Jet Fuel Review
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  • Issue 22 Fall 2021
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  • Issue 23 Spring 2022
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      • Jeannine Hall Gailey Spring 2022
      • Phil Goldstein Spring 2022
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      • Angie Macri Spring 2022
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      • Vismai Rao Spring 2022
      • Anna Laura Reeve Spring 2022
      • Jenny Irish Spring 2022
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      • 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
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    • Issue #23 Fiction Spring 2022 >
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      • Srinaath Perangur Spring 2022
      • Audrey T. Carroll Spring 2022

Gary McDowell

Tell Me Again About The Last Time You Saw Her


The telephone on the moon has been ringing
continuously

since 1969          The footprints
ache to answer it
See red Mars
rise

Driving becomes difficult with only the road
in your way          What shatters
on it but light, two moons claiming the other false
The best kind of torture
The voluntary kind
Ghosts revered for their sense of smell:
fingerling potatoes roasted in olive oil
and sea salt

And on the couch          Paranoia
curled-up in the shape
of a child’s skeleton
​

I’ve Lost a Considerable Amount of Weight


I want women without a God

If you’ve suffered death, heart attack, or stroke,
call now

God damn it, it’s cold, says Chicago,
which is an almost better place for warmth to be
Somewhere in Somewhere, TX
an armadillo crosses the road
and three goldfish share a ten-gallon hat

Would a bulimic fatalist
trust fate

Would a diabetic baseball purist ever suicide
squeeze the clean-up hitter
Show me yours, and I’ll show you mind
I’m everything you meant to say and didn’t
Tell me how
​

More and More Like the Wife


We hope the possession never ends:
the molecular eye, the ocean’s narration,

things I cannot see to see

Child,
there is no easy way to drown
I once ran a marathon barefoot,
and the door to the desert locks
behind you when you go
So go
Legendary jazz: chaos in a cracked
coffee cup          The horizon

dips to the lips of a giant fish,
a catfish so large
Even fate gets hammered
hard by the hard rain  


 


--
Gary McDowell’s first collection of poems, American Amen (Dream Horse Press, 2010), won the 2009 Orphic Prize for Poetry. He’s also the author of two chapbooks, They Speak of Fruit (Cooper Dillon, 2009) and The Blueprint (Pudding House, 2005), and he’s the co-editor of The Rose Metal Press Field Guide to Prose Poetry: Contemporary Poets in Discussion and Practice (Rose Metal Press, 2010). His poems have appeared in various literary journals, including The Bellingham Review, Colorado Review, The Indiana Review, The Laurel Review, New England Review, Ninth Letter, and Quarterly West. He lives in Nashville, TN with his wife and two kids where he is an Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at Belmont University.

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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