Tag: Morrow Dowdle

Two Poems by Morrow Dowdle

~ ONE ART ~ 3 Comments

My Friend Tells Me He’s a Felon

The term comes down from Old French,
its Latin root meaning bile. It makes mine rise
on the spring morning he recounts an old story—
three cops surrounded him at a community pool,
claimed he stole a watch at the local Target.
Cuffed in front of everyone, he was hauled off
in cold, wet trunks. They withheld evidence,
put him in a cell. He shivered until his wife arrived
with that month’s rent—the bail. He says he’s innocent
but took the plea because he didn’t know better.
Now, he needs work but can’t get hired—and here
I thought that full-time father was his calling, not fallout
from a system’s tricks. He’s still the man
I meet for playdates at this park, who brings
frosted flower cookies for the kids and trusts
in me, I who have been untrustworthy in my time,
have broken the law more than once, by luck
or demographic never caught. I hold his secret
like a bright green moth. Next week, we’ll go
camping, we say, sprawling on the mossy bank.
We watch our boys pitch rocks in the creek.

*

Confession

The guy outside the club wearing a dirty priest getup
and patent go-go boots says he likes my clutch,
its red pop against my black dress. Calls it fetch.

We take drags from my cigarette and I tell him
it was once a makeup bag, stolen from my sister
when she went to rehab. He raises an eyebrow,

I explain that we were teens, it was her third try
at sobriety. So I nicked it, plus a flimsy blouse
and necklace, beads the pink of a baby’s lips,

pendant a ceramic hibiscus. And birth control pills—
I mean, she left them. I just downed them for my own
protection. I wanted to make something of myself,

and it sure wasn’t a parent. It wasn’t my fault
she returned pregnant. Her CDs stayed zipped
safe in their case. I never liked Dave Matthews, Oasis,

all those jam bands ripping off the Grateful Dead.
I wasn’t grateful living in that house in her absence.
Without her comparison, I was the bad daughter,

getting all our father’s bad attention.
If I could, I’d give it all back. Pilgrimage
to where she still lives with our mother,

having never quite gotten it together. I’d lay
my plunder at her feet, give her a pedicure,
beg her forgiveness for being callous,

for being a bitch to her when we were little kids.
But we haven’t spoken in twenty years.
It isn’t because of what I took—no.

I can’t tell this priest it’s what our father
stole from us when we didn’t know it.
What we let him get away with once we did.

*

Morrow Dowdle is the author of the chapbook Hardly (Bottlecap Press, 2024) and the forthcoming chapbook Missing Woman. Their poems have been featured or are forthcoming in Rattle, New York Quarterly, Southeast Review, Stonecoast Review, The Baltimore Review, and ONE ART, among other literary journals. They have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, Best of the Net, and the 2024 Red Wheelbarrow Poetry Prize. They run a performance series which features BIPOC and LGBTQIA+ voices and are pursuing their creative writing MFA at Spalding University. They live in Durham, NC. Find out more on Instagram @morrowdowdle.

ONE ART’s 2026 Pushcart Prize Nominations

~ ONE ART ~ 2 Comments

ONE ART’s 2026 Pushcart Prize Nominations

Moudi Sbeity – Whale Shark
Morrow Dowdle – And Then, We Hear It
Veronica Tucker – Once, on the Oncology Floor
Hilary Sideris – Net Worth
Francesca Leader – Weights & Measures
Anne Starling – Conversations with My Son

§

Whale Shark

A whale shark, according to the five year old at
the climbing gym, is what happens when a whale
eats a shark. Just like that. It’s simple. Everything
is separate and when two things join they just
add to another. The shark doesn’t die in this story.
Nothing changes. The world is still safe, predictable.
The whale shark was his favorite tattoo, but now it’s
erased. My full sleeve tattoos don’t erase though,
and they’re the biggest ones he’s seen. Like really big.
Like really really big. I thought of how when sorrow
consumes joy they don’t simply add to each other,
but become poignant. And when gratitude spills
into grief together they create the conditions for
surrender. Or even how water and flour make bread,
not Water Flour. Some things get lost along the way.
But I didn’t tell him this; that a whale shark is actually
a shark, just a really big one. I wanted more to believe
in the simplicity of his world, in the authenticity of
how things join, then come apart, and in the process
nothing is changed, no one dies. We just continue to
appear and disappear into each other’s lives unaffected,
our innocence not yet capable of breaking.

*

Moudi Sbeity is a first-generation Lebanese-American currently enrolled in the Mindfulness-Based Transpersonal Counseling masters program at Naropa University. Prior to attending Naropa, they co-owned and operated a Lebanese restaurant in Salt Lake City, which served as a queer safe space. Moudi was also a named plaintiff in Kitchen v. Herbert, the landmark case that brought marriage equality to Utah in 2014. As a person who stutters, they are passionate about writing and poetry as transpersonal practices in self-expression.

Moudi’s poems have appeared in the following anthologies; Irreplaceable by Nan Seymour and Terry Tempest Williams (Moon In The Rye Press, 2025), Love Is For All Of Us by James Crews (Storey Publishing, May 2025), The Nature Of Our Times by Luisa A. Igloria (Paloma Press, Fall 2025). Moudi’s first book, Habibi Means Beloved, a memoir on growing up queer and stuttering in Lebanon, is expected to be published in late 2026 by University of Utah Press.

§

And Then, We Hear It

That is, I hear it, and then
she enters my bedroom.
Face stricken.

I heard it, she says. Something
booming. I don’t correct her,
don’t say shooting.

The book of essays stays
open on my lap. I’m reading
the scholar’s message

to the would-be confessional poet.
Their recommendation? Your verse
should be more gospel

than gossip. The only hymn
at present a ringing in my ears.
Aren’t you scared?

she asks. I tell again the saddest
lie—No, I reply. I cut her
loose in her fear, make

my face maddeningly flat.
And what could I say about
the stray bullet that found me

in Chicago. Or the ones
that fly by no accident
into a brother’s or sister’s

chest or head. Men do kill,
whether it’s bird or deer
or a queer who’s been known

to hold a red card, sitting
out here in the country
with my daughter,

where the KKK still lurks
in corners. Then there’s
the adrenaline of executive
orders, the line not far
from Klan to militia.
It’s probably someone

hammering, she says.
Yes, I say. I like that
explanation. I like us

to think that someone’s
out there in the dark
on a silver ladder, nails

sprouting from their mouth.
So eager to build a house
they could not wait for morning.

*

Morrow Dowdle is a two-time Pushcart Prize nominee and the author of the micro-chapbook Hardly (Bottlecap Press, 2024). Their work can be found in New York Quarterly, The Baltimore Review, Pedestal Magazine, and other publications. They run a performance series which features BIPOC and LGBTQIA+ voices. They are an MFA candidate at Pacific University and live in Durham, NC.

§

Once, on the Oncology Floor

A teenager asked
if he’d ever drive again.
No one knew what to say.
So I showed him
how to press the nurse call button
like it was an ignition switch.
He laughed,
and for a minute,
the hallway turned
into an open road.

That night
I dreamed of him
parallel parking
between stars.
I woke with the memory
of his hand
gripping the rail
as if it were
a steering wheel.

*

Veronica Tucker is an emergency medicine and addiction medicine physician, as well as a mother of three. Her work appears in redrosethorns, Red Eft Review, and Medmic, with additional pieces forthcoming. Find her at www.veronicatuckerwrites.com or on Instagram @veronicatuckerwrites.

§

Net Worth

I watch the news & file
my statement of net worth,
sign a retainer stating I won’t date
until divorced. Mom loves Sam,

a man my age who lives with her
(locked out of his wife’s house,
his name not on the deed).
No one has ever treated her so well.

Ecstatic to have someone to cook for,
she wonders what sex will be like.
My father wasn’t nice. I have his eyes,
& the bags under them. At church

folks talk. Sam promises he’ll build
a mansion soon, maybe they’ll move
to Spain. Incredulous, she tells me
He even finds my phone.

