“When he handed them over, earrings dripping with teeth—the heavens / howled in protest & the silver tigers cried out.” Arya Vishin tactfully uses imagery inspired by the epic story, Mahabharat, to delve into the nuances of devotion. In the…
“Some day, I realize, underwater archaeologists / will find, upon necropsy, the artifacts of my brief presence / in the stomach of the last Great White that entered the lagoon” Take a deep dive into the crystalline imagery of “Some…
“I said flesh / was a soft patch of wheat, a half-knotted rope. I said / rain was the unnamed radar sound in a dinosaur rib.” Shiyang Su zooms into a singular moment between the speaker and their father that…
“When it rains, the water flows off the dead dirt / like the words of her father roll off her mother’s back.” Let’s celebrate our 2023 Roots & Roads 3rd Place Winner, Motherland by Edgar Morales! We are so excited…
There is an earnestness to the inward reflection that comes from the boy in this poem, who is moved by a whale. He slowly uncovers the hatred of men, the fear of what one might become, and the urge to…
“Seasons leave their marks: Leaves turn red, / figs stain the sidewalk, there are irises // or not, sour grass or not, but nothing is ever / not changing, not renewing.” Give it up for the 2023 Roots & Roads…
There is beauty in release. A freedom in succumbing to the water that envelopes us. Louise Kim shows us, with rich texture and calming imagery, that there is a lushness in letting go. Looking up and glimpsing the light can…
“Daughter after daughter was / offered for the harvest.” We’re thrilled to celebrate Meriem Evangeline, our 2023 Roots & Roads winner! Her poem, “ANCESTRY TOLD THROUGH PROPHECY,” has been awarded the first place prize of $3,000. Stay tuned as we…
The implied sterility of a hospital bed; communication through a tablet; processing death in a sterile environment. These experiences during hospice care are contrasted beautifully with changing seasons in Leland Seese’s poem. The silence of the words a fatherly specter…
In Ashleigh Xindan Kennedy’s poem, the reader is trapped between past and present, longing and loss, put into the perspective of both Icarus and the Minotaur. The narrator explores what it is to be human or maybe not human at…
