Tag: hope

Aleppo at Christmas 2016

Merima Trako

The age of miracles pretending to be this wonderful illusion wanting to see our hearts depths and story lines wanting to leave the eyes and trips stuck in our throats wanting to achieve endless motion, desire to believe in our human sacrifice wanting a reprieve from monsters hiding wanting to Read more

Merima Trako

Merima was born and raised in Bosnia-Herzegovina (former Yugoslavia). Sudden nationalistic divide in the early nineties, leads to a bloody war where a three percent of Bosnian population (mainly Muslims) is killed. Merima and her family escape ethnic cleansing in Banja Luka (where she was born) and settle in Travnik. Her story continues with her move to the USA to study engineering and mathematics, her “other love”, where she lives now. She is a mother, a refugee, an engineer and a woman passionate about creating literary awareness about world issues, social injustices and her life experiences, consisting of complex topics, from religion to non-spiritual events. Her work is available for readers on her website www.worldaccordingtoblam.com. Most recently she published two short stories and two poems in the collection of prose and poetry of the No Name Writing Group from Washington Depot, CT in their anthology titled “This One Has No Name”.

Women With Wings

Jude Walsh

During my routine OB appointment, my doctor mentioned that my nipple “looked a little funny.” I had noticed that too. She was fairly certain it was eczema but wondered aloud if I might be willing to have a dermatologist check it. As I had a mole on my neck I Read more

Jude Walsh

Jude Walsh is now more than five years post cancer. She still listens to Libana and still sees smiling children when she hears What a Wonderful World. Retired from education, she focuses on writing now and is grateful for all the new women friends this has brought into her life. Jude writes memoir, personal essays, fiction, and poetry. Her work has been published in Mothers Always Write, Flights Literary Magazine, Indiana Voice Journal, The Manifest-Station, The Story Circle Network Quarterly Journal, The AWW Collection, and numerous anthologies including The Magic of Memoir (2016).

Oneiric projectiles: Dreaming My Female Ancestors Forward

Hiba Zafran

My mother comes to pick me up from kindergarten and is pulled aside by the teacher. “Your daughter doesn’t color between the lines.” “She knows how she just doesn’t want to.” One week later, the same conversation repeats. So, my mother chooses another school for me—my mother, who dropped out Read more

Hiba Zafran

Hiba Zafran is a therapist and academic working in mental health. She is drawn to critical and queering lenses, as well as poetic explorations of encounters as relational spaces of transformation. Her literary work is just starting to step out there, with a poem in The Muse and honorable mention for a micro-essay in Mothers Always Write. She is grateful for the people, values, and peripheries that she calls her home.

Not Pompeii

Ann Klotz

On our way to school last week, Atticus, 12, and I discuss our black cat’s willingness to lie in the driveway, unafraid or oblivious to traffic. “Like a cat in Pompeii, Mom,” Atticus observes, “Just caught.” “In lava,” I add, “and left there for thousands of years.” “Have you been Read more

Ann Klotz

I am a writer and mother, living in Shaker Heights, OH, where I am the Head of Laurel School, a girls' school. Our house is full of books and tiny rescue dogs. My work has appeared in Literary Mama, Mothers Always Write, the Brevity Blog, Mutha, Mamlode, The Grief Diaries, Manifest Station and elsewhere. My essay about becoming a teacher was recently published in Creative Nonfiction's anthology What I Didn't Know. I blog semi-regularly for the Huffington Post.

Coming Home to Joy

Wendy Brown-Baez

When I tell my friends in Puerto Vallarta that I am returning to Minneapolis, they think I am crazy. “The weather changes here on October 15th; I can guarantee it,” Ted, owner of the cigar shop, tells me. “It’s like a curtain comes down on the humidity.” “It’s paradise here Read more

Wendy Brown-Baez

Wendy Brown-Báez is a writer, teacher, performance poet and installation artist. Wendy’s prose and poetry have appeared in numerous literary journals and anthologies, such as Borderlands, The Litchfield Review, Lavanderia, Mizna, Minnetonka Review, The Chrysalis Reader, Wising Up Press, We-Moon datebooks, 200 New Mexico poems and The Heart of All that Is and on-line journals www.Interfaithings.org and www.talkingwriting.com. She has published two poetry books: "Ceremonies of the Spirit" and "transparencies of light." Her article "Why We Write; The Wounded and Enduring" appeared in Poets & Writers 2014 July/August issue and her essay "Pilgrimage" won the NWBA 2016 contest. Wendy received McKnight and Minnesota State Arts board grants to bring writing workshops into non-profit organizations. She is a member of the Mn Prison Writing Workshop and leads a writing group at Pathways health crisis center.

Magical Thinking

Michele Landers

According to Farlex Partner Medical Dictionary,  “Magical thinking is the irrational belief that one can bring about a circumstance or event by thinking about it or wishing for it.” Hmm…Irrational belief… well, that’s quite interesting given the fact that ironically, the medical community also recognizes the Placedo effect: “A remarkable Read more

Michele Landers

Michele Landers is a Board Certified Life Purpose Coach as seen on FOX's "Eye on South Florida" with Shannon Cake. She is a Certified Hypnotherapist, Numerologist,and Author of "Tao of Numbers" & "The Year of Living Miraculously" Executive Producer "It's Your Life" Talk Show

Shut Up, and Listen

Jacqueline Cioffa

Did you remember to open your eyes, and un-wax your ears when you woke this morning? Did you take for granted the cozy 500-thread count sheets, and the down pillows propped under your head? Did you have a proper bed to sleep in with too many pretty, pleasing greige throw Read more

Jacqueline Cioffa

A retired, international model, and celebrity makeup artist. Co-Author of Model Citi Zen, the guide. Founder of http://modelcitizenmakeup.blogspot.com/. Author of numerous prose pieces in various literary magazines. Most recently published in Little Episodes Brainstorms the anthology, among esteemed artists Sadie Frost, Melvin Burgess and Todd Swift.