Exploring the ephemeral space between day and night, 'Down The Crack With The Crickets' by Kristine Jensen delves into the fleeting nature of thoughts and emotions. An angry thought disappears with the wind, symbolizing lost moments and the struggle to reclaim them.

Explore the poignant poem Mates by Iain C. Smith, dedicated to Jake and Patrick. Reflecting on the sudden loss of a young life, it intertwines themes of grief, camaraderie, and the fleeting nature of youth, as experienced through the lens of a soccer match metaphor.

"Explore the evocative poem 'Pipedream' by Iain C. Smith. A vivid blend of memory and observation, it captures a moment of reflection amidst a storm, evoking nostalgia and introspection about family, past experiences, and the transformative journey of life.

In *Souvenirs You Never Lose*, M.E. McMullen turns heartbreak, failed relationships and everyday humiliation into a sharply comic meditation on the scars people carry with them. Through the long-suffering friendship of Miles and Dodds, the story moves from lost girlfriends and ruined marriages to vanished pancake houses, blocked roads and one spectacular battle with a plastic sawhorse. Beneath the absurdity lies something more tender: the recognition that old hurts rarely disappear completely, and that friendship, humour and self-mockery are sometimes the best ways of learning to live with them.

In *DPP v Morgan, 1975*, Parineeta revisits a landmark British rape case through the imagined perspective of the woman at its centre. Moving between memory, marriage, violence and the courtroom, the story examines the devastating consequences of a legal culture in which a man’s claimed belief in consent could outweigh the reality of a woman’s refusal. By placing personal experience alongside legal history, Parineeta turns a famous judgment into an intimate exploration of trauma, power and the long afterlife of injustice.

In I’m a Jellyroll, Joseph Giordano brings together memory, political history, displacement and music through the meeting of an East German musician and a Kurdish singer in Dresden. The story moves through the divided and reunited Germany, family loss and the uneasy consequences of political change, while playfully invoking the enduring legend that John F. Kennedy’s famous declaration, “Ich bin ein Berliner,” made him sound as though he had called himself a jelly doughnut. Beneath its humour lies a story about people uprooted by history and the possibility of finding connection, identity and a new beginning through music.

Christmas Present by Marie Shields

Three small children, a pompous brother-in-law and a family gathering that promises mayhem. Marie Shields approaches Christmas with a wickedly observant eye. Anyone who has survived a crowded family holiday may recognise the scene!

The Execution by John C. Mannone

The chopping block awaits. Onions are stripped, peppers deseeded, and a garlic clove loses its head. In this wonderfully mischievous poem, preparing supper becomes an execution of quite extraordinary culinary proportions.

Christmas Morning by Martin Heavisides

Breakfast, cake, a view through the window and a radio playing somewhere nearby. Martin Heavisides gathers the small pleasures of Christmas morning into a poem alive with flavour, observation and unexpected associations.

The Language of Frost

A woman sits alone at a Christmas table set for two. Beyond the window, a mysterious visitor writes a single word across the frozen panes. Sometimes love finds its voice in the coldest places.

Sweet Talk

Plastic garlands, relentless Christmas music and an apology from Brad that Kate could well do without. Lauran Strait invites us into a festive season where goodwill is apparently in rather short supply.

Be Sure Your Sins

Lilly Peach has a problem. She needs a solicitor, has no money to pay him, and wants five minutes to explain herself. Matthew is about to discover whether those five minutes are worth his time. And so are we.

My Lady Adair by A. J. Brown

October was a glorious month for a boy growing up in a South Carolina mill village. There was the State Fair, the excitement of Halloween, harvest festivals at the local churches and the delicious freedom of roaming the neighbourhood in a homemade costume.

Money might have been scarce, but adventure was everywhere.

A. J. Brown opens My Lady Adair by taking us into that remembered world, where family, community and the turning seasons gave childhood its particular magic. There are grandparents, brothers, village streets and those small, vivid details that somehow survive the passing of years.

It is an inviting beginning, rich with the atmosphere of place and memory, and one that encourages the reader to follow the story beyond its opening recollections.

Neal Celebrates Christmas by Cheryl Chambers

It begins with a postcard unlike the familiar Christmas cards Neal usually sees: a Ukrainian Nativity scene, its figures gathered in candlelight. From that small discovery, Cheryl Chambers opens a story of Christmas traditions, family and the meanings we attach to the season.

Ann Walters' poem intricately weaves together these narratives to present a multifaceted exploration of flight, capturing its beauty and brutality, its capacity for liberation, and its potential for sorrow. The repeated motif of flying serves as a powerful metaphor for the human condition, reflecting our deepest desires, fears, and the inevitable search for meaning beyond our tangible experiences.

Venom by Dennis Tallefer explores the complexity of human emotions and the struggle for personal safety and dignity in a world that can be unwelcoming and dangerous for those who are perceived as different; it also highlights the need for empathy and understanding towards individuals who are fighting their own battles, both internal and external.

Summer

Autumn

Winter

Adam Kluger’s “The Party” is a wickedly comic dialogue of literary appetite and social performance, where talk of prose, platform, food, friendship, and flesh turns darker by the line.

Stephen Zelnick’s “New World Poetry” follows Rubén Darío from Nicaragua into modernismo, politics, myth, and cultural resistance, tracing the music and force of a poet who carried the New World into literature.

Mozart and I by Alex Braverman is a narrative that captures the essence of what it means to be an artist and the often tumultuous journey of balancing personal vision with external pressures. The narrative oscillates between admiration and resentment, showcasing how genius can be both a gift and a curse. The reference to Chaim Potok's novel "My Name is Asher Lev" serves as a poignant parallel, highlighting the universal struggles of artists who must navigate the tensions between their creative expressions and the values of their communities or families.

At a grave, the narrator receives a box of ashes, the remains of a loved one. Struggling to find poetry in the moment, they recount the cremation process and the stark reality of loss.

In "When the Morning is a Prayer," Kathleen Cassen Mickelson captures the serene beauty of a winter morning in Minnesota. The poem unfolds like a series of cherished gifts:

"Ghost" by James Graham is a hauntingly beautiful exploration of memory and loss. In the quiet aftermath of a loved one's passing, the poet describes the emptiness of a house once filled with life and conversation. As time passes, memories of the departed begin to resurface vividly--their eyes, voice, and laughter lingering like a comforting ghost. Graham's poignant verses capture the enduring presence of those we have lost, transforming grief into a gentle daily companion that brings solace and quiet strength. This poem is a touching tribute to the enduring power of love and memory.

Across five exuberant sonnets, Russell Bittner turns the coming of dawn into an elaborate argument for desire. Doves, stars, moon, sun and hill are recruited into a witty, formally playful courtship in which arithmetic, prudence and passing time are repeatedly challenged by the sheer appetite to love, risk and delight..

Martin Heavisides makes an impassioned case for Peter Barnes as one of the great, insufficiently recognised comic dramatists of the modern stage. Moving through The Ruling Class, Laughter!, Red Noses, Dreaming and Barnes’s shorter works, he celebrates a theatre of extravagant invention in which comedy confronts cruelty, hierarchy, death and received wisdom without surrendering its delight in human possibility.

“In Time” by Nonnie Augustine imagines a shared future built not from perfection, but from beauty, wear and mutual care. From a rain-sheltered café in Montmartre, the speaker looks ahead to chipped porcelain, faded carpets, Mozart in an ageing car and two lives learning to steady one another. Tender and quietly assured, the poem finds enduring love in the graceful acceptance of time.