Walker mingles washes of watercolor, gouache, ink, and graphite to create a series that calls forth a past at once mythological and real, ancient and contemporary.

—Curator Katie Geha on the Kara Walker folio in the April issue of POETRY.
bit.ly/4cI6f51

fortschrittsschlacke. eine parallel-

welt, die dich machtvoll anzieht, in beschlag nimmt,

the ash of progress, some proxy

world that forcefully attracts you, holds you,

——Jan Wagner (trans. by David Keplinger) in the April issue of POETRY.
bit.ly/3PIEXSl

This woman is no different. Look:
her gaze plunged into echo, mid-
night specter looking back, black.

—Krista Franklin Krista Franklin in the April issue of POETRY, after Kara Walker’s “Blue,” 2020.
bit.ly/3VEbRY0

Poetry Month isn't over yet! 💐
Have you downloaded your FREE April 2024 issue of @PoetryMagazine?

Learn how and explore the special events and offers we have going on through the rest of April. bit.ly/3VKKDix

Do the dead see everything?
What is the suffering to joy index?
Today the land you were forced from is famous
for ice cream.

—Melanie Tafejian in the April issue of POETRY.
bit.ly/3vCp9JX

A resolve to broaden the category of “us,” to expand in ever-inclusive ways what we mean by “our,” is the briefest answer I can give to how and why one should be reading [Melvin] Dixon’s work.

—Justin A. Joyce in the April issue of POETRY. bit.ly/4az1WqY

Hear from @PoetryMagazine editor Adrian Matejka, Chicago Poet Laureate avery r. young (@beblk), and more poetry minds in this piece about TORTURED POETS DEPARTMENT, verse, and music! 🎧 [via Chicago Tribune] bit.ly/3JpubNe

My friend is by no means Dracula or a werewolf,
but the full moon’s mostly lawless beauty

has never failed to tantalize him,
to lure him outdoors.

—Cyrus Cassells Cyrus Cassells in the April issue of POETRY.
bit.ly/3PLTXPo

In the cement floor’s tarnish, its boot-bruised
mezzotint, I’ll find a face, unnervingly genuine,
grave lineaments, true conviction, and sometimes
among these smudges, in the crude marbling, mercy.

—Erik Tschekunow in the April issue of POETRY.
bit.ly/3VFwi6O

Stranger,

I love  you.
Even if you have no
small chimpanzee to rock you back

and forth.

—Corey Van Landingham in the April issue of POETRY.
bit.ly/3TDVqIF

Everyday some brown
woman pools into inky blue,
a madness that crawls up
from the floor of her and flows
out all around.

—Krista Franklin (Krista Franklin) in the current issue of POETRY, after Kara Walker’s “Blue,” 2020.
bit.ly/3PJGZ4t

In college, Saskia said
a group of psychologists

had asked people to spit
into a cup of water,

and drink. Nobody would.

—Xuela Zhang in the April issue of POETRY.
bit.ly/3VGMYLj

to znaczy wszystko
fajnie bo nie ma to tamto a jest
oświecenie spójników

meaning everything’s
fine because there’s no arguing  but there is
the enlightenment of conjunctions

— Kacper Bartczak (trans. by Mark Tardi) in the April issue of POETRY.
bit.ly/3xiQ6Db

how, in this contrapuntal,
spectacular Roman spring,
so help me,
the thicket-black shadow of my upwelling joy
deepens my joy.

—Cyrus Cassells Cyrus Cassells in the April issue of POETRY.
bit.ly/43HevhG

My name is old—
my name

means  jewel girl.

—Bo Hee Moon in the April issue of POETRY.
bit.ly/49hMZso

Nobody likes to look
away. The spill carries

no message but I think
with it.

—Nica Giromini in the April issue of POETRY.
bit.ly/4cFXLLW

Dixon’s work has been with me for the last fourteen years, and this is my first opportunity to share what I’ve long loved with a wide audience.

—CM Burroughs in the April issue of POETRY, which features a folio on Melvin Dixon.
bit.ly/4azvogl

Don't miss the Kara Walker folio in this month's issue as well! bit.ly/3PJheS4

A minor supplication casts me blue as valley
tunneled beneath sky, a substrate of happening,

your hand, my back, treacherous love,
how easy, our end, O end, how free.

—@RuthEllenKocher in the April issue of POETRY, after Kara Walker’s “Tar pit,” 2021.
bit.ly/3VHjYD7

das tröstende rauschen zwischen den sendern,
der wind im künftigen wald.

the soothing swoosh between the radio transmitters.
the wind in the forests yet to come.

—Jan Wagner (trans. by David Keplinger) in the April issue of POETRY.
bit.ly/4cE5JFe