Lent
︎︎︎ Jordan Castro
︎ Oct 30, 2025
Black fire
Silver sun
cuts across the hidden hills
then sets behind the distant edge
illuminating other dark
Silver sun
cuts across the hidden hills
then sets behind the distant edge
illuminating other dark
Jordan Castro is the author of the novels Muscle Man (2025) and The Novelist (2022).
Also by Jordan: 23
5 Stages to Everything Except Making Tea
︎︎︎ Travis Stephens
︎ Oct 28, 2025
Elisabeth Kubler-Ross described five stages of grief:
Anger,
Denial,
Bargaining,
Depression,
Acceptance.
As recovering alcoholic, single Dad &
part-time gardener, I subscribe that
there are five stages to many things.
Consider romance:
Tease,
Thrill,
Move-in,
Marriage,
Acceptance.
My detox is:
Hangover,
Thirsty,
Sneaky,
Desperate,
Smug.
Five guys to build a house:
Planner,
Pourer,
Carpenter,
Plumber,
Electrician.
To quit smoking:
Parceled,
Gum chewing,
Gain weight,
Twitchy,
Haunted.
Even the 5 steps of cuckold:
Shock,
Rage,
Violence,
Denial,
Calm
as water trickled onto new, soft grass
on the unnoticed ground where
the bodies are.
Anger,
Denial,
Bargaining,
Depression,
Acceptance.
As recovering alcoholic, single Dad &
part-time gardener, I subscribe that
there are five stages to many things.
Consider romance:
Tease,
Thrill,
Move-in,
Marriage,
Acceptance.
My detox is:
Hangover,
Thirsty,
Sneaky,
Desperate,
Smug.
Five guys to build a house:
Planner,
Pourer,
Carpenter,
Plumber,
Electrician.
To quit smoking:
Parceled,
Gum chewing,
Gain weight,
Twitchy,
Haunted.
Even the 5 steps of cuckold:
Shock,
Rage,
Violence,
Denial,
Calm
as water trickled onto new, soft grass
on the unnoticed ground where
the bodies are.
Travis Stephens is a tugboat captain who lives with his family in California. His book of poetry skeeter bit & still drunk was published by Finishing Line Press.
Also by Travis: Caravels for Joan
Also by Travis: Caravels for Joan
Williston
︎︎︎ Sarah Beth Spraggins
︎ Oct 27, 2025
Laura, I’m angry.
It all seems so unnatural
in our religion.
Filaments of heavenly light spill out
of my water bottle and into
the intersection
but dissipate just as fast
and people scatter
like dropped pills.
Every week
you bake in your oven.
You are always coming up
with new sacraments.
Cake is concise.
Weren’t you the one
who taught me how to pray
in the first place? At the top
of that building
saying ask him this,
ask him that.
If you didn’t know
what to think,
you would ask
that he show you
where he was in physical
proximity.
Jesus appeared
in different places in the room.
I chase his figure
with my rat mind,
blurry and dark.
Sometimes a pink spot shows up
and I think it’s his flesh,
but then, like I said,
it goes away.
Faster than it used to.
Laura, I’m scared.
Inside the projection
of a star’s fuzz, I think
the wicked will ruin themselves
before punishment
finds them.
It all seems so unnatural
in our religion.
Filaments of heavenly light spill out
of my water bottle and into
the intersection
but dissipate just as fast
and people scatter
like dropped pills.
Every week
you bake in your oven.
You are always coming up
with new sacraments.
Cake is concise.
Weren’t you the one
who taught me how to pray
in the first place? At the top
of that building
saying ask him this,
ask him that.
If you didn’t know
what to think,
you would ask
that he show you
where he was in physical
proximity.
Jesus appeared
in different places in the room.
I chase his figure
with my rat mind,
blurry and dark.
Sometimes a pink spot shows up
and I think it’s his flesh,
but then, like I said,
it goes away.
Faster than it used to.
Laura, I’m scared.
Inside the projection
of a star’s fuzz, I think
the wicked will ruin themselves
before punishment
finds them.
Sarah Beth Spraggins is a writer in Washington, DC.
