The night before, my sister sobbed a waterfall into the sleeve of my silk pajamas. My own eyes are bone dry like the wooden roof we lay under. Rain hasn’t come in weeks and the tomato plants outside are decaying like autumn leaves crumbling to dust underfoot. The market was shut down weeks ago by Japanese men with eyes painted with malice.
Continue reading “A Sister’s Promise by Grace Lee”
The bubble gum is a large wad in my mouth. I chew it until it is soft and then produce a limp bubble between my lips. I suck it back in and start again, chewing and molding the gum between my teeth hoping for better results.
Continue reading “Good Girls and Goddesses by Rachel Sievers”
Spring breaks through my empty walls and drawn curtains, an impenetrable fortress. It spills onto cell phones where sisterly jokes about my old-school wardrobe and loving and laughing face emojis no longer wait. Sunlight taunts the charcoal-colored shadows that keep me company on empty couches that smell of musk, armpits, Malbecs, and sativas.
Continue reading “Renaissance by Yash Seyedbagheri”
A Day in the Life of 1987
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Ever since it was installed in 1951, the carillon atop the Charleston city courthouse plays a piece of classical music after it chimes noon. On a day long since protected by the statute of limitations, I was waiting out a red light in front of the courthouse when the carillon played the Chopin nocturne featured in The Deer Hunter. Maybe I’ve reached the age where my cultural references are “out of print,” but there’s a special sadness in that melody which always sinks me; yet on that day, when I was twenty-eight, I felt nothing at all.
Continue reading “The Sisterhood of Nod by Leila Allison”
“Men are gold, and women are white cloth. Gold, once sullied, can be cleaned and polished, while white cloth, once soiled and torn, can never be clean again.”
Khmer proverb
Continue reading “Haunt Me Like You Hate Me by Alex Sinclair”
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