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
  • Car Wash

    Car Wash

    While I wait for him to pull the trigger, I drive to the grocery store. Pick up milk, chewing gum, sponges. Drop off the dry cleaning: the dress I splattered with a spaghetti stain at Shana and Calvin’s wedding last… // 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

  • Rocket

    Rocket

    by Jason Baum. “He asks if he can put the radio to a country station…the guy is going into space for a year so I let him. Who knows what kind of reception he’ll be able to get up there.” // continue reading

  • Radon Gas and the Believers

    Radon Gas and the Believers

    But its impossible to go very far without seeing a sudden dark opening, the sloping, rotting framing of an abandoned mine entrance, or the colorful, dangerous scree sloping downhill: the remnant tailings from the ore processing that once happened here,… // continue reading

  • Distance

    Distance

    The ward doctor rang me late in the night to say that the Judge had been admitted with COVID-19 and was not doing well. He wasn’t deemed fit for ICU because of his age and his prior illness, the blood… // continue reading

  • Harvest Moon

    Harvest Moon

    He’d looked perfect – nothing deformed or discolored, no hair out of place, both shoelaces tied. The life had been shaken out of him.  // continue reading

  • The Rules of Surgery

    The Rules of Surgery

    by Kristin Robertson. “With the pad of my finger I collect crumb / after crumb like a hopeful, disappearing braille.” // continue reading

  • Walking, No Longer Your Patient

    Walking, No Longer Your Patient

    by Jill M. Allen. “A decade after we burned through the mysteries / and you taught me cartography’s other dark / arts, I dreamed of you coming for a garden tea…” // continue reading

  • Hemiplegia

    Hemiplegia

    by Ona Gritz. “Left, my bright half, gets all of it… / soft sharp prickly wet lined. / But press your head against my right shoulder, / I sense weight but no warmth.” // 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