Playing House by Emma Yahr

Image from tumblr user ladybabyfairy

He’s the daddy.

Boy’s boy with a briefcase.

I visit him every day at work, imaginary

casserole dish resting in the dip

of my feminine hip.

It’s 1952 with iPhones

and craft coffee and don’t

we make a handsome couple?

He’s God

and I’m Tour Guide Barbie! Leading

every conversation back to him:

his long day, his stressful meeting,

his big dick. I’m smart,

but still fuckable. Prude

in public, slut in his sheets,

mirroring the mothers before me.

I’ve learned how to stare up at him

through my eyelashes and moan.

He’s learned to expect dinner, pretend

like he isn’t obsessed with me. But he is?

Isn’t he? You are? Obsessed with me, aren’t you?

His lips, infinitely more gentle

than his hands, remind me

that this is a non-speaking role.

I never did learn how to keep my legs open

and my mouth shut.

---

Emma Yahr is a recent alumna of North Central College, graduating in May of 2021 with her Bachelor of Arts in English Studies. Most recently, her chapbook, "Healing: An Index" was long listed for the 2020 Button Poetry Chapbook Contest. Her work has been featured on Poets.org, the 30 North Literary Review, as well as on various post-it notes and napkin corners scattered across the greater Chicago area. Emma is a poet, storyteller, and freelance writer living in the suburbs and figuring it all out.

A Love Letter to My Breasts by Eloísa Pérez-Lozano

From barely-there buds to voluptuous curves

you have enjoyed the freedom of undershirts

before bouncing into Jockey training bras

and finally becoming familiar with

the metal smiles of underwire.

In college, at the peak of your perkiness,

You hid away under baggy t-shirts with

the rest of my rolls and freshman fifteen.

But I worked the weight off, blossoming

enjoying the fabric now hugging our figure.

But your time is ticking, my tender twins

Tightly bound and tumbling when I run

sagging au naturel after a growing baby

latched, suckled, and stroked you gently

the boobs on high balancing hefty hips.

O bountiful breasts, overflowing fatty tissue

sites of playful pleasure and essential sustenance:

Though gravity insists on your inevitable descent

I am grateful for your curves, your cushion

and the overwhelming world of sensation you bring.

---

Eloísa Pérez-Lozano (she/her) writes poems and essays about Mexican-American identity, women’s issues and motherhood. She graduated from Iowa State University with a B.S. in psychology and an M.S. in journalism and mass communications. A Best of the Net-nominated writer, her work has been featured in The Texas Observer, Houston Chronicle, Houston Public Media, and Poets Reading the News, among others. She lives with her family in Houston, Texas. She can be found on Instagram at @elodisneygirl and twitter @EloPoeta.

My Mother was not a Feminist by Heather Paladini

My mother was not a feminist

But she suffered all the same

For in all of the ways her life was poor,

A man was always to blame.

My mother spoke not of equality 

But surely she noticed it didn’t exist

So then who was this woman who raised me

If she was not a feminist?

My mother was raised in poverty

In a family plagued with violence

They say children learn what they live

And she watched her own mother suffer in silence.

My mother did not speak of this until I was older

These horrible truths that were part of her history

It did not occur to me at the time that the past

Would repeat itself and become her story.

My mother spoke not against domestic violence

As I watched her use makeup to cover a bruise

Surely she did not want this life for her daughter

So then why did she tolerate the abuse? 

My mother did not model healthy relationships

She always said she hated being alone

I watched her time and time again slide back into the arms

Of men I had hoped she’d outgrown.

My mother once wore a scarlet letter

That tainted both her reputation and mine

But through rumors and gossip, I learned from my mother

One action does not a person define.

My mother spoke not about mental illness

As I sometimes watched her cry in bed for days

She took Prozac, and one time, a few too many

But I was told it was just a phase.

My mother spoke out against no stigmas

After all, what would people think? 

She’d just take it in stride, brush it off with a smile,

And pour herself another drink.

My mother spoke not about women and addiction

As I watched and learned how to become comfortably numb

I never properly learned about addiction

Until after my own addictions, I had overcome.

My mother spoke not about women’s rights

But as a teen, she let me make my own choice

A haunting experience we never spoke of again

I think that was the seed from which grew my voice.

