Samoylov as a soldier in the Red Army in the 1940sTranslator’s note: In June 1944 David Samoylov (1920–1990), an important Russian-language poet who was then a soldier in the Red Army, was se…
Poetry
September 26, 2017
September 20, 2017This view of Saturn’s rings from the “ringscape finale” series was among the last images Cassini sent back to Earth (September 13, 2017) / Courtesy of NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute…
September 13, 2017Gillie Rhodes, “Log pile,” November 7, 2009Late Autumn A butterfly searches our garden plants for blossoms I don’t see. Flitting, almost lurching, it lands at last on a ba…
September 7, 2017Grave at the US/Mexico border taken at a cemetery near Anthony, New Mexico, July 19, 2015 / Photo by Lanie ElizabethThe following is an excerpt from part 2 of a four-part poem called “The…
September 6, 2017Liu Xiaobo, 1991 / Courtesy of Wang YaTranslator’s note: This photo of Liu Xiaobo swimming surfaced on the Internet after the sea burial in Dalian, China. Those of us who were heartb…
August 30, 2017Bury Metell me wet limestone flinching coral reefs what’s it li…
August 23, 2017John, “Fallen Angel,” August 29, 2010 Here and NowHere he is sitting across from the balcony door;the wind will blow – a wound. The rustling lightblushes and fades in the rectangular mirror – the…
August 15, 2017Lorenzo Gaudenzi, “Agria,” September 15, 2016For more, read Brian Sneeden’s translator’s note on Giannisi’s work. (Nostos I) …
August 7, 2017Tail light. Photo: Sarah-Rose/Flickr Pistoningseas rise andmountains flow a river spreadsin the bed of an undulatingvalley forestswither and entire citiesblossom people copulate thereon certain n…
August 2, 2017coniferconifer, “water ablution pavilion,” November 30, 2013 Sparrows, SparrowsShe is a man in her late forties and nobody knows when she was born or when she built a silvery house at the notorio…
July 31, 2017Chañaral is a small coastal city in the Atacama region of Chile. Devastating flash floods in 2015 caused an estimated $1.5 billion in damage to the region. Photo by jipe7. worldlittoday · Chanaral…
July 26, 2017Editorial note: This Sunday, July 30, marks the World Day against Trafficking in Persons, established in 2013 by the UN General Assembly. Nadia Murad—nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize…
July 24, 2017Mike Prince, “Black Drongo at Sunrise,” October 7, 2015Where Would I GoWhere would I goI shall only stay here,like a handprinton a doorjust to be there,I’ll be hidden inthe smell of a suitcasesitting…
July 20, 2017Iranian mathematician Maryam Mirzakhani died of breast cancer on July 15 at the age of 40. A professor at Stanford University, Mirzakhani became the first woman to win the prestigious Fields Medal…
July 19, 2017A H T, “Goreme – Pasabag,” December 5, 2014GöremeA ripple of flicking eyelids,a rooster’s cryand the call to prayerbreak through this dustyIslamic morning.I have been in this room before.The tense jaw…
July 4, 2017Gary Burke, “Remembering 9/11,” September 11, 2014i’m from where the towers felli’m from where the towers felljaws where we mourned Tupacarmpit of a state bruised byhad-it-too-hard dollar ferries and…
June 19, 2017Eros Bendato (Eros bound), bronze, 1999, by Igor Mitoraj, Kraków, Poland / Photo by Val KerryNot Elegy, But Eros …
June 14, 2017Rich, “On a Saturday Afternoon” (on the road from Royal, Nebraska, to the Ashfall Fossil Beds), May 25, 2013Creation StoriesMy favorite creation story right nowis the Babylonian one,where Apsu and Tia…
May 24, 2017Geoff Whalan, “Mistletoe Bird (Diaceum hirundinaceum),” Fogg Dam Conservation Reserve, Middle Point, Northern Territory, Australia, November 8, 2015Graphology Endgame 55: AdjustmentWe have no…
May 22, 2017Marcel Duchamp, Nude Descending a Staircase (1912), oil on canvas, 147 × 89.2 cm, Philadelphia Museum of Art / The Louise and Walter Arensberg Collection, 1950Desnudo bajando una escaleraEste…
May 15, 2017Giovanni Bellini, Pietà (1505), oil on wood, 65 x 90 cm, Gallerie dell’Accademia, VeniceFor more on the poetry of Pollakówna, read “A Terrible Ecstasy,” a companion essay by Alice-Catheri…
February 8, 2017Seb, “Gilded/Glider,” Amsterdam, October 8, 2008from Zodiac Early in the morning he wanders through the city.The silence is unnerving, and quickly the streetraises empty eyes to…
January 25, 2017Antti T. Nissinen, “Untitled” (spirit level), May 25, 2011Homesickness A house is something that stands up to a slopeby what it confronts on every side.But take note: say house in this c…
November 23, 2016Isis Olivier, La grive II (The thrush II), 2015. All illustrations courtesy of the artist.A Note on the Illustrations Diti Ronen: “I suddenly have this unexplained urge…
October 4, 2016The translation of The Diamond Sutra by Kumārajīva of the Yao Ch’in dynasty, in a handwritten version by Zhang Jizhi of the Southern Song Dynasty in 1253. Kumārajīva had established…
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