The walls were the last
to go quiet, though not
without some creaks
and shuddering I swear
I could see them shift.
Tho’ nothing cracked
the plaster stayed smooth &
dreamy— like it had gone
through a terrible war
to return home unscathed.
Susan Isla Tepper is a twenty year writer in all genres. Her stage play "Crooked Heart" will be featured in Origin Theatre Company 'May Play Festival', NYC.
In memory of David Bowie
Tracking the echoes of the
sidereal mystery show
Where red platform boots lick the stars
Where the shadows of white stains glyph
themselves to the crimson carpet ride
Where unspeakable dimensions of
foreign objects immersed in expired milk
Crack the yolk of the actor within
Being and becoming the tempter or Satan
Lacerating the heart with the will to break spines
Lancing minds with Crowleyan knowledge
And oh how good it is to be King
in the shimmering desert of Malkuth
Long live the sephora the wheat from the chafed ass chaps
In cybersonic sedition forever the Holy Ones unite
Their limbs surrender thy Uncle's politics
Ever more disturbed to crack the primate archives
and break out the dancers of white heat red hot
They surely know the boogie grimoires on separated
sheets of blotter acid
They surely know birasure fissures of men
They sought the Kingdom in the waters sifted around the
toes of the Kingfisher
They melted into psychedelic vampires ultimately
And Major Tom's the space vampire they warned you
about
Spinning eternally through the abyss of Deep Time
And magick cancels magick thrusts its hips rhythmically to the warp and creak of
the Starman's astral footprint
A sensation novel to the taste what's the frequency Giatri Spivak
Yet somehow the subaltern does speak contrary to all expectation
In the liminal spaces statuettes plunge from the cliffs of Aldeberan into the Holy Grove
And lost minds are herded like cattle through the
Egyptian afterlife
Photonegative zombies clench fucked jaws in supplication of the homoerotic meat
We salute the arctic traces of your tongue on our
flesh of memorial marble
Kissin the whip in final surrender.
John Shirley, screenwriter of The Crow (1994) with David J. Schow wrote of Alex S. Johnson that he is "the Baudelaire of our time; the poet of the underground." Johnson has worked as a developmental education specialist, a secretary to entertainment royalty Tom Sullivan and Betty White, assistant to the CEO of the boutique Los Angeles ad agency Haller Schwarz, and scorer of the AP English exam for the Educational Testing Service. His books include THE DOOM HIPPIES, FUCKED UP FAIRY TALES VOLUMES 1-12 and FINAL DESTINATION: WIPEOUT. His forthcoming books include GRIMWAR: A BOOK OF POETIC WARFARE in collaboration with the legendary Steven Johnson Leyba, ordained a high priest in the Church of Satan by Anton LaVey, a magus in Thee Order Ov Psychick Youth and founder of the Church of Coyotel. Johnson lives in Carmichael, California with his family.
Now stouter
and broader,
temples too
gray to hide.
Had to turn
ugly as me
to become
somebody
able to take
own baggage.
Welcome to
man’s world.
Population:
an army of
lonely ones
cut off.
No longer
wanted
but oh so
very needed.
No one
gets any
except those
who ask
so much of
your all.
Chad Parenteau hosts Boston’s long-running Stone Soup Poetry series. His work has appeared in journals such as Résonancee, Molecule, Ibbetson Street, Pocket Lint, Cape Cod Poetry Review, Tell-Tale Inklings, Off The Coast, The Skinny Poetry Journal, The New Verse News, dadakuku, Nixes Mate Review and The Ugly Monster. He has also been published in anthologies such as French Connections, Sounds of Wind, Reimagine America, and The Vagabond Lunar Collection. He serves as Associate Editor of the online journal Oddball Magazine and co-organizer of the annual Boston Poetry Marathon. He lives and works in Boston.
And, after finally being
able to take a shit after
three weeks of suffering…
I stood up, turned to my left,
then, forgot what I was doing.
I threw a right jab in the air…out of frustration.
Swearing at Bukowski under my breath…
Saying to myself, “I would have taken that fat bastard
out with one punch…”
I bled on the toilet paper…
Hemorrhoids, or maybe just some leftover sadness…
Flushed, wiped off the sweat from my brow…
Picked up the book of poems I was reading by Alan Catlin…
Wishing I could be in the same stratosphere with the posey as him…
Sprayed the stench, for, my wife was coming home
from work soon…
Not yet diluted, but looking at the ceiling…
Waiting for the count.
The TKO…
That would afford me a chance
to leave
the game
for good.
Dan Provost's poetry has been published throughout the small press for a number of years. Some recent publications include: Ariel Chart, Poetical Review, Merak Magazine, Oddball Magazine, Deuce Coupe, Misfit Magazine, the Rye Whiskey Review, Cajun Mutt Press and the Dope Fiend Daily. He has two books coming out in 2020. Under the Influence of Nothingness by Kung Fu Treachery Press and Rattle of a Realizer, published by Whiskey City Press. He lives in Berlin, New Hampshire with his wife Laura and dog Bella.
After months in weeds, I thought my little blue boat was
ruined.
It hardly leaks at all.
Hop in, I say to a wood duck watching from the shore.
See how it feels to be a passenger
for a change.
He nods yes, he would like that.
and we drift, us two, for hours
over Lake Washington
until I see a face
staring up at me from the reeds.
Come on in, it whispers,
the water’s fine,
which startles me awake.
The duck has flown.
How far away the shore is now, how very far away.
Trish Saunders writes poems and short fiction from Seattle, formerly Honolulu. She has been published in The American Journal of Poetry, Punk Noir Magazine, Medusa’s Kitchen, Off The Coast, Pacifica Poetry Review, and the Rye Whiskey Review.
Sunset in full bloom
bleed out the old day
sleepily into silence
rain gentle on me into
lulling dream, we had
our moment in the sun
danced together for
a little while, but nothing
last forever, kiss me now
goodbye, join me in those
sweetest of memories.
Wayne Russell is a creative jack of all trades, master of none. Poet, singer, artist, rhythm guitarist, photographer, and author of the poetry books “Splinter of the Moon” and "Waves of Lucidity", both published via Silver Bow Publishing, they are both available for purchase on Amazon in paperback and digital formats such as Ingram Distribution at your local library.
for Simon Perchik (1923 – 2022)
While you lay dying
my left ear bled
abstractions
streaking the pillow
— you’d unearth a poem
were you able
Day after I woke to
red filling the white
of my right eye
— both sloshed its river
But when the limb
entwined
crashed down
what was left to feed the other.
Susan Isla Tepper is a twenty year writer in all genres. Her stage play "Crooked Heart" will be featured in Origin Theatre Company 'May Play Festival', NYC.
