Never Call Us Conventional by insertlitmaghere

insert

lit mag here

never call us conventional issue four//september 2014

from your art editor Hats off to Julia for this issue, like all the previous issues. I can't take too much credit for this, Julia is honestly the brains and the brawn behind ILMH. With that said I am so happy with this issue, the literature is amazing, as always. The art we're featuring is also amazing, but I only wish there was more to show. I was a little sad to see the amount of art that was submitted because last month submissions were full of art! I can only hope to receive more art for the next issue; I know there are some other wonderful artists out there who haven't submitted to us. If you're hesitant to submit anything to us please ignore all those thoughts in your head telling you not to submit. Whats the worse that could happen? I love this magazine because it highlights so many unknown artists, and the only way to get this opportunity is to take a chance and submit to us. For the next issue I am expecting the same caliber of work, I just want more! Keep writing, drawing, painting, whatever it is you love, and never be afraid to share it with us! -Kayla Savage

ILMH is brought to you by chipped tooth press. visit us at chippedtoothpress.tumblr.com

from your literary editor Over the course of this summer, crazy and exciting things have happened to us. Chipped Tooth Press, which ILMH now operates as a part of was formed. Under the press we released our first chapbook In a Bed That Barely Fits by Emma Hannan, and just announced that our next release, Various Plans for Success by Kevin Popovich, is coming out on September 20th. By August, the number of submissions we were getting had nearly doubled since we started in April which is why we made the decision to start publishing monthly issues. Admittedly, I was afraid to do this. I was afraid that it would be too much work and that I would overwhelm myself and quit. I was afraid that with a shortened reading period this issue would never live up to the others. I’m sorry for ever having doubted our contributors because as always they sent in work that exceeded all of my expectations. I’ve made plenty of dumb mistakes throughout this endeavor. I’ve said some pretty stupid things to all of you. But, my biggest mistake was ever even thinking that our contributors wouldn’t be able to make this issue just as interesting, just as gut-wrenching, just as hard-hitting as all of our previous editions. This issue is titled NEVER CALL US CONVENTIONAL. We wanted the first of our monthly issues to reflect our taste for the eccentric. We publish artists who aren’t focused on what is nomal because we aren’t exactly normal. We don’t try to be something we are not. Our contributors are far from average, and we do our best to keep up. As always, with pride I present to you our September issue, NEVER CALL US CONVENTIONAL -Julia Alexander The cover art for this issue is a photo by Amy Autumn Dewar

indian summers Gabrielle Bauman

It’s interesting that we chose to spend our summers in the deepest of silences. Every year, as the days grew long and the nights grew hot we’d count the spaces on our calendar until there was nothing left. Then Dad would load up the station wagon and we’d drive. Drive until the rolling hills grew tall. Drive until the leaves turn into needles. Drive until passing cars are an endangered species, and the blocks turn into miles. And then we arrive. We pile our blankets and coca cola and sun visors on the old beds. We drink in mothballs and memories. We drag ourselves to bed, but not before wondering at the starfire bright enough to read by. In the morning we’ll awake to our aunt making eggs in the cracked cast iron pan, scraping the spatulaloud enough to wake us up. Mom will be drinking coffee on the porch and reading a design magazine. I will join her soon. We’ll spend all day playing in the yard, playing in the creek, playing in the woods. We’ll shoot water guns at our dad, but he’ll get revenge later – yard work. You’re afraid of the spiders in the outhouse. I’m afraid of the complete dark. Mom is afraid of losing us in the woods. Dad is afraid of going home. This place hasn’t changed since your mom was a child. The same stuffed deer head in the living room, the same sagging couches, the same green floral curtains, the same novelty canned food (Fish Assholes! Lady Legs!), the same cups and tarnished silverware and chairs and floor rugs and wooden dining table with big benches and tractor pillows and musty blankets. There are newspaper clippings on the fridge, yellowed. One is an ad for a realtor our great-grandfather knew once. One family picture – five of

them have died since it was taken. Pinned to the wall are invitations to the annual pig roast, going back fifteen years We spend weekends and weeks here every summer, whiling away a childhood making moments last for an eternity. For once, we can confuse exhaustion for utter relaxation, and remember what it means to slow. One day we leave. We pile our blankets and empty coca cola and sun visors into the car. We drive. Drive until the mountains flatten into hills. Drive until the needles turn soft. Drive until cars flood the road, and the empty miles transform into stoplights. I still go back sometimes. I pile in my car and drive until the mountains loom large, find the key (hidden in the plastic bag under the porch), and step through the solid wooden front door. I rifle through the old magazines left over the years, and smile at the clippings on the fridge. So many years have passed since we got in Dad’s station wagon, but when I stand in the ancient kitchen – I know. I’m home. Gabrielle Bauman is a Temple University student from Lancaster, Pennsylvania. If she could time travel, she would totally go to 1920s Paris and hang out with Ernest Hemingway. Find her photography at phillyview.tumblr.com

scream holy An icon(religious image) a deviant to your own inept desires. Apologize for all of your holy teeth sunken into something sour, apologize for you holy gold plated teeth.

meritt drake

An opiatealtering your mind like the way the sky is sometimes a harsh orange split with themi click clack of a writerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s wrath. An oyster to a pearl a tomb to a corpse. You are finally home in this.

