Fluent Winter 2015

ARTS | CULTURE | EVENTS

Winter 2015 | Vol 3 No 2

Striving for Authenticity An Interview with Susan Carney The Art of Film Shepherdstown Film Society A Conversation With West Virginia Poet Laureate Marc Harshman Diana Suttenfield Landscape & Light Eyes, Ears & Soul Jim Cummins Poetry Cheryl Denise Fiction Three Prose Pieces

by Marc Harshman Ed:Cetera Swan Songs in the Key of Ray Baby Coda The Lennon Wall

Fox Spirit Chair I by Susan Carney

CONTENTS

Winter 2015

Striving for Authenticity An Interview with Susan Carney

The Art of Film Shepherdstown Film Society

A Conversation With West Virginia Poet Laureate Marc Harshman

Diana Suttenfield Landscape & Light

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Letter From the Editor Turning Three

Ears, Eyes & Soul Jim Cummins

Poetry Cheryl Denise

Fiction: Three Prose Pieces Marc Harshman

Ed:Cetera Swan Songs in the Key of Ray Baby...

Coda The Lennon Wall

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C O N T R I B U T O R S Todd Coyle is a journeyman musician who has performed in and around the Eastern Panhandle of WV and around the country for over 30 years.

He has worked in folk, blues, pop, jazz and country bands as a guitarist, bassist, singer, producer and sound man.

Zach Davis is an award-winning writer whose work has appeared in numerous publications in print and online, such as Carve, The First Line, Bartleby Snopes, Drunk Monkeys and numerous volumes of the Anthology of Appalachian Writers. He is the Fiction Editor of Fluent Magazine. keron psillas is a photographer,

writer, instructor and mentor, with an extensive background in the print and publishing industry. She has two books

O N

published: Meditation for Two, and The Alchemy of Lightness, both with longtime collaborator, Mestre Dominique Barbier. Find her work and writing at www.keronpsillas.com and www.lossandbeauty.com.

Sheila Vertino is returning to her roots as a freelance writer and journalist, after a career as a magazine editor-in-chief and book and research publisher. Based in Shepherdstown, she describes herself as a culturally curious word nerd.

Ed Zahniser’s poems have appeared in 5 books, 5 chapbooks, 10 anthologies, and over 150 magazines and other venues. He is co-editor of In Good Company, an anthology of area poets celebrating Shepherdstown’s 250th anniversary.

T H E

Sheila Kelly Vertino Associate Editor Cheryl L. Serra Managing Editor Kathryn Burns Visual Arts Editor Zachary Davis Fiction Editor Todd Coyle Music Editor Contributing Writers Amy Mathews Amos, Paula Pennell, Ed Zahniser

Carl Schultz, Sterling “Rip” Smith, Hali Taylor Submissions For information on submitting unsolicited fiction, nonfiction,

C O V E R

See the FLUENT website for more content: Calls for Artists lists opportunities.

Classes lists arts classes for children and adults. Back Issues is the magazine archive.

plays and poetry, please see the website: www.fluent-magazine.com/submissions.

Please submit events and arts news to events@fluent-magazine.com.

Fluent Magazine is published quarterly and distributed via email. It is available online at www.fluent-magazine.com.

To subscribe www.fluent-magazine.com/subscribe All rights reserved. No portion of this publication may be duplicated or reprinted

A D V E R T I Z E R S Capture Marketing

Nancy McKeithen Editor & Publisher

Curt Mason, Mark Muse, Keron Psillas,

F LU E N T W E B S I T E 9 41

Winter 2015 | Vol 3 No 2

Contributing Photographers

“Fox Spirit Chair I” by Susan Carney is part of a series of monotypes. “These images were revealed after reading a story from ‘The Death of Woman Wang’ by Jonathan D. Spence—a collection of tales from 17th century China. The story focuses on Liang, a female medium who could summon the spirit of a fox. The story describes a room in great detail, including a chair with a cushion.”­—Susan Carney.

Mark Muse Photographs The Bridge Gallery

MAGAZINE

without permission from the publisher. © 2015 Fluent Magazine

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Jefferson County, WV is a Certified Arts Community.

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Subscribe here!

Turning Three Three years ago in January, what would become Fluent was an idea. It didn’t have a name or a business plan or a volunteer staff. What it had was a vision: to share the arts and culture in West Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley and neighboring regions. Our first issue came out in July that year. Thirteen issues later, our vision is the same. And Fluent remains a free online magazine, available by subscription and accessible via the Fluent website— to everyone, everywhere.

What has changed is the scope of Fluent’s readership. People around the region, the country and the world—the international numbers are small but growing—are reading Fluent thanks to your sharing it, on Facebook and Twitter, and on issuu.com, the website where we “flip” the Fluent PDF into an online magazine; and through email and word of mouth to your families, friends, neighbors. Thank you! Please keep sharing Fluent.

The growing number of readers and subscribers, I think, indicates two significant things: that the Eastern Panhandle of West Virginia and the surrounding regions are home to thriving and talented arts communities.

And that good art here is good art everywhere, irrespective of distance, culture or language.

Fluent’s third-birthday present for you is in the making—an update on the artists, writers, poets, photographers, sculptors, designers and musicians whose work has filled the 13 issues and 673 pages of Fluent since our first issue launched the magazine in the summer of 2012.

Stay tuned.

At the Bridge Fine Art & Framing Gallery in Shepherdstown, WV, the idea for a regional arts magazine was born over a Sunday afternoon conversation between two friends. Editorial meetings and impromptu issue planning often take place there.

Nancy McKeithen Editor & Publisher

PHOTO Kathryn Burns

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EARS, EYES & SOUL

Meet Jim Cummins, aka “Fat Jimmie”

BY TODD COYLE Local musicians are more than just entertainment. They contribute more than mere notes. Family man, environmental guru, woodworker and hatchet thrower are just a few of the things Jim Cummins adds to our community. And he’s blows a mean harp, too.

FLUENT Why the harmonica? Where did it all begin?

FAT JIMMIE In the mid-60s, at 17, I bought my first

album, “Electric Mud,” by the great bluesman Muddy Waters. But that was a mistake purchase, I didn’t know anything about the blues, I thought I was buying a different album. It was fate, because when I got home and played it, the blues immediately caught my imagination and never let go.

From the blue’s earliest days the harmonica, or “harp,” has been a major instrument. I like its sound, it speaks to me. So I taught myself to play by listening to records, lots of records. I typically play the classic 10-hole harps. They are amazing instruments: relatively inexpensive, simple in design — most people can pick one up and play a decent chord right off the bat — but capable of a wide range of sounds, very voice-like in presencec and given their small size can

project surprisingly well. They are extremely transportable. Abraham Lincoln carried one in his shirt pocket.

I’ve played them on the tops of mountains. I’m fond of these characteristics.

I’m also fascinated by how you don’t see the harmonica when you play it; its small size makes it effectively invisible to you, which is quite unique for a musical instrument. As a result, you don’t get the visual feedback that you get looking down at, let’s say, a guitar, piano, saxophone, drums, or almost every other instrument in the world. Therefore, when you play harp you are almost entirely focused upon the sound. You are, in a sense, blind, and I like that. While that complicates the learning process for the harmonica, it makes the act of playing them more, ah, what’s the best word, oh yes, fluent.

Regarding the blues, it has a much wider music spectrum than commonly perceived. It has evolved far beyond its rural southern roots. To quote Muddy Waters, “The Blues had a baby and they called it Rock and Roll.” Well, the grandchildren of that birth populate much of today’s music. Thereby, we hear the blues more often than many realize. It’s woven into our musical fabric.

FLUENT Your playing is very passionate. Who are the

influences?

FAT JIMMIE Thank you for that nice compliment! I hope that passion comes from my love of life and the energy of all of those who make it whole. When I was 18, a drunk driver hit a car I was in and, amongst other injuries, broke all of my arms and legs with serious compound fractures. I lost almost all of my blood, met

FLUENT What brand of harps do you use and why?

FAT JIMMIE I am a big fan of Hohner’s Special 20s.

They are well made, durable. I like their sound, and they are relatively affordable. Affordability is relative.

