The Humors Ben Nardolilli Hush collapses in the room When I mention the towers As a punchline, Those falling faces, no one laughs At that defenestration. But a joke about the trains Delayed and the prisoners complaining About bad gas Before going into the ovens, That one is set free to chuckles. For the ones performing in days Of smoke and tonic, Barbed wire brought the house To silence, The joke about Lisbon, What did God have against the Portuguese? Earthquake and tidal wave in one day. And in the salons of Paris, Such a tragedy was no comedy, It was all things to all people Turned to discourse, Too busy searching for the crime, That shook the earth And devour that capital city. They had their jokes too, About the inquisition And the bumbling antics, All the hysterics Of those old priests in chambers That they painted with stars And called the eyes of God. Behind those tables, Men sitting in stern, crimson judgment, Tolerated no humor From the accused, they wanted Straight answers, But if one of them broke wind, They were surely permitted to laugh.

A little bit about Ben Nardolilli Ben Nardolilli is a twenty four year old writer currently living in Arlington, Virginia. His work has appeared in Houston Literary Review, Perigee Magazine, Canopic Jar, Lachryma: Modern Songs of Lament, Baker’s Dozen, Children, Churches, and Daddies, Thieves Jargon, Farmhouse Magazine, Elimae, Poems Niederngasse, Gold Dust, The Delmarva Review, Underground Voices Magazine, SoMa Literary Review, Heroin Love Songs, Shakespeare’s Monkey Revue, Cantaraville, and Perspectives Magazine. In addition he was the poetry editor for West 10th Magazine at NYU and maintains a blog at mirrorsponge.blogspot.com.

bare Devin Wayne Davis in winter there’s nothing but space; I feel, this is why it’s so cold.

read from the 04/10 issue (v081) of Down in the Dirt magazine Scar Publications’ Janet Kuypers reading the poem by Devin Wayne Davis: “Bare”

Watch this YouTube video live at the Café in Chicago 04/06/10

Forgetting Chris G. Vaillancourt Forgetting. That’s the soul’s answer to the locked doors that confront you in the path. Open the eyes and see the zero that has become you. And when the danger comes, let the forgetting become a mantra. Let it flush away the diseases of yesterday’s disasters. When the yellow sun shines, ignore the grey skies that have defined you. Be the empty that you can be. It’s the solution to the falling asleep at the wheel. And when the pencil lead breaks, sharpen the axes to begin the hacking away. Let the zone alarms arrive, and make them the purpose of your ashtray heart. Forgetting. It’s the most obvious solution to the drowning of the sense of being. And when the rain starts to fall, hold the radio in your arms and let the electricity snapple your brainwaves. Leave without saying goodbye.

Rudy Goes Against Nature Dietrich Kalteis That she said yes in the first place was a wonder. Maybe blunder is a better word. A dancer’s lean with long limbs and long hair curling, she could have done a hell of a lot better than Rudy. Her name was Rochelle. Rudy met her in the Blue Room of the Holiday Inn, a good night for him, one where he wasn’t cracking the arms off chairs or blind drunk and getting tossed out on his ass. Rudy packed a lot of belly, but he was solid enough to be a two bouncer drunk. Just add booze and you had an ugly scene every time. The band that night was a local three-piece act called Cody that played that upbeat crap that was good to dance to. Rochelle came to dance, lived to dance, wore the skirt, the flat-soled shoes. Rudy came first for the eight buck buffet, next to prey on the girls that met for cocktails after eight hours of drudgery. He picked Rochelle out, left his peanuts on the bar went up to her table and plucked her from between the librarian hens. She danced all grace and rhythm, feeling the music, beautiful, her feet barely kissing the floor. Rudy threw up one arm, then the other, like he were chucking boxes, size fourteen shoes of lead shuffling a weary box step, all muscles and hair, knees dipping; here a spin, there a bop. His red, wet eyes searching hers, feeling their moons align, wanting to touch her hips, her back, to draw her close. Throwing Cody’s singer a look, willing him to play a clutching, slow one. The buffet of roast beef and gravy, dumplings, baked chicken, stuffing, french fries and apple cobbler did a good job soaking up the drink. Rudy managed to say enough of the right words over the music, or at least not too many of the wrong ones: exchanged names, come here often, nice band, that sort of empty talk. The music took the edge off his slur. Two nights later Rudy slipped past dinner and a movie, going easy on the booze. Rudy wore his dad’s blazer and striped tie and snuck the keys to his mom’s silver Volvo with the white Jesus on the dash, cross swinging from the rearview. An outstanding performance – a good catholic boy from a Christian home. Holding back, a peck on the cheek, he held her hand as they walked. A real gentleman coping with the low-minded call in the privacy of his bedroom after the lights went out. On Saturday evening, he met her dad, mouthwash breath, showed himself in his neighbor’s ivy league blazer framing a young man of culture and promise. The men laughed over a beer, the dad and the suitor. Rudy politely refused a second beer (which was really number six). Driving and all that, he told the dad. He asked what time the dad would like Rochelle home, then handshakes and smiles, then he had Rochelle to the door, back by eleven on the nose. A good night. It went like that for two months, Rudy of promise, Rudy of culture, Rudy at Sunday dinners, Rudy, a fine catch; then rudimentary Rudy, the Rudy of muscle and hair that lived in the depths of his soul couldn’t stay hidden. That Rudy started to peel the outer layer like an onion skin, needing to reveal himself. Rudy invited Rochelle along on the camping trip. Away from the rat race, hiking trails, portaging, sleeping under a starry blanket, lungfuls of air among the sweet pines, dinner over open flame and another couple, another girl to talk to. Rochelle hesitated, but this was Rudy, Rudy of culture, Rudy of character, Rudy of promise. It would be alright. Kat and I drove up in my Jeep, everything crammed in the back. Tent, sleeping bag, pillows, air mattress, lantern, camp stove, kerosene, fishing rods, beer, wine, canned food, pork chops and steaks. Rudy drove his converted bread truck, the kind with sliding front doors. A real gas guzzling camping machine, a shaggin’ wagon of the seventies. Airbrushed body, naugahyde panels, curtains, plush carpet, a monster sound system, ‘Don’t laugh; you’re daughter’s in here’ sticker pasted on the bumper. Rudy cracked the first of his travel beers shortly after the city traffic thinned, somewhere around Holland Marsh. Deep Purple blaring from the sound system, Rudy singing Nobody’s gonna beat my car, it’s gonna break the speed of sound, yeah, it’s a killing machine. Rochelle laughed, bopping on her seat, sipping a diet soda, unaware she was about to meet the Rudy that lived in the depths. Rudy and I went at the tents and somehow got both tents up, Rudy’s breath holding off the black flies, better than citronella, Rudy on his fifth or sixth travel beer (after the ones at home). Rain clouds boiled overhead like an omen. A chill wind out of the north flapped the tent sides and guy ropes, Kat and Rochelle getting along, frying sirloins over the canned heat, corn and potatoes in the cans they came in, flies getting in the food. Beer and wine and woodsmoke. After we ate, Kat and I huddled with the sleeping bag around around shoulders, across from Rudy and Rochelle, talking over the small fire, warm on our faces and hands. Music from Rudy’s van, the crackling fire and the night sounds filled the woods. This time of the season, we were the only campers. The stars all over the place. Wine and beer going down. Rudy drinking two to our one. After a couple of styrofoam cups of wine, Rochelle switched to Club Soda. A white blaze caught my eye. It moved around the edge of our cleared campsite. I couldn’t be sure, I thought skunk or house cat, maybe a plastic bag blown in from someplace. It stayed still, then was gone, and I forgot about it, then caught it again on the far side of the camp, staying in the shadows at the edge of the clearing. Rudy pulled the second, then the third cork, popped another beer tab, the booze defeating the cold. The Rudy under wraps craving a hit of tequila. Kat and I sat with a sleeping bag over our knees. Me with my eye on the white blaze. Kat with her wine. Rudy with an arm around Rochelle who sat stiff with the cold. Then I caught the flash of the white thing moving across the edge of the campsite, a quick blaze showing in the firelight, then it was gone again. A few minutes and I saw it twenty feet to the right. It stayed still for a minute, my eyes on it. Then it shifted, showing a black head and black eyes. I didn’t want to alarm the girls, instead, I thumbed my nose, getting Rudy’s attention, pulling him aside, telling him about the bear. Rudy went ape shit. “Bear, fuck, where? run!” He dashed for his van. “Come on, Rochelle, hurry the fuck up.” He slid the door closed behind him. The bear bumbled into the clearing, showing itself, cutting Rochelle off from the van, its curious nose in the air catching a whiff. Rochelle got in the jeep with us, squeezed on the seat with Kat, our eyes on the bear. Rudy honked and yelled through his open window, threw an empty can, but the bear was intent on ripping open the garbage bag, flipping the coolers, clawing at them, eating down a pound of butter, a loaf of bread, the next night’s pork chops, eggs, bacon, spilled an open bottle of wine. Rudy started the van and drove at it, trying to catch it with the bumper, hitting a tent peg, blowing the front right tire. He called through his cracked window. “Yah yah hey yah.” Rochelle cracked her window and called to Rudy. “My insulin’s in the cooler.” “Insulin? What for?” “I’m a ... I just need it.” “Don’t worry. Bears don’t eat insulin.” The bear plowed its nose through everything, into both tents, then wandered into the night, a big bag of Lays between its teeth. We waited, then got out to the carnage. It looked like a hundred hillbillies threw down a moonshine shebang then left. Coolers tipped, food all over, Rudy’s front tire blown on the tent peg. Rochelle became female quiet, Rudy asking about the insulin, not picking up on her mood as he polished off Kat’s wine bottle that hadn’t been spilled. Then he rescued a beer from the spilled ice, getting out the jack and the airless spare. With the beer gone, Rudy opened the tequila, then with bottle in one hand and jack handle in the other, Rudy beat the woods; he went after bear, calling through the pines, growling in a language the bear would understand, calling his challenge, all muscle and hair. Rochelle hoisted herself up on the passenger seat of the van, wrapped a sleeping bag around her shoulders, as happy as a rain-soaked cat and closed her eyes. When Rudy stumbled back into the firelight, he tried to urinate out the campfire, splashing his pants, a reek sure to repel any bear; it was sure to repel Rochelle. Kat and I closed our eyes as Rudy tried to pump air into the spare with the pump used for his air mattress. In the morning, I opened my eyes to the grey, the sky full of heavy clouds. Rudy squatted by the fire, near empty tequila bottle at his side, a blanket draped around his shoulders. The jack handle lay in the dirt. Tire still flat. “Hey,” I said, coming over, wondering if I could salvage coffee fixings. “You got to help me,” he said, looking into the ashes. “What’s up?” I figured he wanted help getting air in the spare. “Accident.” “Huh?” “Had a bit of an accident.” He opened the blanket, his pants completely soaked. “God.” “Fucking tequila.” “Guess so. So go change.” “Didn’t bring extra pants.” “Don’t look at me. Mine won’t fit you.” “Can’t let Rochelle see me like this. Aren’t things bad enough?” “Let’s get you in the lake.” “Fucking freezing.” “Wash your pants, then dry them on the truck’s vent.” “Get real.” “Got a better idea.” “Fuck me.” “Or stay like that, smells great by the way. He sighed and climbed to his feet. “Come with me.” “Gotta make coffee.” “Do it later. Just come with.” I stood on the rickety dock while Rudy dunked into the ice water, splashing around, getting the urine from his briefs and pants, the tequila from his head. He got out, shriveled, shaking, wringing the water from his pants. I almost felt sorry for him. He walked the stony path in his saggy briefs, barefooted, stones hurting his soles, his sneakers and jeans in his hand. “Think Rochelle’s pissed?” “She’s a saint if she’s not.” That was pretty much the instant we saw it. Standing on its haunches in the middle of the path, forty yards away, white blaze on its nose. We froze. “Fucker’s not that big,” Rudy said. “It’s still a bear.” “Let’s nail it with a rock.” “Let’s not. Let’s just take another path.” Rudy didn’t want to give ground, but we backed up and made it to the dock. The bear didn’t follow. The beach was stony all the way to the point. Rudy limped along. No sign of another path. We retraced our steps, Rudy with an armload of good-sized stones, jeans and sneakers. The bear was gone. When we got to the camp, the girls were gone. I remembered the rest room on the way in. Rudy piled his stones beside the cold ashes of the fire, squeezed into his sneakers and wet pants, his lips blue from the cold. Then we took the path in the other direction, eyes going this way and that, ears straining for sounds other than rustling leaves. We came to the brick structure from the rear and rounded the corner, face to face with the bear. Ten yards felt like ten feet. The bear sniffed the air. Kat called from inside. “Just stay put,” I called back, knowing bears could run, bears could climb, bears had teeth. The girls watched from the one window. “Get the girls,” Rudy said to me, grabbing up a stick and throwing it, missing by a mile, then charging, rebel yelling, hoisting his arms wide, all muscle and hair. The bear turned and bolted into the woods. Rudy went in after it, me calling him to stop, me ushering the girls out of there and back to the camp. I got the fire going, got coffee on, tried to figure out how to get air into Rudy’s spare. By noon, we were plenty worried, ate some canned spagetti, had the camp cleaned and packed up. Everybody wanted to go home. Rudy came out of the woods from the north side, limping, a stick for a crutch, feet muddy, face muddy, shirt and pants ripped. From drunkard to Rambo, he looked like he had gone four rounds with the bear. There had been a cutbank he didn’t see, slid down it, rolling over brambles and stones. As he lay there trying to catch his wind, the bear came to the top of the cutbank, looking down at him, its red, wet eyes searching his, all muscle and hair. Rudy, injured, backed up, scrambled on hands and size fourteen feet barely touching the ground, through the stream, through the woods, thinking the bear was behind him. Lost among the trees, lost in nature. With flies biting him, he ran until he came to a road, running this way, running that way, finally finding his way back. The look on Rochelle’s face said she would be running, too. Rudy’s eyes said he knew it, knew there was no way back. Nothing learned. Nothing more to say.

Not Yet a Success Katrina Cahall Dawn breaks this birthday and I watch it from the stove, suddenly exposed, a child crawling out of a playground tube, blinking her eyes in the sunlight. The yolk looked sturdy in the cast iron, but with my mind tied to the light poles, it bleeds into the rough pan and I’m afraid that it was doomed from the refrigerator.

