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T M M OOOOO RRRRR PPPPP OOOOO RRRRR EEEEE V V IIIII EEEEE W W
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H M M M O O RRRR PPPP O O RRRR EEE V V I EEE W W W
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Volume #2 November 8, 1995 Issue #5
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CONTENTS FOR VOLUME 2, ISSUE 5
Column: A Synopsis of The Story So Far . . . Robert A. Fulkerson
Column: From the Belly of the Dough Boy . . . . . . . Matt Mason
Swing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Joseph W. Flood
One Tongues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Richard Todd
Tuki Mila Pahi . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Richard Todd
Speechless . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Julie Schneider
Woman -- A Terza Rima . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Janan Platt
Nostalgia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Janan Platt
ponderings of a beached poet . . . . . . . . . . . B.H. Bentzman
jazzbender's sermon under the stars . . . . . . . . B.H. Bentzman
jazzbender makes the aquaintance
of old salt charon . . . . . . B.H. Bentzman
The Greatest Escape . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . B.H. Bentzman
Testicular Trauma . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Drew Feinberg
About the Authors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Authors
In Their Own Words . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Authors
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Editor + Poetry Editor
Robert Fulkerson The Morpo Staff Matthew Mason
rfulk@novia.net + mtmason@novia.net
Layout Editor Fiction Editor
Kris Kalil Fulkerson J.D. Rummel
kkalil@novia.net rummel@creighton.edu
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
_The Morpo Review_. Volume 2, Issue 5. _The Morpo Review_ is published
electronically on a bi-monthly basis. Reproduction of this magazine is
permitted as long as the magazine is not sold and the entire text of the
issue remains intact. Copyright 1995, Robert Fulkerson and Matthew Mason.
_The Morpo Review_ is published in ASCII and World Wide Web formats. All
literary and artistic works are Copyright 1995 by their respective authors
and artists.
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
EDITORS' NOTES
o "A Synopsis of The Story So Far" by Robert A. Fulkerson
First off, I'd like to apologize for the extreme lateness of this
issue. Many things (which I won't list in gory detail) have prevented
the issue from being published on it's proposed date. In fact, we're
almost two months overdue with this issue. We appreciate your patience
and understanding. Rather than rush the issue out the door, we wanted
to make sure everything was just right.
Now, to move on to things changed. Since last I wrote a real column,
over 5 months ago, many things have happened, both in my personal life
and in the world of Morpo.
Personally, I left the corporate business world as a programmer for
Tandem Telecom and took a position at the University of Nebraska at
Omaha as a full-time instructor of computer science. It's not that I
didn't like my job at Tandem, but rather it was more a feeling like I
was a square peg trying to fit into a round hole. After so many years
in college (six with an almost-masters degree), I grew accustomed to
the whole environment. I thrive on interaction with people, and
sitting quietly in my cubicle at Tandem wasn't feeding that hunger.
Now I interact with people every day (well, every
Monday/Wednesday/Friday) and absolutely love it.
I was also promoted to the position of Vice President of Novia
Internetworking, an Internet Service Provider in Omaha, Nebraska.
Between teaching full-time and vice-presidenting 3/4 time, life is, to
say the least, rather hectic.
Morpo-wise, we've added two new major features to our World Wide Web
site. First, we've added real-time audio samples of some of the pieces
in this issue being read by the author. Currently, Janan Platt can be
heard reading two of her poems, Woman -- A Terza Rima and Nostalgia,
and Richard Todd can be heard reading his two poems, One Tongues and
Tuki Mila Pahi. Currently, only users of Windows or Windows 95 can
hear these samples, as we're using the TrueSpeech audio technology.
There should be a Macintosh and a Unix player soon. We'll also be
adding Real Audio support by the next issue.
This is very exciting, as I think that while the literature should
speak for itself, it always casts a new and different light on the
work when I hear the author read it. Matt Mason, the Poetry Editor for
Morpo, has written hundreds of poems which I've read on-line and had
my own interpretation of running around in my head. It wasn't until
the summer of 1994 that I got to hear him read some of his own poetry,
which was a truly wonderful experience, as there were subtle nuances I
never noticed before. In the future, I hope we can do more here at
Morpo with the spoken-word aspect of the works we publish. We'll also
be looking at integrating some multimedia presentations into future
publications, including re-printing a video file presentation of one
of our previously published poems.
Additionally, with this issue, we'd like to announce the grand opening
of the Morpo Review CyberCafe, a World Wide Web-based conferencing
application. We searched high and low for a Web-based "chat" program
and finally found one we liked for its simplicity and elegance. Now,
after reading Morpo online, stop by the CyberCafe and chat with other
literature lovers in one of three rooms: General Discussion, Fiction
Discussion or Poetry Discussion. In the future, we'll be hosting live
conferences with some of your favorite Morpo authors. You can visit
the CyberCafe at http://morpo.novia.net/morpo/chat/.
