RE-ACQUITTED

by Imogen Arate

Dying stars burn the brightest

Europe's birth rate is falling

Italian towns offer abandoned 

homes on the cheap

Even in a COVID year

nearly 1-0-0-0 

wo/men and children

died on the Mediterranean

in pursuit of safety

The Sonoran took its biggest gulp

in 10 years

as desiccated remains are picked

from between its gritty teeth

to stage a caravan

One in five American households

speaks a language other than English

but my people can’t get in a

Best-Pic nominee

without the label “foreign”

Be grateful that you are now 

presented with a choice between 

Black and    White

Prostrate melaniferous bodies 

weave into a shroud

covering the distance between 

George Floyd and today

Be grateful for crumbs that drop

from the high table

as we scramble

and gladiate in spectacle

for droppings

Half a million seemed like 

an impossible number

Last year   Valentine’s Day

was still lonely 

but in person

Be grateful

Why aren’t we grateful

Why are we so ungrateful

We are given a choice now

Isn’t it enough

A cloth cover is the real

hindrance to liberty

The 2020 “I voted” sticker

a high-priced memorabilia

for the lives risked

to those other than minorities

forced hyphenation 

worn as a crown

trudge past other saintly feasts

lay bare the sacrifice

Be grateful for the little things

The big ones are for the rarified

the falling birth rate

the fear of extinction

I guess they always knew

Dying stars burn the brightest

Rage

rage against the dying of the light

Imogen Arate is an award-winning Asian-American poet and writer and the Executive Producer and Host of the weekly poetry podcast Poets and Muses. She has written in four languages and published in two. Her work was most recently featured in the Global Poemic, Rigorous and The Hong Kong Review.

17 HEARTS FOR VALENTINE'S DAY

by Tammy Nuzzo-Morgan


Mourners hug during a prayer vigil Thursday for victims of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting at Parkridge Church in Coral Springs, Florida. Rhona Wise / AFP - Getty Images via NBC News.

b                e a           t
            red balloons
        b             e     a            t
            red cards
b    e        a                t
            red roses

           b                         e                 a                 t

17 hearts for Valentine’s day           

red                        red                     red               red

b                e a           t
           red hall floors

        b             e     a            t
            red on walls

b    e        a                t
            red of youthful flesh

           b                         e                 a                 t           

         2/14                    celebration of love                
        
2/14/18    life seeps         a                        way                         
children weep

b                e a           t

        b             e     a            t

b    e        a                t

           b                         e                 a                 t

be                          at                peace

Tammy Nuzzo-Morgan, named 2017 Long Island (NY) Poet of the Year by the Walt Whitman Birthplace, was the 2010-2011 Suffolk County Poet Laureate. She is the Founder/President of The North Sea Poetry Scene, Inc., President of The Poetry Place, and the editor of the poetry anthology series Long Island Sounds. She is the author of five poetry collections including Let Me Tell You Something, For Michael, and Life’s a Beach.