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October 2, 2024
Melanie Delbridge
Medusa Revisited
She is in the dark waiting for him. She has been in this cavern so long she feels the darkness as a familiar caress on her skin. She hears the tread of sandals and keeps her eyes closed, careful, lest her scales scrape the stone beneath her coiled body.
“If he thinks I am asleep, I may escape with a painless death,” she thinks. “I desire nothing, but an absence of pain.” Not exactly true, but she will allow herself this lie.
His sandals whisper against the stone as he draws nearer to her resting place.
“I am asleep. Believe it, son of Zeus,” she thinks as she keeps her breathing slow and steady and waits.
She has no anger at him for his desire to murder her. After all, is it not the gods’ desire?
“We are all punished for our crimes. No logic, reason, or balance, just the whim of the gods,” she thinks. “What were my crimes? I did not choose to be born beautiful. I chose the life of the devout,” she thinks bitterly.
She worshiped, hidden in Athena’s temple, cloistered from the advances of men, but what can one do when a god pursues?
When Poseidon came for her, she tried to flee. She ran to her one safe place, the temple. Still, he came. She tried to hide. Still, he found her. She tried to resist. Still, he flooded over and through her. Who can fight the sea? She was just a girl.
She expected vengeance when Athena discovered she had been sullied within the temple. When that vengeance changed her and not the waves which had stolen her innocence, she was as horrified as the expressions frozen forever on the men unlucky enough to see her now hideous countenance.
So she ran again, this time to her sisters in their cave. Her sisters had never known beauty. This world and these gods, who made them hideous from birth, feared their scaly skin, tusks, snakes, claws. The world and these gods never knew the tenderness of her sisters.
She feels her heart coil snakelike at the grief her death will cause. She remembers the terror on her sister Euryale’s hideous face as she recounted her vision. Euryale had the sight and her vision warned of Perseus’ murderous plans.
“A hero, they call him.” Euryale hissed.
Euryale begged her to run, to hide.
“No more,” she replied. “Punish me, kill me, I am finished. I no longer wish to be pursued, feared, reviled. Let him come.”
She rejoiced in Euryale’s vision which revealed her future revenge when Perseus took her head. Her blood spilled would rise as serpents to kill the sons of men.
“I will kill these toys of the gods. I will rejoice when my blood-children murder.”
The scent of sweat assails her nostrils and startles her from her reverie.
“What good is life if it is at the whim of a god?” she thinks, as she listens to his footfalls, furtive and frightened.
“Be afraid, son of Zeus. For I will have my revenge, just as surely as you will have my head.”
She hears the soft, whispering hiss of his sword leaving its sheath and she waits.
Mel Delbridge is a former actor and director who began writing out of necessity to create material for her independent theatre company Sugar High Theatricals. Currently, she is a senior at UW-Superior in the online Writing Program. Mel has published poetry, plays, and short fiction in Coil, the literary journal of Monmouth College, where she attended before transferring to UW-Superior in the summer of 2022. Mel has lived everywhere from Key West, Florida to Venice, California, but currently resides in Galesburg, Illinois with her husband, Fred and two cats, Finn and Aine.
September 9, 2024
Lynn Watson
Morning Circle
The labyrinth beckons just ahead as the stones curve toward me. Fingers of light trace pathways, twining around this illuminated, sacred ground. A cross at the center extends its arms through the labyrinth’s concentric rings. The cross overlaying a circle represents male and female united. Together in ritual, planetary wholeness, they are an ancient symbol used worldwide, for centuries.
Under the bluest of skies, the labyrinth lies, welcoming. A path guides footsteps, flat stone following flat stone, in serpentine coils. Folding forward, backward, forward, the winding of the labyrinth’s ancestral arcs encompass the glistening meadow. Walking it will clear my mind. Labyrinths have only one way in and only one way out. It is not a maze, an avenue to confusion. It is a release from time in a rhythm of mindful steps and breathing. Hushing sounds of my feet, Shhh-Shhh, will glide from stone to stone. Serenity will begin my solitary, contemplative journey.
