The Awkward Alligator

ISSUE 5

2007-06-02T09:45:00.001-07:00

Letter to Friends and Lovers (p. 2)

2007-06-02T09:40:00.000-07:00

Dear Friends and Lovers,

It has come to my attention that you are aware of the presence of one publication, The Awkward Alligator, of which you are at the present moment in possession. While I recommend that you read the contents of said magazine with whatever keen awareness and vigour you are able to devote, I also would like to place inside your head a number of notions that we have been discussing of late. Do you mind if I explain in the next paragraph?

Thank you, Reader, I see that you are both humane and of capable faculties. I was telling you before that we have been gabbing about new ideas, and we've decided to make some additions in the coming year that you should probably make yourself familiar with. Some of you are already familiar with the group to which we belong, the RE: collective, but others of you are not. The website is on the back of this AA, and you should probably poke in to say hello. Through RE: we do our mail art stuff and a new project called Excerpts that's pretty sweet. In the next year we will also be launching our Wish Tank, dedicated to writing strongly worded letters to all the different people and organizations that so desperately need a dose of diction. All of our friends are encouraged (almost required, really) to download the letterhead, write off a couple scolding lines, and then send it to the offending person (or organization). We'll make sure you know more about it as the website comes up.

Speaking of which, can I write to you for just a second in a candid manner? Bless you. The deal is this: many of you have chatted with us over our email address (awkwardalligator@gmail.com), and this is always good because we like chatting, but now we have a website where you can also chat. No, seriously. All of you know how much we flap our gums about helping smart readers find smart writers, and a blog-style website seemed like a logical extension of that. We're still doing a bunch of work, but most AA back-issues are up there now for your perusing pleasure. Where is it? At www.re-awkwardalligator.blogspot.com, of course! All submissions, comments, questions, and general gossip can still be sent to the email address, (and for submissions the email address is the only way [actually, just recently The Awkward Alligator has activated it's very own PO Box, feel free to send things to us; see "submit work" section on the right side of your screen for address details]) but for other chats about stories, poems, or friendship we'll now be using our new babble-wagon.

I know that you're smart, Reader. You'll figure out the rest. In the meantime please try some of this Awkward Alligator. I hope you think it's delicious.

With Due Gusto,

Vincent Saint-Simon

Contents (p. 3)

2007-06-02T09:19:00.000-07:00

Contents

POETRY

............................................................................................................................................6

Never Ignorant of Getting Goals Accomplished
Oedipus Jones

.....................................................................................................................................................................................7

floaters
brock bernard

...............................................................................................................................................................8

Outline For a Discourse
C. Yumi Kim

..............................................................................................................................................................................9

ten
brock bernard

ESSAYS & LETTERS

....................................................................................................................................................................12

Manifesto
Nikki Rainey

................................................................................................................................................................................14

Artist’s Statement
Curt Bozif

..........................................................................................................................................................16

Strongly Worded Letter to Smiling Fox
Vincent Saint-Simon

......................................................................................................................................................18

Strongly Worded Letter to Vincent Saint-Simon
Smiling Fox

FICTION

.........................................................................................................................................................................22

Don’t Forget to Write
Vincent Saint-Simon

The Awkward Alligator is lovingly shuffled together by Matt, Nikki, Curt, Natalie, Brock, AJ, and Nick. Please send submissions to: awkwardalligator@gmail.com.

Never Ignorant of Getting Goals Accomplished (p. 6)

2007-06-02T09:15:00.000-07:00

POETRY

Never Ignorant of Getting Goals Accomplished
Oedipus Jones

I want
To drink coffee without any ulcers,
To smoke without worry of cancer,
To take drink in excess with no consequences
Physical or social,
To read think and write (almost) exclusively,
Confound reason and commonsense,
And plague the collective unconscious with my contemptible whims.

I will achieve a literal immortality
And die by my own hand.

floaters (p. 7)

2007-06-02T09:13:00.000-07:00

floaters
brock bernard

i asked around
and i hear that they're called floaters,

quickly becoming
a great annoyance for me.

they make me feel old.
they make me feel dry.

they make me feel like a writer,
which is quite the shame; i am most certainy not,

waking up a three pm
with burning eyes because of that oppressive

late afternoon sunlight, reading Ginsberg and
writing 'i feel' statements.

a different floater in a different eye
every other week.

and it makes me wonder,
really if they aren't just errant memories,

ones i was looking for a fortnight ago,
saying their last goodbyes laughingly.

three-and-twenty feels old
and i can't back that up tomorrow, with new ash

in my eyes.

Outline for a Discourse (p. 8)

2007-06-02T09:11:00.000-07:00

Outline for a Discourse
C. Yumi Kim

The Windy City
The Coast
Myself
Crowded Airport
You, of course.
In Between
Unfamiliarity
This is the skeleton of a discourse. I hope to finish it one day.

ten (p. 9)

2007-06-02T09:09:00.000-07:00

ten
brock bernard

turtle shimmied left,
he only wanted to
see the big sky

Manifesto (p. 12)

2007-06-02T09:01:00.000-07:00

ESSAYS & LETTERS

Manifesto
Nikki Rainey

Saturday night, I babysat Anya and it took her forty five minutes to fall asleep she’s really nervous about sleeping. I told her a very prolonged, cleaned up version of the Twelve Dancing Princesses and then sat patting her back for what seemed like hours.

I think: she can’t actually be paying attention to this ridiculous shit, I add adjectives “luxurious gown,” “melancholy visage,” I wonder if she’s scared, or if she thinks I’m insane, or if she’d really like to believe that she’s a princess sneaking out of her room every night to muck around with handsome phantoms in an underground ball.

I have this childhood memory of telling myself stories when I couldn’t sleep, hoping the stories would turn into dreams. Now I’m a grown-up and I teach poetry to children as part of my job. I ask them, “write a list of three dreams you can remember.”

They write about:

1. boogers,
2. wrestling (specifically John Cena from the WWF),
3. traditionally inanimate objects violently eating their friends.

This is what they always write about, except for one teacher-pleasing little girl who writes about wanting to be able to fly, and God I love her for it. But I can’t blame them, it’s after school, they’re being smart, being funny, and making up good lies to get someone to laugh.

If they were grown-ups, I’d tell them my Manifesto:

* Letters from Wally and Julia are just as brilliant as any famous novel.
* All good writing (not just poetry) uses images and sound.
* In spite of an obvious love for innovation/sophistication/cleverness, no fair forgetting the original bone/primal love of resonating with stories
* I secretly still think boogers are funny.
* I believe in fearlessness,
* a desire for experiment,
* boredom when it comes to experiment
without purpose,
* dancing in underground balls.
* No one is famous anymore so fuck it
and just make something beautiful already.

Sadly, I am a miserable poetry teacher, so instead I say something vapid and grown-uppish like, “That’s hilarious, but could you show it to your mother?”

They roll their eyes and secretly we both know that some things are just not for your mother. Secretly we both know that skating the line between funny/nasty, fanasy/reality, singing/talking, waking/dreaming, grown-up/kid, John Cena/human, Anya/Princess is what makes writing fun, hard, and a powerful tool for liberation.

Post Script: I love ya’ll, come visit me in Wisconsin and be a guest writer in my class. We’ll pretend you published a couple of novels and impress the hell out of some 8 year olds. I don’t have a couch, but we can sit on my porch and tell each other fairy tales all night long.

Artist's Statement (p. 14)

2007-06-02T08:57:00.000-07:00

Artist’s Statement
Curt Bozif

At its most basic level my work is concerned with drawing attention to the beauty of human activities/efforts and their effects positioned within/against their own transient nature. More specifically, the content of my work gestures toward a preoccupation with the subject's psychological economy and movement within ideology (religious, political, and socio-economic), i.e. the dialectic struggle that is the subject's simultaneous resistance to and reliance upon the social Other. In my work these concepts find signifiers in an economy where mundane material objects (such as brick, carpet, and ball-point pen), the tools of execution (such as hammers, compasses, and rulers), processes (such as the lifting of fingerprints from random objects), and formal elements (color, shape) in conjunction with one another, give themselves, that is, their literal material properties, over to the meanings they are provided by the very nature of their functioning within the practice of everyday life. In this sense, the drawing of countless straight parallel lines in blue ball-point pen, significantly with the aid of a ruler, may activate connotations to the reified, homogeneous, and expendable worker/individual (the mass produced ball-point pen) exercised by a higher authority (the ruler) through an assembly-line process (the systematic stacking of repeated marks). In addition to the logic of its symbolic order, my work is overtly process based and labor intensive, involving the repetition of simple gestures and tasks such as standing still and walking in circles on carpet, boring through chalkboard with sandpaper, and crushing brick by hand. The intensity of the labor process and the familiarity of its material parts should function (ideally) as an entry point to the work, heightening both the viewer's sense of the time and efforts required for the realization of any certain goal, i.e. the human endeavors that give definition to the world that surrounds them. Obsessive in its execution and succinctly closed logic, my work is imbued with an absurd and at times pathetic (though undeniable) seriousness that may seem trivial next to the want that is the product of such efforts. Through my work, I attempt to fathom the nature of a humanity that is assailed on both sides in the struggle between order and chaos, orthodoxy and innovation, the eternal and the ephemeral. Lastly, if at all possible, through these activities I aspire to heighten one's sensitivity to the (un)redeemable, to those most authentic of moments that seem forever lost to each of us in the constant movement of days.

Strongly Worded Letter to Smiling Fox (p. 16)

2007-06-02T08:54:00.000-07:00

Strongly Worded Letter to Smiling Fox
Vincent Saint-Simon

Dear Sir, Madam, or any combination therein:

I find upon your character a mark as revolting as Ms. S’s genital warts and almost as strong of scent, and if you will permit an explanation I will willingly give it in about the next paragraph or so. I see now that you are a man of the strongest indifference and boorishness, an oaf of the highest variety, and, on top of these qualities, you happen to display a stubbornness far above the average in two to five year old idiots and general-class fools. That you, in haste and with (I might add) language a chimp could comprehend, antagonize me to condescend to you a letter against your baseless and churlish pseudo-thesis only reiterates for me the notion that you are of the most simple class of what are loosely (and benevolently) referred to as human beings, if in fact we can have a clique of humanity that requires no indication of Reason to enter. I also posit that you find yourself in the most depraved and ridiculous of company since you exhibit the rationality of Ms. V on a hunger binge and the mental capacity of Ms. E after watching season two of The OC. Not that you would mind, since you seem to like that vapid show, and I have to admit you should since it suits your disposition so well. That you would even consider infringing upon my well being to make yourself feel like a Fulfilled Person (a title which you have never earned) makes you susceptible to the same hubris and fallacious logic that I find in your peer Mr. A; that is to say your disorganized attempts to rape my good name only lead to you looking all the more rude and unskilled, while your name (which could only laughingly be considered "fair" before) swiftly becomes something only urchins and bawdy street-tongue-laden Queens deign to converse of. Please, I beg you, go back to reading your Dan Brown novels and listening to your coveted Switchfoot CD's before you hurt yourself or those you have caused too much pain to already by your mere and ribald existence.

I believe you forget yourself, Thing.

Ever Yours,

Vincent

Strongly Worded Letter to Vincent Saint-Simon (p. 18)

2007-06-02T08:38:00.001-07:00

Strongly Worded Letter to Vincent Saint-Simon
Smiling Fox Vincent,

you walking crotchet, i am beginning to get the feeling that you want something from me, but i cannot possibly begin to imagine what it is. you have the audacity to send me a comment on __Space, no less, about something that i know next to nothing about. i'm sorry that some people simply do not have the respect or consideration any more to keep in mind that some people such as myself are youth-impaired, and thus, memory impaired, and i feel it needless to mention—but i shall for some modicum of measure and the sake of some subtle satiation—that i can barely get up in the morning (which is somewhere around two o’clock) because my back doesn't seem to want me to get out of bed, and if it is not that, then it is my almost constantly palpating righteyeball, as if it is having a seizure. do you think that is pleasant? did you know that a piece of my right pinkie toenail is missing?? did you know that i wasn't at your little summit?? i am halfway tempted not to give the slightest fraction of a fuck—if i may be so vulgar (and i will)—about all these cute little things that are happening. 'Mm, yes, look at all of our lovely ideas, burning up our heads. What's that? What black guy?' exactly. how do all those rectums taste? hm? all those highfalutin flatulence factories, those bombastic butt-holes? do they taste like steam? literature? feminism? painting? goodness, i hope not. but there is an idea, since i know that i will have no emancipation from your interminable inconsequential intimidations and your perpetual provocations; why don't i simply collect all the faecal matter that is falling out of your maw, slather it on the interweb and call it, at the most fundamental plane, a commune of aesthetes and pseudowordsmiths reeling on the flipside of voyeurism and forsooth soforth and somethingorother. but listen to this old man ramble! let’s just do this, Vincent. i shall lie prostrate and naked on some canvass, and you find a feather, and i mean a good feather. then, you will proceed to spread my quote-unquote ghettoed booty and tickle my sphincter until a chunk of foetid prose to your liking slides out all on its own, and you can call it, oh i don’t know, an excerpt.

-Smiling Fox

Don't Forget to Write (p. 22)

2007-06-02T08:25:00.000-07:00

FICTION

Don't Forget to Write
Vincent Saint-Simon

Alvin sat hunched against the first cool evening breezes, watching the twin suns go down, squinting through the whirling sand of yet another Tatooine sunset. "WHA WHA WHA!" he sighed to himself in discontent. Readjusting his sawed-off blaster rifle on his back, he turned and looked at the rest of his friends on their Banthas. He wished his parents were rich enough to buy him a Bantha so that he wouldn't always have to ride around with Oliver, who happened to be a total douche. It seemed like all his friends ever grunted about was getting wasted on glug and raiding moisture farms. Alvin stared hard into the suns, watching them until the last arcs of orange were past the tan horizon, hoping that the bright orbs would take away his sight, his boredom, or his loneliness. The suns picked answer D, taking away none of the above.

Charles Dickens awoke suddenly to a mass of hands, horrifying masks, and blaster rifles. He didn't sweat it. He was Charles Dickens. He tried to sit up, but the pain was too great. His legs felt like they were being slowly roasted, his back felt like it had been neatly sliced open right over his spine, and his migraines were worse than England's view of a child's education (which was very bad indeed). In short, it was nothing he couldn't handle, but he couldn't get up. Fortunately, a hand rested on him, stopping any other efforts. Dickens saw a compassionate mask above him.

"WHA WHA WHA!" the mask said soothingly.

"Yes," Dickens whispered, "Thank you. I do need rest. But where am I? Where is the Corellian Corvette 'Staplehurst' that was supposed to carry me to my reading in Mos Entha?"

