LUMINOX + Waymarkers, elsewhere (IV)
new poetry and fiction, only available in print
Hello to you all,
It’s been 9 months since I did one of these roundups, and there are now nearly 1,900 of you subscribed to this strange journal of mine(!) which is staggering and lovely. Thank you for being here.
LUMINOX — poetry chapbook
My debut poetry chapbook LUMINOX, featuring my best visual poems plus some prose-poetry about science and faith and doubt and darkness and battling towards the light, is now available for sale! The art-poems I’ve been sharing here over the past few years are some of my most popular work, and I’m glad to see them gathered in one, physical volume.
The pre-orders for LUMINOX were very strong, so there are only about a dozen copies left! The publisher does small batch printings, making this an exclusive piece of print media to own. There’s no guarantee there will be more printings, so if you’re interested in owning a physical copy of my best visual poems, please order ASAP.
Here are some sample images of what you can expect:
New Fiction
Some of the best short fiction I’ve written over the past 12 months has found a home in three delightful print publications. You all know how much I value print media (which is why paid subscribers receive physical mail-outs of my writing), so I wanted to give you a taste of these three stories and provide links where you can buy the actual publications. These are stories about faith and love and sin and redemption and corporate sabotage and time travel and guns and fathers and sons. So basically everything you could want in a short story.
Please go and buy these journals / mags / anthologies and support independent print media (and also become a paid subscriber to Waymarkers).
‘Summer of Amnesty’ in PARADOXA by Solid Food Press
I’m at the police station, queuing to the desk with the plexiglass screens. It’s not what you think, I’m not in any trouble. There’s some buyback scheme on. Nothing official, but word got around that the new police chief was letting anyone who had unregistered firearms come and surrender them for cash. And not just guns, it was any unregistered or illegal weapon. Usually hearing ‘cash for guns’ means Roddy’s pawn shop is trying to drum up business, but I always feel scummy going to Roddy’s. Besides, John works at the station and he said it was legit. They were handing out cheques every day and the copier room had been converted into an emergency storage cupboard for all the guns being handed in.
I get to the front of the line and my body relaxes a little because John’s behind the desk. Not that I was nervous, but it doesn’t feel right standing in a room full of cops with an unlicensed pistol in your hand. But I’ve known John for years, he’s one of my oldest friends, and one of the few that stuck around here. Nearly everyone else our age ended up on the coast. John and I used to run in the same crew — a bunch of young guys messing around on dirt bikes and drinking cheap whisky down on Lakeshore Drive. Most of those guys are gone, either to the cities or really gone, taken by stupid accidents or having too much of a good thing. John fought his way back to the straight and narrow, got in shape just enough to pass the police cadet course, and then let himself go all over again. He sometimes plays Santa at the school Christmas shows, so that gives you an idea of the kind of middle-aged soft cop that John is now. If they ever asked me to be in the school play, they’d have to invent a new Christmas character. Something like ‘Stringy the Elf’ or ‘The Ghost of Christmas Lanky’. I look older and thinner and harder than I am.
But I’m friends with the guy, so I’m not too worried as I’m stepping up with the unloaded .45 cradled in my hand. I’m acting like it’s just something casual I came to show my buddy.
‘Sins of the Afterfather’ in Volume 1 of ECLOGUE PRESS
I’m in Trivandrum for a few days before I make contact with Kathika about the heritage museum, through a series of cousins and aunts and cousins-of-cousins and aunts-of-aunts and cousins-of-aunts and aunts-of-cousins. One of these aunts or cousins or aunt-cousin hybrids gives me the name of the café by the beach and a time of day, so I get there early and park myself under the wheezing air conditioning unit while I wait. I scroll through the feeds of six different news and social media apps before Kathika finally arrives and beckons me to where an autorickshaw is idling.
As we speed down the potholed roads, Kathika is snipping at the driver in Malayalam. I can’t understand a word, but I assume she’s giving him directions and a firm idea of the fare she’s willing to pay. Then Kathika turns and bores her dark eyes into my skull.
Kathika: How do you know about the museum?
Me: It’s part of my membership with ColonialHeritage. I get free entry and access to their archives all over the world.
Kathika: You’re looking for a record of your forefathers? In India?
Me: Yeah, they were here for generations. My grandfather was born here. His family left when he was a teenager.
Kathika’s face is blank so I keep talking.
Me: I’m actually named after the first of my ancestors who came to India. In the seventeen-hundreds.
Kathika: He was with the East India Company?
Me: Yeah, he was a mercenary.
She frowns then turns to look out at the backwater canals blurring past us.
‘Ruminate, Inc.’ in Masculine by Bad Clown Books
The Steering Committee is like the bridge of a ship, that’s what Godfrey always says. But this ship has a rat sitting with us in the bridge. And I know who they are, and Godfrey doesn’t know that I know.
Godfrey knows there’s a rat because he planned to fire Martha before she took maternity leave. But Martha published the plan on her LinkedIn before the Steering Committee could implement it; she had documents proving the whole thing. The plan was for her to be caught accessing Godfrey’s own personnel file, specifically his financial records, which would be accidentally-on-purpose linked in an email. Right about now she should have been packing up her desk and handing back her laptop, crying and holding her pregnant belly, but instead she’s on podcasts quoting Godfrey’s exact words from the last Steering Committee meeting.
G: She won’t be able to resist the temptation to see all my bits and pieces.
Gross. I winced when he said that, then recorded it in the meeting minutes.
Back to rats and ships. Some traditions describe Noah’s ark as perfectly round, a giant coracle holding life afloat during the floods. I imagine the ark as a panopticon, dark and musty, the animals under constant observation. Old man Noah sitting in the centre, flitting his eye over all the beasts. A few shards of light knifing the gloom. Who sees more than the man at the centre of the panopticon? Only the spider. Throwing up webs in the upper corners, manifold eyes peering through the dark. Silver threads catching whatever delicate light can be found. To be a spider then is the only way to survive a company like Ruminate. To spin our delicate lines toward those who would help us, then to scuttle and hide and watch. To pray that our threads will hold onto what little light remains.
Thank you again for being such great supporters of my writing and the wider Waymarkers project. There’s much more ahead (*cough* debut novel *cough*) and I count myself fortunate to walk each step of this journey with you all.
Here’s to going futher up and further in together.
You get to be in the same magazine issue as Guy Gavriel Kay. Jealous..
Brilliant snippets there! Want to read all of them for sure ...