The Barstool That Forgot My Name By Heather Kays

The barstool remembered me once—

how I spilled my secrets

and my cheap whiskey dreams

onto its cracked leather skin.

It held me up

when I couldn’t stand straight,

when the nights bled into mornings

and the air tasted like regret.

But time changed the place,

or maybe it changed me.

Now it’s just a seat—

cold, silent, and indifferent—

like the way you left

without so much as a goodbye.

I sat there tonight,

waiting for the ghost of my own voice

to call me back by name.

But the barstool stayed quiet,

like it never knew me at all.

Heather Kays is a St. Louis-based poet and author passionate about writing since age 7. Her memoir, Pieces of Us, dissects her mother’s struggles with alcoholism and addiction. Her YA novel, Lila’s Letters, focuses on healing through unsent letters. She runs The Alchemists, an online writing group, and enjoys discussing creativity and complex narratives.

quite the impression By J.J. Campbell

in the wet neon

i will always hear

a saxophone off in

the distance

all those nights down

on fifth left quite the

impression

lighting cigarettes for

drunken women while

frank would play note

after note

i would try to get a line

in or two but i was 17

and most of these late

twenties early thirties

women were with someone

that looked like they

wanted to beat the shit

out of someone

that was when i first

learned about timing

and how to talk my 

way out of anything

that usually still 

works to this day

at least i’m old enough

now to get in those bars

frank is gone but the

music is still here

of course, we’re all

smoking something

different these days

J.J. Campbell (1976 - ?) is old enough to know better. He's been widely published over the years, most recently at Synchronized Chaos, Disturb the Universe Magazine, The Beatnik Cowboy, Lothlorien Poetry Journal and Black Coffee Review. You can find him most days on his mildly entertaining blog, evil delights. (https://evildelights.blogspot.com)

Home From the Cemetery By Howie Good

Yesterday was a difficult day. 

We buried my sister. 

Friends called her Stevie. 

Her name was Stephanie, 

and there was nothing 

Stephanie loved better 

probably than a townie bar 

with red leatherette booths 

and a worn pool table 

and a jukebox full of old 45’s. 

I’m 73 but feel a thousand. 

Weeds garnished the graves.

Howie Good is a professor emeritus at SUNY New Paltz whose poetry collections include The Dark and Akimbo, available from Sacred Parasite.

Truth Serum By Bruce Morton

This is a beverage of a certain kind,

A cocktail of this and that sweetened,

The proof of which is irrelevant.

Shaken or stirred, it will encourage you

To reveal yourself, unburden yourself,

To unwind. It begins with conversation.

Dialogue sips to monologue, a script

Inventing itself--few thoughts to think.

You are looking for ships to sink, lips loose

Words like torpedoes cutting beneath

Perfunctory waves and greetings. You sense

There Is danger growing accustomed to truth.

It creates an expectation, an anticipation that

Can only lead to disappointment. No lie.

Bruce Morton divides his time between Montana and Arizona. He is the author of two poetry collections: Planet Mort (2024) and Simple Arithmetic & Other Artifices (2014). His poems have appeared in numerous online and print venues. He was formerly dean at the Montana State University library.

How to Photograph Wild Animals and Mourn While Drunk in a National Wildlife Refuge By Renee Williams

First thing, stop at the Lost Colony Brewery on the waterfront

in Nag’s Head, see the bartender, Dirt, and order

up a Holy Hand Grenade to put you out of your misery.

One should be all that you need. It’s a dark Russian 

Imperial Stout that you’ll need to chew through. Grab 

a slice of Benny Tesoro’s pizza while you’re at it. 

You should have some of your wits about you for 

later in the night.

Leave nearly at sunset. It will take awhile

to get to the Refuge, and once there, you won’t

want to leave. Black bears, otters, coyotes 

are more active in the early evening. 

Yes, the area was used for 

moonshining, logging, murders, who knows what?

And who gives a damn if the place 

is haunted? After what you’ve been through

a ghost might be a welcome sight because 

heaven knows you have questions. 

Drive down Buffalo City Road and look.

Just look above you in the trees, behind you,

and beside you. Pray that your designated 

driver just had a Hatteras Red at the bar

because he’ll need to be more sober than 

you are. Red wolves roam these roads,

bobcats, too, and when you do get out 

of the car, watch yourself. Don’t step in

the ditches because a cottonmouth might

be hidden there, and trust me, 

you’d rather see that bloody corpse coming

at you than those fangs wrapped around

your ankle.