The answer came back to him in a flash. The careless mechanic that accidentally disabled the sub-light engines. The panic on the faces of the other passengers as they recklessly careened toward Tattooine. The tears in the Solstan captain's eyes. Dickens himself screaming at the crew, trying to be heard above the din of the women and droids, telling them to turn on the repulsors and to please, for god's sake, remember the plight of the lowest class who had to face worse trials than this every day just trying to feed their families on the few shillings that were condescendingly thrown at them by the industrial tycoons. The capital ship ripped through the atmosphere and gained momentum. As they barreled toward the expanse of sand Dickens thought he remembered a lone figure running out ahead of them, desperately trying to get out of the way of the ship, looking over his shoulder every couple of seconds with terror written on his mask. Alvin dove to safety just as the ship slammed into the ground spraying waves of dust, sand, and wreckage.

Charles Dickens' eyes opened as he slowly came back to consciousness. The blurry outline of a dark brown lean-to, the sharp aroma of the tanned Bantha hide, and the sound of a fire were all he could gather of his surroundings. Fully rested and suddenly famished Dickens sat up and took his thumb out of his mouth. He found, however, that even these small motions were too much for him. He slumped back down onto what he now knew was a Dewback-hide bedroll, pain throbbing in his powerful cranium and down his back. It was in this moment of vulnerability that Dickens heard footsteps behind him. His headache was getting worse, his forehead and palms sweating under the pressure, his breath coming heavy and infrequently. The steps came closer, stopped, a clang of metal and the rustle of cloth as something knelt beside him. A cool cloth on his enormous brow, a hand in his hand. As the pain subsided and Dickens could breathe normally again he looked up and through the tears saw the most beautiful mask he had ever seen. "Thank you," he whispered, "What is your name?"

"WHA WHA!" the beautiful mask said.

"And I am Charles Dickens," he said, "You can call me Boz."

Alvin also came to see the bed-ridden Dickens many times. He had no choice. It was his hut. Still, as the days shuffled themselves neatly into a week, and Charles was slowly beginning to regain mobility, Alvin found that he liked the man, and that in fact they had much in common. It was Alvin who told Dickens about the Staplehurst crash, about the smashing of Oliver and his other friends, and how Alvin stole their two Banthas before the respective families could claim them (something he was very proud of but that utterly perplexed Dickens).

"You say you stole their banthas?" Dickens queried.

"WHA WHA WHA!" said Alvin.

"Well, that really is something then. And you had not one of your own?"

"WHA WHA!" Alvin said emphatically.

"Ah. That is what I did not understand. You are of the lower caste, then, and must make do with what you can. In a position like yours I am surprised that morality is even a word in your vocabulary. Well, we all hope to be moral but," and here Alvin noticed a tear in Dickens' eye as he squeezed Alvin's shoulder, "the world often has other plans doesn't it, son?"

For the first time Alvin felt like someone understood him.

During the middle of the second week Dickens was able to leave the hut and walk around unassisted. He began to talk to the other Raiders in the village, to tell jokes to the women and teach the children games. In fact, he seemed to be everywhere at once. Though many had wanted to slay Dickens right after the crash and take whatever stuff he had for their own, all were now deeply impressed by his kindness, sincerity, and willingness to help. Alvin was proud. It was also during that second week that Alvin took it upon himself to introduce Dickens to his wife, Ellen Tersken.

"I believe we have met before, have we not, Ms. Tersken?" Dickens said with a sparkle in his eye.

"WHA WHA WHA!" Ellen coyly responded.

"Yes, I thought it was you, madam Ellen. Alvin, you have a most beautiful wife."

Alvin already knew that, but he was glad to have Dickens' approval. If the smile on his mask appeared just a little plastic it was only because he knew Ellen to be a bit of a stoic; never letting anyone get too close, not even Alvin. She did not have any good friends and she seemed content to keep it that way. Why, then, had she referred to Charles as Boz?

That evening Alvin and Charles rode Oliver's bantha out into the expanse of desert known as the Dune Sea. Stretching waves of sand, moving in the wind and smashing on the horizon against the cliffs of the Junland Wastes. Dickens took a long look at the golden-tan ocean and then out towards the two suns, one of which was setting neon-rose. Alvin had stopped the bantha and now stared at Dickens amazed. Even the double-blinding glare of two suns couldn't damage his eyes. Eventually the two dismounted and sat on the skeletal spine of a Krayt Dragon looming large on one of the taller dunes.

"This place reminds me of England," Dickens whispered reverently.

"WHA WHA WHA!"

"No, no, Alvin my friend. Not like that. England," Dickens said, "doesn't have sand. I mean that the waves remind me of water and the cliffs are like their counterparts in Dover. Also, I have noticed the way people here talk about moisture farms and the so-called 'human' cities."

"WHA WHA!" Alvin said bitterly.

"I thought as much. Of course you cannot enter the cities. I'll bet they chase you off like common beasts, don't they? Like a bunch of feral felines that they don't want hanging around the scrap heaps, no? Well! So much for 'humanity.'"

Alvin couldn't help but look down. "WHA WHA!" he said.

"Yes," said Dickens, now looking him straight in the eye.

"WHA WHA WHA WHA!" Alvin said, sawed-off blaster rifle waving above his head in excitement.

"Yes," said Dickens.

"WHA WHA!"

Yes, my friend," said Dickens. Some conversations can never be fully translated, but tears were in eyes and mask alike as they stood and embraced. "The suns do not shine upon this desolate planet to meet frowning eyes, depend upon it," Dickens said.

Alvin, a little embarrassed by the moment he and Dickens had shared and also forced, with his wife, to hunt to feed themselves, spent the next three days without so much as the sight of Dickens. He found when they came back laden with the bodies of womp-rats and two moisture farmers that, in fact, no one had seen Dickens. Others reported he had not left his hut (he had by now moved into one of his own) since he came back with Alvin from the Dune Sea. Concerned but still feeling awkward, Alvin asked his wife to look in on Dickens. After nearly three hours Ellen returned saying he was not well and could not see people. The trauma of the crash catching up to him at last.

Ellen spent much time with Dickens, devoting almost all her free moments to him while Alvin tended to their hut maintenance and cured the meat. Sand People started to talk. Why was Ellen there for hours? What was she holding when she came out? Even Alvin started to see curious habits. Ellen would start fires in their fire pit (in the middle of summer, no less) and he could swear he saw paper burning. He also thought he saw her squatting on the floor scribbling on what appeared to be stationary. Alvin was not the type of sand person who felt the need to bust into every situation yelling his mask off about everything under the suns and demand his wife not keep secrets. He realized that intimacy thrived on autonomy, and he just could not believe that anything sinister was happening between these two people he loved.

On the second day Dickens was in confinement, however, Alvin's curiosity got the better of him. As his wife left the fire to go back to Dickens' hut Alvin ran over, whipped out his portable hose, and pissed out the fire. There was a letter in it! All was burned but a small scrap, almost nothing really, but Alvin picked it up anyway. "The beating of my heart was so violent and wild that I felt as if my life were breaking from me..." the letter read. After that small sentence there was a charred piece of ash and then, barely decipherable at the bottom, "Boz."

Alvin had no idea that the Staplehurst crash had had such an effect on his friend and felt bad for reading even the shred of letter he had been able to. He decided then and there that, however bizarre, he would not interfere with the close relationship that seemed to be budding between Charles and Ellen. If it would help Dickens heal, it was worth the small pain of tamping out his curiosity for the time being.

It wasn't until two weeks later that a truly strange event finally brought Dickens out of hiding, although by that time he had invited Alvin to his hut at least once a day to chat. Dickens made it clear, over the course of their conversations, that he was very troubled by the second-class status of the Tuskens.

"Don't you see?" Dickens had explained to Alvin one day, "The people here give you the name 'Raider' and with it the connotation that you have always been a barbarian people who are by nature a danger to society. They force you to believe horrible things about yourselves; that you are aggressive and cruel; that you eat humans and take their things; that you do not have a place with the other so-called 'civilized' races that push you into the unspeakable wasteland of sand where nothing will grow. But how do they expect you to live when you cannot grow food and are forced into a parasitical relationship with those around you? It is a vicious cycle where they force you to pillage what you can and then say you are to be feared because you pillage. If only they would give your children a proper foundation, schools and housing, a decent job, or the charity all people are owed. My meaning is that no man can expect his children to respect what he degrades."

"WHA WHA!"

"Don't ever say that, Alvin," Dickens said looking him straight in the mask, "you must never lose hope. There will come a time when we can prove them wrong. Also, please don't take my name in vain."

Alvin apologized for his oath.

Three days later a Tusken hunting party from Alvin's small village brought in three drunk smugglers who had wandered into the desert. They were, of course, dead by the time they made it to the encampment and two had already been gutted and skinned. As the third was being dressed for dinner, however, a data pad was found on his body. Dickens had asked the village to bring any written findings to him, that he might assess their value, so after every raid all data pads and other more conventional written documents were put in a sack that Ellen would take in. When Dickens read this particular data pad, he came bursting out of his hut half-dressed (although Alvin knew from personal experience that Dickens slept in his clothes) and ran over to Alvin's hut.

"WHA WHA WHA," Alvin asked.

"Our solution, that's what," Dickens responded with a gleam in his eye. "Can I borrow one of your banthas for a journey? I'm afraid I must go alone."

"WHA WHA WHA," Alvin responded, confusion written on his mask. Dickens was already almost out the door again, all excitement.

"Thank you, my friend."

The day Charles left was the hottest day the tribe had experienced in a great many years. There were places in the sand that were literally smoking from the heat, turning to speeder-class wafers of charred glass. Most in the village expressed concern, asking Dickens to please wait until this heat wave passed them by. They also reminded him that the water from the moisture farm they had taken over was rapidly evaporating and they would soon have to relocate. They didn't know where they would go, what they would do, much less how they would let Dickens know. He seemed to barely hear them. Mumbling his thanks for their kind thoughts and telling them to remember the orphans, he saddled Alvin's bantha. He took no water, telling the tribe that he did not want to inconvenience them and politely reminding them that he was Charles Dickens. Finally all preparations were done and it was time to leave. Everyone able gathered to see him off, many of whom were grunting and sobbing, their tears instantly dissolving in the heat. Alvin and Ellen were at the forefront of the mass.

Dickens embraced them both, whispering something in Ellen's ear that made her mask blush.

"WHA WHA," Alvin asked, his sadness overtaking him.

"I will return in forty days," Dickens responded, brushing his beard out of his mouth, "and not a day later. Goodbye until then, my friend."

With that Dickens rode out, and though Ellen still wrote letters constantly no one knew where they went and no one saw or heard word of Dickens.

During his sorrowful days Alvin often went out with hunting parties to take his mind off things and everyday he would go to the edge of the village and etch in the sand the number of days Dickens had been gone. They were always gone by morning. Eventually he lost count, choosing instead to etch random numbers, always wishing that the total of his etches would rise like the two suns to match the number that had hit inside his head with the force of the blaster bolt, shattering all other wishes and dreams and leaving only a longing for his friend that he had never known.

Another curious thing shook the village shortly after Dickens faded into the pulsating horizon: Ellen started to show that she was pregnant. Alvin, loving her more than ever, stuck his blaster rifle into the sand and made another mark.

The small tribe had just finished putting up their lean-tos at the commandeered moisture farm that was to be their new home for a while. All had gone inside, adjusting bedrolls, cooking, or making love, and so no one was there to see the bantha or the man who rode it. Dickens had returned.

Of course there was a big to-do when Sally the Widow went outside to take a leak and happened upon Dickens doing the same. He was as handsome as ever, calm now, with a look in his eye that bespoke great adventure and personal achievement. The whole village gathered, but it was Ellen and Alvin that he sought first, embracing them both the same as when he left. Ellen was composed. Alvin broke into tears and eventually had to have a bag put over his mask to keep him from hyperventilating.

"Hello, my dear friends. I come from Jabba's palace, and I come with great tidings. I'm sorry I had to leave in such haste, but I hope I can explain myself. The data pad the smuggler carried contained information about a lottery that Jabba was having to gain money for a new operation that it is best you know little about. Most of the capital from the sale of the tickets, of course, he kept for himself, but to the winner of the lottery he offered five million credits in one lump sum. I traveled to Jabba's palace and had an audience with him. After a series of charismatic efforts on my part he threw me into a pit with a giant rancor, wishing to kill me. I was able to impress him and all his underlings, however, when I looked the rancor straight in the eye and told it to stop. Of course it did. I then asked its name and then said, 'Micah, I command you to sleep.'

After this event I was able to get into Jabba's inner circle. I told him of the Staplehurst crash and how I was living among those called Sand People." Here Dickens stopped and looked at Alvin.

"You have been a good friend to me, Alvin, and my life is better for the meeting. I did this for you, and so to you will go the reward for my efforts. This," here Dickens took out a credit chip, "is for you."

Alvin looked down and saw the chip was for 4,800,000 credits. Shocked, he looked back at Dickens.

"WHA WHA WHA!"

"Please Alvin, I want you to have it. You raised an interesting point. Where would the money come from? The cities will have nothing to do with you and you certainly have no savings of your own. This is to build our dream. Right here. A school for your children; clothes; decent food; moisture farms. This is the investment I am making in your future. I hope you will use it to help the Tusken people everywhere to better their position and once again join the world of the living--where you belong."

Alvin's mask, already drenched, was leaking anew. He bowed his head, humbled.

"WHA WHA," he whispered.

"I knew you would," Dickens said, "and I'm glad. I will not be here to see it, but I know it will be a source of pride for your people."

Dickens did not even give the village time to release their shock and protest.

"Don't bother with your excitement or your pleas. I love you all but my time here is finished. I have used the remaining credits to buy myself a ship, and it awaits me."

Dickens started to turn and then looked back at Ellen.

"Your child will be the future of your people. Congratulations, Ellen, and please--don't forget to write."

ISSUE 4

2006-11-05T12:20:00.000-08:00

Contents

POETRY

..............................................................................................................................................................................4

I Say

brock bernard

.........................................................................................................................................................................................7

The Western Affront
Henri Caputo

……………….......................................................................................................................................................…............... 8

How to Make a Man
Angela Feeherty

…………...................…………………............................……...........................................................................................… 9

Downbeat

brock bernard

…….............………………………………….............................................................................................................................. 11

Cryptic
Kei Tse

………........……………………………….............................................................................................................................….. 12

Jake
Vincent Saint-Simon

ESSAY

……..........................................................................................................................................................…. 15

In Defense of a New Literature
N.T.

FICTION

…........................................................................................................................................................ 19

And Strawberry Ice Cream Sandwhiches
Oedipus Jones

Lovingly shuffled together under the direction of Nikki Rainey, Matt Siemer, Brock Walker, and Curt Bozif.

