“We just want to be manipulated with a little fucking consideration” —Tony Hoagland from Application for Release from the Dream Tony Hoagland’s poetry doesn’t mince words but it will proudly mince people and ideas. He can be funny and saddening, often in the same line. His fifth collection, Application for…
Category: Online Work
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This Book Is Full of Spiders: Seriously Dude, Don’t Touch It! Review by Rebecca Nelson
**Editor’s Note: This is a special review serving as a throwback to our high school selves and their favorite books. Have you ever had an intensely realistic dream that you forget the moment you wake up, only to forever feel as though you’d had an epiphany about the meaning of…
Some thoughts on responding to literature in a creative way by Shannon Hearn
English majors become good at writing to survive. There always have been and always will be those W courses where fifteen pages of revised writing means writing way more than the diminutive requirement so many of us are afraid of at the beginning of a semester. So, on top of…
Remembering Sidney Sheldon by Laura Ruttan
“Libraries store the energy that fuels the imagination. They open up windows to the world and inspire us to explore and achieve, and contribute to improving our quality of life. Libraries change lives for the better.” — Sidney Sheldon Sidney Sheldon was a famous successful American playwright, screenwriter, and best selling…
The Cult of Objectivity by Sten Spinella
Objectivity is overrated. Well, it’s misunderstood. Journalists commonly call it “covering both sides.” The traditional and (self-proclaimed) unassailable reporter will say that there’s never an angle to a story. Maybe there’s a story begging to be told, but never an angle—never to be covered from one viewpoint, and never, under…
“Turner’s Comedy” by Martin Bremer (2015)
The pistol lies across the desk from me—out of reach, but pointing straight at my chest. Halogen lamps flood the interrogation room—I can almost feel my innards incinerate as the brightness forces its way through my retina—every crevice, every wrinkle of me, laid bare, out in the open—illuminated. I’m trying…
“Morning on Cathedral Parkway” by Lillie Gardner (2015)
Waking up after being awake all night from sweating under your blankets and out of your blankets and leaning against the wall to cry and cough, with your loose shirt slipping off my shoulders, with too much of the moonlight bouncing off the cold cars in the parking lot below…
“Glorious” by Amy Martin (2015)
Glimpses of his dreams pass by his eyes in the calm solitude of the waiting window. It’s one thing in Sean’s life that he wants slow and still and calm. One of few. He always seems in a rush. In a way, he is; in a way no one but…
“Cold Water” by Catherine Hires (2015)
Nia was still sleeping when I woke up. She was snoring loudly as I crawled my way down the rickety ladder that supported my lofted bed. I walked past her bed, her open mouth smushed ungracefully against her pillow, and made my way into the kitchen. I turned on the…
Happy Chinese New Year by Steph Koo
The supermarket was packed yesterday. Today, Mom is preparing food. I select music for a playlist for tonight’s guests. We are complaining about cleaning the house. No, it is not because it is Superbowl Sunday. This year, overshadowed by an American pastime I never quite understood, Chinese New Year Eve…