by Emily McIlroy
I climb into the ear
of the island–auricle of ash
rising above blue lung. Continue reading
Medicine
Filed under Poetry
Keith Richards and Rebel Yell
by Leslie Armstrong
My cousin Elspeth was always going on trips to exotic places in hopes of meeting an improvement over the two husbands she’d already had. One spring in the late ’80s, while on vacation, she met a possible candidate. They’d spent only an evening together, but he was a real estate lawyer practicing in Connecticut, clearly solvent, and, other than his thick south-Boston accent, which offended her Cambridge ear, he was indeed a prospect. Could she invite him to dinner so my husband, Dewey, and I could check him out? Continue reading
Filed under Nonfiction
Self-Portrait with Nissan and Failed Romance
by Connor Watkins-Xu
I’m fingertips interlocked on the console
like an oyster. What is our pearl?
I’m an embrace that halts your heart and
I hope to be the vessels of wine-aged love. Continue reading
Filed under Poetry
Seek and Ye Shall Find
by Shawna Ervin
Lost
1984. Scott Hamilton won the Olympic gold medal for men’s figure skating in Sarajevo that February. He trained at a rink near where I lived with my parents and younger brother. I was nine, in third grade. I hadn’t paid attention to figure skating before, and probably hadn’t paid much attention that year either. My parents were conservative Christians. TV—like the radio, movies, alcohol, smoking, dancing, and anyone outside of our small, fundamental world—was to be feared and avoided at all costs. Continue reading
Filed under Nonfiction
Lahaina, August 17, 2023
by Dr. Edward J. Kame`enui
My Hawaiian blood is from Hilo,
the Waipio Valley, and Kamuela
where gobo grows vertical
in soft brown dirt.
Not Lahaina. Continue reading
Filed under Poetry
Hawaii Pacific Review 