down in the dirt
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Janet K., Editor
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In This Issue... Fritz Hamilton Liam Spencer Nicholas Viglietta Travis Green Brian Looney Steven Pelcman Eric Burbridge Christopher Hanson Kathryn Leetch Kenneth DiMaggio Jeffrey Park Loukia M. Janavaras Denny E. Marshall John Ragusa Larry Schug Alessandra Siraco Frank Traverse Nathan Hahs Christie Lambert Jim Carson Bill Wolak Kevin Moore Annabelle Dura William Wright Harris Benjamin Christensen Rex Bromfield Janet Kuypers

Note that any artwork that appears in Down in the Dirt will appear in black and white in the print edition of Down in the Dirt magazine.

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The string theory works when they string you up Fritz Hamilton The string theory works when they string you up & becomes the chaos theory when they find you hanging. It’s more than theory when the Keystone Koppers arrive, because they don’t know what they’re doing anymore than Rick Perry, Michelle Bachman, or the Pizza King do. The string theory works when they string you up & leave you to swing in the pollution. They take you seriously like Donald Duck or Donald Trump. It’s more than theory when the Keystone Koppers arrive. It’s not because you wash once a month that you stink so bad. You’ve been hanging so long, it makes the people mad. The string theory works when they string you up. They should let you down into the cold cold grave & celebrate the end of a putrid knave. It’s more than theory when the Keystone Koppers arrive. The string theory works when they string you up & becomes the chaos theory when they find you hanging. It’s more than theory when the Keystone Koppers arrive. The string theory works when they string you up ... !

Old Burt in the madhouse has hanged himself. Fritz Hamilton Old Burt in the madhouse has hanged himself. Of course, at Chicago State he could have had help. No one knows what the guards do to amuse themselves. Burt is hanging in the stairwell where the last one did it. He has gone from subject to object in a few seconds. His neck hasn’t begun to stretch, but it will. Patients’ bones have been found buried in the yard. Burt’s neck could stretch ten feet to the floor, unless the stench grows too much, & they remove him. Nobody will look into it because they’d rather cover it up. Burt’s bones could go with the others into the yard. I guess this is how the guards amuse themselve. Burt doesn’t care whether he or the guards hanged him. He stopped caring an hour or so ago. Others care because they have to get rid of him, or he’ll make a stink - tee hee hee! - & that’s not a good cover up. Old Burt in the madhouse has hanged himself, unless the guards did it. So what ... !

I hang from the track, & the train runs over my fingers Fritz Hamilton I hang from the track, & the train runs over my fingers. Thus I give the train the finger, all ten of them. The train has a crush on me. Should I knuckle under to her affections or acknowledge that I’ve taken the wrong track. I don’t care about these ties & shall not tie the knot. I won’t be railroaded into marriage.I’ll fly away into the friendly sky of bachelorhood.I’ll be Robinhood.I don’t give a fuck about Friar Tuck.My only frier is a chicken. They call me chicken liver, which beats chicken dead. Cut off the cackling head & eat her liver with bacon. If she’s a pain in the neck, eat that too, after you give her the wedding wring. If she likes Robinhood pretty good, she’ll give him a piece of tail as the holy grail, & if he has a loco motive, they’ll take him from the roundhouse to the madhouse & train him right ... !

Beautiful, l3-yr-old Cressida is dead. Fritz Hamilton Beautiful, l3-yr-old Cressida is dead. Star of her soccer team, with many girl & boyfriends, She’s taken by a strange disease & dies. Already accepted by Yale, her father’s alma mater, an athletic scholarship a sure thing, beautiful, l3-yr-old Cressida is dead. Seduced by her lst boyfriend, a high school senior, & then available to many young lotharios, she’s taken by a strange disease & dies. First noticed when she has no stamina on the field, the doctors examine her finding nothing, beautiful, 13-yr-old Cressida is dead. The older boys continue to date her & use her. She leaves her soccer team & hates herself. She’s taken by a strange disease & dies. She drops out of school & watches TV all day. Her friends stop coming to see her/ she doesn’t care. Beautiful, 13-yr-old Cressida is dead. She has every test/ she weakens & stays in the hospital. She gets lethargic & hopeless/ she just doesn’t care. She’s taken by a strange disease & dies. Beautiful, 13-yr-old Cressida is dead ... !

Drift Liam Spencer The blinds allow some light to weasel through. another sleepless night Why even bother to try? I get up and drink more wine just a little Birds announce impending consciousness the rest of the world is waking up soon they will be having to pretend it’s all good faking laughs and smiles pretending to care, feigning interest the day mundane and sad but distracted Their torture awaits of going home being flooded with reminders this is all they’ll ever know all they can ever be their lives are scripted standard home for the neighborhood significant other, kids, bills, mortgages mindless tv, news, gossip the right conversations and experiences the right opinions, positions all the should be’s, all proper each an inner bullet shattering their soul killing them slowly, cruelly. Maybe I have nothing but I’m not them my wine kicks in I feel better drift to sleep

two texans Liam Spencer     I had been in the city for just a few months, but had already discovered many great hangouts. It was the first time I had lived in a city, or had even visited one for that matter, so every day was thrilling to me. I had never seen such a culture of abundance and abandon. Incredibly attractive women were everywhere, and easy to approach. Beer and liquor were the steady diets of most inhabitants. Parties filled every block. Clubs were packed, bars were busy, and a simple walk down the street brought a contact high.     The summer heat brought things to fever pitch. The energies were amazing. One couldn’t help but get drawn in. One night, it was clubs with sexy women, driving music, and cheap beer, followed by an after hours party on a rooftop of an apartment building. The next night was a crowded bar with great live music, followed by a rowdy party in a nearby apartment. Still another was an all night party at a house across the street .There were no limits.     Being new to the city was no issue. There seemed to be a code amongst drunks; they, no we, talked to everyone. The only drunken strangers are those who chose to be, and even they had to walk away from us drunks who tried to converse with them. Even parties that were in private places were easy to get in. I would just bring a cheap pizza and walk right in the door. No one will turn away a pizza, especially when drunk.     On this particular night, I had checked out a few places after drinking too much at my apartment. They were all dull, with only hardened, older drunks who cared more about drinking than partying. I decided to check out a place I knew would be happening. It was legendary for wildness, and held quite the legacy for rowdy rock and roll, not to mention an abundance of incredibly beautiful women.     The night was all too hot and very humid, with the overnight low of eighty three. The moon was nearly full, and helped light the darker areas of the city. Hot young chicks passed by while gabbing about nonsense to other hot young chicks. They were clearly students at the university too.     As I neared the place the music got louder and louder. It would be a wild one for sure! When I got to the bar, there was a long line, as bouncers were checking for underage drinkers. Before long, two skinny guys in cowboy hats got in line behind me. Actually, I heard their drawl before I saw them. The people in front of me were three guys and two women, obviously all together. I could see the two women were with two of the guys, and they were a closed clique. Nonetheless, I stole glances at the women, especially their beautiful legs and asses.     The guys behind me in those awful hats saw I was alone, and sensed a chance to talk with someone. No harm there. They explained that they were from Texas (there’s a surprise), and were in town for a visit. They wanted a wild time, and were asking about where the best places were. I explained that I had come up empty that night, and so that bar was the best bet. Then I warned them that the place can get pretty wild.     They stood there with wide eyes. The larger one told the other that he wasn’t sure about going in there, that a couple Texans in the big city might not fare well. I chuckled and said adventure is a good thing, and if they wanted dull, there were other places that could accommodate. The smaller Texan reassured, adding that they only get one night to be in a city. I found myself feeling bad for them, but glad I finally was living in a city. I was actually better off than someone!     Eventually we all made it inside, and it was a hell of scene. Women wore revealing clothes and moved with high levels of sexuality. Men tried to look tough, but revealed deep insecurities all too apparently. The music was loud and rowdy, and high energies ran rampid. Oddly, there wasn’t much of a line to get beer, though. It was as though everyone was broke, somehow, and was farming every sip. I grabbed two beers for myself and went to check opportunities to meet women. I doubted I would get to, as they all seemed to be with someone.     I took to enjoying the music, absorbing the energies, and making light conversation with whoever I came across. I did speak with a few women who came over to me, but that was ended when their boyfriends came over to round them up while giving me the evil eye. Not much else was going on, and I was feeling like an outsider for the first time since I first moved to the city.     Eventually, the two Texans showed up. They had decided to stay close to the only person the “knew.” Great. There would be no meeting chicks or even finding new people to converse with. The two Texans were too scared to talk with anyone else. They chose me because I was backwoods enough to put them at ease. I tried to make conversation with others, and include the Texans. Neither side was interested. The Texans were only into comparing everything with Texas. Like I gave a fuck about how things were in Texas!     The night rolled on. I enjoyed the music, but nothing else was developing. The Texans continued rambling and insisting I hear every line of bullshit and everything they found amusing. Then they interrupted when I tried to talk with a hot blond woman who seemed interested just to say that one of them had to use the restroom. It wasn’t that I thought I’d get her, necessarily, but it’s always good to seem like one is happening enough to converse with beautiful women. It helps the image, not to mention providing masturbation material later. I was getting pissed.     When I finished my second beer, I decided to leave, partly to get rid of the Texans. I made the mistake of telling them I was going. They followed. I thought I might be able to convince them to buy beer and follow me to find a party somewhere, but they didn’t want to spend the money.     As we reached the door, the smaller one declared he had to use the bathroom and disappeared through the crowd. The larger one stood there looking stupid with that damn hat and saying nothing. We were just at the edge of the crowd, so I stole glances at hot feminine legs to distract from the bad night. The band played on. The place was packed and rowdy.     A woman I hadn’t seen tapped me on the shoulder and spoke. I couldn’t hear her. She leaned in close. Her sexy voice gave me a hard on.     “Who is that? Why does he have a fucking cowboy hat on?”     “Oh, him? He’s one of the village people.”     I meant it as a joke.     Instead of laughing, she told her friends ahead of us. They told more people. Word spread rapidly. The next thing I knew, the Texan was being lifted up by the crowd. They carried him on a wave toward the stage. The terrified Texan yelled, kicked, and screamed, but it was drown out by chants of “YMCA, YMCA!” They put the man on the stage. The singer of the band came over and put his arm around him, while continuing to sing, as the crowd continued to chant “YMCA YMCA!” the Texan stood frozen with a bright red face.     The other Texan came out, ready to leave.     “Whoa. We gotta wait for your friend.”     “Where is he?”     I motioned to the stage. He froze too. His face was almost as red.     The song ended, and the singer shook the Texan’s hand, then motioned for him to get off the stage. As he left and hurried through the crowd, chants of “YMCA” were stronger than ever. When he reached us, he just rushed out the door. The other Texan rushed to keep up. I left slowly, hoping they’d leave. They waited half a block away.     “Thanks for showing us around. We gotta go now. Nice to meet you.”     “Sure. Take care. Enjoy your trip.     They were so shaken that I felt guilty. Then again, it was probably the most memorable night they’ll ever have in their lives. The thought saddened me terribly. I stopped at a quiet bar and bought a six pack, then went home to put my past behind me.

Pursuit Nicholas Viglietta Can this pursuit be seen by others? A dead face blind to the unsatisfying surroundings. Mute, but while also being present to madness Noises are washed away by the endless rolling of crazed images in a sea that seems to be a century long. Now, completely detached from the outside senses, I am free to dissolve into this pure endless sea.

Janet Kuypers reads the Nicholas Viglietta September 2012 (v110) Down in the Dirt magazine poem Pursuit

See YouTube video of Janet reading this poem straight from the September 2012 issue (v236) of cc&d magazine, live 9/12/12 at Gallery Cabaret’s the Café Gallery open mic in Chicago)

Metaphor Travis Green Metaphor is breathless until it crashes onto shore, captures sea shells, releases with sharp language. Waiting in the distance, tasting the salty sand, I grew into the bitter man full of bloody wine, pouring my toxic chemicals into anyone who defied me. There was always mystery behind my words, a compelling question of why, why, why, but all I could ever say was that I was inflamed, a scorned bitch forced to cause tragedy.

Janet Kuypers reads the Travis Green September 2012 (v110) Down in the Dirt magazine poem Metaphor

See YouTube video of Janet reading this poem straight from the September 2012 issue (v236) of cc&d magazine, live 9/12/12 at Gallery Cabaret’s the Café Gallery open mic in Chicago)

Bridge-Burner Brian Looney You only cared when it was convenient, Bridge-burner, but you act you like gave a damn all along. True, you cared on the weekends. Which means I had a five-out-of-seven chance of being kicked in the teeth. Love is truly blind. You only cared, Bridge-burner, when it was time to pay the check, when you looked in the mirror and saw a witch. And you think you have a big heart. Well I’ve opened you up; the dried-out core of an apricot. That’s just how your type is, Bridge-burner. You’re a species in yourself, and you procreate more than most: my how the fruitful multiply.

I Know I Won’t Brian Looney Someday, perhaps decades from now, I’ll burn through my fuel and collapse. Then you may find yourself weeping. Or maybe you just won’t care. I know I won’t.

Thinking Steven Pelcman All night long I pretend the rising moon Is just another curious face Studying me from a distance Until clouds like creatures Crawling through sand Breach a rift and out pours Blue smoke into a haze Where a single boatman Drifts as if dark trout Beneath a shallow sea Lead him away. Leaning against the window Where time is measured In the flapping of wings That blink their way across The skies, darkness No longer separates But rather binds me To every moving star And I think that nothing good Can come from all this thinking That a mass of blackness Cannot be without reason And that perhaps it is the last Breath of the dying That robs us of sunlight Each night.

Steven Pelcman Bio     Steven Pelcman is a writer of poetry and short stories who has spent the past few years completing the novels titled RIVERBED and SPENDING TIME and books of poems titled, WHERE THE LEAVES DARKEN and LIKE WATER TO STONE. He has been published in a number of magazines including: The Windsor Review, Paris/Atlantic, The Innisfree Poetry Journal, Voxhumana magazine, Nomad’s Choir, Fourth River magazine, Salzburg Poetry Review, River Oak Review, www.enskyment.org and many others. He has been nominated for the 2011 Pushcart prize. Steven resides in Germany where he teaches in academia and as a business language trainer and consultant.

