Gooches

Her daughter runs ahead and is immediately engulfed within the crowds of people silhouetted by firelight along the beach. There must be hundreds of people gathered at dusk for the show, sitting perched along the beach wall, naked feet, flip-flops clinging for life to sandy toes or dropped, discarded below them in the sand. Others are gathered in chairs and blankets along the beach in gaggles of tan and ruddy exuberance. Children of all ages are running everywhere; shadowy figures squealing and darting to and fro, many run recklessly with sparklers to illuminate their way.  She knows without having to look that her husband is nervous about someone losing an eye or combusting into flames.

The excitement is palpable and she detects and appreciates the sulfurous clouds of smoke from the sparklers reflecting the firelight and the atmosphere it adds to the beauty of the beach at night. There is just enough of a cool wind to keep the state birds at bay and she spies a good spot just big enough to lay out their spread and sit and wait for the fireworks. She scans the crowds to try and pinpoint where Frida has gone—pushing hair from her face she assesses the outlines of all of the small dancing shapes and zeros in on one dancing along the perimeter of a group of older girls—enjoying herself while looking to the elders to inform her of what is next on the horizon.  She hopes that her daughter is not feeling like an outcast. She is so adorable in her blossoming young body and her feral beach hair. Please don’t let her get hurt by anyone. Ever.

She waves and Frida nods with a tilt of the head but chooses not to wave back; she is enforcing her independence but still being polite and acknowledging her. Pointing to their blanket, she turns and sits down and starts unpacking; wine, sparklers, sweatshirts. She slips off her flip-flops and pulls on an overly large sweatshirt and settles into the evening.

'She needs bug spray. She is going to be eaten alive.' He is stressed already. Please relax and sit down. In an attempt to appear placating she assures him that she’ll administer a healthy dose of pesticide once Frida returns. Please relax. Beach. Wine. Smile. She pantomimes a smile, in case he has forgotten the mechanics behind the process.

Looking up the beach she follows the dark stretch of land jutting out to a point where it meets the glistening inkblot of the sea, the jetty extending out from the dunes, clogged with wild roses and ocean detritus; driftwood, broken lobster traps, seaweed dried into clots of fermented stink drape the rocks. Small pinpoints of light from houses across the port blink like fireflies trapped in a jar. She smiles.

This place, this beach is a crossroads of sorts for her. It occupies a crucial place in her memories, like a temporal gathering place; a church, where all ages of her self reconnect, remind and inform. Turning back to watch her daughter frolicking she can almost see a shadow of herself there too, scampering around and dancing right behind her daughter, her childhood folding forward to overlap the present, two generations and multiple times meeting at one point; this beach.

She had her first sexual experience right over there, in those dunes. He was older and more experienced, one of many tan and athletic sons from a wealthy family from down Bayberry street. He will forever be nameless and remembered as something of a dullard, but the dunes will always house the spirits of the clumsy figures, intertwined. He had coached her and she had acquiesced, feeling the excitement but also keenly aware that he was nothing but an item on a list in the process of being crossed off. The sandy groping and grappling had been a new and heady introduction to the beach; from child to teen in one night; she could now look at the wild and familiar landscape through different eyes.

'I’m going to go find her.' She is right there. 'I don’t want her getting lost.' What about you? Here. Take these sparklers. 'Ha-ha.'

Checking her watch and then the sky—still a ways to go. There is something about the light that triggers another memory—or a feeling of a memory. Of evenings hanging out around the bugzapper with the other kids, bikes abandoned against trees, hoods up and listening to REO Speedwagon on the transistor tied to a tree branch. The light cast from the small fire danced warm on knowing faces intermittently flashed with a terse ZAP of blue white light, the moths circling helplessly above the flames, beautifully trapped in an inevitable swirl of smoke and light, helpless to prevent extinguishment and locked in an atmospheric beauty and her face, upturned, couldn’t help but think it was the most beautiful thing she had ever witnessed.

Again folding forward there were fireworks that summer, too; a hug from behind and a box produced with a ring. She had known, could see the box jutting out from the back of his sweatshirt, wedged down into the back of his shorts. Not wanting to spoil the secret and the wonderful tension she had feigned surprise and yet still was surprised. Right over there.

Sipping her wine she sees Dominik leaning over Frida, his body still and serious as he helps his jittery daughter light a sparkler. When it sparks she begins moving fast, like electrons bouncing around inside an atom—atomic! —while he stands close, anchoring her to reality. He is a really good father. Their daughter will teach him to be even better.

Looking past them she sees two figures walking side by side down along the water. It is low tide and they are far away. They walk silently, equidistant and parallel at all times. They are both barefoot, her legs are bare and she allows the water to run up and soak the edge of her skirt. Squinting, she sees that they are both holding something in front of them; if they speak she cannot see their mouths moving. Watching, she feels a tugging, a pulling sensation, of needing to be closer to them, or to be a part of them. She rises to walk slowly down towards the water, hesitant to be so voyeuristic but unable to stem the overwhelming sense that this couple is familiar, familial.

As she draws nearer she slows down her pace, pretends to wet her feet as she wraps her arms around herself. It is dark now but the two seem to not be effected. They have stopped walking and turn to face each other, at arms length their feet sink firmly into the wet sand, planted together and rooted to the beach.

The girl is shuffling through cards, seeming to read each one as she reorganizes them in her hands. Without pause she sees that this girl is she. Younger, less encumbered; Dominik has hair and his face is open, unlined and looks infinitely approachable. Swiftly turning her gaze back up the beach she confirms placement of her husband and daughter, still playing their parts and dancing their dance.

The couple solemnly looks at each other and without prompting he takes a card from the pile he is holding and hands her one. She bends her neck to read what is written there.

I’m sorry that I took you for granted.

The girl cocks her head sideways, assessing him. Her face is neutral. He looks young and uncomplicated—her heart expands fractionally at this poignant memory of a person she has misplaced.

The girl takes a card from the top of her pile and hands it to him.

I apologize for being selfish.

