River Poets Journal

2015 Autumn/Winter Edition

2015 Volume 9 Issue 3 $20.00

A Collection of Poetry, Fiction, Memoir, and Art

Sleet Storm by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

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River Poets Journal 2015

Autumn-Winter Edition

Promenade by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

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Autumn-Winter Edition - 2015

Volume 9 Issue 3

A Journal of Poetry, Fiction, Memoir, and Art

Featured Artist Charles E. Burchfield Fiction/Memoir Christopher Woods Moser Khan Scott McPherson Toti O’Brien Terry Sanville Erica Verrillo Poetry/Prose W.M. Rivera Thomas Rigney Terri Niccum Jessica W. Lawrence Catalina Claussen Yuan Changming Sonnet Mondal Anuja Ghimire Mark Vogel Simon Perchik Holly Wotherspoon Paul A. Lubenkov Cassandra Dallett Judith A. Lawrence Kathleen Jacobson Art Heifetz Loretta D. Walker Lowell Jaeger Jason Hinchcliffe Lew Maltby Grant Sorrell Heath Bowen Lana Bella Tom Montag

Page 19 20-22 23-26 27-28 29 30-37 6 6 7 7 8 8 9 10 10 11 11 11 12 12 13 14 14-15 15 16 16 17 17 18 18

River Poets Journal Published by Lilly Press www.riverpoetsjournal.com Judith A. Lawrence, Editor & Publisher lillypressrpj@aol.com All future rights to material published in River Poets Journal are retained by the individual Authors/Artists and Photographers

River Poets Journal 2015

Autumn-Winter Edition

Autumn-Winter Edition - 2015

Volume 9 Issue 3

River Poets Journal Published by Lilly Press www.riverpoetsjournal.com Judith A. Lawrence, Editor & Publisher lillypressrpj@aol.com All future rights to material published in River Poets Journal are retained by the individual Authors/Artists and Photographers

River Poets Journal

2015 Autumn-Winter Edition

Ice Glare by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

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Dear Poets and Writers, Changes in my life seem to occur in Autumn each year. My life slightly shifts into a new direction. A part of me remains watchful, as if I’m an actor waiting for the director to give me my next lines. Another part who wants to hold onto what was, keeps looking back. Mostly I live somewhere in between. Some of my life is captured in poetry, or as re-invented characters in stories, or lies dormant growing its own thick skin. Such is the purpose of life. Always expect the un-expected. The poetry and short stories in this issue all have elements of the unexpected. It’s what makes a poem or story stand out from the rest. Grace Paley wrote, “a writer is like an idealist who marries nearly the same woman over and over. He tries to write with different names and faces, using different professions and labors, other forms to travel the shortest distance to the way things really are.” I think she’s right. Sometimes years later I re-read one of my old poems and come to the realization that I see now what was happening then. I just hid it in metaphor and a litany of words. So as writers we chase after the elusive, viewing life through splintered mirror bits and pieces attempting to interpret our experiences, but never satisfied that we have completed the story. Judith Lawrence, editor

Upcoming Publications in 2016

2016 Anthology - Signature Poems

Scheduled for February Publication

River Poets Journal retains one time rights to publish your work online and in print. All future rights are retained by the author. We ask if your work published by River Poets Journal will be re-published by other publications, that an acknowledgement is credited to the first publication, such as, "previously published by River Poets Journal, plus month/year.” Although River Poets Journal prefers first time submissions, previously published exceptional work is accepted with a note indicating previous publication. Simultaneous submission work is accepted. We ask that the author notifies us as soon as they are accepted by another literary site or publication. River Poets Journal publishes three large issues a year, a Special Themed issue in the first quarter, a Spring/Summer issue during late Summer, and an Autumn/Winter issue towards the end of the year. Artists or Photographers - please submit themed samples of your work. Submissions are open year round for the Spring/Summer and the Autumn/Winter open themed issues. Please provide a short bio of 2 -5 lines with your submission. Either a personal bio, current list of publications, or combo will do. Column space always presents a problem when formatting a poem in a journal. Please refrain from mixing long lines in an otherwise short or average line length poem in your submission. Although it might be an excellent poem, it may prevent publication due to space allowance.

Please Note Editorial

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River Poets Journal Submission Guidelines

River Poets Journal Accepts: New and Established Writers Poetry - 3 to 6 poems - please include your name on each poem submitted. Short Stories - under 5,000 words Flash Fiction - under 3,000 words Essays - under 500 words Short Memoir - under 1,000 words Excerpts from novels that can stand on their own - under 3,000 words preferred Art (illustrations and paintings) or Photography A short bio of 2 - 5 lines Simultaneous and previously published “exceptional” poems are accepted as long as we know

where poems are being considered or have appeared.

We prefer:

Work that inspires, excites, feeds the imagination, rich in imagery; work that is memorable. Work that is submitted in the body of an email or as a word attachment, but will accept work

through snail mail if the writer does not use a computer. Unselected snail mail submissions are returned if the author requests and SASE is provided with sufficient postage.

When submitting work, please provide a short bio of 3-4 lines. Listing all your published work is not required. If not previously published, write something about your life you would like the readers to know.

Previously being published is not a requirement for publication in our Journal. We love new writers with great potential.

Send work in simple format, Times New Roman, Arial, Georgia 12 pt font, single spaced. Please note long line poems may need editing to fit constraints of formatting. We do not accept: Unsolicited reviews Pornographic and blatantly vulgar language Clichéd or over-sentimental poems or stories Response time is: 3 to 6 months depending on time of year work is submitted. All submissions are thoroughly read. River Poets Journal Print Editions: $20.00 per issue plus media postage cost. Note: International shipping cost varies. For ordering multiple copies, please email me for exact cost to avoid overpaying postage. Payment accepted through Paypal, Money Order or Check. Please do not send cash. Delivery of printed copies ordered take 4-6 weeks due to response time of orders placed, and fitting into the Print Shop schedule. Contributor Copies: River Poets Journal issues are free in PDF format online for easy access. We do not offer free contributor print copies with the exception of the featured poet, and featured artist/photographer, as the printing cost would be too prohibitive for a small press.

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Poetry

The Mistick Krewe of Comus

Mules pull the floats back

then, the Krewe members in bright- white facemasks, dressed like sheiks, blow kisses to women

shrieking for throws flung across the crowds—strands of beads, fistfuls

of doubloons. The women blow kisses back at the Krewe’s members.

Mardi Gras kids snatch at the green, gold, purple, yelling “Throw me

something, Mr.,” taking chances beneath each float’s curtained under- wheels, the spills from gaslight flambeaux, for made-in-Japan trinkets.

The street’s a trampoline; the crowd like Masai dancers

springing in air tirelessly--for keepsakes, jammed in between cheek-hugs and howls. Squeezing against plump derrieres

trumps sanity. Night’s a secret in the offing. Jazz quickens the feet.

What’s to come, floats away.

©W.M. Rivera

(The Mistick Krewe of Comus, est. in 1856 was the first Mardi Gras Krewe to parade floats. In 1991 Comus became the last of New Orleans secret societies).

rsvp I’ll meet you some day in the back lots of hell Working the crowds, crying aloud, Sharp’ning your blade on the rough wheel you made, Stone upon stone upon stone, infernal cairns piled high To guide your foes through the smoke and mists Summoned to your ambient trysts Hands worn away, heads neatly bowed, Marching in hell’s celebratory parade. ©Thomas Rigney

Blackbirds in the Snow

by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

New Moon in January by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

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Poetry

Lessons I taught my sister how to drive in the cemetery. My father, who had taught my brothers, was too busy farming and holding onto a day job. My mother, who had taught me, had steered her way into a dust funnel and a six-car pile up and lost her nerve. So it fell to me to nurture our family’s remaining non-driver. The cemetery suited our purpose— to give Kris enough of the basics to pass driver’s ed. Enough of the start stop turn to elude the hoots of farm boys who had driven tractors since the age of 6. So she drove on roads better paved than those of the county, round and round the tombstones showing respect with a sedate speed a couple miles per hour above breathing. And as she drove, the residents sent up silent cheers. While the sun glinted off granite Kris set her chin, and the car plowed determinedly on. As the day progressed, she drove smoother, smoother, and we shifted into secrets, the silly sister kind that are quickly forgotten, that are only told for the simple joy of sharing, that evaporate into the car seats and the trees. Decades later, what is remembered is not what we said, but how we laughed. We may have had relatives in that cemetery, but didn’t know it. Then, neither of us was into looking back not even into rear views. We just drove, closer and closer

to the on-ramp of the dream of faster cars and open highways and no one in the car older than us. ©Terri Niccum You’ll Find Yourself Thinking of Her She believes in solids, though all is open and melting like tar and honey. All is melting like black and gold. Chances come raining down in slow motion. Diamonds pass through your skin into the center of you. You are not what you think you are. She takes you and holds you up to the darkness, searching for precious hailstones. Sleet glazes bare neurons as something thick envelops your mind. It seeps into your brain. It seeps into the folds and coats the watered tissues with tar and honey poured and studded with diamond rain falling through blue planets. Fear pours out, black and gold, and you’ll find yourself thinking of her. ©Jessica Wiseman Lawrence

