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Katherine Villari and Sam Beasley || Editors-in-Chief Back cover by Xylux info@lalluredesmots.com
And a very special
thank you to these lovely individuals.The print version of this magazine would not have been possible without them.
Clay Lipsky Gary Mitchell Rebecca Jones-Howe Berit Ellingsen Jeffrey Irwin
Jeff Wack Jules Archer Bryan Benoit James O’Sullivan Gary Dikarev Maks Dikarev
Contents 8 Eyes That Said Don’t Leave Me Here by John Matthew Whalen
62 Petite Mort by D.L. Pesavento
10 Nannycam by Karley Bayer
63 Bruises by Ramona Evans
14 Persephone, Past Curfew photography by Bryan Benoit
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20 Helen and the Suitor by Marsha Singh and J.P. Christiansen 22 Specter of the Repressed by Andrew Olson
my angel rocks back and forth
(ex-voto) by Giacomo Lee 66 Tree Hugger by Bobby Fox 70
back when we didn’t need coats
photography by Wolf189 24 Artist Feature: Motohiko Odani 40 Mile 127 by Joseph Lambach 46 Heat: An Ode to the Thermostat photography by Sam Beasley 60 Hamlet (Act V, Scene VII) by William Shakespeare by L’Allure des Mots
80 CrabTown by Zane Coker 84 Trains by James O’Sullivan 85 A Tendency Mistaken For Rapture by Colin James 86 Oh, won’t you meet me in the Indian summer? photography by Xylux
Letter Letter Issue Issue8 8
In In June June of of 2011, 2011, wewe launched launched lalluredesmots.com, lalluredesmots.com, bringing bringing together together writers writers andand artists artists who who share share ourour sensibilities sensibilities in in anan internet internet portal portal to to life’s life’s sensory sensory experiences. experiences. And And now, now, justjust a year a year andand a half a half later, later, with with thethe help help of of ourour blessed blessed contributors, contributors, thisthis whim whim of of ours ours hashas become become a bit a bit of of tangible tangible matter, matter, something something one canone thumb can thumb throughthrough leisurely leisurely withoutwithout the need theofneed a glowing of a glowing rectangle rectangle to aid in toviewing. aid in viewing. Our Our minds minds areare blown blown byby this. this. In In thisthis issue, issue, wewe explore explore ourour memories. memories. OfOf youth, youth, of of mistakes, mistakes, of of honest honest lovemaking. lovemaking. WeWe recall recall feelings feelings of of helplessness helplessness as as wewe watch watch thethe world world continue continue on.on. And And seek seek to to right right thethe wrongs wrongs done done upon upon us.us. Also, Also, we choose we choose to ignore to ignore the approaching the approaching winterwinter entirely entirely and bask andinbask ourinnever-ending our never-ending sunlight. sunlight. With With great great exhilaration, exhilaration, wewe present present thisthis bound bound collection collection of of souls souls onon paper. paper. Thank Thank youyou forfor reading. reading.
Katherine Katherine Villari Villari and and Sam Sam Beasley Beasley Editors-in-Chief Editors-in-Chief
Joseph Lambach is married and the father of two. Besides his family, his biggest passion is reading and writing. He works a regular day job fixing avionic equipment on helicopters, and then writing at night whatever he can get out of his head and onto paper. He currently lives in Southern California and is working on his first novel.
Andrew J. Olson’s work has appeared in such publications as Down in the Dirt Magazine, The Monarch Review, Leaf Garden Press, and The Linnet’s Wings, among others. His first collection of short stories, Barn Stripping and Other Stories, was released this past year by Knuckledown Press.
Giacomo Lee currently writes and teaches in London. J. P. Christiansen The writer is Danish-American, Other works by the author can be found in zines such the poet isn’t; as Poxymash, The Beat, and Quail Bell, along with the the writer resides in America, 2010 New Asian Writing anthology. You can read his the poet doesn’t. writing at http://elegiacomo.tumblr.com. The writer is of this place, then is of that place, everywhere looking for the poet.
James O’Sullivan is from Cork city. His first collection of poetry, entitled Kneeling on the Redwood Floor, was published by Belfast-based Lapwing Publications in August 2011. Outside of his day-to-day work as postgraduate researcher, James attempts to write poetry Colin James works in Energy Conservation and is and short fiction, and is continually striving to get beta great admirer of the Scottish landscape painter, ter at both crafts. He also hopes to improve in his abilJohn Mackenzie. ity to write about himself in the third person. James is a graduate of both University College Cork and Cork Institute of Technology. His work has appeared in nu- Ramona Evans is a young writer with an unconditional love for riveting books, steaming lattes, and merous periodicals and anthologies, including Revival both the English and French language. Literary Journal, Bray Arts Journal, Wordlegs, Holly Bough, Motley Magazine and The Southern Star. He has given a number of public recitals, including at the Irish Writers’ Centre. Further information on James’ work can be found at josullivan.org.
Karley Bayer runs the Filth zine (www.wix.com/the_ Zane Coker was born in Atlanta, Georgia. He moved filth/zine). She is from Baltimore, Maryland. She ento Florida where he grew up in the coastal cities. joys talking a great deal of smack around the Scrabble Throughout his youth, Zane had the passion for many board, experiencing new flavors, and running amok. things but, somehow, writing always seemed to find its Incidentally, she is also disabled and uses a wheelchair. way into his life; always, there was that urge to explore This year she had her left shoulder replaced. Future the night winds of the mind. plans for the year include: going to the gun range, getting her first tattoo, and turning 35! Bryan Benoit captures what his heart perceives, rather Wolf189 loves mathematics, physics, poetry, beautithan what his half-blind eyes see. His work can be ful women, good people, photography and cinema. seen on the model portfolio pages of the top Miami …among many other things. wolf189.tumblr.com agencies like NEXT, MC2, Front Management, Mega Models, and others. www.bryanbenoit.com Marsha Singh cooks great food and plays frisbee with her dogs in the Green Mountains of Vermont. Her poems don’t get out much, but she’s glad they’re here.
When he is not winning beauty contests or appearing on magazine covers, Xylux enjoys spending time with kitties and drinking nog. Currently, he is working on his highly anticipated acting debut. Also, he takes photos. www.xylux.net
Bobby Fox is the award-winning writer of several short stories, plays, poems, a novel and 15 feature John Matthew Whalen is an ornery New Englander. length screenplays. Two of his screenplays have He grew up in a 1-stoplight town, and he still thinks been optioned to Hollywood. His works have been about it sometimes. His other work can be found in published in the The Naked Feather, The Medulla Subtle Fiction, Downer, and The Rusty Nail. Review, Lap Top Lit Mag, The Path, Contemporary Literary Review India, Yareah Magazine, One Title D.L. Pesavento poetry-dreams from the Heartland’s Magazine, The Knotted Beard Review, Bareback, deep wellspring, Ulysses-like fastened to a mast, enrapThe Zodiac Review, Fortunates, Randomly Accessed tured by Siren-seductive sultry voices nocturne-calling Poetics, Wordsmiths, Toska, Enhance, Common Line him nearer in the night. Journal, Cold Noon, Miracle e-Zine, Shadows Express, The Rusty Nail, Airplane Reading, Untapped Cities, The Lyceum, Detroit News, Dearborn TimesHerald, TravelMag and inTravel Magazine. He is also the writer/director/editor of several award-winning short films. He resides in Ypsilanti, MI.
