Live Last read · last published · next check
Nadim looked in the mirror and sighed. It was his face. It was his face and he was tired of it. Somewhere in the years he’d grown disappointed with his face. He’d never thought of himself as ugly. But neither had he considered himself handsome. His wife, Amina, disagreed with him, but he knew she was biased. He loved her, and appreciated her. But he knew she was wrong. His face was… too familiar.…
You know the man, you know how he seethes and burns from the inside, though he occasionally masks it with a smile and smooth words. You know the malevolence within. - an old-man’s lust for a young girl’s flesh, his fingers in her hair, on her skin - a black-hearted scorn for people of color coming up from “shithole” countries. He calls them vermin. He calls them dogs - a gleeful delight as he…
Yahya stood in the bathroom, looking into the mirror, trying to see the reflection of images in the television – a thousand hidden faces, twisting, kicking arms and legs captured by some impossible wreckage. He saw strangers and foreigners and pilgrims beyond the door. And he began to wonder about catacombs and cathedrals, soccer fields and train depots about the many multiplied paintings of…
We’ve spent the past few weeks moving through the life and teachings of Jesus as recorded in the Gospel of Matthew – lingering on his parables and thinking about his miracles. Today I’d like to continue that by taking the next episode in Jesus’ life, the next little pericope – as Bible students will call it – and treat it as a sort of parable. I want to tell his earthly story with a heavenly…
Dear Brothers, Because we failed to check the calendar, we did not notice that this month’s meeting was scheduled for Sunday evening (08.16.26 at 6:16 pm.) But, as was pointed out by Brother Agabus, Prophecy Club bylaws prohibit holding meetings on the Sabbath. So we have been forced to cancel August’s meeting. We apologize for the oversight. However, you will find included in this correspondence…
Fifteen years ago, just before midnight, on the night that the mounted police came to our door, I was in the basement writing unrhymed distortion poems for the Free-Radical Press. The horses’ Lorenz-Helmschmied barding was crafted of plaited ultra-high molecular weight polyethylene fibers. They rode silently to the door. We never heard them at all. We didn’t hear the blackwing Megiddo-Copters…
There are angry faces beneath the window as the day wanes toward darkness. Shadow faces with loud voices. There are boots on the gravel and hot breath fogging the glass. “Any last words before we plunge the hole with you?” “I told the truth, I swear.” How long for crushing shame? How long for speeches? If I’ve erred, my errors are mine. If I’ve stumbled, my feet are my own. If I misspoke, they are…
The expanse of the universe from one burning star to another waiting for the impossible, watching the revolution from grief and suffering to comfort The entire collection of angels past, present, future singing funeral hymns soothed into silence Thoughts turn to golden fire
Si vis pacem, para bellum. Our contemporary language is indebted to the Roman men of action who had as many great words as they had weapons to wield when they needed them. Semper Paratus. S emp er Fidelis. Great words to describe the human physique. Great words to understand the anatomical structure – jawlines and bone structures – of their subjects. They knew how to describe a variety of…
It’s been a number of years so now we can openly acknowledge the story. Even with all the burdensome little asides, we can tell the truth. Try to reconstruct the story from the scattered fragments she left behind. She had time to kill, driving the back-roads at random, hurt and wounded, with a sandwich and two cups of coffee. She couldn’t go home to make things right. Or wouldn’t. She’d injured…
“Looks like rain,” said the man standing next to me as he sniffed the air. But, born and raised in the Midwest, I knew better. When the sky’s red and overcast in the morning, I know it will be storming soon. I know clouds in the west are for rain and wind from the south is hot. But this is neither. There were news cameras from all the major outlets, with a clear title and clean report. Cleared for…