ISSUE THREE

Guinevere Glasford-Brown Reading to Putin

Belica Antonia KubareliRevelations of a Degnerate Artist

Rich IvesSophie

Fungisayi SasaSleepwalkLove’s Carnivore

Will BuckinghamMicrotheology

Richard WattPort Blacksand

Erin BrittonCackle Fruit

Joshua JonesScalpPhones & Pennies

Rob HaughtonTube Lines

Mary SlocumThe Sand Crab

Stephanie DaviesSemi-colon

Howard Mosley-ClarkScarborough

Peter WildThe Washing Up

WHAT’S INSIDE?

GUINEVERE GLASFURD-BROWN

Reading to Putin

I dreamt I was reading a bedtime story to Putin. The next morning I’m on

facebook and write, what’s that all about then?

Someone replies, quick as you like, unacknowledged desire for world

domination, and I’m not sure if that’s meant to be funny or not. Either

way it annoys me.

Later, in Tescos, I am drawn to the three for two offers. I buy three bottles

of caffeine-free Coke, three packs of courgettes, three hard-as-stone avo-

cados, and three bottles of elderflower cordial. The yogurts are three for

two as well, but they’re in packs of four. I don’t want twelve yoghurts.

At the checkout I dither then go with the yoghurt I’ve got. I pack the

wretched stuff at the bottom of the bag out of sight.

I buy one flabby salmon fillet and put it in the fridge for later.

Maybe the dream wasn’t about Putin but about Daniel Craig. They look

alike. Putin’s one thing, but reading bedtime stories to Daniel Craig?

What would my husband say to that?

Someone else wants to know, was it in English or Russian? It was a

dream, not War and Peace. Dream words in a dream book with no title

on the spine.

When I close my eyes he’s still there. I can make the bed soft and him

naked. There’s no hurry. Let him wait until I’m ready to begin.

BELICA ANTONIA KUBARELI

Revelations of a Degenerate Artist

When father died I went home and defrosted everything, cooked it and

ate it. It took me the whole night to eat it and the next day to vomit it, so

during the funeral I was thinking I had to refill the freezer.

Now I wonder what I should do when mother dies. I guess the best thing

would be to eat her and have a funeral only with her bones in the coffin.

I am fed up with freezing and de-freezing. It’s not artistic.

Sophie

I expect to get there before anyone.

I like the grievance process, but I don’t like to complain.

My underwear remind me of childhood, but they’re not singular.

I don’t like to argue about distribution. I just want an equitable

memory.

Look at my new red satisfactions. I don’t want anyone to see me

without them anymore.

There’s a note on the refrigerator that says, “Harold is not the neigh-

bor’s dog.”

The toilet bowl is clean and I don’t have any changes.

An airplane. I can hear it through the dryer vent. Which is wet.

A basket of polyester pinkie rings for the waiting salesmen. Single

application vaseline tubes. A carpet stain in the shape of an ordinary

nose. Harold is not a salesman.

The holy days of Andy Devine. It must be Saturday morning. It must

be a long time ago. It must be a kind of torture.

The television asks if I have found Jesus.

So I turn it on.

RICH IVES

The television works by turning the knobs with your fingers. Harold

doesn’t.

An airplane caught in a pattern of airplanes. You’re not supposed to

have to hear it scream.

Sophie wants to know how I feel about the issues. I expect there’ll be

a stain.

Harold draws a line on the chalkboard. I draw a line on the chalk-

board. Sophie just draws a line.

I cover it with vaseline. I begin listening for Jesus.

Sophie is participating in an exchange of uncertain possibilities.

I listen to her loud report.

I listen to another one.

There’s a note on the refrigerator that says, “Harold will not try to

anticipate the reactionaries.”

I listen to a voice repeating the ending.

Which allows it to continue.

Which makes it something other than the ending.

Sleepwalk

i have walked streets paved with the beating hearts of jilted lovers, where hollow men whisperfrom the moment you are born, you begin to decay.

