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By Billy Rock Mitchell Part 1: The Baron A ragged trousered noble A prince in taste and a pauper in pocket That was the fate of the intensely afflicted Baron Bozo Bambi The sickly and intoxicating pursuit of life's immediate pleasure Hung over dear Bozo's head like an intense and aggressive fog  Was it a natural state or was it an unholy affliction  He knew not But either way he wore his nature like a crown Proving the legitimacy of his self appointed title A child of the ses

By Paula Llorens Ortega as a child, she would stitch the waves together.  thread by thread, like a sail,   looping it twice,  so it would have someone to retreat with.  she chased them with springy leaps, flat feet charred from the burning sand. she bit off the blisters, numbing the redness with spume.  damp hem of a dress dragged behind her; a mother’s dress cut off at the ends and a grease stain on the ruffled sleeve. she wore patches of

By Paula Llorens Ortega Twice, thrice, until you barely see. Until speech is ruffled instead of silk. At first, it is loose and hanging limply in inconvenience. How troublesome to have to focus more thoroughly; the footage on TV, the hatred sprawled across oxidized streets. How irksome to have to strain your voice, your words tangled to become shrouded in approval. If no one can see your lips move, they can make themselves believe anything else.  The knots become double.  Now

By Paula Llorens Ortega Her veil was a shroud of mourning: a callous sobriety that bore too much weight but which the wisps of wind could carry. It hung loosely, swaying like a tendril of hazy mist.  There were promises that it would get easier, on how the wind would bear the weight through murmurs, on how the night would obscure the murkiness of her thoughts, on how it would slacken the discomfort coiling around her lungs. But cruelty was not known for loosening its taut gri

By Roshan Tara At sixteen, I was homeless, shunned by parents who called me disgrace. Thugs lured me with cash, then drugged my tea for an old man's lust. I fought, sinking into darkness. He came-older, kind-his voice pulling me free, breaking chains. He gave shelter, bread by my cot, eyes warm at dawn. I loved him, heart a hidden blaze. His wife, his child, sealed my truth. Nightly, my diary caught my words by lantern's glow. It listened, holding my secret-love, fierce, unsp

By Roshan Tara Every morning, I sweep dust outside the tea stall. The school gate is right across. Kids laugh and run in, holding their mums’ and dads’ hands. They wear shiny shoes and smell like soap and tiffin. I just smell like chai and smoke. Uncle says I’m lucky to work here. But I wish I had a bag like theirs. I don’t go in. But my shadow does. It runs with them, like it belongs. Maybe it wants to learn. Maybe one day, I will too. I stand here, waiting. For the day my s

By Roshan Tara I sat in my car, wanting to run. Or die. Work, family, my own skin crushed me. Then I looked up. An old man stood by the vegetable stall with a child. The vendor dumped scraps—spoiled, unwanted. The man crouched, smiling, picking through. The child held a bent tomato, laughing like it was gold. They had nothing, yet joy spilled free. The air felt lighter, their warmth cutting my fog. My chest eased. Maybe the world isn’t kind. But it waits—in bent tomatoes, qui

By Roshan Tara By day, he plays the part—footsteps firm, voice lowered, eyes dry. Everyone calls him brave. But the door stays shut. At night, silence softens the world, and he breathes out the truth. A dress, soft and secret, brushes his skin. Lips painted with trembling hands, he smiles—real, fragile, alive. The door creaks; light spills in. He steps closer. As dawn breaks, he whispers, “I’m fine.” The door slams. He stares at the mirror, its glow gone. Still, he remembers—

By Roshan Tara “You’ve never written me a love letter,” she teased, eyes bright. “Like in old movies. Handwritten. Just once—for my birthday.” He promised. But fate was faster than his pen. She never reached twenty. So he wrote it anyway—poured his heart into paper, tears staining ink—and left it at her grave. Each year, another letter. Another flame inside him. He tells her how the world moves without her, how he doesn’t. Ink keeps flowing. Embers keep glowing. The grave nev

By Roshan Tara I remember the first time I saw her the world was loud around me, but she stepped in and silence bent bent around her. her eyes a shade of light brown, so rare it almost fooled me into calling them golden. our eyes met, and somewhere inside me something quietly shattered. I thought it would pass like all passing wonders do but days folded into weeks, and she lingered in the spaces between my thoughts, in the ache I tried to forget. her hair caught the sun like

