11/22/2017 1 Comment Poetry by Donna ReisDon Harder Wake Astonished to see my father laid out in a suit, I turn to my stepmother, who says, He was a husband and a man before he was a priest, so he should be ordinarily dressed. But he didn't want that. He wanted to be buried in his ivory, Gothic Chasuble with the blue velvet cross and oval sapphire sewn in its center. His love for the church was the only thing that sustained him through her trampling. This was his last chance to be anything other than ordinary. Already decomposing, his face morphed into the washed-out man he'd become. Nothing like the Irish wakes of my mother's family where everyone clucks, Doesn't he look grand?! ...Never looked better. God's Shepherd My father lived his last months between waves of cancerous pain where all he could do was rest his head on the kitchen table and pray. Yet, he relished God's graces to the end, telling how the bishop of Long Island visited him in the hospital, saying he needed to get better, because he was one of God's shepherds--those words regaled and broke his heart, knowing he was already one of many sheep crossing the plank of a ship about to leave. My Father Passed into the Afterlife Feet First a breach of promise, a dying he couldn't wrap his head around. Preparations eluded him, too late for DNRs, wills living or dead. I waited to see his spirit rise, but it was long gone-- no point opening a window, he no longer hears the didactic furies who plagued him on earth. His life, a litany of injustices, propelled him past Purgatory, where his Seminarian brothers met him, singing psalms, Kyrie Eleison, Kyrie Eleison, Kyrie Eleison-- while my stepmother wags a finger over his corpse, boasting her grand efforts to bring him home. Yet when he had a day's respite at their apartment, she screeched I hope you die in your shit! Want to see where you're goin'? Do Ya? We'll drive there now-- as their son kicked his chair and yelled, Get up and walk, you fuckin" stubborn, old Pollock, while the visiting nurse dialed 911, my father's body released his soul, his blood pressure bottoming out. Christi Eleison, Christi Eleison, Christ have mercy upon us all. Bio: Donna Reis’s debut poetry collection, No Passing Zone, published by Deerbrook Editions (December, 2012) was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. She is co-editor and contributor to the anthology, Blues for Bill: A Tribute to William Matthews (Akron Poetry Series, 2005). Her non-fiction book, Seeking Ghosts in the Warwick Valley, published by Schiffer Publishing, Ltd (2003) has sold nearly 3000 copies. She is the author of three poetry chapbooks: Certain (Finishing Line Press, 2012); Dog Shows and Church: A Sequence of Poems (2000) and Incantations (1995) both published by Eurydice Press. Her work has appeared in numerous journals and anthologies, including The Same, and Zone 3, Blood Lines: Tales of Mayhem and Murder (Knopf, 2011); Chance of a Ghost, Helicon Nine Editions (2005) and Beyond Lament: Poets of the World Bearing Witness to the Holocaust, Northwestern University Press (1998). Reis received her Master of Arts Degree in Creative Writing at The City College, City University of New York, in 2002.
1 Comment
Tristan Loper
1 You long-legged before me Scrawling my nightmares Across a page Before it was a man With no pen And no form Now it’s you before me Long-legged and waiting For me to speak “I’m fine,” I say “Ground yourself,” She tells me Knowing I’m not here But grounding Grinds down every Everything That piercing, bloody joy That can only come from Floating 2 I can’t write on medication stretch out on planks keep them I punch it A hole through the knot I’ll make it my shush the capsules fall just the air bleeds out (pick them up) I can’t write on medication (two no but my one) said I can’t have a you if you’re never a now I’ll make it my shush the capsules fall just my sun faded (“You in live in half light.”) But I can’t write! I can’t write! (and you can’t live without your we) 3 Gus sticks out his mitt For beer money. He’s scarred from Elbow to wrist On account of his smoking a Camel And pumping gas A few years back. 4 I walked past a crippled corner Where a man was Digging in a ditch six feet down Preserving the root of a centennial dogwood Jerky orange-hatted and hungry For a fight he said, “All this for a fucking tree?!” On my heels at my back He yelled, “Yeah, I said that!” 5 I come out of the kitchen and think about everything I regret That time with the guy a name caller that careless purchase a paperweight. I move into the living room And think about Everything I regret That guy with the gun could get me killed the elder with a temper