April 2013 | back-issues, poetry
This was not just a room – it was
A milestone- a first communion,
A crisp suit, a new car, a fresh haircut-
A blank set of blueprints on how to be human.
It was a field where shoes aren’t needed-
Where you break curfew and don’t care about
Time or memory, where everything stands
Still because your mouth can’t keep up with
Smiling it wants to do. Eyes speak more
Than hands because they meet others and know
That there’s no need to hide and blow lines
Off of picture frames holding the dead eyed stares
Of mistakes and regrets. This was a room,
Where a beautiful girl and I first met.
by Michael Murray
April 2013 | back-issues, poetry
Surrounded by the Buddha’s bounty,
a calming serenity hushes the crowd
as a docent provides a brief biography . . .
The bump of knowledge crowns his head with
Tightly bundled curls of second-growth hair,
Framed by long lobes stretched by gold earrings.
“Only real Buddhas have these three things!”
I hear her, but I wonder if it’s truly those that
make Buddhas something more than . . . men.
It is this “something more” in which to bask,
a golden warmth of subtle majesty renounced,
to shoulder the suffering of the world at large.
A larger world was what he sought,
the world of intense introspection,
in order to understand . . . himself.
With minds on fire and pillars of intellect,
exposed, crucified, pinned as for dissection,
performing mundane exercises, shoveling shit;
Bodhisattvas exchanging thoughts for actions,
expiring moment to moment in Phoenix flames,
waiting to be reborn . . . endlessly.
by Richard Hartwell
Rick Hartwell is a retired middle school English teacher living in Moreno Valley, California. He believes in the succinct, that the small becomes large; and, like the Transcendentalists and William Blake, that the instant contains eternity. Given his “druthers,” if he’s not writing poetry, Rick would rather still be tailing plywood in a mill in Oregon
April 2013 | back-issues, poetry
Have you ever felt music?
have you ever felt a sound?
have you felt it swirl through the air
until in penetrates you
stirs up the past and present
show’s you the future.
And you’re no longer numb
you’re alive, you woke up
the sounds come from within now
you’re the player
and the instrument
you’re the audience
every note is powerful and strong
every note has meaning.
Don’t listen – feel,
let it penetrate
let the sounds fill you
music is magic, it’s sublime
and listening’s too rational
feeling is the key of every piece.
by Jonas Cimermanas
April 2013 | back-issues, poetry
A spicy seam, unraveled in a café, brunette with streaks. Jittering fingers unstitch brown and red; a smell like mad-heat buried in cheeks, flesh wild and fever-drenched. His lips are swollen on warm treats, but he stretches the peppered vein and drinks.
by Janae Green
Janae Green is a recipient of the 2nd Annual Gypsy Sachet Awards in Letters and Biography from Fiction Fix. Her poems and short stories have appeared in Atticus Review, Eunoia Review, Fiction Fix, Paper Darts, Poetry Quarterly, scissors and spackle, The Ofi Press, The Salmon Creek Journal, Turk’s Head Review, and forthcoming in various online and print literary journals. She lives in the Pacific Northwest with her partner, artist Shea Bordo.
April 2013 | back-issues, fiction
Giant Rat
There was a giant rat that lived in our basement floor apartment in Boston that year. I lived with two guys that I didn’t know very well—and we were all very different personality types. One guy, Tom, worshipped David Bowie. He was a skinny, angular blond guy—with David Bowie hair and clothes. He called himself “Major Tom.” The other guy was Irish Mike. Irish Mike liked the Pogues and the Dropkick Murphies, and all things Irish.
The three of us didn’t have a lot of common interests to talk about. Therefore, we got stoned a lot, and we’d sit around in the living room—which was also where Irish Mike slept—and zone out, watching TV. And the giant rat would lumber across the living room floor, waddling like an armadillo. And we’d be dazed and numbed out, but we appreciated having the rat to focus on. “Holy crap,” someone would say, “that rat is huge!” “It’s more like a dog.”
The rat would squeeze into a hole behind the radiator in Irish Mike’s room and disappear. But then one day the giant rat got stuck. We could hear it—wedged in between the wall and a stud or a pipe in the corner of the living room. It would emit a low squeak and wiggle and push.
We told our landlord about it, but he just sent over an exterminator who left a lot of trays full of poison lying around the apartment. That was the end of the giant rat.
It was sad, like losing a pet. And we didn’t talk to each other about it. We just went about our lives, sharing the painful, tragic glances of parents who silently mourn their lost children.
Johnny Fist
A muscle-bound young blond man strode up to the bar and slapped both of his palms down hard on the wooden counter to get Sherry’s attention. She looked at him, expressionless. He held up six fingers.
“Six beers for Johnny Fist.” He was wearing a tight t-shirt that read: Johnny Fist will Kick some Ass tonight.
“The limit is two,” Sherry answered flatly, putting down two bottles.
Johnny Fist threw some bills onto the bar and smiled, picking up the beers.
“I’ll be back,” he announced.
I’d only been working at the bar for a couple weeks. I’d never seen this guy before. “What’s the deal with the inflatable man?” I asked Sherry.
“Johnny Fist? He’s here quite a bit. He’s a small time professional wrestler—you know, like in that movie with Mickey Rourke. He wrestles down at the armory—I guess he almost always loses. Somebody told me his tights have a black circle on the crotch, with a bright red fist in the center.”
“Figures,” I said, watching Johnny as he worked his way over to a table of girl-women near the bar.
“Who’s got a cigarette for Johnny Fist?” he barked out.
A girl in leather jacket, with a Nascar t-shirt gave him one. Johnny Fist nodded.
“Johnny Fist likes action,” he said with a smile.
“Oh Jesus,” I said, shaking my head.
“He’s all talk,” Sherry said. We watched him pose for the girl-women, flexing his muscle. “I carded him the first time he came in.” Sherry smiled. “His real name is Wendell.”
by Paul Rogalus