Scratch...Scratch Eric Burbridge     My head spun like a tornado, thanks to continuous shots of Tequila. A drunken whirlwind of popcorn, beer nuts and chicken wings swirled in putrid stomach acid waiting to touch down on the stained musty carpet. I couldn’t drink anyway, but I chose, due to drowsiness, to stop at this Bate’s Motel clone. Molly said, “Don’t drink on business trips.” But, short skirts with shapely legs in cowboy boots, a flirtatious wink outside the next door bar, and now look at you Marty Avers. I grabbed the lumpy mattress and held on. Round and round and...     Scratch...scratch; I drug my face across the rough sheets. My head pounded, I rolled over and yanked my ear. What’s in it? Something crept across my lips and stopped. I tried to spit whatever it was off, but it clung for a minute until my tongue hit it. I jumped up, slapped and brushed my lips. I itched all over. Relax, just relax. I stumbled and knocked over the lamp on the night stand. When I turned the switch.     Bugs everywhere!     They froze. Why didn’t they scatter? Their trail stretched from a crevice in the drawer of the night stand along the pillow case that brushed against it.     My inner ear vibrated with every scratch. I shoved my pinky in my ear and rung it. It stopped; maybe it’s gone. Scratch...scratch. I grabbed a pillow and beat at the tiny intruders.     What’s that noise? Are they screaming? Impossible. I looked closer. Earwigs! That’s in my ear? Oh, no! I rung my ear over and over again. Scratch...scratch, it’s going deeper. They say they lay eggs in moist, warm, dark places. I leaned on the wall and looked at the pinchers of the dead ones. Ringing drove that thing deeper. Hurry; pour hot water in your ear. That will work.     I hit the bathroom light switch. It was filthy; the smell told me why the toilet seat cover was down. Something trickled in my ear. It’s still going deeper. I pulled a few sheets of toilet tissue, twisted it, tilted my head and wiped out some wax. The creeping sensation continued. I turned on the hot water in the rusty sink, nothing, not even a drip; the shower, the same. Dammit. Scratch...scratch. What’s that scream? I covered my ears. I’m losing it.     Relax, Marty, you’re fine.     Ouch! It bit me. Try cold water...it might help. What I wouldn’t give some peroxide. I snatched open the vanity door; maybe there’s some in here. No luck.     I dialed the front desk; no answer, no surprise. I tilted my head and shook, my ear drained. I wiped it, no wax or blood. Scratch...something moving out. I jerked my head toward the sink. The wax covered critter dropped on the slippery porcelain, twisting and turning. It screamed in agony trying to gain traction. I pounded the squirming intruder into a brown slimy smudge. What if that thing laid eggs? It couldn’t be the eggs screaming, could it? I rambled through my travel bag. Molly always packed a surprise, something that comes in handy. If I dilute the non-alcohol mouthwash and put in a tiny bit, that should work. I sat in a chair, held my head back and thought about that. Don’t do it. You want to burn up your eardrum? Scratch...scratch. Oh, shit! Not another one. I grabbed for the mouthwash and saw a green rubber bulb syringe and some sweet oil.     Molly, I love you.     I took the syringe, squeezed it and eased it in my ear and released the bulb. That relieved the pressure when I pulled it out. I tilted my head, wax and insect body parts ran out. A few more times and I felt much better.     Listen, Marty, listen. That noise is next door. No more booze with business.

The Talking Barracuda Eric Burbridge     DISCRETION APPLIED • PRIVILEGE PRESERVED. Harris placed the plaque back in position. “Only our illustrious executive Davis could think of a riddle like that,” shook his head and looked around the office. “Look at this set-up. The walls are red and everything else has got red in it. Is she the devil or what? The furniture is arranged in front of the window so everybody on the workroom floor sees you, but all they see is the back of her chair. Remember, her words; she said she doesn’t have an open door policy? In other words, screw you.”     “No, I don’t.” Smith said and dabbed sweat off his face. Obesity and alcohol had taken its toll over the years.     Harris cut his eyes at Smith. “What happen to you Smith? You use to lead the saints in prayer on break. Those words of inspiration made some people’s day. Then you go over to the dark side.” Smith sat, expressionless. “Anyway, you really think the barracuda will flip a union steward, who betrays his own people, to a level one supervisor?”     “I’m qualified and connected,” Smith said, confident.     “That’s a pipe dream. Boy are you...stupid.” Harris chuckled.     “Don’t laugh, that dog incident didn’t die. You insulted a prominent customer’s dog. They still want to burn you for it.”     “I apologized to the lady and she accepted, in writing. If she’s still upset, so what I’m a mailman not an animal rights advocate. She needs to stop feeding that four-legged shit factory Fido fiber. That mutt’s poop is all over the sidewalk. Is that why I’m in here?” Smith looked straight ahead avoiding eye contact. “I know what it is. You two are still upset about the last time you tried to suspend me.” Harris shook his head. “How do you change scheduled absences to unscheduled to secure a suspension? The system automatically flags it. That was dumb.” Harris laughed. “She got reprimanded and you almost lost your stewardship.”     Smith cleared his throat and focused his eyes on Harris with laser like intensity. “That’s none of your business,” he hissed and then smiled. “Davis is headed this way.” *     “Good.” Harris laid an envelope on her desk. Smith glanced at it and wiped his forehead.     Executive Camille Davis Ph.D. frowned when she licked her blistered lips. It really tingled when she smiled and revealed the gaps between her pointed teeth. Her bony fingers crept through files in the cabinet like a spider approaching its prey, waiting for the copier to finish. She glanced at her distorted reflection in the office’s glass partition and adjusted her blue leather pants suit that clung to her curveless frame. She fluffed her freshly permed hair trying to enhance her elongated face and bulging eyes that earned her the nickname barracuda. Pleased, she snatched the documents out of the machine. She studied them and they were perfect.     Camille stepped onto the workroom floor and walked toward the center. She ignored all greetings while inspecting hand trucks of mail. She insisted Central Station Post Office needed a makeover. In spite of objections, her open floor plan eliminated rows of cases and lined them on the perimeter. Supervisor’s offices were converted to storage space and relocated to the center. She stopped just short of their desk and stood and cut her eyes in their direction. They shuffled papers and started playing with their computers. Unnecessary movement slowed, vibrant conversation became whispers and then, virtual silence. Camille remained silent and continued to her office.     Camille pushed open the door and went and sat. She turned on the computer and shot Harris a dirty look. She couldn’t stand them, but she tolerated Smith. Harris reminded her of their mailman in the housing projects, tall, thin and balding. He came early on check day. And took her mom in the bedroom where they laughed and made strange noises. When she got older she understood. One day she overheard him tell his friends “women in the projects were all hips and butt with no brains.” And from that day on getting an education was priority one. When she graduated she returned to mentor, almost becoming an obsession, her fellow impoverished females to prove that myth a lie.     “Good morning, Dr. Davis,” Smith said.     “Hello.” Camille tossed the file across the oversized desk toward Smith.     “Show Mr. Harris that,” she ordered.     “What’s this?” Harris reached over and grabbed the file before Smith touched it.     “Read it.”     Harris read and caught a glimpse of some carriers looking toward the office. “I don’t understand. This is a removal request for undelivered mail without authorization.”     Camille sighed and smiled. The bags under her fishy eyes tightened. “Mr. Harris, you brought back mail. You can read, can’t you?”     “I called Mr. Porter to get authorization for double time and it was denied. He told me to come back and fill out a report of undelivered mail form. Which I did and he signed it. He didn’t tell you?”     “If he did you wouldn’t be sitting here,” snapped Camille. Smith covered his mouth and suppressed his laughter.     “Where’s Mr. Porter? He’ll tell you.”     “Porter’s on vacation.”     “Well call him.” Harris said.     “Don’t tell me what to do.” Camille raised her voice and then quickly relaxed.     Harris slammed his hand on the write-up. “This is three weeks ago, I followed instructions, ask Porter.”     “As executive I have the final say.” Camille looked at Smith. “I think the union will concur. Right, Mr. Smith?”     Smith coughed and his rolls of fat fluttered like Jell-O. “Yes Dr. Davis, he looked at Harris. “You didn’t finish, that ties our hands.”     “That means I’m on my own.”     “Yes it does.” They giggled as Camille looked at her computer.     “So why is yes man sitting here?” Harris pointed at Smith.     “SOP. You do know what that is?     “Standard operating procedure.”     “Um, I’m surprised.” Camille continued to look at the screen.     Harris clenched his fist in anger until his fingers hurt.”Dr. Davis?”     “What?” Camille turned from her computer.     “My word should be good enough until Mr. Porter returns.”     Camille laughed. Her cackle made his skin crawl. She arched her back and leaned forward and folded her hands on the desk. “A letter carriers word is meaningless. You made the decision.”     “It was an instruction,” Harris interrupted.     Camille looked disgusted. “I don’t care Harris. Don’t you get it? My job is to rid this station of carriers of your ilk.” Her lips twisted like she just tasted something sour. “Right, Mr. Smith?”     “Yes, Dr. Davis.” Smith replied as if ordered.     “Oh, I’m sorry Mr. Harris. You do know what ilk means?”     “I don’t have to take the insults.” Harris frowned.     “Don’t like it, call EEO.” Camille leaned back in her chair. “Carriers like you are killing my budget. You use tons of overtime. I’ve got people worth my time to mentor, not waiting around all night for carriers.”     “Look at all the new growth. There’s high rises going up on every block plus townhouse complexes.”     “So work around it. Adapt.”     “We did. It’s called overtime,” Harris countered.     Camille stared for a moment. “My supervisors and I have been canvassing the neighborhood about the service. And nothing has been said about you minus that dog incident.”     “I’ve never heard of management soliciting complaints. Was that wise?” Harris asked, smiling.     “We weren’t soliciting, Mr. Harris.” Camille frowned. “I contemplate all my decisions. You should try it sometimes, Mr. Harris.”     “Certainly, Dr. Davis.” Harris smiled.     Camille looked puzzled. “Anyway, since you have no complaints.” She handed him a file. “Read this. You can see I’ll hold this in abeyance for six months. Once you’ve enrolled in an out-patient rehab program, submit to random drug test and your attendance remains perfect.” Camille winked at Smith while Harris read. “Oh, it’s so unfortunate, you were two weeks from living down that last suspension,” and poked out her bottom lip. “And let’s not forget you’re a year from retiring.” She sighed. “So close, yet so far.” She held out a pen and smiled. “Sign on the dotted line.”     “You wish.” Harris stared at her. “I don’t do drugs and I don’t drink. My next step would be a suspension, not removal.”     “Call EEO if you don’t like it. You got away last time, not this one, Mr. Harris.”     “A lowly letter carrier got away from a Ph.D. Is that why you messed up my chance to transfer to engineering?”     “Yes. And you’re too old, like most of the carriers in this station,” disgust written on her face.     “That’s discrimination,” Harris raised his voice.     “That’s privilege. Which you and they don’t have,” snapped Camille.     Harris tapped Smith’s arm. “You hear that?”     Camille grinned. “That doesn’t mean you, Mr. Smith.”     “Yeah, right.” Harris laughed.     “Don’t laugh, Mr. Harris. I can still put you off the clock. It might be one or six months before you go to arbitration. And that’s no guarantee of back pay.” She twirled the pen between her fingers. “Last chance.”     Harris leaned to the side looking past Camille and smiled. Carriers and a couple of supervisors gathered around the bulletin board, laughing and exchanging high fives. He folded the write-up and tore it in half, then in quarters and put it in front of her. She leaned back in her chair, speechless. “Enslave someone else Camille, you can’t do a thing to me.” Harris said and smiled.     “It’s Dr. Davis...to you.”     Harris sighed. “You’re an educated fool, Dr. Davis.”     Camille frowned. “What did you say?”     “You heard me...Dr. Davis.” Harris opened his folder and flipped her a sheet of paper. “Read it. I figured you’d try something like this.”     Camille slammed her hand on the desk. “Don’t fling that at me.”     Harris grinned. Camille’s bulging eyes glared with anger. “That’s the report Mr. Porter signed, keep it. I got copies.” Harris held out a copy toward Smith. He snatched it and read. “You and the executive missed again. So take that sweat rag and wipe the egg off Dr. Davis’ face.”     Smith started coughing and heaving. He wiped his face and mouth. Then he cleared his throat. “That’s insubordination.”     “Really.” Harris’ eyes narrowed, focusing on Camille. “You take pleasure in talking about my pension. Well, Dr. Davis, the seniority date in your system doesn’t coincide with my official personnel folder. You see, I didn’t start in 73, but 1971. A typo, I called to their attention several times over the years, but they never changed it.” Harris picked up the file again and removed the contents. He smiled as she watched, her curiosity heightened. “I was able to retire several months ago.” She turned to her computer. Her fingers danced over the keyboard while her fishy eyes scanned the screen. “As you can see, my termination date is next month. That means everything is approved and headed for Washington.” Her face was flushed. She was red as a beet. “My, my. Are hose veins bulging on your forehead? Relax.”     “Get out of my office, before I call security!”     “Watch the one that got away walk out the door. But first.” Harris leaned forward and held a small neighborhood newspaper in her face. “I posted this on the bulletin board earlier this morning for the station’s information.”     Camille snatched it and read. POSTAL EXECUTIVE SOLICITS COMPLAINTS FROM CARLINGTON PARKWAY RESIDENTS. She studied the article and mumbled under her breath.     Harris leaned and looked pass her. “As you can see it’s getting a lot of attention.”     Camille spun in her chair. Some carriers and supervisors were bunched up reading the article. She pressed the PA system button. “Supervisors get your people back to work immediately.” Camille turned and leaned her head back. “That’s a lie.” She slammed the paper on the desk.     “I contemplate all my decisions. Sound familiar, Dr. Davis? And for your information, the Carlington Parkway Assoc is headed by the matriarch of the Preston family. Who own the international hotel chain. I don’t know what you said, but they didn’t appreciate it at all. It doesn’t mention any of your supervisors, but I’m sure they’ll speak up for you.” Harris giggled. “And since they faxed the complaint to Washington you got a big problem. I hope you’ve updated your resume,” Harris laughed. “You’re not familiar with this part of Chicago. Some of the richest people in the world live around here. We’ve been delivering their mail on average, twenty years, and you just got here. Also carriers at this station pray, a lot, on and off the job. And prayer puts executives of your ilk in check...Dr. Davis. Believe me you aren’t the first. Ask Mr. Smith, former divinity student, he lead us in prayer many a day.”     Camille sprung out of her chair, propelling it backwards up against the glass partition; stood over Harris and pointed at the door. “This is a business not a church. Get out of my office!”     Harris looked up and saw snot pulsating in her flared nostrils and pasty spit on the sides of her mouth. He rose and patted Smith on the shoulder. “Remember that scripture: if he’s with you, he’s more than the world against you. Right, Mr. Smith?”     Smith turned and gave Harris an icy stare; then gave him the finger. Harris laughed and walked out. On the opposite end of the station, the freight elevator opened and the regional executive emerged and walked toward Camille’s office.     Harris went back to his case. Mail was everywhere. He turned and looked at the station, next month would be a new beginning.