God willing you were smart enough prior

to inebriation to put on your zoom lens

because you probably shouldn’t get too close 

to the black bears—nor waste any time.

Yeah, they look hefty enough

munching on those soybeans and the like,

moving at pace of a caterpillar, but trust me,

you have to keep your eyes on those bears

and be ready with your camera because

they can move, especially when they 

are feeling threatened, and let’s face it:

since that meniscus surgery, you’re not

in danger of winning any marathons. 

If you’re lucky, you may get to spend

time with a bear. It may sit on an

embankment to nibble on thistle, bugs,

or swat away flies. Juveniles are just

as lost and confused as you, having

been tossed aside by their mothers 

to fend and forage on their own. 

Chances are, you two have a lot

to discuss. You might ask that 

bear how it feels not to call

his mother every day or evening,

and even though you’re 60 now,

you’ve just become an orphan, 

like this fella. You may tell him

that your mother left you just

a few months ago, up and died,

and even after all this time,

you weren’t ready, either. 

Snap a few shots for good measure

and while no one is looking,

wipe the tears away. Set your camera

down and tell your partner the battery

is dead, even though you both know

that isn’t the truth, and just gaze into the

bear’s eyes. Maybe then neither of you

will feel so alone. 

Renee Williams is a retired English instructor, who has written for Guitar Digest, Alien Buddha Press and Fevers of the Mind. 

 

Are there honky-tonks in Heaven By Terrence Sykes

With hardwood on the floors

Are there 7-11s conveniently next door

So I can buy more beer & condoms 

When I take a fallen angel home

Terrence Sykes is a GASP Gay Alcoholic Southern Poet & was born and raised in the rural coal mining area of Virginia.     Although he is a far better cook &  gardener – his  poetry - photography - flash fiction has been published in India, Mauritius,Scotland, Spain and the USA. ..Other interests include heirloom vegetable research & foraging wild edibles .

Authorial Intent Ale By Drema Drudge

Poetry isn’t a

writing residency at some

chichi

place where

you stand around and talk among

flaccid hors d'oeuvres

and drink Authorial Intent Ale

while thinking briefly over the

workshop sheets you’ll be discussing

tomorrow

when

everyone knows

you just want to get to and through

your own.

Crown me now,

and also,

tell me why my work

sucks.

But mostly, crown me.

Poetry needs

3 a.m. and

a phrase overheard on the subway

and

a love so deep and wide

you can only carry it

with a hand truck

and a pack of Gitanes.

And yet

you have.

(And maybe it needs a red pen.)

Drema Drudge is a novelist and poet whose poetry blends emotional candor and the everyday with longing. She has an MFA from the Naslund-Mann Graduate School of Writing, and her work has appeared in The Word’s Faire, The Louisville Review, Spectrum, and others.

She Couldn’t Hold Her Body Still By Michael Minassian

All our friends hung out

at the Royal Oak,

but you preferred 

the dive bar down 

at the bottom of Main Street

where you could play

shuffleboard and tease

old men sitting

on worn leather stools.

One night your best friend

from high school

showed up and fed quarters

into the juke box.

She couldn’t hold her

body still, so you grabbed

her hand and danced.

When the music stopped,

she opened her eyes,

and I thought that would be

the end of the story

until I heard her sob 

as she raced

into the restroom.

The mirror had its own

tale to tell—

a smear of red on her lips,

fingernails chewed

to the quick.

MICHAEL MINASSIAN lives with his wife in Southern New England. He is a Contributing Editor for Verse-Virtual, an online poetry journal. His poetry collections Time is Not a River, Morning Calm, and A Matter of Timing as well as a chapbook, Jack Pays a Visit, are all available on Amazon. For more information: https://michaelminassian.com

 

Sign on the Dotted Line By Gabriel Bates

After that,

the temp agency

can start processing

your background check

and drug test,

get your banking information,

fill out all the tax paperwork,

go over their rules and guidelines,

have you watch

their workplace safety video,

set up an appointment for you

to attend one of their orientations,

and then they might finally consider

letting you sell your soul to them

for a new job.

