by Sophia Smith
A mangled row of bones stacks up from your hips
and into your skull, hidden
behind layers of skin and muscle, Continue reading
behind layers of skin and muscle, Continue reading
Author Archives: venusmairena
Beckoned by Lilith
by Isabel Rhodes
They call me Maiden of the Night,
but I crawled out of the sun.
Celestial fluids dripped from my wings,
blisters marred my cheeks and bloody welts
rose out of my skin, Continue reading
Filed under Poetry, Young Writers Edition
Of Love & Loss
by Shayna Cristy-Mendez
My body feels it before my brain can ever make sense of it; words always fail in their attempt to capture the sense of abandonment that comes with losing a parent to drug addiction. That particular sense of abandonment also tends to be exaggerated when their death falls on your birthday. As it happens, death has a habit of being a real foot to the groin of celebration. Continue reading
Filed under Nonfiction, Young Writers Edition
Sick Days
by April Bannister
When her heart buys its ticket and packs its suitcase and settles in its window seat to watch the airplane heave up from the soil, she is at home—she has not yet laid in her hospital bed, nor stepped on an airplane herself. When her heart buys its ticket, she feels it, chloroform cold radiating from inside her chest. She panics. Hands clutch at something too deep to grasp, so she flails, alone in her bedroom, alone in the apartment. I can’t die yet, she thinks. There’s so much food I need to eat. Continue reading
Filed under Fiction, Young Writers Edition
Self-Portrait with Matilda, 1996
by Siobhan Jean-Charles
Every day she untangles herself
from the sidewalks, sits in the library
with the sun spilling in her lap. She stacks
the novels into a skyline. At the bookstore, Continue reading
Filed under Poetry, Young Writers Edition
Hawaii Pacific Review 