“We never know how high we are, till we are asked to rise.� - Emily Dickinson
Oculus Volume XX 2012
Alabama School of Mathematics and Science 1255 Dauphin Street Mobile, AL 36604
Editor-in-Chief Amy Welch Poetry Editor Kathryn Hurst Proofing Editor Elizabeth Self
Cover
Lisa Renye Kaylin Bowen
Assistant Editor Lisa Renye
Art Editor Kaylin Bowen
Prose Editor Julia Nelson
Staff Members
Julia Rath Caitlin Nowlin Alexander Peeples
From the Editor: The Alabama School of Math and Science Oculus has always been known as a prestigious accomplishment to the students who work all year to produce it and to the students who write and submit their poems, short stories, and art for consideration. The Oculus is a student-led, student-produced, and student-directed literary magazine that displays the feelings, imaginations, and insight of an entire student body in a short amount of space. This year, the Oculus went through many twists and turns along the way to become the cluster of pages that you are now holding. Despite struggles, complications, and downright mishaps, the Oculus staff came together as a unit and overcame all obstacles. Though this Oculus is probably one of the shortest in our publication history, I doubt that there has been a collection of staff that is happier to present it to you just as it is—complete. A large amount of thanks go out to the Oculus staff—all of your hard work has set a standard that I doubt any can ever surpass. Thanks to Dr. Jeff Goodman and Andria Diamond for their dedication and contributions. And last, but definitely not least, to the writers and artists of ASMS—there couldn’t be an Oculus without you. We, as a group, have been grateful for the privilege of reading your words and being able to see through your eyes for a brief time. We’ve had a great time forming and creating the 2011/2012 Alabama School of Mathematics and Science Oculus, and hope that you enjoy it just as much.
-Amy Welch Editor-in-Chief
Table of Contents Literature Title Body World Middle Aged His Name SHHHH... Swing Set Impression: Portrait of Albert Einstein One of a Kind Fatherhood, Reclined My Hero Elyse High School in a Nutshell Man In Red Beach Boys That’s Her Brand New A Slow Country Night Two-Year-Old Soldier Times In May Barbie Silhouette Quicksilver The Fate Family Man Galactic Phase For You, Dad A Place Above A Country Home To the Dandelion in My Backyard Onward King of the Swamp Don’t Be Surprised Restraint
Author Anonymous Ai Abshire Esther Grubbe Hannah Burns Hope He Freddy Argueta Alyson Daniels Alexis Pierce John Chancellor Morgan Jowers Whitney Rogers Kerry Ellis Tylor Schmitt Tyrone Rudolph Kathryn Hurst John Upton Latei Iyegha Baylin Hester Anonymous Jordan Danford Anonymous Latei Iyegha Anonymous Anonymous Kerry Ellis John Chancellor Jordan Danford Jordan Danford Tyrone Rudolph Jordan Danford Nick Chaplow
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#6 #6 #7 #7 #8 #8 # 12 # 12 # 13 # 13 # 14 # 14 # 15 # 15 # 17 # 17 # 18 # 18 # 19 # 19 # 20 # 22 # 22 # 23 # 25 # 25 # 32 # 37 # 37 # 44 # 44
Short Story Title Alone... Untitled Salt Her Daddy
Art work Title Beach Vortex All That Remains Is What We Find Unacceptable Knight Embra Sometimes I Wonder, What If ? Fall Simplicity Red Lipstick Violet Celestial Rotation Honk Reconciliation Violin The Return to Ruins Contempt My Angel The Grand Rescape Soaking Up the Sun Colour Block Abstraction Enlightenment Waterfall
Author Anonymous Greg Tate Hollis DeLaney Alexis Pierce
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# 16 # 26 # 27 # 38
Artist
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Bekka Dicks Felipe Shinsato Konnor Kuhlmann
#9 #9 # 10
Bekka Dicks Veronica Kinoshita Aiden McNellis Nick Chaplow DNA Preyear Tiffany Ngo Nick Chaplow Konnor Kuhlmann Nick Chaplow Tracy Lin Audrey Arnold DNA Preyear DNA Preyear Konnor Kuhlmann Aiden McNellis Nick Chaplow DNA Preyear Felipe Shinsato Bekka Dicks
# 10 # 11 # 11 # 20 # 21 # 21 # 23 # 24 # 24 # 26 # 32 # 33 # 33 # 34 # 34 # 35 # 35 # 36 # 36
Ai Abshire Middle Aged
Anonymous Body World Body bare and flesh stripped exposing what we should not see Anatomy analyzed at such an angle is only displayed in morgues Precisely cut to every detail we are shown for what we are Insensitivity may have its place here but still we all gaze on Tantalizingly presented Mesmerized without disgust Natural is the body’s beauty I should feel so lucky
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Made of stone and forever smiling this is the statue of middle-aged Marty. Wavy hair waxed and eyes bulging out. He has a wrinkle for each one of his worries. An insane expression is plastered on that chills my bones throughout my body. He speaks to me of his tale. How fake smiles had driven him crazy. Turned to stone he brings fear to viewers, even to I who now know his story. Listen closely, you’ll hear him whisper, “Don’t end up Like middle-aged Marty.”
Esther Grubbe His Name His voice, a country boom, makes laughter erupt throughout a room. Like a military man upon his glistening head rests short bristles of brown hair. The black and silver band engraved with August 24, 2010, rests on a working man’s finger. His height makes you so small but stands as a protector. So young, the sudden loss of his parents now strengthens him as he clings to their memory. He captures me with his graceless hands. The excitement we share at our late night homecomings fires up the world.
Hannah Burns SHHHHH... ‌ Stone cold silence. A single digit laid over closed lips. Apparition of white. Unmoving. A face, incomplete. Abysmal eyes staring changless. Powerful Undying Silence.
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Hope He Swing Set Next to my white house With the green shrubbery, Steel bars of happiness In beige and navy. 4 years and counting. Spots of rust amongst the joints Adorn the nifty structure. Glistening in the rain, Gleaming under sun. With the birds. Aging, but never disappearing His insight will never fade His equations and scribbled drawings Imprinted on his face, with white ink And his work imprinted on society, with black ink His white face, dimmed by the brightness of his white hair Wrinkles, from the countless hours spent discovering And understanding The next big thing
Swings and seesaw lean Swing side to side like art. Assembled by hand, Instructions and wrench Created this masterpiece. Laughter it brings little ones joy With the gentle wind My swing set sings. With breeze in harmony.
The endlessness of space to the endlessness of his mind capacity This portrait depicts the mind of the great Albert Einstein
Freddy Argueta Impression: Portrait of Albert Einstein
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Bekka Dicks Beach
Felipe Sinshato Vortex
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Konnor Kuhlman All That Remains Is What We Find Unacceptable Bekka Dicks Knight
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Veronica Kinoshita Embra
Aiden Mcnellis Sometimes I Wonder, What If?
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Alexis Pierce Fatherhood, Reclined
It is green-not hued in jade or moss or any of that novella Just green Unlike the other dĂŠcor It sits alone, plush A home for dust and other such folly Waiting, forever for its owner to return an eyesore among Eyesores
He is of one kind a delight to have nearby. Almond-shaped brown eyes, deep with pupils bottomless, like a magician’s top hat. Height surpasses mine, as a cello to a violin. His hair is short and neat, a freshly mowed summer lawn. The tiny wrinkles below his eyes, are vintage curtains with tiebacks. And his cinnamon cheeks, reflect the light of the early-morning sky. His speaks with a lovely voice, strong, kind, and of moderate pitch. He laughs timidly at the silliest things, reminding me of a little kid. Somewhat shy, like the sun on a cloudy day, he is relaxed and very slow to anger. He protects me as a lid protects the eye.
