Always I can see them on the horizon. First they rise high above the skyscrapers, and then they dive down like frenzied birds feeding on a school of fish. The power of their bodies is immense. I thought they wouldn’t look quite so indestructible from above. I was wrong. As our jets raced overhead, I …
Monthly Archives: July 2017
Fiction: ‘The Cowardly Soldier’
Under the torchlight, the clearing is filled with an amber glow. The wind is still and all is quiet. Through the branches that arch across the sky, there are thousands of stars glinting in the night. But he doesn’t notice these things. He can’t see the moon ripening into a golden orb, or the snowy …
Fiction: ‘Trip of a Lifetime’
The suffocating smell of incense wafts through the curtain of colourful beads hanging across the doorway. She feels ridiculous for even coming in. But it’s warm inside the little building and the glow of flickering candles is inviting. She takes a deep breath once. Twice. And then parts the beaded strings and steps into the …
Fiction: ‘The Tulip’
All my life I’ve been told the story of the tulip that had grown from the pavement, but I never really believed it until I saw it for myself. She was as enchanting as a fairy tale. Her bright red petals were awash with orange and gold so that she burned like a sunrise in …
Fiction: ‘Paradise’
He chips away at the stone with a blunt axe, pausing only to brush away the flakes which have built up around him. His hands are coarse and weathered. The skin on his palms is a patchwork of callouses, each at varying stages of healing. He stops to look up at the roughly hewn ceiling …
Fiction: ‘Firebug’
Skeletal trees splashed with silver and charcoal glare down upon the winding road. If you stand on the very crest of the hill, they look like an army of charred trunks and twisted limbs. No animals move about within the shadows. No birds nest in the trunks of the trees. No insects make a sound …
