Short Stories

John of Mine

Acknowledged by The Writing District in 2018, John of Mine captures the tired intimacy between Maggie and her coal miner husband.

“Maggie’s head rests in the damp palm of her hand as her cherry red nails pick at her lower lip. She half-listens as a serial drones across the kitchen, abuzz with monotone fantasies of a brighter tomorrow, a better today, a different yesterday.”

Nature’s Clowns

Featured in the 2017 edition of The Laurel, Nature’s Clowns follows the internal dialogue of a weary priest.

“Tap tap tap. Why did he have to say the zoo? Of all the possible things he could have been doing. It’s like some bad joke. If only he knew a Rabbi and a Minister to go along with him. And of course she knows all about the zoo. She has a season pass, she says. Takes her grandson twice a month, she says. And oh, how he loves to watch the otters play. If you can’t make dinner, you just have to see the otters, Kevin. It is so funny to watch them pretend to be people. They’re nature’s clowns.”

God-Drum

Featured in the 2017 edition of The Laurel, God-Drum is set on a 105 degree day at Warped Tour.

“It was a stampede, locked arm in arm, howling with crackling, failing voices torn from our chests. We ran faster and faster in a massive circle until the stage disappeared in a cyclonic brown haze, and then the sky. The sky had been consumed by the sun, but we the beast had blacked it out by worship to the god-drum.”