The rain pelted the window as I typed the last few pages of my manuscript. It was past midnight, and I had been working for hours with a cold cup of coffee on my desk. My agent advised that it would be in my best interest to have it ready by tomorrow morning, my first novel.

I didn’t have a chance to hit save before the power outage.

From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher

I dreamt my mother’s voice became a flood in the hallway, walls bowing to her words. I held a paper bird to shield myself, and it tore in my hands, scattering wings across the shallow floors. Waves of her lullabies chased me through rooms that stretched into the sky, where I ran barefoot over glass clouds, each step echoing familiar fear. When the storm softened, I found a small window of light, where I could breathe without drowning. I reached out, and it grew until it swallowed the echoes, leaving only the warmth of my own hand on my chest.

From Guest Contributor Taylor Brann

Taylor studies sociology at Pikes Peak State College and writes poetry that traces the landscapes of memory, family, and the human heart.

The new boy lived in the old house on top of the hill. The house was abandoned years ago and every kid knew it was seriously haunted. If you rode your bike by at night, a witch could be seen standing in the window.

When it turned out the new boy’s parents were vampires, and every family in town was killed except the Landovers, it seemed a particularly harsh punishment.

I wake up and it’s almost dark. I hear boom…boom…boom. I think it’s the raccoons jumping across the roof on their way to look for food. Maybe it’s the wind, the porch swing hitting the house, fireworks for some forgotten holiday or the war we’ve been waiting for but when I pull back the curtain on the window in the door, each rectangle of glass is a piece of your thumping heart, the size of a car, its feathery periwinkle veins like map-rivers, red finger-branches steady, wrapping down around the lower chambers, stamping the glass with tree patterns, knocking. Asking.

From Guest Contributor Brook Bhagat

Brook (she/her) is the author of Only Flying, a Pushcart-nominated collection of surreal poetry and flash fiction on paradox, rebellion, transformation, and enlightenment from Unsolicited Press. Her work has won contests and appeared in Monkeybicycle, Empty Mirror, Soundings East, Anthem: A Tribute to Leonard Cohen, and elsewhere. Two new collections, Exodus with Red Delicious and I Drink from an Ear: Real Ghazals, are forthcoming from Unsolicited Press in 2026 and 2027. She is a founding editor of Blue Planet Journal, the founder and facilitator of The Nearby Universe writers’ group, and a professor of creative writing at Pikes Peak State College.

The Nazis arrived in Poland stomping down the street showing their authority. My mother was in the kitchen cooking dinner, the smell of vegetables wafting in the air, and my father had the radio on listening to the broadcast of the invasion. I sat next to him and stared out the window. For no apparent reason, one of the soldiers kicked a man that stood on the sidewalk with I’m assuming his young daughter. The girl screamed when the man collapsed in a heap. Was this the world now? No one was safe.

The next day I joined the resistance.

From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher

George’s wait–a few moments or a million years, it’s difficult to tell the difference–comes to an end as his number is called. The angel at his window looks over his paperwork perfunctorily before giving his folder the rubber stamp.

“Being good isn’t enough. Like I said, we’re exclusive.”

Dr. Billows pressed Go on his time machine. Inside the vessel nothing happened. But through the window, everything in his lab stretched and distorted into a brilliant mixture of light and darkness, indicating he was tunneling into space time. His calculations had been correct, at least the first part.

He emerged into his laboratory exactly one day earlier. Confronted with his past self, he told himself not to ask Dr. Morgan on a date later that night.

Dave and Heather sat in cafe and looked at their phones. There was a lot David wanted to say, but the place was crowded and he didn’t want to be overheard.

So much for promises.

There was a knock on the cabin door.

Her worst fears were realized. There was a man out there.

The first thing I did last night was set the alarm for seven o’clock in the morning. I didn’t know the snow the weather forecaster predicted was going to start so early.

When I awakened later that afternoon, the snow ceased, and the sun shined.

From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher