HSR Home
HSR Archives
Past EditorsIssue # 44 Spring 2021
Editors for this Issue:
Dorian Gossy
Roger Mitchell
Table of Contents
(Click on title of the piece to go directly to it.)
Poetry
Carolyn Adams
Heavy in My Hand
The Mass, the Weight
Negative Space
Dan Alter
Who goes
Poem in blue with the news
Tony Beyer
Palimpsest
Children of ISIS
La Terre
A thread From Du Fu
Sharon Black
You Encourage Me
Semblances
Michael Carrino
The Beach House in Autumn
Rain
What Would Your Closest Friend Do?
R.T. Castleberry
Still a Stranger
People Tell Me Things
The Curiosities of Decline
Our Beautiful Coats
Patrick R. Connelly
Arithmetic of Dementia
William Doreski
Lost in Somerville Again
Grave Robbing for Fun and Profit
E.J. Evans
To the Child I Never Had
The City and the Sea
The Father
Enlarging the Space
The Psychic
Howie Good
Ghosts of Breath
Famous Long Ago
Revolution #49
Touched by Fire
Nels Hanson
Disguises
Katrina Hays
Simultaneous
Leonore Hildebrandt
Girl With Cumulus
Happy After All
Joseph Kerschbaum
Distance to Here
Michael Lauchlan
Elemental Order
Old Oaks
Aaron Rounds Third
Rebecca Ledbetter
Much
Harriet Levin Millan
Green Fox Fur
We Face Our Own Traumas
Salt
Emmett Lewis
The Conductor
DS Maolalai
Stale and yellow milk
Gordon W. Mennenga
This Highway
Daniel Edward Moore
It’s Not That You Drifted
Seconds Remaining
Wilderness Weary
Philip Newton
Landing on Mars
Roger Pfingston
Caught Moments
Buying Local
Meggie Royer
the diving bell
aubade for my doppelganger
Gerard Sarnat
2020 Tanka
Claire Scott
Opera’s Tragedies
Barry Seiler
Shoe
Pencil
Bill
J.R. Solonche
A Place in the Woods
Shelby Stephenson
Order
What It’s Like to Forget
Racing Toward Clarity
Phillip Sterling
Umbrella
D. E. Steward
Doggerland
Tim Suermondt
The Poem Wrote Itself
The Impulses of Religion
What Comes Next
They Are Never Late the Sweet Early Days
Michael Walker
After the Retreat
Erin Wilson
Fox
Marie Gray Wise
Philadelphia Influenza, 1918
Pui Ying Wong
Lincoln Park
On Quay Bercy
Mark Young
in terms of gear efficiency
From the Pound Cantos: CENTO XXI
ABBAdABBA
Prose
Dan A. Cardoza
The Woodshed
Kathie Giorgio
Let Us Go Then,You & I
Lisa Lebduska
Confessions in Canyonlands
Harriet Levin Millan
You Drove Me
Babak Movahed
Salton Sea
Heather Whited
James, My Wife Today
Contributors' Notes
Carolyn Adams’ poetry and art have appeared in Steam Ticket, Cimarron Review, Topology, Apercus Quarterly, and Blueline Magazine, among others. She is the author of four chapbooks, and has been nominated for a Pushcart prize, as well as for Best of the Net.
Dan Alter’s poems and reviews have been published in journals including Field, Fourteen Hills, Pank, and Zyzzyva; his first collection “My Little Book of Exiles” is forthcoming from Eyewear Press. He lives with his wife and daughter in Berkeley and makes his living as an IBEW electrician. He can be found online at https://danalter.net.
Tony Beyer’s print titles include Anchor Stone, a finalist in the poetry category of the 2018 New Zealand Book Awards, and Friday Prayers (2019), both from Cold Hub Press. Recent poems have appeared in Hamilton Stone Review, Molly Bloom, Mudlark, Otoliths and elsewhere.
