CONFRONTING THE DEMON OF HIDDEN THINGS, by David Sklar: On a winter day, at a mountain’s feet, from a dream more ancient than language, three men went out to stand against the darkness within the darkness: the Oak Man with a bamboo staff, the Reed Man with a staff of oak, the Water Man with […]

GILGAMESH (WHAT THE SUMERIANS SEEM TO HAVE MISSED) by David Sklar: When first I sought my brother in the Kingdom of the Dead, I did not know exactly what I hoped to find. Not forgiveness, for I did not put him there. Not an apology; he did not put me here. But when I walked […]

MIGHTIER THAN, by Keith Kennedy: Pile on — brothers of carnage add your rage, make pure your lust for death. In times of consequence, let there be no other reason but the one that delivers blood. Feed off the ache of a dulled blade, as it moans, loosed from its housing once more, to create […]

I SHALL NOT DIE HERE (BALLADE OF A WARRIOR BOUND), by Jason M. Waltz: Pulled taut, Oh! so painfully taut, cold links stretched tight — chains draped in quantities self-wrought. Loathed, debased, abused — endless pains never dimming, never hiding darker stains of iniquities untold, retold, sold ado . . . All lost; empty favors […]

LAMENT FOR THE FATHERS, by Joshua Hampton: Heed me, Sons of the Fathers, huddled round the great hall’s hearth, let’s hear such tales of war and woe, of kin and kind unlike us, once told on false fiddles and lying lyres strung with catgut slanders, screaming sweet songs of dreadful deeds never to be undone […]