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Magic

November 23, 2018/in Flash Prose, Flash Prose, Winter-Spring 2019 / by Jose Francisco Fonseca

[fiction]

Estoy corriendo on a dirt road feeling the right side of my face swelling up. Brittle and stiff mesquite se rodearon el camino. Trailers float on the mesquite milas aparte, solos, escuchando los vultures crowing as they circle. And montaña morenas stand silent squatting el cielo azul on their jagged backs.

Oigo un grito and a door slamming open. I look back at my dad standing at the doorway of our tan trailer, sin camisa, su estomago redondo bright in the sun. A belt is wrapped around his fist. He is shouting at me a regresar.

I keep running. Mi corazon pegando mi pecho, cracking a few ribs, my blood veins being squeezed by my muscles, my bones being chipped away con cada piso. I turn away, and the road ends in a patch of small Barrel Cacti.

I slip and fall before I get to the patch. Un hoyo de conejo caught my foot. Dust swirls around me, coating me and lifting into el cielo azul. Me quedo echado en mi espalda mirando el polvo y cielo. The dust drifts away and leaves yellow specks flickering around me. They flutter gently, a few calmly land on me. Son mariposas amarillas, a flutter of them. Mi ojo derecho esta cerrado, and I want to cry but I don’t. Instead I look at those little bits of yellow sun and wind flicker about in the blue forever above me and let that swell into my right eye.

 

Iraq war vet viviendo en la frontera de los Estados Unidos y Mexico, Jose Francisco Fonseca reads, writes, y trabajos con motors and tends to have aventuras en Juarez y El Paso. He is published in numerous online journals and a few lit mags, most recently published in The Iowa Review. Orgullo mi gente Americanos! You can find him on Twitter @jose_f_fonseca

https://lunchticket.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/lunch-ticket-logo-white-text-only.png 0 0 Amanda Lopez https://lunchticket.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/lunch-ticket-logo-white-text-only.png Amanda Lopez2018-11-23 11:34:472018-11-29 07:32:03Magic

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Genre Archive

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Friday Lunch Blog

Friday Lunch! A serving of contemporary essays published the second Friday of every month.

Today’s course:

How to Kill a Cat, or How to Prepare for CATastrophe

March 10, 2023/in Blog / Meghan McGuire
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The Night I Want to Remember

December 16, 2022/in 2023ws-migration, Blog / Sanaz Tamjidi
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From Paper to the Page

November 18, 2022/in 2023ws-migration, Blog / Annie Bartos
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Midnight Snack

Take a bite out of these late night obsessions.

Tonight’s bites:

Point Break & Top Gun Are More Than Homoerotic Action Movies

March 3, 2023/in Midnight Snack / Michaela Emerson
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Mending the Heart and Slowing Down: Reintroducing Myself to Mexican Cooking

October 7, 2022/in Midnight Snack / Megan Vasquez
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The Worth of a Billionaire’s Words

September 23, 2022/in Midnight Snack / Kirby Chen Mages
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Amuse-Bouche

Little bites every third Friday to whet your appetite!

Today’s plate:

On Such a Full Sea Are We Now

March 17, 2023/in Amuse-Bouche / Jemma Leigh Roe
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The Russian Train

February 24, 2023/in Amuse-Bouche / Cammy Thomas
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Still Life

October 31, 2022/in Amuse-Bouche / Daniel J. Rortvedt
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School Lunch

An occasional Wednesday series dishing up today’s best youth writers.

Today’s slice:

I’ve Stayed in the Front Yard

May 12, 2021/in School Lunch, School Lunch 2021 / Brendan Nurczyk
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A Communal Announcement

April 28, 2021/in School Lunch, School Lunch 2021 / Isabella Dail
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Seventeen

April 14, 2021/in School Lunch, School Lunch 2021 / Abigail E. Calimaran
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Word From the Editor

Our contributors are diverse and the topics they share through their art vary, but their work embodies this mission. They explore climate change, family, relationships, poverty, immigration, human rights, gun control, among others topics. Some of these works represent the mission by showing pain or hardship, other times humor or shock, but they all carry in them a vision for a brighter world.

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