The Australian Writer By Brenton Booth

He sends me a link for a new 

Netflix series about an early 

Australian writer. A pompous 

looking, fake actor, dressed 

in a pristine old fashioned suit 

with a ridiculous expression: 

doing all he can to look cool. 

"Shit!" I think, "If that is what 

they want: let them have it!" 

Eleven-forty on a hungover 

Sunday morning. Listening 

to loud rock music with 

bottomless glasses of sweet 

American whiskey and cola. 

Finishing off the last few 

words of poem number three 

for the day. Marvelling at the 

radiating yellow sun hanging

perfectly in the dry winking 

sky. Full smile on my lips. In 

worn black singlet and shorts. 

Tough enough to challenge any 

man. Weak enough to still care.

Brenton Booth lives in Sydney, Australia. Writing of his has been published in hundreds of journals over the past decade, including New York Quarterly, The Midwest Quarterly, North Dakota Quarterly and The Chiron Review. His latest collection Variations in the Key of Loss will soon be available from Whiskey City Press.

Long Curved Bar By Susan Isla Tepper

Should I switch 

to the seltzer water

my dog slurps

out of the foil bowl

Jack fills—

Right here, panting.

Jack.  And my dog.

I'm so lost in this city.

The long curved bar 

old wood, spittle 

and snot of men

using up time.

I can feel the warping

going on between

my legs.

Gin, Jack. Hit me.

Susan Isla Tepper is a a twenty year writer and author of 13 published books of fiction and poetry. Her latest new release GIRL UPSIDE DOWN is a Novella published by Wilderness House Press. www.susantepper.com

The Faux English Pub By Wayne Russell

Halloween in the pub,

some bloke just kicked

a black and white ball

through an elongated white

spiderweb of a net; Man

United vs Liverpool FC,

I think? I’m just a mere 

Mortal, I well-traveled Yank;

but I have an edge on this 

drunken lot, I know some of the slang,

it’s dimly lit

and sparsely populated in

here, isn’t it too chilly out

side for this to be going on?

The lady must be 50; but she

looks much older, fishnet stockings

and a leather jacket in this day in age?

Some bloke kicks a black and white 

ball through an elongated spiderwebbed

net; the drunken few, ask 

"When does karaoke start?"

Wayne Russell is a poet that's been twice nominated for both The Best Of The Net and The Pushcart Prize, he's the author of the poetry books “Splinter of the Moon” and "Waves of Lucidity", both published via Silver Bow Publishing, they are both available for purchase on Amazon in paperback and digital formats such as Ingram Distribution at your local bookstore and library.

Viscous By PW Covington

Bright marks drawn across catastrophes
Our cosmic calibrated metronome keeps time
Dragging all intention through the threshold
Crafting tunes from dial tones
All our intention left hanging
Left fallow this season
All yield wasted in our vanity

Like brandy, decanted
Yet not yet enjoyed

Woven from branches, slow growth captivity
Time machine taxi cabs, their meter dials breaking
In daylight’s blue comparison
Our hours are melted and viscous
This extension, this interruption
Of all always obvious
Veer off the axis of our kind intention

With the external ache of friction setting in
We just clocked in at closing time
Hired to quicken the moments of consequence, inevitable
Binding eternal, wrapped in our fold of futility
Polish and tarnish, crack and repair
The smoke from our ongoing rush, its own certainty
Days and years and minutes pass

Fueled by all illusion
Our hours, melted and viscous 

PW Covington was recently named United States BEAT Poet Laureate (2026-27) by the National Beat Poetry Foundation.

 They travel extensively, encouraging free expression wherever they go.

Covington lives not far from where Historic Route 66 crosses the fabled Rio Grande River, in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Cheque Day Vignette By Joe Couture

Welcoming nostrils,

the return of dusted-off smiles, 

the hands raising plastic glasses.

The crank on the peanut machine

turns like a record. 

Someone says drinking melted vinyl

fucks you up—believe them,

they’ve tried it. 

Piano Man plays.

It’s relatable, not apropos:

There is no piano.

Only a carpeted stage

with a guitar tuned for Thursdays,

Billy Joel on an old TV,

laughter,

salted nuts tumbling from chins,

another epic story

the room keeps forgetting.

Joe Couture lives in rural Nova Scotia. Recent and upcoming publications include Main Street Rag, The Gorko Gazette, New Verse News, and Mad Swirl. His work has been nominated for Best Small Fictions 2027.

October Day By Alec Solomita

A mid-October day

crisp as an Italian cracker,

cold as a football game,

bright as a flashing,

jet in the sky

mirroring the midday sun.

Come on out, say the

blinding venetian blinds.

Wrap up in season’s wrapping,

step out cocoon-like

and stroll through this

prophecy of winter.

But I drank too much  

last night to obey demanding

accoutrements. I stay safe

undercovers as cold slyly

slips into my cozy cul-de-sac.

Alec Solomita is a writer working in Massachusetts. His fiction and poetry have appeared in many journals and anthologies, including the Southwest Review, The Mississippi Review, The Lake, The New Criterion, The Galway Review, and One Art. His chapbook “Do Not Forsake Me,” was published in 2017. His full-length poetry book, “Hard To Be a Hero,” was released in the spring of 2022. He’s just completed his third collection, “Glass Flowers.”

A Certain Kind of Woman By Connie Johnson

dark pathos

on incendiary vinyl

liquor  overflowing

I’m awed by what it takes to sustain 

your rendering of chaos / & the hungry

hounds that bark at you in your own 

backyard 

you are your own jazz epicenter! 

hypothesis of Etta James / recognizable 

from a former life /

inscriptions upon the heart / 

every emotion sung in a minor key   

jazz ancestry / veined with gold 

& amber / & sapphire  blue 

buxom curves & bare legs 

in the summertime 

you offer sanctuary 

& there’s     something 

exquisite / about the bites 

that mar 

your 

  / skin

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