"I want to hear locks opening. / We must keep striking the water, / Shouting dry land, dry land. " Yonatan Berg, "Amen," translated by Joanna Chen in Presence 2025.

"Yet when they sing all the woe of the world / Is transformed. It is as if they / Have touched the tips of their fingers / To the air. The suffering, the blood-vaporized air." Gregory Orfalea, "It Is Hard To Speak" in Presence 2025.

"Everyone said your bones in the box kept singing, talking, yakking, jumping, bouncing as if Petrouchka in his red, white carnival apparel had arrived." Janice Zerfas, "The weather up there must be changing" in Presence 2025.

"How solipsistic / Of us windowsill philosophers / To measure the space / Between God and the moon. " Helen Behe, "Tilting Earth" in Presence 2025.

"The 𝑖𝑛𝑠𝑖𝑑𝑒 is where the danger is real: / spiraling fears, a vice to conceal, / yourself your worst enemy tied to a chair. / Be careful in there." Monica Silva "Neuroplasticity" in Presence 2025.

"The floor bedecked / with mop and broom is the prow / of a ship; the old house / sails on into time, towards the promised Land / and under your idle feet swells / the vasty deep you fled." Jean-Pierre Lemaire, trans. Margaret Morrison, "Equipment" in Presence 2025.

"Squat in the stacks, her back hunched / Like a bent branch, she kneels before / A wall of children's books." Andrew Calis, "Patron," in Presence 2025.

Our apologies for our incorrect date - Martha Silano passed away from us on May 5, not May 7 as previously posted. She will be dearly missed.

Martha Silano, 2021. "It turns out gravity// doesn’t hold for souls; souls drift, like loons/ between dives, into eternity,//. //My travel speed is two inches per year,/ same as the moon from Earth. A little less bound by gravity./A little more free.".

Remembering Martha Silano.9/2/61 - 5/7/25. for the many ways she supported us over the years: by gracing us with her poems, reading with us, and smiling that inspirational smile! We love you . We will miss you, and we will ALWAYS remember you.

"lungs as branches, as leaves / as green song in early April - // only robins with perfect pitch are more intense." Linda Nemec Foster "After the Long Winter of Chemo, Her Lungs as Trees in Spring" in Presence 2024.

"Long before first light, a rumble comes / from distant dark. Persistent / percussive, the rhythmic / hum of a train unseen // on unseen rails rattles / the windows in their panes." Paul Jaskunas, "Praying After the Night Train" in Presence 2024.

Presence at AWP! Presence 2025 will be available for a reduced rate at the conference. Come see us at table 350!

Mary Ann Miller's panel: .Tricks of the Trade: Teaching Literary Editing and Publishing, 9:00-10:15 AM Friday, 3/28 Room 408B, Level 2.Moderated by Jeremy Schraffenberger, editor of North American Review.Panelists: Elijah Burrell, Jennie Case, Sarah Matthes, .Mary Ann B. Miller

Presence will be at AWP March 26-29! Join us at Table 350:.*meet/visit staff.*purchase copies & subscriptions.*sign up for email list.*pitch an idea for a life's work essay.*volunteer to review books. We can't wait to see you there!

"A theologian / and astrophysicist walk into a bar. / The regulars are entranced by the homespun // conceits they craft for what we long to hear: / we're made of stars;" Mia Schilling Grogan "One Mystery" in Presence 2024. #faithpoetry #presence

"The wind gushes / clouds burst / light passes through the window / and there is nothing but time. " Mildred Rivadeneyra Bello, "Naked Time" in Presence 2024. #presence #faithpoetry

"God, let me sense / what it takes for bluegill / to warm their quiet fins / beneath the ice-skin of the lake, /. / I've lived / so long in frozen homes, / my heartbeat fades. How can / I shelter, as your creatures do?" Dana Delibovi, "Reply Requested," in Presence 2024.

"Love's words in such a dusty light / must have felt to her like water running free, the living kind / that isn't gathered from a well. All she ever wanted. Did she / resent her own desire?" Jen Grace Stewart "Story with a Ghost in It" in Presence 2024.