My mother spoke not of equality

But surely she noticed it didn’t exist

So then who was this woman who raised me

If she was not a feminist?

My mother - a feminist - she was not

She did not raise me to stand up, to resist

But after all, I am my mother’s legacy

She bore me - I AM A FEMINIST.

---

Heather Paladini is a poet, writer, and artist living as a transplant in the PNW. She finds her inspiration from the natural world all around her and from her personal experiences in life. Heather is a wild woman, a mother, a student of the Earth, a dreamer, a seeker, a maker and creator, a spiritual being, a romantic optimist, an environmentalist, and a feminist.

my sub

he feeds me rolls of twenties

sticky from his anxious fingers his eyes can’t land until i whip him with my tongue and then

so solid release carves him into a huMan

his nails curling around the toes of my socks the edges of his lips twitching and when he

texts me “sorry mistress” from the laundromat

i imagine him sitting in front of the machine that perpetual tear drop of a face

reflected in the undertow of the pay per use washer

&This is how he can pretend he is drowning in

my sudsy lingerie

---

Breton Lalama (they/he) is a queer, trans human who combines mediums to encourage sociopolitical dialogue and bring attention to the weird parts of everyday life. They really like tomato soup. In his work, they are currently excited by explorations of identity and multiplicity.

You can find their work in Harlot X Trans Sex Workers Zine, Feels Zine, Open Heart Forgery, Crush Zine, Saved By Sex Ed, Toho Journal. Breton is grateful to be part of Nightwood Theatre’s Write From The Hip cohort, 2020-2021.

Super Like

i want someone to wake up next to every morning

says a guy on tinder

i laugh so hard that i fall out of my bed

and tears fall out of my eyes

because

that was way too forward

jesus christ

and he says

oh my god i’m so sorry i didn’t mean to send that to you

and i continue to laugh

and block him immediately

a guy starts the conversation with

i want your babies

i want that dick

and i block him too

a guy starts with

i can teach you a thing or two about dating

and i say

wow that’s a way to flirt

he doesn’t respond

and two days later he says

wait so will you go out with me

a guy says

hey is that bread in your second picture?

i like bread too

we have so much in common

and proceeds to spam 

with sexual bread jokes

literally all day

at midnight he says

come over to my dorm and i’ll knead your dough

and i

continue to laugh

at all these other

lonely gay men

even though i am

a lonely gay man

myself

it’s been almost three (3)

years

since i last had a boyfriend

but i’m so tired of swiping

and talking to strangers

when i know the dates

never go anywhere

and i don’t really

talk to guys i like

anymore

and i laugh

at how these men

can be

way too forward

sometimes

i understand

the desperation

but that doesn’t mean

it’s not uncomfortable

and hilarious

to receive messages

like that

here i am

feeding my loneliness

with

strangers

that i don’t care about

sometimes i laugh

missing

something better

than this.

---

Mercury-Marvin Sunderland (he/him) is a transgender autistic gay man from Seattle with Borderline Personality Disorder. He currently attends the Evergreen State College and works for Headline Poetry & Press. He's been published by UC Riverside's Santa Ana River Review, UC Santa Barbara's Spectrum Literary Journal, and The New School's The Inquisitive Eater. His lifelong dream is to become the most banned author in human history. He's @Romangodmercury on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.

Screwdriver

For some reason, I still think about the plumber.

How he asked me to stand in my bathroom and hold the loose faucet,

keep it from slipping and sliding on the fresh plaster he’d 

slapped down.

(Later, your friends tell you a plumber should 

never ask you to help them. Even in this, you 

should have been on your guard. Prepared to

say no, the liability on you.)

As I stand, he lies under me, loosening and tightening

screws, making the pipes jingle and jangle.

Grunts and groans expelled from his mouth

like belches from a small volcano.

(Meant to illustrate how hard he is working, 

not how close he is to eruption.)

And his fingers, stubby and stained as the handle of his screwdriver,

colliding with the insides of my thighs,

battering the fabric of my underwear.

(Not the first time a man’s hand has landed 

there uninvited. Makes you wonder if a skirt’s 

an invitation, in some language you don’t speak, 

and don’t want to.)

The first time, maybe an accident. The second time, I’m

not so sure. By the fourth time, no question left. He

gasps “sorry” between grunts.

