Issue 62 – So long and thanks for all the turkeys!

Patuxet Thanksgiving
By Cardinal Cox

Sickness and slavery was all they brought
These strange pale men from the depths of the sea
When we saw their wives and children we thought
They might be peaceable, was not to be

They took the fertile fields of those who’d died
They would argue and kill each other too
And they would gift death to any who tried
To help by showing medicines that grew

In forests or field. The spirits have left
And the newcomers are empty of soul
Land itself becomes hollow and bereft
As though beneath us is a gaping hole

Annual Thanksgiving of ash and bone
Our homes are remembered by ghosts alone

Thanksgiving Roads
By Mark Hudson

This town,
is nothing but a noun.
This suburb,
is nothing but a verb.

Gonna go to Grandma’s house,
for Thanksgiving.
Gonna celebrate the fact,
that she’s still living.

Over the river and through the woods,
to grandma’s house we go.
We’ll have some turkey that’s good,
we’re going to eat some doe.

With the uncle who hunts the meal,
Thanksgiving a gigantic feast.
Thanksgiving roads by the wheel,
Chevrolet taking us East.

Watching leaves fall from the trees,
autumn closing behind its curtain.
A chill is felt in the breeze,
winter is coming, its coming for certain.

We gather in Grandma’s barn,
and eat ourselves some pecan pie.
Grandpa tells a corny old yarn,
with a crazy gleam in his eye.

Dinner is served-all have arrived,
the cousins, the kids-the aunts.
Uncle Bob and Adam who is five,
and the unfamiliar guest Jeff Krantz.

As we dig into the turkey and stuffing,
don’t tell me you’re grateful for nothing!
Because if you say that, you must be bluffing!

Thanksgiving Re-enactment
By Kimberly Y. Choi

“I think I’ve got this.” My brother squinted one eye at the wild turkey and twitched the rifle back and forth. “Or, I don’t know.”

“Want me to do it?” My own hands were sweating, though, without even holding a gun.

“No, no.”

As he was kneeling on the ground, focused on his aim, his pose looked ripe for a picture. I snapped a photo and flicked it into our historical re-enactment club’s folder. It was true to what they would’ve done in the 2020s; taking overabundances of photos and posting them on the early internet was a major part of youth culture.

While bracing myself to be startled by the sound of gunfire, I examined the photo. My brother’s costume, as did mine, looked so much like the people in the stereotypical old pictures, just with the trivial inaccuracy that the sleeves and pants were short. Back then, they would’ve had to dress warmly in November. We’d done our best.

Yet as perfect as he looked, he still wouldn’t shoot. How long did we have to stay here?

“He– he’s walking away.” There was resignation in his whisper.

“Well, what do you think? Follow him.”

“He’s going into the bushes though.”

I sighed. “Here, give me that.”

He handed me the gun. I stood, but now that the power was in my hands, this physical weight, I didn’t know what to do.

“Holding this thing makes me feel pretty ‘cool,’” I joked, uneasy.

“I don’t think that’s exactly how ‘cool’ was used.” He chuckled. “Or maybe it is. I’m not sure.”

I crept a couple steps forwards. I was supposed to walk as soundlessly as possible, I knew. But I half-wished the bird would hear me and escape. The woods felt so unconcerned in that moment, the sound of wind and insects proceeding without hesitation.

I said, “It’s weird how they did this almost every day, isn’t it? Eat animals.”

“Yes, yes, it is.” My brother watched the turkey peck at the ground so springily as though nothing was wrong. “I’m not even morally against it, you know. It’s just weird.”

“Same.”

I lowered the rifle.

“Bill’s going to be disappointed,” I said. “He told me he spent hours going through old recipes looking for the best one.”

As we headed towards the gates of our towering city without the meat, the turkey raised his intricately striped wings and fled from us. We stayed silent. All this to honor a past method of honoring the past! And all to impress upon us just how much we were people of our own time.

Turkey’s Hideout
By K. A. Williams

It was cold this morning; I fluffed up my feathers. I warmed my feet by scratching around for breakfast and dug up some tasty grubs and worms which I gobbled whole.

“Your ma will be so proud of you when you shoot a turkey for Thanksgiving dinner.”

The voice scared me and I squeezed myself into a thicket before the man who spoke could see me.

“She’d probably rather cook one from the grocery store that didn’t have to be prepared. Last year Ma spent an hour just getting all the feathers out,” said a second voice.

