.jpg)
click to enlarge
This spectacular cover was created by none other than the wonderful and talented Denny E. Marshall.
Showing posts with label Issue 18 October 2012. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Issue 18 October 2012. Show all posts
Monday, October 1, 2012
Issue 18 Table of Contents
Here's this issue's round up of writers:
Octoucan Cover Art, Denny E. Marshall
A Leisurely Walk Through Hell, Dan Nawrocki
Perfect Corners, Brian Kayser
Realizations, Anita Babcock
The Skateboard, Rick Hartwell
Butterfly, Amy Ekins
Dishes, Alex Strong
New Clothes, Alex Strong
Persona, Afshan Shafi
Lord's Park, Joan Colby
Brothers in the Sun, Denny E. Marshall
Song of Ulysses, Clinton Van Inman
Song of Sirens, Clinton Van Inman
The End #486,283,764,016, Denny E. Marshall
Close Open Eyes, Denny E. Marshall
Poetry Birds of the Street, Denny E. Marshall
Contributor Bios
Editrice Note
Octoucan Cover Art, Denny E. Marshall
A Leisurely Walk Through Hell, Dan Nawrocki
Perfect Corners, Brian Kayser
Realizations, Anita Babcock
The Skateboard, Rick Hartwell
Butterfly, Amy Ekins
Dishes, Alex Strong
New Clothes, Alex Strong
Persona, Afshan Shafi
Lord's Park, Joan Colby
Brothers in the Sun, Denny E. Marshall
Song of Ulysses, Clinton Van Inman
Song of Sirens, Clinton Van Inman
The End #486,283,764,016, Denny E. Marshall
Close Open Eyes, Denny E. Marshall
Poetry Birds of the Street, Denny E. Marshall
Contributor Bios
Editrice Note
Prepping for the Season
That time of year is upon us when
the air is crisp and chilly. It sounds like it would make a potentially
delicious food dish, but as weather I find it quite distasteful. Of course, if
you’re in the southern hemisphere you’re just finishing up with that kind of
weather. It’s a pity that the toucan isn’t a passenger bird; I’d never have to endure
another Chicago winter. Though the weather leaves something to be desired, I do
love everything building up to Halloween. Halloween and the use of cinnamon in
everything. But none of these things have to do with why we’re here. It’s a
brand spanking new issue filled with all kinds of goodies!
I’ve gotten
my sea legs for overseeing everything, and man do I have an issue for you! As
the baseball season wraps up, “Perfect Corners” reminds us it isn’t all about
the game. If you’re like me or the main character in “Realizations” you would
be thrilled to escape to Greece for the season.
Or just imagine you were there a long time ago as you read “Song of
Ulysses” and “Song of Sirens”. Those gearing up for Halloween will appreciate
the horror of “A Leisurely Walk Through Hell.” Gave me shivers and I loved it.
Of course, I love all of these enough to share them! I wouldn’t want you to
waste your time, especially if you were contemplating “The End #486,283,764,016”
or even just your “Dishes.”
So grab
your favorite beverage and enjoy issue 18! A lot of cuppas went into putting it
together so I hope you find it up to snuff. Many thanks to Denny Marshall for
the cover art and everyone who submitted their writing. In order to keep this
bird in the air I need submissions. Please submit to thetoucanmag@gmail.com if you want
there to be an issue 19. Thanks and enjoy issue 18!
Sincerely,
Editrice Laura
A Leisurely Walk Through Hell, Dan Nawrocki
The man was falling and flying, every second going deeper and higher into the seemingly endless expanse of black nothingness. He could not say for how long this continued or how many lifetimes had passed. He simply continued his journey into the black.
And then he stopped. He had hardly even noticed, but his bare feet had finally met with solid ground, smooth as polished marble. He looked around, lost. The nothingness seemed to extend infinitely in all directions. He had no idea where he was or in which direction to go. He tried to call out to anyone that might hear him. He called so many times, but his throat never became raw and his lungs were never empty of breath.
But no one answered.
After an indeterminate amount of time, the man ended his futile yelling and, with no other options, he chose a direction and began to walk. The air around him did not move and his footfalls made no sound. There was nothing but silence around him and as he thought about it, he could not tell if even his calls had made a noise.
As he continued to walk, the man began to realize that he had no memory of what had happened before his arrival at this strange place. He did not remember being born, he did not remember his name, he did not remember his adult life, and he did not remember dying. And it struck him.
The man had died.
The man began to panic and screamed silently, calling into the darkness for someone to help him and to tell him what had happened and why. But the darkness did not answer.
Until it did.
As the man continued his calling, a voice was suddenly clear and apparent from in front of him.
“You poor creature, please quiet yourself. I hear you.”
The man was immediately silenced by the sudden presence of this new voice. And from the blackness, a figure emerged. It was the figure of a woman clad in a red cloak, whose color was nearly blinding against the absolute black of the world around them, and little else. And her hair was somehow darker than the darkness.
“I hear you,” the woman said again. “Tell me what you need.”
The man fell to his knees before the woman and begged her for clarity. “Where am I?” he said. “Why have I been brought to this desolate place? What has happened to me? Please, I beg of you!”
The woman listened quietly until the man was finished speaking. And then she smiled. That smile frightened the man more than he had ever been frightened.
“Why, you’re dead, you silly fool. And this is, how do I put it? Your final destination.”
The man was confused. Though he could not remember his life, he did seem to recall that the Afterlife was supposed to be a place of great peace and happiness, and not a place of solitude and darkness.
“And it would be, were that a place to which you deserved to go,” the woman said, as if hearing his thoughts. “But I know you. And you don’t,” she said, no longer smiling, but glowering at the man. “For your sins, you deserve to be here, in my home. And you deserve my punishment.”
The man began to weep. “But, there has to be some mistake! I cannot remember living, much less any sins!”
“Perhaps you’re right,” the woman said. And for a moment, the man’s spirits soared. “After all, I’ve only been doing this job since the beginning of time and never once made a mistake. But hey, I suppose it had to happen sometime. I apologize.” And she held out her hand to the man.
Naively, the man reached for her hand, but he was immediately struck with magnificent force by the woman.
“Now you listen to me, creature,” the woman said with a new, paralyzing ferocity. “It is not nearly as easy to get here as people think. So, you know when I say that you deserve everything that I am about to do to you, you can believe it beyond a doubt.”
The man began to beg again. He began to plead for any compromise, any way to repent and be spared this torture.
The woman simply said, “No. This is where you belong”. But then she smiled again. “But don’t take my word for it. You may see for yourself.”
And with that, the woman turned and began to walk away. “But who knows? Maybe you’ll be forgiven,” the woman laughed. “You won’t see me again,” she said as the darkness enveloped her.
The man did not want to be alone again. He scrambled to his feet and chased wildly after the woman and called out to her. But he could not catch up, and she did not respond to his calls. And soon, the man was left alone once again.
After an eternity of mourning, the man finally brought himself to his feet. He thought that perhaps if he kept walking, he might eventually find the end of this place. It was a small hope, but it was all on which the man had to hold.
So he walked.
He continued in one direction for a long period of time, neither his eyes nor his legs ever becoming tired. He took one more step and was suddenly confronted with an image. It was as if a window had been opened in the blackness and no matter which direction the man turned, the image was always in front of him.
The image vividly depicted two young men involved in some kind of struggle. One of the boys, the more muscular and fit of the two, was grabbing at the limbs and head of the other. The smaller one tripped over himself and ended up in a heap. The larger boy grabbed him from the ground and put him in a headlock. But as he was being pulled up, the smaller boy had extracted something from his pocket. It was nothing more than a pen, but with a desperate movement, the boy drove the pen deep into his attacker’s Achilles tendon. The larger boy, with a cry of pain, loosed his victim and fell. The smaller boy spit on the larger one and walked away, laughing all the while.
Then the image vanished and the man was alone in the darkness again. He did not fully understand what he had just seen or why. He stood for a long moment wondering and calling out, “That’s it? The roughhousing of an angry boy? Is that why you brought me here?! Who are those people? Damn you, answer me!” But, unsurprisingly, there was no answer. Dejected, the man resumed his long walk. He noticed with some surprise that the ground beneath his feet felt cracked now.
