Phantom Cento By Michael Dwayne Smith

too slippery in the world & exposed

we were surrounded by syllables

from lungfuls of tarantulas &

pink-mouthed cats in the shower

(press star for customer service)

us all scraping our eye sockets clean

with broken whisky bottles—

but you cannot demolish a hole, so

we mustn’t cry over an absence of air

Michael Dwayne Smith haunts many literary houses, including The Cortland Review, New World Writing, Third Wednesday, Gargoyle, Chiron Review, Monkeybicycle, and Heavy Feather Review. Author of four books, recipient of the Hinderaker Prize for poetry, the Polonsky Prize for fiction, and a multiple-time Pushcart Prize/Best of the Net nominee, he lives near a Mojave Desert ghost town with his family and rescued horses. His latest full-length collection hopes to go from apparition to publication in 2024.

We Love Our Audience By Alex S. Johnson

"Because we can"--Illuminati

Breaking through the

inevitable cosmic

Crust

Starshine, fumbling fingers of ocean, topographic maps to never, rain

slicing like

surgical steel

Scraped rust of clever

Because we can

Because we must

Draining the sutures

firing bullets of rainbows over

Galaxies skin deep

We're not proud

we have agents in

Every country

sporting mirrorshades

that feed back

into your

brain

We speak all languages

including

alien and

angelic and

android and

animal and

pain

We are the Illuminati they warned you about

the vampire hive mind

Relax

Don't be afraid

Accept your true

Nature.

We never die.

We never die.

We never die.

We are the gods your ancestors thought they invented

For millennia we have been hunted

We are the goblins and ghosts that haunt your erotic nightmares

We play for keeps.

Join us

Do not weep.












Alex S. Johnson is a retired English instructor, disability rights activist, author, editor and publisher (Nocturnicorn Books). He is known for his highly unusual poetry style which combines influences from Dada and Surrealism to hip hop, black metal, industrial noise, T.S. Eliot, Walt Whitman and Rimbaud. His books include the acclaimed collection The Death Jazz, Bureau of Dreams, The Doom Hippies and Bizarrely Departed. His work has appeared in such venues as Horror Sleaze Trash, Black Noise, Bizarro Central and Cease, Cows. His upcoming books include The Junk Merchants 2: A Literary Tribute to William S. Burroughs, featuring a roster of luminaries including Poppy Z. Brite, Caitlin Kiernan, John Shirley and the co-founder of the iconic Goth rock band Bauhaus, David J. Haskins. Johnson ilves in Sacramento, California with his family.

Johnson's poetry and prose collections The Doom Hippies and Skull Vinyl have been acquired by the Widener Library at Harvard University

Aubade By Manny Grimaldi

Never enough drinks in me, not quite

what I want, still sober when I start;

and today, this is the day I wake

and begin anew, my head whisked

to the refrigerator by wheelbarrow

where a Black Russian waits for breakfast.

It’s not a good idea this morning, 

and the avocado wall telephone rings,

sawing and splitting my ears like logs.

Time to hide in the barn, someone’s

coming for me, the mail not checked

in weeks, and the glancing, pierces, rays

through the blinds—I drop my only drink,

and begin to weep to face anything 

so unpromising, like when my father took

me aside sweet seventeen hounding

with the words I’d ruined everything;

when that little girl Kay had full measure

of my smothering and said goodbye;

and when it dawned my rage had the cart

before the horse, I whimpered and drove

the car by a drive thru liquor store,

and talked to a bottle for five hours.

Until noon.

Manny Grimaldi is a Louisville, Kentucky poet, a spit and a cough just west of the "bourbon trail".  He is the managing editor for the poetry journal Yearling out of Lexington, Kentucky.  Years ago, his drinking got arrested and thrown in jail, and occasionally Manny has marched on its behalf.  Manny is also a clown.  Personally, and by training.

A Redwood By JPR

Is just a really big fucking tree stuck out in the middle of bum fucking Egypt. 

That oddly reminds me of myself, as it's perfectly isolated and never feels the need to overstate the obvious.

As it kind of overshadows everything in its vicinity by default. 

Don't be jealous but keep this in mind.

Of course it's easy to stand tall at six four when mostly your contemporaries,

on their tip toes, stand five two. 

 I'm sorry, do I offend you? 

Hey don't get short with me. 

It's not your fault our roots run deep and this is but metaphorically speaking. 

But the issue may be good genetics; of course, 

it helps my family’s tree actually forks. 

Get it?

JPR, currently, is seeking Susan but not desperately. He is also touring the country as part of Corey Feldman's band, for-which at every event he hands out free earplugs and autographed barf bags. His work has been published in Esquire and Screw magazine, both esteemed literary publications. He once went ice fishing with Bert & Ernie. He found a wallet once in his pants and quickly returned it to himself right away. He once worked in Hollywood...... Florida as a greeter at Gary's Mortuary. He is also on a first name basis with the Lochness Monster, although they have never actually met. He also holds the title of the greatest bio writer in history...... He is tired now and will go have his Capri Sun Juice Box. Nah, nah, you can't have one.

