“The bride and groom grinned the way we did then, “The hash has been hand pressed with tea
into little cakes,
then heated over coals
by the gardener in the backyard
of your hotel in Kabul.”
with a mouth full of promise,
believing that even when it finally got dark,
our hearts would glow fluorescent,
for we had stopped the world from spinning
and would always be together just like this.”
“Elsewhere, a biblical hurricane,
but by me the Tchefuncte is motionless,
a mirror for cypress trees, and the lone chaos
is kids cannonballing for Jesus.”
“On February 28, 1979, I got dressed for another day of sixth grade in my newest blue jeans, a knit sweater, and a red satin coat Mom and I had found at Second Act used clothing. I loved that shiny red coat with the wide buckle, but I never wore any of those things again.
Coming home from school, I’d left the 6 far down the platform on the first warm, spring-is-coming day. I felt good. It hadn’t been long since Lindsay had stopped taking me, and it was the very first trip where I felt I can do this! This is my neighborhood, and I belong here, too!
I got off that train and made the mistake of letting my good mood show. I accidentally smiled at a boy on the platform. (Stupid! I’d believe afterwards. You never ever smile.)”
“My mother turned to me and said,
look, his skin is so soft, touch him,
and she held his hand, stroked it
in a way I’d never seen her do in life.”
“The bride and groom grinned the way we did then,
with a mouth full of promise,
believing that even when it finally got dark,
our hearts would glow fluorescent,
for we had stopped the world from spinning
and would always be together just like this.”
“God is a little girl with mud on her hands. She crafts the soft skull of an infant from the earth, cradles it into a face, thumbs settling into eye sockets, an index finger smoothing the angles of a triangle nose. A stick descends from the heavens to carve a mouth, to pierce nostrils and pupils. The mud baby is born, the size of two fists. It lies limp in the girl’s hands, the red clay staining her skin. Creation is messy. The girl wipes the mess away on her dress, but the red remains.”
Reproductive Rites: Writing the Right to Choose – A Series of 4 Generative Writing Workshops Presented on Zoom by CALYX Press, Facilitated by Laura Rosenthal This series of four generative writing workshops and a final group reading will support participants interested in writing about reproductive choices and experiences, regardless of genre. We invite both experienced
Burning Down the Haunted House (Trope): How Architecture Amplifies Horror: Craft Talk *** NEW DATE October 24, 2025 *** Virtual (Zoom)COST: $40 This 75-minute craft talk explores how architectural elements in literature reflect and intensify horror, tracing a path from Poe’s “The Fall of the House of Usher” to contemporary works like “In the Dream House” and “Model
Photo credit: OSU CLA photographer, Blake Brown. Balancing academic deadlines, work responsibilities, and a personal life is no small feat for a college student. Yet during her undergraduate years at Oregon State University, Tayah Kohler not only kept pace—she distinguished herself. Through a funded internship with CALYX Press, a historic feminist publishing house based in
CALYX is excited to feature an exploratory new interview with novelist Jean Hegland. Hegland’s new novel, Here in This Next New Now, a companion book to her 1996 debut, Into the Forest, has been released in France. Debbra Palmer’s interview with Hegland covers a wide range of topics, including dystopian themes, fire, taboo, community, gender,
“they sent me flowers
the summer you died
as if more death was a consolation—”
Our very first CALYX Live reading brought the powerful voices of women writers off the page and into the Zoom room—and we’re still glowing. To everyone who joined us: thank you. Your presence, your listening, your applause—it meant everything. To our readers: your words lit the room with courage, truth, and artistry. You reminded us
“Girl-shaped things guzzle Sylvia Plath
SlimFast shakes for breakfast
eat their own fingernails for lunch”
“On the walk home redwings shrill as you hum the “Bogoró ditse” (sixth movement, “Rejoice, O Virgin”), which starts in a slow, solemn whisper and then soars into an exalted alto duet. You would love to sing that duet, but Fred will recruit professionals. You altos joke that Rachmaninoff must have had an alto mistress, because the Vespers gives all the gorgeous melodies to them. The sopranos, who normally get all the gorgeous melodies, joke that they don’t mind being your accessories, but they do.
You tie your raincoat around your waist. The sticky things pull, which makes you hunch over, which makes you think about old age. A rare sunny day in a birdy wetland—at least you’ll be able to do this when you’re old. You think, I suppose it’s time to think about death.
