On the 6th of October—after almost a year of war—tanks surround Jabalia camp for the second time, attacking hospitals and preventing anyone from entering or leaving. People flood into our area laden with belongings, barrels of water, crates of food and drink, blankets and mattresses. They’ve learned the hard way...

At his Basilica, the ivory horn
St. Francis used to call people to prayer
rather than dogs to hunt small creatures
hangs in a glass box, gift of a Muslim sultan,
a wooden cylinder later strung with chains
& used to beat disciples to attention.

In my mother tongue, the word for “inarticulate”—косноязыкий—means, literally, “bone-tongued.” It’s the physicality evoked that compels me: the hard, smooth quality of the tongue rendered as a bone in the mouth, the whole apparatus capable of grinding words into dust like a mortar and pestle.

There are bats in the attic. From my office, where I spend most of my waking hours, I can hear them. They live just above my head. Chittering. A screech, a crinkle. I know the babies are up there, just above the far eastern corner of the ceiling, hairless and pink. And then one appeared dead on the...

Rita Dove, former U.S. Poet Laureate, is the recipient of the Pulitzer Prize, the Duke Ellington Lifetime Achievement Award, the National Humanities Medal, the Heinz Award, the NAACP Great American Artist Award, and numerous other awards. She is a chancellor of the Academy of American Poets and edit...

Staslow had driven up Coyote Road and down our steep drive for nine years now. Each Friday morning, I anticipated the zip of his hand brake when he pulled in next to our house. Then the sound as he unlatched the tailgate of his pickup and let it drop so that it caught on its own chains. Stas was an ...