Roanoke Review
  • Home
  • 2025 Issue
  • Poetry Fiction & Nonfiction Archive
  • Interviews Reviews Podcasts Galleries
  • Eco-Poetry Contest Anthology 2022 Young Writers Issue 2023 Young Writers Issue 2024 Young Writers Issue 2025 Young Writers Issue
  • High School Writing Contest
  • Submit
  • Contact
  • About Us

Roanoke Review

  • Home/
  • 2025 Issue/
  • All Issues/
    • Poetry
    • Fiction & Nonfiction
    • Archive
  • Features/
    • Interviews
    • Reviews
    • Podcasts
    • Galleries
  • Special Issues/
    • Eco-Poetry Contest
    • Anthology
    • 2022 Young Writers Issue
    • 2023 Young Writers Issue
    • 2024 Young Writers Issue
    • 2025 Young Writers Issue
  • High School Writing Contest/
  • Submit/
  • Contact/
  • About Us/

Roanoke Review

Volume XLV

2020 Poetry Backpage

Roanoke Review

  • Home/
  • 2025 Issue/
  • All Issues/
    • Poetry
    • Fiction & Nonfiction
    • Archive
  • Features/
    • Interviews
    • Reviews
    • Podcasts
    • Galleries
  • Special Issues/
    • Eco-Poetry Contest
    • Anthology
    • 2022 Young Writers Issue
    • 2023 Young Writers Issue
    • 2024 Young Writers Issue
    • 2025 Young Writers Issue
  • High School Writing Contest/
  • Submit/
  • Contact/
  • About Us/
April 30, 2020

the springsign of today is a lie

April 30, 2020/ Roanoke Review

the springsign of today is a lie
we will ourselves believe
this mountain ruse
of air & hope

Read More
April 30, 2020/ Roanoke Review/
Poetry
Roanoke Review, poetry2020, Jim Wardell, the springsign of today is a lie
April 30, 2020

My Wife Invites Her Ex-Boyfriend to Lunch

April 30, 2020/ Roanoke Review

She tells me Justin had good jokes,
good manners, was a card shark
and a militant Baptist. They broke up
because she always burst into giggles

Read More
April 30, 2020/ Roanoke Review/
Poetry
Roanoke Review, poetry2020, joe cottonwood, my wife invites her ex-boyfriend to lunch
April 30, 2020

Two Poems

April 30, 2020/ Roanoke Review

for trees they are formidable / thus the name / giants as if
they’re mythic / as if they know something we don’t / when we start

through the eerie tunnel it’s still early / foggy / Hanne asks me
to put on spooky music / says she feels like we’re trespassing

Read More
April 30, 2020/ Roanoke Review/
Poetry
Roanoke Review, poetry2020, Karah Kemmerly, bad animals, avenue of giants
April 30, 2020

The Street You Can't Uncross

April 30, 2020/ Roanoke Review

The last time you held my hand

to cross the road, I knew

you would never hold it again,

I’d have to go it alone.

Read More
April 30, 2020/ Roanoke Review/
Poetry
the street you can't uncross, meghan mcclure, Roanoke Review, poetry2020
March 30, 2020

Many Years Ago We Parted From the Sunny Mountainside

March 30, 2020/ Roanoke Review

On the east side of I-
81, sunflowers are

jading, but still tall as me.
On the west side, three silos,

Read More
March 30, 2020/ Roanoke Review/
Poetry
Roanoke Review, Andy Fogle, poetry2020, Many Years Ago We Parted from the Sunny Mountainside
March 30, 2020

Hat

March 30, 2020/ Roanoke Review

The hat on my head wants to jump off the cliff each time the wind rises.
It wants to pour the darkness down its throat, into its belly.
It wishes to hold the small fate of a blade of grass in its arms.
It does not want to be worshipped by me.

Read More
March 30, 2020/ Roanoke Review/
Poetry
Roanoke Review, poetry2020, Sinyun Fang, Hat
March 30, 2020

Bob Dylan in Concert at 77

March 30, 2020/ Roanoke Review

Some baby boomers doze in the dark hall;
others, grey or hairless, travel back,
flower children impatient for the sun to set.