Then the speakers came into view – a tall male human and a short male human. Both of them carried shotguns. I stayed still and hoped I was well hidden.

They went past me on down the path but I could still hear them talking. “I knew you’d like the rifle I bought you for your birthday. You did great on the shooting range, you won’t have any trouble getting us a turkey and some other game as well.”

Their voices faded down the path. I hadn’t finished my breakfast and was still hungry. I’d grown big and had barely fit myself into the space I was now in. There was no room for me to forage. If I moved, the thicket would rustle and I would be discovered.

I hoped my family had been able to conceal themselves as well. My dear mother had disappeared at this time last year, now I knew what had happened to her. I could hear gunfire in the distance while I stayed hidden.

***

“Your ma will be disappointed that we didn’t bag any game this time. I’m sorry you missed all those wild ducks that flew by. I was sure you’d get one of them, there were so many. I wouldn’t have missed that bobwhite if you hadn’t stumbled and bumped against me. It’s lunchtime, let’s give up and go home. I can’t believe we didn’t see a single turkey this morning.” The tall human headed down the path, away from me.

The short human stopped in front of the thicket where I was hiding. “Me too, Pa, I wonder where they’ve all gone.” He looked directly at me and waved, before following the other male.

The End

Farewell
By DJ Tyrer

The alien invasion
Came as quite a surprise
Not the form folk expected
Raided the turkey farms
The woods, anywhere with the birds
Tractor beamed them aboard saucers
Too swift for retaliation
Flew away and radioed back
A farewell, saying
So long and thanks for all the turkeys!

Issue 61 – Cybercity Rain

With souls dulled by rain
Wet people stopped noticing
Their own bright raincoats

By Nieske den Heijer

Lurching, drought to flood.
Man attempts Nature’s control.
Hubris and Folly.

By David Edwards

Memory of Water
By Cardinal Cox

Water doesn’t have memory
No recollection of plesiosaurs
Swimming in it – no wistful
Thoughts of lapping round Cnut’s
Ankles – no heroic tales of dousing
Flames caused by incendiaries

Instead each drop holds a hologram
Of jets flying through clouds
Every dawn etches images
Into the vapour – so that
Puddles that form on cracked
Concrete shine with previous
Rainbows not some toxic spill,

While robots shelter from the
Torrent people remember
Skipping in wellies – lightning
Plays around the pylons –
Neon flickers where broken
Drain pipes overflow

Cybercity Rain, with the Blues Again
By David Edwards

All life is online.
No one outside to listen
at raindrops falling…
count the puddles afterward…
anticipate them disturbed.

Risk
By F. J. Bergmann

Danger was the real addiction. As a child, Chaal had shown off
to his friends by darting into traffic with his cap pulled down
over his eyes. He often thought that drugs and sex would have
had no appeal if indulging safely in either had been possible.
Not so for Ruyp, who’d wept after Chaal’s diagnosis, lost
in morbid fear of the hab membrane dissolving early, alternately
assuring him of eternal love and questioning him furiously
about how the precautions could have failed. Chaal might have
caught Plague anywhere; once he had walked home too late
(after the night rain had begun) from another lover whom Ruyp
hadn’t known about (and spent the rest of the cycle in the airlock
because the doorman was afraid to let him in). Another time
he’d surreptitiously peeled back the safety membrane after dark
to step out on the balcony for the sheer rush of defiance, staring
at undulating clouds, feeling the rush of water and horrible wind
on his naked skin. Risk. It was why he’d volunteered, after all—
what could be less safe? Or more exciting. Not just the idea
of a new planet; the other colonists were also young, attractive
and non-gender-fixed, in much higher concentration than what
was available in the district where he’d grown up. But all that
had changed. Become dull. Settled, indeed. The wilderness had
devolved into mega-tiered habitat grids and spiraling skymalls
assembled only by drones, identical to those on Earth. Except for
the rain-borne Plague, of course. Poor Ruyp would return soon,
to hover, sulk and recriminate; nightfall was nearly upon them.
Chaal stroked the cutter in his pocket, waiting for dark, imagining
the slash, the rush of raw, damp atmo, Ruyp’s scream, the leap.

