Zero Ducats

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the late Maxwell Mednick
(1981–2014)
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----------------------------Jan. 1st 12:01 AM 2013………………………..travis sehorn 9
Again, at the New Orleans Art Museum.……………… 10
9th Ward Moat…………………………………………………... 11
A Place in the Sun………………………....…james franco 12
“I email you in a cold dark sweat”…..maxwell mednick 19
Tap, Tap…………………………………....…..karen volkman 23
With Flood….………………carol guess & kelly magee 24
With Stone Lion….…………………………………………... 25
Blame Year………………….…………………..shane jones 26
The 1943 Minidoka Veil ….…………lawrence matsuda 31
The 1943 Concentration Camp Album….…………….. 33
With Damien in Blackhawk………........brent l. smith 35
Antarctica……………………..…...kristina marie darling 38
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Landscape……………………………………………………….. 39
Find a Way to Leave.…………………..volatalistic phil 40
They Seem to Hate Me…………………………...……….. 44
From Hollow Bodies……..….…harold whit williams 47
From Hollow Bodies……….....scott alexander jones 48
Tuesday Afternoon in a Cage…....….raegan butcher
Don’t Say a Word…..………………..………………………..
Scut…..…………………………………...……………………....
Snapshots…..…………………………................................
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Communication Failure……..………….…olivia parkes 71
Air Duct to Air Duct………..………………..…linh dinh 74
A Disappointed Bridge………….………matthew kaler 75
At the Mütter………………………………..erik anderson 76
Farewell…………………………….matteo delpho delfini 83
Crash……………………………………………........john grey 84
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The Feuerzeig Video Covers Project #2: “Lisa Says”
(Velvet Underground, Live,
1969 Version)…………………………chris stroffolino 85
Wastoid……………………………..……….mathias svalina 91
Never Better…………………..……kristine ong muslim 92
Sidewalk Class…………………..…………………………….. 93
Students Should Become
Anarchists………………………….....……noam chomsky 94
Bells………..…………………………………..jamie stewart 101
Princess Tam Tam………..………………………………… 102
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Travis SEHORN
---------------------------------------------ST
JAN. 1 12:01 AM 2013 jailbait hung out the limo, it's new
years in new orleans, it's a war
zone and we're winning. the popo
cower in the cruisers as the rockets
fly under their wheels, making cops
beautiful for the only time ever,
on technicolor bonfire. the two-story
bikes and the coked-up spindles
up top waggling their legs to go.
the crying, the wailing, the slobbery.
it's a war and the first of accidental
grace. so fast it cuts to slow-motion
so play that fiddle and i'll recline
to watch the world stop from a crumby
foldout couch in no-mans land.
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Travis SEHORN
---------------------------------------------AGAIN, AT THE NEW ORLEANS
ART MUSEUM
feeling sexual in a glass
house flying above the bayou.
it's all these nudes,
everyone makes nude
art. i paint dogs
in the nude. swans
of the swamp, nude too.
having serious
crisis days, oh god
what have i done?
one more trip to the art
museum. to the store.
to the bar. to the cemetery,
past the school.
over again
and again, im just embarrassed
to find the purpose
of living.
everyone still
alive is.
purpose of living,
a bad joke. or something.
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Travis SEHORN
---------------------------------------------9TH WARD MOAT
many days i'm cut
off. a canal between
my abandoned home
sweet home an' the world.
and night under red
beans and illuminati,
kids bombin scrawl
and this concrete bird
bobbing its ancient
head up to salute
whatever moon exists
and "ring ding a ding"
flashes red. i'm happy,
hoping i don't get mugged
waiting for the road
to exist in front of me again.
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James FRANCO
---------------------------------------------A PLACE IN THE SUN 1
His leather jacket kicks it off so well,
Under the opening credits—printed large—
As he hitch-hikes on the side of the road;
An indelible image that was Kerouac,
Jack London, Tom Cruise, Matt Dillon,
And my acting infancy.
Now I watched the film with a part Irish,
Part Cherokee beauty, with a cheekbone face
And a long elvin body to match, slung
In a cherry red G-string, and nothing else, bundled
In a cloud of Chateau sheets. She remarking
On the close-up beauty of young society Liz;
I silently noting the deft reticence of Clift when caught
In the woods: the leather, now with a Hawaiian shirt.
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James FRANCO
---------------------------------------------A PLACE IN THE SUN 2
If each of the three had two movies that hold performances
As defined and remarkable as God and Adam
On the Sistine Ceiling, they would be East of Eden and Rebel
For Dean; Streetcar and Waterfront for Brando;
And fucking Monty’s would be From Here to Eternity
And A Place in the Sun. There is something so perfect
About the likeable murderer he crafted with George Stevens
In Noirish black and white. A frightening,
Striking attack on romance and finance from Dreiser.
Dreiser, Dreiser, Theodore Dreiser,
An abridged version of Dreiser, ready to kill
With brevity and succinct plot accumulation.
He was just a young man on the rise; can’t blame the boy
For such a situation. I can understand.
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James FRANCO
---------------------------------------------A PLACE IN THE SUN 3
Three perfect performances: a young man
Swirling in his back-lot room, with “Vickers”
Flashing in Neon out the window: his mind exposed;
A young woman/angel, the actual Vickers,
An apparition too good to be fucked—
You can’t blame the hero for sinking ship,
And jumping ship, when one ship was loaded
With baby on board; and the Shelley Winters
One, mama mia, what a performance.
To play such a sniveling, wet rag
With no holding back; I’m in love.
Goes to show you, there is no hope
For the ugly. All we want is Monty and Liz
To love and love and love. But Shelley, I love you.
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James FRANCO
---------------------------------------------A PLACE IN THE SUN 4
When Dean played in Steven’s Giant he was hoping
For the intimate portrait Monty gave
In A Place in the Sun, but instead got a man who shot
And shot and shot, from every angle; the around
The clock method, Dean called it. He was in Marfa hell.
But Monty got to play in the intimate world
Of Stevens, where a subtle half grin or a blank stare
Registered like revelations.
There is a little room for coincidence: randomly
He runs into Shelley Winters in the movie theater;
But all of that is just leading us to the situation
We need for tragedy: a tough dilemma, with no easy way
Out. There are beautiful settings and shots but they are all
strung
On the taught line of dramatic tension.
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James FRANCO
---------------------------------------------A PLACE IN THE SUN 5
When asked I should say that A Place
In the Sun is my favorite film,
But I rarely do, I guess because I forget
How effective the black and white
And the wide shots that let the action play;
And the very selective use of close ups,
Saved primarily for hazy, angelic filter shots
Of Angela Vickers—that’s Elizabeth Taylor—
Beauty shots that establish her as the young man’s
Objex of desire, establish his subjective lust.
Not even Monty gets a close up in some of these scenes.
Also, one close up towards the end, the scene
When Monty’s caught, there’s a strange old man
waiting in the woods,
The shot feels most real of all: his scruffy face releasing
cigarette smoke.
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James FRANCO
---------------------------------------------A PLACE IN THE SUN 6
In the paradisal bed—with the sheets
And the girl in the candy red string panties—
I was haunted by the parallels
Between Monty’s situation as George Eastman,
And Monty’s situation as Monty and myself.
(I love my life). But George wanted to rise: have money
and have the girl.
He convinced himself that he could love Shelley Winters
before he knew
He could have Elizabeth Taylor. I know I’ve done the same,
Except I don’t try for the Liz Taylors anymore, if they come
they come;
But that’s how you do it, just share the bed with any old body,
And most times they’ll be nice ones—especially if you’re a
movie star.
(I like how Liz comforted Monty in the film like she did in
life.)
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And don’t think love won’t exist: “I love you. I’ve loved
you since the first
Moment I saw you. I guess maybe I’ve even loved
you before I saw you.”