And that’s enough of that.”
“Once, I was my brother’s subject. He controlled
time, light moving across
my face in steady increments”
“This morning I watched a kinglet
—a bird so quick it often evades
human gaze—flit only a foot
from my husband’s face. I watched
the corners of his eyes lift.”
“Jerry is curled around the steering wheel, his head pivoting back and forth as he contemplates passing. He edges closer and closer to the truck’s rear bumper, when an errant rock dislodges from behind its left mudflap. The rock hits their windshield like spit in the face. “Motherfucker,” Jerry mutters. To Miriam, it looks like practically nothing, just a faint indent in the glass, but she knows that by tomorrow it will have spread across the windshield. Somebody will have to repair it.”
“Dark still. Her father loads her arms with bottles of the Jersey’s milk,
and wordless, turns her out under the stern Iowa stars.
She is hardly taller than the snowdrifts.
Stocking-capped head down, she sets out to meet the disapproving wind.”
“The speaker of the poem, “V. Simon the Cyrene,” admits, On all sides I am jostled / by witnesses of an execution. / They say the man had a knife / and the guards shot him down. Drawing poetic (if sobering) parallels between the Nazarene and the dead man (both killed by the state), Watson experiences painful realities that probably more closely resemble those of marginalized communities in first-century Jerusalem than the canonical Gospels portray.”
“Dark still. Her father loads her arms with bottles of the Jersey’s milk,
and wordless, turns her out under the stern Iowa stars.
She is hardly taller than the snowdrifts.
Stocking-capped head down, she sets out to meet the disapproving wind.”
“Say you thought you were pregnant. But you’re eighteen, newbie freshman on campus, hours from your boyfriend, hours from home. Wise enough to bring a couple of pregnancy tests with you to school, ones you made the boyfriend purchase at a drugstore miles from your hometown because, you know, people talk. But this is 1979, and those tests don’t work until you’re a few weeks along. It’s not like today, where you blink and find out you’re pregnant before you even miss a period. If you’re retro enough to still be menstruating.”
“The speaker of the poem, “V. Simon the Cyrene,” admits, On all sides I am jostled / by witnesses of an execution. / They say the man had a knife / and the guards shot him down. Drawing poetic (if sobering) parallels between the Nazarene and the dead man (both killed by the state), Watson experiences painful realities that probably more closely resemble those of marginalized communities in first-century Jerusalem than the canonical Gospels portray.”
“I never thought I’d leave
until I realized it was okay
if he only remembered me as a weight.”
“Gauging others’ happiness by her own preference for company, Will’s mom took Will’s introversion for depression. Her mom always nudged her to make friends. Meet boys. Make boyfriends. Will wondered if teen pregnancy would’ve set her mom at ease, convinced her of Will’s joie de vivre and put to rest her insistence on the pixie cut.”
Wednesday, April 16th – 5:30 p.m. Pacific time – Register now to receive the event link and updates Join us for a free virtual reading featuring poets and prose writers from the latest issue of CALYX Journal as they bring their words to life. This is a time to gather, to listen, and to celebrate
Thursday, May 15th – Zoom5:30-7:00 pm Pacific – 8:30-10:00 pm Eastern———->>> Zoom Registration – This is a free event <<<———- Join us for an insightful panel discussion exploring the resilience, creativity, and necessity of women’s voices in times that challenge artists and writers. New York Times Best Selling Author, Eula Biss, is the author of
CALYX is excited to feature an immersive new interview with poet Jennifer A. Reimer by Piotr Gwiazda. Reimer’s new collection, Keşke (Airlie Press, 2022), features poems that are, in Gwiazda’s words, formally inventive, often dialogic if not multivoiced, working with lyric and epic traditions. His interview with Reimer covers her experiences in Turkey, the modern retelling
CALYX Press has decided to leave Twitter X and make the move to BlueSky, a rapidly growing social platform. As a feminist press that has been publishing works of literature by women, trans, and non-binary writers for over 50 years, CALYX has always valued creating spaces for dialogue, connection, and inspiration. The decision to shift
Last month, CALYX Journal hit a major milestone that we’ve been working toward for years: we now have subscribers in all 50 states! This achievement became official in December 2024, when we welcomed readers from Louisiana, Alabama, Arkansas, Nebraska, and Oklahoma—the final states to join our community of supporters. Reaching every corner of the country