Winter Solstice by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

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Poetry

The Song of the Middle Fork

The silent twist of ghost white Butterflies in a joyful dance Wrought by the updraft Of fragrance from vetch, mullein, and artemesia A scintillating pollen cloud En plein air, pleasantly exhausted Wings inhale and exhale Precariously perched in sunshine That glints and glimmers Off the spiraling surface, tempestuous tornadoes that reel, Gather, and tumble downstream In boundless playground laughter Turned whitewater in its race around the lazy bend that captures You and me smiling, Mirrored on the surface. ©Catalina Claussen

Fallen Leaf Shaking off all the dust You have accumulated over the season Flapping your wings against twilight At the border of night Like a butterfly coming down to Kiss the land As if to listen to The heartbeat of the earth Only once in a lifetime ©Yuan Changming

Photography by Ajalaa Claussen

The Insect Chorus by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

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Unusual Shiver in Winter Days She was a creeping winter,- coiling and settling into the wardrobe of my lined collections of cassettes and clothes (Scattered in a bachelor’s room) Suits arranged by brands fragranced by sensuous nights brought by you molded me into a gentleman below uncombed hairs and unwashed hands. I was into lessons to be clean while I was feeding on my love. From a scrappy life beside a pond abound with weeping cranes she was the only fish in front of my hungry beaks. Short-lived and destructive as most pleasures are I am wedged back back into an untidy shiver from an act worthy of no mercy. ©Sonnet Mondal

Two Worlds A blue lake captures my soul in its unmeasured, unimaginable depths where a new world better than lands survive drinking immortality. Howling wolves pierce melancholy and the dropping leaves stuck with fever of spring bows down before the majestic stance of endless sky and waters. Echo of unknown sounds emerging from the unexplored ends of the woods run wildly and circle around ears like unquenched souls. Striking against the trunks of topless trees they become one with lingering serenity. The bridge connecting them to my land is left broken for years; perhaps broken by the Gods and none has dared to swim across for both the worlds, one of religion and other of reason stand with obstinate swords and spears wearing T-shirts of barriers and laws in either side of the bridge.

©Sonnet Mondal

Poetry

House by the Railroad by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

February Dusk by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

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Is it barbaric to write poetry after Syria? —for Amel Perhaps there is music In the black scrawls Maybe there is poetry In the inky splatter Because she is here With shrapnel Right above her eye Her forehead bled Through her first home The mother’s belly and womb But she has come With the first water Breaking red Her brow with a soft arch Is already scarred The sky that falls in pieces Is still starred The scabs in the mother’s arms Also fold When the child is in A cradle hold The night circles under their eyes Only pillows sleep on the bed The morning sun will also rise And the mother and child Will share its light With the mortar and the clots That are hardened Without cotton swabs Or warm water But, remember She has arrived ©Anuja Ghimire (homage to Theodore Adorno's words and the brutal reality of the crisis in Syria).

Lying Fallow Maybe great ships will someday return, but hoists and nets don’t move as fisherman dawdle drinking coffee in the Salt Café, the talk recounting past swarming profusion/ boats bumping at docks/great ships carrying Gray’s Harbor lumber shipments. In this quieted Washington State world a solitary beach walker spots a lone seal bobbing on gray Pacific swells left to rise/fall in un-netted/ unhurried peace. Beneath, an underwater pasture allowed to grow. Once inland oceans existed, but now a sheltered Olympia garden meditates, like it could be permanent, with two pampered bonsai apple trees as ancient fathers. Thirty miles further, in Montesano, one hundred thousand jonquils grow fat, unhurried, and in working Aberdeen on rain soaked roads birds chatter and flit, picking and planting cherries. Further on, east of Lake Sylvia, saplings erupt round dead stumps from savaged dirt. Outside, the heckling call of jays says much about how connections emerge when a July pine breeze stalls, coaxing thick rain from afar. Now the mall pleas for more are forgotten, and we are three thousand miles further on in a Blue Ridge holler, where napping builds strength. Our history says study maps/ plot travels, and add notes, then bend and crawl in the garden/waiting for ducklings to mature, tomatoes to ripen, until crows note smoking compost/and worms grow into tangled community. Until the time is right in overwhelming plenty, when grapes ripen without fanfare, moving in heat from hard green to soft red. ©Mark Vogel

Poetry

Winter East by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

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* You will hide, try point to your forehead almost remember where the mourners put the dirt back so even you won’t know the difference --you need more dirt :a sky with one cloud then another filled with stones and gasping for air so you will think it’s the grasses that have forgotten where to go have nothing left to do the way funerals still come by as if rain no longer mattered at night and the kiss someone once gave you --you won’t eat anymore :the breeze will step back, go slack, cover you though there’s not enough room with distances and longing. ©Simon Perchik

The Flowers' Lament The flowers ache, the ones he brings my favorites. I suffer from my own interpretation of what is not fresh beauty. A bit of leaf edge curled, browning. A few petals already falling. Is there something to divine here? That thought rambles through my consciousness trying to pull itself into focus. Should I be finding grace in my decay? Or loudly grieve that the fresh new lives being born will not be mine? Or? As I curl, brown-edged my moisture is age-wicked and what is left of me but the scratchings on my bones, hidden like hopeful young lovers' initials carved long ago grown over. Yes, I ramble - I am an old woman - back to the flowers. What did they say, who can remember? ©Holly Wotherspoon If Not For Love I never planned to take you for a ride In the flim-flam caravan of love, but Here we are, again, hunkered down And dirty in your luminous boudoir where Stuffed animals still bear us silent witness. So let them stare. I will not rise to guilt, That aching vice, and you, on your behalf, May rightfully laugh at all my loopy lust And looney-tune desires. But I tell you this, Here in this dense capsule we call now, The time is right and you are ripe as well. So whether you take me as I am or how You wish I were, it’s all the same to me. You will never be more voluptuous while I Shall be as brave and dashing as you desire, And together we may tease away the night And cheat the moon. I will have no regrets. ©Paul A. Lubenkov

Poetry

Garden of Memories by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

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A single light in tedium Nights of eclipse I’m always sleeping off tryst, insomnia, too many drinks with writers I have a cat on my fridge each day I threaten to drop him off at the old folks home for he meows like a nagging wife I need a wife to come home to help with the never ending things like trash day and laundry how it all goes round and round every week you can’t believe it’s there again last night’s moon orange above the bridges the twinkling lights the bay inky idling in the middle of all this beauty traffic keeps us from enjoying we can’t help hoping for catastrophe to shake some of these cars out of our area I drive back and forth buy food out more than I should it will keep me broke wing grounded like so much does experiences not things are the secrets to happiness that’s what they sell us the sky outrageously gorgeous the night we watch sunset with a suicidal man I say through the gate to him I have felt that way I promise you but I do not admit how recently how empty these summer nights violently masturbating or texting a black hole I want to live now for the same absurdity that will drop me back down to the same darkness not as hot and helpless as the suicidal man still in the night never ending I can get worked up about a rendezvous thinking every fuck is the answer a friend tells me about retraining the neurons in my brain about telling yourself you are worth it until you erase and write over the thought patterns that say you are not worth it I mean the ones that make it impossible for you to cook for yourself even as you stir chicken in the pan you tell yourself lies

you season it for his tongue you can only enjoy food like your body a reflection of their wanting you good cook and cocksucker the clouds tonight painted pastel pink there is a horned horse in the chair an endless stream of poets dying to speak their truth the world is filling with refugees everyone running away and we condemn them for the places we made awful as we wear cheap garments made by hungry hands and most days its only the hungry poets that keep us wanting to live. ©Cassandra Dallett The End of Things We stayed the rough course until the road ahead disappeared from view acknowledging all the while it was an illusion at best wishful thinking in the least. All the vague warnings suddenly materialized clear as that look of chagrin imprinted on his face. His empty words fell all around us weightless smoke drifting into memory. The road slipped into the dust of yesterdays and what remained for a long-long time was only for appearance. ©Judith A. Lawrence

Poetry

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Streetcar Stella could tell me About nights of heat passion after a fight stripped of airs and ancestry Tennessee wrote truth Boiling over and exploding Seeking refuge in childhoods patched blanket Like Blanche I fear age And loss longing for paper lanterns To soften the harsh light comfort is fleeting hiding in cool baths or Wild Turkey oblivion wearing a glass and glue tiara It will not stop time nor erase it all comes back in the morning that streetcar keeps coming ©Kathleen Jacobson

