Fiction by Lindsey Godfrey Eccles WHEN MOUNTAINS WERE PEOPLE Long ago when mountains were people there were two sisters, each so tall her forehead touched the sky, and each so beautiful that anyone who saw her stared in wonder. Between…
Poetry by Elly Katz DUPLEX dark is darker than I remember was it a dream or a memory? rescue me from these shadows on the undersurface of spiral threads nude twists and turns mounting dismounting that called off glowing ground…
Poetry by Bradley J. Fest2023.32 Soaring amaranthis getting you down on the floor again? Diane Seuss’s long line’ll [1] set things right while hazarding the new kinds of loneliness. The body that is your body is and always has been…
Nonfiction by Margo SanabriaHARD TIMES, RACE, AND CLASSIC MOVIES By the time I was ten I was a classic movies devotee. It still makes me smile to think of an African-American child with cat-eye glasses, three pigtails, two in back…
Fiction by Krista Puttler ORIGIN STORY Mama, where do stories come from? They come from a dog’s ear. No, they don’t! They come from your fingertips! You mean fingernails. No, I don’t. Pens, pencils, keyboards… Blood, pain, anticipation… What are…
Poetry by John Minczeski LITTLE ODE TO TAKING THE DOG OUT The last trip to the yard for the night, temperature not minus anything just now. The day, having lost its train of thought, clung to twilight like a lamprey.…
Flash by Jessica KlimeshTHE BODY SHOP I find a pair of arms in my size and put them on, then exchange my middle-aged ears for some keener ones since Lyle says I don’t listen, says it’s just one of my…
Flash by Coleman BigelowBECAUSE AT LEAST WE DRINK FRESH ROAST When we first dropped out of design school, coffee was our everything—the intoxicating grounds providing just the jittering jolt our imaginations required. Each sip sending us bareback on burros ascending…
Flash by Kiely Todd RoskaGOD’S LOVE IS TWO WOMEN FROM A QUILTING GUILD IN MISSOULA, MONTANA You fly halfway across the country to clean your mom’s house and plan her funeral. She died by suicide a week and a half…
Poetry by Herman BeaversTRUE NORTH Sidereal & reassuring, lightattired in the color of plums.Aching with sap, the trees’throb of sweetness’s likea ghost vexing me. Grass browningunder its pointed stare,a ground hog, back curved amongthe sycamore leaves, presses closeagainst the gravel,…
Nonfiction by Judith Serin THE HOUSE WITH WALLS OF HONEY in memory of Herbert Yee and 39 years together The house with walls of honey. Bees swarmed into the house and we let them stay. Their buzzing lulled our sleep.…
Fiction by Sinclair Cabocel THE ARMAGEDDON SURF CLUB When the trumpets sounded, Monica was propped up on her elbows, watching Mateo shred from the sandy shore. The other beachgoers swiveled their heads, as if they might find some passing band…
Poetry by Anders HowertonAI, THE END We had done it before with skylines,migrations, lasagna, and this too was alive, a chamber of neurons, layered like we are. Everyone ever known now looms before us. It rose like a scaffold, part…
Clifford Thompson ON THE OTHER HAND… (PART 2) Read ON THE OTHER HAND… (Part 1) Clifford Thompson’s books include What It Is: Race, Family, and One Thinking Black Man’s Blues (2019), which Time magazine called one of the most anticipated…
David UpdikeKeeping the Dream Alive I almost never remember my dreams. This feels like a loss, because when I do, they offer glimpses into how the subconscious folds time and space to shape new narratives, much like an origamist folds…
Vanessa SaundersWRITING AS A SOMATIC PROCESS To expand your approach to writing prose sentences, practice typing out pages from writers you admire. Doing a page every day helps me get an understanding of how different kinds of prose feel under my fingers. I also get the…
