Sisyphus November 25th, 2020
Photograph by Owen Rittenhouse Layout Design By Carter J. Fortman
Poem Tree Patrick Tyrrell
Roots grow from a solid foundation, the trunk, a thousand books yet written, branches like ladders to the sky, leaves of twisting and whirling verse, the fruit plump and sweet nourished by waters of knowledge past. I’ve built this tree and only by ignorance is it felled.
Watercolor by Nathan Rich
Bray Carter J. (Bray) Fortman
I took the long route home after passing my
my tank up, I was somewhere else.
insignificant patch of skin. He had melanoma
driving test on a rainy afternoon. As the rain gen-
“Hey kid, need any help?” said a jet-black-
and by the time it was caught, his fate was sealed.
tly hit my car, I was soothed by my “respectable
haired man in a thick St. Louis accent. “Stop
Confused, I began to unravel the mystery.
jazz” playlist. Midway along my drive, my com-
standin’ around we’re busy.”
“Mr. Bray…” I started. “I mean...grandpa?”
fort was interrupted when I realized I needed gas.
As I looked around, the vehicles had trans-
I miss him, a man I have never met. I long to
The Shell Station I found on my phone seemed
formed into the muscle cars of the 60s. My white
know him, to hear his voice just once, to hear
like a perfect option. Always bustling, the sta-
Honda, now a classic, American-made Ford.
his sayings and know what he believed. I long to
tion saw hundreds of people every day; differ-
Smoke billowed the air as I watched the man
know that missing quarter of my genetics. My
ent faces, names, genetics, etcetera, all there for
approach. His short-sleeved button-up was but-
father was a toddler when my grandpa died and
a shared commodity. I pulled up to the nearest
toned just as nice as his greasy hair. He was tall,
remembers very little. The knowledge he has
pump and realized where I was. The station was
about my height, with a long narrow face like my
comes from either secondhand memories from
my grandpa’s. The one I had never met. In my
father’s. For a minute, I thought it was my father.
my late grandma, or the sparse artifacts passed
mind as the middle-aged man he was in all the
He was a businessman. That’s what I know
pictures, it was hard to imagine him as my grand-
most about him. He owned what was, for most
“What’d you call me?”
father, especially as my father’s father. He was a
of the 1960s, the busiest Shell Station in the mid-
“I’m your grandson.”
distant name, not even a memory or a voice to
west. Using those proceeds, he opened a hotel. In
“Carter?”
associate.
1969, my grandpa had the momentum to create
“How’d you know that?!”
an empire. But it was all cut short by a seemingly
“I’ve waited for you. Follow me.”
When I touched the handle to begin filling
down.
We began walking down the bustling street.
It hadn’t been long, but it seemed as if we had family, maternal, paternal, all brought together
Cigarette smoke billowed but for some reason been walking for hours. He stopped walking at beside a turkey in the most festive autumn sweatdidn’t affect me. The sun seemed brighter than the Mississippi, grinned ear to ear, and patted me ers available. Careless and innocent, I let myself before, much brighter. I was curious and con- on my shoulder. fused. It must be a dream, I thought. But this is
“Time, like life, is short,” he explained. “What’d I was brought back to desolation.
all I ever wanted. Just a moment in time to unite you like to know?” my identity. To be whole. ”How’d you know I’d come?” I said.
be swept into the story, but at the snap of a finger,
“Who am I?”
“Your dreams are wrong. The feast is happening now! The most important part of your iden-
He chuckled. “C’mon Carter, you know I can’t tity came from the Lamb, Jesus, as a sacrifice.
”It’s the land of the unforgotten. People like tell you that. When I was about your age, I had Don’t be sad! Your direction is bright, but accept me, us who leave the earth too early for our de- no idea what I wanted to do, but I figured it out. that I am not your only grandfather, not up here. scendants, have the opportunity to meet one. I You’re a Bray, sure, but you’re also a Fortman. Up here, everyone is your grandfather as you are chose you, Carter, ” he said. ”Much like I did, you You’ve got quite a bit of German blood, a tiny bit theirs. You aren’t missing any part of your identihave the ambition to be very successful. Your fa- of English. You can be Catholic or Protestant. You ty. You have everything you need when you focus ther is a good man, a good role model, the type I got some artist in you from your Grandma Shirley on what is important: love. Your family is endless, hoped to have been to him, the kind his adopted and some business genes from me. The possibili- as is love.” father was to him. Life is short; I should know. ties are truly endless, kid. Besides, We will always
“I must go there now,” he said, gesturing to-
However, I have no regrets. I’m...happy. After this be with you as guardians praying for you,” he ex- wards the sky, gleaming with anticipation. “But I talk, my matters to the earth are finished. 51 years plained, pointing to the skies. I’ve been here, but I finally see peace.”
