Issue Five Contents

4 poems
by Domingo Alfonso
2 poems
by Rito Ramón Aroche
3 poems
by Caridad Atencio
Flower Power
by Miguel Barnet
2 poems
by Pierre Bernet
2 poems
by Yanelys Encinosa Cabrera
4 poems
by Alberto Peraza Ceballos
3 poems
by Maria Liliana Celorrio
4 poems
by Felix Contreras
art
by Wally Gilbert
3 poems
by Georgina Herrera
3 poems
by Karel Leyva
3 poems
by Robert Manzano
2 poems
by Roberto Méndez Martínez
Grand Prismatic Spring
by Jamila Medina
2 poems
by Edel Morales
3 poems
by Alex Pausides
How Lucky They Are, The Normal Ones
by Roberto Fernandez Retamar
A Gust Disperses the Limits of Home
by Soleida Ríos
3 poems
by Mirta Yáñez
Frogpondia
2 poems
by Roberto Méndez Martínez
translated by Carmen Laura Contreras, Anne James, and Yma Johnson
Roberto Méndez Martínez (Camagüey, Cuba, 1958) is a poet, essayist and storyteller. He holds a doctorate in Art from the ISA (Superior Art Institute) of Havana. He is a member of the Cuban Language Academy and the Royal Spanish Academy. He is a recipient of the 2001 Nicolás Guillén Poetry Prize, the 2007 and 2017 Alejo Carpentier Essay Prize, the 2011 Alejo Carpentier Novel Prize, and the 2014 Italo Calvino Novel Prize. He has published around 30 collections, the most recent of which are: Epístola para una sombra (Letras Cubanas, 2013), Libro de la ventura (Extramuros, 2014) and Fiestas de otoño (Ediciones Matanzas, 2016).

Anne James has edited and solicited work for Ploughshares, St. Petersburg Review and Zymbol, the latter of which she founded in 2012. She also served as Treasurer of the New England Poetry Club from 2012-2016. She now works as a freelance editor, literary agent, translator and publishing consultant. She can be reached at annejjames@gmail.com.

Laura Contreras was born in Cuban in 1995 and is currently pursuing undergraduate degrees in history and Chinese at Havana University. In 2017, she conducted tours for Chinese and Costa Rican visitors to Cuba. Contreras worked as an English-Spanish translator for UNEAC at the International Poetry Festival of Havana, also in 2017. She was employed as a Chinese-Spanish translator in a Cuban Factory for a company based in Shanghai in 2018. Contreras currently works as a private Spanish tutor and teacher.

Yma Johnson is a first generation Sierra Leonean immigrant who began her writing career in 1996 as a journalist in Puerto Rico. She has written articles on topics ranging from the criminalization of the mentally ill to Japanese swordsmanship. She is a master’s candidate in creative writing at Eastern Michigan University where she taught rhetoric and composition. She also taught a poetry at a women's prison. Yma won 1st place in the 2012 Current Magazine Fiction and Poetry Contest as well as an honorable mention from 2014 Glimmer Train's Very Short Fiction Contest. Her work has appeared in Cosmonauts Avenue, the St. Petersburg Review, The Encyclopedia Project Vol. 3, an anthology of experimental literature. Her fiction was also anthologized in, “Cthulhu Lies Dreaming,” short story collection of works inspired by H.P. Lovecraft.

ON THE DESK

MOZART ON THE SUBWAY

ON THE DESK

Rude and blue, its feet hanging, eyes going nowhere, the desk bear lets the day pass by. It accomplishes—by omission— its big task: to guard a glass with four pencils. I stare at the thread that holds up its enormous shoes, its snout worn by the pain of time and the dumb expression of one who has a throne disputed by no one. Tomorrow his day will go tumbling down, and mine too. Around midnight it dares to stare at me without winking: it’s true each poet is a blue wooden bear that guards four pencils with amazement.

MOZART ON THE SUBWAY

At the bottom of the escalator Mozart is waiting for you: the orchestra, martial and kind of ominous, highlights the departure of the trains but it’s the piano with its childish melody that conducts the closing of doors and the farewell that the drivers ignore. How would the station be if that musician, fun-loving and a little silly, wasn’t imprisoned among its arches? It’d be the kingdom of soot, of stumbling, of things exhibited for a century and never wanted. Every afternoon the Austrian imposes his concert and when one who walks beyond the yellow lines finally begins his underground journey toward dinner or toward death he knows that behind remains the suspended cadence that will receive him on another day. It’s Mozart who laughs at the speed and the invisible sky. The escalator returns us to the light, the laughter and the glory remains below.
Roberto Méndez Martínez (Camagüey, Cuba, 1958) is a poet, essayist and storyteller. He holds a doctorate in Art from the ISA (Superior Art Institute) of Havana. He is a member of the Cuban Language Academy and the Royal Spanish Academy. He is a recipient of the 2001 Nicolás Guillén Poetry Prize, the 2007 and 2017 Alejo Carpentier Essay Prize, the 2011 Alejo Carpentier Novel Prize, and the 2014 Italo Calvino Novel Prize. He has published around 30 collections, the most recent of which are: Epístola para una sombra (Letras Cubanas, 2013), Libro de la ventura (Extramuros, 2014) and Fiestas de otoño (Ediciones Matanzas, 2016).

Anne James has edited and solicited work for Ploughshares, St. Petersburg Review and Zymbol, the latter of which she founded in 2012. She also served as Treasurer of the New England Poetry Club from 2012-2016. She now works as a freelance editor, literary agent, translator and publishing consultant. She can be reached at annejjames@gmail.com.

Laura Contreras was born in Cuban in 1995 and is currently pursuing undergraduate degrees in history and Chinese at Havana University. In 2017, she conducted tours for Chinese and Costa Rican visitors to Cuba. Contreras worked as an English-Spanish translator for UNEAC at the International Poetry Festival of Havana, also in 2017. She was employed as a Chinese-Spanish translator in a Cuban Factory for a company based in Shanghai in 2018. Contreras currently works as a private Spanish tutor and teacher.

Yma Johnson is a first generation Sierra Leonean immigrant who began her writing career in 1996 as a journalist in Puerto Rico. She has written articles on topics ranging from the criminalization of the mentally ill to Japanese swordsmanship. She is a master’s candidate in creative writing at Eastern Michigan University where she taught rhetoric and composition. She also taught a poetry at a women's prison. Yma won 1st place in the 2012 Current Magazine Fiction and Poetry Contest as well as an honorable mention from 2014 Glimmer Train's Very Short Fiction Contest. Her work has appeared in Cosmonauts Avenue, the St. Petersburg Review, The Encyclopedia Project Vol. 3, an anthology of experimental literature. Her fiction was also anthologized in, “Cthulhu Lies Dreaming,” short story collection of works inspired by H.P. Lovecraft.