Al#009 by Jessica Gleason

Issue #009

ISSN 2179-8805

Aberration Labyrinth

Aberration Labyrinth ISSN 2179-8805

December 2013

Issue #009

A Note From The Editors: We’re back on track! Thank you for all of your submissions, support and readership. You’re the driving force behind AL. Keep sending your best. We’re looking forward to reading more. -AL A Chemist's Lament Annie Hulkower If you asked me what I think about Tuesdays, I’d tell you that they are my favorite— I’ve got a beaker full of delights, in this case elemental As, and a pencil shakes with my laughter as the garlic smell tickles my nose—

Off Key Maria Davila

--Oh, Mendeleev! But most other days are not so beautiful although they sound it: Organometallic (I taste it as I mouth the word) Phosphorescent Mercury…(mercurial?)

My bagged lunch starts to emit turkey: dead, and always turkey, around 11. My labcoat is rarely stained with crystalline flecks or blinding S (ought to stand for spontaneity) , my heart is too full for the tasks assigned to me. By Thursday, life starts to reek of bitter almond and for once I just wish to boogie under ink-blue sky, with those more animate than my gases and solids, share a kiss, be resplendent-be sublime.

A girl I once knew stood isolated by an orchestra and when I came up to her, she said to me, “I wish heaven hadn’t made me tone deaf.” I lacked a response, held back my tears. Looking down, she slowly continued, “My ears measure the ones I desire. My hips don’t have the rhythm they should. My hands shake along with the percussionists. And my brain is jumbled in half notes and eighth notes in a 5/8 tempo.” Now I’d tell her that she sang the lyrics no one else ever could. Her hands only shook discordance away and her brain played harmonious music. And if heaven had made her tone deafwell, heaven also makes an audience.

Aberration Labyrinth ISSN 2179-8805

December 2013

Issue #009

You're Fucking Crazy Edward Valladao

We were at it again. “You’re fucking crazy,” she said. “You’re literally insane.” “Rather be insane, than heartless,” I told her. “Why am I heartless? Because I don’t love you?” The fluidity, the utter ease with which those words came out dumbfounded me. “No, but you did once. You said so yourself.” “Yeah, well I said a lot of things back then. But now I’m glad I’ve seen the real you and I couldn’t love the real you.” The real me? Who was the real me? Was he not the same guy who got her flowers on Easter, just because? Tulips because they were her favorite, with one long stalk drooping down past the cusp of the vase. “It looks sad,” she had said before giving them away an hour later.

Was he not the same guy she once said held her life in the palms of his hands? And where had that life gone to? Had it slipped out from wiping the tears from her eyes one too many times, on nights I said I would leave her, but couldn’t?

Then she hung up, and I sit here filled with pride and soiled in grief, contemplating for the thousandth time if I should stop drinking and if there were any good women left in the world, wondering what would the real me do?

I was crazy. I could admit that. I could admit a lot of things and maybe that’s what really made me crazy. “I think I’m just fine,” I said. “That’s great, but if you can’t handle your alcohol then you shouldn’t drink. I don’t need you calling me up in the middle of the night just to tell me I’m a heartless bitch. I don’t owe you anything.” “I’ll handle my alcohol when you can handle not being such a heartless bitch. Deal?” “Jesus Christ you’re fucking crazy! You’re literally insane!”

The Signs Along Highway 51 (The Illinois Version) Matt Rotman The critics are crazy It’s gonna be great Hand-crocheted guns Flowered green-plated steel Messengers became serviceable I rode their silverbacks home.

Aberration Labyrinth ISSN 2179-8805

December 2013

Issue #009

THE HEAT IN THIS ROOM Kanishka Singh

The Poison Pen Letters of Vienna Benjamin Welton

I watch it settle in you lucent eyes The same peace that hangs in your scent And I've been waitingAnd I waitIngesting the haze It isn't any wonder I've lost faith But I know what I must tame Visceral gurgles, ripples in my gaze And apocryphal rigidity is born The spaces between the walls mourn Deprivation, that coarse howl The shudders in my conscience The trembles of your hesitation As my facility slowly drowns

Poem: Did you know about the Colonel and the tramp? Did you hear that a Jew was elected mayor, or that your sister fancies her step-father?

SOBRIETY AT DAWN Kanishka Singh I have lost control Vacillating between mush, soft and wet And tenderAnd then exultancy, and an empty sense of comfort Then I am ballooned by vacancy, And the shell is baked hard by the scorch of illusion That cools as a curious thought precipitates: What was that ornament of a smile, Is now a crack that separates Your eyes from your jaw

There is so much to tell; will you listen on the Josefstädter Straße? Or will you listen in the Café Bräunerhof? O, give me your ears then and lend me your eyes— I have hate to spill. You are a man and you are a woman, so this is fit for your sick skin. Scream and object, but enjoy it— sip it like Einspaenner and eat it like shit. This letter is for you— open it, then lick the fingers that will soon compress a backwards tongue.

