Ben Umayam moved to NYC to write the Great American Filipino Gay Short Story. He worked for pollsters, then became a chef and then retired. He is working that short story in CO. He was published recently by The Midway Journal, BULL, The Phare, , Metaworker, and others. Continue reading Community No. 76 – Ben Umayam
Jonah Meyer is a poet, writer, and editor in North Carolina. His poetry and creative nonfiction has been published widely. Jonah plays guitar and piano, shoots photography, and studies neuroscience and Buddhist philosophy. He serves as Poetry Editor of Mud Season Review and Assistant Poetry Editor with Random Sample Review. Continue reading Community No. 75 – Jonah Meyer
Andrew Rihn is the author of Revelation: An Apocalypse in Fifty-Eight Fights (Press 53, 2020) and the chapbook O Hungry Star (Beir Bua, 2021). From 2019-2021 he wrote The Pugilist, a monthly boxing column for Into the Void magazine. He currently writes for The Fight City, a premier independent boxing site. Continue reading Community No. 74 – Andrew Rihn
Kathy Kremins is a retired public school teacher and coach. Her chapbook Undressing the World is forthcoming (Finishing Line Press, 2022). Kathy’s work appears in Soup Can Magazine, The Night Heron Barks, Lavender Review, The Stillwater Review, Divine Feminist: An Anthology of Poetry & Art by Womxn & Non-Binary Folx, Stay Salty: Life in the Garden State, and other publications. Continue reading Community No. 73 – Kathy Kremins
Abigail Carl-Klassen is a writer, researcher, poet, educator, translator, and activist. Raised in the oil fields of the Permian Basin, she earned an MFA in Bilingual Creative Writing from the UT El Paso. Her work has appeared in ZYZZYVA, Catapult, and Guernica, among others. The 2nd printing of her chapbook, Ain’t Country Like You, is forthcoming from Digging Press. Continue reading Community No. 72 – Abigail Carl-Klassen
A first-generation Romanian American poet and educator, Roxana Cazan is the author The Accident of Birth (Main Street Rag, 2017) and Tethered to the Unexpected (Alien Buddha Press, 2022). She co-edited Voices on the Move: An Anthology by and about Refugees (Solis Press, 2020). Continue reading Community No. 71 – Roxana L. Cazan
henry 7. reneau, jr. does not Twitter, Tik Tok, Facebook, Snapchat, or Instagram. It is not that he is scared of change, or stuck fast in the past; instead, he has learned from experience that the crack pipe kills. His work is published in Superstition Review, TriQuarterly, Poets Reading the News, Prairie Schooner, and Rigorous. Continue reading Community No. 70 – henry 7. reneau, jr.
Before Don Robishaw stopped working he was a Sailor, PCV, world-traveler, professor, and circus roustabout. Most recently he ran educational programs for homeless shelters. ‘Bad Paper Odyssey’ was a semi-finalist in the Digging Press Chapbook Series Competition. Multiple works have appeared in Literary Heist, Drunk-Monkeys, Crack-the-Spine, FFM, and other venues. Continue reading Community No. 69 – Don Robishaw
Christie Cochrell’s work has been published by a wide variety of journals and won several awards. Chosen as New Mexico Young Poet of the Year while growing up in Santa Fe, she’s recently published a volume of collected poems, Contagious Magic. She lives by the ocean in Santa Cruz, California. Continue reading Community No. 68 – Christie Cochrell
Stories by Jeanne Althouse (she/her) have been published in numerous literary journals, most recently in Catamaran Reader, Connotation Press, The Penman Review, The Closed Eye Open, Potato Soup Journal and The Plentitudes Journal. Her work has won several awards, been collected into a Chapbook, and twice nominated for a Pushcart. Continue reading Community No. 67 – Jeanne Althouse
Aida Zilelian is a first generation American-Armenian writer and educator. She is the author The Legacy of Lost Things, recipient of the 2014 Tololyan Literary Award. Continue reading Community No. 66 – Aida Zilelian
She is born knowing how to swim. Her first few days of life, she spends suspended in the plankton with all the other drifters, larval fishes, jellyfishes, just-hatched cephalopods, copepods, diatoms, microscopic flora, plastic nurdles following the ocean’s whims. Continue reading Hybrid No. 2 – Mandy-Suzanne Wong
A stranger called and I picked up my phone.
