Hulltown 360 v3 i1. Disconnection.

Hulltown

360

Disconnection.

Hulltown 360 Literary Journal Volume 3 Issue 1 Fall 2012

Editor Jim Burfoot Managing Editors Tom Vanderlinden (Visual Art) Sandra Zona (Poetry and Fiction) Journal Design Tom Vanderlinden Lady Grammar Sandra Zona Hulltown 360 is published online biannually. Please check the web site for publishing schedule and submission guidelines: www.hulltown360.org Hulltown 360 acknowledges the encouragement and support of our families, friends, and the outstanding literary journals we read online and in print.

Hulltown 360 holds First Electronic Rights and First North American Rights. We are the first publication to feature the works online and in print.

ISSN 2158-1363

Hulltown

360 Volume 3 Issue 1, Fall 2012

Jessica Tyner 5 Symptoms of an End

Vivian Rinaldo 6 Nannie’s Cat

Mike Berger 15 The Old Merc

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Joanna M. Weston 17 Dentist’s Chair

Rob Schultz 18 DJ Dreams

Linda Crate 20 a friendship spoiled like troy

Keith Moul 21 Oasis Blacktop

fiction

Frank Scozzari 22 The Shaman’s Eye Holly Day 32 Sunday Morning Miracles

poetry

33

Michael Fitzgerald-Clarke 34 So Invisible a Thing Rich Ives 36 Breakfast Alone

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Richard Kostelanetz 39 Complete Stories 2012 Christopher Jozef Chrobak 40 Learning Astronomy Guy R. Beining 44 moUth # 13-16 Robert Mitchell 48 A Sign of the Times

51 52 Where is Hulltown 360?

54 Authors and Artists

Eleanor Leonne Bennett 56 Reza Deghati & Eleanor Leonne Bennett Portrait

art

We finally made it.

Life interrupts.

Believe or not plans are already underway for a Winter 2013 issue. If you have a story, poem, or 2-D art piece you would like to see in H360, please send it to us.

We want you to know that our choices for each issue are not made lightly. There is a great deal of discussion and debate. Sometimes, a piece is just not a good fit. If we made you angry or disheartened with a rejection e-mail, just remember to keep submitting to us or to any of the journals out there.

Don’t take rejection personally.

We’d like to thank and welcome all the writers and artists that have contributed to this issue of Hulltown 360 Literary Journal. (Some have been here before.)

This issue has many wonderful works of literature and art to delight you. Thank you for reading, and enjoy!

J. Burfoot editor@hulltown360.org

Jessica Tyner Symptoms of an End Let me take you back to the Red Woods where we drank cup after cup

of Dutch Brothers hazelnut coffee, sucked the flesh from fish bones

and salty oysters from their homes.

I’d drive you again

over the state line,

my hand on your thick thigh

while the Oregon pines shake with uncertainty

as if they don’t realize

how incredible they are,

and you ask your empty hands, Aren’t these trees big enough?

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Vivian Rinaldo

Nannie’s Cat

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Cat was in the garden. She called him Cat because that’s what he was. She didn’t hold with giving animals people-names. Nannie could hear him squalling at the birds who so deftly avoided his clawless front paws. Chuckling softly, Nannie tied an apron around her ample waist and began setting out the ingredients to make a stack cake. She guarded the recipe jealously; it had been her grandmother’s and not an easy one to replicate. She had kept it only in her memory until her memory started to go, then she wrote it down and put it in her coffee canister. She prayed every night she wouldn’t forget where she’d hidden it. She looked around her sunny yellow kitchen and breathed a prayer of thanks that she could still find it when she needed it.

Her children, scattered out over the state, didn’t like her living alone now, and they strenuously objected to her cooking; they were afraid she’d forget the stove was on and burn the house down around her. She got one meal a day from Meals on Wheels, but the rest of the time they wanted her to eat cereal for breakfast every morning, and a sandwich of some kind each evening for supper. She was not willing to give up cooking for herself, but she taped up notes all over the kitchen saying, “Check the stove” to pacify them.

Nannie sighed and began mixing the ingredients for the stack cake. Her son had disconnected the gas stove, so she wasn’t able to cook with it anymore.

He said he was scared she’d turn it on, forget to light it (it was very old, and she had to light each burner with a match), and die from gas. Nannie was indignant, but she knew arguing that issue was a battle she could never win,

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and she was terrified her children would have her ruled incompetent and send her to an old age home, so she held her tongue. She wondered how long it would be before they refused to let her cook at all. For the time being they were willing to let her continue to use the toaster oven. It had a timer, so even if she burned something, it would eventually shut itself off.

She couldn’t drive; had never learned, and she was at the mercy of her daughter who lived in a small town just west of her own. She hated having to ask Darcy to drive her to the Piggly Wiggly every Saturday; Darcy always made her call and ask, saying she didn’t want to waste a trip if Nannie didn’t really …she taped up notes all need anything that week. Nannie thought her daughter just enjoyed being in control of over the kitchen saying, everything. Darcy was the only child who lived “Check the stove” to close enough to Nannie to help her, so Nannie pacify them. didn’t dare antagonize her. Quietly, while the cake was cooling, she made her grocery list. Milk, eggs, Arm & Hammer baking soda, yeast, baking powder, Eagle brand condensed milk, some ripe bananas, vanilla wafers. For a moment she considered what other items she might need that she’d forgotten. Finally, she rose and went to the pantry.

Opening the door, she saw rows of gleaming Mason jars filled with the vegetables and fruits she had canned the summer before. She dusted them regularly and enjoyed some nearly every day. She was careful not to use them up too quickly because there would be no more. With no stove to cook on, she could no longer can anything, and the few things she still raised in her small garden had to be eaten quickly before they rotted on the ground. She’d used to give away cans of food to her neighbors, but the neighborhood had changed, and she didn’t really know anyone there any more.

When the timer on the toaster oven went off, Nannie took the cake out and placed it on a rack to cool. Back to the list: new potatoes, salt substitute (which she thought tasted like tin foil, but was forced to buy because her children worried about her blood pressure), oleo (she preferred real butter, but Darcy insisted on the fake kind with less cholesterol and fat), Crisco, and vanilla pudding. Putting the list down on the table, she went back to the cooling rack, took the cake and began slicing it crosswise into half-inch

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layers. Once this was done, she pulled out a jar of apple butter (one of the few things she could not make for herself), and began layering cake slices with apple butter between them. When she had all the layers stacked neatly and had spread the final layer of apple butter on top for garnish, she stepped back to see her handiwork. Beautiful, she thought, licking a smear of apple butter off her thumb. She got out the waxed paper and wrapped it carefully around the sides and bottom of the cake. She left the top uncovered for the “frosting” to get solid.

She didn’t have many visitors, except for the Meals-On-Wheels lady, who had so many deliveries to make she didn’t have much time to chat. The …she had the stack preacher came by a couple of times a month to see cake ready, and she her; she appreciated that more, because she lived so could make some far out in the county he had to drive a good while to come. His visits usually only lasted an hour, but he instant coffee if he always called to let her know he was coming, and she came by. always had boiled coffee and cake or muffins for him when he arrived.

The preacher was getting on in years now, too, and the congregation had voted to retire him. They had already brought in a new younger preacher who was getting to know the church and its members, and they had given the old preacher six months to prepare for his retirement.

She was afraid that after he was gone, she’d really be alone. She didn’t much cotton to the new preacher; she’d met him once, and he seemed to be in a great hurry. During the one visit he’d made to her, when he was sitting in her parlor, his movements told her that it was a mere courtesy call, and that he would much rather be somewhere else.

Her phone rang, but she ignored it. It was one of those cell phones with the great big numbers, and she still wasn’t too comfortable with a phone that didn’t have a cord. Mostly she figured it was somebody trying to sell her something or ask her research questions or some other tripe, and she just didn’t have time for that. She still had to clean up her kitchen and do her Bible reading. Everything seemed to take her so much longer lately; she tired easily and had to sit down often, even when she was just standing at the sink washing dishes. Sometimes her heart pained her a bit, but she didn’t tell the

Vivian Rinaldo

children that. She knew if she did, they’d pack her off to the old age home right away.

