Art by Matt Bollinger

by Yuko Iida Frost

One night after work in December, I decided to hop on the express train to visit Masa unannounced. The restaurant where he worked was tucked behind a quiet street, off the Imperial Palace. The oldest in Kyoto, it used to serve the emperor until the capital moved to Tokyo, formerly called Edo, in the late nineteenth century. The street was dark. Their unassuming façade disguised its legendary reputation and looked more like an entrance to an old merchant’s house trying to hide his wealth. The sliding door was almost invisible with only two dimly lit paper lanterns hanging on both sides.

Art by Andy Mister

by Marilyn Martin

Nine years after my father died, my mother dug up a clump of wild irises from behind the New York suburban house where she still lived and where I’d grown up. At the time, my two young children and I were visiting, and the evening before we were to leave, my mother tenderly swaddled one iris in damp paper towels and placed it in a shopping bag. On the plane, the iris balanced between Sara and John who put their arms around it as we cruised 30,000 feet above the earth.