In Memory of Atlas Moon

Marisa Barnard

 6502 , Quinn Keck When I was seven years old, I looked out upon a graveyard and read each name written in marble letters. To my horror, I realized I did not know a single one of them. A name…

Categories: Fiction, Volume XI

Swimming Lessons

Claire Doll

Baptism, Mia Silvan-Grau I watch my tears trickle into the river. They fit right in, running with the current, salting the summer air, adding to the flow of water coursing forward. There’s something beautiful about that, and if I weren’t…

Categories: Fiction, Volume XI

Oceanic Oracle

Summer Hagan

Drum Heads, Kalen Keir after My Octopus Teacher    sensesdilate opento a dense depthunknown. assuming a glimmerof indigo, I dance weightless, no bones.a light-patterned seafloor: my personalshow. the semelparous loss who lent me life, youwouldn’t know, as I straddle my assailant to a…

Categories: Poetry, Volume XI

American

Juan Ortega

Old Man Feeding Birds, Daniel Mrotek What makes an American?Is it the men and women who spend daysworking under the sun, with nothing but a water bottle,whose fingers are blistered and hard with a pain in their back? Their arms growing tired,…

Categories: Poetry, Volume XI

Orare por ti (I will pray for you)

Juan Ortega

Morning Prayer, Jenny Brum Que dios te perdone y cambie tu menteFor something I am, that I did not chooseAdan y Eva, hombre y mujer es lo que es simplementeI won’t move, please just change your views. Tu eres hombre y…

Categories: Poetry, Volume XI

Staring at My Bookshelf

Angela Vodola

Afternoon Tea, Ericka Veliz Sun and moon switch places.I’ve aged, and so have you.Years went by like minutes,as they always seem to do. The open window leaks poison.The foul wind won’t retreat.Air turns bitter with western ash.I breathe it insignificantly.…

Categories: Poetry, Volume XI

Red Snow

Hobson Wadsworth

Ripped, Breanne Sparta Red snow. School was out for red snow. We were just asleep last night, and out of nowhere, like a late Christmas present, the red snow was everywhere. Me and Dad looked outside at the few people…

Categories: Fiction, Volume XI

Radium Girls

Gwydion Miller

Geraldine, Tara Piscatelli I’m thinking about those girls again—       the ones who painted watch faces to glow in the dark    tapering radium-tipped paintbrushes with their lips.  Some of them, the creative ones,           …

Categories: Poetry, Volume XI

Scarecrow

Chelsea Anderson

Untitled, Jenny Nguyen The freezing plastic shovel bends  at the handle as it penetrates  bright red snow. It screeches  loudly as it scrapes  pale pink matter  off the road. He flings it into the woods he covers it in fresh…

Categories: Poetry, Volume XI

We Have Nothing If Not Time

Chelsea Panameño

Throwback, Abigail Jackson The heatwave was announced the day before the solstice, the day after my brother and I arrived at our mother’s summer home.  We did what we thought we should do, based on a few vague Internet searches and…

Categories: Fiction, Volume XI

Sitting Under Starry Skies

Claire Doll

Winter, Jonathan Agee The parking lot of my old high school looked the same, even in the dark of winter. It was haunting to see the building lit up only by streetlights, to watch the December winds toss forgotten autumn…

Categories: Fiction, Volume XI

Laurel in Full Bloom

Chelsea Panameño

Into the Ether, Nicky Meaux The bark appeared on the first day of spring, when the winds were starting to pick up, but the worst of the rain had not yet begun. It started as a small thing: a rough,…

Categories: Fiction, Volume XI