a PDF - Fluent Magazine

ARTS | CULTURE | EVENTS
Spring 2014 | Vol 2 No 4
Monica Ann Wilkins’
Colorful Story
New Guitars Mimic Old-Time
Blues: Michael Hauver, Luthier
Making Connections:
The Photography of
David Rosen
Mercy Killers Comes to the
Eastern Panhandle
Eyes, Ears & Soul
Kipyn Martin
Ed:Cetera Babysitting, The
Affordable Care Act & How To
Reduce Lyme Disease
Poetry Five Poets, Seven
Poems
Fiction
J. M. R. Harrison
Jim Koenig
Coda And the winner is ...
“Self Portrait” by Monica Ann Wilkins
CONTENTS
Spring 2014
Monica Ann Wilkins’ Colorful Story
New Guitars Mimic Old-Time Blues:
Michael Hauver, Luthier
Making Connections:
The Photography of David Rosen
Mercy Killers
Comes to the Eastern Panhandle
2 | fluent
Letter From the Editor
Making Time
Ears, Eyes & Soul
Kipyn Martin
Poetry
Five Poets, Seven Poems
Fiction
J. M. R. Harrison & Jim Koenig
Ed:Cetera
Babysitting, The Affordable Care …
Coda
And the winner is ...
fluent | 3
C O N T R I B U T O R S
Todd Coyle is a journeyman musician
PaulA Pennell, having developed tech-
who has performed in and around the
Eastern Panhandle of WV and around
the country for over 30 years. He has
worked in folk, blues, pop, jazz and
country bands as a guitarist, bassist,
singer, producer and sound man.
nical proposals for over 20 years, enjoys
the contrast of writing about creative
people and their art. An artist herself,
Paula works with hot glass and keeps
bees at her home in Monrovia, MD.
Sean O’Leary is a playwright, newspaper
writer who began her career as a journalist. She has served as a marketing communications specialist and a magazine
founder and publisher.
of My State: A Native Son’s Search
for West Virginia, is a collection of
his newspaper columns. Sean is also the
author of seven full-length plays. In 2006,
he was named to The Literary Map of
West Virginia.
Judy Olsen, a Washington, DC, native
residing in Shepherdstown, WVa, has
had a love affair with photography
since her teens. After 30+ years in the
corporate world, her passion has been
rediscovered. She enjoys capturing the
world of light and shadow that will never
come again in exactly the same way. 9
12
24
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Cheryl L. Serra Managing Editor
Kathryn Burns Visual Arts Editor
Zachary Davis Fiction Editor
Tom Donlon Poetry Editor
Sheila Vertino is returning to her roots
Amy Mathews Amos, Paula Pennell,
as a freelance writer and journalist, after
a career as a magazine editor-in-chief
and book and research publisher. Based
in Shepherdstown, she describes herself
as a culturally curious word nerd.
Ed Zahniser
Ed Zahniser’s poems have appeared in
over 100 literary magazines, 7 anthologies, 3 books and 3 chapbooks in the
U.S. and the U.K. He is co-editor of
In Good Company, an anthology of
area poets celebrating Shepherdstown’s
250th anniversary.
Berkeley Street Bakery
Entrepreneurs’ Café
Panhandle EarthDay Celebration
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Dec 13–Jan 14
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Fluent Magazine
4 | fluent
Nancy McKeithen Editor & Publisher
Contributing Editors
A D V E R T I Z E R S
Old Opera House
The Bridge Gallery
Mark Muse Photography
Skinner Law Firm
Spring 2014 | Vol 2 No 4
Sheila Kelly Vertino Associate Editor
Cheryl L. Serra is an award-winning
columnist, blogger and marketing
consultant living and working in Harpers
Ferry, WV. His new book, The State
MAGAZINE
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Submissions For information on
submitting unsolicited fiction, nonfiction,
plays and poetry, please see the website:
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Please submit events and arts news to
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Fluent Magazine is published bimonthly
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All rights reserved. No portion of this
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© 2014 Fluent Magazine
Fluent Magazine is
grateful for the support
of the Jefferson County
Arts and Humanities
Alliance (AHA) through
its Community Arts
Impact Award program.
Jefferson County, WVa
is a Certified Arts
Community.
Making Time
For photographer David Rosen, making time for his art is a
whittling down of choices and juggling work, family, town council and a
local entrepreneurial micro-grant program. Painter Monica Ann Wilkins
is known to make time for her art—watercolor painting—even while
riding in the car, in a balancing act of palette, paints, brush and water
bottle. Playwright Michael Milligan is making time to bring an important
issue—the political battle over healthcare—to the stage through his
art. He’s shepherding the production of his play “Mercy Killers” around
the country. For luthier Michael Hauver, making time for his art is also
making a living.
That these artists make time to photograph and paint and write
and build is what Fluent thrives on. As we near the two-year mark of
publishing, we’re looking for input on filling Fluent’s editorial calendar for
the next two years of issues. In the next few weeks, we’ll email subscribers
a short survey—and also post it on the website—so you can let us know
what you would like to see in Fluent.
We hope you’ll make time to tell us.
“McMurran” by David Rosen
Nancy McKeithen
Editor & Publisher
fluent | 5
EARS, EYES & SOUL
Kipyn Martin: Singer / Songwriter Living Her Passion
BY TODD COYLE
FLUENT Your recent album “Undercover Muse,” tell
us about it and the philosophy behind the title.
KM “Undercover Muse” is my debut album, which
was self-released in 2013. The album offers a representation of my live performances, as almost the entire album is just one voice and one acoustic guitar. It’s what
it would sound like if I were sitting next to you, and it’s
a collection of songs which I am very proud to share.
6 | fluent
Most everyone who has ever been involved in a
creative endeavor understands how the inspirational
force, the muse, operates—unpredictably. In a way this
album is my offering to her, stating from an artist’s
standpoint, “I’m present and willing to write the songs.
I’m listening, and I’ll do what it takes.”
FLUENT You grew up in a musical family in the Eastern Panhandle of West Virginia. What are your roots?
KM I am thankful that my mother and sister jumped
at every opportunity to sing three-part harmony with
me when I was a child, and that my Dad, a blues singer
and keyboard player, sat down with me at the piano
every chance he got. Throughout grade school I was
enamored with choral singing, the passion which
continued through college to graduate school and now
still persists. My roots are richly and diversely musical,
and I try to water them as best I can.
