•
mosaic
4






MOSAIC
SPRING
1974
Editors- in- chief:
Patricia Jane Jameson
Paulette Guay
Jeff Burdick
Art Editor:
James Michael Naccarato
Faculty Advisor:
Dr. Milton Teichman




Writing is a long, hard process, often commencing
in frustration and chaotic uncertainty, leading to
brainwracking search, surprising discoveries and much
revision.
Although writers will admit that perfection
is impossible, fortunately a point of contentment can
be reached.
The writers of the pieces in this issue
of the Mosaic did not jump out of a deep sleep at 3
a.m. with a sudden inspiration, complete their story,
poem or essay
by
four and return to bed.
They had to
sweat i t out, but were finally able to find a satis-
faction in their creative efforts.
We hope the reader
experiences something of the satisfaction in reading
these works that the writers experienced in creating
them.
We would like to thank Dr. Milton Teichman, our
faculty advisor; Ms. Linda Scorza, who typed the manu-
script; and all the students who submitted their work
and supported our efforts.
Signed,
Jeff Burdick
Paulette Guay
Patricia Jameson
Editors

















:
~
ONTH.IHUTOR
S
P
ROSE:
Marideanne
Blomgren
Je
f
f Burdick
An
g
ela
Y.
Davis
M
ike Harrigan
Johanna O'Connell
Philip Petrosky
Mary Beth Pfeiffer
Carmine Pirone
POE
T
R
Y:
Joseph Ahearn
Claudia Caglianone
Vince Garfora
John Covell
Joseph Duffy
Thomas Gill
Stuart Gross
Paulette Guay
Pattie Jameson
je.f
Chip Kennard
Ruth Marquez
Jamie Miaiuta
Elizabeth Spiro
Max
Jacob - translation by Tana M. Webster
Federico Garcfa Lorca - translation by Tana
M.
Webster
ESSAYS:
Pattie Jameson
James Michael .Naccarato
This issue of Mosaic is dedicated with love to all those
who have ever struggled with the creative process.
Ma7 your future struggles be fruitful ones!





The sand runs through my hands.
A child's game, you say.
Perhaps.
But i t serves to remind me
of other lovers, other times,
other places ••• now gone.
Today too will soon be gone
like that sand.
But there will be other days -
other sands,
And we must remember
and not give ourselves over to sadness.
So you say you're
Dynamite.
I nod.
Green-eyed fuse
Touches off:
Leaving a million bits
Shattered.
Pattie Jameson
Pattie Jameson




she Paints
Art
is
her life she says
god
that's the truth
she'd cut her wrists
if she ran out of
Rose Madder
and keep right on Painting
drying in her Studio
she squeezes herself
back into the tube
whenever there's any love
left over
Paulette Guay
POLLUTION
Another hype from Bio-degradeable soap -
to the garbage the tourists leave.
Getting away from i t all, means:
going some other place to make your mess.
Stuart Gross





THE SECOND SON
by Carmine Pirone
I had a brother who was far away at war.
I
re~ember very little about him, only that he was a
boy who was always energetic and who always wore a
smile which accentuated his rosy cheeks all the more.
When he was eighteen and I was half his age, the
terrible news came:
the ship was bombed.
The most
depressed face seemed merry compared to that of my
mother.
She set off to get between death and her boy.
~7e trooped with her down the hill and then across
town, four blocks to the station where casualty sta-
tistics came in daily.
There she stood, oblivious to
us, with a resentful fighting face when my father came
out of the telegraph office, a tear rolling down his
cheek, and said "He's gone!"
She had anticipated i t
before he said it.
We turned away quietly and went
home, crossing the four blocks and then walking up the
small hill.
That is how my mother got her soft angelic face
and her pathetic ways and the large charity and love
which overflowed from deep within her heart.
It was
why other mothers ran to her when they had lost a
child.
She became very delicate from that hour on,
and for many months she was very i l l .
It was shortly after that climactic day that my
sister came to me and told me to go to my mother and
remind her that she still had another boy.
Being only
nine, and thinking like a nine-year old, I excitedly
went to her room.
When I heard the door shut and no
sound corning from the bed I became frightened, and all
I could do was just stand still.
I suppose I was
breathing hard and perhaps even crying; for after a
time, a time which seemed endless, I heard a voice
that sounded drained of all the energies of life, a
voice that had never sounded so
.
listless before, say,
"Is that you?" I thought i t was the dead boy she was
speaking of, and I said in a lonely, neglected voice,
''No i t ' s not him, i t ' s me."
Then
.
I heard my mother
crying, and she turned in bed; and though the room
was dark I knew she held out her arms and clasped them
in a prayerful mood.
After that I sat a great deal on her bed trying
to make her forget him.
If I remembered or saw anyone













I
I
do somethin
g
that
made
p
e
opl
e
laugh, I ir
.rr:
:ec'.iately
came in and
went
riq
n
t to
m
y mother's
~
ar
k
room and
did i t for her.
I
suppose I
seemed very
odd
and
differ
e
nt to others.
I
had
been told t
ha
t
ny
perse-
verance to make
each
d
ay
a
little
b
righter for her
gave my face a very strained, tense look.
I realize
now I grew up before my time from this.
I would
do
anything and
everything
to make my mother srrile and
laugh aqain.
I would do tur.
,
b
le saults
and
ask
mv
mother if she was laughinn.
Perhaps what
made h~r
laugh was something I was unconscious of, but she
did
laugh suddenly now
and
then.
When
she di
d
, I
screamed
and ran for my sister to come and see what was for
me
the happiest sight.
By
the time
my
sister carne, m
y
mother's soft face was wet aaain.
I
was deprived
of
the full glory of my accomplishment.
I can
-
only re-
member once making her laugh in front of
witnesses.
At
this time in
my
life, the one thin
g
I wanted
to accomplish was to make
my
mother the woman she once
was.
I
kept
a chart of her lauqhs on a piece of oak-
tag paper, mar
ki
ng a stroke for each time she lauahed.
There were six strokes the first time I showed the
doctor the paper.
When
I explained their meaning, he
began laughing.
I cried within myself
wis:-1ing
that i t
was one of her laughs.
The
doctor
knew how I felt,
and said that if I
showed
the
paper
to mother now and
told her that these
were
her
laughs, he
thought I
might win another.
I
did
what he told me, and sure
enough she laughed; and
when I
stroked the
paper,
she
laughed again.
So
actually, although i t
was
only one
laugh with a tear i
n
the middle, I counted i t as two.
My
sister told me not to sulk or
get
depressed
when my mother lay thinkina of him, but to try to get
her to talk about him.
Inside me I could not see
how this would bring back the vivacious mother I once
had.
But I was told that if I couldn't do i t , no one
could; and this
gave me
the stamina to remedy her
illness.
l\.t first, jealousy overcame me often.
I would
stop her fond
memories
by
asking her if
she
remembered
anything about me, but that didn't last.
Soon I de-
sired intensely to
become
so much like
him
that even
my mother should not see the difference.
I hid myself for a whole week
while
I was
in
the
process of
p
r
ac
ticing t
he
characteristics he once
attained,
but after a
w
h
ol
e
week I was
still rather
myself, a r
ef
l
ec
tion of my own
experiences.
~
1y








brother had such a cheery way of whistling, Mom sai
d.
He would stand with his legs spread apart and his
hands in the pockets of his worn-out ~lue jeans.
I
decided to go after this trait which he possessed; so
one day after
I had learned his whistle from boys who
had been his friends,
I
secretly dressed in his
clothes, which fit me only years later, and went into
my mother's room.
Nervously, yet pleased with myself,
I
stood s t i l l until she saw me.
"Listen"
I
said with
a glow of accomplishment, and
I
stretched my legs
apart and sunk my hands into the pockets of his worn-
out blue jeans, and began to whistle.
She smiled.
the womb
that is my heart
miscarried
ANOTHER FAILURE
my
tiny, fragile love for him
and now i t lies
unbaptized
with all the others
in the graveyard
of my ~cul.
Jamie





What's that wet, warrn
Liquid
Running down my face?
A teardrop,
Reflecting a depth
I thought I'd forqotten.
I thouoht I'd manaaed to
Hide t~at pool,
J
And I'd never give myself away
Again:
Until you came -
and
Shattered the glassine
Cover
And made
r-1y tears
Run
Once
Again.
Pattie Jameson
A little critter in the grass
Smiled at me as I went past
I looked a~ain--to my surprise
Something familiar about his eyes.
Then suddenly I renlized
That he had been a friend of mine.
When I had known him long before
He stood beside the cottaae door
Six feet-three and tall and thin
He used to let the critters in.
He'd give them bits of food to eat
And on his doorstep they would meet
Grandfather used to feed them crumbs
And now to me the job has come
It's funny when I look and see
My Grandpa still crouched next to me!
jef











THE
WJ
\.
KE
by
Johanna
O'Connell
Pat Flannagan stepped out of the taxi on 25th
~treet, paid his fare, nnc watched the cab disappear
in the foggy night.
He pulled his collar around his
neck to protect himself from the drizzle and ran
under the canopy of the front entrance of the funeral
home.
He looked at the entrance disdainfully.
He
really didn't mind
goinCT
in, i t was more the place of
business that intrigued him.
"Savastano and Sons,"
he read out loud.
Surely
this was no place for a
proper Irish funeral.
If one looked at him closely, Flannagan was a
man of seventy-four who could have passed for teh
years less.
llis eyes and ruddy complexion easily told
the story of
his
life as a farmer until he came to the
states.
Now,
here
he was,
forty
years later,
calling
on a deceased cousin--Old McCarthy by name.
Pat
didn't know him that well,
b
ut at times like this,
"civilty doesn't cost,"
as his
mother would say.
While he
quietly
rehearsed his lines of sympathy
for the widow,
another cab
pulled up directly in front
of the home.
A
short,
bandy-legged man of Pat's age
or thereabouts
,
stepped
under the canopy.
Although
.
some years had
passed
,
Flannagan
remembered the little
man.
"Seamus
Lynch," he
called heartily.
The man
named Lynch squinted at Pat and remer:ibered.
'l'hey had
come over on the boat together and lived as neighbors
for some years
.
"It's
been lonq,"
Seamus said.
think you
knew Old
M
cCarthy."
"But I
.
didn't
"Oh sure,"
Pat
answered.
"He was
a cousin on me
mother's side.
What
was
he
to
you?"
"My fat
her's cousi
n's
brother-in-law."
Both
men walked
slowly toward
the entrance.
They
passed
conversation about the five odd years
they
hadn't
seen one
another
.
It turned
out that Lynch and
the missus
lived
with a daugh
ter
.
Pat
had
stayed in
the old
neighborhood
with hi
s
wife
and the last
son



of ten children who wasn't yet married.
"Did Old McCarthy have a first name?"
Pat asked.
"Well, before he was Old McCarthy, they called
him Young McCarthy because his father was then Old
McCarthy."
"Granted," Pat retorted.
"But I doubt they' 11
put 'The Infant McCarthy' on his tombstone."
"Tis true, tis true," Seamus said thoughtfully.
Pat held the door for his friend who was reading the
name of the funeral home out loud as Pat had done a
few minutes before.
"Savastano and Sons," he said.
"I don't know,
Pat, the Iye-talians has the country overrun."
Both men stepped into a blazing front hall.
Their feet sank into the plush red rug and they were
almost blinded by the light from the chandelier.
"Very, very elegant," Pat whispered.
"Very Iye-talian," Seamus said out loud.
Above
the first door on their right, a sign read "McCarthy."
Both men were very dismayed.
They were hoping to
solve the mystery of the missing first name.
The room beyond was the place of mourning.
Not
many people were there.
Lynch and Flannagan took
their places in line to view the remains of Old
McCarthy.
"This is the part that bothers me," Seamus
whispered.
"I feel like I'm waiting in line at the
World's Fair."
Pat smiled.
Finally their turn came.
Both knelt
down to say their "Hail Mary" and "Glory Be."
Seamus
tilted slightly toward Pat and whispered indiscreetly:
"Me foot
.
is asleep."
Pat nudged him with his elbow but smiled inwardly
to himself.
Pat and Seamus rose simultaneously as
they did years ago in Communion processions.
Pat
lingered on a moment longer, studying the corpse.
Well, you still have that ugly look plastered on your
gob, he said to himself.
Seamus was already present-
ing himself to the widow.











