by Sacha Bissonnette
And what do we do to feel safe ?
We cut out pounds of our own flesh for dowry, for position, we give up sensibility and carve out pieces of bone, pounded into flour, and then we hope, we hope that our forearms can still knead.
And at that Sunday market, I will sell myself over and over again, hoping that whoever is buying doesn’t think martyrdom, but self-sacrifice; better yet, thinks compromise, like Sunday brunch.
Sacha Bissonnette is a writer from Ottawa, Canada. His fiction has appeared in Witness, Wigleaf, SmokeLong Quarterly, Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine, Terrain.org, Ghost Parachute, The NoSleep Podcast, and elsewhere. He is currently working on a short fiction collection and a comic book adaptation of one of his short stories. His projects are powered by the Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, and the City of Ottawa. He has been nominated for several awards, including the Pushcart Prize and Best Small Fictions, and is a reader for Wigleaf TOP 50. He was selected for the 2024 Sundress Publications Residency and was the winner of the 2024 Faulkner Gulf Coast Residency. Find him at sachajohnbissonnette.com or on X @sjohnb9.