Pumpkin Spice Spider by Shannon O’Connor

The group of poets stumbled into the bar after the poetry reading, thirsty for drinks, since reading aloud makes a poet want alcohol. Beer is preferable, or sometimes whiskey, or wine, if one believes they have class.

The noisy bar irritated the group, because they wanted to debate the finer points of Plath and Poe, they decided to take up space on the patio, and ordered from the bar, so they would not have to wait. They went in twos, and carried their drinks outside to avoid the sports brawl inside.

“What do you think of the state of the world today?” they asked each other.

They all groaned.

The poets were losing money, nobody wanted to spend on poetry anymore, grants were not given, none had won any awards, and they barely had enough money for drinks, but drink they needed, because it was a poet’s duty to drown away problems with Pumpkin Spice beer or Guinness or Miller Lite.

Stephanie, a funny poet, noticed a small white spider on the table.

“Is that spider trying to drink the sugar off the glass of my pumpkin spice beer?” she asked to nobody in particular.

The tiny spider crawled up her beer.

“Don’t kill it,” Miguel said. “It’s a life, and it should be honored.”

“But I don’t want it in my beer,” she said.

“Brush it off,” he said.

Stephanie swiped it with her hand.

“What has everything come to when spiders are trying to steal our beer?” 

“it’s a tragic day, indeed,” he said.

Stephanie sipped her beer, and held her glass, so the spider would not crawl inside.

“Everyone wants to drown their sorrow, even the spiders,” Miguel said. “That’s the state of the world today.”

The poets commiserated, and talked about how the leaders were like spiders, trying to steal all the best things they had.

The group agreed to meet the next month in the bar after the poetry reading, when it would be deeper into the fall, and the leaves would be almost gone from the trees.

At the end of October, after the poetry reading, Stephanie went to the bar to order pumpkin spice beer, and the bartender said, “We don’t have any more pumpkin spice.”

“Why not, is the season over already?”

“We didn’t run out, the spiders drank the beer,” he said. “Somehow, they got a taste of it on a glass covered in sugar, and they came into the bar, and went into the taps, and drank all of it, every drop gone.”

“But was it my fault?” Stephanie moaned. “I tried to keep the spider away from my beer.”

“You might have tried, but once they get a taste of something delicious, they want more and more and more until every last drop has been drunk, to be sure, those spiders are thirsty, especially for pumpkin spice.”

“But what else do you have that’s like pumpkin spice?”

“We have Octoberfest and Guinness, but if you crave pumpkin, I can make you a pumpkin spice martini.”

“I don’t want a martini; I’ll have the Octoberfest. But it’s a nightmare! It’s October, and it’s still pumpkin season! Those freakin’ spiders! Why do they have to be so evil?”

“It’s the nature of spiders to be evil,” the bartender said. “You should never give them anything good because they’ll devour it until it’s gone. They’re usually patient, spinning their webs, waiting for their prey, but not when it comes to pumpkin spice. It’s the sugar in the beer that fuels their desire.”

“This is a Halloween tale to end them all,” Stephanie said. “The pumpkin spice spider.”

She took her Octoberfest, and went back to her seat to join the other poets. They talked about the spiders taking over the world, and the death of poetry and beauty and imagination and all the things in life that make it wonderful, except beer, because poets need something to ease their pain, and something to look forward to at the end of the day.

Shannon O'Connor holds an MFA from Bennington College. She has been published previously in The Rye Whiskey Review, as well as Oddball Magazine, Wordgathering, The Alien Buddha Press, and others. She is the chairperson of the Boston Chapter of the National Writers Union. She adores Halloween, and spends October thinking of ghost stories to write and reading vampire novels. She lives in the Boston area.

