Not Trump SeriesrbdNina Li Coomes, nottrump, poetry

Nina Li Coomes: #NotTrump Series

Not Trump SeriesrbdNina Li Coomes, nottrump, poetry
Nina Li Coomes: #NotTrump Series

Customs Confessional

Forgive me Fatherfor I have sinned
It has been two weeks since my last migration

Forgive me for I have not declared the pickled plums in our bag
AndI used my phone in line

Forgive me I touched a farm animal but I won’t tell you
for I have no Foot and Mouth disease

Forgive me your khaki vestment,  your Beverly accent,
your meaty grip on entry stamp

Forgive me the cold coffee,
the skin of powdered donut glued to your lip

Forgive me the failed Police Academy,
the second place TSA appointment

Forgive me the passports,
three are cool blue but one is a pitted ember I am entrusting to you

Forgive me I am square up against the glass of your confessional
answering every question in morse

Forgive me the percussion in my index
as it kisses the finger-printer: good-bye-hello-good-bye

Forgive me I did not stand still for the photo,
I became a ghost, or prayed to one

As absolution, I will kneel in the baggage claim
A hymn of hyperventilation scattering my tongue

Say ten Hail Mothers and Glory Be
The cold tile of the O’Hare Arrivals Lobby,

the stale smell of a 90s era McDonalds,
the retreating kneeler of my contraband mother

as she heads for the exit, pushing our baggage,
smuggled safe, once more.                                           

Nina Li Coomes is a Japanese and American writer, living in Boston. Her work can be found in tap lit mag, the alice blue review, Blue Stem Journal and elsewhere. Her chapbook, 'haircut poems', is forthcoming from Dancing Girl Press in autumn of 2017.

Not Trump Seriesrbdchelsea whitton, nottrump, poetry

Chelsea Whitton: #NotTrump Series

Chelsea Whitton is a southern poet and essayist living in Ridgewood, Queens. Her poems have appeared in various web and print publications, including Sixth Finch, Forklift, Ohio, Bateau, WomenArts Quarterly, Cimarron Review, Ilk and Valley Voices. She hold an MFA from the New School. Read more of her work at www.chelseawhitton.com.

Not Trump Seriesrbdchelsea whitton, nottrump, poetry
Chelsea Whitton: #NotTrump Series
Not Trump SeriesrbdMonica Rowley, nottrump, poetry

Monica Rowley: #NotTrump Series

Monica Rowley teaches amazing high school students in Brooklyn, noting that they are far better than she is at trigonometry and pentameter. She loves sharks and tigers, Gilgamesh, and Ramprasad Sen's poetry to the Goddess Kali. She is the oldest of seven, and her siblings are her best friends. She considers this turn of sibling luck the best fortune she could have.  Monica has been the recipient of several grants and awards, including one from the National Endowment for the Humanities. If you would like to read more of her poems, check them out on Brooklyn Poets’ The Bridge or in the upcoming issue of the Irish literary journal, The Ogham Stone.

Not Trump SeriesrbdMonica Rowley, nottrump, poetry
Monica Rowley: #NotTrump Series
Not Trump SeriesrbdJen DeGregorio, nottrump, poetry

Jen DeGregorio: #NotTrump Series

Jen DeGregorio's poetry has appeared in Apogee online, The Baltimore Review, The Collagist, The Cossack Review, PANK, Spoon River Poetry Review, Women's Studies Quarterly, and elsewhere. Her writing has won scholarships from the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference and Hunter College in New York, where she received her MFA in creative writing. She teaches writing to undergraduates in New York and New Jersey and, come September, will be a PhD candidate in English/Creative Writing at Binghamton University (State University of New York).

Not Trump SeriesrbdJen DeGregorio, nottrump, poetry
Jen DeGregorio: #NotTrump Series