Poems by Mark Young

LEITMOTIF

How we react is determined by
grimacing in the sudden sharp light &
the actions of clouds on the distant
hills, the morning we've had, thoughts
that come bouncing back from a time
we thought had been left behind us. We,
grimacing in the sudden sharp light, are
orphans — I was about to say urchins,
& perhaps that is also true — out of
luck & also out of time, out of one cliché
& clinging hopefully & hopelessly to
another, grimacing in the sudden sharp
Light. Catalytic converters cascade down
the face of Witwatersrand, setting the
dogs barking, setting off klieg lights
in every circus between there & the Cape,
causing the elephant to leave the room
grimacing in the sudden sharp light.


AVUNCULAR ODALISQUES

As the second & third syllables
suggest, word-counting was the
rage in the interregnum of World
War II. Hopes of avoiding blood-

shed faded: the shelling of the open
parts of towns gave rise to too many
anagrams; Hemingway's Death in
the Afternoon shot to the top of the

bestseller lists. Now the clicking of
abaci accompanies any walk in the
markets. Exchange rates are no longer
seen, replaced by the current rate for

dissecting an average-sized novel, the
occasional "Python used here" sign.
& from the doorways the ubiqui-
tous question: "Are you my uncle?"

Poem by Les Wicks

A BARREL OF HOOTS 

This time again, afterwards, naked together
you point something out
& we laugh.
Struggling bones
a few fractures of regret
but now all that is forgotten.

A simple thing, the spasms of the lungs
air expelled like mortars
against battlements of ordinary.
This guffaw feeds & expels in equal measure —
one of the few unquestioned gifts, moments enlivened.

Siblings, out in the trees — chimps, bonobos —
all share this beneficence beyond intelligence.
A simple tickle can part branches,
smother a grudge.
For dolphins it’s pulses, followed by a whistle —
the sea is a great show.

By a generous heater, aged Labrador Rex
watches “his” human toddler pick up a ball
then fall spectacularly.
A pant, his play-face swivels as
the sleeping tail awakens.

Even rats, mining our humanity
the buffets of trash
they too chirp when the scurry is done
& nest-noise is dampened.

We can’t save the world, laughter might.
It’s too scattered to hear or annotate
this rogue wave roams the globe.
Nothing dies when it visits,
best futures drink it in.

Poems by Luis Cuauhtémoc Berriozábal

GATHER VOICES

Let us gather voices,
find delight in their sound.
There is a world in every
pitch with labyrinths and
blackholes where silence
is a symphony. There are
cities of water that are
mere mirages. Let us bring
these voices to our doorway.
Frame them on the walls like
family photographs. Let
their richness glow, their
tenderness overflow, and
resonate with kindness.


TIME DOES NOT EXIST

Time does not exist
when you walk out the secret door.
The wind rushes you
and removes the eyes from your face.
Ashes cover you.
It is an unending amount of ashes.

Time does not exist
as you stand on the threshold of
the secret room for
a second. You do not think of leaving.
Returning to the place
behind the secret door, your twin waits
for you with eyes intact.


WHITE EYED SUN

When I look up at the sky
and it is full of clouds
that slowly part to reveal
the white eye of the sun,
I wonder if there are other
eyes, other suns, that are
too engulfed by clouds
that will never shine.

This afternoon I took a
snapshot of that white
eyed sun to study it later.
I looked at the retina of
that white eyed sun and
found a pool of tears
forming. Was its heat too
much that it formed those
tears of light and fire?

Poems by Mark Goodwin

yesterday Alphabet bit

into my old bone

non-song

today Alphabet’s throat feels

my flesh-shape slide

down

tomorrow this phantom

of antler-shapes

this ghost of ants’

ways over snow

this cross-

criss twig lord this

god will

begin

to digest

my human me

an

ing

tugged

a word out

from

mud

spat on

it to

clear

its

surface of

dirt then

heard

how a

word may

clink

ever

so very

gently as

light

hits

  it

Poems by Keith Nunes

THE BLACK-AND-WHITING OF THE RED-NECKING

I was thinking good things
when I turned bad,
When I went off and
left the coastal yaw for the
icky-thump inner-tubing of this
spit & spat conurbation, the
roasting lamb gracefully steps aside for the
colour-coded deposits of vegan chewings,
The newfound efficacy of mine bowels! 
Not a small improvement, but what
penetration of this ruling-code, I’ll never
laugh again without a wary sideways glance,
The skin-piercing stare of the selfie-righteous
falling over backwards for a clear-screen-shot of the
blunt & blameworthy
Barbarians inside the gate


