Calliope2003 - Sandmedia.net · 2006. 4. 5. · paradise is blue notes hanging from the teeth of my...

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Editor & Chief:

Abigail Aikens

Art Editor/Designer:

scott Andrew

Prose Editor:

Kelly Herendeen

Poetry Editor:

Jenn Young

Web Designer:

Ethan Jerrett

Staff:

Eric Cummings

Drew Blasingame

Danielle Conaway

Cate Wilson

Jamie Griffith

Calliope

2003, Volume 15

West Virginia University

Morgantown, WV 26506

Website: http://www.as.wvu.edu/english/calliope/

Colophon:

The 2003 edition of Calliope was produced on a dual processor 500 Mhz G4 Macin-tosh. Images were edited with the assistance of Adobe Photoshop 6.0, and layout design was done in InDesign 2.0. Poetry and prose pieces were set in Baskerville font at 9 point and Art titles in Pericles at 9 point. The publication was printed by Morgantown Printing and Binding.

Information:

Professor Jim Harms, our faculty advisor; Bonnie Anderson; the Department of English; the disgruntled English Office photocopy machine; and of course, all those students who submitted their work to the Calliope.

Special Thanks to:

is currently enjoying his first of what may be several senior years here at WVU, where he majors in English and Philosophy. His future career goals are somewhat murky, but he hopes to produce the maximum possible joy with the minimum possible consequences over the longest possible timeline. Although generally cheerful and humane, Paul predicts the (largely) regrettable extinction of the human race within the century. He has no spouse or children, one fish, a step-cat, and tries to live in accordance with the universal frequencies.

was born and raised in Long Island, NY and is currently a senior majoring in English and History. In her spare time, she writes poetry and short fiction and loves to read and sing Karaoke. She owes all her creativity to her friends and her parents Dave and Pat Altadonna.

Paul Adams

was born in New Orleans and raised in Los Angeles before experiencing the culture shock of moving to Charleston, West Virginia in the 8th grade. She is currently working towards a degree in Theatre, and also hopes to become a licensed cosmetologist. (To pay the bills while she auditions.) Claire enjoys acting, writing, dancing, painting, old-fashioned burlesque, bottles, cutlery, and rock and roll.

Tina Altadonna

Claire Beaudreault

Danielle Conaway is English major.

is a collector of old photographs and Chinese fortunes. Her lifelong dream is to be a railroad hobo, ghost hunter, and City Lights bookkeeper. Pine trees and the number three tickle her fancy and she believes that the ideal poetry is imagist.

Courtney Bell

is a graduate of WVU in Philosophy. She is currently working on her second degree in computer science. She regularly participates in local poetry slams and was a finalist in the Second Annual AWP Open Poetry Slam. She is also a regular editorialist for the Daily Athenaeum.

Christian Czaniecki is an English major.

Alicia Crall

is graduating with a BS in Computer Science in May. He enjoys reading, writing, and talking to his fiancée. He hates

trying to find a job.

lives with his plant, Wallace, in Morgantown, along with a bunch of CDs and books and a chord organ that he just bought the other day -- an absolute steal at ten dollars. He likes people, reading, film, math, radio and most of all, music.

Justin Duewel-Zahniser

is a senior News Editorial major who is about to embark out into the great wide open or perhaps back to school. He tends to geek out on comic books, movies, music, and books. He also will spurt out irrelevant babble like “Frodo Lives!” from time to time.

Matt Fedorko

Bill Frye

Writer Biographies:

Crystal Hoover

is a freshman Art History and Religious Studies pre-major who insists “I write to purge myself of the human condition. Opera singing and obsessing over Sartre all day just didn’t look like it was going to pan out.”

Jodi L. Linderman

was the starting center on the undefeated 1994 Central Preston Junior High School Junior Varsity basketball team. Now he writes poems.

Bryan T. Livengood

Christian Czaniecki is an English major.


S. Whitney Holmes is a Journalism major.

is a Virgo. She is an Advertising major and a Creative Writing minor. She also hopes to complete an Intermedia degree, which will help her to explore her interests in art, photography, film and computers.

is a twenty-one year old junior from Ridgewood, NJ. He is currently enrolled in the Creative Writing concentration. He is an avid reader and writer of fiction and screenplay.

Crystal Hoover

Evan Lambert

is a freshman Art History and Religious Studies pre-major who insists “I write to purge myself of the human condition. Opera singing and obsessing over Sartre all day just didn’t look like it was going to pan out.”

Jodi L. Linderman

was the starting center on the undefeated 1994 Central Preston Junior High School Junior Varsity basketball team. Now he writes poems.

Bryan T. Livengood

Sarah Seldomridge is a Visual Arts major.

originally hails from Paden City, WV, a little town on the Ohio. She is a junior English major, but her creative pursuits aren’t confined to the written word--she loves making art, cooking, rocking out, and philosophizing. She never goes to Eat ‘n Park before 10pm and rarely leaves before 2am. Her roommate has a pet snake that she loves as her own.

Adrian Slider

is a sophomore at WVU. She likes blue, the smell of chalk dust, boots, beer, fake plants, Billy Idol, Dolecki, the Swan Palace, long walks on the beach, people who wink, and she just fixed her chipped tooth.

Leah Squires

is a professional idiot and amateur vagrant who can be found on or about the Morning Show on a local classic rock radio station where he has been sharpening his lurking skills. Other than working full-time, he is also enrolled at WVU and spends all of his spare time studying, writing and wondering how to find more spare time. He thinks that Neil Peart is a far better poet than William Shakespeare, or at least a far better drummer.

Dave Sweitzer

is a senior at WVU majoring in News-Ed Journalism and Non-Fiction Creative Writing. He feels uncomfortable writing about himself in the third person.

Mark Tuanquin

is a Physics major and self defined geek. She enjoys reading, being vegan, stargazing, the outdoors and Lagrangians.

Anna Zaniewski

Table of Contents:

Video Stills from In Sorrowfull Thunder (self-portrait) - Scott Andrew

Craven - Anna Zaniewski

Uniform - Danielle Conaway

Motive - Dan Sims

Things to distract you while contemplating... - Sarah Seldomridge

Tiny - Bryan Livengood

College Lunch - Bryan Livengood

smoke-filled stages - S. Whitney Holmes

What the Eyes Miss While Dying - Jodi L. Linderman

Re-creation of Jacques-Louis David’s ‘Death of Marat’ - Lori Burroughs

Long Distance - Mark Tuanquin

Bus Stop Woman - Courtney Bell

Silent Protest - Michael Bonadio

The October Issue - Alicia Crall

Late Show Host - Bill Frye

little chicken - Anna Zaniewski

Thugged out since Cub Scouts & a Dreamer - Nathan Hamrick

The Piano (nourishment,addiction,and grace) - Scott Andrew

Dean #1 and Dean #2 - Michael Garrett

Cockpit - Dan Sims

House - Genevieve Larimer

Apology to Jason - Justin Duewel-Zahniser

Cover

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Metro #1 and Metro #2 - Amanda Williams

