The 5th C
Continue reading “The 5th C – ReVerse Butcher and Kylie Supski”
Martin and the Sea
Dusk had fallen long ago and a cold biting sea breeze was humming a sweet melody as the sea waves crashed on the formidable sea wall of Georgetown. It was almost pitching dark. Martin sat on the sea wall looking at the incoming waves laughing under the yellow tail of the moon hidden behind a dark curtain of clouds. He walked slowly on the broad edges of the wall, watching little boys hauling a seine along the shallow shore line. White egrets nibbled at shrimps in the salty mud holes on the broken mud flats, lovers passed by holding hands in the thin whisper of rain. He kept a lonely vigil on the Continue reading “Martin and the Sea – Gideon Cecil”
Quiet Wife
It is winter, suddenly, and Agnete is stuck inside her cottage. She is running out of preserves. She is bored. Sometimes Agnete wishes her husband would return, but alas, he is locked away. He may even be dead. Most of the time she is glad to be rid of him and his sharp teeth and breath like rotted wood. The snowfall came as a surprise. It is only the third week of September, after all. The white blanket has obscured her captor, and Agnete does not know the protocol of escaping a fairy ring one cannot see. Continue reading “Quiet Wife – Erin Vance”
Testimonies
I am a stranger in this place
& grief’s white teeth leave
its bite marks on my skin:
the relic of a child left in the
cold hand of an estranged city,
alone. I am a stranger in this city
& family dinner table is a strange Continue reading “1. Testimonies 2. When the Rainbow Falls from the Sky 3. How Things Look Back – Ifeoluwa Ayandele”
When the Show Must Go On
my magic sparks
but doesn’t light
it is not so
effervescent
your smile spreads
pretty, mine splits
a parlor trick
halving myself
you pull a dove Continue reading “When the Show Must Go On – Trina Young”
i am full of children i do not want
If every girl/daughter is a seed, what will that seed become? What plume, bloom, or vegetation?
muck-in-my-gut // ghost-white and beloved // give me a disregard for neighbors and sirens
Maybe it’s true, that “the acorn doesn’t fall far from the tree.” That the seed of her being is a blue-bell blueprint, genesis of genes, traumatic histories and memories mapping destinies predestined, societal soldering of gender-norms, which she inherits. Continue reading “‘Daughter-Seed’ by Arielle Tipa – reviewed by Miggy Angel”
The Easter Sunday My Faith Strayed
A thurible swung solemnly
voices sang for risen King
and sweet incense was billowing.
Prayers of the Faithful asked
help for Syria,
comfort for their suffering.
As I spoke, “Lord, hear our prayer,”
the holy smoke
grew strangling. Continue reading “1. The Easter Sunday my Faith Strayed, and 2. Lost and Found Still Lost – Carrie Danaher Hoyt”
Vigil
It’s blue-dark,
the kind of dark that comes only
in the midst of a full moon,
and the night is cool, and calm,
and the wind, lightly dancing
through the trees, is beginning
to whisper in our ears, calling us Continue reading “1. Vigil, and 2. Clear – Jon Bishop”
The natural beauty of Lego
Broken bones, heaped, on the next chair.
In front, two fat lungs growling and full.
Sweat slides down the baubled face of the child
On the floor, playing manual labour with Lego.
Young Mr. and Mrs. Naïve, #blessed
Murmur a sweet prayer for the health
Of an embryo, their band aid future.
I shouldn’t be here now.
This fresh. This clean. This unlucky. Continue reading “1. The natural beauty of Lego, and 2. Pulp Savannah – Amy Kean”
The Orange Tree
At the centre of a cloistered courtyard
encircled by curve and shadow
a ladder reaches from earth to sky.
While men whip the sin
from their flesh, red ribboned inside
darkened cells, or gaze Continue reading “The Orange Tree – Lucy Whitehead”
In limbo
A fighter falls to his knees—bloodied, all but broken.
A big man with small hands stands
stock still, unsullied.
Two lovers kiss, a humming bird
touches down on dust-palled ground.
Dragnet chases crisscross cityscape;
a dragged woman paces, hands on hips; coffee drips; Continue reading “In Limbo – Anne Casey”
Running
I grew up counting the names of God,
all of them—it was the one thing Father taught me to do.
Father, unlike Moses, did not find the Lord in bushfire,
he had found him in fleeing from burning.
And I joined him (we all did), running.
I ran so much my heart began to ache,
my body began to shift perspective,
I began to see things other than what my eyes have been
taught to see—that I am not salt and light, Continue reading “1. Running, and 2. Finding God – Ernest Ogunyemi”
Pulling Through
It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle
than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God. ––– Matthew 19:24
It would take so much work
(forget the gospel metaphor)
to yank a tattered thread
through a fine-eyed needle
or a battered camel
through the last mirage. Continue reading “Pulling Through – Laurie Koensgen”
Requisition
And when I say I’m void of self-belief I’m trying to say I don’t live
The answer I’m trying to say I recognize helpless nature I’m trying to say
That I write God in the alfresco mother says he is ubiquitous like air I am a daily
SOS on some other days while I await heaven’s radar I re- arrange my misery
As a response driven to a space on the ocean’s expanse reciting each pain into pebbles
Feeding pebbles to strong currents I hang my scars like petitions around my neck Continue reading “1. Requisition, and 2. God, Look At God – Goodness Olanrewaju Ayoola”
The Anger of Water
Water rises
With a roar,
Forms a fist of iron
And throws itself at you.
I do not pray to see water angry.
It is mannerless;
Has respect for nothing
But its evil intentions.
Upon the blue sea, Continue reading “The Anger of Water – Kolawole Samuel Adebayo”
Inferno, Cantos I–III
I.
In the middle of my life, I lost myself in a dark wood.
I can’t say how I got there: I was on the path, and then I wasn’t. I can hardly even describe the wood. It was dark and dense, and I was afraid.
I wandered all night, first one way, then another, then back again. Every turn led me deeper into the wood. When I stopped to rest, I heard a distant howl, and I set off, almost running. The thick branches shut out the moonlight, and I tripped on roots and skinned my wrists on the stony ground. Continue reading “Inferno, Cantos I–III – Ryan Napier”
Suddenly Blind
The microwave is beeping in time to the pulse in my head.
My fingernails are splitting, one by one, leaving ragged points
that scratch my numbed face.
I wander from room to room feeling like this house
is a stranger that’s abducted me.
I go days without washing my face or brushing my hair
and I blame the moon. It’s too bright, it’s too big, Continue reading “1. Suddenly Blind, and 2. The Last Earthly Gift – Charlotte Hamrick”
In the Dark
I devise a plan:
I will take you
to places you’ve never seen.
I book my ticket
and we’re off:
jetting across the globe,
the adventure of a lifetime.
We go to New York, Libya, Malaysia,
and now here I am in Italy,
your rounded body Continue reading “1. In the Dark, and 2. Embracing Vulnerability – David Hanlon”
Empyrean Swings
what is love if not
catching irrepressible canyons
in calloused hands
breathing homespun winds
into dessicated
labium-gullies
what is love if not
defining impossibility Continue reading “Empyrean Swings – Ashley Bullen-Cutting”
Prayer book
When I was 12 I found a prayer book at a jumble sale
and bought it for the grand sum of 25p.
It had daffodils on the front – a cheery bunch of yellow flowers
and I remember thinking, yellow flowers can only be good
they always make people happy.
And I didn’t feel happy, not very often, not even at the age
of bike rides and cupcakes and sleepovers, Continue reading “Prayer Book – Victoria Richards”
BURNING HOUSE PRESS 