Featured – Page 77 – FEMININE COLLECTIVE

Of Fruit

August 20, 2017October 13, 2018 Nikki Moore

I met a woman who told me the creases in my hand held no hope for children or a life-long love. I wondered if the word alone tasted in her mouth as it did in mine. Sweet but not quite ripe, salty but naturally preserved. Could she feel it on Read more

Sticks and Stones

August 19, 2017September 16, 2018 Jacqueline Cioffa

You are better than that, so much brighter than spewing and spitting rhetoric. You are morally responsible and dignified.
Honor is your middle name.
Youth, pay attention you are our
Salvation.

Day 302: Bye, Felicia.

August 18, 2017May 7, 2019 Amye Archer

I have written a million poems about my body. How she couldn’t stay in her lane, fit in her assigned container, listen to directions. How she never did what was expected, lived in the fray, wandered endlessly from ship to ship.

Archives of My Mind

August 18, 2017October 13, 2018 Rebecca Charlotte

I’m the archivist of my mind
But I lack the proper training to keep a clean house

Arsonist

August 16, 2017October 13, 2018 Paakhi Bhatnagar

I see a corridor and I see it with all its edges. I throw a burning ember on the wooden floor and the mustard wallpaper suddenly shudders; the shroud that left my room uncovered now melts and slithers into my mouth. It soaks into my throat and curls into my Read more

Right Here

August 16, 2017September 12, 2018 Ann Klotz

The April Mom died, I resisted going East, believing that if I didn’t go, she wouldn’t die. I did not want her spry, wise, funny light extinguished. But my second daughter, then fifteen, looked at me with scorn and said, “I don’t know what you’re doing, but I’m going to Read more

Five Year Gap

August 16, 2017August 13, 2021 Judith Staff

Five-year gap It could have been ten, I was so young then Just sixteen, you were just ‘old’ Policing my youth, like you always knew better Me and Molly, your mall rats We partied late into the night and brought you coffee at sunrise You scolded our morning-after-those Wildberry Vodka Read more

Laughing with the Sinners: My Life as a Jehovah’s Witness

August 14, 2017September 12, 2018 Dave Pasquel

By the world’s standards, I was a good kid: I didn’t smoke, I didn’t drink, I didn’t do drugs, and I didn’t get into trouble with the law. In fact, I was so squeaky-clean I was still a virgin. Without delay, however, I was counseled by church elders and advised I wasn’t a good kid by Jehovah’s Witnesses standards: I had shoulder-length hair, I attended rock concerts, I had worldly girlfriends, and I possessed a questionable record collection that included music by Stevie Nicks and Led Zeppelin.