On writing
Being a Writer
by William Farrant
I know I can write because my mother told me so when I was twenty-two. Leaving home that day I bought a tweed jacket, one with leather elbow patches. Soon I became an effete cognac drinker and had several children with my third wife. Selling a kidney afforded me the…
Skull Stomping @ American Apparel
by Mike Sauve
PITCH: A man creates a fake Facebook persona named Tarheel Slim to “avenge the offenses against good taste” he witnesses on the newsfeed. The stated goal: “the denigration of rubes.” But the man has a hard time being impolite to said rubes, until, in the real world of all places,…
Writing Surgery
by Ashley Varela
On Wednesday they brought in the first-years.
They sat in the front of the classroom,
White knuckles clutching rough drafts by the fistful.
Making the first cut was the hardest.
Ink in black, and blue, and red
Spilled across the pages—
Slicing adverbs from…
Three Dots and a Full Stop
by Mira Desai
Three dots and a full stop
I skim over a form rejection letter, click it shut, move it to a folder named “Subs.” One down, on to the next, and Duotrope awaits your writing pleasure. This “let’s get on with it” indifference, now a second skin, did not come easy.…
Taking a Poetry Manuscript to the Post Office
by Laura L. Snyder
It took a month to get this group of twenty-four
poems into a cohesive manuscript. Thirty
late night screamings, bouts of brain freeze,
juggling and futzing with commas and line
breaks, Do I want “the” or “a?” on poems
I had considered done. Dang, it’s the…
A Short Piece
by Timothy Charles Anderson
I thought of writing a novel, not an epic
but a turner of serious girth, but I couldn’t
be bothered by random details like the
mismatched buttons on her frock, or
his solid expression as the train rolled
through that dying…
Canning
by Laura L. Snyder
I come to the woods for solitude,
for long ambling walks with field guides
in a battered knapsack, and for the serendipity
of wild creatures. I want writing time, and lament
that here, the sparse humanity is so social.
Acquaintances, up…
Paper Rash
by Jamieson Wolf
When the itch started, he knew that the books weren’t far behind.
It would start on the palms of his hands; a hot tingling that felt as if his hands were covered in small, thin needles. He would scratch at his hands, hoping to make the itch go away so…
NINE DREAMS THAT TOOK ME NOWHERE
by M V Montgomery
bad start
Library books were strewn in the forest near campus. I picked one up. The title was How to Save the Earth, or something like that.
coming to an end
The term was coming to an end, and I was about to close the grade book on…
I’ve Slipped into the Third Person
by Jacqueline Doyle
I’ve slipped into the third person and I can’t seem to get out.
There, she started a sentence with “I.” She breathes a sigh of relief, and then realizes that she’s become “she” again, a familiar but alien being, that character on the page who both is and is…
The Arcing Crystals
by M.J. Nicholls
K.Y. Jellette was so eager to send his latest novel, Arcs of Crystal, to publishers, he forgot to write it. So much time had been spent scouring websites and books for appropriate markets, drafting cover letters and self-promoting on the internet, that he assumed the novel had been written somewhere…
Aweh, Aweh
by Aletheia Plankiw
Aweh, Aweh
Two dogs were trying to play. One of the dogs ran enthusiastically into the surf. She looked like a Golden Retriever, the darker, more russet-colored type, but her hair, matted-wet and nearly black from the sea, made it impossible to be certain. She ran out into…
Writing Exercise
by Carolyn Scarbrough
It’s nearly midnight and I’ve not yet
done my daily poem. The exercise is
automatic writing—the beginning as simple as
a first word and another and most may,
after all, become the scaffolding into
the real poem, then the opening
is knocked…
We’re Just a Writer
by Augustin Erba
My first writing personality is the artist formerly known as Augustin. He writes like there’s no tomorrow, or, as my other personalities would put it: as if there were no readers. The artist writes because it makes him feel better and he don’t give a rat’s ass what it…
January 1
by David Lehman
Some people confuse inspiration with lightning
not me I know it comes from the lungs and air
you breathe it in you breathe it out it circulates
it’s the breath of my being the wind across the face
of the waters yes…
Writing a book is like falling in love
by Augustin Erba
The first morning you write a lot. Maybe ten pages. They are glorious. The best you ever did. This new partner brings magic into your life. The two of you have a brilliant future together. This is all you ever dreamed of. You are completely satisfied.
You take a nap.…