The 19-Year-Old Cuban Guitar Player William Locke Hauser I am telling you the truth, Sergeant. It was absolutely self-defense. He was going to shoot me, so I shot him. You’re a lieutenant? I beg your pardon. Of course I loved the man! He was my husband. Now I’m not going to say another word till I see my lawyer. Yes, I have her number, on a card in my purse. Here it is — Marilyn Tutwiler. When you call her, say that Sara Benning is being held on suspicion — mind you say suspicion — of murder, and she’ll be here within minutes. A glass of water? Thank you, young man. Are you a lieutenant too? No? Well, patrolman is a very respectable rank. I’m sure your mother is proud of you. * * * Here you are, Marilyn — my, that was fast! Can we be alone a little while, Lieutenant? Do you suppose they have listening devices in here, Marilyn? I’m sure they’re not supposed to, but you never can tell nowadays. But what the hell — I’m innocent, so no harm in their hearing my side of the story. Let’s start from the beginning. You remember we had that old Italian-American gardener, but he retired and we needed someone, because Jeffrey would never get his precious CPA hands soiled with God’s dirt. I doubt he could bend over enough to handle a trowel — he’s grown so fat it’s been years since he’s seen his own feet. You never knew him when he was young, of course. Back when you were just a little girl, he wooed and won me with smooth talk and that gorgeous body he had back then. Did I ever tell you how we met? Well, I was at a fifth reunion, at a resort in Barbados over the holidays, with my Kappa classmates from Wellesley, all accompanied by a spouse or fiancé. All but I, that is. “Spinster Sara,” they called me. After three days of being the only single in the crowd, I was really getting frustrated. To top it off, the couple in the next room had a loose headboard on their bed, which bumped the wall during their lovemaking. Our party was booked for a week, but I was ready by the fourth day — and after a third night! — to fly back to the States. That evening changed everything. Following dinner, there was dancing, but I declined one of the husbands (he of the bumping headboard, wouldn’t you know) and stepped onto the terrace for a breath of air. It was a lovely night — surf splashing on the rocks, moonlight on the ocean, air thick with the scent of tropical flowers. Some movement caught my eye, and there, at the far end, stood a man I’d been watching. Before breakfast each morning, he’d been coming to a pool just under my balcony, where he swam laps for half an hour. With every stroke, you could see the rippling of his back muscles. Earlier that evening, I’d spotted him across the room, wearing a white suit that set off his deep tan. And now, on the terrace, I chanced . . . No, that’s not quite the truth, Marilyn. I’d watched him go out and I’d followed. In a moment, he was at my side. “I’m Jeffrey Benning,” he said. “Are you with anyone?” “With friends, college classmates. And I’m called Sara.” “There are men with some of the women, Sara, but I see no one with you.” “My fiancé was unable to come,” I lied. “John’s very busy . . . with his business.” “Will you have one dance with me, if I promise not to pester you for another?” We were together the rest of the evening. Chatting with my sorority sisters, he had the grace not to react when I reminded them that “my fiancé Thomas” had been unable to come. The band had finished playing and we were saying goodnight, when something went click in my brain. “Join me for a nightcap — in my room?” I smiled, but my lips were quivering. “You don’t really intend me to come with you,” he said. “But I do. What a man can want, a woman can equally desire.” “What about John Thomas? Or was it Thomas John?” “You know better.” You’re asking what this has to do with here and now, Marilyn? Be patient. I’ll get there. On a table in my room there was a candelabrum, three tapers within a glass chimney. Jeffrey opened the curtains, lit the candles, and turned off the light. “That’s good,” I said, dialing the phone. “Who are you calling?” “Room service. One does not relinquish one’s virginity without something to drink.” His jaw dropped, and it was my turn to laugh. “You heard correctly. As of this night of December 29, I am what the Victorians called a ‘maiden lady.’ I’m determined not to see the New Year in as one. Mumm’s Cordon Rouge, or do you prefer something stronger?” For the first time — and the last in our eighteen years together — the man looked fearful. Then he grinned. “You’re serious, aren’t you? You’re tired of being a virgin, and I’ve been picked to do the dirty deed.” “I’ve bred dogs and horses,” I said, “and see nothing dirty about it. So is Champagne to your taste?” He shrugged and sat down in a wicker armchair. When the bubbly arrived, he barely reacted when I requested two house breakfasts, to be brought at “. . . what time, Jeffrey?” “I’ll want my swim first.” “So you will,” I said, and to the waitress, “eight o’clock.” “Now I have to leave, to get my swimsuit,” he said when the door had closed behind the woman’s back. When ten minutes had passed, I was close to tears. I’d wanted to create an air of sophistication, but the man had taken me for the sex-starved spinster I was, or worse, a predator who’d cry rape the moment he had his clothes off. So I’d resigned myself to another night of that awful headboard, when a knock came at the door and he entered, wearing a sportshirt and slacks. “Welcome back,” I quipped. “You’ve changed.” “And you haven’t,” he said. “It’s the lady’s prerogative to use the facilities first, and then be in bed when the gentleman emerges.” “Very well.” I rose and walked into the bathroom. I brushed my teeth, washed my hands, and dabbed perfume on earlobes and wrists. Should I shower? No, I didn’t want to keep my prospective lover waiting. I walked out the door. “Get going,” I said. “It’s not nice to make a lady wait.” I’ll admit, Marilyn — I was trembling! He went into the bathroom, and I took off all but my bra and panties and got under the sheet. The toilet flushed, there was a rush of water in the basin, and the door opened. He stood for a moment silhouetted against the light, then turned it off and stepped into the bedroom. The candles had guttered out, so I found myself, for the first time in my life and in the dimmest of light, gazing at the body of a naked man. Of course I’d seen classical statues and paintings, and we’d watched unrated European films at the sorority house, but nothing had prepared me for this living, three-dimensional sight. Above those beautiful high-arched feet and sinewy legs, and below a flat stomach, his penis curved outward like a separate living creature. It was uncircumsized, and its shape reminded me — I couldn’t help giggling — of the state of Florida. He slipped in beside me, and I felt the warmth radiating from his body. What a delicious sensation! He reached one hand across and stroked my body, from the hollow of my throat down my breastbone to my belly. “This won’t do,” he said. “Shall I . . .” “That would be better,” he said. “It’s supposedly more passionate for the man to do it, but a whole lot clumsier.” I rolled to my edge of the bed, slid my panties off and onto the floor, and sitting partway up, unfastened the bra and sent it also over the edge. He reached again across to me. “I’m not much for foreplay,” he said, “but I promise not to rush things.” He rolled on top of me, supporting his weight with his hands. The hair of his chest brushed my chin. The mingled smells of his body—soap, perspiration, and aftershave—filled my nostrils. I giggled again. “What’s funny?” he asked. “Isn’t sex supposed to be fun?” “Yes, but not funny. There’s a difference.” Then he said, “This may hurt a bit.” There was absolutely no pain, Marilyn, just a wonderful sense of fullness. He held still, but I could sense his penis stirring inside me. The thought crossed my mind that it was indeed a separate creature. He began to move, and I discovered myself emitting little squeaks of pleasure. Self-stimulation had never produced anything comparable. We kept to ourselves the next three days, except for a picture session, where he stood behind the photographer and mugged to make us all laugh, and the final party, where he and I left early to welcome the New Year privately. The sisters were delighted at my changed status — and dying to hear about our lovemaking, which I shared only by a contented smile. We changed our tickets and flew back together, separately from the groups we’d come with. Within the year, we got married, moved into a beautiful new home on Cedar Ridge, and were happy for years and years. But then, you know, Jeffrey grew that huge gut, and even his feet, those once beautiful high-arched feet, got pudgy and flat, and that was the end of our sex life. I thought it was the end of mine also, until . . . Well, I advertised for a gardener, not in the paper but on that little bulletin board at our tennis club, and this young man showed up on my doorstep. His name was José, he said, and I supposed he was illegal, but one doesn’t ask, does one? He wasn’t big and muscular like Jeffrey had once been, but trimly put together, with square shoulders and a tiny butt — a toreador’s physique. Skin the color of almonds, or maybe magnolia blossoms. And such a romantic history — he and his parents had fled Castro’s Cuba in a rubber boat. No, I’m not about to tell you what it was like making love with him. . . . Let’s just say I’d forgotten how it felt to be absolutely satiated with sex. But that’s no one else’s business, if anyone’s listening. No, Marilyn, I said no. Maybe I did tell you all that about Jeffrey and me — I got carried away by memories! But my relationship with José was . . . is . . . in the present. Well, Jeffrey had flown to London for a conference on international standardization of accounting — bo-ring! He was supposed to get back Tuesday evening, so I asked José to come do the garden on Monday. I didn’t usually allow him to sleep over — oh, all right, I did when I thought it safe, and this was certainly one of those times, because I’d read Jeffrey’s ticket which he’d put on top of his dresser the day before he left. But maybe the conference wound up early and he decided on an early return, though it certainly wasn’t characteristic of him, what with having to pay a fee for rescheduling. You know what a cheapskate he is . . . was. We’d fallen asleep — it was past midnight — when Jeffrey let himself in the house. I guess he suspected something, because José as usual had left his workshoes in the front hall. The first thing I knew was when he walked into the bedroom, switched on the light, and shouted “Gotcha!” I’m a light sleeper, but you can hardly rouse José once his head hits the pillow. Jeffrey walked over to the bedside — that’s when I noticed the revolver in his hand — and pressed the muzzle hard against José’s forehead. Then my sweet 19-year-old woke up, and you’ve never seen anyone so terrified. “Get up, you little spic bastard,” Jeffrey said, and José crawled slowly out from under the covers. He reached for his shorts and t-shirt, which he’d dropped on the floor. “Oh, no you don’t,” Jeffrey said. “I was planning to shoot a burglar, but I think naked rapist would be more plausible. Are you ready to join your ancestors, amigo?” Then I reached into my bedside table, and took out that little silver pistol that Jeffrey had made me take lessons with on an indoor range. I pointed it at him and said, “You’re not shooting anybody. This is my house as well as yours, and it’s not going to be a murder scene. We’d have to move, and we just refinanced, so you’d get docked for early payoff on the mortgage.” I was sure that would get to him, the pennypincher! “What’s this we stuff, paleface,” he laughed. “You’re next. In fact, Sara,” he said, swinging the revolver in my direction, “you’re going to be first.” So I shot him, Marilyn. You can imagine the surprised look on his face, but he didn’t fall down, and he was still pointing the revolver at me. So I shot him again—in fact twice more, the policeman said, though I certainly don’t remember. I don’t recall anything from that point on, until I found myself here and asked them to send for you. Yes, young man, what do you want? The lieutenant wishes to see us? We’re coming. You mean we’re free to go, Lieutenant? There won’t be any charges . . . none at all? Yes, I’ll come back to the station, or testify to the coroner, whatever, whenever you let me know. Let’s get out of here, Marilyn. And give me a ride home, please. This calls for a stiff drink, and I make it a point never to drink alone. * * * You know my street, left at the next light. And now that we’re alone, really alone, I can tell you that Jeffrey never pointed that gun at me. But I wasn’t about to let him shoot my beautiful, beautiful José. Did I mention that he also plays the guitar?

William Locke Hauser bio William Locke Hauser, after military and business careers, is engaged in a “third career” of writing fiction. Eighteen of his stories have been published, notably in AntiMuse (Best in Show Fiction, 2006) and Writers’ Forum (first prize, Summer 2007 contest); and, most recently, in Mobius (March 2009). He and his wife Helen Alexandra, an entrepreneurial businesswoman, live in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

The Deeper Stain Jim Carson Bag of bones and ragged gap toothed smile My sidewalk ambush Brother can you spare some coin for a child of God Who is down on his luck? Revulsion battles the shame of not caring more I purchase some temporary personal salvation For a few bits of pocket change Before I can recoil sandpapery gnarled fingers Claw my hand to offer blessing Later I frantically try to wash away the grime And the memory The flesh is cleansed But the deeper stain remains

read from the 04/10 issue (v081) of Down in the Dirt magazine Scar Publications’ Janet Kuypers reading the poem by Jim Carson: “the Deeper Stain”

Watch this YouTube video live at the Café in Chicago 04/06/10

Clementines Jennifer Licata thinking of when I drank tea just because you liked it of how I craved the caverns of your cranium. the weight of my books brings me back to sitting on that scratchy gray carpet and when my chin was always tilted up so it could be nearer to yours. thinking of the clementine peels in your bed and how small your ears are. when inspiration lived in the lining of your pockets because that’s where you stuffed your hands, of sitting on the cold cement steps when you ran uptown with your arms out.

On the Fast Lane Frank De Canio My wife goes back for a brie, olives and anchovies. There’s a new refrigerator to match the dining room set; maybe even two, before the move to the large apartment down the street. There’s a house in the suburbs, not far from the grand opening of the new supermarket before the kids return shouldering their own and holding, with the daily news, a series subscription to the opera. “Grimes” ends with a slow curtain on a sun that hovers on the horizon. I, too, sailed on ships that docked at a few foreign ports, unloading weary passengers. But I’m close to home now. The cashier tallies produce which I purchase with a credit card. A few items have to be taken out of my shopping cart, though no child’s sitting there, and I’m left with two bags of milk, veggies and cold cuts that I’ll schlep back to an empty flat.

