Smokey room. Little room off Rue Polonceau. New old country, France and the lights are so bright and I hate them. Do they know what it is like to see your mother in a mud […]
Archive
A Trip to MOMA to See Picasso’s ‘Bull’ and Other Sculptures
Where is ‘Bull?’ Is ‘Bull’ even here? Did I miss it? No, I don’t think so. Jesus Christ! This show goes on forever. There must a thousand pieces. Room after room of art. Why wasn’t […]
Pulling the Door Open
I arrived at Christopher Street Station in a carefully selected sundress. Slowly, I made my way aboveground trying my best not to sweat too much in the July heat. This would be the first time […]
New Apartment
Finding and securing an apartment in New York City is one sort of nightmare. Nightmares exist all over the world, but this particular one all New Yorkers share. It’s in the contract we write in […]
Transient
“We have a tendency to think of the homeless as a transient population” “Yeah, but Toronto […]
Amsterdam Houses
Four sparrows pick at a chicken bone. The spray of last night’s McCormick, Butterfingers and rolling papers flutter in the path like quietly existing flowers. A boy snoozes on a bench; his smooth, brown neck […]
A City Pantoum
Learn the knack in noisy streets, of shifting on a new hour’s turn: Your bottom-of-the-cavern-ness into a view from the green valley, Or a ride along the midpoint of Taroko’s white-marble gorge. Because bodies deprived […]
$5 PSYCHIC SPECIAL
you should get a reading beautiful like the orange we were red now we’re orange i’ve been cleaning it’s time for a change what’s your name how old are you you were born under a […]
Bushwick: Parte Una.
Mom said, “Fuck this,” as she handed me clothing soaked in feces, mold or whatever was in that floodwater. I wanted to ask her for the quarter to put in our curse jar, kept on […]
NYC Musician
The pavement was wet from the early morning showers and the trees in Union Square dripped on the benches and bright green tables on the lawn. The trees dripped on people walking across the square. […]
Cheque
Cheque placed his dress shoes on the kitchen floor, and reached under the kitchen table for his shoe shining kit. In a small handwoven basket, traditionally used for keeping tortillas warm, he found a tired […]
Speakcheesy
We met under the JMZ in Bushwick, Brooklyn at 4pm. The cheesemakers had to deliver their cheeses on time to the restaurant, otherwise, our night wouldn’t go according to plan. I had coordinated the evening’s […]
A Conversation with Rene Steinke
René Steinke’s most recent novel, Friendswood (Riverhead), was named one of National Public Radio’s Best Books of 2014. Her previous novel, Holy Skirts, an imaginative retelling of the life of the artist and provocateur, Baroness […]
A Conversation with Tiphanie Yanique
Tiphanie Yanique is the author of the story collection, How to Escape from a Leper Colony, and I Am the Virgin Islands, a poem and children’s book illustrated by her husband, photographer Moses Djeli. Yanique […]
A Conversation with Rigoberto Gonzàlez
Rigoberto González was born in Bakersfield, California, and raised in Michoacán, Mexico. He is the author of several poetry books, including So Often the Pitcher Goes to Water until It Breaks (1999), a National Poetry Series selection; Other Fugitives […]
I Dreamed I Was a Very Clean Tramp, A Review
I Dreamed I Was a Very Clean Tramp by Richards Meyers (2013, Harper Collins) Richard Hell would tell you he invented New York Punk Rock. And he does tell us this along with many […]
I’m Not A Journaler, But…
I’ve never kept a journal or a diary. The idea always seemed odd to me. It reminded me of books by Judy Blume that I read when I was a kid. I wasn’t the […]
IDOLS
I’ve never snorted rat poison before but I was glad that I could cross that from my list of things I shouldn’t have done. That feeling of being so close to death brought me […]
Many Dead, And A Funeral
He grew up in this house with plastic covers on the chairs, and the decrepit couch with stuffing escaping the leather. This is my second time here. I should be uncomfortable sitting here. I […]
Excerpts from Author Interviews in Print Journal 2015
(conducted by Charlotte Slivka) 12th Street: When did you know you’d be a writer, and what propelled you to go for it? Tiphanie Yanique: My grandmother was a children’s librarian, which really means–especially in the Virgin […]
A Consultation with the Doctors
Managing Editor Charlotte Slivka engaged the drDOCTOR team in conversation via email. They discussed their reading series/podcast and where they’re going next. Sam Farahmand and Luke Wiget are the New School MFA Grads that make […]