Shadowboxing
Jeremiah Castelo
My shoulders are well oiled axles,
my fists are cannon balls
I am an uncompromised,
uninhibited,
and unchallenged fresh breath of boldness
I am the statue of fastholding,
chiseled down from black diamond by the strong hand of craftsmanship
I am chaos’s more stable second cousin,
and favored uncle to the prodigals, the profligates, the princes, and the prodigies
I am the lion’s heart beat,
the war drum’s sporadic syncopation
I am the wolf pack’s collective sixth and seventh senses,
keen on the scent of blood, fear, and impending annihilation
I will not sway to the breath of your voice
nor will I stagger at the wind your weather weaves
Advance upon me and find yourself hard pressed against calloused intolerance,
behind which is a wall,
and behind that wall,
an army
I pray you combust into flames and feathers at once
should my name birth from your lips
I pray my night guardsmen have eyes of eagles,
and my trumpeteers have breaths of behemoths
should you ever encroach upon my camp at dreaming hour
I promise to empress upon you pressure,
of a nature that spawns pearls, magma, and passionate revolution
But the only revolution that will come of your resistance is vertigo,
as you spiral downward into abysmal forgottenness
Now heed my words with intent lest you risk the fate of faded bewilderment
May God be my strength as I destroy you
Eviscerate you
Annihilate you
I will obliterate you until the only remnant of your very existence
is but a vague memory,
of a fleeting idea,
in a dream,
inside a dream,
inside a coma.
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Jeremiah Castelo bio
Jeremiah Castelo is an avid seeker of truth who isn’t afraid to admit he’s been tragically mislead, more than once. His offbeat list of life experiences isn’t one to be found on a resume designed to impress nor on a gravestone meant to commemorate, but is as structural to his writing as his skeleton is to his body. He now resides in the Washington DC area, pursuing missionary and non-profit work through poetic, photojournalistic, and musical means.
Website: www.psalmsandpsychoses.com
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Keeper of the Keys
Ruth Z. Deming
I yawned and sat up in bed. Six a.m. already. Sarah and Dan were downstairs in the kitchen talking softly over breakfast. In my blue summer nightgown, I went over to the drapes and peeked outside. Yes, the world was still there. It looked like my sexy red poppies, swaying back and forth by the lamp post, would soon burst into bloom.
Pulling on a pair of slacks and a striped silk blouse for work, I walked downstairs.
“Hey, Mom,” said Sarah, who was in her first year of high school. “Don’t forget you promised me we’d go shopping for earrings this weekend at the mall.”
“Sure, sweetie,” I said. She had gotten the part of Annie Sullivan in “The Miracle Worker” at her Quaker school. She’d gotten a scholarship to attend because she hated regular school, unlike her little brother, Dan, who loved his public school.
Dan hung out with a colorful crowd - Tracey with the purple hair, Mark with the dreadlocks. One day when I came home from my job as a psychotherapist, he ushered me into his blue bedroom.
Underneath the window was a huge black casket standing on one end. My blue-eyed, handsome young son had brought it home after finishing a school project.
My kids were very independent. I wasn’t one of those parents who helped their children with their homework. After all – and this was the truth – my kids were smarter than I was. They took after their dad, who had remarried and was living in Texas. Sarah couldn’t stand him, calling him a “misogynist,” which I agreed with, while Dan was fond of him.
Back in the kitchen, I went over to the brown breadbox on the counter, took out my medication, and swallowed it with a glass of orange juice. The pink pillow-shaped lithium pills made me gain weight but it controlled my manic-depression, later known as the droll-sounding bipolar disorder.
After I kissed the kids goodbye, I brewed some drip coffee in my yellow Stangl pot, then poured it into a clear glass mug - a Flintstones one we’d gotten at the Burger-King. I had my usual breakfast of hot oatmeal and raisins and then took my place at the computer in the large living room-dining room.
The window looked onto our neighbor’s grey house, horrible people who yelled at their kids and called them “idiots and retards.”
“Enrico the Man” I typed at the top of the page. Enrico was not his real name. Frederick was. In my work as a psychotherapist I met the most fascinating clients and when they stung my heart I would write a poem about them.
Closing my eyes, I thought about this new client at Bristol-Bensalem Human Services, an amazing, indomitable man whose life was thoroughly ruined by schizophrenia. Although I’ve never felt sure there was a God, I hoped, for his sake, there was. He could take his place at the right arm of God without Haldol coursing through his veins and the tremors it gave him.
He would become whole again. He was a handsome man with a beard. And told me, in confidence, he had fathered a child when he worked in Los Angeles as an actor. And rode a motorcycle.
He had never seen his daughter who lived three-thousand miles away, while he and his mother, a true saint, lived in poverty in Bristol, Pennsylvania. I can still visualize them sitting stoically next to one another in the waiting room. Of course he would never meet his daughter. And who knows if the mother would tell the child the truth about Frederick.
As I sat gazing out my living room window, I noticed my mind began going faster and faster, like I’d drunk a hundred cups of coffee.
“Oh no!” I said, standing up from the desk. “It can’t be happening again!”
I walked across the beige living room carpet stained from the three of us spilling food and drink on it, and began assessing the state of my mind. I needed to leave for work in forty-five minutes.
Looking out the front window of our yellow house I saw an unfamiliar blue Buick parked across the street. “Who was that?” I wondered.
“Oh no,” I quickly realized. “They had come for me. They were spying on me.”
Paranoia.
Back into the kitchen I went and looked out the window into the back yard. A shapely maple tree spread its green leaves toward the sky. My eyes traced its lovely outlines, as a few squirrels scampered up and down.
Suddenly, their shapes began to change.
They metamorphosed into monkeys.
Damn!
Tugging on my green earring, I went back to my desk and looked in the stack of business cards. There it was on the top.
“Laurence M. Schwartz, MD” read the card. “Psychiatrist, Abington Memorial Hospital.”
I dialed his number and began counting the rings. One-two-three.
“Answering service,” said the bored-sounding woman on the other end.
“Yeah,” I said. “Can you have Dr. Schwartz call me? Tell him I’m getting psychotic. Do you know how to spell that?”
She did. Her voice quickened. I paced around the kitchen, putting away the dishes, and staring at the two-door white refrigerator that the Travis Family had left us when we moved in five years earlier.
The phone rang.
“Roooth... Larry” he said in his kindly but slightly whiny voice. “What’s going on?”
I told him the symptoms and admitted I had slept poorly the night before, another symptom of mania-paranoia.
“You have your Navane,” he said.
“Yes, a white bottle of Navane.”
“Take a capsule right now and one at bedtime. And the Cogentin with it.”
I asked him to hold on while I fetched the drugs from the brown breadbox and then ran the faucet for some cold water.
In my hand I held the blue and yellow Navane capsule and the tiny white side-effect pill, Cogentin. With my wandering mind I tried to make meaning from the capsule.
Yes, I thought. When I was a kid, we’d had a blue powder room downstairs and a yellow one on the second floor. I was so pleased with myself and felt my “brilliance” ballooning through my mind.
“Keep that to yourself,” I thought. “It’s a sign of mania that I think I’m a genius. Even though it’s true.”
“Okay, Larry,” I said. “The pills are melting in my stomach.”
I always liked to please him.
“Fine,” he said. “Call me tomorrow. And stay home from work today,” he added. He was very conservative. Didn’t want me to get in trouble at work and get fired. This is one of the terrible consequences of having bipolar disorder: misbehavior.
“Larry, I’ll be damned if I’m gonna waste a perfectly good day and stay home! We nipped it in the bud.”
Or had we? A little of the mania and psychosis slipped out like water oozing from the faucet.
This was my life. Up and down. Up and down. Once you got used to it, it wasn’t so bad. I absolutely loved my job as a therapist and was soon making a left turn into the driveway of The Atrium, where I had a full day of seeing clients, whether I was manic or not.
When I moved to the agency, they didn’t know what to do with me, so they gave me the huge conference room. Glorious windows all around. I decorated the walls with calendars – Audubon, wildlife, flowers – anything I could get my hands on to prettify the space. Without spending a penny. I was superstitious and believed that the moment I decorated my office, I’d be fired.
Fellow therapist Judy Alvarez told me, “It looks crazy, Ruthie!” Everyone else thought it was unique, plus atop the calendars I wrote in Magic Marker the diagnostic codes of the patients, since one of my jobs was to offer a preliminary diagnosis before the psychiatrist saw them.
296.01 Bipolar Disorder – 309.00 Alcohol Abuse – 295.30 Paranoid Schizophrenia.
Mostly, when you’re psychotic or out of reality, you simply listen to your clients and nod your head. My mind was whirling like a pinwheel, simply unstoppable. I could barely hear what Lisa was saying.
“Where’s your Diet Dr Pepper?” she asked me when she sat down at the round table.
“Not in the mood today,” I said. Not exactly. More caffeine would only exacerbate my galloping mind.
On my table I kept doodads for the clients to look at or play with. Seashells, small pine cones, buckeyes, all from my travels at nature centers. I taught the kids to love nature and we drove to far-off Lake Nockamixon where we rented a canoe and paddled across the still waters, and hiked at nearby Pennypack Watershed where the kids loved to chase the black wild turkeys they never did catch.
Lisa’s problems were not that severe. When she started to bite her nails, I slid a paper clip over to her.
“Fiddle with this, instead,” I said.
Lisa was a talented artist and I encouraged her to enter an art contest at Norristown State Hospital. She did and won a cash prize. She had no idea her august psychotherapist had been involuntarily locked up for mania there almost twenty years earlier.
I was at the mercy of jingling keys and there was no way to escape and go home to my lost children.
When our session was over, I opened the door and watched her walk down the long hallway. I rubbed my forehead and my cheeks. I felt so confused. Then I wrote my “progress notes” in black ink, chewing the inside of my cheeks as I tried to concentrate. I looked out the window to see if anyone was peeking inside, trying to spy on me, but no one was there. Not yet anyway.
I often felt lonely in my huge room. Not exactly lonely, but carrying the steep burden of caring for my beloved people with schizophrenia, borderline personality disorder, bipolar disorder and even my sociopaths, many of whom were good-hearted underneath.
Between clients I would turn on my stereo to the classical music station. Soft soothing music would fill the air and I could look out the window at the sunbeams and yellow forsythia in spring.
Sometimes, when the lithium exhausted me, I would lock my door, lie down on the floor and nap.
Three days earlier, I had installed a display case at the largest library in our area, the Abington Public Library. This was part of the “awareness” campaign that the support group I founded, New Directions, embarked on. The topic was “teenage suicide.”
There were four glass shelves at the library. Kremp Florist donated artificial flowers to spruce up the case.
With my friend Nadine, we artfully arranged the shelves. On large index cards, I’d printed out “signs” that a teenager was thinking about suicide. “Giving away of possessions, trouble sleeping, use of alcohol.”
My coup de grace was a pretend letter I wrote – a suicide note. I used italics from my computer and signed it in ink – Love, Beth.
As I always do, I showed the display case to the library director, Nancy Marshall, and asked some patrons entering the library to take a look at it.
“Very convincing,” everyone said.
I was so proud. Another way of using my bipolar creativity.
Back in my office, I finished up Lisa’s progress notes.
The phone rang.
“Damn!” I thought. “My next client must be early.” How I needed a break. I needed to rest my pressured mind, which felt as if it were a melon about to explode.
But it was not the receptionist telling me Brian was there. It was Nancy Marshall, the director of the Abington library. With her authoritative voice, she told me the news.
“Ruth,” she said. “We’ve gotten some complaints about your display case?”
“What?”
“People think the suicide letter is real.”
“Oh no!” I said. “Well, then, just take it out of the case.”
“That’s all I wanted to know,” she said. “Just needed to check with you.”
“Thanks, Nancy,” I said and hung up.
I sat with my head in my hands.
What had I done?
I needed a break.
Although I’d brought a sandwich and banana for lunch, I thought I’d drive over to Nino’s Pizzeria.
As I walked down the stairs of our building, the fresh spring air smelled delicious, like flowers with a hint of gasoline from all the cars driving by The Atrium.
I drove over to Nino’s and ordered a small salad and poured ranch dressing over it. While I was digging in, I saw a man in the next booth looking my way.
I smiled at him. Not exactly a smile. More like a smirk.
“Don’t see no ring on your finger,” he said.
“I’m not married,” I said. “No one will have me,” I laughed.
“You work around here?”
“Yes,” I said. “I’m a psychotherapist over at Bristol-Bensalem.”
“A therapist!” he cooed. “Neat! I need to get my head examined.”
I gave another one of my smile smirks.
He pointed at his red truck parked outside. Told me he was a contractor who had more work than he knew what to do with.
“Can I take you out?” he asked.
“You bet!” I said. “Pick me up at six?”
As I drove back to work, my mind was flying, simply flying. I couldn’t remember if we exchanged names. He was cute, with a tiny little chin beard, like Bruce Springsteen and best of all, he worked with his hands. Nothing better than the combination of a blue collar worker and a lady.
My ex-husband, whom I had no use for, had been a city planner.
Mania confers a certain aura around the manic individual. This is not my imagination. We are hypersexual and give out vibes, a halo, like a rainbow encircling our bodies.
We thrum.
I hadn’t been with a guy in a couple of months and was terribly excited.
My next client Brian was a mess. His girlfriend had just broken up with him and he was distraught. A regular person can get over these mini-tragedies with difficulty, certainly, but any patient who came to Bristol-Bensalem would feel their heart was broken in two, like a branch snapped off a tree.
What could I say to comfort Brian? The usual tripe. Go for a walk. Stay at your mother’s house instead of your lonely apartment. Take more Klonopin.
Brian was a very vulnerable young man. He would not take his own life, I knew – “Any thoughts of harming yourself?” – but his life would be obsessed with this woman for months.
I walked Brian down the long linoleum corridor to the door. And stayed with him while he pushed open the door and walked down the concrete steps and out to his car.
The apple trees were beginning to bloom out front, as well as the pink dogwood I remembered from last year.
My home away from home.
After finishing my progress notes, I looked at my watch. Five forty-five. Only fifteen more minutes. I put on my lightweight spring jacket and grabbed my brown leather pocketbook and walked out front where he would meet me.
The agency had closed for the day. It was up to me to lock up. Imagine that! A woman who had been locked up at Norristown State Hospital for three days for manic-depression and now she is keeper of the keys. Maybe there was a God after all.
I stepped outside the two double glass doors and turned the key in the lock with a satisfying click.
Shading my eyes from the lowering sun, I looked down the driveway for his red truck.
“Good,” I thought, “I need the exercise.” Round and round the circular drive I walked, hearing the whooshing of traffic on busy Bensalem Avenue.
Six o’clock turned into six-fifteen, which turned into six-thirty.
“Damn!” I thought. “He’s standing me up.”
Finally, at the end of the driveway, I saw his red truck pulling in and getting closer and closer.
By now I was fuming.
“Where have you been?” I shrieked. “You kept me waiting! That’s no way to treat a lady.”
I refused to listen to his protests and walked the other way to my car.
I drove home listening to loud rock music on the radio, hoping to comfort myself.
At the nearest Wawa, I ran in and bought a huge Cadbury milk chocolate bar. It tasted delicious, assuring myself it was better than sex.
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Ruth Z. Deming bio
Ruth Z. Deming, winner of a Leeway Grant for Creative Nonfiction, has had her work published in lit mags including The Writing Disorder, Literary Yard, and Hektoen International. A psychotherapist and mental health advocate, she runs New Directions Support Group – www.newdirectionssupport.org - for people and loved ones affected by depression and bipolar disorder. She lives in Willow Grove, PA, a suburb of Philadelphia.
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Ode To A Swing
Linda Golden
Solace, sweet swinging solace
Backyard tree with splintering
Wooden seat still calls
Remember me Remember me
When Poppa deemed it strong enough
A limb was put into service for my pleasure
Strong thick rope looped over and over
Around the fig tree’s appendage
New plank for a seat sanded
Drilled wide holes for stout twine
Sometimes I just sat there sideways
Leaning on the cords, staring at the stars
Other times I would pump my way
To the heavens leaning back for a better view
Or trip through my mind rocking away life’s stings
Making worlds that were far kinder
More fun or just far enough away
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What I Was Told
Linda Golden
When I die take some parts of me
To make someone’s life better
Cut my hair, a piece of bone, a sheath of skin
An organ or two
I was told all parts of me must be buried
Together to be holy
I will myself to be useful
Even in death
Then take what is left
Make ash and fly it to the wind
In the oak grove behind the old house
Let the flakes nourish the ground
Leave the things I kept
In the hands of those I hold dear
To keep or move to more useful
Places spread close or far
If my words prove useful
Pass them to your progeny
Then all will be well
Made sacred by the sharing
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Who is the Author of My Life
Linda Golden
To the brave who dare
To live their dreams
I watch with awe
Have I such bravery
Am I hungry enough
To weather such storms
To be a writer, a poet
An artist, a creator
I forget in such moments
How hard it was to show up
Hour after hour to hold someone’s
Being in my hands
An analyst couch my stage
My words unscripted
Born from my heart
In hopes of reaching theirs
It was not my dream
It was not my dream
I backed in to it
As an antidote
To a nightmare
From a family tragedy
That still confounds
I forgot to remember myself
As one who showed up anyway
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Hitler’s Woman
Steve Sibra
The Greylag geese paint the canvas sky with their wings, their feathery brush strokes lightly sweeping the cheeks of God. The Bavarian Alps are always in winter. She is Hitler’s woman but she was once just a small town shop girl. From her balcony window she could watch the precision of the squirming tarantulas as they marched by. They were drilling endlessly. The bright colors of the Nazi stanchions stung her eyes like pellets of sand — delivered without passion; unwilling messages from the wind.
Perhaps today is another day to be filled by considering attempts at suicide. She turns from the balcony with despair - all emotions are private but this one was insulting. If only she could have had another dog. In her bedroom dresser there was a drawer filled with nothing but ornate thimbles. Atop the table, a weary music box turns its half broken circular stage. The tiny ceramic dogs riding there show no interest in their work or their world.
She walks through her confined space feeling like a block of wood. Smoking and drinking in spite of the Fuhrer’s rage, she spends her time reciting the names of the others, all now dead from their own “suicides”: His niece Geli Raubal. The great actress Renate Muller. She swears at the others whose names are so easily there for her now. She is a woman who thoroughly hates women. Everything about them disgusts her as bitterly as Hitler’s diseased teeth and graveyard breath.
Women to her are like German Shepherds driven mad by syphilis and ravaged by Parkinson’s.
The belladonna and the cyanide are nestled like friendly homesteaders into the cuffs of her blouse. Tomorrow is to be her wedding day. She will not be returning to the Berghof and she will not carry water up the hill to the Allies, posing as some peasant. All of history’s most spectacular weaklings took their own lives.
If only she could locate the missing twenty-two pages of her diary. How whimsically she would burn them now, while in the bunker, far beneath the so-called earth.
Black and copper. Every day would have been so like a birthday, if only she could have had a dachshund.
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Haiku (UFO)
Denny E. Marshall
Landing UFO
Earthlings are surprised they had
No concept of clothes
1st Published In UFO Gigolo August 2014
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Microbes
Denny E. Marshall
Giants of the universe
Did not notice humans
Under a microscope
At 10,000x
The photos are
Sort of interesting
Just not enough
To waste time
With all the titans
To be found
1st Published In Pyrokinection July 2014
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Rim
Denny E. Marshall
After countless light years
Passed, counted, and forgotten
The end is finally visible
Physicists say no center or edge
As far as you can see
Now only a rim
Like a shoreline
To start over again
To another unknown
1st Published In UFO Gigolo August 2014
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Turquoise Stone
Al Ortolani
I sit on the toilet chewing tobacco and thinking about reincarnation. My shoes are old. They stick out from under my jeans like duck bills. To maintain my health my wife insists I must walk 10,000 steps per day. My Indian belt has many beads, turquoise stones; a silver buckle rests on my shoe. I spit into a cracked coffee mug. When I was a boy, I had two invisible friends that I talked to in quiet moments like this. They offered advice, kept my secrets. They lived under the clothes hamper between the sink and the tub.
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a measure of time
Nathaniel Sverlow
I look at LOVE
as a measure of time
between one person and the next
And so, when you told me three times
“I love you! I love you! I love you!”
as he slept in the next room
I knew our time was limited
so I kissed you
and watched your eyes close
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what to do
Nathaniel Sverlow
A man gets stabbed at the Pour House
because his pants were too tight
I don’t know how he got away,
but he did,
limping and bleeding into the Press Club
a couple blocks away
and they took him to the ER
where the nurses and the doctors all wore crosses
and they looked at the blood
at the pants
at the pale face
blinking in and out of consciousness
“Well, are you?”
they said, thumbing their crosses
“I ain’t no fag!”
“What about these pants, then?”
“I already told you.”
