Category: The Future

Posing utopic, apocalyptic, dystopic, or superhero solutions to “The Future.” Writers depict futuristic alternative worlds in politics, environment, gender, religion, sexuality, or ethnography.

The Future Has Poetry: “The Year of the Buzzard” by Bray McDonald

It was the Year of the Buzzard, and everything was dying not to die.The last of the clinging leaves had fallen,and the trees were stark with despair.The sky could only croak at dawn.Its throat was clogged, and its eyes itchedwith the dusty and rusty particlesthat rained across the horizon, and bloated the suninto a stunted…
The Future Has Fiction: “The Park Bench That Appeared on the Beach, and All That Followed” by Luke McCarthy

A History in Seven Parts “Is this a sign?” someone asked. “Obviously” replied another. I. Gray and stone-like in appearance, the bench sat on the beach directly in front of the shoreline. When it was first discovered, onlookers attempted to move it, but no matter how hard they tried, the bench simply would not budge. It…
Two Poems from The Future: William Ross

Memo to Agency: CLEAR THE DECKS _ Run desire metrics on thisnew thanato-tourism and ping me back asap _ Scramble the screen scrapers & launch theweb crawlers now _ Get me intel on any brand lift on social _ If this has legs, we’ll pry open themouths of every dead one ferrying the Styx, reach …
The Future Has Poetry: “Begging to Be Marooned” by David Dodd Lee

The geese cross the highway—five silent film comedians—while snowfalls on their slate-gray backs. I’m in seclusion. My parents are ata remove, like dolls placed in doll-shaped holes, but when you openthe box there are only cardboard edges giving shape to nothing but air.The narrator signs a lease. He lives in a haze of monofilamentand insurance…
The Future Has Fiction: “Inside of a Dog, It’s Too Dark to Read” by David Ebenbach

1. Vulcan whimpered a little and then she let out a tentative yap. It was starting to get pretty warm in the lander. 2. There had been no good reason to send a dog to Venus, but that’s one of the interesting things about humans: we invented reasons in the first place, but, upon doing…
Original Short Fiction from The Future: “Hard Boiled Ovaries” by Marty B. Rivers

Xiang Lee arrived home from work greeted by his Siamese cat, perched on the kitchen counter. “I’m hungry. Feed me.” Xiang blinked, looked at the cat, “Did you just speak, Toshiko?” “I’m hungry,” repeated Toshiko, pacing. “Feed me. I want sardines.” Toshiko then screamed a baby-cry of dissatisfaction. Wide-eyed and trembling from what Xiang considered…
Poetry from The Future: “The Night the Moon Left Us” by Sam Bovard

The night the moon left us all the spiders lost their webs.Gossamer lay empty in the corners as they crawled outThe windows and cracks, haphazard,Drunk in the dull wind. We climbed onto the roofUnder a light drizzle, the darkening terracottaSliding like scree underfoot.She was the head of a nail at that point,Barely visible through the…
“pod”: Recorded Transmissions from The Future by Andrew Brenza

*Ed.’s Note: click images to view larger sizes. Over a period of several months in the winter of 2022, a nameless entity, via manipulations of entangled particles across time, or pods, as the entity referred to them, transmitted an expressive model for the development of an eternally sustainable utopian consciousness into the plastic architecture of my…
Poetry: Two Scores from The Future by Willa Carroll

Score for the Body as Last Frontier Poachers prize the rosette pelt | bones are gold | on the black market | I put on the body | of this snow leopard | my eyes behind hers | scanning terrain | We pant across borders | Russia Mongolia China Tibet | Plush paws | doing…