Bog Body
︎︎︎ Abigail Helmke
︎ Oct 25, 2025
There was no Lamia or Lamashtu to rip you from me in the night
Just me
On a quiet Vancouver morning
And a soft-voiced Chinese woman doctor
And a blonde nurse who, in an attempt to make me
Feel better, asked me what I studied at school.
Russian, I said. I was embarrassed.
She told me that her brother did, too,
And now he makes icons
By hand.
You were not made by hands—
I remember—
But, like an old saint of whom
No photos exist, your image hangs
In my mind.
Incorrupt possibility.
I never actually saw your eyes or your hair
But I know them.
All I ever saw of you was what you left behind—
Blood, thick and black
Like wet peat or tar
That bubbled out of me like a spring.
And I felt myself turn into a peat bog
Woman-shaped, walking
Mat’ syraya zemlya, Мать сырая земля
A little mother
Made of sodden abiotic earth that
Takes lives and tucks them in,
Perfect and sleeping and hidden
Unto the ages of ages.
Five years later, I remember you.
It’s only me who carries the hollow you left,
Your ghost, microfossils of you,
All in the black bog of my body.
Your soul weighs more than you did
And I carry it and will carry it
Perfect and sleeping and hidden
Unto ages of ages.
Just me
On a quiet Vancouver morning
And a soft-voiced Chinese woman doctor
And a blonde nurse who, in an attempt to make me
Feel better, asked me what I studied at school.
Russian, I said. I was embarrassed.
She told me that her brother did, too,
And now he makes icons
By hand.
You were not made by hands—
I remember—
But, like an old saint of whom
No photos exist, your image hangs
In my mind.
Incorrupt possibility.
I never actually saw your eyes or your hair
But I know them.
All I ever saw of you was what you left behind—
Blood, thick and black
Like wet peat or tar
That bubbled out of me like a spring.
And I felt myself turn into a peat bog
Woman-shaped, walking
Mat’ syraya zemlya, Мать сырая земля
A little mother
Made of sodden abiotic earth that
Takes lives and tucks them in,
Perfect and sleeping and hidden
Unto the ages of ages.
Five years later, I remember you.
It’s only me who carries the hollow you left,
Your ghost, microfossils of you,
All in the black bog of my body.
Your soul weighs more than you did
And I carry it and will carry it
Perfect and sleeping and hidden
Unto ages of ages.
Abigail Helmke is a writer, artist, and researcher in Montreal.
The Mirror
︎︎︎ Rachel Horvath
︎ Oct 24, 2025
You take each word—hollow, full, a coin I toss to myself—
& you wear them like jewelry, or wounds.
I let myself evaporate inside LA, sun loosening the shape of my body,
& there’s pleasure in the roaming, the heat.
I moved for the promise of some permanent softness
(I moved for the weather),
My ears are bare now—I want the noise unfiltered, I want it like bad advice
New York baptized me in fuel and flame. I learned addiction to the light, the burning,
how very slowly you can die inside something golden.
In God’s Ocean, everything stirs, you drag continents for me—I trust you,
I let you steer with your tongue,
I let the storm teach me.
Who will bail out this swelling ache, these debts I keep accumulating
All of it folding back into the mirror—my heart with its vain attachments, indulgent, luminous, bright. I hate to admit I embrace it.
I say hate, but I mean: it’s mine.
& you wear them like jewelry, or wounds.
I let myself evaporate inside LA, sun loosening the shape of my body,
& there’s pleasure in the roaming, the heat.
I moved for the promise of some permanent softness
(I moved for the weather),
My ears are bare now—I want the noise unfiltered, I want it like bad advice
New York baptized me in fuel and flame. I learned addiction to the light, the burning,
how very slowly you can die inside something golden.
In God’s Ocean, everything stirs, you drag continents for me—I trust you,
I let you steer with your tongue,
I let the storm teach me.
Who will bail out this swelling ache, these debts I keep accumulating
All of it folding back into the mirror—my heart with its vain attachments, indulgent, luminous, bright. I hate to admit I embrace it.
I say hate, but I mean: it’s mine.
Rachel Horvath is an artist, designer, and writer living in Los Angeles.