Not Arguing With The Bar Tender Over Half A Miller Lite Draft By Don Monaghan

—for MK

My glass is half full she says      

as matter-of-factly as she 

is lovely — a ginger flashing a smile

and waistline that elicits starry-eyed 

expressions from her patrons     

I say my glass is what it is

—which once meant a fickle whore 

the fingered reflection of this observer's

mood on any particular day—

But today I say it's best

if we don't find miracles  

nor the lowest wretches 

in the fluid level of a frosty utensil  

Instead let's air some light laundry 

listen to familiar music 

to my head or your heart 

ignore our new acquaintance on the end 

who's certain his experience

is the yellow brick road 

you me and Fido can follow

past every set of glazed lifeless 

eyes along the wayside

She's not remotely impressed

perhaps even peeved 

at my misperceived...What? Neutrality?

I see she's dead sure I'm telling 

the wrong story so I don't

speak of wending the intricacies  

of an irreparable love 

or the feeling of walking in and finding 

the woman I married naked  

hair still wet from the shower

nor the funeral I've just come from

or how glorious the motorcycle

ride here was afterwards

Instead I say By God you know what?

Mine Too! Half Full It Is!

Only because right now her smile  

will find my smile and because at 54 

I've finally come to accept the bringing in 

and the washing away much like 

believing in loss is a way of knowing 

and allowing simple pleasures 

is a way of forgetting 

Don Monaghan has been published in The Boston Literary Magazine and The Ravens Perch. He resides in Upstate NY.

Without Foundations By Jonathan Butcher

A door handle rattle, 

that chimes louder 

than that splinted

grandfather clock; 

it's twisted pendulum 

slightly knocking 

the left side, 

but never seems 

to leave a dent. 

The door hinges remain

in place, regurgitate 

their screws, 

that now embed into

these floorboards,

a haze of dust and brass

the walls with crumbled

plaster, it's flakes

form into dunes.

A fragmented recollection,

of a time that was never 

in one piece, an outside 

path, it's concrete uneven,

yet still lead me out 

to that street, that never

stayed as narrow as we 

would have liked. 

Jonathan Butcher has had poems appear in various print and online publications including, The Morning Star, Mad Swirl, Drunk Monkeys, The Abyss, Cajun Mutt Press and others. His fourth chapbook, 'Turpentine' was published by Alien Buddha Press. 

He is also the editor of online poetry journal Fixator Press. 

Death of the Soul By George Gad Economou

with a fifth of bourbon in my bloodstream I

fire up a cigarette and listen to old songs that

bring up the days after Christine left for

Copenhagen, unable anymore to survive in

the crazy rhythms of my drug-addled life.

she found me dead with the needle in my arm, brought

me back to life and nursed me through cold

turkey. then, she got accepted to the university and

left as I was drinking my liver away on some Greek island

with people I barely remember. I came home to

an empty apartment, everything belonging to

her was gone except for a shot of Narcan and

a note next to it: don’t die, please.

I wanted to shoot; I even went ahead and got an 8ball.

it sat there on my coffee table for two weeks.

I’d have staring contests with it while guzzling Four Roses

out of the bottle. eventually, I

smoked it. didn’t shoot. haven’t shot since the day she

found me dead.

but the glass pipes and the aluminum foil pipes

were a constant as I tried to juggle reality and fiction,

as I drank myself into stupors in bars while

believing I was having an academic future.

death avoids me like I’m a tequila-reeking plague and I

drain fifths of bourbon and rye while staying

away from glass pipes, struggling to recapture the magic of

lost years I can’t remember.

George Gad Economou has a Master’s degree in Philosophy of Science, currently works as a freelance writer, and has published three novels and two poetry collections, with the latest being his horror novel, The Lair of Sinful Angels (Translucent Eyes Press). His words have also appeared in Spillwords Press, Ariel Chart, Cajun Mutt Press, Fixator Press, Horror Sleaze Trash, Outcast Press, The Piker Press, The Beatnik Cowboy, The Rye Whiskey Review, and Modern Drunkard Magazine.

The Creek (2) By Keith Pearson

He follows the creek once again

bones clicking like stone against stone

the air damp with rot and pine.

He knows this water or thinks he does.

It used to shimmer with trout

when he was a boy and spent days here.

The light begins to grow thin as

the birches turn silver and strange.

