Summer 2009
Abha Iyengar
Alison Eastley
Barton Smock
Bridget Gage-Dixon
Charles Reis
Cheryl Snell
Daniel Crocker
David Jordan
David Lawrence
Dennis Mahagin
Doug Ramspeck
Henry Louis Shifrin
John Sweet
Kathryn Jacobs
Lois P. Jones
Margaret Babbott
Mather Schneider
Richard Lighthouse
Roger Pfingston
Roy Lewis
Simon Perchik
Tim Kahl
Tony Leuzzi
Julie Steiner
Don Shaeffer
Steiner Interview
by Alex Nodopaka
Jennifer VanBuren
Jai Britton
Alex Nodopaka
Patrick Carrington
Mannequin Envy in memory of poet and artist Douglas Gamrath
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Kathryn Jacobs
Summer 2009
Limiting the Damage
At 3 A.M., there’s nothing you can do.
When moonlight fractures outlines into smudge
and splinters integers to decimals;
when dustballs shine with what are clearly teeth,
you’re down to fingertips. Then what you touch
is all that’s left of real, and sense of self
shrinks back to arm’s reach -- swallowed in the dark.
At 3 A. M., when every sound sprouts legs
and dreams wear suction cups like octopi,
you let it happen. But you draw the line
at afternoons: as soon as solid folk
grow fuzzy at the edges, do something
(like what, you wonder? Eye-doctor, a shrink?
Don’t ask hard questions). Look for warning signs:
If airports bounce about and you play chase
and dead men leave no body and the fridge
prefers to hum in English, you’re far gone:
my principle of sane is “know thy fridge” –
personify him later. Don’t forget.
Same goes for elevators, dishwashers
and ticking clocks: they’re just electric, folks.
Like fuck-buddies; you don’t get too involved.
Kathryn Jacobs is a poet and medievalist at Texas A&M University. Her chapbook of poetry, Advice Column, appears from Finishing Line Press in November, and she has an e-chapbook sponsored by Poetry Midwest (The Boy Who Loved Pigeons). Her poems have appeared widely in such journals as New Formalist, Measure, and Road Not Taken. She has also published a scholarly book on literary marriage contracts in the Middle Ages and Renaissance and sixteen articles in periodicals. She has two daughters. She lost her 18-year old son, Ray, in 2005.
Don Shaffer Wine on Terrace
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