Angel Ranch after Las Poquianchis, by Francisco Corzas (Mexico) 1966 “Last week, in a San Francisco del Rincón courtroom … the (Gonzalez) sisters were found guilty of first-degree murder, white slavery and assorted other crimes and sentenced to the maximum penalty under Mexican law: 40 years in prison.” Time Magazine, October 30, 1964 Catalina, small, sweet,… Read More Angel Ranch ~ creative nonfiction by Lorette C. Luzajic
The 101 Uses of a Cravat The “Before” picture of a necktie. A bandage to staunch the blood. If it’s black, an armband for mourning. If it’s red, an armband for war. To welcome the spirit of Edgar Allan Poe to inhabit your body as his host. A lobster bib. A tourniquet. To appear epicurean… Read More The 101 Uses of a Cravat ~ poetry by E.R. Davis
One again, Dottie and I are happy to announce this year’s Best of the Net nominations. We always love when this time of year rolls around because we get to review all the terrific work we’ve published in the last twelve months. And, as always, it’s exceedingly difficult to filter all this great material down… Read More 2025 Best of the Net Nominations
When It Seems Like Nothing Is Happening a Lot Is Happening I’m planning a big party. My friend has no idea. She hates her job and cries on the weekends about it. We tell her she can do better. We tell each other lies all the time. The party will be drinks and dinner. When… Read More Three Micros ~ fiction by Jeffrey Hermann
Draft 1 08/18/25, 7:45 PM I like to be the boss of everything in my life. Ever since I was a child, I had to raise seven siblings on my own. My parents were always working, gone more than home. Naturally, I became the responsible one: the fixer, the planner. When I’m in charge, everything… Read More Without a Checklist ~ fiction by Christopher Grady
“Having Weight” is a modular story that mirrors the narrator’s fractured state of mind, prompting the reader to collaborate in constructing meaning from the apparent chaos. Each time the reader visits the page or clicks “Shuffle,” the narrative reorders itself, resisting a straight plot in favor of emotional constellations. The print button generates different “permanent”… Read More Having Weight ~ fiction by Cate McGowan
When Amanda Corin arrived at Mommy & Me Yoga, everyone could see that her new baby had turned into a glass of wine. Her friends felt bad. Their baby shower gifts—booties that looked like tacos, wool diaper covers from women-owned New Zealand farms, a onesie with Leonard Peltier’s face—all of them were useless now. As… Read More A Deficit of Attention ~ fiction by Sage Tyrtle
An extended metaphor to explore the uneven feelings associated with beginning psychotherapy. When I move into the house, the foundation is wonky. I know for sure because I roll an empty wine bottle down the hardwoods, and even with the friction of the area rug, the bottle cruises, gains momentum. There are hills and valleys… Read More My Brain is a Shifting Foundation ~ creative nonfiction by Kaci Neves
Self-Portrait as a Miniature Donkey Dew-grass. Groomed. Sing sweet hee- haw for saltlick treat. If sad, sagged ears, mossy eyes. If sad, so? Sing. Be silver, small. Fat velvet muzzle: be led by. Crowd. Blue ribbons prick. Best soft. Best good. Look, it’s smiling. See: teeth. Only stablehand smell grimy breath. Only stablehand scraped by… Read More Self-Portrait as a Miniature Donkey ~ poetry by Annie Przypyszny
Chronic Pain “The cure for pain is in the pain” – Rumi The tink of the gold band tumbling down a shower drain. Finding the unposed photograph of your mother at seventeen, falling in love with her, knowing you will never know that girl. The bleary-eyed stare of the goat in… Read More Chronic Pain ~ poetry by Colleen S. Harris
The Father of Minimalism I couldn’t sleep, so I poured myself a glass of water in the kitchen. That was when American composer Philip Glass walked through the door, a keyboard tucked under his arm. Why are you here, I asked. He opened his mouth but no sound came out. Instead, I heard the murmur… Read More The Father of Minimalism ~ poetry by Elena Zhang
Experiential Ecotone: Hashimoto’s Disease & Gestational Diabetes Something (un)natural happened. After almost twenty long years, I still want answers. I think I spent the first decade in denial. The first decade I spent raising other children. But around 2013, when I first moved to Las Vegas, I wanted to remember. I wanted to remember better,… Read More Experiential Ecotone: Hashimoto’s Disease & Gestational Diabetes ~ creative nonfiction by Court Harler
My Daddy’s Accordion My daddy’s accordion was his second set of lungs. The first was for breathing, He played it every night between Jeopardy and his bedtime medicine. He named it “Darla.” Said it was the only lady who never done him wrong or maxed out his credit card. Only thing that never judged him… Read More My Daddy’s Accordion ~ poetry by Tom Busillo
Ewen Glass (he/him) is a screenwriter and poet from Northern Ireland who lives with two dogs, a tortoise and a body of self-doubt; his poetry has appeared in the likes of Okay Donkey, Maudlin House, HAD, Poetry Scotland and One Art. Bluesky/X/IG: @ewenglass.
