The Toho Journal, which is based in Philadelphia, has just published my short essay "A Visit to Isle Royale" online. This essay is about a trip that my husband and I took in the 1990s to Isle Royale, which is in Lake Superior off the coast of Michigan. The link to my essay is https://www.tohopub.com/tjo/a-visit-to-isle-royale Lori McElrath-Eslick's beautiful cover for my poetry book Traffic Stop
The journal Nashim has accepted my poem "Family Reunions" for its next issue. The poem is about growing up in Milwaukee and the closeness of my family and my mother's twin brother's family. It is sad that my Aunt Ann, who is mentioned in the poem, died last week before I could tell her about this forthcoming publication. She had seen the poem a long time ago, however. Now both twins and their spouses are in Heaven. The young children mentioned in this poem, Brandon, Jason, and Zach, are now adults, and there is a new generation of young cousins. I wrote this poem in the 1990s. Photo of Janet Ruth Heller by Diane Joy Schmidt