Alyson Daniels One of a Kind
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John Chancellor My Hero My Hero Toned body, a tomboy, you Adventure out into this Dark, forsaken world spreading The light of your bright crooked smile Still, Your feminine beauty shows As your apricot skin edges into pink cheeks And your sapphire eyes fade to emerald Yet, Our God didn’t just create a beauty As the proverbs of 1000 men Transcend into your wisdom Through Whatever trial or trouble Or wind or storm My love and adoration for you will remain
Morgan Jowers Elyse On a symmetrical face framed with blonde, though roots are dark She wears bright colors, preppy. Happy until home, remembering her father no longer lives with her. So in love, her parents until they let go of it, and so she. No trust in love or happiness, so she will change herself just to fit in. I feel so sad to see her terrified, trying to find where she belongs. If only she would be Elyse, she’d find what she is looking for. Her eyes like the heavens on these colorful days.
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‘ Beauty. Originality. Be yourself… But like everyone else. Dream. Believe. Shoot for the moon! Yet don’t set yourself up for failure. Confused. Lost. Just try it! Go here! Decisions. Decisions. Morals. Principles. Stand strong for beliefs. Then torn down by peers. Powerful. Strong. You can change the world. For better…or for worse. Perfection. Flawless. Appearance is everything Personality, just a plus. Judgment. Stereotypical. Everyone equal? If only…
Whitney Rogers High School in A Nutshell
Kerry Ellis Man In Red 14
Dark frame almost burned traps a man in red. Smoke-filled house is blazing as orange flames rise. Water quenches a thirsty house. the man in red made a hero.
Tylor Schmitt Beach Boys
He pulls at me the way a rip tide pulls you out to sea, so soft and gentle it seems the choice is up to me. His smile dazzling like the colors of a reef, Towering over me, a tidal wave crashing overhead. I can’t keep standing in ankle deep waters, Dare I go any deeper? All in or all out is the choice I must make… There’s another calling me from the ocean’s deep. Like sun-soaked sand, warm and soft. Much safer, no chance of getting in over my head… But could I give up those white-capped waves forever? Or would I lament never being pulled into an adventure like no other.
Tyrone Rudolph That’s Her
Her jewelry corresponds with a variety of clothes She makes your stomach drop when she comes close Her Bath and Body Works fragrance explores your nose Such a beautiful smile which is well composed When she walks, you can’t help but stare As she sways her long, dark, silky hair She has a man but no one cares She does math so fast that other students can’t compare If it weren’t for that man of hers Guys would be on her back like boots and spurs She is considered fly, so she soars with the birds Knowing that you can’t have this girl really hurts
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Anonymous Alone she sat on the floor. No one around her but the walls that endlessly watched. She was content to sit upon the ground. And wait. He sat up in his bed. It was exactly eight minutes before his alarm was supposed to ring. Every morning was the same. He didn’t bother to bathe. He just threw clothes on with unexplainable spite. He didn’t eat. He just left. He went where the world wanted him. He did what the world wanted him to do. He thought what the world wanted him to think. Every day was exactly the same. He didn’t even notice, but that’s the beauty of it. The world around him pulled the strings ever so gently, and he remained oblivious. He was no one special he had no purpose. He had no goal. He would leave no mark upon the world, because that’s not what the world wanted. He would simply live. Exist. Alone she sat on the floor. No one around her but the walls that spoke no words. She was content to sit upon the ground. And wait. He didn’t act out of place. He didn’t dress to attract. He didn’t even speak much. He had a duty, and he fulfilled it. Day in. day out. He was completely out of sync with his mind. He could only hear the world. He wasn’t depressed. He wasn’t particularly happy, either. He just felt. He did what he needed to do. Exist. Alone she sat on the floor. No one around her but the walls that listened in peace. She was content to sit upon the ground. And wait. One day, he opened his eyes. Not the eyes that the world had given him, but his eyes. He saw everything around him. He finally saw all there was to see. He sat in bewilderment, simply looking. He looked and looked and looked. Finally he began to hear. He heard the sounds around him. He didn’t hear the ominous boom of the world, but the life all around him. It was all so beautiful, but so sad. No one else could see or hear. They 16
only did what the world wanted. Exist. Alone she sat upon the floor. No one around her but the walls that gave no comfort. She was content to sit upon the ground. And wait. He drove home slowly that day. He had driven that same path day after day, but he had no idea where he was driving. He only did what the world wanted. He began to think. Slowly, at first, timidly stretching his mind. One thought led to another, which led to another and another and another. He was thinking. Thinking about everything. Why? Who? When? Where? What? He couldn’t stop his own mind. He sat alone in his car and just laughed. All this time he hadn’t been alive. He’d only been a tool. Alone she sat upon the floor. No one around her but the walls that shared no thought. She was content to sit upon the ground. And wait. He lay in bed and wondered. Before he had only existed. He had no place. He had no name. He sat up. Everything had a name, but he couldn’t recall his own. He jumped out of bed and into the street. A name. He needed a name. He ran. He ran. He ran. He had no name. He wasn’t meant to have a name. He was meant to remain nameless. Alone she sat upon the floor. No one around her but the walls so hollow. She was content to sit upon the ground. And wait. He stopped running. He was tired. He had never been tired before. He had never moved on his own free will. He looked upon the house in front of him. He heard the eerie silence. He thought about why he had come here. He wondered what was inside. Alone she sat upon the floor. The door opened. She was content to sit upon the ground. He stared at her. She simply sat. She looked at him. She heard his heavy breathing. She thought about his purpose. She wondered what he would do next. He walked over. He sat down. And they existed together.
Kathryn Hurst Brand New A knowing glance And a friendly smile A caring hug And a loving goodbye Brand new faces And judging looks A smiling friend and a new attitude A new city New education A new experience And a new life
John Upton A Slow Country Night The stars shine brighter than diamonds In that large, cloudless country sky A relaxed summer night like this Can leave you with an awesome high. All of us with our own hardships, Battles that have yet to be won. Our parents divorced and hateful, Would be an example of one. We sit in that tailgate and talk, While the loud country music plays. Whatever problems may arise That tailgate is our great escape. A 2001 Ford Ranger Small and red, sits just up the road Many times it has seemed to be More comfortable than my own home
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On a balmy summer day, I lie in the yawning shade of a pine tree, In the bright shadow, pondering the afternoon away, And even though nothing ever gets done, this is how I love to spend the hours of May.
Baylin Hester Times in May
Latei Iyegha Two-Year-Old Soldier
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When I gaze into her eyes, I find my inspiration: A little soldier, in the heat of battle, afraid, but never giving up. Strong and sweet, she struts with admirable sassiness. Her silly laugh is contagious wearing a precious smile that brightens dark days. But the sound of her trimmed nails grating her battered skin, is screeching in my ear. Fragile and pure, she suffers more than a person should. Psoriasis, a cold-hearted disease, left scars and bumps on her chocolate brown skin. Arms like the scales of a snake. Legs like the bark of a tree. I stare at her feeble body, a revolting chill rushes down my spine. I turn my unwilling eyes. If I could take her pain away and put that burden upon myself, a single heartbeat would untie her from eternal peace of mind.
