Ruthless

Dr. Sheila Fabiana, PHD., surveyed the water with her binoculars, looking for signs of predation. Sharks patrolled these waters. Her current task was to record their feeding behavior and keep track of various data related to hunter and prey.

She did not have to wait long.

People think of sharks as ruthless killers, incapable of pity or empathy. Dr. Fabiana believed this was an unfair characterization. People are generally able to feel pity for the unfortunate and empathize with others, including both humans and animals.

Sharks are literally incapable of pity or empathy. Ruthless by definition, but are they really?

The March Waters

The stillness of the air weighed heavily on the landscape. The lake, melted during the false summer, was paved over again.

Every kid in the neighborhood was under strict orders to stay off the ice. After the first melt happens, you can't trust its solidity.

The best part about even the mildest of late winter storms is that school shuts down but parents still have to work. By 10AM all the boys, and a few of the girls, had started an epic hockey game.

That night, they all bristled at the injustice of their punishment. After all, they'd been right.

In Pursuit Of Tomorrow

A young boy shaped sand sculptures. His parents combed the beach with a metal detector. When clouds rolled in, mother rose, balancing on the only leg spared in a shark attack.

Over driftwood, shells and rocks they trampled to reach the trail that would lead them to a road.

Father turned for one last glance of the abandoned tanker anchored by the coast. He had heard of buried treasures from at least a dozen ships in those turbulent waters.

As he imagined newly acquired wealth for his family, the sea tossed out a bottle. Nestled inside was a folded note.

From Guest Contributor Krystyna Fedosejevs

Krystyna writes poetry, fiction and creative nonfiction. She resides in Alberta, Canada.

Sailing To America

There was something about the endless sky, gray and somber, and the ship’s surging through the dark swirling waters of the Atlantic, that prompted Macbeth to worry about the past. The witches. The blood. The trouble that followed. Was there a route to forgiveness? People went down on their knees, didn’t they? Could he hire someone to do it for him? He was still royalty, wasn’t he? But the breeze was so soothing, the trouble, so remote. Surely Scotland was a memory best forgotten. Besides, in the distance, he could almost see, shining like a pardon, the Statue of Liberty.

From Guest Contributor Linda Lowe

Linda Lowe's stories and poems have appeared in Gone Lawn, Tiny Molecules, Eunoia Review, Misfit Magazine, Six Sentences, and others.

Dangerous Waters

After smoking cigarettes with a few other men in the lounge, I walk onto the deck for some ocean air, and watch the water splash against the Lusitania. I rest my arms against the railing and look out at the great ocean. After taking a deep breath, I notice a ship in the near distance. Other passengers are pointing, and no one seems panicked, but I know. Below I hear a rumble and see something approaching at great speed. A torpedo.

I jump, and when I hit the water, a mental image of my family without me, aches my heart.

From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher

Parting Sails

The seas clash between her and the shore. Yer crew lined up on the edge of the beach. Her sails are riddled with holes from cannon fire. Her hull crushed and impaled by other vessels that have crashed beside her. Quite a miracle she can float even now. As yer crew take their final glances, ye walk until the water reaches yer knees as ye recall her the most. Through storms, valleys, and currents. With a staff of flame on yer right hand, ye set her ablaze in a last gaze of glory. She rests in the sea’s foamy waters.

From Guest Contributor Nahum Zewdie

Nahum is a student of general studies in Pikes Peak Community College.

The Swans On The Seine

“O ugly ducklings grown into beauty, are ye homesick too?”

Thus I, standing in the shadows of the House of Quasimodo, watching you glide upon these placid waters, O snow-winged sisters of my soul!

“Swans fly south for the winter” You, of whom I first read in the sun-baked plains of my homeland, a world soaked in the scents of masala and mangoes – in this city of eternal Autumn, you have made yourselves a second Spring.

You know not my home, O Daughters of Winter. I know not yours. Yet here the twain shall meet, Once Upon a September.

From Guest Contributor Hibah Shabkhez

Hibah is a writer of the half-yo literary tradition, an erratic language-learning enthusiast, a teacher of French as a foreign language and a happily eccentric blogger from Lahore, Pakistan. Studying life, languages and literature from a comparative perspective across linguistic and cultural boundaries holds a particular fascination for her.

Lure Of The Surf

Chatter heightened in a resort restaurant.

“She’s a striking beauty,” someone blurted. “Out surfing every day,”another added. “Can’t miss.”

Ken placed lunch servings before the patrons, imagining running intosomeone like that.

When work ended, he headed for the beach. Between relationships,feeling low, he sought peace by the sea. Surfers dotted distantsparkling waters. Their faces couldn’t be distinguished.

Next day, Ken served the same group of diners who had talked sopassionately about the mystery woman.

“She’s walking ashore holding a surfboard,” someone shouted.

Everyone, including Ken, turned to look out the window.

It was his sister.

From Guest Contributor Krystyna Fedosejevs

Krystyna writes poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction.