- Robert L. Giron
Issue 123 — Six Poets & Three Artists
In this issue, work by
Amirah al Wassif
Nominated for a 2021 Pushcart Prize
according to nature’s rules
50 barefoot men carrying
their empty pots
their facial bones
tell you about long ages of bitterly
shabby dresses, fearful eyes
ancient faces full of pimples
much sweat
and shaky hands
50 barefoot men bearing their pain
looking for a way
to protect their feet
but the shattered glass
was everywhere
the dispossessed people died
and the rest were alive around the river
laughing, jumping, drinking
but the river has a sense of justice
so, it made a good decision
according to nature’s rules
and, dried up!
Copyright © 2019 by Amirah al Wassif
a woman looking for a tongue!
they said your voice should not be heard
we need a woman without sound
then I asked my god
o lord, do I count?
and he answered me in short
raise your voice and shout
they said we need a perfect doll
walking and stopping when we want
but I am totally tweety bird
so, I whispered: no, I cannot
they said the good girl knows how to
close her mouth
she always pretends to ignore seeing
revolutions in the north
or in the south
the good girl used to crawl
she must hide the bright side of her soul
good girl hasn’t any right
or even fight for her vote
the good girl could not contemplate the faint light
in the middle of the road
they said we need a plastic woman
but, I act like a real woman
so, they cried “be shy”
but, I insisted to fly!
Copyright © 2019 by Amirah al Wassif
as an African child
As an African child
I crawled on mama’s arm
Searching for an imaginary house
Which bears me with a fancy view
Of the coming clouds upon my head
As an African child
I jumped many times for seeing the clown
Who laughs and cries
Making jokes
Acts an excellent spy
With many children in their bed
As an African child
I saw the bitterness on mama’s face
And tried to chase
Her shadow before her cheek was wet
As an African child
I drew my plan on the clay pot
I insisted to fly
Asking my sun to let
The charming of justice light
And asking the darkness to rest
Copyright © 2019 by Amirah al Wassif
About the Author
Amirah Al Wassif is a freelance writer who hails from Egypt. She has written articles, novels, short stories poems and songs. Five of her books were written in Arabic and many of her English works have been published in various cultural magazines such as Praxies Magazine, The Gathering of Tribes, Credo Spoir, Reach Poetry, Chrion Review, among others. Her books in English include: For Those Who Don’t Know Chocolate and The Cocoa Boy and Other Stories.
Elsa Bonstein
Ark
Where is our ark?
Our place of refuge?
Where can we go when the earth shifts
When the mountains are moved to the seas?
There is a peaceful village
Close within our hearts
And to that quiet place
We bring our thoughts and fears.
We flee to the sacristy that rests inside,
Everlasting, beyond thought or understanding,
Copyright © 2019 by Elsa Bonstein.
America
If there is a value in America, it is ideals and philosophies,
not wealth and power. We will not keep those ideals here,
locked in our land.
When we say “Give me your tired, your poor,” we mean give us
your old, patriarchal, backward, non-functioning mores
and let us show you what liberty and freedom can do for your people.
Give us your masses of oppressed men and women and
let us teach them to read, to think and to reason, for we know
that goodness exists in the core of every human being.
If we do this, the beauty, the excellence, the giving
and helping healing heart of all people will grow, and
we will have a new world: free, abundant, kind, and caring.
Copyright © 2019 by Elsa Bonstein.
About the Author
Elsa Bonstein has been a feature writer for various publications and magazines. She has written two novels, Find Edsell, which received the “Mark of Excellence” from Writer Digest and Footes Creek, which is available as an ebook at Inkitt or at Bonstein’s website, www.elsabonstein.com.
Alyssa Cooper
Midazolam
Time of death was 11:56.
They broadcast the vitals of the men they were killing,
as if those failing heart beats were news stories,
as if those flickering lifelines were tabloids,
and their mothers and daughters watched them die
alongside a horde of slathering spectators.
Time of death was 7:20.
And the next morning,
the headlines told of their arching backs
and gnashing teeth,
they told of the drugs that we knew didn’t work,
that they used anyways, poison in vials set to expire,
like canned soup must be eaten before the date stamped into the tin,
except this was not tomatoes and cream,
it was life—
and this is what we call freedom.
Time of death was 10:33.
