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  • Issue 22 Fall 2021
    • Issue #22 Art Fall 2021 >
      • Bonnie Severien Fall 2021
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    • Issue #22 Poetry Fall 2021 >
      • Maureen Alsop Fall 2021
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      • Sherine Gilmour Fall 2021
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      • Sara Moore Fall 2021
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      • Haley Wooning Fall 2021
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      • Evy Shen Fall 2021
      • Suzanne Frischkorn Fall 2021
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    • Issue #22 Nonfiction Fall 2021 >
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    • Issue #22 Fiction Fall 2021 >
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      • Jenny Magnus Fall 2021
  • Issue 23 Spring 2022
    • Issue #23 Art Spring 2022 >
      • Jonathan Kvassay Spring 2022
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    • Issue #23 Poetry Spring 2022 >
      • Robin Gow Spring 2022
      • T.D. Walker Spring 2022
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      • Carrie McGath Spring 2022
      • Lupita Eyde-Tucker Spring 2022
      • Susan L. Leary Spring 2022
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      • Rita Mookerjee Spring 2022
      • Erin Carlyle Spring 2022
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      • Jen Karetnick Spring 2022
      • Meghan Sterling Spring 2022
      • Lorelei Bacht Spring 2022
      • Michael Passafiume Spring 2022
      • Jeannine Hall Gailey Spring 2022
      • Phil Goldstein Spring 2022
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      • Martha Silano Spring 2022
      • Vismai Rao Spring 2022
      • Anna Laura Reeve Spring 2022
      • Jenny Irish Spring 2022
      • Marek Kulig Spring 2022
      • Jami Macarty Spring 2022
      • Sarah A. Rae Spring 2022
      • Brittney Corrigan Spring 2022
      • Callista Buchen Spring 2022
      • Issam Zineh Spring 2022
      • MICHAEL CHANG Spring 2022
      • henry 7. reneau, jr. Spring 2022
      • Leah Umansky Spring 2022
      • Cody Beck Spring 2022
      • Danyal Kim Spring 2022
      • Rachel DeWoskin Spring 2022
    • Issue #23 Fiction Spring 2022 >
      • Melissa Boberg Spring 2022
    • Issue #23 Nonfiction Spring 2022 >
      • Srinaath Perangur Spring 2022
      • Audrey T. Carroll Spring 2022

Aaron DeLee 

Latin Elegy


To wrap my mouth around yours and tongue
          your tongue, that’s what I’m after.
Slip your syllables around like Aeon
          Flux would, inserting encrypted scrolls
into moveable teeth, pockets where roots
          write themselves. I’ll ignore your chipped
molars and canker sores, for I adore the taste
          offered by antiquated acquaintances, the aroma
of primitive odors, of all that’s Indo--
          it’s romantic, really, such touch and go,
this dance between stretched flesh
          that snails weave when out of their shells,
entwined. Suffice your suffix with its
          -mus ending because it ends with us,
because it means ‘we’, because it
          drips with how we used to be
​

An Elegy for Mojave


​Now, all that water the Colorado gushes
no longer blushes with sediment,
due to the dam.

​What is the word for green?
Not envy, not for those living
along the serpentine bank.

Elderly men mumble as motor boats
traverse the current;
untaught to not talk in mothertongue.

Meandering here, as a rattle snake
banters about when you get near,
then all of a sudden, quiet—

I see how deep this vein of river’s
been cut. I’ve had so many dreams
snapped up. Remember? Hardly, fossils

fail feathers and scales;
their colors once vibrant and separate
now all run ruddy.


Dear Q


Your days there are fewer
than the notches used in
your father’s belt; that lean
leather strip pulled out
to clap against your backside
and knock out the fairy
dust, the horseplay, ballet
twirls you must make
because westerly winds so
move you; he plays doctor,
performing the Heimlich
maneuver which stings
your throat with cries
and cough-ups of never
again
touching your sister’s
My Little Ponies, the lies,
because you did and he
wrings you like those white
knuckles of his around
his buckle. And that snap
of his snapping catches you
by surprise every time.
You know why rabbits run
and hide when the dog’s
let loose outside. You
wish upon the nebulae
of bruises left behind
that you would disappear
or die, unaware that your
years are dissolving
rapidly around you like
the bubbles bursting open
from a rabid dog’s face;
his fate is written in foam.
Before you know it, you’ll
be bidding him goodbye .




