ISSUE 9
Letter from the editors, So many Americans are sick from the TV. They’re pouring empty light in their eyes! They got sucked into ads, false desire and gorged themself on it for who knows how long. Dr. Fernandes from Cherokee University has now proven that your eyes, like your gut and your mouth, have a bacterial micro biome that is deeply incorporated into your perception. Your mood, visual appetite and visual taste are all monitored by complex interactions between your unique ocular bacteria. If you hear the residents of your inner ecology burping and farting at you while you eat, you know you need some combucha. But if your ocular flora are unhappy with the fruit and nectar that you feed them, it might go unnoticed. Dr. Fernandes recommends reading Bad Jacket periodically for proactive treatment of irritable eye syndrome and other eye diseases. It’s our newest, most advanced combination of live visual cultures yet. Do not read Bad Jacket while operating heavy machinery. Medicinally yours, Bad Jacket TO SUBMIT TO BAD JACKET SEND YOUR WORK TO BADJACKET94@GMAIL.COM To keep us in print, this magazine costs $7 Brought to you with love by editors Katryn Dierksen, Daniel W.Wright, Frances Garren, Chris Zuver, Zoë Scala, RC Patterson, Jacob L.E. Oliver, Clara Stone and Benjamin Luczak.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS Amber Skies..................................8, 24 Anna Wermuth.................................9,23 Bethanie Reid..................................11 Bobby Stevens..................................10 Caitlin Tyczka..............................33,38 Chris Zuver....................................33 Clara Stone..................................2,31 Dani Skye......................................27 Daniel W. Wright.............................13,37 Dawn Tree......................................15 Frances Garren...............................1,44 G.M.H. Thompson................................39 J. Leigh....................................3,26 Jacob L.E. Oliver......................23,30,35,46 Jennifer Allen.........................2,12,43,47 Kat Lush Sterman.............................14, 25 Katryn Dierksen...................cover,4,7,11,15 Kristen Mcgeehan.............................6,48 Mackenzie Thorn................................19 Mary Lay.......................................34 Moody Rose Christopher..........................30 Peter Pranschke................................18 Phil Berwick...................................17 Pseudo-Poetess.............................29,46 RC Patterson.................................5,36 Spencer Hughes.................................28 Todd Smith....................................25 Xander Millsap...............................4,26 Zoë Scala...................................20,21
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(above) Called Out Frances Garren (right) Untitled Jennifer Allen 1
Safety Glass Ice Clara Stone Broken safety glass, all greenish-blue and deep behind that bus stop in the sweltering summer heat. At first, I thought it may be ice, but my senses told me otherwise. Wishful thinking from a wishful mind, thinking of cold wet winter ice when in winter the wishful mind will consider the summer sun. It isn’t ice at all it was only ever broken safety glass behind an old bus stop and the summer afternoon is filled with the aromas of hot asphalt and sweat.
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Day at the beach J. Leigh crab will hide Run into its burrow run away jellyfish washed ashore Exposed not by its own accord birds to chase the tide birds that tear at what Washed Up birds that sway in unison flying overhead tides bring Trash never treasures sunburned body crisp prickling feels Deserved
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Untitled Xander Millsap These frequencies that I’m channeling so indiscreetly recently convinced your girlie to move to Crete with me we last convened at the local speakeasy and it seems you’ve been acting indecently well sheesh b after you haphazardly shattered her glass menagerie and failed to act compassionately one might expect her to come to the conclusion to leave your ass quite naturally
My Skin Katryn Dierksen 4
DJ Rhinestoned Coyboy RC Patterson 5
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Untitled Kristen Mcgeehan
Skull-sized hunks of quartz and granite Katryn Dierksen He said, “Your imagination is very strong.� The beatles nestled in his eyes sockets did not blink, but glimmered once and significantly. The scarabs fluttered their wings, so I knew one was lying and the other believed the lie was true--and so that one was not lying. I imagined him imagining my imagination and was pleased with the colors bled on the silk screen of my retina, inked onto my tongue: blue, gold, green, greener highlighting neon greenyellow-green, tubes of glass popping bright sprays of toxic color on my skin and rubbed in like firefly guts painting me a raving putrid glow. A smudged, indelicate patina: a gross halo marking me as a poison dart frog. If I am a poisonous frog, then beatle boy is my friend and I fear only the hunter aiming to poison his arrow with my guts, and fibbing bugs are food for frogs. So there, my munition is prized and dreaded. I dreamt that night of greenbacks, of dollars, wedged under rocks, held in place for me by the river by the skull-sized hunks of quartz and granite.
