After the Pause Volume 2, Issue 1 Spring 2015
What you are about to read will change you. Proceed at your own risk.
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About After the Pause is an online literary journal based in the Midwest, featuring poetry, visual poetry, flash fiction, and artwork, published quarterly in March, June, September, and December. We look to feature the zaniest, most experimental work from new, emerging, and veteran writers. Find us online: afterthepause.com Twitter: @afterthepause Issuu: issuu.com/afterthepause
Purpose We believe art is a product of life experiences, from the joyful to the heartbreaking to the absolutely mundane. Life throws pauses at us. Art follows the pause. We want to share the best art we can find and bring hope through those artworks.
Founding Editor Michael Prihoda. He can be found online by plugging his name into Google or else in person by randomly scouring the Midwest. He writes, breathes most of the time, and runs this journal.
Thanks to Linda Taylor Dennis Hensley Aaron Housholder
More Thanks To everyone who sent us work. Each of you matters. Your work matters. It is an honor to publish such astounding talent.
Cover Art by Chris Drew
Back Cover Art by Chris Drew
Copyright 2015 All rights of the material within belong to the authors.
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…In This Issue… Poetry From L. Ward Abel Autocracy Between Zebulon and Here Shinjini Bhattacharjee A Workshop on Self-Disguise Sarah Clare La Jetee Signs; a Play Andrew Condouris Recent Searches Corey Cook Iris Darren C. Demaree A Damaged Thinker #43 A Damaged Thinker #44 A Damaged Thinker #45 Fabio Fernandes Human, Post Howie Good Any Given Moment Confiding in the Blind Dark Garden Mitchell Grabois Froth John Grey Poetry Reading, Enter at Your Own Risk Sophie Johnson Killing Issei Sagawa Katie Lewington Untitled Liz Mariani Poem 1 Poem 2
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Jennifer Moore Kitchen The Lusty Month of May Andy N. Arguably a Goodbye Ben Nardolilli Good Foil Darrell Petska Spider of the Mind Peter G. Res Excerpts from The Softest Girl on Earth Louise Robertson Canvas Aaron Simm [claustrophobia] Knocking On: Adam Tedesco Amen Erin Vance skin signs Still the Girl He Married John Wells The First Act was a Naming of All Beasts The Future of Cybernetics & a Dream of My Sister
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Visual Poetry Michael Brandonisio EGG: Concept and Context Emptiness Mathias Jansson Cyber
Flash Fiction Sagnik Datta A Morning Taste of Loneliness Soren James Never Force a Dichotomy, or Either You Like Dichotomies or You Don’t Gwendolyn Kiste Relationship Status Kim Peter Kovac The Glow of Discovery Philip Kuan Medley Corey Mesler Wall Briane Pagel An Unsigned Inscription Found In A Class Of 1987 Yearbook The Man Who Never Finished His Amanda Quinn Passed The Key
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Art Chris Drew Just8.1 Just8.2 Just8.3 Kyle Hemmings Open High W. Jack Savage Defeated by the Terrain Segregated Detention Platforms The Lesser The Stragglers Began to Arrive Ernest Williamson Artist Delving Into Her Craft The Master Soul of a Mannequin
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Editor’s Note Welcome to the March 2015 issue of After the Pause. No paginated index exists because I hope you will explore and discover as you read the issue. In compiling this edition of After the Pause, I returned to the idea of an art museum. While I don’t ever intend to theme an issue, the concept came to mind and I think it applies, especially as you tour the artwork, the visual poetry, the prose poetry, and all the other pieces that act as snippets of culture, of minds, of the creative/connective process. This document has an architecture all its own that I hope you discover as you roam its four rooms and one gallery.
Editor’s Note Part 2 Once literature hits the page, it becomes about the reader. Poetry, and other writing, should not be seen as some intricate knot of ropes that perhaps only Wittgenstein could decipher. In reading, take what you can from a piece, and if that’s nothing, oh well, move on. Nonetheless, each of these pieces strikes a certain cord for me; each of them has lasting appeal, provokes thought, and just plain matters in the enormous diversity of the literary landscape. As always, running this magazine has been a privilege. I am completely honored to publish such talented artists. Enjoy the flow and happy reading.
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room #1
The content for this part is missing. -Soren James, Never Force a Dichotomy
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Soren James
Never Force a Dichotomy, or Either You Like Dichotomies or You Don’t1 Part 12, or Parted Dichotomies fall into three categories: a, b, and c (a being the first, c being the last), with each dichotomy arranged into two parts (one white, and one black). All other distinctions are arbitrary, and the arbitrariness of these distinctions is entirely their own concern. This is due to one of two reasons... but I dichotomise. Part 7, or Where Do These Parts Come From? The content for this part is missing (this will be dealt with as soon as someone becomes available). Part 4, or Why Things Are In Parts Things are in parts. These parts are under subjugation to a whole. The whole’s subjugation of its parts is unflinching and absolute. Or it is generous and magnanimous in its supply of unity. Either way this is true/false. Part 8 (of 4), or Today In conclusion, she entreated me to “have a nice day,” emphasising the “a”; thereby suggesting that I have only one nice day. I thanked her for her sentiment, and subsequently chose my “nice day” carefully - electing a day that would neither be in the past or in the future, and thereby eking out a satisfying life in the here and now. Part 8.4.2c, or Dichoto-maniac People who create false dichotomies for a living disgust me, they should either be shot, or put in front of a bullet that has recently been released from a gun. Either that, or one of the above, or both at once. Anything to release me from the frustration of being trapped in the category of gratuitous and unjustifiable hatred. Part 9’s, or Whose Part is This Anyway Part of the problem of any problem is the problem itself. If one eliminates the problem, then the problem tends only to be problematic by virtue of being identified as a problem. Please note: If this has solved your problem then please be suspicious that the problem has re-manifested in the form of a different problem. Part 18, or Descent and Other Descendants In shorts, there are no dichotomies. Unless you happen to fall on the side of “male” in the gender dichotomy, whilst also falling into the category of owning the “male member” (please note: actual membership is optional). In this case, one is
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obliged to dress either to the left or to the right (centre, or “external” dressing are dependent upon local regulations). “A” Part, or Hippo-Trichotomous There is a lesser known “try-chotomy.” This try-chotomy is based on the tripartite grouping of: “The try-alls in life”; “The trials of life”; and “The just get on with something because questions only lead to false answers in life“. Part 2, or Like All False Dichotomies, This Isn’t A Dichotomy Once upon a time there was a dichotomy that was approximately false. Authorities could not accept this finding, and so they subjected it to dichotomisational analysis. The results were found to be vague and uncertain. So a team of specialists was brought in to analyse these findings - their conclusion stated that the results were “un-dichotomisable.” A nebulous sense of ambiguity ensued, so the report was accordingly closed and the file lost. Part, The End In existence, either one or the other can’t be applied.