Now she sat down at her kitchen table for a rest, and while she was resting, it occurred to her that the preacher might have told her he’d visit today. She wasn’t sure she was remembering that right, and it worried her.

But she had the stack cake ready, and she could make some instant coffee if he came by. She did need to change clothes, though; she had flour and baking powder all over her apron and some on her housedress. She got up to head toward the bedroom; suddenly, she felt weak and dizzy and was afraid she might faint. She sat back down abruptly and was surprised when she broke out in a cold sweat. “Why, the Lord have mercy…what on earth is wrong with me?” When the symptoms gradually went away, she relaxed and breathed a sigh of relief. “Well…” she said out loud. “Whatever it was, it’s gone now.” She rose from the chair, started toward the door to the hall and her bedroom, but she suddenly found herself short of breath and so tired…so tired. As she slid down the wall to the floor, she thought she might’ve gotten up out of the chair too quickly; after all, she wasn’t young anymore. She sat there on the linoleum for a few minutes; as she waited for the weakness and dizziness to pass, she saw a paw reach through the kitty door and feel around, flexing nonexistent claws, a head and then a large ginger-colored body slinked through the opening.

Once all of him was in the house, the cat stood still staring at Nannie sitting on the floor, and if cats could have an expression, Nannie felt sure his was one of surprise. He eased along the wall to his food and water dishes, keeping her in sight, but not making direct eye contact. As he lowered his head to nibble delicately on his dry food, she was sure she was still present in his peripheral vision. He finished his snack and lapped up a bit of water to cleanse his palate; the ritual of cleaning his face with licked paws began, and he studiously avoided looking at her, but she was sure she was keeping an eye on her.

“Oh, Cat, if only you could dial a phone. I think I’m in a mess of trouble here.” Nannie sighed and eased herself down into a prone position on the floor, pressing her hot face against the cool linoleum. She knew she was trembling, and she was disgusted at her weakness. “For heaven’s sake, snap out of it, old woman. The preacher’ll be here in a while, and he’ll see to you.”

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Vivian Rinaldo

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It frustrated and frightened her that she wasn’t sure if he was really coming that day or not. She flattened herself out on her back and folded her arms under her head for a cushion. The shortness of breath and weakness were just as real, but the dizziness had abated a little. “I’ll just rest here for a minute, and I’ll be fine. I just overdid, cooking in this hot kitchen.” The kitchen wasn’t especially hot, and she was shaking with cold, but she refused to pay attention to that.

“Maybe I just need to rest a bit. I did scrub the bathroom this morning.”

She looked at the cat for reassurance, but he had decided that his toilet was finished, and she saw the stub of his tail exiting through the kitty door. “Yes, that’s it; that is it, isn’t it, Lord?” she asked, looking up toward the ceiling. She often talked to God out loud; that was one of the nice things about living alone, not having someone think you’re off your rocker if you think out loud. “I’m not ready to go yet; I feel like you have more work for me to do here, but if you’re ready for me, just let me know. The ladies Sunday School class will just have to get along without me.” She chuckled to herself, knowing that the minute she was gone, her best friend and sometime bitterest rival, Carol, would jump into the role of teacher that had been Nannie’s at the Church of the Most High God for thirty-five years. Carol had just been waiting for an opportunity to show Nannie up. “That’s not a very Christian attitude, old woman,” she scolded herself. “Carol will make a fine Sunday School teacher. She has that big, booming voice,” she chuckled. “No one’ll fall asleep in her class, I can tell you.”

The laughter in her voice died away, and she became reflective. She remembered when she’d moved into this old house – it was 1950, and she had just married her husband. She sighed, “Oh, Harv was fine, Lord. He was handsome and kind – kinda quiet, but strong, and he loved me good. Oh, yes, he did.” She remembered with yearning holding him in her arms. “I loved that old man till the day he passed. He was ever’thing to me. He was a good daddy to our children, and a man of faith and constancy.” Nannie felt tears trickle down her face and find their way into her ears. “I’ll be glad to see him if you’re ready for me to, Lord. Let him know I’m coming, will you? He startles kinda easy,” she laughed. The laughter was choked; she felt a little strangled, like she’d sipped hot coffee, and it’d gone down the wrong way.

The phone on the counter began to ring again. She relaxed a little; if her children were calling, they would know she was in trouble because she hardly

Vivian Rinaldo

ever let her phone ring without answering it. They would come and check on her. It rang and rang and rang; she had never let her children install the answering machine they had argued about with her for years. She didn’t understand how it worked, and she always felt it wasn’t polite to make people talk to a box when they wanted to talk to you. So the phone rang on.

“Well, for heaven’s sake,” she grunted and tried to get up, but her head was swimmy, and she just couldn’t do it. She managed to drag herself back to her chair, but the chair was an old cane-bottomed one she’d had for years, and it was a little wobbly in the joints. “Just like me,” she laughed, and again, her muscles went weak. She was able to get back against the wall, and she began to grow calmer, but no less annoyed at the continued ringing of the phone.

Eventually, the ringing stopped, and she thought, ‘It must have been a sales call. No one I know would let the phone ring that long, even if they thought I was on the commode!’

“That’s why I feel so Then she was glad she couldn’t get I didn’t eat!” to it; she hated sales calls. Southern courtesy demanded that she listen to the spiel they delivered and turn it down politely, and that aggravated her.

She hated being forced to speak to people she didn’t know, and she hated even worse not being able to help people. Her children thought she was ridiculous for listening to the telemarketers, and they encouraged her to just hang up on them, but she just couldn’t bring herself to do it. She always thought they might have children to support, and that the least she could do is listen, even if she couldn’t afford to buy anything they were selling.

The smell of the stack cake tantalized her, and she thought if she could just get up off the floor, maybe she’d have just a smidge of it until the preacher came. There was a pressure in her stomach, and she thought maybe she’d forgotten to eat that day. Since it was a Saturday, the Meals on Wheels didn’t run, and she usually just made herself some instant oatmeal for lunch.

Frustrated, she really couldn’t remember. “That’s why I feel so puny. I didn’t eat!”

The paw reappeared through the cat door, swatting the rubber piece aside and the long ginger body followed the paw. This time the cat sniffed at the few pieces of dry cat food in his dish, ignored the water entirely, and walked

puny.

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calmly over to Nannie, still seated on the floor. He pushed his head against her hip, insisting on a petting. When she didn’t respond, he looked indignantly at her and pushed again, this time against her leg, then turned, flipped his tail so she could see his rosebud, and settled down beside her, purring loudly and grunting with the effort.

Nannie reached down and stroked his bristly fur. He didn’t shed too badly, but every time she swept the kitchen, it seemed she swept up more gingercolored fur than anything else. She had considered trying to use the fur for something; may to make a nest for the hummingbirds that frequent the feeder she’d hung for them from a nail on the eave of the house. She’d hung it high enough so the cat couldn’t reach it, and had used fishing line to keep the ants off the sugar-water-filled bowl.

The phone began to ring again, and Nannie thought she really ought to try to answer it. It was all the way across the kitchen on the far counter, and she wasn’t sure she could get there. She didn’t want to crawl there – it would be terrible if the preacher looked in the back door and saw her dragging her bottom across her kitchen floor – but she was sure she couldn’t get back up again…at least until she could rest some more. The feeling of fullness in her chest was starting to subside a little, and she thought maybe she could get into a chair and just scoot it across the floor. She knew that would damage the linoleum, and Darcy would give her heck about it, but what was she supposed to do? The phone kept on and on and it was starting to make her head hurt.

With great effort, much groaning and puffing, she managed to drag herself up into a kitchen chair. Resting, she thought if she could get close enough to the counter, she could maybe scoot the chair close enough to the phone to reach it. She swept some loose grey hairs behind her ears and tried to rise from the chair, leaning on the sink. Her limbs were weak, but she was able to rest on her forearms and elbows enough to reach out to the phone. By the time she had mastered this movement, the cursed thing had stopped ringing.

Letting out an aggravated puff of air, she collapsed back into the chair, leaning forward to cool her hot cheek against the stainless steel of the sink.

