Five Minutes explores five minutes of a life in one hundred words. Five minutes is edited by Susanna Baird, with editorial support from managing editor Maria s. picone, newsletter editor kate meen, and founding reader bobbi lerman, plus our rotating team of guest readers, who you can meet in the latest newsletteR. Five Minutes was founded in October 2020, with the Salem (Mass.)-based writing group Carrot Cake Writers supplying the journal’s first pieces. We’d love to read your five. Submit here

Undying Hope

The heavy bass resonates in the bathroom, the vocals barely audible over the running water. The comforting scent of moringa* travels across the skin, through the room. Thoughts hold no shape, lost in the steam. But the song comes to an end. I turn off the shower and wrap myself in a towel. As I open the window, the sound of the city invites itself back into my home. The ambient floral scent disappears between horn blasts and what-ifs. The invisible roots tighten around my lungs again. I wipe my tearful eyes. Yet my hands still reek of hopeful moringa.

*Moringa, Moringa oleifera, aka drumstick tree, is a tree native to South Asia. Many parts of the tree are eaten and used in herbal medicines. The oil is good for dry skin.

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Bygone