Category: Opinion

A short story by Jack Mint His face is haunted. Cheekbones press against his sallow skin like bruised fists. He hasn’t eaten in days. The grocery store shelves went empty a month ago. Between the shooting pains of his stomach eating itself and the ever-approaching void of his mind are the moans of his children. They cry themselves to sleep to escape the hunger. He cannot escape their cries and his hunger, and he hates them for it. He’s done everything he could and still they want and want. Cooked the cat and the dog, but the fish was the…

A Short Story by Jack Mint Grass grows over most of the up and down landscape. A few places are islands of bare gravel. They are surrounded by yellowing halos where the green of that grass sank to somewhere else below the footsteps of ants. They proceed in the sporadic lines of a march step they’ve known forever creased in the crisscross nature of continuing. Casting spritely shadows on the ants, bees peruse the sunlight on the clearing like marooned sailors. They look down mostly. They search for flowers the scouts had reported back at the hive. Bees dance to…

Dear Editor, For those of us who have chosen to reside here in beautiful northwest Arizona, there is almost an overabundance of things for which to be thankful. As most folks who live here are immigrants from other states, it might be interesting to examine the contrasts between here and those other places and to examine just why folks have chosen to live here. Now, with my tongue planted very firmly in my cheek, here are some descriptions of those other places. Northern tier states offer lots of greenery and fishing and hunting and opportunity for gardening and sometimes a…

EDITOR’S NOTE: While we at The Standard do not agree with Mr. Hommel’s opinion, we do believe that all citizens have the right to express themselves in print. To censure Mr. Hommel’s letter to the editor would be in direct opposition to America’s values of freedom of expression. Dear Editor, Please allow me to respond to you and my friend Jack Hommel on his column, “Who killed the Democratic Party”. It was hard to read this rant about Jack’s feelings regarding his victimhood that made him demean and degrade good Americans, especially women of accomplishment, who simply have a different…