artichoke haircut volume two
summer 2011
Artichoke Haircut
editors justin sanders saralyn lyons jonathan gavazzi adam shutz melissa streat
layout & cover design adam shutz
cover art
“chiefs of operation” by justin marc lloyd www.artichokehaircut.com
Artichoke Haircut is published biyearly by the people listed above. This is our second issue and we still don’t know what goes here, so all the info that’s usually in this space we haven’t come up with yet or we have no idea what it means. We’re still poor and still can’t afford lawyers. But we’ve seen this phrase a lot so we’ll put it here: All rights reserved. Copyright © 2011. And oh yeah, watch out for our reading series, “You’re Allowed,” at Dionysus Lounge, Baltimore. Happy reading and postulating.
artichoke haircut annemarie ní churreaín gale acuff mary elizabeth mays eleanor levine julianna dzierwa mary harpin
louis bourgeois
volume two
poetry
8
Safe House poetry
11
Crush poetry
17
Playing with Children poetry
MĂmĂligĂ; Pallidotomy
20
poetry
Middlesex Center
25
poetry
In which a Scientist Rummages Around in the Body for the Soul; Self Portrait in the Town where I was Born fiction
28
33
Death at the End of the Road Artichoke Haircut
libby rasmussen maureen foley anthony nannetti william doreski paul kavanagh ron riekki justin marc lloyd matthew falk joel allegretti
poetry
Orion: the Hunter poetry
Haze
poetry
Waterlog poetry
At the Mournful Resort fiction
Road poetry
Writing photography
Noble Trails; Shambles; Everything is a Tide poetry
ErinnĂ?es (Noblesse Oblige) poetry
BÉla Lugosi, Junkie of the Night
35 39 41 43 46 49 51 55 58
kyle hemmings r.j. ingram melanie browne buck downs erik pecukonis sid gold julius kalamarz timmy reed michael goddard
fiction
61
from Tales of the Northern Plains poetry
Gepetto the Illusionist; Queequeg the Seer poetry
The Color of Your Aura after a 72 Hour Speed Binge poetry
64 69 72
Broke into Song; Driver Update poetry
76
Getting Drunk poetry
27 Stills
82
poetry
85
Folksy Atrocious fiction
The Maids Make Me Uncomfortable (in High Grade Silk)
88
Store in a Cool, Dry Place
90
fiction
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cait dudley howie good
poetry
Tautology poetry
Choreography
96 99
11 poetry
gale acuff
Gale Acuff teaches university-level English in China; he has also taught in the US and the Palestinian West Bank. He has played guitar, rather badly, in all three countries.
Crush I hate how she makes me feel, Miss Hooker,
my Sunday School teacher, when I see her in class, her red hair and green eyes and shoes with the open toes and her ten little piggies and all of them colorful, one Sunday blue and the next week pink and the next no color at all, just natural but still radiant. Mother doesn’t like her— her skirts are too short, she says, but Father likes her fine and smiles whenever Mother criticizes her, which she does each time I bring Miss Hooker up, say at supper on Saturday night when I know I’ll see her again in the morning and can’t wait, or barely. I don’t think her pearls are real, Mother says when I describe them to her
during dessert, apple pie and ice cream, a la mode, or maybe that’s the same thing, I can hardly speak the Bible’s language. Father’s fast to defend her, Miss Hooker I mean. He says that that’s called chivalry but Mother says it’s inappropriate whatever else it is. Father grins and winks at me as Mother reddens and looks down at her lap as if she’s spilled something and brushes it with the back of her hand but I think she hopes Miss Hooker’s down there. Maybe that’s a kind of slap in the face. In a fair fight I think that Mother could take her but I’d hate to have to choose sides because I love them both equally, just in a different way that’s still love but I guess that’s why Jesus died for folks’ sins, to sort things out but I’m still confused so I guess I’m too young, only 10, to make much sense out of the world, which is all grown-ups anyway and the screwy things Artichoke Haircut
they do. Father says that Miss Hooker will make some young man very happy one day and Mother laughs, but not loudly and not because she’s happy, and says she thinks that Miss Hooker’s already made many men happy and I say, well, I’m not happy yet, and Father laughs and says, well, give it a few days, boy, and Mother says, eat your dessert but she’s talking to us both. I finish mine and ask to be excused, and go to my attic bedroom and wait for darkness because that’s when I like to pray and when I think God’s likely to listen because He’s probably busier days and tomorrow, of course, He’ll rest, and might be off His feet in Heaven right now and readier to let me whisper in His ear the Lord’s Prayer, which He must be sick of, bless His heart, and everything else people throw up there to Him. [...]
