Phoenix - Winter 1983

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Reed Massengill EDITOR Hallie Murrey MANAGING EDITOR Holly Planells ART EDITOR Susan Droppleman FICTION EDITOR Tamara Renfro NON-FICTION EDITOR Barbara Jaekel PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR Anne Stafford POETRY EDITOR Mark Hanshaw Michaele Orlowski David Webb SUPPORTING STAFF

Cover photography by Patrick Benjamin We will consider unsolicited articles , manuscripts, art and photography at the beginning of each quarter. 漏Copyright 1982 by The University of Tennessee. All rights retained by the individual contributors. Send contributions to Phoenix Literary Art Magazine, Suite 11 Communications Building, 1345 Circle Park Drive , Knoxville , TN 37996-0314.

EOI-0271-013-83

Betty Allen Faith Revell Paul Wright PRODUCTION Marcia Goldenstein Byron McKeeby Brian Wells ART FACULTY COMMITTEE Dr. Edward Bratton Dr. Marilyn Kallett Dr. B.J. Leggett Dr. Jon M. White ENGLISH FACULTY COMMITTEE Dr. Les Hyder DIRECTOR OF STUDENT PUBLICATIONS

LITERARY ART MAGAZINE

WINTER 1983

ART Tim Massey Ruth Lewis Bonnie Adamson

6-7 12 30

FICTION Marsha Bryant Robby Griffith

2-5 20-22

NON-FICTION Holly Planells Catherine Wurst

11 30-31

pHOTOGRAPHY David Hobart Patrick Benjamin Owen Poveda Steve Swindel Mary Louise Peacock Vance Carter Gary Walker Michael Messing Reed Massengill Larry Maloney

2 5, 8, 29 10, 24-25 14 15 18 23 24 26-27 32

POETRY Kristen Cook Jeff Callahan Gary Simmers Tony Miller Linda Parsons Burggraf

9, 16-17 13-14 15 19 28, 33

Contents

David Hobart

Throw Out the Lifeline!

by Marsha Bryant I never could understand what went on at True Vine Baptist Church. You know where that is, I reckon. Oh sure you do! Go on out Highway 46 till you cross Cedar Creek, then turn left at Hack's Cross. Can't miss it from there. It's across the street from Mt. Zion Friends Assembly. You know, those Quaker people.

Anyway, like I was saying, that congregation didn't

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ever make no sense to me. Right noisy place, as I recall.

Every time Brother John, that's the preacher, read a passage from the Word - well, Deacon Jones done let out the most bellowin' AMEN you ever heard. 'Bout made me jump out of my pew when I was a youngster .

Course, he was accompanied by the Amen Chorus from the back row.

And crying! When Brother John had a 'specially fieri sermon, you never seen such weeping and wailing at altar call.. Right after one of thes~_J;ype sermons, Miss Ethel Albright would crank up the old Hammond and plunge into ''Throw Out the Lifelin ." Only organist the church has had since it was founde in 1937. Anyhow, that organ music would start vibrati right up your spine. And half the congregation would sing along while the other half was crying. ''Throw out the lifeline across the dark wave, There is a brother whom someone should save." You could hear old Mrs. Watts quavering half a step higher than the tune. I asked Ma about her quavering one time when I was little and she told me to leave her be - that Mrs. Watts was filled with the Spirit, that's all. I said that if I was the Spirit I sure wouldn't wanna be responsible for makin' someone sound like that. Ma told me to hush my mouth afore Mrs. Watts heard me. "Somebody's brother! Oh, who then will dare to throw out the lifeline, his peril to share?"

I remember one of Brother John's real moving sermons - I believe he called it "Standing Trial for Jesus."

Nine years old I was, first time I heard it. Can't remember his exact words, but it was from Luke's gospel. That part about God denying those in heaven who denied Him on earth. But if you showed you was God's friend in public, He'd save you. Well, my big sister Betty Lou was whining all through the sermon like Rufus our old dog. I handed her Kleenex till my purse ran out. Ma always made us bring plenty of Kleenex on Sundays. Betty Lou came with half a box. You know how emotional girls get when they're sixteen.

I figured Brother John expected a response from this one, cuz he was sweating and red in the face after it was over. Sure enough, Miss Ethel Albright trumpeted out the summoning altar call. "Throw out the lifeline!

Throw out the lifeline! Someone is drifting away." I was wondering who it'd be this time, when my own sister Betty Lou excused herself and went weeping toward the altar. ''Throw out the lifeline! Throw out the lifeline! Someone is sinking today."

"What's she doing?" I asked Ma. "She's rededicating her life to God," she replied. Ma was grinning from ear to ear and wiping away a few stray tears at the same time.

"Well, if she's doing that what's she so sad for?" I says.

Before Ma could answer, my brother Taylor sneered: "Don't you know, dummy? You're s'posed to cry when you rededicate your life to God." Taylor was the middle child and a real smart aleck.

"Hush, Taylor. Clara Belle's too young to understand all that now," Ma says. Then turning to me, she whispered, "Your sister's crying because she's so happy."

Well, that didn't satisfy me none. But I knew there wasn't no use in asking anymore. All I knew was that I never cried when I was overcome with happiness.

But the thing that shook me up most at True Vine was Miss Lilly Blevins. She was the Sunday School teacher for the third and fourth grade. Never got married. Some

say she was stood up at the altar back in '35. Held herself straight as a yardstick even though her face was furrowed with wrinkles. She wore her silver hair way up high on her head. Ma said she drove into Pickens every week to have it done at the beauty parlor. But I still thought she was quite frightening to look at. Those burning dark eyes of hers would pierce right through me even if I sat in the back. And she was all fired up about baptism.