FLUENT You’re a huge CSNY fan. What did you
learn from each of them and the other influences who
shaped your playing and writing?
KM Absolutely I am. Each maintains his distinct
tone, yet their voices blend together seamlessly for
their timeless signature sound. Likewise, CSNY’s
sensibilities behave the same way with songwriting. I
hope that in my songwriting career, I can maintain
uniqueness while collaborating with other artists in
real harmony. That’s a beautiful thing.
FLUENT What’s your education? What’s your take
on the state of education in our world today?
KM I did undergraduate work at Shepherd University in Shepherdstown, WV, which culminated in a
Bachelor of Arts in Music in 2008. Then I attended
Shenandoah Conservatory in Winchester, VA, where I
received a Master of Music degree in Composition in
2012. I remember a harsh struggle during undergraduate study, during which I felt that classical music and
folk-style music were at odds with each other. It took
graduate work to boost my confidence in my compositional voice such that I could discard whatever
pre-existing notions told me that I couldn’t be both a
composer and a songwriter.
KM Compare the river to music. And … Shenandoah or
the Nile? The river’s meaning in my life is about as mystical and powerful as its behavior. The word Shenandoah simultaneously symbolizes a journey and a place of
rest for me. The spirit of the river is that which carries
me through the bends and turns of life. And when I
need to touch base I know that my family (biological
and otherwise) resides just along the banks in multiple
towns in the valley. Its beauty is something that I know
I’m not ready to tackle in song just yet. The lyric in the
famous traditional tune goes, “’O Shenandoah I long
to see you.” I haven’t been gone long enough to write
a love song full of yearning to the river quite yet; but I
want to. Music is a lot like the river: When you submerge yourself in it, it takes you somewhere. And after
I visit the Nile, then we can compare the two!
FLUENT What’s your take on the arts in the Eastern
Panhandle of WV?
Honestly I am rather uneducated when it comes to
the state of education in a global sense. (I hope that
my father with a doctorate in education will forgive
me after reading that.) But higher education has given
me some incredibly useful tools for my career as a
professional musician. Learning is good.
KM I think that rich Appalachian culture mixed
together with proximity to the nation’s capital make
the Panhandle a truly unique place of creativity. I am
honored to have grown up here. And I would love
to see more funding for performance spaces and galleries, and I know a lot of people who feel the same way.
FLUENT The Shenandoah River seems to have had a
big influence on your life. What’s the river mean to you?
FLUENT Kipyn is an interesting name, what’s the
story on it? u
fluent | 7
KM My older sister heard the name when she was
very young, and asked my parents, “If I ever have a
younger sister, can we name her Kippin?” A few years
and alternate spellings later, there I was.
FLUENT You use open tunings extensively. Which
ones do you use?
KM I utilize drop D and DADGAD mostly (with the
occasional capo).
FLUENT What’s the allure of open tunings? Explain
your use of them.
KM I have always been a rhythm player, accompanying my own voice. And after I strummed chords
for years, there were only so many standard position
chords I could play until I just yearned for more color
choices. Extending the bass note down a whole step
on the guitar adds fullness to anything in the key of
D. And DADGAD is a world of its own, promoting
maximum color with minimal chord shapes in the left
hand. I’m still exploring.
FLUENT What’s in the future for Kipyn? New
album? Hopes? Dream?
KM A new album is definitely in store. Hopefully lots
of them! I hope our culture will continue to refresh its
appreciation of folk music, and continue to support
local artists. I dream of winning a Grammy someday.
That’d be nice!
FLUENT What’s your perfect afternoon?
KM It would be spent in my home with a cup of
French press coffee next to the warm fireplace with
a blank page and a pen. My best friend and our kitties
would be roaming around, being adorable and content.
The important context of this afternoon is that I have
nothing to do but create. The only task would be
writing my heart’s intent to yours. fluent
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fluent | 9
FICTION
Tryst
BY J. M. R. HARRISON
“So beautiful,” he sighed, “it breaks your heart.”
But he was not looking at or listening to me; he was staring into a past distance.
He shook his head slightly, dispelling the ghosts. He was looking in my direction
again, those eyes I once spent hours pondering whether blue or gray, but his manner
turned professorial.
“Unattainable beauty cannot have that effect. Longing might dent the heart, but
breaking it needs something you can hold.” He fisted his hand for emphasis.
I reached across the table, and dumped three teaspoons of sugar in his coffee,
stirring it loudly. He likes it black.
He continued, oblivious, “But only briefly. Here, and then gone.” Theatrically,
he opened his hand.
We never had Paris, only shoddy, bohemian imitations like this cheap restaurant
where the candles dripped wax on empty Chianti bottles. I felt a pang—of longing?
Grief?—as I watched him, my first love, my once lover, but not my future.
“Heartbreaking beauty is always transitory. The Japanese know this. That’s why
they’re fascinated by cherry blossoms,” he concluded with a flourish.
His smile wavered as he regarded me. I had missed my cue to look adoring. I
looked down at the dingy tablecloth.
“I don’t know,” I said, glancing up through my eyelashes. He relaxed; I had been
recast as the slightly dim ingénue in need of further explication. “Beauty’s such a
vague, overused word. And breaking hearts—an abused cliché. Don’t you think?” fluent
J. M. R. Harrison’s poems
have appeared in various
publications, including
Fluent. “Tryst” is her first
fiction publication.
PHOTO Judy Olsen Photography
M I S S E D
A N Y
I S S U E S
O F
F L U E N T
M A G A Z I N E ?
C L I C K O N T H E I S S U E S B E L O W T O R E A D T H E M .
fluent | 11
By Sheila Kelly Vertino
T
he roads around Morgantown
are lined with rows of skinny,
unremarkable trees. Dull gray and
brown, they might go unnoticed by
some. But not by painter Monica Ann
Wilkins, who has painted an entire
series of those trees. “Put on your
imagination glasses,” says Wilkins.
“Painting allows me to move a tree or
add a mountain, bend a river. You do
not have to be shackled to paint nature
as you see it or know it. You want to
relate to it and paint what you feel
about that field or barn.” u
“Colorado Wildflowers,” a commission.
fluent | 13
TREES
Below, “Dancing Trees.” Top right,
“Smiling Trees.” Below right, “Bluzee
Trees.”