He allows only a second to pass before he hands her the next card—they are allowing less reaction time now, only holding the silent conversation and telling each other what needs to be said.

I wish I had tried harder to understand you.

And in return—

Thank you for all of the little things I didn’t pay attention to.

And—

Thank you for trying.

I should have hugged you when you were grieving but I didn’t know how.

I shouldn’t have had so many expectations.

I should have lived up to your expectations.

I wish I had been more honest with you.

I wish you had been more honest with yourself.

She stood watching the couple in the perpetual conversation; locked in the seemingly endless reconciliation. She cried for them, and for herself and her family, at what they had lost and she wished that this young couple could reach out and gather them all into this moment where they could all silently emote and converse and emerge whole and themselves again.

Running back up the beach, she flops down onto the blanket and dries her yes. Dominik appears before her and sits next to her, planting a small kiss on her cheek while Frida runs, jumps and lands heavily in a lap growing too small for her. She fills the void.

The thunderous clamor of the fireworks begins followed by the sublime echo—birds screech off into the night for safety. The crowd collectively oooh and ahhs and she cranes her neck, looking up into the bright projections of light and the swirls of sulfurous clouds descending, as bits and pieces of paper flit and fly like moths, swept up in a current of memory, ash and hope. Hugging her daughter, feeling for her husband's hand, she can’t help but think it is the most beautiful thing she has ever witnessed.

It's Just Like a Movie

I swear it's just like a movie.  I'm walking up the ramp and the rain is coming down.  I can't keep my head up but I catch glimpses of him--looking sideways at him at the top of the incline, people moving all around  and all he does is stare at me.  He's actually in a black trench coat and he's standing under an umbrella.  He's wearing a fedora for Christ's.  I have no where to go.  Nowhere to go but up!
"Hey Dennis."
"They're gonna need the money today Andy."
"Yeah...I get that.  It's just..."
"Today, Andy.  What the fucks the matter with you!"
He's actually yelling.  He's poking my chest.
"Ow."
"Christ!"
"Dennis, look."
"Christ Andy!  I'm not fucking around anymore."
People are staring.  I laugh for a second.  Just a second.  There's people.
"I don't give a fuck Andy.  I don't.  People wanna look let 'em.  What're they gonna see anyway?  Washed up loser?  Shit they must know all about you by now.  How many fucking beers you have on the train today Andy?  Have you puked yet today?  Did you even make it to the bathroom."
"My hand to God..."
"'Cause I don't give a fuck.  Not anymore.  I'm just here to tell you.  They're gonna need the money today.  Course you're not gonna get it and they're gonna fuck you up.  You know that right?"
"Dennis.  Come on....man.  You know me.  I can talk my way..."
"They're gonna fuck you up Andy.  And I'm not gonna be around to..."
"Suppose I told you..."
"See you Andy."
"No wait Dennis.  Whatta you think of this?"
I pull out the envelope.
"What's this supposed to be?"
"Open it."
He does.  I'm already walking past him.  I can see her getting into her car down in the parking lot.
"Andy, where...what did you do?"
The tail lights flare.  She's too far away for me to see but I can feel her looking at me.  She's pausing.  Not part of the plan but she's taking a second.  Not too long now.
"What the fuck, Andy?  How'd..."
There she goes.  That's it.  Good.  The train back to the city's coming.  If I time it right.  Funny, they don't build these railings high at all.  One...two...rain feels nice on my face.

Tick

by: Dottie PR

She wore her heart necklace,
as if this talisman of fifteen could ward off her 39th birthday
concocting a proud demure for the onlookers
which she viewed askance.
lavender dress, upswept hair, perfection.
The smell of flowers swirling round
but not a summer field, on a breezy day
shoes off
scratched shins.
Instead,
overripe,
almost turned,
sickeningly sweet,
funeral flowers.
No longer fly season, but tick season.
She couldn't afford to be shooed away
next decent thing,
flicker of interest,
latch on,
refuse to be brushed aside,
only when pinched
will she let go.
She wore her heart necklace,

as if this talisman of fifteen could ward off her 39th birthday

Better off than

fifteen years old,

rife with reality,

entering the tenth grade

All grown up. 

Cindy Sherman - Women of a Certain Age

O Captain!

"It's all right there."
He waves his arm dramatically from across the street at the three buildings that sit in a row.
"The church, God; City Hall, the state; and then the school.  Which one looks the best and which the worst?"
It was a rhetorical question.  The answer was obvious.
"But they each have a duty to each other.  They're each responsible for each other and yet sometimes they fail that responsibility, each in its turn."
He was giving me, really, a lesson in speech-making.  I had asked about the presentation he had made the night before at the Man of the Year dinner sponsored by the local newspaper--it was an award given for community service.
"Did you get de Tocqueville in there?"
What a question I know.  You have to understand what it's like to be his son.  There's this line from the Godfather II where Fredo and Michael are having a heart-to-heart at a cafe in Cuba.  Fredo wishes he was a better man.
"...more like Pop," he says.
Michael gives him one of the few soft looks he has in the film.  "It's not easy being his son, Fredo."
Or words to that effect.
Being my Dad's son is easy.
"Democracy in America!  Of course.  That's the whole point.  These institutions exist side-by-side.  Each serving the community and hopefully inspiring the citizens to participate."
I knew the speech well.  I am the curator of my father's lectures--his public comments, the record of his public life.  I know how he crafts them.  He loves to talk about natural talent--especially in the sports world.  And even if you're talking about a ballet dancer, say, he'll bring it back to sports, "the way she danced the dying swan?  It's like Willie Mays..."  Anyway, he's a natural.  The delivery he could do in his sleep.  He's fearless at a podium.  He doesn't reach out and grab you as much as draw you in and pull you along.  I've watched it happen.  I'm a connoisseur of the myriad ways he makes people smile, laugh, nod their heads agreeing with his populism, his practical optimism, his boot-strap liberalism.
He has a "It's a Wonderful Life" speech--you don't know how good you got it until you lose it--and a "Wizard of Oz" speech--don't look to the horizon for the truth, it's right there in your own backyard, both he can pull out and, at a moment's notice, re-shape depending on the audience, the scenery, or the occasion.  Despite all my years of learning at his knee I still can't inspire an audience like he can.
I look at him and realize that I'll remember this moment forever.  I can't say why but I know it to be true.
"What?"
"Nothing."  I put my arm around his shoulder and he circles my waist with his for a moment.  I can feel how our bodies are the same.  His, is mine 30 years on.  I am his.

