Because I’m the Executive Editor and have no hand in picking the selections, I feel I can say our Spring 2015 issue of Interfictions Online is a real treat. Below is a very brief description from each of our editors…
Issue 5
fiction
Fordham CourtRichard Bowes
To evoke the first place I lived, I try to remember the first adult words I understood, the scrambled way toys and furniture were as important as people, the terrors that came with the dark. Those things stay with you…
poetry
From, ToSaudamini Deo
Rain and rain and rain and the familiar sight of rural Rajasthan seemed almost foreign with its green stillness reminding me of my train ride to Prague from Berlin where nothing happened except silence, …
poetry
How We Are MarkedPear Nuallak
We all sleep above our ancestors– it began and ended with bone, a rotted tooth, a thigh broken, honeycomb and marrow. Near Ban Chiang, a pointed-face dhole whistles to the balcony of stars, quick feet through leaves as the hunt…
fiction
The CureMalinda Lo
“A hysterical girl is a vampire who sucks the blood of the healthy people about her.” — Oliver Wendell Holmes The first time the fit came over me it was as if I’d plunged into a deep well, and…
Arts
Lo and LaStephin Merritt
Singer/songwriter Stephin Merritt is the leader of the band the Magnetic Fields, as well as three offshoot bands: the 6ths, Future Bible Heroes, and the Gothic Archies. He has also written music for theater and film, including a collaboration with…
poetry
StonePenny Stirling
Penny Stirling used to be stone but now she is flesh, words and embroidery stitches. Her poetry and short fiction have appeared in Lackington’s, Strange Horizons, Goblin Fruit, Heiresses of Russ 2014, and others. Find her at http://www.pennystirling.com/ and…
nonfiction
Octavia Butler’s Survivor: Romance & SpeculationKeguro Macharia
“I mean to survive” –Octavia Butler, Parable of the Sower At the heart of Octavia Butler’s Survivor (1979) lies a forgettable rape scene: He covered me with the thick, very soft blanket of his fur and hurt me as…
fiction
The Emerald Coat and Other WishesEmily B. Cataneo
“I’ll never understand why some people go out of their way to kiss death,” Violet said, the second night I knew her. As she spoke, the presence of the Emerald Coat in the museum behind us crawled down my neck.…
poetry
On Two Streets, with Three LanguagesSonya Taaffe
The exorcism has failed. Dead Khonen in his bridegroom’s stainless kitl lifts white-gowned Leye into his arms, into the golden ghost-light, two halves of one neshome as dark-haired and slender in embrace as twins or a trick with mirrors, their…
Arts
TelepresenceEmily Jiang
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER, COMPOSER, CONDUCTOR: EMILY JIANG PRODUCER, DIRECTOR: BRIAN DOOM EDITOR: LENA BROOKS ON-SITE SINGERS: CATHLEEN KALCIC (SOLOIST), BARBARA SAXTON, ANNA CHASE, CIARA KARSKI, EITHNE PARDINI, YITING JIN TELEPRESENCE SINGERS: ARKADY MARTINE (SOLOIST), MARI NESS, TEDDY BUCHANAN, MIKE SWIRSKY, ALYC…
poetry
Auchindrain Inventory: Village MuseumNeile Graham
ragweed yellowish bramble yellow & grey these are the dyes & the colours they make meadowsweet bright yellow brown alder dark brown for the handspun wool hand-woven into herringbone tweed iris green & light brown…
fiction
The Walking ThingMarlee Jane Ward
“Have you heard about this walking thing?” Mum called, knocking on the door. Brian Sloan looked up from between my legs with alarm. “Shit,” I said. He shot up like a piston, sheets flying as he scrambled for his clothes.…
fiction
On Post-Mortem BirdsNatalia Theodoridou
Extraction Place a body block under the back of the cadaver so that the chest protrudes and the neck and arms fall backwards. You might hear the bird flutter at this stage. Do not be alarmed; this is normal. Make…
poetry
The Difference Between an Arm and a WingSunny Chan
Sunday is the first day of the week on the calendar but the last day of the week in Chinese. On…
nonfiction
Can You Hear What I’m SayingPeri Himsel
Spotlight 1 In 1988, Gallaudet University elected another hearing president. The students of Gallaudet believed that the time had come for a deaf person to run the university for the deaf and hard of hearing—they created the Deaf President Now protest…
fiction
Number One HitElad Haber
The highway is paved with the bodies of musicians. Their bones crunch under the weight of our motorcycles, a staccato of shattering, every once awhile a cleft-shaped sigh or a note or two of an ancient number one hit. The…
poetry
Five BitesBrenda Beardsley
Plattered slivers, curled cinnamon, and the frame of yarrow. The oily residue of mother’s homemade salad dressing, decanter lid open – rim, glimmering with oregano feathered oil. In this one: patina patterned sidewalk, moss clawing through cracks and…