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TWO
NIGHTSTANDS
ATTACKING
A CELLO By Bruce Boston It
doesn't stand a chance.
Their solid wood panels and
sharp edges beating
its delicately formed and
hand polished shell.
Their vicious drawers with
brass handles
gouging at its neck, striking
and raking
its tender strings, forcing
it to cry out
in a discordant roar. Afterward
the nefarious
pair return to their stations
by the sides
of the bed, once again motionless,
seemingly
innocent
as any object
of
inanimate furniture,
marred by little more than
a scratch or two
as evidence of their abandon,
their brutal
and unprovoked assault. Aching
in every fiber
of its fragile being, the
cello retreats to
the corner of the room, suffering
in silence,
nursing its many wounds. Yet
when it summons
the courage to speak, it
discovers that the
resonance of its voice has
been transformed
through this ordeal of
pain and humiliation.
The true dulcet tones and
melancholy overtones
too long hidden in the hollow
of its chest
have emerged unbidden. Astounded
by the depth
of this doleful epiphany, mute
and wooden as
the day they were made, the
nightstands listen
with strained indifference and
all the pent fury
of rectilinear forms. Of Dance Steps and Distances By G. O. Clark The universe is
closing in on me tonight,
the full moon arcing down and swishing into the empty green laundry basket by the bureau, Ursa major and
Minor floating into
a cobweb in one corner, their signature stars holding a family of spiders in facination, Saturn sprialing
down, its rings snagging
upon an empy coat hook on the closet door, like an old knit hat from the Sixties, Jupiter bouncing
on the faded carpet,
light as a ping pong ball, my cat pouncing upon it for a little nocturnal amusement. All the myriad
stars settling down into
the semidarkness of my room, some suspended in lamp glow like electric dust motes, galaxies too
distant to ever be all the way
here, even in dreams, for what else can this be but my mind trying to make sense of distances so
great that time and
space must bend before I comprehend them, even those few yards just across the street to the local
dance hall, where this night -
if logic follows - angels are dancing on the head of a pin, swinging to the music of the spheres. Rod Serling's Eyes
By G. O. Clark Rod Serling,
field correspondent to the strange, sportscaster
for the wonderful world of the bizarre, your sad yet
twinkling eyes say it all, every moral has a darkly
humorous lining, and God
does on occasion play
dice with
the universe.
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SPIRIT REBORN
By Bruce Boston Like a dead man
trying on the flesh of the living, still relearning its form and function. Like a revenant
up from the grave, shambling awkwardly, unaccustomed to the feel of his new clothes. Like a wraith
so long insubstantial the rush of sense impressions and emotions leaves him breathless. Like a ghost
returned from the void, reveling in the taste of bread and the touch of flesh. back from a long illness seeing the earth anew, wondering why so many walk with death. egg horror poem By Laura Winter small white afraid of heights whispering in the cold, dark carton to the rest of the dozen. They are ten now. Any meal is dangerous, but they fear breakfast most. They jostle in their compartments trying for tiny, dark-veined cracks-- not enough to hurt much, just anything to make them unattractive to the big hands that reach in from time to random time. They tell horror stories that their mothers, the chickens, clucked to them-- meringues, omelettes, egg salad sandwiches, that destroyer of dozens, the home-made angel food cake. The door opens. Light filters into the carton, "Let it be the milk," they pray. But the carton opens, a hand reaches in-- once, twice. Before they can even jiggle, they are alone again, in the cold, in the dark, new spaces hollow where the two were. Through the heavy door they hear the sound of the mixer, deadly blades whirring. They huddle, the eight, in the cold, in the dark, and wait. Godlet By Laura Winter She has a galaxy in a jar. She watches it at night when she's supposed to be asleep, marvels at the minuscule worlds, orbiting the glitter-speck stars. And the beings: patiently carving roads, inventing the wheel, learning to fly. She smiles, and sometimes she shakes the jar. Heart By Steve Rasnic Tem Where it all gets pumped: the fuel and the soul, the flow of dreams unimpeded into tomorrow, where the skylines are lit with its blood. In the engines, in the wires and plumbing, in the lives of each cell stacked together a hundred miles high, scaffolds of nuclei and hereditary memory that become community, pulsing with the hope that sugars your blood this morning. Poe's Grave By Steve Rasnic Tem He is not dead. He only sleeps: his hair as long as fear, as old, creeping into the blind dark hearts underground we forgot were there. His eyes are stones and too large for the skull; there is terror in vision that sees far more than words will tell. Our children compel us to bury him again, for peace, again, for a good night's sleep. But he will not stay. Buried fingers, tongue, his stare cough up with each dream. He is not dead, but only sleeps, and with each terror unspoken, he walks. |