Exterminating Angel Press

Creative Solutions for Practical Idealists.

poem

Advice.

by

by Marissa Bell Toffoli.

Easy to give,
hard to take.
I’m collecting
wise words
like buttons
in a jar.
Shook up–
how they rattle
before settling in.
Pick one, test
the weight of it
in your hand.
Try another,
try them all.
Hem and haw,
and sew a new
design. Plan
for things to go
agley. Autumn
is a waking dream,
fallen leaves,
buttoning down
the path.

Advice to the Distressed.

by

by Barry Vitcov. Filled with the allure of double rainbows, my dreams are often in technicolor; sometimes fanciful with bright lights aglow, other times a transparent watercolor. Your dreams are nightmares filled with fear and dread, the kind that wake you in the chill of night and cause you to shake yourself from your bed […]

when the stars align chaos reigns.

by

by JW James. even with your eyes wide open you will take the wrong road this is the road of blizzards and fandom your eyes are bloodshot you sing anthems tonight that seem endless this is the wrong road at the right time you lose car keys and fall in love this is the uncheckered […]

Before you know it you’re pretty much dead.

by

by Gale Acuff. and in the Afterlife, Heaven or Hell or a third place if there is one and if there isn’t then that doesn’t seem very fair or democratic but what do I know, I’m only ten years old, Eternity gets left to the grownups, I guess, but one day I’ll be one, a […]

How to Lose.

by

by Joanie Terrizzi. You can argue (wrestle) (wail) (fight) (rail) against reality. And continue to flail in waters made for drowning. Or you can fill your lungs with breath find your floating back and stare breathless at the starry sky no matter how the waters churn. Reality wins every time. You can soften your heart […]

The Last Night There.

by

by Richard LeDue. Beer kept cold in the kitchen sink with ice because the fridge was too important to leave behind, my wife and I slept on an air mattress in the living room, while the rest of the house was empty as a waiting grave, and the last crumbs we swept up meant more […]

The sookies.

by

by DS Maolalai. my uncle had hands strong as wood, sawn from an old cork tree. knuckles and tufts stiff as knots on a riverboat siding and children as tough as him, gristly and growing as strong. it must have been strange for him, showing this city child animals which he kept for nothing but […]

Grandfathered In.

by

by Katherine Olsen. The alcohol running through my veins started in my grandfather’s. Who said that my inheritance would only come from grandma’s side? I never understood why my father would never watch us playing catch, I couldn’t understand why mom sent me off to grandpa, made me ask. My skinned knees trophies of athleticism, […]

Small Game.

by

by Robert Estes. I only shot at an animal once It was a lucky shot Not for the rabbit who was disabled by it, lay there giving out with that distress cry I’d only heard as a blown fox-hunters’ call before: now seen as authentic My friend finished it off with the gun butt Good […]

Mother May I.

by

by John Van Pelt. There’s always red, double-deckers resolved from fog and granite, the boy’s glasses blearing city lights in slashes of impasto, no holiday cheer but reaches his ears in a sodden frenzy, clots of pleasantries pinched off by tinkling bells, muted all beneath the threadbare coverlet of incessant rain. He’s late to a […]