Bracken is thrilled to announce our nominees for 2027 Best of the Net: poetry and artwork from Issues XIV and XV!
Bracken Magazine
@brackenmagazine.bsky.social
An online literary journal publishing poetry and art inspired by the woods and its shadows. https://www.brackenmagazine.com/
"We pushed off and floated out into the stillness, as evening started to darken the woods and grain the light on the water." Enjoy Michael Hettich's poem "Forgiveness," plus "The Gloaming," in Issue XV of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xv/two...
Two Poems by Michael Hettich — Bracken
On my walk to town, I came across the body of an animal mangled so badly I couldn’t tell what it was…
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Bracken is open for submissions! Send us your poems, poetry translations, and visual art October 1 - November 30. See our guidelines here: www.brackenmagazine.com/submit.
"No more boots sliding on ferns and underbrush, the exhale of breath rising in the fog and scent of pine needles." Enjoy "Mushroom Hunting Elegy" by Sharon Hashimoto in the current issue of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xv/mus...
Mushroom Hunting Elegy by Sharon Hashimoto — Bracken
No dripping rain tickles trails inside the arms of our Gore-tex jackets, knuckles growing frosted as rounded stones, clutching burlap bags…
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"I changed my clothes behind a rock. We’re not looking at you someone said." From Thea Goodman's poem "Shell" in the current issue of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xv/she...
Shell by Thea Goodman — Bracken
I changed my clothes behind a rock. We’re not looking at you someone said.
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"Lilac. Dogwood. Bridal wreath. Lupin. Unidentified yellow songs I want to call tallulahs. Whatever we pick we name. In a collection, all the broken things become beautiful." Enjoy Sierra Golden's poem "Black Canyon" in the current issue of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xv/bla...
Black Canyon by Sierra Golden — Bracken
Between the apple picker’s cabin and the house a rabbit the size of a teacup trembles.
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“a thing to be lemoned, vinegared swallowed not chewed and once all is taken left in two” 🦪 ❤️ The rhythm of this poem tickles my brain’s fancy.
Bracken Magazine@brackenmagazine.bsky.social · 6mo ago"bivalves cracked at the spine plucked from seabed stripped for pearl’s iridescent light" Enjoy Leusa Lloyd's poem "I am oyster" in the current issue of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xiv/i-...
“Stay & we will offer you a kind of a kingdom, a kind of full palace-golden, only real life, yours this time.” 🌌 🦉 💛
Bracken Magazine@brackenmagazine.bsky.social · 6mo ago"We know you have collected rainstorms in soup bowls, coaxed hummingbirds to your bed-pillow." From @anyakirshbaum.bsky.social's "Forgetting the Constellations," one of two gorgeous poems featured in the current issue of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xiv/tw...
"It’s difficult for snow to be beautiful in March." From "Flurry" by Robbie Gamble @robbiegamblewriter.bsky.social in the current issue of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xv/flu...
Flurry by Robbie Gamble — Bracken
It’s difficult for snow to be beautiful in March.
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"Gray herringbone had become bark of a black oak, had tattered and taken the shape of volve, of turn..." Enjoy @bkfischer.bsky.social B.K. Fischer's poem "The Lichen Coat" in the current issue of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xv/the...
The Lichen Coat by B.K. Fischer — Bracken
The darkness came down hard that November, and when I took the coat out of the closet…
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"...when reflections of the orange-roofed boathouse and bare trees at the edge of the island sharpen and still, we take it as a kind of peace..." From David Edelman's poem "Small Sun" in the current issue of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xv/sma...
Small Sun by David Edelman — Bracken
When the drizzle finally thins out, when the wind dies down and the channel smooths, when reflections of the orange-roofed boathouse and bare trees at the edge of the island…
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"And the geese that fly overhead in October, how they sing each other home ... " From "October Geese" by Geoff Collins in the current issue of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xv/oct...
October Geese by Geoff Collins — Bracken
On our street, an elderly couple walks together each evening and it is easy to see how they cling to one another so tightly…
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"he jabs his beak into a nugget of mouse jeweling his talon" From "Cooper's Hawk" by Mary Buchinger @mebuchinger.bsky.social in the new issue of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xv/coo...