First week of Sunday School she made us memorize the Meaning of Baptism from the back of the hymn book. The line she really rumbled out was this: ''Therefore we are buried with Him by baptism into death." She'd thunder out them last two words. I wasn't sure I liked the thought of dying, but I learnt the whole passage and said it right the first time. Miss Lilly Blevins had a way of making you do that. She put the holy fear into you.

One particular Sunday Miss Lilly said we wasn't gonna use our Sunday Scool Books that day. Brother John ordered them books all the way from the Baptist Bookstore in Cookeville. Instead, Miss Lilly Blevins was gonna read to us directly from the Word. We'd been studying about John the Baptist, and now we were gonna hear what St. Luke had to say about him. Clearing her wrinkly throat and putting on' her cat-eye spectacles, Miss Lilly began reading in a voice that coulda waked the dead.

"And he came into all the country about Jordan, preaching baptism of repentance for the remission of sins."

I never figured out why Miss Lilly Blevins toted that five-pound Bible around with her. She had the whole thing practically memorized. Ma said it was a special large-print Bible that was gift from an old beau.

Anyhow, there was something about John the Baptist that confused me. How could anyone eat no thin' but wild locusts and honey all the time? I asked Miss Lilly what wild locusts was, and when she told me I about got sick. Thelma Rae next to me starts laughing, and Miss Lilly Blevins threatened to send us out in the hall. When she got to around the ninth verse, my ears pricked up.

"Every tree therefore which bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire."

The room got so quiet you could hear Nathan's teeth a-chatterin'. He always was a fraidy-cat. You shoulda seen him on Halloween! Anyway, Miss Lilly Blevins closed the book with a big WHUMP and peered at us through them spectacles. They made her fearsome eyes look even bigger. "Well, children," she said. "Does anyone know what this scripture means?"

Sally's hand shot up like a flash. She always sat on the front row, and Miss Lilly was 'specially fond of her. "It means we should be baptized or we'll get in trouble with God!" ''That's right, Sally." A rare smile punctuated Miss Lilly's parched face. But it didn't last long. Raisin' herself up to her full height, Miss Lilly Blevins put on an expression like she was fixin' to give everyone of us a whuppin'. "What the Lord God is saying through His Holy Word is this. We must repent of our sins and

Phoenix 3

wickedness in order to be baptized. This is the first step.

In holy baptism we die along with Jesus when we sink beneath the water. But when we are raised up again we become new people in Christ Jesus - and our sins are forgiven . O nly then are we true children of God. But if we don't repent of our sins, if we don't "bringeth forth good fruit," then God will cast us into hellfire for eternity."

I trembled in my seat like a dead leaf on an oak tree and raised my skinny arm real timid-like. "You mean if we don't get baptized, we'll. . . " "If you don't get baptized you'll go straight to hell."

I wanted to ask another question, but Mrs. Colebank started ringin' the bell out in the hall. I was so shook up I just couldn't go to service, so I ran home before Ma could miss me. I hoped Betty Lou had enough Kleenex on her own to last her just this once. Come 12:30 I heard Ma yt"!llin' for me at the door. "Clara Belle! Clara Belle, what's the meaning of this, child!" I came out a'blubbering with my fac,e still wet from crying. "Whatsa matter, child?" Ma says, scooping me up in her arms.

"Ma, Miss Lilly Blevins said - she said . . . ''I'm listening Clara Belle," Ma says to me. "What'd she say?"

I blurted out, "Miss Lilly Blevins said I was going straight to hell cuz I ain't been baptized!"

Ma just clucks her tongue and said real soothing, ''I'm sure she didn't mean it like that. What she was sayin' was that sinners go to hell. " I corrected her. "No ma'am, she says if you don't get baptized you'll go straight to hell. When can I get baptized, Ma?" Taylor was listening and chimed in, ''I've been baptized. So has Betty Lou." "See, Ma? " I hollered. 'They won't go to hell like me.

Let me get baptized, too. You let them do it. " "Child, child," Ma coos at me. "You're too young to be baptized. Taylor and 'Betty Lou wasn't till they was thirteen."

I was getting real panicky now . "But what if I go to hell before I'm thirteen? I wanna be baptized now! " Ma just shook her head. "You have to be old enough to understand the true meaning of baptism. Now don 't you be frettin' about hell - you're much to little to have to worry about that. Jesus will take care of you. And He'll send his Holy Spirit to let you know when it's the proper time to be baptized. " "If he sends me the Spirit, does that mean I'll start sounding like Mrs. Watts? " I asked, all big-eyed.

Laughing and shaking her head, Ma says, "No child.

Now you just rest your mind about these matters and go wash up for dinner. " Ma's comforting made me feel better, but questions were still gnawing at my insides. Seems like every time I asked something about church, everybody told me I was too young to know. Too young. Well, I thought , if I was old enough to go to hell like Miss Lilly Blevins said - well , I sure must be old enough to commence doing something about it. If baptism kept you from going down there , well I had just as much right as anybody to have it. Didn 't Jesus say, "Suffer the little children to

" f1hoenix

come to me?" I sure didn't want to no red hot devils prickin' my behind. And if they wouldn' t let me go about baptism the proper way, I'd just do it myself .

