Three Drops from a Cauldron: Issue 24 by Three Drops from a Cauldron

Three Drops from a Cauldron Issue 24 / November 2018 Scry for the Moon

The Blue Monologue

Rain

Selkie

The Lady with the Shears

Encounter with gods

Prayer to Odin from the Psychiatric Inpatient Unit

Promise

Echo’s Revenge

Saint Abigail

The prayer of the honey-collector’s wife

Lantern Men

Two Queens

And in the End, They All Lived Happily Ever After

The Presence of a Witch

Crow Rose

The Hammer of Witches

Seven of Staves

Enchanted

Serve and Protect

Ghost Tunnels

Healing

Short Cut

Angel

Scents of Ghosts

Dad

Long Live Kushim

At Night

Grazing Dinosaurs. For Shame

Bigfoot Love

Bigfoot Loves Me

Dame Van Winkle

Niamh’s Wishes

My Dear Undine

The Dragon’s Gate

Horn Dance

Taliesin’s Harp

The Nightmare Bird

Grimalkin

Retreat

Biographical Notes

Previous Publication Credits

Scry for the Moon In my house there is a secret room, painted duck egg blue and lit by the moon. At the window a silver water basin holds her roundness in its hands. I splash my face, wash with her fullness. Break her carbon copy to shivers, water displaced. As she turns, futures disperse and reform, quiver on the surface, tenuous as smoke.

Charley Reay

The Blue Monologue I have a stalker, a leery witch. Keeping close. Sometimes she forgets herself, and I catch a thread of brine in the air over my shoulder. Intentions. The kind that sting and stain for centuries to come. I will live inside that sting, fold myself into the edge of something bitter. Breath stops, in the sting. I turn cold and blue, turn to something crystallised. Rotate. From life to death, from warm rush to a pale thing. Cocoonwrapped, the witch lets me float out to sea. Rotate. Am I transformed? Salt-crust snap of hitting the bottom. I have found my way to the belly of the earth. Ocean. Here I dream of exhumation by pirates, for this is no burial ground. I sprout gills, encourage the fleshy rip and watery gulp. A scaly resurfacing. Rotate. From waterlogged bulk to resurrection, now I am a holy sea dweller. My witch returns at each full moon. She keeps the sacrifice fresh, but it was a pyrrhic victory in the end. The waves spit at her. I am Scylla, I am the prayed-to angel of the deep.

Meg Gripton-Cooper

Rain When rain clouds go back on what seemed their word / Ploughmen turn still, sullen their oxen herd. Tiruv Alluvar // drought-stricken village / priests marry two frogs / with Vedic rites / in a bid for rain // // a two-hour ceremony / the whole village attends / frogs decorated with oil & sindoor // // on the wedding day / guests shower the frogs in flowers / hold a feast // // these rituals / please the rain god / Barun Devata // // folderol surrounds religion / rain eludes // // the frogs kept / as pets //

Wendy Holborow

Selkie His smile stretches as wide as his shoulders and Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m adrift, beached and gaping. With brackish vision, he measures his height and weight against my frame then tears at me with broad persistent jaws until I sink into the ocean. My lungs must learn to breathe under water and yield to tidal pressure. On a distant shore, he rests me on a shrinking bed of ice and slaps the heat back into me, my meat harpooned so cleanly I will bleed to an uncertain death if he leaves or if he stays. This strict percussion is his carnivorous lesson, his dilating eyes shining in the dark like gaslight.

Zoe Mitchell

The Lady with the Shears The lady who stands on the bridge over the Tallapoosa River has been there for as long as anyone can remember. She’s old, wears sunglasses, a baseball cap that says “God Bless America,” and has a walker with an American flag draped over the front. She waves at passing cars. Sometimes she’s fishing. Sometimes she’ll disappear for days, weeks at a time. But just when you forget to laugh at her presence, or lack of it, she’s back. There is a tree near the bridge someone has nailed a sign to. It reads, “Jesus is coming soon! Are you ready?” I used to laugh at that sign. I’d ask whoever happened to be in the passenger’s seat, “Do you think it’ll be today? Because I bet that lady’s not ready!” I don’t know what I ever thought was funny about that, but if I’m being honest, it’s what I said. I used to wonder about the lady’s family. I wondered if anyone knew she was there, alone, fishing from a bridge on a Tallapoosa backroad. Surely she doesn’t expect to catch anything, I used to tell myself. The cane pole she has is thin and flimsy, and the line is a thick piece of ugly black yarn. But it must work because there is a string of fish hanging from the side of her walker. There had never been fish on her walker before, but there have been lately. I slowed the car once and counted. There were seven fish. I never really cared about the lady with the walker and her string of fish. I never cared until the day I drove past as she was changing the line on her cane pole. There was something about the way she looked as she measured for the next strand of black yarn. I watched as she held it high in the air, way over her head, almost ceremoniously, and seemed to judge the length of yarn. In her other hand were shears. But she wasn’t cutting the yarn when I saw her. When I saw the lady on the bridge that last time, she was holding the yarn in one hand and pointing with the other. Her shears were pointed at me. I had slowed to look, of course. I saw the rot in her teeth as she smiled, sweetly, and pointed at me. When I told my wife about the lady with the shears, she laughed. 12

“What fairy tale are you telling now?” I don’t drive over her bridge anymore; I take the long way around. I know what she intends, the lady with the shears. I fear what might happen if she cuts the yarn for her pole to catch another fish to add to the line on her walker. I wonder if I can take it back, the laughter I sent her way, the lack of compassion I felt when I saw her. I’m afraid it’s too late, but I’ll try anyway. I swear I will.

Chip Jett

Encounter with gods A bloom of breath appears before us, misting tracks through heather, chilling lips and fingers. Snow-capped peaks sing countertenor. Voices fill our ears with language older than belonging, being one with what just is. Below, lights glow like flowers in the valley, shifting, drifting through a wind that drops its rain on Gaiaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s open hands. We canâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t return to source, to the freezing certainty of equal on the mountain. Earth withdraws her hands, dismisses us, allows the storm to push us down the path to where bright petals lie in drifts, uneven and unfair. Glimpses of other. Possessions without purpose. The old gods beckon.

Kathy Gee

Prayer to Odin from the Psychiatric Inpatient Unit If I die in battle against my madness does it count toward Valhalla? In another time, I have sensed, entranced, enthralled, I might have been a Vala, self-owned, rune-wise, wand-wed, conversing with the dead. Bringer of berserker mania, on dark wings, like mine, you fly. Such fickle gifts the Allfather brings. True, you must have claimed me, Old One-Eye. But in this here and in this now, my only place is a secure ward; never quite understanding how all Idunnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s golden apples have been cored.