She rested there a good while, thinking about what might happen if she were going to meet the Lord. She was fairly certain the children would sell her house, probably before the first clump of dirt had hit the top of her coffin.

They had never liked it, said it was too small for visitors – she always chuckled

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a bit at that – and that they didn’t understand why, if she liked such a small space, she didn’t just move into an assisted living apartment like her friend Carol. The truth was, since her old man had died, Nannie had grown used to being alone, and she liked it. Except for Darcy’s Saturday obligation and the preacher’s visits, she enjoyed the silence of her own company. When she needed someone to talk to, she just conversed with the cat. He was a very good listener.

A dull ache started in Nannie’s jaw and throat and spread down her arm.

She began to be afraid. She knew the symptoms of a heart attack – her own father had died at the table after complaining of indigestion and gas from the greasy pork chops her momma had fixed him for supper. She was afraid – oh, not so much of dying, but of laying here till someone bothered to come check on her. She didn’t want the preacher to be the one to find her. Not in her dusty housedress and flour-covered apron. “Lord,” she croaked out, “Lord, don’t let me go like this. I ain’t in no shape to meet you and my old man.” She knew she was right with her Maker; she’d been washed in the blood of the Lamb most of her life. She just didn’t want to meet him right now. Not with the kitchen a mess, her clothes a mess, and a stack cake that needed to be covered and put in the Fridgedaire.

The phone began to ring again, and this time she felt hope with each ring.

She struggled to reach to her left and finally was able to touch, then move the phone near enough to grasp it in her one good hand. The other had gone strangely cold. She flipped it open and in a near-whisper said, “Yep?” “Momma, how many times have I told you it’s rude to answer the phone like that,” Darcy grumbled. “What if it was somebody important calling you?

They’d think you were some kind of white trash. Oh, never mind,” she hurried on, “the real reason I called you is ‘cause I can’t carry you to the Piggly Wiggly today. I’ve got a meeting with my ladies from the Junior League, and I clean forgot about it. You can wait till tomorrow to go to the store, can’t you?”

Nannie took a breath to speak, but managed only a strangled sound.

“Oh, Momma, for heaven’s sake, it’s only one day,” Darcy groused.

“Besides, you know you hate to go anyhow, and you can’t be out of everything already. I’ll be there tomorrow around noon, and we can go then. All right?”

Without waiting for a response, Darcy pressed on. “Okay, then, well, I’ll see

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you tomorrow. I have to go. Bye, momma.” She hung up while Nannie was still trying to marshall her thoughts into a cry for help.

Nannie dropped the phone and slumped back into the chair. The cat leapt onto the counter and rubbed his muzzle against Nannie’s hand. She petted him absently. She guessed that it wasn’t in the Lord’s plan for her to be able to ask Darcy for help. Likely she’d have thought Nannie was exaggerating anyhow; she paid little attention to her mother’s complaints of ailments. Darcy was of the opinion that human frailties should be dealt with as mind over matter, and she had very little patience with what she considered her mother’s weaknesses.

Darcy was of the “Well, Cat,” Nannie said softly, rubbing his opinion that human velvety-soft ears, “I guess the time has come. I know frailties to be should be you won’t understand this, but you been pretty dealt with as mind over good company for me, and I hate to leave you. You matter… have plenty of food and water, but please don’t mess around my stack cake. I reckon the mourners will want that.” Once again, she laid her cheek on the cool counter and closed her eyes. The pain had subsided a little, but the numbness in her hand and the ache in her jaw were constant. * * * “Miz Miller?” the young, handsomely dressed preacher called through the screen door. “Hello? Miz Miller? Are you there, ma’am?” He glanced at his watch, only an hour till the UFC title bout on Channel 76 – his only guilty pleasure – and he was only making this visit because the old preacher was feeling ill. “Miz Miller?” he called once again, then turned to go. As he stepped down off the porch, he thought, ‘I’m sure as heck not gonna miss my show to visit with some old biddy who doesn’t even like me.’ He climbed back into his dark-blue SUV and drove away.

Mike Berger The Old Merc The old building stood for fifty years.

It was a quaint and cheery place. Bright

lights and glitzy walls were fun, dabbed with paint like a Monet.

You name it, the old Merc had it from nuts

and bolts to chocolate chip cookies. The little lunch counter served anything as long as it was chicken nuggets.

There were trinkets, gadgets and gizmos, and a variety of shoes. You could buy a dozen

roses if you don’t mind the smell of plastic.

The old Merc had to go; its bricks were crumbling and some stucco came sloughing off. They will

replace it with a concrete shell with the personality of a mud fence with gray tiled floors and blue walls.

Hospitals are brighter.

The old Merc was a study of people. People

came just to browse; it was a fairy land for kids.

With the new super store people will hustle,

not stopping to enjoy the magic. Get in, get out, return to their cardboard world.

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Joanna M. Weston Dentist’s Chair (Abecedarian) Zombie-zoned out and

yelling, anaesthetized, as x-rays are examined

willingly by the dentist.

Veneers will be applied where unbrushed, unflossed; then

teeth will return to pristine white

scaled and sealed to perfection with root canals explained, all

queries duly answered and

prophylaxis recommended annually.

Orthodontic problems

neatly dealt with in childhood, those malocclusions changed with braces.

Light scaling achieved while

kibitzing of local politics and jokes about implants.

Ignoring blood and spit the

hygienist scrapes unlovely plaque grinding carefully the while.

Fluoride can be applied over enamels old and new after dentists finish drilling out cavities caused

by eating chocolate after dinner.

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Rob Schultz DJ Dreams This is how it begins: You stand

outside copping a smoke with thought that inside a song is running out, cue tone failing to fire. Dead air.

Nightmare of radio. You dream dead air even in sleep—

melody fading, but mike won’t open, or jaw’s so tight you can’t speak

as dream dims with last flick of mare’s tail.

Curse of speech errors you learn to overcome, turning faux pas 18

into Freudian slip, though never fear of endless stutter—stuck, say, on an alveolar like d

(“duh-duh-duh-duh”) into a kind of eternity, or till “death” comes.

Worse than slip-ups on-air,

soft-pedal of sponsor’s name,

un-pregnant pause, are nightmares off, dreams in sleep of equipment failing but for the mike,

gotta keep talkin’—no lights

blinking, or hum of tape cart

Rob Schultz

or spin of old turntable,

just an open mike with VU meter wavering til you run out of something to say…

Other dreams have you lost

in a hallway, can’t find your way, studio door vanishing

or otherwise sealed to sight

as tune plays down to last iambic beat.

In this nightmare, you search

for that door, a friendly newsperson even shows you the way, but

you can’t locate it; you wander through other studios, but

not where your song is ending.

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Linda M. Crate a friendship spoiled like troy the grisly remains of a friendship we once shared lay on the ground in carnage blood dripped from the walls in burnt sienna blooms of scarlet lilies loyalty limped leglessly upon the ground as he tried to pull himself up but found that he could not

betrayal rankled the air with tension secrets of our souls lay bare upon the floor in spools of silver thread

more gossamer than the tissue paper wings of the butterflies i was always so fond of i watch as you take rose petals to seal your wounds — you don’t say a word to me, 20

you only leave your stain in pomegranates -- a bitter taste that i could never stand i watch you go but remain silent the writing on the wall is a missive that tells me things will never be the same i wait until you’re gone,

then use moon silver to seal my fissures in as if they never happened, as if we still laughed together,

holding hands as we ran together,

laughing through all of life’s thunderstorms because we had each other all that has decayed into troy’s ruin

Keith Moul

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Oasis Blacktop

Frank Scozzari The Shaman’s Eye

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The chest wound was deep and Ben Gordon knew he had to stop the bleeding and stop it soon, or he’d lose yet another patient. After all he had been through in the past week with all the wounded and displaced refuges pouring in from the region north, the delayed shipment of medical supplies, and their water source going foul, losing another patient now would be more than he could bear.

The boy, barely sixteen, lay beneath a hanging fluorescent light. Beads of perspiration covered his dark black skin. The wound, caused by a single slash of a machete, split his chest diagonally from above his left breast down nearly to his waist.

