Threshold 2026 Exhibition

01 The Birth Short fiction

Fiction / Bold

The Birth

Michele Partain

She paced restlessly around her study, a hand to the small of her back. Why wouldn’t it come? It felt like she’d been carrying this child forever. Well, when you counted all the years she’d dreamed, imagined,...

Print pp. 2–3

Visual Art / Bold

Jim

Laura Sapko

A clay sculpture placed early in the issue as a quiet figure of arrival.

Print p. 4

03 3 Haikus Haiku

Poetry / Bold

3 Haikus

Colette Hope Marks

1.even the rose’s foundation is rooted on a stem of thorns

Print pp. 7–8

Design / Bold

Brilliant

Cheri Moe

A graphic design work built around the language and visual system of brilliance.

Print pp. 9–10

Visual Art / Bold

Memories

Shelley Lowell

A warm, textured visual work held as memory and atmosphere.

Print p. 10

06 Chrysalis Short fiction

Fiction / Transit

Chrysalis

Dee Cohen

Patty pushes open the shop door and we see, in the short time we’ve been inside, that the moths have invaded the town, their fragile bodies flitting past the moon, parking lot littered with white wings. They...

Print pp. 12–13

Visual Art / Transit

Watercolor

Cheryl VanderBerg

A watercolor work whose softness interrupts the transit sequence with wash and pause.

Print pp. 15–16

08 That Night, the Moon Forgot My Name Poem

Poetry / Transit

That Night, the Moon Forgot My Name

Kavindra Blount

When I was small, my voice carried like a bright thing— a child’s easy spark, quick to leap from my tongue into anyone’s waiting hands. Nothing in me knew how to hush. But then there was that night— the one...

Print p. 18

Visual Art / Transit

Boston Seaport, MA

Raven Boer

A harbor scene translated through acrylic color and architectural light.

Print p. 20

10 The Ransom Note Creative nonfiction

Nonfiction / Transit

The Ransom Note

Larry Urish

The true story of a busy library, a jigsaw puzzle, a severed ear and a missing dog.

Print pp. 23–24

Visual Art / Transit

Suspended

Steve Mason

A watercolor study of suspension, edge, and stillness.

Print p. 25

12 Avocados Poem

Poetry / Transit

Avocados

Dee Cohen

What strikes me now is not that this no longer exists but that it ever existed at all. That place you rented in Old Hollywood, small backyard dense with foliage, avocados like heavy bells in the cathedral of a...

Print p. 27

Visual Art / Transit

A Postcard from Mars

Mike Coyne

A speculative landscape rendered as an oil painting and dispatch.

Print p. 29

14 In Medias Res Short fiction

Fiction / Transit

In Medias Res

Dee Cohen

Mabel parks behind a long line of vehicles on the road’s shoulder, grabs her camera from the passenger seat, and starts walking towards Peter’s house. Only a mile out of town, yet rural, she can hear chickens...

Print pp. 30–32

15 Invasive Species Poem

Poetry / Transit

Invasive Species

Lara Hamidi-Ismert

Kansas’ climate is not like Pluto’s, nor Jupiter’s. The summer air is hot and thick and wet, it coats the corn fields in purple sweat, cries beneath a red-eye sun. Then winter comes enthusiastically and...

Print p. 34

Visual Art / Transit

In Flight

Mike Coyne

An oil painting organized around motion, sky, and suspended passage.

Print p. 36

17 Loitering/a life in cigarettes Poem

Poetry / Transit

Loitering/a life in cigarettes

Dee Cohen

Tarrytons were sweet, Lucky strikes; harsh, Pall Malls; edgy. Hank blew perfect rings, popped them with an angry finger. Sam shot pool with a Winston shoved in his missing tooth. Tidy package: hard pack, soft...