"Ah
,
missus,"
he said
in
a somber voi
c
e
.
"Y
our
husb
and
was
a gran
d
man.
,
J
ust
grand he
was.
Him
and
mysel
f
graduated from the
Christian
Brother
s
together.
God
rest
him. "
The
widow nodded
a
tearful
thank
you.
Pa
t spoke
his
usu
al short speech
that
he
gave
at wakes
:
"Deep-
est
sym
pathy," he said
and went
to seat
himsel
f with
Seamu
s
.
"Tha
t was
some
speech
you gave her,"
he re-
marke
d to Lynch
.
"It
was nice
,
but
we
both
know
McCart
hy doesn't have
a snowball's
chance
in hell."
"True, true," Se
amus
sighed.
"Besides
,
I tho
ught
the Christian
Brothers
threw
you
tw
o
out
."
"That's
what happe
ned.
'W
hen I failed
all
my
subjec
ts, the Brothe
rs
sent the
report to my
father.
Do
you
know
what
he
wrote
back?
He
wrote:
'I
am
very
plea
sed with
th
e pr
ogress
my
boy
is
maki
ng at
your
school.'"
The two
laughed.
Then
both
of them
reali
zed that
they
hadn
' t
yet
asked
or ev
en
found out McCart
hy's
firs
t name.
Pat
tapp
ed the
fello
w sitting
nex
t to
him
who
turned
out
to be
McCarthy's nephew.
"Well," the
nephew
expla
in
ed, "he was You
ng
McC
arthy
and his fath
er
was
Old
McCarthy,
and
the
fat
her
died
; ·
then
he was
Old
McCarthy
."
"Oh, I
.
see,'' Pat re
marked an
d
slumpe
d
in
to his
usu
al silence.
Meanwh
ile,
Seamus
lo
oked
around in discom
fort.
The
interio
r
was much
too
lavish
for
his
taste
.
"R
emembe
r,"
he said
to
Pat,
"how
much fun the
house
wake
s were."
Pa
t
nodded
.
"And wh
en they
w
ent
out
of
style,
we had
them at
Dolo
ns."
"At
least
you
felt
that
you \vere
among fr
iends,"
Lync
h added.
Gradua
lly, the
room
filled
up.
Seamus
an
d
Pat
knew
none
of
the
peo
ple ar
rivin
g.
Think
we
sh
ould
stay
for the rosary?"
Sea
mus aske
d.
Seamus
never
st
ayed
for rosaries
anyw
here;
the
re was no
reas
on
to
make
this
an exceptio
n
.






"I don't think so,'' Pat rctortec..
"I think th0
rosary went out with Barry Fitz"0.rald.
Nhat do you
say we hit tJoonan' s across town for a fe,,, drinl-:s?
Scamu~ was convincPd.
~s the two friends stenned
out into the ni0ht air, th~y sana auietlv.
''T,,ras
down thP
n
lenn, one Easter niorn, to
a
city
fair :rode
I . . . ·,
"'i'hnt' s a crood
old s0nCT, '' Pat said.
"Tis," Seanius said.
any
more, just new nncs.
~1ccarthy?"
"They don't write old songs
nir. vnu ever find out ab0ut
"tlcll, •· Pat beaan, "he was YounCT ~'cCarthv until
his father died . . . ''
~nd the two friends hailed a cah to take them to
Nocnan's.






ROMANCE DEL EMPLAZADO
iMi soledad sin descanso!
Ojos chicos de mi cuerpo
y grandes de mi caballo,
no cierran por la noche
ni miran al otro lado
donde se aleje tranquilo
un sueno de trece barcos.
Sino que, limpios y duros
escuderos desvelados,
mis ojos miran un norte
N
de metales y penascos
donde mi cuerpo sin venas
consulta naipes helados
Los densos bueyes del agua
embisten a los muchachos
,oJ
que se banan en las lunas
de sus cuernos ondulados.
Y los martillos cantaban
sobre los yunques sonambulos,
el insomnio del jinete
y
el insomnio del caballo.
El veinticinco de junio
le dijeron al Amargo:
-Ya puedes cortar si gustas
las adelfas de tu
patio.
Pinta una cruz en la puerta
y pon tu nombre debajo,
porque cicutas y ortijas
naceran en tu costado,
agujas de cal monjada
te morderan los zapatos.
Sera de noche, en lo oscuro,
por los montes imantados
donde los bueyes del agua
beben los juncos sonando.
Pide luces y campanas.
Aprende a cruzar los manes
y gusta los aires fries
de metales
y
penascos.
Poroue dentro de
dos
meses
yaceras arnortajado.



Espadon de nebulosa
mueve en el aire Santiago.
Grave silencio, de espalda,
manaba el cielo dombado.
El veinticinco de junio
abrfo sus ojos Amargo,
y
el ve~nticinco de agosto
se tendio para los cielos.
Hombres bajaban la calle
?ara ver al emplazado,
que fijaba sobre el muro
su soledad con descanso.
Y la sabana impecable,
de duro acento romano,
daba equilibrio a la muerte
con las rectas de sus pa'.nos.
,,,
Federico Garcia Lorca






































































































































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BALLAD OF ONE DOOMED TO
on.:
Loneliness without rest!
The little eyes of my body
and the big eyes of my horse
never close at night
nor look the other way
where quietly, a dream
of thirteen boats disappears.
Instead, clean and hard,
squires of wakefulness,
my eyes look for a north
of metals and of cliffs
where my veinless body
consults frozen playing cards.
Heavy water-oxen, charge
boys who bathe in the moons
of their rippling horns.
And the hammers sing
on the somnambulous anvils
the insomnia of the rider
and the insomnia of the horse.
On the twenty-fifth of June
they said to Amargo:
-Now, you may cut, if you wish,
the oleanders in your courtyard.
Paint a cross on your door
and put your name beneath it,
for hemlock and nettle
shall take root in your side
and the needles of wet lime
will bite into your shoes.
It will be night, in the dark,
in the magnetic mountains
where water-oxen drink
in the reeds, dreaming.
Ask for lights and bells.
Learn to cross your hands,
to taste the cold air
of metals and of cliffs
because within two months
you'll lie down shrouded.



Santiago moved his misty
sword in the air,
Dead silence flows over
the shoulder of the curved sky.
On the twenty-fifth of June
Amargo opened his eyes,
and on the twenty-fifth of August
he lay down to close them.
Men came down the street
to look upon the doomed one
who cast his shadow of loneliness
against the wall •
.
And the impeccable sheet
with its hard Roman accent
gave death a certain poise
by the rectitude of its folds.
Tana Webster





THE GREAT BOTTLE ROBBERY
by Jeff Burdick
This morning was typical of most of my mornings--
dragging myself out of bed, going through the motions
of washing and dressing, sleeping through breakfast.
I went through the usual routine before leaving:
feeding the cat, washing a few dishes, packing a
small lunch.
Once everything was in order, I found
the back door, managed to get on the outside of the
house, and headed for the garage.
Suddenly, I noticed something about the air I
was breathing.
It was like drinking an ice cold
glass of water; I could feel i t go down.
It was
crisp, cool, and refreshing; and i t filled my lungs,
my head, and my entire body with an overwhelming
sensation of being alive.
I looked at my shoes wet
with morning dew.
I noticed some of the leaves in
the trees had turned to orange and gold.
The sky was
clear, like still rain water in an old barrel, and
the sun shone brightly but softly, trying to pene-
trate the coldness that night had left behind.
All
of these things gave me a strange feeling that I
could not place.
As I walked to the garage, I kicked
an empty soda bottle from my path.
An
empty soda
bottle? All at once the new morning was an old
friend.
I was ten years old and my best friend was
standing in front of me.
"Oid you get in trouble?"
"Will you shut up, Mark!" I whispered, like a
thief in the night.
"My parents could be listening
·
at the windows."
As we walked away from my house through the tall
grass, I felt the morning dew beginning to seep
through my shoes; and I knew that i t would eventually
saturate my socks, leaving me with wet, clammy feet
until mid-afternoon.
Soon, I could feel the sun
gently warming my back through my worn-out corduroy
coat and Mark reopen~d his line of questioning.
"So,
what happened?"
"Nothing.
She never even called."
"Same here.
Think she called the police?"
Mark







constantly worried about being handcuffed and thrown
in jail.
"For painting a stupid speed limit si
g
n?
I don't
think so.
"
"She said i t was against the law.
"
"I think we were
in
the woods before she had a
chance to see our faces," I said, hoping I was right.
"Yeh."
Mark
d
h t
1
·
d
d
seeme
somew a
re ieve
an
began
patting us on the back.
11
'1.'hat was pretty good.
I
bet no other kids would dare do that in broad day-
light.
And with real paint, too!"
"I could have done better," I said, knowing that
Mark would begin praising me.
"Are you kidding?" he said.
"It looks like a
real eight, now.
Instead of cars goin' thirty on
Croft Road, they
1
ll be
g
oin' eighty.
All 'cause of
you!"
We were always proud whenever we pulled off
one of our daring escapades and got away with it.
The spirit of Halloween entered us weeks before the
day itself.
Mark never walked; he bounced, letting his un-
tamed, straw-colored hair jump about on top of his
head.
The hand-me-down clothes he always wore hung
loosely on his skinny frame, giving him the appear-
ance of a small scarecrow.
He was a loud-mouth who
was not afraid to say anything to anybody as long as
he was at a safe distance and had somewhere to run.
Even though I was a year older than him, I always
looked up to Mark.
I often wished I could be as com-
pletely boisterous and obnoxious as he was; but I
never spoke out, except to Mark, for fear that the
words might come out wrong.
I could not bear making
a fool out of myself.
Mark would be the one to stand
out in the middle of the street and shout, "Shove i t ,
lady!"
I would be busy running from the scene of
the crime and having fits of hysterical laughter.
After walking through golden fields and fallen
leaves for awhile, we found ourselves in the vicinity
of the Grand Union Supermarket.
We always hit Grand
Union first thing in the morning on Saturdays.
As
we entered through the automatic door, leaving the
autumn air behind, I felt my body tense up.
My eyes
darted to every corner of the store in search of










neigh
bors
and re
lativ
es
who kept
my
parents posted
with
information
concer
ning my whereabouts
and what I
was
up
to.
Grand Uni
on was off limits
by orders of
my
mother
.
Firs
t, a ge
n
eral
tour
of the
store was in order
to check
the
whereabo
ut
s
of most
of the personnel,
after
which
we
heade
d for the
cashier where they
kept
the
cigarette
s.
"A
ren't
these the
kind
your
mother wants?"
Mark
began,
se
lect
ing
a pack
of Parliaments.
He had a
tendency
to
speak his
part
louder
than necessary.
"I th
ink sh
e
said
Winston,"
I replied, illus-
trating
my
point by pic
king up
and displaying a pack
of Winst
on
cigarettes.
"No, s
he said Pa
rliament.
11
"Why
don't
we take
both
of these
over to her,"
I sugges
ted,
"and ask h
er which
one i t is?
11
"I'm
su
r
e
i t '
s
P
arliame
nt, but if
you insist."
We
cas
ually foun
d an
empty
the
cig
ar
ettes in our p
ockets.
store
, we
also collec
ted
a
few
and
choco
l
a
te whic
h we
stuffed
our bu
lk
y coats l
i
k
e squirrel
s
their
che
eks with f
ood.
aisle
where we put
Before
leaving the
pounds
of chewing gum
into the
linings of
filling the
pouches in
Once
out of th
e
s
tore
and
around
the corner, we
made
a mad
d
ash for
a grove
of trees
that were just
begi
nning
to l
ose th
eir
summer colors.
Though the
day had
grown
warm, the
moist coolness
of morning
s t i l l
linge
red on in
the
shade.
As soon as we were
sure
of ou
r safety,
we
looked at
each other and let
the laugh
ter pour out
into
the
air and the booty
pour
out
o
n
t
o the ground.
Ci
garet
t
e sm
o
k
i
ng was
enjoyable mainly
because
i t was
forbidde
n;
but
i t
also made us
feel equal to
our
elders
both in pow
er and wickedness.
We both
sat
on
blankets
of
fallen
leaves pretending
to in-
hale
large
quan
t
ities
of
smoke.
"You're
not
i
nhaling!
11
Mark charged.
11
I am
to
o!
11
I
said,
acting
rather
insulted at
such
an ac
cusat
i
on.