“You are not going to die,” Gordon said. You are too young to die.

The boy’s eyes flashed up at Gordon then he turned his head away and fixed a gaze on the southeast corner of the tent. Squatted there was the old medicine man. He sat on a woven, reed mat with colorful ceremonial beads draped down from his neck, and he held a long spear upright in his hand.

“I have seen him before,” Gordon said.

Kairubu, Gordon’s young Tanzanian aide, looked over at the old medicine man. “Yes,” he replied.

“He’s been here several times this week,” Gordon said.

“Yes.” “Why does he come?”

“He come for the dead.”

Gordon looked up at Kairubu. “What?”

“He come for the dead.”

“Is he an undertaker or something?”

“No, he is Malaika.”

“Malaika?”

“Yes.” “A witchdoctor?”

“He takes the dead to the High Place.”

Frank Scozzari

The boy began to shake. His skin looked pale and clammy.

“He’s going into shock,” Gordon said.

Kairubu pulled the makeshift I.V. stand along side the stainless-steel operating table and opened the flow-bag wide. He then went to the end of the table and lifted the boy’s legs to his shoulders. Gordon, meanwhile, grabbed a handful of gauze and held it to the wound, but blood immediately oozed up through it.

“He’s hemorrhaging again,” Gordon said. He tossed the gauze to the floor, grabbed a fresh handful, and pushed it deeper into the wound. “Let his legs down.”

Kairubu promptly complied.

“Hold this!” Gordon said, grabbing Kairubu’s hand and placing it against the gauze. Gordon took a syringe, drew it full of medicine, and injected it into the boy’s arm. He held the boy steady waiting …in a land where it was more for the medicine to take economical to use machetes for killing effect. He could see the blood again oozing up than bullets… through the gauze.

What’s happened to your magic? he asked himself. What’s become of your science to make people live? To repair what men have done?

Gordon knew, in a land where it was more economical to use machetes for killing than bullets, it was easy to loose faith. Surrounded by the daily carnage of man’s brutality against itself, and despite the World’s efforts to stop it, it seemed he and the other Red Cross volunteers were all destined to fail.

The boy’s eyes remained fixed on the old medicine man.

Gordon glanced over at the old man.

“Is he kin?” he asked Kairubu.

“No.” “He’s upsetting the boy,” Gordon said.

“The boy would want him here.”

“Why?” “He is special.”

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“Is he kin?”

“I said no.”

“Then, he must leave.”

“But Mr. Ben, you don’t understand. It is a good thing he is here. It is African tradition.”

“You’re not convincing me, Kairubu.”

“He will ensure the boy’s safe passage to the spirit world.”

“What?”

Passage? Gordon thought. What passage? “Wait a minute… you aren’t saying…?” Gordon stopped, “He will ensure the boy’s turned to Kairubu, and said firmly, “Unless he’s safe passage the boy’s grandfather or something, he must to the spirit world.” leave.”

“I tell you Mr. Ben. It is a good thing. The boy would want him here.”

“Sorry Kairubu, this boy isn’t going to die, not today, not on my table. Tell the old man he must leave.”

“But Mr. Ben…” “Get him out of here please, now!”

Kairubu’s white eyes flashed from his jet-black skin. He reluctantly motioned to the soldier at the doorway and said in Swahili, “Chukua mzee nje.

Toke!” The soldier took the old man by his long, slender arm, and escorted him to the exit.

Gordon watched as the old man moved slowly toward the door, and as he did, the old man turned and looked back at Gordon and for the first time Gordon saw clearly his face. He had dark, sullen eyes which were sunken in his head. They appeared as black canker sores from beneath snow-white brows.

It dawned on Gordon that old man’s presence coincided with the deaths of many of his patients. In the past week alone there was the old woman on Tuesday, the little girl with dysentery, and the man who had lost his arm to a machete. Each time the old man had been sitting there, like he was now, a buzzard waiting for the carrion.

As the tent flap closed behind him, Gordon looked over at Kairubu. “Is that your Dark Africa?”

Kairubu did not answer.

Frank Scozzari

Gordon slowly lifted the gauze from the boy’s chest. The wound had stabilized. The blood had begun to coagulate. Gordon sighed.

“We’re getting it, Kairubu,” he said. He dabbed the wound with the gaze.

“Yeah, that’s the way it should look.”

Kairubu broke a little smile.

“You are going to be fine,” Gordon said, wiping the young man’s forehead with his free hand.

The wound was deep, down to the sternum, and the tissue surrounding the lesion was blue and swollen. But it was a clean cut, as if it had been done with a surgical knife, which would make it easier to close. He took a nylon string from the tray, threaded it through a needle, and began to suture the wound. It is time to make your magic, Gordon thought, to use your hands to repair what man has done.

“He does not come for everyone,” Kairubu said, returning to the old medicine man, “only for special people, those with a pure heart. A heart must be pure.”

“Yes?” Gordon replied, sarcastically. “It must be real special to be dead with a pure heart.”

“It is African custom,” Kairubu assured. “It is part of life.”

“Okay, I’m sorry.”

“He takes them to Peponi,” Kairubu said, “a place way up in the mountain.

It is a beautiful place, most beautiful place in all of Africa. You can see far out across the Savannah, and all the animal life is one and the same, and all the places you wish you could be are there, all in one. It is like your heaven, the dwelling place of God.” Gordon looked skeptical. Being a man of medicine, trained in science, he had always been cynical about such things. He was not one to believe in something that was not supported by science, but he did not want to offend his young friend. “Is it like Arusha?” he asked.

“Is Arusha a place of peace and beauty for you?”

“Yes. It is my favorite spot in Africa.”

“Then it is like Arusha. It is beauty in its purest form; beauty of the natures, and beauty of the souls.”

Gordon smiled. He knew of this place; a place high in the mountains where his mind could go to rest; to find asylum from the horrors of this

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Frank Scozzari

26

world. It was a place he wished he could be now. And now, as he sutured up the wound, he recalled a time he was in Arusha, especially beautiful after the long rains of March and April, although it was September now and the rains had not come yet. The rains are good, he thought. They wash away all the blood and horror of war; they cleanse what man has done and bring back to Africa what it has always been, a beautiful place of natural bounty.

“What did you call him?” Gordon asked.

“Malaika.”

“Malaika?”

“Yes. It means Special One, touched by the spirit of the animal world, like an angel is touched by your God. It is a great honor if he comes for you.”

“Yesterday they were no one. Today they are the honored dead,” Gordon recited softly.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“We all die. We all do not go to Peponi.”

“If you don’t mind, I think I’ll pass on this Peponi for now.”

“Peponi… heaven… no different, Mr. Ben, just called different things.”

“Heaven waits only for those who believe,” Gordon said. He looked down at the boy. “He believes, especially now,” he said. “Here, hold this.”

Kairubu held the gauze against the boy’s chest as Gordon tied off the last suture.

It finished nicely, Gordon thought. The sutures were well-spaced and pulled tightly together against the skin. He cleaned the wound with an antiseptic.

“You are well!” Gordon announced triumphantly to the boy.

As he smiled at the boy and then turned his head to Kairubu, a gush of wind outside whipped the roof canvas like a blanket. All those inside the surgical tent glanced skyward as if waiting for something. The militia had set up eighty-millimeter L´egers in the low-lying hills to the south and had been periodically bombarding the camp.

“Look at us!” Gordon said. “We’ve all lost our nerve.”

He dropped his eyes back down to the boy. The boy looked relieved and alive again, and his skin was back to its beautiful natural color.

With Kairubu’s assistance, Gordon helped the boy upright. Together they

Frank Scozzari

dressed the wound with gauze and wrapped it completely with bandages around his chest.

“He will need plenty of rest and plenty of water,” Gordon said. “Water is best, but hot tea with lemon juice is good too. The antibiotics must continue all night.” Gordon looked down at his youthful patient and smiled. “Take special care of this one for me. I will see him first thing in the morning.”

