Dr. B. Said
Larissa Shmailo
As I contemplate my treatment by the psychiatrist J. B. M.D. over a span of twenty years, I recall some of the things the good doctor said and did.
Dr. B. of Connecticut, of the upper classes.
Who carried bedpans as an...
Two Poems by Stephen Berk
Stephen Berk
The Family Tree
To all the sons and all the daughters of all the mothers and all the fathers who blessed their children with the demons that drove them to greatness:
Happy Mother’s Day Mother, this two-dollar gift ca...
The End of The World
Vincent Zangrillo
New York City—8/8/84—Day to Night
Mark wanted to see how fast he could burn through the 10,000 dollar inheritance from Grandpa Dave, who sold schmatta to Hendrix on St Marks, and who despite his gnomic wisd...
The Large Ladies of Lands’ End and L.L. Bean
John J. Trause
The Large Ladies of Lands' End and L.L. Bean
"I have been heavy and had much selecting."
--Gertrude Stein, Lifting Belly [1915 - 1917]
Because I am not satisfied by the limited palette of...
SLEET
D. James Smith
Sleet, the first he’d seen in California, and not much of it at that. At five thousand feet in February, it made sense, though. Nosing along in his pickup, he’d traced the lake created by Pacific Gas and Electric, part...
A Home on the Plains
Meg Kaizu
A boundless region extends from the east to west, from the south to north. There are a few trees, dwellings and ranches that stretch out over the horizon. Many travelers drive very fast. This place is nothing more than unwan...
Two Poems For Fall by Rebecca Weiner Tompkins
Rebecca Weiner Tompkins
ANOTHER AUTUMNAL
Sometimes I imagine
parking lots are water, dark seas
no longer dry ground
but not either anywhere to drown.
Sometimes all the trees in the park
are radiant yellow
in the end of November twiligh...
Bob Dylan Deserves the Nobel Prize for Literature
Bernard Meisler
Bob Dylan just won the 2016 Nobel Prize for literature. Many are angry. But they're wrong. He deserves it.
Joni Mitchel says Dylan is a fake. I take her critique with a grain of salt. Certainly Dylan is a confabulist—in...
The Sex Pistols: The Dance Band at the End of the World
Drew Hubner
The Sex Pistols: The Dance Band at the End of the World
A tall girl in a yellow ostrich feather top and red Bettie Page bangs, simulates oral sex with Sid, who says, Now that's the kind of girl I like and the band starts ...
What I Think Historians Will Say in 20 Years about the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election
Eliot Katz
What I Think Historians Will Say in 20 Years about the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election
How crazy it was that America’s elders nominated the two most
unpopular major-party candidates in U.S. history. On the Democratic ...
untitled—a poem by Marina Tsvetaeva
Karina McCorkle
А следующий раз — глухонемая
Приду на свет, где всем свой стих дарю, свой слух дарю.
Ведь всё равно — что говорят — не пон...
A Visit with June Leaf and Robert Frank
Erik La Prade
On a particular February 2011, afternoon, I spent part of the day in June Leaf's studio, watching her work, and listening to her talk about her work. As I sat in a wooden office chair, I watched Leaf busily untangling some s...
The Red Wheelbarrow
William Carlos Williams
"The Red Wheelbarrow," a classic poem by the great William Carlos Williams. You don't need to say much to say a lot.
Four Poems from Child of Storm
Michael J. Wilson
Tesla is Born
The sound of a shell at your ear
in an expansive void
that is the mouth of the universe
Lightening across the curve of the eye
A crack in the spheres
allowing a peek at the undergarments of God
And...
Mink Stole
Vincent Zangrillo
Gregory loved Cookie Mueller. Cookie loved John Waters. John Waters loved Mink Stole.
I was in a pub called Beggars Bush in Ubud, Bali, in 1989, when the guy sitting next to me told me Cookie died. I finished my beer ...
