RogueAgent

ISSUE 96
CONTENTS

MARCH 2023

Marilyn McCabe
Nicole Callihan
Jaime Jacques
Sam Moe
Alison Lubar
Sarah Esmi
Ian Schoultz
Lynne Ellis
Lisa Baird
William Palmer

CONTRIBUTORS

Marilyn McCabe

THINGS SHAPED BY WHAT CONTAINS THEM

cranberry sauce that gloops out
can-shaped and scored, and pea soup
too, that Campbell's kind, olive drab,
a chicken from an egg, wide bottomed
and bobbly, those L'Eggs pantyhose
eggwadded, that unwashed after two shifts
at Ho Jos will still contain my calves,
the wind that curled in my inner ear
hums loops, and the tumbleweed
Marty shipped me one Christmas
squared by the box for fifteen years
apartment to apartment fading gray
with piling dust until that place
too compact for a tumbleweed and me
up under the eaves under the sky
where I became for a time roof-shaped
like a witch's hat, like the vees
of all those geese leaving
until I broke out and became window
glass, rectangular in shape but
amorphous in form, somewhat
unsolid, slightly disorganized,
but elastic and retaining, as it turns out,
bubbles and waves of the initial pour,
like liquid, but not.

Nicole Callihan

THE PAIN SCALE

Nearly always, I was a six,
somewhere between a five and a six,

I’d say, between moderate and severe,
between tiger lily and hot house orchid,

between learning how to sound out a word
I’d only ever read, and learning how to spell

despair, be in disrepair, what’s the difference,
I asked, between pain and discomfort,

am I feeling pain that you’ve cut off my breasts,
that you’ve slit me from hip bone to hip bone

and taken skin and fat from my abdomen,
taken the tiniest blood vessels and moved them

to make these sort of breast-looking breasts, or is it
discomfort, is it discomfort, is it discomfort

that I cannot roll over onto my side, look at the birds
out the window, that someone has to help me

to the bathroom, that someone, or maybe just me,
will have to put on these disposable gloves—

bought to go grocery shopping in the early days
of the pandemic, o how we washed the plums!—

and use these gloves now to drag the shit out of me,
the shit that collects and collects from all the drugs.

Is that pain, is that discomfort, is the crying
into the sink, is the nipple falling off in the shower,

or the other that was hanging on by what seemed
to be a thread, how I took my toenail clippers to it,

the wince, the flushing it down the toilet so as not
to draw rats to the trash. Pain, I’d say, yes, somewhere

between a five and a six, I think, but maybe
a two or so, maybe an eight, but god, I’m ready

for a pleasure scale, and not moderate pleasure, I want
severe. Severed but raptured. Not comfort but pleasure.

 Pure unadulterated pleasure. Ten, I want to say, ten.

Jaime Jacques

WHEN DELIVERING MAIL, I STOP AT THE BAR TO USE THE BATHROOM

which wouldn’t be a thing,
but two years sober
and I’m thirsty.
I breathe in bleach and stale beer,
relax into the dark room of misfits:
man with sword tattoo on face,
woman with wild, silver hair.
I wouldn’t mind having a drink
with that woman I think,
as I open the stall door.

A co-worker once told me about a guy
who parked his truck downtown,
threw the keys in the nearest mailbox,
and walked away.
I’m tired of kale and soda water
and scanning parcels.

The toilet flushes.
I tuck in my neon yellow safety shirt,
adjust my mask,
walk out past the pull of naked faces,
condensed droplets on pints of beer.
The woman is laughing.
Her bangles are jangling.

Two years.
At this point most people brag
about meeting the love of their life,
buying a house,
starting their dream job.
Maybe you’ll hit your stride
at three years, a friend suggests.

Back in the truck
I sing to Ed Sheeran’s Bad Habits,
I hate the song.
At red lights I drink
from my thermos of green tea,
pretend to appreciate the notes
of rosehips, safflower and cherry.

I am reaching for myself.
The center keeps moving.