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Maxwell MEDNICK
--------------------------------------------From: Maxwell Mednick
Date: Thu, Aug 5, 2010 at 4:51 PM
Subject: the gig for me is up
To: Scott Alexander Jones
I email you in a cold dark sweat with sunken skull
eyes in an office cube so bright it might as well be on
the sun or in a pure white Morgan Freeman plays
wise god heaven. Now things are getting serious
because I haven't slept more than four hours in two
days. I got home yesterday fully expecting to sleep to
whale music but my neighbors (a gentle sweet
couple into death metal named Alex and Erica)
were out having a cigarette and I told them to take
my patio chairs and that I'm giving them everything
I own because they happen to exist in my vision
cone. There were like Why? And I told them that I
was traveling to New Zealand... and Alex visited
New Zealand a few years ago for like 6 months and
LOVED it and they invited me in to talk about it
and I ended up smoking pot and drinking with
them all day watching horror movies, eating, and
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playing with their big orange cat named Dime Bag
Darrell... I was so exhausted from the breakup and
lack of sleep that I wasn't in reality anymore... the
great apes dimmed into forgotten times. Everything
dimmed. And after all that I was so wired up that I
couldn't sleep well AT ALL and then I got this
email this morning saying I was scheduled for a
physical exam today... and then I remembered that
Ashley begged me a while back to get a physical
before I leave the country because I like to talk
about death and other related topics of conversation
which scared her... and so since it was free with my
health insurance, I said why not? So I show up to
work at 11:45 am... walk around. Talk to everyone.
You know, give the impression that "I'm around."
People are looking at me funny. I haven't showered.
I am wearing jeans and last nights t-shirt that was
stained with melted butter that looks exactly like
Salt Cum Lake City, Utah. Then I go to the Kaiser
office in downtown Mountain View to get this
physical with Dr. Lou (pronounced Dr. Loo). She
is like a 39-year-old serious Chinese woman with
hazel eyes. And I thought it was going to be free but
the lady at the front told me it was 25 bucks! So I
was like, shit man, ok, here, and gave her the cash.
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Then I get in the examination room and I'm in a
hospital gown and I look up and there is Dr. Lou's
MD diploma from The University of California at
Davis... and she walks in and I just felt really rotten.
She looked at me like what the fuck is this guy doing
in here? I mean, I saw her ONCE before when I got
my poison oak and she was totally cool then.
Anyways, all the other patients in the waiting room
were like these old fat crippled ladies on their last
leg who really need to see the Dr... and here I am,
this disturbed 30 year old diaper man who everyone
would rather just be left on the street to die. And I
tell her that I'm there because I want her to check
my "gene replicating bio shell I find myself
imprisoned in," and she doesn't laugh or smile, just
gets right to work checking my blood pressure, and
I quietly mutter "bio shell" and she tells me to be
quiet because that will get my blood pressure up.
And she asks me if I drink and I say yes. And she
asks me what. And I tell her beer and wine and
vodka and gin and tonic. And she asks me how
much? And i tell her 25 beers a week and she tells me
my liver can't be enjoying that and she asks me if I
take "street drugs" and I stall uncomfortably for a
second and say "just a little pot here and there and
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very rarely cocaine and a little aspirin." And she
didn't say anything. Just jotted it down. And I was
inside my mind like "what the fuck am I doing here?
I want to leave now." And she had me lay down on
the exam table and she pressed a few times on my
chest and looked at my feet (which I was squirming
around trying to hide from her) because my big toe
was sticking up out of my tattered black sock and
she pretended she didn't see it. And then she asked
if I every had any surgery and I told her I had two
nose jobs and a circumcision which she didn't seem
to find cute at all and she didn't do anything else.
She just kind of got up and said, "You can pick up
your results downstairs" and left. Like why the fuck
was I naked under a hospital gown? What was I
doing here? What brought me to this point? And I
really felt like shit big time and I felt like I wasn't
even a dignified animal corpse anymore. Just
something for the world to forget. And the only
warmth I got today was that on the elevator where I
met an old lady who was very nice and suffering
from some kind of terrible killer ulcers and I hugged
her and left. Then I got in my car and left the
hospital, and the radio told me the more I spend the
more reward points I earn.
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Karen VOLKMAN
---------------------------------------------TAP, TAP
Tap, tap. The math’s complex.
A smut on your cornstalk,
a fracas, a fat
plenitude: Christian fish.
Differential, in sum.
Spoke, spike, and strut
groomed like the ruminant
calf of crass seraphs.
Asphodel, that greeny phallus,
slats in its strows.
Auricular gloze
descanting auto-da-fes.
Animal slaughters
or fun by the pyres?
Stare of Medusa
salt scream at the supper.
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Carol GUESS & Kelly MAGEE
---------------------------------------------WITH FLOOD
Then the basement filled with water. We learned to
live with it, as we lived with everything else. Maybe
if I stopped wearing yellow and you stopped
wearing blue. Our flooded house was across from a
park. Sometimes it was also across from a truck.
The truck was yours but the park was public:
children on leash and dogs on display. Sometimes
the curtains in our windows were yellow and
sometimes the curtains in our windows were blue.
The only green was the flood in our basement and
the tornado sky, which was actually gray. When we
imagined a family, we imagined a child. You wanted
the child to come from your body. Instead, this
flood; trouble rising to meet us. Green like your eyes
and taller each day.
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Carol GUESS & Kelly MAGEE
---------------------------------------------WITH STONE LION
The mean girls started it. Dragged Becky into the
girls’ bathroom and strapped a stone lion to her
back. Left her lying sideways on subway tile,
pregnant with statuary. Smoking and stalled I
smelled their perfume. I unstrapped the lion, helped
her straighten her dress. Without a word she fixed
her hair and we walked into the lunchroom as if
nothing had changed.
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Shane JONES
--------------------------------------------BLAME YEAR
Blame the men who wear pig masks who run
under the artificial sky when it’s turned to foreverforest. Blame the wires. Blame the canopies of
endless static ads the child runs through. Blame
the teacher who keeps gold tipped sais in her desk
drawer. When the men who wear pig masks
attempt to eat the artificial sky, breaking their
wire molds, pushing further than what is allowed,
blame them for the long slit in the sky that
becomes The Giants zipper. Blame rain when it
should be snow. Blame The Giant for opening his
zipper and spilling out horses, clams, more wire,
sea turtles, blue stars. Blame the New York
Giants. Blame people who wash their flying cars
for more than an hour. Blame anyone who washes
a car. Blame crystals. Blame Billy Idol for
choosing sea foam when it’s his turn at the dial for
the artificial sky. Blame the wires fencing in your
house connecting you to the sky. The men
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wearing pig masks have stolen the gold tipped
sais and are stabbing antiques called balloons.
Blame the roads made of light and crystal that
twist transparent through the sky. Blame the
crinkle in your suit and the stale air in your
helmet. Blame too many days eating egg salad.
Blame Billy Idol for everything. Blame the hall of
green books. Blame Yama the God of death for
water worship for his always hungry water
buffalo. Blame the feeding wire. Blame ham.
When the planets civilians gather on the iron hill
with spears they will be doused in wire. They will
sleep in wire. They will fuck and make babies who
will be born to wire. They will drive their cars into
the sky and believe they are free and not
connected by wire. Blame the year 2088. When
the men who wear pig masks stab the last orange
balloon the pig masks double in size. The iron hill
trembles. Blame your mothers choice for the
artificial sky: royal purple. Blame the men in pearl
colored space suits patching up the sky, The
Giants zipper, with syrup. Blame all sports played
by men. Blame men. Blame The Rocket Hello
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that navigates the planet. Sky shark. Blame all
light you can’t feel. Blame your insides. Blame
Wednesday. Blame chicken tenders. Blame
craving an open floor plan. Blame the sky father.
The men in pig masks are water boarding a water
buffalo. Blame the stars pretending to be planets.
The sky says: Where is Henry when you need
him? The men who wear pig masks are making
the sounds of horses as they approach residential
houses. Blame the letter V. Blame laughing
teenagers for choosing the sky color Orcs Pussy.