She wore a lily in her hair A pink dress, pink like the mouth of the flower She danced a silhouette waltz So delicate, like the seconds falling this twilight hour She hummed a soft tune So sweetly, like the sonata of cricket evenings She whirled in solitude Faintly, her shadow too danced on the ceiling Yet I approached her And she grew slowly dimmer As the sun set She faded into the glimmer Of the chandelier O’er the dusty parquet floor I’ve seen her never again And never before
Anonymous Barbie
Jordan Danford Silhouette
When you hear the word Barbie. She comes to mind. Skin like rubber She exhausts the tanning bed. Eyes of ice Glisten Reflecting light like the yards of bleached hair hanging from her head. Decrepit body, hidden beneath layers of fake. Her facial expression, stuck. Confused eyebrows emphasize Pure stupidity. Cars, money, clothes, All at her fingertips. Makeup hides all. Skin-tight dresses flaunt that fantasy body. Everything seemingly perfect Under the surface, Pills. Just to stay alive. Anorexia and bulimia are the shadows in every snapped picture. But you cannot tell The flash dissipates truth. We see her as what she appears, Barbie. Behind closed doors, She cries every night.
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Anonymous Quicksilver
Those timid eyes Aren’t fooling anyone. He’ll break the silence Once his nerves are done. With selfish intentions He mingles among life, Awkward as the moon is high. Laughing at himself, He takes the initiative to Put everyone down. A whale in shark’s clothing, He disregards what he has And pities his own ‘misfortune.’ He’ll never admit that he’s wrong. With false pretensions, He claims a clean style, Facetious as the ocean, wide. Talking to himself, He’ll never be real enough to Impress his own lies.
Nick Chaplow Fall Simplicity 20
DNA Preyear Red Lipstick
Tiffany Ngo Violet
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Anonymous Family Man
As the seasons changed, the gray danced along his jet black hair. Chocolate eyes, old, yet full of compassion stared gaily at his son, as he played in the small sandbox. Calloused hands, from his long strenuous days, delicately tucked his son into bed. Lines formed around his mouth as he smiled at his wife, then he gently touched his lips to hers. Wrinkles covered his latte-colored skin, as he watched his son grow into a similar man.
Latei Iyegha The Fate
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A dim and lonely swamp. Shallow, murky water a revolting golden brown filled with creatures unknown. Yet amongst all the ugly, there’s a single white flower-beauty comparable to the pale-skinned holder. But a sorrowful expression brings dread to her surrounding and a longed-for lover never came. A sly calloused crocodile lurks for un-expecting prey, yet her tender body and soul remain quietly unmoved. Life without love is not worth living. She lies in the swamp and accepts her fate.
Anonymous Galactic Phase Skyward I turn my gaze Your lights never cease to amaze Content in the midnight haze To be in the galactic phase Transition to the outer-spacial Swimming through the moonlit flight Leave the clouds that become glacial And melt into the morning light
Nick Chaplow Celestial Rotation
I could lie forever immobile here Numb and free from fear And I wouldn’t think it queer If I just disappear
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Konnor Kuhlman Honk
Nick Chaplow Reconciliation
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Kerry Ellis For You, Dad Alone without you once again, My thoughts are the same. I wonder where you are, and where you have been. Seventeen years have passed. I have done fine without you. I remember your hands are rough, much like your heart. Yet here I am wasting my time. But you are not here and I don’t need you.
The climb up the ladder takes me To a place I owe credit to. Bland concrete, trapped by an aged fence, is found underneath theses shingles. Pecans and leaves from the old tree add all the color that you see. Escaping mediocrity, I am the only one nurtured by this fresh air sanctuary. A place, lacking tribulation, where I feel greater than myself.
John Chancellor A Place Above A Country House
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Tracy Lin Violin
Greg Tate Untitled Words cannot express the way I feel… They have long forsaken me, but that’s how life goes, here one day and gone the next. In this hour of night I lie awake thinking of the time that has gone by. As time flies by when we are together, I feel the bond stronger than any adhesive could ever form. In long overdue sleep I dream of your presence by my side never leaving. Does this make me weak? I once wished I could find someone that fit the page ripped from the book of my life. I believe that if there is a hand of fate upon me smiling or not I still move on. Is it in the stars that we met? Was it by that hand of fate that drew us together or was it dumb luck that this chance meeting happened? Who is this angel that came down from the heavens to wish me a good life that fate may smile upon me? The stars share no secrets regardless of the question. In the dead of night I stare up at those bright lights in the midnight sky and wonder. Why? This seems too good to be true, but why tempt fate? What is there to gain by trying to carve your own destiny? Why fight what seems like it was meant to be? In the 26
dead of night I stare at those bright glowing beings in the midnight sky and wonder. What was it that caused these chains of events to alter the course of the lives of two? Whatever it was I will not fight, nor will I ever forget that fateful night when the lives of these two beings became intertwined. Although she has slipped from my side I still think and wonder. What was the price of that fateful day when the excitement faded from the once happy message? Was it after you were gone from my side or was it when the two intertwined could no longer meet face to face as the days grew short? The night is long and empty knowing I can no longer see that angel’s face but once in a blue moon. The human and the angel are still intertwined; although they are far apart, their hearts stay connected with each beat. Is it in the stars that the angel has been taken from my side, or is this just fate at its age old game of give-and-take? I’m just not sure anymore, but I know for sure the answer is up there somewhere amongst the stars. Although the nights are long I won’t stop searching for that answer among the stars.
