Boy Scout Blue

by Justin Wade Thompson

the girl had

her tits hanging out

boy scout blue and

no respect for her

own blood

some fag boys were singing

from the floor

i went home and cried

warm beer and a stain

on my pants the next day

to keep the patrons staring

in the grocery store

in the restaurant

where i ate cactus

and bananas with my rice

last time my dad sat across from

me screaming about Texas politics

and the end of the world

seemingly relative subjects

i don't know anymore

lies parade the news and magazine stands,

the wine bottles, the cat pills,

the beer, sex,and vinegar

and red-faced children

crying over the mountainous bridge while

their fat parents make them

watch and take pictures

of the bats

that look

just like

shitty rats

on wings.

i'd like them all to die

some day.

barfly revisited

by Alan Catlin

all those

nights waking

up in back

alleys or on

flop house

floors were

beginning to

take a fatal

toll on his

body& his

mind that

thought split

lips black

eyes & scabbed

knuckles were

a fashion

statement &

that he could

make a habit

of calling

out the bar

tender like

some lyric

poet barfly

Dixon was

by Alan Catlin

just bar

trash so

they let

him drink

all the flat

watered down

leftovers

from the night

before catching

a buzz the hard

way 'til some

joker left a shot

glass of rat

poison mixed

in w/ the others

Never did

find out

who or

what old

Dixon did

to piss that

guy off

Rejection

by Melanie Browne

I'm not sure I understand what this piece
is about. Susan? The neighbor? The neighborhood?
I also found myself wondering what the point
of the snake is. I hope it's just me.
I wish you luck in placing these pieces elsewhere.

Only Publish This Poem When I’m Dead

by Chris Butler

When I imagine

that I’ve died,

I know exactly

what will be of me,

but what of death

can one envision?

Dark

dirt/

digging

worms,

and the endless mumblings

of lawnmowers over my ceiling

or the moaning of Sunday morning’s

mourning,

or pissed against the wind

and left to sit adrift

an ocean of whale carcasses

and swimmers’ urine,

I wish that you just don’t burn

my paper skin.

FUGUE BY THE TING KNOWN AS RANDALL

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THE SAD GIRL

by Lyn Lifshin

once was the blonde
boys gave watches to,
even teachers
tried to lure
and kiss. Sales
men in furniture
stores gasped at her
beauty, looked
sorry for the
fat sister, glued
to her mother’s
sleeves, hiding out
behind thick glasses.
Too pretty to
bother to study, her
perfect legs cheering
the football
players on while
the other made
science projects
of the eye, studies
of carbon, papier mache
models of the eye,
making beauty
out of nothing.
While the pretty
one didn’t bother,
couldn’t care, just
smiled at the watches
boys gave her, got
bored, got into crushes
on married men, anything
not available, wanted what
her sister had, snatched
sweaters and sweets,
tried to snatch the
quiet one’s lovers
but by now, the fatty
had slimmed down, had
contacts, long hair
no longer in braids, now longer,
curly, lighted by the
sun and Clairol, as the
pretty one thickened, no
longer smiled, grew fat
around her as a barricade
against any drunk or abusive
man, let her blonde hair
go grey, let herself
go but not in the way
she had as a child, dancing
in restaurant aisles, twirling
batons, showing off her
lovely lovelies but like some
one who has nothing left
to hold on to


*Lyn's website: http://www.lynlifshin.com/books.htm

“Writers Block”

by Ben Smith

I wrote a book of poems
When i was 15.

Full of pre-pubescent
bullshit
And the bitter
Whinings of a
Middle class
White
Suburban
Ass-hole.


Then i
Feel in love with an Asian
Girl who had a prostitute
As a mother.

We smoked dope
In her lounge and i
Asked to fuck her
But ended up
Laying with her
Sister on the floor
For a few days
With out touching
Cause she was to young
To have any hair on her
Vagina.

We laid and
Listened to
Cold chisel
While people banged
In rooms around
The empty house
And avoided
our parents
By loosing our phones.

I realised then
that love was
Something that
Had to be mutual

And i
Gave up writing not long
After that.

spent many years
afterwards
Getting drunk
And wandering the streets.

Chasing abandon
With fists of
Cotton wool.