Blame all floating ships who are not connected by
wire, their exhaust the same color as their hulls.
Blame mechanical birds. If you see Henry, tell
him he is needed. Blame your boss. Blame your
mother for wanting everything to be colored royal
purple, even her wheelchair. Blame the creator of
rockets. Blame the intern for losing The Rocket
Hello. If a man in a pig mask could ride a rocket
the villagers on the iron hill would dance. Stay
away from your home. Blame your body for
wanting a wire to insert itself in any hole it
chooses. Blame the human back. Blame Sheila.
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When the men in pig masks run through the
residential streets Henry is waiting for them. The
sky now is static green. Everyone on the iron hill
moans. Their mouths open and they receive their
wire. Cars fly on tracks of light and crystal,
ribbons of road entwine the planet. Blame
yourself. Blame microwaves for not being able to
handle metal. Blame electricity. Blame the sun
warming the artificial sky from behind, giving it
that glowing backdrop no matter what the choice
is. Someone picked Ostrich Eye. Blame the
human face. Blame The Rocket Hello. Blame the
countdown to forever sleep. Blame any type of
force pressing down on you. Blame February.
Blame your memory of the ocean. Blame garbage
night. Blame the endless feed of fast food through
your feeding wire. Blame all the buildings, their
windows, their smoke, their circulating air, their
disregard for your oxygen helmet. Blame people
who only take baths. Blame your inability to leave
the planet, to slap stars. Blame pig prayer. Blame
poisoned fountains you can’t drink from. Blame
the number zero. Henry is our hero. Behind the
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artificial sky is the sun we’ve never seen. Turn the
sky to sun please. Blame the subtraction of the
word murder from our vocabulary. Everyone on
the iron hill moans at the imitation sun glorious
gold above their helmet heads, wired feet. Henry
smashes the pig masks into walls of wire. He
places their bodies in wired bird nest bags. He
opens his mouth to the sky. Cars spewing light on
a wire track. Don’t blame Henry. The Rocket
Hello spews exhaust across the sky. Henry
throws the bags at the artificial sky and it tears a
hole reveling black sky. This is it. There are no
past memories allowed inside your helmet head.
Blame yourself.
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Lawrence MATSUDA
---------------------------------------------THE 1943 MINIDOKA VEIL
Auntie Shizuko lives with
voices from beyond the veil:
It is our destiny to be in hell
that is purgatory where our
spirits will be pulled
slowly from our
feet through silver cords,
to wrap our bodies
around a cross.
Our bound feet will be the first
to feel the fire. Odors like
the stench of 10,000 cattle
snorting in cages
fume. Necks held tight between
bars, muzzles in the feed. Blinded
by the narrow passageways,
they march heavily down the chute
too trusting to suspect
the hammer will fall now.
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Glistening steel troughs in the latrine
run red, yellow, and brown.
The water cascades,
stench flushes past all.
Mother’s modesty lost,
private functions on public display.
She can not sit in full view, covers her head
with a paper bag to guard
what dignity remains.
Nocturnal habits emerge—
prehistoric survival patterns burn
cycle shifts, internal clock
sets midnight relief sessions—
obsessive habit like a facial tick carted
back to Seattle, remnant of a time
when bathroom doors
were luxuries.
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Lawrence MATSUDA
----------------------------------------------
1943 MINIDOKA CONCENTRATION
CAMP ALBUM
Cradled in a grim carpenter’s lap,
a wide-eyed infant’s face appears
on the Minidoka cabinet makers album page.
Years later at a party, I heard
the story of an elderly Japanese couple
who pray for a child, cherish the baby,
helplessly watch its last breath
before this photo is taken.
Is that a real infant’s face?
Ghost? Or a black and white
shadow cast between
a carpenter’s suspenders?
A button resembles an eye.
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Temperatures drop, distortion bends
a mirror reflection,
my mind falls like Alice
twisting down the rabbit hole.
I push tingling fingers
through a mist, touch something cool.
The dead carpenter and child,
no longer shadows on slick paper.
In my closeness I know them.
Their names, anxious to be heard
rest like glowing embers on my tongue.
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Brent L. SMITH
--------------------------------------------WITH DAMIEN IN BLACKHAWK
So, we're there in the casino, which is mostly empty
except for a loud craps table on the other side of the
massive game room, and I'm irritated. Some part of
me hates to see other people winning. I'm distracted
by the ubiquitous smell of cigarrette remains and
stale perfume. Awful 70s color scheme. The browns
and the yellows and the oranges mix in with the
dated odors and so thank god we've both been
snorting our nasal cavities all to hell. We sit at a
blackjack table and I'm already losing. We both
order whiskey on the rocks and Damien tips the
waitress more than I do and the dealer smiles as I
lose more hands and he attempts making quirky
small talk about the weather and I tell him to shut
the fuck up "Just deal the cards, man" and Damien
is quietly laughing the entire time. He wins more
hands than I do.
I notice that: Damien doesn't count his chips;
that my pack of Parliaments is empty; that I lock
eyes with pretty girls who become empty seats, drift
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in and then fade away; that I yell at the waitress to
get me more cigarettes; that we walk from casino to
casino and none of it seems to end; that all the walls
of these Old West buildings have been gutted and
fused and revamped; that it's all just one long
building with different names for different casino
rooms with different front doors; that we're
gambling and coke rambling in a sick labyrinthine
thing, little glassine bags in our fiddling hands
under mirrors and chandeliers.
"Pass that pinot grigio," Damien calls it. We
sniff a lot and our eyes water making it hard to sit
still at blackjack tables. A man follows us to each
one. Matted hair long and black and grey, parted
down the middle. He's a wiry man who never looks
us in the eye and cries like a sick dog over every lost
hand. "You guys think I could get some of that?"
he'd ask, still not looking at us. We pretend not to
see him.
We finally ditch that wiry dog, he was bad
karma, he'd lose hands then we'd lose hands. We
meet two girls at the circular bar in the middle of the
casino. The stale air, recycled, gets refreshed with
fresh puffs, damp parliaments, deep drags, chemical
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ghosts. I light their ends. They're possessed.
Afternoon buzz. One is platinum blonde and has
colorful tattoos that are beautiful. The other is a
darker blonde and she has a diamond piercing on
her left cheekbone matching her eyes. They work as
waitresses in some restaurant in Estes Park I've
never heard of. They're from Cheyenne, here just for
the summer. "You left the middle of nowhere to
arrive in the middle of nowhere," Damien spits
passing them their shots of Fernet Branca. They
laugh like people do when they're not listening.
"Ew, what is this stuff?"
"Just be lucky this dump even had this shit,"
Damien barks.
"I like it," the other says, wincing.
They do some blow with us and we laugh and
fondle in a spacious handicap bathroom stall and
later at a three-card poker table they ask if we want
to go back to Estes Park with them for the night
and we say sure and after they leave us to go back to
the bathroom "Be right back!" Damien looks at me
and gives a bored shrug and I shrug back and we
leave going back to the car driving away. I look back
for the wiry dog and he's not there.
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Kristina Marie DARLING
---------------------------------------------ANTARCTICA
When I mentioned the landscape, you were thinking
of something else. All around us were figure skaters.
The blades on their shoes etching circles into the ice
below.
For weeks we had been drifting apart. In each room
of the house, I imagined frost accumulating on the
furniture. An uncanny brightness in every window.
Now we're standing at the edge of the lake. You keep
telling me that you "need some more time." Your face
darkening like a house buried in winter.
So I sit down and try to carve a man from a block of
ice. In every direction, the same snow-covered fields.
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Kristina Marie DARLING
---------------------------------------------LANDSCAPE
You kept mentioning the other women, the way they
would lie on their backs in the grassy field. All around
them were breadknives. The place settings for a
picnic.
But even before that we had been quarrelling. You
told me, tilting your pretty head, how my pastoral
elegy failed to move you.
Now you're watching women stare at the sky.
