WAILERS
"Poetry can change our hearts in an instant" -Andrea Gibson
Wailers are raw, unfiltered, and unrefined. These are the poems that didn’t just leap out of your brain, they clawed their way up and out of you to claim a space on the page and now refuse to be moved. Send us your first drafts, you late night ravings fueled by nothing but rage and monster ultra. Your hand written love poems, their pages still wet with dewy heartache, and any of your other work that needs to exist.
To The Super (Working) Women of the Late 1980s
Johannah Simon (She/Her)
Your collective delusion did us dirty. Telling us we could be moms, CEOs, fashion models, and the girl next door. Telling us we could have it all. So long as we found that balance. Prioritized. Leaned in. Scheduled time to talk about scheduling time. You told us you cleared the path. Found a way. Underneath those career-forged, hard outlines of shoulder-padded, polyester power suits, you were soft. Desirable. Feminine. Fuckable. We sipped your story like sweet tea, wanting to believe that we’d make rain, make babies, make our own destinies. Then we graduated, debt-ridden, to a working world that didn’t think we’d be more than coffee-corralling admins. Turns out that we couldn’t have it all. Couldn’t be slender and successful. Smart and sweet. Strong and sexy. We couldn’t be soft and self-supporting. We were forced to choose. I bring home greasy, paper-bagged burgers to a family I see on evenings and weekends. I feel the weight of being a wage-bound woman. I am collapsing under the burden of bread-winning. Even if it’s only hamburger buns. Johannah Simon (she/her) is a corporate strategist, adjunct professor, and (sometime) creative. A Midwest GenX multi-genre writer, her tiny pieces have appeared in BULL, The Hooghly Review, Underbelly Press, A Sufferer’s Digest, and Fahmidan Journal. You can find her on X @JohannahWrites, @johannah.bsky.social, and at www.thewritingtype.com.
I Wake Up In His Bed
Bella MK (They/She)
The folds in the sheets Made living imprints on my legs Like a leaf Grew from my knee The clouds outside Looked like two people in love So I thought maybe there was Faith to be had in each other And merriment to be felt For a wicked thing Like a hot summer beating Infiltrating Out-of-code, single-pane Windows I want so badly Not to be myself Though I always tend to be Unexpectedly And in the sky Reverently And in a sleep-marked body With no second thought But definitely a third As I lay next to What sounds like misfire And smells like The last time you felt peace The scent of cherry Vape smoke Spinning through An open window A man who Could never please you Or rain On the way back home With quick wit and a killing glare, Bella M.K. is a feral mountain child turned well oiled retail machine. She is from Provo, UT, and spends most of her time hugging trees, people, and herself. She hopes to one day be the next Bob Dylan; Controversial, socially inept, and permanently disheveled. You can find her work on most platforms under the handle Leftoverworry.
PC: Halee H.
PC: Halee H.
Wile E. Coyote Earns a Citation in the Annals of American History
Micheal Brockley (he/him)
Wile E. Coyote drives America’s worst president to a rabbit hole north of Dennison, Ohio. The chauffeur weaves the limousine from the drafting lane to the passing lane as the executive devours a bucket of chicken livers and mashed potatoes. A convoy of Peterbilts tailgates Cadillac One, a stream of air horn complaints reproaching the humid night. As POTUS rains C notes on himself, Wile E.’s eyes ricochet from dashboard to gear shift to arm rest until the eye balls hover over the president who wallows in a drift of greenbacks in the privacy of the main cabin. After the semis form two rows behind the commander-in-chief’s ride, W. E. slows the limo to ten miles per hour. Then passes the first getaway exit, heading toward a no man’s land of potholes and $6.00-a-gallon fuel. The president applies packets of U. S. Grants to his eyes, like sleep masks for an over-taxed executive. Behind him, the grills of the Petes begin to open, exposing an iron fence of fangs that grind as the truck engines snarl. Wile E. brakes, signaling his exit to a sandwich shack that sells heart-attack burgers slathered with salmonella hot sauce. In the rearview mirror the lead Pete rends the boot from the trunk of the town car. Oblivious, POTUS relaxes beneath the luxury of a blanket of Franklins and Grants, dreaming of funnelin his cut from the getaway grift into a Cayman Island account and of his picture on the cover of Soldier of Fortune magazine. Of his new palace in Rublyovka. The star of Rushing Roulette and Guided Muscle parks the limo in a space reserved for VIPs and moseys into the brush behind the greasy spoon, securing the car doors with the automatic lock. A rumbling semi-circle of Peterbilts forms around the idling Beast. Later, a fry cook who was smoking behind a dumpster, tells her boyfriend a fleet of Peterbilts devours a Cadillac in seventeen minutes. He refuses to believe that limousines scream. Michael Brockley is a retired school psychologist who lives in Muncie, Indiana. His prose poems have appeared in Alien Buddha, Keeping the Flame Alive, and Unlikely Stories Mark VI. In addition, Brockley's prose poems are forthcoming in AGNI Magazine, Ivo Review, and Visiting Joni: Poems and Short Prose Inspired by the Life and Work of Joni Mitchell.