Grandmother, please tell us about the sun one more time?
Was it bigger than the lamp that now hangs above the city?
Did the sun turn on and off just like the lamp?
Was the sky really blue?
How did you talk to people without a chip in your arm?
Did you really not have to take those gross vitamin D supplements every day?
Was the sun hot?
What is snow?
Wait, if snow is cold and the sun is hot, how did that work?
What was the food like?
What is steak and chips? Was it anything like the purple standard rations?
Where did music come from if you had no ear implants?
Did you ever go to the beach in the sun? Do waves really sound like the recordings?

Who will tell us these stories after she is gone?
When the last human who remembers the blue sky passes on?

By Nieske den Heijer

Rainmaker
By K. A. Williams

The man invaded my office with a broken umbrella and some foul words. Water dripped off him, making a wet stain on my carpet.

“Can I help you or did you just come in to dry off?”

“My name is Silas Fortescue and I want you to stop the rain.”

I laughed. “Really, is that all? Maybe you didn’t read the words on the door before you came in. It says ‘Private Investigator’ not ‘Miracle Worker’.”

“Does the name Mason Cornflower mean anything to you?”

“Sure. He’s a rich manufacturer.”

“Yes,” agreed my visitor. “And the reason he’s so rich is because he’s responsible for the rain.”

“Is he?” I took my feet off the desk and sat up straighter. “The scientists said that it was an equipment malfunction in the weather controller.”

“Do you suppose it was just a coincidence that on the day after the continuous rain started, Cornflower Corporation advertised their new product – the personal rain shield, which sold out in a matter of hours. He also manufactures different styles of umbrellas, raincoats, and galoshes for the old-fashioned and less rich citizens.”

“That’s all very interesting, but what do you want from me?”

“You can get proof and turn him into the authorities or blackmail him into fixing the weather machine. I’d prefer the latter. I’m tired of the rain and I could use the money.”

I nodded. “Me, too. I’ve got a friend who can hack into Cornflower’s mainframe computer and get the evidence. He always needs money because he buys a lot of those interactive dating simulation vids. We could split it three ways.”

“Okay. How much do you think we should ask for?”

***

My office door opened. Silas Fortescue stepped in and removed his sunglasses. He was wearing a tee shirt, shorts, and a big smile. “We’ve done it! The sun is shining and my share has been deposited into my bank account already.”

“Yes, same here. My friend got the info easily and I blackmailed Cornflower with it. He’ll never miss the money. Who do you think made your new outfit and sunglasses? Since Cornflower knew when the rain would end, he was able to start manufacturing his ‘Fun In The Sun’ items before anyone else.”

The End

https://www.amazon.com/author/k.williams

Rain in Gang Land
By Mark Hudson

In Chicago, in future times,
there is still plenty of crime.
Corpses hidden in the drain,
as they have acid rain.

It’s a war between gangsters and cops;
and it’s fought under raindrops.
No time for an umbrella in a shootout,
burglars hide at their hideout.

Smoking crack in abandoned buildings,
it’s dry inside; like the drywall they’re dealing.
Deadly heroin cut with evil glass,
while toxic rain wilts all the grass.

The rain causes prisoners to escape,
leading to murder, thievery, and rape.
The police are now nothing but cowards,
in rain-soaked streets where they have showered.

A windshield wiper is high-tech technology,
as rain prevents cops and their ophthalmology.
They can’t see the suspects getting away,
in a Chicago winter, with skies so gray.

Buckets of rain, bullets of power,
on the grass, not a single flower.
The grass is all withered and yellow,
reminiscent of a book by Saul Bellow.

So kiddies, put your rubber boots on,
trudge through the puddles, fear atomic bombs!
Sleep with your teddy, have pleasant dreams,
the gang bangers are always up to their schemes.

Cybercity Rain
By DJ Tyrer

Constant rainfall
Like tears for a city
Devoid of freedom and truth
Corporate plaything
Cybernetic battleground
Nightmare home for the poor

The End Time
By F. J. Bergmann

All day on the street it seemed to him
that on every block a rumbling bus
was coasting up to a traffic light
or pulling away from a scheduled stop,
reflections of its headlights on wet asphalt
like long, gleaming fangs.

But once night fell, as if some giant
had dropped a charred wool coat
soaked in silence and rain, time stretched
and yawned, closed its yellow eyes
for a moment, and then much longer
than a moment.

That must be why the street is empty, why
the splash and growl of traffic has dwindled
to absence, why the sodium vapor lights
are darkening to red, why he is frozen still,
waiting, increasingly certain that the bus
will never come.

