The Enormous Gift by Laura Marello
Absolutely unmixed attention is prayer. Simone Weil Love is not merely an emotion. It is a meltdown that reestablishes a more unified space of brilliance, goodness, and sadness. This is the real function of love in spiritual tradition. Lama Lodro Dorje Last week, the week before my last semester of university teaching (online, in an unprecedented pandemic), I had the most extraordinary experience with a stranger that I have ever had in my long life. I was nervous as always about the semester starting, but extra nervous because of what that last full-time teaching … Continue reading The Enormous Gift by Laura Marello
Pestilence Poetry by Fred Wilbur
Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Many readers may feel that the disrupting Covid-19 pandemic has changed poetry and more broadly the arts, forever. This may be true as many activities are now on-line and the usual ways of interaction have been altered. I see an unprecedented (yes, that word) out-pouring of mass fear, anger, and angst. It must be said that several other concerns are simultaneously occurring in our country; the destruction of our democracy by incompetence and cruelty and the renewed concern for racial/social justice, sparked by police corruption and a militaristic mentality. … Continue reading Pestilence Poetry by Fred Wilbur
Susan Patrick: Debris into Drawings, Paintings and Sculptures
On walks, I find feathers, seed pods, pieces of wood, leaves, flowers, sticks, papers, plastic and metal things, pieces of glass, strings, all objects that were useful in some way before they were dropped or lost. They served important purposes and then they didn’t. Some fell from trees, from birds, from pockets, the undersides of cars, or from the hand of a distracted walker like me. I find these little things visually interesting. … Continue reading Susan Patrick: Debris into Drawings, Paintings and Sculptures
Markings by Donna Isaac
Duck prints score the pond, the one out my window, the one where an egret roosts come spring, the one where a blue heron fishes in summer, the one where nuthatches sip drips on the shoreline. It is still winter. I don’t know tomorrow except for penciled-in plans, scrimshaw on a calendar. I don’t know the future but for forked feet. Donna Isaac is a teaching artist who organizes community readings in the Twin Cities, Minn.; she curates and hosts the reading series, Literary Lights. Published poetry includes Footfalls (Pocahontas Press), a paean to growing … Continue reading Markings by Donna Isaac
Mired in Diacritics by Irina Moga
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New Garbage Disposal by Barbara Conrad
I don’t know why this simple apparatus makes me smile. After months of scooping out lemon rinds and soggy granola with bare hands, there’s something sweet about the soft buzz of a motor mushing up the day’s drudgeries. It’s a mind, body, spirit kind of thing, don’t you think? I mean, when another active shooter splatters our headlines red and migrants get stored in cages while the planet sizzles and viruses roam the earth a garbage disposal seems to have an odd way of leveling the playing field. Barbara Conrad is author of three poetry … Continue reading New Garbage Disposal by Barbara Conrad
Another Day by Cheryl Aubin
Toward the evening of the night I thought my mother was dying, the aide, who stayed with mom during the day, told me mom had been asleep for twenty-four hours and would not wake up. She sent me a picture of my mom, smiling and looking peaceful. The aide put the phone up to my mother’s ear so I could talk to her. It felt as if my lungs had closed and no breath would come, a drowning in sorrow and grief, as in the barest choking whisper I told my mother I loved her. … Continue reading Another Day by Cheryl Aubin
Troubling the Fields by Mary Alice Hostetter
Mary Alice Hostetter is an Honorable Mention in Streetlight Magazine‘s 2020 Essay/Memoir Contest The first thing I noticed was the sign. My mother and I were driving back from getting corn meal at the mill, and we saw it on Leroy’s fence, “Brunk Tent Revival Coming August 15-22.” Leroy’s farm bordered ours. “Well, I guess that’ll take care of the peace and quiet for a while,” my mother said. “Looks like the show is coming.” The next week Leroy mowed his hayfield as close as he could cut it, pulling the hay mower back and … Continue reading Troubling the Fields by Mary Alice Hostetter
First Sonogram and How Family Stories Go, 2 poems by Eric Forsberg
First Sonogram Seen from your upper window, down the block at some remove, an Edward Hopper black and white and grainy through the screen, a street lamp’s cone shines down. There, you notice a figure, indistinct, possibly familiar, curled as if to tie a shoe, and wonder who it is . How Family Stories Go A cured and hanging ham, one of several, drawn from a dark larder in the back of a paid-down clapboard house. Hard. A little shrunk. With a flourish it’s revealed on the cutting board. Each time, descendants of the first … Continue reading First Sonogram and How Family Stories Go, 2 poems by Eric Forsberg
More News of Good Writing—Essay Honorable Mentions 2020
When we held our essay/memoir contest last spring, we had such a wealth of wonderful entries, it was very hard to pick the winners. I think we did a good job—certainly the best we could—but in the process we knew there were entrants, beside those we chose for the prizes, whose work we could not overlook. We therefore asked a number of those whose work we could not pick—since we had only three prizes to award—if they would be willing accept the status of Honorable Mention. Five really excellent memoirists graciously acceded to this request. … Continue reading More News of Good Writing—Essay Honorable Mentions 2020