Decimos
We Say
is a creative writing outlet for writers living in the Florida Keys. All our content is locally grown, free range of course. Available in print or digital formats. If you would like to submit content please click below:
Decimos - We Say, Issue #12
Cover Art courtesy JD Adler
Samplers
- 21 Sep 2018
A Storm of Tears Julie Cuneo Key West For miles there is no one. Not one car, bike, person, nothing. Not even a bird gliding in the air. Nothing looks the same. Trees are stripped bare. The ocean’s floor is scattered everywhere. Tears are pouring down my face. There is a house on the gulf side of the road. It used to be on the ocean side. Beachside homes never seen before rise through the ghosts of trees that have died. Tears are drenching my shirt. The “things” that represent a person’s life are piled up on the sides of the road. Waiting to be taken away, dotting the miles with load after load. Tears are drowning me. Flashback to my life after Wilma when it was my “things” waiting to be removed. Waiting for the trash man to take them away, hoping my hurt could be some-what soothed. Tears […]
- 16 Aug 2018
Kalo Key West unlike u I want/need/crave swear words as often as possible to highlight what u brilliantly call the fascist nature of our new normality. the shit’s hit the fan big time. bye bye women’s rights/gay rights/human rights. our personal vulnerabilities so naked. your brown pigmentation. my grab-able pussy. so much lost already. down the tubes in just 1 year/161 days/23 hours/51 minutes/36 seconds. my response poem is not nuanced with linguistic restraint like your call. yeah silence IS death; I’m alive & yelling FUCK (did mother church say not to curse? one of the ex-cathedra “shalt nots”?) so I propose: shitfuck. crapfuck. goddamnedfuck. assholefuck. bastardfuck. sonofabitchfuck. better than that? not me. u can take my profanity as 1. offensive language 2. sinking to base in their likeness or 3. a swearer’s sworn oath to resist the Trumpfucking of America. I pick #3
- 16 Aug 2018
Edgardo Alvarado – Vazquez Stock Island This is ME What I want to write is too dark Too angry to inscribe to spell out and yes I did promise that I would march on paper but the paper is muddied with spewed words full of hatred from the other side and yes I’m better than that, I’m better than them and it’s not about how many swear words I can put in a poem (as I heard someone ask behind my back) and yes IT IS about my anger IT IS about not remaining silent because silence equals death death of the mind equals death of the heart and death of the pen and yes I stand before you trying to articulate an anti-racist poem against the fascist core of our new normal and yes Without rocking the linguistic coded boat set out by the ex-cathedra infallibility of the brethren and of the establishment holding me down today and yes I can say with […]
- 22 Jun 2018
by Allen Cody Key West -ETERNITY NEAR- The charity pine box they put me in was too small – so they chop’d a hole and me feet, they waggled outa one end. You could tell them miners in the crowd, their skin was white and pasty. But them ones that killed me looked down – avoidin’ the eyes of me family and – the innocent. Then they lowered me inta the ground near grandaddy. Me family cried. But me baby Jacob – oh Jacob – Jacob, he cried the loudest. Then I heard ’em say. . .”GOOD BYE” ”NO! I AIN’T DEAD! I AIN’T!” I holler’d. But I had no voice no more. But . . . But it was true . . . I was dead. ‘ Then it was quiet an’ dark for a long, long time, an’ there was a lota memories. Memories of Life. I want’d […]
- 8 May 2018
JD Adler Key West In an age when the bad guys are winning and the good guys are on the run Maybe we don’t need heroes But villains to save everyone Loki, Lex Luthor and Magneto to the rescue of this world gone bizzaro Everything they told us we’re supposed to do gets you nothing but tired yet crime and sin pay mad dividends and lack of morality is the key to the kingdom when up is down and crime means time only if you don’t have any dimes Maybe what we need is not another honorable do-gooder but a crafty conniving hell-raiser On our side after all wasn’t ‘a villain for the people’ Robin Hood’s whole thing when a tyrant usurped the beloved king exploiting the people for his own aggrandizement George Washington was a traitor to his King so maybe the lesson of history is a Villain is […]
- Storm of the Century 21 Sep 2018
The Storm of the Century Steven Saint Vincent Key Largo They live and work and play on the easternmost third of the archipelago. It sounds exotic as if it were some faraway Paradise but it’s just a place they call home; The Upper Keys of Key Largo, Tavernier and Islamorada. There is a special language in this place where they make their lives, memories, retire or raise their children and there only are 2 seasons; Off season and In season. The people of the islands love Off season and tolerate In season. If asked directions, they tell you what you are looking for is north or south or just the mile marker, bay side or ocean. Seldom will you hear an address. There’s only one main road unless you live here and then you know the original highway. Outsiders are called Mainlanders. They don’t live here but they vacation, sometimes […]
- Lives Together 22 Jun 2018
by M.N. SNow Key West “Jesus, David, you forget every time!” “Do I?” “Yes, and I still can’t believe it. It’s only been about a thousand years!” Hannah should’ve been used to it by now, but it still bothered her. She felt a piercing stab of loss thinking that he could’ve forgotten her. Her head was bent and her long, dark, ringlet hair shrouded her face. “But I remember now. Does that help?” Hannah felt a sigh of release ease out—a pressure valve deep inside providing relief. Fifteen times, maybe seventeen, and it always hurt, and it always passed. What she always forgot was that it passed. Maybe they each had their forgetting to get past. “Yes it does, David. We’re together again and that’s what counts.” A question by David had precipitated the conversation—as it always did, every time. “We’ve been together before, haven’t we?”
