Ben Mazer
THE STRAWBERRY BLONDE Miasmal afternoons in run-down shadeof clutter and rickety porches, smells of sex,and filthy carpets, loose floors, leaning walls,interminably appointmentless an
Roddy Lumsden
HALFWAY THROUGH THE YEAR OF THE DRAGON She loves the music box forever, she's crying on my shoulder-The Blue Nile, 'Stay'You can mythologise anywhere but you cannot
Niall Campbell
AESTHETICS, ON A SIDE STREET OFF GLASGOW GREEN The sky is starred by the shells of the BochesThe marvellous forest where I live is giving a ball— Apollinaire, La Nuit d’avril 1
Alison Brackenbury
NO CHEMOTHERAPY ‘Then can I go home?’ she asks them brightly.I note three pearls, bunched at the doctor’s throat,the dark nape of the fair nurse, curling tightly.The silence str
David Cooke
AFTER BRUEGEL The magpie on the gallowshas seen it all, but nowremembers nothing;the bright beadsof his eyes swivellingremorselesslyfrom one catastropheto another. And th
KAREN GREENBAUM-MAYA
TRUE WAY The true way to brush your teeth is like painting the Golden Gate Bridge. One side always gets more fluoride than the other. When you reach Marin'
Keith Driver
THE EMPEROR OF THE EMPIRE There was no such thing as salt, norwas there a taste called salt, nor did anyonewish his meat or his bread saltedor its bitterness soothed by salt, norwer
Siegfried Mortkowitz
BUDAPEST it’s morning and my knee hurts when I move itthe right one but only when I move itso I stop moving my right leg but nowthere’s this dull ache under my left should