The Fox and the Secret Police of Alaska

Lotsa freaky women and girls cluck and carp
in falling snows, gad about in sandals showing
off their toes, or take the elevator upward
into Juneau’s downtown library. This one here
wears a foxtail clipped to her belt. When
she walks, ambles or sashays, the foxtail swings.
“Nice tail,” I say, and for the front desk she trots.
“I need you to call the police,” she says. “There’s
a man who’s been chasing me and saying crude
things to me. Please call the police now.”

 
The library lady, bless her heart, looks around,
sees no hunter, says she can’t call the cops
unless a person is in danger. The fox is upset
and a little bit desperate, her foxy eyes darting,
looking for avenues of escape and safe
spaces should I jump out and reveal my pistol
and take aim at her foxy tail.

 
Oh, these trials and tribulations oppress her, but
here comes her savior! It’s a man of brawn
musculature and brown skin. He’s come off the
cruise ship docked outside and on his shirt, in big
bold white block letters is: SECRET POLICE.
She trots to him. “Are you the secret police?”
says she, and the man smiles. “Yes I am,”
says he, and winks at his friend.

 
The fox tells him of the perv, but the joke, sadly,
is over. The Secret Police do not help her. They
leave her, just leave her there, standing all alone,
and so helpless. The frightened fox knows not
what now to do, so trots for the elevator, me
following, her tail swinging furry and soft.

 

Opham Denyer lives in New Jersey where he loves life and looks forward to the future. He is poor, but who needs money? His favorite things are dumpster diving and speaking in Korean.

Lions and Tigers and Bears, Oh My!

Sometimes, I think I want to be a teacher.
Other times, I think I want to be a rare creature
Like a unicorn, because what else could I be
But teetering on the edge on insanity?
I’m a mentally ill wreck that sometimes
Can’t get out of bed until the clock chimes
Past noon. Why would people trust me
To look after their children. Humanity
Is not yet that desperate for educators
That they would look past the many indicators
Of my insanity. Surely, they must see
My frequent and loud use of profanity
And dismiss me as an irreverent anarchist,
Preferring the more traditional protagonist.
But I think, these kids, they need to be free.
It’s not just a pathetic form of vanity,
Born of a need to be helpful and good
At something to do with adulthood;
I think they might really need me,
Along with my own type of insanity.

 

Emily Ash is a 19 year old from Britain. They are retaking their A-levels right now, and hope to go to uni next year. Their favourite poet is Spike Milligan.

Trouble Every Day XIII

The other night I was thinking
About teeth

 
I was drinking rum
And reading

 
A message from a friend who felt
That the amount
Of fight and purity

 
I craved had nothing
To do with the cardinal winds

 
A pin dropped
I heard the stop sign

 
A nightingale and a raven
Made angry love
Midair

 
I was thinking about secret agents
How sometimes their teeth
Are hollowed

 
Capsules full of cyanide
How other

 
Times they’ll kill
The landlord or sleep
With your teenage daughter

 
Then look you in the eye
And say
This never happened.

 

Glen Armstrong edits a poetry journal called Cruel Garters and has three recent chapbooks: Set List (Bitchin Kitsch,) In Stone and The Most Awkward Silence of All (both Cruel Garters Press.)

Will I say?

When my number is up
and I lie helpless on my mobile
state of the art electric bed,
will I mind if they call me “darling”?
When I have lost control of my bowels,
wear pads in my pants, a tube on my dick,
my piss in a bag down the side of the bed,
will I mind being called “sweetheart”?

 
Will I mind having my pants pulled down,
my arse wiped by a teenager in uniform?
What will I feel lying stark naked while
she lifts my balls for a bed wash,
removes the sheets I have soiled?
Will I care when I fart in her face,
and burp while she inserts a straw
between my dry lips, to ease the passage
of those putrid pills I don’t have
the muscle to swallow?

 
When they have rolled me from side to side,
side to side again, creamed my crack,
brushed the shit from my nails,
squirted stuff in my armpits,
stuffed my arms into pyjamas,
done my buttons, lifted my flabby legs,
socked my swollen feet, shaved my double chin,
talked down to me in practised platitudes,
covered me up, patted me down,
and then ask – “how does that feel?”
If I can still speak, will I say how I feel?
will I say how,
it actually,
fucking,
feels?