Portrait: Superman With His Finger in His Ear, Like a Gun
Christopher Jones (he/him/maestro)
How do you pierce the invulnerable eardrum? Even if I had time to sleep that question would keep me wide-eyed and insomniac, puzzling solutions to this problem. All through the solar day and lunar night I listen to you pray. I listen to you demanding. You say my name and I appear faster than a speeding bullet: “Superman, save me! Superman, save me more! Superman, I’m not a racist, but…” Even my super-strength is impotent against the endless torrent of my super-hearing, because…I hear you. Even at super-speed I can only waste my effort in one place at a time. And that place is America, America is where my rocket landed, America is where the Kents took me in and loved me. So I show up here, I catch my girlfriend or Jimmy falling off their hundredth high-rise while I listen to the cells in a skeletal child’s body half the world away, eating themselves as he dies. I stop my fifteenth bank robbery of the week, ensuring a Christmas card from the FDIC and a burned-in memory I make in the meantime of the sounds a sniper makes pulling slowly on the trigger, the splash and patter of children’s brains on the ground, the shooter’s laughter that follows and the pings and whistles of his Instagram. This letter on my chest, these colors, this symbol is supposed to have meaning. I’m supposed to stand for Truth, and Justice and the American Way, but here I am bearing witness to mass graves that still scream and fight to free ziptied hands while the bulldozers roll over the top of them and I’m here, instead. Wasting my time, distracted with trivialities. I guess the American Way is all I get.
PC: Halee H.
Salem's Sid and Nancy
Nancy Byrne Iannucci (She/her)
-For Giles and Martha Corey, Salem 1692
Tis smotherin’ under these stones but me conscience suffocates me worse. Travelin’ nights with the weight still on me chest. I should have kept me mouth shut, Martha, callin’ thee a witch, me own wife. what’s worse, I signed thee off to the gallows led by those damned Girls, especially that Ann Putnam. Oh, how they howled like banshees when the court stripped thee down to thy shift, sifting for the mark, the Devil’s mark. Hathorne heeded their cries like the Lord’s counsel. I’m a damned fool! No one is innocent! The slanderers, the lot of us, like that Mercy Lewis. she said I was “a dreadful wizard.” for that I stood before the court, mute. Many think me now a brave man for I’d rather be put to the peine forte et dure than confess to their lyin’ talk of witchcraft. Brave! Brave, me arse! Me tongue still hangs out me mouth from the weight of these stones. Can thee forgive me, Martha? Can thee help me breathe again? Aye? Speak up, Martha. I can hardly hear thee. Fuck thee, Giles Corey!
Originally published in Apr 20th, 2021 | By Defenestration
"Nancy Byrne Iannucci is a librarian and poet who resides in Troy, NY, with her two cats: Nash and Emily Dickinson. THRUSH Poetry Journal, Eunoia, Maudlin House, San Pedro River Review, and 34 Orchard are some of the places you'll find. Her work has been nominated for Best of the Net. She is the author of four chapbooks: Temptation of Wood (Nixes Mate Review, 2018), Goblin Fruit (Impspired, 2021), Primitive Prayer (Plan B Press, fall 2022), and Hummingbirds and Cigarettes ( Bottlecap Press, 2024). Visit her at www.nancybyrneiannucci.com Instagram: @nancybyrneiannucci "
PC: Halee H.
