“To Know Life, To Fight Unarmed” by Sarah Kersey
To know life is to greet knowing you won’t unmeet. To know life is to see your creators split into demigods, degrading into man and …
Author: Matthew Maichen
“Half-Dream” by Ann Christine Tabaka
Gilded morning shatters sleep, dreams cling on with tenacious teeth. A confused reality sorting through a fragmented emotional state. Warm bed, cold toast. Sensations …
“Night” by Chestina Craig
I have been raised to fear my footfalls in the dark to be a walking skirt is to sacrifice safety, sway like an open gate …
“Icing” by Melissa Bobe
She’d had a cupcake for breakfast every day for the last month. Thick on the icing, more often than not with sprinkles, occasionally filled with …
Mother Rips my Roots by Jasmine King
With Lines from “The Apple Trees at Olema” by Robert Hass Shakes me by the raw, white, backlit flaring of her lightning streaked hand. Fingers …
“He Stared Down the Barrel of a Gun and He Saw Me” by Stephanie Luka
I watched you slide swiftly into the fog encapsulating Eagle Junction railway station. Scraps of rust leaking with oil-stained dew flung into the past, and …
“Skin” by Chestina Craig
SKIN is the bodies first line of defense. our metal shell wrap-around sometimes, your body can confuse fortress for prison, my mother is able to …
“Hatching” by Lena Silver
I was born an old soul they say, a quiet spectator mulling over muddled thoughts, about what I don’t know, perhaps a previous lifetime. I …
“The Plum Tree” by Ken Allan Dronsfield
How did the despair become fluid for clear, dry eyes to shed? Why did the burden on the heart allow the stress and cause …
“War Paint” by Linda Imbler
Tonight the battle will begin. But first, as the concealer smooths across my eye folds, I picture her breathlessly saying hello to him, always making …
“Water Angel 2” by Stephen Mead
Note from the artist: Though a montage which utilized different computer programs to create the effects that photographers of not-so-old created during acid bath development, this …
“Old Photos” by Pat St. Pierre
I never saw my mother smoke; didn’t smell her lingering breath or see her brown stained teeth; nor did I take in the stench of …
“Lexical Proverbs Newly Discovered” by Yuan Changming
No art without startle No belief without a lie No character without an act No business without sin No coffee without a fee No culture …
“Soft Dismount” by Matt Gillick
A Gymnast propels through the air after launching off the springboard. Camera flashes capture blurry movements: Facebook posts for later, if She wins. Judges dress …
“Eight Hour Sunder” by Edward Hemstreet
Do not let this be the end. Do not bisect, dissect our time with before and after, with Now …
“On Halloween” by Matthew Maichen
My earliest memories involve skeletons. I remember watching The Nightmare Before Christmas with the same vague fascination that grabbed the hearts of basic goth children …
“Coming Home” by Ray Cicetti
Once there was a man who found a forest in his pocket. When he came home after a day’s work he would take it out. …
“Beware of the Quiet” by Ann Christine Tabaka
Do not allow the quietness that saturates the halls of night break through the dawn. For it will shatter all perception of time …
“Oh, What the Hell” by Ken Allan Dronsfield
Gracefully inept at life’s perfection gleefully disorganized and simple who put the milk in the top freezer? Sometimes I think gremlins reside here glowing and …
“The Confession of the Watcher at the Bell” by K.A. Liedel
The peace inside the giant glass bell is almost always short-lived. Soon the translucent, riblike curves will spark with electric-blue orbs, followed by clouds of …
“This is What We Do Now” by Becky Shirley
You come home, half gallon of milk in one hand, the other snaking around my waist. Head buried in my shoulder, no words, just small …
“A Fairy Tale About War” by Matthew McAyeal
Once upon a time, there were two big kingdoms and two small kingdoms. The two big kingdoms were called Khakia and Doogland. The two small …
“You and I” by Shah Tazrian Ashrafi
You were the ocean foams, and I was the golden grains of sand. You were the heron that flew above, and I was the salty …