DC Underground - Amanda Williams

Untitled (Series) - Janeen Ritson

Verona - Lauren Cutruzzula

Old Kodak Snap Labeled Justin - Justin Duewel-Zahniser

wardrobe, red and storybook - Claire Beaudreault

The Sky Falls on Helsingor - Leah Squires

Eggs - Amanda Williams

Blood Thief - Dave Sweitzer

Dreamer - Suzzane Stewart

Suggestions for More Accurate Depiction of Angels - Paul Adams

A Brief Timeline of Innocence - Evan Lambert

Refraction 1 - Dan Sims

514 Pennsylvania - Crystal Hoover

Love Song of Carl Stallings Jr. - Matt Fedorko

Enter Trumpet - Leah Squires

The Seven Day Itch - Dave Sweitzer

Rubies, Pearls & Sapphires - Tina Altadonna

Chaos Mathematics - Christian Czaniecki

cloying - Adrian Slider

From the Rorschach Test Series - Lori Burroughs

Mix Tape for Sale: An E-bay Plea - Sarah Seldomridge

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Calliope2003Calliope2003Calliope2003Calliope2003Calliope2003Calliope2003 Calliope2003Calliope2003Calliope2003Calliope2003Calliope2003Calliope2003

The sun is so bright, I live with closed eyes,only blinking them opento burn an image to walk by.

Anna Zaniewski

Craven

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You are a uniform,stiff starched fabric skin,shiny black toes peeping outbeneath firmly pleated legs;there are pocket flaps,but no pocketsand the medals,they do not impress,I want to rip at themin a frenzy takingshredded shirt sleevesand legs with me,I want your eyes to grow wide,to hear you growllike a rudely awakened animal.I would calm you in your nakednessand show you the path of the lamb,but you had to give Uncle Samyour John Hancock.America is your mistress now,you move, disrobe, and shootat her signal only.

Danielle Conaway

Uniform


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Dan SimsMotive

Steel, wood, and bronze sculpture

2002

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stare at those bedroom walls and wonder why you bought the glossy paint. further—why the orange glossy paint?

fill a garbage bag with clothes that got too big, too small, and toougly to be seen walking round inoutside your orange bedroom.

take the bag to the Salvation Army.

on your way to the Salvation Army,spill your mochachino on yourivory angora sweater.

take off your sweater.

leave the too bigs and the too smalls, but reach into your trash bag and pull out a too-ugly-to-wear-outside-your-orange-bedroom and put it on.

throw your ivory angora sweaterin the Salvation Army bag, drop off thebag, and head for work.

check your e-mail every three minutesat work until your boss comes into reprimand you.“nice shirt.”

put four or five office pens in your bag.

drive home to stare at those orange walls.

Things to distract you while contemplating changingmajors, changing apartments, or changing boyfriends

4Sarah Seldomridge

My mind is full of tiny men with tiny hammers making tiny dents; I fancy they’re looking for gold, but it’s whispered they’re shaping a gallows.

Bryan Livengood


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tiny

The lines are too long for us, the impatient pair, so I wish my best girl down to Jack’s for a Cherry Coke & Pringles – undoubtedly our favorite chips. Purchase in hand, we stroll, careful not to move too fast in the humid heat of August, to exclusion & comfort on the bio building’s second floor. This is where we dine; filling our guts with unburnable calories, and our brains with happy wrinkles. Who’d pick a fresh-cut salad & crowds instead?

Bryan Livengood

College Lunch

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paradise is blue noteshanging from the teethof my favorite jazz greats,swinging from a lassoed bicuspid,sustaining a succulent C with stamina.I wasn’t the tallest in music classbut I always got placed in the back.(it’s amazing how a muffled maleficent voice can manage through seven-year-old bodies.)I used to blow a sexing sax-machineuntil someone suggested I sucked better than I blew (and I blew my best).I was better on my F-ing French Canadian Horn,a whore to the muted effect of my hand in its bell.I loved that gently curving bell like a child that wasn’t an accident.(I could never resent my bell,even if it couldn’t play those blue notes.)goodbye jazz sound,hello Christmas orchestra,church quintet, concert stage.I tried to dance on the jazz sceneand Gus Giordano laughed at me.he said I had the heart, but I was screaming for a ballet barre. I kept contracting at the barre.they called me Miss No-Spine, because my classic arch was a vault ceiling for little trinas.Tchaikovsky said to have a chat with Martha.“Miss Graham, what am I?”“show me,” she said, and I did,and I dancedand the dance gods were watchingAlvin Ailey appeared to applaudand I woke up and said hi to modern.

S. Whitney Holmes

smoke-filled stages

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You clutch a worn photograph, a Victorian expression impressed upon your psyche. Your hope is that if you bend it at a certain angle you will be able to crawl inside of it, tangling your legs with those of the dead child, pushing yourself inside of her, into the holes the rats have yet to chew. The photograph is carried with you. There almost exists the sensation of the girl suffocating in your back pocket, drastically creased from wrinkles, choking against your pants. Her undeveloped chest heaves, her breath is hot and gasping, and this pleases you. You press her flat between yourself and a playground swing, invigorated by her pleading spasms as you watch the children invert themselves on the monkey bars, careless with the display of their bodies; dresses falling up to reveal cartoon underpants stretched over virgin clefts and innocent shirts uncovering milky, young torsos. A distance that you live in constant fear of bridging, spans itself between yourself and your family: the aging wife that you’ve grown disgusted with--her black hair having seized the gray of her years, once-perfect skin contaminated with wrinkles, the arch in her brow having fallen with her smile--and the two small children you avoid bathing. Dinners are silent, and bedtimes have long lacked the essence that you once sought comfort in--a breast that you laid your head upon, a nipple that you once sucked against your teeth during nights of profound lust. You hear the echo of juvenile laughter from across the hall, and it taunts you. With your eyes wet and your vision blurred you walk out into the evening, holding the memory of your two smiling offspring, the laughter of your beautiful wife, and their savage replacement in your back pocket. A foreign remorse pours into you, and your eyes turn to the sky to seek out a god for forgiveness. Instead, the setting of the sun runs stinging sweat into your eyes, and you allow it to burn them as your feet carry you blind into the street, not permitting you to see the headlights of the cars that you hope will fail to stop.

Jodi L. Linderman

What the Eyes Miss While Dying

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Lori BurroughsRe-creation of Jacques-Louis David’s ‘Death of Marat’

Silverprint

2001


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A voice through spiral audio wires swims desperate and drowns in my ear. “The streets of Brooklyn smell like trash in the summer. And everyone here is an asshole. I wish I could make friends.” So I tell her the truth: she’s nutty, nutty as hell. “Well yeah,” she laughs, flicking tears off her cheeks. I give her other things to think about. Memories of perfume and cigarettes; the sweet and the suffocating. “Kitten…neither distance nor disconnect could stop me from kissing those saccharin lips.”

