Flying Island

Still Frames at Friendship Hollow Did the bobcat descend from leafy ridge, kits stowed in tree hollow  or under muddled brush? She lopes  past the trail-cam, ears white,  cocked. Is she stalking prey— mice for babes, for her a sleeping  rabbit, squirrel in tree-fork’s drey?  She seems not to notice the pair of eyes flicker, electric, hunkered beneath the cabin’s warped deck. Whatever it might be—raccoon  or opossum—it’s large, wedged in  tight. Shrouded by thicket, folded  into long grass, a doe suckles  mottled fawns. Phoebes take  shifts, rest in a mossy nest tucked into rafters, smooth white eggs speckled brown. The heavy  opossum slinks from cranny, angles for trunk, clambers up. This valley’s life whirrs, unfurls to the rhythm of trees, bud to leaf meal.  A raccoon clings to shadowed branch, silent bobcat rounds the night. Annette Sisson ’s poems appear in Valparaiso Poetry Review, Birmingham Poetry Review, Rust & Moth...

The Artist She paints the room in her underwear freeing her arms from the confinement of cloth, loosening the notion of sleeves and muttering while she swathes the walls in the new colors of autumn. There are no boundaries to this canvas, and the paints that she brushes on are unending, as if she has called in all her markers, and whatever debt was owed her was paid in oils and pastels, a palette of tempera, and golden acrylics. Her movement is sustained by this, as if she is fed on the uncertainties of time mixed with paint.  She knows the minutes need to be counted, the brush strokes calculated as she turns to another empty wall. Mary Sexson is an award-winning poet with two full-length books and two collaborative chapbooks. Her work has appeared in numerous publications and anthologies, and she has participated in many public poetry projects in Indiana. She has poems archived in the INverse collection of Hoosier Poets, at the Indiana State Library. Sexson has six Pushcart Prize...

I Never Knew You You are like a shadow In the window, the reflections Getting in the way You are the neighbor mowing your yard The scent of grass trailing you Behind your unsteady gait You are that man on the bench in town Hanging with your cronies Heads bent to shelter what you say You are fighting for your life Cells in revolt course through you Engaged in unruly play You were the decent man next door I never tried to get to know And now you’ve died only steps away Shelley Smithson is a psychotherapist living and working in northern MI. She studied at Earlham College in Indiana and Michigan State University in East Lansing, MI. In her free time she loves to spend time with family and friends, write, do political volunteer work and roam beaches in Michigan.

The Last Untattooed American The Last Untattooed American hastily removed his long-sleeved turtleneck shirt, gloves, long trousers and knee-length socks and prepared to take his first shower in six weeks. At that moment, a gust from the heat duct slightly parted the bathroom window curtain. The breach of several inches was sufficient for a citizen spotter across the street to note through his binoculars the apparent absence of mandatory anatomical art. The authorities were alerted. Agents were dispatched. Within minutes, the offender was in custody, dried and under examination. Sworn to fair and thorough treatment of all suspects, the officers probed the length and width of The Last Untattooed American in quest to remove all doubt he was indeed such. "Possible Metallica lightning bolt, back of the neck!" "Barbed wire crucifix, sternum!" "Monarch butterfly, left buttock!" Long shots, all, and each proving to be only a scar -- from acne, from heart surgery, ...

Dear Flying Island Readers: Welcome to the 11.29 Edition of the Flying Island Journal! In this edition we publish poems by John Kruschke , Courtney Hitson , and William Teets . A big congratulations to our 2024 Pushcart nominees! We also wanted to announce that Mary Brown, who has served as the Poetry Editor for the Flying Island Journal for over four years, is stepping down and Hiromi Yoshida will be taking her place as Poetry Editor. We want to thank Mary for all of her years of dedication to the Indiana Writers Center's literary magazine. We also want to thank Marjie Giffin for her years of dedication as a reader for Flying Island . Mary, Hirmoi, and Marjie were a fantastic team, and we're excited to start a new chapter with Hiromi and her new team of readers, Tony Brewer and Joseph Kerschbaum. Inspired to send us your fiction, poetry, or creative nonfiction? For more info on how to submit, see the tab above. Thank you for reading, Flying Island Editors and Readers

The Sun Shines Fluidly on Every House The sun shines fluidly on every house,  spilling over the sheep and cattle  in view of the cowboy brothers (twins  – by different fathers – it’s a long story),  while at the water’s edge a crab  scuttles unnoticed by a cat  dozing beside an adolescent girl  weighing her options, curious of the scorpion poised  at the hooves of a centaur (yes,  a half-horse man roams this landscape) with bow and arrow slung open-carry,  galloping to meet his chimeric brethren  the sea-goat at the seaside where a gorgeous boy pours them wine and two fish swim together connected by a luminous thread,  which, star by star, connects to every  creature in this scene because  the sun shone fluidly in every house the day each one was born,  and would keep shining even if  the cat appraised its options,  and the scorpion claimed to be crab and the bull converted to ram and the brothers came ...

Another sort of yellow, a prose poem by Courtney Hitson Another sort of yellow As if a baby carriage’s canopy saturated in sun. As if yellow were a ruffian. As if Helvetica repackaged into paint-tubes. As if the yellow elixir of personhood I let stale in grief’s fridge. As if the depth my father’s absence affixed to each moment. As if a harvest moon leaked through a spigot. As if the unuttered yellow relief of a finality. As if amber crosshatched with neon. As if the persona formed by gold’s pseudonym. As if pollen could foam. As if a yellow truth began to thaw murky. As if yellow time-traveled and grew fond of its insignificance. As if a golden velvet’s creamy plush. As if your alternate endings lined up in heats to race towards never. As if your smallness in the universe took shelter in a yellow tent.  Originally hailing from central Indiana, Courtney Hitson now lives in Key West and teaches English at the College of the Florida Keys. She currently has work forthcoming in Allium...

Ring Around the Rosie    A grey-bearded beatnik sells Christian candy bars door to door, a relatively-famous bluesman blows a Hey Joe harp on the corner block Old Mother Hubbard hooks herself for a bone and I realize Chicken Little is no liar Trust is a myth created by the Big Bad Wolf, who makes me into a modern-day Little Boy Blue So I duck into the basement of the Dugout Bar and prepare for Revelation All until you call my cell All until Dr. John shoos me to fly away home to where you wait  with open arms  I stagger to you softly  in our house built from bricks Gift candy bars and hum a long-lost song You smile and embrace me warm But more than the sky is about to fall  Will fall Has fallen Our lives made from nothing but straw William Teets is a writer born in Peekskill, New York, who has recently relocated to Southeast, Michigan. His poetry and prose has been published in numerous journals and anthologies, including Ariel Chart , Drunk Monkeys ,...