Poetry Issue #8: Rest & Recovery August 19th, 2021 Letter from the Poetry Editor: Keeping It Going by Steve Granzyk The poems fulfilling this issue’s theme of rest and recovery feature both the challenging struggles we face from injuries and illnesses of mind and body and the many sources of strength and restoration that help us revive from what ails us. These are the yin and the yang of healthcare: all the ills flesh is heir ...
Read MoreArt Issue #7: Mental Health April 15, 2021 Artist’s Statement by Pranitha Karthikeyan Youth's Struggle hen I was elementary school I remember meeting this boy on the playground. He told me about how everywhere he went, a dark and joyless feeling followed him. He described it to me as a rain cloud, which followed him from recess and back home. I was so naive and young that I barely understood him. The bright colors and the ...
Read MoreFiction Issue #7: Mental Health April 15th, 2021 Letter from the Guest Fiction Editor: Picking Up the Pieces by Barbara Riddle f you are reading this, you have survived a year like no other in American history. Political upheaval, a global pandemic that is far from over—and yet, some certainties prevail. We need each other, the human connection, art. More than ever before, we need to find ways to come together, to create healing tools as ...
Read MoreEditorial Issue #7: Mental Health April 15th, 2021 Letter from the Editor: The Power of Narrative in Mental Health Awareness by Tracy Granzyk ccording to the National Alliance on Mental Health, 20 percent of adults in the US experience a mental health condition, but less than half receive treatment. Lack of dedicated health policy, inequities in access and quality of care, fear of stigmatization, and mistrust or bad experiences when seeking care all contribute to the ...
Read MoreArt Issue #7: Mental Health April 15, 2021 Art Cover Image: Bipolarations Art | David Martinez Multiple Images | Alan Bern Love Sorrow Self Portrait | Natalie Brescia Prague Under the Mask | Jana Hunterova Youth's Struggle | Pranitha Karthikeyan The Suicide Ward | Husein Taherbhai Emptiness | James Reade Venable
Read MorePoetry Issue #7: Mental Health April 15th, 2021 Letter from the Poetry Editor: The Search for Peace by Steve Granzyk In thinking about the human power to influence mental and emotional health, I recalled Gretel Erlich’s book A Match to the Heart. After fully recovering from a heart issue related to a lightning strike, she decided to shadow her cardiologist on his rounds. As the doctor talked to one patient in his bed, Erlich observed the ...
Read MoreContest Issue #7: Mental Health April 15th, 2021 April 15th, 2021 2021 Mental Health Awareness Writing Contest NONFICTION Winner Bipolarations | David Martinez Runner-Up Sorrow: Surviving a Son’s Suicide | Susan Wight FICTION Winner The Gravity of Adrianne Lane | Rhonda Zimlich Runner-Up When We Meet Again | Oreoluwa Oladimeji POETRY Winner Grace and Grit | Emily Boshkoff
Read MoreIssue #7 Mental Health April 15, 2021 Table of Contents Letter from the Editor: The Power of Narrative in Mental Health Awareness Cover image by David Martinez Announcing the winners of Please See Me’s 2021 Mental Health Awareness Writing Contest: Nonfiction Bipolarations | David Martinez Fiction The Gravity of Adrianne Lane | Rhonda Zimlich Poetry Grace and Grit | Emily Boshkoff Nonfiction Sorrow: Surviving a Son’s Suicide | Susan Wight Fiction When We Meet Again | Oreoluwa Oladimeji Inexplicable| Mickey Greaves Feeling of Impending Doom| Michael P. Moran COVID Helped ...
Read MorePoetry Issue #7: Mental Health April 15, 2021 Two Sides of the Same Coin by Rose Menyon Heflin Two Sides of the Same Coin: An Obsessive-Compulsive’s Take on the Pandemic Heads: The Obsessive-Compulsive’s Nightmare and the Therapist’s Revenge This coronavirus-induced shortage of disinfecting products is driving me out of my obsessive-compulsive mind, as all the while, I imagine my old therapist at the specialist mental institution sitting at her desk in her shared office thinking about the lack of Clorox Wipes, the lack of Lysol, and me and ...
Read MorePoetry Issue #7: Mental Health April 15, 2021 City Sidewalk, Christmas Eve 2020 by Mark Blickley City Sidewalk, Christmas Eve 2020 In the dark times Will there also be singing? Yes, there will also be singing About the dark times. -Bertolt Brecht Do my squeaks and squeals sound like frightened cries of hopeful breaths crushed inside a fabric of society that brings exhaled warmth to my facing known yet unseen dangers as I squat before an empty street of holiday cheer ...
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