Gabriel Bates is a poet living in Pittsburg, Kansas. His work has appeared in several publications, online and in print. Keep up with him at facebook.com/gabrieljbates

If At First You Don’t Succeed, Take a Hint By Manny Grimaldi

If at first you don’t hit bottom, 

you will hit a series of possibly-maybes, 

the perhapses, something silly of a quizás

and the trusted not-yet.

When in grace, 

I met you laughing.

The field, lit with last night’s rain, 

still damp,

glowed somewhat firefly.

You said you liked men with shaved heads,

I took a clipper to my skull. 

The whirrsome blade belied my want.

But I passed it off, 

“Baby, you’d do it too in Kentucky weather.”

You smiled, left me

sliding downhill in my black sweats,, 

always oversized hiding 

a dad bod.

I latched onto a tourist and she made me do it.

This is how I fight alcohol

when I feel alone.

Manny Grimaldi works in Kentucky. He manages Yearling, a Poetry Journal for Working Writers. Manny is the author of the upcoming poetry collection Finding a Word to Describe You, a book covering the whole gamut of emotion in one seemingly ill-advised, whirlwind relationship. It is released for consumption by Whiskey City Press (2025). In 2024, he self-published a full length poetry book about addiction and family issues, Riding Shotgun with the Mothman, and a satirical chapbook ranging from the literary and cinematic, to political and pop sensibilities named ex libris Ioannes Cerva. Recently he was awarded The Browning Literary Club Poetry Award by Western Kentucky University Creative Writing Faculty for “Judas Contemplates a Painting.” Manny is father to two genius-level children. His currency is his word. The dishes are never done.

Dim Lights By George Gad Economou

nothing beats a dim lit joint, a dive criminals and lowlifes frequent;

you hear the best tales, you meet the most interesting people populating

an otherwise dull and dry world. and, sometimes, you find love hiding

in some worn-out booth, between vomit and blood stains on walls and floors.

it was in a dim lit dive I met her, and in a dive I forgot her.

most in there were looking for a fight; I wasn’t, but never backed out

of a challenge. not even blades glistening under the orange streetlamp 

scared me off; being suicidal helps immensely. 

didn’t take long to be left alone, angry lowlifes attacked other newcomers

and I just hunkered down on my stool, gulping down gin and tonics and beer,

and bourbon and tequila, and whatever horrid concoctions the bartenders

threw at me.

next time you walk by a flashing neon sign, with a name as uninspiring as

DAN’S BAR, walk in. you might never come back out, alive,

but it’s alright. if you do, you’ll know what I’m talking about.

George Gad Economou has a Master’s degree in Philosophy of Science, currently works as a freelance writer, and has published three novels and two poetry collections, with the latest being his horror novel, The Lair of Sinful Angels (Translucent Eyes Press). His words have also appeared in Spillwords Press, Ariel Chart, Cajun Mutt Press, Fixator Press, Horror Sleaze Trash, Outcast Press, The Piker Press, The Beatnik Cowboy, The Rye Whiskey Review, and Modern Drunkard Magazine.

HAM & SPAM By Susan Isla Tepper

Try and conceal your darkness

flashing those angry yellow teeth

a smile meant to fool

it sure ain’t me you’re fooling

 

I can tell the difference

between ham and spam

 

You grew up with a silver spoon

as they used to say—

I grew up mowing the grass

when my dad had to be away

 

I learned to count raindrops in numbers:

 

Carry in a load of firewood

ball up some newspaper

light it then light the kindling.

 

Bake a cake or make the supper

when my mom had to work

nights to help bring home the bacon.

Don’t mess with me.

I can piss like a dog against a wall

if necessary.

Susan Isla Tepper is a twenty year writer in all genres. Her most recent book, a Novel titled Hair Of A Fallen Angel, came out in the fall from Spuyten Duyvil Books, NYC. Tepper has also written 7 stage plays. Her third play titled EVA & ADAMO will present at The Tank, NYC, early fall. www.susantepper.com

Another One Night Stand By Karen A VandenBos

She walked into the bar tonight

at seventeen past nine

laid her money on the table,

ordered a glass of wine.

When he leaned over her shoulder

and asked her for a dance

she decided to put her hand in his,

decided to take a chance.

They two-stepped to country,

danced close and far apart,

the only sound that she could hear

was the thumping of her heart.

Lying in the bed she made

when she offered him her hand

she knew she'd kick this one out

by dawn, another one night stand.

Karen A VandenBos was born on a warm July morn in Kalamazoo, MI. 

