Dear Reader

Offer everyone else a piece of coal and a packet of pink popping candy. Sit those with handkerchiefs on one side, those with tissues, or nothing, on the other. When no one is expecting you to stand, rise up,  wink at the celebrant and smile. Lean on a pillar sing Misty again for me. Raise your eyes to the roof as if you think a part of me is rising to heaven. Note those who follow your gaze. Nod a bow  and gesture to my coffin  as if I should take one too. Tell everyone I always wanted to hear the collective sound of open-mouthed mourners  popping candy. --- Sue Finch was born in Kent. She now lives with her wife in North Wales and enjoys exploring the coast. Her first published poem appeared in A New Manchester Alphabet in 2015 whilst studying for her MA with Manchester Metropolitan University. Her work has also appeared in The Interpreter’s House, Ink, Sweat and Tears, Poetry Bus Magazine and in Crossings Over, an anthology published by Chester University Press. Having a number of po

waits at the Hungarian border.  Listening, it hears a smörgåsbord of languages.  Cries in Magyar, Polski, Romani, Russkiy, and Ukrainska  among many, many others.  As its boy’s train pulls away it sighs as if deflating. Accepting that it will never see him again.   Quarantined, despite possessing the appropriate papers.  The monkey waits.  Listening to passing children laugh.  Hearing gunshots and       answering with smiles.  Hearing screams but       trading in laughter.  The monkey has not forgotten its boy  but, it has a new job now.  Watching the future come and go.  Come and go  on trains that have been  coming and going  for years. --- Ian Brunner is a writer from Buffalo, NY. He has most recently been published in Ghost City Press, Selcouth Station, and the Comics Cabinet, and is the author of the  chapbook: Ruminations published through the Cringe Worthy Poet's Collective. Along with this, he is the short fiction editor for Variety Pack Magazine and can be found at Twitter

Autumn has called this rugged child dog out of sleep when the sun is still just flexing her fingers.   He has been a restless sleeper lately, two days ago he was chasing something in his doggy slumber, and   we didn’t wake him, because who would do that, or undo it, bind his little wildness? But yesterday   it must have been a nightmare, because he leapt suddenly upright, growling, terrified in our quiet bedroom but   furious to protect us from his transient intruders. He is a loyal boy, fully dedicated to his life’s work –   to the vanquishing of all the small noises at his great noise, to the unbroken light at the front window.   This will be his first autumn, the first ever in the whole world to a doggy, and thus, I guess, his restlessness:   big paws in the leaves, trusted teeth on dry wood, cotton ball head,   tail like a plume he flies, waking suddenly into triumph. --- Jesse Miksic is a graphic designer and writer living in the suburbs of  Philadelphia. He spends his life writin