Author: Editor Team

By: Cole Grennan My mother stopped loving me two days after her fifty-fifthbirthday. Like any other Tuesday, she got home late. The dark sky stoodon a precipice. Clouds covered the Sturgeon moon and all her friendlystars. Sweaty and tired from the Zumba class she taught, my mother puttogether a meal that we should have eaten…

By: Lesly Portugal I keep you like a most treasured secret,closely, obsessivelyand just for myself.furtive, stolen touchessoftly linger upon my skinas an unspoken love lettertraced upon my bodywith ink that only I can read.illicit conversations wrap around my mindlike stolen silk,it’s a blanket of beautiful and delicately subdued voicesa blanket of comfort againstthe scrutiny of…

Encounter 1: A Unified Sunday Morning By: Tonya McMillian The church is full today. It is as if we all are expecting a specialvisitation from the Holy Spirit in our lives. Everyone is praying, praising, singing, dancing, and rejoicing in the Lord, “Hallelujah!” Ironically, the sermon is titled “The Soon Coming of the Lord.” As…

By: Cole Grennan Sometimes I imagine myself a priest. Collared and chained tomy master’s back door, I wait diligently day in and day out. Sometimes,a stranger will come, staring over the tall gates wrapped in vines. Theyreach out a hand, offering salvation. Freedom, they whisper, temptationdripping from their cupped hands. They bring with them tools…

Fractured Psyche By: Helen Scullin Close your eyes, see a beautiful world!Deafening voices have silenced, dissolved.Horrors of that world will cease to resolve,Weave a new way with the borders unfurled.Close off your mind, live an unconscious dream!Ink blots in darkness as death drives your sleep,Repress the real till the limbo’s too steep,Nightmares in new worlds…

By: Tonya McMillian Growing up in a big city, raised by her father, Charles, andmother, Vonnie, with two siblings, her older brother, Christoph, andyounger sister, Kammie, did not negate that Anne felt all alone all thetime. Her earliest memory was between the ages of three and five. Herparents were fighting in the hall just outside…

By: Rachel Riffle Last night I had a dreamthat you appearedin front of meand I wept. We embraced andI could smellour faded years of friendshipon yourshoulder. I didn’t know what to say except forWhere have you been?aYou towered over melike the Redwoods onthat starry nightwhen we were young and camping. When we thought the futurewas…

By: Rachel Riffle I see my friend wrapped in white,saying her goodbyesto the mournersweeping at her feet. I try to approach her.But with every step,my eyes burn.I fear I cannot controlthe flood aboutto burstand overwhelm her worshippersat the altar of grief. She is dying.But I turn from her,for fear that her fireand lightwill be too…

By: Christian Bauer A-BETA access providers flout alt-countryatmospheric rivers with no back button, only theblue screen of death. Meanwhile, bootlegbody cameras snap after-hour booty calls. A click throughthe commentariat, cosplaying cybersurfers, Cyclospora, dead treedeep cuts with endless desire lines of the Digital Nomadhoarding dissociative identity disorder [DID] on DVD. We’re a dwarf planet, pushed by…

By: Christian Bauer T’DAY everythin’s a shade of off-whiteLike grainy movies binged in the late-nightComin’ to’s a little fuzzyGot me asking ‘really was he’?Did you notice me last nightTurnin’ over that gaslightNeedin’ you to chef soloBut you jus’ flake off sayin’ ‘dunno’?Roll those eyes, not a sure sightDash’a shade ‘n honey seasonin’ our plightCan’t take…