Issue 36

Popshot Magazine

The illustrated magazine of new writing

Popshot Magazine1 min read
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Editorial
The insatiable, infectious nature of joy makes me think of music festivals, where the growl of guitars and the singing of a crowd can make even the shyest most introverted person (guilty) fling themselves off friends’ shoulders to be carried along by
Popshot Magazine1 min read
Popshot Magazine
Cover illustration by: Gracie Dahl graciedahl.com Editor: Matilda Battersby Art Editor: Stuart Selner Publisher: Simon Temlett Printed in the UK by: William Gibbons ■
Popshot Magazine1 min read
Two For Joy
I walked down to the lake to hear the ducks arguing,and everywhere I went I saw magpies, hopping two by twoon the stone steps that crown the hill, between the stone-grey curtains of the willow,along the stone-dry trails. One for sorrow, two for joy:
Popshot Magazine1 min read
Champagne Supernova
I put the champagne in the freezer as soon as we got the news.I wanted it to be cold by the time they arrived. She was hurriedly laying the table, still laughing. Three glasses. We didn’t have flutes yet. Her orders were usually tiresome.Today, thoug
Popshot Magazine3 min read
Under The Paddling Pool
The finest thing of all is to be safe from the rain beneath an upturned paddling pool. Theirs had leant against the shed since the end of summer and when the rains came down they said,“Quick, let’s get under!” The three of them huddled close, cold an
Popshot Magazine1 min read
Blanket Fort
We pushed two kitchen chairsto be book-ends in the roomand stacked our heaviestcookbooks and dictionaries,and travelogues of Norwayto hold the draped blankets in place. The flashlight was moonlight andcrunchy snacks snappedlike crickets. Under the bl
Popshot Magazine1 min read
I Want These Nights Forever
We shout ‘i bloody love you’ in each other’s faces as the pubturns the lights onlast callbut not on you and menever on usWe share chips and cans of poplock legs under the tablein full chicken shopsfluorescent lights that feel too brightand looks we i
Popshot Magazine1 min read
Apricot Jam
Another yearthe somnolent apricots are ripe in thegarden, curled upagainst the leaves, ready to be pickedone by one. Another yearin a country of defeated, sleeping the illusion ofequality; she is preparing the apricots and the jars,just in case the r
Popshot Magazine8 min read
The Art Of Secretion
It started as a dare but became more than that. Became a knife. A scalpel. A fine, thin blade we took to one man–and so to all those men, and the women who orbited them with their L’Eau d’Issey-sprayed wrists and Diana-rolled hair. January. Nineteen
Popshot Magazine1 min read
Lifeblood
TodayI catch raindrops on my tongue. Iwas never taught to. Ma hated rain. Bahated confrontation.Another morning, I foldedthe polka-dotted jaws of an umbrellashut. I was never taught to. Oncea persimmon grove taught me that rainis a mother. I spot its
Popshot Magazine3 min read
Caerfai
I get up for work in the dark. The four-thirty am alarm has a particular bleating, but my apartment has no central heating so to even extend one arm from my nest of warmth to silence it is a wrench. No time to snooze, (oh to be able to wake when I ch
Popshot Magazine1 min read
More On The Plums
I have eaten the plums in the Ms Pac-Man reboot. Arcade lights flicker over the pie chart of my desires. The score is high but it’s never the same without cathode rays. Adolescence fades out, returning only in the corners of eyes. Electron guns we cl
Popshot Magazine6 min read
For The Spirit Of Joy
“Watch out!” Joy yanked the startled, young man away from the kerb as the bus doors hissed closed in a burst of heat just inches from his face and wafted back his dark, glossy quiff like a shampoo advert. The vehicle lurched away with a whine, its pu
Popshot Magazine2 min read
Tell Me A Story
One cold (How cold?) … a bitter cold but lovely (How lovely?) –beautiful– winter’s night I was listening to that Nick Cave LP (The one you didn’t like until you met me) and drinking the last of the Christmas gin (My gin) when somebody rapped the door
Popshot Magazine3 min read
Brief Encounters With My Father
The first time my father treated me like an adult, I was startled. I was sitting in the passenger seat in my pink dress, holding my white shoes in my lap, playing with the velcro. I had begged him to take me home early, the music at the wedding felt
Popshot Magazine2 min read
Like Diamonds
She asks what the wooden fences on the beach are for. I get my phone out and swipe away the group chats and emails. I search for wooden fence on beach. “They’re called groynes, and apparently they help avoid something called ‘longshore drift’,” I say
Popshot Magazine1 min read
Joy
Remember to think on joy, my love.Remember to think on joy. May it be a steamy, hot bath.Or the incredibly long neck of a giraffe. Crunching a leaf.A crooning song-weep. Sandy shifted, foot-tread whispers.Or the ochre-dusty finger paint, that lingers
Popshot Magazine4 min read
Xoxo
“So in love!” That’s what you caption the photo of your cheek smashed against mine before posting it to your social feed. Your smile is bright, yet tense. Can’t you see the trepidation in my eyes? “XOXO,” you add to the caption. We both know it’s a l
Popshot Magazine2 min read