“Hello, how are you doing today?” said the voice from the other end. The voice belonged to a woman, an older woman. It was deep and luxurious, a perfect balance of grace and authority. Just from that simple hello, I could hear the weight of experience, a lifetime of training in forming the perfect first impression.
Before I met you, we went to the same party, but I don’t remember seeing you there. I like to pretend I was strangely compelled by the sight of you staggering around in a threadbare coat and loosened tie, your lips red from the bottle of wine you clutched, its green neck peeking halfway out of a paper bag. Continue reading Flash No. 26 – Jannitt Ark
A car’s life can be hard to imagine, but maybe not so difficult when the automobile comes back home one last time. Like most objects in the physical universe we occupy, it’s not hard to see when a car is going to wear out. Continue reading Flash No. 25 – Jason Arment
There once was a girl who lived in a little house in a pine wood. The pines were tall and thick with needles, and above them was a clear deep blue sky with large white clouds in it, solid-seeming white clouds that moved swiftly on a brisk wind, like boats on their way to some place or another. Continue reading Flash No. 24 – Lúa Margita Brau
Lena was raised on violin lessons and minimal parental supervision. Maestro Ludwig, her first violin teacher, was spiritually her only family. After early morning lessons, before she went off to school, they liked to relax together on the cool sheets of his unmade bed in his private studio in the Hyatt Regency, her violin lying between them. They smelled plumeria and coconut-scented sunscreen lotion from Kaanapali Beach through the one open window. Continue reading Stories No. 89 – Jeanne Althouse
I cannot rehearse the pathways of smoke, but I spend my entire life on the journey, my one particular part, small, wingless, and flattened. You would not guess it when meeting me alone and my host can be nearly gone, emaciated. I place my eggs upon her hair. But there’s a second host and more further south. I could migrate and release my benefactor. I could trade in my habitat. But in this way deceptive birds might find me sailing. Continue reading Flash No. 23 – Rich Ives
They offered me a job at the clinic near my house, and I took It because I had to keep up with rent while mami visited home country to nurse her mama for three months. I did not mind that It was a graveyard shift since the place was just a few bus stops away. My task was to receive packages and log their arrival in a binder. The delivery men wore khaki overalls and never spoke. As of now, those are the facts I can recall. Continue reading Stories No. 88 – Elinol López
Sticky post
Penn State University would periodically send down these studies on dairy cows. The farmers would have to implement them whether they liked it or not, but it was always the cause of ridicule, of mockery, that the scientists at Penn State hadn’t gotten close to the udders of a single cow, had never been kicked by one, never saw the mastitis their directives were meant to clear up,… Continue reading Flash No. 22 – Richard Krause
You go to flip the omelet over, and it breaks. Ever so gently a turn, like you always do, and it still breaks. The innards are exposed. The eggs will continue to harden and soon burn. Continue reading Flash No. 21 – Josh Dale
The author confesses that this story has been written entirely by mistake. It begins with the mistake of an alarm clock opening and keeps piling them on: a stereotypical main character, a two-dimensional significant other, an unconvincing villain. Continue reading Flash No. 20 – KP Vogell
In a brothel outside of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, an English archaeologist finds a clay tablet with Latin writings. After careful study, historians believe it is the reproduction of a letter written by John the Apostle. Continue reading Flash No. 19 – JP Infante
Read the Medication Guide that comes with AMBIEN before you begin taking the pill, or unless you can’t sleep. Which is ironic. Continue reading Flash No. 18 – Denise Tolan
I am folding my mom’s fancy clothes. Bright patterned dresses and diaphanous floral blouses from Bloomingdale’s. Bespoke wool pants, now impossibly baggy, from a shop on Madison. All the finery she once wore to Broadway plays and opera at the Met, to museums and lunches at upscale Manhattan restaurants. Continue reading Flash No. 17 – Sue Mell