Gordon pulled the plastic surgical gloves from his hands and laid them on the tray. He grabbed Kairubu by the shoulders and shook him playfully. “You did well, Kairubu. We did well! I’ll be in my tent if you need me.”

Gordon exited the surgical tent still wearing his blood-covered apron. He was surprised to see the old medicine man seated across the dirt corridor, there in the long shadows of an old wooden cart with his legs crossed and his long spear held tall beside him. The cart, drawn by a single mule and oddly sporting car tires, was empty now, except for a single throw rug which lay flattened in the bed.

Gordon took off his apron and rolled it into a ball. “Sorry to disappoint you old man,” he said.

He glanced down the long corridor between the tents. There were thousands of white canvas tents, and smoke coming from many makeshift cooking fires, and there were children playing, kicking up the African dust into the late afternoon light. The sun’s rays caught the dust and with the silhouetted children dancing beneath it, for a moment Gordon saw beauty. It was good to see beauty again, Gordon thought.

Just beyond, in the hills below the fading light, he knew, the genocide continued under the hands of the Hutu militia.

As Gordon turned south heading toward his tent and passed the medicine man, he nodded and offered a smile. The old medicine man’s face was too dark to reveal an expression, but Gordon noticed the crown of his snow-white head turned and followed him.

Sorry to keep you waiting old man… Gordon thought, waiting for nothing.

Today was not your day. But don’t worry old man. If it is the dead you seek, there’ll be plenty others for you. * * * Gordon lay back on his cot staring at the canvas-ceiling. At a quarter to six, the evening attendant came to spray the tent with mosquito repellant.

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Frank Scozzari

28

When he finished, Gordon asked him to bring some beer. In several minutes the attendant returned with a bucket of river-drawn water with three bottles of Tusker beer in it. Gordon thanked the boy, tipped him the customary Swiss franc, and sent him on his way. He popped off the top of one of the beer bottles and took a long drink from it.

The smell of the insect repellant was still strong, so Gordon began opening the tent windows, rolling up the canvas of each and tying it off. When he reached the door, he pulled back the canvas and was startled to see the old Shaman’s cart parked across the way. Squatted in the shadow was the old medicine man.

“Sorry to deny you a corpse today, old one,” he said. “I hope you are not upset by it.”

It was not I who denied you. It was the power of a surgical knife. You may know death better than I, you may not despise it as I do, but it is I who holds the knowledge of life… the science of reparation.

Gordon shook his head, fastened the outside clasps, and retreated back to his cot.

It was true! he thought. The old medicine man had been there in the surgical room each time a patient had died that week. But today he was denied.

He lay down, took a long swig from the Tusker beer, and recommenced his long, thoughtful gaze at the ceiling. He considered now, how it was that he came to this wretched place, “Sorry to deny you a this indention in the earth where two rivers met where the Red Cross had pitched the first of three corpse today, old one,” refugee camps closest to the war. Everyone coming he said. “I hope you are out of Rwanda was a refugee in the strictest sense not upset by it.” of the word, starved and wounded, desperate for shelter and food, and medical care, some missing limbs, and if they could walk, carrying all they had in their arms.

Gordon retraced his steps as though he were telling the story to someone.

He remembered how there had been plenty of pilots at the hotel in Nyanza.

Wherever there are U.N. people there are always plenty pilots around looking to make a dollar. But none of them were willing to fly them to Ngara, even

Frank Scozzari

though a flight had been pre-arranged with the Red Cross. That should have been a sign, in and of itself. Still, after an afternoon of searching, their team leader tracked one down, and because the money was good, they had been guaranteed a flight to their distant outpost. The following morning, they were led to a dirt tarmac where they all squeezed into a small, Spanish-built CASA. They made themselves comfortable among crates of medicine and food destined for the refugee camp. The ninety-minute flight was uneventful, except for the trip over Lake Victoria. From the altitude of the plane, they could see tiny islands floating in the turquoise water. It was shocking to all of them when they realized they were bloated bodies floating in the water, turned white by the sun.

They landed on a dusty runway surrounded by a tent city that stretched for many miles. A fleet of Land Rovers arrived to collect their supplies and take them to the U.N. headquarters. The place was a conglomerate of relief organizations – the Red Cross, MSF, CARE, and the Red Crescent.

In the morning they headed out for the border, an hour to travel fifteen miles. They felt like salmon swimming upstream against a ferocious river.

There were endless lines of Hutus and Tutsi, people carrying the last of their possessions; even children carried bundles. Old men carried firewood, now a valuable commodity. It took them all day to reach the Tanzanian border post on the eastern shore of the Kagera River. There was no longer a need for visas - there was not much of a government left. They were waved across with little fuss. They crossed the bridge high above the Kagera River. He could see bodies floating downstream. It is strange, he thought, having just a day earlier been in a St. Louis airport, and now seeing bodies in a river. There were clusters of children, newly orphaned and wandering around with blank expressions of their faces. He remembered being stopped by armed members of the RPF Rwandese Patriotic Front. They were questioned and identified, and allowed to pass. Their Tutsi driver didn’t fare as well. The guards treated him like a deserter and questioned his ownership of the vehicle. He was escorted away to a nearby building and never seen again.

There was a group of four European Red Cross volunteers stranded on the roadside. The tires on their vehicle had been blown when they had run over sabotage spikes which had been laid across the road. They had continued on until their jeep had gone down to its undercarriage in the mud. They loaded

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30

as much of their medical supplies as they could into their Land Rover, and they had room for only one; a Swiss nurse who sat herself in the back among the supply crates, her knees cramped to her chest.

Finally they reach this godforsaken outpost; this place where streams of broken humanity poured down into a hollow in the earth. It had been five months now that he had been there, five months too long.

Now in his mind Gordon saw the children playing outside the surgical tent.

He saw the long columns of white dust they kicked up and how the afternoon sunlight filtered through it so nicely.

It is good to see the beauty again, he thought. It is good to find an island of beauty in a sea of war. There were times he thought he’d never see beauty again.

He took another drink from his beer and rested his head back on the pillow. * * * It came suddenly, a flap of wind against the tent canvas, a loud gusting sound, followed by that awful screeching. In his mind he knew what was coming, but he lay there hopelessly paralyzed. There was nothing he could do.

The sound of splitting air was followed by a thunderous roar and a blinding flash. Then there was nothingness.

When he awoke, he found himself in the center of the rubble of what remained of his tent. The air was full of dust and smoke, and the smell of sulfur. His legs had no feeling, nor did his torso. He was not sure if he still had legs, or if they had been blown off by the blast.

I must check my body, completely as a physician would check it, he thought.

But his hands would not move.

There was a silhouette above him. He realized he was not alone. Slowly a face came into focus.

Kneeling above him was the old medicine man.

Gordon tried to move, restlessly, but could not manage even the slightest of movement. Fighting it, finally giving in, he eased back and looked up into the deep, dark canker-sores which were the old man’s eyes. In the second past, which seemed to be a millennium, he saw into another world. Within the

Frank Scozzari

old man’s eyes was the accumulation of all the colors of the earth; of all the magnificent spirits of animal kingdom; and of all the benevolence of mankind.

Gordon’s mind faded back into darkness.

The next thing he knew he was inside the back of a Land Rover racing swiftly across the Savannah. He could feel the ground rolling swiftly past beneath him. He was so thankful that he was alive and had survived the blast. But where was it that they were taking him?

He lifted himself up and looked out across the countryside. He was amazed to see the beautiful green hills of Arusha. It was strange, he thought, to see the grass so green in September. The rains must have come early.

He lowered his head back down in the bed and pictured the lovely green hills of Arusha rolling past. It was good to see beauty again, he thought. At last, he had returned to his favorite place in Africa, to Arusha.

31

Holly Day Sunday Morning Miracles my son thinks I’m amazing because I can catch

the tiny spotted toads that swarm the riverbank with my bare hands

he runs after them as they

retreat into the long, wild grasses,

smacking his hands together as he

tries to anticipate where they’ll jump next and I amaze him

because I can reach down,

slip my fingers under their fragile velvet bodies and pluck them 32

from the cool, green stones of cattail rushes, finding their hiding places every time, like magic

remembering myself at his age,

I’m a little amazed at the ease of it all

33

Michael Fitzgerald-Clarke So Invisible a Thing for Beverly Taylor

“The loveliest trick of the Devil is to convince you that he does not exist!”

