A day more beautiful
Photo: Sorbie Farm, Salem, OH, Hanna Family Archives (circa 1958) It was a day, her uncle said, more beautiful than it had any right…
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Orange silk
A splash of brilliant orange between many layers. A green dress, moth-eaten, in which she had once danced with her uniformed father amidst the…
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Muscle and bone
I was sitting at the kitchen table on a rare lazy Saturday morning—no swimming lessons, no birthday parties, no sleepovers. My wife was still…
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Fidelity and fecundity
Editor’s note: Each Thursday, we feature a throwback piece from Topology’s predecessor, catapult magazine. In this essay from 2009, Gary Guthrie explores the fruit…
Read MoreApple Jacks, Affairs, and Separation
It wasn’t the nights spent alone that forced my decision to be made but the mornings he came home. In the night, there was…
Read MoreDeath & Taxes
But you have missed the snowdrops’ promised rise Again, buried me in a blizzard of forms As surely as you have gone to the worms,…
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White on rice
When we return from our honeymoon, I learn immediately from my Korean elders at church that my chief duty as wife is to fatten…
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Border crossing
For two years, my daily commute included the international border crossing from Ciudád Juarez to El Paso, Texas, and back. I was a U.S….
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Sounds like home
Werner likes to crouch in his dormer and imagine radio waves like mile-long harp strings, bending and vibrating over Zollverein, flying through forests, through…
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Water
“Water,” they all say, one after the other around the table. “Water.” “Water.” “Water.” “Water.” The waitress turns to me with a smile, pen…
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