Learning to Dance
Approaching the intersection of Main and Second Avenue, Elizabeth eyed the elegant dancing couple framed in neon which no longer lit. She’d always thought the sign had faded, aged like the interior of the Merlin Dance Studio itself. But now, poised above a slightly sagging, black canopy in the mid-afternoon drizzle, the dancers seemed vivid and animated. Eyeing them between swipes of the windshield wipers, Elizabeth imagined the man in black tux and the woman in flowing red gown moving to their own rhythm. The dashing couple vanished from sight, replaced by a mental image of Art...
Read MoreFeatured: Week of August 27
Welcome to a new beginning! After years of struggling to maintain the quarterly publishing schedule — with its lengthy, intense periods of design work — we’ve moved towards a publishing model that makes more sense: both for me and for our contributors. Scrapping the “issue” format, each week we’ll publish a small range of pieces that work together. Sometimes it will be poetry, sometimes fiction, humor, essays, reviews, interviews or more. For those interested in how to cite Wild Violet works, now that the publishing format has changed, please...
Read MoreClint and Buck
I. I met Clint Eastwood in the hills today, that familiar grin, slouch, that laconic stance. Faithful to the etiquette of the trail, he rolled out a howdy, I repeated him, reversed passage to see if the star had truly passed me by. Was the man long-limbed enough, spare enough? Does Clint put on khaki shorts like those, that bland kind of tee, does he live nearby, like to hike, to see bees swarm & butterflies on the lam? The thought bore with me, echoed in the silence of my solo trek to the height of the ridge, the silence of my break, the slog back to an empty fridge,...
Read MoreNew Crop
An article in The Christian Science Monitor reported that some Burmese peasants believe democracy is something to eat. When the students told us about this plant a few months ago, they were not sure precisely what it was either, but they said it will change our lives. They’d heard it will make hair grow on bald heads. People who eat it must battle to keep from wearing a silly smile, they like it so much. The soil gets better when it grows there. The produce is at chest and stomach level so when you pick, you don’t have to stoop or reach; yet the rest of the plant can be...
Read MoreWhither Zenobia?
1. The antique brass pen holder winked under the cone of lamplight among the ungraded homework papers, pulling Constance’s gaze to the leafy designs etched onto its phallic shaft. Almost reluctantly, she let her fingertip push up the scallop-shaped cap, then peered into the empty inkwell. Memories lurked there. She remembered bargaining for the pen holder in the tiny shop deep within Damascus’s great souk — and Roberta grasping her wrist as they left the store. “Connie, over there — look!” Three women shrouded in tent-like chadors hovered like black...
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