December 14th, 2011 § Comments Off on Sugahtank John Roubanis – Featured Artist – December § permalink
King Kong - Sugahtank John Roubanis - on the theme of love
Dragons Do Exists - Sugahtank John Roubanis - on the theme of Childhood
love card poster - Sugahtank John Roubanis - on the theme of love
Bestial Love - Sugahtank John Roubanis - on the theme of love
Dancer Out of Gravity - Sugahtank John Roubanis - Enough Rope
Melancholic Silver Surfer - Sugahtank John Roubanis - on the theme of Childhood
Wonder - Sugahtank John Roubanis - on the theme Joan of Arc
Artist Biography
Sugahtank is a graphic artist and illustrator born in Athens, Greece. See more of his work here and hook up with him here
December 14th, 2011 § Comments Off on David Tomaloff § permalink
On David Bowie and Dancing About Architecture
What Grows In Its Place - David Tomaloff - Dancing About Architecture
DAVID BOWIE
hey kid,
look up at the stars;
do you think
one
of them
is david bowie?
go ahead
, make a wish:
dear david bowie,
I wish I had more
facebook friends
Author Biography
David Tomaloff is a writer, photographer, musician, and all around bad influence. His work has appeared in fine publications such as Mud Luscious, >kill author, Connotation Press, HOUSEFIRE, Prick of the Spindle, DOGZPLOT, elimae, and many more. He is the author of the chapbooks A SOFT THAT TOUCHES DOWN &REMOVES ITSELF (NAP), Olifaunt (Red Ceilings Press), EXIT STRATEGIES (Gold Wake Press), and MESCAL NON-PALINDROME CINEMA (Ten Pages Press). He resides in the form of ones and zeros at: davidtomaloff.com
December 14th, 2011 § Comments Off on Kevin Sampsell § permalink
on the theme of David Bowie
Labyrinth
“I want to see you dressed like David Bowie,” you said.
“For Halloween?” I asked.
“No,” you said. “For the bedroom.”
“Keep going,” I said.
“I want to see you with 70s space shoulder pads and gold tights with leather platform boots.”
“What about my hair?”
“Big and poofed up, like a lion!”
“Like in Labyrinth?”
I tried to remember if I liked that movie.
“Who do you want me to dress up like?” you asked.
I had to pretend like I was thinking about it, but the truth is I had the answer to this question in my head for most of my life. Still, I tried to play it a little vague.
“Um, I can’t remember her name,” I started, “but she’s on an album cover from the 70s and she’s wearing roller skates, striped athletic socks up to her knees, short shorts, a white t-shirt, and a satin letterman style jacket.”
“You want me to dress up like Linda Ronstadt on the cover of her album, Living in the U.S.A.?”
You seemed weirdly happy and excited about this. “And she had knee pads too,” I said.
You squinted your eyes at the ceiling fan, like its spinning above us was your brain working it out. “This might get complicated,” you said.
Author Biography
Kevin Sampsell is the publisher of the micropress, Future Tense Books, and author and editor of several books of fiction and nonfiction. His latest book is A Common Pornography (Harper Perennial). He lives in Portland, Oregon.
December 14th, 2011 § Comments Off on Jenny Forrester § permalink
Cake
on childhood
The little boy and I were at his house. It was just after his birthday party (it was just him and me) and we were standing on the picnic table because we were about to stomp around on his cake because we thought it would be fun. His mama came out screaming, “What’re you two doin’?
We jumped down off that picnic table and he ran one way and I ran the other.
She had a stick in her hand and she was swinging it. It was a small branch, she called it a switch and I could see why cuz when she waved it, I heard it say, “Switch, switch.”
She was screaming and saying things I couldn’t understand. That little boy and I ran and ran and ran.
Then my mama came over the fence. I had never in my short life seen her do anything like that. My mama was big with comfy arms for resting your head on and she grunted whenever she stood, but she was over that fence.
She went at that little boy’s mama like my dog went after a squirrel.
That boy’s mama went down and limp like that squirrel. That fast. And she was like a sock on the ground.
My mama sat down on the bench. She sat and looked at the moon over the trees – a sliver in the midday sky. She sat like that breathing and breathing, like me when I play real hard, until she was normal again.