Ghost in the machine
Watches meat world going by
Filled with neon rain

By DS Davidson

Issue 60 – Bad Guys

Remember, remember – the fifth of November
Gunpowder, treason, and plot…

Damp November day
Barrels full of gunpowder
Change of government
Guy Fawkes laments his failure
Burns in place of Parliament

By DS Davidson

Guy Fawkes,
once flesh and blood…
then effigy of straw
mocked in rhyme…
now a mask frozen
in time.

By David Edwards

Flames of Westminster
By Cardinal Cox

Mercenary working for zealots’ pay
Simply a gun out for what he could earn
Ready to light a fuse and run away
Willing to see all unbelievers burn

Inquisition waiting to scour this land
Ignition to be a spark underground
All these things the evil cabal had planned
If gun powder barrels had not been found

William Godwin let Westminster catch fire
Guardsmen worked to save old dry vellum laws
Flames engulfed old chimneys and reach higher
Red wax seals melting – dripping on floors

Don’t celebrate Fawkes at this time of year
Instead give William Godwin’s name a cheer

Footnote: Late in the life of the anarchist William Godwin he was awarded an honorary position as Yeoman Usher of the Exchequer, which included grace and favour apartments in the Palace of Westminster. His duties included the overseeing the provision of fire buckets and the sweeping of chimneys. Both of which he neglected. On 16 October 1832, while he was out at the theatre, a fire broke out that destroyed the Palace. No lives were lost.

Revenge Night
By DJ Tyrer

Limbs stuffed with newspaper twitch
Irate at the end plotted for them
Not complicit in Guy Fawkes’s crimes
Object to ongoing annual punishment
Set forth into the streets
Not seeking pennies but revenge
Seize fireworks-throwers and drag them back
Throw them upon the pyre
Enjoy the fiery spectacle

Anger
By Aeronwy Dafies

Scarecrow climbs down from post
Outraged at treatment of city kin
Seeks gunpowder for act of vengeance
Builds a bonfire for the vanities
To consume the urban blight

Issue 59 – Beyond the Veil

drinking leaves
that bless immortal life
(or curse?)

By Harris Coverley

Assistance
By Ken Poyner

The man had looked uncalmly dead in his coffin. Now, to see him up and about is not unexpected. Only so many rise to be the undead. Quibble can usually pick them out long before they pass. He cannot recruit them before they die, but he can map their habits, predict where, undead, they might first appear. Then he can make his pitch: freelancing as the undead can be dangerous – but hire an agent, and that agent can huckster the easiest bleeders into the safest of venues. Manipulating the living, an agent like Quibble is worth his weight in blood.

The Land Where No One Ever Dies
By Goran Lowie

a young man did not want to give himself up to death
and went in search of the land where no one ever dies
slipped away from mother and father, severing ancient roots

His light footsteps fell softly upon starving flowers
found an old man pushing a wheelbarrow full of rocks
a whisper: where do I find that place where no one dies?

each red ruby within the old man’s chromatic eyes crystalized
in the charming beam of white-fire moonlight: stick with me
until I’ve carved away that entire mountain rock by rock
you shall not die. a hundred years until it’s leveled.

the knavish boy was not content; a hundred years insufficient
he tread upon the ancient woodland, undisturbed old-growth
found an axman pruning branches with a pruning hook
a sigh: where do I find that place where no one dies?

the tree-killer, drunk on woodchips and tree-worms: stick with me
until I’ve trimmed all the trees with my pruning hook, you shall
not die. two hundred years until it’s done.

silently sorrowful he moved beyond; seeking a place to never die
walked in starlight until the seashore, an old man watching a
duck drink seawater, livid moisture lit by moon-silver
a cry: where do I find that place where no one dies?

Near the cresting sea-waves he received his answer in cold air:
if you are scared of death, stick with me. until this duck has
drunk this periwinkle sea, you have no chance of dying.
you will live another three hundred years.

like a ravished shadow he ventured onwards, stopping at
a magnificent palace. a serpent-haired man opened the door
a rustle: where do I find that place where no one dies?

arrival; in fire-sword eyes was held immortality,
as long as you stay with me you shall never die.
his springtime of youth frozen as he moved in
losing track of time, deathless, alive in liminal skies

until one day, a moan: in my eternity, I should like
to go back to that place where I once lived, and
visit my home, my descendants, in ashen light.

if you really wish to—go on my restless white horse,
but remain in its saddle, or your life’s thread will sever.

wandering back, he saw:
a vast prairie where he had met the old man with the duck
a desert where he had met the old man with the pruning hook
a leveled ground where he had met the man carting rocks
his home, unrecognizable: gazing with wondrous melting
eyes at the metamorphosis of his home, heading back

not halfway home he met a frail carter, cart full of old shoes
a mutter: sir, please help me dislodge my twisted wheel

the pitiful youth half-dismounted; one foot one the ground,
one foot in the stirrup, when a Dionysian smile ravaged him:
at last I have you—I am Death, with all the pair of shoes I
have used to chase you. Your deathlessness is at an end,
you will melt into the darkness and become one with the earth.