Someone's perfect clavicle showing through a white
dress. The field doesn't seem to end.
So I try and try to enter the landscape. I watch your
perfect mouth, mouthing commands: threshold,
delicious, melancholia.
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Volatalistic PHIL
--------------------------------------------FIND A WAY TO LEAVE
They sat together, all huddled around the evening’s
meal, trying to stay warm.
“They say it’s the coldest place on Earth,” Broc
said to the others.
“I heard that it’s because Hell finally froze over
and that’s why it’s so cold,” said Tom.
Out of the shadows came a bitter old spud, he
hobbled over to the rest of the group.
“You youngin’s don’t know squat. This, this cold
here, now—this is nothing,” Old Papa said. “You
should be where I’ve been or go where I have gone.
I have gone to the great depths of this place and the
further you explore, the colder it gets. It gets so cold
that you think you are going to freeze to death. I lost
a lot of good comrades that way, and so many of
them are still frozen in the ice, as we speak. So
please, spare me the dramatics.” Old Papa told
them, as he prepared his spot next to the meal.
“What is for dinner tonight anyhow,” Broc
asked.
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“I’m not sure, I think it’s supposed to be a
casserole tonight,” said Tom.
“Well whatever it is, it smells awful!” said Old
Papa.
“Hey, whatever happened with that one
passerby we had about three weeks ago?” Tom
asked.
“Oh, you didn’t hear?” Broc asked. “Old Papa
found him. Tell the story Old Papa.”
“Alright you two don’t go having any
nightmares. What I am about to tell you can’t be
untold.” Old Papa began to dramatically tell his
story.
“It was an evening like this, just as common as
could be, and then this tall feller comes along,
asking where he could find a place to cool down and
rest. He said he’d been at the market all day and it
must have been 100 degrees. So I told him where he
could go to get some shade and relax, and I never
saw him again after that, not that day at least. Well
about a week ago, I was doing some more
excavating and I came across him, he was frozen
rock solid. He had ventured too far, and froze. That
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wasn’t the worst part of it though…he was missing
his head!” Old Papa said.
“Missing his head?!” Tom shouted in fear.
“Yep, I reckon it was cut clean off. Whoever had
done it, done it real good alright,” said Old Papa.
“We have to get out of here! We have to find a
way to leave this place!” Tom shouted and
continued to panic.
“Pipe down!” said Old Papa. “Shh, someone is
coming near, I can hear them in the distance!” he
said, trying to get Tom to be quiet.
The door opened, and in came a hand reaching
for the orange juice. On its way to the orange juice,
it pushed aside the evening’s dinner, an old potato
(Papa), a stalk of broccoli (Broc) and a Tomato
(Tom).
43
(from Flash Fiction 40+1: New Mexican Bread Aisle)
44
Volatalistic PHIL
--------------------------------------------THEY SEEM TO HATE ME
I’m not allowed to eat. All of the food in the house
always seems to belong to someone else. It’s hard
enough trying to live alone, so as a result of
everything, I live with my family. I don’t understand
why it is such a big deal for me to be able to eat
every now and then. It seems like whenever I go to
eat something, someone is always watching for me,
like they are afraid that I will eat their food. There is
so much food, would it really be such a big deal if I
helped myself to such a small portion. Such a small
portion can’t be missed and it will help keep me
alive. I think that it’s unfair that they sometimes get
fast food or other good food and eat it around me,
without giving or offering me any.
I can’t reason with them though, because it’s as if I
do not exist. I know that they know I am here, I
exist and live here, but they seem to hate me. It’s like
nothing I do is accepted. Trying to talk with or
reason with them only leaves them becoming hostile
and setting up traps for me. Everything always
45
seems like a trap. It’s as if they do it on purpose just
so they will have something to complain about.
I’ll give you an example, the other day when I
was hungry, I went into the kitchen to help myself to
a sandwich, but I couldn’t find any bread, I guess we
ran out. But I found some peanut butter, but I
know that if I ate that, then there would be hell to
pay.
I just don’t understand why they like to leave
food out, if they’re only doing it to try and hurt me.
46
(from Flash Fiction 40+1: New Mexican Bread Aisle)
47
Harold Whit WILLIAMS
---------------------------------------------from HOLLOW BODIES
Dear Scott, just this morning those tulip trees behind
The Bataclan building show off frostbitten flowers,
Browned & brittle, snowing down in spring showers.
O! I’ve always admired Nature not giving two shits
About anything. & myself? I’m too easily attached,
Tenderhearted, weak-kneed. I can’t help but want everything
In its place: the wren in his hedge, thunderstorms, sunrise.
How quiet the conversations that matter most, how loud
This silence of others. Now that I think of it, Scott,
Don’t even read this. Let it be a meadow of unmarked snow,
A pond without ripples, a tiny blossom frozen in my heart.
48
Scott Alexander JONES
---------------------------------------------from HOLLOW BODIES
Me, I’ve always hated rivers for being
Just as likely to swallow euphoric spring
Breakers manacled with jeans as spit us out
Onto oxbows like newborn otters trembling—
I vacillate between the cardinals filling me with awe
In the garden outside my window, icicles in the eaves
& feeling awful that floods will send us inland
& turn us into cannibals. I don’t have enough Stalin
Or Jesus in me to join Greenpeace. Or maybe
I’m just lazy. When morning cuts thru Bloody
Kansas oaks & I set my coffee on a tombstone
To tie my shoes & a ladybug flutters
In the tiny undergrowth, I get that feeling
Someone’s watching me & for a second
I forget I believe in nothing.
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
Raegan BUTCHER
---------------------------------------------TUESDAY AFTERNOON
IN A CAGE
my celly lifts weights
is a Reverend of the Universal Life Church
and has a pierced nipple
he walks in
calls me a freak
laughs
turns the boom box up louder
says CRANK THIS!
i tell him
it’s loud enough in here
he laughs
this is how time passes.
65
Raegan BUTCHER
---------------------------------------------DON’T SAY A WORD
i’m locked
in an 8 x 10 cell
with
a pig of a man
who
farts
chainsmokes and wipes his boogers
on the
walls
he outweighs me by at least 150 lbs
so i don’t
complain
66
Raegan BUTCHER
---------------------------------------------SCUT
i don’t know
how many hours
of my life
i’ve spent
cleaning up after
other people.
when you don’t
have any skills
and you need $$$
you either work
in fast food
or become a janitor.
i’ve cleaned office
buildings, restaurants,
hardware stores, horse
stables, grocery stores,
prison work camps
and visiting rooms.
my friends always
seemed to have jobs
67
that were somehow
more bearable; they
worked in record shops
or vintage clothing stores or their
parents had their
own businesses and
they worked for them.
i always ended up
as a janitor.
in prison that term
is never used; instead you
are a porter.
i am not sure why;
i thought a porter
was a guy who helped people
get on trains
or something.
all thru my teens
and twenties, right
up until i got arrested
i worked crappy little jobs with low pay
and zero prestige;
let’s face it,
scrubbing toilets isn’t
68
a sexy occupation.
it seemed that whenever
i found a job that
paid well i was laid
off within a few months.
i’ve never been laid off
from a job
that only paid minimum wage.
i had to quit those jobs, only to be
forced to find other, similar
jobs after a few months
of starving
and sleeping on people’s couches.
it wasn’t much of
a life
but it was what
i did.