Meritt Drake is a writer living in Texas who has been featured in a few literary journals. She is a student who is also working as a waitress. Meritt loves mountains and yoga.

heavy

michelle pastor Vulnerable gestures

Like rosy cheeks And lovers spit Tongue full of sympathy Drips Like clammy hands Like dry mouths Or runny ones Drip Oceans in my mouth I can only hope the salt wonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t dry you out Try to keep me settled Like everyone wants to be You are The imprint of elastic On my inner thigh All the places where you kiss Is where you lie I fall within your sheets And quickly drown in them Try my best to swim in the rugged waves of your furrowed brow But I am so dense that I drown Michelle Marie Pastor is a grease ball poet. Read more on her blog: curiousnerves.tumblr.com

inside the white clapboard house brandon speck the walls sweat, fluorescent July heat paces around rooms through the hallway air thick as fleas dance hot in the brain, around the ankles.

it is 10pm, do you know where your children are? your children move couches into their backyards, not mowing the lawn. everything you taught your children to kill and cut down starts to grow wild, proving you wrong. your children paint the walls with sex then melt into the sunrise. your children wake up at noon, scratch at the bites gaze longingly, at a breathing puzzle of plaster

your children 20 years older wandering outside the crib into boxcars and houseboats. there is rotting wood there is stomach clench. Your children grow their hair out collect velvet in their teeth, comb leaves and branches from their hair gaze at reflections in car windows. your children’s mail piles up but nobody writes letters to them. your children learned more from wires than from your throat. the white clapboard house, now the mother you never were.

Brandon Speck is a face behind a beard. He has self-released one chapbook, titled “this early purgatory” on his small press, Stray Arrow, based out of his basement in Portland, OR. “Cool” and “chill” are adjectives that have been used to describe Brandon by a handful of “dudes.

there is no god Ryan Havers

I used to go to church, Although I’ve never read the Bible, My ex-attendance makes me an expert.

I used to sit in that Holy House, And never was confirmed. Probably why I mis-understood ev’ry sermon word. There is no God. That’s the conclusion that I’ve reached. How can there be? With all this science that they teach. I used to go to school, Although I never read the textbook, My attendance makes me an expert. I used to sit in that lacking lab And I never wore my goggles, Probably why I now wear prescription glasses. There is no God. Only people who’ve read different books And tell me I should believe them. Ryan Havers is a British poet who likes to maintain an air of mystery. However you can find him at ryanhavers.tumblr.com and twitter.com/ryanhaverspoet

the wilderness in you Pinar Yasar

every new era is mottled with accents and candies come, by river, by reaching into the next bellyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s harvest. rejoiced upon arrival, dismissed of all charges. plentiful and winsome to the Captains and the Kingdoms. rulers ruling by the length of sky between them and the arrows of the divine. dotted are the maps, spilled are their yokes, and that, the line muted by steepled fingers, is the bone you on which you choke PÄąnar Yasar is currently studying English at Tufts University. She speaks three (and a half) languages, but none of them help her understand her dog.

High & dry

Zachary Caballero All cars go somewhere this makes you think you should too makes you wanna gamble your morning breath away on your rainy day playlist a shuffle so sad pours out replaces the sugar in your coffee with Radiohead and now this suffering refuses to skip, simply steam I am sobbing songs out to an audience invisible from the outside in but oh I don’t just sing for nobody now Ya see? I remove the stirrer, now my tongue, and the thickness of its insincerity curdled the cream degreased the deadbolt that keeps the best thing I ever had whole and no one knows or remembers how to gather gone glory even after you showed them. It’s ok, though. ‘Cause this morning I can sing about wishing to make love without my inside falling to pieces again. You are not in your car yet and you think still, to step out into the day, to enter all that earnest ecology will make you impostor or maybe just impossible or maybe opening the door will affirm what is waiting and what is waiting is what is not yet yours but that will always be waiting so what’s the rush? Maybe now you are the open door

Welcome! you think to the world whose constant availability vindicates the time it takes for you to open so true and maybe none of this is what you thought would happen by noon but it is Friday nonetheless you have now drank two cups of coffee finishing neither but your breath says otherwise and now you are awake now you are in your car going somewhere but you still haven’t left. Zachary Caballero is a Mexican-American poet from Texas. He co-founded the University of Texas’ only poetry organization, Spitshine Poetry, and co-coached their 2014 National Slam Team, who took first place at the College Union Poetry Slam Invitational. Currently, he works for Writers In The Schools (WITS), attends law school in Houston, and has a homemade tortilla for a heart.

thermostat Christopher Mulrooney what is the butter doing in the frying pan but melting away like cocoa butter on a beauty’s skin in the Caribbean where the wrecks of history lie on the bottom of the sea in heaps Christopher Mulrooney is the author of symphony (The Moon Publishing & Printing), flotilla (Ood Press), and viceroy (Kind of a Hurricane Press).

Leia Renee

drawing

Leia Reneeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s art is heavily influenced by her affinity for Gothic fiction and natural forms. She is currently based in Wisconsin and works in a wide variety of media.

comatoast KATY LEWELLEN

dirt spills from TV sets riding Xanax limos across living room deserts. carpeted mouth invasive door creak; the streak of light touching too deep. hearing becomes belief. storms shake furniture old man weather strokes his beard --can you taste forests of desolation decomposition as caws of crows bust eardrums settling for carnage as a link between you and (me)? sun shatters her shell moon tides the water as clean as heâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll ever be breaking sand castle intent as the machine etches labyrinthine. wall cascade into the call of too many mouths without enough glass to cull the chatter of wavelength rotations. Katy is an avid daydreamer stuck between four walls somewhere near Dallas. She spends her days coercing fruits and vegetables and by night she sings â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;50s pop hits to her dog and cat.

Mitch Westcott

photos

Mitch Westcott a CT based photographer who is working towards his bachelors degree in Photography

You're funny. Thanks, bye then. jo COleslaw She gone and died so he dyed. Half-hearted got himself a new suit off the market. Popped down Ladbrokes, got himself a habit; with the free coffee felt a little better ‘bout his losses. He covered it up though, the biggest one, you know, the one where he lost his house to the bank? Oh what a fucking muddle in the middle of his life. Drowning in a puddle under sunny fucking skies. “Yeah, you’ve got it better son, a better life, a better one.” A bitter man will blame the rain

on everybody else’s sun. Suddenly his life has pace where there was space. Suddenly it feels like a death race. Suddenly there’s only skull where there was face. Suddenly he’s only a trace. Suddenly there’s no place for him - ‘Boring!’ All of the time just yawning caught in a fuck trap; migraine shrink wrap. Suddenly his life was a Goddamn fucked up mishap. Jo Coleslaw lives in England and wanders about the places staring at stuff and dancing to Northern Soul music.

