Cfirysa[is the Citerarylart magazine offerrum co[fege
:fa[f 1992
Contents Literature
Free James C. Miller III Who? Matt Ames Requiem Chris Monroe Musicals & Metaphors Anne Dickens Awaken in the Night James C. Miller III Cosmetic Surgery Cliff Kirk Another Notch Jason Tueller The Corner Cafe of Celestial Bargains Aaron Conover The Author of Our Hearts Christine Ullman 1840
Eric Baker Fall Break at Home Genna Fuchs The Devastation of Contemplation Robert Carl Ennis I Can Feel Your Ashes Eric Baker
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Art
Madona Allgeier Aaron Conover Michael Newman Jason Tueller
title page 12 cover, 7, 1, 11 2,5, 15, 19
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Mike Newman
Free It's up to me to be what I want to be do what I want to do. It will never be up to you you see because I am free. Come and go fight it or go with the flow pouring it in I will win. Let's go take a spin go where ever be who ever. I will win no matter what I'll have a friend. Liquid emotion true or false still giving the devotion. - James C. Miller III
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Jason Tueller
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WHO? Who could blow the Earth up fifty times? Who commits all sorts of crimes? Who could bust down your front door? Who could make you fight their war? Who sells forests really cheap? Who puts school kids' minds to sleep? Who denies your right to choice? Who will censor your own voice? Who prohibits use of helpful drugs? Who sends into streets their brainwashed thugs? Who fills prisons with troubled souls? Who divides by stereotyped roles? Who wastes billions every day? Who can force us all to pay? Who has power that rests on force? Who keeps change from taking course? Who institutionalized greed? Who is it we just don't need?
-Matt Ames
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Requiem The things I hear And the things I see Reality's ¡ Not what I thought it would be Among the innocent You've spread your disease And slaughtered this vision That's inside ofme Your kind of life leads nowhere Solutions only feed the nightmare I believed in you and you killed my children So now I sing to you my requiem Life's made me hard Like a timeless stone I drift with the wind I seem always alone If you want a free ride Want to throw me away Don't forget I'm a rock I'm no man of clay Your cancerous world leaves me uninspired Varieties of boredom-my mind's growing tired You've corrupted all things that are under the sun So now I sing to you my requiem I've taken your blows For such a long time All the backs you have broken While making your climb So I'm leaving you now While I'm still in my prime And when I return I'll be taking what's mine
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The air I breathe keeps choking me Tonight there'll be No sleep Tonight I'll run through starlit hills If eyes appear I'll creep
- Chris Monroe
Jason Tueller
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Musicals & Metaphors
At the edge of a bubble the shapes rearrange no order to silence alone on the stage soliloquied madness the turn of a page some ghostly applause the shapes rearrange no order to memories alone in your rage a soft shoe in cream cheese the start of an age some mingle of laughter the shapes rearrange. - Anne Dickens
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Mike Newman
ANOTHER NOTCH by Jason Tueller Paul was penknifing a notch in his wooden desk when the phone went off at one a.m. "S.N.O.T. Line," he answered, "May I help you?" "Is this the 'Say No to Tragedy' line?" the caller asked. "Yes. Let's talk. What's on your mind?" "A target. I'm going to blow my brains out." "Wait. I'm glad you called me. I'm Paul Allington, by the way. What's your name?" "Mark." "Mark what?" "Mark, and Mark only." "Why do you feel like blowing your brains out, Mark?" Paul asked. "World War Three is imminent. People are starving in the streets. My job stinks. My life is meaningless. No one ben efits from me being around." "That's my being around." "You feel that way, too? And you're answering suicide phones?" Mark exclaimed. "Never mind," Paul said. "What do you do for a living ?" "A never-ending cycle of meaningless activity." "Do you have a family?" "No." Mark replied. "Friends?" "No. Does anyone?" "Don't you feel you have anything worth living for?" "I have a nice car," Mark said. "Is that worth living for?" "What kind of car?" "A Mercedes." ''New?"