"Let
's
see yo
u
inhale."
"Why don't you?" I answered, fully aware of
Mark's usual reaction when challenged.
"Okay."
Putting the cigarette up to his lips,
he drew in enough smoke for ten lungs and held i t in
his mouth looking similar to a bullfrog about to
croak.
Just as he was turning blue, he exhaled
filling the grove with a cloud of smoke, and
with
a
triumphant look, said, "Now, how about you?"
But my
attention was elsewhere.
"Look at all those bottles!"
"What!"
Mark looked at me as if I had gone mad.
"There must be hundreds of 'em."
"Jeff, what the hell are you talking about?"
"Over there," I pointed.
"In back of Grand
Union."
"Big deal.
Grand Union has a lot of bottles."
Mark leaned back on his elbows, angry because I had
missed his fantastic smoking demonstration.
Mark sprang up.
A shaft of autumn sunlight,
that found
i
ts way through the trees to Mark's face,
gave his wicked smile an even more devilish glow.
Thoughtfully and slowly, the words oozed out of his
mouth as if he was savoring each one.
"Two cents
apiece.
Let's do it."
After loading our mouths with ten sticks of gum
to cover up any cigarette breath that mothers could
detect within one hundred yards, we left the cool
shade and headed for the bottles that were about to
make us rich.
We acquired two cases and walked
across the highway to Food Fair which was a conve-
.
nient short distance away from Grand Union.
Inside, we unloaded our cargo on the counter
and smiled with our baseball size wads of gum stretch-
ing our cheeks out to abnormal proportions.
The man
said, "Forty
-
eight bottles.
That's ninety-six cents."
Mark pocketed t
h
e change and we left for a second
trip during which I relieved my jaw and probably
saved myself from choking to death,
by discarding
my rubbery wa
d.
Gum chewing was quite necessary


though; having a dislocated jaw was better than being
sent away to reform school for first degree tobacco
breath, anyday.
When we got back to Food Fair, the man looked at
the bottles, studied our smiling faces, and looked
back at the bottles.
"We're cleaning out our basement," Mark ex-
plained.
I turned my head to hide any laughter that
might escape from inside.
"Why doesn't your mother or somebody bring all
the bottles at once in a car?" the man suggested.
"She's got a headache and wants us out of her
hair.
You know how i t is.
She works hard and we
like to help her out once in awhile."
Mark kept such a straight face as he lied that
I had to excuse myself and wait outside so that I
would not give us away when my laughter overflowed.
Soon, Mark appeared, jingling the change in his
pocket.
On the way back to Grand Union, we took some time
out for laughter and self-congratulation.
The after-
noon was gradually becoming too warm for wearing
coats; that was typical for fall:
cool mornings and
warm afternoons.
Mark reached for another case of empties.
"What are you boys doing?"
The deep, authorita-
tive voice left us frozen like manikins in a showcase.
"Have you been taking these bottles?"
"Yes, sir.
Why?"
asked Mark.
"That's stealing, you know."
"Stealing?"
Mark sounded shocked.
"We thought
these bottles were here for anybody who needed them."
"You need them?"
He gave Mark a quizzical look.
Even I wondered what Mark was up to.
The man, whose
nametag read 'Mr. Alfred Breen,' continued his
questioning.
"What could you possible need bottles
for?"
"To decorate our basement," Mark said, naturally




enough.
I was too scared to even think of laughing.
"To decorate your basement," Breen repeated in
amazement.
11
Yeh.
Haven't you ever seen soda bottles with
crayons melted over them?
They're very colorful."
Once Mark got started he was hard to stop.
"Well, we
were thinking of lining the walls of our basement with
these bottles.
It's gonna look really good when it's
done.
A friend of mine once--"
"Okay," said Breen, "Why don't you boys just come
inside with me and we'll have a talk with Mr. Wilcox,
the general manager."
For the first time since we met, Mark was speech-
less.
His lies had failed.
I was convinced that we
had had it.
It was all over for us.
As we followed Mr. Breen into the store, I felt
my world crwnbling down.
I would be sent away for
sure now and would have to spend years in a pitch
black cell somewhere.
Visions of my parents, who
loved and trusted me and gave me anything I wanted,
filled my head--my mother crying, my father yelling.
If I ever came back from reform school, nobody would
want me.
Who cares about a criminal?
I had ruined
my entire life before i t had even started, and for no
good reason!
"Oh God!
11
I thought.
"If I ever get
out of this one I would never steal anything again.
I wouldn't smoke or swear or anything."
"In here."
Breen directed us into Mr. Wilcox's
office where we expected to be chained against the
wall and interrogated.
After a short conference with
our captor, Wilcox addressed us in a tone that was
pure gas chamber.
"Boys, what you have done is
wrong.
You have committed a crime."
I was thinking, "Here i t comes.
Jail for sure!"
when the tone of Mr. Wilcox's voice suddenly changed.
"Now, you boys must learn to respect other peoples'
property.
I'm sure you wouldn't like i t if somebody
took something of yours.
If you had asked, we would
have probably gladly given you some bottles for your
basement.
In fact, you can keep the ones you have
already taken.
But if I ever catch you stealing
again, I will have to call the police and there will
be no questions asked.
Understand?"




We nodded.
My body became so relaxed I felt
faint.
Mark's relief was obvious.
"Well we didn't
think i t was stealinq, sir," he said.
"We wouldn't
ever steal on purpose.
We know better than that."
"Yes, I'm sure you do," Wilcox smiled.
what are your names?"
"Now
"Charlie Bronson," Mark answered, with a face as
honest as Abraham Lincoln.
"Bill Creed," I said, following Mark's lead.
We spent the afternoon, intoxicated with relief,
lying on our backs in a field, watching the clear
autumn sky.
Feeling the soft sun on my face, I
smiled and enjoyed the freedom I had almost lost,
until Mark sat up and said, "If we go into Stop 'n
Shop and buy a pie for twenty cents, they'll give us
a receipt.
Right?"
I just stared at him.
"Now, if we take the pie outside and eat it,
we'll be able to go back and get another pie for free
because the receipt will prove that we paid for that
one, too.
It's gotta work and there's no way we can
get caught!
Let's go."
As the sky began to blush, I followed Mark to
Stop 'n Shop.
After all, the plan was foolproof.
This morning as I got into my car, my boyhood
filled my head with the most olorious feeling.
The
sun was warm on my face as I turned the key and let
the engine roar as I pushed the accelerator to the
floor several times.
I had a feeling of wildness; i t
was a fresh feeling.
Suddenly, a window =lew open in the house next
door.
"Just .bec
~
iuse you have to go to work so early
in the morning doesn't mean you have to wake up the
rest of the neiqhborhood!"
., Shove it, lady!" I shouted at the top of my
lungs as I sped out cf my driveway, leaving my
neighbor hanging out of her window with a very
stunned look on her face.


YOUR EXPRESSION
Smile.
Make me happy.
Come, sing a joyful song,
Dance to the pipers tune.
Laugh.
Tiny crystals of ice shatter,
fall musically in snow covered tombs.
Their sounds die before they are quite heard,
Playing a thousand melodious notes in one resounding
chorus.
Cry.
Sharp needle pains, silver pearls roll upon your
cheek,
Cleansing skin and soul both at once,
Leaving salt on the wounds, never to be rubbed in.
Shout.
Tones of gladness,
Surprise visits of those you love and love you.
Tones of sadness, over one too young to die, who did.
Regret.
Days long past.
Unchanging days you want to change,
Bring new before the old, erasing memories of yester-
year.
Innocense.
Beauty of you, being yourself.
Keeping good qualities.
Qualities of younger days.
Children days.
Real beauty, real expressions.
You being you.
Vince Carfora



THE HAMILTONS
by Philip Petrosky
The house around the corner is one of the most
beautiful homes in town.
The Hamiltons had fixed i t
up years ago when they moved into the house.
It is
the type of house one finds in Better Homes and
Gardens or in American Homes.
The large slanting
roof with its dormers gives the house a warm appear-
ance.
The beige clapboard and white shutters blend
into the surrounding green shrubbery.
There is still
a mark underneath the number on the large white door
where the name Hamilton used to appear.
The Hamiltons were an average, middle class,
suburban family.
Mr. Hamilton was a stern looking
man with greying hair.
He was always dressed con-
servatively for work as well as for leisure.
Mrs.
Hamilton was a good looking woman with dark hair and
shiny blue eyes.
She was a busy woman involved with
shopping and with many community activities.
She was
out most of the day except for the times that Karen
was home.
Their only child, Karen, was a bright and
pretty young girl.
While she was the same age as I
was and would have been in the same class, Mrs.
Hamilton insisted that she attend the private school
in town instead of the public grarnmer school.
Every morning Mrs. Hamilton would drive me,
Karen, and Mr. Hamilton to our destinations.
First
she would drive Mr. Hamilton to the train station;
next she would let me off at my school, which was
five minutes from Karen's school.
Mrs. Hamilton
felt that i t was no problem driving me to school be-
cause she had to drive past i t on her way to Karen
1
s
school.
By seven o'clock in the morning I could hear
Mrs. Hamilton pulling up the driveway in the Country
Squire station wagon.
She would blow the horn lightly
to remind me that she was waiting.
I would quickly
grab my lunch and dash out to the car.
I always sat
in the corner of the back seat, behind Mr. Hamilton,
while Karen would sit behind her mother, who was
driving the car.
I was greeted with a quiet "good
morning" from everyone in the car.
Mrs. Hamilton
would add, "Do you have everything?
Alright let's
go."
During the ride to the train station there were



short segments of discussion, which seldomly in-
cluded me.
Inevitably Mrs. Hamilton would say to
Karen, "Karen, do you have everything:
lunch, books,
sweater, homework?"
Karen would interrupt saying,
"Yes mother" in a sophisticated and almost conde-
scending tone of voice.
While these short exchanges
occurred, Mr. Hamilton was usually occupied in his
daily newspaper or watching the passing scenery.
Occasionally he would interject a few words into the
discussion without turning his head.
One cold day in the beginning of November I got
into the car and found myself in the middle of a
disagreement.
Mrs. Hamilton interrupted the conver-
sation to quickly greet me.
In the same breath she
continued, "What do you mean by that?" in a rather
strong voice.
I quietly retreated to my secure
corner in the car.
Mr. Hamilton in his deep voice
said, "You're spoiling the damn child; she doesn't
have to get everything she wants."
Karen responded
"But Daddy, i t ' s important.
I've got to have it.
11
Mrs. Hamilton sharply interrupted saying, "Brian,
this is important.
You are never able to see what's
important.
You don't even think about it.
All you
care about is the money.
11
Mr. Hamilton answered in
an annoyed tone of voice saying, "Oh, that expensive
bicycle that she had to have was important also?
Well, I haven't seen i t out of the garage for weeks.
Come on, who are you kidding?"
Mrs. Hamilton became
visibly upset and quickly turned her eyes to the
road.
When we arrived at the train station, Mr.
Hamilton left the car without saying goodbye.
Mrs.
Hamilton made no effort to say anything to him
either.
Her facial expression had changed to one of
frustration and almost anger.
Karen remained quiet
throughout this entire discussion.
After Mr.
Hamilton had left, nothing else was said.
The next morning there was an air of hostility
in the car.
Mr. Hamilton was staring out of his
window silently while Mrs. Hamilton drove in silence
as well.
Karen asked, "Daddy, can we get i t to-
night?"
He sharply answered, "No Karen, not to-
night!"
She answered in a whining voice, "Why not
Daddy?"
Mr. Hamilton, trying to restrain his
annoyance and anger, said, "Because we are not going
to and that's final.
11
Karen slammed her hand down
on the car seat and looked out the window.
Mrs.
Hamilton did not join in this time.
After Mr.
Hamilton had left the car, M~s. Hamilton mumbled,
"That man .•. sometimes ..•. "
Karen interrupted her




saying, "Mommy, I forgot my Geography notebook.
We'll
have to turn back for it." Mrs. Hamilton asked, "Is
i t really that important that we must go back home for
it?"
Karen nodded and Mrs. Hamilton reluctantly said,
"Well if you think i t ' s that important, then we'll go
back."
Mrs. Hamilton turned the car around at the
first opportunity and went back to their house for
the book.
The rides to school in the morning became qui-
eter, and I began to feel more uncomfortable each day.
One Thursday, however, I could hear ~r. and Mrs.
Hamilton arguing as I ran up to the car.
As I opened
the door, Mr. Hamilton was saying, "When are you
going to stop this? She's not an infant any longer;
can't you see this yourself.
We have our lives and
she has her own.
How much longer are you going to
let her control our lives and you dominate hers?"
Mrs. Hamilton retorted, in a condescending tone of
voice, "When are you going to accept your responsi-
bilities as a father?"
Karen seemed to ignore the
whole conversation and occupied herself in some of
her books.
I sat in my usual corner trying to ignore
what was being said.
The disagreement quickly ended
once I was in the car and not a single word was said
afterwards.
I was able to see the anger in the faces
of both Mr. and Mrs. Hamilton.
The following morning I asked my mother if she
would take me to school herself.
I told her about
the uncomfortable situation of the previous morning.
She insisted that i t was nonsense and that I
shouldn't let i t bother me.
When the Hamiltons
arrived I was sent out of the house to go with them
to school.
I sat in a car that was utterly silent.
Neither Mr. or Mrs. Hamilton looked at one another.
Both their faces carried expressions of anger.
As
Mr. Hamilton left the car he sharply said,""! won't
be home t i l l Wednesday."
Mrs. Hamilton
,
mumbled,
"Good, go, why should I care? ••. "
Karen asked,
"When will we go shopping?"
And she continued in
her whining voice, "But Daddy said he would take me
tonight or tomorrow."
Mrs. Hamilton quickly re-
sponded, "Stop the whining.
I ' l l take you tomorrow."
The ride to school on the following Monday and
Tuesday were more pleasant than they had been in a
long time, but they were far from enjoyable.
Mrs.
Hamilton said very little.
She seemed to be pre-
occupied with something.
Karen sat where her father
usually did.
She was more talkative than usual
.