So, there's a five-month synopsis of what's been going on. Though it
sounds unlikely, look for the next issue of Morpo to hit the virtual
stands around December 1st.
o "From the Belly of the Dough Boy" by Matt Mason
We've secretly replaced Matt Mason's normal column with new Folger's
Crystals; let's see what happens:
Everytime I open a magazine or newspaper, it seems that there's
something new on the World Wide Web. I, myself, am pretty fascinated
with that whole tetrazini, though a few things keep me from really
piddling around there.
Sure, I've been over at a friend's place in awestruck fascination as
we waited for that whole damned file to transfer so that we could hear
Godzilla roar on the Godzilla page. I've seen the nifty Morpo page and
lots of other places.
But, truth be told, I'm still working off an Apple iie, a computer so
outdated that if it breaks I'll have no choice but to use it as a
suitcase, a candleholder, or perhaps a nice casserole dish as there's
no one left who fixes these things.
I guess, technically, I do have Web access. Of course, with my
computer's ASCII graphics and primitive ways, everything would look
like Elton John's wardrobe closet put through a shredder, so it just
ain't worth it.
And you out there may ask, well.. hey.. you edit that keen electric
rag called Morpo.. why not just take all the cash flowing in from that
enterprise and buy a laptop or a UNIX system.
Sadly, Morpo doesn't pay as well as it used to. Sure, I remember the
old days when we'd be coated with expensive champagne, swimming in
lentil-shaped pools full of marinara sauce and kiwifruit. But those
days are over. Stiff competition from scads and scads (and scads) of
other ezines has forced us to tighten our budget, eat more rice, and
operate on Apple iie's.
And.. oh.. wait a minute. That's not us. We never had a budget. You
want that ezine three doors down, the one with the plastic flowers and
the ceramic gnome in the yard.
And why does everything smell like coffee?
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
"Swing" by Joseph W. Flood
_________________________________________________________________
I inherited the swing records. The box full of ancient 78s had been
unceremoniously deposited in my room. A day later, the equally old
phonograph player arrived. My father was cleaning out the last of
Grandpa's things, one minivan load at a time. He hated the whole
affair, going through the odds and ends of an old man's life,
searching through dusty closet after dusty closet, encountering only
detritus.
Dad put the records in my room because he had run out of space for
them in the garage. He could have put them in his office; none of
Grandpa's old stuff was in there.
"Here," he said, letting the box fall to the floor. I was lying on my
bed, TV idly by, thinking of awful high school stuff. "You like music,
don't you?" Dad tried smiling, lamely. He was just looking for a place
to dump all this crap.
"Whatever."
That night, I opened up the box and discovered records. Records!
What's a record? The records had pictures of men playing trombones on
them. There were illustrations of people in uniform, neatly lined up,
playing instruments. I took the records out of the sleeves and ran my
fingers across the deep vinyl grooves. It was so different from a CD.
"You'll never guess what I was checking last night," I told my
friends. We were gathered at a lunch table in the Commons. They were
eating junk food and scoping for women.
"What?" someone said.
"LP's."
"LP? Who's that?"
"Records, idiot. Long-playing records."
"Huh." They were utterly uninterested.
_________________________________________________________________
When Dad hauled in the old phonograph, I pretended to be annoyed at
the imposition. On the way out, he carefully shut the door behind him.
I dragged the heavy phonograph across the room to a socket and plugged
it in. The cover had a rusty metal latch. The speed of the turntable
was controlled by switches as big as my hand. A plate on the side said
that it had been manufactured at Versatile Manufactures in Cleveland,
Ohio. I cued up the record and dropped the needle into the groove,
just like I had seen them do it in the movies.
Nothing happened. Then I found the round volume knob on the front of
the box. I turned it and.... Sound, rich bass sound, poured out of the
tiny speakers. It wasn't like my stereo, the music wasn't clear, it
somehow was overlaid with background noise and static. I could see the
needle tracing the groove, feeling the vinyl, and knew that that was
where the sound was coming from.
The music was rhythm, it was a song, a melody, like something from an
old movie. I had never heard it before, ever, but knew that if I heard
it more than once I'd be whistling the damn thing. I really hated
myself but it was true--I liked this old crap. The mind tried to
resist but was borne away by song.
Who could I tell? I couldn't tell anyone. Grandpa was dead. If I told
my friends, I'd be laughed out of Sun High. This was beyond old
people's music--this was dead people's music.
I went through the box and listened to all the records. It was a sick
kind of fun, using this ancient technology. I liked the fact that the
records were so big, much bigger than a CD. And heavy, the box full of
them must have weighed fifty pounds. I liked watching the records spin
inside the old box; I would see a scratch coming and then hear (and
see) the record jump. I didn't worry about Mom or Dad finding me
listening to all this fogey stuff--is our son weird? They both worked
late and were never home. When they were, Dad tended to hole up in his
office, typing, working on a spreadsheet. Mom would sit in the kitchen
and work the phone, calling clients.
There was still a lot of work to do with Grandpa's estate. Dad traded
e-mails with my aunt regarding the "final disposition". He told me all
this as if I cared. I couldn't see how it mattered very much--Grandpa
was dead, all that was left was his stuff.
