Congratulations to P&L's nominees for Best New Poets 2021!
this is for you, / little wee thing of ears, wee body of mouth / this burden is for you the better to hear the better to shout / this is for you
The mathematical lie is x / / My problem can’t be solved / for treasure or emptiness / much less a number / that wobbles on a cliff
I meant to weave a nest today, / to replicate the spider's web / with floss or something runnable / through teeth.
How the house sighed, air brim with old wood, paint, and coffee spilling from around the parlor‘s paired doors as I swung them closed, slowing before they smacked the jamb so not to rattle the jaundiced panes or disrupt the furniture we had force-fed the room—
We broke up with acrimony / but the problem wasn't us. / Self-appointed middlemen / complicated our relationship
The sea squirt is born with a primitive brain and one eye. It cruises the ocean, and when it finds a surface to fasten to, the squirt eats its own eye and brain. Without movement, it no longer needs them.
