For the end of the plague, for victory the erection of a scutulously ornate votive column in the isolation of the multiaxial crossroads of the citycenter, for here is the palimpsest of vehicular crossroads, for the completion of the navmesh, for the nativity of Salty, for nothing more than the ecstasy of sculpture, for successful dolphin harvesting, here upon this plinth is the destruction of the Parliament Hall, here upon this plinth is the meatjam Continue reading “Smithsonian Destruction Vigil by John Trefry”
“When you change the bed sheets, keep your mouth shut – you don’t want to breathe in other people’s dead skin.” Continue reading “Skin by Olga Dermott-Bond”
The Sale
The linen man was having a sale. The townspeople got up early to buy linens.
The linen man had boasted of his sale for seven years, and the townspeople were driven by a rabid impatience. They’d pressured him to hold it now, and then now, and so on.
On the day of the sale, the town was caught up in a colossal heat. It was uncommon, so early in the summer, and the townspeople swung their limbs in wretchedness. Henny and Ida claimed the temperature had increased daily as the sale neared.
Others noticed this, too; worse, the air took on a density that smelled of flowers. It was clear from the smell these flowers had flourished in the heat, grown large in it, and died. The townspeople chose not to say anything, as it was unpleasant in a variety of ways. They held handkerchiefs over their faces as they walked to the linen sale.
The sun hadn’t come up yet, and all but one of the streetlights along the linen man’s street had gone out. It was too hot to fix them, so no one had, and the solitary light turned the air an uncomfortable green.
“There’s something linen-like about that shade of green,” said Mrs. R.
“It’s not the shade of green you’re noticing, it’s that machine sound,” said Mr. L.
“It’s the smell,” said Ms. X, “which is clearly linen in nature.”
Mr. L and Ms. X were notoriously confident about the superiority of their perceptions.
Townspeople streamed into the linen man’s street. The machine sound was very loud there, and a large object shook under a piece of plastic.
Near the object was a crate of cubes.
The townspeople needed dishcloths, bedclothes, curtains, and shirts. But they saw none of this—merely the cubes, and the density in the air.
Mrs. R drew a line through the air, an involuntary motion.
“Linen sale,” called the linen man. He ushered the townspeople with his hands.
It was a surprise to see the danger red, tango orange, white mottle. All the other shellfish she had seen that day in the rock pools had been dark browns, some black elegant creatures. This was a lobster that looked like it was half-cooked, but alive and well, a naturally appealing dinner invitation.
She felt like a child squatting down next to the rock pool. How had he got washed up here, so beautiful against the wrinkled rocks and sighing sand. The day, sunny but with a wind that ran through her ankles and up her skirt occasionally, should have been about observing. She thought she would spend some time looking at the rock pools, looking at the creatures in them, grey and black and brown—crabs moving amongst the husks and wrappers of their dead comrades. Never take a step back, pick up claw from a fallen brother.
She was going to be detached today, she’d promised. She wasn’t going to get involved with anything, she said the creative writing course was helping, but there needed to be more material, more distraction. She’d been told by the tutor that she was a natural journalist, scornfully. Always ready to get involved and meddle in someone else’s story, rather than secretly skimming off the best bits from a distance.
So she would observe today. It was a bit like when she had been dumped by her boyfriend. Ex-boyfriend. The idea was to stay single for a while, to observe the others doing the dance and check she knew the steps.
But here, with this orange lobster in the black bowl of a Welsh rock pool, she decided to engage with it. She started by giving it a nudge with a stick to see how active it was. It was beautiful, so could be dead. It moved and whirled around to look at her, pointedly. She was surprised, and didn’t expect it to be so forward, it was a rare thing and therefore should be shy in her world. Continue reading “The Boyfriend Pinch by Christopher John Eggett”
out of the gray afternoon it might begin—the creation of the world. in the sound of a snow shovel scraping on ice and in the slush that remains a kind of ex nihilo is generated. from nothing. certainly from nothing. in the birthing of worlds there are no principles only the appearance of that which did not exist before and that now is. that now irrefutably is. where once the cosmos was simply gray expanse and the waters then below, or even the gathering of all things in one small, great magnitude, there is now the gray afternoon. no diving for worlds in the great sea. no trickster. nothing. a flock of dying geese crosses the new sky in a v that tapers to oblivion. a dog howls to no answer in the distance. his leg is broken and he is looking for a culvert to hide in. surely, they have come. in this world the names are stripped one by one and a first and last lonesome forked creature with twelve fingers and no face ticks off the forgotten. ah, yes. this swirling mass of creation, this pool of dim color that rises in the deep of the gray and seems to nod to the cracked moon above—this is genesis. the names fall off each and each wanders to their glory in a desert of rock and gray sun. a world. a new world.