The doe is lying on her side. Just there. Shiny black hooves touch the labyrinth’s entry stone. Her gaunt, angular body, brown on brown, sprawls in the dirt. Her front legs churn in futility. A scrabbling run takes her nowhere. Her head lies on one delicate cheek. Dirt cradles one brown eye. The one I can see is closing. No sun glints off the opaque pupil. Each deep breath is a silent struggle. Leaves on the bush above her tremble. The doe’s free ear swivels and strains to hear what is no longer visible. Her breath slows. Each expansion does not make it to the last rise. She strains upward, but the pulsing flank hollows more deeply. Her usually upright, white flag of danger drags in the dust.
The doe’s eye does not move. Her ear lays all the way down. Her back legs give a final flail, then stop their crippled prance. Her joints, at shoulder and hip, relax, her taut, bounding springs un-wound.
Waiting until the key turns in the lock. Within the cathedral of her ribs, her heart slows. The push for life is barely enough to pulse blood, one last time, through its circulatory orbit. Unlocking the constellation of the doe’s body will allow her to dissipate into the Great Mystery. Life into death into life is the circle for all creatures. This doe enters and returns within her life’s labyrinth, and effervesces into the glowing morning.
***
I had taken the long tour in the stillness of this morning. The rising sun backlit the trees in gold, spangling the dew into stars. The trees had dropped rainbows of leaves that I scuffled through with my feet. The trail had encircled the lake where ducks had drifted among cattails and geese fed in flotillas of families. The calls of Sandhill Cranes had cascaded from overhead. The rim of the lake burned with the reflected orange and yellow of the season. Bright trees flamed up between the dark pines: right side up mirrored upside down. The details were perfect in the balance of the dawn.
***
Now, standing here in front of this labyrinth, and this dead doe on the first stone, my heart takes me back without permission to the entrance of my mother’s hospice room. A nurse says, “I think you should prepare to stay for the next few days.” I stay and four more days gather. Mom’s lucidities and confusions continually change places. This last morning with her is brilliant with winter. Curtains of snow glitter as they drift by the window. Her hand is cooling on the thin blanket in this too warm room. I carefully cup it between my two.
“It hurts, it hurts. Don’t touch me!” she whimpers like she has for these past many months.
“We love you,” I offer. “Jeannie, Lynn, Nancy and Suanne. Your daughters.” She winces. There are too many words for her to hold or understand. She is deep in preparation to leave this world where everything hurts.
“Shhh . . . Shhh . . . . Shhh . . . ” I whisper. I reassure her the same as I did for my restless kids at bedtime. Like you, Mom, they were caught in between. Not able to sleep, not able to wake up. I didn’t turn the lights on, but left the door open a reassuring crack, to let them know I was near.
“Shhh . . . Shhh . . . Shhh . . . ” was the pulse of your heart above me while chambered in your womb.
“Shhh . . . Shhh . . . Shhh. . . ” is the sound of waves as they curl ashore. Mom had a lifetime of tidal dramas. They tumble together in this last surging surf. The fetch of waves is stronger, the farther out they start. Pushed with the power of her 85 years, I sense the profound tollings of her life.
Boom . . . boom . . . boom . . . under her straining silence.
“Shhh . . . Shhh . . . Shhh . . . ” A rush of waters, days and years, in and out. Love and joy and sorrow all breathe in . . . and out.
“Shhh . . . Shhh . . . Shhh . . . ” I am old enough to share memories, Mom. I have been able to live some of your dreams. My shhh . . . voice smooths like my hand down the back of a running horse. Shhh . . . remembering all the trees and animals and wildflowers of the North Shore you taught me . . . I married and had my own babies. Shhh . . . here I am for your dying, Mom. You fade over the hours. I hold your ever-colder hand, my forehead bent to your bed.
“Shhh . . . ” The sound is longer and longer as it fills in the pauses between her breathing. I watch her eyes glaze, flare, and focus. But not on me. It’s on something out beyond this room. She smiles in greeting, like the best birthday present ever. She closes her eyes, lies back and gently sets sail. She goes out, and I breathe out, too. All is still on this empty bed and shore.
