QB
Staff of QB
I am not your giving tree
You may not eat my fruit
You will not break my branches
You cannot cut my roots
You shall not carve off parts of me
My bark’s grown thick with thorns
I will not be a giving tree
Not yours
Not yours
Not yours
Adrienne Rex is a writer, a Texan, and a weirdo. Find her here: https://adrienne-rex-writes.carrd.co/
Sunglasses, lawn chairs, woolen parkas, and his favorite book. Erik watched Astrid build a snow-castle in the almost balmy Antarctic Polar Desert.
The sun was large in the sky. Too large. All projections said they’d be safe here… for now. The equator; uninhabitable. Antarctica; the new vacation destination. He sipped his tea and reclined his head, finger bookmark in place.
“Look! You can read it now!” Astrid’s voice drew his eyes to the large stone with ancient carving in the ice-melt. “What’s it say, Dad?”
Erik sighed, reopening his book, licking his thumb to turn the page. “Ragnarok, sweetie.”
—Meghan Murphy
Poets and writers each have their vices
Whether it’s drugs, arthouse movies, or tea
How they all swear by their own devices
To create time-honored works for a fee
The faint promise of fame that entices
Against all work ethics’ stodgy decrees
The dance between professional and fun
Candy in pill bottles? That’s a new one
E.J. LeRoy is a Pushcart Prize-nominated writer with a forthcoming mpreg novella. Curious? Visit http://ejleroy.weebly.com.
Apprentice wizard Fortio pulled up a chair, grinning in anticipation. He set his pint of foaming beer on a coaster and covertly studied the humans at the table from under shaggy eyebrows.
Friday was games night at the Boar’s Head Pub. He’d been longing to join in for months now. He’d had to sneak away from his master, the great wizard Greybeard, to get here tonight. He hoped the jeans and sweater he’d liberated from a neighbor’s laundry line would conceal his identity. Better than wearing my robe and regalia, he told himself.
Fortio shook his head as he remembered the veiled warnings the wizards back at the School had given, about the dangers of mixing with humans. Overdone, like most of their warnings, he thought. How could these weak creatures harm him?
He took a long pull on his beer as he checked out the game box on the table. Pandemic. He’d never played before, but if humans could do it, surely he could manage.
On his first turn, he flipped a card over.
In a distant city, a child began to cough.
Lisa Timpf’s writing has appeared in Star*Line, Polar Borealis, Scifaikuest and other venues.
September sun ignites snow, blinding a thawed penguin in the polar dawn. It stumbles and flails atop blue-gray glacier. A quintet of explorers laugh. You've got to appreciate the little things, pratfalls included. The penguin rights itself and waddles through their wispy, spectral forms, plunging into six months of day.
Nicholas De Marino is a neurodivergent rhyparographer. More at nicholasdemarino.blogspot.com.
The ocean was blue all around Miguel. Even the blood rushing out from his
body, and those of his four friends, could not change that.
Burning chunks of boat bobbed on wavetops, already sinking or dispersing. Soon there would be no trace of what had happened here.
The drone retreated into soft, white clouds above.
Enzo had warned him that if he didn’t give up his fishing spot, he’d
report them to the americanos as drug runners. But Miguel was raised to
stand up to bullies. He hoped his boys would understand that and remember
when they grew into men.
Michael Wever is a part-time writer and occasional observer of the world around himself. This story muscled its way into his mind during a morning shower and refused to leave until it had been written down.
A Moment in Aftermath was the winner of our Annual Drabble contest to capture the year that was 2025 in 100 words.
The Pardoner rode high in the saddle; reins loosely wrapped around the horn. The horse knew where he was going. The Pardoner’s little fingers weaved patterns in the air that only he
could see.
The sun broke out from behind the clouds and bounced off his weathered face throwing a warning miasma of orange into the sky. The Preacher, in the steeple of his church, alerted the good people of Camelot.
The Pardoner stopped in front of the jail. Waving a document above his head, the doors of the jail opened, and all the desperados of the West danced out.
Kenneth M. Kapp lives in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, writing late into the night in his man-cave.
The Pardoner was a finalist in our Annual Drabble contest to capture the year that was 2025 in 100 words.