Bullet Pudding After taking a strong sleeping potion I left my bed, and the four of us spent the day playing badminton. Chloe says I have eyes like errant cabbages. Lately she’s been obsessed with luxury communism fully automated. Because we haven’t been thinking big enough, because badminton before it was badminton was known as… Read More Bullet Pudding ~ poetry by Damon Hubbs
Tess Godhardt is an attorney who has always harbored a love for creative writing. When she is not working, she can be found on the basketball court attempting to relive her collegiate glory days or outside throwing the ball for one of her five dogs. A few of her stories can be found in the… Read More How to be Enough ~ recipe by Tess Godhardt
I crept past the sunlight on the hay, hiding from the light so as not to appear present at all to my father’s men, who were pitching the golden strands into piles. I had been at it for an hour, trying to inch my way to Becker, who was sitting in the barn loft, stricken… Read More What have they done to the horses? ~ fiction by Chrissy Stegman
The Devil’s Handiwork LOGLINE The Devil himself runs his doom shop out of an industrial waste-processing plant in Cleveland. Eons of ushering humanity’s worst specimens to perdition have taken a toll on Nick Ruprecht (The Devil), but in the 21st century he decides to change it up and give the damned a second chance. The… Read More The Devil’s Handiwork ~ sitcom pitch by Janusz Cutler
The turbaned, red-lipped and broad-shouldered apparition announces she’s heard my pleas. My daughter, Delilah, the snarky adolescent that she is, had bought me a Joan Crawford prayer candle as a gag gift for Mother’s Day. Now, I see she must have moved it to where it’s currently sitting— on my alter. “I am delighted you… Read More Saint Joan ~ fiction by Angela James
I I see a land that looks like another world. There is agave and saguaro cactus and desert marigold, all of it brown and gold and dripping silver. The silver is the sun’s light and it bathes a city, pooling like water on waterless highways and dripping from statues of horses that have roamed the… Read More Statues of Horses Seen from the Sky ~ creative nonfiction by Karen Chaffee
His username is among the list of players when I log on the server, with a blue tick at the end. His avatar is gliding across the pixel-terrain, hovering over other users’ multicolored cursors. I don’t intend to play this game again. Not with him. Our broken bodies, battling each other online and off for… Read More Abandonware ~ fiction by Sarp Sozdinler
demise the la fires wolf down homes and buildings in the palisades – 0% containment. i walk outside my home 40 miles away and swallow a chunk of dust and debris that wind carries and deposits into my mouth. my yard looks like the aftermath of the storm in the wizard of oz. i walk… Read More demise ~ poetry by Ken Kakareka
No one knows what it was like, how very dark it was in 1815. The nights were enormous; you couldn’t believe they would ever end. After sunset, there was so little to do that, for amusement, I would linger outside by the stables, testing my bravery, but dusk had way of cowing me: the night… Read More On Seeing Byron ~ fiction by Amber Burke
Thanksgiving SOS Grandpa’s vodka watered down, the only potatoes served. Raised eyebrows & cocked heads after cocktail hour, guns with infinite woundability. Signs passed like cranberries over clicks of Morse code cutlery. Deep-fried turkey fireball a flare signal for help. The kids at the adult table a mere thirty- plus three major tantrums. Divorce… Read More Three Poems ~ poetry by Jennifer Ruth Jackson
What a terrific surprise the other day to learn that two stories we published in 2024 have been selected for the forthcoming Best Microfiction anthology by Guest Editor Dawn Raffel and Series Editors Meg Pokrass and Gary Fincke. Celebrate! Congratulations to Barbara Diggs, for “Questions The Caseworker Should Have Asked After My Ex Accused Me… Read More Best Microfiction Taps Two of Our Own!