Lines Between Christie Lambert The old man was not satisfied with today’s stop in Haiti. And now first in line for standby tickets at the comedy club, to forget the disgrace of these young people whizzing around on jet-skis, here, in the waters Columbus once sailed, prancing in bikinis around this manufactured port-of-call with its swept-clean façade of a market. Him, and his wife, and ten others waiting their turn to laugh when villages are but a few miles away where only God knows what conditions are really like since an official of this hogwash town will stop you from climbing the fence they’ve erected to keep tourists in. Here, in the land of mountains, where he came once before, he did not come to bounce on an oceanic trampoline or to dash down the inflatable slide. No, he most assuredly did not. He came to walk through the villages, as he did long ago with his wife and kids, to see what remained of those memories and those people with their smiles and beckoning hands. Those slight boats of livelihood, nets for fish- those boats nearly broke his heart. And when the earthquake hit, hadn’t those faces all returned to his mind and was it too much to ask to see more than pre-approved carvings and well-tended white sand? The Haitian guide he’d met today said yes, because there wasn’t much else left since the rich Americans came down with funds-raised, snapped their pixels of proof and left with the money. If this was true, the old man wanted to know. He could raise a ruckus back home, oh, yes. He was sure of it. But they kept an eye on him, on his wife, too, and never so insulted as to feel like an insubordinate child on this trip (he’d paid his money and good money at that, too much to be prodded along like sheep into the fold). His wife pleaded and they walked by well-spaced booths. He bought one painting in the market; it caught his eye, the dark blues and greens. The black smoke that hovered over the mountains wasn’t in the picture, but he felt it there in the heaviness of the lines. The smoke ever-present, product of charcoal (foundation of this people), something he cooks with every now and then, steaks hot on the grill, standing on the back deck where the fan blows and there are so many citronella candles that mosquitoes can’t get close enough to bite. First in line and a ticket to the comedy club is his, but the comedian thinks too much of his own jokes and the old man can’t stop thinking of slender fishing boats lost at sea, survival marking the clear blue sky, that one wire fence between fantasy and humanity, the way they wouldn’t let him cross it,

I Can Do This Kathryn Leetch     I feel like I’m traveling through scenes of bad movie when I realize that we have been on the same chalky, rocky, gravel road for the last hour. The scenery looks the same...plain, grass on the right, a tree or two every mile. The music we try to listen to is easily overpowered by the sound of rocks clinking and clanking the metal contraptions used to make an undercarriage on my 1997 Nissan Altima. What used to be a shiny black paintjob is now covered by the dust from this stupid gravel. I realized that they lived out in the middle of nowhere, but damn, they weren’t joking. My boyfriend, Chad, and I had come to the conclusion that we have seen maybe three houses on this entire thoroughfare. It’s spring break, and I can’t even listen to music.     Clinton, Missouri. What a town. Nothing more than a Wal-mart and a couple historic museums and a couple thousand people (maybe). Podunk. We pull off of one gravel road, and turn onto another. My mom’s driveway. The first thing I notice is my mom. Relaxed, slouching in a green and white striped lawn chair, and in her hand a cigarette, a habit she recently picked up. I see my mother and I think about why she left. She left me, my brother, and my dad- but took my sister. I felt rejected. Was I not good enough for my mom? I may not be six years old, like my sister, but I was still her daughter. I guess she had other things on her mind, like her 27 year old boyfriend, her now husband. Jake. That name just sounds young.     We get out of the car, stretch our arms and take a big yawn. I grab Chad’s hand. We take a deep breath. I look at him. I say, “We can do this.”     “Hey twinks!” my mom says, as she looks up from hugging Lauren. I still don’t know why she calls me that, but I have lost interest. Too many years have passed, too late, now, to ask.     “Oh, hey mom...” I say as I take my turn to embrace. I smile, and watch as she moves on to hug Chad.     “How was the drive?” she asks, implying that it might have been interesting in some way.     “Oh, you know. As good as it can be in a little, old Nissan.” I reply, resorting to my normal sarcasm.     I put my sunglasses on top of my head, acting as a temporary headband, and start toward the house, anticipating the tour my mom promised. The outside of this “farmhouse” was, well, hideous. Mom claims it used to be white, but I don’t believe her. Green moss had overtaken at least one side of the house, and mold was obvious as well. Untrimmed bushes, weeds, and dead flowers surrounded the outside. Disgusting, but nothing compared to what lay within.     We walk through the old screen door, which slammed behind us, startling both Chad and I. My mom begins “the tour”. The first room we walk into from the door is the kitchen. It sort of reminds me of what I thought a fraternity house would look like before I came to college, wooden floors, dirt in the cracks, dust in the corners, is lined with cases of five different kinds of soda (only in a fraternity, of course, it’d be cases of beer, right?), and an old dresser top that serves as a shelf for wine and beer glasses. No dishwasher, just a pile of plates and cups needing to be cleaned. The wooden dining table takes up more than half of the space in the room, making it almost impossible to walk around. Surprisingly, the kitchen smelled magical. My mom was an incredible cook-one of the many things I miss about having her around. I could always count on her to make a great meal, one that could mend broken hearts, or soothe stressed minds. The smell of a pot roast and potatoes in the oven, crispy golden brown. Perfection on a plate. Well, not on a plate yet, but soon. One room down, how many to go?     Next, the living room. Two black leather couches, a glass table, and our old television, half fuzz, half picture. I’m not exaggerating. It was literally one-side fuzz. The green carpet screamed at me when we first entered the room, but that is the least of my worries. At least this room was halfway normal. We walk to the next room, still the same green carpet, but this time, no furniture. The “office”, my mom announces, was hardly that. I remain unconvinced. There was a computer, but it was probably the oldest one I have ever seen. An old clock, folding chairs, stuffed animals, nick-knacks, and pillows all collected dust on the floor. I guess this was a storage room, too.     She was so proud of this, excuse my language, shithole, and it amazed me, and still does. What pride could she find within these walls? I feel as though she only acted this way to make me feel like she was doing alright, and that she knew this may be a temporary situation. She was putting up with her house, and fronting like she loved it here. I just don’t get it. Why wouldn’t she want to be truly happy where she lived, and who she lived with? Why does she feel the need to lie? She’s good at convincing herself of things. So good she almost convinces me.     I didn’t feel like asking questions. We were back to the kitchen. It didn’t look any better from this angle, though. In front of me was the kitchen, and to my right was a set of stairs. Past the stairs was the laundry, a bathroom, a pantry, and my mom’s room. The washer and dryer are buried under clothes and random items that probably hadn’t been moved in quite some time. The bathroom is crammed in the corner, next to the pantry which consists of crackers, chips, snack cakes, a few cans of vegetables, and other not-so-healthy items. And we wonder why my sister is diabetic at the age of 6.     When I first see my mom’s room, words escape me. I honestly don’t know what it looked like because it is covered in clothes. I couldn’t see a bedspread, sheets, pillows, anything. I am just assuming those were all under the sweatshirts and dirty jeans. My sister comes running over to me, and grabs my hand, begging me to come see her room upstairs. Thank God. I pick my jaw up from the ground, and follow her.     A sign on the door to the steps says “Lauren’s Apartment,” I was in for a good time. My sister is 6, a first-grader, and sometimes I think she is smarter than I am. She holds my hand as we walk up the old wooden steps. They creaked as we took each step. I cling tightly to the railing, holding myself up with a small piece of wood and a few nails. The wallpaper in the hall is a light salmon color, bubbly and torn in some spots. The first thing I notice in her room is the bright green walls- perfect for a 6 year old girl. She has everything you could imagine: a fish tank, a T.V., a boom box, stuffed animals, and many other toys. She’s got it made. She shows me an assignment that she got a good grade on, and then some cool new toy that she had just gotten. It was at this moment that my heart began to quicken. I looked around, examining Lauren’s room, seeing the magic that hid within these walls. My mom has given her everything she could want, but is she happy?     Lauren goes on to tell me that she has even more toys in the room across the hall, her “play room.” We walk over to it, and I stand in the doorway, shocked. Toys were everywhere. More stuffed animals, kitchen sets, Barbie’s, dolls, an Easy Bake Oven, everything a little girl could ever dream of. I gaze around the room, my jaw on the floor once again. Awestruck. I slowly take a look around the room. From right to left, I look at the toys. Dolls I never had. Toys I begged for but never got. And a toilet? Yes, in the middle of this magical little place, surrounded by a ten by ten foot patch of linoleum, sat a toilet. I laughed when I first saw it, but then I realize that this is so many different kinds of wrong. I wanted to grab my sister by the arm, and walk out of this house as fast as I could, taking her out of this awful situation. But I can’t. Instead, I listen to why there is this toilet in the middle of her playroom. Apparently, the lady who lived there before them was older, and intended on finishing the room, but never got around to finishing it, and so it sits. I wish I could see the humor.     A tear comes to my eye when Lauren looked up at me and told me this story. I asked myself, yet again, why my mom left. She left a perfect life in suburban St. Louis, for this? An old house, with mold and dust and bubbly wallpaper and a toilet. I know I have issues with commitment sometimes, but am I this bad? My heart hadn’t felt the way it did at this moment, in a long time. I thought I was ready to forgive my mom, but I wasn’t. Not after seeing this.     I take my sisters hand, grip it tight, take a deep breath and think to myself, “I can do this.”

Between the Barbed Wire and the Still-to-be-Discovered God Particle, Remains an Unfinished Line of American Poetry (#5). Kenneth DiMaggio Your collection agency notices The labels from your empty anti-depressant prescription bottles Tabloids & scandal rags that read more like cut out and collaged serial killer or kidnapper ransom notes and soon the coagulation necessary to create poetry

Between the Barbed Wire and the Still-to-be-Discovered God Particle, Remains an Unfinished Line of American Poetry (#6). Kenneth DiMaggio Fleeing in a stolen car whose rear view mirror has whose bloody thumbprint? Ah    there is still a great American epic that has room for your anonymous fugitive fingerprints

Courage Boys! Jeffrey Park Courage boys! Courage under fire, courage in the face of near-certain death, stiffen those lips and what-not, stop that trembling trembling trembling, steady now, forward three steps, back one, now forward again, hop, hop, big jump and slide...slide...slide back a full body length, hunker down lads and tuck you’re your chins down deep between your knees and don’t get distracted by what you find there. We’ll be needing to move again shortly, marching sharply in broken formation hup-two hup-two and now for the big push, the shake and bake, under the wire, through the crawlways, up over the electrified fence, slog through the moat, dash through the fire and don’t forget to slap out your buddy’s eyebrows. And you’ve made it, lads, give a great big hug to the buddy on your right, on your left, no need to thank me but someday when your grandkids ask you about this historic day, you’ll be able to say, aye, I was there, I answered the call and I did my part, my own small modest part for king, country, and a way of life still envied round the world: inspiration, aspiration, a splash of perspiration, secret ingredients in the sauce of victory.

Jeffrey Park Bio     Baltimore native Jeffrey Park currently lives in Munich, Germany, where he works at a private secondary school and teaches business English to adults. His latest poems have appeared in Subliminal Interiors, Mobius, Danse Macabre, cc&d Magazine, Right Hand Pointing and elsewhere. Visit his website at http://www.scribbles-and-dribbles.com/.

Muse Loukia M. Janavaras What is it like knowing you have opened me from the inside tapped deep releasing an outpour captured only in craft a form you can take away as your own a souvenir embodying our journey.

Loukia M. Janavaras Bio     Loukia M. Janavaras is from Minneapolis, MN and currently resides in Athens, Greece. Her poem White was published in J.D. Vine publications The Creative Writer in 2008 and in 2010 she received an Honourable Mention in the Writer’s Digest 79th Annual Writing Competition for The Neighbour in the Memoirs/Personal Essay category.

Bob Rashkow reads the Loukia M Janavaras September 2012 (v110) Down in the Dirt magazine poem Muse

See YouTube video of Bob reading this poem straight from the September 2012 issue (v236) of cc&d magazine, live 9/12/12 at Gallery Cabaret’s the Café Gallery open mic in Chicago)

Garbage Denny E. Marshall Two men on a truck, making their rounds Picking up the neighborhood trash One ask, can we take your garbage I said, “No thank–you.” “I’d like to keep my TV.” 1st Published “Pablo Lennis” Aug. 1999

Photographic Memories Denny E. Marshall The mind camera flashes With or without lightning All the dots inside the head Are closer than any picture You cannot copy the brush Painted inside the mind You will always have memories If you have the film to find it The image moves closer Will not be easily erased As the words pass on.