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Untitled Amber Skies 8
The Work Continues Anna Wermuth 9
Smoke Signals Bobby Stevens I didn’t plan on doing so, But I built a fire in the morning Because I was chilly and bored. There were embers, still hot, from last night spreading You stayed asleep in the tent. I could not contain myself from looking at the ashes, Charred wood and cigarette butts Hearing a voice, “Let there be light” This was a proud fire, I’m a proud builder, I managed to make it without lighter or match, Just a few prods and a heap of dried leaves I kept my exhales short and few And checked my inner instinct, man loves the red flower glow. Knowing our departure was soon I only needed enough for coffee and patience The water bubbled in the instant mix mug As I moved closer to the warmth of my fire To feel what I’d accomplished, I thought of things we learn to keep quiet about I heard you stretching out of slumber I had a mug waiting for you as you emerged, Doused the small flames and spread out the embers Ensuring that this time it would not be so easy And in the plume of smoke we kissed to the day.
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Modern Romance Bethanie Reid A pound of flesh and blood is the cost of being held quietly, the price of a tentative connection, and every night is a tiny sacrifice with words of affection writ in blood. Finding sincerity in a lover is a tall order in these trying times when the world is so full of false men. Tender words can’t stand alone when all they want is to lick your skin.
Got My Eyes Katryn Dierksen 11
Untitled Jennifer Allen 12
NO REASON Daniel W. Wright You never know when that feeling will hit but you know it when it comes When a wave washes over you and you know, the person you’re with won’t be around much longer You try to fight against it because this person hasn’t done anything wrong For no reason at all you just don’t love them anymore You try to rationalize with your feelings, trying not to draw attention because the more a significant other asks what’s wrong the more they accidentally annoy you and fuel the argument of your emotions You remind yourself of every good memory but even that feels forced So you stop trying to convince yourself And keep what you feel a secret hoping that everything might work out different for a change You try to hold your lover close though your smothering of them causes them to push you away and soon your smothering of them makes you feel smothered and you push them away They don’t know how to react and you don’t know what to say without sounding insane so instead you say nothing as a relationship remains
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damaged enough to decay And there’s nothing to blame because you didn’t want this you didn’t plan this but a feeling just sprung up for no reason
Untitled Kat Lush Sterman 14
I’m Real Katryn Dierksen Oh Tulsa, Oh Tulsa Dawn Tree Oh Tulsa, Oh Tulsa I yell out your name But surely it ain’t the same as Old Town Tulsey in a quest to tame The Black Wall Street name They maim, they burn, they murder, steal the jewelry, throw bodies in rivers, buy even bigger mirrors Satisfaction Thats what it be Pure Jealousy you see The alternative is to counter
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Copy cat is the word, I believe But I smile in yo face Cause quite frankly the devil don’t like how it tastes haha so I smile in yo face cause God knows the base the true religion within LOVE It’s a water source, the opposite of a torch That Fiyah Oh Tulsa, Oh Tulsa I yell out your name But surely it ain’t the same as Old Town Tulsey Where the native man was slain Their blood cries out from the ground That town, old Town Tulsa The spirits be willin, be willin to covet Prepared to take what is not yours Forcing others to forge
A new narrative must be written I fight with LOVE A wise man once said that’s what juuuustice looks like in the streets
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Merferd and the Treetoons in Picking up the Trash Phil Berwick The Adventures of Peter the Person Peter Pranschke