As he walked, the words of the cloaked woman began to ring in his head. “This is where you belong. But don’t take my work for it. You may see for yourself.”
Before he could make sense of it, the man was faced with another image.
The boy that had wielded the pen in the last scene was now in a kitchen of some kind. An argument with a middle-aged woman was unfolding. His mother, perhaps? The man heard their voices as if through glass. Vague sounds resembling voices. But what these people were saying would turn out to be irrelevant. The boy turned away from the woman and began to walk away. The woman reached out to him, but the boy spun and struck his mother, knocking her flat. The boy, without even looking back, stormed from the house.
And once again, the man was alone. He took a step back, taken aback by the scene that had played out in front of him. As he did, he felt a sharp pain run through his foot. He fell backwards, and as he did, there were more sharp pains through his back. The ground beneath him had become even more cracked and seemed to be lined with sharp, invisible rocks. As he rubbed the pain from his body, the man began to understand his punishment in this place. The boy in the images was indeed the man as he was in life.
So, the man walked forever. As he walked, more images of the man appeared in front of him, each time revealing a sin of increasing severity. He witnessed theft, assault, and numerous fistfights with his father. And with each image, the ground upon which he walked became more treacherous and painful. But he became increasingly enraged as he watched. Though these crimes were heinous, to the man, they certainly did not seem so heinous that he should be punished so severely. He cursed the woman that had cursed him so.
That is, until he witnessed a murder.
The poor woman had done nothing but throw a drink in the man’s face. The man quietly followed her for the rest of the night. When she was alone in an empty subway station, the man grabbed her, dragged her to a supply closet, and stabbed her innumerable times in the face and chest. The image then cut to the man watching his television, his murder being reported on the news, all the while muttering things to himself about the woman “getting what she deserved”. Then the newscaster stated that a suspect had been apprehended. The man burst into hysterical laughter.
The image vanished and the man stood, stunned. The floor was now as millions of upturned nails beneath his feet. Despite the severe pain he was suffering by standing in place on such a terrain, the man was afraid to move any more for fear of what he might see next. He fell to his knees upon the nails and wept again.
When he finally ceased his cries, the man noticed that the darkness around him seemed to become much more oppressive, closing in on him until it felt as if it were physically pushing him to continue. The man could barely stand the pain of walking on the floor of nails, but he could not resist and the darkness forced him to keep walking. He was in tremendous pain and frightened beyond words. The visions had not stopped or repeated yet, and he did not want to know what still awaited him.
The next vision began to play in front of him. The man closed his eyes tight, but the image was projected on the inside of his eyelids. There was no escaping it.
Since he had gotten away with his previous murder, the man had entered a relationship with a young woman. But, the young woman had left him for another man. It was this man and woman that he proceeded to torture for days on end using every torture method that he could imagine before finally killing them on the fourth day. Their bodies were never found and the man was still a model citizen in the eyes of society.
The man begged the darkness to stop. He could witness no more. “Have I not been punished enough?” he cried. “I cannot bear to see any more! Please, I beg of you, end this torture!” The ground beneath him was now as molten rock, sending immense pain throughout his whole body with each step. But again, the darkness forced him onward. It became so oppressive, that the thought of resisting it became more frightening to the man than walking across this burning ground and the skin of his feet being constantly and repeatedly melted. So, he turned and walked. And before he could even think to object further, the next image flashed before him.
The man saw himself, now very skinny and exhausted. He was in a basement staring angrily at two other people tied to chairs. The man recognized them from previous visions as his parents. The man was leaning over them, yelling something at them. Again, the speech was garbled, but one sentence rang through. “You deserve to be here, in my home. And you deserve my punishment.”
And with that, his parents were killed.
The vision changed. The man was now on a dark and empty stretch of road, handcuffed to a telephone pole. Staring directly at him was a police officer with his gun drawn. The officer was yelling in the face of the man. The man laughed. The officer tore his badge from his uniform, threw it to the ground, and shot the man in the head.
Black.
The man stood. He could no longer feel the pain in his feet, or anything at all. He simply stared straight ahead. When he finally did feel something, it wasn’t pain or remorse. He felt a strange satisfaction. When that officer had pulled that trigger, the man felt that justice had been served admirably.
“That officer will never need to see this place.”
The voice had come suddenly and the man was snapped from his stupor. Standing in front of him was the woman in the red cloak. Though a look of sorrow had replaced the look of hatred that she had originally shown.
“I hope you understand why your punishment had to be like this.”
The man nodded.
“Then, I have something to show you.”
The woman gently placed her hand on the man’s shoulder and they were immediately surrounded by a blinding whiteness. The woman stepped aside. When the man’s eyes had adjusted, what he saw was a pair of giant, brilliant gates standing before him.
“Do you know what this is?”
“Is this--?” the man said.
“It is,” the woman replied. “Will you enter?”
The man looked to the woman, amazed at the offer. The man laughed. The man wept.
The man refused.
“Of course I will not enter!” the man said, “All of the time that I spent in the blackness was meant to shown exactly why I should not be allowed, was it not?”
“Then I am glad to see that you truly do understand.” The woman smiled sorrowfully as she put her hand on the man’s shoulder. “This time, you really won’t see me again.”
Black.
The ground was smooth and unblemished and the man began to walk, awaiting the images. Forever awaiting the images.
And then he stopped. He had hardly even noticed, but his bare feet had finally met with solid ground, smooth as polished marble. He looked around, lost. The nothingness seemed to extend infinitely in all directions. He had no idea where he was or in which direction to go. He tried to call out to anyone that might hear him. He called so many times, but his throat never became raw and his lungs were never empty of breath.
But no one answered.
After an indeterminate amount of time, the man ended his futile yelling and, with no other options, he chose a direction and began to walk. The air around him did not move and his footfalls made no sound. There was nothing but silence around him and as he thought about it, he could not tell if even his calls had made a noise.
As he continued to walk, the man began to realize that he had no memory of what had happened before his arrival at this strange place. He did not remember being born, he did not remember his name, he did not remember his adult life, and he did not remember dying. And it struck him.
The man had died.
The man began to panic and screamed silently, calling into the darkness for someone to help him and to tell him what had happened and why. But the darkness did not answer.
Until it did.
As the man continued his calling, a voice was suddenly clear and apparent from in front of him.
“You poor creature, please quiet yourself. I hear you.”
The man was immediately silenced by the sudden presence of this new voice. And from the blackness, a figure emerged. It was the figure of a woman clad in a red cloak, whose color was nearly blinding against the absolute black of the world around them, and little else. And her hair was somehow darker than the darkness.
“I hear you,” the woman said again. “Tell me what you need.”
The man fell to his knees before the woman and begged her for clarity. “Where am I?” he said. “Why have I been brought to this desolate place? What has happened to me? Please, I beg of you!”
The woman listened quietly until the man was finished speaking. And then she smiled. That smile frightened the man more than he had ever been frightened.
“Why, you’re dead, you silly fool. And this is, how do I put it? Your final destination.”
The man was confused. Though he could not remember his life, he did seem to recall that the Afterlife was supposed to be a place of great peace and happiness, and not a place of solitude and darkness.
“And it would be, were that a place to which you deserved to go,” the woman said, as if hearing his thoughts. “But I know you. And you don’t,” she said, no longer smiling, but glowering at the man. “For your sins, you deserve to be here, in my home. And you deserve my punishment.”
The man began to weep. “But, there has to be some mistake! I cannot remember living, much less any sins!”
“Perhaps you’re right,” the woman said. And for a moment, the man’s spirits soared. “After all, I’ve only been doing this job since the beginning of time and never once made a mistake. But hey, I suppose it had to happen sometime. I apologize.” And she held out her hand to the man.
Naively, the man reached for her hand, but he was immediately struck with magnificent force by the woman.
“Now you listen to me, creature,” the woman said with a new, paralyzing ferocity. “It is not nearly as easy to get here as people think. So, you know when I say that you deserve everything that I am about to do to you, you can believe it beyond a doubt.”
The man began to beg again. He began to plead for any compromise, any way to repent and be spared this torture.
The woman simply said, “No. This is where you belong”. But then she smiled again. “But don’t take my word for it. You may see for yourself.”
