THE FIRST LETTER OF PAUL TO THE CHURCH OF [NAME WITHHELD ON ADVICE OF COUNSEL]

by Matthew E. Henry (MEH)

from Paul—a prisoner to the gospel of God—to all those 

across the Eastern Ocean who have named themselves 

after Christ, consider themselves His most holy people. 

 

doubtless you have heard of the bonds of our brother, 

Pastor Daniel Fuentes Espinal who, born in Honduras, 

heeded God’s call to minster among you in Maryland 

for over a decade. heard how he was stalked and taken 

into the unholy hands of masked men on the road between 

Lowes’ and McDonald’s. was shackled into the belly 

of their beast, but preached the fruits of repentance—his hope

of their finding forgiveness in Jesus—to his captors 

from his car to the cell they anonymously threw him in.

 

when such reached my ear, my spirit was greatly troubled, 

but I took comfort assured that you—his siblings in Christ—

were firmly knit in condemning such actions, tied in the unity

of securing his release from imprisonments worse than mine. 

that no disagreements could cut the knot of our fellowship. 

I was astonished to hear some among you have raised your voice

against our brother on social media, confident in the baffling belief 

our refugee Savior—who fled Judea for Egypt—would stand 

within the invisible lines you’ve drawn about both His kingdoms.

 

given all we hold holy, how in the Hell—you so vehemently 

sentence others to—have you allowed Phillip Doug to say 

our brother “is not a victim if he is in our country illegally”? or 

tolerate Todd James—a supposed minister of the Grace 

of God—claims that “Christians who have illegal paperwork 

are getting sent back to their country so they can preach the gospel

and lay their life down like the apostles did”? Miller Tonee rejoices 

that people in his congregation are self-deporting. Herb Jimzel—

whose bio proclaims he spreads God's love to orphans, the poor, 

and to those with no hope—says his family came here legally—

in all caps, with three exclamation points—sees no contradiction 

between our brother’s treatment and “the word of God.” Shawn Dale

says pastor Espinal should be glad he wasn’t shot. 

 

though I once warned the Philippians to beware the devious bitches 

in their midst and wished botched circumcisions to scar my detractors 

in Galatia, I’m uncharacteristically at a loss for words to address 

those reprobate minds who forget our brother’s skin looks more like 

our shared Savior’s than what they feign. fiery indignation scalds

my tongue to near-silence least I scandalize those of you who allow 

such slander to continue. 

 

hear the word of the LORD, set your house in order. God is faithful—

He will see to His servant, but will also remember and repay all you

have and not done, especially to those within the household of faith.

Editor’s note: This poem includes actual quotations found on social media in response to the story of Pastor Daniel, but the names of the authors of those quotations have been changed… on advice of counsel as well.

Author’s note: You can help free Pastor Daniel Fuentes Espinal by supporting his GoFundMe.

Matthew E. Henry (MEH) is the author of six poetry collections, most recently said the Frog to the scorpion. He is an educator and editor who received his MFA yet continued to spend money he didn’t have completing an MA in theology and a PhD in education. He writes about education, race, religion, and burning oppressive systems to the ground at www.MEHPoeting.com

THE PASSOVER STORY: A MIDRASH

by Joel Savishinsky

 

It seems that long ago, 
there was a strong streak 
of antisemitism in Egypt. 
Something about domestic servitude. 
Lots of salty sweat; 
construction jobs performed 
by undocumented people. 
A labor leader arose—the usual kind 
of suspect: Jewish, bearded, 
an immigrant, messianic inclinations 
—and he called a strike. There were 
threats of retribution. There 
were counter-threats, something 
about nasty stuff, plagues. 
 
Death threats, sacrificial animals, 
an angel making overhead 
surveillance flights—
possible early versions of 
Jewish space lasers—
lambs' blood smeared on doorways, 
a kind of warning, a kind of sign 
to leave us alone. Then there was 
an expulsion order. Many waters to cross...
that kind of thing. The people crossed over. 
It was not the Hudson. The promised land 
was not, contrary to rumors, New Jersey. 
 
Apparently, some of the descendants of 
the people who got across the water are 
now persecuting another people 
—also Semites, as it turns out—who live where 
the former slaves’ ancestors used to live. 
It is a sad cycle. 
 
Those who have a sense of history and 
its tragic ironies now raise their wine glasses 
and say, with tears in their eyes, Oy vey. 
We should know better. 
We could do a lot better than this.
 

Author's note: Midrash: an ancient commentary on part of the Hebrew scriptures, attached to the Biblical text. 
 

