GNASHERS
"Poetry is Language at it's most distilled and most powerful" - Rita Dove
Gnashers have been ground down, these are your poems that have been through the gauntlet, forged in the fires of your google drive and tinkered on by wordsmiths until every nook and cranny has been nitpicked and you are sure its sharpest edges have been honed to perfection.
Undressed
David DiSarro (he/him/his)
I. Our mothers, undressed, stretched and screamed us into the world, an infinitesimal body hoisted into view. They wept, no longer able to keep us, gave us up to the world while we rested for a time, naked, rooting wildly for the womb. II. We fumbled, shed clothes, and stood uncertain, as if to say, Here I am. Undressed, examined with serpentine glances, oblique wounds on our bodies, indisposed, until one of us coiled around the other, the length of a breath between us. III. we often forget how brutal a victory living can be. resigned until we decide to let go, as the nurses squawk like seagulls over us, and we hear the chimes from the loud- speaker, signaling the end of visiting hours, a heavenly voice undressed in our ears, telling us “Time’s up.” David R. DiSarro is currently an Associate Professor of English at Endicott College in Beverly, MA. His work has previously appeared in The Rye Whiskey Review, Neologism Poetry Journal, Bending Genres, The Rome Review, The Hawaii Pacific Review, among others. David's first chapbook, I Used to Play in Bands, was published by Finishing Line Press, with a second chapbook, The Overnight Shift, forthcoming in August 2026. He currently lives on the North Shore of Massachusetts with his wife, Riley, five children, and two rambunctious dogs.
Previously published in Home Planet News
I Remember Eating My Blue Crayons in Kindergarten
Meghan Sterling (she/they)
Because I wanted to penetrate blue, all blue, bright blue, cobalt, azure, the way blue sears our eyes with its flood, like the sea-goddess grown from the foam of Uranus’s junk, the rain of her flesh like lapis lazuli inlaid on marble pillars tasked with holding up the edifice of the world’s last library. Inside, its books blue-spined and whispering. Blue maps of lost oceans on the walls. Because I wanted to be blue, to eat blue, to wallow in it like pearls in an oyster’s wet body, rolling blue in my mouth, tonguing it raw, swallowing blue until my body was the edge between sea and sky and every ship that sailed along my edge disappeared into me.
PC: Halee H.
Limping Dog
Stephen Mead (He,Him)
Hear his tag, frantic jangle & the clack-clack of paws… He’s in a hurry, mad black fur blur among house shadows, among oblivious traffic… Up that side of the street, now down, behind… Will he bite? Let petting happen? Give any inkling to these pausing feet, these hands which stretch forth though wary of touch? His eyes don’t look up, ears never perk as, although injured, he skirts ‘round, he rushes off. I have known saints like this. All walls resound with their palms, all craft, all work humming past the completion which yet exists: A vision the wounded aren’t too busy for the glory of still. Resident artist/curator for The Chroma Museum, https://thestephenmeadchromamuseum.weebly.com/ ,Stephen Mead has intermittently been submitting work for publication going on four decades. He remains grateful to all of the editors who have given his work a good home as now, retired from his day job, he is busy trying to sell his 40-year backlog of art, https://www.artworkarchive.com/profile/stephen-mead
PC: Halee H.
Wipeout
Les Wicks (he)
At Bondi Beach today there’s this wave that is me. Amongst an endless succession nothing special about myself though those who know the ocean understand how different each break can be. There’s this thought that life is the expenditure of energy & I’m comfortable to become a ripple before hitting the sand. Winds & the moon divert, engorge, confuse. This page is the lone rider tight wrapped in neoprene but loose mullering deep in my genes. Struggle, then patience. There is memory of a sandbar. Up on the promenade a young couple worry that perhaps their jobs are pointless. Two pramming parents poke the fever of the globe. Still have faith in I don’t care though that too is pretend. This me, boring as a pulse. Let the sand come up then the next wave. "Les Wicks’ 15th book of poetry is Time Taken – New & Selected (Puncher & Wattmann, 2022 2nd ed 2024). For over 50 years Les has been active in the Australian literary community. He has been a guest at most of his nation’s literary festivals alongside a substantial list of international ones. 2024 Boao International Lifetime Achievement Award, 2025 Silk Road Oceanian Poet of the Year. Publication has been seen in over 500 different newspapers, anthologies and magazines across 41 countries in 19 languages. Has conducted workshops around Australia, edited various projects over the decades, latest being Class (2024) & runs Meuse Press which focuses on poetry outreach projects like poetry on buses & poetry published on the surface of a river. leswicks@hotmail.com http://leswicks.tripod.com/lw.htm "
PC: Halee H.