FUNGISAYI SASA

Love’s Carnivore

We are of the same speciesSo let’s marry, reproduce thenToast each other’s happinessBefore we stumble into the darknessOf disillusionmentWhere we must face facts:We were never in love.

I am of your speciesSo you must not eat meBut you have whispered sweet, tender words (Traps laid in my heart)That ensnare me wheneverI try to leave.You say that I must face facts:The salt on my wounds is from your sweat.

FUNGISAYI SASA

Microtheology

There is a small god who lives on the windowsill of my house, between

the flowerpots. In the summer, when the petunias are in bloom, it is al-

most impossible to see him at all amid the foliage and the coloured pet-

als, whilst in winter he shrinks—I think it is on account of the cold—to

the size of a pea, although he is grey instead of green.

Of all the gods I have known, he is one of the strangest. When the dust-

men come every Monday morning, their cart rounding the brow of the

hill to churn down the road, the men shouting to each other and throw-

ing the black sacks into the back of their monstrous machine, my god

whispers to himself “Let there be a dustcart!”, and he sees that it is so.

When the neighbour’s cat leaps over the fence, he takes credit for having

brought such a fine, sleek creature into existence; and when it leaps back

again, he believes that he has consigned the animal to nothingness.

I am not unaware of his convictions. As I come and go through the front

door to water the plants or to fetch a bottle of milk from the shop, he

wonders at this new creation of his, and asks me to bow down and make

him offerings. I would be nothing without his power, he tells me.

I do not believe him. But you can never be certain. So whenever I pass,

I make him offerings of flowers, grains of rice, small coloured pebbles,

seashells and the occasional raisin. Just in case.

WILL BUCKINGHAM

RICH WATT

Port Blacksand

The humble and dark crumbsno longer fill you, sosquint into the sleet, prepare to goperform alembic motions of the wristsand ready to ingressinto these villain slums. A distant waypoint mast sees you homeyawning, wearied, sidewaysdown the theatre’s stepspast cats and smoking dens to Clock Lane,avoiding cups and candle gamessince the fortune teller dealtthe ace of traps, on its side. You have felt trapped beforebut are becoming lignified. Opening your mouth,you feel yourself draininginto the surroundings;Moss creeps between your toesand around your voice-box;We escape undergroundinto the green

with no television,vans, shrieking.

Cackle Fruit

For the first few days after my boyfriend decided to become a pirate, I

didn’t think that it would cause a problem for the relationship. To tell the

truth, he’d always had a bit of a squinting issue and the eye patch really

took care of it. Plus, the little embroidered skull and crossbones gave me

something to concentrate on if I started to drift off while he was talking

about cricket. Even the stubble rash and occasional burns from his flam-

ing beard weren’t too bad when weighed against the extra cash that his

clandestine raids on slow moving pensioners brought in.

I began to suspect that he’d taken things too far when I came home from

work one day to find my blender filled with blood and half a ration of

digits. He started spending several hours a day polishing his new hook

until it sparkled; we were going through three pots of vim a week. Soon

he was letting the parrot do all the talking for him. It wouldn’t have been

so bad if the bird had known more than one phrase. Having to clean the

parrot crap from the back of all his shirts was no picnic either.

I haven’t seen him for a couple of months now but sometimes, when it

rains, I find myself picturing him standing on the prow of a houseboat

on the Thames, drops of rain falling to the deck from his scorched, mat-

ted beard.

ERIN BRITTON

Scalp

The sun tricked this local kid

out into the street, I watched him

step from his house like off a cliff-edge

he somehow hadn’t seen.

The wind

goaded and bullied him, pushing

from behind, ducking between his legs

grabbing one on the way through; and when

the kid fell over the leaves on the trees

rustled like barely suppressed laughter.

It slapped him, booted the backs of his knees

and yanked and tore and spliced at his hair

until it semi-scalped him, skin

slopping to the street like gobs of phlegm.

The kid

was dancing about now after his scalp, reaching

and slipping and grounded and up, the laughing leaves

dropping towards him, eyes leaking, the wind

drowning his tears with rain.

The sun

JOSHUA JONES

is very high up. You can’t

see a trickle in a tsunami

or hear a cough in a thunderstorm.

But I

watched him and I heard him. My window

was slightly ajar, though I couldn’t

bring myself to pull it shut.

Phones & Pennies

She always takes her phone with her

when she leaves the room now,

and smothers it in her pocket on silent

when she’s in there.

He watches her leave

and feels like a TV-show vampire

dissolving into dust,

then conjures up a thought bubble

that spells the word ‘PARANOIA’

in an anxious looking font.

As she returns it becomes solid

and drops onto his head.

Later that night in bed

he tells her he loves her,

but thinks his words sound like

those of a beggar

in a urine soaked underpass,

JOSHUA JONES

and her reply jangles at his feet

like a petty handful

of one and two pence pieces.

They sleep back-to-back

and in his dreams he is pursued

by dirty pennies

that declare their love sarcastically

before grabbing him, flipping him

upside down

and shaking him like a baby

that Just Won’t Shut Up.

He wakes to the cold light of morning

and a kiss that slaps him around the face.

Tube lines

Central

Crushed nuts on the central.

A Flapjack bar of

underground dwellers.

I break

sow seeds of conversation,

least I could do

for the tie rack man

inhabiting my armpit.

Smiling, a toothy grin

seen too much tea tannin,

he talks and tells

his life through Pret breath.

Grad of ninety-nine

“Oxford baby”

slipped into the city

with a sparkle CV.

Pushed paper,

ROB HAUGHTON

penned profit,

promoted, promiscuated,

purchased property on Portobello.

Pretty good going I conceded.

But that is not all, he spoke.

Theatre in the eve.

Opera on occasion;

each night a different group,

each time a new station.

“What about you;

what’s your occupation?”

I write prose and poetry,

said with elation.

No networking ops here, unfortunately.

Silence ensued, he turned to flee.

Excuse me; places to go,

people to see.

Jubilee

Her shoes are your Mrs. Robinson.

Jesus, you love them more than you know.

That sliver of silver

lingering

over every curve.

I see you peeking,

faded toecaps pointing towards.

The haughtiness is noted;

high chin heels, rising gentry posture.

Shiny brown patent.

Totter closer

little canvas converse;

Aim above your status.

A lady and the tramp

barleycorn retelling,

soles touching, sweet ankle-y love.

As they pass they tut

tutut… tutut… tutut…

Your tongue tremors

laced with lust

And the sharp stiletto stab

in Achilles

does not prefix an apology.

District

That’s how I came to have

this sausage sandwich…

Crinkled eyes brush mine,

concentrated and sneering.

He unfolded himself.

Unleashing wisps of

piss and cabbage.

Upsetting the Sloane rangers,

with their malnourished dangers.

Hobbling past haute couture

holding a piece of heather.

Grin fixed in concrete,

my personal space in sight.

He called out.

A voice of fungus.

‘Charlie? Charles!’

He hadn’t seen me in so long.

Didn’t point out he’d got it wrong so I accepted the gift

pulled from coat pocket.

Feeling the mustard dribble.

Picadilly

Stop dead.

Check the bearings.

For fuck sake

get them and

GO!

‘Scuse me sir,

Where is Lie – Sest – or Square?’

… Same place as the Leicester one.

They launch themselves into the

real city,

fall at the first Starbuck hurdle.

Spiral into London limbo.

Unlife in urban aperture.

Mostly Morlock,

confined in the guts.

Watching the machine turn

until rising to the surface

on cold metal stairs.

Go one and see you’re printed sights.

But hell, please stand on the right

Bakerloo

Tossing a tincture

an apocalyptic mixture,

he claims it’s worth to all.

With me cheap as chips

if the money’s one the hip,

It’d be extortion if sold in the mall.

Never mind the afghan, the court conviction.