The Cat Lady My Guru is an old lady with eleven cats who wears striped elastic waist pants and a flowered shirt that doesn’t match I have never seen her speak except to her cats at feeding time on the partially dried hedge covered porch Her nirvana garden an unruly display of rocks, dirt piles and an occasional weed the Zen yard of least labor framed by neighboring roses and picket fences In comfortable shoes she sets off to the grocery store buying only what she can carry she does not venture often beyond the front gate As I watch and wait each day When the man from code enforcement stops by she peeks out the window but does not answer the door it has gone on like this for years like an unrequited lover the officer will return only to be rebuffed again As I walk by in admiration my Guru catches me staring and in a rare moment she speaks to me I wait for her words of wisdom of simplicity and age, She exclaims, “Why don’t you mind your own fuckin business!” ©Kathleen Jacobson

Poetry

Flower Pot in Window -Charles Ephraim Burchfield Scrap Iron by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

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The Leaves Speak watch us pirouette to the ground prima donnas of the air every day we multiply until the sere brown grass becomes a patchwork quilt of many colors rake us in your sleep you'll never be rid of us aim the blower at us we spiral into the sky kidnap us in plastic bags a squirrel chews a hole and we work ourselves free suck us up with powerful machines and we clog the engines fence us in and we spill over the edges we are consummate hangers-on even in spring you'll find us hiding under the stairs stuck to the roses' thorns crammed in the bow of a boat like Dilsey and her family we endure the hickory nuts pounding in staccato bursts upon your roof are telling you a hard winter lies ahead stop pursuing us with your clumsy implements and go cut some wood if it's a quest for order that makes you act this way go re-arrange the house but leave us leaves alone. ©Art Heifetz

Thursday Night Poetry Reading I am a lone ambassador of poetry before a delegation of the Thursday Night Writers Group. They stare, fat notebooks opened and pencils posed on the page. The president admonishes although I am a poet they can still learn from me. How genuine her belief, beautiful her cause, sad her explanation. Before sharing Why Write Poetry, I read my first poem. It is an anthem of protest for the man sitting on the second row. His face is a billboard of disapproval, azure eyes commercials of complaint. His crossed arms are empty pens; he cannot write flexibility into his thoughts. There is no gage to measure the hostility in his voice when he informs, “That’s not a poem. It doesn’t rhyme.” I do not tell him there is no rhyme for an orange soaked sky at the end of an idle day. The wind is not dactyl when it scraps wispy arms through a thirsty maple. There is no end-stopped for a candle’s hot tongue burning scents of lavender into its smooth body. Maybe there is spondee in the smile-smothered face of a grandmother recovering from cancer after holding her granddaughter for the first time. He refuses to engage, challenges me with a protruding chest. I read on, the words pitching from my larynx are more determined than his angry stone stare of disagreement. ©Loretta Diane Walker

Winter Sun and Backyard by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

Poetry

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Lament of a Catalpa Each night when the moon meanders through the doorframe of darkness, I dream history, the future, feel the blade of the past chopping at my strength. Last night I was fence posts. Taut barbwire cut through my limbs, my cries covered by wailing wind. Who will grieve with me? The cypress? The cedar? I watch them lift their leafy hands in praise, shake them with green gratitude because they are still standing regally. The night before, I was railroad ties with my soul splintering as I tasted the trains’ coal broiled breakfast, felt their steel wheels churn across my trunk cracked like ribs. The Creator wrung clouds like cleaning rags. The aroma of fresh rain could not wash away the stench of their motoring to mysterious destinations. Who will mourn for me? This croissant May morning? The child leaning against my rough body, reaching for my ripe fruit? The hummingbirds on holiday in the folds of my flowers? I stand alone in the entrance of this day, look up long enough to see the sun is a massive mole on the wide cheek of a glassy sky. ©Loretta Diane Walker

never an easy goodbye what do i say to you mother after your birthday cake and small-talk i wave goodbye backing out the driveway goodbye goodbye to you in the window your trembling half-smile hands wringing your apron and the broken look in your eye till around the corner i swallow hard against the way i hurt you heave a sigh and think back years toward hours you lifted me to perch on the kitchen counter look oh look out the window new backyard robin families in spring even then i felt like a young bird with wings and you were the one who builds the nest and i’m the price you pay raising the kind of bird that flies ©Lowell Jaeger

Sun and Moon Painting by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

Winter Bouquet by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

Poetry

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These things I once pictured for us. I see them here every Thursday. They always sit in the same place if they can, next to the window, with the husband facing so he can watch the television above the bar. They never speak until they finish flipping through the menus and even then, conversation comes and goes. I’m not always close enough to hear the words, but when I do, they talk about normal things, like an incident at the grocery store, or a flower that is coming up in the garden. I hear the same stories enough that I’m able to follow their conversation even when I’m across the room. I never hear either one of them laugh. They rarely smile, yet there’s a tenderness about them I admire, the kind only learned from sharing a house together many years, from raising children and earning a well-deserved retirement. Sometimes one of them glances my way, and if our eyes meet, I smile slightly and nod, and they always nod back. They must be used to my presence here, too. What do they think, looking at me? Do they pity the middle-aged man sitting alone in the restaurant, scratching thoughts into a notebook between bites? That’s not how I write it. The way I write it, they don’t even see me because I’m not part of their world. I’m part of the restaurant, part of the background, part of the noise that doesn’t register. The friendly nod wasn’t a recognition but just a reflex. Their dinner goes untroubled, protected by the routine of their tenderness. ©Jason Hinchcliffe

Dahomey Blues Atchafalaya night, red moon swimming in Chocolate Bayou. Saxophone sings a runaway train, switchblade rhythm slicing Cajun darkness like a blacksnake through summer grass. Echos of djembes and conch shells wresting under jagged Dahomey stars. Shark-dark eyes kneeling on bloody earth, awaiting the benediction of the leopard’s paw. ©Lew Maltby

Poetry

Roadside Stream by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

Night Walkers by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

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Grandma’s Faces Every summer we’d kill the engine and walk up your driveway, through the open side of the two-car garage and into the kitchen where, hanging above the table with pictures spread out like a family tree, your collection of ceramic faces grew from the wall, prisoners squeezing their heads through iron bars and sizing me up as I paced before them. As their warden, you’d remind me not to be afraid. After you died and we walked up your driveway for the last time, through the empty two-car garage and into the table-less kitchen to squeeze the last of your things into the trunk of our car, one face remained on that dust-polka-dotted wall, staring at me with a reciprocated sadness in his gloss black eyes that begged on missing knees to take him away. Like you, he now watches over me as I type, listening to the keystrokes from a nail above my monitor and reminding me always of your angel-food cakes, your glass-shattering laughter, and your resolve to never be afraid. ©Grant Sorrell

Frozen Tense A secondhand photo on a late spring afternoon. Her eyes like her father's- blue in the morning, green in the late-day sun. Brown curls bouncing off her soft shoulders. Yesterday, tantrums and broken phrases. Her future: dances in wintertime, that first brush of a pen, a white-dressed wedding: something close to her father's path. Fragments from taillights and shards of strewn metal form a stained glass window of a child in a garden; a father bathed in warm hues with only a photo of a girl in the clover field a dandelion in hand, and eyes that once upon a time changed colors like seasons. ©Heath Bowen

Poetry

Rainy Night by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

Early Spring by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

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The Elusive Mermaid Secrets in their tiny boxes, dreams sleep in glass, occasionally you fish them out to swim among the ordinary stones, hoping to catch a glance of her floating hair and beryl-colored scaled fins. Before sleep, you walk on coral reefs of deep orange, emerging through murmuring inlet where current is heavily stocked with fish. Any moment the skies may darken and the sea spews billows in great ascent, and through the narrow slit of the mist she may rise, when the open earth, rumbling air, and sheer stone walls of spray collide. She may walk to shore, peeling free the briny coat, flesh molds over bone, the moon churns gold on her tresses. Then how will you explain the way your thoughts slide beneath the half-light and the ghosts of bird rasp your voice in pained cackle--when the head knows not what the heart speculates. You will need to speak the language of the sea, of a midnight's wail that breathes beneath the underbelly of the words, one part air, the other part earth. And maybe, just maybe, as her limbs morph back under the waves, memory will carry the part of speech where delicate shift in barometer will remind her of your refrained whisper, and some- where in the midst of liquid depths, the tracing of your vanishing leaves itself on lime-rich shales. ©Lana Bella

Porch Porch across the south side of that farmhouse, but we always used the east door through the mudroom where we kept the slop pail, where the freezer lined one wall, winter coats the other, where sun first warmed that house, to a kitchen which was the center of the small farm universe. Turn left into the dining room, from there turn right to the living room where a door opens onto the porch but is not ever used. Turn right again, back to the far end of the long kitchen. Turn left upstairs to the bedrooms and eventually to a bathroom straight down the hall. Before we had the bathroom, we used the outhouse. We bare- footed it in summer and in winter -- the young have no time for shoes. Under that porch, our dog whelped a litter of pups one bleak year and I was the one who had to crawl under to bring them out. After, we sat on the porch steps. I don't remember just sitting on the porch itself, though. We weren't porch- sitting people. ©Tom Montag

