Today the invisible line
between Man
and that other world
of magic, enchantment and Death
is crossed by hordes of spirits.
They appear to mortals in
strange guise.
Devils pick belladonna,
hemlock, monks hood
kept in glass jars of shadowy blue.
Satan’s minions,
invisible to human eye,
feasting on adders’ tongues,
stab hearts with knives
sharpened in Wayland’s forge.
Skeletal wraiths
haunt new-dug tombs
to feed on grave wax.
In deep woods,
dark spirits
search for deadly mushrooms,
rotting, fleshy fungus
to lay before
drunken sots
on tavern benches.
The putrid dead
search desolate graveyards
for all of Death’s detritus.
Phantom vultures
fight over festering
bones.
Sarah Das Gupta is a school teacher from near Cambridge, UK who has also lived and taught in India and Tanzania. She has had work published in over 70 magazines/journals from many different countries, including US, UK, Canada,
Australia, Germany, Romania, Croatia, India, Nigeria and others.
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Pretending to be me, a well-paid blonde
Appears to host my Instagram account,
Engages with my followers, replies
Politely in my “voice,” negotiates
All sponsorship requests, promotes my book.
Before I died, I didn’t taste success.
My maker, who bestowed the gift, arrived
When I was 55, revealed how to
Shape-shift witnessed by the moon’s upturned face.
Spoiler alert: that’s not in my memoir.
Fresh blood that energizes vamps must be
Emboldened by passion — a desire
For living, the best nourishment on which to feed.
Next comes exhilaration: plan the hunt,
Select the prize. No matter what you’ve heard,
Blood type’s no concern — just vibrancy.
Another cut involved text deemed obscene
Because I gushed: “The kill! My lord, the kill!”
Imagine this: blood pumping, spurting straight
From puncture’s wounds, red tears in human flesh,
Aromas coppery, sweet pungent sweat,
As it’s consumed, tonight’s hot chalice drained.
Instructions newbies need were all excised.
My lawyers helped combat that censorship.
Click on the link to join my master class.
Ten percent off — if you pay by midnight.
Native New Yorker LindaAnn LoSchiavo (she/her), a four time nominee for The Pushcart Prize, is a member of SFPA, British Fantasy Society, and Dramatists Guild. Her books include: “Women Who Were Warned,” “Messengers of the Macabre,” “Apprenticed to the Night,” and “Vampire Ventures” (Alien Buddha Press). Forthcoming in 2024: “Cancer Courts My Mother.”
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Among towering, dark pine tree
in the horror of the blackest forest
the creature moved a claw.
Its cavernous mouth gaped wide.
Yellowing fangs glowed in the night
like sharp, serrated saws.
Rotting remains of flesh hung from the jaws
as carcasses from a butcher’s steel hook.
Ropes of bulging veins criss-crossed
beneath thinly stretched skin.
As its fearful feet rustled dead leaves,
the forest moaned in a cruel east wind,
the trees whispered in trembling fear.
It opened the graveyard gate.
A skeleton moon sailed
from behind a dark cloud.
Mounds of newly dug graves
shone in the ghostly light.
With deadly intent it dug, dug deep.
A body wrapped in a shroud
was dragged into the air again
the head held in the cavernous mouth.
Back into the forest it lumbered and lurched
to enjoy its horrific feast
the savagery of the beast
satisfied for one day, at least
Post Stoker
He sat in the humid jungle;
his heart drained,
cold, frozen beyond ice.
No pulse, no beat responded,
even to his own hand.
The cave in its darkness
offered deeper darkness,
a savage blackness:
fur, pelt, claw, tooth.
Deeper, ever deeper,
they were there
these, his kin, his familiars,
hanging, closely, bloated
processing the last feed.
Night rolls inside;
he feels the vampires,
restless, weak, seeking
reviving transfusion.
One by one, gathering,
swarming, they fly.
Dark coated, snub nosed,
his wings now spreading,
his thumbs transforming-
tiny, stubby wing digits
to climb the sleeping prey.
Cattle lying, agents of revival;
the colony descends.
He climbs, claw thumbs grappling.
Sharp incisors puncture
the tough skin. His tongue
long, viper-like drinks,
lapping the dark red stream
Sarah Das Gupta is a school teacher from near Cambridge, UK who has also lived and taught in India and Tanzania. She has had work published in over 70 magazines/journals from many different countries, including US, UK, Canada,
Australia, Germany, Romania, Croatia, India, Nigeria and others.
For Grace Murphy Rodriguez
The houses of my childhood, lived in and
Visited, all bore walls exhibiting
The landscapes of the Highwaymen.
On a balmy Christmas night in Wellington, Florida
I used my aunt’s bathroom off the master suite of
Her house. Sprouting from an oil paint lawn,
A scene of a Royal Poinciana tree offered
Acrylic shade over my relative’s bed. Tiptoeing over,
I went to take a closer look at the framed window to
Another time. Yet its tangerine petals failed to prevent
My meddling and I was distracted by another orange-colored object—
A prescription bottle, its faded label illegible, waited empty on the nightstand.
A lace doily, like a tesselated stage, hosted a menagerie of other strange
Belongings— horn-rimmed glasses, a gilded compact and
A single, full cup of water, I assumed forgotten.
