ISSUE FIFTEEN: Lastly, My Seer | next poem →

Montana Wildhack Read Aloud

Kristie Betts Letter

Time and time again our eyes were brought together
by the book we read; our faces flushed and paled.
--Dante Alighieri

a push from the narrative nest       streaming wordbrook       chasing a girl who burned      
with cities       with Hojo parlors       to dance despite machine guns

of fantasies yet unread       penned by Mr. Trout       metaphysics, says Montana       failed
science fiction       alternate selves       I am Kilgore. I’m Kilgore.

we’re all in the wilds of Montana       softening pages       quickening fingers       print pats
the heart       breathless movement       time-travel       birdsong in her mouth

leave it to       unabashed voyeurism through bars       to offend       but her reveal
in the back       of the bookstore, now       dances unfettered resistance

later schooling cast shadows       about hostess and fetish       or drawing Montana
topography       overshadows       (finger)printed pages       words in flight

on the disappearance       beneath big skies       of Dresden, dolls       keeping what’s beneath
the covers       deep inside       so it goes       away eventually       but what remains:

one hand       (Montana’s)       lifts dusty       sci-fi softcover

Kristie Betts Letter's poetry collection Under-Worldly came out in April from Editorial L’Aleph. Other works have appeared in The Massachusetts Review, The North Dakota Quarterly, Washington Square, Passages North and The Southern Humanities Review. She's won several teaching awards in Colorado for forcing Hamlet on high school seniors, and also plays a mean game of pub trivia.

ISSUE FIFTEEN: Lastly, My Seer | next poem →











ISSUE FIFTEEN: Lastly, My Seer

Michael Albright
   Because of your problem,
      do you often feel others
      have no idea what you are going through?

Emily Rosello Mercurio
   Sunny Honey

Rose Knapp
   Socio-EFascismo

Rachel Mindell
   Life as we know it

Kathleen E. Krause
   Digging Digits

Kristie Betts Letter
   Montana Wildhack Read Aloud

Sandeep Kumar Mishra
   Pebbles

Daniel Romo
   Diplomacy

Elizabeth Kirkpatrick-Vrenios
   See Saw Margery Daw

Nate Maxson
   Patient Zero

Alec Hershman
   The Point of Vanishing