Poetry

The Luminous Tree by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

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Stories by Christopher Woods

It surprised me when she showed up at my door. I had seen her earlier in town at the market, told her I was a good listener if she ever wanted to talk. I never thought she would take me up on it. But there she was, shivering from the cold. I brought her in and gave her a shot of brandy. She began telling me her story, first in small pieces. I wasn't sure where it was going at first. It seemed like small details from an impressionist painting. Soon, though, I began to see the whole, the sadness of it. When she was finished, I thanked her for telling me. I gave her a bit more brandy. She would need it to stay warm on the way home. Then she was gone. Her words still hung in the air, small clouds that drifted around the room and hovered near the ceiling. I poured myself a shot of brandy. After hearing her story, I realized that I too had a story that needed to be told. I needed to confide in someone else. Shared stories are better, I knew. I poured another brandy. It was too late to go into town again, to find someone who might listen. I decided to tell my story. I hoped that someone, somewhere, might hear it in time. I began speaking aloud in the empty room. Like this. Warts and all. I hope I am not being a burden to you. Yes, I know that some of the details are quite grim. But as you listen, maybe you will feel your own story stirring inside. It's been there a long time. Festering. Germinating. Floating, trapped, in memory. Once I have finished telling you my story, maybe you will want to tell me yours. Yes, I know that my story has elements of her story. It's something of a mix. When you tell me your own story, I know it will have pieces of my story, which is also partly her story. Like I said, shared stories are better. Between us, all our stories will be told. Shared. They will go on floating free, country to country. Go ahead, tell me. I can be a good listener.

Old Houses in Winter by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

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Finding Jesus Christ: a fictional account by Mousir Khan

The ‘Kerala Daily’ was thrown at the doorsteps to be picked up. A collection of paper that is so

significant in our lives, so much so that even after its contents have lost their importance, it can very

well be used to wrap things or even wipe the derrières. As the door opened a lot of coughing could be

heard. It was the Sunday morning of May because the temperature was fierce and the wind

elsewhere.

I was then one of the tenants in the chawl (a large building divided into many separate tenements)

where this incident took place. The chawl was the closest accommodation, I could afford, to the

university, where I was studying for a master’s degree in English. I spent most of my day at the

university, if not in the classroom then in the library. I didn’t have a great appetite for reading;

hence, I used to coerce myself to read.

I remember that day very well because of the events that ensued. After all, it is the events that occur

in a day that make it memorable. But before I narrate the whole story it is necessary to acquaint you

with the two men, whose story this is; my neighbours: Mr. S (also referred herein as Mr. Piety) and

Mr. A.

Mr. S dealt in used cars. But his business is not what makes him a distinguished character, it was his

religious ardour. Deeply pious man as he was, there was not an occasion where he wouldn’t mention

God or Jesus or the Holy Spirit or all of them together at times in a conversation. ‘God is great,’ ‘It is

God’s will,’ ‘Jesus is to be praised,’ and the likes were phrases that frequently broke free from his

mouth. Despite all the piety, there was not a single crooked trick of the business that he did not

employ in his business. He lied, cheated, extorted, and connived and contrived without any qualms

and pangs of conscience. When it came to charity, this man sought every opportunity to take charity

and sought every excuse not give it. Once, few people came asking for donations for some flood

victims somewhere. Mr. S sent them away empty handed saying he himself was poor and instead of

begging for donations they should supplicate Lord Jesus for help.

Then there was Mr. A. Consider it a coincidence that I happen to be a witness of these two men. The

second one whom I haven’t described was the exact antithesis of Mr. S, so much so that Mr. S was

married, Mr. A was single; Mr. S was a devout Roman Catholic, Mr. A was an atheist; Mr. S was dark

as charcoal, Mr. A was fair as butter; Mr. S was short, a little taller than 5 feet, Mr. A was tall; the

only things that were common in them was that they were both human beings and my neighbours.

Coming back to the day of which I was about to tell you, the noise of coughing was from Mr. S’s

house. His wife was invariably sick. She was fair and pretty with lovely hair that reached her

shoulders. She was slender and meek as a mule before her husband. I haven’t seen an angel, but I

can imagine one. An angel, that’s what she looked like. How this man came in possession of her is a

21

Finding Jesus Christ: a fictional account by Mousir Khan

miracle. Maybe the God was graceful to him. But what a pity it was to learn that this goddess, seeing

whom even the cruelest man’s heart would melt like burning wax, was neither loved nor respected by

Mr. Piety. However, one thing that I can tell with certainty is that Mr. A had something for her,

because like every man who feels uneasy at the sight of a woman he’s attracted to, Mr. A also

displayed ample signs of loss-headedness and agitation when he espied this angel. He would gaze at

her secretly, only to look at the sky or the earth beneath his feet when she looked at him. Whether

she too had anything for him, I cannot comment on that. Simply because I can put myself in another

man’s shoes but I cannot put myself in another woman’s shoes, for I do not know if women think like

men.

You must excuse me for digressing from the matter again. I’m not one of those able and skilful

literary stalwarts whose work you often read and who have the experience of writing voluminously. If

they are the lords and dukes, I’m a mere mendicant in the field of ecriture.

There was a lot of commotion that day. I came to know of it only, when I read the newspaper, just

out of curiosity. On the first page of the ‘Kerala Daily’ on the bottom left there was a line in black

bold letters that read: ‘Jesus Has Arrived in Israel’. When I read the news article a little more, I

realized this could have a great significance to the Christian population all over the world, perhaps

the whole world. It is obvious that Mr. Piety was affected the most, by this news.

Then there were others, like Mr. A, who would simply not care even if God himself appeared before

them. They were the sceptics who work their mind so much that they even doubt their own senses. If

they were not there, perhaps the world would have a single religion.

The events which ensued after this incident were quite interesting to form the subject of my story,

because of their nature and the short duration in which they occurred. Mr. S left his ailing wife to get

succour from Jesus. It seems he travelled to a village in Israel where so many others like him

travelled from all the corners of the world to witness and be blessed by the God’s son.

I thought it was so, at first, but then I realized it was only to escape the creditors that he had left in a

hurry and one can be certain it was to seek succour himself rather than for his wife.

During the absence of Mr. S, Mr. A, being the closest neighbour of Mr. S, with good intentions visited

the ailing wife. Since her condition required attention and care, Mr. A, called upon her more often

and did the chores for her. What went on in the house is left for the readers to imagine, but I think

there was lot of meeting of the eyes and shyness of the ailing maiden, and chivalry of the

neighbouring knight. That they would fall in love with each other was but obvious or perhaps

predestined.

22

But soon the other neighbours began to talk and raise their eyebrows. That didn’t stop these two

lovers from seeing each other. Under the care and love of Mr. A, Mrs. S’s health had improved

considerably. She appeared like a blooming flower, fresh and beautiful. His love was like water to this

wilting flower. Had the news of which I’m going to tell you below, not arrived, the two lovers would

have run away to a place where their lives would not be the subject of evening gossip and censure of

the society.

After a month of the hastened departure of Mr. S, once again the news arrived regarding the Son of

God. This time it read: ‘Thousands of Christian Devotees Die in Stampede in Israel.’

Furthermore the news read as follows: ‘in their attempt to seek blessings, thousands of Christian

devotees hailing from all over the world lost their lives...The claim that Jesus appeared in Israel

was proved to be a hoax...the local authorities are investigating the perpetrators...’

Well, Jesus certainly didn’t turn up in Israel. However, he did turn up in the form of a neighbour to

Mrs. S, coveting his neighbour’s wife. Mr. S never returned and Mrs. S became Mrs. A.

Finding Jesus Christ: a fictional account by Mousir Khan

Six O’ Clock by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

23

His Left Hand by Scott McPherson

Dad spent the better part of one hot August day getting pretty loaded on Jack Daniels, the Old

Number 7. That itself wasn't anything new, but this time he drove us down Interstate 35 in his

crappy '74 Dodge Challenger with the mag wheels and side pipes, a considerable source of pride that

he called “Old Blue.” We parked just before the Texoma Bridge, which crosses the river where the

bank is wide and the water runs slow and dirty. The dirt is red in Oklahoma, and so is the river.

Paul, my oldest brother, had saved all winter and spring for a Ruger 10-22, .22 caliber rifle,

and he was really excited about shooting it for the first time. All any of us could think about was

shooting that gun.