What the night and morning gave me

Its not so much the yelling as it is the finger, fat and blunt, like a cigar—stabbing at the air, and the vehemence with which the words are sputtered and thrown into the air between us. The air is thick and stale; an elderly person could live here. He screams, ‘Why don’t you look at yourself in the mirror? Look at yourself!!’ I hide a smile in indigo dark. Walking, I prize the great oblivion outside, no stars in a clear sky and a wind that has picked up and chased the clotted breathless opacity that has descended and hung for days. When I arrive home I throw my keys in my purse and turn off my cell phone, perhaps forever. I do not look in the mirror. I sleep as though I’ve been without a bed for too long, enclosed in a protective womb of down and as my alarm drags me rudely out from slumber my immediate thought upon waking is the knowledge that now its really going to happen; I’ve really done it this time.

I park in my usual place and my friend is there beside me, grinning like a loon. It is cool and the sun bright and keen. He starts talking and does not stop until we part ways at the top of the overly long stretch of escalator. He would have preferred to take the elevator but I informed him it was nothing but a casket powered by hydraulics. I did catch a glimpse of myself a few times reflected back from the train window as we had entered into the tunnel. What am I supposed to be able to see beyond myself? I can still see the fat finger jabbing but Lawrence is a kindly and very appreciated distraction. He is so sweet and I am fortunate.

I put on my ipod and set it to shuffle. I hate to place so much importance on whatever the first song is going to be but I cannot help myself. It has a power, the first song. The street is crowded and jarring in monochromatic tones, all reflective; it is pierced violently through with cadmium yellow taxi streaks. Norwegian Wood. This is good, right? It makes me smile. It is music from a time when this kind of song was enough. It’s not going to armor me but this works and I walk and try not to feel vulnerable. The second song is also important and this is how I can doom the quality of my own day; placing this relevance on a somewhat random selection of music—it is just math. I’d Have You Anytime. Oh Jesus, this one is going to break me but still I walk and I’m almost okay with listening to something this beautiful and allowing myself to feel like a fleshy pink mussel with its shell pried open and ripped apart. I’m walking and the weather is perfect and the cadence of a beautiful voice is pushing me through this crowd and then I see the first dead person. He does not stop to acknowledge me but I hold my breath and all sound stops abruptly. I am sure that my ipod is still playing but I cannot hear a thing. Am I still walking? His hair is matted but slicked back in an attempt at order. His hair looks as though there is a layer of dust atop his strangely styled coif. His shirt is an unnatural green—more saturated than any other color there is and he walks slowly, so slowly through the crowded street with unknown purpose. He is not bothered by anyone or anything and is influenced by the splendor of invisibility. I pass him and avert my eyes, cross Madison and regain composure when I see the second one. She is also crossing the street and is pale beyond comparison, also clad in a color that is drenched and indefinable. It is a red, I know that much. Her hair is long and the same color as her flesh, her eyelids are large, deep set and round as moons. Why can I see her eyelids, are her eyes closed? I do not want to know. She too passes. The color of her hair troubles me.

The music kicks back in but now it is Mississippi Goddam and this shall surely fortify and act as a talisman for whatever else I should happen to see. I look up to watch the sky briefly as I navigate. I like the shapes the buildings cut into sky as I pass. A plane flies low across my blue clip of sky and my heart convulses—only momentarily—as I am sure it always will from now on. It too passes.

I turn a corner and walk in silence for the last leg of the journey, where hot coffee awaits me. I stop to put my ipod away and see myself reflected in the mirror at Burger Hell.

I can see. I know something is coming.

Truly on the Moon (Part 2)

        Before the PhD, the tenured position at the state university, before the books and the lectures and the Nobel short-list, and way before the scandal that eventually side-tracked what was otherwise an illustrious career, Mental Dobbs grew up outside of New York City, in a northern suburb, the son of a school teacher and a community activist, both of relatively minor intelligence compared to their only son but with the yin-yang, between them, of an almost unnatural instinct for child-rearing and a penchant for living the well-lived life that gave their genius son the perfect environment, and brain-pan marinade, at every critical juncture of his early- and later-childhood-development to become the object of Truly Tess Trudy’s every affection; and she was, of course among many other things, an excellent judge of character.  

     His mother would watch him, from the high kitchen window, play quiet games in the alley behind the house, experimenting with what he called, at 4-years old, his terriformulation, the plants, animals, insects and weather-patterns of his world, and fantasizing about his role in his family life, as protector of his father’s legacy and his mother’s safety and virtue, toggling back and forth between these opposite identities searching for the one that fit best.  Little by little the outward won over the in-, and as she would look down on him his mother would imagine that she could see his head growing even as his body seemed to shrivel, until the time when he finally reached what would be his full maturity at 17, and he appeared to be like a dandelion, a green-stalk body and a wild head of white fluffy hair that would fall out, strand by strand, in the autumn, grow back in, black, by the end of winter and into spring and turn white again over the summer, falling out all over just as the leaves dropped off the trees.  

