A deluge of voices constantly reminds us that the world we see is hopelessly broken. Day after day, it becomes more apparent, and we can hardly ignore it. Yet we desperately want to. We want the world to be whole and the sunshine and rainbows to flood our days. Without even realizing it, we begin to believe hopeful lies to

In a small West African city, dust clings to and thickly layers everything in sight. The impenetrable haze of harmattan settles over the city. Harmattan is a mixture of Saharan sand, smoke, and dust that settles in thick haze over much of sub-Saharan Africa. The distant mountains lie shrouded behind its stifling fortification. Countless tendrils of smoke from cooking fires

“The value of the myth is that it takes all the things we know and restores to them the rich significance which has been hidden by ‘the veil of familiarity.’” -C.S. Lewis I set my alarm and tug the blankets to my nose. Tomorrow, I’ll be Sisyphus again, minus the biceps. Before I knew the world was gray

If you walk a winter’s night, Listen, and you will hear The shrieking wind evade your sight And cry into your ear. It whips away at flowers, And the roses bow their heads, Acknowledging the power Of the singing silver thread Which leaps about the outcrops, And laughs with the ravine, And whistles past the cave tops Without once

Higgledy-Piggledy Hades’ Persephone Six Months in Underworld Darkness and Cling.     Ceres, or Demeter, Extra-possessively Calls for her Daughter to Usher the Spring.

There’s nothing like turning to find only ocean. Everywhere. To know that it would take a day or more just to find land. It was a darker night than I’d ever known, as I’d only known the night of land, with all its light and rushing. Paul and I were on the top of a cruise ship,

To read the first two parts of “In the Dark,” check out Volume 2, Issues 5 and 6 in the Inkwell Literary Magazine’s online archive. Four people huddled together, rushing to City Hall. Marty pushed in the lead, and Gemma, Ellis, and Wade tagged along behind. The others had headed straight for the dark blocks in order to get

To read the past parts of “Pirate Hunters,” check out Volume 2, Issues 2, 3, 5, and 6 in the Inkwell Literary Magazine’s online archive. Red. Blood Red. That’s what the sky looked like that morning. Any seaman worth his salt knew what that meant. In my mind I could see the dark clouds laughing thunderously as they

“My, my, Lindsay, that is quite the stack of books you have there.” Mrs. Nelson pulled her reading glasses lower on her nose to scrutinize the stack of books that Lindsay thunked on the library desk. The red beads along Mrs. Nelson’s glasses chain clattered together with her movement. “Are you planning on reading all,”—she paused to count

The woman dipped the sturdy oars into the glasslike reflection below, rippling the face of the moon with hushed strokes. Wish, wish, breathed the lake in response to the foreign touch. She directed the oaken boat toward the castle standing on the other shore; the vessel glided along its invisible course without so much as a strain from the woman’

The turtle tank gurgled softly in the corner of the classroom. I watched the turtle heads poke up for air before ducking back under the water. My seven-year-old self wanted to go swimming. I fiddled with a long, thin piece of wood that had marks and numbers evenly spaced along the edge. What had Mom called it? Miss Hawkins stood