A half breath taken between blurred readings
Hooks pulling me further and further
Down
The corridor of books
Heavy books and too many words
Lines of logic now zigzagging spirals
I walk without direction
Cold walls and rickety shelves
The hook tightening its grip
Pulling but I am lifeless
Floating but not afloat
The walls narrowing 
Engulfing the space, the air, the books
And the door


Author Bio:
Simona Laski is an undergraduate in her 4th year of college who simply enjoys using words as vehicles of expression.

Every slight chips away a piece of me
As I try to put a price on the dignity
My boss has slowly chipped away
Embarrassment and degradation remain
Longing looks $75
Licking of lips $130
Grazing backsides $100
Peering down blouses $50
Massaging shoulders $60
Fingers trickling down arms $30
Promotion dependent on traveling with him $250
He says he wants to taste my sweet cake $#!#!#!
Slowly, I take home one item at a time 
Until there is no trace of me in the office 
I will leave for lunch and not come back
The ID badge will forever hang from my rearview mirror
So I will always remember treasures I wouldn’t give up
My coffee cups says “Good Morning” on its face 
Every morning he says, “You’re prettier when you smile”
I flip the mug over and leave it on my desk
Hidden on the bottom are the words, “Fuck You”
If he misses me, he can drink out of my cup of strength
I tally up the scorecard and there is a negative balance 
Years of apologies written in red ink not recoverable
I’ll take the loss and leave for my vagina is not for sale


Author Bio:
Yong Takahashi won the Chattahoochee Valley Writers National Short Story Contest and the Writer's Digest's Write It Your Way Contest. She was a finalist in The Restless Books Prize for New Immigrant Writing, Southern Fried Karma Novel Contest, Gemini Magazine Short Story Contest, and Georgia Writers Association Flash Fiction Contest. Some of her works appear in Cactus Heart, Crab Fat Magazine, Flash Fiction Magazine, Gemini Magazine, Meat For Tea, and Twisted Vines. 

To read some of Yong’s stories, please visit: www.yctwriter.com.

busy grey squirrel hears
fall acorns pit pat bounce
dashes out of nest
 
sun sets on pine run
shadows sprint for tilting sun
branch and bark flashes
 
bored black calico 
studies scuttling beetles
planning an attack
 
quiet sunrise mirror
orange purple clouds and moon
off wet bullfrog eye 
 
bright red cutthroat trout
sense dancing beetles
splash wakes desert fox
 
hissing fall raindrops
tapping rich soil and roses
night scents meander
 
red grey woodpecker
scuttles and hopscotches
listening for ants


Author Bio:
Gregg Dotoli studied English at Seton Hall University and enjoys living in the NYC area. He is a white hat hacker, but his first love is the Arts.

for my daughter, in her future 

So the dancing is a cure, the drums wild
like movement in painting--
flashes of color equal
to the strife of future years, careless

of days going off the rails and
emptying into an evaporating atmosphere
or recurring, shaping
a kind of mimicry of motion and intent

that becomes the meme
by which others are recognized, awakening
to an even greater understanding 
of the inner dimensional self—all this, but 

what if there was more, beyond 
these shifting shiny surfaces where 
an ineluctable sea strips away the sand
and gathers us all up, like stars, 

into the spoken word? The real cost
includes the risk of not having—in a future
where each day’s a delight, where
music and dancing fill your house.


Author Bio:
David Wyman’s first collection of poems, Proletariat Sunrise, was published in 2017 by Kelsay Books. His poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Dissident Voice, The Aurorean, BlazeVOX, Clockwise Cat, Picaroon Poetry, A Certain Slant, The Wallace Stevens Journal, Old Crow Review, Spout and Green Hills Literary Lantern among other publications. 

If I could somehow untwist my achesfearsdisappointmentworry 
From my scalp easy 
like itchy kanekalon

Believe me,
It’d be yours. 

I’m certain it will scratch the roof of your mouth better than it serves my amygdala.


Author Bio:
Alex Sullivan is a master’s student at NYU who does far too much editing and is far too scared to share her poetry with fellow editors. 

