AT THE WAFFLE HOUSE, AN ASSESSOR FROM THE DISASTER DECLARATIONS UNIT OF THE FEDERAL EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT AGENCY BREAKS CRACKERS INTO A BOWL OF BERT’S CHILI

Think of this place as an index. Even roofless, it remains open. How bad can an EF5 be if one is still served risk-managed grits?

ON HER LUNCH HOUR, THE SOCIAL SECURITY ADMINISTRATION’S DEPUTY CHIEF ACTUARY (LONG RANGE) VISITS RUINS OF THE ENCHANTED FOREST, OLD ROUTE 40, ELLICOTT CITY, MARYLAND

Today, I’ll make news! Most popular baby names? “Noah.” “Sophia.” When you die, you die. Your number’s mine. I reassign it. A stranger’s strange candy.

THE INCINERATOR OPERATOR AT THE NATIONAL ANIMAL DISEASE CENTER IN AMES, IOWA, WRITES A DEAR JOHN LETTER TO HER LOVER, A BEEKEEPER, FOLLOWING THE BLOOM

Colony Collapse Disorder eludes research. I burn buckets of bees. Enclosed, insects’ ashes. That mailed anthrax powder, remember, was the “Ames” strain. Here, weaponized tears.

Michael Martone was born in Fort Wayne, Indiana, and is the author of several books, including Four for a Quarter, Michael Martone, and The Blue Guide to Indiana. He’s happy that, now, his computer actually counts the number of words allotted (he has been given 75) to tell his life story, like robotic Fates, measuring out the length of line, there, at the bottom of window frame, cutting him off at the exact