by Felicia Tsao
Read More »an imperial reminder of revolutions to come and the ones that landed at their feet
Symphony for Piano and Fire
by Maysam Kandej and Bill Tope
Maysam was a writer from Iran. For three months, he had dreamed of this trip. He had met an American writer, Mr. Robert Hawley, online. They emailed about books and writing. One day, Mr. Hawley kindly invited Maysam to visit him in America.
Now, Maysam was here. On his second night, he was invited to dinner at the Hawleys’ large, beautiful home in an exclusive gated community known as The Village. He was nervous. As a Muslim, he did not eat pork or drink alcohol, but he did not want to explain his religion. He wanted to be a normal guest.
Read More »Monologue / Field Notes
by Lynsey France
they say recovery is trying twice
when blood dries, gnats swarming the only sentence that’s safe to
return to
I am still waking from my last death because you will not forget her
Read More »A Girl Named Lana
by Mark Smeltzer
A wounded girl sneaks through the algorithm.
A bullet burrows under the root of her ponytail,
Copper tic swelling at the base of her skull.
A blue glove bears her arm to give or take fluids.
She faces, stony, away on a rare hospital bed.
Someone Who Watches
by Foster Trecost
It was my first day.
Awkward introductions. Handshakes held a second too long. Then parked in a cubicle. The computer insisted on my attention, but the desk drawers won that battle. I pulled open the top. Empty, except for a few paperclips. Nothing in the next. The bottom bin, larger than the first two, contained only a coiled ethernet cable. I moved to close it, but stopped. Something more. Beneath the cable, a folded note. Hard-pressed pencil. Block letters.
Read More »A Book Review (The Problem with Plastic)
The Angels are Bowling
by Emma Williquette
EXHIBIT A: GREAT-GRANDMA ON DAD’S MOM’S SIDE.
Indianapolis, Indiana. Sometime in 2007.
I only remember the day in photographic bursts now at twenty-one. Mom was putting my hair half-up in a little ribbon as she always did. After that, I was in someone’s arms going somewhere. Suddenly I had shoes on. Wanted them off. Couldn’t take them off. Lastly, the backseat of the car, left side, on a purple floral booster seat.
Read More »The Topic
by Jeffrey Zable
Of course we’re all in different stages of dying,
but it seems that those who are closest to it
are mostly the ones talking about it.
Just One Different Thing
by Randall Amster
I awaken every day knowing that one thing will be different—one item out of place, one song lyric changed, one person here or not, one event remembered differently by others, one part of myself altered in a way that only I would notice. I’ve named this experience temporal arrhythmia because it sounds cool and smart and sciency, but I have no idea what it all really means in any tangible sense.
Read More »Push Through
by Doug Raphael
There are days
Adam and I would walk
by the sawdust silt banks
of the Medway River,
to a patch of grass