I Am Not the Painter from Puerto Rico
byTHE FIREWORKS LAST THROUGH DAWN. Smoke collects in streetlights, lingering that dense, burnt chemical sweetness you come to love through old age. It’s colder than cold and yet I’m warm inside…
Stories
Rock and Brush
byWHEN I WAS A LITTLE GIRL THE DESERT WAS MY HOME. Sagebrush rooms and rock furniture made up my house. I scraped lavender rock dust out of a hollow boulder and…
Swampland
byTHE RAINS CAME TWO YEARS AGO, AND THEY HAVEN’T STOPPED SINCE. Some said it was global warming like everything else, from high tides to broken sinks, but the 2028 report…
Dreadlocks
byWHEN I ENTERED THE APARTMENT I STOOD OUTSIDE HER DOORWAY, WHICH USED TO BE MY DOORWAY, TOO. Vicki had just returned. She sat on the edge of her bed, fully dressed…
A Gun for Every Baby Born
byDAN STOOD WATCH OVER THE BEDS OF HIS FIVE SLEEPING CHILDREN. An arsenal of guns—five, to be exact—were locked tightly in a chest in the corner of the bedroom. Dan…
Audiot Savant
byW.—ROUND, FILMY, AND LOOSELY KNIT—SPAT BLOOD PROFUSELY FOR PURE PLEASURE. On the sidewalk, in the halls of settling brick buildings, over green spears of academic grass, W. bit his inner lip,…
An Official Letter from Our Leader to Yours
byEXCUSE ME [ENTER PRESIDENT/KING/STATE-LEADER’S-NAME HERE (I CAN’T RECALL WHAT IT IS)], Sir/Madam, you have shot down my plane. No, you have shot down the plane of my country—our plane—the plane that…
Shoes
byYOU FLOCK FROM THE BASEMENT WITH A SLEEVE OF DUSTY CUPS. Mo is reading the newspaper at the marble counter which looks like an altar. Little is sacrosanct here, though Mo…
Clyde
byWHEN I GET HOME FROM THE CALL CENTER, MY BROTHER JON-JON AND HIS FRIEND ARI ARE SITTING AT THE KITCHEN TABLE, DISCUSSING THE RABBITS. “They’d make a real nice coat,”…
Acorn
byPHIL WOKE WITH A SENSE OF DREAD, VISIONS OF SCRABBLING FEET AND SHARP TEETH FRESH IN HIS MIND. He checked the monitor; it whirred with the smooth sounds of the…