And with that, the woman turned and began to walk away. “But who knows? Maybe you’ll be forgiven,” the woman laughed. “You won’t see me again,” she said as the darkness enveloped her.
The man did not want to be alone again. He scrambled to his feet and chased wildly after the woman and called out to her. But he could not catch up, and she did not respond to his calls. And soon, the man was left alone once again.
After an eternity of mourning, the man finally brought himself to his feet. He thought that perhaps if he kept walking, he might eventually find the end of this place. It was a small hope, but it was all on which the man had to hold.
So he walked.
He continued in one direction for a long period of time, neither his eyes nor his legs ever becoming tired. He took one more step and was suddenly confronted with an image. It was as if a window had been opened in the blackness and no matter which direction the man turned, the image was always in front of him.
The image vividly depicted two young men involved in some kind of struggle. One of the boys, the more muscular and fit of the two, was grabbing at the limbs and head of the other. The smaller one tripped over himself and ended up in a heap. The larger boy grabbed him from the ground and put him in a headlock. But as he was being pulled up, the smaller boy had extracted something from his pocket. It was nothing more than a pen, but with a desperate movement, the boy drove the pen deep into his attacker’s Achilles tendon. The larger boy, with a cry of pain, loosed his victim and fell. The smaller boy spit on the larger one and walked away, laughing all the while.
Then the image vanished and the man was alone in the darkness again. He did not fully understand what he had just seen or why. He stood for a long moment wondering and calling out, “That’s it? The roughhousing of an angry boy? Is that why you brought me here?! Who are those people? Damn you, answer me!” But, unsurprisingly, there was no answer. Dejected, the man resumed his long walk. He noticed with some surprise that the ground beneath his feet felt cracked now.
As he walked, the words of the cloaked woman began to ring in his head. “This is where you belong. But don’t take my work for it. You may see for yourself.”
Before he could make sense of it, the man was faced with another image.
The boy that had wielded the pen in the last scene was now in a kitchen of some kind. An argument with a middle-aged woman was unfolding. His mother, perhaps? The man heard their voices as if through glass. Vague sounds resembling voices. But what these people were saying would turn out to be irrelevant. The boy turned away from the woman and began to walk away. The woman reached out to him, but the boy spun and struck his mother, knocking her flat. The boy, without even looking back, stormed from the house.
And once again, the man was alone. He took a step back, taken aback by the scene that had played out in front of him. As he did, he felt a sharp pain run through his foot. He fell backwards, and as he did, there were more sharp pains through his back. The ground beneath him had become even more cracked and seemed to be lined with sharp, invisible rocks. As he rubbed the pain from his body, the man began to understand his punishment in this place. The boy in the images was indeed the man as he was in life.
So, the man walked forever. As he walked, more images of the man appeared in front of him, each time revealing a sin of increasing severity. He witnessed theft, assault, and numerous fistfights with his father. And with each image, the ground upon which he walked became more treacherous and painful. But he became increasingly enraged as he watched. Though these crimes were heinous, to the man, they certainly did not seem so heinous that he should be punished so severely. He cursed the woman that had cursed him so.
That is, until he witnessed a murder.
The poor woman had done nothing but throw a drink in the man’s face. The man quietly followed her for the rest of the night. When she was alone in an empty subway station, the man grabbed her, dragged her to a supply closet, and stabbed her innumerable times in the face and chest. The image then cut to the man watching his television, his murder being reported on the news, all the while muttering things to himself about the woman “getting what she deserved”. Then the newscaster stated that a suspect had been apprehended. The man burst into hysterical laughter.
The image vanished and the man stood, stunned. The floor was now as millions of upturned nails beneath his feet. Despite the severe pain he was suffering by standing in place on such a terrain, the man was afraid to move any more for fear of what he might see next. He fell to his knees upon the nails and wept again.
When he finally ceased his cries, the man noticed that the darkness around him seemed to become much more oppressive, closing in on him until it felt as if it were physically pushing him to continue. The man could barely stand the pain of walking on the floor of nails, but he could not resist and the darkness forced him to keep walking. He was in tremendous pain and frightened beyond words. The visions had not stopped or repeated yet, and he did not want to know what still awaited him.
The next vision began to play in front of him. The man closed his eyes tight, but the image was projected on the inside of his eyelids. There was no escaping it.
Since he had gotten away with his previous murder, the man had entered a relationship with a young woman. But, the young woman had left him for another man. It was this man and woman that he proceeded to torture for days on end using every torture method that he could imagine before finally killing them on the fourth day. Their bodies were never found and the man was still a model citizen in the eyes of society.
The man begged the darkness to stop. He could witness no more. “Have I not been punished enough?” he cried. “I cannot bear to see any more! Please, I beg of you, end this torture!” The ground beneath him was now as molten rock, sending immense pain throughout his whole body with each step. But again, the darkness forced him onward. It became so oppressive, that the thought of resisting it became more frightening to the man than walking across this burning ground and the skin of his feet being constantly and repeatedly melted. So, he turned and walked. And before he could even think to object further, the next image flashed before him.
The man saw himself, now very skinny and exhausted. He was in a basement staring angrily at two other people tied to chairs. The man recognized them from previous visions as his parents. The man was leaning over them, yelling something at them. Again, the speech was garbled, but one sentence rang through. “You deserve to be here, in my home. And you deserve my punishment.”
And with that, his parents were killed.
The vision changed. The man was now on a dark and empty stretch of road, handcuffed to a telephone pole. Staring directly at him was a police officer with his gun drawn. The officer was yelling in the face of the man. The man laughed. The officer tore his badge from his uniform, threw it to the ground, and shot the man in the head.
Black.
The man stood. He could no longer feel the pain in his feet, or anything at all. He simply stared straight ahead. When he finally did feel something, it wasn’t pain or remorse. He felt a strange satisfaction. When that officer had pulled that trigger, the man felt that justice had been served admirably.
“That officer will never need to see this place.”
The voice had come suddenly and the man was snapped from his stupor. Standing in front of him was the woman in the red cloak. Though a look of sorrow had replaced the look of hatred that she had originally shown.
“I hope you understand why your punishment had to be like this.”
The man nodded.
“Then, I have something to show you.”
The woman gently placed her hand on the man’s shoulder and they were immediately surrounded by a blinding whiteness. The woman stepped aside. When the man’s eyes had adjusted, what he saw was a pair of giant, brilliant gates standing before him.
“Do you know what this is?”
“Is this--?” the man said.
“It is,” the woman replied. “Will you enter?”
The man looked to the woman, amazed at the offer. The man laughed. The man wept.
The man refused.
“Of course I will not enter!” the man said, “All of the time that I spent in the blackness was meant to shown exactly why I should not be allowed, was it not?”
“Then I am glad to see that you truly do understand.” The woman smiled sorrowfully as she put her hand on the man’s shoulder. “This time, you really won’t see me again.”
Black.
The ground was smooth and unblemished and the man began to walk, awaiting the images. Forever awaiting the images.
Perfect Corners, Brian Kayser
“I can’t even give you half book value for this,” the dealer said, holding my 1975 Topps Nolan Ryan baseball card to the light. “The centering's off on the sides.” He handed the card back to me.
I held the plastic case in my hand, staring back at Nolan Ryan’s intense gaze, obviously a pose. I never noticed the players in the background or the empty bleachers. The card brought back memories of my mother, how she’d open the door, leaning into it with a brown grocery bag, the hinges squeaking as she entered. I’d help her with the groceries, turning away from whatever baseball game was on TV. After we put everything away, she’d reach into her purse and say, “Oh, I forgot something,” and pull out a pack of baseball cards, the waxy wrappers and stale gum a thumbprint of my childhood.
My collection grew over the years. By the time I was old enough to make money for myself, I’d go to the store with her and drop whatever cash I had on the counter and grab as many packs as I could. I’d jam them into my pockets and open them on the ride home, flipping through the cards like a Vegas card dealer, looking for Padres and Angels, my favorite teams. The cards were in shoeboxes under my bed, the same way I envisioned gold bars were kept at Fort Knox. I didn’t have any real system for keeping them organized until I got older. Sometimes Dad and I would sort them by teams, other times by talent. “This guy is terrible,” he’d say, flipping a card over and reading his stats. “Hasn’t even hit .250 in five years. Dead weight.” He’d lay on the carpet in my room, his head resting on his hand. I remember when he pulled out my Nolan Ryan card, the same one the dealer dismissed with barely a glance, holding it on its sides with one hand, pointing to it with the other. “Now this guy, this guy here, he’s gonna be something,” he said. “You better hang on to this.”