Mark Tuanquin

Long Distance


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She is eternal though death looms in her silence

Her home is amongst congestionwithout cushion chairs

She’s fought off time with stillnessfought off love with slouching socksfought off friendship with the gaps in her teeth

Dare to sit beside her and you will surely hear her mantra:“The ocean is a giant drain pipe, you see.It sucks up all our memories, and breathes with the push of the moon.”

Courtney Bell

Bus Stop Woman


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Michael BonadioSilent Protest

Metal Sculpture

2003

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Calliope2003Calliope2003Calliope2003Calliope2003Calliope2003Calliope2003 My bump-toe shoes are out. I received the letter from Vogue today. They instructed me to replace them all with t-straps if I intend to maintain my membership. The threat was unnecessary. Of course I will comply.

I gathered up my bump-toes and marched them to the cellar of style, assuring them like one of those dreadful Jews used to calm other Jews through the drill to the gas chamber, “This isn’t the end. You may come back in season.”

As I opened the door some valley girls scuttled back from the light. It stank of ammonia and ginger, not unlike the pleather of subway or sleeper-car seats. The commotion alerted Andy Warhol. Ever the polite host, he emerged from a curtain of fiberglass insulation with two teacups. “Vinegar,” he offered, “In my day, that’s what girls did to stay thin.” “Some things never change,” I smiled as I took a sip and tried not to vomit, although I’m sure that was the point. As he stepped into the light, I tried not to spit out my vinegar in horror. He was wearing a monocle. When was that last in? And on top of his silver hair was a hat of steel wool and nettle. “You like it?” Andy preened, “I still haven’t lost my touch. Baby, before you go, give me some dirt. Whatever happened to Debbie Harry? I hear she’s still up there, does she wear false teeth? Does she still walk like a giraffe? Has Lou Reed taken up clarinet?” Andy was still obsessed with the famous. I noticed he was wearing John Lennon’s t-shirt. It still had some gunpowder and blood on it. I had to defenestrate the idea of civility and run. After all, what would Vogue think?

Alicia Crall

The October Issue

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Here is the first dream: The sign flickers with applause. The lights burn down to the stage. The band’s horns and guitars blend together while the guests are announced. It’s time! It’s time! It’s time we’re goin’ live!

The curtains open. The audience roars. The monologue is beamed up

to satellites, in silent orbit aroundthe earth’s increased eccentricity,and it’s all brought back…

“Late Show Host”

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…home where the willows nolonger stand and the playhouserots into the soft ground and the meadow’s down troddengrass is full of mud holes and thebridge is no longer there.the past cracks like the painton the side of the old house,the horses have roamed togreener pastures and the treesthat dad planted now towerinto the sky like the hills justa few hundred yardsfrom the kitchen.the gate clangs and vibratesin the autumn breezethe stream winds down from theV shaped valley,a thrown rock terrifies schools of guppies as the roots of treesabsorb the water’s glistening reflection.the tree’s palette of colors bathe in thefall sunset and the distant echo of theinterstate falls upon my ears.walking on the side of the roadthe sound of the tires of somestruggling car grind into loose gravellike the snap, crackle, pop of theRice Krispies I ate as a child,where I can still hear mom’spots and pans clamoring through the wallson an early Saturday morning beforethe Smurfs and Snorkels took to TV’sairwaves. on those days wars werewaged in sandboxes underneath thewillow’s net of shade, the Joes foughtvaliantly against Cobra, where Duke died

and was never found again, in the back-ground of this Rockwell scene horsesnayed and grumbled for hay whilethe postman delivered the mail.Babe barked and the stray cats scattered.the swing set always creaked and screechedin the country breezes which wouldscatter the lightning bugs under the harvestmoon that beat down on this nightscapelike the last dim light bulb behind the cellardoor that held back the damp cold world ofjarred green beans and home made grape juice that looked eerie in the yellow light.through it all I can still hear her laughterbut it fades into the grey over the hillsand the satellite dish rumblesquietly with age where it picks up alost signal that was beamed downlast night across the cities web oflight…

…the audience applaudsand you smilelook directly into the cameraLadies and Gentlemen.That’s our show for the night.Thank you for tuning in.Good Night.

Bill Frye

“Late Show Host”

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9:something a.m. my eyelids drift apart andi realize i am nottrapped under a fallen sky;only my grandmother’s quilt.

maybe if i lie motionlessmy day won’t have to begin.

but the quilt is too thin to absorb the daycreeping in through the window.

i try to return to the nightmarebut he won’t take me back, soI pull my thoughts inthrough my nose and pushout through my mouth untilthe monsoon turnsto soft rain.

Anna Zaniewski

little chicken


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Nathan HamrickThugged out since Cub Scouts & A dreamer

Digital paintings

2003

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Scott AndrewThe Piano

( nourishment, Addiction, and Grace )

Digital Scan Compositions

2002

Michael GarrettDean #1 & Dean #2

Acrylic paintings on canvas

2003

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Dan Simscockpit

steel, wood, pyrex Sculpture

2003

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Genevieve LarimerHouse

digital imagery

2002

Remember that time I said to bea responsible young man? I meant tosay: Once in a while, burn yourclothes, dance naked around the fire(wine in hand) wearing only a groveof fig trees and the cold night sky.

Remember the time they calledme in to school, the day you foughton the playground? I should have laughedat the blood, taken you out to dinner,toasted your bruises.

Now as you stand in line--as you castyour first vote--here is my final lesson:Ignore everything I taught you.Burn your ballot.Buy a box of condoms.Start living.


An Apology to Jason

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Amanda WilliamsMetro #1 and Metro #2

digital photographs

2002

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Amanda Williamsdc underground

digital photography

2002

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Janeen RitsonUntitled (Series)

Digital Media

2002

Janeen RitsonUntitled (Series)

Digital Media

2002

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Lauren CutruzzulaVerona

Video Stills

2003

Asleep in the Hanged Man’s posture,a soft bed of wall-to-wall carpeting,paper bag color. This three-year-oldkid, three-year-old wind-up toy, hasrun out of string for a few half-hours,until some cartoon pulls it again.

He dreams of following a baby dragonacross an island of tangerines,hopping sand dunes and scramblingup child-sized cliffs, wearingthe same comfortable denim overalls andstriped cotton shirt as the kidpassed out on the floor.

He snoozes next to a piano leg in theupper left corner of the photograph.In his dream, the boy and the dragonstop to rest under a great polished tree withivory leaves that harmonize in the breeze.Later, he saves the dragon from avicious man-eating fern like the one he’dbattled with in the living room beforepassing out on the floor.

His mother, snapping the photograph,swears it’s the cutest thing she’s ever seen.She forgets, briefly, the sad state of herhouseplant, and the lunch she will have to makefor the hero boy and his companion dragon.


Old Kodak Snap Labled “Justin”

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I do owna lot of red shoes.

(it’s the ruby slipper principle)

when am I going to find my way home?the answer’s inside me,been at my feet the whole time.

(just look down)

cherry hooded sweatshirtthe barrier and the shield…on the way to Uwa’sthrough the wood and wolves.

