Prose, Poetry, and Art since 1956
Portland Review welcomes submissions of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, art, and mixed-genre works for its 2019 themed anthology, Unchartable: On Environmental Unknowns. It is the nature of the human mind to seek, to touch, to understand and occupy vast unknowable terrains, but which of our daily environments resist comprehension?
“Celebration, vacation, recreation: these escape the mind of a farmer, and an engineer only craves perfection. Stands to reason that my gentleman farmer lives on one long beautiful plain undisturbed by the concept of complementariness…”
Late autumn, a day of mist and rain keeping me indoors. I think of Bashō at the outset of his final journey: taking up the walking stick, crossing the threshold. All day long I have sat by the window watching rain, reading The Narrow Road, strumming the guitar. Outside, dead leaves have piled up, vines have lost their bloom. In a nearby field, cranes pick through harvest remains without concern for the downpour…
Mon Chou – (Fr.) ca. 1997 1. A phrase of French origin that literally translates as “my cabbage.” 2. A French term of endearment. 3. A phrase I learned in French class freshman year of high school and began calling you, which you did not like (see definition 1)…