The day was gray and calm. The river, a sheet of ripple-less obsidian, stretched before Alan and his stepson, Travis. Alan’s line was taught in the water, the pole pinned between two large rocks, while Travis’s pole laid between the fishermen as Alan fed line through the eyelet of a treble hook. Alan worked his thick fingers around each other with gentle precision a couple of times to complete the knot.
“Livers, please,” Alan said, studying the hook in his hand and giving it a tug to test the knot.
Travis extended the open container, Alan retrieving a slippery liver from the soup with a slurp.
“Closer ‘er up,” said Alan, massaging the treble hook into the liver, then calling for string.
Travis riffled through the tackle box before extending a spool.…
I see them vaguely in the darkness. Their eyes glow green in the firelight and their sharp white teeth shine hungrily in their wide mouths, plumes of steamy breath floating forcefully into the frigid air. They wait. They are patient, but I can see the desire in their dreadful grimaces, in the long, slow strings of saliva descending from chin to ice-covered snow.
I watch the play of the fire as the harsh wind gusts past the slim shelter of the overhang, pushing the blaze nearly flat, threatening to shrink it to nothing. Then the gusts abate briefly, and the flames flare upward again. Icicles melt slowly from the stone roof. The drops hiss as they plop into the flames. I feel no heat. My legs are frozen, and the numbness spreads slowly up my torso.…
I lie in the belly of my bed like a flame dying in a pool of wax— ponder if Mother Earth will be swallowed by the ocean as she boils in a belly
of poison. Outside my window I hear her crying raindrops, and I am crying too. Her heavy clouds spew a flood of water, fill the ground, rage rivers, melt soil,
and crumble rocks. Even as she suffers, she is still more powerful than us. She knows humanity will die before her. Her thunder blasts a distant horn—tells me
I know how to strike a match—begs me to ignite this sunken Earth mother’s flame and make her new.
Author’s Note: “Put a Match to It” ignites the opening of a collection I am working on, setting the tone with its focus on climate change and the resilience of Mother Earth.…
Ella M. Peebles & Leah Bainbridge (Photo: Ella M. Peebles)
When I first began the process for Watch Us Begin, it was simply going to be a pamphlet of what I considered to be some of my best poems. A few months later, it became a fully-fledged collection, with each poem complimented by an illustration by my best friend, Leah Bainbridge. There was something oddly poetic about the fact that Leah accompanied me on this creative journey, as she has been a present, and unwavering support throughout the emotional journey that this collection tracks.
I write poetry, quite simply, to express myself. Over the years, this has become increasingly important to me, as my poems are an amalgamation of words and thoughts that I struggle to express with any real clarity.…
“Dad, you need a new For Rent sign. The edges are torn. The letters are faded.”
“This’ll do the job,” Leo said. He smiled at Alan to soften his tone. “I’m renting your apartment, not the sign.”
Leo finished taping the tattered For Rent sign to the front door of his two-flat. His son and daughter-in-law were moving to California. They’d asked him to move with them, and if he could’ve moved his home too, he would have gladly left Chicago.
It’s not that he didn’t like Chicago. He’d been born and raised on the city’s south side. The winters, though, were getting harder. Los Angeles weather would be kinder. But he couldn’t leave his two-flat. The two-flat was where he and his wife had raised their boy.…
Ashley turned off the busy interstate highway. She drove down one long overpacked road after another. Ten miles took nearly thirty minutes to reach her destination. She turned down the river road. It was almost deserted as most people raced from one job to another, or perhaps to their sleeping places.
She paused at one of the drive through pull-offs. A brown and muddy river had been beautiful many generations ago. Dead limbs stood where trees had once towered over the river. Sludge filled; the oily stream struggled slowly downstream to join the ocean.
The pull-offs had been designed to make this a place to eat between jobs for today’s workers. Few wanted to stop here and contemplate what their grandparents had done to the environment.…
Immense vociferations echoed through the amusement park from the terrified onlookers as bright blue sparks spat from the back of the “Number One” roller coaster that was stuck upside down on its final loop.
“We have to keep calm, I’m sure that the emergency crews are on their way” Robert stated as he attempted to alleviate the trepidation that had captured both he and his best friend.
“It’s been fifteen minutes, I know they’ll get here but I doubt it will be easy-” Jake replied before profusely vomiting from the nausea that he struggled to contain.
“This high in the air isn’t a good place to be but it’ll be okay soon!” Robert exclaimed, trying to calm the other distraught riders most of whom were young children that dangled behind them.…
