Saragun

I Grind My Teeth: Oral Poetry by Jordan Eve Morral

It was kindergarten.

The creepy guy on lunch duty

pulled my teeth out with a wrench.

They fell out in a clump

of enamel and gum.

Still, I felt convinced

they wouldn’t notice.

I lost my teeth again –

the four front ones on top.

They remained in my mouth

with Scotch tape, held down.

My teeth are so loose

they protrude at all angles;

My lips have parted,

forever alone.

It’s weird. In dreams

I’ll be endlessly falling,

my throat slit,

a child’s voice calling,

but I only wake up scared–

delirious and delusional–

when my fangs are not bared

and able to reflect the moon.

*Dreams of lost teeth commonly symbolize feelings of insecurity, loss, or transformation.

I have always been interested in the concept of dream interpretation, yet I am always going

back and forth between believing and not believing the accuracy of a real-life translation.

However, I have been dreaming about losing my teeth for as long as I can remember. Starting

in elementary school and continuing into the present day, I have had the lingering fear that I will

one day soon be without my teeth.

The hard thing about this constant worry is that I am afraid I will never be able to rid my mind of

it. Teeth are so often the focus of my dreams that I spend my waking hours thinking of them too.

Unfortunately, this leads to more of the same dreams. I cannot stop the cycle.

It is for no other reason than my recurring dreams that I wrote this poem. On some level, I think I

expected it to be a form of catharsis. In this aspect, I believe I have failed. I have simply

confirmed how much time I spend thinking about my teeth. I am perpetuating the cycle.

Jordan Eve Morral

(Image is of the author)

Oxymorons by Jordan Eve Morral

We know clouds are water vapor,

but we’re still amazed they float.

We know trees are turned to paper,

but how, we’ll never know.

So many little things,

make so little sense.

But since they are ordinary,

questions make us sound dense.

We may be too easily transfixed–

insane and dull and dumb–

but we see the world with wonder,

seeking all of its wisdom.

We are wise fools.

The “wise fool”:

An oxymoron that, like the rest,

is contradictory but makes perfect sense.

Jordan Eve Morral

(Image is of the author)

The Rime of the Globalised Mariner. In Six Parts (with bonus track from a chorus of Greek Shippers) by Michael Bloor

First Published in Sociology, 47(1): 30-50, 2013 doi: 10.1177/00380385112448568

(Editor Note: Due to some slop dished out by WP, we have decided to show a better looking version of this fine article, which first appeared on New Years Day–LS)

Part One

(Another Edit note: The parenthetical material in darker font corresponds with the material above it; “call and response” is the theatrical term.)

It is a global Mariner,

And he stoppeth one of three.

‘By thy long grey beard and glittering eye,

Now wherefore stopp’st thou me?

(A globalised Mariner

meeteth three gallants

outside a shopping centre

and detaineth one.)

‘The centre’s doors are opened wide,

And Bourdieu got it right:

Consumption lends distinction.

So get you out my sight.’

(The Consumer protesteth

against detention outside

the shopping mall.)

He holds him with his glittering eye –

No Big Issue 1 sale is sought,

But fifty yards from B&Q

The would-be Consumer’s caught.

(The Consumer is spell-

bound by the mariner and

constrained to hear his tale.)

So spake the doleful mariner,

Transfixing with his e’e,

In fluent, graphic English –

The language of the sea.

(Proficiency in English is a

requirement of a seafaring

career.)

‘I had no wish to work on ships –

Filipinos know it’s hard –

Mouths were many, jobs were scarce,

From birth my life was marr’d.

(The Mariner telleth of early

hardships and how he and

his parents were cheated by

the maritime colleges and

the crewing agents.)

‘From green island homes we travel,

As mariner, nurse, or maid,

And remit 3 to our loved ones

The pittance we get paid.

‘Father scraped up money

For training college fees –

A scam of the local senator,

Whose throat I’d gladly seize.

(Filipino maritime training

institutions are often

controlled by persons with

powerful political

connections.)

‘The college had no equipment,

Just endless, pointless drill,

No qualifications either –

The news made my father ill.

(The academic training

often follows a military

model and is of poor

quality. And it does not

qualify cadets for

certificates of seafarer

competency without

additional practical

experience – ‘sea time’.

