"My Last Memory of My Grandmother" by Adelaide Gifford

My uncle says the sea erodes.
Salt, surf, sand,
and wind.
And I remember
six years old,
clinging to my grandmother’s hand,
fearing that
I’d fly away.
I remember
sea spitting, burning sparks of sand on little legs,
fish flailing,
flung from homes beneath the water,
silver bodies spinning in air they
cannot breathe.
I remember shrieking, my own
shrieking. Wet suction
of a thin body, clinging
to my leg, fearing
flying. I remember
our wild eyes,
my small hand slapping,
my small fish slipping
off the skin of my leg
into the air, into
the wind,
ripped away.

---

Adelaide Gifford is a recent graduate of Hamilton College in New York, where she majored in Creative Writing and double-minored in Hispanic Studies and Environmental Studies. Her favorite genre to write is a mixture of nature writing and fantasy, with a bit of magical realism thrown in, and her favorite authors include Richard Powers, Harper Lee, and Billy Collins. She has previously published a short story, “Bullfight,” in Sucarnochee Review, and poems in Applause Literary Magazine and Furrow Literary Magazine, among others. When she’s not writing, she enjoys hanging out with her dog and exploring the natural world. Instagram @adelaideluciagifford. 

"Knock on the Door" by Rohan Buettel

What should you do when you hear
a knock on the door in the middle
of the night? Quietly slip
out the back, climb the fence
and hide in the neighbour’s yard.
When the authorities search,
they’ll decide they’ve missed you.
If you hear a noise out the back,
turn off the lights and take cover
in a cupboard or another bolthole.
After a cursory search
they may conclude you’re gone
and round up the neighbours instead.
If living in an apartment block,
place heavy furniture against the entry,
make it hard for them to come in.
Never answer the bang on the door
in the middle of the night, though
you’ve never done anything wrong,
know years in the gulag await,
know they never admit their mistakes,
hide or flee, don’t make it easy,
know they’ve come for you.

---

Rohan Buettel lives in Canberra, Australia. His haiku appear in various Australian and international journals (including Presence, Cattails and The Heron’s Nest). His longer poetry appears in many journals, including Rattle, The Goodlife Review, Meanjin, Meniscus and Quadrant.

"Americano" by Ryan Walker

5

I am on the floor, somewhere in the Midwest,
repeating numbers to the yellow feathered man
and his friends who live on Sesame Street.
Uno. Dos. Tres. Cuatro. We count. We sing.

I reach for the screen, try and reach through,
“Can you tell me how to get to Sesame Street?”
Cinco. Seis. Siete. Ocho... I am counting. I am singing.
I am alone on the floor, somewhere in the Midwest.

17

I am in Mr. Lamping’s Advanced Placement Spanish,
Repeating phrases and words and dad jokes: “No piscina pool.”
We sing a song about months, and another about fish swimming for God.
I trace his thighs with my eyes.

Mr. Lamping tells me how naturally I roll my r’s.
I imagine him rolling his r’s against my neck, my back;
Pero mira cómo beben los peces en el río.
Pero mira cómo beben por ver al Dios nacido*.

25

I am finally in a land I have so long pursued,
shopping in mercados and asking, ¿Cuánto cuesta?
I walk the gulf sipping at fresh pressed margaritas
before looking for something else to fill me.

My language lessons fail me in dark alleys.
Between bodegas, pesos exchanged for fucking hustlers.
Boca... Cuello... Polla...
He asks, “Does I hurt you?” Solo un poco.

37

I am escaping 45**, chasing Mediterranean dreams,
lost in Barcelona somewhere between Gaudí structures and endless paella.
My eyes on cobblestone passing bathhouses and hustlers, craving pan over polla,
connections that feel like anything but home.

I find a panaderia and fumble for euros. Buenos Dias I say to the cashier.
Bon dia he says to me. I speak Spanglish. He speaks Catalan.
I order pan and cafè americano, setting euros in his palm,
exchanging currency and touch. I sip...

