Two Stories
“Emotional Landscapes 43” by Holly Willis
Depot Dog
Neon pooch above the bus station sign. Chasing or maybe being chased like all the folks on all the buses, Running to or running from. Can’t wait to get there, can’t wait to leave floating above the passengers’ heads. A baby curled against his mama’s heart, the mama thinking don’t grow up. Don’t grow up and leave me. A runaway with father scars on her upper arm. Gas fumes and rumble stutter. The depot dog a scrunch in the velvet night, his neon family, somewhere, maybe, wondering where he ran off to.
“Dimple” by Rachel Walker
Brain Goes Plop
but I don’t stop. The rest of me, the flesh of me keeps walking down Main Street. My feet, my legs, my hair in the breeze. The trees are cotton candy now, all sugarfroth and green. The air is easy and lemonade. But most important, you. Without my brain, forgotten. I am gauze and whiteblow, a float of me. My brain left behind, a blob back there on the concrete, the traffic lights going red, then green, then red. My brain, an almost metronome, the tick-tock of move, then don’t move, then move.
About the Author
Francine Witte is the author of eleven books of poetry and flash fiction. Her flash fiction collection, RADIO WATER, was published by Roadside Press in January 2024. Her poetry collection is forthcoming from Cervena Barva Press. She is flash fiction editor of FLASH BOULEVARD and South Florida Poetry Journal. Visit her website at francinewitte.com.
about the artist
Holly Willis is a writer and photographer based in Los Angeles whose work moves across analog and digital processes experimenting with varied forms of materiality.
About the artist
Rachel Walker is a Brooklyn-based artist who paints otherworldly women lost in a ghostly dimension. Her watercolor technique in gouache defines her unusual palette and approach to painting. Her methodology is unique, utilizing an intuitive process that taps into surrealist methods such as automatic painting and collage. Her work has been featured in New American Paintings and The Chicago Underground Film Festival.