Gizelle S with a poem featuring an almost divine longing, "Don't Touch". 

I lifted the overlay to examine the gold in the plates beneath, 
no one there to say, Don’t touch. 

In her poem, "Finches", Martina Reisz Newberry shows us how hard it can be to say the things we want to say. 

Notice while we talk
what my hands are doing
to each other: 
fluttering, flying,
straining at the fingers of each. 

Jessica Sheets shares the sensual joys of her poem "For Amy". 

So much of your time spent with your mouth propped open,
drowning down maraschino cherries, popping on
a flattened tongue, soon enough, the whole of you
would be splashed into a flaming ruby that hands
became deaf and numb towards, leaving fingers to stare. 

John Dorsey makes his Drunk Monkeys debut with a set of four short poems. 

the only thing
that keeps me here
is the thought
that a mile
on uneven gravel
is too far to go
for a final baptism. 

Relationships are complicated. Especially the ones closest to home. April Jones with her poem "Flight".

I only think of you in the quietest moments, the ones

that force me to remember the things I’ve worked

my life to forget. I once thought that I’d long for a

mother.

Rich Ives on the slow, steady movement of time in his poem "Building Materials". 

Each year, a little more of my house
is eaten by grass. 

The river along the route

Of the heart, close to

The most recent feeling, overflows

At each bloody corner

Dale Wisely with a brilliant found poem, "The Many Ways to Say 'Sorry' in Japanese.  

I owe you an apology for my behavior at work over the past few weeks.  Mistakes are often made in the passive voice. I've been coming in late each day, I've been distracted during meetings, and the projects I've been turning in have been full of errors and mistakes that I should've been able to catch. Did you never call? I waited for your call.