And, the man fell forward
landing hard
they could not revive him
to ask him again
and the blood spread
out from under him
and they thumbed their crosses
and looked at one another
they didn’t know
what to do
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wondering
Nathaniel Sverlow
you have a baby
you set it in front of the television
you take it to church on Sundays
and school on weekdays
you eat dinner with it
at the table
at the couch
with the game on
you buy it a trumpet
but miss some recitals
you buy it a basketball
but miss some games
you give it the car keys
when it brings a new date over
and yell at it
when it comes home late
with alcohol on its breath
you cry when it says goodbye
you learn the country it’s stationed in
you keep track of the conflict
you pray for its safety
for everyone’s safety
you fasten a yellow ribbon to your porch
you raise a flag in your yard
you wait
You finally receive a letter
you read the letter
you read the letter again
your baby has killed someone
your baby has killed someone else’s baby
your baby doesn’t know how to feel
doesn’t know when it’ll be home
and you place the letter
on the mantle
by the dusty picture frames
wondering
if there was any other
way
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Consider the Source
Richard Schnap
Some seek the counsel of dead men
Speaking from ages long past
Some seek the counsel of prophets
Riddles that have driven some mad
Some seek the counsel of magnates
Blinded by its profit to themselves
Some seek the counsel of leaders
Claiming whatever serves their needs
Some seek the counsel of loved ones
Afraid that their words might cause harm
Some seek the counsel of healers
Burdened by their own private wounds
Some seek the counsel of children
Believing in the trends of their time
And some seek the counsel of poets
Answering both yes and no
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Volition
Richard Schnap
The overcast sky
Seems unable to decide
Whether it should rain
Or give way to the sun
Like a teenage girl
Wondering if her prom date
Should be the star quarterback
Or the class outcast
For sometimes it’s not
So easy to choose
When we feel our hearts
Tugged in opposite directions
And both ways offer
Their own rewards
To dance in the spotlight
Or mend a wilted flower
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Love Among the Ruins
Richard Schnap
She wanders the streets
With other people’s children
Dreaming of a time
Before death acquired a voice
When faces didn’t change
To obituary snapshots
Especially the one
She carried in her womb
And if she was not mad
She soon learned the language
As the world began to wither
In a winter without end
While romance became a song
On an obscure album
That now when she hears it
Doesn’t sound the same
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Negative
Kathryn Trattner
The pregnancy test was negative. She looked into the bedroom where the shadow of a man lay wrapped in her blankets. Could she roll him out from under them; pull at the edge until he came free of her bed, her room, her life?
Negative. She clutched it like a cross against the undead, waiting for the body in the bed to rise and attack. His hands would search her curves, the insides of her thighs and he would push his tongue past stiff lips. He wouldn’t notice that she didn’t kiss him back. He would never see her letting go.
Turning she went into the bathroom, eyes slipping over the mirror and the blurry ghost of reflection. Without her glasses, the world was soft focus, the sharp angles and red eyes softer and less apparent. She held the slim white piece of plastic above the bathroom trash, contemplating letting it slip through her fingers. It would lay there in the mess of used tissue and gray toilet paper rolls, a sign of freedom thrown carelessly away.
Her fingers tightened, gripping white her proof of choice. She set it aside on the closed seat of the toilet.
Reaching for the tap above the bathtub she ran water so hot it would turn her delicate skin a bright shade of red. Her mind skipped ahead to the moment she would sink beneath it, watching the steam curl and cool around her. The pipes groaned, water shifting in its copper skin beneath the shell of tile, filling the small space.
This small moment of anticipation stretched out. The simple enjoyment of sinking into hot water and feeling her mind draw a blank, it only lasted a moment.
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My Dark Knight
Rachael Thompson
I can’t eat or be merry any longer. All my will power to think positive is gone. My heart and my head are telling me the same thing over and over again. I am alone.
No one in my family jumped up to claim me when my mother told the courts that I am no longer useful to her. Not even my father. He is too busy with his new wife and family to even care what will happen to me. The perfect family he has always wanted has been delivered to him on a silver platter. A premade family, thanks to his new wife, has gifted him with the perfect daughter, son, and grandchildren. He has the whole package with no room for someone like me in the middle of it. I am the outcast.
For some time now, I have been running this idea through my head, I just don’t know if it will provide any solution to my problem. I want to run away from all this pain and all the problems I cause everyone I ever come into contact with. Everything inside me is holding me back; I just do not know what is keeping me from running and not looking back.
A knock on my bedroom window has my stomach moving into my throat so fast that it takes me several seconds to get my breath back. I sneak a quick look toward the window, for fear that it is my brother who always tries to make a move on me, but I am relieved when I see that it is my best friend, coming to wish me a good-bye no doubt.
Oh, my best friend. I can say so much about him. He has been there for me since the first day of pre-k, when the kids where being mean to me. When they were pulling my hair and pushing me around. He was there to protect me. Ever since that day, he has never left my side and I can only be grateful for everything he has done for me.
I look at the clock on my nightstand and feel relieved to see that it is one in the morning. My mother will be at the bar for another three hours. I was free for a little while at least.
Within seconds I am out of bed and at the window, throwing it open I’m greeted with the scent of not only the boy I consider my best friend, but the scent of summer in full bloom.
“Well, aren’t you excited to see me,” he says, throwing his most handsome smile my way.
I can do nothing but to answer his promising smile with one of my own. He has been here for me through thick and thin, for as long as I can remember. He may be two year older then my sixteen years but he is my rock in the horrible reality that I am forced to call my life.
I cannot help but to tease him just a little, which has become more of a relaxed greeting between the two of us. “Oh Faris, what in heaven’s name makes you believe that.”
“Well considering how fast your up off your bed and to the window have to count for something.”
“Ok, I am more than happy to see you. Happy now.”
“More than happy.” The smile on his face disappears and in its place is a frown that I wish I could remove from his face and make the dazzling smile return to his beautiful, flawless, tanned face. His endless chestnut brown eyes glaze over with unshed tears. “I didn’t want to leave before I had the chance to tell you goodbye myself.”
Tears spring to my eyes without so much as a warning, trickling down my checks before I ever have the chance to fight them back. “I had a feeling you would come. I was just hoping it was before the sun came up.”
He slowly brings his hand to my check to remove the tears that have escaped my eyes. “Can I come in?” His voice is low and filled with sorrow and regret.
“Mom is still at the bar and will not be home for at least three more hours. Just got to make this quick. I have no idea when the evil spawn of Satan will be back.” I step back allowing him the room that he needs to move his long body through the window and into my room.
I have to take a step back after he stand to show off his full height. “You have grown since the last time that I saw you. What are you, Close to six feet by now?”
“Yeah, that sounds about right. Now stop trying to distract me. I am here on a mission.” His face lights up with the biggest smile I have ever seen coming from him.
“What are you thinking?” I haven’t the faintest idea what he has come up with in the evil mastermind of a like brain of his.
“Do you remember when you wrote me that letter a few weeks ago, when you found out that you are going into foster care? Well it got me thinking.”
“Thinking about what?”
“About you. About how you feel being here, getting ganged up and beat on by people who are supposed to love you.” His smile has faded as his hands slide down my arms to the bottom of my shirtsleeves, only to push them up some to reveal the fresh bruises that are now covering both of my wrists. “People who are supposed to love you are not supposed to do these things to you. Why do you let them?”
I do not know how many times I have heard the same thing over and over again from him, but this time, it feels different. It has a deeper meaning than it had before. “I don’t know, but I can say that I don’t love them. The only thing is ...”
“Don’t say another word.” Frustrated now, he dragged his hands through his hair. He knows me well enough to know what I was about to say. It is clearly written all over his face. “I know what they are to you, but that doesn’t mean anything Anna.”
“I know. I just don’t know any other way.”
Within a blink of an eye, his arms are draped around me and pulling me close. He smells like he always has, like Faris. Clean, like the lemon soap he uses in the shower, and of the outdoors.
“Come with me.” He releases his hold on me but still keeps me at arms length. He has that dead serious look in his eye that I have gotten use to. “Come with me to New York. I cannot and will not leave you here. Please, Anna! Please?”
Tears spring from my eyes once more. He cares about me, about what will happen when he leaves. A part of me always knew that he cared about me and wanted me out of harms way. I always knew that once he left, I would have no one to lean on and no one to talk to when times get tuff like they are now. He would be putting himself in the line of danger. He could be arrested for helping me run away.
Before I know it, Faris has his arms wrapped around me and holding me tight and trying to sooth all the crazy emotions running inside me.
At that moment I know that I must go with him. I have to go with him if I am ever going to get the chance of a half way normal life. To get away from all of this has been a life long dream of mine that I will do anything to fulfill.
“Yes Faris. I’ll go.” That was all that I was able to say before he had me in a bear hug again and his placing a soft kiss on my lips that shocks me to the bone. In all the years that I have known him, he has never kissed me with as much sweetness and determination as he has now.
Something in the back of my mind comes into view as he pulls his lips away from mine. It has me double thinking all the emotions that were swirling inside me just a few moments before. “You can not do this for me. No matter how bad I want to go with you, you just can’t. I’ll only get in your way. What if your parents or the police find out and come after you?”
His arms drop to his sides, giving up the fight. He knows I am right. The future that has been planned for him will fall apart at the seams once the police find out that I am with him and that he helped me. My life is already planned for me. I will stay here and be alone for as long as I shall live. All my hopes and dreams have been shattered once; there is no point in letting the one true friend I have, ruin his over some low life like me.
Faris finally looks me in the eyes; tears streaming down his face. I can see all the pain he feels as it fills his eyes with more tears. In all the years that I have known him, I have never seen him cry. In that moment, I know I will never get a chance like this again, the chance to leave all this behind me and start a new chapter of my life.
All the fears from before have faded once again. I can finally see what God has planned out for me. It is to leave here with him and never look back. Nothing can touch me now. Not even the family I was born into that never really wanted me. I know what it is I must do.
I smile up at him, wrapping my arms around him and looking up at him, I know that I have made the right choice for once in my life; for my mind and my heart.
“I’ll go with you.” My heart is in my throat and I fight back tears when Faris smiles at me. “I’ll go, but we have to hurry. I don’t know what time the Satan span will be back.”
“Ok, ok. But you have to let me go. My car is parked down the hill and through the ...” He stops mid sentence as we hear my brother walking into the house. “I’ll be right out the window. Scream if he lays a hand on you. I’m not leaving without you, but I won’t sit here and let him beat you in front of me again. Close the window but leave it cracked so that I can hear you. You can do this.”
I remember the night he is talking about all too well and I promised myself not to think of it. The memory is still too strong and powerful to bear.
Faris is out the window in the matter of seconds. I close the window slowly so that I don’t slam it shut and give an excuse to my brother to come in here and “check on me.” I jump into bed just in time to close my eyes and fake sleep when my brother opens my bedroom door.
“Damn! She’s asleep. I cant believe that she didn’t wait up for me to get home. Welp, I’ll just have to wake her up.”
My heart kicks into over time, like it is about to beat out of my chest as I sense his movements around the room. I can hear him shutting the door and walking towards me, undoing his fly as he goes. Tears threaten to over flow but I hold them back with all my might. I have promised myself that I will never show any sign of the coward I really am when it comes to him and my mother. It only makes things worse for me.
The next thing I hear is the sound of shattered glass from the other room. My heart is once again in my throat and I find it hard to breath. It seems like minutes have passed before I hear the sound of his fly being done up again and the many curses that follow as he leaves my room, slamming the door behind me.
Within the next second I hear the window opening and Faris trying his hardest to get my attention. When I finally look up at him he is pointing to my bags of clothes and understanding finally registers in my mind. He threw something into the window, which made it shatter, and now I am to throw my bags out the window for him to haul alongside the house.
I scramble out of my bed and throw my two lonely bags out the window. Jumping back into my bed, I peek a look at the window and relieved to see it cracked again and Faris gone into hiding. Once I hear foot steps coming down the hall I quickly lay back in my bed and wait for the assault that is to come.
The door flies open, slamming against the wall. I force my body not to make a move even though my whole body is tensing to run. A long running oath escapes my brother’s lips, but my mind is too wound up to hear a thing that he says. My ears are waiting for the next crash, the next sound of destruction so that I can make my leave. It seems like hours pass as I sit here waiting.
Finally, the welcoming sound of the living room lamp falling to the floor makes it way to my ears. Hearing another string of oaths coming from my brother, I hear him turn on his heel and make his way down the hall, slamming the door as he goes once more.
I jump out of bed so fast my head starts to spin, but I ignore it, knowing I only have a matter of seconds before he returns. Grabbing my shoes and art kit that I wouldn’t leave behind no matter what; I turn to the window and see the welcoming face of Faris. Quickly I hand over my art kit bag and shoes and start to slip my legs out the window opening when the door swings open again.
My heart jumps back into my throat; I force myself not to turn around and look at the face of my brother. I try and force my body to move further out the window but I can’t move, frozen in place for what seems like hours.
The movement behind me has my mind back on track and my body moving faster than before. My feet hit the ground at the same time as my brother tries to grab me by my ponytail and drag me back in.
“Anna! Run! Fast!” Faris is right beside me, steading me on my feet before I take off at a full sprint. “Faster!” is all I have to hear from Faris to make me move faster in front of him.
I run across the yard, jumping the ditch, running across the road, bounding up the small hill and through the roads with Faris right behind me caring my bags and shoes. Leaving the screams behind us, we make our way through the woods and to a long abandoned dirt road and to the waiting car.
“Its unlocked! Get in! Now!” Faris is to the driver side door opening it wide and throwing all my belongings into the back seat before turning at the sound of pounding feet against the forest floor. “Now! Anna! Get in!” is all he has to say to me to get me moving around the car and throwing the door open and slumping against the seat for a second of air.
“Anna! The door!” Faris doesn’t even give me time to turn and shut the door. He is already leaning across me and slamming the door shut. In the next second all the doors are locked and the engine is running.
The car speeds off down the dirt road. I look at the rear view mirror to see my brother standing in the middle of the road wielding a bat, screaming at the top of his lungs but I cannot hear a thing. Blood is still rushing through my ears and my breathing is still uneven.
I slump back into the seat again and breathe a big sigh of relief. There is nothing in front of me now besides an open road and dreams of the future. Nothing sounded quite so good before now.
“Thank you, Faris. I don’t know how I would of pulled this off without you.”
“Oh, Anna,” says Faris as tears run down his face. “I didn’t know you could run that fast but we did it. You did it; your finally free. I’m so proud of you.” He reaches over to grab my hand and brings it to his lips, soothing my fears without even knowing it.
We listen to the radio, not daring to break the silence. My eyes want to close but I will them open again. I do not want to miss a moment in the car with Faris, but my eyes win out in the end.
The next thing that I know, I am gently shaken awake as the sun is slowly rising and the New York skyline is coming into view. It is breathtaking and makes me want to cry. I made it.
“I love you Faris.” The words are out my mouth before I can stop them.
He just merely smiles at me and winks. “I love you too, Anna!” He reaches for my hand and holds tight as we continue to drive into the safe haven that is New York.
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The Distance
Dan Maltbie
“Slow down son! It’s up here on the right,” Frank said.
“I know where it is dad. Just let me drive, ok?” I said.
The Jeep slowed and edged off the black top into the tall grass. The smell of honeysuckles blew in on the light breeze.
“I can remember the first time we came out here. Your Pop had bought the house and land on foreclosure,” Frank said.
“I know. You tell me that every time we come out,” I said. “Why exactly did Mom want to do this here?”
“She said that the summers we spent here were the best times of her life,”
I turned down a rutted out trail that sloped downhill ahead of the tree line. The tall brown grass that sprouted up between patches of loose rock begged for rain.
“Did you let Coach Thompson know we were driving across his property?” I asked.
“Coach came by last night. He said there were a few trees down from a tornado last spring,” Frank said.
“I’m not worried about the trees. I don’t want to get confused for a trespasser. Coach Thompson could have a flashback and shoot us!”
“Hell, he still might shoot us.”
The air was much cooler in the shade of the mountain and I could feel the rush of water thrumming the ground. I pulled the Jeep onto a bed of crunchy pine needles and parked. The sky was bright and my shirt was sticking to my back with sweat.
“Are you going to make it ok Dad?” I asked, mopping my brow.
“I will be just fine boy. I might be old but I raised you for trips like this. Worry about you,” he said wrapping a bandana around his head.
Dust covered the tailgate as I pulled out my rucksack, checking the pockets for water and bug spray.
“Are we sleeping in Sparky’s old shoot house?” Frank asked.
“When I talked to him he said that we could. If the clouds don’t roll in I’m going to sleep outside by the fire. The office is cramped and the fluorescent lights are sucking out my soul.”
We loaded our packs and headed off across the cool creek water into the woods. I kept an eye on my dad and made sure the heat wasn’t too much. All the years of working in chicken houses seemed to make him impervious to the elements, except water.
“I hate having wet feet! Now it’s going to be an hour before they dry out,” Frank said.
“Just in time for us to cross this creek again.”
We started up the rocky slope and grabbed onto saplings as leverage if we needed to climb. I had made this trip so often that I knew where I could find the handholds without looking.
“They don’t give you exercise like this in the office do they boy?” Frank said looking back at the creek below flashing a huge smile.
“I sit for nine or ten hours a day some days. I go on runs and do some other stuff, hiking is what I love to do,” I said, slipping in the cold rush of water.
“Your mother always said that exercise makes you feel better. She was right about everything,” Frank said.
“Why didn’t she want me to know she was sick?”
The smile vanished from Frank’s lips.
“You had just started your new job and you were happy. She didn’t want to ruin it for you.”
“Ruin it for me? So she waited from the day you found out until the day she died and wouldn’t tell me?”
“You don’t understand. Your happiness was the most important thing in her life.”
I pushed past him and pressed him and further up the hill. Just ahead the terrain began to flatten and the trees thickened.
“Do we need to stop Dad?”
“Yeah boy. Let’s sit down up here in the shade,” Frank said, red faced and sweating through the bandana around his head.
We found a tall white oak that kept us covered from the noonday sun. The coldness of the water shocked my face and neck. I drank a few deep gulps and poured some on my shirt. Frank was trying to hide behind a tree and was taking a few pills.
The sun was at its height when we set back out on the trail, our shadows stretched out in front guiding us onward.
“Dad, if we need to go back we can. There is still enough daylight left that we can make it back to my Jeep,”
“No, I am fine. Let’s just keep going. The trail is flat here until we get to Sparky’s gate. Let’s keep going,” Frank said.
“Ok, but let me take the bag with the urn in it. You are already carrying the food and a heavy pack.” I said.
“You are going to be a good father one day,” he said. “Look at you, trying to take care of me like I’m a little boy,”
“I just don’t want you getting hurt. It’s not something that I need to be mocked over,” I said. “Besides if something happens to you out here there won’t be any help for miles. I would have to make a skid and drag you out myself.”
“You think having too much of your mother in you is a bad thing? It’s a damn blessing boy, feeling empathy and respect for people are rare commodities these days,” Frank said.
The extra weight of the urn slowed me to a crawl, but I still kept one eye on Dad at all times. His lean form didn’t seem to know how to stop moving. Several times he lost his footing on the slippery rocks at the bottom of the creek bed.
“I need to get some water before we hit this hill,” he said slipping down into the icy spring.
He stabled himself and took a long drink. As he was rising to his feet his knees gave way. Dumping him head first into the creek water.
“Dad!”
I ran over and pulled him up. His hands and face were covered in brown mud.
“I’m so sorry Robby! I – I,” Frank said spitting mud and grit.
“It’s ok Dad. Let’s go back in the shade.”
The sun had crossed behind the tops of the trees cooling the night air. Frank drank long and deep from the steel container.
“The days before she died your mom told me about how much stronger going on this hike made our family. Did you know that there was a baby before you? We had a miscarriage the year before you were born. It was a long time before I saw your mother happy again. This cabin helped bring her back. It has the power to heal.”
“I always wondered why I never had any siblings,” I said.
“She said we didn’t want to ruin a good thing. That you were a gift from God and we should enjoy your life to the fullest.”
Tears streamed down both of our faces. I walked over and hugged my dad for the first time since the funeral. He had the same smell I remember from childhood. His hands were rough and strong.
“Alright buddy. Let’s see if we can make it up Sparky’s hill,” Frank said grasping me firmly by the arm.
Calling it a hill was an understatement. I had heard it was the reason a road had never been built to Lake Warren. Someone had determined it was a large spire resting in a shallow trench. Blasting it or going through it was out of the question. The few patches of grass that dotted it were a credit to creation. A collection of rocks and flat stones made a makeshift stairway up the creek bank and onto green pastures. Sections of sheer rock made the climb treacherous and not safe for solo climbing.
I moved over a series of angled rocks when one shifted, wedging my right foot into a crevice between rock and earth.
“Rob, are you ok?”
“Yeah Dad. I just can’t feel my ankle anymore.”
Dad climbed into my view and moved his weight with mine.
“On three. Ready?” Frank asked.
“One...Two...Three...”
The tendons in my neck were strained against the dead weight. My father’s teeth were bared and he was turning bright red. The weight shifted and I was yanked free from my trap but my right leg wouldn’t hold any weight.
“Sit down boy, let me look at it.”
He removed my boot and sock gingerly, using the same care he used when he bandaged my childhood scrapes.
“It looks like a sprain,” I said.
“Could be. We won’t know anything until we get some light. We only have a short climb left, let’s lean on each other,” Frank said and vanished down the dark trail returning with a crooked limb.
“This should help.”
“What is that supposed to be? A crutch?” I said.
“It’s the best we can do for now Robby. Just help me out here, ok?”
The limb was heavy but fit my height well. Dad climbed ahead on the rocks and dragged me up behind him. Every time his face crunched up with effort and then relaxed into a smile.
“You having a good time now old man?”
“I can hear your mom’s voice in my head the same words she said when she watched you make this climb.”
“I remember that day. I had worked all winter just to show you that I could make it.”
“Frank, she said. Our son wants to impress you. He wants to make you happy and for you to be proud of him. I know how your father was and all the things you left unsaid. Don’t hide yourself from him. One day if something happens to me he will be there for you.”
I pushed up onto a jutting rock covered in dry fragile grass. Frank was looking at an old corrugated roof building across the pasture.
“It’s all downhill from now on boy. I think that Sparky has a first aid kit under the bunks. Let me check it out,” he said.
The sun had fallen behind the ridgeline. Giving way to a clear night sky. The fire was spitting tiny embers into the night making tiny tracers as the flared out. The moon was bright and the stars shone like diamonds.
“Son, have we ever talked about how my Pop and I got along?”
“You said he was a worker. That he never missed a day of work or a day of church,” I said.
“He was those things, and more. He never told me he loved me. We didn’t go out into the yard and throw the ball. So I don’t express myself like I should. You should just know that I love you and will be here for you as long as I can be.”
“I love you too Dad. Are you going to try and kiss me now?”
Frank’s nostrils flared and his brow furrowed.
“Come on dad, it was a joke.”
It started in his eyes and then progressed to his forehead and cheeks before breaking into a huge smile.
“Are you ever going to stop falling for that old trick boy? I’ve been pulling that on you since we brought you home from the hospital!”