When I started playing, harps cost $1.50; now they are about $40. They come in different keys, so a serious player has about 20 harps to be able to play frequently used major and minor keys, as well as 10 more as backups. Collectively, that is $1200, a pretty large investment. Regarding durability, harps are similar to guitar strings; they eventually get worn out and then it’s best to get new ones. One of the side effects—I have no “old trusty” harps, no favored “Lucille” like B.B. King’s guitar. My favorite harps are fresh out of the box. I tried using brands with replaceable reeds, but unfortunately, I have never been satisfied with their sound.

FLUENT Tell us about any other equipment you use.

FAT JIMMIE I prefer to play an amplified harp, that is,

using a microphone [mic] played through an amplifier [amp], with the harp pressed right onto the mic face.

That method transforms the harp into another instrument really—one with a driving, distorted, hard-rocking sound. By far my favorite mike is a vintage Shure 520, often called a “green bullet.” My favorite amp is a Fender “’59 Bassman,” a favorite of many harp players.

I also dig this little Peavey “Backstage 50” amp that I picked up for $40 a few years back at the Harpers Ferry Flea market. When I play harp acoustically I cup it in my hands, which can produce very vocal effects; you can almost hear words in its sound. I sometimes use a mic when playing acoustically, but then it goes directly through a PA system, and I hold the harp back an inch or more from the mic to keep the sound crisp.

FLUENT Hatchet throwing? Do you still do that? How

did that come about?

FAT JIMMIE I still throw. We constructed two large

hatchet targets in our backyard and I use them frequently. They are my “pioneer dart” boards. I like “flinging sports”—archery being another; they are relaxing sports that link the mind’s-eye with the body.

Good exercise. I picked those up, and whip-cracking and gun-slinging, while in college when I worked summers at a Western-theme park. I am still a pioneer and cowboy at heart. u Photo provided by Jim Cummins.

death, but for whatever reasons, I lived and returned to good health. Ever since I have had a wonderful passion for life, for every breath and minute of every day.

I hope that is part of the passion that you hear.

My musical influences include Little Walter, Charlie Musselwhite, Magic Dick, Charlie McCoy and Paul Butterfield, to name my top five.

FLUENT Your “day job” is pretty cool. Tell us about that.

FAT JIMMIE I am a biologist for the Interstate Commission on the Potomac River Basin. I work on a variety of stream and river protection and restoration projects—my favorite is the restoration of the American shad, an ecologically, historically and culturally important fish. Google “Jim Cummins shad” or add “Potomac” for more details. My job is a cool gig. I get to work with many wonderful people on the great resources of the Potomac, which we all share, which is both enjoyable and a daunting responsibility. When we care for and improve the river and its streams, our investments reap many benefits. Clean water brings us good health, strong economies and fun times.

FLUENT Your nickname, “Fat Jimmie,” where did that come from?

FAT JIMMIE That tag came from a bass player in a band I was in back in 1971, the Crawling Kingsnakes.

Back then I only weighed about 125 lbs at 5'11" tall.

Thus, the name doesn’t refer to my body size, past or present, but the size of my attitude. I nurture a very fat attitude.

FLUENT You’re a man of many talents. Music, cowboy, fishing, painting, building to name a few. What’s your favorite? Anything unusual? What inspires you to do so many different things?

FAT JIMMIE I like to build with wood—houses, sheds, barns and furniture. Long-distance horseback riding is probably my most unusual pursuit—in 1973, my horse Pogo and I rode solo about 1000 miles, from Virginia Beach, Virginia to Panama City, Florida. Pogo was more than a horse, she was a “social vehicle.” People naturally like horses, Pogo made them feel comfortable and thereby brought me access to southern people who may have never spoken with me otherwise, from sharecroppers to plantation owners. I like studying people, and in the South, like so many places, I found good people far outnumber bad people.

Inspiration? I prefer to believe that my Scottish background obligates me to do my best to improve both myself and this world. The same obligation applies to my English, Irish, German, Neanderthal, Denisovan and African backgrounds. I don’t always succeed, but I try.

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FLUENT You’re a family man. Tell us about your family.

Have the kids picked up your penchant for art?

FAT JIMMIE My wife, Nancy, is a special education teacher at Jefferson High School. She plays guitar and sings in the Angel Band at our church, Camp Hill Methodist in Harpers Ferry. Our oldest, daughter Caroline, lives in Manyapples, Minnesota, is artistic and can play a pretty good piano and violin. Our son, Dirick (an old family spelling, pronounced “Derek”), is an Art Major at Shepherd University. He plays guitar and occasionally jams at the Blue Moon and other venues.

FLUENT You, Steve Kemp and I had fathers who where fliers in WWII. How do you think WWII and what they went through affected us, our world and the music that shaped us? Also, anything that our world today has forgotten or should reexamine?

FAT JIMMIE That was tough stuff. WWII fliers had the highest casualty rates of the war. My father went on to make flying his career, so I grew up at various U.S. Air Force bases. It was a good upbringing. Unfortunately, it left me with no “Home Town,” but I now proudly apply that claim to this area.

Our fathers and mothers, deemed the “Greatest of Generations” by Tom Brokaw, thrived upon regimentation, which brought them through the Great Depression, enabled their successes in WWII and marched them into the post-war years when they spearheaded one of the world’s greatest economic expansions. But that regimentation came with a cost: It repressed equality and freedom of expression. You, Steve and I came of age in the ’60s, and our generation compensated for that repression. OK, sometimes we overcompensated, but I am very proud of the changes that we brought about, and our resolve was inspired by our parents. As per today, I am not an expert on the world, but I am pretty sure America needs to re-acquire the WWII generation’s grit, self-responsibility and community spirit.

FLUENT Tell us about some of the musicians you’ve played with over the years.

FAT JIMMIE My favorite band was the Compulsions in the late ’70s, early ’80s, playing locally with Sam Felker, Brian Lloyd, Scot Rockwell and Lantz Cox. Our music was quite creative and danceable. You can

check out some of the cuts at www.reverbnation.com/ control_room/artist/1288903/songs. Perhaps my biggest thrill was sitting in with blues legend Buddy Guy when he came into DC. This region is especially rich in great musicians. These days I really dig playing with Christian Lopez and his band, with Skyla Burrell, Billy Thompson and Paul Phau when they are back from touring. I love many of the jam venues around here, opportunities to jam with you, Steve Kemp, Chris Crawford, Domenic Valentine, Luke Johnson, Dawn Crock, Dick Lawrence and Vique Dill, just to name a few. I am lucky to live in the midst of these folks. It is a wonderful aspect of this area. Sadly, we recently lost one of its brightest, Greg Lloyd. I’ll always aspire to play at his level of skill and passion.

Mark Muse – Photographs Fine Art Photography and Printmaking • Portfolio Printing Printing for Exhibition Color and Black&White High Quality Art Reproduction

FLUENT Any other interesting things you’d like to

share?

FAT JIMMIE While I have owned and listened to

thousands of albums and CDs since that first one, “Electric Mud” is still one of my favorites. Muddy later said he regretted straying into Hendrix-style psychedelic blues. I don’t, I dig it. fluent

[\ muse@markmusephotographs.com markmusephotographs.com

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By Nancy McKeithen

Striving for Authenticity An Interview with Susan Carney

12 | fluent

P

ainter and printmaker Susan Carney will tell you, “This is what I’m supposed to be doing.” Nearly two years ago, she left teaching to pursue her art full-time. And while she prints or paints every day, she hasn’t fully embraced being called a professional artist. “I’m an artist trying to make a living as one, but do I feel like I’m a real artist?

Not really.”

To Carney, a real artist is an authentic artist. “I think that in order to be truly authentic, you have to do work that only you could have done, no one else.” She points to one of her paintings on the wall, of an artichoke: “Anyone could have done that, really…it’s just skill,” she says.

As a middle-school art teacher, Carney loved to show her students the work of Jackson Pollock, an American painter known for his abstract splatter and drip paintings. “They would all say, ‘I can do that!’ or ‘My fiveyear-old brother could do that.’ ” And she would tell them, “Yes, but the difference is, you didn’t do that and he did.”

In striving for authenticity, Carney strives to do work that has something to say “about the human condition — about living, about dying, about being born, about disappointment, redemption, betrayal.” But that doesn’t mean she wants to dissect every element of her intention for her work. “I’m against endless reasoning,” she says, with a nod to conceptual art that takes a lengthy artist’s statement to explain what it’s about.

Notwithstanding the occasional “why didn’t I think of that” artist moment, Carney is carving her own unique niche as an artist. “I don’t know anyone who does monotypes the way I do,” she says.

