Editor in Chief: Dylan gascon
Fiction Editors: Johnathan Etchart
Jenny Lin
Melinda Smith
Stephen williams
Shaymaa Mahmoud
Nonfiction Editors: Collette Curran
Owen Torres
Anastasia Zamora
Poetry Editors: Shaymaa Mahmoud
Sean hisaka
Lisa Tate
Blog Manager: Dylan Gascon
By C.G. Dominguez
1973, 45 miles from Delta, Utah
There’s a curse on this road, Danny decides. Got to be.
Route 50 never failed to leave her sore, broke, demoralized. Whether it was getting Ganged up on at a service station outside of Sacramento, stricken with food poisoning in Cincinnati, decked by a delicate, tow-headed cocktail waitress in Annapolis, no other road offered up such consistent misfortune.
And now, this. Danny grips the wheel harder, slaps the dash, palms the gearshift as though it will make any kind of a of difference. Beyond the windshield of her rig, the harborless landscape slows its ribboning speed, details taking on greater and greater clarity.
Leaving just enough in the tank that the engine might turnover when she fills it up again, she pulls off to the side of the razor-straight highway. Not even bothering to brake, she coasts and coasts, the tenacious inertia of heavy cargo carrying her down the last meager meters, gravel flying in her wake.
With a mighty creak of driveshaft and wheels, she stops.
The silence of the desert beyond the doors of his cab is deafening. No wind blows through the dead brush and bare hickory. No chittering of rodents or insects fizzes up from the scant undergrowth. No plaintive shriek of a hawk careens over the marching line of smoke-blue hills.
She unbuckles herself, clamors out onto the tarmac, taps her last pack into her palm to count them, already performing the calculations required to ration them out. Sobered, she considers her circumstances. She’s had no one in front or behind her since she crossed the
Nevada state line, and it’s been an hour since anyone passed her in the opposite direction. And these roads invited such wild speeds. Even if someone did come this way, would they even know to slow down?
She wishes she had some other way to pass the time. She never liked the men who settled around the picnic tables at the remoter service stations with harmonicas and extra rotgut to share — offering the false promise of companionship, of cowboy bonhomie. Everyone wanted to think he was Yul Brynner parked in the driver’s seat of the town hearse, braving a hailstone of bigot’s bullets. But Danny already knows, even in her green and tender years, the West has no heroes in it, no mythmakers. Only small, greedy-handed men willing to fill up their own emptiness in nearly every way there was to find. Men who would gladly do things they were afraid to put a name to, with people they would never know the names of, and live the whole of their lives as if it meant nothing at all.
Danny hasn’t been around long, but she’s been around long enough to know that. If only her infinite wisdom were sufficient to know she couldn’t make it from Delta to Ely without some spare fucking diesel.
“Hello there.”
Danny starts. Her eyes and mouth are parched sandpaper-dry. It stings to pry her eyelids open.
Below her, at the side of the cab, stands a strange kind of woman. Her long hair falls out in flyaways from a steely braid. In her snap-shirt and her old mill coveralls, she looks like a Dust Bowl drifter flung forward thirty years out of the past.
Her vehicle, too, fits the era. An old jangly jalopy of a truck, rusted through at the edges of the chassis, with a great whip of a radio antenna leaning back over the bed, it probably couldn’t take any speeds higher than forty.
“Any trouble?”
Even her accent, Danny thinks, is anomalous. Ground down with Western vowel sounds, but with an undeniable Scottish brogue, one she’s only ever heard in movies.
“No trouble,” Danny assures her, speaking evenly, careful to keep both hands where the Good Samaritan can see them, lest either of them make any rash or sudden moves. “Just out of gas.”
“I see. How unlucky.”
Feeling it would be rude to continue the conversation from her high perch and weaken her chances of prizing a favor from this stranger, Danny climbs down from the side door.
They keep wary of each other for the moment, each assessing the possibility of threat in the other.
“There is a service station in town,” the woman says. “Not the most reliable in terms of business hours, but it is what it is. If you need a ride.”
“I’d be obliged,” Danny says, carefully. And the stranger steps aside, gesturing to the passenger seat of her own vehicle.
A few seconds of accelerating off the shoulder and back up onto the tarmac is all it takes for them to get as familiar with each other as they need to be.
“Caro,” the driver says, offering no last name.
“Danny Brown,” she says, because it feels important to be polite.
The woman’s hand, when Danny shakes it, is dry and incongruously cool. The knuckles, she notes, are richly scarred.
“You hadn’t many perishables in your trailer, I hope?”
“Nothing but Michigan limestone.”
“Small mercies, then.”
And that is enough conversation for both of them. Caro drives, and fiddles with some dials on the dash.
There’s a radio built in, newer than the vehicle itself, but not by much. Even the song playing seems a spirit summoned out of a distant past; Bach, or something like it. Her abuela had owned a few records that sounded just like it. She could recall their even, mathematical precision, their sedate pace, even if she had no recollection of specific melodies, because those qualities had reminded her so much of the last years of her life, when it was only the two of them together. The slow, thoughtful deliberation required of every step, every swipe of a towel over the dishes, until Danny was aware of just how much the labor of living was to her a conscious, painful effort.
Danny realizes the great antenna, swaying ominously behind the rear windshield, must have been installed for the express purpose of picking up this station, which couldn’t have been beamed from anywhere closer than Reno, or Vegas.
They pull into the service station lot, braking in a haze of grey dust.
The sign in the window, hand-scratched in crayon and foxed at the edges with yellow nicotine, is unequivocal. Closed, back tomorrow
“Damn.”
“Yes, I had worried that might be the case.”
Danny sighs, cracks her neck from one side, then the other.
“Well, thank you for the lift all the same.”
And she moves to unlatch the door of the truck.
“What do you think you’re doing?”
“Waiting.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” says Caro, with a haughty sniff. “You can’t sleep out here.”
“I don’t mind.”
“I didn’t go to the trouble of stopping and picking you up so you could die of exposure or take a snakebite.”
“Doesn’t seem like there’s anywhere else for me to go,” Danny points out. “Unless you have a hotel somewhere out here.”
He’s being rude, but the point stands. And even if this low-desert ghost town had any rooms for rent, he couldn’t afford them.
“No,” Caro says. And then, he hesitates, as if he knows how what he has to say next will sound.
“I’ll put you up.”
The offer drops between them like a stone into a pond; with undeniable weight. And yet Danny is certain Caro’s fully convinced himself there’s nothing else she could say, nothing to be done but offer this stranger the hospitality of his house, for however long Danny might require it.
And yet. Good faith offer or not, it sounds the way it sounds.
