.
Blood Ink
"#ng 2%6
edi to r s
a l ex a n dr a b a i l ey
ste p h a n i e b a i l ey
el l i o t ker r
el en i l o uta s
n a di a r ush dy
ma r k woyti uk
s u b m i s s i o n s deadline
June 26 th 2006
blood ink began in 2005
with the idea to find new
s t u d e n t ’s w r i t i n g t h a t e cho e d w h a t Fe d e r i c o G a r c í a
Lorca said of Ner uda –
that
he
wrote
poems
“ c l o s e r t o b l o o d t h a n i n k .”
blood ink literary journal
acknowledges the financial
(and moral) suppor t of the
Alberta Public Interest
Research Group
http://www.ualber ta.ca/~jeker r/
© co p yr i gh t 2006
th e r esp ective a uth o r s
blood ink
[email protected]
PRESS
Wi& works by:
Maria Chen
Chelsea Novak
Mandie Lopatka
K Heath
Rebecca Fletcher
Victoria Rohac
Dean Morrison McKenzie
M a r k Wo y t i u k
Nadia Niven
Aaron Everingham
N i n a Va r s a v a
Gina Cormier
T h o m a s Tr o f i m u k
Natalie Helberg
Neil Pilger
Angela Facundo
Kevin Christopher
Erika Anguiano
1
3
7
9
13
15
19
20
22
23
24
25
29
30
33
34
35
37
38
th e actu al f acts abou t th is is s u e
elliot kerr
A lot of people, like about six, have been asking me how we choose stuff for blood ink, &
why their cool stor y/poem/thing was not chosen. No one much asks why we did choose
them, apparently it is self-evident somehow, although I take this as a sign that we need to
cultivate more submissions of random nonsense I can publish, which would make the writer
reply, you what?
But basically the answer is, I don’t know why you got rejected. It’s nothing per sonal, I assure
you. We all sit around & pick the stuff we happen to like. Sometimes two shor t pieces beat
a long piece even though we still like it. Sometimes we armwrestle over who should go in,
& any poem or stor y that gets me to represent it is going to lose, sorr y. Influential people
get chosen for their political value not the merit of their wor k, but so far we have received
no shor t stories from Mr. Klein, nor anyone who could even remotely be called powerful,
so far as we know, so this r ule has not yet come into effect. The moral of the stor y is, don’t
take it too seriously, submit again, or write me & complain. But to help the lost & hopeful, I
have compiled a brief synopsis of What We Believe:
✓We believe in the plenary-verbal inspiration of the accepted canon as originally given.
✓We believe the canon is supernaturally inspired, so that it is inerrant in the
original manuscripts, so that it is a divinely authoritative standard
for ever y age & ever y lifestyle.
✓We believe in the spirit, a life of separation from the world, as perfecting for
holiness as an expression of faith.
✓We believe that the true Church of Poetr y is composed of all persons who
are regenerated by the Holy Spirit through the power of the Word.
✓We believe that the establishment & continuance of the local Church is
clearly taught in the canonical works.
✓We believe that the local Church is autonomous & free of any external Authority or Control.
✓We believe in the salvation of sinners by grace, through repentance & faith.
✓We believe in eternal reward for believers & eternal disbelief for unbelievers.
Now, about this issue. These poems & other writings have been arranged ver y carefully in
an intensely meaningful, careful arrangement that took me a lot of time, & has nothing to
do with who my friends are or who I like best. You can discover this secret meaning by
looking carefully at the piece’s context, its diction & any “deep” metaphor s, then calculating
the amount of irony it contains. This will give you a pretty good idea, but the key is to then
read each poem aloud, backwards at 33 1/2 rpm. Here, I’ll star t you off: Maria got to go
fir st, because she wrote a nasty little poem about suicide, & then more about being
trapped, & I wanted it to be next to my introduction, & so you’ll feel so trapped by goodness when you read blood ink that you get to the end & feel like killing your self. Now you
read it backwards & tr y to figure out the connection to Mandie’s poems...
2
Fo un d Wo n der l a n d !
He’s committed
suicide.
Happily, there was
no half-way house.
We can say,
he did it.
He can say,
I’m not sure if
it hurt.
Maybe God won’t
even frown if
we go to the
right church.
Ma#a Chen
3
un ti tl ed
the mendicant spins intricate dreams on my mother’s dusk web telling us he cannot
take our offering of preciously saved sporing potatoes but he can take the offer as we listen to him
say she is not paling but etherealizing like light bending around a crystal bead prism from her
necklace the blue of her snaky veins the red of her baby cheeks the green everywhere like ingrown
grass the orange pulsing all around like blood-in-training straining to be like a free river where we
used to pretend to fish when we were young with the humming aquatic plants playing catch me if
you can catch her if you can catch her if you can
Ma#a Chen
4
un ti tl ed
I like girls
with self-esteem problems who
probe me with questions
make me God
You have to be careful how you pick them: she’ll have left the side door open so you don’t break
in the front which is usually too messy. You offer her a cigarette on the end of an inquisitive
statement and let the reel sit slack when she hesitates.
How (will she?)
reconcile the two sides of her person?
It’s key to moving in for anything more. She’ll leave the cigarette because she’s not that welldisguised and her dancing hair says please, please don’t pass me by.
Some boys like girls
with assets like
round tits and a firm ass
You prepare for everyone else to pair or third off. You don’t let it affect your expressions or the smoothness
of the friendship you offer like grenadine in her fourth drink.
Assets tend to falter as Saturdays wind on
I listen: my friends complain they don’t get as much
I smile
You fucking bastard
they say
She doesn’t always eye the dishes or offer to go dutch on Japanese dinners. She’ll probably bond
with your mother and try to bake cookies for your friends, offering them in the middle of the
overtime. But God, when you say you need her, when you say you need her to, she’ll re-sew the
buttons onto your new shirts again and again.
I like girls
with self-esteem problems who
probe me with questions
make me God
And if her name’s Mary, well hell yeah.
Ma#a Chen
5
Li feti me Vo l un teer
"The moment is not just a passing, empty nothing. Yet -and this is in the way in which these secret
passages happen- yes, it's empty with such fullness that the great moment, the great life, of the
universe is pulsating in it.”
Full of
marriage/marriage/marriage/marriage/marriage/marriage/marriage/marriage/marriage/marriage/ma
rriage/marriage/marriage/marriage/marriage/marriage/marriage/marriage/marriage/marriage/marri
age/marriage/suilliage/marriage/pilliage/marriage/marriage/marriage/carrniage/marriage/marriage/
marriage/hemmarriage/marriage/marriage/marriage/marriage/marriage/sulliage/marriage/marria
geh/geh/geh
marriage//marr
iage (măr’ĭj)
n. n. n. n.
I stumbled in
to the empty home. Tim
h
e
greeted me, the ghost,
t
r
a
s
n
l
c
u e
nt
as winter rain
in the prairies.
Pores
in my trespassing hands breathing in
his tobacco ashes.
Ma#a Chen
6
W h er e i s S h e?
Chelsea Novak
January 19 th , 1934. It’s late. The streets are almost empty and the café I was supposed to meet Leala at closed down hours ago. So where is she?
At first I thought maybe I’d gotten the address wrong, but I pulled the note from
my pocket and sure enough Le Petit Carsac is scribbled in Leala’s handwriting. Right
underneath meet me at 9 o’clock tonight and followed by the address.
But nine o’clock has come and gone and still no Leala. I check my watch: 10:01.
Shove my hand back in my pocket. Damn it’s cold. Not as cold as back home, but still
enough to put frost on your knuckles.
I found the note in Leala’s hotel room. She’d left it on the table. The concierge had
instructions to give me the key.
I had just wrapped up a case when Leala sent a telegraph to my office in Montreal.
In trouble STOP hurry STOP. No word about who she was working for, which studio
they were filming at, just the name of her hotel and the room number. I took the next
train to Halifax and boarded a steamer. Ten days later I finally hit Paris.
Check my watch again: 10:12. I take a look around. Not many people out tonight: a
group of street musicians just packing up, an artist sketching the closed shops, bunch
of youngsters out for a walk.
Last time I saw her she was wearing that little green dress and a gold locket. It was
a gift. A little something to wish her luck with the movie. The woman working the
Bay’s jewelry counter had assured me a girl her age would like it.
The street is empty and I realize it’s been snowing. A street over I can hear somebody’s footsteps: heavy thuds on the cobblestones. A man’s footsteps. Where the hell
is Leala?
She doesn’t speak a word of French, but the director assured her it wouldn’t matter. Assured her the pay was good. And it had been a while since Leala could find a
paying gig. Poor kid.
The footsteps draw closer.
Leala where are you?
The street echoes with the gun shot, but the owner of the footsteps missed. I’m
still standing. I draw my own gun and take cover behind a mail box.
7
A bullet punches through the top of the box, sends ripples through my hair as it
skims my head. I’m shaking. Not with fear, but with anger. This bastard knows where
Leala is.
