by Rachel White
Bark shed, the redgum
stands near a stone—
makeshift grave.
Radio drones: hostages
in Gaza; we voted down
The Voice. Blade of knife
in avocado seed, its shape
exacts a hole in the flesh. Continue reading
October 13th
Filed under Poetry
Memories
by Fabiana Martínez
If men learn this, it will implant forgetfulness in their souls; they will cease to exercise memory because they rely on that which is written, calling things to remembrance no longer from within themselves, but by means of external marks. What you have discovered is a recipe not for memory, but for reminder.
Plato, Phaedrus, 274c-275 b, Reginald Hackforth, transl., 1952.
“You will have to sign page four and make three copies. One for us, one for you and… I’m confident they will require one at the funeral home, Sir,” the big blonde hospital administrator with one missing fake nail pronounced matter-of-factly. Continue reading
Filed under Fiction
On the Interpretation of Dreams
by Daniel Webre
The dreams were never the scary part. It was Allison’s interpretations. Even these weren’t terrifying in a conventional manner. It’s just that Allison’s mind could make connections no one else would ever think of, and though most of these made no sense, once they were in her head, she’d become so convinced of their reality that a part of me was never quite sure anymore.
Let me give you an example. Once I dreamt of my cousin Fred. Fred and I were picking pineapples with a machete, reaching carefully inside the palm fronds and cutting just below the ripe fruit. I had not seen Fred since my childhood, and this was a grown man with a Hemingway beard. But in my dream I knew the man was Fred in the same way you can tell in the movies when time passes and someone has aged and maybe isn’t even played by the same actor. This was Fred all right, and the thing was, even though we were out in the tropical heat and there were a lot of these pineapples to harvest, we were having a wonderful time. Continue reading
Filed under Fiction
Ka ‘Iwa ‘Alua
by Eric Paul Shaffer
_____ If a moment under the sun happened only once,
that would be one, but as I lay in the sunlight reading,
a shadow flicked over the page beneath my eyes.
I looked into the light, and through the clouds soared
_____the ‘iwa, the glorious crook-winged glider of sea
and shore, veering waveward after a long, luxurious turn Continue reading
Filed under Poetry
Cold Uterus
by Ann Yuan
I have a cold uterus.
It’s hard to explain. In traditional Chinese medicine, one cause of infertility is that your uterus is too cold. Of course, when they say “cold,” it doesn’t mean it’s cold to touch. Also, the term “uterus” includes the whole set of reproductive systems instead of just the pear-shaped organ itself. The point is, you have to provide an optimal environment in order to grow something as delicate as a fertilized egg. Continue reading
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