In the process of creating a monotype, only one print is made, although a series of similar prints can be created where each print is unique. Carney uses — and reuses — stencils that she designs and then cuts

Inspiration is the first part of the printmaking process. For this print in particular, Carney had been practicing “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” on the mandolin. “I started thinking about bluebirds flying over the rainbow and this image came to me…where they’re all gathering…these blue birds have accomplished their dreams.” Blue Birds Over the Rainbow, monotype, 24 x 18 inches.

out of steel roof flashing. “That’s usually almost the hardest part, because I have to plan a composition, loosely,” she says. She layers the stencils on a plate, which she may have wrapped with string or yarn to create a grid or burlap for texture. “I like the woven stuff.”

After an initial print, Carney may decide to rearrange or flip the stencils before the next print. It’s this process of reviewing her work on press — of “reading” the image and “listening” to it — that in a way dictates the direction of her work. u fluent | 13

“The stencils can become interesting as works of art in themselves,” says Carney, who occasionally will sell a piece of work with a stencil attached.

She loves the surprise and serendipity of printmaking: “A lot of times you’ll make a print and there’ll be things on the plate you can’t see; but the paper is wet when you run it through the press so it picks up everything that’s remaining on that plate — all the residue, the ink. Sometimes it’s ‘wow, I love that, how did that happen?’ And sometimes, it’s ‘eww, that didn’t work.’ ” Whichever, she keeps all her prints. Some she may run through the press again, adding new elements.

Carney spends 8 to 10 hours a day in the print studio at Shepherd University, where she is artist-inresidence. She admits that an obsession with making a better print — it’s almost like perfectionism — and lacking all cognition of time can keep her there longer than she plans on. “I have literally printed on the back of prints when I’ve run out of paper, on a piece of canvas, on whatever I can find around me because I just have to make one more print.”

The Shepherd campus is familiar to her. She earned a BFA in Painting and Printmaking there, and completed an MFA at The University of the Arts in Phildelphia.

Recently, Carney and her printmaking were documented in a video by Jack Kelly of 78 Degrees West Films, Berkeley Springs, WV, as part of the ArtVoiceWV series. Marla, Kelly’s wife, interviewed Carney for the short film, which was shot in the printmaking studio at Shepherd University’s Center for Contemporary Arts. u

listen

In the summer of 2013, she never intended to work with butterflies and cocoons. “But I had this one idea that I wanted to wrap up, where I wanted to print on top of a print I had. I started making some prints, and I literally spent almost the entire summer printing butterflies. I would come home [from the studio] and cut out more. That’s all I did until finally I forbid myself from doing it: No butterflies, no matter what. It was almost uncontrollable.” Girl with an Umbrella and Monarchs II, monotype, 24 x 18 inches.

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Night Bird I, monotype, 44 x 35 inches.

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The Business and the Mystique of Art Generally, Carney works on more than one painting at a time, and overall, prefers oil to acrylic, unless she has a deadline to meet. “There’s just something about oil…a richness,” she says, noting that all her monotypes are also oil-based paint. Carney combines other elements in her work as well: watercolor, spray paint, varnish and especially, collage.

There have been times, says Carney, when she has been paralyzed artistically, but she makes herself work. “A bad print is better than no print at all, a bad painting is better than no painting,” she tells herself. A year after leaving teaching, she realized that working full-time as an artist is stressful as well, “but it has a whole different set of stressors because I’m depending on me — to make a living, to make work that is good.” To do commissions.

One of her images, Deadwood, resonates strongly with her. The title refers to the HBO show, and a storyline of women in the 1800s and how hard life was for them. “I really relate to those women because they are so strong and cool,” she says. “I’m always in danger of falling off that horse, every day.”

A Conglomeration of Ways to Communicate Many of the images in Carney’s artwork — birds, butterflies, plants, words, maps, language, equations — play into her own backstory, and appear in her art as symbols. u

16 | fluent

Deadwood II, monotype, 18 x 24 inches

They inspire and inform her work, and provide a narrative. “I love when a viewer can create their own story, when my image resonates with them.”

A lot about birds resonates with Carney. “Not just that they’re pretty little creatures but particularly migration, because I moved my whole life,” she tells. Her father was in the Army, and they moved often — from California, where she was born, to New Delhi in northern India, Germany, New York City, Albuquerque, Virginia. “I was always saying goodbye to people,” she says. “That really shapes you; layered on top of that….” As her words trail off, “layered” hangs in the air, and you ponder its connection to her printmaking: layering stencils on a plate.

Carney doesn’t know where her fascination with China and Asia comes from. “I guess if there are other

New World Order Series I, monotype, 18 x 24 inches

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lives — I don’t know if I believe in that — I think I lived in Mongolia or somewhere over there.” Carney is dyslexic and coincidentally, when she picks up a book she starts at the back, the way books are read in China and in Arabic lands.

“I love when a viewer can create their own story, when my image resonates with them.”

She wishes aloud that she was a better reader, then suggests that maybe the dyslexia makes her more visually oriented. Her first drawing teacher told her that in order to be a really good artist, you need to read a lot. u

Baby Bird, acrylic on wood, 8 x 8

fluent | 19

Gillian, oil on canvas, 36 x 36 inches.

Instead, she listens to radio and TV — “Fresh Air” with Terry Gross, an interview format show that covers contemporary arts and issues on NPR is a favorite — and she especially likes commentaries where writers and directors are talking. “Words and writers inspire me,” says Carney. She once did a series of paintings that was an homage to writers, one of them American singer-songwriter Gillian Welch, known for her sparse musical style. Her lyrics speak to Carney.

“She’s my hero…and a very authentic artist.”

Is there anything Carney would like to do as an artist that she hasn’t already done? “Oh, definitely, but I don’t know what it is because I haven’t done it yet,” she says, laughing. fluent 20 | fluent

Susan Carney’s website: www.susancarney.com Exhibits

April 2015: Shenandoah Arts Council, Winchester, VA, with sculptor Sally Myers May 2015: The Dairy Barn, Middleburg, VA May 17–18: Stockley Gardens Art Festival, Norfolk, VA July 31–Aug 12: Shepherdstown Community Club, Shepherdstown, WV

American Gold, oil on canvas, 60 x 36 inches.

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THE ART OF FILM W

hat’s behind most every great film? The studio pedigree of a film — whether indie or DreamWorks — is no sure indicator of its potential greatness, Rachel Krantz, PhD, Associate Professor, Shepherd University Language and Film Study, and Lex Miller, local film buff and popular discussion leader with the Shepherdstown Film Society, agree.

Not all indies are destined for greatness; not all blockbusters are low-brow.

“An interesting film — Krantz prefers not to say “great film” — is one that makes me think while I’m watching it, and stays with me after I’ve watched it,” says Krantz.

The Audience Plays a Role Whether watching at home or in a theater, the audience creates part of the meaning of a film, explains Krantz. “They bring in what they know about life in general. If we have seen other films like it, we bring in knowledge of the genre.”

Sometimes the audience’s experience with the pretext (what the film is adapted from) is critical to enjoying the film, for example, in a film like Bride and Prejudice. “In this Bollywood remake of Pride and Prejudice, the director assumes you are familiar with the original story,” says Krantz. “It seems to me you would be missing half the movie if you weren’t aware of the literary allusions.”

Behind Every Great Film is a Great Director Pressed to name the hallmarks that make a film great, Miller hedges, “It’s hard to tie it down to two or three things. Films can vary so much in what they give you — pleasure, intellectual stimulation, a cathartic emotional experience….”

This much is certain: A film will never be great if its director does not have a consistent vision that carries through the film, says Krantz. “The French came up with the auteur theory: the director as the ‘writer’ of the film….The screenwriter is only responsible for the script, whereas the director is part of an ensemble effort…not just coordinating everything, but the film’s lifeblood.”

Not surprisingly, Krantz and Miller each have many favorite directors.

For Miller, it’s Billy Wilder, Alfred Hitchcock, Francois Truffaut, Jean Campion; he likes some films by Jean-Luc Godard. About The Woman in the Dunes, made in the 1964 and directed by Hiroshi Teshigahara, Miller says, 22 | fluent

By Sheila Kelly Vertino

“My wife and I went to see it when it first came out and we were blown away. It’s very existential, barren and stark. Once I saw it, I said, ‘I want to see other things by that guy.’ ” Krantz reels off Atom Egoyan, Francis Ford Coppola, Anne Fontaine, Sam Mendez, Tom Tykwer and Christopher Nolan. “Even though his Interstellar got mixed reviews, I will go see it just because Christopher Nolan made it!”