She has a PhD in Holistic Health where a course in shamanism taught 

her to travel between two worlds. She can be found unleashing her vivid

imagination in two writing groups. A Best of the Net nominee, her writing

has been published in Lothlorien Poetry Journal, Blue Heron Review, 

The Rye Whiskey Review, One Art: a journal of poetry, Anti-Heroin Chic, 

The Ekphrastic Review, MacQueen's Quinterly, Moss Piglet, Panoply, 

Feed the Holy, Peninsula Poets and others.

Preschool By Doug Holder

A child

outside the preschool

grabbed her mother's leg

face immersed

in the tight tendon of this

trunk,

" I don't want to go!"

Some way

she senses

her complacent

float

in her mother's sea

A well-cushioned

dream

of neither here

or there....

Why is life so unfair?

Doug Holder is on the board of the New England Poetry Club and teaches creative writing at Endicott College. His latest poetry collection is " I ain't gonna wait for Godot, no more" ( Wilderness House Press)

Co-President of the New England Poetry Club

Boston Area Small Press and Poetry Scene   http://dougholder.blogspot.com

Ibbetson Street Press  http://www.ibbetsonpress.com

Poet to Poet/Writer to Writer  http://www.poettopoetwritertowriter.blogspot.com

Doug Holder CV http://www.dougholderresume.blogspot.com

Doug Holder's Columns in The Somerville Times

https://www.thesomervilletimes.com/?s=%22Doug+Holder%22&x=0&y=0

Doug Holder's collection at the Internet Archive   https://archive.org/details/@dougholder

The Familiar Drank the Strange By Tony Brewer

after Matt Hart

When I want to get sober I stop

embellishing reality 

its sharpness 

opposing the dull ache

It never ends 

even as I dissolve

into brick & rain

as sentient as swung elbows 

in a pit

primal

elemental 

Minor gods

overseeing humble hangovers

fever dreamed in Midwest 

shamanic escape from rest 

stop bathroom simulacrum

& trashcan calisthenics 

Nothing to do but count breaths 

left in a sinking party balloon

& when I want to get fucked up

I pull weaponry from the arsenal

of a universe rebuilt a million times

a day from upcycled memories

shaped like dreams sloshing

around in the soup within the bowl

my gray dumpling

floats warm & hand formed in

Unkempt & reserved for the sacred

rite of accidents

Leaving blazed trail away 

from groove of flat frequency

destined to bring back volume 

& loss of control

every atom wishes had a switch

SNAP – lights on awareness full

SNAP – I cannot find me here

I stumble into shadow

mistaken for stagger

my dance

around the fire of my humanity

burnt down to you my body

my lovely put-upon soul

now sponging up all poisons

& squeezing out precious drops

of something mercifully sweet

Tony Brewer is a poet and audio artist from Bloomington, Indiana. He co-produces the Writers Guild Spoken Word Series and the Urban Deer Performance Series. His books include Good Job, Lightning (Stubborn Mule Press) and Water Witch (Pure Sleeze Press). More at linktr.ee/TonyBrewer

25-cent wing night at kangaroo’s By John Grochalski

 

it was

this australian themed place

in a strip mall

in the northern pittsburgh suburbs

a mixture of a bar and club

and the wings came in a bucket

flaming orange and spicy

with that night’s

$1.50 beer special

and the four of us 

old buddies suddenly grown mature

would sit at table

attacking them

like we’d never had food before

as chicks in miniskirts went by

and we didn’t care

for me, it was freedom

from a bad relationship

twenty-one

and we just fought all of the time

i wasn’t sure if that’s what love was supposed to be

or not

but it didn’t matter there

at that strip mall bar

orange spicy goo

on my cheeks

on my fingers

ravaged bones in a metal bucket

piles of rust-colored napkins

all over the table

empty pints of beer piled all around us

as we told dick jokes

and pumped dollars

into the jukebox

to hear all of the music that made our world

it was the grandest place

that i’d ever been

my summer oasis

away from the bullshit and strife

until…

she turned twenty-one that fall

and i she made me

take her there

specifically there

and everything in that bar 

seemed drab and dead to me that night

tasteless

like beer without foam

but she had the time of her life

got drunk and stuffed on that place’s bounty

and in the car

her face a mess of dried buffalo sauce

her breath a catastrophe

she turned to me and said

now, i can come here with you

and your friends

all of the time

before rolling down her window

and throwing it all up

on the cracked and cold

godforsaken 

parking lot.