Cooper's Hawk by Mary Buchinger — Bracken
Cooper’s Hawk stands in the sun on a stout branch in the pine grove and barks cak-cak-cak
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"I clamber out and bend to see a shadow draped over the dark line..." Read Rebecca Bagget's poem "The Mouse" in the new issue of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xv/the...
The Mouse by Rebecca Baggett — Bracken
I am about to climb into the bed in this borrowed cabin, to burrow under the quilt
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Here's an appetizer from @jbaibel.bsky.social's poem "Forsythia Pavilion" in the new issue of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xv/for... "My father wanted to cut the overgrown all wild. I begged."
Forsythia Pavilion by Jonathan B. Aibel — Bracken
My father wanted to cut the overgrown all wild. I begged...
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Issue XV of Bracken is here! Enjoy reading www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xv/main
Issue XV — Bracken
We’re not very good at holding the truth of our fragility. Even when our bones are strong, our muscles thick with power, and our minds resolute with purpose, still, we are naked before the world’s bat...
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"Don’t think you can trespass in my garden & slip away clean No one walks out of a fairytale unscathed" Enjoy Diana Whitney's poem "Nightshade" in the current issue of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xiv/ni...
Nightshade by Diana Whitney — Bracken
When the potato turns green it’s poison Behold my glossy peppers
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"Sunlight reaches in, a hand that won’t commit." Enjoy "Houseplant" by Gordan Struić in the current issue of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xiv/ho...
Houseplant by Gordan Struić — Bracken
I water it the way I once spoke to you – too little, then too much.
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"if we are light then we must . . . return to the opaque objects, offer them our apologies . . ." Check out Erin Slomski-Pritz's poem "lineage" in the current issue of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xiv/li...
lineage by Erin Slomski-Pritz — Bracken
if we are light then we must travel by way of the line…
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"I was post and beam, mortise and tenon, tongue and groove. I was the whole construction built on friction’s bite." Enjoy "I Was the House," along with "Autumn Work Song," by @haydensaunier.bsky.social in the current issue of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xiv/tw...
Two Poems by Hayden Saunier — Bracken
I saw the storm come on. I held each window’s shiny eye in place. I rattled.
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"... I would watch the world unfold like the pattering steps of a pregnant cloud." Enjoy CP Nwankwo's "April, If I Could Flee" in the current issue of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xiv/ap...
April, If I Could Flee by CP Nwankwo — Bracken
April, if I could flee, I would. I would unbutton this body, peel it like the soft rind of an udara fruit
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"... an awe that’s part fear—the sharp blue shadows of cliffs bleaching us to smallness, to silence. " Check out Theresa Monteiro's "Dear Fernando, November" in the current issue of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xiv/de...
Dear Fernando, November by Theresa Monteiro — Bracken
Define the sublime? In the books we’re told to read here, poets say: guava skies, mountains of paradox
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"The inlet’s waves bare their teeth, seethe to shore. The grasses tremble, shark-colored clouds cruise the sky." Enjoy Jennifer Stewart Miller's "Gull and Mollusk," plus "To the Young Baltimore Oriole," in the current issue of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xiv/tw...
Two Poems by Jennifer Stewart Miller — Bracken
You should have been sipping nectar all winter in some green, voluptuous place far south of here. But October turned to November turned to December
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Compelling photography of India's stepwells by Claudio Cambon in the current issue of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xiv/cl...
Claudio Cambon — Bracken
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Enjoy landscape photography by Michael Miller in the current issue of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xiv/mi...
Michael Miller — Bracken
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Beautiful aquatic artwork by Charles B. Bowers in the current issue of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xiv/ch...
Charles B. Bowers — Bracken
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"... clocks became unreliable, their minutes spilling like old coins using the last currency of hours." Enjoy Jane Medved's "In the time before," as well as "follow the river and you will get to the sea," in the current issue of Bracken: www.brackenmagazine.com/issue-xiv/tw...
Two Poems by Jane Medved — Bracken
Follow the river and you will get to the sea says the proverb but today is not flowing any which way and if you've traveled the Mississippi you'd know there are tree stumps logs hazardous debris…
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