However, on that Wednesday the cold silence returned
with the presence of Mr. Hamilton.
I began to grow
accustomed to it and occupied myself with school work
during the ride
.
I was eating my breakfast on a cold February
morning when my mother walked into the kitchen saying,
"Today I'll take you to
·
school.
Mrs. Hamilton and
Karen aren't feeling well and Mrs. Hamilton said that
she will not be taking Karen to school today.
So get
ready quickly and we'll leave."
I quickly rushed
my
breakfast so as not to keep my mother waiting.
On
the way to school she said, "I'll pick you up this
afternoon.
And by the way, stay away from the
Hamil tons and don't disturb them."
That afternoon I was having my cookies and milk
before going out to play.
I could overhear my mother
talking with one of the neighbors on the phone.
,
As I
listened I heard her saying, "Oh my God!
What a
shame.
I knew that there were problems but I didn't
think this would happen.
No, that's not what I heard
from Julie.
Julie saw it happen from her kitchen
window.
Liz and Brian Hamilton have been arguing for
the longest time over Karen.
My Richard rides with
them to school everyday and he tells me about some of
their disagreements.
Anyway, Julie was telling me
that she saw Brian running out of the house while Liz
was following and yelling at him.
He didn't turn
around when she yelled at him.
She saw him quickly
leave in the car.
She was surprised that the screech-
ing of the wheels didn't wake up any of the children.
This morning the police found the car smashed into the
cement wall on that sharp curve near B
_
ryant's Highway.
What
·
a shame.
Oh, I'm not sure what they are going
to do with the house.
They could get a nice price
for it. As far as I know Liz and Karen have moved
over to her mother's house or one of her brother's.
Isn't that awful? Such a shame.
Well, I've got to
go now.
Goodbye •
11
When my mother walked into the kitchen I asked,
"What happened to the Hamiltons?"
She was surprised
that I had heard her conversation.
She quickly re-
plied, "Oh, I think they' re moving or something.
Now go out and play.
Make sure you are back here in
time for dinner.
Alright, go ahead."







.nn
OP0SSlT~1' S
TPLE
hy
Pary Reth Pfeiffer
It was a bright, shiverous winter day one January
long
aqo, and the sun reflectec~ so brilliantly off the
c::listening white snow thot Herman had to turn
a\·1ay
fr0rn i t for just a moment.
Ile would stick his !-leaci in
and out of his little hole in the ground trying to
adjust his lazy eyes to the change.
They squinted in-
voluntarily, and he used his lonq, tinv claws to fluff
up the fur around them as he shi;lded ihe sun.
Herman spent the greater part of his winters be-
neath the ground.
He didn't like the biting wind that
crept underneath his fur, nor did he care to get his
four dainty legs wet trudqing about in snow that was
deeper than he.
His long, hairy tail also swept along
the snow so conspicuously so as to advertise to any
predators that a rotund, old opossum had just passed
through.
At this stage of his life, Eerman wasn't
much of a challenge to any would-be 'possum hunter; so
he
knew how to play i t safe.
From the way that tail
dragged in the snow they could probably even tell that
by now the old opossum's ,-!hiskers were long and gray
and his voice had grown deep and raspy.
Herman had quite a large progeny so he never
worried much about food or dinging himself out of the
next blizzard.
His daily ritual of popping his head
out into the sunlight was for the purpose of clearing
his lungs with the frigid winter air.
"Works wonders, hub, hub," he'<l mutter, coughing
in his old familiar way and then retreating to his
cozy burrow.
~t least once a day one of his brood would stop
by to visit Gra~pa, usually bringing him some nuts and
j_,erri~s from the family storehouse.
I-Ierr:1an, too, had
prenared himself a storehouse of nuts and berries, but
as the years went on his capacity to collect them had
slowly been diminishing and so had his store.
It was
for the young to care for the old.
He had well been
taught this 2nd he had taught this very well.
Today ~irabella decided to visit her grandfather,
and she filled a basket with the juiciest edibles she
could find.
f1irabella was the oldest of all the















grandchild
ren,
and wha
t
she lacked in
the
fine,
rich,
brown color
or
the
graceful
s
aunter
of
he
r anc
estors
,
she made up
in the sweetn
e
ss
of
her
voice
and the
touch of her
warm
paw.
Her fur
w
as a mous
y
brown
color, and she
had whiskers where she
sho
u
ld
have had
none.
Her claws
were
short and rag
ged as
was her
coarse, lifeless tail;
but
noneth
eless Herman
took
pride in this, the continuation
of
his
blo
o
dline.
Mirabella
was
especially
excited today
for
she
had good news for Gramps.
S
he
held her
front paw
s
close to
her
chest
pondering exactly how
to tell
him,
and she squeaked with
deliqhted
laughter as
she
thought.
Grampa
was the head
of the clan and he must
hear the news
first, she
thought.
She knew
she was
doing somethi
ng to please him
and that
pleased
her.
As
soon as
she
filled the basket
to overflowing,
she tied
a
g
arlan
d
of pine needles
around the top as a
special
touch.
Out
in the
wintry
sun, she held the
basket close
aga
inst
her
round belly and headed on two
paws
to
Gramp
'
s
place
.
Two
of
her
brothers
were busy pawing
the snow
away from
their
gran
df
a
ther's
path so he might be
able
to corr.e
out
a
nd
exercise
his legs a bit.
Fester
and Thom
p
son
hurled ba
lls
of sno
w
at one another and
met
Mirabella
with
on
e
rioht
smack on
the snoot.
She
snorted,
looked at
then
c~ossly and continued
up the
path
.
Her
man
was
cur
led
up
in
the
furthest
corner
of
the
burrow when
Mirabe
lla squeezed through
the
tiny
opening.
"Hello,
Gr
amps," she
said,
greeting
him
out of
his peaceful slumber
.
"Oh, hub, hub, hub," he
coughed,
"h
ello, Mira my
belle.
What have
you
for
me
toda
y?"
She
proudly hel
d
the decorate
d basket
out befdre
her.
"Why, thank
you, child.
Quite
nic
e,
h
ub,
hub.
Quite nice."
Herman
quietl
y
set about digging
into the
tre~-
sure
as
Mirabell
a
stood
by
nervously.
She
knew wha
t
she
was
goin
g
to
say
firs
t.
She'd said i t
to herself
all
t
he
wa
y
~~
~
r
there
.
But
somehow,
the wo
rds didn't
co
m
e
as
easily
now.





"(;r-Grarnps, '' she finally s2id.
"You know that
I'm getting . . . uh . . . uh ... aettina of matinq aqe."
She blurted out the last few w;rds faste~ than the
first few.
"So you are," sain. Herman in his raspy voice.
Somethinq told him to put the basket down and listen
closely to his grandda~qhter's words.
"Well, I've . . . I've found me a :ri.ate!"
She
soueaked and clapped her front paws togeth~r once.
"CalTTl down, child, calJT1 down."
He scratched his
Hhiskers.
"A
.
nd tell me of hiM," he said definitively.
"His name is J\braham and you' 11 meet hiJT1 Satur-
day evenin<:1 at the feast.
No one kr..ows hut you,
Gramps, and no one ,-rill know t i l l then.
Will you
announce i t for us?"
"Well, uh, ves, I think I could," said Herman
glad to be of service and never beinn able to refuse
a request of his belle.
Mirabella kissed hiM on the cheek quickly and
scurried out the openina.
She popped her head hack in,
said, "0h, thank you, GraMps," and followed the path
home.
Herman sat pensivelv thinkina about his first
c-rranddauqhter matina and havina a litter.
"How ab-
surd," he chuckled.
"Was I ever that younn?" he
muttered and thouaht no more of it.
On Saturday, the clan aathered within the huae
hollow oak to share a rare winter feast.
Fallen
leaves were scattered about to make a warm cushion of
the cold earthen floor.
When Grandfather Herman en-
tered, the qrandchildren warmed about him anxiouslv.
"Calm down, children, hub, hub, calm down," he
said pattina a few on the hind.
When 11.urabclla entered, Herman suddenly recalled
the reauest made of him for this meal.
She ran uo to
him and said, "Is i t alriaht to bring him in now,
·
Cramps?"
"Yes, Mira.
Now
wi
11 <lo fine," he said, but !=ihe
only heard the word 'yes' an<l Has qone.






Mirabella returned a few short minutes later and
Herman eyed the doorway cautiously to see what this
Abraham fellow would look like.
He had no doubts that
his granddaughter had made a wise choice.
vJhat emerged from the round oak doorway caused
Herman to gasp in horror and a hush to fall over the
feast.
For there behind the small sweet
:-
tirabella
stood a gaudy, striped racoon with short fur and a
scroungy tail!
The children ran innocently over to Hirabella to
inspect her beau while Herman and the other adults
pondered to themselves what to do.
The children took
immediately to the stranger, climbing all over him
and pulling his black and white tail.
Abraham
laughed and said that his brothers and sisters always
did the same thing.
!'-1irabella left Abraham to the children and
crossed the floor to her qrandfather.
She sensed the
tense air that had befallen the festivities.
"Grandfather, don't you like Abe?"
"Mirabella, he is not one of us.
He is not an
opossum," Herman said straightening himself up.
"Yes I know that," said Mirabella.
"But one can
love other animals besides opossums, can't one?"
''But your children, they wi 11 be half-breeds.
Not opossum, not ... not racoon."
It pained him to say
this.
"Being a little of each, Grandfather, means
they'd be free to love either kind.
They would have
.
twice as many animals to love," said Mirabella, not a
nervous child anymore, but a matured female.
"But no one will love them, Mira.
No one will
love them.
I won't hear of i t , hub, hub," said
Herman raising his voice and coughing.
Abe looked up with the innocence of the children
about him.
"I have chosen a mate and I would like everyone
to meet him," Mirabella said, stretching out her paw
for Abraham to take.
He broke through the crowd of
youngsters and stood
b
y
Mirabella.
He towered awk-



wardly above her.
Herman realized he had been defied and lowered
his bushy eyebrows and pursed his lips to greet the
'coon.
"Child, I won't let
usually low voice.
"And
alone in that decision.
this clan."
you do it," he said in an un-
if you decide to, you will be
You will no longer be part of
Mirabella, awestruck, fought back her tears.
''But Grandfather ... "
"I will hear no more."
This word was final an<l
Mirabella straightened herself up for what she knew
would be her last words with her family.
"My love for my family and my love for Abraham
are fighting one another, but i t is not a decision of
which one is stronger.
When I leave here with him,"
she sniffled intermittently, "I will leave still
loving each and every one of you.
I have a family of
my own to build and a life of my own to lead.
Please
forgive me."
She c:rrabbed Herman's arm and kissed him
quickly.
Mirabella's sweet voice, her squeaking chirp, and
her warm paw passed through the oaken doorway followed
by her husband.
A tear appeared at the brink of Herman's eye but
he dared not let i t fall.
The children, the grand-
children all looked to him.
After a long pause, he said, "Now we won't have
any more of that, I hope, hub, hub.
We won't have
·
any more of that."











