Issue 8

FICTION

• Proxies, by Anne Freier

• The Grief Eater, by Bianca M. Caraza

• Spanglish Deceptions, by Bryan Betancur

• Family Meeting, by Dawn Deanna Wilson

• The Craftsman’s Box, by Jeanette Smith

• My Name is Sophrosyne. Go Ahead, Snicker, by J. Gregory Alderisio

• Fishing for Love, by Taylor Hopper

FLASH FICTION

• Four Colors, by Linda McMullen

• Inheritance, by Sean Murphy

POETRY

• Talking to grandpa at the feet of an alarm, by Aiyejinna Abraham O

• The Moon Walks Out on the Sun: Is-Chel to Kinch Ahau, by Ariadne Makridakis Arroyo

•  How to Clean Unhealing Wounds, by Christian Hanz Lozada

• My Mother Made Me/Mexicana, by Claudia Duran

•  Dungeon Fog, by Emily Browne

• Perfume, Lipstick, Girdle, by Erica McGee

• Gifthorse, by Kate Maxwel

• What the Dawn Told Me, by Kunle Okesipe

•  ¡Pasa, pasa! by Roy Duffield

  
  

Editorial Team: Jose Palacios, Aimee Campos, Monica Aleman

Advisors: Juana Moriel-Payne, Thomas Cook

1 2

3 4

1. By Jim Zola

   Jim Zola is a poet and photographer living in North Carolina. His most recent books are Erasing Cabeza de Vaca (Main Street Rag Press) and Monday After the End of the World (Aldrich Press).

2. Utopia,

   by Courtney Songco

   Courtney Songco a sophomore student at Mt. San Jacinto College who is currently majoring in Computer Science.

3. Small Universe, by Edward Michael Supranowicz

   Edward Michael Supranowicz is the grandson of Irish and Russian/Ukrainian immigrants. He grew up on a small farm in Appalachia.  He has a grad background in painting and printmaking. Some of his artwork has recently or will soon appear in Fish Food, Streetlight, Another Chicago Magazine, The Door Is a Jar, The Phoenix, and other journals. Edward is also a published poet.

   Artist Statement

   I do not believe in formal artist statements. Art should speak for itself, and the artist should maintain a respectful distance and silence. I work intuitively and compulsively, probably believing that there are archetypes that are shared among us all, but amenable to being expressed in one’s own individual style.

   I have been doing digital paintings and drawings for the last 10 or so years. It is a good fit to my personality and nature, being able go forward, then back, then back and forward, and not having to worry about wasted canvas. And digital work allows for sharing work with more than one person rather than just one person “owning” a painting.

4. from orphans to street boys in embryo

   by Olude Peter

   Olude Peter Sunday is an Hyper-realistic Pencil Artist, Writer and Poet from Nigeria. His has his Arts, Stories and Poems published/forthcoming in magazines including: Caffeinated Journal Anthology, Hayden’s Ferry review, The Shallow Tales Review, Native Skin Mag, Kalahari Review, Erogospel magazine, African writers, Parousia magazine, Poemify, Madswirl, Eskimo pie and elsewhere. He won the third place prize in the Endsars National poetry contest held in October 2020.When he isn’t writing, he is painting pure portraits with pencils and Photoshop. Find him on twitter @peterolude, IG @cee_tawpson

FICTION

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Proxies

by Anne Freier

I had been dating the man who said he loved me more than he loved his cat for 46 days. This seemed an excessive time because good things always disappeared from my life after four weeks. Good things like the scent of blossom in April, the two-inch fringe, the excitement of an unheard melody, or the promise of my parents’ return from prison.

The cat was a tabby with white socks for paws. Esquire, the man would call and it would come darting from behind the sofa or the cupboard or some other nook that it had squeezed between. How useful it would be to bend into the hollows in the concrete walls! Confined spaces were the safest, my parents liked to joke.

I didn’t ask about the cat’s name. He may want my opinion and I’d have to tell the truth, that I didn’t think it was a good fit for a tabby with white socks for paws. Boots or Moose or any name with a double ‘o’ felt more appropriate.

Esquire despised the touching. I was fond of his hand on my body. Maybe that’s why he liked me just a little more. Stroking was a soothing pastime for the hand. I liked other things he did to me too, but the petting was my favorite. He was quick to notice my preferences and reached out to caress my neck or shoulder whenever he passed by.

There was a dead palm tree overlooking the apartment. His landlady hadn’t bothered to remove it. It lends the place a certain charm, he said, but I didn’t ask what charm that was because he could be one of those repressed goths. My mother had warned me not to go near people with death ideologies. Sooner or later they’ll want to know what it feels like for themselves, she’d said and I always took her advice seriously. Unless it was about money. Those behind bars for embezzlement couldn’t be trusted on the matter.

He was younger than me by five years, but thought that he was older by two. He never asked, but just assumed and when he finally said it out loud, five weeks had passed. I put a cut-off on honesty. After four weeks, the truth became a matter of interpretation. I asked how old Esquire was and he said he didn’t know.

The man whom I’d been seeing for 46 days sold charity donations on the doors of strangers. That was how he’d stumbled into my territory. Leaflets depicting hungry children stacked up on his coffee table. I liked to shuffle through them and look at all the pictures when I was low on spirit. These days I was blue more often. My yoga teacher suggested it was on account of all the things disappearing. Get a pet, she said, they’re reliable company. And I thought that it was practical that the man whom I was seeing had a cat. But I refused to get my own. It would run away eventually and there were no spaces left for posters on the lamp posts on my street.

He cooked large, lavish dinners for the two of us; a menu filled with dishes I had never tried before – grilled quail with arugula, glazed goat cheese bake on lemon honey risotto, and avocado chocolate-dipped berry ice cream. We ate the leftovers for breakfast and lunch. At first, I’d sit on his crotch all grateful because there was no one home to feed me meals. But soon it occurred to me that the feeding was conspiracy. A body that couldn’t fit through the door frame was a body that could never leave. I noticed that Esquire’s bowls were always full. Lucky for the cat, it was a picky eater. Mind to cut down on the courses, I asked, and he said that I was being silly. Then he stroked my eyebrows and I forgot about his scheme.

I came to see him every evening, mostly unannounced but I sensed he knew that I’d be there. We ate and drank, and talked about our day or stories we’d read in the paper. Sometimes we’d watch a movie on TV and he asked if he could comb my hair. I sank deep into his hands as the soft bristles gently pulled on the roots. One hundred strokes, he said and brushed until my scalp vibrated. I hummed along to every second motion.

When it rained, he liked to play a game with me. We gave into chess. We gave up on chess when Esquire got into the habit of jumping onto the board to move the queens and knights with the white-sock paws. I was relieved because I wasn’t very good at chess and worried I’d lose my patience and hide the board in one of the hollow spaces. It was the cat, I could have said. My favorite game was hide and seek. All of me tingled when I saw his feet approach the bed.

At night, I buried my head in his armpit. His perfume reminded me of mint and sandalwood. I lay still for hours, enveloped in his scent. A single thought that came escaped me quickly. I shook my head on instinct when he suggested we ought to plan something special for our two-month anniversary. What makes you certain we should last, I asked. He smiled and gently flicked my earlobe. I rested my head on his chest and listened to the heart beating. My tongue rolled across my teeth to locate a thing that was stuck between the top front row. It wouldn’t budge. Forty-six days, more days than I had teeth in my mouth. The excess of time was disquieting. Then I freed what had been lodged between the teeth and fished it from my mouth. I held it closer to my eyes to see it in the dark. What is it, he asked. Nothing, I said, just a strand of cat hair.

