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Fragments 1 The Lone Ranger approached the low makeshift stage of the automobile dealership as his audience waited for him to begin to speak--- Uncle Fud and Uncle Dud lolled together in the mud--- Stay far away from Danbury, Connecticut--- Out of control on a downward grassy slope---face first onto a hard concrete driveway--- Cow bells on the mountain--- The fresh eastern hilly countryside of Quebec---- Not a cento--- Run the bases, fill the vases full of flowers--- Slug a lug a ding dong, a pocket full of high--- Pioneers and Sons of the Pioneers--- Sons of the desert--- Aunt Louise and Sister Smith polished off a potent fifth--- The farmer lost his right arm at the elbow to an enraged boar--- Green can be an odious color--- All babies cry in the same language--- Near Venice, Florida mostly black prehistoric sharks’ teeth of various shapes and sizes wash up toward the beach in the relentlessly frothy surf--- The Alamo, from the vantage point of this height, looks quite small indeed— Run The Bases Run the bases. Fill the vases. Full of flowers. Watch the hours. Tic away. Say heh heh. Note the surplus. Turning purple. And the gurgle. Of the water. Nothing soft. Comes this way. Say heh. Single mothers. W/ their children. Want to cross here. Very grimly. They advance now. Granite faces. Of the players. Fill the bases. And the mayors. Cheat and steal. Never miss. A single meal. (The Texas “swing” song. Piano and violin. At the surprising end. Of “Places In The Heart”.) Mind your daddy. And your mama. Don’t abuse them. Or confuse them. Or misuse them. Give them honor. And amuse them. Joseph Buehler has published over one hundred poems in over 40 literary magazines in the UK, "Sentinel literary QuarterlY', Ireland, "H.C.E. Review", Australia, "Otoliths" and widely in the USA, "ArLiJo", "North Dakota Quarterly", and "The Tower Journal" among others. He lives with his wife Trish in Georgia; they are originally from the Mid-west USA.

Every day, in the window of the house with the red door, there are flowers. Flowers sitting in pride of place. Flowers spilling their petals, their colour and leaves. Falling piece by piece, day by day, onto the deep wooden sill. Every day there are flowers in that window. Flowers that call and sing to the rest of the narrow grey street outside. And each week the arrangement changes. Samantha has noticed that no two bunches are ever the same. Sometimes a round red vase holds simple daffodils; proud and golden, standing alone. Next time there is a crystal vase, crammed with the exotic; vivid orchids, crashing and clashing with blousy roses. Or a blue jug, swirling with bright pink lilies, star-shaped chrysanthemum or indigo irises waving like flags. As she walks past each Monday, making her way from two doors down, Samantha turns to the window, ready to gaze upon this week’s offering. And she wonders how the woman who lives there chooses. Does someone buy the flowers for her? Or does she select them herself to reflect her life or alter her mood? Are they delivered by the armful in a sleek white van? Or brought home from the supermarket, jammed between toilet rolls and food? Does this woman choose these blooms for love, for laughter, for sorrow? In remembrance, in celebration, in defiance or in joy? Occasionally Samantha catches sight of the woman moving within. She is tall, statuesque, with long dark hair, flowing like water past her shoulders, onto her back. As she strides from room to room her clothes move loosely around her; swatches and swathes of emerald, bronze, cerise and gold. Striking colours. Sometimes there is music, escaping from the open window. Music that is high and urgent, that pushes through the drab English air, sending something foreign and forbidden up to the grey clouds and northerly winds. And in the evenings other women come to the house. Samantha sees them park their cars and walk, laughing, up the path to the red door. Like the woman of the flowers they too are shrouded in colour. In their hands are bottles of wine and covered dishes from which spice and heat escape, pooling in the road. Then one weekend Samantha hears shouting. Shouting that turns to screaming in the black heart of the night. And the music is drowned out, by the sounds of glass smashing, the squeal of tyres and slamming doors. Followed by the thin wail of sirens and blinking blue lights that wriggle under Samantha’s thin curtains and dance on her bed. In the morning she asks her mother what happened. But her mother shrugs and clutching a mug turns away. And the silence in their kitchen is a little tighter and the air is a little more grey. On Monday the red door has gone. Nailed over and hidden under a sheet of splintered plywood. And in the window there are no flowers. Just a single cactus instead. Rachel Canwell is a writer and teacher living in Cumbria. She is currently working on a flash collection and her first novel which was shortlisted for the Retreat West Pitch to Win 2021. Her short fiction has been published in Sledgehammer Lit, Pigeon Review and The Birdseed amongst others. Website - https://bookbound.blog/writing/ Twitter - @bookbound2019