Hiding from cops
And setting bins alight
With the other local
Kids in the
Neighbourhood.

I started writing again
When i met another
Woman who
Could deal with me

And now i pitter patter
Away at the keys
On the Carona
And wait for the day
To come when

All the words dry up
And i can go back
To the streets
Like every other
White
Middle class
Ass-hole
Who gave up when they
Finally understood
That love
Was never
Meant
To be something
You can do
By yourself.

The streets.

The Streets
Are calling
Again.


*Ben's blog

Baby Jesus

by Chris Butler

After the second cumming,

baby jesus will be born

by an immaculate abortion

from the lord,

after his excavation from

the virgin whore’s womb

with crucified wire,

and left to die for

nothing more than

the conception of

some masturbated

master race.

THE FUNERAL (2)

by Lyn Lifshin

my sister’s face,
a swollen pumpkin
of anger. I think
of the spring that
never was, how just
going to get paper
towels and ice
cream, we giggled,
away from the
sick room but by
the end of the year
weren’t talking.
My uncle, safe in
his coffin, waits
outside, waits in
blue Vermont
light. My sister
spits, “murderer,”
in the voice of
a stranger, a sad
girl who wants to
sue the stars,
grows another
layer of fat, a
barrier, a fence,
the way she cages
her cats and turtles.
Fat seals her
lips tight. “Do
you know what
this is,” my aunt
says after the
service, whispers,
“shit,” into my
ear and tho I’m
not exactly sure
what she means,
I know it’s true


*Lyn's website: http://www.lynlifshin.com/books.htm

THE FUNERAL

by Lyn Lifshin

I hardly think of my uncle
in the coffin outside, waiting
when my sister guns the
air with, “You murderer,
you stole the souls of the
murdered by writing about
them.” My face white, some
one tells me later. It’s a layer
of ice. I get thru the rabbi’s
study wrapped in its glaze
thru his open grave, the one
time my aunt weeps as
the coffin is pulled from the
hearse. I shovel dirt,
wrapped in its numbness,
shovel after shovel into
the grave and walking near
this stranger, back to the
car. I always forgave her
when she was a brat, spied
on boyfriends, didn’t
come to my wedding
party or visit me in the
hospital, said my car crash
didn’t happen, a few scrapes
she sneered. She threatened
to sue me for the title
of a book, had others come
after me for other poems.
I’m in this glaze, like
glass at the meal in
the synagogue, each
of us on one side
of our aunt, the only
one left of the
Vermont Lazaruses.
Ice crystals on grass,
topaz sky. I bury two
family relatives


*Lyn's website: http://www.lynlifshin.com/books.htm

HOME FROM THE WAR

by Stephen Jarrell Williams

Don't leave me
with your girlfriend.

My horror stories
will crush her in my bed.

She will stay. Will stay
with the window open and wind
blowing over her wounds.

On my pillow
she will moan at the ceiling,
as I lick her down...

She will beg
for the lightning in my stick,
sticking her again and again...

And you were so glad when I went off to war...
never knowing what would come back.

SNIPER

by Stephen Jarrell Williams

Counting heads
before I shoot,

all my victims
in the valley below,

I follow my orders,
my brainwash

swishing inside my head,
a parade somewhere

back home
knowing my name,

but they'll never know what I've done,
the pierced skulls I've created,

so many holes in my memory.

Spin Cycle in Nine Minutes

by Jay Coral

2 - i will thank the homeless dude for opening the door
and slip him ten bucks for his last six pack of beer
+2 - to the rosary-clutching lady, i will say that
like the spin cycle is how a survivor described an earthquake
and entreat her to pray for all abandoned dogs
+2 - i will kiss the prettiest girl in the laundromat
(no time to explain the preciousness of an end-of-the-world smooch)
then offer my blushing face to be smacked
+2 - "blessed are the hungry and the poor in spirit"
despite the wretched mother's shy protestations
i will buy a candy bar to the dirtiest urchin i can find
+1 - and on the waning minute of my popularity i will shout
"i am the loneliest man in the planet and
this is the happiest day of my life"
=9.

