Cold Rambler

The liquor store security guard seems bothered. Like he knows it is only a matter of time. This is how the alarm clock has always made me feel. I understand this man. Though we are strangers in a most real sense. I'd probably hate the guy if we ever sat down to have a beer. Come to think of it, the liquor store security guard looks like a real asshole. Probably pisses in public pools an pushes old ladies in the subway. Yellow under the nails like Shakespearean sonnets. That breath mint way of lying.   Ryan Quinn Flanagan is a Canadian-born author residing in Elliot Lake, Ontario, Canada with his wife and many mounds of snow.  His work can be found both in print and online in such places as: Evergreen Review, The New York Quarterly, Horror Sleaze Trash, Cold Rambler, Zygote in My Coffee, Rusty Truck and The Oklahoma Review.

Upon a heart's once-promising horizon. I know that all too familiar emptiness that burns within my very soul. I am a pawn shop's promise as I have sold my soul to stand a shell where once was a man. I hide behind a mask as none could bear the burden of the vision that is me. Tears of the blood of the vacant stare pour freely as I die slowly. When the sun sets every time, there is less of me to be found upon its return. Soon, only the mask will remain to be discovered, Of the person who was never truly me.   John Patrick Robbins, is a Southern Gothic writer hus work has been published in. Disturb The Universe, Piker Press, Impspired Magazine, Lothlorien Poetry Journal, Fixator Press and here at Cold Rambler. His work is often dark and always unfiltered.

Annabel had been a Social Worker for a good many years. She’d seen it all, or so she’d thought. And then she met the artist. Neighbours had reported concerns, but were somewhat vague about the problems. She called round anyway. Annabel was like that. She was old school, didn’t work to rule. The artist’s house was large and a bit crumbly, dirty and decrepit, rather like the artist herself, Annabel thought and she didn’t chance the cup of tea, when offered. There were paintings stacked up everywhere and, in the corner of one room, a large whitish sculpture. It towered upwards almost up to the ceiling. Annabel walked round it pondering it’s strange shape and texture. The artist laughed, saying, “That’s not a sculpture! Years ago I had a dog and never got round to house-training it. That’s dog shit! I piled it up. It went dry, then solid, then whitish over the years! And here it still is.” Back at the office Annabel reported, there was no cause for concern. Time passed. The artist died. An...

There are a lot of dried tears Left with any vintage carpet Aged like style and subtle Dead people smiling approval at me From the tabletops and mantles This room smells Like the inside of a brand-new tennis shoe California is burning again I slept through breakfast    William S. Tribell is an award winning American poet, musician, sometimes actor and cautionary tale. He currently stays in Nashville.

It was the death rattle I've heard about. You can't breathe. You find yourself hanging on by a thread. An iron lung was helping me breathe, it was shaped like a coffin. I wasn't ready to die. Double pneumonia was almost the death of me. Mary Bone has been writing poetry and short stories since childhood. She has written two books of poetry. Some of her recent poems can be found at Poetry Catalog, The Whiskey River Review, Backchannels Journal, The Academy of the Heart and Mind, and upcoming at Literary Revelations.

 I got home from work, showered and changed, and immediately ordered an Uber. One minute before he was scheduled to pick me up, I remember the driver I had a while back—an old, overweight war vet—who refused to engage in small talk, but had the back of his front seats covered with badly printed right wing propaganda—ranging from typical conspiracy stuff (OBAMA=ANTICHRIST) to the intimidating (“You stomp my flag, I'll stomp your ass!”) That was just a normal day - this day, on the other hand, was Trump's 2020 campaign rally at Van Andel Arena. I imagined running into the same guy, or someone similar to him, and having to spend a 10-15 minute ride not with an antisocial conservative, but with fully-energized Trumper, doing my best to keep the small talk to a minimum so I don't have to hear their brags and rants, and so I won't get one starred because I refused to put up with their attitude. The driver pulls up - a graying, middle aged white dude—and I think, “GOD, PLEASE”...