By Craig Dobson Fiona is sitting with her back to the window, a semi-silhouette against the village’s winding main street. The weather has been hot for days. Farm machinery blunders along the narrow lanes, great round bales balanced precariously on splayed trailers. Wisps of straw litter the hedgerows and pavements. In the warm evenings, check-shirted … Continue reading A Chip Off
The Friend
By Sharon Farnsworth And the race begins. Another Friday afternoon, and city traffic was horrific. I picked up my son from daycare and joined the throng of manic drivers, my thoughts racing faster than the traffic was moving. Forty plus hours as a Probation Officer, and I was on overload. The windshield wipers whacking the glass in a … Continue reading The Friend
The Power of Faith
By Timothy Law Grandpa sowed the winter wheat in between family visiting for Easter, even though it had been a dry and hot summer. “You’re wasting your time and your money, dad,” my father had argued. I overheard them talking in the kitchen when I got up in the night. Grandma had complained over dinner … Continue reading The Power of Faith
The Blue-Schist Sentinels
By Celeste Wolfe Night after night, a quartet of prehistoric megaliths stand as blue-schist sentinels, on guard since the ancient era of dinosaurs into the digital era of modernity. The foursome’s enduring foundations with their unyielding weight, cutting deep into the earth, arise as if shrapnel protruding from a wound. Their stone polished faces like … Continue reading The Blue-Schist Sentinels
The Grocery Store
By Olivia Brochu I am holding two boxes of cereal, letting my three-year-old pick his favorite, while my one-year-old throws his pacifier to the ground and my five-year-old has already moved ahead to the granola bars and pop tarts. My white T-shirt is French tucked into my high waisted, light wash jeans. My unreasonably long … Continue reading The Grocery Store
My Sweatshirt In Lost Time: A Memoir
By David R. Topper One might say – looking back figuratively – that my sweatshirt had Proust written all over it. Is this worth pursuing? Depends. Let’s see. It came about when I remembered this almost sixty-year-old episode in my life. I was in Pittsburgh, my hometown. It was 1964, a late-summer evening. My close … Continue reading My Sweatshirt In Lost Time: A Memoir
Griffin’s Lecture
By Andrew Nickerson The lecture hall of Meade Academy of Magic buzzed with anticipation as students settled behind the room’s many layered desks. As the smells of various cafeteria lunch/drink specials floated all around, merging with the antiquated orders of wood and stone, everyone anxiously awaited the arrival of their special guest: Professor G. Griffin, … Continue reading Griffin’s Lecture
The Puma That She Met One Day
By Frances Gaudiano Lucy was standing at the edge of the field. It hadn’t been tilled recently and there was still stalks of growth left from previous years, dry and battered in the morning breeze. She began to walk along a narrow footpath between the weeds. After a bit, she felt a presence behind her … Continue reading The Puma That She Met One Day
The alphabet of nature And Other Poems
By Domina Petric The alphabet of nature Agate caught the rainbow in its memory. Beryl hid its heart at the bottom of a lake. Carnelian is as sweet as honey. Citrine is the sun that illuminates Earth at noon. Charoite is a picture of a stormy sky and a setting sun. The winter landscape is … Continue reading The alphabet of nature And Other Poems
Patterns
By S.F. Wright Wednesday evening Almost over; Then Thursday, And Friday. The weekend’s Booze Seems like A faraway Oasis; Yet it will Come, go, Disappoint. Then Tired Sunday, Monday; And the oasis Appears Again. S.F. Wright lives and teaches in New Jersey. His work has appeared in Hobart, X-R-A-Y Literary Magazine, and Elm Leaves Journal, … Continue reading Patterns
Academy of the Heart And Mind 