“She’s supposed to keep that light on,” a voice came behind me.
It was my aunt’s sister-in-law, Sylvie, whose greeting earlier was
Remember me for I hardly ever saw her. The only sound she made approaching
Was the ice shifting in her marlin-decaled tumbler. A two-beat song
Of the bedside lamp’s chain being pulled permeated the silence and
We were bathed in light. My Aunt Kimmy came in, almost
Frightened— “I checked on your mother’s room before the party started,”
She said, pulling a pleather purse out of the dresser drawer, placing it
Neatly on top. “I hope I haven’t forgotten
Anything.” Sylvie reminded my aunt about the lamp and before
I could use the bathroom or tamper with anything else she ushered us out.
Sandwiched in between the two older women, I felt we were making a guilty
Procession from that historic capsule, that vacuum, and back to
The contemporary, a Christmas party. But passing the threshold,
Sylvie stopped cold, in between the hallway and bedroom.
She gripped the molding on the doorway for
Dear life, a pained look in her eye. For whatever reason,
She kicked off her sneakers and missing her long-dead mother,
She cried.
Isabel Grey is receiving her MFA in Genre Fiction and Poetry at Western Colorado University. Her work has contributed to Black Poppy Review,WordCrafter Press, the upcoming Dear America series at Terrain.org, and elsewhere.
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I unconsciously chop the carrots
My cat jumping on the counter
Hoping I will have something for it
But I stare deeply at the house
The overgrown brown and green creepers
Encaging the old brick walls
I couldn’t even tell you of what color those walls were
Maybe they were brown, or perhaps black
I knew not and quite frankly I cared not
In the daytime the place was okay
In the nighttime? Well the tiny yellow bottle that holds my pills
That knock me right out can tell you the story
Outside a green stream flows, the stench of it unbearable
I dare not look at its waters
I swear something sinister lives there
Or maybe it was my hallucination
Induced by the sleeping pills I was always dosed on
I have no idea why I even purchased the property
Maybe it’s because it reminds me of myself
Abandoned in my misery
Well, maybe we can keep each other company
As we fade out of existence to the world
With nothing much to offer
Nah Hannah, is a Kenyan-born poet who often expresses her worldview through writing. She graduated from Kenyatta University with a bachelor’s degree but found her passion in poetry. She seeks to make an impact in the world through her writing.
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Marisa Jade is an independent writer that aspires to be a published author. Her works have appeared in the Heart of Flesh, where she wrote her testimony, and The Chamber Magazine, where she did her first book review. You can connect with her on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, where she supports authors all over the world.
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Once more the maestro
mounts the stage, his ivory baton
a splurge in loops. My obsidian
rook again threads soft bullets of fog
into wealthy heads. A low purring
train of ebony wind, I fall oblong
into a first repeat. My octave
valve resolves us into intervals
of dementia, and gulls slide
over my cracked facets. Curved
rows of violins cloud shapes
in my double-reed mouth
as it dissolves women into air.
The cellos respond precisely
and I solo. The concertmaster,
tuxedoed fugue behind black metal
music stand, eyes me. I leave.
Heads haunt this lantern, warm
arrangements of fatalities
in each new piece of Beethoven.
My bassoon stands disastrous, exacting
on my lap, a crisis in solitude. I play
seldom. Now, almost never. Insomnia
of notes fixed, skeletal. Will I expose
my self again? My face can be sudden—
my absence a collapse. Inside, angels
burble phlegm into a symphonic
soup, while scales on my bassoon’s body
peel, splash, and sink like scabs into
a toxic broth. Archaic eels electrocute
schisms of marionettes, whip ribbons
in a pottage of vomit. Contrapuntal
borscht— gelatinous chunks mimicking
love, lark’s tongue in aspic spread
thick on sarcastic dressing-room toast.
Late-night at the 24-Hour Walgreens
Regaining consciousness, I find everyone
smoothed into another timeframe. But if
my sutures stretch me oblong, I can still
do mantras for breakfast. When the people
upstairs meditate, roots from the soles
of their feet branch down through our place
like octopus’ tentacles. We tweak them
into centerpieces for our various displays,
but the chewy suction cups don't fit in
with our virtual furniture. The sadness
of our insomnia splashes tax forms
on our sunny plutonium toys. So I disillusion
this torrent of barefoot Hare Krishna’s clanging
finger cymbals. Or maybe our slow-death
memories don't wait at the door ringing, but barge
in with guns, aggressive species of genitalia
who tickle aloft our hysteria's migraine. I find
myself in a condo full of emptiness. I know,
right? We keep our cynicism shut up tight in jars
for the unlikely event of mushroom embolism.
While the woman behind the drug counter
says, "a pomegranate the size of a baby's head
is not exactly something you can pass by
at the grocery," I focus my wandering thoughts
on each raindrop as it plops on the warm sill
outside the pharmacy window in mercury-vapor
snow-globe implosion. But then, how many
funerals can there be in a raindrop? The woman
behind the counter grimaces, jaw clenching
behind her makeup mask, pretending to care how
she might medicate our late-night symptoms.
