by Laine Derr Like a red-faced warbler,he stumbles across our yard. A father I rarely see, imagesof dappled light mark a face familiar, like a morning mirror,eyes singing a summer song – I come from a jagged lineof men who leavetheir wives on sunny days,kids playing in yardsnewly mowed, tortoiseor…
by James D. Mills There is a term used in support groups to describe a sudden onset of extreme emotion. When the dam of composure that you so carefully built comes crumbling down and there is nothing that can withstand the raging rapids of your own despair. The Grief Share…
by Roxanne Finniss I understand whyyou never wanted to be buried.It begins with a hole6-feet below to preventthe odor of decay.They preserve your skin and organsthrough the process of embalming.Then your family must decidewhether your body mightbe presented in an open casket. (A dead body,that no longer holds the soulin…
by Amber Allehoff thoughts like polka-dotscircular and scattered.shattered dreamsa million beams of lightthat never mattered.
by Amanda Valerie Judd The oceans are a poem –The continuous ebb and flow of the tides,Stanza after stanza in the greatest poem ever written;Each wave a line, punctuated by dolphins,holding a different meaning for each coast it caresses;every word a grain of sand, spoken by the surf,before being tossed…
by Ivy Rozen This poem was originally published in Hot Pot Magazine. We ate avocadoson toast, in salads, with chips.We craved their pits.We saved them inventi plastic cups, logo fadingbut my mom’s misspelled nameremained in Sharpie. Tap water, lukewarm:only fill it half-way.Stab the heart with wooden stakesto hold it up,…
by Russell Rowland No hole is too smallfor a mouse to get into your head. First alarm might bea gnawing sound under floorboards.Treating the symptom, you poundon the floor. Sound stops,briefly. Then resumes. Poundingwill not stop it now. Or you find tiny black seedsin your sock drawer, inside a pianoyou…
by Roland Goity Back in the eighties, my buddy Tommy and I saw every hair metal band from Los Angeles and beyond. We even formed our own hair band and noise polluted every neighborhood in Reseda. These days we’re empty nesters, and since his wife was away at a conference…
by Nolo Segundo My friend Marco and I went out to for lunch, toa ramshackle little place, but my friend told methe food was great—and it was! Three differentchicken curries, a lovely lamb korma, with a half-dozen veggies, and mango drinks to wash it down. I suppose we visited the…
by Joshua Gessner (This story contains a dead body.) “It’s weird to see a dead one up close.” Those words felt wrong. All dirty and naked; they were almost like a baby. When it first comes out, wailing and red, pretty but in a gross way. I don’t recall Jane…