Phoenix - Fall 1985

LH

:-rb' P3 i<)g5 ro. ) I

v.~i

no .\

PHOENIX

LITERARY ART MAGAZINE Volume

27,

Number

Fall,1985

Editor

Managing Editor

Designer

Art Editor

Photo Editor

Fiction Editor

Non-fiction Editor

Poetry Editor

Special Projects Editor

Copy Editor

Advertising Manager

Forrest Craig Kecia Driver Andy Edmonson Amy Fletcher Jennifer Kautzy Alicia Long Diana Morgan Haley Panzer Greg Spinner John Vance

Jane Pope Eric Smith

IV

~sl1Y

('oF.

tl0 â&#x20AC;˘.;\1 _

'n~r::-. "::3

Copyright 1985 by The University of Tennessee. All rights retained by the indil idual eontribulOrs. PHOENIX is prepared caIJjera-ready by student scaff members and is published three times each year. Works of art, non-fiction, ficcion, and poetry are accepted chroughout che academic year. Send submissiolls to PHOENIX, Room 5 - CommUllicacions Bldg., 1345 Circle Park Drive, Knoxville, TN, 37996-031<4.

8

25 28 28 34 35 38 40

"It'. all In ,our timed" by Kirk Smith Untnled by Victoria Kryah Untitled by Valerie Clark V.E. Da" Pari. by Heather 'Joyner Vld.o Stili. from "Preclou. Photo." by Kirk Smith R.vlval by Connie Thalken Marked Transpar.nc, by John Campbell M.nag. a Uno by John Campbell At the Bord.r by Susanna Harris Warrior by Caryn Kreitzer Swl.. by Jimmy Schneider Th. Last Thr. . Month. II by Gail Lipscomb Untnled by Barry Fleming Thaw by Mary Jo Gigax Mike by Accident

2

Th. FI.h Story by D.E. Daugherty

14 14

15 20 22 24 24

"..... .1

:

.'.

by Amy West Have you noticed it yet? Work by"'internationally known artists is in your own backyard on the UT Sculpture Tour.

18 Th. Chrlstma. Concerto by Shera Gross

12 Low Roller. by Rex Leatherwood 12 Th. Go..lp Shop by Jane Sasser Coffey 13 13

28 28 27

M.ath.ad Revl.ned by Rachel Jennings Ba.k.tball Jon.. by Ian Joyce Tur. .n by 'leni Turleigh In Sharon, T.nn..... by Ellen Wright Lo.... by Jeff Callahan A.htra, by Bob Rogers

by Beauvais Lyons Explore the enigma of the lost culture of the Apasht.

38 38 Quns by Jeff Callahan 37 37

ho da, Inn by Ian Joyce South of ".mphl. by Rex Leatherwood

The oil painting on the cover is by Lori Marks, senior in the Bachelor of Fine Arts program at UT Knoxville. The work measures 72" x 102". ~...-....... .

..,

by Richard S. Keith

Richard S. Keith takes you on a magical mystery tour of Knoxville's own artful rockers, HQ.

HOW A PHILOSOPHER VIEWS "THE ONE THAT GOT AWAY" he Gods first make mad those they would destroy. My question to you is who are the Gods and what is destruction?" Before 1 could answer, he added, "Let me tell you a story. It's true and not too long.

You will be surprised."

The grey man with the long face star~ at me from out of his strange mist. Why should I listen to this fellow? I had only just met him as I came to fish on the long pier that pushed into the sea. We sat toge路 ther: he on a bucket covered with a board, me on my tackle box. We had talked of tragedy.

"Where is today's Oedipus," he asked? I wondered how he meant it. I stared at the lines that started beneath his eyes and found their way across the high bones in his cheeks to his mouth and chin. He wore an old suit coat that was too large for his shoulders, beneath that a greying hairy chest and T-shirt. He took his old captain's hat off and wiped his brow with his coat sleeve. He turned looked out to sea. "Have you ever wondered whether it is the sea that is fascinating or if we have not merely turned our own fascination towards it?" 路 It's much easier to say now, but then I had very ambiguous feelings tmvarC1S/ this dispirited, slightly bearded face. 1 was interested. Was this some rare to learn some hidden mystery forged by a life of suffering, or was this a person infirm mind, the apparently harmless kind that wander about every town? Or maybe he was a spinner, a spinner of tales. Already he was somebody; at least me he was.

"I'd like to hear your story." The request sort of fell from my lips, as if it had been waiting for some time to let go.

He reached for his rod, raising his tip just enough to feel the pull of the line.

He rested it against the rail. orty years ago," he began, "a young philosophy student was on a weekend in the Canaan Mountains in northeast Connecticut. He was alone. He often would walk in the area around Bradford Mountain lost in the rarefied aether of Husserl, Schelling, and Alejandro Korn. He was smarter than most, I guess. More show than substance, though there was substance too. Put yourself in this scene. You have been reading about death. A philosopher has written that it is simply the negation of life. At the same time, you have also been reading about symbols and their potential for universal meaning. And you yourself wonder: 'Is there a contemporary archetype, a death that is understood as negation? Do contemporary ideas have to develop contemporary myths? Is there a figure in some time, or place, or stpry that could, in fact, give structure to

MF

2

"YOuJ:jn.complete,toohgllt$?'" , n,',,' '·,Theideas$eeffi 'tofollow a 'dialectic pattern, keeping time' with you as you " ;':1likJ'alo~g the'crestof a ridge. 'you taKe in theslln ~nd trees, ~lie light tha{1shines , .' through the green and brown shapes. The earth' seerits rich <'~" nd~full of life, yet it is ' warmed by a blanket of dead leaves. You are not prone towards taking clues ,frOth nature or providence, but neither are you above it. The cycles of nature , seem' very real to him. He wonders now death can give life. As you come to the • end of ,the ridge. the foresftumbles down before you into a small lake. You have never seen th~sllake before. It is green-brown', small ripples, marsh on one side, forest completing the rest of the shore. It is much the same as other small lakes, but he wondered why he had not seen it before? He anticipated providence."