Most colleges fail to

arrange ‘sea time’ for their

cadets.)

‘Course passes gained no certificates,

Without some time at sea.

There was no ship to serve on,

But the senator had his fee.

‘Father paid a crewing agent:

Yet another fee required,

But at least I’d get a berth,

And that’s what we desired.

(Many ship operators out-

source crew recruitment

and employment to

specialist crewing agencies

with offices in the major

labour supply countries.

Cadets graduating from

maritime colleges must

pass a basic safety training

course before they can go

to sea. The courses are

usually conducted at

specialist training

institutions with requisite

equipment such as

lifeboats. State regulatory

agencies inspect the

training institutions to

ensure the requisite

equipment is present, but

not that it is used.)

‘The agent sent me to train then

At a dismal-looking place

More fees and little learned,

Sad repetition of my case.

‘A lifeboat stood on davits,

By a creek filled-up with mud.

“For audit purposes only”,

That pristine lifeboat stood.

‘There’s so many schools for training –

Why’d the agent send me there?

The training was quite useless –

Why didn’t that agent care?

‘It seemed he got a “rebate”

(kickback to you and me)

For every trainee sent there,

A percentage of their fee.

(Corrupt crewing agents NOTE WORK FROM PRINT TO FINISH

distort the seafarer training market)

‘They issued my certificates,

But their paper had a price:

My father’s hard-earned money,

Stolen once, then twice.

‘Ever since it’s been the same:

When I come home from sea,

The agent wants another course,

And I must pay the fee’.

Specialist short courses

must be taken to allow

employment in particular

trades, such as tankers.

Usually, the seafarer must

pay the course fee.

[Enter Chorus of Greek Shippers]

‘O woe to us, and to our ships,

But what are we to do?

The wages they are paying now,

Won’t draw a young Greek crew.

‘So we take these global mariners,

Who’re really up for it,

But they can’t begin to work a ship:

Their training’s frankly s**t!

(Ship operators moan that

international standards of

seafarer training are not

being properly enforced.)

‘Someone, somewhere, should sort it out,

We’ve really had enough:

Inspect and close the colleges,

It’s time for getting tough!’

PART II

Consumer groaned to Mariner:

‘So you each believe the same!

But if all think your training’s s**t

Then, truly, who’s to blame?’

‘Our union said, there is a law –

A real law, no invention –

That lays down training standards,

An international convention.

(The Mariner relateth that

there are international

standards on seafarer

training.)

‘Government should enforce it,

End the bribing and the feigning,

Close-down the useless paper-mills

And give us decent training’.

(But these international

standards rely on national

enforcement.)

‘Yes, yes’, the Chorus chorused,

‘Our ships need well-trained crew.’

‘So what went wrong?’ Consumer asked,

But the Mariner hardly knew.

‘There are no simple answers,’

Voice grated, knife on rock,

‘The true path’s no open highway,

Good governance no wind-up clock.’

A gaunt figure stepped among them:

He gave each a piercing look.

His boots were worn, his cloak was stained,

And he bore a calf-bound book.

‘Who art thou?’ they cried in wonder,

‘And what thing’s your burden there?’

‘I’m the Inspector,’ spake the stranger,

‘And the Law’s my burden fair.’

(An Inspector calls.)

The Chorus shrank and muttered,

The Mariner downed his e’e.

‘I’ve heard tell of you,’ he whispered,

‘As have all who sail the sea.

‘You come aboard, unheralded,

You seek out the rusting hulks:

You cow the cruel masters,

Ships’ agents get the sulks.’

Consumer viewed Inspector,

Eyes lit with wild surmise:

‘It’s up to you to punish,

Right wrongs, and nail their lies?’

‘In truth, that is my duty –

The goal for all my kind –

But the journey is a long one,

And the road’s not paved, nor signed.

‘Those who inspect the colleges

In each poor country of the Earth:

They’re government employees

And are not paid their worth.

‘The owner is a man of power,

The inspector – he is not,

The one dines in his castle,

The other in his cot.

‘The inspector has a check-list,

To work through, line by line.

If a lifeboat’s at the college,

Then it gets a tick – that’s fine.

‘We know it can’t be launched:

It’s to be ticked, naught more.

