Everything around and about you is white: the light bulb hanging from the ceiling, your white hair, enveloped in the smoke from the cigarette in your white hand and the empty piece of paper on which you, for the last few hours, have been trying to write me a letter.
Khop wrote this story.
overpowering the ebony night sky
an enormous, auric full moon
showing a bear, rabbit, fox then human face
my childhood wonder spoke
flimsy with pearly tendrils, empty spaces
daytime’s white-lace moon appears
no shiny, vibrant light to ease
love’s lost spirit
only a pale reminder
maybe I can love again
Hazel Ann Lee is a Black American author of works on science fiction and fantasy, education and science. Her poetry has appeared in 50-Word Stories, Star*Line, Utopia and Frost Zone Zine. Her short story was also published in Frost Zone Zine. Her book of original science poems and science fiction short stories is titled The Astronaut’s Window: Collection of Poems and Short Stories Celebrating Nature.
Brown-eyed, pink snout, prominent white mark on forehead, frail-looking, peeping out of the cheap red pails and the rancid meat, whining and wailing like a toddler, before locking eyes that collect my sympathy. The tenth adoption. Homecoming. Rain pattering. Pleasant petrichor. Tippy taps, tails wagging, tongues licking and happy songs.
Soumya Doralli from India is the author of two books of fiction titled ‘I Seek You’ and ‘Hues of the Sky’. Her short stories have been published in a journal and a couple of anthologies.
Call me crazy for still rooting for my team. It’s an historic fifty-seven years without a Super Bowl win. Despite declining health, I wear my favorite player’s jersey, paint my face orange, and cheer louder so they’ll score, hoping it helps them get to the promised land before I do.
Charles lives in Texas with his wife. He enjoys playing chess and dabbling in dribbles and drabbles.
It started around midnight.
“You’re a martyr – just like your mother,” yelled my mother.
“You’re a dictator – just like your father,” yelled my father.
Eight years old and listening through plaster walls they’d built themselves, I wondered which parts of them had collided in me.
They thought I was asleep.
Jasmine Beth writes and performs songs, stories and poems. She lives in Sydney, but tours Australia and the UK regularly. Follow her at jasminebeth.com.
The story of the week for November 13 to 17 is…
Psychotherapist in Need of One by Kelsey Mathias
The scuffle was jarring. Rick shouldn’t have offered the vet a job. How could he have known tomatoes would trigger him? The serrated knife, the guts. Afterwards, he canned the man, restoring order to his kitchen.
Rick laid the knife on the drainboard, imagining men gutting. Cutting.
Stringing sundried ears.
Steve Saulsbury resides in Maryland, writing slowly, and sometimes successfully. His story “Herding Instinct” will be included in the 2023 London Independent Story Prize anthology.
After balancing on the slippery maze of village roads, the green bus jumped on the highway going uphill, past the ancient sign spelling the greeting familiar to Mark from his school days. He dove back into the language with the enthusiasm of somebody deciding to turn his life upside down.
Nelly Shulman is a writer based in Jerusalem. Her short stories appeared on JewishFiction.net, in the Vine Leaves Press Anthology of the Best Flash Fiction, and the various literary magazines and anthologies.
“There’s no such thing as huskycorns,” sneered Mariah’s big brother, stomping her drawing into the dirt.
Mariah wailed. Tears rolled down her rosy cheeks, sparkling as they hit the sandbox.
Little did she know that if you plant a dream—and water it—there’s a slight chance it will grow.
Amy Clare Fontaine is a wildlife biologist and a wildly imaginative author of fiction, poetry, and games. Her work often features fantastic creatures. Find out more at www.amyclarefontaine.com.
“Hi guys,” I say to my stuffed animals each morning—one elephant and one bear. “I’m up.”
They look back wide-eyed, their floppy selves eager to fill the void that sometimes threatens to swallow me whole. They require so little yet offer so freely the healing balm of their silence.
A prolific writer, Carol Reeves is loving the freedom and challenges of 50 word stories. Her memoir, “All the Little Miracles,” was published last year. Her stories often reflect the privilege and vicissitudes of aging.