diet pills and non-alcoholic beer By John Grochalski

jimmy says,

the government cured cancer, you know

and aids

and alzheimer’s

and all that other bullshit

they got all these bigfoots in captivity

in one of their faceless facilities

jimmy says,

i mean we know the government

killed kennedy 

and his brother

mlk and malcolm x too

he has a pull on his beer

they probably killed john lennon

and tupac

and biggie 

yeah, the government is always up to something

9/11 for one

and like how they lied to us about u.f.o.s all those years

he looks up at the bar ceiling

they’re probably amongst us right now, 

jimmy says

did i tell you that the government has a way

to fix the weather?

they have this thing

like iodine or iodide or something

i don’t know

that they can just shoot into the sky

and poof we’d have nothing but sunny and 70 every day 

but no

instead they let us have 

blizzards and rain

and hurricanes and typhoons and tornados

that kill people and knock down homes

the government could be out here right now

jimmy says

doing real things to help

but instead they give lazy people money

for not working

tax cuts for the rich

and all the rest of us get from them 

are diet pills and non-alcoholic beer

and they want us to think

that’s something big

like progress

or some shit like that.

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.

Another Day in Paradise By Jeff Weddle

Old Jimmy’s hands on the bar 

and half the pitcher gone. 

The radio quit working some time back, 

but there’s television now 

and it sometimes comes in fine. 

Ugly Mary does her little dance 

for loose change 

and the regulars laugh 

as they pelt her with quarters.

That half-a-pitcher gets warmer

as old Jimmy studies his knuckles. 

Ugly Mary squats to pick up the coins, 

careful to get them all,

then sits down beside him 

and counts her money.

Somebody says they think 

it’s snowing outside. 

Jimmy pours Mary a glass 

and himself one too. 

He enjoyed her dance

and he tells her.

She smiles a broken smile.

They are hogtied, 

bone to bone, 

by love.

 

Jeff Weddle is the Alabama Beat Poet Laureate (2024-2026). His latest books are High on Rose (Keeping the Flame Alive Press, 2026), The Things We Do to Protect Our Own (Meat for Tea Press, 2025), and Letter to Xhevdet Bajraj (2025). He opposes fascism in all forms and grieves that such opposition has become dangerous in America.

Last call by Charles Walker

Just another beer I said

and I'll come home to you

I miss the shouts,

I miss the threats,

the dyscomphany of you

without the fighting

and the shouts

without the great discord

without the love that turned rancid

I'm a stranger in this world

Charles Walker is a Denver poet who occasionally puts a book down long enough to open a blank one and pick up a pen. He is at work on a book, An Exploration of Life.

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.