I stuff the happy yellow silken blooms into my pocket, my bunny rabbit’s favorite treat. I let them grow wild in my yard and harvest them in big batches. The sun heats my back as I collect the yellow bursts for Bunnylla Bean. He is not a young rabbit anymore. He is slow and cantankerous, picks fights with the cats all day, and I know that he is in pain, that he is dying. The dandelions bring a new bounce to his tired bounce as he rushes over to gobble them all down. He eats them all stem to blossom in one slurp, his little jaw churning the flower into mush. I wonder how it tastes for him, the bloom giving off only a slightly sweet scent. I imagine it tastes green and rich on his soft little bunny tongue. And so I gather more for him, my offering to the companion who will soon be saying goodbye. Levi Faulk has been obsessed with reading and writing for as long as he could read and write. He still believes in the power of the written word to change lives.

Christmas Eve night And the pub is not very full, Although there is a hundred percent more People than last year, When it was closed, And we were locked down Like pampered prisoners. The DJ plays the same songs As he does every weekend. And when he plays ‘Love really hurts without you,’ I feel like crying, Because it is true. There is a man in here Who looks like a garden gnome, Woolly hat pulled down, Squashing his ears, A carefully constructed beard. He grabs a kiss from a woman with large breasts, Who then staggers to the bar top heavy, Ready for more shots, That she spills down her chest. My friend Karl has walked in And it appears he has been drinking All day again. He sits alone with his eyes shut tight, Occasionally clapping along to the song, And jerks his denim clad body, Awkwardly. I don’t know if Karl and I Will see another Christmas, If we don’t quit This drinking tradition. S.Bennett is a new poet from Rotherham, England. He has poems appearing in the Spring issues of boatsagainstthecurrent and Delicate Emissions.

I let it creep up the sage-throated walls and roost While the body crawls out of the room. The kitchen walls whisper about spoiled milk and trying again. Cry about it! The body snaps, seizing a fistful of honey-nuts. Meanwhile i’m somewhere on the ceiling, picking the whites out of my eyes. Passing the thin pearlescent membrane over the acne prone face of the moon. Metalcore hums about yellowjackets and i’m fading out in a red flannel. Are people sixty percent freshwater or saltwater? Do they ebb and flow? Is the moon tugging at the seas we carry, begging for company? The body takes to the cold wave of a canvas. I quickly learn that drowning doesn’t feel like anything. Alana is a writer from South Florida. Her work has previously appeared in Little Death Lit and Hecate Magazine, notably their Winter 2021 anthology DECAY and inaugural zine FRANKENZINE. Track her down on Twitter @alanaseenah

CW: violence I spent a year wanting to kill a preacher. Inside the mother’s body, a child began to grow. I imagined medieval contraptions. Sharpened metal designed to pierce, cut, and stretch. His fingernails extracted one by one, my laughter at his screams. The baby grew quick, the mother exhausted and nauseous in those early months. I moved on to the more practical. I had no gun but my dad had a shotgun and more. A bullet in the leg would fell him. The second would keep him down. I’d stand over him. The barrel of the rifle would split open his forehead. I’d spit into the stream of blood. A sonogram surprised with the reveal of a tiny penis. The mother regained energy as her belly gained heft. There was an arrest but he was out on bail. No lawyer nearby would touch him once the name of the victimized family had been leaked. No secrets in small towns. I plotted violence. The mother was put on bed rest. Monitored. Everything was monitored. Family emotions raw. Rumors had him at Wegman’s, sitting in the minivan while his wife shopped for groceries. Murderous thoughts became attainable. He’d get out for a stretch. I’d mow him down with my car. The bumper shattering his knees, the asphalt cracking his head, my wheels crushing his sternum. Trolling the parking lot, I visualized the carnage. The last months were long but less anxious for the mother. The boy was healthy and big. I didn’t attend the trial. I was afraid. Afraid of my hands reaching for his neck, squeezing him lifeless before other hands could reach me. Waiting. Waiting for the boy, waiting for the verdict. Guilty. He was going to jail. Guilty. I imagined the sick things that might happen to a man such as him on the inside, not sure if those thoughts rendered me guilty too. The child was born. My son. Almost 10 pounds and with much less trouble coming out than hatching. A beginning. Joy. The second child was my niece. She was 12 when it started. 12. The preacher told her he loved her. Told her those things were okay. Okay in the sanctity of the church. Her childhood ended as my son’s began. My son is grown and taller than me. I have two more children at home. I watch over them and hope never to want to kill again.

