Cellar Door Spring 2010

CELLAR DOOR

THE UNDERGRADUATE LITERARY MAGAZINE OF THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA AT CHAPEL HILL VOLUME路

XXXVI

ISSUE

II

Š Cellar Door 2010

All rights reserved

Cellar Door, the undergraduate literary magazine of the Untverstty 0 II under' f North Carolina at Chapel Hill, is publiShed tWice annually and welcomes submissions from a linea! graduate students currently enrolled.

GUidelines for submission can be foun on http;//studentorgsoUncoedu/thedooro d o

0

Publication of this issue of Cellar Door was made Possible in part with a generous gran! ~i~ the Creative Writing Program's BlanChe Britt Armfield Fund for Poetry at UNC Chap'd nt Cellar Door also gratefully acknOWledges the generous nnancialsupport of the UNCStu' Government and the Department of English Gift Fund.

STAFF H.L. Spelman

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

EDITOR

Sally Symons L. Jill Dwiggins

POETRY

EDITOR

Matthew

DESIGN

EDITOR

Zen a Cardman

ART

EDITOR

FICTION

LAYOUT

&

TREASURER ART

STAFF

Poindexter

Sarah Smith Grayson Bland Rebecca Egger Lucy Sears

Sarah Smith FICTION

STAFF

Maria Devlin Stephanie Komoski Samuel

Lemley

Jon O'Neill Liz Turgeon

Elizabeth Walker POETRY

STAFF

Zena Cardman Maria Carlos

Mary Cook Patrick Dowd

Alisha Gard Ella Ott FUNDRAISING

Lauren

Peters berg

A. Rees Sweeney-Taylor ADVERTISING WEBMASTER

Marianne

Gapuz

Michael McFee FACULTY

ADVISOR

COVER SISTER CHAMELEON

Mat)' Catherine

Penn

PRIZES 6 7

WINNING PIECES JUDGES

ART

9 13

4 A.M. Mary Cathel'ine Penn WORSHIP Lau/-en Talley

30

BLESS YOU

33 39

SCRIBBLEON MY FACE G'-'g Halloran COLUSION Rebecca Smith

40 41 42

WHOSE GOD Moriah LeFebvf"e BLUE-EYED GIRL Michela Wagner SCHISM Ariel Rudolph

51

COMPLICITY

KelTY Kelso

MOI"ian LeFebvre

53 54

CLAM-CRACK IN' SWAMP THING SURPRISE IN C# C,-eg Halloran

64

BLOOD MOON

Mary

Catherine

Moriah LeFebv,-e

FICTION

10 14

WHAT WAS ON THE EAVES SAVAGES Delaney Nolan

D<lanry Nolan

34 46

SHOOT AND LET BE Josh Wolonick NOrSE Leslie E,...zn TaylofTHE FOUR OARSMEN Alex Wa,-d

S6

WHEN IT SNOWED IN HANGING DOG John McElwee

31

Penn

POETRY 8 12 20

WASH Michelle Hicks MATISSE TO THE ODALISQUE WITH RED TROUSERS Emily Hylton ON WEARING YOUR SHIRTS Caroline

32

FIND AN OLD ROLLING

38

WOODS F. Ryan Dowdy I LEAVE THINGS BEHIND

43 44 48 SO

Fishel"

ROCK IN THE

Hannah Riddl,

FIRST HABANERO F. Ryan Dowdy A PRAYER TO MIZUKO JIZO, PATRON OF MISCARRIED, ABORTED, OR STILLBORN CHILDREN Nikki Cap' THE PATRON SAINT OF LOST CAUSES Ch,路i, Castro-Rappi MYTHS ABOUT THE NORTHERN LIGHTS Rebecca Holmes

52

ON THE WHITE FEATHERS SCATIERED ACROSS A SEVEN~MILE STRETCH OF 1~85 Caroline Fisher

55

STAIRWELL

62

INTO THE LABYRINTH

IN BALLYMUN

65

GHAZAL

22

I NTERVIEW WITH BETH ANN

OF LOSS

Emily Hylton

Michelle

Hicks

Emily Hylton

INTERVIEW

NOT

FENNELLY

Matt Poindexter

E5 66

CONTRIBUTORS

路 fi n d more art, fi ctron,

d h try available exclusively on our website at an roe http:// studentorgs. unc.edu/thedoor

______

.1

ART

FIR

ST

SECOND

Sister Chameleon Ma,y Cathe";ne Penn Whose God Moriah LeFebvre

T HI R D

Schism Ariel

Rudolph

FICTION

FIR

ST

Savages Delaney Nolan

SECOND When it Snowed in Hanging John McElwee T HI R D

Dog

Noise Leslie Erin Taylor

FIR 5 T On the White Feathers Scattered Across a Seven-Mile Stretch of I-85 Caroline Fisher The Patron Saint of Lost Causes Chris Castro-Rappl T HI R D

Wash Michelle Hicks

6

JUDGES

~:i~T. LIN

MeG ~ U L E ~ (A R T)

is an artist and illustrator with a colorful,

. sicel style. Her ill ust r-arions have appeared in numerous publications, incj ud109, m~st recently, a feature in the Daily Candy national newsletter and an artist pro~le 10 Lonny Magazine. McGauley studied illustration, fashion, and textiles, and received her B.F.A from Syracuse

University.

She lives and works in the Chelsea

area of New York City.

J

a HN

PIP KIN

(F

Fiction's First Novel Prize

t

cr

ION)

was awarded

for his nationally

the

acclaimed

2009

New York Center

Woodsbumer,

for

a novel about

Henry David Thoreau and nineteenth century New England. An alumnus of UNC路 Chapel Hill, Pipkin received a Ph.D. in British Literature from Rice University. He has taught literature and 'Writing at Saint Louis University, Boston University, and Southwestern University and has served as the Executive Director of the Writers' Leagueof Texas. Pipkin lives with his wife and son in Austin, Texas,

BET HAN N FEN N ELL Y (P 0 E TRY) has published three collections of poetry: Open House (winner of the 2001 Kenyon Review Prize in Poetry), Tender Hooks ( 5), and Unmentionables (2009)' Her work has been included three times 200 in the Best American Poetry series. Among her many a'Wards are two NEA fellowships, the Pushcart Prize, and an American Academy of Poets Prize. The Harvard Review has praised her poems as "consistently dramatic, complex in their pe~cep,: tions and formal unfolding, and enthralled with language ... g~ner~llyou~standlng.

She lives with her husband novelist Tom Franklin, and their chddren In Oxford, Mississippi.

'

7

______

1

I

WAS MICHELLE

H

HICKS

Each time I washed anything, dishes, my sister's face, my hair, I intoned the word like a prayer. I could downplay my accent like a fiddle, prune it like an ornamental pear. Cain'( became can't, vowels shortened, g's resurfaced at the ends of gerunds and hardened in the middle of pigeon. The word for myself emerged triumphant as I instead of that sound like grunting OUt a sigh, but usarsh, warshed, warshillg held its burr of an r like it had eaten it, embodied it, like a ten-month baby

Was pregnant with and retaining it. r rehearsed over the basin at school, at the Laundromat, bypassing the r by splitting

the word into wa and sh until there was no recovering what was lost. Wash. Hear me. Even as I say ;t, I'm sorry.

8

i i

路"

MARY

CATHERINE

PENN

9

______

1

I

WHAT WAS THE EAVES

ON

DELANEY

NOLAN

Wh e .

I en the bats came, We Were ready. We had seen t h em on t hn~rin arce ona and Nagasaki, turning lemon trees into b ac squormmg e I k . . heaps In Florence, cr'aw I;ng with the barefoot Over dumps in Jonestown. So we linedrh roof With copper sheeting, bright and hot and smooth. Stocked up the kitrh'~ and plugged the Windows. Called our families. Put down the dog. We weren scared.

B

They came on Wednesday, when it was Overcast and the sky was low and bruise-yellow. Landed on the gutters and weighed them till they broh,~, heard the sharp crack and crash of them falling off the eaves. The electricity Went OUtafter a day or so. We had economy candles. We played a lot of cards.

We told each other secrets till we ran out and then we made them up, wrote love lette" to teleViSion celebrities and neighbors and the president but didn't have way to send them. We had time and time and time to waste, all of us in thatany little green house.

It b~oke my heart, I;ving with musicians. They got all tom up when they Wen, sw.mming 'hrough chords and crescendos. They turned songs up ;0 ,I wasn't the m u a. noise but I a room, h a weather. When the power went, we had 10 build . up 5"

curse ves so t ey took fingers to guitars and found old harmonicas. lb路 h b d i nd

It wasn'r sOmeth' tried to keep up.

Ing

10

was

Orn Wit.

I turned Over a bucket and

ange

It a

Outside, the bats still swarmed. They were tiny, fruit bats. They didn't attack. But we couldn't

go outside

because

they

'Were curious and dove at our

heads. !housands of them, more. They never gave us a reason but we think they were: SIck of the caves, the dripping in the dark, being weighed back into the deep throats of the earth. They didn't ask for anything. We heard them outside and sometimes they made

noises like chirping,

high-pitched

and sustained,

like

wheels coming off. Sending

out their sonar, speaking.

A~d then we noticed it, when it was dear and late and we were cradled deep

down In the night. (Strings played soft and I with my palms flat on the edge of the plastic thing making sounds like a pulse. Voices and cymbals and an old toy keyboard, someone had found thick wire bits and strung up a broken table like a poor man's cello. played it low and the bass started right in the center of your chest and traveled along your ribs and into your lungs and outwards till it poured out of you like water, we were sitting in the dark on the stairs and listening to ourselves. It had been days and we'd run out of milk. We weren't scared.)

Jack noticed first. I saw his face change. Lifted his hands with the pick still in them and looked up at the ceiling all drawn and worried. Then went blank and open and put his hands out for us to hush up. We all did one by one and listened.

The roof went scritch scratch, their little claws trying to find a hold on the copper sheets. We looked at him and waited. Slow he played some chords, major into minor, something sad and tumbling. And we heard it then: the bats, with their glossy fur and frantic eyes, gone silent. Someone lifted a blind and we saw it outside, a low still sea of them, standing rigid on the driveway and lawn, draping trees and sagging power lines, wings folded, motionless. And all of them, peaked black ears turned towards our little buoy of a house. Stilt and silent, the sonar stopped. Someone else pushed his fingers to piano keys. More still flew in, calm and settling quickly, apologetically. And if only we could've climbed up to see from a bird's height how from all around they surged towards us, left the walls and porches of houses so families couLd open the window and cautiously dip their head into cold December air, how they came from miles, and sat and listened, so anxious and grateful for notes and the new frequencies comi~g from where we sat in the steps in the dark with our heads leaned back against the "" I d . tes Paused and I swear bowed Listened to our srnal an gracIOUs no . .'. beruster. " h ds asif h k Thank you for being unafraid. For soundmg th err ea s as I to say, t an. you. back. This is why we came.

