Matthew E. Henry (MEH) is an educator, essayist, occasional fiction writer, and author of seven poetry collections, most recently Promises to Keep (Wayfarer Books, 2026). Editor-in-chief of The Weight Journal, a poetry editor at American Poetry Journal, and nonfiction editor at Porcupine Literary, MEH’s publications include Had, Massachusetts Review, Mom Egg Review, The Pedestal Magazine, Ploughshares, Southern Humanities Review, Terrain, and The Worcester Review. MEH earned an MFA yet continued to spend money he didn’t have completing an MA in theology and a PhD in education. He writes about education, race, religion, and burning oppressive systems to the ground at www.MEHPoeting.com.
my mother weaved the slumped bag of my father through traffic as fast as she could but he died of a hornet sting. after two EpiPens on route, additional amps of epinephrine at the hospital ER, he coded but then pulled through. I learned this at his bedside—his gown-drowning body surrounded by family and welcomed, incessant beeping—when a young resident… Read more →