Short Story
Black Planet
“There is no plot; it’s just Black people living their lives with other Black people on their own planet.”
Post Scripts
My dead mother called me to say she knew she killed me a long time ago but look how well I’m doing now.
Chicano Frankenstein
How can you have thoughts without words? The man turned back to his coffee and drank. It was cold. Breakfast was done. Time to move on.
Nomenclator of the Revolution
She described their world at last in a language that they recognized as true.
Bartow Station
It’s a thing about being a man. To be so stingy, to deny even a sip of yourself. To deny and deny and deny until one day it all comes out as a violence, like water spewing forth from a hose.
Rock Creek Parkway
When you weren’t sure if a guy was gay, you asked if he was Canadian. The straight ones always look puzzled, and told you they were American.
The Origin of Cow Therapy
“In the East, it is the cow that animalizes the man. Hence, the native occupies this intermediate space between man and beast, which we term ‘savage.’”
Kaitiakitanga
The world never really ended. An apocalypse wasn’t an end so much as a change of state, ice into water.
The Wind Has Swept Away What the Fire Has Spared
“I will be a tightrope walker,” she said, “and I will walk across the air to you.”
The Still, Small Voice That Thunders
“Most were drills. Pilots weren’t to know which were the real deal. They were not to think of the lethal effects of their duty.” A pilot is pulled aside by a desperate woman seeking help.
Post-Literature
This is my version of the story, but I will illuminate only a corner of it, one that ran parallel to and underneath it, revealing what was left in its wake.
Upper Avenue
“Abroadness became my obsession.” When a young Nigerian girl is invited to go live with her uncle in Canada, it sets in motion a peculiar friendship with someone she has long envied.
Undo
“You can’t go to Mass like that.” A woman’s mother wakes up dramatically transformed, leading to a reappraisal of their relationships.
Six Months of Salad
“She stuffed spinach in her mouth until her teeth were a hayish green.” A woman’s extreme diet earns praise from church friends but concern from her family.
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