I Say... (p. 4)

2006-11-05T12:19:00.000-08:00

I say…
brock bernard

What i know of this so-called ‘love’
is somewhat limited to warbling along with
nigh forgotten singers from the eighties,
hands in gloves,
wisping jazz through brass, and
creating questionable photographs and poems, yet still
clicking buttons and pens and keys,
never to the tune of any erstwhile success.
i ‘love’ to gaze in some pretentious state
of admiration into the meticulously alphabetised
books on my shelf
which i have yet to read.

It wasn’t that aforementioned, specious passion
which caused me to forget entirely
what i was going to do with the remainder of
the day that you gave me;
not the kind that got me lost in
your green eyes
that i didn’t think would make such a big deal of themselves
during that introductory
palaver over pancakes;
not the kind that made me chary
of my proclivity for daftness,
and more nervous than a fresh cup of coffee
set in front of a busy graduate student.
Much like my closet must feel
after a day’s worth of laundry,
when there isn’t an empty hanger to be seen,
i became whole again, and full of colour.

Now there is the everpresent somethingnew,
which they sang about
in those lofty rock-ballads of yore.
At least to me it’s somenewthing
of which i don’t think i can sing with a
February voice.
Rather, i write the time when we were both ill,
when Joni Mitchell sang us into a
deliquescing mass on black canvas;
i forgot which hand was mine.
Every day, i am surprised by you,
how you manage to catch me in every innocent lie,
the way that you seem to voice what my mind is scribbling in it’s pages
and you always seem to find a way to
complete what i’m supposed to be.

What i know of…
is your hair playing lambent upon my shoulder,
my cigarette smoke rising from
tangerine tendrils like wisteria caught fire,
when the only thing aflame was something behind my sternum
that i have never known.
It’s something as ubiquitous as
Grass in Amsterdam and equally wondrous,
so much so that i am not surprised that
you catch me staring at you,
evidently ensorcelled.

You remind me much of hummus in a
rainbow bowl
and everything else is just carrots to me,
only an excuse to get to you,
to touch your hand,
to hear the canorous susurrations of your voice,
to see you blush when i can’t seem to abscond with my eyes.

i thought that i was going to cry,
or perhaps float off into some airy dream
while i was waiting for you, watching
as you performed the cell-phone pace
under the lamp post,
a fantastic, refulgent dandelion
turning snow into coruscating motes falling to the ground,
only to shimmer again under slivers of
moonlight through agreeable branches.
i surprised myself that i didn’t collapse before you
very much due to the efflorescing
somethingnew.

i didn’t think that such beauty could exist,
and so close to me.
This is not to say that a word such as ‘beauty’
or any word at all could be used to describe the singular visage that is
you. Even now, you pour forth as much as i from these lines
that are just to say
that i love you, more than any pen could ever find the perspicuity to scrawl.

The Western Affront (p. 7)

2006-11-05T12:18:00.000-08:00

The Western Affront
Henri Caputo

The clouds were as gruel exiled from its water base
It looked as if they were poised to go to war with the rest of the sky,
except where there seemed to be an opening cut out
in the ranks of wispy warriors where the sun sat vainglorious,

grinning into my face,
so close to the ground I thought
I could lob a rock hitting it
in the centre of its smug mug, but
instead I just threw it a squinty glare as rain began to cool my head.

How to Make a Man (p. 8)

2006-11-05T12:17:00.000-08:00

How to Make a Man
Angela Feeherty

Knead with the knuckles then
open the palm and press.
Turn the wad of flour and dye
close to your eye and
carefully in your hand,

push with your thumbs
from flat pizza to umbrella
and then pull the sides
like the sheets of your bed
at night until they converge
to a head just like yours.
Kneel over a fingerprinted
body of red on the floor

in the sunlit space between
the dark blind stripes
squishing the two parts until
the light is filled with life.

Brush your curls back
to admire what you've made,
then with a smile in your
dream-filled mind
go outside to play.

Downbeat (p. 9)

2006-11-05T12:16:00.000-08:00

Downbeat
brock bernard

On the street near the closed-down book store
there stand the twin trees
who, when seen under cloudless skies of Midwest autumn,
bend towards the brown green patchwork
like mother birds in search of sustenance,

eager branches and limbs rising toward the gelid moon,
spread wide
as earthenworn seraphs stretching sleepy.
My lips are aflame and

the soft smoke of inspiration
dutifully sifts up through the roof of my mouth,
manoeuvring like the legless
throughout a darkened labyrinth,

spawning the nearly obvious notion
that from the beginning,
the first welcoming light that immediately went out –
as my body began to covet moving air –

I was having a nearer death experience
as I breathed it all in
Now I no longer appreciate the tacit pleasure
of leaping from rock
to stone,
with charred predilection toward staying afloat,

lightly alighting on each
stoic grey face
that grimaced at me and those damn kids,

and I go home sixteen years later
to shoot into my arm
selectively objective information –
while the somnolent fog rubs its eyes,

lingering above the ballad-imbued uptight grand, dizzying each
fresh . hatched . one . fourth . note
as they lackadaisically erected gravestones on my ashen eyelids,

the cowards

Cryptic (p. 11)

2006-11-05T12:15:00.000-08:00

Cryptic
Kei Tse

Clawing at extensions of youth
bleeding out from hollowed cavities,
we rip out our eyes in wonder,
drinking nectars of self-sufficiency and trauma.

Orphaned fingers curled around a pallid canvas,
folding delectably with bursts of colours blooming
out of the Fahrenheit and paradigms of our bodies, shifting.

Fragilities,
somewhere in the space between two broken mirrors.
This is eternity, passing.
A cryptic astrology.

Jake (p. 12)

2006-11-05T12:13:00.000-08:00

Jake
Vincent Saint-Simon

When St. Louis was
young and her
belly got
big; when her
eyes would squint
shut with pain,
when the columns
of vomit she
would deposit into
the toilet had developed
into a hated ritual,
the water rose
to the bridge-marked
borders
and broke.

The doctors decked
in masks and sterile eyes,
adjusting their glasses
like monkeys
over a rotting boy,
ripped off her skirt
and pulled down her
stockings so the
stench of shit
stood almost as exposed
as her labial lips
opened wide to his
crowning head.

I doubt that she, self-absorbed lady,
was ever aware the fortune she bore.
That now in these, the fields
of blood, her child stands
stripped of human rights
against the backdrop of a country that acts
the way that toe-jam tastes.

But if I could tell her
of the son she fed
on her poorly-paved
nipples that secrete only ash,
I would tell her of the Jake I saw
on a thunder-filled night when he
climbed to the top of the lightning tree--
that when God and radio evangelicals
trained arrows on us both,
it was I who tearfully ran to her
and he who had the courage
to laugh.

In Defense of a New Literature (p. 15)

2006-11-05T12:12:00.000-08:00

In Defense of a New Literature
N.T.

Lately I’ve been considering the connection between publishing and puberty. Each can only be traced as far back as the Latin (publicus and puber, respectively), but I don’t find it entirely out of line to suggest that that “pub” root comes from some concept of public space. Shared space. Community space. Publishing being the initiation of a literary work into the public intellectual space, just as puberty is the initiation of a person into the public sexual space.

At the risk of sounding overly clever or smug, I’m willing to compare the present state of publishing with some sort of hyper-organized institutional prostitution. Not to belittle prostitution—the oldest profession must clearly serve a necessary social function. This is not the point. The point is that prostitution is not the sexual norm and I’m willing to again put myself out there and say that this is probably a good thing. The point is that the visible publishing world—like prostitution—is more concerned with money than with human connection.

And this is fine.

Just as prostitution fills a needed social role, so does commercial literature with mass appeal. It will always be there. It’s fine. The problem is that there is this prevailing social understanding that commercial publication is the only option. While this understanding is easily disproved (small-scale self-publishing companies, independent literary magazines, or even just the internet offer considerable opportunity), it will continue to prevail until frustrated writers are willing to organize to a level of public visibility. The bad news, writers of the world, is that this will require not only time and energy, but money.

I cannot honestly see the internet as a viable option for subverting the system that currently exists. If people are not presented with a product that they can consume, then it will never be real enough to draw the public eye. Magazines are better, but they still seem somewhat expendable. What a new literary movement will need to be successful is writers who are willing to invest (or literary-minded people who are willing to invest) in their work. Small publishers will print your work if they are paid. The bigger problem is distribution.

This is another point where I do not see the internet as an effective option. Though online sale is probably the easiest and most direct result, it is not enough. If a new literature is to succeed, it needs a community of writers and like-minded individuals who are willing to back it up. It needs a network of people who will put faith in one another’s work and push that work onto other people. The option to buy directly from an author means nothing in the stale isolation of internet world. If it is not understood that there is a person behind the sale, an open sense of discourse between reader and writer, then they might as well be buying from any other giant, impersonal conglomerate.

The real issue is money and it is, regrettably, not an issue that will go away any time soon. It has perverted the public intellectual space by taking it over and leaving the social need for human connection through personal intellectual discourse unfulfilled. A new literature may be the only way to grasp a decent share of this public space. At its best, this could revitalize the present state of intellectual thought, revolutionize education, initiate social reforms, etc. etc. In the very least, it can prove to be an interesting failure—which, really, may be more than could be said for most.

-February 15, 2006

And Strawberry Ice Cream Sandwhiches (p. 19)

2006-11-05T12:11:00.000-08:00

And Strawberry Ice Cream Sandwhiches
Oedipus Jones

“Move closer, corpse of Catherine Tekakwitha, it is 20 below, I do not know how to hug you.”
-Leonard Cohen

I’ve fallen in love. I’ve fallen in love and I can hardly bear it. It’s not that I never expected to fall in love--that maddening, sickening, 4:43-in-the-morning-and-I-can’t-stop-writing-about-it kind of love. It’s not that at all. I’ve always had a sort of disgusting flare for the romantic (no matter how hard I’ve tried to hide it, tried to run from it), and it was never anything but a matter of time.

I just never thought I’d fall in love with a postcard.

But if you could just see this postcard, then you would understand. My God! You couldn’t believe the art, the love and the care and the passionate cries that must have gone into this postcard. The shortcomings of language could never be more apparent than in the frail attempt of a writer to capture in paltry prose the very essence of beauty (when even beauty itself, with all its array of nuance and connotation, seems a bastard misnomer in this particular signifier). My love is more than just cardstock and stamp, ink and idea. My love is a life all its own… but what kind of life is a life unrequited?

Forgive, if you will, an inevitably doomed attempt at an explanation (with the utmost poeticism, of course).

I live in small apartment in a small apartment building in a fairly busy section of a fairly small town. The placement of my residence is only relevant in its relation. This relation of relevance is found exactly sixty-six feet east of my building’s front steps, ninety-nine feet north of the town’s post office, cleverly standing in clear view of heaven, mockingly hiding the gateway to hell.

The structure in question, while known by many names, bears the official title: Infoshop and Community Resource Center. Its primary function, for all intents and purposes, seems to be amassing hippies and anarchists, the socially conscious and the consciously social (without mention to the undoubtedly present poseurs (with whom your admittedly unacclimated author would certainly fall akin)), for the fulfillment of a collective unconscious desire for rock and roll music. Those endless summer nights of loud interruptions from my reading have long since extended through the fall and now winter months.

The building itself is both unimpressive and unimportant. Possibly of equal unimportance (except, of course, to satisfy the unshakable curiosity of my theoretical Reader) is the nature of the activities held at this Infoshop. What is important (and I only italicize (as, I imagine, all great writers italicize) out of my own personal insecurities), is the fact that this building, this Infoshop--has at its front, as all buildings must (especially those ninety-nine feet north of post offices), a mailbox. (An obvious point, I’m well aware. But, I assure you, of dire importance to the story at hand.)

The entire action of the story is really culminated in one action--and a pedestrian one at that. (I apologize still, finding myself untrusting of the wording “pedestrian” to abate the anticlimax of this next statement.) The physical action of this story is perfect and complete in the singular act of checking the mail.

(With the ever-present fear of losing what little credibility I may have with the Reader (masking prose as poetry, feigning enlightenment in the hope of being heard…), I’m going to venture a brief change of tone. Not to suggest a lack of poetry in the mundane, I just can’t self-justify flowery language in the description of finding a piece of mail (no matter how beautiful) that was meant for my next-door neighbors. To cut to the balls of it all, that’s just what happened--I opened my mailbox and found an odd-looking postcard that was addressed to the Infoshop next-door. Curiosity (if not also a bit of that disgusting flare mentioned above) got the best of me.)

The postcard itself was visually captivating. It was obviously hand-made, not just purchased at some souvenir shop or gas station--consisting of a cardboard base with duct tape on the corners (--I’ll spare you the artful details of the duct tape’s tender placement). The front of the postcard was decorated with a shopping list written on notebook paper:

1 small thing milk
1 bg cheddar-n-sour cream
1 bg doritos
1 cake donut
1 strawberry ice cream sandwhich
1 milky way

On the back, written on long white labels with no return address:

Dear infoshop!

I hope everything is going well! I heard a story on the radio about a man who collected as many grocery lists as he could and pasted them in scrapbooks. He would scour grocery store floors—he said there was an “intimate poetry” to them. I think that’s very silly, but at the same time I really love it and kind of secretly agree. I miss you guys a lot and think about you all the time. I know that the space must be going well because I get ya’lls emails—so, good job! Could somebody please tell Ben and Chris that I’m considering purchasing a copy machine? Everybody I know just really needs a lot of goddam copies.
I love you guys!

Yours truly!
and strawberry ice cream sandwhiches,

Nikki R.

As I held the postcard, a tear began to well up in my eye. I haven’t been moved, deeply or otherwise, in years, but when I read that postcard I wept like a child. It wasn’t just the fact that the postcard was homemade. It wasn’t just the fact that the shopping list taped to the front was in a different handwriting and had a footprint on it. It wasn’t just that she spelled “goddam” the way that a spell-checker says is wrong—the angsty literary way. It wasn’t just that there was a real person behind this masterpiece. It was something else that, if it isn’t already apparent, I must not have the capacity to explain. If my attempt at conveying the magnificence of this postcard remains unaccomplished, it can only be said that there must be a more talented writer than myself who should have been the one checking my mailbox on that windy night. Or maybe the pinnacle work of human expression--of truth, of beauty, of passionate squalor and love—maybe that…something might possibly be beyond the limits of explanation. Maybe it just has to be experienced.

* * *

It's been twelve days since I opened my mailbox and found what artists and philosophers have been looking for forever. It's the middle of one of the most frigid winters I've ever experienced, but I don't care. I'm siting namked in my apartment with the windows open, and the cold wind is nothing when I hold the postcard. The floor is covered with pages and pages of worthless literature, torn-off covers, wasted lives. I've searched through it all—there is nothing left for me. Nobody else knows. No one ever knew. I'm the first.