Banana Bread Zachary Caballero Waiting for the bus in the rain, sounds like a sentence that belongs in a story about nostalgia. You know. trying to remember, as if the mere mention of memory does not make us a history book? This doesn’t take that much work, though. I am waiting for the bus in the rain. With little effort, everyone avoids drowning. Except me, and that exception applies to the entire previous sentence. With much effort, I am still no one avoiding nothing which to say today is Thursday and I am waiting for the bus in the rain. Goodness, now it sounds like I’m trying to remember but memory for me doesn’t work like that. What happened is still happening, as always with me, an unhappenable being and this mostly gets confusing due to the speed at which I speak and that has to do with memory, too. I’m afraid if I forget what I want to say, I will lose my tongue one day. I want to say everything all at once. Oh, my mouth is my mistress and I want to make love like teeth and fresh banana bread. Have you ever had fresh banana bread?

If you can’t say yes, you haven’t made love with your teeth like I know and let me tell you, that’s a love you have to show. What’s the point of being able to speak if you ain’t gonna sing? What’s the point of being able to eat if you ain’t gonna make the food sing to you? Goodness, now it sounds like I forgot what made me remember which I didn’t because I don’t have to remember. I was waiting for the bus in the rain and nobody drowned except me but that’s mostly because I was born next to the ocean and my father was a sailor and you know there’s something about apples falling from the ship deck and getting caught in boys’ teeth, until they are forever finding apple flesh? Well that’s me. I am waiting for the bus in the rain when the bus stops like I don’t know how to do and now I am on the bus with the rain outside when I look up and see a poem by Jill Wiggins. The ending was this: “Into dark water— I could drown in words” and then did. Zachary Caballero is a Mexican-American poet from Texas. He co-founded the University of Texas’ only poetry organization, Spitshine Poetry, and co-coached their 2014 National Slam Team, who took first place at the College Union Poetry Slam Invitational. Currently, he works for Writers In The Schools (WITS), attends law school in Houston, and has a homemade tortilla for a heart.

LEG

Doug Hawley

Joey Kellog was born twenty five years ago in Fresno. His father Gary was and still is a real estate salesman. He had been a three sport letterman in high school and was drafted by the Chicago Cubs upon graduation. He got as far as Triple A baseball, but had inadequate speed for someone who was not a power hitter to make it to the bigs. The disappointment gnawed inside him, but outwardly it showed in his belittling the accomplishments of others. Garyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s relative success in sports made him the leader of the guys in the neighborhood. At work, while hunting, fishing or golfing, or at the local sports bar he was deferred to. His opinions on sports, politics, sex, art and metaphysics were given great weight by his peers. They did not question his beliefs that ancient astronauts had created the art on the plains of Peru, or that Atlantis had not been colonized by Lemuria. Gary was not smarter than his friends, but his early success had given him an aura of assurance. His mother Mary was a minor league (and below Triple A at that) trophy wife. Unfortunately for Gary his greatest successes had been early in life so he had not been able to upgrade. Mary dabbled - her interests included drinking, cards, volunteer projects (her part of the work always involved the phone) and an antique boutique which Gary hoped would make money some years and qualify as a write off in other years. Gary had better luck with the write offs than the profits. Their marriage was a success because each was self involved and tried to ignore the other. Their unspoken road to marital contentment, if not bliss, was to keep anything controversial out of sight. Mary did most of her drinking, beauty treatments and phone marathons when Gary was gone, and Garyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s

cigar smoking, poker and pornographic movies were always enjoyed with the boys. Their partnership was the envy of both men and women, and who can say they are wrong? Gene was Joey’s younger brother. Since he was significantly taller than both Joey and Gary and had different skin tone and eye color, there was some good natured debate about his parentage. Gary had no problem with any such conjecture since Mary never broached the subject and Gary secretly believed that Gene was better than he could have conceived, so to speak. If Gary had dwelt on the subject he probably would have suspected that Gene’s father was one of his better ex ballplayer buddies. At twenty two Gene had made it to the bigs. He was only a utility player, but his looks and quotability had made him a favorite of sports writers and fans. His inability to change a tire, locate Argentina on a map, find the square root of 16 or spell “cache” was not held against him, in fact it added to his charm. He did know the important things - Don’t show up the umpire, always wear a condom during sex and then only with unmarried females over 18, have someone else drive after you are unconscious, get a good agent and financial manager (not the same person) and don’t spit on fans regardless of how bad a day you are having. Having a father in the business had helped a great deal. Joey was the odd man out in this household. He was the brightest, but intelligence did not impress anyone in the family and education was not encouraged. All of them knew that success was not dependent on a college education. Looks and motor skills suffice. His mother made him good meals and would tend to boo - boos, but he did not really fit into any of her interests. His father had spent a lot of time with him until he quit youth baseball for high school wrestling which was more appropriate for his build and skills. By that time, it was obvious