Incognito
Bart Edelman- (He/Him)
Every once in a while, It’s good to tempt fate, Alter the course of history, Throw a bone on the table, Demand marmalade for your bread. If you don’t require it, who will? As far as I can tell, You only go around once. Twice is courting trouble, Jeers from an unruly crowd, And, surely, you’ll need a permit, Costing money you don’t possess. Yes, face it, my sweet, fat friend; Every exit is simply an entrance You haven’t found just yet. What’s in, nowadays, I’m afraid, Has already fallen out, Top to bottom, short to stout— Somewhere across the terrain. So do yourself a colossal favor. Travel incognito for as long as it takes To wipe the smirk off your face. Bart Edelman’s poetry collections include Crossing the Hackensack (Prometheus Press), Under Damaris’ Dress (Lightning Publications), The Alphabet of Love (Red Hen Press), The Gentle Man (Red Hen Press), The Last Mojito (Red Hen Press), The Geographer’s Wife (Red Hen Press), Whistling to Trick the Wind (Meadowlark Press), and This Body Is Never at Rest: New and Selected Poems 1993 – 2023 (Meadowlark Press). He has taught at Glendale College, where he edited Eclipse, a literary journal, and, most recently, in the MFA program at Antioch University, Los Angeles. His work has been widely anthologized in textbooks published by City Lights Books, Etruscan Press, Fountainhead Press, Harcourt Brace, Longman, McGraw-Hill, Prentice Hall, Simon & Schuster, Thomson/Heinle, the University of Iowa Press, Wadsworth, and others. He lives in Pasadena, California.
PC: Halee H.
eyeliner guardian.
Julia Gaskill (she/her)
This poem's formatting is integral to the work, please expand to read.
Julia Gaskill (she/her) is a neurodivergent, queer poet and organizer hailing from Portland, OR. A Best of the Net nominated poet, her work has been published through journals such as Moria Magazine, Pine Row Press, Vagabond City Lit, FreezeRay Poetry, and more, as well as in several poetry anthologies. Her debut full length collection, "weirdo", was published by Game Over Books Press in 2022. Julia runs the poetry series Slamlandia and is the lead organizer of the Bigfoot Poetry Festival. She was elected to the board of the Oregon Poetry Association in 2024, and she is a 2025 Carolyn Moore Writer's House resident. Find more about her at @geekgirlgrownup or juliagaskill.com
PC: Halee H.
On Being Shot from a Cannon at the Georgia Mountain Fair
Karen Paul Holmes (she/her)
PC: Halee H.
Going Loco
Thomas Zimmerman (he/him/his)
so i go loco when i drink the hard stuff Dad did too // that’s Shostakovich streaming from my speaker solo keyboard pieces pensive tense // intensity i got from Mom & Democratic tenderheart from Dad heredity that helps & haunts // oh how long since i’ve felt that kind of love where i can’t keep my hands off that sworn object of affection culture tells me object is the problem // grabass on the porch two car wheels in a country ditch bikini lined ecstatic softness striped by moonlit ash trees // by the time we kill the fifth my breathing corpse is dreaming far downriverThomas Zimmerman (he/him/his) teaches English, directs the Writing Center, and edits The Big Windows Review https://thebigwindowsreview.com/ at Washtenaw Community College, in Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA. His poems have appeared recently in Cold Signal, TrashLight Press, and Trouvaille Review. His latest poetry book is My Night to Cook (Cyberwit, 2024). Website: https:/thomaszimmerman.wordpress.com
PC: Halee H.
