I change planes at DFW (Dallas-Fort Worth). Last time I came to Dallas was that November Friday. Then, it was modest, utilitarian Love Field. Now, DFW is a vacuous tomb, a secular temple to all things modern. Curving hallways shout empty expense – highfalutin hotdoggin’. They drift off, out of sight in both directions, melting away like an unbeliever’s prayer. Texans walk by on indoor/outdoor carpet – red river of contrived warmth cutting gorges through glacial glass and stone. These Texans have a different look about them today than they did back on that day.
Now, cool and confident primary industrialists, purveyors of food and fodder, fuel and fiber, they saunter past. Or clump in small knots of small talk. In one corner of the waiting area, a tall blonde woman with dangling earrings chit-chats with two men.…
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I. Ken
I could never tell old Mrs. Lindstom why I was in such a rush. But then, I was used to that – hiding my urges and desires, covering the excitable boy in me with the respectable exterior of a normal forty-year-old man. She waddled between the dahlias and the roses; I tapped my finger against the “CLOSED” sign on my lap. For ten years she’d been coming in, and not once had she bought a thing. Shouldn’t that be illegal in a capitalist country like this?
Unable to bear it any longer, I placed the sign on the counter where she could see it.
“Oh, I’m sorry, dear,” she said. “Are you trying to close?”
“Actually, yeah,” I said. “But there’s no rush.”
“Oh, no, but I should really be off now, anyway.…
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I was leery about teaching Lear
wondering what my students
might understand about dynamics
of family life. Young faces found
dreams and fairy dust appealing but
“Midsummer Night’s Dream”
seemed silly as a Puck, to them,
is a hockey item. And Hero
definitely would be “Much Ado
About Nothing” since comedy
has four-letter words spouted by
jeans-clad entertainers. “Hamlet”
tragedy isn’t as terrible as a broken
cell-phone or wondering where is
a wi-fi hookup. 1603. Sounds like
a zip code with missing numbers.
“O, blood, blood, blood!”, “Othello”
more suited to students television
preferences. “To be or not to be”
teaching Shakespeare, “that is
the question.”
– Lois Greene Stone
Note: This piece was originally published by The Lake in May 2016 and reprinted by Scarlet Leaf Review in June 2020.…
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Shane looked down at the familiar pattern of scratches on the floor, a lopsided snowflake etched by years of boot heels and chair legs. As he did every week, he found the sooty remnant of blue electrical tape that he’d always treated as center stage, or as a spot close enough to center that the emcee never corrected his placement.
He pulled the rickety wooden chair half an inch forward and eased into it without moving the guitar. As he fixed its tuning and adjusted his capo over the second fret, he looked at the sparse crowd, scanning the foreheads so as not to distract himself with eye contact.
Shane thought through the short set he was about to play, and about whether his voice felt up to it after a long shift taking drink orders.…
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A crescent moon smiles over Big Piney Ridge
frozen above the black cross-stitching of the forest canopy
chilling anatomy of arteries veins and capillaries
endlessly branching from trunk and stem
with roots groping for my boots
through the crusty snow.
– Edward Sheehy…
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“The game has been delayed,” Pappy told us through the open kitchen window. The lack of air conditioning in the house is what had brought all of us outside to the back porch. We were witnessing the reason for the delay; a wicked thunderstorm had settled itself nicely over Baltimore that afternoon. The winds came first, followed by the rain that pummeled the tin roof that covered us. The roar of approaching thunder was in the distance. My two younger brothers were hugging tight to mom, while I sat with grandma on the opposite lawn chair. I tried my best to look unafraid, but I, too, hated thunderstorms.
The screen door banged loudly against the frame as Pappy, adorned in the outfit I will always remember him in, handed mom a plate of thickly sliced heirloom tomatoes sprinkled with salt and pepper.…
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Jo-Jo entered commercial establishments sideways, facing right. He hailed taxis with his right arm. During company staff meetings, he planted himself in the end seat, POV starboard. Did Jo-Jo have a psychological problem? OCD? Did an animal eat the left side of his face? Answer: No. Jo-Jo was a mixed-race baby. But not in the way you would think. He is racially divided down the middle. Entire right side, head to toe, white. Left side, Black. Body parts, even-steven.
So why did Jo-Jo’s white right precede the rest of him? He found that people are more likely to take him seriously. Or even take him at all. This is not a practice he pulled out of his nether region, but the result of twenty-five years of societal experience. …
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