“You’re so serious! I can never tell when you are joking,” I said.
Dad doubled over and was gasping for breath. His laughter was echoing for miles spurring the country dogs to respond.
The next morning my foot was much better. I still had to use the limb to keep my balance, but I could move it now. The tall green grasses caressed our legs as we strolled along. The creek wound around the pasture and through the pathway. A series of rocks peeking above the water gave us a bridge to our land.
“I wished we could thank mom for this. She was always scheming some way for us to come back,” I said.
The cabin was an old A-frame house built in the early 1900s. The back wall faced Lake Warren and had a great porch for a barbecue. Sliding doors made it possible to watch the sun dip down into the lake each night. An old dock reached out into the deep waters of the lake. The boathouse was flecking paint chips and hadn’t housed a boat in decades.
“Maria, you were the glue that kept us together. We miss you every minute of every day. I am so thankful to God for having you as a partner and a friend.”
“Mom, you were my best friend. I could always trust you to help me. I don’t know what to do without you but I think that Dad and I can handle it. We love you.”
Frank removed the lid from the urn and poured Maria’s ashes into the wind.
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The Hive
Allan Onik
Zek molded the honey into a ball between his pincers. Tak buzzed next to him and had a taste of the batch.
“Very nice,” Tak said.
“As ordered,” Zek replied. When the ball was finished Zek buzzed to another area of the hive and rested in an outcropping comb.
“Have you been following the info?” Tak yelled from a distance.
“Don’t we all?” Zek replied.
“Of course, you’d think The Creator thought us miniscule.”
“Not even a single atom is miniscule in His eyes—so says The Queen.”
“I wouldn’t argue with her, might I risk having to live with The Black Army in their mounds,” Tak chided
“An abomination,” Zek replied.
The bees buzzed around the outside of the hive, forming a thick cloud.
“Dammit,” Tab said. He found a baseball in a patch of clovers behind the patio and chucked it at the nest. When it fell he doused it with the leftover ice and water from his tailgate cooler. “Gonna have to call the exterminator,” he muttered in the twilight.
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Canotila
Allan Onik
The moonlight in the forest was dim. The Canotila created a glow that warmed the insects on the ponderosa bark.
“The night is young, I should like to sleep now,” one of them said. It was shaped like a prowling thief, pincers ahead of its’ buzzing wings.
“Sleep?” said another, “surely you must be mistaken. We have not slept since The Father’s dawn, when the humans vice became a threat to the Sun, and the Sun broke its Yoke into a ball of Blood and Time.” The Canotila pulsed like a fiery cannon—inflamed.
“Do not speak to me of The Father, has he ever spoken to us? HE merely watches! Sometimes I think he laughs. No, there is no Love.”
The fairy rested on a branch. “So thinks many a human. Perhaps it is them you should vex. Here, let me help you find your Star. The Music is sweet tonight, is it not? Just listen to the crickets.”
The two began to float. Higher and higher—into the wrinkles and wormholes, the dark blankets and twinkling pinholes. Soon there was nothing but Light and Warmth.
“You see? It is Love. The Father does not laugh.”
“Yes...” The wisp rested, and soon dozed off to sleep.
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Tests Aren’t the Only Things with Difficult Choices
Luis Herrera
Today was like any other Wednesday I had at high school; I started off in first period then went on to second, everything was going fine until before class was over when my friend Arthur asked me the same question from earlier this week.
“So Sam you want to skip out on third period Thursday and go hang out with the seniors, it’ll be fun?”
You see I’m not really all that “popular” in school; I’m pretty much a straight A student. Can you see my dilemma right now, “perfect student asked to hang with the popular kids”? But that’s the thing, I don’t want to. I’ve heard some pretty convincing rumors about what the seniors do after skipping class and to be honest I’m scared to be getting involved with drugs, sex, and alcohol, especially at sixteen. Having to choose what to do after high school is hard enough, but having to choose between school and my best friend since third grade is harder. I couldn’t decide, but I had to tell him something for now.
“Sorry Arthur I still haven’t made up my mind yet, I still need to think about it, you understand right?” he stuttered for a moment and responded.
“Yeah, yeah of course I understand, it’s the first time you’ve been asked this to do something like this so it’s going to be a bit harder to decide what to do. How about this, tomorrow just meet me and the seniors in the back of the student parking lot before third period starts, they said once the bell rings to start class they’ll be leaving so just show up before then and we’ll head out, sounds cool?”
I faked a smile and nodded “yeah man sounds alright with me.” The bell rang to dismiss class and as I headed to the door, right before Arthur left the room he turned around and winked “see you tomorrow Sam.” then he left for his next class.
I couldn’t think of anything else for the rest of the day, I just couldn’t make a decision, so I did what anyone would do. I slept on it and whatever I thought of first in the morning I went with that. After a long and frustrating night’s sleep I woke up the next morning and finally made my decision. I knew that after going through with it I would have made probably one of the most difficult choices in my life.
After getting to school I played it cool. I saw Arthur in second period and told him I’ll meet him in the parking lot, after class was over I went to the bathroom and had to collect my thoughts before going on with it. I headed out to the parking lot and went in search of everyone, I saw the group of seniors along with a few juniors and sophomores, and almost all of them were smoking and showing off the “stuff” they brought as I walked up Arthur saw me and yelled with excitement
“Sam you showed up! Come on let’s get going-”
I cut him off before he finished speaking “I’m not going.”
“Then why are you here?” he responded in confusion.
I spoke, “Arthur I had some time to think about this over the past several days and I had an incredibly difficult time coming up with a decision” I paused to catch my breath. “I couldn’t decide whether to risk grades just to have fun or to risk losing my best friend because my grades were more important, but I realized last night that a real friend wouldn’t put me in that type of situation.”
“Sam I’m sorry I didn’t know-”
I cut him off again “I’m not done talking Arthur! After all this time to think I’ve made my decision.”
Arthur spoke nervously “Well what’s your decision Sammy?”
I looked at him with a straight face “I’m sorry Arthur, but if you’re going to be living this type of life then we can’t be friends anymore.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” he said in an angry and confused tone “After almost ten years of being best friends, just because I want to do stuff you don’t, were not friends anymore?”
“Good bye Arthur.” I said quietly as I turned around.
As I headed back inside I heard Arthur yelling at me, cursing and screaming my name. I wanted to look back, but I didn’t, there was nothing left to look back to.
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mister
Janet Kuypers
haiku 2/15/14
Mr. president,
there are schools that have books banned.
And he thought, oh, no...
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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 three collection books from 2004: Oeuvre (poetry), Exaro Versus (prose) and L’arte (art), 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, the 2012 art book a Picture’s Worth 1,000 words (available with both b&w interior pages and full color interior pages, the shutterfly ISSN# cc& hardcover art book life, in color, Post-Apocalyptic, Burn Through Me, Under the Sea (photo book), the Periodic Table of Poetry, a year long Journey, Bon Voyage!, and the mini books Part of my Pain, Let me See you Stripped, Say Nothing, Give me the News, when you Dream tonight, Rape, Sexism, Life & Death (with some Slovak poetry translations), Twitterati, and 100 Haikus, that coincided with the June 2014 release of the two poetry collection books Partial Nudity and Revealed.
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Flower’s Essence
JoyAnne O’Donnell
Flowers dance their petal’s colors
in the winds hour
covering the sweet lands with an embrace
of soft whispers
painting the fields like a masterpiece
in an art museum.
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Darkness
Rose Saunders
I have never been one to spend too much time looking at myself in the mirror; to me, it has always seemed to be a massive waste of my time. To everyone else, a mirror is almost like a mythical instrument of magic and wonder, one that, if you were to stare into it just long enough, the image reflected within it would surely change for the better. I, on the other hand, entertain no such delusions or fantasies.
Through the looking glass, I see only what there is to see... a short, slender, frail-looking girl with long, dark hair; dark, sorrow-filled eyes and painfully inexcusable dark skin whose foretold future is as black as the souls of the demons who’ve conspired to condemn it. I am the Empress Rose; Dark Lady, Queen of the Damned... sworn enemy of The Light and its Hallowed Bringers.
All Hail The Forsaken.
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The Chamber
Mario “Maxx” Hassell
Alone. In my chamber. Everyone has choices. But not me. I was created for one reason; to destroy anything in my way. Right and wrong are not a part of my moral compass. Hell, I don’t even have a moral compass. I have one goal in mind and one goal only. And that goal is to kill. If I had my way, I’d stay here locked up. I’m no good to the world. Still, here I am.
It seems to work for some people; me being a killer. At least for most of the people who employ my services. You know, society is a funny thing. No one seems to have a problem with a controlled assassin. And it’s true. I am controlled. I just act on order. Success isn’t my desire, but we all find fulfillment in meeting our purpose. And I find myself in solitaire contemplating my fate.
I have one chance to get this right. I’m not sure what got the mark put on my target’s back. And I really don’t care. That’s not my place. All I know is I was in the cage with some of my fellow assassins and I was hand-picked from gen pop to complete this job. No picture. No briefing. “You’ll know him when you see him.” is the most we ever get. And this time was no different. One thing is for sure though; somebody’s day is ending way different than it started.
Most killers have a debt to pay to society. But what debt do you pay when you serve your purpose. I’m not some misguided frat boy with rich kid problems or some thug from the ghetto. They have choices. Not me. The only choice I get is to succeed or to not. Today, I will succeed. But, first, they have to let me out. “But woe to the earth and the sea, because the devil has gone down to you!” Yeah, that’s the word for it alright; woe.
I heard the click of the lock and escaped my chamber with an ear shattering “BANG!” I didn’t have time to look around. I tore through the air and hit my target within seconds. He fell to the ground yelping in pain. But, he shouldn’t be yelping in anything. That son of a bitch should be silent. It wasn’t long though before his screams took on an emotional candor. I mean, are his feelings hurt that he got shot? Almost simultaneously, though, a woman’s voice joined his “GABBYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!!!!!”
Gabby? Gabby is a girl name. Damn. Damn. Damn. Not this. Gabby is definitely a girl name. Gabby is the name of the baby girl in the stroller that was in front of James when I hit him in his knee. And this is the bullshit I’m talking about. I’m a controlled assassin, no doubt. And my warden can’t even aim. I failed my mission because of and have to participate in the dismal mediocrity of a street salesman hell bent on revenge. He never once thought to get back at the people who told him he would never amount to anything by being successful. This coward wanted to come and mix it up with the likes of killers, present company included. And here I lay, much like a bee who has already used its stinger; useless. And as screams multiply into cries and escalate into sirens and the sounds manifest into a crowd around us, I become an even more useless witness to my own crime. If only I had a choice. I would have stayed in my chamber.
Everyone has choices. Everyone has purpose. But I am not included in everyone. I am included in everything. My actions are not my choices. My actions are the direct result of the choice made by another. Depending on your worldview, my existence is justified. But, whatever your view, you need to understand that I can’t and won’t be tamed. It’s either all of me or none of me; literally. In my end I ponder that it’s crazy how the destiny of me and my victims align every single time. Because much like the 4 month old body that up until now housed an infant spirit and much the parents now set to begin their mourning process, I am but a shell, with no sign of any life spark. I got my chance. My one shot. And I blew it. No redo. No card up. And no return back to the chamber.
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floor
Janet Kuypers
haiku 2/8/14
Writhing on the floor,
bruised, she cried, begged for an end.
I had to kill her
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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 three collection books from 2004: Oeuvre (poetry), Exaro Versus (prose) and L’arte (art), 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, the 2012 art book a Picture’s Worth 1,000 words (available with both b&w interior pages and full color interior pages, the shutterfly ISSN# cc& hardcover art book life, in color, Post-Apocalyptic, Burn Through Me, Under the Sea (photo book), the Periodic Table of Poetry, a year long Journey, Bon Voyage!, and the mini books Part of my Pain, Let me See you Stripped, Say Nothing, Give me the News, when you Dream tonight, Rape, Sexism, Life & Death (with some Slovak poetry translations), Twitterati, and 100 Haikus, that coincided with the June 2014 release of the two poetry collection books Partial Nudity and Revealed.
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Shot
Kendra Burns
It started two weeks ago. Every morning at exactly nine a.m. a blocked number calls me. On the other end, a man with a rough shaky voice whispers, “I know what you did.” Every time it gets to me. My hands quiver as I try to steady my racing heartbeat. I know by now I should have called the police, but I just cannot seem to dial the number. It’s not like I’m terrified of what he could know. No, wait, that’s a lie.
It hasn’t even been a month yet since everything ended. Ian Romanov had been caught, or at least that’s what I’ve been led to believe, and Mark is safe at home with his family. There is only a handful of people that know what I’ve done and up until two weeks ago that number consisted of three people besides myself. Alex had done all he could to dispose of the body.
He had been one of Ian’s goons. I had walked in the abandoned warehouse hoping to just find Mark tied to a chair and no one around. Man, had I been wrong. The guy held Mark up against the wall, knife to Mark’s slender throat, smiling with untamed glee at the look of uncontrolled fear in Mark’s once big, innocent brown eyes. I had panicked. The man was speaking in Russian. From what Alex had taught me I gathered he was telling Mark that death was too good for his entire family.
My heel clicked a little too loudly against the dusty cement. Both of them looked at me. He cocked an eyebrow up as to question which side I was on, Ian’s or Alex’s.
“Rae, get out of here.” Mark’s voice was nothing but broken syllables strung together trying to form words. It broke my heart. The man removed the knife from Mark’s neck and pulled out his small handgun that I could barely make out from the distance. It took all my will to not freeze dead in my tracks. In the back of my mind, I could hear Alex’s words of how this was a bad idea having me involved. Yet I had insisted on coming. If anything happened to me, it was my fault. I can live and die with that.
What happened next, I don’t fully remember. One minute he was pointing a gun at me, gunshots echoing off the brick walls. The next minute, both of us are on the floor, Mark screaming for me to get up. The other guy lay in a pool of his own blood. It was another few minutes before Alex and Gabriel burst into the warehouse, both dripping in sweat. Alex kneeled over me, a slight grin brightening his weary blue eyes.
“Don’t worry about the rest of this. Gabe and I will deal with it.” Alex sounded just as tired as he looked. His calloused hand covered my eyes, casting me into dark blissful sleep.
The memory drifts away as I lower my phone from my ear. The sunlight piercing through my light blue sheer curtains illuminating the barren area that I call my room. I push myself off my bed with determination in my bones. Whoever was on the other end of the line wasn’t going to get away with whatever they were trying. I won't be frightened so easily. With a deep breath, I’ve made up my mind to go talk to Gabriel. If anything he will be able to track the call and get his FBI friends on the case.
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ever leave me
Janet Kuypers
6/24/15
if death ever consumed you
if your soul were ever to leave
if there was something out there
insidious enough, evil enough
to snuff you from this earth
and force us to go on without you
well, what would I do
as you departed, I would hold you
until your heart stopped beating
and then I would hold you tighter
until your brain no longer functioned
because I would want
your thinking mind to know
that I would hold you fiercely
and never let you go
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See YouTube video
of Janet Kuypers reading her poem ever leave me live 7/25/15 on Chicago’s WZRD 88.3 FM radio (Cfs)
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See YouTube video
of Janet Kuypers reading her poem ever leave me live 7/25/15 on Chicago’s WZRD 88.3 FM radio (Cfs200, FlCrSat)
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See YouTube video of Janet Kuypers (wrapped in VHS tape) in her 8/14/15 show “Farewell Chicago” in her final scheduled feature at Poetry’s “Love Letter” (while living in Chicago) in Chicago (Canon Power Shot), with her poems
Chicago,
Breaking Their Heart,
change (2015 edit),
Planting Palm Tree Seeds,
Shared Air,
Other Souls, and
ever leave me.
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See YouTube video of Janet Kuypers (wrapped in VHS tape) in her 8/14/15 show “Farewell Chicago” in her final scheduled feature at Poetry’s “Love Letter” (while living in Chicago) in Chicago (Canon fs200), with her poems
Chicago,
Breaking Their Heart,
change (2015 edit),
Planting Palm Tree Seeds,
Shared Air,
Other Souls, and
ever leave me.
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Download poems in the free chapbook
Farewell Chicago
of this & other poems read 8/14/15 at a live Chicago show
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See YouTube video 1/3/16 of Janet Kuypers reading her poems White Knuckled, Women’s Very Existence and Burn It In from her book Rape, Sexism, Life & Death and her poem ever leave me from the cc&d book When the Walls are Paper Thin at the Austin open mic Kick Butt Poetry (Nikon CoolPix S7000)
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See YouTube video 1/3/16 of Janet Kuypers reading her poems White Knuckled, Women’s Very Existence and Burn It In from her book Rape, Sexism, Life & Death and her poem ever leave me from the cc&d book When the Walls are Paper Thin at the Austin open mic Kick Butt Poetry (Canon Power Shot)
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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 three collection books from 2004: Oeuvre (poetry), Exaro Versus (prose) and L’arte (art), 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, the 2012 art book a Picture’s Worth 1,000 words (available with both b&w interior pages and full color interior pages, the shutterfly ISSN# cc& hardcover art book life, in color, Post-Apocalyptic, Burn Through Me, Under the Sea (photo book), the Periodic Table of Poetry, a year long Journey, Bon Voyage!, and the mini books Part of my Pain, Let me See you Stripped, Say Nothing, Give me the News, when you Dream tonight, Rape, Sexism, Life & Death (with some Slovak poetry translations), Twitterati, and 100 Haikus, that coincided with the June 2014 release of the two poetry collection books Partial Nudity and Revealed.
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John
Jazmine Dorsey
“Carla, you’ve gotta find people worth suffering for.”
Today, marks the anniversary of when he first said those words to me in his baritone voice and ever since then, they’ve replayed in my head like a poisonous melody. He loves me, he loves me not, he loves me and the anguish colliding through my physique has me realizing that the last petal clinging to life on this frail peduncle will determine my fate, he loves me not.
>center>I don’t want to be loved. Make that quick kiss last
I don’t want to make love. Touch my body with lust
2 Years Later
As the northern sun spills through my bedroom curtains I am ingested into my phone roaming through my newsfeed on Facebook and by surprise there he is. 2 years ago I gave up and I found myself attending the funeral of our dead love. Is it crazy that I remember the environment of our first hug it felt like a bullet wound to the chest, he hit me that hard. I believe that’s when it happened. I’m not the type to fall but the kill in his smile, the population in his eyes for me, and the passion in the dimple on his right cheek is the reason why I continuously betray myself saying that I’ll given up, but I stay in love, why?
I believe we nurse infinite possibilities to rekindle our demised love. I believe that we can be what we used to be, you and me the happier version. But then I remember he loves me not and I’m in the pursuit of trying to fix something that he doesn’t even see is broken. I’m tossing and turning on the edge of my bed with my phone glued to my hand. I try to continue to scroll through my newsfeed but my demanding hands won’t allow me to delete the image of him on my screen. He loves me.
July 18th 2012, “Carla, I love you so much.”
This is the first day he said he loved me. He said he loved me. He said it dammit! The violins were playing a soft melody that day, but he recited those lyrics with no music.
I dart over to my bedroom mirror and all I see in the reflection of this glass is a silhouette of the different positions in which we made love. My emotions take control and I lose it. When I regain my rational consciousness I see a shattered mirror, splattered blood, and I feel excruciating pain throbbing from my right hand.
>center>Make that quick kiss last. I don’t want to be loved
Touch my body with lust. I don’t want to make love
I fucking hate him, I fucking hate him. He loves me not. I reach down with my left hand to grab my phone, I quickly tap on his Facebook profile and click message. He loves me.
Dear John,
My words read:
I fucking hate you, I fucking hate you. Look what you did to me. Some people they’re just worth suffering for, huh? Well, I wish nothing but the worst for you!
My body temperature is 212 Fahrenheit. My palms are dripping raindrops. From the vibration of my quivering fingers, I hit the power button without clicking send. She loves him, she loves him not, she loves him.
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John
Janet Kuypers
On the other side of the room
I sense him through the cigarette smoke,
the roar of conversation, and the dim lights.
I look at his face, but I can no longer see John.
I have dreamt and envisioned a God-like figure.
I have imagined his sensitivity
and his thoughtfulness. I have felt his hands caress
my skin and his lips meet mine. He has held me a
thousand times, protecting me. I have rehearsed our
moments together in my mind, the moments I’ve
created: the candlelight dinners, the dancing,
the loving. While never knowing him any more
than glimpses of his face across a crowded room.
The music blares as I look over my shoulder
between the empty faces and see his image
laughing, smiling, talking with friends. And my eyes flare
with envy. I wonder why he is not with me,
but I know the face across the room is not John.
It is a door to a dream that will never be.
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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 three collection books from 2004: Oeuvre (poetry), Exaro Versus (prose) and L’arte (art), 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, the 2012 art book a Picture’s Worth 1,000 words (available with both b&w interior pages and full color interior pages, the shutterfly ISSN# cc& hardcover art book life, in color, Post-Apocalyptic, Burn Through Me, Under the Sea (photo book), the Periodic Table of Poetry, a year long Journey, Bon Voyage!, and the mini books Part of my Pain, Let me See you Stripped, Say Nothing, Give me the News, when you Dream tonight, Rape, Sexism, Life & Death (with some Slovak poetry translations), Twitterati, and 100 Haikus, that coincided with the June 2014 release of the two poetry collection books Partial Nudity and Revealed.
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Thriller
Jamanda Parker
This place is cold, I thought as I looked around. The forest was blanketed in fog, the dirt wet with morning dew. I was wearing my favorite dress, the one with gold sequins all over it that shimmered with every move. How did I get here? Taking a step forward, I realized I was barefoot. The earth was soft under my feet, shifting with every step. In the distance I heard a car engine stalling and a male voice shouting in frustration. I knew that voice. What was Caleb doing here? Heading towards the commotion, the forest started to grow and stretch. Panic gripped my body and I began to run. “Caleb!” I screamed, “Caleb, help me!” The branches moved, reaching for me like dead fingers on rotting corpses. Roots began to lift from the ground, grabbing at my ankles as I fought to get to Caleb. Just as I saw the road ahead, I fell, hitting my head on a large rock. Blinking rapidly to clear my vision, I looked up to see Caleb standing over me. “Caleb, help me,” I pleaded. “What’s happening?” He stood motionless, staring back at me with blank, dead eyes. Though his mouth never moved, I heard his voice in my head, “Night creatures call and the dead start to walk in their masquerade. There’s no escaping this time, this is the end of your life.”
