This Issue

Sep/Oct 2010

Have you ever had one of those days when you're trying awfully hard to keep it all together? Freightloads of deadlines are crashing around your head, and it feels like the light at the end of the tunnel is a fast-moving train. And then, suddenly, unbelievably, you find yourself laughing. On-the-floor, rocking-back-and-forth laughter. And when you finally pull yourself together, your problems no longer seem so insurmountable.

You've just experienced catharsis, that sudden lessening of tension that reduces roadblocks from Mt. Everests to barriers a person can leap over. All those endorphins racing to the rescue, sirens screaming.

Characters in this issue of Cicada® experience their own emotional breakthroughs as well. Poet Brendan O'Brien faces down his dictatorial girlfriend in "Ode to a Past Comrade" while "Prudent Paisley Gives Her Troubles Away" features a control freak who needs to loosen up and be more like her hippie mother. Meanwhile, two cowpokes find themselves tumbling toward disaster when their comrades decide to rustle up some fun in O. Henry's "The Marquis and Miss Sally."

When you're done reading the following selections from Cicada, go to www.cicadamag.com/submitwork and answer the Call for Creative Endeavors. Your Challenge theme: Catharsis!