Sam Moe

THE SOFTER THE ORANGE, THE TASTIER THE GOLD

There is a horse running across the field. I take off my glasses and its form becomes a storm cloud. I wake up; you might not love me, but we head down to the kitchen together, your pajamas snagging on old stairs, my hand steading myself as I pretend to be another person. At breakfast we control the pull and rush of others, though I can’t see your face behind a stack of toast I know we’ll snap together, fast magnets, back again but we don’t really care about details, back again but why do we always do this, back in those days I turned my imagination into something you could shatter, I let your words open blooms on my skin, I was a scab, I lost my nerve and my scarf and my scars in the squishy sun patches of October. You’d laugh if you knew how much I was sleeping. A riotous joy in your half-asleep eyes, I’m trying not to try, I’m trying to fold my body into the snack cupboard, I’d rather be a chain link on a cat collar, I’d rather tell lies, did you forget about the fires and the forests, the gristmill and the gods and the ground beef cold between our fingers, a sala full of home cooks, a Saturday entrusted with meaning, but what about the way the crows roped across the sky, but what about the sob caught in my throat, but what about your arms—there’s a reason I don’t go home anymore. There’s a lot you don’t know about the inside of my skull, worn away like crabs or time, saltwater hands, bone turns to shell, purple then thin in the sun, a part of me is always intentionally disconnected, a plug yanked out of the wall, this isn’t about feelings, nor is it about panic, I have no more heat to share. Mid-day. We warm our hands by the wood stove, we talk about frittatas and blue ducks, geese with their honey spots, a quail the size and gumption of a heart. Someone brings glowing caviar, someone scrambles meat in a pan, someone asks what I’m doing these days, what’s going on with that old writing thing, yes I remember something like that, the direction of the pen in my hand, but already the conversation is glossy glaze-haze then ham, someone asks for the jelly, then killing me with the anterior exam, the tendon twist, screw the ulna, what would I even know about the fade out, I could be a poltergeist walking and you’d never notice, not when food jumped through me clear, not when I couldn’t stay in the tub, not later, not sooner, not ever, not anyone but you.

Alison Lubar

I BLOCKED YOU BECAUSE

your face is anaphylactic.
Like developing a sudden
allergy to peanuts makes
every confection a suggestion
of death– even jelly, alone.
Or to shellfish. Now, I avoid
all oceans, lose the ability
to swim, develop a fear
of the bathtub. I adjust to life
without water: danger in
the tap, a molecule of oxygen
one element away from
a closed throat. Now, clouds hold
terror in their low, dark bellies
of waiting rain. Thunder becomes
death-knell. I stay inside. You are
every element and sound—
when you step out from behind
a song on the radio, even a favorite
word, I only know to close my eyes,
hold my breath, and choke
myself to death.

Sarah Esmi

IT IS EASY ENOUGH

It is easy enough
to pretend I am not a product
of revolution, that my parents and their parents
didn’t flee their homes for

me to sit behind
those laminated desks and recite
my allegiance to a striped and
speckled flag.

It is easy enough
to sit in the kitchen with my in-laws
and listen to them reminisce
about their son’s youth,
his one and only childhood home.

No one dares ask me about
the motels and the border crossings
the language barriers and the cognates
upon which I relied. The Fingilisi.

It is easy enough
to sit like a fawn, still, and smile at those
across the conference table than to
hurl my history out into the room like an omen.

The work of my lineage
remains hostage in the tired
marrow of this body,
this ocean of blood,

an energy,
an ever-present
roiling

beneath the scabs,
a beast,
heaving
with one eye open.

Ian Schoultz

SLEEP REPLY ALL

hypoxia drum of the ocean
—that i am buried in—
the word—inverse pressure
osmosis stuffing
the material
someone
over a number
over years
water has been
opened—
circle uncircle borders in
skin—

i can’t hold still
everything i see
is on tv
creatures turned to
figments
feed and feed the medium—
where is now
in whale fall
in habitable zone
over years burrowed
cut and stratified
my hands held each other— 

i close my eyes—i close my body
under heavy sheets
under eggshell ceiling
skybox—i follow a dream
unborn water
to whatever
grief

i talk—i think—
i trick myself into belief
we are all human beings
we are all topiary puppetry
and honeycombed ribs
mined out panoptic
serotonin cavalcade
mined and body and—
recycled iridescent moods

if—then
growth out of
kingdom phylum genus species
even the rocks
were dead little fishes

Lynne Ellis

BURROW / MRI-ASSISTED BIOPSY

Nothing will hurt.
A nurse will offer their hand as a nest, another will inject numb-making medicine.
            Get a Xanax prescription. And one for anti-nausea.
            You have a right to medical care that does not wound you.

The room will smell clean and be dim.
This will be your den; all your tender places will be padded.
            Ask for everything you need.
            You're Lady Gaga at the Grammys in an egg.

You'll get to ask questions.
Ask how many times the needle will draw. This will help mid-test,
when you listen to the object inside your breast.
            It will pull the number of times that they said.

Each pull will tickle a little.
You will be sore for a few days. Sore, but not in pain.
The nurse will offer you little round ice packs.
They'll nestle in your bra as fox kits.

Lisa Baird

AN ALTERNATE UNIVERSE IN WHICH MY TRAUMA RESPONSE IS MADE OF BIRDS

A startle of sparrows
launching from the branch
to fly into a window again,
or the fatigue of grackles circling
with nowhere to land. A sharpness
of hummingbirds tearing into
one another, needle-beaked.
That cardinal pecking
at its reflection until the glass shatters.
An immobility of meadowlarks
unblinking in tall grass. I am
an animal made of other animals,
their tiny hammering hearts
orbiting the moment that something
breaks, something survives
& something else moves just as fast
as its shadow.