After all, I could recite the entire Meaning of Baptism without one mistake.

Tuesday afternoon came my chance.

My schoolteacher Miss Molly Butler was having our class put on a Thanksgiving play. I was one of the pilgrim's wives. I wanted to be a Injun, but Miss Molly Butler wouldn't let me.

Anyway, we had practice on Tuesday, so I told Ma I'd be late walking back from school. None of our neighbor's young'uns was in the fourth grade, so Ma'd never know if I sneaked by the church on the way home. She'd think I was still at play practice, see.

The night before I had recited the Meaning of Baptism three times after my bedtime prayers. I wanted to have every word down pat for the big day . All through school I had the fidgets something fierce. I thought Miss Molly Butler would never hush teaching us. I even messed up at play practice! Finally, we called it quits for the day.

I ran all the way to True Vine Baptist Church, but the excitement kept me from getting all tuckered out. I did slow up when I got to the churdl grounds, though , so as not to look suspicious. I listened real quiet to make sure Miss Ethel Albright wasn't practicing on the organ.

Coast was clear. Sneakin' around to the back of the building, I stood up on a rock and peeked in Brother John's window. Sometimes he's there in the afternoons preparing his sermon. But I didn't see nobody in there on that particular afternoon.

I went toward the little room on the right hand side of the altar. My footsteps clip-clopped over the slick hardwood floor. It was so loud that several times I thought someone was walking along behind me.

Walking up to the side door, I pulled it open with a dragging, creaky sound. This gave me the jitters for a minute and my heart started flopping around inside me .

It was dark inside the church except for the prayer light they leave on over the altar. Feeling around the wall I found the light switch. I never been in such a quiet room in my life - rightly spooky it was . I kept thinking over and over to myself, "The Lord is in here; God is all around this room!

When I got inside the al~ar room , robes was all around me. Choir robes , preacher robes, acol y te robes . . . baptismal robes! I leaned over and fingered one, and when I did it fell right off the rack . My heart done a few more flip-flop s, but I managed to get it hung up again . Had to stand way up on my tip-toes. These baptismal robes was much too huge for me , so I got one of the acolyte robes . It had a "]" on the lapel and was the one Jimmy Patton wore at services. It came down to my ankles and the arms was all loose. When I flapped my arms, it looked like angel wings.

Well, I tippy-toed up to the altar and drew back the heavy maroon curtains that was behind it. There it wa s, big as life! The baptismal font! I went over to the left hand side and kneeled by the water's edge . I recited the

Patrick Benjamin Meaning of Baptism in a slow, solemn-like voice to make sure God could hear me: "And Jesus, when he was baptized, went up straightway out of the water: and 10, the heavens were opened unto him, and saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove . . . " And when I done finished with that, I prayed to God that He'd let this baptism count even though Brother John wasn't doing it, so as I wouldn't go straight to hell like Miss Lilly Blevins said. Then I throwed in a verse of a baptism hymn for good measure: Come, Holy Spirit , Dove divine On these baptismal waters shine And teach our hearts, in highest strain, To praise the Lamb for sinners slain.

When the last word died in my throat , I raised myself up and looked down at the water. I could count seven steps going down in it, and it looked pretty deep to me.

But I surely wasn't gonna chicken out now. I kept flashing pictures of red hot devils through my mind to give me courage. I started going down the steps real slow .

When I got to the fourth step I heard a long, creaky sound from out in the congregation section. It startled

me so that I slipped and fell into water that was clear over my head. I was all panicky and started thrashing about in the water, trying to find them steps again.

From somewhere far off I could hear a clomp-clomp, clomp-clomp that kept gettin' louder and louder. The clomping noise stopped and I opened my eyes under water. An arm was coming down through the water; I thought it must be the hand of God. Another arm joined the first one, and together they pulled me up outa the water.

Well, I was coughing and spewing water so much it took me a while to look up and see just who my savior was. It was Brother John. He slapped me on the back a few times and asked me if I was all right. Presently, he says "Clara Belle Hawkins, just what was you doing in the baptismal font? " "Brother John, " I says to him, "I have been baptized ."

"Child, child," he said, like my Ma. "What you 've done is just go playing around in the water like you'd do at the swimming hole. You about near drowned! Now you know good as myself that one has to be the proper age to be truly baptized."

I looked up at him again. His face was real kind , but I didn't think he was too pleased about what I'd done.

"But Brother John - Miss Lilly Blevins said I'd go straight to hell - if I wasn't baptized. She did! I asked my Ma - about it, but she wouldn' t let me - on account of I was too young. So I decided to - do it myself."

Brother John stared at me with utter amazement on his face.

"Well, I'll have little talk with Miss Blevins. Now just listen to your Ma - you are too young to be worrying with matters like this. Jesus will look after you , just like he looks after that little sparrow up in that tree out yonder. " Now that I was recovering my breath , I was growing a little angry with Brother John. I wanted to let him know that what I'd done was no mere child's play.

"Brother John," I says, "I ain't too young . Before I went into the water I recited the whole Meaning of Baptism from memory, and I sang "Come Holy Spirit, Dove Divine" too. God let my baptism count, I just know He did!"

The smile had gone from the preacher's face. He shook his head. 'That's where you're wrong child, " he said. "You'll understand all this a lot better when you grow up."

