(These are excerpts--click on the title to view the whole piece!)

A Dance For Her Tiger: Memories of Idu Iyi rite
 
She is the bright flower Ugente recently plucked from Ahaba only the week before, the temptress he has planted in his yard at Ohaukabi to please him every day and beget his flowerets.  
 
Nnorom Azuonye

 

Turbulence at -100 Feet
 
Faced with thousands of strangers every day, I guess those who struggle for seats as if their lives depended on it see others as shadows, delusions that have transformed flesh into nothing more than light and dark. Suspicion, greed, and selfishness run amok in a society that has been praised world-wide for its polity.  
 
Hauquan Chau

 

If Only Men Came in Chocolate
 
There's a down side of course. Jobs in the edible underwear and flavored gel sectors will suffer. Since no one admits to buying these items, it may not be so bad after all.  
 
Michelle Hartman

 

The Red Hair Gene
 
Most people with red hair have at least one change in the gene for a receptor protein. That protein is called the melanocortin-1 receptor (abbreviated as MC1R).  
 
Anju Kanumalla

 

Oxymorons
 
Now you know why it ends in "-morons."  
 
Don Stitt

 

The Lens of a Memory
 
The cops often come to sweep us from the square. It seems we are a blemish on the pristine face of their town. They say we are "loitering." In a park. HAHAHA.  
 
Leslie A. Wolter

 

Pain Principle
 
My left foot is broken in half, the toes pointing inward at a ninety degree angle. The last thing I want to do is call my father, but my date has driven me to the emergency room, and it could be hours before I'm released.  
 
Jeff Tannen