I ONCE KNEW

When you’ve finished saving the
money you earned being the man
you never wanted to be
email me,
We can shine for a day or so,
Bring the Citroen, not the dog,
Bring the Gauloises, not the pipe,
I’ll present as Lauren Bacall,
Wear the Borsalino,

I’ll atone for the summer and
splatter lemon on black, the
Valery V neck with sequins,
Be late, be cool,
Be the man
I once knew


HOTEL

In a dreary room on La Rue de la Morte,
On the winter’s most miserable night,
Victor Hugo kills off his protagonist
&
So many sheets tossed out from the seedy
One Great Star Hotel because they’ve
Been shredded and tied into nooses
&
Aspiring actor Marion Morrison takes
A room on the third floor of The Grand,
When he moves out he’s John Wayne
&
Tabloid media throng to the notorious
Chelsea Hotel when a sign is displayed,
‘Rock stars BYO ambulance’
&
A Belarusian brute and his model wife in
London ranting that the bath ‘it’s too small and
we have no fucking sea view!’


A PERFECT 10

Zukofsky hanged himself
In a hangar 2k long,
On a silent night
On a Christmas Day,
The rope of inferior quality snapped,
He’s a heavy dude

Zukofsky dropped onto the unforgiving concrete floor,
This time his arthritic knees
Stood up to the challenge and
He landed like a gymnast dismounting
The uneven bars, scoring a perfect 10,
An impish expression on his chubby face,

He was never one to seek notoriety but
Photographs surfaced and he began wearing polar necks,
Fielding book offers, co-writing essays, talking
To Coppola and Spielberg, all the while
Seeking out
Reliable rope

Poems by Timothy Pilgrim

A FORM OF REMORSE 

It feels much like a noose, anyway —
sleep, troubled, the Earth’s lithe back
turned, Peneloped, to me. Unraveled,
nature long ground down, us, all quite okay

with waste, ruin, decay. I drift to sleep,
from elfin scaffold see what will be —
tiny house, windows closed,
no water for micro-lawn, trifling vines,

mini-garden, grape tomatoes,
baby peas. Dwarf shadows fall
from Bonsai trees. It’s now a given,
rusted Lexus, thawed tundra, empty dam.

Rotted mansion, guesthouse,
yacht. Cruise ship north, watch
glaciers calve, melt to zip,
nada — no reprieve, any chance

for petite demise, gone. Only hope,
a rope too long, last words,
the entire Odyssey, in Greek.
I’ll speak them hanging, upside-down.


LATTE LIFE

Gnats, a churning cloud, swirl past
my drive-thru pane. They dance,
whirl, flit en mass, puree still air
in growing damp. I fake-smile
at ordering pricks, stir, mix,
liquify. Sun fades to gray,
wipes the entire swirl away.
I clock out, flip off night,
blunge myself a crap latte.
In the end, I slog home alone —
blackness pours in again.


CHOOSING SECOND PERSON

If you could re-live life,
it would look like this —

lurk shadowed outside,
peer in, study yourself.

Wish for no more snow,
a bit of warmth, enough time

to wonder if you could stand
being in there with you.

Poems by Joshua Martin

DOWNCAST CRITERIA FOR A CRICKET MUTTERING

The cowering pulse out runs the hare
fields swimming Kentucky carbon-dated odes
a pool of seminars regurgitating secular air
leads and puzzles and impulsive cucumber foliage
yet blotched inscrutable crepuscular suspicions
born of roaring capital limp continents
mourn the land the tracks the jubilant disarray
meagre like buzzards crawling in echoed paradigm
pure massage beating looking-glass stubbled bone
all straining exiles hurling private looping toads
shrouded hearse plucked a wig
square a burning century of cinematography
pressed cooked knee length confessions
masked yawn shivered drop of rot
naked swift privilege shifting scrutiny
staring at carnal ruins splayed before a wax grove
chipped like primal shells scatological and narrow
astound where ceilings offer empty jaws
crooked public toilets disappearing
within melancholic collapsible courthouse
insecticide possessing downstairs groaning
only splits rising and steel-rimmed in recall
as each session of grouping ponders buried cities
pleasant befuddled hills reduce mediations
grandfather following afflictions
messing timid gorge stretched thinner than paint
sainted vagaries leaning over lantern months
grandmother wearing chandelier smokescreen
between us and the vital paralysis wanders splinters
tamed vibrant unless spun from one-way ticket
pirating closer than expected victims of research
spine closing shelf that winking sermons obsess.


