January 2014 | back-issues, fiction
Lucy strolled into my life twenty years ago. Short and heavyset, trailing a couple of unruly dogs, she welcomed me to the neighbourhood. Most mornings Lucy wound her way through the community with her dogs in tow, and their leisurely pace always invited the opportunity to chat.
On warm evenings Lucy walked with her husband Leo, a tall thin navy veteran. It made people smile to see the elderly couple hand in hand. When Lucy stopped to admire gardens and dispense dubious dog training advice, Leo waited patiently, content to let his wife weave her hospitality through the neighbourhood.
An ambulance came for Leo one bright afternoon and for a few months Lucy’s walks took a different path. Neighbours respected the urgency in her step as she hurried back and forth on her way to the hospital. No time for chats and even the dogs curtailed their usual exuberance.
One morning, a thinner and frailer Lucy stopped to admire my fall asters. Leo was gone, but Lucy was back. I joined her as she retraced a familiar path through the community and gathered condolences like a grand bouquet of sunflowers. Lucy’s daily walks continued until the day she got confused – inexplicably lost on her own street – and well-meaning family intervened. Recently, a young couple bought Lucy’s old house.
I often stroll by at a leisurely pace that invites the opportunity to chat.
by Hermine Robinson
Hermine loves writing short fiction in many genres and her publication credits include Readers’ Digest, Postcard Shorts and Vine Leaves Literary Journal. She lives with her husband and children in Calgary, Alberta where the winters are long and the inspiration is plentiful. Her nickname Minkee was chosen at the age of five and it is still the name she answers to when it is shouted across a crowded room.
January 2014 | back-issues, poetry
cœur de pirate
do not fall for a boy with a pirate heart, even if he will
cross five thousand miles of sand and ocean to be with you,
carrying nothing more than loneliness and longing in his cargo hold.
those things will bond you both together like an oath, but
blood is thicker than water and soon, the promises will weigh you down
like rocks in your pocket, keeping your lungs and heart empty.
he will not stay, something will always call him away in the morning,
even after you’ve spent the night wrapped in his strong arms,
counting the stars from the undersides of the highest sail.
you will listen to his stories, for they will stretch beyond the decks
of his ship and make you feel both empty and full at once,
but you cannot rely on a tattooed smile to forge you a key to the world.
eventually, he will leave you on stranger shores, soaking and breathless,
wondering when the next tide will bring him close to you again.
but you are not a wench he found bar-side, never call yourself that.
you must be unpredictable and wild as the sea itself, bottling storms
into your heartbeat and braiding a barrier reef into your hair.
you are calypso, dangerous and beautiful and unyielding,
and if he comes back ten years from now to set foot on the shore,
you will not be waiting. you cannot always be waiting.
he might tell you he loves you. but even then, he is only speaking
about the seventy percent he is familiar with, the part that is pulled into
rises and falls by the moon, a dna sequence patterned by the earth itself.
do not answer him. steal his ship by sunrise instead and plan to follow
the treasure map that you’ve long since forgotten. never come back.
leave him with a seashell at his side and he will remember at last
that the reason he loved the ocean was because it sounded like you.
by krista kurisaki
dancing on fault lines
i am not the girl your mother warned you about.
you know, the one with the pierced lip and a glare
that could start a fire during the monsoon season.
the girl whose arms are inky wings entwined with
weeds and paper chain reminders of past loves.
the girl whose name tastes like smoke on your lips
and whose report cards are littered with the one
letter that begins her most favorite swear word.
i am not the girl your mother warned you about.
the only relics that i carry on my body are scars
from playgrounds that kissed me back too hard.
my lungs consist of both words and silences,
neither of which i have found a way to control.
i am a few inches short of dangerous and about
nineteen years wiser than a pack of cigarettes.
your mother warned you about the girls who
are hurricanes, that will see your body as a stone
they can toss across the oceans without a second
glance. hearts going seventy miles an hour have
no time for regret. but there is always a sign
or a season that brings them; each one you meet
will be mapped out on a list of broken promises;
hazel, audrey, katrina. they won’t let you forget.
but i am not a hurricane; i am a california earthquake
with a 7.8 on the richter scale of volatile personalities.
i will come without warning and dissolve the earth
into dust under your feet. there will be nowhere for
you to hide; your body will unravel into war with itself,
and your mother, wide-eyed, will wonder why you
let me in. but i know better. she taught you to train
your eyes to the sky when not even a seismograph
could pick out a heartbeat buried 1800 miles deep.
by krista kurisaki
Krista Kurisaki is a nineteen-year-old California native, currently falling in love with the world and wishing she could see more of it. she spends her days singing Beatles songs and facing reality, but keeps a pen close to her bed by night. find her across the universe at http://flythevinyl.tumblr.com
January 2014 | back-issues, poetry
At the end of the beach
where rocks are impassible
and sea unswimmable.
I am the passively standing stone
points extended into the waves.
Weathered in daily battle
knowing stoically the war is lost with time.
The ocean is immortal
but sand is boulders defeated.
The water swirls and shakes me.
At the end of the beach
with dead pelicans pealed open.
Crows and seagulls gleeful
dripping citrusy flesh fruit.
by Josh Bliek
Joshua Bliek is a literature student in his local community college. Although previously unpublished, Joshua is optimistic about his future as a poet and a critic and works daily towards developing his own unique voice.
January 2014 | back-issues, poetry
I don’t sleep anymore.
And when I’m on the train
I look up the tall woman’s
skirt and find an outlet
I don’t have the correct
connection to plug into.
Man stares at something
long enough to kill it;
he hunts for things not his
own, and, underserving,
greedy for their teeth—
their particular song, a luster—
spoils just about everything
along his way. And the car
goes dark, jingles a little bit
before it goes silent, before
the recorded announcer
announces to be careful,
that it might begin to rain.
by Britt Melewski
Girl #275
I will run my car
For eleven years straight
Into a concrete abutment
To keep you inside me
For another minute I will
I will do anything
You ask me so please
Ask me what colors make up
My love ask me
Which is my favorite flavor
Of whip my obsession
Is ketchup please
Not you you are different
when you call me
Baby I melt into a paste
That you can spread
I am somebody not only
Some body but the one
You swallowed skinned
Strawberry the one
Who held your fist
And cracked your knuckles
While I kissed you
I did I kissed
You your shoulder
With its wealth of muscle
And salt I replay it
Now I replay it to
Your song replay
Repose our mouths
Our bodies coming
Together bones flesh
Secrets creaking in song
by Britt Melewski
Inmate #386426
When they first brought you to jail,
you were bound to the black chair on wheels
with its sheen straps—the squeak it makes
while it glides across the bleached linoleum
at intake.
When they tied the mask clasps
around your neck, they bore witness
to your chalky breath—the knot wound
tightly across your pulse.
But in your torn Nirvana
T-shirt, and beekeeper eyes, you shrugged
and allowed them each their job.
by Britt Melewski
January 2014 | back-issues, poetry
Two censuses back
Our home held three:
An infant was added
To you and me.
A census ago
We counted more:
Persons in household
Numbered four.
This latest census
Our data was new:
Three residents remained,
But where were you?
by Barth Landor
Barth Landor has had poems in Clapboard Journal, Spectrum, Inscape and Grey Sparrow Journal (named the Best New Literary Journal of 2011-2012). His poem ‘Tree’ was a finalist for the Montreal International Poetry Prize in 2011, and the online journal Lowestoft Chronicle published two poems in 2012, including ‘Grotte de Niaux’, nominated by them for a Pushcart Prize.
