Letter from the Editor
By John Hardberger
Moon and Star
Benjamin Green
arroyos
By Marika Guthrie
when you grow up in arizona everyone asks about rattlesnakes
as if they were as common as shoelaces
as if they tied us up from running barefoot through the ocotillo and prickly pear
gathering goatheads on our heels and devil’s snare around our raw, skinny ankles.
the snakes were there but we never thought of them-curled into bright hoops of folkloric death
the arroyos were ours
were ours
were ours…
the snakes were there but we travelled our arroyos with sovereignty
filled our pockets with a wealth of quartz as white and worthless as lost teeth
climbed the branches of the cussing tree– to try to pronounce shit, fuck, damn, and
Tanya is a whore– words scaley, plentiful on the green skin of the great palo verde
once we poked a stick into a bloated dead jackrabbit until maggots unfurled like stars,
like planets, like indifferent moons from the hole we made in its flank…
we watched as if it were the birth of a galaxy…
we watched as if we were the creators of the universe…
sometimes we did not dare enter our arroyos and stood on the rim watching the mad, wild mud soup
of an August monsoon flood– the water red and thick with styrofoam coolers,
Doritos bags, empty packs of menthol 100s, and every now and then a truck tire
we knew snakes could swim, but we never saw it happen
most days our arroyos were as dry as any highway, the threat of snakes unable to keep us from
the dusty, irregular paths that ended at our backgates, wooden or chain-link
we trespassed on each other’s lives and on our own
the house with ghosts that smoked cigarettes at the breakfast nook
the house with the six mormon kids who cut a snickers bar like bread to share
the house where the schizophrenic mother pulled over the fifty gallon fishtank
-the water a shallow ocean on linoleum, the fish golden waves of agony
the house where the stepfather’s eyes opened on thirteenth birthdays
the house where we watched our first porn on VHS from the dozens in plain sight
-a naked woman on a diner counter being rubbed down with Twinkies, yellow
cake and soft cream falling out of her mouth
we drank from puddles in our arroyos, driven by heat and the distance to familiar hose spigots…
in our mouths origin stories tasting of yellow cake and golden fish and ghosts and
nicotine and stepfathers and slivers of candybars and jackrabbit-maggot-stars
and Tanya is a whore…
but never rattlesnakes…
Marika Guthrie
Marika Guthrie is an emerging writer residing in Pueblo, Colorado. She is a nontraditional undergraduate student currently attending CSU-Pueblo, pursuing a major in English with an emphasis in creative writing. Marika is an ardent horsewoman, a sometimes artist, a stumbling philosopher, a poet and writer. Marika has been published in The Baltimore Review, The New Ohio Review, La Piccioletta Barca, The Rappahannock Review, Tempered Steele, and Vortex. Her work will also be featured in The McNeese Review in spring of 2026.
Benjamin Green
Benjamin Green is the author of twelve books including His Only Merit (Finishing Line Press) and the upcoming Old Man Looking through a Window at Night (Main Street Rag); he is also a visual artist employing many different media. At the age of sixty-nine, he hopes his new work articulates a mature vision of the world and does so with some integrity. He resides in Jemez Springs, New Mexico.
