Reconsider the Misunderstanding of What We See

This earth covered in a forest
of yawn. Mean wind

of a peculiar howl, alto,
rushing. The horizon

spangled with fish leaping
against the brittle curve

of earth. This earth covered,
as said, in a forest

of mirrors shaved thin
by the gaze of water.

So many heads crowned
with curvy punctuation.

Gabriel Welsch is the author of a collection of short stories, Groundscratchers, and four collections of poems: The Four Horsepersons of a Disappointing Apocalypse, The Death of Flying Things, An Eye Fluent in Gray, and Dirt and All Its Dense Labor. His work has appeared widely, in journals including Ploughshares, Southern Review, THRUSH, Harvard Review, Moon City Review, Lake Effect, Missouri Review, as well as on Verse Daily and in Ted Kooser’s column “American Life in Poetry.” Welsch lives in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, with his family, and works at Duquesne University.

Diagnosis

The gums of the sky bled. I
fainted. I woke up to a TV
blaring in a midwestern hospital: Kurt
Cobain, my favorite
musician, killed himself.
My parents were back east, suffering
the aftershocks of their divorce,
which made them too busy, tired, and
unavailable to hold my hand or offer any
words of comfort before or after
a tall, affable doctor with a marvelous
southern drawl stuck a metal, snake-like
camera inside me and discovered ulcers
on my small intestines. They would stay
with me for the rest of my life. I gasped.
Not to worry, the doctor said. You can
still live a mostly normal life.
Kurt was gone. My friends
were there, turning off the TV
and telling me jokes. I laughed.
Sunlight dripped into my veins.

Joey Nicoletti’s latest books are Extinction Wednesday: A Memoir (Bordighera, 2024) and Breakaway (Broadstone Books, 2023). He teaches writing at SUNY Buffalo State University.

Swimming at Villa Copenhagen

From the pool I see
sunny blue with only
a few wispy white clouds.

Last night, my tired husband
called the amusement park
“the Frivoli Gardens.”

From its flying swings,
some screaming rings out—
the song of the frivoli.

Alongside my laps,
the businesslike windows
have gone all Magritte blue,

as if the wall were only a shell
holding back the sea
forever and ever,

as if there were another,
world where I would never
have to get out of the pool—

or maybe a world where climate change
only meant the turn of the seasons
and kids could once again ice skate and build snow forts.

I even dream of a Frivoli world
where everyone could swim in this pool
and fly on those swings.

Lorna Wood lives in Auburn, Alabama. Her flash fiction has appeared in Every Day Fiction, Wild Violet, and Every Writer, among others. Her poetry has appeared in her collection, The Great Garbage Patch (Alien Buddha Press), and in many magazines on five continents.

How To Dance

When the world starts to end
All I really want is a dance
I’d never confess I’ve had trouble finding my footing but you can tell
When you put on Harvest Moon for a change
“Don’t forget your left foot” you’re saying “Don’t forget your left foot”
I’m still walking backwards, my right hand on your chest
Pull me in tight, harmonica solo
You look so tired of my shit
But still, you kiss my wrist
This kind of apocalypse is nothing like we’ve seen before
Rising salty waters and dangerous forest fires
That’s all right, that’s okay
One foot in front of the other now

Meghan Rainey is an award-winning photojournalist, mass-transit advocate, retired prom queen, and all-around delight. She graduated with a degree in journalism from Shippensburg University in 2020. She is published by Hog River Press and Moss Puppy Magazine in 2024 and is represented by literary agent Laura Bradford. You can find her on Twitter (X), Instagram and Threads (@rhursday on all platforms) or at www.meghanrainey.com. 

On the Platform

It started with his walking her home from church.

Obviously, it didn’t start there, there must have been something before. Physical at that point: he liked her soft grey eyes and slightly breathy voice. He offered to walk her back, and she acquiesced. When they got near to her house she said stop here and he asked her why. I’m just around the corner, she said, and scuttled off.

Things went on like that. People see us leaving church, he said. She shrugged. They took to spending a few minutes on a park bench on the way to chat. Both signed up for a Bible-study weekend away in a converted country house. She wouldn’t sit with him on the coach but once they got there, came to find him at dinner. They joked about it being like an Agatha Christie. After the prayer meeting she said she was tired but he urged her to come out onto the terrace. There was a little summer-house just visible across the lawn in the gloom. It smelt of cigarettes inside, the cooks probably used it, but they opened the doors wide to let the breeze through. They went there the next night too, found some blankets and settled on the broken sofa. She told him about the man her parents expected her to marry; older, a family friend. Do you love him? I suppose so, she answered. Yes, of course. They laced their fingers together and he stroked her arm. How does he make you feel? She sighed and nestled into his shoulder. I don’t know.

She got four As and a place at a top university; he got a college place in a nearby town, and they wrote. He had a thing going with the college’s star athlete, in secret. It was furtive, late-night, one-way: a quiet rap on his door and the guy would come in. He wasn’t allowed to make any move himself but there was a lot of pleasure in it, he let it happen. When she had a study week he went to see her. He wrote saying what time his train would come in and she was there on the platform, stood on tip-toe to kiss him, took him to her room; to both of their surprise they went to bed. Afterwards they couldn’t speak, just lay face to face with their arms round each other. The next day she showed him a letter from her fiancé, all about the house he was buying. Look, she said, he’s asked me what kind of car I’d like. What’s that, he replied. A Mini Mayfair, she said, decidedly. I just think they’re lovely.

Now he opens his eyes, checks the time again, and his texts. In four minutes he will meet a grown-up, and newly-orphaned, daughter. They have swapped messages for weeks; she was surprised to learn that he had a husband, but not put off. He is thinking about the colour of her eyes.

Geoff Sawers (he, him) is the author of several books including a collection of linked short stories, Friends of Friends (Diehard, 2024). He is a full-time parent and lives in Reading, UK.

Jason Ryberg is the author of eighteen books of poetry, six screenplays, a few short stories, a box full of folders, notebooks and scraps of paper that could one day be (loosely) construed as a novel, and countless love letters, never sent. He is currently an artist-in- residence at both The Prospero Institute of Disquieted P/o/e/t/i/c/s and the Osage Arts Community, and is an editor and designer at Spartan Books. His latest collection of poems is Fence Post Blues (River Dog Press, 2023). He lives part-time in Kansas City, MO with a rooster named Little Red and a Billy-goat named Giuseppe, and part-time somewhere in the Ozarks, near the Gasconade River, where there are also many strange and wonderful woodland critters.