Posts

OVERWHELMED BY CRABS

  OVERWHELMED BY CRABS   Fred did not survive the crash landing. Amelia had done her best, but putting the Electra down on the reef was like running a tin can over a cheese grater. When she looked east down the atoll, she could see that Fred had washed ashore on the beach, same as her. She couldn’t be certain he was dead. He hadn’t moved for what seemed like hours, but then again, she could barely move herself. All of her limbs were broken and completely immobile, and she could see the jagged end of a rib poking out of her chest, through her leather bomber jacket. She could turn her head, but only just barely. The pain was sublime. When she looked to the west, she could see the Electra still hung up on the reef. It dangled there like a gum-ball charm, rolling and shifting like a little toy on a chain every time the waves crashed over the wreckage. Before long, the sea dislodged the Electra and swallowed her to the bottom. Amelia watched as she sunk,...
Post a Comment
Read more

THE SPIRIT OF THE STACK

  THE SPIRIT OF THE STACK    - By Jennifer J. Clark You are a rare, giant Pacific Northwest salamander. You live in a rotting log at the very bottom of a pile of firewood. Your favorite foods are Jerusalem Crickets and Harvestmen. Your name is Gretchen. The stack of firewood that you live in is mostly covered by a lean-to and sits up off the ground on pallets so that it is protected from the rain. The edge of the stack, however, is just out of range of the lean-to and pallets, and is exposed to the mud below and the elements above. The wood is soggy here, especially at the bottom of the pile, and rests rotting in the mud. A log at the very bottom of the stack, hollow and half-buried in sludge, is where you live. This section of the wood pile is a haven for maggots, crickets, and slugs – your staple foods. You are ravenously carnivorous. You eat centipedes, banana slug larvae, banana slugs, redwood spiders, harvestmen, crickets, maggots, gr...
Post a Comment
Read more

NETTLEWYFE TEA

  NETTLEWYFE TEA By Jennifer J. Clark        In the early spring, Trudy had stumbled upon a just-sprouted patch of wild heartsbane growing not 200 cubits from her cabin. It was a miracle that the tender shoots had not been eaten by elk or rabbits, and she had worked quickly to construct a thick and sturdy willow fence to surround and protect the patch. All summer long she worked the patch, staking plants up, trimming them back, and trellising the flowers to reach out for the sun. When the scorching summer days were at their hottest, she carried water by the bucketful to the patch, and on nights with a full moon, she slept in the patch naked and peed at the roots of every plant so all the other creatures in the forest and mountains knew that this patch was hers and to leave it alone.      But now it was autumn, she had harvested the patch, and every inch of space in her cabin was filled with freshly-cut heartsbane. There was heartsbane on all of th...
Post a Comment
Read more