How Shy Can a Little Girl Be by B. Lynne Zika

You know that year there was a private toilet

in the classroom? Not many schools had that.

Girls wore dresses then, sometimes even at play

but always, always at school.

You had to pull down your tights and undies,

let them pool around your ankles—honestly,

so absurd—then gather your petticoat

and the folds of your skirt

up around your waist and sit.

Your Mary Janes dangled.

Your feet didn’t even touch the floor.

So there you sat, ridiculous as a monkey 

with a cigarette, and THEN

somebody knocks on the door.

There wasn’t any screen in front of the little toilette.

When you opened the door, the whole white throne

exposed itself to the room. I can’t imagine 

who designed such a thing.

But the day I was holding court,

well, privately holding court,

somebody knocked on the door.

I’m there in all my dangling Mary Janes glory,

but I have a bigger problem.

I don’t know what to say.

I don’t mean that a range of options

presented itself for consideration.

I mean no one ever told me how to respond

when you’re sitting in a semi-public bathroom—

a single-stall semi-public bathroom—

and someone knocks.

I just couldn’t think of a thing to say.

So Jimmy Felding opened the door,

thinking the room unoccupied.

He stared. I stared. 

Jimmy’s the one who spoke.

“Oh! Excuse me!”

It was like the time I was late for my performance

in the school play. Mama dropped me off,

and I ran down the hall clutching my costume

and the sheet music I’d marked in blue ink.

I hear a voice behind me. “Is this yours?”

I turn. A fella is holding up

a white crinoline petticoat.

They’re the kind which make your skirts

stand out like an upside-down tipi.

A boy was waving my petticoat high in the air,

some beribboned flag of surrender.

My petticoat was in his hand.

I believe I tossed my curls. I said,

“Nope. Not mine.”

He looked astounded.

But then, so did I.

B. Lynne Zika’s photography, nonfiction, and poetry have appeared in numerous literary and consumer publications. 2022 publications include Delta Poetry Review, Backchannels, Poesy, Suburban Witchcraft, and The Dead Mule School of Southern Literature. In addition to editing poetry and nonfiction, she worked as a closed-captioning editor for the deaf and hard-of-hearing. Awards include: Pacificus Foundation Literary Award in short fiction, Little Sister Award and Moon Prize in poetry, and Viewbug 2020 and 2021Top Creator Awards in photography. Website: https://artsawry.com/.

Maybe the Holes by Michael Dwayne Smith

Maybe coyote is your wallet

Maybe coyote is the money in your wallet

Maybe coyote is your tongue and fingertips

Maybe coyote is a voice in your head that says

    buy candy or weed

    or an obscenely expensive motor vehicle

    out of covet or jealousy or envy or boredom

    or ennui or depression

Maybe coyote is that Billy Crystal voice that says

    it’s better to look good

    than to feel good, my friend

Maybe coyote has eaten through your skin

Maybe coyote has gobbled up your heart

Maybe coyote has chomped your bones, sucked your marrow

Maybe coyote has fucked you like a movie star

Maybe coyote has devoured your cock and balls and tits and clit

Maybe coyote has penetrated all your holes,

    made them more and more empty

Maybe coyote has become the holes

Maybe the holes have become your soul

Michael Dwayne Smith has appeared in ONE ART Poetry Journal, The Rye Whiskey Review, The Cortland Review, New World Writing, Ethel Zine, Chiron Review, Third Wednesday, and Heavy Feather Review, among many others; a multiple-time nominee for the Pushcart and Best of the Net, he lives near a Mojave Desert ghost town with his family and rescued horses.

Things That Go ping! in the Night by B. Lynne Zika

Do you know what neuropathy is? How about peripheral neuropathy? Me, neither. But mine has a Napoleon complex. The brat.

I finally order the Muses to shut up at 3:00 a.m. and jitterbug my way to bed. There I lie, not thinking about the 47 things I’m thinking about, and ping! he’s at it again. Napoleon, I mean. I have a feeling this is going to be good.

Four days ago it was a bee sting to the hip. Then the usual 30 fine needles peppering my hands and feet. I sit down to dinner and the knees start aching. Fiercely. I ignore them. Three bites of tortellini later, Bludgeoning crash! and I get a hatchet to the left knee. All right, already. I get it! Now, mon général, what do you want me to do about it? Silence.

But tonight, he’s King. This is a full-frontal attack. He’s skirmishing with hands, feet, shins, quadriceps, chest, right nipple — Hold on a damn minute. My nipple?

B. Lynne Zika’s photography, nonfiction, and poetry have appeared in numerous literary and consumer publications. 2022 publications include Delta Poetry Review, Backchannels, Poesy, Suburban Witchcraft, and The Dead Mule School of Southern Literature. In addition to editing poetry and nonfiction, she worked as a closed-captioning editor for the deaf and hard-of-hearing. Awards include: Pacificus Foundation Literary Award in short fiction, Little Sister Award and Moon Prize in poetry, and Viewbug 2020 and 2021Top Creator Awards in photography. Website: https://artsawry.com/.