DELILAH

by Lyn Lifshin

Sure geraniums are
carnations. She loved
my tangerine plant,
the heavy sweetness
like musky night
wind in Guatemala.
I will think of her
asking, “Is it true
in this country they
chop up the dead
and put them in
coffins?” Delilah,
when she couldn’t
eat, she waited,
passed up fruits and
fresh things she
loved and when
they found what it
was, hoped her hair
wouldn’t fall out.
Anything green and
growing charmed
her, anything alive
was a miracle.
She prayed and
prayed and her
church prayed with
her. There was
chemo and radiation,
9 months long as if
to grow a baby
or oranges, raspberries.
Delilah with your
soaps of raw potatoes
that didn’t work and
the drugs that changed
your voice. With your
mop and vacuum you
were always singing.
Now that the honey
is coming into what you
say on tape, the sun, a
little giggling, even with
out you unlocking the
door–“Miss Lyn, are you
here?” her radio bleats
Spanish stations. She
gleams at my cat’s
clear green eyes

*Lyn's website: http://www.lynlifshin.com/books.htm

Lily And Bob

by Doug Draime

Bob was back
in the corner
by the juke box, his
shotgun propped
up against the
machine. No one
had noticed him
coming in the back-
door. Lily was serving
some rowdies at the
front table. I’d been
watching the Reds kick
the shit outta the
Cubs on the black
& white at the
end of the bar.
And if I hadn’t
turned when Jerry
asked for another beer,
I wouldn’t have
noticed Bob sitting
there either.
I walked over
and drew Jerry
a draft. Bob was
craning his neck around
trying to get a good
look at Lily. I sat the draft
in front of Jerry
and reached under
the counter for the
.357, and stuck it
under my shirt, and
started walking back
to the table.
Bob spotted me coming
and moved his
shotgun, laying
it across the
table, with 2 fingers
resting on the trigger.
He yelled at me,
“This is done of
your concern, Doug.
I just came to
get Lily. Go back
behind the bar
and tend to business.”
Lily was
right behind me by
then and I knew
she could see the
bulge of the gun.
“Bob, you need
to take your
fingers off the trigger
and sit the fucking
shotgun back against
the juke box.
And I need you
to do that, now, OK?”
Bob just stared
at me, trying to
stare me down.
The place grew
as still as a rock.
“I don’t want
any trouble with
you, Doug. I
came to get Lily,
like I said.”
I could hear
Lily starting to
cry behind me.
“You come in here
with a shotgun
and you don’t want
any trouble? I
think you’re
a little confused,
man. You need to call it a
night, go home and
sleep if off.”
He was just tapping his
fingers on the stock of
the shotgun
near the trigger
and staring at me.
I could feel
Lily moving, as she
touched my
shoulder and stepped
out in front
of me.
She took a couple
steps toward
the table,
haltingly, gently
reaching out
her hand.
“Bob, honey, I’ll
leave with you
but you have
to stop this
before someone
gets killed. We
can work
this out, baby.
You don’t
want anybody
to get hurt, Bob.
I know
you don’t.”
Locked on mine,
Bob’s eyes moved
slowly away
to Lily’s,
his whole
body softening.
He took his hand
off the
shotgun and stood up,
his eyes
filling with tears.
Not another word
was spoken,
as Bob
began to sob.
Lily had his hand and was
leading him
out the back door.
When I heard
his old pickup start,
I walked over
and picked-up the
shotgun, broke it open,
and took
the shells out,
put them in my pocket.
Walking back
up to the bar
with the unloaded
weapon, some wise ass played
Lovesick Blues, by
Hank Williams,
and there was an uproar
of laughter.

Protest Organizer

by Doug Draime

Century City in
1967, or 8, very stoned
to protest
Lyndon Johnson’s
speech. We were
among the
crowd the cops
were pushing back
and yelling at us
to cease and desist.
She took my hand
and placed it
between her legs
up her lily white
sun dress. When the
speech was over
she drove me home,
to my place on
Lexington in Hollywood.
And she jacked me
off and I came in her mouth.
When I finally got
outta the car, she was
insistent that I take not
one but two, Stop The War
t-shirts.

For All The Fakes, Flakes, Liars, Betrayers, And Ball-less Wonders Over The Last 40 Years In The Small Press

by Doug Draime

My heart
forgives you
but
my
middle
finger (now
in
your
dead or
dying
faces)
I am
sorry
to say
has a
life
of its
own