I jolted upright in my bed, breathing heavily. Eyes straining against the morning sunlight, it took me a moment to realize that it was my phone shouting Michael Jacksons “Thriller” at me. I was so changing my ringtone. Because it took me a moment to shake off the the dream, I missed the call. I stared nervously at my phone, already knowing what it displayed. It was 9:00 am sharp, just as it had been yesterday, the day before that, and the day before that. Today marked two weeks straight that I’d been receiving calls from an unknown number. The stranger says only five words before disconnecting, “I know what you did.”
At first I thought it was a prank. My best friend Megan’s sick idea of a joke. I confronted her in school the next morning. Pulling her into the janitor’s closet before our first class, I told her what had been happening.
“Kayla, why would I do something so childish and cruel?” she asked.
“If it wasn’t you, then someone else knows,” I whispered back.
“We have to do something. I’ll be 18 in two months, Kay, I can’t go to prison. What about law school?” Her voice grew louder with every word. “If even a whisper of that party gets back to daddy he’ll snatch my trust fund, let alone a MURDER CHARGE-”
“Shh! Lower your voice. Just give me a second to think.” Checking the time, it was just after 8:45 which meant we had 15 minutes until first bell. Pacing the length of the small, damp, cement room, I went over the details of that night. Meg’s parents were away on business. About 50 people were at that party. Pills were being traded like lunches in kindergarten. There wasn’t a non-alcoholic drink in the entire three story house. Only Caleb, Megan, and I were in the garage when he collapsed. Nobody heard us screaming over the thumping music and before we could run for help, he coughed up one final stream of blood and went still. We put Caleb’s body into Megan’s trunk right away. The drugs hadn’t come from us, but it was still our party and neither of us could risk the fallout. We waited until everyone had left to drive far into the woods and bury the body... the woods. I spun to Megan. “Someone saw us in the woods that night. We have to move the body. It’s their only proof against us.”
Leaving the closet, we were making our way through the sea of students, towards the main doors when my phone began to vibrate in my pocket. Focused on the mission at hand, I answered without a second thought. Those dreaded five words froze me to the ground and Megan ran into me. I turned to tell her what had just happened when I saw that she too had gone still and pale. She was staring across the hall like she’d seen a ghost. Following her line of sight, I knew why. Staring back at me, phone in hand, was Caleb.
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Eleanor Leonne Bennett Bio (20150720)
Eleanor Leonne Bennett is an internationally award winning artist of almost fifty awards. She was the CIWEM Young Environmental Photographer of the Year in 2013. Eleanor’s photography has been published in British Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar. Her work has been displayed around the world consistently for six years since the age of thirteen. This year (2015) she has done the anthology cover for the incredibly popular Austin International Poetry Festival. She is also featured in Schiffer’s “Contemporary Wildlife Art” published this Spring. She is an art editor for multiple international publications.
www.eleanorleonnebennett.com
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Destiny
Melanie Greenwood
“Professor De’Von was right about one thing,” Lucy said, “criminals are not born, they are made.”
Edgar smiled.
“Remember the date, Edgar,” she said. “I, Destiny Degas born this day, Sunday, March 18, 1990 in the Short Gallery Room at Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, Massachusetts.”
Edgar’s smile widened.
“I am here to take back my father’s fucking sketches,” Destiny said.
Edgar laughed.
“My Lady,” he said, accompanied by a bow of devotion. “May I present a symbol of your proclamation from Napoleon Bonaparte, himself,” he said and handed her the Eagle of the 1st Squadron of the Horse Grenadiers of the Imperial Guard.
She smiled.
He knew Lucy’s life was one of tragedy and that she had played by all the rules. He also knew that she claimed to have lost her humanity, betrayed by co-workers, friends, family, and losing her mother to Cancer.
“Don’t move,” she said, bending over to grab the wrench from his backpack.
Her wig fell off.
He reached for it.
She rubbed the smooth surface of her head and with wide eyes and trembling lips stared at him.
With soft eyes and a lump at his throat, he barely muttered the words, “My Lady!”
He knew her fragile state and that she pretended to be brave for him. So, he held her wig securely and kneeled before her.
With the wrench, she knighted him, Sir Lancelot.
Lucy may have graduated with a B.A. in Criminal Justice and a Master’s Degree in Criminal Psychology, but he knew her heart would forever be devoted to art and history.
“Give me my wig,” she said, laughing. “It’s chilly in here.”
Edgar handed her the wig.
“Go get the other bag,” she said. “I’ll wait here for you.”
Still laughing, she watched as he exited the Short Gallery Room. He ran through the Rafael Room into the Italian Room and grabbed the bag holding three Rembrandt; then, traced his steps back into the Short Gallery Room.
“Lucy!” He froze momentarily.
Dropping the paintings, he flew over to her side but knew immediately that he was too late.
Her head was cold. He removed the wig from her hand and found she had placed a sealed envelope inside the cup. The envelope was addressed to Sir Lancelot. Edgar opened it not caring if a real cop walked in and found two fake cops, one dead and the other wishing he were.
The tears flowed as he read her note.
Dear Edgar,
Enclosed is a map to a secret rose garden. Be careful of the thorns and please, follow the instructions. If you do, it will take the FBI over twenty years to find out who did it. By then, the Statue of Limitations will apply and no one will be able to arrest you. I planned everything perfectly.
In addition, please donate my portion to the charities I’ve listed on the second page.
Please bury me next to my mother.
Thank you for everything!
You are my only friend,
Lucy
P.S.: Our treasure is worth an estimated $500 million dollars. |
He smiled with the girl who claimed she’d lost her humanity. Then, took all their treasure – including her father’s five sketches along with his only friend and left.
This story was created for a class assignment from the video called, “The Gardner Museum Heist The Largest Art Theft in the World.” at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1mzMh0sugg.
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The Wolf
Stephan Deemer
If you find this note, it means I am no longer alive. I have little time and even less space, so I will try and recall what I can about the circumstances that led me to this small, secluded cabin in Wyoming.
The first time the call came; I thought it was a prank call. I mean, who wouldn’t? You get a phone call at 9:00 am and a deep voice at the other end of the line breathes for a few seconds, says, “I know what you did,” then hangs up? It has to be a prank call.
That was over a year ago.
Since that first call 423 days ago, I have received a phone call every single morning at 9:00 am. And every single call is the same voice. It’s deep and breathy, menacing. If wolves could speak, I imagine their voices would sound like the man who calls me daily.
It doesn’t matter where I am, the caller will find me. If I’m out, he will call my cell phone. Multiple times I was sitting in my cubicle getting an early start to my work, and the call came to my work phone. Once I was out for breakfast with my friends, and the call came to the restaurant! Fear filled me as I went to the host stand and picked up the phone. And there he was, waiting for me.
I have tried everything to get rid of him. I’ve changed my numbers; he calls the new number the next day. I’ve blocked the number he calls from, but the next morning he just calls from a new one. I moved to a new city, and he still followed me! Does he know what I’ve lost? Of course he does. He knows everything about me I suspect.
I tried to get the police involved, but they told me as long as he wasn’t threatening me, they were powerless to help. I even went and hired a private detective, but he could not find a thing. He said it was the first case that he had ever returned completely empty handed on. Seeing my pale face and sunken eyes, he decided not to charge me.
Before moving again to Wyoming, I tried to figure out exactly what it is I did. Why this man keeps calling me? I pored over my memories like a researcher poring over microfilm. I called friends and family, asked them to try and point me in the right direction. Nothing.
I wonder if it was something insignificant like I forgot to hold the door open for him on my way into a building. Or maybe I cut him off on the freeway. Maybe that’s all it takes to set a mad man off.
Sometimes I have nightmares about him. In my dreams he’s tall and ghostly thin, with long gray hair, sharp teeth, and piercing red eyes. But just as in real life, he never comes after me. He just stands there, staring, and licking his lips.
I came to this cabin with nothing but clothes, food, and basic supplies. No electronics. I also brought a gun. I thought if there were ever a place for him to attack me, this secluded cabin would be it.
My first morning in the cabin I awoke to ringing. He had left a cell phone on the dining table. I smashed it to pieces but the next morning another one appeared in the bathroom.
I don’t sleep much anymore. I try and stay up all night to catch him in the act. But when I stay up all night watching the dining area, the phone turns up on the front porch. When I stay up all night watching the front porch, the phone appears in the bathroom. They have popped up everywhere. Once I fell asleep standing watch and woke up to a new phone ringing in my lap.
This morning I woke up to find a new phone ringing on my nightstand. Instead of smashing it like all the rest, I answered and begged him to stop. He listened to my crying, just breathing into the phone and listening. And then he hung up.
And for some reason that was my breaking point.
Not the friends I’ve lost, or the family I’ve deserted, or the fact that he has driven me to this piece of shit cabin so far away from everything I loved. No, my breaking point was his total lack of compassion this morning. I know for sure what I have always suspected: he will not stop.
To whoever finds this, please deliver this note to the police.
And if you find this: you won.
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easy
Janet Kuypers
haiku 3/10/14
I’m angry with you
for taking the easy way out
when death is your choice
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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 three collection books from 2004: Oeuvre (poetry), Exaro Versus (prose) and L’arte (art), 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, the 2012 art book a Picture’s Worth 1,000 words (available with both b&w interior pages and full color interior pages, the shutterfly ISSN# cc& hardcover art book life, in color, Post-Apocalyptic, Burn Through Me, Under the Sea (photo book), the Periodic Table of Poetry, a year long Journey, Bon Voyage!, and the mini books Part of my Pain, Let me See you Stripped, Say Nothing, Give me the News, when you Dream tonight, Rape, Sexism, Life & Death (with some Slovak poetry translations), Twitterati, and 100 Haikus, that coincided with the June 2014 release of the two poetry collection books Partial Nudity and Revealed.
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Time Is Madness
Jaron Panikkar
Tick, tock, tick tock. I hear it. I hear it all the time. I want them to shut it off. I want to smash it. I want it gone. But they won’t get rid of it. They keep it hanging outside the cell doors. Sometimes I go over to the cell and reach my hand out and for it. “Destroy, destroy,” I say. I see it grin at me. One day I’ll wipe that smug look off of it’s face. A guard bangs against my cell door; I cower to a corner beside my cot. I curl up and start to say, “Get it away get it away get it away getitawaygetitawaygetitaway...”
I feel time pass as my cell door opens. I’m still curled up in the corner saying, “...getitawaygetitaway”; some guards pick me up against my will. They place me in a room with a tall man in a white coat; he starts to ask me questions. Questions about my childhood, and my teen years, but the thing is, I tell him that I don’t remember any of it. I tell him that Time has taken that from me all that I remember is seeing a large ticking device in a dark void that tried to eat me whole and only hearing “Tick tock tick tock” over and over again.
I notice he has a ticking device on his desk I start to ignore his questions and say, “Time, time is a marvelous thing — all it does is move forward with or without us. But what if some of us can’t move on? What if some of us can only stay stuck in our own reality?”
He says, “Harry. If you don’t answer my questions I can’t help you.” I frantically look around trying to avoid eye contact with him I look at his ticking device.
I say, “Get it away get it away get it away!” I start to laugh manically “There is no helping me. I’m a lost cause. I’m lost in the river of time! Time is madness after all.” I start to go back into saying, “Get it away get it awaygetitaway!”
I’m thrown back into my cell. Its dark and lonely until I see a shadowy figure walk towards me; it has the face of the object that hangs out side the cell. It’s wearing a similar coat to the one that the evil doctor was wearing. I start to back up; the figure is holding a sharp object. It gets up in my face. All I hear is tick tock, tick tock. The figure then grins and says, “It’s time to dissect your brain Harry. I want to know what makes you Tick. Don’t you?”
“Get it away get it away get it away!” I say. The ticking and the tocking get faster and faster as it matches my heart beat. I feel like my head is about to explode. I then let off an agonizing scream. The figure grabs me and brings the sharp object closer. I feel the sharp object penetrate my head. The ticking and the tocking now start to slow down. It’s a slow process. The pain is unbearable. The cold steel digs into my brain cutting the muscles that hold it together. I start to see smaller ticking devices with wings fly around me. They start to circle me like vultures. Their numbers started to fly off and get bigger; the numbers start to dance in front of me. The now empty faces grew mouths. The mouths opened and had large fangs. They start to bite into me. I continue to scream. The ticking and the tocking gets faster again, and the numbers start to melt in front of me as I say, “Noo, No Get away get away get away getawaygetawaygetawaygetaway!”
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The Life of a Thief
Andrew Estep
The Rose Gold Diamond. The most beautiful gem in the world was on display at the Nickelback City Museum. It sparkled like the stars that shine during the darkest of nights. And they say that if you shine a light on it just right, it will reveal the world’s deepest secrets. So, naturally, most thieves have tried their hands at getting this precious gem of life. And, naturally, every thief failed. That’s how it’s been since the diamond got put on display for the world to see. And the museum itself has the longest streak of captured criminals. But, if anyone was going to end it, it would be me.
The plan was simple. Make an almost uncannily similar fake gem, to replace the real one.. Then, create a diversion and lead all the security guards into a small little room in the back of the museum and lock the door. Then, when no one is looking, bam! I switch the gems and get off clean. It was so simple! Until, I forgot to switch the damn security lasers. I was right there! The diamond was in my hand! And then came the police sirens. The blue and red lights were shining through the windows. They looked just like Christmas lights that change colors every second.
I ran. I ran like the wind. I ran so fast I felt like I was flying. Certainly those cops couldn’t catch me, right? Wrong! As I rounded the corner to get to the back door, I saw the end. The police had barricaded the door! And I was literally running into my own demise! I tried to stop but I was running at such a high velocity that my feet wouldn’t slow down. I ran straight into the police, the gem getting knocked out of my hand and rolling to the cops feet. That was the end of the line. I thought I could get away with it, but I didn’t.
Now I’m stuck here in this smelly cell, inside the Nickelback Penitentiary. I swear this place smells like sweaty socks and rotten eggs all bundled up in a package. It sucks. And I have to stay here for 15 years! It feels like an eternity. But, thus is the life of a thief I guess. Thus is the life.
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run
Janet Kuypers
haiku 2/17/14
although I hate you
I’ll never let go, so you’ll
have to run faster
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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 three collection books from 2004: Oeuvre (poetry), Exaro Versus (prose) and L’arte (art), 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, the 2012 art book a Picture’s Worth 1,000 words (available with both b&w interior pages and full color interior pages, the shutterfly ISSN# cc& hardcover art book life, in color, Post-Apocalyptic, Burn Through Me, Under the Sea (photo book), the Periodic Table of Poetry, a year long Journey, Bon Voyage!, and the mini books Part of my Pain, Let me See you Stripped, Say Nothing, Give me the News, when you Dream tonight, Rape, Sexism, Life & Death (with some Slovak poetry translations), Twitterati, and 100 Haikus, that coincided with the June 2014 release of the two poetry collection books Partial Nudity and Revealed.
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The Life of a Thief
Andrew Estep
The Rose Gold Diamond. The most beautiful gem in the world was on display at the Nickelback City Museum. It sparkled like the stars that shine during the darkest of nights. And they say that if you shine a light on it just right, it will reveal the world’s deepest secrets. So, naturally, most thieves have tried their hands at getting this precious gem of life. And, naturally, every thief failed. That’s how it’s been since the diamond got put on display for the world to see. And the museum itself has the longest streak of captured criminals. But, if anyone was going to end it, it would be me.
The plan was simple. Make an almost uncannily similar fake gem, to replace the real one.. Then, create a diversion and lead all the security guards into a small little room in the back of the museum and lock the door. Then, when no one is looking, bam! I switch the gems and get off clean. It was so simple! Until, I forgot to switch the damn security lasers. I was right there! The diamond was in my hand! And then came the police sirens. The blue and red lights were shining through the windows. They looked just like Christmas lights that change colors every second.
I ran. I ran like the wind. I ran so fast I felt like I was flying. Certainly those cops couldn’t catch me, right? Wrong! As I rounded the corner to get to the back door, I saw the end. The police had barricaded the door! And I was literally running into my own demise! I tried to stop but I was running at such a high velocity that my feet wouldn’t slow down. I ran straight into the police, the gem getting knocked out of my hand and rolling to the cops feet. That was the end of the line. I thought I could get away with it, but I didn’t.
Now I’m stuck here in this smelly cell, inside the Nickelback Penitentiary. I swear this place smells like sweaty socks and rotten eggs all bundled up in a package. It sucks. And I have to stay here for 15 years! It feels like an eternity. But, thus is the life of a thief I guess. Thus is the life.
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Blackmail the Devil
Alex Kingsley
Before me lay a long hallway covered with a disgusting off brown and well-stained carpet. I walked slowly while whistling a sweet tune I had heard on the radio that morning. The separate offices all looked different from their windows as I passed them. One was a dental or optometry office, while the opposing side held a darkened and empty room. I passed one more set of doors before reaching my destination.
I turned toward the frosted window of Trenton Investigations. The sign read that they were “Private Investigators” and listed their hours of operation. I stood there for a moment to finish my whistling before rapping my knuckles on the glass. I could hear faint shuffling as someone rushed to the doorway. I quickly scanned the hallway for other people yet found none.
A heavy man wearing a white shirt, brown slacks, suspenders and a belt opened the door to greet me. His face was a deep red from exertion and his weight I’m sure. He had beady dark eyes that revealed that he was a scared, obese slob. He greeted me with a smile, but seeing my face the color drained from his face and his eyes widened in horror. I met his gaze with a smile as I drew my suppressed Walther P22 and lodged two rounds into his skull.
His body fell with a sickening thud and his fat rolls swayed like waves on the beach. As thick blood began trickling down the cavities in his face, I stepped into the office and closed the door behind me.
“Hello Mr. Trenton. I am Mr. Richter, but I am quite sure that you already knew that. It took me quite a while, but I found you!” I spoke to his body cordially, almost as if we had been friends for years. I smiled as I waited to be absolutely sure that he was dead before I began to look about his office.
The tiny office looked as if it were ripped straight from film noir. I had even noticed that Mr. Trenton had a brown duster and matching fedora hanging from a mount on the wall.
“You take this private eye thing too seriously Mr. Trenton. Honestly these relics should have been left in the 50’s. It can be found quite offensive to people of taste.” I laughed as I spoke with him. This little pig of a man probably envisioned himself as some hero in a Dick Tracy comic.
I began to search the room for evidence that connected me to my line of work. I could be called a hired gun, mercenary or assassin. Whatever my title, I killed people for my income. Life could be quite sweet when you pull in over $50,000 a week. However, Mr. Trenton sought to ruin my manner of living.
Everyday for the last two weeks Mr. Trenton had been calling me, from an unknown number, at 9 am. Each time I answered, he would threaten, “I know what you did!” At first I was unintimidated, but after a week I began to take more notice. I grew tired of this weak and childish tactic, and therefore I began to track my would-be blackmailer.
Two days ago I had discovered Mr. Trenton and Trenton Investigations which confirmed my worry that he possibly had info on a hit. I had resolved that I could not allow this information to be put in public eye, for both myself and my employers.
“So where is it, you wretch? Where are the pictures!?” My cordial tone had disappeared as my irritation began to bubble. I dug through the files on his computer hoping to discover some fragment of information about me. I looked at his body in anger as I struggled to find the evidence. As I looked at him, and then his office, I had a moment of clarity. Someone stuck in the past as he would surely use Polaroid!
I looked in the drawers in his desk and quickly found what I was looking for. I took a moment flipping through the pictures of me and could only laugh heartily.
“You stupid bastard, you didn’t have to die!” I threw the pictures at his corpse and began laughing hysterically. I poured gasoline around the room and Mr. Trenton. I took one last look at the pictures of my affair, laughed yet again and threw the lit match to the ground.
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evil
Janet Kuypers
haiku 3/1/14
like cream in coffee,
evil explodes into a
mushroom cloud and spreads
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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 three collection books from 2004: Oeuvre (poetry), Exaro Versus (prose) and L’arte (art), 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, the 2012 art book a Picture’s Worth 1,000 words (available with both b&w interior pages and full color interior pages, the shutterfly ISSN# cc& hardcover art book life, in color, Post-Apocalyptic, Burn Through Me, Under the Sea (photo book), the Periodic Table of Poetry, a year long Journey, Bon Voyage!, and the mini books Part of my Pain, Let me See you Stripped, Say Nothing, Give me the News, when you Dream tonight, Rape, Sexism, Life & Death (with some Slovak poetry translations), Twitterati, and 100 Haikus, that coincided with the June 2014 release of the two poetry collection books Partial Nudity and Revealed.
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Nine-Year-Old Eyes
Angelica Carter
She took my hand and led me towards their bathroom. Her hand was warm. Kind of like the stove when she cooks dinner. She kept saying, ‘this is what’s best for you, this is what mothers do for their children.’ I do not understand that word, or rather the phrase; what’s best for you. There are so many versions and definitions of that word, best. She also says broccoli is best for you, but it tastes so nasty, now how can that be “best” for me? I want to ask her this question again. Is this really what’s best for me, mommy? But, hearing my father beat down the door of their bedroom stops me. She tells me to get in the bathtub, I’d do it, if that is what’s best for me. But what I don’t understand is why don’t I get a say in what’s best for me? Why is it not my decision?
