Category: Uncategorized
-
This Is West – Winter Nights
There is no stillness like winter nights on the plains, cold creeping through the cracks in the earth and the gaps around aged windows, chilling skin and bone even through layers as I stand just inside the screen door listening to the watery whisper of rain against concrete, chain-link, and dust. Nobody ventures outside these days.…
-
This Is West – Not Mine
While I take a short break on my run I stand a few feet short of a barbed-wire fence, tumbleweeds stacked waist-high against the artificial barrier. For such an expansive landscape, Eastern New Mexico is ironically inaccessible. Frustratingly inaccessible. This must be how the cowboys felt way back when, the land shut off in front…
-
El Portal – Fall 2015 Edition
Readers can now access the PDF version of El Portal’s Fall 2015 issue. Click on the image above to access the PDF file. If you have any questions about the Fall 2015 issue, please feel free to contact the editor at el.portal@enmu.edu. Full List of Contributors: Sreyash Sarkar “Whirligig” Justin J. Murphy “Space-time Snakebite Continuum…
-
This Is West – JJ’s Café
The coffee was stale already and the sun had barely risen. It was hot and the dry stuffiness of the diner made words thick and heavy. There was no time for nonsense in this kind of heat. The cowboy hats that sat erect across from one another with half-empty plates of hash browns and ketchup…
-
Launch Party!
Join El Portal TONIGHT for the Launch of its Fall 2015 issue! El Portal’s Fall 2015 launch party starts at 6pm in JWLA 112. Food, entertainment, and shiny new journals abound!
-
The Submission Deadline’s Almost Here!
There’s less than one week left until the deadline for the Spring 2016 issue! With the release of our Fall 2015 issue scheduled for next month, El Portal is looking ahead. We have already received a number of submissions, but that doesn’t mean the submission period is over yet! Prose, poetry, flash fiction, photography, and art are all welcome internationally,…
-
This Is West – Railroad Crossing
Long, candy-cane-striped arms descend across the road in front Andrew, cherry-red lights flashing alternatively on the cautionary railroad crossing sign. “Damn it. God damn it.” Andrew will be late for his flight for sure now. He debates trying to beat the train across the tracks, but already knows he won’t do it. A train takes…
-
Submission Period Ending Soon
With the release of our Fall 2015 issue scheduled for next month, El Portal is looking ahead. We have already received a number of submissions for our Spring 2016 issue, but that doesn’t mean the submission period is over yet! Prose, poetry, flash fiction, photography, and art are all welcome internationally, so be sure to submit your pieces in time…
-
The Approaching Deadline, Web Features, and Some Fun
It’s a little over three weeks until the submission deadline for El Portal‘s Spring 2016 issue. Prose, poetry, flash fiction, photography, and art are all welcome internationally, so be sure to submit your pieces in time for consideration! Deadline October 31st. For Terms of Submission: Click Here For Submission Guidelines: Click Here El Portal is also…
-
El Portal’s September Web Feature
El Portal is pleased to announce that this September’s web feature will be Greg Rapp’s “Chthonic Cinema”. Be on the lookout for it this coming Wednesday, September 30th. El Portal‘s monthly web feature runs from September through April. Everyone is welcome to submit their stories, poems, photography, and art for consideration. If you have any…
-
El Portal’s Web Feature for May 2015
We apologize for the short period of inactivity. In April, we were unable to post excerpts from the most recent edition of El Portal due to technical issues. However, this month we have a special treat for our readers. Alexandra Itzi has put together an interview with Kayleen Burdine, who will serve as El Portal‘s…
-
Thinking West: Campfire Coffee Recipe
El Portal has decided to publish its own recipe of a western favorite: campfire coffee. Campfire coffee is an art and a science, despite what many city folks might believe. Moreover, coffee is just as important to the cowpokes of the range as it is to the business folks of the city. Unlike those city slickers who visit…
-
Send Us Your Submissions!
El Portal is currently accepting submissions for its Fall 2015 issue. The deadline for submission is 31 March. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact the editor at el.portal@enmu.edu. Also, be sure to check out our Guidelines and Terms of Submission pages.
-
Thinking West: The Pineapple Express (Weather)
In December 2014, many Americans watched news coverage of torrential downpours in California. The torrential downpours, still occurring when this post was written, came at a time when California had been in the midst of the worst drought in its history. (Ironically NOAA claimed that California’s drought was not man-made but naturally caused…
-
ItNothing (Poem by Alexandra Itzi)
“No.” “But I—“ “I said no.” There was a slam, a bang, and then a sigh. That’s how the story started, and also how it ended. She looked down at his body, at the crooked bend of his neck. She peeked into the crater of flesh, at the bored-out hole in his skull.…
-
Thinking West: Robo Novels
Technology and science now act as the modern world’s newest frontier. It is a frontier full of excitement, questions, and its share of dangers. The questions brought forth from this nebulous frontier could shape our world and how technological and scientific progress become part and parcel of our daily lives. As we approach the singularity…
-
More from Jim O’Donnell
Danube River at Night – My Shot of the Day – October 16, 2014. More Pictures of Beautiful Bratislava by Night. We be will hosting two major events while Jim O’Donnell is in Portales: Reading on Friday, the 23rd at 2pm in JWLA 112 Lecture on Thursday the 29th at 2pm in JWLA 112
-
More from Jim O’Donnell: Egypt, Day One-Around the World in Eighty Years
Egypt, Day One-Around the World in Eighty Years.
-
Thinking West: Comparative Wests Project
Check out the Comparative Wests Project by Stanford University. Read the small blurbs below and check the project’s website (click on “read more here…”). The Comparative Wests Project is an interdisciplinary collaboration focused on exploring the common histories and shared contemporary issues among Indigenous populations and settler colonialists in Australia, New Zealand, Western South America,…
El Portal Literary Journal 