5_trope

Neeli Cherkovski

admin — Fri, 02 Sep 2011 05:43:55 +0000

Neeli Cherkovski is completing a new collection of poems (RL Crow, 2008) and a memoir, AMONG OTHERS: A POET’S LIFE. He is a recipient of the PEN Josephine Miles Award for Excellence in Literature.

A Field of Letters

dpayers — Fri, 02 Sep 2011 03:27:55 +0000

those dreams come thrusting forward
from the tongue
Aleph leads and leaps over a white fence,
the invisible crows sit as if on fire,
the ‘as if’ of the flames lean
toward the rumored clouds
we are drifting across this field

Aleph is followed by Beth
the men in blue trousers move in
they are employed by the rain
the rain cannot blame us enough
we are blessed in the deluge
and work toward the temple
where the letters converge
Gimel is the third letter
as we climb the temple mount

so clean are the tubers
and so blue are the swaths of air
trumpets sound in the center
of the letters, seraphim and angels
jump from the end of an ancient
writing device, o the field, the fiel
is where we are buried
in the field we drink to excess
and find our way

in the field wild eyed men
caress the tall grass
far off he yew trees cry out
overhead the crows glisten
men are trapped in the deep terrain
of their own silence
come offer the letters a chance
in a wheat field, near a cypress
on the edge of your mind

dreams, dreams, the empty
field, mice are speaking
open air calls in a secret
combination of letters, come touch
the dream, become
overtake everything, find
the chasm by the pale sky
as night descends, as single
letters begin their ascent

The Shadow Box

admin — Fri, 02 Sep 2011 00:21:06 +0000

Some pieces of the past come together. She liked to play cowboy games. “Look what we won at the carnival,” they said. Something glittered in the dirt. She dug out a piece. She thought it had something to do with a gun. She kept quiet about her discovery. She placed it in a little treasure box in her room. All the children knew it was a tiny object. It was so mysterious she carried it in her wallet. Five years after falling in love she visited her cousins in the city. No one knew what fighting had occurred there. She lived on a farm. She began having visions. “There’s a wounded soldier standing there, just below the sharp peaks of the mountains. He loves to hunt and fish in the forests and streams. He worked in the hay and the wheat fields. He was always good to me.” But he had a stubborn streak and a temper. At times his anger flared. He had a rocky relationship with his father. He would lash out. “You always salute the flag,” he said. He worried about the brewing conflict. Tens of thousands of soldiers were taken captive or died along the way, which was made famous in films and books. It was a vicious camp where Americans were starved, tortured or beheaded. Her mother and dad both cried. This time the news was much worse. She ran out to the kitchen to get a glass of water. What horrors their brother endured will be never known. Or where he is buried. She tried to imagine for half a century who he was. High in the mountains – did he die there? She lived with her father until his death. The idea sounded too vague for her.

She let it languish. She didn’t want him to be lost to time. In the midst of war he found love. It was the family’s only link. She uncovered pieces of the puzzle. He returned with a broken heart. He died a few years ago. “We haven’t much of a family tie in our heritage picture. I have always wanted to know our grandfather. It’s very profound to me to have found out.” She didn’t have much to give them. She placed it in a small white box. “It is a blessing I have finally found. I am sure he would have wanted it that way. I’m going to miss it.” He turned it over and over in his hands. In a land across an ocean a long time ago, you just get a kind of empty feeling in your stomach. It will hang on the wall in a shadow box.

— from the Austin American-Statesman, 11/12/06, p. J1

Peter Ramon

admin — Fri, 02 Sep 2011 00:19:45 +0000

Peter Ramon was born in Brooklyn and has been writing poetry since the sixties. He now lives in Austin, TX, where the girls are pretty. Much of his past work is archived at nupoetics.com. The Shadow Box was composed by appropriating text from a local newspaper article.

Three Flash Pieces

admin — Fri, 02 Sep 2011 00:17:02 +0000

Paul and Snow

The snow had stopped falling sometime before the lawn needed mowing. Paul didn’t think to put his boots away. He didn’t trust the change in air. Next to the front door the laces of his boots lay caked in mud. They were cold and just as wet as expected.

Some time ago Paul had carved his initials in the plastic handle of a pumice stone. He kept it tucked away, taking it out only when rubbing the scenes from photographs that made him sad. He scraped everything away except the foot-disrupted-ground.

From Paul’s window the ground looked the same and sunk. Paul thought it was stars that had fallen. The corner of his lip was swollen from watching. Diamonds twinkled from a litter box in the corner.

