TWO FLASH PIECES
by Marc Harshman
Jail Break
Time passes, and little by little everything that we have spoken in falsehood becomes true.
— Marcel Proust
•
Al walks under an onyx set of moons whose one good eye blinks like the cherry top called to that last day in his old life. Yesterday, the warden warned the leaky faucet would not be tolerated, and so it became the last domino to topple—and how true they all fell. Al draws on his jeans under a mirror of clouds. It was time to set his watch, the cheap Timex from Aunt Alice, set it to a more auspicious hour—perhaps Twelfth Night off Dame Street in a drawing room where they were dancing in quadrilles and pansy skirts. Or to an hour of privacy where the fairy tale poet still searches vodka in the closed garage that tilts to Africa. Himself, he will make do and go his own way, hoarding every second like chocolate and fresh air. The ghosts of a million regrets follow him through the prairie’s parking lot. He will find a hole in a wall and erect a door, a few windows open to the birds. Relieved of all the undeserved responsibilities he’s carried, he’ll sing each word of his silence with patience. He’s clever enough to be wary of freedom and trusts only the grunge music of adolescent basements where sex blossoms and a single toad watches from the ledge. Every lie he ever told draws close to be excised lovingly with memory and ink. He is counting the scars, and dividing with forbearance the good luck from the bad. Figures he’s due.
◊
She Didn’t Think of Herself as Religious
One evening she observed Truth standing off in a corner by the tall Chinese urn upon which was worked a pattern of leaping salmon, watched him stand there smug and translucent, mostly unnoticed. The kitten circled and circled that urn, mesmerized by the predictable, yet elusive fish. An “unexpected quandary” her father is saying, and she has no idea to whom he is speaking, nor what he might mean. Her father is corpulent like Edward the Seventh, though without the mistresses, and to blame beer, burgers, and fries seems unfair unless America counts for more than she heretofore believed. But it is true. America is so busy being imperial—very much like the good king in his later days—that it doesn’t take time to consider this evening’s metaphors loosed by a boy on his bike whose name was Andrew and who’d stopped earlier to ask about a kitten. This was a definition of “quandary,” as well as “unexpected.” To have anchoring words redefined by someone who was not even part of the family—how does this happen? And yet this boy clearly knew this feline creature, seemed to care, was disappointed when we were too busy to conduct a proper search. He was so intent, a real soldier of devotion, and now what if he’s gone missing, too? It’s a rough neighborhood between here and there, and if he gets lost, what chance is there of any one innocent ever finding their way home? Someone tell me, tell us, tell someone.
You were just over there a moment ago, so silent and aloof. Behind the “quandary,” wasn’t it? And what is that? Is it a “quandary” of salmon, or will you call them a school? We need teaching. Remember that urn? A question and a number. Fifty-four comes to mind, and the other is beggared so she must leave them to it, shift the urn, face it away from the clouds where the others will soon be eating from her hand. It is she, isn’t it, who holds the metaphor, trumps every time? The kitten is mewing at the door, the urn leaning towards ambivalence, truth putting on its sunglasses, ready to slip away, slippery as a fish in the silken waters of China. Herself, she has a ticket for Roanoke, a kitty box under her arms, and the boy’s hand in hers. Salvation has less to do with truth than belief. Watch those salmon lift their wings, see the poor, first in line, at the only door that matters, and not “unexpected.”
Marc Harshman’s second full-length collection, Believe What You Can, is out from West Virginia University. Periodical publications include The Georgia Review, Emerson Review, Salamander, and Poetry Salzburg Review. His poems have been anthologized by Kent State University, the University of Iowa, University of Georgia, and University of Arizona. His thirteen children’s books include The Storm, a Smithsonian Notable Book. He was an invited reader at the 2016 Greenwich Book Festival in London. His monthly show for West Virginia Public Radio, The Poetry Break, began airing in January, 2016. He is the poet laureate of West Virginia.
Hear Marc’s piece and more virtual poetry from Cleaver on our SoundCloud podcast On The Edge.
Image credit: Pacto Visual on Unsplash
Brandon Timm is a recent fiction graduate of Southern Illinois University’s MFA program. He currently resides in his home state of Ohio, where he holds a position at a logistics company. His work has been published in ZONE 3 and online at The Carolina Quarterly. He owes much to those family members, friends, and teachers who have supported him, and this is a small, printed thank you to all those who have rooted for him.
Marcia Roberts, originally from South Dakota, has lived many places, including Madrid, Spain; Washington, D.C.; and San Francisco. She now resides in San Antonio, TX, with her husband Len about five houses away from her granddaughter Hannah. Marcia holds a master’s degree in English and Spanish, and she studied Poetics at New College of California. Her chapbooks include Open Eye (Skanky Possum Press), Autumn’s Slant and In the Bird’s Breath (Effing Press), and What She Knows (BlazeVox Books).