that Gene was the one with the most potential so the family got behind the more likely winner. Gene had tagged along with Joey in order to play with the big boys, until his talent made it clear that he was better than his brother. Then he started to hang out with the even bigger boys. By the time Gene was a freshman in high school, he was a better ball player than Senior Joey, who had already quit ball in favor of girls, wrestling and wrestling girls. Because of his illustrious, if flawed, family, Joey was deemed a loser. This was in spite of his successes in wrestling (not a big sport locally) and weightlifting. A good wrestler of the legitimate or the show business variety must have a combination of strength, speed, technique and endurance. Joey was only better than average at everything but strength. He built on his naturally superior strength with hours of weightlifting with the football players. At 145 pounds he got so he could lift with some of the linemen. He aided his quest for strength with a nutritious diet and supplements which had not been generally outlawed. Because Joey was not really good at baseball, his father never gave him much advice. Therefore, he got herpes which limited his social life to some extent. Aside from that handicap, his perceived inferiority compared to the rest of his family made him somewhat inhibited. He mostly hung out with other wrestlers. He had average grades in most subjects, but was good at logic and got good math grades. His family saw no reason for him to go to college, and he did not disagree. In any case no financial support was offered by the family, nor did he qualify for any good scholarships based on grades, athletics or other extracurricular activities. After graduating from high school, he got a series of jobs including furniture moving, video rental and the like. He liked the physical jobs best because they allowed his mind free rein, but they paid barely enough for his small apartment, meals and a ten year old Corolla. Now he always used condoms and occasionally got lucky at closing time at the local bar â&#x20AC;&#x153;Drown Townâ&#x20AC;?. By mutual

agreement, his entanglements were mostly NSA. During the early years after high school he fooled around with weight lifting and was surprised to see steady improvement in his ability. To find out how good he really was, he joined a local group which trained at the best gym in Fresno. To his mild surprise he rose to rank second or third nationally, depending on the meet, in his weight division. That was good enough to get him a little notice in the local news and some “Attaboys” from family and acquaintances. His mother used him in bragging to her friends that “Joey is very strong and won something or other”, his father was pleased that, as he put it, “Everyone in the family has had some success at something” and his brother told him “I might not be the only star in the family”. After about a year of holding steady in the rankings, he finally got a break or lost his brakes. He was driving alone outside of town on a rare rainy day when he ran off the road. A friend, Garfield Travis, who was following him took him to a nearby clinic where his legs below the knees had to amputated. Although he was not exactly famous, he was well enough known that he was showered with best wishes, presents and money. The local tech school “Better Than McJobs” paid his way through programming school while he recuperated. He got good, lightweight prosthetics which while not as good as the original issue, never got athletes foot or ingrown toenails. To the surprise and amazement of most, Joey was as good at weightlifting, albeit a bit more mechanical, as ever after he finished physical therapy. Fortunately, style doesn’t count as it does in body building and synchronized swimming. Better yet, the light weight prosthetics lowered his weight enough to put him in a lighter division where he could be the best in the world. When he began winning competitions, two things happened. First, some competitors and fans said that he had an unfair “bionic” advantage. In this case, he was the $5,432.50 man - the cost of the prosthetics as donated by a sympathetic citizen.

The reaction to the criticism was being lionized by editorial writers and opinion makers around the country. Politicians of all stripes and dots rallied to his defense as did various athletes who had gone through similar difficulties. He was compared to the gymnast who completed her routine in the Olympics despite voluminous and noisy flatulence. His picture was put on the front of the breakfast cereal of endorsers. He became the actual poster boy (not the figurative or metaphorical, but actual) of the Disabled and/or Disgruntled Political Action Group. THE END Or so it seemed except for those 7 or 8 people who knew differently. Joey had “issues” and he had a lot of information. Agents had told him number three would get him nothing, but number one would pay off. Brian Silver was ready to represent him if he could move up. Before drinking to excess and past remembrance (what did they do later that evening - he didn’t know) with a physical therapist named Jane Lane he had learned a lot about the prosthetics and physical therapy involved in lower limb amputations. When he was sober he found that Jane knew an emergency clinic Quick Fix that would provide services not sanctioned by the late Hipocrates (who was, after all, far beyond approving or disapproving). Garfield and Joey ran Joey’s car off the road close to Quick Fix. Under anesthesia, Joey’s lower legs were amputated. Brian Silver did all of the public relations from the sympathy campaign, through the protests against his competition and ultimately the overwhelming support he received. How do I know the whole story? I was assigned to what appeared to be a normal public interest story about Joey by Sports Deified. One of the people I interviewed for the story was Jane Lane. The interview started at Drown Town, but ended at her apartment. I don’t know if it was my charm, good looks (not likely), the aphrodisiac qualities of Budweiser, or the fact that I was

from a national magazine, but we ended up in the sack. The next morning, when I woke up she was quietly weeping. I have gotten that reaction more than once and I know that it can represent either an emotional release or fornicator’s regret. When I asked her why she was crying, most of the Joey Kellog story came out. I later pieced together the rest. Is Joey crazy? Is family to blame? Should I run the story as is, or the sugar coated version? Maybe I should have another beer than ask any more questions. Doug Hawley is a retired actuary living in the Portland OR area.

this is not romantic but I wanted it to be part one Grace Tallmadge If I ever kill myself (and I won’t) but if I do, I’ll tie rocks to my legs and arms and I’ll sit on the edge of Buchner Pool at twilight when the world’s all blue and I’ll take pill after pill after pill of Zoloft and Lorazepam and I’ll chase it with my dad’s most expensive red wine straight from the bottle and maybe some of my mom’s homemade buttercream frosting too, and I’ll lie back on the diving board counting the stars until I get sleepy with “Transatlanticism” by Death Cab for Cutie playing on repeat in the background and then I’ll dive in and settle on the bottom of the pool and watch the surface of the water move until it all goes completely still Grace Tallmadge is a seventeen year old aspiring writer from Milwaukee, WI

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visit chippedtoothpress.bandcamp.com to listen to our contributors reading some of their work. you can stream the album or download and donate to help keep the mag running. if you choose to download youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll get four bonus tracks which are unavailable for streaming.

