Pumpkin Ash and Cypress Knees Katherine Quevedo __________ Bald cypress thrusts its knees in knobby little spires just above the waterline. Pumpkin ash bulges at the base of its trunk, engorged with brackish drink. By moonlight, I can almost discern the red spikes of cardinal flowers craning their necks alongside…
Read MoreFeu-Follet Danelle Lejeune __________ This trace is what’s left of us. Look for the weight of light, the particles falling down like crumbs. The mass of the universe is choking, leaving lines, chain burns, in my flesh. These pieces of you, pieces of me, we are stardust. The music of…
Read MoreLore of Swamp Girl Ryleigh Wann __________ LORE OF SWAMP GIRL I wasn’t always this wretched. Men paint me up when they talk outside the shaken down juke joint, drunk off warm whiskey, drool pooling from snarled teeth: the woman who hides in the swamp off the Delta— murky with…
Read MoreAbbie Skinner Abbie Skinner is an MFA/MA candidate at McNeese State University. Originally from Southern California, Abbie has spent more than half her life living in New York and abroad. She is happy to have settled in Louisiana for now, at least until her next adventure takes her someplace else.…
Read MoreKeep Times Good (Or the League to Save the Good Times) Joe Farley __________ Rex liked to have a good time. Rex liked to ensure everyone else was having a good time. Rex liked to keep times good. He played the towns centennial party. He played the townie bars, the…
Read MoreThe Boyfriend Ben Selesnick __________ The dining room was one of the larger rooms in Noah’s Atlantic-facing colonial. It had a vaulted ceiling, a glassed-encased display at one end of the cedar-cut table that held a collection of plaques and trophies he’d accrued over the past decade working as the…
Read MoreOver the Edge Rebecca L. Monroe __________ “You ready?” He looked up, tightening his harness, helmet in place. He was slim, tanned with blonde hair bleached by the summer sun. He was a poster picture for an outdoors man. “Yes.” Alice replied, breath short as she finished adjusting…
Read MoreTwo Lone Voices Aubrey Lozano-Cofield __________ It’s the rain after five years of drought in Texas. The water stitches up the cracked earth and I don’t want to disturb it. I want it to know it’s welcome, that the South is thirsty. “Can you taste the salt?!” she asks me,…
Read MoreHIGHWAY 111 Mathieu Cailler __________ Even at 11:59 p.m., the heat still owned Palm Springs. Emile’s shift had started a couple of hours earlier, and he sat in his taxicab, munching on some stale donut holes, waiting for dispatch to inform him of his next pick-up. He tinkered with…
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