SMELL COMES STIFF

We heel
stitched comets
fueling roach shoes
chewing belly
aching backwards
pedal to milestones
oozing pebbles
like chemical
shrinking mazes
cockatiel mocking
tobacco wanderers
patterned wallpaper
carpeted pranks
we steal
mountain lisps
covered memo
blood thirsty
leg tattoo
shrinking layered
caked on killings
of seagull doggone
old rhyme schisms
occupy humanoid
sunset portal
we peel
plasma asylum
jump backwards
electrical hazard
paying daddy-o
momentum feeding
head full of stinking
lords of attributes
abandoned bile
we deal
mermaid pyramids

Poems by Madalyn Lovejoy

WHAT’S UNSPOKEN

I feel like something is taken from me,
conversations faltering and settling
split searingly sideways
             bit by bit
             word by word

there’s an allotted number of words
allowed for the day
a hidden counter ticking down
the tension dragging on

once it’s gone, something will stumble
             and falter
             and fall
with words pulled out like teeth

on the surface, maybe a misstep or stutter
that simple flaw will rise above while
under the depths, each and every word is
ripped deep from the pit of my stomach

tearing my insides with
grating consonants, lingering vowels
words getting further and farther away,
flooding my eyes with a blink,
           a gulp, and a shuddering gasp


SELF-EROSION

Of love, of dust
Pulsing iron, gone to rust
A disintegrating sigh
Flaking away from the root of you

Of love, of rot
Slipping into a sort-of sickness
A desperate, decaying call to the soil
With a gasp, only sediment remains


BE SOFT

we are going to rot
sooner or later
wasted away
by the sun and the living
melt away, be soft

Poems by Cassandra Atherton and Paul Hetherington

 ELIOT’S LAGOON

1.

Midwinter and the sky darkens early. Viv sits in the light of 

her computer screen and begins a playlist of cooking shows, 

travelling around the world from her kitchen table. She 

watches YouTube videos of Roman recipes and Venetian 

specialities, bookmarking each. Tom will visit tomorrow, 

bring news of his travels, and she’ll make Cacio e Pepe, his 

favourite meal. “We’ll eat it in Italy,” he’ll say before he 

goes, as he has so many times. A travelogue about Venice 

sinking into its lagoon cascades onto her TV screen.

2.

Tom is late, saying, “I always feel like drinking when I’m 

with you.” Viv opens a bottle of red she was given at 

Christmas and runs two dusty wine glasses under a tap. The 

water creates a pale circle of dirt in the bottom of the 

glasses and she dries them with the corner of a tea towel. 

Tom hands her a package, saying “open it now”, and she 

pulls a rhinoceros foot from blue tissue paper. “I found it in 

a small antique shop,” he laughs, sipping the cabernet 

sauvignon doubtfully. She asks how long he’ll stay and he 

says, “a week, assuming that’s all right with you”—sipping 

again, like a bird dipping its beak into a Serengeti pool. 

“The black rhinos are gone,” she says abstractly as he 

positions the foot on the mantelpiece above the fire.

CLOUDS IN MY COFFEE

The barista serves lattes and hers has a white swan floating on the 

surface, its neck curling toward the mug’s handle like a query. His 

coffee is decorated with a circle, like a target, and as he stirs, the 

bullseye momentarily resembles a heart. Her swan dissolves into 

cirrus clouds. He’s talking about the loss of businesses in the 

pandemic and the doubtful health of his aged cat. He reads 

subtitles on the television above her head, complaining about bad 

song lyrics and an ad for home gyms. The waitress brings Black 

Forest cake and she thinks how slowly they used to eat the kirsch-

soaked cherries. The barista brings him a coffee decorated with a 

Dali moustache as customers order fruit-and-vegetable juices with 

improbable names. Swathes of light hit the tabletop. He’s digging 

blueberries from his fruit salad and though he says he likes the 

yoghurt, she knows it’s too sweet for him. His eyes wander into 

her words and their identities stutter. A Carly Simon song begins.

