Happiness

Formed Otherwise

Sun, 31 May 2026 15:00:00 -0400

There’s a presumption that to raise a child with disabilities makes you brave. I wasn’t brave. I wasn’t always a stellar mother, either. But I studied my daughter as if she were an ancient text to see what was beneath the chatter and the rage

Practicing

Thu, 30 Apr 2026 11:00:00 -0400

Taking piano lessons, learning to speak Russian, seeking enlightenment

Four of Cups

Tue, 31 Mar 2026 10:00:00 -0400

Maybe it was a mistake choosing such a solemn and contemplative place. Raising your voice above a whisper feels like an intrusion. The entrance branches into different rooms, leading you through multiple cultures and eras. You can move through time, follow the various paths available to you. You pick a direction and go.

Pockets

Sat, 28 Feb 2026 12:00:00 -0500

Shoplifting cigarettes, running the pool table, creating a “pocket prairie”

Selected Poems

Sat, 28 Feb 2026 12:00:00 -0500

It all reminds me of that moment when you take off your sunglasses / after a long drive and realize it’s earlier / and lighter out than you had accounted for.

A Thousand Words

Sat, 28 Feb 2026 12:00:00 -0500

A Thousand Words features photography so rich with narrative that it tells a story all on its own.

Nicknames

Sat, 31 Jan 2026 12:00:00 -0500

Get to know Boxcar Betty, Stick Dick, Lali, and the Cajun Asian

The Danish

Wed, 31 Dec 2025 12:00:00 -0500

Then I felt a small admiration for the Man With The Danish, who hoped to give away excess food rather than throw it in the trash. Maybe I should have accepted the Danish, although I didn’t want it. By turning it down resentfully, I might have discouraged him from ever offering food to a stranger again. But there’s no time to think when someone thrusts a sudden dessert in your face.

Celebrating

Sun, 30 Nov 2025 11:00:00 -0500

A fiftieth anniversary in Paris, a COVID Christmas in April, a first birthday in America

Pinkie Masters

Sun, 30 Nov 2025 11:00:00 -0500

A good scare can cure anything, she says. / We nod, and I thank her but insist / on holding my breath all night.

Getting Dressed

Sun, 31 Aug 2025 12:00:00 -0400

Sleeping in uniform, layering against the cold, wearing your spouse’s jeans

On Wheels

Sun, 31 Aug 2025 12:00:00 -0400

Last summer I took a free one-day course in nearby Philadelphia for adults who wanted to learn to ride a bike. The incident that finally pushed me over the edge was when my eight-year-old niece was riding in circles around me, baffled by my inability to do the same. She asked why I was afraid to do something so easy. And I was afraid: Of falling. Of looking foolish. Of struggling to even get on the seat at a public park and then throwing a tantrum while some teens recorded me on their phones. Mostly I was afraid of finding out how limited I really am.

Records

Fri, 30 May 2025 12:00:00 -0400

A favorite album, a fastest time, a handwritten note about an adoption

Regards

Fri, 28 Feb 2025 12:00:00 -0500

A big bumbling bee / hovers like a chopper near your head / and you were going to swat him / but instead you laugh and wave / like a nut because you’re not / at your job and at times / it can be nice to be regarded.

Snowdrops

Fri, 28 Feb 2025 12:00:00 -0500

Dad was happiest in early spring, / when the lake thawed and the fish stirred. / When bluegills rose to snowflakes. / When the whole world got hungry.

Making Luxury Out of Flat Soda

frederickt.joseph@gmail.com — Sat, 30 Nov 2024 12:00:00 -0500

I learned to breathe in my grandmother’s kitchen / despite life sitting on my chest. / Scent of cast-iron skillet seasoned by sunrises / and ancestors’ touch. Gospels of sizzling grease / and bubbling greens my uncle called hallelujah and amen.

