Rhubarb

To check on your rhubarb
I tuck my sharp knife
double-wrapped in plastic bags
under the bungee of my paddle board
and head out to your dock.
Summer is soup right now—
hot, viscous. I find the rhubarb—
great stalks as thick as my wrist
long as my thighs. I pull out my knife
to make the clean cuts.
I know why I cannot restrain myself—
I’ve had your rhubarb on my mind
ever since I last summer—
your gift—so large, so plentiful.
Don’t think I’m crazy talking to a dead man.
Don’t think I’m stealing what would go to waste.
I’m hoping I honor your life,
to taste the sour in the pie.

Applesauce

How crisp the apples that resist the knife.
How sweet the pale yellow flesh to bite.
How the apple, smaller than my fist
pretends at symmetry when I slice.
One seed split by my cut peers
out like a new tooth from the core.
I steady the apple half and dice
think of how each piece each wedge
of flesh fits together like a puzzle
and when I pour water in to simmer
sprinkle cinnamon from a jar
without taking time to measure
I think how imprecise this process
is—the making of the sauce—
no matter the number of apples
no matter how much water—
while I wait for the cook down.
For how long? Who cares?
For this moment I cover
then simmer
then mill.

Filmmaker and photographer Carla Schwartz’s poems have been widely published, including in
The Practicing Poet (Diane Lockward, Ed) and in her collections “Signs of Marriage” and
“Intimacy with the Wind.” Her CB99videos youtube channel has 2,400,000+ views. Find her
at carlapoet.com, wakewiththesun.blogspot.com, or on Twitter, or Instagram @cb99videos.
Recent publications appear in The Ear, Channel, The Poet’s Touchstone, Ibbetson Street,
Paterson Literary Review, The MacGuffin, and Leon.

Does everyone fall in love
with their ex–brother-in-law?
I did for a moment.

He came to my house to eat
this man-cook who knows
the fishmonger, the fisherman
(never a woman in his world)

buys the tuna, slaps it on the grill
maybe fires up a few potatoes.
Asparagus or greens and there’s dinner —
the best I ever had.

Oh, what would I make
this tormenting god of the grill?
I opened a cookbook from France
a country he would never see
and followed directions.

Peppers, heaps of bloody red ones,
scorched until their skins popped,
could be peeled off, their painful
tender, raw flesh exposed
silky and tender
wet, vulnerable.
Soft and precious.

Into the processor
steel blades whirled, sliced
spun them with more olive oil
than anyone but the French
would dare use.

Oh, the delight, better than a kiss
on my own raw, red tender lips,
his sigh when he scooped up
the last pool of it.

“My, that’s good.”

I would give anything just to sit down to dinner
at a restaurant tonight
my friend and I are texting each other from our apartments
blocks away
I miss oysters too
glasses of champagne
even a table for one
on a Tuesday night, deviled eggs
each one a gift
passed from dozens of hands to mine
the farmer upstate
who surely misses a bottle of wine
now, sitting down for dinner
and the truck driver dreaming about pulled pork
from a place he knows to stop at
off I-87, south into the city
where a thousand line cooks dream
about after work shift drinks
steady paychecks
the bread they used to make
and the bartender, twirling an empty coup glass
in her kitchen missing that girl
who used to come sit at the bar alone
who ordered anything to drink
but always deviled eggs.

Keri Smith grew up in Florida then saw the world playing in punk bands. She has her MFA in Poetry from the New School, and her first book, Dragging Anchor, was published by Hanging Loose Press in 2018. She works as a bartender in Brooklyn and can often be found at Rockaway Beach with her chihuahua. 

For far too long I’ve listened in silence
to those espousing Kalamata supremacy,
(which, admittedly, I wholeheartedly concede),
or to others vaunting the virtues of Castelvetrano,
(God help those misguided dupes); I’ve patiently endured
insufferable disquisitions on the buttery flavor
of Cerignola, the tartness of Picholine,
the meaty richness of Gordal, most beloved
as a tapa beside slivered jamon and a glass of sherry.
With unbridled lust have I gazed at jet-black Nyon,
plump and wrinkly, dry-cured then aged in brine,
and I hereby confess that where my eye wandered,
alas, my faithless fingers soon followed.
Granted, I’ve nibbled my share of Nicoise tapenade
and reveled with abandon in its herbal fragrance graced
with faint notes of licorice; its petite counterpart
across the Alps, the Liguria, cannot withstand
comparison (very sorry, but my decision is final).
My palate has also thrilled at the tart, citrussy taste
of Gaeta, whose tender flesh enlivens the tongue;
I’ve swooned whilst savoring the sour bittterness
of Alfonso, supple after maceration in red wine.
Naturally, I’ve had my way with many a Manzanilla,
almondy ovals pitted then stuffed with pimiento
or else cracked and dressed with fresh garlic.
Full disclosure: I whored through handfuls of the rare
Beldi, sumptuous as a tagine garnish, and like a glutton
gorged myself on more Amfissa samples from the hills
by Delphi than the local oracles surely ever did.
And yet, for all my shameless promiscuity, I refuse
to avert my view from the grassy Mission variety,
oft overlooked and neglected by lesser connoisseurs,
but not by me, not this time, so once and for all let me
set the record straight, for in truth, I must insist,
black olives matter.

