Latest Features
Fiction
Recall of Duty
Robert Lee, SGT (US Army Reserve). Recalled to active duty for current emergency plus six months. Report TDS Fort Riley, Kan. by 1300 hours, 6 July 1950 for retraining and overseas deployment. Oh-dark-thirty, 6 July 1950...
The Donkey
Photo credit: W. Greeson, USMC افغان “Yes, kaka zoi, I’m coming!” Hamid had been awake for an hour when he heard his cousin Kadir’s whistle. He had already revived the dying embers in the mud-brick fireplace, put a kettle...
Gaza by the Sea
Sunset in Gaza City, August, 2023 | Photo by author Author's Note: “Gaza by the Sea” was inspired by true events; the characters and plot line are fictional. The story was written in the summer of 2023, prior to the...
Poetry
Małopolska Mosaic
Kraków, Lesser Poland (Małopolska), Poland | Photo: Alexander Zvir Author’s Note: This poem sprang out of the experience of crossing the border from Ukraine to Poland, seven months after the 2022 Russian invasion began, and while living in Poland,...
Generational Scars
My grandmother hid in a hole in Nagoya. My grandfather was a soldier in China. My other grandmother watched the falling bombs. My other grandfather searched for a victim’s mother after...
Three Poems by Nwuguru Sullivan Chidiebere
The Marvels of Little Extents Our god is awake but chose to ignore us as a cloudemptying glass into a child's mouth there were days he gifted us the sky as a culture plate we madestreaks on it & hoped a colony of stars would grow...
Wounded Soldier to Fred
A poem by William Derge that pays homage to Fred Astaire and the part he played during the war by entertaining the troops.
Translations
Kagay-an and a Love in the Time of an All-Out War
Translator’s Note: Kagay-an and a Love in the Time of an All-Out War (2018) unfolds in the early 2000s, during former president and kleptocrat Joseph Estrada’s “all-out war” against Islamic separatists and communist...
Lessons in Palestinian Motherhood, 101
Palestinian Woman | Acrylic on canvas | 2024 To be a Palestinian mother, you must learn some simple things: how to hold your wounded child until he sheds his last drop of blood; crafting words to turn a child into a man...
Nonfiction
Pádraic Ó Conaire’s Enduring Art of Conflict Narration
Pádraic Ó Conaire (1882-1928), a pioneering Modernist author with a bilingual mind and comic wit(photo courtesy Galway City Museum, Ireland)It is a foggy day in March 1916, and British Resident Magistrate Robert Sparrow can’t quite believe why he’s been pulled from Londonderry to oversee...
Defending the Tribe
Palisades Fire in Los Angeles by CAL FIRE_Official, January 2025. Public Domain. The scale of destruction inflicted by the wildfires that ripped through Los Angeles last month is unprecedented. Sixteen hundred buildings incinerated. Nearly two hundred thousand people evacuated. An...
A Walk in Budapest
First stop: Medieval Jewish Prayer House—Középkori Zsidó Imaház American historians say Hungary’s political system is dangerous, but conservatives find inspiration in its Christian government. I expected dark shadows in Budapest storefronts, people yearning for freedom. Instead, I found...
Navigating a Broken World
A poster left by a participant taking part in a candlelight vigil and silent protest organized as part of the #JewsAndArabsRefuseToBeEnemies | August 11, 2014 near the United Nations in New York.Photo credit: DON EMMERT/AFP via Getty Images Late last week, I switched on my car radio to...
Reviews
Still Here: Two Featured Reviews by Fred Marchant
Communiqués by Maria Galina / Russian and English, bi-lingual edition Translated by Anna Halberstadt & Ainsley Morse.Cicada Press, New York. (2023-24) $22.00. Those Absences Now Closest by...
The Beinart Notebook: A Review
The Beinart Notebook is a Substack site with a weekly “show” (via Zoom) in which the journalist Peter Beinart discusses issues concerning Israel-Palestine with his guests. These presentations are a...