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Copyright 2022 The Parliament Literary Journal ISSN 2767 2158 print ISSN 2767 2166 online is published quarterly in November February May and August All correspondence should be sent via email to parliamentlit gmail com All rights are reserved by the artists and authors All works in the journal are fictional Names characters places and incidents are the products of the author s imagination or are used fictitiously Any resemblance to actual events locales or persons living or dead is entirely coincidental The Parliament Literary Journal and logo design are registered trademarks Submissions are accepted for our themed issues and contests via Submittable details on our submission requirements can be found at our website www parliamentlit com

4 5 6 7 Nikki Gonzalez 46 47 Leah Mueller 8 9 Michael Brockley 50 51 Gerard Sarnat 53 Franchesca Witzak 10 11 12 J P Sexton 54 Jay Nunnery 13 Mark Blickley 14 15 Ksenija Dakovic 16 17 18 Vin Whitman 56 57 58 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 DC Diamondopolous 70 71 72 20 Gurupreet Khalsa 21 Sarah Butkovic 22 23 Mark Danowsky 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 Niall Power Edward Michael Supranowicz 40 41 James B Nicola 42 43 David Blumenfeld 73 74 Deborah Johnstone 75 Bri Narick Lindsey Pucci 24 25 26 38 39 Christine Diane Allen Stephen Kingsnorth 44 Kevin Vivers 45 Jarrett Pitts In addition please enjoy throughout the pages a selection of various anonymous writers responses to our special social media call for manicthoughts Artistically Inspired Contest featuring the art of Angela McCarthy 77 Stephen Kingsnorth ARTIST S WINNER 78 79 Maid Corbic EDITOR S WINNER

Art we know inevitably imitates life Though it is often no fine line at all that separates an artist from their work but instead a thick and wide bog of gray that we trudge through connections revealed only in shadows and glimpses This is certainly true for my selection of each issue s theme I can t help but to extract from the situations in my own life from the things that are quietly gnawing in the recesses of my own mind at the moment There is without a doubt a bit of me in each selection even if they are pulled unconsciously But in calling these themes out in putting my voice to them I can stare them down and grapple with them What s more is knowing I have an entire community my parliament of writers artists and readers joining me standing ready to add their voices even if their own words with the theme may sound a little different than mine And so MANIA Characterized by the DSM V mania presents itself for clinical diagnosis as a distinct period of abnormally and persistently elevated expansive or irritable mood lasting at least one week Emil 1 Kraepelin described mania succinctly as increased busyness But we don t need clinical certification to know it It s the mind that just won t rest The energetic itch to just do do do something anything to stay busy and distracted The ideas the activity and the ego too all grown uncontrollably big We ve each contended with this to our own degree But we in these pages confront it with our talent We use our LANGUAGE We harness the words to square off with mania We SPEAK to it knowing that silence offers no power at all We will not hide behind others let them speak for us And we too take on the roots of the discord whoever or whatever it may be flaming its fires by addressing them insisting with our words that they step in front of us and be dealt with It s scary no doubt but our words are our weapons and our shields alike There are no cowards in these pages And as I promised as I always promise we take on mania in true Parliament style both reverently and irreverently as it deserves Our contributors works in the pages that follow battle with the theme with humor and stoicism with creativity and with hands open bare All possess 1 Kraeplin would go on to say of the sufferer of mania He begins to take part in social entertainments to write many long letters to keep a diary to go in a great deal for music and authorship Especially the tendency of rhyming is usually very conspicuous Of course it s the writers eh Kraepelin We re the ones who know how to write the shit out of the hard stuff But perhaps in these pages then pay particular attention to the rhymers 4

bravery They could have chosen to cower into silence Instead they face it with their own words This includes submissions to our extra call on our social media pages for manicthoughts Throughout these pages are people s thoughts the funny the serious and the disturbing alike sent in and shared boldly BUT Permit me a moment to step up on my soapbox and veer slightly now Here is where things get personal There is a disparity in perception of mental phenomenon like mania one that spans all of history Try something with me Let s play a little word association to access the schema folders of your brain that propel your thoughts and interactions unconsciously on a daily basis Ready When I say emotionally hysterical you say _______ When I ask you to close your eyes as I say emotionally hysterical what picture paints in your mind More specifically who comes to mind Is it a woman You couldn t be faulted if she does A misogyny lurks and it s been sneaking squatting there for some time The word hysterical comes from the Greek hystera meaning womb originally believed to be the physiological center to hysteria s onset In Ancient Egypt for example spontaneous movements of the uterus were blamed and uterine repositioning treatments were performed Sex however was the cure put forward by Greek physician Melampus who posited uterine melancholy I kid 2 you not and its resulting hysteria symptoms stemmed from lack of orgasms I recently read the National Book Award winning collection of short stories Fortune Smiles by Adam Johnson in which he writes Interesting fact The kanji for irrational I learned is a combination of the elements woman and death Surprisingly it would be Sigmund Freud the notable misogynist himself who would allow for the consideration of male hysteria But that s still thousands of years of deeply rooted beliefs to contend with And the word too remains And damn do words matter Language is power in scripting our perception So as a result she comes to mind She is labeled with words like coercive and manipulative She 2 Tasca C et al 2012 Women and hysteria in the history of mental health Clinical Practice of Epidemiological Health 8 110 119 doi 10 2174 174501790128010110 5

is emotional She is not given the benefit of clear perspective because your opinions of her have been long ago shaped even if you don t know her With only fragments of her story you have already shouldered her with your judgment rather than offer the assistance she asked for She doesn t get believed Even as she has the evidence ready in her hands to present But she ll learn She won t ever return to you for help again We have painted the pages of this journal all of us of all gender identities with our evidence in words and art We vocalize even in the face of fear Believe us or not Label us manipulative or not But here we are our feet firmly planted ready to scream if we must at the mania and the labels and labelers both We don t cower in silence There is no safety there after all There are no solutions there We speak bravely Let me step down now off of this box Let me take a defiant breath I m certain you those of you that needed to hear this those of you who my finger points directly at hiding though you may be have heard me after all and understood But let me continue to talk about bravery for just a moment longer This bravery comes in the form of a diminutive woman of just 18 years A woman whose origins could very well have scripted her life powerless Instead she is here on these pages boldly And I am in such awe of her she must know Angela McCarthy provided the art for this issue s Art Inspired Contest and I am delighted to showcase her talents that are only beginning to emerge into their full potential Angela s personality oozes into her work Raw Powerful Confident Art imitating life as it does We have both chosen our favorites from the overwhelming stack of responses We hope they speak to you as they did for us I ll close this letter with this a seemingly simply expression of gratitude though truly it is anything but simple at all Thank you to our contributors and to you our readers who join us and embolden us to continue to face the themes of life Nikki Gonzalez I love you 6

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and a congressman with an aversion to state of the art bridges broadcasts his fantasy of murdering a brown woman in a pre holiday cartoon and the last white rhinoceros has a bodyguard to protect it from poachers and slowhand and van the man complain about mask mandates that interfere with their playing arena concerts and the kid who killed two men who are not to be called victims ekes out a tear at his staged trial and whatever happened to stacy abrams and someone somewhere is shooting a wolf and virgin condors are laying eggs without mates and except for you none of the customers in culver s wore a face mask today and the thirteen congressmen who voted to repair potholes are on double secret probation no that s not true their pre holiday gifts are death threats and don t mention school shootings and stay mum about black men and women being shot and strangled and hanged and the seventeen year old son of the guy you didn t vote for tried to vote for his father twice and you re too old for another german shepherd and starbucks quit selling toffee nut lattes and a billionaire bought all of olive garden s dolcini desserts and none of the restaurants in the midwest serves tilapia anymore and you think you might look for a poodle or a cairn terrier and a billionaire ignored a warning light on his rocket so he could be the first of his kind in space and you haven t had a raise in six years and why didn t your juneberry and pear trees bear fruit this summer and don t tell anyone your state is the home of the candidate who said women can shut their bodies down to prevent conceiving through rape and what is exceptional about fighting wars forever and gas is 3 29 at pump n pay today and the neighbor s pit bull jumped the fence this evening with a chew toy in its mouth on a mission to find a buddy to play with and the women of texas are hostages in the book of american lamentations and a lone star school board fired a black principal for running a public school that teaches history and you worry as the holidays approach whether the possum you saw once this summer will find shelter against the ice storms to come 8

A Motherless Day on West Seventh Street in 1969 A vase with three wilted lilies sits off center on the table in the dining room where my father trembles as he says You re the most worthless son He shakes his fists at the disappointment that repulses him He raises his voice Twenty one years old and you can t start a lawnmower Or build a sandbox I am the fool who lost his last chance job at the fiberglass insulation plant A bowl of dusty Butterscotch candies rests at the far end of the table My breath tastes sour Neither of us has brushed his teeth I stand before my father s prediction You ll never amount to anything much more than a ditch digger A Pomeranian with an overbite worries itself at our feet Sunlight prisms my eyes from the east windows Pimpling my face with another dose of shame I see how rage clenches my father s eyes into ruthless squints He says You wet your bed for eighteen years You killed your mother And once again my father restrains himself from blackening my eye or breaking my nose Maybe with the last vestiges of love Michael Brockley is a retired school psychologist who lives in Muncie Indiana where he is looking for a dog to adopt His poems have appeared in The Parliament Literary Journal The Pine Cone Review and Visiting Bob Poems Inspired by the Life and Work of Bob Dylan Poems are forthcoming in Last Stanza Poetry Journal Marrow Magazine Borderless and Down in Dust 9

