I AM A BROWN MAN.
I AM A WHITE MAN.
I AM A MAN
WITHOUT ALLEGIANCE.
ONLY I CAN DECIDE
WHERE I BELONG
I AM UNIVERSAL MAN.
I AM A MAN ALMOST
NOBODY CAN UNDERSTAND.
IF YOU ARE WHAT YOU EAT
I HAVE BEEN MANY THINGS
I AM ASHAMED OF.
I HAVE NEVER BEEN A WHOLE.
MY PIECES ARE HELD
TOGETHER BY CHEESE. 
I AM A WHITE MAN.
I AM A BROWN MAN.
AND COME TO THINK OF IT
THERE IS NO BETTER PLACE
FOR ME THAN HERE.


Author Bio:
Alex L. Swartzentruber is a poet of mixed Mexican, American, and Chinese heritage from Goshen, Indiana. 

'Believe me. If I knew then, what I know now I wouldn’t have left home. Mother said something about God’s protection. Rewinding was not an option, but leaving our village seemed a no-brainer then. I was clutching a lucky ewe’s tooth deep inside my wax coat pocket, and my future was sorted. ‘Welcome to Britain,’ the pilot announced. Still, I felt I’d been given a break; doors were opening at last. 
​
The vibrant rays coming through the plane window weren’t quite as vivid as those in my dream, but it was okay. My journey had begun. Then I had stomach cramps after the touch-down at Birmingham Airport. That triggered running for the loo. Lucky I didn’t know about the dodgy deal I’d signed up to. A good job or I’d have begged a seat on the next flight back to Bucharest.

Faking it, I kept my eyes focused ahead and rubbed away the creases from my best pink blouse, tucked neatly into my jeans. I convinced myself I could do this traveling abroad thing and desperately wanted to make a good impression, but dragging my wheelie case made me melt into a messy heap. That wasn’t a good start.

A fine drizzle crazed the huge arrivals hall windows blurring my vision; the air was muggy. When I reached for a body spray out of the suitcase side pocket, it got kind of awkward...' 


Author Bio:
Author Polly White admits to being around forty. Her absolute favourite place to go with her family is the seaside, which is a long way from the suburbs where she lives in the Midlands, UK. To keep fit she runs along paths. That's when she imagines her characters in their own setting, aiming to offer a heads-up to readers. She attended a conference supporting victims of sexual exploitation called Hope for Justice and spoke to police, as part of the research for this realistic fiction. However, holding her protagonist’s hand can be scary. 

The ebook from which the excerpt is taken is called, ‘What If I Go?’ and aimed at college and uni students. Dealing with sensitive coming-of-age issues in an easy read way, the story of Grace acts as a heads up for others to avoid falling prey to gangs. The aim is to raise awareness of issues that can make students vulnerable, in a culturally cohesive manner. She is an advocate for young women and loves to empower them through her fiction.

Polly is a multi-genre author with previous short story success. Her muse has a Christian voice. Her characters learn by experience making the read more authentic.

Struggling against more turbulence
this broken concrete can’t shut down
and cool –your shadow’s too old

leans down and though the wall
falls closer and closer
it tries to rest your face 

–a sleeping face
still circling where your forehead
mingles with rocks and weeds 

–even your grave goes to pot
lets anyone point at it
as if sunlight could urge you

to spread out inside a sky
that has no days left, is lifted
face to face with the ground.


Author Bio:
Simon Perchik is an attorney whose poetry has appeared in appeared in Partisan Review, the New Yorker and elsewhere.

Home from college on Christmas break,
on a drunken teenage impulse
they decided to attend midnight mass,
none of the three Catholic,
two Protestants and a Jew.

Potawatomi Rapids a small town,
Saint John’s fixed in their minds
at the corner of Cass and Calhoun,
how could they ever miss it,
even in a Michigan blizzard,
the snow coming down now 
like ripped feather pillows shaken,
wind a cutting knife, ice
stinging insect bites blinding eyes.

As a child, Owen’s mother laughed
when he asked her the location of Orientàr.