I can hear a band warming up next-door. The hippies and anarchists (aren't we all just poseurs, really?) are waiting patiently as the collective unconscious grows more and more reckless. I know what they're looking for, but they won't ever find it. Not over there, not anywhere.

For a brief moment, I considered going over to the Infoshop. Maybe she would be there. Would I know her if she was? In the very least I could deliver the postcard to its proper destination. No. Proper is the wrong word. Intended destination. The very idea of propriety seems injust...

I'm sorry, Nikki R. (wherever you are), but I'm keeping your postcard. It was never anything but mine.

ISSUE 3

2006-03-05T10:43:00.000-08:00

Contents

POETRY

...............................................................................................................................................……………………………………..... 2

Kansas, KS
Dru Parrish

........................... 3

And your husband will smash your face open against a wardrobe but I still loved you, only the moon more dormant
Chris Scott

……......................................................................................................................................…….………… 5

Memorandum (Sticky Buns)
Tristan Meyer

ESSAY & LETTERS

……….................................................................................................................................................……….………………. 7

Artist’s Statement
Curt Bozif

……............................................................................................................................………….......................……………….. 9

The New Messiah
Alexander Braitberg

………........................................................................................................................………...........................…………….……. 13

A Letter to Dru
Vincent Saint-Simon

FICTION

................................................................................................................…………………….................................…………….……... 21

M = Male
Jake Beard

………..................................................................................................................…………………..............................………...… 27

The Bicycle
Royal Young

PLAY

.................................................................................................................40

Leo Tolstoy and Alfred Lord Tennyson Fistfight in Hell
Oedipus Jones

Kansas, KS (p. 2)

2006-03-05T10:40:00.000-08:00

Kansas, KS
Dru Parrish

All the arums of October spaced over
The cropping fields drawn and loved behold all others.
The land here runs in directions northwest,
Too far from the modicums of the seasons.

Rubbing callus over blister at the work done.
Trace over the thorn bushes and the crops all silence I feel.
At this moment none of it seems real to the touch.

How aged in the long tired of the day from the morning.
The moment of innocence whips whiskers I have long forgotten to a beard.

In every evening the soft light of the west touches
The hidden colors of the atmosphere and cloud nine
Becoming the mainstay over this slumbering field work.
With night the punctual wonder of forgiveness.

Rocking chair porches, to theater of the stridulation
All wonder and sleep, to know is to dream.

All is lost until the hint murmur of the sun peak.
Conveying all too immediate that rest breeds no yield.
From where we are now the world curves in the scape.
There remains only the day, the cultivating, and the hands that bend the two.

And your husband will smash your face open against a wardrobe but I still loved you, only the moon more dormant (p. 3)

2006-03-05T10:39:00.000-08:00

And your husband will smash your face open against a wardrobe but I still loved you, only the moon more dormant
Chris Scott

The future will be
how our kneecaps throb and pull
in a moving vehicle when we’re escaping
the deftly crumbling infrastructure
of a traumatized eastern seaboard,
trying to dissuade the shift
of interlocking limbs
from distracting the night sadistic

When you gaze like an impaled
wingspan stretched across the stomach
of a growling minivan I come alive
like the way we fill the air
between towns and cities with x-rays
and waves bent with anchormen
grinning on cue

And you,
at the foot of the bed when he’s crying
and bouncing your children on his lap
saying he still needs you, when
he’s driving you to the hospital and
he becomes your hero because there
were other weapons in the house
he could’ve used

I’ll ape ventriloquist blue from
the top floor of a brownstone, wrapping
canvas around my fists and packing my
things again like the past
won’t be our palms scraped from misjudged
footing and an awkward fall, and your
face as I still remember it are postcards collected
in a shoebox when it hasn’t rained in years
and we didn’t know better

Memorandum (Sticky Buns) (p. 5)

2006-03-05T10:38:00.000-08:00

Memorandum (Sticky Buns)
Tristan Meyer

Moonlight on your brow
kiss like streams; love like oceans
Starlight on your breath

Liquid, piebald dreams
on doleful, holefull canvas;
Rain of memory

‘Some may find me cold,
but it is the limitless warmth
which I protect that they cannot see
or touch.’

Artist's Statement (p. 7)

2006-03-05T10:37:00.000-08:00

Artist’s Statement
Curt Bozif

My work finds its origins in my fascination with the transient nature of existence, the residue of the individual’s choices/actions in time, and humanity’s dependence upon ritual. Process-based and labor-intensive, my paintings are physically demanding to make, and involve mundane materials and the representation of simple gestures and tasks such as walking in circles and drawing straight lines in blue ball-point pen. The intensity of the labor process and the commonality of its material parts function as entry points for the viewer that I hope trigger associations with the working class, education, social dogma, and religion. Countless straight lines made in blue with the aid of a ruler can activate connotations to the homogeneous and therefore expendable worker/individual (signified by the ball-point pen) exercised by a higher authority (the tool; the ruler) through an assembly-line process. My approach to transparency of form, material, and fervently avoids symbology and content outside of form, I embrace the sign-event to further enrich the experience of a piece.

Site-specific yet discrete, my sculptural installations explore the dynamic between the passage of time and the individual’s place within it by emphasizing the ephemerality of both the material and the artist’s intervention. In my work, as with that of Joseph Beuy’s, material, tool, process, and formal considerations ideally function at a highly symbolic, yet inviting level. In Circle Sidewalk –drawing from early Christian symbolism—the circle as form represents unity, cyclical time, and the cosmos, to mention but a few of many connotations. The sidewalk is divided into five equal sections, the number five referring to the human individual (the five senses and the four appendages plus the head that controls them). Where the number four symbolizes earthly structure (the four cardinal directions, the four elements, the square, etc.), the sum of one and four symbolizes the individual within the earthly realm. The formal symbology combined with the public and participatory nature of a sidewalk, together create a rich poetry.

Through its seeming incompleteness I attempt to imbue my work with both a sense of cynical anticipation—due to its dogmatic, task-oriented process—and an intense, meditative stillness triggered by its directness. I try to question and undermine the ideas of legacy, effort, and permanence by heightening one’s awareness of the poetic absurdities of daily existence.

The New Messiah (p. 9)

2006-03-05T10:36:00.000-08:00

The New Messiah
Alexander Braitberg

Planet Earth will cease to exist eventually, one way or another. Our sun, a yellow dwarf, is in the main stage of its lifecycle, but in a few billion years it will transform into a red giant, and become so large that it will consume all of the planets in the inner solar system. And the Earth may become uninhabitable well before then. A meteor miniscule compared to the Earth has the potential to cause global extinction. If we manage to conquer internal threats to our existence such as climate change and nuclear war, our time on this cosmic yacht will nevertheless be limited.

Doubtless most readers will have heard these facts recited in science courses, but will have dismissed them as too far in the future to be relevant. Surely our time is better spent thinking about more pressing problems: global poverty, hunger, inequality, health, art.
But we live in an age of science. Religion continues to lose ground in the developed world, despite a temporary resurgence in the decadent and declining United States of America. Evolution is entirely uncontroversial in the scientific community, and evolutionary theory makes religion optional. We still hang on to the old myths, but their original purpose no longer applies. We no longer need them as explanations for our origin – we have something more believable, more concrete, and undeniably true.

A recent study published in the Journal of Religion and Society found that among citizens of developed nations, acceptance of evolution correlated inversely with religiosity. Thus, as long as scientific knowledge continues to expand, acceptance of religious myths will decline. As well it should be. Humanity has graduated into adulthood, and no longer needs Santa Claus.
The absence of religion leaves a void. We can no longer hope for eternal life, nor can we look to a Messiah as the culmination of human history. Instead, we are left with the bleak picture that we grew like a festering yeast in the stagnant pools of Earth, and will fester alone in a corner of the Universe until scrubbed from existence, with no sign of our passing. But this void can be filled.

We need a new Messianic event – a new story of hope, of transcendence, of eternality. The new story cannot simply be another myth. Science, education, and the spread of information across the globe will preclude self-deception. The new story must be a true story. And the truth is that we need not perish on this island Earth. The new Messianic event will be the spread of humankind across interstellar space.

It is true that travel to the closest stars, tens of light years away, at currently imaginable speeds, would take hundreds and perhaps thousands of years. Of course, we do not currently know if we would find habitable planets once we arrived. But if scientific knowledge continues to expand exponentially, the development of the technology for such travel is inevitable.
The obstacles to interstellar travel are, literally, cosmically large. But humankind is almost inconceivably powerful. The idea that amalgamations of amino acids born in the furnaces of oceanic vents could evolve into God-like beings capable of music, communication, emotion, is the most incredible phenomenon in the observable universe. To what ultimate purpose have we, the real Gods in our corner of the universe, devoted our incomprehensibly magnificent talents?

For 200,000 years we have fought wars and made knick-knacks, played games and deceived each other, masturbated and procreated. We have undoubtedly made amazing progress in understanding ourselves and in mastery of our environment. But it’s about time, now that we know who we are and how we got here, that we decide what to do with ourselves.
Of course, in order to ensure that we will reach a point when we are ready to embark on our journey, we must not shit in our own nests. We must forestall nuclear war and climate change at all costs, while continuing our quest after the technology for our escape. Survival must be our new worship, our new devotion.

The Christians have waited 2,000 years for the Second Coming of Jesus Christ. The Jews have waited almost 6,000 years for their Messiah. In this age of knowledge, we are capable of thinking, and will have to think, in terms of time scales much greater than the order of thousands of years. As medical technology advances and life spans increase, the time scales involved in traveling to the stars will seem less and less daunting. During our lifetimes, we may see stem cells used to grow replacement organs, perhaps indefinitely extending life. We can even imagine, further into the future, downloading consciousness into a digital medium for eternal preservation. It is within the realm of possibility that you and I will live to see the colonization of Alpha Centauri.

Like the Messianic myths from humankind’s childhood, this new Messianic event retains the promise that we may see it in our own lifetimes. We will retain our romantic quest for eternality, and we will retain a sense of purpose and hope. But this new hope is firmly rooted in the empirical – and is therefore much more resilient than the anthropomorphic legends of the past that even the most faithful cannot help but occasionally doubt.

Letter to Dru (p. 13)

2006-03-05T10:35:00.000-08:00

June 23rd, 2005

The Dru,

I must confess that it's been awhile since I've sat down with the express purpose of writing a letter. I don't know how well I'll fare, or how many of your questions I will answer. I have a specific goal in mind, you see, and if that goal does not coincide with your inquiries, then I have every intention of "letting them slide." These days are too hot to try and do anything else. If you had written me in autumn, then you may have stood a better chance of getting a direct response.

Ah! How refreshing. Now that the hedge is out of the way, I feel like I can write both candidly and with purpose. The two are not opposing forces. Actually, I often find that writing off-the-cuff can illicit a better response than mulling over something for many days. I encourage you to try it.

But now on to other things. The weather in this town is unbearable. The air is suffocating and almost as irritating as the basketball-sized bees that live just outside my window in the carport. I sweat at all hours of the day and night, even when taking a cold shower. As a result I take far too many naps and read far too much poetry. I've taken a great liking to Anna Akhmatova and Fyodor Tyutchev (excellently translated by Vladimir Nabokov).

You may be asking, "Hey, what are you getting at?" Well, the summer heat always has a strange effect on a young person. It makes one remember the happier days. Riding bikes with old friends until dusk, catching fireflies as the porch-light comes on, sitting in parks after dark talking with an old lover as the air cools and the stars become visible. Ah, to be young! I suffer this affliction every summer, pining for those times when talking about feelings came as naturally as skinning a knee. I often poured my heart out on those summer nights, sitting on benches, staring across the vacant baseball fields still alive with the energy of those who had played so ardently during the lighter hours.

I associate all of those emotions with being young, and in doing so, I tacitly admit that I no longer have the capacity to do them. I haven't set myself upon a bike in more than five years. I doubt I could ride one for very long, and I doubt even more that I will ever have an inclination to. I have no lover to share a starry evening with, and even if I did, I have been alone so long that I have forgotten how to talk about how I feel.

Only in the summer do I mourn the passing. I am not a man given to talking about myself. Most of my problems are either stationary parts of my character that I long ago learned not to talk about, or the sort of things I or Time can solve. I think of my past as a series of unfortunate, often embarrassing attempts to act out my favorite movie scripts mixed with a desperate adolescent desire to pass my woes off as battle scars. If that's what passes for communication between lovers, then, for my sake, I'm glad I don't have one. If that isn't the normal fare, then I'm glad, for the world, that I'm the only one who practices such silliness.

In the summer, however, the whole process seems magical. My past has the aura of a storybook, and all my actions are filled with the scent of romance run dry. Once, when I was much younger, I celebrated my anniversary with a certain girl by having a candle-lit picnic in our favorite park. I conned a friend of mine into setting up the picnic while we (the girl and I) went to the Botanical Gardens. After the Gardens closed, I took her back to the park where the picnic was already laid out. The whole night seems a work of art in retrospect, and I can't help but sigh, wanting desperately to relive it, to make it a part of me again. It makes me want to shower the first girl I meet with gifts, to take her out to an expensive restaurant, to listen to her stories about her past, and to tell her that I think she is very special and that I love her. What an evening that would be! And how quickly my interest would fade. After the summer was over, perhaps even after the night was over, I would wake up and realize it was just me painting something that wasn't there. I would come to find I didn't think the girl was that special, and really we didn't have anything to talk about (since I really have found that I have an inability to talk about myself for an extended period of time). Then, as always, I would feel trapped and would want to be alone. I remember all of this and it makes me hate summer, the season that always brings with it a failed attempt at love. It is the season of passion misspent. But enough of that. In response to your letter, I fear that I can give little comfort or advice. For quite some time now I've been using overdoses of melatonin to get to sleep, since chronic headaches have been plaguing me incessantly for about a month. I can only hope that you are able to get past your restlessness soon and can teach me your secret.

You did, however, mention that you have an inability to communicate with others, or an inability to relate. I find that I have the same problem. I've stopped going places where there is a risk of me talking to people outside my family since I often get myself into awkward situations in which I make a complete ass of myself. A week ago, for example, I went to a party at The Bivouac. Usually I wouldn't have gone, but I was feeling lonely, and I knew Brock would be there. Also, it is only two houses down from us so I knew I could leave suddenly if I had to. Well, I made myself a gin and tonic and trooped down. People on the porch yelled hellos at me, and I haphazardly responded with some nonsense about the time of night. I do remember saying "'Tis the season!" as I went inside, but I don't know what the context was, if there was a proper one at all.

