Barbicide® Feast

After Passing the Accident

George Bishop

As I move through the night, failures reach out like the poor

from their eyes and the miles begin to stretch like panthers

at dark. Even instinct was all for pulling over, waving time

by. On the seat beside me my small bag of success fit perfectly.

It was enough. Where I was going I could be late, and no one would

notice if I were early. Besides, I was just outside of somewhere,

where they thought they were going, where they thought they arrived.

The Wayne Literary Review: Escapism

Barbicide® Feast

Ian Levine

i wasn ’t allowed in the top drawer of Father ’ s bureau so i thought that’ s what would make me masculine when i looked inside, i became the Tenzin Gyatso as long as i had the discipline

i imagined touching His things in a certain order would open a door locked by an ancient order. that if i were a good safecracker, exploiting all of the lock’ s faults at last, i would feel the rugged beat of My Papa ’ sWaltz

i had to choose five of my previous self’ s things buried amongst one hundred other objects:

yahrzeit candle melted like gold fillings picking up the broadcast of Chanson d’ automne let The Life that[They]Have pass for a schilling don ’t trust the green grass on the lawn

pocketknife sharp as Jocasta ’ s brooch a patina of Apple peels Caesar ’ s wife must be above reproach before the sweetened juice congeals

boar ’ s hairbrush weathered like Ulysses ’ breaches cerulean Barbicide® waves crashing against Pinaud-Clubman fine talc beaches walnut hilt splintered but lasting

wristwatch counting time like Scheherazade ’ s tales until the ticking becomes adagio betting against C(h)ronos with a martingale as Billy said, “ so it goes. ”

The Wayne Literary Review: Escapism