much worse than mine I sit at the computer And think about Everything I regret shooting down my hair making way for my fingers. The tool at the bar the one who said no and no the cowardice that enveloped after she that thing the time a friend left my eyes don’t look at me anymore the lie that was discovered after coming home the milk and the murder and marrying all made way for you. 6 I let my wife have chickens to leach out her mothering (She might die in childbirth.) “You bleed too much to carry,” I say. “An egg is an egg,” But she wants to see her face. 7 After the dog died I swept weekly The first week Wiry hair in bunny bunches The second A mound The third A wisp on a bristle I swept weakly until Her hair was gone 8 A military friend of mine showed his identification to airport security. “You’re a hero!” the officer said. I didn’t know you could tell a hero by looking at a card. 9 I’m so liberal I go to Whole Foods to get wasted. Bio: Kari Rhyan's previous work, Standby for Broadcast--a memoir on the dangers of canned patriotism, family loyalty, and discount retail--focused on her time as a Navy nurse in Afghanistan, and has received praise from Kirkus and Blue Ink, and are widely available online. www.krhyan.com There Are No Androids Just Electric Sheep It has always been a crazy world – do not let anyone tell you different. Confusion, uncertainty and outright chaos have been more the norm than the exception since Adam and Eve strolled around that famous garden. Even a cursory glance through history will show this to be true. As a great line in a famous movie once said our brilliance has gone hand-in-hand with our idiocy. I would guess, then, that it is no wonder I never really subscribed to all the glorification of the past and lamentations about the present that are so prevalent in society. While sharing the same warm glow of nostalgia we all get when looking backwards, and feeling that same sense of things “making sense” in the simpler long ago, I recognize the “good old days” as much more of a mythological creation than anything approaching the reality of how it really was. Be it personal memories or a generational description of time and place, the world is the same as it has always been; it is our perception that is distorted. The further we get from the source, the greater the distortion, it seems. Like that tee shirt that says “The older I get the better I was”. Indeed. And yet... I must confess that the past few years there has been a creeping suspicion, at times bordering on uneasy certainty that maybe this time in our history is unique, that there has been a game-changer, if you will. There is a new element now in play – actually, it has always been there in one form or another, but never so all-encompassing, so inescapable, so manipulative. I speak of modern Technology, of course, and definitely with a capital “T”. Perhaps it should all be capitalized. In bold print.Italicized. Yes, technology has always been with us. One day, many moons ago, some impatient Cro-Magnon, wanting a faster way to get from here to there, found himself a big stone, grabbed his chisel, created the wheel, and we were off and running. Along the way we invented things to build with, add with, fight with, tell time with and eventually plant a flag on the moon with. We have used it to give us thrills, make us more efficient and do tasks requiring strength and stamina beyond our mortal limitations. That said, never in all that time - not even the Atomic Age of the 1950’s or the heady 1980’s of the Space Shuttle - has Technology been so much a part of our everyday lives. Never in our entire recorded history has nearly everything we seek to do depend on or require some form of Technological phenomena. Even ordering a pizza hasn’t managed to escape unscathed by the tidal wave of Technology. This is not a good thing. For the first time I am starting to think those “good old days” folks may be onto something after all. More than that, I am not sure this runaway train is stoppable. Deep down I fear it isn’t. The rewind button is permanently broken. So is the pause button. This is not a good thing at all. The late sci-fi writer Phillip K Dick wrote almost exclusively on the theme of Technology running amok. A brilliant talent unjustly confined to cult status until his very last years, Dick was certainly no optimist. His futures were dystopian and dark, and Technology misused and uncontrolled had made it so. Mankind had evolved intellectually but not morally, and the result was a world often barren of humanity and run by soulless technocrats. Be it the mechanized weapons of war turning on their creators in “Screamers” or the