I close stiff white knuckles over the hilt of my gun, dive out from behind the
mailbox and fire a shot. There’s a sick, squishy thwap as the bullet enters his leg.
He clutches at his injury and starts stumbling backwards. Running away.
I give chase.
He’s moving too slow to stay ahead of me. And then he falls.
I’ve got the bastard now.
What the hell? A car comes careening around the corner, spitting out gunfire. I
take cover and suddenly the street goes quiet.
There’s a clink of something small hitting the ground and then the car roars off,
still spraying bullets. I wait until they’re gone before I come out.
On the ground there’s something small and shiny. I pick it up. It’s cold and sticky.
Smooth and metallic. It’s Leala’s locket and it’s covered in blood.
I pop it open and there’s a note: She’s in the Seine.
8
Pl ayma te You're a loose shoelace
a French nude, a piqued and whistling-hot harlot drawn long in red chalk
a high-stakes, hit-or-miss, mid-morning shakedown
a fleshy sweat-box cover shot
an off-colour wall
My lady, you are lavish as a soap bubble
You are the belly of a hummingbird
the rise and fall, rise and fall
You are
waking
in the middle of the night
for water
I scratch your back
and never have to ask for mine
You're a spritz of citrus
You're honeyed and toothsome
You are, good neighbour,
as inevitable as kindness
Man+e Lopatka
9
Di sea se a s a n O r p h a n a g e
We all wear wooly knee-length skirts the color of soot,
stiff and prissy snow white collared shirts over sports bras and full panties.
We all wear the same size leggings to keep our stems looking slender
We are allowed soft pink elastics for our hair
but I cut mine short with my pocket knife,
since removed and put in a big brown envelope with my name on it, the day I arrived.
Of the ladies who wear pens and whistles around their necks, I like the one who wears
long earrings that ring like windchimes and smells like tea. She says we all look the same
so it’s fair for all of us.
We play basketball in yard in black leather Mary Janes with shiny patent straps and toes
incase the mothers and fathers come and like nice shoes. At the beginning of the tourney
against the boys on Sunday, I didn’t feel like playing so I sat to have a rest to feel the concrete and the white lines of painted concrete and how different they feel and they threw
the basketball at me hard as they could ‘till I got off the court.
Before bed I go to the gate and wrap my hands around the bars and twist ‘till my palms
are orange and red with rust and think of my mother who would twist my hair in loose
knots and talk with the other mothers before dance lessons while I put my fists in my
slippers and hit them on the floor like they were stomping feet.
I think of my mother and rows of trees with mists of hore frost, bear bright yellow flowers thick like canola fields.
I think of my mother and like her all the same breastless or with cancer in her bones.
I think of my mother, hold onto the gate, stretch my arms, swing my body in a dip – I’m
dancing the fandango with a rose in my mouth - except I’m biting the iron and picking
the lock at the entrance of the institution my mom wanted to build when she was young
before I grew in her belly and grew in her home where she would serve me love and I
would eat it.
We all wear the same vague corduroy jacket fastened with a dainty silver chain. We display
the same manners, hold the same posture. We’ve read the same books. We tell the same
stories. Our mothers are there in the lobby looking at pictures of us on a wall, crying they
can’t tell us apart.
Our eyes burnt out and aphotic from wanting them.
Man+e Lopatka
10
Johnny Cash Never Had a Friend Like You
Man+e Lopatka
Johnny Cash never had a friend like you
and if he did,
he'd a sang more like Buddy Holly
and danced more like Elvis
than Johnny Cash
We are like two pine tree air-fresheners
dangling from the emergency break
one old
and one new
Johnny Cash never had a friend like you
and if he had, he'd of quit smoking,
tidied his hotel rooms
worn tan polo shirts
and kissed like a minister
he'd a settled down with a good woman to make babies
instead a writin' songs
Now I'm certain that Johnny Cash never had a friend like you
because friend of John's woulda known that good people get
into some bad things
and that you can't even call em bad things
they're just life things, and these things gonna keep happenin'
if you got any kinda life worth living
and you can't go around blamin' people
shamin' people
for these things because you know that in your closet, in your bottom
drawer,
in your sock, in your shoe, sewn in your lapel
you got such things
such awful unpleasant things with big bug eyes and long wet tongues
so you're better-off to get your self acquainted
tip your hat to ‘em
rub their bellies and scratch ‘em behind the ear
keep ‘em cool
the best you can
Love other people and their foreseeable things
if you ever want anyone
to love you
Yes, yes, that's right Johnny Cash never had a friend like you
Johnny's friend would of felt his own faintness, his own appetites
folding up Johnny's sweat-soaked bed
Johnny's friend woulda said that you can't help anyone
without understandin' em first
11
and he'd take a pill from the bottle in John's coat pocket
to see what it would do
Johnny Cash had a better friend
than a friend like you
A friend like you would roll the sheets with only fingertips, stiff and
first-class pinkies
tip the water glass from the bedside
and leave me to think
of wasted time and new rhymes
to put in my notebook
You are to me
what a spoiled tomato is to showbusiness
a bloodletting
in rhinestone pants
Now when John spread his hand he kept to himself what he got
otherwise what's the damn point in playin' the game
and a friend of John's coulda guessed John's last card
because he was payin' attention
and that's what good friends do
and he'd a known that anybody but John would lose with that card
and he let 'em play it
because he's not Johnny Cash
and he gets a real buzz out of watching him win
and that's what good friends do
Johnny Cash had a good friend,
he never had a friend like you
We are the grit and the rocks in the wind
We hit like fast-flying bugs
caught in the most uncomfortable of places
in your open mouth, in your ear,
the well of your eye
Tell me, do I look like I lost my best friend?
Tell me what I look like.
Do I look like you?
I sold my guitar for this empire of dirt?
My sweetest friend,
Remember how you cried with me?
you have let me down, you have let me down
God save you You don't even hurt?
I suppose this is the way the free
and modern world ends,
not with a friend,
but with a wail and a country song
12
T h e Tr uth
K Hea&
I am plagued by a block. Completely without the spark that may kindle some grand
adventure or epic literary diversion. All that I am left with are the horrible truths of
my life.
I wish that people will die. Not ones who I dislike or even hate, but ones I know and
love. The deplorable truth is that death most greatly affects and brings sympathy
upon the survivors. It is a sympathy that I crave. Some misaligned logic tells me that
if someone dies, everything will get better for me. The best friend who I hate will
stop making me completely miserable with my life. I will have an excuse to just sleep,
and sit, and be alone with thoughts. My eating habits can cease for a reason and
maybe these fifteen pounds I'm carrying like the world on my shoulders will melt
away. To answer your question now, I am not fat. Not even close at 130 pounds. But
I just can’t stand that I don’t look perfect naked. This, however, is not my only reason.
I want to become anorexic. I am jealous of those who are able to drop food out of
their lives and starve themselves to thinness. This is not a disease, it is an amazing
display of self discipline. Each time boredom overtakes me I pile food into my mouth
that provides no emotional comfort or mental stimulation. How could food be so
powerful? What do I want from it? I have no excuse to give up so easily on losing
weight. My fifteen pound goal is a fraction of what many truly overweight individuals
set for themselves. It can only be described as a lack of self discipline. After each
snack a voice says: “that was the last one before the great starvation truly begins!” An
hour later I will be watching TV, spooning peanut butter into my mouth.
I am sickly trapped inside my own head. This internal dialogue is relentless. When I
was young I believed that upon my death, the complete narration of my life would
flow from my head like ticker tape for the entire world to read and become fascinated
with. I told my story thoroughly. Now, I scathingly relate the story to myself as it
unravels. Often boring, never satisfied with itself. I have come to believe that the
13
world has run out of truly interesting times and places to live in. When I was younger
I wished so badly that I could wake up in ancient Greece, or Elizabethan England.
Anywhere would beat the tired monotony of this century where life drags on like the
second hand of a clock that may never venture from its circular pattern. I would be
lying if I said I didn't still wish to wake up in those places. I wish I could call this depression. It is a much more glamorous affliction. I am bored. With my life, and everyone else's. The idea that writing about boredom has just excited me only attests to
how sad my life is.
I can say that I am loved and cared for. So what? A parent who loves their child is
simply doing their duty. It is hardly a compliment to be loved by those who created
you. We don't even know if they do love us. Meet me and then fall in love with me,
perhaps this would be a compliment if “LOVE” existed, but it would be flattering at
the least. We don't know what a single person ever truly thinks. Not once in our entire lives will we be completely sure that the emotions another human relates to us are
true. We are deceptive by nature. We are sinners by design. Whoever devised the idea
of a moral code, religious commandments or otherwise, was intent on chaining a human's true desires. It has become painfully obvious to me at the age of eighteen that
people always do what makes them feel good. Martyrs are the most offensive people
of all, because they are trying to trick us into believing that they aren't following their
own wants and desires. A martyr is not a selfless humanitarian, but rather the type of
person who needs to feel superior. The idea of "being the bigger person" only exists
inside the minds of those who gain selfish pleasure in being branded that "bigger"
person. Whatever they are giving up to attain this title is worth it to them. They are
as selfish as the rest of us, and noticeably more deceitful.