She picks me up and sets me in our pink bathtub, such an odd color, pink. She reaches into the cabinet and pulls what I think is a gun, I only see ones on the telly, I learned that word from my friend, Blanket, from England. He always carries a blanket. His parents tried to take it from him. He screamed so loud, I hate loud noises. I cover my ears when Daddy yells at Momma. Kind of like how he is right now. She’s kissing my forehead and telling me she loves me. What does love mean? She holds me tight before she goes, her face wet from tears. Momma says she loves Daddy, but I didn’t know love hurts you, and leaves black and blue spots on your face and arms. I thought love was fun, and nice.
I hear more banging now. Daddy is really mad at momma, madder then the time she left for three whole days. I cover my ears; I don’t like loud noises. I can still hear them shouting. I try not to listen but, I can’t help but hear them. I turn the water on, cold just the way I like it. Momma says that’s weird, but cold water feels so good. It’s something refreshing about it, like it’s taking away all the bad stuff. All the, tension. I want to live in Alaska, it’s always cold there. You know, they don’t get to see the sun for 40 days. That’s a long time. I don’t really care for the sun, I mean I know it’s important but, if it was dark all the time that would be the greatest of great things. I have this theory that everything comes alive at night. Everything and one becomes what they truly are. I believe I’m truly a fish. A pretty fish like coy fish.
The water is seeping out and onto the floor. It’s quiet now, creepy quiet. Maybe it’s safe, now. I get out the tub. My clothes soaking wet but, I don’t reach for a towel. I hear my mother scream, and something fall. Then this extremely loud sound explodes in my ears, I think my ears have bells in them, they won’t stop ringing. It takes forever to get to the door but, even when I do reach it, I know it is locked I saw her lock it but I can’t seem to will my body to stop trying. My throat is sore, I hear more screaming, but this time it’s coming from my own mouth. My hands are raw and red from trying to open the door. I hear another of that horrible retched sound. Retched another funny word. Like in that song momma sings, Amazing Grace.
A louder thud lands next to the door. Then silence. It’s in that silence that makes everything seem better. My parents aren’t playing the who’s louder than who game. I don’t have to cover my ears. But this silence isn’t peaceful, it’s torture. “Another stranger word,” I say to myself as I slide down the bathroom door. My cheeks are wet with tears. My bottom starts to feel wet and warm. I was too old to pee on myself. What is this? I reached my hand behind me, it was coming from the other side of the door. It was blood.
The door smashed in, sending me flying towards that hideous pink bathtub. My head felt fuzzy. My vision became a little blurry and I could see black spots. A black cloud forms over my body and mind. I was lost. Floating on a black cloud in darkness. I was in a sleepless dream. Or a nightmare. Was this death? Such an unusual word. A word that was just, so, final. I couldn’t be dead, I hadn’t had my first bra measuring yet. My momma's friends say the right bra changes your life. If I get one my life could be changed too, into a life of the happy kind of love, a life of quietness.
Bright. That’s all I saw when I opened my eyes. Bright light and loud voices. I wanted to cover my ears but I couldn’t move. Men in uniform surrounded me. I tried to guess which one would tell me, what I already knew about my parents. This is the life my mother chose for us, the life she thought was better. The life of a criminal. I over heard the end of the conversation of the guy closest to me.
“Both parents, deceased. You think she knows where it is? You think she’ll talk?” he asked his colleagues.
“She will. She just a child. It can’t be that hard, can it?” one said.
No. He’s wrong. I will never talk. Because that’s what’s best for me.
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Honor
Abdulrahman “Manny” Sembawah
Feng enters the hotel room. Ugly shag carpeting covers the floor. There are two beds with comforters not matching the rest of the décor, like a snap shot from the 70s. Phil Collin’s “In the Air Tonight,” is playing on the radio, and overwhelming fumes of Pine-Sol fill the room. The patio is toward the back of the room. Out there sits a man with his back facing the sliding glass door, a cigarette in his left hand. A tea kettle, two cups, pack of cigarettes, and a light and ashtray, sit on the table in front of the man.
Feng heads to out to the patio, approaches the table, bows to the seated man, and says, “Uncle Jing.”
Jing points to the chair across from him. “Nephew, sit.”
Feng sits at the table with his uncle.
Jing places his cigarette on the lip of the ashtray and pours his nephew a cup of steaming tea. With two fingers, Jing pushes the cup across the table. “Drink, nephew,” Jing says, pouring himself a cup of tea. “It’s your mother’s recipe,” says Jing.
Feng sips from the cup, while trying to not burn himself from the hot tea. He puts it back on the table.
“Can I convince you to just leave here, Feng?” Jing asks. “Just let me be.”
“You know I can’t do that,” Feng says. “You killed the boss. You aren’t leaving here alive.”
Jing picks his cigarette up, slips it between his lips, and inhales. “So,” Jing says, then exhales the smoke, “they sent my nephew to kill me.” He flicks the ash of his cigarette. “Cowards.”
Feng places his hand on his uncle’s. “No, the Xiang clan decided to not get involved, but also, not to get in the way of the Triad,” says Feng, just before he takes another drink from his tea.
“Nephew, do you know why I did it?” asks Jing, as he puts out his cigarette.
“For honor,” says Feng.
“No, nephew” says Jing, putting a newly lit cigarette in his mouth. “I did it for family.” Jing pours himself a second cup of tea. “If I didn’t kill Suma Tzu, we would have gone to war with the Mexicans.” Jing drinks some tea. “If you’re not here to kill me, why are you here?” asks Jing.
“Mother sent me,” says Feng, grabbing a cigarette from the pack sitting on the table. “She wanted me to thank you.”
“Why didn’t she come herself?” asks Jing.
“Because I have a message for you. One mother couldn’t deliver to her brother. I’m here to give you a choice,” says Feng.
Jing laughs. “Choice? What choice do I have? I can wait here and they’ll come in and shoot me, or I can leave and they’ll shoot me. Either way, I’m dead. Those aren’t choices,” Jing says, leaning forward to pour more tea in Feng’s empty cup.
Feng pulls a pistol out from his waist, a 9mm, and puts it on to the table with the barrel facing his uncle. “You can be a coward. You can waste their time and let them kill you.” Feng puts two fingers on the gun, and like his uncle, he slides it across the table and places it in front of him.“Or you can end it yourself, remove the shame you have brought the Xiang clan, and die with honor.”
Jing stands and throws the cup on the ground. Ceramic shards and tea disperse through the air, like shrapnel from a grenade. “Honor, honor!” yells Jing, “everything we have done was to bring honor to the Triad. If we went to war, who do you think would have fought? The Suma clan? You think the boss would send his family to fight? His children? His grandchildren? No, he would have sent us, my family, my children, and my grandchildren, to fight and die for his honor, not ours, and now you sit here lecturing me of honor,” he says, with tears flowing from his eyes
Feng’s eyes open wide, he grips the table, and swallows. “Uncle, you say you did this for the family, well then you know what you must do for the best interest of the family,” says Feng.
Jing sits back down looks down to his cigarette, almost burnt down to the filter and says, “Just go, nephew, tell your mother not to worry.”
Feng stands from the table and bows. He walks back into the hotel room and exits through the door into the hallway. As the door closes, a shot rings out. Feng leans his back against the door and slides down until he’s sitting with his knees up against his chest. His eyes swell and his cheeks turn red. Jing takes a deep breath then sobs as tears run down his face and begin to soak his arm.
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knowing
Janet Kuypers
haiku 3/1/14
fallen to my knees,
I can feel my chest cave in
knowing it’s my time
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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 three collection books from 2004: Oeuvre (poetry), Exaro Versus (prose) and L’arte (art), 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, the 2012 art book a Picture’s Worth 1,000 words (available with both b&w interior pages and full color interior pages, the shutterfly ISSN# cc& hardcover art book life, in color, Post-Apocalyptic, Burn Through Me, Under the Sea (photo book), the Periodic Table of Poetry, a year long Journey, Bon Voyage!, and the mini books Part of my Pain, Let me See you Stripped, Say Nothing, Give me the News, when you Dream tonight, Rape, Sexism, Life & Death (with some Slovak poetry translations), Twitterati, and 100 Haikus, that coincided with the June 2014 release of the two poetry collection books Partial Nudity and Revealed.
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Bloody Knuckles and Broken Bottles
King Wiz
The air felt like a sharp knife as I walked out into the cold. Tuesdays, I always hated Tuesdays for some reason. What made me hate Tuesdays more was that my phone has been ringing for the past two weeks on the same day with some jerk saying he knows something. I tightened my trench coat around me and lit up a cigar, trying to keep myself warm. The thought of somebody knowing my past worried me. Everybody who knew my past were either taken care of or was long gone on some fool’s attempt to climb the ranks in the criminal underworld like everybody else in this rotten town. The ringing of the phone ripped me away from my train of thought. I flipped open my phone and finally answered it.
“Meet me at Marv’s bar tonight” said the voice. It was something about this voice that felt like an angry spirit. Could it be a ghost from the past trying to haunt me? The identity of this mysterious caller was killing me. There was no point in me trying to follow any leads and get the drop on this person. I had to face this demon face to face. The trek to the diner felt longer then usual. Getting there, I flicked the cigar onto the ground and walked inside, letting the smell of bacon and pancakes whisk me on a journey. I thought I heard angels singing the glories of pancakes, but it was just Mary greeting me.
“Charlie! You look like you haven’t eaten in days! Come over here and let me pour a cup of coffee. Patrick is cooking your pancakes and bacon just how you like.” Mary poured me a cup of coffee and gave me a smile. I gave her a quiet nod and sat down drinking. I heard the bell ring as the front door opened and I looked back seeing a couple of knuckleheads looking for trouble.
“Mary? I hope you have insurance on this place.” I said calmly as I continued drinking my coffee. I reached into my pockets and slipped on my brass knuckles. I could hear the kids harassing the customers. These knuckleheads needed a lesson in manners. I lunged at the first kid and knocked a few of his teeth out with the first two punches. I didn’t give the second kid a chance to react as I elbowed him in the face. The third kid was quicker, grabbing a glass and smashed it in my face. I stumbled back into the counter. Looking back at it now, I was surprised that nobody came to my rescue. Maybe nobody wanted to help an old gangster like me or maybe it was God telling me that my time was coming near. But my survival instincts kicked in, I slowly reached for a fork and stabbed the kid. I ignored his screams and punched with everything I got. The kid was down, my head is bleeding, and it felt like I fought a whole army by myself. The phone ringing was the last thing I needed right now. I flipped it open and answered the call.
“Remember what I said. Don’t get cold feet on me just because a bunch of youngsters knock you around,” the voice felt familiar but at the same time it didn’t. I sighed as I hung up and rubbed my face. The only bad thing out of this fight was that I didn’t get to eat my pancakes. I headed out before the cops came and started asking questions. I slipped off my brass knuckles and headed back home. Time felt slow as I prepared myself to face my demon. I suited up in my bulletproof vest and checked the time. It was only eleven o’ clock pm and it would take fifteen to thirty minutes to get to the bar give or take. The drive to the bar felt like I bought a ticket to my own funeral. I parked my car in the empty parking lot and headed inside the bar. My fears were realized when I saw a younger man standing there with his back to me.
“It’s about time you got here old man. Before we get to the matters at hand. Do you know who I am?” the young man asked.
“You’re just another man I will kill today. I bet you’re some small fish trying to make it big time,” said Charlie with his arms crossed against his chest.
“You can’t even recognize your own flesh and blood. Don’t remember me big brother?” said the man as he turned around. It was Jason; he was Charlie’s little brother by two years. Charlie couldn’t believe it was Jason after all those years.
“Jason! I thought you-” Charlie wasn’t able to finish when Jason pulled out a gun on him.
“You ripped apart our family. You killed mother, father, and our little sister! You’re nothing but a monster!” yelled Jason in the amidst of tears.
“Sometimes it takes a monster to kill a monster. We come from a family of hired killers, but they enjoyed killing too much. A decision had to be made and I made the call. Jason, I don’t want to shoot you little brother,” said Charlie.
“Its too late for that old man,” said Jason. Charlie thought fast and quickly grabbed Jason’s shooting arm and moved it out of his face. Bullets flew everywhere, before Charlie punched Jason in the face. The two brothers fought till Jason got some room and shot his brother in the chest. As Charlie stumbled back, he pulled out his gun getting two shots out. One hit his chest and the other square in the head. Charlie hit the ground and opened his shirt, revealing that the vest had saved his life. Looking at his dead brother, he sighed sadly.
“Man, I really do hate Tuesdays.”
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Meds
Doug Hawley
As they did for the last eleven years, Duke and Jane packed up for their two week vacation at their secluded cabin at Frog Lake in the Cascades. As always, Duke told Jane to pack his xydox. And as always, he cautioned her “Taking my meds is a matter of life and death.” Jane said nothing, despite being sick of the routine.
After they got to the cabin, Duke said “I’m an hour overdue for taking my meds, and I can’t find them.”
“That’s because I didn’t bring them.”
“What?”
“I can’t stand you anymore, and I saw my way out. There is no way that you can get your meds before you die.”
“Did you plan on marrying Jason after I’m gone?”
“That’s right. I’ve got him in the palm of my hands. After you’re gone I’m moving up to an exciting guy that doesn’t think that watching TV for four hours after coming home from the insurance company and then going to bed at nine is a good time. How did you know about Jason?”
“There are a few holes in your plan.”
“Like what, smart guy, soon to be dead guy?”
“First, Jason talked to me about you. He thinks that you are pathetic and crude. He shudders every time you rub up against him. What you thought of as affection was just Jason being polite.”
“Even if you are right, I’ll still be happy to be rid of you. No one can prove that I deliberately forgot your meds.”
“Let’s look at mistake number two. You have totally misunderstood the meaning of ‘life and death’. It is your life or death. Years before I met you, I killed several people in a tavern brawl. The shrinks said I had ‘extreme anger issues’. Rather than go to jail, I was placed in an asylum. After a few years there, they found that with xydox, I could be very mild mannered, or as you put it deadly boring. With the understanding that I would always take my meds, I was released. Without my meds, under provocation, I’m likely to kill again. You are so self-centered that you never asked me what the meds were for. You just made a faulty assumption.”
“You wouldn’t hurt me, you love me.”
“You bring up your third mistake. I know that you only married me because the rich guy you tried to entrap by getting pregnant was sterile, and the real father was a meth-head loser. I was supposed to be a second choice meal ticket for you and your kid before you miscarried. I admit that I was mesmerized by your hour glass figure and felt lucky that I could land a prize like you. That was before your hour glass turned into a fireplug and your using sex to manipulate me caused me to look around. I found someone who loves me and wants to marry me as soon as I’m out of your clutches.”
“You’ll never get away with it.”
“What is this, some bad TV show? For the most part, I will away with it. Jason will be happy to testify that you had hinted I might not be alive long. You will be blamed for denying me my meds. I’ll do a little time at my former institution, followed by being cured again and in the arms of my curvy young beauty. Now why aren’t you running?”
Jane didn’t make it to the door.
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Desire Burned Your Doors to Ashes, art by Bill Wolak
He is Just Asleep!
Indunil Madhusankha
The metal huts set in the compound were all crowded
with his relatives, neighbors and fellow soldiers in the army
In the midst of the verandah, there was the sealed coffin,
a stylish wooden box with pale embellishments
His wife was seated there, leaning against the casket
All she wanted was just to be close enough to him
as she had always craved with all her heart,
and as they had both promised to each other
It had been more than half a day now
and she would not cease to leech
Then her mother came towards her
and caressed her head for a while saying,
“Come, my dear, it’s already the afternoon,
You have to eat something now,
You must be very hungry.
Let’s go, my dear!”
She replied in an uneasy tone,
“No mom, no, he’s still asleep, isn’t he?
You know mom, he’s just asleep!
They told me, you know, the fortune tellers!
There was nothing wrong with his horoscope.
So, how come?
Wait, I’ll come together with him to lunch.
He’ll knock when he wakes up.”
As she laboriously jabbered these words,
a few tears that had been struggling so far
rolled up from her reddish eyes
and fell on the floor thus bursting into droplets.
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Biography of Author
Indunil Madhusankha (B. H. I. Madhusankha) is currently an undergraduate in the Faculty of Science of the University of Colombo. Even though he is academically involved with the subjects of Mathematics and Statistics, he also pursues a successful career in the field of English language and literature as a budding young researcher, reviewer, poet and content writer. Basically, he explores the miscellaneous complications of the human existence through his poetry by focussing on the burning issues in the contemporary society. Moreover, Indunil’s works have been featured in several international anthologies, magazines and journals.
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Paradox
Indunil Madhusankha
Cemeteries everywhere,
newly cleared plains,
large patches of land,
and a congestion of tombs
from every feet to feet
Graves, concrete clad graves and
tombstones teeming with
beautifully inscribed letters
unveiling heavily coloured accounts
of thanksgiving and veneration
“Our gallant war hero, May you gain
the exaltation of emancipation!”
In expounding worldly life,
I can remember the monk stated
how the repellent sin of homicide
demands deterrent penalties in the hell
The torturer,
his belly protruding as if pregnant,
the two huge teeth like round horns,
ears like cart wheels,
skin as black as tar
Baying fiercely,
he will chop your neck apart
at a single stroke
Despite the unflinching sacrifice,
the truth is,
killers they are,
provoked by whatever means
Murderers attaining nirvana
sounds quite nonsense
Yet these convincing epigrams,
glaring prominent in grave stones
What a paradox is this?
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Biography of Author
Indunil Madhusankha (B. H. I. Madhusankha) is currently an undergraduate in the Faculty of Science of the University of Colombo. Even though he is academically involved with the subjects of Mathematics and Statistics, he also pursues a successful career in the field of English language and literature as a budding young researcher, reviewer, poet and content writer. Basically, he explores the miscellaneous complications of the human existence through his poetry by focussing on the burning issues in the contemporary society. Moreover, Indunil’s works have been featured in several international anthologies, magazines and journals.
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Death Protects
Nick Gregorio
It was on the news.
No one was named.
Nothing was solved.
People were dead and it was back to Sheena Parveen for the weather report—it was going to feel like Christmas should’ve.
***
“Motherfucker from his block did it,” Derrick said before first period. “Put three in him.”
I almost said, “Derrick. Language.” But didn’t.
A bell. Chairs scraping against linoleum. Whispers of James’ death before I got started.
I’d prepped a Powerpoint. Held a discussion about Lennie Small’s brains getting blown out. Why George would do that. How death protects from pain.
Marcy excused herself without a pass.
I said nothing, sat down. Wiped a coffee ring off my desk, filed stray papers.
***
Over the PA, a senior assembly in place of fourth.
Principal Adler talked about James. Used words like Senseless, and Future, and Cope.
There were tears from students, other teachers.
People signed up for sessions with the grief councilors brought in for the day.
We’d pick back up with Of Mice and Men tomorrow.
***
The English department offices were filled with sniffling, stories, comments about James’ papers—insightful for his age.
Matt said, “You had him, right?”
Sue said, “Good kid, wasn’t he?”
Chris said, “What are you thinking?”
I answered the questions. Told the truth. All good things.
Then, in his office, I told Chris that once this sort of thing happens enough it’s just cloudiness. Hypersensitive ears. Waiting for everyone to go back to normal.
***
The students were dismissed early.
We were asked to stay.
Figured I’d leave before I was allowed.
I smoked out back where the cameras had been ripped from the walls. Watched trash tumble down the filthy street. Homeless rummaging through mounds of garbage. People collecting on corners, handing things off, moving along.
All concrete, brick, and cinderblock. Chain link fences and caution tape.
Gray, cold, everything amplified by the squalor.
James got three put in him.
He was the third since September.
***
I had to Xerox a quiz.
I left anyway.
Walked over the glass in the parking lot. Kicked a syringe into a pile of dead leaves. Crushed a beer can as it rolled my way with the wind.
I’d go home. Work through my DVR. Drink coffee. Go to sleep with Nick at Nite casting a blue glow onto my bedroom walls in the dark. Then I’d wake up in the morning, go to work, and give a lecture on death and what it means and how sometimes it means nothing and how sometimes it loses meaning.
Alone in front of my car, my reflection in the window, I showed myself my teeth, arched the corners of my lips and turned my mouth into an inverted U, made a face people make when they cry—a face I never used to have to think about making.
Then I got in the car, started it up.
I drove home listening to the tires’ white noise on the road.
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Nick Gregorio Bio
Nick Gregorio lives, writes, and teaches in Philadelphia. His fiction has appeared in Crack the Spine, Yellow Chair Review, The Bitchin’ Kitsch and more. He is a contributing writer and assistant editor for the arts and culture blog, Spectrum Culture, and currently serves as fiction editor for Driftwood Press. He earned his MFA from Arcadia University in May 2015 and has fiction forthcoming in Zeit|Haus.
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sting
Janet Kuypers
haiku 2/28/14
it’s just a small sting.
it’s not physically painful.
it just hurts your heart.
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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 three collection books from 2004: Oeuvre (poetry), Exaro Versus (prose) and L’arte (art), 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, the 2012 art book a Picture’s Worth 1,000 words (available with both b&w interior pages and full color interior pages, the shutterfly ISSN# cc& hardcover art book life, in color, Post-Apocalyptic, Burn Through Me, Under the Sea (photo book), the Periodic Table of Poetry, a year long Journey, Bon Voyage!, and the mini books Part of my Pain, Let me See you Stripped, Say Nothing, Give me the News, when you Dream tonight, Rape, Sexism, Life & Death (with some Slovak poetry translations), Twitterati, and 100 Haikus, that coincided with the June 2014 release of the two poetry collection books Partial Nudity and Revealed.
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Burning Sensation
Stephanie Conley
I flinched at the sound of the glass breaking. “Christopher. Hurry up.”
Our family frame is smashed on the floor. I made eye contact with my father. He had that devious, twisted look that I only saw once when I was nine years old. That day he sliced off my fingers with an old, rusted, dull steak knife. After that incident, I was never supposed to see him again.
Six years later and he still had that menacing look, but I think it got worse. His dirty blonde hair spiked up messy. His darker than normal after shave. His smell was a combination of whisky and sweat. His eyes were bright green crazy. I forgot how terrifying he was when he got that way.