Brandon Marlon is a writer from Ottawa, Canada. He received his B.A. in Drama & English from the University of Toronto and his M.A. in English from the University of Victoria. His poetry was awarded the Harry Hoyt Lacey Prize in Poetry (Fall 2015), and his writing has been published in 300+ publications in 32 countries. www.brandonmarlon.com

A memory: my father
angry in Disney World,
his hand cold & damp
around mine as I fly
behind him like a severed rope
through a sea of costumed
families, in a frantic search
for a kiosk, a Coke, anything
to feed his blood. Finally
we find chocolate
which he swallows
without joy,

closes his eyes

and breathes,
presses both hands
on the yellow
counter & hangs
his head & sweats
& breathes
until his hands are dry
and he’s saying sorry
I’m sorry

As my vision wobbled
& bubbled into blackness
I became abstractly aware
of the teeth in my mouth
& even though this is not
what you’re supposed to do
when fainting, I gripped
the counter, desperately
searching for a door back
to my feet. Fireworks
crackled, still
& vibrant, staring
back

Emily Zogbi is a writer from Long Island who earned her MFA in poetry from The New School. Her work has been published in Chronogram, Tinderbox Poetry Journal, RHINO Poetry, Half Mystic, and Ocean State Review, among others. Emily was the recipient of the 2021 Sappho Poetry Prize from Palette Poetry and is a poetry reader for The Adroit Journal. Her debut book of poems, “all the time more than anything,” is forthcoming from Finishing Line Press. She wishes she had been a dancer.

When mango mania strikes, I ditch my apple pie
and neglect my wife and my children.
The history of Lexington dims
and the street I live on,
where Paul Revere once galloped on his horse,
no longer ties me to this town.
India reigns in my mind –
the accordion pleats of a sari, orange jasmine blossoms against ebony hair,
the red sindoor on foreheads, the competitive cry of vendors,
the clanging of temple bells summoning late-comers, 
the devout singers with their seductive, spiraling notes,
the dancer’s jangling anklets reaching a crescendo 
as she hurtles forward on a brass plate,
the monsoon rain urgently pounding on rooftops,
the wafting scent of biryani that refuses to be banished from minds, 
the calming fragrance of sandalwood in handicraft stores,
and the once elegant ancestral house, 
decaying in the midst
of the scaffolding of residential buildings
rising around it like futuristic towers of doom.


As the craving becomes an obsession, 
I know I must head 
to the place where the ovoid fruit thrives
and is artfully reproduced on brocaded saris
that brides wear on their wedding day
and where the auspicious leaves of the mango tree
are strung along the entrance of homes on special occasions.
All one needs in life is a mango, smooth or pitted,
small or large, to be eaten or pureed into dessert.


At my uncle’s dining table, I watch my reflection 
greedily devour Alphonso mangos.
I wipe the mango juice that dripples down my chin 
with my hand and then I suck my fingertips.
My aunt remarks that I haven’t changed
nor have I forgotten my mother tongue.
You’re not stuck-up either, she says, watching
me wipe my chin with the heel of my hand this time.
The fruits taste like the ones I used to pluck from my mother’s garden
when, as a child, I’d ensconce myself on a lower branch 
and balance a stainless steel container 
dotted with chili powder and salt.
In my absence, the urchins would aim their slingshots
at our fruit and wander off with their spoils.
A week later, satiated with my uncle’s mangos, 
tired of the ceaseless hammering of laborers,
the nocturnal braying of dogs auguring death,
the relentless sun creating beads of sweat, 
the never-ending stream of visitors coming to see me,
and the stench of overflowing garbage on the streets, 
my thoughts flit across an ocean to America.
I miss my adopted town,
where sounds, sights, and scents are more subtle
and where mangos can be bought or gifted,
but none are as flavorful 
as those plucked in my ancestral home.
In my mind I’m already in Lexington,
where the Chinese, Brazilians, Pakistanis, Armenians
and others have also made themselves at home
and where we indulge in the American passion
for frozen yogurt even in chilly temperatures,
our portions widening with the years 
until we feel the need to practice austerity.
On my last evening, my uncle chuckles,
drums his fingers on the table, and says he won’t see me 
until mango mania strikes me again.
Then he winks, knowing he can depend 
on my cravings to guide me back to his table.

Tara Menon is a freelance writer based in Lexington, Massachusetts.  Her poetry is forthcoming in “Tiger Moth Review.”  The following journals and anthologies have published her poetry: “Yearning to Breathe Free,” “Blue Minaret,” “The Bangalore Review,” “voices ofeve,” “Calliope,” “Lalitamba,” “AzizahMagazine,” “Aaduna,” “Yellow as Turmeric, Fragrant as Cloves,” “the view from here,” and “10×3 plus poetry.”  Her nonfiction has appeared in “TheCourtship of Winds,” “The Boston Globe,” “The Kenyon Review,” “Green Mountains Review,” “Fjords Review,” “Na’amat Woman,” “Calyx,” “India Currents,” “Parabola,” “India NewEngland,” “Lokvani,” and “Hinduism Today.”  Her fiction has appeared in several journals and anthologies.

Full of green
Spicy bite 
Heart’s zing 
Rich appetite 


Brittle dust
Green smear 
Lying in sun 
Maple tear 


Missing leg 
Mean and sweet 
Dipped head 
Saturated treat 


Breaking limbs
One by one 
Sweet and mean 
Isn’t it fun 

Hannah Updegraff is a wellness blogger, vinyasa yoga teacher, and a Food Studies student at The New School. Find her on social media: @theheartbeet.co and @hannahkupdegraff

Photo by Hannah Updegraff

Satiating tears
The only ones
Delicate petals pressed
Steeped invisible fun

A drink that hugs you
A soothing twist
Magic potion pour
Hydrated eyelids

In your body
And on your skin
A liquid bouquet
A floral swim

Shrinking almonds
Maple saltwater
Blending a dash
Dissipating dropper

Sweet petal cream
A healing skim
Squeezed fluff
Beige bubbles the brim

Hannah Updegraff is a wellness blogger, vinyasa yoga teacher, and a Food Studies student at The New School. Find her on social media: @theheartbeet.co and @hannahkupdegraff