But What about the Actors?

“In the days of the Hollywood studio system, the studios had people under contract, and they wanted to use them — the same stars in different settings, over and over,” says Miller. About iconic figures like John Wayne, he contends, “They couldn’t play against character. Cary Grant was always Cary Grant.”

Fast-forwarding to contemporary movie actors, Miller praises Steve Carell — previously known for his comedic roles — for his performance in The Way Way Back. “[Carell’s character] was emotionally debilitating to everyone around him. It’s great to see somebody grow as an actor.” Miller also mentions Gerard Depardieu in My Afternoons with Margaritte, in which he plays against type. “Although anything with Gerard Depardieu is worth watching!”

Krantz favors actors who can tackle odd characters. “I like Benedict Cumberbatch and Jeremy Irons — actors who play the twisted roles. As good as George Clooney is, the ‘chameleon’ actors are more interesting to watch.”

Experiencing a Film Both Krantz and Miller believe in watching a film for the first time without much preparation, and focusing on the story without analysis. Krantz says, “If I know too much before I go in, I’m already analyzing and I don’t think that’s a good way to do it. It just has to hit you! If you pull back to analyze, you are enjoying it, but at a different level.”

For those films that completely capture your attention and make you want to see them again, Krantz and Miller offer some tips:

Reviews & Online Discussions about All Things Cinema Film Magazines Sight and Sound (sight-sound.com) Slant Magazine (slantmagazine.com) New Yorker film reviews by Anthony Lane and David Denby (newyorker.com)

Podcast (current releases and retrospectives) Film Spotting (filmspotting.net)

Websites Internet Movie Database (imdb.com) Rotten Tomatoes (rottentomatoes.com) AARP’s Movies for Grownups (aarp.org/entertainment/moviesfor-grownups)

Watch the film without interruption or distractions (no phone!).

For a film with a complex story, fill in the blanks and recap what you missed. u fluent | 23

Try to figure out how the director imposed his or her point of view on you by filming the scenes in a certain way.

What’s Your Favorite Movie?

Rachel Krantz “I tend to go for what they call the ‘Puzzle Film.’ Things that are ambiguous or you have to think through. Inception, Memento, Shutter Island….I watch a lot of foreign films because I teach foreign language.

I’ll watch pretty much anything with subtitles! Stateside, I liked Being John Malkovich, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Johnny Darko.”

Lex Miller “My first film memory was the typhoon in The Caine Mutiny. I was seven years old, and it was the visual power of the screen, the noise, the action.

Looking back at the movie now, it’s pacing is very plodding. It doesn’t interest me very much.“ “Now, in my mid-60s I want to see a film that has some degree of human interaction. A film like Juno fits this indie mode: a small film, starring people who were unknown at the time — probably made on a shoestring. It deals with human emotion in a naturalistic way, and that appeals to me.”

24 | fluent

Look for foreshadowing and pivotal scenes that help to tell the story. Is the director using a leitmotif, a symbol that keeps recurring throughout the movie?

Analyze how the effects are produced. Look at a scene multiple times to isolate the various elements of the image track.

Listen carefully to the sound track: voice, ambient sound, music (both in the scene or outside the scene), etc.

Watch the film and focus just on a single component, for example, the lighting, color, costume, acting….

Krantz suggests, “Ask ‘Why?’ Why this kind of sound, lighting or whatever.

It’s all on purpose. Nothing is an accident.”

Overlooked Films Worth a Look Expecting Krantz and Miller to name just a few “overlooked” films isn’t really fair, given their deep backgrounds in film. But Krantz quickly names two as worth watching.

Lourdes, directed by Jessica Hausner, “is a slowly developing movie but an intense experience, very subtle, and filled with ambiguity.” She also likes Hadewijch, directed by Bruno Dumont. Although the title refers to a medieval Flemish mystic, this is a contemporary film about a nun who follows extreme religious practices.

For his overlooked jewels, Miller nominates a German-language film, The White Ribbon, set in a small village before World War I. Directed by Michael Haneke, the story is told through the eyes of schoolchildren.

Miller was also moved by Still Mine, a Canadian film directed by Michael McGowan and starring James Cromwell and Genevieve Bujold as a married couple coping with dementia.

Sensing a trend in the movies that he and Krantz have mentioned, Miller laughs, “It’s not all ‘paint drying’ and downers!” For a more upbeat experience, Krantz suggests the Belgian dramedy Romantics Anonymous, directed by Jean-Pierre Améris.

Some films are just fun to see, like Pirate Radio, about boats that broadcast rock and roll into England in the early 1960s when the BBC did not allow it. Miller recalls his wife, Pam, saying, “That was the happiest two hours I’ve had in a long time.”

“There are as many kinds of film viewers as there are films,” Krantz adds. “None of what people do in the pursuit of understanding, stimulation or intellectual analysis [of a film] should preclude or supersede pleasure....I think you can have it all. Find where your natural interest and pleasure coincide with something you are willing to dig into.” fluent

SHEPHERDSTOWN FILM SOCIETY This coalition of interested individuals and organizations is dedicated to bringing quality films to Shepherdstown. The spring film series is made possible through a partnership with Shepherd University’s Scarborough Society and is also supported by Friends of the Shepherdstown Library (FOSL). For further information on these and other films, visit www.shepherdstownfilmsociety.org or contact Lisa Welch (304-876-1837, lmwelch@ frontiernet.net) or Mina Goodrich (304-876-2159).

The spring theme is “films about women artists.” The series also includes a special collaborative presentation. The movies will be screened on Fridays at 7 pm in Shepherd University’s Reynolds Hall. Foreign language films have English subtitles.

Closed captions or subtitles are also used for English language films, when available.

Admission is free, and all films are followed by a post-film discussion.

Spring Season and Schedule January 30, 7 pm La Vie En Rose (2007) directed by Olivier Dahan, in French and English; 140 minutes. Discussion led by Lex Miller (preceded by opening reception at War Memorial Building at 5:30 pm). The life story of singer Edith Piaf. Actress Marion Cotillard won an Oscar for her portrayal of Piaf in this film.

February 13, 7 pm Frida (2002) directed by Julie Taymor, in English, French and Russian; 123 minutes. The film portrays Frida Kahlo, a Mexican painter of the early 20th century known for her vivid color palette and striking imagery: her artistic and political growth and turbulent marriage to fellow Mexican painter Diego Rivera. Actress Salma Hayek was nominated for an Oscar in the role of Frida. Discussion led by Mary Stanley.

February 27, 7 pm Wadjda (2012) directed by Haifaa Al-Mansour, in Arabic; 98 minutes. Presented in conjunction with Shepherd University’s Common Reading Program. The story of Wadjda, a bright, vivacious Saudi Arabian 10-year-old. Not happy with the restrictions placed on Saudi girls, Wadjda devises a plan to raise money to buy a forbidden bicycle and complications ensue. Discussion led by Dr. Rachel Krantz.

March 13, 7 pm Mozart’s Sister (2010) directed by Rene Feret, in French; 120 minutes.

“What if a musically precocious girl was given the same opportunities as her brother in 18th century Vienna?” is the starting point of this film, which examines the life of Maria Anna Mozart, a talented musician almost lost to history. Discussion led by Dr. Rebecca Ayraud.

April 24, 7 pm Finding Vivian Maier (2013) directed by John Maloof and Charlie Siskel, in English; 83 minutes. The story of Vivian Maier, who photographed over 150,000 street scenes in and around Chicago in the second half of the 20th century.

Her work was never shown publicly and she died completely unknown. This documentary film traces the discovery of her work and the posthumous critical acclaim she has received. Discussion led by Benita Keller.

Information from the Shepherdstown Film Society website. fluent | 25

PHOTO provided by Marc Harshman

A Conversation with West Virginia Poet Laureate Marc Harshman

By Zachary Davis

The following interview was conducted by phone in October 2014. A multitude of topics were discussed, many more than can be covered in this space. However, this transcription provides a glimpse inside the work of Marc Harshman, from conception to composition.

FLUENT: I’d like to get a sense of who you are as a

writer and what you do as a writer. One of the things that most interests me is writing habits.