Sharon Black, a recently retired librarian, is published in a variety of journals, including The South Carolina Review, Alaska Quarterly Review, Mantis, Poet Lore, Mudfish, Rhino, GW Review, Verse Daily, and Painted Bride Quarterly. Her poetry has been twice nominated for the Pushcart Prize. She lives in Wallingford, PA but more and more these days escapes to Rainbow Lake (Adirondacks) with her husband and dog.
Dan Cardoza’s poetry, fiction, and nonfiction: BlazeVOX, Bull, Cleaver, Coffin Bell, Entropy, Gravel, O:JA&L/Open: Journal of Arts & Letters, New Flash Fiction Review, Poetry Northwest, Spelk, and Your Impossible Voice. Dan’s nominations: Best Micro Fiction, Tiny Molecules, 2020, and Best Poetry, Coffin Bell, 2020.
Michael Carrino is a retired English lecturer at the State University College at Plattsburgh, New York, where he was co-founder and poetry editor of the Saranac Review. His publications include Some Rescues, (New Poets Series, Inc.) Under This Combustible Sky, (Mellen Poetry Press), Café Sonata, (Brown Pepper Press), Autumn’s Return to the Maple Pavilion (Conestoga Press), By Available Light (Guernica Editions), Always Close, Forever Careless (Kelsay Books), and Until I’ve Forgotten, Until I’m Stunned (Kelsay Books), as well as individual poems in numerous journals and reviews. Kelsay Books will publish his In No Hurry this fall.
A Pushcart Prize nominee, R.T. Castleberry is an internationally published poet and critic. His work has appeared in The Alembic, Blue Collar Review, Misfit, White Wall Review, Silk Road and Hamilton Stone Review. Internationally, he’s had poetry published in Canada, Wales, Ireland, Scotland, New Zealand, Portugal. the Philippines and Antarctica. His poetry has appeared in the anthologies: Travois-An Anthology of Texas Poetry, TimeSlice, The Weight of Addition, Anthem: A Tribute to Leonard Cohen, You Can Hear the Ocean: An Anthology of Classic and Current Poetry and Level Land: Poetry For and About the I35 Corridor. He lives and writes in Houston, Texas.
Patrick R. Connelly lives in Harvard, MA. His poems and essays appear in literary magazines in the United States and Europe. Patrick is a member of the Board of Directors of GrubStreet, a creative writing and narrative arts center in Boston.
William Doreski lives in Peterborough, New Hampshire. His most recent book of poetry is Mist in Their Eyes (2021). He has published three critical studies, including Robert Lowell’s Shifting Colors. His essays, poetry, fiction, and reviews have appeared in many journals.
E. J. Evans’s poetry has appeared in several literary journals including Poetry East, Confrontation, New Mexico Poetry Journal, RHINO Poetry and Hamilton Stone Review. I am the author of the poetry collections Conversations With the Horizon (Box Turtle Press) and Ghost Houses (Clare Songbirds, forthcoming), and the chapbook First Snow Coming (Kattywompus Press).
Kathie Giorgio is the author of five novels, two story collections, an essay collection, and two poetry chapbooks. A full-length poetry collection, No Matter Which Way You Look, There Is More To See, was released in September 2020. Her new novel, All Told, will be released in late 2021 by Austin Macauley Publishers. A poetry chapbook, Olivia In Five, Seven, Five; Autism In Haiku, will be released in early 2022, She’s been nominated for the Pushcart Prize in fiction and poetry, and been awarded the Outstanding Achievement Award from the Wisconsin Library Association, the Silver Pen Award for Literary Excellence, the Pencraft Award for Literary Excellence, and the Eric Hoffer Award in Fiction. She is the director and founder of the international creative writing studio, AllWriters’ Workplace & Workshop LLC.
Howie Good is the author of more than two dozen poetry collections, including most recently The Death Row Shuffle (Finishing Line Press), The Trouble with Being Born (Ethel Micro Press), and Gunmetal Sky (Thirty West Publishing).