will never be far away. I love you, Carter; see you
Projected in the clouds, I saw my dream. My soon.”
Drawing by Alex Deiters
The Opportunists Rich Moran
An opportunistic infection is … caused by pathogens … that take advantage of an opportunity not normally available…. Wikipedia I. Every living form seeks a chance, seizes a moment, to claw its way along a track, to snatch the baton, and race ahead to spin out copies of itself, seeking conquest of its realm and the next. But the Coronas with their name so accidentally apt keep their red eyes on the crown that lies so uneasily on your head and mine, strangling their hosts so quietly, seizing upon our crowns. Such opportunists are they…and we— so intent on exploiting each chance, contesting each win and winning each contest. Their nature and, yes, ours is “red in tooth and claw,” Such ruthless death-dealing: it’s the story of all life… Except when it isn’t.
Looking out our second-floor window, I saw once a distant neighbor, a circuit judge, strolling along the usually busy street, though quietly empty that Saturday morning at 7. As he walked, he bowed now and then to pick up trash— a cup here, a greasy bag and empty pint there. All on a walk not along his own street, just a place in the world where with this unseen (for all he knows) deed, he seizes his chance to make the city, not nearly pristine, but just a bit less messy. Or like my mom and most likely yours, who pushes the last slices of roast and cake toward each departing guest, or accepts a sick child into her home, though she’s the one who will soon be ill. II. In Tolstoy’s “Master and Man,” one December 7, the day after the feast of Nicholas, (who protects the weak from the strong) the old innkeeper Brekhunov orders his poor servant Nikita to harness horse to sled so they might set out in the cold on a chance
to buy someone’s grove before competitors arrive. But the two get lost and doomed in a blinding blizzard. At Nikita’s suggestion, master and man decide to burrow down into the sled and stake their lives there ‘til dawn. But Brekhunov cannot sleep. He lies awake, reckoning the profits ahead and savoring the wealth he has amassed, despising the indolence that has rendered pawns like Nikita so lazily content with life as it is— so passively they accept their poverty and even the frozen silence of this dark forest. “Blizzard or no blizzard,” Brekhunov recalls his code, “I start out. So business gets done.” Thus spurring himself to action, Brekhunov mounts the unharnessed and shivering horse, and sets out, abandoning his shabby-coated servant. But misguided perhaps by a fiercer grace, Brekhunov loses his way, loses his horse and wanders in circles to the opportunity his Master perhaps has with him charged, the chance that leads him back to the half-frozen peasant, the sled where Brekhunov now suddenly feels at home, sheltered finally from the desolation of being lost and scorning the life he built in pursuit of counted treasures. With clarity and joy, the master lays his life down
atop Nikita, blanketing the peasant with the master’s own fading warmth, and, no longer the master, he knows “he was Nikita and Nikita…he…. His life was not in himself but in Nikita.” Thus does the master kindle life in his serf. III. Rather like our local giant, who sets out on winter’s harshest nights To find the homeless camped in forlorn corners of our city to give them coats and blankets to keep them warm. Or Al Letson, reporting at a Berkeley protest who, seeing an alt-right man clubbed by “righteous” antifas, leaps atop the pummeled white supremacist, offering his own black spine instead to those who would beat another’s. What opportunities did these givers seize upon to crown their lives when they risked their status and maybe life itself? So we might all distinguish ourselves from this virus not by how we boast of what we’ve gained but by how we lay life down to serve another’s.