Greenie

heatherellesellers@gmail.com — Sat, 30 Nov 2024 12:00:00 -0500

Sometimes I wonder if that moment when I came into the house after school, during a time when I was mostly friendless, dressed in matronly, dated clothes from the Cancer Society thrift shop, barred by my mother from concerts, movies, and parties, and I sat down at the table and was grabbed hard by my grandmother’s hand, which seemed to hold a charge of energy—sometimes I wonder if that moment, that physical connection, that pinch, was how I survived.

Sunbeams

Mon, 01 Jul 2024 00:00:00 -0400

Food has powers. It picks us up from our lonely corners and sits us back down, together. It pulls us out of ourselves, to the kitchen, to the table, to the diner down the block. At the same time, it draws us inward. Food is the keeper of our memories, connecting us with our pasts and with our people.

Jessica Fechtor

New Life

Mon, 01 Jul 2024 00:00:00 -0400

Since I had no one else to ask, I asked the hunger where it wanted to go. It said, West, like that was a point on the map called Freedom. So I drove west. I stopped at a Walmart somewhere in Kansas and bought a propane camp stove and a tent, because hotels were not in the budget.

Two Guys Walk into a Bar

Tue, 30 Apr 2024 00:00:00 -0400

But I’m talking about joke structure; you’re asking about the purpose of comedy as a whole. When my first book came out, people would ask me in interviews, “Why is comedy important?” I don’t know that it is. There are lots of people, believe it or not, who don’t care about comedy. And they can live to the age of eighty or ninety.

Mountain Flowers

Thu, 29 Feb 2024 05:00:00 -0500

When I was sixteen, / pickup truck, load of hay, / there was nothing I’d rather see / from the window than women’s underwear / hanging on a backyard clothesline.

The Ice Age

Sat, 30 Sep 2023 04:05:00 -0400

I could see others finding happiness, but whenever I approached it, an invisible sheet of ice stopped me from getting any closer. I could never cross over to the other side; I could only pound on the ice that never cracked.

No Small Wonder

Thu, 31 Aug 2023 04:00:00 -0400

Emotions aren’t discrete bubbles. They are blending into each other all the time. You might be feeling awe and wonder at the miracle of life, and also realizing that we all die, which perhaps moves you closer to terror. In our work we try to find what’s true in it all.

Sunbeams

Thu, 31 Aug 2023 04:00:00 -0400

One imagines the birth of happiness to be accompanied by some great spectacular upheaval. One can imagine it flowering in the most luxurious setting. Yet happiness is born of a trifle, feeds on nothing.

Mariama Bâ, Scarlet Song

Don’t Panic

dgmlewis@gmail.com — Wed, 31 May 2023 04:00:00 -0400

I’m not talking about burning the system down. . . . I simply think that the things we can do to respond to climate change will also make the world a better place for most people.

On Seeing A Sex Surrogate

Fri, 31 Mar 2023 04:00:00 -0400

Pounding the keys with my mouth stick, I wrote in my journal as quickly as I could about my experience, then switched off the computer and tried to nap. But I couldn’t. I was too happy. For the first time, I felt glad to be a man.

Sparrow’s Guide To Business

Tue, 28 Feb 2023 05:05:00 -0500

When you walk on sand, you leave footprints. When you work, you leave “workprints.” The people who come behind you will judge you by your workprints.

Captain’s Log

Tue, 28 Feb 2023 05:00:00 -0500

7:17 — Wife yells, Oh, God, look! Dusk now, harder to see. What? I say. Bear! she says. To right, where riverbank gives way to pasture, large beast lurks in shadow of tree. Dark, terrible beast, now moving slightly toward us. Large, dark beast says, Moooo.

A Thousand Words

Sun, 31 Jul 2022 04:00:00 -0400

A Thousand Words features photography so rich with narrative that it tells a story all on its own.

Love In Our Seventies

Thu, 30 Jun 2022 04:00:00 -0400

We don’t take each other for granted, because we know we’re old. Sometimes when we’re bird-watching — field guides, binoculars — happy to be looking at egrets or green-winged teal, I think, One of us is going to die first.