La Moustache – by Howard McKenzie-Murray
Fiction Howard McKenzie-Murray Fiction Howard McKenzie-Murray

La Moustache – by Howard McKenzie-Murray

Although the babysitter hadn’t budged on the sunlounge in 30 minutes, a singularly shitty mood radiated visibly off her. She lay supine by the pool way beyond Cancer Council recommendations under a double coat of SPF 50+. 

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Life Span – by Fiona Reilly
Nonfiction Fiona Reilly Nonfiction Fiona Reilly

Life Span – by Fiona Reilly

Every night, broad wings of black, brown and silver fluttered against my windows, drawn by the kitchen lights. Hundreds of moths scattered across the glass, forming a dark floral pattern against the inky backdrop of the night sky.

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333532 – by Ouyang Yu
Fiction Ouyang Yu Fiction Ouyang Yu

333532 – by Ouyang Yu

When a writer is reaching his year of never-never, do you know what goes through his mind on a daily basis? Even after he has lived for more than thirty years in a country that is a cultural, linguistic, political, philosophical, poetical and pathological antithesis to his home country, these things that come to haunt him remain an antithesis in themselves.

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Alhambra – by Omar Musa
Poetry Omar Musa Poetry Omar Musa

Alhambra – by Omar Musa

Mashallah —
tsk tsk tsk —
walls brim with barakas —
the Almighty’s horror vacui —
knotted Kufic, lattice-worked centuries —
rammed, iron-blooded, light-strafed earth —

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Outer Banks – by Kathleen Williams
Nonfiction Kathleen Williams Nonfiction Kathleen Williams

Outer Banks – by Kathleen Williams

Six houses collapsed into the ocean on the Outer Banks, a series of islands off North Carolina, between May and November 2024. In this area of the world, strips of houses that were once on solid ground find themselves on sand due to coastal erosion. I discover these houses through TikTok. Their immense, shuddering structures collapsing into the ocean are captivating, seductive. I wonder if it’s somehow appealing on a class level, if we’re all hiding smirks while watching the upstairs gentry implode from the downstairs quarters.

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The humming – by Meisha Simpson
Fiction Meisha Simpson Fiction Meisha Simpson

The humming – by Meisha Simpson

In the sea, a wolfish grin. The oily head of a seal, whiskers dripping and twitching. The wave, curling the seal with it, one body in motion. Flex, release, and slide with the wave like a seed from a pod. Rolling water, shattering, splintering.

On the shore, a boy and a girl. The boy is on his knees, digging a hole. The girl is brushing sand from her wet purple tights. There’s a dark shape to the left of them, a lump of brown, scaly with sand, a golden strand of seaweed like a wreath on its head.

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Extinctions – by Dani Netherclift
Nonfiction Dani Netherclift Nonfiction Dani Netherclift

Extinctions – by Dani Netherclift

The threat AI poses to writers and the art of writing seems to have arisen swiftly. Who threw open those doors? What is an entry? A door is an aperture to possibility. These are important concerns for a lyric essayist. There are so many ways in (and out), so many connecting silences in between. What does it mean for your calling to become extinct?

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Cold coffee – by Aboubakr Daqiq
Nonfiction Aboubakr Daqiq Nonfiction Aboubakr Daqiq

Cold coffee – by Aboubakr Daqiq

I haven’t always liked coffee. Loved the smell, just not the taste. In recent years, however, I’ve found myself more than impartial towards an occasional morning coffee – especially when paired with a delicious pastry. My poison of choice is the mocha. Often perjured by claims of inauthenticity and childlike nodes, the mocha has long been a victim of slander and ridicule. Putting aside the politics of coffee elitism, I’ve found that brewing a good mocha is no easy feat.

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The colour of perception – by Tony Barrett
Fiction Tony Barrett Fiction Tony Barrett

The colour of perception – by Tony Barrett

Robbie was a volunteer driver. His first pick-up was in Warrane, a largely public housing suburb on Hobart’s eastern shore. Reno, a cancer patient, was in his mid-seventies, though the disease made him look older. He had far more reason than Robbie to think his day had begun badly, but he didn’t. He’d been a concreter for over fifty years, so he knew about structural weakness and had recognised it in himself long before the specialist delivered his dismal sentence.

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Fish inside a birdcage – by Samuel O'Neil Hamad
Fiction Samuel O'Neil-Hamad Fiction Samuel O'Neil-Hamad

Fish inside a birdcage – by Samuel O'Neil Hamad

‘Winkle-dink, there’s been another one.’

Winkle-dink is an unsightly albatross in his forties with a crooked foot and a mucked-up eye. He’s been off the field for ten years, but he’s still the best detective the Bureau of Investigative Research and Detection (BIRD) has. Mr. Hamburger would trust Winkle-dink with his life and then some.

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The sobber – by Oliver Johns
Fiction Oliver Johns Fiction Oliver Johns

The sobber – by Oliver Johns

Crying is a skill, and I do it exceptionally well. So well, it’s scary. I can’t exactly remember when I first shed a tear. There’s a collection of abstract images: a dropped Cornetto, an overly aggressive peacock, gravelly skinned kneecaps. But they fade in and out. All these memories have melded into a crystallised mound of bad days, something I would need to hack at with a pickaxe – or therapy – but who needs that?

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Gravity – by Morgan Kelly
Fiction Morgan Kelly Fiction Morgan Kelly

Gravity – by Morgan Kelly

He finished his fourth Coke and slumped onto an elbow and a palm. There was nothing new to look at on Countenance – he’d checked. Six times. In the last half hour. Anyone he might have complained to was in bed, go figure. The guys who had dragged him out here had long ago vanished into different corners of the bar. He called them his ‘mates’ in the same sense you might say ‘thanks, mate’ to a stranger. They were the people he saw most often, certainly, but they weren’t his friends.

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Once inside – by Maddie Goss
Fiction Maddie Goss Fiction Maddie Goss

Once inside – by Maddie Goss

He sits in front of a fire, almost life, in a house, a patchwork of frayed could-haves and has-beens. The anger that was once inside is now outside, and the man that was once out there is now in here.

So is the dog, waiting inside to go out.

Once, when the man was boy, he ran and played, small hands tugged, pulled, patted fur and ears with fingers always salty. Now, man smells like something that is not life, pours it down his throat and throws it into the fire. No little hands, no salty fingers.

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Parasites make red pearls – by Lucy Haughton
Fiction Lucy Haughton Fiction Lucy Haughton

Parasites make red pearls – by Lucy Haughton

It was their sixth year at school and the first person in their class, Strillia, had started to Bleed. Conversations erupted in every corner as the children debated when and where they were going to Bleed. Luna took it upon herself to bring her mother’s nail polish in and paint Strillia’s nails all the shades of blood. Crimson red, magenta, deep brown, and baby pink proudly covered Strillia’s fingers for the entire week.

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Flotsam on the drift – by Lonnie Dalton
Fiction Lonnie Dalton Fiction Lonnie Dalton

Flotsam on the drift – by Lonnie Dalton

Upon the frothing current rode splintered ships, barnacled barrels, and one wayward soul.

Crengston lounged on his makeshift raft, whistling out of tune. To be on the drift was a marvellous thing – to be truly detached, basking in nothingness. These waters were strange, but peaceful. The brown, fragrant sea gave the sensation of spiralling down, down towards some unseen centre.

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