by Oladejo Abdullah Feranmi Honorable Mention, Poetry, Create | Encounter 2025 Softest legs, hardened pace; wading   the marshes of time one step at a time.   You taste life when you inhale with your mouth—   every brittleness, every gust that never knew storm,   rushing to the tunnel of your breath,   finding light in your lungs; breeze swaying   the leaf alveoli to the rhythm of dandelions.   Like sleeping time that dreamt of spring   forgetting how crusty autumn lips were,

by Taylor Hyatt 1st Place, Prose, Create | Encounter 2025 Dear Terri… I was just a few weeks away from turning 13 when you died. An observer might say I “grew up” in an instant: in that month or so between when I first became curious about your story, and when your life ended. After your passing, I continued to grow “alongside” the world’s reaction to your death – trying to figure out my place in the world: as a young girl – dealing with family upheavals and middle school lif

by Nick Sansone 2nd Place, Prose, Create | Encounter 2025 Download Wonderfully Made to read it in its original screenplay formatting: Artist Statement: This script came from a deeply personal place as I navigate a new season of life, pondering future marriage and family in a more serious way than I have previously. Particularly as a pro-life man with autism, I have had to navigate difficult conversations with my family that revealed ignorant, outdated, ableist, and eugenicis

by Mary Stroka Honorable Mention, Prose, Create | Encounter 2025 Dear Jolene That’s how the letter from my daughter begins.  She reached that level of disrespect after she snuck off to Vegas to marry Rod — a name I’ve always found revolting, even before I met the man who wore it so well. I continue to ride the train, every day, past the spot where Dad killed himself. I swallow and swat moisture from one of my eyes. For years now, I’ve blamed you for his death. That little bra

by Monica Heiss Honorable Mention, Prose, Create | Encounter 2025 The world cries out in anguish. Does anybody hear it? The night is silent as I scroll through social media watching random videos. Bored, I keep swiping up, until an image of gore fills my screen. "A victim of abortion"  the caption reads. Disturbed, I block the account that shared it and keep scrolling. The morning is cold. I stir my coffee and make my breakfast. The image from last night flashes through my mi

by Eugene Wynyard Honorable Mention, Prose, Create | Encounter 2025 Hello Mercedes, ​ My name is Eugene. I am your biological father. ​ You were never born, and I never held you—but I carry you now, in a way I didn’t understand back then. I don’t know if you knew I existed. I don’t know if you searched for me. But I know this: you were real. You mattered. And you still do. I was born in Rotorua, New Zealand, and grew up in the Bay Of Plenty—places where the waves rolled in li

Photos by Maria Oswalt

by Timothy Kirchoff — Early in the morning of January 3, 2026, the US military launched an operation in Caracas, Venezuela, which succeeded in its objective of abducting Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro, apparently to be tried on charges related to drug trafficking and narcoterrorism. As of now, it remains to be seen whether the American government has more evidence of Maduro’s guilt on these charges than they did for the various individuals who were killed without trial i

by John Whitehead — The new year of 2026 has brought a dramatic escalation in the conflict between the United States and Venezuela. The US military attacked Venezuela  on January 3, capturing the country’s president, Nicolas Maduro, and his wife. This US military intervention comes after months of growing American pressure on Venezuela. The US military has greatly increased its presence in the region around Venezuela and has imposed a blockade  on the passage of sanctioned oi

by Lauren Pope — Yesterday, Renee Good was killed by an ICE agent who shot her three times at point blank range. Many videos released yesterday show her turning away from the agent. I am going to temporarily set aside the question of whether this was a justified use of force, because focusing on that question obscures a larger and more important one. Why was ICE in Minneapolis at all? This was not a neutral or routine law enforcement interaction. Paramilitary federal agents h

by John Whitehead — A group of activists known as a Meta Peace Team  (MPT) traveled to the West Bank this autumn. These activists are committed to “creating a nonviolent alternative to militarism.” During their West Bank work, the MPT collaborated with the Palestinian-led International Solidarity Movement  (ISM).   The MPT and ISM’s joint mission includes “participating in Palestinian-led demonstrations, creatively disrupting activity by the Israeli occupation forces, [and] a

by Sarah Terzo — After the Dobbs  decision was leaked  in May 2022, many media outlets predicted that maternal deaths would rise as a result. More women, they said, would die in childbirth if abortion weren’t available. For example, an article in the Washington Post  said “researchers have estimated that maternal deaths could increase by up to 25 to 30 percent.”  Pro-choice authors Rebecca Little and Colleen Long, in their book I’m Sorry for My Loss: An Urgent Examination of

by Christy Yao Pelliccioni — About a year ago, I was nine months pregnant and letting my two-year-old have some extra screen time while I lay on my mother’s couch. I was pretty exhausted when a new show came on— Carl the Collector .  I then forced myself to pay attention. I had heard about this show before: PBS had been running promos, and a news article had popped up on my phone reporting that this show was unique in that the main character openly explained how he is autisti

by Sarah Terzo — Many people claim that public assistance programs such as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), which assists people in buying food, allow lazy people to avoid working. They imagine a “welfare queen” who lives high on the hog on government benefits while refusing to work. They resent their tax dollars going to help such a person. People aren’t eating lobster and steak on SNAP, though. The monthly SNAP benefit varies , but the average amount pe

by John Whitehead —   Nuclear war is the greatest catastrophe that could befall life on this planet. Nuclear war would mean death on an unparalleled scale and the likely end of human civilization.  Today, in 2025, the danger of nuclear war is greater than it has been in decades. We are living through a period of nuclear danger comparable to the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962 or the extreme Cold War tensions of the 1980s.  We see the danger of nuclear war in the ongoing war in U

by Nora Stewart Wylie — In 2005, the Netherlands made the historic decision  to legalize assisted death for terminally ill infants under the age of one. Dutch law specifies that, should a baby be born with a severe medical condition that is irremediable and causes “unbearable” suffering, parents may have the right to terminate their child’s life .  While many other countries in the world have legalized assisted dying for adults, the Netherlands was the first to legalize it fo

by Timothy Kirchoff — The term “heritage American” has come into use  in certain parts of the internet—in blogs, on X, and in hand-wringing commentary  from outlets like Politico . While definitions of the term vary, it seems to mean roughly “Americans who trace their presence in the country back to the colonial or Civil War era.” The term is endorsed by some as a celebration of the United States’ “national heritage and its culture.”  When I first heard the term “heritage Ame

by John Whitehead — A group of activists known as a Meta Peace Team (MPT) traveled to the West Bank this autumn. These activists are committed to “creating a nonviolent alternative to militarism.” During their West Bank work, the MPT is collaborating with the Palestinian-led International Solidarity Movement (ISM).   The MPT and ISM’s joint mission includes “participating in Palestinian-led demonstrations, creatively disrupting activity by the Israeli occupation forces, [an

by Christy Yao Pelliccioni — Starting in early September,  the Trump administration started attacking vessels supposedly being used in the illegal narcotics trade, as part of what it calls Operation Southern Spear. Between September 2 and November 19, 22 vessels have been hit in 21 strikes, and 83 people have been killed.  This is the largest US military operation in or around Latin America for decades, with tens of thousands of troops and substantial air and naval assets hav

Start with Common Ground You and Uncle Paul might disagree on literally everything politically (although I would challenge this, you probably have a few shared premises that you can build on) but you probably agree on the damage that Brian Kelly did to the LSU football program. The advice here isn’t to avoid politics altogether, but rather to start with some friendly topics that won’t trigger any immediate arguments. If things turn political, take a stance of curiosity not in