Aiden Kwon is a sophomore at Yongsan International School of Seoul. Aiden is a student who believes creativity is the key to life. He, therefore, shows interest in art, where he can create and draw his ideas. Creativity crosses Aiden’s eyes every second, with random yet brilliant ideas or a scene coming to his mind. Different colors and shapes for him are the key to the entrance of his creative ideas. His endless adventure of improvements and findings highlights his creativity every day.
Brendan Praniewicz earned his MFA in creative writing from San Diego State in 2007 and has subsequently taught creative writing at San Diego colleges. He has had poetry published in From Whispers to Roars, Tiny Seed Journal, That Literary Review, and The Dallas Review. In addition, he received second place in a first-chapters competition in the Seven Hills Review Chapter Competition in 2019. He won first place in The Rilla Askew Short Fiction Contest in 2020. He was a Pushcart Nominee for poetry in 2023.
Everyone knew The Muffin Man. Or thought they did.
In the solitude of pre-dawn, he was not above smoking a cigarette
while he stirred, flicking an ash or two into the batter.
And it wasn’t even Ash Wednesday. People didn’t know him,
only that Thursday was cherry chocolate, Friday was blueberry crumble.
Muffins weren’t the only thing crumbling.
For years now, The Muffin Man dreamed of a different life—
one where he braised osso buco at a seaside café.
Where he worked side by side with a soulmate wife
while the kids played underfoot, and his friends— those guys
he should have stayed tight with since high school—
came around on Saturday nights for a plate of oysters
and a bottle of pinot gris. Things hadn’t turned out the way he’d hoped.
He took another drag on the cigarette, greased the muffin tins.
“After the morning rush,” he said aloud to no one but himself,
“I’m going to post my profile on one of those dating sites— Binge,
or Yes, Chef, or maybe FreshCatch.com.” But The Muffin Man knew
he was all flour dust, no yeast.
He’d spend another afternoon in the safe embrace
of Zillow: commercial zone, large oven, ocean view.
Ann Weil
Ann Weil is the author of Lifecycle of a Beautiful Woman (Yellow Arrow Publishing, 2023) and Blue Dog Road Trip (Gnashing Teeth Publishing, October 2024). Her poetry appears or is forthcoming in Pedestal Magazine, RHINO, Chestnut Review, DMQ Review, Maudlin House, 3Elements Review, and elsewhere. Her poem, “Moon Child,” was nominated for a Pushcart Prize by Burningword Literary Journal and selected for inclusion in the 2024 Edition of Best New Poets. She earned her doctorate at the University of Michigan and lives with her husband and soul-dog in Ann Arbor, MI, and Key West, FL.
Lucinda Trew lives and writes in North Carolina with her jazz musician husband, two dogs, one cat, and far too many (or never enough?) books to count. Her work has been featured in Bloodroot Literary Magazine, Cathexis Northwest, Mockingheart Review, storySouth, Eastern Iowa Review, and other journals and anthologies. She is a two-time Pushcart Prize nominee, Best of the Net nominee, and Boulevard’s 2023 Emerging Poet Award recipient.
Featuring:
Issue 114, published April 2025, features works of poetry, flash fiction, short nonfiction, and visual art by Virginia Barrett, Julie Benesh, Alyssa Blankenship, Alex Braslavsky, Vikki C., Tetman Callis, Roger Camp, Zack Carson, John Colburn, Ben Guterson, Tresha Faye Haefner, Moriah Hampton, Sher Harvey, Penny Jackson, Carella Keil, Sam Kerbel, Amy S Lerman, Valentine Mizrahi, Christian David Loeffler, Judith Mikesch McKenzie, Jiyoo Nam, Megan Peralta, Andy Posner, Jim Ross, Beth Sherman, J.R. Solonche, Alex Stolis, Maxwell Tang, James Bradley Wells, Tracey Dean Widelitz, and Stephen Curtis Wilson.
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