I set the trap tonight. Last week I wrote in my journal that life is sacred. Later, I bought the trap. Tonight I read to my child. Do animal mothers love their babies? Yes, yes, of course they do. Animal mothers love their babies, just like yours loves you. I kissed him goodnight. I came downstairs. Shakily I spread the peanut butter onto the trap. A minute ago I went outdoors. Two steps beyond the door, I stopped to breathe the cold air, to salute the moon and stars, so bright in a sky framed by the silhouettes of bare…
Author: Mom Egg Review
He could do it himself, make his own sandwich, omelette and Monterey Jack in pita bread, no tomato, just a pickle on the side. Could squeeze his own orange juice when he comes to visit. Wash his clothes. I could tell him—as I told my daughter when she moved out—that he’s old enough now but he is my youngest and, unlike the others, keeps to himself and clips his words, racing or mumbling or stripping to essentials, sometimes heated and sharp, though he has his moments—openings, warm and sudden as spring rain. I hold them like gold, hoping for more…
At 2 am I sit in a car in an unmarked parking spot around the corner from the house. Will he escape from his room, jump onto the roof and down to the driveway to run? Earlier, I tell his probation officers he won’t be showing up. The burly men are here to haul him outward-bound to West Virginia. The escort service owner assured me I’d be able to say goodbye. But the ex-CIA men push me aside and out the door as they bound up the stairs. I wait, my eyes fixated on my driveway. The three of them…
Review by Marcene Gandolfo – In Sunday school, when we chose roles for the Easter play, no one wanted to play Judas. Understandably so. Judas Iscariot was the traitor, the villain. Who would want to be Judas? Then we realized, if no one played Judas, there would be no play. Judas character – however despised – was an integral part of our story. Without Judas kiss, there would be no Easter. I began to feel sympathy for this man, who was left in the end, hanging from a tree, detested for centuries. Years later, my interest resurfaced when I read…
Review by Christina Mock – Tara Masih’s The Chalk Circle is a superb collection of essays that moves the reader outside of their comfort zone. These award winning writers cover a wide range of topics which raise questions about war, violence, forgiveness, racism, love, innocence, and ultimately, what it means to be human. While reading this collection, I could not help but become attached to the characters I met whether it was Shanti Elke Bannwart, in search of peace for her father’s crimes as a Nazi or Samuel Autman, the only African American man working on a newspaper in Utah…
Review by Ivy Rutledge – Nina Schuyler’s novel, The Translator, will pull you along Hanne Schubert’s journey through the shifting landscapes of her life, both literal and figurative. From her apartment in San Francisco across the ocean to Japan and beyond, she seeks the answers to important questions. Questions she only discovers after months of searching: “What happens when the soul is assigned its purpose, but is neglected? Forgotten? Or worse, thwarted? When someone or something comes along and tells the soul that its reason for being here is not wanted?” Hanne’s story opens with a love affair with a…
Review by Libby Maxey – I expected to graze on Nicole Callihan’s Superloop (Sock Monkey Press, 2014), but I ended up devouring it —or, to make use of the titular metaphor, I went to Callihan’s classy midway and didn’t want to leave. This collection has a quirky gravitas that commands attention, and Callihan’s poems are just different enough, one to another—stylistically and thematically—to keep the reader wondering what kind of ride comes next. Sometimes, the poems are a giddy, rushing experience; sometimes, they carry the reader away gently, such that she might not realize it until the bottom drops out…
Review by Judy Swann – The first recorded poetry I ever heard the Joan Baez Baptism album; and in the many years since, drunk with verse and swaddled in vocals, I had yet to hear another. Then I came across Eve Packer and Stephanie Stone’s My Champagne Waltz. Both are perfect, but the only thing they have in common is their commitment to the trip. Throw out your shoon, put on your pork-pie hat and grab your stilettos! Eve Packer’s poetry is not slam, but that sassy – no contemplative James Emanuel – but a big city block Jezebel, writing…
Review by Maura Candela – Katrinka Moore’s third book of poetry, Numa, published by Aqueduct Press, is a departure from her first two books, and like nothing else you’ve read. An epic poem about a shape-shifting creature, Numa tells a fast-paced story, even as it proves a meditation on consciousness, on the primal nature of motherhood, and on how the body shapes identity. However you imagine her, asleep she folds in on herself fawn-like, puma tail curled to her chin. This is how we first meet Numa, a young numen, a Roman word for a forest spirit. It is telling…
Dear Kindergarten Teacher, I am going out of town this week. My husband and Henry are coming with me because Henry is still nursing and can’t be away from me for more than twelve hours or else my milk will dry up and then he’ll be forced to drink water all the time because he won’t take a bottle. We’re staying in a hotel with a monstrous bed, one with heaven stuffed between the sheets and twenty pillows to support every limb, enough bed for the two of us to twist around in and then sleep like no one else…