Joel Savishinsky is a retired professor of anthropology and gerontology, and the author of the collection Our Aching Bones, Our Breaking Hearts: Poems on Aging. A Pushcart and Best of the Net nominee, his work has appeared in The New York Times, Passager, and Willawaw. His book Breaking the Watch: The Meanings of Retirement in America, won the Gerontological Society of America’s annual book award. He has been leading family Passover Seders for many years. 

BEAUTY AND THE WOOLY BEAST

by Lisa Seidenberg

Left: Archaeologist Kathleen Martinez believes a marble statue discovered at a temple site portrays the face of Cleopatra. (Image courtesy Egypt Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities via Hyperallergic. Right: Researchers inspect the remains of a baby mammoth found in the Siberian permafrost in Russia's Batagaika crater. (Image by Roman Kutukov / Reuters via NBC News.)

A female wooly mammoth was found
In the frozen reaches of the “mouth of hell”
Nestled in a crater underground

50,000 years since she made a sound
Did she leave with a tale to tell
Nestled in her crater underground?

She was named Yana, a gentle sound
We don’t know if she let out a yell
Stumbled down by chance or forced underground

Cleopatra’s stone head was found uncrowned
Along with coins and other bagatelles
Scattered near her tomb recovered underground

Burial sites are a scientist’s playground
Clues in bones, a grown-up show and tell
Treasures from an ancient lost and found

Might the wooly beast and the Egyptian Queen 
prefer their secrets to remain unseen?
Safe-keeping their private lives 
Locked away from prying eyes

Lisa Seidenberg is a writer and filmmaker who resides in coastal Connecticut. She is a nominee for the 2025 Pushcart Prize. Her recent work has been published in Asymptote Journal, The New Verse News, OneArt: A Journal of Poetry, and Gyroscope Review. She is peer poetry reviewer for Whale Road Review.

ME AND THE TEN COMMANDMENTS

by CaLokie

Every public school classroom in Louisiana has been ordered to display a poster of the Ten Commandments. This one? Weird.

I come from a Bible Belt State where 
a majority of the people said 
they loved a God who 
they had never seen 
but voted for governors 
and legislators who 
passed Jim Crow laws which 
segregated themselves from 
fellow humans who 
could be seen. 

Now the Bible Belt state of Louisiana 
has passed a law requiring 
the Ten Commandments to be 
displayed in school classrooms despite 
the fact that there is no archeological or 
historical evidence of an exodus of 
a nation of slaves from Egypt led by 
the great emancipator 
and lawgiver, Moses. 

But having said that I have no 
problem with a public display of 
the ten commandments since 
I’m not a sculptor 
and have never made 
any graven image, nor 
any likeness of any thing 
that is in heaven above, nor 
that is in the earth beneath, nor 
that is in the water under the earth.
 
Moreover I have never coveted 
my neighbor’s manservant, nor 
his maidservant, nor 
his ox, nor 
his ass. 

Carl Stilwell (aka CaLokie) is a retired teacher who taught for over 30 years in the Los Angeles Unified school District. He was born during the depression in Oklahoma and came to California in 1959 and has lived there ever since. His pen name was inspired by the Joads’ struggle for survival in The Grapes of Wrath and the songs and life of Woody Guthrie. His poems have been published in Altadena Poetry Review, Blue Collar Review, Four Feather’s Press, Lummox, Pearl, Prism, Revolutionary Poets Brigade—Los Angeles, Rise Up, Sequoyah Cherokee River Journal, and The Sparring Artists. 

PERSPECTIVE

by Marc Swan

“This is a relatively civilized” city, he says, referring to Kyiv, after saying it’s not like Iraq or Afghanistan. https://t.co/q6UEtwvzyZ

— Mehdi Hasan (@mehdirhasan) February 26, 2022

Each morning after an espresso

from our six-cup stovetop

with granola, yogurt and blueberries

in our favorite ceramic bowls

we review the news in the online sources

disheartening is a mild term

enlightening

sometimes

watching the world dissolve before our eyes

is unnerving, overwhelming, disjointing

first European invasion since WW II

how quickly we have forgotten invasions

in Gaza, Egypt, Lebanon, the Balkans, Africa, 

and points beyond and in between

today eastern and western economies 

have our attention

fuel prices, trade options, empty store shelves

car prices, building supplies, and yes

the list has only begun

we are interlocked in this chaotic world

of language differences, money differences

but most of all ideology differences

that create distrust, uncertainty, and taint

the taste of Pavé Toulousain cheese

we used to get

from the French farm outside Toulouse

and the crisp white Txakolina 

imported from the Pyrenees—

that once seemed so important 

Marc Swan, a retired vocational rehabilitation counselor, lives in coastal Maine. Poems recently published in Gargoyle, Crannóg, Chiron Review, Queen’s Quarterly, among others. His fifth collection all it would take was published in 2020 by tall-lighthouse (UK).

