Once upon a time,
there were three little pigs. Each of the pigs feared the big bad wolf that
would terrorize them by crossing the border from where he lived to where they
lived. To protect themselves, the three little pigs formed a committee and paid
for a focus group to provide politically correct solutions to their problem
about the undocumented wolf.
The first focus group
advocated for giving the wolf whatever he wanted because it was not fair that
the pigs had so much and the wolf had nothing. The first little pig asked, “Why
should I give the wolf everything I worked so hard for, all my life, to
acquire?” The head of the focus group denounced the first little pig as a
racist and a speaker of “hate speech”.…
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I knew from the moment my unholy foot crossed its raised threshold, that Theatre Hall was tormented by something surreal, something unnatural. How I surmised this, so quickly, and yet so certainly, I cannot be sure. It was as clear to me as the Proscenium stage, lit up by a dozen or so overhead spotlights.
Something
lingered here, something dead and hollowed out. It did not feel malevolent to
me, not vengeful or violent. I was only aware of the overwhelming pressure of
hopelessness, of long, insurmountable despair.
My
drama professor stood at the front of the room, prattling on about the history of
the building, pointing out its architectural subtleties. He spoke with all the
enthusiasm of someone impassioned by personal interest. Still, I couldn’t bring
myself to invest in the lecture, couldn’t curtail the sinking ache that seemed
to have imbedded itself into my chest wall.…
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Tomorrow, when the Vulcan god of fire,
Rejects their offerings, she will burn with the rest of the city.
Tomorrow, when the wrath of gods pour into landfills and
The river boils, she will not get far on foot.
Tomorrow,
when the walls are breaking and
the air is sour with naked fear,
she will be one of a thousand deaths, slaughtered
under the mass of ash and pumice.
But today, she is alive and with her mother in the markets,
Clutching a stout baby. The sun is shining and they are shopping for the evening meal.
Pausing at the flower stand between the vendors of fishhooks
And cloth, the flower she lifts to her nose smelled sweeter than usual.
– Sarah Huang…
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Jasmine won’t stop speaking in a British accent, the vowels extended and muffled like chewing gum. As we climb around Walmart’s posh blue belly, grabbing at lotion on shelves and running our hands across bedazzled clothing, she stays ahead of me. This is one of her favorite pastimes, Jasmine says. Melting away in supermarkets. It’s like a game, peaking around aisles after midnight, buying for the sake of buying. Especially in the summer, supermarkets have an ethereal way about them. An air conditioned liminal space. A playground for the sleepless. We sit across from each other in an aisle full of toys.
Myself: So, who are you?
Jasmine: (checking her phone) I’m
twenty. I’m from Texas. I’m a nobody poet. I’m a couple of neurons.
Myself: What do you want to
do with your life?…
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There are geese in the road
a monogamous pair protecting
five goslings from the onslaught
of morning traffic
like many families
they knit together in times of change
times of great movement
unbearable crisis
here they cross
Silicon Beach tenderly
bookending their nestlings
from the Metro we
know human urgency waits
for no one
least of all these. …
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Born to order, off the fossil record, I may
have as many half-life crises as I like. The closing
question hypothetical, I aced my metaphysical
examination. Calibrated down, I’m dead to heaven
yet. While looking over my left shoulder I walk
backwards. I walk where the state of nature was.
While compensating for obliquity I convert every
moon-lit soft spot to a horizontal. To soft spots I
say, Go easy on the realism – realism is thin ice.
– Heikki Huotari
Author’s Note: “My Body Is My Canvas” is a manifestation of my current program of zooming in on the fractal boundary between what I see and what I think about what I see. In this case, what I saw was a YouTube video about an exercise fad in Japan, walking backwards, and what I thought I thought while trying it out myself.…
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James A. Cox is the Editor-in-Chief of the highly popular and comprehensive Midwest Book Review, which hosts nine monthly book review magazines such as The Reviewer’s Bookwatch and Internet Bookwatch (which are written by volunteer reviewers), while the other magazines are by Midwest Book Review and associates.
How did you become the Editor-in-Chief of The Midwest Book Review physically located in Wisconsin?
In the summer of 1976 I was sitting in a Wednesday night meeting of the Madison Science Fiction Club in a State Street restaurant. The purpose of our weekly get-togethers was to socialize with like minded folk for whom fantasy and science fiction were something more than just another hobby.
Into that night’s gathering came a good friend of mine by the name of Hank Luttrell.…
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