He talks aloud to keep himself company

talking to the ghosts of deer or

with the wind moving through the trees.

The creek whispers only in riddles

a language he once knew.

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

WRITING WITH WINE Excerpt By Tim G. Young

Sliding my fingers through my hair reminds me of the way the wine slips down my throat. Slippery. Very slippery. I do not want to think that my fingers are sliding because my hair is a greasy mess, but it is. It falls onto my face, and then I get a whiff of it, or I feel it more than I want to. It's simply another distraction. Something else driving me mad in its attempts to take my mind off my writing. I've already disposed of my television, and my ancient radio is on its last legs. I'm waiting for the static to move in permanently and command the broadcast waves so that the next time I am tempted to turn that thing on, all I'm going to hear is white noise, the static of my life that not even I would want to listen to. Forget it. I can not be bothered by the likes of modern mass communications sucking the essence of life through my brain and clogging my nostrils so that I can barely breathe. Damn, I joke with myself, who was the fucking idiot who bought this cheap bottle of red wine?  What fool wouldn't have the sense to notice that this particular bottle is nothing but red vinegar trapped in a bottle created to contain wine!  I am so angry. But I can not throw the shit away. If I did that, then I wouldn't have anything to drink and worse, nothing to help advance the growing anger in my dilapidated brain that somehow continues to punch the keys on my lousy typewriter. I could have at least broken down my rules for once and bought a goddamn electric typewriter. But no. I'd rather not do anything like that. I'd rather punish myself as frequently and as abusively as I possibly can. And with that comes the knowledge that this brand new story I have been working on for the past two weeks is gonna be another throwaway! And I have invested myself in this story. I have gone to the library and read several self-help books on the wonders of being good to one's self and now I can see plainly that there is not a drop of 'good' in this character. He's the next thing to a scum bag. He only arrives late or never even appears for whatever social function he might be involved with, and if he does, he invents lies and excuses that are obvious to the people he was supposed to interact with. Then, once he sees that nobody is buying his line, he will begin to roar a string of obscenities at them and storm out of the room, slamming the door, shattering the glass in the door. And, yes, I have the power to insist that there is a huge panel of glass in every door that Mr. Madman slams as he makes his hasty, obscenity-filled exit. 

Suddenly I push my ass to the very back of my chair and attempt to straighten out this horrible back of mine. As I moan and grab my glass of red vinegar, I see that the page of crisp white paper in my typewriter carriage is blank. My fingers have not been punching any keys at all. I see all I have been punching is myself in the head with all these random throwaway thoughts, and that I am probably my own greatest distraction. Goddamn it, where is the television?!  I could watch a ball game and get this much work finished. Shit. I realize I have to take a breath. My vision seems to be clouding over, and I can barely feel my heart beating. I must be slipping into a coma. If I do that, then who will be able to dial 911?  My strength will have leaked onto the floor like a puddle of this ghastly so-called red wine. I pour the remaining few ounces of it onto the floor. Next, with whatever strength remaining, I pull myself out of my chair. My foot will, without a doubt, step immediately into the puddle of horrid grape juice, causing my head to smash on the floor. Then a trickle of blood will race down from my lips to my chin, only to eventually mingle with the fucking cheap wine, which, if I ever recover consciousness, will lap up like the thirsty dog I am.