 

John Ling, aka Juicy John, having spent ten years working with autistic kids,  has learnt lots of ways to annoy people in charge. He now spend my days (seriously) in conflict resolution, and sending up all sorts of people in his writing.

“Compliant to assault”

Crimson beams of your dream uphold my sentiments,
It is indifferent to normal, I yet have no resentments,
The chilling twilight tide might answer better,
Our questions were few but we couldn’t cater,
I’m not your mistakes, love!
You sought below, I neither reside above,
Mine too nurtures magic, like every other hand,
I can butter up behind your eye lids without a wand,
My potions don’t blemish the pathos of a dark,
I can hug your instincts, I can ignite your spark,
We could open a book together,
We could mark it with a feather,
Or we can embrace this destitute path,
Let’s enlighten their infertile wrath,
Clamp the blue of your heart with red,
Open the mixed purple together, let it spread,
Or bury these love beads beneath the sand,
Let go the lit ends, burn cigarettes bearing no brand,
Time will upheave your nostalgic thought,
I’ll hoist a sad flag, I’ll buy whatever you brought.

 

Rida Akhtar Ghumman is a 19 years old dilettante, successfully pursuing a Bachelor degree in English. They love writing for the mere sake of self pleasure but nobody minds some pounds handy. Their poetry is a reflection of what goes in their mind, obviously. It’s usually boggling with unadulterated ideas & then they decide to write.

Of Flowers and Bees

Pantyless, I lay on cool pink cotton sheets, scrolling through a weekend’s worth of messages on my mobile. Your pussy looks like a flower, my boyfriend said suddenly. A flower? What the hell kind of flower is that? He shrugged his shoulders in that, how do you expect me to know gesture he often uses. Leaping off the bed, he grabbed a pen, a piece of paper and began sketching.  Open your legs a little wider, hon, I need a better view. I looked at him with an arched eyebrow, but did what he requested.  Lying there, I look up at the ceiling thinking of flowers and bees and if the drawing of my pussy would look like a Van Gogh or a Matisse. In about two minutes, my sweetie placed the pen and paper on the nightstand and smiled his one dimpled smile at me. I asked to see the drawing, he didn’t answer as he climbed on top of me and watered my flower.

 

Toni G. had dreams of becoming a rap artist (Hence the name Toni G.) but due to life struggles (such as being an old fart and not having enough money to buy gold chains or gold caps for her teeth) she decided to forgo that career and become a poet. As you can tell by her piece being published in WFP, she hasn’t made it as a poet either. 

the above piece of rubbish shamefully wrought from my fifty plus shades of petrified grayish (comfortably) numb skull materiel, who, like that kid in Deliverance, a banjo he doth “FAKE” to strum.

 

As an arboreal bonobo, cereal dumbo, and ethereal fondue

oh…and an American of LVIII skittish scuttles salutary hoo

ha slip shod journey round mister sun,

and becomes Crispr than any 23andme and during Jew

if fie venture to close,

thus hastening a rush to water closet to extinguish fire loo

ping all around me – asper resembling a mulberry bush,

moost likely severe burns will into a new

lee reincarnated carbon based life form,

or if lucky aye will buck hum a rolling stone –

as the jagged key cornerstone laid for a sin a gog

 

 

 

or other non denominational church pew,

that bore witness to political ambition of one hog

in daas ice cream addict, and indulged without letup,

thus necessitating being rolled like one bump on a log

so mud dear wanton Downton Abbey dwellers,

I present a synopsis of Jacob William Rees-Mogg

(born 24 May 1969), and evinced a craving for deluxe

top of the line pie ala mode posse sub bull being nursed on egg nog

which left no rum for any contrition,

hence this mollycoddled, pampered

non heir oh gent, ex spoon non chilly unscrupulous Brit did slog

his way as a Conservative Politician of Parliament

for North East Somerset at the 2010 general election

success predicated on his birth in Hammersmith, London

educated at Eton College, he got along swimmingly with pollywog

wharf air he superseded his piers (plow man style),

who many Thames thought himself tubby

the moost salient resplendent cog.

