Category:Words

Caramel and Chocolate Can Both Have Sea Salt

Gabrielle Honore

My Dad always said I had caramel skin. “A perfect combination of your mom and me.” Growing up, I never thought twice about the color dynamic within my family. To me, having a Mom and Dad that looked different from each other never struck me as strange. There have been plenty of discussions about mixed-race marriage (it took a 1967 Supreme Court ruling to make it legal. In all US states) but there is rarely any dialogue regarding the child that splits the two races: the people who bridge what is often perceived as the “privileged” and the “oppressed.” I found out for myself that to be in between these two worlds, meant my language and understanding had to change consistently and frequently. The frustrating part is, that those assumptions aren’t necessarily always from outside observers, they can also be from individuals within the group I’m trying to fit myself into. ...

Willemien’s Promise

Paula Srur Carcar

She’s sitting at her dinner table, looking out the window as the winter passes through. “I’ll take care of the snow in the morning.” It’s the last thing she remembers. It’s been a long time since she heard another person’s…

Well, What Would Lincoln Do?

John Burt

Of course, nobody really knows, and there are many reasons why. In the first place, nobody knows how Lincoln would have understood the century and half of political and social change since his own day. In the second place, Lincoln’s…

Vajra (Water song)

Kevin O’Keefe

1

Some day, a day not on your calendar

And it shouldn’t be long from now

You’ll leave behind your shelter of

Practiced spontaneity and dull knives. ...

Five Poems

Ziyi Wu

A Horizon Line

When I close my eyes,
I see a horizon line.

It’s black at the Coney Island beach in New York,
Gray on the plane back to China,
Blood orange in LA,
And gradient pink at Charles River, Boston.

Time—it’s time that defines the color of the horizon line. ...