“The David Foster Wallace Empathy Contest” – Fiction by Wm. Samuel Bradford

Excerpts, Fiction, Flappertising, Flappricana, , ,
Sea Turtle - Mike Brice, 2014
Sea Turtle – Mike Brice, 2014

“The David Foster Wallace Empathy Contest” (contributed by Wm. Samuel Bradford for our Spring 2015 issue) is not merely a satirical homage to the work & fans of David Foster Wallace, it’s also a touching story of camaraderie and survival in a harsh, chaotic world.

{ X }

IN ITS LAST YEAR, WALLACEFEST HAD ONLY THREE ATTENDEES. The event was advertised as “an alcohol-free weekend of mutual appreciation for Wallace’s principles.” For Roland, it was a balls-to-the-wall competition.

Roland, Jon, and Bendiks sat on the pier behind the beach house rented for the occasion. They had just released the live lobsters they had purchased from a restaurant.

Roland, who had long ago realized that his looks and wit impressed no one, had latched onto Wallace fandom as his chance to be noticed. He had spent his inheritance building the no-kill dog shelter Wallace had allegedly dreamed of. He called it the David Wallace Foster House. No one would outdo him.

“So, I mean, I just felt so much gratitude. It wasn’t revealed by D or bolstered by D–it was, like, caused by D,” Roland said.

As Roland spoke, Jon spooned pureed squash into the lipless mouth of Bendiks. He had pointed Bendiks’s wheelchair to face the sunset, even though Bendiks’s eyes were rolled back in his head behind closed, twitching eyelids.

“How did you and Bendiks meet?” Roland asked.

Jon took a swig of non-alcoholic beer and wiped the rubber-capped spoon.

“So this new Latvian woman works with me in the lab. We wanted her to feel a part of the group, so we listened to Latvian folk music on internet radio while we worked. The lab started to get into it–all the zithers and stuff. It’s cool. Anyway, one day we’re listening and this news report begins, and the Latvian woman was like ‘Jesus Christ! Jesus Christ!’ and no one else speaks Latvian, and we’re all like ‘What is it, Dagnija?’ and she starts telling us about the report.

“You know bath salts, the drug? Well, it had just hit Latvia, and this kid had taken a ton of bath salts and went into a pet store and like, went nuts. He started eating puppies. I’m talking, like, eating them alive. Then he bites himself. Chunks of his arms. He bent over and bit his calves off. He bit his own lips off.”

Continue reading “The David Foster Wallace Empathy Contest” – Fiction by Wm. Samuel Bradford →

“Reset Your Heart” – Poetry by Bud Smith

Excerpts, Flappertising, Flappricana, Poetry, ,
Jack of Hearts - Olga Rozanova, 1915
Jack of Hearts – Olga Rozanova, 1915

“Reset Your Heart,” Bud Smith‘s poem from our Spring 2015 issue, is thick with unforgettable imagery and indispensable life advice.

{ X }

FORGET YOUR NAME. Hold your heart in your palm till it finally
stops.
“Friends may know you better than you know yourself”

Fling silver key to City into sewer.
Deny mountain of problems: call them routine riots; daily
avalanche; plain life, ordinary fire.
“Friends may know you better than you know”

Flip a doctor’s desk.
Sip sap from a falling tree, domino’n the rest of the forest.
Circle a lost love with a chalk line on the sperm bank sidewalk.
“Friends may know better than you”

Check out of abandoned hospital.
Eat a million marshmallows, not a single soggy Cheerio.
Avoid tears any smaller than a soft ball.
Dump paint thinner on car; wolf out in red moonlight,
lurking down twitching street.
“You may know better”

Continue reading “Reset Your Heart” – Poetry by Bud Smith →

“A Lesser Cement” – Fiction by Anna Lea Jancewicz

Excerpts, Fiction, Flappertising, Flappricana, , , , ,

In some ways, “A Lesser Cement” (Anna Lea Jancewicz‘s flash fiction from our Spring 2015 issue) is a love story like countless others. But in other ways, it’s a unique love story– particularly in the way that it’s about a girl who marries a hammer.

{ X }

THERE WAS A GIRL WHO MARRIED A HAMMER. At first, it seemed like a pretty great idea. He was the strong and silent type. She found him on Craigslist, and he only cost her five bucks. She knew he was used, but she had a checkered past herself, one she didn’t want to talk about, so that part was okay. Their first date was awesome. She made a huge pot of matzo ball soup and they lay on her couch, binge-watching Firefly in its entirety. He didn’t complain when she ate all the matzo balls, and she never had to pause the show for him to take pee breaks or get beers. When he fell asleep on the couch, she covered him with a freshly laundered dish towel, tucking it under his sloping claw. He looked serene in the blue television glow. She was sure they’d be very happy together.

She liked his soft rubber grip, the way it fit perfectly in her hand, as if they were made for each other. Things could get a little rough in the bedroom, but it wasn’t so bad. He cracked one of her molars, but she liked that she could sit at her desk at her job during the day tonguing the sharp edge of the broken tooth and thinking about him. It felt like a barnacle. She was glad he never discarded used cotton swabs on the bathroom floor or insisted on listening to NPR when he rode in her car, because she liked to rock out. She was glad he didn’t make fun of her when she didn’t know how to fix something on her computer and it took her a long time to do it. She liked that he had no misguided opinions about female underarm hair equating to lax hygiene. He didn’t snore. He didn’t smugly correct the way she mispronounced certain words that she’d only ever read but never heard aloud.

