Special Diet
Forrest Anderson
His skin tastes like pan-fried chicken soaked in buttermilk, mustard, shortening, but I’m a raw vegan.
My Dog, Peanut
John David Harding
When your mother says that she is sending your dog “to the farm” for “more room to play,” you must remember to inquire as to the exact location of this farm and how much room for playing in terms of acreage; she could very well be speaking metaphorically
Sorry for the Mess
Maria Pabon
You once told me that if my hands ever grew too heavy you could take them from me so yesterday I dragged my knuckles to your door, muttered a quiet prayer, and knocked bone against wood; you greeted me with an apologetic smile and raised two bloody stumps from your pockets.
1/4 Cup Blame
Rich Larson
While we fought the banana bread burned, stinging our eyes wet with banana smoke and making you have to outscream both me and the wooping smoke detector, but both of us should have heard the stove timer so when you messaged me three months later to say that what happened was both our faults, you were right.
Flicker
Kyle Beachy
What she saw undid entirely that trope of human life as a burning candle — here she saw no flame, no wick nor wax, only the plain metal disk that sits beneath a spent candle’s bottom, to which it had grown attached by way of its melting self, and these were the eyes of the bodies she saw standing in line, all of their eyes like dead tin platforms stuck beneath dead-spent candles.