“I can’t let it go for less than book value,” I told the dealer. “It’s Nolan Ryan.”
“Can’t do it,” he said, ringing up a customer. I placed the card back in the shoebox, the same one I stashed under my bed, although this time most of the cards were in protective plastic cases, the hard plastic edges framing them like miniature paintings. “You must not want to sell it negotiating like that.”
I left the store, the bell ringing behind me, shoebox tucked under my arm. I could say I tried. A feeling of relief washed over the guilt I felt, holding the cards of my childhood heroes out for appraisal like common junk. I started the car and pulled out of the gravel parking lot, leaving behind a cartoon-like trail of dust.
Mary would lean her head to the side, the way she always did when she did when she didn’t get something she wanted, when she came home from work tonight. I knew that. She’d ask how much I’d made from the cards, talk about what a nice dinner we could have with the extra money, maybe even pay for the wedding favors. She’d been asking me to do something with my shoeboxes since she’d found them in the attic. Said they were just taking up space and we, she emphasized “we,” should make money on them while there were still fools willing to buy pictures of athletes on cardboard.
I sat on the couch with my shoebox and watched the afternoon game on cable. A lot of the players I hadn’t heard of, but I enjoyed the slow rhythm of sounds; the announcers between pitches, the sound of the ball as it smacked the catcher’s leather or wooden bat of the hitter, the constant murmur of the fans. I stacked my cards in piles of three in terms of what I wouldn’t sell, couldn’t sell, and could sell but didn’t want to. The third stack was the shortest.
“Have any luck today?” Mary asked, placing a plastic bag of take-out on the counter.
“Not really. Doesn’t seem to be a seller’s market right now.”
She cocked her head to the side. “Does it matter?”
I didn’t answer. The Nolan Ryan card stared back at me from the top of the “Can’t Sell” pile.
“I would like to see you make more of an effort to sell the cards,” Mary said. “They’re not doing us any good.”
“What if we have a son?” I asked.
Mary took her plastic container of food out of the plastic bag. She held it like the bottom could drop out at any moment and leave her covered in sweet and sour chicken. “We’re not doing this again, are we?”
I remained silent. On the TV, the batter had a 3-2 count. He was digging his cleats in, his back arm extended to the umpire asking for a time out. The camera zoomed in on the pitcher, who spit in the dirt. I didn’t recognize the pitcher or the batter, but I recognized the importance of the pitch.
“I’m not going to stand around and try to talk to you if you’re going to be rude,” Mary said. She opened the back porch and sat at our patio table, staring at her phone as she shoveled chunks of chicken into her mouth.
We’d dated for six months before I proposed at The Char House a year ago. At the time, it seemed like the right thing to do. I hadn’t met anyone in college, always the single guy tagging along as my buddies slowly disappeared into relationships, removing themselves from our group to focus on their girlfriend, then trying to integrate back into the group with the girlfriend attached and their personality altered, softer, more accommodating to what they thought their girlfriend wanted. I thought I’d find someone in college too, it just never happened. I’d met Mary at a 5K my company was sponsoring, she running, me manning the oranges and bagels. What I initially found attractive in her I still did; the bounce of her black ponytail, her high cheekbones, full lips.
During the six months of dating, I ignored the important questions about money, kids, and anything else the men’s magazines said can tear apart relationships. After the engagement, I assumed when the time came to make the decisions, we’d agree on all the important issues. What I didn’t expect was Mary’s steadfast vehemence against bearing children, something she didn’t reveal until after the engagement. She’d been speaking out against kids with a more intense vehemence as the wedding date approached. Having a kid was something I always wanted. She could change her mind. And if she didn’t, I thought I could win her over. I learned it’s not like selling a juicer on late night TV. You can’t talk someone into something just because you really want it. I told her I just wanted a kid, someone I could explain the world to, push on a swing, share ice cream with. The first night I mentioned it, Mary rolled over in bed, away from me and squirmed every time I tried to hold her. The next morning, neither of us spoke at breakfast. I don’t even think I sat. All I remember is making up an excuse about having to be at work early.
We didn’t speak of having children again until Mary discovered my collection when she went up to the attic on a rainy Sunday, bringing down boxes to organize.
“Are you ready to talk?” Mary asked, putting her leftovers in the fridge.
“Sure,” I said. I didn’t know what we’d talk about, but I knew how it would end.
“It’s not fair what you’re doing, just so you know. We talked about having kids and we agreed.”
“I don’t remember signing anything,” I said, defensive.
“We said we weren’t the type of people who were going to have kids. We said that.” Mary clapped her hands as she pronounced each word for emphasis. Her head leaned to the side.
“I thought you’d come around,” I said. “I really thought you would.”
Mary grabbed her keys off the counter. “I’m going to the gym. Enjoy your fucking dinner.”
“Don’t puke,” I said. I took my keys off the counter too.
The gravel parking lot of the card shop was empty, save for one car parked on the side. I walked in, the bell’s jangle announcing my arrival.
“I’m closing in ten minutes,” the owner said. He sipped a soda. Empty cans and card wrappers filled the garbage basket behind him.
“I won’t be long,” I said.
“What are you trying to unload this time?”
“Unload?” I didn’t understand what he meant right away. “Oh, nothing. I’m not trying to unload anything. I’m just here to look.” I walked around the store. A cardboard cut-out of a younger Michael Jordan stood in a corner of the shop. He was wearing his Bulls uniform holding a ball with one hand, other hand on his hip. The ink was fading after years of exposure in the sun, the colors giving Jordan a bleached effect. Against one of the side walls were shelves filled with cardboard boxes, the year, brand, and price on the side.
“Are these all complete sets?” I asked.
“Yep.”
I pulled a set of 1997 Topps baseball off the shelf. “Mind if I look through?”
“Go ahead,” the owner said.
I pulled a stack of cards from the middle out, glancing at the players. I had stopped collecting cards in the mid ‘90s, caught up in college, girls, beer. Any extra money went to the beer and pizza fund. My father never stopped collecting, but he slowed down when I went away. Said it wasn’t as much fun anymore. He’d tell me about great cards he’d pull, deals he’d worked out with Mike, the owner of Legend’s Sports Cards, the store that opened down the street when I was in middle school. I’d listen over the phone, but as I became more busy, I stopped asking what he was collecting and he stopped telling me. After graduation, when he showed me his collection, I noticed everything stopped around 1995.
“Ken Caminiti.” His goateed face looked alive, youthful. “Shame what happened to him,” I said, referring to his suicide.
“Hell of a player.”
“I used to see him play when he was with the Padres. Almost caught one of his foul balls.”
I continued flipping. “J.T. Snow. I forgot about him. My father loved his father. What was his name?”
“Jack. Jack Snow. Great receiver.”
“Wow, Gary Sheffield.” I held the card, looking at Sheffield swinging, his bat almost at full extension. He wore a Florida Marlins uniform, something I had never gotten used to seeing him in. When he played for the Padres, he was one of my favorite players. I had all of his cards in a pile in one of the shoeboxes.
The owner said nothing. He had his back to me, rearranging packs in boxes. I grabbed his baseball and football price guides off the shelf. “What packs are selling well these days?”
“These ‘Memoirs,’” the owner said. “They’re $25 a pack, but you have a one in two chance of getting an autograph. The boxes are going for $500.”
“What about Topps? Does Topps still just do Topps?”
“Yeah, we still sell those. They’re not very popular. No autographs or special cards.”
“But do they have stats on the back?”
“Yep, but that’s about it though.”
I paid for the set of ’97 Topps and a box of the most recent Topps. I called my father’s nursing home as the bell rang behind me. I heard the deadbolt fasten as soon as the door shut.
“Dad? Hey, it’s me. What are you doing tomorrow?”
There was a pause on the other end. I wondered if I woke him.
“Nothing? Good. I’ll be up in the morning.”
