Three Pieces of Flash Fiction Things That Stood Out There was a boy in Izard. A brave boy. Everyone knew him. Ricky D…
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Archives
New Nonfiction from Sarah Haak: “Assimilation”
My husband has downloaded a sleep cycle app for his phone. Every evening he tucks the phone into bed with him, under …
New Fiction from Adrian Bonenberger: “Wonder Woman”
In Atlanta at the Ritz Carlton we stopped at the bar by the lobby on our way upstairs. Fred saw Newt Gingrich who was…
New Poetry from Lauren Davis: “The Flowers You Brought Back From Italy”
Each time I open my notebook the pages stick.Because I’ve forgotten. And onto the ground they fall:royal purple flowe…
New Poetry from Scott Janssen: “Bottle Tree”
On my first visit I askedA stock question about Whether you’d been in the military. Marines, nineteen sixty-six, you …
New Fiction from Matt Gallagher: “The Biggest Little City”
“Been to Las Vegas? Clean. Corporate. Sleek, serious suit. We’re that guy’s kid brother selling Adderall in the parki…
New Nonfiction from Erin Carpenter: “Fully Involved: A Trauma-Informed Approach to Date Night”
Part 1: The Healing Shed In 2016, my husband burned our guesthouse to the ground. He left a t-shirt over a lightbulb …
New Poetry from Nestor Walters: “Homecoming”
Only the dead have seen the end of war –Plato he lies down, finally to rest. grey light bands his closed door with no…
“Art-Making is My Light:” An Interview with Poet Suzanne S. Rancourt
As Suzanne Rancourt notes, her work is a bridge between disparate worlds, attempting to make connections between thes…
New Poetry from Sheila Bonenberger: “They Gave Their Lives”
The brass buttons are piled in a bowl that sits on the shop counter beside the cash register, so I buy one,watch as t…
New Fiction from Brian Castner: The Troll
John Gurdenson’s legs weren’t what they used to be, and though the veteran charged hard on the forecheck, he was slow…
New Nonfiction by Abena Ntoso: Memorial Day
There are four ways of telling what happened. 1. Just tell the truth. Some stories are told just once; others are tol…
New Poetry from Mack Freeman: “Death Row Butterflies”
Gossamer wings glintRazor wire gleams in sunlight Death row butterflies
…
The Splintering Effect
Time is much longer when you’re sober, moments like molecules dragging into pixelated detail with nothing to du…
Soldier
An homage to Jamaica Kincaid’s “Girl” (The New Yorker, June 1978). Wake up at oh-my-god-o’clock on …
Artist Profile: Larry Abbott Interviews Musician Vince Gabriel
INTRO: Vince Gabriel has been making music since his high school days in New Jersey. Born in South Amboy on Sep…
New Poem from Nazli Karabiyikoglu: “Hymn: A Coffin at the Gates of Topkapi”
The head, decapitated,it sits on a shore, at some corner of the world.Desperation is what they feel as blood g…
Praying at America’s Altar: A Review of Phil Klay’s MISSIONARIES, by Adrian Bonenberger
One of the first books I read was given to me by my father, who got it from his father—a children’s version of the Il…
A Brief History of an Apology
Here are questions. How is it possible to engage in a process of healing for the evils of history? Who has the …
New Poetry from George Kramer: “Three Snapshots of Superman’s Mother,” “Google Earth”
Three Snapshots of Superman’s Mother Budapest, Hungary. December 1944. This stagnant end squats over its …
New Fiction from Matthew Cricchio: “War All the Time”
The Staff Sergeant shifted in his tight, class-A uniform and frowned. Phones rang and keyboards, the primary weapon o…
Artist Profile: Singer-Songwriter Jason Moon
Jason Moon served in Iraq with a combat engineering battalion. He returned to the States in 2004 and was eventually d…
Poetry from Westley Smith: “Homecoming,” “On Not Dying,” “Nocturne”
Homecoming He doesn’t feel quite right, being there—same house, a little run down, dirtierthan he remembers. They smi…
A Dispatch from Fort Atwater
Nostalgia is another word for history, but only our personal, petty, smalltime histories; history is all about the si…
New Poetry from Jacqlyn Cope: “Mission 376: Patient X,” “Prolonged Exposure Therapy,” “Doxies and Rum”