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Katie Lewington
Untitled I've just been drinking, sweating, drifting, take a selfie, hear a joke -not funny-, go to bed, doze off, you get home, have sex, suck it off, you leave, I switch on the TV and catch up on the soaps Real life, got to get dressed in a skirt, perhaps I'll wear stockings, though you won't be there, I'm alone, place full of people, flowered gardens, drinking sober, I am hungry, triangle cuts of sandwich, pastry? sausage rolls, go home, get naked, you bring me an actual sausage in a roll, I laugh, that joke IS funny, you don't get it, sleep it off, wake at 2am, it’s dark, you’re watching some movie on the TV, I sit, I stand, I open the back door, argument next door, sit on the step, smoke a cigarette, get the book from my bag, read a poem, have an idea, hit by inspiration, starts getting light, we're in bed together, like some old married couple you say sleepy, tired, yawning, up early, work I get up later, switch off the radio you left on, you know I hate it, put on the TV, watch the news, get depressed, paint my nails, local paper falls on the mat with a couple of bills, got to get a job, make a sandwich, another dress, share a taxi, gay friend John, get drunk, fall down twice, home early, I'm a fucking disgrace, on the sofa, sleeping it off, you’re home, tell me I'm a right proper laugh when I'm drunk so don't worry about what they think, I don't, we have a Chinese and then we go to the pub, get pissed, got each other to hold each other up but when we all fall down who's going to get us back up, can't get the key in the lock, stars are up and out, soldiers on parade, bird noises, we sit on the doorstep, you snore when you sleep, although you deny that you had fallen into a dream, we laugh, we slur, we get so absurd, nosy neighbour calls the police, says we're making a racket, pious neighbourhood, nobody understands, ah to be young, only once, drunk every other day of the week though, policeman, nice man, tolerant, humble, gets the key in the lock, tells us to behave then he's on his way, like the postman, haven't heard from Barbra yet, up we get and stumble, you sit on the stair and I collapse onto your lap, mass giggling, bit of a play fight, you tickle, I slap, lose a nail, your hair ruffled, close the door, but I'm so hot, I know you are, take off your clothes Midnight, new day already, what happened yesterday? We got drunk, again!, you say erratically, each word carefully said, like you can't get them out of your head, let’s go to bed, good, good idea, you hiccup, I groan, where is bed, how far is it until we get there, just up the stairs, are we there yet, are we going to have sex, I can't even find the light switch and This could go on forever and ever.
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Andrew Condouris
Recent Searches inductive vs. deductive sebaceous gland karma chameleon lyrics did you mean what does it feel like To fall in love? some women are like birds diluvian for or since why do men cheat? Mansa Musa's hajj Tolstoy quotes happy Bangladesh anti dog hair rug longest word in English what rhymes with orange? engine needs to warm up? how many times a day should I eat? how many times a day should I floss? are oil changes really necessary? why are we at war?
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Darren C. Demaree
A Damaged Thinker #43 Art & actual fire, I am fed only shouting in my head & the echo that escapes from there, where the burst of man opened me up, I lose, I lose, I lose always.
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Darren C. Demaree
A Damaged Thinker #44 Draped in the sackcloth of time, I am packaged burning, cord to the past, when blessings came with a singular glow of real thought, revolutions of abandoning the lyric garbage of man only surviving.
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Darren C. Demaree
A Damaged Thinker #45 If Rodin had painted me with his thumbs, the moon would have swept me up & destroyed whole sections of the firmament to place my closed wrists with colors akin to the unnatural world of cosmos. Grounded, statue, I was bound to be muscle relaxing all over the placement of my pedestal. The gravity of me, here, is landscape.
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Peter G. Res
From The Softest Girl on Earth The color returns to your face. After some time, you recount the hours that have left us, their silver fingers sparking into night. “In this moment, we are knives,” you tell me. “There are movements in the fears of field mice, where the heart shoots straight through the skull and all fires learn to scream.” I begin my mantra. Flood of mine, lead me free: lead me under apple trees To sprawl among the roots
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Peter G. Res
From The Softest Girl on Earth As a trick, I put your father’s ashes into a saltshaker just before we married. I was thinking of the decorative lanterns in Chinese restaurants. The sound elevators make. As a kid, I built many elaborate forts over the creek near our house. One winter, my imaginary friend pulled my sister into the ice. Her hair made me the sound of lips kissing. Her knees snapped shut like a drawer. Your father never liked me even though I gave him a picture of my uncle. I swore to murder anyone who touched you. The heat of his eyes, a brown burned willow. The sound elevators make.
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Peter G. Res
From The Softest Girl on Earth Peanuts to you, boy, nothing but peanuts When the kids were small we rented a house near Los Angeles We installed passageways in the closets to scare them on holidays Our parents died slowly in schoolbooks The tired shit you slap onto walls. Uncle Bobby opened a restaurant with a pair of pliers and an ice pick Soon all of America knew his face The kids don’t know what it is to struggle The kids don’t want to succeed The haunted car turns itself around The haunted mother haunts out of grace
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Peter G. Res
From The Softest Girl on Earth I left you a side of beef, Lucy Ricardo, in the kitchen across the dining room table, where your mother sits curtailing the air. Hegel says Nature is a destructive force. Eventually the forest will kill us. When our daughter comes home, she’ll find the brain resting in a pot of water. Do not fear the rings around her eyes. Once, at a party you threw in May, I met her on the elevator. We pretended to be stuck. I knew one day she would make a great lover, so I fucked the tired distance between us.
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Peter G. Res
From The Softest Girl on Earth After you were born, we occupied a small post office near Tulsa, Oklahoma I never knew guns could be so quiet and so we celebrated with a meal at Sizzler I want you to know I killed everyone for you and your brother The fire met me here, after my father asked for underwear He likes it hot, fresh from the dryer I remember once he told me a story about horses, something of finding Elvis on a gelding in Wyoming I never did know what he meant
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Amanda Quinn
The Key It was in the bag left by the Jones’ with the alarm code and a recycling collection leaflet. It remained undiscovered until I needed a spare for the back door. It had “Success” written in pencil on the fob. I tried every lock but it didn’t open anything for me.
Passed Eithne is catching words in the dark: “cope”, “proud”, “devoted”. Different hands clasp hers. Must be near time to lock up; two steps to the kitchen, then three to the back door. Someone is asking about tea. Should they make another pot? “Cormac?” she asks. “No Ma, it’s me. Da…” Another voice, a fine baritone, begins to sing. Danny Boy. So that’s it. She wonders who has passed.
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Erin Vance
skin signs. Fingertip: signs from nails useful lacerations bruising: from burst genitalia caused: those pressure cooker bloody chin wrists by: bludgeon application to the san maria hospital grabbing: shaped like first amendment corporeal or: agitation of punctured lung squeezing: some bruises categorize this flesh: alleged refund for defective produce, your rĂŠsumĂŠ will appear: on abdomens open, rectangular, larger oval: ankles, that child is bruise shaped: smaller than these slaps intervene intervene intervene bruises: areas of various cutaneous with: fingernail patterns attend to patients form: tend to the blemish thumb: through the handbook of crescent moon distance: diagnosed tissue also soft linear uneven all: an Alleged Volcano not for the weak hearted fingers: mimic contents suggests crude laceration may: these torture patterns leave: curvilinear claws between diagnoses torture: abdomens a finger result: stock tests uneven: infliction, submit pressure: a cylindrical cover letter cooker being: the skin department seeks an applied: crescent moon coffin bearer
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Erin Vance
Still the Girl He Married seek cream cleanser hysterical fallopian tubes a burning douche the cotton bed frame sits in the hamburger lab at 3pm its thumbs inhabit dead porcelain your marble uterus there are rich jail cells in crater cuts, champagne cysts the tattooed nazi turtles are a scared aesthetician with purple eyes her laughing gas lipstick sits with USB hemorrhage a womb scoops rage in a mad attic spinsters chinchillas seize grey veils of toilet paper their poodle wings bleed out leeches seep mortar the walls, run tuberculosis tests red with carcinogenic tampons (lysol your lady bits) hit run run run to undercover hemoglobin shaped zebras (dry pavement screams) drink cement bowls pierce (pop) stars in thick glass cheeks; your head, a pincushion, still wear skin like blue nail polish bare skin blue your technicolor body flu of rotten eggs damage the tabernacle forehead, stifle acid birth
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Andy N.