Nels Hanson has worked as a farmer, teacher and contract writer/editor. His fiction received the San Francisco Foundation’s James D. Phelan Award and Pushcart nominations in 2010, 2012, 2014 and 2016. His poems received a 2014 Pushcart nomination, Sharkpack Review’s 2014 Prospero Prize, and 2015 and 2016 Best of the Net nominations.
Katrina Hays Katrina Hays’ writing recently appeared or is forthcoming in Apalachee Review, Bellingham Review, Crab Creek Review, The Hollins Critic, Hubbub, and Tahoma Literary Review, among others. She worked as a river guide and opera singer, managed to pick up an MFA from the Rainier Writing Workshop along the way, and was a guest instructor for that program for many years. She lives in Bend, Oregon. Her web page is at katrinahays.com.
Leonore Hildebrandt is the author of the poetry collections The Work at Hand (Deerbrook Editions, 2018), The Next Unknown (Pecan Grove Press, 2014) and Where You Happen to Be (Letterpress chapbook, University of Maine, 2011). Her poems and translations have appeared in the Cafe Review, Cerise Press, the Cimarron Review, Denver Quarterly, Harpur Palate, Poetry Daily, Rhino, Salzburg Poetry Review, and the Sugar House Review, among other journals. She was nominated several times for a Pushcart Prize. Originally from Germany, Leonore lives “off the grid” in Harrington, Maine. See her web page at http://leonorehildebrandt.com.
Joseph Kerschbaum’s most recent publications include Mirror Box (Main St Rag Press, 2020) and Distant Shore of a Split Second (Louisiana Literature Press, 2018). Joseph has been awarded grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Indiana Arts Commission. His work has appeared in journals such as Poetry Distillery, failbetter, Panoply, Flying Island, The Battered Suitcase, Main St. Rag, and The Delinquent. Joseph lives in Bloomington, Indiana with his family.
Michael Lauchlan has contributed to many publications, including New England Review, Virginia Quarterly Review, The North American Review, Valparaiso Poetry Review, Sugar House Review, Louisville Review, Poet Lore, Southern Poetry Review, and Lake Effect. His most recent collection is Trumbull Ave., from WSU Press (2015).
Rebecca Ledbetter is a poet and artist, who seeks to understand the relationships and interactions we experience every day, and how those connections shape us. Sometimes dreamy, sometimes more serious, she writes the words in a poem in a carefully curated way, much the same way a painter brushes strokes onto a canvas. She received her BA in Communications and Studio Art from Denison University in 2013, and since then has showcased work in Philadelphia, Granville, OH and Martha’s Vineyard, and currently resides and works in Philadelphia, PA.
Currently the director of the College Writing Program at Wheaton College in Massachusetts, Lisa Lebduska has published work in such journals as The Tishman Review, Lunch Ticket, Adelaide, Writing on the Edge, and Narrative, among others. She lives in Salem, Connecticut, not too far from Devil's Hopyard where she likes to hike.
Emmett Lewis is currently an MFA candidate in poetry at Columbia University. He studied philosophy at Vassar College and then spent a couple of years farming. He also reviews poetry submissions for the Columbia Journal.
DS Maolalai is agraduate of English Literature from Trinity College in Dublin and recently returned there after four years abroad in the UK and Canada. His writing has appeared in such publications as 4'33', Strange Bounce and Bong is Bard, Down in the Dirt Magazine, Out of Ours, The Eunoia Review, Kerouac's Dog, More Said Than Done, Star Tips, Myths Magazine, Ariadne's Thread, The Belleville Park Pages, Killing the Angel and Unrorean Broadsheet, by whom he was twice nominated for the Pushcart Prize. He has also had his work published in two collections, Love is Breaking Plates in the Garden and Sad Havoc Among the Birds.
