“What’s wrong with pear trees?” I ask, wondering if my dad is getting senile. “Well, they’re an invasive species. They’re not allowed to sell them in nurseries here anymore. They’re very spreadable because of their seeds. The ones in this subdivision are cultivated so they don’t have the thorns, but once the birds start getting to them, and they, you know, do what birds do, the ones that turn up in the wild have the thorns and then they take over everything around them. It’s the monoculture. If you plant only one kind of tree, … Continue reading Foie Gras by Nathan Cover→
I was listening to NPR on my way home from the dentist today and it turned out to be one of those shows I carried into my house when I got home. The show was about mattering. And how mattering is a meta-need—one that is above the other needs like significance, purpose, or belonging. It turns out we need to feel valued and to feel like we are adding value. This isn’t just a nice, woo-woo part of life, supported by affirmations. This is a nitty-gritty, down to our very core, need. Without it, we risk turning … Continue reading Mattering To Fiona by Ginger Moran→
He took his bike from under the porch and rode down the driveway and out onto the sidewalk. He rode around the corner and east on 47th Street past the Ford house and the other homes that all knew decent lives within. He rode around to the other side of the block, a short distance all in all, and then he was coasting up in front of Mark’s house, where Mark was already carrying bricks out to the sidewalk. Gabriel stopped and stood straddling his bike. Come on, Mark said. Are you going to help … Continue reading Two Homes by Douglas Cole→
Black-faced sheep stand still in the valley along the Great Western Railway line, filling their bellies with the grass of the English countryside. Some hold onto the hillsides, their tails in the air, gathered in threes and fours. And near the train tracks, a stream runs, and shirtless young boys carry on in a waterfall. I travel through Western England, a few miles east of Bristol where outside the old village, rows of brown and grey stone homes lean against gardens of red roses. I’m heading for Portsmouth on a Sunday in June to stand … Continue reading A Tavern in The Village by David W. Berner→
My Irish Catholic grandmother—no slouch herself to rosary beads and the Stations of the Cross—had a friend, Wilma, who was far more pious than she. So pious in fact, that she refused to answer the telephone, eat, cook, read the pay-puh or turn on the TV on Good Friday between the hours of 12 and 3 pm. Instead, she knelt in her living room and prayed during the Three Hours’ Agony—the hours of Christ’s crucifixion and death on the cross. Don’t get me wrong. My grandmother was all for a a solemn Catholic ritual, … Continue reading Good Friday by Kathleen McKitty Harris→
I’d already missed two periods before I went to Planned Parenthood in Berkeley. I knew the result before a woman asked if I wanted counseling. She had a lovely voice. “I always say, you’re the one to ask the questions of yourself. Who do you see in yourself, Gina, what do you want?” I answered that I was thirty-five, unmarried, and didn’t know what I wanted. “But my hormones aren’t neutral,” I laughed. “They’re saying yes but I just don’t know.” She asked about my circumstances. “The father is not committed but I’d like him … Continue reading Distances by Barbara Baer→
My four-year-old granddaughter, “Zoe”, lives out-of-state. We often meet via Zoom. She and I share a screen and explore her burning questions by searching YouTube videos. Last Saturday morning, Zoe wanted to know: Do unicorns exist? Are mermaids real? We discovered that unicorn sightings might have been skinny rhinoceros or possibly rare Italian one-horned deer. We also learned that mermaids likely were manatees basking on boulders and the wishful thinking of sailors who had been at sea too long. This news didn’t crush the child. A week later, though, when I asked what she wanted … Continue reading Deconstructing Unicorns and Mermaids by Deborah M. Prum→
She is a large woman. In another place or circumstance, she would have been the woman in the flowery housedress with fluffy mules on her feet. She would have been the lady you always seem to get stuck next to on the bus when it is hot and crowded and everyone has to hold onto the strap. She would have been the one with the smelly armpits. But she fits no clichés. She has money from sources unknown. She has a style so cosmopolitan it makes your teeth hurt. She’s always waving. Hello. Bye-bye. … Continue reading Adrienne by Lisa Ben-Shoshan→
What happens to the homes where we once lived? Homes we left behind, in childhood when it wasn’t a choice, as an adult when it was necessary for work or, as elders, for health reasons or to be closer to family. We can track them down via Google maps, but I suggest they no longer exist. Those places where we once lived, and especially those we once loved, exist only in memory, and, if we’re lucky, in the imagination. I hold onto places I’ve loved by writing fiction set there. Writing helps me process loss. … Continue reading Holding Onto The Past Through Fiction by Virginia Pye→
Spring. Finally. After several snowstorms, ice, and being stuck in the house for days on end, Louise couldn’t wait to get in her yard. The daffodils had bloomed, the forsythia had appeared on stage and the February camellias were still struggling with their winter memories. There was plenty of work to do: mulching, feeding, cleaning up windblown trash, picking up sticks, planting grass seed, trimming bushes, pulling her pots out; she was so glad she had her yardman Buddy to help, insofar as her husband Robert wasn’t much help. The garden, other than family and … Continue reading So Be It by Tyler Scott→
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