Carolina Marquez

Carolina Marquez is an illustrator out of California.

evolution

Ryan Havers

Started off as a fish did I (?) And swam through those large bodies of water I forget what theyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re called... Reached the edge and fell out of the water, Started sprawling on the land. Rolling in the sand And I died. Couldnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t cope with the environment. My mate though had legs and started running, He went on to win the London marathon He was the first ever sea-monkey To do so. Ryan Havers is a British poet who likes to maintain an air of mystery. However you can find him at ryanhavers.tumblr.com and twitter.com/ryanhaverspoet

rheostat

Christopher Mulrooney Bam-Bam the campus dormitory thermocouple from Montgomery he walked into thin air just the other day the other night drinking his Sprite as in a television commercial full of speculations on the product Christopher Mulrooney is the author of symphony (The Moon Publishing & Printing), flotilla (Ood Press), and viceroy (Kind of a Hurricane Press).

How to Say I Love You with Tear- Swollen Eyes SHannon HOrte sometimes emotion hits you way too fucking hard panic attacks at 3 AM can make you realize that you don’t always fully understand how much you care about things, or people, or a person. I could have suffocated myself I cried so hard at the thought of . . . at the picture of . . . at the . . . — nevermind, it’s gone now. I don’t know how my chest was expanding when my brain was convinced that I had not taken a solid breath since the last time I kissed you I hope, when you hugged me goodbye, you didn’t mind if she was thinner than me. Ventured too far back I sat pigeon-toed sat glossy-eyed and the hyperventilating started

and I couldn’t stop it it increased with each breath you took, asleep. I’m sorry if I woke you. I’m sorry if I woke you. I’m sorry if I upset you. Emotion rams through my rib cage with hammers a dull but gut-wrenching knock, knock, knock from the inside of my ribs I just want to breathe again, to stand again please let my legs work this time. I can’t scream anymore sitting down. Shannon enjoys the finer things in life like sleeping in late, her poorly-paying retail job, and begging her landlord to let her have a cat. In her spare time, she spills her guts onto paper and calls it poetry.

Mitch Westcott

photo

Mitch Westcott a CT based photographer who is working towards his bachelors degree in Photography

Notes from my Phone: 4.26.14 christina scott

“Summer 2013”???? more like -what kinda bread do you want? Mam, in order to get the flatbread that means we have to toast it soRRY. Don’t trust your family and don’t trust me Order from Etsy Don’t trust ME I SAID- I’ve cheated at every game of monopoly, I’ve looked through your sketchbooks from when you were into drawing anime in the 7th grade, you let me sleep in your bed and you took the couch- so let’s be honest, it was really your fault, you set me up. I’m not one to be around. Forty-one year old guy with small dog syndrome in a deep v-neck and an Aeropostale sweatshirt letting me know JUST how cool I am. Christina Scott (You can call her Tina) is a person who draws. She enjoys brush pen, comics, and printmaking. When she's not making art, she's probably curling her hair, writing haikus about people she's slept with, or thinking about dead things. tumblr: www.02343.tumblr.com website: www.christina-scott.com

part two Grace Tallmadge

If I ever kill myself (and I won’t) but if I do, I’ll make a red velvet birthday cake and stick sparklers in it instead of candles, one for every person I love that I’m leaving behind and I’ll do my makeup like I’m going to meet the Coppolas with glitter all over my shoulders and cheekbones and I’ll kiss my dog goodnight and then I’ll lock myself in the garage and start the car with that snow patrol album playing softly on the stereo and I’ll read Pablo Neruda’s poems out loud in Spanish until my head gets heavy and there are no more words Grace Tallmadge is a seventeen year old aspiring writer from Milwaukee, WI

sheer blooming larks Christopher Mulrooney

they come out of the trees like an exhalation you would write in your book if you had your book handy and when you wish upon a star or a piece of candy to do your will it is all one powdered sweetmeat or great sun Christopher Mulrooney is the author of symphony (The Moon Publishing & Printing), flotilla (Ood Press), and viceroy (Kind of a Hurricane Press).

part three Grace Tallmadge If I ever kill myself (and I won’t) but if I do, I’ll be sitting on the floor of my bathroom with the window open and the smell of rain drizzling through, and I’ll be wearing that teal dress I wore to that party in Hawaii and I’ll eat a hamburger with extra pickles and ketchup and put on my lipstick in the most fluorescent shade of violet I have and then I’ll grab a knife from the kitchen and I’ll lick chocolate custard out of the carton while everything is almost silent except the rain patters on the roof and I’ll cry just a little as I bleed out Grace Tallmadge is a seventeen year old aspiring writer from Milwaukee, WI

leia renee

drawing

Leia Reneeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s art is heavily influenced by her affinity for Gothic fiction and natural forms. She is currently based in Wisconsin and works in a wide variety of media.

what it is like in sweden, or some other place brandon speck

in this universe I am a scandinavian pop star. you are a glacier still stuck in teenage angst. my purple lipstick smears on coffee cups and you can’t get those scientists to leave you alone. in this universe nothing is perfect. every morning we share a sunrise we talk sweet-nothings at each other, gaze adoringly past the table of seagulls and it feels closest to perfection. in this universe I am finally famous you pose important questions: how does anything ever get decided? how does anyone even feel anything? I gaze upon my jagged snow-cut surroundings through my triangular polarized sunglasses tingling in memories of melting into your bare landscape. your icy touch against my dripping back I am the closest to myself that I have ever been.

“Brandon Speck is a face behind a beard. He has self-released one chapbook, titled “this early purgatory” on his small press, Stray Arrow, based out of his basement in Portland, OR. “Cool” and “chill” are adjectives that have been used to describe Brandon by a handful of “dudes”.

