Issue 1: Poetry by A. Daniel M.

Traffic Light by A. Daniel M.


Stranger, who are you?
Casting your eyes at me.
Fate, perhaps that we should cross paths
On this night, in this town, on this corner.

Stop. Go.
A traffic light.
I yield to you looking at me.
Though, you are not looking through me.

I do not want to meet eyes.
I do not want our eyes to meet.
It frightens me
To share a look with a stranger on a random street.

I just want to drive—
Not to somewhere more familiar
But just out of your sight.
It pains me to wonder why you look at me.

How is it that I’ve intrigued you?
I am nothing special.
How have I caught your eye and
Held your glance captive? I can’t read them.

I have no clear image of you.
You are neither a man nor a woman.
You are not black, or white, not my own color.
Does my color catch your eye? Is it the structure of my face?

Are you judgmental? Or impressed at the sight of me?
Do I spark something in you?
Hatred? Sadness? Envy? Or just wanting company?
Are you a figment of my own insecurity?

It is a free country.
You are free to entrap me. Foucauldian eyes: panoptic vision.
Vanity slaves—imprisoned.
I worry that I must appeal to all the five wits at the once. Inward and outward.

Why couldn’t I have just run through the YELLOW?
Stopped at RED. Life slowed down.
I’ve been waiting to go on with my life for what seems like hours.
It’s only been minutes.
I’m fucking impatient at intersections on dead streets.
The signal never changes fast enough.
If you weren’t here staring at me,
I’d have run right through it.


Without by A. Daniel M.

Without pretensions, codes, or hidden agendas.
Without preaching.
No soapbox; a makeshift pulpit to wash your mouth of sins.
Without pressure—I’ll understand if you walk away while I’m speaking.

For those without.
The drought makes the land dry.
For those without regard
For another human life.

Remorse without forgiveness,
Insult without apology.
In and out of control
Like now.

I write without direction,
You write with no purpose –
This is how words become worthless.
Casting newborn neologies into the air.

Dictions with broken wings.
Ideology with no place to go.
Homeless.
Vagabond vocabulary.

Existing in the imaginary, they cannot be seen without demonstration.
And still we fear to say some things
Without being criticized.
Without being victimized.

Without helping hands,
What is man without
God, what is a god without
Man?

A child without parents: an orphan.
A sky without a sun: darkness.
A book with no words: a story untold.
Words with no voice: silence.

Speak without restraint,
but do so with aim
Pure and chaste
Speak slow.
Speak today, like living without tomorrow.
What am I without a mind?
Dear Language,
I am not my-Self without you.

Illustration by Matt Paramo