Philly Poetry Chapbook Review is pleased to present two original poems by Yasmin Mariam Kloth as our fourth biweekly featured poet of the Fall 2025 issue.
Poems
Before
I think about the olive trees I have never
seen but that I know grow on my ancestors’
land somewhere against the soft slope of a
mountain in Lebanon. The curves of their
branches and the curl of the bark escape red
baked earth as if they are walking to another
place. I’ve dreamed of the olives falling
lightly, the way my grandmother quietly
palms dough in her oiled hands, pulls the
edges out from the heart before folding it
over again. There is more and more and
more I do not know about the broken,
cracked land trailing the bend along blue
water. I see it in the same way I dream
of olive trees that grow farther south, grow
on lands with their own ancestors, grew
on lands before books of God gave
them names, before borders
made strangers of friends,
before war
and war.
We know nothing from before, when
land was emptiness and long blades
of grass, when an olive would ripen
slowly in the sun. Or before–if asked
for guidance, the land would roll its
own language into a circle, smooth
its parchment tongue into a line
and still say nothing, offer
nothing; salvia like salve
dried up in the desert
well of our broken
hearts.
The Lucky Ones
The summer the cicadas hatched, their fragile
shells adhered to the driveway like crustaceans
scouring microbes in the sand. At their loudest,
we couldn’t hear each other speak as their bodies
buzzed heavy from the grass to the trees. We knew
they were coming, but like any good denial we
never believed they’d arrive; not until they ascended
their tunnels, blooming, as perennials do. They live
and die in a circle; there are no elderly to care for
or children to nurture into their adolescence. They
shed skins into adulthood, an entire lifetime already
lived underground. Our puppy rooted out soft bodies
from between the blades of grass, her nose to their
wings, without even a rustle before she’d swallowed
them whole. The lucky ones swirled as if an upward
draft had pulled them toward higher branches. One
morning we woke to remember nothing; not how we
got here, or the siren that had for days sliced the sky.
About “Before”
‘Before’ came to me first as the vision of an olive rolling downhill on the lands of my ancestors, lands I have never seen, lands I may never see. In some ways, I wanted these olive trees of my dreams to tell me something, anything, about the place where my family comes from. As I shaped the poem, the olive trees became a witness to a deeper experience—to a region’s ongoing, collective pain. It was the land I wanted to make speak in a place where I did not have words; and it was from the land’s perspective that I imagined what it had seen before our footprints, imagined what it would say in the face of our deepest struggles and conflicts.
Author Bio
Yasmin Mariam Kloth’s poetry explores love, loss, place, and space, often at the intersection of her family memories and her Middle Eastern heritage. Yasmin’s work has been published in the LA Times, Rockvale Review, Cathexis Northwest Press, Tiger Moth Review, West Trestle Review, among others. Her poem “Banyan Song” was awarded third place in the 2021 Hawker Prize for Southeast Asian Poetry. Her debut collection of poetry from Kelsay Books is titled Ancestry Unfinished: Poems of a Lost Generation.
Contents
Chapbook Poem: When I Was Straight by Dustin Brookshire
“‘When I Was Straight’ prompted me to think about a common queer experience—how most parents assume their children are ‘straight’ and expect their children to live a ‘straight’ life.” Read the featured Chapbook Poem of the Month for October 2025 along with words from the poet.
Book Excerpt: American Girl: Fort Hood, 2023 by Thea Matthews
“[W]eaving in and juxtaposing the lyrics of Tom Petty’s ‘American Girl.’ The song’s themes of desperation, wanderlust, and longing are subverted by Ana’s life and tragedy at Fort Cavazos, previously known as Fort Hood, Texas.” Read the featured Excerpt Poem for October 2025 along with words from the poet.
“It seems such a shame that a beautiful location is just gathering dust and overgrowth, and I wanted to lean into the juxtaposition of that.” Read three poems by Bryana Fern along with a few words about “Women on the Wall.”
Bodies in Transition: Sacred & Perishable by Carissa Natalia Baconguis
“There is a muscular intimacy to the ecosystem of these poems, each one of them creating as vivid a world individually as exists in the collection as a whole.” Read Gray Davidson Carroll’s full review.
“In ‘No Breaks’ I was writing about something I hope I never have to experience. … I tried to keep despair at bay and show some defiance and resilience.” Read two poems by Gerald Yelle along with a few words about “No Breaks.”
November ’25: New Staff, Issue Archive & Donations
Read a note from Editor Aiden Hunt about our new Poetry Readers, the additions of an Issue Archive and a Contributor Fund, Fall poetry submissions, and Gaza.
Chapbook Poem: Two egrets at the edge of a tidal marsh by Rebekah Wolman
“Settling on the mirror form opened the way into the parallels between the original image of the egrets, their reflection, and their ambiguous relationship and the shifting, even reversing, roles of an adult daughter and her aging mother…” Read the featured Chapbook Poem of the Month for November 2025 along with words from the poet.
Three Poems by Alexandra Burack
“Subsequent drafts enabled me to … uncover the metaphor of exile, whose meanings are intended to move readers from an experience of alienation to one of discernment of the liberating qualities of outsiderhood.” Read three poems by Alexandra Burack, along with a few words about “To Know Blue From the Color of Snow at Dusk.”
Book Excerpt: Rondo by Yamini Pathak
“The sculpture gardens are located on … the native land of the Lenape people. The poem is a conversation between sculpture, land, and its human and more-than-human inhabitants.” Read the featured Excerpt Poem of the Month for November 2025, “Rondo” from Her Mouth a Palace of Lamps by Yamini Pathak, along with a few words from the poet.
Two Poems by Yasmin Mariam Kloth
“As I shaped the poem, the olive trees became a witness to a deeper experience—to a region’s ongoing, collective pain. It was the land I wanted to make speak in a place where I did not have words.” Read two poems by Yasmin Mariam Kloth, along with a few words about “Before.”
A Conversation with Chris Abani and Kwame Dawes
“We wanted something that was alive, highlighted an ever-expanding list of books by these poets, and that will hopefully survive the both of us and flourish under the curation of a fresh set of poets.” Read the full interview about the New-Generation African Poets Chapbook series.
Chapbook Poem: Red Tide by Mary Gilliland
“Reflection, research, a public service announcement, an old Zen koan, and 3 weeks of bicycling for groceries with a bandana tied around my nose and mouth inform ‘Red Tide’.” Read the featured Chapbook Poem of the Month for December 2025, “Red Tide” from Red Tide at Sandy Bend, along with a few words from the poet.
Three Poems by Veronica Tucker
“’You Left the Fridge Open Again’ transforms an ordinary domestic moment into a meditation on tenderness and decay. The open refrigerator becomes a quiet altar, its hum a hymn to what lingers after love’s warmth has cooled.” Read three poems by Veronica Tucker, along with a few words about “You Left the Fridge Open Again.”
Book Excerpt: The Samadhi of Words by Richard Collins
“Zen poets, past and present, who experience deep absorption in the grandeur of this world may even gain wisdom through the way of poetry, Shidō (詩道). This is the samadhi of words.” Read the featured Excerpt Poem of the Month for December 2025, “The Samadhi of Words” from Stone Nest by Richard Collins, along with a few words from the poet.
December ’25: Pushcart Prize Nominations
Editor Aiden Hunt announces Philly Chapbook Review’s 2026 Pushcart Prize anthology nominations in this editor’s note and provides links to, and a carousel of, the nominated poems.