Prayer
m.e. gamlem Prayer They burst out the front door in frenzy, not unlike the fireflies that would soon surround them. Three little girls, six, seven and eight, all with blonde hair and bare feet. When they would return, just before…
Unseen Children
Franz Jørgen Neumann Unseen Children Penny pats the trail marker on the other side of the stream. “Only a mile to the cave,” she calls to the kids. “No laggards!” Tom doesn’t turn around, the turbid water threshed by the…
Ethan Welcomes Back the World
Derek Updegraff Ethan Welcomes Back the World Part 1: Enter Ethan. Enter Chris. They’re in the Laundromat now, brightness glaring down on them from fluorescent bulbs lining the ceiling, machines humming as they drown clothes in soapy water or…
A Letter to, for, on the Other
Viola Clune A Letter to, for, on the Other If you’ve ever written a story, you have probably heard the advice “write what you know.” Although originally an import of wisdom from the quintessential writer of the American experience, Mark…
Night Poem # 3
Augustus C. Grohmann NIGHT POEM #3 The moths chewed through the starlit upholstery of night and left thunderstorm holes in the August sky: Needless to say, it was another Virginia summer. You and I in the butter yellow living room,…
A Lesson in Cartography / Everything Is Made of Water and Full of Gods
Zachary Lundgren A LESSON IN CARTOGRAPHY He wrestled a stingray from the ocean, Joe did, laugh- jogging his way up the beach. Combing his black ocean hair, he smiled, showing us all the cuts between his fingers, sand colored to…
Poem beginning with Duolingo practice sentence / Ode to the Astronaut Who Mistook His Own Piss for Stars
David Eileen Poem beginning with Duolingo practice sentence Mi abuelo quiere morir en su país. It’s not my tongue but I like to practice naming what my grandfather can’t have: for this red field to be his & his…
Shadow Sonnet
Devon Balwit SHADOW SONNET The children are anxious, but no more so than their parents, who are also anxious, so much so that they day-drink on top of their meds, Xanax or Zoloft, worrying about their kids’ drinking on top…
Grownup Gods / After Fifty Years
Claire Scott GROWNUP GODS Myths are stories we tell each other to make living tolerable. Martyr by Kaveh Akbar The grownup gods aren’t working out. Some on sabbatical some lounging on the beaches of…
Nostalgia
Donna Pucciani NOSTALGIA We’d dug out the photos from a closet full of old things, the boxes vaguely dusty, and decided to pay attention to the past. We started at the beginning, our beginning, the Seventies, when life seemed simple…