MICHAEL CHANG—"执迷不悔 UNREPENTANT" (Issue 28)

Sugar House Review · Michael Chang's, "执迷不悔 Unrepentant"

UNREPENTANT 

What can I do but shine / in memory 

—John Wieners 

● 

racing down a beach may reap uncommon rewards 

a simple gift, one a ghost could give 

when all’s said & done, what have we got left 

ghost nuts, a whole wad 

[something to share] 

ur breath on my chest 

AG standing for “aspiring governor” 

u will surely hate growing old 

the constant yelping in the yard 

followed by extended periods of pain 

my mood depending upon the fireworks 

i derive no pleasure from fantasies 

indecent lips, carnal skin 

unwholesome, vulgar 

buggers to be awoken 

ppl who disappear into side streets w/o warning 

& never look back 

on a day like today 

remind me how the sunroom filled w/ ferns 

over our protestations 

the trip to echo park being unnecessary 

it was the first good party of the season [some say the only] 

baubles & balls 

snow that keeps melting 

after u shake it off 

three bees on a shield 

shiny headgear lifted from a learned man 

reciting the dimensions of a dream

ABOUT THE POET 

Michael Chang (they/them) is the author of Almanac of Useless Talents 

(CLASH Books, 2022) and Synthetic Jungle (Northwestern University Press, 

2023). Tapped to edit Lambda Literary's Emerge anthology, their poems have 

been nominated for Best New Poets, Best of the Net, and the Pushcart Prize. 

They were awarded the Poetry Project's Brannan Prize & edit poetry at Fence.

ABOUT SUGAR HOUSE REVIEW 

We loved reading the work that we’ve published (clearly), and we want an 

opportunity to better hear our contributors. We're featuring audio recordings of 

poems from our pages, read by the poet. This an open invitation to all contributors 

from any of our issues, we were delighted to print your work, now we’re eager to 

hear it.

J.P. DANCING BEAR—"TRAP TEOP TRAP FLOW" (Issue 28)

Sugar House Review · J. P. Dancing Bear's, "Trap Teop Trap Flow"

TRAP TEOP TRAP FLOW

for Ruth Awad 

Today on your birthday, 

I told several people seeking advice 

to read your work. Not because, 

but because I didn't know, at the time, 

it being your anniversary howl. 

My people dreamed of stately swans 

floating across dreamcatcher 

ponds who were themselves ancient people. 

When I was a child, a bear came to me, 

and in my sleep it nudged me awake, 

and breathed into my mouth. Now I confess 

my words, my words, my tongue are hers. 

She still comes in between worlds, comes 

and looks down at me, much as you do, 

in that photo, the one where behind 

you, on swan-white paper, float the words, 

traP 

teoP 

traP 

floW 

Yes. It is the look of one who knows 

this world is a forest trail, cutting, 

winding its way down to water, down 

to a face made of tears.

ABOUT THE POET 

J.P. Dancing Bear is editor of Verse Daily. He is the author of sixteen 

collections of poetry, most recently, Of Oracles and Monsters (Glass Lyre 

Press, 2020), and Fish Singing Foxes (Salmon Poetry, 2019). His work has 

appeared in hundreds of venues.

ABOUT SUGAR HOUSE REVIEW 

We loved reading the work that we’ve published (clearly), and we want an 

opportunity to better hear our contributors. We're featuring audio recordings of 

poems from our pages, read by the poet. This an open invitation to all contributors 

from any of our issues, we were delighted to print your work, now we’re eager to 

hear it.

SETH HAGEN—"ONE OF US" (Issue 28)

Sugar House Review · Seth Hagen's, "One of Us"

ONE OF US

One of us is drunk, and one of us is lying–

if love is a temple, it’s got spiders and a curse. 

Maybe we won’t work it out, but we’re trying. 

Us still swims luminous in my mind, 

an embryo in its egg, candled and obscure— 

O.K., one of us is drunk, and one of us is lying. 

You said, “Hold that thought. I’m buying,” 

pleated a twenty you plucked from your purse. 

Were we working it out? Were we even trying? 

You swung on the surface in the glass of wine. 

“I remember our first bed. Now there are no more firsts.” 

Someone must be drunk. Someone must be lying. 

You asked me if love was just crust, salt rime 

on rock when the lies burned off from lust– 

so maybe we won’t work it out, but I’m trying. 