Liquid Comfort John Ragusa     Things had been bad for Bubba Dapner lately. He’d received a ticket for speeding, was audited by the IRS, and was demoted at his job, all in the space of one week. He felt like the worst kind of loser. His whole world was spinning out of control, and there was nothing he could do about it. He was full of distress.     And he hadn’t even done anything bad to deserve his misfortune! He was suffering without having committed any sin. It was totally unfair!     That’s when Bubba prayed to the Lord for help. He hoped the Father would hear him and end his troubles. If He were a kind God, He’d do that.     Bubba found that alcohol enabled him to cope with his problems. It gave him comfort when he was feeling bad.     But he was drinking too much of it. He was afraid he was becoming dependent on it. He needed it to relieve his despair. He didn’t know what he’d do without it.     Bubba realized how dangerous his alcoholism was. If he drove while drunk, he could get into a car accident and kill himself and other people. He must give up booze before it led to tragedy.     But he couldn’t bring himself to stop drinking it; he was hooked on it. He needed professional help. But that was expensive, and Bubba wasn’t sure he could afford it.     His life was now so screwed up that Bubba didn’t think he wanted to live.     Soon he was sneaking drinks behind his wife Kendra’s back. He figured he wouldn’t get in trouble if she didn’t catch him drinking.     He couldn’t get too close to her, either, because he couldn’t let her smell liquor on his breath.     But Kendra was suspecting the truth now.     “Have you been drinking when I’m not around?” she asked him one day.     “What makes you think that?” he said.     “Your speech is slurred and your walk is wobbly, as if you’ve been hitting the bottle.”     “That’s ridiculous. I don’t ever drink alcohol.”     “Well, if you are helping yourself to the sauce, you’d better stop, or else you’ll regret it.”     A week later, Bubba left his bedroom in the middle of the night and walked softly into the den, where he got a bottle from a cabinet. He was about to drink from it when Kendra entered the den.     “So! You have been drinking!” she said angrily.     “I swear this will be my last drink,” Bubba said, covering the bottle’s label with his hand so that Kendra wouldn’t see the skull and crossbones on it.

The Vacation John Ragusa     Percy Heller was married to a shrew. Margaret griped night and day about everything under the sun. She never let Percy have any relaxation. The poor man was a nervous wreck; he prayed that he could get some relief from his wife’s nagging.     Her complaints were meant to make him feel as worthless as counterfeit money. She had so many insults that he couldn’t help but feel like a failure.     His friends told him to take up for himself. They said if he stood up to Margaret, she’d stop berating him. But Percy knew that standing up to her would only make her worse. She wouldn’t take any backtalk from him. She was the boss in their marriage; Percy had to do exactly what she told him to do.     Percy tried to drink his troubles away. Sometimes he’d go to bars just to get away from Margaret. He would sit there with his beer and enjoy her absence. He wished he were a bachelor again. He’d have the serenity he longed for. But it was too late for that.     “When are you going to clean out the garage?” Margaret asked him once. “I’m tired of telling you to do it.”     “And I’m tired of you complaining about it,” Percy said.     “Well, you’d never do anything if I didn’t pressure you.”     “Why can’t you just leave me alone?”     “Because I have to remind you to do things. You’re always forgetting your responsibilities.”     “I always do things to please you, but they never work. I could shower you with gifts, but it still wouldn’t be enough. You’d keep complaining about something.”     But it was useless to try and talk sense into Margaret; she was as stubborn as she was grating. If Percy could shut her up somehow, then he would have comfort. However, nothing could stop her bitching.     He wished that her mother Grace would get ill and need to have Margaret go to her house and look after her a few weeks. He’d get a respite from Margaret’s yelling and griping for a while. It would be like spending time in heaven. He’d get some wonderful silence.     Percy would be ecstatic if Margaret lost her voice, if only temporarily. He’d be spared the horrendous sound of her vocals. That would be a real treat. He said a prayer that it would happen.     She never stopped for breath. She resembled a broken phonograph needle. How on earth did he ever get himself into such a mess?     Percy looked for excuses to leave the house. He said he had to go bowling on some nights. He would bowl with his buddies, and it was nicely diverting.     He considered divorcing Margaret, but he didn’t want to pay alimony, so he’d have to stay married to her. He was stuck in a miserable marriage. What a revolting development!     Percy hoped that something would happen to get Margaret out of his hair. Then Margaret herself came up with a solution.     “It sure would be nice if we could go on a vacation somewhere,” she said one day. “We could fly to a great country.”     “We’ll do that real soon,” Percy promised.     “I want to see other places. I’m bored staying in this house.”     “I’ll travel with you someday. You’ll get to visit another land.”     “When will you do that?”     “I promise we’ll do it shortly.”     “I won’t hold my breath.”     “When I get the money, I’ll take us to a foreign nation.”     “Why can’t we do that now?”     “As I told you, I can’t afford it right now.”     “Oh, you’re such a tightwad!” Margaret said.     “I’m simply not wealthy enough to take you on a trip,” Percy said.     Margaret pouted for a long time, but Percy held his ground. He wasn’t going to let her have her way.     The next morning, Percy saw an advertisement in the newspaper. A travel agency was offering a discount on a rocket trip to a distant planet. Percy figured that this would make the perfect vacation for Margaret. She’d enjoy going into outer space.     “You should take this journey,” he said to Margaret. “You’d have the thrill of a lifetime.”     “Don’t you want to go with me?”     “That’s impossible, dear. I can only afford to send one of us on the trip, and I think you’d enjoy it more than me.”     “That’s very thoughtful of you, Percy. I’ll go there alone, then.”     The following week, Margaret took off for the planet in the rocket ship. Percy smiled as he watched the missile fly away on TV. He would have a month of peace and quiet.     A week later, Percy read a news story about a meteor heading toward a planet that was currently a vacation spot. When it would strike the planet, everyone on it would be killed in a fiery explosion.     Percy couldn’t believe his luck. Now he would have a lifetime of peace and quiet.

Tom Larry Schug A great blue heron stalks the bog inside me; beautiful, yet vicious, it spears my precious frogs with a whip-snap of its coiled neck. You would think my frogs would quiet when the heron is about, but they keep on singing. They keep on singing.

Tom’s Apartment Larry Schug How can he enjoy the symphony, allegro or adagio, when the walls around him are thin as the sheetrock between cheap apartments? He tries to gather solace from the music but is apprehensive of the arrival of noisy neighbors, their loud stereos, obnoxious televisions, fearful the cacophony around him will shatter this moment of tranquility composed by Brahms.

Tiles Alessandra Siraco     Sometimes when Jessica is sleeping, Kyle thinks of ways that he could kill her. It would be easy, with a pillow or with the knife she insists on keeping in the nightstand in case of intruders. She’s scared that they’ll come so close to her that she’ll need something powerful, like a knife, instead of just her cell phone to call 911. She watched the E! special about unsolved murder mysteries last Sunday and knows that everybody is not what they seem. She watched the show lying on her stomach with her nose stuffed in the musty, pilly brown pillows that line their couch, and she lifted her eyes just high enough above the fabric to see a middle-aged overweight actor re-creating the murder, going into a house of the woman he was about to kill.     “The children were in the house,” the narrator of the show said. “In the house,” Jessica heard the narrator whisper more softly, for effect.     Jessica got up off of the couch and walked into the kitchen where Kyle was doing a crossword, sitting on top of the counter like he always did.     “The kids were in the house when he shot her,” Jessica told Kyle, pushing past him to get into the cabinet where the Cheez-Its were. “Isn’t that horrible?” A Cheez-It crumb flew out of her mouth and landed on the counter next to Kyle’s thigh.     “That’s horrible,” he said, and folded the crossword over so he could only see the “Across” prompts and finish them first. “People are sick.”     Their kitchen always smelled slightly of cat food and bananas, even though they didn’t have any cats. The people who lived in the house before them did, though, which Jessica found out shortly after they’d moved in the year before, when she was looking in her closet for shoes. They were still unpacking and she was expecting, after four years together, to find a ring hidden underneath a suitcase or shoved in a sock drawer, but she didn’t. Instead she found the height markers.     “What is this?” she’d asked, crouching over to see the marks on the doorjamb, little lines with numbers next to them. Eight inches, nine inches, 11.5 inches. The numbers were written with black marker but the lines were scraped into the woodwork. Kyle hadn’t been home so Jessica had talked to herself, like she always did when she was alone, and sometimes did when she was with others. “They’re too small to be kids’ markers.”     They were for the cats. Jessica had found gravestones in the backyard for the cats and then realized that the markers in the house were for their growing, too. There were none marking the children’s growth spurts. Only the cats.     “I want cats, one day,” Jessica had told Kyle. “Do you?”     Kyle had shaken his head, no.     Jessica also likes to watch infomercials, even though she refuses to buy anything on them. When the E! specials are over on Sunday mornings, Jessica flips the channels until she gets to the ones advertising the onion choppers and closet miracle hangers. Her favorite is the P90-X.     “I want that,” Jessica said the first time she saw it on the infomercial. The girl on the screen was ripped, too ripped, thought Kyle, and her muscles bulged out of her tiny sports bra and skintight biking shorts as she demonstrated how she got rock-hard abs in just 90 days.     “Why? She looks horrible.” Kyle sat next to Jessica on the couch and reached behind him to open the blinds.     “Don’t,” she said, “there’ll be a glare on the screen.” She moved closer to him and curled her legs up on the couch. He put his palms on the fabric, feeling the pilly covering as he adjusted himself closer to her, too. Jessica pulled the box of Cheez-Its nearer to them and delicately ate one.     “I guess I shouldn’t eat Cheez-Its if I want rock-hard abs like that girl,” she said, putting the box on the other side of Kyle so she couldn’t reach it.     It was stale in their house and Kyle badly wanted to open the blinds but he knew Jessica liked these Sunday mornings, lazy, dark.     “You don’t need rock-hard abs,” Kyle said, reaching his arm around her waist and pulling her tighter. “I love you.”     Kyle could see Jessica smile under her mass of curly red hair, which was snaking its way up into his face as she put her head on his shoulder. Jessica told him once that she’d fallen for him because he’d never tried to imagine what she could be like, if she were someone else.     He imagined that was probably the only reason she’d stayed. ——     Sometimes when they’re lying in bed and Kyle is thinking of ways that it would be so easy to kill her, Jessica plops over onto her back and sighs, rubbing her eyes in her sleep a little bit, and Kyle knows that he’ll never actually kill her. Wishing and doing are two separate things entirely.     Kyle gets out of bed and picks up the socks that Jessica left on the ground, going downstairs to get breakfast. He sits on the counter and does the crossword with one hand while eating a granola bar with the other. The counter is cold because it’s November and New Hampshire, but Kyle doesn’t mind because the bedroom was way too hot and stuffy. He doesn’t want to go skiing today.     The house is dark and dingy. It was built in the ‘60s and there are still some of the original carpets there, the kind that creep up into your feet and up past your ankles when you walk on them, or maybe your feet sink into them. Either way, you shrink a little bit, and for some reason it’s always wet. Every surface is laced with a layer of dew, at all times of the year. Kyle reaches down from the counter and feels the wetness of the table and the wetness of the floor, his feet bare and getting wet against the cold tan kitchen tiles.     Jessica wants him to sleep with her on the kitchen floor. She’s said this before, and he knows it, but he’s been waiting for the right moment for it to happen.     “Like in When Harry Met Sally,” she’d said, “how she says they never have sex on the kitchen floor, even though they’re able to and have no kids, because the floor tiles are so cold. I want to do that, one day. Like your elevator fantasy,” she winked, “my kitchen floor fantasy.”     Kyle pulls his pajama pants looser around his stomach and puts a bucket of flowers on the counter. He picked them the day before but didn’t put them in water yet, forgot them on the counter. They’re daisies because that’s what Jessica likes and because that’s what’s left in the field outside their house, for some reason, even though it’s November. He wants to make it special for her. The bucket is the blue one they got when they went to Hampton Beach last year, some shitty yellow handle that almost broke off right after Kyle won it at one of the boardwalk games.     She comes downstairs with her hair curly and frizzy. He told her once that her hair looked like Robert Plant’s in the morning, but she didn’t like that, so he’d grabbed her hair and twisted it in her fingers, kissing her hard and long.     “It’s a compliment,” he’d said in between breaths, “I love your hair.”     When she comes into the kitchen, she pulls her hair back into the elastic she’s taken to keeping around her wrist while she sleeps, but she misses a strand and it stays stuck to her cheek in a frozen red curl.     Kyle puts down his granola bar and wipes a piece of chocolate off the corners of his mouth, thinks he probably should have brushed his teeth if he really wanted to make this perfect, but he wraps his arms around her waist, just a little low on her hips so he can feel the bulge of her butt underneath his fingers, and leans down to kiss her, tasting her mouth of Listerine and Chinese food from last night, but he doesn’t care, not really.     He pushes her against the counter and then thinks that this will be difficult, to get down onto the kitchen floor gracefully without dropping her, so he sort of slides her down, pushing her back against the cabinets to keep his balance, feeling the bumping of her body as they glide over the doorknobs of each cabinet.     “Ow,” she says, pulling away and rubbing her back, but he just smiles and puts his hands behind her back to cushion the cabinet doorknobs and to warm the cold, wet floor tiles.     “What is this?” she mumbles between moments, and he doesn’t think that he needs to answer because she should already know, she should know that this was coming, that he’d been planning it since she mentioned it three months and two days ago, like he plans everything, with her, because he loves her. ——     When Kyle thinks those things about smothering Jessica with the pillow or cutting her with her own knife, he feels terrible, because he knows that he’d never do it, yet for some reason, he wonders what it would be like to watch her die. He wonders if it would feel like he was dying, too, because that’s what it always seems like in the movies.     Jessica looks over at him driving. She smiles, her hair straightened and tamed for the day. She squeezes his thigh and he remembers why he could never smother her with a pillow. But he thinks of driving off the road, like in Thelma and Louise, one of many chick flicks that Jessica’s made him watch. He wonders if she knows that these chick flicks stay with him because they’re all tragic; but nothing in their relationship is tragic, he tells himself. He knows.     “You okay?” she asks, and squeezes a little tighter. She loves him but she shouldn’t; if she knew what he was thinking, she wouldn’t.     “Yeah,” he says, and stops at a stop sign half covered in snow. It’s barely winter but up here there’s snow almost all the time, and he can feel the wheels trying on the ice. He’s used to it.     Jessica’s ski gear takes up most of the backseat, but Kyle doesn’t take much with him to go skiing. Just a hat and gloves, sometimes a helmet. Jessica takes two pairs of ski pants and two jackets, just in case, and a hat and earmuffs and toe warmers.     She smells like the mac and cheese they had for lunch as she leans over and whispers in his ear, “I love you,” and she’s so close he can feel the moisture from her words.     “I’m thinking bad things,” he says in return, staring ahead at the windy, salt-covered road and trying not to think about what it would be like if her heat wasn’t next to him in the passenger seat.     “Stop,” she says, pulling back and squinting at him, used to him saying this, now. She knows everything. “Just don’t think them.”_     “I can’t help it.”     “You don’t actually want them though, right?” she asks.     He shakes his head. “No,” he says. But then that’s lying, because sometimes he does want them. Sometimes he does want to know what it would be like to feel her loss, to feel her slipping and slipped away, just to see how people would react to him. Sometimes he does want to see her dog get sick, just to be able to show her how much she means to him by making her feel better. To show her how much he’d be there. Sometimes he wants her sister to get in a car accident, so he can show up at the hospital faster than anyone else.     “Yes,” he says instead, “I don’t know. Sometimes I do, but not really,” he says quickly.     She takes her hand from his thigh and puts it in her lap, staring at him with wet eyes.     “I don’t,” he says, “not when I really think about it. Just when I sort of do, in the hypothetical.” But she’s not listening because she’s heard what he said and what he’s said before, many times, now. “I love you,” he says, softly, because that’s all that’s left, and she either believes him or she doesn’t.     “You need to stop,” she says in reply this time, her mascara running but her eyes not red, clear white.     “I know,” he says. He tells her these things not to hurt her, but because he thinks that if she knew what was going through his mind, she wouldn’t love him back, and maybe he should tell her so that she knows everything, absolutely everything, about him. That way she can decide for herself if she loves him, all of him, even the bad, horrible parts of him. That’s why he always tells her these things.     “It’s going to make me love you less,” she says, and he expects her to speak softly, or whisper, but she doesn’t. She says it loudly, almost too loud for the small car, almost too loud for this road and this state and these ski mountains. ——     The ski path gets more crowded as Kyle tries to think of ways that he can make it up to her, because he does love her, so much that it hurts. Kyle hates skiing. He hates the coldness on his face and how the snow gets everywhere, inside ski boots and hats. Jessica told him once that if he brought more gear, like she did, he’d be warmer and then maybe he’d like it more.     She’s ahead of him, and he can see her below him on the trail. She’s beautiful. He can’t see her face but he can see her hair, red and curly underneath her blue helmet, her blue ski pants, blue jacket. She skis faster than some of the little kids but always lets them go first anyways, because she knows how much they love that.     Kyle tries to call to her, but she can’t hear him over the kids’ yelling and the wind on the mountain. It’s cold and he can see all of the trees below, and almost the lodge, but not quite because it’s so far down. There’s a string on the inside of his right glove that he can feel loosening, and he tries to pull it but it won’t come out. He fiddles with it, twirling it around in a tiny knot inside his glove’s fingertips, back and forth, feeling the smooth strong crease of the string against his fingers.     “Jessica,” he yells again, but she still doesn’t hear him. She waves him on, waiting for him halfway down the mountain, after the fork in the paths. This fork is why people come to this mountain; you can ski down one way with one person and one way with the other, but all of the forks end up in the same place at the bottom of the hill. She’s chosen the middle one, like she always does, because it’s the easiest for Kyle.     He thinks about what would happen if a snow groomer plowed into her, right in front of him, as she waved him down.     He tries not to think about what would happen, but he can’t. He gets hot beneath his ski jacket and begins to get dizzy, fuzzy, and he knows he needs to tell her, has to tell her what he’s thinking because what if he doesn’t tell her, and then she feels the same about him, but if he chooses to tell her, and after hearing, she feels differently? It’s not fair to her to have to love most of him and not know the other horrible parts of him, those thoughts that come into his head and he can’t seem to shake.     Jessica’s hat is a lighter blue than her ski coat, and she stands out against the white of the mountain and the myriad of red and black ski coats darting past her. She tilts her head a little bit, gesturing harder this time, come down, I’m waiting.     All he can picture is her own scene from Final Destination, or Thelma and Louise, or The Shining, Jessica dying in a million different ways right in front of him on the ski slope, trapped in coldness and ski gear and snow, wet and freezing beneath his fingers.