“Chris. Oh, Chris. I really don’t have all day. Decide who is going to live or die,” he said.
It was so hard for me to speak that I stuttered words that I didn’t even make out. All of a sudden, I felt a sharp burning sensation on my face.
“Don’t you dare hit my son,” I heard my mom shout.
I looked at her direction. I could tell by her facial expression that she felt helpless. What could she do? She was tied up on the chair. I wish I could’ve untied her, but if I even got close to her, my father would’ve beat me till I was unconscious.
“He is my son. I can put my hands anywhere on his body,” he winked at me viciously.
“Don’t you dare, you bastard.” She spat at him.
As my father wiped the spit off his face, he walked over to her with the knife that was lying piercingly on the coffee table.
I jumped. “Wait!”
My father smashed the bottle of whisky on the floor and yelled, “Well, for heaven sake’s boy! Who is going to die, you or your mother?”
I fell on my knees and cried, “Why must I decide on that?”
He walked over to me, grabbed the collar of my shirt, and pulled me close to his face.
“I haven’t seen you in person for six years. I’m not going to accept only phone calls anymore while that bitch gets to see you every day. It’s not fair,” he said as tears welled up in his eyes. “Either I have you or nobody has you. Understand?”
When he let go of my collar, I fell hard on the floor and started bawling.
“No, Chris. Don’t cry. You need to choose,” he said as tears went down his cheeks.
I couldn’t live without my mom. However, if I chose her, I won’t live. I knew my mom would understand if I chose her. She would’ve wanted me too. Unfortunately, I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I chose her. Honestly, I’d rather both of us had died.
“Honey, it’s okay. You have much more to live for. I’ll be in a better place,” my mother reassured.
I knew she’ll be in a better place, but I couldn’t put my mother through that. Six years later, I still feel the moment my father slashed my fingers, and the unbearable sensation is still indescribable. I didn’t want my mother to go through that pain.
I was never undeceive until today. The possibility that if I pick myself and he still kills my mother afterwards, haunts the process of my decision.
I looked up at my father, who was kneeling beside me, and asked, “How do I know-”
“No,” my father interrupted sharply. “No questions. Just pick.”
As I looked into my father’s welled up eyes, I remembered when I was really little. He would fly me around the house like I was an airplane. My father and I played laser tag every Saturday. Every morning we made shapes on our waffles with syrup. Every night my father would tell me fairy-tale stories that he made up in his mind... He would fly me around the house like I was an airplane.
Staring deep into my father’s eyes, I made a decision. “Me,” I whispered.
“What,” my father’s voice stuttered.
“Me,” I whispered again.
“No,” I heard my mother cry in the distance.
My father stared at me, laughing and crying at the same time. “You hate me.”
I didn’t say anything. All I could do is stare at the knife in his hand. He was wrong. I didn’t hate him. My love for him was in fear.
All of a sudden, he dropped the knife. I looked at him confused. He reached behind his coat pocket and pulled out a gun. My heart was pounding fast, knowing I was going to die instantly. That should’ve comfort me, though. Knowing he didn’t want me to suffer, made a little light into the situation. He pointed the gun... My eyes grew wide. The sound shattered my ears... I stopped shaking.
My heart dropped as I couldn’t stop staring at my father’s head. Seeing the blood flow out, feeling his warm blood that splattered on my face, gave me mixed feelings of relief and agony.
“Chris. Come here,” I heard my mother saying in the distance.
I walked over and untied her. Once she was released, she squeezed me so hard while crying.
When I saw her face, her smile quickly ran away. “I love you, Chris. I know that I can’t make you un-see what you’ve just seen, but I am here for you.”
Her voice sounded distant. My ears were still ringing. Everything was turning blurry. I felt the cold floor hit my face.
The last thing I remember seeing was a blurry vision of my mother plugging the phone and pressing three buttons.
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Blues Man
Roger G. Singer
He breathed out the blues with
the release of a raspy washboard,
capturing the days full of sweat
under a full sun or nights hanging
moss or in backrooms where spilled
whiskey drenches sawdust floors.
He had a birth of songs flash spitting
from hot greasy pans of his kingdom high
thoughts, peppered with dreams, shining
golden and dripping honey from his fingers
onto piano black and white teeth, feeding
back to him the life of toe tappingand the
sway that keeps his walk.
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Long Long on the Moon Ride
David A. Forrester
I sat with a cat. He was peach and cream and grey with a little bit of black. The patches of color had faded outlines that allowed the colors to blend slightly. He had been accused of stowing away earlier but that was cleared up. He sat alone as if an outcast and somehow I ended up next to him.
Unlike the cat, this was my first voyage on a sky ship. In fact the cat was inured to this; as if he had done it all his life. I saw him the first day I came aboard but he never stayed on deck. It was probably why they questioned his legitimacy.
He kept his eyes cast down at the deck boards. My eyes wandered everywhere. I looked at the deck boards and glanced at the cat. A flow of yellow light was coming off his face and collecting on the floor. I felt uneasy for some reason when I saw this. I looked over the side of the ship. I watched the stars swirl into the distance as they stirred in our wake.
“Careful”
I turned when I heard the word. The cat was still. He sat motionless as if he could not have spoken, yet there was no one else near.
“Did you speak?” I asked him, but there was no reply.
I was sure he had spoken. I thought if I leaned over the edge I could influence him to speak again. I leaned out to look at the stars below us and in an instant the wake pulled my hat off and tugged at my body. I grabbed at the side and felt my waist hit the cross rail. There was more of my body above the rail than below and I had the sick feeling of being lost. The cat pounced on my leg and dug into my jeans. His weight was just enough to make me balance on the edge and lower back onto the ship.
“What an ass hole,” said the cat.
“You did speak”
“And you lost your hat”
“Thank you for helping me out there”
The cat looked at me with his eyes wide open. They were clear gold like a crisp white wine. They even seemed to swirl like the last sip in the bottom of a glass. A pulsating glow of light came out, casting a wash of color on me that had the feel of neon at twilight. He didn’t speak again but turned his eyes away and went back into his hunched stance; his face was down towards the deck boards once again.
I sat next to him in silence for a while. I was calm but just knowing he was beside me gnawed at my conscience. Then as if he felt my thoughts he turned and spoke.
“Look I don’t usually take the ship anymore. There are quicker ways to get to the moon. I missed the rise and have to bide my time.”
I didn’t have anything to say to that. I wanted to tell him I liked sailing on the ship even if it took longer than whatever way he usually took, but even before I formulated my response he continued.
“I don’t have any problems with you but... well OK I do. You’re a first timer and they are always full of questions I don’t want to answer.”
“I tell you what,” I said “I won’t ask you any questions. How’s that?”
For some reason he looked at me wide eyed again and went silent. We sat quiet as the sky ship sailed on in a surreal atmosphere of humming and pulsating silence. The kind you think you hear. Then with a sway in my stomach the ship banked to the left and I saw the outline of the earth crest over the side and then slide away. It gave me a strange out of body feeling. It was like being able to look back at the full length of my life while I was still in it.
“I’m jealous,” said the cat.
“Of what? Of me?”
“I saw your eyes. I remember that look and the feeling that comes with it. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen that sight. I saw it, the way you just did once upon a time. I’ve let the feeling slip away. A vagabond once told me to look at the earth like you are never going to return. It makes you appreciate it.”
Tears welled up in his eyes. I don’t think I ever saw a cat cry before.
“What’s your name?” I asked.
“Don’t ask that”
“What should I call you, I just wanted...”
“What’s wrong with cat? I’ll call you man. It’s not like we will get mixed up with anyone else.”
“Why are you sad cat?”
“You promised not to ask me any questions”
We sat quiet for some time. The surrounding darkness was filled with barely visible shapes. There were forest trees and mountain ranges, valleys that we slid through or were engulfed in and clouds of giant birds that burst out in all directions at once like fantastic displays of fireworks. All the shapes were shades of black on black with stars that glittered and twirled throughout. The cat had a much more friendly air about him. The depth of the blackness around us was beautiful. Stars created a three dimensional effect that was humbling. Quickly a couple of shooting stars crossed the bow.
“I like them,” said the cat.
“Me too,”
“Never stop appreciating small things; in the end they make all the difference.”
I wanted to ask why but just answered, “I won’t”
After a while I found it hard to think of something to say that wasn’t a question. I made a couple more attempts at small talk but soon it seemed the cat had gone to sleep. I stood up and watched the stars. They seemed to fade as we approached the moon. We were still a day away from the surface but I couldn’t help but wonder if I should wake the cat. He looked so peaceful that I decided I would let him be.
One of the strange things about this ride was that I never ate nor drank. I also wasn’t sure I was breathing. And now that I think about it I never slept. I don’t even know how the passage of time was marked. Suddenly as if waking from a dream we docked along the lunar wharf.
Several sailors with featureless faces and nondescript clothes came down from the upper deck and secured the ropes. A few on the wharf placed planks for safe passage onto the moon. A couple of dark passengers I hadn’t really paid attention to before, passed off the ship and into the mist that blanketed the surface. I walked up to the plank to depart and glanced back along the deck but the cat wasn’t there. I stepped back out onto the deck but couldn’t see him.
I spent three days on the moon. I could tell when a day passed by the rotation of the earth in the sky, but the sun never set on the lunar horizon. It was always full sunlight across the pale sky. I went into a tavern and saw several strange characters that I did not feel comfortable making contact with. The tender was not too friendly either. He was all business, that is, if it was a he.
There were however, a few cats at a table in the back. They looked much taken aback as I approached. In fact they made motions as if they were going to leave if I continued. I raised a hand in gesture to say that I would not. I instead obtained drinks for them. It was difficult to get the tender to transfer the drinks but the acknowledgements from the cats were received.
Despite accepting my gift they did not become friendly. I gave up my desire to communicate with them, took my drink and walked back outside. There were a couple of shooting stars but nothing else occurred. I thought about the cat on the ship and what he said about looking at the earth as if I would never see it again. It did make me appreciate the planet a little more, but it also made me wonder exactly what he meant. Did he mean as if I would never return to the earth or if I would never get to see it from the moon again? The first idea was worrisome but the second was sad.
I never went out into the wilderness but stayed in the small outpost with its sparse scattered buildings. I spent most of my time in the tavern or the lunar library. I did go into a general equipment store but found nothing to my liking.
The morning of the day I departed I did venture out behind the tavern towards a giant crater that engulfed the whole western scene. It dropped away after a hundred feet from the building and stretched to the horizon. I had stirred up small whiffs of dust as I walked, but now noticed deep drifts in the raised spots at the base of the basin. I also had not seen or felt any kind of wind or air movement but as I watched the scenery I saw columns of lunar dust rise and spin in the distance. The columns grew in size and at times split into two columns where there had been one and each new column was as large as or larger than the original. Soon over a dozen dust columns were spinning violently and racing toward the edge of the crater where all at once they collapsed and where gone. All in total silence.
Without the rotation of the earth in the sky there was no change to indicate the time of day. At first, time seemed to not exist, where the day lasted for eons until it was time to return to the ship.
Once on board the movement of time was different. It was still practically indiscernible but yet different. The first day was uneventful but on the second day I saw the three cats that I had purchased drinks for in the tavern. They were talking with much animation. I approached them and as they recognized me, they did not shy away but their lively talk became subdued.
“Is this your first ride?” I asked.
They became quiet; one young cat did turn toward me and spoke.
“Yes for me, why?”
“How did you get on the moon?”
The cats looked at me with strange expressions.
“How did you get on the moon?” asked the older cat.
I realized my questions was an absurd one and let it pass. We were quiet for a while and then I asked the question I had wanted to ask them on the moon.
“Did you see a dilute calico with gold eyes come onto the surface?”
They shook there heads. No one made a sound. Again all was quiet. The stars grew bright again as we left the lunar glow far behind. I peeked over the side and saw them swirl in the wake, careful not to lean over the edge.
The next day I saw only the young cat up on deck. He sought me out.
“Did they glow?”
“The stars?” I asked.
“The gold eyes of the cat,”
“Yes they did, why?”
“It was time to return,”
“What do you mean?”
At that the other two cats came up and chided the young one for talking to me. They avoided me the rest of the trip. After that day I never saw them again.
I’ve taken the moon ride several times since and have met a few cats. They’re friendly enough but will not share much information. A few times I have mentioned the cat with the gold eyes but each time it was a turn-off. It seems to touch a nerve or breach a private area they prefer to keep secret. In memory of my friend, I’ll honor their wishes.
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An Open Letter to the Lady with a Dog
Daniel Mark
To the Lady with a Dog,
You don’t know me and probably don’t remember me but I remember you. I cannot imagine what you thought when you saw me pressed against the hood of my car by a police officer while another held a gun on me. You were drinking coffee, dressed in seasonally appropriate jogging wear. You were probably out walking your dog that morning, maybe before work. I didn’t even know what day it was. The officer knew. He knew a lot more than me. He knew that someone had called in a report of an unconscious man in a car. The driver side door was ajar. He was possibly injured. Possibly dead.
It was a cool spring morning, I could feel the dew on the hood of my car as my face was pressed against it. So I knew I wasn’t dead. At least I knew that. You probably knew what day it was. The officer bounced my head a couple times, maybe hoping it would help me know something else. Maybe to help me understand why I chose to pass out drunk in a strange neighborhood. It didn’t help. I didn’t even know how I got here. Maybe he just wanted me to know that it’s a terrible idea to reach for your pockets when two police officers are about to search you. The gun added punctuation to his point. So he bounced my head off the hood a couple of times while his partner yelled and pointed the gun and yelled some more. I didn’t say anything and the officer was gentle enough not to leave any dents on my hood. I wish he had. Maybe a little reminder of the things he wanted me to know, the things I should have known. I looked up from the yelling and saw you looking at me. They kept yelling and unseen hands groped my body and I saw you and you saw them and I looked away in shame. I hope I didn’t scare you.
I hadn’t bathed in a few weeks and it was obvious that I was living in my car. I was still drunk and when I shuffled out to greet the officer, a half empty bottle of whiskey fell out of my lap onto the ground. My keys were in the ignition. The officer saw all of this. I hope that you didn’t. The officer saw that I was terrified, confused. He also saw that I was in my twenties, cooperative, spoke well even if it were in a slur and white. The last part, he noticed the most. He noticed it because he was too. And so was his partner. And so were you. He wasn’t happy about me being drunk and asleep in a car in a family neighborhood but he would have been less so if I hadn’t been white.
He didn’t put handcuffs on me and he didn’t write me a citation. I hope that you didn’t see when he opened my trunk and threw the bottle in, when he gave my keys back to me with a smile that saidThese things happen sometimes. I really hope that your dog had tugged you away from the scene, insistent that it continue it’s walk so then maybe you didn’t hear him say, “I want you to get some sleep and when you are sobered up, I want you to head home. Don’t drive and don’t let this happen again.” He patted me on the shoulder and told me to have a good day and be safe, like I was a son.
I’m sorry.
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Daniel Mark Bio
Daniel Mark received his BA in Creative Nonfiction from the University of Nebraska at Omaha. He writes to capture the smaller moments in life- the passing glance or a snatch of conversation overheard while walking down a busy street. Through those brief windows, he believes, truth can be found in it’s most raw and honest state. He hopes to one day find that line that can encapsulate the entirety of a person’s existence. When not writing or working whatever job will have him, he tries desperately to find a comfortable place to read.
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heaviness
Janet Kuypers
haiku 2/15/14
before scientists
knew the law of gravity,
the word just felt grave.
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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 three collection books from 2004: Oeuvre (poetry), Exaro Versus (prose) and L’arte (art), 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, the 2012 art book a Picture’s Worth 1,000 words (available with both b&w interior pages and full color interior pages, the shutterfly ISSN# cc& hardcover art book life, in color, Post-Apocalyptic, Burn Through Me, Under the Sea (photo book), the Periodic Table of Poetry, a year long Journey, Bon Voyage!, and the mini books Part of my Pain, Let me See you Stripped, Say Nothing, Give me the News, when you Dream tonight, Rape, Sexism, Life & Death (with some Slovak poetry translations), Twitterati, and 100 Haikus, that coincided with the June 2014 release of the two poetry collection books Partial Nudity and Revealed.
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Haiku In 3D
Edward Alexander
I scored some speed in G-ville, so me and Blondie could get a little bump. I parked the Chevelle a couple of doors down from Cuban Dave’s. Anybody in the know knew the Cuban would be holding. I gave Blondie enough bread to score an eight ball and waited in the car.
She walked up the steps where two big dudes for muscle sitting on the porch gave her the up and down. Blondie pushed her Ray-Bans up and I knew she was giving them a wink. You would be hard pressed to find any male from eight to eighty who wouldn’t agree that she was hot as a pawnshop pistol. Blondie went through the front door and the two dudes on the porch turned their attention back to the street and stared at me. Maybe they were just being impressed with the Chevelle, maybe they were trying to be intimidating but that didn’t matter, I had my own nine-millimeter intimidation under the seat.
Four of the Cuban’s girls were working the block, pulling over drive by johns. A blonde kid with ratty hair who couldn’t have been more than sixteen, already she had that thousand-yard stare. She walked up and tapped on the window. I cracked it an inch and told her to take a hike. She flipped a middle finger, walked not more than twenty feet in front of the car wearing a short short mini skirt and dirty white go go boots. She stood at the curb like a neon sign flashing and it worked. The next car pulled up and the chump dropped the passenger window all the way and she leaned in and it didn’t take half a minute for her to sell the blowjob.
I was jumpy as a cat, parked on this cracked out hooker stroll; the reason was, I was holding thirty pounds of Gainesville Green in the trunk. Just then Blondie came out, stopped on the porch and said something to the two muscles and their stares glued right to her ass as she walked away. She slid in beside me and said, “I got it, let’s go.”
“What took so damn long?” I asked.
“Shit the dumb ass wanted me to go out and hook for em, kept trying to talk me into it.”
”Well,” I said, as I pulled the car out and damn glad to be getting gone, “You got to make a living.”
She pushed the Ray Bans up on her head and said, “You know, you got the heart of a fifty year old whore,” then she gave me that wink.
Just before I- 75, I pulled the Chevelle behind a strip mall. Blondie took out the stuff and dumped some on her compact mirror and mashed it into a power with the back of a lipstick holder. She had that long fingernail on the pinky of her right hand, she scooped it full and said, “Here,” she does it again for the other side; then does herself. Now with the trigger wound and a full tank of gas we hit the road for Texas.
Blondie started talking, she would get wired and go on for hours. It was always the same, one topic falling right into another. She started talking about the rhinos disappearing and I put the bird-dog on and the hammer down. The Chevelle was a 70 with a 396 and fuelie heads and at ninety it was just coming up to cruising. By the time we got to I -10 the rhinos had been left way behind, now she was saying what a crying shame it was that, that damn actor had got in the White House. “Imagine.” she said, “The country being run by a damn actor and a cop.”
“I don’t think George Bush was ever a cop.” I said.
“Ran the damn CIA, how much more cop than that do you need?”
“Well yeah,” I said. “There was that.” I turned on the CB and picked up the mike and it was like an off button to Blondie. There was an eighteen wheeler coning up on the other side of the interstate, I pushed the button on the mike and said, “How about it east-bound, how’s it lookin over your shoulder?”
Through the highway static, the trucker answered back “It’s clean and green all the way to Tally Town,” which meant he hadn’t seen any state troopers as far back as Tallahassee.
Skinny Dennis had got me this work, some friend of a friend had come to G-ville and bought the dope and was going to pay a dime an L B to have it driven. It was a quick three thou minus expenses for two days driving. Blondie was just coming along to get high and talk.
Fifty miles out of Tallahassee she has the loaded pinky nail in my face again and is telling me about God, Buda and the seven chakras, how I needed to get out of my second chakra and move up to the third.
“If there’s seven why stop at three?” I asked.
“Cause you got to meditate for years to open your heart chakra, course a good dose of Orange Sunshine will do it too. Pull over so I can go pee.”
Just outside of Pensacola, Blondie stopped talking, I asked if she wanted another bump and she took out the bag of crank, and handed it to me and said. “No, I’m done, stop before long, I gotta eat somethin.”
I pulled into a truck stop and drank black coffee while Blondie ate a chicken fried steak. Not long after we went through Pensacola Blondie put her head back and closed her eyes and said, “Remember to sing that song when you go through the Mobile Tunnel.”
“What song is that?” I asked.
“You know the Bob Dylan song about Mobile and Memphis. I used to always sing it to myself when I’d drive through, on my way to Mississippi.” She closed her eyes and fell asleep with a smile on her face.
Every fifty miles or so I took out the speed and put a little on the back of my hand and sniffed it off. I drove across the bottom of Alabama and Mississippi. I drove into Louisiana and crossed the Twin Span Bridge that runs six miles over Lake Pontchartrain. I was flying and every truck I passed I asked into the CB mike, “How about it east bound, how’s it lookin over your shoulder.”
Just outside of New Orleans I stopped for gas and Blondie opened her eyes and asked, “Where are we?”
“The other side of New Orlins, we’ll have breakfast in Houston.” As we drove through Southern Louisiana the windows were rolled down and a salt breeze from the Gulf blew across the coastal plain. The radio was playing Zydeco music, I turned the volume down low and we talked through the night, we talked about forever.
The sun was coming up when I pulled into a pancake house on the other side of Beaumont. I called Skinny Dennis’s friend of a friend and he says he can’t see me until afternoon. I got the address and directions and bought a Houston street map. His house was easy to find, just off Telephone road. I drove by just to check it out, make sure there weren’t any cars with funny looking antennas parked near by.
We got a motel for two nights on Telephone Road, showered, made love and I called down to the front desk for a wake up call in four hours.
Just before I walked out to go make the delivery, Blondie sat up in bed “Hey, leave me some cash, so I can get something to eat and have a beer.”
I had a fifty, a ten and three ones, I handed her the fifty. “That’s all we got,” I said.
“Go get paid then,” she said and she gave me the wink.
