By S. A. Bender I drew your bath at dusk and filled it with oatmeal and iodine. Laid the linens soft on marble. Arranged the silver in sequence— from whisper to wound. You came to me as one comes to prayer: barefoot, unsure, still carrying your name in the fragile bones of your throat. I asked you to lie down, and you did, without question. Love like that is already a kind of death. I anointed your chest with warm water and thyme. Let my fingers memorize your pulse before

By Darren Ryding Today i wandered the streets of soho under the weight of nonexistent eyes like infinite young ghosts before me on a gay sex shop quest to obtain a thin black harness and matching jockstrap. Dawn approaches and soon we will draw swords but nothing is stopping me from leaving only inexplicable compulsion has guided me this far, we cannot hide from ourselves who we are. The steps lead down into the underworld pay the fee, receive a towel and a key i strip of

By Weston Campbell The birthing tube is tearing in the mud, underground with the worms. The fertilized ova are spilling into furrows of virginal dirt. Down where the scavengers wander, in the haunt of the carrion-fed, in silence, the queen is disgorging her million glistening eggs. The birds become aware of the smell and the sound of the prey. In a furious frenzy of feathers, they descend on the writhing remains. When the feast and the orgy have ended they return to their cav