IL SE PEUT
A
I l s e peut qu'un reve etrange
Vous ait occupee ce soir,
Vous avez cru voir un anqe
Et c'~tait votre miroir.
-
Dans sa fuite Eleonore
A defait ses longs cheveux
Pour derober
a
l'aurore
Ledoux objet de mes voeux.
A
quelque mari fidele
Il ne faudra plus penser.
Je suis amant, j'ai des ailes,
Je vous apprends
a
voler.
Que la muse du mensonge
Apporte au bout de vos doigts
Ce desdain qui n'est au'un songe
Du berger plus fier
qu'un
roi.
Max Jacob
IT MAY
BE
It may be that
a stranqe
dream
Seized you tonight,
You thought you saw an anael
And i t was your mirror.
In her flight
Eleonore
Undid her long hair
'fo rob the dawn
Of the sweet object of my desire.
You should think no longer
Of some faithful husband.
I am the lover,
I
have wings
I will teach you
to
fly.
May the muse of
falseness
Brina to the end
of your
fino0.rs
That
-
-
scorn which
i
s
but
a dream
Of
a
shepherd
prouder
than a king.
Tana Webster



The Last Winter Sunday
{for Pat Jameson)
The view from her room is of train tracks
and winter trees--yet it is spring,
and she tells me she will be
gone in 41 days.
She talks of living and growing
We can speak of our growing now
and listen to a train pass below,
pushing northward and away
I know, although we are still
new and she will soon be
leaving here, that we
plow the same field
We are tilling what we were,
breaking into the good earth of what we are,
thrusting up our lives
toward each other
Gently, we press the renewed bulbs of
other times and feelings
into that earth, while talking of
pain and poetry
Before I leave, we
catch the first glimpse
of a bud on a spring tree
Paulette Guay


DAWN
Sparkling colours of blue
Shoot from the sky
Showing an all encompassing hue
Which fills the eye.
With each new moment comes
A brighter blue as the sky
Becomes the colour of some
Unfathomable ocean.
With each step i t grows deeper,
The great sea covers all,
And the great keeper of the clouds
Unleashes his lofty hounds
On the silent shafts of sky,
Chasing them around the world.
The bark of the hounds screams out orange-red,
Awaking their prey, who were just playing dead,
In the darkness,
Because they had nowhere to go
instead of that cold, airy bed.
The dark frozen walls
become blindingly bleak and bright,
Solemnly facing all that surrounds them
In the increasing light;
Replacing the reverence of what once was night
With the confusion of a universe come to life.
Thomas Gill








1'HE LI FE OF A \.'!HEELChAI R
by 1',ngela Y. Davis
Hi!
I'm .Angie's motorized wheelchair.
I arrived
in N. Y. C. before l-ngie returned from eleven days at
camp.
Angela tells me you want to know what it's like
being a wheel chair.
Well, to tell you the truth,
i t ' s not easy, especially when you belong to Angie.
Angie is a rough and inconsiderate person.
She
drives like a maniac.
Of course, she doesn't mean to
.
You see, no one took the time to teach her how to
drive me.
She jokes about that by telling people to
watch out for their toes because she's not insured
for toe accidents.
Angie says if she doesn't learn
how to drive me soon, she 's going to end up ra
,
cking
me or killing herself, whichever happens to occur
first.
The only possible way I can make you understand
rry
rough existence is for you to spend a day or two
with me.
I'm going to back-track in time.
We are
going back to last Monday.
Last Monday was unique
because i t was the first day Angie anc. I had a heavy
schedule.
Angie had four classes that day.
In the morning I awoke before Angie's alarm went
off.
I sat there with my battery recharger hooked up
in back of me.
Angie had hooked me up to i t the night
before to make sure I was ready to go when she wanted
to.
Angie went through
a
ritual every morning.
First
you hear the alarm, then Angie lazily gets out of bed
to shut i t off.
She next runs to the ladies' room to
get washed.
After this, she comes back, turns on the
radio and, finally, gets dressed.
She has some pretty
clothes, but they seem to lose their beauty when she
wears them.
After she's dressed, she unplugs my re-
charger.
She puts straws in her pocketbook and piles
her bag of books on my back.
Ouch, does that HURT!
'We
wheel around the room and out the
.
door.
Here we are at breakfast.
How can Angie stand to
eat that food?
She has to cut off my power so I won't
decide to take off without her.
People say hello to
Angie.
She returns their greetings.
I say hello too
but no one hears me.
Hheelchairs aren't supposed to
know how to talk.
(I'm not talking now; i t ' s just
your imagination.)
Aren't you glad you have an




imagination which lets you hear my voice?
Angie has
just finished her breakfast.
It's time to get under-
way.
First class, Biology.
In Biology, Dr. Turley discusses the principles
of life.
He tries to define "LIFE.
11
It is almost im-
possible to find an appropriate definition.
Isn't
this something?
Here I was just made and I'm attend-
ing college classes.
I'm learning about life and I
don't completely understand my own "life."
Angie
seems to be falling asleep.
Wake up!
You should be
listening to this.
After all, you're the one who's
got to take the test on this stuff, not me.
Ah, nine-
thirty, time to split this class.
Angie and I have an hour to kill.
We drive over
to see the nurse.
Hey nurse, how's about checking my
water temperature?
Angie has to sign a release note
saying that she gives the hospital permission to
transfer her records to the nurse's office at Marist.
Angie questions where could she get her medication
with her old lady's mcdicaid card.
As usual, the
nurse doesn't know.
'l
'
ypical nurse, right?
Being a
very polite girl, Angie thanks her and we leave.
Ten-
thirty, time for Psychology.
Today, we have to watch a film.
It has something
to do with psychology.
Here's a lady asking her kid
what color his hair is.
A man appears on the screen,
talking a lot but making no sense at all.
Boy, I'm
glad Angie's the one who wants to be the psychologist,
not me.
The film has ended.
Angie seems to have com-
prehended all the materials presented in it.
I sure
hope she did.
Dr. O'Keefe starts to discuss the film.
Someone objects to brain surgery.
Another wants to
know about that man.
Still another questions the dif-
ference between a schizophrenic child and an autistic
child.
Dr. O'Keefe goes through a long, involved
explanation which I don't understand.
Sure pray Angie
does.
Well, i t ' s eleven-twenty.
Let's say ADIOS to
Dr. O'Keefe and psychology.
Angie and I head for the cafeteria to eat lunch.
We sit at a table full of nuts; namely, Toni, Don,
and Robbie.
Little does Robbie know that Angie has a
huge crush on him.
Of course, I try to tell him but
all he can hear is a squeak.
You see, Robbie's imag-
ination isn't as advanced as yours.
My opinion is
that Angie should go for Don.
He is much cuter than
Robbie.
Toni brought Pngie that garbage to eat.
Angie was so dumbfounded by Robbie that she didn't say



anything through the whole meal.
Boring, boring, boring!
Twentieth Century Music is next on our Monday
schedule through Marist College.
Dr. Sullivan, an
expert in the field of music, conducts the class.
We
listen to old-time music.
I don't like it.
It clogs
my batteries.
I dig good old Rock 'n Roll.
Eric, an
old summer buddy of Pngie's, keeps playing around with
r.1e.
This annoys Angie.
I suppose if there weren • t
this many people around, she might curse him out or
throw a book at him.
I might forget myself and run
over his toe.
Thank God, i t ' s the end of class.
Angie and I have both managed to keep our cool.
Angie drives around the campus in circles, making
whirlpools in my batteries.
Marist has some pretty
odd-looking art forms.
After psyching me out totally, we proceed to
English.
Since this is the first time the class has
met, Angie and I are absolutely and completely fright-
ened.
And, as usual, we are late, which doesn't help
matters any.
First we can't find the room.
Second,
I'm giving Angie a lot of trouble getting through the
door.
I keep pulling and she keeps pushing.
~nfor-
tunately man, or shall I say woman, over machine wins.
We go in zooming.
Angie notices that Chip is in the
room.
She doesn't feel terrified any more ..• mean-
while, Dr. Teichman is playing a name game.
Angie is
all for i t until they come to her name.
I get the
feeling that she wants to say some weird name such as
Tisha or Tenni.
But she has overcome the temptation,
saying simply Angie.
Dr. Teichman discusses the class
requirements, ~arks and stuff like that.
I glance at
the clock.
The time ~as come for dinner.
There isn't anything exciting happening at din-
ner.
In fact, nothing exciting happens for the rest
of the night.
Pngie sits at her typewriter and writes
letters and a poem.
I love her poetry.
One of these
days, she might write about what a lucky girl she is
to have someone like me to travel in.
The sun is setting and my recharger is hooked up
to me again.
I think it's time for you and me to rest
our minds and go back to my non-speaking existence.
Just one more thinq before I go, I love Angie for
she's my only friend.
Angie loves me too, only she
has a weird
way
of showing it!











GROVER KIMBALL
GAS
STATION OWNER
by Mike
Harrigan
PROLOGUE
G
ROVE
R KIMBALL, GAS
STATION
OWNER, 46
Gro
ver Kimball, 46,
of
1712
Route
l0K,
own
er
of
Kimball's
Route
l0K Bolt Service
Stat
ion,
Rosetown, died
Thu
rs
day ev
ening
at
his
home.
Bor
n
in Ne
w York City
,
May
2
,
1
928,
he
was
the
son
of
Wilb
ur
and Eunice
(Be
ntley
)
Kimba
ll.
He
had resided i
n this
area for
the
las
t
sixte
en
years.
He
left the
Army
in
1958
wh
e
re he had served for eleven
ye
ar
s
and had attained the rank of S
er
-
geant.
His wife, the former Jane Welling-
ton, died
in
August,
1961.
Mr.
Ki
mball was
a memb
er of
Gas
Retailers
Association, and a
of the
Rosetown American
Legion.
Mr.
Kimba
l l is a son, Michael.
the
area
member
Surv
iving
Funeral
services will
be
Saturday
,
a
t 10
a.m.
from Wilson's Fun
e
r
a
l
Home
.
Burial
will
be
in
the
Cedari
dge
Rura
l
Cemeter
y.
Do
you
remember the last
time
you
drove
'
past
a
funeral
hom
e
and saw
a
large
number of
cars o
u
tsi
de?
Didn't
you
think to yourself
that
som
eone imp
ortant
must
h
ave
died?
Th
e
y were
all
there, the blue
'65
C
h
e
vy that
bur
ne
d
oil, t
he Cadillac which guzz
led e
x
c
ee
d
ingly
la
rge amoun
ts of gasoline, the whit
e
Fo
r
d that lo
st
its b
r
a
kes
during that
large snowstorm
last ye
ar.
Even
the
motorcy
cle
which only
Grover
kne
w
how to fix
came
to W
ilson's
Fun
eral Home
that
evening.
All of
them
were
his
'regulars'
.
They all knew him
and they
loved
him.



"What amazed me was that Grover knew every road
in the county, including the ones that ain't on any
maps," said the '65 Chevy.
"Yeah, I remember a time when I wanted to go
someplace in New York City on business," said the
Cadillac, "and Grover told me exactly how to get
there and back, and even where to park!"
"He useta live down the City a long time ago.
I
remember some of his friends corning up when his wife
passed on years ago," replied the '65 Chevy.
In another part of the small room with the un-
comfortable wooden chairs, off to the right of the
coffin, stood the '73 Impala with the dented right
fender.
He was speaking to the motorcycle.
"The energy crisis didn't seem to affect Grover,
did it?" questioned the motorcycle.
"Well, he did close up on Sundays, but one time
he opened up special for that doctor from over
Carlton's Ridge.
Seems he had an emergency case or
something," answered the '73 Impala.
"You know," said the motorcycle, turning to
look at the figure in the coffin, "he doesn't look
natural with his hair all combed like that.
I remem-
ber him with i t all messed up and flopping around in
the wind."
"Yeah, and he always wore that greasy old cap.
Yes, he was a real good man, Grover Kimball, best
mechanic in the whole damn county,"
·
offered the '7 3
Impala.
"He could tune up a car and it'd get fifty
percent better mileage."
Then Mr. Wilson, director of the funeral home
brought in a wreath of flowers and placed i t at the
head of the coffin.
He exited quietly without making
a sound, almost as if noise would disturb someone.
A Volkswagen seated in the back smiled at his offer-
ing and wondered what to do with the check for the
lube job that Grover had done only last week.
"Didn't Grover have any relatives?" asked the
school bus.
"Someone told me that he had a son somewhere,
but I really don't know.
Seems he had saved enough





money himself to pay for the expenses here.
But I
don't know,
11
replied the Ford with the repaired brakes.
"Costs so damn much to die these days.
When I
go I hope they just cremate me and keep my ashes in a
can," said the school bus seriously.
"Didja know that they charge you a tax when you
die nowadays; they call i t a Death Tax?" said the
Ford.
"No, I didn't know that. What will they think
of next?" the school bus asked rhetorically.
Then a 1972 Gremlin, dressed in a black dress
came in.
She paid her respects to Grover quietly and
quickly.
She then moved to the rear and sat next to
the Volkswagen.
Then she said, whispering,
"I don' t know ••• why did this have to happen?
He loved that place, and ••• I think he may have loved
me ••• I don't know.
11
She began to cry.
"Look, Sis, control yourself," said the Volks-
wagen.
"Everything' s gonna be all right."
"Everything was all right.
But then when
those ••• those ••• idiots at World refiners sent him
that letter.
Imagine •.• 'The cost of supplying rural
gas stations has risen beyond acceptable levels.'
They told Grover to find a new supplier. Who the
hell would start supplying someone now?" she asked,
wiping her eyes with an already soaked tissue.
"He still would have had his repair business,"
offered her brother.
"He made peanuts from that and you know it. If
all the people who owed him money paid up, then maybe
he'd have had more than barely enough to pay
,
for his
own funeral.
Besides, he only charged a little bit
over what it cost him," blurted out the Gremlin.
"Well, whatever, but that didn't cause his
death.
He died of a heart attack.
He did smoke a
lot didn't he? Come on, take i t easy, please Sis."
The next morning at 10 a.m. the coffin carrying
the late Grover Kimball was loaded into Mr. Wilson's
1970 hearse.
It was the only official car, but it
was followed by a procession of others.



