ISSUE 4 // PROSE

visual art by Ege Al'Bege, Candice James, Richard Vyse, and  Nigel Ford.

Rachel Fiske Reynolds // Partite

hybrid

"For the last few thousand years of white European tradition, childbirth is the rare gem by which women suddenly reign, if only for some moments. As we rip open, our muscles ripple. For once, no one can stop us."

Charity Goodrow // Dive Bar

fiction

"Let her hear you on the other side of Kevin’s door.  She’s trapped now.  You’re the fox and she’s the white rabbit. You pull out all of your tricks.  Those yoga classes really paid off.  You fuck so long, he forgets she’s still there."

Alyson Miller // Possessed

hybrid

"We tell stories of possession and cuckoos; discover the Sumerian ashipu, those sorcerers trained in luring out the sickness demons."

X-tian Whitfeld // X-tian Whitfeld

nonfiction

"a critique of statistics regarding the hours an average human being will spend kissing another human being over the course of a lifetime, and just how we might wish to define, redefine, or refrain from defining that, etc."

Greta Wilensky // Mama

fiction

"I look at Mama and this prison she has built. At the streaks of dried brown water on the kitchen floor. The dead wasps on the windowsill. At my hands and their cracked pink skin and wonder if I will ever really get away from here."

Nika Cavat // "Perishables"

nonfiction

 "I’ve decided not to return to the lives at either end of this trip, I will remain in the strawberry fields, become a migrant worker, wear a green bandana and then a straw hat on my head and spend my days prying the soft, sweet berries from their stems. They cannot be picked by automation. They are too delicate"

Allison Whittenberg // Why Didn’t You Call Me September 11th?

fiction

"Intercourse once every other week was all right.  Clothed intercourse with the lights off lasting only minutes in the standard position.  Both were partial to quick kisses.  Neither liked the tongue."  

Dorothy Erickson // Under the Surface

fiction

"Trees furred the landscape, and the tan earth was scarred in places – little crooked lines that etched the surface, sometimes marking where hand-held tools had cut clear through.   And the water, and the water pooled over ancient shifts and travesties – nothing to be afraid of, just a way of saying this happened, this happened."    

Richa Pokhrel // Mother Tongue

fiction 

"We laughed and laughed as if the air had been doused in laughing gas, tears streaming down my face and my stomach hurting, but I couldn’t stop myself.  As we laughed the hour away, we were startled by heavy rains. Dense, dark clouds seemed to appear out of nowhere, letting loose a torrent of rain." 

Stacey Balkun // FIRST MANIFESTO OF SURREALISM 1924[016]

hybrid

"But it is true we would never dare venture so far, it is not merely a question of distance. Menace accumulates, one yields, one abandons a part of the terrain to be conquered. That same imagination that knows no limits, is never permitted to be exercised except according to arbitrary laws of utility"

Kate Maruyama // Supercuts

fiction

"I reached down and grabbed the little foot. Or hand. Or whatever was reaching out. I laughed. I don't know if it was the cash or other people's drama, but it felt good to just sit and listen to the rain."

Patrick Thomas Henry // The Survivors

fiction

"Barry’s fingers explored the shadows for Caroline’s wrist, but she shrugged away his touch. She seemed intent on examining the balcony’s railing, on incubating the distance between them."

Jack Buck // "It's As If We Had Never Left"

hybrid

"This time I won’t not say anything, this time I’ll say let’s get up, let’s get after it, it’s something we can make together. We can paint those walls together, a color we both like, and it will be like we never left."