I lie. All the time. I’ve got a range from “small and insignificant” to out and out
LIES that tell stories of which not a word is true. I think its okay though, because
nobody knows me. Nobody knows you either. We’ve been wearing masks our entire
lives and creating false personas to go with them. Even in these truths, it is impossible that I have fabricated nothing. Sorry, because this time I tried not to.
14
like a dream where it just feels
like endless falling
your
face
but someone else’s back and in my panicked dreams
you melded were one /
to run my hands over
the body is a temple the body is a temple the body is a temple for Christ
say it over over over over over over ∞
and eventually it seems that Christ has been burned up
by what I seemed to need to contain what did I have /
I thought maybe dignity
so no temples my body has to be a nuclear shelter
the kind where if a bomb goes off inside
the outside is safe and nothing is inside but
238 U + 1 n explosion 90 Sr + 143 Xe + 3 1 n + energy and over over over over over over ∞ /
energy is matter is energy I remember that
do change me over
and sanctity illusory /
black and white photograph
why is that guitar placed where it is just let me touch you
not you though the face changes to yours
and remains as unseeing as if it still looked away
maybe things would be better if I lit the whole world on fire
and burned myself as a heretic /
my flames, not my hands running smoothly over what really is
your
body
Rebecca Fletcher
15
M o th er ’s Day
Having decided this town is no longer my home,
coming back makes it real.
We stopped at Weskatineau
-- restaurant on the highway for brunch
[disgruntled me]
irritated, not ashamed
(as is usual)
at going out with my grandparents
and no buffer.
I do not like to be touched
without invitation.
And a grandmother’s hands should
never leave uncomfortable ripples
on my skin - this eternity of unpleasantry.
I look at the other people
and nausea rises,
my civilized arrogance, calm
[confidence shaking]
Don’t they see tv?
Why are they dressed like that?
Twenty years behind,
overweight, messed up hair [I smooth mine]
and sweat-stained ball caps.
For a moment I stop mourning
my life and consider how close I was
to this fate,
this terrible destiny of being forever surrounded
by people too careless to fit clothes
or look in a mirror.
I shudder at what could have been me
and then at my own thoughts,
making myself better, unable to sort
out this overwhelming fear and revulsion
for these other human beings –
my respect gone.
16
I decided they have the wrong priorities,
or no ambitions –
and if this life, seemingly so senseless,
with no marks of refinement, culture,
or clean chairs is what they want,
well, fine, but I was close to this:
close and tied to it and it is
not for me, oh no, I want to be
around people willing to consider
things outside their hamlets –
even trivial things like relaxing
the 1980s perms or washing their hats.
Fear, mostly, of limits, invisible
cages that seem chained to every
decision made back home,
back home in Cold Lake, where
I studiously try to avoid my
grandparents, lives so like the simple,
petty livings I fear.
Then standing on a sidewalk,
remembering how Andrea and I
would play here,
inhaling spruce smell,
seeing fresh buds, cold wind
and the immense,
free, free, free lake,
I physically
hurt.
Rebecca Fletcher
17
i n str ea ms, down gutter s
We could turn from our time together
and burn ourselves on pyres
built for past mistakes,
unused until the past fused to
our beings, to platelets in our blood,
potassium in our neurons
You, Heracles, begging someone
– for the love of God and all that is holy! –
to set you on fire,
put you out of your pain
I, Dido, prepared to burn on fuel
refined from forsaken hope,
find the fumes making me
heady enough to reach into spacetime
offer you my hand
invite you up here with me
Turn, take our time together
and burn
friction of our bodies lighting tinder
dripping sweat, wet fuel, smoke
fire hoses set us steaming
rubble washes in streams down gutters
With all derelict constructs gone
I know looking in your eyes
won’t hurt
Rebecca Fletcher
18
Van Diemens's Seedlings
Their Royal Majesties bought this distant land
with blood saved from the tower's block
and shipped our great-great ancestors
half the world around.
Gibbet, axe, bedlam cell,
potter's field and crossroad grave
were robbed of British tenants
by the whip-bristling convoys
of men manacled in stocks.
What furtive whispers in the holds
of prison ship outbound and slave ship home
laid plans for hearth and family
when this long trip is done?
The Por tsmouth dockyard bore the sign
"Van Diemen's Devil's Deathmates All:
Who Boards This Ship, His Fate Is Sealed!"
c
De a n M o r r i s o n M K e n z i e
19
A n ta r cti ca
I still feel wired
And angry
And I think I just had one of the saddest days I’ve ever lived
And now I’m here.
I guess it’s not so hard to get through these days
But –
It’s more like
I am recognizing that these moments are passing me
And I just keep getting further and further away from
The way things were before
Before things got all screwed up
And tied together.
Before there were oceans between us.
You are Greenland
And I am Antarctica
And I’m freezing in the snow
And you’re on some glacier
And somehow I’m still thinking about you
Even though now I feel like an ice queen
There are oceans between us
And I’m heaving myself
Trying to move this land mass
This body
I am tired of penguins and snow petrels
I am tired of the cold
You are like the sun on a cool autumn day when it feels crisp in the mornings
And then you break through the clouds and
Feed everyone’s skin
I have forgotten what it feels like to
Be warm
To be soothed
And held in that moment of pure suspension
When I look up to the sky and feel you there
Feeding me
In my dreams
Where Greenland and Antarctica meet.
Victoria Rohac
20
Fur y
there is fever in me
deeper than the rivers
the oceans.
it's seeping through every pore
forcing my sweat onto concrete
forcing my lungs onto ribcage
forcing me to squint
and struggle.
the gentle coo of pigeons
is lulling me into
this sun setting
their greasy feathers
glaring upward.
i can't seem to get past this point
i can't seem to get past this.
it's like i'm
breathing in sand caught in the quick of it.
if i could just pack up my books and pens
and get out of the foreground,
i could stop for a minute
and remember the softness of petals;
the sultry new moon;
the feeling of skin - on skin.
i could remember the settled feeling
of you and me in this place
when i could feel the waters of my heart
in every artery and vein.
if i could just
walk myself numb of this
maybe walk myself over to your place
to show you
show you that this is me...
I'm still here.
and there is a fire;
there is a fire in me. Victoria Rohac
21
T h e La st o f th e M o der n Ro ma n ti cs
A d mi ts th a t No th i n g i s Rema r ka b l e
Mark Woytiuk
I internalized her so completely that tearing her from my thoughts was like removing
an organ buried beneath layers of flesh, an organ sinewed on all sides to soft-tissue
that tore like paper as elegant, glistening tools turned bloody and clumsy by desperation sever the atrophied muscle. Yes, I’m well aware that this romantic dependency is
passé. It’s no longer permitted in the arena of flippant eroticism. We live in decadent
times; the richest civilization ever to methodically and scientifically plunder the resources of this earth. The world trained me to ignore idiosyncrasies, to erase those
attributes that make it harder to deal with myself. But we retain our most poetic qualities. We make irrational decisions like jetting across the ocean for the sake of a touch
that never materializes, and then we’re left in a limbo of longing and discontent for
eternity. These are the incontrovertible clichés of emotion that bind us to the rich
tapestry of human experience. I’m lame. You’re lame. Why aren’t more people more
lame? Why can’t I feel like Dostoyevsky after his redemption in front of the firing
squad. It’s rumored that he felt something inside him snap like a torn Achilles tendon.
Oh, that’s right, talking about Dostoyevsky is lame.
There was a mountain climber once, a young, arrogant mountain climber who attempted to scale a remote and treacherous peak in the Andes. His arrogance remained
intact until he had reached the summit and begun his descent. Thirty meters from the
peak, he fell and snapped his left leg mid-thigh. The injury meant certain death but
the climber, maybe as a result of his arrogance or out of pure desperation, began to
crawl down the mountain to the camp where he knew he could find help. It took him
three days to descend and crawl across the glacier through the snow then through the
field of sharp boulders and shale. He was racked by thirst and had only snow to eat.
The pain in his leg was excruciating. Every movement sent shocks of terror sounding
up his spine. He arrived at the camp delirious in the middle of the night to find it
abandoned. As he lay in the darkness he thought that he heard something inside him
snap. It was the sound of disappointment; the kind of disappointment that we are
supposed to just absorb as if we could continue on without breaking stride after our
Achilles heal is severed by elegant, glistening surgical tools turned bloody and clumsy.
That climber dies but the story is so lame. You should all ignore it because I don’t
have any scars or broken legs or torn tendons to mark my trauma. I only feel like a
corpse buried in the snow in a desolate valley in the Andes. I wake up every morning
and with the civility of a sitcom say hello to the mailman. I boil coffee on the stove
and I’ve become comfortable pretending everything is unremarkable.
