Criticism. Essay. Fiction. Science. Weather.
week:
1The disadvantages of having a hole in your
foot, a cat named Buckley, and falling in love. 2Come eat it.
Or don't. 3Wine, Shoulder, Bolt, Socket. 4Mothbombs 5On the road with your only soul. 6One woman's trash is another woman's treasure 7Aliens! Right here in America! 8It's not as crazy as it sounds
or, music is as music does 91) Sign.
2) Hope for the best. 10A friendship in a bottle. 11A five-year-old tries his hand at action adventure. 12Will the circle be unbroken. 1390ways' first Quaterly Review rages on:
2 samples of Fiction. 14Muscles and fat.
A thin layer of sweat. 15Fiction goes serial.
Part 1 has sex and drugs.
You know you want to stay tuned. 16Our fiction serial concludes to cure your
vertigo from last week's cliff-hanger. 17An iced-out 21-speed sensation: The Moves are
all up on your handlebars. 18We're all in this together.
Except those bastards in administration. 19Jilted, laughed at,
and in the air. 20Swirling and swirling... 21You can't make yourself like them, but you have to pretend because they are your family. 22How well do jewel cases retain odor?
About as well as you stink. 23It's black and white. It's old world.
It's photo time. 24Piggy calls, wanting to sell you insurance.
This is what's on the other end of the line. 25A long pause, then, 26Fiction's Second Qaurterly Review
can speak Italian. 27It's only bread, after all. 28It's job search time at 90ways. 29George W. Bush's resting heart rate and a bum in a green sweater. 30Antique weaponry and teenage angst.
Together at last. 31One-hundred-fifty-three syllables
of October fun. 32there is only
self 33She's cold to the touch.
Cold and pebbly. 34Gut-wrenching love.
And wallabies. 35Building a habit out of ivies and orange flowers. 36A 90ways exclusive sneak peak at the
new and groundbreaking Alphabet Book. 37Type it with one hand and
see what happens 38A face any susbsitence farmer could love. 39The Quarterly Review: read it again for the third time. 40For every task, someone is the best.
Sometimes that's impressive. 41I didn't get a computer;
I moved to Indiana. 42The deepest of mistreatments, in three. 4390ways has new concerns about identity theft. Lock up the children and your sense of self. 44time. eyes. deep sighs. 45I know there's a place 4690 stars are born. 47I had to ask. 48It's about sex.
But isn't that always the way with classical music? 49The epistolary form in the 21st century.
Complete with neuroses and unpunctuation. 50There is no end to the party. 51Rockin to the sweet sounds of prepared food. 52Of or pertaining to. 53Including spaces, this blurb is 90 characters. Ways, words, characters. It is a leitmotif. 54Minnesota. Miami. Poetry in 90ways' Fiction.
It's the best of all worlds. 55It lives and breathes and is hungry for carnival food. 56Manhandled, womanclutched, or otherwise attended. 57The curtain is being pulled back... 58Up in the Fiction house! It's a bird. It's a plane.
It's an illustralogue! 59The hat, in all honesty, is a private matter. 60Putting up with all the doth. 6190words strike terror into the hearts of the longwinded. 62Return of the illustralogue! 63Take one down, pass it around,
blow your nose. 64All any of us want is a little approval and some light stalking. 65The First Quarterly Review wants
you to meet its little friend. 66From our servers to your ear buds!
It's misguided enthusiasm, in podcast form! 67Questions for the man himself.
Plus, the podcast adventure continues. 68No one would ever use Starbucks
to define their identity. Right... 69Don't you remember the rose clipped under my windshield wiper like a butterfly under a pin? 70Oh, it's nothing.
Oh, it's life-threatening disease. 71It's not you. It's me.
And my Eurasian captors.
72Root, root, root for the brisk
sale of anything possible. 73Look within the very bowels of the soul.
Or at least your mother. 74We're not strangers any more. 75He knows of what he speaks. 76I find that often times I'm quite
mature enough to enjoy a few beverages. 77He is licking me.
I don't like it one bit. 78Our favorite stuff is coming 'round the mountain, again. 79A wooden-back brush and a homemade bowl of oatmeal. 80A man's home is his... 81Fack to the Buture. 82This dude pulled back on his nose
and mucus and unleashed a city. 83The polls are in. 93% of respondents do not approve of the monkeybone lodged in their lower lip 84Like a thirsty man in the desert 85Taxpayer dollars wasted on broken egg. News at eleven. 86She loves her red octopus.