Killing men to teach them not to kill,
state sanctioned murders in sterile rooms on clean white gurneys,
and the men who write the laws insist that it is painless,
they insist that it is moral, that this is justice,
they say there is no pain,
but if they truly believed those hollow words,
they would not paralyze their victims before they stopped their hearts.
That three-injection cocktail that they call protocol
was not mixed for the sake of the man being killed,
it was mixed for the sake of the men invited to watch
the spectacle.
Time of death was 11:05.
And this—this is what we call freedom.
Copyright © 2019 by Alyssa Cooper.
Labyrinth
From this distance,
I can see things that were not clear,
before,
when I was so close that your sweat was
clouding my vision,
condensation on my windows,
blurring out the details—
I can see the things that mattered more
than love,
or adoration,
or commitment,
I can see the things that mattered more
than soulmates,
and from this distance,
I can see the things that stood between us like
tightropes,
precarious and unsteady,
the things that drove us apart, like nails
hammered into flesh,
I can see those columns of real life,
and it is impossible to navigate between them
and make my way to you,
it is impossible to find an end to the maze
that lands me in your arms, and that is
okay.
This is not a story.
I am no swooning heroine.
There is no neat and braided plot line
that leads me back to you,
no breadcrumb trail to bring me home,
there is no home at all, and that is
okay.
Copyright © 2019 by Alyssa Cooper.
Twin Sister to Elation
Tonight I press my fingers into
bruises, just to feel the ache; on
days like these, pain is twin
sister to elation, because at least
it is something, and bruises are
just blood learning to rot, learning
to walk, liberated from my veins
and building galaxies, just beneath
the surface of my
skin.
I am looking forward to the days
when I can greet the sun without
wondering why, when my hands
will not spend quiet moments
itching for elation, when I will
know that I am built of dying stars,
without having to be
reminded;
but more and more each day, this
future seems like fiction, like fantasy,
like one of the books I always seem
to be writing.
The curve in my spine was put
there by hardship, and how can I
expect anything less from
the rest of me?
I am a bruise in the shape of a girl,
a monument of rotting blood,
begging for fingers to introduce me
to elation. I am a galaxy spinning in
flesh, I am soft white scars that were
once purple,
were once open,
were once nothing,
I am nothing,
this is nothing,
the sun that begs me to wake each morning
is nothing.
And on these days, I would
give anything for something.
Copyright © 2019 by Alyssa Cooper.
About the Author
Alyssa Cooper is a Canadian author and poet currently living in Kingston, Ontario. First published in 2008, she is the author of four novels, a short story collection, and two poetry collections, as well as having her work included in various local and international publications. An active spoken word performer, she currently holds an executive position in the Kingston Poetry Collective and the Queen’s Poetry Slam planning committee. Visit: www.alyssacooper.ca
Phyllis Green
Ann Wore Her Lucky Red Cape
Acrylic, 36" x 48".
Copyright © 2019 by Phyllis Green.
About the Artist
Phyllis Green is the author of 16 books for young people, these include Nantucket Summer, Eating Ice Cream with a Werewolf, Bagdad Ate It, to name a few, as well as over 50 stories in literary journals. She has had 26 paintings of Women and Flowers at Beaverton Oregon City Hall during the last Christmas season and this coming season she will have five large paintings of European royalty from the years 1100-1800 on display. Ann Wore Her Lucky Red Cape is her first painting in a literary journal and she is delighted.
Jenean McBrearty
The Revolution
Today, and Italian right-winger attacked some migrants.
I don’t know any of the people involved. It happened
in Europe. Theoretically, I’m glad. It’s the only way
the Identity Movement will be effective at ridding
our societies of these invaders. Untheoretically,
I feel sorry for the victims.
Nate made his first notation in February, a month made for worrying, and worry he did. The optics were bad. He called Faustina Purdy.
“Sure, it’s a good sign, we don’t want a failure, Purdy. It demoralizes the rank and file.”
“You talk like a union boss. I think it shows the invaders we mean business. I say good for the guido. The rank and file need to know we mean business too.” He imagined her lips moving as she spoke the words.
Maybe she was right. So many people got fed up with inaction. When are we going to start fighting back, they always asked? I’m almost thirty! Yes, by the time people get thirty, most peoples’ lives get complicated. He kept his life simple. Clarity, he called it.