22
Local Woman Perturbed By Email
EDMONTON,
A B —E v e r
si n ce Ro ss
Sheppard schoolteacher mour him, but that ThursMariel Motlaq received a day evening, after listening
desperate plea for help to the sultry new male
early Monday afternoon, voice announce ‘University
she has felt perturbed. Her Station’, I felt impelled to
timorous lover, local philo- declare our love openly!
phobic Mr. R.B. Senthil, We talked about it afteremailed Motlaq at two- wards and I assured him,
forty-five PM beseeching upon closer inspection,
her to telephone him, as he that none of our acquaint a n c e
was
“too
[Senthil] simply w e r e
afraid” to call
her himself.
abhors public demon- present,
Upon first strations of affection a n d
hardly
reading the
and
I
usually
humour
anyone
email, Motlaq
reports feeling him, but that Thurs- heard the
“dismayed and day evening, after s o u n d
concerned” by listening to the sultry a b o v e
the message: new male voice an- t h e
rhythmic
“I was worried
that perhaps nounce ‘University g r a t i n g
dear ‘Arby’ (our Station’, I felt im- of the
little joke, ha pelled to declare our t r a i n
wheels.”
ha)
w a s love openly!
Motlaq
alarmed by my
states
behaviour on
that
she
had
completely
our last date”. When asked
to elaborate, Motlaq ex- forgotten her ardent beplained that the date took haviour until “it all came
place over cell-phone, and back in a sudden rush” that
that “while dear Arby was fateful Monday afternoon.
ensconced in his tepid “Mariel didn’t read that
bath”, she had been riding email until half-past three”,
the LRT [Light Rail Tran- testifies fellow teacher
sit] where, she hints, she Janice Engels. “She was so
unabashedly blew two bla- upset, she couldn’t go to
tantly public butterfly her four o’clock pilates
kisses into the telephone. class. I don’t think much
Apparently Senthil was of this Senta guy anyways.
quite discomfited at the They met in the canned
foods aisle of the Downtime.
town Save-On, you know
“Arby simply abhors the one on 109th and Jaspublic demonstrations of per?…supposedly a great
affection and I usually hu- place to meet people”,
Engels sighed. “Anyways,
he dropped his can of
pickled asparagus on her
foot. I think he did it on
purpose but Mariel insists
it was only an accident—‘you should have
seen him’, she says to me,
‘his hand was sweating so
much from nervousness,
the can slipped right out.’ I
tell her that anyone who’s
that nervous in a Save-On
is just not ready for a
steady relationship.”
By four-twenty-two PM
that afternoon, less than
one hour after first reading
Senthil’s letter, Motlaq recovered enough to re-read
it. She realized with pity
and “a strange wrenching
sensation” that his email
was emblematic of their
relationship as a whole,
and that it was time for her
to move on.
“He couldn’t bring himself to give”, Motlaq admits sadly. “I don’t know
what it is, but sometimes
he seemed so—so distant,
and I felt like every step I
took towards him, he took
one step back. He’s so
emotionally unavailable
that even the prospect of
phoning me frightened
him!”
When pushed,
Motlaq conceded that she
sometimes felt nervous
about telephoning her
erstwhile lover, but the
feeling “always faded in the
warm glow of the dialtone”.
23
When asked
about her
plans for the
future, Motlaq said that she
would not give up on the
Save-On-Foods location,
but that she would
“probably look for men in
the pasta aisle”, as “there’s
a higher chance of finding
well-rounded men there.”
As for the immediate future, Motlaq plans to
drown her sorrow in a cup
of chai latté with her coworker Engels. Motlaq sincerely hopes that her exlover will learn how to
“communicate vulnerably
and intimately”, but she
concludes that it is better
for both of them to be
single for a while.
Unfortunately, Senthil
could not be reached for
comment.
*
Budding Energy Psychologists please refer to
http://www.phobia-fear-re
lease.com/philophobia.ht
ml
Capitalize on the widespread
fear of falling in love while you
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This News Report is brought
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Na+a Niven
wi n dows wi l l
innocuous window consciously unrolling
her tenuous glass panes through
sapphire silhouettes and sanguine hues of
cellophane starlight in tonight's ever-bright
eyes wonder what shadow slithers menacingly
in this meditative machination
this mercurial festivity
flashing eye-white winterish wildflowers
woven in the wild-nest hair of wounded weapons
while await the women of mythic hearts
and gardenia fate
slicing the faint light with searing flights of force
+
clutching cobras and claw like legions
of carrion crawling crows with
onyx beaks fixed on the fragile ankles of
exhaling garden flowers
swarm with
shrieking thistle winds
+
whispering mythic heartbeats
wrapped in winter windows
undulating wearily
at obtuse angles in diamond like diagonals
dissecting the doomed horizon
rendered helpless in lugubrious lunar blood shades
while heaven bound bubbles
of sapling gasps like baby burps
bounce on nothing bellies
higher and higher toward the gargling swirl sky
sprawling endlessly across the earth
while heaven bound breaths
round cloud bottoms
and wind their way through windows
in the atmospheres of will
Aaron Eve#ngham
24
Ta ke I t Dee p
Nina Varsava
You follow your boyfriend down to his room and curl up into a ball on his couch. He opens
his closet and kneels beside the stacks of porn. You watch him run his fingers over the titles:
Cheerleader Sandwich, Anal Violation, Nasty Black Amateurs, The Little Girl Next Door. . . You
wish he’d just hurry up and pick something—anything.
He finally pulls one out.
“How does Barely Legal Whores sound?” he asks.
Oh God, you think, does he have some fixation on young chicks? Is that why he went
for you? Cause he wanted to fuck a “barely legal whore” like the men in his videos?
Paranoia. Calm down. He’s a good guy. You’ve already been with him for over a
month and he hasn’t been pushy about sex. Although he’s been having it for years, he understood when you wanted to wait. Tonight you told him that you were ready. And you agreed
that it would be fun to start the night off with some porn.
“I’ll take that as a yes?”
“Umm ya, sorry,” I was kind of zoned out. But ya, that sounds fine.”
You’ve never watched porn before. But all your guy friends love it, and some of your
girl friends even admit to indulging in it from time to time. Besides, you’re in a new relationship and don’t want to draw attention to your innocence: he’s 23 and you just turned 18, so
you have a lot of catching up to do. Obviously, porn’s no big deal. It’s really time to see what
you’ve been missing out on.
He was totally thrilled when you said you’d watch porn with him. He went on about
what a cool girlfriend you were: “I thought you might think I was dirty or something. Some
girls are just so uptight,” he explained. “They either refuse to even try it because they’re
afraid, or they watch it and then pretend to be grossed out. I mean, get over it. Anyways,
you’re not like that. I know you’ll love it!”
You’re reassured. You’ve always been open to new things. Why stop at sex?
He pops in the DVD and cuddles up beside you. He’s trying desperately to hide his excitement, but his impish little grin gives him away. You giggle and he turns to you with big, unassuming eyes: “What?” God he’s adorable. “Nothing, you’re just really cute, that’s all.” You
kiss his forehead, and his grin gives way to a smile that stretches across his whole face. He
picks up the remote and pushes play. Your heart speeds up. You feel silly being nervous and
you squeeze his hand so he won’t feel you shaking.
A girl sits on a bed talking to the camera man. “Wow, you look so young,” he exclaims, “How old are you?” “18,” chirps the petite brunette, kicking her legs that hang over
the edge of the bed. “Just a baby. And this is your first time?” the camera man inquires.
“Yup, my first time for everything.” “Wonderful, can’t wait to get started.”
Moments later, the girl’s naked and whimpering on the bed with two men that look to
be in their late thirties. She’s on her hands and knees. One of the men is thrusting his penis
in and out of her mouth as the other fucks her from behind. “First-timers are tight dude,”
he exclaims. “Oh man, I want in on that,” says the other, “let’s trade.” They flip her over
and spin her around so they can trade orifices. She lifts her head up and begins to say
something, but a cock jams into her mouth and the guy about to enter her vagina tells her to
“Shut the fuck up!” putting his hands around her neck and pinning her to the bed. She starts
to choke and a tear streaks mascara down her face. She squeezes her eyes shut, which turns
25
out to be a big mistake. The guy with his dick in her mouth pries them open with his fingers.
“Look at me you little slut. Let me see your eyes popping out of your head while you gag on
my fat cock. Take it deep. Deeper. That’s it. Good girl. That’s how you blow a man.”
Now the camera switches to the other guy: he spits on her asshole and tells her to
open it wide as he thrusts in his dick. She screams for him to stop and her skin looks as if
it’s going to rip apart. “Oh ya, you like that baby, don’t you? Oh ya,” and he fiercely pumps
in and out, simultaneously ramming his fingers into her vagina. After what seems like hours,
he moves up to her face. “You wanna taste your ass don’t you? Lick my dick clean you filthy
whore.” The other guy yanks on her hair and slaps her across the face with his free hand.
