The top 10 lies authors tell themselves
Looks like Pablo Neruda was poisoned
HarperCollins union ratifies new contract
State of the strike at HarperCollins
Amazon is changing its ebook return policy
It’s the school’s loss, not Emma’s


Waves
by William Ogden Haynes
That bowl, whose waves long ago gently caressed / the scent of Sunday dinners, finally washed up / in the swampy cul-de-sac of my kitchen counter.

Lilac
by Alexis Misko
I feel the kind of sticky / I should feel if this were Georgia, / if I were in an Alice Walker novel / with a fist full of blackberries / staining my southern grin.

How to Pay Respects to a Serial Killer
by Robert S. King
Follow the script and the scripture. / Even the biography of the damned / is told with sobbing compassion.

Three Bedrooms in New Jersey
by Tina Barry
One autumn, a neighbor removed the hanging seats from his daughter’s swing set and trussed a deer he had shot to the top bar. I could smell it as I lay in bed.

Orchard Avocation
by William Ford
I’m a laid off mooch / of a prof using up fuel / to cut grass close / around apple trees / where voles eat roots / and breed and breed / deep in the grass, hidden / from fox and hawks.

Memories of David Foster Wallace
Following is a transcript of a memorial service held for David Foster Wallace on 26 October 2008 at Underwood Park in Normal, Illinois.

Roadtrip
by Jane Flett
I lean forward to your ear, touch my lips to the point where the hair curls over your lobe, and I wonder about falling inside. I purse them like a kiss and I whisper road trip.

Christine Elizabeth Eldin, 1966-2012
by Stephen Parrish
Aspiring writer, loving mother, and dear friend Chris Eldin took her life at age 46 after a long and baffling absence from public view.

A True-Begotten Father
By Steve Edwards
I see him on a cold blue February night: He steps onto the back porch to drop a garbage sack by the bin and my mother pushes the door shut behind him, turns the lock.

A Proof
by Andrew McCall
My father does not believe / That the small things accrete, / That the infinitesimals / Lean together to form a whole.