Gordon W. Mennenga earned his MFA from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop where he studied poetry writing with Donald Justice. He’s taught creative writing and film studies at DePauw University, Oregon State University, and Coe College. His monologues have been featured on National Public Radio, and produced by Iowa City’s Riverside Theatre. His podcast about the life of a writer can be found at: gordonmennenga/writingundertheinfluence.
Harriet Levin Millan. whose poetry and prose appears in this issue, is the author of three books of poetry, The Christmas Show, which Eavan Boland chose for The Barnard New Women Poets Prize and also won the Alice Fay di Castagnola Award from the Poetry Society of America; Girl in Cap and Gown, a National Poetry Series finalist; and My Oceanography. She is also the author of a novel, How Fast Can You Run, based on the life of Michael Majok Kuch, which was excerpted in The Kenyon Review and chosen as a Charter for Compassion Global Read. She holds a MFA from the University of Iowa and teaches creative writing at Drexel University.
Daniel Edward Moore lives in Washington on Whidbey Island. His poems are forthcoming in Lullwater Review, The Meadow, The Chaffin Journal, The Chiron Review, The American Journal of Poetry, The Bitter Oleander, Armstrong Literary Review and Gulf Stream Magazine. He is the author of Boys (Duck Lake Books) and Waxing the Dents (Brick Road Poetry Press).
Babek Movahed holds a bachelor’s and a master’s degree in American literature. He defined the type of writer he wanted to become by examining the prose of writers like Hemingway, Faulkner, and Baldwin. Additionally, Babak received his first publication credit after an original short story was published by his university’s literary magazine. Currently, he works as an assistant director for a private school. Although this position is more related to education, he still maintains his creative writing practices in his free time. Babak's recent works have been published in the The Hungry Chimera, The Blue Mountain Review, and The Main Street Rag.
Philip Newton writes and works with stone in Oregon. His novel, Terrane, was recently published by Unsolicited Press. His poems have appeared in The Roanoke Review, The Jefferson Journal, Calliope and other periodicals.
Roger Pfingston is the author of Something Iridescent, a collection of poetry and fiction, as well as five chapbooks, the most recent being What’s Given from Kattywompus Press. He has poems in recent issues of I-70 Review, Sheila-Na-Gig, Main Street Rag, Innisfree Poetry Journal, Front Range Review, and Valparaiso Poetry Review. In 2020 he was nominated twice for a Pushcart Prize.
Meggie Royer is a Midwestern writer, domestic violence advocate, and the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of Persephone’s Daughters, a literary and arts journal for abuse survivors. She has won numerous awards for her work and has been nominated several times for the Pushcart Prize. She thinks there is nothing better in this world than a finished poem.
Gerard Sarnat’s won San Francisco Poetry’s 2020 Contest/Poetry in Arts First Place Award/Dorfman Prizes, been nominated for Pushcarts/Best of Net Awards. Gerry’s published in Buddhist Poetry Review, Gargoyle, Main Street Rag, New Delta Review, New Haven Poetry, Texas Review, Vonnegut Journal, Brooklyn Review, SF Magazine, LA Review, New York Times; plus by Harvard, Stanford, Dartmouth, Penn, Chicago, Columbia presses. He’s authored collections Homeless Chronicles, Disputes, 17s, Melting The Ice King. Gerry’s a physician who’s built/staffed clinics for the marginalized, Stanford professor, healthcare CEO and serves on Climate Action Now’s board. Gerry’s been married since 1969 with three kids/six grandsons. His website is gerardsarnat.com.
Claire Scott is an award-winning poet who has received multiple Pushcart Prize nominations. Her work has appeared in the Atlanta Review, Bellevue Literary Review, New Ohio Review, Enizagam and Healing Muse among others. Claire is the author of Waiting to be Called and Until I Couldn’t. She is the co-author of Unfolding in Light: A Sisters’ Journey in Photography and Poetry.
Barry Seiler has published four books of poetry, three of them by University of Akron Press. Frozen Falls, the most recent, was a finalist for the Paterson Poetry Prize.. He lives in Roxbury, NY, with his wife Dian and cats. They live happily ever after.