I am holding this huge ring and using what feels like every bit of my brain to try and remember what roman numeral XLVII stands for, but light is bouncing off the marble mantle, off my old, framed jersey and everything is messing with my thinking and I can’t get my thoughts straight. I know that X is supposed to be ten and V is five and I is one, but L is that fift?. So ten fifty five- I came in here looking for something, and I got distracted by my Super Bowl ring. Now I’m trying to remember what I was looking for, putting myself in the frame of mind that took me from the breakfast nook to this room, but I am blanking hard. Our long snapper that year was a classics major from Davidson and he explained how roman numerals work to all of us after the celebration champagne had turned sticky and everyone told any camera that would point their way they were going to Disney World! “Evan,” my wife calls. Shit. She told me to grab something in here. It's coming back, but not quick enough. Go get the… and then the thought evaporates. “Baby?” she calls. “I’m in here,” I say. “Are you okay?” “Yeah, I’m fine. Why?” In our house “Are You Okay?” isn’t a polite question from a wife to her husband. It’s a wellness check. Sometimes I am not fine and she has to come to my rescue. She can tell something is wrong this time, even if it is as minor as forgetting what I came in here for or not remembering how roman numerals are ordered. She is actively trying to figure out what I’m thinking about. “Did you grab your notebook?” she asks. “Not yet,” I say. I hold my ring up to her. “I got a little distracted.” She asks if I blacked out, and I tell her I just had to straighten something out. We reach an unspoken agreement to play along that everything is still okay and she walks back to the kitchen. Tori and I met in college. Even then she was my rock, helping me study for high school-level math or checking my conjugation tables when I had no idea when to use conocer. She kept me hopeful and picked me up when I wanted to quit the team. I proposed on Senior night and she cried as I picked her up and kissed her, smearing eyeblack and sweat from my face to hers. My memories of her are the things my brain fights to remember. They are put on a higher shelf than most thoughts, safe from the rising flood that has started rotting other parts of my life. I see a little green notebook on the chair next to me. I pick it up and remind myself I came to look for this. Of course! I didn’t blackout; I was just distracted. Now I hold the ring in one hand and the notebook in the other. I feel the heaviness of the ring, solid gold outweighing the small notebook. I set the ring back in its case. The overhead light is pointed to make all the little gems sparkle my name back at me like I am a king. The notebook is full of writing, mostly mine but some of Tori’s. “Love you, Ev” reads one, and “You can do anything!” is underlined on another page. A few bulleted lists: * Get up at 8 * Shower, brush teeth, shave * Go downstairs for breakfast Monday: Bacon (4) and eggs (3) Tuesday: Granola (3/4 cup) in yogurt Wednesday: Sausage biscuit Thursday: Bacon and Eggs … Sunday: No breakfast. Brunch with Tori and Abigail after Church. Abigail is a friend of Tori’s, but she sometimes comes with us to church. She comes every week if I remember right. On the other side of the page are large, capital letters written by a man who must have tried to be as convincing as possible without giving away how scared he really was: TAKE MEDS. TRUST THE DR. “Mommy,” Abigail calls down the stairs. Tori had a sorority sister named Abigail. My notebook was talking about our daughter Abigail, of course. She calls again and again, louder and tinnier each time because she is a child and that’s just what children do when they want something. I feel like I must make her stop yelling because I am developing a headache. I can’t concentrate on flipping through this little green notebook in my hands because my eyes are blurring because my head is feeling each pulse of blood my heart is sending through it, so I get angry. There is a forest fire in my brain and the acorns are pop pop popping. Now I am yelling back at my little daughter. She’s at the top of the stairs and looking down at me as I take the stairs two, maybe three, at a time. I slam my fist against the wall as I go up. Long whole notes of yells with quarter note thumps against the wall. She screams and runs to her room. My knees force me to stop moving, but they can’t stop me from trying to let the headache out through my mouth by way of screaming. Why am I so angry? It feels like everything would have been fine as long as she said “Mommy” one fewer time. I remind myself that I am a good father, a kind father, but I have to yell so she understands that I am serious about whatever I am saying. I can almost hear the picture frames rattle on the wall as I turn and let one last roar go through the whole upstairs. What am I saying? The back of my throat hurts now. “Evan, what’s going on?” Tori yells. She sees me standing at the top of the stairs and Abigail’s shut door. “What the hell did you do to her?” she asks as she blows past me and starts knocking on her door. “Abigail, baby, are you okay?” I’m not even close to the door, but I hear sobbing on the other side. “I don’t know what I-“ I am told to go downstairs and wait. I am a child again, in trouble with mom. She’s taking me out of church for being disruptive, not sitting still, or stealing from the collection basket. She goes into Abigail’s room as I take the steps one at a time now. My knees force me to be more careful and remind me that I don’t have the explosiveness once listed on my scouting report. I want to look back and see if she is okay, but I don’t. Tori comes down, and I can’t look at her. I trace the pattern in the kitchen counter with my finger to not have to look up and see her staring at me, waiting for me to start the conversation. I don’t want to see her disappointment. She doesn’t give up her silence and waits on the other side of the island, and I feel my face get hot. I was the one that threw a tantrum, not the child. “It really scares her,” Tori finally says. “When you let everything get to you.” The pendulum I was tied to now swings the other way. I burned my forest to the ground and now a river has come to sweep away all the ash. I slap my face, and it hurts like I want it to. I want the hurt to be outside instead of inside. “I don’t know what to do, baby,” I say into my hands as I feel tears in between my fingers. Tori takes a step closer, but I pick up a glass and smash it on the ground. She jumps back and puts a hand on her chest. Oh no. I’ve scared her too. I sit down, and she slowly walks over and puts two hands on my shoulders. I am a spiraling combination of angry, really angry, and soft. She puts her head on top of mine and her hair tickles my face. “Please take your pills,” she pleads. “I think they’ll help.” I hate my pills, but at that moment I don’t remember why. “I can’t take it anymore,” I say, and I’m not sure what I am talking about. The river inside me starts rising and everything is off balance. I want to lay on the floor and curl into a tight ball, but Tori is holding me up. It takes her only a moment to grab the pills from the cabinet, come back, and set them in my hand. The bottle feels full, and I try to remember how many I have taken and if they’ve ever helped. I tell her I need to go lay down, and she almost lifts me off the ground on her own. She would walk me all the way to the bed if I’d let her, but I say I can make it. I am quiet as I walk past Abigail’s room. She has a picture from a family trip to the beach taped to her door. We all look happy and sandy. It was in the downtime between Draft Day and the start of preseason camp. I was almost a different parent then-- I was too busy to get annoyed and lose my train of thought. Almost every day was mapped out where I should be and how I should do my job. I take two pills and hope they make me feel more like that parent. A word from the author: A former professional American football player fights to keep what he’s feeling under control as it gets worse.