The long face looked at me. He tested his line again. ':You have the picture." He stared out at the waves near the shoreline. "Now is the time for interpretation. As he walked down the slope, he noticed a white door set in 'the ,hillside'. Some sort of official monitoring station he thought, but : ';even thep his intu~ti.on·~as far ahead. The incline down was rough; he almost fell <once,' Near the bottom of tIie hill, al~ost to the lake, he did fall. He yelled just ,~.before h~ hit his head. In his unconsciousness he dreamed of Lazarus, lying bound'tn his winding sheeL Lazarus' body lay but one in rows and rows of , shrouded ~orpses. Sud~enly, his burial cloth grew into a sail and in it Lazarus was lifted~.from the- ma~ses." , .e awoke. It was dark. The first thing he noticed was cement floor. It was cool and smooth. His head hurt. There was a knot and what felt like dried blood. He sat up and listened, There was no sound. His eyes had adjusted to th~ darkness, but he still could not see. There was absolutely no light.

It occured to him that he had never experienced such total darkness. He made a slight noise by pulling his feet to his chest across the hard floor. Nothing. Where wa$ be? He reached ~out and felt ,~ hard .walL. It was slightly textured, again like cement; He followed the wall aro'und. It seemed to be a circular chamber. There , w~s no doorway. A loud 'Hullo' was unanswered. This young man then did what '~ ~nYon.e ~ighfdo; s~t i~bwn and began tQ ask himself wh~re he might be. Two b;~U)i1iteS' ocCuI-ed to him: either, he had been 'carried or had wandered in a daze itlt~ t~is' place, or 'and l\ere is where our hero presumed on providence, he was d~~d~ , It struck him:; Dead! H~dn '(he fallen and hit his head? Hadn't he been

1

"I

,, '

"

~

'1 ,

.,

I ,'

"

'

' r,

#~

I

e',~'

h;

t

, 'n

3 "

,

,.

I

.~ ..

~'

'

------------

--路路-----..~~f -- ~

-7'& '

I

't

synthesis. He conjured the picture of time and eternity swirling in some metaphysical soup. ." his way back to his camp. He was unsuccessful when he tried to 'find the lake with the white door. The few he told the story to always seemed to be waiting for a punchline. He c~ntinU(!d his schooling. The whole time , froIlln underclassman to doctoral thesis he built on the event. He continued to feel he had been given some special revelation, the reward of an unusual roll of dice. He had died, and yet not died. It was nothing. Birth had followed death. He wrote a book, in fact, several books. They were much read. Flattery and imitation followed.

There were strong words spoken in many circles. Some said his philosophy established new possibilities. Many became his students, formally and informally. His every thought became important to them~ where he lived, what he ate, even his furniture and housewares became part of the myth. Later, it seemed the myth needed new forage, and he moved out of the classroom and into politics. He was thrown out of several countries fer his agitation. His political activities ev~ntually led to the death of several extreme followers. Their death gripped him in a way he could not negate." he long face grew hard as he drew the last sound of . the word "llegate{j out into a heavy pause ...

He continued. "Gradually a type of inertia overcame hiTIl and compelled him to return to the mountains." ' The old man began to wind up his broken fishing line.

"While in the mountains, he bought a little magazine. It was a regional publication, full of anecdotes about the area; That night Cl,S he sat beneath the stars he turned to the book's table of contents. A story caught his eye: Chapter IX, DO 1>EAJJ MEN WALK AWAY? A STORY FROM THE ~EAR~Y DAYS OF THE CANAAN MTN. WATER PROJECT. The stoty was written by a surveyor with the .state, of Connectisut, name of Mal?.Qe. He wrote how he h~d found a stranger lying dead in the woods, a bad cut in the back of the head . .Mr. Malone had come from inside the project when he heard a man's yell. The water in the lake had been let down to expose a maintenance door , The surveyor carried the dead man back through the door into the project and set him in an underground chamber through which

water would one day flow to the Housatonic River. Afraid that animals would get to the corpse~. Mr. Malone pulled the ladder up and carefully locked the door. Later when he came back, the body was gone, It was quite a mystery. Some wondered if the man had been really dead. Mr. Malone said it made no difference. Without the ladder, the only way out of the chamber Was down a long tunnel. It was regularly filled with water and would flush anything in it down the side of a mountain. Mr. Malorie was sure aperson would drown there.

The surveyor completed the story with the note that a th?,tough ,search never found man or body." 'he old man had IJeen gathering his,things and stood there looking at me, ready to leave. "The man that mythologized a generation was a fool. The event was merely an aocident; he had provided the myth." The long face was grim, even angry. He stared at me, then turned and walked down the pier.

"But tell me," I said, "weren ~ t you the young man?"

"Of course," he answered over his shoulder.