She talked quiet and calm the way she can when she wants to and the little boy and I went to her. I sat on her lap and the boy leaned on her leg with his head against that comfy arm.
She went to touching that little boy’s bruises and cuts. He had bruises everywhere. I had never once touched those bruises.
She talked slow like a river of honey to that little boy, “I used to talk to your mama. I thought we were the same about children, raising them up right with manners. With discipline.”
The little boy backed away from her then. Fear made his shoulders rise and his face go hard and sad.
Mama looked at him like she was the angel who picks people up when they die and takes them to heaven – sad for them cuz living is good.
She said, “But I didn’t mean that the way she did.”
“She means spankins’,” the boy said.
The boy and my mama kept looking at each other with a silence of understanding like birds and small things when they all know their places.
“I didn’t know your mama had the devil whispering in her ear to put you in your place – he puts people in hell and that’s what your demon mama did.”
That little boy and I said, “Puuaa,” with our breath and then mama remembered to say, “God rest her soul.”
She picked me up off her lap and knelt down at the boy’s feet and I don’t know how, but it looked like she was gonna pray to him.
“Will she hurt me when she wakes up?”
“She’ll never wake up again,” mama said with her eyebrows thick and fallen down tree branchy.
That little boy smiled. He whooped and hollered like a little boy again.
My mama grunted and stood. “Now, it’s time for you two to go inside for awhile.”
She turned to the little boy and said, “I want you to call your daddy.”
The daddy came home and the little boy and I watched while he dug a big hole.
I never did see that little boy again.
Somebody else moved into the house.
The boy grew up, as we all did. He sent my mama letters. Photos. No return address.
“We don’t want any connections, you know.” That’s what mama said about that.
On his birthday, every year till I was grown, my mama made a big cake and we danced in it in our bare feet.
______
Writer’s Block and The Imaginary Phone Call
on the theme of Love
I say, “I’m writing a book about you and mom and I.”
“Uh-huh.”
My brother isn’t one to talk to fill the air. Well, yea, he is, what’m I saying. He totally is.
So he fills the air with his words. His rage. His…well, I’ll let him tell you.
Not that it matters, but you’re almost always wrong. And you went to college and got your head messed with – liberalized. You haven’t ever been to war so you don’t know anything about life and death. You’ve never pulled the trigger. You’ve killed, but abortion’s not the same and you know it. The wife already hates you and if you say anything bad about her, we’ll sue you. And I’d be careful cuz some of her relatives are mean as the day is long (and I mean that in a good way) and they’ll find you. Or your daughter. You should think of Emma. What’s she gonna think of what you have to say about yourself. You can’t tell her about abortion cuz then she’ll have one. You can’t tell her about your boyfriend in high school cuz then she’ll have sex. And my kids. What’ll happen to them if people find out they’re related to you – could cost them. We don’t live in a place where it’s ok to talk like you do, telling people shameful things and being ashamed of your ancestors and telling history wrong. We just can’t say things like that. And you know about our cousin, but you don’t know how he’s hurt our uncle – how he went to Vietnam and then had to raise a gay son – do you know what that was like. No, of course you don’t and you don’t spank. Your kid’s gonna grow up cussing and acting like she can do anything she wants and how’s that gonna work out for her. You know she’s a girl, right? And how’s your husband John gonna feel when he knows what you did and what you were like and he’s gonna feel so cheated.
And you never had a son either while we’re talking.
You don’t have anything to write about anyway. I don’t know why anyone should listen to you.
If you write anything about me, I will sue you.
Yea, so…
Give Emma my love. Tell John hello.
Author Biography
Jenny Forrester was the 2011 winner of the Richard Hugo House New Works Competition contest and the runner up in Indiana Review’s 1/2K prize. Find out more about her writing at Trailer Trash Writing on Facebook.
December 14th, 2011 § Comments Off on Terry Faust § permalink
On Childhood
Nick Who Became Max - by Terry Faust - on the theme of Childhood
Artist Statement/Biography
My son Nicholas posed for this photo illustration that was for an article about the connection between music and math. He later decided he liked his middle name, Maxwell (Max for short), and changed it. Thus, Nick Who Became Max.
