All Categories

Red Flag is so much more than just postcards!

We also publish digitally, via the Poetry Express. This format gives us the freedom to publish work that won’t fit on a postcard.

On this page, you will find all of our past Poetry Express poems with information about their authors. If you like these poems and want to get even more poetry delivered to your mailbox, head on over to our subscribe page!

***NOTE: Red Flag Poetry Express has become a purely website based digital publication as of April 2020. This shift offers us even more freedom on what we can publish, allowing for longer or more dynamic works. To clarify, the Red Flag Poetry physical postcard publications will continue to be mailed out monthly per usual.

Lilia Dobos: "Pollination"

5/21/2020

Pollination

Among the summer green
we walk with adolescent
palms picking honeysuckle and sharing
our sweet. He picks the good

ones for me and tells me to lick
the nectar. We race
to the house and back, catching

our breaths, faces
blushed, and golden
heat.
I remember

the backyard trail and its dust:
the dirty taste

in my mouth. I wonder what we
said on those walks, our prepubescent
legs carrying sweat and grime. I give him
a bracelet that says sexy and run

away, far too young to commit
to such a statement, far
too shy to admit
I want to.

Lilia is a current graduate student studying English at Salisbury University, where she also teaches Research and Composition. Her poems have been published in Barely South Review, New Mexico Review, The Shore, and elsewhere.

Matthew Jones: "On Laughing Woman with Ice Cream Cone"

4/16/2020

On Laughing Woman with Ice Cream Cone

He was this little guy
with a camera
Reflection faint
in the window
Claimed he only photographed
Beautiful Women
a cement mixer
churning
promise of fame
invitation for drinks
and that’s when I laughed

Matthew Jones lives and works in Massachusetts. His writing appears in The Worcester Review, Sheila-Na-Gig Online, and Vita Brevis Poetry Magazine. He graduated from Tufts University and Northeastern University School of Law. When not working, writing or spending time with family, he fronts the band, Col. Pike & The Expedition.
http://www.col-pike.com

Kristina Heflin: "Unbecoming"

4/3/2020

Unbecoming

Like the Tortoise and the Hedgehog,
Best Beloved,
I became something I was not
to protect myself.
A strange, exotic creature
all sliding scales and sly, slanted snout
suspicious of the world I lived in –
but that was not me.
So I began to shed my armour
bit by bit, plate by plate
until I was left so very raw and unprotected.
Ah, but finally! –
the glow of the sun on my back
the tickle of the breeze on my cheek
the kiss of grass on my feet –
finally I was free.

Kristina Heflin is the author of the chapbook, iridescent rubble, now available on Amazon. She has served on the editorial board of the literary journal Flumes and been published in journals such as Canyon Voices, Fearsome Critters, Shelia-Na-Gig, Coffin Bell, and Broad River Review among many others. When she’s not writing, she enjoys riding her horse, Lucero, and hiking with her Carolina Dog, Jessie. Visit her at www.sagasandmythos.com, on Facebook @klheflin, and Twitter @KristinaHeflin

Cassandra Baumgardner: "Why I Play Horror Games With the Contrast Turned Up

3/5/2020

Why I Play Horror Games With the Contrast Turned Up

And I have a lot to say.
Too much.
More than
any
one person
should.
It's as if I'm running out of time,
downing streams of thoughts faster than a glass of bourbon.

Cassandra Baumgardner is stuck in a constant state of wonder in the deep woods of central Pennsylvania. She's rarely seen without a book or cup of tea, and often daydreams of far away lands. With the exception of a few local poetry competitions, she's never had her work published. She's a spirited cybersecurity and risk analyst whose other biggest hobbies include cosplaying, urban exploration, and staring at the stars.

Sophia Foss: "The First Language"

1/28/2020

The First Language
Your questioning comes from a different plane,
between chicken noodle soup and the color peach.

I debate a cover-up before reason reminds me you’d compare the marks to space’s sky.

Silence teaches us its language,
far more archaic than Hebrew or Hieroglyphics-
we learn it fast.

I can go back a century in my room and meet you
to hear monologues in a breath;
making promises in the lines of the upturned corners of our lips.

Sophia Foss is a junior Professional Writing major at Western Connecticut State University in Danbury. Currently unpublished, she aspires to release a book of selected poems inspired by raising awareness to mental health issues. She is thrilled to share her work with Red Flag Poetry and its community of readers and writers.

Morgan Plessner: "Paella"

12/26/2019

Paella

I have family recipes for paella
and early death.

