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The second queen forbade any telling of tales or writing of histories. Sufficient to the day is the evil thereof. Let him that breaks this law see his own hands cut off before he loses his eyes. You have taken so much more from me, my Queen. But I will tell my story anyway. Once […]
Down at the riverfront at Kalub, the little gods congregated in clouds, flies and dragonflies and even small birds approaching would–be travelers. They scattered out of the way of wagons and carts, circled over the flagstoned road and then re–formed. Umri walked through them, careful not to jostle or hit. The citizens of Kalub paid […]
The first strange thing Nadia pulled from her pocket was a piece of fudge. It was a perfectly ordinary piece of fudge. But Nadia hated fudge, and couldn’t imagine how she’d come to be carrying it around. She remembered this in particular because it was a bright, cool autumn day and she’d dug into her […]
Today, without trepidation, I send my beloved Marquette out in the city, checking her hair (ringlets still perfect). Her gown, (modeled on that worn by the Princess de Polignac at the crowning of Napoleon the Third) remained flawless. I murmur, “Old age is ripe with memories that should have taught me not to do the […]
I need you. This is a confessional moment. It’s been three weeks with you fitted against me, flush against the place where I now abruptly end. They cleaned me up, neatened and straightened, gave you to me, but it was a while before I could look at you and longer before I was willing to […]
1. At ten of five in the morning, Lao Dao crossed the busy pedestrian lane on his way to find Peng Li. After the end of his shift at the waste processing station, Lao Dao had gone home, first to shower and then to change. He was wearing a white shirt and a pair of […]
Craig Perry, university administration employee. Judy Garland, dead. That’s where it started. Dead five days before, in London, “an incautious overdosage” of barbiturates, according to the coroner, and her body had just come back to New York for burial. Twenty–thousand people lined up to pay their respects. Every gay man in Manhattan must have gone, […]
It was in the park I met him, one summer day when my Dad and I were fighting (again) and I left (again), slamming the door behind me after realizing I wouldn’t be winning (again), and took the tube to Kensington Gardens, where sometimes you can meet interesting people if the timing and other magical […]
I’m shocked that my time machine has worked. At least, I think it’s worked. But I can’t see anything and I’m feeling carsick. The room smells like I imagined, dust and cool metal, and underneath that, a hint of aftershave. I blink a few times and then touch my eyelids to check that my eyes […]
Outside, the rush of wings. The shadows of birds tessellated across my wall, a fraction of a second behind the flight. A flock of birds. An exaltation, a parliament, a murder. Their chirps and chatter filled the sky. This much commotion, it must mean a soul’s migration, from death to life again. One of the […]
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