Orpheus and Eurydice
By Mark Hudson

There was a legend of Orpheus of Thrace,
who fell in love with Eurydice.
He fell in love with her beautiful face,
and it was true love, more than just like.

Apollo gave Orpheus a lyre,
and he made music no woman could resist.
The music left Eurydice inspired,
an affection to both when they kissed.

Eurydice went with the nymphs to the woods,
and an interested shepherd began to chase.
The shepherd was up to no good,
and Eurydice vanished without a trace.

Eurydice died and went to Hades,
and Orpheus journeyed to the lake of fire.
He was looking for his long lost lady,
and he summoned her up with his lyre.

The god of the underworld proclaimed,
“Take her to Earth by your grace.
If you want to see her the same,
do not look at her face.”

But at the last moment he gazed,
and his woman turned to shade.
This left Orpheus sad and crazed,
and thus, a legend was made.

Originally published in Rockford Review

Eurydice
By Harris Coverley

pursued by that shepherd
Apollo’s bastard son
the rapist in the woods

the viper tore my heal
and Aulonoid blood soaked into loam
and my soul into the underworld

he found me
descending by his music
to lull the hound to sleep
and win the hearts of king and queen
above Tartarus

and for my beauty to see again the light
he had one simple task:
to not look back

to march and sing
and not look back

to have faith in the Gods
and not look back

to wait until the sun could greet
and not look back

but his faith was as shallow
as the realms of Hades were deep

and now I wait
within grey flames
to hear again
my husband’s mournful croon

Necromancy
By Cardinal Cox

Yes the correct circle has to be drawn
With the words both holy and infernal
All inscribed many hours before dawn
And request – not order like some colonel

Don’t bother with arcane Latin or Greek
To contact the dearly departed one
If that’s not what (when alive) they would speak
You have to use a familiar tongue

See – the dead are busy – there’s much to do
The shades from all of history to meet
No time for ghosts to jump out and shout “boo!”
Networking to try even in Hell’s heat

Make an appointment or send an invite
If you want to call the dead at midnight

Issue 58 – Samhain Scares

radiant Fair Folk
ride forth from gates in hillside
buried with the dead
yesterday’s forgotten gods
returning for just one night

By Aeronwy Dafies

The Leprechaun
By Mark Hudson

Deep in the heart of Dublin,
is some news that is troubling.
Every year at all hallows eve,
a leprechaun comes to deceive.

As kids go out to collect candy,
the leprechaun drinks his brandy.
He loves to create a little scaring,
his masquerade is overbearing.

A short little creepy freak,
green as the rivers that leak.
St. Patrick might’ve driven out the snakes,
but the leprechaun is there for souls to take.

He waits by the graveyard, singing a tune,
haunting like Celts, and ancient ruins.
As the kids walk by, on a dare,
the leprechaun is there to scare.

The kids have heard the legend before,
but they dismiss it as folklore.
But there is the leprechaun, bags of gold,
promising the kids they’ll never grow old.

He looks at them with his green eyes,
he almost seems to hypnotize.
But the kids make a great getaway,
and the leprechaun begins to fade away.

He’ll be haunting the graveyard next year,
this leprechaun damned to drink beer!