robotic replicates wanting to be human in “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep”, the creation had become the creator and the result was a pervasive nihilism. To be honest, it was great reading but depressing as all Hell. I bring up Dick and his frightening vision because, while it may be shrugged off as the ranting’s of a cynic or the product of a dissatisfied life spilled out on paper, it seems suddenly more relevant now than ever to me. It amazes me how science fiction has given us warning after warning about the future consequences of our current recklessness for generation upon generation and we still do not listen. It is as if we are being shown an oracle’s vision and we continually choose to ignore it. It is all right there, the golden opportunity to change directions and stop the madness before it is too late and we continue to blunder along our path of folly unheeding. Greed, hubris and amorality are a deadly cocktail. This all brings me back to the thoughts that are so prevalent in my mind lately. I look around me and, more and more, I see the possibility of Dick’s dystopian future. While our creations have not taken over yet, nor have the creations become the creators, the way Technology has crept into every corner of our modern society is becoming a real concern. As I stated above, when even ordering a simple pizza involves apps and androids – all necessary for more “efficient” service of course – something is not right. Everything is digital now. Everything seems to involve the internet. Everything is now done online. Everyone is on their cell phone all the time. I mean, you cannot tell me they have something important to say every minute of every day! Everyone is staring at their phone constantly. So much so I sometimes wonder if the next step in our evolution will be a phone attached to our hand permanently. Every restaurant has an app to order ahead of time. People even control their heat and air conditioning with an app on their phone miles away from their house. Turn on their washing machines and televisions with apps from work. It is shocking when you stop and think how inundated we are with the digital world. It has gotten to the point where you never speak to a live human on the phone anymore but an impersonal robot incapable of interaction beyond programmed data. Watch a group of youngsters in a group sometime. I usually see five or six standing around, each looking at their phone, interacting by not interacting. Then again I see adults in their fifties doing the same thing. I wonder if any of them even see the way having your attention solely focused on you has become the normal way people “get together”. I doubt it. All this has now put us as a society in the unenviable position of mass dependency. If you are under twenty and all you know is the world as it is now, how exactly are you going to function when the entire way you know how to live is interrupted, even collapses? The only way such young people know how to interact on almost every level is through Technology. I wonder the culture shock when they have to actually not have a cell phone in hand. I can honestly see reactions from stultifying boredom to crippling helplessness. A world without Technology to them might as well be 1900. That this can really only be said of those under twenty shows the speed at which the world has changed with the onslaught of Technology, which is much faster than we can process it as a whole nor deal with its inherent dark side. It is like an out of control car careening down the freeway at eighty miles per hour and we are standing on the side of the road watching. To me, all this equals the first steps towards a society of complete mechanical impersonality. When life becomes a video game and people literally just another cog in the machine things like empathy, compassion, humanity begin to die. That is happening as I write this and it shows no signs of slowing down. All these things, while unfortunate and unhealthy, are not the worst part of the way modern Technology has the potential to make “Blade Runners” a living, breathing tableau. They may be a collective slouch towards indifference and a sure sign of the insane speed of our modern world, but they are not nearly as troubling, even frightening, as the truly nefarious means Technology would be used for in Dick’s techno nightmare. This is when Technology hides, in the dark, just below the surface, not quite able to be seen, not even able to be pinpointed exactly, but still there and as real and as powerful as ever. Call it Big Brother or the Electric Eye or Satan if you want, but whatever you choose to call it it is watching you. I