Grandma Gasse passes; Art gets the trust fund. He takes up painting in a derelict studio. Crazy neighbor Lou gets a mail-order wife from Ukraine, mellows a bit. Oksana visits the studio in a tube top. Lou returns early from work; discovers his Slavic babe in the arms of Art. They fight. Oksana beans Lou with a rock. The jury finds self-defense. Oksana runs off with the real estate agent. Art returns to his ...art.
by Ted Jean of Milwaukie
With enough guts,
the basics made sense:
Like shrapnel
flight, the absolute option.
You thought it.
by Joshua Otto of Portland
Old Dutch:
a tall candle is love;
short one, dismissal.
Now courtship ends
not with light lost, but
thumbs sore from texting.
by Matt Kolbet of Newberg
1. find book/s you truly love
2. say Fuck it
3. prepare wax by melting cheap candles in bread pan over gas burner
4. dip each side of book/s into wax & allow to dry--if pages 'fizz' turn down heat
5. use knife tip/other to drip wax across pages and along edges
6. dip each side once more in wax to seal
7. replace book/s & ignore
*wax clean-up is a bitch. when it gets all over floor, leave until morning. have a cigar.
by Mason Alexander of Portland
He stared up at the painting. The robot next to him flipped her hair. She smelled like flowers. She asked him if he understood the complexities of the colors. Whether he could truly appreciate the grief, the creativity, the beauty of the art. He sighed, and shook his head. People who painted themselves as art lovers annoyed him. Really, he just liked circles. It wasn’t his fault he had spilled coffee on it, too.
by Nilsa Gibson of Medford
Winter here feels like her jawbone
when we'd kiss against the split-rail
The bedspread always wreaked
of juniper
by Scot Siegel of Lake Oswego
You hurl your knuckled fist into the wall and there is no doubt whatsoever between you and the gypsum. This is you, yours: the swelling, radiating ache and the strangled moan rising slowly and thickly from your throat like a bubble in old paint. In the center of a life owned by ghosts you compress the area between you and the wall into a space too small to hold anything but your fist and the singular idea of I.
by Roy Coughlin of Portland
1. That jacket that you're wearing. It is SO you.
2. The only person who can make this decision.
3. All I want. (To be precise: All Bono wants.)
4. Our only hope for survival.
5. Glue. I, on the other hand, am rubber. So don't bother sending in complaints, because they will bounce off of me and stick to you.
by Mark Saltveit of Portland
Beers go silent as she enters the bar, blackberry scratches on both slender wrists. Swing-shifters transfixed.
A Chinese princess, of sorts, the new CFO, arrives in a Coast Range company mill town. MBA, NCAA tennis: Lin.
Wooden sex with confused alpha logger; unfortunate fist fight with the redneck wife. Long drives up the Santiam in her 4X4 pickup. Dark nights daring tears, alone.
Kids, on the street, transfixed.
by Ted Jean of Milwaukie
"There’s algebra in wine," Ken says snootily. "It must be paired with the right cheese." He sniffs his glass. "Don’t waste this on Crotonese. Maybe Gouda." Other people hear him and move away, investigating the walls. I ignore him, sit, pick at the cheese, drain my glass, refill, repeat. By the end of the party, we’ve both succeeded: Ken has an uncompromised palate; I’m drunk enough to smile as he thanks me.
by Matt Kolbet of Newberg