“The Death of Paul Shephard” by Kristoffer Newsom
They rode together in silence for some time, the old man and the young one. Paul looked out the window, his blue eyes cloudy with …
“No Room in the Rubble” by Khalid Abu Dawas
I used to pray for a wild soul risky enough to give me part of herself when she knows it is likely I will not …
“Moments of Suffocating Dullness Interspersed with Violent and Near-suicidal Flashes of Excitement” by Edd Rose
The poet Charles Bukowski said “I don’t know about other people, but when I wake up in the morning and put my shoes on, I …
June Hiatus – A Message from the Editor in Chief
I’ll start with what we most want you to hear: We’re still taking submissions. You’ll recall that a little over a year ago now, we …
Interview with Gerardeen Santiago of Aionios Books
Editor-in-Chief’s Note: Gerardeen Santiago is a poet and publisher I originally met at Glassless Minds in Oceanside. When the Metaworker staff was suggesting new people …
“The Watcher” by Jenna Crosier
Every year, from the first I was assigned to the graveyard, I would watch the headstones from my place upon the highest pine tree. My …
“The Couple Almost” by John Grey
She camouflaged herself at a darkened far table, idled away time by tapping a spoon against her drink glass; on the opposite side of …
“a blason from the crossfaded” by Connor Chapman
A very pretty girl wears the same brown clogs every day sometimes. Between all the rain-soaked steps we took and the part where she left, …
“To the Best” by Anna Keeler
We sit on the precipice of Heaven and pollution; you hand Me an empty box and promise Desultory protection. Our bodies, superimposed From two …
“Rocks” by Elena L. Perez
Obsidian, black, but when held up to light it is semi-transparent. Also known as Apache Tears. Roughly circular in shape, about half an inch by …
“Belittle” by Kelsey Parrotte
Yesterday you were five foot ten and today your toes don’t touch the base of the bed. You cocoon yourself deeper into the blankets, stuffing …
“Twilight’s Crescendo” by Ken Allan Dronsfield
absent of pearls in a grand ocean mollusk crying self righteousness without salty tears seeking to find truth in an unrelenting fervor see the dark …
“TRUTH #4: The Face Behind the Mirror” by Matthew Maichen
I only ever wrote to be close to you. You didn’t exist. I knew that. But it didn’t matter when I could create words that …
“Word Supreme” by Clint Keller
What I’m saying right now is meaningless – because a word spoken alone is a word spoken in vain. Like a tree falling in an …
“The Pissing Contest” by Laurie Frisbey
Let’s make this a pissing contest. Place your bet with mine. I’m bound to win if winning means a longer yellow line. ‘Cause yellow’s the …
“The Living Dead” by John Short
I opened my eyes, emerging from a dream but couldn’t remember anything at all. Shame really because I’d always considered dream space a bit like …
“Traffic Kids” by Farah Billa
I don’t think in Bengali, I think it is just one of those things that fold my body the way my grandfather used to. At …
“Water” by Gabby Catalano
“He laid his head in my palms And I watched as he grew a garden of roses Across a dying field. He had the power …
“Six Wheat Stories” by Emily Ruth Taylor
1 My grandfather lived next to two wheat farmers. I secretly wished my grandfather was a wheat farmer. I would bicycle along the edge of …
“Shadows” by Hanoch Guy
I. I jump at the slightest touch on my cracked back. Fierce mountain wind rushes around me. My ears, too long and pointy. A cold …
“Blood Orange Soda” by Maya Rahman-Rios
Wait until your mother and brother have left the house. Then, call him. Four oh eight, five five five, seven three eight oh. You’ve had …
“Rowena’s Poetry” by John Grey
She reads new poetry in old settings, antique store turned coffee house, dressed in black sweater, skirt and stockings, perched on the edge of a …
Interview With Michael Schmitt
Michael Schmitt is the man behind Ruthless Hippies, organizing poetry readings and music events in Encinitas and North San Diego County. I met up with …