by Adam Lock For more than twenty years, the only time Loralie had sex was when someone died. Like when Sheila, an old school friend, was hit by a motorbike. She invented the death of a second cousin to test her theory; Arthur consoled her and they made love. The sex noises from next door begin at ten o’clock. They’re Read More
Author: Andre
Cellophane Ghosts
by Amanda McLeod Dead jellyfish float transparent in the void below my rib cage, invisible echoes of unforgotten pain. Ghostly tentacles, trailing translucent threads of agony against my lungs, my heart, drinking my oxygen, taking up space left for breathing, diaphanous, penetrating. I wrap myself in this cellophane, unseen suffocation, extra gloss doesn’t hide suffering but shows no cause. Amanda Read More
I Need a New Job
by Normand Lepine Editor’s Note: Today we have a range of holidays to celebrate. Rather than dance around the maypole, however, we’ve chosen to focus on the modern proletariat. See, many of us have day jobs, side gigs, or straight-up permanent positions. And on International Workers’ Day we stand in solidarity with all those who keep the world running. So Read More
Puncture Wounds
by Amanda McLeod You punch me full of holes and watch the life drain out until I am empty of anything that might be called happiness or love Darkness thick like dried bruises under my skin solidifies into flint hard, unmoving yet from the striking of me comes a shower of sparks a flame a sun I tear the holes Read More
Potential
by JD DeHart You saw a promise in me blooming. What was I to others? A dingy doorknob, too rusted to turn, a child of dirt and swear words. A twisted creature full of uncertain history, crying out from the side of the tracks no one wanted to see. No, I was a child of the mountains, birthed from natural Read More
Forgive
Pachyderms have adapted to human society in so many ways, adopting our customs and manners with steady grace. Yet, the average human understands little about pachyderm culture or the ways it remains separate and distinct. Indeed, opponents of integration worry that dark and inhuman secrets remain concealed. Too often when the two cultures have conflicted, human ways have overpowered our Read More
Poem in which everything turns into plants and fungi
by Alex Page It starts with moss breaking through potholes, cress settling on cracks in walls. You go to bed and wake up on a giant mushroom. Your car is still metal, so you go to your barista job, discovering the coffee beans have sprouted into a jungle, pollen billowing in air painted the pastel yellow of summer dresses. Someone Read More
Rest
They sway out of the dust, elongated noses and bottom teeth scraping at the ground. Huge, striped bulks of flesh and armored skin emerge from a storm they’ve carried from the steaming north. They look exhausted, but they won’t rest until they reach the flooded grasslands behind me. Indeed, this herd has marched relentlessly for hundreds of miles just to Read More
Righteous
by Gale Acuff After Sunday School I walk the long mile home, full of God for another week and the memory of Miss Hooker to last just barely that long. I’ll see her again in seven days, walk to church and it won’t seem so far as it is coming back. I love her and want to marry her but Read More