J wanted to say more. "But, but. .. " Fie stopped and looked at me. I had really met a man with a story, a mystery man. I. had many questions, but this time no words dropped from my lips.

I stuttered again.

He looked at me then at my rod then back at me. "You've got a bite. '" And the long face was gone.

T

Schooner with a Worm on Board IlJreely Myatt, Fulton, Mississippi

Some people feel that the works can't be classified as "real" sculpture. Others mistakenly say that the university is wasting a fortune on the tour, and fume about their student activities fee being spent on such a "mindless project."

"Students have a misconception that they're paying thousands of dollars (through the student activities fee) for 'this junk,' as they call it. That goes back to a popular notion that all modern art is incredibly over-priced. People think that artists are charging a fortune for something that didn't take any time to make, when the opposite is . true," said a liberal arts major who has enjoyed the tour.

Contrary to popular opinion, in the last three years the university hasn't spent any money - from the student activities fee or any other funding base - to buy or rent the sculpture in the tours. The university gets the sculpture free because the artists are willing to donate their works for a year. The artists also pay for transportation costs of the sculpture if they live more than 300 miles away from UT. The university has also been lucky to have overhead costs minimized because Peacock, the creator, organizer, and curator of the tour, volunteers his time. Since Peacock donates his time to arrange the tour and the artists don't charge for the sculpture, the only cost to the university in the past three years has been the expense of the brochure.

But as the tour has grown from a seven-piece show by local artists into a 22-piece exhibit by sculptors from across the nation and Canada, the financial support from the university has also finally grown in the tour's fourth year. This year, for the first time, the tour was allotted some funding from UT's Cultural Affairs Board. The extra funding allowed eight artists to receive $100 honorariums for their participation. lthough Peacock is glad to be able to offer the honorariums, $100 is only a token gesture to a sculptor, and it won't even cover the transportation costs for some of the sculpture, he said.

"Richard Hunt would look at this (the $100 check) and say, 'What is this?'" Peacock said. "In the real world, artists really get paid for

A

10

doing this kind of thing."

"Our budget is enough to get through, but it's not as much money as it takes to replace goalposts," said Peacock, who would like to have enough funding to buy some permanent sculpture for the campus to complement the annual tour.

"Unfortunately, people often think that they're being ripped off when they're dealing with an artist," Peacock said. "But really, it (the price of a sculpture) boils down to about a dollar an hour for the artist. " While some people resent the tour because they mistakenly believe that it is expensive, another reason people may react negatively toward the tour is that they have an old-fashioned view of what sculpture should be, Peacock said.

"People are still looking for the-man-on-the-horse," he said.

"Then along comes this. Suddenly we have live artists floating around the campus. Live, living people who are trying to say something about the world. You don't have to agree with them. It's a learning process for us all.

"Give it a chance. It takes more than two minutes to look at sculpture and decide if you like it or not," he said. egardless of certain public opinions, UT's sculpture tour has brought commendations from art museums. It has sparked spinoff tours. It has brought sculpture by internationally-known artists to campus. And as professionals are showing enthusiasm for the tour and encouraging it, there are also those on campus who support the tour, although the art department and Peacock may hear more of the negative comments.

"I appreciate having art thrust under my nose because I don't have time to seek it out," one student said. "Besides, you walk around campus the whole damn day - what else is there to look at?

"It adds texture to campus. ยงtudents lean against it. I like the idea of students using art like trees," he added.

If vandalism can be used as a gauge, more and more people on cam-

H

Cento I Barry Tinsley, Chicago

s people become more aware of the sculpture tour, the less antagonistic they are. . . . After people have been exposed to outdoor sculpture,' they begin to develop a discerning taste. " pus may be accepting the tour, said Paul Toth, graduate student in sculpture.

"As people become more aware of the sculpture tour, the less antagonistic they are. Vandalism has decreased from a work being destroyed in the first tour to almost no vandalism at all last year, he said.

"After people have been exposed to outdoor sculpture, they begin to develop a discerning taste. Initially, people say everything is bad.

But you develop a relative sense once you've been around it, and you begin to discern. People are becoming educated to it. They're becoming tolerant.

"The works in the tour don't express any wild new movement in sculpture," Toth said. "They're not avant-garde by any means." he works may not be on the cutting edge in sculpture, but some innovative ideas have been incorporated in the tour. Interaction with people is one unexpected twist found in the outdoor tour this year.

Greely Myatt's boat-on-a-pole sculpture has a periscope that a viewer can look through. If you squint, you can see a preserved worm on the ship's deck.

"More and more sculpture is interactive. You can walk through it, over it. It turns, it spins, Toth said.

"One of the fun aspects of the tour is that there are things to discover. You have to search to find things out," Toth said.

Each sculpture is like a puzzle waiting to be solved, and you may have to view the sculpture from several positions before you catch the sculptor's message.

The "Briar Patch," located next to Myatt's sculpture, looks like a man-made, prickly briar patch when you are standing next to it. But if

I

you come across the front lawn of the Art and Architecture Building and look down at the sculpture from the wall there, the image of a briar patch disappears and the shape of the United States becomes evident. tanding next to the base where Myatt's sculpture is anchored, you have to tilt your head back to get a bottom view, and its identity may not be clear. But when viewed from Volunteer Boulevard, you see the sculpture as a boat floating along the wall.

Larry Millard's "Volta" may look like a "beagle cage" as Physical Plant workers call the chain-link fence, marble, steel pipe, zinc, and bronze sculpture, but its design goes much deeper than a dog cage.

