STORY OF THE WEEK

Invasion, Day 3 By Stephanie Cotsirilos

Invasion, Day 3

Juliana tells a reporter in the boxcar that she and her compatriots had only two days of training with their Kalashnikovs. Some of it was target practice.

POEM OF THE WEEK

Sounding By Gibson Fay-LeBlanc

Sounding

My brother and mother died this summer, two of seven billion, two of a hundred seven billion who ever breathed.

POETRY CONTEST

POETRY CONTEST
Open to all poets. Narrative is always looking for new voices, and all entries will be considered for publication. Each entry may contain up to five poems.

Please see the Guidelines.

RECENT AWARDS

RECENT AWARDS
Year in and out, many of our authors receive notable awards, including the BASS and O. Henry prize, and many others. You can find their works here.

FICTION

FICTION

FICTION

FICTION

They Were Like Jewelry By T. Coraghessan Boyle

They Were Like Jewelry

Owning a snake is a basic constitutional guarantee—life, liberty, and happiness, right? And nothing’ll make you happier than having a snake in your life.

FICTION

Damascus By Katherine Heiny

Damascus

The coke made Mia's heart beat very fast. First she felt hot, then she felt cold, then she had a profound idea that would revolutionize the way she did laundry.

FICTION

Asiana By Wen Jing

Asiana

I was twenty-eight, already considered old at the National Dance Theatre, and the night before my interview, I wandered to the glass district to watch a stripper.

NONFICTION

NARRATIVE 10

CARTOONS

NONFICTION

Rewriting Illness By Elizabeth Benedict

Rewriting Illness

I can pinpoint the date, the time, the square foot of couch on which I was sitting, the motion of my left hand slipping into my right armpit.

NARRATIVE 10

Narrative 10 By Dean Rader

Narrative 10

I always urge my students to take risks in their work. Writing is about taking chances, charting new territory, toeing the line of confidence and terror.

CARTOONS

Cartoon Art Volume 2023-05 By Various Artists

Cartoon Art Volume 2023-05

New laughs over wine, at the end of the tunnel, from the couch, at the theater, and with a couple of tech-savvy pups.

POETRY

POETRY

POETRY

POETRY

Water Path By Bruce Bond

Water Path

When a soul passes out of the body, it sinks as certain bodies do, toward some restitution, some cold and colder prospect of the ocean’s threshing floor.

POETRY

Yard Mercies By Tara Bray

Yard Mercies

Bunny thin as knee socks stretched high to the tomato branch, succeeds in an attempt to snap, eat, disappear stems, leaves.

POETRY

Eight Lines on Burning My Hand and Other Poems By Tyler Dunston

Eight Lines on Burning My Hand and Other Poems

I like the kind of heat I am just able to stand, and I like knowing I can remove my hand the second it becomes too much for me.

POETRY

POETRY

POETRY

POETRY

Suggesting By Rose McLarney

Suggesting

I don’t still believe a few split rails are enough to ensure any boundary. I do know how likely a blouse’s buttons are to be undone.

POETRY

Migrant By Kéchi Nne Nomu

Migrant

Each raceme-shaped hour in the new country; disciple of inflorescence, I pause to study petals stunned by their topaz. The descent of robins.

POETRY

My Mom Serves Tea to Her Robbers By Naomi Shihab Nye

My Mom Serves Tea to Her Robbers

Later she will say, they wore white shirts, their faces were kind. One took milk with his sugar.They had an interest in how she’d been living alone.

POETRY

POETRY

iPOEMS

POETRY

Before the Borderless: Dean Rader/Cy Twombly By Dean Rader

Before the Borderless: Dean Rader/Cy Twombly

This evening the sun seems to lie down inside itself everything clicks on from within

POETRY

I Sanitize My Hands to Teach The Tempest Again at West Point By Matthew Carey Salyer

I Sanitize My Hands to Teach The Tempest Again at West Point

I sit brisk in the spirit |willing| as Caliban. I know at least my heart, my part    not so much monster as magician.

iPOEMS

Literacy & Orality By Timothy Leo

Literacy & Orality

The blood tests suggest cancer; the biopsy suggests cancer; the growth suggests cancer.