You caught me honey-bee I always thought I was a wasp With a grin sting, turning green In the porch light, no, though. I turned out to be a moth with Soft wings, coming off on your fingertips I’m grateful for the bees, he says: You will hive me forever. On those movies It was only the words that turned me: each One an aphotic kelp forest, swirling otters Coming up and over the sweating sun. Antediluvian moments, he used to call them, The seven deluges you carved out in old Display cases, native beads, Asian threads. I realized the honey was mine all along. I swear on summer: the…
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Death of An English Shepherd at Flanders Fields
By L.J. Bosela Bombs are falling thick Set me free, let me run My heart stops its’ beat In this hour of my death Save me, Lord, take me home. Clutch my beads, shout a prayer My fate is sealed like a tomb.Close my eyes, see the cross A priest offering up the Sacrament, We are the hallowed flesh Given up by those we do not see An easy, near-forgotten sacrifice To the masters of our war. Our blood is naught but A cheap, unconsecrated libation. And now the crimson earth is Drunk with blood of the nations.Out beyond my trench- A fitting grave for this mass of men- The…
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The Irish Sweepstakes
By Sarah Felder Snow now is only means of weathered transport: Sleep in hinged places just so I can See the bricked fire char and breathe, Lighting the burgundy flooring. I wrote this letter a generation ago; When all those lit Augusts were Nothing but spruce, spurs, spinning And growing up and over on the Chain- link. I wasn’t in the light then because I didn’t understand the destiny of being Born in the first place: I hadn’t re-taught my youngdom To begin again. I contemplate your breathing beats, What they were when I was young: The flaws in our own ticking machines, My dinner to the floor, rocking my…
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Fairbanks in January
By Martha Amore The day Maura arrived it was cold in the way Fairbanks often is in January, fragile with frost, when it seems that even blowing on the trees will crack them to the ground. Every breath burns your lungs like smoke, and your Snowpacs squeak in the bright white snow. Ann was quiet the whole way to the airport, and I knew she was nervous by the way she kept taking her mittens off and then tugging them back on. “A whole week isn’t going to be easy,” I said. We lived in a one-room cabin with a loft, and having a guest meant setting up a bed…
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I RECOUNT MYSELF ON THIS
By Sarah Felder Eyes back, lean back, I haven’t felt The bare boned winter yet, Your face in circles trailing skin-like Apparitions, parenthetical laugh lines, Twined lips, puckered and alive with Hiccupped laughing; The Italian leather of your BMW sticks To my thighs, I dream of her there, The yellowing walls of the Ramada, Where we smoked cigarettes all night Between scratchy throws and music Humming against the floors. Back on the Island I remember you more: The broken stairs to Mconoky beach, Lambert’s cove road winds to me, extends It’s tar limbs to visit for a day, and since leaving That whistle of a place I…
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Fruity Economics
By Evan Nasse “The Blueberry Party has gone too far this time!” Cries the leader of the Red Apple Party, Red Delicious, pointing his finger accusingly in the direction where the patch of Blueberries are seated. “You can’t just decide that we’re going to pay for pesticides for all of the produce! This is an outrage and we will not sit idly by. Starting the day of the implementation of the Affordable Pesticide Act we are implementing a Cropwide Closure unless you agree to our demands to defund Obamegranatecare!” Screams the Red Apple Party representative into the microphone. “You can’t shut down all of the crops just because you disapprove…
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Land Rediscovered
By Simon Frez-Albrecht Anticipation—and exasperation—had been building all summer toward this one special day. I had the fortune of stepping in right at the end to wrap up loose ends and hop on the bandwagon. By the time I showed up, hundreds of hours had gone into planning and arranging the logistics of putting all 35 first-year students at APU on the Yukon River for ten days, not to mention the 10 staff going with them. The last week before departure, the students spent their mornings in class while we shopped for food and sorted gear. In the afternoons, we conducted lessons in wilderness living, basic water rescue, and geared…
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Worthless People – An excerpt from the book (Part 2)
By Tim Wilson (continued) “It will be dark soon,” Dave said. “We should camp and cook these here. Besides, we’re being followed.” “Kulima?” Scott asked, looking at Dave for evidence of concern. “He is not a Kulima,” Dave answered, then shrugged to indicate he was not concerned. They returned to their more comfortable bond of silence. The time for speaking was when the fire had been built and the birds were dressed and cooking. Scott eagerly anticipated the time after a successful hunt. He loved to cook; Dave loved to let him. But telling stories around the evening fire ranked highest for him. Then, his friend Dave really talked. They…
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Tiny Dancer
By M. Erickson It’s funny how certain songs can define an era in your life. The chords make their way from the speakers to your ears then right on in to your heart. In high school, the movie Almost Famous was released, and with it a whole new chance to fall in love with Elton John’s “Tiny Dancer.” It’s a great sing-a-long song, you almost can’t help but join in with the chorus: Hold me closer tiny dancerrrrr, count the headlights on the highway… My friends and I sang it all the time, especially on long road trips—my friend Terry would always do this little dance with his hands to…
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Worthless People – An excerpt from the book (Part 1)
By Tim Wilson “In the discarded husk of yesterday’s sugarcane, the ant sees a harvest.” African proverb Brad glanced in anticipation at his two friends as they stood at the edge of the African rainforest that would be their home for the next few days. Between the guarded gate of Highland Academy and the forest’s edge, they had divested themselves of all things Western; from here on, they would speak only Swahili, their first language. Highland Academy, the boarding school, provided an American-based education to the children of foreign workers in Africa. Most of the students were in Africa temporarily while their parents, on professional sabbaticals, did relief work; these…
