by Tanner Pruitt Tanner Pruitt studied creative writing at the University of Virginia, the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, and Bucknell University’s Stadler Center for Poetry before moving to San Francisco. He works in corporate strategy at Everlaw, a company that makes software for lawyers and legal professionals. Some of his other poems can be found online in… [Read More]
Witness Magazine
Park Stories
by Anju Sharma It shocked me to see the picture my daughter took of me. We went to the park every evening. She played with a friend from school who lived close by while I walked with the friend’s mother. We had met through the children, and like our children, took to each other well. My… [Read More]
Vol. XXXVI No. 2 – Winter 2023
Memory, 1978, Rita Deanin AbbeyAcrylic on canvas60 x 70 inchesArt Series: Desert Space Series (Paintings) 1977–1979© Robert Rock Belliveau and Rita Deanin Abbey Foundation Editor’s Note: “We live to collect experiences, not things.” Whenever I hear that familiar saying, I’m reminded of the preciousness and elusiveness of the present moment, but at the same time,… [Read More]
Vol. XXXVI No. 1 — Spring 2023
Editor’s Note: For the last three years, our endeavors to rebuild our world have yielded mixed results. As we do so, many look forward to beginning life anew and seizing the opportunity to create a better tomorrow. Some of us find ourselves yearning for the days that seem behind us. Others envision retracing their steps… [Read More]
Nine of Pentacles
by Elizabeth Galoozis now we have these trees. not planted by us but in our care. well… your care. you water them assiduously; I just sit on the back patio with a glass of rum at dusk under the crescent moon and watch with love. I watch the green fruit form, its skin distend and… [Read More]
Vol. XXXV No. 3 – Winter 2022
A Note on This Issue Poetry Emma Bolden, The Liturgy of the Hours Edith Lidia Clare, [sorrow is real-er] Chris Crowder, God Does Everything Sandra Fees, Antares in Winter Sky Elizabeth Galoozis, Nine of Pentacles Dariana Guerrero, Poem About My Rights Morgan Hamill, After Diagnosis // Act III Ian U. Lockaby, Ida the Storm… [Read More]
Deliverista
by Natalia Sandoval Imelda was surprised to find that the address wasn’t a law firm, but the headquarters of the Catholic charity in midtown. But except for the huge cross at the entrance of the massive skyscraper and the few portraits of Pope Francis, there wasn’t much particularly churchy about the place. “Eleventh floor, sweetheart,”… [Read More]
Pitangus
by Nikki Zambon He didn’t tell me his real name until we were already engaged 6 months. It happened on a road in the Atacama desert of Chile, the oldest desert on earth. We wagged our thumbs at the few cars that whizzed by. Hot earth lifted behind them, dust storms that swirled into our… [Read More]
From the Waist Down
by Brittany Micka-Foos We’re in the hospital again, me and my wayward womb. My daughter Nora, the birthday girl, was born four years ago. Once more, I wait and I watch the clock. The second hand slices through time—sick, sick, sick—a mean little knife. In a few hours, they will cut out a chunk of… [Read More]
The Right Word: How Writing Poetry Saved My Life
by Ismael Santallines In 1984, I went to prison. I wrote my fiancée, a young lady, fresh out of high school, who had really just begun to live. I asked her to find someone else to love, someone else with whom to plan a life. She responded, saying she loved me and would wait…. [Read More]
[sorrow is real-er]
by Edith Lidia Clare after Albert Leung sorrow is real-er, like the moon; all we do in comparison is as illusory as mirror-glass, or trees: as anything a cloud of dust can light upon, heap softly over, be rinsed from. tonight, as this storm twists the trees, as roof & leaf sounds wrap the house,… [Read More]
A room is a lonely place
by Hannah Seo I like to set unfocused eyes on the skyline, render every manmade thing invisible, imagine bodies separated by feet of empty air, stories high— asleep and suspended, or climbing increments of ether, hovering stacked and facing every which way gaze fixed a few feet ahead mesmerized by something that does not exist…. [Read More]