***
Bright bird song brings me back to today, in the meadow with the labyrinth. My mother is quickened in me, as I was once in her. The doe is lying on her side. Just there. Her shiny black hooves touch the labyrinth’s entry stone. Do I step over the doe? This doe that marks my path of spiritual welcome? The labyrinth beckons:
You come round, now,
Labyrinth doe, labyrinth mother.
Labyrinth fawn, labyrinth daughter.
Labyrinth self, labyrinth all.
Labyrinth in, labyrinth out
Lynn Watson enjoys writing poetry, short stories, and flash fiction. She has written a women’s fiction novel based on her experiences bush teaching in Alaska and is seeking a publisher. Her work has placed 1st and 2nd in the Lake Superior Writers Contest. She has been published in the University of Minnesota Duluth’s Roaring Muse, with upcoming pieces appearing in the 2024 editions of The Thunderbird Review and The Nemadji Review. Lynn enjoys paddleboarding, x-c skiing, hiking, kayaking, and traveling in the family camper van with her husband, Don. Lynn grew up in Bloomington, Minnesota, and now lives in Duluth
August 12, 2024
Roxanne Lien
Deep Within
I am not the wind nor a storm.
a cold night when you can’t keep warm.
I am the soul-deep within
a soul of love, loss and sin.
When you can’t find me
I’m there just the same,
so deep am I hiding
my soul and shame.
Roxanne Lien became an International Flight Attendant in 1972. Retired, she moved to North Dakota and wrote for several county newspapers. At 65, Roxanne began a love affair with fiction as a member of the Willow River Writers in New Richmond, Wisconsin. She now resides in Roseville, Minnesota, sometimes writing under the name Penelope Page. You can find her published stories and poems in The Willow River Anthology, The Nemadji Review, Soulmate Syndrome (Wicked Shadow Press), Wild Crone Wisdom, and Jackpine Writers Bloc.
July 17, 2024
Lynn Watson
Dreamtime Walkabout
Always the same — each time — changing
snow danced this morning
outside my window
designed around DNA
bits blown skyward from
plants and animals until clouds
fell as weighted water
crystals of white lace
Changing always — the same — each time
young ice walked away
from the cattail shore
beneath the yellow branches
willow leaves shoaled like silver
fish under the clarity of winter
stilled water mirror for the moon
Each time — changing always — the same
slowed to heart ticked rhythm
muffled steps, frosted breath
loud in cold swept silence
alert to survive the simple
landscape stitched with purple
my mind writes like stars forming
bright intensities of thought
flare and glimmer with stories
poems and songs fill my sky
with constellations of lines
chapters and rhymes that overflow
marked by patterns of the present
tree shadows and mouse trails
between the doors of birth and death
proceed into the before and after
The same — each time — changing always
Lynn Watson enjoys writing poetry, short stories, and flash fiction.
She has written a women’s fiction novel based on her experiences
bush teaching in Alaska and is seeking a publisher. Her work has
placed 1st and 2nd in the Lake Superior Writers Contest. She has been
published in the University of Minnesota Duluth’s Roaring Muse, with
upcoming pieces appearing in the 2024 editions of The Thunderbird
Review and The Nemadji Review. Lynn enjoys paddleboarding, x-c
skiing, hiking, kayaking, and traveling in the family camper van with
her husband, Don. Lynn grew up in Bloomington, Minnesota, and
now lives in Duluth.
June 17, 2024
Roxanne Lien
Challenging the Shadow
She walks to work reinventing herself
Longing for the pluck
To keep walking past
Her hum-drum job
The hours stagnate
She waits in boredom
Until her day is done
Walking home in silence
Her shadow follows
It, too, wants her to run
It longs for adventure
Desires a gentle push
What would happen?
What would the shadow say?
If she turned and asked
Why do you follow my dreary life each day?
Roxanne Lien became an International Flight Attendant in 1972. Retired, she moved to North Dakota and wrote for several county newspapers. At 65, Roxanne began a love affair with fiction as a member of the Willow River Writers in New Richmond, Wisconsin. She now resides in Roseville, Minnesota, sometimes writing under the name Penelope Page. You can find her published stories and poems in The Willow River Anthology, The Nemadji Review, Soulmate Syndrome (Wicked Shadow Press), Wild Crone Wisdom, and Jackpine Writers Bloc.