INSTEAD OF JUMPING OFF A BUILDING Ashley Shah

i wanted to destroy the school i took the SAT at. there were ethnic posters everywhere which said a lot about wealth and consumerism. i was wry and cool, detaching myself from The System to ponder marxist theory. i know this is supposed to be bad but i just wanted to shoot off everyoneâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s faces. wry and cool though i know this is not a Enlightened thing to say. only massacres solve problems and there is enough clutter in the world to make me cry for a year and a half. i will walk around telling people i plan to blow up the universe with a wry and cool smile. they will think iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m joking and laugh, not wry, not cool. sad and emotional. i will be disgusted. and when i strike, it will be a national tragedy. you will blame it on the ubiquity of violent video games and sentence me to life in prison. i will start a cult and write a book. How To Be Wry & Cool. i will donate the profits to communist party. it will all be spent on business ventures that eventually fail just to make a statement. this is a metaphor for my life, i think. Ashley is teenager experimenting with art, mostly through the medium of language. You can find more of her work on her tumblr - http://internetentity.tumblr.com.

girl in gnawing StefFi Lang

vanilla musk oil, flutter wilt and gnaw she is, she is, she isstuck kisses and ravage molestation petals, disinfestedpink plume skirt and ice cream cups

tangled and flounce, we weren’t sad, we weren’t sad in here but it all crept in, those aluminum ghostslike you said, you said not the words, not the wordthe gash in the word the blood tissues in the word the word that rots vacuous mouths constructing without the istrawberry crust scrapes pinkred eyes, crinkle wrappers veins under girl stuck knees and I left them, calico stitches chorusing the blue smut windows dead letters, sister’s honeydew mouth, rainbow candy necklace and syntax licking sugar off vile tongue; girl sin and pixelated. Steffi Lang is an English and Philosophy graduate student and a former writing instructor. She loves faerie mythos, Russian classical piano, and drying flower petals to press in her favourite books.

Time As a verb meritt drake

1. She googled which flowers only bloom at night because it was 2:26 AM and she needed reassurance that something else felt this restlessness too. She moved at a slow pace, always 6 or 7 paces behind morning. She never caught up enough to rise like the sun. 2. He had been playing the dream over and over in his head all day long. But as the day went on, he lost his grip on what parts of it he had really dreamt and which parts had been filled in by his conscious mind. This almost ruined the dream for him altogether. 3. Is it really necessary to feel close to one another? We never really will be close enough. Like the mid-morning sun will never be able to feel the calm of midnight, our two hearts will never touch. They are forever separated by ribcages and supple skin. We were never meant to try and connect with each other, this will always be superficial. Meritt Drake is a writer living in Texas who has been featured in a few literary journals. She is a student who is also working as a waitress. Meritt loves mountains and yoga.

part Four Grace Tallmadge

If I ever kill myself (and I won’t) but if I do, I’ll steal that car in the middle of my driveway and take it all the way down to the coast even though the headlights are broken and I’ll leave a note behind that says “I love you” in a million ways except by saying “I love you” because “I love you” is just too easy, and I will roll in the sand until my body is golden and eat watermelon until the tide comes in and then I will come barefoot to the edge of the cliff and I’ll say my favorite prayer from Catholic school, just in case there really is a god and then I will dive off the side like I am a pelican by my bones are filled with marrow, not air and for a moment I will be flying Grace Tallmadge is a seventeen year old aspiring writer from Milwaukee, WI

cheap motel room blues Max Mundan Your distinctive aroma lingers on me on my chest, in my hair on my dick all over my dick There is little chance that she will fail to notice I must find a place to wash whatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s left of you from me to erase your memory before I go home to her Lying next to her in bed feeling the expectant heat of her body pressing mine there is so much to say to you to you only to you for her I have nothing but disappointment and excuses lies, lies, so many lies Life can be so cruel sometimes I can be so cruel sometimes Does getting my needs met always mean that someone else has theirs ripped away?

Another day, another room and you wet, warm and willing We shed our guilt and our shame just like our clothes and leave them lying on the floor in careless piles Only later, when we part ways will we pick them up again to wear under our garments like a hair shirt I want to dress you up in trappings and shrouds knit out of stars I pulled down from the sky but all I have to give you is my sweat and my cum and my apologies Max Mundan is the alter ego of poet/provocateur David Rutter . Or is it the other way around? Max Mundan is far from certain. He has been published in a slew of magazines and literary journals, including The Metric, Vagabonds, Dressing Room Poetry Journal, Eunoia Review, the Stone Path Review, Agave, Typehouse Magazine and the Los Angeles Times, to name but a few. He operates popular websites at maxmundan.com and maxmundan.tumblr.com.

A Big Deal Is What You Make Of It Naima

Trauma noun \’trau̇-me, ‘tro-\ an injury (as a wound) to living tissue caused by an extrinsic agent a disordered psychic or behavioral state resulting from severe mental or emotional stress or physical injury an emotional upset Examples: A soldier fighting in a steel web of callous advertising, exhausted to the point of self-imposed hibernation, waking up only to see the store aisles are stocked with his face on reductive games and films. He gave in to the escapism that holds him at square one. A small girl taken hostage by the hands who feed her crumbs and seeds, the same hands who intentionally clip her wings along with her hair. She gives the pigeons her food, so she might escape through the jagged hole in the window. A burn victim running back into the flames to later carry out a blackened outfit, missing the body, and though he tried his best and he tries to forget, his nights ignite his self-worth, and body bags settle under his eyes each daybreak, or dusk. He can’t tell the Sun from the fire with no escape route. A college dropout visiting old roommates meets hypnotizing advances and learns nothing but how to regress to a stripped infant, after the evening leaves her robbed of a semblance of adulthood,

she blocks out her memories with caution tape. She’ll escape when she discovers the others who didn’t dial 911. It isn’t something sirens and hoses can drown out. It doesn’t always make the news. Heartbreak noun \’härt-,brak\ a very strong feeling of sadness, disappointment, etc. crushing grief, anguish, or distress Definitions: Two people who become broken halves during the breakdown after the breakup, they don’t get the right to a paragraph next to the obituaries, because they fell in a manhole and want to call it the Grand Canyon. There are no ropes to help them escape. There is no rescue team waving police sketches. There is no white linen hospital bed prepared for a concussion patient. Heartbreak is untreatable when art is painstaking recovery and science is a hollow first-aid-kit. A little thing like heartbreak is too frivolous and easy to overcome to spend a lifetime with a notepad with the same ten-lettered-title on every header. A giant thing like heartbreak is too well known to require examples, but knowing is not understanding. I wonder what would happen if it were simply called, “an injury that results in a disordered psychic state with a crushing feeling of disappointment and anguish.” Maybe it wouldn’t be a word game, or a game at all. Maybe it would be inextricably linked with the weeping guitar solo on the radio no matter which local station is sending the message in heightened frequency. Maybe it would be an example we can all hear is a trauma. Naima is not a writer. She writes. Is she conscious while she does it? No.