The Surrogates

They stay with the bottoms of their feet still whole in a house draped in aprons and other oiled hoistings. They wring the scalps from their bonnets before I stumble upon them, sewing patterns into the plumpness of their bellies. They laugh and eat what’s left of each other’s hair; they say I should hold their feet while I can. My beard scratches where I blow inside like a wet ear.

Defecation of the Bookstore

We closed the men’s restroom during the first day of liquidation by writing OUT OF ORDER on the cleanest sheet of paper we could find. It was a job, with shit like splattered flowers shot from floor to ceiling.

I watched our parking lot on my smoke break. A sign flapped from where everyone who was coming could see it. I didn’t recognize anyone so went next door to the fast-food place to use their bathroom.

It was like a dead thing left to eat when I came back. I didn’t have time enough to pop my hip. The work kept my spirits up. I scanned some books harder than others and thought there’s nothing for me to pick at. Never was.

One of us set up a piss pot in the break room. One of us was a country boy and asked to be let out back. I wondered how long it had been.

We uncoiled the stores gizzard and one of our husbands stood with his arms crossed by the exit. We were thin and discouraged the distribution of plastic bags. I didn’t have to look people in the face. None of us wanted to clean the bathroom.

Patrick Samuel

admin — Fri, 02 Sep 2011 00:14:45 +0000

Patrick Samuel lives and writes in Michigan. He loves tacos. His work has appeared in elimae.

The Wood Duck

admin — Fri, 02 Sep 2011 00:08:04 +0000

I read The Wood Duck by James Thurber, sitting on a bench across from the lions. The lions were disinterested. My wife appeared with an ice cream. What do you think of those lions, I asked. Ooh, she said, I think they’re kind of frightening out there. Do you think they’re kind of frightening? She offered me a lick of the ice cream. They’re in a cage, I said. I took the lick. But, yes, I think they’re kind of frightening, I said. She offered me the ice cream and I took it, handed her the small book from which I’d been reading. My girlfriend found us. She caught her breath. She sat beside me and I asked her what she thought of the lions. What are you reading, she asked my wife. I’m not, said my wife, I’m eating an ice cream. I took a lick of the ice cream and handed it back to her and she smiled but kept the book. Our daughter climbed out of the mouth of one of the lions, hopped the moat and squeezed through the cage bars. She sat on my lap and wiped the goop from her eyes. What do you think of the lions, I asked. What were you reading, asked my wife. The Wood Duck, I said, by James Thurber. Ooh, said my girlfriend. I think they’re big slobber monsters, said my daughter. She stood up and wiped her hands on the concrete at our feet. She took up a bunch of leaves and wiped them down the length of her red and white dress. They clung to her here and there like feathers. That’s the one where the duck nearly dies, said my girlfriend. I nodded and she said, it’s a boring story, no? I shrugged. The lions were on the move. Our daughter went about plucking the leaves from her dress and my wife said, here, I’ll help you. Two lions climbed together the highest rock and mounted its point. They lay beside one another, on one another. They yawned. My girlfriend yawned and my mother turned the corner. She shook her head, came over to us. She pulled a leaf from our daughter’s hair and said, They’ll hand you over to the wolves soon enough, Ducky. She let the leaf fall, didn’t bother with the others. That’s a horrible thing to say, said my wife. She put both hands on our daughter and held her close. I was just watching the lions. How does that story end? my girlfriend asked. I honestly couldn’t remember. The duck gets eaten by a wolf, I said. My mother turned to see what I was looking at and stuck out her bottom lip at the lions. You’re going to spend all day by the lions, are you? It’s true, I’d been there most of the day. Makes it easier to find him, said my girlfriend. My mother watched the lions. My wife finished her ice cream. The wood duck does not get eaten by wolves, she explained to our daughter. The wood duck makes it out just fine, understand? Our daughter nodded. Those things are lazy cowards, said my mother. She turned back to us. Have you seen the baboons yet? None of us had. Look just like people, she said, tightening her scarf. Look just like you. She touched my arm, took a tuft of hair between her fingers and pulled. My mother did a pelvic thrust and said, let’s get out of here. To the baboons! She pointed in the direction from which my wife’s sister was approaching. What are we doing, I asked, keeping something like that in a cage? My wife’s sister shrugged and said we had to. We had cages. We had lions. Couldn’t let the lions roam the streets of D.C., now could we? She finished her cigarette and sat down beside my girlfriend. I wanted another lick of ice cream but there wasn’t any ice cream, so I asked my girlfriend for a cigarette. You should quit, said my mother. I didn’t know you smoked, said my wife. My daughter asked for one too and my girlfriend said it was the last one. My wife’s sister started laughing and didn’t stop until I was done smoking the cigarette. I looked at the lions and said, they don’t give a shit about that cage. Look at how much they don’t give a shit. My wife elbowed me. I was cursing in front of our daughter. I apologized, put out the cigarette. We all stood up at exactly the same moment. Our daughter swung from her mother’s arms. We each took turns carrying the slobbery thing as we walked. I asked if we could get a stuffed lion and my mother said, yes. I looked at my girlfriend, who was carrying our daughter, and asked, why can’t we remember the ending of that story? I don’t know, she said, you just finished reading it. I asked, can we only hold so much information, and we eventually reach a point where things no longer stick? My mother shook her head. If we don’t remember something does it mean it didn’t happen? My wife said, no. I asked, if I really read the story, and if I don’t remember the ending, does that mean the story failed in some way? My wife’s sister laughed and took our daughter from my girlfriend. What good is a mind that can’t remember? We were back at the lions. They were licking their paws. They seemed somehow in perfect control of everything. They seemed somehow great Gods of the earth. You start taking notes next time you’re reading, said my mother. You keep them with you all the time and check them when your mind drops a thing or two. That way you won’t have to talk about it so much. That way we can enjoy our visit to the zoo, William. Everybody disappeared and I was sitting back down, across from the lions, with the book in my hand. I got up and went over to the duck pond and there was a wood duck, paddling. I watched it for what felt like forever. But it wasn’t forever at all and I thought, that story is not real at all. I tore the pages out of the small book and ripped them into tiny pieces, which I scattered on the surface of the duck pond. The ducks swam over. The wood duck bobbed its head, came up with a mouthful of The Wood Duck. They all made sounds of gratitude and support, the different ducks, and I walked toward the ice cream vending machines. I bought two perfect sandwiches and ate them on the bus.