Bobby Parrott holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Southern Illinois University. His poems appear in Tilted House, RHINO, Phantom Kangaroo, Atticus Review, Collidescope, Neologism, and elsewhere. He sometimes gets the impression his poems are writing him as he dreams himself out of formlessness in the chartreuse meditation capsule of Fort Collins, Colorado.
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Quiet child, strain your ears and listen for the sound of her
Though I know you will not hear
For soon she will come on dark and silent wings to cloak the land in quiet shadow
When the sun grows weary and can no longer stay afloat, she will come
Then the wrens that sing in the willows will hush their songs and grow quiet and still
The frogs and the katydids, will summon her, singing her praises
And the evening breeze will whisper her name
The moon may rise in the heavens and struggle against her
But she will not be defeated nor relent
For some, she will bring the chance to dream, to reflect, and rest in peaceful slumber
While others dread her coming, cursed to once again wander through mazes of nightmare and regret
Quiet child, strain your ears and listen for the sound of her
Though I know, you will not hear
Rory Keene Hopkins is a writer and poet who resides in the backwoods of Kentucky. He is currently working on a collection of stories titled, “Tales From the Dark Cabin.”
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though you know most of your own craziness
inside and out
only now and then do you get to see the fears, worries, demons
of others
and how, sometimes, sadness overwhelms them,
madness hits its head against the wall
produces a big knot on the forehead
the animate meeting the inanimate head on
you understand the tunnels in which our emotions thrive
the darkness
and how a mind runs its hands over a wall
while carefully stepping
no abyss to step into
you hope
so slowly
palms of the hands like suction cups in the dark
you rub sensitive palms
over whatever is rough or smooth
and yes
I see you try to keep yourself upright
forward-looking
though I know you see nothing but the dark
but
you’re ready for a crack of light
I see you
hope you make it through your mind
hope you can squeeze out
into a more beautiful
though imperfect
world and cry
Another Incident in the History of the World
shot
down
in the street
and the black jeep roars off
drives over her
the now nameless officer
just a second
life axed down
sirens cry-rage-mourn-warn-rule
the street
an army of police blanket the area
but the perps slip through the net
for now
oily eels they are
evil slinks away
under trees
away from a helicopter's eyes
they escape for now
family, community do not
grief comes like a storm
drenches
the badge
fallen
doing her duty
a casket, a flag, an elegy
the job remains
good and evil remain
the sun is both light and fire
Affirmation and Negation All in One
begin
again
no
it can't be done
the galaxy has spun
beyond that time and space
the faces are gone
the dawns have dropped like confetti
and though you want so much
nostalgic golden sun
movement of eyelashes
sugar dropping into black coffee
unlacing of crystals
drop of gossamer gown
violins plucking rhythm
a chorus of katydids
and you learning the German word Zeit
no, not to be
the echoes, the silhouettes
walk away
mist, fog, steam
engulfs
Dan Cuddy is currently an editor of the Loch Raven Review. 2003,. Most recently he has had poems published in the End of 83, Broadkill Review, , the Pangolin Review, Madness Muse Press, Horror Sleaze Trash, the Rats’s Ass Review, Roanoke Review, the Amethyst Review, Synchronized Chaos and, Gargoyle.
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A woman makes eye contact
and breaks a dinner plate
from the set her grandmother gave her at her wedding shower
and remembers
making eye contact
with a screaming cat
that was hit by an oncoming pickup truck
that roared past with a honky grin
and she lifted her foot off the brake
and she leaned forward into the breaking wave of it.
Which was when she remembered
being a teenager who
made breakfast for her grandfather every Sunday
and made him breakfast an hour late
and took a long time watching a cartoon
before waiting for a commercial and walking upstairs
and finding him in bed, too late, too cold, far too cold.
Being a teenager who remembered
the broken arm of riding a bicycle between parked cars
into traffic; not as pain, but as the expression on her mother’s face
when she looked at the curb and knelt down to triage,
and a dizzy tumbling beneath that face, open mouthed.
The same arm now
holding the shard of the plate
in a unique, for her,
silence.
Dark dreams, black silk
woven from shadows
and born of fire,
soon to be caressed
by the words
of a lonely martyr.
Kneel within the ashes
of a crime gone by,
and in silence pray,
as you listen to
Jeanne d' Arc cry.
Alan O’Brien is a retired construction manager and lives in London, England. He enjoys writing dark poetry and flash fiction. This is his first published poem and he hopes more will follow.
I’ve lit cathedral candles
so you can find your way
down gargoyle aisles of stone
to where naked ghosts are sitting,
cold, and shivering,
waiting,
waiting there for you.
I’ve lit the forest campfires
for when you’re called to go
beyond your quiet village
to where the elves are laughing,
drinking, shrieking,
crying,
laughing,
about what they’re going to do.
I’ve lit the bedroom lanterns
so you can freely make
your way
from room
to shadowed room,
where witches sit
crocheting baby blankets,
little blankets soft and blue.
I’ve turned the neon lights up bright
so you can find this bar
from miles
and miles away,
to stumble in the door.
And all the wolves will stop,
look up,
and grin,
and begin to move toward you.