December 14th, 2011 § Comments Off on Jenny Hayes § permalink
On the theme of David Bowie
Editor’s note: I hate to pick favorites, but I’m doing it now. Jenny Hayes, this is a masterpiece. -DRG
Dear Rosie AKA Ro-Ho-Zee AKA Rosarita Refried Beans
- Jenny Hayes, 1982
October 12, 1981
Dear Rosie AKA Ro-Ho-Zee AKA Rosarita Refried Beans,
HI! Sorry your new school is so bunk. You aren’t missing much here,
everything is pretty much the same except that Erica got a perm and so
did Leslie Stang. I have Ms. Stanford for History AGAIN!!! I thought I
left her ugly face behind in 7th grade but I guess she teaches 8th
too. My English teacher seems pretty cool. Everything else is just
blah.
Hold on I am going to put on a record, wait isn’t it funny that I just
wrote “hold on” when you haven’t even gotten this letter yet? DUMB! I
bought “CHANGESONEBOWIE” at Pellucidar and it’s hella raw. I am going
to write you while the songs are playing and that way it will be like
we are listening together!
SPACE ODDITY – Weird, I always thought this song was called “Ground
Control To Major Tom” or something like that. I don’t think he even
says “Space Oddity” in the whole song. Do you remember at Jason’s
brother’s party last year how we were all lying on the ground outside
looking up at the stars and Miles said he saw a UFO? I think he was a
big fat liar. Or maybe he was HIGH!
JOHN, I’M ONLY DANCING – That reminds me of the other day when five or
six girls started busting a move at lunch, I don’t know them but the
cafeteria ladies tried to grab them so they started to run, and one of
them tripped over something and knocked Sarah’s tray of food all over
the floor. Oh Lordy! I thought she was going to cry but she didn’t.
We all shared our lunch with her, I gave her an apple and Alexis gave
her half of a sandwich. Oops see that smear? I just smooshed an ant.
Sorry, ant.
CH-CH-CH-CH-CHANGES! “Turn and face the strange”, it seems like
everywhere I go that is what happens, something or someone strange.
But sometimes I like things that are strange! Did I tell you that Rain
got together with this guy named Marcus who is 17 or 18 and a punk. He
doesn’t go to Berkeley High or anywhere but I don’t know if he
graduated already or just dropped out. We went and rode around with
him and a couple of his friends in a van and they got us stoned and we
threw empty slurpee cups at some college students, it was hell of
funny! Then we drove past Sarah and yelled “HEY BABY” and she didn’t
know it was us! Then we went to some girl’s house and there was this
guy there who was FINE! Rain said she wished Marcus wasn’t there
because she wanted to jump on him. I talked to him a little, but
nothing really. Later we were telling Alexis and her older sister was
there and it turns out she knows all those people and she knew who the
really fine guy was. She said his name is Chris and HE HANDCUFFS HIS
GIRLFRIENDS!!!!!!
ZIGGY STARDUST – This song is soooooooo goooooood. One time Rain drew
a lightning bolt over her eye trying to make it like Ziggy Stardust
but it looked kind of weird, and it started to smear and then Alexis
told her it looked like a black eye and Rain said maybe it WAS. But it
was just eyeliner, but sometimes she can be way too dramatic.
SUFFRAGETTE CITY. Is that a real city? I have no idea what this song
is about. Except for WHAM BAM THANK YOU MA’AM! I like the piano part,
I’m gonna tell Sarah she should learn how to play it. She takes piano
lessons and she’s really good. Right now she is learning Stairway to
Heaven!
JEAN GENIE. If my name was Jean I would call myself that. Wait, do the
lyrics say good or bad things? I guess I’d have to listen closer. All
the nicknames for my name are dumb. I can’t think of anything to write
so here is a description of what I am wearing: black pegged pants,
light blue “Go Climb A Rock” t-shirt, purple sweat shirt, music note
pin, and black velvet china flats. Exciting huh? Plus I have blue nail
polish on my nails but it’s hell of chipping!
