Author: Heavy Feather

From Vol. 9: “80,” a short story by Stephen Dixon

He wakes up, gets his cellphone off the night table and opens it to look at the time. 3:02. He’s been asleep for less than an hour. An hour ago he checked the time after lying in bed awake for almost three hours. 2:05. So he’s gotten an hour’s sleep tonight. He’ll probably lie in…
From Vol. 9: Two Poems by Glenn Shaheen

Cannon Fruit flies numerous and can Ibring myself to kill them to ruintheir structures of flight theydiminish our standard of livingthey are minor irritants ourstandard of living already lowfrom years of part time teachingour teeth yellowing our clothesbecoming more out of stylepoetry only works for the wealthyor the white my friends assureme that being Arab…
From Vol. 9: “Creature and the Once-a-Year-House,” a poem by Michael Sikkema

9 shotgun barrels are wrapped around a beech tree, hunting party nowhere in site, one truck engine still running, almost out of gas 7 deer walk backwards out of pines as their seams split to mist Creature figures tiny wolves inside their head leak black milk, sniffs out blood on a salt lick Coming home…
From Vol. 9: “Shame (A Spell to Forget),” poetry by Charlotte Covey

This is a darker magic.This is crawling through his door at four a.m. and begginghim to take a bite. This is slipping between lucid and not, hoping he will finishme off. Somewhere, idly, I am thinkingI don’t even like him. Somewhere, not here, that matters. Somewhere, you arefalling asleep soundly, while he is taking offmy…
From Vol. 9: “Statement of Purpose,” a poem by Nicholas Bon

It’s important for you to know that I’m a fucking mess, that so often the drummer in the corner is too loud for this polite conversation. There are people, even now, asking me what I can bring to the feast. I left my hands at home & can’t get my shit together. How…
“Always Dress for Mud”: James Braun Interviews Peter Markus, Author of When Our Fathers Return to Us as Birds

I first came to Peter Markus not knowing what I needed was Peter Markus. That’s how most of us come to him—not knowing. Us being his students. Not knowing being something we had in us, before any of us ever came to Peter Markus. That’s what Peter likes best, I like to think: when new…
From Vol. 9: “Invasion of the Dad,” fiction by Nicholas Grider

The dad arrived, as dads are known to do, in a large red SUV that was partly covered in mud and made a confident exit from the vehicle, stepping down from the driver’s seat onto the blacktop in dark brown shoes dwelling somewhere between “sensible” and “noticeably expensive,” and the dad was dressed as if…
From Vol. 9: “Dear Editor Who Sent Me a Rejection Letter on Christmas, or Essay That Ends in a Fugue” by Sean Thomas Dougherty

At first I was like for real, man. Really? But then I immediately thought of my coworker Wayne, whose wife died a few years ago near Christmas, and what dismal days the holidays are for him, each colored light blinking on every house a stop light for this life, a demarcation, a calling back to…
From Vol. 9: “A Miniature Tale of Motherhood,” a short story by Oliver Zarandi

My children are cruel and look like goblins. Every day they take something away from me and I don’t ask for anything in return. I asked them this morning, “What do you want for lunch?” “Your breasts,” they said. So they had them. They suckled my teats, one apiece, and sucked them dry. No more…