Katherine Heigh

Promise

Andrea Small 16

Echo’s Revenge It was all over Twitter first off. Shocking news. Narcissus found floating face down in heart-shaped pool. Cause of death as yet unconfirmed. By midnight a bevy of wailing girls bearing purple flowers, huddled at the spot where they dragged him, his wet hair a splash of golden paint across his lovely face. Fools. The tabloids had a field-day: his doomed love affairs, drink problem, bi-polar depression. If questioned, I’d echo the Coroner’s verdict Death by Misadventure. See, I’m no-one’s fool, I know better than to admit what really happened that night, how high on the scent of Night Phlox, drunk on the sultry moon, I offered up my love, awaited his honeyed kiss. Instead, he turned his back, lowered his head, opened up his arms to his own reflection and murmured, My love. Why do you forsake me? A gentle struggle, a tiny splash, a soft echo on the breeze. His scalp a spreading halo beneath my steady grasp.

Jane Salmons

Saint Abigail From her cracked skull, honey: the bees flee the workhouse, burrow themselves into the mistressâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; shawl and hang a basket from their collective arm. A coachman waits to take them away, they glide under the guise of an all-human being. Where to? he asks, and the horses are whipped, tears blinked back by a dozen long lashes. In the city the bees walk free, with shrouded face of flesh in motion, of a thousand wings; but their sound still haunts them; the sound of what they used to be.

M.D. Wheatley

The prayer of the honey-collectorâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s wife Bonbibi, take my two-faced husband, tell me this forest cannot hurt him. Let his feet find their brackish path where land eats water and water dissolves land. See how well Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve drawn it: these black eyes, this grinning mouth. My husband can pass, can he not, between teeth and through claws. Bonbibi, Bongoposagor has yet to give up the sun and my husband is already gone. I beg you, let not those lightless places hide Dokkhin Rai today. When my husband smokes bees into heavy-winged flight, may his extra eyes stare down that stalking orange devil and send it yowling to the mangroves to savage some other dawn. Bonbibi, the roti is ready, and the lentils too, the sun has sailed above our rivers. I am cold and getting colder, and somewhere macaques shriek. The village dogs circle and snap at shadows, my door locked and bolted but this dark is tricky as the tide â&#x20AC;&#x201C; and my husband is not home.

Bonbibi, he calls to me, his voice smoke-stuffed, harsh with coughing. Louder now, he comes, he comes. A thick stink chokes my throat. I hear his pad, the swipe of his tail: Husband, home, too late.

Louise Taylor

Bonbibi – a forest spirit of the Sundarbans, believed by local inhabitants to have protective powers Bongoposagor – the Bay of Bengal Dokkhin Rai – the tiger demon 20

Lantern Men My grandmothers warned me never to leave my window open at night. Now my room is shape-shifted by creatures, the half-light filled with their secrets. Their words become drunk incantations to bulrushes and reed beds. Come morning, they vanish so fast, they leave toothed shadows on the wall. I should learn the art of stilt-walking to step over the menace lurking in their fog. But I am snug, wintered down like an eel in the moment before it tries to flee the fyke. I close the shutters to prevent their whispers unfurling over the sleeping village like a fen on a November night.

Elisabeth Sennitt Clough

Two Queens I. These days, the earth decays, the dying season when rain carries the rot-scent on its breath, sharp sweetness of decay, the apples browning, the worms that weave through the berries, their grainy messes: leaves flatten slickly on the misty path. And I, too, feel the worm twist in my belly, the rot-scent of my breath that you recoil from. My bones are dust beneath the skin that veils them. My blood flows slowly, postponing its spilling. My eyes in the mirror are misty as the evening. II. The world is rolling to its hibernation. The wheel revolves towards the days of darkness. Our tongue declines: our lords forget their names and curds of mud thicken before our doorways, threatening entry, threatening submersion. And I, I feel the green leaves twist within me, dilation of sweet buds, soft slackening. My white bones sizzle with the lightningâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s vigour. The moonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s benign eyes light my silver blade. Your blood will seep reluctantly, rust-coloured, grainy.

Kitty Coles

And in the End, They All Lived Happily Ever After The coachman knows his place, so he stays outside, even though the music swirls in his head and tries to draw him into the ballroom, with all its vibrant colours and beautiful dancers — glamorous, graceful people whirling around the floor in complicated patterns, not needing to look where they’re going because they fit so perfectly into the shape of this grand, wonderful design; people who belong, who follow their steps and play their roles and smile so gloriously because they know, they all know, that they are precisely where they are meant to be. And he knows it too, the coachman, even as he presses his face against the window and tries not to breathe so that it won’t cloud his view; he knows his place is outside, with the horses, stroking necks and smoothing manes and whispering soft nonsense to soothe the restless shivers of these strong, magnificent beasts that gleam like snow in starlight and draw the coach along the winding, uneven path to the palace with unerring, surefooted speed. They know their place, their role and function, just as he does. Just as they all do. Carriage, driver, horses, footmen: a perfect, integrated team. All this he knows to be true. But how? How did he come by his knowledge? His skills? Where did he train? When? What else is there in his life, what else has there ever been, apart from this night and this place and the duties he is here to perform? His purpose is clear and bright and beyond question: he is to drive the beautiful coach and its even more beautiful occupant to the palace, to her destiny, and back again before midnight — and that, oh, yes, that he understands, more keenly than anything, is essential; they must be away, they must be gone, before the clock can strike twelve. But why? Why does he stare, now, at the clouds covering the moon and feel, in his heart, in his blood, the movement of those clock hands and the pull of the pendulum? Why is he suddenly so afraid? 23

The crushing weight of each tick is shortening his bones and coarsening his skin, dimming his eyes even as he sees his Lady, his beautiful Lady, come running along the darkening path too late, the chimes of midnight speeding beside her, past her, ahead of her, into the shrieking horses and the collapsing carriage and the trembling, terrified footmen, and he wants so much to help her as she stumbles, as she falls, but he cannot; the chimes have stolen his strength and his purpose and his certainty, and all he knows now, all he will ever know, is that time has run out, and the forbidden hour has come, and with it has come the darkness, and the diminishing, and the end of all things.

Michelle Ann King

The Presence of a Witch The presence of a witch foretells creativity. They will wall her off, hostility and stale habit, pomp and pealing and protests firing both ways. The discomfort that calls wagons to circle, elephants to circle, opens the sky to eureka. And the ground under circled wagons shudders and stuck places heave and detach, stone into sand. The presence of a witch foretells someone will invent a spaceship, an inoculant, a script for smashing stalemates, stone into sand into dust, gone, almost doubted.

A child on a swing needs a pull before a push. The presence of a witch points out the pendulum, brings the inhalation before the ahhh.

Wren Tuatha

Crow Rose

Kevin Reid

The Hammer of Witches The book has lain unopened for centuries, dust gathering on her slowly crumbling binds, or, rather, thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s what they want you to think. Burnings have simply made their way underground, adorned new robes, assumed new forms. Flame gathers attention, the moths of the liberal mind quick to flutter, to gather their curious wings, flitting about truths best kept hidden. Better a car crash, a bridge perhaps, the convenient guise of the paparazzi. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s not a thick book, nor is script small, but its words hold the heaviest weight, heavy enough to have crushed souls by their thousands. A paper weight for the possessed, a well-worn tool of suppression, a remedy for those caught in the sweet dance of Lucifer. And, of course, it is women who are most easily ensnared, the thin garments of their gender no match for the lures of the demonic. Some even suggest itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s innate, not purely a weakness or a failing, that those of feminine wiles are all simply serpents in disguise, a Lilith lurking in every garden. It certainly makes it easier, to label and to damn, Hepatica flayed alive for the mere curiosity of numbers and of stars, Diana smashed to pieces for philanthropy and compassion. Under the Bridge of Souls, a modern day burning, a book very much alive.