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Coffee county premonitions Mackenzie Thorn Smokestack lighting parades welcomed us at the gates of promised decadence A sanctuary made holy by the boxed blood of Christ Lost in the wine stained routine chaos aside unwashed compatriots Proudly slouching shoulders and bobbing heads like dead refugees in the Mediterranean Listening close for the call of Gabriel’s trumpet Premonitions of hell fire picked at our brains like buzzards as we circled the burning barn We waited until night fall to wash ourselves in the sweet Cherokee spring And begin the ghost dance to celebrate our neglect of fate But behind the smiles and bloodshot eyes The laughter and trembling skin The pines and mud and Tennessee sun We knew This too must end Like the sleeping cicada awoken by the chorus of spring We too shall be released from our quiet cradles And reclaim the coffee county valley once again
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False Forms ZoĂŤ Scala 20
Conversation 2 Zoë Scala “Did I ever tell you about that time I got m’ladied in real life?” “Oh my God, no I think I would’ve remembered that.” “Alright, alright. It wasn’t like super obvious or really obnoxious or anything, but here goes. So the one time I got m’ladied I was just walking around campus. It was a super bright day out and I was keeping my head down because of obnoxious glare and I’m just trying to get my lunch. I wasn’t in a great mood because who’s in a great mood at campus and it was the middle of the year so it was hell. Anyway, so I’m walking into the student center to get my shitty Pizza Hut pasta and to sit down and stare at my phone for 20 minutes when I look up from the sidewalk to the door I’m about to go in and see a fedora.” “Oh no.” “Yeah, keep in mind this was like spring but a really hot and bright out spring day, so this was like, a dedicated fedora bro. You gotta give him that much at least, it was probably like 85, 90 degrees outside and this guy was wearing a black heat trapping device on his head. So, I look up and I make direct eye contact and I just instantly start sweating because I see him, and he sees me, and I know he’s gonna try and hold the door open for me. Which, you know, is generally okay, but I’m like, 30 feet away from the door.” “Oh God does he just—” “Yeah. He just staring at me, this point for because I need
stands there and holds the door and I can’t like break eye contact at more than like one second at a time to acknowledge that nice thing he’s
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doing, fedora or not. So I do that like fast walk shuffle to get to the door a little faster, looking down at my feet and then right back up. I finally get there, to the door, and I see just beyond me on the other side, there’s two frat bros on their way out. Forces colliding at this one glass entrance door, barriers in front of my inevitably cold in the middle, hair in the sauce Pizza Hut pasta.” “And then? You’ve got me on the edge of my seat here.” “Okay, okay, well, so I’m at the door and I’m about to pass through with my very quiet thank you and in like such a booming voice, the man reaches up to the brim of his hat—” “No!” “And the mother fucker tips the damn thing at me and says, of course m’lady.” “How are you not dead just from the sheer force of that.” “I don’t know. I stumbled into the cafeteria so disoriented that I couldn’t even register the look of horrified amusement on the frat boys face on their way out. The rest of that day is a blur because I literally could not stop thinking about it.”
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For the Love of Turnips and Other Purple Vegetables
Anna Wermuth
Fried Jacob L.E. Oliver 23
Embrace Your Heart Amber Skies 24
THE BLUFF SPEAKS FOR ITSELF Todd Smith So much hot air, nothing left or right to spare. All’s asymmetric— the meter, the form, its function; likewise, the sound. This world’s on fire, but it’s a slow burn, and also out of round. The physicists are scrambling, like hapless hamsters without a wheel: “Where are the facts we all believe in?” they squeal. Over here’s some data, statistics; over there, some miscellaneous strata with a Stratocaster rocking out, shredding away: Yes, the Body Electric! So: no kneeling before false hypotheses anymore. We’ve all been jotting down notes, yet nobody knows the score. Again the wave forms; then, the wave crashes. The fire still burns, turning all wordy wood forms to ashes. In a Salvation Army store window just west of the X-Y axis, a Manichean mannequin bats its false eyelashes.
Untitled Kat Lush Sterman 25
J. Leigh
Date
twice! “I’m looking for a relationship” he said eyes fixed on me As if we all aren’t online for the same means, ends On the first date 3 May year 20 & 18 what are my || thoughts of: Do I even like you? Why is your shirt tucked in?
