spring 2015
Table of Contents
Return to Home PageIntroduction
Hotel Lincoln Blues, Chicago
Thomas Zimmerman
Idling on the North Saskatchewan
In American English
Curtis LeBlanc
Self-Portrait (Hospital Poem I) Chelsea Eckert
Victoria Summons Hall George Elliott Clarke
October Lately
William Vallieres
Normal in Our Normal Suburb Kenneth Pobo
Love and IKEA II
January is terrible so far
Ruth Daniell
Introduction
Before one can understand or articulate its merits or its faults, a poem begins as a kind of unconscious relationship. Like music, it hits the gut, it moves through the nerves. It’s a felt thing. Later, one can say ‘Ah, I like these resonant images, those unexpected enjambments, the honesty in the voice.’ And then feel intelligent for figuring it out. But the gut or heart or unconscious knows it first and, arguably, knows it better.
We are grateful to spend time with so many poems and try to be attentive to the strange music coming up from under the floorboards. Music we can’t quite explain. We feel it’s there in all the work we have chosen for our Spring issue; from a small sweet melody in one poem to a dissonant roar in another. We hope, in reading these poems, you find the particular music that strikes a chord deep within you.
Raoul Fernandes, Mark Hoadley, Ram Randhawa
editors, The Maynard
April 2015