At first, Mom refused to even buy it for him. “If you can save enough to buy it yourself, then

you can get one,” she'd told him – never believing a fourteen-year-old would actually do it, and not

believing any of us could do much of anything. Paul worked an extra paper route, slogging through a

long and nasty winter (both are rare in Tulsa) and saving every penny, until he had enough.

Mom was a mean woman, but there were rare moments when some long-forgotten love of

justice clawed its way to the surface and overpowered her more natural tendency to cause hurt. The

look on her face was more than angry. Mad could earn you a slap or two; this was defeat. She didn't

speak to Paul for two days, but she bought him the gun.

That didn't mean she would take him anywhere he could shoot it, and there was no way she'd

agree to let Eddie or me go. Working a couple of jobs left her pretty spent, and what energy she had

left was used up on the doctors she dated. No way was she going to look for a place where we could

shoot.

Tulsa died when the oil money pulled out, but it was still a big city in 1981 – largely a

suburban one, but where we lived, right smack in the middle, there was nowhere nearby you could

shoot a gun without attracting a lot of attention. Just street after street of houses: one-square-mile

grids, tick-tack-toe boxes with outlying thoroughfares lined with strip malls, apartment complexes,

gas stations, bars and movie theaters. You might find a vacant lot, but the cops were everywhere and

they were pricks.

Paul had complained, but Mom didn't care. “Take it with you when you go see your father,”

she'd told him. “Let him deal with it.” Paul did.

Dad lived in Oklahoma City, down Interstate 44 from Tulsa. I'll always remember him saying,

“It's ninety-nine miles to Oklahoma City, and a-hundred ninety-eight miles to Lawton!” I still don't

know if that's true, but I remember Mom cussing “that pack of trash he calls friends” who lived all

along the way. Dad insisted she was “crazy as a shithouse rat.”

Mom dumped us with him. The plan was for us to stay the whole month of August. The

problem was Dad liked to drink, and he was kind of cheap. Jack Daniels was expensive, he always

24

said, so you had to skimp on everything else. When he told us we were going fishing we begged him

to get some bullets. “We'll stop by Otasco!” he said, eyes lighting up, finger poking at the sky – as if

this ubiquitous piece of our childhood and the Oklahoma landscape were a revelation.

Predictably, he'd grabbed the cheapest ammunition they had: the last two boxes of Number

12, a pistol cartridge that people called snake shot (“Because it'll turn that rifle into a shotgun,” he

said, in answer to our quizzical stares), and their last box of ball ammunition. The Number 12 was a

big mistake; the Old Number 7 was a bigger one.

At the river, I sat in the shade under the bridge and Dad told me to cast a line while he and

Paul did some shooting. They found some old tin cans and set them up, Paul running down range to

place new targets as Dad reloaded the ten-round magazine. The ball ammo went quick, in 10-shot

bursts – one on a water moccasin that Eddie found sunning itself a little ways downriver, and Dad

blasted into hamburger. I couldn't concentrate on the fish because I was too busy thinking about

shooting that gun.

Dad dug into a fresh box, the Number 12, reloading the magazine. Dropping the slide, he shot

a can, but the next round jammed against the empty casing still lodged in the chamber. “Goddamn

cheap ammo!” he exclaimed, voice level, but forceful. Ripping the magazine from the well, he shoved

it towards Paul, not looking at him. After six or seven tries at pulling the slide back hard and shoving

it forward he gave up, setting the rifle aside and grabbing his bottle.

Taking a long pull, he looked at us sternly. “Don't touch that gun,” he said, getting up and

weaving his way back to the car. Returning, he held a straight-blade screwdriver in his hand.

Slumping back down into his camping chair, he jerked the slide of the rifle back and prized the

empty casing out of the chamber. “Too long,” he mumbled, swaying in his seat, holding out the tiny

brass cylinder; made for a pistol, it simply wouldn't fit properly in the rifle's chamber. Squinting

disapprovingly, he tossed it aside and reached for another one.

I glanced their way, noticing that Dad was about halfway through his bottle. Looking up, Paul

met my stare. We were thinking the same thing. “Dad,” he said, voice rising just a little; still looking

at me, I could already see the hurt in his eyes. “Don't you think you oughta lay off a bit?”

Eddie, the brother wedged right between us in age, was standing off a bit, near the water

again, but within earshot. He heard the question, and his body turned involuntarily toward us. It was

a thought we'd all had many times; we'd talked about it amongst ourselves when Dad couldn't hear,

and every now and again we'd even hide his bottle. Come morning he'd go looking to spike his coffee

and all hell would break loose. Sooner or later, we had to tell him where it was.

“Shut up!” he snapped, lips tightening into a circle and drawing back slightly from his teeth.

We knew that expression; Eddie had been the first one of us to notice that it made Dad look just like

Clint Eastwood, right before he killed a bad guy. From that day forward we had called him Dirty

His Left Hand by Scott McPherson

25

Dennis – but only if he was in a good mood. As his head snapped up, a strand of black hair fell across

his face. He was good and drunk at this point, struggling to focus. Immediately, shame washed over

him and his face softened. “I'm fine,” he said, trying to sound apologetic but sounding impatient

instead. That was the thing about Dad: he was a terrible father, but at least you got the sense that he

felt bad about it.

With the rifle slide still locked to the rear, Dad placed a fresh round directly into the chamber.

Something across the river grabbed his attention and he dropped the slide, pulling the rifle up quick

and taking aim. A squirrel had wandered down to the water on the Texas side, maybe seventy-five

feet away. Dad killed it easily; we thought that was pretty cool. At that distance, we shouldn't have.

Chuckling, he handed the rifle over to Paul and took another long pull on the bottle. “That

snake shot ain't extractin',” he slurred. “You'll have to load 'em one at a time, and pry out the

empties.”

That's when things really went wrong. Paul grabbed the screwdriver and dug the empty casing

out, but in his excitement he set the fresh cartridge kitty-corner in the chamber. When he dropped

the slide it jammed, on a live round again. For some reason that we never could figure out, the slide

just wouldn't come back now – no matter how hard Paul yanked on it. Dad watched for a while, eying

the struggle impassively as he took another couple of drinks. Once it was clear that Paul was beaten,

he set the bottle down and reached out for the gun.

“Lemme have it,” he said. Dad always wanted to be helpful, he just never really knew how to

do it right. Taking the gun confidently, he placed his left hand over the end of the barrel, the muzzle

resting firmly in the middle of his palm. Right hand on the stock, he started bouncing the rifle on his

knee. Changing his grip after a moment, his thumb slipped inside the trigger guard and rested firmly

across the trigger.

I hadn't noticed any of this. Bored, I'd set the fishing pole down and walked over to where

Eddie was skipping rocks. It was early evening by now, but the humidity wasn't letting up one bit.

The air under the bridge was cool and damp, and coming out of the shade the heat hit me like a wall.

I picked up a rock and let it fly; bouncing across the water, it came to a rest just inches from the

opposite bank. Eddie looked at me, his face showing approval. Even though less than two years

separated us we'd never been very close, but in that moment, when he looked at me, I felt like I'd

pleased him. I liked the feeling. Another thirty seconds of Dad bouncing that rifle on his knee, and

the bullet slipped out of the groove in which it had become wedged and slid perfectly into the

chamber. The slide followed it all the way down, driving the cartridge firmly into place as Dad's

thumb applied backward pressure on the trigger.

The hammer fell on a primer that functioned exactly as it should have. The Number 12

splintered through Dad's left hand, spiraling off into the Oklahoma sky. “Ow!” he shouted, jerking his

hand back and shaking it violently, like he'd been stung by a bee. Blood splattered the front of Paul's

His Left Hand by Scott McPherson

26

His Left Hand by Scott McPherson

Van Halen t-shirt. Eddie and I hadn't seen a thing.

“Boys,” Dad said, dragging that one syllable word out long and serious, “pack up your stuff;

we gotta go.” Something in his voice sounded different. Perhaps he sobered up for just that instant.

But we were busy having fun, and not interested in a long drive back to the city. “Aaaww,” we

complained in unison, looking in his direction. “Do we have to?”

And there stood Dad, swaying from side to side as the blood dripped down his fingers,

forming a dark red pool in the pale red dirt by his foot. “Yeah kids,” he said. “We gotta go.” A nervous

smile was on his lips, but there was fear in his eyes. “I just shot myself,” he said.

Paul pulled off his shirt, handing it to Dad, who took it with his injured hand. His face

grimaced as he closed his fist tightly around the cloth, instantly soaking it with blood. Turning away,

he didn't wait for our compliance, instead reaching down for his bottle and starting for the car. Paul

was at his side, carrying the rifle, the muzzle pointed safely at the ground. Eddie grabbed Dad's

chair, and I grabbed Dad's fishing pole. We left the bag of Number 12 where it sat.

Back at the car Dad fell into the passenger's seat and upended the fifth, gulping it down.

