i always thought it strange when my mother would pray in a full veil and my father in his briefs. he was always a few steps ahead cause it was implemented for her to be behind, even though my dad scratched his pits between surahs. thus, home alone as a boy i wanted to pray […]
Poetry 91
Charlotte Simmonds: Here at the Miniature Zoo
One night my friend holds a dinner party. It is a Viking dinner party. Feasting for feisty Vikings. But not just any feisty Vikings. It is a dinner party for Feisty vegan Vikings. Strictly feisty vegan Vikings. Vegan Vikings who quaff ale and mead, Sop slabs of bread into hearty broths With which they swill […]
Christina Shideler: Stick a Fork in Me
Girl, I want to carve you up like a Christmas ham, put my glaze on you with a cherry on top. You be lookin so good the whole FAMILY want a piece. And I’d roast you bone in, know what I mean? I wanna serve you up on a god damn cornucopia, laid on a […]
Christina Shideler: Dat Ass Tho
Shakin it like two flour sacks, like two massage motors in a Sharper Image chair like a pair of water balloons bursting in slow motion workin that jelly, that tapioca, that pancake batter, shakin dat thing like alternative energy like dat ass was gonna power a pickup, a coupe or sedan, like you were tryin […]
Ali Shapiro: Hook
Your hand was not enough—I want the rest. The taste just whet my appetite for lean, mean meat, your salty pirate’s flesh. I dream your ship gone low and leaky, and your men all drowned, so I get you alone, as motherless as the boy you’re chasing, as the sea itself. And in the dream, […]
Lauren Schmidt: The Box Marked “F”
For Michael You grip your youngest son by his two ankles and peel him open from his diaper like a lid from a tin can. He is rolled back, his rubbery bottom aimed at the sky, so you can clean the ample spattering of shit between his cheeks. You get some on your hand, but […]