spring 2017
Table of Contents
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Constantly Looking, Admitting Nothing
Paul Douglas McNeill II
Dear Miss Parker
Dear Mama
Chelene Knight
Straight Waiting
Sugar le Fae
from Electric Garden
Amanda Earl
Aztlan Travels Emiliano Sepulveda
box cars paper plates annie ross
from Glossary of Musical Terms rob mclennan
A Coke and a KitKat
Spenser Smith
Singing in Dark Times
Bhaswati Ghosh
Romeo, Romeo, WTF?
P.C. Vandall
Prayer For Our Past Selves
Esther McPhee
First Loves in Brevoort Park
Body Analysis
Erin Hiebert
The Lady or the Tiger? Michelle Brooks
Inside My House
Gleaning Stones
Onjana Yawnghwe
We Could Have Called Him Joe, We Didn't
Juliane Okot Bitek
Red Sarongs
Clementine
Chelsea Comeau
Straight Waiting
All the straight waiters at work
make it a point to touch me
once a shift at least, to treat me
to the same fraternal gestures:
the shoulder-hold, the fist-bump,
one of those inane handshakes
they dole out in high school
I still can’t seem to do.
Robert, the elder waiter, prefers
a gentle backslap. Dominic,
of “pure French Creole” stock,
backhands my bicep all shift,
chirpin’ “Ya heard me?”
Marquis, one of the bussers,
bulldozes my shoulder blades
with his forehead.
When I point out this straight
male propensity for physical
affection to Dinos, he says
“You’re just saying that
cuz you’re gay,” and he’s right;
that doesn’t make me wrong.