MARC HARSHMAN: I work best in the mornings. I try and get upstairs as early as I can and stay at my desk at least until lunchtime. The afternoon is a bit of a crapshoot. If it’s a nice day, good weather, I might try and go outside with a cup of tea, books and notebooks all around me. When I’m reading, ideas are always sparking, ideas for stories, phrases for poems and I try to get them down. If you were to look at what I wrote in the notebook compared to what I was reading, you might not see any connection at all, but somewhere in the reading was its inception. And, sometimes that will become a poem or the first line of a children’s book, and other times I’ll take a look at something in the notebook and think “What the hell was that all about?” In the evenings, I generally like to try and get back to my desk. I may continue reading, but I’ve always got a notebook close at hand.

FLUENT: You mentioned a desk—do you have a

designated writing space?

MH: I have a study that has three desks. One has a typewriter that’s been broken for over a year, which I 26 | fluent

guess means I’m just about to give up on that machine, but I still have all my submissions spread out there.

I spend, these days, a good bit of my time at my computer desk although I don’t really compose there very much. Much of what I compose, initially, is still ink and paper. The third is a standing desk, made of two old bookshelves of my grandmother’s that I like to use on occasion.

FLUENT: Do you have a first reader, someone to whom

you show something you’ve been working on when you feel like it’s ready for someone else’s eyes?

MH: Yes. Most of the time I do.

FLUENT: What would you say are your two essential

reads?

MH: I still return to Shakespeare every year or two and read at least one of the plays in its entirety, if not see one live.

FLUENT: Do you like the sonnets, too?

MH: Yeah! Yeah, they’re masterpieces. They please me.

Wish I could write a good one.

FLUENT: Definitely hard to argue with Shakespeare.

MH: Other favorite books? I try to read something

from some of the classics with regularity, something like Dickens or George Eliot, as well as more modern classics like Faulkner, Joyce and Woolf.

FLUENT: What do you read for pleasure, and what do

you read for inspiration, if the two are even separate?

MH: If I read for pleasure, I admit that I have an

appetite for murder mysteries. I’ve developed quite an appetite for the Scandinavian writers, like Henning Mankell, Karin Fossum and Stieg Larrsson. At the moment, I’m reading a novel by Anthony Doerr, and it’s called All the Light We Cannot See. It’s a terrific read so far. The reviews are not letting me down.

I also subscribe to countless numbers of literary journals, and I try to at least skim all of them, so I’m always discovering new writers, especially, that I want to read and rediscovering old favorites with whom I want to get reacquainted.

I’m also haunted by other poets, in particular my two predecessors as state laureates, whose work has had a profound influence on my own writing, although I don’t think you can necessarily see it in my work.

Irene McKinney, who is my immediate predecessor, and Louise McNeill, who came before Irene.

I am also always in awe of — I’m thinking of one more Appalachian writer — Robert Morgan. His poetry, as well as his essays, are essential to me. Someone whose work I idolize, who I put up on a pedestal is a bit harder. I suppose among modern writers I’d still have to say James Wright, whose presence should always haunt anyone living as I do in the upper Ohio Valley.

FLUENT: Have you ever gone back and looked at your — I suppose the correct term is juvenilia — and said “Hey, this isn’t bad, I can see my voice start to develop” or is it all pretty horrifying?

MH: Well, some of it’s pretty horrifying! I did find my first publication the other day. It wasn’t great or grounded very deeply, but I can catch a glimpse in it of where I ended up going from there.

FLUENT: When did you realize that you wanted to be

FLUENT: When you do read over things you’ve

a writer? When did you realize “This is something I can do, and enjoy doing?”

MH: There I could talk for hours. When I think of my father, a sometimes taciturn man, who would, nonetheless, recite poetry out loud to me. As a little boy hearing that, I realized that words could be music, and I think I was in love with that from the start. That’s part of poetry’s beginning for me. As an adolescent, I wasn’t much good at athletics, so I thought the only way to impress a girl was to write her a poem. I didn’t know that that might have actually been worse than if I had gotten trampled on the football field. Then in my later teens I fell in love with rock music and the Beat poets, so then I’m writing Ginsberg and Ferlinghetti and writing “fuck” as many times as I can squeeze it into a poem, which is also

“…I realized that words could be music, and I think I was in love with that from the start.” pretty embarrassing. But eventually, I stumbled into college and was fortunate enough to sit down with someone who suggested I read a little more broadly, that I read Shakespeare, Dickens, the Bible, Austen, on and on and so, slowly I began to get more serious about writing, about craft and my work matured.

written — whether old stuff or things that haven’t been published yet — do you find yourself wanting to go back and revise, or do you think “This is as done as I can make it”?

MH: I’m always revising. Even with my hardback children’s books, it’s rare that I’ll do a reading of them exactly the way they’re written on the page. I think revision goes on all the time. Because I’m not the same person I was last year, let alone 10 or 20 or 30 years ago, I know I see things differently.

FLUENT: The thing that really struck me about the

types of writing that you do — poetry, children’s books and prose poems — is that they all require an economy of detail and a preciseness of language. What drew you to that type of writing? What called out to you? fluent | 27

MH: Well, with the poetry and the children’s books, you are, in a way, trying to get across as much information and provoke as much emotion as possible, using as few words as possible. So, there’s a succinctness of form that’s really quite similar between the two. With the “prose poems,” I really like the idea of trying to tell a complete story in a single paragraph.

FLUENT: When you have an idea, or the spark of an

idea, do you have a genre in mind for it, or do you just start writing and let it come out in whatever form it feels right for?

MH: I just start writing. I might start writing something and have it in mind that it’s a prose poem but come back a month later and think, “No, this would be so much better with room to breathe, with line breaks and the altered phrasings and rhythms that come from that.” Sometimes I’ve got something in front of me, and I don’t know whether it’s an adult poem or a children’s book. I really don’t. I say that about one of my children’s books, my most successful children’s book, actually, called Only One. It’s written for really young children, so it’s really spare — just a sentence per page — and the first line is “There may be a million stars but there is only one sky.” When I wrote those words down, I didn’t know if they were going to be in a picture book or a poem, or the first lines to the great American novel. I really didn’t know, but I liked the sound of those words on the page and so I kept fiddling with it and it became the picture book it is today.

FLUENT: When you give a reading, are their certain works that you prefer to read?

MH: Sure. Some poems just come off better than others. They’re not necessarily my best poems, but they work better in public than others, and I’m not ashamed to go to those. And it depends on the venue, as well. If I’m going to be at a university doing a reading primarily for college students, the poems I pick will likely be different than the ones I would read at a public library for the community.

28 | fluent

“ ‘There may be a million stars but there is only one sky.’ When I wrote those words down, I didn’t know if they were going to be in a picture book or a poem, or the first lines to the great American novel.”

FLUENT: Do you enjoy the performance part of a

reading?

MH: Yes! As a matter of fact, I do. Mind you, I come to it with a certain amount of anxiety beforehand, but I think I do enjoy my readings more than many. I do enjoy reading my work aloud in public. With this appointment as laureate, I’ve had the opportunity to read my poetry in public more than ever, and I’m just loving it.

FLUENT: Can you talk a bit about the places you’ve

been and the influence they’ve had on you? You were born in Indiana, attended Bethany College in West Virginia, received a Masters in Religion from Yale Divinity School and an MA in English writing in Pittsburgh. What brought you to these places?

MH: Well, Bethany reflects the denomination in which I grew up. It was a “church school,” and a rather liberal one, although it doesn’t sound that way. It remains a small liberal arts college, and I got a solid education there with wonderfully personal attention. Nearly all my professors were from the Ivy League, which to this country boy was a big deal. And, because of that, they were able to write my ticket to Yale Divinity School. I went there not to become a priest or preacher, however.

At that time I had fallen in love with Joseph Campbell and the whole notion of creative mythology, and divinity school was really a sort of umbrella under which I

could study those things, like ancient religions, ancient myth and stories. As you can tell, I was already scribbling furiously at that point. And so before I left Yale, I had come to realize that I wasn’t going to be a true academic. The track from there should have been a PhD, and I just couldn’t imagine it. While there I also had a wonderful course I audited on the main campus with Norman Holmes Pearson, whose personal connections to H.D., Pound and Gertrude Stein among others had made for fascinating conversations, as well as whetted my appetite for ever more writing. Meanwhile, I had heard about this fledging creative writing program over at Pitt, and I wanted to get back close to the mountains I had fallen in love with at Bethany. So, there’s the short version of how I came to those three schools.

