January 2016 | fiction
It was ten minutes to closing time at the cell phone store and Gillespie struggled with what to do after work. He had narrowed his options down to either hanging himself or going to the grocery. Now he was stuck, since both seemed so appealing. On one hand, the notion of vegging out in front of the television with a Hungry Man dinner made him breathe deep and flutter his eyelids. On the other, death’s sweet release was permanent and contained no calories. He now had eight minutes to decide.
Oh, hell.
An old woman shuffled through the door and it banged against the two-wheeled grocery basket she pulled behind her. Her hair was platinum and held down with a polka-dotted kerchief. Gillespie smiled wanly at her, knowing he wouldn’t be leaving on time.
“Need some minutes!” The biddy hollered at him good-naturedly.
“Minutes we have.” He clicked his mouse. “What’s your number?”
“How would I know?” She thrust the phone at him. “I never call me.”
Gillespie took the phone. It was covered with something sticky. He punched up her number.
“How many minutes?”
“Ten bucks worth.” The bill came at him and he took it. It was sticky as well. He completed the transaction as quickly as he could, then turned back to the woman and froze.
The old lady held a banana, and it was pointed directly at his heart.
“Take it. They were on sale at Kroger. Strawberries and oranges, too.”
He took it and thanked her, and she and her cart banged out the door and down the sidewalk.
In his car fifteen minutes later, Gillespie peeled the banana and considered his options.
He hadn’t eaten a strawberry in twenty years, and today they were on sale.
by Robert L. Penick
Robert Penick’s work has appeared in over 100 different literary magazines, including The Hudson Review, North American Review, and China Grove. He lives in Louisville, KY, with his free-range box turtle, Sheldon.
January 2016 | poetry
Watercolors
Some days I’m convinced
It’s the pain that makes me real.
Reminding me I’m breathing.
That I am happy to be here.
That I am strong… but some days
Some days it spits and hisses,
and I just can’t love it when I feel so fragile.
It is replaying a slow beautiful loop of misery
Thundering down paper skin
sparks are bursting through the surface
and they are arranging themselves
into prickly and asymmetrical patterns
I close my eyes and I am rocking gently
counting the notes of this symphony
but my breath is coming in waves again
Those wild gulps are cresting the dam I’ve built
A dam made of “I can do it”s and porcelain
For a moment I give in and lean against it
Pressing my cheek on the cold reality of it
Hoping it will hold a while longer
But I can feel it giving, rubble is littering my lap again.
I’m trying to bite back a weakness
but my face heats as I feel the tears
It’s gone feral again
and in all its uncontrolled glory
It is flinging ugliness at my skin
It splatters and spreads like watercolors
Painting everything I touch a sick eggplant color
and leaving copper on my bitten tongue
Because I don’t look fucking sick Do I?!
I’m a tough girl!
It’s been this way so long…
Haven’t I gotten used to it?
Some days
Well, some days it just surprises me
You See Yourself
i see you, i see you seeing yourself
i wish I could see if you pick at the fuzz
on the arm of your sweater
when you read what I write,
that’s what I imagine
and yes I imagine too much
so much
picnics and fresh air and fresh fruit and fresh smiles
dark nights and warm fires and
really
good
books,
books that you might actually read,
because you read things.
and you would remind me that i imagine too much
so much
but its never quite enough
i find myself spinning in your footsteps
like a vacuum
picking up whatever you have dropped
breathing it in with a whir and a grin
because like a vacuum,
yes either kind,
i am hungry
and empty
and always trying to fill myself
with
your
self
and if i was a betting woman,
and i am,
i would place money on the he loves you petals
because he does
at least in some small way
or you wouldn’t be reading this,
you wouldn’t be trying to figure out
how to stuff all these very visible feelings
back in between lines,
the lines i read between to get them.
Maybe we speak different languages,
maybe you don’t speak…
i worry a lot,
so much,
i should start a therapy group.
i wouldn’t invite you
of course
you would already occupy so much of that hour.
by Raychelle Lodato
Raychelle Lodato is a 36yr-old mother, wife, and poet who writes under the names Cybilseyes and Diminished.Me
January 2016 | poetry
Broken Main
Someone from Taft Hall calls it in:
flooded grass, stranded cars.
More trouble with the water main.
Every week, the old iron pipe
rusts through somewhere and bursts,
swamping campus lawns and parking lots.
Same old, same old, says the boss
when we reach the scene, three of us
squeezed onto the truck’s bench seat,
staring at the task ahead.
Water bubbles from a spring hole
and spills down the sidewalk.
Lot A has turned into a small lake.
Years ago it was all play time,
splashing around in pools like this.
With the blackbirds I looked for worms;
then an afternoon at the creek
waiting for fish to bite.
Now sloshing is part of the job.
Turn off the main, drive down to the shop,
wait for the water to recede a bit.
Lunch and Paul Harvey on the radio
until the boss says, Max and Stephens
get on up there, dig us a hole.
With each shovelful, water sucks back in.
Boots soak through, feet prune up.
An hour later, our little triad stares down
at exposed pipe, a six-inch split.
Max kneels in the muck to work the hacksaw.
The boss heads back to the shop to fetch some parts.
People watch our work from office windows,
sipping coffee, looking cool in air conditioning.
One suit grins and gives the thumbs-up.
We’re still at it when the secretaries
leave for the day. The boss doffs his hat
and says Ma’am as they pass.
We watch them mince down the sidewalk,
gingerly picking a path around puddles.
The prettiest one slips off her shoes
and tiptoes barefoot to an islanded Mustang—
a real beauty, one slick ride.
Come on now, the boss says,
no looking at the ladies.
We got work to do.
Another four hours and
the busted pipe’s replaced,
the hole refilled, the lawn spruced up.
The summer sun has already set.
Turning on the main again, we know
the next weak spot down the line
will start to feel the pressure,
ready to burst. Give it a week
and we’ll find out where.
Visiting the Asylum
Noises outside: the beating of wings,
a persistent caw, caw, caw.
From the window I see
the evening sun—bloody
through the branches of a dead tree,
a crow perched near the top,
a groundskeeper crossing the leaf-filled lawn.
What did I expect to learn,
making this pilgrimage
just to visit his former room?
There’s passing chatter in the corridor,
the clacking wheels of a cart.
Somewhere a phone rings and rings,
a door clicks shut, footsteps fade.
Did he, too, hear the bird’s mockery?
Did it foretell renewed anxieties,
the advent of the crisis moment?
Did he stumble to this pane,
peering through the mist
of breath on glass, wondering
who called his name?
I imagine the anguish
when desperate for an answer
from God he gazed
upon this hysterical crow
and the black-garbed groundskeeper
now steadfastly lowering the flag.
by Stephen Cloud
After kicking around the West for a while (with stops in Spokane, Flagstaff, and Sedona), Stephen Cloud has settled in Albuquerque, where he’s fixing up an old adobe, working on poems, and pondering the official New Mexico state question: “Red or green?” Recent publications include work in Valparaiso Poetry Review, High Desert Journal, New Madrid, Shenandoah, and Tar River Poetry.