speak here of privacy. There is not much anymore and soon, if Technology keeps barreling along, there will be none. You can bet that someone, somewhere, knows everything you did today. It is that damn digital world again. The World Wide Web. The Cloud. The Internet of Things. It is all there, the “digital footprint”, telling someone, somewhere what time you turned on your phone, where you bought gas for your car, what you ordered for lunch, how much money you spent, what you have in your bank account, who you voted for, where you live – hell, your blood type and shoe size. I bet some drone has a bead on me right now, sitting on my porch, writing this. I am sure one day soon you will be on someone’s radar 24/7/365. Even ordering a pizza with pepperoni to go on your android app. You know whoever controls this controls you. Controls your life. Because life now is Technology. Now. Imagine what it will be in ten years’ time. Twenty years. Fifty years. Myself, I shudder. Then again, we don’t have to imagine, do we? It is all right there, in the words and images of dystopia and future darkness. Words we ignore and shrug off as they slowly but surely manifest themselves each and every day more fully. We can see the future but are incapable of doing anything about it. What happens when we finally realize it only when we are standing in the middle of it, all around us, controlling us, not the other way around? Somewhere, I bet Phillip K Dick is nodding sadly. There are no Androids. Just Electric Sheep. Bio: Robert Bermudez is currently teaching English abroad. He is a published songwriter and hopes to soon be a published author. He writes mostly non-fiction but has written a screenplay and play and hopes to write more fiction in the future. 11/21/2017 0 Comments Poetry by Andrés CastroDeath Watch In the shade of a tall tree, a mangled crow lay twisted-- fluttering. Alone, I took steps towards it, stopped. It dug beak into earth-- dark head wobbling like a top losing spin. On its right side, slapping dirt with free left wing, if it could have crawled away it would have-- it wasn’t bird. I took more steps, stopped again-- at the CALL! CALL! from a crow across the street high in tree. A friend, family?—yes! With each step one more joined in, until a storm of calls came down-- that stung like hail! They would not stop! Fallen crow rocked in place, madly going nowhere! Enough! I crossed the road to get away. Heard crow calls stagger. One-by- one ending, until the street began quieting, until pure silence. Stopping one last time, looking back, I saw the mangled crow put down its head-- the others, still in the trees, waiting. Terrorism "In this conflict, America faces an enemy that has no regard for conventions of war or rules of morality... "I want Americans and all the world to know that coalition forces will make every effort to spare innocent civilians from harm…"We have no ambition in Iraq except to remove a threat and restore control of that country to its own people…"I know that the families of our military are praying that all those who serve will return safely and soon…” George W. Bush, March 19, 2003 I. Looking straight into his eyes, she swears she knows who he really is…and will tell. He says, “Why not keep it our little secret and call it even?” She calls him a loser and says, “I bet you shook like Jell-O over there.” He calls her a whore at heart. “If you had a heart, instead of that icy cunt,” he says. II. In bed, she rolls him off; and he lands hard, like a log in the dark. He says, “Get help, I can’t move my arms or legs” The sound of war crashes in his ears. She turns on lights and looks at him—waiting to hear more—all she hears is breathing. Naked, she walks passed him, passed their wedding pictures on the night stand, passed her ringing cell phone on the dresser, and enters the bathroom. When he hears the toilet’s flush, then squeaky shower faucets, he closes his eyes and trembles. III. As he hovers near the ceiling, he looks down on himself, then her, and swears, “I’ll get even. I didn’t shoot six fucking Haji to get home and take this shit from you.” Wearing her favorite little black dress, she twirls in front of their full-length bedroom mirror and doesn’t hear his curses pouring down on her. As she slips on black stilettos, he begins to fade into a powdery white mist…disappears with the last pass of her red rose lipstick. “You should have stayed there in a hundred pieces or come home in a box,” she says. Coward. IV. Before leaving the room, she kisses his corpse on the cheek—whispers, “Welcome home, soldier boy. Thanks for the benefits and all. I’ll frame your purple heart and hang it in the living