69
Raegan BUTCHER
---------------------------------------------SNAPSHOTS
having my abscessed
ear-drum lanced when i was 5
being punched in the mouth
in the 4th grade
drinking vodka and orange juice
and skipping school
using money stolen from a church
to buy tickets to see The Clash
rolling a pick-up truck
when i was a sophomore
quitting all those minimum wage jobs
without collecting my last paycheck
wandering the streets of Seattle
in a 2nd hand suit and sleeping in the park
70
being arrested for drunk
and disorderly conduct
watching my girlfriend
give birth to my daughter
and cutting the umbilical cord
seeing myself on a movie
screen for the first time
being put in a mental hospital
on my 27th birthday
finding out my friend
had been murdered
finding a woman’s wallet
and using the money in it to buy heroin
being arrested for armed robbery
being sentenced to 8 years in prison
looking out the bus window at Walla Walla
and seeing a guard holding an automatic rifle
71
Olivia PARKS
--------------------------------------------COMMUNICATION FAILURE
The perpetual hoarseness: like speaking through
sand. In the first few weeks Peter drank more water,
tried to swallow it down. Then it became difficult to
swallow. A doctor, invulnerable in his white coat,
diagnosed him with cancer of the larynx. He cut a
neat black hole in Peter’s neck and gave him a
handheld electrolarynx to speak with. Peter took
some time off, and quit smoking.
Facing himself in the bathroom mirror Peter
murmurs, “Darling.” A tinny voice answers, “D-a-r-ling.” He spits out, “Liar.” The throat croaks, “L-i-ar.”
He gasps, “I’m sorry.” The voice apologizes but it is
an empty sound, robotic and inflectionless, without
timbre or conviction. Standing naked in his bare feet
and clasping the device to his neck, Peter tries
injections of venom, humor, innuendo, and
tenderness. His reflection speaks as if its teeth are
chewing it apart.
On the 214 Peter listens to the lilt of the town.
People talk to each other, to their telephones, to
72
themselves. They speak thoughtlessly or with
purpose, but Peter does not mind what they say.
The voices are ripe as fruit that is easy to peel. He
detects the flatness of exhaustion and a faint note of
rising hysteria. Behind him, a man is skipping a
smoothly rehearsed deception like a stone. At the
front a woman with a pram boards humming to her
child, the child screams. A group of school-kids
chatter like monkeys and throw their wild eyes at
him.
Peter alights at the usual corner. Mrs. Carter is
waiting by the grass with her turgid, invariably cross
pekingese. A green light blinks at its neck, as if
confirming that the dog is on. It is wearing a shock
collar. Peter looks down at the short body cringing
and waggling in inarticulate fervor. The dog begins
to bark. The sun glares and the white animal slips
out of focus, vibrating on the curb like a noise. Peter
raises his hand to his empty throat for the first time
all day and barks Rawff Rawff rawff rawff rwaff. At
this the dog grows frenzied, ejecting one
strangulated rejoinder after another. Peter cries
Rawrf rawrf rwarf rawff rwarff. Parting her combed
cotton lawn curtains, his neighbor Helen sees him
73
standing in the street barking at Mrs. Carter’s dog,
sees him fold like a ribbon and meet the ground.
After the funeral, Helen remembered the
incident with the dog and asked Mrs. Carter: what
was Peter trying to communicate, doing a thing like
that? Maybe it was the difference between what he
meant to say and how he said it that killed him.
74
Linh DINH
---------------------------------------------AIR DUCT TO AIR DUCT
To kiss is to threaten
To eat someone without
Actually chewing and swallowing.
It is also to wed digestive tracts,
Meaning the ultimate expression
Of intimacy, no less than
Having two assholes welded
Together, otherwise
Known as marriage.
75
Matthew KALER
---------------------------------------------A DISAPPOINTED BRIDGE
Wine-drunk Steve
rosily fingered Dawn.
76
Erik ANDERSON
--------------------------------------------AT THE Mü TTER
Among the most prominent displays at the Mütter
Museum in Philadelphia is a wall of skulls collected
by the Austrian anatomist Joseph Hyrtl. Printed
beneath them are names, nationalities, occupations,
and, when known, dates and causes of death—much
of which appears to have been originally written on
the skulls themselves. Taken together, they evoke a
rich tapestry: soldiers, murderers, rope-walkers,
boatmen, brewers, couriers, prostitutes, fruit
vendors, reformers, and thieves; Catholics, cretins,
Protestants, Muslims, and gypsies; suicides,
alcoholics; those with dysentery, pneumonia,
smallpox, and cholera.
The museum, though small, is overwhelming,
and after recently spending an hour there I couldn’t
look any longer. I had grown tired of the body, of
thinking of the body as a stock of specimens and
samples that, taken together, form another sort of
body. Of knowledge, yes, but the kind that,
paradoxically, takes apart—cars, stereos, and the
77
invisible architecture of the program into which I’m
typing these words.
It is the body as seen through the microscope,
the x-ray, the knife.
Several years ago I was referred to a plastic surgeon.
I had been beaten up pretty badly and needed work
done on my nose. The procedure went off without a
hitch. Scheduled in the late afternoon, I arrived
around lunch, had my rights read to me by an
anesthesiologist, and woke up an hour later with a
small cast on my face. Other than the broken
cheekbone, which the surgeon failed to diagnose, I
don’t have any lasting complaints. My nose still
tacks a bit to the left, but this isn’t entirely the
surgeon’s fault.
A few weeks earlier, I had walked into an
unassuming suburban building, tucked out of the
way so as to attract little attention. The
receptionists were masters of discretion, never
keeping anyone waiting for more than a few
minutes. They had even devised an apparatus for
their clipboards that hid the name of whoever had
signed in ahead of you. I found this cloak and
78
dagger business fairly strange, but once I was alone
in the consultation room the poster on the back of
the door confirmed my suspicions: it showed a series
of illustrated breasts in a variety of shapes and sizes.
I realized the only other patients I had seen were
women. My surgeon was a boob doctor.
Anatomical collections like the Mütter are, in part,
relics from the 19th century, a time when collecting
samples of all kinds of life—human, plant, and
animal—reached a fever pitch. Though it would be
unthinkable for a surgeon to maintain a personal
stash of human body parts today, plastic surgery
may be one extension of the practice. Once it
became possible to take the body apart, that is, it
became necessary to put it back together. It seems
inevitable that someone would have figured out that
it could be reassembled in more pleasing
combinations. Likewise, it seems inevitable that
modern genetics will lead to certain codes being
removed from the program altogether.
Throughout history and across cultures we have
modified our bodies, but while there must be
something psychologically and aesthetically pleasing
79
in a tattoo or a piercing, there is dysfunction in a
bound foot or corset. To modify is not always to
empower, in other words, but what does one say to
a man undergoing a vaginoplasty, a woman seeking
a bilateral salgino-oophorectomy? Can a line be
drawn between not feeling at home in your own skin
and wishing your breasts were bigger?
I wonder about this modular approach to the
body, about its origins and effects. I find the idea of
a prefabricated breast or a nose assembled on site
somewhat disturbing, as though one had the agency
to choose one’s body, as though the DNA got it
wrong. It would seem we have a deep discomfort
with being bodies, and so think of them selectively,
disconnectedly—as so many components to be
upgraded, old files to be deleted. The idea being, I
suppose, that a better body awaits.
Opposite the Mütter’s wall of skulls are examples of
early obstetrical instruments: primitive forceps
reminiscent of salad servers and other crude objects
for scraping one body from another. In the lower
level of the museum are bottled babies, preserved
fetuses, a dried colon over eight feet long, and a jar
80
full of epileptic brains. The Mütter is also home to
several books bound in human skin. The practice
appears to have once been part of the punishment
for murderers: the records of the legal proceedings
against William Corder and John Horwood, both
Brits, were bound in their own skin.
But the books may also be an apt metaphor for
the ways culture is inscribed on the body, how it
encodes itself from the circumcised penis to the
piercings in one’s ears, from the tattoos on one’s
arms to the surgical scars on one’s face. How
strange it is that to be a body is also to be a thought
body—one that wears a culture’s thinking. Stranger
yet that for those of us who have the luxury (or is it
burden?) not to labor physically, there is also the
unspoken understanding that our bodies are not our
work, which we take to be a product of our minds,
detached from those bodies.
Ironically, it may be just this that makes the
Mütter possible. Though the surgeon’s hands hold
the scalpel that cuts the skin, it’s what he knows that
incises. More importantly, it is not his body, but a
body—even if it’s your body—on which he operates.