Untitled Xander Millsap shrill commixtures of missed signals leave me defective and disorderly bewitched transistors in slick fixtures get the vision rendered poorly wanting for attention [a] prissy princess sits in privilege prison dourly down below the white knight will be switching positions shortly and the midwife with her fixed plight will swill existential frisson like forty sisters transfixed by british diction will still switch channels to see Morty
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I Survived Dani Skye You locking me into a room and deliberately trying to break my wrists because I tried to leave, You telling me no one else will love me more than you do, Embarrassing in front of my peers by calling me a bitch, Stupid ass, Monkey ass muthafucka, You telling me if you wanted a supermodel chick, You could go get one in a heartbeat, Telling me I don’t got no ass, That you would break up with me if…. I dyed my hair, Gained weight, Or cut my hair, That you kept throwing me on the couch when I was 4 months pregnant with your son, That you told me if I got pregnant again you would throw me down the stairs, That you purposely tried to crash your car with me in it, That you grabbed a fist full of my hair and tried to slam my face into the dashboard, That you fought me in front of my son, That you played on all my insecurities by making me feel like I had to compete for your love, That I tried to commit suicide when I could no longer take your abuse, That you often made me feel lonely, That I never felt beautiful, That I believed I couldn’t do better than you, You said when loved but would take it back when I made you angry, I’m happy that I loved myself the size of a mustard seed, I’m glad God decided it wasn’t my time to go yet, I’m glad I got my voice back, so I can heal others, I’m glad through it all… I survived
Untitled Spencer Hughes 28
Dizzier than an ant climbing a pile of sugar Pseudo-Poetess Michelle drove out down 44, past Six Flags, on the way to a fireworks stand. Her friend Karen was wearing a dad hat, and her car had the remains of a fast food snack on the floor. They giggled at billboards that reminded them to think of Jesus. They bought one of the big boxes of fireworks, with a name like “Screaming Fury”. The older man at the counter smiled at them, with just a touch of perv. A 20-something with a camo-print knife clipped into his front pocket insisted on carrying it to their car for them. Later, Michelle and Karen got drunk in a cornfield together and lipsynced to songs. Karen shared some of the reggie weed that she had gotten from her older brother. They decided to put the box on the top of a big pile of gravel, left over from a never-finished construction job. Michelle held the fifth of whiskey in one hand, low-slung and casual, the stance of a natural. Karen laughed until her cheeks and lips turned pink. They set the fireworks off and watched the sparks from the deep, dinosaur tracks of the long-gone heavy machinery that had made the gravel pile. They screeched their pleasure and defiantly swigged their whiskey (it’s never too late for early times!). When Karen turned to look at Michelle, she couldn’t stop herself from kissing her.
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Mushroom Salad Moody Rose Christopher 30
Framed Jacob L.E. Oliver 31
Clara Stone 32
Flower
I Think of Dalai Lama. Chris Zuver I think of Dalai Lama. I think of the mandala. I am a skeptic within a circle. There is a mortality that a theist understands. Yet, I think of death with no regard for sanctity. I joke about mortal wounds as you bleed.
Comfortable Pain Caitlin Tyczka So much of life spent With eyes closed With that as my armor The real stuff didn’t impose The drunk, drugged haze Of the party that loves you Giving you numbness And wrapping its arms around you It’s like an abusive relationship Your loved ones try to warn you Yet when abuse lacks physical form You hardly know it’s among you
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alzheimer’s Mary Lay the thunder clap laughter faded into mousey whispers 3/4 water 1/4 white wine then free. i watched my grand mother disintegrate into the meekest form of a child; unable to curl hair make lunch attend mass drive form simple sentences. remember my name.
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Fuck Me Slowly Jacob L.E. Oliver 35
Old Dude RC Patterson 36
Happy Ending Daniel W. Wright I wish I could give you a happy ending I wish I could give you pretty little lies I wish I could show the joy felt through the shittiest of climates I wish that I knew that you knew No matter how low the soul The spirit can still soar I wish I could show you every chance one has to kiss the sky before bumming on a skid row art street I wish I could give you a happy ending that wasn’t fairy tales and bullshit because I love you more than that I wish I knew how to give you a chance to experience the wonder of the cosmos by seeing the wonder of the Earth I wish I knew how to keep my big mouth from getting me in to trouble I wish I could talk to you like I used to be able to do I wish I had more to talk about than just what was on my mind in that moment I wish I could give you a happy ending I wish I could show the silver lining in every darkness and I wish what I said could be true so we could both believe it
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To Have What You Want, and Never Want It Again Caitlin Tyczka Sick skin on my hands Shit skin pushed against my nail beds Here in the open air And writing from a wooden chair The mountains whisper In my ear, “What are you thinking dear?” The truth is It’s the best at its worst Closure has knocked A blessing yet a curse Is it time to love? Or to close the book? Perhaps the mountains will cry with you And grip your gut like a hook If it’s in the past you look, You’ll find what is truth Between lines not to be found in books. Sick skin on my hands Shit skin pushed against my nail beds “Bartender, please, another beer.”