Traffic Jam Sarah Mallery Along the California coast, Highway 101 bogs down every once in a while when strong winds, whipping in from out of the west, shoot tiny bits of dried leaves up into swirling funnels that wreak havoc on cars traveling on the southeastern stretch of the road. People slow down but have learned not to panic; these things always pass and when they do, suddenly all the windshield wipers begin their arcs, spitting out streaks of water and soap that will hopefully clean off most of the leftover dust. But the mood is quite different when there’s been an accident; this is not necessarily a force of nature, but a man-made frailty. Listening to the ambulances blaring past on the outer lanes, all car conversations stall for a couple of seconds as everyone peers around, wondering what has happened up ahead, and to whom. Mama and ‘Uncle’ Tad were no exception; if Tad had his way, he would run up and down the lanes, checking out everybody’s business, asking questions and making a general nuisance of himself. For some reason, this time he decided to stay put in the car and focus on us. “So, what do you have to say for yourselves?” His red, puffy face leaned in closer towards us cringing in the back seat. My younger brother Will was a little bolder and a lot more naïve than I. “Gee, Uncle Tad, I don’t know. But I have to go to the bathroom.” He hadn’t learned yet how things really worked in our household. Mama had her tense face on. “Tad, please......” He ignored her, twisting his body halfway around so he could face us directly. “Bathroom? Great, just great! In the middle of a goddamn traffic jam...” All of a sudden, I could hear the radio in the next car over pulsing with disco music. I decided to concentrate on that instead. Bum—bum—bum—bum—it throbbed. ****** Bill’s Mercedes SL purred in idle for another ten minutes before he cut the engine. He tapped several fingers against the steering wheel impatiently, then grabbed his car phone as he studied his newest GPS navigational gadget up on the dashboard; his office would need to know where he was— there was no way he’d be getting to the huge mergers and acquisitions meeting by 2 o’clock in the formal conference room. Not the small, informal one, mind you. The large, oak-paneled, plush carpeted one reserved for the Big Guns. Glancing over at a neighboring Honda Civic, he snapped his instructions to his secretary, leaving no pauses for her to fit in an answer. Inside the Honda, a brown-haired boy around six or seven years old was cuddled up with a man in the back seat, both strapped in together like two astronauts ready for a Gemini flight to the moon. Laughing and tickling each other, they seemed oblivious to the world around them. Then the boy stopped and flattened his face against his side window facing the Mercedes, crossing his eyes and sticking out his tongue. Bill stared at the kid for a couple of seconds, then turned away, deep in thought. ****** Grateful was the operant word. The word his family of eight, crowded together in their tiny, three bedroom apartment in the San Fernando Valley repeated to him every morning when he left for his job and every night when he returned home, dog-tired, tracking in mud from their building’s grass-less front yard and looking like death warmed over. He had been told this job could be an opportunity for him, driving this enormous black stretch limo, so sleek it really resembled more of a locomotive than a motor vehicle, but after seven years, Abel Vasquez, at twenty-nine, wife-less, and a surprisingly skimpy bank account, was still doing the same routes, driving the same clients with only the occasional decent tip. “Mijo, you always searching for the estrellas, pero sometimes the stars not come quick, solamente the correct time. Be happy — this job pay mas que minimum wage. Be happy, mijo! Gracias a Dios!” His mother’s quick sign of the cross was predictable; it always accompanied any words connected with Dios. Each morning, he would look around their home, so meager, so beneath his parents’ back-breaking work, but finally decided maybe he should simply concentrate on those two words: grateful and happy. Agradecido y feliz. He would try to accept his life and rejoice in it. He would accept the wild parties in the back of his stretch, where the young bosomy 22-year-olds, smoking weed and snorting coke along with rock star wannabes, nursing tremendous hangovers, attempted sex in unrealistic positions. He would accept the CEO’s nuzzling their ‘other women’ while talking on their cell phones to their wives, urging them not to stay up too late because this convention would probably extend into the wee hours of the morning. Today, when he had picked up a new customer at 12:45 p.m., he had murmured his new, daily stay-on-track-mantra from the front seat, behind his wheel and St. Christopher cross. ‘Be grateful for what you have, be grateful for what you have, be grateful....’ But now, stuck on the 101, listening to the ambulance sirens blaring outside and glancing at his rear view mirror, he was surprised to see the serious, middle-aged man sitting way in back, ignoring all the commotion and reading some eight and a half by eleven pages as he slowly sipped bottled water and munched on a granola bar. ****** Uncle Tad was on a roll now, bypassing me and concentrating on my brother. “Come on, you little jerk, hold it in!” My brother Will’s strained look indicated he probably wasn’t going to make it to a bathroom in the next room, let alone one that might be several miles away. I could see his body starting to squirm, shifting from one position to another as he looked out the window for bladder distractions. “Tad, please...not today. Let him alone...” Mama’s voice sounded a little stronger than usual. “Not today! Not today!” Tad’s mouth curled up on one end, down on the other as he pulled out his flask, took a big swig, then flung a McDonald’s hamburger wrapper out the window. I kept looking out my side window at the ambulances barreling by without letting him catch my eye; if he did, I knew I could be next. A soft whimper came out of Will, but I didn’t dare turn. I could feel his body twitching, almost grinding on the seat, as the cracked leather squeaked and vibrated even under me. Visions of his bladder bursting and him being rushed to the hospital permeated my thoughts, and before I knew it, I had turned to face my brother and him. ****** Bill angled his tan leather seat back and closed his eyes—might as well get some much-needed shuteye—he certainly wasn’t going anywhere. Flashes of his dad flooded his brain, like the time they went to a ball game and when the white-uniformed, pimple-marked vendor started passing them their hotdogs, a burly, foul-smelling man three people down took a chunk out of one of the wieners. His shirt was raised, exposing thick, hairy folds of a tremendous beer-belly, and bits of hotdog bun were flipping out of his mouth. Bill’s seven-year-old lips had parted in shock, but his dad rolled his head back and roared with laughter. “The Baseball Experience,” he explained, putting his arm around his son’s shoulders and motioning everyone around them to keep the remaining hotdogs coming. ****** Abel thought about turning on the radio, but assumed the client wouldn’t like that—-trying to read to Latin rhythms isn’t really conducive to heavy concentration. Instead, he adjusted his uncomfortable polyester tie, reached for his clipboard, and pretended to be engrossed in his paperwork. “What’s going on, do you think?” The client had a voice. Abel pivoted his rear mirror more squarely to get a better view of the back of the stretch. “I don’t know, sir. Probably an accident.” “Wow! It must be a bad one.” “Yes, sir. Probably.” A couple of seconds passed. “What’s your name?” “Abel, sir.” “Where do you come from?” Why do all gringos assume I’m from somewhere else? Is my accent that bad? “Michoacoan, Mexico, sir.” “How long have you been here?” “Most of my life. I came here when I was ten.” The man put his pages down, and moved up closer to the driver’s section. “Really? How did your folks get here?” Is the next question going to be, ‘Are they legal?’ “It’s a long story. Nothing you’d be interested in, trust me.” “Try me.” Abel looked up, surprised. Was this guy for real? Did he really want to hear his family’s horrendous tale of getting into the United States or was he just passing the time? ****** I expected Uncle Tad would turn his attention to me, but all eyes were directed at Will’s body, contorting in tiny, awkward movements. It reminded me of one of Mama’s friends who told me she once sat for an artist and how, after thirty minutes she had to pretend she was dead so she wouldn’t move and spoil the painting. But after another twenty minutes no matter how hard she tried, her body developed a life of its own—twitching and spasming in odd places she didn’t even know existed; she had become possessed. Mama was looking at Will with an intensity she had assumed was lost in her. “Ok, Willy, Ok. Just go, honey, it’s all right. Here, here’s a little cup for you to use. Just do it.” Tad swilled down the rest of his flask. “Ok, my ass! He’s not gonna ruin my car. YOU HOLD IT IN, PAL!!” His face was beyond red, the color of raw steak, and his facial sweat gathered then stopped, like covered hot food, condensation on Saran Wrap in the fridge. ****** Bill entered his REM sleep. Deeper. Deeper. Images of playing in Central Park with his father—bright Irish green foliage in the hot, July summer, the iron benches almost too warm to touch, the air almost too oppressive to breathe. Deeper. Deeper. Then, with a flutter of his eyelids, the leaves starting to turn cherry-red, yellow, and milk chocolate brown, as the two of them gather up leaves, grouping them separately, then flinging themselves on top of each piled softness, hooting and tossing fragmented colors up into the air. Finally, going home, with his dad tucking him into his stuffed animal-covered bed, talking about the day, vowing to return to the park very soon, and ending with the words, “Love you, buddy....” ****** “Well, my parents have always been poor. They were poor in Michoacoan and poor now in the U.S....” He noticed the client nodding thoughtfully. “Anyway, they decided to come to the U.S. before I was born, but had to save up money first to give to the cuyotes.” “The cuyotes?” “Yes, the shady people who take your money to get immigrants into the states. Only my parents were too trusting, too kind. They didn’t realize they could be cheated out of their money. So....they saved every peso, every centavo they could, and after five years they had just enough to get to the border. “ “Yes?” “Well, they got to the California border all right, but never made it much further than that.” “What do you mean?” “The cuyotes transferred them and ten other people to another van and took them out to the Mojave Desert. Then they opened up the back doors and told them to ‘get the hell out’ and left them there to die in the heat.” Abel couldn’t believe his eyes were filling up. He cleared his throat and went on. “It was days of little to no water, wandering around the desert in the heat of summer, sucking on cactus leaves for fluid, and eating bugs. One of the Mexicans died, and one of the men even discussed cutting him up and cooking him....but finally, they caught some rattle snakes instead for food. “ The client’s face was overhanging Abel’s seat, his arms crossed on the black vinyl. “....one week later, almost dead from thirst, their clothes torn up and covering their heads, they saw a truck. They moved towards the truck carefully, and saw behind it was an old gringo, splashing water on his face at the edge of a watering hole. He turned out to be nice, and as they plunged into the water, smiling and sucking up any water they could, he pointed to his truck and said, ‘I’ll take you to the next town’.” “This is a fascinating story!” ****** Will didn’t make it. As Mama handed him a small plastic cup, his bladder simply released, then emptied. It was amazing the way the urine didn’t just trickle down, but spread out like an umbrella, covering his front area, down his pant legs, and onto the seat. Instantly the car reeked. I thought Uncle Tad was going to explode. His eyes bugged out, looking like those monster eyeball candies Will and I had collected this past Halloween, as he raised his hand automatically and swiveled halfway around to prepare a good smack. Suddenly, Mama found herself. “DON’T YOU DARE!!!” she screamed, flinging her body in front of Will, almost knocking him over. Uncle Tad’s blow grazed her head, and he recoiled, horrified at the misdirection. He hung his head down for a beat, then looked up. I thought I’d never see the day when he looked more like us than himself—the scared look we always got when we knew Uncle Tad was going to get us. “Get out of the car. Get out.....” Mama’s voice was a low, feline growl. ****** Bill jerked awake, disoriented and pasty-mouthed. He looked over at the boy in the Honda and saw that he was sound asleep against the man. As the executive reached for his phone, an odd peace blanketed him, allowing him to breathe deeply from his diaphragm for the first time in years. His secretary was still in the office. “Susan? This is Bill. No, don’t worry, you’re not in any trouble. I.......what’s that?.......No, if the meeting doesn’t happen, it’s not the end of the world.....Susan?.....why are you crying? Don’t worry, it’s all right. Everything’s going to be all right .....in fact....things are going to be very different from now on, I promise. And Susan? I think we need to get you a raise.......That’s right.....what?......you’re welcome......we’ll do lunch out next week and discuss it, OK?” He hung up the phone, chuckling. ****** Abel nodded, acknowledging the client’s enthusiasm, and pumped at the feedback. “Thanks to the old man, they got to the neighboring place only to find nobody wanted to help them; they were viewed as immigrant pariahs. But finally, my mother managed to get a housekeeping job for a wealthy family, and my dad sort of made an income placing bricks in people’s patios. From there they started a family and we all moved to Los Angeles, where they continued their hard work, raised us as good U.S. citizens with pretty decent educations.” The client paused, reached into his pocket, and handed Abel his business card. “Kid, this is your lucky day. My name is Ivan Ross and I’m a Hollywood producer. You’re really smart and articulate, and you have the makings here of a great screenplay. Why don’t you give me a call next week and we’ll set up a meeting. This is no joke.....with your parents’ story and your way of telling it, we might just have the makings of a terrific hit!” ****** This time, when the ambulances flashed by, they were headed in the opposite direction, their sirens wailing, red lights rotating, and tires burning. Automatically, everybody flipped on their own engines, relieved to finally move, and waited for the signal to evacuate the area. Voices floated throughout the air, along with laughter and a few “Thank God, that’s over!!” Kids sang, tail pipes coughed then sputtered smoke, and one by one, people concentrated on their destinations as they started their two-mile-an hour getaway crawl. So intent on following the uniformed California Highway Control, people barely noticed a man by the side of the road, weaving in and out on the dusty right-hand shoulder. Ignored, he crouched down, then sat, Indian-style as he lowered his head.

I’m Sorry Chris Butler Loving her meant never having to apologize for writing my wrongs, but I’m sorry for ever loving her.

The Mentor John Bruce Harold Sigurdson’s seminar on esthetics and criticism was one of the courses Ed McLaughlin took in his first semester at graduate school. He’d been on campus only a few days when Sigurdson, who later became his graduate advisor, pulled Ed into his office to get some idea of what they had. He must have been looking at Ed’s college transcript in the folder. Ed had done his undergraduate work at a prestige school and had majored in English, but you’d never tell it from his graduate record exam score. “You did a lot of work with Hartsfield, didn’t you?” asked Sigurdson. For a moment Ed wasn’t even sure who he meant. “Geoffrey Hartsfield?” he asked. Sigurdson nodded grimly. He shuddered, too. “I got into a real fight with him at a conference once,” he said. Ed couldn’t remember how many courses he’d taken from Hartsfield, in fact; it wasn’t all that many. He wasn’t teaching much more than the sophomore survey and the eighteenth century course. So then Sigurdson kept on grilling him. “Who did you have for the Shakespeare courses?” he asked. “Ellis Throckmorton,” he answered, with even a slight tone of pride. He may as well have said Elmo P. Flickworthy. Sigurdson registered no recognition of the name. He kept on. “Who did you have for American Lit?” “Henry Terrace.” Another null reaction. “Romantics?” “Stansford Bulworth” Sigurdson shook his head. “I haven’t heard of any of these.” Ed almost blurted “Stansford Bulworth? He wrote Generative Dialectic: Charles Lamb and the Deep Structure of Ritual”, which had recently been voted faculty book of the year (though competition that year was light), but he restrained himself. It seemed a bad start, but Sigurdson seemed to have a twinkle in his eye. But he left the first session in Sigurdson’s class with a feeling that he’d actually learned something, an unfamiliar impression that he kept exploring in his mind the way the tongue keeps exploring a loose tooth. The impression was the more incongruous in that he’d just spent four years at an elite college, without ever having felt anything comparable in any of his classes there. The graduate school where Sigurdson taught, for that matter, was anything but top-ten. “I think you mean to use the word ‘notion’, as opposed to the word ‘idea’,” Sigurdson said to one student in the class. He wasn’t rebuking him; he wasn’t even castigating him. He was just working with him to polish his thinking a little. Where Ed had come from, the profs coddled and flattered their students, possibly on the basis that if they weren’t already rich, they soon would be, and if they had fond memories of feel-good class discussions, they’d be more inclined to remit donations to the alma mater. Sigurdson was simply assuming that everyone in the room was an adult. It was a new feeling for Ed. Leaving aside for the moment what had brought Harold Sigurdson to California, I need to point out that he was new there – not quite as new as Ed was, but still new. He’d taught at a couple of liberal-arts safety schools in Massachusetts, not Ivies, but fairly prestigious nonetheless. The transition was apparently as hard for him as it was for Ed. In the first class session, Harold was explaining that he’d rather hold the class meetings at his home and was giving directions for how to get there. He lived in Beverly Hills, though it was south of Wilshire, which meant it was just an ordinary house.. “Do you know where Roxbury is?” he asked Ed, referring to a street near his home. “Sure,” he answered. “It’s near Boston.” Harold, it seemed, felt right then the same pang that Ed was feeling. They hit it off from that moment forward. Sigurdson was in early middle age. He didn’t say much about himself in class, but Ed gradually picked up the story in scuttlebutt. His wife had passed away a year or so earlier, after a long battle with cancer. Beyond that, his children had been on a trip to the zoo with a group from several other families, when an elephant suddenly went rogue, reached over the enclosure, picked up a child with its trunk, and threw it to the ground, killing it. Harold’s own children, while unharmed, were thoroughly traumatized. Since then, he’d been hitting Nietzsche’s Birth of Tragedy, with its glimpse of gruesome night, pretty hard in the readings for the criticism seminar. This further went to Ed’s sense that Sigurdson wasn’t coddling anyone. But around that time, people started to talk to Ed about taking over the program manager’s job for the monthly English Department tea. This unremunerated job involved reserving the room in the Burkett Center, making sure sufficient folding chairs had been laid in, ordering the sherry from the faculty lounge, requisitioning the napkins, crockery, and other refreshments from the student union, serving as master of ceremonies, and not least, securing speakers. One might assume that being selected for such a duty was a sign of favor among the faculty, perhaps also a prefiguring of academic success, since it demanded of the incumbent a certain basic competence and reliability, an ability to work with people at all levels in the university, and a flair for cajolery, flattery, even political maneuver, when needed to persuade faculty members to speak. On the other hand, the last four well-seasoned graduate students who’d been selected for that job had seen their careers truncated. There was no way to do it without offending someone important on the faculty, whether by scheduling a rival, passing over a protégé, making a gaffe in introductions, or even selecting the wrong brand of sherry. Rob French was the current, soon-to-be-former, incumbent; he was giving the whole graduate school thing up and heading off to teach writing at a business college. It was in his interest in recruiting a successor to minimize the problems and frustrations he’d had, and he said nothing about them to Ed. And Ed was new enough at the game that he didn’t divine those issues on his own. “Harold Sigurdson thinks you’re a good candidate for the job,” said Rob. “Really?” Ed said. He figured he and Sigurdson were friendly, but he’d always kept in mind their first meeting. “Are you sure?” “I don’t think you understand,” said Rob. “Every time someone mentions your name, he booms out ‘Good man!’.” Ed had other confirmation of Sigurdson’s attitude toward him. As that year’s spring semester wound down and he began looking at his courses for fall, he decided to take an advanced seminar from David Hume Browne, a recently-hired prestige professor who’d been brought in with a newly-created endowed chair. He and Sigurdson had come in at the same time, and the rumor was that hiring Sigurdson had been a condition of bringing Browne in. Anyone who wanted to sign up had to make an appointment to talk with Browne first, which Ed did. The meeting went much the same as his first talk with Sigurdson: Browne wasn’t impressed with Ed’s undergraduate work and suggested he might want to wait a year or two to get more experience in graduate school before trying again. But then it came out that Ed had taken Sigurdson’s esthetics and criticism course the prior fall. “Just a minute,” said Browne, “I’ll be right back,” and he left the office. Soon enough, he returned. “Well,” he said, “it seems that Prof. Sigurdson was quite. . . impressed with you. I suppose we can let you sign up for the course after all.” Megan told him she was starting to look at teaching opportunities in California for the following school year so they wouldn’t be so far apart. She mentioned a position at a continuation school in San Diego, the same work she’d been doing. Ed wasn’t too unhappy about that; San Diego was a hundred miles away, and they wouldn’t be in each other’s hair. Then there was a potential teaching job in Lompoc: same thing, not so close as to be a problem. But then in March, she called him. She’d applied for, and received, a graduate assistant job at the same university, the same English department, where Ed was teaching. This was a surprise: she hadn’t mentioned anything like it. Her tone on the call was severe: “Is there any reason – any reason,” she repeated carefully, “why I shouldn’t accept that job?” Ed sorted through the possible reasons: what she clearly implied with her severe tone was whether he’d started something serious with some other woman. He’d looked around, but nothing worthwhile had shown up. So the answer to her specific implied question was no. He didn’t have the presence of mind even to start assembling a rejoinder based on whether the whole question of her joining him at work was a good idea or not. And as she promised, Megan moved out to California that summer. She didn’t have a car, so Ed, who’d bought one, though he was still living with his parents, drove her around to find an apartment. Actually, she never bought a car for the several years the relationship with Ed continued, which created a serious problem in California. She relied on public transit, on Ed, or whomever else she could find to give her rides where she wanted to go. That fall, Ed discovered that, without mentioning anything to him about it, Harold Sigurdson had quietly made sure that his son, who was starting college then, wound up in Ed’s first-year comp section. When Megan started graduate school in the fall, she took Sigurdson’s esthetics and criticism seminar on Ed’s recommendation. A week or so later, she said Sigurdson had called her into his office. “He told me I’m in the wrong place,” she said. “He told me, ‘You’re much too good for this school. We need to get you into UCLA as soon as we can.’” This came as a shock to Ed. As far as he could tell, Sigurdson thought of him about as highly as he thought of anyone, yet he’d never mentioned anything along the line of getting him into UCLA. In fact, considering the move they’d made to put him in charge of the monthly English Department tea, they seemed to want him right where he was. On top of that, given the soul searching he’d done on the nature of an elite-school English major, he wasn’t sure how Megan’s background differed all that much from his own. She sensed his puzzlement, as well as his jealousy. “Maybe this is my big chance in life,” she said. “Do you think I should do it?” “I thought what we’d talked about was you coming out so we could be together,” he said. That didn’t, as the reader may well imagine, have much of an effect, and she began to dig her heels in. In fairness, I should add here a bit of information that Ed didn’t have at the time. It often happens that, when offspring enter their parents’ professions, it gives them a Darwinian fitness for survival. Certain habits of personality, which is to say certain fundamentals of professional gamesmanship, are somehow transferred across generations, when for those not born into the family profession, some time, and indeed some careers, must inevitably be sacrificed in trial and error. Megan’s father, as we’ve seen, was himself an English professor, tenured though unpublished and unassuming, at a third-tier institution. His dissertation had traced the hitherto unrecognized influence of Edmund Gosse on Charles R.B. Southwick, a Canadian poet, and although his own work hadn’t reached publication, he’d been engaged for many years in a thoroughgoing if feckless reappraisal of Gosse himself. As some people give lavish gifts to their children on occasions like confirmation or graduation, her father gave Megan what, in his estimation, was the most valuable gift he could give on the occasion of her enrolling in graduate school: a draft of an essay on Gosse. You could interpret this as simple complacency and self-absorption on his part, but it in fact represented a greater understanding than we might expect of his daughter’s real capabilities and actual needs. And perhaps instinctively responding to this intention, Megan took the draft and polished it, helped by numerous professors, throughout her graduate school career, and it formed the core of the only article she ever published. That, in turn, was eventually sufficient to earn her a full-time job, and later tenure, at a community college – but this is beyond the scope of our story. Thus the issue of moving to UCLA soon enough went on the back burner, and a month or so after her first report of a meeting with Harold Sigurdson, Megan reported to Ed on another. “‘Megan,’ he said to me, ‘your prose style is soggy and desultory. You need to come to my office so we can work on it.’” One would think that a graduate student destined for a top-10 school would have a prose style other than soggy and desultory – or at least, that’s what Ed had at the back of his mind. But in fact, nothing afterward was ever said about UCLA. Then, a few weeks after that, she reported yet another exchange, this one indicating that a certain informality had built up between them: “‘Megan,’ he said to me, leaning out of his office door, ‘come play with me.’” She gave no further details on what this may have entailed, and this was the last such exchange that she reported. It did appear, though, that he was satisfied to have her exactly where she was.

