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issue 1: CARNIVAL

in the time of the barley moon

AMEE NASSRENE BROUMAND
The Ferris wheel flickers, 
the pirate ship crests
to an uncertain pause--

night encroaches 
full of drab hopes
lined up in the sunset 
like sticky soda bottles.

Sequins from a torn dress 
twinkle in the marsh. 

New arrivals 
find the muddy fields 
and park 
among trampled grasses. 

There’s an omnipresent
hiss--
perhaps it’s the wind
or a new kind of insect. 

Wearing a top hat 
and diving goggles,
a scarecrow 
presses its face
into the windows
of empty cars,
looking for 
something,
someone. 

Shadows waver
across the purple wall.

Beyond heat dreams,
beyond candy and grease 
and sex in the dark, 
a river gull 
catches her first glimpse
of the sea.

Amee Nassrene Broumand is an Iranian American writer from the Pacific Northwest. A three-time Pushcart Prize nominee, her work has appeared in numerous journals including Glass: A Journal of Poetry (Poets Resist), Rust + Moth, Barren Magazine, Sundog Lit, and Empty Mirror. Find her on Twitter @AmeeBroumand.
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header photo: ludde lorentz (unsplash)
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