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Fiction:
Eyes That Said Don’t Leave Me Here by John Matthew Whalen
The train tracks were kind of hard to walk on. Little kids could step from plank to plank, and adults could hit every other, but at twelve, they were spaced wrong. Sometimes it seemed easier to just balance on the rail as I went, but Zach was bad at that, so I didn’t do it now. We were following them from my house to his, with a short walk through the woods at his end. Following the street would have been quicker, but on the tracks we could throw rocks at trees and carry knives to feel tough—not that we ever saw anyone back there. The only time was one day when we’d gone to jump off the trestle, and kids from the grade above were already there, spearing sticks into the mud like a tiger trap. The sticks were hard to see beneath the water, and we didn’t end up jumping there again. Today, we talked about ATVs, pellet guns, and how to make a good fist, and we kicked rotting leaf piles out of the ditch. Some of them belched up candy wrappers and chew tins, like the prizes hidden in the King’s Cakes my grandmother baked. I was looking forward to camping out at Zach’s house. Sometimes we’d steal Bud Heavies, Playboys, and other supplies from his Dad’s shop across the yard and start fires in the pit out back. Once, we made torches soaked in everything in the shop that said “flammable” on the container, but the fumes were so bad I puked. This time, Zach was carrying some model rocket engines that his sister’s boyfriend had bought for us. He even offered Zach and me weed sometimes, but I never believed him. I was just carrying some snacks and a nylon tent. I preferred Zach’s house to the tent, but it was quieter to sneak through the lawn at night than out of his bedroom window and across the roof—we’d gotten caught like that, once. When we went to climb back in, his dad had screwed Zach’s window shut, screws sticking out everywhere and the glass cracked, and we knew the next morning would be bad. His shop was his fucking livelihood, he’d say, don’t fucking fuck with it. Zach missed two days of school, and he looked like smeared shit after. Today, we had no proper rocket to launch, but it would be fun to just light off a bunch of engines at once and try to get a shoe into the air or something. His dad would never notice a few missing zip-ties. We turned to the right just before the graffiti trees, pushing into the trail that led to Zach’s yard. New branches tried to knit up the opening, like frost lines on a window or skin in an untended piercing. Zach mostly walked in front, snapping the slender growths and bending the strong ones. It was getting hard to see by the time we neared his house, but the lawn looked funny. There was always shit in it, but this time it was Zach’s shit. Shit that was supposed to be hidden in his room: a pile of knives; a couple of his dad’s old Playboys; some flattened beer cans we’d never known how to get rid of; a pair of bolt cutters; that fucking potato cannon; a glass pipe, like the one his sister’s boyfriend had. We looked at each other from the edge of the woods, and Zach took out his knife and unfolded it. He looked down at his thigh and cut it open where the cargo shorts ended. “It doesn’t even hurt,” he said, looking at the injury, blood coming out like red syrup. I took out my knife and did the same. I didn’t know to use the edge, instead of the point, so I had to push
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pretty hard. It did hurt, and the blood felt hot on my skin. I reached out, and Zach handed me the bag of rocket engines without saying anything, looking at me with eyes that said goodbye, or something like it. I shouldered the stuff we still had and nodded, knowing that the night would be bad for him, knowing that my own parents wouldn’t say anything when our basement door opened and closed. I’d probably have to wear pants next week, I realized. Zach walked up to the house and threw his knife, open and bloody, into the pile where the others were. I wiped mine on the clean part of my calf, closed it, and followed the tracks back home. It was dark by then, but the rails shined in the moonlight, so it wasn’t bad.
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Fiction:
Nannycam by Karley Bayer
Bells clanging, lights flashing, and the delighted squeal of a five-year-old girl, caught Jeremy’s attention. He had been on his way to the Big Top tent, but he paused to watch as the girl in pigtails pointed to the display of stuffed toys. Someone had won her a prize; Jeremy held his breath. He exhaled when she chose a pink and white giraffe, and continued on his mission. “No big winner tonight?” Stefanie asked, as he strode through the backstage area. She was dressed in her tight red, black and gold lion tamer outfit, short cropped black jacket and saucy hat included. Her whip curled at her hip wasn’t just for show. The girl could use it. Men begged her to use it on them in dark, hidden corners of the carnival. She would do anything to please, for a price. Jeremy shook his head, and continued to watch the 25-year-old do her pre-show stretches. “Not yet.” Stefanie saw ‘The Smurf ’ watching her and smirked. “Can’t lock up when those knives are flying,” she explained. “Staying limber is important,” he agreed, suddenly in no rush to shut himself into his viewing booth. Stefanie was still with Warren, but everyone knew that her incubator was empty and she was coming to the end of her healing period. Jeremy found her increasingly appealing now that the shock of Clara leaving him had subsided. He felt like he could have stood there all night, admiring her lean limbs and graceful maneuvers, but then the house lights went down and the booming announcer called out her name. Much like a beloved stripper, Stefanie stepped into the spotlight oozing sexual delights for the taking, vaguely veiled by the idea that she was there to perform the typical, expected death-defying stunts, and nothing more. After all, sometimes there were children in the audience. Jeremy watched her act for a few minutes, but then sauntered off to his required job. He was part of the House of Freaks. At under five-feet-tall, Jeremy was billed as ‘The Smurf.’ Better than your average ‘World’s Smallest Man,’ he was also tattooed head to toe in blue ink. Mermaids cavorted in the waves on his back, blue jays flap their wings on his biceps, blue stars, long fragments of poetry… Jeremy had it all. People would take a look at him and forget all about the fact that he really wasn’t the World’s Smallest anything, just a tad short. The tattoos would either appall or intrigue. He took his position among Al, the so-called Bearded Lady (it was amazing what the right bra and makeup could do for an obese man), Ginger, their current fire spitter and an array of semi-talented twenty-somethings spending their summer traveling with the circus. Near the exit of the House of Freaks, the new fortune teller sat in her booth. Jeremy tended to avoid going in that direction. Fortune Tellers could not be trusted. It was going on two hours of sitting there, ‘amazing’ an anemic parade of patrons, when Warren came over to Jeremy’s booth and announced, “Winner, winner. Chicken dinner.” The mental fog that had been creeping into Jeremy’s consciousness instantly evaporated. “Really?” “Cam is on the move.” “Who is in the trailer?” Jeremy had already fallen into hurried step with Warren. “Stefanie.” “Of course. That girl has her fingers in everything.”
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“You wish.” Warren said, flatly. “She was the one who came up with the idea, though.” “But when she came to me, I thought it was going to be my project.” “Stefanie needs to stay occupied or she gets herself into trouble.” “I can’t imagine her getting into more trouble than she’s usually in.” The men were quickly approaching the silver streamline trailer Stefanie had recently bought with the money she earned selling her last two creations. She had not yet taken a paintbrush to it, but she had already told Warren about her plans, shown him her sketches of tigers in tutus, girls in monkey cages. “Girl makes the money. She calls the shots. And, it seems, she’s the one who oh-so-innocently suggested that our winner choose this particular prize.” “How’d she do that?” “She has her ways.” The men entered the trailer which served as the carnival’s office, and found Stefanie perched on the edge of her seat, high heels kicked off next to her chair. She smiled at the men, and then, pointed to the monitor in front of her. “They’re on the Scrambler,” she said, matter-of-factly. On the monitor was a first person view of what it was like to ride the spinning amusement. “They haven’t left yet,” Jeremy stated. “Nope. You’re just in time. In fact, I bet you have time to go get me a beer. I’m parched.” Stefanie began to unfasten the bobby pins that kept her top hat in place. Placing each pin in her mouth, as she pulled it from her hair. She slipped one pin onto the next, so when she removed them from between her lips they were a nice, neat bundle, ready for reuse later. Warren watched Jeremy watching Stefanie and decided, “I’ll get it.” Jeremy glanced at Warren in surprise. Warren did a little bow of servitude and backed out of the trailer. Stefanie pretended not to notice. “Here, sit,” she insisted, once Warren had shut the door. She stood up so Jeremy could take her place in front of the monitor. Jeremy noted that the spinning on the monitor had stopped. The ride was over, and the view changed to show two teenagers, seemingly in discussion with the camera. “Not a kid, then.” Simultaneously slipping both arms out of her black jacket, she caught it in one hand, and placed it on the back of Jeremy’s chair leaving him feeling like she had just performed a magic trick. “Boyfriend and girlfriend. I’m hoping she’s an only child.” “Why’s that?” “More likely to be spoiled, more likely to have better swag in her house. There seems to be this tendency among Americans living in the middle income bracket to spend a great percentage of their earnings on the whims of their only daughters. It‘s ridiculous how many of these girls will get their first car on their sixteenth birthday, or have their own master suites in the house.” Stefanie opened a closet in the corner of the trailer and pulled out a red satin kimono. She slipped it on over her corset, tied it closed. “Aren’t you an only child?” Jeremy tried not to seem too obvious as he watched her reach under the bottom of the kimono and unfasten the clothes underneath. The hem of the robe barely came to the top
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of her knees. When she moved just right, her buttocks peeked out as she took off her leotard. “My three rings were never made of real gold. I’m far from middle class.” She peeled her thigh-high stocking from one leg, balled it up and threw it into the open closet. Then the other. On the monitor, Warren flashed by, flipping them the bird. Stefanie smiled to herself, and loosened the ties on the front of her corset. It slid down her body, she stepped out of it, picked it up and tossed it, too, into the cabinet. She pushed the cabinet closed with the palm of her hand, took four steps, straddled Jeremy on the seat. “Okay, now,” she breathed against his neck, her fingers already at work on the fly of his pants. “Let’s make this quick.” “What about Warren?” Her robe was open, leaving next to nothing to his imagination. Not anymore. “What about this?” she slid her fingers into his pants and gripped him. Jeremy made no words, only sounds. “That’s what I thought.” The girl was crazy, Jeremy thought. Oh, the girl was magic. Stefanie was calmly seated at the office desk, working on paperwork, keeping one eye on the monitor, the other on Jeremy, when Warren stepped back into the office. She raised her eyebrows. He placed two plastic bags on the desk in front of her, and without a word, began unpacking several bottles of whiskey and cartons of Chinese food. “No beer?” Stefanie asked. “You didn’t want beer,” Warren answered with absolute certainty. “Saw you on the monitor.” “Before or after?” Jeremy’s head bobbed up suspiciously, as he focused all his energy on watching as the couple with the nanny cam got into their car. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Stefanie said, as she opened a desk drawer and withdrew a stack of disposable plastic cups. “Take notes!” she hissed at Jeremy. “We need to know how to get to her house later tonight.” Warren poured three triple shots of whiskey into the cups. “He probably can’t handle this.” “Probably not. Give it to him anyway.” Warren slapped the cup of whiskey for Jeremy on the desk next to the monitor, but directed his comment to Stefanie. “No good?” Stefanie was shoveling noodles into her mouth and pretended that she couldn’t answer. Slut, Warren mouthed at her. She grinned innocently. Then the grin melted from her face as she began to silently, slowly draw her chopsticks in and out of her mouth. In and out. Warren watched her with growing interest. Her gaze slipped down to the front of his pants, back to his eyes, and she knew he was done throwing his little hissy fit. Warren joined her in her dinner, but neither of them offered Jeremy any food until he presented them with directions and the address to the teenaged girl’s house. “You were right,” Jeremy said. “Her own suite.” “You went to see the Gypsy,” Warren accused her. “The gypsy came to me. The girl had her fortune told. The gypsy told her she would be lucky in love, told me that the girl had on quality jewelry, plenty of money in her wallet, designer bag. I followed her.”
