A maverick poet and old friend asked if I’d like to replace him teaching prison inmates. Why me? I wondered, and didn’t ask. Men I know don’t often speak directly, even to friends. If pressed, my friend might not have said. Anyway, I can’t ask. He died not long after from a heart attack.… more
Category Archives: CREATIVE NONFICTION
The Roast
CREATIVE NONFICTION by Amy CookI think of my grandmother, who had, by 1987, cooked nightly for my grandfather, for forty years. Was he ever this gentle with his criticism? Did he ever account for the myriad of ways that a roast can burn?… more
THREE FLASH NONFICTION
CREATIVE NONFICTION by Jack B. BedellDavid’s no hero for beating some guy named John; square him off against Goliath, though, and heart makes history.… more
Turbulence
CREATIVE NONFICTION by Thad DeVassieOf course I have cancer. Of course my body has turned against me. I am a writer. We ruminate on the awful, yield to it, wield it into something beautiful even when it isn’t, I want to say. I say nothing.… more
Brian Comes Alive
CREATIVE NONFICTION by LC GutierrezWe’ve all chuckled at the theatrics of the stiff-legged subhumans in a zombie film. Brian was fried in a way that no Hollywood pathos I know of has successfully evoked.… more
Hole
CREATIVE NONFICTION by Brad WetherellThe day my father called to ask if I could help him bury Casey, his golden retriever, I said no, and maybe if I had answered differently this story would be over, but instead he still steps out of his garage with a shovel to dig the hole alone.… more
Clove Cigarettes Are the Fountain of Youth (If they Don’t Kill You First)
CREATIVE NONFICTION by Mary SenterIf I remember correctly (and who can remember anything anymore) I smoked my first cigarette on the lawn of a church down the street from the school gym, after escaping the insufferable first dance of 9th grade, when I decided that school dances were lame and I’d rather be doing cool shit.… more
Dad’s Can
CREATIVE NONFICTION by Booz UllreyDad has to pee right now. He can’t pee directly into the toilet, he needs to pee into the can and then pour it. How dare you touch his can? Well, it’s hard to tell which of the things in the bathroom are “trash.” He also objected to us removing the orange juice containers that were filled with yellow pee, the 2-liter generic Mountain Dew bottle that was filled with black pee, and the floss collection that spun out from the towel rack like God’s pubes.… more
THREE ESSAYS
CREATIVE NONFICTION by Brendan TodtHe has so much knowledge, and also he has none of it. He drives backcountry Minnesota where his father once lived. Because his father once lived—before he killed himself.… more
Buster and Buddy
CREATIVE NONFICTION by Bob OstertagBuster and Buddy, the inseparable pair. “Look,” people would say, “There goes Buster and Buddy.” At least that was how whoever gave them their nicknames imagined it at the outset, when they were still too young for the outlines of who they would be to come into focus.… more