Oxidation Hymn
Betty Santon (she/her)
Her tongue is rusting from silence, red metal turning copper in her mouth and every word flaking away, brittle, before it touches the air. She writes her name in dust, but the dust refuses to hold it – the letters collapsing into the pale heap of everything left unnamed. This is where the night always bends low to listen, presses to the doorframe to catch the sharp scrape of chairs and the shuffle of stealth shadows in the dark. She knows every kiss is a rehearsal for the end of the performance, the final bows, the gesture to the leader of the band. She practices vanishing touches, mouths breaking apart like threadbare seams before a cloth is torn. Her knuckles are cracked bells, ringing each time they meet the wall. This is a hymn of fracture, echoing through a brittle house, the walls thin, the mirrors already broken. We are two shadows, overlapping, ash gathering in our thirsty, quiet throats. But silence is hers to own, a garroted dove, her body carrying the heat as if it were a flame. Betty Stanton (she/her) is a Pushcart nominated writer who lives and works in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in various journals and collections and has been included in various anthologies. She received her MFA from The University of Texas - El Paso and holds a doctorate in Educational Leadership. She is currently on the editorial board of Ivo Review. @fadingbetty.bsky.social
PC: Halee H.
Hex
Cambria White (she/her)
To men who made us felines, prowling tense, and hackles raised, let it be known that you will greet every dawn feeling like whiskey; heavy, thick, lukewarm. To the carnivores that made us cruel, let this be your warning. For every black cat you create, you gift yourself an ocean of bad omens, murmured jinxes you can’t root out. know our call as battlecry for each of the nine lives torn up when you buried bloodied canines in our backs. To boys who misread lips even as we spit curses in their mouths, you will spend each tedious second of the day clawing at scraps the moon has left behind in hopes of a single silver-lined dream, only to find the darkness of the shadow at your feet. I hope lonely tastes as good as I did. Cambria White is a Sophomore high school student living in Utah who has been writing poetry for as long as she could hold a pencil. She expresses her creativity through words, art, and as a member of her high school's tv/video production team.
friendship of horses
—contrapuntal
Indigo Aves (they/them)
This poem's formatting is integral to the work, please expand to read.
Indigo is an undergraduate poet at Utah State University who loves talking people into making long drives to attend poetry events. They find fulfillment in commenting on the state of the world and exploring their emotional turmoils through a connection to nature.
That was the Year
Lynn White (she/her)
That was the year when politicians played on the stage of the New Theatre of the Absurd where empathy was dead as Roszencrantz and Gildestern and the victims of Schrodinger’s genocide both lived and died where Palestine was once and now it had no territory though it was a state, where Israel had a territory for Jews of families not born there in this millennium or the last when their lies became truth and truth became lies that no one truly believed and pretence was real and death was life and things could only get better and things only got worse before the curtain came down to end it all. " Lynn White lives in north Wales. Her work is influenced by issues of social justice and events, places and people she has known or imagined. She is especially interested in exploring the boundaries of dream, fantasy and reality. She has been nominated for Pushcarts, Best of the Net and a Rhysling Award. https://lynnwhitepoetry.blogspot.com and https://www.facebook.com/Lynn-White-Poetry-1603675983213077/ "
Show, not Tell
Susan R. Morritt (she/her)
Susan R. Morritt is a writer, visual artist and musician from Waterford, Ontario, Canada. Her work appears in numerous journals including 34 Orchard Journal, Pulsebeat Poetry Journal, Cool Beans Lit, Cosmic Horror Monthly, and The Speckled Trout Review. Susan is a former racehorse trainer who has worked extensively with livestock, including teaching turkeys English as a Second Language.There is didactic spastic blather chatter clogging up my keyboard, while an engorged horde of bored ed-i-tors pass scores of gassy distain. Streams of unconsciousness splash waterfalls of rolling eyes, as cauldrons of words squelch a belch of forbidden rhyme. Ah… Relief, at last. -#-
Contraptioned
M F Drummy (he/him)
