PoetryErin Adair-Hodges, Aileen Bassis, Emma Bolden, Ashley Chambers,  Karen Craigo, Kwame Dawes, Matthew Henriksen, Erin Hoover, Cindy E. King, EJ Levy, Laurin Becker Macios, Emily Mohn-Slate, Cindy Hunter Morgan, Nancy Carol Moody, Brian Simoneau, Lindsay Tigue, John Walser, PJ Williams

FictionCharles Booth, Ayşe Papatya Bucak, K.L. Cook, Maurice Carlos Ruffin, Nickalus Rupert, Kami Westhoff

NonfictionMarcia Aldrich, BJ Hollars, Devin Latham, Lee Martin, Robin McCarthy, Ander Monson, Alexis Paige, Bonnie J. Rough, Cait Weiss

ArtKatrina Andry, Taylor Baldwin, Luke Ball, Jenny Blumenfield, Dara Engler, Motoko Kamada, Joseph Kameen, Lauren Rose Kinney & Patrick Vincent, Vitus Shell, Bonnie Stipe

“But now, she is crying and all of the children are gathered around her. Short, ugly noises come from her throat. Why isn't Angie,  the recess attendant coming for her? Angie will be here any moment now.”

“When we’re finished eating, my sister sets the pizza box on top of a stack of used take-out containers piled on top of the garbage. My sister has a black heart tattooed on her chest, the first tattoo she ever got, back in high school – when she met Zeb, ten or so years later, she had the black heart engulfed in wild blue flames. The tips of the flames are visible over the neckline of her shirt as she bends to put the leftover pizza slices in the fridge.”

“my friend, an elegy that has taken into account, into heart & October wind, / the weight of someone’s soft”

The Pinch Literary Journal proudly presents its 35th anniversary issue - a sleek, sophisticated, and distinct tribute to the literary arts. 

Issue 35.1 includes the winners of the the 2014 Pinch Literary Awards. Sarah Viren's essay "My Murderer's Futon" won the Pinch Literary Nonfiction Contest (as judged by Lee Martin); Mark Wagennar's poem, "Shake & Bake Blues (Midwest Blues)" which won the Pinch Poetry Contest (as judged by Adam Clay); and Emily Ruth Verona, who won the Pinch Literary Fiction contest with her short story, "Care."

“"I’m sorry," she said when they had picked up all of it, their crocheted fingertips brushing for a moment as their spools met. “

Her opera glasses. Her black and white / artistic snapshots taken on the August '36 / return trip on the Normandy. She titled”

““Did he take the head? You’ll never make us believe otherwise. Yeah, we think he took the head, because it was evidence of a murder,” Galveston District Attorney Kirk Sistrunk later told Dateline. Without Black’s head there was no way to tell how close Durst had been when he shot his neighbor, at what angle, or from what direction. In other words, there was no way to know if we should believe his story of self-defense or not.” 

“And still we remained empty. No quickening, no swelling, no children. It was 1907, and we were not mothers.”

“The Husband and The Wife know about shots. The previous month they brought a large box home, special-ordered from the pharmacy. Inside, dozens of needles and bottles of medicine. Two hundred individually wrapped alcohol wipes. A sharps container. Most needles go in The Wife’s thigh. Another shot, one of thick oil, gets injected into her butt muscle. In the morning, The Husband warms the oil by tucking it into the waistband of his boxers while he shaves.”

In Issue 34.2 we’ve got a lineup of fiction from Gretchen VanWormer, Jessica Newman, Vera Kurian, Alisha Karabinus, Kim Drew Wright, Mike Meginnis and Gabriel Houck.

Creative nonfiction in this issue comes from Sarah Vallance, Matthew Vollmer, Emily Rich, Angela Woodward, Sarah M. Wells and Jamie Lyn Smith.

“of all people, circling, as I was, my ego, / wrecked, as I was, in my own splendor / and drunkenness, landlocked, as I was,“

“The problem, as I saw it, was the lack of antagonist. She vomited in the middle of the night, and then immediately had to clean it up with the napkins she’d filched from various restaurants, because the ants showed up instantly, an immense train of them chugging across the floor straight for the disgusting mess, more and more showing up, grim black avenue wriggling with purpose, to carry away the bounty of her effluence. A small note from him came as a kind of affirming prayer.”

“around her in my book of saints. / Cecilia at the piano, even the same / in death. Gorgeous with blush /just run from her cheeks. Mary’s heart”

“I did not inherit Mother’s auburn hair, but Father’s, which mother claims to have been dirt brown. Mother and I hardly resemble each other, except to be both tall of stature, with the square jaws and prominent brows of many who live in this area. Our shoulders are wide, not sloping like those of so many women, and there is enough meat upon us to be considered farm-worthy. We have the strength and agility to catch a flustered chicken and wring its neck without getting clawed, to chop firewood and do a man’s work in whatever weather happens along.”

‘

“to a pond of koi, and all God’s creatures / going round from the dizzy casting / of neurosis, and of wind”

“While slicing shallots with / a cleaver I wonder if / I’ll ever wield it at my daughter”

“The book I purchased is a religious one filled with counsel from the heavens, from the gods, from the prophets of old. My particular copy cost thousands because this book has become something of a collector’s item in my church. This one was notably special to me because inscribed on the front is the name Marinda Johnson.”

“Of course he is tired, so he holds his hands, palms upturned, on his knees. He is wearing khakis.”