Read an interview with the author here. Jeneé Skinner Mother Goose An old woman gave birth to four eggs. Gold and cradled by tree roots and ribbons inside her house. Their births were ugly, complicated by forceps and fluorescent lighting, but the loving made it worth...
She Was Never the Birds Heavy bodies fall into me as the train brakes and then jerks forward. At each stop, it lets out a prolonged shriek like that of a fussy child. There is a map nailed to the wall that resembles the inside of the human body: green, red, and blue...
You Can Say Sorry They don’t come home for all sorts of reasons. Some explanations feel legitimate, others courteous; some are downright lies, but what are you to do? My daughter Jeanie was meant to come home last Friday, but she didn’t. She called saying she got...
The Boy in the High-Top Converses There are a pair of high-top Converses at Four-Points intersection dangling off the telephone wires. The sneakers were white once but aren’t anymore, just a washed-out gray, heavier from soaking up however many rains that came through...
Sam Taylor White Trash Walking toward the river, I saw— well, I didn’t know what I saw. I’d never seen so many—how many? ten? twelve?—snowy egrets at once, in a single tree overhanging the river, then realized it must be trash of some kind as if from...
PRESSED Simone Muench and Jackie K. White On a sheetless mattress, immobile and undone, I was marked for ruin. I drowned in dread, became a stain, a container of shatter, of “I don’t matter.” I’m told to muzzle that...
Kyle McCord A Guide to Falling Down Stairs You’ll need dollar store flip-flops the shabbier the better you’ll need a black Glad bag a busted porchlight you’ll want a fine char on the cutlets so set the burner to high before...
Tolu Oloruntoba The Tinderbox We were a conflagration asking To be incarnated into the world. My mother, superstitious, Kept my father and I apart, Two stones made of The same igneous anger. Everyone else at home, eyes like saucers, Was crying as if...