You wince and glance at your boyfriend, but his hungry eyes are fixed on the screen.
“You doin’ okay?” he asks, without turning towards you. “Ya, I’m good.” “Good, you don’t
want to miss this. The cum shot’s always the best part.”
The two men throw the girl off of the bed and tell her to get on her knees. They
viciously jab at her face with their stiff penises. One of them holds her head back and tells
her to keep her mouth open wide. “Wider. Wider, you fucking bitch.” They start to ejaculate
at almost the same time, spraying it all over her face. Cum squirts into one of her eyes,
smothering it with an acidic coat; but knowing she’s not to close them, she stares into the
camera like a stunned deer.
You shudder. Your heart pounds uncontrollably. You want to say something, but
don’t know what. You can’t explain why you feel how you do. It’s just a movie; they’re just
actors; the girl chose to do the porn, and she probably got paid a lot for it. Who are you to
judge anyway? Maybe she loves it. Maybe you’re just too sexually unaware to appreciate
what’s going on. So you don’t say anything. But you can’t face your boyfriend either. You
know he’ll see the terror in your eyes.
“You loving this or what? It’s so much hotter with you here.” You glance over at him
and force a smile. His grin looks different now, almost alien; the screen’s glare bounces off
his face and gives you chills. He leans over to kiss you, but without thinking you dodge his
lips and turn back to the screen. He chuckles. “Fine you porn fiend, I guess I’ll have to wait
till the video’s over. But when it is, you had better be ready for a wild night.”
Four scenes later he warns you that this is the last one. You’re consumed with dread
and repulsion. You’re fighting tears, nausea, trying to think of a way out. But you can’t even
make sense of your thoughts, let alone figure out what to say. You’ll ruin everything. You’ll
be just another one of those boring, uptight girls. Now your earlier anxieties come back: you
wonder if he was so interested in getting to know you because you’re an eighteen year-old
virgin. Because he can’t wait to break-in your tight vagina.
You want to get up and leave. But somehow, it’s too late.
The video ends in a final cum shot where a man ejaculates down a girl’s throat, ordering her to gurgle his juice as he rubs her forehead with his penis.
“So, are you ready to fuck like a porn star?” Your boyfriend takes you into his arms
and lays you on his bed. He can tell you’re nervous, and whispers in your ear not to worry:
he doesn’t expect you to know what you’re doing in bed—that’s his job.
“Just relax and let me drive baby.”
...
So this is your shitty night. I don’t know why you went through with it. You’re a strong girl.
You should’ve left. Anyways, it’s over. You should obviously never watch porn again. You’re
too sensitive for that kind of thing.
26
She is, she’s really sensitive. And known to exaggerate. I knew porn was degrading to
women; that’s why I stayed away from it. But I really couldn’t imagine it being that bad. Why
would so many people get off on it? After hearing her story, I got curious and decided to
have a little porn-fest of my own.
I started at Source Adult Video where I talked to a friendly woman working there.
“This is my first time renting porn,” I told her, “but I’ve heard it’s typically degrading to
women. Is there anything you can recommend that isn’t?” She looked at me with empathetic
eyes and told me that it was pretty much all misogynistic, but that lesbian porn would
probably be my best bet. I admired her honesty, but I couldn’t help wondering why she
worked for a business that she knew thrived on the debasement of her own sex. Weird.
I wanted to look at misogynistic porn anyway; I just didn’t realize I’d have so much to
choose from. I picked up five DVDs, two of which—Teen Tryouts and Young and Natural—I
took from the “Top Rentals” section. Then I browsed the rest of the store and took three
other titles that caught my attention: Teen Meat, Sexy Semen Slurpers, and Young Sluts. There
were many others that I wanted to see—the titles are just so provocative—but I was on a
budget and had to resist.
Admittedly, I picked videos that I thought I’d find particularly objectionable. Porn’s
obsession with “barely legal” girls has always bothered and somewhat confused me, and I
wanted to check out some of these videos. So my sampling was biased, non-random, but I
that doesn’t matter; I’m not pretending to be a scientist. I looked for female degradation in
widely accessible, mainstream porn, and it was not hard to find.
Confronting porn meant allowing a reality that I’m indirectly affected by everyday to
slap me in the face with its own brutal hand. It stung—and it still stings—like hell. Watching
the porn videos made me shake with anger and wince with vicarious pain; a couple times I
even broke down crying. The porn left me with extremely negative feelings towards both
sexes, and with a nauseating impression of human sexuality. The male figures made me want
to hate all men and to never touch another one as long as I lived: I wanted to get them back.
The female figures left me ashamed to be a woman—how could they subject themselves to
such debasement? I felt like I had to somehow make up for their humiliating representation
of my sex.
One thing that really bothers me about porn is its fixation on sexual encounters between young women, or “girls,” as they are usually referred to in the videos, and much older
men. I did intentionally choose porn that advertised the youth of the female actors, but this
type of porn is very common. The younger the girls are, the more excited the men seem to
be. The camera men and the male actors especially hype up the girls’ ages if they’re still
teenagers. The videos also emphasize the purported inexperience of the young females, with
the men telling them exactly what and what not to do.
It’s not the age or experience discrepancy in itself that bothers me, but the extreme
power differential that comes with this discrepancy. The females aren’t guided through sex in
positive ways. Sex is forcefully thrust upon them, and they have no other option but to take
it submissively. If they do try to resist, they’re quickly constrained and often punished by
even more rigorous abuse. The relative smallness and weakness of the females is accentuated, as they are tossed around carelessly by the strong, powerful men. This gives viewers a
very clear message of woman’s role in sex: she is to obey the man/men without question,
submissively catering to his/their every whim. The man’s role is also straight forward: he is
to take control of the situation and use the girl(s) in any and every way he wishes in order to
satisfy his own desires.
27
Porn videos also tend to emphasize the purported innocence and naivety of the female actors. For example, one scene in Teen Meat portrays a girl who apparently sees,
touches, sucks, and finally fucks (vaginal and anal) a penis for the first time. When the
man—who looks to be in his mid-thirties—ejaculates inside her, she starts freaking out that
she’s going to get pregnant. But her calm partner assures her that as long as she squeezes it
all out in his hand she doesn’t have to worry. Of course, she trusts him, and—in an utterly
humiliating scene—the audience is given a close-up shot of cum oozing out of her as she
clenches her muscles with all her might. Not only do scenarios like this potentially perpetrate
dangerous myths, but they also portray young females as ridiculously stupid and gullible,
suggesting that girls will believe anything men tell them. In addition, because the men are
thrilled at the stupidity and ignorance of the females, the videos suggest that these are attractive traits in women.
Another thing about mainstream porn that’s terribly disturbing is its disregard for
female pleasure. The sexual encounters tend to revolve around male pleasure, and the men
rarely ask the women what they want. In a scene in Teen Tryouts, for example, the woman
starts to rub her clitoris with her fingers as the man penetrates her vagina. This pleases me,
offers me a flash of hope: the female is actually doing something of her own accord and obviously for her own pleasure’s sake. But the man she is with clearly doesn’t like this idea and
immediately tells her to shove her fingers in her ass. She does for a moment, but soon tries
to take them out. He orders her to keep them there: “Stay baby, stay. Good.” I was enraged!
He won’t even allow her the freedom of one of her hands, and forces her to touch herself in
ways that she clearly doesn’t enjoy.
The majority of pornographic scenes culminate on the renowned “cum shot,” which
typically involves one or more men ejaculating all over the face(s) of one or more women.
Although I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that some women love having their faces covered
in cum, I think it’s safe to believe that many don’t. This final act of humiliation and belittling
of women in pornography puts an exclamation mark on the debasement of the female sex
that’s accomplished in the scenes. The audience can rarely tell if the women come, but my
impression is that they typically don’t. That porn scenes consistently end in the male orgasm
is extremely telling of the ideas that that porn disseminates: female pleasure is largely irrelevant and is only desirable in so far as it helps further male pleasure. And, accordingly,
whether or not women reach orgasm is only tangential to the ultimate goal of the sexual
encounter, which is the male orgasm.
I’m not against the idea of pornography in general. In fact, I’d love to see it thrive in
a female-friendly form. Not only do I find it overwhelmingly disturbing how many people—the majority of them men—enjoy female-debasing material, but I also find it frustrating and unfair that it’s so much more difficult for someone like me—who doesn’t get off on
female subjugation—to find satisfying porn. I think that if pornography is done in ways that
projects sexuality through a lens of gender equality, portraying pleasure equally for both
sexes, then it can also produce pleasure equally for both sexes and promote positive notions of
sexuality.
As it is, though, mainstream porn is sick with misogyny. And I can’t get the mess of it out of
my head.
...
