Bernard Fancher: 12 books

Story excerpt: “Let the earth cause grass to shoot forth,” Jacob recited quietly to himself, “and vegetation to bear seed, and fruit trees to yield fruit according to kind…” He paused, considering the implications of the words to follow, before continuing, “…the seed of which...

A follow-up collection of poems continuing upon themes dealt with in "Before Dark, and After"--but concentrating more on the element of water than fire.

Epi Martin was an intelligent young girl on the cusp of becoming a mature woman. She enjoyed the nearly unquestioning trust of her mother and the devoted attention of Alfredo, the young man whom she loved and who in turn was entirely taken with her special charms. The future seemed safe and quite...

A short play in one act, in which a couple considers their present and past.

excerpt: We leave the car and strip behind it. The boy turns shyly away, exposing the pearly white purity of his bare bottom. Safe from view, I enjoy the transitory thrill of standing naked in the world. Before slipping my trunks on, I look beyond the far side of the wired enclosure, remembering...

excerpt: She would have experienced the same intense, awful pleasure of feeling her insides falling away, and felt as well the desire to scream—a reaction she may either have repressed or indulged; but whether she leapt a little that day or simply held tight to her place and quietly resisted, no-one would ever know.

excerpt:All right then, said Will. He gripped his poles harder and pushed down on them, anchoring himself as he slid his skis back and forth to loosen them in the snow. When he was ready he sucked in a deep breath and pushed off the little ledge.The run came at him fast; he bent his...

excerpt: “I got you a rum and coke,” he said, “without the rum.” She smiled again as her fingers enclosed the glass and he noticed for the first time her nails, long and perfectly rounded, the color of dark twilight sparkling with starlets. “Oh that’s okay,” she...

Poems that explore the interstice between light and dark, day and night, perhaps even good and evil.

He could not help... recall the day he stopped his bike on the bridge intending only to look over the thin spreading creek beyond the falls to the gorge and the green water pooled below. It was then he found himself looking upon the private scene of a girl climbing the falls hand in hand with a young...

excerpt: Now the road north steamed beneath the headlights, illuming a path through a lush growth of small trees and bushes lining both sides. Eventually he turned one last time east, crossing a stream, before heading northward again. By the time he reached the outskirts of Dudley he was ready...

excerpt:She would come by once or twice a week to look in on him, though he was nothing to her but a neighbor. Yesterday, her excuse for doing so amounted to no more than the fact she’d just, an hour before, baked up a big batch of cookies. She and Kevin would never eat them all, or at least...