Alone Time Thoughts drip forming rivers in my mind Like windowpane rain Demons demand my time Lurking waiting to strike without warning The past has passed but has not gone away The future has them too They loom dark as plague Threatening Drip drip they seep into my mind and start meandering 10

Torn Apart Baby shoe on the stair Memories tear strips of flesh from my mind School book on the floor No use anymore Should I send them but where For such tough mettle like Hansel and Grettle I pick among the clues but am clueless The silence is obscene Is this a kidnap scene or a land version of the Marie Celeste Like a refugee your decision to flee and disappear into thin air floored me 11

Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrob Remember when you wrote your initials on my cock And when it was erect you wrote the name of the village you came from in Wales J P Sexton grew up in the most northerly point of Ireland the Inishowen Peninsula He writes about his native homeland people and places around the world where he has lived and worked and basically all kinds of random thoughts He has been published in The Irish Times The Garda Review Magazine and The Connaught Tribune In 2016 his memoir The Big Yank Memoir of a Boy Growing Up Irish was published on Amazon as was Four Green Fields in 2018 He is currently editing a sequel to his memoir titled Drawn to Danger working title 12

Gravity Grateful Mark Blickley grew up within walking distance of the Bronx Zoo He is a proud member of the Dramatists Guild and PEN American Center 13

Ginger bug I m trying to write what comes in my head i think it s better if i wind up dead that rhymes maybe i should be some kind of poet but ive always found it kind of hard to explain how i think in words and not pictures no thats not right its not words its feelings how i think in feelings and not words i suppose if everyone could read each others minds it wouldnt make much of a difference because we wouldnt be able to understand it anyway like how my boyfriend can probably see in 3d in his head because he has dyslexia but if you asked me to picture an apple i would just taste it in my mouth and its really annoying trying to explain or pitch something to someone cause the words never come out right im always ending first and then a bit of the middle but oh wait i forgot to introduce you to our main character her name is and then i have to question why its always easier to write women when sometimes i dont even feel like one but what even is a woman and how does one feel like one i keep thinking of the time when it first clicked that my brain was broken i couldnt fathom how my best friend had such an easy time doing laundry and showering everyday i thought it was just as difficult as her like atlas pushing a boulder uphill or whatever no its sisyphus and everyday just feels more and more sisyphean and thank god for spell check because i couldnt have told you how to spell sisyphean until literally just now this is a pretty accurate reflection of whats in my head that is of course behind the mound of chores and grocery lists and laundry lists and what are we missing in the kitchen and what do i need to do i keep forgetting why do i keep forgetting i can smell oranges i used them in a marinade today its so different making everything by hand and appreciating the little things i guess i could have just continued 14

bought a tub of hummus or a jar of peanut butter and not totally fucked my blender but sometimes you just get the urge like the ginger bug bubbling away in the fridge and you just gotta know how its made did you know that the ginger plant is believed extinct the thing you make real true ginger beer with they used to make it like that in the uk before world war two but id really have to look it up to know all the facts but in nineteen thirty or forty something they made so much ginger beer that they used up all the plant or something its sort of like kombucha but ive never had that so i dont know what it tastes like but i mean the process is the same and anyway the point is that the ginger beer you buy in the store is not true atual ginger beer because it has to have that plant mother thing in it to be true actual ginger beer i get tired doing this because theres so much i want to say but i cant figure out what to focus on and like stephen king ive always been bad at endings Ksenija Dakovic was born and raised in Zimbabwe She currently resides in Belgrade Serbia Ginger bug is her first published work 15

Rhymes With Christopher December 14 2017 The pedophile saint needed to be replaced so I applied A week long interview ensued They vetted every centimeter of my biography They needed street names from when I was a newborn sinner crying non stop in my mother s arms outstretched on a roof in Gainesville daring not to drop me in the bin below Start from the beginning they said Leave nothing out so I inhaled They were very patient I was not Taking up so much space on memory lane Made angry chemicals back up like ships blaring fog horns A dystopian wail as we cruised by childhood homes little general stores comedy clubs funeral parlors When I plowed ahead they pulled me back gently There s a hole in this plot that could continued 16

suck a flock of maggots from their flyhood they told me on Wednesday the 13th It was then I assumed I d lost the position But Thursday came they called me from the roots of my regret to ride the magenta chakra all the way to the boss s office where I was asked one final ultimate paramount thing If you could be one dessert what would you be Black licorice I said without missing a beat The boss his bouquet of theys applauded my pedaphobic choice pinned to the flesh of my chest a nametag that stung like a nova St Dystopher it said I couldn t breathe Congrats bro said they he 17

Praise for the Doppelgangers PRAISE your very own doppelganger living in every single city and isn t it lovely I m someone s doppelganger too The favor reflects itself over over in all the time zones ever I was waiting trapezoidally at the doctor s office one day my mom walked in trippily I rose from my seat to greet her but she ignored me heading straight to the check in window instead She s just getting checked in then she ll see me say hi I thought But when she turned I could suddenly see It wasn t my mom all com but some imposter who d borrowed her posture her wardrobe her aura I felt my mind trying to grasp this mechanically clumsily Finally I picked up my phone dialed her just to make sure Vin Whitman is a former funeral director radio host and poet living in Jasper Indiana Vin s chapbook True Stories of the Odd Equinox is available from Alien Buddha Press Vin s poems have appeared in The Bitchin Kitcsh Crow Hollow Peeking Cat and Yellow Chair Review 18

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Proportion Ah they re all the same men I mean James Merrill Postcards from Hamburg Circa 1912 It brings down kingdoms careers entire religions of do s and don ts to poke or not to poke and when and where multitudes of women shrouded because the apparatus must not be tempted aroused swelled a thing of power control yet not controlled willingly must be wrenched torturously into submission and if not blame a woman Mistaken lost tortured beyond belief in its amplification gritty insistence out of proportion to consequence profundity Needed we are human after all such a little thing the instrument of creation and does God have one and if so where does he poke it and if not then God is a woman clearly But I know better that God is none of the above and seventy two virgins obtained from where vast numbers of innocent babes snatched from life unaware of an awful future to satisfy the drunken martyrdom of a poor deluded wretch a sad goal and what happens to those seventy two girls once the taking is complete they fade away return surely not again and then heaven is over a study and a mission of Where To Poke It Next Gurupreet K Khalsa is a current resident of Mobile Alabama having lived previously in Ohio Washington State India New Mexico and California She holds a Ph D in Instructional Design and is a part time instructor in graduate education programs Her work has appeared in The Poet TL DR Press New York Quarterly Far Side Review Necro Productions IHRAF Publishers aurora journal Last Leaves Delta Poetry Review Ricochet Review Pure Slush and other online and print publications Several poems have won awards 20

cherry tomatoes She was looking at me from across the table with beguiling eyes As soon as I sat down in front of my sterling silver I could feel them on me like hot incandescent stage lights They were watching me sagacious watching as I picked up my glass of water and brought it to my lips watching as I wiped the dampness from around my mouth Curious eyes they were Ogling me like I was the first woman they d ever seen in their life And I didn t dare meet their gaze despite how easy it would have been All I had to do was look up a gesture so innocuous that no one would ve batted an eye Pretend to glimpse the clouds the way the sun was slanted on our dinner table the ketchup stains on the worn tablecloth anything that would have given me an excuse to glance at him for even a moment Keeping my eyes fixated on the wilty spinach salad in front of me may have been the hardest thing I had to do in my life And that wasn t a hyperbole Four tomatoes sliced down the middle Were they cherry or grape They looked too rounded to be cherry but had too many seeds to be grape Maybe they were some sort of heirloom How s your food dear I looked up stunned feeling more exposed than a bathtub murder victim body naked sprawled out for everyone to see up close For a second I d forgotten there was anyone else around me I blinked rapidly and glanced down at my food once again I couldn t bear to glare at those damn tomatoes anymore all red and fleshy and gushing with seeds skins wrinkling ever so slightly from the sting of the sun This is it I thought I m going to be lovesick all over the table Sarah Butkovic received a BA in English from Dominican University this May and is currently pursuing an MA in English from Loyola University As a writer Sarah has published creative and journalistic work within and outside an academic setting with fiction featured in Dominican s literary magazine Stella Veritatis as well as two independent magazines New Contexts and Academy Press 21

Caffeine 22

Rocket Boy Lindsey Pucci has a B S in Art Education from U W La Crosse where she was the recipient of the Carol Quillins Scholarship Award for her digital photography Her work has been shown in the La Crosse Center for the Arts and The State Street Gallery in Wisconsin as well as being published in Nightingale Sparrow She teaches and lives with her husband and young son in Minnesota 23

Shield Assessment upon waking at 9 42 a m Lung capacity severely impacted Oxygen to brain impacted Thought patterns non linear 50 scattered Negativity moderate Oxygen in blood impacted Circulation impacted Temperature regulation impacted Muscle tension moderate to severe Body pain moderate Joint pain high Eye function blurred pressure behind left eye Skin dry clammy atypical armpit sweating Teeth clenching with frequency Nose running dry Chest congestion high tight Neuroticism moderate Rumination n a Edginess moderate to high Feet sweaty Attention Focus compromised General mood irritable Patience threshold impacted Self image low Personality stability relatively static Identity relatively stable Introversion high continued 24

Extraversion limited Energy low Energy reserves depleted Observation ability impacted Sensory defenses low badly compromised Sense of time somewhat impacted Sense of purpose questionable Self awareness impacted Fixation low to moderate see neuroticism Joy low Frustration significant Light sensitivity notable Sound sensitivity high Visual chaos sensitivity moderate Coordination questionable Avoidance moderate Ability to self calm impacted Ability to unwind n a Panic mild to moderate Impulsiveness moderate Perfectionism low Perception of being in danger high Hypervigilance high Dissociation n a General awareness impacted Mental acuity low to moderate Memory questionable Ability to form plans heavily impacted 25