The Russian Girl William Falo Katarina looked into the window of the night club on Nevsky Prospekt, and watched the life she dreamed about taking place on the other side of the pane of glass. The vision shattered when an angry man started yelling in English. He made wild gestures with his hands while talking to a well dressed lady. Katarina understood some of the words, and knew that the man was upset because a girl from a distant village failed to meet him. The man turned toward her, and she spun around causing her red scarf to fall off. He picked it up, and twirled it around in his fingers before holding it up to his nose. When she started to back away; he held it out to her. The gesture made her pause, until he stepped closer. She ran down the street with her hand covering the scar on her neck, and tears running down her cheek. No tourist would dare to follow her there to the empty building where she lived. The crunching of glass under her feet was only broken by the deep breaths of someone inhaling glue in a corner. A boy came out of the darkness. “You’re back early,” Alexey said. “I feel sick.” He looked down and saw the bruises on her arms. “A rough one.” “Yes. I was afraid he was a trafficker.” “Damn, Katarina. You are going to end up being sold. You have to be careful.” “Careful means starving.” “I know. Maybe this will help.” He handed her the bag and she breathed in deeply. The room spun, and she saw her parents before her. They smiled at her when she slumped down, and she closed her eyes until Alexey rubbed her arm. They climbed to the roof, and looked onto the lights of the city. Golden domes of distant cathedrals sparkled in the starlit night. “Sometimes it looks beautiful.” “That’s what the tourists think. They don’t see the side streets,” Alexey said. “I saw my parent’s faces,” Katarina said. “Hallucinations. That’s all.” “Maybe, I know they put me in an orphanage after I got sick.” She paused. “I wonder when I will die.” She rubbed her neck. “Maybe not for a long time.” “No, I have a sickness. See the scar. The orphanage doctor told me it could come back despite the operation.” “Then you ran away.” “Nobody wants a sick orphan?” “Yesterday, I thought about going home, but I know my step father would beat me again,” he said, and rubbed his eyes. The lights of the city failed to illuminate the darkness around them. “I have a plan,” Katarina said. “What is it?” “There’s an American looking for a bride.” “Pervert. Old man?” “Not too old. I want to pretend to be the Russian bride he is looking for.” “Impossible.” “Thanks for the compliment.” She hit his arm. “I’ll steal clothes and makeup. We make the man give me all his money, or take me to America.” You’re not old enough.” “I’m old enough to have sex. That’s what they’re looking for.” “But.” he looked away. Other street children returned from begging or selling, and talked downstairs. “Alexey, don’t tell anyone else. I just want to feel what it is like to be normal even if it’s just this one time.” She hugged him, and he smiled at her and then kissed her. A sliver of light reflected off of a pane of broken glass, and sparkled in his eyes. It hypnotized her, until they fell asleep in each other’s arms against a crumbling wall in the abandoned building. She stole a short red dress from a dryer in an apartment complex; remembering the red scarf she dropped, and how the man twirled it around his fingers. The lipstick came from a loosely guarded pocketbook. When she walked by a window, she stopped, and turned around because she thought someone was standing behind her. “You look like a real woman,” Alexey said. “Thanks, I think,” she said, and laughed. “Don’t go. It’s too dangerous,” he said. She hugged him, and walked onto the streets of Saint Petersburg. She saw him outside the hotel near the place she saw him the night before. He sat alone at a table in an outdoor café. Alexey watched from a distance, while she approached the table. She sat across from the man causing him to gasp. He looked around, and fiddled with his shirt buttons. “Hi,” she said. He stared at her unable to speak then reached into his pocket Without taking his eyes off of her, he pulled out the red scarf. “Yours?” He asked. “You keep it.” She smiled, and rubbed her neck. He folded it, and placed it back into his pocket. “I’m Johan. You?” He said, and held out a hand. “Katarina,” she said, and took his hand. It felt warm, and she held it longer then she wanted to. “Nice name. How old are you?” “Eighteen.” She said, and blinked rapidly. The man ordered her a drink. He sniffed the air, and she knew that she smelled bad. There was no way to shower and perfume was rare in the streets. “Are you with the agency?” “Yes,” the lies came easy. “Why did you come to Russia?” “I’m divorced. The women here are beautiful. It’s a beautiful place.” She wanted to comment on the street children, but couldn’t translate all the words. The man kept looking at her with penetrating eyes. She kept sipping the drink, and spinning the ice inside it. “Here comes, Olga,” he said, and pointed toward a woman walking through the maze of tables. Katarina felt her head buzz. She recognized Olga from the night before, as she approached them. “I need money to stay here, or I have to go back to the village.” Alexey made frantic motions with his hands in the distance. “Please,” Katarina said, and stood up. “When will I see you again?” Johan asked. “Tonight,” she said, and he handed her money. Olga grabbed her by the arm, and she stumbled backwards. Johan stood up, and reached out to steady her. “Johan, this is a street girl not a bride,” Olga said. She then reached out, and ripped the shirt off of Katarina. It fell to the ground, leaving Katarina standing there in a torn undershirt. Katarina ran out of the café; the sound of laughter followed her down the street. Tears fell down her cheeks causing dark streaks on her face, and she dropped the money. Alexey caught up to her, and ran with her back to the abandoned building. “I knew it wouldn’t work. We’re different and nobody cares about us,” he said. The karat numbed her, but she had to go back out on the street. She lost the money, and the dream of being a bride when she ran out of the restaurant. “We should go away. Maybe to Ukraine or Belarus,” he said. “It’s too dangerous. There are even more sex traffickers.” “Saint Petersburg isn’t much better,” Alexey said. “I know.” She sobbed. “Don’t go out tonight. Let’s stay here.” “I have to. I dropped the money. We need food,” she said. “I’ll go beg.” “It won’t be enough, and if you steal you can get caught and beaten by the police.” “Be careful.” Alexey said with a somber look like he sensed something bad was going to happen. “Don’t worry,” she said and threw him a kiss as she left. She walked out onto the dark street toward the main roads near the metro stations. The foreigners would pay more than any locals would. A rain started to fall, and that meant more business. With fewer things to do they would look for a girl to spend their time with. The streets seemed emptier than usual, and she walked further into the city. She turned away when she neared the hotel where the American was. The other street children gathered in the internet café; many of them played a computer game called Counter-Strike. The sounds of the war game, and the constant taunting during the game, made her feel sick, and she moved to a seat by the front entrance because it was located far away from the computer terminals. A long, black car parked by the front door. Its tinted windows hid the driver, and nobody left the vehicle. She looked for Alexey, but saw no sign of her friend. The war game ended in a fist fight, near the computer terminals; as they often did. A short hair, blonde boy jumped up and started hitting the other boy. “You cheated,” he yelled. “No, you’re just not a good soldier.” They wrestled on the floor, while the owner stood up. “Stop that.” Nobody listened, and they tumbled on the floor; knocking over glasses that shattered on the floor. “That’s it. Everybody out,” the owner yelled. “I’m closing.” The boys stopped, and slowly walked out while making gestures at the owner. They walked past the black car that remained motionless. Katarina followed them, and then stopped when the window rolled down, and a man stuck out a clenched fist filled with money. “Come with me, and I’ll give you some food, and you can take a shower.” he said. “I don’t know. What do I have to do?” The word food made her stomach rumble, and she could imagine hot water pouring over her rough, torn skin. “Nothing, but I know someone that needs a girl to watch his children in England. It pays a lot, and it’s a nice place to live.” She looked around for Alexey, but the streets looked empty except for the shadows of other street children, moving between buildings toward their own unknown destinations. Where did the other boys go? The silence made her nervous, but she didn’t leave. Could this be her chance to leave the streets? She could come back for Alexey, and they could move to England together. Maybe, they could get married, and have children. Someone approached, and she saw a flash of red. The man in the car started to talk faster. “Get in the car now, and you can be off the streets forever.” She hesitated, and the man grabbed her wrist with lightning speed. The back door opened, and he steered her toward the darkness inside the car. He smelled of vodka, and when she could see; he looked much older then he appeared from inside the dark car. Despite, her struggling, he started to pull her toward the open door. Her legs gave out, and she fell toward the inside of the car. The man shoved her into the back seat, then stopped when someone yelled in English. The sound of scuffling came from behind her; followed by a thud. Someone pulled her out of the car, and the engine started, followed by the screeching of wheels. The scratches on her legs, and arms burned. The red lights of the car disappeared around a corner, and she turned around to find out who saved her. The only thing she saw was a red scarf. “Are you alright?” Alexey ran down the street toward her. “No,” she said, and fell into his arms. “What happened?” “Traffickers tried to take me away, but someone saved me.” “Who?” She picked up the red scarf. “I think I know.” Alexey nodded his head, and held onto her like he never wanted to let go. *** Katarina took off her apron, and walked out of the cafe that she met the American in. Alexey waited on a bench. “How was your first day?” “Not bad,” she said, and held out a handful of money. “I still can’t believe the American got you the job.” “Actually, Olga the interpreter helped me get the job, but only because she wanted more men to come to her agency. He threatened to give them bad reviews, and use someone else.” “You will get another chance to be a bride to a rich American then.” “I don’t think so. Once is enough,” she laughed. A dark, familiar car headed toward them, and she pulled Alexey into a doorway. Katarina sighed, “They’re still out there.” “I think they will think twice before messing with you,” he said. “But there will be others as long as men will pay for it,” she said and looked down. Alexey hugged her. Katarina grasped his hand as they left the shadows of the old building, and walked toward a flickering light that pierced the darkness ahead of them.