— Charles Baudelaire

I play, nonchalant. The wheel succumbs, and I am rich.

In the back of his truck, Doug Jones choreographs

the Zumba, in his lunch break, for the cameras, and the Ohio winter is perfumed with the scent of $100 bills. The red velvet, the sensuous backdrop

of the gaming room, feels the sweat of palms, but 34

it cloys, unhealthy. Your routine wholesomely drips, no opiates, just a fluent appeal to the goddess of

health: Hygeia, take my dance, my blood diamond offering of self, melodiously, and while Leonardo

DiCaprio is cute, and rumour says there are many

devils, it is the Devil himself who manufactured that

truck, if we believe in the cult of the body. You dance on air in unbelief – thankfully so – you and I share

Michael Fitzgerald-Clarke

*

that hypersonic sense that nothing travels faster

than moderation. But am I obsessed with mathematics of chance? Has my nonchalance become flabby?

I play on, and so invisible a thing, the soundless

music of your soul, cures me of flaunting my cancer, the very wide, very flat, very splayed display of vanities that, oh, so cool, I try to hide.

The wheel turns. The Zumba class continues.

Let us swap, and as we do, my luck changes,

my wins become lasting; and as you watch, but do not play, and the splotches of sweat dry on

your t-shirt, truly, no outfit is complete without a

little cat hair: a Persian kitten is rubbing up a gaming table’s leg, and your leggings, Beverly, are next.

35

Rich Ives Breakfast Alone in this cup the sun is already stepping out in this cup the moon awakens to loss in this cup their love drips they chase each other

half-way round the world it’s the same cup

but you can’t drink from the world half-way round why aren’t we lit as they are from beyond us

if you know what’s good for you

you won’t be half full of yourself 36

you won’t tip over

you won’t swallow too soon

you won’t just stir yourself up this cup has so much emptiness in it you could put yourself here time after time and still be

drunk with that particular kind of happiness that babies you and might actually be you

a wooden machine gun firing swallow-bullets into the cloudless birthday cake goes well with coffee and sunlight weather inhibits the cup

Rich Ives

I’ll take my fingers with me and notarize the intention you’ll have to be there to be everything I think often my thoughts are heavier than that

but in this cup something is starting that started before in this cup the bottom is on the top because in this cup you’re already here

chase the cup around the cupless perimeter

it won’t break it won’t spill it won’t taste you acrobatic dinner utensils and winged handguns participate in the evening but morning

celebrates transience with fading delight 37

38

Richard Kostelanetz

Complete Stories 2012

Knowing that his artistic success was false and thus would be short-lived, he invested his burgeoning income shrewdly and spent the remainder of his life in deserved but solvent obscurity.

39

Christopher Jozef Chrobak

Learning Astronomy

40

I don’t really remember much from my high school days, but I vividly recall when I met Diana. One winter evening I went to the Texan, a low-budget but charming diner always full of interesting characters, because it was the only place open all night where I could smoke countless cigarettes and drink just as many cups of coffee. I often brought along a notebook for appearance’s sake because I preferred to look artsy. I wasn’t a dilettante by any means, but I milked my hobby with the transparent pride of those youthful years.

While I sipped my coffee I dreamt of the lives of those who filled the booths. What did they do during the day? How long had the Harrison Ford lookalike who always wore a red Meijer polo work there? Did he come straight from work? Have a family to go home to? And why did he smoke economy cigarettes instead of name brands? Idleness and inexperience inspired my imagination because the strained social life of a small private school gave me no alternative. I wished for amazing things. * * * I was shaken from my reveries when a young woman brushed by my table on the way to the bathroom and pointed at my shirt, “Eraserhead! Nice!”

The unexpected compliment startled me for two reasons. One, she was one of the only people in the small town who knew of Eraserhead; two, she was unbelievably gorgeous. I didn’t know that she was here because I was so preoccupied with the regulars, but I would’ve much rather fantasized about her.

Christopher Jozef Chrobak

I noticed that astronomy textbooks were scattered on the table from where she came, so I, desperate for conversation and companionship, offered to watch them for her while she used the bathroom. She agreed with a smile, which confused me because I wasn’t quite convinced that this was truly happening.

When she returned I immediately struck up …I offered to help her though I knew conversation that I had absolutely nothing about astronomy. prepared in her absence.

I brought up Eraserhead in attempt to establish a connection using our mutual interest and found that, like me, she was an obscure art film enthusiast. Since I had nothing but free time I spent it all researching the cinematic underground and tracking down copies of rare films. (It wasn’t much, but it was enough to make my otherwise uninteresting life eventful.) Luckily this overly charming college student at least five years my senior dug it. However, the conversation was cut short when she realized her belongings were still in the other booth. There was no way I would let this opportunity slip from my hands, so I offered to help her though I knew absolutely nothing about astronomy.

After we sat down and finally introduced ourselves, I asked Diana about her classes and discovered that, while she was working on astronomy homework, she was an art and design major at a small university the town over. It was only about 20 minutes away, so I immediately, naively, envisioned the possibility of a relationship. As the conversation flowed from school to hobbies to ambitions to philosophies among the confusion of astronomical calculations, a connection solidified; I no longer saw her as unattainable— therefore fiery, exotic and ultimately more tempting—because of an age discrepancy, I saw her simply as the intelligent, interesting and stunning person she was. After I surprisingly learned that she lived alone, save for her cat Dorian Grey, I joked that I “totally needed to meet him.” She agreed. My heart wanted to leap from my chest and embrace her in sheer excitement.

Eventually we gave up concentrating on the exercises scattered on the table and she invited me to her apartment. “It’s only midnight and it’s not due

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42

for another 12 hours. Maybe we could concentrate better with a change of scene…if you don’t mind.” * * * I questioned myself the entire ride there. Here I was, following a stranger to her apartment in another city on a Wednesday evening when I needed to wake up for school in seven hours. The more I reflected, however, the less I cared. This was an opportunity that I would probably never have again. And I already finished my homework. Was sleep deprivation really going to convince me to go home? I called my mom and told her I was staying at Phil’s. Simple as that.

Once we went inside the reality of the evening overwhelmed me. I felt breathless as I stared around her studio: Christmas lights bordered works of her own art on the walls, shelves stacked with DVDs in the corners and various art anthologies kept on the coffee table. I couldn’t find one thing around her apartment that I didn’t enjoy. Her home mirrored mine. Who would’ve thought that a stranger could be so familiar?

I tried to curb my emotional reaction, but failed because the thrill of unexpectedly being welcomed into Diana’s world was too much for my inexperienced self; I simply could not comprehend what I felt. I gained years of experience in our brief relationship and felt like her classmate. All these emotions transported me to an unknown world of maturity. And it was barely after midnight. Her compliment alone swept me off my feet. Where is there to go when your greatest expectations have already been achieved?

In an instant all When we sat down to give astronomy another responsibility flashed try, Dorian leapt unto my lap. Diana chuckled and through my mind… told me that he usually doesn’t like guests and I smiled with the reassurance that I was reaching Diana deeper as the night evolved. As we converted quantities and calculated light years between hypothetical galaxies, she moved closer to me on the futon; by the time we learned about white dwarves and supernovas I had my arm around her; and when the assignment faded into the past we moved into her bedroom.

She led me by my sweaty hand onto her bed, where we sat and faced each other. I could do nothing but smile while my eyes fidgeted around the room to

Christopher Jozef Chrobak

focus on anything that wasn’t her face. Neither of us spoke. I don’t even think I breathed. She removed her hands from mine and brought me closer until her lips brushed against my cheek. Her hair smelled like the unidentifiable aroma emanating from every Bath and Body Works except better, a perfumed potpourri fit for a goddess that I inhaled deeper than any Marlboro.

I wore my inexperience on my sleeve, even after she slid my shirt off.