Well, that did it. I had had just about enough of this too young stuff. I wrenched myself up outa his lap and ran right out of the sanctuary - wet robe still on me . At first I thought I was gonna cry, but something real defiant rose up in me like fire. The closer I got to home, the faster I ran . I ran past Taylor who dropped his whittlin' stick, and Betty Lou who dropped her ball and jacks . I ran past Ma , who dropped her jaw all flabbergasted on the front porch . I ran into my room and slammed the door. Stamping my little bare foot on the floor, I hollered "I ain't never g~in' back to True Vine never again in my whole life! " And ya know what? I never did.

Phoenix 5

portfolio by Tim

Massey

6 Phoenix

Phoenix 7

Patrick Benjamin 8 Phoenix

Tuesday When my mother was a little girl her mother sprinkled the clothes using a jar with holes punched in the lid, and rolled them into tight bundles stacking them in a chair.

One by one she unfolded them and pressed their dampness into straightness; she hung the white shirts, arms stiff with starch on a door.

My mother climbed on the sofa and slid down a mattress that was propped up to air over and over again

she asked, "Will I always remember this moment?" her mother set the iron down and fit the collar more carefully around the curve "Yes," she said, "I think you will ."

Kristen Cook

Phoenix 9

Owen {Javeda

10 rhoenix

An Evening with Maya Angelou

by Holly Planells She cascaded onto the University Center Auditorium stage. Then she extended her long arms and took a bow.

"An Evening with Maya Angelou," author, singer and master of all trades had begun.

She was dressed in an autumn green silk blouse and jet black silk elephant pants. A copper-tinted cinch belt hugged her narrow waist. Shiny silver-hooped earrings hung boldly from her brown earlobes. Angelou was the epitome of an African princess. Her dress denoted success.

Angelou rolled her glazed eyes up at the ceiling. Then she lowered them as the crowd began to rise. She waited.

Slowly, she moved (!way from the podium and bowed.

As the clapping grew louder her smile grew wider. When everyone had stood, Angelou increased her bows. Then she popped her thumbs up in the air and murmured "right on." She stood in her glory for several minutes. Gradually, the crowd took its seats. She collected herself and returned to the microphone.

"It's a wonder to be here at the University of Tennessee. It's a wonder," Angelou said with a smirk on the edge of her lips. The audience snickered and Angelou laughed a dry hack. "However, tonight at The University of Tennesse I want to make you laugh and think." She didn't cease her smiles.

This tall statue of a woman stood bold against the faded gold curtains. But her eyes didn't seem as if they were in the same body. They gazed at the lights.

Then Angelou recited a few lines from a poem written by a black poet in the 1930s. "She could walk past the palm trees and see her brown beauty in the pond, but there ain't no palm trees in the street and there ain't no reflections in dishwater."

Angelou said when someone does advance in society people often say she's nice and smart for a WOMAN and she's nice and loyal for a black student. "When society chooses to ignore the attributes of its members everyone in that society is lessened." There was silence . Everyone clapped. Then she smiled and continued.

In conjunction with these thoughts on a segregated society, Angelou said she wanted to discuss love. "Not mush or sentimentality, but inward feelings - I want this kind of love to build bridges between individuals and eventually help people to cross these bridges."

Concerning romantic love, she said, "Sum people still think that white people make -love and black foks juss have sex." The audience laughed and Angelou imitated ghetto gestures like bopping back and forth. Her upper lip rolled across her glazed teeth. Her smile resembled the cheshire cat's grin. It stood alone.

Shortly after, a camera clicked and its flash burst into the atmosphere. A photographer had disobeyed Angelou's request that no photographs be taken. Several people made attempts to stop him. However, instead of continuing her lecture, Angelou turned to the audience and asked "Shall I wait. . .I'll waste some time. . . ."

She rolled her eyes at the ceiling. She was getting impatient with the impetuous photographer.

After he left, Angelou regained her cool and discussed love in the family. She recited a poem about a . black cleaning lady in New York City. "It's a poem about a woman who tolerates humiliation in order to feed her family and laughs when she's not happy. Her laugh is just a moving jaw that makes empty sounds," Angelou said as a tear lingered in her lower eyelashes. The crowd didn't stir. She turned away to wipe away the water and laughed her flat laugh. This time it resembled a grand piano out of tune.

Angelou said she writes through the black experience because it is familiar to her, but said she also writes about the human condition. "Basically, I believe in humanity."

Quickly, she stepped to the middle of the stage and took about five bows. Once again the crowd rose and Angelou increased her bows.

When she came down the steps, people shuffled to the bottom. Someone presented her with a bouquet of red roses. When they presented the flowers to her they said,"This is a token of our appreciation, Ms. Angelou."

Then Angelou curtly replied, "It's Miss Angelou."

Briskly, she snatched the bundle and waltzed into the crowd.

She and her silky dress permeated the atmosphere.

Then she pushed her way through the crowd and she was gone.

Phoenix 11

Ruth Lewis

12 rhoenix

The Hospital I watch you stare With ringed eyes Through the grating which covers The only glass in Room 306 With frail hands you test This iron reticulation for strength As if in fear that it might collapse And no longer offer protection From that which is watching, waiting Out there.

I have known the terror Of nothing A drifting like the aura of sleepers Their breath suspended above them In clouds of silent rumination: This I have seen in your eyes.

Beyond the compound The day is golden, azure Though no more real to you now Than a photograph Presented solely for the purpose Of torment.

You reach toward An answer, a savior, anything And find only emptiness Churning in the black of a soul Nailed shut like a coffin: The death of a child Who never learned to walk.

I was there Between the torrents And the tensile drifting Between the impulse And the razor piercing flesh But did not see: Was a savior who offered No redemption: God How I mourn the death of this child Whose mother now stands before me Her empty arms bandaged And blurred in rivulets: The burning, burning blood Of my eyes Jeff Callahan

Phoenix 13

Bad Haircut Anyway Having long hair Is nothing but vanity.

So I tell myself Alone in front of the mirror With my new pink rabbit ears.

Jeff Callahan

Steve Swindel

14 Phoenix

Mary Louise Peacock

Crazy Old Man He wasn't nothing much, just an old man a'walking.

Didn't notice him much when I drove past ; just some crazy old man stopped to look at flowers.

Hell, he had dirty clothes and a walking stick, nothing mor' n a crooked pine branch .

Crazy old man, didn't amount to much.

I just kept on driving, stereo going, windows all rolled up.

That old man was still there when I came back , still looking at flowers. . .and smiling, for no reason far as I could see.

Crazy old man , he waved to me .

I didn't bother with him, though , just kept on driving .

Gary Simmers

Phoenix 15

Daddy's Mother

b.y Kristen Cook

She sits like a fat spider weeping into her bosom I u,s ed to regret my small breasts from my mother's mother an elfin woman of no breasts and bird bones Even if she is Daddy's mother My mother must wash her hair and wash that hideous fat body she must help her out of the tub because they are women When we eat I lose my appetite her mouth smacks and moves gristles I leave the room even when she's not eating her mouth moves up and down her tongue flickers out swollen lips, swollen tongue from the other room I hear her foot swinging up and down rattling the newspaper she puts on the footstool she always crosses her legs even when she's on the toilet The doctor says it is the nerve pills she took for over half of her life they destroyed the nerves in her face they destroyed the woman who used to dress my father up like a giant cigarette and have him give temperance talks destroyed the woman who drew people sitting around a Thanksgiving table "She's not who she used to be/' my father says "Then can we trade her in?" I ask.

I remember waking up after a long hot car ride tomatoes filling half the back seat she was laughing Polly drew a picture of her with her hair in pin curls she was very proud of it and laughed much later she moved from the farm we visited her in her apartment behind a grain store she said "Glad to see you" without emotion and hugged us without squeezes

16 Phoenix

She had married again He wanted us to call him "Grandfather" we always called him Amos.

She had a black and white fake leopard fur toilet seat cover that smelled like old man's urine I couldn't believe Mom would make me take a bath there My skin shrank at the slightest touch of porcelain I tried not to touch except with the very bottoms of my feet I felt filthier afterward Her second husband died ' this time no shock treatments she came to live with us but she is never in the right place she moves in twice lives with Margie in Maryland moves into the nursing home cries she made the wrong choice comes home with us again and then insists she must go back She cries in her bedroom (Used to be my bedroom ) I am alone in the house she screams and mews "God, take my life take my life, please" I take my book into the living room but there is no escaping her cries they are in the walls ' the H'o use is too small At night I hear small gasps from her room and go get Mother they turn into shudders and shreiks it is better not to let her cry alone she cries throughout my dreams like the kitten Daddy made us leave outside She cannot read Guideposts The people's troubles even though solved by God make her weep

She is my heritage Sometimes when I am reading tears press against me because of her I can draw I do not carry her pendulous breast her thick face but her unhappiness rides deep within waiting for a new place to move to.

Phoenix 17

18 Phoenix

Vance Carter

Elegy To My Grandmother Inhaling back to banana bread , Hers was darkish hot , buttered wet.

Her gray porch , rickety with cats, Her tattered clothesline.

Impatience breathed while chicken fried.

The half-life of her lemon pies.

The peeling green of her porch swing.

The morning glories - Early up you could count on them blue and violet opening.

August with grass and dew all over your feet.

Dandelions in the morning .

Honeysuckle and the grandkids, getting thirsty and go ing looking.

Always taking for granted her plum tree and always yawning up the steps by the wheeze of that old clock she'd be winding.

Waking to the radio on low , I'd take for granted her hovering over me and the French toast , in the same wrinkled apron, its wrinkles going threadbare , old.

Tony Miller

Phoenix 19

The Infidel by Robby Griffith At the age of six, I could have said that there was no more sincere and determined a believer than myself. Fearing omnipresent eyes, I strove to consider every action and guard every thought. No sin went unconfessed, and I sometimes even sought punishment for imagined offenses. I brought my teacher flowers when she paddled me - she liked 路 that. I brought my mother breakfast, lunch, and dinner in bed. I paid neighbors to let me mow their lawns. I was relentlessly good.

20 Phoenix

At school, my apologetics stifled even the hardest skeptics: "He's just your parents," they told me.

"He can't be," I would say. "My parents don't have enough money to give me all the things he gives me."

One cloudless night, I even thought I saw him smiling down from among the stars.

I think I was in the second grade when the creeping mold of doubt fi rst began to thread its way through the aging cheese of my faith. I had been examining a globe of the world when I discovered that there is no land at the North Pole. Suddenly my soul was vexed with an ineffable cosmic panic. I carried the globe to my teacher, who was very wise and knew everything, and, with a finger tight against that blue void, I demanded an explanation.

"All the water at the North Pole is frozen," she explained, clearly untroubled. "I'm sure he could find some place to live."

I was satisfied.

Later on, I began putting my faith to daring tests. One Christmas Eve, for example, I stayed awake late into the night, sitting in darkness with only a pair of thin pajamas between my bare bottom and the cold tiles, and I watched the stack under my bedroom door and listened for significant sounds from the living room. So that I wouldn't be tempted to break my vigil, I had sprinkled sand in the bed. Before an hour had passed, I heard what I was longing not to hear. My mother's door whined and clicked shut. I sat motionless in the silence for at least half an hour, out of secrecy and dread. Then I rose from the floor and crept into the living room.

All was there. Gleaming in the white moonlight were two bananaseated bicycles with shining ribbons dangling from the handlebars.

under the sparkling tree lay G.1. Joe in wetsuit, next to a deflated basketball wrapped in cellophane with something that looked like a giant hypodermic needle. On the coffee table I found a note that said, "Merry Christmas" in my mother's handwriting. I should have been ecstatic, but I felt nothing, absolutely nothing. With desultory tread, I made my way back through the darkness to my room. When I climbed into bed it had sand in it.

In the morning, my unsuspecting brother was ecstatic.

"Look!" he cried, "A letter from Santa!" He was more excited about that letter than he was about his bike. I tried to feign joyful surprise, smiling like a drill team leader. I didn't have the heart to tell little Andy the truth. Besides, there did still remain enough miniscule fragments of faith glimmering in my soul to warn me that I might have made a mistake.

I began to discuss my discoveries wth my next-door neighbor and best friend, Sam Gredo. Sam found no difficulty whatsoever with the unsettling occurrences of Christmas Eve. His explanation was that Santa had brought the toys and my mother had put them out.

"Our parents buy our toys, so maybe they put them out, too," he reasoned."

"But my mother can't afford to buy my toys," I said. "That's the main reason I believe in Santa Claus."

"Well, my parents buy mine. My mom told me we don't get anything from Santa that her and Dad didn't pay for. She saio all parents do that."

"Are you sure?"

'That's what my mom says.

That meant he was sure. "She says that's why me and my sister shouldn'~ ask for anything they

can't afford."

"But if our parents buy our stuff and our parents put it out - where does Santa come. in?"

"He makes it, I guess. Him and his elves."

"Even G.1. Joes and stuff? I thought there was some kind of a law . . . " "Listen, I know Santa comes, because he always drinks this hot chocolate we put out for him, and leaves a thank-you note."

"Well, what if your mother drinks it?" I asked.

"She wouldn't," he answered.

"She's on a diet."

This soggy straw kept me afloat for another year, while I breathed through a single nostril that I struggled desperately to sustain above a deluge of doubt. Still, despite a titanic effort, it was upon the very next Christmas Eve that my faith received its coup de mort.

Once again I stayed up late, but this time instead of spying on my mother I looked out of my bedroom window into the living room next door and spied on Sam's mom. The lights came on over there and, with a heart that was empty and eyes that were full, I saw her raise the steaming cup to her lips - and drink it. I . gazed up into the infinite expanse overhead; never before had it seemed so vacant, its stars so far away.

The next day, my family and relatives were gathered at my grandmother's house. It was then that, strengthened by proof and convinced that truth was more important than superficial happiness, I told my brother about what I had seen. He didn't belive me at first, nor did I expect him to, not atfirst. I gently insisted that it was the truth, awful as it seemed: Santa Claus does

not exist.

He went directly to Mother and asked her about it.

Phoenix 21

"Of course there's a Santa Claus, " she told him . "Santa Claus is - is Christmas! " "Ahmmmmmmm!! " shouted my brother, pointing a denouncing finger, "You don't believe in Christmas! " I was a heretic .

The roomful of relatives began to converge on me, closing in" each aunt interrupting the others with her own arguments and evidence. Only my two uncles sat quietly in the corner, whispering to each other and smiling sadly. Out of sheer impatience wth the whole lot, I pretended to recant.

Some months later, I again confided everyting to Sam. "Did you know there's no Santa Claus?" I ventured .

Nodding knowingly, he said, "He's your parents. " Sam too had lost the faith.

Some time later, I was playing in Sam's back yard with Andy, Sam, and Sam's little sister, Gretchen, when the question of Santa's ?xistence arose. A furious debate ensued, with Andy and Gretchen pro, and Sam and myself can. Suddenly, Gretchen went into the house and emerged with her mother, who was incensed .

"Sam, I ought to slap you silly, telling your little sister things like that! Of course there's a Santa Claus! " "I didn:t say nothin! " pleaded Sam. "See!" interjected my brother.

Disgusted wIth Sam's cowardly capitulation, I went home and sulked in my room. Soon the doorbell rang . My mother called me.

"Honey, answer the door; if it's the paper boy, tell him I'm not home. " I went to the door reluctantly, expecting Sam. It was his mother, who

22 Phoenix

wanted to talk to my mother. After they exchanged a few words, my mother called me into her room.

"You shouldn't tell Gretchen things like that ," she said gently.

"But there's not a Santa Claus. I know. " I started to tell her about my discoveries.

"I know," she said, trying to soothe me. "It's just make-believe. " It was the first time I had heard her admit it. "But you shouldn't tell Gretchen that. Or even Andy . Let them still have fun believing, while it lasts. Didn't you have fun believing in Santa Claus?"

"Nnn--" "I think you were even a good boy because of Santa - better than you might have been without him.

Why not let that magic work for Andy and Gretchen?"

"But it's a lie, I insisted .

"It's not really a lie. It's makebelieve. It's magic.".

"It's a ' lie . People shouldn't be good just because they believe in a lie."

Now she became impatient. "Well anyway, Mrs. Gredo doesn't want you telling Gretchen there's no Santa Claus, so don't. Okay?"

I didn't answer.

"Okay? I'll spank you if you do. " A tear sprouted on my cheek and I quickly wiped it away.

"Okay?" she repeated.

I looked over at the belt of thin hard leather, coiled on the dresser, its tiny buckle glinting in the dusty shaft of sunlight. Torture wouldn't be necessary. As with Galileo, the mere sight of the instruments was enough.

"Nkay, " I mumbled.

"And don't tell Andy, either."

"Kay." I walked numbly into the hall and found Andy waiting.

"There is too a Santa Claus!

There is too! Isn't there? Isn't there?"

"Why do you have to say everything twice?" I asked.

"Isn 't there?" he persisted. My mother was threatening me with her eyes.

"I. . .guess so," I conceded.

"See! See!" he shouted, skipping out of the house victoriously. I collapsed on my bed in defeat.

The next day, I found a letter clipped to the mailbox. It was addressed to "Santa Claus, North Pole." I opened it and read it: Dear Santa, Ple~se forgive my brother for not believing in you. Will you please bring him presents anyway if he is good?

Love, Andy I took the letter into my brother's room and handed it to him'.

"You forgot the zip code," I said.

"What did you open it for, it wasn't yours! I'm gonna tell." He started for the door, but I grabbed his arm.

"No, please don't. I'm sorry I opened it."

"Do you believe in Santa Claus?" he asked.

"Yes," I said rashly .

"Really!" Now he was smiling as if he thought I were Santa.

"No, not really, " I admitted.

"You do, too."

"Then why would I say I don't?"

"Y ou just wanna hurt my feelings.

I'm gonna tell."

"Go ahead, " I told him. His eyes flared in amazement at my impudence. He left the room.

Suddenly I realized that when I had made that first concession to fear, and suppressed the truth, my brother was lost forever - and so too were future generations. Today, my brother is twenty-seven and has two children. They all believe in Santa.

Phoenix 23

Owen Poveda

Dancing!

The Intimacy of the Art They have been the subject of films, books, and Broadway musicals. They provoke emotion and discussion among those who experience their art. They are dancers.

They possess an innate poise that stretches from their slippered feet to the tips of their gracefully extended fingertips. Give them a studio with mirrored walls and a hardwood floor and they've found their niche.

Members of the New Repertory Dance Company cannot be thrust into any stereotype. Their' backgrounds are diverse, as are their interests.

But they all share one dominant driving desire - the desire to dance.

The NRDC will present its winter concert March 10, 11, and 12 at 8:15 p.m. at the Clarence Brown Theatre.

24 Phoenix

Michael Messing

Owen Poveda

O wen Po veda

2i(aria 70wnes Junior in Vance Anoxuil!e, 7ennessee "I started dancing when I was five years old. I can't remember why, except maybe that every little girl wants to dance.

"I went to a modern dance school from the time I was six until I was sixteen. I was taught to improvise and be creative, and that's when I began to learn about theatre etiquette - what you do and don't do.

"Then I found I liked ballet as well as modern dance, although ballet is very difficult. You have to start when you're young to be a good technician.

"When you begin ballet later in life, you really appreciate it. I respect it because I wasn't

trained in it - ballet wasn't second nature to me. You learn to love it because 'you can't do it.

It's a constant challenge, and you learn to dance with more soul. And it keeps you from becoming burnt out, even though it can be very frustrating at times. liThe discipline of dance makes you a deeper, more tenacious person. You apply that tenacity to the rest of your life - you don't give up easily. It makes you sharp mentally - more alive.

"I plan a career as a dancer, preferably in contemporary ballet. I don't know that I'll be able to do it; I'll have to see how well I'm doing when I finish school.

"What satisfies me? Being able to put into movement an abstract idea. It's wonderful to create an image you've had in a dream . I think that, above anything else, is what satisfies me."

Phoenix 25

!J/(ichael Gable C5op homore in !7idueriising

Oab !Ridge, 7ennessee "Dance is something I've just discovered. It's very new to me. I took an elementary jazz class last year, and I was hooked. Now I want to dance. ''I'm overwhelmed by what I have to learn, by what's ahead of me. I learn something every day that I didn't know before.

"Really, I'm not doing what I came to UT to do. I haven't even taken an advertising class yet, and that's my major. I'm dancing, I'm acting.

I'm learning to take a piece of choreography and feel it - interpret it. ''I'm just not the kind of person who can go to school, get an education, get a job, get married,

26 Phoenix

Reed Massengill

and settle down. I know now how good it feels to let go completely and become somebody else, whether it's through dancing or acting.

"Dance is my athletics. It's my workout. I'm learning the discipline it requires, then technique. And the more I get involved with these things, the more I realize my potential.

"If you feel you have something within you that's special, that drives you, then you know you have to work that much harder to make other people see it. You have to do all that's required of you, and then more. ''I'll always dance. It's wonderful - and it makes me feel wonderful."

Reed Massengill

Julia Sillis 0enior in Vance Garyville, 7ennessee "I think dance is one of the most physical things a person can do, and it's unfortunate that our athleticism as dancers isn't as recognized as our art. Dance is, well , refined athleticism.

"A lot of the satisfaction, for me, comes from class - when you find something you've been looking for inside yourself. But the greatest satisfaction comes from performing on the stage, It's magic.