SUBURBAN SUITE

She likes the fluorescent lighting, there’s nowhere to hide 

in its glare. Her skin is blue stripes with a yellow bruise on 

the underside of her arm in the shape of a bass clef, or 

comma. The trolley is tangled up with others in long rows 

like train carriages. They rattle as she takes the plastic 

token from her pocket to free one, its long chain hanging 

from the red plastic handle. She saves the fruit and 

vegetable section for last. She likes the bright yellow 

lemons and waxy habaneros sitting atop her frozen meals 

and microwavable brown rice. Today, the lemons are larger 

than she’s ever seen, and the habaneros bulge misshapenly. 

She puts twelve of each into the trolley, laughing at the 

expression of the woman behind her in the queue. “You’ll 

explode,” the woman says. “Habaneros are good on water 

crackers with boiled egg,” shesays, but keeps to herself the 

small snap-lock bag with chopped habanero in her 

handbag—for all of those bland moments dished up on 

large white plates. “And the lemons are for preserving in 

jars as gifts.” She thinks of yellow mouth-filling slices, and 

of a nestling glass of wine; of her lover’s mouth tasting of 

sour heat.

Poems by Daniel Y. Harris

Extract from The Metempsychosis of Salvador Dracu Volume VI, The Posthuman Series

2.0123

An occurrence in atomic facts: Bpflock
in GLASS-z13 as feuilletonistica—the host
            pid (possédé) with its cum
            grānō salis in poiein
txts CONFIG_BPF_LSM=y.
This Männerbünde knot,
this rustfist spikes the mnem:
(L. trans-), methimpikehoses
for ANTI.

2.01231

Pursang’s zeroday bugs
in a MiCODUS GPS tracker (dis
           parvenus)—reperuse
           as clausus audits logs
for SIEMs.

2.0124

In a DevSecOps, the integrative
           guise (onticae)
           is a hypermnesiast—DAST.
Just a talismano.

2.013

Audisp (nullus), the last execve syscall
for this [(in)fidelium]: torfian
then isoglossia—VPN. Cicatrix
           in dissemblerata (voucher
           for pseudo), if chiázō is a schize
as cleaver. Nmap over ProxyChains.

2.0131

Redspecks in the psychocrat—DWORD
oldprotect = lēmniscātus “exec_mem
          addr”, (void*): the master kibitzer,
          idot in pitch, in spall—speleology
(Ettercap) for the cipher. GOQL query:
the fuzzy set by δ(μ, ν), the tone class in C
           {Cn : n is an integer} = {..., C−2, C−1, C0,
           C1, C2, C3 ...}—transplanter la tête
d’un morveux, ‘.bss’: ignore [-w+other].

2.014

Stochastica: the MITRE ATT&CK
navigator—guerroyé.
           Hiśtor in TTPs.

2.0141

De Pracontal: the transgraft—promises
herald MitM Sidekicks as DHCPv6
           DNS attacks.
           This messianicity.

2.02

Oversingular:
NetBIOS-NS—spoof,
simp.

2.0201

Antibiographica, pylon: Niflungr
in the HTTPVoid, its OAuth IdP minus
Gewalttätigkeit equals its constituent
            parts—deodatus in the prang,
            the krbrelayx (ante portas).

2.021

Cyber Kill Chain (thēriakós, thḗr,
“beast”)—this perineuronal
           net, this loadbout: comp.*

2.0211

Hypotaxis: exploit the zysudo.suid
binary—illuminatus in TerraformGoat
           (‘ăzāzêl), its barren severity
           is Bund der Perfektibilisten.
This lyriker: expatior, MSF.

2.0212

Autoexposition in Rustscan,
the portexic—systemctl start
           postgresql (in- +terminer):
le tombeau. This alien ductusica.

2.022

            Autochthony: [das
Gastrecht]—dzudezmo in the tatsch.
Testify for Zeugnis [Sprache ist
Namen]: schtasks, certutil, netsh.
In this Gastgeschenk, MSFVenom’s
           cenotaph (und nicht übel
           ist) is husk.

