Nonfiction Issue #14: Acceptance April 15, 2024 Cutting by Alison Watson eptember, 1994. “Give me my fucking oranges!” a voice outside was yelling. “Fuck you, you took my shoes!” came another voice. It was 2:00 AM, and I was wide awake, listening to homeless people arguing in the street, their voices carrying up to my open window on the Lower East Side’s Avenue B. But the noise outside was drowned out by the chatter inside my ...
Read MoreNonfiction Issue #14: Acceptance April 15, 2024 The Sleepover by Kristin Schultz f you show us yours, we’ll show you ours,” Scott offered. I immediately knew what he meant. I looked to Darlene for help. She averted her eyes. I was on my own. Carrie giggled, “You mean our bottoms?” My body tingled and my heart raced. I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know what I wanted. I considered what they said and debated the issue ...
Read MoreFiction Issue #14: Acceptance April 15, 2024 Thirteen Knives of Grape Jelly by Patricia Dutt hen the doctor says, “Serious and persistent,” the mother, because she has no emotional shelf for this concept, imagines Japanese Knotweed pushing up through asphalt; knotweed that you must knock down, and repeatedly because its roots are tenacious and robust. The moment you turn your back, the plant grows stronger, and more resistant than ever into a dense, six-foot-tall hedge ...
Read MoreNonfiction Issue #14: Acceptance April 15, 2024 Catering to Cowards by Louis Fiset e cater to cowards,” brags the advertiser. A smocked dentist blurts out, “Most of my patients have feathers -- yes, I have chickens.” I’m not sure who these dental cowards and chickens are and why they would answer such a call. Perhaps many are “go’ers but haters,” that is, people with mild afflictions who can be soothed with nitrous oxide gas, a panacea ...
Read MoreFiction Issue #14: Acceptance April 15, 2024 The Doctor Behind the Curtains by Adam Strassberg he doctor was standing behind the curtains. Doctor Falsh parted the thick blue drapes with a flourish, then slid them closed ceremonially. His interview room was small and windowless - not much more than a glorified closet - but it was placed conveniently, especially for a locked unit, located just next to the row of patient dorm rooms and just across ...
Read MoreFiction Issue #14: Acceptance April 15, 2024 Smoke, No Fire by Shena Crane am here to keep my bones from melting. This is my first time in an infusion suite, a tired beige hospital room with four hulking recliners, where patients usually receive chemotherapy. But I’m not here for chemo. Just a bone strengthener. I don’t have active cancer—the cancerous cells residing in my bones are officially classified as “smoldering.” Medically, this means my wayward ...
Read MorePoetry Issue #14: Acceptance April 15, 2024 Three Poems by Lucia Owen The Grief Resource Kit just tells me where to find more grief, lists the ways my heart can break but not much about how to fix it, except that healing is no protection against memory’s wrecking ball. It tells me grief may settle in my stomach but the ache feels deeper – the hope, the feel, the weight of you somewhere near, maybe in the shadows when I turn ...
Read MorePoetry Issue #14: Acceptance April 15, 2024 Three Poems by Mary Alice Dixon As I go blind I see flashing lights then fog obscures the dogwoods standing by my buried iris bulbs but as I go blind I hear the earth whisper me her ways I hear the ground shift I hear the dogwoods blossom in fog my ears become irises my synesthesia flowers Mary Alice Dixon reads “As I go blind I see”: each macular hole is an hourglass in my eye my eyes once wild feral stars now see light disappear into two black holes macular pits drawing light bending rays in the middle until all ...
Read MorePoetry Issue #14: Acceptance April 15, 2024 Dust by Vincent Casaregola Dust Time to clean again, to cleanse the kitchen and its cabinets as many decades ago my mother had done, year by year, as I watched, too short, too young to help, too likely to break the fragility of clay or glass. My turn, now, to pay witness to what accumulates along the edges of each cabinet door, across each horizontal space, coated with the oils of daily meals steamed upwards towards heaven’s ceiling. Dust falls, moment ...
Read MorePoetry Issue #14: Acceptance April 15, 2024 Ducks by Erin Jamieson Ducks We fed red-billed ducks crusts from stale Wonder bread by the docks, sunrise dripping like runny egg yolk across a slowly brightening canvas that might become anything: a day yet to be lived, the same sky we flew kites in before we forgot the wonder of spring in bloom or how satisfying peanut butter & jelly sandwiches are shared with your sibling This lake that we return to now that you have a family and I’ve given up on having one This lake where we ...
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