Poor men must heed the letter,

Not the substance, of the law.’

(The Inspector concurreth

with the mere lip-service

maritime colleges pay to

international training

regulations, but believeth

that the local inspectors are

powerless to obtain fuller

compliance.)

The mariner had silent stood,

Hands clenched and visage pale,

Eyeing the Inspector,

As he ground out his tale.

‘I thank you’, cried the mariner,

‘Now I know the bitter worst:

No remedy in law books –

My mates and I are cursed.’

The Greeks had been quite nervous

While yet the Inspector spoke,

But confidently dealt with

The Mariner and such-like folk:

‘Don’t blame the law, nor malice,

Nor trade that’s getting slack,

Global economic forces

Stapped these burdens to your back

‘Colleges could train you better –

With lifeboats working too –

But higher costs would close ‘em down,

Then where’d we find a crew?’

(The ship operators see

poor-quality training as an

economic consequence of

the seafarers’ need for

cheap training.)

The Inspector laughed most harshly,

And turned to face the Greeks:

‘He who looks for truth

Must beware of that he seeks.

‘Good training’s too expensive:

The poor can’t pay the fee.

You state the matter clearly,

And I cannot but agree.

‘Yet I can well remember

When companies paid the fees,

Time-Past – they paid for training,

Invested in their employees.

(The Inspector recalleth that

40 years ago, it was

commonplace for ship

operators to pay for

seafarer training through

cadetships and

apprenticeships.)

‘You complain of training standards,

Cackling like geese

You want action to be taken,

But you don’t pay a penny piece.

‘It seems to me, hypocrisy,

When the poor turn-out their pockets,

To criticize their training,

While adding up your profits.’

PART III

The Chorus blushed and shuffled,

But still they stood their ground.

They’d got their MBAs,

They knew their case was sound:

‘You’re talking of the past,

Dim, distant days of yore,

We don’t train our seafarers –

We don’t employ ‘em any more!’

Consumer quizzed the Chorus:

‘You don’t employ your crew??’ –

‘Our labour’s all outsourced,

‘The late-modern thing to do.

(The Chorus confirmeth the

Mariner’s tale that crewing

agencies, not ship

operators, employ

seafarers. Agencies then

contract with operators to

supply crews with the

requisite qualifications.)

‘If a shipper paid for training,

He’d have an extra cost,

He’d be under-cut by others –

His business would be lost.

‘Pay for training? Better wages??

Remember shipping’s quite anarchic:

We’d love to be more generous

But you cannot buck the market.’

The Inspector gave a mirthless smile:

‘The market’s always cited

As a sovereign power and reason

Why wrongs cannot be righted.

‘But the remedy is simple here:

The flag-State of every nation

Shall charge a levy on each ship,

Paid at each ship’s registration.

(The Inspector proposeth a

training levy to be paid

when each ship is

registered by the flag-State.

See Afterword.)

‘The levy would pay all training costs,

A burden shared without distortion.

It would pay for good inspections too –

No need for doubts or caution.’

The Mariner did slowly nod:

‘The scheme would work – I see –

My last ship flew Mongolia’s flag,

For a three-thousand-dollar fee.’

Although Mongolia is 850

miles from the sea, the

Mongolian People’s

Revolutionary Party

granted a license in 2003,

to a Mr Chong Kov Sen, a

Singaporean businessman,

to operate the Mongolian

Ship Registry. Mr Chong

previously operated the

Cambodia Registry under

license until 2002, when

the license was withdrawn

following international

protests at Cambodia’s

failure to police its ships. In

2008, 73 ships were flying

the Mongolian flag.

‘Mongolia?’ quizzed our Consumer,

‘That’s surely rather queer?’

‘Not really’, saith the Inspector,

‘Some think a proper flag too dear.

‘Each ship is like a piece

Of far-off, sovereign soil –

Its flag denotes allegiance,

Republican or royal.

‘The flag-State has a duty,

Be the country rich or poor,

To check each ship is ship-shape –

As laid down in the law.

‘But flags can be commodities,

And flags can be for rent,

To businessmen and lawyers,

Who’re out on profit bent.

‘When ships are policed badly,

Their seafarers should beware.

Policing ships for profit

Is a mighty strange affair.

