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| "Tracings" by Sandy Beach "The Seer on the Wooden Pillar" by Paul Belz "The World Made from Cacophany" by Paul Belz "Unrequited" by John Birkbeck "Silence" by Curtis Church "In Paradise" by Rosemarie Crisafi "Just a Walk in the Park" by F. Anthony D'Alessandro "Columbus Circle Crooner" by F. Anthony D'Alessandro "Lobster Duck" by F. Anthony D'Alessandro "Sloppy Hair in Sunset Years" by F. Anthony D'Alessandro "Logarithms" by Tony D'Arpino "Lila" by Adriana DiGennaro "A Year of Mourning" by Ruth Dombrow "Conversations with a Naked Ascetic" by Alison Eastley "The Book of Scorpio" by Alison Eastley "Cloud Formations" by Rich Ives "Infancy" by Edith Kur "Hunt, 1831" by Joanne Lowery "Cold Turkey" by Joanne Lowery "Clark Gable as Muse" by Joanne Lowery "Accident in 16 Parts" by Joanne Lowery "Little Pears" by Joanne Lowery "After We Bought a Computer in 1996" by Shawn McLain "Seven Blind Men and the Elephant" by Ram Mehta "What I Want" by Corey Mesler "Stagnation" by Samia Ouederni "On The Walls:" by Marissa Ranello "Urban Cycle" by Marissa Ranello "Midnight Shift" by Cortny Riblett "Thief" by Cortny Riblett "When the Beach is Mine Alone" by Harding Stedler "Enter Stage Left" by Harding Stedler "Superman and Darlene Smith" by Deborah Stinson "Per-millennial Skyline" by Elizabeth Kate Switaj "Under the Umbrella" by Sara Toruno |
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| Just a Walk in the Park |
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| It was supposed to be just a walk in the park,
a cameo visit to the capital of the world. Stretching and rubber banding up the nighttime Lincoln Memorial, behind bands of bamboo legged teeners on their mommy paid bus tours. Someone in my troupe requested our visiting the Vietnam Memorial too. I strolled casually, neatly in line behind the patchquilt of tentative tourists. Their muted rivers of clattering over pavement echoed through the thick Potomac air. Names, thousand of names, lives thousands of lives, loved ones thousands of loved ones, scratched into that outstretched tombstone of lists. Flickering candles highlighting photos of pocked faces, trinkets, prayers strewn along the roll call of victims, all hugging this capital city altar. A few staccato steps later, my emotions lightened as I admired sculptures of both American men and women serving in that wasteland of saturated patties. Books sat decaying under glass, aging pages listing lives much like what must exist at Heaven’s gate. I tripped upon the 1975 edition, and searched a name in that random year. My knees betrayed me and buckled, while my eyes simultaneously dimmed and dampened when the name bulged out of the washed out pages. I pawed my way to a nearby bench and thought about one of my closest college chums, his personality was like an unkempt bed, yet his heart was like a Palermitan confection. We shared the rhythm of our era, much of the rhythm anyway. Lieutenant Alberto never had a chance. I tried to bathe the moment in prayer. Prayer boycotted me. All that was left of the flamboyant barrister and friend were fond memories of nubile females and ’56 Fords and ’57 Chevies. |
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