(when I was small I believed her a witch.)

cover the bodice, laced-too-tight…

(gasp)

I pick the reddest appleslike an ill-fated mathematician.

I own silvery crowns, glittery wings, billowy skirtsand rags, patched and old, full of holes, handed-down, not my own…

hair black and lips stained redthis fairy-tale unreality—

sleep under glass for a hundred years.

wardrobe, red and storybook

30 Claire Beaudreault

Light as day.Blind as darkThe sky opens. Then shutsWith every breath Like a heart beatI think that heavens must be in mad loveFurious EmotionAWAKE!Asleep. Bright Brief Beautiful rolls. CRASH! CURSE! Fall All Awake AsleepCrash! Awake.Awake in a pouring sweat.Breath. Sob. Asleep.Peaceful, fallingSlowly, lightly, newly I wish you would fall in a pattern.So that I could follow you. Track You.Bright. Dark. Dark, Bright Dark Bright Bright Bright.If only it were as simple as counting you steps.In a one, two, three three, one, two, three three.Two, two two tumble one, one one. Three three thrash!

AWAKE!Away-----and allow me to sleepTo cry. To tumble.I don’t want to be followed, to be tracked. To be counted.I only want to breathe.And be Madly in love. With no label. Or number. Or pattern

So The Sky simplyBreathes.Crash! Curse! FALL! All! Awake! Asleep,Allow me to be.

The Sky Falls on Helsingor

31Leah Squires

Amanda WilliamsEggs

Video stills

2002


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I. The light changed and a stream of nameless humanity trickled across the Pittsburgh street. A white Ford Econoline van tapped on the gas, edging its way toward the crosswalk. A man in a long tan coat looked up at the driver and furrowed his brow, but the van never got any closer. As he stepped forward, the man in the coat took off his hat and bent over, seeming to catch himself in a coughing fit, putting his hands over his face. His hat back on his head, he continued towards the sidewalk, stepping past a stretch of orange mesh constructing skirting, head slightly lowered. All other walkers went on, oblivious.

Blood Thief

II. A security camera whirred and wheeled, its little red light blinking rhythmically. The bank lobby was wide and well carpeted, sparsely populated at the moment, but well lit by massive chandeliers. A bank teller named Ruth chatted with another named Barb. Ruth wore a purple jump suit and slightly too much mascara. She chewed gum incessantly as she spoke. A man stepped into line and Ruth pushed the button that made the

light at her lane come on with a chiming sound. “Can I help you sir?” she said as the man reached for a deposit slip inside his jacket. As she took it, she noticed something odd about the man. He kept his head tilted slightly forward so that his face was hidden in shadow. She read the note: Put all the money in the bag and you won’t get hurt. When she looked up this time, all she saw was the barrel of a gun. Ruth couldn’t help gasping out loud. “Alright, lady!” he said, pointing the pistol at her openly now. Under his hat, his face was obscured by camouflage netting. “Fill this up and give it to me quick!” The robber threw a large paisley satchel towards her. “Twentys and bigger, and hurry up!!!” She proceeded to fill the bag with all the money she had at hand. “Now pass it around. Quick!” Barb shoved in all the larger bills from her drawer, too. The other two tellers did the same, then gave the bag back to Ruth. Little streams of mascara trailed down Ruth’s face as she handed the thief his bag. The robber looked quickly at his watch and then headed for the door. As he was reaching the exit, he took off his hat

and pulled off the camouflage netting, letting it fall to the floor. He pulled his hat back on and shoved the pistol into his tan overcoat pocket. It went off. Everyone in the bank panicked. The robber reached down and grabbed his right leg, and a splash of blood stained the bank’s lovely rug. He ran limping from the building. The light on the camera blinked. Two steps outside and he could hear the sirens in the distance. There was still time. He walked quickly out to the curb next to some construction netting and started to cross the road. Ruth and Barb were now looking out the glass doors when the robber stepped out into the crosswalk. The van screeched to a stop. To Ruth it looked like the robber had been run over. The dark-haired woman who was driving the Ford got out, waving her arms around, looked around the front of the van and then looked behind seeing nobody there. She looked under the van, but her victim was gone. There underneath the Econoline was a small pool of blood and what appeared to be Chiclets. Strangely, one of them was made of gold.

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III. Jon Evinger kept mostly to himself. Neighbors would recall that he always smelled like fish. He rented a small apartment in the Strip District and worked during the day at Wholey’s. He’d been arrested on several occasions, each time for possession of small quantities of a controlled substance, but he’d never been busted for anything as high profile as bank robbery. The neighbors couldn’t believe it. Three days after the bank robbery the first police cars showed up and the rumors started. Pretty soon, the chatter on the streets was that Jon Evinger, white male, mid-20’s, dark hair and brown eyes was last seen leaving the scene of a bank robbery at the First Mellon Savings and Loan on Liberty Avenue. He may be wounded, the police had said, and he should be considered armed and dangerous. If anyone did see him in the neighborhood, he should not be approached, but the authorities should be notified immediately. Unfortunately for Jon Evinger, he never returned to his apartment.

IV. An old man sat on a park bench in front of a skyscraper, throwing stale bread at ducks. Occasionally he hit one and it quacked appropriately. A shadow flicked across the ground and the old man turned and looked up behind him. His eyes were failing, but he could see well enough to tell that something was falling, the reflection clear in the tinted glass of the PPG Building. The body hit the ground with the sound of a baseball bat splitting in two, and the old man thought he was going to have a heart attack right then and there.

V. Police Captain Mark Niner poured the rest of his coffee down his throat and sighed. “So, what’s the problem, Jil?” Jil had been a detective in downtown Pittsburgh long enough to know that this tone in the captain’s voice meant trouble. “The problem, Mark, is that this crime makes no sense.” “What do you mean it makes no sense? It makes perfect sense,” he said, wiping the coffee out of his thick salt and pepper mustache. “We have this guy Evinger’s DNA from the scene.

His blood was found on the floor at the bank. We have his teeth and blood from right outside the bank, found under that van that hit him. His hair was in the grill. He did it, there’s no question. So, I’ll ask you again, Jil….what’s the problem?” “Well, Captain. There’s more than one problem.” She laid the photos on the table in front of Mark. “These are the stills from the bank surveillance camera. The tellers say he was wearing a hunter’s camo-netting over his face when he came in.”

