By Moira Crooks Come sit beside me on the deck The wood is fragrant and hot, the air Silent and holding its breath. Birds are hushed in the spindly trees and even the river is sullenly asleep. Violet orbs of sweetness await their fate, A few sacrificed to taste, you…
By Lois Hard Rain cascades from her cheeks as she mourns the only person she ever really knew. When the advocate comes, he will plead her case, but not until she completes her deed. There is still hope though, even as the liquid drips from her fingertips, and her ashen…
My mother sobbed when she found out she was having a girl. I was to be the first after two boys and for that, she was ecstatic. I’ve seen the video countless times, each time noting the way her beautiful brown hair stuck to her forehead and her mossy green…
By Joan Raymond Eloise held open the metal venetian blinds between her thumb and first finger. “Frank will you look at that – the O’Conner’s haven’t taken in their trash bins yet and it’s been well over thirty minutes since the garbage truck emptied them.” She snapped the blinds shut…
By Amanda Paulger She said to me once, This earth is one Great big stone Which grew life One great big stone With a heart Beating, awake. We should thank it for being alive. My grandmother preached At her kitchen table Or over the stove while She cooked breakfast, “Vote,…
By Allen Kopp When Vicki-Vicki was fourteen, she shaved off her eyebrows. They were growing too much, almost meeting in the middle, and she hated the tedious and painful process of pulling them out one by one with the tweezers. She believed that by shaving them off completely they would…
By Andrew Clark Dewey cracked open a bottle of water and drank deeply. “Oh, damn,” he muttered, half coughing, half spitting water down his chest and all over his dusty boots. “This water is piss-warm.” “What’d you expect, those bottles have been sittin’ out here all day,” Harris said, as…
By Steve Prakope Robert held the trembling puppy in the palm of his hand. The puppy, no longer than his width of his hand, twitched with uncontrollable spasms, its head stuck to the side of its body as if looking behind for danger. Robert saw the second puppy in the…
By Alex Scarelli Thunder sounded as Claire stood from her garden and wiped the dirt off her bare knees. She took off her gloves and wiped her dewy forehead with her forearm. Her shoulders, exposed in one of her ratty tank-tops she used for her daily chores, felt tight and…
Motherhood is A Bright Torture By Stephanie Bryant Anderson I have stood at the gates in Leningrad for 17 months with all of Russia’s mothers. We have begged from ground built by bones of the dead. Lev, I was not meant to be your mother, though I have loved you…