The First Firearm
Jonathan Fletcher (he/him/his)
Dunhuang, China, mid-tenth century
Bamboo for a barrel,
gunpowder packed with pottery shards,
A long spear attached,
shaft cradled, grip firm.
Forget Los Alamos.
Forget Oppenheimer.
Forget
Fat Man and Little Boy.
Forget white blooms that replace cities.
This is where porcelain flew,
horses quaked, armies retreated.
This is where world ignited,
turned from sphere to bullet.
Jonathan Fletcher holds a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from Columbia University School of the Arts. His work has been featured in numerous literary journals and magazines, and he has won or placed in various literary contests. A Pushcart Prize, Best of the Net, and Best Microfiction nominee, he won Northwestern University Press’s Drinking Gourd Chapbook Poetry Prize contest in 2023, for which his debut chapbook, This is My Body, was published in 2025. Currently, he serves as a Zoeglossia Fellow and lives in San Antonio, Texas.
The River That Remembered me
Baskin Cooper (he/him/his)
I come back after decades to a river with a different name its surface calm as glass sunlight stippled through sycamores families picnic on the far bank children wade knee-deep, laughing I kneel to drink the current coils around my hand like an old friend testing my pulse something stirs beneath a slick breath rising from gravel and I remember I almost drowned here once small lungs filling mud and silt closing like fists the river speaks in ripples I was the lesson your father could not give you I wanted you wary I made you strong its voice moves under my skin like water under ice it tells me no bridge is safe no bank is steady even calm water has teeth across the current a boy splashes his sister and she shrieks with delight their laughter skims the surface but never sinks I back away as the river stretches itself taller in my reflection an old god rising grinning with weed-green teeth you came back to thank me you came back to drink what I left inside you "Baskin Cooper is a poet, visual artist, and multidisciplinary creator based in Chatham County, North Carolina. His work spans poetry, songwriting, sculpture, screenwriting, and voice acting, weaving together visual, narrative, and musical elements. He holds a PhD in psychology and previously lived in Cork, Ireland, experiences that often shape his explorations of folklore, lyricism, and personal history. His poems have appeared in Rattle, The Avocet, and Ink & Oak, with work forthcoming in ONE ART and Verse-Virtual. His debut collection, The Space Between Branches, is currently seeking publication. "
AYN RAND IN HEAVEN, LOOKING FOR LOVE
Jefferson Carter (he/him)
Once they knew my name, the Young Souls banned me from all heavenly orgies. The Old Souls, those who died of natural causes, keep moaning “O, O, O, love bone back in the day, all-terrain cane now.” Self-pity, such a turn-off. Even my heroes, the Robber Barons, won’t snuggle, obsessed as they are with the bottom line: bigger wings & childish comfort. Jefferson Carter’s work has appeared in journals like Barrow Street and Rattle. Chax Press (Tucson) published his ninth collection, Get Serious: New and Selected Poems, a Southwest Best Book of 2013. Free Hugs, his thirteenth collection, is now available from Coyote Arts (NM). For more information, visit jeffersoncarterverse.com Carter has lived in Tucson, AZ, since 1953 and taught composition and poetry writing full-time for 30 years at Pima Community College.
The Painter and the Poet Talk Politics
Emma Johnson-Rivard (She/her)
Last time we spoke, it came out that I’d written another poem, an account of love and social collapse, a breakdown in the tradition of millennial lesbians everywhere. A cursory glance reveals something of artist and self in every line. This is not memoir in the way that everything, in the end, is memoir. You turn your eye to the sketchpad, pen tucked behind an ear. You’re painting sex and apocalypse. We are well suited this way. The world tilts again. Mostly, I’ve been happy. The soul begs word and paint, a line to break between understanding and the need to sleep. One day, maybe, I’ll write poems about cats again. "Emma Johnson-Rivard is a doctoral student in creative writing at the University of Cincinnati. Her work has appeared in Strange Horizons, Coffin Bell, Red Flag Poetry, and others. She can be found at Bluesky at @blackcattales and at emmajohnson-rivard.com. "
an asterism***
Stephanie JT Russel (she-her / they-them)
This poem's formatting is integral to the work, please expand to read.
