AL Issue #006 by Jessica Gleason

Issue #006

ISSN 2179-8805

Aberration Labyrinth

Aberration Labyrinth ISSN 2179-8805

May 2013

Issue #006

A Note From The Editors: Hello again. We’re here at Issue #006! This marks 1 full year of publication for AL., a benchmark we’re excited to have reached. Rest assure that while things have become a bit overwhelming, we’re still working hard to get your writing to the masses! -AL You Saved Me Jeffrey Park You saved me rescued, redeemed me in a needful hour pulled me up out of the well cold and shaking found a liana not too far from the quicksand lay flat on your belly, inching out onto the creaking ice to grasp my wrist pried me out with the jaws of life warded off the kiss of death. And how dared you fumble with your rude intruding hands into my fate? Had I cried out even once for assistance? Perhaps but only out of reflex. The last very last thing I ever wanted was some kind of self-styled, self-satisfied redeemer thrusting herself into my deliciously tragic determinedly self-destructive downward spiral.

tiny monsters Norman J. Olson tiny monsters crawled around the soles of the shoes of the doomed and the damned… the television flat screen sat in mauve waves of flickering light that licked the fingers of the masturbators of the imagination… yes this was a food court and the mall rose around the hamburger eaters in greasy splendor… flowers fell from the sky like poisonous snakes somewhere barely seen, the cash register blinked red and electric green… and fingers flashed fearful signs… tiny monsters licked their rubbery lips and sucked spilled diet soda from the gritty floor… their cheeks were shiny…

The flames are dancing high now but unfortunately they’re dancing without me.

So Many Noble Intentions Jeffrey Park So many noble intentions in his head selfless acts he wishes he could do – ladle up soup for the homeless collect serviceable toys for orphans help his ancient neighbor lug her heavy bags full of groceries up the stairs, spread the word about the mom-and-pop that just opened for business make amends for the nasty homophobic jokes made at the expense of a harmless coworker show interest in his partner’s passions – fine and worthy causes that he fears will never benefit from his commitment not in this life anyway or at least not as long as it’s still so entertaining to watch old ladies struggle up three flights of stairs with a sack full of canned goods.

Aberration Labyrinth ISSN 2179-8805

May 2013 You, safe. Marney Knowlton

Issue #006 Coming Close Bent Wirkkala

A dead man testing his weight in the world and a women standing. He is looking through the glass face of Jesus; she does not know that he can see her watching him. He is a skeleton in a burial suit, she a bake sale short of saving the world. He has spent a season touring a world that is coming to an end.   This year everywhere to go is miles. She comes for the far away sound of cars and barking dogs; Not cold. Otherwise she likes the close up silence. done. The early evenings, family.  It is his right to feel indifference towards the (the beach) Walk  the dogs. You foot the stream on world, to hold a dying faith in holy places. a little wooden  He thinks of the age of trees here, older than bridge.   him, planted by others. The beach walk.    He chokes back a knot in his throat and there she is, his witness; At night, the fire.  annoyingly intuitive, disturbingly curious. Sea creatures and deer hunted by.   She walks by-comes a little close. Family. Its hide, over the garden clothesline, drying.  She says “remember to advance your clock by   one hour today”. She is like time, she is like the trees. Morning, I go.    He wonders why he cannot be alone. Getting around depends where you go.  Foot, one step out. The door  within and on the trail. The high.  The island. You emerge from the woods,  this little. The trees below beyond the waters. Otherwise,  I can't do too much walking.

a small farm nearby: get fresh yoghurt and vegetables. bearded woman's: collect her eggs.    I cannot remember you, you, always if you  like.  Very lands indeed. Been here before.   Is Rome stop or   stop. I should.   Definitely available.  A few days   thinking I'd go back.    The city, either.  On or very early. New year's eve. Alternatively, if, or additionally. If we do, New York sounds to me. After the city escapes.  Coney Island  or something.

"1930" Benjamin Welton We’re all lined up— row upon row— for the marathon dance towards oblivion. Like angles upon a pin, we are a debated existence; for, through new deities— black-shirted and brown— we voice the discontent of living and breathing with ourselves, with Others. We go hungry, yet we feast ravenously upon the glittering plague of artificial locusts that want to burns Los Angeles to the ground. We will dance in those embers and those ashes until they kick us off the hay truck and we try and seduced the next late great creature.

Untitled (Flame and Mirror) Neil Ellman

The Vegetable Garden is Now Closed Marianne Szlyk

(after the painting by Antoni Tàpies)

Glancing up at the still life of Rubenesque carrots, as thick and rosy as a washerwoman’s arms, translucent onions that glow like the skin of one of Gainsborough’s Englishwomen, and humid spinach from dreams of Rousseau, I considered the Kale Infinity but never ordered it.