11

MATISSE TO THE ODAL/SQUE WITH RED TROUSERS EMILY

HYLTON

What is it that bores you as you stare beyond my canvas? The blue~tiled door is propped open behind you.

Unaware of its empty shadows! you lie stretched on the chaise lounge, arms gauzed in lace and tucked beneath YOur head, veiled in the Same em broidered lace.

What is it that you imagine?

How the warmth of the afternoon mu sr embrace each person walking below the latticed window? The heavy nod of the three roses whose petals fall to the table beSide you> Or is your mind a fixed blank, Open and bare as your smooth span of stomach

and pale domes of breasts?

You do not move your gaze to me,

and still YOUr legs Open like a book, the billOWing folds of those red trousers

gathered in gold at the calf.

12

WORSHIP

LAUREN

TALLEY

SAVAGE~ DELANEY

NOLAN

ee The day befo my mothee got rname , t e gac eners . I rb . d h d spent the whole eaely mo'Omg Sweatmg, speaymg rert r rzer.s m r.xe wr s . . . r 'I' . d ith orne chemica edat Was supposed to make the flowers look dewy. ey were U h ded Th h ge and decorat Sacdeos, floweebeds cunnmg along bot s i es ate wa way h I . h sid f h Ik and the s a <cellis steung avec with ivy. Up behind the patch of ground where t ~ would be were blue twists of hyacinth, shaggy-headed blanket flo~m an kill. bushes sweJJ;ng but within an houe or two we rea liaed the chemical was ing off the bees. The flowers looked fine, but while I w a e aroun ' Ik d d tryingto was ddOdge the eye Contact of step'uncles and family acquaintances" . a welcome to be a bIe to lean down and pick a bee f rom w here iit w as stuck .on h . 路OStract,on my s oe o r stocking. Not to say I Was discespectfu!. Some ate, kf h bee Iitclest cOUSinS held a funeral seevke and dumped Same of them in a little mass gcsve,rna 'ng So em n SOPpy crosses avec the fuzzy yellow el ies an sue egs .

1 I bId . k I pointed" the sky. I attended, and even brought same dogbane that I found by the woods, ee chemical路h Was a black-tie affaie and it was lucky we we" all already dressed for .the It OCcasion.

;;1'::

In eetrospect, this should have been interpreted as a bad omen, but no on~ wanted to say it Out loud at the time. It was a nke ceremony, though. I was co ally very fond of my mother's new husband, despite his deceptively distasteful first nam" Mac. "Mac the Stepfathee" already reeks of wife beaters and bald SPOts,

bot in reality

he is a nice

man

a professor

even

albeit

in the com mum"

. " f cat'ons depanment. He deesses nicely and makes her happy, and even when Was picking Over the buffet table at the eeheaesal dinner and trying not to drop food kOUt of the napkin in my hand , I Could see them OUt of the corner of my eye,, spea ing closely, touching hands, the little actions of the enamored. I still don t know how to chicken look at people balance more in my who hand.ace in love so I kept my eyes down and eciedto It Was getting late and everyone f Id L '.

was On the grounds

and even

With th

拢

o

an

h路 0

was flush and a little deunk. The dinn" h b h' nts OUISlana carriage Ollse, under ig w Ite te bl ,

e ans On t e a'r was muggy and close. I was sitting at a

ta

e

away from my mother's friends. Next to me was a woman whose silvery-blond h,airmatched her thin lips, and a little man in a wrinkled brown suit. To my fight was a man with a green jacket, underdressed and watching people dance, looking calm and happy like he knew what it was to enjoy sitting by himself.

My mom and Mac were standing by the entrance to the big canvas tent we aU sat under) shaking hands and greeting people happily. They were good as a couple; they looked efficient.

My mom told me only one time how she and my father met. I've asked her to tell me again but she ignores the question, which I understand, because I inherited this tendency to treat all memories like a black hallway, and recounting something like that must be exhausting. My father was a good man, but he got antsy and went off and started a new family when I went to college, which is another thing I can understand, I have put it together that they met at a bar, even though she won't say it explicitly. Instead she says, "We met when it was raining. We were both hiding inside to get a drink. Eventually your father started singing to me."

But that doesn't really cover it, r don't think. Probably I will never know what it really looked like. Probably it was smoky, probably there were matchbooks in bowls and commercials on the television over the bartender's head, probably he couldn't sing. Or there could have been candles. It was the seventies so either way I imagine it was orangey and underlit and a little tacky, It seems to me that it can't have been too heroic or touching as it didn't last and must therefore be ultimately regarded as a sort of blunder.

People were quieting down to put their face in their food. r glanced ag~in at " hb " " h "d hi head and caught me looking" my nelg or in green but chis rime e raise IS " .' , "I ontact I [abbed my fork to, P amckmg like I do sometimes at Sl ent eye c wards my plate, raised my eyebrows and said, "Yurn." .

'1 I ic-ht l ipped gesture that was almost like a srru e; H e nodd e d an d rna d e a tlg od- t ÂŁ A ss the tent Mac and my mom h I e rn y ace. era 'hh d d b entovermyplateandlethair sat down, and r could see he pulled the chair out for her. TheY,bot a ~ounI' ' h t r from happtness or w me. t smiling, Irish faces that flushed pin k 10 d t e cen k e me kind a f toast. S ornet hi109 occurred to me that I would be ex peete to rna late e so I had samet hilng t hat I00 ke d O n my p touching but not excessive. Tasteful. . "te I " .' e and I was try 109 to examlO like eggplant or mushroom drowOIng 10 Isaue h rd, a shout an d someone st 00 d u P without picking it apart" when" suddenly . I II d skin ny , h I ea w rhern: twa glr s, ta an 1 so fast they flipped their chair and t en sa d I ki the wed. handgun an 00 mg over tramping into the tent, each one wavmg a ding guests. . h how they strolled with their I saw right away how they stood up stral~ t'h" 'the thick air. They f h i r skID 5 100ng 10 I shoulders back and the flat panes 0 t e f h their long thin ar-ms . bot use e guns or were beautiful and shocking, not Just eca k f irtt; covered their lirnbs 1 b . ht strea so pat or brown shoulders, but because ong rig brig . h t bl ue an d green , red fingerprints al.lover. Their hands and fingers tOOwere 'h" 0 had short blonde hair, ks i their s [r-ts. ne trailing down their sides and nee s IOto

15

,

so blonde it was practically white, and freckles across her nose. Shewalkecl straight to the buffet table and stepped up onto it in heavy black bootswith the laces untied. Everyone who hadn't noticed her already stopped talkingand shrank down and I heard the clatter of expensive silverware being dropped.

"Friends) families, lovers, strangers, adulterers, toxic little children,sttthing teenagers, winged and sagging seniors, good morning!" and that was when I really knew she was crazy, because for one, it wasn't the morning.It was evening. The sun was going down, you could already feel it getting coolerand hear crickets

hinting.

"This is a beautiful garden." said the other, more softly. Her hairwasIon' ger and darker and she had a few bone-white feathers stuck in it behindher ear. When she tucked her hair back she left a smudge of paint on her cheek My hands had become tight shaky fists. I realized my fingertips were freezing from clenching them too hard. "I like the birch. Excuse me." She was talkingto my mother. She reached over her and picked up a switch of birch branchfrolJ1 th e centerplece-It " ha db' een expensIve, Imported , from up Nort. h My stern "h clutched, but I still sat and watched. My mom was leaning into Mac andhehad her arms wrapped around her. I made a mental note to appreciate thatlater, The blonde jumped down from the buffet table noisily. It seemed c1eartha( she was the one in charge. She made a big show when she walked acrossthe tent of looking around, inspecting us and the food too. About half the guestshad c,rouched down, Some under the tables, some too scared to hide and just squat路 tlng on the grass holding the edge of their chairs. All around were little mufBed squeaks and whispers.

"People scare so easy," said the blonde, and then abruptly she fired hergun, once, towards the f d d Th ere h . empty rorn oar and everybody there jumped. ere \II I, rleks. I realized I'd yelled too. The blonde laughed, but it wasn't a maliciouS /ugh or a sharp one, It was rolling and gentle and downy and fell sofdyaway us, and she cOvered her mouth with her hands like she was genuinely em arrassed, then let th f II b k on h er- h ee Is. em a away again and surveyed us leaning ac

1'0:

Meanwhile I had .

I f h ble I, unconscIous y moved to a crouch by the edge 0 t eta wasn t underneath it b I h d I I'k . Is I could h h' tit a It I e a barrier between me and the twOglr . ear t e slivery_lip d .". . d The gree . k pe woman StIrling overwrought sobs behin me. n jac et was crouched so I h . h d so he would b ow e was almost lying on the floor. I me e e a more effective h h' 1 'I Th,y both m Oved to t h e front of th Uman Is ie d, keeping my eyes on the gl[ s. . ally carrying a spot!路 h e tent, anky and swinging their arms, practlC "L' Ig t around With them, . adles and gentlemen" h d '. .

This IS Thea W h ' t e ark-haIred gIrl said. "My name ISAda. . . e aVe COme here b . . fi . penalism its gu ecause the building behind us is a symbol 0 nn h ' ts rotten with th . . e cuse had Once b e gains of colonial exploitation." The carnag een part of an old db th' State now. The t ' gorgeous plantation that was owne Y h d Wo Were standin I h d her an s crossed dain 'l g on a p atform meant for toasts. Ada a tl y and faced us . h h I he< Wit t e gentle sobriety of a schoo teaC .

16

hear

Meanwhile the blonde was closin wards the ceiling, shaking her

he .. an ; l:~i~;dgr:a::l~~ehse~eSplaYtedk~ands tornent "We want d was a Ing sacra. you to un ersra nd we are not here to rob you the individ 1 e are here t b h . ' I IV) ua.

I ~ ro you, t e various products of a corrupt and oppressive system W. tShe 15 ensdaVlng us all an d turning . .. hat fli h society Into a degraded mockery of itself."

I ~pe t e s~fety on and off again. "Just give us your goddamn jewelry." eard the silver-Iipped woman whimper dramatically "This "it,s iIS a"bo ut human dignity!" Thea crowed, pointing .her gun to the sky. s fake, I heard a low voice from next to me. I tore my eyes from the

f ront of the stage.

"Wh at.,,, I t was a scratchy, painful .. kind of whisper. to me urgently. I "The blonde's gun .IS f a k e, " t h e b oy In . green was hissing . . peeredover the table at where the girls stood and saw yes, he was right. Theo's gun was ~ake,and not even a good~looking fake. It was a heavy~duty cap gun.

Anyone in the front half of the tent could have seen that if they had looked c.loselyfor a second, but there were the girls, faces shining under the bright tent

lights, and Thea looking straight up enraptured.