‘Some run their business well,

Some run it as a racket,

With only one objective:

To make themselves a packet.

An OECD report states that

‘a significant percentage of

total vessel operating costs

could be saved by sub-

standard operations’

(OECD 1996: 27).

‘Now, compliance is expensive,

So compliance is a sham

When the flag a shipper flies

Really doesn’t give a damn.

‘A shipper heeds his costs,

A shipper looks to save,

But if he flies a cut-price flag,

Consequences can be grave.

‘Ships that fly a proper flag,

And meet their obligations,

Incur much extra cost

To comply with regulations.

(Thomas Gresham, a

sixteenth-century

Chancellor of the

Exchequer, found it was

impossible to improve the

quality of the English

coinage, by simply issuing

good quality coins. People

hoarded the good coinage.

So it was necessary to also

withdraw the clipped and

debased coins from

circulation. Hence

Gresham’s Law: ‘Bad

money drives out good’.)

‘If they wanted well-found ships,

And skilled, contented crews,

They should have thought to ask us,

Or given us some clues.

‘Truth is: they don’t want “good,”

Or freight rates getting steep.

We skimp, they save –

Truth is: they’re wanting “cheap.”

The Inspector sighed in turn,

‘Some charterers do care,

Oil majors first and foremost,

Others – rather rare.

The Oil Companies

International Marine Forum

(OCIMF) has set up and

funded its own private

inspectorate, SIRE, to

ensure the seaworthiness of

tankers under charter.

Those tankers deemed

satisfactory on inspection

can expect more business

and better terms from the

oil majors, eager to avoid

the bad publicity of marine

pollution incidents.)

‘Oil majors don’t like bad headlines

When tankers hit the rocks

And oil pollutes the beaches

Because the ships are crocks.

‘The public doesn’t like to see

Seabirds black with oil;

Alas, for all the tanker crews,

The public doesn’t care at all.

‘So the tankers get inspected

With much resource and care,

But the crews of all the rest

Make do with me…and prayer.’

PART IV

The Mariner then spoke up:

‘Christian, Buddhist, Hindu, Turk,

Many pray who sail the seas,

But their prayers concern their work.

‘We do not fear a foundering –

Hull pierced, stove in, or rent.

Such a thing may happen,

But it’s a very rare event.

‘Pirates may seize the ship,

And hold us on foreign soil,

But what we fear most is different:

It’s the endless, grinding toil.

‘Each and every ship we join,

Seems there’s fewer crew,

An officer gone, a rating gone,

But there’s still their jobs to do.

(Increasingly, ship operators

have been seeking to save

crewing costs by reducing

the number of watch-

keeping officers. Where

second officers have been

dispensed with, then

watches must alternate

between the master and the

first officer (mate),

although each of them has

many other duties to

perform. An OECD

(2001a) report instances a

saving of $37,000 pa by

under-manning a 20-year-

old 30,000 dwt bulk carrier

by two crew.)

‘The master now must take a watch,

Though there’s paperwork aplenty.

So many crew have disappeared,

The vessel’s almost empty.

‘The master’s nodding on the bridge,

His tired eyes are red.

He’s still to call Head Office,

Before he gets to bed.

‘The mate then takes a watch,

Though it’s two days since he slept –

Problems with the cargo –

But his watch must still be kept

‘The master’s nodding on the bridge,

His tired eyes are red.

He’s still to call Head Office,

Before he gets to bed.

‘The mate then takes a watch,

Though it’s two days since he slept –

Problems with the cargo –

But his watch must be kept

‘Turnabout, the two must watch,

There is no other way,

Six hours on, six off,

Twelve hours in every day.

‘In sickness and in health,

Each watch they duly take,

Dog-tired, red-eyed, grey-faced,

Four months, four months, without a break.

‘No gentle couch our cabin:

The ship is pitching in the waves,

There’s engine noise, vibration,

Yet we sleep the sleep of babes.

‘Too soon, too soon we’re wakened,

We scarcely catch our breath.

An ignoble thing, this tiredness –

As if we slowly bleed to death.’

Part V

As ever when the Mariner spoke,

The Greeks did swell with pride:

‘There is no law that’s broken there,

There’s nothing for us to hide.’