Nonfiction by Michelle Ephraim, reviewed by Benjamin SelesnickGREEN WORLD: A TRAGICOMIC MEMOIR OF LOVE AND SHAKESPEARE (University of Massachusetts Press) The genre of second generation Holocaust survivor memoirs has grown vast with contributions ranging from graphic novels like Maus to…
Nonfiction by Nicole Treska, reviewed by Monica WendelWONDERLAND (Simon & Schuster) Some memoirs feel like stories told in a therapist’s office. The white noise machine, a box of tissues, predictable healing arcs. Other memoirs can feel braggy, like the writer…
Cameron MacKenzieHOW TO NOT END A STORY When I get to the end of a story I’m writing – especially if it’s a long and complicated story – I always want to really nail the landing. I want to stick…
Poetry by Lisa Grunberger, reviewed by Angelina SciollaFOR THE FUTURE OF GIRLS (Kelsay Books) Think about the first time you ran your hands over a relief map or globe—likely as a child in elementary school—and consider how your palms encountered…
Maggie HillStop Writing; Watch Basketball My introduction to poetry happened in Madison Square Garden, back when the New York Knicks were, well, The Knicks. It was the mid-1970s and I was a kid who liked basketball. I was a girl, so…
Andrea CaswellTHE ART (AND SCIENCE) OF REVISION Though most writers accept that there isn’t a one-size-fits-all approach to revision, it doesn’t mean we don’t wish for one! It’s natural to want a “magic solution” for a process that can feel…
A Poetry Craft Essay by Eileen ToomeyIt Started with a List: CRAFTING A HELIX POEM In August 2020, early in the pandemic, I was lucky to attend a remote workshop with poet Lidia Yuknavitch who shared with us a narrative…
Sharon WhiteHARVESTING SUBMISSIONS FROM A WORK IN PROGRESS I’ve been writing a book about New Zealand painter Anna Caselberg. In 2019, I was a writer-in-residence in the house she lived in until her death in 2004. I loved being in…
A Writing Tip by Jackson TatgeDO YOU REALLY NEED A WEBSITE? What comes up when you type your own name into Google? Has the internet been able to accurately describe you as well as you would have hoped? Does it…
Poems by Sharon White, reviewed by Sara Verstynen THE BODY IS BURDEN AND DELIGHT, (Cornerstone Press) Sharon White’s The Body Is Burden and Delight was the perfect selection for The 2023 Portage Poetry Series, awarded annually by Cornerstone Press. The…
A Poetry Craft Essay by Abbie Kiefer THE GENEROUS ACT OF PUBLISHING DRAFTS: Letting Poems Exist as Iterations Most of the poems in my debut book, Certain Shelter, appeared first in journals—and in almost every case, the book version of…
Interview by Andrea CaswellA Conversation with Sven Birkerts, author of The Miró Worm and the Mysteries of Writing (Arrowsmith Press) “Nothing defines a writer so much as what they pay attention to.” In his newest book, The Miró Worm and…
Kate E Lore SALVAGING A DEAD STORY Sometimes a story can start off so strong, but still fizzle out somewhere between the middle and the end. Maybe you’ve got a beautiful visceral spark, this pulsing idea from which you set…
M. LinA PERSONAL ARCHAEOLOGY OF SOUND AS TOLD IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER Honorable Mention of the 2024 Cleaver Emerging Artist Award 1989: 乾你娘 – ‘gan4 ni3 niang2’ – ‘gan’ in the 4th tone meaning fuck. As in ‘you motherfucker’ If…
Oona PatrickTOSTA MISTA/MIXED TOAST On my first trip to Portugal, I ate tosta mista, or mixed toast, nearly every day because it was the only sandwich I knew how to pronounce. The mista distinguishes your order from cheese toast or…
Alex RostTHE BLUE PEN I’m writing this with a blue pen. Traditionally, and consistently, I’ve always been a black pen kind of guy. I think most of us are. You can say that about a lot of things. You can…
Cameron MacKenzieCATSUIT Every time Ally’s mom’s boyfriend fed his ball python, he played “Mouth for War,” by Pantera. My friend Tyler and I would squat beside the snake’s aquarium under the hot light and watch the little mouse as it…
