2010 NONFICTION WINNERS

As Chosen by T.A. Noonan

Asha Baisden's "Touch" from Sweet: A Literary Confection

Is he asking, Does he love you the way your dead father would have wanted him to love you? Is he asking, Does he love you the way other boys have loved you before: Does he carry you to bed when you fall asleep on the floor from too much painting or cleaning or drinking ? Does he know which way to pull your legs so that you don’t want to fuck anyone else, ever? Does he slap you into the plaster wall when you tell him you are too sick to drive him?

Amy Clark's "Someone Else's Ivy" from Fringe Magazine

For a long time, when asked what profession I was in, I would reply by saying that I was a professional milk steamer.

Mark Dowie's "Food Among the Ruins" from Guernica

Were I an aspiring farmer in search of fertile land to buy and plow, I would seriously consider moving to Detroit. There is open land, fertile soil, ample water, willing labor, and a desperate demand for decent food. And there is plenty of community will behind the idea of turning the capital of American industry into an agrarian paradise. In fact, of all the cities in the world, Detroit may be best positioned to become the world’s first one hundred percent food self-sufficient city.

Lina Maria Ferreira Cabeza-Vanegas's "After the Colonel" from Wag’s Revue

The cats were poisoned seven days before my grandfather fell from the sky strapped to a faulty parachute. One, Niky, made it to my grandmother’s feet, washing them with blood before collapsing. Yuri never came back.

Nicholas Garnett's "All That Glitters" from Sliver of Stone Magazine

I pulled my car into the parking lot at work, turned off the radio and cut the engine. Outside, it was the tail end of a fantastic afternoon and the first really warm day of spring, which made the impending end of the semester finally feel real. It was also the kind of day that made a college kid want to pull right out of the parking lot and spend what was left of it doing anything but work. I took a deep breath and let it out. "Showtime," I whispered.

Emma Trelles's "Violet" from Gulf Stream Magazine

How I wish I could begin with nostalgia, some gleaming shard refracted from a childhood where my mother patted my thick-as-branches Hispanic hair with Agustìn Reyes Royal Violets, known by Cubans as Violetas, a 75 year old perfume that has graced the tender heads of infants and the wrists of young women, a fragrance that endured a revolution, survived a dictator, and found its way into the homes of exiles all about.

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