They had originally named him Paul.  When he developed the habit of not responding to calls of “Paul, dinner time” or “Paul, turn the lights off now, it’s time to get some sleep!” they chalked it up to his remarkable ability to focus on whatever he was doing and to block out “extraneous data,” as he called it, from the outside world (although Mental was always quick to add, even back then as merely “Paul,” that “really, no data can ever completely be thought of as ‘extraneous.’”)  The truth was that the name was wrong.  They had mis-named him.  It was the one false-step they had taken in what was otherwise an almost perfect childhood, from Mental’s perspective.  When one day at the dinner table, at 7.56 years old (back then Mental had a penchant for measuring his age out to at least two decimal places), he declared to his parents that he would no longer eat carrots, "or any other root vegetable for that matter."  His father cut him off before he could launch into what he knew would be a multi-chaptered explanation of ‘why,’ saying: “You know what kid?  Sometimes I think you’re mental.”  The boy smiled broadly, a rare occurrence to be sure, creasing the vast forehead on his gigantic head, and the new name stuck.  

When he eventually left home for college, he never went back and his parents never heard from him again.  They did hear all ABOUT him--first in esoteric science journals, then PBS specials and best-seller lists, and finally tabloid rags--but never anything FROM him.  He was done with them, though not through any lack of what little affection Mental had for anything in this world, but more out of a certain respect for science.  Mental knew that his parents' real natural and evolutionary usefulness, with regard to him, was as developmental guides and as biological nurturers.  Of course they had accumulated an affection for him over the years, but he knew also that this, in itself, was an evolutionary construct; that the affection they felt for him made it easier for them to part with whatever personal comfort and sense of well-being they set-aside in working their long, hunter-gathering careers, putting the food on the table, heating the bedrooms and saving the tuition the for college.  He knew his father would have been more happy as a painter, or, strangely he thought, as a landscaper, than as a middle-school teacher, a job he sensed from the sighs and window-gazes his father indulged throughout his daily paper-grading ritual, was not what his father was born to do.  And his mother was certainly a writer.  She worked at a shelter at the local church, saving souls one meal at a time, believing fully that faith without action was sin itself.  But her inner life was all fantasy and Mental read her secret writings, hidden in the third drawer of her roll-top desk, and understood his mother to be an author in the tradition of Twain, with a wit and satirical instinct that, while he could not necessarily feel, certainly not the way she did, he could nevertheless identify and categorize.    

But they set aside these avocations in the interest of providing for Mental and fulfilling their biological, if not their spiritual, destinies.  And so, when that job was finished, Mental concluded that he owed it to them to release them from the responsibility he knew they would continue to feel towards him had he continued to be an active part of their life.  For their part, while they didn’t necessarily enjoy their only son vanishing, post-graduation, they were, in truth, exhausted by raising Mental through to his college years and were secretly, and without comment (when the snakes from the media came slithering to their front porch), devastated by the scandal that sent their son into exile from just not them anymore but from the rest of the world.  Well, at least, from everyone except Truly Tess Trudy, the only person he ever really allowed inside.

UNDISCOVERED COUNTRY

The TV, off, reflects their shadows, and the light from the open window, there a bright rectangle, is divided evenly into six panes. The air is stiff.  They sit waiting for word on how to proceed.  


"I'm right-brained," he says.


Her eyes narrow.  "What's that?  You're more creative?"


"They say if you want to save the environment you should only make right turns."


"Who says that?  Right turns saves the environment?"


"You spend less time idling.  Sitting at red lights.  Right turns; it's the way to go."


"I'm just saying, you should probably do more than just right turns."


"Yes, well, of course.  But yes, right-brained is the creative side.  My right side is the over-active side."


"I have a thyroid condition."


"Which one?  Hypo or hyper?"


"It's so hot in here.  When are they coming back?"


"Who?  Dieter and Paul?"


"Did you tell him we need more tonic?  Oh, and Tanqueray."


"You think Paul is gay?"


"Dieter's gay."


"Dieter yes, but Paul I think no."


"Hypo.  I have to take a little pill every morning.  Somehow I never forget.  So hot..."


He looks out the window.  


"They're coming."


"Can you turn on the radio?"


He reaches down and without looking turns on the radio.  The Clash--softly.  


"I love this song."


"I can't drink too much.  Stop me at two."


"I love a nice Gin and tonic."


"Me too; perfect for summer."


The hands on the clock spin.  There are voices in the hall.  The shadows on the wall cross and re-cross.  The window fills up with melting snow and sunlight and then rain again.  He stands looking out the window.  She sits listening to the music, her feet shifting to this beat and then that one. 
  

Driver

Warm grain sand, fixate
hands looking back at you.
Bumblebees leaping grass to weed
plowing through trees
intoxicated moon rising,
stumbling to take a leak.
That same second: atoms splitting
in the arc of a god's arrows-
angry teenage thumbs stuffing combat shells
embracing like a mother's love
the bat dung, glistening gunpowder
in collective armory
filling righteous ears and ten hearts
all scattered to the reaches of the desert.
Biblical text undeciphered
secret scripture, coming up through crevices
where hides battle tactics and hippie schemes.
Where no one tells him he's wrong
or so right that his dream
should reach further than the world
in which he disbelieves.

Breezy wheatfield youth
softest in secret clinging
to you at night.
Afraid to invite the silence
the science of Alone-
noises heard, not yet learned
the courage to possess,
made into an addictive nose bleed
sunrise.
Prizefight mind
body moves hard
a suit of armor,
kidnapping you to every seaside
carnival you could ever crave--
to overdose on saddling the sky.
A tragic carride accident
comic ferris wheel junkies falling fist-first
like thoughts into waves, laughing them under
begging for a smoke, a chance to save.

The broadest calm, a father sits to judge
his unborn children, from behind
selective, fluid and slipsliding eyes;
the truth pounds
wishing well bound
refurbished garden shed door.
Already reaching his dreams since
the hour before he was born-
conqueror of every shore
to the root of the outer albatross;
the giant kept dragging blind to the side
breeding new ideas that die
then scream, laugh-like.
A horde of school children
monkey fish with 10,000 voices
soaring opera of strength and weakness
feeding from this world,
then found alone and calling,
nestled in the leafy greens, high
above treetops, waiting and gone
beaming mad with boredom
from the off ramp, dead end street of excess
u-turning in a circle of fire water ritual.

