by Erika Mailman

photo by Adrian Bancu on Pexels

It was from another century
It made her feel broken
it hissed of cows and ploughshares

Men who didn’t have time
to talk to their womenfolk
who were sick with shame

if they burned dinner for
no one ate and the cow
was dishonored.

The straw spoke
of how night would claim
them all if the woman

told her desire to make art,
of her dispute with the cast
iron stove,

By Sera Gamble

photo by Huie Dinwiddie on Pexels

I.

he makes a fist.

my world splits:

the truth / the thing

   that makes it stop.

lying is easy

as slipping

into a silk coat.

but we become

what we practice.

who was he before

his father?

By Tamas Dobozy

photo by Karl Griffiths on Pexel

Your locket terrified me as a child. You were an 
old lady then. It swung back and forth as you
bent, pouring tea, knocking against your
breastbone below where your dress, always red,
parted at the neck. I kept asking you to open it,
and you did, out of tiredness. Open it again,
please. Open it again. I had no actual desire to
see the photograph inside. There was nothing
special about it,

by Shira Dentz

photo by Benni Fish on Pexels

This landing strip has seen many falls—
shoehorn soft gliding into a shoe
or curdling against the pressure
presence of time drifting
then landing a perfect minimalist
geometry otherwise known as
settled like home.

This landing strip has seen many falls—
shoehorn left shapely into a shoe or
curdling against the pressure all
charisma of time drifting then
landing a turning minimalist geo-
me-try otherwise known as
settled some mummy of home.

By Nikki Ummel

photo by Wicdhemein One on Pexels

You are Orion and I am pulled close,
to lick the salt from your ears.
WWOZ whispers morning news
as my fingertips chase freckles,
play connect-the-dots, search
your kitchen-scars for constellations
as the sun rises.

I like the feel of you.
Here, in the damp darkness
of your shithole apartment,
the handprints of others
on the wall, above your bed.

I’m not the first hostess
you’ve hunted—there is
a bottle of Wet Head,

By Philip Jason

photo by Adam Gonzales

Schrodinger said the cat exists in the space
between two states, but there is a third state
where you open the box and find only yourself
-Plato

The butterfly in October was not supposed to be there.
In October, the butterflies
live in our dreams. Nonetheless, I saw it
where it was, and decided I’d lost the taste
for whining about the human condition.