Bathroom Visitor - Michael Lee Johnson Shivering - Liz Clift The Effects of Record Breaking Temperatures - Nick Orf Legal Tender - Nick Orf The Empress of Emotional Extortion - Oleh Lysiak Crooked Painting - Stephanie Sguigna Thief - Michael Keshigian Two Step - Michael Keshigian D.L. Martinez
The least she could have done was split the check! What kind of chick lets a guy buy her dinner so she can toss it up later? For Christ sakes, eat and puke, eat and puke, eat and puke— what kind of life is that? I wish I could feel some sympathy for the skinny bitch but she dumped me. It isn't you, she said, it's me. I just need time, she said. Damned skippy, it ain't me! I keep my food down! I wrote a poem (for her) but she laughed and called it crap. I'll publish it anyway and send it to her. Anorexic Rose by: d.l.martinez Oh! Anorexic rose! Like wildflowers, you refused to bloom on command. Nothing could pry apart the petals of your heart to reveal the sweet nectar within. Fuck. She's right, it is crap. But I'm not gonna put my fingers down my throat and vomit my life away. No! I'm gonna ask out the fat girl at work and we're going out for steaks. Juicy Fat Steaks and cheese fries with ranch dressing and ketchup. Then I'll rewrite that crappy poem. D.L. Martinez is an occasional writer, part-time poker player, and full-time engineer living in Denver, Co. His short fiction has previously been published in The Flask Review. Bathroom Visitor Michael Lee Johnson
A horsefly travels the world of my bathroom. Stops at the kitty litter box on occasion for refueling. One thousand round trips including the bathtub area, and buzzes past the toilet bowl. Steady pilot, good mileage. Frequent flier miles. I swat his journey to an abrupt end. Mr. Michael Lee Johnson lives in Chicago, IL after spending 10 years in Edmonton, Alberta Canada during the Viet Nam era. He is a freelance writer and poet. He is heavy influenced by Carl Sandburg, Robert Frost, William Carlos Williams, Irving Layton, and Leonard Cohen, and has had 250 plus poems published. He is a member of Poets & Writers, Inc; Directory of American Poets & Fictions Writers. Recent publications: The Orange Room Review, Bolts of Silk, Chantarelle's Notebook, The Foliate Oak Online Literary Magazine, Poetry Cemetery, Official Site of Laura Hird, The Centrifugal Eye, Adagio Verse Quarterly, Scorched Earth Publishing, and many others. Published in USA, Canada, New Zealand, Australia, Nigeria Africa, India, United Kingdom. Mr. Johnson has a paper book pending publication with iUniverse Publishers.
Shivering Liz Clift
"No one wants anything to do with a dog
that is wet from being out in the rain." Billy Collins But I wonder what the dog thinks of the palms turned outwards, pushing her aside without so much as a whisper of physical contact when all she wants is a scratch behind the ears or pat on the head. And I'm reminded of my own dog all white, except for a half black face. She never barked to come in when it rained, but instead stood dripping and huddled under the glass table on the patio. I'd open the door, worn golden towel ready to envelope her musty, wet dog-smell as she scurried in and slipped on mosaic tile. Under the towel under my hands I'd feel her shiver as I rubbed her down. Stepping back, towel in hand, I'd feel spray tickle my legs as she shook herself of wet, cold and smell. And when she looked up, a dog smile on her lips like we were sharing a private joke, I could see she was saying, "Now you smell like wet dog, too." She didn't look at me that way when I took her to the vet a year ago last June. She shivered just once in my arms, her white fur warm and dry this time. And when I walked outside I looked at the blue-brown city sky, hoping for rain and wanting wet dog-smell. Liz Clift lives in Charlotte, North Carolina, has two cats and five turtles, and holds a BA from Elon University.
