Haiku: Photographic Meditations
By David Fokos
From decades of work, I came to understand that because our emotional responses are based in time, if I want to express the emotion I felt at the time the photograph was made... view photos
Knothole
Fiction by GREGORY WOLOS
The boy whose gloved hand I hold as we cross the busy street on the way to his elementary school is my ex-wife’s son... read more
Divinest Sense
Fiction by Susan Agar
The road is long and vanishes into a horizon without end. The land is covered with frozen snow as far as you can see... read more
Totem
Fiction by Robert M. Herzog
Cedric wasn’t drunk. Spirits from the spirits, he told himself. That was a sober man’s thought, wasn’t it? The neck of the bottle was in his mouth... read more
Hansel and Gretel
Fiction by Laura Williams McCaffrey
In the light of the gibbous moon, beneath the thick boughs of ancient oaks, a girl pulled her brother from the gingerbread house... read more
Connections
Fiction by Marion de Booy Wentzien
Vincent and Harry have come to install broadband. Zip has convinced me we need this more than we need new kitchen cabinets... read more
Look Away
Fiction by David Sahl
A cool, misty fog collects in her hair. Fine droplets gather and flow in tiny rivulets following the smile lines of her face... read more
The Kite
Fiction by Christopher Anderson
Dottie was pregnant. I was a math instructor at Seattle Community College. There was an Indian summer that September, not a drop of rain until the 20th... read more
Between Brie and Cheddar
Nonfiction by Ellen Goldstein
My father moved like a ghost through the house. During the three months he was home after his brain surgery and before he went into a nursing home... read more
GROWN CHILDREN: the water will hold us
Nonfiction by Michelle Blake
On a perfect summer afternoon in the hills of Bath County, Virginia, I find myself walking down a shaded grass path that winds along past an ice-cold pond... read more
Mind Riot
Nonfiction by Gail Waldstein
You could say it started when I was seven, looking through slats on the venetian blinds from my bed at sunset... read more
Eggplant
Nonfiction by Sven Birkerts
It’s my night to make something, not that it was assigned to me but it’s one of those things that’s part of the knowing portion of a marriage... read more
Karl Will Bring A Picnic
Nonfiction by Leslie Lawrence
A week or two into our son’s first summer at overnight camp, I got a call from my Uncle Karl. Before his “hello” was out I knew who it was... read more
Is There Anything Else I Can Help You With Today
Poetry by Kurt Brown
Records topple,
the Midwest melts, rippling through a scrim of heat read moreThe Great Molasses Flood
Poetry by Ben Berman
With Prohibition on the horizon
and the demand for rum about to take off read morePersonal & Metaphysical Derivatives
Poetry by Christopher Buckley
At 5, I picked up French with ease
attending a parochial school read moreThe Lacework of Coherence
Poetry by Kelly Cherry
We know so little but the little we know
we place beside a neighboring bit or byte read moreMusic for Airports
Poetry by Richard Garcia
To those transfixed in the tunnel of colored lights, to those frozen on the escalators read more
Flood
Poetry by Dennis Hinrichsen
Shook foil—that’s what a river is. Catfish hauled like bars
of iron read moreSub Rosa
Poetry by Lindsay Ahl
I spent my childhood in a world of imaginary
swings, the rope lines frayed, the base a heavy board. I’d do magic read moreRemembering Qatar In The Robes Of Spring Rain
Poetry by Jim Daniels
Here in Pittsburgh, March,
rain, days-long, relentless as sin. read moreAutumnal
Poetry by Kathleen Hellen
One-by-one the trees undress in carcasses
of seed, scatter in cascade, in flimsy under-orange, read morePsalm 107
Poetry by Eugenia Leigh
Praise you for that blanket.