I packed the cards out of sight in the trunk and drove home. I put my visor down, the setting sun burning bright in the rush-hour traffic, its reflection off the blue sedan in front cutting under the visor. My phone buzzed, a text from Mary: When are u coming home. I threw the phone on the passenger’s seat and continued driving. There was enough cash in my wallet for a couple slices and a soda. Mary didn’t buy soda ever since she read an article about how soda takes calcium from bones. Instead she treated soda like the mention of an estranged member of the family, grimacing when I’d order one at a restaurant, taking it out of the cart and placing it on a shelf when we went to the grocery store.
That night Mary asked if I was going to budge on “the kid issue.” I told her no, I didn’t think so. She said, “Okay” and turned over. When I woke, she wasn’t there, and I didn’t call. The relationship had no momentum, no legs. It was more obvious to me today as I stared at her various perfumes and lipsticks that took over the bathroom counter.
It was a three hour drive to my father’s nursing home. I left early in the morning after a quick stop at Dunkin’ Donuts. In front of me a father stood with his son. The boy had a hat that was too big for his head and fell over his ears. The father picked the boy up under his arms and held him over the counter as he picked out a doughnut, which the clerk handed him. By the time it was my turn to order, pink frosting speckled the kid’s face. I ordered extra Boston Cremes, my father’s favorite.
The nursing home had its familiar smell, sterile yet musty. I shared the elevator with a man in a wheelchair and his nurse. The man’s skin sagged, a plastic tube tucked under his nose. The nurse was young with bright red lipstick and large hoop earrings. The cards were tucked under my arm like a football.
My father was alone in his room, his breakfast tray atop his dresser, the crumbs and silverware waiting to be taken away. It had been a month since I had last seen him. I always had an excuse to not make the drive, and I suddenly felt very guilty for this. He sat in the easy chair, his arms resting on the arms of the chair. The TV was angled towards him, but I could hear the Sports Center announcers.
“Hey, old man,” I said, my term of endearment for my father for as long as I could remember.
“Hey, Sport,” he said. He leaned forward, his thin arms pressed against the arms of the chair as he rose.
We hugged. His body felt smaller. I could feel his ribs, hear his short breaths. But his eyes were clear like the water poured from the filter on the commercial that played in the background, full of life, vitality. “A five layer filter,” the commercial promised. I thought about taking my father out of the nursing home, if he’d let me take care of him.
“I brought you something,” I said. I held the boxes of cards. He had a perplexed look, almost like he wasn’t sure what I was holding. The look changed when I opened the set of ’97 Topps and he pulled out a stack of cards.
“Tony Gwynn. I miss seeing him in that Padres uniform. Remember we stayed in line for two hours at that card show in ’92 to get his autograph?”
“Yep,” I said, remembering how bad I had to go to the bathroom that day. I was afraid if I got out of line I’d miss my chance to meet my idol. I remember Dad stood with me as we waited, how he handed his throwaway camera to the person behind us to take a picture, each of us on one side of Tony, smiling, his broad shoulders a threat to devour us. “Great player.”
“Hell of a player,” Dad said, flipping to the next card.
I held the plastic case in my hand, staring back at Nolan Ryan’s intense gaze, obviously a pose. I never noticed the players in the background or the empty bleachers. The card brought back memories of my mother, how she’d open the door, leaning into it with a brown grocery bag, the hinges squeaking as she entered. I’d help her with the groceries, turning away from whatever baseball game was on TV. After we put everything away, she’d reach into her purse and say, “Oh, I forgot something,” and pull out a pack of baseball cards, the waxy wrappers and stale gum a thumbprint of my childhood.
My collection grew over the years. By the time I was old enough to make money for myself, I’d go to the store with her and drop whatever cash I had on the counter and grab as many packs as I could. I’d jam them into my pockets and open them on the ride home, flipping through the cards like a Vegas card dealer, looking for Padres and Angels, my favorite teams. The cards were in shoeboxes under my bed, the same way I envisioned gold bars were kept at Fort Knox. I didn’t have any real system for keeping them organized until I got older. Sometimes Dad and I would sort them by teams, other times by talent. “This guy is terrible,” he’d say, flipping a card over and reading his stats. “Hasn’t even hit .250 in five years. Dead weight.” He’d lay on the carpet in my room, his head resting on his hand. I remember when he pulled out my Nolan Ryan card, the same one the dealer dismissed with barely a glance, holding it on its sides with one hand, pointing to it with the other. “Now this guy, this guy here, he’s gonna be something,” he said. “You better hang on to this.”
“I can’t let it go for less than book value,” I told the dealer. “It’s Nolan Ryan.”
“Can’t do it,” he said, ringing up a customer. I placed the card back in the shoebox, the same one I stashed under my bed, although this time most of the cards were in protective plastic cases, the hard plastic edges framing them like miniature paintings. “You must not want to sell it negotiating like that.”
I left the store, the bell ringing behind me, shoebox tucked under my arm. I could say I tried. A feeling of relief washed over the guilt I felt, holding the cards of my childhood heroes out for appraisal like common junk. I started the car and pulled out of the gravel parking lot, leaving behind a cartoon-like trail of dust.
Mary would lean her head to the side, the way she always did when she did when she didn’t get something she wanted, when she came home from work tonight. I knew that. She’d ask how much I’d made from the cards, talk about what a nice dinner we could have with the extra money, maybe even pay for the wedding favors. She’d been asking me to do something with my shoeboxes since she’d found them in the attic. Said they were just taking up space and we, she emphasized “we,” should make money on them while there were still fools willing to buy pictures of athletes on cardboard.
I sat on the couch with my shoebox and watched the afternoon game on cable. A lot of the players I hadn’t heard of, but I enjoyed the slow rhythm of sounds; the announcers between pitches, the sound of the ball as it smacked the catcher’s leather or wooden bat of the hitter, the constant murmur of the fans. I stacked my cards in piles of three in terms of what I wouldn’t sell, couldn’t sell, and could sell but didn’t want to. The third stack was the shortest.
“Have any luck today?” Mary asked, placing a plastic bag of take-out on the counter.
“Not really. Doesn’t seem to be a seller’s market right now.”
She cocked her head to the side. “Does it matter?”
I didn’t answer. The Nolan Ryan card stared back at me from the top of the “Can’t Sell” pile.
“I would like to see you make more of an effort to sell the cards,” Mary said. “They’re not doing us any good.”
“What if we have a son?” I asked.
Mary took her plastic container of food out of the plastic bag. She held it like the bottom could drop out at any moment and leave her covered in sweet and sour chicken. “We’re not doing this again, are we?”
I remained silent. On the TV, the batter had a 3-2 count. He was digging his cleats in, his back arm extended to the umpire asking for a time out. The camera zoomed in on the pitcher, who spit in the dirt. I didn’t recognize the pitcher or the batter, but I recognized the importance of the pitch.
“I’m not going to stand around and try to talk to you if you’re going to be rude,” Mary said. She opened the back porch and sat at our patio table, staring at her phone as she shoveled chunks of chicken into her mouth.
We’d dated for six months before I proposed at The Char House a year ago. At the time, it seemed like the right thing to do. I hadn’t met anyone in college, always the single guy tagging along as my buddies slowly disappeared into relationships, removing themselves from our group to focus on their girlfriend, then trying to integrate back into the group with the girlfriend attached and their personality altered, softer, more accommodating to what they thought their girlfriend wanted. I thought I’d find someone in college too, it just never happened. I’d met Mary at a 5K my company was sponsoring, she running, me manning the oranges and bagels. What I initially found attractive in her I still did; the bounce of her black ponytail, her high cheekbones, full lips.
During the six months of dating, I ignored the important questions about money, kids, and anything else the men’s magazines said can tear apart relationships. After the engagement, I assumed when the time came to make the decisions, we’d agree on all the important issues. What I didn’t expect was Mary’s steadfast vehemence against bearing children, something she didn’t reveal until after the engagement. She’d been speaking out against kids with a more intense vehemence as the wedding date approached. Having a kid was something I always wanted. She could change her mind. And if she didn’t, I thought I could win her over. I learned it’s not like selling a juicer on late night TV. You can’t talk someone into something just because you really want it. I told her I just wanted a kid, someone I could explain the world to, push on a swing, share ice cream with. The first night I mentioned it, Mary rolled over in bed, away from me and squirmed every time I tried to hold her. The next morning, neither of us spoke at breakfast. I don’t even think I sat. All I remember is making up an excuse about having to be at work early.