****

Anne is a writer of fiction, creative non-fiction, and poetry. Her foray into publishing began when, as a child, she self-published booklets on pet care that she sold in front of supermarkets to collect donations for the local animal shelter. Her first book is being published by a Berlin-based indie press in 2021.

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The Grief Eater

by Bianca M. Caraza

I can still see that last glimpse of her face: brows drawn together, mouth slack, tears shimmering in the corners of her eyes in a way that made me almost hungry.

I open my eyes to the final amen of the lengthy rosary and watch the people in the pew ahead of mine. Once they, sniffling already, return to their seats I do the same. Someone in the front slips and the kneeler hits the floor with a loud crash that echoes through the high ceilinged church. Several people wince.

It’s a beautiful church, and I always like to come here. It’s classic— proper stained glass windows depicting resurrections and miracles and drooping saints, there’s a marble altar, and the cloth that hangs off of it is embroidered with little golden vines— none of those goofy felt doves that are supposed to be the Holy Spirit. There are several wreaths off to the right, almost all of them are bundles of white and yellow roses. They look expensive and even from halfway down they’re rich and fragrant, perfuming the whole place up to the points of its high gothic arches.

With the rosary over, the priest begins the mass in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. The casket is before the altar and everyone is standing, I realize just a second too late, and if I weren’t in the back I would have been too obvious. Almost no one else fumbled the timing. Catholic families, go figure.

I haven’t seen her since then. I tried texting. Then calling. But there was never an answer. She probably blocked the number. She never had an instagram, but she even blocked me on venmo. Four years, up in flames.

What do you say when a friend leaves? There’s no break up protocol. You can’t split your finances or your friend group. There’s no custody to navigate.

“In the name of the father…” The priest begins and I carefully make the sign of the cross, careful to move my arm from left to right. I press my eyes closed and take a deep breath, letting the emotions of the room fill me. I like to get a feel for it— the exquisite flavors of sadness which surround me. Grief, of course, is ever present. It’s like a mist that seeps in, that everyone chokes on. That is expected. But it’s not just grief, it’s sorrow, regret for things left unsaid, loss in so many ways— the loss of a father, of a friend, of a mentor— there is even anger simmering under the grief. Perhaps at the deceased, but maybe at fate or God or whatever took him. I’ve never been a mind reader, I could never discern the thoughts behind the feelings, only the particular shades of them. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that I can taste them.

The hunger inside me is like a second mouth. An entity all its own that opens like a maw to reveal a wide and cavernous emptiness. It can never get enough to eat. Sometimes when I check my reflection in the mirror, I think I can see it. An emptiness in the back of my eye. Maybe she could see it, too.

The priest wraps up his homily and then there’s more kneeling. This time I am ready and fall quickly to my knees, as though the hunger, now piqued, has me on high alert. It’s eager to blend in, like a cat hiding in the bushes, eyes wide.

It doesn’t hurt them. At least, I don’t think it does. They’re sad anyway, it’s not like I have anything to do with it. And then my hunger is lessened for a while. I’m another part of nature, like those little birds that live on hippos. Except I get everything and they get sadder. There’s a word for that.

When it’s time to receive communion I rise and follow the line of shaking people— some of them are already crying outright. The thing inside me is not my stomach, it’s higher up, just under my lungs or maybe between them, pushing on them. Sometimes I’m so hungry that my vision goes black and it’s hard to breathe.

But it’s not time yet.

When I get to the altar, I cross my arms in front of my chest. I’ve always wondered, a little blasphemously maybe, what it tastes like— what all the fuss is about. It’s tempting for someone like me— eat this bread and never hunger, etc. But I keep my lips tightly shut and give the bow and turn. From up here I can see everyone, though they’re mostly kneeling, hands pressed together, those who are standing are either crying openly, faces shining like pearls in a sea of black, or else clenching their jaws in determination to get through it.

“Were you… using me this whole time?” Her expression was broken open like a shell crushed in one’s palm.

“No, I swear,” I said, but I wasn’t sure. How could I ever be? Do you notice when you’re breathing?

“You’re lying,” she cried. She grabbed my glass of wine off the table and hurled it at me— maybe she’d only meant to throw it near me. She missed and it burst into a dozen shards, wine seeping into the white rug like spilled blood between us.

It’s best at these things to wait until the perfect moment, a kind of tantalizing foreplay. I have developed such an acute sense of timing that I fear when I do have to attend a service in earnest, I will salivate at the first note of an organ.

When the first born steps up to the ambo, there is a collective tightening of chests. It’s a rush of quick tears, a swallowed lump of regret. The whole crowd holds its breath, praying she doesn’t break.

“My dad,” she begins, “was all of the things Father Eric said. He was dedicated to his family, to his work, and to his community here at St. Lawrence. He was the best dad—” and her voice cracks on the last word “—that anyone could have asked for.”

At first there are a few sniffles, then murmurs, and at last a flood of tears. And it’s time.

How to describe it. It’s like opening every tap inside yourself and letting all the water flow over. Except it doesn’t flow out, it draws in. I just have to take it all in, drink my fill. It’s like standing in the surf and trying to drink your fill from the waves.

It’s like breathing. The air is all around you.

I didn’t. I never would have. Never to someone I loved. I review old text messages, scroll through pictures, rolling the images over until the bittersweet taste of those moments are on my tongue. I didn’t, not to her. I am sure. I am almost sure.

When leaving a funeral unnoticed, one must either be the first or last to go. I stay behind until just a few family members linger, holding each other in their grief. The burial will be in the graveyard just outside, an ancient and overgrown thing. Probably, he had a family plot. I make my way out and slither away, through the parking lot and onto the corner. There’s a coffee shop across the street and I light my cigarette and take a deep drag, wondering what I’ll order for lunch.

The cafe door opens and I catch a flash of red hair. It couldn’t be her, I think. But I see her unmistakable fossil bag with the scratch down its side. I recognize the green blouse she’s wearing, knit with pearl buttons. I can almost smell her perfume, almost taste it in the back of my throat.

A thousand things come to me— I’ll yell at her. I’ll hug her. I’ll slap her. I’ll tell her how sorry I am. I’ll tell her she owes me sixty bucks for that concert ticket I bought. I’ll tell her she was wrong about me.

I will the cars to pass so that I can run at her, so that I can say every word welling up. But when the light turns that sickly green, I don’t move. I watch her turn away, growing smaller, the tether between us thinning until it breaks.

Did she look happy? I can’t remember.

I glance back at the church, black and looming, spires slicing through the fog of the day. I turn back and head for the graveyard where I can stand sinking in the mud at the edges of the weeping crowd.

There is always another funeral, another tragedy. And I am always hungry.

****

Bianca M. Caraza is a graduate student at Mount Saint Mary’s University and English teacher in downtown Los Angeles. She is the former editor in chief of The TKC literary magazine The Troubadour and has been published in The Rush Magazine. She is looking forward to reinventing the gothic genre.

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Spanglish Deceptions

 by Bryan Betancur

I read the email again. After countless rejections, rewrites, restless nights reproaching myself for believing I could write compelling fiction, I finally received an acceptance. The editors at a prestigious journal wanted to publish the story “Spanglish Deceptions.” It was a moment to feel proud, validated. But the story wasn’t mine.