Convergence The dieffenbachia on my fridge is pissed I am too afraid to microdose One of my oldest friends will be at the Hugo awards tonight I m sampling Dorito s Blaze as a Brand Ambassador The dog had another accident I failed to notice until too late I ve worked 11 days in a row It s not work I m tired of Mark Danowsky is Editor in Chief of ONE ART a journal of poetry Senior Editor for Schuylkill Valley Journal Poetry Craft Essays Editor for Cleaver Magazine and a Regular Contributor for Versification He is author of the poetry collection As Falls Trees NightBallet Press and JAWN forthcoming from Moonstone Press 26

His ego inevitably became more than he could carry And so he stumbled 27

The Bugs The bugs live in my microwave Every night when I walk into the kitchen and flip on the light they scatter around the counter dozens of them then sprint underneath and behind the black and grey box I can t remember if I hate bugs or not They seem like creatures I would hate I know I hate snakes I certainly hate snakes But bugs These ones at least don t really bother me I try to remember a specific time when I hated bugs when I felt grossed out or afraid of them Well there was the tick that gave my old dog Lady Lyme s Disease which ultimately killed her Poor Lady But that was more anger at the situation and maybe at God and less of a hatred of bugs kinda thing Last week I was watching a Sunday morning news show and saw that one of the members of The Talking Heads had written a tell all book He was reciting stories of the late 1970s about what this band member said and how the other made him feel How did he remember so much How do so many people remember so much There hasn t been a decision not to kill the bugs I just started not killing them I have killed a few for sure I ve taken a paper towel like six or seven pieces of paper towel and crunched them up into a big ball and pinched a few bugs underneath it I ve stepped on a few too My dogs especially Ruby whenever they see these little bugs scurrying on the kitchen floor love to toy with them They paw at them and lick them up and spit them out and watch them die My two dogs two mutts with golden hearts and placid eyes in my view are the most precious loving creatures on this earth Two animals I feel bad leaving alone to go out and run errands because of the sad looks on their little faces that tie these knots in my stomach They torture and mutilate these bugs So yeah a few times I ve pulled the dogs away and stepped on the bugs quickly to put them out of their misery Then a few times late at night or when I am running late for a work call I see the bugs on the counter rushing under and out from under the microwave and think eh it s okay I won t kill this one I turn the light back off in the kitchen and head into the living room After only a few occasions of mercy I correct this and make a decision to kill the bugs While before the mercy it was a reflex a societal norm see a bug squash a bug Now I would flip the light on and see a bug and have to think I am going to kill this bug continued 28

And I do I kill the bugs Same deal paper towel bunch the crunch between my fingers And it doesn t feel good I think about it after I do it I think about it some more I start to reflect on a bug s life As a vegan and a dog owner where is the line I m drawing What makes these little centimeter sized bugs with their little wings any different from a bird a pig My two dogs Ruby and Ice Queen and myself Then I meet Todd What a strange thing it is to meet him now I am 52 have been alone for many years and have stopped doing anything to make myself anything more than presentable for work My friend sets us up and I show up And he shows up He seems nice taller than I am and skinnier in a healthy way like he jogs His hair is thin floating in the wind on top of his head I think he should shave it or wear a hat The way it looks now kind of reminds me of that president Just in the hair of course and thankfully he is the exact opposite of that president in every other way He s soft spoken kind and interesting in a way where it s like he isn t trying to be interesting which I guess I find interesting And more than anything else he wants to spend some time with me So it s been six or seven weeks of doing exactly that spending time watching movies ordering food cooking food talking and then yeah some other stuff I haven t done in a long long time Something I had stopped hoping for But as the saying goes When you stop looking it finds you or something Todd comes over with a new microwave in his trunk We are at my place because I don t want to leave the dogs tonight He understands this which is great and even though this has been the case for all dates but one he hasn t complained about it yet Ruby loves him but Ruby loves everyone Ice Queen tolerates him which is the best case scenario So he shows up and knocks on my third floor apartment door He s winded and at his feet is a brand new microwave He says little We ve talked about the bugs and he agrees they are coming from the microwave I have now He walks into the kitchen covers the old one with a big black garbage bag and carries it down to the curb out front I say nothing I just watch I walk into the kitchen as he heads back up and the empty area where the utility had been is covered in dead bugs They are splattered all over the wall that was hidden until moments ago It looks like a massacre I grab a clorox wipe and clean it up before he can see That night Todd falls asleep on my couch Ruby is next to him Ice Queen on the floor I walk into the kitchen and there are no bugs No one greets me I think hmm I guess they continued 29

really were all in the microwave I walk over to the window and look out at the black bag on the curb I wonder what will happen to them now Ruby has diarrhea which I guess is normal but it paralyzes me I can t watch TV every few minutes I look over at her and wonder if she has a stomach ache How would I know Thankfully I have the backyard and I can take her out in a hurry She goes and stands by the door if she has to go Such a good girl Ice Queen would just shit all over the floor if she was sick I watch Ruby squat her back legs shaking at this point nothing comes out I am so focused on her that I ignore Ice Queen who is too quiet so I swivel my head and see she is messing with an ant hill Her little snout has flattened it Her body is erect still but her peanut shaped head is vibrating as she destroys the miniature metropolis I rush over and push her off No She looks up at me like yo momma Look at this shit How can I expect her not to be fascinated by it These little mounds on the ground with thousands of these little creatures inside I would be interested too if I didn t know what they were of course I imagine being a dog is a lot like being a human before science When we would look to the sky and see clouds and the moon and stars and be inspired by the mere mystery of it all and could only assume it was God When a storm would crush your house and it could only be dark magic or wrath Maybe animals think like this majestically spiritually I imagine standing in my backyard not being part of this race of creatures that years ago decided to take all the wonder out of everything and replace it with our own data As if these numbers and charts and scales and facts are any less speculative and imaginary than aliens ghosts and a higher power Then I think about the civilization in the microwave which is now gone from the curb If that really was a city a dwelling If time moves differently for them and if they have been through a few generations in there a grandfather with his grandkids sitting around telling the lore about how his father settled this giant box And then it was lifted destroyed A biblical event with which there were no survivors except for the few that were out of the microwave gathering food the fathers who are left behind in the walls of my kitchen shocked and grief stricken that their wives and their babies were lifted by the man and the woman the gods the evil gods and destroyed Now they are alone destined to start again continued 30

Oh well I hear a shuffle a panic without words I look back at Ruby who I forgot about as I pulled Ice Queen off the ant hill She has a bird in her mouth I scream running over How did she catch it The bird is young fully formed and doesn t seem injured I pull Ruby off I slap her back lightly but yell loudly She drops the bird She hates when I m mad at her and she already thinks I am something that happens every time she is sick for a reason I can t figure out I turn around and Ice Queen s nose is back in the ant hill I scream at her too She looks up at me uncaring and immediately returns to her destruction I let it go The bird and whether or not Ruby will kill it is more important I pull Ruby by the collar and yell No No She cowers The bird is not dead but it s convulsing Flapping and bouncing off the ground I can see part of its insides intestines and organs pulsing outside its body Its beak is opening but no noise is escaping Ruby wants to finish it off and part of me wants to let her but she s already sick and this won t help I must be wailing because Joe my downstairs neighbor comes out Joe is a short heavy set man older than me by a decade a recently retired plumber What s wrong Are you okay I just point I cover my mouth with my hand He looks at the suffering creature Ice Queen did this huh He smiles Kill it It s suffering Okay okay You take them inside As I am walking through the little alley on the side of the two family home that leads to my entrance I hear the thuds of Joe s shovel landing on the ground I am relieved the bird is no longer suffering I am inside now rubbing both their mouths with baby wipes I can t stand still I m crying and I want to stop but I can t There is a knock at my door and I know it s Joe and really don t want to see him or have him see me like this But I answer He stands there so calm Ruby and Ice Queen join me at the door All four of us are murderers Joe makes some stupid joke to Ice Queen about the bird My brain doesn t process it How can he joke at a continued 31

time like this He tells me the bird is no longer suffering and just wants to make sure I m okay I lie and tell him I m fine Before he walks down the stairs he turns and says Hey there are a ton of fire ants out back there Maybe you shouldn t take the babies that s what he knows I call my dogs out back for a while You don t want to bring those things into your house OK Thank you I am going to see my daughter for two weeks in Pennsylvania but then I will get an exterminator I text Todd and tell him that both Ruby and I are sick and put our plans off for the following night I can tell he is not happy Todd brings his unhappiness over the next night instead and I compound it by saying I would rather not go to a restaurant Ruby has been sick and I want to keep an eye on her He responds with a lecture It s not normal to never leave your dogs alone They are dogs They will be fine Plus you said he was you know going normally this morning I don t know why he can t just say pooping He keeps half bringing it up all evening He asks if I was like this with my old dog Lady I tell him not really but I could bring Lady most places I can t do that with these two I mean I could with Ruby but definitely not Ice Queen and I would never separate them He seems to get over it We order some Chinese food He has this chicken with sesame seeds on it an egg roll and pork fried rice I think about how many different animals sit on his plate Their skin their meat them They had different personalities were from different places they had wanted to do something that day the day they were killed They were looking forward to something their next meal an affection from another bird or pig they lived with Something And there they were oily and half eaten on Todd s plate in my apartment I have some steamed vegetables and brown rice I put a piece of broccoli on my fork and wonder the same thing As kids we learned that plants were living right Yet even the continued 32