We didn’t speak of having children again until Mary discovered my collection when she went up to the attic on a rainy Sunday, bringing down boxes to organize.
“Are you ready to talk?” Mary asked, putting her leftovers in the fridge.
“Sure,” I said. I didn’t know what we’d talk about, but I knew how it would end.
“It’s not fair what you’re doing, just so you know. We talked about having kids and we agreed.”
“I don’t remember signing anything,” I said, defensive.
“We said we weren’t the type of people who were going to have kids. We said that.” Mary clapped her hands as she pronounced each word for emphasis. Her head leaned to the side.
“I thought you’d come around,” I said. “I really thought you would.”
Mary grabbed her keys off the counter. “I’m going to the gym. Enjoy your fucking dinner.”
“Don’t puke,” I said. I took my keys off the counter too.
The gravel parking lot of the card shop was empty, save for one car parked on the side. I walked in, the bell’s jangle announcing my arrival.
“I’m closing in ten minutes,” the owner said. He sipped a soda. Empty cans and card wrappers filled the garbage basket behind him.
“I won’t be long,” I said.
“What are you trying to unload this time?”
“Unload?” I didn’t understand what he meant right away. “Oh, nothing. I’m not trying to unload anything. I’m just here to look.” I walked around the store. A cardboard cut-out of a younger Michael Jordan stood in a corner of the shop. He was wearing his Bulls uniform holding a ball with one hand, other hand on his hip. The ink was fading after years of exposure in the sun, the colors giving Jordan a bleached effect. Against one of the side walls were shelves filled with cardboard boxes, the year, brand, and price on the side.
“Are these all complete sets?” I asked.
“Yep.”
I pulled a set of 1997 Topps baseball off the shelf. “Mind if I look through?”
“Go ahead,” the owner said.
I pulled a stack of cards from the middle out, glancing at the players. I had stopped collecting cards in the mid ‘90s, caught up in college, girls, beer. Any extra money went to the beer and pizza fund. My father never stopped collecting, but he slowed down when I went away. Said it wasn’t as much fun anymore. He’d tell me about great cards he’d pull, deals he’d worked out with Mike, the owner of Legend’s Sports Cards, the store that opened down the street when I was in middle school. I’d listen over the phone, but as I became more busy, I stopped asking what he was collecting and he stopped telling me. After graduation, when he showed me his collection, I noticed everything stopped around 1995.
“Ken Caminiti.” His goateed face looked alive, youthful. “Shame what happened to him,” I said, referring to his suicide.
“Hell of a player.”
“I used to see him play when he was with the Padres. Almost caught one of his foul balls.”
I continued flipping. “J.T. Snow. I forgot about him. My father loved his father. What was his name?”
“Jack. Jack Snow. Great receiver.”
“Wow, Gary Sheffield.” I held the card, looking at Sheffield swinging, his bat almost at full extension. He wore a Florida Marlins uniform, something I had never gotten used to seeing him in. When he played for the Padres, he was one of my favorite players. I had all of his cards in a pile in one of the shoeboxes.
The owner said nothing. He had his back to me, rearranging packs in boxes. I grabbed his baseball and football price guides off the shelf. “What packs are selling well these days?”
“These ‘Memoirs,’” the owner said. “They’re $25 a pack, but you have a one in two chance of getting an autograph. The boxes are going for $500.”
“What about Topps? Does Topps still just do Topps?”
“Yeah, we still sell those. They’re not very popular. No autographs or special cards.”
“But do they have stats on the back?”
“Yep, but that’s about it though.”
I paid for the set of ’97 Topps and a box of the most recent Topps. I called my father’s nursing home as the bell rang behind me. I heard the deadbolt fasten as soon as the door shut.
“Dad? Hey, it’s me. What are you doing tomorrow?”
There was a pause on the other end. I wondered if I woke him.
“Nothing? Good. I’ll be up in the morning.”
I packed the cards out of sight in the trunk and drove home. I put my visor down, the setting sun burning bright in the rush-hour traffic, its reflection off the blue sedan in front cutting under the visor. My phone buzzed, a text from Mary: When are u coming home. I threw the phone on the passenger’s seat and continued driving. There was enough cash in my wallet for a couple slices and a soda. Mary didn’t buy soda ever since she read an article about how soda takes calcium from bones. Instead she treated soda like the mention of an estranged member of the family, grimacing when I’d order one at a restaurant, taking it out of the cart and placing it on a shelf when we went to the grocery store.
That night Mary asked if I was going to budge on “the kid issue.” I told her no, I didn’t think so. She said, “Okay” and turned over. When I woke, she wasn’t there, and I didn’t call. The relationship had no momentum, no legs. It was more obvious to me today as I stared at her various perfumes and lipsticks that took over the bathroom counter.
It was a three hour drive to my father’s nursing home. I left early in the morning after a quick stop at Dunkin’ Donuts. In front of me a father stood with his son. The boy had a hat that was too big for his head and fell over his ears. The father picked the boy up under his arms and held him over the counter as he picked out a doughnut, which the clerk handed him. By the time it was my turn to order, pink frosting speckled the kid’s face. I ordered extra Boston Cremes, my father’s favorite.
The nursing home had its familiar smell, sterile yet musty. I shared the elevator with a man in a wheelchair and his nurse. The man’s skin sagged, a plastic tube tucked under his nose. The nurse was young with bright red lipstick and large hoop earrings. The cards were tucked under my arm like a football.
My father was alone in his room, his breakfast tray atop his dresser, the crumbs and silverware waiting to be taken away. It had been a month since I had last seen him. I always had an excuse to not make the drive, and I suddenly felt very guilty for this. He sat in the easy chair, his arms resting on the arms of the chair. The TV was angled towards him, but I could hear the Sports Center announcers.
“Hey, old man,” I said, my term of endearment for my father for as long as I could remember.
“Hey, Sport,” he said. He leaned forward, his thin arms pressed against the arms of the chair as he rose.
We hugged. His body felt smaller. I could feel his ribs, hear his short breaths. But his eyes were clear like the water poured from the filter on the commercial that played in the background, full of life, vitality. “A five layer filter,” the commercial promised. I thought about taking my father out of the nursing home, if he’d let me take care of him.
“I brought you something,” I said. I held the boxes of cards. He had a perplexed look, almost like he wasn’t sure what I was holding. The look changed when I opened the set of ’97 Topps and he pulled out a stack of cards.
“Tony Gwynn. I miss seeing him in that Padres uniform. Remember we stayed in line for two hours at that card show in ’92 to get his autograph?”
“Yep,” I said, remembering how bad I had to go to the bathroom that day. I was afraid if I got out of line I’d miss my chance to meet my idol. I remember Dad stood with me as we waited, how he handed his throwaway camera to the person behind us to take a picture, each of us on one side of Tony, smiling, his broad shoulders a threat to devour us. “Great player.”
“Hell of a player,” Dad said, flipping to the next card.
Realizations, Anita Babcock
I am breathless. Beads of sweat roll from
my forehead, to my temple, and down my jaw. It is the end of another crazy night.
Dancing seven nights a week under hot lights isn’t as easy as I thought it would
be; I'm exhausted. I don’t even bother washing off the make-up before I grab my
bag and head home. I flip on the light to my living room and sink into my living
room chair. I have time coming up and it would be perfect time for a vacation.
Logging onto the computer, I search and finally decide on a location. Using my
debit card, I purchase the tickets needed and begin to
pack.
I am a lover of fairy tales of all sorts. Greek mythology has always held
a special place in my heart so I had chosen to visit Greece. I feel a pang as I
remember moments from my childhood with my father reading to me from a book of
Greek myths. I shake my head, pushing the thought out, and head to
bed.
A few days later I arrive in Greece. It is June 21st
and not only is it the Summer Solstice, but also European Music Day. From what I
researched before my travels, Greece celebrates with three days of music. I
decided to stop in Athens for the live shows. After I drop my bags off at my
hotel, I make my way outside. Men and women, both old and young, dance together
in the streets. Off to my right, a stage is set up for the performers. Already,
a woman is up there singing in such a sweet way that I feel a shiver create
goose bumps along my arms.
