there
in
life
is
a
force
to
cheat
death
for
years
once
urban book o death
To the orderly behind the screen at the psych ward – Nancy Dunlop
We just blew inby way of catastrophe.Be kind, althoughyou’ve dealt with your shareof troublemakers. Your shareof trouble.Don’t treat uslike marine recruits.Heck, let us walk aroundin our pajamas without punishing us,relegating us to our rooms for notbeing compliant with rules of your private making.Be kind, although you might not beto avoid burnout. Although you mightbe burned […]
To the orderly behind the screen at the psych ward – Nancy Dunlop
My Ego Dies At The End – Lynn White
At the end I’ll be dust. Dust and flakes of skin and bonewrapped in long hair,teeth chatteringwith no voice.No sense of tasteor smell.No reason.At the endI’ll be impenetrable,anonymous,figmentsof myselfwith no self left,no Id, no Ego.All will dieat my end. Photo by Evie S. on Unsplash Lynn White lives in north Wales. Her work is influenced […]
My Ego Dies At The End – Lynn White
Love Still Finds Me – Kristin Kory
I am nowhere and love still finds me. On feather toes and gentle wind, it drops in. It settles in the hollow, drowning out the echoes. Some of the echoes say your name. Some float away. I wait outside the seawall, untangled and unshackled. I hold no phantoms hostage, swim away, swim away. […]
Love Still Finds Me – Kristin Kory
We the unhinged – Candice Louisa Daquin
Pretend otherwiseRooms steaming with women in towelsHair dripping, feet slick, thrum of lifeLet loose, voices shrill in gossipAre they talking about you? Are they pullingTheir vicious needles throughYour thin, thin skin, where no oneHas been, those secret corners within Time turns her unwashed skirts outThe sauna is set too high to see Faces melt behind […]
We the unhinged – Candice Louisa Daquin
another time
flag display in the El Pavo Real DTLA jewelry gallery on Broadway these beauties have hung there since my kidhood seeing them there so dignified brought back so many wonderful and tragic memories Bruce Lee movies arcades colorful candied almonds parents embroiled in DV fear panic and coloring books fat crayons my pigtails and witnessing fatal drunk fights the stars in the sky an upward continuum of the light bulbs on the marquees and the ever hypnotic Million Dollar Theater and the frightening giant Victor’s Clothing blue groom and so forth and so on Los Angeles here I am your daughter….
struggling with love
ive reduced life to see and keep
watching those outside of me
wandering through the forests of the street
i wandering but knowing my truth
keeping in time with the breath of us
i walk watch look down and teach
myself to bury it all in
like the subway at five
the scents of dust and gasoline
transport me to my early youth and years
when primordial rules of procreation haunted my womb
but there were no takers in the battle
as nights unraveled in perplexity
and days ended in sullen tragedy
no options left amid the fields of nothingness
now a mother to my years i orphaned most of them
walking away from normalcy into the mouth of modern beast who struggles with love for me
Awake and Mostly Sober – Rachael Z. Ikins
what the hell?Dream vapor clings, fried egg reality. I blink pie crust from my eyes. Conscious and not high enough, I fumble through the utensil drawer for a joint. Finger joint, knuckle bone, fill the stock pot, migraine on simmer. Add mushrooms. Throw in an orphaned sock, a lost earring. Solo journey to technicolor awareness […]
Awake and Mostly Sober – Rachael Z. Ikins
slip away
Awake and Pretty Much Sober – Annette Kalandros
I’m awake and pretty much sober. Yet I do not wish to be sober. I want to swirlmy anger in my mouth, letting its tannins coat my tongue until my tongue doesn’t care what words it forms to hurl at old, pasty white men who place chains and shackles upon our bodiesto drag us backthrough […]
Awake and Pretty Much Sober – Annette Kalandros
words less spoken 