Fiction   See a Match Burn Twice by Benjamin Reed Loose pieces of my attention began to cement together. I guess I had noticed that all the kids on stage were black, but suddenly, I realized, as I scanned the audience before me, that for the first time in my life, I was the only white person in the room. The Curse Woman in Search of Her Sex by Christine Hamm At 14, I am visited by strange green flies and visions of the virgin. She is out of focus. Her hair appears to be pink. She speaks only in Greek. When I shake my head because I don't understand, she gives me the finger. Idiot Boy by Tim Wenzell In his delirium of sudden change, a fog of futures rolled across his brain in a rapid drift, never stopping to solidify anything concrete. Instead, he beheld only a glimpse of hopeful summer lawns and rooms full of love -- somewhere, he guessed, in a strange house, on the other side of the valley. Flip by Ptim Callan Idly, I pointed the remote at my sweetie and hit the mute button. Her lips kept moving, but I didn’t hear any sound. Sikes Hebert: Triangle Player by Chris Duncan I am speaking into a tape recorder because my shrink, Mr. Lipchitz, (whom I call "licks dicks") says that I am not in touch with the feelings of my inner child, and that I should record my thoughts. This led to a debate on the differences between thoughts and feelings. After two hours, he finally told me to shut the fuck up and keep a fucking diary because he was the fucking doctor and he fucking says so. Offense in Black and White by Marc Estrin Now the "mere gook rule" doesn’t come from nowhere. As a term, it hides and excuses the inexcusable. It grows out of a culture which hasn’t seen the last of its lynchings and murders. It inherits the cold-bloodedness of a nation built on slavery and extermination of the Indians, our own domestic gooks.   On Baseball   Fan at Work by Cecelia Tan No one seemed the brawling type. But as I would later learn, you can be doing nothing and get ejected from the Fenway Park bleachers, at least when the Yankees are in town. Lewis in the Bush League by Jeff Beresford-Howe As I was watching the A's sweep the Rangers out of town this weekend, I thought, God, it must be depressing to be a baseball fan in Texas.   The Slow Trains Ten   Writers on the Creative Life featuring Susannah Indigo When I was quite young, I was in love with The Paris Review -- The New Yorker was my weekly romance, but TPR went the distance. Pop music & working at Burger Chef & secretly reading The Paris Review, that sums up my schizophrenic teenage years in the lost-culture land of middle-america. 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 Fall 2002 Welcome to Slow Trains, where the postcards never stop. Gay Switzerland by Richard Ammon My family welcomed him -- which was a stretch for them since they were very traditional fair-haired, lederhosen Swiss types who did not know any Muslim people, let alone a gay Muslim boyfriend of their son. Good Morning Aztlán by Jeff Beresford-Howe It's a band with a heart of gold and a cynic's eye, a drunken stumblebum straightening up to reveal the inner Gregory Peck. sophistication pales against the rhythm of slow trains . Dred Scott by Brian Peters I hesitate to even write about slavery...but failing to think and write about institutional evil only prolongs its hold on the imagination -- and that hold remains all too powerful, even a century and a half later. Not Suitable for Children by J.D. Munro Do sperm, having passed an entrance exam, queue up at a border crossing checkpoint, scanning a dossier on parental pre-quals they are handed like those programs you get from blue-haired ladies at the opera? The mustachioed tadpole licks his finger, or perhaps wears one of those little rubber finger caps, as he thumbs through the stack, flipping back to check a cross-reference, humming as he concentrates. He comes to a locked-brake halt. "You watch hockey?" He closes the dossier and executes a spectacular suicide dive out of the queue.   Poetry   you read about these things trinity poem by john sweet january in the / room of empty chairs / and the poem is written slowly / on a light blue wall Street of Flags by Janet Buck I don't recall another 4th where seas of U.S. flags / bedecked a solid mile of road. The avenue is lined in cloth, a carpet to the wasted graves of those we dug and dug to find. all their characters reflected in my face by P.J. Nights ploùra, ploùra, ploùra from the tree frogs / it will rain, it will rain, it will rain / and it does -- cats and dogs and frogs -- over an opaque sugar-cube sky Still Life With Bullets Scratching the Surface of the Sun by Alex Stolis Davis tells the blonde at the bar how he met Frank Sinatra in Philadelphia / doesn't notice how she turns, winks to the bartender helpless before her by John Eivaz reading the newspaper aloud we board the rabbit, thousands of us draped with obituaries, sexy death notices, but it is a grand hare, air-conditioned. Send comments to: editor@slowtrains.com

Poetry   Crispin and Cricket Funambulist Seduction Fourth of July Farewell by Joseph Carcel Crispin is bugged, has a cricket living in his ear. It is like any other cricket except its shape is like a miniature woman. Godhara Tempest of Passion by Nilanshu Kumar Agarwal O Bosnian Serbs! do not cleanse the Muslim populace / Rather, come to this territory of my heart / And indulge in the act of purgation Gold December Horizons Dual Gifts of Strength & Patience by Robert Gibbons Gold December horizons giving in / to tungsten stars piercing blackness / or tonight, the gentle, reflective, maternal glow of the moon / hinting at renewal. Another Boring Academic Poem by Michael A. Hoerman I prefer cruder poems / such as this one, recalling the musky smell of her loins and taste / of her kiss Level 4 West Time by Candy Gourlay Squashed like an insect / beneath the boots of life / before youth had half a chance / to sprout shoots from the dirt and party / at the club down the street / where these legs once danced in hipsters Pop Poetry 101 by William Sovern on the other hand, I got to read poetry in New York three times / the last dancing with the Nuyoricans / hip hop slammers / three days before / 911 When does it happen? Songs to an unseen film by Daniel Sumrall Passion. It can't exist as a singularity. It must be from and to another at once. There must always be another. lamborghini smiles infinite sadness walking by Merlin Greaves disheveled as though i had fallen off a table somewhere / i struggled to attach onto some kind of expression / one that said no / one that said not this time / one that said i'm not ready / all i got was why I Gave You My Watch by Ward Kelley For me, I asked for your clothes, since it was your / nakedness I desired. Is nakedness better than time? Discombobulating Before I Stopped Clubbing Modern by J. Marcus Weekley I fell for a man with holes in his hands and an / all-day-foot-washing-service / and the rest of eternity to serve me unleavened hotcakes Calcutta Poems by Prasenjit Maiti You and me in Paradise while my salad days fornicate in Calcutta, my days and ways being served as funky platters of crab casserole, ecstatic white steam sizzling and blue skies burning in agony.   Search Slow Trains

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