By Ron L. Dowell I First, understand what you call a riot was the Watts rebellion ending our 1965 Little League season. No last inning strikeout, but choking smoke, thick of burning rubber, no walk-off homerun, but smoldering wood, no game-winning catch, but chemicals scorching our throats, chest, lungs, interrupting me & Gerald’s sunrise to [...]
By Karen Morris Garcia Lorca called me last night (Before you get in a twist, he called you too. You didn’t pick up.) He said, “Disappearance and Death are real.” I suggested he text but, texting’s too flat for the poetics of death. “Sure,” you said to no one out loud, ridding yourself of the [...]
By Kate LaDew In 1867, the first instance of a hero saving their sweetheart from an oncoming train after a dastardly villain tied them to the tracks debuted in the last scene of a New York stage play. The hero's sweetheart calls for help, while the hero, locked inside the train station, watches from a barred window, searching for [...]
By Carol Casey Don’t assume, because some creature rests in your palm, that it is safe. It knows it’s not. A toad, dry, rough, bumpy texture like braille—read the message: I’m better free. My biochemical language is telling you something vital in the only way I have: I want to be free. I can make [...]
By Emily Knapp Are you like me? or not like me? Are you normal? or not normal? Are you human? or not human? Are you a boy? or a girl? Are you a woman? or a man? America likes to say: We are right. You are wrong. We are normal. You are not. Fit into [...]
By Mark Blickley Yes, I am dressed in mourning. Dark clothes for a dark time. Yet I yearn to escape pandemic imprisonment with the germ of an idea that will allow me to soar above my confinement in an airborne threat against complacency and boredom as I reach up to a blue heaven that promises [...]