“Try the lamb!” a voice to my left calls out in heavily
accented English. I am hungry and gladly buy a skewer of the meat. I walk along eating
and burning my lips with the grease.
Everyone around me is having fun. I watch the dancing with close attention. I love to dance, which is the reason I chose to be a showgirl. I take a
deep breath and I try to dance the way the Greeks are. I am laughing and having
a grand time. Back home in Vegas, there is so much pressure to be perfect for my
job. Now however, I am in control. I can just dance freely and enjoy the music
instead of dealing with the constant worry about how I look in the costumes that I have to
wear back home. Here I am no longer required to wear a mask for anyone. I am
free to be me.
A family is standing near by. I watch a little boy dance with his dog.
It’s sweet and funny to observe.
The white and brown spotted puppy jumps around the boy. It dances up on
its hind legs and twirls in front of the boy in an almost ballet-like style. The
barks of the dog are as joyous as the laughter is from the young boy. The mother
watches and claps along to the music as she laughs and encourages the boy in
their native tongue.
Suddenly, I am struck with the sadness that I have worked so hard to keep
at bay but keeps creeping up. I think of my own family back home. I haven’t
talked with them in a year. Not since I decided to become a
showgirl.
“That is not an acceptable job for an 18 year old,” my mother
shouted at me having found out what I decided to do.
I feel alone now, surrounded by the happiness of the
celebrating people. The contrast between the others and myself is becoming more
obvious. I find a seat alone and continue to take in everything.
These people actually are happy, aren’t they? They can’t all be
acting!
My throat suddenly tightens and becomes as dry as a desert. I became a
showgirl because I love the showy costumes; I love the thrill of performing for
people. It seemed like an adventure and an easy way to earn some
cash.
“Go to college, make something of yourself,” my father begs me
when he finds out what I want to do.
I ignored his wishes. I didn’t want my family to control me
after so long so I’d packed and left, ignoring the hurt that was on their
faces.
“Please don’t go Amy! You have to stay here with me. Mom and Dad
are going to disown you if you leave.” My sister cried, pleading with me not to
go. I turned a deaf ear to her.
Now, I wonder how my mother is. How is my dad's golfing? Is
my kid sister okay after such a harsh way I had left? I have been so wrong with the
negative attitude I’d expressed with my family.
Here I am, in a beautiful plaza, a gathering of people
surrounds me, but I cannot feel their joy any longer. Leaving home caused me to
lose my identity as it handed me a mask.
“Lose some weight Amy. You have to keep up your appearance!” The
manager shouted at me watching a rehearsal.
Nighttime has fallen upon Greece and its celebration of music. I am still
in the same seat thinking of my family and of my job. I stand up heading back to
my hotel. I have been stubborn for a year, but I miss my family. I see the
reality now instead of the once exciting, abstract life I had created for myself.
I smile to myself and head up to my room. I have made up my mind to reconcile
with my family, but I am nervous. What if they don’t forgive me? I sit on my bed
taking a deep breath nervously. I want to take off the mask that I have hidden
behind for a year and re-enter the simplicity of my former life. It will take
teamwork for my family to forgive me, but it’s a chance I have to take. Slowly I
pick up my hotel room phone and dial.
“Hello?”
“Mom, it’s me,” I choke out, my throat dry with fear. “I am done with my
adventures and I want to come home.”The Skateboard, Rick Hartwell
I remember one late night in
San Francisco. It was after we had
stood in line for hours and had seen Glenn Yarborough at the Hungry I that closed at two. We were walking home to a basement apartment halfway up the
hill, and crossing through a moon-shadowed park. We were listening to the tempoed slap of steel wheels as a
skateboard crossed the cracks of the sidewalk in the park.
Skateboarding in the park at
night in San Francisco seemed just right, and Ben and I gave the kid a buck to
rent the skateboard for one hour.
Steep price, one buck, in 1965, but worth it all the same. No one questioned why the kid was there
at night alone. No one questioned
whether it was safe to be there, or legal, or even wise. Back then those questions just didn’t
come to mind.
The kid kept pace beside us,
keeping track of his property.
That skateboard had a history.
It was not made of the nylon wheels and flexible plastics of today. It was not purchased property. It was made of pilfered steel skates
from a birthday gift and a rough-shaped board lifted from some building
site. This was the kid-made fun of
yesterdays, purchased from the heart.
Ben and I took turns, skating
for an hour, drunk with the breeze of speed and the clacking of the wheels
across the cracks. His second wife
and my first, continued to visit with each other, their irritation
growing. Ben and I continued to
revel in the childishness of what felt deeply good and right. The passage of time interfered with us
and we were told we had to stop because it was so late, or early, or
whatever. We returned the
skateboard to the boy who knew no bounds of time or responsibility. The boy clacked away down the park’s
steep hill, while Ben and I were led home to dulled beds.
I haven’t seen Ben since
then, although I’ve heard he’s been married twice and has a son who bears my
name.
Yes, I remember one late
night in San Francisco skating through the park.
Butterfly, Amy Ekins
Ed. Note - MSc is the term for a Masters of Science degree in England
She pressed paper into the ink
found bleeding across his desk.
The fingers of blue stretched
until butterfly wings grew.
She pinned it with a clip
and hung it from the window ledge,
three stories from the gravel
and two stories up from home.
She took a seat and lit a cigarette
from a purple slender packet.
His lips were a beautiful blue -
part ink, part frost.
She waited ‘til the paper dried,
brought it inside, and folded
intricate wings from the letterhead -
MSc, no use when dead.
She pressed paper into the ink
found bleeding across his desk.
The fingers of blue stretched
until butterfly wings grew.
She pinned it with a clip
and hung it from the window ledge,
three stories from the gravel
and two stories up from home.
She took a seat and lit a cigarette
from a purple slender packet.
His lips were a beautiful blue -
part ink, part frost.
She waited ‘til the paper dried,
brought it inside, and folded
intricate wings from the letterhead -
MSc, no use when dead.
Dishes, Alex Strong
I let the dishes pile up for days.
Not because I didn’t feel like doing them, but because
the bits of leftover food, scattered along the sink bottom, were
meteors falling from a grey sky.
New Clothes, Alex Strong
I’ve never had any reason to wear a dress shirt
five days in a row.
(I have no idea what I’m doing) I realized:
five days in a row.
Utterly unprepared, I
went to the loop and walked around,
looking for a store that sold nice shirts. 40 minutes
went by before(I have no idea what I’m doing) I realized:
Persona, Afshan Shafi
The ‘dissolution of the persona’
Can be achieved by gutting
all fragrant garrets of their chartreuse and liquor
By spurning the monkish leers
Of personable academics,
By refuting the archetype of
The ‘wise old woman’
Or the horsy doppelgangers
Swooning out of the clavicles
Of Ivorian harps,
By asserting the voracity of hyaline
Over the more lugubrious Roman candle,
By refuting the Brunswick blue of love’s
Oppression,
By refusing the handsome or the rich,
For some reward too ingenious to divulge,
For the persona is a priest’s imperative,
A sexagenarian’s masterpiece
Of tact,
A butch girls’ enthralling libretto
Or the giant stalagmites of
A woman’s rhinestones at noon
Can be achieved by gutting
all fragrant garrets of their chartreuse and liquor
By spurning the monkish leers
Of personable academics,
By refuting the archetype of
The ‘wise old woman’
Or the horsy doppelgangers
Swooning out of the clavicles
Of Ivorian harps,
By asserting the voracity of hyaline
Over the more lugubrious Roman candle,
By refuting the Brunswick blue of love’s
Oppression,
By refusing the handsome or the rich,
For some reward too ingenious to divulge,
For the persona is a priest’s imperative,
A sexagenarian’s masterpiece
Of tact,
A butch girls’ enthralling libretto
Or the giant stalagmites of
A woman’s rhinestones at noon
Lord's Park, Joan Colby
The bear pit is gone as is the iron cage
Where the mangy lion paced or snored,
The stone well that held the venomous snakes.
In the museum, circa 1904,
The fusty elk heads, stuffed
Coyotes, raccoons and squirrels,
Glass bell of desiccating songbirds,
Butterfly collections pinned beneath glass
Are relegated to a dim alcove.