He listened to his recorded speech at last night’s meeting he’d just posted on U-tube. Self- congratulation was a bottle of twenty-dollar wine.
“Extravagant,” Purdy had said when she saw the check she’d promised to pay.
“I delivered a great speech, for Christ’s sake,” he’d defended.
“It ought to be great, it’s the same one you’ve given for ten years.” She was spot on, but how many ways and how many times can you say the government stinks? If they’d kept the pregnancy, their kid would be old enough to answer that question.
“Nate? Are you still there?”
“Yeah, I’m here. Listen, can you check out a guy named Chambers? He ordered a t-shirt we don’t sell anymore ⸺the one that says ’Politics are great but I’d rather be revolting’ on the front.”
“So, shoot him an e-mail and tell him.”
“I’d rather not. I think he’s nuts.”
“Damn it, Nate! You think everyone’s crazy.”
“He sent a check for a hundred-fifty for a thirty-dollar shirt.”
“Alleluia! Ask if he’ll accept a substitute. Find out if he’s married to the slogan, or if it’s just a cover.”
“A cover for what?”
“Infiltration, ya’ goofball. Just because we’re not on a list doesn’t mean we’re safe from prying eyes.”
He saw the conversation heading down a one-way street called Nate You’re Incompetent Boulevard. He needed orange juice. He put her on speaker phone while he battled an inner seal. “Maybe, he’s for real.”
“Okay, then ask him if he wants a topic of conversation or really wants to help the cause. Call him and find out. Movements stand or fall on their funding. Gotta go. Love you.”
They were disconnected in every way since she moved out. Funny how happy she sounded. He should call Chambers. Personal contact was the cardinal rule of recruitment. His college football coach taught him that. But a text was quicker. He settled for e-mail:
Dear Mr. Generous. Requested merchandise not available. Can we keep your money anyway? My car needs new tires. Signed Desperately Flat.
Zap! Suddenly the screen read You Message Has Been Sent.
“Aw, shit!” He composed another:
Situation dire. Bad Joke. I’ll return check ASAP. Truly yours. Mr. Stupid.
Hopefully, Purdy would never know how screwed up he was. Depressingly, he suspected she already knew.
***
He found ways to avoid signing into his e-mail for Chambers’ reply. Call his mom, wish her a happy something. Sneak a cigarette. Make a to-do list. Polish his shoes. Go to unemployment for recertification. But, by noon, he had to bite the bullet. Purdy would ask him about the t-shirt ’thing’ when they met for lunch. He had to make the truth palatable if he wanted a piece of something for dessert.
Chambers sent a cringeworthy answer:
No wonder the resistance isn’t going anywhere, asshole. Buy the tires so you don’t kill the innocent. No fire arms for dummies like you with quick fingers.
He’d have to tell her. “Good news, Babe,” he said and slid into the booth, his hands laden with burgers and shakes. “I squared things with Chamber and got tires for my car—”
“How’d things go at unemployment?”
“I’m good for another six months. I’ll find something, I promise.” He’d made the same
promise to Helen Marks, his assigned Career Coach Saint.
“I don’t have time for a screw, tell me the truth.”
“I told Ms. Marks I’m a drunk. If I go to A.A. meetings, I’m good for a whole year. I don’t suppose you have time for a blow—”
“No, Nate.”
Did she want him to be unfaithful? Obviously. When she went to the bathroom, he checked his e-mail again. Unemployment released his payment and Chambers wanted a meeting update. Things were looking up. He could pay for lunch. To Chambers he replied:
February thirteenth. 8 P.M. Gonzo’s Pizzeria upstairs meeting room. Bring your own beer. :)
***
The minute Chambers introduced himself, Nate knew he wouldn’t let Purdy near him. Too damn classy and way too intense. That he looked like a blond Superman made him seem like the movement’s messiah. He probably had a wonderful, lucrative career. Maybe he knew Helen Marks.
“We’ve got a new soldier in the struggle ⸺Princeton Chambers.” He turned to the guy next to him wearing soft linen slacks and a Van Husen with rolled up sleeves. “Do your friends call you Prince?”
“No, they call me Tony.”
“Tony, hunh. Are you Catholic?”
“It’s a long story.”
