George Saunders
- Sticks
He ran lengths of string between the pole and the sticks, and taped to the string letters of apology, admissions of error, pleas for understanding, all written in a frantic hand on index cards. He painted a sign saying LOVE and hung it from the pole and another that said FORGIVE? and then he died in the hall with the radio on and we sold the house to a young couple who yanked out the pole and the sticks and left them by the road on garbage day.
George Saunders
- The Falls
They were dead. They were frantic, calling out to him, but they were dead, as dead as the ancient dead and he was alive, he was needed at home, it was a no-brainer, no one could possibly blame him for this one, and making a low sound of despair in his throat he kicked off his loafers and threw his long ugly body out across the water.
Polaris
- Crooked Path
There are ghosts in every window, and they'll follow you back home. But if you stay a moment, I can tell you all I know, of how these times have changed us, how they bring us to our knees, how they send us down the crooked path, divide us temporarily.
Clementine von Radics
- The Lion
There is a lion in my living room. I feed it raw meat so it does not hurt me. It is a strange thing to nourish what could kill you in the hopes that it does not kill you. We have lived like this, it and I, for so many years. Sometimes it feels like we have always lived like this. Sometimes I think I have always been like this.
Laura Gilpin
- Two-Headed Calf
Tomorrow when the farm boys find this freak of nature, they will wrap his body in newspaper and carry him to the museum. But tonight he is alive and in the north field with his mother. It is a perfect summer evening: the moon rising over the orchard, the wind in the grass. And as he stares into the sky, there are twice as many stars as usual.