Stephanie JT Russell is a prolific interdisciplinary artist, author, and cultural worker. Read her full bio here
Knuckledusters
Emma Johnson-Rivard (She/her)
It's a common belief that bone, once broken, grows back stronger. This is only true for smallest breaks. A boxer will take microfractures on the knuckles, and come back hardened. But a broken arm, once snapped, will always be susceptible to repetition. The lesson now: break, my love, but only just. "Emma Johnson-Rivard is a doctoral student in creative writing at the University of Cincinnati. Her work has appeared in Strange Horizons, Coffin Bell, Red Flag Poetry, and others. She can be found at Bluesky at @blackcattales and at emmajohnson-rivard.com. "
Embraced By An Alien From The Purple Planet, I Almost Touched Infinity
Heather D Haigh (she/her)
His body iridescent in the glow of Earth’s lonely satellite, keratin stroking flesh, invoking shivers, lest his scales catch my wrinkles and I tatter. Instead we glide, cool and smooth, him slyssing silver locks, while age-spotted hands reach for gleaming faunal buds and, reverentially, he bites off, chunks of my hair and chews, bites and chews and swallows, then whispers, Earth men say you bad? I stroke a bony nub and shake my head. They say nothing. Nothing at all. Soon, he left me for a hirsute octogenarian. I stroke my stubble, and hope.
Red Alert
Lynn White (she/her)
It’s not enough to take to the streets one million two million it still needs more. It’s not enough to sign your name three million four million it still needs more. It’s not enough to cast your vote nine million ten million think of a number million it still needs more. It’s never enough the clowns still will have more. First published in New Verse News, December 14 2019 Lynn White lives in north Wales. Her work is influenced by issues of social justice and events, places and people she has known or imagined. She is especially interested in exploring the boundaries of dream, fantasy and reality. She has been nominated for Pushcarts, Best of the Net and a Rhysling Award.
No Need for Concern
Kate Lewington (she/they)
i had been picked up from school and was sat in the back of the car when you told me we had an appointment with the doctor to attend that afternoon i was getting into trouble at school all i wanted to ask was if i would have to roll up my sleeves because if you wasn't aware and i couldn't articulate the doctor could write it off as adolescence if i kept hidden under clothes that i am tearing my flesh apart then there is no need for concern, it will pass. From the South of England, Kate is a writer/poet and blogger. Their writing is largely based on the themes of belonging, loss, and wonder. They have been recently published by Roi Fainéant Press, Autumn Sky Poetry Daily, World Insane and TrashLight Press. https://katelouisepoetry.wordpress.com/
Trigger Warning - Self Harm
F-Bomb Alert!
Jefferson Carter (He/Him)
Every fuckin’ morning I see his fuckin’ picture in the fuckin’ paper. My mother told me over-using the F-word weakens its impact. So why does telling a lie over & over enhance its power? Raising my fork, I look through the tines at his face, visualizing him behind bars & his future fucking. Jefferson Carter’s work has appeared in journals like Barrow Street and Rattle. Chax Press (Tucson) published his ninth collection, Get Serious: New and Selected Poems, a Southwest Best Book of 2013. Free Hugs, his thirteenth collection, is now available from Coyote Arts (NM). For more information, visit jeffersoncarterverse.com Carter has lived in Tucson, AZ, since 1953 and taught composition and poetry writing full-time for 30 years at Pima Community College.