‘You surely lie,’ Consumer cried,

‘I know little of the sea,

But to have a master standing watch –

That’s folly, plain to me.’

The grim inspector then did speak:

‘In truth, they break no law.

The law itself is here at fault –

Therein we find the flaw.

‘The law on Minimum Manning

Lays down for every ship

The crew that must be carried

On each and every trip.

‘What is the minimum manning?

This is what we’re taught:

It’s the smallest competent crew

To bring a stricken vessel safe to port.

(In fact the maximum

number of daily hours of

work for watch-keepers is

specified by the IMO as 14

hours, and the maximum

number of weekly hours is

91.)

‘To make that stricken vessel safe,

Huge effort they’ll expend,

Yet must they slave thus daily?

Til their contract’s at an end?’

Consumer scratched his head:

‘If some members of the crew

Exceed twelve hours each day,

Surely that’s illegal too?’

‘We falsify our working hours’,

Replied the old seadog,

‘To keep the owners happy,

Each day, we flog the log.’

(Falsification of working

hours is so widespread in

the industry that it has

entered everyday slang as

‘flogging the log.’)

‘Then change the minimum manning law –

No more idle chatter –

Require crews to be larger,

It seems a simple matter.’

(Consumer doth not

understand why the flag-

States at IMO do not

change the international

legislation to provide

adequate crewing numbers,

allowing shorter hours.)

The mariner sighed and shrugged.

The Inspector took-up the tale:

‘Flag-States must vote the change,

Or else the measure fails.

‘Flag-States that exist for profit,

And take the operators’ gold,

They can’t increase the crewing costs –

They’ve reputations to uphold.

‘The flag with the greatest tonnage

Flies o’er the Panama Isthmus,

When Panama votes for change,

Then turkeys’ll vote for Christmas.’

Part VI

[All in chorus: …]

‘So come all you kind consumers,

Who the honey’d wine have sipped,

Take pity on the mariner,

Beware how your goods are shipped.

(It is suggested that public

concern for seafarers’

welfare might act in the

same way as public concern

about marine pollution and

be transmitted down the

supply chain from

charterers to ship operators.

Operators who could

‘brand’ their vessels as well

crewed could then

command premium freight

rates.)

‘The crews are outsourced workers,

A study in dejection –

Casualised, long hours, poor training –

And the law is no protection.

‘If charterers thought the public cared

How seafarers are mistreated,

They’d pass the message down the line:

“Our consumers are quite heated.

“It’s bad for our public image,

Like seabirds and pollution,

So get your act together,

And find a true solution.

“We’ll pay your higher freight rates,

If you’ll deploy more crew.

Or we’ll contract your opposition –

See if they know what to do.”

‘So the shippers get the higher rates,

Increase the crews and cut the hours,

Strike the flag of Panama,

And so, at last, they smell of flowers.

‘One day it really just might happen,

A fairy tale come true,

It’s even very possible,

They’d employ and train the crew!’

For an ‘Afterword’ describing in detail the political economy of the global shipping industry, issues of seafarer training, industry regulation and enforcement, please refer to the original publication in the journal ‘Sociology’.

Michael Bloor

These Wood Entities by Jordan Eve Morral

It’s the trees that make me cry

more than anything.

The hemlock stands strong

with its twigs of green and cones

until the last moment

when snow hides the earth

and deer eat the branches bare.

The red cedar stands alone

in fields long abandoned.

Slow but steady it grows

Only to be chopped for chests and posts.

The blue spruce lives long,

valued for its beauty,

but outgrows its friends

well after they are gone.

The red pine feeds mice and birds of song,

but, in eating the seeds,

these creatures devour descendents.

The catalpa with its beans

would seem exempt from my sorrow,

but it too has flowers that quickly fade.

The syrup maple is kind with abundance,

and thus has its sweet sap stolen

before it ever has a taste of itself.

The reason, my friend, these wood entities

bring such strife and pain

is because of the human struggle they endure.

Mankind inflicts the destruction,

and suffers the denouement.