most staunch vegan eats plants I mean that s all they eat But I think as the movie I am not paying attention to blares away too loudly behind where I hold my piece of broccoli in front of my eye line if this was living how are we the vegans not making the same decisions that the meat eaters are making We are deciding that this living thing is less important and deserves to be destroyed by us Is everything okay with your food Todd is looking at me as I hold my fork in front of my face Yeah It s really good I put the little tree in my mouth and as I chew I hear screams echoing inside my mouth down my throat I start to see the change in my reflection within only a couple of days My cheeks look sunken they seem to start lower on my face It s no mystery I haven t had an appetite since the last night Todd came over which was over two weeks ago Since that night every time I take a bite of food I can hear it scream As I chew the screams fade but the projection of that living thing being stolen from its home the bush the field the vine the wind and entering my wet hot mouth being crushed drained of all its constitution and going down the dark tunnel into my acid filled stomach stitches across my mind Todd is coming over tonight and he wants to talk I know this is the end and I know I should care I was able to put it off the first few days the first week by lying about myself and the dogs but it quickly became obvious And I guess I do owe him this much He talks a lot about nothing About his feelings mostly I sit on my couch across from where he sits on my couch and I listen to this man this murderer talk about his feelings of loneliness anxiety disappointment This the same man who encouraged me and helped me destroy an entire population of living creatures I think I can see bits of dead flesh in his teeth The rest of the evening goes on without event Todd is looking at me a lot waiting for me to say something important something about us but there is no energy there for it and eventually he storms out slams the door as if hurting the door or it s frame could continued 33

prove any point after what I ve seen him destroy The only true way is reparation It s an old building so thankfully there are bugs ready with little to no help from me A few nights in when I turn off my kitchen light then forget I need a glass of water I go back in and there are two in the sink I look at them tread carefully and try not to scare them off I fill up my cup from the Britta and take out an apple I cut it into slices exposing its juices and leave it on the counter I switch off the light and take my water into the bedroom Ruby and Ice Queen follow We all sleep peacefully The next day after waking up to an apple with no bugs on it I stop by the corner store and buy a bag of cheap loli pops I open them and suck on them just for a moment each and start to leave them on the counter on the kitchen and bathroom floor I have to put up the gates so Ruby and Ice Queen don t go in and eat them up which I feel badly about but it s my job to help these creatures rebuild after I helped destroy their habitat Ruby s big brown eyes look up at me but as a dog parent you sometimes have to be firm and provide profound experiences they could never achieve with their limited consciousness I believe humans can increase the lives of other living things and this is our most overlooked calling Most of us make life intolerable for all our fellow species It takes a few days of leaving food out before the bugs really start to come It gets to the point where I can hear them scurrying around living creating a home I wonder if I will become a figure in their lore a sort of Greek tragedy about the god who at first unfairly punished and destroyed an entire civilization only to change her ways and build the greatest indoor bug population known to man Or bug This is the opportunity I have On the fourth day of my mission I get a phone call It s Todd Listen I didn t want to alarm you before I knew anything definite but a couple of days after leaving your place I found some bites on my stomach and on my legs They were bites of three or four in straight vertical lines I went to my friend Harry you know the dermatologist and he confirmed that they were bed bug bites I had my place checked into and thank god there are none here So I have to deduce that I picked them up at your place Bed bugs continued 34

Yes bed bugs Your place was the only place I have been where I could have picked up the bites I walk over to my couch and look closely I don t see anything I don t see any bugs on my couch Well that s the thing You can t see them They are too small I wait He says my name and I snap at him What You will have to get an exterminator in Do you need help with that I say no and hang up I m tired of his voice already even in this short conversation Could it be true Are there microscopic bugs on my couch in my bed A moment of disappointment interrupts my excitement when I realize this might be a ruse an attempt of Todd s to insert himself back into my life But it isn t Todd never calls me again and then the bites appear I get them everywhere all over my belly my legs my back my neck even on my hands I sit on my couch Ruby and Ice Queen with me and imagine them swarming me building their kingdom I wonder if life can be replaced I decide that no it can t We wouldn t give a murderer a pass because he had a child So my decision not to exterminate the bed bugs does not cancel out my previous holocaust I continue to leave food out Cornbread apples half finished lollipops which I put behind the toilet and in the corners of my bedroom Fruit flies come easily like ancient explorers after the publication of a new map All sorts of life appears inside my apartment They arrive in the thousands It s magical beautiful Where do they all come from I wonder It isn t possible that they are all born from my small adjustments to their habitat that I can cultivate this much life with such simple actions And if it is was I then a sort of God No This means they were already here and just waiting I watch television at night programs the news etc Fictional doctors and terrorists and real life politicians and news anchors all speaking about seemingly important things But all these things are made up involve their egos and where they saw their image in the story of life And here I am inside continued 35

these walls creating life beating hearts and minds that work toward goals There is but one earth that we know of and when we die at the end how much life did we bring into it How much energy is left over from our being here How much influence More weeks pass They just seem to keep going and I realize that I have less time All I can bring myself to eat is bread and some nuts I don t enjoy a single bite knowing that there are elements of living now purposefully murdered life within even these items I look at Ruby and Ice Queen They look older Their hair has changed colors Brighter in some areas darker in others They continue to eat twice a day and as I watch them inhale other living things I feel sorry for them They can t help it They can t know better Only I can I look in the mirror and can hardly recognize myself I m just a body The thing we leave behind for good reason I hope wherever I go next is wherever they go next I lay in my backyard I feel the worms on my skin I think I don t check I feel the mud It s nice and cold and damp from the rain that was here the past few days It s still grey and I wonder where the colors come from I try to look past the clouds towards the bright white that is the sky today and for the first time in my life in my 57 years I see it It s a dome a glass case I begin to laugh fully aware of how dangerous and menacing the laugh would sound to someone watching me But nobody is watching me My body bounces in the mud as I chuckle I can t control it and it feels so good to release it Here we are all of us me and my neighbors and the people driving past and the people on TV none of us any different from the bugs in my apartment from my lovely Ice Queen and my wonderful Ruby I get to exist here inside this glass case of a world creating life with the two most beautiful kind creatures I look over at Ruby She sits down suddenly and itches her stomach with her back paw I extend a hand neither dog thinks it s odd I lay in the dirt Ruby ignores it and goes over to sniff the same bush I have seen her sniff so many times Ice Queen sees my outreached hand out and slowly walks over to sniff it I look at my own arm and see it is covered in red ants They must have been using it as a bridge to somewhere continued 36

I study Ice Queen studying the ants Life purpose movement And then I see it It s right in the middle of her forehead A black dot I looked closer I get up on my elbow the same elbow carrying the colony of workers I forget they are there disregard what happens to them I move onto my knees I grab Ice Queen s collar and look close The black dot has legs It s crawling somewhere I lean in and pull it off her It s on my thumb It is a tick I crush it with my pointer finger I look like I am making the universal symbol for money I feel it curl and twist and I look It s crumpled destroyed dead There are small stains of blood on my fingers Ice Queen is safe I get up dust my body off with my hands grab the leashes whistle and we head inside Niall Power is a fiction writer poet editor and copywriter from New York City He is the author of Fall Risk a collection of poems and stories that was released by Michelkin Publishing in 2018 His upcoming poetry collection I Might Be A Plant is set to be released later this year by DropOut Publishing House a press he started in 2020 as well as his short story collection Dog Day Dream in 2023 Since 2016 his stories and poems have been featured in dozens of literary magazines and journals He worksas a creative brand narrative writer and copywriter for Reebok while he struggles with his first novel Simple Machines He lives in the north Bronx with his wife Bess and their two dogs Sky and Rudy Their son name TBD is expected to join them in June 2022 37

Angry Bones 38

On the Road Again Edward Michael Supranowicz is the grandson of Irish and Russian Ukrainian immigrants He grew up on a small farm in Appalachia He has a grad background in painting and printmaking Some of his artwork has recently or will soon appear in Fish Food Streetlight Another Chicago Magazine The Door Is a Jar The Phoenix and other journals Edward is also a published poet 39

The House of Other International House Harrisburg PA The carpeting is indestructibleThe walls and ceiling indestructibleThe closet s indestructibleThe bed is indestructibleThe kitchenette s been packed with such efficiency Microwave here refrigerator there Dish drainer tucked in barely by the sink that the design is indestructibleThe television s mounted in a corner nook with a crane for an arm brace that juts out in the room above eye level Remote of courseThe TV swivels but the set is bolted firm as stone indestructibleThere is one chair precisely from which to watch it but then I must massage my neck afterwards so swiveling it the TV that is I watch it lying down on the mattress with my head at the footA mattress that is indestructibleThe halfbath did you guess indestructibleI don t believe it s possible to stain the tile or porcelainOr is the shower plastic cast so thick as to be indestructibleYou know the hues there Walls that brilliant white that blinds you in the morning Plastic almond creme just off white so the two can only vibrate under the bullying fluorescent light and throttle you into morning consciousnessThe blinds can move but only to reveal a giant white P in a bold blue square and the monotone glare of the neon from the garageConcrete and corrugated sheets of steelSo many levels as to blank out most of the skyThe whole place 9 x 12 or so It is my room at the International House Outside the room is a common room for all where the sofas sag beneath their batik buntings fading like nothing in the private rooms There young foreign persons are passed as they pass their time But as I m only going in and out my smile and nod and interest and theirs last but an instant eager to dissolve Downstairs however there is a corridor and a hall for functions with a spanking grand wood floor and kitchen for events not too unlike the setup of any church basement but the linoleum is new and appears to be indestructible as do the snug wood louvers cabinets and the smooth faced glowering yet inviting function room floor On the wall in the corridor a map of the world with all the countries including the new ones I have yet to learn by heart has been tacked up hosting a motley array of pushpins mostly in capital cities There appears to be one for each accent I think I ve heard upstairs One day I notice there s no pin for me so I take one from the cork board and put it in my home I m the almost local from New York Should I go back further and put one in Worcester one for place of birth and one for place of residence continued 40

