daytime gutter vomit scared to change your way from one that has been making you money color-segregated schools for the blind the increasing pressure to pass— indeed, identify—as one of […]
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Some lands are royalty in just existence: the dragging of the boat from sand to sea, the thick of the tongue on the roof of the mouth – that is […]
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“This is not a Democracy!” More equals loss… Fight like this great and disgusting world is laughing at us. We let this happen, we march and stop. The phoney made […]
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I’ve been awake since 4 a.m. But that was twenty hours ago, and now we’re here, at the party, and the sky seems low and […]
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Love like Eucalyptus or Lavender was sabuline. Cacoethes for your company I understand now: the arenosity I had to encounter by cholla-like jabs too. Nursery a green-thumber creates when […]
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A road divider on our thoroughfare has been constructing since three major eclipses, going under the idea scalpel by fickle engineers – flowers or trees – it’s a hard decision […]
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Damian Campana is a Creative Writing student at a community college in Rochester, NY. He is an aspiring creator. He is passionate about telling stories through different aspects of […]
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Life is supposed to be music But we are the notes not the listeners Maybe we are God’s music Chords being strummed on some cosmic level Leftover reverberation echoing from […]
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Her new boyfriend had a ship inside a bottle. You’d ask him how he got it in there, and he’d act like you had to be a […]
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Can your mind sustain the burden for the beating heart to heave? Will you bare the heaviness of being within a lightness of the form? Does the little weevil relent […]
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Editor’s Note: Per the author’s request, we have left this piece untitled. * These crumbs are from so many places yet after every meal they ripen sweeten in time for […]
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D.M. Rice is a non-binary writer from Dallas, TX whose work has been featured in the Aletheia Journal, Sybil, The Bandit Zine, and the anthologies Rec*og*nize, Nameless Woman, Kill Line, and […]
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It was late enough that she didn’t even feel tired anymore. Clarissa squinted so hard her eyes hurt. She tried see through the fogged-over windshield as the onslaught of rain […]
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Hey everyone! Matthew here, we have a special Friday post for you! You may remember Alex Clare as the author of He’s Gone, a mystery novel starring the transgender detective Robyn […]
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Whatever be the season, perhaps you are the reason, for the shadowed man whom limps down the narrow lane. With help of a burled cane, or such unequivocal refrain within […]
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Megan Denese Mealor has been published widely in numerous journal, most recently Children Churched & Daddies, Beakful, streetcake, and Harbinger Asylum. A two-time Pushcart Prize nominee, her debut poetry collection, […]
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Four tea cups lay unattended since Mittag – on the black, bedraggled table in the canteen. You and I – drinking each other in— Slow, dainty sips. Each tea […]
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Now that you’ve passed-through woods deeper and darker than these — climbed into eternity — can you tell me, when our hearts stop, and we’re poised among the mysteries that […]
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You’d expect the power button to be a rare diamond fueling a holographic desktop, folders overflowing in bitcoin. Or that answers just appear, thoughts as search engines. But in fact […]
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To know life is to greet knowing you won’t unmeet. To know life is to see your creators split into demigods, degrading into man and woman. They can’t be fixed; […]
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Gilded morning shatters sleep, dreams cling on with tenacious teeth. A confused reality sorting through a fragmented emotional state. Warm bed, cold toast. Sensations linger throughout the day. A […]
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I have been raised to fear my footfalls in the dark to be a walking skirt is to sacrifice safety, sway like an open gate for danger. but I collect […]
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She’d had a cupcake for breakfast every day for the last month. Thick on the icing, more often than not with sprinkles, occasionally filled with sweet cream or more icing. […]
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With Lines from “The Apple Trees at Olema” by Robert Hass Shakes me by the raw, white, backlit flaring of her lightning streaked hand. Fingers whip, burn my veiny branches […]
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can people see when you look at their facebook calories in chocolate shake calories in wendys chocolate frosty how to get into hiking hiking for depression hiking for people who […]
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I watched you slide swiftly into the fog encapsulating Eagle Junction railway station. Scraps of rust leaking with oil-stained dew flung into the past, and in the faint glinting of […]
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SKIN is the bodies first line of defense. our metal shell wrap-around sometimes, your body can confuse fortress for prison, my mother is able to show me exactly where the […]
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I was born an old soul they say, a quiet spectator mulling over muddled thoughts, about what I don’t know, perhaps a previous lifetime. I woke to bird sounds in […]
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The weed is helping. I can’t survive without it. Honestly, it more or less serves as a natural replacement for Lexapro, because fuck that shit. It’s like lightening your hair […]
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How did the despair become fluid for clear, dry eyes to shed? Why did the burden on the heart allow the stress and cause the beat to finally stop […]
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Tonight the battle will begin. But first, as the concealer smooths across my eye folds, I picture her breathlessly saying hello to him, always making sure to say his name […]
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Note from the artist: Though a montage which utilized different computer programs to create the effects that photographers of not-so-old created during acid bath development, this image, and the Water […]
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I never saw my mother smoke; didn’t smell her lingering breath or see her brown stained teeth; nor did I take in the stench of the smoke. I was told […]
