-
·
A Box to Hold
Geodess, Eric Fram The Subaru Tetris–puzzle of suitcases and boxes was unyielding to the hat box that wasn’t shaped like a box. Shotgun was reserved for the fichus. Packed in on the sides were table cloths—lace for special occasions, gingham, laminated ones for crafts—no one had the heart to say were no longer needed…
-
·
What My Roommate Remembers From Fainting in Middle School
Junglescape, Meagan Dwyer You wake up. You don’t know how long you’ve slept, but it’s time to get ready for school. Oddly enough, you rolled over onto your stomach at some point in the night. Open your eyes with the expectation of cotton candy walls with butterfly borders, because at eleven years…
-
·
Blinking Out
Passage of Time, Logan Sullivan My father and I used to watch stars go out, Up on the hill. We would pull the soiled recliners, Out from under the barn, And walk them up the driveway. I always bruised my shins. In the summer chill we would huddle, Tight to…
-
·
Dress Shoes in an Alleyway
Untitled, Zachary Vaughn On a closed silver garbage can next to boxelders and cockroaches, cigarette butts and rat droppings, broken baby rattles and urine-soaked diapers, a matching pair of size 12 dress shoes. I go down this alleyway on daily walks to my boyfriend’s place, where I’m going now, but I’ve…
-
·
How to Kill Yourself Slowly
Self-Portrait, Thomas Vause When you wake up, you will weigh yourself one, two, three times for safe measure. 95.0 lbs, 94.6 lbs, 94.8 lbs. Fat, fat, obnoxiously fat. You will poke at your cheeks where they are swollen from overactive salivary glands and you will drink ten glasses of ice water to…
-
·
Cornbread
cyprus sanicle, Madeline Harpell She kneaded dough like she was making love. I would have known this, if I had paid attention. She always made her own bread because she hated high-fructose corn syrup. High fructose corn syrup is in everything. I didn’t have time to watch her knead dough; I…
-
·
Albatross Alone
Untitled, Elise Ketch Some would say you’d get lonely out in the big darkness with not a soul on board except for the empty husks of the dead. Marty Corpus would say that they’d be wrong. Of course, though, it must be noted that Captain Corpus was a different sort of man. The hold…
-
·
I Miss You Most
Self-Hatred, Logan Sullivan when I put the last dish in the drainer, when I light a candle and set it on the coffee table, when I merge onto the freeway. I want to share that quiet, a page turn, a rustle of adjusting on the couch. I want to brush my teeth…
-
·
Two Years and Two Months
Beauty After the Storm, Rae Clickenbeard The clock on the stove blinks 12:00a.m., but I know that it’s actually 4:52p.m. I’ve been meaning to reset the clock since the electricity was shut off temporarily a month ago. “Put your tights on, girls.” I don’t have to yell, they are only a thin wall…
-
·
2 Girls
Suffocation, Elise Ketch Two girls at a softball game. One with silky golden hair and one with red shoes. It’s one of their boyfriend’s games, one of those interchangeable boys—maybe he has long hair, maybe he has a nose ring, maybe he’s in a band, maybe he wants to be a chemist,…
-
·
The Picasso House
Envy, Yulia Kenley I. We go to the “Picasso house” today. That’s what Aeden calls it anyway. It’s his family’s art museum, or what’s left of it. The main atrium, with the arched glass ceilings and the Roman pillars lining the matte white walls, is the only part that…
-
·
Fruit Salad
Tomato Menace and Floral Rabbit, Jury St. Judge Oranges My father sits cross-legged on the edge of the couch, a plastic bowl in his lap and a knife in his hand. He peels and wedges two or three, portioning the pieces. Butter stands at his feet, eyes bright, trying…
-
·
I Have a Scab on My Knee
Devil’s Claw, Victoria Barry that’s jagged and circular like a small stone severed from a larger rock The dried blood cavernous and sharp Pussing from the eye of the sore It stings itches begging me to pick at it Peel back Split it apart from healing skin Pink and dry Ripe Not ready to be…
-
·
Sabratha
Holy, Nia Owen When Mother contracted the virus, she had a villa built in Sabratha, Libya, where Roman ruins and human bones lay desolate by the sea. Her doctor estimated that the virus would lie dormant in her body for a year before it entered the replicative phase, at which point it would…
-
·
Killing a Chicken
Smooch, Cassandra Warner Grandma was squatting on a low stool in the stuffy bathroom, lit only with a window open to the traffic below and reeking of blood splashed over the tiles. In between her legs was a blue plastic tub, and in the tub was a half-naked chicken. Her hands worked efficiently,…
-
·
Oh! Send Me a Postcard
Beach, Jacob Roosa i. tightly spun egyptian cotton, imported of course, wraps up your wet body like it did for pharaohs. you picture kings who lounged about in silken kimonos watching the bronzed laymen selling their city’s idiosyncratic spices in a marketplace, so bazaar. you hear only the slipperiness of their…
-
·
Dusk in Dakar
Untitled, Zachary Vaughn Five o’clock shadows cast down their doubting eyes. They turn my wall – a hapless host to a lone Light Bulb – gray. My sea-glassy-eyed window vets each immigrant sunbeam who asks to take refuge who would settle its errant light (“anywhere”) (“please”) Even on the nails…
