BECAUSE. by Jay Passer

because I'm catching up on the black bear's 

hibernation

because the curtain leaking in paltry morning

light

because the 6 AM meat truck vibrates with refrigerated

butchery

because I crack my knuckles and toes reading Bulgakov in

bed

because my eyelids are closed to the policies of the alien

overlords

because I stretch out

while the cosmos

cry out in celebratory

fervor

because some half-wit was elected king of the

clowns

because I've got you next to me whispering while immersed in

dream

Jay Passer's work has appeared in print and online since 1988. He is the author of several chapbooks and has appeared in a bunch of anthologies. His latest collection, they lied to me when they said everything would be alright, from Pski's Porch, is available at Amazon. Passer lives and works in San Francisco, the city of his birth.

A Little Horse by James Babbs

I asked her
why couldn’t the pony talk
and she told me
I was drunk
I said
that might be true
but it still doesn’t
answer the question
she sighed
it was the same sigh I’d heard
so many times before
the one she used
when she was really annoyed
hey I said
I’m just having a good time
she said oh
I know
I took another drink from my beer
what’s wrong with that
I asked
not a thing she said
but she didn’t look at me
I laughed
and looked down
at the bottle in my hand
I took another drink
because I said
he was a little horse
she said what
and I laughed again
she let another sigh slip
from her beautiful lips
that’s why the pony couldn’t talk
I said
and I laughed again
she grabbed some of the empties
scattered on the floor
I heard them hitting together
when she walked out of the room

James Babbs likes the night life but he doesn’t like to boogie.  James has written hundreds of poems and a few short stories over the years and has even had a few of them published.  If you happen to visit the internet you may find something he has written.

Dreams of Pins and Needles. by The Wolf Kevin Martin

last night
flash of blood inside
cylinder before dropping
hammer down cold sweats
used to be dry sheets
tossing turning old day
dreams

hard to come by authentic ones

cold rusty sinew veins aches deviant dominating conversation

a new glass in hand raised toward

New Year

new me believing in her myth again

there are always other applicants waiting  

happens next i’m sorry no one understands

her love and spark was the last vengeance marching

arriving later after sunset fire on chest my muse imitates

road construction bridge building bong hits scorching my throat

downtown wearing a cross of the advocate in bronze leather

strapped heart my chest is brown two rattlesnake vertebrae intertwined

joshua tree thorns taste pierced scapegoat heart before i smelled

her perfume or blood look into the poor begonias appetite waiting for tastes to ferment after waking hungover she realized that she had left her house without her chapstick

The Wolf Kevin Martin is an amateur photographer and poet from Lexington, North Carolina now residing in Pittsburgh,  PA. Contributing poems and images to The Arrival Magazine , The Rye Whiskey Review,  The Dope Fiend Daily , Cajun Mutt Press , Alien Buddha Press.

TIME OUT. by R.M. Engelhardt

All the

Articles

These days

Say that the

Young are 

Writing poetry

Again

But 

All I ever

See is three

Or four lines

And love poems

With pretty

Pictures of

Flowers &

Hot models

Silhouetted 

Against rain or

Backdrops

With even more pretty

Flowers with

An emphasis

On romantic

Themes no whole

Poems about blood or

Whiskey the dead

Or death

Sirens or muses

Politics or religion

Carnage war or 

Soldiers dying

On the fields

Of battle

No.

I see

Too many

Happy poems

Morning after

Poems let me

Make you some

Coffee after sex

Poems but I don't

See any poems

About how this

Beautiful universe

Is going

To shit

No poems

With anger

Teeth bared

Ready to go

Or ready to

Take on the

World

But if the

Young are still

Among

The living

That's good

And so is

Peace

And love

Keep writing

Talon (R.M. Engelhardt) is a poet/author minister who over the last 20 years has been published in such journals as Thunder Sandwich, Full of Crow, Rusty Truck, Writers’ Resist, Dry Land Lit, Rye Whiskey Review, Hobo Camp Review & many others. He currently lives & writes in upstate NY where he hosts a monthly open mic called “The Troy Poetry Mission”

http://www.rmengelhardt.com

Job Hunt. By Ryan Quinn Flanagan

I place a long line of small metal hair clips across the floor

and stand at the end of the hall behind them.

Look how long the unemployment line has gotten,

I say, all these unused hair clips and me.

She sits up on the couch

tells me I am weird and very lucky to have found

a woman such as her.

Look, I even made up a resume for when the line thins out.

Let me see that, she snags it out of my hand.

You were never the King of India for two years.

Yes I was, and I listed you as a personal reference,

so talk me up when they call.