1. “Good girl,” I say to the little dog when she pees beneath the palm tree outside my apartment building. That’s what the training video for Chihuahuas said you’re supposed to say. Good girl. And she seems pleased with herself. Good girl. And she is. A good girl. So far. 2. “Yet something doesn’t feel right about this,” I say to myself. “I feel like I’m the one being trained. Why is that?” 3. “No, wait,” I say to myself. “Don’t answer that. Stop. Just stop.” This. This makes me crazy. Thinking about this. It reminds me of what I did. How I adopted a dog. When I never planned to. When I’m not a dog person. When I never have been. Never wanted to be. I’m a cat person. And happy about it. Very. Happy. But last Saturday. It happened then. I was eating lunch in the park. And there she was. This tiny Chihuahua. Abandoned. In the park. Thin. Too thin. And tiny, tiny. I couldn’t leave her there. I couldn’t. I saw those people drive up, toss her out the window. I saw them drive away. But what could I do? What? So I rescued her. Adopted her. And look what happened. My life changed. Drastically. In just a week. Changed. In ways I never planned. Never wanted. Change. It’s not my friend. No. I’m not good with it. No, not at all. 4. “But, but, but,” I say to myself. “Stop. Just stop. Don’t say another word to me. Thank you.” 5. The little Chihuahua rolls over on my shoe to show me her fat belly. Good girl. And she is. And sweet. That too. I gently tug her new leash (just like the video said). She jumps to her feet. Potty break over. Time to go home. Laura Stamps loves to play with words and create experimental forms for her fiction. Author of 30 novels, novellas, and short story collections, including IT’S ALL ABOUT THE RIDE: CAT MANIA and THE WAY OUT (Alien Buddha Press). Winner of the Muses Prize. Recipient of a Pulitzer Prize nomination and 7 Pushcart Prize nominations. You’ll find her every day on Twitter (@LauraStamps16) and Facebook (Laura Stamps).