Arguably a Goodbye With arguably a goodbye He folds his hand Nodding a solemn defeat Acknowledging he was played out With a wry, knowing smile Engulfing the silence Almost like he knew Glancing to those Who he has left behind Voicing his thoughts incorrectly With a shrug of his shoulders.
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room #2
The afternoon’s a seventeen mile-long postcard taped to window of an Amtrak. -Jennifer Moore, The Lusty Month of May
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Sagnik Datta
A Morning Taste of Loneliness A drop of sunlight moves down your curtain, traverses the floor, climbs up a leg of the bed, the mattress, the bed sheet, the pillow, enters your hair, where it is momentarily lost, before it emerges on your forehead and tickles your eyelids. You open your eyes and see a white ceiling with veins of dampness. You sit up with a taste of guilt. You have just woken up from a dream in which you had committed adultery. The taste fades, since you have never been married, and is replaced with the taste of loneliness. You notice a pink cockroach scuttle on the right side of your bed. You grab your left slipper and slam it on the floor. The insides of the cockroach splatter to make a butterfly with whitish, watery wings. You are amazed by this metamorphosis, and you think about a story, in which a character would turn into a butterfly once he is blasted open by a shotgun. It would be a red butterfly. You say ‘tch’ because now you have to wash the underside of your slipper. You go to your bathroom and hold it under the tap. You curl your toes since you do not like the water hitting them. It hits them anyway. You remember that summer when you went to the beach. You put a pea-sized blob of toothpaste on your toothbrush. You put the brush in your mouth and move it down and up and down. You clean your tongue. You do it till you see blood, but you can still feel that horrible taste. You put a palmful of water in your mouth and move it around and spit it out in the basin. You see it disappear and consider writing a story in which a man tries to commit suicide by hanging, but someone turns off the gravity in his room. You watch yourself smoke in the mirror on a pane of the cupboard. Nothing distinguishes you from how you looked yesterday and how you will look tomorrow. You stare straight into your eyes, and see them stare straight at you. You yawn, and there is a pain in your throat. You try to remember the last time you spoke. You heat water in a kettle. You pour the water in a glass mug and add a teabag. You move it around by its twine. The water turns red. You take a sip. You still taste your loneliness. You throw the teabag in the dustbin. You see the bread crust you threw away yesterday. You need to take the garbage out. You go back to your room and sit at your table. You open the notebook you’ve been writing in. You read it while you drink your tea. You add more sugar, but it does no good. The corpse of the cockroach distracts you. You tear a page from your notebook and lift it. You open a window. Sun drops splatter your face. You hesitate. You place the cockroach on the table, beside your notebook. You observe the hairs on its legs. The sun warms it. The breeze moves its wings. You pet it gently. You sip your tea. It is now too sweet.
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Liz Mariani
Poem 1 Language is bitter. Speak it or die. These are the verbs of dominance.
Poem 2 What sort of generosity Determines rust is a gift? What kind of question troubles industry?
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Jennifer Moore
The Lusty Month of May Morning grows in the dark of a doorway. “Come out, come out, wherever you are!” the King of Corners calls. I set myself beside a keyhole and watch, leaf by leaf, day arrive. “Depressing winter landscapes” were, thank god, a thing of the past. Here the spring is so quick. Every tree’s an exclamation point, a mark used to indicate strong feelings. The afternoon’s a seventeen mile-long postcard taped to the window of an Amtrak. A woodpecker bangs his beak against the dartboard. Bull’s eye, bird. It’s nice to have questions at the beginning of a long and willowy season. Desire is the look of the cat at a sudden flutter of feathers. Hey, predator! There are other things to do than stalk your prey. From the corner, Lorca calls out: “Like love, all the archers are blind.”
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Jennifer Moore
Kitchen In your kitchen, I know the summer. The window’s open; grass blows in. It plays the role of the ghost better than the ghost plays itself. Skin’s peeled back from an apple; a cloud grows. I know that in summer I know that in fall. A child plucks a leaf, names it, and tapes it in a book. This goes on for several pages. The morning was not yet yellow. Next door, a hand argues with a face. The room goes bad. That in the spring, the winter. Snow escapes its globe; the globe escapes its orbit. We un-hook the curtains one by one, then slide the lock shut. Words imagine other words. Every bird’s a sparrow, all black-shimmer and one good eye. My hand holds itself. Some winter in the fall. I’m not wanting to say what you want to hear out loud—that when everything aligns, the mind is monochrome. A house is a house, just like everything else. After the downpour, the river’s a river again. The kitchen knows that summer springs in where winter falls. In the middle of the night—mine, or yours—a tornado gathers. The rain holds within itself another kind of hand, and pulls us from our waking.
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Howie Good
Dark Garden Grandma lived her last 10 years in the thickening gloom of glaucoma. A vehicle is bound to appear sooner or later to collect her body. Until then, enjoy the insomniacs tilling the garden in the dark. They are the same people who send strange items – anvils, a dog born with deformed front legs, a zucchini – through the mail. Ask them about the mental faculties of flowers, whether roses are willing to die for an idea again and again or are more like Van Gogh’s severed ear. Just don’t expect an immediate answer, other than the transparent shine and tired eyes of an improbable grace.
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Howie Good
Confiding in the Blind (a collaboration with Dale Wisely) What I need more than anything / more than this job / more than Chekov / & other bearded 19th-century authors / is a pair of wings & a flaming sword / or one of the smaller / of the 180,497 islands in the world / smaller than Cuba before Castro / I need at least a woman / who wants like me / to be killed by sex / & then killed again / who looks back over her shoulder / her eyes the lean of her body / encouraging me to hurry catch up / because we’re allowed / we’re free to take / whatever we find there / & then confide in the blind / that we took it
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Howie Good
Any Given Moment Baudelaire, dying of the so-called “French disease,” wore white face powder to conceal his condition. “By three things is the world sustained,” he announced and then couldn’t remember what they were. Instead, he felt as if his eyes had been replaced with rough-cut rubies. He sensed rather than saw a troupe of medieval jugglers and musicians camped in the forest outside Paris. How he longed for music – guns going off, factory whistles blowing, a pair of tiny birds snickering in a giant chestnut tree. But just because a heart can burst into radiance at any given moment doesn’t mean it ever will.
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Briane Pagel
An Unsigned Inscription Found In A Class Of 1987 Yearbook Sometimes it’s just like I don’t know, rrrgggggh and then EXPLODE! You know? You know? You know. Thing is, nobody REALLY knows, which just makes me so… so… what is the word I’m looking for here? French. Some kind of French word, one of those words with an apostrophe that doesn’t mean anything. What’s up with that apostrophe? An apostrophe means a letter’s missing, right, at least in English, but I don’t think it means the same in French. My point is, though, that there is a word in French that is exactly the thing I am looking for right now, exactly, because this word sums up how it is when the whole world just implodes. Did I say explodes earlier? Because I definitely meant implodes. That’s how this feels.
