All posts in Member Writing & Art

April 6, 2023

“Popet,” A Short Story by Pierre Boodhoo

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Featured Posts, Member Writing & Art, Writing

Where is the line drawn between fantasy and reality? Between what we see and what we imagine? Read on as Pierre Boodhoo, in his first story for The Fictional Café, takes us on this exploration. Popet “Ayesha, my popet, the eve is upon us. It is time to awaken.” Mother’s voice sparks the fire. The embodiment of Mother’s love spreads within her as limbs come alive. After a few blinks, the blurriness fades. The pale, sharp features of Mother’s face hide between strands of green and black hair as she comes into focus. Mother captivates her. “Mother!” Ayesha throws her arms around Mother’s waist. Herhand pats Ayesha’s head and she beams. Ayesha releases Mother and waits patiently. Mother straightens her clothes and dusts herself off. Ayesha imagines herself in a mature body resembling Mother. If…

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April 4, 2023

Week One: Bob Pope, Eva Grace, Sal Difalco

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Featured Posts, Member Writing & Art, Writing

Bob Pope returns to FC with a provocative poem Samantha Quince Devastated by Death of Biological Mother The fingertips of one of the older woman’s hands land lightly on her breast like a mosquito. Excuse me? she says. You are my biological mother, Samantha Quince says. Ah, I see, she says, a film crew. Mother said to come when I can drive myself. How nice you got your license. That’s my adoptive mother’s car. It looks so easy to handle. I wanted, no needed to see you. I have lemonade. Do you like tea? I was inside you. I came like a moon out the side of a planet. …this woman this stranger my mother, so familiar and weirdly unfamiliar at the same time staring like she doesn’t know me… Wait, what’s this? Taken in…

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April 2, 2023

NATIONAL POETRY MONTH

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Featured Posts, Member Writing & Art

AT THE FICTIONAL CAFÉ Welcome, all, to our second celebration of National Poetry Month, sponsored by the National Academy of Poets. The beautiful image for our posts this month was created by Marc Brown for the Academy. With over 1,200 Coffee Cub members in 74 countries, we baristas often find ourselves with an abundance of excellent poetry from our contributors, who reside literally around the world. Over the National Poetry Month of April we’ll be sharing some of the best recently submitted work. Each week we’ll publish several poets in a single post, so as not to clog your email inboxes. Look for the banner to indicate a new poetry post. We’ll also publish a few other special works because variety is always the spice of life! It all begins tomorrow and we’d love for…

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March 26, 2023

“Sal the Barber” by Frank Diamond

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Member Writing & Art, Writing

“That’s a common mistake, mi amigo,” Sal Gonzalez says. He stops clipping, looks into the barbershop mirror at Larry Shanks. Sal stands to the right and a bit behind Larry; it would be the blind side, if not for reflection. “That’s my first marriage. I married my friend. And we’re still friends.” Larry rolls his neck, says: “One day you look up and you’re roomies. Sex? Maybe. Sometimes. Schedule it.” “And couples need that passion,” Sal says, resuming the clip-clip. “I married three times. Third time’s the charm. With Rita 33 years. I am blessed. Without Rita, I’m dead.” COVID-19 had almost killed Sal three months earlier. He’d been on a respirator—torture!—and had pneumonia. It took eleven weeks to recover and get back to work. “All the nurses on every shift knew Rita.” “How old…

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March 20, 2023

Derrick R. Lafayette’s “Kaleidoscope”

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Member Writing & Art, Writing

Today, March 21st, we celebrate the publication of Kaleidoscope, a short story collection by Fictional Cafe’s former Fiction Writer in Residence, and published by our own imprint! As the French author Marcel Proust once remarked, the mind evokes endlessly changing thought patterns, much like a kaleidoscope. And so reading Derrick R. Lafayette’s Kaleidoscope: Dark Tales, an extraordinary collection of five short stories and a novella, is like seeing the world anew through bits of colored glass. What if . . . In this weird Wild West story an old gunfighter, accompanied by a Billy-the-Kid wannabe, arrives in a town to claim a straightforward bounty. But due to mistaken identity, they run afoul of a supernatural occurrence. What if . . . A loner, held captive for months in a mud castle, escapes but feels certain…

