The Snow Asleep on a Branch

by David M Wallace

There in the window of the apartment across the courtyard, pressed against the glass, a bouquet of pale blossoms. Like a springtime branch snapped off a cherry tree.

No. My mistake. It’s a cat. A white cat sleeping on the window sill, enjoying the warmth of the sun. I can see it breathing.

But for a moment, I thought of you. You who will always be a girl. Perfuming the room with your presence and an armful of white cherry blossoms that spring morning. Before your final winter, when the snow came too soon. And never really left.

Barren Garden

by Emily Hoover

Today the doctor with the Scandinavian name I can’t pronounce went over the newest ultrasound, found a chocolate cyst, said they’d need to do laparoscopy to see the adhesions from the endometrial tissue growing outside my uterus like weeds ruining a perfectly good fucking garden. There’s a surgery I can have or a pill I can take. Both will trigger menopause, the brochures say. I run my fingers along my abdomen, imagine the scars when they plow my pelvis empty—my ex-husband filling another woman’s bed, another woman’s womb, while I live in the cold cavern between moderate and severe.

Day is Night is Day

by David Henson

One dawn, the horizon darkens. As the sun rises, blackness spreads like spilled ink. By midday, stars salt an obsidian sky despite the dazzling sun. Blue skies emerge at sunset and rule the night. Birds don’t know whether to sing or nest. Brilliant, sunless nights and dark, sunny days persist. Our biorhythms play free jazz. Our nerves howl like wolves. Anxiety grips the children. Every morning we gather outside to await the sunrise like hopeful pagans, but it’s always brightest before the dawn. At least we have each other.

Never More

by Cathy Schieffelin

His fists sink into the warm dough, kneading, like a prayer.

A shimmer of white, floats in the dusty rays of morning sun. Lucy, skipping from the henhouse, night clothes mud spattered with a basket of eggs. Looks just like her mama – golden haired and lithe.

Heart heavy, he pummels the gooey mass, craving a salve to numb the nettles pricking his memories.

Wish Hazel’d be here. Never more. Birthing twins was too much. She loved his sourdough. They’d sit on the porch watching fireflies dance in the dying light, taking bites, butter dripping down their chins.

Never more.

The Ninety-One Pearls on My Necklace

by Maryam Shadmehr

Eighty-five? There are supposed to be ninety-one.

The necklace cascades between my shriveled fingers, pearls escaping me like faces fading into shadow.

She catches them. “How about I put it on you?”

We face the mirror. Pity in her bright eyes. Who is she? The daughter I always wanted? I can’t remember if her father was handsome. Fading faces. He had bright eyes. I could never forget his eyes.

“The cleaning lady. She’s slipping out the pearls one by one.”

She shakes her head. Brighter eyes. “There were always eight-five.”

I grasp the necklace. Snow in my palms. Melting away.