“So, let’s welcome Tony with a big round of applause!” The night was going to be tedious with Tony sitting near the dais, lounging in a folding chair and listening to every word. Here was a guy willing to donate to the cause but expecting to see results. What’s worse, he’d already told Purdy about him. Why were guys so damn proud of tires? Women were so much more practical. They were proud of scholastic records.
“He won’t last,” he’d told her on speaker phone when she called to ask about the meeting. He’d fishtailed on ice and decided to keep both hands on the wheel.
“Why not? You didn’t act weird, Nate.”
“We’re too radical for him.”
“Bullshit. We’re as radical as Mother Goose.”
“Well, then maybe we’re not radical enough for him.” The image of a dominatrix dominated his brain. How was he supposed to concentrate on politics and ice?
“You mean you don’t like him. Why?”
“Uppity. You know. Snooty. Snobby. Elitist.”
“Employed. Well dressed. Solvent.”
“Okay. What of it? The poor and the slovenly need love too.”
She’d sighed and said good-bye and brought him chocolate cupcakes on her way home from the Kroger bakery. She’d work overtime because some gal couldn’t find a baby-sitter and to make sure the store had enough product for the Valentine’s Day, and still realized he needed attention when he felt like a colossal loser. She deserved better. Daily, he prayed she never seek it.
***
America is like a big ripe peach, golden pink and as luscious
to the eye as it is to the palate. More tempting than apples, and
sweeter than cherries. Because of technology, people all over
the world have seen her beauty and her promise, and envy
her. Hate her. Look greedily and lustfully upon her. They want
to possess her, rape her, steal her riches and take her down.
It sounded exactly like what Nate had been saying that for years, but when Tony said America was on the verge of extinction, it didn’t sound like a weak warning but a call to arms. Nate stared into the young faces of the Soldiers of Struggle and didn’t recognize them. They’d never looked at him the way they marveled at Tony. Any fool could see America was becoming unhinged, but the attention they paid to this guy told Nate they now believed it.
He should stop their adulation. It was like watching them masturbate. But he was suddenly aware of who he was: the voice of St. John crying in the wilderness. He let Chambers continue.
We must fight, or we will die. The thousand years of genetic
evolution will come to an end, gone forever, unless we act.
What can we do, you ask? I will answer. Our enemies have
fewer resources but more courage than we do. They’re fighting
asymmetrical war and so can we. We must take precautions.
We mustn’t be caught, because there are so few of us now.
But we cannot let that paralyze us. That will change. Those
of like mind will find a way.
Chambers was right. That’s what he was. Paralyzed. Constantly reminding them of a bleak vision of reality while Princeton Chambers was showing them a heroic vision of victory. His words were brazen and beautiful. His plans stark, violent, merciless. Yet, they rang of truth.
We all must die, but it’s what we’ve lived and died for that
makes us magnificent. God triumphed over death to strengthen
our faith and hope so we can triumph over those who seek our
bondage. Rise up, men of America. Smite her enemies. I will
instruct you how when next we meet. Until then, think on this:
if the Founders were not willing to shed their blood for you, we
would still be beholden to a king. Do you want your children
beholden to international communism? Are you so afraid of
mortality that you will sacrifice your freedom for a moment
more of breath?
The room was silent when Tony left the podium, the young men sitting in reverential quietude as they steeled their resolve. The time for amiable socializing had passed. One by one, the twelve men collected their coats and their conscience and left the hall, leaving Nate alone with the usurper. The situation was dire. Nate knew because the men had left their beer behind.
“What will you tell them next week, Tony?” Nate demanded quietly as Tony headed for the stairs. Not that he expected candor, but he did want indications of where the de facto new leader intended to take the Soldiers of Struggle.
“I’ll tell them what they need most of all. Instruction on how to fight an ideological foe.”
“You’re going to ask them to jeopardize their lives?”
Tony had donned his camel-colored wool coat. “And their fortunes and their sacred honor, too,“ he said and walked to where Nate was sitting at the information table. “The SOS men have honest affection for you, but they need a commander not a comrade. Think on that. They will. Next week we’ll discover if they’re real soldiers or simply sympathizers. If they decide to be warriors, they’ll get one of these.“ Tony pulled a small flat white sack from his coat pocket and handed it to Nate. Inside was a 3X3 inch black patch with SOS embroidered in silver thread, and below the letters was a red cross on a white shield.