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“That’s where you were after your set. Gypsy couldn‘t get the address?” “Nah, girl never pulled out any of her credit cards.” “Got it now,” Jeremy said, pointing to the pad of paper covered in his notes. “Who’s going?” Warren asked. “Jeremy, obviously. It’s his project.” She said ‘his project’ as if she had heard the whiny tone of Jeremy’s voice when he had been talking to Warren outside of the trailer. “What the fuck does Jeremy know about B&E?” “If this is his project, it‘s time for him to learn.” She turned her attention to Jeremy. “You good with that? Or you want me to come?” “I’m good,” Jeremy insisted, not wanting to fail her. “Warren will show you how it’s done. Wear gloves and a mask,” she instructed. She turned to Warren and said, “You know I‘ll be watching.” Warren leaned over the desk, slipped his hand inside her kimono, and answered, “You always are, my love.” She kissed Warren as Jeremy squirmed in his own blue skin. The men left to go retrieve a stuffed bear nanny cam and whatever else looked like it would please their Mistress.
Persephone, Past Curfew
photography Bryan Benoit (www.bryanbenoit.com) makeup, hair, styling Taryll Atkins model Raylane @ MC2 Miami
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Poetry:
Helen and the Suitor a duet “Letters From Helen” by Marsha Singh “The Suitor” by J.P. Christiansen Letters From Helen. i Heroes by the hundreds gathered, murmuring my name hungrily. I resented them— mercenaries. I could not walk by the river without feeling hunted. You won. Did that really make you proud? ii The night he came for me, lightning dragged bright fingers through the river, my river. I wept, and walked to meet him. You will say that he stole me. He didn’t. I left. Some divine wife I am. iii You and your thousand ships. How long must I be grateful? As though my gratitude has perspective. No. It is desperate, and offered desperately. I hid his sword. I hate myself. iv Be as angry as you’d like, Menelaus. You and I both know you’ll forgive me the moment my robe falls from my shoulders.
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The Suitor. I killed in the thousands, for you... now I want to kill my self, in you so let me take you gently at first.
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Fiction:
Specter of the Repressed by Andrew Olson
He enters the locker room; the girls are sitting on benches, hair pulled back, breath shortened, skin glistening. Some sit with arms raised above their heads, trying to breathe deeply, their sport bras and smooth curvatures exposed. Mr. Rozner looks at the group then throws his clipboard into the concrete wall next to him. “What in the hell are we doing out there? Because we’re not playing basketball!” A small figure approaches his shoe. The figure tugs on Mr. Rozner’s dangling shoelace. Freud himself, complete with mountain gear, grabs the shoelace in both his hands and mounts Mr. Rozner’s shoe. “What’s happening on offense, girls? We have to get past that midcourt trap. Don’t let them funnel you to the sideline. Someone get me a whiteboard!” Freud removes a modified ice ax and attaches a spike to his own shoe. Looking up Mr. Rozner’s slacks, Freud begins his slow ascent. When he reaches Mr. Rozner’s shin, the slacks tighten as Mr. Rozner kneels down on the other leg. Freud reaches the kneecap, scrambles up, and takes a quick look at Mr. Rozner, who is sweating in his genuflection. Freud quickly scampers across the solid landscape of the quadriceps. Stabbing at the whiteboard with the marker, Mr. Rozner points to the players, coordinating their existence to the small black dots on the board. “Set a pick to free a guard, then set a pick for the inbounder. If they switch off, set a back door pick and throw a lob downcourt. Stay in your lanes and stay disciplined. Once we get across midcourt set up the offense. We’re going to run motion the entire second half.” Freud comes to Mr. Rozner’s arm, the hand resting against the upper part of his thigh. He climbs it and holds on as the wrist suddenly swoops and dives, then returns to rest. Army crawling to the crutch of the inner elbow, Freud takes out a grappling hook with one hand while clutching Mr. Rozner’s shirt in the other. He begins to furiously spin the hook as he stands, and with a grunt, releases it. The hook soars through the air; the thin rope, no more than a thread, catches the top of Mr. Rozner’s half-Windsor. Mr. Rozner begins to lower his arm and Freud jumps, swinging across Mr. Rozner’s body, just reaching his breast pocket. He hangs there momentarily, feet dangling precipitously below him, before pulling himself up. “I want eight passes, ladies, before a shot, and on every single possession, unless it’s a wide open lay-up from the post. I don’t care if Moses parts the lane for you, or if you have a wide-open jumper. Eight passes. If someone shoots before that, I’m going to pull you. We need lots of ball movement and crisp passes, but nothing cross-court; make ‘em work on defense.” Straddling Mr. Rozner’s pocket, Freud takes his ice axe out again and climbs the sheer slope to Mr. Rozner’s shoulder. Once there, Freud wipes his brow, checks his pocket watch, and nods contentedly. He walks to the wall of skin where the neck stubble provides support and Freud free climbs his way to Mr. Rozner’s ear and throws a leg over the lobe. “All right, what in the world is happening on defense? First, take time off on offense, not defense. I want to see everyone get after it. If we want to get back into this game, we’re going to have to pressure them; we’re going full court press. Man-to-man after every bucket. We score and you find your person and stick to them like glue. And let’s keep our hands up, cut off those passing lanes.” Having reached the summit, Freud sits in Mr. Rozner’s ear, his heels gently beating against the earlobe.
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After a short breather, Freud stands and re-harnesses his backpack. He steps into the ear canal, and burrows into the tunnel on hands and knees. Entering the main chamber of the skull, Freud locates a tumescent organ at the back of Mr. Rozner’s skull and sprints toward it. Hopping onto the rigid organ like a soldier manning a gun turret, he points it at the labyrinthine brain matter. Freud secures goggles over his eyes, holds his breath, and pulls a lever next to him. He is propelled off the organ and bores through the back of Mr. Rozner’s brain. As his feet disappear, waves of electric synapses fire out from the seismic center. “And what’s happening in the half-court ladies? You’re getting creamed by double penetration…” Freud bursts forth between the frontal lobes, and like a predatory bird, encloses his arms and barrels downward toward the faint light from the nasal cavity. Crashing through dense nose hairs, Freud emerges from Mr. Rozner’s nose into a silent room. He releases his parachute as the girls, hair pulled back, skin glistening, sit with open mouths and look at Mr. Rozner with astonished, doe-like eyes. As they look at one another in silence, and Mr. Rozner mumbles, Freud lilts gently to the floor, smiling.
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Artist profile:
SP2: New Born (Viper A), 2007. Mixed media. 67 x 28 x 18 cm. Photo: Kioku Keizo. Courtesy of YAMAMOTO GENDAI.
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Motohiko Odani
Motohiko Odani is an internationally exhibited artist from Japan who uses a wide variety of techniques to express his vision. You can see more of his work at www.phantom-limb.com. LAdM: How important are our physical bodies to the experience of being human? Odani: This may sound ordinary, but I think what’s important is to experience through the body as a whole. As the amount of two-dimensional information around us increases, I think cutaneous perception becomes less requisite to us. But tactile perception still plays an important role in the process of human growth, since nobody grows up without going through Freud’s oral stage as the unknown contact between the body and the external. These experiences will eventually develop into human (sub)consciousness. At the same time, the
increasing number of people who are after meditative experiences, including a sort of trance, probably reflects people’s desire to reach the unknown contact of their isolated sprit and the external, away from collective intelligence like the internet. I think this indicates that people are constantly trying to find where their body is currently situated, and seeking a way to grasp the world. You have said that our minds are gradually being drawn to the computer. How do you feel about out need and use of machines and computers today? Do we rely on them too heavily, allowing them to “think for us” in a sense, or can they be seen as extensions of us, to perform things we couldn’t accomplish alone? In my opinion, computers are extension of human brain rather than the body. You will be able to calculate on your own brain, only when you
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learn to use a sort of software that you have installed in yourself through your own experience. Whatever computer you use, you can instantly simulate once you have the software. Compared to that, it would be far more difficult to smoothly extend our body, that is, muscle, bone and skin, with a computer. These are substances whose limit of possible extension is far lower than that of the brain. I believe the relationship between the spiritual nature and the physical nature of human beings has entered an entirely different phase. Your artistic career has spanned everything from photography to sculpture to video. Please tell us more about your multi-media approach to your work. It’s the result of my pursuit for the optimum approach for each concept, and also the trace of my investigation in the notion of Sculpture. This may be narrowed down or turn into a new methodology in the future.
