ANNUAL ISSUE I 2016 1
Baby Lawn Literature is a free online literary magazine.
It is free because we work hard to make sure we don’t have to pay anything for production.
All rights are reserved for the writers, poets, and artists featured. We just ask they mention us when they are famous, and let us crash a their place when we’re evicted.
All artwork is used are without copyright unless stated otherwise.
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Annual Issue I 2016
Published September 10th, 2016 3
EDITORS RAKIM SLAUGHTER ASHLEY KAY BACH DESIGN
ASHLEY KAY BACH
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Editor’s Note POETRY
“ACIDS” by MITCHELL KROCKMALNIK GRABOISs - Page 8
PROSE
“SPACE” by AMY GIACALONE - Page 10
In all the Arts, the value of copies can only be proportioned to the scarcity of originals: among sculptors and painters, a fine statue, or a beautiful picture, of some great master, may deservedly employ the imitative talents of young and inferior artists, that their appropriation to one spot may not wholly prevent the more general expansion of their excellence; but, among authors, the reverse is the case, since the noblest productions of literature are almost equally attainable with the meanest. In books, therefore, imitation cannot be shunned too sedulously; for the very perfection of a model which is frequently seen, serves but more forcibly to mark the inferiority of a copy - Frances Burney
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Editor’s Note A lack of time has hindered our ability to promote Baby Lawn the way we wished. This being the inaugural annual issue, coming out an exact year after our first, we wanted to produce something representative of what we were and wanted to be combining past and present and holding onto the notion that one can be meaningful without being overly serious. This time around, we had a lack of submissions. It was difficult finding submissions that would give a balance of talent AND representation. We wanted quality, but we also wanted "harmony" and include works that spoke to each other. We sacrificed quantity for these reasons, so this issue is unfortunately small. What we lack in quantity we have compensated in the work featured and it is our hope that the new style will draw in more readers and submitters. We aim to receive more submissions in the course of this year, and Baby Lawn can continue to evolve and grow with the editors and the readers.
- Ashley Kay Bach
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POETRY
Featured Art: Altered version of a Pixabay photo Super legal
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ACIDS
MITCHELL KROCKMALNIK GRABOIS h as h a d over a thousand of his poems and fictions appear in literary magazines in the U.S. and abroad, including BABY LAWN LIT. He has been nominated for numerous prizes. His novel, Two-Headed Dog, based o n his work as a clinical psychologist in a state hospital, is available for Kindle and Nook, or as a print edition. To see more of his work, google Mitchell Krockmalnik Grabois. He lives in Denver.
MITCHELL KROCKMALNIK GRABOIS
My dentist told me I have acid erosion My doctor told me I have acid reflux
Do these conditions coalesce or cancel each other out?
Are they friend to each other or foe? I cannot ask my dentist I cannot ask my doctor
I have no guidebook no guide for the acids
streaming through my life like broad rivers white water unexpected waterfalls
They rule my life They put me on my back in Detroit
Featured Art: The Thinker outside the Detroit Institute of Art 8
PROSE
Featured Art: 70s New York (via Flickriver)
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SPACE AMY GIACALONE
I wake up today and whenever I wake up, the first thing I do is pretend I haven’t yet. I snuggle deeper under the covers, smush my face back into the pillow, close my eyes, and try to step back into my dream. But, of course I can’t. I hear you in the kitchen before I even know you’re there. At first I think it’s the cat, I think, ugh, what do you want, cat? but when I sit up the cat jumps off my bed and walks away, hips bob-
bing, all annoyed, so now I know what I hear is officially someone, and that someone sounds like they’re making coffee. I hear you rinsing out the pot, I hear the little scoop in the grinds, the lid of the garbage as you toss out yesterday’s filter, and for a second I can imagine that you’re my husband, my tall, good-looking, coffee-making, cheerful husband, out there jump-starting my day for me while I snuggle in bed. You spill some water. “Ack, fuck,” you say and then I know its you, and I go, “Jamie?” and you go, “Hey,” and then you go, “Yeah, it’s me,” and then you go, “Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you up.” I arch my back and give the world my best morning stretch. And now I know: Here’s today. I just woke right up into it. “What are you doing here?” I say, and you’re like, “Makin’ coffee,” like that’s the most normal thing in the world. I kick off the covers and my bladder literally hurts, that’s how badly I have to pee, and how badly I regret giving you keys.
See, this is my house. I’m the one who moved into it, me, I told the movers where to set the couch and the kitchen table. I slept on the floor in a sleeping bag for one week while I waited for my mattress to arrive. I picked out that coffee maker. I found a utensil holder for all the utensils, at IKEA, a stainless steel utensil holder for six dollars. My six dollars, my utensil holder. I walk into the kitchen and you’re banging around my countertops, dangerously close to my utensil holder, pouring my coffee into one of my novelty mugs, adding my sugar and sipping it. I’m annoyed because you look great. You’re doing that thing where you’re just in jeans and a shirt but 10
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you’re wearing a fabulous scarf that’s draping impossibly around your neck and shoulders and you have sunglasses perched on your head and you look great. It’s much too early for looking great. Especially in my kitchen, especially if I’m the one who has to look at you. I open the pantry. This apartment has a decent little pantry, shelves that go from the ceiling to the floor that I’ve filled with cracker boxes and soups and bottles of canola oil. Dishes that I never use and have literally forgotten entirely.
