Lizbeth Bárcena

January 2026 | poetry

Arid Land Thermophilia

love for the desert heat / a cautionary affair

I don’t feel overjoyed or conceited

to hear people bitch about heat

in a hot place, in late May, amid

what’s befalling the Earth– It’s two

degrees more– think less clothing,

more rubbing of UV protection, but

I’m stuck in a freezer, wearing a down

jacket in June, desiring the burn on

my face, arms, and back, a fiery love bite

on my nape, that ectotherm craving

that sensual boil that gets cramped in July

when the awful AC, the culprit that causes

greenhouse gases, makes me disdain my

thermophilic bent, knowing the price

to the thermotolerant: the Chuckwalla

Fringe-toad lizards, tortoise, roadrunners

hawks, bighorn, coyotes, and xerophytes

could all vanish in August’s peak hour behind

sweltering sand and stone. One degree more

could be that upheaval that stops me from

elating on the hot wall on my skin, heat

emanating from the floors, an endless heat sink

I don’t hate the amorous stink of my Staphylococcus

hominis, thriving in my armpits

Lizbeth Bárcena

Lizbeth Bárcena is a writer and naturalist, dedicated to bringing awareness of the wonders and fragility of nature through writing. She’s currently pursuing an MFA in Nature Writing at Western Colorado University. A Semi-Finalist for the 2024 North American Review Terry Tempest Williams Creative Nonfiction Contest and recipient of the Mari Sandoz Emerging Writer Scholarship, her work was recently published in the El Portal Literary Journal Spring 2025.

June Chua

January 2026 | poetry

Fever Dream

You are about 7, skinny, sheathed in a flaxen knit dress. Margarine yellow. You are

persuaded by the son of your godmother, your namesake, to climb through a large,

wooden fence into a meadow. It’s late June, your month. You have only been on this new

continent for two months. You have some firsts. Your first chocolate milkshake. Its icy

chunks making your stomach turn. The ginormous American burger crowned with a tile of

orange cheese and onions. You are only able to chomp through about five times before the

meat monster appropriates your stomach and now lives there rent free. The burger is

topped with something you’ve never had, relish. But you do not. You help your godmother

catch beefy slugs in the garden. Everything here is super-sized. You feel dwarfed by it all,

the XXXTRA-Largeness of the houses, the roads, the trucks. The size of your parents’

dream.

You and your new friend stroll into a soft, lemony hue of a meadow. The air is toasty, the

flavor of summer tasting you. You are wary of wandering too far. This American boy is

leading the way. You have faith. Until…you see the bull. Why is this giant beast standing in

your fever dream? It gallops like the inevitable future that is racing towards you.

The boy grabs your hand. The air zoomed, the present zooms, the future will zoom.

You reach the fence again. He climbs through but you struggle with your little legs, and

your dress becomes snagged! th-thump-th-thump-th-thump goes your heart thump-thump-thump go the

hooves rumble-rumble goes your gut. Between safety and risk.

Your dress is set free, by you or by him? You both keep running, laughing. Jubilant.

You are never released. The bull remains. An insatiable meat monster.

June Chua

June Chua used to read stories aloud to her little sister when their family lived in Borneo, Malaysia. Eventually, they moved to the Canadian prairies, first living in a trailer! This passion for the written word has led to a 25-year career in journalism, filmmaking, and communications, including work as a CBC News reporter and the writing of articles for newspapers and magazines. Her works have appeared in Back Where I Came From, The Best of Rabble, Strangers in the Mirror, poco. lit, Palisades Review, Tough Poets, Chatelaine, Canadian Living, and The Globe & Mail. She resides in Berlin and is working on a prose and poem collection supported by a Canadian literary grant. See: junechua.com or @re.juneration