THE INCIDENT
by: Joshua Michael Stewart
photography by: Chanel Dubofsky

William won’t speak to me. I tried to apologize. Handed him tickets to the monster truck rally with a note that read, Sorry for everything. He unfriended me on Facebook. Won’t answer my emails. With his repulsiveness toward me, you’d think I slept with his wife or ran over his collie with my minivan. It was nothing like that. If I knew it would cause a rift between us, I wouldn’t have stolen a pickle from the jar he keeps in the breakroom fridge. I would’ve eaten every goddamn one.

 

 

Unhurried
by: Tim Murphy
photography by author

Grieve
as the snail slides
unhurried
yet everywhere
they must reach
they find.

Grieve
as the snail glides
unbothered
by expectations of time
their pace as protective
as their shell.

 

 

Temple Painter
by: Jason Graff

My brother’s touchy about how he’s seen and wouldn’t want me to say why I’ve been forced to drop everything to be at his side. He’s embarrassed that he can’t leave his house and  hates the term breakdown. I know enough but not all the reasons. We’ve never been close. He used to spend time in the car in the garage alone. He said it was for peace and quiet, but Dad always hid the car keys.

I’ve tried convincing myself I’d passed him up with my job and house and family, as if winning an imaginary race to adulthood would cure me of a life of long-harbored jealousy. When he was younger, it looked like he was going to be a great painter. No matter what I do, that promise’s shadow darkens any path I wish travel. We’ve never talked about why. Maybe now we will.

 

 

At Last
by: Tina Mozelle Braziel

Why clover? Because it grows
            lush and green, its bed rising
from the ground. Because bees
          need its blooms to brew honey.

But why wrap your heart in it?
          Because it sprawls, roots deep.
Because my heart, timid, soft,
           thumping wildly, is all rabbit.

 

 

Swallowing
by: Julieta Fuentes Roll 
photography by: Sam Albillo

She pulls out my stomach and places it
on the counter. Let me show you what
you’ve consumed: Lilacs (blushing),
wedding band, a fence, night terrors,
too-blue houses, a shoreline. Swallow
more and you’ll swallow the world,
myself included. We are all waiting
for the days of recovery, so I might
look at my form and think—

Dinner will be an ocean, sand, weeds falling
into the sidewalk. She throws out my stomach,
swollen and pink.

 

 

–

 

Joshua Michael Stewart is the author of three poetry collections. His work has appeared in the Massachusetts Review, Salamander, New Flash Fiction Review, and elsewhere.

Tim Murphy (he/him) is a disabled poet. His writing explores chronic illness, disability justice, and the more-than-human world. Tim’s poetry appears in Louisiana Literature, Kaleidoscope, Writers Resist, and more. Instagram and Twitter (@brokenwingpoet).

Jason Graff’s novel heckler, about lives colliding at a struggling hotel, is out now. So are his short stories in places such as Willow Springs, Exacting Clam, and Door is a Jar.

Tina Mozelle Braziel won the Philip Levine Prize for Known by Salt (Anhinga Press). She and her husband James Braziel co-authored Glass Cabin (Pulley Press) about building their home by hand while living in it.

Julieta Fuentes Roll was born and raised in San Francisco. She is currently a student at the
University of California, Berkeley. She is pursuing a major in anthropology and a minor in
creative writing.