It’s all your fault. Why did you have to tell me your fucked-up story? Because you knew I’d go
see for myself ? Because you wanted me to share in your nightmares of screaming cock and
endless balls?
She’s like that, she really is. But then I guess, so am I.
28
Gh a z a l fo r E ug en e
The young boy’s stor y is not poetic?
But it quivers in the air like a snowflake
His life is a sad poem about snow
Mobile yet frozen at the same time—how can he be both?
Drifting along ditches between street and walkway
My brother is so pale the air just blows him away
Layers coat the g round, floating as if weightless
White cement layers in a guise of innocence
Vacant, wild recidivist wondering where he’s been
With only a tired and unnamed judge to answer him
He’ll wander, tumbling fur ther into the tur moil prisons
Until a sun begins to melt the mind petrified within him
Gina Cormier
29
S h e gives yo u th i s b o o k
Domas Trofimuk
Perhaps she gives you the idea of a book. The gift of a book, real or imagined —the possibility
that you might read it, and find value in it—is a dangerous thing. The giver, a potential lover, will permeate the read. She will be there in the words and sentences and chapters. And you will not be able to
extricate her from the narrative, no matter how compelling the story. She will be there in the beauty of
the words, in the cadence and flow of this narrative—she will become a silent character, standing in
white lingerie at the edge of your read, taunting you, colouring this new reality with herself. Foggy
traces of her feet on the hardwood floor. And you might look down as you reach for your drink and
see two narrow fading imprints. Wonder: What the hell?
This gift of a book will become part of a lovers’ geography, a testament of desire—the pages
transformed into shivering, goose-bumped skin, nipples, and lips, musty scents of cinnamon, sweat,
patchouli, warming pine, her need, and yours. Her name will be exotic, but not too bizarre. Chloe?
Mechtild? Hope? Muriel? Mallory? Jakoba? Drifa? Drifa is an Old Icelandic name that might mean
driven snow. You stumble upon it on-line, by accident.
And just the thought of her name will send all your visceral elements into short-circuit. You’ll lose
focus—not a pretty thing while cutting a zucchini with a sharp knife. Oh, you’ll try to block her out
because you know there’s a ‘best-before’ date-stamp on everything you become with her. You try to be
normal, carry on with your life. But she is distraction.
“what did you do?” Drifa might ask.
“oh, I’m a mediator. I find middles and call it win-win.”
“no,” she says pointing. “that. what did you do?”
“oh, nothing. it’s nothing.” I can’t function when I think of you, you want to say. But
why? She already knows. “when I hear your voice…I,…”
“…are you being romantic?” she says.
“not on purpose. but I am trying to look wounded in an attempt to appeal to everything that is maternal in you.”
That smile again. Indescribable really. So much of it occurs before the teeth. The lips and mouth
in phases and then the eyes, and then lines at the edges of the eyes.
All this, even if the book is just a recommendation: “you should read this book,” she might say,
smiling, looking over the top edges of her glasses, demure. “there’s a character in there that reminds
me of you.” Or perhaps, she’ll blurt: “read this. just read it. it’s very good.” And when you find the
book, you’re convinced there’s a message in it, from her. It’s the foolhardy inference that she wants to
let you in where she is—that she wants to share this hidden world with just you.
And because you want to devour her, you devour her recommendation, looking for clues of her
want. But Drifa Mcfayden is married. She meets with you when she can. Her life sectioned into lies
and half-lies. Her time portioned into truths and half-truths, and the occasional quarter-truth. Her life
positioned to collapse or to move forward into the uncharted—a woman skating on a frozen river, the
ice snake-like under a full, silver moon—ice-crystals suspended in the air. And moonlight cuts a few
dozen swathes through the Venetian blinds into your flat.
There’s a knock on your door. She got past the security system to stand there in your hallway.
Who the hell buzzed her in? She found your address. She must have figured out your full name. She’s
carrying a canvas bag. You can’t help but notice her shoes. Not shoes. But rather pointy toed knee-high
boots that look like they’re a pain in the ass to lace up. She’s wearing a grey hat—a Pork Pie hat and the
way it sits just above her eyebrows gives her an odd panache.
30
“are you just going to gawk at me or will you invite me in?”
You offer to help her with her coat, a black trench that hangs to her ankles. And when she is inside she moves directly to the bookshelves and stands for quite a while, her head tilted awkwardly to
the side so she can read the spines. She leaves you holding her coat. She leaves you at the door with the
scent of her perfume swirling. You might offer her a glass of wine. She’ll take the glass stem between
her fingers. She’ll cup the bowl like a loosely held softball. She ignores you, really. She mutters and sips
her wine. “oh, my. it was a loss when she died.” Or, “this one, I didn’t want to end.” You might play
some music, not too loudly, something by Bach. You love Angela Hewitt’s Bach arrangements, but
skip over the Sinfonia in D major; it’s a bit too raucous, doesn’t really fit with the rest of this disk.
You’d love to say something—explain why you’re skipping the first track—but you’re willing to surrender to this silence and let Drifa be. You sit with your wine and watch her as she moves up and
down and across your shelves. Apparently, books are important to her. Perhaps she’s seeking the middle ground—common touchstones. She’s mediating two lives—which books has he read? Which
books are crossovers? Of course, there is no way to discern which books you’ve read—which books
are just lined up, waiting to be read—which books will likely never be read. And even if you’ve read
every single book, there is no gauge of comprehension. Again, you’d love to explain that you’ve not
read the entire Koran but rather, only sections. Or that Cat’s Cradle is a first edition. Or that Huckleberry Finn is in your top three—one of your absolute favourites. Bookshelves are layered mysteries.
But Drifa continues to carve out a literary landscape. It doesn’t feel like judging. It’s more like desperate
fact-finding. As if time is precious and she does not want to waste it accidentally stumbling into books
you’ve both read—rather, she wants that knowledge immediately. No time to waste.
Do you stop to ask yourself the sensible questions? Is this love? Lust? A simple dalliance? How
easily can she leave the lawyer? How easily could she leave you? What’s she doing? Does it matter what
her intension is? Maybe the only wise course is to pay attention to the moments. Stop thinking altogether.
Perhaps you are only a character in a book about you and Drifa. Drifa is a disaffected, unhappy
and torn, married woman who desperately needs to be distracted out of her rut, and falls into the first
man who shows any interest in the very strange book she might be reading. “Wednesday morning,
about 10:30 a.m., in between the third and eleventh floors…” the book will begin, “…a voice interrupts Drifa’s reverie. She looks up from her book and sees an enormous cockroach.” No, no. No,
that’s a different story—already written. She just looks up from her book. And the book she’s reading
is about a disaffected and sad woman who is bored with her perfect marriage—a woman who needs a
shot of adrenaline in her butt to feel like she’s in her own life again—a woman who meets a man on
an elevator, who says something, and she looks up from her book…and the book she’s reading is
about a lost woman who is interrupted by a man on an elevator. A mirror within a mirror.
What role do you play in this imaginary book? Do you think about what you’re doing? Is there
guilt? Do you care about the un-named lawyer? He’s a guy, just like you, in the struggle to be happy.
And maybe he’s been tempted by a continual parade of sexy legal aids, but he’s declined because he
loves his wife, because those vows meant something to him. But he could be a workaholic jerk who’s
looking to trade in the old model for a new, younger, perky breasted trophy wife. Yes, you can live with
this cliché. It’s easy. Uncomplicated. There are clear lines between good and evil. The lawyer wears the
black cowboy hat of greed, and avarice, and maybe even corruption. You and Drifa wear white cowboy hats of justified righteous—this is a correction of wrong. There’s an obtuse justice to this version
of reality. And nobody gets hurt.
Are you just stupidly in love with an unattainable woman? You are ravenous for the nuances of
her. You want to consume the details of her life with such force that you will never forget. How does
she get dressed? Where does she shave? What are her secrets? How does she brush her teeth? What
kind of shoes does she love?
31
Listen, once you’ve finished reading the book it will become something sacred—you’ll not be able
to give it away, loan it out, or sell it…it will always remind you of her. It’s where you met. Oh, it could
be Russell Hoban’s Riddley Walker. Maybe it’s a particularly tattered edition of Calvino’s Invisible Cities.
Could it be that Drifa is going to give you a copy of Ondaatje’s In the Skin of a Lion? It doesn’t really
matter what the book is. It could be Green Eggs and Ham and you would be smitten, caught.
Even if she goes back to her husband, the dick-wad lawyer who drives the BMW. Even if she
changes the patterns of her life so that you two are never on the same elevator again. And even if she
doesn’t acknowledge you at cancer fundraisers, at Delta hotels, on Thursday nights. Even if all this
happens, you’ll still have the memory of her in your arms, of her moans, and scents, and movements—fragmented pictures of your loving. Even if she is back with the BMW lawyer who wears
suits that cost more than your car, you will have had those dream-like lusty nights where you became
lost in desire and ruined by pleasure, with her.
