Dear cherished readers and contributors, Operating a magazine such as Macrina comes with all the challenges of modern publishing and, for us, without financial compensation. Our small team of editors is composed of students, professors, and full-time professionals. As a result of the plethora of responsibilities and commitments our team of editors must manage alongside Macrina, some key members of the administrative team have had to step down to less demanding roles. Accordingly, with a smaller editorial team and increased submissions, we have been unable to process submissions in a timely ma ..read more

I The other night at dinner, my sons wanted to know about a genie in a bottle. They were initially interested in the physics of a large frame in a such small space, but when I could offer no explanation, they moved to the three wishes. Three wishes and no more, I clarified. After several minutes in a huddled conference, they announced they would wish for the following: their very own video game arcade, a huge bounce house where they could live, and another house for “that man who stands on the corner.” I was touched by this last wish. But they began arguing over which video games would be in ..read more

Damariscotta We drive Downeast leaving Atlantic salt for a freshwater lake I enter the shallow end with my legs close together and cover my thighs so they shrink behind the shadow of my hands. My mother is waiting for me among the loons and wild lilies, calling to me from this lake where she stood twenty-eight years ago and waded as I rocked inside of her. She draws me through weeds and ripples until I return to her side, unfolding my arms from my legs so we are both floating, nestled by waves that rise and fall between us. For All Her Hands Have Made Let her be a woman, uninterrupted ..read more

If I can no longer feel my flesh though I sit uneasy in its warm charnel, how can I know your embrace so like a moth’s wing as something more real?   We huddle against the cold, called out of slavery for wilderness howling for a feast when all that remains is the inscription the accuser crow leaves on cattle bones.   In this cudgel of spring, a green fire in the dry grass, a sprig of forsythia in a vase that appeared on the mantle  while we were children asleep on the couch in grandmother’s house of memory   can you scry for me, prophet,  and deny that blood is nothin ..read more

Part I: https://macrinamagazine.com/general-submissions/guest/2022/11/05/we-are-the-dreamer-earth-and-body-in-times-of-plague-part-i/ St. Benedict teaches us to “day by day remind yourself that you are going to die” (RB 4:47).1 As a Benedictine oblate, I’ve taken that advice seriously for over a decade. But as the pandemic continued last year, the very real specter of death breaking in on so many lives where it had previously been but that distant whisper we would rather not heed, sister death’s demands weighed on me in more anxiety ridden ways than have been the case for many long years ..read more

Dreams have a funny way of making themselves known eventually. They evolve over time. Some recur— same old, same old. Some days I am fascinated with death And the life beyond. But in the now, Have I told you how much you mean to me? Have I spelled out my love to you, recently? 1-4-3 is all it takes—that’s Fred Rogers’ code for I love you. So simple. Perhaps we forget that our time here is fleeting, The blink of an eye. It’s easy to forget, To major on the unimportant— the urgent, the crisis. But for a moment, let me remind you of the easy things. Watching the sunset together in silence. Hold ..read more

At the Malibu Country Mart I beheld the decrepitly ageless Their bronzed bodies Their proud physiques Updated by Pilates and the latest nose Elegantly packed into exercise pants and t-shirts. Clothes not for exercising But to announce: I can afford to exercise. No citizens left Only bright highlights, hair tinsel, and a ruling cadre. In a town so thin It had stretched out on a burning beach One thousand mansions For one hundred oligarchs Down 14 miles of speedway. When I first arrived I used to think Of those Gibraltar monkeys You told me about on the last sun-drenched rocks of Europe Staring ..read more

It was only to be one day’s journey back to our home. There were ten of us traveling together; my parents, a couple of my aunts and uncles and their children of various ages – some younger and some older than myself. My mother chatted away joyfully with her sisters as they bounced along the path. The men chatted but their voices were more measured in tone, so I assumed that they were speaking about more serious topics. Every now and again the adults would have to break their conversations to stop the younger children from venturing off the path to pursue a small animal, rock or plant that ha ..read more

On Nothing In Particular I don’t mean ‘not any thing,’ Or not ‘no thing,’  as in: that definition really leaves nothing  to the imagination. Not that. And not ‘no part’ either.  Like something of no interest or value, as in: those definitions mean nothing  to me.  I mean:  the something  that does not exist; the absence of all  magnitude or quantity; and that, if we have a goose egg, tennis love,  and we also have anything else— cricket ducks and an empty cup—then we have been left  obviously with two things.  I mean that zero is also a ..read more

A stark honesty and daring riskfulness burst through Micheal O’Siadhail’s poems as they bear bold witness to a deeply intimate relationship with the Divine. “Now in my mid-seventies, I dare to be more open,” declares the poet. He explains, “Though from the first belief suffused my poetry, when I was younger I was reticent about naming it… Now I feel a deeper need to give testimony to a source that has sustained my life.” The resulting Testament suggests that for O’Siadhail (pronounced O-Sheel), daring to be more open entails nothing less than the complete and glorious nakedness of a soul reve ..read more