Splitting Wood by David Sapp It wasn’t when I got the hang of cursing, exquisitely and generously, tutored by the bigger kids at the back of the school bus. It wasn’t when I puf […]

On A Scale Of . . . by Wendy Kennar Wendy Kennar is the 1st place winner of Streetlight’s 2026 Essay/Memoir Contest Within my first few years of teaching, the district’s grading sys […]

When My Secrets Were No Longer Mine by Jean Romano One day after school, I stepped into my room and immediately felt that something was wrong. My eyes darted to the bed, and my heart stopped. The […]

Cadence by David Stern You don’t think about it unless you’re doing it. Coughing. The cough reflex is a critical means by which your body protects your airway from blo […]

The Man in the Golden Helmet by Harry Lee James I first saw “The Man In the Golden Helmet” in 1976 on a street corner in Monterey California. At that time he was labeled as “The C […]

Rush Hour Angels by Rosanne Trost A few years ago, I was driving home from work, encountering typical rush hour traffic. At a red light, the car radio went dead. The light turned […]

Why Visual Identity Matters More Than Ever in the AI Content Era by Art Meder I’m a Chicago-based visual artist working primarily with street photography and short-form video. My work focuses on capturing the city through a r […]

What Would Shakespeare Do? by Fiona M. Jones 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 […]

Like your relationship with Creativity? If not, Julia Cameron can help you change it. by Lisa Cooper Ellison Last Thursday, I attended a gathering of local writing friends where we ate food and gave out lots of hugs, along with cheers of “OMG! I haven’t seen […]

What AM I Looking For? by Paula Boyland Despite a mountain of unfinished drafts, I am compelled to start another book. While drafting an essay something clicked, a connection was made in my […]

 
The sound of rain.
It gently taps on the roof. The blinds are closed, but you can see that outside there are a few other
green apartment buildings surrounded by an evergreen forest.
The branches are […]

Steps and measurements, bullet points of to-dos with creation in mind. Beautiful guidelines meant only to guide. It is here that I begin, here that I write something of worth, something to heal, where I grow again […]

Mexican-American. Latino/a. Are the hyphens and slashes connecting these forces more like borders or bridges, separating or unifying to the touch? Why can’t I superimpose Mexican and American so that they Rest u […]

I am in the middle of writing an essay that spans a full twenty-nine of my thirty-two years of life. It hinges on an event that happened three Thanksgivings ago, but reaches as far back as my third birthday […]

At thirty-seven inches and thirty-seven pounds, I was the second smallest kid in my first-grade class. The smallest was a kid we called Peanut—a boy so tiny, he’d drown in the shallow end of the pool. Everyone lov […]

All my life, I’ve processed joy and sorrow, confusion and diatribe, in writing. I have a book of hand written poems working through the tragedies and angst of a teenage mindscape. I have notebooks journaling my c […]

Among other national celebrations like Black History Month, Great American Pies Month and National Library Lover’s Month, February is also National Self-Check Month. Turns out, there’s a whole yearly calendar of […]

Last night I received an email from Emily, the copy editor, reminding me I’d signed up to provide the blog post for Monday. Uh, oh. For some reason I never added the deadline to my calendar. I knew I’d signed up […]

“Welcome! How can I help you today?” I asked as the store doors opened.

The first customer was an older gentleman who I’d glimpsed pacing outside like a taunted zoo lion for at least a half hour before we unloc […]

It’s a common situation. In a closely-knit global community we find ourselves communicating in several languages.

The best part is that we don’t necessarily need to be conversant in the said lan […]