by Lisa Favicchia It had to be hot, because otherwise the snake head would not have been crispy like bacon on the outside, would not have retained its sheen long enough to be conceiva…

by Matthew Moffett If Sophie Brown were an artist, she’d sculpt her own body in clay, in various poses, life-sized and writhing in torment. Then, she’d exhibit the figures…

by Omer Friedlander My parents had bought the first model of the Changing Home at a reduced price, when it was only an experiment. Our experience was used as a case study, to test it …

by J. Bradley I don’t know why my boys have never asked me where my old body went when I became what I am now. It’s like they expected this to happen, all my wrongs and sins poisoning…

by Gay Degani Jennifer, “Jen,” as she preferred to be called, used to meet her neighbor, Howard, in Rocketship Park. They made a game of it. She would be in her jogging clothes, her f…

by Erin Jamieson Though our family lives in Ulaanbaatar, we knew we couldn’t bury Aab there. Not under the smoky hue that clogged the city skyline. Not beyond the ashy streets, the sa…

by GJ Hart Done with remorseful tick and defiant tock and applauding foreheads and wonted theorems behind tremoring hands on grey-areas and Neptune’s one true pyramid, Denholme …

by Sylvia Schwartz A small girl is riding her bike back and forth, trapped in a long, rectangular enclosed box. She does not see that she is confined; her eyes are cast down at her fe…

by Brooke Reynolds Mary’s mother tells Mary to cut down her flowering tree, for it is barren and refuses to bear fruit. Mary tells her mother it is a flowering tree, with other purpos…

by Kyle Hemmings Shortly before my girlfriend died, she asked me to take care of her pet dinosaur. It was the kind that flew–a Confuciusornis. For most of the time that we had …

by Phoebe Reeves-Murray He became aware of colors swirling across the sky in front of him: purple, pink, green, yellow. He tried to touch them, but the curve of the sky bowed away lik…

by Michael Díaz Feito A frondy dog dictated to the things how to take my portrait (and Cnut, drooling sugar, videoed it): “Clip wool turf, mower. Peel then white mold, knife. Gravel t…

by Nina Sudhakar Into a shallow river, the holy tributary, we poured all of our ashes. Hard of bone and soft of soul: the remnants of our ancestors. The sandbar baked in the sun until…

by Michael Carter Jon is a regular person, just like you and me. He lives in a regular neighborhood. He drives a regular car. He has a regular job, working regular hours. He gets up i…

by Paul Beckman The veil is lifted from the bride’s face and the groom is holding her cheeks and staring into her eyes—she’s staring back into his and they’re both smiling. The pictur…

by Anthony Cordello I fell asleep in my front yard and dreamed I was a caterpillar exploring the pulped ranges of the overgrown lawn, looking for a safe spot to sit and feast and molt…

by Jane-Rebecca Cannarella An effort to tame the woodland creatures that live underneath the tables and in the rafters of the Country Home Cafe. In Lebanon, Tennessee critters were cr…

by Soren James I live on a planet where everyone owns a dick, and blowjobs are the measure of everything. There are time-lapses between blowjobs, mostly filled with mundanity –…

by rob mclennan when memory attacks bring breath back ……

by Caroline Couderc Mother has left. Her house is empty. I slowly walk up the hill, following the directions my father has given me. He visited her years ago, right after the divorce.…

by Ahimaz Rajessh Dearest Wealtivist, You are new and so you will do well to remember these facts known as All Things Factual so as to steer clear of the common misconceptions…

by Joe Kapitan I take all the things that I should never have said and I stand them on end, making a forest of sorts, dark and mazed, and in the middle I clear out some of the things …

by Christina Dalcher Isabel tucks into the coldest of his mansion’s rooms, surrounds herself with the smallest of objects: a dolly, a child’s chair, a menagerie of miniatures. It is t…

a journal of narrative concerns

by Jennifer Todhunter Payton stands on the front steps of his school at lunchtime, pulling hair from his head one piece at a time. Attached to the follicle of each flaxen stran…