You are no earth-bound love
Spoke the girl to the God of the Sun. Continue reading Hybrid No. 1 – Emma Eisler
In today’s Community, we are honored to re-introduce prose and poetry by Andrew Rihn, Ben Umayam, and Chris Vola. Andrew Rihn The Pugilist #15: Rocky and Catholic Meatmaking “I’ve seen the movie Rocky, I don’t know, like a hundred times. (OK not really, but still a lot.) Despite the repeated viewings, there are two scenes I always misremember…” Into the VoidNovember 15, 2020 ———————- The Pugilist #18: … Continue reading Community No. 65
In today’s Community, we are honored to re-introduce prose and poetry by Christie Cochrell and Alex Wells Shapiro. Christie Cochrell Death in Tesuque “My father and I left Tesuque on Monday as soon as it got light. So when they found the body in the swimming pool later that morning, strangled and ingloriously dead, they guessed we’d had something to do with it…” Fiction on … Continue reading Community No. 64
In today’s Community, we are honored to re-introduce poetry and prose by Juan Wynn, Jr. and Jeanne Althouse. Juan Wynn, Jr. For All the Half-Children “The first time someone referred to you as my half-brother…” ———————- Portrait of Enduring Love as a Seasonal Haircut “Two years ago, my mother tradedthick ropes of kite string dreadsfor an afro cloud of frost…” ———————- When You Hum, I’m … Continue reading Community No. 63
In today’s Community, we are honored to re-introduce poetry and prose by Lucia Orellana Damacela and Andi Boyd. Lucia Orellana Damacela Sifting “a remote control morning. baking shows. digitized feelings. cyber social distance. video-called closeness. the screen the new skin. some earrings and a navy sweater over pjs an ensemble…” PankAugust 11, 2020 ———————- At Sea “The boat tremblesas if it has seen an old … Continue reading Community No. 62
In today’s Community, we are honored to re-introduce prose and poetry by Denise Tolan and by Zoë Biggs. Denise Tolan Mercury Rising “I see my dead father from time to time. He drives through our old neighborhood in a late model Mercury;…” Crack the SpineMay 20, 2020 ———————- Thank a Bad Girl “There are, of course, bad girls. Bad girls who open wide for a Xanax … Continue reading Community No. 61
In today’s Community, we are honored to re-introduce poetry and prose by Kathy Kremins and Merridawn Duckler. Kathy Kremins Blowing That Trumpet Like Miles “Full moon on Friday the 13th radiated circles of light like the slowly slapping waves of a low Jersey tide, luminous white, a queen wearing a crown…” The Night Heron BarksSummer 2020 Merridawn Duckler First Patty, then Others “We had never … Continue reading Community No. 60
In today’s Community, we are honored to re-introduce prose by Bob MacKenzie and Jon Shorr. Bob MacKenzie In the Midst of Things “in empty streets of locked doorsshuttered windows and the deadbodies on flatbeds to be buried…” Poetry and COVIDNovember 16, 2020 ———————- Amy “Sandy is in the living room; the sitting room, as her mother so quaintly insists on calling it. This had been … Continue reading Community No. 59
In today’s Community, we are honored to re-introduce poetry by Summer J. Hart and prose by Jim Ross. Summer J. Hart Boy Crazy “Nadine belongs to an owl now. They imprinted while I was on vacation. I scowl at my hot pink crop-top & try to pull it down over my belly button. Boy Crazy is printed in puff letters across my chest…” WaxwingFebruary 15, 2020 ———————- … Continue reading Community No. 58
In today’s Community, we are honored to re-introduce prose by C. Adán Cabrera and Jenny Shank. C. Adán Cabrera A Working Class Prayer “for my father, who wakes up in the dark, and who through storm or errant sickness must still ferry strangers to whomever may be waiting for them on the other side…” 433 MagazineMay 2020 ———————- La Siguanaba “The way the story goes, … Continue reading Community No. 57
In today’s Community, we are honored to re-introduce stories and poetry by Steve Henn and D. E. Fulford. Steve Henn Are You Picking Up What I’m Putting Down / Elegy for my friend April, Gone these 20 years “My GF tells meher new friend likes to lift I say I prefer to put down.Not to criticize your fitness…“ The Broadkill ReviewSeptember 2020 ———————- a Small … Continue reading Community No. 56