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Briane Pagel
The Man Who Never Finished His Each day when he woke up he got. From there, he never knew what the day would. At times, over his toast and eggs, he’d sometimes feel so. But there were other. Still, those days were. Oftentimes, he would just. Or sometimes he might. He lived. It was difficult to tell, looking at him (or even when talking with him), if that ever. He never let. This didn’t keep people from trying to find out, of course, because that is how people are. But the man. Eventually, he. Many people who knew him were surprised at that, happening as it did, but those who were closest to him (“close” being a relative thing, here) said they’d figured it would happen sooner rather than later. In this, as with all other things, the man left them.
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John Wells
The Future of Cybernetics & a Dream of My Sister One When my electric failed to snooze I had a sibling: some ding dong mutt-of-a moron: some vanity bulge— a privacy reach: a rat. Once up had I a memory— that is, I had— imprecisely sleepless, sheep by sheep, you get it; [play music— a song you’ve disremembered] portentous of nothing— rags of portents' rags— no ships to; none hence are! They not @ ! & of course I mean arrival hither. Two Diagnostics run right away and long, all along and on, anon, in fevered perpetuity, ostensibly— a flexible rehab of capitulations: a nocturne of delirium +/—, the biography of phantasms: a diet of slow mongooses. Three Gone are days bartering with electromagnetism— its volatility. So what, the cost of gravity’s pervasive negativity: a sissy-chicken in its own spurred nestings whose clucks are #ed. Gone be the memoir of wistful automata. AFTER THE PAUSE VOLUME 2 ISSUE 1
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Gone are the days of cheap chorus.
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John Wells
The First Act was a Naming of All Beasts Been bringin’ the bearer of long news— Le bearer of bad claws. Of old crucifixes— ol’ causalities. Yer way, praise be I. ‘ello Jim, ya know? Our father, I mean? The shrewdness of apes lost in a mix-up— a calling forth of the millipede. Ergo the excommunindictment or the slamming door presiding over the presentation: a chamber full of pinnacles. Later, a barbet, a virgule, a seam— the demagogue est narwhal. Later, an anode inviting the puzzle of troika: the gimbal, the marmot’s, its spinning.
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Ben Nardolilli
Good Foil Saunter to the east side, rub up against a border and trespass over a highway, the shadows foreclose on a church and preserve the cemetery at midnight, the might of stones wrestle with the wind, the ceiling is trees, the branches’ leaves are drunk fans collapsing blame the elves the river is rusty with tears of development somebody lonely scaring you. with stealth behind a bush think of Milan, the fall on the bridge and the battle over the sign, the ceilings there had writing, a wolf is stirring violently somebody nice is in front of you, slowly, forwards, in the house I can lean in safety, touch the ivy and drink the night from winter the ceiling is talking, a ghost is flowing downstream, remind me to drown myself if I forget my name somebody, a stranger, juts out like you jump to a new city if you want your numbers back fast and rolling down the hills, find a place to fall down in a sunny day if the moon is out the moon will do
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now entering the gallery…
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Ernest Williamson
Soul of a Mannequin
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Ernest Williamson
The Master
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Ernest Williamson
Artist Delving Into Her Craft
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W. Jack Savage
Defeated by the Terrain
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W. Jack Savage
Segregated Detention Platforms
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W. Jack Savage
The Lesser
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W. Jack Savage
The Stragglers Began to Arrive
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Michael Brandonisio
EGG: Concept and Context
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Michael Brandonisio
Emptiness
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Kyle Hemmings
Open High
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Chris Drew
Just8.1
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Chris Drew
Just8.2
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Chris Drew
Just8.3
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Mathias Jansson
Cyber
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…now exiting the gallery AFTER THE PAUSE VOLUME 2 ISSUE 1
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room #3
Because tonight I am moving a miniature house down the fine-haired valley of my chest -Adam Tedesco, Amen
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Aaron Simm
[claustrophobic] [[[claustrophobic]]] [walls]:[buzz] [better sound effects for the modern age] [better therapy with newer drugs] [more impressed with today’s technology] [[[claustrophobic]]] [echo chamber] [psychiatrist couch] [progress] Breaking apart [in all the] [worst places]
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Aaron Simm
Knocking On: Buzz Click Every staircase locked up Come in out of the rain Knock Click You are: ___________ From everything You are here here here Time is on your Tick Tock Breathe in slowly The time is: ___________ Buzz Click The ribbons are piling up and it is not even your party
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Adam Tedesco
Amen This is a poem brought to a boil interior sound of blood and nerves because tonight I am moving a miniature house down the fine-haired valley of my chest and I will stare into the corner until you become a phosphene inside me tonight I will pluck bald spots then seal them with nail polish to prevent the implantation of fancy devices that make you smell things that aren’t there landfills or crack smoke clouds until you end up thinking that you are high all the time and kissing me is like tin foil rub downs Tonight our bodies fold into astronaut poses pray like priests who bow in flapjack curtsies we say we shouldn’t have to watch the news to understand our culture is based on human sacrifice we shouldn’t have to wait until the last line of the poem to feel confusion and emptiness evaporate To feel an ever coiling presence like the spring of voices outside your window on summer nights down on Ten Broeck binary stars of air filled glass and vapor hissing you to sleep through morning dew condensate dancing its way to rest
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Sarah Clare
Signs; a Play The hot dark descends, more than a curtainIt suffocates the air, the truth, and makes me want to lie forever. Watch me trying to make you out; your confusing skin as blue, as soft as eggshells. Stare at you through kaleidoscopes because there are so many ways to look at a loony. But I was caught whispering, ravings of a burnt bra, perhaps, softly though- which way will this man swing? Such an unpredictable compass he has; it’s why I’m listening to songs like ‘Maps’ and ‘Budapest’, trying to find the right direction. Or force a liaison: -I want you to wear a band; small, discrete -this isn’t a coup -just so I know how you’re feeling -and my fingers hurt from all the glass -because I can’t keep doing this -and I want you to take the choice away -the bruise is like an atlas now -so, solve it all. Hang up. Let me swing. The loud hum of a dial tone. A corded telephone off the hook. Having enough twist to stretch out this permanent yawn; the drone goes on. Someone will get tangled in it all, cry out, fall down. Grieve over scuffed palms. On a grander scale, someone is mirroring the image at the other end of the line.
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Sarah Clare
La Jetee You are a story of still photographs now it slaps my face as they all hang tidy in the darkroom, with the door open, in the wind. I think I must keep you down there a basement project Don’t want to develop something monstrous. But the devil is already in me, that swelling red memoryA picture of you with one foot on the jetty, and the other on a ship with many sails. You told me you didn’t want hard ground. That ocean was where your heart really lied. It lied. Your heart was in your mouth, petrified of a wild sea. Still, you chose her. And look at that last pictureThe land, the sea, the wolf. Making at separate screams. The irony isn’t lost in here, that your fate lies underneath me. You must lie within firm soil and dream of talking to a previous self, a desperate indie, That tried to balance both worlds, ignoring the gap, the damaged slatsLike the earth wouldn’t claim you back. One way, or-
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L. Ward Abel
Autocracy What's left of Herculaneum is across the pond. Through trees along with my fear of death live ruins, blending winter foreclosed long since. There are instances, it can be argued, when Caesar is welcome. Then there are those days when he's not.
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L. Ward Abel
Between Zebulon and Here Between Zebulon and here my father loops. Highway Eighteen accompanies the ridge left and a few miles. We've been to Barnesville; on Holmes Street Uncle George's old house is overgrown disheveled has worry lines in its paint. The garage is falling into a wound. My father loops all the way
loops all the way back home. I removed a door frame, no one can walk through it anymore. Nothing to keep my ghost in send me, send me from my room out away the color of sound is something with sails. I've become who I think I've wanted to become sharing fourteen acres with the welkin.
