EDITOR PICKS
The Editor, along with the editorial collective, selects with each issue an "editor's pick." The selected piece is, in the opinion of the editor, the strongest of that issue.
WINTER 2008 PICK
"Throwback" Peter St. George -
HDS Photography
SPRING 2006 PICK
Sound .• Erin McWhorter •. Intaglio Color Print
WINTER 2006 PICK
Little Scotts .• Rachel Warkentin •. Encaustic
FALL 2005 PICK
Venison
by Malynda Shook
You skinned a deer here when I was five
in the dank shed cluttering the dark
corner of the long back yard. I watched
you by a single bulb husk
the pussy willow leg like early
corn, mucus cording through your hands
was tassel fibrous, raw. Pink
slopes bloomed beneath like secrets
told too soon. The spaded head was hidden by
your hiking boot, left me watching limbs splayed out
from a once-white belly, mottled vase.
Dark tulips on velvet stems. Skirtless Black-Eyed
Susans, blinking. Stroke by stroke you sheathed
the ample round, your fore-head crouched in
focus. Craftsman you, plying your trade. Suspended
in the air were flies and summer night,
someone speaking. And you, doing the dirty
work, skinning the deer. I asked you once,
You said I must have made it up. Now
I imagine me here, younger, staring at
this splotch of red from a quitting spray-
paint can, in the damp shed turned clubhouse
that my older brother ruled,
writing you in, the strength of your sure
hands skinning that deer like no one else
could strip the supple skin, and lay
its soft forgiveness down.
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