Category: Print Archives

Prose Poetry: Three County Fairs by Cary Stough

The Year I Lost an Eye I’m at the county fair riding the Wurlitzer or Accordion when suddenly I want to be on a different ride. Maybe Button Mountain or The Ride. I slide into my seat and wonder, Wurlitzer or accordion. I scratch my chin as the lady comes by to jam the bar…
“Blood Orange,” a flash fiction by Kate Garklavs

Shell pink, crab fat, lilac of a near-healed bruise: sunset over the Lombard Auto Body Shop, which Jack observes from the folding chair on his porch. The temperature hasn’t climbed above thirty all week, but Jack, bundled in parka and ragg gloves, has prepared. No entertainment on the porch—none of the formal variety, anyway—but Jack…
“You Are/No Longer,” a poem by Shannon Hearn

You Are/No Longer how muchdoes it hurt when you runover a shadowover your ownshadow. is it too heavytoo much sinking in-to the ground i’m askingwhere does it hurt and whendoes it know you are making itmore heavyon purpose Shannon Hearn is a recent graduate of the University of Connecticut where she studied Journalism and English…
Poetry by Trina Burke: “Argument Against the Earthy Pigments”

Our family motto is I want to hold my son and have him talk at me with the cuteness of dumping beer-drowned slugs. Pericarditis. Someone put a cork in the aorta. It sounds like a valentine. The apples are at that stage of unblemished ripeness that is perfect and I don’t have to worry about…
“Midnight at the Organporium,” a short story by Tara Campbell

I only did it for you, when I crept into the Organporium at the Southside Mall last night and broke the glass to the heart display and took what I thought you needed. I mean, how could I have known it wasn’t the right thing. I’d watched you and listened to you; I’d felt your…
Two Poems by Matt Muth

Celebration Lane Be large o heart hug the sumof this world close: its shiny skin its Chinesefamilies stuffing fries into their kidsits Tesla bulbs its bindis tinselwinking in Fendi shades all of us a tight and liquid macraméof living well the light show at the IMAXa sentimental crumple zone the percussionsection’s toms the bands betweenthe…
Excerpt from Gimme the Pretty: Sonnets, poetry by Devon Wootten

What hath might & what hath lament—prolly.Reader, banality’s preferable, i.e., bad faith &/or dialectic,intolerable ambiguity. Reader, take the easy way,mankind &Christendom. * Reader, I’d elsewhere’d it—donesensed & re-sensed,made full & made whole.Reader,them’s the most-dead.Them’s the foolishness.[Breathing]T’ave found want.T’ave found what’s lack & t’ave fasted on’t—O, well-nigh incarnate,stay with me.O, hold-out,O, cut of mine, what’s lent…
Flash Fiction by Heather Sager: “SIT”

MOM TOLD ME I WAS HER BEST ONLY DAUGHTER AND I NEEDED TO SIT WITH GRANDPA BECAUSE OF THIS BECAUSE OF MY BROTHERS THIS IS A TASK SHE COULD NOT ENJOY—MY BROTHERS HAVE LIVES AND I DO THIS FOR HER.SHE DRIVES PLACES SHE IS A MOTHER BUT WHEN MOM DROPS ME OFF I CAN TELLGRANDPA…
“The Complicated Twirl,” a flash fiction by AJ Atwater

Even with advanced techniques like the Complicated Twirl, the Deep Dive, and the candidly difficult balletic Shoulder-Spading, the Shovelers fail to unearth their client. Sweating from the attempt, they polish shovel blades and buff wooden handles with luminous wax from polish kits they carry. They settle shovels carefully into cases like those for violins or…