Fall 2016: Animals Are Us.

by David Budbill.

The Emperor is stingy. The Emperor is greedy. The Emperor hates

the poor. He hates music and sex. And so long as the Emperor is

on the throne, the subway philanthropist plies his trade, prowling

the bowels of New York City moving deliberately from subway sta-

tion to subway station dropping fifty-dollar bills into white plastic

five gallon buckets, saxophone cases, violin cases, upturned straw hats,

Tupperware bowls, all sitting quietly in front of electric guitar

players, Mariachi bands, women classical saxophonists, avant garde

jazz ensembles, brothers in do-rags drumming on plastic buckets

and tin cans, a woman playing a saw, an electric organist playing

Guy Lombardo’s greatest hits, old Chinese men playing one-string

Chinese violins, Peruvian Panpipe Players, young Chinese men play-

ing Chinese flutes, Buddhist monks playing Shakuhachi, doo-wop

singers doing close four part harmonies, conga players, bongo play-

ers, cellists, string quartets, Hawaiian guitar players and trombone

players too, all of them, every one, no matter how good, how bad,

it’s music and it’s a stay against, an antidote to, The Emperor’s ha-

tred of all that is warm, good and alive. And so the subway philan-

thropist plies his trade, makes his rounds, prowls the subways pay-

ing one fifty-dollar bill at a time to keep humanity alive while the

Emperor wages war upstairs, above ground, in the sad daylight of

the world.

 

 

 

 

 

by Tamra Lucid.   I was in my one bedroom Hollywood apartment sleeping peacefully around six in the morning.  I was having the most peculiar dream.  A hummingbird looked directly at me and said several times in excellent English: “Tamra, help me!”  I woke up startled.  The dream troubled me.  I decided I needed a […]

by Ronnie Pontiac.   A koi fish glistening white, rainbows in her scales, with spots of gold and orange, and a black stripe, lived in an aquarium, in a house where a cat lived. The koi had fresh water every day and delicious goldfish food flakes and other treats to eat. At least once a […]

by Marissa Bell Toffoli. Recurring nightmare: neck entangled in tree when lions show up hungry. Upon waking? So far, nothing. Eat a twig, wiggle my ears, keep moving. Always go, go. Like a gazelle’s dancing body grows longer every muscle stretches, holds, reaches. Stillness, the illusion. My legs propel me across these plains faster than […]

by Rose Jermusyk. Mother Thrush had four daughters; Fair, Proud, Trembling, and Loud. Fair was a clever creature who happily left the nest with no intention of turning back, except to smile to her mother. Proud took great strides to stand on her own when she left the nest, and often sang to her mother. […]

by Marie Davis and Margaret Hultz. Most people do not expect a tick to find God at a flea market. But, that is exactly where Harold first recognized God — in the smile between two ladybugs. Not the insects, but the ladybugs that are rouged onto old women’s cheeks — the round, rosy kind of […]

by R.J. Fox. Looking back, there are no shortage of reasons why I was bullied. I’m not saying I deserved it. However, I certainly didn’t help my cause. My elementary school social standing left much to be desired, to say the least. I was a nerd and a dork (labels I now look back at […]

by Brian Griffith. Across the modern world, outrage against people who kill the wrong animals is on the rise. For example, when the Dalit (or untouchable) students of India’s Osmania University served beef biryani at a recent social event, about 100 radicals for cow reverence from a right-wing Hindu group, the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parisad […]

by Charles S. Kraszewski. Se vedea fiammeggiar fra gli altri arnesi scudo di lucidissimo diamante, grande che può coprir genti è paese quante ve n’ha fra il Caucaso e l’Atlante. I thought our dog – all 150 pounds of him – had rushed the bed with a shoulder bred to keep legionary beeves in line […]

by David D. Horowitz. I’ve conversed with various friends and acquaintances over the years who feel human beings are essentially greedy, wasteful, and violent. Some even feel earth would benefit were human beings to become extinct. While I share some of their skepticism about human virtue, I tend to praise and appreciate people. We might […]