The Metaworker Literary Magazine
Where great stories are forged.
“Like the Man, she appeared oblivious to the absence of walls. Standing in my usual spot observing the house, I kept willing [the Woman] to look my way.” – excerpt from The Season of Solitude by Jenn Haase Vetter #MetaworkerMonday #TheMetaworker
“There was no such thing as afternoon here; it was always nighttime. Every day it became murkier. Every day Kivotos-4 moved further from the sun.” – excerpt from Memories of Earth by Felix Anker @bananentupper @schundundsyntax #TheMetaworker #MetaworkerMonday
“I’m cursed to know the whereabouts of every small lost thing, even the things I never touch, like your toothbrush.” excerpt from Only a Witch by Steven Hage #MetaworkerMonday #TheMetaworker
“Today was the day – the day I’d make three year’s salary in a single evening. The day I met the Spaniard.” excerpt from Ashmedai and the Hairdresser by Allister Nelson #MetaworkerMondY #TheMetaworker
“Our Thoughts lurk in the darkened corner of your bedroom while you sleep. Our Thoughts are watching from outside the window while you enter the coffee shop and ask for a large chai latte with almond milk.” – excerpt from “Our Thoughts Are With You” by Sean Monett @nonsensepoetrycomics #TheMetaworker #MetaworkerMonday
“Breathing through his respirator to filter out the steady stream of dust from above, Dimitri passed through murky pools of brown air illuminated by always-on streetlights.” – excerpt from “Astronaut Application” by Andrew Rodgers #TheMetaworker #MetaworkerMonday
“The egg of flesh was placed on the table where my son and I were breakfasting. It was the shape of an ostrich egg, and slightly larger than one, too. Its ‘shell’ would bend to the touch, but it had skin like that of a human.” – excerpt from A Living Stone by Jason Ruiter #MetaworkerMonday #TheMetaworker
“Give it up,” hollered a voice two tombstones down. “Nothing’s spooky to anyone in this damn world of endless light. You’re not scaring anyone.” Excerpt from “Grave Lightning” by Max Zell @ZellWriter #TheMetaworker #MetaworkerMonday
“If my days were like the calcified chambers of a nautilus cell, then my work was the living meat they had arisen to protect. The most human part of me.” @mxwheels #MetaworkerMonday #TheMetaworker
“Many thought that the worldwide aphasia outbreak would bring about the end of the world. It certainly put a crimp in all normal day-to-day activities.” #TheMetaworker #MetaworkerMonday
“Our reconditioned 3D printer just made that gun,” said my boss. “The genuine ones were used by real cowboys during famous gunfights.” #MetaworkerMonday #TheMetaworker
“One day, colorful dots specked the sky as if a rainbow exploded.” #TheMetaworker #MetaworkerMonday
“At the height of my loneliness, I examine ways to escape my skin.” #TheMetaworker #MetaworkerMonday
“The babies of Borad weren’t sleeping. They lay in their cribs blinking. Then the crying started.” #TheMetaworker #MetaworkerMonday
“My little brother had shown early signs, spitting up fire with his baby food. My parents were
covered in small burns for the first few years but I’d never seen them so happy.”
#TheMetaworker #MetaworkerMonday
Nate turns me toward him, my round belly the bumper between us, his brown eyes plead with me. “Everyone has evacuated. We have to go now. Please.”
#TheMetaworker #MetaworkerMonday
“I lived here when the comet struck,” he said, raising his voice, “and I lost my Nellie when the rain of molten gold came down.”