While this permits marvels, it is also the beginning
81
of the abominable body, the body that alternately
demands and defies its display.
I don’t know how to proceed in the face of such
detachment, how to navigate the body and the
demands imposed upon it, either from within or
without, but at times I become intensely aware of
my own embodiment—as I did inside the Mütter. I
felt the flexing of my muscles from my toes through
my ass (first one side, then the other), and when I
left the building, I could almost sense the planet
sensing me—the grass, the sidewalk, the hidden
curvature of the earth. An elaborate choreography
was taking place: I walked past and around other
bodies, as though in orbit.
I thought of bees and of ants, how a colony or
hive is also a form of thinking, and as I moved
through the city the life of our species struck me just
then as an elaborate thought, so beyond any one
body’s ability to excise it.
Some years after my own surgery, I had a student
come into my office. She was writing about the time
when, at fifteen, her mother encouraged her to get a
82
nose job. It was too big, her mother said, too
Jewish. Her mother was planning to get her breasts
done, as her own mother had before her, so she had
no problem correcting what she saw as her
daughter’s deformity. The student decided against
the operation for a number of reasons, not least of
which was her suspicion that her face would, in her
words, be molded into the shape of a lie. But what
had ultimately decided the matter for her, she said,
was when she asked her mother whether she would
be getting a car for her sixteenth birthday. No, her
mother responded, you’ll be getting a nose.
It was fitting, I suppose, that her essay didn’t
adhere to any models, but in the absence of familiar
patterns the problem was apparent. We discussed at
length what shape she should give it, but of course
the real question was, given her own embodiment,
What form should her thinking take?
83
Matteo Delpho DELFINI
---------------------------------------------FAREWELL
Young pregnant women dance on the sidewalks
Their shining and alive atmospheres join together
Stories of a life never lived
That weave together
That rise & rip up
On the road
Where I’m not running because
I have run out of batteries
& she has her new little horse
& together with the ghosts
I catch sight of the new amphetaminic horizon
The angels’ wings are pitched with tar
& my aura is in the shitter.
(translated from Italian by Laura Covelli)
84
John GREY
---------------------------------------------CRASH
I crashed in his apartment
slept on the floor
for days
he kept encouraging me to leave
but I had no place else
so I said
let's make this easier for both of us
why don't I take the bed
and you the floor
for days
for months even
and I'll keep encouraging you to leave
but you have no other place
to the point
where I'm so sick of living with you
in this cramped little space
that despite the comfort of my bed
I leave
we only need do this until September
that's when I start school
85
Chris STROFFOLINO
--------------------------------------------THE FEUERZEIG VIDEO COVERS
PROJECT #2: “LISA SAYS”
(VELVET UNDERGROUND,
LIVE, 1969 VERSION)
Why am I so shy? Oh tell me why am I so shy?
You know good times they just seem to pass me by.
Oh, why am I so shy?
There are certain songs you hear when you’re 18 that
you can immediately relate to, but are convinced
that someday, somehow, you’ll learn to outgrow
when you ‘grow up,’ and “Lisa Says,” particularly this
version of “Lisa Says,” is one of them.
When I was 18, I could immediately relate to
this introverted persona-- so obviously a Pisces
(“made up of mostly water,” as he puts it in
“The Ocean,” another song from these
sessions), but I probably believed it was a
situational mood song more than a salient identity
song—not just because of Reed’s later music, or the
“rock and roll animal” persona he never felt
86
comfortable with, but because even in 1969, he was
on stage singing a song about being so shy. There’s
a difference between being shy, and being shy about
admitting your shyness in public in a heartfelt, yet
artful, way. “Lisa Says,” in contrast to most pop
songs, is not shy about admitting its embarrassing
shyness. In the process, the song becomes an
introvert anthem!
In the original meaning of “introvert,” it’s not a
judgmental term as “shyness” often is, but a
descriptive term that means “inwardly directed.”
This can be evidenced in a tendency to be “always
staring at the sky” (as Lisa puts it). But it can also be
social, and lead to a deeper, more profound, kiss
than what the extroverted “Good Time Charlie,”
able to live in the so-called present, is
capable of--and Reed, as a Pisces Introspective
Hero, helped me embrace it, at least for the record.
Looking back on his early songs in 1975, Reed
writes:
Passion--REALISM--realism was the key. The
records were letters. Real letters from me to certain
87
other people. Who had and still have basically, no
music, be it verbal or instrumental to listen to.
The record, rather than the live performance, is the
key that brings people together (especially in
this increasingly fragmented society). It’s not
just a not “finished product,” but a highly
personalized ‘form letter’—written for certain other
“inwardly directed” people. In the “internet era,”
when the contemplative medium of letter writing
has become supplanted by a glut of tweets and
transient “kiss” of texts, it’s easy to forget it was
standard to write a letter, and wait a few weeks for a
response. This may have lacked the “immediate
gratification” of electronic culture, but certainly
allowed the words to sink in, for both the writer and
reader. Reed’s emphasis on the record emphasizes
the intimate relationship that happens between the
recording studio and the solitary listener.
Like most VU fans, I first discovered them
through records. Part of this was due to necessity—
living in a small town where none of my favorite
bands played, and no ‘underage clubs’ that I was
aware of, made me value recorded music over the
88
live show (and in some ways the medium of
recorded music—for better or worse-- may have a lot
to do with why so many of us are so shy; as if the
record is where it’s happening more than the ‘actual
present,’).
Only later, did that lure me to see Reed in live
performance: just because you’re an introvert,
doesn’t mean you can’t rock. After all, shyness is also
a professional workaholic stance: some people like
to go out dancing/ and other people they have to
work---just watch me now! (as one version of the
“cool” rocker “Sweet Jane” puts it). That may also
explain the dark sunglasses, and why Reed
abandoned the version of the song that emphasizes
the lyrics about the shyness--but for those who find
Lou Reed usually to be “too cool” (if not quite as
‘cool’ as Leonard Cohen), “Lisa Says” may be one of
his most honest songs.
The recording is the art that can compensate for
“failure” in the social present. I experienced this first
hand, when I recorded “Lisa Says” for Jeff
Feuerzeig’s “Piano Van Sessions.” As I sat in a Ford
Econoline with a piano in it, rehearsing the song, I
peered through the little sliver of light and saw
89
pedestrians who “are dancing and having such fun”
(“Afterhours”). You could say I’m bringing music to
the masses, or at least random people who would
never hear such a song in a smokeless bar, but I’m
wearing my “game face,” paying more attention to
practicing the song for the recording than to the
pedestrians in the immediate social moment.
The future is more present than the present; the
record is more social than the live performance. I
feel isolated by the transient “kiss” of the present the
“street musician” is supposed to thrive on. I feel shy,
but—equally—I can understand why Lisa would
say, “You treat everybody so cruel!” It may not be my
intention, but by the time I realize I came off cruel
when she flirted, she’s gone (first thought, worst
thought)! I didn’t outgrow it--even if I thought I did
for a while with my lady by my side for all those
years.
But the recording, by contrast, gives me hope,
and it makes me glad to hear that many others
consider “Lisa Says,” their favorite cover song video
Jeff Feuerzeig and I have made. The responses I’ve
received from people all over the world may be cold,
“wire mesh mother” comfort in the present—but
90
they keep coming in long after “the night like this” in
which I was offered a transient kiss has passed, as if
it might eventually compensate for the affliction, and
allow me, like Lou, to make a virtue of something I
can’t change.
But enough about Lou and myself; what about
Lisa? Of all the “says” women (or trannies),
Caroline, Candy and Stephanie (and even the Lisa
on the VU version of this song), Lisa is the most
forward; she’s charmingly making the first move:
“On a night like this, it’d be so nice if you gave me a
kiss.” She’s not just kissing the guy; she’s using
words to get him to do it. And all her rebukes, that
might seem nags to someone else, are not really
judgmental; she’s just trying to get him to kiss her!