(You squirm, of course, but you don’t kick 

him, you don’t abandon the wobbling faucet 

and walk off, you just want him to fix it so  

he’ll leave, so this will once again be

your home.)

At last, he gets up to retrieve another instrument from

his toolbox, another cold metal hand, and I retreat to the kitchen,

pulling my skirt down as far as it will go, dreaming of 

hot water and soap scouring my thighs and thinking 

I must have imagined it, it must have been an accident, 

(…doubting your own thoughts from a moment 

ago…)

this isn’t some strange man on the street, it’s

an employee, a professional, sent by 

the manager.

(Your skin knows it wasn’t an accident. It tingles

the way skin does when it’s pinched and 

released, the blood rushing back like 

something remembered.)

Another grunt, a metal clatter, and I follow the 

sound without thinking, back through my living room to

see his legs emerging from 

the bathroom door, dirty boots splayed to each side

like big dead bugs, all that’s moving is his hand

inside his pants

inside my bathroom

where he lays with his head 

on the tile floor.

(You knew you weren’t imagining it.)

And I don’t yell, I don’t demand to know what 

he’s doing, I just back away 

as he scrambles like one of those bugs

you think is dead till you get too close

and it runs.

(You don’t remember what happened

after that, if he apologized or

even

acknowledged it at all.)

That was it. A screwdriver-hand surveying 

my underwear

and the insides of my thighs,

a man pleasuring himself

in the spot where I stand before the mirror

each night,

wash my face,

scrutinize my flaws. And then, 

it was over.

(You’ve been through worse. The man who

followed you home and pushed you against 

the wall; the one who told you shh with his

hand against your mouth; the boyfriend who pinched your cheek like a slap without sound.)

So why, for some reason, is it the plumber I 

remember?

(“For some reason,” you say, you remember.

Still polite,

skirting

around the truth.)

I know exactly why.

It’s not because of what happened, inside my 

apartment, my safe space.

(Safe as your body should be.)

It’s because I called the apartment manager,

told him (of course, a him) what had happened,   

said I never wanted that man in my apartment again, and—

(You weren’t loud enough.)

—two years later, that man still comes, with his 

screwdriver-handle fingers,

whistles his way around the apartment building

knocks on my door

pets my dog and tells me he has to fix a leak, 

or a drain, or—

(You call back. They say he’s been talked to,

he won’t do it again. He’s the only handyman

for the building, there’s no one else.)        

—and I let him in, because what else can I do,

I can’t afford to move or launch a lawsuit, 

and each time I open the door to him,

the hinges whisper

(…your voice doesn’t matter…)

—and what else can I do, except shut out

that whisper, take my trembling fingers to a keyboard,

write words like darts

(…my voice…)

and aim them true.

---

SC Parent is a graduate of the Master of Professional Writing program at USC. She is also a former professional submissive and switch at a commercial dungeon. SC's poetry has been nominated for a Rhysling Award and Best of the Net.

This and Other Reasons Why I Don’t Walk Alone At Night

Artwork by Kay Sirianni

This poem was written at a time in my life where my mental health was fraying and I wanted to express my experiences and the experience of those around me. It gets into some deeply personal first-hand experience I have had with people who suffer from PTSD but my true purpose was to talk about the horrors of sexual assault and the mental scars it leaves behind. Sexual violence is a really horrible thing to experience, but the way in which PTSD prolongs victimhood consistently goes unspoken. So I spoke about it, and I hope it helps others understand that this is also a very female problem and many women are dealing with the traumatic aftermath on the daily.

Rape is like all the ‘nice’ guys I have ever met

He forces his way into your head, and then it's your bed

And now you can't rest

But before all of this

I never had this misfortune of meeting the man himself.

But now,

Now - Rape has moved in

Made a home for himself on the bed across the room

He bides his time during the day

Filters into the background

And at night he comes alive in the room

He haunts it

He preys on it

Hell, I think he enjoys it.

Sometimes I want to kick rape out

But I don't know where to start

When I try, he just comes back

He knows just when to show up 

Knows how to wear us down

He makes it hard to keep living here.

Makes it harder to push him out

His shit is all over the place

Now my room is all stains and clutter and pain

Rape is tricky like that.

He comes back just when you think you are safe. 