I read the email again. I wouldn’t submit to a journal of this caliber during my most audacious delusions of grandeur. The letterhead alone sufficed to prove something was amiss. And the message wasn’t even addressed to me, but to a writer named Poster X. This Poster X, stupid nom de plume aside, merited the editors’ admiration, not me.

I read the email again. My eyes, accustomed to scrutinizing nothing but demoralizing rebuffs, pined to revisit the praise lavished on “Spanglish Deceptions.” Haunting yet hopeful …vanguard of Latinx literature…why we’re committed to publishing authors from marginalized groups. The email-encomium was a dream come true for an aspiring Latino writer like me. But I wasn’t the author. “You’re a good writer, too, no te estreses,” I whispered in a feeble attempt at affirmation that echoed the insincere encouragement editors sometimes included in their rejections. Yet I continued stewing in jealous rumination, imagining Poster X’s satisfaction at receiving the acceptance.  

I read the email again. Did I have enough tact to compose a reply that wasn’t unduly passive aggressive? Dear editors, I admire your journal and hope to place my work there some day. In the meantime, you sent me an acceptance intended for another writer. While this oversight is understandable and completely forgiven, it has reiterated, without my needing reminding, that I’m a shit writer. Saludos cordiales, pendejos. Not Poster X.  

I read the email again. The acceptance had come from a no-reply email address, which meant I had to respond through the submission management website I used to send stories and communicate with journals. The site housed all my rejected submissions dating back three years. I would be forced to confront the archived evidence of my failed writing before alerting editors at an eminent journal the story they fawned over wasn’t, couldn’t possibly be, mine. I cursed under my breath and logged into my account.  

I blinked hard and leaned toward the screen as if searching for the 3D image in a Magic Eye puzzle. Jagged icicles spread like tendrils through my veins. Someone hacked into the account. My name still appeared at the top of the page, and several of the active submissions were in the usual In-Progress purgatory, waiting to be read and banished from the pearly gates of publication. Everything looked normal, save the two most recent submissions, both sent to illustrious journals, both titled “Spanglish Deceptions.”

Despite the impulse to slam the laptop shut and forget everything I just saw, I clicked the Accepted tab. Y claro: one acceptance, a story titled “Spanglish Deceptions.” I scrolled through the submission form. Every auto-completed field contained the usual information except the submitter name, which was changed to Poster X. The somatic manifestations of my anxiety disorder poured forth in sweaty, breathy succession. What could be more humiliating than confessing to respected editors that I submitted a story I didn’t write?

After performing EFT tapping for ten minutes to suffuse an oncoming panic attack, I reassessed the situation. Who was Poster X? Had he or she submitted work through other hacked accounts? What was the endgame? Unable to cope with the nauseating whirlwind of unanswered questions, I sought refuge in avoidant behavior. Rather than draft a message to the editors, I read “Spanglish Deceptions.”

I desperately hoped to find something to criticize—an underdeveloped character, exaggerated emotion, a superfluous modifier. Pero nada, the story was sublime. It boasted a subtly complex plot, and the protagonist’s inner monologue drew the reader in with the warm familiarity of a steaming bowl of sancocho. More importantly, the work gave voice to my people, spoke to and for the Latino community in a way my fiction seldom (if ever) accomplished. Poster X captured the Latino identity in its multifaceted complexity, yearning, and nostalgia without resorting to banal stereotype. You’d want to read “Spanglish Deceptions” again and again to savor every leitmotiv and poignant social commentary.

I walked to the living room and lay faceup on the area rug. What’s the worst that would happen if I took credit for Poster X’s story? I didn’t have a writing career to derail, so I could easily ignore the ruthless criticism I’d face if I were outed as a fraud. But what if Poster X wasn’t Latino? What if a white writer intended to use me as a brown mask? The story merited wide circulation for its adroit apposition of artistry and advocacy, but not at the risk of propagating cultural appropriation; not while talented Latino artists struggled to navigate a publishing market still mired in structural racism.

I turned my head toward the window. Heavy, ashen clouds moved languidly behind the wilting orchid on the sill. I tensed my body, took a deep breath, slowly released.

- - -

I know perpetual fear of exposure will make it impossible to fully enjoy whatever recognition “Spanglish Deceptions” might bring. The truth will inevitably come to light. It always does. Until then, I’m Poster X.  

****

Bryan Betancur is a Spanish professor in the Bronx and a freelance journalist who writes on issues related to Latino political identity and representation. In addition to academic and journalistic essays, he has published creative nonfiction in iōLit and The Nasiona and fiction in Hispanic Culture Review (forthcoming).

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Family Meeting

by Dawn Deanna Wilson

Meemaw had a nasty cold and had just discovered the internet. After a five-minute consultation with “Dr. Google,” she was convinced she was dying, so she called this family meeting of the three grandchildren—we assume—to tell everyone what they’re going to inherit when she passes on into the great yonder.

Her room is gloomy, dark and shadowy despite five lamps surrounding her bed. The window overlooks the Dumpster, and there’s a generic still life picture featuring clay pots and day lilies. The television is –as always ---tuned into Animal Planet, the volume too low to hear clearly, but too loud to easily talk over.

Meemaw starts fiddling with the bed controls, trying to move the mattress into a perfectly straight sitting position. She doesn’t know how to do it, but we don’t dare correct her. Last time Lisa tried she got fussed out. Meemaw said she remembered Korea and lost a brother in Vietnam, so she sure as hell knew how to operate a hospital bed.

Meemaw always spoke with the Southern flair of a girl raised along the salty marshes and cypress trees of eastern North Carolina, one who grew up fishing for brim along the river curves and inlets, disappointed when her hook only brought up an angry alligator gar.

She never adjusted to the cool evenings and snowy winters of the Appalachians. I suspect on some level she resented Pop Pop for taking her away from her native landscape, one so flat it spread out like the palm of a hand, peppered with cotton fields and tobacco curing barns sweltering in the August humidity.

But Meemaw could tell stories of oyster roasts and holiday flotillas down by Snow’s Cut on the Cape Fear River. Stories that no one was really interested in, but that disinterest only made her tell them with more gusto, showing a Down East determination that could give the mountain gals a run for their money.

Meemaw clears her throat and moves a stray strand of gray hair from her face, placing it behind her ear. She stretches her ancient hands upward as if presenting an offering. Her lips pucker, trying to form the next sentences with careful craftsmanship.

I want the piano. I know that it’s terrible to be thinking of what I can get when Meemaw dies, but I’ve always loved the piano. I’m the only one in the family who can play it, anyway.

Meemaw takes a deep breath.

“I saw the Lizardman.”

She says it plainly and matter-of-factly like seeing the Lizardman was no more unusual than seeing a cat.

“Was he all with red eyes and bat wings?” Junior asks.

“No, you idiot. That's the Mothman. I'm talking about the Lizardman.”

The Lizardman was seeped deeply in Carolina lore, flourishing near the mountains, but making the occasional appearance in the brackish estuaries and fishing inlets around the coast. He was our Bigfoot, our Chupacabra, our Yeti.

And Meemaw saw him.

“I caught glimpse of him two weeks ago but didn't want to say anything because I was afraid you'd lock me up in the nuthouse.”

“You didn’t see the Lizardman, Meemaw.” Lisa rolls her eyes. She's the only girl in the family, and that’s why she gets by with everything.

