Margo Griffin How to Signal a Ceasefire During War I slipped my feet into the warm, pink, fuzzy slippers my daughter Maura bought me three Christmases ago, before our war began and back when she liked me. The gift…
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Melanie Faranello Becoming Early Days I stick your tiny fist inside my mouth and cry. It’s the size of a plum. We have no regard for time, or the falling from day into night into day. Together, we defy the…
Annie Marhefka You can’t belong to the sky Her lips pressed against each other in a glistening pout when she said it, the melted ChapStick spilling over the top of its plastic cylinder in her chubby-fingered grip. The lid…
Alexandria Faulkenbury In My Toddler’s Room In my toddler’s room, the internet stalls and sputters and gives up halfway through loading a page on my phone. I drop it into my lap in frustration. The darkness envelopes its illuminated…
Ashley Knowlton Sprouting Specks Freckles sprinkle the top of my son’s nose– distinct like the rings of a tree, telling how many summers he’s spent under the sun and in the dirt with digging hands and dusty toes. Sapling…
Marin Smith Just One Last Question Before We Say Goodnight By the way, Mom, she says, where did life come from? Well, I say, unsure where to start, There are many cultures with many answers to that question. Some…
Jennifer Hernandez Chrysalis Stretched in his twin bed, my youngest son, eleven, lies wrapped in pale green. The rest of us awake for hours. But it’s summer, nowhere urgent to be. I let him sleep. This journey is not…
Cassie Mannes Murray Round Peg, Square Hole If I was counting it would be thirteen. Feels like a small number, feels young. After walking in the rain, his hood half over one eye like a pirate or a cartoon…
Bethany Jarmul A Moment, A Memory I’m sitting on a porch chair on our back deck, which is covered with autumn leaves. Near my feet, my daughter crawls amongst them—shuffle, crinkle, shuffle, crinkle. The wind whips my hair, swirls…
Kimberly Ramos Reflection, But Shuffled When night slips into my bed and once again / the world is a place with no edges / I remember you are my first homeland / You, Missouri girl of cattle and birthing…