April 28, 2011
Baggage by Deborah Warren Don’t tell me you expect to find a guy who comes with just a daypack. That’s enough to date on, maybe, but — to marry on? You’re bothered by a little freight? But why? Give me a man who’s travelling with stuff, with serious luggage, not just carry-on — whole skeletons […]
April 27, 2011
Anti-Love Poem by Grace Paley Sometimes you don’t want to love the person you love you turn your face away from that face whose eyes lips might make you give up anger forget insult steal sadness of not wanting to love turn away then turn away at breakfast in the evening don’t lift your eyes […]
April 26, 2011
Tim W. Brown is not an author to limit himself to a single genre. In Second Acts – Brown’s latest novel following Deconstruction Acres (1997), Left of the Loop (2001), and Walking Man (2008) – the long-time Chicagoan and current New Yorker effortlessly blends sci-fi and western elements into the comic historical tale of Dan […]
April 26, 2011
His Future as Attila the Hun by Timothy Donnelly But when I try to envision what it might be like to live detached from the circuitry that suffers me to crave what I know I’ll never need, or what I need but have in abundance already, I feel the cloud of food-court breakfast […]
April 25, 2011
Charlotte Digregorio is an award-winning author, teacher, and poet in the traditional Japanese form of haiku. Her poetry has been featured in such publications as Modern Haiku, frogpond, The University of Chicago Magazine, bottle rockets, and Shamrock Haiku Journal, and as Midwest Regional Coordinator of the Haiku Society of America, the Winnetka resident works tirelessly […]
April 25, 2011
The Lady’s Reward by Dorothy Parker Lady, lady, never start Conversation toward your heart; Keep your pretty words serene; Never murmur what you mean. Show yourself, by word and look, Swift and shallow as a brook. Be as cool and quick to go As a drop of April snow; Be as trenchant and as gay […]
April 24, 2011
Ode to a Nightingale by John Keats My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains My sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk, Or emptied some dull opiate to the drains One minute past, and Lethe-wards had sunk: ‘Tis not through envy of thy happy lot, But being too happy in […]
April 23, 2011
Sonnet XXV by William Shakespeare Let those who are in favor with their stars Of public honor and proud titles boast, Whilst I, whom fortune of such triumph bars, Unlooked for joy in that I honor most. Great princes’ favorites their fair leaves spread But as the marigold at the sun’s eye; And in themselves […]
April 23, 2011
Hear ye, citizens of the fair land of Illinois! It’s official–today is not only Shakespeare’s birthday, it’s “Speaketh Like Shakespeare Day.” For help in sorting out your thee’s and thou’s, and some tips on rhyming couplets (all the rage back then), this helpful guide will assure you that all’s well that speaks well. As to the birthday […]
April 22, 2011
Long Gone Lonesome Blues by A.E. Stallings Death was something that hadn’t happened yet. I was driving in my father’s pickup truck At some late hour, the hour of broken luck. It seeped up through the dashboard’s oubliette, Clear voice through the murk — the radio was set Halfway between two stations and got stuck. […]
