RED WING, by Barbara Daniels
Poetry by Barbara Daniels RED WING If death is marriage, I’ll marry the oil stain under my car. I’ll marry a bright wing. Weeds bend their frayed heads down to dirt, the sky equivocal, the old pines. The door behind…
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FOUR, FIVE, SIX, by Callie Ann Marsalisi
Fiction by Callie Ann Marsalisi FOUR, FIVE, SIX All of the eggs are broken. One, two, three. Four, five, six. Both rows of the carton she mistakenly left open on the counter. Smashed. She closes the carton and thinks. She’s…
CONNECTICUS, EPISODE 2, by Clifford Thompson
Visual Narrative by Clifford Thompson CONNECTICUS, EPISODE 2 Clifford Thompson’s books include What It Is: Race, Family, and One Thinking Black Man’s Blues and Big Man and the Little Men: A Graphic Novel. His book Jazz June: A Self-Portrait in Essays is coming in October…
A ROCKET’S TALE, by Shaun Pieter Clamp
Fiction by Shaun Pieter Clamp A ROCKET’S TALE The scaffolding falls. I’m a shiny rocket nose downslope into crater. Imperfect bliss kindles in the mouth of the stone. I make my way down there on wheels. The bright moment will…
FIVE EASY PIECES, by Jeffrey Feingold
Fiction by Jeffrey FeingoldFIVE EASY PIECES Bobbie Bernstein rolled on her side to give Rayne a goodnight peck. She’d lost the baby a few days earlier, was still sore, and the rolling was a chore. White eyelet curtains fluttered as…
FALL DICTIONARY, by Diane Zinna
Flash Nonfiction by Diane Zinna FALL DICTIONARY Rainbow Coffee Mug: Noun. A broken cup found in the still-running sink. My mother must have been washing it. It lay in four white pieces in the silver-gray basin, and she lay on…
THE BALLPARK, by Thomas William Brewer
Fiction by Thomas William Brewer THE BALLPARK The ballpark rumbles under the steps of the spectators, zealots eagerly streaming into a cathedral of dirt and grass. A boy squeezes his father’s hand as they weave through the congregants and walk…
STILL LIFE WITH FAMILY AND THE STRANGE CASE OF DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE, by Michelle Bitting
Nonfiction by Michelle Bitting STILL LIFE WITH FAMILY AND THE STRANGE CASE OF DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE (with screen quotes from his bifurcated self) My analysis of this soul, the human psyche, leads me to believe that man is…
WINDOWS TO THE SOUL, by Christine H. Chen
Flash by Christine H. Chen WINDOWS TO THE SOUL While your parents went out to pitch Ma’s dress design ideas to strangers, you were locked inside the apartment, the tick-tock of the wall clock your only companion. In the box next to…
THE RUNNING WOMAN, by Alysha Black
Fiction by Alysha Black THE RUNNING WOMAN Nia saw the way everyone looked at her as she wheeled her kids around the grocery store at ten pm, and she hated it. Five months had passed since Peter’s death, and still,…
ELEGY WITH SALTWATER PEARLS, by Nora Gupta
Poetry by Nora Gupta ELEGY WITH SALTWATER PEARLS I track my body through snow brimming with sweat, tears, the eternal glow of tobacco and ash, an unfinished stub melting its way into the ground. Inside, succumbed to hospice, you wrap…
THREE MICROS, by Crockett Doob
Flash Nonfiction by Crockett DoobTHREE MICROS EVERYTHING WITH NOTHING There’s a bagel place I like a block away from work. I go in there and order “an everything with nothing,” which the cashier thinks is funny, and I guess I…
WEDDING DRESS, by Charlotte Gullick
Flash Nonfiction by Charlotte GullickWEDDING DRESS Right now, the daughter and father are alone, the girlfriend—his—sits outside. She pulls on a joint, distancing herself from this, his dying. The girlfriend tries to make room for his children, for the connection…