My aim is to capture a sensory phenomenon called “phantom limb” from multiple perspectives. I actually think that this concept of physical uncertainty is not only associated with the link between the body and the brain, but may also become a key to grasp the current state of Japanese nation. What or who inspires you? It’s always thrilling to personally analyze “mysteries” of ancient Japanese shrines and temples. You cannot understand these places only by a brief visit. Also I am currently staying in New York City, and surprised to realize that an environment influences the way of thinking this much. What are you working on currently? I am planning things out now, and will start to actually work on the new projects at the beginning of next year.
What is your approach to an exhibition? Do you have a specific theme from the beginning before you start creating, or do you simply begin creating art and base a theme off of that?
“I believe the relationship between the spiritual nature and the physical nature of human beings has entered an entirely different phase.”
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New Born “Halo” (hhs), 2011. Cast aluminum, stainless iron. 264 x 264 x 135.4 cm. IINO KAIUN KAISHA, LTD. Photo: Ogawa Taisuke. Courtesy of YAMAMOTO GENDAI.
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Both pages: “Odani Motohiko: Phantom Limb” Installation view: Mori Art Museum, 2010 Photo: Kioku Keizo. Photo Courtesy: Mori Art Museum. Courtesy of YAMAMOTO GENDAI.
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Phantom-Limb, 1997 C-print 148 x 111 cm (Each, Set of 5) Photo: Kioku Keizo Photo Courtesy: Mori Art Museum Courtesy of YAMAMOTO GENDAI
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Dying Slave: Stella, 2009-10 Steel, paraffin, wax Approx. 500 x 180 x 220 cm Photo: Kioku Keizo Photo Courtesy: Mori Art Museum Courtesy of YAMAMOTO GENDAI
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Double Edged of Thought (Dress 02), 1997 Human hair, c-print 166 x 70 x 3 cm, 23.5×18.5 cm (photo) Photo: KUNIMORI Masakazu Courtesy of YAMAMOTO GENDAI
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Human Lesson (Dress 01), 1996 Fur of wolf, et al. 166.5 x 78 x 30 cm Photo: KUNIMORI Masakazu Courtesy of YAMAMOTO GENDAI
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Fingerspanner, 1998 Wood, string, iron, c-print Dimensions variable Photo: Kioku Keizo Photo Courtesy: Mori Art Museum Courtesy of YAMAMOTO GENDAI
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Fingerspanner, 1998 Wood, string, iron, c-print 56.5 x 26 cm (photo: each, diptych) Photo: Kioku Keizo Photo Courtesy: Mori Art Museum Courtesy of YAMAMOTO GENDAI
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Ruffle (Dress 04), 2009-10 Laser print 53.3 x 78 cm (Photo) Courtesy of YAMAMOTO GENDAI
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Ruffle (Dress 04), 2009-10 Wood, laser print 63 × Φ360 cm, 53.3×78 cm (Photo) Photo: Kioku Keizo Photo Courtesy: Mori Art Museum Courtesy of YAMAMOTO GENDAI
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Hollow: Pianist/Rondo, 2009 FRP, urethane paint, mixed media Approx. 154.5 x 496 x 62 cm Work created with the support of Fondation d’entreprise Hermes Photo: Kioku Keizo Courtesy of YAMAMOTO GENDAI
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Fiction:
Mile 127 by Joseph Lambach
So, they’re all just sitting there. Looking into the camera. She – Lisa – has that smile I know so well. But that’s only because we have history. Not to be too pragmatic, or over-zealous, or somehow say that there was real-life no-shit chemistry, because there wasn’t. To say that wouldn’t be the truth. But that’s kind of a lie too. Because boys and girls, men and women, we all can’t be just friends. Those relationships just can’t be platonic. But that’s just one of those points I think I need to point out. Just because. You know, it sort of defines who I am. To a certain extent. But, that’s irrelevant I guess. Sort of. But it’s her, just sitting there, all smiles and teeth, and that one molar that came through to early. The one that feels like a pointed triangle. Because I was in the theater with her, watching some movie that was really just some excuse to hang out with her. Sitting there, scared, reaching over to casually play with her fingers, and then I can’t stop myself. Leaning over, pulling her in, kissing her. Either way though, that’s just all the past. Part of being sixteen, and just not being able to stop your hormones. But the thing is, it all started out innocent. The whole boy meets girl type thing. And it was so real. The kind of real where you’re driving down the road, and then there’s a premonition. The kind that is just screaming in your ear, in your head, just trying so hard to get your attention. But you just keep flushing the mental toilet, so to speak, and try to swat it away. Mentally. But it’s there, and your palms are sweating. You know, just so sticky and slippery and wet, and the steering wheel is actually starting to slip with each little over-corrective jerk you make. The kind that’s supposed to fix that close call between your passenger side wheels and that curb you swore wasn’t there. But maybe it had been, but it was just you, inside your head, thinking about this and that. Because after driving for twelve, maybe thirteen years, you’re doing just that. Getting lost every time you go somewhere. Not in the literal sense of you don’t know where you are. But you’re so lost inside your head. That whole interstate thing, where the green marker for Mile 87 is just all of the sudden Mile 127 and you’re just beginning to get your focus back. Where it’s all not-so-hazy this time, because you’re blinking away your thoughts, trying to get back to driving and not plowing into whatever’s out there. So, you glance over to check the mile marker, get inside your own head for a little while, and BAM!, there it is: Mile 127. And you’re kind of screaming what the hell to yourself. So, you see, it’s this whole epic love story that I just decided might be a good idea to play up in my head. Not because it was necessary, but because it just happened to be here. There. That day. In that spot, just sitting there, cute, making that smile from somewhere between way-back and God-knows-when.
