"Satellite Seasons" by Nam Das
Fathom by Maria McLeod
when finally we went lip to lip our hips
hinged our knees knocked our hairs
singed to salt blown into the face
of the sun as it spun out of the sky
doors sealed shut and shutters
slapped together like mad wives
and curtains swished closed as coats
midwinter under snow and stars
blinking out as we buried our former loves
a fathom beneath the muck
we became what the earth coughed up
we were dirt we were ash we were children
raised by wolves we were filth
we were chewed off at the ankles the wrists
we were out of the trap we were so alive
we were the blood of birth we were bone
marrying bone we were without ceremony
or ceiling or floor or clock we
were spit starved broken divinely
open we dined on each other
we were so ripe we went rotten
hinged our knees knocked our hairs
singed to salt blown into the face
of the sun as it spun out of the sky
doors sealed shut and shutters
slapped together like mad wives
and curtains swished closed as coats
midwinter under snow and stars
blinking out as we buried our former loves
a fathom beneath the muck
we became what the earth coughed up
we were dirt we were ash we were children
raised by wolves we were filth
we were chewed off at the ankles the wrists
we were out of the trap we were so alive
we were the blood of birth we were bone
marrying bone we were without ceremony
or ceiling or floor or clock we
were spit starved broken divinely
open we dined on each other
we were so ripe we went rotten
Maria McLeod writes poetry, fiction, monologues and plays. Honors include three Pushcart Prize nominations and the Indiana Review Poetry Prize. She’s been published nationally and internationally in literary journals such as The Interpreter’s House, Puerto Del Sol, Painted Bride Quarterly, Pearl, Crab Orchard Review, The Brooklyn Rail, and Critical Quarterly.
Nam Das (Filipino, b. 1989) creates open-ended visual stories by arranging figurative elements into an assemblage forming a central idea, an idea that plays around Jungian archetypes of the collective unconscious or mythologems observed throughout history. He uses a limited palette of four colors in his oil paintings. Also called the Zorn palette, it's composed of: Titanium White, Cadmium Red, Yellow Ochre and Ivory Black. Nam began working as a full-time painter in 2019.