Ten Sentences
I. Rowing
I am setting out on this water not to drift but to row, since this not loving you has drawn from me almost as much as loving you once did, and nothing is as full as a boat by itself in a sea that does not end.
II. Barn Ruin
We found it at the edge of the woods that August you wouldn’t touch me, just a skeleton of walls and poison ivy climbing all the way to the caved-in roof, triple leaves bigger than hands and glossed to the point of dripping, and it was almost pretty, all those edges hooked against each other, baring back a tessellated light, just as long as we didn’t come close.
III. Tide
I was not afraid you would hurt me, but that you never would, that you would never even peer between these ribs I’ve hinged apart for you, until the wind will do to me what it does to all soft creatures left behind by the tide, and the only sound my throat can make will be the sound of robin nests unraveled in a storm.
It was for Joanna Newsom that I left my wife and children, all of whom I adored more than anything in that world which I left behind and to which I will never go back. My defence is sound, you’ll see.
I’d checked myself into the hospital, just like they tell you to if you’re experiencing difficulties in breathing, have a tight chest and your head is spinning. I passed swiftly through triage and onto a bed where they wired me to an ECG, took blood and then abandoned me to crisp blue curtains and the metronomic beep of an ignored monitor. Continue reading “Jack by Gene Farmer”
Working while the madness allows. On and off. As little as possible, to tell the truth. It’s fuckin killing me. Shattered image of me in desolate dream mirror and somewhere outside me, floating. Holding it together and holding it down, best as I can. Opioid void of nowhere droid.
Tramadol, Morphine, Temgesic relief. Stolen from medicine cupboards and begged off anyone with a bad back, or broken bones. Prescribed for shoulder injury, used for cracked mind. Takes the edge off. Keeps the shadows from closing in. Stops the terrible doom feeling it’s all going to come crashing down around me. Everything I’ve tried hard to create as a better life. An illusion of peace and sanity. All removed by madness. Deleted. Love too? Without the love, I’d disappear. Dissolve into background of blue blur fuzz. Leave only eyeballs floating in air against blue backdrop. Continue reading “What Else Can I Do? by Rob True”
I leave the house in my jogging bottoms and hoody. It’s the not so early morning in spring and I’m headed up to the corner shop for a loaf of bread and bacon, you know the stuff that says with added water on the packet like it’s something to be proud of, because it’s Saturday and when you live on your own, you’ve got to give yourself little rewards for making it to another weekend. Couples get to lie in together with hangovers but, when you’re on your own, the bed just doesn’t stay warm and a bacon sandwich on buttered white bread is a home remedy that feels like it’s been unconsciously passed down through the ages. Continue reading “A Bacon Sandwich by Jim Gibson”
It really messed me up, it did. For months after my discharge, even the sound of my own farts would send me, you know, wherever it was I went. I would just freeze up. Go into a kind of dead-face trance. I was a big lad back then, and it was difficult for people to get me moving again once I’d stopped. So I’d end up staying there for a while like, in the street, wherever, just staring at the grey clouds on the horizon. At one stage, it got so bad that when I was offered a job at the local arcade – one of them bandit places – my counsellor practically begged me not to take it. She said the flashing lights and the noise of the coins dropping would be too much for me to handle. She made it sound like I’d end my shift fitting on the mucky carpet there, like some sort of fucking fish. But I had to give it a try. It was the only job offer I’d had since landing back on civvy street, and staying in the house all day with my parents tip-toeing nervously around me, well that was sending me another kind of crazy. I was starting to feel like one of them fucking bombs I was so Continue reading “Charon’s Amusement Arcade by BR Williams”
I’ll make jokes about death. Give names to the bunnies locked between coyote teeth as we walk through the forest with bare feet. Go to your apartment. Drop to the floor. Hide under blankets until the air is too warm. Stick heads out and kiss. Stand up, I’ll watch as the covers shift off, leave you naked. Grab a bottle from the counter. Come back. Take the first sip then pass it to me. I’ll crinkle my face and say no more. But that just means I want you to get a glass of water for me to sip after each pull. You’ll know that.
