LAUREN K. WATEL—"THE JAILS" (Issue 25)

Sugar House Review · Lauren K. Watel's "The Jails"

THE JAILS

The jails, they’re full of prisoners. Why are they full of prisoners? 

Because everyone’s doing drugs or selling them. Why is everyone doing 

drugs or selling them? Because they’re bored and desperate. Why are 

they bored and desperate? Because they have no work. Why don’t they 

have work? Because the jobs went away. Why did the jobs go away? 

Because the bosses put in robots. Why did the bosses put in robots? 

Because robots don’t ask questions. Why don’t robots ask questions? 

Because they don’t have minds. Why don’t they have minds? Because 

the scientists haven’t gotten that far. Why haven’t the scientists gotten 

that far? Because the government won’t fund them. Why won’t the 

government fund them? Because they’re funding the army. Why are 

they funding the army? So we can fight. Why should we fight? Because 

we have enemies. Why do we have enemies? Because we’re always 

interfering. Why are we interfering? Because we’re better than they are. 

Why are we better than they are? Because we’re free. Why are we free? 

Because we waged a war to worship our own gods. Why did we wage a 

war to worship our own gods? Because we felt oppressed. Why did we 

feel oppressed? Because they put us in the jails.

ABOUT THE POET 

Lauren K. Watel's poetry, fiction, essays and translations have appeared in 

The Paris Review, The Nation, Narrative, Tin House, Antioch Review, 

TriQuarterly, The Massachusetts Review, Slate, Colorado Review, 

Birmingham Poetry Review, Poetry International, Ploughshares, and the 

Collected Poems of Marcel Proust, among others. She was awarded a visiting 

artist residency at the American Academy in Rome as well as a Distinguished 

Fellowship at Hambidge Art Center. Her work has also won awards from Poets 

and Writers, Moment Magazine-Karma Foundation and Mississippi Review. 

Her prose poem "The House She Lived In" honoring Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg 

was set to music by Pulitzer-winning composer Ellen Taaffe Zwilich, and 

premiered at the Dallas Symphony

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.

JENNIFER MANTHEY—"THE FIGHT" (Issue 24)

Sugar House Review · Jennifer Manthey's "The Fight"

THE FIGHT

My son’s principal calls on the day
of his first fight. First grade.
A boy pushed him out of line,
and he pushed back. Pushing then hitting—
they are six. A white boy’s father
might say, good for you,
standing up for yourself.
My husband says, there are injustices
coming all the time. Sometimes you have to be
the bigger man. He is six. He cries
in bed, I’m a bad boy, and I hate
America. I hate what I can’t stop
it saying to my son. Outside our window,
a dog passes on a leash and our dog
goes crazy with barking. I don’t
bother to stop her—her nose and teeth
crashing at the glass.

ABOUT THE POET 

Jennifer Manthey's poems have appeared in places such as Crab Orchard Review, 

Best New Poets, Calyx Journal, Prairie Schooner, and Palette Poetry. She teaches 

writing at The Loft Literary Center and North Central University in Minneapolis.

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.

JAMES DAVIS MAY—"DEPRESSION IN SAINT-MÉLOIR DES ONDES" (Issue 24)

Sugar House Review · James Davis May's "Depression in Saint-Méloir Des Ondes"

DEPRESSION IN SAINT-MÉLOIR DES ONDES

The donkey my daughter loves

cannot reach the flowers that grow

in the film of soil the ocean breeze

has lifted to the roof of the barn.

We don’t know what they’re called

and speak too little of the language

to ask the farmhand their name,

though we can tell they’re delicious

by the way the donkey cocks its head

to two o’clock toward the roof

and strains its prehensile lips

to almost reach them, an effort

that looks like remembering

a word you can almost remember

how it nearly touches the voice—

“It’s on the tip of my tongue,” we say.

And I don’t know what to say

to myself, or the man I become,

inside those days and nights of hurt

I cannot argue my way out of.

I know it won’t be enough to say,

“Remember the orchard over there,

its plums and cherries, and apples

just forming from the blooms.”

Not enough to remember the tides

we hear beyond the meadow, how

they leave the beach cracked

like ancient porcelain. Not enough

to repeat the Auden lines I muttered

to myself last night at the restaurant

when I felt the depression coming on,

eerie as a suspicion of being watched.

“The lights must never go out,”

I said, “the music must always play.”

And it almost worked: the intoxication

of asking for and receiving the tray

of oysters gleaming like an ornate clock,

then the bouquet of mussels,

and the baked sea bream symmetrical

as a well-wrapped Christmas gift.