room for the wake. To be fair, I’ll invite your buddies and her—I bet you never gave that precious little bitch any black eyes. She would have left your ass.” V. Seconds after gently shutting the door behind her, she lingers—finally deciding to tip-toe back into the bedroom. Bent over him, she stops her right hand an inch from her red kiss tattoo near his mouth. “No,” she says, “I didn’t disturb you at all putting it on. Why bother you now? Let someone who doesn’t love you like I do rub it off.” Bio: Andrés Castro, a PEN member/volunteer, is listed in the Directory of Poets and Writers. His work has appeared in the anthology Off the Cuffs: Poetry by and About the Police, as well as in print and online journals including Left Curve, Counterpunch, The Potomac, Mobius: The Journal of Social Change, Newtown Literary, Acentos, Pilgrimage, New Verse News, Montreal Serai, and ImageOutWrite. He also regularly posts work on his blog The Practicing Poet: Dialogue to Creativity, Poetry, and Liberation. 11/21/2017 0 Comments Poetry by John Darrcradle evaporate into my skin my inner organ den a warping wall grey pillows wove a long my thistled membrane cave my purell-coated chamber, plastic children’s playset lumined on my switchlashed broadway stage the furnace hums like magnifying glasses under sun toes dug in this polaroid incarnation of my kindergarten summer lawn i see the miles imagining a mountaintop affords allowance stored in vestment banks i spit 4 candle years over cake on tiny porch our pumpkins ate up slugs from soily portal glut or gun in shriveled pillow corner the 30-year old hologram of my optimal prediction tending to a crib cradling my blue-skinned would-be baby in your arms, your biceps ribboned red: “a parent’s love is stronger than each spark you’ve ever been.” so tourniquet your ribbon words around my heart and clear me> college app please consider me i have considered it. i have a dream i have a mop it sits in me don’t let me get the tylenol this carpet suits my attitude this park bench suits my adderall i miss you when the windows dark at weird times in the afternoon chainsaw They tapped the blood of our forest, piped syrup into their veins. Strapped us to the bed of a truck to be severed and disseminated. Our legs ripped apart, nailed to chairs in two separate junkyards. I have seen three hundred autumns now from seven different dumpsters. It’s been years since I finished counting the stars. I am running out of space between them for my smoke as I burn. I’m silent and still. And I burn too slowly for anyone to see. Bio: John Darr is a poet, teacher and music critic from Richmond, VA. He is currently an MFA candidate at Wichita State University. 11/20/2017 0 Comments Poetry by Danny DalferroIt seemed like a bad dream Some nightmare I couldn’t wake up from I didn’t want it to be real A neuron in my brain Cold, empty, and dark Played on a loop, backwards and forwards Ad infinitum Started off softly, like a whisper in the trees And grew, Louder, into a roar of cacophony Like a gunshot going off A deaf man suddenly gaining all the noise Enough to make you tie rope around your neck And swing from a branch, Suddenly feeling all the serenity You have no idea You really don’t You’re so comfortable, so ignorant So blissful Take a drink You’ll feel better, I promise Take another one You’ll love it Keep drinking until you can’t stop Then stop And use your fucked up enunciation To discuss your problems Look at yourself in the mirror every day And hate what you see Let time pass And do things you’ve never done before You’ll feel better, I promise Pray You’ll love it Keep helping others Until you forget to help yourself And use your screwed articulation To speak of your experience, strength, and hope Look at yourself in the mirror every morning And start to like what you see Fall, stumble, fail, make mistakes But always remember to get back up Always remember to dust yourself off And always remember, “This too shall pass… like a kidney stone” *** It’s something long forgotten You need to be careful A gutter boy, dirty and worn; A streetwalker, hands bound with electrical tape; A junkie, arms streaked with animal tracks; The unholy trinity Crosses the faded line, Each in need of a personal messiah; Someone to pray to, Someone to give the day to The only light in the alley is a burning monk, Giving hope through sacrifice; The only recourse On the outer walls surrounding the concrete brick hallway Slashes of blood, torn tapestries, marred paintings confound all It’s something long forgotten You need to have courage The ebb and flow of life is rampant here The stench of death is abundant The evil of betrayal Of seduction