In a Montreal Bus Station By Chad Paretneau

Of course

it’s here 

you finally

have clarity

that you are

the asshole

in someone

else’s story

to be offed

offscreen. 

At least 

this means

you’ll be

fan favorite

for going

too soon.

Maybe by

story’s end

survivors 

will name

a new pet

after you,

one last 

tug-of-hearts.

Chad Parenteau hosts Boston’s long-running Stone Soup Poetry series. His work has appeared in journals such as Résonancee, Molecule, Ibbetson Street, Pocket Lint, Cape Cod Poetry Review, Tell-Tale Inklings, Off The Coast, The Skinny Poetry Journal, The New Verse News, dadakuku, Nixes Mate Review and The Ugly Monster. He has also been published in anthologies such as French Connections, Sounds of Wind, Reimagine America, and The Vagabond Lunar Collection. His newest collections are All's Well Isn't You and Cant Republic: Erasures and Blackouts. He serves as Associate Editor of the online journal Oddball Magazine and co-organizer of the annual Boston Poetry Marathon. He lives and works in Boston.

Another Regular OD’d By Joe Couture

Third time this year.

Unlike the last time,

this guy’s still alive.

What’s more:

this time

I like the guy.

The last guy got

barred for life, 

which lasted

a year and a half.

He was terribly upset

he was not allowed back

except for one occasion:

The celebration of life

for his friend, who OD’d 

last year. Another regular.

Management felt bad 

he found her.

He’d stiff us on his tab;

once choked his girlfriend

in the Games Room; one day,

he robbed the place. But

when he died, the boys

shook their heads.

One said:

“It’s a goddamn shame, b’y.”

Another added, 

“When ya play with the bull,

ya get the horns.”

All agreed,

and blamed his druggie girlfriend.

But when his friend had died, 

one shrugged,

another gave a wry, 

“Big surprise.”

Their words were harsher 

the next month

when her daughter died.

The same guy

shrugged again, saying,

“One less crack whore.”

I remembered his smile

the night he took her outside,

“…for a walk.”

My first week

I met both women. 

They were friendly. 

They spoke freely

about how they never

smoke crack near

the baby.

Well, at least 

this guy’s 

still alive.

He’s crippled, but 

the boys say

he’ll be back to work

in a year’s time.

Joe Couture is a writer living in rural Nova Scotia. His most recent work is featured in or forthcoming from Dark Winter Lit, The Literary Underground, Eunoia Review, A Thin Slice of Anxiety, and The Rat's Ass Review. If you want to connect with him, try here: @rjcouture.bsky.social

Crooked Street, Like Your Heart By Trish Saunders

 

I waited a couple of ice ages for you, before giving up

to watch golden headlamps chase each other
down Lombard Street, famous Frisco
hairpin crush, back
when I thought we fitted together
like the 7UP can under your heel,
the Seagram’s bottle
sticking up from weeds.

I thought we co-depended perfectly,
two stunted begonias in one cracked
clay pot on your front porch
watching, enviously, the cars!
racing down Lombard Street.

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. 

the blessing By Keith Pearson

 

go kneel by a clear stream.

thank your makers

for another day.

nobody truly wants to die

especially the dead.

you may think of it

as upstream but

it is really the past.

those whispers you hear

are the echoes of those

gone before urging you on.

'keep going keep going.

its okay to drink

the water here.'

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

 

Triad By Tony Pena / A Review By John Patrick Robbins

In Tony Pena's newest book, Triad, we are treated to a voice that is vibrant and, honestly, exactly what this poetry scene needs more of: something refreshing, genuine, and fun.

This book blends the perspective of a rock 'n' roll poet with barroom wisdom that has true soul, standing apart from so many poets who continue to regurgitate the same tired odes to Bukowski.

Tony's work is truly a breath of fresh air and one of the best poetry books I have read in a very long time. He writes with tremendous heart while keeping the work moving with lines that anyone can connect with, whether they are a devoted poetry fan or not. There isn't a single ounce of the pretentious drivel that seems to pollute so much of today's literary scene.

It's real, and that's what I dig most in a book. It's entertaining, too, with titles like "The Dark Side of Car Karaoke," "Turning Sexty," and "Horizontal Hutzpah." Tony makes it clear from the beginning that he wants you to buckle up, put the top down, and enjoy the ride. It's rock 'n' roll poetry, and it's simply great art.

Accessible and a hell of a read.

The book is broken into four sections: Dead of the Night, Thirty-Three and a Third Revolutions, The Shine of a Rebel Moon, and Bonus Tracks.

I love that approach because I've always believed poetry collections, when done correctly, should be structured like great albums, flowing effortlessly from one track to the next. In this case, Triad does exactly that.

