Mercy

Predator, victim! Parasite, host! Canine distemper! Surely there could be finer mechanisms than these! Surely God can do better than this!

from Mercy
by Lara Santoro
Other Press, 2007

My Mother's Lovers

It was good to be moving, good to be free at times like this. The happy ache that came of knowing you were alive in a foreign place, and richly lost. Where none of your rules apply, where nothing you know is of any use.

from My Mother's Lovers
by Christopher Hope
Grove/Atlantic, 2006

Sacco and Vanzetti Must Die!

Had anticipated more nostalgia, perhaps even ennui, being in such close vicinity to one's own boyhood. But thus far (knock-knock), I remain as free of discernible affect as ever. Perhaps like a ballerina's sole, my own (soul) has callused after years of unnatural contortion, exposure to hard flat surfaces, support of entire body weight at odd angles for prolonged periods. Reader may continue to overextend metaphor as he sees fit.

from Sacco and Vanzetti Must Die!
by Mark Binelli
Dalkey Archive Press, 2006

The Medium

Honesty was not a coin to be spent indiscriminately.

from The Medium
by Noelle Sickels
Five Star, 2007

Intimate Relations with Strangers

Like the dogs, the people accepted their fate, and came to realize that living was only a laborious form of dying.

from Intimate Relations with Strangers
by David Valentine Bernard
Strebor Books, 2007

Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit

Everyone thinks their own situation most tragic. I am no exception.

from Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit
by Jeanette Winterson
Atlantic Monthly Press, 1985

Saman

The aroma of wood, the coldness of stone, the smell of moss and mushrooms - do these things have a name, do they have an age? Man gives them names, as parents give their children names, although the trees are older than man. Rafflesia arnoldi blooms not in Central Park but in the tropical forest of the Malay highlands and we know its father is an Englishman because he has given the flower its name. People talk about things that grow, both cultivated and native, as if they know them more than the trees know about coldness and sun, or about the warmth of the earth. But animals don't recognize the woods by their names, just as a mother animal or mating pair have no names for their chicks or cubs. They know without language.

From Saman
by Ayu Utami
translated from the Indonesian by Pamela Allen
Equinox Publishing, 2005

Chinatown Beat

In Queens, the Nationalists from Taiwan, the Republic's forty-five-year seat of power, provided an even greater bang-up celebration of the day. That was to be expected, Uncle Four thought, Flushing being a KMT stronghold.

from Chinatown Beat
by Henry Chang
Soho Press, 2006