"If you would please," Ada went on, "empty your pockets, approach, and leave the contents in a pile in front of us here."

I was only a bit less scared than I had been before I knew the gun she had fired was fake. Now I was wondering, surely someone had called the police.

And were they all crazy or clever. But Thea I could see was shaking now and dancing a little bit, and Ada pointed to the people seated at the table closest to the front door with her gun which looked a little more real and said, "You first, pretty Iirtles."

One by one they filed to the front and emptied out their pockets and dropped wallets and watches at the feet of the two smiling girls. They weren't moving with the hectic ferocity of smal1~time criminals. They walked around the platform at the front of the tent like ballerinas, lifting their feet and making little pirouettes, shedding paint dust on the floor, catching one another's eyes and smiling, little gestures. I wanted to rush the stage, to take the gun, or maybe join the dancing.

Instead I watched while everyone filed up, with little hunched and Frightened gestures, and then it was our table's turn. I stood up on shaky legs and the four of us walked towards the platform where they were overseeing the whole thing. I couldn't take my eyes off 'Tbeo, who still looked smitt~n with sornething divine and invisible: not when I opened my tiny impractical purse, not when I turned it over and dumped out some crumpled bills and cheap lip gloss and half a pack of T,ident that I was "ally p,etty sorry about losing because I had been saving that. She didn't notice at first, but, when I brought my purse backtowards me, Theo looked up from where she had been tra.ciogpattern~ on the stage with her toes and saw me looking and smiled, not unkindly. but a "ttle shy Sh I k d d h f . Then I saw her brow furrow, and she . e 00 e own at er oot agalO. croucheddown and looked at the grass in front of her, and then over the ground

17

I throughout

the whole

tent,

an d t hen

iog the whole time and asked,

I00 ked up rig 'h

t a

t

me like we'd been talk·

"What's with the dead bees?"

But I couldn't say a thing. r was choked completely. All I could think was, The shot wasn't real! You can't kill me! But I just stared glassily back. Next to me I heatd the voice of the man in the jacket, 'aying, .•

"Fertilizer they sprayed on the gardens. They didn't know it was tOXIC. It was the first time any of us had said anything to them. He sounded goodand 'caced, I was stuck in place, d Thea plucked one of the little dead bees from the edge of the platform an looked at it closely, sad and inqUisitive. "Fertilizer?"

The man d idn 't sa y an ythi ng. Thea stepped off the platform andontothe grass in her heavy boots. She bent her head and looked under the pla~fonnJ reaching under and bringing back a loosely clenched fistful of the litdethmgs.l could see one little black leg still wiggling. The tent was completely silent.

Thea flung them a bru ptl y to the ground. She stood and looked" Ada..

"The goddamn-the god damn-where are we? This place smells terrible,lt really reeks, can we go, can we go."

I couldn't see her face from where r was still frozen in the middle of the place, knees locked, hugging the empty useless purse, but I could see Ada'sface and the way her eyes moved and her shoulders fell. I glanced at her hand.[j was definitely a real gun.

I noticed then that Thea was tensing up as much as I was, bony palearms mOVing to hold one another, Ada stepped off the platform and onto the gr"s.

She stood in from of her and put her hand, so they were just barely touch"g Thea's face, still holding the gun, and leaned her face in to rest where hershoulder met her, neck, She didn't say anything, but took Theo's empty shaking hand and c~t1ed "acound the thin si lver bitch "alk deliberately and it was '0 g",~r and st"l while all the blood 'eemed to have dtained from my locked legs so" was like I was flOating and I felt dizzy fat a mome-n I'd fainted only oncebefore and I could feel I was about to again my vision tunneling so that the edges Were t dar-k and all I saw was Theo', white hair and Ada', scra ped knuckle" and fO a moment it Went black completely, Suddenly I was on the ground with my legs folded under d " lik ' the . me an a pa m 10 my head. No one had caught me uce In mov,e" But only a 'econd had gone by, and Ada was "epping back and tess" 109 what was On th d 'b h ' Iy id ed e groun IOta a gar age bag carelessly and then s e simp gu, h Thea, "ill holding the 'mall btanch, OUt the door ,Hently, without so mUe as a threat or I' h Id so Iidl I y. Th eo was stillant exp lk' anatlOn, . I' I one "I purple streaked hand on her s ou er d a breat h rushed th 1, h Itt e)1 ted sentences. Then they were gonean r a h Ing In ' rougoverwhelming. e e wale tent and I could walk again. Within a rew minutes t h·e nOise was I heard a few da s l h h ' 'II d in t1, e car c ha'e that follOwed Yater t Sat .t ey d shot a cop in Tahoe '. and gotten kl ed unwell I Or at Ieast the blonde . a It was a real gun, and they were psychotICan. One was and the other Was happy to encourage It.

18

They talked,on the TV news about Thea's medical records, institutions, manic breaks. Obviously her name wasn't Thea. I don't remember what it was reall ~upposedto be. We couldn't ever talk about my mom's wedding without beinglng up the botched robbery, the crazy girls with the paint and feathers getting all sh,akyabout dead bugs, all skin and bones, and everyone who was anywhere near It loved to tell the story. I still hated trying to tell the story, trying to walk down that hallway.

The other day I went to visit my mom and Mac in their new house. They were having a dinner

party

and I was out on the covered

porch taking a break

from the light and noise with the other smokers. Porches are the only reason I still smoke really.

Because everyone had been drinking a little bit someone started talking about the rehearsal dinner and the marauding hippies, and the great ongoing debate that people secretly loved about were they sleeping together. It was a popular rumor because the idea of it was sordid and inappropriate for indoor conversations.I used to try to argue no, they weren't, but it's an argument I can only hold so many times) so I stopped listening and stared out the mesh screen) drew up my knees and tried to let my eyes adjust to the dark of the backyard.

They were still yelling but I was thinking about fainting.

In the few moments after I was coming back up out of the unconscious confusion I'd had one of those waking dreams that come up when you're really tired or trying not to fall asleep. There was a corner booth and my mother and father were in it. She was leaning forward with her elbows on the table, eyes half-closed from being drunk or tired, face still young and bright and dewy like the flowers in the garden and my father was tucking her hair back in the champagne-colored light and saying, "Anything you want to hear. Come on tell me." There was still rain on his coat. She said, "Just don't say anything. Don't."

And so hedidn't say anything but he rested his chin on her shoulder, and started to hum but it was not enough hut he could not use words so he sang nonsense or h tOmes going on like that u nnamed t he notes themselves making t em up some I , til they both Fellasleep See ~t's all untrue and made up by an overwhelmed and _k b f- h t away and I can't remember panic_ y rain. When I came out a -dItI t e -tuneh wenth people on the porches are e . . . wn how It goes anymore. But what d i ast IS w en talking about love I don't think of my mom inside smIling and laying do . rching towel sets. All I can th with her husband, or rheir vows orkrnda with patnt .' arcing over t h e hie tablecloth k t hiIn about are bone feathers 'bbrown arms scr-ee h he t stays on even after everyt m a -' shoulders and gold light in a cornerb doat. thaking you awake, te II-tng you t hmg else in town has closed and some a y IS s both that it's time to go home.

19

ON

WEARING YOUR SHIRTS

CAROLINE

FISHER

Today I wear the shirt you wore graduating high school, the white one with the blue pattern printed on it, the kind with the extra long collar, litde strips of plastic sewn inside the points to keep them stiff. To sleep last night, I Wore One of many too-large Tr-shires you've left behind, this one lime green with a full-color picture of MickJagger I worked

On the front.

the garden yesterday afternoon in another shirt draped

of YOurs, flannel

Over my shoulders to keep off intermittent and the constant mosquitoes.

rain

I have closets packed with better-fitting things, but I wear yours

just to be

reminded that although yow make them mine.

20

they weren't made for me,

Maybe decades ago you could have given me a letterman jacket or your class ring on a cord, though somehow they lack the charge of women in men's shirts: the girl with mussed hair leaning against a doorframe in her lover's dress shirt, fitfully buttoned.

But it's the same claima man who puts his clothes on a woman's back still owns the clothes and whatever woman happens to fill them.

On me, your shirts feel like the oversized gowns of a priestess, loose in the sleeves, gauzy with wear. I wonder what I am worshipping.

Even more, I wonder if! would rather be you, with the privilege of owning, or me, who can't help wanting to be owned.

21

____

IIIIIIIIIIIIIII

, ,

. ~,~ ,",

BET HAN N FEN N ELL Y has, in the past decade, carved out a plaet for herself in the new generation of American poets by racking up distinctions foc her Four books, all published by W, W. Norton. At the time of cur inteview, she Was visiting UNe to give the Blanche Armfield Poetry reading. LIke her long auburn hair, the knee-high rainbow socks she wore to the interview, and her remarkable exuberance, Fennelly's poetry is extremely colorful.Formal poems

share space with

free verse.

Humor and darkness

take turns

. h each

Wit

other. John Berryman and French impressionist paintings receive equalbilling.

No topic is OUt of bounds foc Fennelly's "investigations," a word that comesup often when she explains her approach to writing. Raised in the Midwest, she 15 now a profeSSor at the University of Mississippi.

-MATTHEW

22

POINDEXTER

ďż˝ ELL A R DOOR: In you, first book, Open House, so much is devoted to .orelgn travel, and you've said that one of the best things a young poet can do b. ttave] because one day abeoad is the equivalent of seven days here. In that ook,you have poems about Krakow, poems about the Far East-it has a w icle. map. By the time you reach your third collection, Unmentionables, it seems like the American South has become that foreign place for you, although it is home at the same time.

F ~ NNE L L Y: Travel has always been a big catalyst for my work, and I think one of the greatest things about it for a writer is not only experiencing new lives, new thoughts, and new languages, but also gaining new perspective on the place you came from and understanding it in a new way. Someone said youhave to learn another language-otherwise how will you be able to discern your thoughts from the English version? Becoming a traveler and trying to makeit a part of my life was one of the things that really helped me learn a lot aboutmyselfand where I come from. I was focused on Europe especially while writing Open House. I had lived for a year in a coal mining village on the CzechPolishborderthe year after I graduated from college. I traveled all around Eastern Europeand decided I wanted to keep doing that.

As I got older I learned about myself in different ways, and one of the things I learned w~s that coming to the South, for me, felt like home. I went from the Czech Republic to the MFA program at the University of Arkansas.

That was a culture shock. I'd never really been to the South before, but when I got there I fell in love with the landscape and the people. I come front an Irish Catholicfamily, and there's so much Scots-Irish heritage in the South. All the

23

______

1

, things I love about being Irish-the music, the language, the storytelling,the importance of family, and of COurse even the bad rhings-r-bocaing-e-that's all part of the South.