“I really don't think the Lizardman is real,” Junior says, more as if trying to convince himself more than Meemaw.

“I saw the Lizardman and you need to show me some respect.”

I stand up. “Let’s everybody take a deep breath. Meemaw, tell me what happened.”

She straightens her back defiantly, and like sunlight seeping through the blinds, the story starts to appear.

“I was watching Animal Planet one night after supper, and I looked out the window. Along the edge of the Dumpster I saw something silver glisten in the moonlight. Then, I saw something long and sleek ease toward me. It was half-slithering, half-walking. It had a bright blue streak down its back, kind of like the skinks that used to visit my back porch when I was living Down East. Then, it paused, as if it new it was being watched. Then slowly, it stood, walked on two legs and marched right up to my window. It had large, white eyes and a long, pink tongue that wrapped around its pointed snout.”

“You saw a deer,” Lisa says. She lights up a cigarette even though there is no smoking in the nursing home because she’s one of those people who can get by with stuff like that. She’s never gotten a speeding ticket, never filed her taxes and somehow always wins the grand prize at bingo down at the community center.

I knew there was no arguing with Meemaw. If she said she saw the Lizardman then by God, she saw the Lizardman.

“If it was a Lizardman, why was it crawling on all fours?” Lisa asks.

“Because it’s only half lizard. Are you even listening?” Meemaw snaps. “I’m not finished with the story.”

Lisa takes a long drag and then puts out her cigarette on the edge of Meemaw’s nightstand. Her eyes narrow and shower me with invisible bullets. “And by the way, I’m taking the piano.”

My entire body silently quakes. “You are not getting the piano.” The grit and determination in my voice surprise me.

Junior shakes his finger at Lisa, who holds up her hand.

“Don’t start with me,” she says. “Admit that’s why we’re all here. To find out what we’re going to get.”

“For the love of God,” Junior says. “Have some respect.”

“I’m the only one here who isn’t afraid of telling the truth. We’re here to find out about the will, and Meemaw did not see the Lizardman.”

A CNA comes in to check Meemaw’s blood pressure or whatever they do at these places. One glance at the steaming intensity of the room and she slowly backs away, motioning that she’ll come back later.

No one says anything for a long while.

I realize we can’t keep anything straight, and for a moment, I hate myself for even thinking about the piano. I’m justifying it saying that these are tough conversations that need to be had, but the truth is I I’d rather go somewhere and hide for the rest of my life.

“So, what are we getting?” Lisa says.

“Getting?” Meemaw says. “It’s not about getting. I’m trying to tell you about the Lizardman.”

Junior gets up and walks over to the TV, which is still blaring Animal Planet. “You probably just saw something on here and had a bad dream. You know, one of those shows about prehistoric creatures or some such.” He turns it off.

“I know what I done saw.”

She’s wringing her hands.

“Remember when we used to watch Animal Planet, Meemaw?” I asked. “And I always wanted you to get me a puppy, but you said I wasn’t responsible enough?”

Slight recognition. A small grin.

“Was it a dog?” Junior turns to Meemaw. “Maybe it was a dog you saw by the Dumpster and it was one of those little hot dog weenier mutts and it looked like a lizard.”

“I know what a Lizardman look like. It don’t look like a dog.”

Lisa lights up another Newport. “Meemaw, did you or did you not want to tell us about the will?”

“It’s nothing.” Meemaw says. “Nobody’s getting nothing.”

“Then what did you want from us? Why did you call us here?” Lisa paces around Meemaw’s bed.

Meemaw stares blankly at the TV. I gently place my hand on her shoulder.

“You’re not dying Meemaw,” I say. “Why did you call a family meeting?”

She takes a deep breath and slowly lets it out. “I just wanted to tell you about the Lizardman. That’s all. I’ve said my peace.”

Lisa scoffs, gives a halfhearted goodbye and leaves. Junior kisses Meemaw on the cheek and follows Lisa.

I’m alone with Meemaw, and I don’t know what to say. I want to ask her about history, about the things I read about at college. I want to ask her if we really were Irish because all my Ancestry DNA said we were from Germany. I want to ask her to run away with me, just the two of us and the piano, dancing through old music, whispering memories of black-and-white dreams. In a way, I guess it’s always been just the two of us.

She slowly takes my hand and winks. “Of course, you’re getting the piano.”

I get her yet another glass of water. I put it on her nightstand, and she gives a slight nod, and I know she’s seen me. I kiss her on the forehead.

Through the window, overlooking the Dumpster, I see a flash of something sleek and silver.

I choose to ignore it.

****

Dawn DEanna Wilson has more than 20 years of experience as a professional writer. Her articles have appeared in Writer's Digest, Evangel, Byline and Dr. Hurley's Snake-oil Cure. She is the author of two traditionally published novels: Saint Jude (Tudor Publishers) and Leaving the Comfort Cafe (Wild Rose Press).

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The Craftsman’s Box

by Jeanette Smith



In the first years after Pandora opened the forbidden jar and evil entered the world, the wife of a certain craftsman fell ill with disease. Since any remedy remained unknown to him, the man set off to ask of others nearby what might be done.

The man asked every person in his town, but no one could answer him on the method with which to cure this affliction. For disease and death, having been newly introduced to humanity, were without challenge. To the craftsman’s luck, a traveler passing through also heard the pleading of the man for his wife.

Now, this was a traveler of the most immoral kind—having abandoned himself to the greed, envy, and hatred released into the world. Not one to pass up an opportunity to fill his pockets with coin, the traveler made claim to be a man of healing. And so, the craftsman was tricked into bringing the dishonest man home to the side of the ailing woman.

From his bag, the traveler drew a stone and bound it to the woman’s forehead, telling the craftsman to pray to the god Apollo for four nights and on the fifth morning his wife would be cured. Blessing the traveler with many coins and items of value, the craftsman took Hope by the hand and rejoiced in his wife’s coming health.

But as we know, the traveler was not a man of healing and the craftsman’s wife was not cured. On the third morning, the woman, afflicted by a malady of the severest kind, was taken to Pluto and Persephone; and the man, who knew he was no great hero, could not follow.

Consumed by grief, the craftsman lamented in his trust of the strange traveler. Where men had once agreed and worked together, now they deceived and destroyed. Although Pandora was able to contain Hope within the bounds of the jar, it had become clear to the craftsman that Hope alone was not enough to lessen the burden of all Pandora had released.

So, the craftsman decided to build a box in which he could gather and store any civility, integrity, or honor he could find left in the world. This he would bring to Hope so perhaps, with enough goodness by her side, she would be able to stop men like the traveler from such evils and prevent the deaths and grief of others.

The craftsman set to work. The frame of the box he constructed from oak, a strong wood that would protect the box from any evil that might seek to destroy the cargo inside. The joints he cut as smooth as two rivers meeting, and the wood he joined together with the strongest bonds.

The sides of the box he formed from willow, it being soft and easy to fashion to his liking. Into the willow sides he carved with meticulous care scenes of the great works of the gods and the kindness of humans toward one another, scenes of joy for the good that his creation would bring to the human race.

The top he formed from an olive tree, considered sacred to mankind and the gods. The lid of the box he ornamented with precious stones: pearls, diamonds, sapphires of many colors, lapis lazuli, and other prized materials.

