Your skin and hair and clothes are coated in frost. You are still wearing the hiking clothes you disappeared in last month. I watch your approach through the scope of my rifle from my guard post in front of the gate. My breath whistles through my nose. My tongue tastes of metal. I don’t dare … More Winter’s Chill
Earth shakes. The piercing noise of nearby screams rips through the night. In a flash, the darkness devours the light. Pitch-black is almost palpable. Air fills with the metallic smell of human destruction. Whispering shadows admonish the utmost importance of staying quiet. Terror sets back in to reclaim its rightful place. Thirty years later and … More Perpetual
Judith cleans our faces. “Stand by the traffic light. See what you can bring us.” Michael and I approach the British soldiers. We hold up hands to the drivers. “Please, mister! Haben Sie ein Stück Brot?” Green light, they are off. Yellow light. Red light. Try again. The war’s been over since summer. Sometimes a … More Traffic Light
We’d been told to leave our pets behind. They were moving us to the countryside. “But Kaja is only a puppy,” Gittel wailed. “We will smuggle her,” Papa said, hammering holes into the bottom of Gittel’s small valise. People were leaving their cases in a pile on the platform. Gittel screamed as a soldier wrenched … More The Kaja Case
Towards the end, the demented man was unable to recognize his own son when he arrived home from work. Other than his day nurse, everyone had long stopped coming around. They’d forgotten about the numbers seared into the man’s forearm—just like they forgot about the life he managed to build afterwards in a new country. … More Survivor’s Eulogy
Cherry blossoms weep along the boulevard where petals cover the feet of tourists. On the corner a man wipes the wet from his iPhone. I spring forward, leaving him to the chaperoned mercy of uniformed schoolboys. I pause before a wooden teahouse. A woman in kimono poses, her obi streaked with centuries of gold-threaded repair. … More Edo After Long Absence
I have many names. When I hover behind her, she calls me chill, bringer of goosebumps. When he brings his lover to bed, I sink into the girl and she calls me conscience and flees, nauseous. A gloomy mind makes him stoop, and I press, press, press on his shoulders. A force-feeding of guilt. An … More Witness
It’s hilarious. Now, we’re bartering vegetables and hoarding meat like gold. Our prison economy is surprisingly cheerful—we’ve elected delivery lieutenants, and I’ve joined more platoons than I can remember. Eggs, beef, fruit, does anyone have a Coca-Cola platoon? Could we rise up to cover delivery? Emojis rain down as we praise our leaders, laughing at … More When in Quarantine
Wasn’t it lucky that they had the oak tree? That beautiful thing, a colossal span of gnarled knots and twisted tendrils, a heaving mass split into wispy, skyward bronchioles. She dug, careful not to disturb the roots. How about a deal? You take him. I move on. You grow, I grow. She’d been there every … More Friend
How many Angelas does it take to change a lightbulb? Not applicable. Angela’s too stupid to change a lightbulb. How many times has Michael told this “joke”? Angela’s stopped counting. It amuses his friends. What about Angela’s friends? Angela no longer sees her friends. Michael doesn’t like them. How much longer will Angela put up … More Lightbulb Moment
The Centifictionist 
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