Torn by the quandary while conning the map which is about the size of an embrace I do not hear the footsteps stop until I m stopped by a voice I ve never heard before behind me Neu Yerk And that is the beginning Soon I know everyone in The World and long weeks out of town fly by too fast the walls of time itself come crum bling d o w n James B Nicola s poetry and prose have appeared in the Antioch Southwest Green Mountains and Atlanta Reviews Rattle Barrow Street Tar River and Poetry East garnering two Willow Review awards a Dana Literary award one Best of the Net nom and eight Pushcart nominations His full length poetry collections are Manhattan Plaza 2014 Stage to Page 2016 Wind in the Cave 2017 Out of Nothing Poems of Art and Artists 2018 Quickening Poems from Before and Beyond 2019 and Fires of Heaven Poems of Faith and Sense 2021 A Yale grad he also has enjoyed a career as a stage director culminating in the nonfiction book Playing the Audience The Practical Guide to Live Performance which won a Choice award 41

Depth Charge ASDIC for the fathom deeps Marianas shallow end within Tardis trace the space enter through the inner ear active listening cognitive into orbit misty eyes Pinhead angels out of mind forget all such outlandish signs what hard drives momentum s charge flip flop flap r le turnabouts Coddled addled chicken egg modelled muddled design brief bible babble towers inbred fiddled faddled nonsense said Retching out what s reaching in gagging on what s gone before slumming it with squatters rites flowing through the outlet pipe Smokeless fuel yet fire at core amber embers umber burnt portrait bloom from dark milieu hinterland for paradigm parallels not parachute continued 42

Drive by strive by driving range planished patten pattern laid dimples beaten smooth outside molecules have rough old time structures stressed and rearranged template human archetype Poetic forms or prose reports taking waters verbal spar other name for rose is thorns glass half empty eyes fill up Stephen Kingsnorth Cambridge M A English Religious Studies retired to Wales UK from ministry in the Methodist Church has had pieces published by on line poetry sites printed journals and anthologies most recently Academy of the Heart and Mind The Parliament Literary Magazine Poetry Potion Grand Little Things The Poet Magazine His blog is at https poetrykingsnorth wordpress com 43

Whirling Dervish A statement from Kevin Vivers I am constantly amazed by what the world has to offer if one just takes the time to see it 44

Personality Test Which fictional character are you Answer truthfully these questions Do you often feel like you are misunderstood By others Or yourself Do you communicate as a whisper An avalanche of crashing gunships Do you feel a special kinship with the alley cat Do you play well with others On a scale of 1 to 5 Industrious or lazy What would you murder with an hour of free time At a party Fly on the wall The punch bowl Are you one to fidget Anxious at prospect of single place mat This psychometric mythology Aims to anthologize A universal milieu to walking clay caricature Which fictional character are you Answer truthfully Do you believe yourself to be an answer or a question Jarrett Pitts is an American poet His poems have appeared in Poetry Nation 8 Poems DREICH and The San Diego Poetry Annual He currently lives in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina 45

Open Letter to a Part Time Boyfriend G The two of us have known each other for 14 years even though we ve never been together in any traditional sense but now you say you want to leave everything behind including both of your hometown girlfriends and come to live with me in Arizona Am I supposed to believe you re serious about migrating to the Southwestern desert You are as Midwestern as a corn dog with your aw shucks demeanor like you re auditioning for the Andy Griffith show except you re really walking around doing selfish terrible things to people You say you re a better person now that you re more mature but I have heard that line of shit before and have maybe even fallen for it a couple thousand times I think you re just scared of growing old by yourself because it has finally occurred to you that such a thing could happen It hits single guys after age 50 like one of those Warner Brother cartoons where a character gets beamed by an anvil that says 500 pounds and then crumples to the ground and lies there with stars spinning above his head Your member doesn t sit up like a puppy for treats anymore so you have sudden visions of yourself with pee stains on your underwear slumped alone in front of a television You don t even own a television You d need to go out and buy one knowing that all you re going to do is watch it for the rest of your life It s either that or me and I am obviously the better choice because the food and the sex and the furniture are better You think I don t remember what you were like ten years ago when you were banging three different women in one weekend on your rock hard futon without even changing the sheets But I do remember and I run a reel of it through my mind every time I want to surrender and love you for real I loved you then in a Courtney Love kind of way but that was obviously toxic and I don t see how our relationship can possibly settle into some cozy armchair thing now I kept some of that obsessive love and folded it up like one of those paper fortune tellers I made when I was a kid It s in my pocket and I remove it sometimes and I stare at the surface without even knowing what I m looking for I can barely decipher the words because they re partly rubbed out but if I hold the paper to the light I see tiny block letters spelling fear There is also a faded black and white outline of your face and you re smiling like you want me to reconsider You re the kind of guy who tries to sleep with his wife s sister I know continued 46

that was long ago when you were still in your twenties and you were too young to get married in the first place but you should have just dealt with it Instead you showed up unannounced on the young woman s porch and acted like you were just there to talk but you really wanted to casually bring up the topic of sex She got embarrassed and made an excuse to go inside and when you finally got home your wife was furious because she already knew about everything Her sister had called as soon as you left and shared the whole story so you and your wife wound up going to couples counseling for several years as a result of your idiocy It s hard to know what you learned if anything since you still act like you re obsessed with pursuing women you can t possibly have and then getting bored after you have them I figure you ll get bored with me too and you won t treat me any better just because you think I m so goddamned unique and wonderful Everything is kind of sparkly now because we hardly ever see each other and when we do it s like we re always having new relationship sex Wherever we go we radiate pheromones that hover above our heads like flocks of mosquitos in a windstorm People are drawn to us and they want to be part of whatever secret we re sharing but they can t get there because it only belongs to us That s the crazy glue that binds us together despite our long impossible history of failure and redemption and dissolution and reunion I know who you are and I know what you re capable of doing to me and yet I can t tear myself away from you without ripping myself in half You are barreling in my direction and there is no way I can stop it and I am not sure if I even want to We re both afraid to face the terrible possibility of growing old alone and then dying and not having anyone around to identify our bodies But most likely death isn t half as bad as people think It s the part before dying that hurts the worst and that part can continue for years and years without ever getting better until finally you have no time left Which is why you want to spend those last remnants of your life with me instead and why I am going to say yes despite my better judgment I guess maybe we deserve each other after all L Leah Mueller is an indie writer and spoken word performer from Bisbee Arizona She is the author of nine prose and poetry books published by numerous small presses Her latest chapbook Land of Eternal Thirst Dumpster Fire Press was released in 2021 Leah s work appears in Rattle Midway Journal Citron Review The Spectacle Miracle Monocle Outlook Springs Atticus Review Your Impossible Voice and elsewhere Visit her website at www leahmueller org 47

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A M Associative Manipulate massive mathematical model properties properly manic macho Manichaean binary bullshit crapola cursed Mexican Modelo s tumaceous truck swerves stuck Her heavenly titillating teats whetted wedding wet diddle dawn dreams spooned Saddle your yipyap up underneath neat pink plastic dapper Dr Seuss sheets Bubbly Barbie willful wife transmits to creamy custard bullous bloated me matriarchal love laboriously pressed presaged by both of our continued 50

never nada guiltless geriatric monogamy mine certainly curtains to touring Ger s genetic pool paper scissors shoes whose wandering noisy nurturing boomer boomerang business busted rocking rapacious life lusted totally toward glossless grim bodacious breath s rasty rusty razor raison d etre demented voila victorious Freudian free fickle fin threatening thin now nauseatingly pickled penis Gerard Sarnat won San Francisco Poetry s 2020 Contest the Poetry in the Arts First Place Award plus the Dorfman Prize and has been nominated for handfuls of 2021 and previous Pushcarts plus Best of the Net Awards Gerry is widely published including in Hong Kong Review Tokyo Poetry Journal Buddhist Poetry Review Gargoyle Vonnegut Journal The Los Angeles Review and The New York Times as well as by Harvard Stanford Dartmouth Penn Columbia North Dakota and University of Chicago presses He s authored the collections Homeless Chronicles Disputes 17s Melting the Ice King Gerry is a Harvard trained physician who s built and staffed clinics for the marginalized as well as a Stanford professor and healthcare CEO Currently he is devoting energy resources to deal with climate justice and serves on Climate Action Now s board Gerry s been married since 1969 with three kids plus six grandsons and is looking forward to potential future granddaughters 51

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Paradox How many times must I learn that I am nothing but a placeholder for the broken hearts of man breaking and entering into a life that was never mine until I am found and removed like a pest in someone s bedroom I am simultaneously everything and nothing too much and not enough a whisper and a shout a cry and a laugh a hope and a doubt The doll with which a child plays until there is a shiny new toy on the market leaving me to sit and rot in the basement I am the meaning of life and the meaning of death a god and a devil fighting for purchase If only the skeletons in my closet could talk they d tell stories of a girl without a beginning or an end Franchesca Witzak is a college student studying Literature in southern New Jersey She enjoys reading writing poetry about her experiences and playing with her cats 53

