Pondering By Keith Pearson

I was sitting on the porch at dusk, the faded boards silver in the last light, thinking about Ecclesiastes, and an old friend gone a few years now.  The book covers some hard country that everyone passes through, where wind covers the ground and rivers run their course. Where plans made by man get blown away like footsteps in the dust.

 

My friend used to laugh at such talk, said folks spent too much of life trying to outsmart time. I can still hear that laugh some evenings, especially when the sunset is fading into unnamed colors and the wind is out of the west in a faint breeze.

 

Ecclesiastes isn't a place to go for comfort. Maybe that's why I like it, the same reason I make this place home. There's not much comfort found out here. Life here stands tough, boots in the dust, telling hard truths. There's a time for every thing under heaven. Seasons arrive and seasons leave. There's no bargaining, and no appeal.

 

I have learned over my time here how the dead travel along with you. They show themselves here in different ways. A gesture. A word. In the way a gathering storm sends a warning chill along the spine.

 

The sun goes down and leaves only a promise it will rise. I take comfort in that. Out here we keep things simple.

 

They put her in ground where she never wanted to be. I take the blame for that. I was the only one that knew, and I forgot until it was too late.  They chose a bright green patch of fake grass fenced in by tidy rules. Her ashes rode there in a cardboard box decorated with paper roses. I could hear the wind calling her from the far off canyons she loved. The people standing over her meant well in their grief. Meaning well doesn't get you far out here. Handfuls of dirt fell softly. My eyes were somewhere beyond the cemetery, to the west. Across the hard plains to the mountains beyond

Across the seasons where she travels beside me.

keith pearson was born and raised in new hampshire and works at a local high school in the math department.

UNDER NEW MANAGEMENT. NOW O EN 24 HOURS By Trish Saunders

You might think we’ve stumbled

onto hard times

here at the Blue Moon tavern.

Our neon sign doesn’t slice

through the air 

like it used to.

Payroll is cut

to three, including 

the mop and pail. 

We require only a twenty

on the table to run a tab. 

Not complaining, mind you.

The cat still gets fed, 

our landlord seems 

the understanding type. 

Hard times everywhere, but

you’ll always be able 

to get a drink on us, 

so long as you can still find 

a Blue Moon mug somewhere.

It shouldn’t be hard in a big city like this. 

Trish Saunders lives in Seattle. She has poems and short fiction
published or forthcoming in Chiron Review, Main Street Rag, Gargoyle, the late lamented Fat Damsel Review, and here in the Rye Whiskey Review. 

They Called Him Norm By Matthew Ussia

because he looked like that guy from Cheers

but that was before he got a giant scar

across his whole face 

from flipping a car

at over 100 miles per hour

somewhere in Maryland 

but that was after he got expelled

though he still came up most weekends

to perform his famous frat party trick

of drinking until his heart stopped 

when the LifeFlight copters would come

on Saturday night we always shrugged

Oh, that's just Norm

lately I've been asking around

he was a nice enough guy

but no one remembers his real name

so we'll always have to wonder

about the slim possibility

that he lived

Matthew Ussia is director of Duquesne University’s First Year Writing Program in spite of the fact that he got a C- in freshman writing and was rejected from Duquesne’s MA program. He is also an editor, podcaster, post-doom thereminist, softcore punk, postpunk backup singer, social media burnout, and sentient organic matter. His second book, Saturday Night on Earth, was published by Alien Buddha Press in 2025. His first book, The Red Glass Cat, was published by Alien Buddha Press in 2021. His writings have appeared in Mister Rogers and Philosophy, Future Humans in Fiction and Film, North of Oxford, MadSwirl, Trailer Park Quarterly, Anti-Heroin Chic, and Pittsburgh Quarterly among others. More information can be found at www.matthewussia.com.

The Inevitable by Connie Johnson

it’s when I dove into the wine of memory 

each sip revealing what I told you so righteously 

jazz turbulence  / & I reflect on everything 

caress my ear 

with notes of clarity / clear water

w/ waves of  nostalgia 

& Nina Simone!

tears   overflow     into distant waters 

Immortality! / & everyday this becomes 

more clear to me 

I’m no high priestess

I never implied that I 

was built for this

o soul baptism

I always knew 

I always knew

I always knew

you’d make me 

drown

Connie Johnson is a Los Angeles, CA-based Pushcart Prize nominee whose poetry has appeared in San Pedro River Review, Syncopation Literary Journal, Cholla Needles,  The Rye Whiskey Review,    and Writing in a Woman’s Voice. Everything is Distant Now (Blue Horse Press), her debut poetry collection, is available on Amazon; In a Place of Dreams, her digital album/chapbook, can be found at www.jerryjazzmusician.com    

Distant Shores By Leon Drake

I keep your name

in the glove compartment

with the old receipts

and a map

to somewhere

we never went.

Funny how

you can spend years

trying to get somewhere

only to discover

you were already there.

We became

distant shores

not enemies,

not strangers,

just two pieces of land

with too much ocean

between them.

Sometimes at night

I still look toward

the water

as if you might be

standing there,

waving.

And sometimes

I wave back.

Not because

I expect you to see me,

but because

some goodbyes

deserve

a little kindness.

Leon Drake is a Toronto based poet.

His work has been published in Fixator Press, The Literary Underground, The Rye Whiskey Review, Spill The Words Press, Horror Sleaze Trash, Sava Press and The Crossroads Magazine.

Another Broken Mirror By Juliet Cook

Then the mirror began to hate me.

Me and the mirror were smashed.

Stale breadcrumbs, vodka and glass 

falling down into another 

bathtub coffin.

Dripping blood, then drying out, 

unless I keep bleeding inside

my cracked glass coffin until 

blood covers my body and mind.

Bloody grim fairy tale entrapment

in which I visibly bleed out or else

I just disappear. 

Juliet Cook doesn't fit inside an Easy-Bake Oven and rarely cooks. Her

poetry has appeared in a peculiar multitude of literary publications.

She is the author of numerous poetry chapbooks, most recently

including "red flames burning out" (Grey Book Press, 2023), "Contorted

Doom Conveyor" (Gutter Snob Books, 2023), "Your Mouth is Moving

Backwards" (Ethel Zine & Micro Press, 2023), "REVOLTING" (Cul-de-sac

of Blood, 2024), and "Blue Stingers Instead of Wings" (Pure Sleeze

Press, 2025). Her most recent full-length poetry book, "Malformed

Confetti" was published by Crisis Chronicles Press. You can find out

more at https://julietcook.weebly.com/.

After Hours By Barry Basden

The Katy Did closed

and we followed

two girls in a red Chevy,

flirting at stoplights

until we scared them home.

A man in a bathrobe

stepped into the yard.

You boys go on now.

There’s nothing here for you.

I moved toward him

and his hand lifted.

When I saw the gun,

I forgot everything else. 

Barry Basden lives with Bean, his little rescue terrier, in the Texas hill country where, among other things, he drinks good wine and occasionally writes.