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sparkle + blink 71© 2016 Quiet Lightning

artwork © McKenzie Cooncemckenziecoonce.com

“Your Mother Came to Me Again” by Alexandra Naughton from the forthcoming novel American Mary (Civil Coping Mechanisms)

“The Rules” by Annelyse Gelman from Everyone I Love is a Stranger to Someone (Write Bloody, 2014)

book design by j. brandon loberg

set in Absara

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CONTENTScurated by

Lapo Guzzini + Joanna Lioce

featured artist McKenzie Coonce

MICHAEL PALMER Christmas Vacation 1

LAURA JEW A History of the Spine 7 Knock-Knock 8

HEIDI ANDREA RESTREPO RHODES Lamentation for a Broken Constellation 9

ALEXANDRA NAUGHTON Your Mother Came to Me Again 11

CARLY NAIRN Tapeworms 15

KRISTINA TEN Good 21

EMILY PINKERTON Birds 25 Olivia on a Thursday Evening 27

LAURA JEW On Giving Reiki With My Mother 29

ANNELYSE GELMAN The Rules 31

MINDELA RUBY Hoffman 33

CHRIS CAROSI Funeral 35 Funeral 36

HEIDI ANDREA RESTREPO RHODES For the Boy Who Went to War and Came Back Fire, Came Back Song 39

QUIET LIGHTNING IS SPONSORED BY

l a g u n i t a s . c o m

QUIET LIGHTNING

A 501(c)3, the primary objective and purpose of Quiet Lightning is to foster a community based on literary expression and to provide an arena for said expression. QL produces a monthly, submission-based reading series on the first Monday of every month, of which these books (sparkle + blink) are verbatim transcripts.

Formed as a nonprofit in July 2011, the board of QL is currently:

Evan Karp executive director

Chris Cole managing director

Josey Lee public relations

Meghan Thornton treasurer

Kristen Kramer chair

Kelsey Schimmelman secretary

Sarah Ciston director of books

Katie Wheeler-Dubin director of films

Laura Cerón Meloart director

Christine Noproducer/assistant managing director

If you live in the Bay Area and are interested in helping—on any level—please send us a line:

evan@ quiet l ightning .org

- SET 1 -

1

M M C H A E L M A L M E R

CHRISTMAS VACATION

Everyone acts nice and friendly;everyone wants to talk.We share genesbut little else.

This is Christmas.

My Father insists on cooking the meals.He’s 92.When I leave to return homewe wave to one another.

I know only a littleabout his life andhe knows only a littleabout mine.

We both wonderif this is the last timewe’ll see each other.

I drive past Chino, past Pomonaand turn westto go through Los Angeles.

2

Around Pasadenavehicles leave the freewayto go to the Rose Bowl.This is New Year’s Day.Yesterday, Bhutto was assassinated.

At the edge of LAthe Santa Ana winds predicted on last night’s newswhip us without mercy.I grab the steering wheeland pray.

The huge electronic sign at the side of the freeway says

“Fierce Winds: Drive Cautiously”stating what we all already know.

I go up and over the Grapevineentering and leaving the Angeles National Forestarriving at level groundnear Bakersfieldin one piece.

I stop at a service stationand open the door of my truck.The wind blows the doorout of my hand.My hat sails away

Michael PalMer 3

out of sight.I search for itbut can’t find it anywhere.

In the spirit of ChristmasI hope it’s found by someonewho needs a hat;a lonely field worker whose back is aching.

I stand in the line inside the stationto use the restroom.It’s too windyto stand outsideto fill the tank with gas.

I drive on.Farther down the InterstateI find a stationat a placewith less wind.

As I fill the tanka pack of motorcyclists arrive.They’re white guys in their 30’s and 40’s

—maybe one is in his 50’s.

They all have leatherjackets and chaps.Printed in front of their jackets

4

are their names.On the back, printed in large letters,it says “Hell’s Angels”.

One by onethey stride into the service station storeswaggering,grinning with supreme confidence.

For this momentthey own the place.

When told that the restroom is closed for cleaningone laughs and says

“I’ll go piss in the back of the building.”

I see one buya chocolate milkand a Twinkie.

I cannot help but thinkthat these are the guysthat Thom Gunn was always hot for:no bullshit politeness,always on the move.

And God help you if you’re a sissyHeaven’s Angeland you get in their way.

Michael PalMer 5

I imagine themas the front-line in a Medieval battlefield.