*

Hilary Sideris is the author of Un Amore Veloce (Kelsay Books 2019), The Silent B (Dos Madres Press 2019), Animals in English (Dos Madres Press 2020), and Liberty Laundry (Dos Madres Press 2022.) Her new collection, Calliope, is now available from Broadstone. Sideris works as a professional developer for CUNY Start, a program for underserved, limited-income students at The City University of New York. She can be found online at hilarysiderispoetry.com

§

Weights & Measures

I still don’t know how
You can compliment a girl
Without infecting her,

Say she’s perfect
Without seeding worry
Of when she won’t be

Anymore, span her
Waist with hands
Amarvel at its minuteness

Without encoding
Lovability as the ability
To fit inside something

Else, submit to
Subsumption. I still don’t
Know how you can

Expect a girl’s soul
Not to snag on BMI charts,
Measurements, bodyfat

Ratios, celebrity weight
Loss and “Half My Size” stories,
Because they’re

Everywhere—number-shaped
Briars ensnarling all
Paths to self-acceptance—

Or tell her to inure,
Ignore, be tough but soft,
A paradox, like vanity sizing

That makes her crave
The labels that anoint her
A 2 and damn the brands

That brand her a 12,
As if she could be “S”
And “L” at once,

Survive the truth
Of weighing & measuring how
Much she matters in inverse

Proportion to how much
(Always too much) matter
She comprises, for bodies

Most loved are the
Bodies that least exist.
I still don’t know how

You can call a girl
Beautiful because she’s thin
Or ugly because she isn’t

Without engendering
Pathology, a fixation sickness
On what is visible

Instead of what is whole.

*

Francesca Leader has poetry published or forthcoming in Abyss & Apex, HAD, Broadkill Review, Stone Circle, The Storms Journal, and elsewhere. Her poems have been nominated for Best of the Net (2025) and Best Spiritual Literature (2025). Her debut poetry chapbook, “Like Wine or Like Pain,” is available from Bottlecap Press. Learn more about her work at inabucketthemoon.wordpress.com.

§

Conversations with My Son

The longest one lasted twelve minutes.
I held my breath.
He was happy. He had something to tell me.
He was leaving.
He was almost gone.
I can still see us together at that moment,
Nick at thirteen, sitting on the sun porch floor,
playing with the dog’s ears, his whole face
open to me as he talked about his two new
friends, his new school. Open as the weed-
flowers he used to rush inside to bestow
when he was little. So then,
I wasn’t thinking about starting dinner,
or of the magazine article I’d set aside.
Or of the word he’d used— “mavericks”—
to describe the trio of classmates he
so proudly
claimed to lead. I was trying to be happy;
I was happy for him. The world would soon turn
unrecognizable, would become something
I couldn’t imagine. Not the world: of course
I mean life. I mean my life. From then on,
the world was smoldering, until everything
went up in flames. I could show you.
I have the ashes.

*

Anne Starling is a poet from Florida. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Rattle, The Southern Review, New Ohio Review, and Tampa Review, among other journals. Her poem “Shoe Store” appeared in Missouri Review Online as Poem of the Week.

§

Two Poems by Morrow Dowdle

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I Decline the Order of Protection

I knew I had landed in Oregon because the airport speakers
were playing 80s goth rock and there were lots of people dressed
like skater punks or lumberjacks retrieving their luggage.
And the bathroom was all-gender, white and bright-lit
as a futuristic chapel, each stall with a door fully flush
with the floor. I stepped up to the bank of sinks
beside a buttoned-up cop. I admit I’m still scared of men
sometimes, and my mother-in-law’s crime dramas don’t help.
But not there, the officer and I just trying to eliminate
our bodies’ waste. He wasn’t pretending to be a man—
he was a man. Nor was the woman in the church bathroom
back home pretending to be a woman. Nor was she afraid
to wear a leather jacket and skirt to the service—that requires
real courage. She was taking her two little girls to pee,
each whining on the toilet. I was washing my son’s hands
as he resisted the soap. The woman and her kids came out,
and she and I rolled our eyes at each other, no longer
strangers as we sympathized about how our children
drive us nuts. She was just any other mother except
for the small lump at her throat that can never go away.
As if she carries some small sadness. And goes on anyway.