By Roshan Tara The spaces are empty, cracks opened wide, silent hollows locked in pain unspoken, unheard words drift back to me, explained only in these sad whispers that find no listener but my own shadow. My heart echoes in the hollow of your absence; your shadow lingers where my soul still seeks you. I ache for the warmth of your nearness, the gentle anchor of your voice that once tied me to the earth. I am reminded of your presence day in and day out, dusk until dawn yet

By Roshan Tara I didn’t believe in love at first sight. Not in books. Not in movies. Not in real life. I used to roll my eyes when characters fell too fast like, how can a heart be so reckless? How can someone mean everything when you know nothing about them? Then you walked into the room. And suddenly… I forgot how to breathe. You weren’t even looking at me. You were just laughing at something someone said. But God, that laugh it hit me like music I’d known in another life.

By Roshan Tara I met Aarush the summer my father traded what was left of his pride for a job beneath a powerful man. We arrived with one suitcase, a stack of unpaid bills, and silence stretched thin between us like a taut wire. Aarush’s house towered over everything, not just in size but in presence—the kind that made you feel like your shoes were too loud, your skin too visible. I was eight. He was nine. The first time I saw him, he was climbing a mango tree in the backyard,

By Roshan Tara My heart pounds, loud in the silence, but all I hear is the ache inside. I’m not afraid, just a little nervous, convincing myself this is the right thing to do—that after this, everything will be over. This feeling, will no longer torment me. I think of my family—Mom’s smile, Dad’s pride, my sister’s care, my brother’s bickering. They’re just memories now, burned to ash in my mind. “I can’t anymore,” I whisper, my voice breaking, as the blade promises to stop t

By Neeharika Mishra Black turned crimson, shadows negotiated red  To creep, in the veil of veins, in the form of greed.  The voyage on the sea middle was sailing shallow, Shores shuttled, shimmered, submerging in narrow.    The oar streaming against the bewildering surface Several points stuck here and there on my face.  The angles around no void, yet it was never silent, Up goes down, and down goes up in an arc violent.    There stood no shadows to dance, no soul to sing Tim

By Neeharika Mishra The Ganga drifted towards the ghat,  Suffused in the holiness of nature  Among bustling thoughts of rabble,  Yet her quietude was perceived by all.    The bond of the Ganga and the ghat  Was like the bond of life and death.  Every brink awaited a new earth,  Like death awaited a new life.    The spark of the sparkless pyre  Of the exteriority of a dead human  Charred unless the death of death,  In the lap of the Manikarnika of life.    The ashes immersed i

By Neeharika Mishra When the red twilight sails in  With my flickering breath,  Pale lips dry of blood  No veins discernible around my wrists  No marathon of heart pump,  O my glory! The ideal worldly  Rule books declared me dead.    Don't stand in a night long lament  Don't let your relation come out,  Don't proffer any flame flowers to  My entombed body.    Birth never brings life,  And death never seizes it.  I was never born,  And so never died,  My Dear,  I was a guest-v

By Neeharika Mishra In the avarice of today,  The stretched circles  Devour the sense of essence.  Love here has relations and reasons  Beyond that, it wears a costume  And drags heavy feet like a stray.    How can care be projected  In a particular direction?    I have truth and thoughts  Freshly painted on the bench,  I also have money and meadows  To be counted on my thumb or toe.    My sight has muted vision So, I wear a pair of spectacles,  But it flashes the later.    I

By Neeharika Mishra Every day had the colours of innocence.    “Did you have your dinner?”  my Dad would ask, before my footsteps  found their way to the room of my Baba.    Books opened, stories widened.  He took me into his arms, and  words he recited out loud.  “The best narrator!” I would shout.    And in the leisure array of blackened night,  horror movies I loved watching them.  He would hold my hand,  for I always feared the ghosts  would come from their lands.    In t

By Neeharika Mishra The tiny little one she is,  Oh my! Oh my! What bliss!  Like the sweetest dew drops  Curing the leaves of wintry nights,  Like the infinite nebula  From here to there, eternal and infinite Her presence, her divine.    She plays all way long,  From bubbling tiny balloons  To chasing them till the far,  From jumping like a baby kangaroo  To gathering the depth of her smile,  The tiny little one she is,  Oh my! Oh my! What bliss!    She unfurls her feathers