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This whole love story that Mom, or anyone else really, would have told me to not play up so much. Don’t start just imagining everything—making this whole great life out of nothing. Because that’s what she would have told me if I had mentioned Lisa, and how much I really was in love with her. Because being sixteen means you have to fall in love with her, with that girl, because it’s just how it works at that age. Not that hindsight is always twenty-twenty, because sometimes, even after the fact, you still think you were right. But growing up, graduating high school, maybe even making it through one, two, four semesters at community college, it all ends right before it even starts. When you’re from northern Mississippi and the droughts have been licking the tail end of your dad’s farm a couple years in a row. Started burning everything up, but not completely. Then, that is when it has to end. When the high-school-sweet-heart-love-story has to end. And life has to kind of kick you in the face. So, before it all ends and she just drifts away, you just fall in love, romanticize the next eighteen months or so in your head, and it all seems so worth it. Thinking, I’m marrying Lisa, and we’ll sit around that same breakfast table, but with Mom and Dad there too. But, just in my head, making it so fucking textbook. Mile markers are just flying by now and I might be at Mile 98. The black Maverick, with all its broken gauges, gulping miles of gas every couple of minutes. She’s just chewing her bottom lip, half of it, and then it’s her little dimple peeking out. Smiling at me, like she knew I really was there the whole time. It’s just that she couldn’t let me know, it would have been out of character. You know, because that would be beneath her. To admit she’d notice everything she’d sworn off. Like it was possible to actually get away with that. Like it had ever been something she thought she could get away with. Not that it was even an ego thing, or how much I thought of myself, or stood in front of every mirror I passed, and just stared at myself from every angle allowable. It was just I knew. Simply that. But things are never simple. So I’m walking up to her. Wallet pulled out and all kinds of open, rummaging through those extra pockets, so I could make it into a race of who looks up last. Who happens—and maybe it would be better to just throw up those revolver quick-draw little finger quotes, but I’m better than that, come on, man—but it’s that race to see who just happens to look up last. If I can get her, if I can just get Lisa to look up right before I do, then it’s obvious she has to do something, say something, make some sort of gesture in recognition. Those are just the rules. The unwritten, unsaid rules of boy meets girl, but I’m her friend mostly, most of the time, really. But I’m just so sexually charged, hormones just always there. No way around it. And it’s Lisa too, obviously so sexual, and so, just there, I guess. Available, by default really, because she, in not these words exactly, said let’s be friends. Just to be that boy, that guy, she’s calling in the afternoon after school, to talk for a couple hours. Talk, as
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in her doing it, me listening, agreeing, doing that thing where I tune her out but strategically place those uh-huhs and okays in there. Lisa, God, just so sexual though. Always riding up on my leg, hugging me close enough, her cleavage just so right there, feeling my heart pounding out line after line. “Is there a condition?” she says. “Not really.” “It’s just, I can feel my head practically bouncing off your chest.” I can smell it, that sweet fruit and pomegranate smell of shampoo. Some sort of honey conditioner too. “I don’t know.” “…” “Maybe I just have an extra pint stored away somewhere. So my heart has to compensate,” I say. I feel stupid. So conspicuous, because she’s noticing what I always tried to convince myself only I could see. This undocumented heart condition I knew I had to have. Not that I needed a doctor to tell me. But I’d always been told you needed to make that boy scout’s honor sign with you fingers, find the pulse on the neck, at the wrist, and feel for the heartbeat. Not just hold my breath, then see the thump that shouldn’t have been visible. Me. It was the Richter Scale going off every time I laid down in bed. She held on, burrowed her head, somehow, even farther into my chest. Into that weird spot where my chest sort of caves in. That football injury from way back in elementary school. It was this whole church thing. Small church, and this potluck and the pastor, who decided to bring all these kids over for a church get together. Doing the whole be-a-good-neighbor, help those who need it thing. Because it’s what a Baptist preacher does. You know, just does those kind of things. But all these kids, funded through the Lions Club, somehow, all orphans and parentless, and this Southern Baptist preacher brings them out. Maybe thirty of them. Piled into some County bus he’d been able to get for free since he knew this or that bus driver. Maybe it had been the Mayor’s call. He’s running around telling them, no, you can’t smoke here, not at the potluck. Why? Because it’s church property, and that’s just not how we do it, you see. Just wait, please, till you’re back at the house. And you can light up, just not here. It wasn’t even marijuana, just good old fashioned Camels maybe, or Marlboros, but either way, just tobacco. So it’s these kids, half of them twice my height, and because it’s the South, we just play football. Not two hand touch. We play real tackle, the kind where you’re just hoping that last one doesn’t end up in more than a bruised elbow. That’s just how it’s done, how the game’s just supposed to be played. And no ones forcing you either. You just sort of man up, act like you’re not scarred. You get out there and try and get at least one hand on that football every so often. Even though it’s church, it’s still northern Mississippi and it’s football, and all the dads are watching. Talking trash to each other—quietly, so the pastor doesn’t here the occasional unchurch like words slip out, dancing off all the dad’s lips—because it’s Jimmy and Chad and Junior and Bo and all these other kids that are just so grown up. Definitely bigger than me, by far. But everyone’s watching, and I’m playing Safety, trying to just scan the field, the forty kids out here playing (well over regulation limit) and this kid gets the ball, a lateral to the left after a fake to the right.
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He’s running. Straight down the middle, through that hole that shouldn’t have opened up in the first place. And he’s just barreling through, all twenty, forty, sixty pounds more of him than me, but his weight is where it should be, proportioned out. A fucking ox more like it. Just watching, scanning, hoping he’s not going to break through that hole or that tackle, but he has to, because I’m standing back there, pretending I don’t give a shit, that I’m not scarred. Then it’s his right shoulder, the one holding the ball, lowered down, going straight for my chest. Trying to push a hole straight through it. So professional, so smooth. This kid doesn’t have any parents and has to prove himself to the world. Maybe he was one of those Ronald McDonald House kids, a sponsored kid. Either way, he has to be something great so the other kids aren’t wiping his ass all over the playground, shoving him into a locker, because Mom and Dad never showed up for anything. So he’s practiced, way more than me, way more than the occasional throw and catch, sprint, cut right, then just wait for the ball to Scotty-beam-me-up into your hands. You know, the way kids just practice routes because they look good and sharp and there’s that ninety degree angle they all make. But it’s all so occasional and under-practiced. Me, I’m so not ready for this moment. But this Oxen Kid is, he’s ready, he’s coming, non-stop. And I can see it, see that look he’s got, like he doesn’t really see me there at all because the makeshift end zone is just right there, right past where my feet are planted. I grab him. I try to grab him. And my chest sinks in. Sort of near my heart. But a little to the left of it. Flying backwards, his momentum way greater than the half-assed stance I thought would maybe make some sort of a difference. Just like the movies, it’s all so slow-motion and Hollywood for those few seconds. It’s surreal, and I’m waiting for the ground to come up and slap me on the back. Tell me, “Good game kid, you really tried out there today.” And when it does, that’s my breath, somehow gushing out in one fell swoop, like it did every time I slipped off those monkey bars when I was five, or six years old. Just poof, right out of my lungs and mouth. It’s just me, laying there, trying to suck air. But so impossible. And my chest is burning, feeling so sunken in, because that parentless kid just gave it his all, and ran through me. Laying there, choking on nothing, choking on not having any air, I finally suck in that breath, that gust of air, because my lungs are done playing games and are ready to work. Lisa’s head is just there, pressed into this cavity, this not-so glorious football injury that proved to me I just wasn’t cut from whatever it was that all these other kids were. But I was one hell of a friend. For her. God, her hair smells so good, so eucalptus, so smooth, so silky, so fuckable. And her tits, smothered into me, and her playing that game she knows she is playing but just would never say it out loud. Because then it wouldn’t be a game, but just what is really there anyways, just said aloud, finally. And even when I masturbated. It wasn’t always Lisa, but it was her a lot. She was just there, popping into my head, into my thoughts. While I’m trying to get off, for the second or third time that day. It’s Lisa, that angle she’d been standing at, standing there, in some doorway, or against some wall. And I couldn’t help myself. What a friend.
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Christ. More mile markers, just wooshing by. And I might be passing Mile 103. But it was the year me and my friends were all Man In Black, sometimes changing Chris or Tom to Sue. Either way, we’d just discovered the real Johnny Cash, and I had Lisa there too, kind of that fall-back-on plan. In case all my not-so-careful planning didn’t work out, the way it never did anyways. So there’s that phone with the overly long twisted phone cord that loopty-loops over itself when you cradle it back into the receiver. Senior year, high school that is, where the majority of the population, already, they’re just going to end up at the community college, make it through one, maybe two semesters, and go back to smoking pot and delivering pizza. And working at Auto Zone and Pep Boys, and hunt duck and deer and rabbit. Just pull those tractors and bail up cotton or work those sunflower farms that cover half of those little towns, go way out of the county and just keep going, disappearing, taking us all with them. Because they have to. Because it’s northern Mississippi, and it’s farming and hunting. And football. Prom, yeah, it’s homecoming. And there’s Ms. This and Ms. That and Heath took Amy—because she’s pregnant again, and maybe her mom found out and made her keep this one. It’s all that just combined into one, wrapped up into this whole big shebang with all those coaches and chaperones there. Trying to not hand out condoms because the Pastor said it wasn’t right, it was abstinence—“Aren’t you at the service every week, John?” “Well, yeah, but it was just a thought,” Coach Gibson said. Raised his voice at the end, made it sound more like a question. And I might be at Mile 113. And my date, not Lisa, but some girl named Sarah. She’d said yes because I sat next to her for two or three periods every day. And I wasn’t threatening. She’d noticed how I looked at her—Lisa—mentioned something about if I strained enough I might pop a couple blood vessels. I’m tux’ed out, sitting there, trying to engage Sarah in something about maybe making State this year, but probably not, because, well, you know, there’s just too many damn farms and dads that can’t decide what’s more important. And then she’s sliding something to me, under the table, metallic and smooth. “Don’t pull it up, just look down,” she says. “What is it?” “Just put your cup under the table, mix it.” “But, what is it?” “Shine, from Mamaw’s. Had to water down eight jars just to even it all out.” “Okay.” So, it’s Senior Prom and I’m finally drunk the way every Senior before me had said prom was, back in the day. Back when they just didn’t give a shit, when football mattered a little more than it does now. Sarah, she’s pulling me out of my seat, whispering let’s go for a ride and forget Lisa for right now. I’m saying okay and kind of swaying to one side, then the other. Watching Coach Gibson watch me, because he knows I’m drunk and shouldn’t be, but it’s no use anyways, to say anything. Because there’s no future for us besides tonight. Because it’s all high school football and Mississippi and we won’t be able to leave. Because this part of the country doesn’t let you go till it’s ready to. But I don’t remember anything after nodding to Coach, mouthing to him it’s all good, and jumping in Sarah’s dad’s Maverick and gunning it out of the parking lot.