14 | fluent
Recently relocated from Morgantown to the Eastern Panhandle,
Wilkins’ signature style pushes watercolor well beyond typical pastel
landscapes. She credits that break-through to Skip Lawrence’s workshop,
where he introduced her to “more paint, less water,” as a way to create
deep, saturated colors.
“It just clicked because I used to paint in oils and acrylics. Taking more
[watercolor] paint on the brush, you get beautiful, bright colors in your
work.”
Oranges and bright purples are her favorite palette. People often
question Wilkins’ use of such vivid colors in a watercolor painting, asking,
“Why the bright colors?” To her, it seems obvious to want to push the
limits. “Why NOT the bright colors?” she asks.
Wilkins believes that “Every painting should tell a story.” And in
telling that story, Wilkins says, “I try and produce something that nobody
has seen before.” u
Below, “Prevailing Peace.” Right, “Deep
Woods,” one of Wilkins watercolors
she created using a technique called
“negative painting.”
Multi-talented in several mediums, Wilkins began with oils and acrylics, and then tackled watercolor painting. Recently juried in as a signature
member of the West Virginia Watercolor Society, she is constantly experimenting with new mediums and techniques.
“The materials available in today’s art world allow so much more sensation to be expressed… and manufacturers are adding beads and sand and
textures,” says Wilkins, clearly eager to dive in. She also learns techniques
and mediums from her fellow artists in the Friday Painters group in Shepherdstown, WV, who freely share their knowledge with each other.
Wilkins’ latest conquest: negative painting, a challenging watercolor
technique that requires the artist to think backwards about the painting.
“You are reversing your brain. You are not painting a positive thing in your
images; you are painting around it.” (See painting at right.) Using leaves u
fluent | 17
“One Cow Walking.” To see more of Wilkins’ work,
visit her website at www.monicaannwilkins.com.
as an example, she explains, “You want to
paint around the leaf, so the leaf itself is light.
You put down a mingle of colors. Then you
add another glaze, building up the layers.”
Amazingly, Wilkins has devised a way to
work on negative paintings while riding in
the car. On her lap is a stiff surface to hold
the paper and a small palette with paints;
the water bottle sits snugly in the cup holder
in the center console. “You can work small.
You’re not doing a lot of paint. It’s OK if you
hit a bump. It will work,” Wilkins says with a
laugh.
Whether she is painting in her studio
or on a road trip, for Wilkins, success
comes when “I get a feeling of passion and
a powerful connection to the subject or
landscape I am painting.” Borrowing a line
from Jennifer Lopez on “American Idol,”
Wilkins says, “That gives me the goosies! If
I feel that excitement when I am painting, I
know I am on the right track.”
And that passion just might look like
orange and bright purple! fluent
18 | fluent
fluent | 19
New Guitars Mimic
Old-Time Blues
To understand Michael Hauver’s craft
is to experience finger-picking blues and ragtime
guitar from the 1920s and 30s. To remember the old
bluesmen, like the great Charley Patton, father of the
Delta blues; Blind Blake, who became an accomplished
blues guitarist despite being born blind; and Barbeque
Bob, an early Atlanta blues player who worked as a
barbeque cook. Modern blues guitarists pay tribute
to these legends by mimicking their vintage sound—
sound best produced by the same guitars seen with
them in early photos.
“New-Old” Guitars
“Music mimics the human voice, and all instruments
are about imitating,” says Hauver, a long-time repairman of vintage guitars, and more recently, designer
and luthier (builder) of his own line of new Stella-style
guitars, or as he’s coined them, “new-old” guitars. “We
Hauver shows off his finger-picking skills on the first guitar he ever built—a 6-string Stella replica based on the 1920s Galliano model.
By Paula Pennell
all want to make guitars that sound like the vintage
instruments, but vintage sound only comes with age,”
says Hauver. “As wood ages, lacquer cracks and releases its hold on the wood,” he explains. “Also, tension
from the strings can create 150 pounds of non-stop
pressure. This causes the top to pull up and the neck
to bend forward. More pressure on top equals more
sound. It can take 70–100 years for the top and neck
to settle in and for the sound to get better.”
Oscar Schmidt, the largest manufacturer of
fretted (string) instruments in the early 1900s, built
Stella guitars, one of the most popular and affordable
brands through the 1930s. Today, Stellas (Latin for
“star”) are widely collected, selling for upwards of
$10,000. And although age does breed a coveted
sound, it also introduces a host of structural problems
that often render these instruments unplayable.
That’s where Michael Hauver comes in.
From Collector to Luthier
A long-time blues guitar enthusiast and musician,
Hauver had collected a great number of vintage guitars,
all in need of repair. One day, he decided to saw one
apart and analyze how it was built. From there he
began repairing his guitars, and took on jobs from
friends and fellow collectors. Over time, he earned
his reputation as the “go-to” guy for vintage, and
specifically Stella, guitar restoration and refurbishing.
What he had yet to learn was modern guitar-building
techniques.
Hauver wanted to build new guitars the same way
the old guitars were built back in the 1920s and 30s,
with ladder—or “lateral”—bracing. “Ladder-braced
guitars use less wood on top, producing immediacy
and clarity of sound and a dry, burly tone that’s
characteristic of the old blues,” he explains.
PHOTO Paula Pennell
After the 1930s, “X” bracing became popular because it supported heavier strings that amplify volume.
Today, guitars simply plug into electric amps for more
sound, thus removing amplification as a building factor.
“Music mimics the human voice,
and all instruments are about
imitating.”
—Michael Hauver
Hauver felt the time was right for ladder bracing (see an
example behind Michael’s left shoulder in the photo at left)
to make a comeback. And in 2000 he attended the American
School of Lutherie in Healdsburg, California, where he
studied with Charles Fox.
Soon after, he opened Allegheny Blues Guitars in
Sharpsburg, Maryland, and the first Hauver Guitar was
released—a 12-string grand concert Stella replica based on
the 1920s Galliano model. A series of models soon followed,
all inspired by original Stella models and the great bluesmen
who played them: the “Charley Patton,” the “Barbeque Bob,”
the “Blind Blake,” “The Gambler” and “The Mustacio Grand
Concert.”
New-Time Features for Old-Time Guitars
Hauver builds four types of guitars, from smallest to largest:
the concert, grand concert, auditorium and jumbo. “All can
be built with six or twelve strings,” he says.
