25 years of creative writing on health, illness, and healing

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— Everything BLR

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— A new set of great reads with each click —

  • fiction
  • nonfiction
  • poetry
  • SUTHY Syndrome

    SUTHY Syndrome

    by Hollis Seamon. “I shit you not. Right in front of the elevator that spits you into our hospice, there is—get ready for this—a harpist. I mean, isn’t that like a teensy bit premature?” // continue reading

  • We the Mothers

    We the Mothers

    Kathi Hansen “We’re not saying our boys are angels, … we’re just saying that we the mothers didn’t need to teach our boys not to rape.” // continue reading

  • Evacuation Instructions

    Evacuation Instructions

    by Elliott Hold. “With the fat stripped away, she is her essential self. They don’t tell you how beautiful people can be when they’re dying.” // continue reading

  • Carrying History

    Carrying History

    Sahar Delijani. “I am a child of the Iranian revolution. In 1983, my mother gave birth to me in Evin Prison, one of Iran’s most notorious jails.”  // continue reading

  • Flu Shot

    Flu Shot

    by David Watts. “She stands in my examining room unable to sit, pacing, then stopping tensely, as if paralyzed by the urge to pace. Three times she has made this appointment, three times a no-show.” // continue reading

  • Calling Card

    Calling Card

    by Mary Luce. “It was a chilly November afternoon in a southern town so small it never made it to a map. I was in the bedroom typing when I heard the noise and then my mother’s scream. She somehow… // continue reading

  • Bones

    Bones

    by Anne Pierson Wiese. “Big leg bones / of cows sawed / into round sections / that when broiled / erupt thick burps of marrow…” // continue reading

  • A SESTINA OF BAD NEWS

    A SESTINA OF BAD NEWS

    by Alex Johansson. “There are more important things I should be doing at the age of forty-two,” / you say, showing me photos of your daughter in a pink, fluffy tutu and I…” // continue reading

  • Chaas Curry

    Chaas Curry

    by E. Hume Covey. “Two months into her illness, Pat / lay in pain, nearly immobile, / nourished by pills and liquids, / no appetite even for favorite foods…” // continue reading

As featured on PBS News Hour’s CANVAS Series

Watch PBS News Hour’s Jeffrey Brown report on BLR’s 25th Anniversary, featuring BLR Editor Danielle Ofri and past BLR writers reflecting on why poetry, storytelling, and writing matter, especially in moments of illness.

Whiting Award Winner

BLR was awarded a Whiting Literary Magazine Prize for “excellence in publishing, advocacy for writers, and a unique contribution to the strength of the overall literary community.”

Praise & Recognition