Claire Loader

Seven of Staves I deal the cards, lining up your fortune on the table, seven staves coursing out the distance showing you a path you wanted to remain hidden. The skies it shows are dirty; you want to wash them wring out the black clouds, twist out the water till white puffs escape between your fingers, and spring back into the air. The seven signals you to be stubborn, you do not have to let the sky stay dirty. You take up the first stave, ignore the signpost it provided and walk in another direction, leaving the path and striking out across open ground. I let you walk out of sight, then turn back to my cards, I dealt you the seven, but the card that remains on the table is the six.

ZoĂŤ Siobhan Howarth-Lowe

Enchanted I once met a muggle with magic in his mouth. His kisses cast mysterious spells, smooth like Maker’s Mark, clean and neat, sweet like berries—raspberry, black, strawberry, blue— this muggle did things with his mouth only the most powerful wizards can do. I won’t tell you about his tongue— that it’s shaped like a snake, or the way it slithered in my garden. I’ll spare you the story how his lips huff and puff and blow my body down. You don’t need the details—how I rave and claw at my sheets, out of my mind for this man’s magic. But I’ll tell you a secret: My muggle works a crafty incantation. It’s less like a hex, no voodoo, more like sacred invocation. You see, I’m a top with a string turned much too tight. Wound and wound until I can barely breathe. My man gives me mouth-to-mouth, inhale, exhale, then he counts to three. Avra Kehdabra— his words, a potion, set me in motion. Whirling round and round, I’ve just enough space to spin myself free. His words are a wand waved over my skin, presto chango—I shift into shape. Watch me dance to the sound each syllable makes as he speaks life to my dry bones. Wrap me in a strait jacket, lock me in chains, bury me in a box ten feet beneath the winter’s ice. I’ll still melt when he whispers, come when he calls my name.

I’m telling you, it’s magic. When this muggle talks angels listen. His smile is a walk-off homer in the bottom of the ninth to win the Series. He whistles and Marcus Mariota throws a touchdown pass to himself, Vikings beat the Saints. One kiss— and Elvis rises from the dead. So don’t clap when a man pulls his rabbit out of a hat. That’s an old and tired trick. He who shall not be named has illusion down pat. He puts on shows in stadiums and plays to sold-out crowds, but the dark arts will destroy you in the end. Trust me, find yourself a muggle with magic in his mouth—because that man can put a woman sawn in half back together again.

Marissa Glover

Serve and Protect There were no walls, of course, and just a wispy suggestion of a floor. Drifting graffiti clouds wafted through the squad room. Naturally nothing dirty or egotistical. The milling angels had regulation haircuts and identical cream white uniforms, making them hard to differentiate. Reverentus watched Benedictus stick a last holographic Christmas tree needles into a green image of St. Jerome. They were bored, in a Godfearing way. Cohabitating with a human was also boring, but there were compensations. Sex was interesting, although as beings without sex organs they missed much of the nuance. Raising children was intermittently enjoyable. Bodily functions were always pleasant. Reverentus secretly enjoyed defecation, but of course couldn’t mention this to other guardian angels. “Serve and protect, Benedictus. What’s your bet on when we go back out on patrol?” “Protect and serve. Merciful God, soon I hope. I’ve done nothing but validate confessions since we ran surveillance on those two brothers. And that’s a couple eras ago.” Reverentus nodded understanding. He was congenitally incapable of hating paperwork, but was able to be relatively less enthusiastic about it. His performance reviews chastised him for lack of attention to detail. “Salve, Benedictus. I heard they’d disciplined you when that brother died of an overdose.” “Yeah. Not for the death, of course, Internal Affairs zapped me because he wasn’t spiritually fit and didn’t make the cut. How about you?” “It’s gone well. I kept tabs on my brother into his eighties, when they kicked him upstairs. Then a couple infant deaths, always cushy, because they don’t really think, and there’s no sin to target.” While talking, Reverentus had continued modeling a full-sized Notre Dame cathedral made from donuts, trying not to take excessive pride in its progress. “Be hopeful, Benedictus, what else can we do?” 32

The shift arch angel appeared and called the angelic host to order. “Serve and Protect.” “Protect and serve,” they chanted back. “Listen up. Management failed to hit their quota this celestial orbit, despite the overtime you guys have been getting. Commissioner I Am Who Am is displeased, and has ordered mandatory adoration sessions.” Angels never grumble, but there was a collective sigh at this announcement. “Okay, assignments. Pietus.” “Present.” “Girl. Zimbabwe.” “Claudius…” The archangel droned on through several thousand names before: “Benedictus.” “Present.” “Boy, Illinois, USA.” “God is merciful. I’m back on patrol again, Reverentus.” “Protect and serve,” Reverentus watched as both the evergreen St. Jerome and his fellow officer vanished He resumed building Notre Dame. It required one hundred eighty-seven million, four hundred thirtyfive thousand, seven hundred thirty-five donuts, laid one at a time. After several orbits spent walling up the catacombs his name was also called. A baby girl, mostly white, no apparent deformities. Good. a nice middle-class, dies-of-old-age-in-bed assignment. Helena was pleasantly vegetative until she moved toward two orbits. As she discovered herself, Reverentus began developing ectoplasmic ulcers. It wasn’t chewing electrical cords or stealing from her brother, that was to be expected. Reverentus cajoled and nagged, but as she aged Helena began committing moral felonies. She lost her virginity at fifteen, despite Reverentus’ scolding, and over the next ten orbits had two serious relationships r that ended very badly. Reverentus feared both for her soul and for his bad performance review. 33

When Helena took up with Roger, Reverentus saw a faint gleam of hope Please God, let it only be carnality Helena and Roger decided to cohabitate, and Reverentus was able to quit writing summonses for carnality and just issue warnings about sex outside of wedlock. One night, with Roger’s arm draped across Helena’s breasts, Reverentus noticed a faint ectoplasmic stirring above Roger’s head. Christmas tree needles were spiraling into a robed image with a halo. Guardian angels were discouraged from fraternizing while on patrol, but Reverentus took this to be a needed special dispensation. “Benedictus, is that you?” “What? Oh, Reverentus, how’s it shepherding?” “Not well. She’s not what you think. Interesting image.” “Like it? It’s St Eulalia. Virgin, martyred at thirteen. She reportedly suffered thirteen tortures, including being rolled down a street in a barrel with spikes pounded into it, cutting off her breasts, x-shaped crucifixion, and decapitation.” “Maybe it was the original X games, Benedictus. Sorry, think I’m just worried and frustrated.” “Progress not perfection, Reverentus. Anyway, some naysayers assert Eulalia never existed. Can’t prove it by me, I’ve never met the soul. Is the image too chesty for a thirteen-year-old?” “No, quite slender. Benedictus, is your human’s soul in good spiritual condition?” “He’s often oblivious to my suggestions, but good hearted. Why do you ask?” “Helena has a really bad habit.” “Oh?” “Black widow syndrome.” “Hah?” “She not only loves them, Benedictus, she offs them.” “Well, gosh. Can’t you convince her to cease and desist? She’ll be sentenced to eternal life without parole in hell” The image started to shed pine needles as Benedictus worried. 34