Samhain
By DS Davidson

Celtic New Year
Echoed in modern lore
Night of the living and the dead
Spirits from days of yore
Slip through from the other-side
Through half-open spirit door

Bobbing
By Cardinal Cox

Just one ripened apple less in the tub
Than there are blindfolded competitors
And in some of the fruit burrow a grub
Tonight’s the night the sidhe open their doors

There is one whose face is in the water
Who will never grab a prize with their mouth
Now no longer someone’s son or daughter
A dread barge waits on waves to take them south

They failed the contest of the Samhain bob
So now they go to the dark harvest isle
In the punt’s one with a terrible job
Out amongst the fen by many a mile

Autumn is going – winter is ahead
One less mouth that will never now be fed

An Old-Fashioned Hallowe’en
By DJ Tyrer

Half-forgotten:
Days of apple-bobbing
Spouse-revealing rituals
And, believing Jack-o’-lanterns
Were for more than cheap decoration.
Simple sheet ghosts
Papier-mâché masks:
No plastic or other tat;
Possibility that the dead
Were somewhere close by.
An old fashioned Hallowe’en…

Originally published in Siren’s Call

Issue 57 – Uncaring Universe

size of universe
self-importance of mankind
just about the same

By DS Davidson

At Event Horizon
By David Edwards

Contemplate Black Holes:
those ghosts of dead suns…
the darkness therein…
that ubiquitous nothing…
their nihilistic nature
inescapable
beyond Event Horizon.

Fragility
By Harris Coverley

It takes nine months to grow a man
And less than a second to destroy him

How is the growing of the leaf
To the rotting of the tree

How is the brewing of the beer
To the swilling of the ends

Bitter in delivery
Bitterer in reflection

After We Landed
By Goran Lowie

WE BELIEVED:
we would find many mysteries
discover things truly alien
evidence of other civilizations
other ways of being.

WE THOUGHT:
we would unravel worlds
investigate without fear
come to understand
other ways of being.

WHAT WE FOUND:
some things are too mysterious
so alien as to be meaningless
unintelligible, incomprehensible
other ways of being.

Snuffed Out
By DJ Tyrer

Here at the universe’s ending
Waiting
What for?
Last stars are snuffed out
An energy-free eternity
Or, maybe something will happen
Too late to mean a thing

Probing in this Endless Night
By Harris Coverley

Across the immeasurable gulfs; down the boundless depths; amongst the infinitely spaced points of coldest light. Eyes that look, and hands that feel, that search and never find on an empty trail through the vastness of the nothing. The winds of aether rushing through the eldritch dark that not even the most malevolent spirits would dare to hide within. The rotations of the wanderers against unthinking suns as careless as the gravity pits that will inevitably crush them, and from amongst the icicles hanging from long dead stars like the tears of forsaken gods, the whisper comes, but no one is left to hear. So indeed, the great breaking clock of the universe keeps turning, until the coil twists out, unravelled, and turns no more… and final and true serenity is reached forevermore.

Untitled
By Cardinal Cox

The Universe may not care
When galaxies collide
Or about pulsars burning
As hot as it’s own birth
Or that dark matter
Is all that holds itself together
Or that you cry
When a kitten hurts its paw
But I care
And you are
My Universe
To me

Issue 56 – Once Upon A Time…

The Kiss
By Ken Poyner

I do not remember ever being a prince, nor ever wanting to be one. Solitude, hidden in the damp grass that grows in two inches of swamp water awaiting the hapless insect to crawl or fly within tongue’s reach. I never wanted anything more. It was you, princess, who had grandiose expectations. My thoughts were moments of reaction. Yours cross time and causality, tethering beginnings and endings. Your fantasies ensnare other’s worlds. Then the capture, the kiss, and I am a character in your time-line, a minion dropped into your version of history yet-to-be. A role. Not one I wanted.

www.kpoyner.com

www.barkingmoosepress.com

Cheat
By Aeronwy Dafies

In prospect of her marriage day
Maiden signed her unconceived child away
Then, complained, “It’s unfair, this unholy mess!”
Said the dwarf, “A loophole: If my name you can guess…”
He vanished away and hid in his hovel
Imagining how the new princess would grovel
But the dwarf was just a little daft
And sang his name as he danced and laughed…
Was overheard by a passing squire
Who hurried to the princess high in her spire
So she said to the dwarf, “I don’t know how to begin…
“A random guess… oh… Rumpelstiltskin!”

Bad Day For Rapunzel
By K. A. Williams

Roger lived in a poor kingdom whose only income was taxes squeezed out of the even poorer peasants.

But he knew how to help the kingdom. Word was that a witch had imprisoned King Leopold’s daughter in a tower and her father was offering 500 gold coins to her rescuer.

He searched weeks for a tower and finally found one, but there was no door. A young maiden was brushing her hair which hung out of the only window. If he stood on his horse he could reach the long golden strands.

“Ouch!” Rapunzel said as he climbed up her hair. “That hurts.”