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Darrell Petska
Spider of the Mind Just a few ways sojourner Spider’s hike on the wind could go wrong: That lifeline stretching far from the oak's bough might snap— Bullfrog winks below. Heads up! Hungry swifts still bank and reel at lake's edge. Or a wind gust could. Acorn's plummet. High-wire misstep. Spider rises, lowers, treads air. Shore blackberries, this pier reach out. A world of worry, yet Spider drifts. Daylight fading, supper calls.
2. Search Party Last seen by twilight airborne well off shore one itinerant orb-weaver destination unknown. AFTER THE PAUSE VOLUME 2 ISSUE 1
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Dawn's fog lifting. Water calm. Oak taciturn. Spider's tether gone. Come in, Spider. Do you read? At water's edge— “I had to see, dangling here in my dream half the night.” From the pier— “Yes, we weren't born like them to live fearless in god's hand.” Reeds stir. The oak creaks at a wind. Life abounds though much is lost: Spider, please come in.
3. To the Din Spider of the mind in darkness grasping air's thin line Spider of the soul longing to reach true port of anchor Hunger's fly nags always beyond your reach Time's beak never appeased clacks behind And your answer AFTER THE PAUSE VOLUME 2 ISSUE 1
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to the shapeless din: endlessly spin spin spin
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Corey Cook
Iris The vet said it was cancer. That it would only be a matter of time. And, naively, we thought she would wait for death stretched out in a sun patch. Or curled up in the wicker basket on top of the refrigerator. A halogen bulb burning brightly above her. But she went looking for it instead. In the hulking shadows of chairs. Behind the potted houseplants. Under the black belt of the treadmill. In the dim alleyway between the washer and dryer. Beside the stacked soup cans in the pantry. Finally found it in the smallest room of the dollhouse. In the only room without a window. Primitive birds on the wall paper. Acrylic flames in the fireplace. Unmoved and cold to the touch.
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Fabio Fernandes
Human, Post What can you give to the human who has everything? An immortality therapy? A voyage to Arcturus? A copy of Hemingway’s first, lost novel? A chance to get back in time and right wrongs (or wrong rights)? A phial containing an elixir to forgetfulness, so you can leave everything behind, even your very self? Can you give something old, something borrowed, something blue? Can you give abstract things, like the air of Paris that Marcel Duchamp one day had bottled just because?, or like that unforgettable summer in the beach with the love of your life so many years ago? (all gone now, summer, beach, love) Can you give concrete things, like the buildings of São Paulo, once in ruins after protests, droughts, drones, exodus?, or AFTER THE PAUSE VOLUME 2 ISSUE 1
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like that unforgettable Earth, lost in slow diasporas of pain, sorrow, and need? (yes, pain can be concrete as a world.) What can you give to the human who has everything, But for humanity, back? What can you? Can you? You?
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room #4
Now they wanted to hear what I had to say. It’s not what I expected, I tried out first. -Corey Mesler, Wall
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Kim Peter Kovac
The Glow of Discovery A recently decoded journal buried in the lead boxes containing Marie Curie’s papers reveals secretive research in physiology, perhaps the core of a chase for a third Nobel. The battered leather-bound book (still radioactive seventy-five years after her death) contains drawings, charts, and random notes in a barely legible scrawl, written in a code in a Creole constructed from Polish, French, and Latin. Curie is best known for discovering radium, whose mysterious blue-green glow she thought magical and called “fairy-light”. She carried test tubes of the isotope in her clothing, left them on her bedside table, and even nicknamed her second daughter la fille bleu-vert. During the last years of her life, Curie returned to her World War I work in radiography, which included development of battlefield x-ray machines. She experimented with length and dosage of radiation, created methods of magnifying the pictures, and found straight and curved lines, more precise than in nature. Enhancing these images eventually identified an extremely faint blue-green glow on what could only be letters of the alphabet. The journal is filled with redoubled research including records of Marie and colleagues consciously carrying test tubes with radioactive isotopes in their pockets and subjecting themselves to extended radiography. With increased doses, the xrays revealed more and more letters and even words, always in the first language of the person in question. The longer the exposure, the more words, and eventually even groups of letters in Aramaic. In the last pages of the journal, Marie wrote of what she called ghost-words; those in bones spelled architectural terms, while in the neural system they contained phrases from the Ur-stories of ancient Mesopotamia. Researchers speculate she was formulating a unifying theory that ghost-words are the very building blocks of human life, unlike the conventional wisdom that we are made of major, minor, and trace elements. Marie believed, and was attempting to prove, the radical notion that elements are made from ghost-words. It is unclear if the work will ever be completed.
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Sophie Johnson
Killing Issei Sagawa His old testament logic allows this. He did it with a gun and she became the cold meat of his desire. Women without breath can't see sallow anorexic need. I longed too, but could not hold the many hims so I made him a Eucharist, too remote to swallow. Communion without sacrifice is an empty ritual. But I am here and I am beautiful. What should I do to you?
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Philip Kuan
Medley The key to being first off the block isn’t in reacting to cues or whistles, but in aligning your heartbeat with the hush of tension, the percolating audience, everyone held hostage by some pistol’s trigger. Such ambiguous lessons sliced deep, but still I’ll twitch toward my peripheral, toward hairless freaks both left and right. There one’ll go and so here I follow, propelling myself forward like a paper airplane, delusions of gliding overwhelming, briefly overbearing, pointy tip pushing, interlocking fingers slicing the pudding. They said it wouldn’t matter. They said it was my one weakness, a dissension buried beneath ravenous mobs of paperwork proving, test after test, just how flawless The Doctor wanted me to be. Yet there it flashed like a beacon, that average number on that ruthless monitor, 0.75 seconds. Ignore it, they insisted. I was still lord among flies, monarch among moths, golden Minuten pin penetrating my isosceles torso and my 8.9% body fat. A wingspan already 4 inches greater than my height. And my parents, with their towering heights and their stubby legs, beaming blankly at government promises to deliver onto our country something truly special, when it should’ve been the reverse. Expectations so Adonic that it hardly mattered if it wasn’t. Except that it did matter, because everyone, everyone else continued to white-out that dissenting anomaly in my paperwork. So they strapped me down onto my back like an asylum jester, watching and poking and plucking, yelling for me to stop smiling because there’s only a finite amount of dreams amongst far too many dreamers. Because if I sacrificed today, and then tomorrow, perhaps someday I’d know enough to taste the cafeteria stir-fry. Here the smokestacks and silos loom above me, mocking my affected ascension toward uninterruptable serenity, but this I can never do, not with The Doctor smoking his cigarettes and bull-horning his propaganda while taking notes. When he finally recognized the danger he interrupted it, wrestling me into a saddle and parading me forward, breast held high in some silent march of rhythmic nothings, except for the grins of officials giddy in their insistence that there is no more dreaming, only attention. No more respite, only repetition. No more innovation, only a resistance to it, acceptance of the conformity critical to finding the optimal path through the terminal discomfort. Those were the slowest days, when I could feel my nerves deadening, my abs hardening and conforming to the tunnel vision being projected beneath my lids. But when in spite of this I later open them, letting in the chlorinated needling, I find myself alone with the freaks that chase me. No. They chase that inescapable liberation that has nearly drowned me by now, filling my lungs with the type of reckless abandon I should be reserving for those with higher manifests. But I cannot help myself. Revelations grab hold of my wrists and lift me to the rafters, where I hang and watch my mythic conceit spring forth in red. The torrential river that pummels forth, uninhibited. I crash and break against the shorelines but find it still pulling, ever forward, chopping froth, possessed of naught but a haughty need to compete. Even this I penetrate, forcing myself to slip through the friction until I’m safely on the other side. And in an uncontested lead, as it happens. AFTER THE PAUSE VOLUME 2 ISSUE 1
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This is that precise point, that singular opportunity to fulfill a craving that has haunted me in every course, every style. Some will no doubt decide that I was too friendly, or too generous. Others will remind them of an average reading so many years ago, as if that were somehow intentional or relevant. A few of the clever ones will suggest that I am so afraid to lose, that I’ve become afraid to win. However, as I pretend to cramp up, and watch with gleeful abandon the approach of another swimmer nearly a lap behind, all I can anticipate is the incomprehension, the suspicious eyes, the proof that I’m who they will say I am.
