Photograph © 2019 Ryn Holmes

Welcome to Issue 14. For those of you returning, we thank you for joining us once more. For you first-timers, we hope you enjoy what you find here. One special feature of posting an issue just after New Year’s Day is that we compile it over the holidays, smack-dab in the middle of the season, our spirits growing and flowing. It’s a gift to and from so many, and the warmth it brings to us is one of the highlights of the holidays.

You may have noticed we switched our masthead theme from flowers to abstract photography by Co-Editor Ryn Holmes. Pardon the plug, but it’s fascinating, innovative stuff. You’ll see more of these as the issues continue.

Meanwhile, Issue 14 should keep you artistically occupied and satisfied. We tend to see motifs from issue to issue. One of this one’s is women’s experience and consciousness, particularly as girls become women. Not all is princessing, it’s clear. But the art is just as sparkling. Naturally, the fine work here covers a, dare we say it, panoply of subjects, something for everyone.

We must admit that due to a glitch in our submissions process, we received far more submissions than usual, a good problem to have! That helps explain why we’ve included more contributions than usual. They’re all so deserving and gleaming.

Thanks again for your support and attention. 

Best wishes,

Andrea, Jeff, and Ryn, Editors

Table of Contents

2059: Cut Off – Alan C. Smith
Airness – Pablo Saborío
Apollo 11 – Sharon Scholl
Augury – Greg Friedmann
Being Made Ready – Maria Berardi
Beneath My Feet – Sarah Valeika
The Birds – Ian Ganassi
Borrowed – Sean Bolton
A Child Says Morning – Max Heinegg
Civilized – Daniel Edward Moore
Crumbling – Stephen Ground
Dawn By The House of Stone That Jack Built – Vassilis Zambaras
The Days We Meet – R.T. Castleberry
Dying in Paradise – Christy Bailes
Endurance – Molly Fuller
Exit Wounds – Andy N
Feeling Empathy Outside of Santa Maria del Fiore – Adam Webb
Fell in Love with You – John Grey
Finches Prefer Chopin – Raymond Byrnes
Half Light – Doug Bolling
Hard Jazz – DS Maolalai
He’s Dead – Patricia Walsh
Heather in Bloom, Morning – Gerald Kells
A House of Your Own Making – James Diaz
In Line at Banco Central – Tim Hawkins
In Memory of An All-Girl Band (A Cento) – Andrew Sunshine
In the Fog – Steve Klepetar
Is Your Forgetfulness Normal? – Barbara Daniels
Kitsch – George Franklin
Last Days of June – Corbin Louis 
The Last Voyage – Howie Good
Leave-takings – Robert Nisbet
Lines Composed on First Regarding Godzilla after An Uneasy Serenity of Fifty Years – Bruce Robinson
Lullaby for a Politician – Jennifer Bradpiece
The Made and the Unmade – Carolyn Adams
The Music at Montreaux – Matthew James Friday
My English Teacher – Michael Minassian
My Mother’s Ghost Knits a Scarf of Chain – Robert Okaji
Mystery Confirmed – Megan Wildhood
Near Salt River Road: An Elegy for S.D. – Rita Chapman
Nectar – Christopher Wilson
No end to wonder – Hugh Anderson
Pantoum of the Thoughts That Have Been Turning Over in My Head Since I Moved Out a Month Ago – Jacob Bennett
Pareidolia – Megan Merchant
Parallax View – Betsy Mars
Pathing – Vivian Wagner
Patriot’s Chain – Anthony Dennis
peace has its season – Disha Trivedi
Pink Bee – Cliff Saunders
an excerpt from “A Place, A Feeling, Something He Said To You” – Alexandra Naughton
Playing Guitar at Ritter Park – Ace Boggess
[A position we’ll all get] – Blake Francis
Praying Mantis – Penelope Schott
Raven – Kathryn Jordan
Record Low – Russell Rowland
Refugee/fugitive – Sean Urbina
Salsa – Jacob Butlett
Sarabande – Robert René Galván
She Takes a Taxi – Gemma Cooper-Novack
Shifting, Too Anxious to Be Fully Aware – Jonathan Yungkans
That Other Guy – Lenny DellaRocca
This can’t be right – Giovanni Mangiante
Time Flies – John O’Hare
Tuesday in the Home Town – Tom Willemain
Two – Nitya Gupta
Vasculitis – Jared Pearce
Violation – Claire Massey
Warren’s Weathered Barn – Keith Moul
We’re Just Talking – Melissa St. Pierre
What Jesus did do – Dennis Finnell
What Words Cost – Sandy Coomer
When a ’54 Fender Stratocaster Becomes a Fetish – Karla Linn Merrifield
When Coburg Lake Became a Kyrenia Wedding – Angela Costi
Wildfires in Iraq – Sarah Mills
You Cannot Strike a Bargain – Nancy Levinson