Continue reading “A Lesser Cement” – Fiction by Anna Lea Jancewicz →

In the Shadow Under the Green Visor

Flappertising, Flappricana, , ,

We always had a hunch that Ignatius Reilly might be a fan of our work.

1507934_330524277144987_961751623513221202_n

“She Used to Be on a Milk Carton” – Poetry by Kailey Tedesco

Excerpts, Flappertising, Flappricana, Poetry, ,
Girls in the Surf With Moon Casting a Shadow - Joan Brown, 1962
Girls in the Surf With Moon Casting a Shadow – Joan Brown, 1962

“She Used to Be on a Milk Carton” is one of two wonderfully surreal poems by Kailey Tedesco featured in our Spring 2015 issue.

{ X }

SOMETIMES I TALK TO A GIRL WHO HAS THE MOON STUCK
between her teeth like the wedge of an orange.

This girl is all moon, I think – when she moves
the ocean is clearer in my conch shell.

There were only stars where she was and when
asked where she belongs and she says anywhere

but the sky and that she misses
her pearls: Where are they?

She was pleased when I handed her a costume
strand, but it made her look even more moony.

At night, I see her waning, and constellations
could skitter to the planet with a single tug.

{ X }

Headshot UpdateKAILEY TEDESCO is currently enrolled in Arcadia University’s MFA in Poetry program. She edits for Lehigh Valley Vanguard and Marathon Literary Magazine, while also teaching eighth grade English. A long-time flapper at heart, Kailey enjoys hanging out  in speakeasies, cemeteries, and abandoned amusement parks for all of her poetic inspiration. She is a resident poet of the aforementioned LVV, and her work has been featured in Boston Poetry Magazine and Jersey Devil Press. 

We’re Making the Lists…

Flappertising, Flappricana,

Hey cool, we’re making some lists!

We were just added to the database over at the esteemed Review Review, and renowned fantasy author Piers Anthony has also included us on his list of internet publishers. “I was told about this so am listing it though I haven’t looked it up yet,” Mr. Anthony writes of us. “A report is that they responded in about three days and pay pretty well.” (We suppose we do pay “pretty well,” compared to most online publishers at least; however, while we’ve been known to respond in three days or less on occasion, we generally need a bit longer than that.)

“The Burning Moon” – Poetry by Jasper Lo

Excerpts, Flappertising, Flappricana, Poetry, ,
Strong Dream - Paul Klee, 1929
Strong Dream – Paul Klee, 1929

“The Burning Moon” is one of two haunting yet beautiful poems by Jasper Lo featured in our Spring 2015 issue.

{ X }

LAST NIGHT, I DREAMT
the blue moon
caught fire. Its marble

craters formed
Greek columns as fire consumed
each pillar, pulling its Ionic scrolls

into the dark carpet sky.
As it burned,
I lay pushing against the ground,

watching a patrol breathe fog
into their chemical masks.
I flipped down my night vision goggle

and watched quietly as my squad pulled
me closer to our exit; my hip sliding
and my legs shimmying

towards the entrance
of a tunnel.
The moon breathed, burning

more violently, sobbing
combustion. Touching
the door, I turned to see a figure

hoisted in a carry, illuminated
by the patrol’s lights. Then I sprinted
arriving at the stairway’s

secluded base where my body
weight became unbearable
and my stomach dived.

Last night, I dreamt
the cheesy blue moon immolated-
and I watched it burn.

{ X }

Jasper ProfileJASPER LO is a Chinese-American twenty-something US Army veteran. He is recovering from the trauma of being raised Chinese in New York and is a graduate of Boston University.

Shiny Red Stars, Please

Flappricana

By the way, our book & all our zines are now listed on Goodreads, so if you use that site & have read any of our issues & would care to give us any shiny red stars , we would be ever so grateful. (Even if it’s just one star. We know we’re not everyone’s cup of tea.)

“Khepri” – Poetry by Sally J. Johnson

Excerpts, Flappertising, Flappricana, Poetry, ,
Wall painting of Khepri - Author unknown, circa 2nd Millennium BC
Wall painting of Khepri – Artist unknown, circa 2nd Millennium BC

“Khepri” is a scarab-headed sun god, and the inspiration for one of two poems by Sally J. Johnson featured in our Spring 2015 issue. 

{ X }

BORN FULLY FORMED
I can tell you about coming
into being about birthing
out bodies from sun shit and earth
to rise again and emerge whole
from darkness from dung from
the lungs of dirt do not stand
witness against me sing my scarab sisters
into the skin of the dead I am born
of the underworld to show you light
lifting my burden across the burning
sky I am born buried
born again alive
in knowing my time

I’ll embalm your beautiful sun
give you darkness at dawn
I’ll tug at your eyelashes
with my antennae wake you
every day until you die

{ X }

SallyJSALLY J. JOHNSON received her MFA from the University of North Carolina at Wilmington where she served as Managing Editor for the award-winning literary journal Ecotone. Her poetry and nonfiction have appeared or are forthcoming in the Collagist, Bodega, the Pinch, Weave, So to Speak, Everyday Genius and elsewhere. She is a poetry editor for Green Briar Review and works as a publicist in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Find her online:@sallyjayjohnson.