Origin Stories – Alfred Fournier

Warning! by Alfred Fournier Do not feed honey to infants under one year. They may give up the breast. They might sprout mandibles and gnaw the crib rail restlessly, fly from the window with a craving for wildflowers and forsake human form. And who can blame them? Distillation of floral nectar gathered in a million […]

Origin Stories – Gloria Parker

Pet by Gloria Parker You bring her home, give her a bell and collar– a litter box—a name you think she’ll answer to. For your amusement, the stripy little wildcat stalks the rooms of your house under its aging roof, till one day—maybe she’s at a window, licking a paw, when her whiskers twitch and […]

Origin Stories – Jonathan Yungkans

Duplex Beginning with a Line by Paul Vangelisti* by Jonathan Yungkans The progress of remorse and dripping faucets deepens a sharp-edged furrow between rocks on anxiety’s edge. eroding my neighbor. My neighbor’s forehead is where grass bleeds. It’s his clue I’m wasting hemoglobin, to be more diligent on sprinkler heads— leaky sprinklers an overbearing, offensive […]

Origin Stories – Nancy Botkin

Icelandic by Nancy Botkin I’m down on my knees scraping paint off the floor with my thumbnail, washing my hands over and over, but it’s like trying to get blunt force trauma and strangulation out of the news. I went back and forth between Icelandic and Moonmist, colors suggesting cool and distant, colors with blue […]