When you’ve reached at last for naked ghosts,
heard the shrill of elfin laughter,
watched the witches slowly stand,
and felt wolf fur on your skin,
then we’ll go back to the darkness,
past the useless light of reason,
to a place where darkness started...
...and it all begins again.
David Hutto has been a featured poet at the Callanwolde Arts Center in Atlanta. From the Georgia Poetry Society he won first place in the Byron Herbert Reece award for 2020, as well as first place for the Alabama State Poetry Society Award for 2021. He currently lives in Gainesville, Georgia, where he keeps the lights on.
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Glass bottles overflowed with brutality.
Tainting the innocence between her legs.
Impious.
Human trash pile.
Perforate her insides.
Serving pretty pink flesh to the men's table.
Slumped atop red and black Harleys.
Hiding under stale leather cuts.
Unrighteous.
Vile.
Child Predators.
Flaunting a 1% label.
Nothingness
She embraced anything that made her numb.
She longed for nothingness.
For, it was the only time she felt content.
At peace with herself.
One within her pain.
Unaware of who was entering her.
Desolate to the stranger filling her insides.
Dis Encapsulated.
Morgan Phaneuf is an aspiring poet and author from the Quiet Corner of Connecticut. A proud mother, wilderness enthusiast, and karaoke queen, she strives to bring consolation to those who relate to the uncomfortability expressed in her writing. Focusing on authentic experiences, she re-creates trauma into words of empowerment.
Whose soft blue ghost comes here,
darkness bruised
blue-cold as dead moon’s aura
(but with less face than moon)
blue-hot as oven flames
(but with more hurt than flames)?
How swift belief seeps out,
leaking light
butter-slick through thinking’s fingers
(but with less doubt than thought)
butter-salt with terror’s sweat
(but with more depth than fear)!
What strange blue-gold is this,
shadow-formed
between the suffering and the faith
(but much less sure than either)
between the sorrow and the hope
(but much more real than either)?
Is it the flaming of the ocean star
reflected in the moon-churned deep
or just something from a book you read me
too long ago to forget?
The Short Nap
Collar up and hat brim down.
Dirty weather, dirty town.
Viewed the stiff - it wasn’t there.
Lame excuses, empty air.
Faked his death, some two-bit crook.
Hit men fooled, he’s off the hook.
Next I know, he’s cornered me.
I’m the Resurrection, see?
Showed me all his bullet holes.
Claimed he’d come to save our souls.
Keep it to yourself, I said.
On these streets the stiffs stay dead.
Wouldn’t listen, had to top him.
Sawed his head off, that should stop him.
Guys, I ain’t no Bible-hater
But couldn’t write “Long See-you-later”.
Simon MacCulloch lives in London. His poems have appeared in Reach Poetry, Aphelion, Pulsebeat Poetry Journal, Altered Reality, I Become the Beast, Emberr, Grim and Gilded, Ephemeral Elegies, The Sirens Call, Ekstasis and others.
Solitude pianos over wooden blank
space, each stuck note cries between
walls shorn of art, paintings slatted away,
garden overgrown, plans
forgiven for sins unknown.
Unquiet graves? Why?
Rage pervades the loam,
examine any skull, and see
how jaws gape & vacant eyes
darkling stares describe this arc:
abandoned, head turned away,
faceless, hopeless, breathless,
& changeless. Here’s a précis
for the shattered mind,
change beats you with a steady hand,
from child to creature,
from human to beast.
each note strikes a sinew,
twisting tissue into hot agony.
paintings slatted away,
nothing on the walls,
so each note spikes like
driven iron. Flesh & blood,
soul & risen light fail forwards
into shadow.
The Phantom of the Opera
What would you bargain for now
when all the world repugns your words,
maybe not the world,
maybe not the thousand eyes that arrow
Into that garden supposedly of love,
shredding every leaf,
tearing each fine flower,
maybe not the thousand questions twisting
into that pattering rain, supposedly clean,
order muddies, chalk outlines dissolve,
every face concealed or closed;
inside, where carpets stain
my domain must be, hidden from
those open curtains where
the red-haired man may see me,
throw sticks & stones, cans of tomato juice,
or broken boxes of cereal at me,
if I conceal myself behind a mask,
he may never recognize me,
what would I bargain for now
when silent my mind ponders
how my injury began, whether
fate or accident or price,
whether pain or blood obtains.
Only my fingers remit the rent,
plagal chords finish the line,
a summoning of opera spirits
voices sweet pain torture me.
Must this be also so?
The sky didn't answer,
so beneath an oak,
I buried my hope,
my wishes in the ground.
Words like seeds,
too fearful to speak aloud.
Watered them with tears,
longing to be anywhere else.
Mud, dirt, and dust -
Trust lay beneath the soil
and shadows of limbs.
The words sank deeper,
taking root in the dark,
making friends with dead leaves
and chipped bark.
The garden bloomed in fall.
I was gone - free.
The tree cut down.
The earth salted with grief.
The others left behind,
hate me for escaping.
I keep returning, in my mind.
Some roots never die.
Heather Cline is a graduate of Southeast Missouri State University (social science), a caregiver by day, and resides in Missouri, USA. She has works accepted by Bright Flash Literary Review and Five Minutes Lit, and can be found on Twitter @hmclinewrites.