The sculpture is actually a battery, and a small electrical charge can be measured.

Artists approach the university's outdoor tour in different ways.

Some artists design temporary works specifically for the tour, while others exhibit works they hope to sell.

Myatt's boat was created especially for the tour. "Greely created it, his whole reason for creating it, was for this show. It's very close to an artist thinking out loud. He's getting his idea, his attitude out this year. It will last this year. He has no real intention of it lasting forever," Peacock said.

While Myatt created a temporary work specifically for the tour, a group of artists from Chicago have a another perspective, Peacock said. "The Chicago group has a totally different attitude. All of their works are durable, strong, solid. They're preserving their idea. Their work will outlast all of us."

Another sculptor in the tout:', Julie Warren Martin, expressed the same views for the stone sculpture she exhibited in the tour. "We're all going to die. We'll turn to dust, but our art work will remain."

S

11

Low Rollers

The Gossip Shop

It's fear that brings them, huddled in Clutching their bags with straining eyes Like juking half-backs To spend their time between The clanking and the clattering.

The women pray to the cornucopia of fruit Oh, please, they whisper to their catholic god New bedroom furniture, a nicer place to live The men trade chips like aggies They caress the green felt as they would The swaying backs of the glittering nudes Seen in the twice-a-night show. They Dream of enough. Outside, Past muggers and hookers Who dream of getting in, past The initialed boardwalk and beer-can sand, The sharks sleep and dream of getting in.

My brother called it the gossip shop.

When Mama returned from there on Saturdays, hair newly dyed, curled, and sprayed into place, he would grin across the kitchen at her, asking, who left who this week? whose daughter is getting married? and who had to?

Rex Leatherwood

Miss Colon's was a mysterious place.

Her shop was full of the smell of spray, crammed with pink polka dot chairs, trays of burly brown rollers and handsful of bobby pins.

Outside was a pine tree and a blue pond--Miss Colon trod out in white nurse's shoes, shouting, don't you go near that water! /IT

Miss Colon cut my long brown hair just before I started school.

Lonesome for the swinging pigtails, I let it grow again--One Sunday morning as Mama wound it into curls and ribbons, my brother told us he was marrying Sheila.

My mother's hands weaving hair never stopped.

She whispered, I know.

I heard .

Jane Sasser Coffe,

12

Meathead Revisited

Basketball Jones

In waltzed Papa from the day's peace march Wanting dinner on the love rug NOW; then, Always au courant, he switched on the set.

Twirling TV dinners on TV trays, His tart creeped in wearing a peasant blouse And undersized panties from Woolworth's.

I crouched shamefaced at Papa's nude feet.

Some spilt berry wine beat a path through his gauche Goatee---Plop! It splattered his ripe tee-shirt.

Crazed Kamikaze wine! I turned round and Flirted with my food. Scraping the curdled Tomato sauce from the soyloaf, I路 Smeared it across the dingy bleached cabbage.

My eyes slipped off to the fuzzy TV; War in living color kept the medics away.

The War Dead floated in oozing mud, their Stewing blood seeping through their leafy green Uniforms. "Shouldn't we ship the War Dead to The Little Starving Africans---before That meat just rots?" I asked. My elbows pinned His knees. He fended me off with his fork.

His vacant, hardboiled eyes rolled back to the set.

Yes, I noted the vulgar Goldwater eyes.

You're wrong, Papa: I DON'T choose to forget.

Basketball Jones on the hood of a '63 Buick surveys his domain through yellow eyes the skinny boys arching through the Louisiana dust.

Here he holds his world on a fingertip, makes it dance, spin, a picture of body english that leaves fate limping in one sneaker.

Ian Joyce

,

Rachel Jennings

13

Untitled / Victoria Kryah / black and white photograph

Untitled / Valerie Clark / black and white photograph 14

V.E. Day, Paris / Heather Joyner / black and white photograph 15

PLAT ..: IX

EXHUMING THE APASHT by Beauvais Lyons "For lack of a better name, the mysterious people from the Hindoo (sic) Kush have come to be called the Apasht, an Urdu term meaning 'the unintelligible.'"

Aziz Farhat Rashiduzzaman Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, 1926

18

lowe my discovery of the Apasht to a futile search for an obscure edition of Sir Thomas Browne's Urn Burial in the basement of I. Donnelly & Sons Rare Books. While combing through numerous uncatalogued manuscripts covering subjects as diverse as Antediluvian shipbuilding, Eznymian horticulture, and Llhuroscian frescos, t located a massive folio entitled Catalogue of the Apasht Excavations, Vol~rile II. Upon opening the volume, I first noticed the printed end-paper seal which portrays two anthropromorphic lions holding a shield with the narrte of the publisher: Hokes Scholarly Lithography. The title page indicated that this 1933 edition was translated from a French version published four years earlier. The manuscript also makes reference to Volume I, which, despite a lengthy search of dusty shelves, was not to be found.

Volume II of the Catalogue of the Apasht Excavations documents work undertaken by the Delegation Archeologique Francaise en Afghanistan from 1922-28. The catalogue contains ten large chromo-lithographs which reconstruct the Apasht Creation Codex, an ancient clay book which is thought to be their myth of creation. While the manuscript lacks a definitive interpretation of .J the codex, it does refer to a sacred Vedic poem entitled the Mamayabharana, which is thought to be the earliest written

Before time, that was this, this was that, and all was the same.

Vessel for its own seed and egg, one in turn begat two .