I’ll stop for you, I’ll pick you up, drive you to the station, give you a warm meal and a place to sleep.
For what?
Caro is convincing. Maybe she even managed to convince himself. But it’s been a long time since Danny’s been fooled by something so simple as a small favor offered ostensibly with no strings attached. In fact, it begins to add up; the solitary woman, self-sequestered in the middle of nowhere, so eager and willing to help out a stranded young person in need. With her air of gentleness, her soft-spoken erudition, she even reminds Danny of some of the kinder nuns she’s known, in her former life. Maybe that’s the story.
Either way, the more Danny muses on it, the less she minds the idea. After all, she’s done more, for less.
She expects overtures, as they make the quiet, meandering drive from the shuttered service station to Caro’s place. A setting of the pecking order. Instead, Caro avoids her eyes and forswears her touch so assiduously that Danny is forced to come to the conclusion that she was right after all. Far from being unaffected, Caro is clammed up so tight inside herself it would be irrational to suppose she had any other reason except to misdirect, to overcompensate. Or maybe she was just one of those types who remain convinced that if they never give a voice or put a name to a thing, then it was as though it had never existed.
Danny has tried that tactic herself, has indulged that self-same impulse, more than few times. Even convinced herself that it works.
It doesn’t work.
The inside of the house is bare, even self-consciously ascetical. Danny thinks of hermits in cave-carved cloisters, desert patriarchs who earned their holiness by sitting for years on the tops of stone pillars under the sun. She thinks about men who choose to suffer, and how they self-select their forms of suffering.
It brings an unfamiliar pity welling up within her, an unaccustomed tenderness. No, she won’t mind so much, whatever Caro asks of her.
The linoleum floor of the entryway is cool under Danny’s knees. Caro’s calves, her knees, the lines of her thighs are firm under her hands. The fabric smells like rock dust, and sunbleached cotton, and clean warmth.
“Any particular way you like it?” she asks.
Above her, when he flicks her gaze up to meet Caro’s face, all she can see is the soft pink slash of her mouth, softly open. And her eyes, wide and blue and wondrous.
Danny’s chest swells with the little triumph of having guessed right. Of having played her cards correctly; someone who wanted her, craved her, and wouldn’t punish either of them for that fact.
But the victory is short-lived. Before Danny can work her fingertips around the first button of Caro’s fly, the woman is scrambling backwards, pushing Danny away with the heel of one hand.
“This was not what I brought you here for.”
Danny lofts one eyebrow.
“You sure about that?”
Caro takes another step back, holds out one placating palm. Inhales a steadying breath.
“Quite sure,” she says, voice clipped as corrugated steel.
Danny rocks back onto her heels, but doesn’t stand yet. The flush of anticipation running up her neck and cheeks is cooling to a clammy sheen.
“Oh.”
“Don’t misunderstand,” says Caro, all primness again. “I’m flattered. And I’m not…that is, there’s no harm done.”
She should feel relieved. Instead, the sensation that comes slowly over her is… disappointment.
It must show in her face, because when she gets to her feet, Caro’s own expression is one of incongruous tenderness.
“I couldn’t bear it,” she says, “if you thought my offer was…contingent on a thing like that.”
“Then why did you make it?” Danny asks. Caro shrugs.
“Why does anyone do anything?”
And then, without preamble, she leans forward and brushes a featherlight suggestion of a kiss over Danny’s cheek.
“Let’s get some dinner in you,” she says. “Then we can talk.”
Later, after a shower in Caro’s cramped bathroom and a ham sandwich and a change of clothes, Danny feels new made.
While Caro pulls a few beers from the fridge, Danny peeks into the spare room; the one exception to the woman’s apparent commitment to ascetic living. In there, all was a jumble. Papers were scattered around like autumn leaves, books in varying stages of order and disarray.
Music scores, or what Danny thought must be music scores. She’d never learned to read music, even after the hours she spent staring at the papers turned by the sisters who played the ill-tuned instrument in the home’s chapel. Even knowing as little as she did, she understood Sister Claudia was very bad. Or the hymns were bad. Or both.
But even as she feels the urge to pry, she knows Caro's hospitality did not extend to this space. That this was something private.
Coming out into the narrow hall, she towels off her hair to find a tidy pile of blankets and sheets on the sofa. Caro’s even left her a spare toothbrush, a safety razor.
“Where’d you come from?” she asks, a little awestruck. Caro frowns.
“Never you mind,” she says.
Caro goes out onto the rickety porch, gesturing for Danny to follow. Like this, under a sky striped with fierce, fiery color, Dann feels the weight of the lonely life a woman must lead out here.
Maybe she was a musician. But what kind of trouble could a musician possibly get herself into, to land all the way out here?
But even as she wonders, even as her mind courses over the little puzzle of it, she accepts it for an insoluble problem. A divine mystery: something made for contemplation, and not comprehension. A knot woven out of threads from the past, too tangled now to be undone.
Regardless, even if there were answers to these questions, Danny won’t be in her life long enough to learn them.
Again she counts the number of smokes left in his last pack; she hadn’t gone through as many as she expected, and there are plenty left to share. In the lambent glow of a desert sunset, she offers one up to Caro. Leans in close to light it for her.
“I’d like to try again,” Danny says. “If that’s alright.”
Afterward, after all of it, Danny goes out onto the porch for a smoke.
Out in the distance, she hears a shriek and wail. A fight, between a raptor and some creeping mammal, trying to secret itself in a tuft of stunted brush. Danny can smell it; the fragrance warm and resinous, rising up in a cloud around his head like Danny’s own smoke.
There must be a secret spring somewhere around here, considering how nothing whatsoever grew along the roadside of the tableland they had ridden through to get to the house from the main drag of the town.
Yes, there must be a spring, or else this house itself must serve as a kind of oasis, seeding life and lending occult fertility to this barren place. Either way, there won’t be time to find out.
Danny accepts it like another divine mystery; that invaluable skill she was taught as a young woman, to hold the possible and the impossible together in your mind, know that they were irreconcilable, and believe in their reconciliation anyway.
This, she understands, is faith. Hopefully Caro understands it too, or Danny doesn’t know how she stands to go on living the way she does.
But for herself, for now? She looks out into the landscape and feels exactly as a man ought to feel, engulfed on all sides by the immensity of the West.
For just a flickering moment, Danny knows herself for a silver-screen hero, ready for credits to roll.