Read More
March 30, 2020/ Roanoke Review/
Poetry
poetry2020, gaby bedetti, Roanoke Review, bob dylan in concert at 77
March 30, 2020

Résistance

March 30, 2020/ Roanoke Review

A red balloon wafts
over a paddock of horses
near Haworth. It lifts
on bursts of air that reverse

Read More
March 30, 2020/ Roanoke Review/
Poetry
Roanoke Review, Annette Sisson, Resistance, poetry2020
March 30, 2020

Two Poems by Clayton Krollman

March 30, 2020/ Roanoke Review

The tower tells lies. In the tower, I go through rooms upon rooms of mostly velvet. The velvet is not always blue.

Read More
March 30, 2020/ Roanoke Review/
Poetry
Roanoke Review, poetry2020, Feed the Tiger, I Go Into My Head and Emerge with a Lamp, Clayton Krollman
February 29, 2020

Haste

February 29, 2020/ Roanoke Review

You can no longer get there
and if you did
you wouldn’t know it

Read More
February 29, 2020/ Roanoke Review/
Poetry
Roanoke Review, poetry2020, Haste, Philip Newton
February 29, 2020

After Rapture

February 29, 2020/ Roanoke Review

The clocks are stopped
still you know it’s time
to take down the leashes
and walk the whimpering dogs

Read More
February 29, 2020/ Roanoke Review/
Poetry
Roanoke Review, Clay Waters, poetry2020, After Rapture
February 29, 2020

Stardust

February 29, 2020/ Roanoke Review

The sun touches everything
and yet you can’t quite see it. I never knew

how a child’s voice could break up the silence

Read More
February 29, 2020/ Roanoke Review/
Poetry
Roanoke Review, poetry2020, Stardust, Frances Koziar
February 29, 2020

Judgment

February 29, 2020/ Roanoke Review

After some drinks
if he smashes his fist
on their Olive Garden table
and slurs an insult,

Read More
February 29, 2020/ Roanoke Review/
Poetry
Roanoke Review, poetry2020, Judgment, Robert Manaster
January 30, 2020

Decompensated

January 30, 2020/ Roanoke Review

During the week we eloped, your eyes bulged
as shiny and sleepless as supermoons,
then you asked if I were dead, sounding doubtful
and agitated like everyone who meets me.

Read More
January 30, 2020/ Roanoke Review/
Poetry
Roanoke Review, rick viar, decompensated, poetry2020
January 30, 2020

Attendance

January 30, 2020/ Roanoke Review

We could collapse it, the umbrella,
and not get wet. But we hold it aloft
between us so we can be close.

Read More
January 30, 2020/ Roanoke Review/
Poetry
Roanoke Review, attendance, sean madden, poetry2020
December 29, 2019

Made and Unmade

December 29, 2019/ Roanoke Review

Made and unmade,
we make stories and call them memories
make memories and call them identity,
make identity and call it dream,

Read More
December 29, 2019/ Roanoke Review/
Poetry
poetry2020, Roanoke Review, mc rush, Made and Unmade
December 29, 2019

Portrait of My Grandfather in Late-Stage Dementia

December 29, 2019/ Roanoke Review

& so how can the mind           /           so vast & intricate
one day forget where to bathe             /           or how to breathe

Read More
December 29, 2019/ Roanoke Review/
Poetry
poetry2020, Roanoke Review, Adam Gianforcaro, Portrait of My Grandfather in Late-Stage Dementia
December 29, 2019

What Comes Easy

December 29, 2019/ Roanoke Review

becoming is easy enough for most of us to get at least part
of it right       loving is easy compared to being loved
hating, too

Read More
December 29, 2019/ Roanoke Review/
Poetry
poetry2020, Roanoke Review, John Blair, What Comes Easy
December 29, 2019

Two Poems by A. Molotkov

December 29, 2019/ Roanoke Review

Each instant, a shadow
of the one before. I
am the shadow of a shadow

Read More
December 29, 2019/ Roanoke Review/
Poetry
Roanoke Review, poetry2020, A Molotkov, Bridging Memory, Theory
  • Previous
  • 2020 Poetry Backpage
  • Home/
  • 2025 Issue/
  • All Issues/
    • Poetry
    • Fiction & Nonfiction
    • Archive
  • Features/
    • Interviews
    • Reviews
    • Podcasts
    • Galleries
  • Special Issues/
    • Eco-Poetry Contest
    • Anthology
    • 2022 Young Writers Issue
    • 2023 Young Writers Issue
    • 2024 Young Writers Issue
    • 2025 Young Writers Issue
  • High School Writing Contest/
  • Submit/
  • Contact/
  • About Us/

Roanoke Review