While the two headed calf has been removed
With the Cyclops kitten, the human embryo
Floating in a mason jar like a peach.
The rooms have brightened, interactive
Displays allow children to reach
Into the glacial past to view how ice
Rose a thousand feet right here where we stand
Observing Lakota beadwork or the photos
Of the Palm Sunday tornado
When all the churches collapsed.
Where the mangy lion paced or snored,
The stone well that held the venomous snakes.
In the museum, circa 1904,
The fusty elk heads, stuffed
Coyotes, raccoons and squirrels,
Glass bell of desiccating songbirds,
Butterfly collections pinned beneath glass
Are relegated to a dim alcove.
While the two headed calf has been removed
With the Cyclops kitten, the human embryo
Floating in a mason jar like a peach.
The rooms have brightened, interactive
Displays allow children to reach
Into the glacial past to view how ice
Rose a thousand feet right here where we stand
Observing Lakota beadwork or the photos
Of the Palm Sunday tornado
When all the churches collapsed.
Song of Ulysses, Clinton Van Inman
For greatness and glory’s sake,
For all things rich and noble,
In proud ships tall let us make
Again where only men are able.
Tired we’ve grown of glitter and gold,
The Cimmerian curse of a market place,
Let us dream of Delphic days of old
That even Poseidon’s rage could not erase.
Come, arise, my men, arise
For tomorrow we shall sail
Again under blue Aegean skies
There to find newer walls to assail.
The Sirens’ song had made us weak
For we have slept too long and late.
Now for greater joys let us seek
Knowing we are masters of our fate.
For all things rich and noble,
In proud ships tall let us make
Again where only men are able.
Tired we’ve grown of glitter and gold,
The Cimmerian curse of a market place,
Let us dream of Delphic days of old
That even Poseidon’s rage could not erase.
Come, arise, my men, arise
For tomorrow we shall sail
Again under blue Aegean skies
There to find newer walls to assail.
The Sirens’ song had made us weak
For we have slept too long and late.
Now for greater joys let us seek
Knowing we are masters of our fate.
Song of Sirens, Clinton Van Inman
Come closer and you shall hear
Voices only the seas remember
As your proud ship rolls near
And soon upon the rocks surrender.
For those who hear our chorus
There is no turning back,
Or for you, steadfast Ulysses
From the cold, billowing black.
For you are proud, defiant, and true,
Among the Achaeans the bravest and best.
Listen for a voice is calling you,
A voice, a voice unlike all the rest.
Listen as Penelope waits for you.
For we know everything which is Troy!
Listen as her voice is calling you.
For we know everything which is Troy!
Voices only the seas remember
As your proud ship rolls near
And soon upon the rocks surrender.
For those who hear our chorus
There is no turning back,
Or for you, steadfast Ulysses
From the cold, billowing black.
For you are proud, defiant, and true,
Among the Achaeans the bravest and best.
Listen for a voice is calling you,
A voice, a voice unlike all the rest.
Listen as Penelope waits for you.
For we know everything which is Troy!
Listen as her voice is calling you.
For we know everything which is Troy!
The End #486,283,764,016, Denny E. Marshall
The increasing mass of people
Army of fortunetellers
The hoards of philosophers
From elite to commoners
Have talked about
Or predicted the end of the future
Riding on a beam
Among the dusk
Including prophets and intellectuals
To the lone bearded man
On the city street corner
Holding a sign instead of a book
The end is near
Astrologically that is true
The end of what, just us
Is that really the end?
The universe will shed no tears
It will not even notice
The end is ours
Belongs to us alone
New life begins
The birth of countless predictions
Why the latest one
Better then the last
Only the end
Will tell
Army of fortunetellers
The hoards of philosophers
From elite to commoners
Have talked about
Or predicted the end of the future
Riding on a beam
Among the dusk
Including prophets and intellectuals
To the lone bearded man
On the city street corner
Holding a sign instead of a book
The end is near
Astrologically that is true
The end of what, just us
Is that really the end?
The universe will shed no tears
It will not even notice
The end is ours
Belongs to us alone
New life begins
The birth of countless predictions
Why the latest one
Better then the last
Only the end
Will tell
Close Open Eyes, Denny E. Marshall
Looking for a wish just to sleep
Instead of restless find the deep
After telling the night good-byes
Wish I could close my open eyes
To get lost and find the lost dreams
Before awaking, break the seams
In darkened colors changing dyes
Wish I could close my open eyes
Ceiling is a friend lying awake
Was too much caffeine the mistake?
Float away with a bourbon rye
Wish I could close my open eyes
Instead of restless find the deep
After telling the night good-byes
Wish I could close my open eyes
To get lost and find the lost dreams
Before awaking, break the seams
In darkened colors changing dyes
Wish I could close my open eyes
Ceiling is a friend lying awake
Was too much caffeine the mistake?
Float away with a bourbon rye
Wish I could close my open eyes
Poetry Birds of the Street, Denny E. Marshall
What is that bird reciting on the street?
Could it be a poem read by a toucan?
Echoed by a mimicking parakeet
Joined by a penguin walking on two feet
Puffin and parrot adding tweet, tweet, tweet
Snacks arrive flow in by a pelican
What is that bird reciting on the street?
Could it be a poem read by a toucan?
Could it be a poem read by a toucan?
Echoed by a mimicking parakeet
Joined by a penguin walking on two feet
Puffin and parrot adding tweet, tweet, tweet
Snacks arrive flow in by a pelican
What is that bird reciting on the street?
Could it be a poem read by a toucan?
Issue 18 Bios
My name is Anita
Babcock and I am 25 years old. I have been accepted for publication by The
Eclectic Eel and Life As An... before being accepted by the lovely Toucan. My
goal is to touch at least one person with my stories and hopefully a novel in
the future. I can be found at http://creativedreams.webs.
Joan Colby is widely published in
journals such as Poetry, Atlanta Review, Gargoyle, etc. Her latest book
"Dead Horses" is just out from Future Cycle Press.
Amy Ekins is a
writer of fiction and non-fiction, a project manager for a publishing company,
and is at the time of writing finishing up her MRes in Creative Writing at
Northumbria University - for which she was awarded their fee-waiver
scholarship. She tweets at @AmyEWrites.
Brian
Kayser is a writer who lives in Charlottesville, Virginia. Brian’s
fiction has appeared in 34th Parallel Magazine, Alliterati Magazine, Down Dirty
Word, Writing Raw, and Bursting Plethora and forthcoming in The Orris Journal,
Bartleby Snopes, The Write Room, Crack the Spine, Shadows Express, and Eunoia
Review. He has been editor-in-chief at HipHopGame.com since 2003, where he has
interviewed and written about a variety of hip-hop artists. His writings about
music have also appeared in The Source and various websites and magazines.
Denny
E. Marshall has no art education or training, has never won or been
nominated for an award, and has never had art shown in a gallery, public or
private. After all the years still enjoys drawing by hand or computer. Has had
art & poetry recently rejected and some recently published such as poetry
in August 2012 issue of Yes, Poetry, cover art in the April 2012 issue
of Eclectic Eel and art in Decades Review #4.
Dan
Nawrocki is just this guy, you know? He can be found at http://organminerreviews.wordpress.com/
Alex Strong's
poems have appeared in The Aberrant Parade Literary Review, his
notebooks, and emails to friends. Recently, he wrote a thesis on early modern
science fiction. He lives in Chicago, but has spent a lot of time in Iowa.
Clinton
Van Inman - I
am 65 and was born in Walton-on-Thames, England and graduated from San Diego
State University in 1977 with a degree in philosophy. (Don’t laugh, so did TS
Eliot) Currently, I am still working as a high school teacher in Tampa.
I am one of the few last standing Beat poets. I am trying to get a
collection of poems together for future publication called, “Far From Out” or “One
Last Beat.” I have had many poems published over the years. Recent
publications include the Tower Journal, Essence, The Warwick, Journal of
Victorian Poetry, Yes Poetry, Poetry, Out of Four, and Black Cat Poetry.
Also some of my poems have been recently read on YouTube by Janet K. of
Down in the Dirt magazine, which publishes many of my poems.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