Warring Nations Janet Kuypers 06/04/09 For us, it was cheaper to take a bus with a group VISA in your country. I thought it was strange, we had been mortal enemies for decades, and now, here I am, on a bus. You try to show me your splendor, as I look through my rectangular window in this mass transport. I watched the streets out the bus window. Thin black cords were randomly thrown, scattered along the edges of the grayed sky. When you looked to the sky here, upwards of fifteen cables for all of the power-generated trains crisscrossed the hanging light cables down every street, and cables multiplied at every intersection. I wondered if the Marine I came with would have heightened defenses in this Cold War country. But I think he was more interested in buying a bottle of potato vodka. The bus would stop. I would snap photos like some tacky American tourist, trying to photograph any low building I could. Here buildings could not be built tall. That is what protected them from air attacks during World War II. This bus drove me through the town highlights. After we’d turn a corner from the Government buildings or colorful churches I tried to catch photographic glimpses of paint-peeled, brick-exposed, dilapidated buildings, what this country was really about, where door steps cracked and separated from the sidewalks. The bus wouldn’t stop at Nevsky Prospekt to see Alice Rosenbaum’s childhood home, so before we left, I wanted to ask the woman in charge questions. Her English was good. She even described the weather that day to me as “capricious,” which impressed me. Capricious. Impulsive, unpredictable. That’s how she described the day. After photographing stop signs in foreign languages from around the world, I wanted to photograph a stop sign here. I asked her where there was a stop sign. She said they did not have stop signs here. Everyone just slows down for oncoming traffic. She also said that they also do not have parking meters in the city. People just park where they need to and go about their business. She told me that in this part of her country, rent for one-bedroom apartments was about one hundred dollars a month. Factory workers, or mechanical employees, only made about three hundred dollars a month. This is why there are no at-home housewives — everyone has to work to afford keeping the children fed and clothed in their one-bedroom flats. She also said that people in service industries in this country, teachers, doctors, make only two hundred dollars, even less than factory workers. I continued observing on this bus ride. They painted their buildings such pretty colors, yellow, pink. They painted columns on buildings, which had none. Anything to make things look more elegant, or more cheerful, I suppose. I saw your weaponry on display, reminding me of when we were enemies. If you couldn’t kill us in war, you were pleased with injuring us. It took more of our soldiers to help save our sick than bury our dead, leaving us weaker and more vulnerable to our enemies. You still keep your war relics, I see. Then again, so do I. You show off your best features today. Your idolatry for your Motherland shows through in the way you prettied your exterior for us. but your government takes over half of your money and you can barely afford to live. They indoctrinate you by saying this is what’s best for you. You have no other options. I suppose under these conditions you can become so dependent on them that you have no choice but to idolize them. I saw a statue as we were leaving town on the bus, of a man helping another fallen man. It made me think of how all people in your country with next to nothing seem to have no choice but to help their fellow man, because they, like them, are falling. I looked for happiness in these painted exteriors of your buildings. I believe that because of where you are from, because of what you believe, you only have happiness because you are so used to nothing. When you have nothing, anything is a gift. We Americans want too much, and always expect to be happy. I suppose that means you’re let down less often than we. The marine bought his Imperia vodka. I bought a miniature Balalaika. (bahl-ah-lee-ka) At a half hour before midnight here, it was still light out. After seeing how you lived for a day, I felt like reveling in capitalism. So at eleven thirty at night, in daylight, I sat in a hot tub while still docked at these communist shores.

Warring Nations(prose poem)

Camera #1 YouTube video

Camera #2 YouTube video

Janet Kuypers has a Communications degree in News/Editorial Journalism (starting in computer science engineering studies) from the UIUC. She had the equivalent of a minor in photography and specialized in creative writing. A portrait photographer for years in the early 1990s, she was also an acquaintance rape workshop facilitator, and she started her publishing career as an editor of two literary magazines. Later she was an art director, webmaster and photographer for a few magazines for a publishing company in Chicago, and this Journalism major was even the final featured poetry performer of 15 poets with a 10 minute feature at the 2006 Society of Professional Journalism Expo’s Chicago Poetry Showcase. This certified minister was even the officiant of a wedding in 2006. She sang with acoustic bands “Mom’s Favorite Vase”, “Weeds and Flowers” and “the Second Axing”, and does music sampling. Kuypers is published in books, magazines and on the internet around 9,300 times for writing, and over 17,800 times for art work in her professional career, and has been profiled in such magazines as Nation and Discover U, won the award for a Poetry Ambassador and was nominated as Poet of the Year for 2006 by the International Society of Poets. She has also been highlighted on radio stations, including WEFT (90.1FM), WLUW (88.7FM), WSUM (91.7FM), WZRD (88.3FM), WLS (8900AM), the internet radio stations ArtistFirst dot com, chicagopoetry.com’s Poetry World Radio and Scars Internet Radio (SIR), and was even shortly on Q101 FM radio. She has also appeared on television for poetry in Nashville (in 1997), Chicago (in 1997), and northern Illinois (in a few appearances on the show for the Lake County Poets Society in 2006). Kuypers was also interviewed on her art work on Urbana’s WCIA channel 3 10 o’clock news. She turned her writing into performance art on her own and with musical groups like Pointless Orchestra, 5D/5D, The DMJ Art Connection, Order From Chaos, Peter Bartels, Jake and Haystack, the Bastard Trio, and the JoAnne Pow!ers Trio, and starting in 2005 Kuypers ran a monthly iPodCast of her work, as well mixed JK Radio — an Internet radio station — into Scars Internet Radio. She even managed the Chaotic Radio show (an hour long Internet radio show now on hiatus) through BZoO.org and chaoticarts.org. She has performed spoken word and music across the country - in the spring of 1998 she embarked on her first national poetry tour, with featured performances, among other venues, at the Albuquerque Spoken Word Festival during the National Poetry Slam; her bands have had concerts in Chicago and in Alaska; in 2003 she hosted and performed at a weekly poetry and music open mike (called Sing Your Life), and from 2002 through 2005 was a featured performance artist, doing quarterly performance art shows with readings, music and images. In addition to being published with Bernadette Miller in the short story collection book Domestic Blisters, as well as in a book of poetry turned to prose with Eric Bonholtzer in the book Duality, Kuypers has had many books of her own published: Hope Chest in the Attic, The Window, Close Cover Before Striking, (woman.) (spiral bound), Autumn Reason (novel in letter form), the Average Guy’s Guide (to Feminism), Contents Under Pressure, etc., and eventually The Key To Believing (2002 650 page novel), Changing Gears (travel journals around the United States), The Other Side (European travel book), The Boss Lady’s Editorials, The Boss Lady’s Editorials (2005 Expanded Edition), Seeing Things Differently, Change/Rearrange, Death Comes in Threes, Moving Performances, Six Eleven, Live at Cafe Aloha, Dreams, Rough Mixes, The Entropy Project, The Other Side (2006 edition), Stop., Sing Your Life, the hardcover art book (with an editorial) in cc&d v165.25, the Kuypers edition of Writings to Honour & Cherish, The Kuypers Edition: Blister and Burn, S&M, cc&d v170.5, cc&d v171.5: Living in Chaos, Tick Tock, cc&d v1273.22: Silent Screams, Taking It All In, It All Comes Down, Rising to the Surface, Galapagos, Chapter 38 (v1 and volume 1), Chapter 38 (v2 and Volume 2), Chapter 38 v3, Finally: Literature for the Snotty and Elite (Volume 1, Volume 2 and part 1 of a 3 part set), A Wake-Up Call From Tradition (part 2 of a 3 part set), (recovery), Dark Matter: the mind of Janet Kuypers, and Evolution. Three collection books were also published of her work in 2004, Oeuvre (poetry), Exaro Versus (prose) and L’arte (art).

The Extra Sparkle Susanna Wiliker “Are you looking for anything in particular?” “No. I don’t know. It’s for a woman I’m trying to impress.” A young man bows his head shyly to the sales clerk. “I see.” She says knowingly. She’s run into plenty of men like him, who don’t trust their own taste. Looking over his clothes she agrees silently that he doesn’t know what he’s doing. He’s wearing an expensive outfit altogether, but the shirt is slightly off-color as compared to his pants, and while he affects the upper-class accent he has the cadence incorrect. He’s new money trying to attract old money. “We just got these pearl earrings in yesterday. They’re studded with ruby chips. Quite pretty!” Smiles the sales clerk. “And pearls are coming back into fashion, they’re very classy. I’m guessing it’s a classy lady you’re shopping for, right?” “Yes. I never see her wearing earrings though.” He says sheepishly. “What colors does she usually wear?” “A lot of black, and red. White sometimes.” “Oh, wait one moment. Let me find a piece for you.” She walks briskly down to an adjacent display case and carries back a beautiful onyx bracelet. Its slender beads are engraved, and spaced with petite silver studs. “It’s nice but I don’t think it’s, you know...her?” The young man says. He sighs. “Well tell me more about this fine lady of yours. Maybe you could get her a birthstone. Or is she involved in a particular area of magic?” “Yes, she’s a necromancer.” He brightens up. “Do you have something like that?” “Follow me.” She waves him over to another display case. It has many intricate pieces, composed of bone, teeth, and the hard lenses out of eyes. He looks at a ring of polished bone, studded with ruby chips. “How much is that one?” “Only ninety-six marks with tax.” “What about that one?” He points to a necklace of quarter inch bone cabochons set in silver, with a dangling lens as a center piece. “Oh that came in straight from Dead City. It’s a very effective talisman for viewing through the eyes of your owned. It’s all the rage there and very affordable too at two-hundred marks.” “Uh, I was kind of hoping to spend a little more than that. She knows how much is in my budget is the thing. So I’m looking for something expensive.” The sales clerk gets an odd little smile that creases the lines next to her mouth. She’s about to make a nice big sale. “I have the perfect thing. Perfect for her. These are very rare. We keep them in the back room.” She leaves for a second disappearing into the back of the shop. She returns carrying a carved wooden display chest, which she sets on the counter in front of him. Pulling out a set of keys from her pocket she unlocks it. Inside is a set of jewelry including a necklace, ring, bracelet, barrettes, and ankle bracelets. The chains and settings are beautifully crafted from bone and the central piece on each is a black-red stone, with a multi-faceted oblong cut. The sales clerk tilts the lid forward to show off the most singular property of the gems. Though they are shaded from the sun, they still sparkle with light as if from inside. “As you can see, the actual chain on this necklace is bone. It’s a very difficult thing to craft one this thin and has...” “Why do they glow like that?” He asks. She’s hardly surprised at his interruption, and smiles. “Each stone in this set has an actual soul in it.” She replies. “That’s where the extra sparkle comes from. You won’t find anything like this collection elsewhere. We came across them at an auction, by pure luck and recognized their value.” “I’ll buy them.” He says immediately. “Shall I wrap them for you?” “Yes, and could you accidentally leave the price tag on?” He asks with a wink. “Of course, Sir.” She winks back.

Protection Problems Jon Brunette “Someone will kill us with that pistol of yours.” After my wife spoke, I promised to throw my firearm off the old brick footbridge in the wooded lot behind our property. She shook her head firmly. “I don’t want it in the house anymore,” she said. I did what I proclaimed. Beyond my house, I walked through the thick, weedy acreage that touched three townships like a massive quarantine. I wobbled the pistol inside my beefy hands until I finally dropped it. Like a brick, the metal object plummeted quickly off the small bridge onto the muddy bottom. Initially, I bought the pistol because our neighbors were robbed and beaten. Slowly, they had recovered. Like anyone in the country, my wife and I could find worse luck. With the handgun, I could always kill invaders like a black bear would around baby cubs. Without the firearm in my possession, anyone could touch my wife, who looked as lovely as any jewel and held a value that couldn’t compare. Like I had warned, anyone could indeed murder my wife or me. Still, I would never touch another firearm. When I returned home after a lengthy walk in the woods, I found Lisa slumped forward, her small mouth pursed, like she had fallen asleep. Her hands touched her cheeks lightly, with her elbows on her knees. As peaceful as she appeared, I told her that I had ditched the pistol. It wouldn’t harm us anymore. When I shook Lisa, I found her body limp and her skull bloody. Confused, I walked around our comfortable house like I looked upon it for the first time and found barren rooms without television units, without the fancy chrome stereo that had occupied my time in the basement, and lastly, without the sparkly diamonds that Lisa had always worn publicly. Although it hardly seemed important, three expensive vases, which had held three equally fluffy bushels of flowers, had been broken onto the kitchen floor. With my handgun, I could protect anyone. Like my wife had announced earlier, I wouldn’t need it anymore.

A National Geographic View Evvy Gordon Once I watched As a man talked at me About his secondary sexual characteristic: The ability to fuck for fuck’s sake. He said, “I’m not proud,” Like his dick was a cheetah’s incisors Forcing him to prey on flesh By design, and not at all transgression. And the traitorous wedding band On his sweaty hand Tapped nervously against the sweaty pint glass, And his traitorous eyes jutted around Like they weren’t sure they were convincing Enough. I wondered, is he for real? And all I wanted to say to him was Are you for real? And there just was not enough Humanity in me To feel sorry for him Though he would never know The difference between predator and prey.

