APOCALYPSE CONFIDENTIAL

a journal of edgy extrapolations, fringe fascinations, occult obsessions, risky ruminations, and aberrant associations.

ON THE BLINK

APOCALYPSE CONFIDENTIAL

— Dia VanGunten explores overlaps between genres, between poetry & prose, between real & magical. VanGunten’s CNF can be found in Polyestor, Outlander, Cringe, Kinda Weird Magazine, Solstice Lit, Run Amok Books, Deadbeat Poets and Soft Star.  For more, see IG @pinkzombierose, or www.pinkzombierose.com  — Beppi is a fine artist/comic book illustrator & more living in ON THE BLINK

“NO TAKERS”

APOCALYPSE CONFIDENTIAL

This body is god’s burner phone to reach uDot dot dot now if only i couldDial but who tf remembersIn all this rage at life–denuded,Cracked plane. Phone limits emotionTo the speed that I canReach u, limns urgencyIn the scrabble of text-drunkThumbs, our privateAvant-garde, even ifEven if no data, no takersNor livid eyes. Now that dyingIs “NO TAKERS”

MIDNIGHT IN LOVE

APOCALYPSE CONFIDENTIAL

A Patrick Midnight Tale Patrick Midnight was in a foul mood by the time he reached the mansion. His much-needed vacation, which had been promised to him after the disastrous affair in Portuguese Guinea, came to an early termination on the orders of the Society of Gentlemen Geographers. Specifically, Graf von Eberling, a claimant to MIDNIGHT IN LOVE

KISSING THE ROBOT

APOCALYPSE CONFIDENTIAL

She arrived disoriented as usual at the workshop to see the head engineer. Every morning she awoke with her dead husband’s kiss lingering on her mouth. It was the same today. But the guy she privately called the tinkerer wasn’t there yet. His assistant shooed her into the far corner as if to get her KISSING THE ROBOT

JIMMY’S MOTHER DIED

APOCALYPSE CONFIDENTIAL

Jimmy was sweating in the midsummer heat, counting all the places he used to work at as he passed them. Tending bar at The Friar, waiting tables at Chef Bianco’s and Eleganza, several taxi companies he identified by cab markings as they beeped and honked their way through the congested street. He stopped to wipe JIMMY’S MOTHER DIED

GET THAT NUT!

APOCALYPSE CONFIDENTIAL

Dan Baltic’s NUTCRANKR is one of the funniest books I have ever read. Maybe the funniest. I don’t remember laughing harder at a novel. It’s funny enough that as I read it from my lofty throne beside a roaring bonfire like the oracles of old, I, indeed, startled my loyal canine companion from his stalwart GET THAT NUT!

CUPID’S DAGGER

APOCALYPSE CONFIDENTIAL

Mrs. Valentine studied Billie’s rosy skin as it soaked in lavender-scented bathwater. Wet strands of brown hair drifted across the young woman’s mouth. Billie blew them off, then smirked drunkenly as she pushed a bar of Ivory soap around on her chest before lifting an arm out of the milky water to lather its pit CUPID’S DAGGER

“CORNUCOPIA”

APOCALYPSE CONFIDENTIAL

For Lady Asterion “Your love’s a horn of plenty, heavy and rank with juices. Orange and red ripe gourds plump out of it. Can one man sop such sluices? Zeus’ goat Pumped putrid pap through dry dugs by comparison. Thicker Food than Rome’s twins split while She-wolf would sit Brooding: I’ll lap that liquor. The “CORNUCOPIA”

COMFORT STATION

APOCALYPSE CONFIDENTIAL

The first good thing about these places is you can get pills with no hassle. Getting pills with no hassle in the US is its own hassle. I’m talking about walking up to the pharmacy, asking for 100 Viagra, and handing over two USD. They don’t even need you to convert. The dollar will be COMFORT STATION

BATHWATER

APOCALYPSE CONFIDENTIAL

As long as she could remember she had known she could never be a woman. She was born female, and would always be female, but she could never be a woman for a man, or for a child, or for anything else. If she were such a thing, she would not have been born with BATHWATER