Joyous, You
today, as you lay on the spider swingthat I pushed gently to the rhythm of my breath,you closed your eyes, and the light rested on your face,and the birds flew back to the trees, and farawaya storm was brewing like a rumour, no one wouldbelieve it; I
Popshot Magazine1 min read
Magnolia
A scent dancesstops me in the garden.A waft on the breeze and I turn,see last night’s furry budopened, like a cup,pale creamy petals offeringsecrets — orange-tippedcarpels on a mound of stamens,a shock of fuchsia pink.Gently, not to touch, I dipmy he
Popshot Magazine4 min read
Snowing In Deptford
I go to McDonald’s on Saturday morning, to get breakfast and hang out, before going to work my Saturday job at Iceland. Some girls who work there are my age, so we might meet new girls there as well. I am sitting upstairs with Nathan, on a Saturday i
Popshot Magazine1 min read
All The Risks I’ve Taken
all the risks I’ve takenall the taxis flaggedcrowds stepped intoall the buses slept onhead lollingpockets open widelights sliding pastthe windowsall the heels chosenblue velvet strokedcovetous in the department storethat walk I love in winteralong th
Popshot Magazine2 min read
It’s Thursday Tomorrow
It’s five pm on a Thursday and I will be at your door in less than two hours. The nest we have made for ourselves will still be warm, nurtured with sweet soft care, deep satisfaction, and mutual longing. Our nest is a idyll of dreams, but of awakenin
Popshot Magazine1 min read
My Boy
Not pissing alone or tits of my ownOr rushes of nicotineNot eating past seven or sleeping past sixOr free licence to dreamNot nights away or the cinemaOr cause for a made-up faceJeans that fit don’t do it for meAnd neither does personal spaceHappy ho
Popshot Magazine4 min read
Dancing In The Dust Motes
My nipples are darkening again. I stand naked in front of a full length mirror and observe my swollen, tender breasts, preparing to engorge with milk and spray like showerheads. I turn to the side to look at the rounding of my belly. It happens faste
Popshot Magazine1 min read
A Reminder
They lingered by the edge of Grove Hill road,beneath the street lamp’s copper penny glowwhich crowned their heads with glittering specks of dustand turned them, for a little while, to Gods.They kissed goodnight then sat down on the kerb,not knowing w
Popshot Magazine11 min read
A Modern Romance
Kiss of DEATH: twenty-five-year-old woman suffocates and dies after kissing LESBIAN lover who had eaten PEANUT (and her face swelled up to size of AMERICAN FOOTBALL). I could see my destiny spelled out and capitalised across The Daily Mail front page
Popshot Magazine1 min read
Marble Run
we build you in the afternoon, ignoring instructions,clicking parts in place in the hope that eventually,everything will make sense. I can’t speak for my sons,but as we snap wood to plastic, plastic to plastic,plastic to bamboo, I am imagining youent
Popshot Magazine1 min read
Bananas
strawberries laugh when you tickle themtomatoes spit bloodcherries die a long, hard deathgiving up their corpsesto be counted on table topstinker, tailor, soldier, sailorraspberries send themselves to norman mailergrapefruits were born to failurelemo
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The Robin Prefers A Suet Ball
For years dad sat in his chairwith a pile of toenails on the window ledgebeside him, with which hepicked his teeth. Often,there was a banana under his armpit,tucked inside his shirtmy sister warned me about the banana‘Don’t mention it,’she said.Dad w
Popshot Magazine8 min read
Confession Of An Intrepid Digit
In the world of medical specialities, proctology is often the butt of the joke, and I take umbrage with this slander. So, my profession is not as racy or extravagant as that of the heart surgeon, say. Do I not go through just as many (if not more) la
Popshot Magazine1 min read
Ode To The Wrinkle To The Left Of My Mouth
She sucks all the light in,screams, I want attention!like a thirty-four-year-old glitter-cladserious karaoke renditionof My Heart Will Go On.She gorges on my hours, wearsthem like the tights I used to slashat fifteen; too cool forclothes without hole
Popshot Magazine2 min read
You Are Late To Work
You are late to work, and you are sloppy when you plaster your makeup on: an ink-blot smear of eyeliner, stiff upper lip-stick and the line where the foundation reaches your neck is sharp and unblended. You force your feet into the vice grip of pinch
Popshot Magazine4 min read
Endnotes
8 – Corinna Keefe is a freelance writer currently based in the UK. Her work has previously appeared in Ink Sweat & Tears, Amethyst Review and others. 10 – Benedict O’Rourke is a short story writer living in London. His flash came from a Raymond Carve
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Illustrators
Ane Arzelus anearzelus.net An Chen anchenillustration.com Celyn Hunt celfcelyn.com Charlie Riddle charlieriddleillustration.com Eline Veldhuisen elineveldhuisen.com Gracie Dahl graciedahl.com Hannah Finnie hannahfinnie.com Joseph Stevenson (Kynobi) i
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Great Savings When You Subscribe
Includes FREE access to our digital library containing more than 500 stories SUBSCRIBE NOW WWW.CHELSEAMAGAZINES.COM/CPSHSU22 CALL + 44 (0)1858 438816 ■

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