August

Orange Pop by Joanna M. Weston

He’s my rib-tickling, joking Grandpa, who juggles apples, goes sky-high on the playground swings, and has pockets full of orange jujubes – just for me.

Joanna M. Weston is married; has two cats, multiple spiders, a herd of deer, and two derelict hen-houses. Her middle-reader, ‘Those Blue Shoes’, published by Clarity House Press; and poetry, ‘A Summer Father’, published by Frontenac House of Calgary. Her eBook, ‘The Willow Tree Girl’ at  her blog: http://www.1960willowtree.wordpress.com/

Two pieces by Angie Shaeffer

Pinkaboo

Look at that, she thought.  The cut, so bruised and bloody before, turning pink.  Strange, something so painful can evolve into a favorite, pretty color. 

Ginger Passion

Her hair, that’s what always got them paying.  She pranced and sassed like the others, but made sure her curly sienna locks smelled luscious always. 

Angie Shaeffer is a Baltimorean, international educator, and world traveler who recently touched down in New York City.  She finds writing inspiration in everything, including toilet bowls and, thanks to this literary journal, nailpolish colors. 

 

 

Check Me Out by Majnun Ben-David

Temporarily abandoned cart disrupts checkout line, snarky remark ready. Offender revealed as dark beauty, remark shelved. Peace through beauty? No, I’m just shallow he decides.

Majnun Ben-David can be reached at majnunbd@gmail.com and thinks his bio should probably not be longer than his story.

 

Two pieces by Giulietta “Julie” Nardone

Luscious Lips

We could not stop kissing each other’s marshmallow lips in the darkened playground. Entwined bodies wanting more. Oh God, I wish he wasn’t my cousin.

Forest Green

When I regained consciousness, all I could see was green. My body immobilized. Suddenly, a woman shouted, “Help get her out of the trash can.”

Giulietta “Julie” Nardone hails from Massachusetts where she is a creativity activist, writer and karaoke singer. Her stories have been published in The Christian Science Monitor, The Boston Globe, Skirt! Magazine, Underwired Magazine, FlashQuake, Common Ties, Rollins Magazine, and broadcast on NPR. Visit her blog “Take Back Your Life” at http://www.giuliettathemuse.com

Marina Dawn by Charles Rafferty 

She didn’t need to cup her hand around the cigarette. His sails would be useless today. Her feet felt certain as soon as she disembarked.

Charles Rafferty‘s poems have appeared in The New Yorker and The Southern Review, and his stories have appeared in Sonora Review and Cortland Review. His most recent chapbook of poems is Appetites (Clemson University Press). Currently, he directs the MFA program at AlbertusMagnusCollege.

 

Blanc by David Tomaloff

an ignoble vessel. white, girl

shaped. moving over the water

like a ghost,

a ruptured past—

a valediction to days best banished to the sea.

David Tomaloff builds things out of ampersands & light. His work has appeared in several anthologies and many fine publications. He is also coauthor of the collaborative poetry collection YOU ARE JAGUAR, with Ryan W. Bradley (Artistically Declined Press, 2012). Send him threats: davidtomaloff.com

Hopelessly in Love by Madeline Mora-Summonte

Lena hangs her husband’s pants. Straightens collars. Snugs socks. Pretends he’ll wear them tomorrow. She puts the clothes away.

Grief fills the charity bag instead. 

Madeline Mora-Summonte  MadelineMora-Summonte.blogspot.com reads, writes and breathes fiction in all its forms.

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June

 Castaway: A Black And White Story In Five Shades

by David Tomaloff  

 

 

 [i.] Her Intelligent Constellation

 

The word star in all its connotations; how summer sinks its teeth into waiting skin. Which boy is your favorite? she asks a faceless sky.

 

[ii.] Navigate Her

Answers hide their faces & fail to fall, neither as riddles nor as rain. The night sky is a con; of this, she’s become certain.

 

[iii.] Waltz

The word sea in all its connotations; how water caresses the tops of thighs. Which girl is the fairest? she asks of another passing ship.

 

[iv.] Carnival

She asks, but a passing ship is not a boy: her there wading in the water on the morning she left to join the sea.