Dad had finally emptied Grandpa's apartment. "It was like a rat's nest
in there," he told Mom. She was standing in the kitchen, portable
phone in one hand. Something was cooking in the microwave. Dad was
still wearing a tie and the sun was washing over him, making him
squint.
"I couldn't believe how much shit he had saved. There were his old
report cards, from the thirties. Timeslips from his first job--ten
cents an hour. Letters from Mom, when he was fighting in the Pacific.
Shoeboxes of old pictures, of their first house, of me, of those crazy
picnics in the back yard. Pictures..."
"Maybe we can put them on a CD-ROM?"
"And do what then?" Dad loosened his tie. "Who would have time to look
at it?"
The microwave beeped. Cooking was finished.
Mom carefully peeled the plastic sheet off of the plastic dish, steam
escaping. The air conditioning kicked in, a loud whir that shook the
house.
"Well, you have to do something about those things in the garage,
those boxes and furniture. I hate to leave my car on the street."
"It's got an alarm," Dad said. Mom gave him a look. "But you're right,
we need the garage back."
Mom took her dinner out to the living room.
"So," Dad said, opening the freezer, "we have Budget Gourmet, Weight
Watcher's lasagna, bean burritos, Szechwan Chicken..."
_________________________________________________________________
I delved more into the music. I can't remember the songs, I can't
remember the bands. They had names like old white people--Miller,
Herman, Dorsey.
And the song titles were a laugh--Jersey Jump, Woodchopper's Ball,
Chattanooga Choo-Choo. They were simple songs about spring and trains
and love, always on the way to love, or pining for lost love, or
waiting for love to arrive on exactly the right train. No tales of
teenage angst, suicide, self-mutilation.
Then, one day, my records were gone. I found Dad in the living room,
rocketing through cable channels, not looking at anything in
particular. I stood there watching him until he noticed me.
"What do you want?"
"What'd you do with the records, you know, Grandpa's old records?"
He turned to face me, setting the remote down. "I took them to a
record dealer. Sold them."
"Yea?"
"Uh-huh," Dad said. A strange smile crept across his face. "You didn't
want those old things, did you?"
"No, it's just, it's just like it was Grandpa's stuff. I thought we
might keep them."
"No room. You heard your mother."
"Yea, right."
I walked out front and sat down in the driveway. Gnats buzzed around
my face. I sat with my arms over my knees. Some kids I knew from
school rode by on bikes, yelling obscenities at each other. Dad was
inside watching cable TV. I sat in the dark, doing nothing but
thinking.
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
"One Tongues" by Richard Todd
_________________________________________________________________
my language is strange
to this place I know in my heart
let me then my friend
use your tongue
fat and fluttering
on flutes of rivers and wind
moaning in grass
wailing like night to stars
it wraps around thunder
bends to strike its drums
bellows spring
in flood and rumble of hooves
let me speak vowels
to dust and consonants to ice
take name to be spirit
holy as breath
so that spirit speaks spirit
and nameless live in words
and we touch together
edge of the sacred
touch together
unspeakable light
touch together
and feel the same touching
so we may talk
in common tongue
sacred earth holy sky
and the hoop that joins them
joins us
One Tongues
speaking together
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
"Tuki Mila Pahi" by Richard Todd
_________________________________________________________________
we gather shellfish
edges of knives
cracked to scrappers
of flesh and hair
whetted like teeth
to cut water
beneath our hands
to peel skin
we gather shellfish
rooting muck
with bare feet
touching the dark
flat curves
foot to fleshy foot
and string mother
of pearl in pendants
we gather shellfish
the old way
between fast
and slow rivers
in warm water
deep with hair
thick as milk
we grope mud
and gather shellfish
blades to pry
lock and twist
binding muscle
to scrape clean
the end of flesh
and dress bones
in new skins
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
"Speechless" by Julie Schneider
_________________________________________________________________
Your brother, angry
that you weren't at his wedding
refuses to speak.
You were too busy saving your life
drying out in detox
dancing on the head of a pin.
Even now, this second marriage is
dead
and he's still angry.
Funny, how some grudges
last longer than
life,
are stronger than
blood.
Brothers,
what difference does it make now
except to the
mute.
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
"Woman -- A Terza Rima" by Janan Platt
_________________________________________________________________
At the club with pool and courts,
sweating on the gray carpet,
the copper woman in bike shorts,
busy like a sprocket, fit,
well not quite. When her head
weakens, her thighs remit.
Knees, a heart shape desired.
My mind reviews womanhood.
Her small muscles curved
and whittled like rosewood.
And I see her on the mat -
when I took dance I could
make ropey triceps like that.
A few wrinkles lined her skin
that was otherwise flat.
But her curves showed their sin
each muscle dipping under,
enough to hold a man's grin.
Each shape a spiral, going lower,
contour draped in worth.
And I felt this image's power
deep as seawater and birth;
how her movement pulls as yet
from a force outside the earth.