Of greed Of gluttony Of avarice Yes, all these are here, too Waiting to be picked up Like a parasite upon a leaf next to a hiking trail It’s something long forgotten You need to be strong What is life without pain? What is life without humiliation? What is life without trial? With ignorance? With innocence? Yes, the transcendence of pain is happiness For what can one learn from shitting rainbows and pissing unicorns? Pain must be present to have any real serenity *** the boy sits in the cell wondering how he descended into hell a flicker of the lighter and a puff of smoke is all he could muster as he spoke the darkness creeps in the air becomes a howling wind the boy prays for slumber knowing full well it won't come delves deep into his mind terrified of what he finds the door screen ripped, the deadbolt gone 7 shells lay in perfect harmony the walls painted red and pink in the sun he'd only gone over to get his fix the bodies numbered six the boy sits in the cell wondering how he descended into hell *** Someone said, “You need a hobby.” Someone said, “Idle hands do the devil’s work.” Well, what to do? Oh, what to do? Can you repeat the question? Oh, you didn’t ask one? Huh… My mind is empty My heart is heavy My soul is burned up No ideas, no lights go off I’m stuck in this perpetual shadow zone This ghost town, this kill zone Nodding off on some god-serum My arms black as the sun My skin white as mountaintops My spirit gone Ready for the long slumber of eternity Well, what to do? Oh, what to do? My mind has run off Have you seen it? There’s a reward for it, I swear Awakened not by light nor warmth nor love By Desperation and Despair Struck down by the hand of “God” It pains me so Feeling worthwhile, finally Thinking reversed, putting me first Ideas flood Overcome me Stop my trembling hands from putting foot in mouth Halt the crystal container of brown liquid From ever reaching my liver A slight, a voice soft as a whisper Then grows, like a withered sapling into a mighty oak Shakes the very foundation of me “What about poetry, story-creating, lyrics, and the like?” Shit. *** The light dims and quakes Skewed visions run free Like screwed telemetry Like a bad acid trip Like a mental time rip The pain strikes hard My head is jarred It withers and fades Like fleeting love In the mists of shade The world above Where is my mind? Where is my mind? Snow in white lines Flow as dark rhymes Where is my mind? Where is my mind? I’m stuck forever in this dream, this acid trip Searching for salvation, but it has me in its grip Where is my mind? Where is my mind? Bio: Danny Dalferro is a writer from Rockville Centre, New York. For a living, he works as a custodian. He lives in Oceanside, New York with his cat, Mal. 11/20/2017 0 Comments Poetry by Betsy MarsSunnyside Care Home Privacy curtains drawn, we watch Jeopardy. Our nightly routine, a bond before parting. The tray pushed aside - broth and blended brown mounds, reeking of spoon-fed infancy. We listen for questions to which we know the answers. In the same room, behind curtain number 2, a man keeps a vigil, silent like his silent twin, united again in this sterile womb. Final Jeopardy after the next commercial break; we wait expectantly. Before the question can be revealed, a soft voice from behind the curtain requests our pardon. We mute the TV; he tells us his brother has just passed. In solidarity we turn off the TV. That’s how death can happen - the question we will never know. Off-track walking in the spreading weeds beaten down picking salad greens I hear the train coming, rhythmic loneliness spreads the many railway destinations I’ve been railroaded in: New Orleans bars, New York cars, off the tracks in Memphis, waylaid in LA, the last stop is around the bend the sun is glaring, red hot tomatoes grow wild my bag loaded and bursting Banking on it We’ll go to the bank in the morning. The branches are kitty corner, at Main and Elm. Remember? The accounts have a long series of numbers, arranged in columns. I’ll take you first thing in the morning. We’ll get your money; don’t worry. I’ll be secure. There’s no hurry. The funds are there; you’re not yet spent. Leave it for the night, sleep tight. In the morning you can eat peaches and cream to your heart’s discontent. It won’t be long and we’ll both head to that vault, but for now a morphine drip to help you slip into the calm breathing of the night; your last in skin. Now I dream of you, my father, and put on your orphaned socks. Bio: Betsy Mars is a poet, educator, and animal lover. She has a love for languages and other cultures which was born and nurtured during her years living in Brazil as a child. She is her best self when traveling, and sometimes even manages to be funny, though her children deny it, Her work has appeared in the California Quarterly, Silver Birch, and Gnarled Oak, among others, as well as in a number of anthologies. Her poetry can be found at https://marsmyst.wordpress.com/. 