Joseph Farley edited literary magazines such as Implosion, Axe Factory, Paper Airplane, Poetry Chain Letter, Cynic Book Review and other titles.  He has had over 1300 poems and over 135 stories published in his career to date. His poetry books and chapbooks include Suckers, Longing for the Mother Tongue, Waltz of the Meatballs, Crow of Night, and Her Eyes. His fiction books include a novel, Labor Day, and two story collections For the Birds and Farts and Daydreams.

Mixed Drinks

Your sins and my sins
Don't go well with water. 

Maybe with gin
Or vermouth.

Better with fire
That melts all things, 

Makes strange metals
Run together

Even until
The end of time.

Under the weather

There are times
when the body and the mind
are at war with each other,
each wanting what they want,
unwilling to listen
to the needs of the other,

but when you are sick,
truly ill,
both want the same thing,
just to rest and recover.

Some disasters spawn
more disasters,
but there are also times
when collapse
brings about peace.

It may be an illusion
simply meaning
you’re too weak
to fight anymore,

or it may be a whisper
of wisdom,
ideas you would not
listen to
if you were well.

Peace and decay and tragedy.
It’s all there,
wrapped up 
in the same mess.

You might as well
make the best of it.
You’re too tired
to do anything else.

Photos From The War

Grim faces of men in uniform
walking single file
along a contested border
through contested woods.
Helmets, rifles and hand grenades.
Radios, bandages and cigarettes.
Determined beings on their way
to kill invaders and die as well,
all for the land, fought over before,
so many times, so many millennium.
It’s what we do, a gift of our species,
to hurt and kill and destroy.
Heroes and sacrifices and barbarians all
feeding the rich black soil
with new layers of fertilizer.