ANGELICA JIMENEZ: Thinking It Through

Artistic, Submissions, , , , ,

Pigeons are just a type of bird. Like a peacock. Like the beautiful swan at the lake.

“Look, daddy! So pretty!” a five-year-old coos.

From a distance, an old woman watches the lively duo as she tosses bread to a pigeon.

“Who says we ugly ducklings are better off changing?”

Angelica Jimenez is a teenage writer who currently serves as an editor for her high school’s literary magazine, Sin Fronteras. She has also been published in Friday Flash Fiction and has served as a community ambassador at Write the World, a global platform for teenage writers.

JOHN SZAMOSI: No Going Back

Artistic, Submissions, ,

I try to press the day into a wafer, pretending nothing happened, and we can waltz back into the old village we knew.

Reality stands in the way. Only bad choices remain, heavy as March snow, refusing to melt or drift away, no matter how long we keep chanting mantras.

John Szamosi is a wordsmith and peace activist. He’s been publishing short stories, satires and poems since his freshman year in college.

SARAH FLICK: In the center of her universe there is a ball…

Artistic, Submissions, , , ,

My labrador, Dosh, waits. I throw. Released, she grabs it mid-air, showing off, then returns. I throw again; she’d retrieve forever.

If I could, just once, experience the joyous muscle-music I witness when Dosh clamps her jaws around a soggy tennis ball, I could face anything in this challenging world.

Sarah Flick wrote this story.

DON NIGRONI: Nothing but Time

Artistic, Submissions, , , ,

Before he passed away, my uncle, a physicist, explained to me that when the universe collapses to a singularity in the far distant future, matter and energy and even space will disappear, leaving only empty time. And then and only then will desire and its resultant suffering finally cease forevermore.

Don Nigroni is a retired labor economist.

STEVEN HOLDING: Wash My Hands of You

Artistic, Submissions, , ,

Once pristine washbasin becomes farmhouse kitchen clean, witnessing many things being rinsed; plates, potty mouths, placenta off bawling newborns.

Decades later, repurposed porcelain sits upon bricks by a desolate gate, gathering cattle slaking shared thirsts.

The running man in dirty stripes stops, dispersing the herd.

Dunks his head, drinking deeply.

Steven Holding lives in the United Kingdom. His story TURNING A TRICK appears in the collection BLOODLUST from Black Hare Press. You can follow his work at stevenholding.co.uk.

IR SULLEN: Surviving the End of the World

Adventure, Submissions, , , ,

There. On the yellow-grey horizon, the first sign of movement in months. She glides through the murky water without a ripple, closing on her prey: a smooth two-legged hatchling, collapsed near the river.

Its sustenance is meager, but enough to help her forget how close she’d come to the abyss.

I.R. Sullen is a writer living in the Pacific Northwest.

JORDYN DAMATO: Casual

Artistic, Submissions, , ,

We were drinking coffee like we wanted it to become blood in our body. I wouldn’t have minded. I was looking for a way out. Of what, she’d ask, straw on lip. I’d shrug. Leave it open-ended. Casual. In my dreams, I see only her skeleton, and she already knows.

Jordyn Damato is a writer but more importantly a lover.

TAD K: Where I Would’ve Held Her

Artistic, Submissions, Top Stories, , ,

Walk westerly until you reach a low stone wall. Follow it until it turns and runs along the edge of a sheer cliff. Midway round, you’ll see it. A perfect place. Lean back against the smooth pale stone. The waves crashing below feel like the beating of the world’s own heart.

Tad is a writer and editor with a weak grasp of pacing. He has two pugs.

SHARANYA TISSERA: Takeout for Two

Artistic, Submissions, , , ,

It’s been a handful of months since and your coat still hangs from the rack. I place the order for takeout, glancing at the grey wool; it’s egg rolls, sweet and sour chicken and fried rice. The boxes line the table, and I realize that I’ve ordered again for two.

Sharanya Tissera is a Sri-Lankan Canadian writer from the Greater Toronto Area. She considers writing as a remedy to surviving her undergraduate degree.