Our Private Summit

I listened to Camilla talking about global warming, the ocean plastic crisis and the deforestation of the Amazon rainforest. Words crowded behind her lips: I silenced them with a kiss. We stayed ten eternal seconds in that first intimate contact.

“I didn't see it coming,” she told me, when she recovered.

“I don't believe you.”

“I knew it could happen, but not so soon. I thought you were harmless.”

“The same they say about climate change.”

We spent all afternoon enjoying our private summit, evaluating the measures to be taken in the future. We started to negotiate ecological caress credits.

From Guest Contributor Marcelo Medone

Marcelo (1961, Buenos Aires, Argentina) is a fiction writer, poet, essayist and screenwriter. His works have received numerous awards and have been published in magazines and books, individually or in anthologies, in multiple languages in more than 40 countries all over the world, including the US.

He has been nominated for the 2021 Pushcart Prize.

Facebook: Marcelo Medone / Instagram: @marcelomedone

The Art Of Doing Nothing

NATURE SUBMISSION:

There are twelve rules of enlightenment. They cover elements of Buddhist philosophy such as proper meditation, simplicity, and a constant reflection on necessity.

It's this last part that bothers Alicia most. The more she reflects on what's truly necessary, the more she realizes that her life has lost all sense of meaning. It's enough to make her want to go live in the woods someplace like a hermit and just contemplate nature every day.

Nature wants nothing to do with Alicia's existential crisis. It doesn't care that it's meaningless. It just wants to start recomposting her as soon as possible.

From Guest Contributor Laura Stacks

Crisis Averted, Please Carry On

The service officers of the Shuminelectra Corporation were taught an abundance of protocols designed to prevent a crisis. They practiced the politest forms of speech, ran through dozens of foreseeable threats to public order, and were authorized to neutralize all potential disruptions. Shuminelectra Corp. provided the most efficient quality control platform in the entire new territories.

So it was that long after the planet had been abandoned, a group of officers were still operating at full efficiency. They truly were a marvel of engineering. Their decision to banish humanity had ensured that service would run smoothly for centuries to come.

The Mist

One morning, Mayor Baffels woke up to find a dark mist had descended upon the city.

His first thought was on how the mist would play in the upcoming election. People would look for him to have the answers. Was it caused by pollution? Had there been an explosion? Were their lives in danger?

Baffels would use the opportunity to bolster his leadership credentials during a crisis. He expected it would ensure his reelection.

In the end, he did win, but the hellfire and destruction that were unleashed by his deal with devil made his victory rather pyrrhic in nature.