I’m very pleased to have my new poem “Forearm” in Neologism Poetry Journal, and it’s this month’s featured work! You can read it here:
Page 10 of 45


I have two poems out at Cabildo Quarterly today! “can you come to bed?” about not wanting to be alone while going through a difficult time, and “The Difficulties of Existing Gracefully”, which is the result of a little doodle and a free write I did.
I have three poems in Soft Cartel today – “hurricane”, “Edges”, and “The Boy in the Window”! You can read them here: https://softcartel.com/2018/08/03/three-poems-by-sam-rose/
My poem “I am recounting” has been published in Little Rose Magazine today! Read it at the link below, and to give you a feel for it, I did a quick sketch of what was in my head when I wrote it:
https://littlerosemagazine.weebly.com/home/i-am-recounting

we take the afternoon off work to visit the nuclear
medicine department of the hospital
and in the evening I try to access some feeling and I ask
myself
if I cry, will that help flush the radiation out of my body?
or will it just give the bags under my eyes a buttercup glow
as if my pupils had become suns
stop
I say
stop
It was just a CT scan, just a tiny amount of radiation
and you are just melodramatic
you are just a girl, not spiderman
and nothing is happening
but that’s what burns
that still, nothing is quite happening here
no going nuclear, simply stoic
script-sticking
I compromise and just a couple of drops slip through
that is all I can offer
that is all life offers of anything
just a little at a time
just a little glow
A version of this poem was published in Autumn Sky Poetry Daily in April 2021.

My second poem over at Amethyst Magazine is out now. What a busy month! Read it here:
https://amethystmagazine.org/2018/07/29/cocoon-a-poem-by-sam-rose/
I also did a little drawing to go with this one, after not drawing anything for a very long time:


I am eating lunch
I am not fighting cancer.
I am eating my lunch.
And then I am going for
a walk in the overcast
bright of the day.
And then I will go back
to the office and write
some articles. I might
have a snack and
listen to some music.
There is no fighting here.
Just noticed today is the 8th anniversary of my big operation. I’d be eight years cancer free today… if I hadn’t found out two months ago that it’s come back. That stings a bit. Here’s a new poem.
I have two poems published in Terror House Magazine this month: “Twelve Months”, “Control” and “Exchange”. Read them here!

