Two Way Radio

Like kids with two cups and a string.
We play at this life, guessing instead of knowing.
Speaking in riddles as we dance in circles.

Avoiding facts dodging truths
That are clear to everyone, as to ourselves if only we just cut the shit and face the facts.

Games played, lies embraced, as somewhere in between we exist unfazed as fully developed
fools.

I choose to cut the connection instead of maintaining a facade.
It’s never easy to be honest, but in being so.
It is most certainly easier being alone by default.

John Patrick Robbins, is the editor in chief of the Rye Whiskey Review and Off The Coast Magazine. His work has appeared here at Fixator Press, Impspired Magazine, The Dope Fiend Daily, Sava Press, Horror Sleaze Trash, It Takes All Kinds Literary Zine and Schlock Magazine.

over-kill

it is on the second-hand nowhere bridge i cry acid
accepting of defeated cast finally in stoning thump
the scamper drifts to dust in movement of blame

once meant joy but freedom falls into obedience
drives deep heartbeat of happy eroded by rhythm
we were association un-separated by plague boil

inability to save earth natural world continuum beat
our environment grew nil our race once complex flat
apathy depressive anxious result of over-kill heating

when final has become the stop point then what now
climb in bright for this domain now controlled you say
once be it of choice self-destiny determined is halted

gasp rolling hankering smile disintegrated in wet blur
did you see the ex-president controlling own lie preach
that has become usual dragging walk peace step gone

on shattered glass we roll for no more remains solid
greenery we once loved sweet is charred death brown
and that is an ending without try to repeat exculpation

Originally published by and exhibited in, this breath is not mine to keep, Australia

Stephen House has won many awards as a poet, playwright, and actor. He’s received international literature residencies from The Australia Council and Asialink. His chapbooks “real and unreal” and “The Ajoona Guest House” are published by ICOE Press. His next book drops soon. He performs his acclaimed monologues widely.

Monday Morning

The weekend 
was a clown on their day off, 
stepping out of bed only to slip 
on a banana skin and fall 
onto their cacti collection –
the passing blur of a tree trunk 
from the window of a moving car – 
a fresh shiner an and empty wallet 
from some back alley slight of hand 

It is cold outside, 
but inside this kitchen it’s 
a reptile house, as a chef then throws 
a pan and I’m asked to put on 
some music and I choose How’m 
I Supposed To Get Up In The Morning 
by Hank Wood and The Hammerheads.

Once again, my song is skipped
and I return to my section laughing – 
ready to get on with it all
and I will do throughout this week, 
until the weekend suddenly 
reappears in the same way 
that love manifests –
something like a burning church 
cleansed by welcomed rain.

Gwil James Thomas is a poet, novelist and inept musician. He lives in his hometown of Bristol, England but has also lived in London, Brighton and Spain. His eleventh chapbook of poetry Gold Chains Around Our Necks, Hellhounds at Our Heels is forthcoming from Holy & Intoxicated Publications.

Suburbian Image

An image of suburbia
Chain link and close supervision
A spider’s weave and her poison
A blank and unhealthy reflection
On repeat and on repeat
Because a hook is a hook by any other name

Anthony David Vernon is a Cuban-American literary writer and master’s level philosophy student at the University of New Mexico. He has a book out with small press Alien Buddha Press entitled The Assumption of Death.

Ritchie Rich & the Subway Pulse

You can’t get anywhere  
without the underground  
these days 
and here comes Ritchie Rich  
in metal face stud  
and green garbage bag ensemble, 
counting rats large as block parties, 
feeling the subway pulse, 
that joyous skip in his step 
so that the suits push each other 
to get out of his way, 
the smell of fake Cubans from  
the busy bee newsstand – 
CONGRATULATIONS! 
shouts Ritchie Rich with his  
arms and legs wide open; 
everyone is alive and the train 
is on its way, even if you can’t 
hear it yet. 

Ryan Quinn Flanagan is a Canadian-born author residing in Elliot Lake, Ontario, Canada with his wife and many mounds of snow.  His work can be found both in print and online in such places as: Evergreen Review, The New York Quarterly, Fixator Press, In Between Hangovers, Red Fez, and The Oklahoma Review.

Dead Generation

toxic tears flood the streets, gravitational forces
shift power drawing us one day upward, then downward
upward again, there with the ghosts of long gone heroes
forgotten words branded with nuclear fire on leviathan walls
there’s nowhere to run, escaping’s not an option anymore,
horrors inflicted on all continents, there was once
a last generation, called from the greatest sage of the gutter,
now, we live in a yellow sea of nothingness, sharks and whales
play five-draw poker, Neptune laughs and Dionysus swills
Mad Dog, fiery rainstorms and massive hurricanes
ravaged countryside and extirpated cities, giants
fall, dwarves rise up from the planet’s core ready to conquer
a world that never was theirs, down the line in
some far distant future tourists flock to watch
the death of the sun, while in the withering today
the sun showers a world devoured by prehistoric maggots.

Currently residing in Greece, George Gad Economou holds a Master’s degree in Philosophy of Science and supports his writing by doing freelance jobs. Has published a novella, Letters to S. (Storylandia), a poetry collection, Bourbon Bottles and Broken Beds (Adelaide Books), and his drunken words have appeared in various places