The hinges and lock of the box he forged from iron and coated in gold. The iron would hold strong the good of the world while the gold served to make sure each part of the box was pleasing to the gods. For the craftsman’s next task would be to appeal to the gods so he might succeed in the task he had laid upon himself.

Once his work was finished, the craftsman stepped back to admire his creation. The box was like no other earthly thing. The wood appeared to glow with the life’s energy with which it was made. Even the carvings of the box appeared as if they were moving, so lifelike they were.

Once he saw the beauty of the box, the craftsman fell to his knees and wept that he had created such magnificence in a world full of such anger, sadness, hatred, and all other evils. Recovering from his awe, the craftsman went out to buy silk to line the box, for if it were to hold such precious cargo, then the inside should be as beautiful and well-appointed as the outside.

While he was gone to town, that mischievous satyr Pan appeared, drawn by the cries of the wood nymphs who had seen in wonderment and admiration how their sister trees had been transformed. Pan, upon seeing the box, immediately called upon his colleague in misbehavior, Chaos.

When Chaos arrived, followed by her usual wake of terror and confusion, she saw the box and she too wept at its loveliness. When she observed the attention and emotion that the craftsman had poured into his work, she was moved with pity and her heart began to melt within her. Chaos would not destroy a thing so exquisite. However, she soon remembered her character and promptly decided what to do with the box.

Meanwhile, after the craftsman had finished buying his materials, he stopped off at the temple of Vulcan to sacrifice to that lame patron of craftsmen. Vulcan, called to the temple by the man’s pleading, heard his tale of woe and his request for blessings upon the box which was to serve mankind. Following the craftsman back to his house, the god saw the splendor of the box and elected to help the bereaved man.

However, Chaos, fled from the scene with the sense of the approaching Vulcan, had already worked her black magic on the beauteous construction, and what she did could not be undone by the highest of gods, Jupiter himself.

Vulcan, revealed in a divine form to the craftsman, explained the curse set upon the box. The box would henceforth be unable to hold anything. If an object were to be placed within, it would be malformed into any being other than its own and released.

The craftsman’s heart shattered with this news. Vulcan, being the gentlest of the gods, comforted the man and lauded him for his efforts, though futile they had become.

Disconsolate as he was, the craftsman was not ready to give up his valorous undertaking. He thought of the shrouded body of his wife, but this time, he did not weep. Instead, the craftsman set his jaw firm and began rushing about, collecting the various items surrounding him.

Perhaps, with the smallest of blessings from the gods, one of these items might be turned by the box into a useful and good power the craftsman could still give to Hope to offset the escaped evils.

The craftsman’s heart smiled as he began his new work. First, he placed one of his carving tools into the box and closed the lid, but immediately the lid flew back open and a snake slithered out. Next he placed a beautiful piece of olive branch into the box, but no sooner had he closed the lid than it flew open and out of the box came a piece of stone. The man tried many different things, each being turned into something contrary to its nature and all lacking worthwhileness.

Finally, having placed his entire household and every possession, one by one, into the box, the craftsman halted in his efforts. With all the passions of his life gone and his creation having failed, the craftsman had only one thing left to give. The man gathered his wife’s shrouded body and placed her into the box, climbing within to lay by her side.

Jupiter, having witnessed with many of the other gods the craftsman’s attempts, was moved to pity as the dejected man chose himself and his wife as the final sacrifices to the power of the box. Knowledgeable of the pureness of the craftsman’s heart, Jupiter could not bear to have the pair deformed by Chaos’ curse.

With his malice toward Prometheus and humankind abated by the selfless act of the craftsman, Jupiter, imparting his goodwill into a bolt of his mighty lightning, cast it down to Earth where it struck the box, shattering the beauteous thing into nothing.

Where the dedicated work of the craftsman had once stood now glowed two soft, dancing lights. Although unable to reverse Chaos’ curse, the mightiest of gods had used his power to direct the box to bring one final good to mankind.

And so, it is through the spirits of the craftsman and his wife that Love finally entered the world.

****

 Jeanette Smith is a freelance writer and editor based in Dallas, Texas. and is the Curriculum and Coaching Director for DIY MFA and a Contributing Editor to Rare magazine, and also holds a BA in English Literature from Smith College. When not her keyboard, you can find her teaching a scuba diving class or posting pictures of her cats on Instagram (@jeanettethewriter).

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My Name is Sophrosyne. Go Ahead, Snicker

by J. Gregory Alderisio

If my father hadn’t died before I was born I probably would have killed him myself. Maybe not as soon as I was born because, well, I was just an infant, but as soon as I was old enough to hold sharp objects and thrust them with any kind of force.

My dad named me Sophrosyne. Yup. Four syllables, one unpronounceable name. For years I thought she was an ancient Greek goddess which was at least some kind of mitigating factor. Lately I’ve read it’s also a virtue, sophrosyne means having wisdom, an upright character and moral strength. Guess thousands of years ago that stuff was so important the ancient Greeks gave it a name. Did I mention my dad was a professor of Greek mythology at Yale University? Lucky me, right?

You’d think my mom had some kind of veto power over names Dad proposed. She tells me they discussed lots of options. But early on my dad honed in on Sophrosyne

and kept coming back to it. My mom figured over time she could persuade him another name would be better—literally any name. Then six months into the pregnancy there was a car accident and Dad died. Three months later I arrived and Mom felt like she’d be betraying Dad with any name other than the one he wanted.

So I got named out of guilt. Again, lucky me.

Naturally as a kid you have no idea of the horrors coming your way because of one word. People will find the name hilarious so you will never get through a roll call unblemished. Your name will never appear in song lyrics. It won’t fit into the allotted boxes on many standardized forms. No boyfriend will ever tattoo it on their skin. Friends will spell it incorrectly, even I didn’t spell it correctly until I was eight years old.

My mail comes misaddressed to “Saffron” or “Sophie” or “Sappho” (a very different Greek name). Cautious people simply write “S.” followed by my last name.

People ask me if it’s hard growing up without knowing your dad. It’s neither hard nor easy, it’s simply the only life I know. From what I’ve observed, some dads are good and some suck; which kind you get is just the luck of the draw. In my case I get to choose. An absent dad means I can imagine him being whatever kind of dad I want.

There’s this picture Mom gave me of him. Dad’s got his arms out to catch a football. I’m so good with Photoshop I erased the football and dropped a picture of me as an infant into his arms. It’s the only picture I have of us together.

The ones who benefit from my unfortunate name are the kids in school who also have weird names, names just not odd enough to out-weird mine. They should be grateful to me, I took the spotlight off of their weird names. If not for me, they’d be the hopeless geek with the unpopular name people laugh at. You think they’d be appreciative but you’d be wrong. My fellow members in the wacky name club are often the first to tease me. That’s right, I’m looking at you guys—the Chardonnays, Paprikas, Hoschtons and Beruthiels of Holy Innocents elementary and Arlington Valley High.

One of the happiest days I had in school was the day I found out minors can legally change their name. Did you know that? At least in my state they can. I looked it

up. I’ve been watching that little section of the law since I was 15 years old to make sure it doesn’t change and spoil my grand plan. I decided to think about it for six months and if I still feel the same way, on my 16th birthday I’m changing my name.

Most other kids get their driver’s permit when they turn 16. Like that piece of paper will completely change their lives. Not me. The only life-changing experience I want that day will happen at the local family courthouse.