Unlikely Companions
Trish Hopkinson (she/her)
It’s hard to say how it arrived, a remnant of what it once was, incongruent in this place where sodium and potash lap at white sands; where seagull carcasses scatter in assorted states of decay, ghostlike bones and feathers mixed into the beach like a slurry. Some still fly here, awaiting demise, scavenging for scraps, mingling with the millions, loitering as the shores broaden. This forsaken lake abides by its keepers, watched over by a single, empty armchair, leaning slightly on a sunken foot, as if to say, I, too, am broken. I, too, must abide to those who abandon me. Overhead, geese contemplate migration, turkey vultures circle; their great wings stretched wide intimidate the few sparse clouds collecting, but promising no drizzle. The armchair looks toward the clouds and beckons, scowls at the vultures, prays for rain. SLC CWC Iron Pen Winner, 2024 Trish Hopkinson is a poet and advocate for the literary arts. You can find her online at SelfishPoet.com. Her poetry has been published in several literary magazines and journals; and her most recent book A Godless Ascends was published by Lithic Press in March 2024. Hopkinson happily answers to labels such as atheist, feminist, and empty nester; and enjoys traveling, live music, and craft beer.
Call me Issac,
Holton Lee (any/all)
Call me prophet. Call me doom. Family. A strange and suckled beast of slaughter, and what a beast of bloody mouth, of saintly hemorrhage on sacrificial altar. How obedient, how righteous, it is to bring its own kindling, its own pyre. Feel the buckle of my knees, taste the churl of my bile, smell the sparking of this flame, hear the angelic hymnal choir, see the callous of the blade within my palm. What a beast of bloody mouth. What a beast of bloody mouth. What a beast of bloody mouth. Holton Lee (Any/All) is an emerging poet based in Salt Lake City, and occasionally in your dreams (yes that was them, you’re welcome). Their work centers around queerness, identity, and whatever comes to mind. You can find them in cat cafes, co-running Salt Cured Collective, and talking to the local crows. They hope you enjoy their poems.
Beautiful in Spite of You
Andrew Earley (he/him)
I found my solace in crowded basements filled with disregarded souls. our hearts full and our hopes dashed, Let down by everyone, except for each other. We screamed. We struggled, fighting to feel real, with broken knuckles Bloodstains, bruises, and ringing ears. We faced our fears. Hearts on fire. We sang like we were seeds, and danced until we dripped with sweat, irrigating our hopes for revolution. We were alight with lives lousy with ideals, questions for everything, and living as our only answer. I wrote about my sleepless nights in empty buildings, back alleyways, and rooftops chasing away the sunrise, refusing to let the stars rest. Notebooks of night skies screamed that if we never sleep, our days will become home for our dreams, that living is the way to feel alive, and what an awful shame to sleep on that. The city whispers its secrets at 4 am, and the hotter they are the higher they climb, until rooftops bellow life-stories so many miles above those lives that it feels like omnipotence soaring over city streets, standing on the top of the world. When i finally slept i made my bed in a house nobody owned. I guess in the heart of a city no one needed shelter like their land lord needed rent checks when 1983 drowned downtown. Like a good Utah boy the landlord buried his shame so nobody would talk about it, threw up plywood prophylactics to protect from undesirables, and then let the weeds come in. I hope whoever used to fill the halls of my bedroom got their shit out safely. Our home fit us basement souls perfectly. It was a home we made so beautiful they demanded we give it back. But we framed it up with two by fours and necessity. Insulated it with fiberglass dreams in the face of unsheltered nightmares. Carefully arranged fuck you band flyers and fuck you graffiti over freshly hung drywall some construction site misplaced. Said, “if you want it so bad come and take it. Watch, these empty bones crumble without us.” You forgot about us and we’re in love with making your apathy incomprehensibly beautiful. Punks have the most beautiful dreams. I still believe in punk rock things, I believe in dreams deemed Too idealistic I still believe It’s worth the fight That bloodied and broken Or not sleeping at night “Sometimes” means “shelter” for the disregarded souls, lost and alone, with beautiful dreams and hearts on fire. Ready to give everything to the ideals of fuck you walls, roofs, and floors made so beautiful we could never let them take them. Sometimes those rooftops and back alleyways still sing for me. Feed oxygen to my smoldering embers, kept safe and warm by the legacy of a life lived, not looked at. Despite my anxious head, swearing I’m nothing if not disregarded… Bike house, one of the longest running squats in the country, was the first successful case of adverse possession in Utah since something like the 1960s. Elsewhere,the city is still inscribed with a fading legacy of loving fuck you’s From punks, in love with making it beautiful.