A History of Violins Frank Traverse     “Pardon me. I just wanted to tell you that you have a beautiful face.”     She looks up at him. Because she was biting her cheek, he doesn’t know if she is afraid of him or laughing at him.     “What do you want me to say?” she asks.     “I’m not sure. I’ve never said that to someone nearly as young as my granddaughter... or to any woman except my wife. Say ’Thank you’ or ’Go away old man.’ Either would be fine... or say nothing.”     She stands up, gathers her coat and books, and strides out of the college’s cafeteria. He watches her go, shrugs his shoulders, and then picks up the crust of the pizza left on his tray. Did she believe him, this child? That he was not a pervert? That he had not, in fact, ever done this before?     Out of the story-high cafeteria windows, Gary Rothman observes two young men on the lawn tossing a rubber ball back and forth. He thinks of when he was eleven, playing outfield in the vacant lot on the Concourse (he recalls now it is filled with the Bronx Museum). Something distracted him from his usual concentration on the batter and on his friend Jake pitching the softball. It was a girl making her way north on the sidewalk bordering the lot – what would be the third base line. He saw it was Barbara, his flame, his first love. Twice in the past month, he had followed her home from school, well behind her so that she never sensed it, and listened at her apartment door hoping he’d hear her talking to her mother. Now, yelling out to Jake “Watch this!” he ran full speed up to Barbara, said “Hi,” and planted a big wet kiss on her cheek. She was shocked, didn’t say anything, and merely walked away.     A few days later his father sat him down to talk.     “You can’t just run up to girls and kiss them,” he told Gary. “That’s not good behavior. It stops now or you won’t be playing any more baseball.”     Gary thought “I took this to heart” even though he had followed Barbara home once more – the day she wore that blue-and-red checked blouse he liked so.     Three years later, on a long ride with his father, he totally understood the “don’t force anything when you’re with a girl” speech – understood not to do it without understanding what the “it” was until years later.     By the time he had his first girlfriend who might “go all the way,” his father was dead. He was a junior in college and he’d ride the subways from The Bronx to Brooklyn to see her. The fraternity brother who had given him her number said she had spread for the high school basketball team in the catacombs of the lockers, and indeed she would play with him under their blanket in Prospect Park, and he could take off her bra and fondle her, but she stopped at intercourse and he would not force her.     Did the girl believe him just now? He had never done this. He was not, after all, sad Frank Rourke who had been dumped by his wife of 35 years. Rourke, from the moment Gary saw him at the Milan Airport, would walk up to a young woman and ask: “Would you rather be pretty or smart?” That was an opening line Rourke had undoubtedly read on some pick-up-girls 1-2-3 website, or perhaps his therapist had suggested that tack.     Gary would admit he was a starer, but not someone who would take action. At 71, he didn’t get turned on when he stared. It was more admiration. He always thought of Norman Mailer’s “Of Women and Their Elegance.” His staring had gotten him into trouble only once, and that was a few years ago.     It was at a friend’s daughter’s wedding. There was a drunken young woman, maybe in her late ’20s, fast dancing with her husband and making obscene gestures. She was funny. She caught him staring and smiling, came over to him, and insisted he dance with her. He thought the whole thing was a joke, and grinned throughout the nine minutes on the dance floor. She tried to engage him in conversation, and he responded by telling her he wrote poetry and that his favorite poet was Wallace Stevens. She kept at him and, laughing the whole time, Gary finally shooed her away. His wife didn’t think it was funny at all, and there was rancor between them for weeks.     This student – he probably wouldn’t recognize her if he met her again on campus. Would he look the other way if he did see her? Would she turn away in embarrassment? No, he would not know her, he decided. All the girls on campus looked like Laurie, his crushing love at City College in the early ’60s.     He had been the short leg of a triangle. They had dated – gone to a Brecht play, with his fraternity to a Dixieland place in the Village, and out to Brighton Beach – but she never allowed more than a quick kiss. He cried about the situation to his sociology professor who simply laughed at him. Her freckled face, green eyes, corduroy skit with black leotards, bitten nails — why was she so fresh in his mind?     He finishes his soda and brings his tray to the disposal area of the cafeteria, then exits, shifting his book bag from his shoulder to his hand. He walks more slowly across campus than usual because he’s finished reading for his next workshop. How he loves this program – five years into it, he’s like an 18-year old starved for sex, only he’s starved for learning. He waves to half a dozen other seniors he’s met and talked to as he heads for the course tying Joseph Campbell’s mythology to Jung’s work. He climbs the stairs to the fourth floor and enters the classroom. One woman asks whether he’s read the short story the workshop leader assigned for the next day, and he talks for a few minutes about the writer’s technique and the motivation of the main character. He talks to another woman about James Franco’s portrayal of Hart Crane, a film he had seen a few nights before.     The workshop leader has been discussing the myth of Persephone and now reads long sections from Lady Chatterley’s Lover. It is raw stuff and he watches some of the woman around the classroom squirm. Unlike when he read the Lawrence novel in his uncle’s bookshop when he was sixteen, he is bored, unmoved. He begins tuning out and writing a short story. Finally, the workshop is over and he walks to the parking lot, and drives home in fifteen minutes.     His wife’s car is in the garage when he gets home, but when he calls out to her there is no answer. He’s forgotten that she’s playing canasta this afternoon. He takes a slug of seltzer from the bottle in the refrigerator, sheds his jacket, and carries his knapsack upstairs to check his email and look at the headlines.     The phone rings as he’s just becoming immersed in an online crossword puzzle. It’s his daughter and he can tell from her first few syllables that something has happened.     “Dad, can you pick up Amy right now?”     “Sure, where is she?”     “She’s almost home.”     Gary didn’t understand.     “What’s going on, Liz?”     “Oh, Dad, she was walking home from the high school and she had gone just two blocks when this old man starts walking beside her, telling her how pretty she is. She said he was disgusting looking and no matter how fast she walked, he kept up with her.”     “Okay,” Gary says. “I’m off. I’ll sit with her for a while in your house, then call you when I get home.”     He catches up with Amy just as she’s turning the corner, two blocks from her house. He toots his horn gently. He’s happy she’ll recognize his car immediately because he’s given her so many lifts from school, to the gym and to her father’s. He rolls down the window and calls out.     “Hey, Amy, your ride’s here.”     She looks surprised, but gets in. He does not want to lie to her – because he rarely lies to anyone and because at 17 she’s just too smart.     “Your Mom called me. She told me what happened and she thought you’d like some company.”     He looks at her as she’s saying “I’m okay” and knows she is not. They go into the house and sit in the kitchen. He offers Amy water or soda, but she declines.     “What did he look like, Amy? Height, weight, anything that is different about him? I want to call the police.”     “No, Grandpa. I just want to forget this if I can.”     “Did he touch you or try to touch you?”     “No, Grandpa. That’s why the police won’t do anything.”     “Well, what did he say to you? Did he say something dirty?”     Amy looks embarrassed. “No, he didn’t say anything dirty. He asked where I was going and what kind of classes I was taking, then he said ’you know, you have a very pretty face.’ And a minute later he said ’I’ll bet lots of boys tell you that you have a pretty face.’ It wasn’t what he said — it was how he kept staring at me, like he was going to drag me off somewhere. He was all greasy looking and his clothes were so filthy.”     Gary’s jaw drops. “Maybe he didn’t mean any harm,” he tells her... and with each word there flashes the cafeteria girl’s face in stages of fright, anger, pity. He wants to crawl into a hole, but he must keep Amy talking for awhile. He asks about her classes, her friends, Zumba. Most of her answers are monosyllabic. Then he remembers that last weekend she was at a Foo Fighters concert. He asks her about it, and her face lights up. After fifteen minutes, he looks at his watch.     “I’m okay, Grandpa. I have to get my homework done. Thanks for coming over.”     He kisses her on the cheek and tells her to call him if she needs him. It’s only a five minute drive home, but he turns on the radio. The classical station is playing Schoenberg’s String Quartet 2 and he shuts it off. When he gets home, he goes searching for the antacid tablets. He’s sure it was the green peppers in the pizza.     When his wife Adrienne returns, she asks him how his day was. He tells her what the workshop participants said about the photo he submitted, and complains about the D.H. Lawrence readings during the Jung/Campbell workshop. She talks briefly about her day.     “Gary, what’s wrong?” she asks.     He shakes his head.     “Something happened. Tell me.”     “Oh, it’s okay,” he says. “Liz called me to pick up Amy. She was being followed home from school by a dirty old man.”     “Is she okay? I mean he didn’t touch her, did he?”     “No, no. She said he didn’t really say anything lewd to her. He just told her she was pretty and kept staring at her. I got her two blocks from their house and stayed with her awhile. I suppose she’ll get over it faster than I will.”

sitting on the right-hand side of yourself Nathan Hahs we all are intoxicated but ah i may have a use for you... right this way