When I got into Shakespeare years later, I realize
she’s kind of like the Shakespearean comic heroine
(Beatrice, Rosalind, Portia, etc.) in that. I could
easily fall for Lisa, and probably have a few times;
sometimes she’s a tease, but sometimes she’s
genuine! She has to tease to please.
—Chris Stroffolino, March 2013
91
Mathias SVALINA
--------------------------------------------WASTOID
My lover has a body of ashes. He sits in a
windowless room & tries not to move. When I
am with him I must hold my breath & sweat
layers my arms. He is so still, he is a zoo of
stillness & all of the animals are ferocious. I am
a labyrinth of faces, each holding its breath,
each turning blue, talking to & answering itself
without breath. Christ, I am tired. I am all the
colors in a painting of the moon.
92
Kristine Ong MUSLIM
---------------------------------------------NEVER BETTER
Hunger crystallizes with us inside its glass belly
Soon, the glass will melt. The marble kitchen slab
where it rests will turn transparent. Inevitably, we
will wake up swaddled in thawed glass walls.
The walls are warmer this time of the year.
Touch them. The resistance is only temporary.
Wait for your hand to pass through.
Feel the groaning, the slow ticking.
93
Kristine Ong MUSLIM
---------------------------------------------SIDEWALK CLASS
The vendor proffers a sample.
He sells screaming bottles
at two dollars a dozen.
The tiny bottles are glazed,
are frosted with care,
are red around the rim.
“Kids love them,” he says.
“Just squeeze the neck of the bottle
and hear it scream. Wanna try?”
94
Noam CHOMSKY
--------------------------------------------STUDENTS SHOULD BECOME
ANARCHISTS
Appropriated interview from June 14, 2011
Interviewer: Do you believe the world is better
today than 40 or 50 years ago?
Chomsky: Obviously! Walk along the open fields
here at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Half of the students are women; a third belongs to
an ethnic minority. People are dressed more
casually and are engaged for all possible things.
This place was very different when I came here 50
years ago. Then you saw white men, formally
dressed and only interested in their own work. You
could see the same development in Germany and all
over the world.
Interviewer: But are students more political?
Today’s generation is often reproached for being
disinterested in the world.
95
Chomsky: I think that reproach is false. The
period of high politicization at the universities was
very short—from 1968 to 1970. Before that,
students were apolitical. Consider the Vietnam
War, one of the greatest crimes since the Second
World War. Four or five years went by until some
form of visible protest stirred in the US. That
quickly ebbed away in the 1970s. The mood was
very different before the Iraq war. To my
knowledge, the Iraq war was the first war in history
where there were demonstrations before it began.
My students missed the lectures to demonstrate.
That would never have happened 50 years ago. The
protests did not prevent the war but limited it. The
US was never able to do in Iraq a fraction of what it
had done in Vietnam.
Interviewer: Were those protests only a straw
fire?
Chomsky: No. The politicization today is much
greater than in the 1950s. Forms of lasting activism
developed that enabled many of our battles to be
won. For example, there was a continuous progress
in women’s rights. If I had asked my grandmother
96
whether she was oppressed, she wouldn’t have
known what I was talking about. My mother said:
"I am oppressed but I don’t know what to do!" My
daughter would shout to me after such a question:
“Our world is more human!”
Interviewer:
progress?
Do you believe in historical
Chomsky: Progress is slow but dramatic over
long time horizons. Think of the abolition of slavery
or the development of freedom of expression.
Rights are not simply bestowed. People who joined
forces and banded together realized them. Still
progress is not a linear development. There are also
times of backward steps.
Interviewer: If there are times of progress and
times of backward steps, will the world be better in
50 years than today?
Chomsky: What will be in 50 years depends
strongly on what the young generation does today.
Two great dangers threaten the existence of the
world: our relation to the environment and the
danger that starts from nuclear weapons. If we do
97
not champion environmental protection more
vigorously today, we could be mired in a grave
environmental crisis in 50 years, let alone the risks
of nuclear weapons. The terrible catastrophe of
Fukushima reminds us that the non-military use of
nuclear power is fraught with extreme risks. We
cannot ignore this under any circumstances!
Interviewer: In 60 years students of today will be
as old as you. What must they do to look back on
their life with satisfaction?
Chomsky: Naturally they could say they lived
contentedly with friends, children, and fun. But to
really lead a fulfilled and satisfying life, they should
recognize problems and contribute to solving them.
If they cannot look back at 80 and say "I have
accomplished something," then their life will not
have succeeded.
Interviewer: At 82, are you satisfied with what
you achieved?
Chomsky: Being satisfied is impossible. My life
has too many dimensions, family, profession,
politics, and several others. In some areas I am
98
satisfied but not in others. The problems of this
world are quite great. Inequality in the US is at the
level of the 1920s and the economy still has
tremendous influence in our society. I cannot be
satisfied!
Interviewer: Political engagement like yours is
rare among scholars. Are you sometimes furious at
the "servants of power" as you say or at professor
colleagues who only concentrate on their academic
work?
Chomsky: I consider it immoral to be a supporter
of a power system. However that does not mean
that I am furious at anyone. Scholars per se do not
have deeper political insights than other persons
and are not morally superior to others. But they are
obligated to help politicians seek and find the truth.
Interviewer: That sounds like you are becoming
mild in old age.
Chomsky: No. My views and attitudes have not
changed in the course of the decades. I still believe
what I believed as a teenager.
Interviewer: Is that good—to still believe what
99
you believed almost 70 years ago?
Chomsky: Yes, when fundamental principles are
involved. Obviously I have changed my opinions in
many questions—but my ideals are the same!
Interviewer: You often say you are an anarchist.
What do you mean by that?
Chomsky: Anarchists try to identify power
structures. They urge those exercising power to
justify themselves. This justification does not
succeed most of the time. Then anarchists work at
unmasking and mastering the structures, whether
they involve patriarchal families, a Mafia
international system, or the private tyrannies of the
economy, the corporation.
Interviewer: What was the key experience that
made you an anarchist?
Chomsky: There was none. When I was twelve
years old, I began to go to secondhand bookshops.
Many of them were run by anarchists who came
from Spain. Therefore it seemed very natural to me
to be an anarchist.
100
Interviewer:
anarchists?
Should
all
students
become
Chomsky: Yes. Students should challenge
authorities and join a long anarchist tradition.
Interviewer: "Challenge authorities"—a liberal or
a moderate leftist could accept that invitation.
Chomsky: As soon as one identifies challenges
and overcomes illegitimate power, he or she is an
anarchist. Most people are anarchists. What they
call themselves doesn’t matter to me.
Interviewer: Who or what must challenge today’s
student generation?
Chomsky: This world is full of suffering, distress,
violence, and catastrophes. Students must decide:
does something concern you or not? I say: look
around, analyze the problems, ask yourself what
you can do and set out on the work!
101
Jamie STEWART
---------------------------------------------BELLS
ants in the rice,
ants in the seaweed
ants in the kimchi
a worm in my stool
we lived together for months,
we both burst with shaking rage
drunk and nude on the steps,
a cross drawn on her chin
we both look away,
cupcake on a piece of cake
goodbye haunted house,
chuck bo buck banana fanna fo fuck
i see it and i have no right to see it,
i don’t even know what it is
blood paid with blood,
sit on my lap,
it might be the last time we ever feel love
102
Jamie STEWART
---------------------------------------------PRINCESS TAM TAM
its turning from day to dark
Armageddon
what made you think life was special
when I look at you there is at least one
life that is special
We don’t need to live to love
Everyone has failed us and we have failed everyone
We don’t need to live to love
Between you and me, soon this will all be gone
And to spare us kisses in the flood
I stand before, a piece of paper in my hand
A vow of double suicide
The end of the world is avoidable
Our fire escape is 5 floors above the street
We can sit and watch Los Angeles burning
Turn around, holding hands
then lean over backwards
This is the quiet we’ve promised one another
This is the love we’ve always dreamt of
103
104
Fri, Feb 28, 2014 at 3:37 PM
Scott,
We are heading out to the coast now. I am
going to work on the drawings from there. I
have all my art supplies with me! Perfect day
out. I just want you to know that I now call all
the contributors to ZD4 my dick-nose children,
and I actually feel real human mom-child love
for them, which, I assume, is something like
how Nanny felt toward Gonzo. It's called
sympathy, Scott.