Hollis DeLaney Salt Two days after I returned home and the news had settled in, my mother began posing question after question. I felt interrogated like a criminal. “He was such a great swimmer, though. How could that have happened? Couldn’t you do anything to help him?” she would ask. Every time she asked questions such as these, I began to cry, although it was not easy for a man in his twenties to cry in public. Apart from myself, no one knew the truth behind my brother Michael’s death. It was such a peculiar situation. I had told the story upwards of ten times by now. I had it down pat. It was just a tragic accident, as far as the rest of the family knew. I reassured myself, “Being on the water can be dangerous, after all.” It had been about a week and a half since the accident had happened and my mother’s indecisiveness had pushed the funeral back later and later. I was more than happy by this postponement because it gave me more time to think things over. Time had never felt as precious to me as it did then. More people ended up coming to his funeral than one would expect. Anyone who knew our family would foresee a small, unadorned event. My stomach turned as I listened to the priest deliver his funeral sermon. His bald head shined atop large, sharp cornered reading glasses with thick frames. At the funeral, I felt more nervous and scared than I did remorseful. I didn’t like being in the spotlight, especially the spotlight of an interrogation room that I couldn’t help but imagine myself in. My mother stood next to me at the funeral in a black dress with a large silver cross hanging from her neck. Her dark brown hair, flecked with gray, was pinned up into a tight bun, a style I had never seen her wear before. She constantly dabbed at her weeping eyes with a delicately stitched handkerchief embroidered
with a pattern of lace. Her glassy eyes had been surrounded by dismal red circles since she had woken up that morning at five o’ clock sharp, as always. As a single mother, she had lost half her family with my brother’s death and didn’t have any support other than me. I was too worried about lying to be very comforting to her. The pain and guilt everyone in the family felt could not be hidden by anything. My mother especially would be a drastically different person after the loss of Michael. I was one year younger than Michael and we were the only children in the family. He was a few inches taller than I at about six foot flat. He had light brown hair and a dark, red mole on his left cheek. He was very enthusiastic when it came to exercising and fitness and had even tried to be a vegan for about a year. My brother had always been more athletic than I and made better grades. He always was my superior and didn’t care to help ease my jealousy at all, always rubbing in his success and “greatness.” I tried very hard to get along with him, but it seemed as if my mother was always on his side. Many attempts were made on my part to get on his good side but it proved to be nearly impossible. * * * Inside this small room, or box as it seemed, I felt claustrophobic as I stared at the wooden crucifix that hung from the lattice grate across the window into Father Ramon’s compartment. The darkly stained walls seemed to be inching toward me from all sides. This was not my first time going to confessional, but I was not a very religious person. I needed someone to talk to and I knew I could tell Father Ramon without getting into trouble. Kneeling on the pedestal, uncomfortable with what I was doing, I said, “Forgive me 27
father, for I have sinned,” just like I had said on previous occasions. “When were you at confession last, child?” the priest asked. His voice was deep and crisp. I could see the outline of his face and the same unique, large reading glasses that I had never seen him without through the fragile latticework that separated us. “A few times in the past, father,” I responded shyly, while plopping a strip of minty gum into my mouth to try to ebb my nervousness away. “And what sin have you committed?” he quietly whispered. “My brother is dead... ” I mumbled as I tried to peer through the screened window between us. “It was my fault, father.” I said, slowly letting these frightening words of confession leave my mouth. “Was it intentional, son?” “Of course not!” I said, raising my voice. Then, Father Ramon said, “Tell me what has happened,” in a soothing voice. “Life hasn’t been the same for the family since Michael was lost. But, no one’s life had been twisted around as much as mine, Father.” “Continue,” said Father Ramon. And with that, I continued to tell him the story of my brother’s death, “Well, I had the idea to go out in the family boat, a twenty-eight foot Buddy Davis, so that we would have some time to mend old disagreements and catch up with one another. At least I thought this was the plan. ‘You can’t handle that boat on your own. That’s a terrible idea,’ he would tell me. I agreed that the large fishing boat was not meant for tooling around in, but it wasn’t often we did this, and I really wanted to get one more trip out of the boat before it was sent to storage for the winter.” “Yes, continue on son,” said the priest. “You see, that day, Michael was constantly nagging at every move I made. It was my idea to go out in the boat and he strongly disagreed, of course. With a forecast of around fifteen knot winds, he thought it was too rough to go out for a spin. He told me, all joking aside, ‘If I get seasick today, I swear 28
this will be the last time I ever get on a boat with you again.’ When I replied, ‘C’mon Mike, lighten up,’ he gave me a look of disgust. Plus, I couldn’t even get him to help me make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for our lunch,” I explained to him. “It sounds like you had a rough start that morning, but those inconsiderate acts should not be punishable by death,” Father Ramon quietly replied. “Yes, father, I know.” “Go on son.” “Okay, so, it only took only about twenty minutes before we began to approach the Sand Island Lighthouse. We had already decided it would be a decent lunch spot and destination for the day. Then I said to him, ‘I brought two rods, so we can try throwing some pogies over to see if a red or jack will bite!’ trying to start a conversation about something he really loves fishing. He didn’t reply and just stared back at the horizon. I guess he may have been trying to keep from getting seasick.” “Ok, I’m listening.” “Some of the roughest waters and strongest currents are around Dixie Bar and the lighthouse where we planned to stop for lunch. I was driving the boat. So, I tried to sneak the bow of the boat up close to the rocks so Michael could hop off without getting wet.” “I see. I see.” “But the spit of land that Sand Island Light sits upon is rocky and can easily bust through a hull if you aren’t careful. Each wave was bringing the boat closer to destruction! I was controlling the twin 250 horsepower engines calmly, because I really wanted to impress my brother. He was standing on the tip of the bow when he yelled, ‘Back off! Underwater rock!’ I responsively threw both engines in reverse, throwing him off of the boat onto the rocks. Luckily, he caught himself on all fours. He was a stellar soccer player, track star, and swimmer - a real athlete. So I let out a sigh of relief and was thinking ‘No harm done.’ ” “Very well,” Father Ramon interjected. I continued to explain to him, “In about fifteen minutes, I had the boat anchored with
its stern away from the rocky foundation, held in place by the wind and current. I was feeling accomplished, but my ‘loving’ brother never fails to reprimand and scrutinize me.” “Yes, it sounds as if you had every right to feel accomplished. But your brother, what happened?” “Well, he sarcastically said, ‘Fabulous job setting the anchor. You only almost got me killed.’ Then he started telling me how the boat was too much for me to handle in these choppy seas and things like that.” “It sounds like you are getting bullied, child. Did you talk to your parents about this? Your brother sounds like he needed talking to,” Father Ramen told me. “All my mom would ever say to him in my defense were things like, ‘Michael, try to get along with your brother,’ or ‘Michael, dear, try to treat your brother like you do your friends. He’s nearly as old as you,’ ” I told the priest in a whiny voice, mimicking my mother. “I understand. That can be hard.” Trying to keep my composure I continued on with the story. “Then my brother was further insulting me when he interrupted himself, blurting out, ‘Wait, is the boat getting farther away!?’ I looked out in the direction of the boat, and it was evident that the boat had turned almost completely around. Father, the boat was drifting out to sea. I would do anything now to be able to go back and reanchor that boat!” “I understand, but sometimes you can’t go back. What’s done is done. Life takes its course.” “Yes, father, but to make it worse, I decided I was going in after the boat. My brother shouted something like, ‘You must be out of your mind. You won’t make it to that boat.’ Without further ado, shirt still on, I ran to the edge of the farthest rock I could see and began wading my way toward the boat. Before I knew it the rocks beneath my feet had vanished. So here I am, swimming in a ripping current that felt like it was trying to tear my legs off and pull me under.” “Then what did you do, child?” “Well, my brother was a superb