MISSION 376: PATIENT X There’s dirt in his mouth now &nbs…
Loyal to the Corps: A Review of Teresa Fazio’s ‘Fidelis’
The motto of the U.S. Marine Corps, or USMC, is “Semper Fidelis.” Commonly translated to “always faithful,” the motto…
New Fiction from Henry Kronk: “We Found Out”
“What do you think?” he asked. “I don’t know,” she said. “Could be an ambush.” “Could be.” “But here? The corps…
Poetry from Dennis Etzel: “The War in Coming Out,” “The War in Men,” “The War in their Duties”
The War in Coming Out Today we honor those soldiers who fought for our country against oppressing forces. It was a ma…
New Nonfiction from Teresa Fazio: “Light My Fire”
The following excerpt is from Teresa Fazio’s Fidelis: A Memoir, reprinted with permission from Potomac Books.&n…
Uncrossable Borders: A Review of Patrick Hicks’s New Novel, ‘In the Shadow of Dora’
As Patrick Hicks’s novel In the Shadow of Dora opens, it is July 1969 in bright-and-sunny Cape Canaveral, Florida. In…
Artist Profile: Musician Emily Yates
INTRODUCTION Emily Yates joined the Army at 19, spent six years in, from 2002 until her “release,” as she puts it, in…
New Fiction from Lisa Erin Sanchez: “Signatures of Ghosts”
He had one scar when I met him, a single blow to the back of his neck in the soft fleshy space between head gear and …
New Fiction from Brian Van Reet: “Lazarus”
We were the HMDs: the human mine detectors. In a sense the job was easy, but impossible to do well. There was no good…
Novel Excerpt: Elliot Ackerman’s ‘Red Dress in Black and White’
That evening, at half past nine To William, the question of his mother is clear. The question of his father is more c…
An Interview with Elliot Ackerman
Elliot Ackerman is the author of four novels–most recently Red Dress in Black and White, set in Istanbul primar…
New Poetry from Mbizo Chirasha: “Casava Republics,” “Sad Revolutionary Lullabies,” “Rhetorics”
CASAVA REPUBLICS Juba Child of lost sperm in sunsets of political masturbation Wagadugu Deadline of our revolutions D…
New Poetry from D.A. Gray: “Mosul Reflections,” “St. Martin in the City,” “The Rearview Has Two Faces”
Mosul Reflections Ten years and the place is not the same. Memory of green hills in a dry land,cratered by what fell …
An Interview with Filmmaker Jordan Martinez
First Sergeant Russell Tuason faces a dilemma: does he deploy once again to Iraq to lead the troops he has been train…
New Review: BRAVO! Ben Fountain Scores a Touchdown on Reality
Americans do not genuinely support the troops. This is the impression Ben Fountain’s 2012 war novel Billy Lynn’s…
“What Is The Name Of Your Dead Horse”
We start again:With promises made for silver pass, platinum deferment,tithing calls go out to the faithful wealthy,su…
American Exceptionalism: Quo Vadis?
In view of the failures of the COVID-19 pandemic in the USA, which has seen over 2 million cases and more than 115,00…
“Daily Exercise”, “America”, “I Tell My Children”
daily exercise (haiku) my morning poemshave begun to sound like Tweetsfragments of bird song America we best reflect …
Dissent in Iraq
By M.C. Armstrong and Noor Ghazi Protestors in Iraq have a great deal in common with the new wave of protestors in th…
The Gift of Trey
A nuclear reactor is nothing more than a glorified water heater. Sailors as young as nineteen, kids, bombard uranium …
The Witch
These days they call me by name: Hope. By “they,” I mean the people in our small dusty town, Masaka, where everyone k…
Don’t Erase My History and Don’t Sell My Picture
A photo essay on the ongoing struggle of Korean “comfort women” In 2010, I visited The House of Sharing, a residence …
New Poetry from Chad Corrigan: “Hidden Mountain Tops”
The top of the mountain is hidden.It looks like a cloud of smoke.But it’s a snow filled cloud.The map says it&#…
Two Poems by henry 7. reneau, jr: “watch what they mouth say, but listen what they hands do” and “The Book of Hours”
watch what they mouth say, but listen what they hands do i grew up hearing certain accents & vocabularies & s…
New Poetry from Eric Chandler: “The Things You Leave Out”
The Things You Leave Out after Yamamoto Jōchō, Jim Morrison, and Robert Frost You quote One c…