In time all that is caught fire, separating the earth from sky.

Two became four, and hence became more.

The sky was sad and wailed, forming all that is wet.

In the land of the low sun, they wandered hills and forests .

The earth reached to comfort the sky, amd mountains loomed upwards.

Doing as the progenitor, they ate of the mountain top.

Bathed in the juices of heaven, the earth and sky embraced.

Dreaming of every changing, all forms and colors were theirs.

With one pass of the moon, the first spirit was nurtured.

Like breath they filled existence, resting at four earthly corners.

Turning in umbilical warmth, was the first and sex-less one.

From which they became us, as we are today.

1'1 \It

reference to the Apasht. A translation by Abel Bergaine of this ancient poem is reprinted above.

A principal motif which is common to both the Vedic poem and the Apasht Creation Codex is the primordial hermaphrodite, referred to as the "first and sex-less one" who is a "vessel for its own seed and egg." The Mamayabharana also appears to allude to the ancient homeland of the Apasht (the Hindu Kush) in the passage: "In the land of the low sun, they wandered hills and forests."

Despite these clear associations to Vedic culture, very little is known about the Apasht and no comprehensive interpretation of the Apasht Creation Codex has been made to date. Needless to say, I found the Catalogue of the Apasht Excavations, Volume II both curious and attractive, and purchased the tome from I. Donnelly & Sons Rare Books for a modest sum.

Several years passed before I received correspondence from Mr. Herbert Ashe , Curator of Ancient Art at the Akersloop Atheneum in the Netherlands. Mr. Ashe informed me that I possessed the only known copy of the Catalogue of the Apasht Excavations, Volume II. He requested permission to obtain the manuscript on loan for a major exhibition the museum was assembling on Apastology. While I cherished the book, the exhibition offered an important opportunity to share my good fortune with a much larger public. As such, I had the catalogue crated and shipped overseas to the Akersloop Atheneum.

Six months passed without any word from Akersloop regarding the exhibition or the condition of the manuscript. I became seriously concerned and wrote to Mr. Ashe requesting prompt return of the catalogue. To my dismay my letter was returned by the Dutch Postal Service informing me that Akersloop is a small rural community having no museums of any sort. Fortunately I had taken photographs of several of the books plates from the catalogue, which are reproduced herein. Yet, despite the form and craft of these handsome prints, I shall always ponder whether the Apasht, like the Akersloop Atheneum, is a work of fiction.

III

1'1 \It. XI

PIM. XII .J

Beauvais Lyons is an Assistant Professor of Art at the University of Tennessee.

17

THE CHRISTMAS CONCERTO

By Shera Gross

holding the Christmas song. I approached amid the priestess's papers and knelt to hear the innocent words of wisdom. ".Hi. What's your name?" I asked gently.

he high, dark room at the Children's Hospital was filled with the twinkling shimmer of fake Christmas icicles on equally fake Christmas trees. Costumed adults looking suspiciously like large elves circulated among the parents and ailing children. They tried, sometimes with success, sometimes not, to coax timid smiles from the children. Santa Claus weakly ho-ho-hoed, and the children smiled and reached for the candy he offered.

JJ

/eaving among the throng, I

r r searched for the one child to

make the story come alive. The one whose heart would sing the song of Christmas I would commit to paper for thousands to read in the morning news.

The one who would finally bring the meaning of Christmas beyond candy and toys.

I was closely being followed by a Junior League priestess who collected the parental signatures for each young patient I talked to. No sense of posterity motivated her. Only the fear of a lawsuit.

A tiny, yellow-haired girl glowed a small-toothed grin and sat watching the scores of her peers and the elves' hijinks. Here, surely, must be the heart

18

Silence.

"Won't you tell me your name?" I coaxed.

"Missy," said her mama.

"Okay Missy, are you having fun?" I silently pleaded that she would answer.

Silence. And then a timid "yes."

"Do you lik~ Santa Claus?" I asked stupidly, still coaxing, hoping.

And the grand reply, "yes," with a rewarding, innocent smile.

Not even enough for a quiet refrain.

She is too young to carryon a conversation, I realized. I smiled back and moved on.

Surveying the gathered children, all that was visible was a sea of casts, wheelchairs, and swaying IV's. But not all the children were encumbered with the hospital paraphernalia. One boy was sitting with his mother and looking a little bored. I barely said hello before the papers started to fly.

"Hi, are you enjoying the party?" I tried jovially. he searching adolescent gaze connected with mine and, "Sure, it's okay."

"Are you looking forward to Christmas?"

"Oh yeah. I asked Mom to give me a new stereo, you know, and a bunch of different albums. Dad promised me a BB gun, but Mom about had a cow, you know, so it doesn't look too good for the gun."

T

..l..

-

"Right. How long have you been in the hospital?"

"Jeez, you know I'm not really sure.

Seems like forever, you know.

Sometimes the days just kinda run together." He looked off vaguely.

I began to feel hopeful again. Maybe this was it.

"So how long has it been, Mom?" "Well, it's been three days, but the doctors say they are just about through with the tests. Thank goodness Corey , won't have to spend Christmas in the hospital.' , Close but not quite. Back into the crowd with the fearless paper handler and a newly arrived photographer in tow.

I began to wonder if Christmas meant nothing but Santa and goodies to children. It certainly is the biggest toy fiesta of the year.

1

went on to interview three more kids, before I found myself just turning around in circles still without a Christmas story. I felt like giving up, but instead I thought I would try just one more child.