Colin Winnette

admin — Fri, 02 Sep 2011 00:06:21 +0000

Colin Winnette lives in Chicao, Texas, Vermont and between. His work has or will appear in American Short Fiction, HTMLgiant, Necessary Fiction, PANK Magazine, Everyday Genius, The Ampersand Review, Fractured West, The Walrus, Blue Fifth Review, Beecher’s Magazine, the North Texas Review, the Tex Gallery Review, the Denton Scramble, and online at http://offandonandoff.blogspot.com/.

He is online at colinwinnette.com
He blogs at www.allofthisbeforeeleven.blogspot.com.

He is currently a MFAW student at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and an editor for Dear Navigator. He received his BA from Sarah Lawrence College in 2007. Since then, he has attended the Breadloaf Writer’s Conference in Middlebury, Vermont, been awarded a one-month residency at the Vermont Studio Center, and studied poetry and fiction at the University of North Texas. He is currently the co-curator/coordinator of a collective art space in Denton, TX: Tex Gallery. He also edits/designs the Tex Gallery Review, a monthly literary publication featuring the work of contributing Tex Gallery poets and writers.

Lauren Capriotti

admin — Fri, 02 Sep 2011 00:04:17 +0000

Lauren Capriotti is a student at California State University East Bay currently working on a degree in English.

Bombs Away

admin — Fri, 02 Sep 2011 00:03:30 +0000

They had started out distant, like far off thunder. She wondered if the same rule of thumb applied, that the amount of seconds between the lightning and the shaking rolling boom was equal to the amount of miles between you and the storm.

Flash.

One.

Two.

Three.

Boom.

The woman next to her began to get hysterical, her muttering growing louder and more shrill. “They’re coming closer, they’re coming for us.” A man yelled for someone to shut her up.

To her left she heard someone say “Oh God” and begin to pray in a trembling voice. All she could hear were the words “Deliver us” over and over.

Another boom and the walls shook. Dust fell in the flickering light.

Oh God, deliver us.

She sat with her back against the cool concrete and hugged her knees close. Someone pried her right hand away and clamped their fingers around her own. He had green eyes. She squeezed his hand, hard.

A bomb dropped and everything ripped apart, expanding and destroying in a million directions. Mouths spilt open in screams but she was careful only to look at their hands, knuckles white as bone. His fingernails were so clean.