Bruno Lloret
Translated by Ellen Jones
“As I finish writing this, without knowing that I’m writing it, my mum gives me a gold crab on a chain.”
Issue 30
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Nova
Veronica Wasson
“As a young man, Veronica allowed her beard to grow wild and bushy like Almighty Zeus, like a mountain man, like a drifter. With her torn jeans and scavenged T-shirts, she looked disreputable and women avoided her, but certain men were drawn to her.”
happy
William Aarnes
“Having to talk doesn’t make her happy.
She feels put on the spot, doesn’t like
the pitch of her voice, can’t ignore the way
her left hand waves about unless she focuses”
i really love the little things that go unnoticed
Philip Jason
“The first thing I want you to know is that I love
the circle you drew in the sand
with your finger. It has one
too many corners, but it is a thing of you”
Crying Spirit
Kasimma
“Just look at you! Yes, you. Don’t even incur a slap by looking around as if you’re confused. Your senses are very much intact. Look at you, sitting on Dollar Tree’s cold ground, beside the opened fridge, breathing frosty air. The smallest bowl of ice cream sits like a lover beside you.”
Diwata, Where She Walked
Wilfrido Nolledo
“Supper the little children, an expatriate poet was to write of the population in Metropolitan Manila, 1990. And she who had just lost hers that windy November morning drifted aimlessly through the memorial grounds where she’d been cannibalizing tombstones of their expensive garlands.”
Fake Moon
Amy DeBellis
“August in Alabama: air thick with mosquitoes, crickets chirping hoarse and ragged, fireflies blinking on and off like stars gone wrong.”
Zeppole (aka Awama)
Khalil AbuSharekh
“When it arrived, it looked familiar—like the Palestinian dessert known as “awama” (donut balls), but this time topped with chocolate syrup. I took a bite. Immediately the taste transported me far, far away in time and place. I remembered I hadn’t tasted this flavor for over fifteen years.”
Excerpt from Imagine Breaking Everything
Lina Munar Guevara
Translated by Ellen Jones
“The worst thing about this story, the thing we need to remember, is that I had the money, the money to replace the printer. At some point in my life I had it, and I turned it into a tattoo, some earrings, and an avocado-shaped coin purse. You absolute mug—who the fuck even uses a coin purse?”
College
Jeffrey Kingman
“On Mt. Kilimanjaro
we sat, our first date.
The cat took a bath.
We licked each other’s”
Five Shots of Gay Sam, 2009-10
Daniel David Froid
“The man’s identity, of course, is the whole point. But this video does not yield much. From sartorial details alone, it seems difficult to extract any further information about his life, his secret doings, or his proclivities—to derive any signs.”
Two Tales
Alvin Lu
“For there was no doubt I was being watched. The walk back to school collapsed into all that was to follow: the moment I turned on the evening news and saw ‘Uncle S—,’ my son pointing at the screen; the terrifying movie in my head of the police closing in on A—’s apartment, knocking down the front door with guns pulled…”
The Wall
Ricardo Piglia
Translated by Erik Noonan
“This fear does me in now more than anything. Before, at times, I would sometimes remember the curve and dark bulk of the freight coming toward me, I’d remember the crash and I’d wake up in a sweat then force myself to think about what I’d seen during the day, I’d remember each thing, one by one, and it was like seeing them in that very moment until suddenly, without realizing, I’d fall asleep.”
The Desert Inn
Betsy Martin
“the walls
are heat
and bird calls”
Skinny Dipping
Bailey Sims
“You know you’re really pretty.” She pinched a half-inch of fat on my side, her fingers cold and leather-soft like a doctor’s. “It’s just that college is different. Especially in California. I want you to be your best.”
Eight Quebecois Surnames
Francisco García González
Translated by Bradley J. Nelson
“The ship is the San José. The language is French. The flag that waves on the mast is the insignia of Quebec. The story takes place in the future. Proximate. So close that it seems as if it has already happened.”
In the Heart of Love
Cover heart by Nicole F. Kimball