Let us kneel to its Form in faith or in science: the

voice of a virgin, black holes, a fifth force 

What if one of us is drunk and one of us lying? 

Maybe we won’t work it out, but love is trying.

ABOUT THE POET 

Seth Hagen has works forthcoming in DIAGRAM. He has published in the fields 

of literary study and tax law. He lives in Atlanta, GA, where he teaches English.

ABOUT SUGAR HOUSE REVIEW 

We loved reading the work that we’ve published (clearly), and we want an 

opportunity to better hear our contributors. We're featuring audio recordings of 

poems from our pages, read by the poet. This an open invitation to all contributors 

from any of our issues, we were delighted to print your work, now we’re eager to 

hear it.

BETSY MITCHELL MARTINEZ—"BUILDING L: LOS DANANTES" (Issue 28)

Sugar House Review · Betsy Mitchell Martinez's, "Building L: Los Danzantes"

BUILDING L: LOS DANANTES

I’m tired of speaking the language 

of my dreams, with its childhood rhymes 

and tidepools, its bulbs exploding 

on schedule into clusters of grape 

hyacinths. Let’s order brides on the internet 

and shape our mouths into fruits 

or kitchen utensils. Isn’t the weather 

fine today? Would you like some sugar 

in your coffee? When we visited 

the ancient Zapotec city, we crouched 

in the temple of los danzantes and studied 

the curves of naked men presumed 

by early anthropologists to be bent 

in dance. We now believe them to be 

corpses, genitals replaced with 

flowery scrolls. This is what I mean 

when I talk about dancing. 

ABOUT THE POET 

Betsy Michtell Martinez received an MFA from the University of 

Michigan. Her poems have appeared in The Northwest Review and Crab 

Orchard Review.

ABOUT SUGAR HOUSE REVIEW 

We loved reading the work that we’ve published (clearly), and we want an 

opportunity to better hear our contributors. We're featuring audio recordings of 

poems from our pages, read by the poet. This an open invitation to all contributors 

from any of our issues, we were delighted to print your work, now we’re eager to 

hear it.

CYAN JAMES—"Q: ARE YOU CONCERNED ABOUT DIABETES" (Issue 28)

Sugar House Review · Cyan James', "Q: Are You Concerned About Diabetes"

Q: ARE YOU CONCERNED ABOUT DIABETES

A: Sugar is more bam per gram than gunpowder but that’s only a 

fact not a feeling 

Kinds of sugar: caster, granulated, pearl, cane, demerara, turbinado, 

muscovado. Sounds like bachata song titles. Juicy entanglement. Ever smelled 

a cane field on fire? Piccolo note of sweet among the whirling pillar of smoke, 

hawks up high to pierce all the mammals on fire rushing the field’s edges. 

It kills kills kills even though it purrs so loud it fills your mouth it’s still a tiger 

in your kitchen. Possible to imagine people as the personified causes of their 

deaths, such as corpses like a row of frosted cakes in frilly white wrappers 

We make it at seven ounces a day per person, 160 pounds per person per year, 

enough to bury us all. How often we say ‘I love you’ or ‘I’m sorry’ or ‘let’s 

celebrate’ with the slow poison of custards, pecan pie, butter biscuits with tea 

Basterdsuiker: what the Dutch called adding molasses. Sugar so prestigious 

when pure, colonists gobbled it until they got black teeth. If they couldn’t buy 

it, they blackened their teeth to appear rich enough (to be giving themselves 

gum rot), and that’s just about everything you need to know about my people.

ABOUT THE POET 

Cyan James holds an MFA from the University of Michigan. Her work has been 

nominated for two Pushcart Prizes and published in Gettysburg Review, Michigan 

Quarterly Review, Arkansas Review, New Mexico Review, Harvard Review, and 

Salon, among others. She also holds a PhD in public-health genetics and works in 

health policy. Currently she is revising a novel about the young women who 

survived the Green River Killer. She loves fiddles, falconry, long road trips, and 

old front porches.

ABOUT SUGAR HOUSE REVIEW 

We loved reading the work that we’ve published (clearly), and we want an 

opportunity to better hear our contributors. We're featuring audio recordings of 

poems from our pages, read by the poet. This an open invitation to all contributors 

from any of our issues, we were delighted to print your work, now we’re eager to 

hear it.