Breadcrumb #241

DEVIN KELLY

Inside my body is a body
where I keep my body.
Inside the room I hold my body
– prone, dying fish, wanderer
exhausted –
with the hands of my other
body & listen for the sound
of the living breathing
through the walls. Outside
the window. Smoking on the fire
escape. Once I escaped
the first hole I dug for myself
I watched the sun descend
into the hole that is the other side
of the world & spent
my whole life chasing it
by moving deeper into my body.
When I entered the room
I walked through the door
of your mouth with my mouth.
We breathed together & our breath
gave life to flowers. I once
read a story of a man
who grew a fir tree
in his lung. Our bodies
are worlds & these worlds
war as worlds do. They live
& die. They toil against their walls.
So much in us struggles
with so much in us. If there is truth
at all, it must be this. You hung
frames on empty walls
in an empty room. The frames,
filled with pictures of you
in other rooms. When finished,
you held your knees to your chest
& waited for them to fall.
I was just outside the door.
The importance, I wanted to say,
is that there is anything
worth breaking. I opened
the door & brought the outside
with me & it felt like all
we don’t know feels –
silent, trembling, a thin
vibration rippling the dark water
of the sky. I found you
when the room balanced before
the idea of becoming the ruin
of a room. We live here, now,
in this act of balancing. Here,
where all things
extend toward all things
but never touch. Isn’t it
beautiful? All night
we hold each other
without knowing
we hold each other.

• • •

Breadcrumb #240

MEGAN KONIKOWSKI

Endless pavement descends into the depths of the smoky sun. 
One unforgiving beam cuts through haze,
pulling at the already cracked, artificial surface.

A tree-
hollow and uprooted-
curls towards the earth from which it once stood. 

She listens to hear that boom-
those feet-
sliding through the blades. 

Beneath the mist from that busted flood light,
Baby feasts
on solitude and peace.

Trails of ash stream from the stoves
of forgotten moments
as the hearth bakes the bricks of time. 

A fire rages in the night.
The Willow declares, 
“I am here.“

• • •

Breadcrumb #239

ADAM GANONG

It was lunch hour and as always the schoolyard was dividing itself into two factions; oh sure, there was a slight flavour of boys vs girls (“They don't wear makeup or come from Earth”, I’d heard one of the girls whisper to a friend once; I knew what she was talking about). But that was not the true division the tore each of us young, runny nosed, bright eyed kids apart. Honestly the divide changed from week to week, but this week it was Kara Varnor, explorer of the great beyond.

    Kara Varnor was a cartoon, it was a 4d animation, and if you don’t know what that is, so sorry but I really don’t have time to explain. There was us, the ones who thought that Kaylee was the best sidekick on the show and… them, the kids who thought that Gizelle was the better.

    “It’s a dark day my friend,” Nelson said. We were standing at the top f the tall red slide that looked a little like an elephant and a lot like something that you can only imagine made us kids giggle and blush. He was our leader, and was about as stoic as a 7 year old comes. He had an empty toilet paper roll to his eyes and was scanning the battlefield complete with jungle gym and swings. His nose was running.”We’ve lose the southmost sandbox. Bebe was in there, god bless her soul.”

    “She knew the risks.” I said.

    “But still.” He lowered the roll. “No pudding cup should outlast its owner.”

    There was a tug on my sleeve and I turned. I didn’t mean to recoil, it was an honest mistake and it’s something I think about to this day, but the androids dark steely eyes were always disarming. They weren’t bad they were just... different, and kids have a way of recoiling from the different

    “I’d like to help,” he said.

    I opened my mouth to speak, to say (by reaction, I didn't truly believe this) that we had no place for him. Nelson stepped forward and put his hand on my shoulder, “And we could use your help,” he said

    The android smiled. 

    He has a name, you know. I called him the android back then, but his name was Virginia Woolf. His parents had an odd algorithm for naming. For the same reason I didn't know his name, I protested. Nelson smiled and shook his head.

    “When it comes to the schoolyard,” Nelson said, “We need all the help we can get. We’ll call you bin. That’s your code name” Bin nodded, and smiled shyly.

     The attack was sudden. A spitball the likes of which I’ve never seen slapped into the side of the slide with a sickening “Thwack’. We dived behind the elephant ear/testicular outcropping that was at the top of the slide. We all peaked around. Susie was the sentry, and we watched as in slow motion a wet wad of destiny slapped into the side of her face.

    “God, no. Susie.” Nelson whispered. He wiped away a tear and took a sip from his juice box. It was grape.

“Susie was the sentry, and we watched as in slow motion a wet wad of destiny slapped into the side of her face.”

    The android took his hand off (this was normal for us, mind you.” And a kite came out. I watched stunned as it slowly reeled up towards the sky, like a string of handkerchiefs coming from a clown's sleeve. It soared upwards and I was so lost in the beauty I neglected the intent. 

    “7 near the swings. 1 is flanking us from behind.” Bin said.

    “How did you-”

    “Camera,” he said, smiling. “Attached to the kite. I can see the whole schoolyard.”

