At sundown, we would go for walks along the road that went from the airmen’s quarters toward Central School. It was a quiet road back then, when we lived there for a brief while in 1971. The streetlights beside the road would have just been lit, a chill
Photo courtesy of Evelyn Symes The day Glenn left for Vietnam, our large extended family drove to the airport in a procession of five ancient Fords and Uncle Eben’s 1958 Cadillac. Mother filled the air in our car with empty admonitions to Glenn about laundry, diet, and writing home. My
All things which areoutside lovecome to me now—This view and the old woman’s understandingof it, asking to liveone more year, one more yearone more generation, two generations, three,one more eternity. —Leah Goldberg, “In Jerusalem’s Hills” Erna’s sunglasses were already in hand when they walked out of the dim
Bobby Ulili, Digital Sketch, 11.7” x 16.5” Through the window of the inn, Mathew could see the shadow of Rheinsberg Palace over the lake and a purple ribbon of sky dusted with stars. He drank a weissbier from a tall glass and ate blood sausage with sauerkraut. The piano man
The sun shone, having no alternative, on the nothing new.—Samuel Beckett, Murphy It’s obscene the way she cleaned up. It was a mess. I was a mess. Covered, I was. And she came and, I swear to God, when she finished, there was nothing left. All traces were gone. I
A little over two years after he’d enlisted, Allen was back from Iraq and back with Lawn Island Landscaping. If I’d been scared of Allen before, I was terrified of him now. It wasn’t what Allen did that was frightening; it was more what he didn’t do. The first week
I once taught a course called Literature of War at a small community college shortly before the first Iraq war. One assignment I gave was to interview someone who had been in a war about their experiences. For most of my students that would have been a father or grandfather
Editor’s Note: This story is an excerpt from a novel-in-progress. In the dark of the hall, Faraaz watches his brothers Manzoor and Adil alternately going to the toilet. It’s okay. They’ll tell when they’re ready. You can’t expect fifteen- and thirteen-year-old boys to bare all immediately after military torture.
The night before sailing for America with Comte de Rochambeau’s naval fleet, Antoine Cocq cracked one kneepan while pleading to convince Marie Barbe to marry him. The force of his kneel didn’t split the bone, though he had with passion dropped to her skirt hem. He coaxed her assent a
“Ok, you’re gonna feel a little pinch.” What I feel is not a little pinch. A white-hot spear of memory and consequence slowly twists its way into the small of my back. A serpent, coiled around my spine, thrashes against the violation hissing it memory-filled outrage. The muscles across my
How it happen like this. Listen: Melissa Jim say Rayburn can carry flag. The good flag? say Rayburn. Melissa Jim laugh. Same for Bubba and Jon-Jon. Even Grandpa snicker. Rayburn grit teeth and squeeze handle of pistol-gun in waistband. What you gonna do with that peashooter? say Melissa Jim. They’re
It’s like the face of her had changed—like she’s someone else, someone you used to know but can’t quite put your finger on. She greets you warmly, that same smile, her hair whitened by the years, makeup covering the lines that crisscross her skin. She’s visiting her grandkids in Seoul,