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March 10, 2023

Michael Larrain’s “The Long Con”

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Member Writing & Art, Writing

for Sister Monica Joan I’ve sort of lost track of time, but it must have been, oh, a dozen or so years ago that I put a rear-view mirror on my medicine chest, so that now when I shave of a morning I can only see myself in the past. And therefore, by a process I cannot pretend to understand, do I grow one day younger every day. As long as I keep shaving, I’m slipping backwards twenty-four hours at a time, growing gradually more limber, my synapses finger-popping like Hank Ballard and the Midnighters, my beard no longer bristling with silver but turning to a burr of golden blond. When I remember how to move the appropriate muscles in my face, I catch the reflection of something resembling a smile, teeth sparkling, eyes bright….

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March 1, 2023

“A Little Space for Happiness” by Michael Larrain

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Member Writing & Art

Poetry lives on in the soul I know this sentence, which I wrote here in 2014 when I first met Michael Larrain “selling blissed-out flowers from the back of his Jeep about two blocks east of downtown Cotati (California), sounds a lot like the first sentence in James Crumley’s finest novel, The Last Good Kiss. Which may or may not be coincidentally set in nearby Sonoma (California). It could also be something evocative about The Land that is Sonoma County. I don’t know. But you might want to find the time to read Crumly’s novel and endulge yourself in that first sentence. But before you do, please read (and comment on) this magnificent poem by our featured poet today. Another of his poems appears here in a week’s time. A Little Space for Happiness Between…

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February 26, 2023

“His Name’s Not Ben”

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Member Writing & Art, Writing

A Mystery by Paul Perilli It often feels like we’re living in an age of identity obfuscation. People choose alias, noms de plume, stage names, nicknames . . . sometimes it must be hard to remember exactly who you are. Or, in the case of Ben, whom this story is about, how you ever got yourself into such a mess that you had to change your name and . . .. But let’s let author Paul Perilli open the creaking door to tell us Ben’s story. ** THE STREETS OF NEW YORK CHANGE as often as the seasons. Each year businesses come and go. For the most part their opening and closing have little effect on me. The Mexican restaurant on Manhattan Ave. I ordered from once or twice a year is now an empty…

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February 26, 2023

“Chocolates From Majorca” By Ewa Mazierska

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Member Writing & Art, Writing

The British, for as long as anyone cares to remember, have loved vacationing on the island of Majorca, one of four Spanish isles in the Mediterranean Sea. The history of making marvelous chocolates in Spain dates back to the days of Christopher Columbus. Today’s story is about thoughtfulness, and perhaps an absence thereof . . . (Featured Image courtesy of Spanish Abores.com) ** It took Robert almost five hours to travel from his house on the outskirts of Dunfermline to his old house in Lancashire. By the time he reached the house, he was exhausted and in a bad mood, not least because his favourite restaurant, where he used to have brunch, was closed due to a broken pipe. He felt that Justine, his ex-wife, would immediately sense his bad mood and react with her…

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February 17, 2023

Max Orkis’s Stunning Poetic Visions

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Member Writing & Art, Writing

Eight poems you won’t soon forget. Poems you’ll want to read again and again. Each reading reveals new layers, depths, insights, poetic visions, and an overwhelming desire to understand the heart and the mind of a true poet. Missing Fold, collapse, telescope. How piercing glows a ray — if The star rolls round once every so many Forevers while night falls daily? So cold to hope, In an ice age, for global warming As streams  Grow stiff, Like a bay leaf, Harden, Fossilize, like a trope, Like the uncanny Flower that buds more  Slowly than  Death blooms — so, grow wild, bow, garden. How real are dreams If even after brainstorming One can hardly recall one or  Forget disbelief Again? ~ ~ Divine Dream I often wonder why my dreams so seldom Remember me in…

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