 

[v.] Fiji

A young summer is rife with the consequences of prayers for certainty: we may ask a shark for directions; it might then follow us home.

David Tomaloff is a writer, photographer, musician, and an all-around bad influence. His work has appeared in several anthologies and in fine publications such as Mud Luscious, A-Minor, >kill author, PANK, and elimae. He is the author of several chapbooks, including 13 (Artistically Declined Press), and A SOFT THAT TOUCHES DOWN &REMOVES ITSELF (NAP and Red Ceilings Press). His book of collaborative poetry with Ryan W. Bradley, YOU ARE JAGUAR, is due out summer 2012 from Artistically Declined Press. He resides in the form of ones and zeros at: davidtomaloff.com

 

Porcini by Annmarie Lockhart

He preferred steak,

rare, with red wine,

but all she ever ate

was fungus that grew

along the tree roots.

They chose heartache

over stomachache.

Annmarie Lockhart is the founding editor of vox poetica, an online literary salon dedicated to bringing poetry into the every day, and the founder of unbound CONTENT, an independent press for a boundless age. A lifelong resident of Bergen County NJ, she lives, works, and writes 2 miles east of the hospital where she was born.

 

No More Film

Anonymous

Too many moments lived through a glass lens and thrown in that musty drawer, she hugged her son as he blew out his seven candles.

 

Liquid Vinyl by Tracy Hauser

The needle scratched your spin back and forth, and sweatbands on wet hair pumped your choices.  The blue strobe flashes on your rises and falls.

Tracy Hauser is an MFA graduate student at the University of Baltimore’s Creative Writing & Publishing Arts program.  Currently she is the editor of the Strange Detours online magazine.  She has been published in the latest issue of Abandoned Towers Magazine, the Urbanite, Epiphany Magazine, Marco Polo Arts Magazine, Writer’s Underground, Trivial Typewriter, the Colonnades Literary Magazine, Literary Brushstrokes, Blood & Roses, The Rusty Nail, and for the 2012 4th edition of Welcome Hon, You’re in Baltimore!.  She is involved around the city in promoting writing through project-based learning activities for schools and organizations. 

 

Two pieces by JY Saville

Flight of Fancy

He rode in on a silver horse and took them by surprise. She’d said come in character but hadn’t specified whose. He used his own.

Naked Truth

I watch the petals fall and know with sudden clarity that this marks the end. With those bare stalks, the last of us is gone.

JY Saville writes in the North of England and blogs at http://thousandmonkeys.wordpress.com; the nails that tap at her keyboard are not always purple.

 

 

Blue Lagoon by Joanna M. Weston

A long shallow dive into the blue of sunlit water.  Reach up, grab her wrinkled old ankles.  Pull her down.  And the inheritance is mine.

Joanna M. Weston has had poetry, reviews, and short stories published in anthologies and journals for twenty-five years. Her  middle-reader, ‘Those Blue Shoes’, published by Clarity House Press; and poetry, ‘A Summer Father’, published by Frontenac House of Calgary. Her eBook, ‘The Willow Tree Girl’ at her blog http://www.1960willowtree.wordpress.com/

 

 

David Tomaloff, 11/28/11

Photo by Kierstin Bridger

 

Three pieces by David Tomaloff

 

Shifting Power 

Sundresses and summer have replaced her boys and winter.  She walks lighter along the shore, casting names into the sea—beginning again, one by one. 

Super Bossa Nova

I dreamt of you, a pirate ship, dark and fast approaching. I was a Royal Naval Fleet, no match for a galleass such as yours.

Absolutely Shore

Windows make bad lovers, though they tend to make great cops.  The salt makes its way to my lips, reminds me which side I’m on.

David Tomaloff is a writer, photographer, musician, and all around bad influence. His work has appeared in fine publications such as Mud Luscious, >kill author, Connotation Press, HOUSEFIRE, & elimae. He is the author of the chapbooks 13 (Artistically Declined Press), A SOFT THAT TOUCHES DOWN & REMOVES ITSELF (NAP), Olifaunt (Red Ceilings Press), EXIT STRATEGIES (Gold Wake Press) and MESCAL NON-PALINDROME CINEMA (Ten Pages Press). He resides in the form of ones and zeros at: davidtomaloff.com