KALLIOPE, A JOURNAL OF WOMEN'S LITERATURE & ART

Kalliope - Vol. XXI:3

Selections From This Issue:

Flash Fiction & Prose Poetry - Introduction
Safety Tips by Michelle Perez
Requiem in F Minor by J.B. Bernstein

Flash Fiction & Prose Poetry - Introduction

". a dark shape of something. she keeps entering and leaving, entering and leaving like the wind." A metaphor for this issue: short Prose Poetry and Flash Fiction seem like shadows the reader enters and leaves - fast - because the experience of the work is so fleeting, over so soon. Indeed, the reader enters and leaves and returns to leave and return again.

We offer you this intriguing cycle of knowing in our Prose Poetry and Flash Fiction theme issue.

We created this issue because Kalliope women have been asking, "What are prose poems and flash fiction? What might they have in common?" After carefully reading over the more than 500 submissions we received in answer to our call for flash fiction and prose poetry, we chose these works to share with you. Now we ask you questions, too.

Some pieces in this issue share traditional characteristics of fiction; some pieces lack these same characteristics but still seem to be story-like. Are these works flash fiction or prose poetry? Other pieces are prose poetry in the paragraph form. Could you rearrange the same words with entirely different line breaks? Would you still have a prose poem? What would be lost? Gained?

Is a narrative that looks like poetry still a prose poem? When is a list a prose poem? Is a paragraph of lyrical description a prose poem? Is a lyric in paragraph form still a lyric poem? All of these forms appear here.

Hermine Meinhard writes in paragraphs in "The Wind" but uses short line breaks in "Second Attentions." Are both prose poems?

In "The Vine Fable," Ruth Moon Kempher tells an old story. Flash fiction or prose poetry?

J.B. Bernstein writes seventeen lines in a paragraph block without one period. Is the stream-of-consciousness a surreal poem or flash fiction?

Michelle Perez, in three gripping stanzas (paragraphs?), watches a mother drown her children. Can prose or poetry best bear such emotions? Or, as one reader suggested, is prose needed in our culture for a piece to be taken seriously?

Perhaps this volume answers few questions, but it is intended to add to the discussion. Let us know your thoughts.

Mary Sue Koeppel
For the Collective