March 6, 2024 | Poetry
Excerpts from X: previously posted on Twitter . . .
@asdkfjasdlfjd
Can't spoil what's ahead but suffice to say I may attempt to falsely accuse a fellow indie writer of war crimes in a psychotic bid for even more attention
March 5, 2024 | Fiction
Percocet Helps
David Simmons
Crush ten pills into a fine powder, then stir thoroughly in a glass of warm water. Put the glass in the freezer and let sit for twenty minutes. At this point, the mixture will have separated.
March 5, 2024 | Interview
Chaos Questions with Leah Hampton
Sheldon Lee Compton
SHELDON LEE COMPTON: The aliens actually showed up. They only communicate through images and demand you show them one overall image that explains our civilization. You have five minutes to Google Image search. What do you type into the search bar?
LEAH HAMPTON: “Image of Donald Trump shitting on an endangered butterfly”
I Appreciate the Company
Jade Mar
Eventually, the coke got to his head. He started becoming extremely paranoid. I was on a trip.
Matt and Marie get high, get back together
Will Mountain Cox
They all knew the drugs. But they hadn’t seen each other in years. The drugs were doing well. The drugs were doing fine. The drugs were good. The drugs were good to run into again. The drugs were taller, maybe? Or, stronger?
Thamar and Amnon
Wallace Barker
All of the bedroom was suffering / with his eyes full of wings.
Mosul
Paul Thompson
Waitresses circled the room like vultures. Sometimes I dreamt of laying down on the hot sand, my spine fusing to it, nerves sizzling, going blind from the light, my chest cavity ripped open while they pecked around my ribs—the waitresses, I mean—for whatever they could salvage, whatever was still good.
I Like the Drugs (And the Drugs Like Me)
Chandler Morrison
I was ten when my mother first took me to a psychiatrist. He put me on Zoloft at her request. My relationship with pharmaceuticals is my longest running one to date. My normal.
A Unique Way With Animals
Jesse Hilson
So I guess I’m an animal then, aren’t I? Why? Why was I born?
Grammy Is Still Smoking
Trisha Kostis
I, and my vile habit represented a toxic threat both materially and existentially. It wasn’t only the danger of secondhand smoke, but the mere existence of smoking that they wished to shield from their cherub.
NOTES FROM THE BLOOD FACTORY ISSUE #2 ‘AFTER HOURS.’
Frank Reardon
Chris snaps the seal of a Jack Daniels shooter and pops the brown sugar down his throat. Tommy pops Vicodin: Coronado eats a stick of dynamite and blasts his brain with meth, no judgement.
Her Special Place
Mather Schneider
She sits in the grass in her special place and she does her meditation. It is the place she has carved out for herself in the world.
The Mourning After
Tara Layne
I haven’t had a sip of water in days. I scan the colorful, exotic flowers that fill the twenty eighth floor apartment. The view overlooks the Hudson River in New York City, and the lazy, muddy water
Betty Blue Eyes
Rohan Muthanna
Relentless torrents of rain poured down that whole night, gently lulling me to sleep.
Darling Monsters
wrath of persephone
So what if I can’t cook? I can clean a crime scene then let you hate-fuck me after.
Sick Gal Seeks Rare Elk Sighting or Mate
Laura Adrienne Brady
Chronic illness already made dating hard. And then the pandemic arrived.
“I almost forgot—” my childhood friend interjected as we were wrapping up a phone call on a blustery September day. “I
dirty work
El Musgrave
I keep trying not to say, I think about you all the time, I want to come for you, and I hang up without saying it, and then I call you later from my bed and I end up saying it all anyway.
Chaos Questions with Benjamin Drevlow
Sheldon Lee Compton
What I mean is I write auto-biographical fiction and as such I’m a habitual and unrepentant liar-liar-pants-on-fire sheep in wolf’s clothing.
Street Blues
R.A. Gallagher
Swallowing those pills at night was now like playing Russian roulette; the blues were, for the first time in many years, the leading cause of drug deaths in Scotland, overtaking even heroin.
What the Dead Know
Joanna Acevedo
Once, I thought I would forgive. Now, a year later, I’m still waiting for the feeling to appear
An Unmodern Love
Karen McKinney
No, I do not want any kind of modern love, with all its entitlements,
A Guide to Recognizing Your Pasties, or A Non-Alphabetical Glossary of Burlesque Pasties
Lauren Emily Whalen
Nipple covers.
Pasties come in every shape, size and color. They can be plain or blinged within an inch of their minuscule lives. They can have tassels attached. They go on one’s butt cheeks with
Chaos Questions with Michael Lafontaine
Sheldon Lee Compton
Full facial tattoo or painlessly losing your lips. One has to happen. What is it going to be? What’s that facial tattoo going to be? How’re you going to face the world without those lips?
Who Say Men Don't Cry?
Paul Chuks
You asked Harrison who sat opposite you, if Mexico was a strong team and all he said was they might upset Argentina. He said this in reference to their game against Saudi-Arabia, you no see wetin them play against those Arab men the other day? Your hope dashed. You became a piece of meat doused with anxiety.
3 Poems of the Old Testament
Stephanie Yue Duhem
I have known / a hunger I would undo / my own good birth to sate