11/19/2017 2 Comments Poetry by Isabelle KenyonOut in the open The country air heals us, in a month you’ve become so small, become harder, less naïve – he’s left his mark, perhaps you’re better for it, hungry for success, for your own happiness above all else. I shouldn’t be surprised that you didn’t ask about me because you’ve been regrowing your roots, a kind of new growing deep in your bones – I forgot that unspoken, our friendship our loyalty lies deeper. Tell me you love me Assuming is a lesser magic than hearing you love me – assumptions are neither here nor there they float and never land. Many faces, many moons There are so many sides of me, which one do I wear when I wake up in the morning, when I let down my hair, shake the sleep away, unveil, my covers reveal shaking limbs, fragile if I choose to show it, brittle if you choose to touch: Don’t break me like they did. Bio: Isabelle Kenyon is a Greater Manchester based poet and a graduate in Theatre: Writing, Directing and Performance from the University of York. She is inspired by the people and events around her - she observes and writes what she sees and what she feels. She is the author of poetry anthology, This is not a Spectacle and micro chapbook, The Trees Whispered, published by Origami Poetry Press. Her poems have been published in many poetry anthologies and included in literary festivals, such as the Inkyneedles anthology, the Great British Write Off, the Wirral festival of Music, Speech and Drama, Poetry Rivals, and the Festival of Firsts. Isabelle has been awarded third place in the Langwith Scott Award for Art and Drama and runner up in the Visit Newark Poetry Competition. You can read more about Isabelle and see her work at flyonthewallpoetry.co.uk 11/18/2017 2 Comments Storiettes by Salvatore DifalcoThomas_H_photo
THIS IS NOT A STORY The night drive proved hypnotic. Old jazz standards issued from the radio. This person still listened to the radio. It made him unique among his peers. His peers owned property and groomed children to be better and more successful than them. In many instances this was not going as planned. Problems arose. “Maybe you should order the banquet burger.” “I was thinking that.” “I know what you’re thinking.” “I know you know what I’m thinking.” We were talking about the food we wished to eat at the drive-in diner. We were spanning several decades. “Miracles on roller skates.” “I know where you’re going with this.” “I know you know.” It never made sense to me, after we ate and drove up the Jolly Cut to the escarpment, why we had driven there. “You wanted to see the city at night.” “I have seen it at night.” “Smells foul tonight.” “It always smells foul.” When we drove back down the Jolly Cut to the city proper he said he wanted coffee. “You might not sleep.” “Let me worry about that.” I turned up the radio when Polka Dots and Rainbows came on. Wes Montgomery. “I love Wes Montgomery.” “Yes, I know you do.” “I know you know I do.” The children of my peers have grown into ugly and distracted teenagers with bad haircuts. I don’t envy them. “Yes you do.” “I love Wes Montgomery.” SELF-PORTRAIT WITH CROPPED HAIR I believed that by being careful and using a sharp pair of scissors I could save myself the cost. I’m poor enough to suffer these debates. One part of me, a would-be patrician, finds the idea abhorrent. The other part, an abject failure and pauper, thinks enough of his manual skills and dexterity to brave the attempt. “He’s courageous,” offers one of the audience sitting in the tiny theatre-in-the-round. “But surely he must know things can go wrong,” states another audience-member, standing to make his case. Stage-lights obscure the people’s faces. A technique I often use. That is to say, blaming the lights I save myself from describing faces. “Perhaps he’s mining the meta-fictionists.” “Are you mining the meta-fictionists, sir?” I don’t know what these idiots are talking about. A story has a beginning, middle and end. Yet, most of what gets exchanged between humans can hardly be called a story. “It consists more of little snapshots, sir.” “What’s your name?” “Oh me, uh, my name is Robert.” “Robert, I don’t know where you come from or what your state of mind is. Perhaps you’re paranoid. I don’t know. “I can assure you Robert isn’t paranoid, sir.” “And you, what’s your name?” “I’d rather not say, sir.” “Sit down, both of you. Sit