Welcome to Lothlorien Poetry Journal Volume 27 – Magicians with Words. Lothlorien Poetry Journal is a contemporary literary journal featuring free verse/rhyming/experimental poetry, short stories and flash fiction. Journey with these 70 superb poets and fiction authors, herein Magicians with Words on the road. Immerse yourself in their spells cast in poems and stories that linger and haunt. Discover sublime works of fantasy, fairy tale and folklore, dreams and reality, dystopia, nature and magical realism with romance and anything hiding deep in-between the cracks. Her Kind by Anne Sexton I have gone out, a possessed witch, haunting the black air, braver at night; dreaming evil, I have done my hitch over the plain houses, light by light: lonely thing, twelve-fingered, out of mind. A woman like that is not a woman, quite. I have been her kind. I have found the warm caves in the woods, filled them with skillets, carvings, shelves, closets, silks, innumerable goods; fixed the suppers for the worms and the elves: whining, rearranging the disaligned. A woman like that is misunderstood. I have been her kind. I have ridden in your cart, driver, waved my nude arms at villages going by, learning the last bright routes, survivor where your flames still bite my thigh and my ribs crack where your wheels wind. A woman like that is not ashamed to die. I have been her kind. -Anne Sexton “Once, poets were magicians. Poets were strong, stronger than warriors or kings — stronger than old hapless gods. And they will be strong once again.” ― Greg Bear “Poetry is nearer to vital truth than history.“ ― Plato “Poetry is the lifeblood of rebellion, revolution, and the raising of consciousness.“ ― Alice Walker “A poet's work is to name the unnameable, to point at frauds, to take sides, start arguments, shape the world, and stop it going to sleep.“ ― Salman Rushdie "Poetry is like a bird, it ignores all frontiers." ― Yevgeny Yevtushenko “Poetry is what happens when nothing else can.” ― Charles Bukowski “When power leads man toward arrogance, poetry reminds him of his limitations. When power narrows the area of man's concern, poetry reminds him of the richness and diversity of existence. When power corrupts, poetry cleanses.“ ― John F. Kennedy "In a war situation or where violence and injustice are prevalent, poetry is called upon to be something more than a thing of beauty." ― Seamus Heaney