“And if they come down on the side of sanity?”
“They will have chosen impotence and annihilation and will get nothing because that’s what they deserve.”
Tony left. Nate heard his footfalls on the stairs, and the squeaky door leading outside open and close. He believed he was alone, but Purdy appeared from the dark side of the room. She came towards him, holding her shoulder bag close to her hip with one hand and her keys in the other.
“How long have you been here?” he said grimly.
“Long enough to understand that you fear Chambers more than you fear the Marxists, and why you should.”
“You know he means to blow something up, Purdy. A building, a courthouse, a school. . . ”
“My guess is something big. A mosque maybe, but what do I know?”
“Somebody’s going to get killed.”
“I think that’s the point, Nate. Body counts matter in a war of some against all.”
“We can’t let this happen. We have to tell the Feds. They’ll cast a big net, and I don’t want to be caught up in it when things go south.”
“Nope.” She put her keys in her purse and set it on the chair. There was a table to clear, beer and beer to stash in the ice-box.
“Okay then, tomorrow we call the FBI. Agreed?”
“You do that.” She stacked the brochures and stuffed them in the trash can. He swiped a cookie from a plate he knew was her next target.
“You don’t think we should turn him in? I told you, he’s crazy. Did you see this?” He held out the patch Tony had left on the table. “Weird, right? SOS. The man, the plan, the insignia. They’re gonna think we’re all Nazis, or worse, terrorists.”
“I think there’s no easy way out and no easy answers. There never has been. There’s only winners and losers.”
“No win-win, ever? What happened to all that I’m okay, you’re okay crap we learned in psych 101?”
She had everything in its place except for the tablecloth. “Elbows up!” He leaned back in the chair and watched as she folded the slippery plastic that had Happy Birthday written in script around the edge. They’d go home now. Alone to different addresses, he predicted.
“You’re a wonderful guy, Nate. But Chambers is a guy on a mission. Probably one of the few alpha males left in these parts.”
“You make 2040 Lexington sound like the Paris of 1789.”
She got her purse from the chair. Like a slo-mo sequence in an action movie, she brought it over her shoulder and ten-thousand volts shot through his groin. That was her sexiest move. Covering up after she’d let him have a peek at her. If this was a movie, they’d make passionate love on the table, and reminisce about it on their golden wedding anniversary. She was his goddess, after all. Who knew Venus was alive and well in Kentucky and working in a grocery store bakery?
“This revolution isn’t going to have dress rehearsals. Go ahead and call the FBI. Or the CIA, or DHS, or any alphabet from the ACLU to the UN.”
He hustled to keep up with her. “We have to stop him some way—”
She stopped so abruptly, he almost fell on her. “It’s too late,“ she said without looking at him, “Try to stop him and Chambers will kill you.” She walked on, and he didn’t follow. Her words had the ring of truth too.
***
Today, the Italian police arrested that neo-fascist who
killed those migrants. Over a hundred-thousand
people demonstrated against his arrest and the cops
used tear-gas to drive them back. The crowd grew to
over two-hundred-fifty thousand —;led by Franco Laganza,
an unemployed tailor. When Pope Francis called for order,
peace and tolerance, the crowd threw tomatoes at him and
shouted Viva Italia!
Nate made his second notation in February, a month made for fear, and fear he did.
He’d recruited new members since Chambers had come and gone. He’d been lots relieved, but a little disappointed that his guys had turned out to be simply sympathizers. On the bright side, A.A. meetings were so anonymous he never had to prove to Helen Parks he ever went.
“How’s it going?” she’d ask every six weeks.
“I’ve got a terrific sponsor.” It wasn’t a complete lie. Purdy stopped buying him beer. Not even she could afford luxuries when the economy nosed dived again. “If things get any worse, you’ll have to move back in with me,” he joked. It didn’t happen, but things got a hell’uva lot worse.
His mother had died from the influenza epidemic in September of ’40. At least the doctors said it was influenza. The only person he still trusted was Purdy, and she insisted it was cholera. “When did you ever hear boil water warnings with influenza?” she asked when they left the emergency room that drizzly Tuesday night.