He builds each one to “fit” each individual for comfort
and playability. He adjusts neck scale, shape and width to
support a player’s reach and hand size; he lowers the strings
so playing is low and easy on the fingers; and by using u
fluent | 21
Charlie Patton (grand concert guitar). Charlie Patton is
considered in some circles to be the father of country blues
guitar. The label features a Neil Harpe lithograph adapted from
the only existing photo of Patton.
different woods, bindings and purflings (ornamental borders),
rosettes, lacquers and decals, Hauver transforms each
instrument into a true, one-of-a-kind reflection of the player
behind the guitar.
As originally planned, he combines new-time features
with old-time building techniques. “I build new guitars
for players who want a vintage look and sound.” He
also builds guitars that are easy to maintain and built
to last. Three truss rods are built into the neck for
strength. Two are carbon fiber, which has the weight of
wood and the strength of steel, and one is adjustable to
correct string tension. “The adjustable rod bends the
neck either way so it stays in place,” he says, adding
that he also uses bolt-on necks rather than glued-on to
allow for easy neck resets, and reverse kerfing (lining)
for added stability around the sides.
Hauver’s “Mustachio” Grand Concert Guitar has the same
body dimensions and ladder bracing pattern as the 1920s
A. Galiano guitar. The bracing runs horizontally from side to
side and lends to the guitar’s dry, burly tone.
22 | fluent
Hauver insists on building his guitars of solid
wood. “Different woods produce different sound
characteristics,” he explains. “For instance, maple
Gambler (auditorium) twelve-string guitar with decal motif
of playing cards. These guitars are offered with six or twelve
strings in several sizes and with a mother-of-pearl fingerboard.
produces a harder sound, rosewood produces a softer
sound, and mahogany produces a sound that’s in the
middle of the road. I try to build a lot of warmth into
my guitars,” he says. “Players can add the edge, but if
the guitar is already bright sounding, you can never
make it warm. Brightness can be added through the
playing.” As for good tone, Hauver says the secret is
keeping the bridge in the belly of the guitar. “That’s
what Oscar Schmidt did.”
The Story Behind the Label
Recently, Hauver began engraving his name into his guitar handles, but the true brand of a Hauver guitar is in
the old-style label that displays
from the interior. Neil Harpe, a
blues musician/artist/collector/
dealer and long-time friend u
Auditorium 12-string guitar. “Huddie ‘Lead Belly’ Ledbetter is
undoubtedly the most famous name associated with the Stella
twelve-string guitar,” says Hauver.
fluent | 23
of Hauver, designed the labels, which feature Harpe’s
lithographic prints of old-time blues players based on
early Stella labels. Harpe’s artwork is a natural fit for the
Hauver brand. “Neil created those lithographs 15 years
before I even began building guitars,” he says.
Hauver stays busy in his small studio filling orders
for his “new-old” guitars and performing high-end
repairs on guitars from all over the United States, Australia, Germany, Spain and the U.K. “I can complete
one guitar in about 60 hours over a 6-week period,“
he says. “Much of that is downtime for drying and
curing.”
His well-earned reputation continues to gain
visibility as modern blues artists like Little Toby
Walker, Stefan Grossman, Tom Feldmann and Happy
Traum sing Hauver’s praises and use his guitars to
teach future generations of blues musicians. “People
see these instructors using my guitars and they want
the same sound,” he says.
They also want the best of both worlds—new
guitars with old sound. On this note, Hauver more
than delivers. fluent
For more information, visit www.hauverguitars.com.
Little Toby Walker talks through the structure of a Hauver
“Blind Blake” guitar and plays a demo: http://www.youtube.
com/watch?v=AVfqUBGThWg
A look at how an old Stella guitar is restored:
http://www.stellaguitars.com/restoration%20of%20
a%20Stella.htm
R.L. Burnside plays the Hauver “Charley Patton” Guitar:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BjaYhhe2oWE&play
next_from=TL&videos=dgqKXVr7LHA
Toby Walker plays the “Barbecue Bob” 12-string guitar:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7plVe3VkQRg
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fluent | 25
St. John’s DC
Making connections:
The Photography of
David
ROSEN
By Nancy McKeithen
H
e’s passionate about photographing
architecture, and about taking pictures
of things people connect with. “Buildings speak to us,” says David Rosen. “A good
building tells a story to anyone.” Like this yellow church across the street from the White
House—it’s one of his favorite photographs.
Rosen shoots with a Sony DSLR but
says the best camera is “the one you have
with you.” While his favorite time of year to
shoot is spring—for the color—the picture
he has sold the most is one he took in winter:
“Panoramic Shepherdstown Street” (page 30).
Rosen has dabbled in different media; in
college at UMBC, he studied graphic design
as a way to get paid to do art. And he does,
in a way, running the grants website at the
National Institutes of Health. “It keeps Photoshop open on my desk,” he says, smiling. He
also loves painting and drawing, “but I always
come back to photography and digital art.”
The convergence of those is something he
first did for fun that has evolved into art u
fluent | 27
that gets commissioned—a photograph of a
street in Harpers Ferry or the church where
a couple got married, for example. And his
work is featured at PLUM, a jewelry store in
Shepherdstown owned by his wife, Cari Aliveto
Rosen. Also an artist, she specializes in sterling
silver and hand-stamped jewelry.
For Rosen, making art goes hand in hand
with entrepreneurship. “An entrepreneur creates
to make money, and an artist creates to make
more art,” he ponders. “But in the end, they’re
both entrepreneurs. If you’re an artist and you
want to sustain it for the long term, you have to
do it for profit. I sell art so I can create more
art... it supports itself.”
When Rosen isn’t taking photographs, he’s
often thinking about his audience—how to connect his art to them, and how to market his art.
“There has to be a story behind it,” he says. With
his help, the buildings he shoots provide that.
“Most of my inspiration comes from painters,” he says, mentioning Kandinsky. “His early
work was almost all buildings ... almost like fluorescent colors.” The way he describes the painter’s work—“like two pieces of art, layered, where
one is the photograph of the buildings and the
other is the art and geometry of how the colors
lay out”—can describe his own work as well.
As his work evolves, Rosen wants to make
photographs where there’s a lot of digital manipulation and yet it’s difficult to perceive. “The kind
of photograph that compels someone to look at a
picture and think, ‘Oh, that’s a good photograph’
and then all of a sudden realize something’s not
right,” he says. A surrealist photo.
