ISSUE #5
Dean Bakopoulos
What I Did on the Moon
Well, I had some drinks. I yearned for you. I dug up my father’s bones and watched them float off into the ether. I ignored my infirm mother. I engaged with various shadows….
Sarah Cypher
The Lord’s Tower Had Many Fine Rooms
I met my father’s house in the scorching green heart of an Oregon summer. This house was a sort of enchantment. It had a gambrel roof that softened the crisp eaves and long porch. Inside, it was full of hardworking windows and honey-colored wooden floors….
Evanthia Bromiley
eviction
an excerpt from junkyard lyric: a novel
To bed, their mother says.
But the walls of the trailer are thin and the night is sharp with broken things. Virginia and Evan stalk their scraped-empty bedroom, Virginia handstanding-up-against the wall, Evan hurling a rubber ball at the door over and over….
Matthew Olzmann
Fine. I give up. There’s no such thing as trees.
You make the two-hour drive back to Marquette for the holiday. At dinner, grandpa asks, “Have you heard the truth about trees?”…
Alyssa Jordan
A Love Song in Three Parts
The Computer Tech
You think about his crooked little grin first. Mostly, you retrace that day you sat in bed, your foot propped up, wrapped with blood and bandages. He took the rocking chair next to your bed….
Read More
M. E. Proctor
Eye in the Sky
The window was open just enough to let in the cool night air. It felt good and unexpected after the scorching heat of the day. There had been very little relief lately. Even the sea breeze seemed to have given up and the ocean was as sluggish as molten pewter…
Read More
Cheryl Pappas
Let It Out
I stole my witch from the forest. Years ago. She’s with me today, in my purse, as I walk the mossy path with my children. She is niggling and fussing in there, clamping her gums at me…
Read More
Sofia T. Romero
The Moment Wasn’t Ours to Begin With
I was cleaning, clearing, rearranging, disposing. I thought you might ask what I was doing. I thought you might stay my hand, ask me to stop the relentless curation of our life together. But you didn’t. You didn’t ask much about what I was doing…
Read More
Kirsten Jacobson
The Dead Are All Around Us
“Mommy. Mommy!” My daughter’s face is pale in the moonlight.
“What, sweetheart?”
“The dead are all around us,” she whispers urgently. “I hear them playing games.”…
Gerry Stanek
Tangible
There was no light at the tracks behind the A&P, and a distant thud compressed and pulsed in predawn air. His glasses were spotted with mist but made the world clearer for cobalt eyes. Strained eyes, bloodshot. A flask hid corn whiskey in his jacket…
Read More
Sasha Hom
They Swim Circles In The Rain (excerpt)
I. Time, Korea.
This is a story about birth. About mothers and daughters and sisters too. Those who are sold across seas…
Read More
Elyse Durham
Lulu
Lulu comes to my apartment door. She’s just skin and bones with gray hair and poodle pajamas, made bonier still by the flu, which kept her in bed all last week. She carries the oversized mason jar I had given her, then filled with chicken broth, now empty…
Read More