by Wesley R. Bishop

“Joe had grown up on the other side of the river, the side with houses struggling to maintain their roofs and dogs that barked all night. The kind of place the old men at the club called “real America” until someone Black walked by, then it was just “sad.” If it was Joe, in regular clothes, no uniform, then it was “dangerous.”

by Wesley R. Bishop

“It was tethered by a thick chain to a run-down box, paint peeling, the roof sagging on one side like a collapsed tent…the dog sat in the heat, sides rising with shallow breath.”