I only knew one Eunice in my life, and she lived long enough to get a birthday letter from the queen I have a covid fever am afraid I’m not doing well I’m deaf with snot, thank God, to hear it all would- anyway afraid of losing trees and roofs and fencing in the storm. Storm Eunice has arrived she’s singing whiney songs down to the hearth clinking wood-burner stove timpani and I’m afraid the wind will blow the chimney down I see it crashing through the roof it hits bed and kills the cat afraid the roof tiles will lift off fly sideways down and hit a car. The fact is - I have felt this many times before - I fear the wind. That time when hinge-ing from its final fixings like a big square wooden box lid that six-foot fencing on the border threatened to fly free alone then in my DIY incompetence, my neighbour laughed at me I tried to haul it free to lay it flat before it flew who knows what damage hundred mile an hour fence panels can do I tucked my chin into my chest and wore some gloves as if they gave me power struck on the face by rain I ripped and wrenched it wrestled it to horizontal next-door man looked on. And then I flew. The wind came underneath the panel was a square flat kite took off with me attached like Super Ted. We landed by a plum tree, me face-down, the panel looking innocent I’d travelled seven metres. My neighbour laughing still. That I am powerless against the storm, that laughter at me is the inevitable choral strain is what I fear Storm Eunice is a siren. I picture wreckage way before it comes. Lesley is currently shortlisted for Love Reading UK's 2022 very short story award with Jungle, 1971. Recent work can be found in The Broken Spine (twice featured flash of month) and Full House Lit Mag (featured creator). Kathryn O'Driscoll selected one of her poems for Full House's 2021 mental health live reading and forthcoming podcast. Dirigible Balloon and Parakeet have been lovely enough to publish some of her writing for kids.