Cult leader without a tribe
Come to take a drive
bleeding into the sun as it sets
on the shores-- one day promised to recalculation,
Eavesdrop to its unspoken ground
the soul born free, beneath
grand confusion, collapsing star
live to walk on top of carriage rides
soar through verbal skies, believing
that the stars twinkle above.
Shining even in the paleness of daytime
from within broken bones, scattered-
abandoned playground
shrouded
in the deepest equation of blue.

Chieftain of foreign tours
sands of war
civilization in every pore
peace in the valley in the soles of light shoes;
rainbows hailing colours like cabs in each second
of his eternity, the moment before it runs from itself.
Always around the bend
just never close at hand
trapping movement in the meadow pond;
still conceiving even sleeping
telling lies small and overblown-
unclaimed truth that's lived and known.
Soul glides down the waterfall
cascading heart beats
filling with sounds
stories emptying from veins like children and rules
surrounding his multitude
shooting at midnight starry skies---
The day is old
fades to a close
bold
that it will construct him forward,
forever on a roam in search of haven,
boundless home.

~ M. Lucia

In my room

You were in my room, once

Streetlight sifted through curtains starched white; it filled the spaces between us and illuminated the distance left untraveled

Poised, your silence descended as I held your gaze

If you drift I will not follow do you understand?

In muted response you gently remove my red sweater

I am unfastened by measure of each precious pearl button

How is it that fingers are more considerate than your mouth?

With fold and crease you craft a vessel, a boat with buttons and it too gets pressed into the spaces between us

You shield your face from me, using your articulate hands to render yourself ineffectual; it is a bitter betrayal, this

Again, you craft and mark me an accomplice to your departure and I have nothing but love with which to comply

Closing my eyes I dream you a sea of words; fathomless waves in which to lull, and, you—swept away

With only your tongue; tied, shall moor you

OLD FRIEND

By: Dottie PR

I thought I should buy a new dress. It was June and all the old people were dying. Not in any order, but they were all over 90, and the family was large, so my life became littered with wakes. Most people dug up outdated, grey, navy or black ensembles, but I would buy a new dress.

I had read that wakes came to be because way back when, when doctors were sparse and medical knowledge was just emerging, sometimes they couldn’t tell if a person was just drunk and passed out or actually dead. So they laid him out on the kitchen table, invited the neighbors, and partied while they waited to see if he would “wake” up.

So you can understand why, after passing through the groupings of pruned aunts and second cousins, I approached Uncle George’s casket with some trepidation. To my great relief, he couldn’t look more dead. He was presented in his neat three-piece suit left over from his city days and his signature bow tie in the bold choice of red.

Uncle George was an artist and he loved New York City. He always asked me how it was, as if it were the ex-wife he regretted leaving and I was her new best friend. I told him about the museum exhibits I’d seen, described the new buildings and told him about the latest hot spots. I could see in his eyes that he knew he shouldn’t have went for what was behind the big curtain when he loved what was in the box.

I couldn’t pinch him, he looked like chalk, I was afraid he would crumble. So I kneeled down as if to say a prayer and whispered “ Hey Uncle George, want to catch a train into the city, it’s a beautiful evening and I have a new dress.”

I waited. Then sighed. Farewell old friend. I turned to see Auntie Vera propped up in the front row of seats sandwiched between the pruned Aunts, patting her hand, whispering in her ear. As I approached her, her eyes were bright with sadness but she smiled at the evolution of faces she had revisited all her life,these faces like notes, some more frequent than others, made her hum to herself.I leaned down to hold her small, fragile hand and I kissed her papery cheek. I knew the next time I saw her, I'd be wearing this dress.

How about a Hawaiian punch?

‘Don’t get me wrong, everything is fine. It’s in no way perfect, but I don’t think that I can expect perfection at this point—it’s going to have to do, you know what I mean?’ I pause to take a drag from the filthy cigarette that I am sneaking behind my husband’s back—it is disgusting and the smoke that I exhale chokes me and leaves me feeling slightly green. Nice buzz though. Who am I? I don’t smoke—it is a disgusting habit. It’s the wine I’ve been drinking, and the comfort of having my friends around me—they too are smoking. The weather has been beautiful in such a way that I have been pleasantly distracted by it all day. ‘Like I said, it’s going to be fine, we’ll work it out—I’ve had so much to tell you about what happened and I just haven’t had a single moment alone with you. I’m glad we all got together today; the kids are really excited to see each other.’ I come to my senses and realize that I’m not enjoying the smoke and toss it unfinished over the deck railing. Peering down from the deck I can see the children frolicking at the edge of the duck pond with their nets and plastic cups. They are shrieking and dancing around the little pool like Indians from a child’s story; some are coated up to their knees with a slick of quick-drying mud. My daughter is perched on a rock in the middle of the pond—waving bugs away from her face frantically and trying to capture tadpoles. The echoes from their cries of celebration and excitement drift up to us, secluded on the outermost deck, nestled by the crowns of trees and impending dusk. I am happy, and I breathe deeply. This is how contentment feels—how it really feels. Not the temporary kind I fool myself into believing to staunch the discontent, this is real and consistent and from sources tangible.

Marley nudges me with her sandal and prompts me to continue, ‘so what did you discuss, how is it going to happen—do you need me to do anything? Of course you know I’m going to be there, but I’m not certain how Dale is going to feel. He might feel…conflicted’ I smile and nod, inspect my fingernails in my lap. It’s in no way a happy smile, just a knowing one. I know. “I don’t think we’re there yet—but what I really need is—‘

Hieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee! A waxen yet oddly luminous face suddenly floats over me; lips pulled back in a huge rictus grin painted garishly like an overripe watermelon. I struggle to piece together my thoughts, to store away my conversation that I need to have so badly with Marley and now…who…is…this? I know…the lips. Her face, I can feel something click internally. It’s Fruit-punch Lips. But it can’t be—this is a safe place. How is Fruit-punch Lips here…at Jina with a J’s house? A train person has defiled my most sacred of inner sanctums. A commuter?!

