Litbreak Magazine

[et_pb_section admin_label=”section”][et_pb_row admin_label=”row”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″][/et_pb_column][/et_pb_row][/et_pb_section][et_pb_section admin_label=”section” transparent_background=”off” allow_player_pause=”off” inner_shadow=”off” parallax=”off” parallax_method=”off” padding_mobile=”off” make_fullwidth=”off” use_custom_width=”off” width_unit=”on” make_equal=”off” use_custom_gutter=”off” gutter_width=”3″][et_pb_row admin_label=”Row”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″][et_pb_code admin_label=”Code” global_module=”116″ saved_tabs=”all”]<center><script type=’text/javascript’ src=’http://www.googletagservices.com/tag/js/gpt.js’> googletag.pubads().definePassback(‘/23083367/litbreaker/litbreak/Top’, [[970, 250], [728, 90]]).display(); </script> </center>[/et_pb_code][et_pb_divider admin_label=”Divider” color=”#ffffff” show_divider=”off” height=”10″ divider_style=”solid” divider_position=”top” divider_weight=”1″ hide_on_mobile=”on”] [/et_pb_divider][/et_pb_column][/et_pb_row][et_pb_row admin_label=”Row”][et_pb_column type=”2_3″][et_pb_post_title admin_label=”Post Title” title=”on” meta=”on” author=”on” date=”on” categories=”on” comments=”off” featured_image=”on” featured_placement=”background” parallax_effect=”on” parallax_method=”on” text_orientation=”center” text_color=”dark” text_background=”on” text_bg_color=”rgba(255,255,255,0.9)” module_bg_color=”rgba(255,255,255,0)” title_all_caps=”off” meta_font_size=”14″ use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid”] [/et_pb_post_title][et_pb_text admin_label=”Text” background_layout=”light” text_orientation=”left” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid”] read more

Now, look, I’ve been at this for more than forty-five years — long before Satish was even an itch in his father’s pants. I started with nothing, squatting on roadsides, selling roasted chana and peanuts off a gunny sack. They called me “Joker” because of how my wide smile always stayed on, even when dust, thick as chickpea flour, covered my face and hair. read more

They rise to the sky in shades deeper than the night, darker than my melancholy. Fragments of midnight, they consume the space between spaces, chew them and spit them out into obsidian cityscape. I observe them from my tenth-floor apartment – the highest aerie I could afford – and fill my vista with dark uncertainty. Outlined by infinity, bathed in the light spectral, the city’s building blocks stand aloft and not a single light shines. Not one. read more

The starchy white pillowcase left faint red imprints on Lana’s cheek. She blinked, considered—for a beat too long—just where an insinuating shaft of sunlight was coming from. Her bedroom windows faced east, their azure-colored curtains vibrantly awash with the morning sun. This light was from the west and these curtains were taupe, tawdry. Tubes itched at their points of insertion. Not her condominium then, but St. Barnabas’s Hospital. It took longer, lately, to distinguish. To lay claim to a sense of place. read more

“My levees are washing away like New Orleans,” Terry tells me on the phone. “There goes a chunk now. I have sung Broadway tunes for days, but my signal hasn’t penetrated their dead zone. Did I close the windows? Pay my taxes? One is always unprepared for death.” read more