#TheMetaworker #MetaworkerMonday
She came out of the woods with nothing but a blanket sprayed with white and silver paint #F. J. Bergmann #TheMetaworker
#MetaworkerMonday
The moons of twenty-eight yesterdaysare strung across silent twilight,a pearl necklace on the plump blue throat of a cyanotic stillborn prepared for burial. Under the phasing …
around these parts, you’d hear about trail angels, their wings spread between those parched white blazes. offering plenty and good.take your rest beneath their wings, …
if you are listening, I am here, wracked with a Martian longing dreaming of stowaway spiders who would weave sickly webs over semi-important fixtures: reviled queen who presides …
The car, an older gas-powered Lincoln, rolled up smoothly, making no splash in the curbside puddle. Driver’s face (human, of course, the Others could operate …
The woman at the cafe was out of breath as she sat in the window seat looking through the early night at the few groups …
“What are we waiting for?” Chris asked, staring at me from the passenger seat of the car. I shifted in the driver’s seat. “Lorenzo told …
In a house, in a heart, a demon lurked. The girl found it in her dead brother’s skull buried in the backyard. She looked into …
Lock Howe grew up in rural Tennessee in a conservative, Baptist area. Raised atheist and liberal, Lock struggled with feelings of isolation and confusion, themes …
When I think about it, none of this would have happened if Roger weren’t such a slob. After Roger left for the gym, I decided …
There’s a distinct scent to the air right before a Firestorm breaks: acrid and sulfuric, with a touch of sweet smoke. It manifests moments before …
The sky is bigger in Texas. The trees in the Midwest loomed large, stretching their branches upward and forming green canopies that provided shelter. But …
When dust rolls in like an eruption and you can hardly see across the street, and everything else (city, mountains, sky) is hidden by a …
The Dongle You thought you were arriving at the train an hour early, but you got the times wrong and happened to get there just …
The wind howled and tore through the treetops, and our horses, Highland and Orion, crowded together to share their heat, but I was warm and …
Jerry backed the ’68 Ford Fairlane into a driveway, then jammed it into Drive, and stomped on the accelerator. The tires squealed and he crossed …
The first cockroach appeared during a tour for prospective graduate students. Being a laser lab, we had turned the lights out and configured exhibitions of …
When I was in eighth grade, Dad started feeling “neither here nor there.” The harder he tried to relax, the more violently he’d jitter. The …
A fang of lightning crashesa branch into the wind-clawed loch. Thunder drives eels to the bottom. Water flashes downa mountain rising through the skin of …
Are you dead, Maria? One Hour It seems so. Seven Days Their black clothes. Their black veils. Their white handkerchiefs, dry in their pockets. None …
When I remember to look, I will see her. At least that’s what usually happens. I work on the high hill in the towers of …
I. Snapshot Click. WHIRR. Shadowed still frame capturing fae.Ethereal grace magnified by child’s wonder.Muted only by adults’ misunderstanding “genuine.”Why would fae be less real if …
There’s a cloud in the room that the boy knows as ‘vapour’, knows it in the way he knows his emotions, knows it in the …
Maya’s entire town had awoken one morning to find swarms of people milling outside their doors, their skins a mottled mix of colors: sunny yellows, …
The sky’s been running down my walls for the last week, just these weird regal purple trickles of oily space that squirm their way down …
Before their house was built, Jan and Stan spent hours staring at the blueprints, hunting for a 90-degree angle. Their architect told them the construction …
Mom’s breathing was shallow, her skin rough, hair green. I glanced up and saw my father, Fred, checking his phone as his wife of almost …
Bob Sanders awoke one morning from a dream to discover that he no longer existed. He had died in the night. He had been fifty-eight …
It’s odd. I’ve never felt anything like it. I’ve been here for a very long time, as long as I can remember, as long as …
We arrived right on time, although we had debated that. Isn’t fashionably late, well, fashionable? In the end, though, we were on time. Which was …
Sure, no one ever said that people were getting their powers from the rain. Tommy guessed it had something to do with all those big …
Every year, from the first I was assigned to the graveyard, I would watch the headstones from my place upon the highest pine tree. My …
Yesterday you were five foot ten and today your toes don’t touch the base of the bed. You cocoon yourself deeper into the blankets, stuffing …
