I launched Stitch ten years ago, in the summer of 2016, as a companion publication to my online literary magazine Thread that I founded the year before. The idea was to pair Thread with a literary cousin of flash nonfiction personal essays no longer than 100 words.

Submissions arrived from every stage of a writer’s creative life. Previously published. Never before published. Always wanted to be published. Work generated in my writing workshops. Word smiths who would become book authors, award winners, podcasters, publishers and teachers of writing. The subjects were as diverse as the writers who wrote them. They wrote about aging, grief, hot coffee, lilacs, sexual abuse, M&Ms, motherhood, suicide, bolo ties, dementia, voicemail, near misses.

It’s not easy to write a personal narrative in 100 words that feels complete. On the surface, it appears as a small thing but writing it is not. “I would have written a shorter letter but I did not have the time” is an often quoted maxim mistakenly ascribed to Mark Twain (written by the scientist and philosopher Blaise Pascal.) Writing short makes an excellent prompt. The pieces that ultimately landed in Stitch made each word count just as every stitch does in a garment.

I put Thread & Stitchon hiatus in 2019 while working on my memoir and from time to time I think about resurrecting it. But for now, I keep it alive online because I am proud of the work and grateful for the experience of bringing into the world.

Celebrating the 10th anniversary of the first Stitchwith a shout out to the writers who took a chance on a tiny little online lit pub (see list below) and a gift to you, dear reader.

Ellie Wendell, Andrea Isiminger, David M. Barish, Debbi Welch, Sarah C. Baldwin, Karen J. Weyant, Ruth Rozen, Dianne Moritz,Julia C. Spring, Sarah J. Crewe, Jim Civik, Keri Mangis, Katelyn Thomas, Karen Zey,Dara Dokas, Will McMillan,Gila K. Berryman,Katherine Houston,Marie Davidson,Leslie Prpich, Gillian Rennie,Renee Moses,Annette Covrigaru,Jennifer Lang, Heather Mangan,Tom McGohey,Richard LeBlond,Judy Bolton-Fasman, Lori Dube, Rachel Hoge, Kim O’Connell, Nina B. Lichtenstein, Kristine Langley Mahler, Kurt Mullen,Mindy Watson, Katie J. Beberian, Michael Rabiger, Frederick Charles Melancon,Jacqueline Doyle

Coming Up

Join me for a first-time ever, single session, online workshop on finding the crafted parts of your works-in-progress. If you are interested in discovering the melodic pieces of your writing so that you can lean in and make them sing, these two hours will be a productive use of your time. "Literary Lightning: Finding the Poetry in Your Prose," will be offered on June 16th from 10-12 pm Chicago time through the Lighthouse Lit Fest based in Denver, Colorado. Find out more here.

A Stitch in Time

The Poetry in Your Prose