ANNIKA BAJAJ
“I think I might be in love with you.” Y leans against the cell wall with hands behind his head, foot tapping against the cell wall. (The other cell wall; the cell was very small.)…Continue Reading Prisoner’s Dilemma
Archive
Shooba
AWA DIOP
Every Sunday at dusk, her moans dragged down our Sunday sun and beckoned it to set. The unnatural sound always rang too loud and plastered to every inch of space….Continue Reading Shooba
Ruby and Rose
BEA AGBI
It began around the time I got back together with Booker. They thought he was too simple, too easy to read. He wants what everyone else wants….Continue Reading Ruby and Rose
Under the Sun
BRYAN JIMENEZ FLORES
It was tradition that when I’d finish enough of my work I’d take the rest to the kitchen table and accompany my mom and the chores….Continue Reading Under the Sun
Saudade
CLARA CHIU
The envelopes began arriving over two months ago: blank white rectangles slipped through the mailslot at odd hours of the day. …Continue Reading Saudade
Haunted
CRAWFORD DAWSON
She bit her lip. What she was about to do was a felony, or at the very least, a crime. But she simply had to do it. …Continue Reading Haunted
Paralyzed Pole
ELIZA BECKER
Korris winced at the scissors’ first zip. Her ear had never been nicked while having her hair cut professionally, but she felt it to be probable, inevitable…Continue Reading Paralyzed Pole
Falling Apart
EMILY WYKOFF
Will this love die if unattended? / Abscising our petals, like peonies decaying / Feed for squirrels and worms and everything else / That wants to eat us alive …Continue Reading Falling Apart
Nine Lives of A Cat
FAHIM ZAMAN
Who knew behind the twelve trees’ / ceaseless tears of fiery leaves / and those hundred and one river / coves of green shade there were / only a lone pair of amber eyes?…Continue Reading Nine Lives of A Cat
I’m Sorry, I Need A Moment —
GABBY AVENA
I mean — I need a moment to move through — an image to see with — an orange on an altar, rotting on speedlapse…Continue Reading I’m Sorry, I Need A Moment —
How to Fall in ROT
GRACE ESCOE
I am not ashamed / That I have not known much intimacy / That I never had a hand that fit the curvature of my own / That I never had someone whisper my name…Continue Reading How to Fall in ROT
Choice
GRACIE ROWLAND
Georgiana and I tangled ourselves in each other’s arms on the stairs to the loft. We were sitting in the only place we knew to sit whenever our Mama and Daddy fought….Continue Reading Choice
becomeingto
JIHYUN PAIK
here; / take before / you, see, behold / extravagance extraordinarily unceasing in splendor / traces lingering without diffusion…Continue Reading becomeingto
I Wanna Show You Someone
JORGE RODRIGUEZ JR
Their father threw a faded quilt in the middle seat where Ulysses would sit. Ulysses developed the habit of wetting himself when he felt the slightest urge to go. …Continue Reading I Wanna Show You Someone
Disappear
KAELA LIU
The five senses: touch, taste, sight, hearing, smelling. These five senses make up how we perceive the world. As we grow up, we accumulate experiences. …Continue Reading Disappear
The Great Peat Bog Body Bonanza of Who Knows When and Who Knows How
LAURA ALMEIDA
It was the beginning of yet another end. It didn’t like this; for one, being an it. There was a scream that resounded through the bubbling bog as it recalled, violently, its true life as a sprawl us and them and I…Continue Reading The Great Peat Bog Body Bonanza of Who Knows When and Who Knows How
Statement of Matthew Ingersoll, Regarding Earthworms
LELAND CULVER
I’ve always hated earthworms, you know. Repulsive slimy wriggly little monsters. I know they’re supposed to help turn over the old soil redistribute the nutrients from all the rotting things, but I can’t see them like that…Continue Reading Statement of Matthew Ingersoll, Regarding Earthworms
Roadkill
LILA SCHLISSEL
The best thing about having / two eyes wriggling around in your / head like minnows is that they / have already learned to blur / and your retina is cracked and crumbling…Continue Reading Roadkill
Do Zombies Dream of Electric Guitar
M LAWSON
Up here, on the podium, is our subject’s soul-liver during the first stage of zombification… infection of the brain is a Hollywood lie….Continue Reading Do Zombies Dream of Electric Guitar
the horror inside, beautiful faces
MACKENZIE DUNSON
My mother liked to style her hair based on the white magazines, Vogue, Cosmo, the nice ones that she had to get a special subscription for, 5.00 dollars every month and delivered straight to our front door….Continue Reading the horror inside, beautiful faces
Untitled
MARIAM BESHIDZE
She sat down at the table with her coffee mug, squeezing it with her little hands and absorbing the warmth that she desperately needed. Under the table her leg swung back and forth erratically. …Continue Reading Untitled
introduction with no end
MEL ARTHUR
2. / Sometime in late, / i fragment at my being, watch my body turn itself up in the shape of a palm that claws at my feelings, marking my gut with heaps of silence that ever so often bursts into sound….Continue Reading introduction with no end
Toe Rotten
MIKAYAH PARSONS
I am just a body— / A body with words inscribed, / With meanings taped over my mouth, / And phrases to my thighs….Continue Reading Toe Rotten
The Maw
MIKE ROSENTHAL
The sorrowful keening of the crowd pierced the clear, dry air on the plateau. They huddled together, staining the dusty ground with their crying and the clear air with their wailing….Continue Reading The Maw
Properiamphimetaphysics
PRISCILLA LEE
In the beginning, God took the greatest dump of all Time, squeezed time and space through the white hot speck of what would be the universe. …Continue Reading Properiamphimetaphysics
Voided
RANIA ADOUIM
As a kid, I used to lock myself in the bathroom and try to imagine what death was like…..Continue Reading Voided
Falling Awake
SARAH WU
Waking up is like falling down a rollercoaster. In the crowded amusement park, this is what I tell my brother and mother and father. …Continue Reading Falling Awake
brainrot
SERIN HWANG
some songs make me think of you. / earworms till through my brain matter, / electric guitar leaving earthen grooves in my body. / i retrace lines like i would retrace my steps in an old forest,…Continue Reading brainrot
Twin-Sized Beds, Weather Conundrums, & Starry Smiles
SIANI-SIMONE AMMONS
Typically, he swipes up & I think he’s a sonnet-eyed Robin Hood. Who/ am I kidding? I am a romantic who believes time intervals between text / messages sent & how quickly he doesn’t respond & how…Continue Reading Twin-Sized Beds, Weather Conundrums, & Starry Smiles
Space for Decay
SOFIA AHMED
I had to be called home, then dragged when I didn’t comply, to eat something. I was too happy, too alive, how was I supposed to remember that I needed food when I was this content? …Continue Reading Space for Decay