She laughs when she gets to the section on skills:

chewing with mouth closed, provider of orgasms,

speaks 1700 languages including: cat,

able to fly, read minds, computer literate

etc.

She hands the resume back to me

and walks back to the couch after

noting all my previous experience:

roofer

King of India for 2 years (as previously mentioned)

parking enforcement on Venus

Anne Frank’s body double

sous chef to Jeffery Dahmer

inventor of the autobahn

Spanish inquisitor in a past life

desert cactus stand in for eight prickly months in Tucson

prison house snitch for the warden

metallurgy apprentice

Vatican underwear model

etc.

Do not be so quick to critique.

Everyone exaggerates on their resume.

And judging by the size of the line in front of me,

I just hoped it was enough.

Ryan Quinn Flanagan is a male gigolo for hire.  Presently residing along the sunny shores of Guantanamo Bay, Cuba where he spends his days drinking discount Tequila and accusing chemtrails of being "sky farts."  His work can be found both in print and online in such joints as: The Rye Whiskey Review, The Dope Fiend Daily, Outlaw Poetry Network, Horror Sleaze Trash, and Under The Bleachers.

Stuck In The Freezer With You. by Scott.The Squire Simmons

The definition of happiness is always a freezing meat locker.

Although I couldn’t feel my hands anymore I could still feel the magic. 

All of the bits of flesh hanging up had a pretty pink color too.

And my breath was showing just like on a cold Christmas morning! 

Why I know that Santa Claus himself would love the weather in here.

Especially with his all of elves wielding their favorite butcher knives.

Honestly the only shame of this is that I’ll probably have hypothermia.

Or I’ll be chopped into tiny little pieces by whoever locked me in here. 

Who knows but at least everybody loves a good surprise.

                         Scott The Squire Simmons

Is the head cheerleader of the Frat and Editor of The Dope Fiend Daily and Co Editor of The Rye Whiskey Review.

Where he gets continually sexually harassed by his co workers yet struggles through dreaming of the day he can become a fashion designer and achieve world dominance and finally afford his sex change.

Scott dreams of starting the sorority to empower his fellow Frat sisters and have pajama party's and tickle fights sharing his deepest thoughts while shaving his legs and moustache.


His publications include .

Rolling Stone Magazine, The Ryan Quinn Flanagan Qaurterly,  Solider Of Fortune, Tiger Beat , The Blue Balls Review , Sport Illustrated,  The Rye Whiskey Review , Panda Lovers Monthly and Poetry Magazine .


He enjoys making his own clothes and showing the fellas he is more than just a piece of meat .

If you ever feel alone and just need a friend or cuddle buddy give him a call at .

832 802 9430.

King Of The Sidewalk. by John Grochalski

i am drunk

and she is outside my bedroom

shouting into her cell phone

this is a bad combination for the night

i look out the window

to sidewalks full of dogshit and misery

to a starless sky that screams city

and the dim lights of dim homes housing dim people

and she is pacing back and forth

a hat riding low on her head

and a trust fund college sweatshirt on her back

she is shouting some inanity

about what kim did to lizzie at the bar

or what derrick did to joe at the office

absent co-stars in this one-sided war

that she and i currently have going on

loud enough for the whole neighborhood

to know her petty drama

there is nothing to do

but lean my head out the window

and tell her to shut the fuck up

the words stop her in her tracks

she glares at me

young and dumb and in possession of the world

and i glare back

old and drunk and knowing the world isn’t worth it

finally, she says

you know, you’re not the king of the sidewalk

and i look back out

at the dogshit and dim lights

trying my hardest to find the moon

before setting my eyes

back on her dull and dimwit face

finally telling her

yes, yes i am

i’m king of the sidewalk

and if you don’t move

i’ll have your fucking head

before regally closing my blinds

and passing out on the poking, rusting coils

of my lumpy throne

amidst the falling ceiling plaster

and scattering cockroaches

of this dark pleasure palace.

John Grochalski is the author of the poetry collections, The Noose Doesn’t Get Any Looser After You Punch Out (Six Gallery Press 2008), Glass City (Low Ghost Press, 2010), In The Year of Everything Dying (Camel Saloon, 2012), Starting with the Last Name Grochalski (Coleridge Street Books, 2014), and The Philosopher’s Ship (Alien Buddha Press, 2018). He is also the author of the novels, The Librarian (Six Gallery Press 2013), and Wine Clerk (Six Gallery Press 2016).  Grochalski currently lives in Brooklyn, New York, where the garbage can smell like roses if you wish on it hard enough.