At the late end of the late-season afternoon, across the parched grasses that rode the hill to its crest from where he stood, squinting, he could make out the steel-white glow of the last streetlamps before the town line, a half mile off, and the Dodge’s tires flat from disuse and his leg still weeks from healed.

she couldn’t breathe / liquid tar in her throat / sultry-hot earthen remnants / rising up, now / like the grenade in her hand

“She’s quite vile,” huffed the matronly figure in a corner as she lifted the millipede by its front legs. It wriggled, glossy and black, in mid-air, its body more than weighty, more than alive, an intestinal curling thing of awful design.

soft-rock on the radio and soft-serve melting in a dish — his eyes showing too much white over the dated frames of his glasses — he reached out, fingers trembling, to touch the thistle bristling in the vase at the table’s center

Puffed up as a pigeon, she perched on the brick ledge of the Super Mart, eating a pile of king-sized Snickers bars as one would corn-on-the-cob, peanut side first. Her eyes shifted back and forth, slitted guiltily, judging and eschewing judgment.

wolf lessons

over time, she had lost the root of her self-definition: was it she, or was it it?

He silences the ringer and returns the phone to his pocket. He takes a sip. He draws ink from an inkwell, the quill pen quivering in a gust from the door. A girl at the next table smiles and inquires about his work. He recoils; he doesn’t want to talk about it. He takes a sip.

industrial milk

a face intentionally left blank and forgettable