My mother had a chair that when she sat in it, she was invisible. At first she put it in a corner where she would be unseen and could not be found and where she would hide from our rambunctiousness and our […]

I have worked with children in Bosnia, crocodiles in Mexico, frogs in Puerto Rico, egrets in Bali, mushrooms in Montana, archaeologists in Spain, butterflies in Los Angeles and lectured on island […]

The truck stop parking lot reverberated with idling big diesel engines. The air smelled like sour urine. Randal Whitley stood by the open door of his cab smoking a cigarette and drinking his morning coffee. A […]

I grew up in Virginia Beach where I witnessed damage and destruction of rural and natural lands for the lie called development. I feel levels of anger and disappointment when I see gree […]

Some of America’s greatest photographers roamed the country by automobile. They forever changed the context of artistic imagery. They eventually replaced traditional monochrome with color, and they shot the u […]

Anne Holzman is the 3rd place winner of Streetlight’s 2020 Flash Fiction Contest
 

I hear you before I see you. I start working on arranging my face.

There’s the ding-ding of the elevator, the door op […]

I’m bored. Really, really bored.

Since the cases of COVID went back on the rise about a month ago I’ve been put back on shelter-in-place orders. Since my transplant I’ve been immunosuppressed, so I have to be […]

The Captain had not been himself ever since we extracted the frozen bird carcass from the ice. He had become withdrawn, seeking solitude, showing disinterest in his duties even as four of his men resided in the […]

My father was an atheist; my mother, an agnostic. My parents preached conscience and character to their two daughters instead of dogma.

I grew up in Greensboro, N.C., a city with seven colleges. Outside of […]

Sheila Longton is the 2nd place winner of Streetlight’s 2020 Flash Fiction Contest
 

What I remember of my mother is this: She is down on her hands and knees, crawling backwards along the hallway, s […]

Nancy Ludmerer is the 1st place winner of Streetlight’s 2020 Flash Fiction Contest
 

The Lubavitch Hasidim are sending two teen volunteers to spend time with our daughter. I resist at first, but […]

It is no easy task to provide a peek into a textured world, with backstory, present and possibility —in only five hundred words. The writers who submitted to our Flash Fiction Contest took on the challenge a […]

On walks, I find feathers, seed pods, pieces of wood, leaves, flowers, sticks, papers, plastic and metal things, pieces of glass, strings, all object […]

Travel has always been important to me. It’s about adventure, experience, and cultures that are different from my own. Cuba intrigued me for all these reasons. In 2018, I felt it would be a fleet […]

Once a week a Sergeant and a Driver were detailed to take the garbage from the Camp mess hall and dump it at the impromptu garbage dump out on the far end of the runway.

In a country where much of the rural […]