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Brazilwood Carousel Phantasm: Two Modes in Azure G.M.H. Thompson Shiva parries and pivots, his infinite arms each armed with a racket that batts and bludgeons an interminable series of tennis balls. His form is perfect, but he has no real love for the game, & so he plays with a reckless impatience that will eternally prevent him from achieving perfection. “Enough of this, Vishnu!” he screams as one of his endless paddled batons just misses one of the incessant synthetic earths, striking the earth of the tennis court instead. Yet still the Lord of Destruction does not cease in his attacks, & the Preserver replies with divine ease, his lone four blades of nylon and aluminum compassionately tapping each globe with the lightest of force, a tranquil, considerate defense that contrasts markedly with his opposite’s manic whirlwind of fury. “Your rage betrays your game,” he observes gently. “Give up your desires to win, and you will achieve the nirvana of pure tennis.” These words, offered out of a sincere appreciation for the sport & an earnest wish that its present representation might exceed all knowable bounds of excellence, only further incense his inflammatory opponent. “Curse your nirvana! May all the demons of that festering bottomless void Naraka take it!!!” he spits in a near apoplectic tempest of rancor.
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With this, his innumerable limbs metamorphosize into a gyring sea of serpents that swallow each ball still in play and then each other, their former armaments clattering to the sickly yellow floorboards as Lord Shiva becomes smaller and smaller, wrapping himself tighter and tighter until the single tennis ball he missed is bigger than he is. And as it ricochets off the back wall of the gym and arcs back towards the court, this his lone mistake slams into the dense orb of snakeflesh this lord of transformation has transformed into, transferring most of its energy to him & sending him rocketing upward at such a speed & angle that he soars over the net and comes down to shoot perfectly into Vishnu’s gapping mouth, which has stood open like an ancient drawbridge (with chains rusted out and so overgrown with ivy & serpentine vines, it can no longer be closed to unwelcome visitors) in shocked amazement during the whole course of this startling phenomenon, the missile lodging firmly in the throat of the Lord of Conservation, & now Lord Vishnu can’t breathe,— now his turquoise body is choking to death. * * * * * The ugly baby cried violently in its dirty yellow cradle, rocking back & forth seismically and consequently almost entirely overpowering the weary wheezings of the blue harmonium. Ayana Pearlgrave sighed. It was all so tiring— this child, this marriage, this life. How did it come to this— it was supposed to be better than this, it was supposed to be good. And when he came home, she would have to go to dinner & after that, the bedroom, & she just wanted no part in any of it. It was monstrous. She had never felt more detached from everything. It was as if her life was happening to someone she was watching from a high balcony through binoculars, like
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an opera. She sensed she had to leave forever, but she just had no idea. It was monstrous. A sharp rapping at the front door severed these dire ruminations, the knocks echoing off the palatial marble & opulent columns like thunder in a canyon. She stopped playing the harmonium & waited for the door to be answered, a dense apprehension bubbling to a kind of mania as the seconds passed into centuries. The baby cried, its face pink with tears & pain at the world, beetle eyes hidden beneath warped distortions of cheap vellum. The door beckoned again, this time harsher. She waited what felt a long time. Finally, she rose through corridors of ice & rusted iron. The baby shrieked once more & reignited its bellicose gyrations, but its ragings somehow seemed a very far way off, like the faint legends of some forgotten people. Arriving in the foyer, the front door appeared gigantic, like a gateway for titans or cyclopes. She stood before it for eternities, afraid to grasp the heavy handle yet petrified not to. Finally, she opened the door, a tingling brightness stabbing her mind as the portal lunged hideously open. There was no one there. Hesitantly, she walked out onto the terrace, but there was no one there either, nor on the great staircase leading up from the path, nor on the path leading up to the stair, nor on the fringes of forest looming ominously in the near distance into which the path disappeared. The sun hung low & lazily in the sky, a jaded memento to another wasted day. Walking back from the balcony, where she had spent several minutes staring at the treacherous rocks that lurked some seventy feet below, she nearly collapsed as her heel slipped upon a plain white envelope resting upon the threshold. Picking it up, an unreal haze washed over Ayana, & she grasped the wall in desperation, nearly