I spotted a lanky black girl watching the skits without a smile. A red baseball cap was perched upon the pig-tailed head as she propped her elbows up and hunched her shoulders. Her mother stood like a sentinel behind her. A strong-looking woman with a road-map forehead and weary eyes.

"Hi, what's your name?" I smiled.

"Amy." Her warm brown eyes reassured me, giving me hope.

"How old are you, Amy?" "13."

"Are you enjoying the Christmas party?"

-- -

..

-

_..

..

-

-

Amy was wearing a baseball cap. She had not been to school in over a month and the prognosis was about 50/ 50.

been to school in over a month and the prognosis was about 50/50.

Amy would probably be in the hospital on Christmas Day. "Yes, it's fine," she said somewhat listlessly.

I began to feel like I was losing her.

"Are you in school right now?"

"No, I'm too sick to go." She hung her head.

"Do you miss school?"

The cap's bill came back up and Amy smiled for the first time. "Well, I miss my friends, but I sure don't miss schooL" Amy laughed as her mother and I joined in. I felt a little tension ease. he told me she had a brother and a sis~er at home, and that she

' S

had been in the hospital for a month.

Reluctantly, I asked her mother about Amy's illness. She haltingly told me Amy had just been diagnosed as having leukemia. The doctors had started chemotherapy. I then understood why

Amy would probably be in the hospital on Christmas Day. I turned back to Amy. "Do you think you are going to be all right?"

"I hope I will," she said as her now sad brown eyes began to melt my heart like a warm rain on old snow. I knew I had to ask that one, most dangerous question.

"Amy, if yoa. could have anything you wanted in the world for Christmas, what would you ask for?" I asked holding my breath.

A

my thought for a moment seeming to look about the room for inspiration. Slowly, her head turned back and her eyes connected with mine. And softly, ever' so softly, "I'd like a bicycle."

And I knew I couldn't stop tears from

slipping under my eyelids, and I had to reach out to touch this brave and solitary girl. I leaned down and hugged the fragile body gently as Amy cried.

Her tears mingled with mine while the photographer, the priestess and her mother all wiped at their eyes. I let her go and she carefully settled herself back into her gray rubber and chrome wheelchair.

19

Video Stills from "Precious Photos" / Kirk Smith

20

21

22 Revival/Connie Thalken / black and white photograph

23

Marke d Transp arency (Image from Video) / John Campbell

Menag e a Uno / John Campbe ll / color photogr aph

24

-- -------_--.

-- -------_-.

---- - _-â&#x20AC;˘. .

-x 80" At the Border / Susanna Harris / acrylic on paper and canvas, 60"

25

I

Tureen

In Sharon, Tennessee

Around the chilled tureen I place ten fingers.

In Sharon, Tennessee my eldest aunt gathers the green apples which have fallen from the tree they are so bright and round, their skin-firm, unblemished--each belies its early fall

Mneme calls a scene when he and I dipped carefully in soupy soup for the hot Greek lentils.

Ladle game.

Then season set out nowness of Helios' summer ego.

My hands!

My hands! ... and pot cannot tell.

In the barn, my uncle moves hay down from the rafters he is old now and thinks it is winter Out of his jacket pocket, he takes a wallet and from the back of the wallet, a photograph a smile my aunt, her sixteenth birthday, and on the back December 21, 1929 '

'Ieni Turleigh The wind was blowing something fierce when this was taken.

I doubt if you can tell who it is.

Mattie P .S. Don't look at the mud on the car-Look at me.

--my aunt's voice from the side yard-sour as crabapples asp-ominous My uncle shrugs undiscerningly turns off his hearing aid, turns back eyes on the photograph, smiling She was 16 and he 24 and they went into Kentucky outran my grandfather and married during the Depression her green eyes, warm the winter

Ellen Wright

28

Losses 1.

In 1973, behind a locked door in my parent's new paint-stinking split-level,

2.

Late in early life I have come to remember myself to myself, to sit on a porch

I could almost weep for my 1001 losses, both real and imagined, for my Irish-English grandfather, whom I had barely known, who

in white of day, looking all the way into that dark that separates then from now.

And it's strange, or is it?,

had sunk into cancer like a lung filling with water, whose funeral had been a blur of boredom and confusion to me,

that I should have married a woman who wants so little of the past save that it stay where it is, huge and inconsolable, a woman

almost weep at being rejected by my first girlfriend, Tamara Gladden, who I'd not yet even met, or do we plan these

without fear or hope, whose shy openness tells me everything I know is wrong or beside the point.

things beyond realizing it?, weep for my beautiful yellow-haired sister, the one thing I wanted more than dreaming,

And times when we fight and show our ugly-f; ces, I can feel myoid losses rattling my gut like a meal I can't get rid of.

I remember week-long fights between my parents, my father, master of imagined loss,

but could not have, for all the old reasons, obvious and not, almost even, though it wasn't fairwhat they were, at not being born to smarter, better-looking parents like John-Boy of TV's The Waltons.

Sullen and soon embarrassed, I spent most nights in my room.

relentless in his abuse-bitch, cow, slut-until my mother would finally have enough and scream I'm leaving, I can't

I had an old Silvertone guitar and record collection to console me, and, also, I'd just started to look at a few books, and even to get

take this anymore, not moving from her chair as my father, satisfied, would bend over her, mumbling I love you

something from some of them.