The friend of a friend was waiting at the front door, we both carried a duffle bag into his place and he set up a triple beam and checked the weights. Then he hit me with the bad news.
“Look I can’t pay you, I mean I can’t pay you today,” he said.
“What do you mean you can’t pay me! When?”
“Maybe two days or you can take some dope. I’ll give you two elbows.”
“What the hell can I do with weed in a strange city?” He stood and for the first time I noticed that he’s way too big to threaten and the Glock was still in the car under the front seat. After I calmed down some I saw the possibilities for the better payday. I could take the dope, carry the pot back to G-ville, ounce it out and make another two grand. All I had to do was sell an ounce or two for traveling money; so I took the pot. Each of the thirty L Bs was individually packaged in freezer bags; I took two of them and opened one. The friend of a friend set up the triple beam again and weighed out four o zs, putting each in sandwich baggies. I put it all in a black garbage bag and put it in the trunk behind the spare tire, then without even a handshake drove away.
Back at the motel, Blondie was laying on the bed watching ‘The Price is Right.’ “Hey handsome,” she said, “You gonna to buy me a steak dinner now?”
“I didn’t get paid, least not in money,” I said, closing the door and leaning against it.
“What’d he give you diamonds?” She put the remote on mute.
“Pot, I just gotta sell a little and we’ll be fine.”
“And just how you plan on doing that, gonna make a sandwich sign and stand on the corner?”
“I thought I’d find a bar that looks right and just sit there, I saw a biker’s bar a couple miles back. I can just nurse a beer and start conversations until the right person comes along, hell it’s gonna be someone’s lucky day.”
“Shit, you’ll get busted,” she said and walked to the bathroom strips off the tee-shirt and jeans and brushed her golden hair then took a dress from her bag and slipped it on, it was turquoise blue and slinky with little straps.
“What the shit you think you’re doin?” I asked.
“Going to go make enough to get us home.”
“No way,” I said to her. “You ain’t gonna go out and sell pussy.”
“You don’t boss me sweetie,” she said. “Besides next time you look, you won’t even notice none is gone.” and she walked out.
I waited five minutes then went to the car and took the pistol from under the seat and put it in my waistband. I zipped up the windbreaker to hide the gun and followed her to the Red Lobster next to the motel. There was a barroom on one side of the restaurant and Blondie was sitting at the bar and she already had a chump sitting beside her, leaning in close. I took a booth next to the window where I could watch Blondie’s back. I ordered a Budweiser and checked out the room. There were two guys sitting in the back that didn’t look right. One was dressed in a suit and tie, he even had on wingtip shoes; his companion was a middle aged, over weight hippie, whose clothes looked too new. Then Blondie and the chump stood, he left a bill on the bar and they headed for the door. “Damn,” I said to myself, “She don’t take long. Hot as a pawnshop pistol.”
Then the two guys who didn’t look right stood and walked out, I noticed their drinks were left unfinished and I knew Blondie was being set up. I saw the whole thing through the plate glass window beside me. Blondie and the chump had only gone about twenty steps towards the motel when the two guys who didn’t look right were out the front door and the chump grabbed her tight by the shoulder. It didn’t take up two minutes, they had her cuffed and in the patrol car that must have been waiting out of sight. There was nothing I could do but go back to the motel room where a notice taped on the phone said ‘FREE LOCAL CALLS.’ I called the jail and found out that I couldn’t see Blondie until after she was arraigned the next morning. I got the Courthouse’s address and lay awake watching late-night television and thought about bad luck. To work a bar that the vice cops were working the same night, just bad luck. I fell asleep with the TV on.
I arrived at the Courthouse early and ended up waiting half the day. It was the middle of the afternoon before she was brought in. She was in line with a dozen or more other women. Blondie was the seventh one to stand in front of the Judge and was charged with pandering and given a twenty thousand dollar bond. We make eye contact before she was walked out a side door, she gave me the wink but it was only half assed. A Bailiff told me I couldn’t see her there at the Courthouse but I could visit her at the Jail. An hour later I was sitting in a small cubical across from Blondie with three inches of Plexiglas between us. She looked tired and worn and now was wearing an orange jailhouse jump suit. She picked up the phone and before I could say a thing she said, “I can’t take it in here, get me out.”
“Ten percent of twenty thousand, all I got is that product.” I said. “You got anybody I can call?”
“I don’t have anybody left, I’ve run out of selections.” Then she said, “Nothing last forever anymore.”
She stood and hung up the receiver and was turning away as I said into my phone, “You hang in there.” She couldn’t hear me but she turned and looked me in the eye and didn’t wink.
Across from the Jail there was half a dozen bails bonds signs on the windows. They would all be the same price, those guys never have specials. I was told what I already knew, two thousand dollars up front to get it done. Excluding armed robbery there was only one way to make two grand fast and that was to revert to plan A, sell the pot, all of it. I went back to the motel and waited until evening.
I drove back to the biker bar I’d seen the day before, it looked to be the kind of place that you could come right out and ask someone if they wanted to buy two pounds of homegrown marijuana. The place was already crowded, at least twenty bikes parked in the gravel parking lot. A group wearing leather jackets with the Bandidos patch sewed on the backs were standing there drinking beer. I parked and sat in the car and watched, this could be tricky. I had to weigh the options. I’d lose the two grand that I would put up for the bond because she would skip for sure. Hell I could get robbed but I wouldn’t let that be easy or I might have to kill somebody and the truth of the matter was, I hadn’t known Blondie that long. Then I thought about forever. I took the pistol from under the seat and stuck it in my waistband, I left the windbreaker unzipped so the outline of the gun was plain to see. I took the garbage bag from behind the spare in the trunk and took out one of the o zs. As I walked across the parking lot the bikers were all checking me out and I knew they all saw the outline of the Glock. There was one that seemed to be the center of the group. He was big and tall with red hair pulled back in a ponytail, a red beard clipped short. He didn’t have his leathers on, his jacket was draped over the handlebars of the nearest bike. The front of his T-shirt said, ‘WHAT DID BUDDHA SAY TO THE HOTDOG VENDER—.’ I walked up and stood in front of Red Beard. He was smiling and gave me the up and down and said, “You looken’ for the O K Coral Stretch,” it wasn’t a question.
I held out the ounce of homegrown, “I got two pounds of this, I’ll sell it for three thousand.”
He took the baggie, unzipped the seal and held it up to his nose. “Why so generous?” he asked and he held onto the bag.
“I need to go someone’s bail, I got to raise the ten percent.” I said.
He nodded his head in understanding, “You got it here?”
“It’s in the car.”
“Show me,” he said and along with the group followed me to the Chevelle.
I popped the trunk and opened the garbage bag. “This is Gainesville Green,” I said. “I brought it from Florida myself.”
He leaned over checked out the product then dropped the baggie he was holding in with the rest of it, stood and said, “Bring that inside.” He turned and headed back to the bar, I took the dope and followed “Nice ride,” he said over his shoulder. The back of his T-shirt said, ‘MAKE ME ONE WITH EVERYTHING—”.
I felt a little apprehensive carrying a garbage bag of dope into a strange bar, so I said to Red Beard’s back, “You wanna do this right here?”
“You got nothing to worry about, you on my playground now,” he said. “Besides you got your pistol.” Two of the other bikers that had come along laughed.
The barroom was crowded with Banditos and biker chicks but there’s one guy in a booth that looked completely out of place. He was dressed in a suit and a loosened tie, there was two biker chicks sitting with him. Red Beard walked up to his table, leans down and whispers in his ear, the suit said something back to him and Red Beard took the product from me. The suit took one of the freezer bags out and put it on the table in front of God and everyone. He opened it and took a good sniff. Then him and Red Beard talked low and Red Beard turned to me and asks. “The weight right?”
“It’s right on the money,” I said.
“Twenty-five hundred,” he said.
I figured it was not the time or place to haggle, I nodded, and said, “Ok.”
Then Red Beard took me by the arm and said, “Lets step back outside, leave the dope here.”
I left the pot at the table with the dude, if this was a rip off I told myself I was going to shoot Red Beard right in the head.’ Outside in the parking lot we stood around waiting until another biker came out and handed me twenty-five one hundred dollar bills. I counted the cash and held out my hand to Red Beard, he didn’t shake but said, “You should get on out of here.”
I bought a fifth of Smirnoff and went back to the motel where I sat in the dark and drank half the bottle before I could sleep.
The next morning the first bail bondsman that unlocked his front door, I was there. I laid the two thousand down and he made a phone call then had me sign a few papers and I walked with him across the street to the jailhouse. We took an elevator up to the third floor. There’s a thickness of desperation that’s in all jailhouses, it’s in the air and on the walls. I could feel it as we rode up the elevator, like the film that builds up in a greasy hamburger joint. On the third floor I took a seat on a bench in the hall and the bondsman went to take care of business. It seemed a little too soon that the bondsman was back, along with a cop in uniform.
The bondsman sat beside and said, “Your friend is dead, she hung herself.”
I guess I must have been in shock because I asked, “Can I get my money back?”
“Of course,” said the bondsman.
“Were you Family?” asked the cop.
“No, I was just a friend, I came to bail her out.”
“She left a note with an address and phone number in Mississippi, we already called, they’re going to make arrangements to have her body shipped home.”
“She had a pair of sunglasses, I’d like to get ‘em, if I could,” I said to the cop.
“I’m sorry,” he said, “but all her stuff needs to be returned with her to the family.”
“We were friends,” I said. “We could’ve lasted forever.”
“Wait here.” He walked away and returned with the Ray-Bans and handed them to me saying, “You didn’t get these from me.” The sunglasses were tortoise shell Wayfarers with scratches on the glass. I put them on and pushed them up on my head the way Blondie did.
The bondsman returned the money; I filled the gas tank and put what was left of the eight-ball on the seat beside me. Just as I was leaving Houston a slow rain started falling and it rained all the way until I reached Mobile. I didn’t put the bird-dog on, I just put the hammer down and flew and I never slowed under a hundred. Maybe it was the rain that kept the troopers with their radar away, or maybe they just thought better of it when I flew by but I didn’t see a cop one.
The Wallace Tunnel are two tunnels, built side-by-side, one for Eastbound and one for West; they go under the Mobile River. The tunnels are round and tiled in white and lit up very bright and it looks like you’re driving down a long hospital corridor. Suddenly I was crying and at the same time singing, Bob Dylan, out loud.
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Edward Alexander Bio
Prolific poet and storyteller Edward Alexander has lived many lives, which he artfully weaves into in his tales of prose and his poetry. His travels have carried him and his pen many places, He fought fires in Vietnam, came home and rode the rails. In 1969 he thumbed his way to Key West Florida, were he stayed for five years. There he dove for conch shells to sell to tourist, he started learning the fine craft of woodworking and became part of the literary journal Solares Hill.
He was first published as a poet in the early seventies and started giving readings in coffee houses, bars and Universities. His writing has appeared in numerous journals since then. Today, when not writing Edward works in his woodshop, outside of Austin, Texas, designing and making one-of-a-kind pieces of furniture.
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fit
Janet Kuypers
haiku 2/15/14
amazing how much
of your life you can fit in
a single suitcase
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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 three collection books from 2004: Oeuvre (poetry), Exaro Versus (prose) and L’arte (art), 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, the 2012 art book a Picture’s Worth 1,000 words (available with both b&w interior pages and full color interior pages, the shutterfly ISSN# cc& hardcover art book life, in color, Post-Apocalyptic, Burn Through Me, Under the Sea (photo book), the Periodic Table of Poetry, a year long Journey, Bon Voyage!, and the mini books Part of my Pain, Let me See you Stripped, Say Nothing, Give me the News, when you Dream tonight, Rape, Sexism, Life & Death (with some Slovak poetry translations), Twitterati, and 100 Haikus, that coincided with the June 2014 release of the two poetry collection books Partial Nudity and Revealed.
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Good Times Bad Times Bar
Matthew Hoch
The sun was slowly tucking itself away from the world, making way for the first night of the year that was really crisp. It signaled that fall was changing shifts with winter. Scarves, heavy coats, and the visible breath on exhale would all be a part of everyone’s future.
I preferred fall; I fancied I looked better in button-down shirts than sweaters. If only worrying about what sweater to wear was my top concern, I’d be living a pretty content life. What sweater to wear didn’t even make my rather long list of concerns.
I’d been in two serious relationships in my life. One relationship started in and lasted through college; it kept me from having to worry about chasing other desirable women. It was a warm and cozy blanket of mediocrity. I didn’t even like Tess, but she was a thin warm body who would let me penetrate her ladyness on a regular basis. For a kid who thought no woman would have sex with him, I was doing okay.
Then after a drought that would’ve taken better men than me, Suzy came along. She saw something in me I couldn’t see. She felt right. She was right. I didn’t feel obligated with her the way I did with Tess. The born loser had one. Ha, take that world, I thought at the time. Well, the world answered back. And with vengeance. Righting the niche it had placed for me, Suzy disappeared into the arms of one far more successful, right from under my nose. He had everything I lacked—confidence, success, and a dream house. As one should by thirty-two, right? My heart was still recovering from her ripping it from my chest and evaporating from its exposure to the elements. I guess what she saw in me never materialized. I had kissed a girl, two months ago. It made me miss sweet, warm glossed female lips pressing up against mine. There was no second date, however. I either said the wrong thing over text or didn’t say enough.
As for my job success; being the perennial junior copywriter at Marshall, Fibers, and Winston, an advertising agency, while I watched young new hires transcend the rungs on the ladder I could never climb was not my idea of award winning. I wasn’t old, but I wanted to have more career success under my belt at thirty-two.
Yes, I, Mark Holter, was a bit of a wall flower you could say; a tall, thin, blond one, but one nonetheless who was coasting through an otherwise comfortable life that was driving me crazy. I felt like I wanted to go out there and run, but I was stuck in jello. With my life feeling like it was deteriorating, I surrendered to the notion that I should make a change.
And so, I sought the advice of my friend Steve. He had been struggling with similar things, his own inflicted roadblocks and the struggle against one’s unrelenting antagonist of self doubt, until recently. In fact, his life had completely turned around. His life was now the vision board of what I wanted my life to be. Job success, throngs of women, and what seemed to be like a restored self were all part of his life now. How I envied him for it.
We were out drinking. He was on his fourth margarita, regaling me with stories of how great life was, when I just simply asked how he did it. He asked me if I had the confidence to walk into a bar by myself, order a drink, and be content there, owning the space around me. Without hesitation, I answered, absolutely not. He told me the perfect bar to go to practice this new art of Zen. It was step one to the new me, he said.
It was called Good Times, Bad Times Bar. I had never heard of it. There were no reviews on yelp. But, there I was, staring at it as the sun went down. A big, ominous wooden door that was flush with black brick walls stared back at me. There was a small sign with the bar’s name above it.
Was I really doing this? Was something this small so big to me? After all, it was just walking into a place by myself.
Jamming my hands into my jean pockets, I paced back and forth in front of the door as if I was picketing. I was looking deep into a pool, wondering the temperature of the water, but not jumping in to find out.
I bought new clothes from J. Crew for the occasion. I styled my hair, ever so carefully, with this new Crew pomade, brushed my teeth, rinsed with both whitening mouthwash for appearance and Listerine for a minty fresh smell. I made sure my pockets were riddled with Altoids to stay fresh. A dollop of cologne was applied on my neck. I had taken my scarf off, put it back on, and taken it off again. I repeated this step four times before leaving with my scarf on. And now, with my scarf left on the passenger’s seat of my car, I placed my hand on the cold metallic handle attached to the full wooden door. I would’ve paid good money for a truckload of Xanax at that moment.
I opened the door.
Dirty-blues rock was blaring over the speakers. The smell of dried beer wafted through the air and into my nostrils. The door closed behind me. There was a loud clunk. If I didn’t know any better, I would’ve said it sounded like the door locked behind me.
I took microscopic steps towards the bar. A turtle would’ve yelled at me to pick up the pace. I moved through a cloud of smoky mist. It reminded me of driving through fog at dusk.
It was pretty barren in there. When I looked to my left, all I saw were empty tables. Empty, except one. I had never seen such a girl in my life. I felt a frisson of excitement the second I saw her and then quickly looked down to make sure she didn’t see me looking at her. She looked as if she had escaped a cartoon with her lusciously large red lips, sparkling blue eyes, like fresh water pools, and smooth auburn hair perfectly drooped over her right shoulder. She was wearing a red dress with a slit as high as possible without exposing her world. Why was she alone drinking a martini? As my eyes darted up again to revel in this most exquisite site, I got to see her seductively take her green olive in between her lips and slowly pull it into her mouth as if to torment my new found overwhelming desire for her. Before I grew too tumescent, I decide to take a seat at the bar.
The bar wasn’t very long at all. Four empty bar stools. Wooden legs with a black circular cushion. They were comfortable enough as I parked myself there. I rested my hands on the cool granite counter top of the bar. Breathe in and breathe out. I stared ahead at the shelves stocked with spirits.
A cough broke my mini-meditation. I looked to my right to see a lot more empty wooden tables. Scattered about the sea of emptiness were four men. There was an intimidating man, what I imagined people would describe as a human brick house, dressed in all black. His eyes stared with laser sharp focus on my every movement. Next to him was a man in all green. This man in green was wearing a fleece blanket around his shoulders and was sipping a hot tea. He looked like the picture of comfort. One table over there was a man in all yellow who looked beaten down and scared. On the table in front of him was a dove. It looked dead. The man in yellow had breadcrumbs and water and seemed to be frantically trying to nurse this poor bird back to life. Off to the side, was a man in light blue; an oddly youthful spirit emanated from him. His head was down, buried into some portable gaming device. I politely smiled and nodded at the man in black and quickly looked away.
Where was this bartender? Looking around more, I saw a closed door. What distinguished it from the rest of the black walls was the slit of light permeating from underneath. What was back there?
A few pictures on the wall could’ve spruced this place up.
I had to pick my jaw up from the floor as I watched the bartender approach. He looked exactly like me; replete with my slouch, blond hair, green eyes, big teeth, average lips, and defeated look in his eyes. He was wearing the exact outfit I had just purchased from J. Crew. My muscles tightened; I couldn’t move.
“Hi,” he said with a sulk. “What will you be drinking tonight?” He had my voice!
I couldn’t tell if I was breathing too fast or not at all. Was I hallucinating here? All I knew was my heart was trying its darndest to beat through my rib cage and land on the bar. My lips and brain tried to work together to form words. “Beer,” was all that came out. After a long silence, it was followed by, “You seem to not notice our resemblance. Um, where, how, who, where are you from?”
“From here. I guess we do look an awful lot alike. Are we alike? Do we just seem alike?”
I tried to respond, but was too dumbfounded to manufacture words. Odd little noises were all that came out.
He handed me my beer and then looked to the man in black who nodded with approval. As the bartender smiled and straightened his posture, I noticed both the man in green and black sit up sternly. He quickly fell back into his, my, patented slouch.
The melodious sound of the vixen’s heels clicking against the hard wooden floors filled my ears as she approached the bar. The aromatic flavors of her perfume cut through any dried beer smell that lingered. The bartender cowered. It was embarrassing to watch. He looked how I felt. Is that how I looked? He refreshed her drink. I watched her blue eyes study him. She almost blushed as he placed a new olive, for her to tease me with, atop her drink. Did she like him? As she turned to return to her lonely seat, her eyes met mine. The split second felt like a lifetime. With one smirk she told me she knew I wanted her and would never get her. Back to her seat she went. Behind her she left a trail of perfume that led to everything I could ever want and more.
The bartender snuck a few glances at this mysterious woman. Swiftly, the man in black came over to the bar.
“Stop looking at her. She’s never gonna want you. Are you the kind of guy who gets that girl?” he asked the bartender.
“I don’t know, maybe, she could, you’re right, probably not.”
“Of course not. I’m just looking out for you, bud. You feel better now, right?”
The man in yellow sat up triumphantly and quickly called out, “You never know, there really isn’t any reason she wouldn’t...” he was stopped by the man in black’s glare. They locked eyes. The man in green started fumbling with his blanket, almost losing it. “I don’t know, maybe not,” the man in yellow said as he slumped his shoulders down and rested his head on the table. When he spoke his dove seemed to flap its wings before once again returning to its cadaverous appearance with his silence. Now that everything seemed to return to status quo, the blanket was once again comfortably wrapped around the man in green’s body.
As my eyes darted around as to not watch this miserable scene, I noticed what appeared to be movement from under the doorway at the back of the bar. Was someone back there?
The man in green quickly approached the bar, blanket and all, with a stride that made him look as if he was floating. He spoke in a calm, soothing voice. He should’ve narrated books on tape. “Don’t be too upset with him,” he said with a nod to the man in black. “You will find a girl. One a little less than her, but you will like her enough,” the words fell from his mouth like butter.
“But, why not her? Why am I not the kind of guy who could get her?” he asked. The bartender really wanted to know. The desperation in his eyes made me feel for him. I did feel for him. I too did not feel like the kind of guy who could leave with a girl like that. Every movement she made caused me to hate myself more and more for not being the kind of guy who could have her.
“You see, the possibility still exists. She didn’t reject you, did she? Hope springs eternal. She hasn’t rejected you, so there is a chance that it could all work out in the future, as long as you don’t ruin it by trying. Your better days are ahead of you,” a comforting nod followed this pep talk. It would’ve made for an incredibly de-motivating cat poster.
The bartender hung his head, but somehow a smile broke open his mouth. “You’re right, I guess. Thanks. Yeah, I bet if I said the right thing I would be having wine with her right now. Maybe eventually even kiss her,” the bartender said as if he had actually achieved this.
“That’s right. Hold onto the feeling. Just keep it there in your mind,” the man in green responded. And with that he returned to his seat.
I was appalled. What was getting at my insides wasn’t just watching this pathetic scene, but it was how much the man in green’s advice resonated with me. How many times did I not do something only to have the fantasy of potential live on in my head? Walter Mitty and his secret lives had nothing on me. Every night before bed, I had a Mad Men like fantasy where I was running the ad agency, being swooned over. I knew it was all possible because I hadn’t been explicitly told no. My beneficent self was protecting me. That seemed to be what the man in green was doing for the bartender.