    I was surprised. In that moment I’d forgotten he was an android. Maybe because kids have short attention spans, but maybe it was just because I was able to see him in the same light you get to see any kid cowering form a spit ball.

    Nelson nodded, and crushed his juice box. “Let’s roll,” he said.

    Then the bell rang, and the war was postponed. The friendship, continued however.

• • •

Breadcrumb #238

JENNA KNORR

Mom says the world is ending, but I am flying my kite. We’ve been watching the sun get big for a few days now. It’s been really bright for the past month or so but ever since Monday it looks like it’s a lot bigger in the sky and mom says that that’s because it is. She says that it’s going to keep getting bigger and bigger until it touches Earth and then we’ll all be a part of the sun.

    I like that mom is letting me fly my kite outside in the yard behind our house. We didn’t have to go to school today. I think the man on TV said that we shouldn’t be outside when the sun is growing, but I don’t like doing anything inside as much as I like flying my kite. My teachers even let me fly my kite at school, at recess, when the other kids are playing games that I don’t like. My mom says that I just don’t have the patience for them, but that I have the patience for kites, and that’s why I’m allowed to bring one from home. I don’t know if mom means that I don’t have the patience for the other kids or if I don’t have the patience for their games, but I know that I have the patience for my kites.

“She says that it’s going to keep getting bigger and bigger until it touches Earth and then we’ll all be a part of the sun.”

    I’m flying my yellow one today, it’s my favourite. Plus it’s like the colour of the sun in the sky, so I like the way it looks when I look up. Two yellow shapes. A diamond and a circle. The diamond gets smaller as I let out the string. The circle gets bigger.

    I know I’m different from the other kids at my school, the ones my age who don’t play with kites anymore. The other girls don’t even want to talk about kites; they like the way they look and they like to pretend that they don’t like boys, but I know they do. They tease the boys because the boys don’t wear makeup, they say that the boys don’t come from Earth and that they come from Mars instead. I’m pretty sure that that’s not true, but I do know that we’re all on Earth right now, and that Earth is the world, and that the world is ending.

    I hear my mom calling me from the house so I swing my head to look. She is screaming my name and she is crying. My dad is standing behind her, holding her tight, and he is crying, too, but he isn’t saying anything. I feel a rush of heat on the back of my head so I turn back to look at my kite. It is touching the sun. The string burns and falls slowly to the ground and as I watch, I become part of the sun, too.

• • •

Breadcrumb #237

BOB RAYMONDA

She stands at the bar, surveying her surroundings. She’s never been in a place such as this: the intergalactic hub at opposite end of her Solar System. A barkeep passes by with what looks like a towel thrown over its shoulder. She motions for another one of the turquoise looking concoctions that stands drained in front of her. 

    She’ll need the liquid courage if she plans to allow anyone around her to approach.

    “Is this your first time, honey?” asks a twelve foot tall monster, with a head so high up she can barely make out what few facial features it has. “Let me buy you something to eat.”

    “I’m fine, thanks,” she says, sipping at the drink in front of her. Salty, with a hint of hazelnut, which settles into a burning sensation that stretches all the way from her throat down to her toes.

    It holds out a giant, leathery tentacle, which she grasps, shaking with all of the power she can muster.

    Confused, it grunts, “What do you think you’re doing, miss?”

    She glances down at her hand, still grasping the slimy thing in front of her, when she notices a second drink down on the bar next to her own. She lets it go, and whispers, “Oh, I’m so sorry.”

    Something reverberates throughout the entire building, and she thinks it might be this thing’s attempt at laugher. Or disgust, she couldn’t be sure. Other patrons around them stop mid conversation for a moment to gawk, before returning to mind their own business.

    Without another word, her new friend slinks off, sidling up to another woman across the room. She isn’t sure whether she should be offended or relieved, but in the moment decides for the latter.

“Something reverberates throughout the entire building, and she thinks it might be this thing’s attempt at laugher. Or disgust, she couldn’t be sure.”

    The barkeep returns, chuckling, “You won’t last another day here.”

    “And why would you say that?” she spits, a little too indignantly.

    “You humans, you’re all so jumpy. I’ve never had one of you last longer than a month,” it glances up at the wall, to what looks like a clock, and finishes,  “My money says you’re outta here before I close for the night.”

    “I’m not that green around the gils, you know. I’ve just never done anything like this.”

    “Tell me something I didn’t know,” chuckles the bartender, a martian with skin bluer than the Atlantic ocean.

    Another patron, this one with a skin the color of snot, decides to pipe up. Its features are humanoid, but you can tell by its face that it’s never called the Earth home. “You’re all the same, you know that? You think you’re so special because your skin is pink and silky smooth. That just because they don’t wear make up or come from earth means they’re somehow less than. You make me sick”

    “I take offense to that, and I’ll have you know...” she starts, but doesn’t know where she ever meant to finish, instead staring into the bottom of her glass and staying silent.

    “You would,” it groans, belching loudly and stalking off after another, more accommodating hostess.

• • •