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Siblings

Essays, Memoirs, & True Stories

Such Gifts

He tells me how Mom’s rabbi tried to convince him that life has a purpose, but my brother wasn’t having it. Existence is a tapestry of chaos, he writes, that we impose meaning on to give our lives purpose.

By Brittany Ackerman January 2024
Readers Write

Privacy

A coded diary, a box of letters, a closed bedroom door

By Our Readers August 2023
Poetry

The Only Ones

Poems About Parents

I failed at wisdom, nurture, / nature, separation, and calm. / I excelled at role model, if what / you wanted was wretched.

from “Old Mom,” by Jessica Barksdale

 

What my father didn’t know when he drove / ten-year-old me in the bed of his pickup truck / to gun shows & shooting ranges, initiating me / into the art of the hunt, was that he was actually / teaching me how to write poems

from “Portrait Of The Poet As A Child,” by Elizabeth Knapp

 

In my memories my godfather towers / over me, his deep baritone thundering / above us as we sing hymns during Sunday / service.

from “Small,” by Courtney LeBlanc

 

My brother calls to say he’ll meet us / for lunch in a few hours, not to wait for him / if he’s late. He’s got to pick up Mom. / And though the crematorium / is near our hotel, he’ll take her ashes home / first.

from “Waiting In Cars,” by Jackleen Holton

By Jessica Barksdale , Jackleen Holton , Elizabeth Knapp & Courtney LeBlanc July 2023
Poetry

Ode To My Brother’s Face Tattoos

At twenty you’ve managed to erase / our dad’s face from your own, / blacked out his sharp cheekbones / with roses, marked each eyelid / with an upside-down cross to distract / from his glossy brown irises.

By Reese Menefee February 2023
Essays, Memoirs, & True Stories

Their Last Argument

I picture my father, dead a dozen years now, reaching from the great beyond to tap me on the shoulder. “What do you want, Pa?” I ask. “Look,” he says. “I’ve been practicing my moonwalk.”

By Peter E. Murphy September 2022
Essays, Memoirs, & True Stories

The Thistle Steps

I have recently made a new enemy. She is a black, curly-haired cocker spaniel walking a man holding a leash. We pass each other sometimes on the steep, narrow public stairs called the Thistle Steps. . . . I could try talking to the man, but I’m never wearing my hearing aids when we meet, so I wouldn’t be able to hear his reply.

By Elana Kupor September 2022
Fiction

Blue Ladder

My uncle finally kicked me out, and I was living in the twenty-four-hour Kroger on Fairhaven Avenue in Tustin, California, pilfering food and sleeping at the coffee bar. One day Mr. Muniz pushed a cart through the frozen-foods section where I was fanning myself, and he stopped. I’d gotten ugly, my face wasn’t right, and I could tell he was thinking, What the hell?

By Bruce McKay August 2022
Essays, Memoirs, & True Stories

Some Notes On Fathers And Sons

I learned how to be a man by modeling the behavior of my father, and then other men. What I don’t know is how my son has modeled me, and that’s creating a commotion in my heart.

By Gary Percesepe July 2022
Poetry

Updated Portrait In A Grocery Store

Most days I stick to the periphery — / produce and eggs and chicken and cheese — / but tonight I am buying peanut butter, / which here is inexplicably placed / with the popcorn and chips.

By Caleb Nolen July 2022
Poetry

In Texas, Thinking Of Georgia

It must have been forty years ago, / my brother and sisters, our mom and dad, / gathered around the fat television / before our Saturday supper / to watch my skinny father / make the evening news.

By John Poch June 2022