Shoot the rabbit, I’m told.
There is saffron rice boiling over on the stovetop
and where is the female hare,
ripe, ready, aching for me to shoot?
It’s easy. After, pick the snails from the tomato vine.

Eat up road, they tell me.
Everything’s rained out, I have glasses for night
driving and every time I hug a curve, little tabs
of Dramamine roll in my cupholder
as if to say: don’t.

But I still drive at night, still listen
for the early morning call to come home
amid the great racket of waking up.
I strain, listening, for breath leased from the dead,
waiting for something to whisper back.

Morgan Plessner is a poet with her MFA from the University of New Hampshire. She has been published in Ink & Voices, Foliate Oak, and Underwood Press's Black Works, with publications forthcoming in Allegory Ridge and Reality Break Press.

Shannon Kernaghan: "Unanticipated Risks"

11/11/2019

Unanticipated Risks

He invested his affections, weekly earnings
and she lapped it up, heavy cream
couldn’t get enough of that sweet stuff

his personal assets rose along
with his self-esteem, until she drilled deep
posing unanticipated risks

when he lost his job and found her cold shoulder
he had to cap spending, write-down their relationship
a premature devaluation as if his teeth yellowed
hair thinned and abs slackened too early
she will haunt him, his losses
stay on the books.

Shannon Kernaghan's work appears in books, magazines, and journals. For years she wrote a weekly newspaper column and she continues to tell her stories at www.ShannonKernaghan.com. This poem is from her latest collection Slippery.

Jules Gates: "National Coming Out Day"

10/28/2019

National Coming Out Day

All I remember is her name was Cindy
And she called herself a bulldog
And we were 2 innocent kids
Doing what kids will do
Because that was before homosexuality existed
So her mother would leave us alone
In the pool for 3 hours
And then reappear with sandwiches and lemonade
After we had quite exhausted ourselves
Swimming, probing, diving in and out
As we did on girl scout camping trips
Outside the building at Bible school
At the roller-skating rink
In my backyard and bedroom
And no one was the wiser
Because we were 2 young girls
Getting it on
On the down low

Jules Gates, Associate Professor of English in the EML Department at Angelo State University (ASU), has worked since 2002 on the ASU Writers Conference, conducted an interview with Terrance Hayes (2009), chaired the Conference for 2 years (Mary Karr 2010/Art Spiegleman 2011). Her poetry is widely published in Texas and throughout the country.

Joumana Altallal: "Self-Portrait"

10/1/2019

Self-Portrait
Wadi As-Salaam

The last time a body is washed,
scent of olive oil soap and tap water,
two inseparable corpses:
always a woman burying herself
with camphor, lotus leaves, a steady hand
in a land that swallows, all of Najaf
is a graveyard
of holy, holy, holy.

Afandi, Yusufi, Lalankee

When Yusuf Afandi brought mandarin saplings
from the island of Malta did he know
they would be given so many names?
to peel the skin of the afandi
is to peel language, to place it in the mouth
and let it run.

Okra necklace

Even after Taita dies, Jiddou remembers
to bring home bags of okra, dried and strung
onto necklaces of thread.

Talisman: Prophet Yusuf’s Shirt

When you (peace be upon you)
tied this shirt
around your brother’s hand
did you know it was written
the sun, the moon, and the eleven stars
bowing, to be thrown
in the well
and still rise
like water, to remember
despite the dismemberment.

Joumana Altallal was born in Baghdad to Iraqi and Lebanese parents. After completing her B.A. at the University of Virginia, she began her M.F.A at the University of Michigan, where she is currently a second-year candidate. She works with Citywide Poets to lead an after-school poetry program for high school students in Dearborn, Michigan. Her work appears in Poets Reading the News, Mikrokosmos, and Alternating Current, among others.

Dannielle McCain: "Immersion"

9/2/2019

--Immersion--

I want to immerse myself in your ocean
Engulfed by your flowing sea
Deep blue so far to explore,
I lose myself within.
I want to dive deep,
deep,
and find no bottom
And never be bored of the sound
Of your waves crashing around me.
—But there’s a chance I’m overestimating your depth
So desperate for Immersion
I drown myself in a puddle just to get my face wet
And maybe that’s the mistake being made
Searching for the ocean in a drinking glass
Looking for the cosmos in an ocean
Perhaps your glittering surface is nothing
But a reflection of my own marvelous galaxy.

Dannielle McCain is not published. She is not well known in the world of popular literature and fiction. She has not been accredited with numerous writing awards including the Hugo Award, Man Booker, and the Pulitzer Prize. She is not published, yet.