2.023

Hālæġ Scriptura: x86,
[prononcée]—Stack
            and Heap.

2.0231

Diacritica, the foreleg’s exogamy:
SHA-1 Algorithm—A PEINE:
           superpose the transurp
           for KYC/AML in this Bibliothēkē.

           Use libc.blukat.me—QUIA PER
INCARNATI VERBI MYSTERIVM.
Haunt the crease: Quadrados Mágicos.
This blastscar configurates.

2.0232

Papeles for skivers—Maldev.
App:gui.

2.0233

Bionegat (LOLBAS): enführung
in punctus contra punctum—reallexikon,
           this singlebar virgula
           in the SSE Websocket
is trenchant (über den Abgrund.)
JTAG’s boundary scan.

2.02331

Díphthongos in Byzantine lingo: typedef
HINSTANCE (*ShellExecuteA)(sub specie
           temporis)—the autocatechist,
           speltic as in torcular (recta ratio),
           gropes syntax. This ferric plus

d’une langue—its teratology (paraflur),
hears the Enabot: psychosomes.

Immersio not asperio (Caesar Cipher,
Enigma, Bombe, RSA, ECC, MD5, Julia):
            circshift()—this lugrós, this dêjoue
(several things which have the totality)

contain ZKConfig.cfg files where Telnet
creds hardcode. Godscourge—(de futuro
versus de praesenti): unprop distinguish.
           Root:/var/zyxel/crontab: PoC
exploit—paulianoi not paulikianoi.
Deploy the patch.

Poems by Irene Koronas

Extract from gnōstos

NHC I,4

Address to Rheginus.

A hidden perspex on the hand
a receipt for arbitrary logic

His thid and her asic in the
second half of succumb

It is not entirely possible
except for the nous and Valhalla,
her avoid is very cautious,
a “Lent” for 6M

Unexplain 1939-45
the Shoah in a woofer,
an atom, a particle,
a cinder burnt by force

Here or below. Only the Jews can
swallow Death as if rehearsing
without being dead…

Kant can’t be against Dionysiokolakes,
or Pallas Athena; from the pit

Because the believers are also Greek
and will fall into insignias.
They refer to the term Pekhrestos

I am tied, I am tied to […]

… just a herd on leave…

Call it cattle car
and one appears in rust as a tattoo

no return the dim dirge
zelem 3761, (is he-) or kapos

Every one craves, if you will,
a genetic expert. A bloodline

The mise–en–scene,
an Epicurus in, “find a flake”

Adventavit asinus
Pulcher et fortissimus

An accord to incinerate
indifference as a power

A selfshelf ideal. A scroll with
bone phonemes

“Isn’t it yours” if it is yours
what am I, a transition

If the us is patient
to any question,

redact the tractate

NHC II,1; III,1; IV,1; BG 8502,2

The correlations between tongues,

about 72 structured speeches 

from taut memory they

open at random while their ears 

cover shacharits

Diogenes said to go close 

and connect the lesh. This

becomes the mallow sprinkle,

the aphelia on the last emanation,

the young aeon

what are tripartites? Two Sophias? 

Or is it Irenaeus and Hippo?

What remains:

The first prink

Projection

Passion

Conversion

(85.11-95.16)

Middle

The expulsion

The errors

The renaming of generators?

Reflex qualities in

a single multitude 

narrates the epistolary.

Collections produce 

one profit

The interim region.

The preexistent ground

Origen (185-254)

Pt.1

The unknow name.

The mouths ask.

To start the bend

they make visible their 

terse colvocals

The nusquamus want

to sway the direction

Pt. 2  

Like shoots

without a harness

Aeons conceal <s> outm.

The suggestion orders

the inimitable <…>. 

the birth marks thick 

movement. who immerses

[remains]

The capacity to trace 

and procreate what was said. 

The fragrance is defi onversis 

membra. We visit the fluid

Matter ordained, matter about 

sentiment, sediment

pt.3

litarians hide and demand

pt4

A different matter,

a contest between buzz 

commotion and three kinds 

of salvations Add another dismantle. 

The pile up. The second bluegray 

notion. This hump stop. We 

peddle decay