In the mirror the flame sees its own reflection licking at the glass as if it were a child tasting itself for the first time its cold mimicry of face hands and flashing arms it sees itself knowing at the first its heat and at the last that it will die in cold.

Now I never will.

Aberration Labyrinth ISSN 2179-8805

May 2013

Issue #006

Miracle Girls John Grochalski

miracle girls they sucked the essence out of me without really trying sent me home my heart sore disgusted with myself for holding them in such high esteem a sentence of hours staring at the wall thinking myself such an easy target as the ache burned low in me and the sad music played on and on all of those suicide nights all of those girls of my youth they were such miracles in my head because whether good or bad or apathetic toward me i could think of nothing but them and nothing else ever made me feel the way they could watching the walls make dull shadows or walking home alone in the rain in that goddamned endless rain of wasted time.

ÂŠ This work is the property of the individual authors within.

Aberration Labyrinth ISSN 2179-8805

May 2013

Issue #006

Disoriented Traci Clemer

I\'m disoriented again This face a hundred faces Now who are you again? Weaving above me, pumping away I watch him work and try to recall What he said his handle was again. I hear the sounds of my pussy, a wet suction I wonder idly what time it is If he has been here for his whole 30 minutes or 60 minutes I look over to the bedspread (my grandmother always called it that) and absent-mindedly smooth out a wrinkle I hear dogs barking and a radio going and laughter of women and the smell of steaks grilling and I think of the life they must be living I say \"hump\" and \"mmm\" Because he is looking at me. And feel disoriented some more

A Multitude of Voices Zane Castillo A multitude of voices sweep through the air Escalating with each trembling octave Shrill and eery the noise clamors over whispered sentiments Rendering a raucous sound to the fragile stillness.

ÂŠ This work is the property of the individual authors within.

Aberration Labyrinth ISSN 2179-8805

May 2013 God Is Always Looking At You Always Dylan Cottrell Souls linger like geists in a dungeon her finger points from funyuns to fundip Ointment appoints progress to grizzled cheeks Beauty is buried in orange age like Snooki, Lil Kim, Kim Kardashian, Taylor Momsen, Nicki Minaj, and Pamela Anderson Not Natasha Khan, Joshua Tillman, George Lewis Jr. Matthew Dear, or Mike Macpherson.

Issue #006 calling my mother John Grochalski

and i drink and drink and drink forget myself until i’m red in the face

made this deal with my old man when i moved out of the house

at least until monday morning

damned near twenty years ago

when the new doldrums hit when a new guilt overwhelms me

he said, look, i don’t care if you call me but you’ll call your mother at least once a week

suffocates me

call her on sundays to make a pattern

makes me feel blue and mortal lower than a crushed slug on hot asphalt

and so i have for the most part

or maybe it’s just the thought of the email that i know i’m destined to get

but there are those sundays sometimes

something that is always short and sweet from my mother

coming off a bad hangover or a six-day work week

telling me

Fearsome fliers slap students like fires slap the rich before someone yelled "bitch" from woman to girl Institutions are felled to progress nothing Everything is nothing until suddenly something grabs you. Unhand Me. Gladly. Then the fall. Gruesome crawl like the walking dead Rise again. Learn to fend for yourself. Grabs you.

sundays spent fighting or fucking the wife

i love you

christian sabbaths where i want to stay in bed with the lights off and the blinds drawn imagining the world moving on without me in it

and i’m so sorry that i missed your call last night.

Leave your right brain behind like a lobotomy Remind your new friends of your intentions Stifle my urge to end in a dirge pushing words Assimilate me toward obesity Make a beast of me We'll have a feast you'll see. Nothing and everything Assimilate me toward pencil-pusher and push me to heaven Fill my coffin with hand-written letters from my children. We won't do it often just when God is looking.

throw myself or this piece-of-shit sixty dollar pay-as-you-go cell phone off of the verrazano-narrows bridge over telling anyone the details of the last week in my miserable failure of a work and creative life

that i just don’t goddamned want to talk to anyone my mother or the risen jesus christ himself

Sharp Edge Steve Hood

sundays where i’d rather

or, worse, hear about theirs and while that might make me selfish or a bad son belligerently ignorant to the fact that time is not infinite

Screams of torture, slit, squirts of bloody splatter, gushing, red flood, excruciation. Worldwide, before crowds or in hidden dungeons, disembowel the living, long intestines on a plate. Scrape a thin blade of steel across a whetstone, pry open the jaw to cut out the tongue of a heretic.

All artwork for this issue has been provided by Loren Kantor. Loren Kantor is a Los Angeles-based Woodcut Artist and writer. He worked in the film industry for 20 years as a screenwriter and assistant director. He is a huge fan of Classic Cinema and iconoclastic American Writers. He's been carving woodcut images for the past five years.