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"Eighty-nine. Thirteen thousand miles on it." "No," Paul said. "A car isn't worth living for. Obviously, suicide is what you want to do. What business is it of mine anyway? I just want you to feel good about yourself when you go." "How?" Mark asked. "By signing your car over to me." "What? Is this a joke?" "No," answered Paul. "Look, you said you didn't have any family or real friends, right? Who knows where the car will end up? I need a car ... badly. My car's a wreck. Do you know how much money I make here? Five bucks an hour. I could nail rivets to machinery in a union shop, or sell ammo to old ladies, and make four times as much money. If you give me your car, I'll be forever indebted to you; your life would have meaning. Someone would have benefited from your having been around. It's so simple. Just sign the car over to me." "This is a trick," Mark said. "You're stalling me. Obviously, if I take the time to sign the car over to you, you'll bring along some guys in white coats, and they'll cart me off to the Rubber Ramada." "I swear I won't. I really want you to kill yourself. I'm sincere. I mean, I'm just trying to do what's best. I took an oath." "Aren't you supposed to try to talk me out of it?" asked Mark. "Well, yes-technically," Paul replied. "But I'm really here to do the right thing." "This is the right thing? Look, I'm not so sure I want to kill myself." "Then why did you call? You know, you're wasting my time." "I thought maybe you could reassure me that life is worth living, or
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something. I didn't think you'd try to steal my car. You ... you treat life like it's not worth living." "Maybe it's not," Paul said. "World War Three is imminent. People are starving in the streets. Your job stinks, and your life is meaningless. Why are you so stubborn about this? I'll help you if you haven't got the guts." "What? Now you're going to rub me out? What is this 'Dial a Thug'? I call for help, and I get someone who wants to kill me and steal my car? Hey, what a service. You guys should advertise. I'm going to report you to someone." "No one will believe you." Paul said. "Don't you have to tape these conversations?" Mark asked. "You don't have to be Nixon to create gaps." "I'll tell you one thing: I'm never going to kill myself just so you'll never get the satisfaction. Understand? But during the next electrical storm, I'm going to wrap you around a lightning rod! Got it?" The receiver hit the phone base with a crash. At the other end of the line, Paul leaned back in his chair, smiled, and carved another notch in his desk.
Mike Newman 11
The Corner Cafe of Celestial Bargains Flaming torches reach high, handheld by young children in a classroom filled with chalk dust and ancient ideals. The rain streams downward on a mass of choked imaginations, strangled by the hands of small visions. Coffee fragrance slips through stained yellow teeth at a booth in the Corner Cafe of Celestial Bargains. Fingertips tap on a black desk as the impatient youth movement pushes on through dank, musty values. Hands grasp tight onto ancient values, squeezing and pouring them out and over the vast, barren terrain of the molested youth standing naked to the harsh sun, blistering and disappearing one by one. - Aaron Conover
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The Author of Our Hearts The diary sits upon a table. i write in it when I am able a daily record of times we'vepassed, but i wonder if these days will last. Pages filled of you and me unraveling God's great mystery, only memories that nowpass by, so i wonder why I used to cry, 'cause memories fa d e and d i s app e a r. Now less and less we seem to care. A blankpiece ofpaper is what i see when you're staring back at me. i cannot understand your thoughts, or where they may be headed. i continue to live in constant fear of what i've always dreaded. But the rhyme between us begins to fade, with less and less attention paid. A blankpiece ofpaper. i stare back at it day by day. So blank. So white. White and Black. Paper andpen. Black ink fills in what has already been. The white waits. Undiscovered. (hidden), it lies in faith. The diary sits upon a table. i write in it when i am able. It may remain collecting dust, thepages yellowed by aged trust, hoping it would see the day
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my pen would have some more to say. As God unwinds the times we face, the white will start to be erased. The blank piece of paper stares at me. God writes our lives as they should be. Together or a p a r t. He is the author of our hearts. - Christine Ullman
Jason Tueller
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Fall Break at Home The Disney bag's been thrown away. Like a hotel, sheets are folded on the bed. The blinds are turned so sterile Zight filters in but doesn't reach the corners. The bed is harder than I remember. The closet is empty of clothes and my shoe boxes of ex-boyfriends are in random order. On the shelf my memories are rearranged and clothes are in the wrong drawer. It is dusty and cold like an unused attic and where has the lived-in look gone? Even my refiection in the mirror is transformed. - Genna Fuchs
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THE DEVASTATION OF CONTEMPLATION Slips and slides inmenVES The SPIRIT of Hows and Whys Atangily wangily spirit that dances with CIRCUMSTANCES and COULD-BE CHANCES It buzzes around (sometimes profound) from head to ground until finally It Is Nowhere To Be Found fora moment I think Did it flee? Set me free? Ahhhh maybe now I can have some tea E and D easily
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Then SUDDENLY whir Is ofitsdust through me g u s t as I am thrust INTO MISTRUST Within, I clash irate in deep debate as I sit and C E A 0 T M L T
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E -Robert Carl Ennis
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Jason Tueller
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I Can Feel Your Ashes
i can feel your ashes adrift in the wind as your bones are burnt bright against the black ofit all when i am cold you are inside of me your silence (like fluid) pulsing through my veins and it is only your blood only your spirit that can assemble my flesh and join the shards ofmy skin how this frantic maze that is meneeds you -within. - Eric Baker
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