Upon coming in the door, I saw that the living room was empty except for one drunk girl from my Ultimate Frisbee class who was dancing by herself. I didn't remember her name, so I tried to sidle past her, but she suddenly came out of her trance and shrieked at me. She had me give her a hug, and as I backed out of the hug, I found myself retreating as she asked me an array of questions about my age and major. I retreated into a corner, and she stood over me for fifteen painful minutes as I tried to field her questions. In the course of that conversation, I managed to down my whole drink. She laughed at me and said I was the most shy, awkward person she had ever met. I wasn't sure if she was hitting on me, and I wasn't sure if I wanted her to, so I asked her where the bathroom was (even though I knew). When she moved out of the way, I fled out the back door and would have left if Brock wasn't standing right there. In short, I was scared silly. I know how it feels to lose the ability to communicate. It's very lonely and kind of sad, even if the stories are funny.

I would like to give you good news, but I don't think it will pass. I've given the matter a lot of thought recently (after the Biv. incident). We are people of literature. We are too used to communicating with texts that don't demand a verbal response, and we are ill equipped to deal with social situations. It doesn't help that we almost never leave the house and only express our feelings in writing, either to each other or in our work. It is part of our occupation to passively observe, to absorb what we see and experience so that it can later be used for our own ends, mutated to fit a theme with dialogue we can make up after the fact. We are too used to constructing our own controlled environments that the characters can breathe within. We are not used to life without context. We are, as you once noted, "just to the left of life," unable to join in completely because we are busy taking notation. It is just our way, and I can embrace that. Sacrifices must be made, I guess, and I can make them. Can you?

I have been writing a little, when my head gives me reprieve, and I think I am close to finished with a new story. I've also been working quite a bit on the Awkward Alligator, reading the submissions and wishing there were a couple we could leave out. Overall I think it will be good. I have the utmost faith in Nikki, and she seems very excited. That means something to those of us who seldom get excited.

I don't know if this is quite the response you were looking for. I'm thinking probably not. But it's the best I can do in this oppressive heat. Do your best to stay in good spirits, and for your own sake please eat something. There's nothing more absurd than a person with good teeth who doesn't use them. Summer will end soon enough.

-Vincent Saint-Simon

M = Male (p. 21)

2006-03-05T10:34:00.000-08:00

M = Male
Jake Beard

She enters the room with great caution. The Paxil she just snorted, only because she is out of coke, is giving her a difficult time walking down the stairs. Snorting prescriptions is a rare occurrence; she usually avoids having to stoop so low, but desperate times and all that. It provides that same burn in her nasal passage that she had begun to crave, first only after sex and then after waking up. The bleeding from all of that nose-candy is the only problem. Fortunately, she’s coated in a crimson red dress that has the ability to hide such stains well. The room seems too distant and distorted like a radio channel that is too faint to listen to, despite the great, glimmering and haunting tune. Needless to say, she wants to be a part of the party. However, the sudden feeling of ice grabbing her entire being had ceased all her attempts. The horrible event upstairs just moments ago jarred her into a sub-reality. “A beer; that will make me feel better,” she reasons to herself. This is a false assumption; the beer enters her and only accentuates the sour, salty drip in the back of her throat.

She feels there really is no point in being at this party any longer. If she’s tired of trying to look put-together, she is certainly exhausted trying not to break down at this point. From across the room two men she does not recognize lower themselves in front of her chair. Words come out of their mouths. Her name, Seria, surely floats into the complex network of her mind, but other than that, their speech is somewhat like a Björk song when one has not had enough sleep; beautiful and melodic, yet unintelligible. Not one for broken social silence, Seria stands up and leaves at the second the two men shut up, waiting for her response.

Outside, the air is definitely that of autumn, chilly enough to give her goose bumps when her bare parts touch the leather on the seat of her car. While always being one prone to rash decisions and action patterns, irrationally driving home to her parents’ from the small college town she now lives in is not usually one of them. First, second, third gear, get on highway, make it home. It ran through her head like a mantra.

She gently jogs from the parking lot to her dorm - a ridiculous four-minute walk - removing her heels, allowing the cool concrete to soothe her feet. When she enters the dorm she continues up some flights of stairs and decides to use the elevator on the way back down; black overnight bag, one pair of jeans, one tooth brush, three joints, new Pumas and a sweater in a color invented in a customer research laboratory, run by J. Crew. Ignoring her roommate copulating in the corner of the room, she retrieves her copy of The Catcher in the Rye off of her bed. Sadly some of the pages are bent and gnarled from the rampant fucking it had just been subjected to. Seria decides to leave on her dress and makeup, just a quick change of shoes. She does not want to spend another minute in the dorm. She will just change and wash up in a gas station bathroom when she will be forced to stop due to her acorn-sized bladder. Besides, the dress makes her feel so confident.

Choosing the elevator for the decent of the building was a bad idea. Hoping for a seamless exit, her plan fails. The doors open up on the next floor down. Bernard came in. Bernard is the kind of guy who will shamelessly touch a girl’s thigh, then just giggle, saying he “can’t help it. It looks too good,” thinking it is all some sort of compliment. Seria closes her eyes and hums when the doors open to his pancake face. “Going somewhere?” he inquires, gesturing towards her bag. “Kinda late, don’t ya think? Ya never know what’s gonna get ya out there.”

The elevator doors open, donating a sigh of relief. Seria makes no response to the creepy man and swiftly makes way to the car. Going home will make everything better, she decides. She will just explain the situation to her mom, her loving mom, and she can switch schools and everything will be okay. Once at the car, she sets her bag in the seat next to her. She removes the first joint from the cigarette case and lights it using the car lighter—always a difficult task. She turns on the heater, but only on the floor so that she can feel the warm air over her hairless legs. Speeding out of town, listening to a scratched Radiohead CD, she slowly inhales the off-white smoke. It calms her at first but leads to paranoia and sudden sickness, both of which the drug has not given her in some years. Thirty miles out of town, forty…
The streetlights cut off at this point, too far from any form of civilization. Tears flow from each corner of her eye, only to be sniffed back up her nose. The sudden crying spell leaves her driving in a sorry state. Red, Blue and White lights flash behind her, at first a glimmer, only to get stronger and closer as the seconds race by. A siren. Slowing her speed down to around sixty and signaling that she is looking for a place to pull over takes a lot of effort. She rolls down all of the windows, allowing a flush of air to blow the reeking smell of joint out of the Volkswagen. “Can I please see your license and registration, ma’am?” one Officer Bartlett states, more than he questions. Grudgingly Seria reaches into her bag and removes her driver’s license, and from her dashboard her insurance card. She doubts they will help her at this point, and thinks of perhaps saying that she does not have her license. The cop takes both and returns to his cruiser. The seconds pass like hours and he returns, asking Seria to get out of the car. They stand in a nest made by both cars, his headlights still calmly beaming in stark contrast to the flashing, patriotic lights mounted to the top. Seria feels like a mess. Her dress is creased and crinkled, she’s wearing tennis shoes, and her makeup is smeared from the tears. “You look like a whore, you know that?” Officer Bartlett once again stated and questioned at the same time. “But, as I am sure you know, Joram speaks out against whoredom in Kings 9:22, and the LORD himself spoke against it in Deuteronomy 31:16. Yep, it’s all up here in my head, the whole thing.”

Bartlett becomes flushed and rapid in his speech, Seria very cold and fearful. Her high was busted the second she got out of the car, and she is now afraid that the cop cares about the pot the least of all. He continued his rant: “But no, you are no whore. You are much, much worse. The Bible never even mentions freaks like you, and we sure as hell can’t have none of that, it, YOU around my town.” With that, a silencing blow is lodged into Seria’s face. Suddenly layed on the grass along the side of the road on this October night, she feels kicks, first just at her side, but then more to her head when suddenly, thankfully, she is no longer able to fear or feel the next blow. She is unaware of how long this bizarre scene is to carry on. She slightly notices being dragged, but so far from consciousness at that point, she has little care.

Mr. and Mrs. Blaine were not told everything about the death of their son. In fact, since no one really knew all the details of the situation, it was speculated that due to the high level of narcotics in his body, he was beaten to death after a drug deal gone wrong. To his parents the police omitted that he was found in full makeup and a red cocktail dress. After attempting to file documentation of their son’s death at his university, complications arose. There was no Eric Blaine enrolled there, only a Seria Blaine, who had been missing from classes for over a week.

The Bicycle (p. 27)

2006-03-05T10:33:00.000-08:00

This piece is dedicated to Tristan, whose eloquence and unconventional elegance has allowed me to stride forward in a wholly less affable world than the one he would mold for me and the one from which he continues to lift me with his shaky hand adhered to mine.

The Bicycle
Royal Young

His mother had explained, after what had happened they needed a change. She had described it all in clear and simple tones to him when he had woken up and was still groggy with sleep. His eyes were closed against the blue dark of the room and she had told him all about the sloping hill and the sea, flat and gray, beyond. She had told about the little old house. He imagined it would have a fantastic attic with long, slender windows. She had told him about sailboats, how they sometimes looked like birds, and smoothed back his hair and promised they would have a good time.

They left in a red Chevy she had rented. He had to count everything out as he put it in his bag. The morning sun was weak but ever-present, and he wondered if he would have a good vacation. He was scared because this was his first. She had gotten the idea the day he came home from school with a black eye and leaves in his hair. She helped him finish packing and his bag was so heavy that it bumped against the hallway walls as he walked out the door behind her.
“Come on,” she said. “You can sit in the front.”
He got into the front seat while she shut the trunk and his legs felt small amidst all that space. She got into the car and started the ignition. The street fell away behind them and the rows of trees got thicker and thicker. He drifted in and out of sleep, and each time woke up to the distinct feeling of movement and his face closer to the cool window. Soon they were on highways and he knew they were almost there when the highways turned back to roads, and through the partially open window he could smell the sea, or at least what he thought he remembered the sea smelt like. He rolled down the window all the way and let the wind whip back his hair and rush against his eyes.
“Get back in,” she said. “You’ll get your head knocked off.”

The house was different from what he thought it might be. It was up a winding path on a sort of cliff overlooking the bay. A short, fat old woman greeted them and handed them a key. From the outside, the house was bigger than he thought it would be. It had a large, majestic doorway. The walls were white and the windows had crooked shutters. There was indeed an attic with a great pointed roof and even a small, beaten weathervane, which was swinging to and fro in the wind.

His mother thanked the woman, who nodded and went off. There were many small bedrooms at the ends of the little hallways. None of the windows had curtains; just open shutters, so the light poured in dully from all sides. His mother showed him to his room. He put his bag down on his bed and looked around. He went up to the full-length mirror and stared at his reflection. His legs looked long and bony and his hair paler than ever.

The room had wallpaper with little gypsy people leading a caravan across the desert. The sand was sepia green and the gypsy people were intended to be brightly dressed, though the colours had faded considerably. He went over to the window and looked out. He could see a bit of very green grass and the sea rippling gently.

He closed the shutters and the room got darker. He went back to the mirror and took off his shirt. He stared at his reflection. It almost felt as though the gypsies in the wallpaper were staring at him and he thought he could almost hear them whispering fitfully and sharpening their daggers. He took off his pants and folded them neatly on the bed. He studied himself again in his socks and underwear. His legs looked thinner. He smiled at his reflection and his reflection smiled back. He lifted one hand, waved, and his reflection waved back, still smiling. He tried to imagine that he didn’t know the person in the mirror. He squinted and thought he saw his reflection wave at him again. He tried to imagine the boy in the mirror was someone he hadn’t met yet.
“Hello,” he said.
“Hello,” said the boy.
The boy waved again. He unscrewed his eyes. He felt the gypsies shifting and coiling about each other. His reflection stared back at him and he felt dizzy—a dizziness that came on him as it had come before, its familiarity lending it greater power. The door opened. His mother stood in the doorway staring at him then she went to the window and opened it.
“Get on your clothes,” she said. “We’re going down to the beach.”

The beach was empty and vaguely cold. He was wearing a sweatshirt and she put her arm around him. The sand was very pale and hard. They walked along it.
“Don’t you like it here?” she asked.
“Yeah,” he said, “I like it a lot.”
“The beach is so nice,” she said, and gestured with one hand. “I always loved the sea.”
“I like the beach a lot,” he said. “The water is so big.”
She smiled at him and squeezed his shoulder. “I knew you’d like it,” she said.

They had sandwiches for dinner all alone at the big dining table. Every so often she would look up at him.
“Did you remember your toothbrush?” she asked.
“Yeah,” he said. “I packed it first so I wouldn’t forget.”
She looked at him sharply. “You’re not thinking about that bicycle, are you?” she asked. He shook his head.
“Nope,” he lied. “I don’t think I rode it much anyway.”
“Honey,” she paused, “you know you’ll never see it again.”
“I know,” he said.

That night he took a bath and then went right to his room. As he was putting on his pajamas she knocked on the door and called goodnight into the room. He got into bed and thought about his reflection, how it had waved to him, how it made him feel happy but scared. He drifted off to sleep and dreamt briefly about boats on flat, black water. He woke up at some point and his light bulb was flickering dimly on and off as though it had been halfway unscrewed. It threw strange yellow shadows on the walls, but then he closed his eyes again. He woke again and the light was off—the mirror glistened palely in the light from the window. He heard the waves and the wind and though he couldn’t see out the window from his bed, he could vividly picture a figure walking across the beach outside, tired and trudging in a sloping way down towards the surf. When he next woke, the room was bright with morning.
“Mom?” he called. There was no answer. He went downstairs and stopped at the foot of the staircase. Through double doors he could see his mother laying on the couch with her back to him.
“Mom?” he asked and walked over to her. Her eyes were open and she had been crying.
“Mom, are you okay?” he asked.
She looked up at him and sighed, then got up, pushing him to the side. She pulled her hair into a ponytail and wiped at her eyes.
“Good morning,” she said. “You must be hungry. Do you want a sandwich?”
“Yeah,” he said. “But are you okay?”
“I’m fine, honey,” she said. “Let’s go eat something.”

She made black coffee with the sandwiches, his with lots of sugar. She leaned on the table.
“What do you want to do today?” she asked.
He shrugged and took another bite of his sandwich. “Go for a walk,” he suggested.
She smiled and nodded her head. “I think I would like that,” she said.

The beach was sunny that day and warm. He took off his sweater and tied it around his waist. The sea looked greener and more inviting. His mother had her arm around him again and they walked slower.
“What are you thinking?’ she asked.
He thought about it for a second. “I don’t know,” he said. “I guess I’m thinking about how nice it is here.”
She nodded. “It’s a nice change,” she said.
”I was thinking,” he said, hesitantly, “maybe we could do this again next year, come back here. I like that house.”
“I like it too,” she said.
“Mom?” he asked.
“Yes?”
“Why were you crying this morning?’
“I wasn’t.”
He looked up at her and she looked down at him for a second and then looked away. “Sometimes I just feel very far from everything,” she said.
“What do you mean?” he asked.
“I feel like everything is very distant and that I cannot touch it.” Then she shook her head and smiled and looked at him again. “I knew you’d like it here, though. That’s why I brought you, so you and I could spend some time alone in a nice place. We haven’t done that in awhile and I felt this would be the perfect thing to keep us close. You know I want us to be very close.”

