Airplane Bottles

by Kevin Ridgeway

six months dry and a sip
of bottom shelf Kentucky bourbon
out of an airplane bottle

gag reflexes dance across the seething nodules of my throat,
sour world worms wiggle along the linings of my intestines
which writhe into arms that want to crawl out of my ass
and produce a sharp blade in one arm
slicing the main line of this head
with an aluminum bat in the other arm to shatter the skull

removing the brain delicately like a newborn
and spoon feed hunks of gray matter
past my bitter lips down
the slide of fire and out of my ass again
to shake hands with this doomed clown
plastic bottles on each finger dancing a horrific
deluded dance with the Devil.

CALIFORNIA FIRE

by Stephen Jarrell Williams

Near dawn I'm sitting on the edge of bed,
everything with a tinge of black
pulling me back into the night,

you're behind me breathing hot on my neck,
your hands snaking around to my belly,

pressing hard against me
your cool breasts...

California fires burning on TV and you
lasting like a line of flame across the entire valley,

never forgetting this
our last night together

sprinkling ashes of glowing orange outside the window,
bed squeaking like an old woman,

you thinking
you'll never be alone,

mountainsides burnt with stumps of trees and bushes
once strong and green,
canopied by an arc of tainted sky.

Goodbye, So Long, and Farewell

by Danica Green

i. Goodbye

Rain is the sad weather,
Snow is reflective,
Such pathetic fallacy.

You'll still be dead when the sun comes out.

ii. So Long

I've never flogged a dead horse,
But I've kicked a dead rat.
I found it in the garden last summer,
Not a mark on it,
But covered in flies.
I kicked it to check it was really dead.

iii. Farewell

I'm taking the good china when I go,
You never used it anyway.
The duvet cover you said was too vintage,
The tacky seashell lamp

And maybe
Wait
...yeah

Fuck it.
I'm taking the cat.

HISTORY ON A FLATBED

by Robert E. Petras

First to go was the lawn tractor
swept away by a flatbed,
then came the strangers to the auction,
and they took things,
things like Betty Jane Demerit’swasher and dryer,
things like Betty Jane’s flat screen TV,
things like Betty’s jewelry,
her pearl necklace, her mother’s brooch,
carried them off the hill
like ants carrying crumbs
as the auctioneer warbled on and on
and they carried away more things—
just things—the grandmother’s wedding dress,
a mother’s ring,
the daily reminder blackboard
erased, the erasers, too.
Another flatbed rolled into haul away junk
as the auctioneer warbled on:
Going, going, gone forever.

Second Millennium Fairy Tale

by Claudia Rey

‘Hi, pretty little thing’
growled the wolf
jumping on the path
from behind a bush.
‘Going for a picnic?’
The girl batted her long lashes
and adjusted her red bonnet.
‘A big bad wolf… how interesting’
she said with a smile.
‘Aren’t you afraid of me?’
said the wolf, disappointed.
‘Er… no. Should I?’
‘Of course you should.
Ever heard about the big wolf
who eats tender little girls
and their grandmothers as well?’
‘Aw, come on’ laughed the girl.
‘No one believes this any more.
And speaking of eating,
are you sure you could manage?
I’m not as tender as I look,
actually I’m pretty tough.
As for my grandma, poor thing,
she’s so old and bony…
not that much to chew there.’
The wolf stared at her, confused.
‘But… but look at me!’
he insisted. ‘Yellow, scary eyes…
sharp fangs… strong claws…
I mean, the works!
You should be terrified!’
The girl examined him critically
from head to tail.
‘Scary eyes, you say?
My dear, they are not scary at all,
they only look sort of red
as if you didn’t get enough sleep.
Try eye-drops, they do wonders.
Fangs? Hum. Not so sharp
and rather yellow in fact.
You should see a dentist!
Now, show me your claws.’
She took his paw in her hand.
‘But Wolfie, you have a problem here!
You see here? A badly broken one.
And there? Broken as well.
Wait a minute, not exactly broken…’
She frowned. ‘Say, do you bite you nails?
The wolf stooped his head
and burst into tears.
‘I’ve been so depressed lately…
no one is afraid of me any more,
can’t find a single goat or lamb,
rabbits and mice regularly outrun me,
I often go to bed hungry…
and now little Red Riding Hood’
he sobbed ‘makes fun of me!’
Red Hood put her arm round him.
‘Now, now, don’t cry. You know what?
I’ll buy you a drink. A beer,
a brandy, a whisky. You choose.
There must be a bar over there
just round the bend.’
‘But… a drink?’ said the wolf.
‘Little girls don’t drink!’
‘Wolfie’ grinned Red Hood
‘don’t be so daft.
I’m no little girl, I’m twenty-eight!
But I had to keep my job, you see,
so I got myself a nip and tuck.
And you know what,
you should do the same.’

She paces the isle of the streets

by Jenny Catlin

She paces the isle of the streets
Corner of McArtur Park,
Alvarado Street
She’s always been there
She was before time.
Her broken sunglasses
That once used to be Gucci
Hang one amputated arm over heavy lidded eyes.
She dances
Shaking her round bottom inside a faded house dress
The flowers that she colors in with felt pens
Her things all live around the park bench
She is before time and above future
Even the crack heads leave it alone
Her leather bag spilling out Family Circle cartoons
And bristeless hair brushes
She’s taped three quarters to three fingers
Now castanets accompany her dancing.

SHOVELING DIRT

by Lee Stern

I’m sorry I can’t shovel the dirt anymore
in the manner in which you’ve come to expect me to do it.
I thought that I was doing a pretty good job.
But the way you looked at me
indicated you lost confidence in what I was doing.
And wanted somebody else to step in and take my place.
And I’m sorry if I didn’t put the dirt in the right place
or if I didn’t spread it evenly.
I tried to subscribe to the goals that you outlined.
But I had a lot of things on my mind
during both the nights and the days.
so I wasn’t always successful in reaching
out for the correct operation. Or for the correct solution.
I was merely trying to move one pile of dirt to another place.
From where it had been located.
And from where safeguards
had been removed from the places that we dreamed would always last.

Vlad

by Emma Ambos

I was the shadow
of a waxwing slain,
sullen and sodden,
plain as a Jane.

But I suppose
that is well beyond
your concern.

So close me down,
fold me up,
hide me in
the pages of
a library book,
where I belong,
along romance and jokers.

Goodbye goodbye
forget me not
or do
if it makes you
feel any better.