But I’ve learned that you can love

pleasure and still want to die

while absolutely not wanting to die,

a situation that requires, if nothing else,

some patience, the precise gentleness

the donkey grants my daughter’s hand

as she offers the wanted flowers

to the mouth that destroys and loves them.

ABOUT THE POET 

James Davis May is a 2021 National Endowment Arts Fellow in creative writing and the author of two poetry collections, both published by Louisiana State University Press: Unquiet Things, which was released in 2016, and Unusually Grand Ideas, forthcoming in 2023. His poetry has appeared in Guernica, The New Republic, Plume, The Southern Review, and other journals. He lives in Macon, GA with his wife, the poet Chelsea Rathburn.

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.

BRIAN SATROM—"MULBERRY TREE" (Issue 24)

Sugar House Review · Brian Satrom's "Mulberry Tree"

MULBERRY TREE

Someone playing flute, the music coming from

an open second-floor window,

sky overcast, and we’re in front

of a mulberry tree,

its leaves wet. I need to memorize

the kind of tree it is, a way

of hanging on to this moment.

It’ll be on a test, the one in which I’m likely

to forget what the tree’s called and so

start to lose my connection to the memory, maybe

to memory altogether,

the first loose thread unraveling.

Flute music woven through the branches

and our conversation.

I wonder who even plays flute anymore

but I’m grateful. Love will be

on the test too, or is it the test itself? Love

when the answers

aren’t easy. Love when it’s not all new.

ABOUT THE POET 

Brian Satrom is the author of the poetry collection Starting Again, published 

by Finishing Line Press in 2020. His poetry has appeared in a variety of journals 

including Cider Press Review, The Laurel Review, Poetry Northwest, Rattle, and 

TAB, which nominated his work for a Pushcart Prize. His work has also featured 

on Verse Daily and Vandal Poem of the Day. After completing his MFA at the 

University of Maryland, he lived in Madison, WI, and Los Angeles before settling 

in Minneapolis. His website is BrianSatrom.com.

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.

AIMEE WRIGHT CLOW—"BLACK AND BLUE FISH" (Issue 24)

Sugar House Review · Aimee Wright Clow's "Black and Blue Fish"

BLACK AND BLUE FISH 

after Nick Flynn 
​
I take curtains off a west-facing window, fold them tightly, peer out into
the open. Not much to see: a dog, a house, a street. Paint a diagram on
the glass with a brush’s bristles fanned so the paint is not too thick, so
light threads through. I feel best with my phone tucked under blankets.
Walk to the store, where I meet a woman who needs just one cup of
flour. Sure. I bring her to my house, give her coffee and one cup of flour
while she tells me of the mountain she has just returned from, all its
height and weight, what a disjuncture returning, and back home she
found a fire had consumed all her old photographs and blankets, leaving
only a brick cocoon and an aluminum-rod bed. Oh dear. I blow over
steam and the dog outside barks. But what of you? she asks. Tell me of
you. I say, Nothing much here. But well, let me show you something. A
detail. Outside we peer through the painted panes as though we are
light. Her face settles, sinks, and she backs away slowly, holding the
flour to her chest. A swampy yard has overtaken my feet, so when I
try to follow, I find I cannot. I cannot leave my feet, so I survey the
yard, which reminds me of a stream. The road: the sound of boats.
The barking dog approaching bites at the swamp around my feet and
my ankles until I am free. I float up the hill as the rains begin, my eyes
still on the window. I don’t know what she saw, of course, what feared.
All the furniture from the side of the road; all the decorations mass
produced. From the outside looking in, I could be anyone, really. But
the bristled paint; the panes. I look away from the house to my hands
where the flour in the rain has become batter. I look down at my feet,
which are fish now. I look down to the yard, a river. I look to the house,
my boat, my home. I float. I go inside, unbury my phone from its bed of
rest. I wish to know what makes one one. I ask the internet. Who’s afraid
of? Battered fish sticks. Recipes for. Fear? It’s only a word. Run? It’s only
time. Take time. Rest. Your boat awaits. The dog barks. It’s bobbing
outside the painting. I open the window.

ABOUT THE POET 

Aimee Wright Clow is a writer and book designer living in Durham, NC with their 

cats, Bifo and Susan G. Their writing and video poems have appeared in journals 

including Salt Hill, The Bennington Review, [PANK], A Gathering of the Tribes, 

Can We Have Our Ball Back, Ghost Proposal, and The Lifted Brow. Their book arts 

project, A Brief Map of Albany, is available from Utilities Included.

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.