by Joni Bour It was a horrible, sideways rain day, seen only on the Oregon coast. I remember that day, because I remember him. He was quaking like an aspen tree, dripping, trying unsuccessfully not to fling water everywhere. He just stood there, not quite making eye contact and barely…
By Michele A. Cunningham Machion never had an adventurous bone in her body. Not one. Somehow turning 40 triggered her need to be more adventurous. “What are you doing Machion,” she stated as she waited in the train terminal. Her summer was supposed to be filled with her working on…
by Sarah May Wilson The intermittent bumps of the rail connectors jostle me against the vinyl seat back. Aside from that I am quite comfortable. I didn’t expect a train to be so accommodating to its passengers. Looking up and out through the window to my left, I have two…
by Nitin Dangwal The curtain hid me from the first light of the day as the dawn broke and lifted the dark veil off the face of the earth. I was lying on the bed, half-asleep since last one hour, wasted from the last night party. I could still feel…
By Hali Morell “Can I ask you one more thing?” It’s the last three minutes of my psychic reading, and I have been saving it for last…out of both fear and denial. My hands are clenched, and I’ve stopped inhaling the fresh summer air blowing through the coffee shop. A…
By Kathleen Zabinski Something off kilter made him look back at the pile of rotting leaves beside the tracks. He wasn’t ever sure what it had been, but he remembered the hair on his neck rising, as his dinner rose, when he first made sense of what he was seeing….
by Gonzalinho da Costa A theory works until you try it out. A theory corrected by experience is no longer a theory. Wisdom is life experience applied to well-considered judgment. Darkness arises from the absence or deficiency of light, obscurity from its excess. Religion…
by CG Fewston I’ve wasted the best years of my life in the senseless struggle every artist faces at the beginning of his life, and I can’t make heads or tails of the damn mess. Either way, those years are gone and I’ll never get them back. Back then the…
by Lisa Harris Where to begin? When she was 17, ten plus seven, in the 7th month on the 7th day, she flew on a 747 above one of the 7 seas to one of the 7 continents. At first, she did not notice patterns in what she saw as…
by Deana Wilson “TEN!” Dark. Too dark. Cramped. Stiff. Stuffed in like carrots in a vacuum sealed bag. Elbow in my gut; tangle of hair in my face. Carlotta! Too dark! Can’t see! Blonde hair on my tongue. Gasping…. “Carlotta!” How? Why blonde? How do I know — “Carlotta!” No…