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dropping the strange missive. It had no writing on the outside, nor did it have postage-stamps. Opening it, 10,000 orans came tumbling out along with identification papers bearing her name & photograph, motorcycle keys, & a message. She looked out upon the path anew only to discover a scintillating robins’egg-blue bike waiting near the foot of the steps. Fixing her gaze upon the epistle, she was beguiled by elegant yet whispery calligraphy:
Ayana Cordance Pearlgrave, You have been recognized and your presence is requested in Pearsil City. Great matters are afoot. Ride the cycle to the airstrip in New Erincaea. A private jet will then transport you to the capital. I await you in the Imperial Palace. —The Ocher of Shadows Before she noticed that anything had happened, she was wondrously rolling down the ivory white road, headed into the sunset & into the future, all her anxieties & disappointments dissolving like a dream upon a sleeper’s awake.
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Untitled Jennifer Allen 43
FRUITFLEYES Futuristic Advertising! Frances Garren Developers at FruiTech have created the first ever pair of indestructible bifocals called FruitFleyes. Sorry, Tomatoes and Doors with Windows, consider yourselves the most lame crew on the technocorporate block. Remember when emojis for Tomatoes made racial progress when their software update surprised the world with ethnically accurate skintoned hand signals and faces? Remember when you could send your loved ones money through the app, Snatch? Remember when we at FruiTech redesigned spell check so it actually worked, beginning our geek takeover known to our current government as FRUITLESS? (Fucking Rally of Useless Information Techies that Like to be Exceptional Shit Starters) Well, we are excited to say that we have both outdone our fascist competitors, and farted on our haters more than previously. FruitFleyes glasses are sure to never break. How? Because we, in combination with the help of the local sewer and trash facilities in our great city of Saint Louis, have developed a new kind of glass(it’s only 12 percent glass) that will mold and hold onto any object, is limber enough that it will never break, and is part of the newly redesigned “Save Shit, Or Die” campaign.(Formerly known as recycling). This “glass”(herein and henceforth to be referred to as FruiTass) is made of one hundred percent kindarecyclable material (mostly sewage water glued together). By that, we simply mean that we have developed new technology to make the materials used, recyclable. FruiTass is flexible, translucent, and has no sharp edges. It’s almost like it’s not glass at all!
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When the developers of FruiTass made this breakthrough in technology, we immediately went to the drawing board and discussed what items made of glass break the most. We concluded it was pairs of glasses! One of the areas we really focus on supporting in this city is higher education. So we set out to make a pair of glasses that was unbreakable for those rare times when professors make bold mistakes in the classroom and cannot immediately see the repercussions. This new technology we have put into these glasses redefines the shelf life of glasses, and if sight were truly hereditary(which we are working on technology for that with Washington University), families of the future could have the same pair of bifocals passed down for generations. We at FruiTech believe that the possibilities truly are endless for FruiTass and are currently working on a project that uses the technology as the surface for all children’s playgrounds. Call 1-800-FRU-TECH to arrange a fitting for your new set of eyes! FruitFleyes: taking your grandpa’s driving from “I can’t see shit!” to “I can see through all this shit!”
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Untitled Jacob L.E. Oliver
A friend of a friend away Pseudo-Poetess I spent the night swallowing my words with liquids that made my eyes water. I wandered down the streets and saw our shadows everywhere. Those Bradford pears smell disgusting, but look like lace, And when their petals fall in oily puddles, i Think about how I want to touch your face. We live in this world of half-latched back gates, alleyways filled with rotten dressers, friends of friends around each corner and strangers who are both friendly and don’t give a shit. Soggy trash exists in every gutter, but sometimes I hear even the street people mutter that this place isn’t really so bad. We keep living in it.
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Untitled Jennifer Allen 47
Untitled Kristen McGeehan 48