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    • Issue 1
    • Issue 2
    • Issue 3 >
      • Judges: Issue 3
      • Contributors: Issue 3
    • Issue 4 >
      • Judges: Issue 4
      • Contributors: Issue 4
      • Poetry: Krista Bell
      • Poetry: Josh Garrett
      • Poetry: Erica McKeen
      • Poetry: Katharine O'Reilly
      • Poetry: Victoria Wiebe
      • Poetry: Eric Zadrozny
      • Creative Nonfiction: Ryan Bates
      • Creative Nonfiction: Devin Golets
      • Creative Nonfiction: Jonas Trottier
      • Experimental Writing, Film Sound: Rachel Ganzewinkel
      • Creative Nonfiction: Victoria Wiebe
      • Fiction: Raquel Farrington
      • Fiction: Yulia Lobacheva
      • Fiction: Alexander Martin
      • Fiction: Tiffany Shepherd
      • Fiction: Jonas Trottier
      • On the Night Before Your Father's Funeral, By Katharine O'Reilly
      • Market Blooms By Robyn Obermeyer
      • All That Glitters By Julia Cutt
      • Mosaic By Evan Pebesma
      • love song 2 By Joy Zhiqian Xian
      • Student Writer in Residence: Steve Slowka
    • Issue 5 >
      • Judges: Issue 5
      • Contributors: Issue 5
      • Poetry: Rayna Abernethy
      • Poetry: Chelsea Brimstin
      • Poetry: Natalie Franke
      • Poetry: Kevin Heslop
      • Poetry: Katarina Huellemann
      • Poetry: Cara Leung
      • Poetry: Tamara Spencer
      • Poetry: Travis Welowsky
      • Poetry: Victoria Wiebe
      • Creative Nonfiction: Lyndsay Fearnall
      • Creative Nonfiction: Gary Jackson
      • Fiction: Patricia Arhinson
      • Fiction: Lyndsay Fearnall
      • Fiction: Levi Hord
      • Fiction: Richard Joseph
      • Fiction: Erica McKeen
      • Experimental Writing: Laura McKinstry
      • Experimental Writing: Brittany Renaud
      • Short Film: Ethan Radomski
      • ALFRED R. POYNT AWARD IN POETRY >
        • Poynt Award: Emma Croll-Baehre
        • Poynt Award: Robyn Obermeyer
        • Poynt Award: David Witmer
    • Issue 6 >
      • Judges: Issue 6
      • Contributors: Issue 6
      • Ficton: Sam Boer
      • Ficton: Sydney Brooman
      • Ficton: Erica McKeen
      • Ficton: Esther Van Galen
      • Creative Nonficton: Erica McKeen
      • Creative Nonficton: Brittany Tilstra
      • Creative Nonficton: Nathan Wright-Edwards
      • Poetry: Miriam Ahmed-Gawel
      • Poetry: Chelsea Brimstin
      • Poetry: Rachael Hofford
      • Poetry: Elana Katz
      • Poetry: Erica McKeen
      • Poetry: R. A. Robinson
      • Poetry: Elizabeth Sak
      • Experimental Writing: Sydney Brooman
      • Experimental Writing: Erica McKeen
      • Experimental Writing: Brittany Renaud
      • Experimental Writing: Brittany Renaud
      • Short Film: Dejvi Dashi
      • Short Film: Matthew Carr
    • Issue 7 >
      • Contributors: Issue 7
      • Judges: Issue 7
      • Poetry: Michelle Baleka
      • Poetry: Jenny Berkel
      • Poetry: Kevin Heslop
      • Poetry: Katarina Huellemann
      • Poetry: Nathan Little
      • Poetry: Erica McKeen
      • Poetry: Kaela Morin
      • Poetry: Elizabeth Sak
      • Poetry: Kate Zahnow
      • Experimental Writing and Film: Erica McKeen
      • Experimental Writing and Film: Shauna Ruby Valchuk
      • Fiction: James Gagnon
      • Fiction: Megan Levine
      • Fiction: Erica McKeen
      • Fiction: Cassia Pelton
