All My Belongins All my belongings have remained as if I died long ago dust to dust the place is full and I inscribe crosses with my fingers all my things recall the hour we spent together when my books lost themselves the clock has stopped at that hour the happy hour, enchanting was the sundown I’ve been dead so long the window has always been closed. No persons nor the sun ever enter my deserted house echoes that hour again, the only hour that lasts from morning to the eve and I don’t know what this place is nor who inscribes the crosses and all my things remained the same as if I died long ago
“Quite right, my dear, and if you don’t mind me saying so, I wish you would take that responsibility a little more seriously and keep the things we hear in confidence to yourself.” Robert Carson folded his hands, placed them on the desk in front of him, and smiled at Emily as if to atone for the harshness of his words. “Having said that,” he continued in a gentler tone, “I will tell you what Ben wanted. You would have to know in a day or so, anyway. Ben’s getting married on Friday.” Emily’s mouth dropped open. She had been about to take offence at his inference that she was a gossip, but his last words erased every other thought from her mind. And she certainly paid no heed to his advice because, within five minutes, she was on the phone to Molly Andrews, her best friend in Nimkus. As in most small communities, a class system existed amongst the residents of Nimkus. The town matrons would have denied it but the divisions, although very subtle, did exist. There was no doctor in town, no dentist and no lawyer. For services supplied by these professionals one had to travel to the neighbouring larger town of Bradshaw. With the absence of such elite families as these, the responsibility of maintaining the position of upper crust fell to the wives of the banker, the minister, the station agent, the town clerk, the druggist … and on it went. Had the principal of the three room school on the outskirts of town been a man, his wife would certainly have been included in this group. But the principal of Nimkus School happened to be, and had been for some time, a single woman. Although well regarded by the parents of the children she taught, Miss Donna Carrington had no status in town because she had no husband. And a single woman, no matter how brilliant and ambitious, was secretly regarded as a nonentity by the town matrons. Immediately following Ben Fielding’s visit to the vicar, Mrs. Carson telephoned Mrs. Andrews. The station agent’s wife then called Jean McKinnon, the banker’s wife. Mrs. McKinnon just happened to be on her way to do her grocery shopping. And, of course, she let slip the astounding news she had just heard as soon as she began to give her grocery order to Mr. Stratton, the owner of Stratton’s…
SPRING It’s here, it has come. Women, gather round, let’s march to meet it, let’s march to welcome it. Here comes sweet spring adorned in flowers, riding a donkey, sitting like a man with herds of braying donkeys close behind it, ready all to copulate ready to be lovers all. They kick with all four legs and bellow in their joy, so wildly alive that you can see the madness in their eyes and braying all along they bellow out spring’s beauty and carry it abroad for all the world to see and spring, as it proceeds and blazons its warm breath, fills up the entrance way of every house with heat. The newly married maiden feels hot in the cool air and dresses in her lightest cotton dress and walks out to refresh herself for all to see her passion and the wind, if it can, to cool her ardor. Ah, spring, sweet spring, companion of the young, youth’s oestrus, comrade equally to boys and girls if you run out to the fields even if you took away your steps a myriad of followers you will always find beside you while all the long-lived men who can no longer walk the fields to meet you, stay behind and envying, blame the young. Ah spring, let us give to others their fair share without losing our good hold on the reins of your donkey. Look how the young girls play and push each other. Look how they fall and show their secret lines to men. Ah spring, stay steady on the saddle and hold more tightly to your donkey’s reins. Oh spring, oh my sweet spring, companion of the young youth’s oestrus, comrade equally to boys and girls.
Some adventure this is.” Atall turned to slash furiously at the bush he’d been trimming. Ari was gone. Atall called after him, “You should be helping us cut grass. Hjálmar’s sailing first thing in the morning.” Keallach and Ailan watched Ari drop down beside them. He put his finger to his lips for silence then untied their bonds. They followed him up and over the side into shallow water. Neither thought to ask why or where. Ari’s friendship with their Brother Lorcan was all they needed to know. It was not until they reached a clearing in the woods that they noticed his blood splattered tunic. When Ari told them that the Little Warrior had been avenged and could rest in peace, they were glad. Both Brothers at the same time said, “God forgive us.” “Now we must find your Brothers.” Ari told them. “But we must be careful. Searchers are out looking for Hrafen, Atall and Bjorn. Soon they will also be looking for four escaped thralls and for me.” The Brothers were ready to go but Ari cautioned them to remain in hiding. “If I run into searchers, I will just be one of them. When I find your Brothers, I will either bring them here or come back for you. Now, please lie low until I return.” With that, Ari slipped into the night. All was quiet except for the hooting of an owl and the scurry of tiny paws on the forest floor.
