Entering the Open
He didn’t see it coming,
this arrival, this unboundedness—
we can be here for years and when we finally
depart it is all one: love, loss, rain,
trembling, the pigeon walking iridescent
in the intersection.
His cheek, cool on asphalt, shining before he closed
his eyes: the pigeon’s neck, shimmering
like morning, and before taking his children to school,
before he straddled his bike,
before the rain, his lover gazed at him
Delicate sky
Behind
Delicate tongue.
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Lindsay Remee Ahl’s poetry collection, If a Dolphin, won the 2025 Washington Prize for poetry. Her novel, Desire, published by Coffee House Press, was nominated for a Discover Great New Writers Award and a Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers’ Award. Her work has appeared in The New England Review, The Massachusetts Review, The Georgia Review, BOMB Magazine, Hotel Amerika, and many others.
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Kelsey Nichols is a freelance Artist/designer living in a small suburb outside Chicago. She earned her diploma in Interior Design in 2019. She’s been working in digital and print mediums for over two years. She blends impressionist sensibilities using digital oil painting techniques to create pieces inspired by nature, life, and a variety of botanicals.
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