      • Fiction: Julia Rooth
      • Creative NonFiction: Noa Rapaport
      • Screenplays: Sydney Brooman
      • Screenplays: Nathan Wright-Edwards
  • Boomerang
    • The Art >
      • Alisha Ansems "Tangled Memories"
      • Lindsay Athoe "Study I" and "Study II"
      • Melissa Bareham "Suspension"
      • Ronnie Clarke "It Is Hard to Say"
      • Nick Cote "City Parks"
      • Liam Creed "Untitled"
      • Gwen Hovey "Jelly"
      • Marissa Martin "Childhood Wonder"
      • Alexa McKinnon "The Feminine Uncanny"
      • Amy Ngo "Untitled"
      • Jill Smith "Shelf Self String Thing" and "things a, b and c"
      • Rebecca Sun "Untitled 1" and "Untitled 2"
      • Gabriele Tyson (Andrew Fraser) "Strong Strides"
      • Val Vallejo "Digital Scaring"
      • Kewen Yan "Time Traveller"
    • The Art/The Poems >
      • Marissa Martin/Mary McDonald
      • Amy Ngo/Jill O'Craven
      • Rebecca Sun/Mary McDonald
      • Gabriele Tyson (Andrew Fraser)/Hashini Puwakgolle Mudiyanselage
      • Val Vallejo/Elizabeth Sak
      • Kewen Yan/Megan Gerret
    • The Poems >
      • Megan Gerrett "Traveller"
      • Mary McDonald "Beyond"
      • Mary McDonald "Blink Back"
      • Hashini Puwakgolle Mudiyanselage "Silent Battles"
      • Jill O'Craven "She is an Ocean"
      • Elizabeth Sak "Stalemate"
  • Issue 8
    • Judges: Issue 8
    • Contributors: Issue 8
    • Poetry 8: Danielle Bryl-Dam
    • Poetry 8: Leah Kuiack
    • Poetry 8: Jameson Lawson
    • Poetry 8: Maxwell Lucas
    • Poetry 8: Kaela Morin
    • Poetry 8: Joanna Shepherd
    • Fiction 8: Mason Frankel
    • Fiction 8: Rylee Loucks
    • Fiction 8: Celia Kate Shapcott
    • Fiction 8: Amy Wang
    • Fiction 8: Blake Zigrossi
    • Screenplays 8: Naomi Barghel
    • Screenplays 8: Amanda Inglese
    • Screenplays 8: Jeff Simpson
    • Creative Nonfiction 8: Tiffany Austin
    • Creative Nonfiction 8: Jenny Berkel
    • Creative Nonfiction 8: Carolina Jung
    • Creative Nonfiction 8: Leah Kuiack
    • Creative Nonfiction 8: Li-elle Rapaport
    • Creative Nonfiction 8: Amy Wang
    • Experimental 8: Lauren Lee
    • Experimental 8: Kirah Ougniwi
    • Experimental 8: Carlie Thompson-Bockus
    • Plays 8: Camille Inston
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  • Writing Studies

Sturgeon

Ancient-angled, more bone than fish,
cold muscle slabbed from the crater's nether muds.
Silt sifts at the edges of his age, pockmarks his diamond
skin. In the lake's varved ribs he's an outcrop, called lung.
His coppered dream, furled like a dead map of this place,
shows the curved distances that used to mean shoreline,
trapline; flecked with gold where homes once rose to
meet their families, awake with walleye and wild rice,
their fires snuffed out by a swollen river, dammed for
hydroelectricity. Embarrassed, on higher ground, the
people moved on, the lake a geography of forgotten things.
In a greening frame, under the covers of his benthic bed,
his jaggedness dissolves into prayer and soft litter. Come,
he says through his suckermouth; gasping, ugly.
Lie down with me. Fill this room.

Steven Slowka

Western University
Department of English and Writing Studies
© Copyright 2018 | ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

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