MH: James Wright preferred to call these types of works “prose pieces.” Frankly, that’s what I would like to have them called, but there are a lot of people who want to argue over a finer distinction between flash fiction and prose poetry, but I’m not one of them.

There are a couple of my longer prose poems that are more like flash fiction — there’s a stronger sense of organized narrative to them, of character and setting.

The prose poems tend to have a lot of imagery and detail in a condensed space, so perhaps those are more poetry, but frankly I really don’t like to over-think these things. I may sometimes now, looking back over certain pieces, say that “This is more like flash fiction” or “This is more like what some call a prose poem,” but I don’t think of that when I’m writing.

FLUENT: You write poetry, so you have a definite form

FLUENT: I read these pieces without reading your bio first, and one of the things that came to mind when reading them, and knowing nothing about you as a writer, was “These were definitely wrought by a poet’s hand.”

MH: (laughter) Yeah, now that’s fair, and especially with the pieces I sent you. It’s interesting that my “prose poems,” so to speak, have won a flash fiction contest and a short-short contest.

in mind when you’re composing. When you’re reading, do you prefer something that falls in line with that, or do you prefer something radically different?

MH: Actually, I’m not looking for any particular form.

In fact, I’m always thrilled when I read something that’s totally different from my own work and evokes a feeling of delight, or wonder — or terror, even. A good poem is a good poem, regardless of its form.

FLUENT: One of the things that struck me about the

pieces you submitted to Fluent [see page 38] was the depths to which you explore the psychology of the narrators, in a sort of stream-of-consciousness effect. I was wondering, is that something you like to do across all your work, or is that more of a hallmark of the short fiction?

MH: You’ve stumped me, there. I don’t really know. I don’t even know where to begin. Thank you for the observation, though—it may be true! I do think the prose poem does lend itself to a kind of stream-ofconsciousness rush of language.

FLUENT: So, what would you consider these pieces in

Fluent? Would you consider them prose poems or flash fiction?

FLUENT: As a wrap up, can you give us a few details of

your duties as Poet Laureate of West Virginia?

MH: There are no stated duties, but since I was appointed, I have seen it as my responsibility to try and get poetry out into the larger world as much as possible. I want to do everything I can to support my fellow writers throughout the state — not just poets, but prose writers, as well, both fiction and nonfiction.

Also, I feel like it’s my duty to spread the net even wider to do what I can to support artists of all kinds throughout the state. Although we are a relatively small state, it’s hard for me to imagine any state with a greater pool of accomplished artists working here — painters, sculptors, musicians, dancers, as well as, of course, writers. And it’s simply a real pleasure to shine a light on my amazingly talented colleagues. fluent fluent | 29

Delbertâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Bales, oil, 44 x 66 inches

Diana Suttenfield Landscape & Light T

he walls of Diana Suttenfield’s airy, light-filled Falling Spring Studio are as much canvas and easel for her as gallery: Finished paintings and current work hang side-byside, two and three deep. The walls bear the pastel smudges, paint smears and pencil sketches from the different phases of her life as an artist. Photos, cards and bits of paper are thumbtacked seemingly at random, interspersed with handwriting — quotes that she doesn’t want to forget and snippets of text that suggest a title for a future painting.

Collectively, they are both abstract and representational, a metaphor for her work and career.

Painting the Place She Calls Home Suttenfield says she’s never had a mentor, but has learned from the work of other painters. “My mentors have been hanging on walls of museums,” she says, recalling a painting by the English landscape painter John Constable at the National Gallery of Art. “Not only is it large [like much of her work], but he reworked and reworked and reworked it,” she says. “The more you look at it, the more you can see, well, there were huge trees, and he took the trees out.” She likes that someone of his stature worked and reworked. “I could probably spend the rest of my life working on 10 or 12 paintings and no more because I’m constantly changing them.”

She’s also inspired by something Constable said: “I should paint my own places best.” As example, Delbert’s Bales (left). The period of painting hay bales has never really ended for Suttenfield. It led to her artwork being selected to represent the United States in U.S. embassies around the world — in Kenya and New Guinea, among others — through the U.S. Department of State “Art in Embassies” program.

The opportunity came when a newly appointed ambassador happened to see her pastels of hay bales at a one-person u fluent | 31

exhibit in 1993 at the Mary Bell Gallery in Chicago.

“I’m pleased to be part of the program,” says Suttenfield, who thinks of it as an icebreaker between cultures, a conversation starter.

In 2013, the hay bales returned in an expansive series of landscape paintings — 26 in all, the smallest 22 x 30 inches — that Suttenfield painted and donated to Hospice of the Panhandle’s new facility in Kearneysville, WV. She worked in fast-drying acrylics due to the volume of work and the deadlines.

Although often identified with that singular image, “I don’t think of them as just hay bales,” she says.

“They’re shapes…shapes that give me a reason to deal with light.” Likewise, she also thinks of the barns and silos that populate her paintings as shapes.

It’s the light in her work that Suttenfield believes makes the work uniquely her own. People tell her that when they see one of her paintings, they know it’s hers.

“It has to be a sensitivity to light and the land. Maybe it’s the way I put the painting together.” She thinks of her process as problem-solving: sketching an idea first, then figuring out how to get it on canvas.

The Light and the Dark Side Suttenfield studied art at then Shepherd College and graduated from the Maryland Institute of Art; still, she considers herself to be a self-taught artist. “I’m still learning,” she says. “It’s a lifelong process.” And while change is the constant in her “work and rework” habit of painting, certain things don’t change, like painting large. “I’ve tried to make small paintings and I just feel like I don’t have any room to move,” she says.

Suttenfield worked almost exclusively with pastels for 25 years, mainly on black paper. “The blue looked phenomenal on it,” she says.

The paper inspired the title of a solo exhibit of her work at Shepherd: “The Light and the Dark Side.”

For Suttenfield, though, the title represents more than the black paper. She says one of the reasons she paints is to prevent her from thinking about the bad times — the “dark side — in her life. “Sunlight is what’s pulled me through a lot of bad times so it’s a very strong element in my work.”

A Circle of Influence Suttenfield informs her own painting “by seeing how other artists handle a particular situation.” She names u 32 | fluent

PHOTOS Nancy McKeithen

Potomac River Travelers, acrylic, 32 x 60 inches

her friend Don Rees for his unique way of thinking about subject and process. “They say if you’re going to play tennis, play tennis with someone who is better than you are. That’s the way I thought about Don,” she says.

Wolf Kahn is another in the circle, for the simplicity of his compositions. His words, too, are on her studio walls: “A good brushstroke is worth a thousand trees.” Translation: Don’t paint every single tree. “The trick is not to paint like Wolf Kahn but to let him inform you a little bit,” says Suttenfield. And she does, with an awareness not to overdo, not to put in too much detail, to loosen up. She credits Frederic Remington for introducing her to the possibilities of painting nocturnes in the National Gallery’s 2008 exhibit, “The Color of Night.”

Others influencers include Eugene Leake for his regional landscapes; Fairfield Porter for his sense of light and space, which is what Suttenfield is ultimately trying to reach; and Jane Freilicher, who painted “inside looking out” from her home on Long Island.

It’s how Suttenfield now paints, looking out her studio windows listening to radio music in the background (“…maybe a movement I hear inspires a couple of brushstrokes”), happy not to deal with “the bugs, the the snakes, the gnats” she recalls from her early days of painting en plein air.

“Particularly since 2008, I’ve been on the inside looking out, figuratively and literally,” she says. That was the year she sold her pastels, and the year three galleries she had long affiliations with closed. She needed a new challenge. It led her back to painting with oils and acrylics, as she had in the ’60s.

Looking Back to the Future In February, the Washington County Museum of Fine Arts is hosting a retrospective of her work (see right). While reviewing her collective work with the museum director and choosing pieces for the exhibit, they noticed that verticals — columns, trees, architecture — were a strong constant, connecting her early, middle and mature work. To Suttenfield, it showed that her eye was consistent. She hopes the range of work in the exhibit — dating from the ’60s — will demonstrate “that she was dedicated, that she stayed on course, zigzagged a little bit.”

34 | fluent

Talking about what she might like her legacy to be, Suttenfield says, “I don’t really know. If some of this work is still hanging 50 years from now, I would like people to continue the conversation I started.”