I am a nothing name, a body set on fire. Bowel, husk, pustule of wonder, water’s breath, a tab of imbecility. From the first wedding we fled a thousand tongues, leaving behind the church smoldering in ridicule. Peace and democracy, hypocrisy of youth, bodies on fire. Unearthed, unsheathed, contraptioned headlong into our eighties, lighting out for the territories, mounted on downstate stallions, ordering clams casino from the early-bird menu at the motel restaurant off Exit 243 on the interstate, toothmarks on the pencil behind the left ear of our server, Jane. M F Drummy holds a PhD in historical theology from Fordham University. The author of numerous articles, essays, poems, reviews, and a monograph on religion and ecology, his poetry has appeared in dozens of journals, literary magazines, and anthologies, including Allium, Chamisa, Meetinghouse, Novus, Reverie, and San Pedro River Review. A 2026 Best of the Net nominee, his debut collection of poetry, Perdido, was published in 2025. Originally from Massachusetts, he and his way cool life partner of over 20 years continue to enjoy their retirement in the Colorado Rockies. He can be found at https://www.instagram.com/miguelito.drummalino/ https://bsky.app/profile/miguelito56.bsky.social https://www.pw.org/directory/writers/m_f_drummy https://substack.com/@mdrummy56
Options
James Rodgers (He/Him)
When he answered the phone, she was in full wail, answering his “Hello?” with, “I don’t want to die with THAT MAN as president!” He paused a moment, letting her cry, And then replied in his usual matter-of-fact way, “Well Mom, the way I see it, if that’s the case, you have two options. You can pass on in the next eight weeks before he is sworn in, or you can hold on for at least four more years.” She chuckled slightly between the sniffles and agreed to stay alive until THAT MAN was long gone from office. What he didn’t tell her, although he almost did before hanging up, was that was his plan too. James Rodgers has lived in the Pacific Northwest his entire life, except for vacations. He was the Poet Laureate for Auburn, WA from 2021-2023, published his first book of poetry, "They Were Called Records, Kids" by MoonPath Press, and has won multiple contests. He lives in Pacific, WA with his very patient wife and two neurotic cats.
My Anger is a God
Holton Lee (any/all)
To which I pray far too often. It is a god of all-consuming flame that spreads across me like a match struck to a dried forest. My anger is a god, and I come from a family line of its disciples. Raised in a monastery to its grief, to its shame, call it a home. Lashed to a cross- -split palate of grief and rage so succulent you could lie it down, Call it a lover you do not wake up to in the morning But still wear its lashings on your back. My anger is a god, And it is the same god as the god of worms, Or car batteries, Or horny teenage rebels. It is one that’s found in meadows, Or oceans, Or pilates classes at 7 am after your ex posted their wedding announcement. My anger is a god, It is Roman, And Greek, and in certain lights a bit Taoist. It is almost wholly Christian, And in that sense, perhaps I’m losing faith in this god, too. "Holton Lee (Any/All) is an emerging poet based in Salt Lake City, and occasionally in your dreams (yes that was them, you’re welcome). Their work centers around queerness, identity, and whatever comes to mind. You can find them in cat cafes, co-running Salt Cured Collective, and talking to the local crows. They hope you enjoy their poems. "
Because Sometimes, “Fuck You” Just Isn’t Enough
Chris Atkin (he/him)
Because no amount of middle fingers can match the force of brandished knuckles bashed into a fascists face, no vindication like the buckling of nose beneath righteous fist. Because combat boots are fucking sexy, when yellow laddered laces wrap around the legs of women with a score to settle, all clad in leather and pink knit caps. Because lately red hats look like white hoods when you see them on the streets, and for every kid who finds themselves while a Black Flag Album plays, a racist shits their pants. Because I can’t play guitar, or sing on tune, but I can make my sentences march in tight lines across a page like it’s 1963, and hurl adjectives at riot shields like cans of chicken soup. Because the right ideas can wound the status quo deeper than the bullets we carve them into, slice holes in their dogma like a butterfly knife. Because the government can ban books and tie our tongues, but they can’t stop me “accidently” letting spotify shuffle onto Rage Against the Machine while my students read. Because the fascists are too dumb to speak literature, They don’t know Animal Farm is not the same as Old McDonald, or that Guy Montag has more in common with Guy Fawkes than with them. So, we put pen to paper and mouth to microphone, write battle cries into being, then practice them at open mics before we shout them in the streets. We cry Anarchy for every anachronism, the ones we write into our poems and the ones they write into our history. We’ll make molotov’s out of metaphors, toss them high, let them shatter, until our fire spreads to every working class oxymoron who wrote “dictate me daddy” on their Presidential ballot. Because a wise man once said, all it takes for evil to triumph is for the good to do nothing, so we’ll pull up our big kid pants, and strap on our cute winter boots, because we may not be good, but we are all we got. Chris Atkin is an English Teacher, spoken word poet, and two time Pushcart Prize nominee living in Draper, UT. His work has been published in Last Leaves Magazine, The Rising Phoenix Review, and the Lascaux Review. Chris loves poems that push the boundaries between page and performance, take big risks, and speak to the things that make us human.
