T a n d o o r i . by Gwil James Thomas

And
I
remember,
every Sunday evening
at The Tandoori was
The Buffet Bonanza -
I’d go there every other week,
wandering in to the rich and spicy
aromas as I’d take a seat
with all the other Bristol rejects -
from Big Jon who’d stagger into
the eatery after his boozy
Sunday session
and routinely put the toilet
out of action,
to Tracy from the corner shop and
her mysterious silent and suited lover,
as I’d go back and forth to the buffet
always leaving the spiciest curry to last –
so that I’d be forced out of the front door,
gasping for fresh air and bed -
with my mind momentarily
taken off the working week ahead.

And never was five quid
spent
on a weekend ever
more beneficial.

“Gwil James Thomas is a poet, novelist and inept musician originally from Bristol, England. His poetry and prose has recently been featured in Paper & Ink, Razur Cuts, Glove Zine and online at Albany Poets, The Beatnik Cowboy and here. His fourth poetry chapbook Writing Beer, Drinking Poetry will be published by Concrete Meat Press later this year. He currently lives in San Sebastián, Northern Spain.

Categorizing Guilt by Jim Bourey

I marked an ad from Jews for Jesus as irrelevant,

blocked their messages. Guilt snuck up on me

later in the day for making that not-so-hard choice.

To those demi-Jews my disregard is an insult,

surely. I have no idea what Jesus is thinking

as we haven’t talked in a long, long time.

He’s a Jew. Or was if religions aren’t hauled

into the afterlife. If he is in the afterlife. So far

the evidence on that is all hearsay and speculative

literature. Convincing literature to some. So, what

is the nature of my guilt? Is it a theological matter?

Is it remorse for an insult? No, I think it is merely

the sad fact that I waste so much time on Facebook.

Jim Bourey is an old poet who divides his year between the Adirondack Mountains and Dover, Delaware. His chapbook “Silence, Interrupted” was published in 2015 by the Broadkill River Press. His work has appeared in Mojave River Review, Paddock Review, Gargoyle and the Broadkill Review and other journals and anthologies. He was first runner up in the Faulkner-Wisdom Poetry Competition in 2012 and 2016. He has served as an adjudicator for the Poetry Out Loud competition in Delaware. In his North Country months, he is active with the St. Lawrence Area Poets and has taken part in Art/Poetry projects in Saranac Lake.

Big Old Dawg by Peter V. Dugan

sleeping outside the bar
an old chromed knucklehead engine
on a hard-tail frame
lies low to the ground

chopped, raked & stretched
with an over-extended
springer front end
the dog bone risers hold
the broomstick handle bars
in place

the suicide stick converted
to a chromed mouse trap shift
hides its age
while the black & silver metal
flake paint
of the teardrop gas tank
glows in the street light

master slides
onto the teaspoon saddle
pumps, primes & kicks
the motor over
it roars awake
settles into a loud idle growl
from the black chrome drag pipes
& with a sharp snapping bark
it pounces on the pavement
& howls into the night
left behind where it was parked
a small oil stain lies on the street

it’s not a leak
it’s just the bike
marking its turf.

Peter V. Dugan is the current Nassau County Poet Laureate, NY (2017-19).  He has published six collections of poetry and co-edited Long Island Sounds 2015 and Writing Outside the Lines poetry anthologies. He has received Honorable Mention from the American Academy of Poetry, LI Bards Poet Mentor Award by the Bards Initiative and he has been twice nominated for the Pushcart Poetry Prize. Mr. Dugan also hosts a reading series, Celebrate Poetry at the Oceanside Library, Oceanside NY, an open mic for teens and college student, It’s poetry, baby! at Sip This Café in Valley Stream NY and a reading series, Paumanok Pirate Poets, at Starbuck’s Long Beach NY.

Dive Bar Dialogues by Ben Adams

there is a young man
sitting at the bar-stool alone
and I ask him
how goes it?
and he says
this is a failing proposition

and I ask him
how do you mean?
and he says
the proposition has failed

The Proposition
was a movie I saw once
with a soundtrack by Nick Cave—
the dark, dull thud of masculine ambiguity
coursing through its chords

but I don't think
this is what he means

he speaks in sentences that end
too soon
assertions and accusations
directed at the world
paints himself
in this dark bar
as the enlightenment man
of reason, holding court


I think of him looking
at Titian's Venus laid out
knowingly
inviting him to investigate her ambiguous opposition
to orthodoxy

but I don't think
this is what he means
either

he moves peanuts from a bowl
to his mouth like a man
unaware they are starving

and glances about the room
at odd intervals

I buy him a beer
and listen as he continues to speak
I have nowhere else to be
and he seems
unknowingly grateful

Ben Adams is a poet, writer, servo-clerk, research assistant and festival cash wrangler, with honors in History and English. His poetry has appeared in a range of print and online publications, including Australian Love Poems, The Grapple Annual, Red Fez, Tulpa Magazine and InDaily. Recently, his poem 'Wet Leaves' was included as part of the 2018 Raining Poetry in Adelaide street-art project, while several poems were performed for Quart Short Collective’s Spring Shorts reading night. He can be found on Facebook, shares poems and photography on Instagram @bts.adams while poems and politics can be found on his Twitter feed @badbadams

Duffy Ain't Here by Jack D. Harvey

Duffy, a couple for the road;
for us sinners
peace of mind seldom settles
at one sitting; who drinks
must mourn his sober self
and Seagram's does more
than the devil can
to justify the thorny paths of sin,
the ungodly things we do,
dirty, sneaky, selfish
sunup to sundown,
making our own misery
every livelong day.

