Submit poems, save trees

A handly list from Diane Lockward, a New Jersey poet (you know, like Bon Jovi), of journals that accept online/email submissions. Save paper and help the post office go out of business.*

The Missing Wife

Wife and dog missing.
Reward for the dog.
—bumper sticker on a pickup truck

The wife and the dog planned their escape
months in advance, laid up biscuits and bones,
waited for the careless moment when he’d forget
to latch the gate, then hightailed it.
They took shelter in the forest, camouflaged
the scent of their trail with leaves.
Free of him at last,
they peed with relief on a tree.

Time passed. They came and went as they pleased,
chased sticks when they felt like chasing sticks,
dug holes in what they came to regard
as their own backyard. They unlearned
how to roll over and play dead.

In spring the dog wandered off in pursuit
of a rabbit. Collared by a hunter and returned
to the master for $25, he lives
on a tight leash now.
He sleeps on the wife’s side of the bed,
whimpering, pressing his snout
into her pillow, breathing
the scent of her hair.

And the wife? She’s moved deep into the heart
of the forest. She walks
on all fours, fetches for no man, performs
no tricks. She is content. Only sometimes
she gets lonely, remembers how he would nuzzle
her cheek and comfort her when she twitched
and thrashed in her sleep.

(Diane Lockward, from Eve's Red Dress, Wind Publications, 2003)

*I don't really want the post office to go out of business because I really like to get mail. Also they have excellent customer service. Like how you have to pay extra if you want them to promise to actually deliver and/or not destroy what you're mailing. And how there are never long lines at the branches and the hours are super convenient. And how they won't even let you mail guns or bombs. Oh, wait. That last part is probably a good thing.