Before she pulled into his dive-way house, the hospital called and said, “We did all we could.”
“Stay with me, please,” he begged. Four words that really meant he had no idea what to do when anybody died. What happens when you have no money to bury your dead relative? Should he call his ex-step-dad in Montana? How could it happen so fast?
She made him a cup of tea. “Did you notice the streets?”
Was she trying to distract him? “It’d be nice if they collected the trash on schedule once in a while. Yeah, I sort’a noticed.”
“Dead animals, Nate. Strays and little tree critters. Listen.” It was midnight and they could hear trash trucks stop and go down the block. They went to the window and watched the city workers shoveling debris between driveways where the cans stood. “When was the last time you saw garbage collectors in haz-mat suits?” she said.
He’d never seen it. Or maybe he never noticed. Living in a fog had repercussions. Had he forgotten Purdy’s birthday again? He felt his throat tighten.
By Sunday, the obits in the Lexington Times ran two full pages. Lexington’s population of four-hundred-thousand had been reduced by twenty-five-thousand —most of those were UK students. Between out of town parents coming to claim their bodies, and early rain, the downtown streets were impassable for two weeks. Then he got more bad news.
All unemployment appointments have been cancelled
until further notice. You are being assigned a new
career coach. You will be notified.
We mourn the loss of the following. . . Joan Apple,
Helen Marks, and Manny Ramirez.
“Should we leave the city?” he asked Purdy.
“And go where? Louisville? One of us has to work.” So much had changed, and nothing had changed. She still took care of him. Still had sex with him. Occasionally. But the wall was still there too, and it pissed him off.
He didn’t go to the FBI like he said he was going to do. And the guys who did keep coming to Gonzo’s never mentioned Chambers or his speech, and he never saw any of them wearing that stupid SOS patch, either. The guys were over him. Why did he get the feeling Purdy wasn’t? Were there meetings he wasn’t invited to?
He jerked off to Beethoven’s Fifth, proud he’d trained his body to wait for the crescendo, and finished off his stash of protein bars for breakfast. Maybe he ought to become an alcoholic again. He’d have a sponsor to talk to. He called Purdy at Kroger’s. No blubbering, he admonished himself as the phone rang. Five months of grieving seemed like a long time, but he liked his mom. She was a great Yahtzee player.
“Purdy, I’m pathetic, I know but I just wanted to hear your voice,” he said when she answered with a terse, yeah?
“I’m icing a wedding cake somebody forgot about. My customer is waiting at the counter— Nate, watch the news and I’ll call you at noon, okay?”
“All the news is bad. I saw a corpse today. The face was shrunken in and yellow. Twisted. Somebody didn’t want to die.”
“I love you. Watch a movie. Find something interesting to do.”
If only he had something interesting to do, a hobby like building model cars maybe. He wouldn’t have hit the TV ’on’ button. He wouldn’t have heard the ’breaking news’ from the kitchen where he was boiling water for tea.
The death toll is beginning to mount along the Mexican
American border from Yuma to the Salton Sea in
Imperial County, California, despite the Center for Disease
Control’s warning to the entire Southwest to boil all
drinking water. Hardest hit are the migrants crossing
into America after traveling in a hundred-plus degree
heat—the Border Patrol has set up watering stations
along known routes, but the discovery of thirty bodies
near the All-American Canal has sent lightning bolts
of fear through all residents who depend on the canal
water for drinking water—for many the warning has
come too late. . .
He stood in his kitchen doorway and watched familiar scenes of distraught family members in hospital corridors, traffic jams in hospital parking lots, and the gut-wrenching pictures of dying children being taken from their beds to make room for those on the floor. On the coffee table was his journal. Franco Laganza had almost half a million followers, irate Italians who were willing to hide him for a year and pelt the Pope with rotten fruit. Numbers. Body counts were interesting. Crucial, according to Princeton Chambers. Impressive to Purdy.
He downloaded and printed off a map of the U.S. and laid it over a cutting board on the living room coffee table, and stuck cork-board push-pins in the cities that had hit with ’influenza’ epidemics. San Francisco: eighty-thousand dead. New York; almost two-hundred-thousand. Miami: one-hundred-fifty-thousand. Los Angeles: one-hundred-thousand. All big cities. All with historically designated as so-called sanctuary cities. And now the border area where people depended on the Colorado River canal for water.
