THAT ONE FRIEND By J. Archer Avary

we all have that one friend, who gets a jolly talking

about the time they met a stranger

rode her all night long 

and slipped out before the pancake ritual

like a snake shedding its skin, ready for another hole

he is your friend, you know and trust him

and though we all exaggerate to a certain degree

you can accept there’s a kernel of truth behind the bravado 

but nobody believes he turned down pancakes

J. Archer Avary (he/him) writes best when he listens to the cactuses in his window. They're hardly wrong, and surprisingly don't like being referred to as cacti. You should buy his debut novella 'the dog sitter’ because it’s excellent. Twitter: @j_archer_avary

Love Conquers All by Ann Christine Tabaka

It is said – love is the great conqueror.

Caesar of emotions,

Napoleonic passion,

ruling heart and mind.

Tales of Tristan and Isolde,

Mariotto and Giannoza.

Yet, who among us has ever loved without

loss or pain?

Counting the days between our fingers,

wishing on fiery suns.

Heavenly bodies circle desire – night overtakes day.

A vanquishing of isolation/fear/want.

We see ourselves as others do not.

Climbing a summit of Amor.

    A reach beyond reality,

        a grasp before the fall.

We want what we cannot have,

    always citing knowledge over fact,

hoping love rises above all.

Praise be Aphrodite!

Ann Christine Tabaka was nominated for the 2017 Pushcart Prize in Poetry. She is the winner of Spillwords Press 2020 Publication of the Year, her bio is featured in the “Who’s Who of Emerging Writers 2020 and 2021,” published by Sweetycat Press. She is the author of 13 poetry books. lives in Delaware, USA. She loves gardening and cooking.  Chris lives with her husband and four cats. Her most recent credits are: Sparks of Calliope; The Closed Eye Open, Poetic Sun, Tangled Locks Journal, Wild Roof Journal, The American Writers Review, The Scribe Magazine, The Phoenix, Burningword Literary Journal, Muddy River Poetry Review, The Silver Blade, Pomona Valley Review, West Texas Literary Review, The Hungry Chimera, Sheila-Na-Gig, Fourth & Sycamore.

*(a complete list of publications is available upon request)

A Lite Alement (Dark, Stormy Knight) by Ken Gosse

There once was a dark, stormy knight,

very angry his flagon was lite,

who yelled, “This grog ain’t ale—

it’s insipid and pale!”

then he banished the innkeep from sight.

Ken Gosse usually writes light, rhyming verse filled with whimsy and humor. Sometimes it’s darker. First published in First Literary Review-East in 2016, since then by Pure Slush, Spillwords, The Ekphrastic Review, Lothlorien Review, and others. Raised in the Chicago suburbs, now retired, he and his wife have lived in Mesa, AZ, over twenty years with rescue dogs and cats underfoot.

Darby Crash Missed the Downfall of the Western World By 24 Hours by John Doyle

I thought of the loneliest place,
stuffed it up with dreams of you, 
I nailed my dreams to a precipice
a saint was pushed from - a book tells me he wouldn't renounce God
or scream when they shoved that sword up his ass.
I hope his fall was short, his landing soft, 
his destination San Francisco
that day I got 7 straight hours of sunshine there.
It's not the loneliest place, not a swarm of dreams 
that make you wake suddenly, 
feeling your way around a couch or looking out the car window
at dawn beating you to day's first light, 
and I stuff this place with dreams of others,
the unsaintly
breaking easily when the sword goes up their asses,
the ones my brother tells me not to be bitter about 
when we do coffee,
looking for distractions like "Darby Crash missed the downfall of the Western World by 24 Hours".
He doesn't get me, doesn't know what it means, our coffee getting cold.
I dream on - recklessly, madly, like this red car that nears me.
Fridays shouldn't be this way

 John Doyle became a Mod again in the summer of 2017 to fight off his impending mid-life crisis; whether this has been a success remains to be seen. He has has two collections published to date, A Stirring at Dusk in 2017, and Songs for Boys Called Wendell Gomez in 2018, both on PSKI's Porch.

He is based in Maynooth, County Kildare, Ireland. All he asks is that you leave your guns at the door and tie up your horses before your enter.

Susan Isla Tepper

Take Shit

insidious flower

certain cultures burn

this black orchid

to make heat.

Rub in the dog's nose.

 

You’ve risen

through unthawed ground.

I’ve smelt it before:

in languishment

while I remained

detached and

bombs went off

 

and other times

as bones

and once when

I was simple grass 

 

Unconsciously

you trod on me

took a piss

against a tree

zipped

then crumpled bills

in your hand.

Laughter—

letting the wind take them.

Making the blind gesture.

Susan Isla Tepper is a twenty years published writer in all genres.  Her current project is an Off-Broadway Play on the subject of art and life.

maybe by Tanya Rakh

maybe home survives

only inside us;

a memory of echoes,

ocean held by shore 

Tanya Rakh was born on the outskirts of time and space in a cardboard box. After extensive planet-hopping, she currently makes her home near Houston, Texas where she writes poetry, surrealist prose, and cross-genre amalgamations. Her writing has appeared in numerous journals including The Gasconade Review, Redshift 4, Literary Orphans, Fearless, Yes, Poetry, and The Rye Whiskey Review. Tanya is the author of two books: Hydrogen Sofi and Wildflower Hell, new editions of both available from Posthuman Poetry & Prose.

Pull Tab Poet Hustler by Susan Cossette

Come on baby, Mama needs a cut and color,
and to pay the landscaper.
 
I need a new living room sofa,
and save for retirement.
I need to pay the mortgage.
 
Come on baby, Mama needs a new life.
 
You ain’t gonna get that from playin’ the $1 pull tab bin, sister.
 
Plastic basket of infertile cardboard,
your brightly colored stars and smiley faces taunt me,
just like the poetry editors.
It’s a numbers game, more in, less out.
 
Table 7 at the Legion Hall is my escape,
free internet, cheap wine, 
and all the pull tab tickets you can’t afford.
All the poems you wish you could write, but can’t.
 
Sometimes the sympathetic gods take pity.
One hundred fifty dollars!
Shoot the moon, money burn!
The old guffers at the bar tell me to pipe down.
 
Blondie, I just spent 50 bucks and won two.
Can I sit by you?
You got luck!
 
You can, if you spot the next round, bro.
 
Let me call my AA sponsor,
Before I call the gambling addiction hotline.
They’re both on speed dial.
 
Yeah, there’s a poem in here.

Susan Cossette lives and writes in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The Author of Peggy Sue Messed Up, she is a recipient of the University of Connecticut’s Wallace Stevens Poetry Prize. A two-time Pushcart Prize nominee, her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Rust and Moth, Vita Brevis, ONE ART, As it Ought to Be, Anti-Heroin Chic, The Amethyst Review, Crow & Cross Keys, Loch Raven Review, and in the anthologies Tuesdays at Curley’s and After the Equinox.