People died here…for a cause many of them didn’t fully understand or believe in. Young boys of 17, no older than my high school students, enlisted thinking the war would be some grand adventure
Hallowed and Hollow by Morgan Kayser
Category: Essays
An archive of all of the personal essays we’ve published at Hippocampus Magazine over the years.
A Field Guide to Motel Chairs by Doug Brewer
I am peering through my camera at an empty chair next to a mostly empty motel swimming pool.
Elixir Washes Ashore by Alexis Paige
A year since we bought the house along the river and weeks since it rained. But now, thunderstorms crackle the edges of sky…
This Is How It Will Go by Randy Magnuson
Next to the girl will be a black trash bag, stretched at the neck and torn in several places, where the contents – all of her worldly possessions…
Echocardiogram by Gloria DeVidas Kirchheimer
A device called a transducer picks up echoes of sound waves as they bounce off the different parts of the heart.
To See a World by Kerry Cohen
He’s not in the yard. My chest grows tight, and I run down the block, calling for him. What will he do if he is lost? He’s only five.
The 18-Minute Rule Throws Jimmy Pro For A Loop In Gotham City by William C. Crawford
Jimmy unleashed his usual slick card swipe, but as he glided into his infamous turnstile roll things turned to shit in a hurry.
The Fortuneteller by Eileen O’Connor
The woman jaywalking toward my side of the street is slight, with stooped shoulders and a bent back. Her wiry neck branches into collarbones so sharp that they resemble a wire hanger…
California by Amanda Fletcher
I run my mother’s old engagement ring along its chain around my neck. Back and forth in the absentminded way I have been doing since I strung it there last month.
Like a Riverbank by Travis Truax
You write out of Montana now—with July’s still-snowy mountains. You are led up and down a scrambled map, open prairie, the bluest lakes, the sharpest peaks…