“I’ve tried, but she’s mentally disturbed, and you know how ineffective our factory installed consciences are with crazy.” “How much time does Roger have?” “Not much, maybe a couple days. She’s been making preparations.” “Well, shucks. Not enough time to power wash his soul. But I think he’ll make it in. What about your loser woman? Sorry, over identification with Roger.” “She’s got too many priors for a plea bargain, but I hope to get her to plead insanity, so she gets in after some purgatorial hard time. Sorry your patrol gets cut short again.” “So am I. Looks like your turn in the desk duty barrel, Reverentus, Hopefully next cycle you’ll draw a saint. Serve and protect.” “Benedictus, did you ever think that we’re playing spiritual roulette?” “Hah?” “Never mind. Protect and serve.”

Ed Ahern

Ghost Tunnels Verne High Angle Battery, Portland This barrow echoes with hoots and screeches as kids run riot in the dark. Words swooshed on walls: HARAMBE in green. Cranesbill prods through slab where soldiers stood their ground against the French. GUNNERS in black. VR 1892, vacated 1907, grade II listed; haunted by men who waited for their watch to end and wrote their names on walls now sprayed by LIAM, BOZO and their mates, who made a film we find on Youtube: a figure flits across the laptop screen and a voice asks is that a ghost?

Sharon Phillips

Healing Long after his breath stopped he stayed close hung round her shoulders â&#x20AC;&#x201C; a black tom cat â&#x20AC;&#x201C; keeping her warm. She could still see the fold lines on his neck the fine bones of his wrists his eyes the colour of dust smoking the face of the moon. But they were right, those old women who have looked in the heart of the fire. As she slept, he grew fainter, dissolved into memory. Over time she developed new spells, strange incantations created fresh patterns found ways to light herself from within.

Jean Taylor

* And the river falling into you lies down the way you are fed by stones that no longer open as rain and your breath never seen again, left in the dirt these graves are used to is all they know â&#x20AC;&#x201C;with each meal a far off night bursts into flames once itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s singled out, fills your mouth as if it would not happen twice and yet you eat only in cemeteries in a sea whose water has dried to become for the dead a new language, easy to whisper over and over and the heading.

Simon Perchik

Short Cut Winter daylight fades as I sling the doubled bin-bag of laundry over my shoulder, lug it up to the brow of the hill, across the road to the short cut through the cemetery. I follow the bramble path. On either side lichen-blotched memorials, cracked and fallen headstones. With each yard, those Asleep in the Bosom of the Lord swoop around me like summer swallows. A few slip into my bag, start trying on my things: Abigail Braithwaite, Departed this Life July 1853, eases stick-thin legs into my jeans. Kathleen Kinsall, Relict of Alfred, pulls up a pair of woolly socks. Alderman James Clough, Loyal Servant of the Corporation, helps himself to an old Hawkwind t-shirt. Josiah Walsh, Infant, curls up in a pair of boxer shorts. The bundle grows lumpier, though not an ounce heavier, as more ghosts cram themselves in until I reach the bottom gate, step onto the street, and my hitchhikers stream back to their graves. By the time Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m done at the launderette it will be pitch black. Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll take the long way home.

Nigel King

Angel

Kevin Reid 40

Scents of Ghosts Sea salt emanates from a seaweed scarf, bordering beach and sand strewn path. Piles banked on either side, little drifts blown from winds while we dream. The winding lane damp, from nocturnal rain. I briskly dodge nonchalant slugs, dotted sporadically for a short stretch. The memories of a different shoreline, when Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;d smaller footprints and an English Midlands accent. The aroma, hovers on a hazy sea. I remembered the gunfire from the prison camp across the Foyle at Magilligan Point, firing chasers, streaking the blue, fading to fuzzy wisps. Chomping cows tear up grass patches, ripping them from the soil, as if Velcro strips, their rough tongues welcome morning dew. A cormorant erupts from the sea, a watery phoenix, gathering speed he runs on the tide, sooty wings skim the water, as he flies off for a second breakfast.

Lorraine Carey

Dad A pumpkin hung from our fruit tree: no nose, a toothless grin, no ears. The pumpkin head sought out my fears â&#x20AC;&#x201C; mum plugged his eyes with plums for me.

Phil Wood

Long Live Kushim -

29086 barley 37 months kushim (from earliest human inscription ever found thus far)

The first known name [of a human individual (Or a profession?)] inscribed on a mud slate [From Uruk does not belong to a god, nor is the] [Text a holy scripture about super-heroic feats, but Rather, it] was an official signature [uncovered In a context of numbers, crops and timeframes]

Yuan Changming

At Night Every new moon he comes back and stands under the eaves until all lights are out. Straight gray hair covers his back and his raven eyes watch the darkness. Never moves until silence fills the air. Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m waiting in my bed. He takes off his wearing blanket and slides one leg next to mine and rolls his body over, almost suspended so I feel his heat without his weight. He knows how to enter gently, opening up the other world where we ramble together through Mississippi brush before reaching the river. We have survived violence against our kind. In 1839 they were moved west to Oklahoma reservations while we hid in the oak forest for ten months. Now this land is ours. At night. We know the seasons by smell. Spring and summer, sweet honeysuckle and magnolia. Winter, pine. Black alluvial soil squishes between our toes as we wade into creeks and bayous. No place is too messy for him to put his face against mine and lay me down in the marsh. The water cools as we slip in and around each other, our legs wrapped in cordgrass. Cottonmouths glide by. We are one of them. I close my eyes, and the sun rises, slicing through limbs and slats. A silver strand on my pillow.

Chella Courington

Grazing Dinosaurs. For Shame See here. She moves like something's missing, like in a dream of things primordial, dun-plumed dinosaurs that skulk around the bushes. Shame. To wonder why the next who speaks repeats the thing you said, receives the gentle laugh. To think to chit-chat. Just be content that no-one speaks and swinging tails of horseshoe crabs avoid your legs.

Out there the whales collide with ships, the kraken dance. My love whose ears are just like shells, I hear the ocean pressed against them, knows. The fairies hate a liar and a thief. My love whose eyes are alabaster knows.

You've plumped up like a dumpling, firm and ragged. Look at me when you speak. You asked if there were rules to being real.

She moves like in a nightmare of an England overrun by wolves. So let the forest have her, if it comes to that. For shame.