OOPS, I forgot this record player is dumb and it doesn’t stop when the
side is over, it’s spinning around and around with the needle down
going BUP … BUP … BUP … Maybe I’ll just sit and listen to that
for a while. What if it’s like one of those mantra things and if you
chant it over and over it opens your mind and you enter a new
dimension? Like the hare krishnas and the stuff they say, I don’t even
know! BUP… Maybe if I listen for long enough I’ll be in touch with
the consciousness of all beings. Maybe I will become one with that ant
that I smashed on this sheet of paper and then I will be sad. I am
going to close my eyes and see how long I can just listen…
Fuck that! I picked up the needle (it made a scratch, oops) and turned
the record over. Now it’s DIAMOND DOGS! They call them the diamond
dogs, wait WHO do they call that? Some dogs? Maybe next time I see
some dogs I’ll just go, “hello Diamond Dogs!” haha I am so weird!!!
REBEL REBEL, Rain likes this one the best, every time it comes on she
closes her eyes and shakes her head like a big weirdo, but I think
it’s pretty good too. The other day she had cloves and we smoked some
at lunch over by the hole in the fence. Have you ever tried them? I
don’t really like cigarettes but I love cloves, they make your mouth
all tingly and sweet tasting. She told me about this store where you
can buy them and they don’t even care if you have a note or anything.
I want to get some next time I have some money!
YOUNG AMERICANS. This is probably my least favorite, it’s okay but it
sounds like something that would be in a play that my parents would
drag me to and it would be some man going off about his lost youth or
something. And then he would BREAK DOWN AND CRYYYYYYYY…. My parents
had their friends over for dinner last night and they are so weird,
the lady has really long hair like down to her butt but it is going
gray, and she wore this long skirt with bells on it! (that was kind of
cool actually) The man is so funny looking, I wish I could draw better
so I could just show you. He has these weird big teeth and dark framed
glasses and this laugh that is like “HUH! HUH! HUH!” it was driving me
crazy!
FAME …wouldn’t it be neat if someday we got famous? Like if we were
all famous together, you and me and Sarah and Rain and Alexis. I know
you think they don’t really like you but they just don’t know you
that well. It’s kind of weird how I started hanging out with all of
them after you and me sort of stopped acting like friends (even though
we still were!) at the end of last school year. I always figured
sooner or later you and me would go back to how things were before,
and then we’d all be friends together, but then you moved.
GOLDEN YEARS. Golden years, mwop mwop mwop … I was going around
singing that part in science the other day, just walking up to people
going “mwop mwop mwop”, everyone probably thought I was a super freak.
Have you heard that song SUPER FREAK??? It’s hexa coo! One time me and
Alexis and Rain were singing it on the 51 and some lady was looking at
us like “How dare you sing on the bus!” But then this one guy went
“Gimme five!” when he stood up to ring the bell for his stop. We all
slapped his hand and then he said something to Rain and none of us
heard what it was but it seemed kind of perverted so I was glad he got
off the bus.
Well, it’s over. Ta-Da! (I already took the needle off this time don’t
worry) Well write me back soon or else I will beat-a your-a ass-a!
Love,
Alison AKA Ally-Wally AKA Alisonwonderland
P.S. WRITE BACK!
P. P.S. Another ant just walked on this piece of paper, but I let it live.
P. P. P.S. I saw Mr. Walter in the hall last week and he said to tell
you he MISSES YOUR BUTT!!!!!!!!!
Author Biography
Jenny Hayes grew up in Berkeley, California and now lives in Seattle.
Her work has appeared in Penduline Press, Ampersand Journal, and
Significant Objects, and she co-authors the blog Yard Sale Bloodbath..
http://www.jennyhayes.com
December 14th, 2011 § Comments Off on Brian Tibbetts § permalink
on the them of Dancing About Architecture
Simple Arsenic
It was something right there in the cold air of the small dank rooms.
The salt coast air, humidity, green, loyalty?
It ate him slowly from the inside out,
Science gave us these things of his last days.
The salt coast air, humidity, green loyalty,
A lock handed down, generation by generation,
Science gave us these things of his last days:
The cracked tea service & frayed rug, the flowered wallpaper and grinding surf.
A lock handed down, generation by generation:
Plotting in his ruined atmosphere for another run at a god’s kingdom
The cracked tea service & frayed rug, the flowered wallpaper and grinding surf
How he smashed the windows out of the cathedral
Plotting in his ruined atmosphere for another run at a god’s kingdom
It ate him slowly from the inside out
How he smashed the windows out of the cathedral
It was something right there in the cold air of the small dank rooms.