A memory. Ha. A memory is not the same as a fleshy union. Not the same as a warm body to
hang onto in the middle of the night. What good is a memory at 3:14 a.m. when reruns of Magnum P.
I. are playing on the TV.
It is of little consequence that Drifa is back with the dick-ass lawyer, living in the big house with
the swimming pool, hot tub, TV in the fridge, and quadruple garage. She made a haven of your flat.
Bolts of sheer blue fabric across windows—a dozen candles, champagne, and gin—and of course,
her, moving her naked body through your space, making her elongated Matisse shadows across walls.
Dancing in the kitchen while she waits for the croissants in the oven. Curling up with you, wrapped in
the down-sleeping bag, on the deck, just looking at the sky and river valley, talking about books.
“is it any good?” you say as you move economically to press G. You hate elevators. Mercifully,
there is no music on this one—no attempt at a dumbed-down, lowest common denominator Celine
Dion mush. You inhale her scent, earthy and sweet, a woman’s smell. Not cute. Not precious. It’s
steady and sure and makes you want more. This scent creates a mystery and there is a profound absence of mystery in human relations these days. You’ve seen her before. Her ride to the 11th floor
often coincides with your journey to the 20th.
“yes, it is.”
“good,” you say, an idiotic, potential conversation ender.
She looks up and really takes you in. She smiles innocence. Her smile migrates to a
sort-of bewildered astonishment. “you might like this book actually.”
“why do you say that?”
“oh, I don’t know. just a guess. or a hope.”
“who’s it by?”
“actually, you should have this. I’ve already read it once.”
“but I can buy…”
“…no. no, you can’t.” She thrusts it toward you. You cannot help but touch her hand as she
passes you the book. And then you are sitting across from her at Café Demitasse, enjoying your second glass of red, but enjoying the timbre of her voice and the elm-filtered sunlight across her face,
much more than the wine. Three hours later, she reaches across the table and touches your hand, stays
touching, continues touching. And in the morning, you watch as she does that thing that some women
do when they put on their bras—the fastening and then turning and tucking the liquid weight of
breasts, and then the shoulder straps—and it would take a medium-sized miracle to get the hook out
of your mouth.
And at the end of all this, you will, of course, still have the goddamned book.
32
Pristine we fail to be Over-lived
Mud and snow crumb
butter into sugar
cars make cobbler
on the road
families are heading home.
In the country
Christmas is a red apple
for a winter mare
who (bloated on oats)
stumbles and collapses
like velvet onto every hill.
Natalie Helberg
33
01/14/2006
The father of a friend
bumps into my dream
and kisses my forehead
His soul is already
meandering in ambiguity
[Everything will be alright.]
Remembered,
Woke up.
Thought about time flying away from God-hands
Safeway bags with rocks fluttering in wind
blown from the mouths of monsters in children’s books
not stopping till the story ends
late to the funeral
from the back pew
watching a pastor roll out red carpet tongues with stories about the afterlife.
then swallows, and the lady with pink eyes crinkles a Kleenex package
swimming in sounds of
blown noses and wiped away tears that distract me from
crying.
Unlike everybody else,
all I feel is guilt for being late.
Neil PilGr
34
Ra ce Tr a ces
Angela Facundo
I was white until the age of seven. In light of such realization, I consoled myself with the conviction that my hands were never that dark. The gradation tone from
the palm to the back of my hand was not as stark as those belonging to other people
of my heritage. One can see this degree of gradation most clearly on the sides of
one’s fingers. When I was a child I looked at my hands a lot, and I liked them the best
during the winter.
Having been raised in Canada, I believed my cultural alienation from my familial background to be natural. As a Canadian, I was proud of my shame: one rung
higher than those immigrant nannies who clean your toilets and raise your children,
and who speak an improper English contaminated with accents of a vulgar tongue. I
am what you would call a poor representative of my subspecies and a diluted contributer to multiculturalism for my country. Needless to say, the feeling I experienced in
visiting my exotic homeland for the first time four years ago was one of discomfort
and disgust.
What I first noticed was the smell. Do they smell like this? This ubiquitous
wet-towel smell, I soon discovered, did not result from the economic use of soap but
rather from damp crowds of sweaty bodies that unavoidably comprised the population
of Manila. Driving in from the airport to the urban core, I received welcome from
towers of billboards, stacked vertically as if forming façades for skyscrapers. On
those billboards I saw Alicia Silverstone, Tommy Hilfiger models, and other white
gods. The billboards seemed to stand oppressively upon rows of dilapidated shanties,
whose roofs had broken ladders for pillars; whose walls were half immersed in brown
rainwater; and whose inhabitants constituted the labour force that ultimately kept their
employers’ billboards erect. Everything suffocated beneath a grey suspension of soot
and gas; the advertisements, however, managed to stay completely clean. It is as if the
advertisements emitted and absorbed all the light that the surrounding urban structures would forbid. So much for the sun-bathing on the beach and the tropical vegetation. For the next two weeks, I was to enjoy the luxuries of an uncle’s mansion
which occupied the prime property of an industrial jungle that was booming and rotting simultaneously.
35
I was riding in my uncle’s tolerably odorous, leather interior, freshly waxed SUV
when the chauffer drove along a wide median of a congested road. Families used the
median for open living spaces: I watched them have meals; wash dishes in basins; hang
rags on wires; sleep. A young family shared a plate of food, with a toddler, clean and
obliviously content, sitting on top of their rotting picnic table. A naked child of
about three used for a shower the incoming water from the bridge’s drainpipes. Then,
a large neon-lighted sign proclaiming in cursive script, “Jesus loves you.” The vehicle’s leather discomforted me in my hypocrisy, neutralizing any pity evoked in me by
the city sights with a confused revulsion toward my relatives’ privilege as rich and my
higher privilege as “non-other.” Meanwhile, my cousin was convincing my mother,
brother, and me on how “American” their urban lifestyles have become: “It’s busy
here, lots of shopping and Starbucks. Like America, ah?? We have all the same brand
names!” She would not shut up until I gave her affirmation. Every single person I
met from that point on asked me to confirm his or her likeness to us Americans.
Oddly, moments like these reminded me of times back in Canada when men flirted
with me by performing an impressive “hello” in Chinese or Korean.
The family’s well-known vulgarity welcomed me in my uncle’s first address: “Hello.
Yes, are those real? What size are they? Y’kno, Americans, they’re much bigger than
the girls here.” In contrast, my aunt’s posture and mannerisms were marked with sophistication and elegance. But when she laughed, the corner of her mouth revealed
the loose attachment of her false teeth to her gums, tilting the set slightly and exposing underneath the row of blackened triangles that continued to decay. In a wealthy
life of betrayal and loneliness, all she could do is laugh.
We remained primarily indoors to keep away from the sun. The family’s blue
blood manifested in the pale complexion which I inherited and which, apparently, we
all preferred to maintain. The rest of my vacation remains a smelly blur of tattoos,
tequila, cigarettes, and family reunion, all of which coerced the shock of my first impressions. I became accustomed to the television commercials that advertised skinwhitening cream: bleach that enriched one’s complexion. Nightly I enjoyed bands who
knew American rock lyrics only phonetically, resulting in dispersed mumbles throughout the cover-songs. In the dank malls my brother and I took pictures of signs such
as “Chicken McDo” and “Choc’ Full O’ Nuts,” indications that this Anglophone culture has yet to master more tasteful connotations of the English language proper. As
a tourist in a land where my perpetual racial displacement confronted me with uncanny starkness, I, for the first time in my life, was most definitely home.
36
i would draw a Raven
look about, watch,
eyes widening, jaws opening,
breath quickening, heartbeat
drumming in your ears.
how to
— merely —
envision
this.
i would draw a Raven
who i saw painted at bottom most
bridge piece, canvas cement.
he glows, some strange coloured aura.
he is not fear felt,
but projects
whyominous mystery.
deep, unknown, ancient,
indescribable power.
and close, then, to Fear,
Who can destroy you
if you step sideways.
the Raven,
it is so still,
there, forever, mute
in movement,
gaze locked on
you who pass,
saying, always, always,
“listen”
Kevin Ch#Hopher
37
S ta r e
E#ka Anguiano
It’s rude how she stares. Her black eyes pry into me, reading every detail of my transparent existence. She stands, hunchbacked and screaming for pity, as if she were a
forty year old woman tired of taking the beating life has thrown. Her hands rest
against the moldy bathroom countertop as she moves in closer, digging deeper into
my being. A bulky baseball cap awkwardly sits atop her head. It’s a worn yellow hat, an
ugly contrast against her beautiful brown skin. Her tiny feet take several steps back
until her back leans against the dirty wall; there she scrutinizes me from afar. Her almond shaped black eyes are merely slits as she stares repulsed at the image before her.
She wears a pair of holey faded jeans two times too big, and threatening to eat her.
