THE SCRUBLAND

by Sezin Devi Koehler

for Rob Reiner

the humid air streams off the slash pine barks

     the breath of a ghost lover against my neck

the tinnitus buzzing of insects, some vampires some not

     the goth butterfly that lands on my sweaty shoulder

     for a drink—I become nectar

gopher turtles scurry into their burrows at my footsteps

     grumpy Harry before Sally

sugar sand yields under my pink sandals

     when it rains, hungry quicksand 

     isn’t just a threat to Westley and Princess Buttercup

this oak tree is 265 years old, the banyan dripping limbs at least 300

these willows extend a fairy circle in the air

rodents of usual size rut below sawgrass thrones

the path into the forest has been worn by hundreds of feet

the train runs parallel, its mournsome whalesong

     I’m the fifth friend in Stand By Me

     looking for my own dead body in the moist brush

     a phoenix in progress

I didn’t forget my comb here by the tracks

     but I did forget myself in the junkyard of a marriage

     that did not bring us together today

I walk through the woods of your memory

as I wish

     come back to us soon

     come back soon

     come back

Sezin Devi Koehler is a multiracial Sri Lankan/Lithuanian American and author of Much Ado About Keanu: A Critical Reeves Theory (April 2025, Chicago Review Press), a sociocultural deep dive into what makes Keanu Reeves so extraordinary as a performer and artist. Pop-culture writer, entertainment journalist, and Rotten Tomatoes-certified film and TV critic for Black Girl Nerds, Sezin's bylines also include Entertainment Weekly, The Daily Beast, Scalawag Magazine, Tasteful Rude, Teen Vogue, and many more. Her poetry has appeared in Tension Literary. Sezin is a board member of the San Francisco Writers Grotto and wordsmiths from an East Oakland historic landmark that looks uncannily like the house from Practical Magic, where she can see the San Francisco Bay from her own window.  

BIRNAM WOULD

by Adele Evershed

There was anger and sadness among people who turned out over the Easter Bank Holiday weekend to protest at the destruction of a tree in Enfield thought to be up to 500 years old… The pedunculate oak, which was cut down on 3 April, was located on the edge of an Enfield council-owned park in north London and overlooked the Toby Carvery pub... Mitchells & Butlers, the owners of the Toby Carvery pub chain, said they cut down the tree after being told it was dead. —BBC, April 21, 2025

I was born in a time of unrest,
where tongues swelled against
religion and unfaithful wives,
riots in the street,
and resentments as large as cats
festering in unemptied bins.

I grew through it all—
pandemics and plagues,
great fires and floods,
watching people work themselves to death,
to be replaced as easily as spokes on a wheel,
bent on moving the carts forward,
but I was in no hurry,
so I was left alone.

The Thames iced over
while frost fairs and firing squads
amused the people,
and all the artists with numb fingers
captured the scenes—
though sometimes they painted over
dead children in the snow.
I never forgot they were there.

The wind moved through me,
leaving a coating of urban sprawl,
and I was the one left
bearing witness to
bombs, broken nights, boozy slashes
oozing rivers of blood,
the good and the very, very bad—
I survived it all,
until a man from a toby-jug pub,
came with a weapon of mass destruction
and cut me down.

Soon there will be no thing left
to tell the old stories,
and how will you know yourselves then?

Adele Evershed is a Welsh writer who swapped the valleys for the American East Coast. You can find some of her writing in Gyroscope, Free Flash Fiction, Trash Cat Lit, Janus Lit, and Poetry Wales. Adele has two poetry collections, Turbulence in Small Spaces (Finishing Line Press) and The Brink of Silence (Bottlecap Press). Her third collection In the Belly of the Wail is upcoming with Querencia Press. She has published two novellas in flash, Wannabe and Schooled (Alien Buddha Press), and has a forthcoming novella, A History of Hand Thrown Walls, with Unsolicited Press.

PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE

by Juditha Dowd

Moon Behind the Oak, a photograph by Alinore Rose

Instead I watched the moon. I watched the moon climb up

the branches of the Rosenbauers’ oak and lift off into open sky.

By then a few stars and planets had pierced the urban night,

their sparkle suggesting forward movement as I viewed them

alone from our porch—it seemed they were headed somewhere.

Soon I was so caught up in thinking about their voyage

I forgot about the frost and the ruined tomatoes and the ruin

of where we’re headed here on earth, driven by barking dogs.

Is it better now that we understand the stars? Was it easier to believe

that all is preordained and all we need to do is bow our heads

and go along? I watched the moon find the windows of every house

on our block. Same moon, same light. I watched until it crested

and fell down our hill toward the college. Then there was nothing

to do but go back in.

 

Juditha Dowd’s latest book is Audubon’s Sparrow (Rose Metal Press, 2020).

THE OAK AND THE REED

 by Judith Terzi

1906 illustration by Benjamin Rabier for “Le Chêne et le Roseau”

a very, very loose translation of "Le Chêne et le Roseau" by Jean de la Fontaine (1621-1695)

So an oak says to a reed, "No wonder 

you hate Mother Nature. A tiny bird's 

a tremendous weight for you. Tremendous

weight. If a little breeze ripples a pool,

you have to bow your head. Me, I can 

almost touch Mount Everest. Amazing. 

Not only can I block the sun's rays, I can 

make it through the worst hurricane. Really, 

really amazing. For me, that north wind's 

just a tiny breeze. People say it's a zephyr. 

People say. I think they call it a zephyr. 

Terrific wind. Look, if your people would 

have been born in my neck of the woods, 

you wouldn't suffer so much. Believe me, 

my spread could defend you, but your 

kind comes from the wet, lowly other side 

of the wind's tracks. Nature's unjust

toward you and yours. Very, very unjust."

"Hey, I get where you're coming from," says 

the reed. "But get over it. I deal with wind 

much easier than you. I bend, I never ever 

break. Up until now, you've done ok––gotten by 

without breaking your back. But hang on!" 

Just then, a fury of a north wind was whipping up 

its breath. The oak holds tight. The reed bends. 

Le roseau plie. The wind doubles down. So bad 

that the oak is uprooted. Oak––with its head nearly 

touching the sky, feet digging into the dead.

Author of Museum of Rearranged Objects (Kelsay), as well as of five chapbooks, including Casbah and If You Spot Your Brother Floating By (Kattywompus), Judith Terzi's poems have received Pushcart and Best of the Web and Net nominations and have been read on Radio 3 of the BBC. She holds an M.A. in French Literature and taught high school French for many years as well as English and French at California State University, Los Angeles, and in Algiers, Algeria.

FOR YOUR INFORMATION

by Katherine Smith

Artist: Steve Brodner via Pinterest

On the Senate Majority Leader

The oaks do not aspire
to spirit or imagination,
but grow straight up.
Indifferently

casting their shadows
over the saplings,
they search
for unopposed light
 
to fall from their canopy                       
into the shadowy ridged bark
of withered trees.
So too

there are human beings—
you know their names—
whose principles are limited
to domination and money.

They are called champions,
these proud lucky ones
that kill everything
that lives

beneath them.


Katherine Smith’s publications include appearances in Poetry, Cincinnati Review, Missouri Review, Ploughshares, Southern Review, and many other journals.  Her short fiction has appeared in Fiction International and Gargoyle. Her first book Argument by Design (Washington Writers’ Publishing House) appeared in 2003. Her second book of poems Woman Alone on the Mountain (Iris Press), appeared in 2014. She teaches at Montgomery College in Maryland.