WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU! SUBMISSIONS WILL OPEN IN FALL 2025! Currently Reading Submissions for Issue 4!

Usually sparing with their words, the time came to speak the truth

I wanted to marry you when I met you, he confessed across the table

Showing up in the restaurant one day, eyes still bright

Handsome, a little weary—his loneliness a crown of thorns.

 

I wanted to marry you when I met you, he confessed across the table

College kids who listened to Bob Dylan, waiting for their real lives to begin

Handsome, a little weary—his loneliness a crown of thorns

They had buried the past long ago—they could start over, couldn’t they?

 

College kids who listened to Bob Dylan, waiting for their real lives to begin

She had never stopped dreaming about him all these years

They had buried the past long ago—they could start over, couldn’t they?

At some point, she realized she’d made a miscalculation (he was better at Math)

 

She had never stopped dreaming about him all these years

Was it a mistake to not tell him about the pregnancy?

At some point, she realized she’d made a miscalculation (he was better at Math)

She had felt trapped—she sometimes imagined they’d be together, but not like that.

 

Was it a mistake to not tell him about the pregnancy?

I have a confession of my own, she begins, holding out a photo

She had felt trapped—she sometimes imagined they’d be together, but not like that

We have a daughter—I gave her up for adoption—she’s in San Francisco.

 

I have a confession of my own, she begins, holding out a photo

Showing up in the restaurant one day, eyes still bright

We have a daughter—I gave her up for adoption—she’s in San Francisco

 

Usually sparing with their words, the time came to speak the truth.

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Diana Donovan is a freelance writer and digital marketing consultant who lives with her husband and daughter in Northern California. A graduate of Brown University, she has participated twice in Quiet Lightning, a San Francisco ‘literary mixtape,’ and her work has been published by Panoplyzine, Plainsongs, Pacific Review, and Not Very Quiet.