The eight-foot terror-cranes once strode tall the savanna, snatching horses. The name that many races call themselves is "only people". 45

My love is this: someone who lies about all day in peace, on cushions, whose eyes are alabaster, whose ears hear only sea. My love holds water. My love can stare and stare as something makes the noise of ten excited crowds outside our door.

You are a walker. Ragged shoes and hobnailed feet and toes clawed like a raptor, but arms as far from graceful, noble wings as steel is far from cardboard in the road, all tracked with mud-soaked treads.

Tired and with pupils spread like dull and rusty pans. She stays awake that time that could be any day. Why can you not be like the rest, who chit-chat?

It's just like talking to a syphilitic. No taste in clothes. No sense of urgency. (God gave that to a flea!)

The fairies in the corners glare with all the hate they have for mortal folk. 46

Milk curdles in your place, things move and letters from your words go missing.

Be real and true or things go badly. Shame.

Jenne Kaivo

Bigfoot Love

Amy Alexander 48

Bigfoot Loves Me For Christine Blasey Ford He is not seen. He Creeps around a Tree Shoeless, Matted fur, Fleas he Flees. (Gather close, friends, You won't believe! I found a creature who believes Me! And all of you. How the man with Leaf skin Pushed us into his den. Even though he is also a him, Bigfoot knows I speak true.) I have to love him in glimpses, Though. He must Never own that identity, Betray the ones who need Fingerprints, Photos, Their women fresh like winter snow.

Bigfoot goes deep Into the woods Comes back looking like the rest Without Respect Saying: How can we really know?

Amy Alexander

Dame Van Winkle I should have listened to my mother. Sure I married him (young naive thing that I was) with his hair slicked back, dark brooding eyes and strong chin, tickling moustache. Oh, butter wouldn’t melt! He would sing to me, my name was Elizabeth, but he called me Lizzykins. I felt safe when Rip held me. Then the children came (as you see I did my wifely duty). I was so busy that I forgot myself. Rip was everyone’s handy man but mine. Our chickens refused to lay eggs and pecked their way to freedom after our fence fell to ruin and our dried-up cow decided to hoof it. He’d take his dog, Wolfe to the pub, but never me! So I’d go and march him straight back to our fly-haunted house, pleading with him to look where we live, look how we live! Breathing in stagnant perfume of his mangy mutt Wolfe all day was no way to live! He would be gone all day. ‘Just where are you off to, Mr. Winkle?’ ‘Work.’ ‘Oh do tell, Mrs. Peacock need a shelf putting up, again? Or maybe the keg needs tapping at the pub, while you set the world to rights. Again? Or perhaps Mrs. Kettle is on the boil, again. Is she, IS SHE? Don’t come home ‘kettled’ weaving your sorry carcass up my path, again, I won’t have it, I tell you I’m the laughing stock I am!’ After rolling his eyes, pulling his crooked brimmed hat over his face, he and Wolfe drifted down our path. Swinging my broom at both, Wolfe yelped as I shouted, ‘What time will you be home; I said what time?!’ Our children were growing with nothing but rags, soggy bread and pendulum spiders for toys. I was ashamed of our weather-beaten house. 51

He would sit nights staring past me into the fire; blue sparks dancing against the brick. Eventually the spark was gone. He disappeared. After sending the children to my mother and looking in the pub and counting all the women in our village, I climbed high into the Catskills, away from the whispers into blue majestic beauty. Paths grew into rocks, grapevines led the way to ravines to dead men’s graves where distant peals of thunder roared through valleys, then a flash. Far below, I envied the winding Hudson’s glassy bosom, swelling out of breath, boundless and untethered. I lost my way, sat weeping into my palms. Time vanished. My lips hungry for green, I plucked a thick reed to play like Pan, pokin’ holes delicate as a fairy’s laugh. I gave tongue to the evening breeze in melodies only nature knows, indulging in things forgotten. Suddenly I was awestruck, peering through the thickets of birch and briars, I heard small bright voices of two square-faced sprites, both stylishly arrayed: rows of buttons down the sides of velveteen breeches; long blue beards; on their shoulders kegs of ale; knees high thrusting out feet and circling in a jig singing this lusty tune: Old Rip was a drip who groaned At a shrew who constantly moaned At a shrew! shrew! a midnight shreeewwww (their voices ascending up the scale) He gulped twenty years From a flagon of beer Delirious to be alone, to be alone 52

They danced motley hilarities, threw me a silver flagon and a familiar wide- brimmed hat that I pulled down over my eyes laughing as I slurped from the shiny pitcher’s spout. I clapped my hands to the rhythm of curious lyrics. I confided my sordid tale; they hung on every word like two school boys, each winking to the other. I felt giddy. ‘Aren’t there any women in these hills?’ I asked, donning my best Snow White face and accent. Turning crimson, one twirled his beard, the other shuffled his rose-coloured high heeled boots and both bowed gracefully doffing sugar-loaf hats. I was careful not to ask too many questions, kept tipping my flagon finding my giggle at the bottom of the foam. Right before I nodded off, I heard rolling thunder, rumbling balls striking pins, causing shocks of fingered light. I awoke on a grassy knoll. Shook my head and rubbed my eyes as sassafras wafted its pink fragrance in the pure mountain’s breeze. I clutched my head to steady my thoughts. Surely I could not have been here all night. Oh! Those two devils poisoned me. Jumping up, with more ease than I had ever known, my limbs felt supple- free and elastic- as I skipped through the rife grapevine weaving its network of paths down the Catskills. As I approached the village, I noticed strange faces and one old man shook his finger at me, growling. ‘Your folk have the whole village in turmoil over the likes of you.’ As I gazed toward the village, I began to panic. ‘Where’s Mrs. Kettle’s hardware store? Where’s the pub?’ Turned quickly and grabbed the old man’s arm, ‘Tell me, where am I, and where’s my mother, where’s my children?’ ‘Your children? Are you OK, lass?’ He looked at me as though my brain had emptied onto the floor. 53

Looking back, sorely perplexed, at the purple mountains and river; I continued to venture forward in a daze. I saw my handsome son, Rip Junior, carrying a cigar-box guitar. Finally, someone I knew. ‘Rip, what has happened to our village?’ I said as I tapped him on the shoulder. ‘Everything is so strange.’ His familiar face turned around, his eyes gleaming as he raised his eyebrows, ‘Oh it’s you Lizzykins, haven’t seen you around lately, where you been keeping yourself?’ Things started to fall into perfect nonsense. I had to get home as fast as my legs would carry me. ‘Just trying to find my way home,’ my voice shaky, backing away, waving open hands as I realised his true identity. ‘Wait, don’t you recognise me Lizzykins? I’ll take you home...wait!’ He rested his guitar on his knee, started singing: Where are you going my beauty fair Come join me in this giddy dance for love is here and now you’re gone and left me in a trance. Still breathless and confused, I eventually found the path leading to my house, or to where my house used to be. In its place – wild fertile landscapes and a flowing creek filled with tadpoles. I bent down to sip a cool drink and to splash some sense back on my face, gasped at the girl staring back at me. Out of nowhere, I heard mother’s voice calling, ‘Elizabeth’ from the distance. I ran to her, shocked and trembling, buried my face in her ample bosom. Pulling back, I exclaimed, ‘Mother, you don’t have grey hair!’ 54

‘Of course not, is your brain addled?’ She combed my hair with her fingers. ‘Mother, you are so much younger!’ ‘Nonsense, I told you never to wander on your own; too many peculiarities in those peaks and valleys. You haven’t spoken to any strangers, have you?’ ‘Well, yes, I mean no, I don’t remember.’ ‘Oh dear, what am I going to do with you!?’ She took me by the ear and marched me back to my childhood. Someday I will tell you what my mother said at tea, about the old forever things, and the closest simplest things, and handsome is as handsome does, and not making the same mistake twice, but that is another story.

