Photo: Sarah McGee/FlickrWhile visiting a kibbutz to give a lecture, and after dining on both hot desert-root vegetable soup and sushi, the speaker becomes the listener when someone in th…
Fiction
Blood War, 2016, by Jia How Lee. The concept art is based on the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire. Years ago the man got married and years ago the man became unhappy in his marriage.…
Photo: Skitterphoto/PixabayOutside the Special Instrument Factory, protesters rally against war, corruption, and the latest in protective head gear: the Ex-Box.Procrustes-1 was the m…
illustration by Michael Vincent Manalo Anything might happen beyond a door opened by a perfect wife.to the memory of María Varela OsorioIf you should meet her on the street, cro…
Photo: Daria Nepriakhina/PixabayThe old man lived in a vast, dark house, windows blind with frosted glass, door adorned with a heavy bronze knocker.At one time or another, all five of his children had…
Duo III, 2013, oil on canvas by André Schulze Courtesy of the artist/andreschulze.comA mother inside, a daughter outside. Has her mother shrunk, or has she always been a…
photo: arcaion/pixabayAfter work, my friend and I go to the Café de Prague in the heart of the Hamra district. As we sit at a table by the large window, looking out on the lighted street, I think abou…
After deciding to end it all, a woman takes a final subway ride. Z, the story writer, decided to end her diary. What is more, with an eye on approaching Christmas, she would adorn it with sta…
Through story and stranger, two fallen-out friends mediate their way back to one another in the Edinburgh Zoo.Meet me in the waves, you bad fisherman, and I will give you Death by Water.Those…
And somewhere in all these, all these possible variants of the bus-taking crowd, was Karl, who would appear from out of nowhere, and I would be the only one who could see him.I…
Photo: PixabayUsing Socrates’ trial as his point of departure, the author spins out a meditation on wisdom, the divine, justice, grace, and desire like “an arrow in the chest.” “We cannot…
An apartment on the bank of the Nile River for a fair price sounds like a no-brainer, unless that apartment happens to be right next to one of the most infamous prisons in Egypt.The…
Photo: Katherine Dewey HillThis story begins with three @ handles and ends with two.With a single hashtag, repeated insistently like a mantra: #m…
Menashe Kadishman (1932–2015), The Sacrifice of Isaac, 1985, cor-ten steel, 15' 1" x 15' 5" x 9'. Kadishman’s sculpture “was partly inspired by an experience the artist had while ser…
Life jackets and a boat used by refugees and migrants to cross the Aegean Sea from Turkey lie abandoned on the Greek island of Lesbos (Photo: Aris Messinis / AFP / Getty Images)An intimate yet uni…
Photo: Daniel KriegIn post-unification Berlin, groups of squatters compete for empty housing. Who will gain the upper hand?The next morning, a group of angry men were standing in the…
Illustration: flickr.com / xyzquantumpoetA Lutheran seminary student wonders what it takes to become a Jew for his girlfriend, whose embrace is “not a preface to anything else.”I…
Cliff jumping at Tenkiller Lake, August 2011. Photo: Rachel FolmarA teenager finds himself living in the shadow of his lover’s deceased boyfriend.Cordell stopped by the gallery to drop o…
Photo: Kai C. SchwarzerA relationship is put to the test when a young couple visits a family member on an isolated island.We left home to think it over. Nanna had an abortion three years ago,…
Illustration: Heidi TailleferrFirst and foremost, we focus on the comfort of our clients.”“And what aspects of your operations are oriented toward tha…
Photo: YSBRANDCOSIJN / 123rf stock photoWho needs confusing laws and bothersome committees when you have an autocrat writing principles for every aspect of your life? He was not tall or…
Photo: www.flickr.com/people/fineplanWhen you are a pestilent being the world stops being pestilent. Or does it?Each night Rafa stares at the vestibule in hatred until those in line…
Photo: James AbbottSome people feel a need to be silent, but I need to look at myself in the mirror, scream, smash things, and tear up my own writing. That’s not so bad, it really isn’t, because all I…
Profile photo: Chandan Kumar Photo: Michael PhamIf only people loved one another and learned to save money, if only the children at the orphanage could get foster parents, if only the sun shone…
Photo: Barn Images/ ift.tt/1PhXbX2 Since you intend to kill yourself anyway, why don’t you fit your death into our plans? We need heroes, and it’s all the same to you…
