Throughout my life, people have always had strong opinions about my name: Blaize. Some find it cool, peppering me with questions like, “Were your parents stoners who liked to blaze it up?”—they’re always crestfallen when I tell them no. Others are baffled, demanding I prove it’s my legal name—in more than one instance, I’ve been…

I pledge allegiance to the bottom line, Of the United Corporations of America, And to the Oligarchy for which it crumbled, A fractured nation, under Capitalism, readily divisible, With liberty and justice for few.

Throughout my life, I’ve managed to gather quite a collection of scars. There’s one that spans the length of my left forearm, a token of a particularly gruesome football injury—let’s just say arms aren’t meant to bend in certain ways. Another, on my right calf, came to be after a poorly judged slide on a…

I don’t remember when it first appeared. One night, it was simply there. The face in my window. I was young then. Young enough to have my tale about a nightly visitor lingering outside my window laughed off by those dubbed older and wiser. It used to scare me. I don’t know why it chose…

Earlier this year, I reached what many would consider a major adult milestone: I bought a car. Some may say this purchase is years behind schedule for a thirty-two-year-old but, as a city dweller who has utilized public transportation for nearly a decade, a vehicle has never been an essential need. It’s not to say…