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There was barely warning
enough to jump.
Opportunistically,
the mice in the walls,
as slanderous as old cracks,
stole the drug salesmen's pen.
They are at this very moment
forming lines,
having deciphered directions
to his flawless lawns.
by Colin
James
by Donna Taylor Burgess
In a world closed to violators
They made their home in the iced pond
Of a December city park
Secrets held fast for a long season of white sleep
The Ice Nymphs worshipped the bloated
Form of a man
Mugged and beaten and robbed and rolled
Into shallow waters, forgotten until thaw
A god grotesque, eyes black like the ice-sky above
Like the leaf-rot below.
The Ice Nymphs hid inside his mouth sometimes
And they felt secure.
Reveling in bleakness, the darkness was safe
They danced and swirled like clipped-winged angels
Bodies thin and fluid as ribbons of flesh
Rather than muscle and bone
They wore feral faces like pixies gone awry
Pale as death's sidekick
Their pointed hands loved the cold touch.
But precious inkiness gave way to sunshine death eventually
And the skies of the ice kingdom began to
Melt, melt, and fall.
The god grotesque ascended toward the light
No longer bound by ice
He forsook them all.
The Ice Nymphs cried tears that ran
Down faces newly colored by agonizing heat
Pain within and without
The bleakness in which they thrived churned slowly
Bleeding in sick, revealing light
Vomit greens
Shit yellows
Pinks like open sores on a child's feet
With screams silent yet piercing
The Ice Nymphs surfaced against their will
And melted like the rest of their murky kingdom.
"Lost Girl" Sean Gilbert
"Crazy Baby" by Sean Gilbert
"Every Woman" by Sean Gilbert
Creatures of Habit by Sean Gilbert
Surviving the Zombie War by Sean Gilbert
A Man's Gotta Do
Sean Gilbert
Tonight was my birthday, so I ended up at the Rail Pub (no surprise there). I ended up there by myself, which is a little different. Normally I wouldn’t bother to go out by myself, but I’ve got this rule where I make myself go out on my birthday because birthdays are bad enough without having to be stuck at home alone. So anyway, I went out even though I didn’t feel like it.
I sat at the bar and made the usual small talk and idle banter that passed for human interaction. It’s the kind of discourse that makes you feel like a serial killer because you’re essentially faking all emotional responses. That’s the kind of thing you don’t have to worry about in a bar. We’re all phonies here.
I spent a couple of hours trading bad jokes with homeless Bob, an interesting drifter type (drifter by look; every time I’ve ever seen him he’s always been in the same place) who looked kind of like Richard Brautigan or one of those cool Easy Rider type of homeless guys who were free of the world instead of destitute and drug addicted. Like me, he enjoyed telling jokes, bad ones especially. Bad jokes are a language all their own, and a hobby I’ve always enjoyed.
“A man finds a magic lamp with a Djinni in it,” Bob told me. “The Djinni tells him ‘I’ll grant you any wish you want.’ The guy thinks about it and says ‘hey, can you build me a bridge from here to Hawaii?’ The Djinni frowns, he’s like, ‘man, do you know how complicated that would be? I’d have to put in pylons down to the ocean floor, build a stable frame work, put in some serious architectural design to build a causeway from here to an island like Hawaii! No way, dude, that’s too hard. Wish for something else.’
“So the guy thinks it over, then he says ‘okay, then I want to know how women think.’
“The Djinni sighs, pauses a second, then says to the guy… ‘So, do you want that bridge to be a two-lane road or a four-lane?’”
Bob laughed and so did I. A few jokes and several beers later we started talking about the importance of oral storytelling and how the telling of jokes is one of the last remnants of it. He started telling me about old folk heroes and where they got their start. He told me about Cu Chulainn and how he distinguished himself at the feast of Bricriu, a story unbelievably similar to that of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. It was all about how a hero stands by his principles and upholds his honor even in the face of the gravest consequences.
And somewhere in all that drinking and all that talk about heroes and it being my birthday (this last fact known only to myself) I realized something: I had to finish what I began. I had to go back to the old 606 Café and find out why so many weird things had been happening to me lately. I had to face the monkey man and make him tell me what was going on. Because that sassy mermaid had been right. Something was coming, and I was somehow caught in the middle of it. So I needed to find out what was happening.
