Ben & Winslow
Tragic Backstory
I would probably do something like this if I liked the idea of having rotting pumpkin carcasses all over my lawn for an entire month. I don’t, though. I really don’t.
Recent Posts
- “I Need a Bell,” by Lisa Haneberg
- “Unceremoniously Speaking,” by Mark Tulin
- “Codicil of My Ill Will,” by Melanie Chartoff
- The Syllabus, Sisyphus and Us,” by Robert Zaretsky
- “God Is My Daddy: The Dove Versus Feminists, China, Californians, etcetera,” by Jessica Tilley Hodgman
- “Rare Autograph & Interview,” by David Conte
- Tragic Backstory
- “‘The Party Invite’ Rocks The New Mom Text Theatre Movement and Gives Audience Members a (Mostly) Rollicking Good Time,” by Liz Lydic
- “Why Can’t I Have One of the Cool Mental Illnesses?” by Daniel Sidman
- “How to Write a Novel in Three Days,” by Thaisa Frank
Featured
Defenestration: August 2022
Prepare yourselves, people of the internet, for the August 2022 issue of Defenestration! How are you all doing? Good? Staying hydrated?
This month’s issue is totally weird. I’ve mentioned this before, but it seems like writers are all part of the same strange zeitgeist during each of our reading periods, and Eileen and I see very clear themes and subject matter in many of the poems and stories submitted. Sometimes you can chalk that up to what the market’s doing; some magazine or anthology might have just concluded its selections for a themed issue, and now everyone’s trying to find a home for the very niche story they wrote. That’s only sometimes, though. More often than not, writers and poets are just breathing the same inspirational air.
Defenestration: April 2022
Welcome, welcome, to the April 2022 issue of Defenestration! It might be spring, but the weather has gotten cold and wet and miserable around Defenestration HQ, which means we all had to dig our sweaters out of storage and made the tough decision to burn our charming wooden deck furniture for warmth. Nature is against us, friends, but that hasn’t stopped the latest issue from dropping right on time.
Defenestration: December 2021
Welcome, one and all, the the December 2021 issue of Defenestration: the literary magazine that has been dedicated to humor for so long that we stopped keeping track. (That’s a lie. Eileen has been keeping track. One deep scar on the wall of her living room for every month Defenestration has existed. It looks as if a cat the size of a Volkswagen has been trying to claw its way out of her home.)
Nonfiction
“I Need a Bell,” by Lisa Haneberg I find myself in an awkward life-and-death situation. I need a bell, but if I buy my own, it will not work well. And if I ask for the bell, the one I receive will possess fewer protective properties. If I neither buy nor ask for the bell, it’s unlikely that I will get one. The consequences could be dire. Let me explain.
Fake Nonfiction
“Codicil of My Ill Will,” by Melanie Chartoff Being of sound mind and ill will, I, Karen Miller-Strauss, execute this document dated March 19, 2022, to replace all prior wills and codicils from me or my beloved late husband, Arthur Strauss for whom I am next of kin, a blood relative, having given blood to sustain him during his final surgery. Disbursements will be reduced by the line item amounts for reasons stated.
Fiction
“Menelaus and the Fake Helen,” by Teresa Spencer Menelaus’s hoary beard is stained red with Trojan blood. Lo, how he sits grieving at the prow of the flagship of a thousand ships, the craggy furrows of his brow deepened with the loss of his brethren, of Patroclus, of dishonored Ajax brought low by his own hand, of even the mighty Achilles. His powerful shoulders bend under the weight of a ten years’ war.
Nearby, his wife Helen is moodily gazing at the horizon, smoking a jay.
Poetry
“Grocery Boy,” by Kim Malinowski The geek I call “grocery boy” at Kroger is named Daniel.
No one nicknamed him or if they did it was Mars or Pluto
or Too-Smart-For-His-Own-Good.
Ben & Winslow
Tragic Backstory I would probably do something like this if I liked the idea of having rotting pumpkin carcasses all over my lawn for an entire month. I don’t, though. I really don’t.
