“Jars” by Fidelis Tan
Intriguing opening paragraph, predictable plot, but I was hooked and I read the whole thing.
(The thing with online fiction is you often read it while connected to the internet. So many distractions! So if you have a story that’s interesting enough to read and finish, then it’s worth sharing, I think.)
I also liked:
“What the Chicken Knows (Or, The Eight Stages of Grief)” by Maria Pia Vibar Benosa
— by Petra Magno
Sappho Beyond Hades
Jo Walton
The shades are silent and there is no making.
She misses the warmth of sunlight on stone
and the sound of children playing.
There are children here, but they are all so grave,
like their elders, moving gravely through death’s halls.
She misses the bright constellations, she misses burning.
She has begun to forget the sound of the sea
and the heft of words.
When she has forgotten how to yearn
when not even blood will bring back names to her
she will slip down through Lethe to begin once more
with “Aaa, oooh, milky goo”, and that is a star, and this
is what it means when you get the words right.
Snowshoe to Otter Creek
Stacie Cassarino
love lasts by not lasting
—Jack Gilbert
I love that Philippines Free Press has already updated its website. New stories/poems every week!
Some recommendations:
“The Battle of Ayala” by Glenn Diaz
“Two Poems” by Allan Justo Pastrana
the divining that doesn’t reach the ear, as all hear,
from the gut, pure animal pain instead when the car
they’re in passes by—so what of the poor pig lying
near the gutter, writhing for being alive still, the throat
slit, from where too much blood gushed,
from what seems to be the only opening, like a window
alone that you lean to, pocket of air, the middle
you once dreamed about, that is as hollow as what a body
can be made of. That no one recalls the last word. That no-
body makes a sound—
* * *
Another thing I love: that friends and fellow writers are telling me that they enjoyed “Summer Evening“, with Tin Lao saying it’s “sick, a la Inglorious Basterds/Pulp Fiction”.
Go read! /whore
EMERGENCY POSTCARD TO A.O.
It’s hard for me to hear over the din
of this living, the racket of oceans
& the gulls overhead. I started to forget
about me & thought maybe
it was for the best. Probably I had my greatest
ever shot already & all that comes next
is some new disappointments. Remind me
again that together is something we can’t
do alone.
—Nate
EMERGENCY POSTCARD TO L.R.
Dandelion stalks populate the yard, reaching
in rusty light, & who knows why
their fuzzy heads are vacant? I can see
the dew on the grass from where I’m sitting
just like I can hear you in your voice.
Who would question my desire
to run outside & feel the dangerous AM
dampness or to risk it all to tell you about it?
—Nate
EMERGENCY POSTCARD TO J.F.
All these birds wake me up just like always
though the me that they sing to is new every day
& relieved to find out a body doesn’t have to do
everything. I’m trying to believe it. I’ve only
ever wanted a reason to slow down, an angle to navigate
that made me feel worth it. Yesterday, I drove
the wrong way from you; soon I’ll jump back
& try the sequence again – you & me lost
together & looking for landmarks that tell you what’s
right: dragonfly light, summer bees exhausted
in the window, that wherever we are is okay.
—Nate
AGNI Online: What Depresses Me by Juanita Brunk.
I vowed to document every memorable piece I read online or offline, so I’m sharing this.
or to all that comes and goes, people
and things that arrive
and then vanish
with a brevity that might, on another day,
from another heart, more valiant,
less fickle,
appear as radiance,
and the grief, praise.
So beautiful it melts the heart.
Heavy Things
by Denver Buston
the world cannot bear the weightlessness of sparrows
or the confetti of our illegible addresses
the moon’s breathless ascent
the world cannot bear it
so the world makes heavy things
like airplanes
and skyscrapers
like your heart
and heavy things fall down
because the world cannot bear them either
Eliza Victoria 