When I got to Arkansas, r became interested in what home is. Why could I move to the South and have it feel like home to me? Why was I responding rc the landscape when I never responded to the Midwestern landscape I grew up with? I know enough about the Midwest to understand what's to admire:the big open vistas and the prairie architecture with the Lovely, wide doorways.Yet I never truly responded to the beauty of the prairie in the way that I respond to the Lushness of the South: the vines and the kudzu. the secrets and the mystery and the history-both the good and the bad-the sense of the storied quality when things are hidden, then revealed and undressed. It's fascinating to me.Because of that, I became interested in the question of what home is, and Ibecame interested in looking at the South as a way for me to investigate that question eEL LA ROO 0 R : One of the things you seem to be investigating is the role of kudzu in the South. Kudzu appears in, "The Snake Charmer," thenrst poem from your nrst chapbook, A Different Kind of Hunger. Eleven yearslater) you have a long poem, "The Kudzu Cbronicles," as the central section of Unmentionables. Do you see kudzu as a symbol for your presence in the South?

r

FEN N ELL Y: That's part of what I wanted to investigate. On one hand, kudzu is a cliche for southern writers, and when you have a cliche you either have to avoid it Or just tackle it dead on and admit what you're doing. Every southern poet has a poem about kudzu. I'm sure there are a thousand of them.

However, I was interested in the history of it. Kudzu came from Japan and grew b~tter in the South than it ever did in Japan, because when they imported kudzu In r876 they didn't bring the beetle that eats it. It was spread all overthe South and the gove 11' rrun enr ac t ua y paid people to farm it. , It grows so well here that I Was thinking of kudzu as a metaphor for myself) In a way, because I feel like I grow better in the South, At the same time though, whenever you adopt an hid ' hid" Orne even rejecting a hom J ew d d h anS you re abandoning another orne M an , I, are n ' r dean, Own here E 'Ian d t e outh is not where my history is, y peopto say t h·IS creels 1'k' my h ami hy oesn't live down here ' so what does it mean , , investigate that.I e Orne w en in some ways it shouldn't? Kudzu helpedme One thing I've I db· . .h b' id Ig I ea lik I e "Wh earne ' id a OUt Wntlng poems is that you can't start Wit.1 a W ird i Or "What is home?" It has to be that little, elt' t h Jng that 0 at IS I entity?" h . bJ'ect' 1 h pens lip t e Investigation, Ezra Pound said "The natural 0 IS a ways t e adeqn t b I", " d you in ' a e s ym ot. That s wise. There's something aroun ' yo ur environment so h' h" . 're interested' In,.'It ,s catc h i109 like met . Ing t at s speaking to you, something you attention to it A I' a piece of Cotton on a hangnail, asking you to pay I, S ve grawn old II d h ' ething I sho··ld ' h' k earne t at when I'm interested in som ... n t t In "Oh haer, e' , t at s stupid", or "Oh ,ath t' s cI'IC he.' e, or "No one •

J

will be interested !n this," If I'm interested in I can find something of interest

(0

it, I believe

everybody.

if I work hard enou h g

.-l

( ELL A R D 0 0 R : Your mrerest in landscape, and your desire to know how landscape, kudzu included, affects us as h umans-w h ere did that originate? Did it come out of your travels? ~ E NNE L LY: Travel made me more aware of its nuances, but I'm interested In how landscape shaped psychology and how being of a place changes who we are.

LA R DOOR: The themes and style of "The Kudzu Chronicles" seem t~edto everything else in Unmentionables. Has the way you put together a collecnon changed since Open House, where the transition from one part to the next

eEL

often felt purposely designed

to jar the reader?

FEN N ELL Y: My first book was the hardest one to organize. Partially, I think what happened is what happens to all young poets who are putting together a first collection: it takes longer to write it and while you're writing it yougrow more because you're meeting new teachers and having different influences,becauseone teacher says, "Try this," and you try it, but another teacher's saying,"No, try this." You end up with a wider range of material to use. That bookwas particularly challenging to organize because my teachers kept saying, "Oh, you're a blank verse poet, a formal poet," while others said, "Oh, you're a free verse poet!" I almost thought deciding what sort of poet I was would be a markof maturity, but at some point I realized: I'm tOO greedy. I like everything, and I want to do everything.

[UNC Professor] Alan Shapiro said something so wise once when he visited my class. He said, "When people say you should only do formal poetry or should only do free verse, it's like being at a convention for construction workers and hearing half say 'Only use the hammer!' while the others say, 'Saw!Saw!'" You need everything-they're all tools that are useful at different moments.

I want to do everything, and with individual poems that's easy enough, but when you put a collection together that's hard because there can be pr~tty . . k I lik d That was partlCUJarrmgtransitions between the type of wor s I e to o. larlytrue for Open House. It was a finalist in contest after contest and I reor~ani d路. d dell I h路t upon the idea ofwanttng rae It every time. I really struggle ,an n na Y I , . this book to be a house where there are very different rooms, When you re In o f h " rn with things that belong ne 0 t em, you have the sense that you re 10 a roo. . ' t h ibe i . h it has good mOJo-but you re oget er-r-the furniture belongs, the VIEe ISh rtg t, I. upposed to have Its . own ,1 ac room s do you understand the 拢 ways 1. aware of other rooms nearby. h II h IS rns , hee mg ' and only once you've gone throug ateb hl roo . 't a great rirle because .It,s ouse s architecture. The title Open House pro a y ISO

25

,I kind of a common idea, but the metaphorical structure is what finallyallowed me to organize the book in a way that helped it to 'Win a contest. eEL

LA ROO

0 R:

best way to organize

It doesn't

become a great tide when you figureoutthe it?

the book around

FEN N ELL Y; Yes, but it's also true that I've heard people introduce me, or say, "Oh, you're Beth Ann Fennelly, didn't you write Open Heart?" (laughs) It's not the world's most memorable title. Unmentionables is definitely a better title.

eEL LA ROO 0 R: I'd like to talk about something that came to the forefront of your work with Tender Hooks: the movement into the unabashed,confessionallook at family. Is that something you would have shied away from at first?

FEN N ELL Y: Absolutely. If I had any idea J was going to write an entire book about my daughter's first year I never would have had a daughter!It's such a terrible idea that every part of me wants to run from: the sappy mommy poems. I never thought I'd be that person. I wasn't even one of those girlswho grew up desperate to get married. We just decided to have a family, we got pregnant, and I wondered, "What's it going to be like to be a mom?" r started reading parenting books and tried to learn a little. and I thought I was really well prepared.

But then Claire was born and r found out r was completely unprepared, because motherhood is so wild, so hard, and weird. It changes everything about . 't rhat your "6I e. Wh at h appe ns to you is unforeseen and inexplicable. But rsn h u m an nature or t h e nature of the writer to try to understand the lOexp .

I'rca bl,'' I wanted to undecstand what I was going through and for me writing is the be;' method of investigating the human 5001. I wrote poems to try to understand what .was happening and I ended up writing a whole book. At no point was I th,nk>ng about a reader. I didn't think, "What's someone going to think? How ~"I I deal with the fact that I'm reveahng all of this stuff about my family, c,lI. II1g everyone by their real names?" I was just writing the poems. Only laterdid I think, "Wow, I hope I'm ready for this book to enter the world."

CELLAR ative?

D 00

R:

How

did YOOkeep it from veering into the exploit-

FENNELLY'Id 'k I . . h . on t now-J hope it isn't exploitative. I was just fol ow Ing t e questions where th Th" , hi k'ng b a OOt ey the other pa t f' M Went. b at lOstlnct was pure. I wasn t t 10 I.d . s 0 It. Writer would have rbeen h' kiay e ba cannier or more sophisticated ' experience d th e road to h aVe publish t dIn hmg i ba OUtwhat k . it's going to be like ten years ownd e t. IS 00, how It's gOing to affect their career an

26

howit's going to affect their family, but I wasn't thinking about that at all. I was so in the moment of being with this newborn all the time and trying to understand, eEL l A R DOOR: You've had other people ask you about what it means to writeand publish about your daughter's first year in Tender Hooks, and you've addressedthe issue in a poem in your next book of poetry, "Because People AskWhat My Daughter Will Think of My Poems When She's 16." You stand finn, FEN N ELL Y: At the time, I never thought about Claire reading these po~ ems when she got older because she was so itty bitr y. She couldn't even burp herself-how was she ever going to read? Then the book came out and everyone startedsaying to me, "What is she going to think of these poems?" I realized shewas going to hate me when she becomes a teenager. eEL LA R DOOR;

But isn't that w hat teenagers are supposed to do?

FEN N ELL Y: Yes! All teenagers hate their moms, right? And now my ~on will probablyhate me because I haven't written about him. It made me think abouthow awful I was as a teenager to my poor mother and how my daughter is going to be just as awfuL to me, though it's unthinkable now when, I'm everything to her, Right now, all she wants is for me to read to her, or give her a bath, and snugg"e With her In in be.d Th e reaction . rna de me face the time when I knowthis phase will end. eEL LA R DOOR:

Will

there be teenager poems in the future?

FEN N ELL Y : I hope not. Lord, I hope not. Like I said, I'm not writi~g ab~ut . . h l' d finitely as invested 10 heirrg my son, who is four now and Claire IS elg t. rn e d h I , d i bei a mother to my aug ter. a mother to him as I was and am investe In. elOg d now I'm turning . to new wonder if I've figured out some of my questions, an . h t now, JU ' st . . ornrny poems Tlg questions.I'm not really interested in ccertmg m f ' Ful I' otten it out 0 my system. readmg ones from other people. Hope U YJ ve g . about the South, you ask eEL LA R DOOR: Returning to our conversa:lO.n F lk "Am I not a , "Th bout Wliitam au ner, m e Kudzu Chronicles," in a passage a h d ing to fit into that . h Sout an trym southern writer now?" How has adoptlOg t e . ? f ? H S it been dauntlOg. meageof southern writers been or you. a

"

. . Oxford Mississippi, a town FEN N ELL Y: It has been daunting. I [jv e 10, I 's been strongly Identhat' s aIf' ways been a locus or wnters, a tOWn that s a way nmiry and its own 'fi d wi . . ., Th' ernendous oppor n e Witha WTttlng tradlttOn. at IS a tr h one he claimed for ' rage starnp, t e s weird burden. I'm living in Fau Ik ner s po

27

,I himself. Everything in that town has in some 'Way been mediated through his eyes, even the things that have happened since he pas~ed, because.he leftsu~ a deep mark on the literary landscape there. Part of being there wtllalways making friends with the ghost that haunts the place. I think I'm sliding inon the side.