The procession crept along Route l0K, past the
late Grover Kimball's Route l0K Service Station,
which was all closed and locked, and past the small
home next to it, where a blue 1968 Chevrolet sat in
the driveway.
It reminded the 1972 Gremlin of a
riderless horse.
DESCRIPTION
Searching for the glitter of a single stone
As the shallow water wades
by
in the wind,
And the sun shines,
One singled out from many,
Like a favorite pine, silhouetted
with the snow,
Sparkling against the dim morning,
And the gray sky.
Thomas Gill




AN APOLOGY FOR ME
In small questions facing down,
Looking up, I am dumb.
So end the hall before the last door.
So wake up assisted by the jamb.
Oh, you nasty jamb,
Clog cog of creativity,
Dripity on my blood filled molars,
Moling through speared heart of marks.
Spelled so close, yet wrong,
Sew the skulled image I almost had.
But you stopped me.
Why am I sorry?
Under love of rack and screw
I showed my hate for you
And never let you to my side,
For fear that some outside have died
For what I said or tried
To kill the pain you caused inside,
A past that's come and set again.
To and fro you sung
And swung me in your arms.
I am sorry you did not drop me.
So are you.
My trail like that of a squirrel's
Pissed in the snow
Will vanish at loves first blow.
Put now, with love,
Imprints slashed on my wrists,
I come closer to your strangling grip,
And smile,
Then cry
For not being aborted as you wished.
Joseph Ahearn


PHILIP ROTH'S GOODBYE, COLUMBUS
-A COMPARISON OF NEIL AND ThE YOUNG BOY
by James Michael Naccarato
In ~oodbye, Columbus, one of the reasons why the
minor character of the nameless black boy has been
created by Philip Roth is to illustrate to Neil, and
to the reader, this main character's own desires and
the means by which he has attempted to attain them.
Roth has carefully prepared a parallel development of
these two characters.
The first time we are introduced to the black
boy, he is standing outside the library apparently
with the intention of taming the large stone lion
which guards the steps.
He is growling at this emo-
tionless beast, calling i t a coward, but of course,
receiving little satisfaction from these taunts.
At
this point in the story, Neil too is attempting to
tame an "emotionless beast," only his is embodied in
the Patimkin family.
He is "growling" at them, sar-
castically ridiculing their way of life--their having
their noses fixed, their automated home, and their
sporting goods trees.
He is challenging them, through
his relationship with Brenda, to step down from their
pedestal.
But like the boy, he is not experiencing an
overwhelming success.
Both characters realize that they need this
accomplishment, even if they themselves must compro-
mise--which in fact is--what each one does.
Although
the boy hasn't as yet tamed the stone lion, he makes
his way around i t and into the library, where there
is, he feels, a promise of something better than he
has.
Neil also forces himself to accept the Patimkins,
though retaining his sarcasm, with the hope that he
may escape the Aunt Gladyses and the Newarks.
At first boy and man seem successful in this com-
promise.
The hoy finds Gauguin and Tahiti, while
Neil finds Short Hills.
The comparison between these two dreams is first
indicated by a remark of Neil's on his first trip to
Brenda's house.
"It was ••. as though the hundred and
eighty feet that the suburbs rose in altitude above
Newark brought one closer to heaven," he thinks to







himself.
He repeats the number "one hundred and
eiohty" aqain only a few pages later.
It is not until
the appearance of the boy that the reason for the dis-
tinct mention of this figure becomes clear.
"He (the
boy) stood for a moment, only his fingers moving, as
thouqh he were countinq the number of marble stairs
before him."
Both characters, i t seems are aware of
the physical distance to their respective paradise.
The Tahiti-Short Hills identification becomes a
more concrete image when Neil says "I started up to
Short Hills, which I could see now, in my mind's eye,
at dusk, rosecolored, like a Gauguin stream.I;
Once they have identified them, Heil and the
black boy find little difficulty in achieving these
dreams.
In the days which follow Neil's scoring of
his "twenty-first point," we find that the boy too has
finally tamed his lion.
Neil begins to find the boy
outside the library each morning, sometimes on the
lion's back, other times beneath his belly.
Almost
sexual in description, there are indications that both
Neil and the boy have found a degree of satisfaction
in their Gauguin painted Short Hills.
But of course this is to be short-lived, and i t
is Tahiti which is the first threatened.
In the absence of the boy an old man attempts to
withdraw the book
by
Gauguin.
Neil protects the boy
.
by lying to the man, sayina the book is on hold.
It
seems doubtful that Neil did this because he was
aware of the relationshin between his own dream and
the boy's, but I feel ce'i:-tain he came to realize this
soon after.
For i t is immediately after this passaae,
that the reader finds lJeil and
D
rendc1 enqage<l in t:ieir
game by the pool.
It is 11ere that, for the first
time, Neil beains to feel insecure about their rela-
tionshin.
he does not want to be away from her,
doubts inat he'll fin2 her when he returns from the
pool.
He l.)ecorncs very
a
ware of the possibility that
he ~ioht lose, and that,
perh0ns
not in quise of an
olc: man "srnellin0 of Life
·
Savers," someone else could
withdraw his "book" from Short llills.
\illen t:1c~ old
n
:
an
returns to the library to in-
quire about Gauauin's book, Ueil finds himself lyina
again.
nut he does not seem as calm as he did before:
•' i
said i t with a finality that bordered on rudeness,
and I alarrr,e
d
rr.vse lf ... "
He tries to convince the boy
to take the
book
hoTT'e, but this is just as impossil>le





for
him as
i
t would be for
Neil to take Short Hills
back to Newark.
"Fancy
-
schmancy,
11
Aunt
Gladys would
say.
And
of course, someone
would "dee-stroy it."
Neil
leaves
on vacation that night, fairly cer-
tain that during
his absence
the old man will return
and withdraw the boy's book.
And although i t is not
expressed, he must
be fairly
doubtful that his own
paradise will continue much longer.
This is demon-
strated through
the
dream he has in which both he and
the boy drift away
from
the paradise, blaming each
other, but still losing their dream worlds.
It is
not explained,
but the
reader, and Neil himself,
understands that when i t docks the boat will be in
Newark.
The weeks at
the
Patimkin house and Ron's wedding
pass, and now
Brenda
returns to school.
"Already we
had sent our first letters and I had called her one
night,"
he
says, ''but in the mail and on the phone we
had some difficulty discovering one another .•. "
It
is now that
Neil
turns his attention back to the boy.
"I wonder what
i t had
been like that day the colored
kid had discovered the book was gone?
Had he cried?
For some
reason I
imagined that he had blamed i t on
me, but then
I realized
that I was confusing the
dream I'd had
with
reality.
Chances were he had dis-
covered
someone else,
Van Gogh, Vermeer ••.
But no,
they were
not his
kind of artists.
What had probably
happened
was that
he'd given up on the library and
gone back
to playing Willie
Mays in the streets.
He
was better
off, I
thought.
No sense carrying dreams
of Tahiti
in your
head, if you can't afford the fare."
By the
end
of this passage Neil is no longer
talking about
the
child, but about
himself.
The
dream of Short
Hills
was all over, and he was back in
Newark.
What would
happen in Boston would be a post-
script.
Neil knew he
still wanted to get out of
Newark, and
that
he
had no
other dreams, but he had
given up on Short
Hills.
Like the boy, he couldn't
"afford the
fare."
He couldn't
be a Patirnkin, or
anyone like
that--he saw
too much of the distortions
in their
lives.
As
for Brenda and her family, I
don't feel that
Roth saw
much hope for
them.
I think the lion con-
tinued
to be made of
stone,
and that
Short
Hills
remained
a paper dream.



mmRELLAS
We saw lavender and pink umbrellas
as we ran out from the building
down the path that was edged with trees
sagging with mid-summer laziness.
We saw a table set for two
with lacy coverings under the umbrellas.
We touched the umbrellas, and the table and sighed.
We watched the sun fall from the sky
turning from yellow to orange,
painting the world.
We sat a long time
imagining the madness of summer magic.
From the building on the hill,
we see them come for us.
We run, but they catch us and bring us back.
We remember how soft i t all felt
and cry when the lock is turned
and we can only look at i t
through barred windows.
Claudia Caglianone





poem in the moon
flickering lights
dense grey cold
ballerina opossum
and golpherless shadows
two stars east west
a faded moon
is
sunrise
Joseph Duffy




ma you taught me how to brush my teeth
i haven't had a cavity now in 3 checkups
ma you taught me 2 and 2
i haven't gotten 1 and 9 mixed now in 13 years
ma you taught me of souls and heaven
i haven't had a soul now in 15 years
ma you taught me right from wrong
i haven't been right now in 17 years
ma you taught me wrong
ma don't cry, i'm right, and you taught me
Joseph Duffy


The Last Winter Sunday
(for Pat Jameson)
The view from her room is of train tracks
and winter trees--yet i t is spring,
and she tells me she will be
gone in 41 days.
She talks of living and growing
We can speak of our growing now
and listen to a train pass below,
pushing northward and away
I know, although we are still
new and she will soon be
leaving here, that we
plow the same field
We are tilling what we were,
breaking into the good earth of what we are,
thrusting up our lives
toward each other
Gently, we press the renewed bulbs of
other times and feelings
into that earth, while talking of
pain and poetry
Before I leave, we
catch the first glimpse
of a bud on a spring tree
Paulette Guay




story in the grass
i am in a field by a river
watching eskirnos weave baskets of wild grass
i t is morning and almost spring
when i write this but i feel
the traces of some time other than now
years ago when i was another yet the same
when i wove with such grass
writing poems with i t as i sat by the river
sometimes i would dye the grass with my blood
my fingers coming to smell like those red stains
which finally wore through
and colored my soul
flavored my lives
that soul and this the same
that soul the poet of me
that soul which feels most at home
in the past and waits
to return to the time before white men
to when people were always dark
and did what they had to
only for food or love
when i wove gras~ and my blood into poetry here
never knowing the place would have me again
so that i could look up and see
eskimos dying grass and weaving baskets
to tell of some old victory
paulette guay





I
AM
AS Y
O
U -
DIFFERENT YET THE SAME
In the picturesque village of San Miguel,
where people move about quickly, and
bright colors grasp my pleasure emotions,
individuality irks me.
Everything seems united on the surface
of daylight, and the nights,
each one being separate of each other,
the subjective lies at the
bottom of the ocean
:
Even I, who is as close as I am to you,
am apart from you
.
I am me, my flesh, f
r
om my epidermis to
the innermost cells circulating in my
bone marrow.
A mind, I can think and write my thoughts,
bury them inside me, preconceive what I
want to, and taste what I eat.
Within me, as you, lies the secrets of life,
both made up of a highly developed system,
both products of our environments.
Using criticism as part of the creative
process, in relation to nature.
The villagers surround thei
r
lives around the sun,
some around the moon.
A New Yorker surrounds his life around clocks and
time,
some around d
epress
ion and darkness.
Each person's
in
te
r
pretation different,
while the power of nature, be you East or West,
creates a u
n
i
v
e
r
s
a
l
c
ommon abstraction.
In my case be
ing
bo
r
n in an inferior environment,
made me th
i
n
k o
f myself as an inferior person.
Not th
a
t my
p
a
rents
were alien fools in a
foreign count
ry
,
wh
e
r
e the ocean is black
from e
x
haust
i
on, an
d
no palm trees grow.
They adap
t
ed
to t
h
e
new w
a
ys because of
the materia
ls t
h
e n
e
w
life had to offer.
I'm onl
y
s
orry t
hey're t
r
apped now,
she alon
e w
ith
her p
ains and prayers,
and he com
pletely
s
p
eechless, like a
living ve
getable.
Deteriorating with the
rest
of
t
he ghett
o
s,
w
a
i
t
i
ng to die, if
the E
mpire
State
does
n
' t f
all first.