 

 

 

Matthew Scott Harris was born in Cincinnati that fuckeye state

January 13th  – unknown+ years to date

a tangle of arms & legs testing lungs, sounded great

in the garden of Eden, he kind of resembled

a misshapen octopus under the sea with an oval pate

glowering inxs deep purple moody blue, and quite irate

thrust out womb of Harriet Harris whom Boyce did date

after courting this youngest Kuritsky whose   

(fast forward half a century) met her ill-fate

whisked by grim reaper, which demise she did hate

trademark persona imbued with vim and vinegar til illness ate

je nais sais quois personable maternal trait

evident during my boyhood reflected by this sole son

inches closer to mortality and Hades gate

aware each day ought to be cherished as the topnotch rate

In my lifetime I’ve performed over 9000 sins

Pick a religion, any religion, and I have sinned against it

Sins that have been catalogued, weighed, and indexed

Each sin, a heart pockmarked, flamed, shamed

 

The universe is voracious, a vast sin-eater

And allowing me to sin more, for its feeding pleasure

No remorse, no heat death, sin without end

 

My sins are not new nor shiny, and cannot be seen

By more than a select few, sinning with me

A sinful conspiracy, beneath a blind complacency

 

My sins have claws and fangs, dragon-sized

Trapped in its sinful cage with no means of escape

Scratching the innards of my sinful brain

 

Sins within sins, nested and hatched

Before I leave, some questionable future sin:

Can one sin in their own personal hell?

 

Jake Tringali (jakethepoet.wordpress.com) has lived up and down the East Coast, and then up and down the West Coast, and is now back in his home city of Boston. He runs rad restaurants. He thrives in a habitat of bars, punk rock shows, and a sprinkling of burlesque performers. He was first published in 2014. Journals include Catch & Release, Boston Poetry Magazine, Indiana Voice Journal, and thirty-five other fine periodicals.

Questions

 

You ask me if I care for you

I look at you suspiciously

Hesitate, and then respond

You doubt the sincerity of my reply

 

You ask me if I want you

Yes, like a cat desires a mouse

You eye my smirk with concern

I picture you, mouse, tail hanging from between my lips

 

You ask me if we’ll get married

I fake a stroke, stumble to the floor

You see through my theatrics and

ask the question again

 

You say that you are leaving

Bags packed you linger at the door

Half-heartedly, I attempt to stop you

You quickly give in and stay

 

You ask me to meet your parents

Faking another stroke just won’t do

I crap and wet my pants

You ease off of your demands for the day

 

You place a ring on my finger

An invisible noose tightens around my neck

My vision blurs, my tongue feels heavy

I sign 911 as I crumble to the floor.

 

 

 

 

 Toni G. had dreams of becoming a rap artist (Hence the name Toni G.) but due to life struggles (such as being an old fart and not having enough money to buy gold chains or gold caps for her teeth) she decided to forgo that career and become a poet. As you can tell by her piece being published in WFP, she hasn’t made it as a poet either. 

 

 

 

A Sunday Drive

I think that we have driven many miles:

paved surface prior to a country road,

the crunch of gravel grinding under tires,

the earthy smell of fields just freshly mowed.

The loud and rolling cries of sandhill cranes

compete with engine revs, rubato notes

and him, his laughter. Damp with coming rains,

the air is muggy as it swallows, bloats.

His hands were strong when he first held me tight,

his breath against my cheek both sweet and hot.

I dropped my phone as I just tried to fight

the dragging by hair through the parking lot.

 

 

I’m guessing he is still profoundly drunk

by how I’m tossed around in this dark trunk.

 

Karen Shepherd lives with her husband and twoA Sunday Drive teenagers in the Pacific Northwest, where she enjoys kayaking, walking in forests and listening to the rain. Her poems and fiction have been published in riverbabble, Literally Stories, CircleShow, Sediments Literary Art Journal, Dime Show Review, The Society of Classical Poets and Poets Reading the News.