An Elephantine Christmas

by Oormila Vijayakrishnan Prahlad For Thomas Thorpe In your collection of Christmas cardsthe Peruvian nativity scene stands outnewborn hope cocooned in a cradlethe snow flecked peaks of the Andesrejoicing in the saviour’s birth. you show me the layered papyrusof an Egyptian Christmas cardwhere denizens gaze upon a stara prayer of hope and peaceupon their parted lips. then you look up Read More

Cat Dreams

by Shirley J. Gregory I need help. My neighbor has a little problem, and I feel partially responsible for his predicament. Well, we both got a little excited about my idea, and didn’t stop to really think through what we decided to do. It happened so suddenly we were caught off guard. And, now he’s … well … he’s sort Read More

It’s Prom Season in the Wasteland

by Justin Karcher A really big crowis chasing an ice cream truckdown a crusty alleywhere high school studentsare chilling sugar on their tonguesand talking about how their parentswere murdered by breathalyzers high school studentsdrinking too much tap waterpissing in their ancestors’coffee cupsMercury is in retrograde boys and girls in Americacarving search enginesinto cop car tireshoping justice looks for themwhen they Read More

Cocktails & Dreams, Baga, Goa

by Satya Dash quantum of pepper     in a Bloody Mary     so perfectequates tipsy to happy    rolling down my throatin jeeps of pinwheel candy    seducing stomachyou Sir be a fine mess     belly blushing a baby’s pinkmy frame a door    to seaweed pleasure     to impermanenceland of bones heaped on sour cream    a cathedral’s holyharmony of slow guzzling     throat raised     prostrateat gravity’s feet     Read More

Your Hometown Is an Apocalypse

by Justin Karcher Buzzfeed tells methat the world is endingjust as it’s always beenand they’re probably right the night sky where I grew upalways felt like a run-on sentencetoo many dashed dreamscompeting for spacethey all blended togetheryou could never tell the narrativejust that it was a desperate onethe stars were apostrophes that didn’t really belongbut we put them in there Read More

The White Elephant

by Norman Klein My worst nightmare, JG’svisiting her sick mother,leaving me nothing buther white elephantto keep me company. Last night there he was alive,sitting in her chair, eating herpretzels, smoking her smokes,turning sullen and telling me,his life is flat out misery. He watches me burn spaghettiin a pot, spill napkins on the floor,and after sampling a meatballgets down on his Read More

Eyes on the Sun

by Rickey Rivers Jr. When you saw me in the skyI thought you’d shoot me downbut you only watched me fly. I flew from here to therewith wings from dreams,the wind in my hair. Eyes on the sun,I cut through clouds,made you hopeyou could join this trip around this hip,around this world.Deny you not, eyes on the sun. You love Read More

Raw

by Monica Kagan I long for magic in my life…Does that sound silly? I long for wings and wandsInstead of claws and sores. Flesh strips, flayedVultures lay bareA raw heart– Rended Shrapnel shreds sisters, mother, fatherA familial holocaustA bone tableau Sylvia, Ingrid and VirginiaWeave their wounds into wordsSpiraling down a well I long for wings and wandsInstead of claws and Read More

Baby Elephant

by Farhana Khalique Baby Elephant is trying to sit in my lap again. I groan and uncross my legs and she half rests, watching me. I run my hands over her parchment skin, a palimpsest of grey. Her watermelon head is as hot as desire. I tickle her parachute ears. We sit like this on the shadowed plains of my Read More

The day begins again

by Megha Sood Silence rests on the edge of my hand a slight movement and it breaks the facade of stillness; of eternity, of longevity and more. my body lies supine within this tall grass scorched by the sun whitened by the heat emptiness seeps slowly making a long trail as that of the tears on my cheeks everything around Read More