EVER GIVEN

by Kat Frabotta

“Ever Given” by DaveRiver at Deviant Art.

She trudged on, steered towards Rotterdam

The captain’s son called him. Something pestering

The wind. He felt itchy. His grip tightened

He jerked the wooden wheel

Left. Left. How fucking far can you go.

Too far, it seems.

A simple, swift U-Turn will fix things

She had other plans.

Had since leaving Taiwan, but now he spurred her on.

Now it wasn’t just a magical dream of a looming, vast, powerless vessel

He had actively propelled her, set her off, equipped her with the tools needed

To make her mark.

Ever Given,

For decades, Passing various goods to every spot she’s been told

Humans have not moved her.

People shoot Asians, step on the necks of black men,

Buy plastic to put on top of plastic

As the world burns.

Incredulous, she did what she could

With her mass and the blessing of propulsion

She burrowed deep.

She takes to Egypt, ignoring the cries of the Captain

Slowly entrenches herself into the sand of the canal.

And now she sits.

She sits, she blocks. She has no intention of budging.

Why should she?

We don’t budge.

And maybe we need to get stuck for a while right now, she thinks,

Shutting her eyes and making herself comfortable.

Kat Frabotta is a 29 year-old living in New York City. She is currently an advertising student and aspiring creative. In her freetime, she loves cuddling with her orange cat and talking to friends over a bowl of penne alla vodka.

TAKING THIS IN

by Jennifer Freed

file photo

My mother sits in her kitchen while I stand
on her patio, our palms pressed
to the sliding glass door
as we speak on our phones.

She must have misplaced her glasses today. I notice
the shape of her cheekbones, how much warmth
in her eyes. She beams
as she did in the hospital, those first dreamy weeks
after her stroke, before
she understood.                                            
Today she is radiant, more radiant than I have seen her
in over a year. Today she is the most beautiful
woman I have ever seen.

We do not go near what hovers around us—
this lesson floating on the air
we don’t dare to share. I don’t know when or whether
I’ll ever touch her again.
But right now, if she has considered how long
these strange days may go on,
she isn’t dwelling on it. She is smiling. We can’t seem to stop
smiling.

I remember how brightly she laughed when she first
tried to stand after her stroke (My legs fell asleep!)
I remember her ease with the nurse
holding her up (We’re slow dancing!)
in front of the commode while a second nurse
cleaned her behind.
Now she says, as she says every day when I call,
that she hasn’t done anything
useful—but today
she’s decided it’s okay, she is lucky
to have help, she’s letting herself
be happy that she can be
queen for a while.
I draw a heart on the glass, kiss it.
She grasps her walker, pushes to stand, kisses back.

My father comes into the room, waves his hello.
She hands him the phone, asks him to tell me
what she’s been struggling to arrange into
words—what they learned on that documentary yesterday.
Wonder and pleasure move over her face
at the ease of his language—ancient Egypt, pharaohs
and deities—but I am not really listening
because she is leaning her head back against his body
as he stands behind her chair, and he
is resting his palm on her arm,
and I watch her drifting
on the rise and fall of his voice. I watch her
gazing out at the sky, at the trees, at me.
She finds my eyes, mouths, I love you,

and I am still
standing outside the glass door, taking all of this in.


Jennifer Freed is staying home with her family in Massachusetts.  Her poetry has appeared/is forthcoming in various journals, including Atlanta Review, Comstock Review, Worcester Review, and Zone 3.