Come this one time,
and that will be
enough.
Say hi
and stay a bit.
Your mother
needs you.
She’s preparing
this year
just for you.
It doesn’t have
to be long.
What do they say?
Just show your face.
I want to reintroduce
you to your cousins,
and Uncle Don.
Just for a minute.
Mom needs a
picture.
Don’t worry about
getting
her attention.
She’ll be watching,
smiling at
her lovely baby.
Matthew Sorrento is editor of Retreats from Oblivion: The Journal of NoirCon and Film International. His poetry has appeared in The Five-Two and The Ekphrastic Review. He teaches film studies at Rutgers-Camden and Temple University, and his latest book is David Fincher’s Zodiac (FDU Press), co-edited with David Ryan.
new mantra
celebrate the poetry of darkness
in voices of those taken
by the uniformed knees
on dirty main streets
their last words igniting
the fires of denied justice
each flame a torch to
spotlight the prejudice
a fuse to explode the myth
of freedom until the screams
liberate up from darkened alleyways
become one breath in
the common tongue
speak loudly to truth and power
the "immortal declaration",
river song
it was a river that restored
it was a river of destruction
it took those without hope
it refreshed those who thirsted
from its shores rose messiahs
gathering strays to its flow
feeding their hunger
in its swells and waves
sounding like the voices of angels
promising paradise in its depths
bar dogs
when she walked into the room
the air became electric with her scent
a temptress marked by every eye
turning men into rabid barbrawl dogs
as she smiled her worked at attitude
those few unaffected new her look
but do not touch reality
a gin joint siren leaving in her wake
whisky sweating blue balled lotharios
drowning in their beer soaked dreams
of lust, in heat and losing control
Sunday highway
give me a Sunday highway
when mom's and pops are
in some church praying
or busy in suburban backyards bbqs
when the wolves are cruising
beach parking lots or downtown streets
when favourite sons are posing
at tennis courts and highend malls
it's then that I let the beast run free
no one on that road to stop me
no cherry top or black and white
no camouflaged radar trap
just the highway straight away
waiting for my restored Chevy ss 454
to embrace it's shimmering blacktop skin
in a burning vulcanized rubber kiss
as the velocity in heat takes hold
my foot on the accelerator a hand on the wheel
a hand on the shifter the gears meshing smoothly
in their ecstatic burst of speed and freedom
the tell tale marks of my muscle machine's
love bite upon it,the only evidence
of their Sunday tryst.
Joseph A Farina is a retired lawyer in Sarnia, Ontario, Canada. drawing from his profession and his Sicilian Canadian background, he is an internationally award winning and published poet. Several of his poems have been published in Quills Canadian Poetry Magazine, The Wild Word, The Chamber Magazine, Lothlorian Poetry Journal, Subterranean Blue and in The Tower Poetry Magazine, Inscribed, The Windsor Review, and appears in many anthologies including Sweet Lemons: Writings with a Sicilian Accent, Canadian Italians at Table, Witness from Serengeti Press and Tamaracks: Canadian Poetry for the 21st Century. He has had poems published in the U.S. magazines Mobius, Pyramid Arts, Arabesques, Fiele-Festa, and Philadelphia Poets. He has several books of poetry published— The Cancer Chronicles, The Ghosts of Water Street, an e-book, Sunsets in Black and White, and his latest, The Beach, The Street and Everything in between.
teeming leaves in a cup of someone who loved me.
loose and fluttering
— preferred it that way
brimming with entropy,
you drink down the scarlet tide
and take the rose warm swell since
you saw no ally among us,
leaking into burdened water.
i hold fast to a blade once loyal, my boasting bedfellow
aching with an unconscionable knowing,
it burns in my grip,
i am not its master.
i turn towards the ghost of you
and see we beg like twisted mirrors,
careful confiture, drowning your hands
i hear you in the dead of night
(out damn spot!)
bursting drupelet, kill me well.
i know what comes for me
a fate well-met at dawn,
this noxious nightshade chants farewell.
i close my eyes.
you stand before a massacre
and tell me it smells of spring.
the taste rips right, and i see crumbling clouds
where people should be.
i wake with blood in my mouth.
“you bite your tongue in your sleep”
this is what you tell me.
i am sour and bubbling,
crushed leaves sail through me
like dancing rocks in a stream.
you left me in the sun too long.
dried me out and pressed me down,
watched the last of me seep from my open eyes.
i have seen what is to come,
the bottom of her cup left for me
i have seen the ladybug’s hide
black spots in a red sea
a toothpick to pluck out my wings
nestled deep in the grooves of your mouth
these crushed leaves, a brutal brew
warning, they tell me
grow not
sullen fruit, fallen leaf
only wait,
for you are soon to be
sun drunk
and
dead.
