Violenceby J. Oakes |
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Parked near the corner of Cottage and Allen silence comes like a tidal wave there is glass in my boots I wonder who I am pastiche of blood and swollen eyes throbbing in the rearview mirror cuts on these hands they must be mine
faces gather under the orange glare of streetlights hands reach out pointing live local late breaking pay per view
love the word shot in a vein spilling silveryblue blood on the sidewalk before it reaches the heart —the thought dragging wings down some secret alley stars dropping scattered in the street abandoned, bleeping from sad puddles under an empty sky
image flickering silent forgetting who I am
who sees Ymalla blazon from the backdoor kitchen Yumalla who loves his mother and wears a white apron who in the wide-screen vision of the world slays the dragon with his shining fist not knowing me or ever knowing me because I no longer am I’ve disappeared from this fairytale disappeared from this screen |
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Loose Changeby Sam Magavern |
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Change came to me in the form of a snake, bearing apples. I said, “Aha, Mr. Snake. The laws of entropy are well known by now. Change equals loss, you know.” The snake just stuck out a glittering tongue, childish, impolite. “Surely, Mr. Snake, you understand my needs. I have only one soul, I must keep it whole.” Then the snake rolled over in the grass, to show me the pictures on each of its scales: thousands of scenes of evil and beauty unlike anything in myself. |
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Oh, Bathshebaby Sam Magavern |
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Accounts of this got it all wrong. First of all, Uriah the Hittite is alive and well and working as an auto mechanic at Frank’s Parts-n-Service. I divorced him last year, and it had nothing to do with King David. Second, King David and I never had an affair, much less a second marriage. I don’t deny that he loved me first—and maybe last—for my beauty. But people take such a narrow view. Beauty is more than physical. Nothing made the King happier than to sit on my patio talking, drinking Kir Royale, just talking. |