“I thought we found that.” “That’s right, Mark. It’s in the evidence locker right now. But why would he take it off while he was still in the bank? Look, he even turns slightly toward the camera. He had to know that camera was there” “He didn’t want to be seen taking it off outside. That would be too obvious. Somebody would notice.” “Nobody noticed him put it on before he came in, though. And then shooting himself in the leg??! Look at this!” She dropped that photo on the table. “That’s just stupid. Whoever planned this knew what they were doing. They had their

Blood Thief

35

timing down, knew how many people were in the bank and where, and made sure they were out on the street in the right amount of time to keep from getting caught. Do you notice anything in these pictures?” They looked at the photos with the man in the tan coat shoving the gun into his pocket, then a picture of it going off. “See? It looks like a muzzle-flash coming out of his pocket. And in this next one, his leg is in the exact same posture. And did you notice, his back is to the camera the whole time this is happening?” Captain Niner looked at the photos. After a pause, he looked up at the detective. “So?” he said. “So, I think the gun went off on purpose.” “You mean he shot himself on purpose? “No. I don’t think he shot himself at all, but I do think the gun went off on purpose.” “What in the world are you talking about?” Jil dropped another photo in front of him. “You can see that he had a .380, standard auto. Unless the bullet lodged completely in his leg, we should have found it in the floor or wall. Our teams have been all over that bank. There’s no bullet from that shot. And if it did lodge in his leg, it would’ve shattered bone or at least knocked him down. See?” she pointed back to the picture with the muzzle flash and the one right after.

“His leg keeps the same position. I think he fired a blank.” “Why on earth would he do that? And how do you explain the blood on the floor?” There was a pause. “I don’t know. I just…I don’t know. I do know that there’s something very weird going on here.” “Look, Jil. I know you’re a good detective. That’s why you’re here. But you’re reading too much into this that just isn’t there. We have all the evidence we need to send this guy Evinger to prison, with one leg or two. All we have to do is find him. And he’ll show up, you can bet on that.” “He already did,” she said. Her face was draw poker expressionless. “What?!” “The John Doe that jumped from the PPG Building yesterday? That was Jon Evinger.”

VI. In a hotel room in Shadyside, Roger counted the money. He rubbed his hand along his scalp, still feeling the spirit gum that had held the hairpiece in place. He still wore the false eyebrows, but they would come off soon enough. He continued to count. “Well, how much is it, baby?” asked the dark-haired woman sitting across from him on the bed. “About 80 grand, give or take.” “I’ll take,” she said, reaching out for a pile. Roger grabbed it first. “Now, now, Rachael. You know we can’t spend any of this until it’s clean.” “Oh! Ok, then. If I can’t take,” she said, slipping a naked leg out from under the covers, “at least let me give…” Rachael, the dark-haired driver of the Econoline van reached out and grabbed hold of Roger. He put the money back in the paisley satchel and was pulled into the bed by Rachael. At the last moment, he realized that he had left something in his pocket. He reached in and pulled out some small item, rolled it in his palm, then let it fall into the bag atop the money. The police had one of these, too. It was one of Jon Evinger’s gold incisors.

Dave Sweitzer

Blood Thief

36

Suzanne Stewartdreamer

silverprint

2001

37


1.

As in the wings of any of several bat species, but with tubes of fluorescent neon/argon replacing the vein-like fingers. These tubes would not be constrained by the normal physical properties of glass and noble gases, and could flex after the fashion of a normal bat’s wing. The wing membrane would be similar to exotic spun silk, diaphanous and bringing to mind subconsciously loaded images of veils and draperies, reflecting the changing colors of the light in the tubes, similar to those little rotating balls of colored monofilament often found on or near the checkout counter in classier Chinese restaurants.

Suggestions For More Accurate Depiction of Angels

2.

As four to twelve geometrically perfect lines extending from the back of the angel unto the vanishing points of a given room or area. This would make an angel in a desert or wilderness setting particularly impressive, since the uppermost sets of lines would extend out of view into the sky. These lines would glow brightly in a pious color such as harvest gold, cornflower blue, or rambler rose, and the lines themselves would apparently be both infinitely long and infinitely thin, with only the diffuse glow giving the illusion of thickness. It is suggested that this glow would brighten painfully when the angel was angered or delivering important tidbits of prophecy.

3.

As a vaguely wing-shaped pile of dark substance reminiscent of wet velvet. This substance would shift, change in size, and bleed off into the atmosphere like smoke, at moments seeming completely solid, at others totally ethereal. Within the folds of these wings would be images both troubling and poignant; scenes from childhood, lost items, faces of loved ones never met, a super 8 video you never got around to making of the dog that was hit by a truck when you were eight, nineteen twenties style cigarette holders, your father as a little boy, kittens in a sock, starving Afghans. As one tried to focus on a specific image, it would fade from view to be replaced by another, all these images displaced by the slightest rustle of the wings.

Paul Adams38

When I was nine, maybe ten, Ian Sawyer taught me how to steal. The lesson came a week after he taught me how to light leaves on fire, and a week before he taught us both that a paper cup is not a good transporter for gasoline, especially when held over a bonfire beneath a pine tree. So eight days after my Mom began to question the smoky aroma of my down jacket, six days before Ian’s eyebrows and nasal hair were no more, and one day after I learned to steal, we walked down the winding hill near my house. We crossed the train tracks, dropping a few strategic pennies on the well-traveled rails. Ian told me that his sister’s friend once did the same thing. Instead of flattening on the rail, he told me, it shot off and sliced halfway through an oak tree. True story, he told me. We walked further, wandering across the bridge, stopping at the middle to gaze over and dare each other to jump. I told him it would be crazy. We stared into the creek below, and I told him he’d die if he tried. Ian told me about his sister’s friend who jumped off the bridge last August.

The same friend? I asked. No, a different one, but what I’m trying to tell you is that he didn’t die. Then what happened? He was in a body cast for six months, Ian told me. I anticipated a moral, but Ian just pushed off of the iron railing and continued across the bridge.

We walked the concrete hill, crossed the street, and stopped in front of the pizza parlor just next to the 5 and 10. Just a day earlier, in this exact spot, Ian had taught me how to steal. The spoils of our ventures were resting in our hands, mine in the shape of a miniature soccer ball, his a basketball. We bounced them on the sidewalk as Ian explained to me our current heist – Sour Patch Kids.

If we were adult criminals, maybe we’d be loading our guns, getting our masks ready, anticipating a cash register full of cash. But the fact remained that we were only nine, maybe ten. The preparation – loosening the drawstrings on our sweatpants, the anticipation – sugar.

Three minutes into the operation, the shopkeeper had become suspicious and Ian had abandoned me. I stood in front of the old, Asian man sobbing uncontrollably. My bounty rested in his raised hand, his other reaching for the phone. I’m calling the police, he shouted, but I cried and insisted that he didn’t. He noticed the ball and took it from my hand.

I keep this ball until you come back with your father, he yelled at me. The irony of the situation was evident before I even knew the definition of the word. I wiped my nose with my sleeve, agreed, and left the store.

I ran home, not stopping at the bridge to wonder the fate of the ill advised. I didn’t even stop at the tracks to find my flattened penny. I ducked when I saw cars coming. I was a fugitive.I hid the rest of the day in Ian’s backyard. I crouched under the pine tree. I sat on my favorite rock. I lit leaves on fire and promised myself not to steal again, not to make stupid mistakes. And I wondered what we could do to keep our bonfires lit.

A Brief Timeline of Innocence

39Evan Lambert

Dan SimsRefractory 1

Bronze and concrete Sculptures

2002

40

Extracted teeth soak in a small glass of peroxide,while a battery-operated toothbrush glances over the rim.A Mason jar filled with hot, soapy water awaits the tilt of a gentle hand.

