Short, Fast, and Deadly

Short, Fast, and Deadly
i35
"Clothing Optional"
Edited by Joseph A. W. Quintela
8 August 2010

Featuring:
Danielle Blasko
Gretchen Cello
Alex Cigale
Jon-Michael Frank
Eirik Gumeny
Bruce Harris
Penn Kemp
Frank Miller
Stephen D. Nadaud II
Kenneth Pobo
Janeen Rastall
Scot Siegel
Gerald So

Copyright © 2010 by Individual Authors
All Rights Reserved

The Morning After

The shower experience frustrated him. The water pressure was poor. The soap was small. The towel was threadbare. The floor was cold. Surprisingly, she was still there, in the kitchen, bent over the stove wearing only his shirt, frying eggs and bacon. He stuck a piece of gum in his mouth, but spit it out seconds later after the flavor faded. Strange how a clean collar suddenly takes on major importance, he thought.

 
by Bruce Harris of Scotch Plains

Birthday Suit/e

His naked body, like a trap door in an attic. I’m up there looking for Tasty Cakes. Woah, I trip, fall through the trap, land on a china cabinet, become a six-foot
 
ornament. After he dresses, he displays me in the living room--which isn’t living and isn’t a room. But people come. Point. Try to break me.

 
by Kenneth Pobo of Media

Summer Fling

Jun. & Jul.
seduce me:
midriffs, short shorts,
fireworks on the 4th,

then Aug.
forces us indoors
& we can't stand
ea. other anymore.

by Gerald So of Old Westbury

On A Dare

you sat bare bottomed
in a snow covered chair
balancing in a drift
off the bedroom balcony
 
by Janeen Rastall of Marquette

Echo

I watch us in the sliver of mirror hanging from your wall. Arms and hips, skin and sweat. You love me, I know. You love me and I want to tell you to stop. I don’t want to hurt you, but that’s exactly where my feelings begin and end. A moan, a smile, black hair spilled across your pillow. I watch you, and I think of a girl from a thousand hours before.

 
by Eirik Gumeny of Montclair

Dressing Down The Ongoing Heat Wave

Our sheets blush, dry, stiff and folded on the line, two clothespins holding each head high. Neighbours cringe, turn off their mower, turn up their sound system. No-one but me wants to see you naked in the yard, hanging up your wet nightshirt, one I wear to bed. OK, so show me.

by Penn Kemp of London

Daylight

At first Megan had loved her vampire boyfriend with all her heart and loins, but lately he had grown a little too fond of the fame and the riches and the lucrative book and movie deals. As she made love to him in her bedroom one afternoon she ripped the curtains open and watched him begin to dissolve. Megan was quick to put her clothes back on to avoid a similar fate.

 
By Stephen D. Nadaud II of Sioux Falls

Fat Clothes

She hung up her fat clothes and spent the night turning a wooden sparrow on a spindle. An old weathervane. It pointed. She looked up the word, "sedentary." She squeezed into skinny clothes. She saw all the dents in the air. The ones that the sparrow pointed to. She broke up the words; starting with, "See Airy Dents."

 
by Jon-Michael Frank of Philadelphia

Bareback Rider

Let it be mid-august. Let me be the chestnut horse for the hunter-jumper girl. Let her lead me to a pasture of timothy grass and wild carrots. Let the soil be amply moist. Let it be loose enough.

 
by Scot Siegel of Lake Oswego

Epitaph; Love Hurts

determination: autoerotic death
victim kept journal of love poetry
dedicated to tractor nicknamed Stone
his desire to soar high together
 
by Alex Cigale of New York City

occasion of fabric’s brief duration

Sometimes I drift
(like I’m losing)
Garments.
Never stay on for long.
Side tracked. At 1am-2am
4am.
I mean clothing
(optional)
Falling.
Off.
 
by Gretchen Cello of New York City

The Contortionist

She was good at getting it up. She knew many ways. But in this case there was only one. She had a flat back and great sense of balance. I hardly exerted myself. My only task to guide her slender legs over a slick white banister. I made sure she cleared the chandelier before turning the corner. She had the straightest teeth. She came perfectly tuned.

 
by Scot Siegel of Lake Oswego

Photo in the Sex Museum

She fucks herself with the bedpost or else the bedpost fucks her.
 
Propped up on pasty-white elbows, she kneels and leans forward.
 
Her ruffled, layered dress lifted up near her head, she has shed her pannier.
 
She poses for the camera, spread extra wide, as an iron bedpost has just been inside of her.

 
by Danielle Blasko of Surfside Beach

Reply

Regrettably
my fantasies
are more complicated
than that
 
by Frank Miller of Bloomington