I’m as straight and narrow as the flight of a sparrow

and you should be in Bedlam if you don’t buy what you can.

He says while tossing a tincture.

I enjoy the banter

as he proceeds and decanters

the liquid kept sealed in glass.

Nothing is better

than this one from Greta.

C’mon now, part with your brass.

You know it’s half-inched but you can buy it for a pinch,

it’s as good as my word so buy it for your bird.

Can’t get any takers? Alright guys, catch you laters.

He moves on tossing a tincture.

Waterloo & City

Get on.

Stare at the oracle

of our financial times.

Thinking in an Excel cell,

a formula existence.

Get off.

Get on.

Memorise the number

below bottom line.

Pink sheets and pink slips,

blue ink and tie.

Get off.

Get on.

Blank stare.

Blank stare.

Blank stare.

Bank scare.

Get off.

Get on the live rail.

Victoria

A coin or key,

your weapon of choice.

Tear yourself in urban glass

and give the tube your voice.

Scratch your mask

on decks and doors.

Fuck knows whoever for

but if it makes you happy

who am I to judge?

If you feel a shade braver

then hell, we’ll all call you ‘Flava’.

Now, I’m a curious type

so forgive me

as I peel back the hype.

Scrape off the seasoning

that you pepper on the line.

I mean no disrespect as I psychoanalyse,

and rationalise your method to vandalise.

I look past the guise because no one gets the prize

for stating the obvious.

I could call you a thug,

an uneducated bug that

contributes to our taxes being high.

Nah, my voice doesn’t sail

the slipstream of Daily (hate)Mail,

who’s readers hold pitchfork and tail

on all days except but Halloween.

I imagine him as something more

than a statistic, crime figure,

a little sprinkle in a blight much bigger.

His real name is Craig,

not a name connoting apocalyptic days

and while there may be peer pressure involved,

you are not the cause of murders unsolved.

Given some resolve, he’d probably

be a good mathematician

(he knows his fractions)

and, without contrition,

they are not right-wing scaremonger gold.

But anyway, that’s conjecture.

I’d venture further…

Secretly he wants to be

a tap dancer.

Clicking to Choplin,

not kicking off with a nightclub bouncer.

Metropoliton

Freidan would have a field day.

Greer would sneer.

Perfume splashes, bat lashes

and she crashes into the twenty-first century.

Salmon pink and roller curls.

Yep, I agree, it was the fashion… once.

Wearing flats I understand

you were made to come up short

against men.

It wasn’t long

before the detritus with a black eye

opened his flaps to propose,

‘Fancy that?’

No composure loss or civility drain,

you can see she was well trained

or maybe she didn’t see

the finger pointing at crotch.

‘Excuse me? Please repeat, I’m rather at a loss.’

‘I mean your the sort to enjoy some sport,

prim and proper on the game.’

‘I’m married!’ She exclaimed.

‘I’m not,’ his reply, ‘It’s not sly to be direct,

and the fifties makes me stand erect.

Nothing ventured, nothing gained’

She made to leave and ventured a look back.

He gained a wink, scooped up his rucksack.

She sucked him off in Kings Cross

before retiring to the aga; a little liberation.

Northern

Long vowels, she’s ‘saahf’

W troubles, he’s ‘nouwf’

Eyes lock in combat

on the black line.

Make quibble in the middle,

Soho blow throwing.

It was only a matter of time

on the noisiest line.

Their grumbles rise above rumbles

and they tumble

into a fight.

Flurries of fack and faarks,

sluhts, cahnts and barstard tarts.

tete de tete, a Tourette air.

Creating questions in us of who, what, where.

Blame seems perched upon the each chair

springing into the spiked words they share.

Swinging like a flail until a face

crumbles into base mumbles of despair.

The other, relentless,

turns from swear to poetic flair.

Metaphor mace and simile spear.

Precision dissonance, sibilance and

hard consonants hit tears.

Although the fatal blow comes

from the head hung low.

Parry, riposte the malicious metre.

For all their opposing they pronounce

love

the same

and leave in embrace from whence they came.