Feathering his chest while the metal claws of an antique tubdig deeper into a solid block of wooden ice.

The warmth within begins to chill, cellsof blood shrink into tears that flowdown the face of a child denied.

Steam settles upon a pane of glass, revealingthe language of lovers...

Gazing through watery eyes—he enters a peaceful rest.The immediate presence of a cat’s tongue

against the part of my body the blanket missed.

Awareness of Position.

Grasping for his limp arm, needing to precede

Down

Slowly

Waiting, yearning for fingertips to touch the moisturethat has gathered at the corners of a starved mouth.

Rise up...

to the kitchen.Dream tea and sugar soak in a mug of scalding water,drops of honey rest on the rim.

Crystal Hoover

514 Pennsylvania

41

I know that if he had come at me, arms unfolding like pistons, and had pushed me off the porch, I would have fallen like a stone, unmoving. My reaction, if any, wouldn’t happen until I hit the ground, shaking the primary colored earth, my back flattened, my legs and arms pointing to the sky. I would be W.E. Coyote, one-upped by R. Runner yet again. My reaction would be this: two quick piano keys as my eyes opened and closed, revealing surprise with two white circles. But that didn’t happen. I sat there and took all the abuse he had. It came out in gray globs, dripping to the floor. His color was wrong. He seemed too dusky. Light died near him, even though the incandescent light above us was transforming each line into a black gash. It fell into his jacket, his hat, his tongue. No bright colors here, no smiling sun. This man had been drawn by someone fascinated with Fudd’s growing rage at another failed hunt. It was raining outside, and the piano was darkening, deepening, the player’s hands traveling to the far ends of the keys, bringing bass and thunder into my muscles. “I’m calm,” the man beside me said. “He’s not,” gesturing to his left at my apparently quivering form. There were faint lines framing my body from the vibrations. They were obvious enough, but I hadn’t noticed. Earlier, inside, I had been charming to a pretty girl. The room was too big, I think, but that’s the way someone drew it, so someone else built it, and I was trying to fill it. She had these eyes and this smile. The artists, I thought, have it out for me. Luckily, I kept control. I didn’t prance like LePew, or lean far over my feet, expecting a quick kiss of feverish passion based only upon my own fawning. On the upside, I wasn’t greeted by a slap or a comically round bomb, and she wasn’t a rabbit in disguise. We talked about the blues. She was sitting across the porch when I was trying to bring my feet above the gray-blue blocks of insults that slid out of his mouth, cut by his teeth, clunking to the floor. It was unfortunate, really, because to write yourself out of a situation like this, you have to do something pretty stupid under the guise of bravery. I exhaled white. A smattering of faces and shapes had obscured him, but I could see his hat peaking over the shadows. The bodies were two-dimensional, moving in one direction, then the other, rocking back and forth. Muttering fell down from above, providing the chorus for this mob. Each face was indistinguishable. Arms never left sides. I inhaled. The guy beside me leaned over. “I’ve got your back, man.” I wonder now what he was doing with the whole thing, and why he hadn’t forked over my spine. I needed it. I’m sure when I stood up, the muttering of the crowd deepened and everything to my left and right darkened a little with the shadow of drama, their faces either respectfully bowed or reverently looking on. Or maybe they didn’t want to tell me that I had been slipped a dynamite stick, the fuse already lit and sputtering in my back pocket. I took a step forward, and another. Viewed from the waist up, it looked like I wasn’t moving at all. This is a trick of perspective. I reached the crowd between us, and each part moved past me, breaking into cardboard cutouts, color on one side only. Their muttering was all around me.

The Love Song of Carl Stallings Jr.

42

Matt Fedorko

He slouched so real, I hated it. I hated who drew him. They had taken something real and darkened the lines and smudged the shading. He was too real. Over the top real. Ugly real.

His mouth opened and closed. Artistic renderings of my anger clinked off his teeth, dripping and tumbling down his chin.

“You’ve got a lot of nerve, man,” I said.I was jealous. I didn’t have any at all.“Yeah? And you’re a faggot.”As if any other picture could be drawn, the girl was sitting three feet away on the edge of the porch.

She wasn’t wearing that smile anymore. The artist forgot the color in her eyes. They were gray now, hesitant and worried. My gut noticed the difference.

“You hear me, faggot?”This wasn’t kid stuff. At least not any kid I ever was. He pulled a gun he had been hiding behind his back. Its stock seemed hazy and undefined, an

impossible wood grain color, the barrel extending forever, flaring improbably at the end. Its enormous cornucopian hole swallowed my face.

I smelled smoke. The coat tails I didn’t have were smoldering behind me. A thin, black strand of smoke crawled upward.

I reached behind my back, pulled out the dynamite stick between my thumb and forefinger, and dropped it neatly into the barrel of his gun, pushing it into place with a single, careful finger.

I turned to the girl, who was crossing her legs, revealing red shoes hugging her feet, complimenting the splash of red hair circling her face. She flashed me a knowing smirk, the color flowing back into her eyes. Her lips curled up one frame at a time. This was worth dying for.

I heard the gun go off. A quickly moving, never expanding cloud of his own fallibility swallowed him and his gun, curled up like an abused tulip. His face was covered in soot, drunken eyes blinking, his clothes torn. He dropped piece by piece into his own pile of gray dust and unimportance.

The crowd waddled through him, their flat bottoms, used for stability, swept him away, dispersing him, forgetting him. I smiled at the girl, turned towards the steps and left. The rain fell in silver streaks over silent streetlights and cars in the distance, stuck forever splashing through one puddle. I looked over my shoulder at the blocks of yellow spilling from the porch, the mass of grays and dark blues moving like waves, and the one brush stroke of red fixed on the edge. The rain moved again, the cars jerked forward. I felt a black circle pulling my corners, swallowing my feet, rising towards my heart, and I turned again, back to the light.

The Love Song of Carl Stallings Jr.

43

TrumpetAs I reiterated my parade through le rue de bourbon.I saw une belle, craziest kitten.She had sunflowers pursuing her scentBees, jealous of her honeyIt’s Sunday!!!Shops opening!~Enter flute~

Le mademoiselle … ooh la la! J’adore Ce~Dig, that kittenAfter the post-man stopped his watch,Dig, that kitten, hands in her pockets all innocent like, Brown eyed boy jumped his wayacross the yellow lines of the street, startled pigeons scatter from their bubble gum,popcorn, Styrofoam.

dig that beauty, the wind caught her around the neck, and took down her scarf.

Art Blakely and his jazz messengers play on…~Enter trombone~

Cigarette bums sharing a cola Hot and straw brimmed boys, aching to be menSing their poems of self satisfaction and public severity amongst the canyons, surroundedby cracked sidewalks.

Underage mad men, forgetting to ask, “Chainge, chainge, chainge?” Le petite Fabianne,some young Kennedy kid, blond, quiet boy,

Enter Trumpet

44

~add saxophone~

Looked at his childish feet, and returned la belle’s scarf.