He says he’ll get there, eventually. “Art is
something I want to do forever.” fluent
For more information, visit plumwv.com
or email [email protected].
28 | fluent
u
Yellow Brick Bank
Reflection Blues
30 | fluent
Opera
House
u
Our Snow Globe
Sunset Library
MERCY KILLERS
Comes to the Eastern Panhandle
BY SEAN O’LEARY
Michael Milligan’s poignant one-man play explores the human
struggle behind the political battle over healthcare.
I
f you hang around people who work in the
arts, it’s not unusual to hear that artistic works
can powerfully influence politics... that novels,
movies and plays can bring to public awareness issues
that would otherwise go unnoticed... or that the arts
can change peoples’ opinions about already roiling
controversies. Sadly, evidence suggests that this is
rarely the case.
It’s true that Abraham Lincoln greeted Harriet
Beecher Stowe, the author of Uncle Tom’s Cabin,
with the words, “So, you are the little woman who
wrote the book that started this great war!” The
34 | fluent
British parliament implemented child labor laws
and other measures to limit the abuse of workers
and debtors in the wake of Charles Dickens’s Oliver
Twist and David Copperfield. And, in the last century,
Sinclair Lewis’s novel The Jungle is generally credited
with concentrating public attention on abusive and
unsanitary conditions in the meatpacking industry
resulting in the nation’s first food safety laws. But,
beyond those cases, one would be hardpressed to cite
other instances in which works of art were primarily
responsible for bringing major issues to the fore or for
significantly altering debate.
Still, none of this means that art doesn’t have an
effect. It just works more subtly.
Michael Milligan’s performance of his one-man
play, Mercy Killers, doesn’t tell us what we should do
about our healthcare system. It doesn’t even expose us
to much of anything we don’t already know about it. In
fact, with the advent of the Affordable Care Act, some
of the facts the play does present are now dated. But,
for an hour Mercy Killers powerfully does something
that is in its own right vital and all too rare.
We, along with Milligan’s character, a profane but
tragically endearing car mechanic, are plunged into an
emotional maelstrom of the inadequacy, resentment,
guilt and grief we experience when we are forced to
watch helplessly as someone we love suffers, perhaps
needlessly, even as the life we built collapses around
us socially, financially and in our own minds. We are
taken to a place beneath the mind-numbing statistics
about the numbers of the uninsured, the percentage
of middle-class households plunged into bankruptcy,
budgetary considerations, and the astronomical costs
of medical care to something more elemental—to the
reasons that we must care about these things however
arcane the debate sometimes becomes. u
fluent | 35
In the end, Milligan’s play doesn’t tell us what to
think about healthcare, but it puts us in a place emotionally and intellectually that prepares us to think
about the issue and examine it from a 360-degree
perspective that encompasses compassion as well as
reason. It reminds us of what illness means in all its dimensions for caregivers as well as for patients and what
it means in our souls as well as in our pocketbooks.
That’s probably why the Eastern Panhandle Single
Payer Action Network (EPSPAN), an advocacy group
for a single-payer healthcare system, chose to present
Milligan’s play as a lead-in to a post-performance discussion that will explore where we are with healthcare,
the ways in which the Affordable Care Act may or may
not be working, and where we should go from here.
But, regardless of where that conversation goes,
Mercy Killers is an example of art doing what art does
well, which is not nuanced criticism or analysis of policy
and proposals. Mercy Killers is a play and a performance
that puts us in touch with our humanity and then lets
the analysis and policy debates flow from there. fluent
Mercy Killers, a play by Michael Milligan, will be
presented throughout the Eastern Panhandle at the
following times and places. There is no charge for
admission, however, contributions to support Milligan and
his national tour of Mercy Killers will be accepted.
3/28, 7 pm, BERKELEY SPRINGS, Ice House,
138 Independence St
3/29, 1:30 pm, CHARLES TOWN, Fisherman’s Hall,
312 S West St
3/30, 2 pm, SHEPHERDSTOWN, Opera House,
131 W German St
3/31, 7 pm, MARTINSBURG, Calvary Church,
220 W Burke St
4/1, 7 pm, RANSON, Baha’i Ctr., 308 S Buchannan St
4/2, 12:30 pm, SHEPHERDSTOWN, Erma Ora Byrd
Nursing Hall, Shepherd Universary
For more information, go to www.mercykillers.com or
www.mercykillerswv.wordpress.com
The Bridge Fine Art & Framing Gallery
Drawing Exhibit • Through March
Colored Pencil Drawing Workshop • Judy Bradshaw • Mar 16, 1–4 pm (must register)
8566 Shepherdstown Pike, Shepherdstown WV 25443 • 304.876.2300
Fine Art, Ceramics, Photography & Custom Framing
36 | fluent
ADVERTISEMENT
ENTREPRENEURS’ CAFÉ
EASTERN PANHANDLE
Be part of a local business’s success story.
At each Entrepreneurs’ Café, five businesses pitch their ideas
and compete for your vote to win the micro-grant cash award.
A $10 admission fee from attendees provides the money for
the micro-grant, and also includes light refreshments.
A little goes a long way.
A larger printer. A promotional video. An automated inventory system.
Past winners of the Entrepreneurs’ Café have leveraged micro-grants
of $500 to $1,000 to reach new heights of success for their businesses.
To date, more than $21,000 in micro-grants has been awarded.
Be part of the Entrepreneurs’ Café. Be part of the success story.
[
Wednesday, April 23, 6:30 pm
White Hall, Princess & High Streets, Shepherd University, Shepherdstown, WV
$10 at the door. All proceeds go to the winner of the Café.
To apply to be a presenter: Deadline April 9
Applications available online or email David Rosen at [email protected]
fluent | 37
POETRY
Into The Meadow
For my father
Orphaned
Bushel & Peck
for J.J.L.
I had this idea.
It sounded like lemons
When he lost them at three,
left to a farmer
in need of extra hands,
he grew up digging.
Arms taut and muscled,
yearning to extend into the dust,
he planted his bare feet
in the Earth.
Turning the fields over,
shirt-sleeves cuffed to the elbows;
brine rolled off his face
and dripped into the soil.
He knew parched land
though he never spoke of it;
he just kept on
tilling, reaching,
praying for rain
to wake them up.