Knowledge Is Power But It Isn't Helping Me
Kate Lewington (she/they)
neglect is a pile-up of responsibilities - creating enough pressure to overwhelm - with my lips sealed - i’m fine, fine, fine frittering away pieces of paper on bulleted points of research on what might be going on in my head knowledge is power but it isn't helping me as a teenager i clung onto research - the non-fiction studies on self-harm and depression it was in the biographies on comedians, writers and musicians who had taken their own lives i searched for recognition how and why - what had led to the crumble of their mind how did it correlate with the cold writing of the studies - why is it that we plead with our demons alone and only the consequences bleed through we burn so brightly in eulogy but we couldn’t persuade anyone those out of character behaviours were a sign of concern when alive how we burn and burn until we are burnt out and done. From the South of England, Kate is a writer/poet and blogger. Their writing is largely based on the themes of belonging, loss, and wonder. They have been recently published by Roi Fainéant Press, Autumn Sky Poetry Daily, World Insane and TrashLight Press. https://katelouisepoetry.wordpress.com/
In One Way or The Other
(Inspired by Stanley Enekwe’s story – 1972, Eastern Nigeria, shortly after the war)
Isaac Dominion Aju (he)
Dear son We are not a defeated people I do not think so. The whole world charged toward us with ammunitions and bomber jets Even vultures feasted on our bodies But we are still here. Dear son I do not want to know whatever name they had labelled you You went to war And you came back with spoils And that is what happens when a war breaks out. Dear son I do not care what they have labelled you But You are a hero. Dear son Take this word from your own father You are not a failure You are not a disaster Though you are hanging there to be executed To experience the war again This time around in your own body I still love you Your ancestors are watching you They will receive you Your ancestors see you They will welcome you back Your ancestors know you They will take you as a full human being Your ancestors record everything In their language That everyone will taste what you are about to taste In one way Or the other Death will still visit every one of us.
In the Night/When CPTSD Speaks
Heather D. Haigh (she/her)
In the Night When bones creak, limbs grumble, and eyelids are heavy as chains, when the heart thumps a drum and flesh trembles, but blood is sluggish as mud, as hell-eyed ghosts linger, while twitch-nose rats skitter, or the hand of a most tender lover is lost to a breath, there’s nothing compares to the misery of needing a piss in the night. --------- When CPTSD Speaks Swallow those claws that ripped and burned, till they dug their way up to your throat to shred the words you wanted to scream, so now you must spit them as barbs. Heather is a disabled, working-class writer and poet from Yorkshire, published by Oxford Flash Fiction, Fictive Dream, Bath Flash Fiction, The Phare, and numerous others. She has won or been placed in several competitions, and is a Pushcart and BOTN nominee, and a cheese addict.