Print pp. 38–40

18 Ode on a Green Banana Poem

Poetry / Verdant

Ode on a Green Banana

Jim Veney

(After John Keats) I Thou still untasted child of tropic lands, Thou greenish morsel waiting to be found Among the broad-leaves shadows deep and cool, With all thy sisters hanging upside-down. What subtle...

Print pp. 42–43

Photography / Verdant

Encinitas 1g8

Steve Mason

A digital print holding coastline, structure, and atmosphere in measured tension.

Print p. 47

20 Greenhorn Creative nonfiction

Nonfiction / Verdant

Greenhorn

Clay Hurtubise

Clay Hurtubise, R.Ph.

Print pp. 48–49

Design / Verdant

Everglow

Lyndsey Redmann

A brand and packaging system whose dark field, luminous mark, and boxed forms read as glow, growth, and threshold.

Print p. 50

22 Interrogated by a Bot Creative nonfiction

Nonfiction / Verdant

Interrogated by a Bot

Larry Urish

My AI-based job interview left me deeply disturbed. I was the last kid on our cul-de-sac to stop using a Montgomery Ward 8-track tape player when cassette players gained traction in the early ’70s. I kept my...

Print pp. 52–58

Visual Art / Cleave

Still Life

Chelsea Castaño

A digital still life balancing surface, object, and quiet pressure.

Print p. 60

24 What’s Left of My Father Poem

Poetry / Cleave

What’s Left of My Father

Lara Hamidi-Ismert

I cut a circle from the chest

Print p. 63

Visual Art / Cleave

Hope for a Better Day

Laura Sapko

An acrylic painting placed as an image of endurance and opening.

Print p. 64

26 Brothers Poem

Poetry / Cleave

Brothers

Mike Casetta

Dan stopped sleepwalking when he enlisted in the Army. He half joked that God tied his legs to the bed at night so he wouldn't get himself killed.

Print pp. 65–66

27 Landscape Image file pending

Visual Art / Cleave

Landscape

Lily Garland

A visual work listed in the print issue; the matching image file was not present in the provided art/design content folder.

Print p. 66

28 To Rid Himself of the Evidence, the Criminal Tossed the Weapon into the Garden Haiku

Poetry / Cleave

To Rid Himself of the Evidence, the Criminal Tossed the Weapon into the Garden

L.M. Scarpitto

Snail finds a pickaxe plots of chaos in its shell slow revenge begins

Print p. 67

29 Basil Poem

Poetry / Cleave

Basil

L.M. Scarpitto

Basil grows at the hands of those who bother to tend, and leans wild when they don’t.

Print p. 67

Hybrid / Cleave

Desert Sands (excerpt)

Jose Trejo Maya

Transparent thoughts in the poolside eclipse that’s hard you see. When there’s a language – but no one to speak it too Nahuatlacah/Purepecha huchari uri picua – por nuestra Fuerza. Carry over sight how...

Print pp. 68–72

Illustration / Cleave

Digital Illustration #31

Hannah Nichols

A digital illustration made in Procreate and held as a sharp visual pause.

Print p. 74

32 The Passing/ The Memorial Creative nonfiction

Nonfiction / Cleave

The Passing/ The Memorial

Michael McLaughlin

San Francisco 11/23/25

Print pp. 76–82

Photography / Cleave

Monterey 1f

Steve Mason

A digital print from Monterey, precise in horizon, surface, and quiet distance.

Print p. 83

Visual Art / Unfold

Copper Dance

Laura Sapko

A wire and clay sculpture with motion held in the line of its form.

Print p. 84

35 To those who chose to keep their shoes dry Poem

Poetry / Unfold

To those who chose to keep their shoes dry

Tinamarie Cox

there was beauty in my storms but it was overshadowed by my angry crashing thunder calling out the injustices by name and brilliant flashes of lightning illuminating all our secrets some only saw the mess my...

