Peggy Garrett must have been glad that Geary’s had given up on the old way and got a ramp fitted. For years I’d watched her lump poor Jim up the step, the wheels catching on the threshold, before she’d lean forward to see to him, like a magpie claiming a crust. She, always in black with her wispy hair that had turned white the night of the accident.
Continue reading “Baby’s Breath by Leanne Simmons”
If I’m born again as a man instead of as a woman, I will aim the silly-looking mushroom waggling between my legs and shoot my stream so it splashes dead center in the toilet bowl. Bullseye! Bango! How hard can that be?
Continue reading “The Second Husband by Cris Aboobaker”
Every great writer, if they want to be a great writer, needs to be able to break it all down into the simplest thing.
For Shakespeare, it’s “To be, or…” and one, or a few, of the sonnets, as well as Juliet on her balcony.
For Cervantes, it’s Don Quixote, his horse Rocinante, and the windmill they think is a giant.
For Goethe, it’s Faust making a deal with the Devil.
For Jack Kerouac, author of On the Road (1957), it’s SKID ROW WINE.
Continue reading “Sunday Whatever:- Skid Row Wine an Essay by Dale Williams Barrigar”
I have no music in my soul. A man told me that once, full of conviction. No real anger in him, but definitely judgment. I sentenced him to twenty-five years in the penitentiary, and he was back before me on a Rule 35 (b) motion for reconsideration, which I denied. He stood at the defense table in his baggy orange prison-transport jumper, his wrists and ankles shackled, and he grinned at me, biting and cold, a man with nothing left to lose.
Continue reading “Judge Me by Ace Boggess”
The air in the alleyway was damp and cold, smelling of urine, rot and decay. Old bricks were wet as his hands brushed against them and the cement under his trainers was slick with vile gunk. Frankie drew away from the wall with a shudder. Pulling his zipper closer under his chin, he crept slowly towards the doorway hidden in the gloom. His dark knitted hat sparkled slightly with moisture under the dim overhead lighting, making him appear to have been sprinkled with Christmas glitter. The thought would not have amused him. He had no patience for such stuff, tinsel and trimming, laughter, joy. What place did it have in a world with all this work to do, all this clearing out and cleaning up?
Continue reading “Crusader by Diane M. Dickson”
“If you know someone who’s depressed, please resolve never to ask them why. Depression isn’t a straightforward response to a bad situation; depression just is, like the weather.”
—Stephen Fry
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Author’s note: My good friend, Sean, had repurposed an old decanter that once held Johnny Walker scotch, whose label he had steamed off and replaced with one of his own design. On the new label he had printed: CONVO-LOTION. In fine print, it announced: “Good for what ails you. Apply liberally.” If only those words had proven to be true.
Continue reading “Thirty Eight Special by Robert Kruger”
The big man filled the doorway of The Smack Inn, blocking out the insistent daylight. ‘Samuel Root?’ he boomed into the gloom.
A wiry little figure leapt up from a table in the depths of the room and scurried forward, hand outstretched. ‘Ned Polley?’ The other grunted. ‘Welcome. How was the journey?’
‘Long. Hard on the arse.’
‘Ale will see to that.’ Root waved and slopping tankards appeared. ‘Parents well?’
‘Mother same as ever. Father won’t see fifty again but good for a few years yet.’
‘Sorry about your uncle.’
‘Took me an age to read your letter.’
Continue reading “Blow, Bonny Breeze by Stephen Silvester”
“I reckon that lass Lyra or Lula or something was well into me, I got her number, I might get lucky later this week if I can see her again”, Kyle smiled, slapping his closest friend on the shoulder.
“Yeah and pigs might fly! Catch you Monday Kyle”.
Continue reading “Spice of Life and Death by M Bridger”
Agatha Christie 1939
Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None was my mother’s all time favorite book. If that isn’t true, well, she can come back from the other side and tell me about it (that statement causes me a bit more anxiety than you might think). She died fifteen years ago and lately I’ve been re-examining the crash and thud of our extremely difficult and often semi-violent relationship. Now, I never swung at Mom except once when I was nine, and she actually pulled a knife on me once when we were both considerably older. I believe “volatile” sums it up if I had only one word to choose from.
Continue reading “Writers Read – And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie an essay by Leila”
By Chancellorsville, his camera had grown heavier, the straps of its leather case cutting into his shoulders, the sway of its brass and wood bruising his ribs. Among the war dead he had photographed, he lacked one, his sister, Ana, who had died two years earlier in a field hospital outside Fredericksburg. Fever, they’d said. By the time he found her name in a ledger, no body was left to claim.
Continue reading “Ana in the Negative by R W Owen”
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