Carolina Marquez

Carolina Marquez is an illustrator out of California.

fran then started talking really fast holly keys Debbie came out of the bathroom in a fluffy white robe singing Notorious B.I.G’s Juicy. Debbie’s boyfriend Jack wondered aloud if that’s what biggie had in mind when he wrote the song. Privileged white girls singing it as they walked out of the shower. Fran thought this was funny. Debbie also thought that was funny. Debbie was trying to make a playlist for her upcoming birthday party. Fran said she should play only Jamie T. Debbie said that was a stupid idea. Fran, Debbie and Jack then had a picnic. Fran told Debbie and Jack that she wasn’t sure whether she actually cared about writing or being a writer and that maybe she just saw writing as a means in which to broadcast her opinions to the world and that if this was in fact the case she was ashamed. Fran then started talking really fast. “And everyday you come across a new philosophy or framework of thought and you click and click and click through one Wikipedia article to the next. Anarchism to post-anarchism to post-post anarchism and you take nothing in but you keep doing it because you want to know everything and every school of thought that you haven’t heard of is an affront to your intellectual security and you don’t want to get caught out never having heard of Habermas so you troll though Wikipedia some more and take even less in. You can always look again and then you wonder if you really know anything or think anything or has it been placed there by some secondary power structure. Your pursuit for knowledge might not be real it might just be the manifestation of an involuntary coercive hierarchy that keeps you wanting more because you’ll never sit still and you’ll never really look

around and then you wonder if you only think that because of the last Wikipedia article you read and your opinions aren’t yours and you’re a phony and everyone’s a phony and you seek absolutes and grand unifying theories that don’t exist and you think why does it matter that I know any of this? What does it change? What does it affect? and you come up with nothing and think it might be easier just not to care but its still there nagging nagging nagging.” Fran then started talking about Facebook. “And my thinly veiled contempt for everything they stand for, that annoying person on Facebook who complains and says nonsense like educate yourselves, and it’s so annoying, and its not the type of thing that can be explained in a status update. This person sucks, and I know their opinion is wrong, and I want them to know that I know their opinion is wrong, but I stop myself because arguing about politics on Facebook is for idiots, and I am thus better than they are, and a feeling of self righteousness surges through me when I don’t do it, and I know that I am better than them even though I need to wash my hair and am eating Thai takeout from three days ago.” Jack and Debbie didn’t know how to respond to Fran’s rambling. So they smiled nodded and ate some olives. Holly Keys is an Australian writer living in New York. She has been published on though catalog, new wave vomit and electric cereal.

Doughnuts

Wayne F. Burke I got off work at 3 in the morning after working another twelve hour shift and I drove my car to the P & C Market where I turned a few doughnuts on the ice before I parked and got out and walked to the door where some guy, who stood looking at me, said “I don’t care how old you are, don’t pull doughnuts in the lot” and I said “FUCK YOU” and he blinked behind his cock-eyed glasses and I followed him inside and asked if he’d heard what I said, but he did not reply and I went about my shopping too tired to give a shit or take any either.

The poetry of Wayne F. Burke has appeared in The Bicycle Review, Red Savina, Bluestem, Forge, Curbside Splendor, The Commonline Journal, Locust, Insert, Bottle Rockets, Black Wire, and elsewhere. His book of poems WORDS THAT BURN is published by Bareback Press (2013). He lives in the central Vermont area.

apparition

michelle pastor The kind of affection based solely on a Challenge and a touch We are both already so tired The exhaust permeates I smell of your sweat the next day And refuse to shower As if washing off your touch will make you disappear There’s constant fear Irrational assumptions that i will be abandoned by someone who wasn’t even here Never even made a plan to stay Resentment piles as high as the doorway There wont be a way out Unless you want to rifle through this shit with me I’ll stay in your room for a month or two Dehydrated death I’d likely be the ghost in your bed Laying still While you spread her on top of me It’s okay She’s not heavy Like I was

Michelle Marie Pastor is a grease ball poet. Read more on her blog: curiousnerves. tumblr.com

excerpts from 'Various plans for success' kevin POpovich Plan A HUNT HUMAN BEINGS. HARVEST THEIR HEARTS. CONSUME THEIR HEARTS. ACQUIRE THEIR POWER. TAKE NO PRISONERS. LEAVE NO WITNESSES. BECOME SUPREME OVERLORD. Plan B hope above all else that they will eventually come back over and drink all your wine and fall asleep next to you again. Wait. Plan C Avoid your ex-lover, please. Stop hurting her, she cares. Quit smoking, you'll breathe easier. Drink less, it isn't helping. Get outta bed and exist. Various Plans For Success is an upcoming collection by Kevin Popovich. Kevin Popovichâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s favorite color is Forest Green. Do with that information what you may.