The Rail is just across the street from the old 606, a building that’s been abandoned so long that I’m certain we’ve lost it to another world. The monkey man suggested quite strongly that if I entered his layer again he’d eat me, but I couldn’t let that deter me. Cu Chulainn and Gawain didn’t back down when staring down the barrel of certain death, and in my current state I was prepared to do no less. I had to know why I had seen the things I’d seen. To secure my resolve, I took one last beer to go. This is something you can do in downtown Savannah, a marvelous quality of this town that has often ushered me from place to place like a winged horse bearing me on its back.
I swear that the iron gate to the café courtyard was always locked, but on nights like this I found it wide open. Maybe I’m drawn to these moments, my Cu Chulainn moments, and that’s why opportunity always presented itself so plainly to me in situations like this. Trouble always leaves the door open for me. And I usually am more than happy to walk through it.
I pushed the gate all the way open with a ridiculously dramatic creak of its hinges. I stepped into the empty courtyard and tried to adjust my eyes to the darkness of it. I peered through the shadows for the mad charge of some wild creature, but the night was still and silent. The absence of monsters was somehow more frightening than my first visit to this place.
A few minutes there bolstered my bravery enough that I decided to head inside. The last time I’d actually entered this building was when 606 was still open, and the last time I was in the courtyard some surly monkey demon tried to kill me, so believe me when I tell you that I was more than a little apprehensive as I approached the door.
Like the gate, it was suspiciously unlocked. I pushed it open and tried to see inside.
The urge to say “hello?” like they do in stupid movies came to me. It was accompanied by the realization that this occurs momentarily prior to the character getting killed horribly, so I resisted it. I didn’t even know what I hoped to find in that place. There was no reason to believe it would be pleasant.
My eyes were well adjusted to the darkness at this point, so I could see around okay. The bathrooms were on the right. There used to be a bar on the left with a sign forbidding cigars and clove cigarettes (that was when you could still smoke inside a restaurant). The bar was still there, but little else that I could recall. There was a moaning sound on the other side of it. I sighed. At this point there was no way to walk out of that place without finding out what was making that sound.
I walked around the bar to see something lying in the floor behind it. It could have been a man, but it wasn’t. It was the creature I had encountered before. Not so strong this time, and not scary at all, it was curled up on the floor like a helpless child.
It looked up at me with only vague recognition. There was no room for malice. Its breathing was heavy, coming in erratic fits. “You have come…” it rasped.
I shrugged. “Yep.”
It’s hard to say, but I think it smiled. It was as pleasant as a crocodile smile, but I think it was baring its needle teeth at me in an effort to be personable. The effect was not good, considering it wasn’t a person. “The brave one…” it whispered.
I nodded, taking a gulp of Guinness from my plastic cup. “Cu Chulainn.”
A wheezy cough issued through its teeth. I think it was trying to laugh. “I need your help…”
Then I laughed. I don’t know if I need to quit drinking or drink more, but I’ve definitely crossed over to new ground here. “You gotta be kidding.”
But it didn’t falter. “She stole… my heart…”
“They do that.”
It tried to sit up, but didn’t make it. “The anidima,” it said, as if that meant something to me. Then, seeing that it didn’t, it clarified: “The succubus…”
Strangely enough, I did know what it meant by that. I haven’t told you that story yet, but I have met the devil in a downtown bar and been tempted by his succubus. “She stole my heart a little too,” I told the monkey man.
It tried again to sit up, but only managed to pull itself up by its arms. It pulled itself two steps toward me. “Listen,” it said desperately, then yanked at the skin covering its breast to reveal that it was hollow inside. “She wants to use it… to summon the Leviathan… to bring back the things… from within. You have… to stop her…”
I scowled. Then I finished my beer. There just wasn’t any getting around it. “Fine. Sit tight, Monkian. I’ll fix this bitch for you.”
“Take care…” it gasped. “If they should return…”
“Yeah yeah yeah, all the worst parts of the Bible. I got it. Just hold the fort, keep the faith and I’ll back by dinnertime.”
Then I made a cool exit. Suck that, monkey man.
TO BE CONTINUED...
Mirror Man
Digital art by Sean Gilbert
