Particles of Me
Blake discovered the world in a grain of sand, and I am now among those grains, tossed from a blossoming, pale sweaty, soft palm into the darkening surf; my last wishes. I am dissolved within the seaweed and misty, salty air, deep within a child’s sand castle slowly eroded by the high tide; particles of me mixed with coconut oil rubbed into the brown skin of a Brazilian beauty, more of me still at the bottom of a black Labrador’s joyous day of digging. Particles of me follow the rhythm of the tides, taking me on a journey into the deep green and blue ocean currents leaving behind the...
Read MoreHigh Mountain Melt in Wyoming
comes like the evergreen motion of spring, makes this boy who lives twenty five miles from anyone his age, his own best friend, makes May’s bright blue air…red pools of water on red-dirt roads and a mud dirty dog running beside him biting the air in celebration, his reason to be in this sense- drenched, sun-warmed spirit of the earth in revolution… sharing the dog’s delight to be alive, singing it in the endless soprano...
Read MoreFeatured Works: Week of May 17 (Hardship)
In our global community, no problem — whether it’s hunger, teen pregnancy, or government repression — stands alone. Such complicated issues as poverty, crime and discrimination are interwoven. This week, our contributors show us stories of hardship, desperation, and the rarest glimpses of hope. “Refugees,” a poem by Leslie Philibert, depicts the hearbreak and determination of those forced out of their homes. “Gasoline,” a poem by Terry Minchow-Proffitt, is told from the point of view of a young man who feels compelled to steal. “Eggs,” a short story by A.D. Sams,...
Read MoreThe Rotten Ones
The rook sailed southward, its black wings spread wide against the blue sky while Lee Sung-Ki watched it go from the earth below. He did not know what kind of bird it was — he knew little of birds at all — but he knew that it could fly, and as it disappeared from his sight into the backdrop of green trees on distant hills, he wished that he could follow. To be away from the stone and steel, to see forbidden cities — that’d be truly something, Sung-Ki thought. Not today, though. Today was school, and hunger, as yesterday was, as tomorrow would likely be, and it was not his lot to...
Read MoreEggs
Babies know when they come out unwanted. I did. I was born with a hole right inside my heart and spent too many years tryin’ to fill a space that didn’t want to be filled. I never knew the empty could be so heavy. Daddy already flew away by then, and Momma didn’t care enough to use her own healin’ touch. She shoved me off on Rayanne, who never wanted me anyhow. We lived down a long, dirt road and out past a barn older than my Momma. She told me once that she kissed a boy in the hay field down the way. She said he smelled like fresh dirt and had a freckle by his left ear. She’d...
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