Lines Between Christie Lambert The old man was not satisfied with today’s stop in Haiti. And now first in line for standby tickets at the comedy club, to forget the disgrace of these young people whizzing around on jet-skis, here, in the waters Columbus once sailed, prancing in bikinis around this manufactured port-of-call with its swept-clean façade of a market. Him, and his wife, and ten others waiting their turn to laugh when villages are but a few miles away where only God knows what conditions are really like since an official of this hogwash town will stop you from climbing the fence they’ve erected to keep tourists in. Here, in the land of mountains, where he came once before, he did not come to bounce on an oceanic trampoline or to dash down the inflatable slide. No, he most assuredly did not. He came to walk through the villages, as he did long ago with his wife and kids, to see what remained of those memories and those people with their smiles and beckoning hands. Those slight boats of livelihood, nets for fish- those boats nearly broke his heart. And when the earthquake hit, hadn’t those faces all returned to his mind and was it too much to ask to see more than pre-approved carvings and well-tended white sand? The Haitian guide he’d met today said yes, because there wasn’t much else left since the rich Americans came down with funds-raised, snapped their pixels of proof and left with the money. If this was true, the old man wanted to know. He could raise a ruckus back home, oh, yes. He was sure of it. But they kept an eye on him, on his wife, too, and never so insulted as to feel like an insubordinate child on this trip (he’d paid his money and good money at that, too much to be prodded along like sheep into the fold). His wife pleaded and they walked by well-spaced booths. He bought one painting in the market; it caught his eye, the dark blues and greens. The black smoke that hovered over the mountains wasn’t in the picture, but he felt it there in the heaviness of the lines. The smoke ever-present, product of charcoal (foundation of this people), something he cooks with every now and then, steaks hot on the grill, standing on the back deck where the fan blows and there are so many citronella candles that mosquitoes can’t get close enough to bite. First in line and a ticket to the comedy club is his, but the comedian thinks too much of his own jokes and the old man can’t stop thinking of slender fishing boats lost at sea, survival marking the clear blue sky, that one wire fence between fantasy and humanity, the way they wouldn’t let him cross it,

God and Fireworks Jim Carson God is real the sign proclaims on this ramshackle little Appalachian church each addition its own testament to whatever building material was free that week a signpost marking nothing in particular just another image burned into memory as I ride the serpentine Sam’s Gap highway tottering produce stands languish in Dali-esque repose technicolor fireworks shops scream for attention apparently there is much to celebrate here and everything is always on sale there is solace for me in these ancient hills nestled in the bosom of verdant hollows a soul caress soft as a lover’s touch time is frozen here and quickly forgotten abandoned barns surrender gently to the resolute earth’s embrace cast off car skeletons are quietly swallowed by mountain laurel invaders empty porch rockers wait patiently for friendly wavers God is real the sign proclaims in this realm it seems so possible and who am I to argue?

An Unsolved Murder, 61 C.E. Bill Wolak Lucius Pedanius Secundus, Prefect of the City of Rome, was murdered mysteriously in his own house. Since no culprit could be discovered, the Senate surrounded his house with soldiers and ordered all four hundred of Pedanius Secundus’ slaves slaughtered in public in accordance with Roman law.

Janet Kuypers reads the Bill Wolak September 2012 (v110) Down in the Dirt magazine poem Steingerdr’s Ankles

See YouTube video of Janet reading this poem straight from the September 2012 issue (v236) of cc&d magazine, live 9/12/12 at Gallery Cabaret’s the Café Gallery open mic in Chicago)

Steingerdr’s Ankles Bill Wolak According to the Norse sagas, the instant Kormak’r glimpsed Steingerdr’s ankles as she was standing behind a half-opened door, he was captivated by their exquisite curving, and afterward no other part of her body interested him.

A Las Escondidas Kevin Moore     “Uno”     The boy, known as “Lo”, facing the wall and with his hands over his eyes, had barely opened his mouth before the other boys were bolting away from him like rays from the sun.     “Dos”     One boy ran west, head up, scanning his surroundings, searching for his place. He turned left sharply, into an alley between two aluminum shacks. This would be his place, behind the cardboard box, easily escapable, and not too far from base.     “Tres”     Two other boys headed the opposite direction. They knew where they were going before the counting even began. They ran, their feet knew the rocky paths from years of rolled ankles and scuffed knees. The path forked into two dirt trails, and they skirted left. There the trail climbed steeply and they followed it for 30 meters, where they saw their spot. This was where they always hid, but were never found. The shorter boy boosted the taller onto the roof of the cinderblock house, and the taller then helped pull the shorter up. They laid flat on the roof with a clear view of Lo.     “Quatro”     The youngest boy playing crept away from Lo. He didn’t go more than 5 meters, and hid silently behind a squatter house. He laughed quietly, Lo would never think to look so close.     “Cinco”     The 6th boy ran south, with no destination in mind. He would have to improvise. He slowed down to think, and saw the snack counter. His first thought was his hunger, how great a bag of chips would be, but then he realized the potential cover the counter could provide. He ran up to the building, head barely peeking above the counter.     “¿Puedo esconder aqui?”     The lady working the store simply laughed and nodded, and the boy scurried over the counter. He crouched on the ground and a big smile crept across his face.     “Seis”     The oldest, strongest, and fastest boy chose not to hide. Instead, he walked 50 meters down the road and sat on the dirt road, in clear sight of Lo, and began to whistle smugly. He hoped to tempt Lo into a chase, one the oldest boy would surely win.     “Siete”     Another boy, one who had never played with these boys before, felt a tremendous panic. He didn’t know where to hide; where was too obvious, and where was out of bounds. He followed his feet down the road with his mind oblivious to any destination. Finally, he found himself at a junk pile. Quickly, he built himself a little, makeshift shack of aluminum and plywood, where he waited quietly, the only noise the persistent pounding of his heart.     “Ocho”      Still another hider bolted north, and although his hiding place was visible from anywhere, he surely wouldn’t be caught. He arrived, ran his hand across the rough surface, and then leapt up, climbing branch by leafless branch until he could climb no higher. He had a clear view of the entire Zone, and looked down on the others with a sense of superiority he never felt before.     “Nueve”     The last hider, one of the younger boys, tried to follow the boy in the tree, but the boy in the tree wouldn’t allow it. Therefore, the last boy, sensing he didn’t have time to find another spot, simply sat down on the ground and started playing in the dirt.     “Diez”

Burning Annabelle Dura     It burns. I like it. I can feel it spread through my body with each pump of the heart. I know it’s wrong, but the sinfulness feels good. I like it. It numbs the outside world. All of the pain and sorrow. Every rejected feeling. Every bit of sadness. It slips away, leaving me in darkness. It feels good.     Most would be scared. But not me. I welcome it with open arms. In fact, I love it. It will probably be the only thing I ever love. It’s the only thing that deserves my love. It is a part of me.     I slow down. Every beat of my eye lids pulls me further and further away. Leaving everything behind. It feels so good. I close my eyes. I can only see darkness, letting me feel the full blast of it. Everything melts in the background and I become present, in the moment. That’s where I want to be.      I smile. I’m sick. But I like it. It feels good to escape, to let go and leave my tortured self in reality, to let my soul wander through dimensions of my unconsciousness.... Through the abyss of the unknown...     People just don’t get it. Humans are cruel, selfish and unforgiving people. I know because I am surrounded by them, I live with them.....and I am one of them. They’ll never know they are the reason. They’ll never know what they have done to me. No – it will be idea – my fault – until they die they throw dirt over me in my grave. Until the day I die, they will never know, until maybe when they miss me, they’ll think, and realize it was their fault that I ended up like this. And this is why, you see, I have to get away. I have to get away from the noose they have around my neck every day. The shackles around my legs and arms, cold metal, and its everlasting grip.     I have learned how to get out of them. I have learned how to escape.     I’m lost now, my body is numb and abandoned. I’m finally free. I’m finally severed from the hostile world that holds me as a tortured prisoner of the war that I fight every day. They thought they could hold me down! Those people on that God forsaken planet. In that country; in that town! They thought I couldn’t escape! But I have! They were wrong.     I’m falling. Something is chasing me. Something bad, I can feel it. I open my eyes. The people around are twisted and strange looking. Contorted figures surround me. I’m slipping back into reality. I have to do it again. I have to have it. Where is it? It hurts. The burning cools down and the pain is coming back. Anxiety, anger and fear follow. A sharp physical pain pierces my side. Where is it?     Another breath. More burning. I feel good again. My body excitedly absorbs it. It moves through me. Taking me away again.     They have forced me to be this way. They have forced me to do this. I never wanted this. I never wanted to be as lost as I am now. But I’ll do anything for my freedom. Anything to escape.

debris christ William Wright Harris the exposed roots of an uprooted tree a crown of thorns a boat empty and dilapidated a torso hungry for a centurion’s spear roof tiles- stones- branches limbs stretched in suffering & left under the sun dali’s earthware in an olive grove

Janet Kuypers reads the William Wright Harris September 2012 (v110) Down in the Dirt magazine poem Man With Knife

See YouTube video of Janet reading this poem straight from the September 2012 issue (v236) of cc&d magazine, live 9/12/12 at Gallery Cabaret’s the Café Gallery open mic in Chicago)

man with knife William Wright Harris naked pointed down ward at an other the blade jutting from the bottom of his closed fist- the other almost bent in supplication to a god that never heard pollock crying in to the new york night

Beautiful Thieves Benjamin Christensen     The twin yellow lines may have well been dashes on a treasure map. To them, the road was an endless maze of escape routes, always somewhere to run. Rounding a corner, the car and its occupants began a steep ascent. Dustin’s hands guided the steering wheel as Tasha put her bare feet on the dashboard. Her bright pink toenails had been painted from the largest bottle she had been able to conceal in the low-cut line of her dress. Dustin smirked. He put a hand on her bare thigh, Tasha’s smooth, bronze skin felt like heaven to his fingers. With swiftness, he slid his hand downwards, pushing her black sundress with it.     She squealed, and quickly drew her knees to her chest, pushing his hand off of her. Dustin laughed as Tasha smacked him on the chest.     “Pay attention to the road.”     A moment passed before she snickered. “There will be plenty of time for this.”     Her finger hooked under the shoulder strap of her dress and seductively let it fall to her elbow. Dustin’s foot pressed harder, and the engine hummed louder.     Dustin’s eyes drifted to the rear view mirror, never fully able to shake the feeling of being followed. The reflection was empty, save for buildings and the road that had already passed under their wheels.     Tasha lowered her head to her palm. Her teeth began biting at the edge of her nails, these, not painted so brightly. Strands of her black hair blew in the breeze of the open window.     Rays of late-afternoon sun gleamed off the orange paint of their ride-of-the-day. The car crested the hill, and for that brief instance, they owned it all. This was a break in the desperate lives they led, a moment of peace interrupting nothing but chaos.     “You good?” Dustin questioned her silence in this, normally triumphant moment.     Tasha solemnly nodded, but in her head she was undoubtedly envisioning the same scenarios Dustin was: an endless possibility of ways to go, all of them ending under the same façade of blue and red lights.     Again he checked the rear view; again no one. Dustin let his eyes drift down the hill to the glowing green orb that hung suspended in its yellow case. In an instant the green light vanished, replaced above it by its yellow counterpart. This light was harder to see; each ray of the late afternoon sun cascaded down on it, masking its yellow glow. He knew what this light meant, every driver did; the innate response of most operators was to press the brakes, except, he hesitated. Dustin saw the light change to yellow; he saw it with his own eyes. Yet his foot never moved to the other pedal, no, in fact he pushed slightly harder on the one it was already on.     “You’re not going to make it.” Tasha said.     Her tone was smug, mocking even. He imagined the devilish smirk on her face, and in thinking of hers, he grew one of his own. Her feet were no longer on the dashboard, and the strap for her dress had relocated to its spot on her shoulder. The needle on the speedometer steadily climbed higher in its arc before peaking, just as the car had done.     Tasha drew her finger from her mouth and placed them on the top of the window. Dustin looked at her and met her eyes. His foot maintained its pressure on the pedal as he felt the car’s descent level out at the bottom of the hill.     Their eyes were locked on each other, a moment of true fearlessness. This was a rush unlike anything they had experienced thus far. As they passed under that red light, they could see everything in each other’s eyes. For that brief instance, they were one.     In the blindness that their love created, the headlights from the left were invisible.     Tasha had been right, the scene was illuminated with red and blue lights, but they never had the chance to see them. The lights reflected over the ground and its pools of crimson. Green pieces of paper littered the scene, each one coming from one of the canvas bags that had been ejected from the backseat; the canvas bags that were marked, First Financial.