William Palmer

THIS JOURNEY

I started tilting forward,
then sideways,

grew lightheaded
like a pale green balloon.

Parkinson’s,
a doctor said.

Some people’s hands tremble
like leaves.

I use a cane,
walk a curly tightrope.

Issue 96 Contributors

Lisa Baird (she/her) is a queer writer and community acupuncturist living on the territories of the Attawandaron/Chonnonton/Neutral peoples, which is also the treaty land of the Mississaugas of the New Credit and part of Dish with One Spoon territory (Guelph ON). Her poetry has been shortlisted for the Room Magazine Poetry Contest and longlisted for the CBC Poetry Prize. Her first book, Winter’s Cold Girls (Caitlin Press, 2019) was shortlisted for the 2020 Relit Award for poetry. Find her at www.lisabaird.ca and on Insta @eramosageese.

Nicole Callihan’s This Strange Garment will be published by Terrapin Books in 2023. Her other books include SuperLoop and the poetry chapbooks: The Deeply Flawed Human, Downtown, and ELSEWHERE (with Zoë Ryder White), as well as the novella, The Couples. Her work has appeared in Tin House, Kenyon Review, Colorado Review, Conduit, The American Poetry Review, and as a Poem-a-Day selection from the Academy of American Poets. Find out more at www.nicolecallihan.com.

Lynne Ellis (she / they) writes in pen. Their words appear in Poetry Northwest, Sugar House Review, The Shore, Barzakh, Pontoon Poetry, and elsewhere. Winner of the Missouri Review's 2021 Perkoff Prize, and a nominee for the 2023 Pushcart Prize, Lynne believes every poem is a collaboration. More on Instagram @stagehandpoet. Ellis is co-editor at Papeachu Press, supporting the voices of women and nonbinary creators.

Sarah Esmi (she/her) is an Iranian-American mother, writer, collage artist and lawyer. Her writing has been published in Calyx, Dime Show Review, The Rising Phoenix Review, The San Pedro River Review, Soundings East, and Papeachu Press, and produced at venues such as Dixon Place and Abrons Arts Center. After receiving a Fulbright award, she dedicated seven years to public interest law, including representing clients in immigration court, on death row in Louisiana, in Brooklyn criminal court, and later in psychiatric units throughout New York City. Sarah is co-founder of counterclaim and currently leads the More Art fellowship program, for which she offers writing workshops, open studios and moderation of artist talks to public and socially engaged artists. Guest speaking credits include NYU and CUNY. 

Jaime Jacques is an itinerant writer who currently calls the east coast of Canada home. Her poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in Birdcoat Quarterly, Cagibi, Anti-Heroin Chic, Brazos River Review and others. She is the author of Moon El Salvador and her reporting and travel writing can be found in Salon, NPR, Narratively, and Roads and Kingdoms among others. Find her on Instagram @calamity__jaime. 

Alison Lubar teaches high school English by day and yoga by night. They are a queer, nonbinary, mixed-race femme whose life work (aside from wordsmithing) has evolved into bringing mindfulness practices, and sometimes even poetry, to young people.  Their work has been nominated for both the Pushcart & Best of the Net, and they’re the author four chapbooks: Philosophers Know Nothing About Love (Thirty West Publishing House, 2022), queer feast (Bottlecap Press, 2022), sweet euphemism (CLASH!, 2023), and It Skips a Generation (Stanchion, 2023). You can find out more at http://www.alisonlubar.com/ or on Twitter @theoriginalison.

Marilyn McCabe’s poetry has won awards through A Room of Her Own Foundation, The Word Works, Grayson Books, the NYS Council on the Arts, and Adirondack Center for Writing. Her books of poems include Perpetual Motion and Glass Factory, and chapbooks Rugged Means of Grace and Being Many Seeds. Poems and videopoetry have been published in print and online, and videopoems have appeared in festivals and galleries. She blogs about writing and reading at Owrite:marilynonaroll.wordpress.com.

Sam Moe is the first-place winner of Invisible City’s Blurred Genres contest in 2022, and the 2021 recipient of an Author Fellowship from Martha’s Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing. Her first chapbook, “Heart Weeds,” is out from Alien Buddha Press and her second chapbook, “Grief Birds,” is forthcoming from Bullshit Lit in April 2023. You can find her on Twitter and Instagram as @SamAnneMoe.

William Palmer’s poetry has appeared recently in Braided Way, Innisfree, JAMA, J Journal, One Art, On the Seawall, and Poetry East. He has published two chapbooks: A String of Blue Lights, and Humble. A retired professor of English at Alma College, he lives in Traverse City, Michigan.   

Ian Schoultz’s poems have appeared in Wild Roof Journal, Vagabond City, Autofocus, New Note Poetry, FEED, Dream Pop, Landlocked, and other journals. He holds an MFA in Poetry from Louisiana State University and teaches writing at Southern University in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.