wicked women
morning hope holds a frozen form,
my tears have calcified
the stroke of summer’s supple hand awakens
a once-shivering sleeper held riverside ice
one more step, once more taken further
onto the vilification of that tired killer
under burning suns, magma will ooze
from the blade of the executioner
next, i lay my head on that marble block
let the scythe descend upon my stretching neck
stretching, stretching i spy faces in the crowd, stones in their hands
weighted suspicions balance eagerly, they think me a harpy
they prepare for a broken blade, for the killing hand to be struck down
through lightning, or the working hand of hades,
i call upon nothing, i mouthe no incantations
my twitching fingers ache to snap,
to move through air,
topple mountains and trees,
turn eager stones against their keepers
i do nothing as i crave this,
after long nights spent in windowless chambers
hearing exclamations for exsanguination
i crave this
i wanted the pyre
i wanted the thaw,
an undeniable, unbecoming desire to consume me,
to consume the watchers too
let us burn together,
let them have their delirious delight
through my delectable demise
i am their savage sister and they give me no choice
since
they wanted a picture,
a souvenir,
a commemoration of a wicked woman,
a wild wench,
they want a lock of hair,
a single rib,
my fingernails and tongue,
i welcome them to it,
let them keep me in their homes,
on their mantles,
on their dining tables
let me stretch my shadows in the depths of their abode
let me darken their doors,
i will fade the blood marked there.
He will come for their sons.
they will keep me above their wells
and i will whisper to neptune.
he will come for their daughters.
finally, when their homes overflow sanguine
i will leave them with their gaping loss
let their tears calcify too
let them feel that hollow ennui
and soon, when they whisper the wind will shake
when they scream, the world will move
as their hands whip through air, thunder will boom
only then, will they see we are all wild women
we are all senseless scourge
we are all harbingers of horror
we are all wicked
and all wicked women die too soon
i will wait for them
for my new savage sisters
my nefarious novices
come, there are still words we must say
to the sky,
to the sea,
to the wind
come! there is malevolence to make
come! there is sorrow to sow
Feast!
i sleep in a violet vase
clear walls for the watcher through the curtains
i eat solid cubes
edges scratch my throat, bloodhungry vulture
i scream a silver sorry
and bored blossoms rush forth, petaldeath pelts
disinfectant on the window pane
can they see me now
my skin is peeled, i’m fiercely burned
wars won on a pyre
choice parts of me soon to splint
so tender, markedly sweet,
translucent-tree, leafmeat
sweet-sorrowed, nascent nymph
unholy veal
passive disc watches me
futile fingers scratch rose rims,
falling flowers dance diametered
forking fingertips,
bracing breastbone,
thorning thigh,
red sea opens, sourstaff split
none can be wasted
spilling without just cause
all watchers turn to glare
while i waftwise waltz in the room
pupils dilate dawn, saliva drips down
mourning mouths charter chanting chins
my meat spreads south, compass disassembly
i wonder who will have my magnet heart,
who will have my arrow-blade brain
i find myself sliced and speared
bred for the hunt he tells me
it’s a service,
she had no wild in her.
she hid no wild in her
slippery slight slaunt.
bred for the hunt they whisper
it’s a delight,
she had no wild in her.
she hid no wild in her
soaring sap sinews.
bred for the hunt i murmur
it’s a slaughter,
she had no wild in her.
she hid no wild in her
simple soiled spite.
i nod my chin jerking,
his breath already smells
that forbidden fruit
i close my eyes, lower my fork,
i feel the fare fuss,
i tear a trembletithe
holding my breath,
a mile at a time
i bite
and
i bite
i am sacred and true
i am withered and gross
i am flame and ash
i am wave and foam
i am flesh
i am home
i am divine
i am decay
i am none
i am done.
Chinasa-Nnenna is an Igbo poet, essayist, and orator. They have a marked interest in themes of consumption, death, the “other”, ancestry, and the mystical. Chinasa describes herself as an orator and emissary of sweet spellwork. They post poems as well as essays on their Substack: https://ch1n4sa.substack.com/
Solemn and alone, he steps from the grey confines
of his tiny flat in the city
descends the stairwell with a burglar’s grace
casts his glance each way
then traces a path through the foggy night.
The moon hangs overhead like a tarnished pendant
the buildings, gaunt and tall
rise up like tombstones in the night
and a faint breeze passes through sleepy streets
like a sigh.
Pausing in the black throat of an alley
he watches the shuffle of whores wrapped in wool
as they lead drunk clients
through the maze of shadows and filtered yellow light—
they will be warm tonight.
And then he is alone again
with loneliness, his friend
and the shadows that crawl upon the walkways
and the yellow mist that wetly creeps along
gathering in folds about his feet.
AFTER A LONG WALK
Under the umbra of a grand rock elm
He sat in a nook along the river’s sweep
The breeze whispered tales he’d heard a thousand times
Soothed him, as he slipped into an amber sleep.
In his dream a boy not too unlike himself
When he was young and fishing in this stream
Played a clever hook against the current’s pull
And caught a rainbow glittering in the dream.
He followed barefoot down the grassy slope
Through pearly mist, around a hidden bend
And came upon a steep and stony fall
Far from home—a place where rainbows end.
He wondered if his dream was something more
So rubbed his eyes to softly set it free
Blew it gently with his waning breath
And watched it sweep as far as he could see
As far as he could see.
Both “The Recluse” and “After a Long Walk” first appeared in the Horror Zine (Spring 2022).
Tom lives in the foothills near the Palomar Observatory (Hale Telescope) with his wonderful wife, Michelle, and three critters. His work has appeared in Wyldblood Press, The Horror Zine, Sirens Call, Hiraeth Publishing, and HellBound Books (pending).