That night at dinner they spoke very little. She had brought a bottle of red wine and kept it close to her on the table, refilling her glass often. Her face got flushed and her lips were touched with a purplish stain. He cleaned up and she went to the couch and lay there facing the cushions. He glanced at her once as he went upstairs and she was rocking slightly. He started to say goodnight but decided better of it and went straight to his room. He turned off the light and opened the shutters so that the moon lit everything gently. He tilted the mirror just the way he wanted then took off his shirt. He took off his pants and put them on his bed. He looked in the mirror and paused. He looked like a very slender girl. He took off his socks and stood there playing with the waistband of his underwear. His reflection looked sullen and dark in the dimness.

“Hello,” he said to the reflection.
“Hello,” the reflection said.
“What’s your name?” he asked, smiling warmly.
“Luke, what’s yours?” the reflection replied.
“Mine’s Luke, too.”
“Oh, gee! Now that’s a coincidence.”
“Yeah, it is.”
“Have you seen my bike, Luke?” his reflection asked.
“No, I haven’t seen it—did you lose it?”
“Well, I guess you could say that,” his reflection smiled.
“What do you mean?” he asked.
“I broke it,” his reflection smiled more widely.
“How?” he asked.
“I can’t say.”
“Oh, sorry—well, I think I’m going to go now.”
“Please don’t.”
“Well…” he paused. “I don’t know.”

He glanced back at the room and it was empty. The wallpaper was not threatening and his bed looked very soft, but everything was so shadowy. He turned back to the mirror. His reflection was motionless, waiting. He felt like he had a great secret, a new friend.
“Okay, I won’t if you don’t want me to,” he said.

His reflection nodded and stared at him. “That’s exactly what I wanted,” it said. He felt blood come to his cheeks.
“Why do you look embarrassed?” his reflection asked.
“I’m not sure,” he said.
“Is your mommy downstairs?” his reflection asked. “Can she hear us?”
“I don’t think so,” he shook his head.
“Do you like her?”
“Yeah, sure I do.”
“I don’t like her much.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t know. I just don’t.”
“I should go,” he said, suddenly feeling very, very certain that this is what he must do.
“Okay,” his reflection understood. “It was nice meeting you, Luke.”
“You too, Luke.”

He stepped back from the mirror and put his shirt back on. He lay down on his bed and felt like laughing. He wondered if the other Luke once lived in this house, maybe even slept in the same bed he was laying on. He smelled the bed and it smelt like the other Luke. He put his head on the pillow and he could feel something near him, something that had been there for a long while, waiting.

Suddenly, he got up and put on his pants. He turned on the light in the room so it would be on when he got back. He walked quickly down the hallway, down the stairs, and into the living room. His mother’s shoes were still by the couch but she was no longer there. He went into the kitchen where the tap dripped into the silence. He went back upstairs and into her bedroom. One of the windows was open and there was a small electric fan on. Some of her clothes were on her bureau and her bed was unmade. He left the room and walked down the hallway looking in the two other bedrooms and the bathroom. He put a hand to his face and realized he had been crying. He reached for the cold-water faucet to wash his face and drew back in shock. The faucet was burning hot and he heard something coming from the ceiling above him.
“Mom?” he shouted, ran out of the bathroom, and started climbing the steps to the attic.
The stairway was long and narrow and a small bare bulb hung lit at the top. He reached for the door and found it locked.
“Mom?” he called again. He heard movement behind the door. “Mom?”
The door opened and she looked down at him. Her face was still flushed and her movements seemed very tense.
“What is it, honey?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” he managed. “I was just thinking if maybe we could leave tomorrow.”
She stared at him for a while before she answered and it made him very uncomfortable.
“No, I don’t imagine there will be any need for that,” she said. “In fact, I quite like it here. No, I don’t think we can even think about leaving just yet. Stop being ridiculous. I brought you here because I thought you might need a vacation and now you want to go home? What do you think you’re going to do there? Stay in your bed day and night? You need to get fresh air; you need to get out.”
“I’m fine, Mom. Please,” he begged, “I don’t like it here.”
“Of course you are, darling. We all are,” she said. “Now go back to bed.” He nodded and walked back down the stairs. He heard the door shut and lock behind him. He walked slowly back to his room and lay down on his bed.

Leo Tolstoy and Alred Lord Tennyson Fistfight in Hell (p. 40)

2006-03-05T10:31:00.000-08:00

Leo Tolstoy and Alfred Lord Tennyson Fistfight in Hell
Oedipus Jones

CHARACTERS:
ALFRED LORD TENNYSON, the 19th century literary genius
LEO TOLSTOY, the 19th century literary genius

The stage is empty except for ALFRED LORD TENNYSON and about a thousand Dixie cups. He is wearing nothing but black Spandex pants and has the letters “A.L.T.” painted on his chest. He is meticulously stacking the Dixie cups in the style of a protective fort around himself. Upon completing his fort, TENNYSON bursts out in song:

TENNYSON: Oh, I wish I was in the land of cotton
Old times there are not forgotten
Look away! Look away! Look away, Dixieland.
In Dixieland where I was born in
Early on one frosty mornin’
Look away! Look away! Look away, Dixieland.

[He kicks down a section of the fort with each upcoming “Away!”]
Oh, I wish I was in Dixie
Away! [kick] Away! [kick]
In Dixieland I’ll make my stand
To live and die in Dixie
Away! [kick] Away! [kick]
Away down south in Dixie!
Away! [kick] Away! [kick]
Away down south in Dixie!

[The fort is now completely destroyed. TENNYSON stands for a moment in the middle of his admirable mess. Without any apparent warning, he suddenly throws himself on all fours, growling and barking like a dog. It is at this point that LEO TOLSTOY enters the stage. He is also wearing nothing but black Spandex pants but has the letters “L.T.” painted on his chest.]

TOLSTOY: Goddammit! [He crosses to TENNYSON and begins slapping him on the top of his head.] Bad dog! Bad dog! [TENNYSON slowly sulks upstage, whimpering like the dog he is. TOLSTOY speaks with sympathy.] Dammit, man…get up. Get up! [A beat, and then enthusiastically:] Up, boy! Up! [He slaps his legs enthusiastically and continues to encourage TENNYSON in this manner. Eventually it works and TENNYSON begins to jump excitedly on TOLSTOY. TOLSTOY in turn begins petting him on the head.] Good dog! Aren’t you a good dog!
TENNYSON, enraged: Damn you… DAMN YOU! [He begins to attack TOLSTOY but then stops himself.] Are these not the hands… the hands of a man? [He begins to quietly weep.]
TOLSTOY: The hands of a man?

TENNYSON, still crying: A man with a plan.

TOLSTOY: A man with a plan and a friend named Stan.

TENNYSON, realizing the game and forgetting his sadness: The hands of a man with a friend named Stan and a plan for the fan and a frying pan!

TOLSTOY: A frying pan?

TENNYSON: A frying pan.

TENNYSON and TOLSTOY: A plan for the fan and a frying pan! [They explode into laughter and shake hands and hug. TOLSTOY collapses in the middle of their embrace.]

TENNYSON: Oh God! [He checks over TOLSTOY and sees that he is no longer moving] Oh Christ Jesus in Heaven! [He straddles the unmoving body and grabs him by the shoulders.] Why? Why! Why, God, why?! Why must you take my one and only friend!? [By this point he is violently shaking TOLSTOY, who wakes up and begins running around the stage and shouting like a distracted person.]

TOLSTOY: RARGHRARGHRARGHRARGHRARGHRARGH!!! [He runs around screaming in this manner for about twenty seconds as TENNYSON just looks on in confused amazement. After the twenty seconds (or however long it takes for the audience to become extremely uncomfortable), TENNYSON begins following TOLSTOY and mimicking his screaming. After this anarchy has lasted far longer than it ever should have, they stop center-stage and pant heavily, looking out at the audience. After they have caught a little breath they begin running and screaming again, only this time they run out into the audience. After running amuck throughout the audience they should both exit through the audience entrance/exit doors in the back of the theatre. As the audience sits whispering amongst themselves and wondering if this so-called “play” is over, TOLSTOY and TENNYSON have made their way backstage. They should wait until the audience has begun comfortably speaking out loud (or possibly even leaving) before they each enter from opposite sides of the stage.]

TENNYSON: Hello, stranger!

TOLSTOY: Hello yourself.

TENNYSON: Fine weather we’re having.

TOLSTOY, after a beat: We’re inside.

TENNYSON, examining his surroundings: Are we?

TOLSTOY, instantly enraged: Of course we are! It is completely obvious that we are meeting here right now for the first time in the great indoors! Gosh and golly! Anyone in his right sense could either see and/or feel that this is the case and that the facts are how the case is solved.

TENNYSON: I see.

TOLSTOY: I don’t know that you do.

TENNYSON: I don’t know that I do.

TOLSTOY: I just said that.

TENNYSON: Said what?

TOLSTOY: That I don’t know that you do.

TENNYSON: Do what?

TOLSTOY: Do what?

TENNYSON: Do what?

TOLSTOY and TENNYSON: Chicken butt! [At this they hook arms and begin skipping in a circle and singing.]

TENNYSON: Do what, do what, do what?

TOLSTOY: Chicken butt!

TENNYSON: Guess what, guess what, guess what?

TOLSTOY: Chicken butt!

TENNYSON: More what, more what, more what?

TOLSTOY: Chicken butt!

TENNYSON: Less what, less what, less what?

TOLSTOY: Chicken butt!

TENNYSON stops.

TENNYSON, gravely: What did you say?

TOLSOTY, suddenly ashamed and sheepish: No… I’m sorry… Please, sir, don’t make me—

TENNYSON, shouting: WHAT… DID… YOU… SAY!! [TOLSTOY drops to his knees sobbing.] Tell me! Tell me you dirty little boy! Tell me what you said!

TOLSTOY, through his sobs: I… said…

TENNYSON: Yesss?

TOLSTOY: Chicken butt. [At this TENNYSON marching about the stage celebrating, seemingly drunk with his newfound power. Meanwhile, TOLSTOY just weeps and calls out to God.] Why me, God? Why me?!

TENNYSON, continuing in his celebration, shouts to TOLSTOY: Assume the position!

[TOLSTOY looks on in horror.]

I said assume the position.

TOLSTOY: Yes… sir. [He stand up and turns around. With his back to the audience he bends over and grabs hold of his ankles.] Read sir.

TENNYSON, menacingly: Good… [At this TENNYSON jumps off the stage and picks a woman out of the crowd. He brings the woman on stage and stands her beside TENNYSON.] Now to begin the chastisement. [He takes the woman’s hands and begins to slap the down on the top of TOLSTOY’s ass. Each time he brings her hands down, he and TOLSTOY shout “Chastisement!” and he encourages her to shout it as well. Once the woman has been established in her new role as an actress, TENNYSON leaves her to continue her job and pulls another woman from the audience. He sets this woman on the other side of TOLSTOY and instructs her in the same manner. When they are both correctly chastising TOLSTOY, TENNYSON leaves the stage again and brings up two more women. When they are on the stage, TENNYSON throws his head back and shouts:] Begin the chastisement! [At this, TENNYSON turns around and grabs his ankles. If the two new women don’t come over immediately, he should beckon them over to him. As they are both being beaten they should eventually start screaming “Chastisement!” in unison and with growing intensity. When their shouting reaches its peek volume, TENNYSON and TOLSTOY should break away from the four women. As the women and audience look on in complete confusion, the two will meet on the very edge of the stage where they will collapse into a passionate make-out session. If the women leave the stage, that’s fine; if not, even better. This make-out should last long enough for the shock to wear off and even to the point where it passes gratuitous and just becomes obnoxious. At this point, they will both look up and back at the back of the stage, which has become greatly illuminated. With a keen sense for pointing out the obvious, they are staring into Heaven.]

TOLSTOY: Father… is that you?

TENNYSON: So… thirsty…

TOLSTOY: Have pity on us… send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool out tongues…

TENNYSON: Because we are in agony…

As the two reach out to Heaven they become overwhelmed with the exhaustion of death. In time, they each collapse, their legs still entwined from the hot make-out session. The curtain should close at this point, leaving TENNYSON and TOLSTOY in front of it. Here they will lie until the theatre is completely empty. The play has ended.

ISSUE 2

2005-08-05T09:38:00.000-07:00

Contents

POETRY

……...............................................................................................................................…………......……………… 2

Above Our Sleeping Heads
Joe Moccia

…........................................................................................................................……………….....…………….…... 3

Last Night in St. Louis
Angela Feeherty

.................................................................................................................................................................................. 5

Narcissus
David Capps

…..............................................................................................................................…...……………………….... 6

Love and the Unsung Hero
Dru Parrish

FICTION

………….....................................................................................................................................………….……… 8

A Night at the Louisville Inn
J. Tyler Mortimer

………………………....................................................................................................................………………….…….. 17

The Driver
Oedipus Jones

The Awkward Alligator is brought to you by Matt Siemer and Nicole Rainey.
Cover art and other images by Curt Bozif.

Above Our Sleeping Heads (p. 2)

2005-08-05T09:37:00.000-07:00

Above Our Sleeping Heads
Joe Moccia

The night has hands
but daylight can touch.
We dream the dark away and
we don't stir so much.

Carrion dreams pile forth
and breathe the north wind bells,
sweating sage and saints and rhythm.

Hymns hued in red and gold
that alight
align and are lost
in heaven we never know,
sung for what love we give them.

Last Night in St. Louis (p. 3)

2005-08-05T09:36:00.000-07:00

Last Night in St. Louis
Angela Feeherty

Above my head cracks are forming;
sky raining on downtown as confetti,
streets shimmering,
bluish shards
crunching as I walk
from Tucker to Washington to 10th;

the vacant gray buildings
create tunnels before my eyes.

Looking down I can see
the clouds, soft pink and bright
tangerine wisps passing through
the ground, blown by strong winds
out of the city,
on to places where the earth still trembles,

the pulse of clear-green rivers swelling
like veins through the grasslands.

The industrial East City
is gone from my sight.
Hollow buildings in South City,
ghettoes in North City,
segregated West County,
lost, beyond location.

Here on the sidewalks the sun
is passing--
blues and yellows and oranges
of the smashed crystal ball
are fading to black.

I sit down on Locust,
brush the sunset off my shoulder
just as a half-moon is forming.
I look across the cityscape
through the fog of falling
shining atmosphere
at the lonely shadowed Arch
that, when passed through, will take me
where I always knew I would go.

