Emerge Literary Journal: 2025
Editor’s Note
Winter’s now gone. Spring has sprung. While this year I welcome the warmth of the sun, the fresh green grass, the promise of birdsong, I also remember there were times when winter seemed to last beyond the months of January, February, March. We all face periods of great loss and sorrow. It is during those bleak days that we may believe we’ll never find our way out of the cold. Most of the time, however, we do. And we grow.
The double issue 33/34 honors those moments. Grief lives in many of the stories and poems in this wonderful issue, but over time, sometimes over many seasons, new perspectives share the space. Ghosts visit. Lodestars guide. Humor says hello.
It is my hope that you will pull up a chair, maybe beside a tree, and spend time with Issue 33/34. Find peace among the pages. Beauty in the offerings.
XOXO
Diane
Be Well. Write Well. Read Well.
Poetry
silueta || Margalit Katz
And Then || Christine Pennylegion
Ode to the Sphenoid Bone || Alison Granucci
After the Election Day Launch of LignoSat | Solidarity Postcards || Diane LeBlanc
Kudzu, like racism (according to Alice Walker) || Lilith Acadia
Attic Abecedarian || Sofia Bagdade
Moins Jolie | Plan à Trois || Grace Bialecki
Bethlehem ii | Merilyn Chang
Freedom | Photosynthesis Reversed || Candice Kelsey
August | April || Daniel Simonds
Wellness || Jackie Delaney
Mute Project || Elizabeth Wing
Sisters | Cento for the Future Abbess || William Ross
New York is Officially Deemed a Humid Sub-Tropical Climate || Daniel Brennan
A House Moving, or How I Became Myself at 3 || Susan Rich
Esperanza Corner
Marked || Linda Parsons
Pyrocene || Shantell Powell
Cuckoo || Laurie Klein
I Am the Feeling of Falling || Charlotte Murray
Our eyes are nothing like the sun || Michael Wilkinson
Once Human || Toby Grossman
Substance || A. Riel Regan
Burn Patterns of the Mind || Dana Wall
ELJ believes that #mentalillnessawareness and #endingthestigma are of paramount importance. We believe in the necessity of sharing our mental illness and trauma stories to facilitate writing through illness and create broader awareness. We’ve created this corner to allow writers to not only share their stories but to be home to those who share in their experiences.
Creative Non-Fiction
Water Child || Karen Paul
Emergency Chocolate || Anca L. Szilaggi
The Alphabet || Andy Young
Lit Across Cultures || Jesse Curran
I waited for the sunrise || Bernadette Geyer
What They Said || Jacqueline Goyette
Bitter Solace || Katherine Silver-Hajo
Fall Is a Garage Sale || Olga Katsovskiy
In the Dark, I worry || Sharon Goldberg
Where You Got That Tan || Elizabeth Collis
Protocol: Generating a stable partner with patience and frequent reassurance || Andrea Lius
Cost-Benefit Analysis || Itto Outini
Going Solo || Karla Jynn
The Final Request || Diane Payne
Fiction
No place like a Kaleidoscope || Pegah Ouji
The Coldest Night || Matthew Daddona
Blue Gouramis || Kathryn Petruccelli
Signs of Life || Kyle Weik
The Places You’re Not || Patience Mackarness
A Word in Edgeways || Nora Nadjarian
The First Migration || Jenny Wong
“What Do You Mean You’re Bilingual?” My Therapist Asks || Norie Suzuki
Crumbs || Mikki Aronoff
Do You Want to Become a Wolf || Elena Zhang
In the Witch House, in the Night || Beth Sherman
That Time I Was Almost Hypnotized by the School of Bait Fish Under the Dock as I Told You About the Abortion I Got When I Was Forty-Nine || Elizabeth Rosen
Twister || Sarp Sozdinler
Application for an entry level secretarial job completed by a woman in her mid forties || Jay McKenzie
Midge and the Red Blazer || Lisa Thornton
Things That Start with Butter || Ellis Shuman
The Desert Apothecary || Lorette C. Luzajic
Memorial in a Taco Bell Parking Lot || Erin Jamieson
Emerge Literary Journal 