Kathleen Strafford

Niamhâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Wishes

Cybele Moon

My Dear Undine I was your first husband, and I died just before our second wedding anniversary. But it wasn't my fault – all hers. That girl I met at work, with her shy conversation and kind smile. The temptation is hard to resist, and before you know it, you're drowning. I found you one morning, swimming in the forest pool. I watched you for a moment, your legs kicking at the murky water like it was for paddling, and not for pond-life to live in. I'd brought my camera to take photos of insects, maybe take home some dead samples for analysis, but you were the most captivating of the lot I found. I heard you sing over the lull of the splashing water, low and lonely and haunting. Your voice was piercing and spoke of a love so desperate to spill out of you, that it hurt - oh, it hurt. So much pain, from beginning to end. In every story, you cried. You just want it to stop, to be happy. I heard your plea that day, and that, coupled with your pretty face, and slender body, was enough. I knew then that I had to make you my wife. * It was too easy. Charm and kindness work wonders, and soon enough, we were married. Just like that. You told me on our honeymoon that I'd better not be unfaithful because if I was, I would die. I’d heard this a thousand times before online while I read up on your species, so I laughed as I went to kiss you, but you pulled back, pushing me away with a glint in your eye. Feisty for once. ‘I mean it,’ you said, before closing your mouth, into a thin line of trembling delicate nerves. 57

‘Oh, I know.’ I replied, smiling too. ‘But surely I’ll only die if you find out?’ You sniffed, and tears suddenly sprung into your eyes like I'd irritatingly knocked on a tap. ‘You mean -’ ‘Oh, no no no!’ I said, quickly, realising that you'd just got upset over absolutely nothing. ‘No. I'd never cheat on you. It was just a joke. I’d never even be tempted -’ You smiled then, twisted your tight lips upwards while your tears fell around them, watery synchronised swimmers following the dip and curve, the delicate form of your top lip. ‘Well, we'll see. You’d better hope you’re not.’ Then they disappeared, drowned in the dark cavern of your mouth as you swallowed them down, quickly, when you showed your teeth. ‘For your sake, at least.’ * When you found out, you spared her, pulled her close, dried her tears after she only explained. I watched you, flesh and bone and immortal, caught in blue amber with her, as the last bubbles of air escaped my open mouth and danced gleefully above me... I was losing light while they floated ever upwards... dancing to your song... that damned haunted song… But then you did warn me, I suppose…

Chloe Smith

The Dragon’s Gate When we were small fry in a tiny pool, You used to tell me of the dragon’s gate At the river’s head, and how the bolder carp, Risking their scales and straining every fin, Could leap the rapids, climb the waterfalls, Ascend against the current to the lake In the mountain’s shadow, where a transformation Would come upon them. When we made our pact To try our thrust against the snowmelt’s force Your words thrilled through me as I threw myself Beyond the water’s lid, into the bright And breathless air. I soared—rocks scraped against My scales—I gasped and wriggled and escaped Into the sweet high waters. Glancing back I saw the current sweep you headlong down Towards the turbid pool where we began. Grown great among the silt and waterweed Your golden scales are dulled, your filmy eyes Blink in the murk, their passion long extinct. You would have made a mighty dragon, friend. You may yet, if you wake and rouse yourself To ram the ruthless river once again, To leap into the unknown element And take each knock-back as a launchpad for A new attempt. And when at last you reach The river’s head, the still and hidden lake, The dragon’s gate and all it promises I will be there to roar with joy beside you.

Thomas Tyrrell

Horn Dance Fiddle half heard, mistaken for a cricket. Fireflies wink, dismissed; coincidence of night and timing. Then the triangle, metallic, certain. The dancers: stags bow and circle, bow and circle, chased by the child archer, the mollie, the fool. Fiddler follows all, herding dancers through the clearing, through the fireflies. Tune strong enough to cut through questions of history and authenticity. Stags dance into the woods, antlers clashing the beat, triangle soothing, ritual ongoing.

Out of sight, dance has no end, only echoes of the fiddle blending with birdsong.

Catherine Fahey

Taliesinâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Harp

Romola Parish 62

The Nightmare Bird Thereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s a bird that visits me in the fevered middle of the night, a demon-bird with horns on its great swivelling bullet-head. By day it sleeps in the depths of damp caverns. It tears up the clouds, slashes the treetops chops the heads off soft tulips. Gunmetal-feathered, earthquake-eyed ice-pick taloned, a red crest of spiky barbs down its spine that a Mohican would covet. Cauldron-born, in the icy grip of Ceridwen. Moon-bitten, storm-struck eater of stars and dreams, its scream strangles the night. It sits on my chest, an incubus, its deadweight pinning me to the spot as it sips the sweat from my petrified brow with a saw-toothed beak. I wake in the blind, exhausted morning covered in a scattering of tattered feathers reeking of graveyards and decay.

Annest Gwilym

Grimalkin The Seamstress’s Cat If Delia had a cat (which I’m sure she had) that cat vibrated on the sunny sill beside the singing, sewing, purring drill that softly pierced the silken dyad of the day. She watched in envy passers-by who skimmed beneath the cloud of desperate air inhaled instead the scent of oak and apple-pear and not the scent of hessian and gold lamé. Yet, never threaded spools lay barely there in half-light; mid the trance of chintz and shame that verberating feline pawed the pane as memory may scratch the mind’s eye bare. The sill the stage; the grimalkin the foilwho pauses prettily to guise her toil.

Amy Louise Wyatt

Retreat Through bent back and aching joints, The smile of the Crone Still gentle when wrapped in wrinkles, Shines less brightly on the grass, Less powerful in the evenings. As the moon rises early And the windâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s whispers of Winter Become louder at dusk. The Maiden sleeps, Happy in the cycleâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s womb.