A Goddess
Ashen Dark
(Finite-forged
Of Death Entire)
Dances
Macabre
‘mid Ancient
Graves
Grotesque
In Wretched
Sins Denied.
A Priestess
Profligate (Hewn of
entropy and doom)
Waltzes
Dolorous
To Music Ill
Of Deadland
Dream.
Dances
Frenetic
To Song Chaotic
In Hell’s Cotillion Black.
Twirls
Putrescent
With essences
Hadean
Billowing
From gaping maws
Of capacious Tombs--
Heaven shunned
Iniquitous
To Alchemic
Chambers
Celestial
In dust and bone
Of Necromancers
Libertine.
Wicked Scourge
Of Grace and Truth
In Dim Antiquities.
Warriors Etheric,
Wayward felled--
Debauched in Life.
Unrepentant in Death!
Soul-barter to Erebus!
Sinister Progeny
Of A Goddess
Dark
Enrapt
In Waltz
Obscene…
As stars glare down
Narcotic
And spheres spin on
Inane.
As One Twilight World
Or another death rattles
Into Terminus…
Somewhere
Within the Myriads
Of Multiplicities:
The Specimen
Queendoms
Of A Goddess
Negate.
Ruler Supreme
Of Dominions
Corpulent
In Manifest
Demise.
Fodder-Lands
Stretching
Sick and fallow
Under
A Manic Moon
Malign.
Wanton Estates
Of A Daemon
Magus
Adorned
Abhorrent
In Malignances
Apocalyptic with
Abandon and Decay.
A Deity Dread,
Fetid with Worms
Waltzes
The Cinders--
Bloated bleak,
Light and Wisdom blind
SHE Staggers
Staccato
‘mid
Miasmal Tombs
Of Mystic Knights
From Dims of Yore
(Keepers of The Light
Expelled from Eden).
Enchanted Shamans
Once Esteemed
And Rare
Seduced Demonic
To All Things
Vain and Vile.
To All Things
Bred in Animus
And Sin.
Brutal Zealots
Of A Goddess
Occult.
A Black Hen
Of Horrors
August…
Prancing
Cock-Mock
Crazed and
Sardonic
Atop
The shattered
Stones of Olde.
Atop
The Eons-battered
Flesh and Blood
Abluted stones
Of Tombs Forgot--
Entangled viscous
In archaic moss
Glinted
Gangrenous
Under a
Manic Moon
Malign.
Under
A Death Phase
Moon…
Grinning
Full Beam
Primeval-White
Upon A Goddess
Pitch with Hate:
Royal Regaled
In funereal
Fineries of
Dread and Gloom.
A Goddess Dark
Finite-Forged
From Cumulus
Of Death Itself--
Waltzes the Cinders
To Ritual Song
Of Decompose
‘mid Ancient Graves
Interred Grotesque
In Wretched
Sins Denied.
Beckoning in Dance Macabre…
The Antediluvian and Wicked Dead--
The Unclean and Unrepentant:
High Shamans of the Blackest Arts,
Lured from the Light expelled from Eden.
Lost amid All Sacred Lies Platonian!
Condemned in perpetuity
To Waltz Demonic
In Hell’s Cotillion Black.
Cacophonous Black,
Chaotic and Dolorous
With the Music Ill
Of Deadland Dream.
De-Evolutional Dream
In the Nebulous-Night
Of Negate—Ad infinitum:
Chattel Grim To
A Goddess Dark,
Under
A Manic Moon,
Hell-Conceived
In Entropy and Doom.
Dean Schreck is retired and relocated New Yorker. He has been writing since the age of fourteen. His work has appeared in Space and Time, Weirdbook, Magical Blend, Literary Hatchet, Eldritch Tales, New Myths, Penumbric, Littoral, Altered Reality, Owlflight and Trembling with Fear, among others. Dean’s work in Comic Books includes—Bloodscent 1988, Now Comics Twilight Zone #7, and Two Tales for Marvel/EPIC Hellraiser Series.
The silent land eludes me,
Hidden by a veil of smoke;
Created by my burning memories,
And the flames on my soul;
The visitor spoke of peace,
An eternal sense of calm;
But she lays beneath poison ivy,
Covered by funeral flowers’ dust;
I converse with the devil henceforth,
Play around on the grave with her;
Blaming her for the noise in my head,
But never burying her instead.
