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New things and particularly good things.
most recent:
poetry
4/8/25
DS Maolalai
fiction
25/7/25
Ronan O'Shea
flash
18/7/25
Ben daggers
poetry
8/7/25
Gerard Sarnat
flash
3/7/25
Chris Carrel
poetry
26/6/25
Sara Eddy
flash
23/6/25
Christy Hartman
fiction
21/11/24
terence hughes
flash
10/11/24
Elysia Rourke
Editor's spotlight:
Inside the cafe are two youngish women with lots of teeth and a pair of tureens and a glass counter full of rolls and loaves. One of them’s poking a ladle into a steaming mulligatawnyish thing. Each time a chunk of meat bobs to the surface she prods it back under. My mouth waters so much so suddenly I think I’m going to throw up. It’s just appetite though…
The full selection can be found on our dedicated page: The Word-Hoard. Or keep scrolling.
Welcome, fantasist!
Some announcements:
- Jul 9: Playwrights! Screenplayers! We want to see your stuff. (We'll put you on the top of the pile.)
- Jun 3: We're back, baby! (Shiny new site design, too.)
- Jun 3: Submissions are open again: prose, scripts and poems. You'll find the link if you scroll.
- Jun 3: Please support literacy for adults. We love Read Easy, a charity whose link is at the top.
- Jan 8: We've deleted our social media pages. Ain't nobody got time for that.
[ˈfɪkʃn]
- literature in the form of prose that describes imaginary events and people
- something that is invented or untrue
I was talking to Mehmet. The chat was dragging out, for two reasons. One, he was lying. Two, the impatient queue behind me was too terrified to interrupt us. In keeping with the times, each person was keeping a self-preserving distance from the next.
“Seán, I am not lying to you,” said the shopkeeper’s son, who worked for his father.
“Mehmet.”
“Seán. We have no flour.”
They had flour. I knew it. Mehmet’s father was a businessman. He had a back room; whiskey from Japan, bought on the cheap from his mate in the merchant navy; fags from the homeland. You name it, Mr. Yilmaz had it in.
Mehmet smiled.
My girlfriend Flo just left our first-floor apartment at 15 Móinéar Street to clock in at her job as the manager of a boutique fashion retailer in downtown Boston. She does not have a license, so she hailed a car through a…
Summer is winding to a close, and it has been three weeks since Eleni returned from the city hospital. She contacted them yesterday, postponing going back for her next placement. A polite, rational email which did not match…
terence hughes
Lisa Vitale
Robin Harker
Claire Jaggard
Harry Dobbs
Lara Hurley
Philip Suggars
Rebecca Miles
Jill Craig
Michael Trafford
David Lambert
Paul Lewellan
Imagine not being able to read.
no !nt3rn3t. no 8ook5.
no 8!r7hd@y [@rd5.
Please take a look at Read Easy’s website.
[ˈpəʊɪtri]
literary work in which the expression of feelings and ideas is given intensity by the use of distinctive style and rhythm; poems collectively or as a genre of literature
they all write so well,
but then, they have space
to stretch out in. american
poets have it better
than anyone else. all that undiscovered
country could make anyone
make anything so easily. all that sky,
if it didn’t make you kill yourself.
I drove through it once – horizon
to stinking horizon. the disease
of the beauty – I wouldn’t go back.
cornfields and universal harvesters
running on diesel. hawks hovering over
the cut. and then there were mountains
and every occasional town
with the fat-floating sandwiches
and burning black coffee…
During the night I play dead
for 6 hours or so, my last rites sung out
by drunken voices on the Rambla.
There is a wine spot in my dreams,
which always seem to take place at
the end of my second cousin’s quinceañera.
You’re always there – of course you are –
your folded thighs, two dry countries,
while your smile builds cities.
I wake thinking of the desecration of Spain,
and in my head steel timpani…
My friend often stops by at lunch to talk
about our kids–how hard it is and how lovely.
It usually happens, because I love them,
that I’m eating an orange, or a mandarin,
Sumo, blood orange, temple–one of that whole
bodacious family of juicy mamas, and I separate
a section or two bursting with cellular juice
and hand them to my friend.
A little gift, a tender tradition.
After several years of these orangey
offerings, ripe recognitions
of our motherly friendship, she tells me…
Chad Frame
Christopher Jones
Colin Dardis
RT Castleberry
Jennifer Todd
Lisa Stone
Gordon Meade
Charity Reed
Gale Acuff
Phoebe Gilmore
Nancy Byrne Iannucci
Dominic Palmer
Chad Frame
gerard Sarnat
Written something and want us to read it?
You should definitely visit our submissions page.
[flaʃ]
- a brief fictional narrative
- a sudden brief burst of bright light
- a patch or sudden display of a bright colour
- ostentatious stylishness or display of wealth
8:08
Just arrived at Portland Expo Center. Inaugural “Artisanal Vendor of the Year” contest starting in less than an hour. Looks like I’m the only journo here.
8:16
Trouble early on. Bouncer [upper body…
There must have been hundreds of them, maybe thousands, but only on the one wall. They fit their small, black bodies closely together by pointing their wings upward, displaying the light tangerine color beneath. In this way, they painted the wall a warm triptych that made…
1994 – Cher
Dorothy Chandler Pavilion
Bathroom Attendant
3 strands
black/curly/synthetic
The hairs flash like a beacon on the bathroom’s white marble tiles. I wrap…
“Mare’s tails and mackerel scales
Make tall ships take in their sails.”
She’s studied the weather and knows about clouds which is why her lips are thin and tight. She does not want to tell him about the promotion. Tonight, she…
The room seems to have more shadows with it bare. Empty shelves. There had been vases and books and objects, articles of life. Modern art in oak frames; how cultured they were, their easy touch of class…
A postcard of a bear. I flip it over and read Dave’s writing (It’s me! Missing you.), then drop it behind the coffee machine, a space normally reserved for brown envelopes and CVs.
Sandra sprays and wipes the empty…
Elysia Rourke
Melanie Mulrooney
Sean Glatch
Andrew Wickham
Rebecca Klassen
Anne Wilkins
Marcelo MEdone
Stephen Newland
Karen Walker
Polly Halladay
Rebecca Miles
David Kotok
John Sheirer
Ingrid Jendrzejewski
competitions past
We did some writing competitions last year. We might do some more again.
three rounds. three inspirations.
Check out the inspirations, judge’s comments and all the rest here.
round 1
round 2
round 3
The Top 10 of our first-ever flash fiction competition. Fandabidozi.
Our full report is here.
team results
