Paul Christensen: Return to France
And I come, suppressing my eagerness for as long as I can, until I burst with affection at the sound of a cork being pulled by a solemn waiter, who waits politely while I sink my liver into a pool of forgetfulness at the first sip.
Michael Simms: Puppy Rolling
When I take Josie to the dog park she likes to find a puppy, preferably a rare breed like a Shiba Inu or a New Guinea Singing Dog and roll it down the hill.
Mike Vargo: Delusions
I cannot help imagining René Descartes as a comedian. The surviving portraits show a polymath with a prominent nose and a sly smirk, as if to say “Heard this one?” … Continue reading
Steve Mentz: I swim to think and to stay afloat in an ever-wetter world
Pools open portals. All bodies of water issue invitations, but there’s a special doorway provided by a familiar concrete rectangle, usually 25 or 50 metres long, filled with warm water. In that unnatural … Continue reading
Robert Lipsyte: Take My Gun, Please
The gun I carried on the streets of New York City in the late 1960s was a Beretta, similar to the pistol James Bond packed in the early Ian Fleming … Continue reading
Video: My Descent into America’s Neo-Nazi Movement — And How I Got Out
At 14, Christian Picciolini went from naïve teenager to white supremacist — and soon, the leader of the first neo-Nazi skinhead gang in the United States. How was he radicalized, and how did he ultimately get out of the movement? In this courageous talk, Picciolini shares the surprising and counterintuitive solution to hate in all forms.
Paul Christensen: Jasmine Blossoms
A chilly, damp, paralyzing Spring, with soggy skies and faded landscapes. Reality feels like a pair of washed-out blue jeans. But the ground keeps birthing its progeny of weeds and … Continue reading
Baron Wormser: The Mythos of the Gun 
Beneath the easy-going, have-a-nice day American exterior is some serious anti-social feeling that does not wish anyone who is somehow different a nice day, that wishes them a bad day, a you-shouldn’t-exist day, an I-would-kill-you-if-I-could day.
Lisa Arrastia: Letter to My Student Teachers on a Day of Yet Another School Mass Shooting in America
While some will call for greater discipline, more resource officers, and paying for “threat assessments,” I will call for love and uplift you, the teachers in public pre-k-12 schools.
Robert Lipsyte: Where Are the Men?
I realized then that I was watching a raid. I felt ice water in my veins as I hurried to a telephone booth from which I could observe the cops closing in on the doctor’s office. What should I do? Warn the doctor? Less than an hour had passed since Maria had gone inside. If they aborted the abortion now, would that spare them criminal charges?
Michael Simms: Trigger Warning | Old White Guy Talks About Racism
White people don’t spend a lot of time talking about racism. Right-wingers dismiss racism as a talking point that black people use to get special treatment while left-leaning white people simply state that racism is an evil tendency among other white people, but not themselves.
Baron Wormser: A Poetry Proposal
There is no shortage of poems and no shortage of strategies to deliver the poems. The failing lies in our wariness. It’s true: to embrace poetry is to embrace a degree of uncertainty. Yet what else is life?
Frida Berrigan: Saving our schools starts with spending less on the military
Public schools have become society’s safety nets, and they are suffering for it. Imagine if we invested in them rather than war.
Paul Christensen: Earth Household
As the world rages to our east, and the fires flare up in Arizona, we have the first signs of spring – dark green spikes, crumbly surfaces around certain roots, … Continue reading