Author Biography
Brian Tibbetts is a writer, musician, print-maker and painter currently living and working in Portland, Oregon. His work has appeared in the journals Gobshite Quarterly, Abuse and Bread and Roses.He is currently constructing a website encompassing his various pursuits: briantibbetts.com
December 14th, 2011 § Comments Off on Holly Hinkle § permalink
Vuluture - Holly Hinkle on Dancing About Architecture
Spiked Fence
(enough rope)
Survival. We talked of little else.
In a book, you read how to jump a spiked fence
so you could camp in a church corridor.
You told me how you scaled it twice a day,
sometimes more, having spent the last
of your money on good rope.
I would give up everything to walk beside you.
Traffic’s taillights cast red in our hair,
our packs rising off the down of our jackets.
I wouldn’t last. I know.
I listen to the black and neon rush
of street noise through the phone.
__________
Topanga Canyon Road
(love)
In the cold pressed, gray light of the basement,
where you discovered the photo album from 1910, the green hurricane lamp,
the great iron-banded trunk you wanted to drag up for me,
I find you packed to leave the boardwalk.
Wet tarmac smell. Black as the night is long.
The road is folded down inside the trunk,
we can open the heavy lid together.
I will help clothe you in that hard, moonlit coat.
__________
Venice Beach
(love)
My sister was at work and I was away that early spring,
when our brother packed one bag for the streets.
The first night: steady rain and his drawing paper wrinkled.
It was cold. I don’t think he ate. My stomach empty that week.
I dreamt my sister and I were a part of the day he left,
of saying goodbye to him on the outskirts of Venice Beach.
From there we could see the boardwalk, smell its salt
and perfumed oils, dyed cotton and clove cigarettes.
We were not there the day he left. It is a loneliness,
knowing that he always walked on after we stopped
at the front steps of home. No memory of when he followed us inside.
He walked down a road we could not follow,
that tore like a frail map. The pieces turned into leaves.
Author and Artist Biography
Holly Hinkle has been creating collage and mixed-media artwork since 2008. With found objects and small antiques as a backdrop, she is always thinking about ways she might create exceptional beauty from unrefined objects that once had a very simple purpose. Her poetry has appeared in Poems and Plays and The Arsenic Lobster. She lives in Portland, Oregon. Beginning this month, she is Arts Editor for Unshod Quills.
December 14th, 2011 § Comments Off on Jimmy Burns § permalink
on David Bowie
Horror
Halloween night/secluded first floor apartment/vandals shot
out street lamps/shadows surrender to darkness/Friday movie
night/cable flick/Cat People/rage of leopards/cross boundary
to human form/must kill to return from transference/spooky
dude David Bowie/black garb/high heel boots/mascara and
lipstick/androgyny/howls during final credits/”Putting out fire
with gasoline”/feral felines clash/window panes rattle/renters
dive into nightmare.
Author Biography
Jimmy Burns writes his poetry from his wheelchair, parked at his rural home near Houston. Recent poetry is in Backstreet, Chest, Eds, Nomad’s Choir, Pegasus, Writer’s Bloc and Wordgathering.
December 14th, 2011 § Comments Off on Joey DAMMIT! § permalink
on David Bowie - FAME- Joey DAMMIT!
on Enough Rope - Rasputin RIP - Joey DAMMIT!
on Love - Leonard Cohen - Joey DAMMIT!
Artist Biography
Joey DAMMIT! is a mixed media/collage pop artist. Born in Madeira, Portugal, DAMMIT! immigrated with his family to Toronto, Canada at the age of 4.Joey DAMMIT! is the three time winner of Toronto’s NOW magazine’s “Best Visual Artist” award. He has been featured on numerous occasions in print and in electronic media, winning some prestigious awards along the way. The Toronto Star, Canada’s largest newspaper, hailed his work as “Warhol in a head-on collision with David Lynch.” His art has been called “brilliant and original” by Mix Arts magazine, and “edgy and darkly funny” by Toronto Life Magazine. He was recently chosen by Inside Entertainment Magazine as one of the “Six Canadian Artists To Watch”. DAMMIT! is especially proud of being the first Canadian artist to be featured on the Naked News. More of his work can be seen at his website.