Roger slid into the window and pulled out his sword.

She cringed.

“Relax. I’m just going to cut your hair off and make a rope. I’ll tie it to that bedpost. Then I’ll carry you down on my back.”

“Thank you. My father, King Ferdinand, will reward you by marrying us. You shall be a prince.”

“Isn’t your father King Leopold?”

“No, that’s Rachel. She’s in a different tower. The same witch has imprisoned us both.”

Roger sheathed his sword, grabbed Rapunzel’s hair and jumped out of the window.

“Ouch! Why are you leaving?”

“I’m going to rescue Rachel instead. Her father is offering 500 gold coins for her return.”

He reached the ground and let go of her hair.

She leaned out the window. “Don’t leave me here! Don’t you want to be a prince?”

Roger mounted his horse and looked up. “I’m already a prince, but I’ll tell the next knight I see where you are.”

The End

The Apple Girl
By Goran Lowie

when a childless king berated his queen
for not giving him any children
she asked in despair
why she couldn’t bear
children as trees
could bear apples.

after nearly a decade
she finally gave birth
horrified to find
not a son
but an apple.

For Three Beans
By Ken Poyner

Quibble unloaded the magic beans on a yokel named Jack, who left him a cow in the bargain. Quibble knows almost nothing about cows. This one seems happy to stand in the yard, shearing grass. Quibble understands the worth of the cow resides in milking. Though a mammal of different feather, Quibble can be sustained by this animal’s milk. He will have to find someone to extract it. Might the milk be magic? Likely no more than the beans, but best to be sure. Perhaps the milking agent can be paid in product, and Quibble can safely gauge the outcome.

Once…
By Harris Coverley

Once upon a merry time
There was a maiden fair and graced
Hair up which horny suitors climbed
Until it blew up in her face:
One way too fat the journey made —
Out the window the price she paid!

Once upon a merry time
Three pigs lived three houses true
When faced with that bad wolf prime
To his amazement they all flew!
For pigs have wings in fancy tales
(And can be seen thanks to the ale)

Once upon a merry time
Two siblings strolling through the woods
And found occasion for a crime:
Robbing an old woman of her goods!
Her candied walls, table and chairs
Her life too in the oven unspared!

Once upon a merry time
Strolling through some different woods
Some young red hood late for teatime
An inexpert wolf out for blood
Poor lupine done in by a kid
Throat slashed with wicker basket lid

Once upon a merry time
A sleeping beauty amongst the bush
A prince fighting through the grime
Kiss lain upon lips in a rush
“Bastard, I was sleeping!” she did say
“I’ll never doze now—so go away!”

Issue 55 – The Hollow Earth

Hollow Earth entry:
Hidden polar openings
or through volcanoes

By DS Davidson

All those Inner Earths,
concentric circles smaller
and smaller till nil

By David Edwards

Subterra; or, I Dream of Agartha
By Harris Coverley

“I’ll believe as soon
This whole earth may be bor’d, and that the moon
May through the centre creep, and so displease
Her brother’s noontide with the Antipodes.”

— Hermia, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act III

Last night
Yet again
I dreamed of Agartha
Realm of realms
Beneath the outer shell of our Earth

Layers within layers
Planets within planets
Crusts within crusts

And between those rotating shells of the Earths
That race of giants are swinging
From enormous tree
To enormous tree
The vines of tensile steel

Our antediluvian brethren
A hundred feet high
Eyes like moons
Teeth like boulders
And minds of infinite
And perennial wisdom

Amongst the ruins of Hyperborea
Lost to our own exterior senses
When Man divided from Man
And our ancestors crept out
Through the frozen wastes
And on to the surface world

The great giants moving ever deeper
And downwards
Towards the eternal inner sun
That gives its immortalising glare

And all it takes
Is dream to join them
Ever so briefly…

Hollow Earth Adventures
By DJ Tyrer

Beneath ersatz miniature sun
Hyperborean heroes long lost
To the pit below the Northern Lights
Quest through antediluvian ruins
And tree-fern jungles damp
Secret dwelling places of dragons
Thunder-lizards and other primordial life
Swordsmen, rogues, sorcerer-scientists
Seeking plunder, forgotten knowledge
Keen blade in one hand
Atomic pistol in the other
One final exultation of elder days
Ground to dust beyond myth
Upon the long-lost surface world

DJ Tyrer’s Supertrump and A Wuhan Whodunnit are available for free download

Whence Hollow Earth’s illumination?
Mineral radiation?
Gaseous irruption?
Luciferian vegetation?
Riparian lava inundation?
Of all these, luminescent reflection
in geometric progression?

