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The archive is a separate site formed from all the posts from that original Ink Sweat & Tears website, it consists of everything we have published up to the end of 2019.

Recent posts

Anyonita Green

      Examining clots It wobbles slightly, red wine jelly. I peer at it, nose close enough to smell the iron, the scent of coagulant, inhaling through slightly parted lips I imagine I can taste it, how everything tasted metallic, like monkey bar poles...

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Soledad Santana

      Kamila Seen as she’d hung her cranial lantern from the roof of her step-father’s garden shed, the parabolic formula was skipped; like two calves, we followed the fence to the end of the foot-ball pitch. Beneath their sprinklers, we kissed on our...

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Claire Harnett-Mann

      Common Ground Behind the block, the night tears in scrub-calls. Fox kill scores the morning, ripped by prints in muck. There's a form for this, a number to call, an action plan, a statement on how the city manages its wild, what to do when it...

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Hedy Hume

      Manchester Piccadilly ➡ Wolverhampton Stepping into the opposing seat I smile, and the look I receive Makes me feel the antisocial one. With oh so many missed connections It seems that somewhere, somewhen, somehow Something has gone horribly...

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Jo Bardsley

      A letter C The little piece of newspaper, crisp and dark with age, flutters out of the gritty space between the fridge and the cabinet. I am cleaning the house while my wife is at school and at first I don’t understand. It is small, less than an...

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Matthew F. Amati

      Hands Said To Head Hands said to Head look what you’ve made me do it’s not me, Head said, talk to Heart, that guy’s sick, Heart said whoa buddy, I take cues from Gut, whence all appetites bloom Gut growled, said nothing. Head said rumor is Gut’s...

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Mariam Saidan

      A Cry Female singing constitutes a 'forbidden act' (ḥarām), punishable under Article 638 of the Islamic Penal Code. When I was younger I used to sing. In private. Now whenever I open my mouth, it's a cry for all the lives in which I didn't or will...

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Meg Pokrass

      Cat Swarm This is what happens when she sits alone in her dining room, eating smoked trout and canned sardines. Twelve cats who are molting arrive as a sweet surprise. They smell the flavor and here they are. Now there’s cat fur everywhere. It...

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Chen-ou Liu

      * the sound of raindrops in our silence of farewell eviction night * 360 degrees of a lighthouse searchlight ... this darkness (in me) * this fresh morning so much like the others ... yet starlings shape-shift     Chen-ou Liu is the...

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Jim Paterson

      One For The Crow A Tuesday morning in November out on the street taking in the bins. As a flight of crows flashed past the street lights went out. My neighbour, very good at counting, said it was a coincidence, but it looked as if the crows put...

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Andy Humphrey

      Becoming Hedgehog (i) Noises are louder now: the kesh of tyres on tarmac slicked with leaves. Rain’s drumming thunder. My other self pulls at me, pricks from inside. Limbs compress, ribs tighten around starved lungs. I furl; I shrink, a leaf about...

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Chrissie Gittins

      My Brother Teaches Me How To Open And Close A Door When you’ve used one handle to open the door, use the other handle to close it. That way the draft from the open window won’t whip it closed and wake everyone up. Even now he still teaches me –...

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Morgan Harlow

      Notes after a walk: a tree that had caught its own fallen limb She hadn’t lost a child but if she had she imagined it would be like that. To hear footsteps running up behind you, and to turn around and no one there. To see a crow gliding under the...

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Stephen C. Curro

      calm river again, his fishing line caught on a tree * raindrops slide down the window death in the family * thick clouds snowflakes dot my dog’s fur * breaking clouds flower petals pasted to my windshield * Christmas dinner with Mom’s new...

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James Norcliffe

      Sarsaparilla Road travels through swamps and reeds, over a black water creek and a narrow bridge, past the swift river with all of its snags and eddies, through the winding gorge of slippery-back slopes, scarps of limestone and galloping gorse to...

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David Hanlon

      Location of Incident Not in that parking lot, not in that residential area, not in that blue car splashed with mud. Not in that leather backseat — fingernail torn. Not in that stuffy air clouding windows. And not — not in this heart. Yet — not not...

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Mana Misaghi

      Mythopolitics we make sure to pack a deck of cards for the train, or a sunday afternoon visit to the park. the cards will give our hands something tangible to do, and that thing should be as far away from Productive as possible, for that is the...

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Taḋg Paul

    Taḋg Paul is a queer poet, former LGBTQ+ rights campaigner, and software developer. In 2022, an injury rendered him quadriplegic. During hospitalization and rehab he rekindled a love for writing poetry. Today he volunteers at Fighting Words mentoring...

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