By Benjamin Pierce
What is it like to be my eye with no say if I open it or is it yet more rude that I close it without asking-but that is barely close to parity not even close to even that my eyeball sees—all over my brain-leaving stains that won't come out misses what else went on in front of me that didn't stain and dares call doing that it's only job…
By Alison Miller
Four poster bed, naked brown body, white sheets at your feet, red walls. I know where to buy booze in my dreamtown and during which hours I can still find brunch. Some of the streets are dangerous. You lie turned and not quite twisted, staring at me while your body looks away. Do you think the red Asian themed wallpaper is a tribute to my grandparents’ green Korean dining room? Pancakes and umbrellas, Papa’s missionary childhood, his two parents dead in the first run of Korean Fords. Do you think it’s wrong that I texted you Love me more. Please. There are six rooms in my dreamhotel and you live in every single one. Outside, the streets are filled with Confederate statues and parades. Elephants, acrobats, home. Marchers march down Monument Avenue, Snow Globes and Snow Queens. Snow Bear sprouting mold in the basement. Fashion shows in church. I’m a lot I almost texted you last night. Only the memorabilia is familiar. Why do I hold onto homecoming floats barreling down the cobblestones?
by Razmik Kocharian
My homeland is where there are mountains, streams and churches. And there it is accepted that the youngest son lives with his parents. I moved out when I was twenty-three. By Armenian standards, I’m a rebel. According to Moscow’s ones, apparently, I’m a freeloader. However, my timid rebellion was as successful as a rebellion itself can be.
Now my back is numb. The bed presses me against the ceiling. And I’ve stayed in bed for three hours already. During this time, I’ve twice pissed on the lavatory seat, because I had such an opportunity. I’ll continue doing it, since it needs to be done.
A toilet seat covered with piss is a necessary symbol. Now I’m alone.
Now I’m making a snow angel on a damp sheet. And sticky napkins, greasy chips bags, and a pizza box fall off the bed. There is still something to eat. I take a dry piece of dough covered with wilted tomatoes and walk over to the table. God, how can you like it?
I do like it.
To drink on the Ponds, you first need to drink at home. To drink at home, you need to visit the ‘Red and White’ store.
As conceived by its creator, the name is about wine. It’s a certain balance between Cabernet Sauvignon and Chardonnay, which drunk working stiffs in sleeping areas find in alcohol drinks with equally beautiful names: ‘Zhuravli’, ‘Zhiguli’, ‘Zhavoronki’.
Then I open the door. And she says:
- Sorry.
She says she just wanted to mop the floor. A woman over sixty. She’s my neighbor, and I don’t know her name, but a few things are already clear to me.
I know that her chestnut blunt bob used to grow on another head. Now it’s here, covering a woman with a wrinkled face, obsessed with cleanliness. This’s a cheap wig, since the hair is inserted into the grid along the lines and divides her head, and indeed her whole body, into two equal parts: right and left. It doesn’t work that way. Everything in nature is chaotic. Everything is chaotic, except her daily routine.
I know that every day at 10 a.m. she takes out the garbage. I know it because my door is located directly across the garbage chute. Every day at 10 a.m., I hear the greasy lid open with a bang. Then the garbage bag slides down the pipe. Then the lid noisily closes.
I know a little more. When you leave the apartment at 5 p.m., you are greeted by a strong smell of bleach. And the burgundy tiles, covered with a thin layer of moisture, glare under a dim lamp. This woman never misses a day.
I open the door, and she says:
- Sorry, I just wanted to mop the floor.
I’ve long got something to say to her, but today’s not the day. Today I look at her right side, look at her left one, smile and leave.
To drink on the Ponds, you first need to drink at home. Then you have to pass seven stations with one transfer without wetting yourself. It’s not so easy, since you must drink a lot at home.
I lasted to ‘Mayakovskaya’. Then I realize that I can’t take it, and I come out. I’m passing by the Garden Ring road. Each year Moscow’s sidewalks are getting wider, let’s assume, it’s for the pedestrians to have more space to walk.
Now I’m moving at a fast pace along the wide road by the Friday traffic jam. I’m nervous, because I’ve often strolled here before. On the way to the Ponds, from the Mayakovskaya side, I’m often targeted by people with doubtful stories, and I never managed to dodge them. I couldn’t pass by, because I ran out of my rebellious spirit, when I moved from my parents. A hefty bald man with a big nose and a sixteen-year-old girl with a medium-sized nose are quickly rushing towards me. They’re aiming at me. Let’s assume, the sidewalks are getting wider for me now to have room to maneuver.
- Brother, wait! Brother! Brother, are you Georgian? Still not wide enough.
- An Armenian.
- Armenian, thank God! Genatsvale, the cops caught my brother a moment ago. We’ve got no money! We’re going there, please, help, we need just two thousand rubles, I beg you, please. Ahper, help me out!
His eyes are wet. His homeland is where there are mountains, streams and churches. And it’s not customary there for a man to cry. But men cry, despite the number and height of the mountains in their homeland. And now this hefty bald Georgian with a big nose is crying in front of his daughter with a medium-sized nose and asks me for two thousand rubles.
- I’ve got no cash.
I’ve got cash.
- Nino, do you have a card? Nino’s got a card, bro, ahper, please, help! I swear on my mother, help!
Now I can’t slip out, ahper. He swore on his mother that Nino has a card, and I have no excuse. Do I have a desire to help him? I don’t know, but I definitely have a desire to piss. I graduated from an economic university and I’ve heard about the Maslow’s pyramid. I don’t remember exactly what the order is, but the desire to piss is definitely closer to the bottom than the desire to show a dubious gesture of altruism.
To drink on the Ponds, you have to pass seven stations with one transfer without wetting yourself. You need to transfer Nino two thousand roubles not to wet yourself. And I transfer them. It’d be faster to give cash, but it’d be kind of ill-mannered.
A hefty Georgian throws his hands up and thanks God. Then he thanks me. Exactly in that order. It hurts me a little, but then he grabs me with his long arms and pulls me close to his chest. He kisses my neck and cries. Exactly in that order. Where his homeland is, the men kiss each other on the neck, but they don’t cry. At least they don’t cry in front of their daughters. Nino timidly says to me, “Thank you.” Her father says that God will surprise me. He says:
- God will definitely surprise you soon. You’ll see.
And I'm leaving. My steps are quick. I’m looking for an eatery. I run. The eatery resembles a facility. There is a guard at the entrance. “Toilet is for visitors only.” I remember, I have one surprise from God in reserve. Am I ready to spend the promised surprise on this situation? It will definitely be a pleasant surprise if I can negotiate with him. I need to say something. The surprise needs to be provoked. I need to walk him past. To drink on the Ponds… You have to say something.
- Erm, let me piss, man!
