happy April. so cool as to be the cruelest, so drool as to be Poetry Month. we’re all poesie and visualie in the first issue of our third year in lit mag humus. publish your own im/perfect beauty in Blog Forum, featuring Melissa Carl. get on the mailing list. send your most riveting work to Toad. still free of hubris, flying low in Mother Earth’s gravy boat: check it out: check in:



Matthew Olzmann


The Raising of Lazarus

“I have said all kinds of things that were never true.”


At Panda Express

“the final candle is always the one that tries to stay lit”


All of it is Fading from View

“Yesterday, you pulled a muscle in your back
reaching for the phone.”


Aleksey Yudzon



Alan Habhab


Pears and Birds

“Now-a-days, hunting pears for sport is rare.”


The Pond

“aluminum fish: pickerel or bass”


Sandra Dyas



Suzanne Marie Hopcroft


Proof of Proposition 2

“a borrowed oboe can plump
the insufficient music”


John Popielaski


Novice

“I’m still dependent on the match”


Emma Bolden


Melancholy Inside the Body

“There are too many
sunsets. Every watch is lost.”


José Arenas



Melissa Carl


Postcard from My Own December

“My Thai friend tells me, “you have good ghosts.””


Departure

“Her mind is usually a hive”


Yeon Ji Yoo



Peter Berghoef


Little Waves

“we are sick of seeing it”


Margaret Graber


The Ghost of Robert Frost Visits in a Dream

“wormholes in the night sky
you can make in your kitchen”


Sean Brown


Ten Thousand Shields and Spears

“laughed
at my ineptitude with cold’s rules—”