January 2014 | back-issues, poetry
Farm land, house land,
Town land, mall land
3 hectares of box-store monolith land
Land of the soccer-centre and recreational utility building
Of thirteen civic centre’s and four public libraries with faded magazines and instructional videos
Occupying two thirds of a floor
Of catholic-school kids hogging the computers and Russian literature, faking excessively long shits in the single bathroom stall, to stalking the only people who actually filled out the requisitional form for a library card.
“can I have your number?”
Of one memorial centre/ prison and four banks on separate corners.
“This was once the most fertile land in all of Canada”
Red-eyed in Denny’s after church
“This was all field all corn and field”
I once grew a pumpkin
It took eight weeks and fourteen seeds and
Ballooned to the size of a lemon
And spat out only three seeds when my dad stepped on it
With size fourteen steel-toe workmans.
Of white flights that keep darkening
And a checkerboard layout that keeps filling in all the
Blank spaces
And two schools built in the middle of factory zones
“what’s wrong with this picture students”
And the laser-tag looks out onto the refinery by the Toys R Us
Next to the ten-lane highway with seven interchanges
Where we still see the occasional coyote.
“but where are the good neighbourhoods anymore”
one bar per hundred thousand
And sixteen home reno stores
“just outside of town”
And the movie theatre blasts opera on Fridays to scare off the teens
But don’t tell me there’s religious tension, the grandmother’s won’t allow it
Of cities that still think they’re towns
and town-lines that change every month
and immigrant towns that change the words for immigrant every month
“but don’t tell me we’re full there’s corn everywhere,
don’t worry we’re made for flight”
by Connor Mellegers
Connor Mellegers is originally from Brampton, Ontario and currently resides in Montreal Quebec where he is pursuing an English Literature degree at Concordia University. His work has previously appeared in The Fat City Review.
January 2014 | back-issues, poetry
Today, I held you within reach of your mother
when you reached down the front of my shirt
and said, “Nana,” your pronunciation for nurse
and a name for what? You grasped at straws—
as if recalling my grade-school shame around girls
at the Y, when I crossed my arms or draped a towel
over my neck to cover up
—before you finally withdrew,
but only to tug the collar of my tee to peek in.
“Nana?” you asked this time but told plenty:
Love long before you take.
by Sidney Thompson
Sidney Thompson’s work has appeared or is forthcoming in RHINO Poetry, IthacaLit, A capella Zoo, The Fat City Review, and The Fertile Source. He is the author of the short story collection Sideshow (River City). Sidney lives in Denton, TX, where he teaches creative writing at Texas Woman’s University.
January 2014 | back-issues, nonfiction
Driving up a curvy incline, all that mattered was the beautiful sunshine which illuminated my rough, grey booster seat. Out the window I saw endless hues of forest green and muted browns that looked like my aged dinner table. Everything in the woods; the trees and faint noises of birds emanated a deep ingrained feeling of my own belonging. As the car crept up along side of a cliff I gazed out at gorgeous cracked rock. Half Dome laid right in the middle of the valley, just to the left was the thundering water drifting down off Yosemite Falls. Through the wonderland of heart-opening trees I rose higher and higher into the valley.
“You ok back there Daniel?,” asked my mom.
“This is better than Disneyland!”
My doctors had warned my parents of altitude with my seven life-threatening heart conditions, but they wanted to try it. As we reached a peaking ecstasy of life in the inner valley, I began gasping.
The world began to deteriorate into a mere image, then suddenly my body fell cold under a redwood as tall as the sky. Cedar, pine, and the valley floor were the only things tangible. A hazy gray seemed to encapsulate my existence. Loud sirens blared as men in white rushed me down the mountain, disturbing the natural world.
Opening my eyes seemed like a mission. What if I can’t open them? What if it’s only gray? The room was an exploding fluorescent white. The white bed, toxic cleaning products, the sting of the IV and of course the smell of rubbing alcohol. My eyes drooped forward and I slouched down. Turning over onto my side I peered out a cellar like window to see the bright sun, which only a few hours ago I had been under.
by Daniel Wallock