Narcissus (p. 5)

2005-08-05T09:35:00.000-07:00

Narcissus
David Capps

reply was he didn't know what the concept was

string of beads, sure
straw floating stars down the river
sweet pressure of the summer's wrist

but this matter of passing time stumped the best
as best i could 'splain it:

drawing my finger to a ridge
a pitiful handful of goats staring back
condescending as the land was drying up
all sense of this migration lost on our nodding

I stood a long time by this Idiot on the bridge
who could not repeat back to me what I said

Love and the Unsung Hero (p. 6)

2005-08-05T09:34:00.000-07:00

Love and the Unsung Hero
Dru Parrish

From the points of index
one can bridge the chasms
between gestures and constellations.

Trace the stars around
harsh lines. Breathe into beauty
with red hair; girls in white
set against darkness in the night.

The one who speaks to me, speak to me.
Swirl hands in red. They come and go
the girls who talk of nothing; nothing and Michelangelo.

My hand drops drawing chasms
together. If to me. Asterisk to eye…and me

I endeavor to be still; let them speak to me;
speak to me…and once.

Cicada’s sing the muse,
summer song sweetly sung:
love and the unsung hero.

A Night at the Louisville Inn (p. 8)

2005-08-05T09:33:00.000-07:00

A Night at the Louisville Inn
J. Tyler Mortimer

I have the body of an old man.

*You sure you don’t mind?*
“No, it’s fine.”
*It’s fine, or it’d be cool?*
“It’d be cool, it’s fine, don’t worry about it.”
*I just don’t want you to be upset, that’s all*
“It’s fine, really.”
*Ok, then, I’ll see you in a couple hours or so.*
“Yeah, that’s great.”

I shouldn’t be this tired.

He walked out of the room and to the elevators. He punched the down button and when the doors opened he stepped on to ride to the lobby. With his satchel slung over his shoulder he walked towards the pedway to the convention center, merging with other dreary-eyed meaningless professionals.

From the metal folding chair somewhere ambiguously in the middle of a field of filled folding chairs, he watched the dichromatic PowerPoint presentation someone mindlessly strung together. He looked around at the heads bobbing in understanding, and wondered if these people were really learning anything, or if they were just nodding out of politeness.

In what was surely a portal of time, he emerged from the conference room two hours later, with nothing more to his person except the wrinkles of being two hours older.

When did it turn into this?

*You sure you don’t mind?*
“Sarah, you’re already here.”
*I don’t have to stop, I could keep going.*
“That’s nonsense, you’re passing through, just stop.”
*But I don’t have to stay there, I mean—*
“I want you to come by. I want you to stay the night. I just might need to sleep, that’s all.”
*I know.*
“I mean, I have to get up early tomorrow too, and I won’t be leaving until late.”
*I know.*
“I’m just not looking forward to the drive tomorrow night, that’s all.”
*I don’t have to stay.*
“I’ll see you in a couple of minutes.”

I’m too young to feel this old. Other people my age don’t feel like this.

His knees ached as he stepped up the stairs to the café.

Why is my body failing?

He pulled out the ten year projections because he was sitting alone, and didn’t want to look alone, so he thought his papers would make him look accompanied, or, at least, busy. And as he tapped his chest and took three pills from out of the bottles in his bag, his weaker mind poked through and began to nag him more intensely.

What if you’re not here in ten years?

Stop that.

You know it’s likely.

Stop that.

Don’t lie to yourself.

Not now, not here.

You can’t ignore me forever.

No one’s ignoring you. No one could ignore you.

*I’m outside the hotel, where are you?*
“I’ll come down and get you.”

He pushed open the door and saw her standing there, adorable, and beautiful, and achingly perfect, but not in a boring cover-model kind of way: no, perfect in an eye-of-the-beholder kind of way. She smiled at him like the middle school kid who came to the dance alone and finally saw someone she knew. They wrapped together, twisted, and rested their foreheads, eyes closed, on each other’s.

“It’s been too long.”
“I know.”
“We shouldn’t keep doing this.”
“I know.”
“I’m too tired of this.”

I’m too tired, period.

“I could transfer schools. And then we’d only be apart when you go on these trips.”

“I’ll quit.”

She smiled and looked at him, and lovingly smacked his shoulder with her hand.

“You can’t quit. One of us has to have a job.”
“I don’t care. I’ll quit.”
“Honey, we need the money.”
“I don’t care. I’m too tired.”
“It’ll get better.”
“No, I mean tired-tired.”
“Oh. Did you not sleep well last night?”
“I slept fine. I slept fine, that’s the thing.”
“Not long enough?”
“I don’t know, maybe, I mean, I used to do just fine.”
“You’re not sixteen anymore honey.”
“Yeah, but I’m not fifty either.”
“I’m sure it’s just the conference, that has to be draining.”

I’m sure it’s just the conference.

They walked, hand in hand, around the city for a while. It started to get dark, and he was starting to get short of breath, so they headed back to the hotel.

“What floor did they put you on?”
“Just the second,” he said, as they stepped onto the elevator.

They got close to his room, and he turned her around, then pushed his hands into her hips and backed her into the door. He slid one hand up the back of her shirt, and pressing his lips into hers, he slid the key into the door. She dropped her bag in the doorway and he kicked it in with his foot while the door swung closed and locked. A noiseless blue light from the muted TV showed them where the space on the floor was between the bed and the dresser, and they fell into it; and with heavy sighs and deft fingers, he slipped off her pants while she reached in his. Between the checking of his breath and the gasping of hers, they pulled off each other’s clothes, and the over-zealous air conditioner began to freeze their sweat.

And with a frightened sense of reality, he realized where he was.

I cannot be this tired.

You’re an old man.

I’m not an old man.

You’re an old, old man.

I shouldn’t be this tired.

Why don’t you go to sleep already.

“Honey, are you ok?”

Tell her not tonight. Tell her we’ll do it the next time we see her.

“Yeah, I’m fine.”
“You seem tired.”

You’re exhausted.

I’m exhausted.

“Cause if you’re too tired, it’s ok, we don’t have to—”
“No, I want to.”

The spirit is willing, old man, the spirit is willing—

“God, I want to be here so bad.”
“You are here.”
“God, I want to be here so bad.”
“Honey what’s wrong?

Tell her you’re weak, and tired.

“Do you want to go to sleep? It’s ok, you have a lot to do tomorrow.”
“So do you.”
“I just have to drive, that’s all.”

“When’s the next time I’ll see you?” he asked, looking into the darkened mass beneath him, breathing and squeezing him.

“Well,” she said, biting her lip, “I have to finish three more weeks at school, and then I go back to my parents’ for a few days if you’re there.”

“I’m in Seattle in three weeks.”
“...and then I leave to Italy for the summer.”
“So not until the before the fall semester.”
“Maybe.”
“God, I want to be here so bad.”
“Why do you keep saying that?”

It’s ok to admit that you’re too weak. She’ll understand.

Don’t let me go to sleep.

But you’re tired old man.

“We should go to sleep, you look exhausted.”
“I’m not exhausted.”

We’re exhausted.

“It’s ok, I don’t mind.”
“I don’t want to go to sleep.”

“Honey, you’re tired, you’ve had a busy week. And I have a lot of driving to do tomorrow, I should sleep too,” she said, pushing him up.

He sat there, naked, while she went over to her bag and pulled out something to sleep in. In a voice, shallow, tense, and wrought with fear, he asked her to come back and lie with him. He asked her to come and be naked with him, and not to let him sleep, and not to let him be tired. And she, sympathetically, told him she loved him, but that if he needed rest, then it was wiser that he get rest.

“I don’t want to be this,” he said, lifting his body off the floor, “I’m not ready for this part.”
She turned back to him, and gently put her hand on his chest.
“The doctor said that when you need rest, you’ll need rest.”
“I’m not ready for this.”
“There will be other days—”
“—”
“—I want there to be other days.”

In the darkness of the room she prepared herself to go to sleep; in the darkness of his mind he did the same.

The Driver (p. 17)

2005-08-05T09:32:00.000-07:00

The Driver
Oedipus Jones

I stagger outta the bar and fumble my keys into the cab door. I forgot the fuckin’ handle’s broke off. Reaching through the open window, I pull the handle from the inside. Now that I’m good ’n fueled back up I can finish my goddam route. Driving drunk’s about the least of my concerns. It’d take the shipwrecked jelly of about a zillion dead seals to lube up my social life. Just me and the streets. Me and the cab-riding shit that stumbles out of god knows where from doing god knows what at hell’s ungodly hour in This Town. A couple six double bourbons and I’m the fuckin’ king of the clams riding my lonely chariot through the nights of wine and walkabouts.

I look out the window and see some pussy standing in the streetlight, passin’ a cig between ‘em. Fuckin’ whores. They should do us all a favor and get back in school. Fuck it. Maybe later I’ll quit window-shopping and take ‘em both for a ride. We’ll see how the tips go.

As I drive my way down Hocus Avenue, it’s all I can see. Pussy this. Coke that. Horse another. Booze-a-lolli. Nothin’ fuckin’ changes. I remember growing up in this shit.

Out of a five-n-dime titty club I see a couple a real high society types. Some real Breakfast at Tiffany’s type shit right on my route—lucky fuckin’ day. Not too typical for this stretcha street, but fuck, what is typical anyway? Nothin’ in This Town. Notha-fuckin’-othin’.

Audrey Go-fuckady stretches out her hand. I guess that’s how you call a washed up ol’ drunk to drive your powdered ass home in the art world. I pull the beast on over and she steps up to bat, Handy Joe Pretty-Pants gigglin’ up beside her. He’s still got a martini in his hand, the lucky fuck.

They hop those pretty little asses in the back and I roar off down the avenue. Killer rack on the dame. Monkey suit on the monkey.

“Darling, you really must keep your hands to yourself,” she says to he.

“Where ya headin’?” says me to she.

“Does it matter?” says she to me.

“Not so long as the meter’s runnin’.”

“81st and Pike,” the Monkey mumbles as much to himself as God ‘n Jesus or anyone. “I’m gonna take you back home and tuck ya in real good.”

“Now, darling, you really have had a bit too much to drink, haven’t you? I don’t know how you ever even talked me into this taxicab with you.”

I take a hard right and he spills his drink all over her pretty little feet.

“Whoops! Not so dry anymore, is it? Hgrah hgrah hgrah hgrah hgrah hgrah!” He even laughs like a goddam asshole.

“Oh damn!” says she. “You’ve spilt martini all over my shoes!”

“Better than blood,” says me, looking up in the mirror. She looks back at me with somethin’ in her eye. Somethin’ I haven’t seen in these parts for a long while... fuck even ever. It looks like somethin’ worthwhile… somethin’ noble… all that shit. But whatever it is it all still smells like pussy to me.

“Driver?” says she in that way that only means one thing.

I take my cue and pull the beast over. Fancy-Pants doesn’t know shit from shingles when I throw him in the street, but the bloody slab of face he leaves skidding across the pavement should fill in the blanks tomorrow.

“Thank you, driver,” says she. “He really was becoming quite a bore.”

I take off down the road again and look back up in the mirror.

“What’s your name, doll?” I ask. Classy broads like these love it when two bits calls ‘em doll. Makes ‘em feel all Daisy Gatsby ‘n shit. That same look flashes ‘cross her eye again.

“What’s in a name?” says she, pulling out a cig from her dainty little doody bag. “Does it really matter?”

“Not so long as the meter’s runnin’,” I shoot her a second time.

“Do you mind if I smoke in your taxicab?” she asks with a prissy little flip in the way she says taxicab.

“Not if you tip the driver with one of them pretty long cigs of yours.” I quit smoking six months ago, but shit like this don’t count. She lights two cigs and hands one to me through the chicken wire in between us.

“Don’t most cabbies these days have bulletproof glass between the seats?” she asks like she really gives a damn or two. I take a long, hard drag and nearly halve the damn thing.

“Maybe,” I say, “but I’m more a chicken wire type a guy… Keeps the trash in back.”

I take another look in the mirror and catch a pretty little peak at the cut of her dress. Pretty low cut for a society type. Makes me wanna slip inside some high society myself. I drag the other half of the cig instead and throw it out the window.

“Well, what if I were to pull a pistol from my handbag and shoot you?” says she.

“Well, what if you were?” says me.

“I should say that it really puts me at an unfair advantage, doesn’t it?”

I look in the mirror again and that damn somethin’ is still in her eye. She stares right back and brings the cig between her lips.

“I’m not too worried about it,” says me.

She leans forward, wrapping her fingers through the chicken wire. The cig between her tasty little knuckles points back at her face and makes it glow like a goddam movie. I turn my head to get a better look and she whispers real seductive like: “That’s not my only advantage over you.”

She leans back and takes another drag.

“Oh no?” says me. “And what else do you think you’ve got?”

And some fuckin’ grin creeps ‘cross her face while she’s blowin’ smoke out her nose.

“I know your name, Mr. Joe Squabbleton,” she reads from the license displayed to the back.

I laugh at the silly bitch and say: “Honey, if you’re still livin’ in a world where you can believe a damn thing because it’s printed on some scrappa paper, then you’ve got a couple ways to watch that pretty little assa yours before you come seedin’ back down to This Town again.”

She stares at me in the mirror. That damn look never does leave her fuckin’ eye.

She samshes out her cig on the cab window and says: “This is my stop.” I pull the fuck over and she gets outta the cab. She comes up to the passenger window and hands me fifty bucks. “I believe this should cover it,” says she.

“You want change?” says me.

“Keep it,” says she an’ she starts leanin’ all forward like on her arms. All the bosom in the world mashed up all together here right in fronta me. That low cutta hers is paying off for all the chips and then some. This bitch is good. She musta done this type a shit before.

“Anything else?” says me, lookin’ straight into that goddam somethin’ in her eye.

“Care to come up for a drink?” she asks like she wasn’t the goddam devil tryin’ to close the deal on one more wayward fuckin’ fuck.

“Sorry, doll,” says me. “There’s a lot more money to be made.”

“I’ve got money,” says she, “And a bit else to boot.” I don’t doubt it and I tell her so.

“But I don’t need your kinda money,” says me and I roar off down the road again.

As I drive the fuck away I look from side to side and wonder: Where the fuck am I… and who the fuck is Joe Squabbleton?

ISSUE 1

2005-07-05T09:04:00.000-07:00

Contents

POETRY

...................................................................................................................................................................... 2

Skin Like Spilled Milk
Dana Kuhnline

...................................................................................................................................................................... 3

Just Inspire
Zhian Kamvar

...................................................................................................................................................................... 5

The Last American
Dru Parrish

FICTION

...................................................................................................................................................................... 7

Puddle Worm
Nicole Rainey

.................................................................................................................................................................... 10

You Love Vodka
William Ostilly

.................................................................................................................................................................... 14

Brother, Dear Brother
Thelonious Wadlington

..................................................................................................................................................................... 17

Picnic Lightning
Vincent Saint-Simon

The Awkward Alligator is brought to you by Nicole Rainey and Matt Siemer.
Cover art and Fiction page art courtesy of Curt Bozif.