Slouching forward, his feet flat on the ground, he stuck his left arm straight out, through the car's

open window. Blood ran down his palm and wrist, and the outside of the door. Fumbling, he reached

back for the CB mic; Paul saw what he wanted and helped him out. Leaning back slightly, Dad keyed

the mic. “I'm shot!” he declared.

It sure didn't take long, just a few minutes of awkward silence before we heard the wail of

sirens approaching. Then State Troopers were swarming all around Old Blue. We got to ride with an

agent of the Oklahoma Bureau of Investigation, and spent the night at the State Police barracks. Dad

got a ride to the hospital. Mom sure gave him hell the next day, when she came to take us away, and

it was a long time before we saw him again. Dad never suffered anything more than some minor

nerve damage, but to his dying day you could still see fragments of that Number 12 snake shot

resting under the skin of his left hand.

End of the Day by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

27

Ariadne’s Song by Toti O'Brien

And you knitted for hours, close to the window because of your faint sight. In silence but happy, I believed, for you said: “I can’t stay without a piece of work in my hands.” You said that in a plaintive tone, yet not querulous. You were too old and weak by then to conceive your own project. Someone (daughters? daughters-in-law? any good willing relative) should decide what you would do. They should buy the yarn or the fabric: then you’d gladly give it a start. Quietly you would sit by the window, sometimes frowning and fretting about a detail you thought you couldn’t get right. But that was a private concern: if I heard sighs or softly muttered words (your head bent, your gaze intent, your thick glasses one inch from the knitting needles) they weren’t meant for the public. If I interrupted you, asking for such and such with the abrupt energy of the youth (so far from your hypnotic tranquility), you just lifted your gaze and you answered. Once on a while you whispered: “wait a moment dear, I am counting my rows”. Or your stitches. You lost count anyway… then you murmured with a broken note in your voice “Oh my, I have to start over,” that you patiently did. Patience: how many barrels of it did you have in stock? Were you born with such an oversized supply? I doubt it. Did you spin it out of yourself during those eternities spent in the sole company of needles? I guess so. Still I miss a good reason. You completed an uncountable number of blankets, curtains, tablecloths, towels, sweaters, camisoles, jumpers, socks, gloves, hats, swimsuits - anything that could be knit, crocheted or sewn. You did it for your children, grandchildren, extended family and friends: all your life, but especially when your children married and house chores wound down. You were left with lots of free time and you didn’t like it. You wanted something in your hands… Most of it you had learned by the nuns at the boarding house (having lost your mom at the age of two). Although you resented your dad for sending you there (your stepmother didn’t like you around - a memory of her predecessor), with the nuns you spent the sweet years of your youth. Those that don’t come back so we try to get back to them (the story of Mohammed and the mountain). There were harmony, safety, maybe something like fairness at the boarding house. And the nuns - those strange sexless girls – taught you never, never to keep your hands aimless (what would hands be tempted to do if they weren’t constantly occupied)? The nuns taught you everything related to so-called feminine work, even finger knitting... you knitted miles and miles of delicate cord, perfect for hemming clothes of all sorts. You did it while singing, memorizing your lessons, even during recess. Indexes and thumbs knew their way, no need for directions. “I can’t stay without work in my hands,” you begged in the morning. Someone gave you a project and you beamed with gratitude. That you could do whatever was asked no matter how difficult (struggling with your decaying memory or with hieroglyphic instructions), that your finished products were absolute marvels, faultless, immaculate, that until your late nineties - almost blind - you could make lace out of almost invisible silk (airy and precious as a piece of gold filigree) no one really acknowledged. You did not seem to care. You didn’t care, truly. As we said that was your hands only, pride and

28

Ariadne’s Song by Toti O'Brien

ego weren’t involved. Ego, pride: did you possess them? I’m not sure. All those things you did went like water under the bridge… anonymous. You didn’t mind. You had an artist eye. With the nuns you had learned watercolor, oil painting, pyrography. I saw samples: you showed them to me with a quasi joyful smile. Those activities did not last: they probably didn’t consist with your housewife status. Only the textile related tasks were suited and remained. When you got older they gradually concentrated: knitting, crocheting, mending… things linear, requiring attention but reduced to a smaller and smaller focus. Didn’t you get bored? Depressed? Obsessed? I believe the thread secured you. I sense it, now that I’ve reached the age you were when I came to life. Now that I’m about to become you I look for your gestures: here they are, I lost nothing. It must be because of this thread I’m holding: it leads me all the way back. Did the wool in your lap connect you to something, someone, your past, a root of some sort? Or did you just enjoy the softness? The warm suppleness rubbing against your fingertips, lightly brushing your forearms and wrists. Isn’t holding cloth like holding a human being? An ideal one. A lost one but also a potential one. A quiet, harmless love vessel, a recipient for our lovemaking. Isn’t lovingly making clothes just like making love? It is. Is baby clothes making like making babies? Yes, grandma. In the evening, before bed, you properly rolled your in-progress piece in a tidy cloth. As professionals do, for fabric is a living matter in need of protection. On the white cloth your glasses: your signature, the undeniable trace of your presence. I miss it. I have stolen an old silver hook (double zero size) and a zest of green yarn from your bed stand after you last closed your eyes. I have it. I am alone as well, grandma. I was born an orphan like you in spite of my parents. I am an orphan at soul: I understand you.

Peace at Christmas by Charles Ephraim Burchfield

29

Mystery Meat by Terry Sanville

Many years ago, my wife-to-be convinced me to eat escargot. I controlled my gag reflex, inhaled the wonderful aroma of garlic, then downed those disgusting snot morsels as quickly as I could, cleaning my palate with some rather good Chardonnay. I did all of that for love…and to impress Marguerite, to show her that my meat-and-potatoes upbringing could be stretched to include such a repulsive food.

But as a child during the 1950s, love had little to do with food choice. I ate what Mom dumped onto my plate at the dinner table, and she made me camp there until I finished it. For breakfast, I happily wolfed fried eggs and bacon – nobody gave a fig about LDL/HDL ratios back then. If I was left on my own, I gobbled corn flakes or Cheerios with four or five heaping teaspoons of sugar dumped on top. The sugar and whole milk formed a sweet slurry at the bottom of the bowl that had the consistency of wet sand. Oh yummmm!

When I was eight or nine, Mom and Dad decided to take a summer break from parenting and

shipped me and my sister off to our grandparents for a few days in Huntington Beach. Cookies, brownies, home-made cinnamon rolls, shoofly pies, and six-layer orange cakes filled Grandmom’s pantry. She had honed her baking skills while living in northeastern Pennsylvania, anthracite coal country, and as a hotel cook in New York City.

But she never strayed far from her Polish roots. On one of my first mornings, I got up early to

eat breakfast before Grandpop left for work at the broom factory. Grandmom stood over the kitchen table holding a crackling cast iron skillet. With a spatula, she lifted a gray slab of something onto Grandpop’s plate. It looking like dark cement and had crispy brown edges from being fried in bacon grease – what else! He covered the half-inch-thick slab with ketchup and dug in. His plate looked like some kind of road kill.

I wrinkled my nose and asked Grandmom what that stuff was. She grinned, told me she had

made it herself, the best scrapple I’d find on the West Coast. At that time, my father worked as a meat cutter for A&P in Santa Barbara. I remember him telling Mom that scrapple was made from anything the butcher couldn’t use from a pig – pieces of liver, skin, fat, snouts, hearts, and tongues, all ground up with corn meal and flour to form a stiff greenish-gray mush. My stomach lurched at the thought of eating pig parts.

The next morning when I stumbled to the kitchen table, Grandmom served me a huge dollop

of scrambled eggs, a warm cinnamon roll, and a small piece of scrapple. She told me to try it. If I didn’t like it, I didn’t have to finish it. Following Grandpop’s example, I camouflaged the gray menace with ketchup. I took the tiniest of forkfuls from one edge and shoved it in my mouth. The spices hit my tongue first, mostly pepper I think. It crunched as I chewed and felt grainy going down. I took a bigger bite. As long as I didn’t stare at the stuff it didn’t taste half bad. I didn’t realize it then, but I had learned to like savory as well as sweet.

My Dad was impressed that I would eat scrapple, considering my usual selective tastes, and

we shared it for breakfast now and then. My Mom still hovered in the background to make sure I ate every bite. It became one of the many treats I looked forward to when visiting Huntington Beach.

It’s been more than fifty years since I ate my last slab. And the revulsion has crept back in

when I think about all the ugly pig parts used to make the stuff. Ketchup isn’t enough to dispel that reality…and breakfast is way too early to start drinking. Besides, eating organ meat is not supposed to be good for your cholesterol levels, so say the dietitians.

But I think of scrapple as part of Grandmom’s magical kitchen – that deep metal pan covered with waxed paper in her icebox, next to the jar of hardboiled eggs pickling in purple beat juice. I’d give anything to sit at her Formica-and-chrome table one more time, drink her chickaree-flavored coffee, pig out on cinnamon rolls, and down a crispy slab of mystery.