Maybe, if I had been born there and my people were from there it would be harder, in a way, because one thing r think I can contribute is that thisisn't in my blood, but rather something I've chosen and am trying to figureout.In that question-Am I not a southern writer now?-you can see the defensiveness a little bit in the word not. I'm not trying to claim it for myself. I know ina lot of ways I never will be Southern in the same respect that, for example,my husband, Tom Franklin, is. He was born in Alabama and lived in Alabamahis whole life until he Went to Arkansas, He's only written about the South.The South is his passion, his obsession, and his nightmare. But even beingwithhim is another kind of introduction to the South, and so is having these children who have Uttle southern drawls now, Even though I didn't move to theSollth until I Was an adult, I think I will be investigating the South for the rest of my life.

eEL LA R D 0 0 R : U nmentlOna . bl es has an Interesting . , orga01za , ton' I . it has seven sections alternating between sections of four short poems and sections consisting in one long poem divided into its own sections, Where did that format COmefrom?

FENNELLY: ' kdf,p'' wri te poems in sections because it allows a in 0 c CIOusness I'm aHa d di If b 'own ' we to Contra ICt myse ,and I can e contrary In my work, or Want to take something from one angle and then take it on fromanother angle, and the sectioned poem really allows for that. I find the sectioned poem useful for exploring the bigger topics.

We talked about it already in "The Kudzu Chronicles" but in the Berry' poems I was 11' d ' 'h l' ro f " rea y Jntereste In understanding inheritance, bot uerarj amillal In "B th M ' h h d h . er e I was looking at moth er 00 t en but also th I crrsot: f h Retrospective" f P'" t h'ey all were th e co e 0 t e emale artist. When I wrote those tree , to b00, k bUt w hen I fiese. separate and I wasn't trying to add them up m a h d h things h' , h he h nlS e t e t ird one I felt for the first time that WI[ t I, s Otter poems, I had the t f h' are h eSltant . t 109 that Was feeling like a book. But, peop to read long ype 0 bid to br ea k t h em up With ,poems ecause long poems are challenging, so h wante the h h_ mOr' h s Otter poems. Some of the shorter poems ave u In t em, Or are lighter fl' Th h h I realized I ld d . ,Or Irty. ey ave different moods in tern, cou 0 a section of f, h h four mOre short p , OUr poems, t en the longer poem, t en oerns agam and' h d I e told me you n d '.

It a a p easing symmetry to me. Someone one fJ ee to organize you b k lik â&#x20AC;˘ ki d of ow ' and may be reoccurring im r 00 b' 1 e a piece of rn u sic:" there 5 a 10 n narrative. ages, ut It has to build on itself and tell Its ow man d an even ems

28

eEL L A R DO 0 R : The humor in the shorter poems carries the reader from page to page.

FEN N ELL Y: In terms of mood, to have the lighter restingpose in yoga. A resting pose in yoga, something a rest becauseit uses all the muscles equally. The shorter youto use your readerly muscles, but in a different way

things is almost like a like downward dog, is poems are still asking that also prepares you

to read something longer, or more difficult, or darker.

One of the things I've gotten more comfortable with is the fact that the poetryI like best is the poetry that uses the entire range of human emotions.

When I was younger I wanted to be taken seriously, so I tried to be serious as a poet.As I got a little older and more confident I realized that what I like in poetryis what I like in friends-not alw ays taking yourself too seriously, being ableto have different moods. I like poetry that can make you smile, laugh, cry, makeyou think, make you uncomfortable, make you 'Want to shower. It's okay to try to bring some of those other emotions into poetry.

29

,

..

_:::'-,,"

BLESS

YOU KERRY

30

KELSO

--'; -

S H o 0 T

AND

L

E

T

JOSH

B

E

WOLONICK

Mr. P is the man with orange hair and wrinkles that lives down the street.It is a hot afternoon and he is telling me a story about his fishpond. He built it all by himself and filled it with big sucker-mouth Koi fish. He says that oneday he left for a vacation in Las Vegas. When he got back, there was a big e~retbird sitting next to the pond. Its belly was filled with all of the fish. The birdcouldn't even move and Mr. P hit its head off with a golf dub. I say I will nevereat his fish, not even one.

He laughs and tells me that he has filled the pond again and is going ~ac~toLasVegas until Sunday. He wants me to shoot any birds that come near It with my BB gun. I ask him what kinds of birds? He says, all birds.

He leaves for Las Vegas and I go over to the house every day. I am reallygoodat shooting birds. If I stare really hard at a bird, I can hit it, just like I canlookreallyhard at a piece of hair in the pool and grab it. My brother takes acoupletries, but I always get it first shot.

Everyday, Mom packs me a lunch and I go to Mr. P's backyard and shootbirds until sunset. All kinds of birds: big fish eaters, little singers, sunset hooters.I shoot all of them because I can. Most fall to the ground and I pick themup and keep a pile next to the barbecue grill. It is the best place because thereis a mean-looking red bird head on the grill cover.

When Mr. P comes back, the pile is very big and smells like throw-up. r walkup to the driveway to say hello and tell him how good at shooting birds r am.He says thank you and gives me five dollars. We walk down to the backyardbecatLse I left my gun down there. He sees the pile of dead birds and turns redand yells at me. I ask what I did wrong and he says what the fuck. He calls mealittle fucker. I am very scared so I say that I will not shoot any more birds.

Hemakesme pUtthe pile in a trash bag. We throw the bag away and his face is notred anymore. He says, keep shooting birds, just don't make piles.

Now, I never make piles, but I shoot birds most every day. I am the besrbird shooter I know,

31

,I FIND

AN OLD ROLLING ROCK IN THE WOODS

F.

RYAN

DOWDY

Wander free of the clearing as dad trunks tackle from the boat.

Notice a green bottleneck punctuating fallen needles that snowdrift around the pines.

Loosen it with earth still clinging to the ridged bottom.

Wrench the cap, scruff the skin of the palm: down the foam and then the yellow brew, like the first Curse into a pillow.

Sit against a trunk and wait, float.

Hear the distance snap as dad shouts.

Chew a sassafras leaf to disguise the smell.

Clamp jaws shut the whole ride home, grunt assents

and denials.

Do these things to never forget the warmth branching through dizzy young limbs, the SUn singing between the pines, the sick, powerful feeling of a secret,

32

br

.~ SCRIBBLE

ON

MY

FACE

GREG

HALLORAN

33

LESLIE

TAYLOR

ERIN

. • the pro' sea.

The sun slips quietly beneath t h e h·or tz on h ere like J a sea I entering There is no splash, just a quiet. slackenmg 0 eat as P f ,herno . f h the inkish evenmg on gresses from red to purple and finally deepens to m . d"'g 0 , Light, rom I hligh' pools on the sidewalk where we sr' oursiid e a ca re, an d headlights sp as r» against the wall of the State Farm Insurance b UIild Ing acr oss the hstreet, I Iof mY i brick, flaring to life as the engine 0 f a passmg true k v tibra res up t e egs [tem .' ' oo wire-mesh chair, It's cool now, and the pressmg 'on a hiscelt ' h urn, id i"y 0 f the june abates. David has been listening to his mother rant about something

',,,,d

, id h cafe, ld' m agaarne f rom a s tack lOSI e b,hio t e I can't be bothered to read his lips, I'm preoccupied, I don't want to 100 dlgo< much for fear I'll give it away. We've been trying for a couple month"an the little blue plus sign a week and a half ago; a trip to Dr. Khosayen co~lirmeJ He'll it. I haven't told David yet though. He is going to be such a great da, ds be so excited-so elated, ecstatic emotional and any number of oth er Ewor· ' J, and surprise him on Father, Day, Hesg a!, Maybe I should wait a couple days ing to be thrilled. I'll just wait. No rush. Seven months before it's realanrvdd DaVod . hangs up his cell phone and smiles at me. He takes my ~nan ,th, phone for twenty minutes now, I , v e b,een readmg a two-month_o

I~.

I

v

pulls me up from my chair. I feel the crisscross of the "at still prmed;n I ba c k '0 f my SUnb urned th'ghs ' and run my fingers across the b ump ysunace "hs. shoot a glance" DaVid's knee-length seersucker shorts. It will fade, heoto and ieughs, probably a warm chuckle. , We hold hands as we walk down the sidewalk. I feel goose bump' n":: my arms as we t th db, Wh n werea urn e Carner an a reeae pushes agamst us. e { the driveway to th b h h ks his Toff' h eeed. I laugh and ofuso we're renting for the week , he smac Ileakc h The door . open tho h pu ey s rorn my purse' , he always forgets tern. h we , IS d ' ug, an we walk up a flight of stairs to the main floor were Vf

34

Dr

left a half-finished puzzle on the kitchen table. The lighthouse was an easy start, but hundreds of blue pieces of sky are still littered around the edges of the table.

Later, we lie together in bed. At first, he runs a hopeful hand up my thigh.

I laugh, but slap it away. The sunburn has made the skin on my legs feel tight, likeit's stretched too taut. The scratchy spare sheets he borrowed from his parents, pulled over this hard rental-house mattress, feel like the prongs of a hundredplastic forks layered over a wooden picnic table pressing into my raw skin.

There is no way in hell.

The bedside lamp is on and he sits up reading a book. The light is a weak orangey yellow and his dark hair looks almost black. His skin is red-brown, like the soil he spends so much time working with in Sampson County, North Carolina, where we've recently taken root. I press my cold body against him, my head nudging up under his arm until it rests on his chest. He puts the book downand kisses the top of my head. He turns the lamp off and slides down his pillow until we're both huddled under the blanket together. He rubs my back betweenmy shoulder blades, and I press a kiss against his chest. When his hand slides further down, I lift my head and glare up at him. Still nO David. I feel his chest slump down in a defeated sigh as I lay my cheek back against him. I should tell him now. I shouldn't make him suffer the wait. But suddenly, he J

sits up.

I tilt my head and look at him. He shakes his head, but I can see his ear straining in the dark room. I touch his arm, and raise my eyebrows in question when he looks at me. He shakes his head again and presses his finger to his lips, drawinghis eyebrows together. His torso is tense, and his legs <Ireben~ slightly.

He pulls the sheets hack and slowly presses his feet to the floor. He crmges: the boardsmust have creaked.