I wish Rape wasn't my problem anymore,

But he follows me now.

On my way home in the dark

Alone in my home

Around the men on the street

Rape, 

Well he’s like all the nice guys I’ve ever met

Always there at the wrong moment.

---

Hayley is an emerging writer and journalist who works hard to create work that is fiercely feminist, anti racist and anti oppression on a whole. You can check out more of her work and content on her instagram @hayley.headley

A Reimagining of ‘A World's Wife’

These poems are inspired by and a play on the poetry of Carol Ann Duffy and published in her collection, “A World’s Wife.”

---

Hayley is an emerging writer and journalist who works hard to create work that is fiercely feminist, anti racist and anti oppression on a whole. You can check out more of her work and content on her instagram @hayley.headley

Gunmetal

You grip the stone
of a peach

between
clenched lips.

A light tap
on wood

tops––the redness
on your knuckles.

I trace you.
Your tattoos

on my finger-
tips. All this blue

ink under
my nails from you.

A few soft
thrusts

and what floats
from you:

Truth like a river
never to pass

under a bridge
to look

for light. All else
explodes

from our mouths––
a gasp of color––

and the fuck
of your curve

on sheets.
Little else gushed

as I watched
you eat.

---

Tyler Michael Jacobs currently serves as Editor-in-Chief of “The Carillon.” His poetry has appeared, or is slated to appear, in “The Carillon,” “Poached Hare,” “The Magazine,” “The Hole in the Head Review,” “Runestone,” “Rumble Fish Quarterly,” and “East by Northeast Literary Magazine.”

Cum and O.J. Simpson

Somewhere in the crowded house party of my twenties

I lost track of what separates pain and pleasure

trauma and temptation

I pictured bruises around my neck more beautiful than any jewel

And dreamed about a morning I would wake up to blood on the mattress

I started to get wet staring at the man putting my groceries away

not because I was fixated on his hands and fingers

but on the plastic bag he held

imagining it wrapped tight around my head

sucked into my mouth

my last breath would be a moan forced out by crumpled lungs

I fantasized about the football star in black leather gloves

Pulling me up by my hair

His foot steadfast on my spine

I can only cum to the thought of his knife against my throat

nobody understands why I drool over men’s belts but not what lays beneath them

why I think love at first sight smells like burnt skin

or why a split lip is better than a lipsticked one

so I sit on the sidelines nursing wounds that only exist in my head

waiting for the day I don’t understand either.

---

Kyoko Caulfield is a nonbinary (they/them) writer currently living in Brooklyn, New York. Their instagram is @honey.lemonade.

Rough, Sugar, and Spellbound

Photo by Oleg Magni from Pexels

ROUGH

My thighs are made of marble,

And between them the cradle

The singing bowl,

of humanity.

Rosebuds and baby’s breath.

My stomach could be

The arid steppes, and sunshine,

Hungry hands, and desperate lips

Slip upward the side of my breasts,

Like mountains of sugar.

Melting into comfort at their peak,

The door to forever.

Inside me,

You finally reached the balmy jungle of my mouth.

You breathed that I;

Taste like blueberries.

SUGAR

That golden thread is eternal,

As it snaps in two,

Drops of honey.

Across and over your lips

I am a martyr for that mouth.

You are buzzing in my ears

All I can hear is you,

I am deafened.

I would crawl across this page,

To the place where what I want coils

To be crowned queen of your hive.

I want your teeth, bared.

Like I want them to rip, and snap, and tear.

Clean the sugar from my skin,

Honeycomb strings.

SPELLBOUND

I smell the magic on your skin,

Mixed with the musk of your perfume.

Your lips pull into a smile, sly, wet

A secret like rose petals.

Your eyes a circle of salt.

I hear the chant in the sway of your hips,

Calling, culling, the ritual of you.

I imagine you bathing in milk,

Wine pouring down your chin.

Black cat at your window, a whistle into the night.

You oil your breasts and sigh.

We are the witches of the past,

Naked in the woods.

We swim in the moonlight, the flames.

My lips, red as Bishop’s bodice, burn.

Bones, runes, witching cards, your collarbones,

A coven, a coven, you say

The alchemy of womankind.

