My Requisite Yelling by Kerry Cullen After work on Wednesday, as I often do on Wednesdays, I walked over to the building and did my requisite yelling. As the years have rolled by, less people have been showing up to do the yelling, but I believe it is my civic duty. Anyway, we are still numbered. Yes, in the beginning it was marches, megaphones, signs and flags, stopping traffic. Now it is more of a small, reasonable group, mostly my […]
Sunday Stories: “Wrath of the Red-Eyed Wizard”
Wrath of the Red-Eyed Wizard by Kevin Maloney Blake Griffin lunges like he’s cutting for the basket but at the last second changes his mind, pulls up and shoots from the perimeter. It goes in. Of course it does. I start to groan, then stop before anybody notices. I’m at a hipster bar on Alberta Street that projects Portland Trail Blazers games onto the wall. The place is packed with young people who don’t normally watch sports but fake excitement […]
Sunday Stories: “Temporary Steps”
Temporary Steps by Ashley P. Taylor The steps leading up to our columned porch were too steep, my mom said. Elderly guests might have trouble climbing them, could fall descending them. And they were ugly: planks painted the green of the house’s porch and roof. The handrail began flush with the first step so that to grab it, you had to lean out over the stairs you were trying not to fall down. Plus, the porch steps were always supposed […]
Sunday Stories: “Dublin, 1999”
Dublin, 1999 by Leah Schnelbach She was just rinsing the shampoo out of her eyes when the alarm went off. She froze, blinking under the water, willing it to stop. It didn’t stop. She counted backward from ten, then gave up and shut the shower’s stream. The alarm billowed into the shower, louder and louder. She could hear people running in the hallway. Tense voices.
Sunday Stories: “House of Hunger”
House of Hunger (Iowa City 1995) by Uzodinma Okehi You think you know what you want. Let me say that much. You move through life, and the idea feels impressed upon you that freedom is the important, most crucial thing. Soaring eagles, like freed slaves. Like dawn, glowing across the mountains. This was how I went to college. I felt I was constantly being told how free I was, or that each next stage; childhood, high school to college, was […]
Sunday Stories: “Puncture Skin To Prevent Explosion”
Puncture Skin To Prevent Explosion by Kathleen Boland Try going on a walk. You always hear about people going on walks, smart people, people who are haunted by things more important than this. A walk might make your brain stop buzzing and twitching, stop you from showing up at the grocery store where you first saw her red peacoat and ever since everything has shades of red. Walk around your block. Walk around your neighborhood. Walk around the park and […]
Sunday Stories: “Drone Drone Drone”
Drone Drone Drone by Harold Stallworth Pete spends most of his time in the garage. He solders wires, welds propeller blades, and salvages parts from different junkyards across the city. For weeks he toils, hunched over his father’s workbench, working toward an optimal design.
Sunday Stories: “Hamlet, Claudia, Zanzibar”
Hamlet, Claudia, Zanzibar by Ilana Masad Cities breathe. They suck the air out of their inhabitants and blow it back through drivers shouting obscenities, the drone of subways, the heaving of buses. The air transforms into sirens in the distance and pigeons cooing on windowsills.