Just when I believe they are going to devour her whole, she starts to sob. Sad little
droplets of water trickle down her face; just like yesterday, and the day before, and the
day before that. And that’s my cue because as the routine goes, I cry just as soon as
she cries. Seconds after the tears have started to dance their way down her carefully
carved cheekbones, her legs give up, and she slides down the wall, landing on the dirty
linoleum floor. She sits attempting to muster her body into a big blob of nothing. Her
knees are pressed tightly against her chest, and her arms embrace them so tightly that
all blood flow has ceased. Her head rests above the mass, as she steadily rocks back
and forth to the beat of her dismal heart. At that moment I know she’s finished. Her
prying eyes are too busy releasing liquid desolation. And I’m too busy pitying her to
dwell on her rude stare.
I made another trip to the mirror today.
He did it again.
He was stumbling about the apartment attempting to cooperate with gravity, a brown
paper bag in his hand- as usual. He knocked over several of the multifunctional grimy
black crates, otherwise known as our dining and seating furnishing. His dirty blonde
hair was oily and clumps of it framed his bony face. Despite intoxication, his gray eyes
were fierce, and displayed all traces of his hatred. You filthy whore stop looking at me, he’d
scream. It didn’t take him long to discover my hiding spot; the only spot that offered
security in the house, behind the emerald green vase. It’s what’s left of her. Once he
spotted me, there was no end to it, immediately I was submerged in a flood of insults.
It was all the same; you filthy whore, just like your mother. Every inch of you is disgusting. It’s
38
as if she shit you out. You’ve got her evil eyes too, and her black hair- black just like her soul. He
let out a sinister laugh, it’s no wonder you keep it hidden beneath that cap. You know. You’re
ashamed. But don’t worry, you’ll be with her in hell soon; filth like you and her isn’t meant to live
long. What’d you say? You better not be speaking the devil language she taught you. And in fact, I
was. Te crees muy macho, you think you’re so tough, I’d say. Si supieras, if only you knew, I’d
whisper. With those few words he yanked my arm, shoved me into the bathroom, and
slammed the weak wooden door so that it almost crumbled to pieces. You stay there in
front of that mirror, he yelled from outside, until you know what filth you are. I could’ve
struggled. I could’ve told him no, but I didn’t. I know better than to attempt to fight
back. Although his body is possessed by alcohol, he retains his strength. And the beatings, they only make me weaker.
She’s back to stare at me. It’s the same routine. She stands before me in the same measly clothes as yesterday. Her lumpy yellow baseball cap still rests atop her head. Her
black eyes glare at me. But something’s changed. Her eyes have eased, they’re pensive
not angry. Her face is calm, almost possessed. Five minutes have gone by, and she still
has the expression of an expensive mannequin, real but dead. I don’t know how to
feel. A petite hand slowly finds its way towards the ugly yellow hat, and as if her hand
were playing with fire, quickly she takes it off. A load of black silk falls and caresses
the small of her back, while comforting her shoulders. And now, like a child first discovers the wonders of her hands, she stands there, gently stroking a lock of black
hair. She smiles. I smile. I’ve never seen her smile before. She’s beautiful. Her black
eyes are tranquil, her cheeks rosy, and black locks surround her face like the frame of
an exquisite portrait. I watch in awe as the hand that once stroked her hair abruptly
stops, it reaches into the old cabinets, a content smile still venerating her face, and she
tightly wraps her fingers around a black straight edge hairbrush. Valiantly she releases
the following from her crimson lips, * Quien eres tu para medir mi belleza? Nadie, no eres
nadie. This isn’t our routine. With those words a smile encompassing all the good in
the world appears on her face and with the speed of a shooting star the hairbrush is
cast from her hands, about to shatter my being…
*Who are you to measure my beauty? Nobody, you are nobody.
39
The Writers
Erika Anguiano Erika is a first year student at Randolph-Macon Woman's College.
She's climbed Mt. Everest, tamed lions, and almost found the fountain of youth. For
now though, she's transferring to the University of Arizona where she will major in Psychology.
Maria Chen A few poems. Thanks for the gin.
Kevin Christopher I am Kevin Christopher MacLeod, 21 years young. I translate poetry
from the universal consciousness when possible, and I strive to tell stories that reflect
the human desire to evolve. Some of my many influences include Khalil Gibran,
R. Buckminster Fuller, Lao Tzu, George Orwell, e e cummings, Robert Frost, Irving
Layton... I want to infuse my writing with a spiritual urgency relevant to the urgent
times we live in, and I hope to use the various word forms to help awaken a new consciousness in the people of Earth.
Gina Cormier was born on the 6 th of April in the Ardennes forest bordering France
and Germany. As a child, she travelled throughout Europe with a band of long-haired
shpenglas and crafted bracelets for a living. Eventually, the leader of the group had his leg
bitten off by a lion and everyone scattered, never to meet again. At this point, the young
iconoclast made her way to Canada where she was able to successfully bargain a life’s
work of jewel-encrusted bracelets (plus some existential advice) in exchange for a High
School Diploma. She plans to move away from the ruthless weather as soon as possible.
Aaron Everingham born in edmonton/ lived all over western canada/lived all over
asia/lived in books, neck deep in ink/30 revolutions around the sun/ love and peace and
strength to your sword arm
Angela Facundo is in her fourth year of a Combined Honors program in English and
Art History. She focuses mostly on critical writing, but her sparse creative writing practices correspond to her oil-painting practices, as both deal with similar preoccupations
in subject matter.
Rebecca Fletcher is a singer/songwriter whose unparalleled cowardice received a swift
kick in the ass this afternoon. Thank you Marissa.
Natalie Helberg is a second year student at the UofA, she is addicted to poetry and is
currently in the midst of an existential crisis.
Mandie Lopatka (Long time U of A literary journal aficionado, Grant MacEwan Professional Writing Program graduate, Stroll of Poets Member & Raving Poets Member
who recently launched a video poem, The Architecture of Language produced by Michael
Hamm of Frame 30 Productions at the inaugural Roar on 24 th, which is expected to appear on Bravo, Book TV and other local stations sometime next year.)
Nadia Niven, sometime poet.
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Chelsea Novak is a slave to the perogy industry and suffers sleep deprivation. She
hopes to one day go to New York so she can break into the comic bizz, using brute
force if necessary.
Dean Morrison McKenzie: The Jazz Poet McKenzie's a kid from the village; it shows
in his themes. His poetry, fiction, music, films and essays are laden with imagery gathered from his prairie world. He has co-authored two or three chapbooks with Richard
Davies and Glen Kirkland, read his stuff on CJSR, CKUA and CBC, and supplied his
voice for a variety of radio and television commercials. He has also published a couple
of spoken word CDs of his poetry and songs and a pair of his poems were the basis of
scripts for Frame 30's "Skipping Stone" and "Night Benz". He has performed his work
at clubs and festivals accompanied by many of Alberta's best musicians. He believes his
best stuff is still in the works and begs his readers' indulgence and patience!
K Heath is shifty, unstable, anti-social, & loves the Beat writers-especially Jack Kerouac.
Victoria Rohac Victoria was born and raised in Edmonton - though the mountains and
ocean are always calling her west. She has a deep interest in all creative mediums but
has focused her energy as of late to poetry and dance.
Neil Pilger Many complexes occasionally come together to make letters turn into
words. Obsessions get left behind, or just switch, as he gets older. "writing quenches
the thirst to be social"
Thomas Trofimuk is a writer of poetry and fiction, a speech-writer and a book reviewer with the Edmonton Journal. He’s a founding member of Edmonton’s Raving Poets movement, and a long-time member of Edmonton’s Stroll of Poets. He’s published
poetry and fiction in many literary magazines across the country, and appeared on CBC’s
Cross-country Poetry Face-Off event, and several times on CBC’s Alberta Anthology.
His first novel, The 52nd Poem (Great Plains Publications) won the Georges Bugnet
Novel of the Year Award at the 2003 Alberta Book Awards, the Manuela Dias Book Design of the Year Award, and was awarded the 2003 City of Edmonton Book Prize. He’s
a long-time teacher at Youthwrite, a summer writing camp for kids, and most recently,
he’s festival director of the Roar Spoken Word Festival. His second novel, Doubting
Yourself to the Bone (Cormorant Books) will be published in the spring of 2006.
Nina Varsava I love silence and solitude, and to read and write (in silence and solitude).
I also love to travel--aimlessly and especially by myself. I'm a third year English major,
Write minor. I started out in Science with aspirations of med school, but was fast appalled by the lack of intimacy and creativity of my science classes, and drawn to arts.
I'm a Newfie, love the ocean, and I love five cent candy and peanut butter (but not together).
Mark Woytiuk Aggressive Mark Woytiuk 27, works as account executive for the Bloodink Corporation. Whether making calls on clients or squiring a lady-friend, Mark comes
on in tailored styles that emphasize his degenerate temperament, e.g., a printed cotton
corduroy two-button suit with peaked lapels, patch pockets and a deep center-vent.
41