---

Emalee Long is a linguistic anthropologist who works in the field of propaganda analysis, her passion is in poetry and her works have been published online at 86 Logic and The Showbear Family Circus, or in print at Milestones 2018. She lives and writes in Little Rock, Arkansas. Find her on Instagram @emaleave.me.alone

Treasure

Explore every inch of me like

uncharted territory

come in,

bask in the sunlight of my skin

dive headfirst into my stormy sea

let my waves pull you down beneath

the treasure you’ve set out to find

is hidden here,

between my thighs

---

Deveree Extein is a poet, and painter based out of southeastern Louisiana. Her first poetry collection, Flicker: poems, is available with online retailers. When Deveree is not scribbling or sketching, she’s usually reading, watching films, or playing with her cat, Luna.

Before We Started Dating I Dreamed of Your Body Like O’Keeffe Paintings

Cherry stem knotted
Pitted expertly
The gushing wet pulp
Slips deeper into her mouth.

I salivate and dream
Of her pink candy heart
Where slick saliva meets
The lips beneath her waist
Maybe they are the same pink.

Her clit a bright berry
To roll and lick and slurp.

---

Cheryl Aguirre is an aspiring poet based in Austin, Texas. They pride themselves on their 7 living houseplants and unpublished poems. They are a recent college graduate and an active member of the Austin LGBTQ+ community. You can follow them at @drowsy_orchid on Instagram and @Wheat_Mistress on Twitter. 

Beautiful by L.Cannon

Beautiful 

Making me look beautiful
Is like
Putting lipstick on a pig: 

Rouging up something
Fat and hairy,
While listening to
Its incessant squealing; 

Brushing out its
Coarse coat
Of bristles
And tying ribbons
Around its thick neck. 

And no runt am I,
Plump and portly:
A prize,
At over 200 lbs. 

I am porcine, not porcelain. 

No one wants to
Bring home this bacon,
Sweet and juicy
Though I am, 

All pink snout and
Raw skin,
Heavy with blood. 

You have audacity,
And I, depravity.
But I have teeth like yours. 

I am mud-slick and
Insatiable in
My cannibalistic troughing. 

Come near me and I will eat you alive. 

Sex me up and 

I’ll tramp you to death
With cloven foot—
I know men too
Fond of pigtails. 

Gilt or sow,
They’ll porker,
But criticize me
When I’m hogging. 

I feel it too—
This unnatural desire
To boil and shave myself
For your consumption; 

To bind myself tightly
In my own intestines,
My own skin,
Encased with entrails. 

Fear you my arms?
These fat, sausage links
Lined with dark hair,
Bigger than your own? 

You’d rather that stock
Was lent to my hams,
A roast pig rump,
Or to sow’s udders. 

Judge the space between my legs;
Is it wide enough, or too closed off? 

Oh, I am a show-pig indeed. 

Calculate the circumference
Of my calves, and the
Angle set off by my high heels
To steady these ham hocks. 

I’d put vaseline on my teeth,
Were it not for the fact my
Tusks would show—
Beware I gore you.
I’ll keep my mouth closed. 

Beautified. 

A vile phrase this is, vile phrase.
Waste not your pearls on me,
Some bi-dyke, mannish woman. 

I have been raised unjust
As a daughter.
I have been g/razed to prepare
For my slaughter. 

This is not a pity poem,
It’s a warning.
For men, and for me:
Eye ham more. 

---

L. Cannon is a 20 year old, queer poet from Canton, Georgia. She currently studies literature and linguistics, and has a passion for the classics. In addition to writing, Lane also narrates audiobooks and has illustrated a book of children's poetry. Their work has also been published in Vantage Point.

Twitter: @cannonvoice
Instagram: @cannonvoice

Euphoria

in her skin, I found solace

in her scent, I found paradise

in her lips, I found life

something changed, 

as we began to consume each other

as we got lost to the rhythmic dance of our tongues

for this euphoric high, we didn’t need to set our lungs afire

to be intertwined, breast to breast

my leg over the majestic lump of her butt 

my hand resting on the small of her back

her hand clinging to my waist

and the perpetual wetness between her legs,

was euphoria on its own

---

NHYLAR is a 24 year QPOC who currently resides in Toronto. She uses poetry as a creative outlet for her existential rage. She writes about queer representation, living away from home, intimacy, existentialism and anything that intrigues her.