Hummingbird: Magazine of the Short Poem 20.1 (September 2009)

Down to 2 issues a year, unfortunately (but understandably).

Still available for $5/issue from:

Phyllis Walsh, Editor
Hummingbird
Harbour Village
5600 Mockingbird Lane, Apt D103
Greendale, WI 53129

Worth it on the whole, if only because it's such an interesting little magazine (and I do mean little) of very short verse. A curiosity, perhaps, but a fun one. A bit earnest this time around (perhaps of late? characterizing the last few issues? earnestness does tire me so). Robert Deluty, who placed one of the stronger poems in the last issue, typifies what tends to curdle my insides:

husband and wife
with matching pacemakers:
heart-and-soulmates

Oof. That's on page 39. On page 47, though, he also gives us:

mid-colloquim... [sic]
watching the department chair
balance her check book

The strongest -- cheekiest? -- poem of this issue, to my thinking, is David G. Lanoue's (27):

she's barefoot and topless
in the fountain...
and bronze

But really, what is it with all the ellipses?

Get a subscription, read it, reread what pleases, put it on a shelf somewhere for someone else to discover one day, and wait half a year for your next ten minutes of pleasure.