Pamela Mathison-Levitt,
Martinsburg, WV
a different way to define
weight&amount—
a different way to talk
about death
how many lemons is that?
asking myself as
I touch the clothes
on the rack (fifteen lemons) and
carry the casket uphill
both ways:
two hundred and twenty-seven
lemons—
which means it is too heavy,
threatening to spill
out
over the top
of the wheelbarrow
piled high with dirt&bones
they fall into yet
another hole
in the ground, filling
it with yellow
symbolism
and lemons.
Anna Brammeier
Shepherdstown, WV
We should have put you
where cows graze and
birds light on every limb
where maples blaze
along an autumn fencerow
and June sends waves
of daisies, yarrow, and
buttercup, should have
tucked your bones where
you were most at home—
sun rising and setting,
grass blooming, withering—
your soul, shining
with dew, singing
its celebratory song.
Connie Jordan Green, Lenoir City, TN
Oak Ridge, Tennessee, 1944
I’ll never forget the boardwalk
the skates sang to, how we dropped
coins through its cracks, milk
money vanishing before we reached
school, and at night pines
in the wind a whispering choir
beyond our bedroom window,
oaks towering, their rocky
understory becoming our rooms,
our paths, and far below the house
a gully cutting through clay banks,
place of imagined animals ready
to pounce, fear an emotion
we had to invent in our daily games,
the cold war and Nikita Khrushchev,
bomb shelters and evacuation routes
images waiting to haunt
our adolescent years,
the simplicity of our childhood
a jewel we would turn this way
and that, marvel at the light
bouncing from its surface.
Connie Jordan Green, Lenoir City, TN
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Canary
My grandfather carried a canary into the mine
he knew what to do
when it stopped singing.
He crawled backwards
out of the womb of the mountain
before the bird fell over
tight as a willow bud.
He traded their money,
these tokens lighter than feathers
for bread, for jam
for his children, shoeless,
hungry as nestlings.
I carry his name into darkness now:
I tell him they are stripping our mountain
down to the bones.
Where will we go when the rivers dry up
when the trees turn to ash
and the sky goes black as the mine that took his lungs?
He turns away from me, blue eyes shining
but I can’t stop singing.
Kathryn Wilson, Loiusville, KY
Worry Comes to Stay
Uninvited, unexpected, she evidenced herself at first
with faint footprints on the doorstep in the mornings,
odd bits of rubble tracked in overnight, soiling
the mat. Soon she grew bolder: jiggled doorknobs,
scratched at windowpanes, left withered bouquets
of long-dead flowers in the mailbox. When she showed up
with her belongings — battered old valise, a steamer
trunk draped with cobwebs — she closed the windows
to block bird song, the morning breeze; lowered the shades
against spring sunlight. All night the measured thuds
of her black thick-heeled oxfords echo as she paces
from room to room, and a fetid odor's thickened the air,
like skunk cabbage decaying in a swamp. Early on
it might have been possible to evict her. After a month,
she's rooted, her shrouded bulk filling the frontporch rocker day after day as she sways slowly back
and forth, staring blank-eyed into the yard, seeing
nothing good ahead, and not planning a departure.
Paradise
After Arthur Smith
I used to live in a similar place. At noon
the sun poured over the mountain,
spread her molten heat like the hottest
ember in the coal grate. By evening
the hollows steamed, cooled overnight
by a draft from deep mine shafts,
by breezes sweeping down the hillsides.
Summers were eternal, winters like
a plunge into ice water, spring
broke in a rapture of bloodroot,
hepatica, trailing arbutus, chartreuse
trees shimmering on the ridges, autumn
like an artist gone mad with his brushes.
I used to live where cousins were daily
companions, where my grandfather’s
hot toddy started the day, my grandmother’s
black skillet was always frying up chicken,
where my father wore coal dust and my
mother sang, sang, sang the day away,
used to live in a house small as a shoe
box where Christmas and Easter created
happy chaos, where childhood diseases
sulfured the air, and always the windows
gleamed, the porch boards were nailed
tight, and love cupped her hands
around us all, lived there in my childhood disguise, filling, filling the vessel
of self, honey to last a lifetime.
Connie Jordan Green, Lenoir City, TN
Carol Grametbauer, Kingston, TN
fluent | 39
FICTION
Interlude
BY JIM KOENIG
My old man, Rosser, wasn’t in our crappy motel
room. On the way back I’d rattled the door on the
VFW, and it had just closed. He was on foot. It was
turning cold, and I had the trench coat he’d left behind. I wore my surplus Army jacket with a Day-Glo
orange peace symbol painted on the back. Instead of
carrying his coat, I squeezed it on over my own. It
was like putting on his skin because of the booze and
cigarette stink. A quick pat and I found his pint and
smokes. In the other pocket was his buckeye. It was a
country boy thing, an Ohio lucky charm: a fat, glossy
brown nut you couldn’t even eat.
When loaded, Rosser fixed a Camel between his
index and middle fingers and rolled a buckeye in his
other hand, waiting for Lady Luck to walk in a tavern and wink at him. Instead, some old woozy broad
would sidle-up and cadge a couple of drafts and half
a dozen smokes before taking him home. Probably
didn’t happen tonight because he’s been pissed-off
about something and guzzled more than usual. I just
about got loaded myself before a chick pulled me away
to dance and I lost track of my old man.
While searching for him, I found two bars
still open with a few Rosser look-a-likes—wiry old
men with G.I. flattops and closely shaved red faces
hunched over shots and sweaty mugs. They eyeballed
me for a millisecond while stubbing out butts in
crowded, smoldering ashtrays. I could tell by the way
they looked at me that they thought I was a draft
dodger. That’s what World War II vets, like Rosser,
always thought about us hippies.
He wasn’t in the bar, so I hit the road out to Memorial Park. Once beyond the reach of streetlights, a
bright moon spooked-up the landscape as I pushed
40 | fluent
deeper and deeper into the night. Fucking Rosser,
what a trip!
Stopping at the Park entrance, I could hear faint
grunting noises. I tracked the sounds, my eyes stopping at the cluster of war memorials. Something or
someone seemed to be hugging the puny Vietnam
monument the town put up in the early days of the
war when the first casket arrived containing a local
boy and everybody knew there’d eventually be more.
Town talk was right on: it did look like a fat parking
lot bollard with a tilted hat. A compromise, they said.