It's the coldest month of the year and here I am in my flip flops. In this oddity of the winter, a fat woman trails her hyperactive Pomeranian who seems to be choking himself, taking steps too quickly for the slack in the leash; a toddler's pigtails bounce in time with her choppy steps around the playground like a sing-along as her mother watches with a stroller and a cigarette; two homeless men relax at a picnic table, appearing stoicemdash;one thumbs through the pages of a paperback, the other holds a bag of chips, chewing slowly, staring off into the horizon. The equivalent in June would be thirty degrees, and we would all be fussy. The weather will get frigid again by next week, if not by tomorrow. Now, however, songbirds sing in the leafless trees and somewhere by a blue screen stands a smug meteorologist who, today, everyone thinks is just a great guy! Today, we have hope. The overweight exercise, the children breathe fresh air, and the vagrant bask in the sun like skinny women laying out on the roof of their sorority house. Legal Tender Nick Orf i started drawing smiley faces
with thick permanent marker on all of my bills before i spend them. i make sure to think a happy thought like peter pan before i take off the cap of the blue sharpie so as not to be hypocritical. you are defacing four different presidents in at least fifty-seven different locations. i could be fined or imprisoned for thinking about you. i think they're onto me. i think we should go someplace (take my hand). Nick Orf is a smiley face. If you see him, he will smile at you. If you don't smile back at him it won't get him down, he will just feel sorry for you not being as happy as him. His work has appeared or is upcoming in Juked, Death Metal Poetry, and Word Riot. Say hello at nametab_nick@yahoo.com. The Empress of Emotional Extortion Oleh Lysiak Soon as the dogs and I drove through the underpass, home from the beach, I knew she would erupt, up on the hill, alone, defiant, waiting. I felt her anger long before frustrated screams hit me, an 88-year-old's emotional haymakers to the gut, the heart, the guilt, all body shots. I begged forgiveness for what I still don't know. She was outraged that I had gone and didn't tell her. Reminding her that I am over 60 didn't help. She had to run the show, the empress of emotional extortion. Her screams got louder. Shut the fuck up, mom, please, I pleaded. That didn't help. She slammed her door and kept on screaming. I asked her to calm down, reminding her of all the times this very same scenario took place when I was growing up. Maybe she thought I was my father. She kept on screaming you're not my son. Next morning I found her dead. She got me one last time, the undisputed empress of emotional extortion. Oleh Lysiak arrived in the United States in 1952, a six -year-old Ukrainian DP. He survived childhood in North Philadelphia, graduated from Temple University with a degree in Journalism. After 30 years as a self-styled vagabond, Lysiak managed to set anchor on the Oregon Coast. He and his wife live in a barn with two dogs and two cats. Lysiak has written and self-published three books: Filet & Release, The Chromium Kid in the American Zoo and Barely Inside the Lines.
Stephanie Sguigna
A tilted landscape, evidence of her affair with the household's sullen gardener. Stephanie Sguigna is a student at Tufts University.
Thief Michael Keshigian
Two days ago the sun caught me stealing light to illuminate a poem, demanded restitution, then reported me to Mother Nature who posted my likeness about the land. Soon, the ocean, forest, birds, flowers, et. al. filed suit for substantial abuse and complacent philandering without permission. I pleaded guilty; admitted taking breath from wind for deliverance, marshmallows from the sky to sweeten song, and rage from the ocean to instill a sense of urgency. Convicted and confined to a windowless room, no writing, visitation or glimpses of stolen sights, I was sentenced to imagine beauty without embezzlement and the wholesale exploitation of words. Two Step Michael Keshigian
I watched them gig in the pit playing funky jazz licks in modal timbres made me squirm. I thought, I'll blow this place when this babe be-bopped from behind hands in my hair said we can really groove. Flattered I danced through the night till light cut a ray through her ceramic face cracking beauty into puzzle fragments. Flaking she started to sing the blues. Michael Keshigian's poetry has appeared in many online and print journals, recently including Mannequin Envy, Ghoti, Ibbetson Street, Ascent Aspirations, and Bellowing Ark. He has five published chapbooks, the most recent (Warm Summer Memories) released in July by Maverick Duck Press.
He is a multiple Pushcart nominee with a Best Of the Net nomination. He is a college educator and performing musician in Boston.
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