“The Night of Glory is better than a thousand months…it is peace until the break of dawn.” —The Holy Quran, 97:3-5 . . . Thick, feverish air swells in soft billows, falling like gossamer over soundless trees, a whisper lost between the minutiae of trembling grass shards. Their souls brush against one another, […]
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I sink my teeth into the skin of an orange child blossoming from the furtive beginnings of youth, hissing as ocherous juice spurts into my eyes, a vengeance siphoned from the soft muscle I pulled apart. In that moment of blindness, I can see Spring looming over my seated form, spouting nonsense about the child […]
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My father, vivacious— a mouth full of leaves and amrut, splurting and gushing between the crooks in his teeth, a call to the boy who punched him square in the face in a brawl on the streets of Gujranwala, the nuts he cracked while playing cards, while dealing empty cigarette boxes, a love song played […]
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Featured Illustration: Rocío Montoya Mirrors bleed a blinding white, light fractured over fractured features. Wrapped across my body, I see white ribbon dyed into splotchy carmine, crisscrossing into makeshift thigh highs and babydoll lingerie. The slope of a neck and the fat of baby cheeks— curves are a tantalizing blessing, the Lord’s gift for lecherous […]
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Featured Illustration: Shehzil Malik They call to us from under the Afghan Sun, their skin bright like amber kindled under flame, and their voices heavy with dripping characters, rough edges and beveled lines, black ink bursting over letters and journals, for they live by the pen, writing in an attempt to reach the world outside, […]
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