We all thought it’d be a great end to a date

after all their make up sex must be bloody great.

Circle

I am a child prodigy,

But I’m a little too old

and anyway, don’t they all burn out and turn out to be a little insane?

I’m a bohemian prince,

That would be solid gold,

but I can’t paint for toffee, don’t really like coffee and haven’t funds for

a silver factory

I am Mr lover man,

Nope, I’m not sold,

I’d be knackered, cream crackered, not to mention the wrecking my back.

I am ahead of the evolutionary curve.

No, I’m sure I would have been told.

I’m not amazingly tall, can’t climb up walls, and my penis let’s face it is

rather small.

I am the second coming.

No, that’s too bold

also, I’m not sure about crucifixion, resurrection and all the justification.

I am that bloke,

that rides a circle mind.

gets off where I get on and almost always misses my stop

Hammersmith & City

He looks as though Failblog follows him into every room,

the type of bloke who stumbled coming out the womb.

Even his seat looks like it wants him out

as he squirms it seems to give a whimper and shout.

Most can get by on looks alone or clothes,

but he looks like a horse bolted when the paddock was closed.

I know I’m being mean but he really has an aura

and his jowly kicked spaniel demeanour does him no favours.

He’s probably really nice if you spoke to him a bit,

may have just been dumped or his work life is a little shit.

Either way, none approach and he doesn’t try to bridge

the ridge of conversation, just sits cold as a fridge.

I see a flicker of a pink in his silent, depressing tomb.

A lottery ticket; every dog has his day. I really hope his comes soon.

The Sand Crab

Hundred of freckled young

Flail on a mother’s body,

Bury her when she rests

Exposed on the sand.

Surrounded, she is

A mass of life rolling

On the tides, sometimes crashing.

It is the clinging of her young,

The clinging , now

That is important.

Another time

It will be letting go.

MARY SLOCUM

Semi-colon

ostentatious,

overused-- and yet

semi-colon;

you wink at

me from the white

& your flagellum

smile

has

got

me.

STEPHANIE DAVIES

Scarborough

The graveyard was just as cold as standing naked in his bedroom had

been. Barely a sun to be seen; the North Sea pushed and pushed at him

as he wandered passed weathered headstones, on the side of the cliff. He

didn’t bother to read the names on the graves; he knew exactly where he

was headed.

The cemetery was no longer in use; its function had shifted from a place

to feel grief to a place to feel melancholy. He walked passed two sitting

teenagers, black hair, black clothing, kissing passionately against a tomb.

Grass crunched beneath his feet.

The grave of Anne Bronte was the best kept in the cemetery; its polished

marble head stone had clearly been cleaned recently and fresh flowers

adorned the ground around it. He stopped just in front of it and read the

many inscriptions, all of which he would forget by the time he got home.

Tentatively, he took the Casio d800 calculator from his pocket, showed

it to the head stone and then placed it on top as previously directed. He

waited.

Standing there, with cold permeating his jacket and moisture sweeping

into his socks, he wondered what to do now.

‘There you go’, he said to nobody. Nobody answered.

In the distance he heard a seagull cry, a car engine start, a child squeal.

His hands ached in the biting icy wind. His eyes stung. He thought he

HOWARD MOSLEY-CHALK

better go but was concerned that somebody might steal the precariously

placed calculator.

‘Excuse me?’ he called over to the entwined Goths. ‘Sorry to disturb

you…’

‘Yeah?’ grunted the male, disentangling himself from his partner’s lips.

‘Will you be here for long?’

‘Maybe. Who’s asking?’ The boy demanded, delicately brushing several

strands of jet black hair from his brow.

‘It’s just’, he said, carefully choosing his words,’ I wondered if you

wouldn’t mind keeping an eye on this calculator; make sure nobody

pinches it.’

The female chirped up; black lipstick flapping with words: ‘Why you

leaving it there?’

‘I was asked to’, he said, not lying to anyone, ‘by… Will you watch it?