I also have a spirit that moves me, an
internal code that pushes me forward, the
sign that shows its presence in the silence
of my heart.
My guider, he is that special line in a poem,
the jungle call of a parrot.
Though the sun shines here my mind dwells in
the east,
wondering what awaits me in the dreary north.
Will I be strong enough to take it?
Will the village people sleep instead tomorrow?
Am
I not as you, you as me--different yet the same?
Only humans, who need love yet prefer isolation,
eat salads maybe lemons, and enjoy the blood of
animals.
Are we not alike?
Ruth Marquez


and to be within the whole,
within life and as a witness:
(it was early and the old were awake)
i was left alone to myself down by the people's lake.
if i were any younger i might not have known,
but i understood the aged faces, and how they've
grown.
perhaps i t was an inspiring thought,
could not yet have been the spoken,
not yet the written words
i
sought.
for a moment,
an instant of creation, of birth,
the reflections of life
unflowered their worth.
two, the love and nature as being,
orange under-sided, and swift shadows over flight,
at silent seeing,
fought against the marrow's night.
an act of lovers,
a pair of frolics,
the two lake-birds
and the distance they've covered.
and here i attend the morning's breeze,
the gift of endless song,
and an old man of please and ease,
following my rights and forever a wanderer •••
Chip Kennard
judy
despite the fact that
she converses very well
the tone of her monologue
makes i t clear that
she really doesn't identify
with petunias--
she just cares--
which makes i t all right
paulette guay


Ed watched him drive off, noticing that Merv
seemed to be talking to himself while pounding the
steering wheel with his fist.
Then, deciding that i t
must be about time for coffee, he turned and went in-
side.
A mountain;
belonging to nobody?
free from everybody?
All night long
i t squats on its hams,
jutting out its crag of a chin
bristling with pine-tree whiskers.
And as dawn
draws a pink frown
across the forehead of the night,
One can hear
a child's laughter
running at the crest of that hill
And suddenly
the mountain belongs
to somebody,
is free for anybody.
Jamie Misiuta




THE THEME OF RENEWAL IN MALAMUD'S THE ASSISTANT
by Pattie Jameson
One significant line in Bernard Malamud's The
Assistant occurs when Helen Bober, the daughter of
Morris Bober, was talking with Morris' assistant,
Frank Alpine, when they were first becoming acquainted.
Alpine was speaking of his previous life and of a girl
he had once loved.
After he told Helen of this girl's
death, Helen said in sympathy, "Life renews itself." 1
Her sympathy is not what is important here; the theme
of renewal is paramount in this work, and Malamud uses
Alpine to illustrate this.
Alpine made his first appearance early in the
book, as a stranger to all who lived in the neighbor-
hood.
The area was an old run-down ghetto in New
York with some interesting inhabitants:
Sam Pearl,
the owner of a candy store, who spends most of his
time pouring over racing forms; Nat, his son, a law
student and one of Helen's suitors; Julius Koop, slum-
lord and proprietor of a liquor store; Louis, his son,
a would-be suitor of Helen; and Morris Bober, a
grocer.
Morris was a Jewish immigrant who had come
to America hoping to make a way of life for himself
and, later his family:
his wife, Ida, son, Ephriam,
and daughter, Helen.
However, fate does not deal
kindly with Morris; Ephriam died at a young age, and
the Bobers stayed poor, although Morris worked hard.
"He labored long hours, was the soul of honesty--he
could not escape his honesty, i t was bedrock; to
cheat would cause an explosion in him, yet he trusted
cheaters--coveted nobody's nothing, always got poorer.
The harder he worked--his toil was a form of devour-
ing time--the less he seemed to have.
He was Morris
Bober and could be nobody more fortunate.
112
Yet
Morris' suffering in the end did prove fortunate for
someone--Frank Alpine, his assistant; and, to a
lesser extent, Helen.
lMalamud, Bernard, The Assistant, from A Malamud
Reader, Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, Inc:-, New York,
1967,
p.
168.
2 rbid., p. 88.
'=









Al
pine
became
the
assist
ant
as a
direct
result
of
Morris
' charity.
Caught sleepi
ng in
Bober's
cellar
bec
au
se
he ha
d
nowh
ere
else
to
g
o, Alpi
ne eventually
confessed
to
Morris that
he
had
been
resp
onsible for
stealin
g milk
and
r
olls; Morris
,
instea
d
of calling
the
polic
e, fed
the
young
man and
permitted
him to
sleep
in the back
room for
t
h
e
night.
The
next
morning
while
Morris
was drag
ging milk
cases into
the
store
, he pa
ss
e
d out; he
had been
injured
during
a
holdup
whic
h
Alp
ine,
ironical
ly
,
had participate
d in
and
still
was
weak
from
a head
injury.
Alpine
called
an
ambulance
,
ale
rted Helen,
and took over
the store.
Thi
s
was
the first step along the road
to becoming
Morris'
assis
tant,
a
son-figure,
and
then
takin
g
over
Morris'
role as provider--and maturing in the
process:
"All
through
Mal
amud's
stories
runs this
persiste
nt
theme
:
man is
his
brother's keeper because
i t
is
onl
y
in
keep
ing one's br
ot
her that
one really
becomes
a man
.
Thus all
of M
alamud's
heroes mature
in
'
the
same
way:
they learn to
see
.•. an
inimical
view-
point
... and
then embrace i t in an overt or implicit
act
of
love."3
Alpine's "act
of
lov
e"
consisted
in
workin
g for
Morris
at subsistent wages and
then
carrying
on
as breadwinner after Morris'
death.
However,
there
are many similarities in
the two
men
which help
us to see
this
development
even
bef
o
re
Morr
is'
de
ath.
B
oth
men are somewhat out of
place
in
their
enviro
nment; Mo
rris
is
a
Jew in
a
basically
Gent
ile neighbo
r
hood and Alpine is a Gentile
in
a
Jew
ish househo
ld.
Th
e
Jews in
the
neig
hborhood,
Pearl
and
K
ar
p, possess
none
of Morris' wisdom
or
integrity;
the
Italian neighbors, the
Fuses,
al-
though
kind people, are not portrayed as sharing
either
Alpine
's
lifestyle
or his
growing
insight
into
himself
or
the
hu
man
condition.
Both
have been
close
to the future
they
wanted
; Morris
wanted
to
become a
ph
armacist but
was pushed by
his wife into
a grocery
instead.
Of his life,
Alpine said,
"I've
been
close
to
some wonde
rful things
--jobs,
f
or instance
,
educa-
tion,
wo
men,
but close is
as
far as I go
. . . .
Don't
ask
me
why, but
sooner
o
r
later
everything I thi
nk
i
s worth
having
gets away fr
om
me
in
some way or
othe
r.
I
work like a mule
for what I
want,
and just
when
i t
looks
like
I am
going
to get
i t
I make
some
3Tucker,
~artin,
"A
Plural
is
tic
Place," Venture
III
(1959)
,
pp. 69-73.
Quot
ed by Rita
N. Kosofs
ky in
Bernar
d Mala
mud:
J~
Anno
ta
ted Checklist,
The
Kent
Sta
te
Uni
versity
Press,
1969, p. 38.





kind of a stupid move, and everything that is just
about nailed down tight blows up in
my
face •••• With
me one wrong thing leads to another and it ends up in
a trap.
I want the moon so all I get is cheese."~
Malamud underscores the similarity shown here:
" ••• Morris was thinking, I am sixty and he talks like
me." 5
The incongruity
,
here is that Frank was twenty-
five.
As the story progresses, i t becomes apparent
that both were incarcerated in their own prisons;
Morris was imprisoned in his store, his ill health,
and his pover~y-stricken life just as Alpine was in
his poverty, the guilt he felt for his crimes, and
later, his unrequited love for Helen.
Malamud com-
ments, "He could see out but nobody could see in" as
Alpine suffered when Helen broke up with him.
The
inability of other people to see good intentions is
yet another similarity between Morris and Alpine.
Another parallel which can be drawn is the compassion
both felt for those less fortunate. Morris' charity
toward Alpine is one example and his trust in the
store toward his customers is another.
Alpine tried
to collect one of these bills while Morris was
·
severely ill, but felt such pity for the family that
he ran back to the store to get his last three dol-
lars to give to them.
On the way back he met Ward
Minogue, however, who looked "as if he had escaped
out of a morgue"
and Mirogue pleaded sickness.
Alpine gave him the money instead.
Perhaps the greatest similarity between Morris
and Alpine was their ability to use suffering crea-
tively; both grew from their suffering, Morris into
greater tolerance and Frank into a man.
Morris said
while explaining the Law to Frank, "'If you live, you
suffer.
Some people suffer more, but not because
they want.
But I think if a Jew don't suffer for the
Law, he will suffer for nothing.'"; earlier he had
defined the Law as "to do what is right, to be honest,
to be good.
This means to other people.
Our life is
hard enough.
Why should we hurt other people? We
4Malamud, Bernard, The Assistant, p. 106.
Srbid., p. 107.
6rbid. , p. 250.
7rbid., p. 253.







ain't anim
a
ls
. . . .
T
h
i
s is what
a
Jew
b
elieves.
118
Frank still
d
i
d
not un
d
e
rstand
.
"'What do you suffer for
,
Morris?' Frank said.
'I suffer for you,' Morris said calmly.
Frank
laid his knife down on the table.
His mouth
ached.
'What do you mean?
'
'I mean yo~ suffer
for me. '
The clerk let i t go at that."
Frank A
l
pine, the stranger and assistant, became
the assailant and suffered as Morris did.
Before
Morris' death he had grown to take the place of
Ephriam, although Morris did not realize this.
Alpine
was more than just a physical substitute; before
Morris died,
"
He dreamed of Ephriam ••• Morris, in a
rush of love for him •.• promised him a good start in
life ••• Ephriam--a gentleman--averted his face as he
snickered ..•.
The boy disappeared in the wake of
laughter ... when the grocer felt himself awakening, he
tried to get back into the dream but i t easily evaded
him.
His eyes were wet.
He thought of his life with
sadness.
For his family he had not provided, the
poor man's disgrace •...
He thought of Helen.
It
would be terrible if she became an old maid.
He
moaned a little, thinking of Frank.
His mood was of
regret.
I gave away my life for nothing.
It was the
thunderous truth.
11
10
Frank, already
i
n misery because Helen has re-
jected him, suffered again as Morris died and grew
from the place of Ephriam to take the grocer's place,
"true to the spirit of our life--to want for others
that which he also wants for himself.
11
11
He sup-
ported the Bobers by running the store, supplementing
the small income with an all-night job, and gave
Helen what her father had most wanted to give to both
Ephriam and Helen--a college education.
Frank's con-
version at the end of the book symbolized his renewal;
the fact that Frank, who had been hostile to the Jews,
could voluntarily convert to Judaism is highly sug-
gestive of death and rebirth and of his maturity.
It
also tells us that Morris Bober did not give away his
8Ibid., p.
190
.
9Ibid., pp. 190-
1
91
.
l0ibid.
,
pp
.
285-
2
8
6.
llibid., p
.
2
89
.


life for nothing; indeed, he played so large a part
in influencing Frank's life that he and Frank merged
into one.
TIDAL EFFECT
Like the tide, predictable
But different each day,
We make our lunar rounds
Bordered by a million shores.
No map is accurate more than a few hours;
Each tide changes the touched shoreline.
The sand it sweeps will never be the same!
Rocks tumbled with its strength
Are altered always:
Some smoothed, some chipped,
Some finally ground to granules.
Elizabeth Spiro























