Fiction by John L'Heureux and poetry by Denver Butson, Holly Iglesias, and Joyce Carol Oates

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Beverly and I were second graders at New Carew Street School and we both hated recess.  She hated recess and she cried the whole time and nobody knew why, so everybody made fun of her.  I hated recess because it wasn't really school and we weren't learning anything.  It was a waste of time.  I knew Beverly only by name and by what I could tell from spying on her.  Her last name was LaPlante, which was strange and therefore wrong, and she was known for being a crybaby. . . .
--From "Three Short Moments in a Long Life," a short story by John L'Heureux, The New Yorker (May 9, 2016), pp. 56-61.

as far as I know
there is no such place
as The Avalanche Café . . . 
--From "Avalanche Café," a poem by Denver Butson, The Adroit Journal, Issue 7 (Summer 2013).

a V formation 
of flying geese
slowly unzips 
the sky's dress . . . 
--From "The Sky Erotic," a poem by Denver Butson, The Adroit Journal, Issue 7 (Summer 2013).

Heading west from Black Mountain to Asheville, strip mall
strip mall strip mall,  and at the light in Swannanoa what
remains of the junk store where we shopped for wine glasses
for a party for your new friends the year we lived apart . . . 
--From "Ye Olde Whatever Shoppe," a poem by Holly Iglesias, Palaver (Spring 2016), p. 18.

Bolts of cotton and worsted wool stand upright until a woman
of indeterminate age rocks on free from the weight of the 
others and lugs it to the table . . . 
--From "Cutting Table," a poem by Holly Iglesias, Palaver (Spring 2016), p. 20.

This is the season when the husbands lie
in their hemp-woven hammocks for the last time
reading The Nation in waning autumn light . . . 
--From "This Is the Season," a poem by Joyce Carol Oates, The New Yorker (April 4, 2016), p. 65.