What she is sure of is this, quoting Fairfield Porter: “You can never have too much yellow.” fluent

Dunbarton Oaks (Melody in Red), pastel, 22 x 30 inches

Diana C. Suttenfield: The Subject is Light Mar 1–Jul 5, Washington County Museum of Fine Arts Artist Diane Suttenfield celebrates the land and architecture of the place she has called home since 1962, Shepherdstown, West Virginia, with luminous paintings and intricate drawings.

Exhibition Preview Reception Feb 28, 4:30–6:30 pm Museum Members $15, Non-members $20 Walking Tour by Diana Suttenfield Mar 15, 2:30–4 pm, Free, wcmfa.org fluent | 35

POETRY

Inheritance After Uncle Ken shot himself Mom bought us girls an organ with the money he left.

She heard laughter in the blue cha cha and red rumba buttons.

I heard old folks moaning hymns in front pews.

Surely Ken never meant to punish us.

He wore bell-bottoms and looked like disco read us the comics, gave us an orange stuffed hippo covered with daisies.

Before the organ, the accordion because lessons were offered just across the street at the Canadian Legion.

As if middle-school wasn’t hard enough?

Not getting a part in Chicken Little, breaking the band-saw in shop and evenings playing hide-and-go seek Mom calling from the porch, Time for your accordion lesson!

Then the magnificent organist, Jimmy Holmstrom joined the Toronto Maple Leafs.

Oh, how I wanted to be him, perched above the rink like a god ordering the crowd to yell Charge.

And years later in New Orleans on Bourbon Street, my hips discovered Zydeco its old world accordion stretching and folding the night.

But I quit both the organ and the accordion unable to imagine they could bring me happiness like so many other things I inherited

and let go.

CHERYL DENISE is the author of two books of poetry, What’s in the Blood and I Saw God Dancing, and a spoken word poetry CD with music, Leaving Eden. She and her husband live in a timber-frame home they built in the intentional community of Shepherds Field, WV, where they raise a small flock of Jacob sheep.

Visit her on Facebook.

Again with the Sheep I’ve been collecting words for years for this exact day — the sun spread thick over the land thick as Dad butters his toast as if butter is better than bread, than earth.

The pond quiet as a storybook since the red-haired boy shot wide to miss, to shoo two beavers.

See the quaking maple leaves, branches bobbing, Yes, Yes, Yes. And the buttercups in the tall grass telling me be beautiful.

My golden retriever with grey-rimmed eyes — yesterday we sheared him with the sheep.

Feel, he is softer now, younger.

And I still have a little childhood inside.

Red Rover, Red Rover let Cheryl come over.

In the field with the fence yet unbroken the spotted Jacob sheep walk single file on spindly stalks down to the spring-fed trough.

See the newest lamb, white curls tight as I hold wishes, look, her umbilical cord

still dangling.

36 | fluent

Swallowing In Mrs. Ellis’ class when it was time for our test with that giant clown poster with all the colors we were supposed to know

I got stomach sick

that easy-to-slip-into sick that struck again in Nursing school, in the locker room before peds

the 6 a.m. vomiting

then walking erect, blue pinstripes, that white starched cap.

And that boy with his gangrenous foot, thin pale body pumped with IV antibiotics that would save his toes. Like me, he had just wanted to get his chores done and somehow lost his boot in the pounding snowstorm, knew, but kept on walking to the barn, milked seven cows before breakfast and his mother’s crying.

When I was twenty-five and freshly engaged my future aunt asked lemonade or iced tea? and I turned to my fiancé for the answer.

At forty-five, I was going to be the only nurse in the county making home visits by motorcycle.

On a tiny toy Honda I drew giant figure eights in the field, then graduated to dirt roads but gaunt black dogs threatened to spill me and I imagined men in pick-up trucks laughing at my efforts. And then that slight incline, that rose like Everest, while I whispered fuck, fuck, fuck, under my helmet before placing an ad in The Trader, One slightly used Honda 200.

Someday I’ll be ninety-five, a porcelainskinned nurse will enter my room without knocking, hand me a small paper cup with two oval pink pills and one blue.

I will think

these are not mine.

She will hand me a glass of water, confident in her white uniform, shiny nametag, shimmery smile. I will hesitate.

She’ll nod.

I’ll shake

the pills onto my tongue swallow.

Love, Your Meditation Bench

You never sit here anymore — I wait, straighten when you pass.

Your husband drilled, nailed, sawed pine boards propped me with rocks, in front of the pond tied a red bow to my seat and walked you to me Christmas morning.

You sat cross-legged, palms up ready, your golden retriever rippling the water, then shaking off on us.

Now all your Thich Nhat Hanh books lie shut and lonely, like you.

You think I don’t hear your prayers?

I once made and cleaned the air — breathe in, breathe out.

Hospital patients heal faster, require shorter stays less pain medicine if their window faces a tree.

You are stingy with your soul hidden under barn jackets and high school jeans as if ready for the muck and slide of joy but not really.

You want peace without work, miracles without roots.

I am pine, slow-growing, resistant to drought, surviving almost anywhere,

as you could.

fluent | 37

PROSE

Three Prose Pieces By Marc Harshman

PORTRAIT

I

for Boyd Carr

sit, as I have before, for a swift ink sketch by this wizened man with a crow’s feather in his cap. It’s almost unnerving the way he’s continuing to talk to others, telling story after story while his restless hand keeps dashing and drawing out the ink and, every five to ten seconds, looking me square in the face, finding me, the surface, the flesh, some quick mirror of the who-I-am this early morning beside the Cedar Lakes in central West Virginia. He’s legendary, I know, and I give him nothing for this but my silence. He does not need me. He does not need me to spill some conventional words of gratitude and banter — I can tell he’s got all he needs in his hands, in his pale eyes, in his stories. He does not need me to ask what the story is, where it began. He does not even need me to stay for the end of his story — his failure at something Shakespearean. He only needs to give, to give me this flash sketch of a moment, a moment in which I fill a small page we both share while the stories will go on to their lonely homes somewhere in the future, the future we may never get to know, the ink always dry before we get there, but someone behind us will name it, call us back, tell a new story — perhaps this very one — and they may call it art, call it a moment saved, call it our slender lives preserved.

Marc Harshman by Boyd Carr.

(Image provided by the author.)

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SUNDAY DRIVE “The use of traveling is to regulate imagination with reality and, instead of thinking how things might be, to see them as they are.”

— Dr. Samuel Johnson

O

ne lane winding and twisting, following one creek then another — slender threads of mirror flashing where the water moves beside me — one lane somewhere in Roane County between Johnson Creek and Left Hand. At one point I forge a low-water bridge flush with the stony stream, golden yellow shelves of poplar and hickory and oak above me. Elsewhere, up out of the run now, bright breaks of green pasture here and there show a farm hanging on. Five miles further along, window down, a dun-gray pair of wings detaches itself from the autumn mosaic of leaves — a huge red-tailed hawk trailing its feathered shadow above me.

Elsewhere, a chipmunk streaks a straight line across the road, a dog snuffles an invisible trail following its own mysteries, and as I go ever slower, I hear overhead a squirrel scold me with its quick, lisping stutter. I am ready to surrender, happily lie down, open a door. I have crossed no ocean, supplied no passport, learned no new language but….I have been reminded of this old language that snaps into place when I loose my grip on the familiar and simply leave home and go. Go towards the other and that is, of course, what has been regulated here on this afternoon drive going nowhere in particular — my imagination has met reality and seen that what might be, truly is. And enough.

“RV-1” by Robert Vellamagna, WV artist. robertvillamagna.com

u

PURPLE RIVER AND BIRTHDAY

for Bob Villamagna

T

he years should fall away when you take off your cap and salute those canaries whistling there in that stand of reeds beside the purple river.

The soldiers along its banks, the halleluiah moaning of the middle class, that pale congregation of zombies should not concern you — they are moving their show elsewhere and soon you will have no need of them, nor punch cards, nor even their sluggard children who, though they eat from your hand, will soon be screwing light bulbs and each other and the whole fucking system that eats this landscape alive. A yellow lather of sunlight is bathing the woodland, and friends call you by name and you need ask for no other. The fight will go on, but it’s a good life. Let the door close behind you. That year is gone and will not come again. Give thanks for it if you like, but then let it go and give thanks, instead, for this, the smallest moment inside a breath you had no hand in manufacturing, and so let the year begin with only enough memory to keep one foot on the ground.

