It was not uncommon to see complete families piled onto a single motorcycle on the streets of Haiti and not a helmet on anyone. Necessity always trumped safety. Roberson himself had suffered several broken bones and broad patches of road rash when his motorcycle clipped the bumper of a tap-tap taxi several years earlier. Dr. Dean had helped pay for the medical expenses to make sure the bones were set correctly and prevent any long-term disability.

“You know I have cancer,” Dr. Dean said, “but I’m not prepared to die today.”

John Tessitore has been a newspaper reporter, a magazine writer, and a biographer. He has taught British and […]

Here is not home so here is free,
as long as the money holds out,
as long as I am through
with dignity (I am).

Mihan Han is a burned-out frontline healthcare worker training to be a teacher, which, in retrospect, may not […]

We meet again after
years of failed relationships
with strangers—you, now
grey, griping about knees
aching, while I’m fat
and gassy, my irritable
bowels expounded
in excruciating detail

Rachel Bolton is writing more projects than she has time for. Her work has appeared in Strange Girls, […]

She glanced at the ornate wall clock Doug picked up from Home Goods. Heather told him it was ugly, yet here it was.  Nothing else they owned in the house matched. The clock’s lacquered finish glinted in the afternoon sun. Lacy and Ryan would get off the bus soon. Heather turned off the laptop and collected her papers. She placed the computer into a kitchen drawer with other paper miscellany. Secure, but not secret.

Now approaching 90, Edward Shaw came to writing quite late in life after a career in academe (UC […]

“Everyone will tell you that I am not a musician. That is correct. From the very beginning of my career, I classed myself as a phonometographer . . . Science is the dominating factor . . . I think I can say that phonology is superior to music…”