If Hope Has Flown Away Shadowboxing barefoot in the grass my blood flows adrenaline pouring up and down my veins like all of my divergent lives peaking in the penultimate and systematic shuffling like the real thing in my mind a champion even without the gold and the jewels having won the battle and the war not knowing that such a thing was possible war being a span in which every moment presents itself as an unwinnable battle something decided my warm hands aching as my heart pumped the senseless further from whenever I had first killed Night after night and I cannot sleep and I walk the roads as they get darker and the streetlights create their shadows I never have a plan I kick through the door a gap in the bird s song emptying the night to a bolder dark and I let myself in believing that the cycle is aware of its spinning the answerless of the unasked in finishing what I start where the waters play their role flooding and cleansing the blood from yesterday s eons producing a scream with no image Temperature dropping beneath my fingers the delirium travelling like greed and strength were no more than another embodiment cold water shooting so much I had to clog the sink to silence all my thoughts connecting that past ours my love and this present and my future and then the water transforms my forgiveness I take my love Look at the wall s cracks Escape myself The heat testifies when the water takes my love To induce all my whiskey s fuel back where my still beating heart lays Progressing from room to room I am a visitor stuck to no realm going downhill her voice in my head as a revelation s crystalline strand intoxicated because kings do not want Everywhere within and without having to be the upmost and real and true how dreams inherit visions and how visions replace dreams Jay Nunnery is a writer teacher and musician who calls many places home Wisconsin New York Louisiana and California Recently he completed his short story collection Alms Louisiana a collection of twenty one interconnected stories Currently he is working on a screenplay called The Circuses when he is not teaching high schoolers or making music 54

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A Girl on the Road Somewhere in Idaho Unzip the self Curl the fingers scoop out the mess Wipe it on the table on jeans That s how it went four or more nights a week her emotions a quilt she carried everywhere to classes head weighted to the desk To work Did I forget your cream So sorry More butter pats To the beer garden where she dripped like sap into strangers ears spilling this trauma and that her eyes stained and flat like run over quarters I left her in a frosted field The night I ditched her she had traded her long johns and lucky sweater for a short filmy dress bursting with bright red and yellow flowers I could see through her I drove until my eyes grew heavy yet anxious for a sign Any sign I barreled down an icy gravel road through a snow studded Palouse An owl rose from the dark a whirl of wings winging clapping enormous feathered cymbals against a half scraped windshield I pulled over despite the drifting snow I didn t cry I didn t say anything She knew I would leave her eventually She stepped out shut the door I backed up She looked at me shielded her eyes from the headlights I turned around left for town From my rear view mirror I could see her black X of a mouth her pale partly veiled legs She is still there With her live a hundred dead men a thousand destinations They crawl up her legs like runs in nylons They search out the private folds continued 56

of her breasts her ears her naval her numerous lips They sail on her long hair in the cold March wind I drove back to check on her now and then I d find her deer eyed frost bitten wandering on the dark rough road We d stare at each other I d hold my breath lock the car doors I couldn t take it anymore the coming and going the days waiting the heady cologne The beer the smiles the Santana not a single assault erased How many days I d up disoriented locked between desire and regret the splitting between this self and that machetes worn dull blood run thin I keep her secrets and mine for the most part I m sure she understands She must understand Last night I saw her in a dream She is beautiful More so now than when we parted Her blue knees tremble Her teeth chatter Her icy hair has frozen into flags That scarf of a dress sometimes snaps up and back with the wind I miss the way she talked nonsense I miss the way her eyebrows drew together worms in love I carried an image of her for years My husband was jealous of what so I tore up the picture She is so far away She wants me to come for her but I can t go back I am intact Alive if numb Out of school and forgetting where I m going I carry fear and violence in my purse in the zipper continued 57

compartment in a red pen I dot i s and cross t s I can t wait to sleep every night I am terrified to go to sleep every night to face the life I have taken the girl I left behind I want only to slip away split all new spill my love spent scent all over a warm and empty room I can t go back I abandoned her for good The girl was a drunk She was so reckless out of control and ready to let me go Christine Diane Allen authored The Arc and the Sediment a novel Utah State University Press 2007 which won a best novel competition and best book length work publication prize from the Utah Arts Council as well as a silver IPPY and honorable mention from the James Jones First Novel Competition Her short fiction collection There s Death in the Balloon won best collection of short fiction and bridesmaid variety commendations from the Drue Heinz the St Lawrence Book Award and the Lorian Hemingway among others Likewise her poetry collection Multiple Choice Questions won second place from the Utah Arts Council She just finished a doctorate in creative writing at the University of Utah where she got an MFA and later taught writing and finished a hybrid memoir novel codex titled Spolia She has two great daughters and some semisurly cats She runs an editing business sometimes 58

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Life with Angie My sister Angie gives me outrageous material for my standup comedy She s a bona fide nut case a paranoid schizophrenic bipolar manic depressive you name it Angie fits every disorder that isn t wired to reality The voices inside her head tell her to run from anyone trying to help her except me I take my sister s sorry existence find the humor in it in the loonies of my own mind and make people laugh Do I feel guilty I m half Jewish half Catholic Humor is my way of coping Hell I m a female standup comic and there s no higher hurdle in show business Growing up bullies at school called me circus girl I m 5 10 big boned with short blonde hair I was gay and Jew bashed I rolled in the hurt turned it inside out and now make people laugh I m a babyface dykey looking pansexual gender fluid LA Dodger and Laker fan There have been days and nights when I ve had to search for Angie I ve become an expert on underpasses the noisiest the filthiest with the latest graffiti art I could be a docent leading tours I d recommend disposable shoes cheap socks and a jar of Vicks VapoRub to hold under the nose because the bouquet is out of this world When the audience leans forward I know I have them They re waiting for the punch line But I let the tragedy of Angie s existence sink in Like the time the cops took her into custody after she stole a crossing guard paddle and used it to direct traffic on the 134 freeway Angie caused gridlock for hours At the mental health facility she was a model of rationality with anger issues that she promised she d address She s instinctive that way knowing when to sane up Truth is the worry and stress have turned my comedy into a commentary on homelessness and the mentally ill I ve become an observational comedian like my idol George Carlin My 5 00 p m visit to Angie s crib an appliance box near the Golden State Freeway is timed before my 7 00 call for Anything Goes and with her reading of the sun s angle the real watch she calls it When I asked her how could she tell time when it s dark she answered When I sleep there is no time Angie s mind is a labyrinth catching words that relate in a flow all her own Are you hungry My stomach s vacant Are you safe My deposits are empty I weave that into my stand up too I visit Angie every afternoon It s a short ride on Interstate 5 from my apartment in Glendale to the Zoo Drive off ramp I m passing a homeless camp along the Los Angeles Aqueduct People are visible through the chain link fence Outside their tents they eat dinner from cans and talk to their neighbors Angie won t live in a tent and she won t be around people She s a fugitive always running from the voices in her head She was like the rest of us until a year ago when she turned twenty five Her transformation continued 60

happened gradually soon after my father s death I ve wondered if that triggered her illness She d withdraw hear voices tear out clumps of her hair be ecstatic then sink into a black hole where no one could reach her not even me We re more than sisters We re best friends Angie has always been willowy but would stare down anyone who d make fun of me I m three years older and have always taken care of her My air conditioning is on full blast in the bumper to bumper traffic I find humor everywhere Right now in front of me is a garbage truck Scrolled across the back in a flowing script are the words Nothing Like a Good Dump I ll use it tonight when I warm up the audience before the filming of the sitcom Anything Goes I m a laughter lube bringing the audience to the edge of their seats so they re ready to cheer for the stars I love my job The pay sucks but I recently scored a weekend gig at Flappers Comedy Club and I have a roof over my head that isn t made of cardboard I snack on saltines and a smoothie hoping my ulcer doesn t act up In the passenger seat is Angie s care package water trail mix granola bars Lorna Doones her favorite toilet paper five packs of wipes a clean sweatshirt and underpants I pass the same old billboards No matter what they advertise everyone smiles For once I d like to see families like mine I d like to see some genuine family friction arguing politics and money iPhones to the right of their knives something candid not canned Nowadays if we do eat together with my father gone and my sister out to lunch it s just my mother and me Ronnie you re head of the family now It s up to you to look after your sister Thanks Mom If you took care of your heart problem and diabetes you could help me roam the underpasses searching for her Of course I d never say that She has no idea how bad it really is I shift my Honda into the right lane for the off ramp Someone grabs my attention as they run across the overpass It s a woman She stops in the center of the bridge and holds up her middle finger to oncoming cars Holy Shit It s Angie My hand sits on the horn I drive up the ramp and hook a left hoping she doesn t climb onto the ledge of the bridge She s on the south side of the narrow walkway facing downtown She s giving the finger with both hands I m on the opposite side of the street I roll down the window and yell Angie She turns and my heart breaks Her swollen eyes are black and blue Her lip is bleeding I drive straight ahead into the zoo entrance and park I race across the street with the flow of traffic Adrenaline sweeps away the pain from my ulcer continued 61

Ahrah she howls a wild animal yelp With her fists she pounds the ledge Angie Vehicles speed 70 miles an hour or more under the bridge Vibration from the cars shakes the overpass Gas fumes noise the height and the power from the traffic zooming under my mind is swirling I m dizzy my sister s battered face comes into focus I grab Angie She wails as I force her skinny arms to her side and pick up all one hundred pounds of her Cars stop on the overpass Down Put me down she shrieks kicking her legs Stop it Let me go asshole I called 911 a man shouts from inside his truck No Angie screams freeing her arms and scratching my neck Damn it She thrashes I m losing She s wily presses her hand into my abdomen right where my ulcer is I let go She darts across traffic and takes off running toward Griffith Park I m racing after her dodging cars It s going to be okay Angie Not until she s treated will she have a chance for anything near okay But no one can force her That s the law Angie stops at the end of the bridge at a bumper railing that curves down an incline to her nest She s sobbing Bruises circle her arms I want to kill whoever hurt her You need to go to the ER Blood and dirt are caked in her long blonde hair Her cut lips tremble We ve got to report this She mumbles flicks her fingers Who hurt you Do you know him Stop she screams My car s across the street I have a first aid kit We ll clean you up I ve got food and clothes This is the worst My poor mother she d die if she knew what happened For a year Angie s survived on the streets and always by a freeway She says the noise helps to muffle the voices She s afraid of automobiles For her they re rooms with walls moving in all directions where she ll never find her way home On rare occasions she ll let me drive her to Denny s for a hamburger and fries I ve never betrayed her I ve always taken her back to her roost A siren blares then cuts off the 911 call continued 62