It worked. Is it my surprise from God, or did I just get along with the guard? A surprise from God. It looks like some kind of a deal. Since I’ve helped, I’m supposed to get recompensed. It seems that the Georgian believe in balance. It doesn’t work that way. Everything in nature is chaotic, except for my neighbor's daily routine, except for her wig. Everything is chaotic, except the ‘Red and White’.
To drink on the Ponds, you have to pass seven stations with one transfer without wetting yourself. Then you need to give six hundred and fifty rubles to the bartender and get your cocktail. A mixture of lemon juice, sugar syrup, egg white and American bourbon is my balanced Whiskey Sour.
I am standing with a glass near the ‘Pinch’ bar on Palashevsky Lane. There are pompous houses around, people dressed up, but now I only care about that Georgian. His brother has serious problems with the cops, which can be solved with the help of my two thousand rubles.
I got fucked over.
This’s not very pleasant to realize, but I have considerable experience in this matter. You just need to find compromises.
Firstly, if I’m right, I saw first-class acting. This guy came up to me already in tears. He threw up his hands to heaven, and kissed my neck. Let’s assume: I’ve paid two thousand rubles for a small performance of the Moscow Art Theater level. It seems to be about the same price. I can believe it.
Secondly, this Georgian was crying in front of his daughter, and if I’m right, and he doesn’t have any brother, then he obviously needed this money. It doesn’t matter on what. The important thing is that I can believe it too.
Thirdly, I was promised a surprise from God. But I would rather believe in God than in his surprise.
Now I notice near the ‘Shiba’ restaurant, which is opposite the ‘Pinch’, a bum with an obscenely happy face. Homeless people don’t walk around with such a face for no reason, so I follow him. Something is about to clear up, and I wouldn’t want to miss it. A waiter comes out of the ‘Shiba’ and gives him a package of instant noodles ‘Dosirak’, with steam coming out. The bum covers it with a lid and drifts along the sidewalk towards the park. He notices my interested look and doesn’t miss the opportunity to ask for a coin. I guess he’s having a pretty good evening, and I refuse.
He drifted away and disappeared over the horizon.
And I felt so disgusted by my inconsistency. I’ve just held a coin for a homeless man, guided only by the desire to maintain a balance in his life.
Another compromise is needed.
Let it not be about balance. Let’s assume, I did it, because at some point in my head a fund to help those in need spontaneously appeared, and I immediately decided that the Georgian had exhausted it for today. I have nothing to do with it. And there’s no balance here at all.
It’s unconvincing. With a strange resentment, I return to ‘Pinch’ and order another drink.
- It’s my treat.
Such a surprise. A woman in her thirties said she would treat me. The woman is not far over thirty, the woman doesn’t have more than fifty kilograms. It’s a woman I wouldn’t mind treating myself. She holds out her hand to me and says:
- Alina.
Such a surprise.
Don’t be mad at me, Alina, but not today. I already screwed up with this bum, and now I wouldn’t like that Georgian to keep his promise. You really would be a divine surprise, but it doesn’t have to be this way.
I refuse the treat and leave.
Breezed by the underground winds, I’m trampling on the escalator. It takes me up to Moscow’s freshness, leaving completely different aromas behind. Then he says:
- Dear sir, I’m not an alcoholic.
He waits for me to turn around. I’d rather pretend I don’t hear. I’d rather take the steps up, but I can’t stand the stairs. Then he says:
- Dear sir, I beg you to listen to me.
These well-mannered men from the subway come across amusing stories every once in a while. The main thing is to try to grasp it. I draw more air in.
- Dear sir, I’m not an alcoholic. Please, listen to me.
I go down a step, and stand next to him. Since I undertook to listen to him, I wouldn't want him to lie.
- You smell like an alcoholic.
- Well, I drank, but I’m not an alcoholic. Look at my clothes. I’ve got normal clothes. Have a look. Do you see?
I look down first. The easiest way to understand how many days a person spent on the street is by the shoes - it’s about three days. Then I understand that I’m behaving badly, since I evaluate his outfit from the bottom to the top. It’s completely disrespectful.
- Sorry. What did you want to say?
- Honestly, I’m not an alcoholic. Honestly, he’s not an alcoholic yet.
- I’m a normal guy. I’m just unlucky. I’m just a normal guy, you know? It just happens, well, when you’re unlucky.
- Got it.
- Give me some money, please. He, sort of, got down to business quickly, but I wanted to hear the story. It’s a pity. Okay. I give him a hundred rubles, then a drunken pause comes. He opens his mouth but can’t speak. This happens when, honestly, you’re not yet an alcoholic, but you’re about to become one. He is about to say something, and now he’s standing with his mouth open, trying to push out a word.
- H-honestly, friend, you’re a man of the right stamp. There are so few like you.
A great investment of a hundred. You could just buy a beer, but you can act like this. You could straighten the crumpled banknote and put it into the machine, which will thank and praise you in every possible way. A machine with a black Puma cap and shoes that had been kneading the mud for three days.
- I want to ask you something. Can we talk? I really want to talk to such a person, well, to a real human.
Oh, stop it. Okay. Maybe the promised story will come.
- Let’s talk.
- I want you to believe me. I’m a normal guy. I’m just completely in deep shit right now. Do you believe me?
- Of course I do.
- I used to have much better clothes than this one.
- I like your cap.
A terrible cap. However, he was very cutely embarrassed, and he smiled. The teeth are all in their places, but something is wrong with his leg. He carries a small package with a pharmacy logo in his hand and limps. I hold the door for him to pass. Seems like he really couldn’t handle it. When you are in a deep shit, a heavy glass door and a draft can be a serious obstacle.
It’s dark already. We enter the lighted yard and stand against the wall. Wet snow falls on his black cap and immediately disappears. I really hope that his story will live up to my expectations.
- I ran a restaurant in Ulyanovsk. At that time, my clothes really were much better than this. And I had a wife there in Ulyanovsk. A normal chick. She died a month and a half ago. And just at the same time, the owner of the restaurant kicked me out and put his nephew in charge. These Armenians always do this.
- Yes, we have such a thing.
- No, get me right, he was a normal guy, no problems. He just undeservedly dismiss…
- Relax, it’s okay.
- That’s it. Katya died, and I was fired. Deep shit. But I’m a man. I didn’t break down. I came to Moscow, and went to work at a construction site.
- Why not go to another restaurant?
- It didn’t work out.
- Why?
- Well, you know, sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn’t. That’s when it didn’t work. I know.
