(Juan Perez "Attack of...") looming overhead
like bright, dawning giant clouds
just waiting to strike MORE
(John Kemmerly "Hemingway in Port Aransas") Various accounts of Ernest Hemingway’s visit to Port Aransas still linger on the Island. Some are credible, some not. We know that he showed up here July 20th, 1957 MORE
(Kailey Hamauei "Taita's House") Off Ocean Drive, in the old neighborhoods, the homes have all been through the cycle: growth, stability, decline, and revitalization. Some have been through the cycle more than once. MORE
(Chelsea Brotherton "Prayer to...") Here’s to you, and trying to forget
My father, who art in nowhere.
Your face, barely seen, burns in memory MORE
(Matt Rosas "Chupacabra") In the 8th Century, Arabs invaded Spain, beginning a rapid conquest. Christians in the North remained strong, and for centuries, fought to reclaim territory. MORE
(Clara Tamez "The Just...") “Would you still love me if I didn’t have teeth?”
“Did you wake up with them gone or did you get into an accident?” Jaydon’s voice sounds MORE
(Tyre Carter novel excerpt) Blue River (1876)
The fire rose wildly and high. Winds of peace frisked the red heat near Deuteronomy, and Melicarthus. Deuteronomy licked at the wind, practicing his duty given to him by his master MORE
(Ana Varela "My Desert Jay") The valley knew that it would change my life forever. The longer that I spent in it, the more sure I was of where I needed to be. Nothing could be the same after that summer in the desert. MORE
(Joshua Bridgwater Hamilton "Song..." ) I ate my own desire. There where
the mirror reflected fruits, vines,
a sickening pace to rot faster MORE
(Coffee Cat "At Fault") When I was a Kid I told myself
I’d never live past 25
Diagnosed with Demons MORE
(Tonantzin Rodriguez "...Chingona") If you grew up without the protection of a father and were raised by two powerful women, Mi Madre y Mi Abuela, you knew a little chingona was in the making... LONGER EXCERPT
(Jon Gregory "Postmodern Poem") They're sending up a press release
On the Minister of Pleasure --
Recently deceased MORE
(Michael Quintana "Two...") Years from now
I want you to tell me
how I got that scar MORE
(Mike Mercer "Down on the Farm 1956") Before daylight, sitting on a bar stool in the Plum Nelly, when Joe, down the way orders two bullbat eggs, and half order of no toast, with coffee MORE
(Mandy Ashcraft "Striptease...") Wendy had conducted her podcast out of the mop closet of a West Texas truck stop for ten months. She was not from Earth, and her name wasn’t really Wendy, but she did work in a mop MORE
(Jim McCutchon "Zombie...") While taking a tour through Pass Christian on my way home from a trip to Biloxi, I stopped at Live Oak Cemetery to see if the gravestone had been placed on my aunt Rebecca’s grave and to just look MORE
(Roberta Dohse "Montevideo") I once read a book about a woman who ran away from her life,
changing her name to that of towns through which she passed,
names so unique and different MORE
(John Meza "And as I watched the sunset") And as I watched the sunset
I remembered a late summer evening
In the fields of Ohio
Cucumber fields MORE
(Elizabeth Flores "Tribute") I wish I knew the boy's name.
He paid tribute to my dad,
a man I'm sure he didn't know MORE
(Jimmy Willden "Bright Static") I can’t recall if it was the sound that came first or the realization that there was even a sound at all – but at some point, just before the sun rose, I found myself staring at an empty pillow as the windows rattled from the tune of a heavy wind that whipped against our nearly two-hundred year-old home MORE
(Patricia Reinhardt "Fudgesicle") People think they can protect their children but not from what is hiding in plain sight. I walked down West Potomac, turning right onto Preston Road, skipped another block or two, past a vacant lot, and I was at the MORE
(Gerald Beckman "A Cold Day in Hell")
Cecil parked his pickup at the curb outside his office. A strong north wind had blown in during the night – not all that unusual this time of year, except this one seemed to be carrying a little snow with it, MORE
(Christian Garduno "Montana Jake") Clenching his teeth
Montana Jake took an uppercut swing
and nailed The Trapper squarely MORE
(Pete Adler "Big Hair...") backstage with her teenage idol
minor characters emerge
obsessed with the ocean MORE
(Annie Huckabee an excerpt from Such Character)
Many years after my sister's death, I came across her creative writing journal from the senior class of 1953 entitled Spring Fever. What a find. I love all the pieces in this book but especially her critical review of MORE
(Judy Mastenbrook "After I Die") After I die, my dresser drawers will be filled with well-worn sexy underwear, including the camisole with imported lace MORE
(Kristopher Cisneros "Hallelujah...") Make love power to the people were the slogans. However, too many great people had been shot down, and the bombs were bursting in the air. We came in peace for all mankind. The sixties were nearly over, and I stopped believing in God MORE
(Carter Little "The Black Cat") “He’s confessing to more?” A dumbfounded expression struck Detective Gitch. Gitch because Gitchorovskiye is too hard to say in the field. Not twenty minutes before Gitch was thinking how happy he was everyone MORE
(Wayne Hankins "Seventy Years") Seventy laps around the sun seemed enough when younger.
Now done, I’ve become greedy and want MORE
(Floyd Swydan "The Bird") A long time ago there was a Bird. He wasn’t a big bird, or a tiny bird, just a regular size bird. Like all birds, when he woke up in the morning, he was hungry. He would fly to the bird feeder that the humans would MORE
(Alondra Usai "Hasta...") Luogo di nascita: Veracruz, Mexico, it’s printed in my copper-red Italian passport.