Maxwell Mednick
105
Erik Anderson is the author of
the book of lyric essays, The Poetics of
Trespass
(Otis
Books/Seismicity
Editions, 2010). Currently, he teaches
at Franklin & Marshall College and
lives in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
Poet, singer, actor, ex-convict & cult
figure Raegan Butcher’s first
poetry collection, End of the World
Graffiti, appeared in 1991. 5 years
later, he was convicted of armed
robbery and spent 7 years in prison,
composing the poems that would
appear in the poetry book, Stone
Hotel, published by the anarchist
collective, CrimethInc in 2003. 2 years
later, living in Cuernavaca, Mexico, he
produced a 2nd book of poetry, Rusty
String Quartet, again with CrimethInc.
He is the also the author of
screenplays and novels, including Siege
of Station 19 and The Chupacabra
Chronicles.
106
Noam Chomsky (b. 1928) is an
American
linguist,
philosopher,
cognitive scientist, logician, political
commentator, activist, and anarchist.
He is Professor Emeritus at MIT,
where he’s taught for over 50 years.
Laura Covelli is an Italian
teacher, translator, and interpreter.
Kristina Marie Darling is the
author of 12 books, including
Melancholia (An Essay) (Ravenna
Press, 2012), Petrarchan (BlazeVOX
Books, 2013), and (with Carol Guess)
X Marks the Dress: A Registry (Gold
Wake Press, forthcoming in 2014).
Matteo Delpho Delfini is an
Italian poet who works as a social
worker in northern Italy, 1 hour south
of Milan. He published his first
collection of poetry book titled
Nullamore last year.
107
Born in Vietnam in 1963, Linh
Dinh came to the US in 1975. He’s
the author of 2 books of stories, Fake
House (2000) and Blood and Soap
(2004), 5 of poems, All Around What
Empties Out (2003), American Tatts
(2005), Borderless Bodies (2006), Jam
Alerts (2007), and Some Kind of
Cheese Orgy (2009), and a novel, Love
Like Hate (2010). He’s been
anthologized in Best American Poetry,
Great American Prose Poems from
Poe to the Present, Postmodern
American Poetry, and Hopeless:
Barack Obama and the Politics of
Illusion.
James Franco is an actor, director,
author, and visual artist. His film
appearances include Milk, Pineapple
Express, Howl, and 127 Hours, which
earned him an Academy Award
nomination. He is the author of Palo
Alto, and his writing has appeared
in Esquire, Vanity Fair, N+1, the Wall
Street
Journal,
and McSweeney’s.
Franco’s art has been exhibited
throughout the world, including
the Museum of Contemporary Art in
LA, the Museum of Contemporary
Art’s PS1 in New York, the Clocktower
Gallery in New York, and the Peres
Projects in Berlin.
108
John Grey is an Australian-born poet.
Recently published in The Lyric, Vallum
and the science fiction anthology, The
Kennedy Curse with work upcoming in
Bryant Literary Magazine, Natural Bridge,
Southern California Review, and The
Pedestal.
Carol Guess is the author of numerous
books, including Tinderbox Lawn and
Doll Studies: Forensics. Follow her here:
www.carolguess.blogspot.com
Scott Alexander Jones is a PhD
dropout who’s lived in Portland, Austin,
Seattle, Montana, and Wellington, NZ.
He’s got three poetry collections:
Elsewhere (Black Lawrence Press, 2014),
Carpe Demons (Unsolicited Press, 2014),
and That Finger on Your Temple is the
Barrel of My Raygun (Bedouin Books,
2015), as well as a chapbook, One Day
There Will Be Nothing to Show That We
Were
Shane Jones is the author of Light
Boxes, The Failure Six, A Cake Appeared,
and Daniel Fights a Hurricane. He lives in
Albany, NY.
109
Matthew Kaler was born and
raised in Missoula, MT. He has lived
on the Isle of Malta in the
Mediterranean, The Balearic Islands
of Spain, and Oahu of Hawaii.
Kelly Magee’s first book, Body
Language, won the Katherine Ann
Porter Prize for Short Fiction. Her
writing has appeared in Crazyhorse,
The Kenyon Review, Hayden’s Ferry
Review, Passages North, Literary
Mama, and others. She teaches
creative
writing
at
Western
Washington University. You can find
her at kellyelizabethmagee.com.
Lawrence Matsuda was born in
the Minidoka, Idaho Concentration
Camp during WWII. He and his
family were among the approximately
120,000 Japanese Americans and
Japanese held without due process for
3 years or more. Matsuda has a PhD
from the University of Washington
and
was: a
secondary
teacher,
university counselor, state level
administrator,
school
principal,
assistant superintendent, educational
consultant, and visiting professor at
Seattle U. In July of 2010, his poetry
book, A Cold Wind from Idaho was
published by Black Lawrence Press.
110
Maxwell Mednick is a piece of
shit.
Kristine Ong Muslim is the
author of several books most recently
We Bury the Landscape (Queen’s
Ferry Press, 2012) and Grim Series
(Popcorn Press, 2012). Her work has
appeared in Arsenic Lobster Poetry
Journal, Painted Bride Quarterly, and
The State. You can find her at:
http://kristinemuslim.weebly.com.
Olivia Parkes was born in London
but grew up in Los Angeles. She
studied art at Wesleyan University and
currently works as a painter and writer
in Berlin.
Travis Sehorn has toured 3
plays nationally with The Missoula
Oblongata and works with other theater
projects, most recently in a mansion in
New Jersey and soon an adaptation of
The Forbidden Zone. Travis also does
film, including Morning Dew, a
futuristic animal apocalypse film made
in London and toured throughout
Europe in 2010. Travis has recorded 11
full albums. Travis refuses to pay rent.
111
Brent L. Smith was born and
raised in LA. He did undergraduate
work at Humboldt State and received
an MFA from the Jack Kerouac
School. Upon returning to LA, he
mopped the floors of Harvard &
Stone, a Hollywood bar as notorious
as it is industrial. He writes
transgressive prose, and screenplays
and music video treatments for Realm
Films.
Jamie Stewart (b. 1978, Los
Angeles) plays in the bands Xiu Xiu
and Sal Mineo and has also composed
music for dance and published 3
volumes of haiku.
Before becoming homeless in 2012
due to disability and unemployment,
Chris Strofollino had worked as
a college professor for over 20 years,
published 7 books of poetry & ath
critical study of Shakespeare’s 12
Night.
Mathias Svalina is the author of
five chapbooks, five collaboratively
written chapbooks, and one book,
Destruction Myths. He teaches writing
and literature in Denver.
112
His name is Volatalistic Phil and
he was born in 1985. He is from
Albuquerque, NM. He is a recovering
alcoholic/addict who has an interest in
people and the community around
him. He enjoys taking part in
experiences that can help enrich his
own life as well as the lives of those
around him. He’s currently in school,
working on his poor man’s PhD (six
associate degrees).
Karen Volkman is the author of
three books of poetry, Crash’s Law,
Spar, and Nomina, and a chapbook,
One might. Poems from her new
manuscript, Whereso, have appeared
in New American Writing, Denver
Quarterly, A Public Space, Black
Warrior Review, and other journals.
She teaches at the University of
Montana in Missoula.
Harold
Whit
Williams
is
guitarist for the critically acclaimed rock
band Cotton Mather. His newest poetry
collection, Backmasking, is winner of
the 2013 Robert Phillips Poetry
Chapbook Prize from Texas Review
Press, and his poems have appeared in
numerous literary journals. He lives in
Austin,
Texas.