This was February. Why was he sweating? He hit rewind and slo-mo as the news report repeated, scanning the newsfeed for any dead animals. He didn’t see any, but he did see the graffiti. Mixed in with MS-13 and Crypts and Sinaloa Cartel, and the local street artists who’d marked their territory was the new guy in town: SOS. The authorities must have noticed it. He’d bet money it had shown up in every city where people were drinking themselves to death. Without an addiction.
He ran to the bathroom and threw up the protein bars. Purdy was right. His mom hadn’t died of influenza. She died of cholera. Purdy knew it. He was almost thirty. Just another three weeks and, yes, his life had suddenly become complicated. Purdy knew it. Purdy knew it.
His trembling fingers could barely push the number 9-1-1.
“This is the operator, what is your emergency?”
“People are dead, and I have to talk to someone. Send the FBI.”
“What people are dead, Sir?”
“The people in El Centro and Miami—please! Send someone, hurry! Christ, he’s going to kill me!”
“Who’s going to kill you? Is there someone in your house?”
“
“No. Just come. I’ll explain it when you get here.” He was sweating again.
“Do you have fire arms in the house, Sir?”
“A hunting rifle. But that’s not it. It’s the cholera. It’s the water. He’s poisoning the water, and she’s hiding him. They all are. I think. I don’t know.” He was dripping sweat but his mouth was dry.
“Just stay calm, they’re on their way.”
“Who? Who’s coming? I don’t need an ambulance. My mom died already. . . the last game we played? Almost a perfect game. She only had to scratch a full house.”
He disconnected. They’d find him. Technology could track anybody down, except people like Franco Laganza and Princeton Chambers. They had to be ratted out by cowards and traitors to the cause. Backstabbers like him who deserved to die. Would it be so bad? He’d be with his mom, if there was an afterlife. We all must die, but it’s what we’ve lived and died for that makes us magnificent, Chambers had said. It’s too late, Purdy had said. There’s only winners and losers. Was he so afraid of mortality that he would sacrifice his freedom for a moment more of breath?
He thought about the arm patch Chambers had made. S-O-S. Save our ship of state. Soldiers of Struggle or Sons of Saints. Had he chosen impotence and annihilation and so deserved nothing? Perhaps, he’d crawled too many miles and it was time to stand up.
“I’m an alcoholic,” he told the police. “I’ve been going to A.A. for about a year. Ask my Career Coach at unemployment. The new guy, Carlie somebody or the other. I just lost it this morning. My mom died in the influenza epidemic. I didn’t drink, I called you. I don’t want to be a loser. Hell, I’m almost thirty.”
They must send guys out in young/old teams. One cop had wrinkles and wore glasses. The other one looked like he’d just graduated middle school. While the Old Guy sat and talked with him, the Young Guy got the rifle from the bedroom closet and checked it for recent fire. He brought tissues from the bathroom, so Nate could blow his nose.
“You said something about cholera to the operator. Where’d you get that idea from?” Old Guy said.
He was smiling, but he was serious. Yeah, they knew the truth. “The night my mom went to the hospital, I heard a CNA say influenza was spreading like cholera. I don’t know what that is but is sounds dangerous. When I heard about the problem at the border. . . it just slipped out.”
“Do you watch a lot of news?” Old Guy was giving him a Santa Claus smile.
“No, actually I don’t. Too old for celebrity drama BS. My hobby’s maps. Look, what I downloaded this morning. See these pins? I’m keeping track of the influenza epidemics. You should have seen me during the elections. Kept track of all the primaries. But my passion is celestial maps. Weird, right?”
“It takes all kinds,” he overheard Young Guy whisper to the Old Guy as they walked to the door. “Pistachios. Filberts. Almonds.”
Let them believe he was an alcoholic, map-loving loser. Let them dismiss him as inconsequential and a harmless nut case. Maybe they’d stop by Kroger’s and buy some glazed doughnuts and Faustina Purdy would give them free coffee. Tonight, he’d tell her he wouldn’t be going to Gonzo’s Pizza anymore, because she was right. The rank and file had needed to know the Soldiers of Struggle meant business. Things had changed. The numbers proved it.
The Old Guy returned to the living room. “Have you drunk any water without boiling it?”
