Continue reading “Reptiles by Evan Parker”“and from that ejecting window ive stood out in the rain looking into the little slits in the blinds bound by something—someone called it god once; christ; small/insignificant—barely even able to breathe; sour under night lights and brown shade”
Continue reading “Waiting To Miscarry by Dorsía Smith Silva”“You tell her in hushed tones that leave shadows. Think of my belly’s desperation. At this early hour begging for space to speak, its weight pressed tightly down. What a twisted silence.”
Continue reading “In Filth You Will Be Found by Sheila Mulrooney”“I still have the carpet from Ikea with stains from my salt when I’d cross the room, kiss your left ear, and call you Al.”
Continue reading “Crossing by Kindra McDonald”“You stole the canoe, I sank in the water, took a breath and swam. With every inhalation I saw you paddling beside me across that long, silent lake to the hot springs a mile away.”
Continue reading “Everyone Says They Saw The Signs by Marissa Glover”“Some boys absorb their father’s punches—release them in sports or turn them into song. Some store the hits in a bruised body, saving them like pennies in a piggy bank, waiting to cash in when the market’s strong.”
Continue reading “They Does Not Fit Like A Thundershirt Should by Nicole Oquendo”“I have slipped in and out of pronouns as if this body was a fitting room. The lighting isn’t right here, and each curve of my body is a segment that, deep down, I’d like to carve out, but she is all I’m left with—”
she melted from the thinnest boundaries of her place in the moment—three-thirty on a Wednesday in the year two-thousand-something-something– her stillness itself a sun dial with a long shadow that moves through time without knowing
what it means.
Smoke rolls in reverse back under the hood, the windshield un-shatters, glass pulling around the branch as it exits the car.
This piece was selected by our guest editor, Joe Russo.
The keratin scythe from my toe pressed against the phone, I called you. Told you I added water from my eyes to the squash soup I made last week.