IN MEMORY OF NARROW PLACES

by Sophie Mann

Out of Egypt we came.
Mitzrayim.
Mitzrayim literally means
Narrow place.
We have come from narrow places forever
Jews have.
Minorities have.
We have come from wombs
We have come narrow passages
From doors of no return
From binaries that do not fit us.
Egypt we overcame.
Mitzrayim.
Egypt literally means
Black.
We have come from dark places forever
Jews have
Minorities have.
We have come from wombs
We have come from middle passages
From the depths of the South
From misgendering and murder.
Out of Egypt we came.
And now
It is as if we were sent back.
G-d did not part the seas this time
He did not speak to Moses
We thought we heard Him through Upshot
And Nate Silver
And everyone who consoled their friends
Their loved ones
The Jews
The minorities
That the sea would part, once more.
But it hasn't.
And while the Jews spent over 500 years in bondage
We must endure four more.
We must overcome.
And they marched and said
We will overcome.
We must march and hold each other up
Because some of us have fallen when the weight of it all became too much.
And as I sat bleary-eyed, sleepless, in the warm presence of dejected journalists
I thought to myself
We will overcome.
And when I saw the sunrise on the new world
A world that was full of hope when I entered my safe haven of journalistics and liberals and love
I remembered that
If we came out of Egypt
Mitzrayim
We can do it again
Jews can
Minorities can
Because we have come out of narrow places forever.
Jews have.
Minorities have.
We have come from wombs
We have come narrow passages
From doors of no return
From binaries that do not fit us.
Egypt we overcame.
And Egypt we will overcome.
For it is narrow now
But we will break through the walls
The wombs
The narrow passages
The binaries that don't fit us
Mitzrayim
Arm in arm.
Together.
Because out of Egypt we came
And out of Egypt we will come

Sophie Mann grew up in Palo Alto, California surrounded by love and trees good for climbing. She has a Bachelor’s in English and psychology from Northwestern University and a Master’s in learning sciences from Harvard University. She currently lives by Lake Michigan.

LATE NIGHT IN A SMOKY BAR AN OLD SWASTIKA DRINKS WHISKEY WITH THE GODDESS ISIS

by Kit Loney

You say a terrorist stole your name? I hear you, sister. Back in the day I was easy in my skin, passed among the creatures of the earth like a fine breeze. I was whirling dervish. Pelican diving. Windmill. Showed travelers the way to Buddhist temples. Would appear on kimono sleeves in sky-blue silk brocade to gather good fortune. Faced left in Sanskrit to juggle dots and dance on pointed toes. Man, those were the days. The Navajo would invite me to kneel on woven carpets for sacred healing chants. I was earth, air, fire, and water. north, west, south, and east. Then one day I’m grabbed from behind, knocked out cold. In fog of fever dreams I’m something small and lethal, like a pistol, dread burning up red from the tail of my spine. Wake up decades later. Splitting headache. Hands covered in blood. These days the Japanese kids call me Mangi, some hashtag to hip as if that Hitler nightmare never happened. But sister, I‘m still covered in scars, still shaking. Oh God! What have I done? And this new tide of angry men with their hands clenching my every arm. No ocean on earth is deep enough. Sister, help me, please!

Kit Loney comes to poetry from a career in visual arts. Her poems have appeared in Prime Number Magazine, The Ekphrastic Review, Fall Lines, Emrys Journal, Kakalak, Yemassee, Qarrtsiluni, Waccamaw, One, and Poetry East. In 2012 she received the Carrie McCray Nickens Poetry Fellowship from the SC Academy of Authors.

EGYPT NOW

by David Radavich

Photo copyright by Tom Prokop.
 Used with permission from 123RF.

Is this
a worse desert
than the one
we knew?

Sharp, with no
relief of sun
or sand

and the faces
down like

ghosts

a violence
so pure

even the angels

cry out
in their belfries.


Every body
is ultimate

alone
in its blood

night
crawling

nowhere
safer than a morgue.


The palm trees
don’t know

their own water,

air aches
bent overhead.


Don’t tell time
to return

until

the sand

falls through.

                      
David Radavich’s recent collections include America Bound: An Epic for Our Time (2007), Canonicals: Love’s Hours (2009), and Middle-East Mezze (2011). His plays have been performed across the U.S., including six Off-Off-Broadway, and in Europe . His new collection is The Countries We Live In. 

ANUBIS SPEAKS

by Anne Harding Woodworth




I will embalm the gun,
dip it in antimony salts and mercury
to preserve the image
of a life that is no more.
I will detach the grip and the trigger.
Both have fingerprints,
which cannot be erased
thoroughly, but I will try
before I reattach the parts to the body.
History must be able
to interpret the design
and the intention
centuries from now.
I will hook the bullet, pull it
through the barrel nose,
steep it in formaldehyde
and return it to its chamber.
History must be able
to decipher the bullet’s use
as the empowering heart
of a cherished anatomy.
I will wrap the gun in linen strips,
brush them with sweet resin
to conceal the stench of death.
And I will place tokens
within the wrappings,
a sword, a toy, a raven,
a rose, a razorblade.
This is my duty:
to prepare a thing for the journey
across the river,
where it will be judged
for its deeds on earth.


Anne Harding Woodworth is the author of four books of poetry and two chapbooks. Her work is widely published in literary journals and on line in the U.S. and abroad. She divides her time between the mountains of Western North Carolina and Washington, D.C., where she is a member of the poetry board at the Folger Shakespeare Library.