I stop. I look down and see there is actually a small stack of papers by my trusty typewriter. I look again and see that indeed there are words and punctuation typed all over those few pages, and that with another glance, I can determine that there is a logic built into the way the words are strung together. I almost allow myself to smile, but I keep those muscles in check because the 'story', if one can call it that, is still in its infancy. The gestation period is not truly at an end. More birthing is necessary, and growth. I stop and am pleased for once that I chose an almost undrinkable bottle of wine. I put that detestable liquid next to the drainboard in the kitchen and find I do have more wine. I must have been crazy thinking I had run out.  This time I chose a Chardonnay. No more red for today. I keep my wine on the windowsill in the kitchen.. It's not really a kitchen. It does pretend to be one, what with the gas-burning stove and the refrigerator standing buddy, buddy next to each other, but that kind of friendship is flimsy at best. They have no true connection, and they know it. Hot and cold is how it is with them, and there is nothing that anyone can do about it. It's a joke. One smiles and the other frowns, and vice versa. My kitchen window lives in constant seclusion because the blinds must be eternally drawn. The reason is the neighbors across the way. Those miserable bastards never close their curtains, shades, or whatever. I hate them. One day, I am going to stand there naked with a pile of rocks by my side while I raise my blinds and throw the rocks like a machine gun across and through their window, smashing the glass into millions of tiny shards that are impossible to ever completely clean up. They will forever be running to the bathroom, screaming for the tweezers so they can attempt, but hopefully not successfully, pull the razor-sharp splinters from the bottom of their tender barking dogs. Oh boy. This is when I would totally allow myself to let my facial muscles soar into uncharted waters. Letting the laughter ooze out of me like hot magma exploding from a too-long extinct volcano, and just when one might suppose the flow had begun to quiet, it would begin all over again with a new ferocity. A fresh energy would spit and gurgle and soar into convulsions. Okay, convulsions, then my body would writhe on the floor, and I would see the ever-present phony friends of the stove and fridge making me continue to laugh. And then the neighbors in pain would summon the police, but I wouldn’t open my door. I wouldn't be able to drag myself off the floor, and they would have to break the door down if they really wanted to subdue me, and if they did that, I would straighten myself up in a flash of a wink and inquire why they would want to invade my apartment. I was only sitting here at the typewriter, working on a story. I would calmly report. I'd offer them a cup of coffee. There wouldn't be any rock evidence in the kitchen because they would all be across the way in the neighbor's apartment. As for my window being broken, well, I live in a dump, the landlord is a corporation, and surely there must be other broken windows besides mine. I mean, after all, my neighbor's window is broken too.

Tim is a published author and singer/songwriter. Originally from Easton, Pa. But the real formative years were spent

 in NYC. After a long run we loaded up the truck and moved to Beverly, Hills that is. Not true, but I like it. Actually the wilds of Arizona.

20. (bedroom clutter) By Ace Boggess

Forgive me when I praise my wealth

of bedroom clutter:

dusty sneakers I never wear

kept as weapons in the constant war

with spiders on the off-white walls

standing out like Ahab’s coin;

folded towels on a Rubbermaid tub

because I have nowhere to put them;

hand-torch & battery-operated fan

beside my bed, handy

when the power fails;

DVDs stacked tight on shelves—

I collect them to remember joy

of having watched these films &

the other odd joy, in owning them,

of never having to watch these films again;

a bottle of lotion—vaguely lavender;

a tube of cortisone ointment;

empty bottles that once contained

over-the-counter pills to battle

allergies, headaches, reflux;

the boxes filled with books—

my books—I haven’t sold,

clogging chairs in which no one sits.

Praise, too, those books, poetry & prose—

they take up room, filling gaps

in my disorderly fortress,

also in me, where the clutter exists

as memories, hopes, shortcomings,

thoughts of times I failed

or fell down a manhole while high or drunk,

or should’ve made love

to a stranger but didn’t

because I didn’t

know how to speak my holy name aloud.

Of course, there are spaces.

I praise those, &

will continue writing

until I somehow fill each one with words.

Ace Boggess is author of seven books of poetry, most recently My Pandemic / Gratitude List (Mōtus Audāx Press, 2025) and Escape Envy (Brick Road Poetry Press, 2021). His writing has appeared in Indiana Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, Hanging Loose, and other journals. An ex-con, he lives in Charleston, West Virginia, where he writes, watches Criterion films, and tries to stay out of trouble. His forthcoming books include the poetry collection, Tell Us How to Live, from Fernwood Press and his first short-story collection, Always One Mistake, from Running Wild Press.

To purchase My Pandemic / Gratitude List Poems. Please use the link below. 

https://a.co/d/eu9HG43