The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
CongenersBy Michael C. Keith QuailBellMagazine.com A boy’s will is the wind’s will. –– Henry Wadsworth Longfellow There is blood on the palm of my hand. It scares me, and I begin to cry. I’ve just climbed over a rusty chain link fence, which is part of a shortcut from the playground to my house. I walk the rest of the block home clenching my injured hand and spot my mother standing on the stone steps to the Albany brownstone where we live. She notices me coming and moves in my direction. By the time we’re together, I’m gulping back tears.
“What’s the matter?” she inquires. There is concern as well as irritation in her expression. “My hand. It’s all bloody. Look!” I unclench my fist and display my wound. By now there are only faint indigo stains running from my wrist to my fingers, and the injury looks far less ominous. “Oh, it’s nothing, a little scrape. Stop crying. Don’t be such a baby. You’re seven years old, for Heaven’s sake,” she says, shaking her head. The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
Caught in the Rip TideDirector: Lindsey Story Photographer: Jasmine Thompson Stylists: Sidney Shuman and Amy Gatewood Writer: Christine Stoddard Models: Terrio Weathers and Taylor Smith QuailBellMagazine.com Many marshes ago, I fell in love
with a stranded siren too far from the sea. The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
Never the CraterBy Jessica Reidy QuailBellMagazine.com Soft land here in deep relief, in Daguerre’s gift to the free world. A red face blows air, drinks moon-grown flowers: perennial/ dangerous. The seeds roll along my fingers, propelled by the opalescent film. Ice breaks on the high ridge, whitening bones in the distance, darkening everything else. Trinkets kept for impressions or safety—grasses and grazing. Even paper leaves are chewed as a lasting morsel. Fire pours into the valley once a river, sucking air over coaling mountains, over bottles of rain. Meat hangs from racks in the cabin invisible from this angle; salt warms in the ash-bitten dark. Hunger faces me like teeth. The alabaster dog has a woman somewhere weeping with glass in her hands. I open my palm, cutting along the middle star. Put back the stolen symbols: black hen, blue otter. Things are strange from this point onward. I wanted to see a cactus sprouting unbidden. See the rusted expanse of mouths opening under rattle-stones, and sand. But there is not much else to say of the unseen. The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
Flower PowerDirector: Tykeya O'Neil
Photographer: Jasmine Thompson Stylists: Sidney Shuman and Lindsey Story Makeup: Rachel Thibault Model: Olivia Walthall QuailBellMagazine.com The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
Secret ShoresDirected by Christine Stoddard Music by Amanda Pryce QuailBellMagazine.com |