Mitch Westcott

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Mitch Westcott a CT based photographer who is working towards his bachelors degree in Photography

Flight 2014 Wayne F. Burke Squashed into a window seat my face in the porthole looks back at me; there is a wing out there somewhere and a city below of dazzling lights and a coastline and ocean beyond where the lights donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t shine... the stewardess dangles a mask in her hands with what looks like a giant condom attached and my dick rubs against my pants and the engines throb and the big jet shudders and I fly through the dark ready to sleep or fuck or whatever.

skin Grace Tallmadge

My skin doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t fit me like it used to. I want to shove holes in it, I want to Slide needles into the layers and Give me metal Or ink. I want hair as blue as the waves in Oahu The ones that broke over the rocks Shattering like glass And exploding like a firework. I want color in my eyes so that I can convince myself I was Cleopatra In a past life. I want to carry black leather on my shoulders And warnings in my cheekbones, Words on my wrist etched permanently, Pepper spray in my voice. I want scraped knees and a bruised collarbone And I want to be born again But I donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t believe in that anyway Because hell is an empty room And heaven is no place For girls With ill-fitting skin. Grace Tallmadge is a seventeen year old aspiring writer from Milwaukee, WI

Amy Autumn Dewar

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Amy Autumn Dewar, age 24, is a Welsh artist currently living in Swansea, United Kingdom. She practices with mediums such as Photography, Installation, Video and Narrative to explore her concepts of interest.

sentient michelle pastor How could anything be worth this Why I canâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t explain The way the clarity in my head Tangles with your words And spits out Light That burns Into skin Into the dark of my eyelids Turn it off Press your fingers Hard Into my closed eyes Circles of color Bubbles of light Neon lines Spelling out directions Keep your composure A distraction to the hand you have shoved inside my chest Grasping something wet and intangible

Michelle Marie Pastor is a grease ball poet. Read more on her blog: curiousnerves. tumblr.com

Mulberry

brian strauss

Fuck me, oh god, I want you to come inside me I want you smack me and come on my tits A weary deadness beginning to callous the bags beneath her eyes, I was on my knees taking her from behind She turned around- knelt down, wrapped both her hands around my cock Stuck it in her mouth, sound of sloshing saliva and expressive moans Tight technique way she cradled the balls and massaged tip with tongue I need you to come inside me... Increasingly desperate, I need you to come inside me (insert scene looking into eyes) You are the witness to my wilderness Wild child dancing cryptically, naked beneath moonlight, smoke floating between particles of air Ash flicked over rusted railing, beat the way your pussy lies beat, way your eyes close in respite Way you fall back, head against pillow, I’m sorry, I can’t keep going... Smile carved into my face like blushing marble It’s not a question to be a solved doesn’t rhyme It’s a picture of a frame being lingual in interpretation Interpret the calloused wounds that pepper my heart

Belate me with the vapid complimentay self-esteem that Comes with being who I am, or at the very least Who I’m becoming. Dampness to the air of the room, I’m sitting at your desk typing, drinking brandy You’ve begun to snore. I can see the sun beginning to peek through the blinds Rooster next door begins to howl, My erection has gone limp But I’m smiling anyways. Brian Strauss is a poet interested in exploring the emotional spatiality of poetry through the use of aesthetic narrative and metamodernist tendencies. His poetry is steeped in sincerity and detachment, oscillating wildly between the notion of self and implied author.

part Five Grace Tallmadge If I ever kill myself (and I won’t) but if I do, I will not be still. I will not weep softly. I will not sink, I will not dream, I will not fly. My lungs will start to freeze and then my heart will begin to panic and all the blood will come rushing in like a hurricane and I will not be ready for it – how can you be ready for it? They’ll put roses at my grave even though they’re my least favorite flower and I always wanted to be a cadaver but I never got around to saying it and there will be a lot of things I never got around to saying – and in that final instant before the kidneys shrivel and the skull cracks I will realize I was happy all along and my final thought will be “Did I water the plants” Grace Tallmadge is a seventeen year old aspiring writer from Milwaukee, WI

WHY ARE WE ALWAYS SPITTING WORDS AT EACH OTHER?

Ashley Shah in my head, we are trees who are kissing very messily. you taste like sap and dirt.

at barnes & noble, you tell me you never even liked the office. i say OK. i am crying and you are kissing me and i am saying get AWAY FROM ME I DONT WANT TO TOUCH SOMEONE WHO DOESNT LIKE THE OFFICE. some people stare. i wonder if they are used to me doing this. you say sorry. i say cool. i am kind of a street performer. on the ride home, you ask if you will go to hell. i say you probably will. sorry, you say. no worries, i say. ha ha, you say. look we are so happy, i say. we take a picture of us being happy and put it on instagram. i use my branches to push you away. i think about killing you because you taste bad. i want to offer you gum but i canâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t. it is impossible for trees to eat gum. i am a sad clown performing on the streets. the children are crying. Ashley is teenager experimenting with art, mostly through the medium of language. You can find more of her work on her tumblr - http://internetentity.tumblr.com.

Amy Autumn Dewar

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watercolours of day and time StefFi Lang

saturnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s eyes donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t see what we do to each other and i used to have all of those tastes in my mouth, sugar and light and roses and chamomilenow i am chalk, i am flaking-i rub off you, i am not a banshee or a rose slip girl, i am water and bone and blood, pink tissue and a mottled blue bruise i peel off the covers, i sit, i stir, i look at my fingers and how funny they look and knobby on the blanket-i look at you and you are still asleep i brush my hair, knotted-tangled because i have not left for days, i do not have days any more, i do not want to define the time now, it passes and blurs, a watercolour of words and light, i suspended here in my stockholm ache i am a bloody pink flower-i wilt, i sag, i drooppeeled membranes and half stuck lungs i am underwater Neptune i am the strangeness of the sea i am nothing, nothing, nothing but i am still here-

Steffi Lang is an English and Philosophy graduate student and a former writing instructor. She loves faerie mythos, Russian classical piano, and drying flower petals to press in her favourite books.

insert lit mag here is looking for submissions for our october issue.the deadline is september 20th. keep writing keep reading. keep submitting. we want work that bares its teeth. we want artists who shake us to the core.