And crows as well; they might have a go.’

‘Yeah, whatever.’ They said together, laughing and already resuming

their embrace. He thought he heard them call him a name, but knew bet-

ter than to challenge them. After all, they were right.

He hopped over a stone wall to avoid walking past the pair, and ven-

tured into Scarborough.

The Washing Up

Once upon a time they had a dishwasher but the dishwasher broke and

they didn’t have enough money to replace it so the dishwasher sat un-

used in the kitchen, where a machine that didn’t work was preferable to

a space, and he returned to washing up manually as he had years before,

when he was young.

When the dishwasher broke, he was angry because the idea of washing

up felt like a chore - and his list of chores, the things he simply had to do

each day, felt, in his mind, when he thought about it, like a teetering pile

of unwashed plates, teetering to the extent that one more plate was likely

to bring the whole lot crashing down.

The reality of washing up was, however, quite different. He would re-

turn from work, sometimes cold and sometimes wet and sometimes

rained on, and sometimes he would cook, if his wife was not cooking,

and he would sit, with his wife and with the children, and they would

eat and talk about their days - and sometimes he would shout, because

the children could get fractious or excitable at the dining table and, at

the best of times, what actually got eaten was up for debate (with each

of the children making deals and lobbying for a specific amount of bites

before they were officially done) such that it often wasn’t until he stood,

PETER WILD

with his hands plunged wrist deep in the soapy basin, that he felt as if he

could breathe out and start to relax.

And so it became one of his things, the washing up. Each night he would

be the one to wash up the dishes after they had all eaten while his wife

ferried the children upstairs for their bath. Each night, he would stand

there, in the kitchen by the sink, sometimes listening to music and some-

times not, washing the plates and the cutlery and the pans, his hands in

the warm water and his wrists covered in suds, his mind comfortably

elsewhere, doing what needed to be done without any other immediate

concern pressing in on his consciousness.

At the weekend, he would stand in the kitchen by the sink doing the

washing up in daylight and he liked this, standing there, staring out

of the window as he transferred shiny plates and sparkling forks and

wooden spoons and grill parts and cups and glasses and baby bottles

and lunchboxes and cereal bowls and all manner of household effluvia

from the sink onto the draining board, all the while watching the world

go by outside.

Not that the world could really be said to go by outside because, from

his position at the sink in the kitchen, all he could really see was his

own back garden and the walls of his closest neighbours. Six or eight

houses away there was a telegraph pole from which wires sprouted like

the spokes on a wheel and beyond that, at the very limit of what was pos-

sible, there was a tall tree, he didn’t know what kind, in which he could

see a nest, at any time of the year, amidst the leaves or the bare branches.

And so this is where he stood. This was his place. In the kitchen by the

sink with his hands plunged wrist deep into warm soapy water doing

the washing up. This is where he was to be found, each night, at around

six, and also at the weekend, early in the morning, early in the after-

noon, early in the evening, doing the washing up. He did the washing up

and he watched his garden as it passed through autumn and winter and

spring and summer, leaves and twigs giving way to ice and snow which

in their turn gave way to green shoots and cracked earth.

The years passed by and many things changed. His children grew up, for

instance, and eventually left home. He and his wife passed into comfort-

able decrepitude. The house they thought they would only ever occupy

for at most ten years turned out to be the house in which they grew old.

Life was as you expect it to be, full of ups and downs, health scares, mon-

ey worries and what-have-you but, through it all, his doing the washing

up was a kind of solace, offering a beknighted calm, each night, shortly

after they had finished eating.

The day came, however, when he was no longer around to do the wash-

ing up. Who can say what happened? One evening he was there, as

usual, and the next he was not. The washing up was not done. Food

begrimed plates piled up. Dirty cutlery stood huddled together in un-

washed glasses. Pans sat around wondering what the hell was going

on. The basin stood empty, on its side, beneath the taps. The house was

quiet. The washing up was not done.

At first, no-one thought anything of it. The washing up was not done.

