Flying Island

Dear Flying Island Readers: Welcome to the 12.26 Edition of the Flying Island Journal! In this edition we publish poems by P.C. Taverez , Ollie Sikes , M.J. Arcangelini , Breanna Sobecki , and Gilbert Arzola .  Inspired to send us your fiction, poetry, or creative nonfiction? For more info on how to submit, see the tab above. Thank you for reading, Flying Island Editors and Readers All images are sourced from the Canva library from various artists. 

Madrigal for a Mackerel   Remember how You dressed This flesh  The onion skirt Sipped slightly Wine of white Shine of light In metal tab Finger lift The tomato The olive Nothing more Lemon juice  Splashed gash  That’s the sting  Mackerel my heart Cram my love  Into this tin shell Where none  Is left that  Felt the sea  No deception  Or obscurity Only waiting  For the air  The cracker The mouth - P. C. Tavarez P. C. Tavarez is a Cuban-Dominican poet living in the Midwest. Born in Miami, she writes about love, grief, mental health, survival, and the mess of being human. Her first two books, That’s Not Love, That’s a Live Grenade (2021) and Love in Winter, Alive in Spring (2024), were self-published. Her newest chapbook, I’m Sorry, I’m Just a Girl (Pure Sleeze Press, 2025), is her most vulnerable work yet. Tavarez writes with her heart open, carving poems out of struggle and resilience, always reaching for honesty. Her words ar...

Recipe for a Dallasite Looking for Love in Indy Forget the taste of love first. Or rather get used to tasting text breakups. Whataburger lovers. Football boys who ask for blowjobs in your parents' bathrooms. Try Indy instead. Meander in miso ramen. McDonald's. Lovers who leave you with nothing but salt. Enter senior year solo. Grow stale from months of frozen foods. Which come after years of same old meals and men. Which come after a lifetime of self-unworthiness. Because queers were never meant to eat. Then,  him. Let your tongue soak up the Indy in him. The real Indy. Its flavor-filled menagerie. Salty  Shake Shack burgers and fries. Citrusy liquor-store soju. Sugary Lincoln Square pancakes.  Savory Ambrosia spaghetti. He brings you this hidden buffet. This solar system of several tastes. He sits at the center. The main course. Feel starved again despite having gorged. Savor not just  these planet-sized bites. Chase the sun who arouses your appetite. - Ollie Sikes ...

Bayside Morning The surface of Lake Huron, across St. Martin Bay, ground perfectly smooth with a diamond chip sander. Driftwood stumps and branches, mirrored twins in the shallow water. Overcast sky brushed in pale pink, with which the lake agrees. On the bed, atop the comforter, he lies naked on his belly, which expands, contracts with his gentle snores, encouraged by the serene water, still air. Lake and sky all but indistinguishable except where an artist has begun to sketch out a horizon in grey chalk. - M. J. Arcangelini M. J. Arcangelini, (b.1952, Pennsylvania) resides in northern California. He has published extensively in both print and online formats, and in more than a dozen anthologies. He is the author of 8 published collections, the most recent of which are the full-length Pawning My Sins , (Luchador Press, 2022), and the chapbooks Fierce Kisses (Rebels & Squares Press, 2024) and Hooking Up (Pure Sleaze Press, 2025). He has been nominated twice for a Pushcart Prize.

Speak through Seed  —after Hadara Bar-Nadav’s “Death by Design” Within our world I am  a secret to some  a secret to none.  I dream to run  by the pinked water  through choices, past pasts  I lost the light  candle, path, pain  still cries to me.  “Indiana” of Lenker & Meek  grand reminders hanged  high treason for change— Chug along,  push along,  play-along crescendo  to reincarnation— By wing my kin  goes seed to soil to sky to rafter  By brushstroke my omen  goes to speak to pry to seek to look after.  - Brenna Sobecki Brenna Sobecki is currently an undergraduate at Indiana State University. Brenna is a Northwest Indiana native who has lived all over the Hoosier state. When not writing, Brenna can usually be found hiking in the Indiana Dunes or spending quality time with their cat, Twig. Their poem “Gerascophobia” has been published in Tipton Poetry Journal .

The Puzzle Of Buttons every morning my mother chose his clothes. laying them flat on the freshly made bed. since his second stroke took part of him, every morning she did it.  because he could not solve the puzzle of buttons.  the mystery of tying shoes, or remember  how to walk out a door.  so my mother helped.  because she remembered everything. and with automatic hands tended to the chores, her eyes staring out at something else;  narrowing against the morning’s glare coming through the kitchen window, she helped the man she had married half a century ago  remember how to keep shirts together  and things in their place.    - Gilbert Arzola Winner of the 2019 Passager Poetry Contest and the 2021 Rattle Poetry Chapbook Contest, Gilbert Arzola has been nominated twice for a Pushcart Award. His full-length poetry collection is Prayers Of Little Consequence (Passager Books, 2019) and his poetry chapbook is The Death of a Migrant ...