I’m still debating what name to adopt. Obviously something simple, a name that doesn’t raise eyebrows or tangle the tongue. Preferably a one-syllable name though I will entertain two-syllable options—but nothing longer. And I thought I’d stick to names that begin with “S” so I can keep my “S.” address. Sara, Sally and Sue are leading contenders.

My Mom told me changing my name is my decision, she’s not taking a side either way. Still, I’ll forge her name on the papers, no use risking her backing out at the last

minute.

So that’s it, now you’re pretty much up-to-date. Oh, except for this little bit of information: today’s my birthday! To celebrate I’m on a public bus cruising along at a

whopping 20 miles an hour and stopping every two blocks to let people on or off. The 10- mile trip to the Cook County courthouse is probably going to take a frigging hour but that’s fine. I budgeted lots of time to get where I need to go.

When my stop comes I all but leap out of the bus. The courthouse is this round building that has a huge dome painted gold. Normally I’d stop to admire it but not today.

Family Court has its own area and I walk into a dimly lit room that processes paperwork. I walk up to a window that has gilded bars across it, whether to keep me out

or to keep the workers in is anyone’s guess. A woman old enough to be my grandmother stands behind the bars.

“I’d like to change my first name,” I say as I slide my application toward her.

The woman looks at me, not quite suspiciously but something close to it.

“How old are you?”

“Sixteen. Today’s my birthday.”

One of her eyebrows twitches. “Happy birthday. May I have your ID?”

I grab my wallet to see what I could possibly show her. When I flip the wallet open, a piece of paper flutters out and lands face down on the ground. I pick it up and see the picture of me and my Dad, the one I created in Photoshop. I look at his floppy brown hair, the smile on his face and how snugly I fit into his outstretched arms. I slip the picture into my pocket.

The woman behind the bars smiles at me and doesn’t say a word, as if she has all the time in the world to wait for me to find identification.

I know I shouldn’t but I look at the picture again and the weight of what I’m

doing hits me. With one piece of paper I can wipe away the most obvious influence this man has on my life.

“Do you need a moment, Honey?”

I look up. The woman behind the bars is still smiling. I stand frozen before the bars that seem to incarcerate her.

“We’re open every weekday all year long,” she tells me. “There’s no rush. You

can come see us any time.”

The photo goes back into my wallet which goes back into my bag. I reclaim the application and walk away. Maybe I am rushing into this. Maybe I’m not quite ready to give up my daily reminder that I have a dad.

****

J. GREGORY needs to eat better and exercise more. When not staring at an iPad, J. GREGORY has found time to create work that has appeared in Please See Me Literary Journal, Coffin Bell Journal and Toasted Cheese Literary Journal.

______________________________

Fishing for Love

by Taylor Hopper

In the quiet space between a breath, where we exist in neither here nor there, the first ray of a sunrise breaks over the horizon.  It catches across the water, burning with the brilliant flame of promising orange. I almost expect it to catch on my line but the flame is only light and my line is only an empty promise.

All around me the fishermen pause, daring to look from under the wide brim of their hats. There’s a collective gasp followed by whispers of a good omen, and then the moment is gone. The sun rises and the dancing flame winks out. Now the light elongates into the soft comfort of a pink morning.

I frown and the breath continues. The here is concrete and time moves on in my tiny boat, dooming me to a full day spent at the other end of my pole.

Ahead of me there is a flurry of motion, a ripple in the water, and a fish being dragged to the surface. The man in the boat laughs when he sees it, a monster of a creature. I wonder how much love he could squeeze out of it and who he will give it to, if he even gives it away.

I wait for the rush of jealousy that seizes the fishers around me but it never comes. Only the remnants of some forgotten emotion. It’s as if a ghost lives inside of me, wallowing as she haunts and I can feel her in traces of the melancholy she leaves behind. She is an old friend of mine and I’m reluctant to leave her behind. Instead, I fish for others. My parents, my sister, even my neighbors have been gifted my love, for if I catch a love fish it is my love to gift.

I sigh and recast the line, having given up on modern techniques long ago. The Internet claims that the size of your fish will depend on the different techniques you try but I think it’s almost always luck. Next to me another trophy is caught and a smile is given. I stare at that smile, as brilliant as the flames that burned moments ago and notice with a certain detachment as my ghost drifts through my heart.

 My lips twitch at the corner as I watch him, as if they wanted to try. I allow them to, feeling strange as my mouth pulls into a grin. It’s uncomfortable and tight, and I drop it immediately. The man holds up his fish and I glance away.

My eyes rest instead on the tip of my pole, pretending that I don’t notice when the man rips out a raw bite of his fish. Blood spills down his chin, the color of love itself, and my stomach churns. Under my fingers the pole jumps, dragging my attention to it. I stare at it mutely as it jumps again.

I think of who I’d want to gift it to. A coworker, the mailman, maybe the stray cat that hangs out near my house. For a moment, my mind flashes to an image of myself eating the fish and the possibility flutters inside my heart. My fingers move to set the hook but then as I grip the pole in grim determination, my ghost passes through my mind and I remember that I don’t want to.

My hands still and eventually, so does the line.

****

Taylor Hopper is a full-time nursing student in Michigan and a part-time painter and author. She primarily focuses on fiction pieces centered around topics of mental health, the strange and exciting, and the wild experience of being a human. When she has spare time, she likes to spend it visiting her family farm, reading at the beach, or hiking in the woods. You can find her art account on Instagram @taylor.hopper.art

FLASH FICTION

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Four Colors

by Linda McMullen

            For Halloween, I donned a cerulean bridesmaid’s dress from Goodwill.  A would-be princess.  You dressed as the Phantom and kissed me with your mask still on.  You tightened your indigo-pressure grip when my knees buckled. 

            We cut the cake.  You mashed it into my face, the snowy Wilton roses stealing color from my lips.  That night, I learned that salt water loosens the starch in bleached hotel pillowcases.

            And that fingernails and knuckles blanch.

            You can keep the house, I said, my fingers clutching the handle of my crimson suitcase. 

Then you saw red…

            …I faded to black.

****

Linda McMullen is a wife, mother, diplomat, and homesick Wisconsinite. Her short stories and the occasional poem have appeared in over ninety literary magazines. She received Pushcart and Best of the Net nominations in 2020. She may be found on Twitter: @LindaCMcMullen.

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Inheritance

by Sean Murphy

I never heard my father tell his father he loved him. His dad, a man of few words, said how he felt to everyone, often, toward the end of his life—as if he’d been saving up for it, or silently practicing for years, waiting impatiently for a time when it would be appropriate, even necessary.

They did, however, always kiss one another. It was, somehow, neither perfunctory nor intimate; it was part instinct, part ritual, an inheritance of sorts.

As a child, like most young boys, when I’d awaken, with a start in the darkness, I’d call for my mother. When she’d arrive, she usually didn’t have to say anything, and within seconds I’d fall back asleep, as if I’d climbed back into her womb, magically calmed by the warm waters within her.

Other times I would lay for seconds that stretched into tiny centuries, calling out the same words in a singsong voice cracking with expectancy and anxiety. Eventually, my father would come in, always wearing only his pajama bottoms, no matter what time of year. I would feel the peculiar combination of fear, disappointment, and reassurance that only boys of a certain age experience when they wake up in the middle of the night, wanting a mother and getting a father. (Why fear? It was something about his bare chest; the skin and hair at all other times concealed by collared shirts or t-shirts with stained underarms—this authenticity vaguely unwelcome; the opposite of what I saw in cartoons and coloring books.)

