May 26, 2017 | Fiction
The Storm
Zeke Perkins
A lot of people had just given up. Other people had made survival plans. Schmitty and his folks were holing up in their basement with shotguns and rations. He asked if I wanted to join them as he was allowed to bring one friend.
"This isn't like going to Hershey Park, Schmitty," I told him, "I'm staying with my family."
May 25, 2017 | Fiction
Inside The Happiness Factory
Jeremy T. Wilson
The baby is adorable, and I wish she really was mine, I was really hers, and this was a picture my wife took, my beautiful blue-eyed wife and my beautiful blue-eyed baby.
May 24, 2017 | Poetry
Four Poems
Caitlin Scarano
Remember when every stray dog was a love story and the snow that night cleared the crust that had gummed my eyes shut? No, me neither, but fuck it. Let’s get lit one last time.
May 23, 2017 | Interview
An Interview With Christine Sneed
Michael Deagler
I think everyone has heard this a lot but it’s still true — read with curiosity and hunger — reading is as important as writing, more important, probably, when you’re first starting to write.
Three Poems
Lori Jakiela
Growing up I never saw road kill. / A government worker was paid / to take the bodies away / and nobody’s day was ruined by death.
The Pie Toxicity Scale
Leyna Krow
On a Tuesday morning in May, everyone in Spokane, Washington woke to the smell of pie. It was blueberry – sugary with a hint of vanilla.
On those Wednesdays
Katy Kim
I wish I had that glorified high school / experience— where some boys / are chugging expired strawberry liqueur / and everyone, I mean everyone, / is sprawling on the grasscarpet
An Interview with Rebecca Schiff
Michael Deagler
I don’t have any goals except to make the reader think and feel. What they think and feel is up to them.
Three Poems
Leslie Marie Aguilar
When I exhaust all other forms of exploration, / this landscape will deny me at the border; / & I will turn my gaze toward a darkening / sky filled with stars I no longer recognize.
The End of the World and Karate
Al Dixon
On the way home from picking up my brother at the airport, I stopped for a hitchhiker. I’d never picked up a hitchhiker before. I think I did it because my brother was with me, Julian. It was the kind of thing Julian would do.
White Dwarf Seeks Red Giant for Binary Orbit
Samantha Edmonds
We’ll have more in common than you’d think—after all, we’re both main sequence stars, I’m just a few million years ahead of you.
Imaginary Jenn
Kevin Maloney
In 2007, I was catfished by a homely woman from Arkansas masquerading as a 5’10” blonde bombshell named “Jenn.” Before you judge me, remember that this was ten years ago.
from HOW TO WRITE A LOVE POEM IN A TIME OF WAR
Kristy Bowen
Sometimes I say novels ruined me in the way they ruin all young bookish girls, slowly and tenderly rotting out the light and making room for the sweet dark.
The Coming
Siobhan Welch
And tbh, I seriously doubt Jesus wants me to die a virgin.
My Dying Neighbor Stole Our Pie
Alex Schuman
You’re always told to do the right thing and stand-up to evil, but can a, old dying woman who lies about being offered pie constitute as evil? I thought yes.
Daytime Is The Greatest: An Interview with Bud Smith and Rae Buleri
Elle Nash
I read the first half of Dust Bunny City (Disorder Press, 2017) at a party, while I was sober. Men were playing darts, making tiny dart holes in the rented apartment walls. I watched them throw darts and cheer and try to teach me how to play, and then drunkenly play with the dogs in the house and then went back to my reading.
Pretty Potion
Jen Palmares Meadows
In the afternoons, I stripped off my boyish clothing and watched back to back episodes of Saved by the Bell, feeding my unhealthy obsession for Kelly KAPOWski. The perky brunette with her slim ankles and come-hither hair tosses was the ultimate teenage bombshell.
Him Hiccup, Me Yawn
Florence Gonsalves
“Fine, but I get full custody of the mustache,” I said, once we’d finished dividing up all of our things: him Chipotle, me The Red Hot Chili Peppers, him macramé, me black clothing.
Dirty Socks
Sean Higgins
Danielson sells his dirty socks to perverts on the internet.
Five Poems
Bud Smith
Remember, there’s a light emitting from you and it's not just your cellphone. / The Internet is a scorched wasteland. / But you've walked through worse places / on your way to work.
Jackalope Run
CJ Hauser
She’s going to be an artist, he told your parents, and he wasn’t wrong, even if you couldn’t hack it in New York.
Open Your Heart
Erika Kleinman
When we first met in the early ‘90s, we had stage names. She went by Kali and I went by Olivia.
The Sculptor
Ryan K. Jory
Mom says new husbands are like circus peanuts. They go stale after a few weeks, and she wonders, Why the hell do I keep buying these things? I don’t even like them.