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.

by mic jones

art by by Rachel Rava

a pronoun can be an emergency
exit a map an experiment
in emancipation like fire
embalming coordinates

let’s make new names what would the world feel
like if gender was understood
the way we understand
a name:
singular
subject to change
sounding different
depending on
through whom
the sound is made

amid mountain ranges
screamed like names
our genders’ echo
sublime as the valley
amplifying bodiless-ness
&

 By Brent Schaeffer 

art curtesy of The University of Chicago on Unsplash

When we got off the train in Paris it was late.
Gare Du Nord looked like a Monet: black
and gray with strokes of gloss. We were lost.
Athena and I slipped into backpacker backpacks and set out
across the city. I had to piss. Like ugly Americans
we stopped at McDonald’s, my ankles killing me,
… We were broke. We took another train north,
hoping it’d be cheaper than Paris. It was.
We got a room for a week—fucked and ate kebabs
from a taco truck thing—just like L.A.—
but colder and somehow romantic.

By Christopher Smith

photo by Ekaterina Astakhova on Pexels 

Wade far enough into the valley, the sun marks banker’s hours.
I sit some shade of darkness two-thirds of every day.

The figure I relate to in the Phaethon myth: that downy little greenhorn
presses Phaethon to prove he’s the chariot’s child.

Who can buy even their own fables about their father?
Portraits of him waving down a sunbeam. Personal olios

of corporate fishing retreats, wood block watchtowers, the empty chair
at back of the theatre.