Applesauce

Her family loves apples so despite the fight she carted off in a cardboard box the tree’s fruit. My family has applesauce in its veins, was what she told me. When I saw her there were cores littering her countertops, a pan boiling on the woodstove. Did she see the metaphor? Those gnarled branches over her head. I took her coring knife, though cut fruit was a present I would not be offering, not to my relations. Beside me she sliced another tree-gift. By stovelight our wrists flashed, the lines in them crisscrossing as we worked, tangling and yet not.

From Guest Contributor Colleen Addison

The Bigger

It was just before the bout between Lefty Louie and Bonecrusher Rocco. Both fighters were in their corners. Louie's manager, Al, offered his last words of advice...

“Remember, Louie, the bigger they are...”

Bonecrusher was big all right. Huge head, bull neck, massive right hand, and a 15-0 record, all by knockouts.

“Got it, Al. The bigger they are, the harder they fall.”

Al added a few more lines of disbelief to his face.

“What'd you mean, Louie?”

“Fall, Al. The bigger they are, the harder...”

“No, Louie, hit. Remember, it's hit. The bigger they are, the harder they hit...”

From Guest Contributor David Sydney

Hands

My mother's hands frail and worked. Her crepey paper fingers and running rivers of lines pass along the hilly blue mounds of veins. Many cultures stand proud of ages proof as it displays wisdom, strength—a life lived. Honored one should be of the achievement—living.

What do they know?

I watch as these hands perform tasks, ones they always have, no longer recognizing them. They are not my mothers anymore; they are mine. The words wisdom—a life lived whisper at my ear, and I try to catch them in the wind. These hands—I want to obliterate them.

From Guest Contributor Dianne C. Braley

Dianne is a nurse freelance writer and blogger from Hamilton, Massachusetts.

Finding Deepstaria

I found her in the rust climbing over shower tiles, red-brown on sea-green. She began as spots, then shapes—a rabbit? A snail? A man, then a woman. She was a mermaid with me for five years, singing pirate songs of lost souls in fishbowls and other Pink things; then she grew out of her skin, became an unnamed creature, alive without lines, her hair like fire. Now only one wisp of her tail holds on to the faucet, for me. She floats free in the glossy turquoise beyond, laughing above the rusty piles of what she used to be.

From Guest Contributor Brook Bhagat

Brook Bhagat’s poetry, fiction, non-fiction, and humor have appeared in Monkeybicycle, Empty Mirror Magazine, Harbinger Asylum, Little India, Rat’s Ass Review, Anthem: A Tribute to Leonard Cohen, and other journals and anthologies. She and her husband Gaurav created Blue Planet Journal, which she edits and writes for. She holds an MFA from Lindenwood University, is an assistant professor of English at a community college, and is writing a novel. Her poetry collection, Only Flying, is due out Nov. 16, 2021 from Unsolicited Press. See more at brook-bhagat.com.

Exquisite

The naked model sits, head bent, arms and hands relaxing. Her beauty is undeniable with pure white skin and long toned legs.

The room is quiet. Everyone is concentrating on brushstrokes and creating a perfect painting, while my quick brush movements against the canvas are remarkable. The background is colorful and the lines of her body immaculate.

“Well done, Nicholas,” says the instructor and pats my shoulder.

Eyes are on me and coldness fills the room.

Ignoring the glares, I concentrate on the finishing touches.

Before me is an exquisite, brilliant image.

My love. The lady who stole my heart.

From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher

Hurt

“We’re joined today by the great Cuban émigré slugger Robinson Falco Villegas, Jr.”

“Hola.”

“Robby, rather than talk about your recent injury, why don’t you tell us why you and your father were named after Jackie Robinson?”

“I wasn’t named after him. I was named after the great irascible poet, Robinson Jeffers. I learned English so I could read his poems.”

“I didn’t know that. Can you quote your favorite lines?”

“I’d prefer to paraphrase.”

“If it makes you more comfortable, go right ahead.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, go for it.”

“Were it not for penalties, you’d be dead now.”

From Guest Contributor Clyde Liffey

Chivalry

“How many years do you think we’ve known each other?” Zoey asked.

“I dunno, at least since pre-school. We’re both thirty now,” I replied. We walked the cobbled roads of Newburyport. The clouds looked like lines of poetry.

“You go first this time,” Zoey said.

“I like holding the door for you though.”

“Damn it, Tyreke. Why do you always hold the door, and hold the umbrella, and make me coffee? Women can do things you know.”

“I know that.”

“Do you feel you have to protect me, or be a man, or–––“

“I do them because I love you.”

From Guest Contributor Steve Colori

Delia

She waits at the bar every night, alone in the corner. Her eyes smudged with fine lines and tear stains from years gone by. Lipstick is applied to chaffed lips and she brushes harsh, greying hairs. Her wrinkled hands fiddle aimlessly with yet another glass of the only fluid that offers relief. Her clothes are worn, unchanged throughout the fashions of the last two decades. Every night she drinks in the corner. Every night she drags herself home, a cigarette slouching from her drying mouth. She remembers little else.

With heavy heart she waits for him. He promised to return.

From Guest Contributor Kerry Kelly

The Holiday Season

It’s my favorite time of year, holiday season on the coast. The weather is nice, the days are long, and everyone is happy. The tourists are everywhere. Children, grandchildren, dogs; they’re all waiting in lines at the jewelry shops, the coffee shops, and the gift shops. Especially standing in lines at the ice cream shop where I work every day. Flashing their cash around once and a while, but mostly credit cards. So carefree and careless. And so clueless. They’re all ripe for the picking. Skimming credit card information is how I can live comfortably the rest of the year.

From Guest Contributor NT Franklin