30

Stella’s Starwish by Erica Verrillo

I'd been working at Shady Grove almost a year the morning Clarence moved in. It wasn’t a day I would have remembered otherwise, since it started fairly typically with Mama red-eyed on the sofa and Hector passed out on the kitchen floor. Nothing new on the home front. It was wall-to-wall traffic all the way up I-10, as usual. My AC was on the fritz, so the commute was literally hell on wheels, and the only thing my radio was picking up was ET trying to make first contact.

Beam me up, I thought. No such luck. After I’d changed into my uniform, Mrs. Jackson took me over to meet the new inmate. “Mr. Savage,” said Mrs. Jackson. “This is Stella. She’ll be cleaning your room.” Mr. Savage

bobbed his head at me. They were all polite when they first arrived. Once he’d gotten used to the place he’d be pinching my butt and hissing dirty jokes in my ear along with the rest of them.

“I’m so glad you’ve decided to join us, Mr. Savage,” I recited. “If you need anything, please don’t

hesitate to call. We pride ourselves on prompt and courteous service.” Mrs. Jackson beamed at me. It had taken her hours of hard work to get The Speech crammed

down my throat. The fact that the janitorial staff was never needed for “prompt and courteous service” meant nothing to her. Neither did the Emancipation Proclamation or the Bill of Rights.

“You can call me Clarence,” he said. I expected that. While Mrs. Jackson always insisted that we

address everyone by their family names so as to “preserve an atmosphere of propriety,” nobody else followed her example, especially not towards the staff. I was always plain old Stella right from the get go.

That morning I went about my normal routine. Cleaning up the public rooms came first, since

most of the old folks slept in. I guess there isn’t much point to getting up early when all you’re doing is dying. I always started with the chapel. I enjoyed the quiet. There wasn’t much of that at home. Best of all it was cool. Hector was too cheap to put in central air, so my room was an oven in the summer even with the window unit, which hardly worked anyway. I liked to sit in the front pew for a few moments before I got on with my rounds, just to gather my thoughts. After the chapel was clean, I moved on to the public bathrooms, the dining room, the rec room, and the TV room. By then most of the old folks were tottering about, so I could start on their bedrooms.

***

When I got to Mr. Savage’s room I banged on his door and waited. On my very first day of work

at Shady Grove, Mrs. Jackson told me to always knock real hard and call out their names. She said we needed to respect the "members' personal space.” I was much more concerned with my own. Some of the men had an uncanny way of popping up stark naked when you came in to clean. I hoped Mr. Savage wasn’t going to be one of those.

“Mr. Savage!” I hollered. I began counting to thirty before I turned the key. That would give him

plenty of time to come to the door if he was still in there. I was pretty sure he wouldn’t be, since Mrs. Jackson liked to take her new “members” for a tour of Shady Grove the day after they arrived. She liked to tell them all about the “estate” and how it had been in her family for generations and all that la-de-dah. So it just about knocked my socks off when the door opened smack in my face. I hadn't even made it to five.

“I can hear just fine,” he said. He was wearing a pair of khakis and a green plaid shirt buttoned all

the way to the top.

Stella’s Starwish by Erica Verrillo

31

Stella’s Starwish by Erica Verrillo

“I’m sorry,” I apologized. “Some of the members . . . ” “I understand,” he said. “You can come in.” I peeked into his room. It was neat as a pin. “I’ll only be a minute,” I said. Maybe less. His room was already so clean I probably wouldn’t have

to do much more than mop. I waited a moment for Clarence to go away, but he just stood there holding the door open. As I angled past him I noticed that he didn’t smell like a shut-in. Old people, when they’ve been housebound for a while, start to smell musty. Clarence smelled like a man who worked with his hands. Clean and sharp. He watched me as I mopped the linoleum, which made me nervous.

“Y’all are gonna love it here. Everybody’s real friendly, and nice. And when the weather cools off

all y'all can take a walk in the old pecan grove.” I tend to rattle on when I get nervous. “Y'all can even send some pecans home to your loved ones next Christmas. Everybody does.” I took a breath. Clarence was looking at me funny. I noticed his eyes were a clear gray.

“All y’all?” he said. His face was round and pleasant when he smiled, but my feathers had been

ruffled. “You aren’t from around here, are you?” I said, real careful. His face got serious again. “No,” he said. “I’m from Maine.” I'd already taken him for a Yankee. His skin was too smooth for a Texan, even a transplanted one.

Old Texans don’t have wrinkles, they have ruts. Still, my jaw dropped. Maine was on the other side of the world. I couldn’t imagine a farther place.

“How on earth did you get down here?” The question just fell out of my mouth. Then I realized I’d

forgotten my manners, so I had to apologize again. “No, no,” he said. “That’s a good question. We Yankees find Texas fascinating. It’s the lure of the

Old West.” Having lived in Texas my whole life, I didn’t see anything luring about the West, old or new. But I

had a Texan’s pride in my state, which is to say, knee-jerk. The only real requirement for graduation in Texas is to remember the Alamo, which we did every spring, regardless of the fact that most of my classmates would likely have been fighting on the other side.

“See y’all tomorrow,” I said. His smell stayed with me all day. Like Christmas.

*** By the time I got home, Mama and Hector had made up and were watching TV on one of the pink

velveteen couches. Mama has three of them. With Mama, everything is either too many or too much. Hector had one beefy, tattooed arm draped around her and the other wrapped around a six-pack. The two of them were drunk as two skunks courting in Kentucky.

“Yo, mamacita,” said Hector. I hate it when he calls me that. In spite of appearances, and a lot of effort on his part, Hector

doesn’t have a drop of Spanish blood in him. Mama, on the other hand, is a direct descendant of Don Quixote.

32

Hector tried to grab my butt when I walked by, but I was ready for him. My purse has a five-pound mini barbell in it. Mama never shifted her fake eyelashes from the screen.

“That’s disgusting!” she said. Some idiot was chowing down on a plate of worms. She took a swig

of beer. “There’s spaghetti,” she said. Somehow, I managed to get back to my room without having to hit Hector again. The house was

a classic "shotgun" with one long central hall going from front to back. It was a simple design, but whoever built it hadn't been sober long enough to read a blueprint. There wasn't a ninety-degree angle in the place, and all the doors swung the wrong way; out instead of in. If you weren't careful, you could brain someone, not that anybody around here had any.

I switched on the window unit, but all it did was bitch and moan. Just like an eighth grade

boyfriend: all jaw and no action. I appreciated the racket. It blocked out the noises Hector and Mama would be making later on.

That night I dreamed about the Titanic again. I especially like the part where it goes down.

*** I liked Clarence. He never asked questions like didn’t I have a boyfriend, and how many

boyfriends had I had, and he never, ever treated me like a servant. At first I couldn’t resist boasting. I’d heard Texas described a lot of ways, but never, to my knowledge, had anybody ever called it “fascinating.” As far as I was concerned, Texas was nothing more than a giant griddle, flat as a pancake and hotter than Hades. Of course, I never let on. The fact that he thought it was interesting made me feel good, like I was special too, somehow. And Clarence was a good listener. When he sat down and cocked an ear at me, it made me stand up tall. In fact, I got so high and mighty it took a couple of weeks for me to realize I didn’t know a thing about him, which was not the normal run of events. Usually, after two or three days I could recite an inmate’s life story by heart.

“What’s Maine like?” I asked. “The interior is mostly woods,” he said. “But I grew up on the coast. In my younger days, I was a

lobsterman,” he added. "Later on, I built boats." I should have guessed. That clean, sharp smell was sawdust. I could see him in a workshop,

sawing something. Although, I have to say, I couldn’t imagine Clarence pulling those big ugly red things out of the water. With those evil-looking claws grabbing at you, how in creation did you get the hook out? You probably had to bash ‘em upside the head with a hammer, which I couldn’t see neat-and-tidy Clarence doing. Anyway, Clarence didn’t smell like the fishing type. Fishermen drank.

“I’ve never seen the ocean,” I said. This time it was his turn to look surprised. “Well,” he said. “It’s big.” I knew what he was talking about. Texas is big. “I know all about big,” I told him. “I could drive all day and never even make it out of this

county.”

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Clarence pulled on his chin and thought about that for a while. I could tell I’d impressed him. “Ayuh,” he said. “I had a car like that once.” Well, I just about popped my panties laughing. “That’s a very old joke,” he said, shaking his head. “You must have heard it before.” I hadn't, but I didn’t want to be shown up by quiet Clarence. Besides, I really had seen big bodies

of water. My entire 10th grade class had taken a field trip to the capital, and on the way back we’d stopped for a picnic on Lake Travis. I told him about it.