I reach for a box of raisins, generic, to save my thirty cents or whatever, and you’re like, “What’s that?” And I’m like, “Breakfast,” and I take my sleepy raisins into the bathroom with me. They are stuck together in a chunk at the bottom of the waxy inside bag. I sit down on the toilet. I try to pick one raisin out at a time but lose patience fast. I take all the stuck-together raisins out and bite into them like a raisin candy bar, and I pee, and I stand back up, and like waking up all over again, I see that I am going to have to stop eating raisins and finish going to the bathroom, one thing at a time, if I want to maintain my standard of living. “What time do you work today?” You are standing right outside the door. “I’m kind of in the middle of something,” I say. “I’m off today,” you tell me, “Should we get breakfast?” “I’m just...” I put the raisins back in the box, set the box on the sink, chew, swallow, flush with my confused elbow, wash my hands, did I do that in the right order? “I’m just... give me a sec-
ond.” You don’t give me a second. “I was thinking the place on Lincoln,” you say. “Which one?” “The one with the pancakes you got that one time.” “Chocolate chip?” “Peanut butter,” I think I can hear you rolling your eyes, and I literally... I have no idea what you’re talking about, so I don’t say anything. 11
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“So when do you work today?” “Jamie.” “It’s a simple question.” “I am trying to use the bathroom in my own home, Jamie.” I run the water. I start putting toothpaste on my toothbrush. I look in the mirror. “Do you not want to hang out with me today?”
There is water getting on my box of raisins. “No, I want to hang out with you. It’s just... my raisins are getting all wet, and could you just give me a minute?” “But--” I open the door and place a hand on one of your shoulders, “Just a sec, okay?” “Your raisins are in the sink.” “Jamie!” You hold your hands up in surrender, well, the hand without the coffee cup in it anyway, and the mug you kind of hold up too on the other side, and you go, “Alright, alright.” “Great.” It’s because I asked you to cat-sit. One week. One short little week out of our lives, I had to go to a wedding in Iowa with Tom-- Tom, who doesn’t even exist anymore-- and I offered you half a bottle of wine and ten bucks to spend the week at my place, and you said keep the ten bucks, I’ll do it for the wine, and I made you that set of keys, one for the inside door, one for the outside door, and, well. Here we are. Because at first, it was just like, I didn’t have to get up to let you in when you came over for dinner, or T.V. watching, or whatever. You could let yourself in. That was nice. Then, it was like, sure, you can crash at my place sometimes. But then you started letting yourself in when I wasn’t home for work yet. I started finding your dishes in the sink when I didn’t even know you came over. I said, “I can take the keys back if you want. You can simplify your keyring,” but you reminded me about emergencies, about being locked out, about burglars. I’m not sure what burglars 12
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have to do with anything. You’re the only person I know who won’t stop breaking into my house.
It’s fine. I set the raisin box on the floor. I fish a pair of jeans out of the hamper. I stomp into the bedroom looking for clean socks and underwear; where is my hoodie? “I can drive if you want,” you call to me. “Have you seen my hoodie?”
“Which hoodie?” “The... I don’t know, the normal hoodie.” “I haven’t seen it.” I start digging through the piles of clothing on the floor. Most of my clothes, I keep on the floor. You ask if you can come in, or if I’m still grumpy. “I’m still grumpy,” I say, “But you can come in.” So you sit on the bed. “Where is my hoodie? Where is it?” “What are you looking for?” “My hoodie. I told you.” “I haven’t seen it,” and you sit down while I move all the pillows on the floor, all the hangers in my closet, the laundry basket in the corner full of towels I never use. I can’t find my hoodie. I need coffee. I head to the kitchen and you’re following me, and your hair is swingy and your scarf is perfect, and after I fill my cup you reach for the pot to refill yours, “Did you know you’re almost out of sugar?” you ask, “I marked it on the fridge for you.” “Thanks,” I shake some fat-free non-dairy creamer into my cup. It dissolves quickly, becomes a pretty color as I stir it in. “So what time do you work?” I want to lie to you. I want to lie right in your face, the face of my baby sister, pretend it’s not my day off, say I work at 2:00, 1:30, even. But you’re looking at me, all blinky and cheerful, sipping 13
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your cup of coffee, and I can’t help it, I really can’t. I just love you. “I don’t work today,” I say, “But I still don’t know what pancakes you’re talking about.” You go, “Yay! I’ll go look up a trailer for you!” and you bounce away, leaving me in my kitchen, leaning against the counter. I close my eyes, and try to focus on coffee. Because I know I’ll only get this one second to be by myself today, alone, in my own space.
_______________________________________________________________________________________ AMY GIACALONE is a fictio n w riter w ith an M FA fro m Co lu m b ia Co llege Ch icago . S h e ’s been published in GHOSTLY: An Anthology Of Ghost Stories (Scribner), Goreyesque, LDOC, Bird’s Thumb, and Hair Trigger 36 and 37. I am also the recipient of a first place CSPA Gold Circle Award for humor writing.
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