Issue 4

FICTION

A WORD FROM THE CHIMPANZEES by Andrew Blossom

The man is after our females. Despite whatever theories may surface to the contrary, you should know this much is true.

PENITENZIARIO by John Beardsley

—and maybe though my prayers are unbeautiful / it is good. That they lie with the frayed and careworn / edges of my collars, my tireless pages, meager and meek as the lamb,

DAUGHTER AT BEDTIME by Anna Claire Hodge

Finger / the scar along your arm, refuse to turn / your back to an open space for fear of dead // relatives that might scrape your shoulder / with cold fingernails.

THE MAD SCIENTISTS AT PROM by Anthony Jones

we smashed all their beakers / and crushed all their test tubes / but here they are in their lab coats—

A CODA WILL BRING US TO A CONVINCING CONCLUSION by Carrie Lorig

Wait for noise / enough to braid. // Wait for a man / at the absolute end of the line

THE LADDER by D. W. Martin

We forgo shoes, hustle to the garage /
to snag the ladder—two splintering sections /
bowed in the middle with age, lashed /
and relashed by duct tape and spit.

WHERE: KNUCKLE BAY BOTANICAL GARDENS by Holly Jensen

He just shrugged, then winced, and said, “Oy.” When Benj was in pain,
he got Jewier.

AT THE MORGUE by Marie Potoczny

At night we whisper to each other, think back to where we went wrong, declaring our love for poetry and art over the sensibility of accounting or law.