Jennifer L. Freed: Even in Unkind Times
I just saw her last summer, sat two rows behind her
on a folding chair. Stared at the knobs of spine
protruding from beneath her tied-back hair
Ellen Foos: Letting Assisted Living Have a Say
We are both losing something.
I am losing him,
he is losing himself.
Sydney Lea: A Busy Life
I’m an old man now, and I do acknowledge a certain kind of pointlessness, namely my occasionally fervent striving to decode my life’s “meaning,” and even the world’s. In saner moments, I can actually consider the futility of such an endeavor a relief and a blessing.
Carol Moldaw: Arthritis
“Save your hands,” my mother says,
seeing me untwist a jar’s tight cap—
just the way she used to tell me
not to let boys fool around
Rosaly DeMaios Roffman: How My Father Does It
Tomorrow, I fly home to teach Prometheus—
that story of saving the universe with fire
and then enduring the eagle punishment
but my raised voice will be for my father
Nolo Segundo: Delusions of Progress
It struck me some years ago when I saw cave paintings in France from 40,000 years ago that people then were just as intelligent as we are.
Beverly Gologorsky: Aging in a Trumpian World
We must loudly proclaim our right to feel safe, to be free from hunger and assured of our healthcare and shelter.
Edna St. Vincent Millay: Say what you will, and scratch my heart to find
Laugh at the unshed leaf, say what you will,
Call me in all things what I was before,
A flutterer in the wind, a woman still;
I tell you I am what I was and more.
Barbara Crooker: Praise Songs for Autumn
Each day, we must learn
again how to love, between morning’s quick coffee
and evening’s slow return.
Dawn Potter: Don’t Tell Me You Don’t Know What Love Is
I think back to those nights in Buck Lane, the melodramas of sex and desire, the intense affections but also the cruelties … the ruthlessness of self-absorption.
Video: A Kind Favor
On the magical coast of Central California, a grandmother reflects on a life filled with art, love, and tragedy.
Video: Eternity
Valerie and Alan have been married 57 years. Eternity is a look at love that lasts a lifetime, whether they like it or not.
Michael Simms: Sunstar
The mist that covers our mountain
Evaporates and becomes a feeling
That lasts all morning. You lift the spoon
From the sauce and feel the texture
Of the aroma.
Video: Side Hustle
Interweaving fiction with documentary testimony of sugar babies and sex workers, Side Hustle follows a young dancer making rent with the financial support of her sugar daddy.