Viet vets wanted to forget, while the senior set remembered long ago wars worthy of grand monuments.
A heroic granite monolith loomed nearby. WW I
claimed one massive face and WW II on the other,
scores of names chiseled in neat soldierly rows: KIAs
move column right, survivors move column left, all
heroes to the home, folks.
A third memorial displayed a weary, life-size
bronze dogface. Crouching atop a high pedestal, an
alert soldier listened intently for the enemy, trapped
forever in the cold hilly landscape around the Chosin
Reservoir in northeast Korea. Soon, waves of Red Chinese would make his life a freezing hell, a brave soldier
even in retreat.
From about ten feet away I began to make out a
man on his knees, arms wrapped around the stubby
concrete pillar that honored Viet vets. Whatever the
hell he was doing sure looked like he was trying to
rock the small monument out of the ground. This was
kooky and just like Rosser when he was really polluted.
I sat down on a park bench.
The bollard had won that round, and the scrawny
old man released his hold and settled back on his heels.
It was my father, all right. There were black splotches
on Rosser’s moonlit face and hands that were either
dirt or blood. His clothes were a mess.
He didn’t seem surprised to find me watching.
“Looks like you could use some help,” I said, although he never wanted any from his disappointmentof-a-son, a recent college dropout and, in his mind, a
soon-to-be draft dodger.
Rosser’s breath came in short gasps. “You can give
me a goddamn smoke,” he huffed, struggling to his
feet. Finding his legs, he wobbled over and sat down
heavily on the far side of the bench.
I fished out the pack and pint and set them down
between us. A small flame wavered underneath the
cigarette, his hand unsteady. He followed with a long
pull off the bottle.
“Don’t be stupid,” he said. “We had the damn war
won,” he spoke in the same ruined rummy’s voice that
seemed to always need a great hacking cough to clear.
I figured he was talking about his war, WWII,
but it could be now. The Viet Cong were whipped,
the spit-shined, crew cut generals told the president,
congress, and us. Then came the Tet offensive and all
the hippie war protestors poured onto the streets. I
had their look—beard, beads and long hair—because
it was the thing to do. Until now, the war had been
somebody else’s problem. Then, I lost my deferment
and got my draft notice.
“We’d be home for Christmas,”
Rosser continued, “Hell, we didn’t
even have winter gear. Then
came the Bulge.” He took another long pull then put the bottle
down on the bench between us.
I expected he’d walk away, probably sobered up
just enough to be embarrassed since he never talked
about the War.
“Keep the fuckin’ buckeye,” Rosser hissed, “and,
don’t believe Army bullshit, ever.” He got up and
wobbled back to the small monument and knelt down
hard against it. Locking his arms around the Vietnam
memorial, he grunted and rocked, trying to rip it from
the earth.
Bathed in lunar light, I sipped the dregs of whiskey and watched him do his thing. After a couple of
minutes, I shed his trench coat and tossed it on the
bench. The surplus Army jacket reminded me that my
draft number was up and I had to report to Fort Holabird in a week for my induction physical.
Shoving his shiny buckeye into my back pocket, I
marched over to help, whether he wanted any or not.
fluent
Jim has won numerous awards for his short stories, including
several first place awards in the annual contest sponsored by
West Virginia Writers, Inc. and a first place from the West
Virginia Fiction Contest sponsored by Shepherd University. His
stories have been published in six anthologies of Appalachian
writers and elsewhere. For the past thirty years he and his wife/
editor, Susanne, have lived in the woods near Harpers Ferry.
fluent | 41
ED:CETERA
Babysitting, The Affordable Care Act & How To
Reduce Lyme Disease
BY ED ZAHNISER
Our present taken-in-stray cat is fastidious
about its food and disdainful of its staff if we alter
its diet. (I am using the objective “it/its” forms to
avoid close identification.) At our former house, the
contrast between our cat and the opossum was acute.
The opossum thought cat food was wonderful. Had it
read The Book of Exodus in the Hebrew Scriptures, it
would probably think “manna from heaven.”
The staff was trained to place the cat’s chow in
the cat’s bowl on the cat’s front porch. But it often
disdained the food, after harassing the staff, starting an
hour before its mealtime. The major mealtime job for
50 percent of the staff—that would be I—was to go
out to check on its meal. Somehow both the kitchen
and the immediate wait staff labored under the illusion
that we’d get a better gratuity by being attentive.
The truth was more like the relationship between
Beat poet Allen Ginsberg and Neal Cassady—the
hero of Jack Kerouac’s novel On the Road. Ginsberg was
desperate for Cassady’s attentions, but Cassady merely
played Ginsberg along just enough to keep him crazy
for Cassady.
Our neighbor the opossum, by contrast, didn’t
give a smooth, over-sized rat’s tail about the Beat
Generation. It wanted the cat’s food. I came out on
the porch to check on the cat formerly known as “it”
but found instead the possum gobbling the food.
“Oh no,” I thought, “ The possum will roll over on
the cat’s porch and play dead.
Not so. The possum looked up at me and bared
every tooth in its pointy-mouthed head. No tip from
this diner—just “Get back, Jojo.”
42 | fluent
Obviously, the possum didn’t feel threatened. It
didn’t go into its play-dead threat response. That was
my karma, which requires some explanation.
My first babysitting job—I believe the job is
now classified as “child care”—was for the neighbor
lady across the street. I was about 13 years old. The
lady’s husband had abandoned her for a younger
woman who wasn’t bedeviled by three kids that her
husband had gifted her.
The oldest kid was almost my age and a pal of
mine. However, his mother didn’t feel she could trust
him to babysit his two younger sisters. As his pal, I
knew she was dead right. I had no experience with
babysitting, but I was the youngest of four kids and
had heavy experience with being tricked and having
my mind messed with.
Chicanery just might sub for experience at
babysitting. So I told the two younger girls that we
were going to play a fun game called “possum.” Playing
possum isn’t complicated, I explained. You just play
like you’re dead. You lie as still as you can and keep
totally quiet. The one who plays dead the longest wins.
They bit—and didn’t ask about a prize for winning.
We three lay on the living room rug. All was still
and quiet. “This just might work,” I thought to
myself. This must be what it’s like to get paid to
do sleep studies. Not that this was even up to
minimum wage. This was still baby-sitting
rates not child care rates.