Danielle Matthews

Biographical Notes Artists Born in Shropshire, England, and raised in Ayrshire, Scotland, James Flowerdew places himself firmly as an alien. Passionate about folklore and Ancient culture, but conscious of his every day environment, James's art frequently brings these two apparently conflicting forces to commune or grapple. Ancient Gods and primal forces roam streets adorned with plastic adverts, and iron railings. This has found expression in paint, print, video games, building of musical instruments, and sculpture. James Flowerdew is married with two children, one of whom has a learning disability and autism, and currently shares his home with too many pigeons. Andrea Small lives in Sheffield. She is a member of a women’s writing group and is currently engaged in a poetry MA at Manchester Metropolitan University. She runs singing groups for all sorts of people, believing that we all can – and should – sing. Her writing is as yet unpublished. Kevin Reid lives between Scotland and other lands. He is the founding creator of the online multimedia collaborations >erasure and >erasure ii and Wordless, an image and text collaboration with George Szirtes published by Knives, Forks and Spoons Press. At present, he is studying a diploma in professional photography. Website: http://eyeosphere.com Twitter/instagram: @eyeosphere Cybele Moon is a time traveler who lives on the west coast of Canada and is very fond of old bones, tomes and philosopher’s stones. She has maintained a few blogs, such as The Runes of the Gatekeeper’s Daughter which was described by another blogger/writer as a site with “strange and magical stories, illustrated with the most fabulous photographs.” She loves to wander around the woodlands with her cameras, (a Canon EOS and a dedicated infrared Nikon) and enjoys writing about her journeys outside of Canada. She is a wanderer in all worlds. History and paleontology are among her interests along with mythology and fairy tales. Her online sites include WordPress and Flickr where she includes Dear Scotland, I Miss You, 66

Eirinn Go Brach, Unfold Your Own Myth, and more stories. www.cybeleshine.blog - www.flickr.com/photos/cybelmoonstruck Dr Romola Parish is an environmental lawyer, artist, poet and (fledgling) harpist. She trained at the Royal School of Needlework, holds a MSt in Creative Writing from Oxford and was poet in residence on Oxfordshire County Councilâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Historic Landscape project in 2017. She has two collections, In Polygonia and Crying in the Silicon Wilderness, and is currently studying for a PhD in Theology though Creative Practice at Glasgow.

Writers Charley Reay is a Newcastle based writer from the Lincolnshire Fens. Her poems are published by Obsessed With Pipework, Ink, Sweat & Tears, and Prole among others. She also performs on the North East spoken word scene. You can find her on Twitter @charleyreay Meg Gripton-Cooper, 21, has just completed a degree in Creative Writing at Sheffield Hallam University, and is inspired by poets such as Anne Carson, Anna Akhmatova, and Arthur Rimbaud. She has previously been published in New Writing Matter 2018. Wendy Holborow, born in South Wales, lived in Greece for 14 years where she edited Poetry Greece. Her poetry has been published internationally and placed in competitions. She recently gained distinction for a Masters in Creative Writing at Swansea University. Collections include: After the Silent Phone Call (Poetry Salzburg 2015) Workâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Forward Motion (2016) and An Italian Afternoon (Indigo Dreams 2017) which was a Poetry Book Society Pamphlet Choice Winter 2017/18. Zoe Mitchell is a writer living and working on the South Coast. Her work has been published in a number journals including The London Magazine, The Rialto and The Moth. She has a particular interest in mythology and is currently working on a creative writing PhD focussed on images of witches in poetry written by women. In 2018, Zoe was named as joint winner of the Indigo-First Collection Competition and her debut collection, Hag, is due out with Indigo Dreams in 2019. 67

Chip Jett is a teacher at a small school in Georgia, USA. He has taught reading and writing for twenty years. His stories have appeared in several literary magazines. He has stories forthcoming in Inwood Indiana, Dual Coast Magazine, Temenos, and Curating Alexandria. Kathy Gee’s career is in heritage and in leadership coaching. Widely published online and on paper, her poetry collection was published by V. Press and she has written the spoken word elements for a contemporary choral piece. In 2018 she contributed to ‘#MeToo – a Women’s Poetry Anthology’ which won the Saboteur Awards anthology prize that year. The recipient of the 2015 P.K. Page Poetry Prize, Katherine Heigh’s work has appeared in Chickenscratch: An Anthology of Student Writing, The River Magazine, Eternal Haunted Summer, and the forthcoming anthology Voices de Queer Femmes VOL. II. Her first chapbook collection, PTBO NSA (bird buried press), will be published in the autumn of 2018. Jane Salmons is a teacher living and working in Stourbridge in the West Midlands. She has been published in various online magazines including Ink, Sweat and Tears, The Ekphrastic Review, The Lake and Algebra of Owls. In addition to writing poetry, she enjoys art and photography and creating handmade photomontage collage. M. D. Wheatley is currently studying for a Creative Writing MA at Royal Holloway, University of London. His work has been published in The Guardian and I Am Not a Silent Poet, often taking a protest stance or exploring queer issues such as sexuality, pornography and gender performance. His Twitter and Instagram are @md_wheatley, and more of his works can be found at www.mdwheatley.com Louise Taylor’s work often connects to nature and mythology even when that was not exactly what she was intending. Publication credits include BBC Wildlife magazine, Synaesthesia, the Woven Tale Press, Dark Tales and Retreat West. She is co-editor of Words for the Wild. @Sar1skaTiger Elisabeth Sennitt Clough’s pamphlet Glass (2016) won the Paper Swans inaugural pamphlet competition. It became a Poetry Society ‘Top Pick’ (2016) and was ‘Best Pamphlet Winner’ at the Saboteur Awards 2017. Her 68

debut collection Sightings was published by Pindrop Press and won the Michael Schmidt Award. Her poems appear in The Rialto, New Welsh Review, Mslexia, Poetry Salzburg Review, Magma, Poem, Stand, and The Cannons’ Mouth. She is an alumna of the Arvon/Jerwood and the Toast Poets mentoring schemes. www.elisabethsennittclough.co.uk Kitty Coles was one of the two winners of the Indigo Dreams Pamphlet Prize 2016 and her debut pamphlet, Seal Wife, was published in August 2017. Michelle Ann King was born in East London and now lives in Essex. She has published stories of fantasy, science fiction, and horror in over ninety different magazines and anthologies, including Interzone, Strange Horizons, and Black Static. Her favourite author is Stephen King (sadly, no relation), and she also loves zombies, Las Vegas, and good Scotch whisky. Her first two short story collections are available in ebook and paperback from Amazon and other online retailers. See www.transientcactus.co.uk for details. Wren Tuatha’s poetry has appeared or is upcoming in The Cafe Review, Canary, Peacock Journal, Poetry Pacific, Coachella Review, Picaroon, Baltimore Review, Pirene’s Fountain, Loch Raven Review, Clover, Lavender Review and Bangalore Review. She’s an editor at Califragile. Wren and her partner, author/activist C.T. Lawrence Butler, herd skeptical goats on a mountain in California. Claire Loader was born in New Zealand and spent several years in China before moving to County Galway, Ireland, where she now lives with her family. She blogs at www.allthefallingstones.com and is currently writing a memoir. Her work has appeared in Crannóg, Dodging The Rain, Massacre Magazine and Pendora. Zoë Siobhan Howarth-Lowe is a Poet and Mum from Dukinfield. She has an MA in Poetry from Bath Spa University. Her work has appeared in Magma, The Lake, Atrium, Picaroon Poetry and The Black Light Engine Room amongst others. She was longlisted for the Ink, Sweat and Tears Pamphlet Competition Nov 2017. 69