Distanced, she wasn't a threat,
a faceless icon. The men's
hot eyes loosened her step.
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
"Nostalgia" by Janan Platt
_________________________________________________________________
Cheese puff crumbs
still savory
and neon orange
in the floor cracks,
nail clippings pulverized
between the mattress
and the headboard,
rose-colored sweater
fluff fluttering
in the heater grates,
dander, thread,
lipstick and flecks
of skin chiseled
by the wind and the blue
heat of the sun;
a woman
who reconciles fifty,
works the tines
of her fingers
through the ravelings
of gray and consults
the dust for a
simple answer.
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
"ponderings of a beached poet" by B.H. Bentzman
_________________________________________________________________
cautiously stepping past the line of debris
of things the sea has not had time to digest
watching its restless skin clawing the beach
thinking about jazzbender laboring for preservation
this is religious truth jazzbender had instructed
you don't encounter raw experience in books and films
but must stay afloat on chaos the mother of us all
who's not malicious but indifferent to her sons
our ships imposing order on her the neversame
and if the captain's not god he's damn well moses
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
"jazzbender's sermon under the stars" by B.H. Bentzman
_________________________________________________________________
we collapsed in a field without
losing our grips on the bottles of beer
and gazed up at the many stars
jazzbender took another pull from
his bottle and pontificated
i got preached at by this baptist
who thinks his little dunking
gives him more wisdom than a sailor
he thinks he's got his hand on the tiller
can navigate the sea he's only scratching
believing it was created for him god damn
a whole sea miles deep and endless wide
if god made the oceans three feet deep
and lukewarm then i might have agreed
but he thinks jesus was a sailor
because he walked upon the water
hell if he could walk upon the water
what need would he have of us sailors
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
"jazzbender makes the acquaintance of old salt charon" by B.H. Bentzman
_________________________________________________________________
to be a sunken galleon in a tropical sea he said
where beyond the landlord's reach dreams like colored
fish would sway among the shelves and desk legs
in the watery twilight of the captain's cabin
in every city jazzbender found a river lapping docks
the sea's slender tentacles grasping at continents
the one road for a thousand exotic ports
how easy to slip the knot and drift back to sea
who would have thought a swabbie couldn't swim
the corpse drifting as far as the brackish harbor
to be found bobbing in the polluted slick and foam
knocking against the rusted hull of a stranded ferry
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
"The Greatest Escape" by B.H. Bentzman
_________________________________________________________________
Normally my tour at Con Edison finishes at midnight. This wasn't a
normal night, but then this is New York where anything that smacks of
being normal is banned. This city is the fertile soil for the unusual.
Only the seed of the world's unusual can take root here and blossom
here. The rest either run away or are worn away. I was born in New
York and I'm still here.
My relief didn't arrive at midnight like he was suppose to, so I
called the supervisor. Apparently Jim, the night tour guy -- my name
is Arnie, or Arnold, which ever is easier for you -- anyway, Jim got
sick at the last moment, possibly a heart attack, so his wife took him
to the hospital. We later learned it was nothing but heartburn. My
supervisor went down the list before he could find someone to cover
and they took a while getting in. So I ended up riding the subway home
at a very late hour.
At three o'clock in the morning my car of the train was without
conventional passengers. A young couple passed through the car, their
hair bizarrely cut and standing on end. They wore black leather cycle
jackets decorated with chromed chains. An elderly waitress, still in
uniform and determined not to smile, passed through my car while
clutching her purse. She was making her way closer to the conductor,
changing cars at each stop.
Only four passengers remained with me in my car. A skinny white guy,
not dressed warm enough for the cold, was huddled in the far corner.
He was forever reaching into baggy pants with those thin arms
scratching and picking at God knows what. His problem, imaginary or
not, had him dancing and jerking and keeping him from sleep.
There was an old white woman not having any trouble sleeping, curled
up against her several plastic bags filled with garbage that must have
been her worldly possessions. She sat with her back to me, but I had
noticed when I got on that she was missing a leg from the knee down,
and this made me feel very sorry for her. She and the itchy guy
probably lived here at night, on the subway. I was in their bedroom.
The two remaining passengers were both Blacks -- I'm a white guy,
something you wouldn't know unless I told you. Anyway, the one sitting
farthest from me was real tall. He wore a dark green trench coat and a
fuzzy fedora with a ridiculously wide brim. It was also a shade of
green and had a colorful, five inch feather in the band.
The black man sitting nearest to me, almost directly across from me,
was drunk. You knew he was drunk because the stink of alcohol floated
about his person. He was snoring, his body slumped forward, his head
hovering just above his knees, his thighs supporting his forearms. His
large hands and head bounced and bobbed with the movement of the
train. While I was amusing myself with watching this little dance of
his appendages, he suddenly jolted bolt upright.
