Exterminating Angel Press

Creative Solutions for Practical Idealists.

Exangel

never mind they were wolves.

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by Chris Farago.

I was with, teaching them to
darn their own skin in case of
a mishap among the pliant furs.
one of them told me no we’re fine,
dial back the fanaticism to a three—
we’ll edit our lore and make you
an honorary wolf if you just
shut the fuck about disaster
for a few minutes.  I told them
I can’t do that:  worry is my fuel
and my being and my snuff.
I never wanted to be a wolf anyway.

what to do if you are in distress.

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by Chris Farago. lie flat. taste the earth, or tequila, or something with a connection to the future.  the world is a magic eye puzzle and you have no focus.  focus. all of your eyes are magical, so you can see anything.  look at your old smoky mezcal self and carry on.  pick up a […]

Blessings.

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by David Bolton. weeding can be good for the soul. clean sheets put the body to sleep. a hug with love cleanses the mind. kindness is a building block to wisdom. art makes for an interesting life. humility leads to clarity. poetry can touch the soul. music takes one to heaven. grandchildren keep one young. […]

The Airplane.

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by Virginia Bell. sits on the dash in the dust like a fallen angel like a mother I keep it there thin slip of balsa, the ballast of two paper wings faded, folded just so the tail as if wicked from a butterfly you made it for a boy who was not of your body […]

Strangers in strange lands.

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by Cliff Beck. Feeling the pain of injustice and loss tears run hot in the tracks etched into your face as you trudge through a desolate space hunched against a world that doesn’t care and ignores the despair which cuts to the bone trapping you in congealed emotion; disconnected, bereft and alone. You feel their […]

What I Left Behind.

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by Lana Hechtman Ayers. What I left behind was the night sea, sand cool as glass on my bare feet, the sweet smell of cedar trees ashore, a short stroll to the place I called home, the last room where you still loved me.  

The New Garden.

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by Charles Holdefer. Outskirts of Pskov, 1569   In a clearing beside a stand of birch trees, Ivan the Terrible surveyed a bubbling cauldron of rabbits and waited for his son, Fyodor the Not So Bad, to stop talking. When would he shut up? “You see, Father, a man in your position needs a pastime. […]

A Field Trip to the Dark Woods.

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by Nick Engelfried. There is a mountain range in the far northwest corner of Montana, just below the Canadian border, where trees of assorted sizes and species grow jumbled together in dense stands and the fungi and strange, pale flowers living on the forest floor exist in perpetual shade. It is a dank, twiggy forest, […]

A Blessing of Tears.

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by D. A. Hosek. They smell it before they see it: the reek of the monkey house mingled with the stench of death. They glimpse emaciated bodies of the barely distinguishable living and dead, yellow-grey skin in dirty blue and white striped unforms before the order comes down from Lieutenant Perry: The squad is to […]

How “Mother Persia” Got Made.

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by Zhinia Noorian. I was working on my PhD dissertation on the Persian female poet Parvin E’tesami, when Brian Griffith asked me to help him with his book project on the history of Iran’s women. Brian is an independent thinker and historian who is interested in women and their roles in shaping different cultures. The […]