- In short, we built such a multi-storey building, you have a lot of them here. These, you know, are sixteen stories high. I worked for two weeks, and then the fittings fell on my leg. The leg wasn’t broken, but it was pierced well. There was blood... An ambulance came and bandaged my leg. They told me not to go to work. My leg hurt, but I needed the money. I came to the construction site and they didn’t give me a job. They don’t fucking need a lame worker, you know? I was looking for a job and, shit, there was nothing. And that fucking leg... I went to the hospital. The doctor looked and said - infection. Either do surgery or cut off. The operation costs two hundred thousand. I don’t have that kind of money. I ask her what it means to cut off? Heal my leg! How is that?! That’s my leg! How can you cut off my leg?!
He grabs my jacket and shakes me. It’s probably okay. I like that kind of jolt. I wouldn’t even turn down a good bream.
- It’s my leg! If it can be cured, why are they going to cut it off?! I need it! Heal it! He told me to come tomorrow and they’ll cut it off for me for free. They’ll cut it off for me for fucking free! What the fuck?!
We are standing in an empty courtyard. Me and that guy with the holey leg. He cries and his shoulders twitch in time with his sobs. And through the tears he speaks:
- Tomorrow I have to go to them to cut my leg off. It’s my leg. Tell me what to do? I got fucking lice a week ago. I had to cut my hair bald and throw out all my clothes. I’m bald, do you understand? I had normal hair, just like yours. Now, have a look.
He finally takes off that awful cap. There is a shaved skull with cuts. It’s crumpled like a snowball with fingerprints.
- I’m persistent. I know what it’s like to be a man. But I can’t take it anymore. I can’t do anything. Tomorrow the leg will be cut off. They can heal it, but they will cut it off. What should I do?
- I don’t know.
I don’t know if there are lice on him. I don’t know if they jumped on me when he was shaking my jacket. I know that I want to leave. I need to muster up the courage and leave. The man wipes his snot with his sleeve and says:
- Listen, can I ask you something?
- Yes.
- Give me some money, please.
- I gave you a hundred.
- Yes? Thank you so much.
- Well, I guess…
- What do you do?
- I’m a student.
- What’s your major?
- Medicine.
I’m not studying to be a doctor. I don’t know why I said that, but now he’s rubbing his palms contently.
- God sent you to me, I swear. He leans against the wall, rolls up his pants. He is breathing hastily, gathering strength. I look at the bandage that is wrapped around the hole in his leg. Blood, pus, and greenery. A real Russian autumn. He draws some air and holds his breath. He unwinds the bandage from the back
of his leg, reaches the hole and freezes. An inhale again. He pulls off the bandage with a quick movement. He screams, and his voice echoes through the empty yard. One, two, three, four turns. How much more? Five, six, seven. Seven. There are seven circles of hell around a holey leg. Anxious residents come out onto the balconies. They scold the peasant for the noise, they scold him for disturbing the peace. And he leans against the wall of the house, breathing heavily. With a trembling hand, he holds out a package with the pharmacy logo. And he says insistently:
- Do it.
- What?
- Do it!
Now I stand in an empty yard and look into this hole. Blood is pulsing from it, mixed with pus, and this man, he’s patiently waiting. He thinks that today he was lucky, and he got a sympathetic medical student. Now this student will carefully, competently, treat his leg. The leg which will be cut off tomorrow. The real Russian hope.
I take out a new bandage and some ointment from the bag. Each medicine has instructions. Everything is written in it to understand how it works. I find a way to use it - it’s nothing complicated. I heard that if you can’t do something, pretend you can until you succeed. I put the instructions in my pocket.
Tomorrow this leg will be gone. I like to think about it. Now I feel like a priest, and I need to read a prayer for the rest of the leg. I don’t know what it sounds like. I’m not a priest, not a doctor, but over the past six months I’ve learned to pretend quite well. Now I draw a cross on the red-yellow hole with ointment. One, two, three, seven. Seven turns around the leg change the color of the white bandage. The leg will be gone tomorrow, but the good news is that you’ll not have to rip the bandage off again.
- Done. It’s time for me to go.
- Thank you very much, but I want to ask you something else.
- Come on, for the last time.
- I want to tell a story.
- Tell me, just quickly.
- I once bought Katya a cat. Thoroughbred, twenty grand worth. And he never learned to use the litter box. He shit anywhere. Can you imagine? Shit. I’m so fucking unlucky in life.
The snow is wet tonight. I walk home through the park on the dirt. I’m picking up a bunch of mud on my boots, enter the elevator, pressing the worn button. I arrive on the tenth floor, traditionally the cleanest in the whole house, and look at the shiny burgundy tiles. I want to take off my shoes and carry them in my hands to the door. I don’t take off my shoes. Because I have something to say to my neighbor. Both parts of her, the right and the left, I have something to say. Tomorrow.
The End
By Dan Raphael
to describe is to unwrite, to diminish, to lead astray took the words right out of my mind the coefficient of friction makes so much possible
a large blank book for a new dictionary a thesaurus of jokes say something enough times and it becomes silence
not the words but the ideas not let in or out a path of half steps and sliding strides don’t know what I’ll be missing this time something was on a different channel
a kitchen on every floor but not a floor in every kitchen one river’s been erased but a new line’s not agreed on shadows in wind, bursting through a wall of compressed confetti
emit or unravel as the set is silently shifted when I teleport my clothes stay behind tailored space, distressed space, random stretching and shrinking not waves but weaves to plug in from anywhere is to be leashed was the lines longest to get in or to leave
I set the clock back a couple hours and nothing changes while my phone is between time zones where a watch used to be has gone feral sharp little arrows a circle pretending to be a slide rule my eyes can count but my brain refuses to translate
you had to be there, behind my eyes viewing mugshots of previous experiences each face has angles from which it’s a single line seldom straight, often glowing with internal reflection leaving focus for now, protected from earshot out of range but not out of fire
By Dave Somerville
It was a rugged hike that started in Mount Savage went south to Savage River Dam then north around the reservoir to Big Run twenty miler ten hours his favorite it was also snake country a rare lapse of attention when he stepped over a log onto a four-foot timber rattler was his undoing.
“Fuck me!” He kept saying Jimmy laid in the shade against the trunk of a large Maple tree and watched the turkey vultures begin to circle like giant airplanes.
“What can I do?” asked Renee.
“Apply a tourniquet,” answered Jimmy.
Renee pulled a hand towel from her pack wrapped and tied it above the bite and below his knee Jimmy pulled a flask from his pack and began to sip at the whiskey.
“I’m surprised at how painless it is,” said Jimmy, “I guess that’s when you know it’s bad.” So, this is how it ended, he thought to himself.
“I wish there was something else I could do,” said Renee. “I wish we’d never come.”
“It’s too late for that,” said Jimmy, as he sipped the whiskey.