':'!IE rENTEP
L·::
\
1arideanne I3lomoren
·
,
cr
v
i_:
ray
\
·
,as
drivinq as best he could consider-
' ::c
uc~)a
tc
he was havinq with himself.
How did
I
let
myself qet roped into buying another farm at
~~
-s
ti
m
e
of year?
But then i t was such a good buy,
·
:c
t
;
1
c
u
C;
!1
t,
how could I pass i t up?
I could have
:J'
Y
.H1:
1t
some stock instead.
No, what they say is true:
·
,
.
uy
land, they don't make i t anymore," a sure invest-
:-;
c~n
t ,
e
specially in the midwest.
But what about that
.:·en
t
c
r,
.Et
'i
r.owe?
He can't get organized enough to
~
a
ke the farm pay, and yet I can't let him go in
O
ctober.
He'd have no place to liv2 or farm.
I guess
I ' l l have to let him stay this year; maybe he'll im-
o
rove.
I:
1c rv saw Ed s tandinq by his patched tractor.
Ed
\las as patched as the tractor, but his worn clothing
did cover his banty height and paunchy stomach.
Ed
hitched his thumbs into his coverall straps and walked
to the new, blu0 New Yorker Chrysler, wondering about
his new landlord.
Would r1erv let him stay?
He knew he never man-
aged to get much, if anything, out of the farm.
It
was hard with a wife, six kids and out-dated machinery.
How could Mr. Bray, who had several farms plus a
couole of general stores, understand that?
Ed knew
he'd never had a chance.
His parents had always been
poor and had rented, and he had to do the same.
But
at least he was his own boss--renter or no.
That's
the way i t had to be.
There were no time-clocks to
punch on a farm.
"Ka tog," he greeted Mr. Bray in Norweqian, as he
watched him ease his tall, lean frame out of the car.
"Ka tog, ka tog," answered Merv, clearing his
throat several times in the process.
"Just thought we
could talk things over, Ed.
You'll stay, I guess?"
"Sure will," Ed answered quickly, much relieved.
"How'd ya want to work it?"
Merv leaned against the car, watching the pattern
his foot traced in the dirt and replied, "Oh, I guess
like usual.
I ' l l furnish the land and buildinas;


you'll furnish the machinery and work, and we'll split
everything fifty-fifty.
Okay?"
Trying to hide his relief at not having to pay
cash rent, Ed stuck a blade of foxtail in his mouth
and moved i t around until i t found a place where two
teeth met.
Then he agreed, "Sure sounds okay.
What
about a contract?"
Merv Bray offered his hand, "That's my binder.
Good enough for ya?"
Taking his hand and shaking i t heartily, Ed
sealed the bargain, "It's alright with me.
I've heard
you're a fair man, and I ' l l do my best.
Come on in
and have some coffee."
"No, no, never drink it; but I would like to see
the house."
They walked in silence to the collapsing porch
and adjoining wood room.
"I been meaning to shore
this up and organize the room," Ed said with a nervous
laugh as he threw some broken toys out into the yard.
"I'll furnish the materials if you do the work,"
Merv offered.
"Just charge i t at Lyle Hardware,
they'll clear i t with me.
Hey, what are these corn
cobs doin' in here?"
"Oh, we burn them in the cook range to make the
wood go further.
If we keep that stoked up, we don't
use as much fuel oil either."
They crossed the porch to the side door and en-
tered the kitchen.
Ed could see Mr. Bray stiffen at
the disorder and knew he wouldn't appreciate the kids,
having only one of his own.
It was a short, quick
tour with little said.
Then, Mr. Bray sped off, his
car kicking dust into the trees that lined the long
driveway.
Ed saw little of Mr. Bray until just before
Thanksgiving.
He was strolling out the door when he
saw the big car coming.
"Rose," he yelled to his
wife , "keep those kids in and keep them quiet. "
Mr.
Bray was already walking up the path when Ed turned
around.
"Here's a little something for Thanksgiving, Ed,"
he said, handing him a fifteen pound turkey.





"Thanks,
Mr.
Bray,"
Ed
said
with a
nervous
chuckle.
He started to turn with i t , then stopped,
confused,
not knowing
what to do or what was ex-
pected.
Finally, he turned and gave i t to Rose.
"I
don't know what to say,
Mr.
Bray."
"Well, just enjoy it, and •.. call me l1erv.
Christ,
we don't need
to
be so formal."
'' All right, Merv.
Say, I heard your daughter
likes to ride horses.
Bring her down some weekend.
She can ride
with
my
kids.
We got some nice riding
horses."
"Okay .•.
yeh,
she'd like that," he said as he
turned to leave.
"This
is
marvelous,
Ed,"
Rose exclaimed, trying
to push her
bushy
hair into unknown order.
"Who
ever
would've thought it?"
"Yeh, who would've?"· Ed answered.
Lazy,
cold November
froze into December and
thoughts of Christmas.
Ed looked uncertainly for the
big blue car.
It didn't fail him.
Three days before
Christmas i t
plowed down
the driveway.
Ed extended
his bare
chapped
hand
to Merv's
finely
gloved
one,
and he sneaked a peek
through the
window of the car.
"I
thought a
little Christmas spirit wouldn't
hurt none,
"
Merv said, opening
the back door of the
car and taking
out
two
large boxes.
Wiping
her
hands
on her apron,
Rose
came out to investigate.
There
was
a large ham
and
fresh
fruit
for her and Ed,
and
a box
of prettily
wrapped
gifts for the kids.
She took the
gifts in, leaving Ed to thank
Merv.
The two
men
strolled over to the porch, kicking
clumps of snow and breaking ice patches with their
heels.
"Thought
maybe
you'd
have this fixed by now,"
Merv said, shaking the
loose
support post.
''Yeh, I meant
to.
Just
have trouble finding the
time, ya know.
I planned on Jimmy, my eldest, helping
me, but he's having a time with his studies this year.
I didn't
want to
make
i t
harder for him by using his
time.
Maybe
this
spring we'll
qet
to it."
"I'd like to paint the
house,"
Merv
replied,
"but
no
use doin'
i t t i l l this
is fixed.
Do some work




on the barn and we could paint that too."
"We'll try to get to i t ,
"
Ed said as they headed
for the car.
"Thanks a lot for everything.
This will
really make Christmas for the wife and kids~•
He
waved casually as Merv left.
"How about this, Rose!" he exclaimed when he got
inside.
"Well, he can afford it," she answered.
his daughter is down here often enough."
"Besides,
"I know, but he doesn't have to do this.
And
Bonnie does have a time here, what with being alone at
home and having six kids to play with here.
I do love
to watch her ride, too.
I can't understand why he
doesn't get her a horse."
"I guess i t is right nice of him after all,"
Rose agreed.
As usual, Ed
W-':l.S
surprised by spring.
He never
could figure out how i t got there so fast.
As he left
the house to do the chores one day, he heard the car
coming.
'
'
Morning, Merv," he called.
"Morning, Ed.
Heading out to plow?"
"No, not just yet.
Got the cows to milk first."
"By God, Ed," Merv exclaimed, "it's ten in the
morning!
Did ya just get up?"
"Yeh, had a little pepsic stomach lately.
Thought some rest would help."
"What about the kids?
Couldn't one of them do
it?"
"The older ones have their hands full helpin'
Rose with the young ones and doin' their studies.
I
couldn't ask them to do more.
"
"
Cows produce better on a schedule, you know
that," Herv said incredulously.
'What the hell kind of schedule can I have?" Ed
asked in a hurt voice.
"What with the weather and
















sickness to worry about, out-datea machinery and day-
1 .
I
+-
•
•
1.a
.
1 '-
savings
t1.:r:,e--my
cows 1:1roducc enouqh to c::ret
hy.
·
·
' I guess that's
y
our business.
L
ut I want the
plowins- done and the fields in on t i
r
,c,
·
· ?ierv said.
' I ' l l leave you to your work, but I ' l l ~
~
back next
week."
The following Tuesda·.1 afternoon,
r
terv found
Ed
staring at the old tractor from his tree stump vantage
point.
·
1
Hm
·
,1
rr.ucll plowin's been done?"
he asked.
'Got the north forty <..lcne, but now
I
sot a flat
front tire.
'::'r:/in' to fiqurc 01,t how
I
TPi<Jht patc
'.
1
i t up.
Can
I t
Luy
that
size
no
nore.
,
.
Taking a deep breath, f1erv said, "Listen, I' 11
have my other renter, Pat, call you.
He's good with
machinery and maybe could help you out."
"I'd appreciate that," Ed said.
"This here's got
me stumped."
He headed to the house for coffee as
Merv drove off.
When Merv came back to check on the planting, he
found Ed out in ~he field wrestling with the still-
lame tractor.
He watched the kids riding and playing,
then left before Ed could see hirr. and stop again.
Then came the Fourth of July.
The corn was knee-
high--except on :Cd's place.
next day, Merv confronted
Ed,
"v
J
e
've had all the rain we need for this sand base
farm.
That means we should have a bumper crop.
We
aren't going to get i t though, are we?"
"0:1,
i t could catch up yet," Ed countered.
"Not unless you get rid of those weeds and give
i t room to grow.
Even then I don't think i t can fully
recover.
"
Changing the subject, Ed said, '
'
Thanks for all
the garden goods you brought down.
We sure enjoyed
them.
You must have a qood crop on that truck farm of
yours."
"Yes, Lut that's not our concern.
I can't see a
way to continue like this.
If there's a decent har-
vest, then maybe we'll both be able to relax."
"hell, there will be, ~erv.
I ' l l get the crops








out
okay--I'm
<loin
'
the best I can," Ed combed
his
fin
gers thr
ough his
thin hair.
'
'
I hope so
,
Ed.
check
things
out
now.
I'm going to drive around and
S
e
e
ya."
T
hat fall
,
the harvest
was late and meager, but
t
-lerv s
a
i
d
l
ittle
about it.
Ed
relaxed as the 'l
'
hanks-
gi vin
g and Christmas
gifts came
as usual.
Eis only
worry
wa
s
whether
th
e
porch would
hold u
n
d
e
r the last
snow.
January
second found Merv wrestling
himself an
d
his ca
r down
the snow-laden
roads to Ed's.
How am I
going to
tell him?
Merv
thought,
and
he heard the
who
le conversation
in
his mind.
"Sorry to bring bad
news
with the
new year,
Ed, but I ' l l have to ask you
to le
ave.
The
losses wer
e ju
st t
oo h
eavy t
his y
ea
r
.
You
can stay t i l l
you
f
i
nd
a p
lac
e
."
"Damn
it,
Merv,
you
can't do
this,"
Ed will say.
"Wh
y didn't you
tell
me this
fall?
What the hell a
m
I su
pposed
to do?"
'
'
Now
,
I
told you I wanted
a decent
harvest
a
n
d we
d
idn't
get it."
"I
know, but
.•.
the gifts
,
the
...
Christ, this has
be
en my
home
for ten
years.
I got
no
place to go.n
"I'm
sorry,
Ed.
You'll
have
to
be
out when
you
ca
n
.
"
Just
thinking about the encounter
sent
!-1er
v
in
to
a co
ughing fit.
"Who'll
take me as
a renter?"
he imagined Ed
ask
ing.
"I haven't
got
no decent machinery, and I got
si
x kids
to feed and clothe.
How many place
s
have
room f
or six
kids?
It's
January.
They ain't n
o
farms
fo
r rent
in January.'
"Why
not try
to
find
work in town?"
"In town?
In town
I
I
d have to punch a ti
m
e-c
l
o
c
k.
Besi
des,
I'm a
farmer.
What can a farmer do in tow
n
?
What
about
my
livestock?"
As
he approached the
farm, Merv resolved to
st
and









firm.
I ' l l say:
"Sorry, you'
,
11 have to be out.
You
can stay until you have a place to go.
That's a fair
offer.
''
\valking up from the barn, Ed sav, the blue car
blinking between the trees.
"Ka tog, Happy :\jew Year,·'
he greeted Merv.
"Happy
New
Year,
Ed,
"
?
1erv responded, shaking
Ed's hand.
'
·
I can't tell you how happy all those gifts made
the kids.
You should'a seen 'em!" Ed beamed.
"That's all right, " :
,
!
erv answered, walking to-
wards the collapsed porch.
"
It finally fell down,
huh?"
"Yeh," Ed said in a small voice.
did it.''
· That last snow
"
Lose any livestock in that last blizzard?"
'' One good milker got tl1e couah and died. "
"The heck."
"The others are okay though," Ed assured.
"Say, did you hear about the fire at Johnson's?
Lost five head."
"Yep, read i t in the paper."
"Well, listen, Ed, help me measure off this porch
and I ' l l ask Lindquist if he can come fix i t in the
spring."
They worked in the silence of numbers, Ed think-
ing that Merv's silence was caused by anger over the
porch.
Finally, with resignation, rierv headed for the
car.
"
Say, Merv," Ed detained him, "I'm a little short
of room in the barn.
I'd sure like i t if you'd take
my Tennessee Walker for Bonnie.
It's her favorite
horse anyway.
I'd like her to have it. '
'
"Well,•· ~
-
1erv coughed to buy time and wondered how
ne could get out of this.
"Well, okay, Ed.
Ah ...
ahem ... have a sood new year. "



THE MESSAGE
I am rocking in my chair
when I hear a knock at the door.
I get up slowly and answer.
It is my son's captain.
He shuffles his feet, coughs, wipes his brow,
looks up with pity in his eyes.
Time grows on and he is still silent.
Vincent Carfora
November day,
how can you tempt us
with your signs of spring?
Warm, clear, clean the air flows.
The river becons for swimmers long gone.
All signs of winter you've covered over.
The cheeks on that pretty girl
are red and full of life
like your sister April's rose.
Why must you tempt us,
when tomorrow will be cold?
John Covell






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