Marissa Glover teaches and writes in Florida, where she spends most of her time sweating. Her work is found in After the Pause, Amaryllis, Clear Poetry, Solstice Sounds, and other journals. Read more at MarissaGlover.wordpress.com and follow her on Twitter. Ed Ahern resumed writing after forty odd years in foreign intelligence and international sales. He’s had a hundred eighty poems and stories published so far, and three books. His collected fairy and folk tales, The Witch Made Me Do It, a novella The Witches’ Bane, and his collected fantasy stories, Capricious Visions. He works the other side of writing at Bewildering Stories, where he sits on the review board and manages a posse of five review editors. Sharon Phillips retired from a career in education in 2015. Since then, she has been learning to write poems again, after a break of 40 years. Her poems have most recently appeared on The Open Mouse, Bluepepper, The Poetry Shed and previously in Three Drops from a Cauldron. Jean Taylor belongs to Words on Canvas – a group of writers who work in collaboration with the National Galleries of Scotland. Her poetry has been published in a range of publications including Orbis, Northwords Now, Freak Circus, and Envoi. Simon Perchik is an attorney whose poems have appeared in Partisan Review, Forge, Poetry, Osiris, The New Yorker and elsewhere. His most recent collection is The Osiris Poems published by box of chalk, 2017. For more information, including free e-books, his essay titled “Magic, Illusion and Other Realities” please visit his website at www.simonperchik.com. Nigel King’s poetry is inspired by (amongst other things) science fiction, gothic horror, travel, myth and fairy-tale, Great Aunts, and the effects of eating too much cheese close to bedtime. His collection, What I Love About Daleks, was published by Calder Valley Poetry in 2017. In his day job he is Professor in Applied Psychology at the University of Huddersfield, UK. He lives in Almondbury, West Yorkshire with his family. Irish poet and artist Lorraine Carey has had work published in the following: Atrium, Prole, The Blue Nib, The Bangor Literary Journal, Poethead, Epoque Press, Marble Poetry, The Honest Ulsterman, Sixteen, 70

Live Encounters, Picaroon and The Lake among others. She has been shortlisted / runner up in Listowel, Trocaire/ Poetry Ireland, The Blue Nib Chapbook Competition and The Sixth Bangor Poetry Competition. Her artwork has featured in Three Drops From A Cauldron, Dodging The Rain, North West Words and Riggwelter Press. A contributor to several anthologies, her debut collection is From Doll House Windows (Revival Press). Phil Wood works in a statistics office. He enjoys working with numbers and words. His writing can be found in various publications, including: Allegro, The Open Mouse, Nutshells and Nuggets, London Grip, Ink Sweat and Tears. Yuan Changming edits Poetry Pacific with Allen Qing Yuan and hosts Happy Yangsheng in Vancouver; credits include ten Pushcart nominations, Best of the Best Canadian Poetry, BestNewPoemsOnline, Threepenny Review and many others worldwide. Chella Courington is a writer and teacher. With a Ph.D. in American and British Literature and an MFA in Poetry, she is the author of six poetry and three flash fiction chapbooks. Her flash appears in numerous anthologies and journals including SmokeLong Quarterly, The Collagist, and The Los Angeles Review. Originally from the Appalachian South, Courington lives in California with another writer. Her Choctaw great grandmother taught her how to listen to spirits. Jenne Kaivo lives in the summer and yearns for the winter. She has had work previously published in Three Drops from a Cauldron: Lughnasadh 2017, The Magnitizdat, Bogleech.com, and Lonesome October, where she was a 2017 Pushcart Prize nominee. Amy Alexander is a poet, visual artist, and homeschooling mother living in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, not far from the Mississippi River, which is very far from her hometown on the Colorado River, but still familiar, because of moving water. Her work has appeared most recently in The Coil, Cease, Cows, Anti-Heroin Chic, the Mojave Heart Review, Mooky Chick, The Remembered Arts, and RKVRY. Follow her on Twitter @iriemom.

Kathleen Strafford is an MA creative writing graduate of Trinity University in Leeds. Her first collection of poetry, 'Her Own Language’, was published in 2017. She has been published in magazines & online: Interpreter's House; Butcher's Dog; Algebra of Owls; Fat Damsel; Cinnamon Press 'Reaching Out' anthology; Trinity's 'Journeys'; Trinity's 50th Anniversary Anthology, and received honourable mention at the 2016 Ilkley Poetry Slam. Chloe Smith is a disabled writer and poet from the UK. She is a Foyle Young Poet of the Year 2015, and her poetry has been featured in numerous Young Writers anthologies, as well as the Great British Write Off: Whispering Words anthology. Her short story, ‘Plenty of Fish’, was published in ‘Harmonious Hearts 2016’ by Harmony Ink Press. Her flash fiction has been featured in Three Drops From a Cauldron before, and she also has publication of her flash fiction forthcoming in Ellipsis Zine and The Ginger Collect. For more about her writing visit her website: chloesmithwrites.wordpress.com. You can also find her on Twitter – @ch1oewrites. Thomas Tyrrell has just received his PhD in English Literature, making him, according to the Chinese proverb ‘a carp who has leapt the dragon’s gate’. As he lives in Wales, this feels very appropriate. Catherine Fahey is a poet and librarian from Salem, Massachusetts. She is the former Managing Editor and Poetry Co-Editor of Soundings East. When she’s not reading and writing, she’s knitting or dancing. You can read more of her work at www.magpiepoems.com.

Annest Gwilym’s work has been widely published in literary journals and anthologies. She has been placed in competitions (winning one) in recent years. She is a member of Disability Arts Cymru. Her first pamphlet of poetry titled Surfacing is published by Lapwing Poetry in August 2018: www.freewebs.com/lapwingpoetry/ (go to Store). Amy Louise Wyatt is a lecturer, poet and artist from Bangor, N.I. She is the editor of The Bangor Literary Journal. Amy has been published in The Blue Nib, CAP Anthology, Lagan Online and FourXFour. She was a finalist in the2016 National Funeral Services Poetry Competition and the 2017 72

Aspects Festival Poetry Slam and shortlisted forThe Seamus Heaney Award for New Writing 2018. Amy is a member of Women Aloud NI. She is based at The Blackberry Path Studios and is working towards her first poetry collection. Danielle Matthews is a published writer from Manchester, UK. She lives for the written word, and, despite being a city girl, loves nature and the outdoors. Danielle lives with a vast hoard of books and her husband near Manchester and gets out to touch the bark of trees as often as she can.

Previous Publication Credits ‘Prayer to Odin from the Psychiatric Inpatient Unit’ by Katherine Heigh was first published in Chickenscratch. ‘And in the End, They All Lived Happily Ever After’ by Michelle Ann King was first published at Daily Science Fiction. ‘The Presence of a Witch’ by Wren Tuatha was first published in Driftwood Press.