Coming Out The saga of Russell Kelly Rex Bromfield     Russell Kelly weighed himself every morning. He weighed himself twice in the afternoon, too, even though deep inside he knew there would be no change—certainly no net weight loss, that’s for sure. And every morning and twice in the afternoon Russell would learn, to his dismay, that his weight continued to hover mercilessly in the neighborhood of 460 pounds.     Since he’d purchased his luxury condo on the twenty-first floor of the exclusive Executive Towers on Front street, he’d broken three of the sturdiest, most expensive bathroom scales that could be ordered on line. Now he had one of those heavy-duty hospital scales set up in one corner of his spare bedroom along with some snazzy gym equipment including a bench press, a treadmill and a full set of weights that the neighbors downstairs would have surely complained about if they’d ever heard them hit the floor. They didn’t; Russell’s weight loss equipment was as new as the day it had been delivered.     And Russell was loaded in more ways than one; he had plenty of money. In fact he was rich. When he was only six, his parents were killed in a head-on collision with a drunk driver and not only had they left their entire fortune to him, their only child, but the pay out from the insurance policy and the punitive award imposed upon the other driver left Russell entirely without want.     For years Russell lived the good life and to all intents and purposes still did—except for one thing; he hated being fat. Along the back wall of his enormous living room, four large bookshelves held a library consisting of every book that had ever been published on weight loss, dieting and the psychology of obesity. Among the volumes were the biographies of Orson Wells, John Candy, Robert Morley and Sidney Greenstreet. He had Sweatin’ and Tonin’ to the Oldies, all five of Oprah Winfrey’s books, everything by Denise Austen, Jillian Michaels, Jack LaLanne and Robert Atkins. And diets? He had tried them all; The Hollywood Diet, The Master Cleanse, South Beach, Apple Cider, The Zone, Grapefruit Volumetrics... He even had two paperbacks on postpartum weight loss. Russell wasn’t one to deny his condition in any way and he’d spent the last fifteen years of his life in a quest to lose the extra mass that hung on him like four fifty-pound bags of Yukon Gold potatoes; those nice big fat ones that are perfect for barbecuing and smothering in sour cream, real bacon bits and chopped chives... Or better still, nice strips of grilled prosciutto broiled into perfectly browned Gruyere and...     Anyway, Russell had given up on losing the weight. Back when he was a mere 290 he could tell himself, and others, he could drop the fifty or sixty pounds it would take to get back to some normal sort of shape any time he wanted. But now it had become simply hopeless. He’d tried every wardrobe trick he could think of to conceal his bulk, or at least he thought he had until the night the cable TV went out while he was watching Celebrity Chefs (and taking notes), and he was at once left to ponder his own reflection in the huge windows that looked out over the pitch black lake. There he was overflowing the giant leather La-Z-Boy in the glow of his Italian designer reading lamp like some Earthly urban Jabba the Hutt. And there he was again in the next window pane of the slightly-curving room. The two images together made him look like an even bigger two-headed hulk. As he stared at the gargantuan caricature of himself he felt his will to live trickling away. Was this to be the way the rest of his life was to play out? Trapped here in this high-rise hell hole, forever shackled inside the mountain of deprivation that was his body?     You see, Russell was, at heart, a social animal with a real need for human contact. In slimmer days he’d been the life of the party; a big jovial man of quick wit who could cajole and entertain and make people laugh at the drop of a hat. He commanded the attentions, if not the caresses, of women one fifth his size. Even in the male pecking order he was respected in some odd way. His affable, infallible ability to get the party going got him into social gatherings beyond his station and at large dinners, organizers would hotly debate where and with whom to seat Russell knowing that his table would invariably be at the center of the most raucous part of the room. His witticisms and stories would have the stuffiest guests in hysterics in spite of themselves. But his most infamous quips involved food and, in a most self-deprecating way, usually hinted at his own condition. He would say things that no one else in the place could get away with like “In side every thin man there’s a fat man screaming to get out, I’m proud to say I had two”. He would comment on the state of American health care by saying “You know, recently a Seattle ferry company had to reduce their seating capacity by thirty-five percent.” He would insist that the huge overweight community would save the national economy. “Did they have to bail out the fast food industry? No. The textile industry? No.”     It was all fabulous as long as it lasted but, somewhere around the time that his weight started to creep over three-eighty or so, the party and diner invitations began to dwindle and as he approached four hundred they stopped altogether.     Now he was socially malnourished. Starved for normal human interaction, he craved that laughter he loved so much, the unrestrained cheer of acclimation that signaled the unanimous approval of the company.     But beneath the bravado and the devil-may-care attitude dwelt a sensitive man who secretly resented the hushed whispers and the furtive glances of the anonymous public. As his weight increased these became more frequent and pronounced evolving into insults from crews of cruel teens who would follow him, pelting him with nasty epithets and, eventually, rocks. In the end he elected to stay home altogether.     Home.     What kind of life was this? The few ethereal acquaintances he had in the online community Second Life were a lie. The men he met there were morons and the women seemed mostly to be looking for intelligent, caring, handsome, fit men.     Handsome.     Fit.     Those were the areas where Russell was definitely in deficit. Any time someone suggested meeting in person, Russell would dissolve quietly into the electron background. Pretty soon he made his avatar female; a lithe, smartly dressed young business woman whose bold conversations were daring and risqué. In this way he managed to attract a small circle of smart female cyber friends and for a while, at least, this seemed to satisfy his need for social contact. In a vague sort of way he was admired by women and respected by other men but it was all fake. What he really wanted was to get out and mingle; walk among his peers; come and go in the daylight as a normal person. This was something he hadn’t actually done in years. From his lofty perch on the twenty-first floor he’d watched three whole seasons come and go with no more human contact than was presented on the big Sony, his computer screen and in the persons of three delivery men who came to his door with boxes and bags overflowing with pies, both sweet and savory, huge roasts of lamb, beef and pork, condiments of every kind, bountiful baked breads and cakes and all manner of frozen delights.     This had become the entirety of Russell’s existence and as much as things were changing inside his body, things were slowly going awry in his mind. In his solitude he had struggled to compensate for the gaping hole in his being, but his reality had gradually liquefied. He was losing track of where he ended and his tiny condo world began. Often he felt that he was his apartment.     There he was, sitting alone in the dark, silently pondering his two-headed image in the glass, his universe shrinking in around him, the buzzing night life of the city spread vast below. For Russell it couldn’t have been farther away if it were on the far side of the moon.     But there was something about that double reflection of himself in the adjoining window panes... was it the way the two figures joined at the shoulders, two people who appear as one...     Wait a minute! That was it!     In one delirious and insanely creative inspiration, he had found a way to join once more with mankind without attracting the unwanted attention and harassment.     He would disguise himself as two people.     Yes.     No one would even notice him. No one bothered to look too closely at two people walking together down the street, especially at night. It was completely normal. Of course he wouldn’t actually talk to anyone, that would be too risky, but he would, albeit in a limited way, be able to exercise his right as a citizen to go about freely in the world. At this stage of his devolution the idea of strolling casually and inconspicuously down the street was absolutely exhilarating. He would be like an alien who had recently arrived from a distant planet and whose mission it was to get out among the people of this world and observe. While he was at it, perhaps he would pick up a few snacks to tide him over till the next grocery delivery. There was a pizzeria with very poor lighting on the corner a block away. They had this fantastic four cheese potato, leek and pepperoni gourmet pie with the onions browned just so, on top of a liberal blanket of Béchamel sauce, ricotta, mozzarella and goat’s cheese—the Parmesan was baked onto a perfect crust lightly flavored with oregano, mmmmm... This would do nicely as a first expeditionary mission. —     Russell worked on his disguise for more than three weeks, but he just couldn’t get it to look quite right. Sometimes, in the dark, if you didn’t look too closely the rig did almost make him look like two people, but he could never keep the head of the second person from waggling around too much on his right shoulder like the painted paper-mâché blob that it was. Practicing the walk in a twenty foot room was no easy thing either, but the year of dance and mime classes he’d taken as a child came in handy.     At first he thought he would disguise himself as a pair of identical twins but there were a lot of drawbacks to that. First, twins would attract as much attention as he would on his own. Second, simulating four legs was a real technical and performance challenge. It was while fretting over the legs that he struck on a workable solution. He reworked his concept to simulate a man and a woman in love. That would explain why they seemed to be in a close perpetual embrace. And, as he had observed many times, people didn’t really like to stare at lovers—especially fat ones. (Russell was never going to look like two thin people—he would have had to disguise himself as a threesome to do that.)     Finally he got the whole thing to work just right. She was dressed in a hippie-type full length skirt in tie-died pastel shades. A billowing blouse crudely sewn from a pair of flowered silk shirts finished it off. The hippie motif was sensational because it allowed her a large floppy hat that would cover the ridiculously inadequate head and face, though the plastic Lady Gaga Halloween mask ordered on eBay helped a lot.     The man was dressed in a gray suit cut down the right side to accommodate his “mate.” This was one of the three suits that Russell once wore to formal affairs. The man’s head was Russell himself.     And now, finally, they were ready.     It was now or never.     He checked himself one more time in the window reflection. In the dimming evening light, he did actually look like two people.     As he stepped out the front door of his apartment and looked down the dark hallway his knees went all rubbery. He had to steady himself against the wall to keep from falling. The elevator arrived quickly and swallowed the two up and Russell was on his way, without realizing that he had left his apartment door hanging wide open for anyone to walk in and examine the traces of his sad life; to poke through his things with rubber gloves and photograph every corner of his seclusion. That’s exactly what the police investigation team was going to be doing in less than fifteen minutes.     Russell stood in the lobby at the big front doors and looked out into the sea of surging humanity passing steadily by on the rush-hour sidewalk outside.     Suddenly a cab pulled up outside. A young woman got out and headed his way. Thinking quickly, Russell drifted over to the half light of a waiting area and the woman passed through without so much as a second glance.     Perfect. This was going to work.     His heart fluttered like that of a young transvestite going out in public for the first time. He steadied himself, breathed deep, pushed open the door, then, one step at a time, set forth.     One step, two steps, then suddenly, there was a gust of wind and the big floppy hat camouflaging the artificial features of his female companion flew off and sailed out over a parked car. Without thinking Russell lurched after it, off the curb then three steps, four steps between two parked taxis, another step into the road and before he knew what was happening a horn blared and Russell caught a glimpse of a speeding florist’s truck before he was slammed broadside and thrown ten feet back onto the sidewalk.     The small truck was stopped dead too, as if it had hit another vehicle head on.      Russell wasn’t sure what was going on as he lolled on his back on the pavement gaping up at the black sky. The collision had rattled his already fragile thinking so when he looked to one side and saw the crinkled face of this vaguely familiar women he seemed to be with he wondered if she was his sister—he’d forgotten he was an only child. But he knew this woman, from somewhere. Was he out on a date?     He was quickly surrounded by onlookers then two cops. When one of them knelt down and peered into his eyes Russell said “Yes cabby, please take us to the Elgin Theater.” He heard a siren approaching. The last thing he remembered before losing consciousness was the voice of a paramedic calling in to request a bigger ambulance. —     With three stainless steel pins in his left leg, three broken ribs and a re-sectioned liver, Russell was suddenly the reluctant recipient of a cruel hospital diet and a strict regimen of rehabilitation. He regained some semblance of normal consciousness fairly quickly and within days his sense of humor began to return. He laughed and joked with his doctors and nurses. Hector, the man who came each morning around eleven to mop the floor, gave Russell’s private room an extra special cleaning so he could get “my laughing every morning” as he would say in broken English.     A few days after admission he had himself moved to a ward with five other patients. The seventh floor staff wondered at the hoopla coming from Russell’s room and soon two psychologists from the University arrived to further their research into the affect of laughter on surgical recovery.     When they wheeled in lunch Russell grasped the cart as it passed and said to everyone else in the room “Don’t worry, I won’t start until they’ve brought yours.” Everybody roared.     The society he loved so much and craved so desperately had come to Russell’s rescue. When his recovery was complete, everyone on the seventh floor was sad to see him go but he promised to visit. Somehow, now, from the back of his cab, the world looked new and friendly.     Within six months Russell was hovering just above the 350 mark. The exercise equipment in his spare bedroom was finally getting used and whether people liked it or not, Russell was doing his own shopping. Not the usual stuff mind you; Russell had learned a few things from the hospital dietitian who visited him every other day and he started doing all his shopping around the outside of the supermarket avoiding the center aisles where the poisons are. It was six blocks to the store and at first he would jump into one of the cabs that prowled the front of his building, but one beautiful spring day he decided to walk. The experience was so pleasant that he walked from then on, even in the rain.     He befriended a biggish woman from the fifteenth floor who was desperately trying to lose twenty pounds so she could get back into her expensive size nine wardrobe. Why she confided in Russell in the first place that day in the lobby Russell didn’t know but she became his first dinner guest in years. The two entered a kind of weight loss contest together and she was in her size nines in a matter of weeks. Russell too was shedding the pounds at a slow but steady rate.     He would make it.     Within a year, Russell was seriously looking at 250.     And he didn’t forget his new friends at the hospital. Not only did he donate all of his books to their meager library, he shelled out $50,000 to have the facility expanded to include the Russell Kelly Reading Lounge.     Russell had delved into the depths of darkest despair and survived. It was a new life for him. There was still work to be done, but with the support of his new friends and neighbors, he was definitely up to the task.

the Playground Janet Kuypers (1990)     I walk to the playground. I have to climb through a tiny winding path to get to it. There are branches in the path scratching my legs. They annoy me.     Maybe they wouldn’t have bothered me if I were a child.     The playground is in the middle of an empty field. Children are playing, making a lot of noise. The swing set is full.     The grass around the playground is dead, probably from too many children jumping on it. There are a few sparse weeds that manage to survive the children’s abuse. They climb up the sides of the equipment on the playground. You never notice the weeds, until they catch your eye once. Then you always notice them.     The paint is chipping off the monkey bars. No one is climbing on them; one child is sitting on the top of the monkey bars, and he won’t let anyone else climb up on them.     Two children are yelling at each other. They are arguing over who gets to swing on the tire. Another child is crying. She said one of the boys stepped on her foot.     I turn around. I can see a few buildings beyond the trees, past the clearing. The grey one is the one where I work. I have to go back soon.     I can see part of a sign at the building. It used to say the name of the company on it, but the sign is worn and the paint is chipping. But I know what it says.

