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Sticker on the Grapes

by Farzana Marie

Inside the super(airconditioned)market

I smile past the piles of smug plums,

shy nectarines decked out in Sunday best,

gaelas beaming, made-up to impress.

{read more}

Detroit

by Caroline Shepard

Crickets are plucking their strings in Detroit.

They live amongst the burned houses,

with their crumbling brick

punched by drunk windows

and the unintentional small lot forests.

{read more}

Curtis

by Mary Barbour

I’m getting the hell out of Jonesboro as soon as I can and I’ll tell you something, I’m not ever coming back. Sometimes I wonder what I ever did to end up in a town like this, in awful old Arkansas, but there’s enough to get you down around here without thinking that way. Besides, they say everything in life makes sense, you’re just not always supposed to know why.

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Roy Blackman’s Mule

by Michael Brantley

It was early afternoon and I was about eight inches into the tunnel I was digging under our old pecan tree in the front yard. We didn’t have Global Warming then, we just knew it was pretty damn hot in August in North Carolina.

{read more}

The Eggman

by Steve Romagnoli

When John Lennon got shot I was in a bar and watching the TV. Right after it was announced, the bartender gave everybody a free shot of whiskey. This was no great act of charity since there were only three of us drinking at the time. After we drank our shots the bartender remarked that the joint was dead, just like the Eggman.

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Nobody Can Touch Those Numbers

by Refe Tuma

Alex cursed as his Blackberry powered down. One hour and forty-five minutes of billable work lost. One hundred and twenty-six dollars and twenty-two cents. He felt under his seat for an outlet and plugged in his phone charger, grunting an apology as his shoulder jostled the Indian man seated next to him. He set the phone on his tray table and looked out the window.

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The Girl Is Not There

Chris Wilkensen

Marissa wasn’t supposed to be here. She said she was sick. She was always too fucking sick to see me. Yet there I was in a dark room with music so loud you could wake the dead staring at her and waiting for the Jameson to kick in and gave me a slur to my steps and I couldn’t take my eyes off her.

{read more}

Howard at the Blue Cafeteria

by Joseph Plasan

A teenage boy sits in a blue cafeteria, in the last stool of the last table alone as one hundred conversations ring around his head. Many sounds can be heard, the first bellows of young men in puberty, the sporadic high pitched cackles of giddy teenage cheerleaders, even a large chocolate chip cookie being pulled from its wrapper by someone to the boys left that he can’t see; all of these noises shoot down Howard’s spine.

{read more}

Snarling Metal

by Michael Plesset

Snarling metal looks at us strangely

could be hostile or only inanimate as clouds

of doubt roll around us surrounding

{read more}

The Accidental Florist

by Marian Brooks

Nora had never so much as plucked a pansy before being hit by an 18 wheeler and suffering a concussion which rewired her brain.

{read more}

Toxic

by Lindsey Appleton

“You’re nothing, nobody, walk yourself out.”

Then you put more of that in your veins

Now didn’t you, baby?

{read more}

Out of the Closet

by Michael Price

I should imagine it will come out eventually. I suppose tonight is as good a night as any. It's just that I have been so terribly lonely as of late, rattling around in this gorgeous old Victorian by myself.

{read more}

County Road 39

by Mark Nenadov

We're passing parades

and piles of unidentifiable, incognito street signs

and painted lines and creatures

probably coons which you'd never see

in the city.

{read more}

Soul

by Jen Baird

I know there aren’t words, no never.

A continuous motion of emotions

I do and don’t know.

{read more}

A Cold Holiday

by Bridget Clark

I stepped outside on the concrete, my feet laced in worn brown boots that made a rough, scraping sound as I began to walk down the driveway. My legs took only seconds to achieve that unpleasant, prickly feeling that is associated with an inhumane amount of cold air.

{read more}

Of Higgs and Flame

by Matthew Sissom

Every Friday and Saturday night the Quick Chick’s parking lot would fill with the signature rides of Rowan Randolph High’s designated elite. Styrofoam cups and expired blunts would litter the lot on Sundays and flutter to collect along the town’s main drag.

{read more}

Two-Ton Paperweight

by Pat Malone

The party had rendered Jake Roberts inebriate and reeking of vomit. He was lying face down in a dumpster, attempting to determine whether or not he was too drunk to escape its walls.

{read more}

Moving Out After the Divorce

by Stephanie Bradbury

How many times have I climbed these stairs-

The top never too far from the bottom

Only greater expectations

{read more}

• • •

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