Akshita, is just another teenager trying to find her place in the world. Passionate about writing she calls her pieces the extensions of herself. Her work has been published in magazines like Masticadores India and Masticadores USA. She welcomes visits to her blog: Anthology of Akshita’s Thoughts.
forget the disappointing daylight
and that job that destroys your soul
flip up your only window and
wait for the night to roll you
out onto the anonymity of city streets
where darkness and neon lights
offer you their midnight bargains
where you can move, breathe and run
freedom in the coolness that shadows bring
redemption by the crowd for all you've done
not a child of darkness but it's welcomed denizen
river saviours
come with me to the river's edge
among the armour stone and stunted trees
at nightfall when it's darkest there
listen to the long ships sailing
to oceans and to river ports
their props and horns a Symphony
to we strays that wait for saviours
on river edges promising salvation
without condition or comitment
astral
i call down darkness
to cover me in its understanding
with cold caresses cover me
sing me raven lullabyes
under clouds of black tresses
as blankets for my own
there to sleep, dreamless
the setting moon as witness
to the rising of my soul
sacrifice
in his full youth and alone
before the grave that waited
he journeyed fields where bent light
revealed grace and peace of summer storms
became a voyeur to the spaces
inhabited by animals and man
touched their gods in their devotion
discovered new consciousness
and took delight in their sensualities
a purity and vulnerability in their seduction
of their ceremonies to appease the constellations
bodies painted with brightness
their souls in dancing frenzy
that touched the memory of time
and he in their fluidity could only stand
transfixed haunted in their surrender
unable by birth or nurture or dogma
to meld into the unfolding spectacle
of man and God and space itself
as the limitless sky caressed the processions
with the lightof the appeased constellations
finally in surrender, enchanted
limbs in movement in mad laughter
into the world of ghosts and gods
in the fog of smoke and scents and gestures
he was touched by the exquisite
awakening into the necessary world
his journey into new origins beginning
Joseph A. Farina is a retired lawyer in Sarnia, Ontario, Canada. drawing from his profession and his Sicilian Canadian back round, he is an internationally award-winning poet. Several of his poems have been published in Quills Canadian Poetry Magazine, The Wild Word, The Chamber Magazine, Lothlorien Poetry Journal, Ascent, Subterranean Blue, and in The Tower Poetry Magazine, Inscribed, The Windsor Review, Boxcar Poetry Revue, and appears in many anthologies including Sweet Lemons: Writings with a Sicilian Accent, Canadian Italians at Table, Witness from Serengeti Press and Tamaracks: Canadian Poetry for the 21st Century. He has had poems published in the U.S. magazines Mobius, Pyramid Arts, Arabesques, Fiele-Festa, and Philadelphia Poets. He has had two books of poetry published—The Cancer Chronicles and The Ghosts of Water Street.
i find the courage
and go to the place of my before
breathe deep
as i cross industrial wastelands
as smoky grit envelopes me
blizzards spew trauma in my mouth and eyes
and speeding desperados calling mean
hurl toxic glares in my anxious path
i pass naked seekers
gathered at dark tunnels
gesturing me back in to game the play
ignore lurking leering ghosts
who spin at me with dancing need
i flee from where i dwelt in trap
but now leave near behind
he is sitting in an empty shrine
outside a shut-down city
on his garbage-strewn way
footpath couch beside him
smoking magic
and sipping on a warm can of lust
engrossed
in watching a scrawny creature
picking through an overflowing bin
i sit next to him
i came back to see you i whisper
he offers me a puff of green
i shake my head in no
i need to ask you why you never tried to show me
why it was left to me
to escape the nowhere hole
to see if any strength to run remained
to discover that absent willpower
i could never gather up
to know if i was more than me
and the chaos i sucked in daily
i want to know why you didn’t show me
what and who it was
he stands and paces
bangs his hand
on burning prayer graffiti walls
stop avoiding true and tell me why
i shout in pleading cry
he ends his racket
and slumps to ground
we watch the creature rip apart
a wasted dream
it’s dragged from the bin
eyes glazed
as greedy mouth gulps perished now
slimy blood of once
spilling over all that never bloomed
he looks into my face
and i sense a sadness so real
i see someone i have never seen before
i don’t know why i didn’t give you
when and why you were
he mutters
as the creature skulks away
with fear remains
dribbling messy trail
i stand and look up
to a smiling just realised sky
and stepping gently away
from where i never began
i say goodbye to my before
and float away
as he fades screaming
into nothing now remains
Stephen House has won awards as a poet, playwright, and actor. He’s received international literature residencies from The Australia Council and Asialink. His chapbooks “real and unreal” poetry and “The Ajoona Guest House” monologue are published by ICOE Press. His next book drops soon. He performs his acclaimed monologues widely. http://apt.org.au/author/?authorinfoid=58
in that old house
that now shivers
next to the idling
wrecking ball
There they lived
the elderly couple
they befriended
nearly everyone
They never traveled
at least at home they'd
rest
all the time all day long
So we were the ones
the ones wrong
when after many days
some years ago
a squatter emerged
from the home
the home of that elderly couple
He needed to find food
nothing left in the freezer
How was that old couple
I remember a neighbour ask
Very quiet,
he said
so very peaceful
and not at all
like this sunny day but
dull, porcellaneous, gray
No trouble at all. They were
at rest
at rest when
I moved in
The Car
I love my broken heart
she said
I'll love it until the day I die
If you don't believe me
she said
Just remember he's
the one now
forever in bed
Because of my broken heart
she said
I can walk and sing
He was in that car that night
not alone, not alone
she said
If I could choose again
and again and again
the broken heart I'd take
she said
the broken body suits him
now he's all alone, alone
she said.
Mj Lemon is a west coast writer and teacher who has been writing poetry for several decades. He is based in Greater Vancouver, though spends as much time as possible hiking western Vancouver Island. He also maintains a Poemhunter page that features selected works.