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And I’m at Mile 127. That whole road time-travel thing. Drunk. The only reason I know about Lisa’s mom ending up thirty five feet in front of her car covered in what looks like bird-shot shell full of glass is because the Southern Baptist preacher came to my hospital room and told me. Patted me on the arm, really on the cast, treating it like maybe I could still feel something through all the drips and whatever the nurses and doctors got me to take. Sarah was somewhere else, the preacher said, and he had to see her next. Hopefully the broken nose, what they had mentioned before he got here, maybe that was the worst of it. But he said either way, we’ll say some prayers for you. And her. And that poor lady you hit. Then Mile 128 is still one mile away, green and reflective. Shimmering off to the side, maybe not even noticeable to anyone but me. Because I’ve driven past 127 enough, enough times to remember where it was Lisa’s mom had been laid out on the road. And maybe those black streaks were her tires trying to screech themselves around the Maverick. Around me in the front seat. Then it ended up being five years later. Watching Lisa across the football field. Knocked up again, her first one sitting next to her, ball cap turned backwards, and his daddy’s way-too-big Letterman’s jacket bunched up all over the place. And Lisa’s dad, sitting there next to little Scott, his arm around his shoulders, tossing his hair around. And I’m across the field—visitor’s side—hunting jacket, torn up Bass Pro Shop trucker hat, arms crossed and inconspicuous. Trying to stay leaned up against the bleachers, and just watch. Because it’s football season again and Mississippi won’t let me leave, knowing I need to still watch Lisa smile, even with her mom not there anymore. Even if there’s no wave across the supermarket when we both somehow end up there, just her glancing up, looking for a second then pretending I’m gone too— like I should have been that night. Friday night football and Lisa’s friend is there, clicking some old Polaroid camera, spitting out pictures, and they’re sitting there, with that smile that I know so well. But that’s only because we had a history before Mile 127.
Heat: An Ode to the Thermostat photography Sam Beasley styling Megan Lynn Lewis makeup and hair Michele Clark model Kyla Estrada
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catsuit and panties Baci
shirt Gap boots Pink des L’Allure & Pepper Mots || Fall, 2012 || Issue No. 8
bodysuit Baci
bra Baci shorts Tinseltown
sweater Tresics panties Josie Natori
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shirt Whetherley
Video:
Hamlet (Act V, Scene VII) by William Shakespeare An audiovisual interpretation by the editors of L’Allure des Mots
2 mins. 40 secs. Press play button to view video
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Poetry:
Petite Mort by D.L. Pesavento
Tigress-striped by venetian-blind butter moonlight Your lunar body eclipses mine, corona solar-flaring; Little-death star, XXX-supernova searing my closed Eyes’ crushed velvet night’s lightning-flashing sky All at once, purring-mist paws of fog Red-razor clawed on my delirium-murmuring lips. And from an absinthe lust-lagoon jade gyzym dream An emerald-sea fading vision of ivory-eyed Ulysses Chest-strapped to a tempest-swept mast, enraptured by Siren-sultry mellifluous singing, surf-foam whispered From she-brine scented honey coves, beckoning me Symphysis-shipwrecked on crème-de-menthe veneris shoals Cobalt blue desire-drowned and sex-suspended in Your juicy kiwi green femme-fatale fallopian depths.
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Bruises by Ramona Evans
I want to feel your teeth sink into the bare canvas of my skin kiss me black and blue leave me blushing with scars of your hands still on my hips my ocean hair pulled against your body, in waves words still carved on my lips your lips of how much I wish I loved you. Your taste of coffee and cigarettes still curled on your tongue let me curl my tongue around them both like your bed sheets curl around my thighs
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Fiction:
my angel rocks back and forth (ex-voto) by Giacomo Lee
‘The beaming globe and the clock face walk hand-in-hand on a summer stroll...’ ~ My apparatus slowly pumps away. My eyes flicker beneath my lids through catalogues of dreams never to be found or repeated. I’m all tucked in, well looked after. I’m all blue in crisp pajamas and my sheets are green and crease-free because I’m a stone at the bottom of a riverbed. Twinkle twinkle little star. I pivot in my dreams as if I can hear what the doctor tells my wife in the room, what he’ll tell me when I finally skip from the hard road to this soft bed, awake again. ~ My hand slowly paints over my sketch. ~ A madman with a knife towers over his wife and child! A gentleman bleeds from the head thanks to a fallen flower pot! In each picture the Madonna shines in the corner and I breathe a sigh of relief for the family. The wife and child were saved, and the gentleman didn’t bleed to death in the street. Living to tell the tale, they painted these offerings back in the 1800s in thanks to Our Lady who watched over them in their darkest hours. I’m carrying Tommy as Claire carries me along through the gallery after another physio session. Tommy’s a snoozing bundle in my arms, and I smile down at him, finally realising I have a lot to give thanks for, no matter my state. I’m awake again. ‘This is amazing...’ Claire muses in front of me at one of those paintings of a Black Madonna. ~ I still haven’t decided the colour of my Mary. ~ I began by sketching the people in the road outside the station. I sketched the pelican lollipops and zebra stripes. The policeman in the UV jacket on his bike. The blinking blood red ambulance. I was the last thing I placed in this composition. Tommy still couldn’t walk, but he could say my name, crawling on the carpet towards me as I tried to raise him onto his feet by clap, clap, clapping in the air, shaking a maraca. I tried to imagine a surge in my own legs. They needed more time, my therapists said. ~ I remember listening to the circling, twinkling harps of my angel rocks back and forth as the escalators carried me to the light and mouth at the top. A million screens flickered around me with the same synchronised image of a comedian in a fat suit and drag, nothing quite so grotesque. We’re kept slow as the world bustles around overground.
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I have a lot to give thanks for - my bloodied body hanging onto the threads of life was actually like a peaceful rock slumbering at the bottom of a riverbed. ~ I’m safely submerged again, open my eyes in the cool blue. Holding onto railings, I walk out of the water, watched by physiotherapists with clipboards. Claire and Tommy are waiting for me in the clean white examination room. I’m showing signs of improvement they say. ~ I finish Her image. Outside the door, Tommy crawls the carpet towards Claire, who’s shaking a maraca. ~ Claire carries him from the examination table into his chair, his hair still damp. That James used to be dead to the world terrifies her, a whole era of time gone after falling through a trap door. There she would miss the next part of this rotating world’s hand-in-hand walk with time, leaving her behind in the park. ‘And the dish ran away with the spoon’ she reads to Tom in his cot, before turning on the circling chimes of the baby mobile that hangs above him. ‘Twinkle twinkle little star...’ ~ Claire holds up the red yellow maraca. Behind her is my framed ex-voto. Tommy gurgles and begins crawling on the carpet in between us. I begin clapping for encouragement and then we start all over again, and again. Tommy lets the pacifier go from his mouth and with a bending of physics he’s up on his feet, into Claire’s arms. The bee has flown, and Claire sets him back onto the ground to see if he can do the same into my arms, clapping in the air. Tommy accepts the challenge, blonde curls in a sway, his arms wide open, and I lean forward and pace to meet him halfway, taking him up and away in my arms, Claire screaming in ecstasy. Her image beams at us from the corner of my painting as I pirouette, a love all around us.
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Fiction:
Tree Hugger by Bobby Fox
Andy Jacobs never quite got over it. And today was going to prove that more than anything. Even though he got over much worse treatment by his former classmates, being tied to a tree for several hours at the age of 9 was something he was never able to completely shake. Although there were much worse things done to him both prior to and following this incident, in hindsight, this was the one that did the most to drag him over the edge – an edge that he had been walking on. Twenty years later, at the age of 29 and with nothing left to lose, the time had come to stop walking on the edge. It was time to finally walk off it. Shortly after midnight, on a crisp fall evening, Andy Jacobs approached the two story colonial in the cookie-cutter subdivision aptly named Pheasant Meadows. He parked in the driveway and headed up an obscenely long sidewalk littered with brittle, dead leaves until he reached the door. He then grabbed the brass knocker with the lion face and gave it three solid knocks, which echoed into the chilly night. Moments later, footsteps were heard descending the stairs. The porch light turned on and the door opened. And there he was: David Sampson. The person single-handedly responsible for everything that led to this most unfortunate moment for him. David did not recognize his midnight visitor. He stood there with half-asleep three-quarter confusion mixed with a one-quarter dose of fear. “Hello, David,” Andy said. “May I help you?” David asked. “I think so.” They stood there in awkward silence, as David tried to calculate the exact purpose of his midnight visitor. “Who are you?” “You know who I am.” “Are you trying to sell me something?” “Do salesmen come after midnight?” “Why are you here? On my porch? At this time of night?” Andy pulled a 9 mm. out of his pocket and aimed it at David Sampson’s face. “This is why.” David froze in panic. “Please don’t kill me.” “I’m not going to kill you.” “Then why are you pointing a gun in my face?” “Is there anybody else in your home?” “No. Just me,” David said. Andy did his homework. Following numerous nights of surveillance, he knew that David lived alone. But he just wanted to be make sure … just in case. “If you’re here to rob me, take what you want. I don’t want any trouble. Okay?” “I don’t want to rob you.” “Please. Just tell me what you want.”