‘Hieeee! It’s been so long since I’ve seen you! What train do you take now? These are my daughters, Flopsie and Mopsie.’ I stare, open-mouthed and struck dumb. I can hear sounds coming out of her mouth in fluctuating high-pitched intonations, like sounds a sea creature would make. I smile weakly at the daughters and try to regain my composure. I must look ridiculous but my shock is deep. I can see Beth and Julia looking over Fruit-punch’s shoulder trying to gage my reaction. They are both puzzled and concerned; Beth, however, is amused. One of the daughters is mouthing a hotdog, bun and all—she fits its entirety into her mouth in one swallow. I feel faint. She chews with her mouth open and they watch me with overly large vacuous eyes. I have cottonmouth. I need to swallow.

I smile. A large scary smile erupts across my face and I greet her warmly. I swear I deserve a small but dangerously heavy golden statuette of a man for this performance. The daughters continue to stare at me as if I have a clown nose on my face. Mopsie uses the back of her hand to wipe her nose. I smile bigger and brighter. I should be on toothpaste commercial with starbursts of light glinting off from my teeth, complete with ZING! Sound effects.

Her daughters race off to take part in the mass slaughter of tadpoles all in the name of science and Fruit-punch lips takes the seat next to Marley and immediately sets in to tell us every painful detail from her recent break-up. She spares us nothing as we both smile politely and nod our heads in unison at all the right moments. It is indeed a painful and dramatic story. I consume two glasses of wine in the time she takes away from me. She is a very animated talker, gesticulating and rolling her eyes as she narrates her tale of many woes. Why doesn’t she notice that we are not really interested in hearing this? Can’t she see that we look trapped and slightly panicked? How come no one notices other people’s feelings? I become trapped with my discomfort in a mind already too crowded—I hear none of her laments and feel for them even less. She keeps talking, never pausing, always smiling—even when she is calling someone a bastard. Suddenly she squeals and rushes over to someone else who has just arrived. Her chair legs scrape across the plank floor as she races off.

Marley and I exchange a look of relief and waste no time in making our way down the stairs towards the lower lawn where the pond is. She sighs and thanks god for the intervention, elbows me and says ‘Let’s continue while we can. What did you do with her clothing?’ My head swims. ‘Nothing, I’m done talking about it—I cannot let myself be that. Done.’

spin

Paper-thin strands twist together for strength,

I tug one away; you pass your turn.

Consider the breeze through a torn screen,

dirt browns the windows, screws, back-thrown,

to a different century-turn, to the color of an age advancing.

The dark inquiry sets only emotion in motion,

Yet always only the mundane recoils the paper, untugs the turn.

The blinkered blasphemies opposing love true are thus, forever.

Cream my coffee, shade my eyes, paste my brush.

These the pressed petals in the book of randy romancing.

A PATCH OF CLOVER

Cormac Foster Morrison

The UPS guy is talking to John across the street. I'm trying to make straight lines with the lawn mower and not sneeze. He's stopped to talk with the package in his hand, held like a waiter's serving tray. Brown shorts and boots match the tan. The truck idles. I turn the mower and start back across the lawn, around the sycamore, deliberately over the chunk of tree branch - thwack and a cloud of dust, the smell of burnt wood. I am the master of this patch of earth, as the truck continues down the road, bare leg and boot hanging out the open driver's side door. I put my back to him. John continues to slump in the plastic chair just outside the front door. Brand new Yankee cap-wonder where that came from. His friend from high school, the famous actor with the street named after him, lies somewhere else in dementia, his days hanging out with John now more his present than his movies. This line across the lawn brings on a feeling of having been here before. Have I cut this patch of grass a hundred times yet? How long before I'm falling asleep on my front steps?

John's pencil drawing of the happy daschund smiles out at countless babies sleeping in their beds including mine.

SPECTRALICA (ONE)

Capt. Buckmaster is in charge. It is, after all, his house. It says so right outside on the wall and on a plaque across the street. Some people come to town just to read these plaques and explore the different layers of architecture in the city; the way the town developed, not so much in a natural way, or at least in any way that could be associated with things in nature, other than the strange whims of humans attempting to make a life out of nothing in a new world, New England of the 18th century.

He maintained his distance from the others, rarely spoke and even then only to have the final word on one of the rare disagreements among the group. He never had any conversations. There were those who remembered a time when he discussed things and took a more active role in the life of the house, but they refrained from gossiping about him, how he was, or speculating on why he was now so quiet now, such was the degree to which he was respected and thus, "in charge."

The house itself was respected almost as a person itself. At this stage of existence you came to understand that souls were not exclusive to humans; that everything had one, in one way or another and a house as old as this one surely was 'alive' as much as anything else was, including the human souls stuck here for the whole range of reasons that might happen. But while the house never 'voted' in any dispute, never complained or got moody when one of the temporally 'living' humans did something stupid or just annoying the way the others did, it made its presence and its feelings known when it wanted to. And at those times, only Capt. Buckmaster could calm it down, although that calming 'process,' for lack of a better word, always happened in private.