Sarah Sarai’s short stories have been published in Gravel, Connotations, Fairy Tale Review, South Dakota Review, New Madrid, The Antigonish Review, Wilderness House, Devil’s Lake, Tampa Review and many other journals. Her MFA in fiction is from Sarah Lawrence College. She is also a poet, with many poems out and about. 
Nadia Laher is a writer living in New Orleans. Her nonfiction has appeared in the Pennsylvania Gazette. Her story “
Nancy Hightower has published short fiction and poetry in journals such as Word Riot, Sundog Lit, Flapperhouse, Cheap Pop, Gargoyle, and Prick of the Spindle. Her first collection of poetry, The Acolyte, was published in 2015 by Port Yonder Press, and she reviewed science fiction and fantasy for The Washington Post from 2014-2016. She is currently working on a book about digital fictions with DJ Spooky and teaches at Hunter College.
Louis Wenzlow’s short canards and poetry have appeared in Cease Cows, Eclectica, The Forge Literary Magazine, International Poetry Review, The Molotov Cocktail, and other places. He is a Lithuanian American who grew up in the suburbs of Chicago and now lives with his wife and daughter in Baraboo, Wisconsin.
Jeanne Murray Walker is the author of eight books of poetry, most recently, Helping the Morning: New and Selected Poems (WordFarm Press). Her poetry and essays have appeared in several hundred journals, including Poetry, The Atlantic Monthly, Christian Century, The American Poetry Review, The Hudson Review, Image, Best American Poetry, and the 100 year anniversary volume of Poetry magazine, The Open Door: 100 Years, 100 Poems. Jeanne, who is the recipient of a number of fellowships as well as 16 nominations for The Pushcart Prize, serves as a mentor in the Seattle Pacific University low residency MFA Program.
Donald Ryan has had work appear in The Topaz Review and The Bicycle Review and received an Honorable Mention from Glimmer Train. He also did editorial work for the forthcoming Tributaries: A Savannah Writers Anthology. Most recently, he’s picked up a job managing a kitchen in Buford, Georgia.
Sean Flood is a writer and poet. His work has appeared in The Bombay Review and Black Ink. Favorite hobbies of his include playing old Nintendo games and daydreaming. Read his poem 
Katy Kim is a student. Her work is forthcoming or published in Tinderbox Poetry Journal, Hermeneutic Chaos, The Blueshift Journal, the Asian American Writers’ Workshop, and has been featured on Verse Daily, among others. Her chapbook, Melon / Echelon is forthcoming from Hermeneutic Chaos Press this year.
Shannon Cothran is a professional food writer who prefers New England’s clam chowder and ice cream to New Orleans’ gumbo and snowballs. 
J. T. Townley has published in Harvard Review, Hayden’s Ferry Review, Prairie Schooner, The Threepenny Review, and other magazines and journals. His stories have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net award. He holds an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of British Columbia and an MPhil in English from Oxford University, and he teaches at the University of Virginia. To learn more, visit 
Elizabeth Morton is a New Zealand writer. She has been published in Poetry NZ, PRISM international, Cordite, JAAM, Shot Glass Journal, Takahe Magazine, Landfall, Atlas, Flash Frontier, Gravel, SmokeLong Quarterly, the Sunday Star Times, Literary Orphans, and in Island Magazine, among others. Her prose is in The Best Small Fictions 2016. Her debut poetry collection is to be published with Mākaro Press this year. In her free time she pens bad rap songs, and collects obscure words in supermarket bags. 
Kristen Brida’s work has appeared or is forthcoming in Hobart, Whiskey Island, Bone Bouquet, REALITY BEACH, and elsewhere. She is the editor-in-chief of the intersectional feminist journal, So to Speak. She is an MFA candidate at George Mason University. She tweets @kissthebrida.
Rachel Oestreich is a Fiction M.F.A. candidate at New Mexico State University, where she received her B.A. in English in 2015. She reads for 
Brenda Butka practices pulmonary medicine and poetry in Nashville, Tennessee, where she and her husband share a small organic farm with a couple of farmers and their cows, goats, chickens, a resident great blue heron and whoever happens to drop in.
C. Wade Bentley teaches and writes in Salt Lake City. His poems have been published or are forthcoming in journals such as Cimarron Review, Best New Poets, Rattle, Antiphon Review, Pembroke Magazine, and Poetry Northwest. A full-length collection of his poems, What Is Mine, was published by Aldrich Press in January of 2015. You may visit 
Tyler Gillespie is the palest Floridian you’ll ever meet. His poems appear in Apogee Journal, Columbia Poetry Review, PANK, Juked, Exposition Review, Hobart, and Prelude, among other places. Find him at 
Emily Paige Wilson’s poetry has been nominated for Best New Poets, Best of the Net, and a Pushcart Prize. Her manuscript was a finalist for the 2016 Hudson Prize from Black Lawrence Press. Her work can be found in The Adroit Journal, The Boiler Journal, Hayden’s Ferry Review, PANK, and Thrush, among others. She lives in Wilmington, NC, where she received her MFA from UNCW, and works as an English adjunct. She rules her life like a fine skylark and is working on her crow pose.