She will chew it to death. 87Bubbling, gurgling, fighting a moment to stay afloat. 88Molting our pasts into the air... 89The Return of 90 Words 90It comes but once a... ever. 91Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year's, the end of the Fiscal Quarter. 92The 540 word circle is now unbroken. 93An emptying out of the animus, perceived as tranquility
94All roads lead to South Dakota. Or at least the I-90 does, anyway. 95He laid down his whittling knife and he and his brother took up arms in rage. 96Drinking manhattans made with a good bourbon, and strong. 97Living white and pudgy, I never expected much for myself. Now, I could tell that was true. 98A few gestural lines towards the thought of death. 99Rest in peace.
I know I will. 100And then we played baseball and then we played army and then we were best friends. 101We torn holes in sheets and became ghosts for each other's pleasures. 102I looked at the pictures of you, twenty years old,
sometimes skinny and sometimes your face a soft moon.
103Fingers clutching little trinkets of the day... 104All roads lead to South Dakota. Or at least the I-90 does, anyway. 105Everywhere signs of an interstice arriving. 106What you see and what you believe are two different things. 107It was as if a million literary ghosts poured from its pages, moaning to be set free. 108So what if too many times we have been here, both
lost in our machinations...
Letters to my Editor
Judson Merrill
To The Editor,
Thank you in advance for your consideration of my enclosed fiction submission for publication in your magazine.
To The Editor,
Last week I submitted a story for publication in your magazine. A closer reading of your online submission guideless has brought me to regret the tone of my initial email. You are not looking for stiff necked writers who stand on formality. I write today to inform you that I am, in fact, too "out there" for two of my uncles who stopped coming to Thanksgiving years ago. They were boxed in by hegemonies, anyway. I know your magazine is looking for real writer's writers who break molds and then make jello in ashtrays instead. I am your man. My story is titled Vacation from Hell.
To The Editor,
Today's the day! It has been exactly two to three months since I submitted to your magazine. (I will probably get your response when the mail comes today.) In way of celebration, please find enclosed two important appendices to Vacation from Hell. The first is a picture of me for publication alongside my story. Please note my unorthodox attire considering I am at a bris. The second document is a companion reader to my story. Titled "Critical Essays on Judson Merrill's Vacation from Hell" it offers a more complete examination of my fiction than your staff may have the time or expertise to provide. Please pay particular attention to the chapters "Giraffe Imagery" and "Autobiographical Influences." I look forward to working with you.
To The Editor,
Thank you for your kind attention to the following apology for any letters I may have written to your magazine between midnight and 3 a.m. this morning. I was celebrating the newest draft of Vacation from Hell (enclosed). I imbibed too freely and, inadvertently, made a blood pact with a man named Woody that I would write hateful things to the person(s) who is most important to me. I assume I wrote to you. I have foggy memories of typing the phrases "Faulknerian idiot-man-child cum editor," "long standing literary giraffe bias," and "blood on your hands." If any of this sounds familiar, I am most sorry.
To The Editor,
Last winter I submitted a story titled Vacation from Hell. Frankly, the length of time it has taken to reply to my submission is an insult. If I had gotten you pregnant back in January, instead of simply submitting a story, we would have already packed a bag for the hospital, mapped out our route, et. al. The big day would be upon us. So, if that's all I am to you, a fake pregnancy you have no intention of pretending to deliver, than I need to know. And I need to know yesterday.
To The Editor,
I have hired a private detective to find out exactly what happened to my submission, Vacation from Hell. Since my writing is my (potential) livelihood I need to keep careful track of it. My detective's name is Gregor Freed and he is currently breaking into your office to retrieve any and all copies of my story from your offices and computers. Also, I have authorized him to leave fresh copies on the desks of all your editors, in the bathrooms and in the pair of galoshes he found by the door.
To The Editor,
Thank you in advance for your kind attention to the tunnel I have excavated underneath your house. I have been living here for a week and enjoy your musical taste. I am writing to invite you to visit me any time to discuss my recent fiction submission, Vacation from Hell. I have previously been in contact with your staff and was under the impression my story was being considered. Nevertheless, I did some detective work on my own and discovered that at least five copies of my story were discarded before there was possibly time to read them. I knew you would want to know of this neglect which is why I am writing you personally. Again, my name is Judson Merrill and my story was titled Vacation from Hell (enclosed). I have recently placed copies in your coffee cup and Basquiat DVD case (that seemed to be the artiest movie you own). I also tucked a copy into your daughters sheets when she was at school today. I think she will appreciate its dark humor and, since she is family, I know she would be a trusted reader.
To The Publisher,
Thank you in advance for your consideration of my enclosed prison memoir, Giraffe Pen, for publication by your imprint. I believe you will find it haunting and visceral. I look forward to working with you.
Just give me one thing I can play for.
Disco boys on bicycles.
So what if too many times we have been here, both
Poetic Retrospective
The Weather votes for Kelly Clarkson.