LEONARD FRANZÉN & PAUL ILECHKO

LEONARD FRANZÉN

TOURIST

There’s an Asian dad
feeding his infant son
with a cheeseburger
at a geyser

I realize I’m in a
crowd of people
staring at boiling
water

I realize that there
is just a cheeseburger
and an infant
separating me from
the Asian dad

I am just material

I don’t know what
I am doing or
what my purpose is

All these places
are just places
we go

Leonard Franzén (b. 1987). Lives in Malmö, Sweden. Studies creative writing at Lund University.

PAUL ILECHKO

THE TOWER

Blackness, almost. Upward corkscrewing.
A sudden blast of windowed garish luster.
Underhand the smoothing brassy.
Memorial to a polishing generation.

Who climbed these very stairs?
Curving twisting stone, then sudden evacuation.
A blinding precarious platform.
Distant glitter of spume, reflecting fiery ball.

Overseen. Such lush and fertile domain.
Taking no prisoners. Softly flowing, this river.
Through these same fields. Beneath us,
our erect and vigilant tower atop its sylvan hill.

Paul Ilechko was born in England but has lived most of his life in the USA. He currently lives in Lambertville, NJ with his girlfriend and a cat. Paul has had poetry published and/or accepted recently by Third Wednesday, Ibis Head Review, Poetry Pacific, The Peacock Journal, Muddy River Review and Slag Review, among others.