A little bit wistfully, I conclude the season’s award nominations with these for the Best Small Fictions anthology. As usual, whittling our published fiction down to these five was difficult, since my approach to curating the magazine is to accept material that could win just about any award. That’s why, at times, it seems like… Read More Best Small Fictions Nominations 2025
A night with Fun Guy always delivers. After back-to-back shifts at the pulp mill you need a release. And who better to spend it with than Fun Guy? Fun Guy brings the drinks. Fun Guy knows where the music is playing, how to score tickets. Fun Guy high-fives everyone at the bar and introduces you.… Read More Fun Guy ~ fiction by Claire Fantus
He speaks to the penis to cajole and comfort, to sometimes instruct, to above all else socialize and introduce the penis to a world populated by others. To remind the penis of the broader community outside their townhome and of the warmth and timbre of his voice. “Let me know if it’s too hot,” he… Read More How to Be Happy for Two ~ fiction by Max Paradise
The Lament of Curley’s Wife He said I was a natural for the pitchers and he would write me when he got back to Hollywood. That starlight smile he had. Coulda been in the movies. Coulda had nice clothes and sat in them big hotels. He saw I was a natural. Coulda worn a white… Read More The Lament of Curley’s Wife ~ poetry by Ruth Lexton
And now it’s time for our Best Microfiction noms—stories under 400 words published in 2024. We have some good ones this year, and Dottie and I only wish we could have nominated all of the qualifying stories because they were all excellent. Here are the five finalists: Questions The Caseworker Should Have Asked After My… Read More Best Microfiction 2025 Nominations
There are reasons for recurring dreams, he says. My therapist. He holds the keys to the inside of my head, but he won’t use them. He expects me to manage this alone, with the butter knife I use as a screwdriver. The only tool I ever had. He lists the reasons—anxiety due to unmet needs,… Read More All the Colors of Red ~ creative nonfiction by Mollie McLean
Since the early days of the zine, we’ve featured a DONATE button in the right-hand sidebar. Feel free to use it when you discover something amazing here, and one day maybe we’ll have a jar of cash substantial enough to pay our writers a little something. Humbly, we could also benefit from some help with… Read More Semi-occasional Fundraising Appeal
Here we are again, in the thick of awards nomination season, and it’s time for the Pushcart Prize! I say this with all sincerity, that it’s getting almost impossible to pluck a few titles from the array of spectacular writing we feature every year, and the Pushcarts make it even harder by limiting the nominations… Read More Pushcart Prize Nominations 2025
Case Number: AT 04/05/01 3072 Incident: Foiled hiatus breaker attempt Reporting Officer: Ibrahim Badran, Police Constable Date of Report: 10/2/2020 At about 12:10 on February 10, 2019, I met with Mr. Djinn at Al Majdool Road regarding a foiled hiatus breaker attempt. Mr. Djinn said that he was a suspended djinn. He stated he was… Read More Case Number: AT 04/05/01 3072 ~ fiction by Roopa Raveendra
A man named Yeah chose the daisy box for me. I am already assuming too much. I imagine that Yeah is a man, and that he pronounces “Yeah” the way I do. I believe we all pronounce “Yeah” the same way underground. But Yeah’s mouth may stretch it, bubble gum pink across three syllables or… Read More Yeah ~ creative nonfiction by Angela Townsend
Torch Song His normal identity: Johnny Storm.1 I tell him: Now that’s a hero’s name. The Human Torch? That’s every man2 I’ve dated, who’ll burn you every time after making promises. Doesn’t matter if he’s a hot-headed superhero3 or not. When you don’t have a secret identity, why do you even need an alter ego? But… Read More Torch Song ~ poetry by Ronnie Sirmans
VII. Mother never mentions my brother. She keeps him in a box. He is endless but divided by even perforations. He has so many ears. Mother lets him out when she studies biology and anatomy. I can’t hear whether he volunteers to help mother summarize the key steps in post-surgery infection prevention. A dot matrix… Read More Three Poems ~ poetry by Jason Fraley
It was the time I could and couldn’t (a villanelle) You know how this goes. You knew this was coming. Soon, evening and the filly is in the dirt pit. And my feelings are spiraling out of control I thought I wasn’t my father’s daughter until I disappointed you again. I think I will wear… Read More It was the time I could and couldn’t (a villanelle) ~ poetry by Samantha Moe
You, the consummate gentleman, bring me a paper plate of Little Caesars pepperoni and mushroom, my favorite. It gets me moist when you remember this intimate factoid. I ask, since it’s only us, should we light some candles? You squirm, shake your head, say, “It’s pizza.” Whatever. All I found in the Youth Group’s pantry… Read More Two Excellent People Burning ~ fiction by Travis Flatt
Alright, Listen SCENARIO I We’re naked and playing guitar, writing love songs that don’t quite rhyme while we drink to all the ghosts who haunt our lives. SCENARIO II I heard a rumor you were selfish and self-consumed, suffocating on the leather gags of your own ego. I crave the peanut butter way you lie… Read More Alright, Listen ~ poetry by Hillary Smith-Maddern
The Disappointed Housewife 