Fish Janet Kuypers 1994     It’s a pretty miraculous thing, I suppose, making the transition from being a fish to being a human being. The first thing I should do is go about explaining how I made the transition, the second thing, attempting to explain why. It has been so long since I made the decision to change and since I have actually assumed the role of a human that it may be hard to explain.     Before my role in human civilization, I was a betta — otherwise known as a Japanese fighting fish. Although we generally have a beautiful purple-blue hue, I was more taupe, and most people familiar with different species of fish thought of us as more expensive goldfish. I was kept in a round bowl, about eight inches wide at it’s longest point (in human terms, that would be living in quarters about 25 feet at the widest point). It may seem large enough to live, but keep in mind that as humans, you not only have the choice of a larger home, but you are also able to leave your living quarters at any point in time. I did not have that luxury. In fact, what I had was a very small glass apartment, not well kept by my owners (and I at that point was unable to care for it myself). I had a view of the outside world, but it was a distorted view. And I thought I could never experience that world first-hand.     Previous to living anywhere else, before I was purchased, I resided in a very small bowl - no longer than three inches at the widest point. Now, keep in mindmy body as measured in length, not vertically, and I was living in what humans would consider an eight foot square, I had difficulty moving. I even had a hard time breathing. Needless to say from then on I felt I needed more space, I needed to be on my own. No matter what, that was what I needed.     I lived in the said bowl alone. There was one plastic plant in the center of my quarters — some algae grew on it, but that was all I had for plant life in my space. The bottom of my quarters was filled with small rocks and a few clear marbles. It was uneventful.     Once they put another betta in my quarters with me — wait, I must correct myself. I thought the put another betta there with me. I must explain, but please do not laugh: I only came to learn at a later point, a point after I was a human, that my owner had actually placed my quarters next to a mirror. I thought another fish was there with me, following my every motion, getting angry when I got angry, never leaving me alone, always taking the same moves as I did. I raced back and forth across my quarters, always staring at the “other” fish, always prepared to fight it. But I never did.     Once I was kept in an aquarium for a short period of time. It was a ten-gallon tank, and I was placed in there with other fish of varying species, mostly smaller. I was the only betta there. There were different colored rocks, and there were more plastic plants. And one of the outside walls was colored a bright shade of blue - I later came to discover that it was paper behind the glass wall. Beyond the other fish, there was no substantial difference in my quarters.     But my interactions with the other fish is what made the time there more interesting. I wanted to be alone most of the time — that is the way I felt the most comfortable. I felt the other fish didn’t look like me, and I often felt that they were specifically out to hamper me from any happiness. You have to understand that we are by nature very predatorial — we want our space, we want dominance over others, we want others to fear us. It is survival of the fittest when it comes to our lives. Eat or be eaten.     I stayed to myself most of the time in the aquarium; I occasionally made shows of strength to gain respect from the other fish. It made getting food from the top of the tank easier when no one tempted to fight me for the food. It was lonely, I suppose, but I survived — and I did so with better luck than most of the others there.     Then one day it appeared. First closed off to the rest of us by some sort of plastic for a while, then eventually the plastic walls were taken away and it was there. Another betta was suddenly in my space. My space. This was my home, I had proven myself there. I was the only fish of my kind there, and now there was this other fish I would have to prove myself to. Eat or be eaten. I had to make sure — and make sure right away — that this other fish would never be a problem for me.     But the thing was, I knew that the other fish had no right to be there. I didn’t know how they got there, what those plastic walls were, or why they were there. But I had to stop them. This fish was suddenly my worst enemy.     It didn’t take long before we fought. It was a difficult battle, all of the other fish got out of the way, and we darted from one end of the aquarium to the other. It wasn’t long until I was given the opportunity to strike. I killed the other betta, its blood flowing into my air. Everyone there was breathing the blood of my victory.     Almost immediately after this I was removed from the aquarium and placed in my other dwelling — the bowl. From then on I knew there had to be a way to get out of those quarters, no matter what I had to do.     I looked around at the owner; I saw them walking around the tank. I knew that they did not breathe water, and this confused me, but I learned that the first thing I had to do was learn to breathe what they did.     It didn’t take much time before I was constantly trying to lift my head up out of the bowl for as long as I could. I would manage to stay there usually because I was holding my breath. But then, one time, I went up to the top in the morning, they way I usually did, and without even thinking about it, I just started to breathe. I was able to keep my full head up out of the water for as long as I wanted and listen to what was going on outside my living quarters.     Everything sounded so different. There were so many sharp noises. They hurt me to listen to them. Looking back, I now understand that the water in my tank muffled any outside noises. But beyond that, no one in my living quarters made noise — no one bumped into things, no one screamed or made noises. But at the time, all these noises were extremely loud.     I then knew I had to keep my head above water as much as possible and try to make sense of the sounds I continually heard. I came to discover what humans refer to as language only through listening to the repeated use of these loud sounds.     When I learned I had to breathe, I did. When I understood that I had to figure out their language, I did. It took so long, but I began to understand what they said. Then I had to learn to speak. I tried to practice under the water, in my dwelling, but it was so hard to hear in my quarters that I never knew if I was doing it correctly. Furthermore, I had become so accustomed to breathing air instead of water that I began to have difficulty breathing in my own home. This filled me with an intense fear. If I continue on with this experiment, I thought, will my own home become uninhabitable to me? Will I die here because I learned too much?     I decided that I had no choice and that I had to as my owner for help. I had to hope that my ability to produce sounds — and the correct ones, at that - would be enough to let them know that I am in trouble. Furthermore, I had to hope that my owner would actually want to help me. Maybe they wouldn’t want me invading their space. Eat or be eaten.     But I had to take the chance. One morning, before I received my daily food, I pulled the upper half of my body from the tank. My owner wasn’t coming yet, so I went back down and jumped up again. Still nothing. I kept jumping, until I jumped out of the tank completely. I landed on the table, fell to the floor, coughing. I screamed.     The next thing I remember (and you have to forgive me, because my memory is weak here, and this was seven years ago) is being in a hospital. I didn’t know what it was then, of course, and it frightened me. Doctors kept me in place and began to study me. They sent me to schools. And to this day I am still learning.     I have discovered one thing about humans during my life as one. With all the new space I have available to me, with all of the other opportunities I have, I see that people still fight each other for their space. They kill. They steal. They do not breathe in the blood, but it is all around them. And I still find myself doing it as well, fighting others to stay alive.

Park Bench Janet Kuypers (1991)     I saw you sit at the park bench. Every day you would go to that one bench, reading the paper, feeding the pigeons, minding your own business. Every day I would watch you. I knew how you adjusted your glasses. I knew how you crossed your legs.     I had to come out of hiding. I had to know you. I had to have a name for your face. So before you came to the park bench I sat down and pulled out a newspaper. I looked up when I heard your footsteps. I knew they were your footsteps. You walked to another bench. No-- you couldn’t sit there. That’s not how the story goes. You have to sit here.     The next day I waited for you before I made my move. You walked back to your bench. I strolled up to the other side, trying to act aloof. I sat down, only three feet away from you. I pulled out my day-old paper. My eyes burned through the pages. I felt your breath streaming down my body. I heard your eyelids open and close. Your heat radiated toward me.     I casually looked away from my paper. You were gone.

the Wrath of Valentine’s Day Janet Kuypers (Spring 1997)     Valentine’s Day is here again, and like most unattached women in the United States, I’m filled with a vague sense of panic, fear and dread. What was meant to be a holiday to express your love for the one you care about has now become (a) a contest between coworkers for who can get the best flower arrangement delivered to their office, (b) a month-long guilt session from one half of an unhappy couple to the other, using the holiday as an excuse to vent their anger for being in a loveless relationship, (c) one more occasion for single men to skirt the constant badgering for a commitment (they already have birthdays and Christmas to contend with, this holiday makes winter pure Hell), or (d) a day-long seminar on depression where women sit at home alone, over-eating, watching must-see-TV, wondering if they will ever find someone to love and honor and cherish them and save them from the horrible fate of becoming the dreaded “old maid.”     Valentine’s Day is supposed to be a heart-felt holiday all about love, but has instead become a commercial holiday about either desperately trying to not feel alone or desperately trying to spare yourself from getting a guilt trip from the one you’re supposed to love.     Half of the confusion, I think, is from how men and women interact on a romantic/sexual level. The other half rests on how people define love. The Battle of the Sexes     What do women think of when they think of love? Commitment, finding a soul mate, having someone romantically sweep them off their feet. What do men think of when they think of love? Being tied down, finally giving in, getting the old ball-and-chain, or else something to fake to get sex. Speaking of sex, women generically think of sex as the greatest connection between two people, something sacred, while men jokingly refer to the act with analogies to power tools or sporting games (see the cover, which is from the art series, “What Sex With Women is Called”).     Imagine a woman, looking for commitment, having what was most sacred to her taken away because a man thought he earned it by buying her dinner.     Granted, these are brash generalizations, but the fact that these examples exist gives an inkling to the differences between men and women, and the potential conflict between the two when it comes to relationships. How is love supposed to flourish when the two halves come in with such distinct ideas and plans? The Definition of Love: Altruism Versus Respect     Love, by a dictionary’s definition, is rooted in three different ways: from kinship or personal ties, from sexual attraction or from admiration or common interests.     Think about that for a minute. From the first way, you’d love someone because they’re your family. Not because you like them, but because you’ve grown up with them. From the second way comes the more spur-of-the-moment feelings, none of which usually last. From the third way, you love someone because they share interests with you and you admire them.     Admire comes the closest to defining respect, and as a result, it comes closest to defining permanent and earned love. Unlike a religious-based altruistic love which tells you to love people even if they are not worth it - especially if they are not worth it, a love based out of respect and admiration, as well as common interests, is a strong, earned (therefore not easily lost) love.     The altruistic “give everyone in your class a valentine because everyone deserves to be loved” doesn’t even fool grade-school children - usually someone is left valentine-less. The question children haven’t at that point figured out how to ask is “Why do they deserve it? They haven’t earned it.”     People claim to fall in and out of love sometimes with amazing turnaround, it seems, and I think the reason for that is that they were never actually in love in the first place. Unless someone you once admired and respected revealed that their life and your perception of it was all a lie, or else drastically changed their life so as not to be respectable any longer, the admiration and respect probably wouldn’t die. Real love is a strong, earned (therefore not easily lost) love.     In my lifetime I have met only a handful of people that deserved respect. Imagine how difficult it must be to find someone to respect so highly, to have common interests with, and to be attracted to - that feels the same way about you.     Imagine a woman, looking for a soul mate, someone she could respect and admire, looking for a man who wants the same things in a relationship, finding men that are looking for a mate that will do their laundry for them, that will be subservient to them. Images of Romance in an Unromantic World     Even to those in a happy relationship, Valentine’s Day has lost some of its appeal. If you’re in a happy relationship, you don’t need an occasion to celebrate it. And flowers and candy are hardly good symbols for true admiration and respect - real love. Who needs us as consumers to spend the money on these items anyway, other than businessmen?     So what place does Valentine’s Day have in our world? It helps conjure up the language of poetry, the beauty of flowers, the romantic notions of a world long gone... and sometimes you get a heart-shaped box of candy to boot. But in our world, considering the different ways men and women are raised to view themselves and their mates, there are a lot of other issues that have to be taken care of before we can make a valentine card out of a doily and pink and red construction paper hearts and have it actually mean something.

phone calls from brian tolle Janet Kuypers (1996)     I came home the other day to find three messages on my answering machine, each nearly two minutes long. They were all from my friend Brian, who lives in Indiana and is working on a film. Now, Brian is a friend of mine from high school, in fact, I asked him to go to prom with me as friends, but he turned me down, saying he wanted to save the experience of prom for someone he was dating. But that was eight years ago, I went to prom anyway, without him, but I still think it would have been more fun if he was my date.     Well I got home the other night and had these messages on my machine and they were all from Brian, and I listen to the first one:     and he says “I’m sorry I haven’t called you in so long, and I hope you don’t hate me because I love you, and I’ve moved, and that’s my roommate you hear in the background, I don’t think you met him before but he knows who you are and he hears your voice on my answering machine and he thinks you have a sexy voice”     and then he says “oh, I really hope you don’t hate me because I didn’t mean to not call, there’s just a lot going on, and oh, I have a new email address so write to me, and I love you and I hope you’re not mad and I might be coming up to visit in Chicago. Well, anyway, call me if you don’t hate me, I love you”     and that was one of the messages, and then I listen to the second one:     and he says “hi, it’s me again, I forgot to give you my new phone number, since I just moved, so here it is, and did I tell you I’m making a film? I’m finally doing it, I’ve scraped enough money together so I’m doing that in the beginning of March and did you get my note? You said you didn’t before but I wanted to make sure. Well, call me”     and that was the second message, and then I listen to the last one:     and he says “hi, it’s me again, and I just wanted to get back to you and tell you that yes, I’d love to go to prom with you. I’ll wear a tux and get a tie and cummerbund that matches your dress. Yes, I’ll go to prom with you. Well, I guess that’s about all. I hope you’re not mad at me, because I love you, I really do, don’t hate me, I’ll talk to you soon”     And so I called him back and I told him, no, I don’t hate you, I love you too, and we all have busy lives and I understand why you haven’t called, I haven’t called, either, so don’t worry. Tell me about your film, I ask, and he says that he borrowed some money and saved some money from his last job and is borrowing equipment so he can do the filming.     “I have the production costs taken care of, but I have no idea where the post-production money is coming from.”     “What are you going to do?”     “I don’t know, maybe get some credit cards.”     “Maybe there are some companies that could use a tax deduction and would be willing to help finance your film.”     So we talk a bit more and I tell him that I wish I could help him out more, and he says that I have because I validate him and what he does in everything I say and that although he had no money he felt like finally he had control over his life. And that now he knows that no matter what he chooses to do with his life, and no matter what happens to him, that he has control over his life and he can handle anything. And I told him I was so glad he felt that way, because I think most people never get to feel that way once in their life. I was proud of him.     And then he asks if he could use a song of mine in his film, and I told him I would be honored, and he said, no, he’d be honored.     I guess it’s just nice to know that I will be a part of such an important film.

Janet Kuypers Bio     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 (both radio stations on the Internet air 2005-2009). She even managed the Chaotic Radio show (an hour long Internet radio show 1.5 years, 2006-2007) 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.     Since 2010 Kuypers also hosts the Chicago poetry open mic at the Café Gallery, while also broadcasting the Cafés weekly feature podcasts (and where she sometimes also performs impromptu mini-features of poetry or short stories or songs, in addition to other shows she performs live in the Chicago area).     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 , Evolution, Adolph Hitler, O .J. Simpson and U.S. Politics, the one thing the government still has no control over, (tweet), Get Your Buzz On, Janet & Jean Together, po•em, Taking Poetry to the Streets, the Cana-Dixie Chi-town Union, the Written Word, Dual, Prepare Her for This, uncorrect, Living in a Big World (color interior book with art and with “Seeing a Psychiatrist”), Pulled the Trigger (part 3 of a 3 part set), Venture to the Unknown (select writings with extensive color NASA/Huubble Space Telescope images), Janet Kuypers: Enriched, She’s an Open Book, “40”, Sexism and Other Stories, the Stories of Women, Prominent Pen (Kuypers edition), Elemental, the paperback book of the 2012 Datebook (which was also released as a spiral-bound cc&d ISSN# 2012 little spiral datebook, , Chaotic Elements, and Fusion, the (select) death poetry book Stabity Stabity Stab Stab Stab, and the 2012 art book a Picture’s Worth 1,000 words (available with both b&w interior pages and full color interior pages. Three collection books were also published of her work in 2004, Oeuvre (poetry), Exaro Versus (prose) and L’arte (art).