Zeta I paired my sigh with the stirring of my heart, the pleasure of the first penetration with the apex of an orgasm and the rain’s slow slap onto the earth’s voluptuousness I paired my lust with undulation of her body with its erotic rapture and the longing for consummation I paired the horse with its rider and death with the flower of life and I said, together they constitute the meaning of transcendence I paired the beggar’s plea with the concern of the passerby and I said, together they fight the common enemy called hunger, the endless source of need for equilibrium the unhealed wound or the bleeding scar of the twentieth century as always and
I said, together they define the meaningful schemata of the swallow’s flight path that slices the wind caressing it with a winged shadow together they formulate the essence of the unexpected soft pain and sweetness together they constitute the final, greatest monad
Lucas: Grand Junction The light filters through a drifting barrage of cloud, early evening mist blurs a green froth of trees and Lucas doesn’t know anything any more. Now that he’s walked out he feels uneasy about his paternal rescue mission. No one stops for the lone hitcher. The B-road wanders everywhere and nowhere. All the signs are overgrown. He staggers into Abbotsburton railway station. At least he can dry out and ponder. From the doorway of the deserted waiting-room, he studies the slant of the rain. No way back to the motherland now. He gazes along a curve of single track. Squat oaks crowd the edge of the trackbed. They bulge with growths, puffs of whiteness.. The dankness of this landscape might dissolve the sticky molecules of his identity. The waiting room window is pointed, forming pseudo-gothic lancets with small leaded panes. There’s a peculiar stained-glass armorial motif at the apex, a stylised flash of green lightning bursting from blue-tinted clouds, with initials: WGJR. This must be the privately-owned ‘restored’ line, probably run by enthusiasts in woolly hats and anoraks. Perhaps they’re hoping to reconnect Abbotsburton with the local coastal resorts, miles away across the moorlands. Yet their steam-age revival has apparently failed already. The cracked canopy leaks, and this room is a sparsely furnished shed, offering a slatted wooden bench, scarred with ancient rune-like graffiti. The faded adverts for Brylcreem, Park Drive cigarettes and Philco Radio-Grams are the kind of time-capsule memorabilia his father used to sell. He is atomised, all his bits and pieces are in free fall. Best not to think too hard about past, future, any time at all. Of course, he has left his bleeding watch behind. Lucas turns up the collar of his black bomber jacket and walks out to the far end of the platform, where nettles split the asphalt. There’s no sign of a timetable or platform staff. He scans the rusty rails. They curve in from the woods and continue out into a steep cutting, between slopes of thick wet bushes. On the far side of the track he can see a low windowless red-brick building, overgrown with creepers. A derelict sub-station; or a wrecked trackside memorial to some defunct moorland industry?
…awkwardly. “It’s about Frances.” “What about her?” Eteo replied, smiling. “She’s crazy about you, Dad,” Logan finally said. “She has asked me twice now about what she can do to get you to go out with her.” Eteo laughed. “I’m aware of Frances, son. I’ll approach her when the time comes, don’t worry about her.” “Be careful though, Dad. She sleeps around, you know.” “I’ll be careful. No worries, son.” When Logan went back to his desk, Eteo sighed and began to make some calls. Yanni. Spiro. Angelo. Tom. Nick. It was time to update them on their accounts and let them know what he had in mind to do for them. As usual, they all said it was up to him to choose what to get into and when to sell their accounts. Eteo felt his chest expanding. He knew he would make some good money with these clients. He always made the most with the ones who just said, “Do what you think is best.” Clients like Ariana who had said exactly that when she opened her account and deposited a hundred thousand dollars in it. He dialed her number. “Hello, sweet baby” he said when she answered. “Hello, my love,” she replied. “How is your working day?” “Pretty good, sweet Ariana. How’s your mother?” “She’s fine, though she’s in her own world these days, I’m afraid.” “Want to meet for lunch? When I’m done here, I mean. We could go to the White Spot on Lonsdale or the one at the Royal Park mall.” “I’d love to, my love. Either place. Just come and get me when you can.” “Soon as I’m done, then. I’ll be at your place no later than 1:45.” “I’ll be ready, baby.” At exactly 1:40, Eteo pressed Ariana’s buzzer. She came down at once, and his day turned more pleasant just as quickly. He kissed her, led her to his car, opened the door for her, and drove to the White Spot at Lonsdale and 23rd. Ariana ordered their legendary hamburger with fries and Eteo the equally famous Mediterranean chicken salad. They shared a half liter of red wine, the house Shiraz, a respectable Okanagan product, and laughed as they clinked their glasses, enjoyed their unassuming meals, and talked of simple things…
Timeline Often, when I was a child, I remember the adults talking about my future. This usually happened at the dinner table. But I didn’t pay attention to them as I listened to the birds in the trees outside. Perhaps for this, my future was delayed so much: there were innumerable birds and trees.
However, he wants to talk, to finish what he left half-done. He listens to the talks around him and inside him he wants to connect them. If we could change, he said, (who said it? To whom?) to change, in other words, to exchange Give me, he said, your beautiful face, your youth that I’ll be inside it, wearing your beautiful body, in a union, my god, from within, melting in a union, melting from the warmth of the union, from the warmth of the spring, melting to the end. And he was marked, since his birth, with a cross on his forehead; marked by fate or his knowledge. However, you move in your time and I in mine, and it’s no one’s fault. He said that and stopped talking. Who was he? You couldn’t tell. People had lost their authentic blood, not being able to discern their voice and their face after so many chance encounters, tolerances,
Manolis Aligizakis 