Current Issue

The Ambassador and the Assassin

Catherine Jagoe

It made the front-page news around the world two Christmases ago. The Russian ambassador to Turkey, Andrei G. Karlov, was assassinated . . . just three months after my father’s death . . .

 

 

Thorns

Justin Dabill

One day, my firstborn, with her younger sister close at her heels, will ask, “Daddy? What did you do in the Army?”

 

 

 

 

 

 

Behind the Walls

J. Malcolm Garcia

Seventeen orphans died the year Hogar de la Casa Corazon de la Misericordia opened . . .

 

 

 

 

Estranged on a Train

John E. Keats

I found a haunting, blank postcard . . . So much white space, sent without any identifying word in warm cursive or determined print, seemed sinister. I had purchased it on the one lengthy trip I’ve taken . . .

 

 

 

 

 

The Dog

Bruce McAllister

I would, my parents decided, spend our third summer in Italy studying art . . .

 

 

 

 

 

 

Beautiful Stones

Jennifer Chianese

When he counts his dragons, I shrug off his difficulties. Instead, I focus on his creativity . . .

 

 

 

 

 

Another Mary Doyle

Jacqueline Doyle

There she is, Mary Doyle, and another right beside her. … Come from Moycullen; from Westmeath and Usher’s Quay. Come from Poulnamuck, Gweesalia, and . . .

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Feathers in the Soul

John Solensten

“It is time. Dress to hunt. Today we seek the last of the snow geese.”

 

 

 

 

 

Lost Things

Michelle Cacho-Negrete

I lose things, a few so precious that I mourn them even as they vanish . . .

 

 

 

 

 

The Disappeared

Jay Wamsted

No one seemed to know where he was. He had disappeared from his friends; I might never know where he went. He was simply gone.

 

 

My Big Happy Illusion

Marlena Fiol

I stared at the words on my computer screen. I begin to understand the burden my big-happy-family illusion placed on me and on other family members. No one could live up to that . . .

 

 

 

Cassatt & Caretaking

Jacqueline Kolosov

At least twice a year my mother, my younger sister and I would take the train into Chicago, then walk the long blocks to Michigan Avenue where . . .

 

 

 

 

 

Slaves of Dance

Genia Blum

She was taken far away from home and would never return—nor want to. My mother’s entire family fled or perished in the war. Now, only her Opera House remained . . .

 

 

 

 

 

Looking Back—Why I Stopped Writing Poetry and How I Started Again:
Embracing the Authentic, Contingent Self

Judy Kronenfeld

As many writers are fond of saying, we don’t choose our subjects; they choose us. In my case, my subjects tapped me on the shoulder or whispered in my ear . . .

 

 

 

 

 

Down the Alphabet

Toti O’Brien

The efforts my father poured into teaching one of my siblings how to write went down in history . . .

 

 

 

 

 

As I Lay Dreaming
of S-Town

Terry Barr

The Tuscaloosa (Alabama) News, which I read daily online, featured a story recently about Tyler Goodson and his impending October trial for stealing John’s property. Tyler denies the charge . . .

 

 

The Raconteur’s Dreams

Briana Loveall

When I wake with a jolt, my legs tangled uncomfortably in sweaty sheets, the bad dream lingering like an odor, I rouse the sleeping form next to me . . .

 

Blue

Mark Brazaitis

What I remembered from the first time I saw the movie were Betty’s beauty and carefree sexuality; her devotion to her going-nowhere-fast boyfriend, a handyman and piano salesman who has written a novel only Betty believes in; her descent into madness; and her mercy-killing murder . . .

 

 

 

The Last Time I Saw Paris
A Poignant List of Lasts

Mel Livatino

I knew there were hundreds of books and thousands of articles devoted to lists of firsts. I had encountered them all my life, but I knew only one book devoted to lasts . . .