Big deal. Many people don’t do the washing up at night. Many people

leave it until the following morning. In some houses, the washing up

can be left for a whole weekend. It isn’t the end of the world. And so the

washing up was not done. The unwashed pile of plates and cutlery grew,

nobody knew how, because, after all, the house was quiet and empty, the

people who lived here were elsewhere - where? we don’t know.

Days passed and the counter-top filled with unwashed crockery. When

the counter-top reached its limit the washing up moved to the floor, tee-

tering ziggurats of plates making their way from the orange ceramic tiles

his wife had picked up on a holiday in Spain up to just shy of the ceiling.

Washing up, more washing up than the house had ever seen, more wash-

ing up than was feasibly possible, given what they owned, given what

the kitchen cupboards could contain, marching from the sink through

the kitchen and, gradually into the living room.

Unseen, the washing up came to fill every available space, even so much

as a tiny chink allowing room for another tea spoon or an egg cup or a

chopstick. When the house was full, the washing up took a step into the

street, the space suddenly available to the washing up making it both

eager and nervous, like an agraphobic taking the proverbial bull by the

horns. Neighbours remarked on how curious it was, the washing up on

the drive, how it seemed to grow day by day. What was that about?

It wasn’t long, however, before the washing up had filled the drive. Al-

though it would have been difficult for anyone to know, the speed with

which the washing up filled the drive was more than double the speed

with which it had filled a comparable space in the house. At some point,

possibly, there will be scientific studies. Perhaps in the future a scientist

will describe the house and the outside world as host organisms, distinct

from one another.

When the washing up reached the garden gate, suddenly all bets were

off. Without a solid perimeter - like a kitchen counter top or a garden

wall - to inhibit growth, the washing up started to expand in all direc-

tions, left and right down the pavement, forward into the street and

up, spilling over the garden wall and into the neighbouring yards. The

neighbours did not like this. They emerged from their houses and stood,

in the street, with their hands on their hips, tutting and shaking their

heads. The neighbours had always suspected there was something not

right about the house from which the washing up emerged.

Telephone calls were made. Emails were sent. Official visits were de-

manded. Still the pile of washing up grew unimpeded. Plans were

hatched. Certain neighbours attempted to reroute the path of the wash-

ing up. Certain neighbours attempted to destroy the washing up with

brooms and small hand axes reserved for breaking ice or cutting wood.

Certain neighbours yelled and pointed and asked what the world was

coming to. Still the washing up grew.

A dry spell - during which the meaty tang of the washing up rose to greet

the neighbours as they awoke each morning - was broken by torrential

rain and the neighbours who hovered by their net curtains wondered

if, in fact, rain was what was required. It was dirty washing up, after

all. Perhaps all that was needed was water. If the dirty washing up was

clean, perhaps that would be the end of it. Those days were long gone,

though.

Nothing stopped the washing up. First, the immediate neighbours

packed up. They were going to go and stay with relations down south

until the whole thing blew over. They didn’t know what the world was

coming to. Then their immediate neighbours and then their immedi-

ate neighbours and then their immediate neighbours and then the en-

tire street found temporary accommodation elsewhere. The washing up

claimed the street.

The story made the local news. The washing up that swallowed a street.

Questions were asked. What happened to the man who once did the

washing up? Where had he gone? Did anyone know? It wasn’t like any-

one had ever thanked him but they thought he knew how much it was

appreciated, his doing the washing up. Had he taken off to spite them?

Was this his doing? Was this his way of saying, you’ll notice me when

I’m gone? Nobody knew for sure. But still, the washing up grew, filling

a postcode like a snowdrift.

This is where you find us. We’re watching the washing up as it grows,

hour by hour and day by day. There is a website devoted to it. You can

check it out. There are satellite pictures. Some experts say the washing

up is an organism and some say the washing up is a virus, as rapacious

as Ebola. They don’t know if it’s catching. We’re all just watching. Watch-

ing and hoping that one day, something will happen.