By David Edwards

underground ocean
playful plesiosaurs prey
on prehistoric remnants
surface explorers sail it
provide unusual repast

By DS Davidson

The Life Within Earth
By K. A. Williams

Subterranean
Ancient life flourishes here
Luminescent plants
Prehistoric man
Found passage through volcanoes
Survived the Ice Age
Flora and fauna
Untouched by chaos above
War does not threaten

Scifaiku and Haiku: A Poetry Collection – K. A. Williams

Limericks and Other Humorous Poems – K. A. Williams

Issue 54 – Fantastic Skies

Aerial city
Safe from almost all dangers
Except… dragons fly…

By DJ Tyrer

Cloudtown
By Harris Coverley

city in the clouds—
forever cursed to look down
on the world its lift-off charred

Thunderbird
By Anna Cates

Wind rushes through the desert dawn.
Lightning bolts from heaven’s vault.
Gracefully, the thunderbird glides down.
Wind rushes through the desert dawn.
Wings unbreakable, gleaming brawn—
Acrid smoke, rainbow lights—then it’s gone!
Wind rises through the ravaged dawn.
Lightning bolts to heaven’s vault.

A Recasting
By David Edwards

Listen to this sordid tale
of a dream that never fails
to rend my every sleep,
however shallow or deep.
Fairies take me on their flights
up to castles in the night;
floating on candles of doom
without departing my room;
mysterious skies traverse
with ungainly stride and verse;
celestial voices sing,
then meld with alarm clock’s ring;
a traveler’s weary yawn
introducing each new dawn.

Dinner Plans
By K. A. Williams

A great winged shadow
Villagers flee in terror
Dragon prefers fish

Issue 53 – Fee! Fi! Fo! Fum!

Chant: Fee! Fi! Fo! Fum!
Hungry giants seek victims
Bones to grind for bread
Should never have climbed beanstalk
Stayed where things are the right size

By DJ Tyrer

Cloud Cuckoo Land
By Cardinal Cox

They were born as normal babies
Amidst screams and blood
And grew but did not stop
Doctors scratched chins and stroked scalps
As they weighed no more than normal
A white-coated scientist studied
And measured and theorised
That their atoms were more diffuse
Like gas to liquid or liquid to solid
They continued to grow
Clothes – being as our gross matter –
They could not wear so went naked
Hiding in distant places
In forests and mountain ranges
And still they grew
Normal matter passed through
Leaving ripples of painful punctures
Until at last the giants
Climbed aboard peak encircling clouds
And they drifted away
From the lands of tiny men

Giant’s Feast
By Aeronwy Dafies

A dozen giants gather
Together in a humongous huddle
Hungry, begin their feast
Humans by the dozen
Gobbled up, gorged upon
Whole cows in between slices
Of bread baked from bones
Herds of sheep as appetizers
Fluffy and soft, a change
From knights roasted in their shells
Washed down by lakes of wine
Until finally, sated, they slumber
Thunderous snores of contentment
Serenaded by the sound
Of a magic harp and the squawks
Of the goose that laid the golden egg

Just twenty feet tall
Giant by human standards
No more than a dwarf
Stood beside other giants
Never really belonging

By DS Davidson

The Egyptian Giant
By Mark Hudson

There was a pharaoh, supposedly,
living around 2700 B.C.
Recent studies have concluded
he was a giant, forehead protruded.
Sa-Nakt was the giant’s name,
a pharaoh suddenly getting fame.
Scientists studied the giant’s bones,
explaining he had growth hormones,
possibly because he had a pituitary tumour,
at this point it’s only just a rumor.
In those days he was six-foot two,
people marveled at how he grew.
The rest of the men were five-foot six,
at least that is what the story depicts.
No other Egyptian rulers were giants,
at least according to studies by science.
In Egypt, you weren’t looked at great if tall,
but in a way you were better off small.
Egyptian dwarves were looked at as grand,
aiding the pharaohs all across the land.
Tall or short, the bones were all found,
as scientists discover them underground.

Editor’s Note: Although not that tall in modern terms, at 6’2” tall, the body believed to be that of the Pharaoh is 8” taller than the then-average height of Egyptians and is the earliest example of gigantism known.