It had startled me, but it seemed even more of a surprise to him. His
bloodshot eyes were wide with shock. He had broad shoulders and a very
powerful build. I couldn't tell if his face was scarred or just deeply
wrinkled. Coarse hair grew on his cheeks and a glimmering drop of snot
was precariously hanging from one wide nostril. At first his eyes did
not seem to see. Then they began to focus on their environment, and,
sure enough, they found me. They locked on me.
This big guy began to stand. With tremendous difficulty, he pulled his
huge frame out of that seat using the adjacent pole, and I admit I was
worried. Not that he was going to hurt me, big as he was, he was just
plain too drunk to do that. I was afraid he was going to make a mess
on me, that he might puke, or at the very least drip that hanging snot
on me. With a push, he launched himself in my direction, swaying,
coming most of the way, then stumbling a few steps backwards. The snot
fell harmlessly to the floor and I was partially relieved. Finally he
made the crossing, grasping the bar that ran over my head. After he
was securely fastened he said, "Excuse me sir, but would you be so
kind as to tell me where I am?"
"You're on the E, guy," I told him.
"The ee-guy?" he asked.
"No, the E, just the E," I said.
"I beg your pardon, but I am afraid I do not understand? I see we are
on a train and that it must be night."
"That's right, guy," I said. "You're riding the subway between
Lexington Avenue and the Twenty-third Street and Ely Avenue station."
"The subway!" he exclaimed, tossing his head from side to side to take
it in. He seemed to be genuinely thrilled at finding himself on the
subway. "I'm in New York! I made it! I did it!"
Being in New York did not strike me as much of an accomplishment, yet
he was overwhelmed with his being there; mind you, we're not talking
about arriving at Carnegie Hall, merely the subway. He stared at me
again, his eyes about to pop out. "Please tell me, what is today's
date?"
"March twenty-fifth -- no, the twenty-sixth," I informed him, while
remembering the lateness of the hour. But no, he wanted to know the
year? So I told him, 1982.
The news was too much for him. Upon learning the year he seemed to
faint, his body twisting and falling. I put my hands out to keep him
from falling on me, but he caught himself, swirled, and plopped into
the adjacent seat. I noticed the man in the fuzzy fedora was watching
us and grinning. The drunk next to me was breathing heavy, as if
exhausted, and mumbling New York and the year over and over. Once more
he turned his attention to me and announced, "I did it,"
"Did what, exactly?" I asked.
"I'm alive." With that he looked at his big hands with their dirty
fingernails. Once more his expression became one of shock and he
gasped, "Schvartse". He looked at me in alarm. "My God, I am a Negro,"
he said.
"Comes as a surprise, does it?"
He rose from his seat with unexpected grace and confidence. "Permit me
to introduce myself," he announced in a booming voice that filled the
car. While holding the nearest pole in one hand, he flamboyantly
tossed his other hand in the air, and acclaimed himself, "I am the
great Houdini!" He swung his arm across his waist and proffered a
theatrical bow. He was unsteady.
I could see past Houdini to the broad smile of the guy in the fuzzy
fedora, who seemed to laugh, but not aloud. The skinny-itchy guy in
the far corner took no notice of us, he was now scratching himself in
his sleep. The old, crippled woman lifted her head, looked over her
shoulder at us and acidly shouted, "Hey, Harry, can you keep it down?"
She was instantly back to sleep. Houdini concluded his bow. He seemed
dizzy for it and quickly sat down again.
"Perhaps in 1982 you do not know of the magnificent Houdini?" The guy
was astute, he could see my skepticism. He leaned a little closer with
that awful breath of his. "I have accomplished the greatest escape of
all time," he said to me. Then he leaned back and loudly announced,
"soon the whole world --" He stopped short. This time his eyes
appeared sad. "Nineteen eighty-two?" he whispered.
"Nineteen eighty-two, guy," I reassured him.
He leaned his head against the wall, just staring at nothing. I could
see his strength dissipating. "Eighty-eight years," he murmured.
"Is that how long you've been dead?" I asked.
"No. That's how long I've been married."
"Married?"
"Oh my God. Beatrice, my darling. All this time I have been trying to
get back and you, my sweet darling, must have died and gone on to
Heaven."
I sat quietly, just watching this hulking black man, his eyes squeezed
closed. "I feel weak," were his last words, that is to say, was
Houdini's last words, and he fell over.
We were coming into Ely station. The guy in the fuzzy fedora was still
grinning at my predicament, this heavy drunk lying across my feet.
While the train was stopped in the station, no one getting off, no one
getting on, I tried lifting Houdini off the dirty floor to get him
back into a seat. He woke, somewhat, but gave only slight assistance.
Unexpectedly, he pushed away. "Hey mahn, what chyu doin'?"
"Just trying to help."
"Well keep ya hands off me, I don' wan' no help." Without any further
help from me, he stumbled to a seat and went back to sleep. He was
still sleeping when I got off.