John Grochalski is the author of the poetry collections, The Noose Doesn’t Get Any Looser After You Punch Out (Six Gallery Press 2008), Glass City (Low Ghost Press, 2010), In The Year of Everything Dying (Camel Saloon, 2012), Starting with the Last Name Grochalski (Coleridge Street Books, 2014), and The Philosopher’s Ship (Alien Buddha Press, 2018). He is also the author of the novels, The Librarian (Six Gallery Press 2013), and Wine Clerk (Six Gallery Press 2016).  Grochalski currently lives in Brooklyn, New York, where the garbage can smell like roses if you wish on it hard enough.

In the Bar By Sam Harty

This bar stool fits my ass

just right --I proudly state

to no one in particular

as I wait on my Guinness.

They know me here

sitting at the far end

of the bar contemplating

Happy Hour.

But I know the truth.

Happy hour is a myth.

We drink regret like wine

and call it coping.

We clink glasses

like it means something--

like we're celebrating

instead of just surviving.

The bartender knows

when to keep the drinks

coming -the pour steady

the questions light or

when not to ask at all.

I laugh louder than I mean to,

because silence

makes the ghost lean in.

We toast to nothing.

To making it through Monday.

To forgetting just enough

to wake up on Tuesday.

We raise our glasses

to blurred edges,

to old pain with new names,

to the lull between songs

where no one talks

where that silence

becomes a mercy.

And this bar stool--

this stupid, perfect bar stool--

still fits like it was made

for someone who stays way

too long.

Sam Harty is the author of Lost Love Volume I and II. Her work has been published in numerous magazines and anthologies. She writes poetry that explores love, loss, and the quiet strength found in healing.

Whiskey Bent and Hellbound By Heather Kays

This is a love letter—

to the burn, to the bite,

to the way whiskey kisses the back of my throat

like a bad decision I know I’ll make again.

To the tilt of the world after shot number three,

when strangers become prophets,

when jukebox songs mean something they never meant before.

To the courage I never had before the glass was full,

to the way my tongue loosens like a rope cut clean,

to the way I stop caring who’s watching—

or maybe start hoping someone is.

To barstools that feel like thrones,

to bartenders who know my name

but never ask for my story.

To the heat in my veins,

to the reckless joy of saying yes when I should say no.

This is a love letter—

to the nights I laughed louder, danced harder,

let hands wander without pulling away.

To the soft blur of neon halos,

to the way sin feels like salvation

when your head is light and your heart is heavier.

But the sun always rises

like an unwanted answer,

and the love letter turns to a debt.

The hangover comes collecting,

the mirror shows a face that looks like shame,

and my body becomes a crime scene

I don’t remember walking into.

The whiskey still works,

until it doesn’t.

The whiskey works 

until you taste the ruin on your tongue.

Heather Kays is a St. Louis-based poet and author passionate about writing since age 7. Her memoir, Pieces of Us, dissects her mother’s struggles with alcoholism and addiction. Her YA novel, Lila’s Letters, focuses on healing through unsent letters. She runs The Alchemists, an online writing group, and enjoys discussing creativity and complex narratives.

Jello Felony By Leah Mueller

A Texas mother

brought Jello shots

to her fifth grader’s classroom

Christmas party, irritating

the children’s stomachs

as well as their doting parents,

in almost equal measure.

Reports included dizziness

and vomiting. One of the kids

passed out. The mother claimed

she purchased the shots

on Facebook Marketplace,

proving, once again,

that social media is 

evil and dangerous

and should be abolished

for society’s greater welfare.

Calls to Mark Zuckerberg

were not immediately returned,

but the mother was arrested.

Justice does prevail,

even in Texas.

Leah Mueller's work is published or forthcoming in Rattle, Writers Resist, Beach Chair Press, NonBinary Review, Brilliant Flash Fiction, Citron Review, New Flash Fiction Review, Does It Have Pockets, Outlook Springs, Your Impossible Voice, etc. She has received several nominations for Pushcart and Best of the Net. One of her short stories appears in the 2022 edition of Best Small Fictions. Her fourteenth book, "A Pretty Good Disaster" is forthcoming from Alien Buddha Press in Summer, 2025. Website: http://www.leahmueller.org.