Issue

Issue 83

July 2017 · 25 pieces

Print edition on MagCloud ↗

Richard King Perkins II

July 2017 | poetry

Featured Author · Issue 83Natal MotionsYou blame me for rumors

Marco and Nothing

July 2017 | fiction

Fiction · Issue 83Marco looked at the empty space that his sculpture was going to occupy. What the hell did he have to say that would be worth occupying this space with? His collection of found objects that were going to be used for the assemblage lay in boxes and sat in bags all around him. He had metal and wood and plastics of all sorts. No paper. He had given up on paper and on vocabulary because words had only ever gotten him into trouble in life. But even without words, his sculpture was supposed to mean something.

The Letter Opener

July 2017 | fiction

Fiction · Issue 83I pulled open the small drawer below the wall phone and saw a point of silver sticking out beneath the mélange of business cards, a sticky pad, and a strip of lime green cloth.

Entropy

July 2017 | poetry

Poetry · Issue 83Scientists call it the measure of the disorder

Marian Kaplun Shapiro

July 2017 | poetry

Poetry · Issue 83Swimming Lapscrawl up 1 crawl down

Golden Fields

July 2017 | poetry

Poetry · Issue 83The night breeze kisses the amber,

Notes for an Awkward Morning

July 2017 | poetry

Poetry · Issue 83A few things you will seek

Kasandra Larsen

July 2017 | poetry

Poetry · Issue 83The Narcissist Hears What You’re Trying to Do ThereGrabs your argument in a certain hand, clenches

The Martyr

July 2017 | fiction

Fiction · Issue 83Who are you?

A Rural Life

July 2017 | fiction

Fiction · Issue 83When the birds and bees die off because of chemical misuse, where will procreation be, who will make love? Only the Doomsday Clock will keep moving and gasping.

Memories that Wander

July 2017 | poetry

Poetry · Issue 83Recalling a melodious pitch,

Lucid Lucy Lululy

July 2017 | poetry

Poetry · Issue 83She had plugged

Compass

July 2017 | poetry

Poetry · Issue 83Another of my father’s dense metal hand tools

James Dean’s Pants

July 2017 | poetry

Poetry · Issue 83I always wanted to wear the pants

War Games

July 2017 | poetry

Poetry · Issue 83The rules are shaped and branded

Trombone

July 2017 | fiction

Fiction · Issue 83When I was a child, my father’s trombone hung from a hook in the utility room in the basement. It was the color of dull brass, with a few greenish patches. It was an unremarkable piece of household flotsam among the extra furnace filters, metal folding chairs, and boxes of old clothes to give to charity.

Although I Should Not Have To

July 2017 | poetry

Poetry · Issue 83sometimes i'm wound tight

Harambe

July 2017 | nonfiction

Nonfiction · Issue 83The meme was first expressed on May 28th, 2016, and demonstrated a remarkable and rapid evolution in only a few short weeks. In the final months of the year the meme’s proliferation and dispersal slowed considerably, as other sensational events captured the internet’s fleeting attention span, but experts predict Harambe may go on replicating itself virtually forever.

“Lust Drags You Down to Hell”

July 2017 | poetry

Poetry · Issue 83Highway billboard between Columbia and Kingdom City, Missouri

Tea with the Tin Man

July 2017 | poetry

Poetry · Issue 83In the 1930s, all we English society girls were mad for Munich. Unity Mitford, one of the six troublesome Mitford sisters, was living there at the time. Unity had become a Fascist and a Hitler groupie. She adopted the name “Unity Valkyrie Mitford.” UNITY VALKYRIE roaring around Munich on her black motorcycle steed. She wore a black shirt and a man’s tie and a gold swastika pin on her collar, dressed in black leather head-to-foot and could skillfully dismantle and clean a carburetor. One day she picked me up and said, “Hop on, Sybil, we’re going to the Hofgarten to have tea with Hitler.”

Modern Art

July 2017 | poetry

Poetry · Issue 83If you wear a suit of bees

Mark Belair

July 2017 | poetry

Poetry · Issue 83MineI was in the yard working

Sam Barbee

July 2017 | poetry

Poetry · Issue 83Reversal of FortuneToday, I write:

Seventh Grade

July 2017 | fiction

Fiction · Issue 83Every day Amanda Treese would draw hearts on her math warm-up when she finished it, and finally Matthew Taylor, who sat next to her, couldn't take it anymore and he said, "What do you love?"

Twirling

July 2017 | fiction

Fiction · Issue 83Miss Jeanette Theresa picks up a fallen branch from the water oak. Ozeal Autin watches her march around the front year. He thumps, thumps, thumps the top of his head. Miss Jeannette Theresa slams her feet into peat moss, an earthy sponge. Her hand dances around alligator bark. Her wrist rotates in perfect circles. She twirls. She twirls and twirls and twirls. She shines silvery. Light reflects off of her. It finds Ozeal Autin. The Light says, “Ozeal, you love that Miss Jeanette Theresa.”