Heather Walker

    The Second Coming   It was a few days after Easter Sunday that Felicity saw Jesus. He was riding a bike, his long hair flowing like the robe around his shoulders. On one handle bar swung a Lidl bag. It was an odd sight, but his resurrection had just...

Jane Lomas

    Gilded by a Thousand Sorrows She follows me, with the flutter of a duster, around the house. A bony question mark, hips grinding like a worn out piston working fur-lined slippers against the old oak boards. Lungs working in out, in out, chuff-chuff,...

Chris Powici

    Fisherman After a long, dreich day in the firth – soaked gansey, torn gloves, a few sorry mackerel dangling from the lines – I hauled up on the beach. Thick smell of wrack. Bird cries. Night.                I lit a kerosene lamp, stood at the sea’s edge,...

Eirene Gentle

      Flower tongue Daffodils hate being shoved in corners. When forced they emit a peculiar scent, part butter, part ulcer. I wear yellow shoes because I don’t like corners either but I am frequently left in them, and so I exude a peculiar smell. You...

P.W. Bridgman

      Chiaroscuro A line of blue hills in the distance is contoured like a monumental sentence… – Ciaran Carson He began his day as he’d always done—by fetching up the milk from his doorstep, putting the kettle on and tumbling Darjeeling leaves...

Niles Reddick

      The Hardee’s Coffee Club I’d seen them all humped over at a table slurping coffee in a mostly empty Hardee’s at 6:30 a.m. in my hometown when I ran in and ordered a bacon and egg biscuit with hash browns and a diet coke because the drive-thru had...