Maybe it was the few sips of beer I had, I was an extreme light weight after all, but I felt compelled to act. “Why do you let him hold you back like that? Who is he to you?” I demanded to know.
“He’s just looking out for me. I’ve been safe for this long listening to him. If it ain’t broke don’t fix it, right?” the bartender responded.
“But it is broken. I heard a saying that always stuck with me: if you want big rewards, you have to take big risks.” Had I lived by this saying? Oh, absolutely not. I really hoped he didn’t ask me where I heard that. I would be mortified to admit it was from some Freddie Prince, Jr. teen movie. I remembered that line and how amazing Jessica Biel looked in her underwear. Teenage dreaming was in full effect after that movie. “Let’s say she rejects you. You are in the exact same place you are now, correct?”
“But then I’ll feel worse about myself.”
Damn it. That was sound logic. Wait, no. No it’s not, I thought. I defiantly looked at the vixen—oh my God, oh my God, she’s looking at me. Logically, I looked up at the ceiling. Fooled her. Phew.
The bartender gave me a sardonic smile, “Not so different, I see. You talk a good game, but you seem to practice the other side.”
He was right. I hated him for being right. I hated myself for him being right. I chugged my beer in anger. Like a man would. Then I paused and coughed because I drank it too fast. Burped. Recomposed myself and stared into the bartender’s eyes. “Have you ever tried?”
I appreciated the thought he gave my question. “Maybe once...well, not really. I’ve tried with others, but someone like her? I guess I would have to say, no.”
If he had asked me, that would’ve been my answer, too. “For me. Tonight. Give it a try,” I said because the world wasn’t big enough for two massive pussies that looked like me, let alone this bar.
The bartender stood up straight. He started walking over to the vixen who was playing oblivious to all this. The man in yellow smiled and stood up. The man in yellow’s dove flapped its wings, showing signs of life.
“You were stronger when you had the possibility,” the man in green shouted at the man in yellow; the blanket once again falling from his shoulders. He turned to me and pleaded, “Why would you want this? I thought you were happy?”
I didn’t know how to answer, so I shrugged my shoulders. It was a confusing question. The bartender was doing it! It felt like I was doing it! It was a rush for sure. My gaze got pulled when I heard a scuffling. The man in black was physically beating the man in yellow. I could hear his fist connect with the bones in the poor man’s jaw. Blood spouted from his mouth and onto the floor of the bar.
The man in green was crying, his hands shielding his eyes, “No, no, no. It didn’t have to be like this. It wasn’t supposed to be like this.”
The bartender’s body language shifted with the defeat of the man in yellow. The dove’s wings stopped flapping. The slouch had come back. He still said something that made her laugh. Could I make her laugh? I heard him ask her if he could buy her a drink, which I thought was an odd question coming from a bartender. Her eyes were quizzical as she looked at him. Her mouth started to open, forming the answer. As her breath started to push the words from her mouth, a gun shot rang out in the bar.
The bullet landed in the back of the bartender’s head with a thud. The back of his head, once blond, was filled with red blood. His head dove into the table with a horrifying crash. The bar was silent. I slowly turned to see the man in black holstering a gun. Why did Steve want me to come here? I could barely breathe. All my strength was going to not screaming, not crying, and not peeing myself.
The man in black walked over and roughly grabbed the carcass. The vixen didn’t seem all that upset. She just moved tables and smiled at the man in black. He dragged the body to the door in the back of the bar, opened it and threw the once barkeep into it. I took this opportunity to dart towards the front door and pushed it with all my might. It didn’t open. I just flew back. It had locked! Frantically, I started kicking the door. It was strong and impervious to my foot. Converse shoes had no added strength to them. The man in green, trying to reposition his blanket over his shoulders, came over and put a hand on my shoulder. I nearly jumped out of my skin. I stared at him, breathing like I just emerged from a deep ocean, and locked my jaw.
“I know it scares you. It was unpleasant. But you know it had to be done. It’s all for your protection,” he assured me and went back to his seat.
My protection?
I looked around. It all looked like when I had first come in. The man in green had successfully adorned himself in his blanket, the man in black stared at me, and the man in yellow, with his now bruised face, tried desperately to give water to his lifeless dove.
I guided myself back to my seat at the bar. I sat and sunk my head into my crossed arms. The youthful spirit in blue sat next to me. He nudged me and smiled. How was he so happy? Did he not see what had just transpired?
“What?” I said, agitated.
He smiled his youthful smile up at me and handed me a gameboy. I couldn’t take my eyes off him. Now that his head wasn’t buried in a game and I was up close, I could see that he looked like a stretched out version of me as a child. I noticed he was missing one of his front teeth when he smiled. It was the last of my baby teeth to fall out to make room for my adult sized choppers.
“I thought maybe playing some Dr. Mario would cheer you up,” he told me.
That was my favorite video game as a kid. I would take my gameboy everywhere with me just so I could escape into the game. This was all getting a little too surreal. “Why would you think that?” I hesitated, but asked him.
“It’s my favorite game. It helps me when I’m scared. Maybe it would help you. One time on a cross country trip with my parents there was a tornado a few miles away. We could see it from our car on the highway. We were in Colorado, I think. My mom was screaming at my dad to drive. I got scared and started playing Dr. Mario. It made me feel better. I forgot about everything,” he told me.
No. Way. I. Can’t. Believe. It.
The memory he just described flashed in my head. I stared at him in disbelief. That was my memory. Why did he have it? I lightly grasped the gameboy and pulled it towards me. It had a blue crayon mark on its right side just like my old gameboy. This was indeed my gameboy. I leaned forward, and almost in a whisper inquired further, “I have a few questions for you. Do you have a dog? If so, what is their name? Where do you live? Are your parents married?”
“I have a golden retriever named Garlic. She’s the best. Always grabs her leash with her mouth and leads you home when she’s done with her walk. I live in Clifton, New Jersey. 65 Garden Ave. And yeah, my parents are married,” he responded without any thought.
All things checked out accept one. My parents were divorced. By age eleven my idyllic family life was ripped apart. My innocence ended when I watched my father walk away down our driveway while my mom cried, asking me why it was so hard to be loved; I still don’t know. It all went south after we moved from Garden Ave. We moved when I was ten.
Wait, when I was ten. Holy shit, I thought. All things checked out if I were just taking a census of my first ten years. He was just smiling at me. Optimistically stupid as I remembered being as a kid. I slowly sat up and treated him as if he was some alien life form. I couldn’t wrap my head around what was happening here.
“How old are you?” I asked him.
“Ten.” What an annoyingly peppy response. He was so proud of his answer.
“How did you get into the bar?”
“Oh, I don’t drink. I’m not allowed to.”
My head was spinning. My brain was looking at a Magic Eye puzzle. I was taking into account all the weird occurrences. Everything that had happened was replaying. Puzzle pieces were starting to connect, but the picture on the box was still fuzzy.
The mysterious back door opened. Another bartender emerged. He was identical to the last one, identical to me. The door shut before I could get a look at what it contained. The new bartender saddled over to me and smiled.
“What drink can I get for you?” he asked. He glanced quickly at the vixen. “She’s a hottie, huh? You should see the movie playing in my head,” he winked at me, “not gonna lose it this time,” he pointed to the back of his head where the bullet submerged itself into the previous bartender.
I could feel my stomach expand and contract from extreme breath. I turned to the youthful ten year old, “Do you know or hang out with those guys?” I pointed to the man in yellow, the man in green, and the man in black.
He looked at them, “I’ve known the guy in yellow the longest, but he’s different now. Don’t really know the other two all that well. They kind of work for me, keep me safe, but I don’t hang out with them. That’s okay, right? It’s okay?”
“Yeah, it’s okay,” I said, not knowing what I was saying. He smiled really wide, reveling in the comfort of validation. He needed validation something fierce. It was a sobering moment to see it in action, to see how I so craved validation for my own existence demonstrated right there in front of me.
I nodded appreciation for his answer then got up like a sheriff in an old western movie. I walked over to the man in black, filled with both rage and fear.
“What do you need me to help you with?” he asked me, almost like an obedient servant, as I approached. That stopped me in my tracks. Help me? How was he helping me?
I looked at the faces of the other three men. They all shared extremely close physical characteristics with each other and me. It was as if I was stretched out and molded into other body types.
All of a sudden it clicked. Everyone in this bar was me.
“What are you?” I asked the man in black.
“I’m nothing,” he told me.
“If you’re nothing, how can you help me?”
“Because nothing is safer than something.”
The man in green smiled and added, “With something, there is something to lose. Staying with nothing, you know what you’re getting. That’s how we became friends.” He gave the man in black a warm smile.
The man in yellow started to cry. I looked to him.
“Do you not agree with them?” I asked.
“I never have. They only keep me around because everyone needs a light at the end of the tunnel.” Holding his poor, dying dove in his cupped hands he said, “Please, don’t leave me.”
“Having a light at the end of the tunnel is better than reaching it,” the man in green declared, tugging his blanket tight.
“Don’t worry, Mark, you won’t reach it, but we’ll keep it there,” the man in black assured me.
With that, everyone in the bar looked at the vixen.
“I just want you to feel safe, Mark. I don’t want you to doubt your doubt. I want you to feel as at ease as possible,” the man in green told me.
This sunk in. It made sense to me in a weird way. It was eerily how I lived my life. “And how do you do that?”
“I try to help you not extend yourself. Keep hope alive. Keep you out of questionable situations where you might not like the answers. I just want you to feel safe.” He then added, “I want to keep you happy by living in the potential instead of living in the failure. Why go out when you can stay in with your favorite television show. You know what that’ll be like, and you’ll enjoy it.”
And that is what I would do. Over and over again. I hated myself for it.
The man in black nodded, “You see the greatest threat to safety is feeling you can achieve something to only realize you can’t. Why not just cut out the middle man. That’s why you brought me in. I hope I’ve served you well.”
The man in yellow looked up at me with sullen eyes, “I’m really sorry Mark. I really hoped it’d be different.”
I looked across the room at the vixen. She was more than just a girl. She was desire, she was risk and therefore she was unattainable. I bowed my head. They had been doing their jobs. I may have been incredibly unhappy as of late, but I couldn’t argue that I felt safe. I felt too safe and secure. I let the risks play out in my head where I could write the ending; they weren’t risks at all. The youthful man in blue didn’t hang out with the man in green or black because they were just forming when I was ten. All things I thought about to make me feel happy were nostalgic memories. My ten year old self was still running the show. My current thirty-two-year-old-self was nowhere to be seen. I was still just a kid who wanted to be told he was doing okay and playing it safe as not to upset anyone.
I felt an extreme loss that I hadn’t gotten to know my thirty-two-year-old-self. I really wondered what he was like. What would be different? What would he do? Would he still need these guys? I had lost a potential good friend.
A light bulb went off in my head. He wasn’t gone. He was here somewhere. I don’t know why, but right then and there I knew it. I bolted towards the door in the back. I kicked it open. It was an empty room. A clear white floor was surrounded by red brick walls. There were a few low hanging lamps that provided the minimal light that was there. Multiple corpses were off to the right side with dried blood around them, tainting the purity of the white floor. On the bottom of the stack, I noticed a dead body that resembled my friend Steve. It smelled horrible. Discarded relics of people’s past were decaying on this floor. On top of the stack was my bartender, his fresh blood mixing in with the dried. I heard a mumbling on the other side of the room. I ran to it. It was dark on the left side of the room; there were no low hanging lamps. I grabbed my Iphone and switched it on to flashlight mode. As the tiny bulb clicked on, I saw another me, dressed in a slightly darker shade of blue than the youthful man in blue, tied up on a black metal chair and gagged.
“NO! I DON’T WANT HIM!” the youthful man in blue screeched. His optimism lost to blind rage induced fear. In a crazy tantrum he ran towards me and jumped at my back. He started clawing at me. His hands grabbed my hair and pulled down, “GET AWAY FROM HIM! YOU NEED ME!” he screamed.
I felt two burley hands from the man in black on my neck. They were coarse and rough. He picked me up and brought me close to his face, “This is for your own good,” his breath smelled like nothing, which was only noticeable for its lack of anything distinguishable. With his throw, I landed back in the bar, defeated. The man in black slammed the door shut. The man in blue grabbed his gameboy and fervently played. The man in green, blanket now on the floor, was restraining, as best as he could, the man in yellow. The dove started to stand and then fell over.
The vixen was cackling at me from across the bar while I lay prostrate. Her beauty had gone. Her laugh was incendiary, sardonic. It cut right through me. Her eyes turned to a fiery orange and then full black.
“You are worthless and always will be,” she told me. She was so vociferous in her declaration I couldn’t help but cower. In an instant she returned to her normal state of being gorgeous and took a sip of her drink. She winked at me. I began to cry. All the things I had laid out to keep me safe had ruined my life.
I rose slowly. I was defeated. All the energy I could muster I would use to exit this bar and live out the rest of my existence safely watching life from a distance. I jammed my hands into my pockets; my eyes glued to the floor as I took my first steps towards the exit. There was a loud thud as the door seemed to unlock itself.
I stopped after a few steps. I didn’t move. I barely breathed. I could feel everyone’s eyes on me. With my retreat towards the door, it seemed everything was back to status quo there in the bar. I deliberately raised my head and stood up straight. I breathed calmly. It was almost as if I was trying to master a relaxation technique. As my eyes stayed transfixed on the exit door, memories seemed to shoot through me. I saw all the pretty eyelashes from girls I let walk away; my safe couch warmed from another night of playing the misanthrope; my co-workers climbing and me at my same desk year after year, content with knowing the function and purpose of what I was doing; and lastly Suzy yelling at me for being indecisive about choosing a restaurant. Such a seemingly innocuous memory of her, but it was the first time I understood her. Then I saw her eyes as they saw me initially, filled with hope and wonder and all the usual accoutrements of budding love. They were excited about what I could be. As I watched them blink, they re-opened with how she saw me when she left, disappointed with what I was.
The memories ended.
“There’s a difference between safe and happy,” I said. No one responded. You could hear a pin drop. My breath grew rapid. I realized if I walked out of the bar at that moment, I would cement my fate.
I walked over to the man in black with an intrepid stride and with one swift motion, my foot connected with his shins. I unloaded. I clenched my fists tightly and began pummeling him. He blocked a few punches and reciprocated. I was too high on adrenaline to feel anything. I outmatched him. I fought with a tenacity birthed from desperation and he gave up. He sat there and took my beating. I could feel his nose break on impact. His blood was getting on my hands. Like a crazed animal, I kept going. I reached in his back pocket and grabbed his gun. I stepped back and pointed it at him. He looked up at me with tears in his eyes, like a child who had done something wrong.
“You help me? How have you really helped me? When I had the idea of the new way to pitch the Coffee Roasters campaign, I didn’t say anything - I followed the rules; I didn’t want to misspeak. I asked Tim, just to see if I had spoken up what they would’ve thought of my idea. He was the one who spoke up, with my idea. He got promoted. Was that you helping me?” I held a steadfast gaze despite the fact that the gun in my hand was shaking wildly.
“Yes. Didn’t you want that? I don’t understand. What did I do to upset you, Mark?” he beseeched me to tell him. The gun in my hand was cold and heavy. I’d never held a gun before. “Mark, please, I was just trying to help. Like you wanted. You kept me. Please, give me the gun,” he extended his hand.
“No,” I said coldly.
“What are you going to do?” he asked.
He started sobbing and screaming. He was begging for some sort of mercy. Some sort of future where nothing could live. I closed my eyes, and before I could second guess myself, pulled the trigger. The shot was loud and instantaneous. I heard screams. With my eyes still closed, I pressed the trigger again. And again. And again. And again.
As I opened my eyes, I saw the man in black lying there motionless. I had shot him multiple times in the chest. There was blood everywhere with his lifeless body sprawled about. Now, he truly was nothing. The man in green was sobbing and holding the man in black’s hand.
“He was my friend,” he wailed.
Both the new bartender and the youthful man in blue were staring at me. I turned my focus to the youthful man in blue. He was shaking. As tears started to escape, he played his gameboy.
“I’m so sorry. But, you know, you know I have to do this,” I told the youthful man in blue.
“I know. I’m just scared. We had fun together though, right?”
“We sure did, we sure did,” I gave him his final validation.
I fired my gun. The bullet ripped through his chest. The gameboy dropped to the floor, shattering into many pieces. He looked up and smiled at me, that youthful innocent smile. His once white toothed smile was now red as blood decorated his enamel. With a loud clunk, he fell to floor.
I gripped that gun with both my hands. My knuckles were white.
The man in green crossed his arms and looked down. “I was just trying to keep you calm and safe. It truly was a pleasure serving you; I’m sorry it wasn’t what you wanted.” He looked at his friend, the man in black, and then back at me, “You won’t be as safe anymore. Just know that.”
“I know,” I said. I fired. The bullet cracked into him. The piercing sound of his flesh being ripped echoed in the bar. As he fell, his blanket floated off him and landed far away on the floor.
The man in yellow looked up at me and smiled. “Please, finish it, Mark. It’s okay, I understand.”
I obliged, fired, and his head plunged forward onto the table. He was at rest. His dove once again showed signs of life.
I turned towards the new bartender, but he was gone.
The vixen walked over to me, her heels clicking on the floor as she walked. The sound annoyed me; her smell no longer intoxicated me. “What are you gonna do with me?” she asked.
I paused. I looked at the martini she was holding. With my thumb and index finger, I plucked the olive from her glass and ate it. “Not a thing,” I told her and walked away.
I opened the door against the wall and untied the man in the chair who resembled me. It seemed he was to take the place of the youthful man in blue.
“Thank you,” he said.
With a smile, he went to tend the bar. I watched him, his posture was different than the others, and he was less affected, more assured. He didn’t seem to search around for approval as the others had. On his way to the bar, he stopped by the broken gameboy. He picked up the Dr. Mario game and the shattered piece of the machine with the blue crayon marking and stowed them away in his pocket.
I sat back at the bar. Same stool I had been occupying. He poured me a drink and then himself. We got to talking. His way of thinking was different, it was nice. I hadn’t lost the friend I feared I had, I just met him a little later than planned. As we talked, a man in charcoal grey, a man in orange, and a man in red came out and occupied the tables. They each gave me a knowing nod. Then the new bartender told me they had to close up, but to stop by anytime. He extended his hand and I shook it.
As I left the bar, I saw another man jamming his hands into his pockets and walking with utmost caution up to the Good Times Bad Times Bar. I wondered how he was gonna leave.
The sun was completely gone. The night was pitch black. I got into my car and put on my seatbelt. Many thoughts ran through my head as I sat there. I felt different. It was new, it was strange, albeit a little scary. The change, for good or bad, I didn’t know. All I knew was the future was going to be different.
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universe
Janet Kuypers
haiku 4/13/14
there are more atoms
in your eye than all stars in
the known universe
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See YouTube video of Janet Kuypers performing her poem Observing Theories of the Universe live 11/19/14 at Chicago’s open mic the Café Gallery (Canon)
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See YouTube video of Janet Kuypers performing her poem Observing Theories of the Universe live 11/19/14 at Chicago’s open mic the Café Gallery (Sony, Edge Detection filter)
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See YouTube video (Cps) of Janet Kuypers reading her poem Observing Theories of the Universe from cc&d v254, “Idea”, live 4/29/15 at the open mic the Café Gallery in Chicago
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See YouTube video (Cfs200) of Janet Kuypers reading her poem Observing Theories of the Universe from cc&d v254, “Idea”, live 4/29/15 at the open mic the Café Gallery in Chicago
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See a Vine video
of Janet Kuypers practicing her twitter-length haiku universe as a looping JKPoetryVine video 5/7/16 for her poetry show today at Austin’s the Baha’i Center.
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See a Vine video
of Janet Kuypers practicing her twitter-length haiku universe as a looping JKPoetryVine video 5during her Expressions 2016 show, her 1st Austin poetry show 5/7/16.
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See YouTube video of Janet Kuypers in her 5/7/16 show “Love in the Universe” in her first scheduled feature at Expressions 2016: Reasons to be Cheerful in Austin (Cps), first singing (with John singing and on guitar) the Depeche Mode song The Bottom Line (with altered chorus lyrics for heir wedding), then with her poems
Pluto, Plutonium & Death (a bonus Periodic Table poem),
her haiku universe,
observer’s love poem (2016 edit),
everything is my home,
Wanted To Play, and
electricity.
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See YouTube video of Janet Kuypers in her 5/7/16 show “Love in the Universe” in her first scheduled feature at Expressions 2016: Reasons to be Cheerful in Austin (Sony), first singing (with John singing and on guitar) the Depeche Mode song The Bottom Line (with altered chorus lyrics for heir wedding), then with her poems
Pluto, Plutonium & Death (a bonus Periodic Table poem),
her haiku universe,
observer’s love poem (2016 edit),
everything is my home,
Wanted To Play, and
electricity.
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Download all of the show poems in the free chapbook
Love in the Universe
5/7/16 at Expressions 2016: Reasons to be Cheerful show in Austin
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See Twitter video of Janet Kuypers reading her haiku universe from Down in the Dirt’s v137 Scars Publications book The Hive 5/30/16.
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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 three collection books from 2004: Oeuvre (poetry), Exaro Versus (prose) and L’arte (art), 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, the 2012 art book a Picture’s Worth 1,000 words (available with both b&w interior pages and full color interior pages, the shutterfly ISSN# cc& hardcover art book life, in color, Post-Apocalyptic, Burn Through Me, Under the Sea (photo book), the Periodic Table of Poetry, a year long Journey, Bon Voyage!, and the mini books Part of my Pain, Let me See you Stripped, Say Nothing, Give me the News, when you Dream tonight, Rape, Sexism, Life & Death (with some Slovak poetry translations), Twitterati, and 100 Haikus, that coincided with the June 2014 release of the two poetry collection books Partial Nudity and Revealed.
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