Issue Seventy-two, November 2015

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From Sedna’s Hands, Chelsea Hanna Cohen
“When he’d revealed after your wedding what he really was, you heard nothing but the winter wind howling in your ears. You told him it was fine but wept silently through the night once you understood. To be married to a bird; who would have thought?”

Dishroom Supervisor, Anthony Cordello
“Dumplings floated aimlessly while their either pork or vegetable insides were alive and rippling against the thin membrane. A lo mein noodle leapt out of the water and clung to my arm hair, slipped up under my sleeve, crawled across my chest, and burrowed effortlessly into my belly button.”

In Response to the News, Maria Pinto
“When he realizes I’ve been eating dirt, he comes out to yell. My dreadlocks are tossed horizontal with the force of his objection. I remind him that he used to make mud pies for his younger sisters. He still feels bad about that childhood tyranny.”

Heatseeker, Marcel Harper
“He liked to hee-haw and back-slap with the tough old fucks who sought out these backwater festivals. Men with calloused hands from working too damned hard all their lives and calloused tongues from smoking cheap cigars. “

We Cannot Become What We Need to Be by Remaining What We Are, C. B. Auder
“After the organ harvesting, the doctor disappeared again, and I peeked over. Dad lay there, like a giant napping open-faced sandwich, and I had to smile.”

Cover art: French Bulldog, Loulabelle Hales