I’m the ghost drifting in yesterday’s misfortune. Mother was murdered, Christmas, years before, before I was a woman, a drunk. I swallow whiskey, pills, hold snapshots, blare music, drowning in sorrow until you appear in a dream, delivering the words, “Release it, Mama’s dancing in the wind, floating amongst stars.”

Angela Carlton lives outside Atlanta with her husband and two
daughters. Her fiction has been published in EWR, Every Day Fiction, Pedestal Magazine, Long Story Short, 6S, High Noon and Friday Flash Fiction among others. Her story “Swallowed” was nominated for the Pushcart Prize in 2023.