Renee knelt, cradled Jimmy’s head in her arms, and looked away.
“Do you love me?” she asked.
“Of course I do.”
They were in a remote place now with big trees a wild river mountain peaks and no cell service two fishermen who’d been fishing the back country came through on foot and said they would go for an ambulance which seemed like a long time ago and it was getting late the wind started to
blow tree branches rubbed noisily together giving way to thoughts of things that plagued him listening and alone they waited.
…with Iraq and Afghanistan behind and an early out from the army to attend college which he never had any intention of finishing it was Portland the black woman beside him looking for a place to run two cops pulling her back throwing her down macing her in the face then moving on to the next one thinking about it how he‘d become jaded and complacent about BLM how someway it failed him or he failed it he never knew which how he fell out of the ranks stood by the side of the road as the crusaders swept resolutely by his head down shoulders stooped how he would look to something else to lift him up and to stay with next time no matter what…
“That’s what it’s like,” murmured Jimmy, “like catching a bullet you should have dodged.”
“You’re upset,” said Renee. “The ambulance will be here soon. I should have gone myself.”
“No,” said Jimmy, “I want you here with me.”
Renee noticed his wound blue-black and swelling she loosened the tourniquet from fear of it being too tight.
“The only thing coming is darkness,” said Jimmy.
“Yes it’s coming,” she said.
…in Iraq he watched soldiers fight over anything Dietz a tall wiry Black man from Georgia and Byfield a lanky long-nosed Pollock from Cleveland hated each other then they fought over it, it was a violent fight he had watched soldiers lie to other soldiers and then watched them fight just to fight and the fight had not concluded when he walked out into the night tired looking to see if he could give some purpose to it, the fighting, but in spite of it he was never able to question something he’d not yet found in himself their loyalty devotion commitment when taking it to the enemy…
The wind died dusk settled in a full moon rose in the sky it was clear above the mountaintops an owl hooted softly there was the steady click of crickets and flickering of fireflies in the tall grass Jimmy dozed off when he awoke Renee had built a fire she’d gotten water to boil he could smell the coffee.
“They’ll be here soon,” said Renee. But Jimmy could only think of the irony of his mishap coming in this place he loved as the long, lovely wail of a loon emanated from the river’s edge swelling to a crescendo they listened to all the other sounds become distant and disappear as he lay quiet the fire crackled tall yellow flames soared up at random to warm his face he began to recall more of certain things and not others the betrayals the cruelties loyalty in all its forms and each yellow flame like a messenger sent these memories to visit him to shine on his face.
…he’d gone up there for something and after he’d left he learned the little girl Brandy was dead she’d taken six hundred dollars from the adults as a game and hid it in a stand of trees behind the house under a rock where there were many rocks and when she went to retrieve the money she couldn’t remember which rock and each time she lifted one and the money wasn’t there with their loyalty being only to the meth they wouldn’t have the adults beat her until they beat her numb and if it was loyalty of the worst kind it was loyalty nonetheless...two volunteer firemen had assaulted his friend Mary and most certainly she had begged for her life and swore she’d never reveal it before they shot her with a .22 caliber rifle but she was still alive after taking two shots and then they beat her with a logging chain loyalty to evil and lust to be sure but loyalty to something nevertheless...as they told him what to mix in the vats for flux they forgot to tell him to put in the main ingredient arguing back and forth all morning about every little thing longhair Joe told little Moe he was ‘Injun’ and being loyal to tribal customs he’d kill him and not even
think about the consequences if he didn’t shut up but little Moe kept it going he was armed his loyalty to the second amendment was stronger how he’d kill him right back and when the plastic gallons of flux were stacked high on skids ready for shipment longhair Joe asked little Moe if he had told him to put in the main ingredient Moe said no he thought Joe had told him and they turned to look at all that flux ready for shipment without the main ingredient it shipped out on schedule and for a time he wondered if anything had tumbled down because of it, because of all the arguing over loyalties…Carl’s mother came out that morning and looked at his head pressed against the window she opened the door and he fell into her arms she knew he was dead and didn’t know for how long the car had idled before it ran out of gas the car was not locked and Carl had had a key for the front door but she’d left it open for him she thought Carl must have fell asleep or passed out before the carbon monoxide quenched his breath his friend’s death was a great blow and it was never clear to him if it was an accident or suicide or how the one main loyalty he felt he had had in his life left him or he left it Carl had been a loyal friend and he wanted to go into the street and shout to demonstrate his loyalty to Carl’s memory stop the cars to get their attention to tell them didn’t they know Carl Simpson was dead and that whatever he wasn’t he was a loyal friend but he had not gone into the street after all had not stopped the cars and time and life moved on around him as usual…
Jimmy thought over time how he’d lost fidelity to the memory of the little girl, Mary, the flux, and his friend Carl and he wondered if he would ever have the capacity to be that one thing he had always envied in others the capacity to be loyal to something anything and have it survive right or wrong misplaced or otherwise to know he wasn’t adrift but stalwart and unmalleable tethered as it where to some principle anchored to something then he thought of the women nothing exposed what little capacity he’d had for constancy and commitment in his life than the
women there were many women each one different yet they were all the same he had always wanted the ones he couldn’t have and he was never satisfied with the ones he had though the ones he had were perfectly fine they were never the ones he couldn’t have and there had been enough so that he couldn’t remember them all but he was sure the ones he’d forgotten were as good as the ones he remembered.
“All my life I’ve been chasing illusions things I never had,” he said.
“You’re tired,” said Renee.
He wouldn’t argue. “Are you afraid?”
“No,” she said, “there’s nothing to be afraid of.”
“That’s because you’re stronger than me,” said Jimmy.”
“I wish it were true.”
She went off into the brush in the dusk Jimmy could see her pull down her jeans and when she rose from the grass pull up her underwear in full view of him he would make love to her even with his wound but it would make his blood work and not be good for him so what would be the difference he thought neither was the whiskey good for him suddenly with the venom coursing Jimmy felt a buzz in his head he could not talk around or yell over and he drifted off.