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“I want you to keep your fucking mouth shut,” Andy demanded. “Now, see that car over there?” David nodded. “Now what I want you to do is walk towards it with the world’s happiest smile on your face, keeping in mind that I’m right behind you. And I swear to God if you even begin to open your mouth, I will blow your head off before you can finish closing your lips. Have I made myself clear?” David nodded in understanding. “The passenger door is unlocked,” Andy made clear. David obediently did as told and headed into the car. Andy hopped in and away they went. Andy raised the volume on his stereo, fittingly playing Mozart’s Requiem. He let the music soak in for awhile before he finally addressed his prey. “You know, it really pains me that you have no idea who I am – considering everything you’ve put me through.” David gave Andy another look, before recognition filled his face. “Andy? Andy Jacobs?!” “Bingo!” Andy gleefully proclaimed. “How’ve you been?” “You tell me.” David tried to think of a fitting response. But there was none. “Where exactly are we going?” David finally asked. Andy raised the volume on the stereo as he pulled into the entrance of park. He proceeded to park in a secluded area at the park’s edge. “See that path heading into the woods?” “Yes, of course. We used to play here all the time when we were kids.” “Well, now I want you to pretend it’s the fucking yellow brick road and follow it. I’ll be right behind you. And if you dare scream for help, I will kill you. Sound fair?” David nodded. “Now get going,” Andy demanded. “Slowly. And don’t turn around.” David got out of the car and started walking, taking refuge in the pleasant smell of autumn pouring out of the woods. Andy retrieved the following items from his trunk: metal wire, rope, duct tape, a can of kerosene and a box of long matches. Andy caught up to David, keeping a distance of about three feet until they arrive at a small clearing with a solitary, dead tree stands in the center. David stopped dead in his tracks. “Now what?” David asked, fearful of what was about to happen. Andy dropped his supplies to the ground, pulled out his gun and shot David square in the foot, causing him to collapse in agony. Andy grabbed the duct tape, quickly ran over to David, who was withering on the ground in pain. “Why did you shoot me?”
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“Shut the fuck up. I will shoot you your fucking nut sack if you scream or say another word without me first asking you a question.” David did as told, despite the excruciating pain. Andy grabbed the metal wire, crouched down next to David and proceeded to tie his hands behind his back. David didn’t even resist. It’s amazing what the threat of death can do to motivate someone. Andy then grabbed David by the ankles and pulled him toward the tree. When he had David lying under the tree, “Now stand up and lean against the tree.” “You just shot my fucking foot!” Andy aimed the gun at him, which motivated David to stand up, fighting through the worst pain of his life. He hopped on his one good foot, keeping his wounded foot up in the air as he leaned against the tree. “Please, don’t do this to me,” David pleaded. Andy ignored his plea and proceeded to tie both the rope and the wire around David and the tree, making sure it was good and tight – just as David and his cronies did to him 20 years before. They were next on the list. Andy made sure to leave about three feet of slack on the rope. “Please. I beg of you.” “You didn’t exactly listen to me when I was begging you, did you?” “Begging me for what?” David said with genuine confusion. “You don’t remember?” “Remember what?” “What you did to me in fourth grade?” “I was just a kid,” David said, grasping for a good excuse. “Do you really think that matters right now?” Andy said in reply. “This is a joke, isn’t? You didn’t mean to shoot my fucking foot, right?” Andy shot David’s other foot to prove he meant business. “Nope, my bad,” Andy said. “There were others, I mean, I wasn’t the only one there that day.” “You were the ringleader. You were always the ringleader.” “Please, I’m sorry! I was stupid. We were just kids. I was just trying to fit in.” “Bullshit,” Andy retorted. “At the time, it’s how I felt,” David tried to justify. “I could never do that type of thing now. What kind of person are you now?” “I’m exactly what you made me.” “We can work this out. Let me buy you a drink and we’ll talk. I’m nothing like that now.” Andy wasn’t going to let him persuade him to stop him from achieving what he had hoped and dreamed and fantasized about for almost 20 years. “Remember how you kept trying to light the rope on fire, but the rope wouldn’t light?” “I did that?” “Yes. You did. And your friends even tried to get you to stop, but you pushed them down and threatened even them. Your own fucking friends!” “I never would have hurt you.” “What if the rope caught fire? Would you have put it out?” “I’m sure I never would have let it get that far.”
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“You tried and you knew it! Allow me to let you in on a little secret.” Andy reached for the can of kerosene. “This might have helped,” Andy said, proceeding to douse not only the rope, but David’s entire body, including his bloody, mangled feet. Despite Andy’s threats, David was unable to hold back screams of agony. In fact, the pain was so immense, he would have preferred death. Andy grabbed a match and lit it. A gust of wind blew it out. He promptly reached for another one, cupped his hand around it and lit it. David looked at him with the fear of a trapped, wounded animal. “Please,” David pleaded a strained, painful whisper. “I was just a kid,” David added. “So was I,” Andy said in reply, before lighting the rope. David attempted to extinguish it with his mangled stump of a foot, but it was too late. Within seconds, he was engulfed in flames – no longer a man, but a screaming pillar of fire. Adding proverbial fuel to the fire, Andy shot both of David’s flaming kneecaps, then his shoulders, transforming David’s screams into yelps. When Andy couldn’t take the yelps anymore, he shot David in the head. Chunks of brain matter erupted above the flames. A brain volcano, Andy thought to himself and smiled. He then gathered his supplies, threw them into his trunk and drove away. By the next day, the forest was gone. A clearing stood in its place.
back when we didn’t need coats
photography Wolf189 (wolf189.tumblr.com) models Brittany Rael and Alexandria Finley @ Best Agency Chelsey De Leon @ Envy Models
L’Allure des Mots || Fall, 2012 || Issue No. 8
Alexandria wears: dress American Apparel shoes Jeffrey Campbell jewelry model’s own
Chelsea wears: flag Free People jeans Hudson bikini Victoria’s Secret shoes model’s own
Chelsea wears her own bikini
Brittany wears: romper Free People lace slip Free People necklace Forever 21
Brittany wears: bodysuit American Apparel boots Steve Madden chain Topshop
Brittany wears: tank Topshop bikini bottoms H&M
Alexandria wears: bodysuit American Apparel boots Diesel shorts model’s own
Alexandria wears: shirt American Apparel bodysuit American Apparel shoes model’s own
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Fiction:
CrabTown by Zane Coker
It was a speechless night. Indeed, the speech of the night was the moon, just above the horizon as a blur of haze, heat haze from the damp rains. Water was still trickling down the sloughs, captured in the gutters of the earth, giving off a thin, thermal steam; sooner spreading out onto the streets, there on the pavement into patchy puddles. The wake of the world, far reaching, seemed to continue over the dark expanse: as far as his eyes could see was the perceptual wisdom of the most crooked night imaginable. The stars were deep, rich, seemingly punched right out of sheer blackness. Down the road where haze meets haze were the glow from street lamps, or the ember from a window… whatever it were, wet with wet flowing over the damp streets as that of fallen fronds, sizzling. Each successive crackle conjured more than its share, sheering in sheen and so capable a whisper, just a drift here, but a purge of her lungs at which his tongue might take over— never would a soulless lull come about and spoil the serenity of their night! Here, alas, the road, a cobbled, slippery road, cut straight through this single synthesis of land, each side but that watery world where now could be seen the brilliance of the heavens, deep, rich, forever reflective. Near the end of the road were a pair of houses, further still, a wade of embers, frozen lights in the night, a mere muddle of inhabited hauntings. But his concern, foremost, were the pair of houses, the first one a smear of yellow, the second one a blotch of darkness, both confused — suddenly — by a sharp right. Already he was shifting down, the motor tugging, the metal buzzing, and the whole wide way, like a sheet of glass, sideways and sheening in light… *** The first house had its door open, a regular sort of door but with claws all over it, stuck at intervals along its termite tattered edges. Ajar, a long trench-like menace of yellow light poured out onto the still wet lawn, spreading across its entirety as that of a spear, ending further across the street as that of a gold, aerosol-like mist. Next to the door near an old lawn chair was a window, half open, no light to speak of, yet, when closer, as observation goes, flickering candle light—soft, fragrant, menace of the night lords, so dark the capture of these flickers such that the nest of darkness at once disturbed. She was lying on a steel table and so frozen was her flesh that when she moved the candle light moved with her. She was pure and naked, from the tip of her toes to the tip of her head, while her head, that sweet head with its sweeter hair, hung over the table’s edge, hinged there, as if into a heat-less fire; where when she moved came the crackles in her lungs, each breath but the lift of her chest and higher still the points of her nipples. On her forehead were beads of sweat nearing their final fall. To be sure, she ravished the steel abound; and to hear whispers from across the hall in the other room were to hear echoes, the same echoes now of which were inside his eardrums. “Oh, the cramps and the pains,” came a sweet voice from within the same room where the candle was, where now its flickers were abscessed in wax, where now its dying flame freckled about a fabulous flesh. He wanted to go look, just to see what all the fuss was about.