Of all the causes
which conspire to dumb the senses,
assuage the remorse of conscience,
the noise of human concourse
leads the pack, driving us mad
with its demands, over the edge;
buzzing, humming, thrumming
of the human beehive or better yet,
red-hot bronze ready to go,
a thirsty Moloch always wanting.

Man a political animal,
so said Aristotle in cozy clamorous Athens
and welcome to it;
more noise for our own good, he said,
but we know better and so did he.

So I sit and drink and think
and love of solitude and gloom
combine, as I sink in the booze,
my hat on my head,
looking in the mirror
at a man with a hat on his head.

Dark with dirt,
the windows exclude
the remaining light of day;
in the glow of the
green neon sign
behind the barkeep,
in the gloom
of dusty bulbs overhead,
we blink and burp like
pallid monkeys in a zoo.

Passing time
I formulate a compliment
for the lady on my left,
painted to no avail;
I see her full in the dingy light
and bow to her
whose course is run.

A look at my watch,
it's time to go,
hasty I leave,
wave goodbye Charlie
and out the door.

They say small habits,
regular ways,
afford great comfort
if given time, but
too much time makes
deadly dull work of it,
laborious drudgery and
the canary in the coal mine
is when too much time
dwindles to no time at all,
frozen in place
like the great wave of Hokusai,
one eternal day,
like Hawking's space,
or the Schwarzschild radius,
one enormous rigid abyss
in which you sit forever,
a witness who sees nothing
and cares not a whit
for the never-ending day,
the never-ending landscape of now.

The work "Duffy Ain't Here" was previously published in issue 30 of The Write Launch.







Jack D. Harvey’s poetry has appeared in Scrivener, The Comstock Review, Bay Area Poets’ Coalition, The Antioch Review, The Piedmont Poetry Journal and a number of other on-line and in print poetry magazines.

The author has been writing poetry since he was sixteen and lives in a small town near Albany, N.Y. He is retired from doing whatever he was doing before he retired. He once owned a cat that could whistle Sweet Adeline, use a knife and fork and killed a postman.

ADVICE FOR WEARY SOULS. by R.M. Engelhardt

I have been a

Man and no man

Traveled

Seen the world

Wrote a few

Books

Fell in and out

Of love

I've seen the

Perfect moment

Come and go

Got older

But now

I'm tired

Broken

Without

Purpose

I've looked

For God

I've looked

For faith

But these

Things don't

Truly exist

So my advice

To you is this

Write a poem

Just write

Keep writing

Get up in the

Morning and

Drink some coffee

Go to work

Even if you hate it

Even if it drags down

Your soul

Because

That shit will

Come & go

Balance out

But don't let

The world win

Don't let this world

Destroy you

Keep writing

Ignore all the other

Crap ignore the hatred

The politics and the lies

Because in the

End that's what

Keeps you human

And keeps you from putting

That gun to your head

And firing

Write a poem

Instead

R.M. Engelhardt is an author, poet & writer whose work over the years has appeared in many journals & magazines such as Rusty Truck, Thunder Sandwich, Full of Crow, In Between Hangovers, Writers Resist, The Rye Whiskey Review and in many others. His new book of poetry is called Coffee Ass Blues & Other Poems published by Alien Buddha Press (2018). He is also the host of The Troy Poetry Mission/The School of Night, an open mic for poets located in Troy, New York.

Lament of Prey By Scott Thomas Outlar

Hello to all the hawks
who have yet to have their fill,
and the vultures, too,
waiting for what’s left over.



Spoiled minds & spoiled hearts
lead to spoiled guts,
but it seems to be
that’s what nature intended
in this twisted realm
of divided time & space.



Dog eat dog
isn’t even the worst part;
it’s flesh unto flesh
in the fire.



Goodbye to all the dreams
that forgot how to conquer,
and the visions still
yet to crystallize in cancer.



Rotten bones & rotten marrow
flow in rotten rivers,
but that’s the taste
acidic blood delivers
when signs of sickness
flash neon & electric in the night.



Tail chase tail
isn’t the end of the story;
it’s a snake that never sheds
the fade to black.

Scott Thomas Outlar hosts the site 17Numa.com where links to his published poetry, fiction, essays, interviews, reviews, live events, and books can be found. He has been a weekly contributor for the cultural newsletter Dissident Voice since 2014. His fifth collection of poetry, Abstract Visions of Light, was released in 2018 through Alien Buddha Press. 

            Selah,
Scott Thomas Outlar