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
"Testicular Trauma"
Thoughts of Designer Imposter Body Spray by Drew Feinberg
_________________________________________________________________
I can remember the first time I saw the commercial vividly, for I was
scarred eternally, not unlike the first time I had a woman look me
square in the eye, force a smile, and mumble "Don't worry, I heard it
happens to a LOT of guys." While channel surfing a few months ago, I
found myself landing on MTV. It was The Real World Two that was on,
and I couldn't change the channel because it was my favorite one,
where Tammi purposely wired her mouth shut to lose weight. I was
thinking about taking up a collection to keep it wired shut forever,
but alas, I digress. A commercial interlude began with a Mentos
commercial, and I was appalled to find myself mouthing along "Mentos,
the freshmaker!" with my television. That was bad enough, but when I
realized I was actually holding my remote triumphantly, not unlike the
girl holding up her mighty Mentos, I knew I must turn off the
television and get some fresh air. I reached for the "off" button on
the remote, but found myself unable to hit it. Instead, I my eyes were
glazed as I heard my RCA beckon: "The following demonstration has been
made suitable for television." It piqued my interest, I figured I'd
watch the commercial. Big mistake.
It was a naked woman prancing around the screen with a spray can,
covered only by two blue bars that followed her around covering her
breasts, and her holiest of holies. Now, seeing an attractive naked
woman bopping around on a television screen, this is not what scarred
me. Don't you worry. In fact, it made me laugh hysterically. A
voice-over was explaining "First, spray Designer Imposter Spray on
your arms, and then spray some on your (beeped out the breasts), and
the same time the woman was spraying it on the described areas. It
went on to describe all the different places one could spray it, while
the woman, seemingly in ecstasy, followed suit. It was truly a
ridiculous image, the quasi-orgasmic quality of spraying some
cheap-assed imitation perfume all over herself. She wound up spraying
every part of her body really, as the voice-over told me that spraying
this poisonous smelling fluid all over feels so good "you could spray
them everywhere". But this of course, is not true. She missed a spot.
If she was to spray the faux- spray in one particular place, shall we
say, below the equator, this would not produce the ecstatic result as
it provided elsewhere. I believe the correct word to describe the
result would be "agony". But, thankfully, she missed that spot, so the
commercial, which I thought was over wound up being just silly, not
traumatic. Little did I know that in just ten seconds, I would be
huddled in the corner of the room, rocking in the fetal position, hand
immersed in my pants, a la Al Bundy.
It seemed as though the commercial was over, as they showed a bottle
of the stuff on the screen. But then it happened. Like all horrible
things in my life, I saw it in slow motion, like when Marsellus
Wallace in Pulp Fiction had Zed give him a proctologic exam without
the courtesy of a sigmoidoscope. A nude man appeared on the screen,
bottle in hand, blue bar on crotch. The voice-over triumphantly
announced, "Available for men too!" The man, with a smug as hell grin,
SPRAYS HIS CROTCH AND CHUCKLES! He laughs with this smirk on his face,
as if it were the most euphoric and wonderful experience he had ever
experienced. .And the commercial was over. It was an overload for my
brain, I believe that was when I went into shock. In my trauma induced
state, my entire life passed before my eyes. Well, okay, not my WHOLE
life, but an incident in particular that involved myself, and my
cajones.
I flashed back to seventh grade, I must have been around twelve or
thirteen years old. I remember being twelve quite well, it was when I
was a tiny 5'4 boy, and knew that someday I would grow and grow and
finally be able to conquer that freaking sign that said "YOU MUST BE
THIS TALL TO GO ON THIS RIDE". Now I'm twenty-five. Hey, it's not that
I'm still not allowed to go on certain rides, I just CHOOSE not to
okay?? I could go on any ride I want, I just don't like waiting in
line! Wait, I'm mixing up my traumas. Let's go back to my being
twelvish.
My dream girl, Penelope Horowitz, had asked me whether I wanted to go
over her house on Sunday and study with her for an algebra exam. I
could hardly sleep that night, knowing what would happen when I was
alone with her, perusing the subtle nuances of algebra. I knew in my
heart of hearts, that in the midst of studying, we would look up from
the book, stare into each others eyes, admit our undying love, have a
torrid affair, get married, have children, and happily grow old
together. I just had to make sure everything was right. Sunday
morning, I spent two hours getting myself absolutely perfect for the
big study date. When I felt I was ready, I started to leave the house,
but ran back into the bathroom.
As I was singing along to "Islands in the Stream" on my radio, I
realized I had forgotten the key to getting a woman to think of me as
real man. Cologne. So I covered myself with my dad's English Leather,
not thoroughly unlike the naked woman in the Designer Imposter
commercial. But what if Penelope begged me to have sex with her? This
was a real possibility. The prospect of her finding me "not so fresh"
was strictly unacceptable. So in the middle of singing the Dolly
Parton part of the chorus, I pulled out the waistband of my underwear,
and did my final spray. "Islands in the stream...that is what we
AREEEEEEEEEEEEGHHHHHHH!" I had never experienced such excruciating
pain in my entire life. I had to cancel the date. I spent the
remainder of the day holding my wounded huevos and cursing the day I
had tried to spray myself "there". Penelope went on to date and marry
my best friend. Oh Penelope, I miss you so...if you're reading this
give me a call, I know I can make you so happy...