Peter Grandbois is the author of seven books. His poems, stories, and essays have appeared in over seventy journals, including, The Kenyon Review, The Gettysburg Review, and Prairie Schooner, and have been shortlisted for both Best American Essays and the Pushcart Prize. His plays have been performed in St. Louis, Columbus, Los Angeles, and New York. He is a senior editor at Boulevard magazine, fiction co-editor at Phantom Drift, and teaches at Denison University in Ohio.
Madeleine Wattenbarger lives, eats, & writes poems on her phone during crowded metro rides in Mexico City. Her writing has been published in Apiary, Ghost Town and on the Philadelphia Inquirer arts blog, among other places. She is originally from Philadelphia.
Taylor Kobran holds an MFA from Hollins University. Her work has been published in the Nottingham Review, Lunch Ticket, Emerge Literary Journal, the City Quill, and the Ilanot Review. She enjoys spending time with her dog and alphabetizing her overflowing bookcase. She lives in New Jersey.
ALARM
Philadelphia native Sandra Shaw Homer lives in Costa Rica, where for years she wrote a regular column, “Local Color,” for the The Tico Times. Her writing has appeared in several print, online literary, and travel journals, as well as her own blog, 
Kyle Kouri is an MFA candidate in fiction at Columbia University. He also makes visual art. His most recent exhibition, “Long After You’re Gone,” opened at 7 Dunham Gallery in April 2015. 
Jeevika Verma has always fought the odds to unapologetically tell the truth and ask a lot of questions. Her work aims to create conversations surrounding power, art, culture and identity. Originally from India, she recently graduated from the University of Washington and is currently a poet and writer based in Seattle, WA.
Elizabeth Schmidt is a third generation Montanan. She graduated from the University of Montana with a B.A. in Creative Writing in 2015 and will be completing her MFA at Sarah Lawrence College in May. After Sarah Lawrence, she plans on continuing her education. When she is not at school, she binges on movies and TV; lately it’s anything with Billy Bob Thornton. This is her first publication.
Preston Eagan is studying journalism and business at the University of Alabama. He writes columns for the Crimson White. 
Emanuel Melo was born in the Azores and immigrated to Canada at the age of nine. He lives in Toronto. His short stories have been included in 
Michele Leavitt, a poet and essayist, is also a high school dropout, hepatitis C survivor, and former trial attorney. In 2016, her essays appeared in Narratively, Guernica, and Catapult. Poems appear most recently in North American Review, concis, and Hermeneutic Chaos. She’s the author of the Kindle Singles memoir, Walk Away.
Flower Conroy is the author of three chapbooks: Facts About Snakes & Hearts, winner of Heavy Feather Press’ Chapbook Contest; The Awful Suicidal Swans; and Escape to Nowhere. She is the winner of Radar Poetry’s first annual Coniston Prize and the Tennessee Williams Exhibit Poetry Contest, as well as a scholarship recipient of Bread Loaf, Squaw Valley, Napa Valley and the Key West Literary Seminar. Her poetry has appeared/is forthcoming in American Literary Review, Prairie Schooner, Gargoyle and others.
Christine Hennessey’s writing has appeared in Necessary Fiction, The Boiler, Bodega, Prime Number, and LIT, among others. She’s been awarded fellowships to Aspen Summer Words and the Vermont Studio Center, has an MFA from UNC Wilmington, and works at a digital marketing agency where she basically tweets for a living. She is, as always, at work on a novel. 
Nina Sabolik’s fiction and essays have appeared in Litro and on the World Literature Today blog. She has master’s degrees in Creative Writing and Comparative Literature from Arizona State University and holds a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from the University of Ss. Cyril and Methodius in Skopje, Macedonia. She is working on a novel.
Ajay Patri is a lawyer and writer from Bangalore, India. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in Eunoia Review, Storgy Magazine, Spelk, Toasted Cheese Literary Journal, and Every Day Fiction, among others. He is currently working on his first book.
Sydney Tammarine is (depending on the day) a Spanish teacher, translator, and writer currently pursuing her MFA at Hollins University. She once convinced a frozen yogurt company to run a coupon series she wrote all about yeti feet. Her work has appeared in Quiz & Quill and The Missing Slate, and her most recent book of literary translations, Diez Odas para Diez Grabados, is forthcoming in Santiago, Chile, from Taller 99.
Youssef Helmi is currently a sophomore studying Creative Writing at Florida State University. Although he hasn’t been published before, his mother once hung one of his stories on the fridge, and he thinks that’s a close second. When not writing, Youssef enjoys lifting weights, watching Wes Anderson movies, and musing over the musical merits of death metal. 