Issue: Volume 36, #1, Spring 2020

224 pages.
In this issue:
Our 35th Anniversary Issue
Fiction
“Community Plot” by Bryan Washington: What can a young man learn about the ways of being in this world from the older neighbor in his building?
“Work Night” by Lysley Tenorio: From her computer, thousands of miles away, Maxima offers a lonely North Dakotan his idea of the perfect woman.
“Before and After” by Elizabeth Reichert: A terrible childhood event may say more about an ex-pat in Hong Kong than he, his wife, or his circle can reckon with.
“Swamp Tyrant” by Santiago José Sánchez: Out camping, two kids navigate the yearning for belonging and the harsh imposition of a Boy’s Mission.
“The Showcase Court” by Mark Chiusano: What could be the catch to an offer to play pick-up basketball on a luxurious estate?
Plus new stories by Peter Orner and Kristen Iskandrian.
Nonfiction
“Cathedrals of Hope” by Lauren Markham: On the 100th anniversary of women’s suffrage, the project of democracy and the right to vote remain contested.
“Behold Us Two Boys Sitting Together” by Dave Madden: “I’m about to tell you about a friendship that’s lasted thirty years and perhaps the first thing to learn is that there are certain subjects we don’t talk about directly.”
Interview
Margaret Wilkerson Sexton talks to John McMurtrie about her road to becoming an author and how her novels examine questions of generational patterns, colorism, and progress.
Poetry
Meg Hurtado Bloom, Lisa Higgs, Troy Jollimore, Debora Kuan, Jennifer Richter, Dujie Tahat, John Sibley Williams, and Emma Winsor Wood.
Art
Anne Siems

Community Plot

by Bryan Washington

Posted on by Zack Ravas

I’d started tending the ex’s plot. The lettuce and the garlic and the turnips. It wasn’t my idea, the apartment complex had a community garden, and of course I’d seen you out there but we didn’t have shit to say to each other. We met on the stairs after my guy left, and it was another few weeks before we spoke. I’d seen you around, though. Sometimes I’d catch you staring. Our eyes met, and you’d look away. You were an old man, living alone, always in the same greasy cardigan and the same burnt brown shoes, which was everything […]

Continue Reading

Alabama Funeral

by Kristen Iskandrian

Posted on by Zack Ravas

The sitter arrived with a Ziploc bag of brightly colored string.“For friendship bracelets,” she said, one eye veering off.“Yes,” Bette said. The sitter’s eye was particularly lazy today; Bette had never gotten used to it, although she herself, when extra tired, had an eye prone to drifting. Bette was aware that she could be, in

Subscribers only: to access this content, you must be a member of ZYZZYVA Studio. Membership is included with any subscription. Subscribe today, or if you are already a subscriber, log in to continue reading. (Read our FAQ for more details, and contact us if you have any trouble logging in.)

[…]

Continue Reading

The Golden State Bundle, Now Available

by ZYZZYVA

Posted on by Zack Ravas
ZYZZYVA Golden State Bundle: No. 117 & No. 119

Within the realm of literature, there is no need to choose one region over the other. Get the Bay Area Issue and the Los Angeles Issue in our Golden State Bundle and enjoy the work of some of the best poets and writers that California has to offer. Together, the issues in the Golden State Bundle boast many of the West Coast’s finest writers, with fiction by Charlie Jane Anders, Jonathan Escoffery, Rita Bullwinkel, Michelle Latiolais, Chia-Chia Lin, Perry Janes, Ingrid Rojas Contreras; essays by Tom Bissell, Lydia Kiesling, and Wendy C. Ortiz; poetry by sam sax, Victoria Chang, Meg […]

Continue Reading

Alabama Funeral

by Kristen Iskandrian

Posted on by Zack Ravas
ZYZZYVA Volume 36, #1, Spring 2020 (No. 118)

The sitter arrived with a Ziploc bag of brightly colored string. “For friendship bracelets,” she said, one eye veering off. “Yes,” Bette said. The sitter’s eye was particularly lazy today; Bette had never gotten used to it, although she herself, when extra tired, had an eye prone to drifting. Bette was aware that she could be, in a multitude of ways, a perfect hypocrite. She was named after Bette Midler, which had always embarrassed her, so she told people she was named after Bette Davis. “So it’s ‘Betty’?” people would ask, and then she’d have to correct them, and they’d […]

Continue Reading

Cathedrals of Hope

by Lauren Markham

Posted on by Zack Ravas

In 2004, when I was first old enough to cast a ballot in a presidential election, I lived in a small Vermont town, population 1,136. It was home to farmland, a cemetery, a snowmobile shop, a church, an elementary school, and a town hall that most days sat empty and unused. The leaky clapboard house my three roommates and I rented was shared with mice that ate through our cupboards and a badger who lodged in an unfinished back room. My roommate Margaret used to sunbathe on our lawn to the occasional honk of a passing car; we all enjoyed […]

Continue Reading

35th Anniversary Issue

by ZYZZYVA

Posted on by ZYZZYVA
ZYZZYVA Volume 36, #1, Spring 2020 (No. 118)

Our 35th Anniversary Issue. Fiction: Bryan Washington, Lysley Tenorio, Elizabeth Reichert, Santiago José Sánchez, Mark Chiusano, Peter Orner, and Kristen Iskandrian. Nonfiction: Lauren Markham, Dave Madden. Interview: Margaret Wilkerson Sexton talks to John McMurtrie. Poetry: Meg Hurtado Bloom, Lisa Higgs, Troy Jollimore, Debora Kuan, Jennifer Richter, Dujie Tahat, John Sibley Williams, and Emma Winsor Wood. Art: Anne Siems. You can purchase a copy of No. 118 here, or order a subscription to ZYZZYVA now. […]

Continue Reading