Angie runs I sprint after her catching up and gently take her arm C mon over there To my car We cross the street and into the parking lot She mutters to herself twitches her fingers laughs She needs a doctor I ve thought of taking a couple of my mother s Xanax pills and dropping them into Angie s water bottle Then what She d wake up in the hospital play lucid and run I d have to hunt for her all over again She s lived at the same off ramp for months It had my approval until now being the cleanest and safest the Beverly Hilton of off ramps and underpasses It s her favorite because she loves the zoo On a couple of occasions we ve gone inside walked around watched the gorillas and eaten hotdogs just like we did as kids But she can t go back to her nest not now I open the passenger door toss the care package in the back and ease Angie into the seat I m a mixed bag of rage sorrow and relief that she wasn t murdered Inside the car I reach for the packet of wipes and clean her face What did he look like I open the glove compartment and take out the first aid kit When did it happen Oh blah blah blah C mon Angie You want to see what you look like She laughs mutters to herself and plays air piano with her right fingers It needs to be reported I say taking a close look at the wounds on her face From the first aid kit I remove an antibiotic ointment and dab it around her eyes cheeks and mouth It stings She winces turns away and says NSFL Angie loves acronyms Not Safe For Life is a favorite Every smell in the city car exhaust cement garbage bins dirt has oozed into her pores I run a cloth over her arms take another wipe and clean her hands With her eyes closed she lifts her face toward the late afternoon sun and says 5 17 I ll be damned just like my watch It s over Angie Her face was once beautiful she looked like a young Cate Blanchett but has now been toughened by the sun the streets her sickness Seeing her beaten makes me want to rip out the heart of the fucker who did this You hear me It s over Don t cry Ronnie she says I flip down her sun visor and slide open the mirror Take a good look at your face and tell me you don t need help Angie flips up the shade It s tempting to feel sorry for her but that would be a further assault There are places that can continued 63

give you medicine a roof over your head Make you feel better You make me feel better I m just a Band Aid I don t make you get better Let me look at your scalp I need to know if it s still bleeding IDC she says I do care I answer One afternoon when I took Angie to Denny s our entire lunch was spoken in acronyms ICYMI OMG FYI BTW EOD I remember being amazed by ILYRSIPYB that she tossed off in a second and then hugged me She flinches when touched so when she embraced me I felt honored It took me days to figure out the acronym I love you Ronnie someday I ll pay you back Let me look I say Angie turns her head I separate the clumped strands and find the wound It s clotted I pour water onto a fresh cloth and dab it What was he wearing She looks out the window at Griffith Park and the Santa Monica Mountains I can report him But I need information She covers her ears with her hands I know when to back off but this is different The schmuck who hurt you is out there Blah blah blah blah blah she says shaking her head We sit together in silence although what s going on inside of me is a roaring chaos of WTF Do you want aspirin No Silence I m tense Angie s in shock and neither one of us knows the way out I ve got a cool apartment You can take a hot shower Brush your teeth I ve told you about Carlin He s the big fat tabby You d like him Wanna meet him I wanna go home You can t My estate needs me I want my stuff Here I say reaching behind and taking the package Put on fresh clothes Then we ll get your stuff and come back Angie changes I m hungry Cookies Jogger mix Currency You have me some continued 64

After we come back to the car LOL she says A crow has swooped down and helped itself to a man s French fries We laugh The moment is an escape for both of us I open the trail mix and hand her the bag She pours the dried fruit and nuts into her mouth Pieces fall on the car seat Hamburgers are the worst She stuffs as much of the burger into her mouth and then eats with her jaws open Angie s social graces fly over the coo coo s nest I can t help but compare her to who she was in the past refined even prim as she d dab the corners of her mouth She went everywhere with several bottles of hand sanitizer She had a boyfriend and worked at Macy s to help put herself through college Her last year at USC she made the Dean s List Peri Software hired her as a technical writer and then fired her when she sent out a mass email to her coworkers with pornographic images If her sanity returned she d be shocked by her behavior I should have let the cops take you to the mental health facility That place wears a headache You faked it It s Hollywood They wanted to help you Angie leads the way through brush and foliage We swipe away branches and forage through dense vegetation Nearby there s a trail that passes through a small narrow tunnel and runs parallel to the aqueduct It s 6 00 p m I need to be at the studio by 7 00 What s so important for her that she d come back to the place where she d been attacked Or was she assaulted somewhere else Angie s nest is in a small clearing The four sided jumbo Sony TV box she calls home has been smashed My old bed quilt is in a heap A filthy tarp covers a partial area of the ground Water bottles food wrappers and banana peels litter the area She s down on hands and knees squaring the edges of her house reminding me of a bird her thin limbs darting eyes the quick sudden movement of her hands if only she had wings Who crushed your house She shrugs I crouch down and say Take what you need and let s go You go Angie says You re not staying here She puts the piece of the tarp inside the box and flattens out the cardboard she uses as a roof Angie continued 65

Her right eye is almost shut Give me my finances My parcel That wasn t the deal C mon take what you need I m not sure what I ll do once she s back in the car I just want her away from here We ll find a new home She wobbles to her feet crosses her arms and gets in my face You ll jab me a knife I just saved you from being arrested Angie sucks on a strand of hair like a sulking child and moves her hips side to side Sometimes I ve wondered what s stronger love or guilt If I m late for work they could fire my ass C mon No I m not going to end up homeless like you Angie giggles You re mad I m not sleeping in this shithole Dirty word Daddy s angry The mention of my father startles me She knows he passed away It s been a year and a half since he died I wish he were here to help You come Or no money or package Naughty naughty pants on fire I m not going to live like Tarzan and Jane I bend forward trying to relieve the shooting pain in my abdomen Angie covers her ears with her hands She s testing me making sure she s the centerpiece of my life I want the night here She moves in closer We re nose to nose so near I can smell the alcohol on her skin You re older Angie says You have to take care of me The truth explodes from my crazy sister s mouth a belief I ve lived with all of my life It s so clear How could I have missed it I ve become an enabler Letting go of rage my own truth explodes Why don t you act normal like you did at the mental health place Mumbling she gets inside the box She glances up at me and says Could you bring Carlin here And curls into a fetal position Defeated I shake out my bed quilt and cover her continued 66

I need my roof On my knees I lay the flat piece of cardboard on top Sweet dreams Angie I make my way down the bank of overgrown weeds to the road and head toward the park I need to calm down I m walking fast past the zoo s parking lot across from the Gene Autry Museum and enter the picnic grounds in Griffith Park I ve been holding my breath for a year I inhale take in the fragrance of the eucalyptus trees and the approaching chill of the night It seems there s no exit out of this hell or could there be one and I don t know it What would you do Dad I pass a couple on a bench The woman kisses her man I d like to fall in love I d like to go places without worrying live as big and wide as I can change my stand up into broader experiences than just commentary on the mentally ill and homelessness The pain in my abdomen subsides Then I think of my sister curled up in a box like a kitten and the ache returns There s a homeless man sitting under a tree talking to himself His fingers flick like Angie s Does his family know where he is Or have they given up on him I won t give up on Angie Will she ever trust me or talk to me again I turn around take out my phone and call 911 Where s the humor in this DC Diamondopolous is an award winning short story and flash fiction writer with over 300 stories published internationally in print and online magazines literary journals and anthologies DC s stories have appeared in Penmen Review Progenitor 34th Parallel So It Goes The Literary Journal of the Kurt Vonnegut Museum and Library Lunch Ticket and others DC was nominated for the Pushcart Prize twice in 2020 and also for Best of the Net Anthology in 2020 and 2017 DC s short story collection Stepping Up is published by Impspired She lives on the California central coast with her wife and animals dcdiamondopolous com 67