Holaday MasonSUMMONED TO PERFORM AT ALL HOURS OF THE NIGHT 1. It’s so late I can hear my grandmother, Margery, slap an ace-high straight down on linoleum, light a Doral, become smoke. We are so wet again, our pool hair…
A.L. GordonPRECIOUS THINGS Winner of the 2024 Cleaver Emerging Artist Award “Precious Things” by A.L. Gordon was one of those submissions that wowed me by how unafraid and emotionally raw it is in its subject, while still being beautifully crafted…
Marj HahneFRAGMENTS FOR AN IDENTICAL TWIN Cleave. Ends with leave. Let’s begin there. Because there includes here. Whenever you leave, I sense my own absence. Right before the last time you left, you screamed, “You got what you wanted! I’m…
Third Place, Duality Creative Nonfiction Contest, 2024 Like all good personal essays, this one brings the humility and wisdom of experience to bear on a look at a past self, with sympathy for that self. The boy of the title…
Michael CzyzniejewskiHER HEART WAS A CHIPMUNK She said her heart was a chipmunk, said it on our first date. I figured she was being poetic, saying something like My heart is a chipmunk to mean she herself was like a…
Second Place, Duality Creative Nonfiction Contest, 2024 This short gem manages to tell us almost nothing, and yet everything, about the girls of the title, capturing the complex dance between person and environment. The descriptions of what these girls pass…
First Place, Duality Creative Nonfiction Contest, 2024 We are made to feel for the central character in this sad, moving work through the way place is evoked—both the place she is in and the one to which she aches to…
Luanne CastleANOTHER WEEK LEFT OF GRAND ROUNDS WITH DR. WEBBER My eyes lock onto Dr. Webber’s seed pearl spectacle cord as she launches clinical phrases from the patient report. After our first day trailing her, I bought a similar cord,…
Clifford Thompson ON THE OTHER HAND… Origins of My Comics As a young boy growing up in Washington, DC, in the early 1970s, I fell in love with the comic strip Peanuts, which left two indelible marks on me: a…
David L. UpdikeREUNION My kindergarten class’s fiftieth reunion is underway. It’s being hosted by two of our classmates, Mike Finnegan and Linda Haupt, who ended up dating in high school and getting married shortly after graduation. They’re now grandparents and…
Magda Andrews-HokeWAG On my twenty-fifth birthday I saw a greyhoundin a little red jacket being walked by a womanin a Scandinavian sweater. I said aloud,“Is this what it’s like to grow older?” I canmake no head, no tail of it:…
David WatersFIVE HEARTS Physician Notes Patient Name: Barbara Fields Chief Complaint: chronic yearning History of Present Illness: This pleasant 38-year-old, well-developed, well-nourished woman—looking younger than her stated age—comes to the Emergency Department complaining of unrequited desire. She is oriented as…
Micah GrotegutONO CHICKEN Scrolling through the news, I clicked on a video headlined “Historic Lahaina Burnt Down in Wildfire.” I listened to the reporter describe the ashy remains of once-standing homes and shells of vehicles strewn on apocalyptic roads, the…
Ho-Ming So DenduangrudeeFAIRYTALE Once upon a time, one of my children assured me that “America” was not just the name of a country but the name of the world. My children are young and have no memory of Thailand, where…
Cassie BurkhardtTHREE FLASH ON MOTHERHOOD MUD KITCHEN Dirt is the bane of my existence, but my kids love it—can’t resist it, never met a mud puddle they didn’t immediately want to wade in barefoot. All I see is laundry. We…
Hart Vetter SLAPPED “Just let it rise,” said Aaron. He’d had it. My son and I had schlepped over two dozen filled buckets out the basement up the steps to the front door and dumped them down the driveway, mercifully…
Erika KrouseI FEEL LIKE I COULD STAND HERE WITH YOU ALL NIGHT AND IT WOULD BE THE WORST NIGHT OF MY LIFE I work at Ye Olde Curio Shoppe downtown. We consign from the community—people bring in old family items…