*

And Then, We Hear It

That is, I hear it, and then
she enters my bedroom.
Face stricken.

I heard it, she says. Something
booming. I don’t correct her,
don’t say shooting.

The book of essays stays
open on my lap. I’m reading
the scholar’s message

to the would-be confessional poet.
Their recommendation? Your verse
should be more gospel

than gossip. The only hymn
at present a ringing in my ears.
Aren’t you scared?

she asks. I tell again the saddest
lie—No, I reply. I cut her
loose in her fear, make

my face maddeningly flat.
And what could I say about
the stray bullet that found me

in Chicago. Or the ones
that fly by no accident
into a brother’s or sister’s

chest or head. Men do kill,
whether it’s bird or deer
or a queer who’s been known

to hold a red card, sitting
out here in the country
with my daughter,

where the KKK still lurks
in corners. Then there’s
the adrenaline of executive
orders, the line not far
from Klan to militia.
It’s probably someone

hammering, she says.
Yes, I say. I like that
explanation. I like us

to think that someone’s
out there in the dark
on a silver ladder, nails

sprouting from their mouth.
So eager to build a house
they could not wait for morning.

*

Morrow Dowdle is a two-time Pushcart Prize nominee and the author of the micro-chapbook Hardly (Bottlecap Press, 2024). Their work can be found in New York Quarterly, The Baltimore Review, Pedestal Magazine, and other publications. They run a performance series which features BIPOC and LGBTQIA+ voices. They are an MFA candidate at Pacific University and live in Durham, NC.

Two Poems by Morrow Dowdle

~ ONE ART ~ 3 Comments

Sleight

I have no idea how he does it, this man
with his braids like pretzel twists,
polo shirt red, color of his profession.

He’s ready with two lovely assistants.
One to distract with the promise
of stickers. The other to step forward
if there’s any resistance.

The magician draws back the tiny arrow.
His fingers flick. The needle leaps
into my son’s small wrist. The boy

doesn’t feel it. His blood slides
smooth into one vial, then two.
The magician slips out the needle quick
as he sank it, and there’s a bandage

over the puncture. He never smiles.
The children that come here need more
than magic. He’s just a passing trick.

*

Bones

If we’d had Appalachian grannies,
         they might have shown us how

to throw those bones, inspect
         angle, shape, and crack,

connect with ancestral knowing.
         Instead, this was New Jersey,

and the most friendless girl I knew
         was digging up her dead cat

for the fifteenth time, though this
         was the first I’d seen of it.

No shaman, no peddler of relics,
         she just wanted to see her again,

so she laid out the bones one by one
         from the softening shoebox,

putting the skeleton in order:
         Hyoid, clavicle, carpal and radius.

Gibbous scapula and matchstick ribs.
         Pelvis ring that sprung one litter.

Each lonely vertebra. The tail’s spindly chain.
         The skull she did not set

on dark March soil, but cuddled it
         to her left breast bud.

I was afraid of the two gaping craters
         where green orbits had lived,

the ghastly fangs. The girl asked,
         Wasn’t she beautiful?

I was trying to be more to her
         than witness, but this sealed it—

yes, our mothers sad dumbly
         in their kitchens while our fathers

drank themselves numb—but we would
         never be connected.

I could never dig up a dead cat.
         I could never love something that much.

*

Morrow Dowdle is a two-time Pushcart Prize nominee and the author of the micro-chapbook Hardly (Bottlecap Press, 2024). Their work can be found in New York Quarterly, The Baltimore Review, Pedestal Magazine, and other publications. They run a performance series which features BIPOC and LGBTQIA+ voices. They are an MFA candidate at Pacific University and live in Durham, NC.