BODY MEMORY, by Lane Osborne
Nonfiction by Lane Osborne BODY MEMORY When my family and I visited my uncle at his home weeks after he’d lost his leg, knee-down to diabetes, I tried not to stare. Not at what remained of his left leg, or…
EXPOSURE, by Liana Johnson
Fiction by Liana Johnson EXPOSURE “Haven’t you ever been spurned by a lover?” Ms. Smith said in her outside voice. Our sixth-grade English class was acting out The Crucible in the school library. Ms. Smith directed the question to Jake,…
NEIGHBORHOOD WATCH, by Elise Wallen-Friedman
Fiction by Elise Wallen-Friedman NEIGHBORHOOD WATCH The Zoo Mrs. Rothenbloom stares at the sheet music propped up on her piano. She taps her foot, her light-brown sock padding into the shag rug carpet. AC pumps through the house, so the…
YAKU, by Michael Copperman
Nonfiction by Michael CoppermanYAKU Grandma Betty never arrived from Hawaii empty-handed. Bringing herself was enough: though she was four-foot-ten at best, she carried herself gracefully, with an air of self-assurance and ease. She wore designer clothes from Japan with flowy…
AS YOU WIND DOWN, by Jay Hodges
Nonfiction by Jay Hodges AS YOU WIND DOWN Planets whirl, asteroids careen, the sun and the moon come and go. Tectonic plates shift, volcanoes spew, icebergs calve, droughts creep, humidity swaddles. Hail pings automobiles, and lightning blitzes planes. Ghost ships…
YOU & I, by Naisha Randhar
Poetry by Naisha Randhar YOU & I My best friend and I grieve the world on the way to school. We walk through chalk pictures, afraid of having kids. Dragonflies in a lit golden cage. Like islands, we are silhouettes.…
THE REFRIGERATOR, by Frances Blankenship
Flash by Frances Blankenship THE REFRIGERATOR That morning when Lydia woke up, she saw that she’d become a refrigerator. It must have happened fairly quickly since she was certain she had woken around two a.m. to give the baby a…
THE SKETCHBOOK, by Gregory Meece
Flash by Gregory Meece THE SKETCHBOOK Blacktop parted infinite walls of cornstalks as I drove through another town. It was as if Moses had stretched his hand across a verdant sea. A fallen leaf on a current, I was pulled…
ANIMALS THAT HAVE NEVER SET FOOT IN A SMILING KITCHEN, by Russell Zintel
Poetry by Russell ZintelANIMALS THAT HAVE NEVER SET FOOT IN A SMILING KITCHEN Felt like a stray In deer form. Felt like a Eurasian red squirrel, As a pet without ownership. Ate like a lion, which is to say gloriously…
THE TESTAMENT OF MY BODY, by Meg LeDuc
Nonfiction by Meg LeDuc THE TESTAMENT OF MY BODY Chapter 1 I’m reading Julian of Norwich, the fourteenth-century Christian mystic, on this October morning. 2 Julian writes, “Whenever a human mother nurtures her child with all that is beautiful and…
The Elements of Marie Curie: How the Glow of Radium Lit a Path for Women in Science, by Dava Sobel, reviewed by Beth Johnston
Nonfiction by Dava Sobel, reviewed by Beth JohnstonThe Elements of Marie Curie: How the Glow of Radium Lit a Path for Women in Science (Atlantic Monthly Press) In The Elements of Marie Curie, Pulitzer-prize winner Dava Sobel promises not only…
AN INTERVIEW WITH ACTOR/WRITER/DIRECTOR GREG SESTERO, STAR OF THE ROOM AND AUTHOR OF THE DISASTER ARTIST, by Brian Burmeister
Interview by Brian Burmeister ACTOR/WRITER/DIRECTOR GREG SESTERO, STAR OF THE ROOM AND AUTHOR OF THE DISASTER ARTIST Greg Sestero has worn many hats in his creative career. As an actor, he’s been in numerous films and TV shows, most famously…