Orientàr?

Where the three kings came from, he explained.
We three kings of Orientàr 
bearing gifts we travel so far.

Now they wandered through slush,
shoes sodden as washcloths,
long after the toll of midnight,
following yonder star.


Author Bio:
Charles Rammelkamp is Prose Editor for BrickHouse Books in Baltimore, where he lives, and edits The Potomac, an online literary journal – http://thepotomacjournal.com . His photographs, poetry and fiction have appeared in many literary journals. His latest book is a collection of poems called Mata Hari: Eye of the Day (Apprentice House, Loyola University), and another poetry collection, American Zeitgeist, is forthcoming from Apprentice House.

rises & like the river-time runs
on my lips
hands grow & I teach silence
to children of dust to children
of wind
 
who came with apples & without--
you cannot see the void
with open eyes
the shark your friend tells you the truth
 
one life two lives the ocean rolls
in you--
you are redeemed  going away
& coming back
with the weather      I hear your steps
along the shore     cast off a tear
& it will rain
 
 
Author Bio:
Stella Vinitchi Radulescu, Ph.D. in French Language & Literature, is the author of several collections of poetry published in the United States, Romania and France. She writes poetry in English, French and Romanian and her poems have appeared in Asheville Poetry Review, Pleiades, Louisville Review, Laurel Review, Rhino, Wallace Stevens Journal, Seneca Review among others, as well as in a variety of literary magazines in France, Belgium, Luxembourg, and Romania. Her last collection of poetry I scrape the window of nothingness - new & selected poems was released in 2015 from Orison Books Press. She lives in Chicago.

It felt like the world gave me nothing,
except secondhand smoke in my atmosphere,
permission to play catch with the neighbor’s kid 
(the one who had the personality of a pet rock),
corduroys that didn’t fit my awkward physique,
and classmates who teased me. Nothing.

I was assigned chores without an allowance,
given water when I begged for grape soda,
told to save money while friends flaunted new toys,
and ordered to be polite, even when people gave me nothing. 
Later, as a teenager, my parents watched as circumstance
kicked confusion into their baby boy’s blood. 
Yet they gave me nothing, except unsolicited advice.

And now I’m older, spending Saturday night sober,
trying to resist the pull of my vices, 
relaxing after five days of working a job I despise 
just so I can purchase junk that I don’t need,
and I realize when the world gave me nothing,
I had everything. 


Author Bio:
Adrian S. Potter writes poetry and short fiction. He is the author of the fiction chapbook Survival Notes (Červená Barva Press, 2008) and winner of the 2010 Southern Illinois Writers Guild Poetry Contest. Some publication credits include North American Review, Jet Fuel Review, Obsidian and Kansas City Voices. He blogs, sometimes, at http://adrianspotter.com/.

Two boys came to my seat.
One planted his hand on my thigh,
the other leaned over the torn seat in front of us
like he was ready for the show to begin.
I hated the look of his buck teeth,
his stupid smirk. 

“How are you?” the one next to me 
said running his hand
up and down my thigh.
I pushed it away
before I said fine. I wasn’t fine. 

The bus was empty and I was alone
in the back. I tried to move.
Told them not to touch me
but the one hanging over the seat
grabbed both of my arms and held them 
tightly together. 

I tried to kick my feet 
the one who sat next to me 
grabbing them and unbuttoning my jeans.

He shoved his hand into my panties
and rammed his fingers into my vagina.

I pleaded for them to let me go
because my stop was next.
I buttoned my jeans and grabbed my bag
and fled up the aisle before the bus even stopped.

“How was your day?”
My mother’s voice was warm 
but I didn’t tell her what happened
I was scared. Scared I provoked them.

“It was good,” I replied
I didn’t understand.
I only knew I was ashamed,
as if I had done something wrong. 


Author Bio:
Kristen Williamson is currently a Graduate in English Literature and Creative Writing at Binghamton University in New York, where her fields of study include poetry and fiction. She has been featured in Slink Chunk Press, The Stray Branch, The Zine and others.