swimmer, you see. My swimming skills, however, leave much to be desired. I slowly began to swim, in bad form, toward the boat, often looking over my back to see my brother shouting and waving at me. I can remember those moments and play them back in my head so easily. It’s driving me insane.” “Traumatized, emotional; I know how you feel, son. Continue with your confession and your voice will be heard by God.” Father Ramon replied. “Well, I heard my brother begin to yell in his loud, raspy voice , through the funnel of his hands around his mouth, “You won’t make it! Swim back!” In a few minutes, I looked back to see his head bobbing behind me. Stroke by stroke, Father, one arm after another, he swam after me. He risked his life for me and now I have taken his. I am overwhelmed with guilt.” “This is understandable but don’t be afraid. God will forgive you. Keep going.” “Well, reality hit when when I realized I was beginning to have to swim up-current to reach the boat. Then, I realized the anchor had become caught on something underwater because the anchor line had become taut.” I further explained the sequence of events. “Soon my brother was almost swimming near my side. It was obvious to us at this point, that we needed to swim for our life, not for the boat. In seconds, the boat was behind us and all that we could see in the direction of the current was the open Gulf of Mexico. There were no boats in sight and the only chances of surviving the sweeping tide were the three final buoys marking the ship channel.” “It sounds like you should thank the Lord that you are still alive today,” the priest said, as I repositioned myself in the small confessional. “Yes, father,” I replied. My legs had now become stiff and the temperature was uncomfortably warm. I continued. “As we were swimming, all I heard from Michael were panting noises along with an occasional curse word between his breaths. We were swimming for what seemed like hours when it was probably only 29
ten minutes. I murmured something like, ‘Need better angle to buoy, won’t make it,’ through mouthfuls of salty seawater. The first channel marker flew by us. We missed it completely along with the second. What seemed to be our last hope for survival might soon pass by if we didn’t act fast. The Farewell Buoy was the last channel marker leading into the vast Gulf of Mexico.” I felt as if Father Ramon was enjoying the story of the accident. He seemed intrigued by the chain of events that had happened and sat anxiously like a child to hear what happened. “I could hear the loud bell on top of the enormous, red buoy,” I said. “It was at least eight feet high and ten feet in diameter. Covered in seaweed and barnacles. We knew it wouldn’t be easy to mount the steel structure. I took off my shirt, and my brother and I each held one end. We tried to stretch ourselves out so we could catch the buoy. We were thrashed into mountains of barnacles that were sharp enough break the skin just by brushing up against them. To our relief, we were now holding on to our final life line.” “Yes, yes,” Father Ramon murmured. “Do you see? He made it to the buoy safely. He didn’t drown,” I said. “Son, you have quite an experience under your belt. God was watching out for you on that day,” the priest said. I could hear him shifting around on the other side of the wall as if he was preparing for the ending of the tale. He urged me on by saying, “Now go on, how was his life taken from him, son?” “Well, we crouched atop the buoy, leaning against the metal structure that supported the light and constantly ringing bell. Not to my disbelief, my own brother did not wait even a minute before cursing and screaming at me in between the deafening rings of the bell. ‘Why on Earth would you try that? Are you stupid?’ he blurted out. Without letting me answer he continued, ‘We are lucky to be alive, and here you are acting as if nothing happened!’ or something like that,” I told the priest. I felt beads of sweat form on my brow as I became hot with anger. I couldn’t help but 30
to begin speaking louder and with more force, still hoping that no one outside could hear me. “Father, I was close to tears and in no mood to listen to him. So I screamed at him and told him to shut up, and without another word, I threw all the force that I could manage into him, shoving my arms into his chest. Father Ramon, he was taken by surprise. He flew backwards and hit his head on the rounded edge of the buoy on the way down. He flipped once and then plunged into the ocean, head first. I waited five, ten, then fifteen seconds. He never surfaced, Father.” Silence filled the cubicle compartment that I knelt in. “Son, let us pray,” the priest said, solemnly. We said a prayer and although I didn’t know what it meant in its entirety, I began to weep harder now. “Father, I sobbed uncontrollably for at least an hour until a small fishing vessel picked me up. I couldn’t tell the truth. I thought to myself, ‘I have to create a story, and I must keep it consistent,’ I was terrified of my fate, but couldn’t dare let the real story out. I have told everyone that he was swimming behind me and must have gotten a cramp. I told them Michael drowned trying to swim to the Farewell Buoy. Father, no one else knows the truth! How could I do such a thing?” “Calm down, son. Even the harshest sins can be forgiven. You must do the right thing, though. Turn yourself in and be thankful for your life and for God’s love,” the priest said. I could have guessed the priest’s response to what had happened, but I was still relieved to have let someone know beside myself. I could now imagine my mother’s response to the truth. Would she forgive me? Would I be sent to jail? I still had many unanswered questions, but it was clear to me now that I needed to tell my mother. I stared at the floor in silence for a moment when I realized a golden light began to shine through a crack from under the door. The sun must be setting low enough to send a direct ray of light through the stained glass windows of the church. I knew it must be late and I should be on my way home. We took a moment to pray once again
and I was told how I could be forgiven. I thanked Father Ramon and quietly and swiftly left the confessional. * * * “How was your day?” my mother asked me as she ladled a spoonful of spicy chicken soup into my bowl. Watching her, I tried to imagine what her reaction would be to the truth of her son’s death. I could imagine her, flustered, yelling and crying. Maybe I shouldn’t do it. “Fine, thanks,” I responded. “You did a really nice job with dinner tonight.” We rarely had such elaborate meals and we never actually ate in the dining room. Frozen dinners at the kitchen counter were the norm for her, even when her sons came home from college. Such an occasion, and I would have to break it as the bearer of bad news. Besides an occasional compliment on the food, I didn’t strike much conversation after that. My mother made a few attempts to talk about a movie she had watched or condolence gifts that friends had sent us in the mail, but she mainly stuck to small talk about dinner. Father Ramon told me what I need to do, I thought, but I can’t seem to give the final push and let it all out. After all, it could ruin my future. “I think this soup turned out pretty good. What do you think?” asked my mom. Thoughts rushing through my mind distracted me from the conversation we were having. I really should tell her. I’m sure she will be forgiving. “Uhm, what?” I replied, puzzled. “The soup...? Do you like it?” “Oh, Oh yeah, its delicious, mom,” I said. I could only help but think about my next words. Could it be time to tell her? How would she handle the truth? “I added extra chicken and cayenne pepper just for you,” she said in a sweet voice as if she was trying to bribe me to do something. “Thanks, I feel like I’m eating in a five star restaurant in New York City!” I said to
her jokingly, trying to show a little bit of a grin. Underneath the smile, I was making up my mind. “I’m making the right decision,” I reassured myself. “She won’t be too harsh on me.” She chuckled and continued to tell me all the work she put into the soup, “I had to peel almost ten carrots and the two of the tomatoes I bought were half rotten.” “Well, its tastes really good,” I replied trying to not let my nervous feelings of anxiety show through. The conversation was going nowhere, but my mother was oblivious to the blandness of our chitchat. Now I felt as if telling her would completely break her and ruin our relationship. What if it drove her to insanity or she even killing herself ? What would be my consequences? Despite my negative thoughts on the situation, with every second, I was getting closer to letting it all out. I was prepared to spill my heart out to her and tell her the complete truth. She was still just going on and on about supper, “Do you think the soup is a little bland?”, she asked. “No, I think it has plenty of flavor. You should have invited Aunt Rebecca or the twins over for dinner,” I suggested. “They would have loved this meal.” Ignoring my comment about inviting family over, she said, “You know what, I’m going to add some salt and pepper to mine. I’ll tell you how it tastes.” I thought to myself, “And I will tell you what happened...” She took a few bites and her face lit up. “Mom, I have-”, I said. “Oh, man! This is so much better!” she exclaimed, interrupting me. “Mom,” I said. “Wow, this really makes the dish!” “Mom!”, I said again. “What? Geez, let me enjoy my dinner,” she replied. I started shaking very slightly in my hands out of nervousness and I knew now was the time to tell her. “Mom,” I said, “I...I...” I could feel the words forming on my lips. “Can you, please, pass the salt?”, I asked her. 31
