by Mark S. Osaki
We have become accustomed
to taking one to bed
like a nightmare
kept under the pillow
for just those times
persuasion must be fatal, Continue reading
Gun Song
Filed under Poetry
Roman Candle
by Leo Coffey
I never told you this before, but we knew about the pills. Jacob, Uncle Tommy, James, all of us. That night you came inside to rest. The rest of us were outside shooting fireworks by the barn. It was the Fourth of July and the air smelled like hotdogs and burnt wax. I drank one too many Mountain Dews and had to pee so bad I ran inside with one hand gripping my crotch and the other holding a Roman candle. Continue reading
Filed under Fiction
Wonton Soup
by Sonia Beauchamp
We never argued when making dumplings for soup.
When rain blanketed the pine trees in gray mist
and chicken broth simmered shrouds of steam,
I stood tiptoed on the wooden stool with uneven legs.
Irregular seconds beat across the kitchen floor.
Filed under Poetry
Talisman
by Anneli Matheson
The day after my mother’s memorial service I sort through her jewelry box. Like her, it’s colorful and disorganized. Gold plumerias and pearls rest beside costume brooches perched atop tangled silver chains and errant earring backs. After her cancer diagnosis my mother rarely wore jewelry, fearing the metals were polluting her body. As I hold one of her favorite pairs of earrings, the gold filigree drops with the red stones I pretend are rubies, I’m tempted to bifurcate her life into Before and After the Diagnosis. Continue reading
Filed under Nonfiction
Ocean’s Lament
by Gail Tirone
A crowd formed on the beach
awed and aghast
as the gray mass surfaced
battered by wave after wave
until the surf with a grotesque belch
heaved it onto the shore Continue reading
Hawaii Pacific Review 