But there were times when nothing could console me, when longing for that one someone or something other chewed at my sleep like fever, when the mere thought of woman, maybe only the thought, was enough

between kisses and smiles.

Jeff Callahan

to induce in me great bone-shucking spasms, fear at all I might never have, or, having it, all I might lose.

27

BY RICHARD S. KEITH

here is an old white house on the west end of Highland. Often there is an old gray van parked outside in the driveway.

Sometimes at night you can hear music coming from the house. It is the house where HQ lives. Actually only three of them sleep, eat, and pay rent there. It is where their music lives.

Once inside the house, you go through the front room, through a set of French doors into the practice room, which is a small dining room converted into a rehearsal hall, stuffed with a drum kit, a stack of keyboards, an amp and mixer in the corner, a beat-up old couch, and colored wires running everywhere. It is an exceedingly small space even without all the equipment. They have trouble finding places to fit ashtrays, fans, and glasses of water necessities for music. Quite a bit of the drum kit is still in boxes. There is little room to move around. Yet, HQ

J

Photograph, b, Jamie Gannon

comes together here to compose and play their music. The room is, appropriately, the very center room of the house.

T

his band and their music and their house brings to mind another band. The Band, a group of musicians who had

spent the better part of ten years backing up other musicians, took off and rented a big pink house in West Saugerties, New York and set about playing their own music in the basement. After some time had passed, The Band released their first

record, an album entitled Music from Big Pink. It featured a sound dominated by group vocalizing with a heavy emphasis on keyboards and ensemble playing, and it launched them on another decade of music as a highly influential group. While HQ has yet to record an album or back up Bob Dylan, they do have certain qualities that can remind one of The Band.

Like The Band, the core elements of HQ have been together for some time, avoiding the incestuous band-hopping that takes place in small scenes like Knoxville. The Band gigged around behind Ronnie Hawkins, Bob Dylan, and their drummer, Levon Helm, for years. Margrit Eichler and Alan Gullette of HQ have known each other for almost seven years, both being U.T. alumni. With Margrit playing keyboards and writing most of the music and Alan drumming, they have been playing music together with various musicians for almost five years. Mark Maxwell, a once and future U.T. student, was added on bass about two years ago. While temporary additions came in and left, Debbie Hughes was added on lead vocals.

The most recent permanent member to be added was guitarist Drew Duvall, a computer science major. If that recent an addition threatens to upset the familiarity theory, you have to know that

keyboard weirdness. Similarly, each of the members of HQ has a distinctive voice in whole, and their music draws much of its spirit

Margrit has known Drew since they were in high school. In addition to their lengthy acquaintance, there is the matter of that white

from the decades before them, particularly the Seventies. But HQ is

house on Highland where Margrit, Alan, and Mark live -

L

that

house where you can find Debbie's van out in front quite a bit of the time. A bit like that old axiom about the family that plays together.

H

Q's sense of community is apparent in the way their music is written and played. Margrit usually comes in with a

argely self-taught, the members of HQ claim many of their

influences from the Seventies art-rock scene. Alan's drumming has obvious ties to such rhythm aces as Bill Bruford and Neil Peart, yet he is a much more bedrock drummer, being

propulsive and varied while avoiding the flash and excess that sometimes mars the performance of the aforementioned drummers.

keyboard part and lyrics. The others occasionally contribute lyrics and music as well. Drew even brings in his own inimitable

Mark's bass playing has similar ties to the big, crunchy, busy style of art-rockers like Geddy Lee and Chris Squire, yet he is more driv-

songs. This, to return to comparisons, puts Margrit akin to Robbie

ing and less concerned about virtuosity. The rhythm section of HQ,

Robertson,

ch~f

songwriter of The Band, who put forth his songs

(and others') to the highly individual players to be made into their music. The tune is hashed out, the players figuring out their individual parts and fitting them into a whole. Arrangement is a largely collective effort. The music that results bears the mark of

32

far from a retro-act.

for all its weighty past influences, more often comes off surprisingly contemporary. On some tunes, their attack and hustle reminds one of the punk-jazz-funk of Mike Watt and George Hurley of the Minutemen. No noodling here, just the essential pulse tarted up a bit. The guitar of Drew Duvall is raw in tone, but, not unlike

each member, yet is remarkably seamless, with the full sound of a

Robertson of The Band, he is content to play what fits. Drew's tex-

cooperating ensemble.

When it comes to the players and their sound, again one can

tural work and curt breaks are refreshing considering all the

draw inference from The Band. The Band's members each found

mindless soloing and ego-thrashing that often inhabits the rock genre.

their primary collective sound from their years of backing up rockabilly legend Ronnie Hawkins and also playing Dylan's electric

sion of the band's synthesis of)he past into something new. It is

folk-rock. Then there were individual quirks, like Rick Danko's

refreshing to hear a synthesizer not farting, squealing, or funking

distinctive James Jamerson/Motown bass and Garth Hudson's

along as they have done almost exclusively the past five years.

Similarly, the keyboards and vocals of HQ reinforce this impres-

The cheery track behind the vocals belies the edginess of the lyrics, subverting the message into one less ominous than implied -

sing-

ing a sad song and making it better, so to speak.

