free your heart

Oil on canvas.

— James Baldwin from Giovanni’s Room (1956)

Superbly Situated by Robert Hershon

Louise Bourgeois

Allen Bratton, Henry Henry

Come. And Be My Baby, Maya Angelou

Postscript by Marie Howe

Hanif Abdurraqib, from A Fortune for Your Disaster: Poems; “The Prestige”

Hanif Abdurraqib, from "Ok I'm Finally Ready to Say I'm Sorry For That One Summer", The Crown Ain't Worth Much

Hope. 10% to make the tragic concept more endurable.

“I do kind gestures. Remove my appendix.  I put my ear to a flat shell and—nothing. I play the lottery ironically. Get married. Have a smear test. I put my ear to the beak of a dead bird—nothing. I grow wisdom teeth. Jog. I pick up a toddler’s telephone, Hello?—No answer. I change a light bulb on my own. Organize a large party. Hire a clown. Attend a four-day stonewalling  course. Have a baby. Stop eating Coco Pops. I put my ear right up to the slack and gaping bonnet of a daffodil—. Get divorced. Floss. Describe a younger person’s music taste as “just noise.” Enjoy perusing a garden center. Sit in a pub without drinking. I stand at the lip of a pouting valley—sᴘᴇᴀᴋ ᴛᴏ ᴍᴇ! My echo plagiarizes. I land a real love plus two real cats. I never meet the talking bird again. Or the yawning hole. The panther of purple wisps who prowls inside the air. I change nappies. Donate my eggs. Learn a profound lesson about sacrifice. Brunch. No singing floorboards. No vents leaking scentless instructions. My mission is over. The world has zipped up her second mouth.” End ID] 

Opeyemi Olukotun.

Wildness Before Something Sublime Leila Chatti