HELLIONS, by Julia Elliott, reviewed by Hana S. Elysia
Fiction by Julia Elliott, reviewed by Hana S. Elysia HELLIONS (Tin House) Grotesque, ethereal, and at times utterly bizarre, Julia Elliott’s magical story collection Hellions is a call to the carnal. Connected by feelings of entrapment, each protagonist encounters the…
US FOOLS, by Nora Lange, reviewed by Maya Grunschlag
Fiction by Nora Lange, reviewed by Maya Grunschlag US FOOLS (Two Dollar Radio) A pink cover decorated with a photograph of lounging blondes may delude some readers into expecting a candy-floss tale of girlhood. Us Fools is a far denser…
ORIGIN STORIES, by Corinna Vallianatos, reviewed by Lennie Roeber-Tsiongas
Fiction by Corinna Vallianatos, reviewed by Lennie Roeber-TsiongasORIGIN STORIES (Graywolf Press) On a rainy February evening in Los Angeles, I made my way to Skylight Books. Like many LA residents, I don’t own an umbrella, so I scurried under overhangs…
In Praise of the Memoir of the Mundane, by Tom McAllister
A Craft Essay by Tom McAllister In Praise of the Memoir of the Mundane The most common concern shared by many would-be memoirists is, “My life is too boring to write about.” Setting aside that often these claims are flat-out…
GIRL WORK, by Zefyr Lisowski, reviewed by Adrie Rose
Poetry by Zefyr Lisowski, reviewed by Adrie RoseGIRL WORK (Noemi Press) When I first saw the title Girl Work, it brought to mind ideas of emotional labor, domestic work so often not seen as actual work, and also, the exhortation…
There’s No Cheating in Poetry, by Elizabeth Galoozis
A Craft Essay by Elizabeth Galoozis There’s No Cheating in Poetry My poems must be composed only of my own original words. This central and stubborn rule hovered, unspoken, over my shoulder for years. Its roots were manifold, from the…
Strangeness and the Art of Revision, by Joshua Wetjen
A Craft Essay by Joshua Wetjen Strangeness and the Art of Revision: How I Invigorated my Fiction by Welcoming the Strange The Toulouse-Lautrec masterpiece “At the Moulin Rouge” was recently part of an exhibition at Minneapolis Institute of Art, a ten-minute…
THE BURROW, by Melanie Cheng, reviewed by Adele Zhao
Fiction by Melanie Cheng, reviewed by Adele Zhao THE BURROW (Tin House) As the COVID pandemic recedes further and further in my memory, I sometimes forget that what happened in those years was not really normal. I find it hard…
Writing About Another (Who’s a Public Figure!) Without Malicious Intent, by Bev Boisseau Stohl
A Craft Essay by Bev Boisseau StohlWriting About Another (Who’s a Public Figure!) Without Malicious Intent Working and traveling with my boss was easy—easy, that is, compared to writing about him. Noam Chomsky, a man I call simply Noam, is…
THE FINDING OUT: Megan Marshall on her latest book, After Lives: On Biography and the Mysteries of the Human Heart, interviewed by Andrea Caswell
Interview by Andrea Caswell THE FINDING OUT: Megan Marshall on her latest book, After Lives: On Biography and the Mysteries of the Human Heart (HarperCollins) In her memoir After Lives, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Megan Marshall trains a biographer’s lens on her…
MORAINE, by Gretta Trafficante
Flash by Gretta Trafficante MORAINE We first formally meet playing hooky from the gay kickball league. Our refuge is the back nook of the only thrift shop in town to house an almost-adequate selection of 2XL vintage. I’m mulling over…
GOOD MANNERS, by John Calderazzo
Poetry by John CalderazzoGOOD MANNERS —Mt. Alice Trail, Seward From the road, through a wall of brush, huge, dank cave of trees, mushroom bursts, mossy yews, spars bent like dancers holding poses on an unlit stage. Path so steep in…
