A Hard Blessing

When the Iron Giant fell from the sky thousands of us died. Thousands of us crushed, frail flesh smeared; muscle, brain and bone pulped. Phosphorus flares turned us to char. We starved and burned and died.

Toppling down from heaven, a hard blessing; we stood in its shadow and begged it to stop. But no ears heard us; they were shut tight to our prayers.

The Giant gouged the earth sending dust into the air choking us. We starved, we fought, we fed on one and other, and we survived. And the Iron Giant lies waiting for us to come.

From Guest Contributor David Rae

Match Light

The flame exploded into being as the match head dragged across the sandpaper. It might have seemed magical, but really it was just that the glass-on-glass friction generated enough heat to kindle the match's phosphorus.

The match provided the only light in the entire house, perhaps the entire city. Between the impenetrable clouds and the power outage, darkness had descended as quickly as the sun.

The illumination lasted long enough for Theresa to count the remaining matches. Seventeen. Each one guaranteed to ignite but she knew such guarantees were hollow.

Seventeen matches to survive until the end of the world.