Tara’s breakup with Ted wasn’t easy. They said nasty things. She was lazy. He was lousy in bed. But it was his “you have a face meant for radio” that hurt her the most. It’s just what I need, she thought, when an artist asked her to model for his portrait class at a local museum.

She looked pretty in the plumed picture hat, and the high-necked blouse flattered her small waist. The students—retirees, creative moms, and talented teens—always got to work right away, squinting at her from their easels, dabbing on paint. What had she expected to find at their final exhibit?

Not the canvas of a single bonnet, 

or the halo of mewing kittens. 
Not the Picasso-esque eyes 

or puce-colored skin. 
In several pieces 
the absence of a neck. 

—Long-listed Finalist in MacQ’s Cheribun Challenge #4

Tina Barry’s

third collection, I Tell Henrietta (with art by Kristin Flynn), was published in August 2024 by Aim Higher Press, Inc. Tina’s first two books were released by Big Table Publishing: Beautiful Raft (2019) and Mall Flower (2016). Her writing can be found in numerous literary journals and anthologies, including American Poetry Journal, The Best Small Fictions 2020 (spotlighted story) and TBSF 2016, The Fourth River, Gone Lawn, Gyroscope Review, MacQueen’s Quinterly, Maryland Literary Review, Nasty Women Poets anthology, ONE ART, Rattle, South Florida Poetry Journal, Sky Island Journal, SWWIM, trampset, Verse Daily, and elsewhere.

She has five nominations for the Pushcart Prize and several Best of the Net and Best Microfiction nods. Tina is a teaching artist at The Poetry Barn and Writers.com.

Author’s website: TinaBarryWriter.com

More on the Web: By, About, and Beyond

⚡ Three Lovers I Never Had, cheribun story by Barry, Third Place Winner of MacQ’s Cheribun Challenge #2 (Issue 24, August 2024)

⚡ I tell Henrietta that before I left my boyfriend and It’s Ed Sullivan’s Fault, microfictions by Barry first published in MacQueen’s Quinterly (Issue 18, April 2023), and reprinted in her collection I Tell Henrietta (August 2024)

⚡ Inside the amazing brains of Laura Rodley, Tina Barry, & Robert Slais by Big Table Publishing in Boston Literary Magazine (February 2023); includes Tina’s poem “Lilies”

⚡ Beautiful Raft: An Interview with Tina Barry by Hannah Grieco in Empty Mirror (28 February 2020)

⚡ “A Friend’s Daughter Dies” in American Poetry Journal (Issue 14, Summer 2017)