Audrey Arnold The Return to Ruins
To the dandelion on my lawn I respect you You have somehow managed not to be struck down by the whirling blades of my lawnmower And somehow you have managed to avoid being crushed by roaming cats and dogs and neighborhood children And I find myself saddened That you have withered and died Unnoticed by the rest of the world But I noticed And I held a little funeral And although no one came I left a little leaf where you stood The wind blew it away across the yard Where I saw the other dandelions
Jordan Danford To the Dandelion on My Lawn 32
DNA Preyear Contempt
DNA Preyear My Angel 33
Aiden Mcnellis Soaking Up the Sun
Konnor Kuhlman The Grand Rescape
34
DNA Preyear Colour Block
Felipe Sinsato Abstraction
35
Nick Chaplow Enlightenment
Bekka Dicks Waterfall
36
Jordan Danford Onward Onward we traveled Like bashful barefoot wand’rers basking warm indeed in warm young sun We swam in light down beaten paths Downbeats and rhythms on our backs We came together to be alone Yet young and youthful, we on our own Found fire frolics far from home So we marched swiftly on On swift March winds, we drifted on
Tyrone Rudolph King of the Swamp A crocodile navigates his way Through the still waters of the day It is ready to eat, no time for play But doesn’t realize that he is the prey The village kids are playing catch The croc spots them, you know what’s next The croc prepares to attack But it captured quickly from the back A bald-headed, muscular man Takes the croc out with bare hands Destroys all of its future plans That croc will never go hungry again A lion tattoo symbolizing courageous things He intercepts villains from their evil schemes He is a hero to many, or so it seems Strong and courageous, he is the Swamp King 37
Alexis Pierce Her Daddy There are times when she wishes she was a boy, if only so that when her daddy calls her Junior she would be his junior and not her momma’s. She doesn’t much mind being a Lillian; name’s always been kind to her and she does love her momma like a good girl should, but she loves her daddy something fierce. If she’s a Junior, she’s a Christopher Junior, through and through, even if she doesn’t have the right equipment to go with the name. She thinks the baby in her belly is going to be a Christopher Junior. Daniel might want it to be a Daniel Junior, and she’d do it if it weren’t for the conviction in her that his baby is going to be so much like her daddy. The baby kicks so that when she takes her daddy’s hand – wide and flat like a bear paw – and puts it on her belly, a slow grin moves across his face when he says, “He’s rodeo-in’ in there!” But then the smile goes away and he gets real quiet, his face painted with the long-gones. For a good while he always looked long-gone to her, but after he came to stay with them, and as Junior’s belly swelled with love, the less long and gone Christopher Manning looked. He still gets that way sometimes when he thinks she isn’t looking though, and it irks her something bad. But the baby’s kicks remind her of her old daddy, before his hair peppered gray and before the long-gones came – when he’d pick her up and swing her over his head and kiss her and rub her back when she was scared – and she makes up her mind it’s a Christopher, even if it’s a girl. Her daddy lives with them now, in the little house they rent from the fellow Daniel works for. It’s a tight fit, but comfortably so. Well, at least until Junior kept getting bigger every damn day. Then the closeness becomes only slightly cramped. She rolls out of bed and creeps down the hall and into the kitchen, where the smell of stale coffee from the night before makes her retch into the stained sink. It’s not long before 38
her daddy appears, rumpled and unshaved, coming up behind her to rub her back and get her some water. Her daddy’s always taken care of her, and Junior never lets momma tell her otherwise. “Getting close,” he says , sitting at the rickety table and pouring himself a cup of the stale, cold coffee. He drinks it and she wants to retch again, wants to knock it out of his hand and make him some new, but there isn’t any because Daniel is not in yet with the groceries – damn slowpoke. “You look ready to pop,” says her daddy. “I feel like I’m gonna pop,” she says, sinking into the chair across from her daddy. The chair squeaks and groans, protesting just like a babe, and she thinks it’d be right funny if it just fell apart from under her and she landed on the floor, the baby just popping out right into her daddy’s hands. She laughs. “Tell the truth, I wouldn’t mind. I’m tired of this. No more after this, I tell you what.” Her daddy laughs and drinks his bad coffee. “You’re sayin’ that now, but once this one’s out and crawlin’, you’ll be wishin’ for another one. Your momma said the same thing; she didn’t want no more and then you was startin’ to walk and talk and she damn near knocked me through a wall, jumpin’ on me to give her another.” Junior goes red in the face. “Daddy,” she scolds, “that’s not right!” She laughs, though, and picks up the coffee pot to get it away from him before he pours himself any more. Daniel comes home and there’s breakfast—a table filled with eggs and bacon and new coffee—and Daniel goes outside to have a smoke because Junior doesn’t allow it in the house. “Doc’s orders,” she tells her daddy. “No smokin’ or drinkin’ coffee.” “Damn,” says her daddy, taking out a cigarette and poking it between his lips. “Don’t know how you do it. Your momma smoked and drank the entire time with you and Regina.”
Junior snorts. “Probably why she’s plain useless now,” she says. She loves her mother to death but she hasn’t got the time for her teenage silliness and attitude. “Go on, get outside with that cancer stick.” Her daddy goes without a fuss, and she watches him and Daniel through the kitchen window until she has to pee. She’s just about to close the bathroom door when there’s a shout and Daniel’s voice telling someone to send an ambulance. She comes back out with lead in her feet to see Daniel bent over her father on the front porch, blowing air in his mouth and hitting him in the chest. She doesn’t know where he learned that or even when—he’s always just been down the street, a country boy with big footsteps to follow in. The sirens in the distance get louder though, and she wets herself in the middle of the hallway. The warmth of it does nothing to thaw her frozen heart. Christopher Manning dies at ten-thirty in the morning on May 13, 1989. He’s awful young to have a heart attack, says the doctor, but you can’t eat bacon and drink coffee and smoke the way he does every morning and expect to live forever. Daniel has to take Junior out of the hospital and sit her down in the parking lot. “You got to calm down,” he tells her. “Ain’t no sense getting yourself all worked up. Think about the baby, Lillian, damn.” She is thinking about the baby, she wants to snap, and how it’s never going to know its grandpa. It’s never going to know how to be a Christopher because Christopher Manning is gone. She doesn’t know how she can have a baby without her daddy around. When she imagined it, he was always there, a silent stranger in the corner. He and Daniel and her momma and even Regina were all supposed to walk with her down the road of motherhood and now it’s all wrong. It’s all wrong because her daddy is gone and she is alone. The baby kicks her in rehearsed agreement. Somehow, she gets home without peeing on herself again, and she sits in the same chair she sat in a few hours ago. Her
