POETRY

Red

by Dzvinia Orlowsky

POETRY

Depot To Another Form of Existence

by Tor Strand

POETRY

Beached Whale

by Scott T. Starbuck

STORY

Telling the Bees

by Jessica Torres

Poetry

This is an Intersection

This is an Intersection

POETRYby Celia Easton KoehlerIllustration by Annabelle Bullock this is an intersection the picnic table arranges spaceconstructs a room gravel island between street and railroad towing enforced at all times once red now pink tow truck gonefishing aspens wiggle &...

Parasaurolophus Song

Parasaurolophus Song

POETRYby Jasper BeckPhoto by Viggo BeckParasaurolophus Song maybe like a saxophone playedthrough cranial crest, crooningheartthrob blues, but scaled up,so much bigger than us, we assumethey ruled the earth. maybe like a bull elk bugle, a teenage beastmoaning horrible...

Newberry Lava Love

Newberry Lava Love

POETRYby Kit EvansPhoto by Daniel TankersleyNewberry Lava Love Lemon vodka on the lips, your huge handwrapped around my whole fist, hurdlingthrough forested slopes in my Jeep.The pines end. Pocked rock starts.Petrified lava flows from 7,000 years ago.Tortured trees...

Two Poems

Two Poems

POETRY BY Trinity HerrPhoto by Camden JonesControlled Burning It blisters down to boundaries —marked and measured. Dig the fire lines wide — wider, even, that the breadth of our campfire,the metal ring circling it —these rounds we rest on. Whoever’s in charge, please...

Small Thirst

Small Thirst

POETRYby Jackson Mills SmithPhoto by Jackson Mills SmithSmall Thirst Some stand along a snowbankat the pass and knockthe powder from a Douglas firlike a five-piece band on Highway 26. Having tested and pried and workedin many faiths, there’s a partnerwho’s not always...

Spitting Distance

Spitting Distance

POETRYby Sam BovardIllustration by Sam BovardSpitting Distance Yellow ore-rich dirt spilled outfrom the long-abandoned orifice,where men once toiled blindlyto bring silver into the sunlight. As wereached the final basin above the mine,the misty rain lifted to reveal...

Iguana Rain

Iguana Rain

POETRYby Holly MitchellIllustration by Daniel TankersleyIguana Rain We sipped sweet cortados from paper cups,taking a long weekend in Miami. Even the bread meltedin a cubano spilling avocado. So many peoplehappy to fritter away the winter on Mid Beach,where the one...

Noah Davis

Noah Davis

POETRY BYWhite-Headed Eagle, Audubon Plate XXXI What other mooncan I clawfrom the river?Barn Owl, Audubon Plate CLXXI Do you see me as foxes see stars,above and blinking?Or have we eaten enough meals togetherto know we’re both ghostsof this river valley whose current...

In the Great Basin, First Day of Spring

In the Great Basin, First Day of Spring

POETRYby Donna HendersonPainting by Donna HendersonIn the Great Basin, First Day of Spring (Summer Lake, Oregon)   The storm smashes the marsh grasses, whips up the willows, crochets then unravels the lake’s glossy lace. Snow whirls in billows of rice-like noise,...

Two Poems

Two Poems

POETRY BY Geffrey DavisPhoto by Rick HafeleSelf-Portrait with Stingers Sometimes I question the blessing of each window opened to pain’s awkward but certain approach, of rewriting my name in tenderness without converting this body to smoke.    The first hit: I watched...

Spring Aires

Spring Aires

POETRYby Kimberly BlaeserPhoto by Rick HafeleSpring Aires A fen where the earth blooms red.As mists part, I pause—awake now. Two sandhills, three-toed strut strut,slit of beaks tilted, point skyward— to sing in a wet forgotten languageone made of spring and hollow and...

Comfort Zone

Comfort Zone

POETRYby David HargreavesPhoto by David HargreavesComfort Zone North Spit, Coos Bay, Oregon Four-wheelin’ tire-track donuts scara pristine Oregon winter beach,smoothed by the tide’s retreat—obscene, you might think,but not to the habitat threatened Snowy Plovers....

Essay

Morning Swim

Morning Swim

Essayby Todd DavisIllustration by Annabelle BullockMorning Swim She comes to the water, as mountain deer do, never fully trusting each step. An older doe. No fawns with her. Perhaps she’s laid them down, licked as much scent from them as she can, and gone off to...

I Know This Frog

I Know This Frog

Essayby Daniel TankersleyPhoto by Daniel TankersleyI Know This Frog Hey, I know this frog! A Pacific tree frog. We met decades ago when I was a child at a campsite on the other side of this mountain view lake in the Central Oregon Cascades. It’s a shore of settled...

Aldo Leopold and the Land’s Original Rhythms

Aldo Leopold and the Land’s Original Rhythms

Essayby Dan ShillingPhoto by Becky Duhr, courtesy of the Aldo Leopold Foundation.Aldo Leopold and the Land’s Original Rhythms In 1904, after the prominent physician and Native elder Charles Eastman had visited his New Jersey boarding school, 17-year-old Aldo Leopold...

Memoir

Memoir

Memoir

MEMOIR BY Rob DavidsonCredit: Courtesy of ExelonThe Bukowski of the Susquehanna Harrisburg, Pennsylvania 1987 Joe hands me another beer. It opens with a gassy pop, foam rising in a sudsy bubble. The first sip is warm. I hold it in my mouth for a moment, letting the...

Story

Telling the Bees

Telling the Bees

by Jessica TorresTelling the Bees The day before her scheduled D&C, the beekeeper walked across the field with tight steps, her cart and dark suede boots compressing the tender grass into marked furrows. The air felt clean, like something newborn: a spindly calf...