Amy Chatelaine News Today

In his poem “Refrigerator, 1957,” Thomas Lux opens the door to his childhood appliance, where a jar of maraschino cherries speaks volumes.

Rita Wong’s poem “flush” proffers a praise song to water’s expansive and unceasing presence in our lives.

Maria Dahvana Headley’s gutsy, swaggering translation of “Beowulf” brings the Old English epic poem roaring and storming into this century.

In "Our Bird Aegis," poet Ray Young Bear evokes an eagle to show the blend of the visceral, the inherited, and the self-made that's in each of us.

In “ROLL CALL: NEW TAROT NAMES FOR BLACK GIRLS,” Amber McBride playfully and powerfully reclaims the words meant to take people down.

Carl Dennis’s powerful and meditative “Breath” calls on us to take a moment, give our breath our full attention, and celebrate it.

Elisa Gonzalez’s “To My Twenty-Four-Year-Old Self” captures the vast expanse between past and present and between feeling connected and feeling alone.

Ofelia Zepeda’s poem “Deer Dance Exhibition” welcomes us to listen in on an exchange between two people as they watch a ceremonial dance.

In the poem “When in Doubt,” Sandra Cisneros shares some wisdom that she’s gleaned over the years.

To be alive is to be in conversation with the dead. In “Three Mangoes, £1,” Kandace Siobhan Walker describes an encounter with her late grandmother.