…when he was with Clare and they were in love at Snead’s Ferry that young summer he could see them running and standing in the rain out front of Biff Yost’s gas station that was below the trailer park and the rain poured down in huge drops that splashed all over them like water balloons and they were laughing that abandoned laughter and breathing heavily when they sat down at the pumps and never had he felt the rain like he had felt it on him that day he looked over at her and he saw on her face what he hadn’t seen there before her face was a petaled flower where the water drops beaded up on its surface and clung to it and he leaned over kissed
several of the droplets and he felt them on his lips as her face became Clare’s’ again and he remembered how she went missing with all the others into that black hole of relationships with women he was unable to commit to…toward the Carolina shore of pine and sand he could see two ATV’s racing and bouncing speeding crazily over the landscape leaving the ground between hills coming down hard then going up wildly again he looked over to see Danny and Liz ahead of him in a cloud of dust with their goggles and gloves they looked back and he could see them smile and wave only to disappear into that same dark pit of friends he had ghosted…in Cleveland on Lake Erie after many hours spent observing it he concluded the water had more character than any he’d seen most of all it was angry and that suited him in the winter its waves slapped the freeway that came into the city from the east and then froze like great icy fingers they arched over the concrete roadway threatening to grasp up and pull away the cement right in front of you and then there was the beauty of Ninth street standing on the pier in the bitterest wind and cold wanting to feel something anything he stood as the force of gusts from the north over the ice took his breath and drove him back and as he clung to the rail he would look around on more than one occasion and wonder why he was the only one expecting with each icy blast to be imbued with something he was missing something he didn’t have something the others who weren’t there must have already had…he went to Texas for all the right reasons endless summer and endless beaches but that’s not what he had found there the beaches were a harsh environment of wind and blowing sand and there were jellyfish and sharks that kept him away from the water the days were unbearably hot and the grass was filled with lethal armies of fire ants and barbs called sand spurs and rattlesnakes and he was discriminated against as a snowbird by Texans both white and brown and in spite of his commitment to stick it out on Christmas day he sat on the beach and decided he’d had enough as he drank the bottles of MD
20-20 and got sick, sick enough so that he would not forget how sick he had become of south Texas but some things had been real to him he had seen the dolphins at Aransas Pass and magnificent rainbows and he had crossed the harbor bridge in the morning and at sunset from Portland into Corpus Christi where the sun the moon the sand and the palm trees had all combined at the bay’s edge to create the softest and one best image he would take with him but he was sure the last thing in his mind he would ever see would be the dolphins especially the dolphins at Aransas pass...then his path then took him back to where a road went gently through a valley along Dan’s Mountain from Westernport it twisted and turned its way upward for twenty miles to Frostburg in western Maryland he drove it almost every day for a year to classes at the college it started where George’s Creek empties into the Potomac and ended just below Mount Savage some things stayed in his mind like certain dreams for whatever reason and old Route 36 was one he looked forward to driving it especially in the fall in the fall leaving Westernport at the ‘Leaving Westernport’ sign there were gnarled Oaks and Maple trees whose limbs stretched low over the road and presented an array of color that he never tired of and looked forward to seeing this daily odyssey continued through several villages and towns with odd and old sounding names past houses with cobblestone foundations some built right on the road heavy with road dust by clotheslines in the breeze and by old gas stations with old men by taverns and barber shops and grocery’s with old metal signs where traffic stopped for people to cross backyards had farm animals and kids played on broken swing sets in the winter with George’s Creek frozen over and a heavy quiet hanging in and smoke drifting up from chimneys the road was like a ribbon that laced its way gently through a corridor of snow blanketed luster toward the upland where heavier snow drifted over and against rock fences he’d wondered over time why he started to feel peculiar about the valley its inhabitants and the road that went naturally
through it quiet and undisturbed he’d never seen anything like it and yet wondering what possessed him eventually and all at once it became clear that everything had combined after many trips to create in him a spell a state of enchantment that allowed him to escape from the things he was thinking eventually a highway that went straight to its destination a 4-lane superstructure made by gouging excavating blasting and removal of the earth forcing the landscape to accommodate it replaced the road there were many protests and demonstrations to stop it or get it re-routed but in the end only portions of the old road still existed or were visible and he never got over the sense of loss the new road caused him but he had turned his back on the protests and demonstrations as was the case in Portland with BLM and looked away any loyalty or devotion he might have had to the road the valley its inhabitants any inspiration he might have gained from it was all disposable as the paper and plastic in his knapsack…
While Jimmy was distracted Renee had begun to make a lean-to when he stirred, she stopped to look at him.
“I think I’m still trying to learn some things,” said Jimmy.
“I don’t recall you saying them. What were they?”
“Loyalty, unconditional love,” said Jimmy he looked to see her reaction.
Renee did not answer right away. “Those are difficult things,” she said and took a drink of the whiskey she could not talk anymore from fatigue that suddenly consumed her as a sudden wind became the voice of the loon again its long rising wail reverberated like a primal scream throughout the entire chasm of ridge and slope water and dark forest that was in front of them.
“The only thing I’ve learned is each time it strips you of something,” she said, “life goes on.”
“So that’s it?”
“I think so.”
“Maybe someday,” he said, “if you try to stay strong try to keep going things will be different.”
Renee did not answer, she poked the fire Jimmy looked away. …and now with his isolation made complete he could see green mountains forests streams rivers farms and small towns and it was West Virginia and he thought of the marathons free-falls riverruns caves the climbs the hunts, and all the fishing that occurred there to make him forget about everything that went before especially the dark periods where he tried to forget about the things that made them not worth remembering then he remembered the Oak tree in front of the high school with its great trunk and long heavy branches that they cut down and how its absence left a hole in him when he saw for the first time where it had stood and it wasn’t there… Jimmy thought maybe those were all the things he could think of and that at least he had thought about them then the cold enveloped him and he thought about the fall and how it suited him with its wind driving rain and dead leaves that gave a certain finality to everything he thought of reincarnation but he had not believed in it much then he thought of how he’d not believed in much of anything at all especially when it came to religion he told Renee about the junction in the forest on a side of the hill where two roads converged how he would walk up the hill and take the road to the left always expecting a different outcome and in his dreams as many times as that image came to him how he regretted not having taken the other road he told her about his dream of hitchhiking along a mountain road through ferns and boulders and how the driver with the fedora pulled down low over his face would stop ahead of him then pull away each time he reached the car door and how it symbolized a certain frustration he’d never been free of he looked up at the ridge of the mountain now in front of him the moon had moved across the sky directly over it Jimmy found the empty flask of Jim Beam he held it in one hand.
“I have this feeling,” he said to Renee, “I’ve never been a whole person,” as he tossed the flask aside in torment at the muck and sorrow he’d found himself in he slapped his chest, “there’s nothing in here.”
Renee thought about how life had ravaged her left her jaded and cynical after all her loves ended in failure how Jimmy became her salvation how their scars and sorrows had bound them together how he took her away from her losses and disappointments drugs debt and con men she wouldn’t have allowed herself to be with otherwise how he helped rehab and rebuild her how she was at ease with him how he expected nothing from her how whatever plagued him she felt he’d gotten space over it how the chasm before them reverberated now in its full fall splendor how perfect her life was.
