“Just because my charms did not work didn't mean they were broken.”

Creative Non-FictionSubmissionMay 4, 2020maggie edinger, short story, women who write, creative writing, creative non-fiction, CNFComment

Iconoclastic

It wasn’t supposed to feel like this.

Creative Non-FictionSubmissionApril 20, 2020exodus oktavia brownlow, writing, creative non-fiction, CNF, women who write, witches who write, read women, storytelling, fill in the blank, interactive writingComment

In the Beginning

“We are trained to be unsure of our own conceptions, to leave it in the hands of an exterior industry. I fight back against this conditioning in small ways, like giving different dates of my last menstrual period when asked.”

Creative Non-FictionSubmissionMarch 30, 2020storytelling, motherhood, pregnancy, creative non-fictionComment

Ribs

“We shall no longer think of ourselves as floating heads, seeping vulvas, hard breasts, black gums, crooked, and harsh teeth. We will no longer have the desire to compare our round and dark selves to the moon or to the sun or to the stars. We shall drink from the final and sweet waters.”

Creative Non-FictionSubmissionDecember 16, 2019ribs, creative non-fiction, creative writing, non-fiction, queer black writers, queer black women, woc, woc writers, black women writers, black womanhood, short story, milka kiriakuComment

I Keep Meaning to Write About the Day You Were Born

“I’m not saying in those years I tried to forget you but I tried to stop remembering you… I could not forget you anymore than I could forgive myself for trying to.”

First Morning After

“When JD is gone, I run the third-floor shower as hot as I can stand it. Hotter. I sit hunched in my aunt’s pristine clawfoot tub and rock, scratching at my skin flaring red as it scalds. A leaden balloon swells in my gut, full and empty at once. My body is cavernous. My bones are hollow. I slink into the bed where he was an hour ago.”

Creative Non-FictionSubmissionNovember 11, 2019Comment

great stories

“a great story doesn’t provide everything that’s desired. desire is the most surreal thing so why try to restrain it within the limitations of the real. reject coherence because any calcification is ultimately a betrayal.”

Creative Non-FictionMarina ManoukianJuly 23, 2019creative non-fiction, creative writing, marina manoukian, great stories, prose, good stories, storytelling, pussy magicComment

Remember Who You Are

“One of them had a shaved head and a silver stud in her nose, the other had cat’s-eye glasses and chipped red nail polish, and they were holding hands. I was so fucking happy—queer zines and records in my hands and a grrl-couple holding hands in public—that I smiled. The girls returned my smile, and my baby-queer heart went boom-boom-bam, a bass drum in my chest.”