The Blue Nib Literary Magazine

Their bodies are worn out, but their hearts are still stronger than iron. Etched upon their wrinkled faces is the pain of an unjust time.

Now he carries the backpack, spacesuit and helmet to the garage, stowing them in the capsule. From somewhere in the house he hears a muffled bang that might be a door slamming, or something else.

His table at the kafeneion was left unoccupied, out of respect. Kalliope, who still leased the corner kiosk selling newspapers and cigarettes, wept. He had been her favourite customer, because of his quiet courtesy.

Benny opens mouth to brush teeth. I sit scowling between bottom incisors. Tongue hangs over me like umbrella. Drool drips around me. He looks happy. Glad someone is happy.

Unfortunately, before the documentary can be completed, he meets his demise—along with the entire crew—via a roving violent disinformed Capitalist mob of #MeMyself&I...

The fog was thick at half past three, so when I walked into the street, I imagined this was how it must feel to live in the ear canal of a giant.

He seems not to hear the rasping squeak of the screen door opening to produce two children who tread softly to stand immobile in the chemically green grass like lawn statuary, beardless garden gnomes in cartoon pajamas.

Strange how it’s the names of things, the nouns, that leak away. You’d think words that are some of the first we learn – teddy, milk, ball, hat – would be more embedded

They swayed to the beat and sent currents through the room, bumped us into each other, into dances that weren’t quite accidental but seemed that way.

'Had I not offered the Frisbee man my stare, the brief but unsettling vision of his feather-topped head in my fridge, then he probably wouldn’t have veered off course and found the Frisbee, and the perfect woman'