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No art without startle No belief without a lie No character without an act No business without sin No coffee without a fee No culture without a cult No entrance […]
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A Gymnast propels through the air after launching off the springboard. Camera flashes capture blurry movements: Facebook posts for later, if She wins. Judges dress in hooking avenue suits, out […]
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Do not let this be the end. Do not bisect, dissect our time with before and after, with Now and Never. Do not spill […]
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He stood outside the door asking for directions, lost hope in hand. Paying the toll with a pocketful of dreams. Aspirations evaporating at the sound of his own voice. A […]
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My earliest memories involve skeletons. I remember watching The Nightmare Before Christmas with the same vague fascination that grabbed the hearts of basic goth children everywhere. (That has to be […]
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Once there was a man who found a forest in his pocket. When he came home after a day’s work he would take it out. His house would fill up […]
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As the dusk creeps through the summit the once luscious sun dips below the rocky mounts And flocks of birds soar away weaving intricate patterns in the grayish sky […]
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Do not allow the quietness that saturates the halls of night break through the dawn. For it will shatter all perception of time and space, grabbing reality by […]
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Gracefully inept at life’s perfection gleefully disorganized and simple who put the milk in the top freezer? Sometimes I think gremlins reside here glowing and rising with the autumn sun […]
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The peace inside the giant glass bell is almost always short-lived. Soon the translucent, riblike curves will spark with electric-blue orbs, followed by clouds of glittering cosmic dust, followed again […]
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You come home, half gallon of milk in one hand, the other snaking around my waist. Head buried in my shoulder, no words, just small noises that I can feel […]
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Once upon a time, there were two big kingdoms and two small kingdoms. The two big kingdoms were called Khakia and Doogland. The two small kingdoms were called Bibbleton and […]
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I was born a human jigsaw puzzle. I emerged from my mother’s womb, not as a whole baby, but in scattered pieces. The doctors worked non-stop as they assembled me. […]
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Fragments of dreams scattered among the ruins of once lofty ambitions, buried along with lost loves and white lace promises Standing tall against the crumbling visions. Whispers of gargoyles devouring […]
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I’ve probably been inside more than 500 tunnels, caves, souterrains, or underground passages in my entire life. My first home was a kind of cave, an organic one that was […]
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Tsuki Amai’s wristwatch emitted a soft click, and she tugged gently at her ear to make sure, for the tenth time that day, that she was awake. Her mother hated […]
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It’s not smoggy like they say it is in London, at least I don’t think so, but the River Thames is filthier than I had imagined. I saw it from […]
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The tweeker’s Boggy, alcoholic eyes Bulged unblinkingly Within inches of mine Setting the stage For mere players In this mosh pit At the intersection of ol’Frisco And modernity While the […]
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You were the ocean foams, and I was the golden grains of sand. You were the heron that flew above, and I was the salty air that your wings collided […]
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They rode together in silence for some time, the old man and the young one. Paul looked out the window, his blue eyes cloudy with cateracts, his vision clouded with […]
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I used to pray for a wild soul risky enough to give me part of herself when she knows it is likely I will not come back when she knows […]
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The poet Charles Bukowski said “I don’t know about other people, but when I wake up in the morning and put my shoes on, I think, Jesus Christ, what now?” […]
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I’ll start with what we most want you to hear: We’re still taking submissions. You’ll recall that a little over a year ago now, we went on hiatus from regular […]
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It’s autumn now. The leaves are carrying quiet dust on their surfaces. Northern winds puff and relieve your skin from the unforgiving sun. Soon there will come winter. It will […]
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Darling, listen. no matter what we do our fingers will end up blistered, our palms bloody if we look into the mirror long enough to know anything, if we pull […]
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Someone would love to have you for a daughter; Wouldn’t mind you in the attic, stealing their things. The walls would be yours, as would your body And four […]
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Editor-in-Chief’s Note: Gerardeen Santiago is a poet and publisher I originally met at Glassless Minds in Oceanside. When the Metaworker staff was suggesting new people to interview, she was at […]
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Every year, from the first I was assigned to the graveyard, I would watch the headstones from my place upon the highest pine tree. My job was to make sure […]
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The fog was making whispering sounds It was rising up from the earth Like spirits from the past I spit dust from my mouth Just to prove I’m a […]
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She camouflaged herself at a darkened far table, idled away time by tapping a spoon against her drink glass; on the opposite side of the hall, similarly nervous and […]
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A very pretty girl wears the same brown clogs every day sometimes. Between all the rain-soaked steps we took and the part where she left, she joked, “These are my […]
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We sit on the precipice of Heaven and pollution; you hand Me an empty box and promise Desultory protection. Our bodies, superimposed From two different tangles of lake water […]
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Obsidian, black, but when held up to light it is semi-transparent. Also known as Apache Tears. Roughly circular in shape, about half an inch by half an inch. Received by […]
