First Place:

An Insomniac’s Guide to Night Walking

By Jay McKenzie

She wakes tangled: the witching hour her midwife called it, but she is not afraid of witches. She walks under the light of a slivered grey hangnail or a buffed copper penny or a low-dip communion wafer-moon. 

After he’d gone, there was nothing left to fear in the shadows. She remembers this in the pale half-light at just past four, when a eucalypt shadow is a dancer, a bin left out past collection day, a stout friend. 

In the dark, she can imagine she is not alone. 

Unlike in the light that illuminates the spaces where he isn’t.

Second Place:

For Sale, 1979 AMC Gremlin, $18,000 As
Is

By Dave Klotzkin

“Bill’s in back, with his… project.” Henrietta showed the young man to the backyard, where Bill waited beside the Gremlin. Painted unapologetic orange, it looked like a gremlin: windshield a high gremlin forehead, front lights like beady round eyes.

“Restoring it myself,” Bill rubbed the fender, opened the hood. “Bondo, welding, light machining…” The engine gleamed. “Needs a transmission…”

“It’s beautiful, sir,” said the young man. “I’ll take it.”

Bill blinked. “Sorry, son.” He glanced at Henrietta, on the porch, out of earshot. “Ain’t really selling.” He leaned forward, sharing a secret. “Jest wanted to show someone who’d appreciate it.”

Third Place:

Soar

By Maddie Logemann

 When hawthorn and meadowsweet can’t soothe her fever anymore, her heart falls forever asleep under the warmth. With the same care she always wiped my blackberry smudged lips, I drain away cooling blood so her skin dries papery light.

Dawns and dusks later, I hum her lullaby and peel river birch curls of skin and muscle off her bones, freeing a soul who shouldn’t be buried.

From her ribcage unfurls a heron of stardust, stretching finely feathered wings for the first time. There’s a moment for me, one heart-reaching glance, before flight carries her light, constellation bound, to shine eternal.

Fourth Place:

Cracking Open the Cocoon

By Alice Shaw

After the funeral, I switched off my phone, ignored the doorbell and threw out the flowers. The camper van, packed with our retirement dreams, lay idle in the garage. I kicked its tyre as I thought of you lying sprawled on the floor, the light fading from your eyes.

For months, I wandered through the supermarket in a haze, with hair unwashed and crumpled clothes, picking through meals-for-one and leaving with little.

One morning, light crept under my bedroom door. Outside my window, a crocus pushed through the sodden soil, and a robin chirped.

I opened the door.