PAUL GERMANO: Every Four Years

Artistic, Submissions, , ,

Every four years, George and Michelle Anderson go hand in hand to their polling place to vote, hopeful their presidential candidate will win. Every four years, they spend election night guzzling coffee side by side on the couch, watching election returns. Every four years, one of them is bitterly disappointed.

Paul Germano was born, raised, and still lives in Syracuse, smack dab in the center of New York State. His fiction–micro, flash, and longer–has been published in the United States, Canada, England, Scotland, Hong Kong, and India.

KEN GOSSE: Shoulder Surfing

Artistic, Poetry, Submissions, , , , ,

When I rest on the shoulder of giants
to hear what they say or to see things their way,
they aren’t all enormous but may help inform us
and broaden our naivete.
I write this to say that we might look that way
to someone on our shoulders some day.

Like most of Ken’s submissions, this story is a rhymed poem. Inspired by a friend’s Facebook conversation earlier this year, Ken looked up the history of the phrase “standing on the shoulders of giants.” Best known, perhaps, is the letter by Isaac Newton to his rival Robert Hook in 1675, but it has been dated to 1159, attributed to Bernard of Chartres (this Ken learned from a concurrent giant). Newton’s letter said, “If I have seen further [than others], it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.”

MOLLY ZANG: The New Apartment

Artistic, Submissions, , ,

Quiet—not like a tomb, but a beginning.
Like a lock clicking in a latch
Like a key that only I have
Like breathing air without rules
I stuck my fingers between the blinds to see trees
I left the spoon in the sink after ice cream
Quiet—like mine.

Molly Zang has always loved the escape of a good story, especially with a cup of tea or coffee. She likes to write from real life and likes to read fantasy the best. She loves cozy days surrounded by blankets and cats and her favorite person in the world, her husband.

DAVID LOWIS: Holidaying Alone

Artistic, Submissions, , , ,

She lies on an isolated sunlounger and reads. From time to time, she gets up and roams the poolside area, glancing down, noting what others are reading. Back on her lounger, she googles the books and reads the preview pages. It helps her feel connected to the other hotel guests.

David Lowis writes in Surrey, England, and prefers going on holiday with his family to travelling alone.

COLLEEN ADDISON: Healing

Artistic, Submissions, , , ,

Because I am sick, I imagine myself capable of astonishing feats. I fit my bare feet into the crevices of mountains. I leap off cliffs armed with spears to take on sharks. I fly. Where to? But I am not sure it matters, as my wings have yet to grow.

Colleen Addison did a PhD in health information and promptly got sick herself. She now lives, heals, and writes on a small island off the coast of Vancouver, Canada.

STORY OF THE MONTH: October 2024

News

The Story of the Month is chosen from the Story of the Week winners announced from the past month.

The finalists for October were:

Whispers by Angela Carlton
Not Everyone Likes Cookies by Nissa Harlow
Crunchy Sensation in Every Bite by Leonie Gregory
Desert Heroes by Stephen Tilden

The winner of the October 2024 Story of the Month, and the $10 prize, is…

Whispers

BUD PHARO: Matched For Life

Touching, , ,

Watching the pair of graceful swans in the pond behind the hospice facility calmed her anxiety in ways the end-of-life therapy regimen had not. During the visit, she said, “See, they’re like us, perfectly matched.”

After her funeral, I returned to the pond.

Now, just a solitary swan swam alone.

Bud is a disabled veteran who writes flash fiction and short stories.

STEPHEN TILDEN: Knife’s Edge

Artistic, Submissions, Top Stories, , ,

I write each piece as if making a knife. I grind it into shape, polish the surfaces, maybe cut some fancy scrollwork into the sides, and then hone the blade edge with a precise discernment, enabling its power to slice the topic so thin as to be transparent to all.

Stephen Tilden is retired in Brooklyn and carries this knife wherever he goes.

CHERYL SNELL: Samaritans

Adventure, Amusing, Submissions, , ,

Two sisters decide to adopt an old woman. They find one selling roses on the corner. She is entangled in blue weather, crying in the rain. We’ve come to rescue you, the girls say, pulling her into their car, roses and all. The woman stops crying. She begins to scream.

Cheryl Snell writes as revenge against reality.