And my father, also a man of few words, would say softly, at once a command and request: go back to sleep. Before he left me, alone and in the dark, he would always lean down and give me a kiss. It was never enough, but it had to be. And, no longer an infant, I was beginning to accept the obligation of some accountability, this understanding handed down like an heirloom.

****

Sean Murphy has appeared on NPR's "All Things Considered" and been quoted in USA Today, The New York Times, The Huffington Post, and AdAge. His work has also appeared in Salon, The Village Voice, The New York Post, The Good Men Project, Memoir Magazine, and others. His chapbook, The Blackened Blues, is forthcoming from Finishing Line Press. He has

POETRY

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Talking to grandpa at the feet of an alarm

by Aiyejinna Abraham O

you never believed in setting alarms.

you will say alarms are set by those

who are sure of tomorrow; [& sunrays

never met you sleeping.] at the base

of the smooth-barked tree stretching

out in the middle of the compound,

i dawdle out of my room to always

see you there, curved in your rocker,

eyeing the cold orange sun as if it hid

gold in its mouth—i oft thought you

drew essence & buttered bones from

the tree until today: your shadow

isn't cast upon its body like a child

caught between the arms & chest of

his father. the leaves are autumn-ing.

i know you can't see mum's eyes—

they are weak like damped teabags.

the house is silent except for her

organic violin synchronizing with

the alarm clock that's snoozing for

the fifteenth time... i'm a question:

for the first time grandpa, you set

an alarm; you became sure of tomorrow.

why did you not see it?

****

Aiyejinna Abraham O. is an upcoming poet fascinated by unanswered questions. Presently, he studies Applied (industrial) chemistry in Usmanu Danfodiyo University, Sokoto. He is a christian who loves his country & wishes that it doesn't become cold ash. His works are published (or forthcoming) on EBOquills, PRAXIS magazine, EOPP 2020 finalists' anthology: Beyond the veil of walls. A NNDP 2020 finalist. Whenever he is not chemistry, he is poetry. He lives in Nigeria. Meet him on Instagram aiyejinnaab, Twitter AiyejinnaAB.

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The Moon Walks Out on the Sun: Is-Chel to Kinch Ahau

by Ariadne Makridakis Arroyo

You thought I wouldn’t leave you, couldn’t leave you,

but I set into the night,

cloaked in shadow jaguar form as you slept.

I was so fed up. I figured if I was invisible

to you, I might as well disappear for good.

Back then, you were my sun-god—I thought

it was an “opposites attract” sort of thing,

so I weaved for you a spider web catching the morning

dew. But your brilliant craze

never understood my gloomy haze.

Despite your promises to end your jealous fits,

you never delivered.

I should have known—you never change,

always an atomic bull’s eye stuck to the sky.

Your bruises couldn’t paint me any darker

than the eye of the night.

What is black? What is blue

to the hue of the moon’s muse? I sing haunting

nightmare on your pillow. I hiss lingering

embrace.   

What’s that you hear, my beloved?

Oh, nothing? Not a peep from me?

Without you,

I’m flourishing in a way that day

can’t even penetrate.  

I face them with the bellies of stars

and all the gaps in between—They ask “What’s up there?”  

You merely scatter rays of blind light,

so trapped in your own gaze.

Every nocturnal noise belongs to me—they clutch my name

to their chests during their bedtime prayers, not yours.

****

Ariadne Makridakis Arroyo is a poet of Greek and Guatemalan descent who resides in Los Angeles. She recently completed her Bachelor’s degree in Critical Theory & Social Justice at Occidental College. Her work has been featured in Twisted Moon Magazine, Evocations Review, and Feast Magazine, Stellium Literary Magazine, and she is a recipient of the 2019 Argonaut Summer Research/Creative Writing Fellowship.

______________________________

 How to Clean Unhealing Wounds

by Christian Hanz Lozada

White Grandma fills our house and her mobile home

with synonyms, with the rhythmic swish and click

of a mop across the floor, with her voice—like a scratched

country record—saying you can’t help because you do it wrong.

But she’ll show you again, with all the lifehacks she’s learned.

Not to cut corners, no, but to make things microscopically

easier for some unimaginable later.

The slosh of water in a bucket and the creak of a wringed rag

are sounds of her search for a dead Mamma, the one who was

so young and left all them kids to a no-good alcoholic;

for a dead Daddy, the one that took her in, loved her

with quiet and constant calm, adoption, and her first shoes;

for her daughter, the one that was born with the last good genes

in her blood, the one that has been gone, gone, gone,

without a word.

White Grandma fills her cleaning bucket by putting pain

in the solution to wash everything leading up to the doorway.

You can watch, but you can’t help.

****

Christian Hanz Lozada is the son of an immigrant Filipino and a descendent of the Confederacy. His heart beats with hope and exclusion. He co-authored the poetry book Leave with More Than You Came With from Arroyo Seco Press and the history book Hawaiian in Los Angeles. His poems and stories have appeared in Hawaii Pacific Review (Pushcart Nominee), A&U Magazine, Rigorous Journal, Cultural Weekly, Dryland, among others. Christian has featured at the Autry Museum, the Twin Towers Correctional Facility, Tebot Bach, and Beyond Baroque. He lives in San Pedro, CA and uses his MFA to teach his neighbors’ kids at Los Angeles Harbor College.

_______________________________

My Mother Made Me/Mexicana

by Claudia Duran

****

Claudia Duran currently reside in Los Angeles, CA. Her poem entitled, Querida Tequila, was featured in an anthology of poetry, Snorted the Moon and Doused the Sun: An Addiction Anthology. She has also been a guest poet, performer, and writer with The Los Angeles Poet Society, Chicanas Cholas y Chisme, and La Palabra at Avenue 50 Studio.

_____________________________

Stars on Fire

by Diane Thiel

It happens like that—turning

one day down a different highway

going west as west will go,

tracing burning star to star

with our fingertips

the day we find water—

that opening when all the trails

of earth and sky are visible

for just an instant,

and suddenly, we are out there

in a desert shower

watching stars on fire.

****

Diane Thiel is the author of ten books of poetry and nonfiction, including Echolocations and Resistance Fantasies. Her new book of poetry, Questions from Outer Space, is forthcoming from Red Hen Press in Spring 2022. Thiel's work has appeared in many journals, including Poetry, The Hudson Review, the Notre Dame Review and Rattle and is re-printed in over sixty major anthologies. Her awards include a PEN award, the Robinson Jeffers Award, the Robert Frost Award, the Nicholas Roerich Award, and she was a Fulbright Scholar. Thiel received her undergraduate and graduate degrees from Brown University and is Professor of English and Associate Chair at the University of New Mexico. Thiel has traveled and lived in Europe, South America, Asia, and Australia, working on literary and environmental projects. For more information, please visit her website: www.dianethiel.net

____________________________

 Dungeon Fog

by Emily Browne

you can predict the severity of a winter

from the markings on a wooly caterpillar in fall

the thicker the more likely

cosmic mishap leaves earth in a petri-dish

growing soft white fungus

steeping sailors & ships

in the hope that they are going straight

in the direction of home

it’s not a formula

or not a formula for us

who are so intent on perfection

the shipwrecks collected in vials

will tell the story of how we took to the ocean

& turned around once we ran out of food

wherever we landed we said

we were staying forever

in the petri-dish we are a mist of dream bodies

traversing apocalypse

running on empty

in the waters of original conception

eroding in real time

this is the age of mirrors

first we painted the moon into a cage

thinking if we could control the moon

we could control ourselves

then we painted ourselves into this storm

& our fate took the shape of its container

all signs point to being stained here

with slim to no visibility

candy-wrappers popping into view

as suddenly as rocks

both with a kill wish

we listen for water hitting anything

& decide to call the darkness magic

we hold our breath

for spring & pray it ends well

this is the message

etched into the hull

someday we may find the thing we need

it will smell of peace

an angel’s share

with forget-me-not in hand

my ankle will crack every step I take

to the room where you sleep

warning you of my approach

you will mistake me for cicadas in heat

not the male chorus but the quieter

sound of females flicking their wings

****

Emily Browne is a poet in the M.F.A. program and an adjunct lecturer in the English Department at Brooklyn College. In her writing, she delves into the emotions revolving around death, grief, and spirituality through Californian landscapes and biota.