daddy’s coffee cup is still where he left it, but she hadn’t the heart to wash it out. The phone rings and Daniel answers it, telling her momma that she’s not fit to talk right now and they’ll come by later. “I don’t want to go,” she tells him, and her voice sounds strained. It doesn’t sound like her normal treble; no, it sounds like her momma’s voice—old and warn out. “You have to go,” says Daniel. “Your momma’s upset, too.” “No, she isn’t. She hated Daddy, you know that.” Daniel sighs. “She’s gonna want to see you anyway, so you’re gonna go over there like a good girl.” She does go, but not because of Daniel’s urging. She goes because she’s too tired to argue. Her momma hugs her and gives her something to drink, a bitter concoction of tea and milk. Regina is there, red-eyed and sniffling in a way that makes Junior want to slap her upside the head. She wants to yell at her: “You never visited with him, you ain’t never so much as give him a phone call on his birthday!” and call her things that might make a sailor blush and cause her momma to throw her out. At least then she’s have an excuse to go home and lay down. Instead, she sits quiet and lets them talk around her while Daniel holds her hand tight across the table, a rickety harbor on a broken shore. The funeral is short because Christopher Manning’s will said he didn’t want one. Regardless, her momma insisted that they get a preacher to say a few choice words at least, before the body was cremated into dust. Junior got the urn, which is ugly and metal and sits on her kitchen table because she doesn’t know what else to do with it. Daniel says they ought to have it interred somewhere but she knows her daddy. “He don’t want to be in the ground,” she tells him. “He’d hate that. Can’t see the sky when you’re covered in dirt.” Truth is, she can’t put it in the ground because then her daddy’d be out of her sight forever. She sits across from it in the mornings, drinking water or tea and feeling her baby kick against her like an angry mule. The 39
urn doesn’t talk and for a crazy second she thinks nothing’s changed, because her daddy hoarded words like they were valuable and he was afraid of spending them all too quick. If she thinks about it, she can probably count out how many words he’d given her since the day she was born. So an urn that doesn’t speak isn’t too different from her daddy at all. Except that it is. It doesn’t smell like tobacco and cloves, and it doesn’t have calloused hands that rub her back in the mornings after she pukes, and it doesn’t call her little darlin’. It doesn’t have her eyes or her snub nose or her temper. It’s not the Christopher to her Junior. She doesn’t know what she misses most—her daddy, or who she had been to her daddy. Eventually, it was time to go through her daddy’s things, a process she prolonged to the very end. They needed the spare bedroom for the baby, Daniel reminded her, and she had to make room for the crib he was building out behind the house. So, she went in early one morning in May, when the sun was smiling shy and the room was stagnant with summer heat. For a long time she couldn’t even cross the threshold. She stood in the doorway and looked at the bits and pieces of her daddy’s life, trying to solve the puzzle with so few pieces. He didn’t have much. When he’d come to stay with them, all he’d brought were some clothes and fishing lines, boots and a couple of books he didn’t read but couldn’t get rid of, for some reason. There isn’t anything on the walls except a couple of pictures of her and Regina as little girls, pictures that are a true testament to time. It doesn’t look like anyone lived in the room and she thinks maybe her daddy hadn’t been living at all, but that this had been just a place to be before the next thing came along. She wonders if he’d known what the next thing would turn out to be, of if he even cared to think about it. She starts on the random things first, things scattered around. The books turn out to be Bibles that belonged to her grandparents so she puts those aside, a homage of sorts of people she never even met. Papers scattered here and there she throws into bags for Dan40
iel to deal with the next time he has things to burn. She strips the bed and forces herself to take the sheets out to the wash, folding up the blanket into a neat little square, trying to place it on the top shelf of the closet, but it won’t go. She stands on the tips of her toes—and she wryly thinks that there are not fat ballerinas out there, she’s one of a kind—and reaches up until she can feel around with her hands. And that is when her fingers find something hard and square. A box. A boot box, older than she is, and twice as dusty. She sneezes five times when she opens it and the baby kicks her in annoyance. In it are postcards, stacks of them. The date on one is 1968. There’s another one from 1967. They’re all addressed Christopher Manning, and they’re all signed by one name: William. She vaguely remembers someone called William. She reads each card, and each card promises a visit. The oldest one—Friend, how time has flown—has postmark from Tennessee. She takes each card out of the box and arranges them on the naked bed, according to date, and after a while she finds herself staring at a secret history of her daddy that goes on for almost twenty years. The front door slams and Daniel calls out a greeting, so she carefully puts the postcards back in the box. She goes to find him with a kiss and tells him, “I need to go to my momma’s.” So he has a quick cup of coffee and a smoke before helping her into the truck and driving her over. She takes the box with her. “I don’t know no William Marsh,” says her momma, and for some reason this doesn’t surprise Junior at all. “Musta been one of your daddy’s rodeo buddies.” There’s a cold, hard line to her mouth when she says it, says the world rodeo like she was tasting something awful and tart. Junior looks at her. “I remember a William,” she says. “When I was little. Daddy brought him home.” She fights for the memory, looking for the face and smiling when she finds it. “He was real handsome. Nice eyes—” Her momma slams her hand down on the table and knocks over the sugar bowl. “You don’t know nothin’!” she says. “You’re
rememberin’ the TV or somethin’.” “No,” Junior argues. “I remember William Marsh; I just don’t know what happened to him. I thought you might know.” “I told you, I don’t know nothin’.” Her momma’s eyes were wet, but not from tears. “Now get home, before it gets dark.” Junior tells Daniel about the box on the drive back. “He kept them all,” she says, wrapping her hands around the box the way she used to hold her daddy’s hands. “So they must have been important to him.” “Was your dad ever in the army?” he asks, voice honest in its query. She shakes her head. “No, the Army didn’t get him.” She looks out the window. “Must have been something else about William Marsh worth rememberin’ if it wasn’t the Army.” At the library, she gets a Tennessee phone book and looks up Marsh. There’s four, but two aren’t home, one is an Oriental (and Junior doesn’t really know what to think about that) and the other has an answering machine. She leaves a message, but doesn’t expect to get a call back, so she’s surprised when the next morning the phone rings and there’s a woman with a Southern drawl on the other end. “William was my husband,” she says, long and slow. “We met in the rodeo.” She remembered her daddy’s words about the kicking in her belly. He’s rodeo-in’ in there. “He knew my daddy,” says Junior. “My daddy was Christopher Manning. He died in May.” The woman is quiet for a moment. “I’m awful sorry to hear that,” she says. “I talked to your daddy once. He called me after William died.” Junior felt a twinge in her belly that for once had nothing to do with the baby. “I… didn’t know. I’m sorry.” “It’s fine. He had an accident; real young when it happened.” “I-I just…” She takes a deep breath. “I was cleanin’ out my daddy’s things and I found a box of postcards from William.” There’s another silence on the other end of the line that goes on so long that Junior wonders if they’ve been disconnected. She’s
about to ask when the woman makes a noise that sounds halfway between a shudder and a sigh. “Listen, your-” She stops and clears her throat. “There’s no sense in wonderin’. William is long gone and your daddy’s gone, and you just got to let them go.” “But-” “Listen. You sound like a real nice girl, and I don’t want to upset y’all with talk about the past. You love your daddy, don’t you?” Junior swallows. “Yeah.” “Then keep lovin’ him like he was to you. It don’t matter what he was before, y’hear?” The woman sounded a little rushed. “Just let sleepin’ dogs lie.” “But-“ “I gotta go,” she says, and then there’s a click. Junior stares at the phone for a moment before she hangs it up and sits down at the table. Her father’s urn is still there, along with the coffee cup that’s got green fuzz in the bottom now. “Daddy,” she whispers, “who were you before me?” That afternoon, Junior packs up her daddy’s clothes. He only had a few things, old jeans and shirts and the same pair of boots he wore since before he came to stay with them. She’s tempted to save some of them for Daniel, but she doesn’t think she wants to see her husband going around in her daddy’s old clothes; something about that seems morbid, so she packs them into a bag to give to Goodwill, instead. Better that they go to a stranger she doesn’t know that be around for her to look at all the time. In the closet, there are more boots and she wonders why he never wore them in front of her until she looks at the bottoms. They’re worn clean through and stink of crap and beer. Why he’d keep them, she doesn’t know, but she sets them aside anyway. She pulls out more shirts and folds them up and packs them away, until she reaches an end. She finds it in the back of the closet, tacked to the wall instead of hung like the other occupants of the wardrobe. When she looks closer, she finds that it is a cowboy hat, a generic leather one. It’s bloodstained and a little 41
