I Overhear My Grandmother In A Dream

I knew about the tarpaper roof torn in the shape of the mountains she had just left, the shape of her youth spent in birthing a dozen children. I did not know she sang only to the sons, who arrived looking like wrinkled old men. When I asked her why she wouldn’t sing to her daughters, I already knew the answer: the girls would just leave her for strangers.

I saved my voice for prayer. The light flinched under the lie, but it was only my shadow. That light came from some distance, she said. You really shouldn’t impede it.

From Guest Contributor Cheryl Snell

Cheryl is a classically trained pianist who writes by ear. Author of several collections of poetry, she has also written a series of novels called Bombay Trilogy; and been published in hundreds of literary journals and anthologies, including a Best of the Net. Look her up on Facebook.

Mud Flats

She watched the never-ending rotting seaweed wash up onto the mud flats. No one really came down to this area because of the smell, but the stench would cover the odor of a decomposing body for days. She had to return to the scene of the crime, she couldn’t help it. She had to see for the sake of her daughters.

One finger was sticking out of the muddy flats next to shore. It was harder getting the body to the flats than killing him. Her hurt was over, and he would never lay a hand on another woman again.

From Guest Contributor N.T. Franklin

NT Franklin has been published in Page and Spine, Fiction on the Web, 101 Words, Friday Flash Fiction, CafeLit, Madswirl, Postcard Shorts, 404 Words, Scarlet Leaf Review, Freedom Fiction, Burrst, Entropy, Alsina Publishing, Fifty-word stories, Dime Show Review, among others.

Free

"Oooh, look!" Miriam slowed for a u-turn. They had been driving the county routes and dead ends. The third sofa. "Free" written on cardboard. A recliner.

Her daughters tumbled out. Mitzi leaped from the hatchback. The girls bounced. One bounced on the recliner.

"Here Mitzi!" Mitzi jumped.

"Over here!" One daughter bounced on the sofa. Cushion to cushion. Mitzi twirled.

Miriam pointed to the recliner. "This one?" One daughter squealed. "That one?" nodding to the sofa. The other squealed.

Mitzi spun.

Miriam placed two cushions into the far back. Mitzi jumped. The girls slid. Miriam drove.

"That's enough for today."

From Guest Contributor Rick Henry

Hungry Hannah

"HUNGRY HANNAH EATS REAL FOOD!" I thought all robotic dolls were creepy, but my twin daughters loved that commercial.

And they loved Hannah.

At least until tonight. Tonight I find the babysitter's back gnawed down to her spine. Karen lays legless, dead mid-scream, a broken doll herself. Samantha's face is chewed to tattered strips of scarlet skin -- wet ribbons staining hectic red hieroglyphs across the carpet. Her eyes and scalp are gone.

I find Hannah looking up at me. Her painted eyes are flat black coins. Her plastic teeth, still moving, are soaked in violent crimson.

"Feed me," she bleats.

From Guest Contributor Eric Robert Nolan

Arborists Cultivate Trees That Look Like Cell Towers

They are pollinated by wind, insects, and calls from former porn stars to their fathers. They disperse packets of data via winged and plumed seeds. They host mosses, mistletoe, birds, and full-duplex digital transceivers. Ultra High Frequency bands of bark, cork, geolocation, quinine, tannin, code division, salicin, syrup, microwaves, and tearful confessions. Across their collinear arrays of dipoles, clustered characters of fury, lust, and suicide notes are passed among their branches. And, late at night, handed over from tree to tree, lined along the Interstate, in streams of ones and zeros, the fathers forgive their daughters and invite them home.

Dale Wisely co-edits Right Hand Pointing, One Sentence Poems, Unlost Journal, and Unbroken Journal. www.dalewisely.com/literary

Salt Of The Earth

Ian sits supping his pint, jotting down some verses in his notebook, his Sylvia Plath’s Collected Poems at his side.

A mother and two twenty-something daughters take the next table. The menfolk, the husband and the boyfriends, arrive with the drinks.

They notice him briefly and he senses the usual smirks and rolling eyes.

But he’s soon forgotten as they immerse themselves in their hearty little world.

The men have large practical hands. Eavesdropping, Ian learns that the daughters are in sales and retail, respectively.

‘Salt of the earth’ he thinks sardonically, thanking God for poets and tortured souls everywhere.

From Guest Contributor Ian Fletcher

A Special Bond

I’m sitting on the couch with Lucy on my lap and Breanna running laps around the living room. My Shih-Tzus, my furry friends.

Lucy is older than Breanna, but smaller. She stands her ground when Breanna gets out of line with a fierce growl. Breanna plays with every toy, while Lucy enjoys curling up on my lap or turning over for a stomach rub.

Breanna is in constant motion. When her batteries finally run out, she plops down, wags her golden tail and Lucy watches on with her big brown eyes.

I love them. My furry friends, my furry daughters.

From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher