The door shouted as you came in after work. Your high viz brought in a fake sun. We tilted words off our heads as we nodded. You never lied to me but never spoke the truth. You placed your spirit level on the kitchen table. The bubble went with your weight as you filled the kettle. The newspaper was rolled in your pocket and all I got was headlines. You sold my fishing tackle that you bought for my birthday. UHT milk poured out of the fridge as you made a cuppa. I sat listeni

i. I know you by the many names you use for camouflage: fbuds, blow bud, Netflix and chill, bennifriends, “maintenance,” white boy toy, afam. ii. It would be as if we had labels: / how we would lay atop each other’s body / —flesh of oyster hinged on its shell— / for hours, how we would converse / over cigarettes about the abstract depth / after it. We both prefer Marlboro Ice Blast, / “the brand for construction workers and security guards,” / said some pretentious poet-wanna

Wear something nice: a full length ball gown or a hat with an ornamental rose on the front. This will show that you have made an effort. As you walk into the living room crowded with his family and yours, try to look humble and bride-like and not trip over Chubbs the cat winding her way between your steps. Your father will say: this is my daughter, Sidra, which is the cue for you to make salams and sit down in whatever space you can find. Do not ask the boy’s mother to stand

Dionysos at the Blue Moon, four rounds deep it’s in my nature, it is my nature black curls limp down a clammy neck and bleary burgundy eyes losing time in little sips of infinity but his skin still glows there is no running from the melted gold in your veins, King of Carousers, Lord of the Bacchanal did you forget that this is supposed to be fun and drinking alone is a modern invention we are so far from the shrieking laughter of lilac-skinned women, a muscular wrist grippin

Anxiety in the house is starting to raise like the marsh around our boots as we stomp through the woods that run from our garden to the meadow. It is seeping over the top, and subtly threatening to pull us all under. It is always a tricky time, when the days become darker, the doors to the garden are closed more and my son finds it hard to create the space he needs for movement to regulate his nervous system, his emotions and sense of self in space. 2020 bought turmoil and an

I line boxes up along the windowsill, mirroring the line of birds picking Hawthorn berries, full of hope for the winter. Each one promises, to see me through the darkness ahead. It only takes a moment, for my hopes to vanish, all wings and shrill calls leaving the windowsill empty of anything but tea. Elisabeth Kelly is a teacher who lives on a Scottish hill farm with her young family and too many animals. She recently began writing and has been published in or is due to be i

The petiole and the midrib The trick is to press the leaf to your cheek and crack its raw wax against your skin. Extract the blackened stump and roots, but leave the loam unstitched. The land rent from you is now yours to tend. Agricultural experimental plan for late fall Tapering stairs, diminishing, converge in a savage hook that splits the moon’s face, a leer below butterfly eyes and lighthouse nose, sighting the catboat conceding the field’s advance. Threads of turnip roo

.....who saw me as their stepmom" fire truck. helicopter. american girl doll. army men. shopping cart. all these things that were once marinated in you, germed up by you, now lonely in my storage house. doll clothes. mainstreet. silly putty. plastic food. playing cards. i touch each toy i come across, hoping it maintains some essence of you but it never does. board games. teddy bear. ball pit. barber shop. each new item brings out scores of memories and i don't know how to do

2 Frost Haikus *for Chris La Tray 1. pink morning sunlight sparkling on the frosty grass crunch beneath my boots 2. frost dusting the trees cat sleeps on radiator winter is coming Agaric Haiku *for Bram Riddlebarger running through the yard girl kicks yellow agarics death comes to us all Alan ten-Hoeve lives in the woods with his wife and children. Work in The Daily Drunk, Versification, 433 Magazine, Macromic, Close to the Bone. Twitter @alantenhoeve

You picked me up and packed me in a cardboard box, so I could watch you mix the salads and talk to you in my own babble. The uniforms stitched us together like twins and made us tighter than the yellow and red stars you sewed on our identical flares. The white walls laughed at the swear words you taught me when I was 2 years old. You would put your dreadlocks up in a ponytail for work and I would follow you outside on your break so you could smoke Peter Jackson cigarettes. At