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My Obsession with Limericks Occasionally something that commanded attention in our youth which we eventually put aside returns to grip us in old age A piano prodigy abandons the keyboard as an adult for something likelier to yield a steady dollar only to take up the instrument again in retirement A high school golfer drops the sport when the academic demands of college require it but returns passionately to golf in later life In my case it was limericks Many years ago I tried writing these humorous frequently off color ditties Someone had recited this limerick to me There once was a sailor named Dave who took a dead whore in a cave He said I ll admit I m a bit of a shit But look at the money I save I thought it was clever and since I seemed to have a knack for low level verbal skills like punning I figured I could easily knock out a few limericks In fact I hit a stone wall No matter how long or how hard I tried nothing worked The rhymes failed the pattern was wrong or the limerick wasn t funny I kept trying and trying Yet my staunchest efforts endlessly pursued were to no avail Stymied I gave up and forgot about it until several years ago sometime in my late seventies My wife Paula and I were having dinner with friends when one of them brought up the subject of limericks I recited the limerick about Dave which everyone liked and that did it for me Something clicked and the next day I was off to the races writing limericks this time with success Too much success in fact For many months thereafter almost non stop limericks kept popping into my head unbidden I d think of them while I was running while I was cooking washing dishes or especially as I was falling asleep I even dreamed limericks I could do almost nothing else effectively because limericks consumed me It became an absolute mania Even my shopping lists began to rhyme and take on a bizarre slightly off color cast Don t forget jelly or cheese that is smelly and beer I can swill and also the pill so Paula won t get a child in her belly Fat chance in our seventies but never mind Sometimes I d wake up at night and rush to the computer continued 70

to write one down in order not to lose my latest inspiration My unconscious must have been working on limericks for all those years and when the subject came up at dinner that night they all came spurting out It was like being visited by The Muse from Hell who was bent on disgorging the contents clogged in the dark recesses of my mind Freud s Return of the Repressed on steroids I began constantly emailing limericks to a few of my friends whom I drove crazy with my obsession but I just couldn t stop I even became a little delusional and started to think of limerick writing as a calling for which I had been chosen to ensure the survival of the genre In one of my creations that I sent to my friend Victor Roberts I dubbed myself The Bard of the Yard It began Oh I am the Bard of the Yard The limerick s protector and guard And if I had a and proceeded to a climax too filthy to reproduce here Victor so liked the idea of my being the Bard of the Yard that he gave me a number of other titles He suggested that I should also be called The Lion of Limerick The Honcho of Haiku The Regent of Rhyme The Viceroy of Verse The Doge of Doggerel The Suzerain of Sonnet The Prince of Pentameter The Daimyo of Dactyl and The Caliph of Quatrains When I had written fifty of what I considered my best limericks including ones involving my being The Lion of Limerick the Honcho of Haiku etc I went completely off the deep end and decided that I d publish the collection under the pen name Dean Dreckmund In my professional life I had been a university associate dean and as German or Yiddish speakers will know Dreckmund translates as Crap Mouth I even sent a proposal to a publisher for a book of maximally filthy limericks and unsurprisingly received no reply I also managed to write a few clean limericks but they were the exception My id inspired obsession was clearly channeled through the gutter After all this talk about limericks it wouldn t be fair not to provide at least a sample even if only of the clean ones There once was a man named Thelonius who thought that his name was euphonious When he learned the proposition that he was named for a musician he cried Good Lord then my name is felonioius continued 71

There once was a lim rist named Hieronymous who signed all his doggerel Anonymous Though his clever creations became great sensations no one knew that his name was eponymous OK just a couple of the tamer dirty ones There once was a tenor named Morris who sang for an all woman chorus He put on a dress and a pair of false breasts and pretended he had a clitoris There once was a man with large genitalia who wore tight pants as a kind of regalia the girls spied his bump and wanted to hump and cried What a fine piece of paraphernalia My mania continued unabated until oddly its termination came suddenly and decisively After receiving what must have seemed like the quintillionth limerick Victor emailed me saying simply This way lies madness Somehow that did it Or maybe his message simply reached me precisely when my unconscious had exhausted its long repressed supply of verbal detritus Whatever the explanation I haven t written another limerick since Hallelujah David Blumenfeld is an ex philosophy professor and associate dean who does much of his work in a cabin on an undeveloped Georgia barrier island accessible only by boat In retirement he has returned to an old interest writing nonfiction humor and children s lit as Dean Flowerfield Blumenfeld Flowerfield s 2021 publications are in Best New True Crime Stories Well Mannered Crooks Rogues Criminals Mono Balloons Lit Journal The Caterpillar Beyond Words the other side of hope Sport Literate and forthcoming 2022 Drunk Monkeys The 3rd Act and Carmina Magazine 72

God Grooms Assholes God grooms more new assholes every day It s a fact of life Grooming assholes is actually Gods main purpose You pray to him thinking that some unfulfilled destiny will suddenly materialize or that long lost incident involving you and your brother s wife will be forgiven but the reality is that God has added your name to a list The list exists in the cloud not accessible via VPN It s called the Godless List Don t confuse this with Apple s iCloud where information is bought hacked and exchanged It s a closed database only accessible to Him It s like the Dark Web no way to hack in no chance of redemption Once your name is on the Godless List you re screwed He keeps track of all the whining and complaining and the unending lachrymose bullshit you dish out daily The thing to do is stay off the Godless List You really don t want him in your business the less he knows about you the better Stop posting useless bullshit on Facebook no one cares anyway but He does watch He s looking for any excuse to categorize you as a low functioning human so don t give him ammunition The myriad anecdotal incidents about your matching Chihuahua s birth canal collapse and your gall bladder drainage fiasco and the plight of adjuncts condors the poor the rich eco systems and demographic groups that you have absolutely no affinity with but feel compelled to rail about will incite God s brawny wrath He will loathe your need to reach out to total strangers for affirmation of your inconsequential existence He will seethe upon viewing your efforts to call these multitudes friends when he knows the last time you actually helped a friend was in 1976 and that was only so he would lend you his Pontiac Firebird for an ill advised excursion to Nevada God will scrutinize your folly and mourn to himself You see he s still trying to get it right God is convinced that if he keeps churning out the human animal he will eventually hit on the right model an optimum consciousness template for all time something that can be gift boxed and celebrated and anthologized and curated by future species Somewhere along the line he will get it right and those people will go on to live in grace squalor and various degrees of addiction Until that happens God can be found any day of the week drowning his sorrows in the Cloud continued 73

Bar complaining to the bartender Christ that last batch just sucked I tried so hard and they all turned out to be assholes Christ will turn to him and say Listen dad you oughta spend some time on Earth if you think this is bad You re up here blissfully alone You don t have to deal with all the bullshit all you have to do is decide who to vilify God will nod and shed a tear for the uninvited the misunderstood the heathens the barren and the lackluster He will pick up his Cloud tab and post on his twitter feed Download my Literary Thriller now And we will Deborah s writing has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and has been anthologized or is forthcoming in several journals Her story Pray for Rain was selected as runner up finalist for Light and Dark Magazine s Flash Fiction Contest and Iris with Mermaids was shortlisted for the 2019 Into the Void Fiction Prize 74

woMEN They fear the women that love themselves The women who have taken the rules that were planted Into our young minds And let them bleed out On the side of the curb Bri Narick is currently a junior in high school and has been writing since she could remember She is a student aid for AP English a talented speaker on the speech and debate team and enjoys writing poetry 75

An Art Inspired Contest featuring Monarch by Angela McCarty Words from the artist My name is Angela I am 18 years old and I am a senior in high school I was born in the Philippines and moved to the U S when I was 7 years old I have 6 brothers and 2 sisters I first started with my art when I was 8 years old I quickly found I had a passion for art and moved onto other styles like watercolor acrylics pen arts sculpting and more I am excited to have been able to share my artwork with other artists and writers and look forward to seeing how my artwork inspires others 76

STEPHEN KINGSNORTH Chimera ARTIST S WINNER Is it the octopus we choose or king of castle up above do undercurrents well below or built on sand keep battlements I sovereign over pennant towers but speculate Leviathan Do I seek divers to explore unfathomed deeps swirl sediments perchance to find some purchase there a grip on rising levels fear Perhaps report that all is clear more likely start with pistol shot a danger warning lurking near the breakers rolling in to crash But do I ride crest of the waves risk pull by suckers underneath devoured by behemoth of past Is this what surface tension means meniscus fragile on the sea chimaeras shimmy in the brine illusory spooks rats ghost sharks I spade build dream my bucket list amongst sure stranded grain and grit where razors cowries starfish lie a paper fig from Eden s soil doves jingles limpets holding fast See scallops of a pilgrimage and tellin trivia of beach midst oyster beds rock pools fish fry and iridescent cultured pearls by spiney jewel box angel wings It is skilled art to nib the Quink to craft the printer s eroteme those question marks float free from block a stain from squid to cloud with ink Stephen Kingsnorth Cambridge M A English Religious Studies retired to Wales UK from ministry in the Methodist Church has had pieces published by on line poetry sites printed journals and anthologies most recently Academy of the Heart and Mind The Parliament Literary Magazine Poetry Potion Grand Little Things The Poet Magazine His blog is at https poetrykingsnorth wordpress com 77

MAID CORBIC The Underground Worlds of Today EDITOR S WINNER I live in a time where injustice takes hold and I am the boy of the desires of my unfulfilled and I think I have to live this life as best I know and can for no one but me will sink into that hopeless world full of silence but he may be better happier than where I am now i know it might just be my imagination but I often tell myself that it will be much better though sometimes I am deceived when I see the world how he becomes very disgusting to me and I a boy who just wants to stay carefree in this world where every piece takes its own that whiteness that draws black contours over me I am not aware that one day it will cost me every word uttered is measured in per mille while I still sit and consider myself pious to comment on some works that people do and on the other hand I feel better that way than being very unhappy The fact is that the world is changing very fast and that coloring books we outgrew forever but I believe that each of us must be our child of happiness and to draw his joy to others around him because happiness is greatest then when I draw it to someone other than myself 78

I am not someone who looks at people viciously but I think the castle is more than anything which is located at the top and difficult to reach with a little luck here are new opportunities for me to clear my mind and bring it to a state where no one wants to bother me anymore because I only want one dream that I dream a better and more beautiful life for your children Maid orbi is 21 years old from Tuzla In his spare time he writes poetry that have received praised and awards He also selflessly helps others around him and he is moderator of the World Literature Forum WLFPH World Literature Forum Peace and Humanity for humanity and peace in the world in Bhutan He is also the editor of the First Virtual Art portal led by Dijana Uherek Stevanovic and the selector of the competition at a page of the same name that aims to bring together all poets around the world Many works of his works have also been published in anthologies and journals around the world Chile Spain Ecuador Bosnia and Herzegovina San Salvador United Kingdom Indonesia India Croatia Serbia etc as well as printed copies of the anthology of poems Sea in the palm of your hand Stories from Isolation Kosovo Peony and others 79

You only had to trust my love You still can Take my hand Get in the boat A beautiful journey awaits