The kitchen is new to her, its wide granite island, so big you could autopsy a moose on it. More cabinet space than she’d had in all her previous kitchens combined, and then some. A Viking range. A hot water tap. Ice and water through the door in the refrigerator. Although her contributions were meager by comparison, they merged kitchen tools. Her KitchenAid mixer; her mixing bowls; his Cuisinart food processor; his silverware set. Chili is simmering in an enameled pot on the stove. Cornbread bakes in the oven. Her own work day finished, Sarah … Continue reading You Must Pay The Rent by Marijean Oldham→
The word Lent derives from an Old English word meaning ‘lengthen.’ Or more precisely, it comes from the Middle English word lente which means springtime, which itself descends from the Old English lencten. Of course the forty day period of Lent comes at a time when days are lengthening and a few green tips of flowers are testing the air. It is this time of lightening that enters the liturgical calendar as a season of reflection and forgiveness. As it turns out, reflection and forgiveness are complicated. Friends in recovery from alcoholism tell me they … Continue reading Lent by Sharon Ackerman→
We Were Bag People Life is no knock-off handbag, no purse ordinary as any K-Mart pocketbook. No. Worse. Life is a brown paper bag, plainest container, what my father called a poke. Run get me a poke for these beans now. My father talked like a Hank Williams song: Life is a sack of shit sometimes. A&P store bags jam-packed our slumping shelves—our lunchboxes our backpacks our suitcases. Life is utilitarian and pitiful sometimes, papery thin as bird legs. Life is a grease spot in the corner of a lunch sack, stained like a workshirt … Continue reading We Were Bag People and Lament for my Late Cousin While Feeding the Dog, 2 poems by Marianne Worthington→
I’ve been having trouble reading lately. Actually, for the last few years. I can’t seem to sit down with a book and focus on it long enough to get through the entire thing. And my memory what it is, if I start a book and set it down longer than a day or so I forget everything that’s going on and some of the characters and even the setting, and the result is that I have to start over. I don’t have the energy. But recently my same-age-as-me aunt, Eden, suggested Fourth Wing, a “romantasy” … Continue reading A Change of Scenery by Emily Littlewood→
your namealways tasteslike a palindrome across my tongue minnowingpond wide words stained red as pomegranate arilsthe sun dies between us painting ripples aquarelles what is left to say when there is no way forward that doesn’t feel like retreatwhen clouds lit citrus bright over lakeside cypress hold that dream i can’t whisper B. Luke Wilson grew up in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains and his fiction and poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in Moon City Review, LIT Magazine, Artemis Journal, and elsewhere. He is the assistant … Continue reading say goodbye, without disappearing by B. Luke Wilson→
My father died twenty-five years ago when I was fifty; a third of my life ago. He was by most measures a good man, and I grieved as a good son should. I think of him often, have written poems about our relationship. So, I was eager, a few years back, to read An Odyssey: A Father, A Son, and An Epic (Daniel Mendelsohn) which, though mostly memoir, explores the father/son relationship; Odysseus and Telemachus being an early example in literature. My father was not secretive though reserved, not agitated but conscientious, not obnoxiously ambitious … Continue reading Our Fathers by Fred Wilbur→
I know people who know horses They ride them and own them and talk about their different points. They look at a horse in a field or paddock, and evaluate it, speak of its attributes. In all the Westerns I read growing up, there were always characters who knew “horse flesh.” I don’t. I know nothing. All horses are beautiful to me. A faculty member at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts, Joseph Mills has published eight volumes of poetry, most recently Bodies in Motion: Poems about Dance. His book This Miraculous … Continue reading Horses by Joseph Mills→
The silence had lengthened to the point where it was awkward. The young man said, “Have you noticed? Ours is a Cinzano umbrella, but all the others are for Kronenbourg beer.” Despite herself she turned her shoulders the minimum necessary to ascertain it was true. She thought that if she were in a brighter mood, she might look for some metaphor, but nothing presented itself except the very trivial fact that of the five tables on the terrace of the café, four were shaded by umbrellas advertising Kronenbourg 1664 whereas theirs had on each … Continue reading Cinzano by Michael Paul Hogan→
Diligent was the only word that could be applied to my father’s pursuit of dandelions in our front yard. Clearly Iremember him in his worn work boots, laced to the top, socks rolled down touching, and an old white t-shirt and shorts of some kind, though never cut offs. Covering his head would be an old sailor’s hat turned down like a white mushroom cap. His clip on sunglasses would cover his regular ones, and the milky colored plastic nose protector was attached to the bridge. He would be bent over with his trusty pocket … Continue reading Weeds Don’t Weep but Gardeners Do. by Nancy Halgren→
I’ve been a vegetarian for years and years. I try not to be preachy about the issue `#ToEachHisOrHerOwn but in truth the whole concept of eating other creatures depresses the hell out of me. Last week, a truck carrying a load of chickens in horribly overcrowded cages, passed me on the highway and I burst into tears. All of which is an ironic preamble to the following observation: Like mammals with two legs, the four-legged variety can also be assholes. Just on principle. Seriously. The coyotes who use our yard as a public toilet, for … Continue reading Political Animals by Erika Raskin→
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