Ian Goh

No moons in orbit meant there was no tug 
on the heartstrings, no pull of the unknown
for the natives like statues stirred in the light 
of distant suns. There were no migration cycles, 
just a lone city spun out in concentric circles, 
those in the outer rungs prone to sharp pangs 
of homesickness, and the great adventurers 
made pilgrimage inwards, scarce discovery 
of themselves, as they sailed to the edges of 
still, mirrored oceans. There, they ebbed 
and flowed, hypnotised by their own reflections, 
diving into each other’s eyes instead of the shiny 
beings that swam across heavenly skies.

IAN GOH is a writer and teacher based in Singapore. His work has appeared in QLRS, Star*Line, Eye to the Telescope, The Tiger Moth Reviewand elsewhere. He attained his MA in Creative Writing from Goldsmith University of London.

Ashley Crout

This screened porch, its mesh
angling shadows on my face,
my circles of sight,
where the hawk each dim dawn flies
nearer to me than my name.

ASHLEY CROUT was born in Charleston, SC, and graduated from Bard College and the MFA program at Hunter College. She is the recipient of a poetry grant from The Astraea Foundation and has received awards from The Academy of American Poets and the Poetry Foundation. Her work has been published in Sojourner, New Orleans Review, Atticus Review and Dodging the Rain, among others. She lives in Greenville, SC, with her hound, Stella.

Askold Skalsky

Where I first encountered Hokusai’s wave 
on the South Jersey shore—first it threw me down, 
then twisted me around, then pushed me headfirst 
through the surf and washed me up, scraping my belly 
and filling sand into my trunks galore. That was my surf-
surrendered self. How good it was not to resist the walls 
of sea, unstem the waves crashing over me like a cliff 
of transparent jade, and I bobbing like a fusillade
of stone, like corks of light, not knowing up or down, 
thrashing around in a wet bowl through the silt of stars 
with their wedges of wet light, green fire and ice 
in submerged reservoirs of avalanchine bright,
the smooth and water-weedy skins of briny meteors 
in my young, and as yet innocent, receptive pores.

Originally from Ukraine, ASKOLD SKALSKY is a retired college professor living in Frederick, Maryland, with three cats and many books, and who annually takes at least one trip to his beloved South Jersey.