20 poetry
eleanor levine
Eleanor once interviewed John Kennedy, Jr. via telephone when the young Kennedy was at Brown University. She also spoke with Abbie Hoffman after he came out of hiding. Eleanor heard, several years later, she had an FBI file. Artichoke Haircut
Pallidotomy A destructive operation on the globus pallidus, done to relieve involuntary movements or muscular rigidity. -Stedman’s Dictionary
she assuages madness by cultivating lyricism on the page
a double dose of aphrodisiacs and she wanders in her robe eating cereal watching TV thereafter
blood sweeps like an ocean remnants of an old lady fill the room benign thoughts like popcorn
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46 fiction
paul kavanagh
Paul Kavanagh’s novel, The Killing of a Bank Manager is published by Honest Publishing.
Road
The village fathers wanted the village to grow into a town and then a city and so
they built a road. The road was one lane. It was a road easily missed and those who came upon the road quickly turned off the road. The road was a failure and so the village fathers hired an old army captain to make the road into a highway. Captain Caomhรกnach was as industrious as they come, big-shouldered, spades for hands, legs made out of concrete. He refused to remove his tweed jacket even when the thing was moldy and soggy. He refused to shave off his mustache even though birds
started nesting in it. He worked night and day. The village fathers said that Captain Caomhรกnach was a hero. They wanted expensive shops, fancy restaurants, a great football team. They wanted illuminated boulevards. They wanted skyscrapers and they saw that Captain Caomhรกnach was doing everything in his power to bring them the things they desired. Captain Caomhรกnach worked night and day removing hill tops, trees, people, laying down the asphalt. He knew words that were filthy and dirty. He showed the village fathers how to brew strong drink and he showed the old ladies how to roll fine cigars. Artichoke Haircut
He gave the children of the village sharp knives. The death rate in the village rose. He handed out axes and the men of the village cut down all the trees. To the King of the village he gave a gun and the King of the village cleared the jungle of all the wildlife. He introduced new ways of making love. The women of the village no longer produced babies. The village fathers said that all the men of the village should grow a mustache, believing that Captain Caomhánach’s power came from his mustache. Father grew a mustache. He was not good with his hands. The mustache was lopsided, it looked silly. The village fathers stuck up pictures of Queen Victoria, the woman Captain Caomhánach loved most, and said that all the mothers of the village should dress in the style of Queen Victoria. The village fathers banned jeans, sneakers, T-shirts. All newborn babies had to have their hair long and be dressed in girl’s clothing. Boys had to wear caps and shorts. Girls were told never to be seen without a smile. Captain Caomhánach finished the highway and left the village. Everybody was
sad to see him leave. He said he had work in Thailand. With the new highway came cars, and then buses and then trucks. The cars got faster, the buses were overloaded, so new buses were needed, and the trucks got bigger. As strangers filled up the village my family dwindled. Uncle Tommy was hit by a speeding car and Uncle Bobby was hit by a speeding car and Auntie Mary was hit by a speeding car and Auntie Jean was hit by a speeding car and Uncle Jimmy was hit by a packed bus and Auntie Kitty was hit by a speeding truck and Uncle Mickey was hit by a speeding car and Auntie Lucy was hit by a speeding car and Cousin Mary was hit by a speeding car and Cousin Jessica was hit by a speeding car and Cousin Philip was hit by a packed bus and Cousin Kate was hit by a speeding truck.
51 photography
justin marc lloyd
Justin’s philosophy is simple, he points and shoots when he sees something that moves or intrigues him. You can see more of his work at shiftandsignal.blogspot.com
99 poetry
howie good
Howie Good, a journalism professor at SUNY New Paltz, is the author of the full-length poetry collections Lovesick (Press Americana, 2009), Heart With a Dirty Windshield (BeWrite Books, 2010), and Everything Reminds Me of Me (Desperanto, 2011).
Choreography The dog
licks itself an extraordinary untranslatable pink Any movement can be part of the dance
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other stuff:
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