by Garth Martens

“Cousins share a thing or two. Or so we find, braiding thirty-year-old pain. / When their brother died of heroin, our mothers, / in separate houses, locked their doors. Cigarettes in ash pits, walled in.”

by Shannon Guglielmo

“I want to experience transcendence / & go beyond this life / to hear the birth givers who have come before / not just my mother grandmother / nor my ancestors of the last millennium / but 135,000 years ago”

by Olivia Bell

“I had sex on molly and accidentally fell in love. They say don’t ever have sex on molly because no sex will ever be that good again.”

by Clara No!

“his pierced taint hangs over you / like a roof over your head / botulism at the kink brunch”

by Craig Constantine

“Yes, your uncle carried you off. / Cry me the River Styx. / You soon had the besotted old goat / Bent to your every whim. / Not tragedy - destiny.”

by John Repp

“…glugging goat’s milk from pickle jars on a wedge / of un-sand. I did my best to fit in. I listened hard / & stripped at the right times, worked to grok / the squashed vowels & absent irony.”

by Hanna Webster

“I lick her palm, which tastes like mercy, her grooved heartline ensnared by the pathetic molecular boundary of her flesh. What a shame. I smell fear radiate from her hair like steam”

by Andy Huy Le

“the blinds / keep the light away / but if you look close enough / in the moments when they are vulnerable / they show their ridges / decals / embossing / of flora / plastic / and / always / blooming”

by Alice Blackwell

“Growing up, bicycle riding seemed like a rudimentary skill / Instead, I developed my own LLC to diagnose, treat, and mend wounds / My healing abilities emerged at 8 / Far too young to understand my parents’ wrongdoings, but too naïve to say no”

by Piper Rasmussen

“The vision of a Queen appears (see also: milagro, fantasma) / ‍as if from the center of a fluffy white cloud / (see also: oscurecida, desaparecida)”

by Wayne F. Burke

“A man calls “come / when I call” and / a small boy comes running.”

by Jade Kleiner

“…my eyes droop. my soul droops, / but my toes in their shoes do not. / every toe is agitated, ready to run…”

by Madeline Blair

“very quietly say: i am spinning / and no one can stop me. dizzy invitations / to staple yourself to the bed in remission / just waiting for 2 no 7 days until the tachycardic / tremble ceases, third prescription of a no-refill”

by Scott C. Holstad

“they said i took shit too seriously, / that my name is Mister Devil, / a most serious Satanist.”

by Joe Pagano, Jr.

“That night you plucked the red words / from my mouth like berries in the wild / and found a place for them in your breast…”

by Liz Mariani

“This Buffalo pizza sweats lakes of golden grease / Like proud parents / We glaze lovingly into these tiny bowls / Liquid copper pepperoni peace”

by Crystal James

“Today, I celebrate my inner child / Her strength and resilience / Her messy hair and shy voice / Her dirty feet and fearless climb / Her vigilance / Her hope / Her love for red poppies in August”

by Pawel Markiewicz

“The spiderweb adorned dainty tavern. / The spider slept immensely, such eagle owl. / The parrot longed for a native distance. / In its eyes a dreamery of moon and cage.”

by Loel Earl

“If I had a nickel / for every time / I had a tumid erection / on an airplane, / I'd have the necessary funds to / purchase a plane…”

by Shon Mapp

“…your nightshade skin / seems so smooth, / taut. My teeth long / to pierce it. Lessen / this buffer of air / between us.”