Jordan Eve Morral

(Image is of the author)

Castles in the Air by Bill Tope

(Today we welcome back Bill Tope,–who appeared earlier in a collaboration with Doug Hawley–for his first solo appearance on the Springs. The image is by our friend CJA)

Tommy’s voice was low-pitched and urgent as he murmured beseechingly to his wife. She didn’t respond. He gazed at her, strewn across their bed, her auburn tresses spilling over the pillow. She looked beautiful to him, despite the way she’d let herself go since the baby died. Tommy remembered that it had been only weeks, but the heartbreak seemed to stretch back as far as he could recall, years almost, owing to Rachel’s mental history.

The child they had waited for five years for had been stillborn and it still took his breath away to remember. Rachel had taken it especially hard. She felt as though she had let him down. He was forever telling her she hadn’t failed him. That sometimes, things just happened. She worried that it was because she had smoked occasionally during her pregnancy and had maybe one or two glasses of wine, late in her term. He told her she was mistaken.

“Baby,” he said, “you need to get up and take a shower. Brush your teeth and wash your hair.” It had been so long since she first became immersed in her grief.

“I can’t,” she said simply.

Tommy nodded. He understood that he would just have to be patient. What was it the priest had said? Time heals all wounds or some nonsense like that. But maybe it was true.

“Can I get you some fresh clothes, Rach?” he asked.

She sniffed her bed clothes and nodded. “I’m sorry I let myself go, Tommy,” she said in a small voice.

“It’s alright,” he told her. “You heal. Take whatever time you need I’ll be here for you.” Tommy slipped from the room and closed the door behind him. Thank goodness people had stopped dropping by to offer condolences. They meant well, he knew, but each time they tore the wound wider. It would just take time, he told himself again.

All their lives was wrapped up in just the two of them. Diagnosed years before with avoidant personality disorder, Rachel was inordinately shy, withdrawn and non-assertive. She had drifted from one unchallenging job to the next since her marriage to Tommy, four years before, at age 21.

“I quit my job today, Tommy,” she said one day.

“But why, Babe?” he’d asked. “You loved that job.”

Rachel had been employed at a nursery, caring for and selling plants. She adored all living things.

“Mrs. Dickinson,” she said, “told me I wasn’t doing a good job.”

When Tommy called her boss, she told Tommy that she had merely made suggestions to Rachel, regarding how she could make more sales.

“Rachel got very upset, Mr. Johnson,” said Dickinson. “It wasn’t even criticism, and she went all to pieces.”

Tommy explained about his wife’s diagnosed personality disorder and intense shyness and her boss seemed sympathetic. “Tell her to come back,” she said. “I’ll hire her again. She’s very good with the plants, but she gets her feelings hurt easily.”

But Rachel wouldn’t return to Plants R Us, saying she felt inadequate.

The first year of their marriage, at Tommy insistence, Rachel had seen a therapist, but the results were a mixed bag. Dr. Fuller explained Rachel’s condition to Tommy, who attended the last session with her. The doctor said that based on his private talks with Rachel, he concluded that emotional abuse during her formative years and sexual trauma at 17 had led to her condition.

“She never told me about emotional abuse,” Tommy had said. “But, she almost never talks about her family.” She had told him about her rape as a teen. Intimacy between them had been touch and go.

Because of her associated depression, the therapist had prescribed some antidepressants, but they seemed to have little effect.

One day Rachel approached Tommy and placed her arms around his neck. She didn’t often show overt affection, thought Tommy.

“Tommy, I want a baby,” she’d said.

This was wonderful news, thought Tommy. “Are you sure, Rach?” He had begun to despair of ever starting a family.

“Of course,” she said, leaning in for a kiss. “It would make my life complete.”

Rachel’s therapist had retired, so Tommy consulted Rachel’s personal physician and asked what he thought.

“Could be the best thing for her,” declared the elderly doctor. “Might straighten her out.”

The pregnancy had gone well. Rachel seemed to have found a purpose for her existence. She stopped smoking for the most part, and drinking and getting high. She was attentive to her diet and got plenty of rest.

Then she lost the baby. In her seventh month, things went all wrong. Rachel felt sharp pains in her abdomen and began bleeding. Tommy called an ambulance and rode in the back of the vehicle on the way to the hospital.

“I’m with you, Babe,” he told her. “You’ll be alright.” But she wasn’t.

When Tommy asked her OB-GYN what had gone wrong, she said, “Mr. Johnson, there was no way to foresee what happened to Rachel. Sometimes there is no reason. Shit happens,” she said bluntly.