Praise you for the stranger read moreThe Rope
Poetry by Natasha Sajé
twisted of two
strands
read moreThe Old Moon in the New Moon’s Arms
Poetry by Jean Monahan
The trees unravel,
plowed by a bright prow.
read morePurity
Poetry by Barry Spacks
When the new kitten chooses my lap for her nest, when miraculously I’ve earned her trust read more
Advice for Aspiring Writers
Poetry by Diana Der-Hovanessian
“Try talking yourself out of it.” Richard Ford But, of course, you can’t, or won’t. read more
Eulogy of Jimi Christ
Poetry by Regie O’Hare Gibson
Watch Video
Silvertone
Poetry by Dzvinia Orlowsky
Watch Video
Many of us on the staff of Solstice lit mag, a Boston-based, international journal, feel the reverberations of the tragic events at the Boston Marathon. Our cover, by the well-known photographer, David Fokos, shows the undergirdings of a bridge over Storrow Drive. We chose this cover image many months before this year’s Marathon, but we feel it is especially timely now.
We encourage you to delve into this Spring Issue. Be sure to view our new featured videos. Performance poetry by our new reader and poet Regie O. Gibson, and a video collage of “Silvertone” read by poet Dzvinia Orlowsky.
Our fiction ranges from stories about the vagaries of love in pieces by Wolos, de Wentzien and Sahl, to Agar’s delving into psychiatry, to Herzog’s mythic probing into Native American history, to McCaffrey’s retelling of a fairy tale, to Anderson’s story confronting death.
In nonfiction, we also present a range from dealing with death in the essays by Blake and by Goldstein, to abuse and mental illness by Waldstein, to the ironic piece about an eccentric relative by Lawrence, to the deconstruction of an eggplant by Sven Birkerts.
In poetry, we highlight our new poetry editor Kurt Brown and our new assistant poetry editor Ben Berman. Please read their poems at the beginning of our poetry section and do read Kurt Brown’s and Ben Berman’s poetry editors’ note below. Also, in the Book Reviews, experience Kurt Brown’s poetry reviews (Poemviews) in the style of the poet critiqued. And please check out Kathleen Aguero’s review of Dzvinia Orlowsky’s new collection.
We also welcome to our ever-growing staff as our new eBook co-editor, Debbie Merion and our new eBook intern Jenifer DeBellis. Solstice lit mag is in the book publishing business!
And why? Because we want to promote literature and diversity and cause you to pause and meditate and explore the complicated facets of our joyous, suffering world.
Strength to Boston and to all our readers.
Lee Hope, Editor-in-chief
Poetry Editors’ Note:
We are happy to offer an eclectic group of poems for this issue. From Christopher Buckley’s ruminations on the intersection of the cosmos and the 1950s, to Natasha Sajé’s pean to the Fisher Cat, the poems assay the seasons, consider the piped-in music of airports, the trust love evokes, complex memories of childhood, the mysteries of lineage, the coherence of chaos, cross-cultural differences, and advice to aspiring lovers and writers. Many poems cross our desk in the course of assembling an issue, but these stayed lodged in our imaginations. That is the true mark of accomplishment. We hope you enjoy reading these poems as much as we did.
Kurt Brown and Ben Berman
SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENTS:
PLEASE SUBSCRIBE: Join our community. Just go to the Subscribe box in the sidebar. Joining us is free, it’s private, and you will then receive pertinent info, literary tips, updates on terrific events, and more. And do Like us on Facebook!
To All Who Submitted to our Annual Lit Contest: We will post the winners and the finalists in late June on this page. They will be published in the Summer Awards Issue, due out in early August. Thanks to all of you who submitted!
NEW Announcement, May 29, 2013:
Solstice lit mag has a sisterly, independent connection with the Solstice MFA, which offers terrific classes to audit:
Solstice MFA in Creative Writing Program invites local writers to audit graduate-level creative writing courses during its summer residency, scheduled from June 28-July 7, 2013 on the Pine Manor College campus in Chestnut Hill, MA. Classes are open to serious writers working at all levels; the registration fee is $40 per course for the general public.
For a course list and registration form, go to: http://www.pmc.edu/mfa-classes-for-audit.
Stay tuned for more announcements updated each week!