38

I sip…

39

I sip…

---

*From “El Peces En El Rio” by Villancicos

**The 45th President of the United States

---

Ryan (he/him) is a Pushcart nominated, queer writer from Dayton, Ohio, and a member of the Miami Valley Writers Network. Ryan earned his MFA in Creative Writing from Eastern Kentucky University’s Bluegrass Writers Studio. His work has been featured in Flights, Longridge Review, Red Noise Collective, Miracle Monocle, The Uncommon Grackle, No Tokens, and others. Ryan's flash fiction Binge was long listed for Hunger: The Best of Brilliant Flash Fiction 2014-2019, and his hybrid form chapbook Americano was long listed for multiple awards. Ryan’s essay Dress was nominated for the 2024 Pushcart Prize. When he isn’t advocating for the Oxford comma, Ryan is [exploring] a town near you. Follow him on Instagram @ryan.wrote.it or visit ryanwroteit.com.

"Kireji" by Craig Cotter

Too much grey,
walls, floor—
would I be happier
if the room had more colors?
I’d like us all to be content

Black Converse
run through the room and outside
silver eyelets
sparkle—
Mike’s back!

Pine trees out the window
don’t move
yes they do
they grew 60 feet
I waited

---

Craig Cotter was born in 1960 in New York and has lived in California since 1986. His poems have appeared in hundreds of journals in the U.S., France, Italy, the Czech Republic, the U.K., Australia, Japan, New Zealand, Singapore, Canada, India and Ireland. Books include The Aroma of Toast, Chopstix Numbers, and After Lunch with Frank O’Hara. www.craigcotter.com

"Blazed Poem #4" by Basil Payne

Sometimes I worry that the sun is gone,
whipping my head towards the window

to check for light,

Fear like the smell of chopped garlic
that won’t leave the sliver of moon

underneath my nails.

In about two-billion years, it’ll start to
die, eat itself up from the inside out.

We all know that.

But I’m scared the billions will pass
when my back is turned, a simple fatal

oversight.

So I always have to check. I’m scared of
dying without changing my name to

what it should be

or before I can see an emperor penguin
dance for the first time or last before

their extinction.

At 23, time slips past me and takes
the sun with it. I wish the sun would make

more iron for my blood

Or at the very least take that shit back to
where it came from. My life is a blink but

when I’m high

It’s a millenia. Too many blinks and I’ll
never see the sun again.

---

Basil Payne (they/them) is a queer poet-artist living in Logan, Utah. Their work can be found in Sugar House Review, Sink Hollow, Oyster River Pages, Sheepshead Review, Progenitor, The Southern Quill, and occasionally Utah State University's Projects Gallery.

"Never Nothing" by Basil Payne

Sometimes in my nightmares I’m God,
not the regal haloed man
or an omnipotent beast,
just me in a robe.
Never by choice, I’m exalted
by a passerby angel
or I’ve found that God retired
and I’m the closest option.

As god, my first action is to cry.
My hands, still small, shake
but carry the weight of life.
I can never find my siblings,
who the angels say
God never created.

My second action as god is run
through the blue storm I brewed
and search, tear up
the building blocks of a world I created
Prayers pile up in my holy email inbox
but I can’t get back to my computer.
The terror of responding wrong.

My third action as god is curl
in on myself and become smaller.
My siblings never existed
nor anyone else I loved.
Bit-by-bit, pieces of life fade away,
opaque then transparent then translucent then gone.
Nobody screams when they fade,
I’m the last speck of color they see.

And I’m left all alone again
when I wake crying.

---

Basil Payne (they/them) is a queer poet-artist living in Logan, Utah. Their work can be found in Sugar House Review, Sink Hollow, Oyster River Pages, Sheepshead Review, Progenitor, The Southern Quill, and occasionally Utah State University's Projects Gallery.

"Body Pool" by Sam Spring

She was a drunk
As was I — what a life.
I would recommend the high road
If I could ever have found it.
Instead, my parents found us,
Drunk and dazed in a pool
Of our own bodies on their porch,
The morning light just
Coming on in the East.
They were mortified.
We were silly.
And we never spoke about it
Directly.
The memory blurring like
Landscapes on a train —
The shame, the guilt, that sinking feeling
And the whole world spun on.

---

Sam Spring is a 28-year-old nomadic writer working to save up for a van. He dropped out of SMC to sell bongs online and is the lead singer of the band ‘Tennis Club’ with their music being streamed over 7,000,000 times. Sam bounces around the West, staying with lovers and friends. He has work appearing in Passengers Journal, The Wisconsin Review, and Denver Quarterly, among others. Find his writing, music, and art here —> www.samspring.me

"The World at Large" by Sam Spring

The tin crimped flowerbed
Raised up off the tired
Fading brick floor
Held so gently the pink
And red geraniums
That bobbed in the
Sweet afternoon breeze.
The jasmine died weeks ago
But even the sight of
The brown leaves,
Far out of season,
Still held the ghost
Of that feeling
The smell painted on my brain.
Within the redwood fence line,
Atop the lazily-bricked patio floor.

