Murphy Writing of Stockton University Presents This entry is part of Getaway Reads, an e-mail series curated by Kendal Nicole Lambert that features the writing of the Winter Poetry & Prose Getaway faculty. Excerpt from Chapter 1, Pasture of Heaven by Judith Lindbergh The Kara Kam told my mother I would be important. I was five winters old and had just begun to learn the skill of sewing felt. I sat beside our fire working at two small patches with a thin wool thread when my mother stepped inside our winter hut, kneeling low to warm her ... Read More...
Getaway Reads: Beautiful Girls by Anndee Hochman
Murphy Writing of Stockton University Presents This entry is part of Getaway Reads, an e-mail series curated by Kendal Nicole Lambert that features the writing of the Winter Poetry & Prose Getaway faculty. Beautiful Girls by Anndee Hochman The problem was an infected earlobe. Sasha, my 13-year-old daughter, had been diligent about swabbing the new piercing twice a day, but the air is full of germs, and somehow one of them had crept inside. Now the ear throbbed scarlet, and a lymph node had swollen just behind it, an unforgiving pea ... Read More...
Getaway Reads: Two Poems by Stephen Dunn
Murphy Writing of Stockton University Presents This entry is part of Getaway Reads, an e-mail series curated by Kendal Nicole Lambert that features the writing of the Winter Poetry & Prose Getaway faculty. Mrs. Cavendish and the Dancer by Stephen Dunn Mrs. Cavendish desired the man in the fedora who danced the tarantella without regard for who might care. All her life she had a weakness for abandon, and, if the music stopped, for anyone who could turn a phrase. The problem was Mrs. Cavendish wanted it all to mean something in a ... Read More...
Getaway Reads: Extract from Chapter 4, Spring of Hope by Michelle Cameron
Murphy Writing of Stockton University Presents This entry is part of Getaway Reads, an e-mail series curated by Kendal Lambert that features the writing of the Winter Poetry & Prose Getaway faculty. Extract from Chapter 4, Spring of Hope by Michelle Cameron April 28, 1796. Piedmont The company was marched into the cobbler’s shop and the cobbler ordered, at musket point, to fashion them all new footwear. Every soldier in Daniel’s company knew General Bonaparte’s motto, “the war must feed the war.” The general moved his men too quickly ... Read More...
Getaway Reads: The Need for Character
Murphy Writing of Stockton University Presents This entry is part of Getaway Reads, an e-mail series curated by Kendal Nicole Lambert that features the writing of the Winter Poetry & Prose Getaway faculty. The Need for Character by Richard K. Weems Until this morning, my story was the same as any other yokel leaning on the brass rail at 9 a.m. Until this morning, there was no reason to tell my story to anyone but the tenderer of the booze and every-goddamn-one else like me: hiding in the dark in broad daylight, feeling safe with those who ... Read More...
Getaway Reads: Between People by Diana Goetsch
Murphy Writing of Stockton University Presents This entry is part of Getaway Reads, an e-mail series curated by Kendal Lambert that features the writing of the Winter Poetry & Prose Getaway faculty. Between People by Diana Goetsch In a very real sense, all of us are transitioning. My life broke down two years ago at age 50, though it was broken all along. I seemed to be a well-functioning man named Douglas Goetsch: a teacher who’d taught at Stuyvesant High School and various universities, a poet with award-winning collections, a ... Read More...
Getaway Reads: The Sea Crest by Jeff Bens
Murphy Writing of Stockton University Presents This entry is part of Getaway Reads, an e-mail series curated by Kendal Lambert that features the writing of the Winter Poetry & Prose Getaway faculty. The Sea Crest by Jeff Bens I’d moved to Atlantic City to take care of my father. My sister Daphne had called from Tampa Bay to say that his number was up. “What are we going to do?” she asked me, like we talked all the time, like we was a thing. “How bad?” “He wouldn’t say.” I didn’t have anywhere else to go. Jillian had ... Read More...
Getaway Reads: Two Poems by BJ Ward
Murphy Writing of Stockton University Presents This entry is part of Getaway Reads, an e-mail series curated by Kendal Lambert that features the writing of the Winter Poetry & Prose Getaway faculty. Cuckoldom by BJ Ward Such conundrums of English. I blame my ex-wife. She rearranged my dictionary, or re- taught an old story: in this book, if you look for alimony, it follows acrimony (nothing between). However, contrition still borders contrivance (if it can be seen). Untruth in her troth sallowed the language, sullied a ... Read More...
Getaway Reads: Two Poems by Thomas Lux
Murphy Writing of Stockton University Presents This entry is part of Getaway Reads, an e-mail series curated by Kendal Lambert that features the writing of the Winter Poetry & Prose Getaway faculty. Backyard Swing Set by Thomas Lux Splayed, swayback, cheap pipe playground: a swing, a slide, some rings maybe—we love our babies and a tire hanging from a branch won't do. For one summer it shines—red, the chains of silver, and beside it the blue plastic pool. First winter out it goes to rust. I love America's backyards, seen from ... Read More...
Getaway Reads: Grand Fugue by Peter E. Murphy
This entry is part of Getaway Reads, an e-mail series curated by Kendal Lambert that features the writing of the Winter Poetry & Prose Getaway faculty. Grand Fugue by Peter E. Murphy After the hospital released me with a warning, I walked around this busy city that hadn’t noticed I’d been missing, me and my reconstructed heart, so full of gratitude I wanted to kiss every light that flashed GO, forgive the ones that said STOP. And when I felt the earth throb under my feet I remembered the subway below where commuters were ... Read More...