That is perhaps one of the more significant facts about rock music that needs to be emphasized. Very few musicians will pull their lyrics away from the music, the music and its delivery being crucial to the emotional payoff. The appeal of someone asking, "How does it feel?" in a quiet measured tone, or in print, such as on the page you are reading, is minute compared to hearing Bob Dylan squawling out "HOW DOES IT FEEEEEEEELL?" in front of Mike Bloomfield and a host of sidemen. The lyrics are only part of the story. ach HQ~ong creates a different distinctive mood. The open-

E

ing of "Should You Believe It" starts with the band playing

eighth notes in a low ominous melody, the drums keeping

on the eighths, holding back, while Debbie uncoils the vocal line

over the top:

Shollid YOIl believe it If he says he's lying No one really knows His face is so complicated **

The band holds back the kick, kind of like The Who holds back in Margrit's synthesizer is long on melody and graciously short on

"I Can See for Miles," until the chorus, where the drums break out

gimmicks and flatulent overplaying. Her use of electric piano is

from the eighths and ride into a steady groove with a ride cymbal

stu nningly fresh-sounding in this age of synthesized chicannery. The

ticking along. Margrit is behind Debbie on vocals while the

very tones themselves are reminiscent of the early days of jazz-rock.

keyboards, bass, and guitar work the soaring melody until the song

Combined with the musical interplay of the instruments and the oc-

slides back into verse.

All in all, "Should You Believe It" is one of their more powerful

casional tricky meters and changes, one can see another influence peeking through the chinks in the music. With Debbie Hughes' tart

and engrossing pieces of music. But, there are more upbeat tunes,

vocals sailing along on top like a southern loni Mitchell, Margrit's

such as the waltzing "Harvest," or the bouncing carnival-like

harmonies and occasional leads, and Drew's good-timey drawl on

keyboards and bopping groove of "This is the Day." There are

his own tunes, HQ presents a fascinating musical experience.

rockers like the Pink Floyd-y cruise of "Outside," Drew's riff-

heir music is honest and without the weighty pretense that

rocker "I've Got a Big Dream," and the occasional cover of the

would eventually help bring The Band to its knees in the

"Peter Gunn Theme."

Q's music, just like The Band's, shows thought, care, and

detachment that so often seeps into music that tries to be artful.

H

Over the push-pull chug of "Busy Signal", a striking set of images

no longer able to progress or surprise. HQ has yet to garner the

mid-Seventies. They are free from exhortations to party all night and the existential angst of the morning after. No anarchy in the U.K . There is surprisingly little ironic distance, the kind of

lea p out:

variety live or on tape. Also, they have yet to develop that performer's distance that prevents communication, that

very distance which turned The Band into a monolithic institution critical and commercial praise that many other area bands have attained, but HQ has some things going for them that may help as-

sure it. They are a unique, tightly-knit group with a certain crafts-

Noontime, cars go by PIlII .rOll from JOllr sleep Y011 hllrl cllrses At their metal feet *

manship about their work. Dedication shines through in conversation with them. Regardless of any other events, one can imagine them gathering in the center room in that white house on the west end of Highland to play their.Jmusic for some time to come.

* copyright Debbie Hughes and Margrit Eichler

** copyright Margrit Eichler

33

Ashtray

Quits

When the headlights are on it is illuminated. Even closed a bar of light squeezes through .

The ashtray slides out like a mortuary slab with last summer's cigarette ends twisted, cold, unidentifiable.

It holds things burned out, smoked down, sucked into her lungs and extinguished. Virginia Slims wearing the red bracelet of her lipstick.

We are partners in crime, this ashtray and me. My not smoking hasn't made us less close. We know the cigarettes lit, the faces instrument panel green and silent.

We know which roads, the way home.

Sometimes alone on that 300 mile drive I pull out the ashtray and look at what is there.

Because the air conditioner's on the blink the house is too hot for cooking.

We take our beer and celery out on the porch and sit in the cranky air, swatting bugs that crave the whiteness of our skin.

Bob Rogers

This is the hour when evening spreads pink linen across the sky and the hummingbird calls it quits, jamming its quick syringe in on'e final flower.

Across the street the divorcee who "waves but never speaks" washes her pickup r suds splashing the pavement, brightening the black oil spots.

Weekends her lover comes and they take off-to Paris for all we know-but she's back every Monday.

That could be him in that B-17 up there, stretching threads of smoke across the last blue patch of sky in her honor.

We eat, minutes turn away from us like chidden moons.

Night comes on and we step inside, the divorcee finally looking up, waving as she dumps black water from her bucket.

Jeff Callahan

38

holiday inn

South of Memphis

nine a.m.

South of Memphis, began the land Of porches lit by yellow bulbs.

I closed my eyes and settled down Into the humming Greyhound seat To dream of tattered wings that strummed Against the screen of Grandma's porch.

in the holiday inn of dull, tn. is a mouth full of plastic icecubes, smoke from year-old cigarette butts, series of cheap landscapes for windows, and the mothers

Passing the levees and moonlit fields, I awoke to a rusting Fina sign And guided my dreams to dazzling days: The summers spent with Mother's kin On one-square-mile of wooded hills And spring-fed quicksand bottoms.

I dreamt again of how I killed the deer That drank each dusk and came so close It seemed absurd to shopt. Again, I looked into its eyes then stirred The still warm guts and felt The emptiness inside of me.

of alcoholic siamese twins ranting their woes

Awakening to the emptiness, I pressed my face against the glass and felt the coldness of the night

on channel 12.

Rex Leatherwood the price of escape is high, packaged in a neat bundle of wallpaper and blinking neon.

Ian Joyce

37

38

Thaw / Mary Jo Gigax / gouache, 22" x

3~''

39