---

Sam Spring is a 28-year-old nomadic writer working to save up for a van. He dropped out of SMC to sell bongs online and is the lead singer of the band ‘Tennis Club’ with their music being streamed over 7,000,000 times. Sam bounces around the West, staying with lovers and friends. He has work appearing in Passengers Journal, The Wisconsin Review, and Denver Quarterly, among others. Find his writing, music, and art here —> www.samspring.me

"Poor Thing" by Abbie Langmead

One year since pity moved
into the present tense, and my mother
into the past. I don’t lie when people ask
the natural questions of family life, until
the awkward question of how long is broached.

When am I allowed to live again?
Reanimated after falling
into the river, nothing more
than a childlike memory
that gets reconstructed day
by day as I relearn how to speak.

Frankenstein was always about a child
and her mother. The irresponsible
science was just a ploy to get men
to care the slightest bit about
a creation myth that wasn’t made
from their rib. I know that,

but they didn’t. The others in that house
wet with rain instead of sick,
although both stick to the skin
and linger longer than they’re welcome.
I don’t know if Shelley would’ve
Understood me. I don’t think she and I
would get along in the slightest,
two stubborn women butting heads
while both claim to be revolutionary.
Reminds me of my mother, or hers.

At the Tower Records on Dawson Street
I told a friend I thought it was a terrible movie—
that I felt like womanhood was more than
being a baby and getting your brains fucked into you
by Mark Ruffalo. I’m sorting out
what the word “woman” means, or if I am one,
but there has to be more to life, isn’t there?

She disagreed with me,
not about the definition of womanhood,
but about what the film meant, and what regaining
things after you’d lost them looked like.
What is the shape of all of this being, and what
do we make space for?

One year into resurrection
and I don’t know if I believe in it at all—
this world where there’s no number to call
when things get screwy, no one to return to
when your mind is stuck in the black and white.
something monstrous happened. I am still
remembering what it’s like to watch love decay.

I don’t know how to accept these pithy sympathies.
These are the facts of a life reborn,
in a place where she’d never been,
and where nobody knows who I was
when she was still here.

---

Abbie Langmead (she/they) is a Sapphic Jewish writer originally from Boston, MA, currently living in Dublin, Ireland. Their poetry has recently appeared in Shot Glass Journal, Northern New England Review, Trace Fossils Review, and many others. Find them in those places, wandering, or hosting dinner parties in her too crowded apartment.

"A Theology Lesson on Sherman Street" by Abbie Langmead

On the way to synagogue one day my dad told me about Hell
And Heaven, or at least what he believes of it.
The story went a little something like this:

We don’t know anything for certain.
I won’t guarantee you an afterlife
When I’m gone. But the only after
Life I’ve ever heard are people talking
About you, remembering you.

If someone thinks of you and the times
Where you hurt them, they’ll place you
In Hell, in this immobile ash of sin.

Heaven is the kindness you give someone
That lasts forever. That is afterlife, no,
That is immortality.

I didn’t tell him that on that same strip of road
My mother and I also talked about an afterlife.
When she talked about legacy, she said:

If people remember your father,
They will know he was a good man.

If.

My father is soft-spoken and godly,
Although he’d hate both those characterizations.
I mean that I think that people will put him
In Heaven when the time comes.
I know that I will.

And that will be all I have,
Because despite all the scriptures and Talmud
He reads, he too doesn’t believe
In hauntings. He’s promised me that
Any psychic or medium who claims
To have a message from him will be a liar.
He can’t tell me that they’re all liars, Just like he can’t say whether Heaven and Hell
Are real, or just metaphors like he likes to say.

But he won’t say anything after he’s gone,
He doesn’t believe in mediums now and refuses
To let me get wrapped up in the foolish nonsense
That my mother and grandmother adore.
Anyone who speaks for him is a fraud

That’s for certain.

---

Abbie Langmead (she/they) is a Sapphic Jewish writer originally from Boston, MA, currently living in Dublin, Ireland. Their poetry has recently appeared in Shot Glass Journal, Northern New England Review, Trace Fossils Review, and many others. Find them in those places, wandering, or hosting dinner parties in her too crowded apartment.