And so a slithery rumination Wet with newness Profound, and of consequence Born out of distance Rests with me, as I rest against your skin

Aberration Labyrinth ISSN 2179-8805

December 2013

Issue #009

Riding Death in My Sleep (after the painting by Wangechi Mutu)

Ode to Muddle (after the painting by Llyn Foulkes)

Neil Ellman

Stuck in the saddle of a horse called Death I ride through now deserted streets that once were filled with childhood dreams and hope that came with the morning sun as if the world were new and I could be born again and again in this eternal night. I hold it tight, my legs against its sides, the darkness of its course enveloping me with its mystery, but I still know the finish line my place among the artifacts of time— I ride on Death and it rides me. Rift I (after the painting by Richard Serra)

O, Muddle Man befuddled by the shape you’re in your face a jumble cluttered by the sin within your soul in shambles struggling for a human mask to hide the chaos fumbling in your eyes tumbling through your veins as if you were alive and something other than the form you take the mumbo-jumbo words you speak— O, Muddle Man so much an every man bewildered by the life you lead.

Neil Ellman I In the space between our worlds at the confluence of opposites bewildered at the in-betweens of matter over mind we measure in miles and yesterdays the rift that separates your truth from mine. II In the valley of our birth between the journey and the circle’s end the past and destiny we find a meeting of our minds in the distance and the days between our disconnected lives.

Suspension of Consciousness Carl Scharwath Numb atop the pillow Bright delusions summoned Dreams battle reality Awakening in melancholy The inspiration vanishing Where in the endA face in the mirrorLooks for landmarksAnd tries to remember Phantom perfection.

Aberration Labyrinth ISSN 2179-8805

December 2013

Issue #009

Tingle wears speedo; so do I John Roth Ganondorf gets all the babes by default because the male to female ratio of the Gerudo tribe is like 1/1,000,000,000. Don’t ever ask him if the carpet matches the drapes. What I want to know is who the fuck keeps hiding all of these rupees in the grass? Gibdos are only a slight variation of their naked cousin the redead. Link never washes out his bottles; he once carried a Deku princess in one and forgot to let her breathe. I always drink the red potion right in front of the person I’m supposed to give it to. When Link pulls out the master sword, he goes through puberty all over again. Fall damage is overrated. Attack the chickens in Kakariko village and I guarantee they’ll fuck you up: Game over.

An ode to Ganondorf John Roth Cloaked thief born to darkness, King of nothing; the power is not yours alone. Snatch the light from this world, the fields of Hyrule tremble beneath your black steeds iron hooves. Your tribe scattered like a handful of sand on the wind. You trap the sages in a crystal prison, but the hero of time will strike you down with the master sword, cast you back into the sacred realm you corrupted. But you too have grown since then, and your magic has become so strong, that you can almost feel some monster crawling just below your skin. The final battle is now.

Aberration Labyrinth ISSN 2179-8805

December 2013

Issue #009

Today Jessie Gaston My 18th Birthday has come. It is bright out. meaning the Sun is hot, meaning I'd melt at it's surface, meaning I am not so cool after all, meaning all our skin is parched, meaning we should be on the look out for Burns, which turn to moles, which turn to cancer, which is very prevalent in the desert where we live. I smoked a bowl before Physics, and Newton still kept me down, that is, on the Earth's surface, that is, human with a manageable ego, that is, without a big head, that is, with the knowledge that I will one day die, which is a part of life, which has got its ups and downs, which is a cliché, but honest like my mother, who made me a banner this morning, that in bold text read, “You will go far, Happy 18th!” Before I left the house, my father told me what it meant to be a man, who was born in rural Tennessee, who was black in the sixties in the South, who worked his way up, who votes for Democrats, who sees value in hard work, it was a long talk.

Four years past to this day, my old teacher doctored my grades, called them a gift, and told me to work harder in the future, in high school, where things would only get worse. In 2007, outside Carson Junior, I was fighting Aaron Wermuth, who called me nigger, or just blackie, or just not very nice, and he is punching once and crying, and five years back his parents were beating him, and five years forward he is graduating, but then he was crying, and I was punching. When I was four, in '99, my parents looked at the sky and wondered which one their eldest son had landed on. There was a twinkle South of Orion, so they guessed he'd gone there. And they cried as the ball dropped, as their marriage fell apart, as they lost their shit, and in my room I am becoming conscious. Eighteen and one half years ago, I am in my mother's womb, and I understand, and I am happy.

On the way to sleep last night, I ignored a phone call from Alexa, who had been upset about how lonely she was, about how boys didn't love her, about how she felt like a whore, about how painful it was to Feel.

Aberration Labyrinth ISSN 2179-8805

December 2013

Issue #009

Midnight Swell

Crone JD DeHart

JD DeHart She woke to find her face was puffy Self-medication, dosages not done correctly Her own peculiar mixture She woke later to find herself no longer there Vanished into some other vision of herself Not really waking up at all That powerless feeling of cannot save her.

The most alluring one found him I am the luckiest one here, he said And two hours later he was She was magic, a dream Nothing like he had before Then there was the discomfort As she left, he caught sight of her A reflection of her body, aged, yellowed The discomfort became more intense He woke up and heard screaming It was his own.

Human Nature JD DeHart There is a small creature in the kitchen He says his name is Todd Hi Todd, we all say together We notice Todd’s skin is different Then decide to say nothing (at first) Eventually, we decide to try to kill him We call it Manifest Destiny Plus Todd has a nice jacket we like Leave him alone, I hear my brother’s voice We have bigger fish to fry I glance over to see the mess of fish Where’d you get those River up north That’s my river, Todd says So that settles it then.

All artwork for this issue has been provided by Jessica Gleason.