Many editors refuse to let you write
things like: “We lay there for some of
the longest minutes of my life.” You can’t qualify the
duration of fixed measures of time, such editors tell you.
A minute of time is 60 seconds. There is no minute of
time shorter or longer than 60 seconds that is a minute.
The younger girl lasted about five minutes. She
had never been edited, so I’m sure they were long
minutes for her. For me those same minutes were
short. Oh no, I thought, I’ll have to baby sit for real. I
could tell that a re-match wouldn’t sell.
I had seen only one or two possums in the wild before
getting put in my place by that possum on the cat’s front
porch at the cat’s food dish. Possums caught my attention in the 1980s, however, when I read in Natural History magazine that possums are not known to get sick.
Possums have been around a long time, unless you
subscribe to the idea that God created everything
all at once but not quite ex nihilo—sort of like the
Big Bang theory but far less wasteful time-wise—in
4004 BCE. Their longevity as a species, scientists
speculated, explained their immunity to disease.
A decade or more later, my day job (biased toward
the empirical) made it necessary for me to see whether
the empiricism of science agreed with the literal
interpretation of the Hebrew Scriptures. I was not in
a position to judge which account was correct, the empirical studies or a literal reading of ancient creation
stories translated from another language and another
culture epoch.
The plural, “stories,” is operative here, because
The Book of Genesis alone has two creation accounts. Five more are found throughout the rest of the
Hebrew Scriptures. Old Testament scholar William
P. Brown recounts the suite of stories in his book The
Seven Pillars of Creation.
The story pieced together by scientists indicates
that possums arose when dinosaurs still roamed Earth.
Then-tiny possum-like early mammals arose 65 million
years ago. Tiny was good, then, even though dinosaurs—some about the size of a Walmart—were on
their way out.
High-resolution CT scans of one 55-million-year-old
skull were done before The Affordable Care Act kicked
in. Why, I don’t know. The skull had been removed
from a former lakebed in Wyoming’s Bighorn Basin.
Some non-empiricist critics say the Devil sprinkled
that skull—and other bones—across various landscapes
worldwide to stoke the imaginary fires of science.
A 2009 news release from the University of
Florida said that “… the evolutionary split between the
ancestor of opossums and the ancestor of all other living marsupials occurred at least 65 million years ago.”
Bishop Ussher, who did the date study for 4004 BCE,
wasn’t born yet.
It is not known whether the bishop even knew
that marsupials—most popular as kangaroos—are
mammals whose young are born at an early stage of
development and are carried in a pouch. The nearfetal-stage newborns crawl up the mother’s
body into her pouch. Conveniently, the
pouch is outfitted with nipples to
which the little ones attach. Most
mammals are placental, which is
irrelevant here, where it simply
begs explanation.
But this story is only tangentially about possums. It’s
more about my first babysitting job, and the attempt to
get the girls to play possum.
Had I known then what I
learned last month, I might
have sought a different game
metaphor than “playing possum.”
My vision of a possum playing
dead went something like the u
fluent | 43
following: The possum is foraging about and, sensing
a threat, plops over on its side and plays dead. When
the threat appears to pass, the possum gets up and
goes about its business.
Evidently it’s more involved than that. In a blog
post to “Adirondack Almanac,” Kenrick Vezina, who
works for the Genetic Literacy Project, fleshes out—
to put it mildly—the details. Vezina reports that
“… when it comes to feigning death, the possum is
anything but playing … . It drops into a near-coma. It’s
tongue lolls, eyes open but vacant, and a foul green
liquid leaks from its anus.”
Babysitting and playing possum? I was the youngest of four so I never changed a diaper until my wife
and I had kids of her own. I passed up the opportunity
while “watching” a bevy of nieces and nephews. Among
my siblings, I became known as “the changeless uncle.”
A green liquid leaking … Yuck! Today’s young kids
may have watched on YouTube what I didn’t even
know existed. Vezina doesn’t indicate that the possum
lies there straining to produce that green liquid. The
liquid leaks—an active verb, apparently independent
of possum volition.
Vezina continues: “It may take a possum upwards
of four hours to come out of this apparently involuntary biochemical state.”
Four hours? Having those two little girls out of it
for four hours—at 50 cents an hour? Still probably not
worth the green liquid clean up.
You, dear reader, may wish for a different takeaway, so let me share a couple of Vezina’s other facts
about possums, facts no doubt due to their longevity
as a species, if the science story is correct.
“Possums are highly resistant to pit viper (e.g.,
copperhead, water moccasin) venoms. Research
suggests that possums—which will eat snakes, among
many other things—are locked in an evolutionary
arms race… constantly developing new ways to combat
snake venom. They’re highly resistant to rabies, likely
as a result of a slightly lower body temperature that
makes it difficult for the virus to thrive.”
They also function as tick vacuums. A possum
trundling through the undergrowth accumulates
a large collection of ticks, but possums are such
fastidious groomers that ticks which latch onto them
are as good as dead. A dense possum population may
even help reduce the prevalence of Lyme disease. fluent
44 | fluent
Like Jazz in the American Night,
my grandmother’s voice is
the American West
and her y’alls have lost all sense of propriety
since the days she was married to a politician.
I can tell she hated those days when her wings
were clipped in a suburban cage.
she isn’t a Zelda per se,
even though whiskey’s about all that whet her tongue
but there’s definitely that wild grace about her,
and I’ve heard she was a hoot at the dinner parties.
she’s settled back in the South now but I know she
aches
for some lonesome place in New Mexico
where we can share a love for the arid palette —
the sage and ombre and lavender and orange,
the dust and cacti and rugged individualism people
will never understand.
she belongs with the horses and moonshine and
mountain skyline,
away from the orange plastic bottles of poisons and
cheap rental apartments.
we’ll find a little cabin and hunker down for the
summer,
breathing in inky skies and cassiopea.
like jazz in the American night, we’ll whisper with the
crickets
that there’s nothing new under the sun,
but isn’t it fine tonight?
Eileen Waggoner
“Like Jazz in the American Night,” was previously published
in Sans Merci.
fluent | 45
CODA
And the winner is ...
Jeremy Horner stars in “The Silence of the Lambrusco” • A Grapes & Grain Gourmet Production
Cheryl Gallery, Producer • Konrad Turnbull, Cinematographer
www.grapesandgrainsgourmet.com • 304-876-1316 • 110 E German St, Shepherdstown, WV
46 | fluent