Take the title poem, "Triad":

Though it may take two to tango,

things happen in threes and it may take all three to keep the dance hall of diminishing dreams lit by the electricity of creativity, allowing a menagerie of emotions to coalesce into the unique character of unconditional love.

Tony mixes pure poetry with what often feel like miniature stories, all told with a narrative flair I wish I encountered more often in contemporary writing.

When a writer can so effortlessly paint vivid pictures in your mind, they've got me hooked, and Tony certainly does. What we have here is a wonderful hybrid of poetry and storytelling, all wrapped in a rock 'n' roll spirit.

In another piece, "Playing House," we tag along on the journey:

When cutting school

Dahlia and Benji would

meet up and crash*

at the zombie house,

a barely standing bungalow

held together by cobwebs,

peeling plaster and ghosts of

Natalie Wood and James Dean.

Roasting marshmallows on a tiny

hibachi grill ripped off from Haggerty

Hardware, sipping warm Schaefer,

 and chugging cherry cough syrup.

Tony's work flows effortlessly and takes us back, inviting reflection in the best possible way while providing a much-needed escape during an era when we need one more than ever.

Triad is an outstanding book in any genre real, honest, soulful, and fun.

Pick up a copy and take the ride.

I promise you won't regret it.

John Patrick Robbins

Editor-in-Chief, The Rye Whiskey Review

To purchase a copy please use this link below.

https://a.co/d/06JQJNHs

A Fool's Message By Sergey Bielecki

The only testimony of my existence will be a cigarette burn on a fringed leather jacket that you will wear. Then there will be a stack of poetry books, which will eventually be lost and scattered. Then you, yes, you, have witnessed my death. This is a fact of life you will carry with you. You will love a woman who doesn't love you back, and you will love a man who is far too cruel for your gentle soul. These, too, are facts that must be held dear. You will meet the man—the cruel one. He will wear boots, donned in fringed leather. An embodiment of the 1970s, when a cigarette dangles out of his mouth. You, yes, you will be caught— not him, but you. When this man leaves you desolate, you, yes, you will meet a woman. Yes, the one who will never love you, she will have the eyes of a cat. And she will be your summer, for you know no better. She will caress you and introduce you to poetry. She will have you entranced, mold you into someone else. You, yes, you have learned nothing, for she will leave you just as desolate as before. So you drink cough syrup, yet still you lie awake, staring out your window. And, when you lift your head, your body will be bathed in the dawn of a day that never came. Still, though, you are desolate. Still you, you don't fit through the window, no matter how hard you push. So instead, you’ll drown in old poets and the greats. Smoke cigarettes, dress up to erase the childish parts of you that she loved and he exploited. You, little by little, will become a new man. Still you, just no longer a boy. Still desolate, her memory will never leave you, just as the boots on your ribcage and cigarette burns. You, you forgot the fact you must remember. The memories, the boots, the burns, and the desolation will leave you, yes, you, but only in death. Once again, you lay by the window; this time, you stay awake to watch the celestials play tag. You realize what a fool you’ve been. You remembered my stories. Yes, me, I forgot these facts, now I'm a man, and you're no longer you.

Sergey Bielecki is an LGBTQ+ writer born in Russia, with one book already published, and is being recognized by poets like Yona Harvey and John Hennessy. He has put his resources into creating a writing club at UMass Amherst, where he serves as chief editor. His other efforts are being put towards his magazine Polymenia for up-and-coming writers, where he will serve as one of three editors

Fumes By Patrick Carella

The yellow pump icon had been on for miles. I cradled the bottle of Reyka in the crook of my arm.

Two women stood outside the liquor store, comparing their lottery tickets.

“Ya know, we spent forty-two dollars on these things today.”

“Suckers,” I said, just loud enough to feel it.

I slipped into the Outback, the seat giving the way it always did. Checked the mirror. She scratched, flakes blowing back into her face.

Fuck one-in-a-million odds—unless it’s something bad. Then I don’t miss. Never have.

Skeeter Davis came on, singing about the end of the world. When I was a kid, that song meant my parents were gone and I was still here. 

Now they are gone.

The song still plays.

The gas light was still on. I’d gotten used to it—how long you could drive before something gave out. How far you could push it.

The low glow of mortality—ignored, familiar, inevitable.

Patrick Carella is a former advertising creative director and School of Visual Arts instructor whose fiction, creative nonfiction, and humor have appeared or are forthcoming in Hobart, BULL, JMWW, The Hooghly Review, Eunoia Review, Panorama: The Journal of Travel, Place, and Nature, CaféLit, Gorko Gazette, Wicked Shadow Press, and other journals. He lives in New York's Hudson Valley.