Snake Pit by Berwyn Moore
“Snake Pit” by Berwyn Moore Tote-‘em-In Zoo Wilmington, NC Camera clenched in hand and pencil wedged behind my ear, I followed him in – Samson the Snake Handler wearing enchanted khaki pants and a safari helmet, and me, daring reporter, in summer sandals. Not one stirred as we entered, their stillness tangled in shadow. Heads, tails, indistinct. Sleepless eyes guarded every corner –...
Greenman by Maureen McQuerry
“Greenman” by Maureen McQuerry It was this way, in the heart of the forest: green sea deep and light, leaves like rippling water, a steady heartbeat of silence. It was this way, a mere tickle an itching of the scalp and suddenly every movement becomes a rustle as tufts of hair unfurl to leaf, a flourish of jade moustache sprouting and curling from raw, nude skin. My legs and fingers swollen wood, ridged and...
Jaguar Foretells His Own Extinction by Suzette Bishop
“Jaguar Foretells His Own Extinction” by Suzette Bishop “Our fragile ego drives us to possess the beauty and strength of the jaguar, so we kill it, then hang it on the wall, walk on it on the floor, or wear it like an ancient Maya King . . . the jaguar, despite its strength, is no match for the jungle-eating machinery of man.” Alan Rabinowitz,...
Break Beauty by Lisbeth Davidow
“Break Beauty” by Lisbeth Davidow The lights of lower Manhattan shone in the night sky beyond the bank of large, paned, arched, uncovered windows. In front of the windows, the other eight members of June Finch’s dance company stood quietly in the dark. Wearing a pale yellow leotard and matching tights, I danced alone under a spotlight in the center of the broad, sumptuous Merce Cunningham Studio on...
“Look at that, you son of a bitch” by Peg Duthie
“Look at that, you son of a bitch” by Peg Duthie In the world I want to believe in, we would greet hard truths with the gentleness born of water long gone under the bridge, milk wrung out of mops whose grey-clean strands also soaked up the tearfalls slicking the hay and slopping the mud against our came-by-their-age-honestly boots. Meanwhile the moon, which our schoolteachers said didn’t have water, turns out to have...
Does the sea remember everything? I wonder.
Does she absorb everything? Does she keep it safe?
Virginia Woolf
. . .
The Q: Can you fathom the spectacle that would be created if we moved together, arms outstretched, close enough to touch?
The Q: What echoes through you that longs to take form—a poem, an image, a mark, a whisper of becoming?
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fathoms Feb 28, 2026 -
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