Father’s Rage Okechukwu Otukwu ‘I think Emeka will have canvas shoes for his birthday,’ Father said as he prepared to go to the university where he worked as security man. ‘No, he will have sandals,’ Mother countered. ‘The sandals he wears to school are now worn-out and need to be replaced.’ Father sighed. Standing in the doorway that connected the two rooms that we occupied, waiting for Mother to give the word so Emeka and I would go to school, I sighed with him. It had always been this way with my parents. Father would say one thing and Mother would immediately counter him with a different opinion. If Father said that it was morning Mother would be sure to maintain it was night instead. I could not understand it. It was as if every opinion of Father’s was faulty in some way and needed to be amended by Mother’s superior intelligence. This might be so, for Father never raised a word of objection once countered by Mother. People said that he was afraid of her; and there might be some truth in that, too. But it was not a thing to wonder at; everyone I knew feared Mother—our neighbours, her friends and her fellow teachers in the primary school where she taught (which was also the school that Emeka and I attended). Even I feared Mother sometimes even though she doted on Emeka and me when the fancy caught her. But she had a quick temper which seemed constantly to be on edge; and when she was angry, her huge frame looming large like a volcanic mountain, even a child who knew he was loved would be seized by instant fright. Emeka and I lived in constant fear of such moments. So it was not a thing of wonder that Father who was smallish and wiry and submissive in nature should be afraid of Mother too. He had always accepted Mother’s domineering attitude without question and it was not likely that that was going to end now; and so it was agreed that Emeka would have sandals for his birthday, a few weeks away. When he heard it, Emeka was very disappointed that he was not going to have shoes. But even the sandals were not later bought because the birthday never took place; a week before it, Emeka had taken ill. The illness came as a fever in the early hours of the evening and, as their custom, Father and Mother had expressed contrary views concerning it. While Father feared the fever was a sign of malaria, Mother laughed at him and said it was an ordinary high temperature brought on by Emeka’s excessive play, that it would go before nightfall. ‘I don’t think this is an ordinary fever, Mama Ebuka,’ Father said, feeling Emeka’s temperature. ‘This is malaria. You don’t have to wait until it manifests fully before you know it. Ebuka,’ he said to me, ‘feel your brother. What do you think?’ He was trying to enlist my support but I was only thirteen then and had not acquired the boldness to take part in their war of opinions and counter opinions. So I merely felt Emeka’s temperature which was pretty high and said nothing. Father, who was on night duty that week, would soon leave and I would be left alone with Mother for the rest of the night. I was not such a fool as not to know how I was better off. ‘You worry yourself unnecessarily, Papa Ebuka,’ Mother said. ‘I tell you this is nothing more than an ordinary high temperature. You don’t expect children to play the way Ebuka and Emeka do the whole time and not come down with a high temperature. That is why I always quarrel with them over their excessive play but you will tell me to leave them alone, that boys will be boys. Anyway, I will rub udeaku over his body; it will take care of the high temperature.’ Udeaku, or palm kernel cream, was oil extracted from roasted palm kernel, and it was claimed to cure all feverish conditions. Ever since I could remember, it was what Mother always used on us whenever we had a bout of fever. So far it had worked ... until today. Some hours after Mother rubbed the oil all over Emeka’s body, he did not appear to get any better; the fever persisted. ‘You must take this boy to the hospital,’ Father said as he left for work, his voice scarcely concealing his anger. He left some money on a table in the parlour. ‘Here is five thousand naira. Use it to take him to the hospital. This is no ordinary fever.’ ‘I will do that, Doctor Ignatius Mbaelu,’ Mother replied in derision. ‘This is a fine thing to waste money on. But when the time comes to pay their school fees you will say you don’t have money.’ Father said nothing more and left. As soon as Father was out the door, Mother began to act in a manner that I found quite strange. Locking the door of the parlour as if to prevent any intruder, she took Emeka into the bedroom and laid him on the bed that she shared with Father. Then from under the bed, she pulled out a box from which she took out a wooden crucifix, two red candles, a small white container and something wrapped in a little cellophane bag. She placed a low table at one end of the room, covered it with a white cloth, then she placed the cross in the centre of the table, the red candles on either side of it. Untying the cellophane bag, she took out something that looked like small pieces of wood and put them on a saucer which she then placed on top of the table, behind the cross. Then she set fire to the candles and the pieces of wood. Suddenly, the room was covered in a mist of grey, strong-smelling smoke. I stared in amazement at Mother, realizing only then that she was burning incense at home, but she took no notice of me. At that moment she was possessed by a strange spirit and she looked like a priestess performing a ritual. When the candles and the incense were burning, she poured a little water from the white container that she had taken from the box into a bowl. With a white handkerchief which was also taken from the box, she began to wipe Emeka’s body from head to toes. As she did this, she muttered some words that sounded like a chant to me. After this ablution, she laid Emeka back on the bed; her face looked somewhat relaxed. Emeka on his part appeared to be recovering fast. At least, his body no longer trembled uncontrollably as it did in the evening. Mother let the candles and the incense burn for a little while longer before she blew out the candles and poured away the incense. She told me that Emeka was all right now. ‘That was what your Father wanted to spend five thousand naira on, as if he could afford the money. Ask him now to bring money for food, he will tell you how the university has been owing them for months. But he has money to donate to doctors. I will not let him.’           I said nothing, not knowing what to say anyway. But her pronouncement that Emeka was healed proved to be false. Whatever power was contained in the ritual that she had performed must have been calculated to last only a few hours, for Emeka’s illness returned in the midnight with a renewed vigour that left him shaking and jerking like a victim of convulsions. Great beads of sweat stood on his body like bumps. For the first time in my life I saw Mother frightened. Even though the night was cold, her face glistened with sweat, and a wild lost look came into her eyes. She repeated the ritual of the evening but to effect; the power seemed to have deserted her. When she had done everything she could think of, she sat with Emeka on her laps, and we waited for the dawn. I thought that maybe then she would take Emeka to the hospital as Father had instructed. But I was mistaken. She told me that when the day broke we would take Emeka to Apostle Jonah’s Temple of Divinity, a prayer house for which she had abandoned our Catholic faith a few months before, and which, like everything else, had been a subject of intense controversy between her and Father. The ritual she had performed in the evening in a bid to heal Emeka had come from her association with the Temple of Divinity. As soon as the hour struck five Mother lit a hurricane lamp, put it in my hand and, strapping Emeka to her back, she led the way into the breaking dawn. We should have left the lamp at home; it was useless against the thick fog that was customary in Nsukka in the harmattan season. Furious gusts of cold wind broke out every now and then from the rocky hills that bounded the town like sporadic outbursts of laughter from a lunatic, twisting tree branches with a painful howl. I felt the blood in my veins freeze with the cold but Mother hardly took any notice of my condition. She walked in agitated urgency in front of me, throwing only occasional glances behind at me. Soon we were in the Temple of Divinity, tucked under a three-storey building on Ogurugu Road. It was a small airless room with a dais at one end to serve as the altar. On top of the dais stood a table covered with a red cloth; two red candles were burning on it. A wide red curtain with the inscription: Jehovah Jireh liveth! Hallelujah! hung behind the altar. The strange redness of the altar with its burning red candles and the red curtain behind it struck a chill into me. About five people were kneeling at the altar praying; some unknown number were lying in various parts of the room sleeping. Mother unstrapped Emeka from her back and laid him before the altar. The other worshippers crowded round him. They gasped sharply when they saw his condition. Someone shouted to another to go and call Apostle Jonah. The person dashed off behind the red curtain. Apostle Jonah appeared almost immediately in a red cassock; he held a bible to his chest and a bell in the other hand. His face hid behind a mass of face hair and his bloodshot eyes gleamed with an unnatural light. He ordered people to move away from Emeka, then he began to pray. He jangled the bell he held at intervals as if to ring home his prayer. The congregation shouted ‘Amen!’ or ‘Hallelujah!’ in response. Midway into the prayer, he paused and, taking hold of a bowl on the altar, he sprinkled water on Emeka, shouting in an unnatural, eerie tone. Emeka was jerking and twisting and moaning on the floor. ‘Come out him!’ Apostle Jonah screamed. ‘I command you with the power of the Most High to come out of him at once, you spirit of destruction! Begone! Begone! Begone!...’ Jonah’s voice shook round the small space in the room with a frightening echo. Meanwhile he continued pouring water on Emeka and shouting at the same time. He prayed in this manner for more than an hour, then he stopped abruptly. He was sweating profusely, but there was a look of contentment on his face. ‘I saw a demon with the head of a lion and the body of a hawk come out of that boy and fly away through the open door,’ he intoned. ‘It is all over now. Woman, here is your son. Son, here is your Mother. Our Jehovah has upheld his judgment against the devil.’ The congregation greeted this with a thunderous ‘hallelujah!’ that made the walls reverberate. Emeka lay completely still on the floor, as if in sleep. Someone went to him, touched him and stiffened. Then he straightened and whispered something to Apostle Jonah. A look of astonishment and then of fear spread over Apostle Jonah’s face. He exchanged some words with the man and then disappeared behind the red curtain. The others started leaving one after another until only Mother and Emeka and I were left in the temple. Looking confused, Mother went to carry Emeka. I saw her stiffen. She nudged him lightly but there was no response. She shook him violently, still no response. She placed a hand on his chest, and then she uttered a high-pitched, bloodcurdling scream that sounded as if the roof were coming down. Mother and I were still in the temple with Emeka’s body when the police arrived an hour later. I had no idea who had contacted them but they acted as if they knew what had happened. They ransacked the whole place but it was a wasted effort. There was no sign of Apostle Jonah or any of his worshippers. Finally they took the body and Mother to the station to explain her role in the whole affair. Father, who had been contacted by the police, arrived in the station with a man from his office. After much argument, the police released the corpse to Father, and Mother was allowed to go home. Before evening, Emeka’s body was taken to one of the cemeteries in town and buried. There was an air of utter mystery about Father that I found disconcerting. He did not cry throughout the day, not even when Emeka’s body was taken out for burial, yet I knew how deeply he had loved him. He walked around in a kind of haze, like a person under a spell. His attitude frightened me. For a long time after this incident, my parents did not speak to each other. It looked as if the period of trading words forth and back was over for them. Then in the middle of one night, about two weeks after, I was woken by the noise of a fight from the bedroom where they slept. Frightened, I crept to the door and peered in; and my heart stopped at the sight that met my eyes. Mother lay in a pool of blood on the floor, screaming and writhing in agony. Father stood over her with a horsewhip which he brought down on her with a maniacal savagery. Even from where I stood, I could see large weals on Mother’s body where the whip had cut her. I ran out screaming for neighbours. They awoke from sleep and came into our room and dragged Father away to the palour, holding him down to a chair so that he could not break free and return to Mother. Some of the neighbours took Mother to the hospital that night to treat her wounds. Mother spent three weeks in the hospital before she was discharged. When she came back she was a changed person. She seemed to have withdrawn into herself, as a snail does when it suddenly encounters an obstacle; and never once did she counter Father’s opinion again. But if this was the much-desired truce between them, it came rather late and at a great cost to the family. Even now, some twenty years later, I still recall the event of Emeka’s death with something of shame at both my parents’ foolishness.

The little things in life Okechukwu otukwu He had been waiting for some hours, still his muscles tensed as the pastor’s car turned into the compound. From across the church where he sat under a mango tree, Ikem craned his neck and watched the pastor pull up, come out of the car and go into the church. His blood quickened as it had done for the past week since he came up with the plan. But he also noticed that underneath his excitement lay fear. He had no reason to be afraid, though; everything was working to plan. The thought that he might actually be afraid of the pastor inflamed his anger and he clutched the little container in his pocket with a particular viciousness. He would give the pastor five minutes to be sure he was seated, then he would surprise him. When he had come here about three hours ago he had little thought how God would lead the pastor into his hands. What did you expect, anyway? You did not think that God would stand by any of his servants—granted that they were His servants at all—going after other people’s girlfriends and casting a spell on them? Only two weeks ago he had called her again as he had been doing for the past month and, as a custom, Nkiru had left her breakfast and gone outside to answer the call. What a pastor had to discuss with a girl which he would not want others to hear Ikem could not understand. And it had been going on like this for some time now—these disruptive calls from the pastor which would make Nkiru leave whatever she was doing and go outside to talk to the pastor in privacy. Suddenly he decided that it had to stop. When Nkiru returned to the room a few minutes after, he was standing with a heavy expression at the window, watching the lazy traffic passing along Zik Avenue. Even Enugu on a Saturday morning could take a break from the weeklong hustle and bustle of city life. Only a pastor did not take a rest on a day like this. ‘You are not eating your breakfast anymore?’ she said to him as she came into the room. Her tone was jaunty like the rest of her character. Even if she had come in and found his body hanging from the roof her tone would still be jaunty, he thought bitterly. ‘No,’ he said in answer to her question. ‘Somehow I have lost my appetite. Who was that on the phone, Nkiru?’ ‘You mean just now?’ She is only prevaricating, he thought. She knows what I am asking her but she only wants to buy time to lie. If only I would not look into those eyes of hers, I might be able to enforce my will on her and maybe bring all this nonsense to a stop. But even as he thought this, he still looked into her eyes, and was lost. Those eyes, like every part of Nkiru actually, held a spell over him that was stronger than the most powerful charm.  She was not beautiful in a way that could have fetched her laurels but there was an air of heightened sexuality about her which seemed to envelop every man that came in contact with her and drive him mad with wild fantasies of unending pleasures. She had that effect on every boy in their class. The first time that Ikem met her in class, he had fallen intensely under her spell. But being more shy than most of the boys in the class, he had not summoned enough courage to talk to her then. While every boy in the class fell over each other to steal Nkiru’s affection, Ikem alone kept his cool and it was reckoned to him as a virtue.  But there was nothing virtuous in his inaction. He had no illusions about his abilities. He knew next to nothing about women; they scared him.  And a girl like Nkiru...well, you might as well ask him to commit suicide. So throughout their first year, he did not exchange a word with Nkiru even though his heart melted each time they met. Then during a picnic organized by their class, Ikem had suddenly found Nkiru seated beside him. She struck up a conversation with him and after that day they had become friends—a friendship in which he found himself writing most of Nkiru’s assignments and helping her in exams. By his efforts, Nkiru’s grades improved. Their relationship had gone on quite well until one day, after a visit home, Nkiru told him that her father, who held an important position in government, had fallen sick. Her entire family attributed his illness to witchcraft (it was revealed that his half-brother had threatened him over a piece of disputed family land). The family called for fasting and prayers and even invited some men of God to lay hands on him. But Nkiru’s father, who was a knight of the Catholic church, resisted them. He stubbornly refused to see any man of God that was not of the Catholic faith. His wife and children were in dismay. Nkiru told Ikem how they had to sneak to prayer houses with an item belonging to her father to offer prayers in his behalf. Ikem did not know the advice to give in the circumstances. He had his own view—a very private view—about religion and faith but it would shock Nkiru to hear it. So he simply made some sympathetic noises and kept silent. Then a few days later, he was alarmed to hear her say that she had discovered a powerful man of God who would deliver her father from the powers of witchcraft. ‘What do you mean?’ he asked. ‘Pastor Andy of Everlasting Hope Ministries,’ she said, perhaps not understanding his question or choosing not to understand it. ‘You may have heard of him. He told me to bring an item that belongs to my father so that he could use it as point of contact to reach him since he will not agree to come to his church.’ ‘Are you sure you know what you are doing, Nkiru? Some of these so-called pastors and miracle workers are impostors that prey on people’s ignorance and gullibility.’ ‘That was what my father said. He is old and sick and can be forgiven.  But I don’t expect you who are young to say the same thing.’ He saw that she was getting angry and decided not to pursue the matter any longer; she would not listen to him, anyway. She would see his protest as an example of what she called ‘his unreasonableness.’ How was he to explain to her that he once had a brother who had died because his mother had taken him without his father’s knowledge to a prayer house when he fell ill? She would not understand—or pretend not to understand—and the saying of it might reduce him in her opinion. So he did not interfere with her newfound faith, but then the thing started to take a turn that he found unbearable. The pastor would call her at odd hours and, each time, she went away to talk where Ikem could not hear what they discussed. He had kept silent until that Saturday morning when the pastor’s call had disrupted their breakfast. He left the window and, coming to the middle of the room, he repeated the question, ‘Who was that on the phone?’ ‘That was Pastor Andy,’ she replied and resumed her interrupted breakfast. ‘Why are you interested?’ ‘I am just curious. He has been calling you for some time now in privacy. What is it you discuss that you don’t want others to hear?’ ‘I don’t like your tone to start with. If you are trying to pick a quarrel this morning, Ik, I will not oblige you.’ ‘Don’t run away from the point, Nkiru. You know if it were me behaving like this, you would want to know what was going on.’ ‘For Goodness’ sake, what do you mean by what is going on? I have told you everything about the prayers and counselling sessions I have with the pastor. What are you trying to insinuate by that comment?’ ‘Tell me,’ he said, not looking at her, ‘are you dating this man?’ Nkiru laughed—pure, simple laughter. ‘You tell me,’ she said after her laughter, ‘why are you so incurably jealous?’ I knew that was how she would view it, he thought. Say anything about a man with whom your woman is friendly and it will be your foolish jealousy talking. ‘You are not answering my question,’ he said. ‘Your question is stupid to say the least. Tell me, if I were dating the pastor, would I be here with you? I don’t know what is wrong with you. Ever since I started going to this new church, you have been acting kind of strangely.’ ‘Yes,’ he said, looking outside to see an okada stop in front of the house and one of his neighbours come down. ‘I told you before that I did not like this your newfound faith—I still don’t like it. Some of these churches and prayer houses are death to people. They are pits waiting to swallow the unwary and ignorant.’ ‘Spare me all that,’ she snapped and pushed away the breakfast tray. ‘That was what you said before; I don’t want to hear it all over again. Religion is a personal thing.  I have chosen the way I want to worship God; you can choose yours—I have no objection. But I will not have you condemn mine.’ ‘You will not listen to me,’ he said bitterly. ‘If only you had an idea! But I think the spell they cast on you has taken too strong a hold on you.’ ‘That does it then,’ she said and rose. She went to the wardrobe and started to bring out her clothes. ‘I came here to spend the weekend with you but I don’t think I have the strength to argue with you over the most little things of life for the rest of the weekend.’ ‘Where are you going?’ he asked in alarm as she folded her clothes and put them in a small bag with which she had come yesterday evening. ‘To the hostel, of course.’ ‘Why?’ ‘You know why. Since you will not allow me to be in peace, I cannot stay here and endure two more days of incessant complaints and nagging. I am going back to the hostel. I will see you in class on Monday.’ With those words she went out of the room, leaving Ikem in an emotional agony. Nkiru did not come to his room again after that incident. Whenever they met in class, she treated him with a coldness that he found strange and perplexing. Could it be that he had lost her? No, that could not be—it was too painful to be. Not after everything he had done for her. It was not possible that a little spat like that could destroy a relationship that had lasted for more than a year now. Ikem blamed the pastor for everything. He suspected that the pastor had cast a spell on Nkiru, and he resolved to break it at all costs. How he could do this he had no idea. He thought about it for a very long time, then suddenly he came up with a bright idea. Where the idea came from he could not tell. It came right out of nowhere and took shape in his mind as though God Himself had implanted it there. He reflected on it for long, lived with it for a week, then he knew he was going to carry it out. He knew it was dangerous—he could get beaten up by the pastor’s congregation or the police might arrest him for assault. But one thing that was certain to come out of it was that the pastor would stay clear of his girlfriend after that. That outcome alone was worth any risk. He wasted no time to put his plan into execution. A few days after, he went to Ogbete Market, bought red oil paint and a small plastic container with a sprayer, the type that reverend fathers used to spray holy water in church. Getting home, he turned the paint into the container, tried it and nodded with satisfaction. When the time stood at a quarter to twelve, Ikem stood before the mirror and looked at himself with amazement. He wore a wig of dreadlocks which he had borrowed from his friend who was studying theatre arts. He covered the wig with a large woolen cap in the manner he had seen Rastafarians do. He also pasted some hair to his bare chin so that he looked like something that had emerged from a comic strip. The overall effect of the disguise was startling; but for the two nervous eyes that stared back at him from the mirror, he would not have recognized himself. The disguise was part of his careful planning for a week. You never could tell; it might stand him in good stead. It would not help if Nkiru or any other person that knew him saw him in the church premises and disrupted his plan. Pleased with himself, he took the container of paint and left the house by a back exit so that none of his neighbours could see him. It took him fifteen minutes to get to the church by taxi. The church was a medium-sized bungalow set on well-kept compound surrounded by a hedgerow. In front of the church was a signboard which bore the name of the church with this injunction: Come and receive your miracle. Ikem gritted his teeth. The sight of the church with its beautiful exterior and pretentious signboard filled him with sudden anger. Apart from a man who was working at the hedge with a pair of shears, Ikem saw no one in the church compound. He looked at his watch and stood wondering for a moment. From his findings, the pastor was supposed to keep office for counselling from twelve to three today but he could not see the pastor’s car. Thinking that he had probably missed him, he went to the woman selling fruit across the road and asked her about the pastor. The woman looked strangely at him as though he had fallen from the sky and asked, ‘Pastor Andrew? He will soon be here. He does not come early today because today is not a day of service.’ ‘But it is a day of counselling?’ ‘Counselling? I don’t know about counselling, but I know that he usually comes around twelve to see people and pray for them.’ She gave him that strange look again. ‘Do you want to see the pastor?’ she asked in a tone of disbelief. ‘Yes.’ Surely she cannot see through me? The woman muttered something then said aloud, ‘You really mean you want to see the pastor? Mh! Things have changed indeed. I thought that Rastas had nothing to do with church. I had a cousin who was a Rasta. He said that Rastas did not worship the same God that we Christians worship. So I am surprised to see a Rasta looking for a pastor,’ and she laughed facetiously. ‘The world indeed is changing.’ Ikem said nothing. After looking at him again like an apparition, the woman offered him a stool which he took under the mango tree behind the woman’s fruit table and sat down to wait for the pastor. The weather was intolerably hot. In mid April, one might have expected the hot weather to cease and usher in the rains, but the sun still baked the earth with a savagery that was unequalled by anything in nature. Those of his classmates who sat in the back seats and made noise during class said that a part of hell had caved in and its heat now escaped and held the whole earth in judgment. It was a crude metaphor and Ikem had given them a hard look when they had said it, but sitting under the mango tree this hot afternoon, he wondered if there might not be some truth in it after all. Sweat ran like little wet insects inside his clothes which stuck to his body, stifling him. Worse of all, flies which had been attracted by the fruits troubled him from time to time as though they mocked him. By the time the pastor’s car drove into the church compound after about three hours of his waiting, Ikem was in quite a mood. His nerves were raw and he could hardly hold himself back from jumping in at once and get the job over with.  But it was to his credit that he was able to wait five minutes as he instructed himself, then clutching the little container, he rose and went into the church. He found the way to the pastor’s office, opened the door and entered. The pastor was standing at his desk, looking at a document in his hand. He was a man of small build; Ikem reflected that he could overpower him if it came to a physical scuffle. He closed the door and leaned against it. The pastor stared at him with wide eyes. ‘Who are you?’ he demanded. ‘You are Pastor Andy or Andrew?’ ‘Yes. Who are you?’ he repeated. ‘Who I am is not important, pastor. You took something that belongs to me. You must give it back.’ ‘What are you talking about?’ the pastor asked in an angry tone but Ikem noticed that he was edging slowly backwards. He left the door and advanced towards him. ‘Nkiru Onu, that’s what I am talking about. She is my girlfriend and you turned her head with charm. You must undo what you did to her.’ Ikem was watching him closely and he noticed a flicker pass like a shadow over his eyes. ‘Are you out of your mind?’ the pastor said in the same angry tone that suddenly began to dampen Ikem’s courage. ‘I have no business with you. Now get out of my office before I do you something you will regret.’ ‘You still have the mouth to threaten me? Okay, take this!’ Jerking out the container, Ikem raised it in front of the pastor and depressed the sprayer. To his shock, nothing happened. He flung himself within a foot of the pastor and viciously depressed the sprayer again. A short squirt of red paint came out and splattered the pastor’s clothes. He screamed. Ikem depressed the sprayer again, producing a sticky jet of paint that covered the front of the pastor’s suit. Then he felt a pair of hands drag him back. He tried to struggle and received a kick in his back. He crashed to the ground; two men held him down. Suddenly the room was full of people. Some of the women that had run in went to the pastor and helped him to remove his jacket and wipe the paint off his face. ‘Don’t beat him,’ the pastor said to the two men that held Ikem down. ‘Can’t you see he is a madman? Don’t treat people of weak mind harshly.’ Ikem laughed at this. ‘Madman? Is that your new trick—to brand me mad when you know exactly what I am talking about?’ The pastor gave him a sympathetic smile. ‘We will send you to a place where they will take good care of you. I don’t support madmen roaming the streets.’ The police arrived a while after and took him away. All his protestations of sanity fell on deaf ears. And had Nkiru not arrived then with some of his classmates and friends, he would have ended up in the State Psychiatric Hospital. But even after that, some people were inclined to say that he had actually had a temporary attack of madness—that his breakup with Nkiru had somehow tipped him off the edge of sanity.

