Michael H. Brownstein is a Chicago writer who has been published in more than four hunderd small press journals. Dark Planet is designed and edited by Lucy A. Snyder. If you spot any errors, or if you have any comments, please contact her at lusnyde@cyberus.ca. All materials copyright 1996-1999 by their respective creators. No stories, articles, poems or images from this webzine may be posted or published without the written consent of their creator(s).

A Sour Taste In The Mouth by Michael H. Brownstein You know this taste--it comes late when the moon is a bleached towel glowering in the sky. This is the time for the old ones. They can march into day as if they were tricks in your sleeve, tricks lost in sex, tricks from Ansi the Spider. They come and go into night as if day were an opening in time. They lack teeth, but they bite. Their jaws are muscled and their grasps are jaw breakers. Late, before the sun rises, they are there and they are watching. They know you and they understand your fear of dark, the fear the sun will not rise, the car will not get you there, sleep will overwhelm you, everything has a beginning, or an end.