"I was a bored child of twelve when I took my first ballet class. Dance just sort of happened for me. At one point, I thought I was going to be a veterinarian or a microbiologist.

"I make good grades. I belong to three different honor societies, but I've never been to a meeting. When you HAVE to dance, everything else in your life becomes secondary. ''I'm compelled to attend rehearsals, and I have to go at least a half hour early to get focused - you can't dance if you're preoccupied with thoughts of a test or a boyfriend. You must

concentrate strictly on the rehearsal.

"There are times when you look in the mirror and say 'I hate that body.' There are days when you can't do a single damned thing right , and you just want to go home and die. But you do it and you do it and you do it - until y ou get it right.

"Dancers feel everything. They're overemotional, but they have to be. That's what brings everything to life when y ou're performing on the stage.

"One of the things I love best about dance is that chivalry is still alive. There's nothing like a man taking care of a woman - knowing she can do it on her own , but still being there for her . Like in pas de deux work.

"My forte is performing. That's where the magic is for me . When I get too old to dance, maybe I'll become a ballet mistress. But I'm going to perform for as long as this battered old body will hold up. "

Ph oenix 27

Monet' 5 Dream How dare you suggest I paint with only one color.

I do not grandly shade bitter into the sweet around my ankles, fingertips and hair from drizzle-day charcoals to warmest camomile and rose 0 ' sharon so near my throat.

How can you deny the velveteen , cheapen me on whims of dustbowl browns, a Revlon dollface content to pivot keyed up by willful strings ungarnered , wound up spinning in your palm like a plastic ballerina on endless satin toes .

And why ask that I settle for Wool~orth's rhinestone collars when teardrop rubies have been mined at the slope of my cheekbone .

Now watch closely and hand over the violet.

Linda Parsons Burggraf

28 Phoenix

Patrick Benjamin

Ph oenix 29

No Place Like Home

by Catherine Wurst

Bonnie Adamson

30 Phoenix

Death surrounds this place.

The blinding fluorescent lights and antiseptic look of the walls only camouflage its presence. It hangs like a faint shadow - around the corner , in the closed rooms, and sometimes right by your side.

The people here are comfortable with death, as all of us are with the things most familiar to us. These people have death in common - they have been left in this nursing home to die. They are no longer useful to productive society.

Three types of people live here; the lucid and mobile patients , the handicapped but clear-headed residents, and the senile dysfunctionals. The senile ones are among the luckiest. The others must endure each endless day with the realization that they have been cast aside like some broken bit of machinery, used and carelessly discarded.

During the day the old men and women sit in a long row of chairs against the wall. The heavy silence is broken occasionally by distant noises; someone bangs his wheelchair against the wall, a woman cries out in despair for her dead husband. The staff chats and clatters in their clamor to make beds , clean rooms and dole out medication.

Every time a nurse briskly strides by, someone asks " What time is it? " As if it really mattered. More often than not, she does not respond.

And so the patients sit, with their own thoughts, together but alone. Elsa , a German woman with a clear, sharp mind, cannot speak English. Once a month her grandson visits her and they converse in German. Nobody in the nursing home speaks her native tongue. She does not attempt to communicate with the others anymore because it is too tiring and almost always unsuccessful.

Another patient, Tom, moved into the nursing home with his wife Esther when he could no longer take care of her. Not long ago, Esther died and Tom has no will to continue to live. He has stopped eating and is coughing from deep within his lungs in a strange, disturbing manner.

Three doors down the hall from Tom, Grace sits quietly in her room.SIie was accidentally blinded during a routine cataract operation three years ago. Even though the doctors have diagnosed her permanently blind , Grace still hopes that she may one day see again. Every night she puts a drop of holy water in each eye and prays that her sight will return.

"The people here have been so nice to me. I don ' t have any complaints with anyone," she insists. She does not recall that her wedding ring was stolen six months ago, and that a senile patient once attacked her.

Grace also doesn't know that her savings are gone and her house has been put up for sale in order to pay for her nursing home care.

Very few patients have visitors , but when someone does come to visit, it's like a breath of spring air invading a musty, closed room. Children are enjoyed by all the residents. The old people reach out to touch the children 's tousled heads as they toddle by.

"I have six grandchildren, " Grace says proudly. Her grandchildren put her in the nursing home when she became a nuisance to them.

Grace died recently, just before her 84th birthday. All the nursing home staff attended the funeral. She had been well-liked by both the patients and the staff because of her cheerful and accepting attitude.

And now, I am here at the nursing home to pick up her belongings.

I'm sorry Grandma. You deserved better than this.

Phoenix 31

32 Phoenix

Doxology On the noble wooden pew my legs blushing rose from stained-glass shepherds and communion rites never touched any hallowed ground washed in the Blood of the Lamb.

My grandmother's lilac-scented holiness and colored pencils promised far sweeter salvation than Brother Paul in chains or Methodist houses on sinking sand.

I peeled foil from Juicy Fruit wrappers in thin silver parchment that afterward rolled itself up like a serpent's tongue, and copied the stiff-necked alter gladioluses on covers of stolen matchbooks.

Now you come forward so long after the divine passage offering gowns of purest lily white dressing me, binding m e at arm's length with colors that insist upon innocence and speak of nothing more.

Bathing me as if the cold white river could somehow save me a second time.

You say the grape is bitter and must remain unripe .

But here, let's drink - friend to friend World without end .

Think I'll sit this one out.

I know that hymn by heart.

Linda Parsons Burggraf

,