Skin Like Spilled Milk (p. 2)

2005-07-05T09:02:00.000-07:00

Skin Like Spilled Milk
Dana Kunline

For a long time I wanted to have skin like spilled milk,
smooth, glassy, impenetrable by light,
worth weeping over.

I wanted hips like the shadows under a melon,
something soft you could curve your hand around,
that didn’t exist.

Hands like birds, with quick fluttering heartbeats, long lovely
feathers for fingers, fragile pretty bones,
nails like singing beaks.

But my skin isn’t mine to change. I can see through it when
I get out of the shower, hairs stand up,
my veins show through.
When in an airplane above the midwest,
they are the thin rivers you see.

Just Inspire (p. 3)

2005-07-05T09:01:00.000-07:00

Just Inspire (Music: Aphex Twin-"Fingerbib")
Zhian Kamvar

Tear the skin. A
flap of flesh hangs
down as this force
called gravity
welcomes it to
become one with
the ground. I dive
into the pool
of blood that waits.

Flowing out of
the arteries
and veins, it falls
down the skin like
rain from empty
Fields will flow to
empty creek beds

Down stream in the
Superior
Vena Cava
is where I will
swim. Bumping this
way and that, try
to keep up with
flowing matrix
secreted by
friendly blood cells.
I climb upon
and surf the stream
on my way to
the heart. I can

see atrium
is waiting for
me, drinking my
brothers, sharing
them with its heart's
body. Now my turn,
in atrium.
is of the right,
through tricuspid,
Pulmonary
Semilunar.

In atrium,
is of the left,
through bicuspid,
out aortic
semilunar,
dispersed into
arteries I
will flow to my
Capillaries
and give waiting
cells oxygen
to breathe and live
for one more day.

The Last American (p. 5)

2005-07-05T09:00:00.000-07:00

The Last American
Dru Parrish

“No one writes like Hemingway anymore, I’ll tell ya.”
No need. His heart became the arms
of an age that pulled a generation
into the sea when all that was known was
the Atlantic.

“Imagine what arms! My, my, my.
Holding the gaze of Hard men
with journal eyes. Speaking glory
through callused hands.”

I paused him. Smoked cursive lungs
and set this thought;
--But with them, nothing’s the same now
no more wars to win, nothing left to wrestle

“...
They’d have to be steady.
Tremors don’t doubt sure hands
composure thick, even at the end
when they have but one way out.
They do not waver at fate.
Boredom kills all ancient lions.”

You Love Vodka (p. 10)

2005-07-05T08:57:00.000-07:00

You Love Vodka
William Ostilly

You love vodka. There’s no sense in denying it. You just told me not two weeks ago when we were on our honeymoon, and I have a pretty good memory of that.

No, we weren’t drunk. I remember because we were staying in that awful hotel—the first one we stayed at—you know, the one with the really sad looking fake palm trees. Yes, one did fall over in the pool. Now you’re starting to remember. Anyway you were up in our room reading and I had gone down to get some ice (and maybe a soda?). I came back in the room and you looked me up and down with what appeared to be a look of disgust. I think you didn’t like my shirt. Do you remember the shirt? The orange and green one that you said was “so stupid looking it almost made me unlovable?” Yes, it was a button up, and the buttons were square. Well, it doesn’t matter what shoes I was wearing. I was on vacation, and I think I’m allowed to wear blue shoes if I want to. Why do you always do this, anyway? You just tear me down all the time when we’re trying to have an adult discussion. It’s like you don’t even care about my feelings. What’s the fucking big deal about, huh? You think that I’m going to change the way I dress just for you? Is that it? No, I’m not angry; I’m frustrated and upset. If you don’t want me to yell then you shouldn’t judge me. It isn’t like your fashion sense is so great either. I seem to recall a certain grayish-blue dress that makes me want to barf all over myself. You know, the one you wear all the time because you think it makes you look pretty. It just makes you look like a prissy whore. And you shouldn’t wear socks with dresses. What do you think of that? Now do you know how it feels? How does it feel to be insulted? Now maybe if I did it constantly you would understand.

Yeah, I felt like crying too, but that’s not even the point. That’s not even what we were discussing. Why do you always have to go on about things so that we get off-topic? I was right in the middle of the story, too, so I know you weren’t listening.

Oh, you were, were you? What was I saying then? Where was I in the story? Can you tell me or do I have to repeat it all again?

Well, that does happen to be exactly where I stopped. You got lucky I guess. I came in the room and you gave me a look of disgust. I felt like giving you one too, because you were reading that one book, Crimes that Punish or something like that. Yeah, that one. The one that I told you time and again not to read because it makes me feel stupid. But you keep reading it because you don’t give a shit about how I feel.

Anyway, I felt like giving you a look but I didn’t because I love you and care about how you feel. Don’t interrupt me, please. I won’t ask again nicely. So I put the ice over on the little sink next to the closet and I came over to the bed. You pretended not to be interested in me because you were reading. I remember that. But whatever, I thought, she does that all the time.

I grabbed the book from you and closed it, so that we could talk or have sex.

What was that you mumbled? You know what I’m talking about. You mumbled just now. I heard you but I want you to repeat it. Oh. Well, isn’t that just a fine statement to make. How dare you, really. As a matter of fact I do talk to you, and I don’t just use you for sex. You’re just saying that to make me mad.

You know a lot of women would appreciate my healthy sex drive. Yes, they would. And you know, maybe if you were better in bed, we wouldn’t have to do it so often. Yeah, that’s right. Don’t get all offended like it isn’t true. Excuse me? I do too know how to please a woman; you’re just too uptight. No, I don’t just lie there. No other woman has ever had a problem with me, so it must be you. I could have any woman I wanted. You should feel honored. It isn’t like you have any prospects. I don’t care how many people you slept with. Are you trying to make me jealous? Is that the game we’re playing? Well, if your dad hadn’t given me all that money I wouldn’t have married you. How do you feel now? Is that something you wanted to hear? What? How can your dad force you to marry me? Now you’re just making things up. Well, no one likes you either, and we all talk about you behind your back. You don’t like to hear that, do you? Well, next time you shouldn’t make me mad.

And you changed the topic again. You always do this. Why can’t we have a normal conversation without you insulting me every two minutes? It’s like you’re trying to make this as difficult as possible. Anyway, we were sitting there and I had just taken your book so that you would actually look at me when we were talking. Then I asked you if you wanted to have sex, and of course you said no because you always do. Then I said that if we weren’t going to have sex I was going to get drunk and you got mad because you love telling me what to do. No, just hold on, you can speak later.

So we went down to the hotel bar, and it looked like it had been built in a closet at the last minute. We sat down at one of like three tables and the waitress with bad make-up asked us what we wanted. I said I wanted brandy and then you said that you wanted vodka. I asked you why you ordered vodka, because I had never heard you order it before, and as I’m sure you’ll remember, you said that in that degrading voice, “I love vodka.” Remember now?

No, no it was not gin. No it wasn’t. Yes, I do remember you asking the bad make-up girl what kind she was using. Tanqueray. That’s not vodka? Are you sure? You always do this; you make things up to make me feel dumb. Why would you have a bottle here? Don’t use that tone, and no you don’t “love gin.” Where is it? Fine. I’ll look in the freezer.
Well, so what if it is gin?

Brother, Dear Brother (p. 14)

2005-07-05T08:56:00.000-07:00

Brother, Dear Brother
Thelonious Wadlington

The stars sat still, watching us watch them. Each cloud seemed to have gone on holiday at the behest of each star; or rather, through our own wills. The flattened grass under our naked backs did not prick or itch, but seemed only to bend under our weight and will as we laid side by side, hand in hand, exposed to the night exposed to us. A wan moon blanketed us in its bluish glow and a cool, favonian breeze traversed our skin glistening with the sweat of passion from the heat of a midsummer’s night.

I turned to him and he turned to me on his side, slender and curved like a tulip seeking sunlight, his jet-black hair falling over his eyes but leaving his rubious, supple lips free to press against my own while he pulled and pressed me close to him until our midriffs were laved against one another and our legs were woven together. My hand traveled down his side and rested on his waist. He was so smooth like an angel’s down. My fingers migrated up the centre line of his back and I palmed his velvety nape, the tips of my fingers in his hair. Oh! How gentle he was when he slid his delicate hand into the longing furnace that was my loins and I writhed and my body arced into him as I whimpered under his breath. He silenced me with his fine, incarnadine lips and floated above me as if underwater and lifted by a current.

Above me, he pulled his lips away from mine and his obsidian eyes stared into me. It was like gazing into a mirror. His visage was my own and he was haloed by the moon behind him, his hair hanging like willow branches. He smiled softly and, at this, I smiled and I felt the tears welling in my own eyes then rolling down my temples. He smoothed the hair from my brow and wiped the tears away with his hand. He leaned in close to me, rested his cheek against mine, and kissed my ear. I turned my head and his lips met my neck, and again…and again. Our bodies together, he stretched his arms out on either side until his hands were in mine. Our fingers crossed and our arms parallel he dragged them along the grass and above my head until our bodies were like spears.

‘I am you and nothing more,’ he whispered, and he raised both of my legs onto his shoulders and slipped into me. My very skin tinged and I whimpered again and gasped as if my essence had been spilled into the night. I clenched… He pushed… I clenched… he felt so fluid as he delved into me and into me as I clasped his glazed, pallid back with both hands, moiling to keep my talons from harming him. The trees harkened my cries and the cherry blossoms floated down on us. Deeper he pushed… I clenched… I brought my hands down up on the earth and clasped and wrenched the grass from her, his sweat dripping onto my chest. A drop of his blood fell onto my neck from where he had bitten his lip.

Oh, my brother! My hand moved down my torso and I fondled my own item and brought my hand up again, caressing my chest above the back-and-forth of my body. My hand slid up my neck, collecting blood and sweat and I brought it to my mouth. Oh, my sweet-tasting brother! I took my other hand, aquiver, down and clutched myself; stroked myself in time with his metronomic thrusts. Oh! How I thought or bodies would blaze with fire when he let loose from his rod his nectar inside of me and I onto my already dampened self. My body collapsed. My brother laid on me, his breath hot on my chest, and then he brought his lips, one still raw from the pangs of ecstasy, to mine and he tasted so sweet. With the same black eyes he looked into me.

‘Brother, dear brother...’ he said, and floated to the earth beside me. We laid side by side, hand in hand, exposed to the dawn exposed to us. I turned and he turned toward me and wrapped his arm around me. We slumbered beneath the matutinal elegy of the waking lark.

Picnic Lightning (p. 17)

2005-07-05T08:55:00.000-07:00

Picnic Lightning
Matt Siemer

On a hill of bright yellow grass, surrounded by a vast yellow field that seemed to stretch forever, we sat down to eat. The hill was chosen for the stream that ran at its base and the short, gnarled tree that, though bereft of leaves, we could sit under and where at least two of us five could put our backs against it. Mom, of course, got one of the prime spots. Cassie took the other. I laid out the pink blanket, and sat around it with Sam and Poe.

“Poe!” Mom called, “Go to the river and get some water!”

Poe complied. I could see him as he staggered down the hill to the berry-red stream, where he scooped up the water in a pail. As young as he was, I was surprised that he was able to carry the pail back up to the top where we all waited. He stumbled once or twice, holding the bucket against his left side with both hands as he trudged slowly upward. He set the pail next to Mom, and then sunk down where he was sitting before. Mom was busy talking to Cassie who seemed to not be listening. No one really listened to Mom except Poe, probably because he got the least amount of attention.

The three of us littler ones spread ourselves out on the blanket and stared up into the dark sky and the fast-moving sea-green clouds that pulled themselves across its surface. Sam thought that she could touch them, they looked so close to us, but when she tried she didn’t even come close. I laughed as I watched, knowing that they would be out of reach. The only way she could stand a chance of touching them would be to climb the tree and try from there. But that wasn’t an option now that Mom and Cassie were against the trunk. Mom had discovered the red water and was drinking from it. Then she offered some to Cassie. Sam had once asked her if she could try some, and Mom had said that it wasn’t for kids. We stared at Cassie in envy as she pulled the pail to her. Cassie got to do everything. She was the only one who could make Mom smile.

Time passed, and Poe’s stomach started to rumble. Sam and I told him to keep quiet, but he told us he couldn’t. He looked like he was going to cry, but his stomach didn’t stop.

“We were supposed to have a picnic,” he said, “but there’s no food and I’m hungry.”

I told him to keep quiet. I tried to comfort him as best I could without Mom seeing. Sam tried to comfort him, too.

“Eat some grass,” she said, “maybe that will make your stomach stop.”

Poe turned off of the blanket and, with tears streaming down his face, pulled up some of the yellow grass and shook off the dirt. He looked back at us, the limp grass in his hand, as if to ask us whether this was the grass we were talking about. To reassure him, I went off the blanket and took some grass and put it in my mouth. Poe was still crying, but he ate the grass and picked up another handful. Sam and I watched him, waiting for his stomach to relax into silence. We had forgotten about Mom.

And Mom had forgotten about us in her conversation with Cassie until, reaching for the now half-empty pail, she knocked it over. Anger flared in her bloodshot eyes and she bared her yellow teeth. Cassie moved away, pale and fearful. Mom didn’t notice her. She looked around for a target, and her eye fell on Poe, still eating grass on the edge of the blanket. She screamed in rage, and all three of us suddenly noticed her staring at us. Poe was trembling. Mom’s shout had scared away his tears.

“Come here, Poe,” she called. She did not yell it, but there was something in her voice that was so much more disturbing than if she would have yelled. Poe tried to stand, but he couldn’t. He tried twice before Sam got up the courage to try and help him. As Sam started to help Poe, however, the empty pail was hurled at her head and it knocked her over.

“Don’t touch him,” Mom said, “go get some water from the river.”

Sam took the bucket and started down the hill. Poe climbed to his feet and walked toward Mom. She stayed sitting as he walked up, but her eyes did not leave him.

“Kneel down,” she told Poe. He did. “Who told you to eat grass?”

Poe didn’t answer, and I knew he was trying to keep Sam and I from getting in trouble.

“Who told you to eat grass?” she said again. This time it was more of a command than a question, and though Poe started crying again and hung his head, he didn’t answer. There were still flecks of dirt on his cheeks around his mouth. The tears were smearing them. There was complete silence around us. I couldn’t hear myself breathe. I couldn’t hear Poe cry.

“Look at me,” Mom said.

Poe looked up, and as his watery eyes met Mom’s her hand came up. I saw a flash of color over my shoulder and looked just in time to see a bolt of neon-pink lightning as it came out of the green clouds and slammed into the yellow ground very far away. I kept looking at where it had struck until the afterglow faded from my eyes. Behind me, Poe was falling down the hill.