UNWRITING, by Federico Escobar
Nonfiction by Federico EscobarUNWRITING An energy healer told me I was a vampire in a previous life. She was deep in toning, stopped, and told me this. It seemed bizarre enough to be true. I didn’t know what to say.…
ON THE EVE OF THEIR TWENTY-FOURTH WEDDING ANNIVERSARY, by Miranda Keskes
Flash by Miranda Keskes ON THE EVE OF THEIR TWENTY-FOURTH WEDDING ANNIVERSARY After answering the front door and declining another neighborly cup of coffee, she closes the door, places another casserole on the kitchen counter, walks past the row of…
TOUCH POOL, by Caroline Beuley
Fiction by Caroline Beuley TOUCH POOL The visitors grab, stroke, and poke, slipping their hands beneath the water’s surface. They touch the creatures, hoping touch will bring knowledge or understanding. When they leave, they bat their damp hands against their…
HERE IN THE HEAT, by Andrew Graham Martin
Fiction by Andrew Graham Martin HERE IN THE HEAT He enters through the window. The family’s on the ground. Why? Slumber party? Who does this? It’s June. Maybe the only air conditioner is in here. Is he really doing this?…
ARE YOU FEELING BRAVE?, by James Seidler
Fiction by James Seidler ARE YOU FEELING BRAVE? The summer before his freshman year of high school, Adam Lake and his pal Denny spent a good week building a tree fort in the woods near their houses. It was just…
TO THE DRIVER OF THE GREY SEDAN…, by Jocelyn Jane Cox
Flash Nonfiction by Jocelyn Jane Cox TO THE DRIVER OF THE GREY SEDAN WHO HIT ME ON MY BIKE AT THE CORNER OF WALNUT AND 37TH I’m writing to let you know that was me in the green helmet traveling…
THE LIFE AND DEATH OF ELSIE MAE, by Robyn Wheelock
Nonfiction by Robyn Wheelock THE LIFE AND DEATH OF ELSIE MAE Elsie Mae was born beneath Spanish moss and big bright stars a stone’s throw from the Louisiana border. It was April. It was the Great Depression. There were copperheads…
WORKING WITH BLANKS, by Andrea Bishop
Flash by Andrea Bishop WORKING WITH BLANKS My husband says, if you’re going to have to kill something, it’s best to practice beforehand. I say I don’t think I will; I have you. And if I’m not here to keep…
PIETÀ, by Sarah C. Baldwin
Flash Nonfiction by Sarah C. Baldwin PIETÀ I wanted to be thin, thin like Earlene. College food and a middle-class life had left me doughy, but decades had whittled her into something edgy and lean—a slash of charcoal, a licorice…
NECROPANTS, by Colton Huelle
Fiction by Colton Huelle NECROPANTS Erik’s set to fly out of Logan at nine in the morning, and I’m crashing at his place so we can get on the road early enough to beat rush hour. It feels just like…
CONNECTICUS, by Clifford Thompson
Visual Narrative by Clifford Thompson CONNECTICUS Clifford Thompson’s books include What It Is: Race, Family, and One Thinking Black Man’s Blues and Big Man and the Little Men: A Graphic Novel. His book Jazz June: A Self-Portrait in Essays is coming in October from the…
NEGATIVE BOTANY (I ALMOST WEPT), by Adam Doniger
Poetry by Adam Doniger NEGATIVE BOTANY (I ALMOST WEPT) plants do not actually sleep nor do they lie or even bluff they do, however, expose their genitalia (Anne Carson) I climbed the tallest mountain in New York in the middle…
THANK YOU, COCO CHANEL, by Lisa K. Buchanan
Nonfiction by Lisa K. Buchanan THANK YOU, COCO CHANEL Nobody had to tell us it was healthy. We were teenage TV watchers, California girls up on the latest—margarine instead of butter, baby powder for hygiene, lite cigarettes. A suntan meant…