“The ocean is a lot bigger,” he said. “Well, that may be,” I admitted. “But I’ll bet you dimes to dollars you couldn’t swim across Lake

Travis.” Now it was his turn to laugh, though I didn’t know why. “You won that bet,” he said. “I couldn’t swim across a bathtub.” I gave him a skeptical look. I was beginning to get the suspicion that he had been pulling my leg

all along. “You said you caught lobsters.” “I did,” he said. “Lobstermen can’t swim. The water off the coast of Maine is so cold, if you fell

overboard you’d be dead in ten minutes.” He swirled his tea, making the ice cubes clink against the sides of the glass. “It’s like ice,” he said. “That sounds real good,” I told him. “I’d like that.”

***

It was May, and the heat was just revving up. You couldn’t fry an egg on the sidewalk yet, but you could probably poach one. Every morning I would arrive at work just itching to get Clarence into a conversation about that big old ice bath. I swear it made me feel cooler just to hear him talk about it. I’d lean up against the wall for a few minutes after I’d mopped (there never was anything else to do in Clarence’s room), and I swear I could feel that cool sea breeze blowing right over me. He had a way of telling stories that would make me fall down laughing, though I could never remember how he did it afterwards. He would just sit in his chair, pulling his chin. Maybe it was because he’d made me laugh so much that I forgot my manners one day.

“How come you don’t have any pictures on your dresser?” I asked him. Everybody else at Shady

Grove had scads of family photos propped up on just about every surface. That’s why it never took me any time to clean up Clarence’s room. There was nothing to dust.

Clarence didn’t answer me. So I just stood there like a moron until it dawned on me that I was

way out of line. Stupid me. I’d forgotten Rule Number One: Staff is Not Permitted to Make Personal Inquiries of Members.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I shouldn’t have asked.” Clarence still didn’t say anything. He looked out the window to where the crape myrtles were

blooming. Crape myrtles are perfect for this climate. They bloom all summer long and don’t mind

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the heat. I imagine that’s why Mrs. Jackson’s illustrious ancestors had planted them everywhere. On second thought, it was the gardeners who had planted them. My illustrious ancestors.

I was almost through the door when Clarence finally said something. “My wife died a year ago last March,” he said. “We didn’t have any children.” Now, I felt terrible. “Oh, I am sorry,” I said again. This time I meant it. Clarence looked so forlorn.

All of a sudden I wanted to go over and hug him. Instead, I stood in the doorway like a fool, holding a mop and a bucket in my hands. Clarence shook his head and sighed.

“She was from Texas,” he said. I stood there for a bit, trying to think of something to say that would cheer him up. “Did she say

all ya’ll?” I asked. “Like me?” Clarence looked me straight in the eye. “Just like you.”

***

Hector and Mama were going at it full blast when I got home. She was calling him an hijo de puta, which is the only thing she can say in Spanish, and he was yelling about somebody named Frank. I heard some thumps and crying. But it was 101 degrees and after spending an hour on the interstate, getting passed by suits yakking on their cell phones inside Audis that had frickin' frost on the windows, I was in no mood to call the police. So I went to my room and turned on the AC as loud as it would go. I also turned on the radio for good measure. Then I stretched out on the bed, praying for world peace, for a sea of ice, for anything but this. I lay there for a while with my ears cocked, just in case things got really nasty. Then, in spite of the heat, Willie Nelson, and the sound of dishes flying around the kitchen, I fell asleep.

What woke me up was the quiet. The whole world was dead. I looked over at my clock and saw

nothing. Outage. In the summer, with all of Texas trying to reinvent Alaska, the power frequently goes out. I got up and went to the window. There were lights on in some of the houses. Maybe it was just a blown fuse. I threw on a robe, since I wasn’t wearing much, and tried to remember where the fuse box was. Or did we have switches?

My door wouldn’t open. I shoved and pushed and kicked, but it wouldn’t budge. Something heavy was blocking it. Finally

I started yelling, but nobody heard me; Mama and Hector were probably out cold. Eventually, my brains woke up. I went back to the window and pushed out the AC unit. Even though it didn’t work, the thing still weighed a ton - kind of like Hector. Then I climbed out the window and hopped onto the lawn.

When I came around to the front of the house, I saw the door hanging open. Hector’s car was

gone, so he must have stormed off after tonight’s fight, leaving the front door wide open. Total idiot, I thought. Don’t y’all come back now. The house was pitch black, but I knew it well enough to find what I needed. Neither Mama nor

Hector had gotten around to opening any of the drawers in the kitchen, except, of course, for the one that had the bottle opener in it, so the flashlight was still where I’d put it when we moved in last year.

The kitchen was a wreck. But, that was to be expected. I hadn’t gone in there for a while, so

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there’d been plenty of time for TV dinner trays and dirty dishes to pile up. The cans were having a pow-wow on the floor with some broken plates and there was a bunch of empty bottles on the table. It looked like Hector and Mama had graduated to the hard stuff last night. Or maybe it had been that way all week. I hadn’t been keeping track.

I walked out of the kitchen and headed down the hallway to the back of the house. There was

something heaped in front of my door. “Mama,” I said. I shook her as hard as I could. When I tried to lift her, Mama’s head snapped

back like a broken doll. I called 911. When the ambulance arrived, I still hadn’t been able to wake her. I hadn’t even thought about the

fuses, so I had to lead the medics through the house with my flashlight. I was glad they couldn’t see most of it. But what they couldn’t see they could smell. They took Mama straight to the detox unit of the hospital.

The doctor who finally came out to see me looked harried. It was 4 AM. “She’ll need to stay here for a couple of weeks,” he said, glancing at her chart. “Are you a

relative?” I said yes. “Good," he said. "You’ll have to sign some forms." “Will she be all right?” I asked. The doctor finally took a good look at me. “You aren’t a minor, are you?” “No,” I said. “I turned eighteen last August.” And if we'd been in China, that would have been

God's honest truth. “Good,” said the doctor. “Go to the main desk. They’ll have the papers ready.” He hadn’t answered my question. After I'd signed everything, the nurse told me that I should

probably take a couple weeks off work. It might help Mama to have someone there for support. I asked her if Mama was going to be all right.

“That depends,” she said. There wasn’t much I could say to that.

***

I called in sick and told Mrs. Jackson I needed some time off. She grumped about unreliable help, but didn’t say I was fired. Thank god for small favors. Then I went back to bed, but I couldn’t sleep. I felt like I needed to talk to somebody. I got into the car and drove to work, hoping that Mrs. Jackson wouldn’t catch me on the premises. I’d have a hard time explaining my miraculous recovery from the plague.

Clarence looked so happy to see me, I felt like bawling.

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“I thought you were sick,” he said. “No, my mother’s not well.” I said. “I’m going to have to take care of her for a couple of weeks.” Clarence waved me into his room and shut the door. He pulled up a chair for me, and then sat on

the edge of his bed. “Is there anything I can do?” he said softly. I just looked at him, sitting there in his green plaid shirt. Even first thing in the morning his eyes

were clear and bright. He didn’t look like the sort of person who had ever gotten falling down drunk, or tried to pinch his step-daughter’s butt, or carted his mother off to detox. He looked like . . . Maine.

“No,” I said. “It’s nothing I can’t handle.” Clarence sighed and nodded. He knew I was in over my head. And what made me love him is that

he didn’t call me out on it. He respected my decision to keep my problems to myself. And I knew that whenever I wanted to talk, he’d be there. In the end that was all I really needed. Just knowing Clarence was there was enough.

We sat for a moment. Then Clarence got up and took something out of the top drawer of his

dresser. He handed me a little box. “Open it,” he said. "I was going to save it for Christmas, but now seems to be a good time." Inside the box was a rusty-looking thing with five points, like a star. The top of it was covered

with tiny pimples. I didn't want to know what was on the bottom. It looked like something one of those weirdos on TV might eat if you offered him enough money.

“It’s a starfish,” he said. It didn’t look even remotely like a fish. But, then again, lobsters don’t look like anything you’d

want to put in your mouth either. “Did you used to catch these things, too?” I asked. "There's a note," he said. "Underneath." I lifted up one corner of the starfish with tip of my fingernail and saw a small square of paper. A

star for Stella, it said. “Umm,” I mumbled. I wasn’t good at getting gifts. "Make a wish,” he said. “It’s a star.” “I don’t have anything to wish for,” I lied. Clarence looked down at me. “Follow your dreams, Stella,” he said. “While you still have them.”

He held out his hand for me to shake, and I realized he’d never touched me before. I said goodbye to him then.

“Y’all come back now,” he said.

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Stella’s Starwish by Erica Verrillo

“Ayuh,” I replied. “I’ll send you a post card.”

*** When I came back to work, I was excited about seeing Clarence again. Hector had disappeared

and Mama seemed to be doing much better without him. She had lost that gray haggard look, and she'd even whipped up a batch of chicken fried steak on her first night home. But with Mama it was hard to get