My friend has written a poem about a pair of deer—one with antlers, the other without. In the poem, they are in a cemetery filled with green grass and large trees. The antlered deer fixates on the poem’s speaker. He watches her with his whole body. And the antlers too: like antennae reading the air for threat. She is no threat. And, the speaker claims, the deer determines that.  My friend loves deer and wants a tattoo of one on her shoulder.   We are talking about deer and w

Say Phantom, why don’t you play that twinkly opening lick to “Growin’ Up'' on your Korg CX-3 while I tell the good people here at the A-Go-Go this story.  All this happened about six years ago. Or maybe ten years ago. Maybe even twenty. Hell, I don’t remember. Might’ve been yesterday, for all I know. I ain’t the type to stick pins into the cushion of time. What matters is, it happened. And because it happened, I get to stand up here on this stage and talk into this microphone

This story was originally published by Free Spirit “Speak of the Devil” Anthology. The casting director guided the girl with glasses in...

There were pills beneath the sink; crowding the bathroom countertop, fallen behind the toilet, swept under the rugs. When did Katherine...

“Been slow.” Within the TV commercial extra world, Howie’s resemblance to a nursing home resident had been a disadvantage. Eyebrow, nose...

END 6 An unfamiliar woman waves at him from across the park. She sidesits on the ground with her baby. The child is lying prone on a...

Rivers scrawl the history of the lands they mark up and divide. For thousands of years the Danube bent humanity over its will, vectored...

I. Sunday morning, my elderly father murmuring into a bottle of Pabst Blue Ribbon, a brand of beer he especially hated, though he wasn’t...

Congratulations on the purchase of your Red Shooz! In your email, you said you’d been seeking a socioeconomic boost from lack to luxury,...

It was down to me to make the announcement. I took a deep breath and then cleared my throat to get the attention of the office. Heads...

Billy stands lost in the doorway, much smaller than I remember. Bruno barks, unsure of who he is, but eventually picks up Billy’s scent...

The poor dogs of Budapest were having a hard time, and it didn’t look like it was getting better any time soon. Over the past few weeks,...

(CW: Self-harm, suicidal feelings, blood) I barely slept last night. Bloody humidity kept me up, among other things. My stomach rumbles,...

The concept was brilliant, a stroke of pure genius. There’s no way, other than sabotage, an idea of such brilliance could’ve flopped....

As the first tentacle rose out of the murky brown water of the bay and wrapped itself around the stage of the Jones Beach Amphitheater,...

The inside of The Armory usually exuded a red glow from every surface. Tonight, this was technically the truth—the recessed ceiling...

“Open up, you useless fat fuck!”              Someone is banging on Heath’s front door. It’s late. Heath lives in the upstairs apartment...

We went to the botanica to pick out something nice and easy to heal Tami’s marriage. I knew it was falling apart because of all of the...

‘Compassion was the most important, perhaps the sole law of human existence. ~ ‘The Idiot’ by Fyodor...

During those first awful weeks in March, when rumors swirled that the city was about to go into lockdown and the wealthy clogged bridges...