Footnote to a Footnote
—after Allen Ginsberg’s “Footnote to Howl”
Trish Hopkinson (she/her)
Jacuzzis are holy. Garage door openers are holy. Back-up cameras and recycle bins—all holy. Putting the red flag up on the mailbox, waving at the elderly getting my toes wet with dew—holy, holy, holy. Keeping my eyelids open and trying to sleep like fish, signing my name with less letters and more scribbles, counting crows feet, counting yellow toenails, counting haircuts, counting plucked whiskers, counting constantly. Bookshelves are holy. Missing dust covers are holy, magicians and black and white T.V. shows, Penn Jillette theories and Andy Griffith justice, Uncle Walt songs and Ginsberg poems—holy, holy, holy. Drinking beer before noon, drinking liquor right after, drinking it warm (or on ice) with a friend (or not). Waking up drunk, waking up sober, waking up tired, waking up hungry, waking—always holy. Table wine is holy. Candle sticks are holy, dishwashers and cloth napkins, the folk art cricket made from wire and a railroad nail, rock salt from the salt flats in a salt cellar—holy, holy, holy. Opening an empty cedar chest to still moths and crumbs, staring at stretched cobwebs immersed in the sun, swallowing nests, swallowing nectar, swallowing chimes, swallowing saliva, swallows—always holy. Self-portraits are holy. Ceramic urns also are holy. Tape recorders and keyboards, drawing pads and gold-plated ball-point pens, calligraphy and stipple—holy, holy, holy. Unfolding a letter, unfolding a chair, unfolding into downward dog, from child’s pose, into corpse pose. Picking apricots, picking green grapes, picking out a husband, a shower curtain, selection—always holy. Twist-off caps, dresser drawers, remote controls, carpeted stairs, revolving doors, product recalls, keycodes, passwords, restaurant reservations, last-minute invitations, cell phones, voice recognition, land minds, and secrets—holy. Holy word, holy water, holy book, holy soap boxes, bathtubs, soap dishes—holy, holy drains and draining, empty. Trish Hopkinson is a poet and advocate for the literary arts. You can find her online at SelfishPoet.com. Her poetry has been published in several literary magazines and journals; and her most recent book A Godless Ascends was published by Lithic Press in March 2024. Hopkinson happily answers to labels such as atheist, feminist, and empty nester; and enjoys traveling, live music, and craft beer. --previously published in Footnote, Lithic Press, 2017
101 ways to crack an Egg
Chris Atkin (he/him)
Today, I learned there are 100 different ways to cook an egg, and my English teacher brain immediately was like, “Well, there’s a metaphor in that.” Something to be said about how no matter if we’re poached or boiled, we’re still just fucking eggs. In high school I was scrambled, lazily dropped into a bowl with 3 dozen other eggs and beaten with a wire whisk while some hateful chef folded in hormones and angst like butter and heavy cream until I didn’t know which way was sunny side up. In college I was fried, but I'll be honest the clouds of sweat and smoke that clung to our shirts and skins in that crowded dorm room made it feel like we steamed, The point is we were high all the goddamn time. Lately I’ve been, I don’t know, raw? Not raw, like, safe and uncooked and tucked away in a comfortable carton. I mean raw like, my skins been peeled off and everything inside me is screaming because it’s not supposed to be exposed to the open air. I’m raw like, broken yolk raw, like the things inside me are oozing out no matter how hard I try to keep them in, raw. Like, i'm telling random people in the elevator that my favorite student hung themself on the way to school last week, that my sister has gone from anxious to agoraphobic, and everytime I go back to try and coax her out of my parents basement, she’s trying to drag me to the bottom of a well and drown me there, like I’m the bad brother for trying to keep my head above water. I’m raw like, two hours away from rotten, raw, Like, I’m splattered across the hood of car going 40 miles an hour, raw, like, last week I had dreams of being a rooster, and now I don’t know if I’m going to be an omelet, or a stinking puddle at the bottom of a dumpster. There’s like 100 different ways to cook an egg and right now I’d rather be cooked up anyway but this. I guess it’s a good thing that I’m a grown ass man instead. That I can wake up every morning after another worst night of the week and make fucking breakfast. That unlike the poor bastards swirling in my frying pan, when my shell cracks, it scabs, it flakes, and eventually, it heals.