Play music. Dance with me. Wait till our eyes are clouded just a bit. I’ll look up at you. You’ll look down. The whole world between my nose and yours. Eyes lock. We’ll have to fill the gap. Lace your fingers through my hair. Sit on the ground. Grab the bottle. Continue reading “After the 10th Date by Sam Frost”
RUCKSACK
- 1 x tooth brush
- 1 x toothpaste (100ml)
- 1 x shower gel (100ml)
- 2 x t shirts, pants, socks
- 1 x jumper
- 1 x anorak
- 1 x shorts
- 2 x good books
- Flip flops
- Tobacco, rizla, filter, lighter
- I-pod (nb delete nostalgic songs)
- Earphones (splash out on DECENT pair)
- Passport
Continue reading “Before Faking Your Own Death… by Paul Case”
by Amee Nassrene Broumand
ANB: Autumn begins to pulse from leaf to flavescent leaf, beading—here and there—into cardioid splashes of pomegranate. The hum of the forest alters. Over the hills, in a dilapidated garden choked with honeysuckle vines gone wrong, sunbeams curve down upon a mud-eaten shoe. In places such as these, even saints grow timid.
EC: Currents of light and wind thread a passage. I trail my hands through the leaves, and they come away doused in bergamot, verbena, thyme, traces of care still scattered in this tangled place, death not reversed but charmed into a feral green. I crush rosemary needles between my teeth, think how I must have gone wild too early, trying to possess some other shape. The wind pushes me like a weathervane through the bramble, up to the hollow brink where a house once stood. A granite threshold left sunk in the ground marks where ghosts should step. How can it be the only things that seem real to me now are ruins. Continue reading “An Experimental Conversation with Writer Erin Calabria”
Pairty
Goat an invite fae the boy up the stair. A wee pairty he wis huvin fur his birthday, an he wondered if Ah fancied comin up fur a couple o beers. At first Ah thought, Christ, a room fu o folk Ah dinnae ken, drinkin, gettin pished, mibbie talkin aboot fitba or politics or that. Ah cannae be daein wi aw that cairry oan. Continue reading “‘Pairty’ by A.G. Kayman”
Burning House Press are excited to announce that our first book publication forthcoming in 2018 will be ‘Gospel Of Aberration’ by Rob True – his first full collection of stories. More details to come.
Relax
‘Ye’re so fuckin tense,’ he says. An in ma heid Ah’m like, whit the fuck, if ye want tae make somebdy less tense then the worst thing ye kin say is ‘Ye’re so fuckin tense’. Ah mean, whit guid is that gonnae dae?
Ah actually feel like sayin that tae him, bit Ah dinnae want tae end up back oan the rock ‘n’ roll, so fuck that fur a game o soadjurz. Jist huv tae grin an bear it Ah suppose – minus the grin obviously.
‘Seriously, man, jist relax,’ he says. ‘Ivryhin’s easier when ye relax, take it fae me.’
Ah take a deep breath an look at the flair. ‘Yes, chef,’ Ah say.
‘Look at me when ye’re talkin tae me,’ he says. Continue reading “‘Relax’ by A.G. Kayman”
1st Weekend
Billy and Ian are walking along opposite sides of the high street in Cambridge, pretending to throw an imaginary ball across the cars that glide by in the darkness. It’s really windy so if there was a ball, it would have flown off in the wrong direction by now, but these boys don’t seem that concerned by the laws of reality at the moment – the party in their fuzzed up heads is much better than what’s going on out here. Continue reading “‘1st Weekend’ by Terence Corless”
Some cold Jan morning Cruz and I were sitting at a Neon Express coffee bar, mouthing off about BlackGenie’s latest album cover; mirrored vinyl shining through star shaped perforations in the polyplas sleeve, a mini constellation in the shape of the BG’s glyph. Cruz strongly disagreeing with the criticism that I’m laying down on the lack of artistry “…any one can just cut a bit of the sleeve out to show the vinyl underneath, but what’s the story… you know ?. This album is about something, so why don’t they make a picture of it ?, this isn’t album art it’s packaging design man…!” after gulping his stale Mericano Cruz casually wiped his mouth and replies “you think with your eyes too much bud…”, sighing I put the album down on the counter and reach for my quadro espresso. “you know what I’m saying Cruz, I know you do…” Continue reading “‘Shoot Out At The Neon Express’ by Simon Woodward”
the following story contains content relating to self-harm which could be triggering to some readers
“Tell me what you know.”
“I don’t know anything.”
“Tell me how you feel then.”
“Honestly, I don’t feel anything. Please. Please don’t. Fucking hell. Please don’t do that.” Continue reading ““Tell me what you know.” – by Jonathan Taylor”
First Class Stamp
Terence Stamp in ‘Far From The Madding Crowd’, that’s who I think of as the doctor pokes about my ancient lady bits. Terence Stamp in his cavalry outfit on a hillside, jacket red as rose hip. It’s a nicer picture, that, than the top of this doctor’s head, all mottled like the backs of my hands. No, it’s worse, more like the bottom of a teacup with the floaty bits left. He wants to be careful with that. Continue reading “‘First Class Stamp’ by Nick Black”
BURNING HOUSE PRESS 