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Mitchell Grabois
Froth Leonard Bernstein said: This will be our reply to violence to make music more intensely than ever before So after I heard about the murder of twenty children in their Crayola classroom I descended the splintery stairs to my cellar and sat behind my drums and beat them By the time the other members of my band showed up the bassist, who works as a bartender the guitarist, whose girlfriend went back to Arkansas and the lead singer, dark as a gypsy I was frothed my black t-shirt soaked with sweat my arms pumped like a bodybuilder’s the Mounds of Venus at the base of my thumbs hard as walnuts My dog who I’d saved from the pound and normally likes rock music cowered behind the water heater as if the shooter of children were in the room with his assault rifle I got up to give him a lamb treat and smooth his ears back and tell him that everything was going to be all right
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Corey Mesler
Wall “Now is an excellent time to take inventory of that wall of yours. Is it serving you well? Is it keeping out the influences you don't want but allowing in the influences you do want? Could it use some renovation? Are you willing to reimagine what its purpose is and how you want it to work for you in the future?” --Rob Brezsney’s Horoscopes
They finished the wall before the weekend. They invited me to walk its length, commenting here and there about a loose brick or a lower than usual section. They had spoken little during its construction and I was flummoxed into silence. Now they wanted to hear what I had to say. It’s not what I expected, I tried out first. The supervisor nodded, his severe mien held steady like a mask that could become permanent. One gets used to anything, he said at last. After they left I thought about this. I realized that I did not know my role. Had they told me early in the construction and I had forgotten? Had the wall’s relation to me been explained, how my seclusion behind it was to affect my life? Was freedom important to me? This last query I asked myself and, seriously, I could not answer. Not yet. Perhaps after I had lived with the wall I would know better who I was before the wall. Perhaps it would come to me that I was the reason for the wall and this would be a source of pride, even power. I began to think of the wall as a positive influence, like religion, or television. I vowed to walk its entire length one day and know it whole. The first day after the wall I took to my bed where I stayed for a week. When my strength returns, I told my reflection, the wall and I would know each other better. When my strength returns, I repeated. Some days the sun doesn’t even crest the wall and my room remains changeless, no shadows, no shifting figures. And I am inert, too, as quiet as the wall, and as endless.
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Shinjini Bhattacharjee
A Workshop on Self-Disguise What happens when the missing breath disappears from our arms is hazy disguise. Arrange yourself according to feathers from a flight. As if teeth are a bloodline to summon air from the zip codes dragged out in the sunlight. Commitment works like a loud smell snatched from an old flower stashed away. Think in terms of raindrops pressed to lonely bandages. Even salvation has forgotten its name. Trickle down if you have the guts.
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John Grey
Poetry Reading, Enter at Your Own Risk In my memory of the night, one Hannibal Lecter wannabe in the audience, leapt up from his seat, grabbed the reader in his brute hands and bit off the poor man's ear. "He was saying shit about me that I alone could know" was his explanation for the act. Yes, poetry can be a dangerous place. You hang your rawest emotions out on the quivering line of your voice and don't be surprised if some untethered cannon in the crowd takes your heart to heart while thinking it's vice versa. I've been beaten down myself many a time, even had a nose ripped off, hair jerked out by the roots, many broken ribs of course, even a busted kneecap. It's why insurance companies are so wary of covering poets. It's not that these poverty dwellers can't afford the premiums. It's the honesty they can't afford. They just don't know that until it's too late. And worse things happen. Listeners get all torn up themselves by those rapacious talons of sympathy. Their emotions break out in hives when some emaciated female versifier talks of being booted from her parent's home or knocked down, run over, on route 7 by a gang of bikers. I once fell in love on the spot with a young woman because of a certain phrase she used to describe a flower. I forget the woman and I forget the phrase. But I remember the love. AFTER THE PAUSE VOLUME 2 ISSUE 1
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That's poetry, isn't it. Long ago and in the now.
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Louise Robertson
Canvas Take your canvas to the coffee shop. Sit that canvas on the chair. Pour hot chocolate into its mouth. Like a kiss. Like a kiss.
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Gwendolyn Kiste
Relationship Status Ten seconds after Jack changed his relationship status from ‘Married’ to ‘It’s Complicated’, his phone chirped. Then it chirped again. And for the next two hours, it didn’t stop chirping. He considered changing his name and number too. But then Vianca couldn’t call and remind him to pick up Eve on Friday. Jack loved how every time she left a voicemail, his ex still intimated a Transylvanian accent just to make him laugh. Despite their split, he couldn’t miss that. When he finally checked his profile, one-hundred-and-seventeen comments awaited him. “I didn’t know I had that many acquaintances,” he moaned. It was bad enough convincing his friends that dating a vampire wasn’t some fad. It was even harder corralling everyone for the midnight wedding. It was abject misery when none of his fraternity buddies would let their kids play with his beautiful (and human and entirely harmless) daughter. But in the eight years he spent with Vianca, nothing was worse than reading the virtual gloating over their breakup. ‘i told u not to date that bloodsucking trollop’ ‘She prolly broke your heart cause she doesn’t have one. Not a beating one anyhow.’ ‘I heard she cheated on you. Time to talk to your doc about VTDs. LOL’ ‘What happened? Did she leave you for Dracula?’ On top of everything, Jack worried Vianca’s family might stumble onto the sanguivoriphobic display in their newsfeeds. Even if he sometimes descended into the “I-want-to-toss-my-ex-into-the-nearest-sunbeam” stage of grief—especially when his daughter Eve called to say goodnight and Jack heard Vianca’s new beau tittering in the background—he had never minded her family. And while his social life might improve if he purged his friends list of the undead, he couldn’t bring himself to delete them. They loved Eve and deserved the chance to see all her coming-of-age benchmarks. Plus, it wasn’t as if they could attend festivities like her first day of school given the sunlight-equals-dust situation. So Jack sent a message to apologize for his friends’ behavior. It was easy to find the family on his list. Since they didn’t show up on film (or in pixels), none of them had real profile pictures. A crow represented his ex-mother-in-law, an old castle was his ex-father-in-law, and a sunset—complete with a requisite ironic caption— belonged to his ex-sister-in-law. As usual, they responded in minutes. ‘Oh, honey, I’m so sorry about everything you’re going through. Vianca made the biggest mistake of her un-life when she left you.’ ‘Son, you’re still part of our family as far as we’re concerned. Let’s go out for cigars soon.’ ‘I’m having a Sunday dinner. You should bring Eve. My heartbreaker sister is coming too, but right now, we like you more.’ AFTER THE PAUSE VOLUME 2 ISSUE 1
