I tell my new baby to watch their flutter. I list all the things I know that flap—mostly in flight. We can’t feel the breeze from the porch. Her neck is sour. Her nails sharp. As it should be. I’d like to tell you the moment ends, nothing painful waits beneath the skin. I’d like to be someone who sees mostly joy—some are. Even the wasp and paralyzed hopper belong—watch yourself, not everything an omen, but here you’re right—even in the morning, even on the silent wind, heavy with honeysuckle, refracting sweetness off every pore on our bodies: If I leave in the night, what will she remember of my mouth and hands? What of my body or blood lingers inside hers?
Allison Blevins is the author of the chapbooks Susurration (Blue Lyra Press, 2019), Letters to Joan (Lithic Press, 2019), and A Season for Speaking (Seven Kitchens Press, 2019). Her books Slowly/Suddenly (Vegetarian Alcoholic Press, 2021) and Cataloging Pain (YesYes Books, 2023) are forthcoming. Chorus for the Kill (Seven Kitchens Press 2021), her collaborative chapbook, is forthcoming. She is the Director of Small Harbor Publishing and a Poetry Editor at Literary Mama. She lives in Missouri with her spouse and three children where she co-organizes the Downtown Poetry reading series. For more information visit http://www.allisonblevins.com
Guest editor, Morgan O.H. McCune, currently works at Pittsburg State University in southeast Kansas. She is a native Kansan, and holds an M.F.A. in Poetry from Washington University in St. Louis (1991) and an M.L.S. from Emporia State University (2002). Her poems have been published previously in River Styx and Flint Hills Review.
The Coop: A Poetry Cooperative 