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we never learned your given name
but did you still get married
the day after your dad lost
forty thousand smackers
to poor unlucky Marion

he wanted to buy his baby girl
a lavish wedding present
but marriage-coveting Marion
split with the cash
and the rest is grisly history

did your father still end up
buying you that house
daughter whose nuptials
inadvertently touched off
all this mayhem

Marion Crane lost everything
what did you lose
a sense of the world’s innocence
a pure white wedding day
unblemished by blood

did you think of how
your father’s moola
sped her way to death
appalled cello half-notes
descending like Marion
sliding down the wall
slipping out of life
eyes going out

how your dad flashed his green
until she couldn’t resist
becoming a blonde in a car
driving towards her black
and white demise



Gwynne Garfinkle is the author of a novel, Can’t Find My Way Home (2022), and a collection of short fiction and poetry, People Change (2018), both published by Aqueduct Press. Her work has appeared in such publications as Fantasy, Escape Pod, Uncanny, Apex, and Other Covenants. For more about her work, visit her website: gwynnegarfinkle.com.
Current Issue
29 Apr 2024

The Lightning Road cuts far across the Cosmos, a streak of dazzling gold amidst the star-studded void.
daily you suppress it and ride the shame / like a surfer rides a monster wave,
somersaulting in continuous turns
two wolves lope / behind the Atlantic
The thing is; I don’t set out to write neurodivergent characters. I write people – fictional people who are drawn from the people around me, the way I experience the world, and my understanding of these experiences. Too bad if other people refuse to afford my experiences as being real or relatable.
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