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Jack tried not to think about how his human friends were more dastardly than the bonafide monsters. Instead, he reminisced about the first time Vianca’s sister invited him to a family dinner, and he was terrified he might be the main course. “If only my torture could be so swift,” he muttered en route to supper. “What’s torture, Daddy?” Eve grinned at him. “Nothing, darling,” he said and mussed the shiny black hair she inherited from her mother. Vianca’s red sports car—tinted windows and all—waited in the driveway. “Mommy’s here!” Eve announced, and Jack thought he might wretch. “I’m glad you came,” Vianca said as her family greeted them at the door. “I have someone I want you to meet.” She introduced her wan paramour, Lars. “Nice to meet you.” The man wobbled and extended a half-hearted handshake. It was no secret why Lars was so pallid. Jack remembered his early days with Vianca, back when things were exciting and new and he didn’t worry about losing a pint of blood here and there. She had begged to taste him on their first date, and he couldn’t resist those icy eyes. Then they had Eve, and romance turned into excuses. “You can’t be weak for the board meeting tomorrow,” Vianca would say and roll over without so much as a nibble. For years, Jack almost expected her to leave him for a vampire. “That’s been her type for centuries,” he told himself. But the notion of her canoodling with another mortal nauseated him. Though Jack glared at her, Vianca just shrugged and excused herself to churn the blood pudding, leaving the men alone with her family. Jack inspected his rival. “You ready for the, uh, initiation?” Lars fidgeted. “What initiation?” “Vianca didn’t tell you?” Jack bit his lip to stymie a smile. “The new boyfriend is tasted by the entire family.” “Yes,” Vianca’s sister interjected, “an old vampire tradition.” Whimpering, Lars glanced around. “She’s already taken a couple pints today,” he said. “I can’t handle much more blood loss.” “You don’t have a choice,” Vianca’s father said. The matriarch flashed a toothy grin. “If you stay, we feed.” At that, Lars grabbed his jacket. A baffled Vianca tried to change his mind, but he issued a dozen conflicting excuses. “Alright,” she said, closing the door, “what’d you tell him?” “Just about the ritual feeding,” Jack said. Vianca scoffed. “We haven’t done that in decades!” “He doesn’t know that,” her sister said. All fangs and hugs, the family removed Lars’ seat from the table. While he had never developed a taste for the sanguine recipes, Jack thoroughly enjoyed the evening’s blood pudding. After the meal, Vianca lured him onto the porch with a bottle of wine. “Lars was only so-so anyhow,” she said. “Fun at first taste, bland afterward. But then no one tastes as good as you.” AFTER THE PAUSE VOLUME 2 ISSUE 1
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She smiled in the moonlight, and Jack rolled his eyes. “My sister already put Eve to bed.” Jack frowned. “So?” “So this,” Vianca said and pulled him close. “I vant you, darling. I vant you vith all my heart.” “I love it when you talk dirty,” he said as her teeth nuzzled into his neck. Like their first date all over again.
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…Contributors… Poetry L. Ward Abel L. Ward Abel, poet, composer and performer of music, teacher, retired lawyer, lives in rural Georgia, has been published hundreds of times in print and online, and is the author of Peach Box and Verge (Little Poem Press, 2003), Jonesing For Byzantium (UK Authors Press, 2006), The Heat of Blooming (Pudding House Press, 2008), Torn Sky Bleeding Blue (erbacce-Press, 2010), American Bruise (Parallel Press, 2012), Cousins Over Colder Fields (Finishing Line Press, 2013), Roseorange (Flutter Press, 2013), and the forthcoming Little Town gods (Folded Word Press). Shinjini Bhattacharjee Shinjini Bhattacharjee is a writer and the Editor-in-Chief of Hermeneutic Chaos Literary Journal. A Pushcart Prize nominee, her poems have been published, or are forthcoming in Crack the Spine, Small Po[r]tions, elimae, Metazen, The Stray Branch, Uppagus, Literary Orphans and elsewhere. Sarah Clare Sarah Clare is an MA Professional Writing student at Falmouth University. She loves telling stories through prose and poetry, almost as much as she loves reading them. Poet and part-time zombie (will bite between the hours of 6am and 9am) - has a tattoo of Edgar Allan Poe to keep her on the 'write' track. Her work has been included in the current issue of the NonBinary Review. Andrew Condouris Andrew Condouris is a poet, teacher, and Bodhisattva Monk in the Five Mountain Zen Order. He has been writing poetry since he looked out a window and couldn't tell the city lights from the stars. Corey Cook Corey Cook's work has recently appeared in Dewpoint Literary Journal, East Coast Literary Review, Eunoia Review, Lummox and Melancholy Hyperbole. New poems are forthcoming in bear creek haiku and Columbia College Literary Review. He lives in Thetford Center, Vermont, and is currently trying to find a publisher for his fourth chapbook, White Flag Raised. Darren C. Demaree Darren C. Demaree is the author of "As We Refer to Our Bodies" (8th House, 2013), "Temporary Champions" (Main Street Rag, 2014), and "Not For Art Nor Prayer" (8th House, 2015). He is the Managing Editor of the Best of the Net Anthology. He is currently living in Columbus, Ohio, with his wife and children. Fabio Fernandes Fabio Fernandes is a writer and translator. Clarion West 2013. Stories published in Kaleidotrope, StarShipSofa, Scigentasy, The Apex Book of World SF 2, The Near Now (coming soon). Two-time recipient of Argos Award (Brazil). Co-editor of the post-colonialist SF anthology We See a Different Frontier (Futurefire.net Publishing, 2013). Currently writing his first novel in English. He lives with his wife in São Paulo, Brazil. Howie Good All proceeds from Howie Good's latest book of poetry, Fugitive Pieces (Right Hand Press, 2014), go to the Food Bank of the Hudson Valley. Visit www.righthandpointing.net/#!e-chapbooks/c1qi1 Mitchell Grabois Mitchell Krockmalnik Grabois has had over seven hundred of his poems and fictions appear in literary magazines in the U.S. and abroad, including AFTER THE PAUSE. He has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize for work published in 2012, 2013, and 2014. His novel, Two-Headed Dog, based on his work as a clinical psychologist in a state hospital, is available for Kindle and Nook, or as a print edition. He lives in Denver. AFTER THE PAUSE VOLUME 2 ISSUE 1
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John Grey John Grey is an Australian-born poet. Recently published in Oyez Review, Rockhurst Review and Spindrift with work upcoming in New Plains Review, Big Muddy Review, Willow Review and Louisiana Literature. Sophie Johnson Sophie Johnson lives, writes, and paints in Lincoln, Nebraska. Katie Lewington Katie Lewington is currently studying Maths and English at college. She spends the rest of her time searching for a job although she does often tend to be distracted by the blank page and all of the ideas in her head clamouring to get out onto it. She lives in Hertfordshire in the United Kingdom. She has previously had no writing published. Liz Mariani Liz Mariani lives in Vermont. Poems have been published in Two Serious Ladies, The Buffalo News, Great Lakes Review and The Brooklyner. Liz’s latest performance took place in Toronto as part of the Art Bar Poetry Series. Click www.lizmariani.com to book Liz for a performance, lecture or teaching artist workshop. Jennifer Moore Jennifer Moore is the author of The Veronica Maneuver (forthcoming, The University of Akron Press), and What the Spigot Said (High5 Press). Poems have appeared in American Letters & Commentary, Best New Poets, Columbia Poetry Review, Barrow