FEB 2023 / ISSUE 21

LEMONADE (THIS BIRD)

by Meghan Lennox

On July 20, 1997, after 22 years, 8 months and 14 days of human form, my sister turned into a bird. That very first day, a finch—she perched, beak open, eyes to the sky, on the hood of…

SCARIFICATION

by Nell Smith

Seeing you now, after an absence that had seemed indefinite, I don’t know what to do with my hands. Bare and creased with soil, I hook them into my pockets so they don’t hang at my side…

CHEMOSYNTHESIS

by Tara Anne Dalbow

He was straight off ten days on a troller when we met in a wet bar. When we kissed, his mouth tasted medieval and his sandpaper cheeks turned my face red for two weeks…

MOURNING SURF

by J’aime Morrison

In the first few weeks and months after my beloved husband Jim died, I couldn’t read anything or even listen to music. Not even talk radio. A total blackout. I couldn’t go near anything that might…

VIEW FROM MY ROOM

by Arturo Soto

We usually perform two actions when looking through a window: we delve into ourselves while looking out at the world. The pictures in my series Some Windows Later…

When we meet again

by Siarra Riehl

Deep in the mossy centre of my body blooms a flower. The red clover—its more than one hundred petals reaching from its centre—secures like sugar maple sap to my lungs, heart, stomach…