Aug 01
middle aged men at the best buy geek squad tech center one of us is here because he has a virus he was downloading an unreleased e-book he says but it was probably porn i’m there because i’m too scared and stupid to do basic set up on the new laptop i paid $1000 for …
Jul 31
Summer Wedding The cicadas chant Their song of sex, sex And longing, like a Greek Chorus, courting The inevitable divorce. Nobody listens. Humidity provides A bond that holds close The ceremony. Everything Clingy–clothes to body, Skin to bone, nerve to nerve– Each to other. Flowers wilt As they should, parched In the heat of the …
Jul 30
Celeste’s Butterfly She is looking down on a city through chicken wire and it’s a long way down in this neighborhood that has seen better days. It could have been New York or Chicago or New Orleans, what she sees is timeless and suggests a reason why she is framed in this window thinking of …
Jul 29
This is What We Do to Book Snitches Where I Come From Life has been a blur, lately. Work becomes a weekly series of Bataan death marches. Sixty-six-hour work weeks, four twelve-hour shifts, a blessedly abbreviated ten-hour Friday shift and the obligatory straight eight, 5am to 1pm on Saturday. We’re told this won’t last forever. …
Jul 28
In Service The former Marine with a zipper scar curled around his ear like a topographical map charting a river said he once had to explain to a Texas farmer during a 4 AM training exercise that those men dropping from black helicopters in his fields were U.S. Marines but the government was not coming …
Jul 27
Red Rockets It’s the season of the sun, and I feel like I’m on it, the sun that is, with solar cells at peak absorption rates the rays can’t penetrate eyelids or the smog surrounding this moody fucking astronaut who just wants to crash somewhere on earth, but can’t make up their mind where. A …
Jul 26
A Small Ruffle of Feathers Across the back acre, we looked for the graves. Nothing had been buried out there in years. The boxwoods were gone, the garden abandoned. Now my sister wanted to know, because someone had to cut the grass. Keep It Simple Stupid, I told her. Honeysuckle had choked the fence. A …
Jul 25
The Mayor of Williams My tow truck driver is “70, but a young 70!” and has plucked me from Williams, CA to bring me to Marysville so I can rent a car He’s off duty and worried I won’t pay him “I mind my own business as long as no one fucks with me!” he …
Jul 24
BIAGIO FORTINI was born in Ripalta Cremasca, in the province of Cremona, Italy. His passion for photography has led him to travel to many countries around the world. His works are part of various anthologies and websites in Canada, USA, Spain, Italy, Albania and India and have been finalists in various literary competitions in …
Jul 23
WOUNDED SWALLOWS You rise like an automaton long before dawn, and in that silence the closing of a door is heard; your footsteps resemble those of a drunkard. A bit of bread is wrapped in a piece of paper. It is a long way by train and by bus. The hours drag on, and the …
