Saralene Tapley’s Gallery
‘Blue Portrait,’ acrylic on canvas, 26 x 30 inches, 2025
Continue reading “Saralene Tapley”Saralene Tapley
Natalie Forsyth
Uncomfortable, Yet Familiar: An Asylum Experience
I take you to my room on a cold April morning. My head usually feels like the boulder Sisyphus had to push up the hill but that day it was much worse. The littlest sounds felt like I was being waterboarded. Drip, drip, drip. They came to me like drops of water slowly hitting my head. Each one more agonizing than before.
Continue reading “Natalie Forsyth”Alison Dawson
Underwater
Your partner, Megan, greeted me at the airport with a warm hug. We communicated by phone the three weeks you were missing. When we saw each other, there was an instant knowing, a recognition of deep grief that we both carried.
Continue reading “Alison Dawson”Johanna Rothe
The Emperor Has No Clothes! Resist Zionist Reason!
Mad Studies in Palestine Solidarity
Johanna Rothe
It is November 2023. My friend and I are sitting on my couch in my Berlin home. We are discussing a draft of my friend’s upcoming conference presentation. The presentation is about the case of a teacher in Berlin Neukölln hitting a Palestinian student. German media and government framed the incident into a scare about Palestine threatening the peace in German schools. We are finished discussing, in a way, when I advise my friend: “Someone at this conference is going to ask you to condemn Hamas. You should think about how you want to respond.”
Continue reading “Johanna Rothe”Soe Win
Come and See Me at the Intersection: Navigating My Gender Identity, Faith in Christianity, and Mental Health
God, I love you, and I know you love me. You have made me who I am today, and I believe you make no mistakes.
Continue reading “Soe Win”Nancy Jensen
The Room
I am alone in the Room. It has dirty old orange shag carpet on the floor and no furniture except a trash can. The windows are boarded up so you can only see treetops and sky at the top. On the other side of the Room are French doors, also all boarded up. A person standing on the other side of the French doors would not be able to tell that there is a Room beyond those doors. In the Room a light bulb hangs down from a cord, but the control switch to turn the light on or off is not in the Room.
Continue reading “Nancy Jensen”Gayle Bluebird
History of the Consumer/Survivor Movement
Continue reading “Gayle Bluebird”Fanney Björk Ingólfsdóttir
Fragments of a Story
1.
It‘s hard for me to describe my surroundings. Maybe because I just keep looking down at my hands or maybe because the tears are blurring my vision. I can clearly make out my mother’s voice. How stern it is, rough as always when she is giving someone a piece of her mind. But at the same time there is a tremble in it now, a nervous vibration that I have not heard before. Almost as if the sternness is breakable, at the verge of shattering at any moment.
Continue reading “Fanney Björk Ingólfsdóttir”Beth Sheeran
Sonnet 43
I begged them for the tools to move in with you
I promised to tear down the shack called medicine falling down on you
I wanted my hands to blister and age and wrinkle putting up new walls to cover you
I wanted to bring you wildflowers in the morning to enjoy with your coffee and greet you with a smile
Continue reading “Beth Sheeran”Sofia Stremlin-Adams
Maed
At five years old I had an impressive resume: aspiring coven leader, professional frog wrangler, and avid Michael Jackson fan. Absent from my curious resume was the ability to spell my own name. Even though I would be repeating kindergarten in the fall as a result of my creative spelling, I was in no hurry to uncover what seemed like an impossible cipher.
Continue reading “Sofia Stremlin-Adams”
Madwomen in the Attic 