Blog
Filter By:
Advocacy • Analysis • Blog • Commentary • Drama • Essay • Event • Feature • Fiction • Graphic Narrative • Interview • Memoir • News • Obituary • Open Letter • Poetry • Press Release • Profile
Browse By Series:
PEN Poetry Series • Prison Writing • The PEN Ten Interviews • Illustrated PEN • Pen Pals • The PEN World
Browse By Email Subscription:
PEN America News • Educational Censorship News • Works of Justice
Season of Ice
1In the beginning there was snow. Torrents of tiny flakes blew in off the lake, pricked my skin before they melted on my hands and face and tongue. I… More
Deadly Innocence
FADE IN:EXT. EAST TEXAS—TEXAS YOUTH COMMISSION FACILITY—DAYAs we begin to pan the campus, the words CROCKET STATE SCHOOL JUVENILE PRISON—JULY 1987 are displayed across the center of the screen,… More
Bright Eyes, Brown Skin: Talking Openly to Children About Racial Differences
Bright eyes, brown skinA heart shaped faceA dimpled chinBright eyes, cheeks that glowChubby fingers, ticklish toesA playful grinA perfect noseVery special hair and clothesBright eyes, ears to listenLips that… More
Time Cut for Willy
Cast of Characters:William (Willy) Conrad Barns: Eighteen and looks younger. Small boned and effeminate with blonde hair and blue eyes. Pretty boy.Susan (Sam) Allison Macmillan: Petite redhead with a… More
A Madman Dreams of Turing Machines
There is no beginning. I’ve tried to invent one but it was a lie and I don’t want to be a liar. This story will end where it began,… More
Suite Française
1Hot, thought the Parisians. The warm air of spring. It was night, they were at war and there was an air raid. But dawn was near and the war… More
The Selected Poems of Wang Wei
At Cloud Valley with Huang-fu Yüeh1 Bird-Cry CreekIn our idleness, cinnamon blossoms fall.In night quiet, spring mountains standempty. Moonrise startles mountain birds:here and there, cries in a spring gorge.3… More
House of War
The Building looms over the Potomac across sixty years of war and peace, through six decades of memory. A forbidden temple even now, when I am older—imagine how the… More
Cut off the Ears of Winter
Cut Off the Ears of WinterCut off the ears of winterthey have overheard too much,where incinerators burn,where rubble-strewn streetsare covered in dust from the remodeling.Again, the doe-man in mauve… More
Writers Like Me
I am a 46-year-old writer of “literary” fiction. I’ve had three novels published — the first for young people, the last two for adults. All have won minor prizes,… More
Support for the freedom to read with exclusive designs by Todd Parr, Mike Curato, Art Spiegelman, and more!
