Fiction   The Temple of Air by Patricia Ann McNair When I saw Mom sneak a pack of HiDeeHo cupcakes out from the bottom of the pan cupboard and slip them in the pocket of her sky blue bathrobe, naturally I thought they were for me. It was my birthday after all, we were supposed to do that kind of thing for each other, right? Pink Oleander by Anne Tourney That summer I was trying to decide whether to become a whore or a poet. I knew I couldn't be both: vivid and sexual, quiet and solitary. Though I didn't know exactly what whores did, besides wearing flashy dresses and smoking and swearing, I believed I knew what poets did: they lived in seclusion and wove their words in silence. You Speak Good English by Aaron Paulson The real thing, Megook had already decided, was a stork, was a praying mantis stretched out on a branch of a cherry tree. And it was the real thing Megook had come half-way around the world to find. Not some shadow, not some second-rate imitation of the hamburger and vanilla milkshake world he’d left behind. School Day by Brendan Connell Children circle math, worshipping her unalterable rules, her savage truth. For while parents lie in their puerile unreality, their wishfulness, mother math is puncture frank, telling you how in all likelihood you will not live more than one-hundred sixty-five thousand three-hundred and thirty-five days. Tell Me About Africa by Susannah Indigo It seems to me that men and women deliver some extraordinary pain to each other as they desperately stumble toward passion and love. I've had three passions in my own life -- travel, writing, and Matthew. Matthew, who on day one of my love for him said he would take care of me always. He said it right after the mate in our third game of chess.   On Baseball   How Baseball Changed My Life by Marcy Sheiner Five years ago, if anyone had told me I'd be walking around in a baseball cap, cheering, booing and citing statistics, I'd have thought they were nuts. Those Old Suntanners by Tom Sheehan You know, the old summer Class A's they saved from their promised long weekend leaves, those killers, those formidable young warriors, those hot Omaha Beach swimmers with salt in their noses and in gun barrels and curing half the ills and evils they had ever known...   In Memory   Uneasy Kesey by William Dean Kesey's kicked it at last / He's shuffled off the scuffed Levi's / and dowager boots / and joined the coots / up there where the past / is all coffee houses, divas, and lies George Was My Beatle by Samantha Capps Emerson I am eleven years old and I can sign George Harrison's autograph so well it looks almost like the real thing. All material in Slow Trains is copyrighted to the original authors and may not be reproduced without permission. Violators will be prosecuted.

Essays   Rave On Winter 2002-2003 Welcome to Slow Trains, where the postcards never stop. Hartsburg by Dave Gregg Hartsburg has entered her death throes. The good businessmen have fled, a great Arabic caravan of carpet dealers, jewelers, appliance salesmen and clothing merchants. They have retreated to malls where customers stroll through climate-controlled environs sheltered from such nuisances as atmosphere. In the Beginning There Was Theda by Anthony Puccinelli In the film's most famous scene, a jealous, abandoned lover draws a pistol to shoot the vampire. Imperious and unafraid, Theda commands: "Kiss me, my fool!" Unable to shoot her and unable to live without her, he blows his brains out. sophistication pales against the rhythm of slow trains Turning Green in Ecuador by David Taylor It was getting dark in the Andes and the conductor -- the only person in the world who knew where we needed to get off -- was dozing in the stairwell of the bus. The driver had no clue that my wife and I had to get off at the remote village of Rio Verde. Lisa and I had no idea what Rio Verde looked like, we only knew it was tiny and had a church. Miracles of Art by Robert Gibbons Time allowed that red hat to be supplanted by the complexities involved in Vermeer's Woman Holding a Balance. How often she righted the course of my passionate advance which was often askew. How often A Lady Writing asked me why I was not writing. Pictures That Became Words by Tony Leather Less than 20% of the people of England could even sign their names, in Elizabethan times -- a period regarded as one of literature's golden periods -- yet before that, only the priestly castes, or the very powerful, received the necessary education in reading and writing. Even today, there are 900 million adults in the world who are illiterate. The Fritz Chapel by Brian Peters There is a characteristic of that Great Faith I'm so miserably unable to define, which I think applies here. Universally when I have seen it, persons of Great Faith lead what might be called examined lives. Timeless / Lover's Rock by Jeff Beresford-Howe Reviews of new music, including the Hank Williams tribute, Suzanne Vega, the Grateful Dead, and Sade's Lover's Rock   An Ongoing Journal   Entering the Monastery by Judy Bunce For me, it's a day off. I'm on kitchen crew for this three month practice period, which is something that everyone who stays at Tasssajara long-term has to do sooner or later. I'm sitting on my bed with two kerosene lamps burning and my laptop running on its battery. What a life. Send comments to: editor@slowtrains.com

Poetry   Hangover Sestina by P.J. Nights If the stars of Gemini hadn’t been invaded by Jupiter / perhaps that malarkey with the crocodiles / wouldn’t have left me here at the North Pole / crying into my over-the-top tequila shot. A Kiss in Dreams by Rebecca Lu Kiernan I watch you sleep for the last time.You were to be my / stepdaughter, laughing angel, fragile pixie. I have been / planning my getaway for months, feeding and dressing / You, trying to detach myself. Satori in the Fifth by Michael K. Gause The second drink / finds my tears diluted / with whiskey, the glass on the table Falling Back by Lytton Bell The dark man's bed is already on fire / by the time she runs to it / it has, by all accounts, spontaneously combusted Selected Poems by John Eivaz Jackson Pollock's Lucifer / hung in a girl's bedroom / until she left for college / and then was placed / in a common area of the house The Best Two Things about Verlaine by Robert Gibbons Angels have begun to inhabit the larger bells / which seemed to have been abandoned, / & with that, a chorus of song rang out / orchestrating a regular Christmas / Babes in Toyland atmosphere / or wonderfully cacophonous Bruegel. Long Distance Love by Lawrence Schimel As far as the poem is concerned / this is our sole sustenance / and if we remember brunching / it was only for the pleasure / of feeding one another rossellini shooting while the seamstress ceases copying life by PJ Nights and John Eivaz the director / speeds through crafty reality and ansia dell'esistenza / in an Alfa Romeo, each change of terminus / requires a change in muse Who's the Ju-Ju Man? by Pasquale Capocasa Two drinks into the new bottle / I glanced up and into the bar / mirror to see a man standing / behind me, leaning heavily / on a slender, wooden pole. / Odd, I thought. Girls Named After Flowers by Itir Toksoz You boys / sleeping next to girls / named after flowers! Wake up! Unintentional Provinces by Kathryn Rantala We are hurtling / pressed and folded in two suitcases / We are hurrying / paying the intercity charge and buying wine Route 1 Free Association by Tony Gruenewald You'd think you were Neal Cassady / if you only knew who he was / but you don't / so you also don't know / you're just settling / for fancying yourself a / James Dean, who unlike Cassady / couldn't handle the speed.

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