Callahan wishes the voices would stop, but they never do. Some are soft as a caress, some are screamed out shrill. Some are wistful sighs of longing, some are determined mantras. Some are woven with glee, some are drowned in sorrow. No matter what they are, they never stop, swirling around his head, taunting him to listen, daring him to comfort, daring him to help, daring him to laugh, daring him to cry.
Continue reading “Autumn Eyes Lost, Autumn Eyes found by Anmitra Jagannathan”
My simple wooden church was all-but empty when I stepped up to the pulpit to give mass to the congregation. I had half expected it.
When Beltane fell on a Sunday, it seemed to draw out the heretical tendencies of my flock. Every year, they would abscond to some secret glade in the woods, to celebrate the coming of the summer, to pray to a heathen god for verdant growth and an abundant harvest. This year was no different.
Continue reading “Jack in the Green by Lee Stoddart”
It took seven minutes of her time, seven minutes of his time, and time was as precious as ever to them. He was on his way to a potluck breakfast (for which he hadn’t even bought his dish yet) and she was on her way to buy a new dress for her mother’s wedding before going to work. Neither of them had time for this but, luckily, it didn’t take much time. Everyone was in agreement about that.
Continue reading “Sexed by Mark Saba”
Yunmin lived in a patchwork apartment–mismatched, patched, and paper-thin, held together by red thread and a prayer. There were words on the walls; looping, colorful cursive on the mirrors and windows, written in whiteboard marker. He once admired it: the sharp ink, the crisp angles, the spider-like intricacy of every line and dotted letter. To sit and look about his mother’s house was like being trapped amidst a pastel and most perfect plague.
Continue reading “Home Remedy By Young Tanoto”
I leaned against the largest maple tree, planted hungry years before upon a leech trench in my back yard, watching my going out of me at play and shining the souls of mirrors back, telling each other what we knew.
I loved him from the tree, later a window dark-squared above the wide grass, as I leaned toward his hands moving out of himself, making; and the corners of the house, the inners and outers hammered upwards from my hand in late repair.
Continue reading “Flashing Mirrors at a House Built in 1742 by Tom Sheehan”
A brightly hued rag covered Kanmani’s eyes as she hopped daintily over the grid of numbered squares drawn hurriedly on the stone floor. “Right-a?” she asked, pausing on one leg. “Right-u”, came the response, confirming that Kanmani was within the boundaries of a square. This “Right-a/Right-u” exchange continued a few more times, until Kanmani stepped on a line and lost her chance. It was Kaveri’s turn now. Kaveri removed Kanmani’s blindfold, placed her gently on a chair nearby, and proceeded to tie the rag over her own eyes. She ensured that her blindfold was loose enough to allow her to catch little peeks through the cracks. Closing her eyes tight, she hopped to what she thought was the first square and paused, balancing gingerly on one foot. “Right-a?”, she asked, opening her eyes wide enough to peek at the floor, checking whether her foot was within the square. “Right-u”, answered Kanmani. Kaveri smiled, closed her eyes and hopped to the next square. She loved playing this game called “Paandi”, with Kanmani.
Continue reading “The Kumari by Naga Vydyanathan”
You need a fierce imagination to get along in Hell, and yet creative thinking is not appreciated here, and change is practically a dirty word to the old coots who run the place.
Continue reading “Good Intentions by Deborah-Zenha Adams”
Kora can neither stand nor fall. The Earth is shifting up, down, across. It is far more befuddling than frightening until the ground opens under her. Terror consumes her as she plunges into the chasm.
Continue reading “Infection by Frederick K Foote”
A hollowness opened in me as I entered the house, a space within a space, as if I already sensed what had been lost. In the TV room the stuffed toys lay piled almost to the ceiling, their little heads and tiny eyes facing up. A whirring in my ears began, from the space within a space, “hello?” I said and the sound disappeared. Where were the cats? I paused at at the stairs to the second floor. The steps up seemed staged, like a movie set, “Follow us, the show’s about to begin,” said the hollow in my head. I went to the kitchen instead.
“I will not give in yet,” I thought, though that hollow space signalled over and over again “this is not going to be good.”
Continue reading “I Love You More by Harrison Kim”
World War I was more than 20 years down the drain for most people, but Tommy Heffernan was looking up, with a slight discrediting look on his face, at Tim Kiely the bartender who was talking to or, more to the point, entertaining three drinkers sitting at his bar in Kiely’s Pub. The 2 o’clock sun bounced off Highland Avenue west of Malden Square and tried to come in through the windows shaded from years of accumulated cigarette smoke. Like always, Kiely couldn’t whisper; too much beyond his control, too much audience pull.“I know you boys come all the way from Somerville to hear the stories that grow from here. They come, glory be, without warning, like a knock on the door, trick or treat. For instance, take that lad down there at the other end of the bar, Tommy Heffernan, Colum’s boy. He was scorched in France, really bad. WW I’s green stuff they say. How many years ago’s that? He’s not worked a hard day since he come home from the Kaiser’s playground and might never work a hard day in all his life remaining, though the boy can put away a pint or two with the best of them. This I’ll tell you, though, that this lad, sick or not, for whatever ails him that the gas brought too close, has the softest hands in the whole world. Watch out for the cards in his hands, or a needle and thread.”
He tittered with his half laugh.
Continue reading “The Softest Hands by Tom Sheehan”
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