Back to the story at hand. the man in the commercial had made the same
mistake I had made, yet suffered no ill consequences. It was the most
unreal and unjust act I had seen since Marisa Tomei had won the Oscar
for Best Supporting Actress. But like the Tomei tragedy, this wrong
could be righted, I knew it. I knew then why I had been put on this
earth. It was to get that commercial modified. I wrote letters. I made
urgent phone calls. I boycotted using the product. Okay, I hadn't
really used it in the first place, but hey, manufacturers didn't know
that. Yet every day that blasted commercial would come on time and
time again. Hundreds of times, I saw that smug bastard spray his
crotch. Was there no justice in the world? The horror, the horror. But
just as I began to give up hope, it happened. The commercial began the
same, bimbo dancing around in her Imposter glory. Same guy, blue bar
on privates. But this time, he sprayed his CHEST, smirking and
chuckling. Glory, hallelujah! Can I get an amen? There's no need to
thank me. Just knowing that I might have saved one pubescent boy from
making the same mistakes I made is enough. All I ask for is a page in
the history books documenting my selfless effort to make the world a
better place to live. Or maybe a statue.
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About the Authors
_________________________________________________________________
o B.H. Bentzman (BHBentzman@aol.com) was born in the Bronx in 1951.
"My greatest achievement is to earn the companionship of a splendid
woman, to whom I have been married for eight years." He earns his
income working for AT&T as a Communications Technician. "And I am
presently alive and well in a suburb of Philadelphia."
o Drew Feinberg (afeinber@panix.com) is twenty-something and resides
in East Meadow, NY where he is currently a full-time philosopher. He
enjoys watching movies and then bitching about them, joining crusades
he knows he cannot win, and singing TV theme songs to anybody within
earshot especially the "Facts Of Life." Drew and his partner-in-crime,
Jen, are starting their 'zine "Marvin Nash's Ear" in the very-near
future so they can rant as long as they like to make the world smile
and/or think, preferably both. For a free subscription, just send a
request and the name of your favorite childhood board game to
afeinber@panix.com.
o Joseph W. Flood (JoeFlood@aol.com) had this to write:
"Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano
Buendia was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took
him to discover ice."
Unlike the doomed Buendias, my family always had ice in the freezer so
we escaped one hundred years of solitude. Instead, I grew up
peacefully in Wheaton, Illinois, a small town on a commuter line
outside of Chicago, IL . After fourteen rather mundane years, my
family left ice and snow for sand and sun (sort of like those kids on
Beverly Hills 90210 but in a more modest income bracket). We arrived
in Orlando in the middle of summer and still stayed. I spent my high
school years in Florida. Then, graduation loomed (unlike those pesky
kids on Beverly Hills 90210) and I had to go off to college. I chose
American University because they actually gave me some cash and
because I wanted to do more with my life than just hang out at Daytona
Beach, like, you know? I majored in International Relations and
minored in Literature. College has a way of cooking the interest out
of you. You start fresh and excited about a subject and four years
later all you can think is, "Get me the hell out of here!" After I
graduated, I worked for a couple years for a banking consulting firm
as an Information Assistant. Then, I moved back to Orlando to work on
the Great American Novel. Instead, I wrote the minor Florida novel. My
Inheritance (that's the name of my 65,000 words) is the first-person
account of a high school "burn-out" who escapes his abusive father
(and some legal troubles) by running off to college and masquerading
as a college student. It's completely fictional--my parents are
wonderful. My friends loved it and a couple agents actually read it
but getting a first-novel published is a 1,000,000 to 1 shot. So, I
moved back to The District and a got a job at The World Bank.
o Janan Platt (janan@sonic.net) was born in Redding, California in
1957. She has published one chapbook of poetry (Alpha Beat Press,
1993) and her poems have appeared in Poetry Flash, The Tomcat, tight,
and Recursive Angel. She is also a contributing editor of The Albany
Poetry Workshop, a World Wide Web Internet poetry forum
(http://www.sonic.net/web/albany/workshop).
o Julie Schneider (jschneid@teleport.com) is a past winner of the
Washington Poet's Association Totem Award and has the requisite degree
in English Lit. She works as a LAN Administrator and among other
talents can find lost icons while you wait. Favorite poets are Molly
Peacock, Erica Jong and Robert Frost. This is her first published
work.
o Richard Todd (rtodd@unlinfo.unl.edu) grew up at the confluence of
North and South Platte Rivers in western Nebraska. When he came of age
he wandered from Nebraska to New York City to Montana to Colorado and
back to Platte forks. He now writes, grows kids and lives on the edge
of the valley. Recent work of Richard Todd is found on the web "When
Arcs of Circles Touch" at
http://ianrwww.unl.edu/ianr/wcrec/water/arctouch/index.htm.
