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10 Questions for JC Andrews

May 11, 2023 - By Edward Clifford

I’m so in love with you all of a sudden, you
    machine angel. Angel machine. Because I am still learning
        your new smells. Plastic, salt, animal, finally and still

thinking plastic, salt, animal, finally. Because you are letting
    me stand you up in the shower and wash your hair like you are not
        my mother, like I am not your daughter.
—from "Momma, Refracted," Volume 64, Issue 1

Tell us about one of the first pieces you wrote.
I don’t remember the first time I wrote a poem and took it seriously. I will say, though, that my grandmother used to write letters for me to her...

2023 Winner of the Anne Halley Poetry Prize

May 10, 2023 - By Staff

Congratulations to MEGAN PINTO, winner of this year's Anne Halley Poetry Prize!

Nathan McClain and Franny Choi have selected Megan Pinto's poem "Chiaroscuro after Caravaggio’s Paul" from MR's Summer 2022 issue (Vol.63, Issue 2) for the prestigious prize.

MEGAN PINTO is a writer living in Brooklyn. Her poems can be found or are forthcoming in Ploughshares, Lit Hub, Plume, and elsewhere. She has received scholarships and fellowships from Bread Loaf, the Martha’s Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing, the Port Townsend Writers’ Conference, and an Amy Award from Poets & Writers. Megan holds an MFA...

10 Questions for Lauren Hohle

May 9, 2023 - By Edward Clifford

Hannah doesn't get on-campus housing for the summer, but she doesn't want to go back to Missouri, back to her old life, back in time. The summer before, her first summer after starting college, she sat in basements sipping Budweiser as her formerly bookish friends swapped stories about frat parties. She sat through each Sunday's sermon as the pastor built God's army out of straw men, drew conclusions her professors would have docked her points for.
—from "Inland," Volume 64, Issue 1 (Spring 2023)

Tell us about one of the first pieces you wrote.
I dreamed up a lot of stories when I was young but always kind of froze with the writing-it-down part. I somehow finagled my way into a creative writing independent study...

April 2023 Contributor Publications

May 4, 2023 - By Staff

Karin Cecile Davidson's collection of stories, The Geography of First Kisses, is out now from Kallisto Gaia Press. Her story "In the Great Wide" was published in our Spring 2020 issue.

Mary Fister's poetry collection...

10 Questions for Asnia Asim

May 2, 2023 - By Edward Clifford

Maybe it was a reaction to old age; it could be that
he resented retired life. But the ex-neurologist,
amateur collector of oriental coins, had recently

taken to scolding his poor wife for all that praying
under her breath, Mashallah-this and Inshallah-that.
—from "Mr.Kemal Questions God," Volume 64, Issue 1 (Spring 2023)

Tell us about one of the first pieces you wrote.
My first poem “The White Petal” startled itself into existence through me. I was a lonely Pakistani kid struggling with overwhelming unrest. As I wrote the poem, the vague aroma of its ambience became significant. I remember feeling transported, less alone, but more importantly, I felt a kind of ecstasy as the image of a soft...