By Sonia M. Your silence now reigns—raw and painful. Almost like the rubble after an earthquake: land littered with broken homes and still corpses. Yet, yours is so much worse: a sign of neither loss or acceptance. Disappointment sews your lips into that tight pursed line. There will be no grave mourning, because only loved ones plan funerals, and you have chosen bitter resignation—the 20th century widow that raves of his wife’s fallibility, flipping all her portraits as

By Alethea Cavanaugh Don’t listen too closely as the voices hush. I am the jarring echo of brittle laughter that blossomed within the cacophony before the quietude. I am words that once felt safe — camouflaged by white noise — but now sink in unanswered awkwardness across the divide. My words cut the silence, but the chorus in my mind whispers you’re a broken record. As a stopped clock is right twice a day, there are instances your pitch offers melody or harmony, but do not

By Pamilerin Jacob That arrow you shot at me, O Lord, passed through me like air through a keyhole. It is why I am desperate for belief, having grazed it for a moment. Let me proceed into the kernel of silence armed only with the promise of delight. I know that light falls gently because it does not want to be wounded. I could crawl & crawl into myself only to meet the world waiting like a serpent’s gape. I will die on a certain day, but as Brooks admonishes, not toda