Blessings Come in Many Forms

By Leslee W. Kahler My husband and I had been married for about two years when Nekko came into our lives. I was visiting friends when on the way back to my car I spotted a small black and gray cat stuck in a tree. I climbed the tree part way and managed to coax …

Academy Classics: O Tannenbaum

By Thomas Page The tree sort of slumped over. Ornaments scattered all over the ground. On the way down, the tree took out several pictures on the mantle. The ground was covered in broken glass, clay, and porcelain. Their dog, Sparkles, was trying to eat the remains of a surfing Santa. “Well, I’ll get some …

Life Lessons I Learned From My Cat

By Leslee Kahler I have had cats in my life since I was born, I can’t say I owned any of them as any cat owner knows the cat owns you , you don’t own the cat. Over the years I have learned much from my cats, but the greatest lessons I learned were patience, …

Tuna Tortellini with Cream

By John Goodie Eli, the main chef in the kitchen at his family-owned Jewish Ghetto restaurant near Rome’s Trastevere neighborhood, heard a ruckus outside when the sous-chef, Jacob, opened the back door to step out for a cigarette. Eli grew up in that Italian-Jewish kitchen, learning to cook with his grandfather and father, easily mastering …

Herman

By Harvey Huddleston Joanne was such a conniver.  Elliot didn’t know that at the time because like they say in the Bronx, buttah wouldn’t melt in her mouth.  They’d just recently begun working together as legal assistants at a big firm with adjoining desks.  Everyday he’d hear about the problem her rescue group was having.  …

The Tourists of Sargasso Sea and Other Poems

By Thomas Page   The Tourists of the Sargasso Sea  Marine biologists have been baffled by the Sargasso Sea’s tubular tourists— The eel.    The eel  Seem to be the true  Sexless  Ageless  Birthless  Originless creature swimming along the warm streams.    They have baffled the likes of philosophers and psychoanalysts  With their knavish resistance …

Poems by Douglas Young

The Airport Intense faces all around: Black, white, yellow and brown; High expectations mixed with the mundane – No matter the motive, get to that plane. We fervently cling to the notion That the solution is in motion; So everyone’s in a hurry -- So focused, with no time to worry. If we just get …

Art by Jing Kong

    Biography: I love life, nature and animals. I think painting is a way to explore human and animal souls. I like traditional painting, using gouache and ballpoint pen. I get inspiration from interesting pet stories. I try to discover the inner world of animals from paintings. Website: https://www.artwanted.com/cat8080 https://www.artmajeur.com/nickyta-k6 https://fineartamerica.com/profiles/jing-kong.html

Poems by Vivian Wagner

"In Defense of Cat Ladies"   At a certain point you can no longer keep up with the decades: you didn’t see Shrek, have only a tenuous grasp on Pokémon, stopped listening past Smashing Pumpkins, still think of Nirvana as new. There’s only so much a body can take, only so much hype and excitement, …

Dramatic Cat

By John Page