“Merci, Fabianne”Child’s rabbit-like eyes, glowed with thoughts of warm milk and honey, dripping fromhis sipping.

At least that was the word on everyone’s mind. Or rather, the thought on everyone’s lips.

Dig, this, dig this!!! Man.

Dig, she walked on, stripping her hands, all tan and bare

~enter miscellaneous percussion instruments~From her pockets, deep and looseDefying the wind himself, defying the blowRetied the silk to her dark naked neck,Retied the silk to her dark naked neck.

I sunk, spiritually supported by the dry thieves in the alley, and the post-man ticking hiswatch, nervous lips and all, and the white townies, sad in their silent seams, frustration in claustrophobia, back down to my usual Sunday stop of parade in the church steps, like a beaten dog, thirsty and obsolete.

~exit trumpet~

Leah Squires


45

Enter Trumpet


Fast enough, and it becomes the sound of rain falling on wax paper, sniffling infants, a knife sharpener’s grindstone. Unquenchable thirst followed by an unsoothing numbness, then pain. And that hardly scratches the surface. Momentary hollow fury flows through fingertips, creating fire mixed with wool and centipede fingers.Motes of DNA go flaking across the armchair.

Skin throws his coat on the floor, grows impatient.

Nails count to ten, wait for the next elevator.

Synapses, histamine-gorged, wipe their faces with checkered tablecloth.

It is fast enough or too slow. Time doesn’t enter into it at all. Often, breath is held.Under the umbrella, a dollop of lotion spreads over soothing chills, a girl talks to her cell phone about feather dusters, a hermit crab flings sand from his newly borrowed carapace.

Dave Sweitzer

The Seven Day Itch

46


“But they never told you” Brian, Lauren, Mer & Scott Little Rock... Sex in Politics “Only the good die young” Huh... Really Billy Even in Cold Spring? “Your stars and stripes” Burned “Your playground Booze” Gangsters

Madonna’s bra’s Like a prayer Vogue Like a Virgin Paradise by the dashboard light Two out of three ain’t bad Meatloaf ’s bar’s

J.D.’s Catcher in the Rye My Summer Sisters Danielle & Nicole

“And she wonders”.................. This was the time Ashroguen Beachshores Bethpage picnics Suffolk county fairs Belmore strawberry festival

Here’s “your tired your poor” Bill, FDR, Wilson “Cause the world got in her way” “This is the time”

MY RED, WHITE & BLUE?

Tina Altadonna

Rubies, Pearls & Sapphires

47

48

The phenomenon described as chaos has an underlying order, in apparent randomness is order or an emerging order.

Above, a bird glides on well placed thermals,silhouetted by an apologetically oppressive sky.

If I were inclined to bet,

I imagine this must be how the sky looked down upon Kennedy,

his day in Dallas.

I feel as a tree would,implicated into beinga cupboard or a table,

or just dead, for a poem.

I walk to the ocean, raging againstthe idea that I am an equation.

In the water,

I dive as far as I can to where it is cold and dark,

and very, very quiet.

Christian Czaniecki

Chaos Mathematics



I never told you,but we were in loveone July afternoonon the grass.

Our lips did a sinuousslow dance.After a while, our mouths flappedand prated and sucked

greedily at each other’s marrow.And today there is a needle buriedin my foot which I do notremember stepping on.

One July afternoon

when the air was too fatiguedto move, and you and Iwere alive. We stoodout from

the stillness of the worldlike two black fliesbuzzingin front of a white wall.

Evan Lambert

cloying


49

50

Lori BurroughsFrom the Rorschach Test Series

Liquid emulsion on paper

2002

The Story Behind the Merchandise: In the winter of 1995 technology came calling in a rural West Virginia town. Just as we had been the first house on our street to allow our grass to grow to mid-shin height, my family was the first in the neighborhood to have home Internet access. As a high school freshman I was eager to tap into the vast resources of the Information Superhighway. I began my research in that virtual den of inequity—the chat room. My first visits to these implicit slums were almost always with friends. In groups of three or four, we rediscovered a pastime we hadn’t seriously pursued since we’d stolen the last fruit roll-up right out of our baby brothers’ hands—lying. The chat room experience for us involved claiming we had blue hair, weighed over 400 pounds, and had seen fellow chatters’ mothers running naked in front of the picture window. It was when I started using alone and eventually telling the truth, that I made an online friend. His name was Brian, and he was getting a masters degree in history at Boston University. I came to know him through Firefly, an online discussion forum devoted to music. At the time, search engines were just so friggin’ cool that Firefly provided a searching service for other members with similar interests. I would habitually run a search and then send off around ten identical messages to the members the engine spit out. The messages were always bizarre—Why is Nuprin little, yellow and different?—and people rarely answered them. Brian was an answerer, and he became my confidant, my co-reviewer of books and movies, my psychic advisor, and most of all, my personal music guru.

I wouldn’t buy a CD until I knew what Brian thought of it, and he always had an opinion—it was only natural that he began doling out his musical advice via mix tape. I remember hesitating a little when he asked for my home address, but this small stress was nothing compared to my anxious deliberations over creating a mix tape to send him. How could I possibly round up 90 minutes worth of songs he had never heard? How would I ever find a band he didn’t know of ? And what if he thought my tape sucked? Probably to calm my nerves, Brian let me drop my end of our bargain after Tape 1. He kept sending tapes though, all through high school and into college, well after I had outgrown chat rooms and Firefly.

I sometimes wondered what Brian got out of expanding the musical horizons of a young girl in WV, but I kept updating my address for him as I moved. I liked getting packages in the mail. I liked listening to new music. My sophomore year of college, he told me that he was thinking of working on an education degree at West Virginia University. He said he was coming to check out my school and could we get together? I figured that meeting him would be harmless enough—I’d bring a friend to be careful. My roommate and I met Brian at the bus station. It was there, after seeing him trip off the Greyhound steps in clearly unwashed clothing, that he let me in on his real plans. He wasn’t staying at the Econo Lodge—he was staying with me. After a lengthy discussion, Brian sufficiently convinced us that he had no money for a hotel and that he wasn’t a serial killer. We told him he could stay for one night. Three stressful evenings later, I was still hosting my brilliant, witty, knowledgeable e-mail buddy. But 3-D Brian had ADD, was socially inept, and had severe body odor. Through e-mails sent from my computer, he updated me on what he thought of my place, my friends, my town, and me: my friends and my conversations were like “being trapped in a Beastie Boys album,” my boyfriend had “peaked as a precocious 8-year-old,” my curtains were ugly and it wasn’t Smashing Pumpkins, it was The Smashing Pumpkins. He leaned over me eerily

Mix Tape for Sale: An E-bay Plea

51


one morning while I was still in bed and told me that I was “underwater and [he] needed to bring me to the surface to depressurize.” After flooding my bathroom floor by leaving the shower curtain open, he proceeded to wrap himself naked in a blanket my grandmother had given me. My friends and I would gather around the computer and howl at his in-visit e-mails. It was the chat room all over again and though a terribly frightening person, Brian was hilariously right on about a lot of things.