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
In Their Own Words
_________________________________________________________________
o Swing by Joseph W. Flood
"Like the protaganist in Swing, I have lately developed a taste
for the music of earlier generations. At first, I was
embarassed by my new like and would hide the offending CDs from
visitors, but now I proudly display my Sinatra box set."
o One Tongues by Richard Todd
"One Tongues is about discovering languages. Tongues we all
know but which we forgot or misplaced or which were taken from
us. To relearn these ways of speaking and touching. These are
languages of this place called Great Plains. Written after
thinking about Great Grandmother Christina who refused to learn
English."
o Tuki Mila Pahi by Richard Todd
"Tuki Mila Pahi means 'to gather shellfish knives'. Lakota name
for North Platte River in western Nebraska. We mucked the
marshes barefoot searching for shellfish. A strong way to touch
the river, to root in it. In the search you lift to surface
many other things hidden in the mud. Some can be made into
useful tools. Others scare the hell out of you."
o Speechless by Julie Schneider
"This is the quintessential 90's dysfunctional family poem.
Apathy, denial, hidden anger and lack of communication; it's
all there, with the hope that things could be different. It
speaks for itself."
o Woman -- A Terza Rima by Janan Platt
"In Woman, I wanted to show the reader a bit of that heavy-duty
nonverbal environment in today's typical health club. For
months I tried many different versions and recycled two grocery
bags full of crumpled paper. Then, in Scott Reid's Albany
Poetry Workshop on traditional poetic forms, the words seemed
to find their place within the Terza Rima framework. Poetic
forms, to me, feel like tap dance rhythms."
o Nostalgia by Janan Platt
"I write most of my poems hearing other people's voices, not my
own, reading the words. That was the case with Nostalgia, a
short poem about the beautiful and simple way some women view
the world and themselves when no one else is looking."
o ponderings of a beached poet, jazzbender's sermon under the stars,
and jazzbender makes the aquaintance of an old salt charon, by
B.H. Bentzman
"The three poems selected here are part of a series of eight
poems written about a friend. Over many a good glass he
exhanged his experiences at sea for my experiences on land. I
then took his stories and character and embellished them. He
was pleased at my attempts to metamorphosize him into a
semi-mythical sailor. What is ficticious and what is true about
Jazzbender (not his real name) I leave to the reader's best
guess. This much I would like the reader to know, that the poem
jazzbender makes the aquaintance of old salt charon was
composed before my friend took his own life. Those of us who
knew him were never surprised by his last act. We couldn't stop
it from coming. It made us angry, but it didn't stop us from
loving him, nor do we want to stop remembering him."
o The Greatest Escape by B.H. Bentzman
"My short story, The Greatest Escape, was developed from an
entry in my notebook/journal. Following a dull period of
several days in which nothing noteworthy was happening in my
life, in a desperate act to make my notebook/journal
interesting, I concocted this story about my late night ride
home on the subway. A friend, who later read the entry, thought
the late night tale true. Years later, I extracted the story
from my notebook/journal, removed myself and invented a
fictitious persona to tell the story."
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WHERE TO FIND _THE MORPO REVIEW_
Back issues of The Morpo Review are available via the following avenues:
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of an e-mail message to majordomo@novia.net, exclude the quotes)
= Gopher (morpo.creighton.edu:/The Morpo Review or
ftp.etext.org:/Zines/Morpo.Review)
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SUBSCRIBE TO _THE MORPO REVIEW_
We offer two types of subscriptions to The Morpo Review:
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If you would like to subscribe to The Morpo Review, send an e-mail
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ADDRESSES FOR _THE MORPO REVIEW_
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rummel@creighton.edu . . . . . . . . . . . . J.D. Rummel, Fiction Editor
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SUBMISSION GUIDELINES FOR TMR
Q: How do I submit my work to The Morpo Review and what are you looking for?
A: We accept poetry, prose and essays of any type and subject matter. To
get a good feel for what we publish, please read some of our previous
issues (see above on how to access back issues).
The deadline for submissions is one month prior to the release date of
an issue. We publish bi-monthly on the 30th of the month in January,
March, May, July, September and November.
If you would like to submit your work, please send it via Internet
E-mail to the E-mail address morpo-submissions@novia.net.
Your submission will be acknowledged and reviewed for inclusion in the
next issue. In addition to simply reviewing pieces for inclusion in
the magazine, we attempt to provide feedback for all of the pieces that
are submitted.
Along with your submission, please include a valid electronic mail address
and telephone number that you can be reached at. This will provide us with
the means to reach you should we have any questions, comments or concerns
regarding your submission.
There are no size guidelines on stories or individual poems, but we ask
that you limit the number of poems that you submit to five (5) per issue
(i.e., during any two month period).
We can read IBM-compatible word processing documents and straight ASCII
text. If you are converting your word processing document to ASCII,
please make sure to convert the "smart quotes" (the double quotes that
"curve" in like ``'') to plain, straight quotes ("") in your document
before converting. When converted, smart quotes sometimes look like
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difficult.
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Our next issue will be available around December 1st, 1995.
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