J.R. Solonche has been publishing poetry in magazines, journals, and anthologies since the early 70s. He is the author of 23 books of poetry and coauthor of one other. He lives in the Hudson Valley.
Shelby Stephenson was poet laureate of North Carolina from 2015-18. His recent books: More and Shelby's Lady: The Hog Poems.
Phillip Sterling’s books include two full-length collections of poetry (And Then Snow, Mutual Shores), and five chapbook-length series of poems, the most recent of which, Short on Days, was released from Main Street Rag in June 2020 (after months of quarantine). He is also the author of two collections of short fiction: In Which Brief Stories Are Told (Wayne State U Press 2011) and Amateur Husbandry, a series of micro-fictions narrated by the domestic partner of a yellow horse (Mayapple 2019).
D. E. Steward’s five volumes of Chroma were out in 2018 from Archae Editions in Brooklyn. Chroma is a month-to-month calendar book, the months are continuing to accumulate of which "Doggerland” is one.
Tim Suermondt’s sixth full-length book of poems A Doughnut And The Great Beauty Of The World will be forthcoming from MadHat Press in 2021. He has published in Poetry, Ploughshares, Prairie Schooner, The Georgia Review, Bellevue Literary Review, Stand Magazine, december magazine, On the Seawall, Poet Lore and Plume, among many others. He lives in Cambridge (MA) with his wife, the poet Pui Ying Wong.
Michael Walker is a writer living in Newark, Ohio. He is the author of two published books: 7-22 and The Vampire Henry. He has also seen his stories and poems published in Adelaide Review, PIF, and Fiction Southeast.
Heather Whited graduated from Western Kentucky University in 2006 with a BA in creative writing, somehow graduating on time despite changing her major too many times. She lived in Japan and Ireland before returning to her hometown of Nashville, Tennessee, to obtain her graduate degree in education. She now lives in Portland, Oregon, where she works as a teacher and spends a lot of time with her dog and loves to play board games and smoke the local competition at bar trivia (sometimes). She's been lucky to be published in several literary magazines and be named a finalist in some competitions, too, and is grateful to Hamilton Stone Review for taking a chance on her story.
Erin Wilson's poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Salamander Magazine, Crab Creek Review, takahē, The Prairie Journal, A Magazine of Canadian Literature, Trinity House Review, Pembroke Magazine, San Pedro River Review, The Honest Ulsterman, and elsewhere. Her first collection is At Home with Disquiet, published by Circling Rivers Press. She lives and writes in a small town in northern Ontario, Canada.
Marie Gray Wise’s work has appeared or is forthcoming in various journals including I-70 Review, Tipton Poetry Journal, Post Road, U.S.1 Worksheets, and The Paterson Literary Review. She is a retired English teacher who has lived most of her life in South Jersey (a different country from North Jersey) except for an adventure in San Francisco where she found a husband and dragged him East. She also dabbles in fiction.
Pui Ying Wong was born in Hong Kong. Her new collection of poetry The Feast is forthcoming from MadHat Press in 2021. She is the author of two full-length books of poetry: An Emigrant’s Winter (Glass Lyre Press, 2016) and Yellow Plum Season (New York Quarterly Books, 2010)—along with two chapbooks. She has received a Pushcart Prize. Her poems have appeared in Ploughshares, Prairie Schooner, Plume Poetry, New Letters, Zone 3 and The New York Times, among others. She lives in Cambridge Massachusetts with her husband, the poet Tim Suermondt.
Mark Young's latest collection, The Toast, will be published by Luna Bisonte Prods later in 2021. Recent text &/or visual poetry has appeared in Word For/Word, Synchronized Chaos, Moss Trill, Futures Trading, & SurVision, among other places.
T H E H A M I L T O N S T O N E R E V I E W
Virgens de Guadalupe by Lynda Schor