Street and elsewhere, and criticism and reviews in Jacket2, Spoke Too Soon, and The Offending Adam. A native of the Seattle area, she holds degrees from the University of Colorado and the University of Illinois at Chicago. Jennifer is an assistant professor of creative writing at Ohio Northern University and lives in Defiance, Ohio. Andy N. Andy N is a writer from Manchester, UK. He has published one full-length collection of Poetry ‘Return in Kemptown’ and two split books ‘A means to an End’ in 2011 with Jeff Dawson and ‘Europa’ with Nick Armbrister in 2014 as well as his first chapbook ‘Mystery Stories’. He is currently co-writing the poetic play ‘Last Chance Saloon’ and his next full-length poetry collection ‘The End of Summer’ which should both be out in 2015 or 2016. His official website is http://www.andyn.org.uk Ben Nardolilli Ben Nardolilli currently lives in Arlington, Virginia. His work has appeared in Perigee Magazine, Red Fez, Danse Macabre, The 22 Magazine, Quail Bell Magazine, Elimae, fwriction, THEMA, Pear Noir, The Minetta Review, and Yes Poetry. He has a chapbook Common Symptoms of an Enduring Chill Explained, from Folded Word Press. He blogs at mirrorsponge.blogspot.com and is looking to publish a novel. Darrell Petska Darrell Petska's writing focuses on place, time, and hope's centrality in our lives. His work appears in Lummox, San Pedro River Review, Blast Furnace, Apocrypha and Abstractions, About Place Journal and other electronic and print journals. Day jobs have included psychiatric casework, nursing home evaluation, and engineering communications. Peter G. Res Peter G. Res, M.F.A. is a poet, teacher, songwriter, and musician. He is currently Adjunct Professor of English at Westchester Community College in Mount Vernon, New York. His most recent collection of poems, Neon Soliloquies, was published by Erbacce Press in 2011. Louise Robertson Louise Robertson is active as a writer, organizer, and performer in the Columbus, Ohio, poetry scene. She's published (Crack the Spine, Third Wednesday, and baldhip magazine, among others) and won awards (Columbus Arts Festival Festival [twice], Mary Roberts Rinehart, among others). Her first fullAFTER THE PAUSE VOLUME 2 ISSUE 1
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length book is due out in 2015 (Brick Cave Books). Someone once said about her that underneath it all she is kind. Aaron Simm Aaron Simm is a poet, playwright, hip-hop artist, and llama enthusiast living in Victoria, BC. He was the co-founder of the Winnipeg Spoken Word Festival, and his work has been published in CV2, text, and the forthcoming issues of rip/torn and cede poetry. Adam Tedesco Adam Tedesco has worked as a shipbuilder, a meditation instructor, a telephone technician and cultural critic for the now disbanded Maoist Internationalist Movement. His recent work has appeared, or is forthcoming in dcomP, Drunk In A Midnight Choir, Cartridge Lit, Similar: Peaks:: and Potluck. He lives in Albany, New York, with his family. Erin Emily Ann Vance Erin Emily Ann Vance’s work has appeared in numerous publications, including Grip Magazine, WAX Poetry and Art Magazine, The Gauntlet, and NoD Magazine. She is currently completing a BA in English literature and creative writing at The University of Calgary. Erin loves to travel and works with children on the autism spectrum. John Wells John Wells is an Ohioan living in North Carolina with his lovely family. He teaches raucous collegians, plays music, and writes. He holds an MFA in poetry, and his recent work appears in journals such as Spittoon.
Visual Poetry Michael Brandonisio Domiciled in Brooklyn, New York, Michael Brandonisio a poet, photographer, fictionist and visual artist. His work has appeared in Small Po[r]tions, Otoliths, and Squawk Back. He has never had a facelift. Mathias Jansson Mathias Jansson is a Swedish art critic and poet. He has contributed with visual poetry to magazines as Lex-ICON, Anatematiskpress, Quarter After #4 and Maintenant 8: A Journal of Contemporary Dada. He has also published a chapbook at this is visual poetry and contributed with erasure poetry to anthologies from Silver Birch Press.
Fiction Sagnik Datta Sagnik Datta had been working as a Software Developer in Hyderabad, India, but has now left his job to pursue his writing interests. His works have appeared (or are forthcoming) in: Eunoia Review, eFiction India, Right Hand Pointing, Ranar. Soren James Soren James is a writer and visual artist - more of his work can be seen here: http://sorenjames.moonfruit.com/ Gwendolyn Kiste Gwendolyn Kiste is a horror and fantasy writer based in Pennsylvania. Her short stories have appeared in numerous magazines and anthologies, including Strangely Funny II, History and Horror, Oh My! and Whispers from the Past: Fright and Fear. You can find her at www.gwendolynkiste.com and on Twitter (@GwendolynKiste). Kim Peter Kovac AFTER THE PAUSE VOLUME 2 ISSUE 1
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Kim Peter Kovac writes poems, prose poems, flash fiction, microfiction, creative non-fiction, haiku, haibun, tanka, three line poems, and various interstitials which appear in or are forthcoming in Frogpond, Mudlark, Crunchable, Elsewhere, and other journals with longer names. www.kimpeterkovac.tumblr.com Philip Kuan Philip Kuan is an aspiring writer from Northern California, with a healthy interest in befuddling readers with some stories. Some of his favorite authors include Charles Dickens, Tolkien, and Franz Kafka, among others. He has been published in several short story magazines, and is always looking for constructive feedback at http://philkuan.wordpress.com/ Corey Mesler Corey Mesler has published in numerous anthologies and journals including Poetry, Good Poems American Places, andEsquire/Narrative. He has published 8 novels, 4 short story collections, chapbooks, and 4 full-length poetry collections. He’s been nominated for many Pushcarts, and 2 of his poems were chosen for Garrison Keillor’s Writer’s Almanac. He runs a bookstore in Memphis. Briane Pagel Briane Pagel found out, too late, that bagpipes are way harder to play than they look. He is the author of the novel “Codes,” available in 2015 from Golden Fleece, as well as several other books and short stories. He blogs at www.thinkingthelions.com. Amanda Quinn Amanda Quinn writes short fiction and poetry. She has been published in Scraps (National Flash Fiction Day anthology), Butcher's Dog, The Journeyman, and on the Paragraph Planet website. Her poem, Cast Away, recently came second in the Black Country Living Museum's annual poetry competition. She is on Twitter: @amandaqwriter.
Art Chris Drew Chris lives and works in rural northeast Missouri. He is a musican, artist, and writer in his free time and maintains a blog of his attempts at proliferate-propagate.tumblr.com Kyle Hemmings Kyle Hemmings has art work in The Stray Branch, Euphenism, Uppagus, The Bitchin' Kitsch, Black Market Lit, Red Bird Press, and upcoming work in Convergence. He loves pre-punk garage bands of the 60s, Manga comics, and urban photography/art. W. Jack Savage W. Jack Savage is a retired broadcaster and educator (wjacksavage.com). Jack and his wife Kathy live in Monrovia, California. Ernest Williamson Ernest Williamson has published poetry and/or visual art in over 500 periodicals. His poetry and/or art has appeared in journals such as The Oklahoma Review, The Copperfield Review, The Columbia Review, and The Tulane Review. Dr. Williamson is an Assistant Professor of English at Allen University.
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Editor’s Note Part 3 Thank you for reading. I look forward to encountering all the future versions of you and I hope you feel the same about me. Please consider submitting work or just saying hi. Send all communiqués to afterthepause@gmail.com. Until next time…
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