- The Truth About Pelicans 8 May 2018
THE TRUTH ABOUT PELICANS Kurt Cole Eidsvig Key West Nina wanted a sandwich but Marty wouldn’t stop talking about the sunset. They were riding bikes toward White Street Pier on the last day of their vacation. Nina’s hair salon in Duluth— Full Twist—was doing just fine. The way Marty kept pedaling by her every time they came to a stop sign she knew something else was wrong though. Her stomach rumbled. Marty described the purple. Marty said she’d just missed The Green Flash last night. Marty mentioned silhouettes. Nina rang her little rented bike bell on her little rented bike. She rang it again. The shadow of the sailboat, Marty said. “Marty!” Nina almost yelled it. A group of pelicans dove and twisted and gulped at fish. They made Nina think about airplanes. They made Nina think about twisted steel and last-minute pleas. They made Nina think about crashing. She […]
- The Harbor 10 Apr 2018
THE HARBOR Kim Alan Pederson Key West Have you been down to the harbor lately? I know you haven’t. I can tell by looking at you that you haven’t. Why not? What’s keeping you from it? What better things might you be doing? What thing, anything, might you be doing? You never say. I went to the harbor yesterday. I went today. I go every day, every morning. I time my visit to arrive at the precise moment of high tide. But you know that already. I’ve told you, what, a million times? You know I go out on Pier 4. You know I take a jackknife with me. A single-blade Spyderco Delica4 with a black handle. You can open and close it with one hand, not that that’s important for what I do with it. It’s small—blade length 2.87 inches—but small is fine. The handle has bi-directional texturing for […]
- Voyage of the Band, Part 1 23 Feb 2018
JD Adler Key West 1. OPANU Doug spent hours staring at it, the so called “hull” of the ship. There was just no convincing him it was sturdy enough to protect them from the void. The energy field stretched between the struts of the spherical frame revealed itself in shimmering rainbow waves crashing against one strut then back towards the other. He was doing it again, laying on his back on the floor of the top level just staring into the glittering energy shield and beyond, pondering which stars belonged to him, when Deru-Ti bellowed. “Hu! Man!” Deru-Ti was barely tall enough to ride a roller coaster. Though the average carney would probably be more put off by the bright blue fur covering his mostly naked body (except for the loin cloth his crew mates had finally convinced him to wear). Perhaps the thick trunk, half the length of his […]
- Development on A Dish
“Development” on a Dish Flower Conroy Key West Poet Laureate My fellow writer friend, Kelly Wolfe, asked if I would be willing to share my poem “Development” with her students (a group of aspiring chefs at Johnson and Wales)—to which I of course agreed. One of my poems was going to be discussed and …
- The Word
Flower Conroy Poet Laureate of Key West De/compositions In his book De/compositions, W. D. Snodgrass alters great canonic poems’ techniques of diction, meter, image, and/or intention in order to showcase how crucial each and every gesture a poet makes contributes to the poem’s overall success. As a result, these new poems become semblances of …
- The Dead Sheep
By the time you read this I will have presumably led a poetry craft workshop titled, “A world of Emotion, Image and Rhythm,” in which we, the class, will “practice drawing emotion from imagery and rhythm from word choices in an array of poetic exercises.” I’m planning on beginning by asking the class, “why do …