the INLAID EAR

Bill Griffith's "Musical Pins" inspired not just one queron but a second as footnotes. “Even if you’ve never had a piano lesson in your life…” 1            three Zippy the Pinhead comic strips 2 1. These days you can get a gloss of anything you don’t understand, watch Liberace’s spot for The Baldwin Fun Machine, get sold and ring it up with shipping—without leaving your post. Then videocapture with all your being! 2. Saturday Night Sing-a-longs—teens thing they’re tops! Mom puts out a plate of garbanzo crescents. Dad plugs in the home fog machine and flash pots. Suddenly you’re three of the many Osmonds. “I think about your lovin’.” “Double lovin’.” 3. We’re graced with a visit from our long-nosed friend, so we gather around the keyboard console. His face opens up—such a sweet audience. When he starts to get confused after a while, we explain: the organ sounds best off. So stop ...

“Transplants are commonplace nowadays, even routine, so no impediments remain to performing the process on oneself. Pleased to meet you. Doctor Kenneth Frank—Ken’s fine. Transplants. Symbiology . You’ve probably guessed the hand you shook just now was not always mine. My gardener, a former cowpoke and prizefighter, possessed musculature that was enviable, indeed. When he quite unexpectedly passed, I imagined a mutually beneficial arrangement. His cadaver agreed, you might say. His arm lives on, serves me and retains the strength and soul of his brawn and breed. You felt him in the handshake. You met him, too, just then. Sadly, his left hand would not accede motor control (damned thing). But look here! Mismatched, it’s true. My left belonged to a concert harpist. Female, yes. It was her dominant hand, so although in school, I was right-handed, I now find myself ambidextrous— and master of this limb’s delicacy. My sutures have become gesture...

By Sybil Archibald . I'm thinking I better find a publisher willing to make a full-color book! House Guest       Plastic wrapped her from the inside, entered as a gas and sealed her. The home closed its doors to its bride, repossessed the meaning of “where the heart is.” And she might have died on the curb but for a neighbor whose own scarred heart bled quite enough. After all, what’s a great room for? “The Big One doesn’t make us tough,” she said. “It just shakes off our pride.” She gave her time to sleep and slough the cellophane around her brain. Too, there was the brother she loved who had not made it past the strain. On a clear afternoon, grief tore the seal open and out she came, shaking, wet, ready to begin.

As I've approached artists for this book, I have been telling them truthfully that I would be "backflippingly thrilled" to get a piece from them. Since March, I have turned a lot of back flips, figuratively. The incredible Stefan G. Bucher , warned me off attempting a literal one, but getting this piece from him brought me close to endangering myself and others with spontaneous acrobatics.  Here's "Unearthly whiz," illustrated by Stefan G. " The Daily Monster " Bucher. You can play along with Stefan with The Daily Monster app !   Unearthly Whiz          Initially sparked by the documentary, Wretches & Jabberers A’s for appearance , the first shapes one sees, and mine don’t help to make my beauty’s case. Beard bramble, beach-ball belly, buzzard eyes, bottom bite—and bejesus, what a face— cleave all my encounters to choppy seas. Do you think you’d do with a self like this: a knack for remunerative vi...

The amazing Art Moura submitted a whole graveyard full of zombies in illustration of this poem. Which one or two do you like best?                                       published in Turbulence Magazine, Issue 8 (2012) Zombie Movie Climax This is a zombie movie scenario starring me as me myself, and also as the zombie who shambles patiently through the abandoned midnight neighborhood scene: Hero-me stops running, grabs zombie-me by the lapels, yells “Wake up! Smell the roses!” Both shaking violently. Close up on two faces. The living one: “Look at yourself!” A spark ignites in the zombie’s eyes. “You’re animated!” The room spirals and goes bright in a frenzy of cellos. Their clutch breaks. The hero cries, “You don’t have to be so dead!” The zombie’s mouth closes. Then opens and moans, “Oh. I s...