CONSPIRACY

I'm alone again, walking down 86th Street, alone again, not sure where I'm going, alone. Again, the block is residential almost, stately and serene buildings, large but warm, although not really inviting to me. I keep catching my reflection in the windows I pass and I can't get comfortable with what I see. When did I get so think (I mean THICK) in the middle? My head is pounding and there's a whistling. They closeted...they CLOSED the bagel place on the corner. The only one I ever wanted to go to because of the wheat flour they use from Lebanon. No really. I can't tell you the name. It's not that I can't remember it's only because I'm limited contractually. Well, maybe not contractually but it's not something I'm comfortable discussing for let's say ethical reasons. Let's just SAY that. I passed by a window - street level - and it must have been a dentists office. Well, first there was a reception area with a blond at the desk but she didn't look like the kind of woman that would you know actually work for a dentist. Don't get me wrong, the uniform was excellent. And not just because it fit her...perfectly. I almost forgot my pounding FUCKING HEADACHE. In the next window there was a man actually in the dental chair, reclined--I'm staring at the bottoms of his shoes. I can see something has collected there near his right heel. It's maddening. The man is gigantic. His shirt is not well-fitted. It would be more appropriate for the doctor, you know the dentist. They probably dressed too quickly--in the assassin dressing room-HAH. And he's like IN the guy's mouth. There's no reason to be that far down his throat and believe me I know; I have some experience with teeth. I duck into the ATM, at the bank where the Lebanese bagel store used to be, bastards. There's another blond there. She's not part of the deal though. I saw her look at me reflected in the steel above her machine and it wasn't a look of someone watching, you know? Just looking like anyone else would look--not that anyone ever 'looks' at me. She dips her card and then so do I now that I know it's safe. We're entering our pins at the same time. Mine's from Winston Churchill's wife's birthday because no one would ever guess that. And Churchill's been dead for like 50 years and so he doesn't know anything about ATM's. And then I realize that they pitched the beeps of the two ATM's keypads like a half a tone apart from one another. It's an old Nazi trick. They used to play recordings of Mozart violin concertos on two separate turntables connected to the speakers in the camps. But the second recording turned just a little bit faster. The effect is maddening. How long is this blond's pin? She keeps entering. My head's going to explode.

We create a temporal place without lines or borders, future curling into

past Stay here you will never ask this of me Want me to ask I wouldn’t

dare to be drawn like smoke, held deeply sfumato you bring light

to azure yetdark held deeply

1920's

short hair

leather jacket

and oh those boots

her high school yearbook quote:

"A.E. – the girl in brown who walks alone."

expressed her unhappiness.

How strange, years later

the same quote can be used to

express her success.

-DP Rothschild

The Gabblergoo is Coming to Get You

A slick, a slime?

A ghost, goblin or ghoul?

Is it witch, warlock, Orc?

Devil, demon dragoon?

In a dream her name remembered

"Don't forget you fool!"

Then disappeared in a fizz,

a black, foaming whirlpool.

It was the end of the day and you both knew that opportunities had been missed. Sometimes you have to cling on to those brief moments in time as hard as you can, but holding on to them don’t make them last. You both had to let go. She did, you could not. And there was such beauty too, don’t forget that. You gave her a moment that she will never ever forget, although she admits to tryin’. And didn’t she give you yours? Didn’t she try to give you what you wanted towards the end and that’s what ruined everything? She will never forgive herself for that—that last minute involuntary decision to give up the fight, relent, and succumb to the dreams you were selling. If she could only take that split second back. You were standing next to her on that rock looking all hangdog and she was sad but too high on everything—too much happiness after such a long time without it. The taste of it must have loosened something in her—all of her sensibilities unraveled and she was unfettered. She tugged down the straps of her wet bathing suit and gingerly stepped out of it, tossed it into the dirt and stood on that rock in front of you naked as anyone could be and let you see her. Just stood there looking at you out in the middle of the river on a rock, the overpass buzzing and vibrating right over your shoulder, both of you fools in plain sight.

And then she jumped.

LOSS

by Bella Belsova

"my father moved through dooms of love

through sames of am through haves of give,

singing each morning out of each night

my father moved through depths of height"

The school I went to, the one my father insisted I go to, despite mounting household expenses and lay-offs and, what was it, "easy credit rip offs," they made me, that glorious (now) school, memorize e.e. cummings. And Shakespeare of course, and Kipling and Donne (famous vaudeville comedy team, my Dad used to say. I never knew what vaudeville was until much later but I laughed anyway), and Frost of course, and Emily D. and on and on. Words and words. Dad making jokes. Teachers, some of them, lording it over me, forcing it down some of the time, but most of the time though, I got it. I heard the rhythm although I didn't have the words, or the vocabulary of experience, yet to explain to him that I knew. But still, he knew I knew and so he knew he was right to send me to that school that made me memorize life before I knew really what it was to live it. And he knew that in any way that he wasn't right, I would make up for it by being me, his daughter.

Of course, all this I know now, after he's gone. He died when I was 12. One night after dinner with the family, my uncle and aunt, my cousins. Eating and drinking (them, the adults, and especially him) and everyone talking too loud over the music. I don't mean to say, back there, that he 'drank'. Not like that. Not the way you're thinking. But he drank and ate and talked and was loud and...he was LIFE that man. All that life in that giant of a man; I never knew how big he was until he was gone.

"his flesh was flesh his blood was blood:

no hungry man but wished him food;

no cripple wouldn't creep one mile

uphill to only see him smile."

Here today gone tomorrow. He was gone after that night. And I have no regrets. I was with him, entirely, that last night. I rode with him home, the windows open. I remember him looking back at me enjoying the breeze and nothing else and I saw the pride in his eyes. I know I'm not imagining that even. It was a fact that pride and that love for me; his daughter in full--what he wanted from his girl. If he had asked for something from his God the night of my birth I know it was me. But, see, he made me this way. How could I be anything but this? And so there I was, with him. He had exceeded even his own expectations and so what was left for him but to die? What more could be asked of him?

i have no regrets. i wish i did almost. Maybe it would help me deal with that little loose end--the surprise i felt, utter and pure, when he was gone. Almost nothing else but surprise. The loss creeps in though. The sinking suspicion that maybe all i was, all i had in me, was back there, in the back seat to my Dad, making his night complete. Sometimes i think that. Maybe that's not as bad as it could be. Maybe it could be worse. Maybes am i.

"scorning the pomp of must and shall

my father moved through dooms of feel;

his anger was a right as rain

his pity was as green as grain"

CLEVELAND

by Cormac Foster Morrison

I'm sitting in the hotel lobby trying to decide whether to go in the bar or not. I'm supposed to meet her in the lobby. She was very specific about that. "There's a couch," she said, "at the back, near the stand with all the tourism brochures." So I'm sitting here looking at pictures of Jacob's Field. I've been in the city four days now and I still haven't seen the ball field. Well, it is winter. And it's cold cold cold outside, especially tonight.