June 11, 2024
Tina Higgins Wussow
Swagger
Henry just propped himself up, two paws on the kitchen floor, two more on the counter edge, and took in his mouth a nub of bread – the butt, the heel.
I am graced enough in this life that I do not need it, want it, or think of this piece beyond the quick conclusion that I am too good for bread butts.
When Henry came down from the counter with the butt in his mouth, I made a grunting noise meant to seem intimidating. His eyes flashed guilt or, rather, recognition that he had been caught. The hinge of his jaw went slack and the nub of bread fell to his paws.
There was a moment between us where he was testing me for kindness, for the potential of my heart’s generosity, as he hovered over his loot. But I rationally explained: Henry, I cannot let you have it, not when you take it with such arrogance, such entitlement, such swagger. We are supposed to be careful, to ask first, to deny ourselves, and then eat slowly.
But haven’t I been trying to teach Henry these skills since I brought him home many years ago? Why do I keep giving him a test he will never pass?
I put the nub in the compost and he went to his spot on the couch and I returned to my writing in the bright winter sun making shadows of the clutter across the dining room table and now I feel awful. I will bring him the bread butt and let him eat it on the couch. This is how generous I am. I see now that I was wrong to demand him shame and refuse him what I never even wanted in the first place.
Can you imagine? I threw it in the compost bin, a stinky pile of coffee grounds and eggshells rather than let him have what I never wanted.
I have become the dirtball out of a Steinbeck novel.
When I set the bread on the orange pillow just in front of his pouty mouth he gives it a little sniff, a little lick, and begins to eat rather slowly which is not like him. He doesn’t leap up and spin in a whirl of joy over the sudden shift in my reasoning. He seems bored with the bread like he’d rather be napping.
I don’t stay to watch him chew, rather I go back to my spot to finish the poem relatively satisfied, as he must be, that I am not completely undeserving of the sunlight that still shines across the page.
Tina Higgins Wussow is a writer of poetry, fiction, and creative non-fiction. Her work has been published in a variety of local and national journals and her essays can be found on Substack. Tina is also a teacher, bookseller, and cafe owner living in Duluth, Minnesota with her husband & Clover the dog, CC the cat, and Paul the Goldfish.
May 20, 2024
Bud Brand
winter’s dragon
a glistening
on
the fallen snow,
a christening
of
the season…
indicators
that
old jack frost
was acting
without
reason….
to each of us
who savor warmth
which now is out of reach,
the drifting snow
soon proves to be
a seasonal contract breach….
and yet we stop
to watch in awe
the beauty on display,
before we need
to take up arms
and winter’s dragon slay….
Bud Brand is a 77-year-old retired government worker who believes that “some forms of poetry are just destined to rhyme…a throwback in writing to an earlier time.” His works derive from divine inspiration and the love of his wife Donna, children David and Melissa, and grandchildren Dyllon, Jadyn, Tylar, Alexis, Samantha, and Christopher.
January 30, 2024
Henry Kneiszel
Life is about compromise
When I was a child, I wanted to dig a hole to China
But in the hustle and bustle of adulthood, some dreams need to change
So instead I dug a hole to Iowa City, Iowa.
The other side opens in the parking lot of a Kwik Star
Which is what they call Kwik Trip there for some reason
That’s the kind of exotic experience you unlock for yourself when you dig a hole to Iowa City, Iowa.
Traveling expands your horizons
And digging keeps your claws from getting too long
It’s the nice Kwik Star too,
Across from the 24-hour chipotle and George Washington School of Dentistry
You should come some time!
Henry Kneiszel (they/them) is a non-binary writer from the wild, wild Midwest. You can find their poetry in several journals including Star*Line, Untenured, and Mutiny! Henry is also a visual artist and one of the founding members of an experimental performance group called the Three Ring Goose Circus. Follow them on Instagram @friendly.dirt.pile.
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