“Your perception,” said Renee smiling, “is not what I see you’re the most complete loyal and committed person I know.”
“We should eat something,” said Jimmy exasperated.
“When this is over, we’ll go back to the city get some fine wine,” then she looked into the distance from where they’d heard the loon, “maybe with a duck-filled ravioli,” she said stirring the freeze-dried.
“I’d rather eat beans and weenies over a campfire in these woods,” said Jimmy having collected himself.
After they ate, they talked about having left the city abandoning its culture wars and wokeness leaving behind friendships that had masqueraded as such how they wanted to be alone after what they’d been through alone together. Jimmy was in front of the high school now where the great Oak stood it towered magnificently in front of him more magnificent than could anything
manmade then on the ferry boat at Aransas Pass, he could see the dolphins as with great force an enormous tiredness enveloped him.
“We should get some sleep,” he said suddenly he wanted to live like he’d never lived to finally embrace the things he was missing was his last thought.
“You go ahead,” she said. “I’ll be along.”
It was as if he had just closed his eyes when he heard the chopper Renee had gone out to stand in the middle of a flat open space where she’d marked a landing spot with some embers and as she stood there waving a flashlight up at it, it hovered in the moonlight did a pirouette and then set down out from underneath the blades of the chopper appeared Carl Simpson his most loyal and lifelong friend they’d been rafting guides for the same company had done dozens of search and rescue missions together.
“Heard you got troubles old man,” said Carl.
“Turn that thing off let’s have a drink I know you got some.”
“Can’t,” said Carl, “got to hurry can’t even squeeze an ATV in here constructions got the roads blocked in from New Germany and Westernport, rockslides got the main route cut off downstream it’s a goddamn perfect storm they’re clearing it now Renee’ll have to wait for the ambulance need all the room we can get.”
He was glad to see Carl it was good to hear his voice as he looked at Carl then back at Renee he felt for the first time something inside something real authentic unconditional he wished he could caress her face touch her green eyes her disheveled blond hair but they placed him on a stretcher and with the venom still surging he could not make his hands work as Carl Renee and the pilot had checked his wound they conferred away from him and returned. “Lot of wind coming across Big Savage,” said Carl, “be a rough ride but got no choice it’s the shortest way.”
With the stretcher strapped to its struts the chopper lifted off the full moon was a backdrop to the highest point on the summit and it illuminated with brilliant clarity the ascending chopper Jimmy had looked out to see the reservoir mirror smooth with Crabtree Creek Middle Fork and Dry Run feeding into it he saw the view tower atop Swisher Hill and he could see where the tracks of the Western Maryland cut along Backbone Ridge then he felt the wind heard one of them say ‘emergency’ and he turned his head to look at the searchlight searching the ground he felt something tear from his chest explode in a plume of ash then scatter into a million fine particles over the crest of the mountain.
It was morning Renee had lain most of the night awake and her sleep had been restless she had thought of her parents dreamed about her father’s air balloon going to the club on Sundays to go up without a care in the world where the balloons would float up drift off become particles in the sky then drift back shiny and huge again she dreamed of her mother in the backyard garden that had become their refuge together and where they had spent so many hours tending lilacs daisies and roses the most peaceful hours of her life she thought of her eldest son lost in a freak accident who she had loved unconditionally and his paintings which had held out the promise of a bright career she stared straight ahead and for the millionth time she tried to understand about why her ex-husband had betrayed her loyalty to him and how her life had slipped away after the divorce and the death of her son until she met Jimmy then startled by the silence around her she turned to look at him the tourniquet had loosened and fallen away his blue eyes were blank and he was not breathing. “Jimmy,” she cried removing the knife from his belt that he always carried she placed the blade of it against the soft inner side of her wrist then dropped it she would try to stay strong try to keep going as the noise of the loon became a laughing crazy cackle.
By Holly Payne-Strange
Our thoughts are nude. Our words are allowed to dress up, Or dress down, depending on the mood.
Sometimes they even have daggers, Once in a very blue moon. They sometimes smell sweet Laced with vanilla kindness and a baked bread warmth.
But thoughts just strut about, Thick pubes and truthful pouts For all your soul to see.
Some don't like that so much Bare bums on full display, It is a bit off putting.
But I quite enjoy it. When you get over the shock It’s remarkable what's down there, Deep inside your mind. A lot of it is more beautiful Then you might expect.
C.G. Dominguez is a Puerto Rican physician-in-training working and writing in the American Midwest with her wife, her dog, and her black raspberry patch. Her work has or will soon appear in Mentis, The Greyhound, and elsewhere.
Benjamin Norman Pierce lives in Madison, Wisconsin. He is a professional dishwasher. He displays graphics in local coffeehouses. His selfpublished a novel, Snuck Past Death And Sleep, and an album, Al-Azif, are available online. He was an enthusiastic participant in the 2011 occupation of the Wisconsin State Capitol.
Alison Miller is a writer and sex educator whose poetry has been published in various literary magazines including Hobart Pulp, Anti-Heroin Chic, Ariel Chart, and Cultural Daily. The owner of sex positive adult boutiques in Richmond, Virginia, she currently resides in San Diego. She is the editor-inchief of Throats to the Sky literary magazine.
Razmik Kocharian writes novels, short stories and screenplays. He is based in Yerevan, Armenia, and studied playwriting at the Meyerhold Theatre Centre, Moscow.
Dan Raphael's poetry collection In the Wordshed was published by Last Word Books. More recent works appear in Cafe Review, Lothlorien, Otoliths, Mad Swirl and Impspirted. Most Wednesdays Dan writes and records a current events poem for The KBOO Evening News.
David Summerfield is a graduate of Frostburg State University, Maryland, and a veteran of the Iraq war. He has been an editor, columnist, and contributor to various publications within his home state of West Virginia. His work has appeared or is due to appear in Night Picnic Press, New Square Literary Magazine, Just Good Poems, Literary Heist Magazine, Amphora Magazine, The Journal of Expressive Writing, Door Is a Jar Literary Magazine, Carmina Magazine, The Rye Whiskey Review, and El Portal (EUNM) Literary Journal.
Holly Payne-Strange is a novelist, poet and podcaster. Her writing has been described as “genuinely captivating” by LA Weekly and “profound and sincerely engaging” by USA Today. She was also a writer for Fireside Mystery Theater, which The New York Times called “One of the top ten podcasts to bring drama into your home”. Her poetry has been published by various groups including In Parenthesis, Dipity Lit Magazine, Gnashing Teeth Publishing, and will soon be featured in Red Door, among others.
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