May 17, 2017 | Issue 1: Mothers, Poetry, R.K. Riley
My mother hated me the way I looked at her through my father’s pale eyes the independent insurgence of a being where she wanted a porcelain-faced doll with peachy cheeks and white stark cold skin who never blinked at her vulnerability or turned from her naked cruelty...May 17, 2017 | Adam Robinson, All Authors, Article, Issue 1: Mothers
As the Executive Director at the Zacharias Sexual Abuse Center, I have had the privilege of seeing firsthand just how true – and powerful – this quotation is, particularly within families impacted by sexual abuse and sexual assault. In seven years as a...Apr 28, 2017 | Issue 1: Mothers, Memory Piece, Sara Connell
The story I played out growing up was The Ugly Duckling. For a time, even the nickname given to me by my mother was “Ug.” My two younger sisters seemed to move seamlessly from the womb into the family unit. I constantly felt the outsider: at worst, pathologized; at...Apr 28, 2017 | Issue 1: Mothers, Jean Cozier, Poetry
My mother entered a nursing facility on January 2, 2014, and thus I began yet another chapter in a long, dysfunctional story I really would like to stop reading. At the age of 98, she still has the power to darken my life. I’m working on that – hence, “Heavy Metal.” ...