He stands and I sit up. He turns around and presses me back against the ·11 fi h b d then cups his ear-the pi ows, nger to his lips again. He gestures at tee , . . h I'll b b k His gestures are Wide sprmgs are loud. Don't move, he mout s. e acx , " ·" d w He moves stealthtly an d sweeping, his form dark against t h e moon IIt WIO 0 . " h hi h d or I watch him turn r e aroun d t h e foot of the bed and presses IS ear to teO " . h flo hi at what must be a .' k handle and pull the door slowly toward his c est, i nc ng . . ci . th ough the wldentng crac , whmmg hinge. Light from the living room n cers 10 r . h . br-i ht over the surf romg t. t he bay windows face the ocean and the moon IS ("1& b ck and we make eye contact I watch him slink out of the room. He turnsf' a me stay t h· ere, stay to as h e pulls the door shut one hand raised, pa Irn acrng b k b d ' h " that presses mto my a c e . .I huddle down between the sheets, eac ' spnng k I don't know anymore. poSSibly letting out a screeching groan. I don t now. f ·1' the mountains ·· w ich m y am r yin Y ears ago, when I was ten, I went s k ling I ld b . ed to ternfWd I h u hr a co , emg us o est Virginia. My older sister an . eack ca ag.long ttrne to get over mine . perate North Carolina winters, and tt tOO Fever and A h me ceh ic h b ecame scarrlet r. my got well quickly, but I caught strep t roar J

•

35

I

eventually a double ear infection. The anti biotics d idn't work, and I losthearrng completely in my left ear and nearly so in my right. Another ear infectionin8th grade took care of the rest of it.

I've coped. I know how to talk, so I'm years ahead of many ctherdef people when it comes to communicating.

It worries me, though, when I speal I remember how foolish people sounded if they were wearing headphones eel listening to their walkm a ns when they talked. But I have no gaugeanymort.

I can't just slip them off when people laugh at me jamming out to some tunes can't lower my voice to the proper level, or lean my words into a doubleenter dee. I learned how to sign, and prefer it. I started teaching David when we met senior year of high school. He's come a long wa y. By the time he proposedfour days after our college graduation, it was with a ring and silent gestures.

We read each other well. I almost don't even miss the sound of birdschirp, In 'h' t e morning, or grease crac kl ing in the frying pan, or my mothers ' voice mg singing in the kitchen, or my sister's laugh after my dad makes a cornyjokt, 01 my dog's toenails clacking on the hardwood as he shuffles over to seeme.tag' jingling when he wags his tail so hard his whole body shakes, snufflingbreath wheezing through his too-long nose as he licks my chin. With David, mostof the time, I am Content.

Now, however, this pressing silence is excruciating.

In my head, I think I ~emember what floorboards sound like as they groan under heavy footfalls.l think I can imagine the sound of a skirmish chairs pushed across alinoleu1D kitchen floor. I am petrified in bed, scared that each breath I take is a scratchy gasp, that my expanding and contracting chest is pushing too hard againstolJ mattress springs and creaking in the silent room. I think I can imaginethe Sound of heavy b rea tl-r lng, i '. a t h ump. Is Someone on the groun;d' M uffledyd!; , skin hitting sk'n fi h id h on' d er the door andI ,a A shadow moves across t e gap m gb dt OUtSI e the D room. ' y 0 y tenses. avid? Please be David.

For a whole sec d I" I M mind '. on, m 10 rota agony as the door begins to open. y ~s ra~lng. The next second will determine my fate, I think. The fate of mychild. waited too long t II h' h' I k f' on h' fate rrn, e 1 never know. I haven't seen that 100 0 JOy IS ace. I haven't felt hi h vent Ee I, h'IS h and Preesed ae-Âť:IS arms wrapped around me in an excited hug, a . h ,h h h resse against my stomach feeling for a kick. I'm nauseous Wit e t aug t that pe hI' , feel th . . raps won t ever feel it now. I'm scared that I won t e rIppmg tear of childb' hI' . head dose to rn h In, won t feel my child pressed agaInst me, Y ea r-r, perfect ea s h d b h . hest.!

Can feel th h r Soot e y t e cadence he hears In my c e roug sheets ben h d h 'II' watCh the next second k eat me, an s ur my eyes, not WI 109to B t~ e place. Please be David. ut so what If it is;:!S hae : . ?There will be orh . a w at If DaVid comes walking into the room. ermoments!ik h" 'Ick in the mar' D. e t IS, Worse than this. Months from now at 2 0 C 0 nlng, aVId will sl" fb ' ' g;' the basi net in h Ip OUt 0 ed to SOothe the child who IS crym . t e corner of OUr h'l f eand crYing for my h I b room, a C I d who is six feet away rom III pens to him? O~rPch ~~ whom I ~ill not be able to hear. What if something hapI needs him. I need him.

36

I open my eyes as the draft from the door hits me. It's him. It's David. I sit up in the bed. Suddenly I'm overwhelmingly angry. I'm angry at David for beingable to hear things that go bump in the night. For being able to hear a familiarfootfall and know he's safe. I'm angry at him for being able to hear the surfoutsideour window, for being able to hear the seagulls in the afternoon sun.

I'm angry that he will someday hear our unborn child's first cry, that first sound of life to come bursting from his lungs, so angry that he'll be able to hear and knowhalf a second before I do that our child is alive and line. He'll hear the nrst words,the first laughs, the first angry teenage rants. I'm so angry.

But it's David. It's David. I should be relieved. David smiles, comforted, as heslides back into bed, probably chuckling a quiet laugh. He presses my head to his chest and Ican feel his heart beat against the silence of my ear, I can feel his heart pounding in his chest but I can't hear it, I start to cry. It's an ugly, draining cry that's making my nose run and my face red and my head ache from nit the pressure.

I can feel his voice rumbling in his chest as he keeps up a mantra, saying Godknows what into my hair, stroking my back until I calm down. Eventually, Ifall hack into the scratchy sheets, too tired for this new rage.

I don't want to tell him now, I can't tell him about this child we've been trying to have about this child that will be his. I can't tell him about this child that I will carry for seven more months, protect for seven more months, and then turn out as a fledgling robin to fend for itself. I lie back and stare at the 'I' inted d f di II Wh e ther I tell David in an hour, eel 109,pamte white an a 109 to ye ow. ' "h her we are here or at home or a day, whether I sign it or say It or write It, w et h' , h h' hi 'II h the fact that this will be IS or Wit IS parents or mine, not mg WI c ange

child,

F ld d throat and motion at my Pregnant I push the word out a my se om-use ' I' h , I id b . g in the moon Ig t. stomach. Iclose my eyes, but 1 can fee Dav i ea m m I know he wants to talk, but it's quiet again.

37

L E AV HANNAH

E THINGS RIDDLE

At night, I leave behind lights still lit, leave what I've scattered of my mind all over the place-traces of halves of tasks (linens on the lawn, dishes, a half-drawn bird bath), questions I mayor may not have asked.

Sometimes in the morning I End the phrases I forgot, the moths around the lights and the sink full of crescent moon~stained spoons.

38

BEHIND

REBECCA

SMITH

39

MORIAH

LEFEBVRE

at r i gh t:

40

GIRL NER

BLUE-EYED A~

,,.,,,..,

"

lMIlr:

FIR 5 T F.

RYAN

HABANERO DOWDY

Its ancient color of warning stops my knife preparing to light on the cutting board: the neon of the habanera gleams against cilantro, tomatoes, and minced onions.

I pause between desire and what may follow crunching its flesh to sate my curious tongue.

Adam's sin was truly original: he had no prior experience with apples.

I pluck the pepper from the salsa mix and plunge into the unholy knowledge of ghosts, cobras, red devils, addiction, worshipping the mystery of capsicum, feeling my mouth committing suicide as tastebuds napalm into jumbled nurnbness.

at'

eft:

43

A

PRAYER TO MIZUKO JIZO,PATRON OF MISCARRIED, ABORTED, OR

STILLBORN

CHILDREN NIKKI

CAPPS

In Japan, women visit Buddhist temples to make amends with a Miauko jizo, their eyes cast down, weighted there by contemplation of forgiveness.

Each figure an effigy of an individual's

mourning.

II They stand in rows, thousands, decorated with knitted caps, bibs, flowers left by the mothers who have adopted them.

Statues silently smiling.

Not with joy, hut with comfort.

A staff held easily in the right hand.

A Wishing jewel cupped in the left.

III Leaving my house she was carrying a child; Upon returning home she was not.

In the waiting room, the only sounds heard were those of heavy heart beats, fidgeting fingers, jittering legs.

When the nurse opened the door to the waiting room, everything fell silent.

44

...

IV Howmanymothers stand alone with a Mizukc Jizo andmeditateon the relinquished life the figurine represents?

The reliefthat was overcome by guilt; thesecretthat weighs down the corners of their mouths.

V Leavesstilt not decomposed or otherwise raked up rot in the puddles of rain. Their parched skin soaking

up every

ounceof water they can handle, tearingapart at their hard veins.

The rain seemed to know it should come to disguiseour sorrow s.

VI

It fallsin sheets so profound, the sound or their impact drownsout all of our thoughts.

It washesaway tears to the ocean, where salt water belongs, and with them it carries our unspoken prayers.

They float to the shores of japan and fallupon the devoted ears of a Miauko jiao.

45

I

THE

F

R

A man found himself on the bank of a river. He could not see to the othe side through a thick veil of fog. The ground was hard clay, despite the river.A small rowboat waited on the shore. The man approached it.

Four skeletons sat in two rows, oars clamped in fleshless hands. The firs wore a white baseball cap with the word conquest written in bold letters on the front. The second had a red bowler hat, war embroidered in an elegant scrawl A black sombrero covered the third's face,jamine barely legible, almost falling off. The fourth skeleton was hunched over, asleep with eye sockets wide open.

He wore an old, threadbare top hat, death inscribed on the rim in small, exac letters.

The man stepped on to the boat. The creaking of the old wood wokeupthe first three skeletons and they began rowing. The oars scraped against the hard day until the boat finally crawled into the water. The man sat down in the center of the boat. Creak.

"I'm dead, aren't I?" asked the man.

No one answered.

"This must be a test."

The man fidgeted in silence.

"Do you realize that we're just rowing in circles?"

The boat answered with another creak, louder now as he grew more restless.

"This must be purgatory."

Creak.

Silence.

He looked to the side. "Just my luck."

"Well, you could at least say something," said the man.

Conquest stirred.

"Did you ever conquer anything in your life?" Conquest asked.

"Well, r wrote a book," said the man.

46

ALEX

Warstirred. "You conquered 'Maybe said the man.

WARD

nothing!"

l"

'Did you ever hate anything?" War asked.

"Well,I wrote a book," said the man.

Faminestirred. "You hated nothing!"

"Maybe/' said the man.

"Ilid you ever suffer?" Famine asked. ~Well,I wrote a book," said the man, Creak, Silence.

Thefirst three Oarsmen turned to Death. He was sleeping.

Famine poked DrathWith theendof his oar. He jumped to his feet, surprised. The other three ocn~englaredat him, Death looked at the man, confused.

Well,I wrote a book" said the man

'W

I

• ell, good for you, chap!H Death •Maybe/' said the man .

•

cheered .

. I'm sorry,gentlemen, but I'm really quite late for a very important ap. i'Ointment I' 1 D Slmpy must be going now."

pL,p. :th tookoff his top hat, bowed) and jumped into the river with a loud F IS,hat landedin the boat. Bubbles.