Let the other lift you up the ladder toward those dreams hanging ripe and within easy reach. All you will ever want is there, and you can take a nap after lunch, and no one has to know anything about that, and no one has to be asked, and no one is going to care, and no one but you has earned this birthday, so let go, sing yourself to sleep dreaming of those canaries and a fight that might be won with friends who don’t ask and a purple river that goes on and on and on.

5.31.08

“House of Fun” by Robert Vellamagna, WV artist. robertvillamagna.com

MARC HARSHMAN is the poet laureate of West Virginia. His full-length poetry collection, Green-Silver and Silent, was released by Bottom Dog in 2012, and his four chapbooks of poetry include All That Feeds Us: The WV Poems, from Quarrier Press, WV. His periodical publications include The Georgia Review, The Progressive, Gargoyle, Poetry Salzburg Review, Fourteen Hills, Emerson Review and Shenandoah. His poems have been anthologized by Kent State University, the University of Iowa, University of Georgia and the University of Arizona.

His 11 children’s books include The Storm, a Smithsonian Notable Book.

In The Company of Heaven won the Newport Review flash fiction contest, and other recent work won Literal Latté’s Short Short Contest. Three new children’s titles are forthcoming.

Read Fluent Fiction Editor Zach Davis’ interview with Marc Harshman on page 26.

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The Bridge Fine Art & Framing Gallery

Spring exhibit, “Drawings & Prints,” opens March 21. Upcoming exhibits include Rebecca Grace Jones, Evan Boggess. bridgegalleryandframing.com

8566 Shepherdstown Pike, Shepherdstown WV 25443 • 304.876.2300 Fine Art, Ceramics, Photography & Custom Framing

things you’ll find on the fluent website all free, all the time the magazine: current & past issues to read and download gallery exhibit information calls for artists / contest info / audition listings arts & culture events listings arts class listings arts news how to subscribe, how to advertise, how to submit work, how to contact us <updated daily>

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ED:CETERA

Swan Songs in the Key of Ray Baby: Liner Notes for “Music by Design”

BY ED ZAHNISER Decades before customized playlists there was Ray Baby.

Decades before there was no iThing but iHOP, there was Ray Baby, aficionado and uber-hysterian of the Civil Wart. Ray Baby cut his playlist iTeeth in the sweet biz of 8-bit Atari “software sharing.” He early joined regionally renowned Saturday Morning Club, hosted by Mumford “Muddy” Littlewood. “Muddy was an 8-bit character with 16-bit dreams,” Ray Baby later said. “Easy as slipping a disk, software cascaded from I don’t know where into iDon’t KnowWare.” By contrast, Ray Baby modeled dignity and a probing rectitude. Sampled here are songs from one such vintage playlist suggestive of dynamic hints of a self-possessed aromatic graphic design bouquet.

“UniGrid Qui Mal y Grind” Massive Vanilla Its title a play on the Middle French Honi Soit Qui Mal Y Pense (Evil is in the Mind of the Beholder), this song was originally scored in Italy with Swiss influences whisked across the border in a vintage Fiat by a full-service graphic designer about to tell the entire world to “Go to Helvetica.” Massive Vanilla, a revival group fronted by roots-rocker Mica el Bayroot, here hews to the original grand design.

“Leila” Kinky Vanilla, with Hangs from the Top This 1970s New York love song extols the female partner in a globular firm whose principles were reputedly in bed with each other.

Kinky Vanilla vocals insinuate a cosmopolitan accent that the firm employed to get Old Worldwannabe’s to go belly-up like a pussycat and cave-in 42 | fluent

to outrageous design schemes. Imagine these lyrics in Italian: The heart is grown on a grid / And not in some Petri dish / That’s open, and lacks a lid / To keep microbes from smothering fish. (English translation: Marinara Bertolli.)

“One Signal Only, Don’t Need No Two” Toothbrush and His 32mm Black Band Legacy group 32mm Black Band topped all charts once they paired up with and dug roots vocalist Toothbrush, former lead singer for Hangs from the Top. Massive Vanilla’s one-signal dictum proved prophetic with the pandemic outbreak of social media like YouTubeless, iTireless, FacelessE-book, ConradTwitter, MySpacedOut, etc.

“How Come They Trash Our Best Designs?”

Holdfast, with Down in the Dumps Back-up band Down in the Dumps later characterized this “catchless slow-dance tune” as “like a broken record.” Massive L’Ego® graduate Holdfast insisted on performing it at every gig. Some interpreted this as penance for decades of drug-like dependence on bassist Pa Kettle, lead mime for the KnowNothings.

They’d chilled together in mosh pits at L’Ego®Mania concerts in New England during fall colors.

“Columbus Centennial A Year Late” Denace the Mennis and the Big Bold Types This vinyl-only submission was sent to the presser

by Mac LeCouteau in late 1993. Holdfast misread Hispanic as his panic and balked at attacking the job.

He’d hired a Limey designer who originally responded “Who was Columbus?” By 1993 most people asked “Columbus who?” and you couldn’t give the record away. But it did inspire Bro Bob of the von Almond Bros to produce intra-studio pseudo liner notes that became known as “Edmundo Tailors.” Office archivist VannaVanna “Bo” Panna later deemed the “Edmundo Tailors” as Bro Bob’s “career-best work.”

“O Jamestowne, Where Art Thou?”

Edmundo Tailor and the Pile Drivers Rock critic Stretch Guywire dissed this song in prerelease as “so misguided it would be the last to know what it might be about.” But hardcorpse punk band Pile Drivers tightly coagulated around the tune, and their reputation drove Tailor smiling back to Britain and Lloyd’s Bank.

“Where’s My Houston, Where’s My Book?”

Heath Barr (without the Live Kennedys) Soon after a heartfelt, bluesy lament failed to be released despite 10 years of depleting its budget, Barr did an abrupt Bye-Bye two-step. Frontman Roger of the Live Kennedys— activating underlings— whistled Barr the everefficacious “Bumptious Begone.”

“Take My Job and Shove It” Caries and the Tanbarkers This innovative tune employed random background snip or clip sounds like the eponymous background noise that named Buddy Holly’s first band “The Crickets.” One music critic, a Viet Nam-era Army veteran, described it as uncannily like “eavesdropping on an entire OJT clip joint, not some annoying arthropod hole-punching map films for a pre-digital cartographic sandwich.” A manuscript auctioned on eBay years later revealed that the original title was less trim than the published title. (Editors Note: Not to be confused with the David Allan Coe song popularized

by Johnny Paycheck in the 1970s.)

“Civil Wart Scratch ‘n Sniff” Edwin and the Double-R Bears Contract record presser Art Lithgow overdubbed this song’s bold-faced notes. Rock critic Albertine Swiffer® of Dust and Dirt fame, overhearing gobs of garbled lyrics about “the Eastern Theater,” thought that the Civil Wart had played out inside the Gettysburg Cyclorama. Hysterian Dusty Tome, backed by Roger of the Live Kennedys and the K Street lobby formerly known as Starving Academics, determined to disabuse the public of such simplistic interpretations of the war’s origins. Re-enactors now must hold a PhD. in sociology.

“Quid Pro Kaypro” 64k Blue Steel Field Case Band Named for vintage production hardware, this song eulogizes a historic personal monitor even smaller than your ATM screen. Its John Cage lyrics plagiarized from his musical score “Silence,” displayed as wavy lines uncannily like Marcel Duchamp’s cardiogram. At the eponymous 64k, the song lacked the oomphf of the later iMacs version. However, critics agree that this was more than compensated for by its lack of the subsequent annoying security issues, passwords, timed screen locks, networks, and up-start work group of nouveau high priests who considered themselves IT—in all-caps. Founding Nostalgia keyboardist Dunston “Fat Knuckles” Scotus reportedly lamented: “No way could I make music like that on my Underwood manual.” fluent fluent | 43

CODA

The Lennon Wall

The image of The Lennon Wall was made in Prague in March 2014. The Wall has been there since the early 80s and was a great source of irritation to the then-Communist government. In November 2014, it was painted over by a group of art students except for the words ‘Wall Is Over’. It has since been covered again with graffiti. Now it says ‘War Is Over’. Would that it were true!

— Keron Psillas

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