torn around the rim, looking too tacky to have been her daddy’s. She takes it down and turns it over, and starts to place it atop her head but stops. Next to the hat, on the wall, is a yellowed postcard. When she picks at it, the tape holding it there falls apart and turns to dust, and the corners of the postcard flake away on her fingers. She flips it over, expecting to see another note from William Marsh, but, instead, there’s nothing there, just the name of the place on the front. Bledsoe County. She calls her momma, holding the hat in one hand and the postcard in the other, phone perched precariously on her shoulder. “I told you,” says her momma. “I don’t know nothin’.” She hangs up on her, and Junior is tempted to call her back, but, instead, she finds herself dialing another number, Tennessee area code. “Bledsoe County,” the woman, it’s William’s wife, drawls. Junior can tell that she’s not happy to hear from her again, but she can also tell that the woman’s not surprised, either. “Yeah, I heard of it.” “Where is it?” asks Junior. The woman hesitates. “Tell me.” The woman sighs. “You don’t listen, do you? You must be Christopher Manning’s daughter. If William’s told me anything true in his life, he always said Christopher Manning was one stubborn son of a bitch. The only thing he ever really told me about him.” Junior waits for more info. “Bledsoe County,” says the woman, in a softer voice Junior hasn’t heard her use before, “is where William is buried, right beneath the old Sycamore tree, after he died. Said it was his favorite place on earth. Then your daddy told me it’s where he and William would meet up to ‘talk.’ Spent weeks out there talking, apparently, ‘bout the rodeo.” She snorts. “Doesn’t take much to put two and two together, y’think?” The woman pauses then, to let her words sink in. Junior is panting into the phone, clutching it so hard that her fingers start to ache. The baby squirms something terrible, and Junior wants to hurl. She can’t tell, but both things make her feel suddenly sick. “It’s a dirty lie,” she whispers, no 42
force behind it. “That’s-“ “Honey,” says the woman, “I’ve seldom told a lie in my life. Your daddy and William told enough, and they didn’t need no help in telling them.” She pauses. “Or livin’ them.” Junior slams the phone down. She drops the hat and the postcard to the kitchen floor and backs up until she finds the kitchen chair to sit in. She sits and stares. The urn stares with her, but she can’t look at it. She can’t, because she doesn’t know who’s in it anymore. Her gut reaction is disgust. Her momma used to say things about people like that, if they saw any on the streets. Folks just don’t do that, not proper folks anyway. She’s heard stories about them, though, about all the deviants in San Francisco and that disease in the papers that’s making them all sick, turning them into living skeletons. The preacher on Sundays warns about it, says that it’s not God’s way to be like that. It’s in the Bible. She’s never exactly found it in the Bible, but she knows it’s there. They’ve always told her it is. But it’s her daddy. Her big, strong, beautiful daddy with the long-gone looks and the smile that touched his eyes without ever staying there. If her daddy was like that, she would know, wouldn’t she? Her daddy wasn’t a queer. Her daddy was a rodeo man and a good man who cleaned his plate at supper and kept her company during storms when Daniel had to work. Her daddy walked her down the aisle and planned to teach his grandchild to ride a horse someday. Her daddy who had a box of postcards and a hat from another man hidden away in his bedroom. Junior isn’t stupid; she knows it’s more than sex when you’ve got someone’s old hat stuck up to your wall with a postcard of the place you met at to…bond. That’s love and she shivers, because that’s one of those loves that’s too big, that doesn’t go cold, and a love like that you can’t carry around where everyone can see. There isn’t any sex good enough to be worth all the trouble of hiding something like that for so long if there wasn’t any love involved. And the preachers never mention the
love part. She thinks about William Marsh. The woman said he had already died. She wonders how she’d feel if Daniel died tomorrow, and the thought makes her heart ache. Is this how her daddy felt after William died? Is this how her daddy felt all the time? She thought about his long-gone looks after talking about the rodeo and the times when he’d shuffle off outside to sit under the stars, drinking beer and looking up at them as if he were trying to make them tell him something, like some kind of answer to a question he’d never dared ask out loud where somebody could pinch her and repeat it. The truck pulls up outside, coughs and stalls, and she hears Daniel curse at it. She stands and picks up the hat and the postcard from the floor, and takes them back into her daddy’s room. She hangs them back up in the closet, and presses the postcard between the middle pages of one of her grandparents’ Bibles. She half-expects a bolt of lightning to slice through the roof of the house and strike her down, but nothing happens except Daniel coming in to look for her, kissing her cheek, and asking what’s for dinner. July’s heat arrives like the fires of Hell itself, licking at Junior’s face through the open window as the truck bounces along the road. Daniel doesn’t think they’re going the right way, but Junior’s got the map, despite and arm full of baby, and she says they are there. “This here,” she says. “Turn left!” “Give me that map!” “No!” She laughs. “Left! Go left!” Left is a long and winding road that climbs through the hills, past a construction site that looks like it’s going to be vacation homes someday. Junior frowns a little and distracts herself with the map. “Go right, next fork.” Daniel mutters to himself, but goes right, and suddenly they are there. It’s a ridge that looks out over a pasture, and there’s a little creek nearby. It’s one of the most beautiful places she’s ever seen, and Junior passes the
baby to Daniel before scrambling out of the truck. “Didn’t even know this place existed,” says Daniel, coming up behind her. The baby gurgles. “Mighty pretty.” “Daddy used to come here,” says Junior, “with a friend.” She goes back to the truck and brings out the urn. “Look, Daddy,” she murmurs to it, not caring if Daniel thinks she’s crazy. “Look, it’s Bledsoe. I brought you back to it, ‘cause I know you miss it.” She swallows, and whispers, “I know you miss him, and if you’re gonna find him, this is the best place to start lookin’.” She opens the urn and turns away, not willing to see the white plumes of her daddy as they cascade down to the ground, dancing over the grass and off into the wind. She shakes it until she’s sure it’s empty, and closes it up again, leaning the urn against a rock with a view. “There,” she says. Her throat hurts like there’s something big inside it, trying to get out. Daniel comes up and squeezes her shoulder, and she takes the baby from him. “Okay,” she says. “That’s okay, isn’t it?” Daniel smiles. “There’s some grass over yonder. We could have us a little picnic there.” Junior nods. “Alrighty.” She doesn’t look back to where her father’s ashes are. The next rain, she knows, will wash them down and take them into the creek and they’ll feed the mountain and her daddy will stretch on for miles and miles, trying to reach that place he could never quite get back to. She hope that she’s helped him find his way. In her arms, her son wriggles and squirms. He was born kicking and screaming at the end of June, and Lillian Junior had taken one look at him and knew his name wasn’t going to be Christopher. The name just didn’t fit this one, with his rodeo legs and spirit that her daddy could see before anybody else could. Her son couldn’t be called Christopher. So she named him William, instead.
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Jordan Danford Don’t Be Surprised When you find love Don’t be surprised When it’s not in a red rose In a Paris night In a getaway Somewhere like Paraguay Where you can hide away and stay No, it’s not always ballroom dancing Or the love-at-first-glance thing There are no sparks No fireworks No choir of angels or golden lights Don’t be surprised When you don’t find it on the rainy streets Or in the falling snow Or the pouring rain Or the bright daylight Or the soft moonlight It’s not like the movies Welcome to the real world — But when you find it When you find your love Don’t be surprised When it’s the smell of his clothes Not the smell of a rose When it’s the smile on her face Not the time or place When it’s what he can’t seem to say Not what cheesy words he pours out When it’s the charm of her laughter Not the sex you were after When the silence is golden Not awkward When you can’t help but smile Even after a while It’s the little things That are always So much bigger So don’t be surprised
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Nick Chaplow Restraint Thinking but restraining, I’m abstaining. Actions refrained, Thoughts now straining. Patience sustained, A crucial life lesson.
-With Love, The Oculus Staff.
Special thanks to Gwin’s Commercial Printing for t wenty years of help in producing the Oculus.
Oculus Volume XX 2012