“Untitled”
by Magella Cantara

I’m changing my hair trying to get so far from you.

from myself

from existence 

None of the colors I’ve tried are working so I keep changing 

Trying something new to keep recreating myself

To gain a sense of purpose but all I’ve come to understand is that

I’m playing into a dark well 

There’s a void in me here

one of many in fact,  I’ve come across 

pieces of my autopsy

The surface is covered in blood thicker than copper my sight gets drunk at the smell

I’m constantly stumbling, skipping, & smiling afraid of every layered out confession stacked 20 tables high for the number of years that have stretched me apart.

I’m not ready to get access to a bottle so easy afraid of the death certificate that will be hungover 

All because this lonely well never was well.

Because The Crossroads Always Have Oil And Water
by Liam Woodworth-Cook

Strawberries and cream out of season

as if we are to enjoy our pleasures freely.

A truck is not a boat or a plane yet gas

is gas— a venom in movement. I am faced

with the high strides of dignity,

that my simple dessert can come 

with contemplation of God and the rubber

taste of  slaved expediency.

Could Johnson still have met the devil

in the 21st century? Where now the traffic lights

breeze the semi’s on their journey.

What enticement is the devil’s hand 

in giving music for the exchange of souls— 

The god in my nighttime treat is not the caped counter 

to the devil I describe, but a questioning of myself. 

My mythos hasn’t been kind to God nor my guilt 

of participatory serving in the pillaging plot,

served my healing.

It must be the season why,

I remember when fruit grows. 

Length of continent, of rough gloved

hand, of replacing Sun and Moon. 

It’s as if suddenly I had grown in fear 

of a being whose name my parents never spoke. 

Attracted to something cold, and sweet.

I Awoke To Find The Songs Of My Own
|by Liam Woodworth-Cook

It was something to do with the way the flower unfolded

as a Monarch butterfly. I tell you of a Monarch because 

as much as it was about Spring, it was Autumnal in nature. 

It always is. The soft orange, the oak leaf

crumpled. I was born in October, upon the fringe of the veil.

The swaying back and forth, like a long lone smear

of red paint on canvas. Burnt edges.

This mind of mine wonders amongst dreams.

At times it is like walking out on my father’s  fire escape,

rickety and exposed at each shuddering step.

I am the arsonist afterall, a bellowing boy

of no particular tragedy.

I spent some time later reading of tragedies—

I call it history, the weight of freight trains.

It was in the 6th grade when I read 

of  the transformation from Begonias to 

Monarch. I thought about the way

George Harrison sang “My Sweet Lord”.

I didn’t believe in God then.

I have a complex relationship

with God now. What struck me

was how the song summoned 

truth. How the Begonias blossomed

into something else. One life to the next.

Myths at the breaking twilight.

I found myself opening a matchbox

amazed at each flaring strike.

Curious to what truths

I keep unknown.