W

aminepickedup Death's hat, examined it, and switched it with his own. a~t.tooflk off hisbowler and grabbed Famine's sombrero. He spun it in the air It oatedd ttdbo 1 OWnOnto his head slowly, like a feather. Conquest took War's n.il(h~r andexchanged it with his Own hat. The three oarsmen continued to Whittbat~backandforth in a circle until finally the man picked up Conquest's

rtltItd of~' allcapand put it on. He took the empty seat and the four oarsmen Into the fog.

47

I THE

PATRON SAINT LOST CAUSES

CHRIS

CASTRO-RAPPL

Saint Jude watches a fly crawling upside down on the ceiling of his apartment in the warehouse district on the flickering outskirts of heaven.

If he stands, he will be backlit by his window, black and shadowed against the nimbus city.

So he breathes there as the fly licks its black palms, wondering how he'll make rent on so few pca yers a day.

His supplicants confuse his name with]udas Iscariot, the Gnarled One, the betrayer, whose mail Jude has often received, prayers in red envelopes, text in ragged scrawl, perfumed with day-old sweat and a sharp desperation.

It drives him mad to think of Judas reading misdirected prayers, licking sharp little teeth, flapping useless little wings against his body, giggling at a father's pleading on behalf of his atheist son, at the army wife who swears to go to church in exchange for her husband's life, not knOWing that as she prayed he was bleeding out, dyeing the sand black, the dry wind Scourging his skin.

48

OF

4

Even prayers property

addressed

and delivered to his box are difficult to answer.

Lostcauses are not called such ona whim. The other saints and members of the host nudgeeach other with elbows as he passes in the halls

on the way to his tiny office. "[ude.jude," they cry, "why are you not with Zeus and Loki, fading away with the fest of the unneeded divine?"

He hasan answer, written and rewritten in the ragged journal, hard rectangle he keeps under his pillow: "Lookaround you!

Half the buildings in heaven are condem ned.

Your makeup dries and cakes and where it crumbles youare transparent, folding into darkness.

Your feet sink deeper into the douds and soon you'Il step and feel nothing asyou fall to the earth."

Butas he moves his mouth to speak, he feelshis own makeup crack at the corners of his li PSI doesn'tsay the words he works on everynight, written becausehe has no one to pray to.

49

MYTHS ABOUT NORTHERN REBECCA

THE

LIGHTS

HOLMES

Your pale streamers don't come from God or dead ancestors or fire foxes or even from the North pole.

I read these things to avoid disappointment.

Photographs show deep pink, but this color is imagined by exposures impossible for the human eye. r saw only green bands, needles, curls, and endless columns.

I didn't hear you whispering, or meet you in the woods along the Chena Hot Springs Road.

Sometimes now I look at your postcard photographsmultiple exposures, digitally enhanced-and squint, ignoring the pink to remember that anemic green of science and experience.

And sometimes now (when I need you) I am wild with superstition.

I remem ber your electric form, I feel your slow stimulus, I look for your tracks in the snow.

50

COMPLICITY

MORIAH

LEFEBVRE

51

ON

THE WHITE FEATHERS SCATTERED ACROSS A SEVEN-MILE STRETCH OF 1-85 CAROLINE

Some hit my windshield, looking like misshapen that could have fallen from the mutant sky of gray tinged with pink.

FISHER

snowflakes

They gathered in drifts between the lanes, little spirals sent up by passing cars, and in restless piles by each bar of the guardrail from where the wind had pushed them flush against the metal.

A pillow~truck crash? Seagulls raptured mid-flight, their quills not pure enough for Heaven? A few angels dragged behind a semi, trapped until God answered their prayers?

I was trapped in my car, hedged in by feathers left unattended. Now no one could rest her head on this white stuffing. Now birds or angels somewhere on high were missing their clothes in a cool wind.

52

CLAM-CRACKIN'

SWAMP MARY

CATHERINE

THING PENN

53

I

54

STAIRWELL

IN

BALLYMUN

EMILY

HYLTON

Getting closer, you start to smell dung that brings back your grandfather's farmthe cows gathered around the trough, tails swatting cheerfully on each rump.

But this is the city. The rails flake rust onto your hands. Puddles of dingy water dry on the concrete landing, layering new designs over dried rims of old puddles.

The dark soot walls of the stairwells bloom wi.th yellow, red, and black graffiti, young tenants marking their territory with "Leon Pat Kevin" and "Fuck the garda."

There are no animals in Ballymun except a rat that darts around a cornet, or the small white dog in the arm of the woman who retreats quickly into her house with bottled m ilk.

55

b

IT W HEN SNOWED IN HANGING DOG AND

ALL

THE

PEOPLE

WENT JOHN

CRAZY McELWEE

I WAS SITTING IN SCIENCE,makingalistofeverything!would save from my house in the event of a fire. There wasn't much-r-a poster, a picture, maybe a baseball, the jacket that still had my father's smell. I woulddothis to distract myself. Or I'd count the brown flecks in my desk, or calculatethe probability of things.

It was better than the Breathing Exercises they would tell me to do. In, Out, In, Out. Or Rising, Falling, Rising, Falling, whichever works better for you. Or take a hot, hot shower-so hot it makes the back of your neck tingle and you start to think maybe you turned the cold water faucet all th,e way around on accident, or wear a rubber band around your wrist and puUIt out until you're afraid and then, just then, let it snap back and POPYOll redandah-you won't be sad anymore, and you will be just like everybody else.

I was at my desk, staring at Mr. White's white neckbeard and wondering how he doesn't get food or gravy caught in it. His neckbeard was long and he always had his fingers in it, tugging and twirling the wiry strands.

Then Mr. White was clapping his palm around his wrist and saying Sex, penis~jn~vagjna} vagjna~QI-ound-penjs. Sex-and somebody interrupted and yelled from the back of the class Hey look snow!

It was the first time it had snowed in Hanging Dog in maybe twenty yea.rs, so all the kids jumped from their chairs and pushed their faces against the win' dow and fought for a Spot without a paper fish on it, but I stayed in my seat,still thinking. The Lady from the Front Desk who squirted sanitizer on her ha~ds every time she touched a piece of paper came in the room. She did not realize that she was probably breeding an invincible death virus that would kill every' thing, ever. I wanted to raise my hand and be like, Mr. White and Lady, don'tyou realize? But her throat was jiggling and she was panting and red in the faceand

56

whispering to Mr. White.

Then came the squawking

of the loudspeaker,

something like, Emergency!

Emergency! All the children must go home immediately!

The kids at the window put my head under my desk

quieted down to listen. I dropped

my pencil and

to look for it.

I hatethe loudspeaker-the same metal screeching voice that makes announcements everyday. The same voice that called my name, that day last year. !ohnny,Gass.Johnny Gass please report to the principal's office, your. ..please report Immediately.

And all the kids looked at me because they knew what was happening, and It wasso bright in the hallway I was almost blind but I could see the teachers lower th erreyes . " my feet weren t (OuC himg as I walked by them, and it felt like o

theground.

I bumpedmy head on the way back up after I found my pencil. I pushed hardagainstthe welt that rose on the back of my head and my eyes stung.

ONe E T H I N G SSE

TTL

ED

DOW

N, they pu,hed

us onto the bus

forhomelikesheep. Since they'd let us out early, I was going to Tommy's. My momwouldn'tbe home from work until late, and I'd left my key and lanyard that! usuallywore around my neck sitting on my dresser.

Tommy's house was in a Modern Development. He had the Internet and Lunch abiesand a father and there I never had to listen to my morn hyperventl 'latethroughher bedroom door. He let me use his computer all the time, and he wouldsneakme Lunchables to school so I didn't have to stick with PB and J or tunafish,and his father-one

time he took us to a baseballd the game. smell of peanuts. d .

And there were lights, that night. an d h ot ogs an

57

The mascots raced around the bases in opposite directions and got into a fi.ghtand my back was sweaty and stuck to the plastic seat, and we hit a home run at the last second, and the baseball flew through the night and we were the winners.

Then Tommy's dad and Tommy and I we left and once we'd gotten far enough away from the warm pink brown glow of the stadium he stopped thecar and pointed up and taught us how to see the curvature of the atmosphere. His thick forearm was dark against the sky as he traced the long shape of an arc,andJ saw how outer space was curved, like the night was wrapped around the earth.

J

WAS eRA M M E 0 against the window on the bus to Tommy's, and outside the fields were slowly going white. The men used to go down and saw the river during cold snaps in Hanging Dog. They would carve out big shining blocks of ice and put them in a shed with woodchips for tea in the summertime.

But today it seemed like everybody was going to the grocery store with chains wrapped around their tires, like they were trying to get away. The peopledidn't realize that grocery stores are not the safest place to be in an emergency. There are too many windows. You're way too exposed.

The bus wasn't moving because of all the cars, so I took out my PB and] and unraveled the newspaper it was wrapped up in. I smushed the sandwich under the seat in front of me and this girl was like You're gross, I'm literally going tobarf, but I didn't say anything back. When Tommy brought me lunch sometimesI'd save my sandwich for the ride home and peel them apart and try to stick themto road~signs that shot by and be like Did you see that?

The newspaper was a USA Today. It was America's Number One Newspaper. It made my mom feel Informed and Progressive. The jelly had bled through the bread, so the grainy paper was sticky and purple. It was about how everyone in Greenland is killing themselves, because of the continual sun and snow and because of Danish people and because everybody else is doing it and they're all drunk, most of the time. It was pretty funny, I thought, since it was snowing right there and then, and also because I wonder why did they name it Greenland in the first place.

THE R EWE R E CAR S everyw here and the harsh sound of horns. Some of them had run off the road into ditches, and peopLe were standing around like they were lost, or maybe somebody had died.

Maybe people were putting chains on their tires to come and watch the snowflakes fall, like salt or feathers. They were all in a hurry, because it hadbeen ~o long since it snowed in Hanging Dog, or maybe it was only sno-wingin Hang' 109 Dog and nowhere else for miles around. Maybe it was snowing only in an of North Carolina, even in the mountains, and we would be like a white spotona radar or a map. .

This was surprising, because people usually only came to visit the Amac: trons. There was this Railcar Museum I'd been to with my dad before everything.

He'd made all the people laugh when he stopped the tour and said Okay, now boys

58

anly! at theentranceto the Mail Car. And therewas this swamp where people looked for musket balls after they stopped lookingfor this dead boy that got weighted down in the water with strings andrailroadspikes.

And past the swamp there was this place called the Devil's Tramping Grounds, wayup in the woods that were so full of bamboo it stayed night all day.

People visitedthere, too, because it was where they said the Devil Himself would cometoearthto pace and plan out all the evil He'd rain down on the human race.

He'dpacebackand forth, His hands behind His back, and His feet burned and tramped salt in the earth, so nothing grew there, ever.

