Issue 14: Spring 2022
Dear Friends of eMerge, Spring is here, blown in between sunny and cold days, as colorful as a child's birthday party and almost as celebratory. We hope you...
We Hold These Truths
Enough said.
Little Green Lies
UAP is the new UFO, according to Zed.“Unidentified Aerial Phenomena,” he repeats for Sal, who is hanging on to his uncle’s every word.My brother is more...
Half and Half
The white liberal racistIs worse than the redneckYou can spot red from a mile away…This type of white will convince you they likeYou, know you,By spitting...
Chiaroscuro
All your life youwere neveryou.Born oneway, beinganother.I dreamt ofyouwith such sadclarity, notperfect/perfection:all silver andshadow.Reflectingwhat...
Therapy In 13 Lines
I can find no other passiontaken from the life I’ve lived.Gone is devotion to a notion.Gone the sureness of doctrinal purity.Gone the group that held me...
Acquisitions
Barefoot, I pad down the hall,careful to avoid floorboardsthat complain in their dotage.I stand, unnoticed,to the side of your office door,shielded by ornate...
One more thing
before you goback to the new placeyou are calling home,did you even wonder why the wordparent is included in the wordtransparent?It’s because I want tobe...
Pandemic Time
1The dog goes out. The cat comes in.Daffodils! So early, and a day later,sleet clinging to their surprised ruffles.The ceiling fan spins. Redbuds vivid asthe...
A Portrait of Madness
This essay previously appeared in Linden Avenue Literary JournalThe world was always ending when I was pregnant. There was no pattern to the apocalypse. The...
When We Were Kestrels
It was easier of course. Riding the thermals onlyrequired reaching wide enough to make our wingsflush with flattening slate of wind.Landing was harder, but...
Love Not Hate
In addition to these two extremes, let us consider tolerance.
Forgetting Yesterday and Forgiving Tomorrow
After Paul Laurence DunbarYesterday I refuse to know,I adamantly forget it,And softly I remind myselfThat truly I should leave it.Yet today I preach to...
Italian Stone Soup
Ingredients 1 lb bulk Italian sausage3 large garlic cloves, minced2 small zucchini, cut into 1/2-inch slices2 small yellow squash, cut into 1/2-inch slices1...
Questions Without Answers
After Tu FuIt’s peaceful to sit in my garden,to sit with the lilies,the bluebells and hibiscus.But the leaves now harden,and shadows like ashescover the...
Dark Birds
After dinner we sometimes sit out on the deck.We are used to watching crowswinging their way back to the rooston the next ridge over.In late spring we begin...
Currents
We are sitting on a seamed and speckled rock above the last set of rapids. The day is warm and grey with an easy south-east wind just strong enough to send...
On Being an Old Woman with a Young Dog
Within the year the two old dogs succumbedto the ills of old age, Fritzie wandering offinto the woods to die though we sent out soundripples of her name...
The Snake in the Garden
This is not the old misogynistic story ofthe mythic expulsion from the perfect gardenbecause we know that wherever knowledge isforbidden to women there will...
The Storm
The leaves on the old oak dance in the breeze.The rain left little droplets on them like diamonds.The path needs to be climbed, hard on the knees.A dozen...