Every one of my teenage chest hairs stood on end while she ran her fingers over my body and I clumsily fumbled with her bra until she took it off herself and tossed it aside with a giggle. A sliver of moonlight peeked through the curtain and illuminated her topless body, which shone more beautiful than the Venus de Milo. I felt like a child beholding the splendor of sunset for the first time, in awe of how nature could be so sublime.

In an instant all responsibility flashed through my mind: homework, school, college applications, my job selling shoes at the mall, the 8 hours of sleep a night I wouldn’t be getting; and none of it mattered because for once I was truly in the present, ebbing and flowing with life’s current, not filling in the blanks on a rigid list of events already plotted. Life was Diana, her pale blue eyes and the language of our bodies, which spoke volumes more than my aspiring dabbling ever could and taught me more than anything I’d ever learn from a textbook.

Like the celestial bodies that brought us together, we happened upon each other by pure chance. We were two worlds that crossed paths, burned brightly, briefly, and passed on. Although the world would spin on, unchanged by what took place in Diana’s apartment on this particular Wednesday, mine would never be the same. * * * I’ll never forget that night, although it still remains a blur. I’d never woken up in another bed but mine, but there’s a first time for everything. As I drove home with the sunrise, Diana’s words echoed in my head, “Let’s keep it this way. I’m not going to give you my number because we’ll never relive this moment. It’ll be our secret. I hope I never see you again because tonight was too beautiful.”

I looked at the church history book on the passenger seat and knew she was right.

43

Guy Beining moUth # 13 (in 4 voices) green youth: watching the parson lope across the green as birds chirped in jest at his dangling form.

44

beige marker: scrubbing color, making a new fashion, lifting veil; finding existence more believable then daily subsistence.

blue man:

fōrma forme form

four quarters of a lip pour out like snails crossing over each other. a leaf scratches cheek & a hat is lifted by a twig.

gray thinker: tongue curls up; words thud downward; lucid spit dribbles over t e e t h, as a murmur pushes through.

Guy Beining

moUth # 14 green youth:

(in 4 voices) blue man:

under a booming elm mulling over gracious leaves waiting for the sun to stutter.

 losian losien   lose beige marker: the painter stood in the dark; panted for direction but could not find one foot print.

on the intercom she said why? his boots were clean & licked beyond any stain but left unheard.

gray thinker: the wallpaper became an index, a totem for those flattened years.

45

Guy Beining

moUth # 15 (in 4 voices) green youth: the burial appeared rushed. dirt was spread unevenly & umbrellas leaked as rain peppered the final scene.

46

beige marker: two dark figures spun into one white line, insane as the background of a cartoon.

blue man:

embruon embryon embryo

the sleeves of a young lady caught air thru blinds watching star cords loosen.

gray thinker: between dark pieces of night stars stabbed at eyes; pricked weeds & bounced along glistening barbed wire.

Guy Beining

moUth # 16 (in 4 voices) green youth:

blue man:

a naked herd of wrestlers kicked a leather ball in a field full of pumpkins acknowledging the strong scent of autumn.

 slenta slenten slant beige marker: expanding wall within canvas sketching a lung over moon eggs filling in tourists that run from braying creatures.

the burning eye of alcohol taps the skull. necks of swans become white, musical notes as the drinker jumps into the sound.

47

gray thinker: the birds were wise on matters of death & plucked at worms along sloping gravesight.

Robert Mitchell

A Sign of the Times

48

Shafts of sunlight sift through trees, forming patterns on the turf. The wind adds confusion to the patterns, blowing the trees, causing the shadows to shift and sway. Patches of yellow and green dart back and forth like fish in a pond, a midsummer dance to the song of the breeze. Somewhere a dog barks, somewhere nearer a bird calls out in an extended whistle. The scent of ripe apples wafts across the yard to find the nose of a man sitting on the back steps.

It was in that spot, He removes his jacket and places it on the time-worn cement. Cooling air he remembers, that he had passes pleasantly through his shirt. played with his darling cousin Rising slowly, he moves toward the from ‘up north’… gnarled tree, toward the scent of the apples. The sound of his own footsteps alarms him; the crunch of urchin-like sweet gum balls and scattered twigs is as harsh as noises in a library.

Crouching low, he avoids the fruit-heavy boughs of the droopy tree. A sheltered place is revealed to him, an open area near the trunk like the inside of a Boy Scout tent formed by the tree and surrounding bushes. He picks an apple, wipes it clean the way Grandma taught him, and takes a lingering bite.

It’s mildly sweet and reminds him of the fried ones she used to make — apples that, in his youth, he had been too immature to really appreciate.

Now he peers out through the limbs and notices that, back on the steps,

Robert Mitchell

a green globe from the sweet gum tree has landed on his coat. It strikes him as strange that it should find its way directly to that spot, to land there soundlessly and without warning.

Between the pitted steps and the tool shed there is an open expanse of green, weedy, grass. It was in that spot, he remembers, that he had played with his darling cousin from ‘up north,’ splashing for hours in a blue plastic wading pool. In that very pool (he wonders what ever happened to the thing) he had been stung by a bee for the first time, bringing the day’s fun to a squealing end.

He tries to lick away the sticky juices from the finished apple but it’s no use, and he catches himself as his hand moves out of instinct for the seat of his pants. Leaving the sheltered area beneath the tree, he walks toward the old shed, thinking that perhaps there might be a rag there.

It is just as he recalls it from childhood, a squarish tin-roofed building with a single door and window. Jutting off the side is an extended, unwalled section supported only by two posts. Perhaps a car was meant to be kept out of the rain here, but now only a child’s peddle car and an old washer share the space. Beneath the washer’s lid he finds a rag among the spider webs and leaves. Shaking it out releases the musty smell of pure condensed age. A cloud of dust drifts across the yard through rays of sunlight. He wipes his hand, then replaces it carefully like a flower in a grave, closing the lid.

He turns to the toy car now, and moves toward it. He had sat in it many times as a child and peddled it about the yard, pretending to be just what he is now: a man. The red paint on its surface was chipped even in those days, though the rust was not so bad then. Suddenly, he remembers that the steering is broken, that it had been placed in this spot after one of the grandchildren had been too rough with it years ago.

The door will be locked but he tries it anyway. He peeks through the window coated with dust and dirt, rubs it gently with this hand. When he was a kid his uncle had told him there was a Civil War sword stashed somewhere inside, but it had never been found. He wonders if it’s still there, if it was ever there to begin with. There are boxes, an old bed frame with springs, an abandoned stack of magazines, a shelf littered with rusted tools no longer of use to anyone, a decrepit push mower. He recalls weekend grass-cutting trips to this place; recalls how, while his father dragged out the ancient mower all

49

Robert Mitchell

50

crusted and caked with clippings and pushed it laboriously back and forth, he would poke around in piles of fascinating junk.

Now he’s a child again, is standing on tip toe trying to see something, anything; he knows there is something more here than he can see, some old toy to fool around with, some nook to play in, some mystery to unlock, some cranny in which to crouch and play pretend. Staring deeply into the cobwebbed dimness a kind of fear wells up in him, a child’s fear of the unknown, the unexpected fear that sometimes strikes while trying to see within, under, or behind. The fear shocks him back into the present and he stands dazed and wondering.

He turns back toward the steps, loosening his tie as he goes. Looking up at the back entrance, he picks up his coat and pictures his father’s mother, …the unexpected fear that standing there complaining behind the screen door. The children are going in sometimes strikes while trying and out too much and letting in the to see within, under, or behind. flies. She rubs her twisted arthritic hands on an apron made from a feed bag, hands battered by seventy-odd years of chores; hands that buried a husband and then raised five children through a great war, alone.

The light has muted. Patches of green and yellow no longer dance on the lawn, the calls of birds are giving way to the hiss of insects, and the air is growing dolorous and still. It’s getting toward supper. He walks slowly around the house in the direction of his car, passing as he goes the sign in the front yard that reads ‘SOLD’ in harsh fluorescent letters.

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Where is Hulltown 360?

