Issue 9: Harbor, Home, Hard Love—Summary, Contents & Editor’s Note

by on Aug 29, 2016

gnarled_oak_cover-9Summary

Issue 9: Harbor, Home, Hard Love (Jul-Aug 2016) is an unthemed issue featuring poetry, prose, videos, and artwork from writers and artists around the world.

Read online | Read the PDF (click to read online, right-click & save-as to download)

Contents

I Am April — Tiffany Grantom

Gossamer — Jeanie Tomasko

composing for voice & breath — Scott-Patrick Mitchell

Westbound PA Turnpike — James Esch

Acutance — Jack Bedell

prairie storm — Debbie Strange

Texas Life Story, Six Words — Lisa Bubert

and if you sketched the view from here minus
 — Jeanie Tomasko

The Meeting Ran Long — Marie Craven

Multilingual — Steve Klepetar

The Elephant in the Room — Juliet Wilson

After Ekphrasis — Marie Landau

Geography of the Dream — Joan Colby

Talking You to Sleep — Margaret Holley

Sea Song — PJ Wren

Daydream — Olivier Schopfer

Moon Kisses — Kelsey May

Super Moon— Cathryn Essigner

In a Dark Room — Steve Klepetar

Once Upon a Time — Consuelo Arredondo,
 Cristina Ortiz, Ferrie = differentieel,
 Johann Mynhardt & Luis Rojas

My Cross — Chinua Ezenwa-Ohaeto

Skins — Mary McCarthy

ECT — Mary McCarthy

Ominous Dreams — Bill Waters

Only the Lonely — Marie Craven

old footbridge — Pravat Kumar Padhy

tequila sunset — Christina Sng

riddle of renewing — j.lewis

from Orchards — Marilyn McCabe

Shorts-and-long-sleeved-shirt-kinda-perfect-Sunday
 afternoon at the beach — Jeanie Tomasko

Editor’s Note

Back to school. That’s why this note and issue wrap-up is so late. Should I tell you the dog ate my work? It’s a great excuse since dogs will eat anything: paper, plastic, Legos, spatulas, curtains, coffee tables, trash. Why not the last page of this issue?

So I’m back to school and already I hear this from my students: “Writing is boring.”

My mind short circuits. This simply does not compute.

Lately, I’ve tried responding with, “Why are you writing boring things? Try writing something interesting.”

This stumps them sometimes, but I figure why not? Many of my kids act like they want me to entertain them, but maybe they should try to entertain me.

This year, I’ll tell them to try to think like writers: entertain me, inform me, persuade me. Show me your world as only you know it.

Now here we are starting the second week of school and a few at least seem willing to try. Maybe I can find a seat in the back of the classroom, sit down and learn from what they’ve got to say.

It’s what I like to do here at Gnarled Oak, and so, thank you as always for writing and reading, for sending your work and letting me publish some of it. For letting me sit in the back and learn so much. It’s always an honor, and I hope you’ve enjoyed this issue as much as I did.

And for those of you teachers, students, and parents of school and college-aged kids, best of luck to you in the new school year, and may all your dogs keep their teeth off your work.

With gratitude and thanks,

James Brush, editor
Aug 2016

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Gnarled Oak — Issue 9: Harbor, Home, Hard Love: Read onlineRead the PDF (right-click/save-as to download)