__________________________

Perfume, Lipstick, Girdle

by Erica McGee

Perfume

I dab the scent upon my waiting neck

It fills the air, a cloud of sensuous air

Remembering we took that wonderous trek

Each time I smell those roses I do care

About you and the way you surprised me

With little gifts, revealed to my own eyes

Before our love I struggled just to see

My loneliness filled with the tears I cried

The smell, it takes me back to special times

A clear, belonging place we grew to know

Was home, we built it with our youthful crimes

My perfume takes me back, I long to go

Like the wind blows effortless in trees

The memories I grab onto and seize.

Lipstick

Red and pink and purple matte and gloss

The colors of my personality

I paint it on my lips, absorb the cost

Of fooling everyone that I do see

It makes me feel together and made up

Of confidence and power that I hold

When inside insecurity creeps us

I know that I should do what I am told

A face that’s free of any tiny trace

Of product that is purchased for a fee

Will convey all the truth that’s on my face

Projecting what I want you all to see

It’s me, it’s me, reality is free

But that’s a risk that truly cannot be

Girdle

Please don’t hold me so tight, I cannot breathe

You smother, smash and sometimes I must moan

I feel if this persists my heart will seize

It’s like a dog that’s waiting for a bone

This constant push and pull tears me apart

Not understanding why, you have to cling

I put you on and then I know it starts

Such misery our closeness always brings

A silhouette, a painful hourglass

If I was free to take in all the air

A different way the hours they would pass

I’d dance and clap and sing without a care

Of what the world would judge and truly see

Could be a new and better love would be

__________________________________

Gifthorse

by Kate Maxwel

This unexpected offer of hours, days

I would have once called possibility

and begged for its embrace 

like a dazed teen groupie 

ready to kneel and suckle on its glory. 

Time’s former crass dismissal 

of my needs, no object to 

this temporal adoration. 

And once I’d named it master

Time stayed, splaying out 

lazy limbs for me to lay beside

caress the sinews of its constancy.

I stroked and worshipped

ever grateful for its crush 

of frantic rush, its henchmen 

wasting haste with long deliberate 

breath. And revelled in the way 

it tamed that fast-twitch monster

who’d flung me task to task 

from meal to sleep, now silenced

cowered underneath the bed.

So, in the first flush of Time’s 

love it was my only captain. 

But now, my lover bores me.

Stretching vowels, drawing out 

every sentence and pushing me to ponder

not the volumes waiting on the shelf

nor the ever-changing colours of the sky

the hum of a quiet Autumn day

but the chafing patches on my elbows

an Internet quiz on ‘Who I’d be 

If I was a Hollywood Star’

and how to bake a loaf of bread 

from tending stinking mould. 

I could, do so many other things

with my blank boring lover 

but sadly, Time and I 

are not on speaking terms

and I will squander it, just for spite.

****

Kate Maxwell is yet another teacher with writing aspirations. She’s been published and awarded in Australian and International literary magazines such as The Chopping Blog, Hecate, Blood and Bourbon, fourW, and Social Alternatives. Kate’s interests include film, wine, and sleeping. Her first poetry anthology, to be published with Interactive Publications, Brisbane is forthcoming in 2021. She can be found at https://kateswritingplace.com/publications/

________________________

What the Dawn Told Me

by Kunle Okesipe

That if you nurse a grain of light enough

it would soon become a sea;

if you stroke the lineament of the earth enough,

it would soon become the body of a woman.

That memory is a token of silence between the barking of dogs,

like a radius of lightning across the sphere of dark circles,

that the barking of dogs is a foretaste of thunderstorms,  

that the twisting of rivers precedes the dance of oceans

and if the ants of these feelings are fed,

they will surely dwarf the legend of the elephant.

****

Kunle Okesipe currently teaches postcolonial literature at Igbinedion University, Okada, Nigeria. His adaptation of Wole Soyinka’s The Interpreters, “The Rattling of Sagoe’s Drink Lobes” won an Association of Nigerian Authors’ adaptation contest. His poetry has appeared in adda, The Tiger Moth Review, Moonchild Magazine, African Writer Magazine and others.

_________________________

How to Survive Asbestos, Carpet, Moon Pie

by Raymond Luczak

How to Survive Asbestos

The house of us is fragile.

Its walls are paper-thin.

Secrets are drafty as wind.

Promises are futile preventions.

It’s in everything we’ve built.

Our home is made of chemicals.

We need to be careful not to inhale.

Our lungs are taxed with hurt.

The TV screen blares warning.

We gauge the distance between ourselves.

Our hearts are tanks of petrol.

We can’t afford a rupture.

All I ever want is a kiss of caulk

from you to heal and seal.

Raymond Luczak (raymondluczak@gmail.com)

Carpet

Weave dog hairs into vortices that wave and bend like wheat rolling across oceans

all over Kansas. Love and affection are the stuff of pollen.

An overlong thread cut off a button is a forgotten song drifting far away to be heard,

the scratch of needle burrowed in time.

Lintballs are jewels against the rust belts of shadow, waiting to leap again

like dandelion whiskers with nothing else better to do.

The pebbles once stuck inside the bank ridges of your sneaker soles are blackheads

buried in the scalp of carpet.

Such tiny seeds. It’s high time that you pull out the vacuum cleaner to harvest.

You are a farmer.

Raymond Luczak (raymondluczak@gmail.com)

Moon Pie

1.

At the National Air and Space Museum,

a small chunk of moon was glued to the counter.

It looked like any other rock, worn down

smooth into an indescribable gray.

I touched it, as had thousands of other visitors,

hoping to elevate myself 200,000 miles instantly.

2.

On Saturday nights when I was alone on campus,

I ventured out to the Ely Student Center

where a vending machine offered moon pies.

I couldn’t afford a night out at the gay bars

lining up and down P Street off Dupont Circle,

but I usually had a spare dollar bill for a pie.

3.

The moon’s most common element is oxygen,

approximating 60% of the crust by weight.

There’s also silicon, aluminum, calcium,

magnesium, iron, and titanium.

How I wanted to bite into that airy crust

like an astronaut with a handsome date.

****

Raymond Luczak is the author and editor of 25 titles, including Compassion, Michigan: The Ironwood Stories (Modern History Press) and once upon a twin: poems (Gallaudet University Press). His work has appeared in Poetry, Passages North, and elsewhere. An inaugural Zoeglossia Fellow, he lives in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

________________________________________________

 ¡Pasa, pasa!

by Roy Duffield