Holly Day

Linda Crate

Guy R. Beining

Mike Berger

Jessica Tyner

Christopher Jozef Chrobak

Michael Fitzgerald-Clarke

Keith Moul

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Robert Mitchell

Rich Ives

Richard Kostelanetz

Frank Scozzari

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Eleanor Leonne Bennett

Vivian Rinaldo

Rob Schultz

Joanna M. Weston

Authors and Artists Jessica Tyner Symptoms of an End Jessica Tyner is originally from Oregon, USA, a member of the Cherokee Nation, and has been a writer and editor for ten years.

Currently, she is a copy writer for Word Jones, a travel writer with Mucha Costa Rica, a writer for TripFab, a copy editor at the Londonbased Flaneur Arts Journal, and a contributing editor at New York’s Thalo Magazine. She lives in San José, Costa Rica.

Vivian Rinaldo Nannie’s Cat

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Vivian Rinaldo has been a writer most of her life, but only in the past few years has she had a few short stories and poems published in print and online. She is currently working on a novel and a nonfiction book about grandmothers. No deadline for either, but she works on them as she has a spare moment.

Ms. Rinaldo says that the main character in Nannie’s Cat is loosely based on her grandmother and her stubborn insistence on feeding every stray cat in eastern Tennessee.

Mike Berger The Old Merc Mike Berger is an MFA, PhD. He is retired and writes poetry and short stories full time. He has been writing poetry for less than two years.

His works appear in seventy-one journals. He has published two books of short stories and seven poetry chapbooks. He is a member of The Academy of American Poets.

Joanna M. Weston Dentist’s Chair (Abecedarian) Joanna M. Weston has had poetry, reviews, and short stories published in anthologies and journals for twenty-five years including Hulltown 360. Her middle-reader, ‘Those Blue Shoes’, published by Clarity House Press; Poetry, A Summer Father, was published

by Frontenac House of Calgary. http://1960willowtree.wordpress.com.

Rob Schultz DJ Dreams Rob Schultz’s first novel, Styll in Love, came out a decade ago from Van Neste Books (located in Midlothian before merging with Permanent Press) and another, On-Air, is nearly complete. Other work has appeared in Rattapallax, Slant, Sou’wester, The MacGuffin, Warwick Unbound and West Branch, among others, and most recently, Prime Mincer. He taught comp classes at VCU before drifting into local radio and voice work.

appeared widely for more than 40 years. Blue & Yellow Dog Press released his chapbook, The Grammar of Mind, 11/10; Red Ochre Press announced that another work, Beautiful Agitation, was a winner of its 2011 Chapbook Contest.

Frank Scozzari The Shaman’s Eye Frank Scozzari’s fiction has previously appeared in various literary magazines, including The Kenyon Review, South Dakota Review, Roanoke Review, Pacific Review, Skylark Literary Magazine, Reed Magazine, Eureka Literary Magazine, Foliate Oak Literary Journal, Spindrift Art and Literary Journal, The Licking River Review, and many others.

Writing awards include Winner of the National Writer’s Association Short Story Contest and two publisher nominations for the Pushcart Prize of Short Stories.

Holly Day Sunday Morning Miracles

Linda Crate is a Pennsylvanian native. Her poetry has been published in Magic Cat Press, Black-Listed Magazine, and Bigger Stones. She has a degree in EnglishLiterature from Edinboro University of Pennsylvania. In addition to poetry Linda writes short stories and is working on a few novels. Her greatest aspiration is not only to have her poetry published but her fantasy works, as well.

Holly Day is a housewife and mother of two living in Minneapolis, Minnesota who teaches needlepoint classes in the Minneapolis school district. Her poetry has recently appeared in Hawai’i Pacific Review, The Oxford American, and Slipstream.

Her book publications include The Book Of, A Bright Patch of Sunlight, Music Composition for Dummies, Guitar-All-in-One for Dummies, and Music Theory for Dummies, which has recently been translated into French, Dutch, Spanish, Russian, and Portuguese.

Keith Moul Oasis Blacktop

Michael Fitzgerald-Clarke So Invisible a Thing

Linda Crate a friendship spoiled like troy

Keith Moul has published photos widely for a couple years, including in Hulltown 360. His poems have

Michael Fitzgerald-Clarke is an English-born Australian poet who lives in Townsville, Queensland. As the only Michael Fitzgerald-Clarke,

with the hyphen, on the planet, as far as he knows, he is easy to find on the web. This poem is from his latest poetry book in progress, at the time of submitting to Hulltown 360 Literary Journal, Five Faves, Five Least Faves. The book will comprise one hundred dedicated poems, for one hundred people, who will have given Michael their five favorite, and five least favorite, words, all of which are included in that person’s poem.

Rich Ives Breakfast Alone Rich Ives has received grants and awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, Artist Trust, Seattle Arts Commission and the Coordinating Council of Literary Magazines for his work in poetry, fiction, editing, publishing, translation and photography. His writing has appeared in, amoung other journals, Verse, North American Review, Massachusetts Review, Northwest Review, Quarterly West, Iowa Review, and Poetry Northwest.

He is the 2009 winner of the Francis Locke Memorial Poetry Award from Bitter Oleander. His story collection, The Balloon Containing the Water Containing the Narrative Begins Leaking, was one of five finalists for the 2009 Starcherone Innovative Fiction Prize. In 2010 he has been a finalist in fiction at Black Warrior Review and Mississippi Review and in poetry at Cloudbank and Mississippi Review.

Richard Kostelanetz Complete Stories 2012 Richard Kostelanetz’s work in several fields appear in, among others directories, various editions of Readers Guide to TwentiethCentury Writers, Merriam-Webster Encyclopedia of Literature, Contemporary Poets, Contemporary

Novelists, Postmodern Fiction, Webster’s Dictionary of American Writers, The HarperCollins Reader’s Encyclopedia of American Literature, and Baker’s Biographical Dictionary of Musicians. Otherwise, he survives in New York, where he was born, unemployed and thus overworked.

Christopher Jozef Chrobak Learning Astronomy Christopher Jozef Chrobak graduated in 2011 with distinction from the University of Michigan with a dual-degree in Creative Writing/Literature and Philosophy.

He has been editor, creative director and head of submissions committee of Xylem Literary Magazine and currently works as an editor for Orange Quarterly (orangequarterly.com). He writes reviews and music criticism for local radio station WCBN (88.3 fm). When not writing, reading or watching films Chris composes and performs original music. He is also a creative mind behind a local Ann Arbor art collective and has staged and been featured in several performance art pieces around the Ann Arbor/ Detroit area.

Guy R. Beining moUth # 13 – #16 Guy R. Beining’s work has recently appeared in Fence, Phoebe and The Portland Review. His last art show was at the Hudson Opera House, Hudson, NY, and his last book out was The Compact Duchamp, Amp after Amp from Chapultepec Press.

His poem ‘Take Me Over the Wheel of It’ appears in Square Lake Number Five. His poems have recently appeared in Fourteen Hills, Skid Row/ Penthouse, Cairn, Charon Review, River’s Edge, Illuminations and Sierra Nevada Review.

Robert Mitchell A Sign of the Times Robert Mitchell is an indie writer and martial artist from Richmond, VA. His works include the novels Chatters on the Tide and Ghilan, the popular pamphlet ‘Self-Defense for Activists’, The Cabal Fang Martial Arts Manual, and numerous poems, ‘zines, comic books, and short stories. Visit his virtual office at 808hack.wordpress.com.

Eleanor Leonne Bennett Reza Deghati and Eleanor Leonne Bennett Portrait Eleanor Leonne Bennett is a photographer and artist who has won contests with National Geographic, The Woodland Trust, The World Photography Organization, Winston’s Wish, Papworth Trust, Mencap, Big Issue, Wrexham Science, Fennel and Fern and Nature’s Best Photography. She has had her photographs published in exhibitions and magazines across the world including The Guardian, RSPB Birds , RSPB Bird Life, Dot Dot Dash, Alabama Coast, Alabama Seaport and NG Kids Magazine.

She was also the only person from the UK to have her work displayed in the National Geographic and Airbus’ See The Bigger Picture global exhibition tour with the United Nations International Year Of Biodiversity 2010.

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Eleanor Leonne Bennet

Reza Deghati and Eleanor Leonne Bennett Portrait