Her fingers. They are like creeping spider legs, spindly and skeletal, reaching out towards you, pleading and desperate.
MORGAN QUINN, BRIDGET CLEARY’S FINGERS
The Croak—Ellen Forkin
I soar as the world turns to winter. The heather is purpling, like swathes of velvet upon the green, grass-tufted land. The thistledown’s catch the wind, the docks and cow parsley have turned to rust. The bogs are dark, muddied, treacherous. The harvest fields, golden, gleaming, rippling a whispering wave of barley.
In a manor—Rebecca Dempsey
She broods alone on the cliff, an old house frowning toward the lines of breakers and beyond, to where the sky submits, kissing the restless face of the vast ocean. The building’s weathered features sag and creak in the cold, briny wind, waiting for her owner. And she does return: in the evenings with the new moon. With her presence, the dark, colossal dwelling is transformed. The old mansion shakes off the dour expression and greets the visitor with gaping smiles from its broken and jagged leaded windows.
Before Us—Marisca Pichette
Once there were no dragons. From Boston to San Francisco, the horizon was empty. Once, fires only happened when you started them. Once, houses were built only to weather time, never considering that a cloud was not a cloud.
Feather Its Nest—Aleks Wittkamp
Potato pancakes, tomato soup, sweetbread—Jamie’s favourites. You set the table for two and you take your seat. You hold out hope that Jamie will come, right up until you hear the wings beating.
This is the Place—David Hartley
This is the place. Right here. Where the wizards drowned the village.
Look at the lay of the land. Look at how it sweeps and how it curves. Something’s not quite right. You feel a tad dizzy. As if you suddenly can’t trust your organs. Any of them.
This is no place for a lake. That’s what’s wrong. The lake should not be here.
When the Dust Whispers—Chelsea Thornton
My sister is sleeping just behind this door. My hand trembles. Ripples undulate in small circles within the glass of water I hold onto as my knuckles pale. The door looms in front of me. I hate this room. I’ve hated it ever since my sister went to sleep.
As the Blood Moon Burns—Kristin Kozlowski
She didn’t hear the gentle yip of the coyotes. She didn’t hear the cicadas vibrating against the cold trees behind her. She didn’t hear the mournful owl before he left his branch and swept past her like a silent train engine.
Phantom Queen—Emma Louise Gill
The crow girl sits on top of the phone box, tossing pennies at the loch. Flip. Pitch. Splosh. Copper frisbees catch the afternoon sun, sink beneath murky water.
Embla’s Ages in Love, Observed—Hanne Larsson
I’d never seen you cry before; I didn’t think fathers cried like that, but you did when she left. Even then I knew she was the love of your life but she’d made you choose between your two girls.
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Growths start. Spreading out from the point of contact: lumpy knobs that flatten out into palms, with knuckles on one side and heart lines on the other. The palms fold out into jointed fingers as she draws the flame back, reaching forward for the match, ending in nails.
SEAN NOAH NOAH, SOLID WALL BUT THE WALLIS MADE OF
HANDS BUT THE HANDS ARE MADE OF SHEETROCK
Crow & Cross Keys 