Etymology uncertain. That is how the dictionary deals with the origins of the word gradoo, tip-toeing lightly around a word you wouldn’t want to step in. Pronounced graw-doo with the accent on doo, as in Scooby-Doo and Yabba Dabba Doo, a colloquialism from the South, the dictionary says. Ahh! No surprise there. It’s not Connecticut yankees throwing a word like that around if classier terms are available. Which brings up the question of what, exactly, is gradoo. Back to the dictionary again: crud, filth, garbage, gunk; burnt mess stuck to the bottom of a pot. … Continue reading Gradoo by Richard Key→
The train whistle trumpets its warning. I watch the woods, meadows and marshland slowly morph into urban views and city skylines. Washington. Baltimore. Philadelphia. Newark. New York will be next. The best of memories surface as I approach Manhattan, the captivating city for which I feel a claim and abiding affection. What, I wonder, does it take to be considered a New Yorker. My first memories of the city date from the 1940s, a formative time and closeness to my parents. We lived on Seventeenth Street near Stuyvesant Park where my mother took me … Continue reading To Be a New Yorker by Elizabeth Meade Howard→
With all due respect, Mr. William Carlos Williams, it’s not the red wheelbarrow on which so much depends. It’s the cinder block car wash glazed with rainbow foam beside the Handlebar Grill in Great Bend, Kansas. I’ve seen it in the setting sun as I watched Red River Valley clay, carried up from Texas, make runnels off my rented pickup. You don’t go having mystical experiences in Kansas. At least that’s what I’d heard. What was it Dorothy said when she opened the Technicolor door? “I’ve a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore.” By which … Continue reading To See the Universe in Cinderblock by Alex Joyner→
We are excited to announce the Streetlight Poetry Contest winners for this year. But first, several observations: we are pleased with your response of 106 entries comprising 290 poems. As we have previously noted, all poems are read by each of us independently. Then, through consultation and often multiple re-readings, we arrive at the most poignant and well-crafted poems. But we also want to emphasize that, being poets ourselves, we recognize and appreciate the creative effort of each entrant and in a sense, each poem. We want to encourage each of you to persevere … Continue reading Poetry Contest Winners for 2025 by Sharon Ackerman and Fred Wilbur→
Rachel Turney has traveled the world with curiosity and a camera. It all began in childhood. “I started taking pictures of houses in my Midwest neighborhood when I was in grade school. I was very interested in architecture. Patterns have always intrigued me. Shutters on brick, the placement of windows, the varying colors of paint. “I also spent a lot of time as a child with stacks of National Geographics at my grandparents’ house. My grandparents were big travelers and I loved to look at their photographs and old slide shows. I think the … Continue reading The Photographs of Rachel Turney→
What do you do when something ought to be a word but isn’t yet? You’re typing in something you’ve written, and a little red line appears under it. You’re supposed to humbly backspace and obediently type something else instead, because the robots are always right. Let’s say you’re writing about the sensory experience of walking on damp sand. You’re writing from the POV of an autistic child, so you need precision. “Grittiness” isn’t quite right; “powderiness” is way off. It’s not a static “roughness”, or a “crunch” exactly. “Grind” carries the wrong connotation, and even … Continue reading What Would Shakespeare Do? by Fiona M. Jones→
So, I found myself in a restaurant with my wife, two friends, and one friend’s first cousin whom I had not previously met. After drinks and appetizers, the cousin, a well-educated, intelligent, funny, and charming lawyer and real estate investor, learned that I had recently published a novel and was in the process of editing a second for publication. After hearing that each novel had taken me about ten years to write, edit and find a publisher, he proposed that, to produce more in a shorter period of time, I upload my writings into an … Continue reading Aritifice or Intelligence by E. H. Jacobs→
We are going on the trip of a lifetime and the two parts of my personality are at war. Anxiety/control vs. procrastination/let it ride. It’s really fun. To celebrate our twentieth wedding anniversary, the husband and I are going back to the Isle of Man, for the annual TT motorcycle races. We have a year to plan everything; unfortunately all this time means there’s plenty of opportunity for things to go wrong and for changes to have to be made. So I take a few breaths and try to focus on something else, anything else … Continue reading Vacations are great, but . . . by Emily Littlewood→
Two years ago, in the pocket of time between Thanksgiving and the onslaught of holiday chaos, I spent a week with my grandmother, Mimi, at her home on St. Simons Island. She had been feeling a little off—her words, not mine—and welcomed the company. Under her astute and vigilant direction, I cooked her favorite dinners, recorded a podcast episode about her life, and rubbed her feet while we watched TV procedurals in the evenings. Mostly, she rested. But on Thursday she got antsy. She wanted to go out to dinner. So we did. We ended … Continue reading Talk To Strangers by Bree Luck→
My writing mantra used to be, Fine is good enough. I made sure whatever I sent out was the best it could be. However, I worked fulltime and was the primary caretaker for three children. When I finished a manuscript, I checked for issues, then hit “send” before anyone came down with croup, required a ride to music lessons, or needed four zillion forms signed. I never lingered at the finish line, which meant some manuscripts went out not quite fully polished. You’ve heard of the tyranny of the urgent? Those years, I happened to … Continue reading Don’t Arrive Before You Get There by Deborah M. Prum→
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