It’s not hard to sneak into the Manhattan Exclusion zone if you know what you’re doing. The Coast Guard mostly looks for the guys who don’t know what they’re doing—the ones who rush past Spuyten Duyvil with some loud-as-shit electric motor alerting everyone still living in Riverdale of their presence. It’s good when these guys get caught. They love racing down the flooded streets of Manhattan, usually drunk, disrupting the wild, but still fragile ecosystem bubbling up from below the waves. If you know what you’re doing, you know to launch your boat from … Continue reading The Last Man in Manhattan by Daniel Goulden→
a lot of roadkill lately. one sign of summer’s approach. dead foxes— dead birds especially. and once, on the main road driving toward blessington, an otter—an almost intact thing, a torso as thick as cracked leadpipe, lying down on the lines which bisected the lanes, and everyone swerving about it. april is indeed a morbid month, and it’s dishonest— sun striking the tarmac like water and drawing things in. daffodils rise, draping forward fat flowers with curl in the neck of a landed and interested vulture. folding its wings at the verges of roadside. strutting, … Continue reading A morbid month by D. S. Maolalai→
The sky streams by overhead, a blue tapestry dappled with puffs of white, each cloud haloed by the sun’s mild gold. The day is at its half- way point. Soon, the sky will lose its hold on gold, the blue spruce will sigh, the verdure of their green growing imperceptible as night unveils its black cloak But, for the moment, the sun’s orange rays still shower down; the moon’s silver sliver is an afterthought for the firmament. I sit in front of my computer to write, the white screen staring back at me. This is … Continue reading The Shades of My Life by Alexander Lazarus Wolff→
At recess, I was talking to a friend on the schoolyard, when a kid came up to us and said that President Kennedy had been shot. He did not say he had died. He just said he had been shot. I turned to my friend, and we exchanged uncertain looks. There was something smart-alecky about this kid, and I accused him of trying to put one over on us. I was twelve years (plus two months) old that November 1963, and I had read a book about the Secret Service, so I knew that the … Continue reading A Death Remembered by Miles Fowler→
……………………………………………………………Inspired by, “What’s Broken,” ………………………………………………………………………………….Dorianne Laux The little boy who only wanted to be rocked on his mother’s lap grows to desire nothing more than to hop in his baby blue Mercury Comet and drive far away from her. The lovers who spent hours in embrace but grew to despise the thought of each other. The scale learned to precision eventually abandoned to atonal schemes and dissonance. The cranky white-haired genius who wrote that only two roads diverged in the wood when there were hundreds of roads, some with potholes, some never completed, some washed … Continue reading What’s Not Broken by Charles Brice→
My flight is booked. I’ll be with you at the hospital, and I’ll stay for your recovery when your kids go back to work. It’s been just a few days—plenty of time for the doctors to figure things out. We’ve been talking on screens for too long; I can’t wait to hug you! And then our brother is on the phone, a strange urgency in his voice. “She wants to see you; she needs to see you.” “You told her I’m coming? I’ll be there in forty-eight hours. I’m on my way!” “She wants to … Continue reading For Ali by Elizabeth Bird→
Streetlight Voices: Short Fiction & Memoir · The Chair by Sue Allison Podcast: “The Chair” is a short fiction about a huge absence. A fictional story performed by Jennifer Sims. Read the story online: “The Chair” by Sue Allison Jennifer Sims is an actor and voice over artist who has voiced hundreds of projects across all genres. After attending the American Academy of Dramatic Arts she wandered into a career in advertising. She worked as an ad agency producer for ten years before she found her way back to her creative path as … Continue reading The Chair by Sue Allison→
Rose sat on the front porch, her custom at that dwindling time of day, watching. She tucked a strand of gray-white hair behind an ear. Her rocker squeaked against the floorboards. Light had fallen near gloaming. She tugged her cardigan around her girth. Not much happening in the old neighborhood. The lady across the street took in laundry from her side yard. At the two-family house a few doors further down, a young couple potted a plant together on their second-floor balcony. A little girl Rose didn’t recognize peddled by on a bicycle with training … Continue reading Another Fall by William Cass→
What an impressive turnout this year! We received such a broad spectrum of poetry this go-round, such an interesting blend of sestinas, free verse, couplets and some that made skilled use of rhyme. As always, I am an apologist for contests; the talent level is great and the funnel is much too small. But maybe in some way, contests challenge us to bring our work to a level that surprises us and win or lose, we are left with that gain. Without further delay, here are the winners and editors’ (myself and co-editor Frederick Wilbur) … Continue reading Poetry Contest Winners 2022 by Sharon Ackerman→
Wall paintings are for looking at. Mirrors are not. Mirrors are puzzles for finding your way in or out. Once, I found on my way a geode thinking itself an unfertilized egg thinking itself to sleep but unable to pull up the anchor. I smashed it open. Dazzling! I’ve tried repeatedly nailing to a page that explosion to hang there. As a dancer, I find I have to dance again each time I’m moved as though the last time didn’t count. A look within finds DNA shared with many I was too late to … Continue reading Mirror by Joe Imwalle→
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