The spaces between phrases evoke the veil between the waking world and dream world beautifully on the page. So when I rose, I told them what I saw: from “Now I Have No Book of Dreams”īy Sara Elkamel in Tinderbox Poetry Journal Unsurveilled by the angels awake on my shoulders. To bury my two feet in, I was sure my dreams played When I was young and still would dig holes in the sand “Clean” becomes “seen,” “broken” splinters forward into “broke.” This active address to God, complete with pointed, surprising questions (Pray tell, do I lie, God?) weaves confession and prayer in such a skillful way. I love how Mungaray beseeches through constant self-revision in this powerful poem. from “The Unblessed Cries to God for the First Time In a Decade” I hope you’ll join me in reading and rereading these poems, in trailing insistently forward on what Teo Mungaray calls “this wicked pavement of life.”

They ask us to bear witness at the Gate of Mercy in Palestine, to archive every dream that leaks into the waking world. They shift from one image to another in fluid, surprising ways. These five poems show me how to toe the line between this and that. So how do we mark passage amidst it all, how do we grow? What new, unmarred sun might we angle our faces toward? During an ongoing pandemic, mere months into a new administration, it’s clear that many transitions are larger forces we find ourselves struggling to navigate day in and day out. Transition calls to mind the concluding lines of Lucille Clifton’s “ blessing the boats:” “and may you in your innocence/sail through this to that.” It signals a shift, whether physical, emotional, or spiritual, from the world (or life) (or moment) you were given to another that is as of yet unknown, so yours for the choosing-so abounding with potential. Our theme for May is “Transition,” which feels apt for a month expected to bloom on command. Palette is back with another Poetry We Admire for May-curated by a new editor! I’m delighted to be drawing your attention today to a few recent poems published online that I haven’t been able to shake.

Blessing the boats poem