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Let’s say you meet in ancient India,
in a dry, moondrunk field—just you
and pakicetus, a kind of rutty wiener-dog
from 50,000,000 years ago and yes,
you speak the same language.

You start by telling him about the sea,
how his descendants will become
aquatic zeppelins with five-foot hearts
who can swim beneath icebergs
and compose choruses of such beauty

that another species will listen
and use them to fall asleep.
How they will live out their whole
whale-lives in the absence of ground,
their fat angelic bellies floating

over the world’s greatest cemetery.
But pakicetus barely listens, his snout
resting between his paws, gazing
at the horizon: the breeze-bent grass,
stillness that stretches on forever.



Michael Meyerhofer is the author of a fantasy series and several books of poetry. His work has appeared in Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine, Analog, Orson Scott Card's InterGalactic Medicine Show, Heroic Fantasy Quarterly, and other journals. For more info and an embarrassing childhood photo, visit troublewithhammers.com.
Current Issue
28 Apr 2025

By: Sofia Rhei
Translated by: Marian Womack
When the flint salamander stopped talking, its lava eyes dimmed and it sank back into the sand. Some of the scales on its upper body still poked out, here and there, as though they were part of no living creature, but simply stones scattered across the surface. 
Cuando la salamandra de sílex terminó de hablar, sus ojos de lava se apagaron y volvió a hundirse en la arena. Algunas de las escamas de su parte superior asomaban aún, aquí y allá, como si no formaran parte de un mismo cuerpo vivo, como si no fueran más que unas cuantas piedras dispuestas al azar.
By: Bella Han
Translated by: Bella Han
I am waiting for Helen on her fiftieth birthday. On the table, there’s a crystal drinking glass and a vase with rare orchids; I can’t tell if the flowers are genuine or not. Faint piano notes and a cold scent drift in the air.
我在等待海伦,为她庆祝五十岁生日。面前是一杯水,一瓶花。杯子是水晶杯,花是垂着头的兰花,不知道是真是假。
When the branches veer towards the ground you can/ climb the trees—up and up, just as you’d ditch/ ladder rungs you’re standing on.
Wenn die Zweige zum Boden geneigt sind kannst du/ auf den Baum klettern immer weiter so wie man/ die Leiter wegwirft auf der man steht
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Podcast read by: Emmie Christie
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By: Holli Mintzer
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