“Lovespeak: A Technical and Focused Consideration of a Psychological Phenomenon Common to Human Life, Particularly w/Contemporary, Monogamous Western Culture (i.e. The Recovery Process for an All-too-Standard Break Up)” By David Shreve, Jr. Introduction So once, this boy decided he did not want to deal with the loaded vocabulary of the lowercase “r”-romantics any more. He realized he was through with talks about anything human lasting for an eternity, done with that Wuthering Heights nonsense about souls being made of the same substance. It was, as decisions go, a rather selfish and egocentric one, based purely on the unfortunate fact that that particular vein of lovespeak had not worked to his advantage in specific life situations—namely, one in which a certain long-term, committed romantic coupling afforded a certain important person to convince him that this was the language to speak in, to think in, to make life plans around, and that same certain important person had (on multiple occasions) decided to take the language to somebody else, someone far different than he. She had made a decision (or multiple decisions, more precisely) to live and fuck on the pages of someone else’s story and for some reason, to this boy under inspection, this certain important person’s decisions and actions worked to disqualify the entire language she had once inflated for this boy. Section 1 To nurture and camouflage his repulsive self-sympathy, in lieu of continuing to rant about the perils of the healing process to friends who cared justifiably little, he wrapped his dismal philosophical condition in scientific logic, bottom line thought processes, and Occam’s razor insight. For instance, he continued to write love letters to girls whom he met, but only after adopting a far more academic voice (See below). Dear girl, As soon as I saw you, my inherent, inherited evolutionary breeding instincts sounded alarm. Something in the shape of your hips suggests you are capable of safely and thoroughly producing and carrying children. The fat deposits that swell around your mammary glands indicate an ability to feed and nurture these offspring, as well as an ability to stay warm during the winter, which isn’t as significant an ability in contemporary times, but the sense of recognition that was necessary in ancient ancestors exists in modern man as his common lust for large breasts. Furthermore, semi-conscious selective breeding insight informs me that the quality of your facial features promises that your genes might work well when spliced with mine, giving our offspring a better chance at having symmetrical features which would in turn improve their chances at finding success in modern industrialized life. I just wanted to write to let you know the immediate impact you had on me and explain just why I find you so irresistible. Be good, Boy Figure 1: Letter, Example A. Hey lady, Listen: I am drawn to your pheromones. Something about your company elevates the level and activity of the endorphins in my bloodstream, moving me into a state of joy and even bliss. I think it behooves us to concede that elevated physiological states such as these are always temporary, and maybe we should allow ourselves to further confess that routine and familiarity would only dull this circulatory and neurological excitement. This in mind, perhaps it would be a good idea to take full of advantage of this peaking condition and punctuate it through intercourse, an act which also releases endorphins; this way we can move together into a state of orgasmic euphoria without concerning ourselves with the quiet and disappointing larger life that falls on the other side of our heightened sense of happiness. Do you agree? Check yes or no. __Yes <3 __No : ( Figure 2: Letter, Example B. Dear familiar company, It turns out that being in your close proximity works to the benefit of my weakened psychological state. I have, from the beginning, placed high value in the social stock of your being “dateable” and inversely, my having paired myself with you and your having shown interest in me has worked to rebuild my own sense of self-value. In short, you are like a social trophy that slowly nurses my wounded ego. Please stay? Boy Figure 3: Letter, Example C. He rarely delivered these letters to their intended recipients. Instead, more often, he quickly deleted them from his hard drive or crumpled the napkin or paper on which he had written and tossed it in the trash. Then, he would go find his new uninspiring scientific muses and engage them in heartless, rigorous, and often painful sexual activity only to return to his own residence and ignore phone calls for a few days, just in case you-know-what started to happen again. Through the entire process, he would marvel at how much less writing was required of manipulating loneliness than was required for feeding love. Section 2 This boy was smart and understood this method (detailed in Section 1) to be more escapism than therapy, more anesthetic than treatment, but he was also committed to the process, because he could look around and see everyday examples of people handling things like this in worse ways, most of them sacrificing immeasurable amounts of pride in the process. Section 3 But this boy especially could tell you that you cannot practice that sort of science-based cynicism (discussed in Sections 1 & 2) in just one cognitive category without it infiltrating your perception of all areas of life. A minor example: Under this new attitude, the temperature of his world meant nothing in the way that the air felt against this boy’s skin, but rather it was just the happenstance product of the atmospheric conditions and the position of the Earth and its axis in relation to the sun, and someday not-so-far-down-the-line in a not-so-unrelated process, he and all of it would be dust floating in space. Even more, particular social structures began to make less sense than they had before. He could not understand why everyone else wanted what they wanted. He often struggled to explain his inability to comfortably assimilate himself into any sort of acceptable social position (See below). “If every life is a rape of our sacred time, then the paycheck is the drug that keeps us from fighting it. And if every death is considered a murder, than more often than not, love is the weapon.” Figure 4: Explanation, Example Normally, when he would say shit like this (shown in Figure 4, above), it was an indicator that he had, at that particular moment, been drinking too much. Which was a further indicator that his method of adopting this new way of thinking was having less than positive results. Section 4 One day, this boy, who happened to be throughout his entire life senselessly afraid of birds, took a walk and stumbled upon a small flock of black birds in a covered bridge on a cold and empty back road. Because his scientific mind could find no explanation for his apparently arbitrary phobia and because he could not bring himself to walk through the passageway, he became angry. He expressed his anger by chucking a small stone, just smaller than his fist, into the cylindrical tunnel. The birds took flight and their working wings sounded like small explosions in the hollow echo of the bridge. He noticed then that this was how it felt when that certain special person (referenced in the Introduction of this document) made any attempt at friendly conversation with him lately (as if nothing major had ever happened). Her simple, sweet, formal statement or question flew through the center of him and woke up all those words of which he thought he had rid himself and they flew wildly and it felt like thunder against the barren walls of his scientific heart. And shit, he realized then, he was having no success at killing the poet that lived inside of him. Conclusion The same notion of poetic reluctance (referenced in Section 4) started to recur and surprise him with more frequency. This boy had wanted, after all, before being bothered with the language of lovespeak, to be only a writer. He had wanted only to be left alone so he could be a writer. He started to try again. As he had so many times in the past, he tried to sit before white pages and put on them something that someone might love to read, something like he used to write, but there was nothing beautiful about straight science. He could not connect his scientific mind with his writer’s spirit and when he managed to find any words at all, he discovered himself capable of writing only the simplest phrases, statements that would mean nothing to almost everyone (See below). I’m sorry... Figure 5: ...

Graffiti Sky Roger Cowin There is a howling dog moon in the sky tonight, an asylum of stars dresses the night in celestial pictographs, the obscure scribblings of an anonymous author. Atop a mountain in Tennessee, a beach in southern Florida or the blank slate of the Midwestern plains, surrounded by nothing but stars and the priapic night we are attached by the umbilicus connecting us to the navel of the universe.

