by McKenzie | Aug 21, 2014 | Blog, My Poems
Crab is such an ugly word—the hard k, its suddenness. I’m steeped in these small pools, or perched on the surrounding rocks and sand, one hole after the next, searching for shore crabs, carcinus maenas. I find their gray and tan bodies, slick with the...
by McKenzie | Aug 17, 2014 | Blog, My Poems
I go out into the world, looking for strawberries like the ones from my mother’s garden. They were small and firm, sweet but bitter, dirt caught in the leaves and deeper pits. We plucked them fresh from their stems and ate them before cleaning them, the dirt...
by McKenzie | Aug 17, 2014 | Poetry Collections, Reviews
No matter how long I’ve been reading and writing professionally, it still amazes me how much a little time away can contribute to my appreciation of a larger work. During my first year as the Layout and Design Editor at New Issues Poetry and Prose, I had the...
by McKenzie | Aug 16, 2014 | Blog, My Poems
Yesterday, I spent the day sleeping away my life. It was peaceful, the blankets all clustered near the back porch door, and all the doors and windows on the first floor were left wide open. The sounds of wind and wind chimes, birds calling, the scent of trees,...
by McKenzie | Aug 16, 2014 | Blog, My Poems
I want to get back into drawing, the pencil in my hand, the thick charcoal under my nails. I keep collecting spare pieces of paper, of cardboard, in the hope that something might happen. A horse, gray and white shadows, it appears—the long mane draped...
