New World Writing Quarterly

Everyone just calls me Al.  Well, not every­one, exact­ly, as I do not have that many friends here in this coun­try, but all those who do call me Al.  You can call me Al.

It makes me laugh how mixed up you Americans are.  You get every­thing so com­plete­ly –more

There’s noth­ing quite like the Chinese edu­ca­tion­al sys­tem, where by the very same for­mu­las that are drilled in the stu­dents’ heads day in and day out, con­crete “this-is-the-answer” study­ing is added and mul­ti­plied to com­pose a sin­gle ado­les­cen­t’s entire –more

*
Each night this neck­lace cools
till its fever smells from silk
cov­ers the dirt with buttons

and sleeves help­ing you reach
for a stone small enough to swallow
though it’s her mouth that’s lifted

that stakes every­thing on a sin­gle rock
for shore­line –just like that! a tiny pill
tak­en with water and you find yourself

Standing, hunched, in his bed­room, he would plan to pack the bare essentials—one pair each of under­wear and socks, one t‑shirt for each day, one pair of jeans, a col­lared shirt—but would end up frus­trat­ed, confused.

Which under­wear, for exam­ple, –more

Gavin, a mid­dle school his­to­ry teacher, stood in line at the super­mar­ket, duck­ing his head, try­ing to go unno­ticed. Though he only had a few items, he hat­ed the self-check machines, afraid he’d make a mis­take or the price would­n’t ring up right. Some –more

Gently, Dr. Sukimoto sug­gests it is time for Sharon to get her affairs in order. Dr. Sukimoto is her favorite oncol­o­gist. The flaps of hair on either side of his face remind her of the soft ears of a bea­gle. When he says these words, Sharon, whose –more

A coun­try grows, waters its deserts, rais­es its chil­dren, cul­ti­vates trees, con­structs cities, opens schools, equips hos­pi­tals, defends its bor­ders, builds sky­scrap­ers, pro­grams its com­put­ers, fights a nec­es­sary war, accepts immi­grants, starts busi­ness­es, –more

Pull the weeds, I hear my land­la­dy say. She likes to give strict instruc­tions to her man, so much so that I’ve been inspect­ing him from my kitchen win­dow to see if I can fig­ure out if he is a sub­mis­sive. He is no hunk but there seems to be some­thing –more

Crosswalk

I nev­er see her any­more, but I remem­ber what she said.  We were near the end of our sec­ond date, stand­ing at a cross­walk.  On our first date, we’d been on our best behav­ior, so I’d post­poned any con­clu­sions.  We’d both been divorced for over –more

Faces round a fire call back spin­ning wheels, pull up that throb­bing glow, the hiss of drip­ping sul­phur on a grade of crush run gravel.

Fourth of July and they thought it’d be a kick to stick pieces of bust­ed lum­ber to the back of my bicy­cle, –more

I don’t remem­ber how old I was. I think it was the sum­mer between fifth and sixth grades. I don’t remem­ber Tony going to Erwine Middle School, although there was a boy there with dark hair and a big nose who car­ried a brief­case to class and remind­ed –more

Worms

I took myself to the out­door shop­ping cen­ter when the urges got real­ly bad. The unwel­com­ing way they made you slide your car into a spot was just the begin­ning. Women wear­ing pas­tel polo shirts hand­ed out sam­plers that scorched my heart. Men with –more

The macabre scene looked like a Halloween prank to the toll tak­er. Then she saw the blood. – St. Petersburg Times, 2005

Manny is cross­ing 34th Street, mak­ing a list of things to pay for—flowers, music, dress, –more

I received The World’s Biggest Piece of Shit Award in 1990. My name was writ­ten on the award in fan­cy cal­lig­ra­phy. In front of the whole class, Mrs. Kerris, our English teacher, hand­ed me the award. She wasn’t wor­ried about get­ting fired, as she –more

Theo sat in the tiny din­ing room next to the kitchen, try­ing to con­cen­trate on a book he want­ed to read for a long time now. In lieu of a din­ing set, there was a bur­gundy reclin­er and a small round table that once sat in the break­fast nook. His twen­ty-six –more

It was their own damn fault for day­time drink­ing. You don’t wave wads of cash around in front of a woman who can’t afford to buy the drug that keeps her alive and not expect her to grab it as fast as she can.

The first cou­ple she stole from was so nice. –more

The din­ing room, elec­tric with the shift­ing of wool and the sta­t­ic that hums over the tables in the form of spec­u­la­tion and vibrat­ing con­ver­sa­tion, leans towards the impor­tant ones as they enter and take their seats at the tables.

As usu­al, we’ve –more

Wayne knows that the Atlanta-Fulton Public Library down­town opens at 10 a.m. on Tuesday-Saturday and nev­er one minute ear­li­er, not even when it’s rain­ing and there are a dozen plus-cit­i­zens wait­ing to get inside. The build­ing is eight sto­ries, cube-shaped, –more

Another head poked through the small open­ing in the door. This time it belonged to Rory, the flop­py-haired kid from next door. He was wear­ing a Santa hat and didn’t say any­thing to James, who lay on the bed with his hands behind his head and –more

The hos­pi­tal where Petra was born, her moth­er would lat­er tell her, ran out of drugs the week of her birth­day, so her moth­er screamed for hours, and her father, at work fil­ing papers, swore he could hear the shrieks echo­ing across the entire city. –more