Whenever I showed my passport at the airport, I would always get second glances and puzzled looks until they saw my dad, whose skin was a few shades lighter, as confirmation of my nationality MORE
(Stephen Gambill "Just a Parable") God and Satan were sitting at a table,
having a glass of wine just before
the beginning of everything. MORE
(Scott Wayland Griffin "The First Wolf") The days grew longer; snow melted; life slowly returned to the valley. The pups were finally allowed to venture out to play. MORE
(Azrael Montoya "Love You") It was hard to find you.
I really had to try.
You drove me to work and I was MORE
A cat could not have done it, not in such a manner: she’d have had plumes stuck between her pointy, yellowed, newly-rounded teeth and bird matter matted to her yellow fur and paws MORE
(Ale Cota "Plucked") Ma, there is a winged girl atop your rooftop. Enveloped in
Night, she exhales a birthing cry. Death is cyclical like that MORE
(Matthew Platz "Pills") Every night before i sleep, there, in my palm they gather.
Together they join little hands and dance their little dance and sing a merry tune MORE
(Paul McCann "Quantum Me") I can easily go back
and sandle my high school linoleum
in self-loathing
as greasy hairs and pimply faces MORE
(Jason Bond "Ghost Box") Brian watched Timmy reach as far as he could under his bed. Imagining his chubby fingers tiptoeing like spider legs over dust-bunny covered Cheetos or long-lost Lego pieces or whatever else might be under there MORE
(Joseph Wilson "I Always Knew...")
one hundred years ago
my grandfather
Paul Herbert Cline
fought in WW One MORE
(Neina Chapa "The Snake Escape" from CCW2023) We used to slither through the marsh
Peek out under brush and burrow in soft karst
Nestle in between the bark and heart of a warm tree MORE
(Theresa Kuhl-Babcock "Empty") Staying in the present drains the life right out of me. The current negative moment is that our son Corey is going off to college, and I am about to be an empty nester. My chest aches with the knowledge that while I MORE
(S.P. Wilkins "Read...") It’s not that the piano teacher is unqualified—bless her for still trying to play after losing that finger—but that she cares more about making money than teaching any discernible piano skills. Four weeks into our MORE
(Dustin Hackfield "Conjuring") we follow the tarantula across the caliche path
into the oak’s shaggy head
electric with the bronze scream of cicadas MORE
(John Swinburn "On Open Water") Early that morning, at daybreak, a shallow, nearly opaque layer of water-hugging mist flowed in through the quiet marina. Faith watched it MORE
(F.E.I. "Super Singularity" from CCW2023) At his retirement party, I was told by the affable man that I cried all the way from Chicago to Corpus, and my mother had asked if he would like to hold the bottle for me MORE
(Dennis Denman "Heart of a Rancher") I drove west through the small towns of Banquete and Agua Dulce and turned on a Farm-to-Market road and drove another four or five miles. I passed the shop and farm house and turned into the entrance to the ranch MORE
(William Walton "Or Even...") Casey was very drunk. He leaned his forearms on the cold, sticky stern rail and hung his head over the side. The sea was rough, and every time the ship rolled so did his stomach MORE
(Neesy Tompkins "Life of a Ship") It was like any other day, the day my father died. Oblivious to the crying and runny noses on the other end of the phone line, it seemed surreal, like the way talking sounds through the fog across a ship channel MORE
(D. Weiss "A Meeting...") I once had a meeting with the Fae.
Seeking answers to questions long pondered, I wished to settle the matter for good.
Just how accepting is the Fae of a new companion in their vast woods? MORE
(Javier Villarreal "Jim") At first sign of dawn
the uncertainty of your movements
troubles the stillness of the day. MORE
(Lizz Cosgrove "Late") I’m running late again…
My morning writing, that attempted to become my afternoon writing,
has manifested itself into my evening writing MORE
This photo is representative of an idea I had about selfies being artifacts, not of narcissism and vanity of which they are charged, but of self-introspection and feminine control of female perception. MORE
(Alisa Hope Wagner "I'm Losing Her")
Childhood moments mourn
While secrets shade the soul
Can’t confess to perfection MORE
(Donna Huddleston "Customary Prayers for Marie" from CCW2023) “I’m only thirty-four years old,” Marie said. "I’m too young to die.”
That morning, she ran away from her husband, ten-month-old daughter MORE
(Louise Pettigrove from Bright Fields) One of the barriers Wallis and Mollie encountered in their relationship was the Nueces River between them. It often flooded, and crossing it would’ve been impossible on horseback or with a horse and buggy. A ferry had been there since 1877 MORE
(Kristi Sprinkle "visible briefly") visible briefly Is
A lone metal chair Inside a grove of California trees
Just under a turnpike MORE
(Julieta Corpus "Her Cross...") The beast beats up his wife
For no other reason, than to
Assert his manhood MORE
(Frederick Gonzales "Crossing Borders") The day we left was the saddest day of my life. We lived in a small village outside of Chihuahua. My three older brothers, my aunts and uncles, and even my cousins were there, but only Marisela and Rosita and I would cross MORE
(Mariah Massengill ""To Be, Or Used to Be"")This decrepit monster house used to be
a suite of youth and dreams
until momma heard strangers shouting in the attic MORE
(Floyd Swydan "The Bird") A long time ago there was a Bird. He wasn’t a big bird, or a tiny bird, just a regular size bird. Like all birds, when he woke up in the morning, he was hungry. He would fly to the bird feeder that the humans would MORE
(Sara Kaplan "Casing...") The Shoal Creek vitex against the brick spikes
12-inch fragrant flowers of deep lavender blue by May and a second flush in August MORE
(Alyson Greene "Firsts") I didn’t want to go out on the water. Seth, Amber, and I had spent our childhoods running along the soft sand and splashing in the warm surf. But we weren’t kids anymore and Amber had moved away. In the MORE
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