WhenI was just a little kid I used to be so scared of it. Every dark yard or comerI wanderedinto, I thought He might possess me, or take control of my brain.I wouldlie awake at night, terrified of the noise from construction sites, sure that everyhammer fall was a drum beating in the woods, that every rustle of bamboowas a spell carried on the breeze. But now I knew it was just where people wentto drink beer and feel each other up.

WE RAT T LED

A LON

G through the snow and cars. AU the kids on the

buswereyellingand pointing at things and fogging up the windows, and I was pretending to chop down all the trees and flatten all the buildings with a giant chainsaw thatextended from my fingertip. Every time we dropped a kid off, their ~arentswouldrush out the front door to the bus and grab them and pull them :nside.Someof them looked like they were even crying and it was like, Everyone 15

going crazy.

THE. NTH E T H \ N G T HAT HAP PEN E 0 was, after we were at Tommy'shousea while: I started thinking maybe we're going a little crazy, becauseTommywent outside and took this axe from his shed and we walked over t~hispond.He lifted it high over his head and it glinted in the sun for a second hke it was frozen too. Then he slammed it down into the ice and sent cracks run~ingoutlikespiderlegs, with this crunch so satisfying it made my teeth hurt. ~e hftedit again,and began to hack like a Cannibal, showering green shivers of ice throughthe dry cold air that was so cold it also made my teeth hurt.

Then he broke through, and there in the slush was this frog. I reached do~n andpeeledits lifeless body out from under the chopped ice and jiggled it by i ts froglegs.It felt like old string beans and had blue lips-blue blood too, probablr rrogs can freeze I told him then melt and come back to life-like they re 1>0 rn againand anew. ' It was so, according ' to the Internet.

Yeah right, he said.

I told him that it's like this thing called Cryogenics. It's what happens when youfreezeyour brain-or your entire self-and corne back in a thousand years, dW h ... t be here you an elcome to the future, they say to you, and Than you, It IS ~lc.e.~ â&#x20AC;˘ sayback.Richpeople do it and Walt Disney. Imagine the posslbtlttles.

Mayhe it's not frozen but dead, he said.

59

...

You just watch, I said.

I carried this frog inside by his little toe, and it bounced along my side. This frog would live. Live, Littlefrog, I thought, Breathe, Froggiefrog.

But the microwave did nothing. The frog was a little warmer, which wasa good sign, but that was it. We laid the frog on the floor and put a plastic curly straw down its throat and blew. It rose and fell and gurgled. It felt like blowing spit bubbles, like blowing a frog balloon.

We pushed our fingers in tight rhythm against his slippery frog chest. We didn't know where frogs stored their hearts, so we chose a spot somewhere between where his arms met. But his little animal eyes stayed shut. There wasno blue pumping cold blood in his veins.

So we took him into the garage. We laid him out on his dad's carpentry table and stripped the frayed end of a lamp cord bare.

Clear! I said, and Tommy pushed the exposed copper together against the frog's chest. Sparks flew all over, but we couldn't shock him into life, The frog didn't jolt and recoil and then gasp for air and weep himself alive like most people do.

Outside again, we slung him around by the feet, like a junebug on a stringin the summer, but it was no fun. It didn't buzz or struggle or die or come backto life. Its skin was starting to shed on our fingertips.

We stood there. Tommy dangled the frog.

THE WIN D 5 TAR TED B LOW I N G, swept a mist of snow in my eyes. I closed them against the sting. People say this is how serial killers start off: small acts of torture; snuffing out tiny lives. They put amphibians in jars with chemicals, watch them shudder, their skin boil and peel itself off. Or they digup fat beetles and cut off the legs and stomp the life out of little baby black salamanders. But this was not that. This was the opposite. It was life we wanted to stomp into the little frog with wires and straws and our breath and a microwave.

I opened my eyes, and there was Tommy, like I told you so, with a BlackCat firecracker in his hand. I was like, Don't you. But he said it was dead, anyway.

It's no use, he said, and he stuck this Black Cat firecracker into its gullet.

And when he lit the fuse I ran a couple feet away, and when its waterlogged guts flew in the air like confetti, all these blackbirds scattered into the sky outof the naked trees and Tomm y's mom ran outside screaming.

You got the Devil in you! She yelled. Her face was red and she could barely breathe.

You boys, you! She choked on the words.

The Devil! Boys! I tell you!

She was waving her arms like a crazy person.

J L 0 0 KED A WAY from her and over the pond, and then I looked down at my fee.t, and out of nowhere I realized I was standing in the exact spot where I was a kid fishing, and there was my dad with his rod bent under the weightof

60

somethinghe'd hooked and I spilled this jar of crickets on my legs and I hollered andcried,and he dropped his rod and sat me on top of the car and You're safe up here, he said,and he gave me a Pepsi in a bottle and I tried so hard to finish it but I couldn'tbecauseI was too small and it had got all warm and sticky.

And I was standing right in that spot out of all the other spots around the pond.The chanceswere very unlikely, and there was frog skin on my fingertips andtheywere so cold it hurt and there was ice in the pond. The blackbirds had comeout of nowhere, flying up into the curved grey atmosphere and now bullfrogsout of nowhere were screaming, and there were cars and people screaming alloverthe roads, and aU the noise grated on my ears like the metal loudspeaker atschooltellingme to come to the office because my dad was dead, and Tommy's momwasscreaming about the Devil, and He was up there in the woods, walking incircles.He had chains dragging from His feet. He had a railroad spike hanging offa pieceof twine around His neck, and a tiny little black boy following Him aroundlike a dog and not a drop of snow had fallen on His bare salted patch of l

dirtunderthe sky.

I lookedup and stared straight ahead and I could see so far. I could see past thepond and the house and over the roads and the swamp and into the middle ofthe woods,and I felt hot and sick and my hands were shaking, and then the Devil,He stops pacing and He looks up; He looks right at me across all that distanceand He touches His nose and winks His eye and He waggles His tongue, andI can feelmine swelling, jumping up in my throat as darkness starts to close in fromall sides, and I reach for the key around my neck, but it's not there and mycoldpink fingers close on nothing and I want right then so badly, more than l

anything,to go home.

61

INTO

THE

LABYRINTH MICHELLE

for my mother

Last October I swam naked in the Atlantic off the coast of In ish Meainn and half froze in the water umber as fresh sap. Unprepared, on a desperate whim, I couldn't be weighted any longer with the melodious keen of wind through the comb of stacked-stone walls, a voice of suffering that found me again.

Immersed in the soughing of waves, I swam

II

..

the length of the flat, rocky beach and out into the expanse of water, diving under as a fishing boat sailed out of the small harbor.

From the crest of a hill rising above the shore, a woman carrying a bucket, leading a calf, stopped and watched me swim, her long skirt undulating in the wind. If only you knew me then.

From her ungated pen, the calfs cow lowed .

HICKS

A tinny bell over the: boat's transom rang, the tone winnowing away through the tall walls gridding the island like home quilting with miles of narrow paths between. Soon, my body beganto believe I was freezing to death, veins showed livid in my skin, but instead of fading I warmed with the sense of coming to life again.

If only you knew me then. When I stu m bled backto the shore, dripping on the rocks, tangled in being alive, I memorized the curvature of wind-torn shore, the cliffs, the high, winding miles of stone walls that the sun shone through as it reddened, that later I entered like the labyrinth, searching for the woman with the bucket; the monster waiting, distant, trapped in the center, is a cow missing her calf.

63

BLOOD

MOON

MORIAH

LEFEBVRE

GHAZAL

OF

LOSS EMILY

HYLTON

Curl of the lily petals today in the garden, like fine curls of her hair when she'd play in the garden.

Facingdeath, even Christ sweats drops of blood, asking to drink any other wine, crouching to pray in the garden.

A slug, plumped to a stone, has slicked his path behind him overpressed pulps of roots that decay in the garden.

We all eventually go inside. There are stoves andsheets there. We've no reason to stay in the garden.

Aloneagain, the serpent oozes a single tear as Eve walks with that man away from the garden.

Barebranches flaring like capittaries are the only hopehere, a lasting disarray in the garden.

65

N I K K I CAP 5 is a senior Psychology from Burlington, North Carolina.

major and Creative Writing

C H R I 5 CAS T R 0 - RAP P L is a senior Communications Creative Writing minor from Raleigh, North Carolina.

F. R Y AND 0 W D Y is a senior English major with Writing and Music from Auburn, Alabama.

CAR 0 LIN E F ISH E R is a senior English minor from Charlotte, North Carolina.

I

major

minor

major and

minors in Creative

and Creative

Writing

G REG HAL LOR A N is a freshman Studio Art major with minors in Creative Writing and Music from Raleigh, North Carolina.

M I C H ELL E Hie K 5 is a senior English major with minors in Comparerive Literature and Creative Writing from Lafayette, Louisiana.

REB E ( C A minor.

H0 LM E5

is a junior Physics

major

and Creative Writing

E M J L Y H Y L TON is a senior Arabic and Political Science double-major and Creative Writing minor from Asheville, North Carolina.

K ERR Y K E L 5 0 is a junior Studio Art and Psychology Creative Writing minor from Charlotte, North Carolina.

M 0 R I A H L E FEB V R E North Carolina.

is a senior Studio

Art

double-major and

major from Durham)

J 0 H N M eEL WEE is a senior Comparative Literature and Cultural Studies double-major and Creative Writing minor from Charlotte, North Carolina.

66

AS \ A N I (0

L E M 0 R R I S is a freshman

majorfrom Salisbury, North DEL A N EY NO LAN

is a senior International

Writing minor from Winston-Salem, MAR

Y (A THE R I N E

PEN

0 LEis

Studies major and Creative

North Carolina.

N

is a senior Photojournalism

CreativeWriting minor from Wilmington, HAN NA H RID

Speech and Hearing Sciences

Carolina.

a sophomore

major and

North Carolina.

English major and Creative Writing

minor from Hickory, North

Carolina.

A R IE L R U DOL PHis

a senior Studio Art major with minors in Creative

Writing and Graphic Design from Asheville, North REB E(( A S M \ THis

Carolina.

a senior Studio Art and Journalism

double-major

from Kinston, North Carolina.

LA U R E N TAL LEY

is a junior Studio Art major and Creative Writing

minor from Albemarle, North Carolina.

LE 5 LIE

E R I N T A Y LOR

is a senior English

major and Creative Writ-

ing minor from Clayton, North Carolina.

M I C HE LAW

A G N E R is a freshman

Studio Art major and Pre~Med stu-

dent from Chicago, Illinois.

ALE X WAR 0

is a junior Philosophy

and Psychology

double-major

and

Creative Writing minor from Raleigh, North Carolina.

J 0 5 H W 0 LON I C K is a sophomore English and Peace, War, and Defense double-major and Creative

Writing

minor from Pinehurst,

North Carolina.

67

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