Shifting Gears Janet Yung My mother left when I was twelve years old after nearly twenty years of marriage to my dad. I should have suspected something when I came home from school one afternoon in early October and she was seated at the kitchen table, her hair bleached an unnatural shade of blond while she doodled hearts in the margins of the morning paper. Grabbing a soda from the refrigerator, I glanced over her shoulder, spotting her initials entwined with two letters not belonging to my dad. “What’s up?” I asked nonchalantly, popping the can’s tab and swallowing a large gulp of carbonation, the way I’d seen my mother do it all my life. “Nothing,” she quickly scratched through the letters, a guilty expression crossing her face. “How are the driving lessons going?” She’d decided to learn to drive after we relocated to a section of the city not convenient to the bus line, my father responding to her complaints about the inability to get around easily, with the offer of driving lessons. “You don’t think I’m too old to learn?” was her coy reaction and once he assured her it was never to late to take on something new, she became an avid student. It wasn’t till after her departure, we discovered how avid. “Okay,” she shrugged her shoulders, a small smile on her lips, color rising in her cheeks. “Shifting gears can be something of a problem, though.” My eyes couldn’t avoid the hair and noticing my stare, she patted the puffy do. “What do you think?” Not wanting to disappoint her with the truth, I told her what I thought she needed to hear. “Looks good.” “Really?” I nodded vigorously, giving credence to my venial sin. “Well, get out of your uniform before you go outside and do you have any homework?” “I will and yes.” Then I was out of the room, pursuing my own interests wondering why adults did the things they did, knowing to question their decisions would only lead to the inevitable rejoinder of “someday, when you’re older, you’ll understand.” I’d barely worked out my Halloween plans when the note appeared on the kitchen table addressed to my dad and me, the childish script undeniably belonging to my mother. The house had an eerie feel as the back door squeaked upon my returning home that afternoon. The days were getting shorter and chillier, the house suddenly reflecting the changing atmosphere. “Hello,” I called, and not hearing anything, ventured down the hall, opening doors and checking closets, uncertain what I’d find. Back in the kitchen, I picked up the note, debating about the wisdom of reading something addressed to both my dad and me. It was only four o’clock, two hours till he’d return from the factory job he described as “something to keep a roof over our heads and pay the bills.” I hoped for better things myself. The envelope flap wasn’t sealed, suggesting it wasn’t of too intimate a nature, free for either addressee to read with or without the other being present. Opening it, I unfolded the linen colored stationary my mother had purchased over the summer to keep up on her correspondence. “Do you like this?” she’d wanted to know and being bored by the downtown expedition and, eager to be outside playing, agreed it looked good although I didn’t care much for the flower border. I pulled off the jacket she’d insisted I wear that morning, suddenly filled with the image of my mother at the back door, waving good-bye, as if I already knew the epistle’s contents. Hanging the jacket over the back of my chair, the note flat in front of me, my eyes took in the words, confirming my worst fears. That evening, my father tried to explain my mother’s departure had nothing to do with me. “She’s not leaving you, she’s leaving me,” which I assumed was another one of those things age would help me comprehend. Buried beneath my blanket on the night of the first hard frost, it was difficult to distinguish between the two, ruminating on the oft repeated joy at my unexpected arrival. “Your dad and I were married several years and had given up all hope of ever having children and then you were here.” I supposed the thrill had worn off. Twenty-five years later, I stood in the doorway of the café where we’d agreed to meet. I’d only seen her a few times since she’d left us for the driving instructor. Our few encounters after her departure had been covert with instructions, “not to tell your father,” as if I were a coconspirator in her plans to reconstruct her life. Each meeting, she was a little vague as to her present situation, making it impossible to decide whether or not she ever regretted her decision. I could only remember that first Christmas without her, longing for her to come through the door, laden with presents and apologies, learning to live with disappointment when my fantasy failed to materialize. She was seated at the counter, easily recognizable by the sharp, Roman nose I’d inherited and which she’d studied in the mirror, pondering the possibilities of “having it fixed.” Standing there now, I was struck by how often she’d uttered that phrase regarding numerous aspects of her life. Seeing me, she waved me over and taking a seat next to her, I noticed how spotted and veiny her hands had become. Her hair was still the same hideous blond shade, but thinner now and wearing a hat, I supposed, to conceal bits of scalp peeking through. Drinking her morning cola, a half eaten doughnut on her plate. “Hi, dear,” she smiled and pecked me on the cheek as though it had been only a few weeks since our last meeting rather than years. “Hi.” I squirmed on the stool, trying to get comfortable amid the Saturday morning crowd and noise, as many seeking refuge from the sudden downpour as something to eat. “How’s your father?” “Okay.” It was pointless to let her know his true condition. “Would you like something to eat?” I ordered a cup of tea and a bagel, a change in diet from my blue collar roots, unable to remember when I’d abandoned them, thinking she’d be impressed some things had been altered. Her call had surprised me in the middle of a busy week and, at first, I hadn’t recognized her voice. When she asked if we could meet, I’d agreed, but now, questioned the wisdom of doing so. I stirred my tea, the silence between us deafening. She cleared her throat, indicating she was on the brink of imparting some important information. “Danny died,” she announced, choking back a tear. “Oh, I’m sorry.” Patting her hand, I sincerely meant that. I’d long ago released any resentment of the hapless driving instructor, several years my mother’s junior, when it became apparent she had no intention of returning to her old life, and, meeting him, saw he made her happier than she’d been before. “I just needed to tell somebody who cared.” She stared at the crumbs on her small white plate, and I understood what he had meant to her. After a few moments, she added, “I wanted you to come with me, but it was impossible,” sounding more like she was thinking out loud, rather than addressing me. Stunned by this long, overdue disclosure, I was incapable of an immediate rejoinder, any residual anger fading at the sorrow in her voice. We chatted for a while longer and looking at the clock, she understood I had someplace else to be. “Don’t be a stranger,” I said outside the restaurant, buttoning up my coat against the wind and, giving me a squeeze, promised that she wouldn’t. Then, she was gone again, leaving me troubled by how fragile her retreating figure, fading into the crowd looked, uncertain as to when we’d meet again.

The Blood Machine Kristopher Miller The Blood Machine Gathers fresh meat, rotten meat, poor meat, and even rich meat To churn into gore and fireand fuel the red soaked engine To continue endless massacre that just showcases as statistics on its screens. The machine runs over some pedestrians, And the machine cleans off blood off its lights As casually as a convertible driver wipes rainwater off his windshield with his wipers. It heaves up its chain gun and it rattles with the motion of a rattlesnake’s warning sound, Only no warning lights or calls were given by the machine As its target, a platoon of infantrymen are shredded up for the worms and maggots to munch on. Its diplomacy involves shooting mortar first, nuking the local pubs second And crushing the ambassadors who visit later. The Blood Machine Lacks a soul, for anything that kills without purpose Because failed goose stepping artists, Former hitmen turned dictators, And whipping boys turned sadists Never have souls anyway. The brains are a mishmash of battle networks and kill rosters. It only calculates how many opposing tanks were destroyed Or how many aircraft carriers were blown apart like soup cans heated too much from the inside But its circuitry never counts how many babies are crushed by its treadmill wheels Or how many men and women are pierced apart by its fifty-caliber revolving guns As they seek out resistance with old shotguns and Molotov cocktails. The machine’s muscles are synthetic and run hot with energy, From the amount of blood it absorbs from its victims, And from the wreckage it collects for fuel. The machine does not speak For its fury is expressed on scorched soil it leaves behind After incinerating wheat fields and cattle stations with white phosphorous grenades And nuclear-powered missiles it packs within its steaming, hinged-together body. The cogs outside its core sing a hymn of broken flesh, And hot, bone melting plasma it fires to accompany as backup vocals To their victims’ cries for a weeping god offering mercy and sympathy. The whirling blades attached to its arms string a chorus of screams, And of sharp crack of woodlands mangled up in splintered messes As the machine treads apart meadows, lakes, and mountains To bring its brand of industrial warfare close to home. The engine powering up the machine cries a requiem of unanswered prayers for peace, Or smashed talks of civil disobedience, Of cracked discussion to disarm nations of their thousand warheads aimed at one another. The machine is not build for peacekeeping, its creators say, It is built for war And war it will create. The Blood Machine Was planned, drawn out, built and sold by designers Of the Hawk and Spear Corporation, The same company that brought the world catapults, mustard gas and the atom bomb Who thought the latest assault rifle did not kill fast enough. They thought the latest model of tank didn’t blow enough craters on Earth’s surface. They even shook their heads at the latest helicopter that was versatile, But only versatile to see battle-scarred lands and not versatile enough to create them. So Hawk and Spear sold their weapon to the press writing today’s stories in popular blood, To war gamers who were fed up with the digital thing, To the generals who wanted to see the next big Battle of the Bulge and Blitzkrieg, And to global leaders who preferred to lean back in their chairs to watch the ball game And let the machine take care of the other problems proved “unfit” for diplomats and secretaries. The Blood Machine Made all other weapons obsolete, As it did make peace meaningless. The plans for the machine were always there though. It was once a stone for crushing shells and rib cages. It was an axe for hewing wood and meat. It was a spear of strife used to pierce Spartans and Persians alike. It was a hammer to make metal and to destroy metal and craniums. It was a sword for conquering fiefs, nations, and peoples. It was a sickle of justifying war and its reasons for war. Most recently, the machine served as a rifle of fire and brimstone and revolution And cannons for remaking the world by hastily written constitutions And holes in crumbling churches and hospitals. The Blood Machine Is now the new God of War, It is the incarnation of one of the Horsemen, It is the Military Industrial Complex fully realized and dreaded, And it is Death made concrete with the numbers of bodies it reaps every day. The Blood Machine Roars, rages, and revs up its power core As it speeds up to smoking shelters, To screaming soldiers, To crying civilians, And to slaughter all for the wholesale Of money, power, and entertainment for its investors.

Deep Wells Roger Singer His strangeness lays a comfort on distant water, too far to name, too cold to be near. Wheat fields. Gold stringed faces stand void of riches like the man; both weave under winds from an angry heaven. Endless dark space above watches the brim of his hat and dull scratched buttons on a coat he uses as a blanket. Sweet visions sing to him at roads end. A night light of stars hangs loosely above; a flat bag of soulless rocks offering no comfort to the deep wells in his eyes.

Untitled Alexander Leleux Rain poured down upon the wretched pox that blemished the earth with its infectious disease. Thick noxious clouds loomed over the peeling scab, the heavy roar of thunder drowning out the screams of the innocent. What had once been a beautiful city was now nothing more then a withered husk. Shattered street lights no longer bathed their inhabitants in the safety of their warm glow. Now only an array of dim neon lights cast shadows across the alleyways which festered with graffiti and dry blood as a plague breeds puss and boils. The pollution that man once called air now reeked of smoke and death, the bitter metallic tang of blood overwhelming the taste. Where once had been a man among men now sat a drunken, tired creature. Thick black greasy hair matted down his collar like an unkempt mane, obscuring the blood shot eyes that had once been the most beautiful of crystal blue. Dark sags lay beneath his eyes, scars and bruises littering his unshaven face. He rubbed a grimy hand across his weary face, taking another swig of his newest bottle of the cheapest and hardest liquor he could buy. He gazed over the pile of now empty bottles that lay streamed across the alley floor, randomly counting the number to amuse himself but quickly lost attention at about seventeen. He then let out a ragged sigh, gazing up to the black sky and feeling the rain fall upon his cheeks. ‘You’re disgusting...’ he muttered quietly to himself, seeing his reflection in every raindrop that splattered upon the cold cement. “You will never be good enough... You were never conceited enough... You will not rise above...” The words played across his lips and through his mind over and over again, a parrot that had learned to copy the words he had been told from the very beginning of his life. He looked down at the broken beer bottles, his abusive drunken father. He looked down at the used heroine needles strewn across his lap, his careless drug addict mother. He had become everything he loathed and hated in this life, now the very embodiment of all he feared and hated. He did everything he could to betray his roots, studied hard in school, got a job, even found his way into the police academy and graduated at the top of his class. That was when he met her, the love of his life and the woman of his dreams. That was all another life now, a memory faded into nothingness through years of neglect. He had betrayed his love and himself. The stress of seeing the death and suffering in others was more then he could handle. He turned to alcohol for comfort but was quickly consumed. It was a quick and hellish descent from there, drug, prostitutes, and other atrocities to which he could no longer look himself in the eye. He was a monster, a danger to his wife and his new born child. He vowed that the outcome would be different. He would not be like his parents... His lips curled into a soft, almost warm smile as he finally came to the realization of the task that had been set before him. He reached down ever so casually to his belt and slowly drew his gun from its holster, the barrel sliding smoothly from its leather bed. The gun had been given to him with the responsibility and duty to protect others. He would uphold that vow one final time. He would protect his family from the horrible monster he had become. The thought delivered comfort to his despondent heart as he pulled back the hammer, the muzzle nestled so tenderly against his temple. “I love you....” He muttered quietly to the rain as the image of his wife and child. Tears of joy and absolution rolled down his smiling face as he pulled the trigger, and then he felt only peace.

Playing My Hand Courtney Watson When nightmares came I reached for you but You withdrew, so I Pulled my blanket over My head, cuddled by bear, And told myself “It would be okay” I drew a Jack, but needed a Queen When I fell off my bike And blood rushed Dirt was like makeup and Tears formed. I reached out for you But you withdrew so I Dusted myself off, got back on, Telling myself “I’ll be okay” I was dealt the ace of spades, cold When I had a performance Singing or dancing, I’d look In the crowd, but you weren’t Around. I’d call to invite you But you always had an excuse So I looked beyond the crowd Put on a smile “Encore Encore” You were the wild card But he was always in the crowd Tucked me in, kissed my boo-boos Wiped my tears. Reassured me that “It really was okay.” When mommy Never came, daddy did. I learned to play the hand I was dealt and win

Another Woman Dawn Schout She got a voicemail with a country superstar crooning, “Thought I was doing fine. Vowed to get you off my mind. I see your face”— a recording accidentally sent. She smiles when her co-worker receives roses. Smiles long enough for her to see then turns to face her computer screen, stares at her reflection, and reflects in its dim light. She’ll pretend her name was on the card and the song was written about her. She’ll spray her flowers at home until some of the petals fall off, until they kiss dirt.

Dawn Schout Bio(02/05/10) Dawn Schout won first place in the 2008 Lucidity Poetry Journal Contest, and her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Breadcrumb Scabs, Fogged Clarity, Glass: A Journal of Poetry, Lucidity Poetry Journal, and Tipton Poetry Journal.

from “Fables” (part 1) Tom Ball “The Pig and the Horse” Once there was a pig who stood by the road with a large bag on his back. A horse came along and the pig said “Take me to my home and you can have half of what’s in my bag.” “How do I know what’s in the bag is valuable?” said the horse. “I wouldn’t be carrying it otherwise,” said the pig. “OK” said the horse. But upon reaching the destination the pig revealed that it was just a bag of bricks which he had no use for. Moral: Be careful when making deals with greedy pigs. “An End to Carnivores” Perhaps there will once be a machine that can produce food for all the animals (including synthetic meat) of the forest and so no need for meat eating. Moral: The animal world is changing just as fast as human society is. “The Vixen and the Mirror” One day a certain female fox strayed near a farm house and saw a mirror. She was surprised that she was not really good looking as she had imagined. So she charged the mirror and broke it, cutting herself in the process. Several weeks later she died from her wounds. Moral: Vanity is a recipe for disaster. “What is Real?” The family had a cat and a dog but neither were the least bit interested in the TV. To them it was not reality. Moral: If only humans could be so wise. “Caught in a Trap” There was once a rabbit caught in a trap. He quickly realized that his only hope at freedom was to bite his leg off. So he bit it off, very painfully. It looked like it was all over for him, with only 3 legs. But then he got a great idea: to lie down outside a local farmhouse door. The farmer’s daughter took him in and made a pet out of him. Moral: If you are considered cute by humans, you can always appeal to them when you are hurt. “Two Fishermen” Once there were two fishermen who made an agreement. The agreement was they would share equally the fish they had caught. However it turned out one of the fishermen was much better than the other. The better of the two then announced that he would not share saying the other was a lousy fisherman. Moral: People often break their promises and convince themselves that they are right. “Risks” There was once a female deer who was very afraid of predators, having seen her brothers shot by a huntsman. But she met a lot of humans who didn’t attack her and she was confused into thinking they treated her just like another human. Finally she decided it was safe to live near the suburbs where there were no wolf droppings. Moral: People’s behavior is very inconsistent in the minds of animals. “The Beggar” The beggar was wearing sunglasses and said he was blind, which was not the case. He would play the flute and he had what was apparently a seeing-eye dog. People were enchanted and donated generously. The beggar even began to get rich and bought an apartment. Moral 1: Things are often not what they seem. Moral 2: There are many ways to get rich. “Declaration of the Rights of Beasts” All beasts had rights. But some bigger beasts had more rights than others. Not all animals are created equal, they said. The predator animals controlled the parliament of animals and it was them who ruled the forest. Also they planned to set free animals from zoos. No animal should be in a zoo they said. But when they went to the zoos the humans were waiting for them and captured them. What about our rights said the animals? Moral: Everyone is always talking about their rights. But justice usually goes to the rich and powerful. “Bull” There was once a bull who was fond of speaking the truth. Others called it b.s. He would say things like I eat the best food and kiss the best female cows and I am the happiest bull alive. Indeed he thought he was a prince among bulls as he was the stud on the farm. I am the best in this world around me he said. But then suddenly he realized he was old and he was sold to make hamburgers. Moral: Some people think they’ve got it made. And they brag and show how happy they are. But usually such people are narrow-minded and their world is limited. “Bigfoot” A man dressed in an ape costume with big foot shaped boards was seen by many in the community. They even had some digital film of the Bigfoot; of course the photo was dim having been taken at night. The local press got hold of the news and soon it was an international sensation. The local businesses were doing a roaring business and everyone was happy. Moral: Some people will believe anything. Some of them live in a giant fairy tale of their own making. Just like with video games. “Ladies Man” Once there was a fox who dyed his hair blue. The other animals laughed at him, but the vixens were interested in him. He spoke sweet words to these females. And they all loved him. Moral 1: Sometimes being different can give you a big advantage. Moral 2: Sometimes the members of the opposite sex may like you much more than friends of the same sex. “Fish in a school” For predators it is good that fish swim in schools. Much easier to see and catch them. On the other hand fish who leave the school have a better chance of survival. Moral: Sometimes it pays to be a rebel.