Summer's Day
Fiction by Eric Bonholtzer

            Summer was burning the ashes, watching intently as every trace of her

boyfriend’s favorite blue shirt disappeared into the smoldering fire of burning leaves.

She thought about just how much her boyfriend loved that shirt, and smiled a little,

the engraved brass buttons the only thing she ever liked about it. She watched the

tendrils of smoke as they wafted on the breeze, READ MORE

Expectations and Abandonment
Fiction by Peter LaBerge

 
       The ice that tickled the New York City sidewalks felt strangely warm against my bare
feet—or perhaps my skin was just numb. It seemed that everything of mine was frozen—my
feet, my heart, my mind, and my life. It had been this way since they threw the dusty,
crumbling suitcase onto my neatly made-up bed, forced some clothes into it, and shoved
me out three months ago like a bag of garbage down a chute. READ MORE

The Ineffectual Pummeling of Father Time
Fiction by Dave Early

Another day of incessant guilt and shame looms. 
              Sometimes it takes him by surprise; two, three days burgeoning with basic multiple
intent; things get done, routine in their spontaneity, and then a morning of weakness, an
inability to wake up at the best time from which to progress with a meaningful schedule,
and everything is ruined, and this allows the greater concerns, those ingrained, to infiltrate
his mind and scupper any prospect of returning to that functioning tread of the few
days past. READ MORE



Useless Vows and Fallen Cherry Blossoms
Flash Fiction by Erica Gustafson

         Peering over the bridge, his toes hovered over the edge as tingles of fear and

anxiety raced through his veins. He took one last swig of beer, which was now wrapped

by a brown paper bag that crinkled beneath his fingertips. READ MORE

5/12/2013 -  Submissions are now closed and will not re-open until October 1st. Any submissions sent now
will not be read until then. Reading times for The Stray Branch are from October 1st through the end of
April. Have a great summer and I will see you in the Fall. Thank you, Debbie Berk

Thank you,

Debbie Berk 
Founder/Editor