Publication Notice
Subject: New poems appearing in Rundelania! Plus: Free Sampler.
Dear friends,
Free Sampler at thekessinger.com
The Fall 2025 issue of Rundelania! features 3 of my poems.
“If the Tongue Dangled”
A speculative inquiry into the mechanics of language, wondering how our words would change if the tongue functioned like a dangling, gravity-driven weapon, rather than an expressive tool of the mind that “gloves its control.”
“Hi, Dad”
A poignant Thanksgiving poem that contrasts warm family tradition with the raw, heroic memory of a father’s near-death survival during wartime. It portrays his miraculous walk to a field hospital after being “left for dead” as an act of fate that built the very “family tree” they gather beneath.
“Word Puppets”
A poetic mission statement for creative reinvention, treating language as a physical medium—piling rocks, folding worlds, and passing hands over everything—in search of a missing, untranslated word that lies just outside the reach of conventional vocabulary.
You can read the full pieces in the new issue, available soon, at rundelania.com.
For those interested in more of my recent work, publications in past months include:
• “IT” and “Signal Falls, Nebraska” (in Mantis, Stanford University),
• “Mid” (in Midsummer Dream House),
• “Digital Smoke” (in Cool Beans Lit).
• “My brush with bleeding hearts” (in Activemuse)
• “Proving Grounds’ (in confetti)
Readers can also explore my work at thekessinger.com, where a free sampler, Five Poems, Five Worlds, is available. The set includes:
• “Out of the blue” from The Book of Joe (CSU Poetry Center)
• “Children” from The Exploded View (CSU Poetry Center)
• “Marys and Joes” from Misery’s Lick – 1900 Storm
• “Life with an Expert Lover” from Once in Love
• “A Rising” from The Smolder Between Solstices
With gratitude to the editors at Rundelania for their interest in my work and to all of those who support poetry.
Warmly,
Mark Kessinger