If nothing else, you must respect the classical hustle; the Roman legionaries signed twenty-five-year contracts, sacrificed their youth and delayed marriage to be muscle. After being discharged they received a parcel of land, found wives, and retired. This is how men (and, fuck it!, some women) should be: youth isn’t a dalliance—it’s meant for raw, myopic exertion.… Continue Reading
All that winter my apartment was a rocking boat. I decided to slip notes underneath the doors of my disputing neighbours. I let them all know, anonymously, whose sides I was on. My choices were random, but I felt like taking some sort of an action.… Continue Reading
I thought I was moving in exponentials. Things blurred or bent in me, like a dance between chaos and order. No. We all move a notch on this sprocket, the specifics of which I will never be able to shake.… Continue Reading
Twice I have heard young women scream when they have seen someone they love torn open or crushed and bleeding and dying in front of them. There is no other scream like it.… Continue Reading
A writer for the hometown newspaper wanted to tell my grandfather’s story and tried to coax it out for years. “It wouldn’t be fair to the men that I served with that didn’t make it back, so ain’t nothing I can tell you.” He had lived through hell and revisiting it with a reporter for some article on personal glory was something he didn’t intend on doing.… Continue Reading
While we agree to support our burgeoning activists, for a bit, we’re mindful they’ll soon get cranky from a glucose drop without a freshly picked and blanched mint and kale smoothie, that naps are needed for brain development, and of course sunset yoga is crucial to maintaining circadian rhythm.… Continue Reading
The investigator was torn whether or not to note subject was dressed only in a large men’s t-shirt and had visible bruising on face and neck, but figured the video would speak for itself upon review.… Continue Reading
You neither dare nor care to leave your fetal position to crawl to the commode. When you soil yourself, they come, hold their noses, and hose. “You’ve hit bottom,” they say. “Without a chance to explore your options, you’re lucky you ended up here.”… Continue Reading
They hammer nails into their fingers tear themselves with saws and do everything left-handed which is why their father calls them maudit gaucher but when was being left-handed a bad thing and their mom and aunt say they were smacked by the nuns to learn to write with the right hand and they should count themselves lucky nuns don’t do that now… Continue Reading
I sometimes feel bad that non-potential rapist-murder-assaulter men have to be lumped in with their horrible brethren in my general mistrust of any man I perceive as physically capable of overwhelming me. But really I only feel ever so slightly bad. Sorry more-or-less decent men with girth, height, and penises.… Continue Reading