A body is a body.
She will never know
what it’s like to look,
see bare skin, suffer 
a sensation—the urge
men feel to give love 
as they interpret. No
time for romance, need 
for connection, just action.

A cry is a cry.
He will never notice
her dead blank stare
while pressing his body--
his aching body--
inside her lying passively,
thinking he is sharing
a reward she has earned
just for being beautiful. 


Author Bio:
Rebecca Rodriguez is a young writer from South Jersey currently getting an M.A. in Writing and working as a graduate instructor teaching Composition 1. Although she has published a few fiction prose pieces, this is her first attempt at poetry. 

The universe I carry on my back
is a lot lighter,

hunch and move
past reality,

decades ago
flailing my arms

like a boxer
inside the ring

tearing rib cages
to shreds.

I have learned
hear the voice first,

ask for help
admitting

there is a dawn
perceive it

above the cities of destruction
crumbling in your mind


without sound,
all you need do

is reach beyond
boundaries created

something
untouchable

impossible to describe.


Author Bio:
Dennis Reed is a National Endowment Fellow and author of the poetry collection DEFINITIONS recently published by OPUS press. His work has appeared in STYLE, ESSENCE, CLA, BLACK SCHOLAR and many other magazines and journals. His memoir, MIGRATION MEMORIES, was a semi-finalist in the NCTE/NORMAN MAILER writer of non-fiction award for high school teachers.

He has taught writing courses at Morehouse College, William and Mary and Virginia Commonwealth University. 

I heard the drops
Knocking at the glass plane 
Above my bed, 
They are begging for
Attention,
Screaming out to me -
pleading -
That I show pity on them.

They are persistent
And married to their 
Hope of one day breaking in -
Into my home.

I do not fear their intrusion,
I fear their character.
What ever have I done to deserve
the attention
Of such noble creations?
Their will is admirable,
Evident in every 
thump-thump.

At night I stare indifferently 
As armies come and fall.
Their strength commendable
But still no match 
For my ironclad fortress.

I pray silently each night
In memory of the slain.

~eshasmoky
​

Author Bio:
Esha Radhaykissoon is a seventeen-year-old girl who grew up in the Caribbean. She enjoys crafting stories and poems based on her perception of life and the emotions she associates with the world. She does not consider herself her a writer, merely a spinner of words. To her writing is and always will be therapeutic. 

​We live in the age of panic
Yet it is not felt
It is not touched
And it is not materially measured
 
Regardless
There it tis
Having perhaps more hold over some
Then the seen, palpated and touched
 
Are the worst types of pressure
From the observable
Or are they rather
From the intangible?
 
The observable we can quantify
Hence focus on
With all our wrath and venom
And desire for vengeance
 
But the intangible unexplainable
Can be a whole other matter
For how do we hold accountable
That which we cannot see, hear or explain?
 
Boundaries become blurred
Personal integrity becomes compromised
We feel violated
Let alone vulnerable
 
Is that not
What the panic wants
It has won
Before the battle has been joined
 
Our deepest fears
Have been realized
The unseen enemy
A victor of the battle let alone the war.
 

Author Bio:
David I. Mayerhoff is an emerging writer while being a practicing physician and Clinical Professor of Psychiatry. His areas of specialty are in Graduate Medical Education, the chronic mentally ill, and academic research with a focus on the heterogeneity of schizophrenia disorders. 

Selected poetry of his can be found at drsyke.wordpress.com, allpoetry.com, poetry.com, as well as published selections at PoetryBay/ Long Island Quarterly, The Paragon Journal and elsewhere. 

​Collar bones
I see them even through your sweatshirt.
What happened to your soft edges? 
Jagged, broken
Every square inch of your neck covered
In blue, in purple
Those bruises on your wrists
Those holes in your ankles
Who put them there?
Was it your dad? Those dreams you couldn't quite spin into realities? 
Or was it your mother you took so much from
I saw her here, too
But you don’t live
You survive 


Author Bio:
Svetlana Lefevre is an International Studies major and a freshman in college. She writes for fun.