morning/night poetry

Aubade: Threshold

by Christina Lee

The amazing part is the sun. It’s been coming up mornings Without my permission. Still I supervise. In the 3 a.m. heat I review the plans, I coordinate it all again just in case. Let’s keep inside ourselves, if we keep anything, a knowledge of this time. This nausea of ignorance. This emerald color that falls when questions choke our air. But keep dignity there beside the rest of it, so when we step across it we can’t shrink back to who we were. Keep also this dawn, this sun pushing herself up the mountain’s side. — Christina Lee has published poems and essays in the Tin House’s “Broadside Thirty,” The Seattle Times, The Toast, Hoot Review, and elsewhere. She holds an M.F.A. from Seattle Pacific, and she and her husband have recently moved to Seattle from Los Angeles, where she spent ten years teaching public school English. Her books are organized by color.  Artwork by: Emily Wiethorn Emily Wiethorn (b.1991) is a photographic artist currently based in Lincoln, NE where she will graduate with her MFA in Studio Art at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, where she is an Instructor of Record and holds a Graduate Teaching Assistantship. She received her BFA in Photography from Northern Kentucky University. She has most recently been awarded the 2017 SPE Student Award for Innovations in Imaging, was a Critical Mass finalist in 2017, a finalist for The Texas Photographic Society’s National Photography Award, and is a featured artist in the spring 2018 issue of PDNedu. Her work has been published online with Musee Magazine, Lenstratch, Loosen Art, among others. Her work has been exhibited both nationally and internationally in China and Italy. She works primarily in self-portraiture where she explores notions of feminine identity, societal constructs of femininity, and self-discovery. Links Website: www.emilywiethorn.com Instagram: @emily.wiethorn

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