slip and when to punch, and when to flurry like a drunken lunatic. Such a poem is truly a radical burst of emotion rendered immaculately on the page.

Barnstorm Journal | Gabriel Antonio Reed

Jessica Purdy’s breathtaking ekphrasis of Rippl-Rónai’s “Woman with Birdcage” sets a new standard for the medium. The poet’s manner encapsulates perfectly the mood of the painting, adding new life to the art with stanzas that create motion, lore, and unity. Usually an ekphrasis plays second fiddle to the subject itself, but Purdy composes so succinctly, so imaginatively, so elegantly, it’s as if they were created by the same synthesis of mind. Thus, a lover of verse cannot help but ask the question; which came first, the painting or the poem?

Imposter | Jessica Purdy

With a name that needs no introduction, Natalie Shapero continues to impress with this poetic synthesis of Plath and Faulkner. Flippant at the gate of the unrepentant world, Shapero falls first upon a fellow flawed member of humankind before commiserating in her own remembrances of a bright-eyed youth turned cold. Full of comically callous observations on the daily rat race and the monotonous plight of modern man, Shapero demonstrates courage in her survival, creating a reverse coming of age poem that is as innovative as it is flawless.

bath magg | Natalie Shapero

Shari Lawrence Pfleeger escapes into nature, away from the perfidy of man and into the temples of rock, the etchings of water, shielded by shadows. Balance is the focal point of this poem, breathtakingly illustrated in the dichotomy of light and dark, the idea that one cannot exist without the other, both being defined by the existence of their opposite. This is a poem of disillusion eclipsed by universal wisdom, the serenity of virgin earth and the continual upheaval of man, and amounts, of course, to an absolute masterwork of art.

Blue House Journal | Shari Lawrence Pfleeger

Matthew Thorburn’s At Eighty is a harrowing portrait of an artist with dementia, managing to exhibit both the horrific effects of the illness and the hard-nosed defiance of human dignity. The end is bitter-sweet, succinct, a balance of sorrow and acceptance: this is a poem of life, not death. Timeless in theme and flawless in composition, it is ready to be read for ages to come.

Anacapa Review | Matthew Thorburn

Sylvia Chan, though I pray her poem is not confessional, takes after the more acclaimed confessionalist Mrs. Plath in her incredible ability to express horrific events and traumatic emotions. The latter labels may conjure in one’s head one of the many melodramatic ink slicks currently clogging old father poesy’s gills, but seeing how rare it is for me to be actually disturbed by anything I read (Homes’ Alice or Nabakov’s Ada), I am extremely impressed by not only this poem’s construction, but its ability to hold and horrify in such a sparse and purposely elusive manner.

Annulet | Sylvia Chan

Kristen Garth seemingly has an unhealthy fear of swans, and so naturally, she constructed this slasher film en vers, with swans filling the role of the main antagonist. Despite what some may tell you, a poem needn’t be composed of ecclesiastical revelations and meditations on mortality. In fact, sometimes the best poems are just plain old fun. Garth has proven this by weaving together a magnificent display of her poetic talents by way of the most unlikely subjects… a pair of bloodthirsty swans. It’s absurd, tongue-twisting, brooding in the most humorous of manners, and yes, absolutely enthralling to read.

The Cabinet of Heed | Kristen Garth

What if Cinderella smoked methamphetamine from her glass slipper? If by some extremely strange coincidence you’ve ever asked yourself that question, then you’re in luck. Enter the world of Georgina Titmus’s step-sisters, a tongue-twisting tidbit that turns this classic fairytale into a fragment of dark foreboding and uncanny (possibly suggestive?) horror. If Finnegans Wake and The Autobiography of Red got blasted together at the ball, then eight months later this Cronenbergian masterpiece of a poem would be born.

Briefly Write | Georgina Titmus

Penelope Pelizzon sails the sea of self-loathing and picks up some friends along the way, mainly various sea related detritus that accompany her on this dystopian beach stroll. Nevertheless, her imagery and rhythm are exquisite, horrific, surreal, and the tactful use of her sprawling vocabulary builds marvelously on the absurd setting.

32 Poems | Penelope Pelizzon

Adam Houle has produced a scathing, cunning, hysterical rebuke of modern language, and how accurate his depiction is! Published alongside this critical masterpiece are two other impeccable poems both worthy of mention in their own right. All of that to say, Adam Houle a garnered a new reader, and this reviewer will be studying his work from hereon out.

Thrush Poetry Journal | Adam Houle

Superlatives to the editors Kathleen Volk Miller, Marion Wrenn, Jason Schneiderman, Bryan Dickey, Daniel Driscoll, Miriam R. Haier, Andrew Keller, Samantha Neugebauer, Rachel Wenrick, and all plaudits to the poets James Harms for Make Muffins, Pier Wright for Driveway Poem and The Hibiscus, Key West, Sarah A. Chavez for Dear Carol, I look out the window, William Palmer for He Pours a Small Glass of Milk, and to all other poets for their contributions. It is a fantastic issue from back to front, and was both a pleasure and a breeze to read.

Painted Bride Quarterly Issue 102: Touch | Editors and Contributors Respectively

Mara Adamitz Scrupe has crafted two exemplary passages of gritty, reflexive, dynamic music. Scrupe means business, and her verse, though clad in iron, hovers so effortlessly across the page, and flits through the mind with a guttural magniloquence. These twin poems are triumphs, and should be subsumed with all warranted relish.

Parish Line Press | Mara Adamitz Scrupe

Michael J Seidlinger teaches us “how to conceptualize a voice” in this hilariously absurd instructional-in-verse. A paragon of prose-poetry and a lecture in slacker philosophy, Pornography is a must read for any lover of lyrical discourse.

Tagvverk | Michael J Seidlinger

Kevin McIlvoy teaches drunken wedding etiquette in this striking ode to self-loathing, senescence, and cynicism.

Bluestem Magazine | Kevin McIlvoy

For those who are fans of Burroughs’ word jumbled and bizarre philosophies, Ken Edwards’ A River on the Table will be quite the exceptional find. Excerpted from his book Wild Metrics, this is a must read for any connoisseurs of experimental prose poetry.

Tears in the Fence | Ken Edwards

Maryann Corbett brings new life to this old wen, masterfully rendered in a new playful and pliable tone. One almost wants to welcome a wen into their armpit, if only to hear this rapturous movement repeated once again.

Ars Medica Vol. 16 Pg. 21 | Anonymous Author Translated by Maryann Corbett

Joseph Harms is a poet of astronomical significance, and Ichor is no different. Harms is a master of syntax-jumbled, thesaurus-thumped, sublime absurdities, and yet it comes off so naturally… it’s as though Harms has learned to write in tongues.

Midway Journal | Joseph Harms

Rebekah Devine embarks on a divine metamorphosis mirroring that of the maddened Nebuchadnezzar. With a frightful rigor she narrates her transformation, one placated by aquiline cud and plagued by a fear of God.

Foothill Poetry Journal | Rebekah Devine

Michael Brookbank probes the abyss for peace in this exemplary work of psychological space travel.

Ayaskala Magazine | Michael Brookbank

Jayne Marek makes the reviewer pity a ferret, but is the ferret the true protagonist? And what is the poet hiding? Whatever the case may be, though the weasel may be artificial, the verse is filled with life.

Quartet Journal | Jayne Marek