down. I’m feeling kind of sick.” Indeed, a turbulence in my digestive tract had torqued its way into my lower intestine and lower. I wanted to run off the stage, but then, seeing how I had failed to actually construct a stage, I found myself at a loss. “How are you going to get out of this one, sir?” “I’d pay to see that, sir.” With a snap of my fingers I silenced the voices, dimmed the stage lights (which I had included) and settled into the black void that is my time away from my desk. DETAILS I was too full to sit on her narrow couch. She stared at me while I stood near the stereo, one hand on my hip. “Are you okay?” “Yeah, yeah. Fine. Do you, uh, have any Sinatra?” “I don’t really go for the old stuff.” “May I use your bathroom?” “Of course. Second door on your right.” To void or not to void. Emptiness would be welcome on these occasions. Any presuppositions involving gymnastic maneuvers, nearly pulled muscles, and cramping toes already flew off like Canada geese, their trumpets fading by the moment. Ivory soap scented the bathroom, a clean menacing smell. I ran the taps, looked at myself in the mirror over the sink, and opened my mouth like a hippopotamus. Then I stared at myself in the eyes until it got weird. “Are you okay?” I heard the lady ask from behind the door. “Yes, I’m fine,” I said. But I felt unwell insofar as retaining your demons in order to blunt any follow up questions and hideous faces will make you feel unwell. I told myself, this can be remedied. All you have to do is relax. While I’m embarrassed to complete this story, I am one of those mulishly stubborn souls who always finishes what he started. Maybe that’s an exaggeration. “Yoo-hoo.” “Yes, yes, almost done.” The devil is in the details, I’ve heard. But then again, I’ve also heard that God is in the details. In any event, the details seem paramount over both the devil and God. Dear reader, what details have I omitted that would have made this experience richer or more fulfilling? Bio: Salvatore Difalco lives in Toronto. His work has appeared here and there. 11/18/2017 1 Comment Poetry by Ben BrittonTooting it’s romantic being with you here in the light of the passing ambulances i’m sorry i keep looking at the time sweetheart i do only want to be with you irises grow you put your bare chest to mine the mistake of the sober morning you can trust me haven’t you noticed yet? i sound better when i’m caring, more middle class i mean you know i’ve never met anyone so similar not one although i’ve been in love and with a lot of guys – i don’t mind you snoring but could you cut out the philosophical crap? neither of us had latency periods anyway. and did i tell you about my childhood or the time i saw Uncle Paul’s ghost or the time i lay hallucinating on the bathroom floor and afterwards couldn’t call you just sip tea in bed with death in my lap? you pee too much but that’s okay i’ll masturbate whilst you’re in the bathroom. don’t lie there lie here. this is all so marital don’t go to sleep just yet though – i sigh slide an arm over and close my eyes. i see the alternative does not have the word love in it. seems like you want to go out tonight? i thought we were going to stay in and see the new Jeffery Dahmer movie. poke holes in your jumper with a biro pen you got paint on my shoes like a little kid Flames Trees – Thika i think something’s gone wrong for a moment i thought you were leaving? breakfast at the lebanese silent miserable shwarma my favourite running away the pool is empty is empty all the birds are now dead no i’m not going to take off my shirt for you instead await the earthquake to shift the beam from above my bed Lombardy, 1753 and slip away out the window come righteousness a gun and dont leave me waiting here at a crossroads maybe? bah the crosswords we do for love two frightened and alone to say much about anything except Vout and the drilling in the wall and keeping a mind on where the passports are at all times you went through the things of my house naked when i left you just like you were that time i said something perverted something’s wrong? no? and far away handpicked fruit is being painted – i dont want your excuses i want your money shall we do it? when? tonight? i’m not ready sex and death i said were all that mattered. what a responsible adult theyve grown in to Bio: Ben Britton is a writer studying in the south west of the UK, although was brought up in the Big City. He has had a few poems published, and was selected to be a judge for the 2017 Poetry Super Highway annual contest. He enjoys Chinese food and walking in the rain. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. Archives
April 2024
Categories |