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Just then she came around the corner, out from within the other room, holding in her arms about four or so oranges. She came into being as that of a match-strike, too soon a winded blow from the mouth at which the flame goes out; now but a puff, wavering there in the still air. “Let me help,” he said, rushing up to her, “here, let me take a couple.” “Oh, thanks,” she said, repeating herself. She was as naked as naked goes and the oranges, what was left of them, covered her breast. “Fresh squeezed juice is good,” she said from the kitchen now, poking and jabbing a knife into an orange. “How long as it been since you had any?” Naked in the kitchen and so bothersome the orange in her hands with which indeed troubled her, such that she let go the orange and watched as it bumped around in the sink, sounding in the hollows of the night the hollows of another sort. “See, “she said with smile in her eyes, with what little light across the arc of her tanned back, “I’ve never known a man who did not like fresh juice.” He put down on the wooden countertop the oranges he had been holding, watched casually as they rolled; some went over toward her; others got stuck on the nail-heads which were sticking out of the counter-top. She looked at him, her face at a slant while an infamous light showing glossy on her cheekbones. Her head was slightly bent downward, along the crest of her head that same sweat as before, suspended, and nearing their final fall. Half joking, he swung his leg over a stool and pulled himself closer to the counter and started staring at an orange. Then she got to business and straightened her back, to her left, a pile of boxes, wet things with wetter bottoms and with crab antenna peeping outward the various cracks and tears, next to them, higher up, a butcher’s block. They looked at each other — so fine her eyes, so bronze her skin, so soft and fragile her lips. “Tell me, what do you think?” “Who, me?” “Yes, you.” “Oh, I don’t know...” “Dirty wash of the mind,” she said while taking delicate steps with her fingers over her stomach. “Why do you do that?” she asked. “What?” “Your feet, why do you twitch them?” Mona was just in her ways, grooming the question with her fingers. Her hair was loose limps of passion, one by one, he could almost pinch their thorns — and he looked at that hair, very calmly, he looked at that hair and in another moment he realized—just now—how naked she was. “Here, here,” she said, putting her hand inside a cabinet, “let me make you some coffee.” “But the time,” and he was looking at an alligator clock on whose hands showed the extreme lateness of
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the night, “and if I drink it now, I’ll not sleep a wink.” “Come, come, that’s fairytale—here—let me give you something to wipe that slobber from your mouth.” He took the towel: she wiped his mouth. “But I can say for sure that what’s happening to me now is a tough lot.” “So, so,” she said, pouring his coffee, “and in the meantime, just be yourself, let it happen. We have all the time in the world.” “But that’s just it: confusion stops that clock.” “Sugar… I bet two dips… and now the cream, in we go, a little more—there! Coffee to your liking.” He took the coffee, sipped it and hardly could get it down. “Watch it — hot stuff!” To which he spit back his big take. “You’re a sweet girl…” and he was thinking the latter over at an even slower speed. “I’m getting along,” she said, almost pouting, stirring her coffee, which she then preceded to sip, devilishly. “Last year this time I was the taxi-girl, long trips on the airboat—I loved it though, all that sunshine on my naked body, all that freedom in my hair, and those islands, yes, those islands, endless and forever happening.” He knew about the islands the moment before; it had been a weak effort on the part of his imagination, trying to make sense of the break-offs, the cells of the earth round the big mother earth. “I don’t know,” he said with his head practically hanging over the counter, “it’s practically the only thing I can do.” “It’s all right,” she assured, turning toward the vertebra of endless islands, “sometimes I follow perceptually the long green of those islands which disappear in a moment, anyway.” Laughs in the night; a slight giggle from within the other room. “Years here and the heart becomes the sun, till the moment when it goes away, orange, and all you can do is think how beautiful it was.” “Fast,” he said, wishing, he was, for a cigarette. “No—not fast but like the real thing, it only lasts as long as you don’t get used to it.” Overhead the night skies went cream white, brilliant in sheen, pumping the arteries of the land; pumping emptier his veins. “Must be the rain has stopped,” he said. “Must be,” she said, “night rains especially.” “Yeah, them kind, the ones across the night looking like wads of black paper.” There was silence in the little house. She was around the counter now, standing, shivering before him. Her skin had bumps all over it. “I’m alone,” she said, moving closer to him. “No more is there the sun, I am alone, here for you, as you may like to use me, any which way that pleases you, have me, do as you wish and I will stand still.” That was fine, but did he think it or was it coming from her lips? “It’s true,” she said, nodding her own head, “it’s as true as can be—you don’t like what you see?” But what he did see was a perfection of lust, a taste in the night, riveting his heart tightly. He wanted her but she kept straight his own head. “Have me — use me — the choice is yours.” It’s only natural, he thought. He took another sip of his coffee, put the cup down and wanted to ask her if she had any cigarettes; instead, he let his hand fall to his lap where he felt his pants’ pocket for pocket change.
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Now he had her right where he thought not to have her because her lips were quivering while the edges of her cheeks gleamed. She was set straight next to the stool with her chin up, her eyes as black as onyx, and for what seemed the longest time just stared into the flakes of space round his head, and what she saw (what he thought she saw) was a well-made man, indolent in his own ways to the workings of a required life. Not to mention that he was a smart man, for what he had just thought caused in her quite a stir. “What makes the world go round, smart man of the world, tell me so the secrets of life?” That was fine and he never smiled but instead tried to shake his own head. Then she was nearer him, letting her hair fall forward; suspended for a moment between his face, that hair, at which point she suddenly flung back over her shoulder, snapping time itself. She was a stranger in the night winds of the mind, standing before him with the open doors of her heart as free and as willing as any man could possibly bare. Her breasts were just right, a handful, jutting out his immediate front like two, nimble cypress stumps. Her head was cocked to the side while the rest of her body sort of swayed, especially her right hip which was sticking straight out into the starry air. Her side was bowed while her stomach rippled, and her belly button was but a dark cavern and diamond shaped. Down her legs the muscles worked, bigger on her thighs whereupon the sun tanned images of this sun tanned queen adamantly came to life. Moving on him, her leg lifting, her rear edging upon the stool, she reached with her right hand down toward the middle part of her split legs, petting like a soft cat the black curly fur there, that finger of hers bent at the knuckle and so boldly its pose, like a stroll thru the yellow pages. She cocked her head to the right, leaned inward a bit the counter and grabbed with her other hand its edge and pulled herself closer. “Not yet,” she whispered, swelling in warmth. Now he had no idea what to do next; it was as she were offering, at the same time, offending, that final swell of desire. Another small swell caught hold her, “It lifts me,” she said with the downward momentum, “soon it puts me back.” And in a moment it hit him, kind of like an after-burner of a scream at which point he had to look at it backwards… it was a taste in his mouth, a residue catching him cold. Boldly, he looked at her; she was drawing up a full breath now, her chin fracturing brilliantly the starry night. “Yes!” she says. …In a speechless way, the mist round his freshly severed head nothing but a swirling halo of stars.
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Poetry:
Trains by James O’Sullivan
I. Chaste smiles from spurious mouths bring savage truth to Iago’s words, held down on bonnets and defiled craft, justifying unjustified castes. Rhythmic grief to come each day; fictitious smiles become distant eyes gazing at hollow selves, by blinking red, rolling blackness – the artisan’s lens. II. A cheap office chair bled light from that plastic bedside lamp. Rocking, he swayed in the shade, watching her cry on the floor. He had tried to stay away; no train came by his platform. Those cries made his still heart beat; panto tears set his mind at ease. In those silent hours, none neared that suburban dungeon where he rocked to tired pleas. He had tried to stay away, and as he twisted, he would wait – for a train that never came.
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A Tendency Mistaken For Rapture by Colin James
Sure it’s free, but the attendant has pushed us so far back all us contestants resemble an archaic avant-garde. Here the most explicit are the least fortunate. My friends primp in their false teeth. If only a wrinkle could harness power. I see you came prepared, brought your “I want”. And the camera so does love you. Don’t open up too much, dear. Keep it esoteric for the masses.
Oh, won’t you meet me in the Indian summer? photography Xylux (www.xylux.net) makeup, hair, styling Lauren Coleman model Brittany Oldehoff @ Next
L’Allure des Mots || Fall, 2012 || Issue No. 8
vest Just U.S.A. jeans Jessica Simpson
shirt Envy Couture jeans Cambridge
denim jacket Bitten by Sarah Jessica Parker jeans Hollister
Fall, 2012 || Issue No. 8 www.lalluredesmots.com
$15 (USD)