Creative

by Greta Torelli   scar tissue protrudes less as do angles of deprivation down a spine now a backbone ready for snapping   this body of work evidence of healing hides fissions in my nerves of disrupted childhood games blue sirens in our driveway   while writing recollections resurface tears surface, and I place palm to breast   a check- up I am my own doctor, my own healer I feel the running heart punch out, don’t run, dear little heart, fill my veins, fill me with feeling, so that I don’t cut them open and check for poison inside

By C. Ross   News spread across the county, across barnyards and dinner tables - McGil's pig liked to sit in his chair. Then they started saying the pig liked to smoke McGil's pipe while it sat in his chair and that sometimes it read from women's magazines. Wasn't long before ears beyond the shadow of their mountain were soon begging to hear more, so naturally, the papers sent their best to find the truth to this hogwash. It was Dixie Dartmouth, whose mouth runs almost as fast as she does, who arrived first on the scene. "About time," was all McGil said and led her out to the pig.

Strength in fragility: Sometimes strength is as much a weakness as breaking in a time of crisis. Standing tall in determined protest, nothing soft nothing fragile, open. A fortress against delicacy. A brick wall, no sensitivity. But in crisis one needs fragility. In darkness, find sensibility. Relinquish this stubborn tenacity, debility, deficiency in warmth. Tenderness, a spring flower blooming, frangible, a paper-thin egg-shell. Like a fruit, stripped of its peel, exposed, naked flesh, raw, sensitive real. Expose the layers of your soul, and in fragility find strength.