Print p. 85

36 My Grandmother’s Empty House Poem

Poetry / Unfold

My Grandmother’s Empty House

Gypsy Jackson

Her bedroom door nailed shut Just like mine

Print pp. 86–87

37 Flow State Essay

Nonfiction / Unfold

Flow State

Willow

As I type this, my children and I are currently in one. That’s not the technical term, so allow me to elucidate:

Print pp. 88–90

Visual Art / Unfold

The Works

Reeves Holt

A sculptural work made from metal found objects.

Print p. 91

39 Bringing Stillness to Life Essay

Nonfiction / Unfold

Bringing Stillness to Life

Ellen Greenblum-Siddons

I was on my therapist's couch being treated for an acute PTSD episode after accidentally backing over my new,12-week-old Saint Bernard puppy, Ziggy. I had thought Ziggy was on the porch, but he was under my...

Print pp. 93–96

Design / Unfold

The Gilded Egg

Cassandra Tallman

A packaging design project presented as a crafted object and visual system.

Print pp. 97–101

41 White Knuckled Poem

Poetry / Hallow

White Knuckled

Jalen Warner

I rip grass from the earth as if something within me will finally loosen with it The blades snap wet against my calloused palms cold, fragile things breaking because I need something to break

Print p. 106

Visual Art / Hallow

Anunciación

Diego Perez

An oil painting whose devotional title and figure study open the Hallow room.

Print pp. 106–107

43 Hispana Poem

Poetry / Hallow

Hispana

Fanny Zapata

1. A Hispanic woman is built from stories. 2. Built from stories that everyone talked about at the dinner table. 3. Learns what love and family are early. 4. Comfort means something is cooking in ma’s kitchen....

Print p. 109

44 Upheaval Poem

Poetry / Hallow

Upheaval

Shelley Lowell

Out of nowhere ground rumbled shook wildly

Print pp. 112–113

Visual Art / Hallow

Falling Waters

Shelley Lowell

A textured painting that carries water, height, and ancestral force.

Print p. 113

46 Sleep No More Poem

Poetry / Hallow

Sleep No More

Lara Hamidi-Ismert

Sleep No More is performed three times a night, through dance, without words.

Print pp. 114–115

Visual Art / Hallow

Cellular Memory

Shelley Lowell

An abstract oil and wax work concerned with memory held at a cellular scale.

Print p. 117

48 Stretching South Poem

Poetry / Hallow

Stretching South

Michael McLaughlin

We lost track. Losing count We were sixteen. After dark anywhere Such light Mud patch Star nights. I don’t Remember. Fridays often. Mostly Saturdays Orange Julius when you got off. Just to see your mouth! Was...

Print p. 119

Visual Art / Hallow

Dreamz

Rita Toikka

A material work in wood, steel, and copper, presented as dream-object.

Print p. 120

Visual Art / Hallow

Sleep Paralysis

Rita Toikka

A visual work whose title moves between body, sleep, and suspended fear.

Print p. 121

Visual Art / Hallow

Mexican Spotted Owl

Thatcher Bohrman

An acrylic painting of a Mexican spotted owl, rendered with close attention and presence.

Print p. 123

52 Christmas Day – El Toro, California Poem

Poetry / Hallow

Christmas Day – El Toro, California

Dee Cohen

It’s pretty quiet today, one skateboarder clomping over the cement of the basketball court, a few guys sitting on a bench. Louie drives by in the golf cart, little ponytail pulled back, red tinsel taped to the...

Print pp. 124–125

Visual Art / Hallow

Vanitas Still Life with Dutch Bantam and Coyote Skull

Raven Boer

A vanitas still life in oil, staged around animal remains, object, and symbolic time.

Print p. 126

54 Icarus Poem

Poetry / Hallow

Icarus

Lara Hamidi-Ismert

Icarus is a blue supergiant that was discovered in 2018 and is the most distant individual star ever detected.

Print p. 127

Visual Art / Hallow

View from the Empire State Building

Raven Boer

A graphite view from the Empire State Building, architectural and atmospheric.

Print p. 129