Rough Copy

Ben Chadwick’s story from our Fall/Winter 2009 issue, “The Power of Fiction” was selected as a Notable Story from storySouth Million Writers Award Notable Stories of 2009. Congratulations, Ben… you deserve it!

How fitting this issue’s cover art features an egg beater! This spring, we here at Rough Copy have decided it’s time to mix things up a bit. In addition to the same quality poetry, fiction and essays you’ve come to expect, we’re also publishing our very first flash fiction, a breathtaking piece by Kim Chinquee […]

Until today, I have always worn my legs hairy by principle, despite the coarse, dark pelt that always made me feel more primate than pretty, more grotesque than desirable. But this morning, twelve years after my girl friends began shaving their legs, I was drawn to the curved brown razor my housemate left in the […]

Heather McQueen is a painter, illustrator and photographer living and working in Northampton, Massachusetts.  Her work, representational in its nature, examines the details of everyday objects and plant life.
Ashawnta Jackson:  So, tell me a bit about your background, and the kind of work you do.
Heather McQueen:  I always did art as a kid, and eventually […]

Days after arriving in England, the doctor took her to the bunker,
calling it a spaceship-probably haunted, he said,
and that it used to be a morgue during the big war.
He showered over there and he pointed to a stall and said he went
running during lunch breaks.
He said she was the first to arrive. “One’s still on […]

The sea of spuming thought foists up again
The radiant bubble that she was.  And then
A deep up-pouring from some saltier well
Within me, bursts its watery syllable.
–Wallace Stevens, “Le Monocle de Mon Oncle”
This morning, my husband yells at me.  There’s nothing to do, I say.  You could try doing the dishes, he says.  He goes.  I […]

Editor’s Note: Dao has graciously given Rough Copy an mp3 of “Traveler’s Ode.”  Click here to listen.
Sometimes I see the future
& it looks alright
to a man who’s been waiting
his whole long life
to be returned to that land
it was north of somewhere
it was cold and
oh so bright
((& everyone was happy there))
I’ve memorized
every promise
that was gave on […]

I. Ode to Mother(land)

Didn’t you once believe in art?
Didn’t you once have a beating heart?
when you told me the story of a poet
& her friends who went to see a king
but he wouldn’t let them in
except for her fine eyes
she told him of the troubles
throughout their country
she told him of her worries
for all their people
she […]

I.  Two Rivers

((two rivers meet where the water is warm))
((blackberries stain my childish hands))

- a tapestry of memory of temperature
that I can nary forget nor Remember
(we saw) two rivers cross
one from the valley
one from up on the rocks
one streamed cold, one streamed hot
in a blackberry forest
I saw the two rivers join into one
((father killed a […]

When I was eight, my family moved from Albuquerque to El Paso.
An adventure! my mother said. Why, if you want to go to Mexico, you just walk across a bridge, and there you are!
We learned how to count in Spanish, celebrated Christmas, packed the U-Haul, and moved south during the worst snow-storm the area had […]

  Heather McQueen works in pencil, watercolor, pen and ink, and linoleum block prints. Her subject matter comes from the plant kingdom and household artifacts of the early to mid 20th century. The plant subjects offer a mini universe for her to examine in drawings and watercolors. The household artifacts present an opportunity to explore […]