Erin Britton has all of her teeth and most of her marbles.

Will Buckingham writes philosophy and fiction. Sometimes he gets confused and forgets which is which. His novel, Cargo Fever, is published by Tindal Street Press.

Displaced Australian, Stephanie Davies, has taken a year out from her course in English Literature to work in the glorious oxymoron that is public relations. She enjoys semi-colons almost as much as Sam.

Guinevere Glasfurd-Brown tells us she is a mother, lover, worker, wife. At least that’s who she thinks she is. In practice it’s more like – worker, worker, mother, wife. Writer in-between times. Published by Mslexia and The Scotsman.

Rob Haughton is the co-founder of Trashed Organ and general miscreant. He has been writing prose and performance poetry since an early age; a by-prod-uct of hormones and the idea it would make him disirable to the opposite sex. After the hormones subsided and the idea proved fruitless he carried on writ-ing and performing, because his coffee-stained imagination and warped take on the world wouldn’t let him get a real job.

Rich Ives has received grants and awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, Artist Trust, Seattle Arts Commission and the Coordinating Council of Literary Magazines for his work in poetry, fiction, editing, publishing, transla-tion and photography. His writing has appeared in Verse, North American Re-view, Massachusetts Review, Northwest Review, Quarterly West, Iowa Review, Poetry Northwest, Virginia Quarterly Review and many more. He is the 2009 winner of the Francis Locke Memorial Poetry Award from Bitter Oleander. His story collection, The Balloon Containing the Water Containing the Narrative Begins Leaking, was one of five finalists for the 2009 Starcherone Innovative Fiction Prize.

Joshua Jones is a ‘student’ at UEA. His ‘poetry’ has appeard in Succour, Gists and Piths, WTF PWM, and The View From Here, and his chapbook ‘Sigging’ is out on Silkworms Ink. He sometimes ‘involuntaily’ inverts his commas for no reason. He would like to name his first cat Derrida and to be able to write an unironic bio. He edits and runs Etcetera, which he advises you to check out.

Belica Antonia Kubareli is Greek and has published 6 novels and many short stories. Apart from writing she has translated approximately 50 books. She has studied theater, sociology and creative writing.

OUR LOVELY CONTRIBUTORS

Howard Mosley-Chalk is a writer and comedian from York. His blog, which was once described by the Police as “slander” is here: http://howardmosley-chalk.blogspot.com

Fungisayi Sasa grew up in Zimbabwe and for as long as she can remember, as enjoyed making up stories and poems. She has published a children’s book, The Search for the Perfect Head, and is currently working on a second book.

Mary Slocum has been a shipyard electrician for 17 years with a MSW, semi-retired activist. The last winner of the Portland, Artquake competition in the 90’s. and a winner of Washington State Poetry Assn. humorous poetry competi-tion in the 90’s. Has been published in Stanza, NW Literary Review, Upper Left Edge, Tradeswomen’s Network Newsletter, and Carcinogenic.

Richard Watt is a keen and unintelligible Taysider who works for a newspaper, occasionally reviewing bits and bobs. He stays in Forfar (Scotland’s secret capi-tal) with Abigail and a rabbit called Mr Eccles.

Peter Wild is the co-author of Before the Rain (published by Flax Books) and the editor of The Flash (published by Social Disease) and Perverted by Language: Fiction inspired by The Fall, The Empty Page: Fiction inspired by Sonic Youth (published in the US as Noise) and Paint a Vulgar Picture: Fiction inspired by The Smiths (soon to be published as Please), all of which were published by Serpent’s Tail. Apart from the US editions. They were published by Harper Col-lins. Peter also runs the Bookmunch site which you can look at at http://book-munch.wordpress.com

send us something tasty

www.spiltmilkmag.co.uk

We would like to thank all of the lovely writers who have kindly permitted us to publish their glorious words.

All work is copyright of the author who spawned it;all rights belong to them [we are just sharing the joy]

Images probably came from Sam

issue three - July 2010

ISSN 2044-0111