215 lede

The Garden Party by Emily Lemieux (she/hers)

It’s hard to find good help. Actually, that old cliché isn’t totally right, you can find it, but they always turn on you, without fail. Maybe it’s hard to keep your good help acting right. They go mentally astray.
...READ MORE

Comic strip + 2 illustrations in this issue by Viktoriya Banul

The Connect and Disconnect. by Jasmine Tutum (she/they)

        the women 
in my family 
never imagined Germany,
anywhere except
in 1943. Kingston 
my little girl, mother, walking past the internment camp and
sudden pink fingers shove a porcelain doll through the fence.
she plays with it for years until the red hair fades –lets go in clumps.
...READ MORE

Tigers by Ilana Lindsey

My mother gave me one of her you're crazy looks and insisted the Toledanos family never had a man living in a mobile home in their back yard. I guess it could have been a dream, although even decades later the memory is so clear it leaves me with an ache of guilt. Porcelain tigers. A fragile old man. The inability to trust my own mind. It might have taken place at one of the other cousins’ houses. But then, wouldn’t my mother have pointed that out rather than denying it happened altogether?
...READ MORE

The Translucent Girl by Charles Sutphin

With reluctance Mama Beck and Papa Beck depart the town of Amherst and return to their home in California. The girl left behind talks and babbles before falling asleep with the door open and the light on. I tiptoe into the room. Outside, frost forms against the ground like silver icing, leaves are frozen into piles. During the day the temperature is warm enough for squirrels to dig and bury, the songbirds are gone. At night nothing moves except the rustle of a child alone with a father she barely knows.
...READ MORE

Instructions for a Hug | On Throwing Away All My Childhood Trophies and Medals | Chopping Off All My Hair. by Tara Labovich (they/them)

as with all warm
things, there is a spectrum of goodness.

sock wetted in a mysterious hot puddle → showerwater hitting three day grime.

that’s the range. the arms go
where they fit. feet too, slotted nice,
though no one ever mentions the feet.
...READ MORE

Dollhouse by Karla E. Melendez (she/her)

His stiff frame concealed in a blue satin ball gown, Sadol twirls across the dance floor, a cape of glitter tulle billowing in his wake. He steps on the beat, skirt pinched in either hand so the hem doesn’t drag. When his usual attire consists of swimming trunks and an ill-fitting beach bum tee not seen new since the days of Sejong the Great, who knows if he’ll get the privilege of wearing this gown again.
...READ MORE

The Great Switcheroo by Vinnegar DeKalb

Boulos awoke that morning and gret the sun, and the face of the sun smiled as he stared into it and Boulos smiled back. Here was a man who ran all the deliveries for a thriving bakery in Ridgewood, Queens. He had begun there, some months earlier, as a delivery boy, but now managed and instructed others in the delivery of bread, cakes, doughnuts and all of the other things the bakery made, of which Boulos loved nearly all, and he loved even better the smell of the place.
...READ MORE

I want to extract a time when no body loved me | + Quickest way to slow down time. by Hallie Fogarty (she/they)

I tongue at the feeling like a tooth
or the hole it leaves behind.
The reedy-soft wind tunnel
of my throat wants
to say something mean 
to my mother.    
...READ MORE

Rain When I Die by September Woods Garland (she/they)

The last thing you remember is performing at the annual Layne Staley tribute show downtown. Layne’s spitting image, you flaunted your lanky figure and signature wail and dominated the night’s lineup with the expert performance of a seasoned impersonator.

For years you soaked up the love of mourning fans at local shows and karaoke bars. You woke in your share of squalid living rooms among junkies and hangers-on. But you’re surprised to find yourself here, bound and gagged in a damp basement.
...READ MORE

Cocoa with Monsters by Phineas Knowles

The nightmare gnaws on Skylar’s memory as she stands in the doorway of her bedroom. Her limbs quiver. At the end of the dark hall, the walls reflect shades of gray, blue, and orange from a television screen. Mommy must still be awake. The wooden floor creaks as Skylar walks down the hall and passes Winston’s door. She doesn’t remember who Winston is, but it doesn’t matter. She needs Mommy now, right now to hold her close and say that everything’s okay.
...READ MORE