She said to wait but she was supposed to be here almost 45 minutes ago. And I haven't moved from the bench other than to look at all these ads for the local attractions since I got here 10 minutes early to meet her. There's a brewery right here in town, and a working dairy farm just an hour and 15 minutes away, down out on 480. She knew the hotel when I mentioned the name even though it's a little off the beaten track, as they say. The job's downgrading their policy regarding executive travel and me being only a junior executive at best I suppose I'm lucky to even rate a hotel with a bar in the lobby.

The Brown's are playing on the TV in there and they must be winning for a change judging by the noise. The girl at the front desk keeps glancing my way. I like to think she's just taking a shine to the cut of my suit but I'm pretty sure it's more that I'm something of a loose end in her shift. Not a lot of traffic in the lobby at this hour, at least not people checking in. Sure, there's the occasional question about where there's a steakhouse in the neighborhood or a "where can I find a pharmacy nearby," and so the guy sitting in the same spot for close to an hour must be wearing on her. "What's he doing over there?" she's thinking.

I look again at my shoes; scuffed still from the flight and having to jam them under the seat in front of me, the fat guy from Charlotte wouldn't get off the cell phone at take-off. Had to be told, specifically. A special trip had to be made, down the aisle of the 707, and even then he held his ground. It was like he didn't even hear her. I wish I had that set of balls. It's not even a question of authority or anything like that. More like a consideration. She made the trip specific to tell him to shut down. I would've turned it right off. Me--I had my phone off already and my seat belt buckled soon as I sat down. That's me.

What's she see in me anyway? She's got everything going for her, that's why I'm waiting here. Yeah, maybe she's had it tough but who hasn't? My life's sure hasn't been a picnic. Still though, someone beautiful like that? Coming to meet a guy with what, scuffed shoes? Says it all doesn't it? I take another look at the clock, not bothering with my own watch. Ah, I'm gonna go watch the game in the bar. She'll find me. I'll stop at the front desk and ask about the pay-per-view, let on subtle that at least I'm a guest in the hotel. A guest that likes to hang out alone in the lobby.

"Hello," says the voice, sweet as honey.

Looking out at me over that same old scarf. Cheeks rose red from the wind off the lake. Man, I could get lost in those eyes.

MIGHT AS WELL...(3rd and Final)

by: Dottie Pond Rothschild

He extended his hand to her as if he'd known her since kindergarten and she trusted him for no reason, they were strangers after all. Her hand was delicate in his but she was dead weight, like a stone sinking to the bottom of the river already.

"You need to use the phone? I mean THIS phone- they put them here for that reason."

She waved her hand in front of her face, " I can't talk to people who can't see me - I walk through everyday, slowly dissolving from view, it's the strangest thing, to be there and not there."

Joey shifted his weight, hands in pockets, making small piles of gravel with the side of his Converse. Jenna stood still, dress and hair plastered than flung around her. Joey moved to kick the telephone post with one foot than the other, eventually adding a little hop.

"I've talked to them you know, not on the phone, the shrinks I mean, the ones who have it all figured out." He peeked up at her, "All that sitting in school and they get to hang their sanity in fancy writing on their wall. If the trick is to leave you running and screaming back to yourself, it works."

Joey picked up a rock and hurled it toward Tarrytown, Jenna twisted to look.

"Some guy lives in that lighthouse, you know, eats, sleeps, goes out and buys groceries." He throws another rock.

Jenna twists back, "they fired me from my unimportant job, well laid me off really, but I work till the end of the year. They plan how things will function when I'm gone and I smile and nod, I go in each day and help tap the nails into my own coffin."

Another twist and Jenna gracefully extends her arms along the cold smoothness of the rail, looking out over the water.

"My boyfriend cheats on me, but he doesn't leave- so I go on believing this is part of our journey, but when he looks at me, he looks through me, not at me. I noticed lately, when I walk off the path, into the dirt, I look to see if I leave footprints."

Joey didn't like where this was going, he felt in his jacket pocket for the individually wrapped rectangles of Dentine gum, spearmint. He shed the loose paper in his pocket and quickly shoved the gum into his mouth. He always carried gum with him, Mrs. O'Leary had started that in the fourth grade. She was a hard ass to most of the kids, she used to be corporate, very important, and then was somehow elementary school. At some point she was put in charge of kids like Joey, the ones who perched not sat, called out not raised their hand, left class for a drink of water and ended up helping Mr. Stickle, the janitor, sweep the floors because the stuff you found in the garbage was just so great. He said that his teacher had suggested he help, boy did he get in trouble for that one.

When state tests came around and Mrs. O'Leary sat the six of them down in a separate classroom for kids who got extra time, before reading the exasperatingly tedious directions she asked "Who wants a piece of gum?"

The first time she did it they all just smiled and looked at each other, thinking she was kidding. But she walked around very business like to each desk in her high, clip-clip heels and offered them a stick of Dentine spearmint from her pack "Chewing gum helps you focus and I want you all to do well."

Joey wanted to offer this girl a piece, but then thought better of it.

" I wore this dress because I wanted to look like a flower floating on the water, you know, something beautiful" She leaned over the rail and studied the water, "but I would sink wouldn't I? I would just sink."

She turned to face him. "I didn't expect to meet anyone up here, I was going to disappear completely, but you saw me here tonight, you saw me."

Then, just like that, she started to walk back toward Jersey, she waved her hand as she descended but didn't turn her head to see Joey standing there, hands in pockets, foraging for another piece of gum.

A light dust coats her worn black shoes and Jenna can feel the dampness through her soles, but she'll wear these shoes till a patch of cardboard, some duct tape and an extra length of lace could hold them no more.

Joey watched her disappear, then lifted the cold receiver on the metal box phone, "I did your job for you, you fuckers!"

The light from the lighthouse blared in his eyes, and his endless questions scurried back into the walls of his brain.

"I'm calling it a night, I'm going home, might as well..."

And he turned and started back toward New York