"My Angel," original and unpublished."I wake up beside an angel. Every morning, she plants a kiss on my lips. And then I get up to make coffee and feed the cat."

Unpublished and original.

An original poem.

"Trimbell's Complaint," original and unpublished."On October 2nd, 2029, at 7:42 PM PST, the Basketville sheriff department received a call from Mr. Trimbell’s neighbor, Mrs. Petunia Foxwood, stating that she heard strange loud noises...

"Even Me," original and unpublished."As long as I can remember, I have been alone."

One original poem: "The Little Secret"

"Dog Won't Hunt," original and unpublished."Barry didn’t know how to refuse the flowers so he accepted them bashfully and left without saying thank you or goodbye."

Krishna Sharma reads three original poems.

"Sunday Morning," original and unpublished."For the first time that day, I felt sad, for it seemed to me that the place where someone died should be special or noteworthy in some way and yet, for all my riding up and down the tow pat...

Marcus Changed talks poetry and reads several original poems.

"Follow Her," original and unpublished."My fear is unformed molten steel. It’s a knife, a jet engine, a crutch, whatever I need whenever I need it."

"The Simulator" is an original one-act play.CharactersBen: Nels ChallinorAliss: Alexandra Duprey

"Loneliness," original and unpublished."His attempts to soothe her, his soft cooing words, his very presence, these only made her angrier and sadder. This time, he lies very still, looking at his long unbitten fingernails and countin...

Four original micropoems, unpublished.

"Candlemaker," previously unpublished."Our purpose, if we have one beyond the abilities we perform effortlessly thousands of times per day, is ethereal and divine. It is related to survival and beauty and the interrelatedness of all ...

Dan Foley reads three original poems.

One original poem: "Gravity's Mistake"

"Alarm," previously unpublished."They both feel lucky to have someone who cares enough about them to make sure that they are drinking enough water."

"Walking to the Number 61," previously unpublished."Ian always frames his emails to colleagues in the passive voice. It’s a habit he picked up from his father, a librarian, who believed that if you did your job well, people wouldn’t ...

One original poem: "Mastery"

Singer-songwriter DAIN describes his songwriting process and how he wrote "Tinman."DAIN is a Seattle based singer-songwriter / indie pop artist with an emphasis on storytelling in his lyrics. His music can be found here:Spotify: <...

"A Tribe of Genies," previously unpublished.“Packets of cigarettes and boxes of sweets were passed round, and the bedouin women sang and danced, the night and the desert resounding with the echoes of a great feast, as thou...

"Locked Inside," previously unpublished."He couldn’t live with not knowing. It was far more painful to him than the violation of his home by these two yahoos, the loneliness he felt daily, the heavy shame that he carried around his ...

"The Promise," previously unpublished."He wonders whether change can be intentionally sought, or rather, like a sudden crisis of faith, it can only be experienced, it can only come as a reaction. If this is the case, which he comes ...

Discussion with Dale Hall and Charlie Hope-D'Anieri about the best books we read in 2024.