“Me? No. I follow government orders.”
What was this? Outreach in the time of cholera? Nate gave him a half-assed wave good bye. Then peered down at the map. Gonzo’s 8 PM tonight.
***
The last person he expected to see at an AA meeting was Princeton Chambers, but there he was sitting at the table near the podium, looking as composed and authoritative as last time. Gonzo’s was an equal opportunity hall. Bar Mitzvahs. Confirmation parties. Wedding receptions. Wicca, DAR, NOW —maybe alcohol was a secret weapon against diseases. Most of the audience was older guys in dark clothing. Not a pair of jeans or a t-shirt in the bunch. Old Guy motioned him over to a seat next to his.
Before he could take the seat, Old guy had him cuffed and two other guys had taped his mouth, tied his feet with rope and had jostled him to folding chair next to the podium. All eyes were on him, eyes filled with disgust, hate and recrimination. He hadn’t meant to rat anyone out. He was just confused. Panicked. Everybody was. And there was that book. Panic on the Pacific. The whole West coast preparing for the Japanese attack that never came on December 8th. The big fear was the water supply for the big cities. The dams had just been finished. If they’d been bombed, millions would have died—he’d heard about it on book TV. C-Span. Weekends.
“Now we have him, gentlemen,” he heard Chambers say. “The foolish Christ who saves humanity from its just fate.”
Cilivization is about water. Amniotic fluid. Oceans. Tears. Water basins.
“Yeah, well I think your Christ has cholera,” Young Guy said, and everyone in the room vanished except Purdy.
“I'll stay with you, you damn fool,” she said as she sponged the sweat from his face. “The one time in our lives we agree on something and it has to be when one of us is dying.”
Copyright © 2019 by Jenean McBrearty.
About the Author
Jenean McBrearty is a graduate of San Diego State University. She received the EKU English Department’s Award for Graduate Non-fiction (2011), and a Silver Pen Award in 2015. Her fiction, photographs and poetry have been published over two hundred e-publications, and in print. She lives in Kentucky and writes full time. Her works are available at Lulu.com and Amazon.
Stephanie Sabourin
Hidden Falls, Patapsco State Park
Copyright © 2019 by Stephanie Sabourin.
About the Artist
Stephanie Sabourin is a photographer, teacher, and nature lover. She draws inspiration from the beauty found all around her. As the owner of Stephanie Sabourin Photography, she is frequently found photographing dogs and other animals, along with their people, in natural settings. Stephanie is a member of Professional Photographers of America, and she has been published in Wonderful West Virginia Magazine and on a number of web pages. She lives with her husband and standard poodle in Columbia, Maryland
Carol Smallwood
When a Certain Age
if you’re a woman be prepared to be called
young lady, sweetheart, honey, dear, and
your first name preceeded by Miss as
terms of endearment; it’s best not to recall
those you used for others not long ago.
Copyright © 2019 by Carol Smallwood.
An American Icon
Blue jeans began in 1871: sturdy pants, duck cloth in brown
for miners using horse harness rivets to add strength necessary
for long wear, developing into eventual popularity world round.
A change to denim (a sturdy cotton twill) became a shakedown
when blue dye began the look we consider being customary;
blue jeans began in 1871: sturdy pants, duck cloth in brown.
A ribbing of diagonal design made a cloth that became renowned:
indigo makes the warp, the weft white, producing the shade vary
for long wear, developing into eventual popularity world round.
By 1960 blue jeans became high fashion, a designer meltdown
and collectors rivaled old gold prospectors in being monetary:
blue jeans began in 1871: sturdy pants, duck cloth in brown.
Then the distressed kicked in—the tattered, holes handed down
and patches haphazard; some mostly threads making them airy
for long wear, developing into eventual popularity world round.
Jeans now stretch but “tend to sag” after walking around town
my daughter said and may shrink when washed—quite arbitrary;
blue jeans began in 1871: sturdy pants, duck cloth in brown
for long wear, developing into eventual popularity world round.
Copyright © 2019 by Carol Smallwood.
About the Author
Carol Smallwood a literary reader, judge, and interviewer. Her most recent book is In the Measuring (Shanti Arts, 2018).
Edward M. Supranowicz
untitled
Copyright © 2019 by Edward M. Supranowicz.