Category: Side A

New Side A Poetry: “Called Up / 2025 USA” by Jonathan Memmert

Called Up / 2025 USA We live in a place called what’s the differenceWe swim in an ocean called what’s to know We have something to say called who caresWe fall in love to a song called who remembers We wake to each morning called rewindWe eat meals each day called handouts We go to…
Side A Poem: “The Next Time I Talk to My Friends” by Peter Leight

The Next Time I Talk to My Friends I’m not leaving anything outNot putting anything awayThat I haven’t taken outAs part of the same projectWhen it’s dark insideWe’re sitting down together and turning on the lights quickly like William JamesIn order to see what the darkness looks likeThere are times when we lookAt the same…
Poetry for Side A: “Mantle of Bread” by Tina Cane

On the front Napoleon refused to eat Russian bread dark and heavy as a mantle it was du pain pour Nicole he said before feeding it to his horse this story is of course too delightful to be true but I do confess I like keeping it alive in the telling tonight trees are bowing…
Side A Short Story: “The Foster” by Tom Busillo

We were having dinner, and she said, “I signed us up for a foster.” I thought she was kidding, but everything had already been arranged. His name was Lollie. The next morning, he was in the kitchen making toast. He wore a cardigan and kept his shoes on inside. He had dietary needs, emotional needs, and…
New Poetry for Side A: “My Curriculum Vide, eh!” by Éamonn Ó Laocha

My Curriculum Vide, eh! Dear Sir/Madam To whomever you are and in regard to Whatever it is You are offering I am very excited to apply It is that which I’ve long sought And to which My whole purpose and being Has been heretofore directed To this amazing opportunity Oh, what joyful chance That on…
Side A Poetry: “buzzing my lips into” by daniel joseph

buzzing my lips into i put plastic grocery bags over my ripped shoes, bending myself, hitched up on the eroding edge of the front stoop, breathing more than i should, feeling the pain of bending and tuggingnear the empty loops of my sagging pants, but i feel joy today, for muddy spring is here. hallelujah, so be it. the…
Fiction for Side A: “Pearl Ring” by Ivy Grimes

Pearl Ring He and his betrothed moved into a cream-colored apartment in the outer ring of the concentric circles that made up the apartment complex. At the center of the complex was a swimming pool. He first noticed her pearl ring on their first trip to the apartment’s swimming pool when she took off her…
Side A Short Story: “Light ’Em Up” by Elizabeth Rosen

I spotted the guy as he came around the corner where the protest was happening outside the library on the plaza. Kind of scummy-looking, and not in a hipster way. White guy, wearing a plain Hanes T-shirt frayed at the collar and scuffed aviator sunglasses pushed up into unwashed hair. He was carrying a homemade…
Side A Poetry: “Dream Lover” by Paul Ilechko

Dream Lover The people you love the most are the ones who come to mind when you wake up in the darkness unsure of where you are and how you got to be thereit’s as stygian as the movie theater downtown in that brief period before the titles start an interval that feels almost dreamlike…