Funny or not, I was thrilled to put him back on a bus home and out of my life. His was a friendship whose html code did not translate to reality. Therefore, I am sacrificing a mix tape to the Internet gods from the series I received. Passing this tape on to someone through a web-based auction seems the only way to give the tape peace. Please watch over this tape in its next life.

Disclaimer: Copyright laws prevent me from auctioning this tape in all its original glory. I have been forced to record over it with what amounts to white noise. Don’t think of this as a rip-off—I have included the original play list, and you are free to hunt down and record the original songs. Any high school student, ex-convict, or househusband is also free to resurrect the tape, giving it life anew with recordings of Barry Manilow, Pantera, or Johnny Cash reading excerpts from the Bible. The tape is a blank canvas on which to splatter your musical taste, or lack thereof. Perhaps you will choose to create a mix tape to mail to your own favorite chat room buddy. Esquire magazine says that women get over men faster than they think—“after two weeks, your ex-girlfriend is already recycling your favorite songs into a party mix tape.” Be that ex-girlfriend. However, the American Journal of Health warns against the mixing of prescription drugs. Don’t be that ex-girlfriend.

Description of the Merchandise: The mix tape is a 90-minute Maxell UR cassette proclaiming to be “great for everyday recording.” It is clear plastic and has a small crack on the backside of the case. The spine bears the title “Always Something More That I Should Tell You” written in navy, royal, periwinkle, sky blue, aqua, teal, and olive markers. The background color of the spine is that of a ripe cantaloupe. The plastic case is smooth to the touch and is approximately 2/3 the length of a baby’s arm. Unlike the sleek modern “slim” cases, this cassette case is of standard size and will fit easily into a pre-fab cassette tape storage unit. When held up to the light, the ends of the case are like a beautiful prism through which filters the world. The tape itself has two gears, which can be wound with the tip of an index finder if a tape deck is not accessible. There are holes in the bottom on the tape that allow the magnetic strip to read. One of the holes houses a springy brown pad that is pleasing to the touch.

The music selection that used to be on the tape, and is still listed on the cardboard insert, reminds me of the record collection of a somewhat recently employed college radio deejay in 1996. The handwriting listing these songs is like that of a second grade teacher.The tape case smells faintly of spice cake.The tape is cute as a button.It is like butter.

52


The Original Play List of the Tape:Side A:

• Laurie Anderson: “From the Air”• Thomas Dolby: “The Flat Earth”• Jane Siberry: “Mimi on the Beach”• The Chrysanthemums: “God and the Dave Clark Five”• The Loud Family: “Aerodeliria”• Yes: “Release, Release”• Carter USM: “Bring on the Girls”• R. Stevie Moore: “Part of the Problem”• The Tall Dwarfs: “Things”• Veda Hille: “Instructions”• Laurie Anderson: “Let X = X”Side B:• Jesus Jones: “For a Moment”• Jethro Tull: “One Brown Mouse”• Cindy Lee Berryhill: “Damn, Wish I was a Man”• Peter Bleguad: “Special Delivery”• People From Earth: “Ice Tears”• Herb Heinz: “Beautiful Thing”• The Chrysanthemums: “Climb Aboard the Groove Tractor”• Peter Bleguad: “How Beautiful You Are”• Figures: “Accidentally 4th Street”• Church: “Already Yesterday”• Magnetic Fields: “Strange Powers”• The Odds: “The Last Drink”

53


Interviews with Experts on the Merchandise Conducted by the Seller of the Mix Tape:

Interview with my roommate Jess, who met the mix tape’s creator during his visit to WV.[mix tape playing in background]

SS: What are your thoughts on this mix tape?

JM: I can’t believe that Brian put this song on here.[Jesus Jones’ “For a Moment” plays]

Like, “I’m gonna put this song on your tape and then I’m gonna show up at your place and be very weird. Like make a big pool of water in your bathroom and wrap myself up naked in your Velux blanket.”

SS: Do you remember when Mike reminded us of [mix tape creator] Brian?

JM: When we were at that party? and was it you? Singing those songs?

SS: No. I was not singing show tunes.

JM: No, it was fucking Kiersten…Eli was defending me about my driving… [picks up the tape case]He has nice writing…This music sounds like they’ve taken helium hits. Like the Munchikins on tape.

SS: This is Jethro Tull.

JM: Damn, look at the title [of the tape]! Everyone’s gonna think what a bad mouth I have. But what the hell. The Munchkins are singing.Everything is really immediate with me. When I have to pee. When I want a cigarette. When I want a sandwich. And I can’t think until I have my bodily satisfaction. [thoughts return to tape] Can it really get any weirder than this? This brings to mind kids in tree houses.

54


SS: It’s kind of good. I haven’t listened to it in years. Makes me not wanna sell it.

JM: I want the White Stripes…I always wanna write down everything. Really big. Two sentences. Like that. This is dictation. I know where the sentences break… [looks at bookshelf]I forgot to read Alice Munro. She’s Canadian, right?

SS: Yeah. Good. Read it… [hands over a copy of book]I should make a copy of this before I sell it.

JM: Are you really gonna sell it? Like Jason’s glass bowls? On E-bay?

SS: I never even knew how this thing worked [fiddling with tape deck on stereo]. I should drag out the manual for this and figure out how it works.

JM: Yeah, I would always try to play tapes last year. After awhile I had to give up… You gotta read While I Was Gone, which I think is a ridiculous title. It’s like I Know What You Did Last Summer. Some editor let that slip by. You think it’s a horror novel, but in fact it’s an uplifting story about a middle-aged woman.

Interview with Random Person in ‘Lair (WVU Student Union) who presumably listens to mix tapes from time to time.

SS: Hey. [Said to person sitting at adjacent table in food court]I’m doing this project. Can I give you a little interview?

RP: I guess so.

55

SS: What’s your name?

RP: Don’t, like, print my name on anything. It’s Sam, though.

SS: So what do you think of this mix tape? [hands over mix tape for inspection]

RP: I’ve never heard of any of these songs. Or these bands. I have heard of Jethro Tull. Are you gonna let me listen to this?

SS: No. What do you think of the object itself…the tape itself and the case…describe it for me.

RP: Um. OK. It’s like clear plastic with writing on it inside and there’s a bunch of songs that nobody’s ever heard of on it and it says UR. Maxell UR.

SS: Maxell I am.

RP: What? [hands back mix tape]

SS: Nevermind. Thanks for your time.

RP: Sure. No problem.

Parting Message to Interested Buyers: Please give my mix tape a new home. Remember, McDonalds “currently opens about five new restaurants every day and at least four of them are overseas.”1 The least you can do to help our economy is to purchase this tape and save its soul from purgatory.

(Footnotes)1 Eric Schlosser, Fast Food Nation, p 229.

Sarah Seldomridge


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