“I can’t wait till the baby’s born,” said Rachel dreamily from their bed several days later. She ran her hands over her belly.

Tommy stared at his wife. He had been warned by the doctor that he contacted over the web that Rachel’s reaction to her grief might be fantasy-prone personality or FPP, which she likened to maladaptive dreaming disorder, which she’d had as a teen, but with a difference.

“Your wife may not recognize what reality is and be able to tell it apart from the fantasy world that she creates. You really should seek professional help for your wife, Mr. Johnson, outside online resources.” Tommy agreed that he would.

But when Tommy brought the subject up with Rachel, she was resistent. “I’m getting better,” she claimed. “I’ll tell you what,” she said, “I’ll get out of bed and take a shower and wash my hair and get dressed in clean clothes and you’ll see, I’ll be all better.”

Reluctantly, he agreed. And for a short while, Rachel was vastly improved, if not quite her old self. She fluttered around the house, busying herself dusting and mopping and so on. Tommy had to tell her to rest up, which she did.

Next day, she was again languishing in the bedroom, listless. She practically stopped eating. Tommy began to worry when she started losing weight. He entered the bedroom bearing a tray on which he brought her a toasted cheese sandwich and a bowl of tomato soup, long her favorite. She promised she’d eat it, but when he returned an hour later, the meal sat untouched.

Tommy glanced at his cell phone and noted the date: Oct. 30. Today was the three-month anniversary of the loss of their child. He sighed. In all that time, almost nothing had changed. He had managed to get Rachel to bathe every few days, but otherwise she seemed little improved. She stayed in bed all day.

Tommy was replacing the vacuum sweeper in the hall closet when he heard a thump from behind the bedroom door. What had happened? he wondered wildly. Had Rachel fallen? He slammed the closet door and rushed to the bedroom, threw the door open.

“Rach?” he cried. She was nude and lying upon the floor, between the bed and the door. She had fallen out of bed. He knelt and lifted her back onto the mattress. She seemed weightless. What he saw horrified him: she was stick-thin. She had lost so much weight. She lay limply where he laid her on the surface of the bed. Tommy cradled her shoulders and held her close.

“God, Rachel, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know it had gone this far.” She murmured into his shoulder and he jumped. “I’ll get help, Baby,” he promised, and gingerly laid her flat upon the mattress. Taking out his cell, he called 911 and got the operator, told her his name, address, what he could about his wife’s condition. The operator promised the EMTs would come straight out.

15 minutes later a loud knock sounded on the front door and Tommy rushed into the living room, swept open the door.

“Thank you, thank you,” he stammered, and led the first responders to the bedroom, answering their questions on the way.

“Wait here, Mr. Johnson,” said one of the men. “We’ll take it from here. Tommy waited outside the door. After a few seconds, the man who appeared to be in charge reemerged and asked Tommy, “where is she?”

Tommy’s eyes widened and he rushed into the bedroom and found the room empty.

“Could she have moved from this room?” asked the man.

Tommy collapsed on the neatly-made bed and stared vacantly around the room. The EMT was on his radio. After a moment’s conversation, he turned to the other emergenccy worker and explained, “Rachel Johnson died during childbirth three months ago.” He turned to Tommy. “That’s right, isn’t it, Mr.Johnson?”

Finally Tommy found his voice. “Yes, I guess it is.”

Meanwhile, the other first responder had fetched a collapsible gurney.

“Lie down, Mr. Johnson,” suggested the man. “We’ll take you to the hospital, get you some help.”

“Okay,” said Tommy, as he stretched out on the gurney, felt himself being strapped in. As the EMTs wheeled the gurney through the front door, Tommy felt the cool breeze of Autumn on his skin. “I need to leave a note for my wife,” he told the men.

“We’ll do it, Mr. Johnson,” said one of them.

“Okay,” said Tommy. “Thanks.”