​​
--
Aaron DeLee’s previous work has appeared in Interrobang, Found Poetry Review, OVS Magazine, and various other journals. His work has also been commissioned, set to music and performed by a Chicago opera troupe, VOX3.

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  • Home
  • About
    • Our Story
    • Masthead
  • Submit
    • Submission Guidelines
    • Submit Here
  • Features
  • Interviews
  • Book Reviews
  • Previous Issues
  • Blog
  • Contact
  • Issue 22 Fall 2021
    • Issue #22 Art Fall 2021 >
      • Bonnie Severien Fall 2021
      • Camilla Taylor Fall 2021
      • Guilherme Bergamini Fall 2021
      • Emanuela Iorga Fall 2021
    • Issue #22 Poetry Fall 2021 >
      • Maureen Alsop Fall 2021
      • Annah Browning Fall 2021
      • Romana Iorga Fall 2021
      • Natalie Hampton Fall 2021
      • Sherine Gilmour Fall 2021
      • Adam Day Fall 2021
      • Amanda Auchter Fall 2021
      • Adam Tavel Fall 2021
      • Sara Moore Fall 2021
      • Karen Rigby Fall 2021
      • Daniel Zhang Fall 2021
      • Erika Lutzner Fall 2021
      • Kindall Fredricks Fall 2021
      • Cin Salach Fall 2021
      • Andrew Zawacki Fall 2021
      • Micah Ruelle Fall 2021
      • Rachel Stempel Fall 2021
      • Haley Wooning Fall 2021
      • Rikki Santer Fall 2021
      • Evy Shen Fall 2021
      • Suzanne Frischkorn Fall 2021
      • Danielle Rose Fall 2021
      • Eric Burgoyne Fall 2021
      • John Cullen Fall 2021
      • Maureen Seaton Fall 2021
      • Hannah Stephens Fall 2021
    • Issue #22 Nonfiction Fall 2021 >
      • Kevin Grauke Fall 2021
      • Courtney Justus Fall 2021
      • Amy Nicholson Fall 2021
    • Issue #22 Fiction Fall 2021 >
      • Tina Jenkins Bell Fall 2021
      • David Obuchowski Fall 2021
      • Thomas Misuraca Fall 2021
      • Aiden Baker Fall 2021
      • Jenny Magnus Fall 2021
  • Issue 23 Spring 2022
    • Issue #23 Art Spring 2022 >
      • Jonathan Kvassay Spring 2022
      • Karyna McGlynn Spring 2022
      • Andrea Kowch Spring 2022
      • Layla Garcia-Torres Spring 2022
    • Issue #23 Poetry Spring 2022 >
      • Robin Gow Spring 2022
      • T.D. Walker Spring 2022
      • Jen Schalliol Huang Spring 2022
      • Yvonne Zipter Spring 2022
      • Carrie McGath Spring 2022
      • Lupita Eyde-Tucker Spring 2022
      • Susan L. Leary Spring 2022
      • Kate Sweeney Spring 2022
      • Rita Mookerjee Spring 2022
      • Erin Carlyle Spring 2022
      • Cori Bratty-Rudd Spring 2022
      • Jen Karetnick Spring 2022
      • Meghan Sterling Spring 2022
      • Lorelei Bacht Spring 2022
      • Michael Passafiume Spring 2022
      • Jeannine Hall Gailey Spring 2022
      • Phil Goldstein Spring 2022
      • Michael Mingo Spring 2022
      • Angie Macri Spring 2022
      • Martha Silano Spring 2022
      • Vismai Rao Spring 2022
      • Anna Laura Reeve Spring 2022
      • Jenny Irish Spring 2022
      • Marek Kulig Spring 2022
      • Jami Macarty Spring 2022
      • Sarah A. Rae Spring 2022
      • Brittney Corrigan Spring 2022
      • Callista Buchen Spring 2022
      • Issam Zineh Spring 2022
      • MICHAEL CHANG Spring 2022
      • henry 7. reneau, jr. Spring 2022
      • Leah Umansky Spring 2022
      • Cody Beck Spring 2022
      • Danyal Kim Spring 2022
      • Rachel DeWoskin Spring 2022
    • Issue #23 Fiction Spring 2022 >
      • Melissa Boberg Spring 2022
    • Issue #23 Nonfiction Spring 2022 >
      • Srinaath Perangur Spring 2022
      • Audrey T. Carroll Spring 2022