Still Water torn with crossing waves tells how the wind blows currents to fight against the tide rolling forward flattening sand while cloud tissue rises catching fire from the sun and warmth escapes walls built by ancient hands I breathe deeply My lungs billow greedily pulling mineral air into my bones If the earth stopped turning If the moon tugging gently slowed to a halt If I could hold my breath The sea could at last grow still and do nothing but absorb the sky Unnamed I would never name it Shape it for you Transport it in words To your ears For your digestion So you can enjoy the taste Of your understanding And compassion You would require reasons And lessons learned A philosophical conclusion Me, wrapped in packaging You can read It ain’t gonna happen I suppose I should Do something with it As it is, unspoken It remains as large As the universe Surrounding me Sometimes I wake up At night and feel the truth Coming at me through The blackness and I Am afraid. I don’t want To see clearly, thank you It might be I am projecting on to you It is I pushing for a Consumable me I’m waiting ‘til it’s ok To look back If I turn too soon, I’ll fall Descending Me At the top is laughter A healing, welcome, guest Say hi to joy She loves to dance Next is hope A sturdy steam train Sometimes she chokes Love, like flowers Blooms in many colours Hello, sexuality A colourful bird of prey La Ego. Ever performing Never real The intellect Likes spinning riddles And empathy You speak, I feel Engage anger! She burns and comforts me Beware of fear Poisoning my vision While illusions peel away like dead skin The past Anchors me down Grief Coils in the dark Stillness passes I try to reach with shallow touch This is the I ascending me Tuesday Afternoons You look like happiness to me. Walking through the office with a noble stride. Putting things right, winking my way. If you were my boyfriend, I would be happy. When you leave, I want to eat chocolate, something with icing. A sugar hit to the brain, that’s what I need. Or a blow to the skull, may be better. To wake me from this restless sleep of desire with turns of fear and faith. Probably the cocktail born in humans since one saw their reflection in still water and thinking it was the self, asked: can I improve on this? And we continued ever more finding flaws in what is Accepting longing as the price for imagination. It's nothing to do with you really. Gráinne (grawn-ya) Shannon is a software developer, writer and poet from Ireland. Her day job inspired the award-nominated, Orla's Code, found on her website with her other side projects. When she's not working or writing, she's enjoying city life and often escaping it!

The last cold bite of the year together. Ice, wish you could fossilize the cream As an oasis to the desert Of my dry years to come. The inevitable ones Willing to leave me At once, Cutting my branches, Pruning twigs and leaves; Prick but tear me not apart. Uprooting costs dearly, Takes life, Bit by bit. You see very often The deserted sere roots too Grow greenish Once the tap leaks. Hopes do die And dying faith Fails to see the last look. Don’t you all feel the same? The shame of being a burden? Blankets still cover winter. Summer shines alone. Uday Shankar Ojha is a professor of English and former Dean, Student Welfare at Jai Prakash University, Chapra, Bihar, India. He has authored/edited many books on literature and has lectured widely across his country. He is prone to singing ghazals past midnight and has a hard time saying no to rice, lentils and curry despite his gym trainer advising against full Bihari meals. Regardless, he manages to stay in shape. Uday has captained his district cricket team and has been a table tennis player in the 80s. He can be reached at udayshankarojha001@gmail.com

Things We Did Before Google Danielle yells my name at the gate louder than usual and I trip over my dad’s shoes, stumbling out the door. Her eyes are euphoric bouncing balls - in her arms a new pair of neon green rollerblades with four gel wheels that light up when she spins. I rush back in, grab my worn-out pair - the one I keep under my bed, two sizes too big, passed around too many times. We sit on the sidewalk - her feet slide into her birthday present, and I stuff old stretched-out socks inside mine to make them fit. We pull the buckles as tight as Rose's corset. No helmets or elbow pads, we wear scabs and scars. Holding hands to get up from the curb, we stand as tall as a captain. We skate down to the video store as if we were in a Gaelic Storm at a third-class party. We've been waiting all 1998 for Titanic to dive right into our VHS players, months opening our arms singing Celine Dion's My Heart Will Go On in perfect gibberish. We know things take a while to come to Brazil. A semi-open box labeled new arrivals stands on the counter at the store, and I can hear the flute melody echoing from the inside. Robbie steps out from the backstage of his store in full theatrics, sound effects brought to us by his bamboo curtains. Bravo, give this man an Oscar. Hands behind his perfectly postured back, Titanic - the double VHS, still sealed with plastic film appears before our eyes. We grab the box as if it were a life jacket, saving our afternoon. Three consecutive hours of swooning over Jack, drenching ourselves in the ocean of our newfound grief. We pull together our change, skate down to the drugstore, and pick up some red hair dye. We want to be Rose Agape Thaina (she/her) is a Brazilian-American poet and educator based in Maryland. Nominated for Best of the Net by Sledgehammer Lit, her poetry has also been featured at OlneyMagazine, Lumiere Review, South Africa New Contrast, The Bitchin’ Kitsch, and elsewhere. She hopes her work will empower, connect the human experience, and evoke new perspectives. Find her on IG: @thainawrites Twitter: @teedistrict