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Yesterday you were five foot ten and today your toes don’t touch the base of the bed. You cocoon yourself deeper into the blankets, stuffing your face into fluff and […]
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absent of pearls in a grand ocean mollusk crying self righteousness without salty tears seeking to find truth in an unrelenting fervor see the dark drift in during a twilight […]
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Sometimes I like to reimagine religion and the stories I was told as a child, so that it fits the way I understand the world now. I tell myself it […]
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I only ever wrote to be close to you. You didn’t exist. I knew that. But it didn’t matter when I could create words that would conjure you. And someday, […]
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I lost my heart last night. It must have happened in my sleep. I didn’t notice at first, but when I looked in the mirror this morning I saw the […]
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If I were to outlive you, I would feel the poet in me blackening, nails pulling in like a sea of petals in the mouth at the end of the […]
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The letter I wrote Lilly first thing after I found out talks to her in the present tense, like she still exists, because she does still exist for me, or […]
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Every morning I look in the mirror and hope for a different reflection. The problem with makeup is that it doesn’t cover every scar. And I’ve got a lot of […]
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I reveal the parts I want you to see you think you know me masquerade ugly thoughts inside my head mourning at the side of a haunted bed empty womb […]
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I hold the moon like a baby in my arms. If I let it go, it will fall. The light of the night will die. Out of the corner of […]
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The doctor’s handsome and that makes it worse… more bad news from the lips of handsome men. We need more tests, he says. Well no lover ever put it in […]
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Hypertension: Each bus line a grime-filled artery, Each soup line snaking concrete corners, slithering in human filth like wet soil, wet and thick and fast like noseblood; Each […]
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What I’m saying right now is meaningless – because a word spoken alone is a word spoken in vain. Like a tree falling in an empty forest, I may as […]
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Let’s make this a pissing contest. Place your bet with mine. I’m bound to win if winning means a longer yellow line. ‘Cause yellow’s the color of smiley faces, Daffodils […]
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I opened my eyes, emerging from a dream but couldn’t remember anything at all. Shame really because I’d always considered dream space a bit like going to the cinema without […]
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I don’t think in Bengali, I think it is just one of those things that fold my body the way my grandfather used to. At least that’s what my mother […]
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“He laid his head in my palms And I watched as he grew a garden of roses Across a dying field. He had the power to entrap me in flesh […]
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1 My grandfather lived next to two wheat farmers. I secretly wished my grandfather was a wheat farmer. I would bicycle along the edge of their fields, picking stalks that […]
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Writing isn’t only for novelists or poets. Screenwriters are writers, too! Below is an excerpt from the script of the upcoming web-series called Hypervision, which is about four friends who embark […]
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Writing isn’t only for novelists or poets. Screenwriters are writers, too! Below is an interview with Steven Jay, the writer and creator of an upcoming web-series called Hypervision, which is […]
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Catacombs and catastrophe fill my head. I cannot sleep. We end up going for a drive. The car pushes past streetlights and traffic stops— little by little the comfort of […]
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I’ve spent the last two years trying to figure out how to pull this trigger finger from my mouth and blast the sour blackness out into the sunshine. I had been […]
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And The Metaworker is locked down through the end of 2016. Thank you to everyone who’s kept submitting, and especially to everyone who’s kept reading. But wait, there’s more! We’ve […]
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I. I jump at the slightest touch on my cracked back. Fierce mountain wind rushes around me. My ears, too long and pointy. A cold hand on my forehead makes […]
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portuguese lyric lilt xe’s, lifting ocean inflection lifted south american toneflexing a talker’s tongue one ganders in psychadelic wonder when they codeswitch– one is jealous my rudimentary spanish gives nothing, […]
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A blank is waiting to get painted, a bank shimmers with slimes and silt. I have waited for you; liquid caresses, and the kisses of ether, and fires of cloud. […]
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Wait until your mother and brother have left the house. Then, call him. Four oh eight, five five five, seven three eight oh. You’ve had the number memorized since he […]
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Madeline loves it And sits as Mother would. The priest is like her Father Dressed all in grey, Palms fluttering with Paper clowns, Legs and arms spinning anti-clockwise Like the […]
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She reads new poetry in old settings, antique store turned coffee house, dressed in black sweater, skirt and stockings, perched on the edge of a table. a lotus sipping coffee […]
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We have a new prompt for Writing on the Wall! The rules are the same: we post the prompt, and YOU, in 100 words or less, can write a response […]
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To be man means to reach toward being God. Or, if you prefer, man fundamentally is the desire to be God. Jean-Paul Sartre I am a prisoner, wrongfully […]
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This one’s a very special post. We’re presenting to you the work of the highly accomplished Albanian Poet Irsa Ruçi, both translated, and in its original language. Irsa Ruçi […]
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Success is a function of desire when I was younger it evolved into an adrenaline addiction Instead of running from death I decided to chase it and ultimately set the […]
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I’m always finding myself writing about fire Maybe because I always got so much to burn maybe cause I’m a fire sign it’s easy because I smell a hint of […]
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