photograph by Patrick Zarrick
a sandwich through the tent stitch Francisco Schmidt
I was handed a soggy sandwich It was peculiar where it came from By a hand through the tent stitch Who could it be that owned the green thumb? Perhaps his name was Cristo or Ruben? A polite man would try at least a crumb To find that the meal was actually a Cuban I unzipped the tent so I could ask him to stay But much to my confusion It appeared that my Hero had rushed far away
Watercolor Pencil by Nathan Rich
Staying Power Noah Apprill-Sokol
T
he rumble of lawnmowers drifted through
table: facing a drafting notebook, a pencil, and
the open dining room window, interrupt-
a calculator. A glossy paperback book—a souve-
Ding-dong! Ding-dong!
ing the stillness of the summer morning. Spar-
nir from the historical society—lay open on the
“...you,” my grandfather mused as the old
rows chirped their Summer song, laughter rose
table. My grandfather’s leathery scarred hands
clock chimed, heralding his departure. He rose
from the back alley. Typical sounds of a Saturday
clutched mine, guiding the pencil across the
slowly from the chair, searched his pocket for
morning in my Saint Louis neighborhood, when
graph paper. The lines on the paper detailed our
the floppy ballcap to protect his head from the
time meanders slowly without urgency. But this
plan, based on calculations I was just barely old
sun, and stepped towards the backdoor.
particular morning, and others in the weeks to
enough to comprehend.
come, would take on a special purpose for me
“This is how I used to build models when I
and my grandfather. We worked diligently to-
was a kid,” my grandfather reminisced, smiling
gether on a scaled-down model of a ship that
at the memory.
and glue. Now, I am doing the same with . . .”
“ ‘Til another day,” he called while exiting. “ ‘Til another day,” I repeated. The windowpane rattled when he shut the door.
last sailed in 1607. I was 10, my grandfather was
“Really?” I asked. It was difficult to conjure
My grandfather and I have built projects to-
71, and the ship, or at least the historical record
an image of my grandfather as a youth. I always
gether for as long as I can remember. They are
of it, was over 400 years old. The vessel, called
imagined him grown-up and gray.
as numerous as my collections of Legos, Tinker-
The Virginia, had captured my imagination when
“My friends and I loved planes,” said my
toys, and Lincoln Logs. My grandfather’s engi-
I visited the historical society in Bath, Maine, a
grandfather. “We would go to the town library,
neering talents, coupled with my growing sense
month earlier on a family vacation.
find pictures of planes in books, and then go
of wonder, have made us a formidable team, even
home to try to recreate them from balsa wood
if my attention sometimes wanders. Yet the ship
My grandfather and I sat at the dining room
project was different. Building a model—like the
model. My grandfather looked over my shoulder,
said, “We are all works-in-progress, ships that
volunteers from the community in Maine who
proudly smiling, knowing all the work, time, and
sail through history.” He stopped looking at the
created the ship with original tools—had taken
growth that had occurred over the weeks. The
lines of my name and turned to examine the lines
hold in my mind. I couldn’t fully explain: this
workbench was paint-stained and had grooves
on his hands.
project had staying power. It had real history.
where my carving tools had gone astray. My fin-
I sat on a stool at the workbench, hunched
gers now had a few scars too.
The Virginia now sits next to my desk in the upstairs study, a memento of my grandfather and
over the project. We had moved to the base-
“It’s finally complete,” I exclaimed, admiring
an important ingredient of who I have become.
ment several weeks earlier. Tools were scattered
the ship, decked out with riggings and cloth sails.
My grandfather taught me that we are all proj-
everywhere. A wood-burner was clutched in my
“Nothing is really complete,” my grandfather
ects in time. The past never stays in the past; it
shaking hands as I engraved the phrase Noah’s
retorted. Then, sounding philosophical he ad-
lives through us in the present. That’s what gives
Virginia, 1607-2014 into the stand that held the
mired the letters of my name in the stand, and
history its staying power.
Sisyphus Thanksgiving, November 2020 Literary Editors: Harrison Beardsley, Corey Lyles, Taggart Arens, Alex Wentz, Luke Duffy, Alexander Preusser, Christopher St. John, Austin Wald Art Editors: Philip Hiblovic, Brendan McLaughlin, Nathan Rich, Owen Rittenhouse Layout Editors: Carter Fortman, Luke Duffy, Carter Spence Moderators: Frank Kovarik, Rich Moran