Bill Tope

Happening (A Minologue) by Geraint Jonathan

If I hear you say ‘what happens, happens’ just one more time, I’ll be responsible for my actions and it won’t be pretty. What happens happens, what the fuck am I supposed to do with that? What doesn’t happen doesn’t happen, what do you say to that? No don’t, please, don’t answer that, I’m sure there’s a perfectly unreasonable explanation. Things happen, don’t happen, might happen, have happened, will happen, may never happen: I get it. We all just happen along, as you say. But at this precise moment, I happen to be what’s known in the trade as mightily pissed off. Unnervingly so, if I say it myself. That what happens just happens to happen because it happens to happen is no good to me. As to what’s actually happened, it could’ve done with not happening, trust me, its having happened at all being the very thing that shouldn’t have happened. And even though it has happened, I can’t, like you, shrug it off saying ‘these things happen.’ That these things of course do happen is of no consolation at all. They’re not supposed to happen, that’s the whole point. But it’s happened and I’m the one it’s happened to. There’s no getting away from it. Or perhaps there is. Maybe you happen to know what no one else happens to know. Any chance of that? Happening, I mean.

Geraint Jonathan

(Image by CJA)

The Picture on the Phone Pole by Christopher J Ananias

The streets of Marion were one way, even the alleys. If I went past the address, it would be a hassle. My GPS led me with its robotic commands like I was its mindless servant. That’s about the way I felt driving the Medicaid Taxi van, old No. 4, that smelled like a dirty laundry hamper. The so-called clients, “The Riders,” gave me a hard time if I showed up late for their free ride.

“They’re a bunch of deadbeats, Cal.” I said on our daily bullshit call.

Cal, who was always ranting about them, suddenly said, like a big company man, “Hey, don’t talk about our riders like that.” He was a fanatical Trumper too, hounding me to vote for the orange man. I almost did, thinking Trump was for Christian values, what a crock. Now I’m wondering about Biden and his senility.

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Crime Fiction By Dale Williams Barrigar

Even if you

tell yourself you

don’t want to become a writer,

the truth is

you will have to become a hardboiled romance writer

of a different kind.

(There is more than one kind

of everything).

And what you will have to write

is your own life

(if you want to save

your own soul).

Or think of writing your life

as your own endless film trip

(not strip)

you are making, tragicomic.

Where work is play

and the play is your work

and you are usually more

of an antihero.

And you get to take all the things

you have been handed

by Life.

And create the script, and fall

in love.

And so you nurture it, love it, write it down.

Hide it under your bed

(when you have one), fix it when it

needs fixing.

Know it’s good at heart, in its heart, and keep it

that way.

Let it go.

But don’t ever let the it of it go.

Send it and get it sent

straight back at you

by the greatest editor

ever known

demanding ever more

difficult

and life-enhancing

corrections.

Hemingway By Dale Williams Barrigar

(Image provided by DWB)

During the last fifteen

years of my life, when my mind

was mostly in Michigan even though

I wasn’t, I saved

way more small animals from my yard in Cuba

or Idaho than I killed any large ones somewhere

out in a field, whether sea fields or waving grain ones.

And nobody knows it.

I even took a hurt mouse to bed one time for a small spell.

A hurt mouse I found Faulkner the Cat about to kill.

When my wife was out all night making too many bad choices

again.

Took him to bed with me and fed the injured little fellow,

warm milk out of a bottle

drip by drop.

My own bottle there at hand on the nightstand by the Bible,

King Lear, rapier, dagger, tomahawk, paper airplanes,

pencils.

And the mouse got better.

And I, the great Hemingway, never reported any of this to the papers.

But the next day I was up for breakfast and wrestling

with grouchy circus lions down at the pier

to impress them, and got my arm

torn for my troubles

again.

At one point, the mouse sat on my chest

and he looked me right in the eye

almost as if to whisper, “Thank you.”

And he may have whispered

thank you.

I had a Juan Gris painting of a black Latin guitar player

above my bed back then.

In 1946, after she was gone for good,

when I predicted

rock and roll to Paco down here by where

the boat used to be and he,

he agreed with me.

Blonde Noir by DC Diamondopolous

Kit Covington sat on the sofa in her Pacific Palisades mansion with a cigarette lodged in the side of her mouth. A cloud of smoke floated around her head. She adjusted the oxygen tube in her nose, then brushed ash from her dog Muffin’s champagne-colored curls. The miniature poodle dozing in Kit’s lap startled when the camera crew from The Great Morning Talk Show banged equipment into Kit’s antique furniture.

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