In today’s Community, we are honored to re-introduce poetry by henry 7. reneau, jr. and stories by Andrew Stancek. henry 7. reneau, jr. Who speak Sass like Scripture? “Who the outside agitator…” Superstition ReviewDecember 1, 2020 ———————- Every Angry Black Man Could Give A Fuck About Post-Racial Politically Correct Rhetoric. That Is The Same Lie Willie Lynch Used To Chain The Minds Of Slaves. “The … Continue reading Community No. 55
In today’s Community, we are honored to re-introduce stories by Annie Dawid and Tony Press. Annie Dawid The Closer You Were, the Less You Knew “When Jules drops Ina off for the procedure, he kisses her deeply, embarrassingly, in the back of the cab and says, “Last time I caress the dear old face of the dear old gal I married.” SequestrumSpring 2020 ———————- Sacred … Continue reading Community No. 54
In today’s Community, we are honored to re-introduce stories by Paul Beckman and Ann Graham. Paul Beckman Scrub-a-Dub-Dub “It’s a quarter of seven and time to put Henry to bed or my daughter will be all over my case and blame me if he’s late getting up in the morning and cranky from lack of sleep and he only wants to watch the end of … Continue reading Community No. 53
DAWN CORRIGAN Dawn Corrigan has published poems and prose in a number of journals and anthologies, and her debut novel, an environmental mystery, was published in 2014. She works in the affordable housing industry and lives in Myrtle Grove, Florida. Title: The Mystery of Titian Hair First Line(s): If there’s one thing I knew growing up, it’s that I was working class. Or lower middle … Continue reading Community No. 52
PETRULA LAUDATO Petrula Laudato’s fiction has appeared in Haunted Waters Press, Panoplyzine, The Magnitizdat Literary, The Ocotillo Review, and Crack The Spine. She lives in Boston, Massachusetts. Title: The October I Am Sixteen First Line(s): The October I am sixteen I tiptoe out of my mom’s small pink kitchen and meet a smiling, middle-aged man in a park, only a broken swing and some crushed … Continue reading Community No. 51
RC DEWINTER RC deWinter’s poetry is anthologized in New York City Haiku (NY Times, 2017), Uno: A Poetry Anthology (Verian Thomas, 2002), in print in 2River View, Meat For Tea: The Valley Review, Pink Panther Magazine, Down in the Dirt, Scarlet Leaf Review, Genre Urban Arts and in numerous online literary journals. Title: Being a Bishop First Line(s): yesterday having discovered late in the game i am no queen only a … Continue reading Community No. 50
JAMAL ANTHONIE MICHEL Jamal Anthonie Michel is an English Literature teacher in Durham. His work has appeared in Lunch Ticket, Apogee Journal, and Linden Avenue Literary Journal, to name a few. His future plans include pursuing an MFA in creative writing for film and television. Title: Nino’s First Line(s): “Just picking up,” I say to the woman at the counter, smiling. She’s got flour on her … Continue reading Community No. 49
Letters to Flowers We stand in that field. The sun traces you in gold and you shine from behind, with one hand resting on the rough stone. The stone rises up to your fingers, needing your touch like you need its grey assurance. There is a lot of necessity sitting heavy in the July humidity. The grass a sweet shade of green, patiently waiting for … Continue reading Essay No. 11 – Simona Zaretsky
_ Tyson vs. Francis Jan 29, 2000 MEN Arena, Manchester, England No prophet is accepted in his own country: a familiar ring in a foreign land, Mike Tyson takes refuge inside a Brixton police station and asks by bullhorn to be broken out. A British newspaper bought advertising space on the soles of Francis’s shoes, anticipating the front page photos of him laid low, their … Continue reading Essay No. 10 – Andrew Rihn
Essay No. 9 – THE WRITER ARCHETYPE By Anna Kaye-Rogers Continue reading Essay No. 9 – Anna Kaye-Rogers
Stories No. 66 – The Limbo Meet-up Group by Trista Hurley-Waxali Continue reading Stories No. 66 – Trista Hurley-Waxali
Stories No. 65 – A Nice Boy by Raffi Boyadjian Continue reading Stories No. 65 – Raffi Boyadjian
Stories No. 64 – Strangely Quiet by Kevin Richard White Continue reading Stories No. 64 – Kevin Richard White
Essay No. 8 – DELIVERANCE by David Nicholas Rigel Continue reading Essay No. 8 – David Nicholas Rigel
Copyright 2013 - 2022 | Digging Press LLC | All rights reserved. | 130 W. Pleasant Avenue, Suite 307 | Maywood, New Jersey 07607
ISSN 2641-9262
