The first time I saw infinity was on the Gulf of Mexico. Almost since the day I was born, I felt it absolutely necessary that I one day see the ocean. Some of my first memories are dumping worms into the lake, because if I were not to feed the fish, they may go […]
Nonfiction
Odd Ducks
by Marlene Olin
Home is where you hang your hat, park your shoes, make your bed. It’s the place you boomerang back to. Barn. Stable. Coop. Cage. It’s the place where your belongings belong. I live in a townhouse community in Coconut Grove, a suburb of Miami. The more expensive homes sit right on the bay. The location […]
New Media/Digital Poetry and the Body
by Amanda Hodes
<h1> The body is. The body is not. What is the body when it is not the body? What can a body be when it is not the body? Is the body ever just the body? What is the body even when we claim it is not the body? </h1> <h2> This is what I […]
Writing Tips or (How I tried to get my niece—who asked—to change her mind on a writing career as she cavalierly jumped into the writing business after graduating from business school, quitting her six-figure accounting job only three months in while boldly proclaiming her Quixotic quest to follow her dreams, become vegan, pay off her student loan, marry for love, write the next great American novel, reconcile me with both my ex and with my brother (her dad), rescue a St. Bernard—in her apartment—one bedroom, downtown San Francisco, etc.)
by Ed McManis
Part One Thanks for thinking of me. It seems like we were just at your graduation. Hope you can use the blender. Too bad about the job. Yes, the business world is a desert; I guess yours was kind of a six-figure desert. Regarding advice: I’m flattered you asked. […]
Convergence
by Kathryn Hively
Side effects include: insomnia. But gone are the reverberations of the day’s thoughts, the should haves and second guesses. Gone is the ricochet of what could be, scenarios crafted with increasing fallout until, heart pounding and breathless, the night slips away. The worry remains in singular form. The roads may be icy in the morning. […]
He Started It
by Jim Kelly
What you don’t know about is the picnic table. It was, when I was growing up, our breakfast, lunch, and dinner table. School nights, it was my homework table. When he was sleeping off a drunk, it was a bed for my Old Man. A log leg, second hand picnic table with split board bench […]
Nothing but Ice Gravel
by Brittany Ackerman
On the way through, clasp your fists around the universe: Nothing but ice-gravel. But open your hands when you reach the other side. Quickly, before it melts. – “Love Letter (Clouds)” Sarah Manguso I. Nick was married but I met him at the park anyway. We sat on a bench that faced a manmade lake. […]
Freeing Lucy
by Alyssa Witbeck
They named me Lucy on March 3rd. Dressed in white (dress, socks, slippers), I clutched a lacy sack of sacred clothing while I followed the small congregation from room to room of the Mormon temple. I entered a closet-like space, the place they name people in, the room that launches a person from who they […]
Kitchen Notes for Oldest Daughters Who Were Never Taught to Cook
by Amanda Roth
Chocolate Cake Ingredients ▢ 1½ cups all-purpose flour ▢ ¼ cup unsweetened childhood memories, thoroughly sifted ▢ ⅓ cup vegetable oil (an oldest daughter) ▢ 1 cup water (her mother) ▢ 1 teaspoon white vinegar (her father) ▢ 1 cup sugar or artificial sweetener (see also: the way the parents act differently in public) ▢ […]
The Poetry Reading
by Karli Petrovic
My friend Jess wrote a pocket-sized book of poetry I carried in my purse for many years. A blank black cover with white font, No Subject, Just Reflection found its home among loose change, random pens, elusive hair ties and the pink Motorola flip phone that hung out in my increasingly tattered tote bag. The […]