I leave to returnto Interstate 5.I see families ride in suv’s with tiny computer screens boltedabove the back seat rowwhere movies showto keep the kids quiet.

Tumbleweeds,barbed skeletons,fly across the freeway androll in front of vehicles moving at 80 miles per hour.

I watch the tumbleweeds bounce into an open fieldand stop.

Some are alone,some are connected to others.Until the windtakes them.

7

L A L R A L E W

A HISTORY OF THE SPINE

It must have been July. We were getting our first tattoos and the parlor, with its wood panel walls slathered red, felt as if it were sweating, too. Outside, the sun was invasive. The shop was called ftw, and my brother and I couldn’t decide whether it meant “for the win” or “fuck the world”. Still, we never asked. The tattoo artist was pale, his whole head was clean-shaven. I had mine done first. I had planned on wearing my faux silk halter-top with the qipao collar so that my spine and shoulder blades would be exposed. There is a picture of me lying belly down on the table, eyebrows arching upwards even though I could swear they weren’t. The artist drew my grandfather’s name along my spine in characters we couldn’t read. The needle felt as if it were digging a trench. I tried to think about what homework I had to do. My brother went next. With his arm laid out on the table, he looked exposed. The paleness of his bicep made me turn away. I got the call, then. Right then. It happened right at the moment we were being marked with his name. On the drive to the hospital we said nothing. In the hallway, we hid the bloody patches underneath our clothes. In the room, we stood like history over our grandfather. His name a grave blooming in our skin.

8

KNOCK-KNOCK

The body is not borninto loyalty. It will entice you through senses borrowed outlike books until the edges grow dull and frayed from overuse. Even your bones have seasons. Even they, in their brittle geology,record the years with poetic striations.And as the wind cuts in, your body will stay behind as you continue on, wondering who betrayed who, wondering how you could have fallen for that trick when you knew the ending all along.

9

H E M H M A H H R E A R E S T R E M O R H O H E SLAMENTATION FOR ABROKEN CONSTELLATION

for Gwen Amber Rose Araujo, 1985-2002

Shovels are for gardening, frying pansfor breakfast & ropes for tug-of-war in the muddysplendor of summer sunsets. Blankets are for

cuddling closelyyour friends & darlings in foggy damp sadly-moving

winters & canned foodis for an easy meal when you & your mama have

survived another long day beneath the nail.

They ripped you open to make of your body a kite that would never fly & the Westboro vultures

scavengedour beat-paused hearts in the name of a stony &

callous god,& I will not forget the clamour & hue of hell in my

ear, nor the false shoeof panic thrown at the gavel, nor the weeping storm

of your bruised & weary bodyclutching to the tapestry, the trance of aspirations

& pennies spent on lipstick & fountain wishes.

10

I will not forget the fetid fumes of rockyMasculinities tightening the death lariat againstyour trachea & gleam, nor the madness of carrions,

thoseconfused arthropods scratching their heads at your

unexpected arrivalto that seat beneath the soil home, nor the surprise of

angels questioning the fist tapof you & your sidereal sisters knocking early at the

liminal door, mossed twigs in your hair where

flowers should have been, & I will beloosing the knots at your wrists, ankles, underthe years of these cringing, aching, nightmares, & I

will begrasping at the reddest marigold, ferociously digging

the silt of theseweathered & fertile flowerbeds, under the empty,

mnemonic apertures of a ruddy

& perforated twilight sky.

11

A L E A A H H R A H A L G H T O HYOUR MOTHER

CAME TO ME AGAIN

Your mother came to me again, all sunken dreams and smoker lines, leaning on the bell. I could smell her disappointment in the vestibule. Too sweet perfume and hot breath swirling around her in waves like a deranged tattooed halo.

I must have said hello but I can’t remember now I can only remember the way I felt the blood in my wrists coursing like fire ants and how I hate when I can feel that or having my fingernails touched or hearing water in my stomach splosh around. We must have looked at each other for some time but then I turned.

She followed me silently up creaking stairs, so close behind, too close, silently closely everpressing.

‘Did you need something. Maybe I can help,’ and pausing and feeling like wringing my eyes to guess a motivation, adjusting with hands moving slowly like a supplicant but she just glared, peeling linoleum.

This can’t keep happening.

I pressed.

12

‘You know, you should call me if you are going to come by. I could have picked up a coffee cake.’ Mothers like coffee cake.

She opened her mouth and I could almost see small children picking up litter, birds crashing into tall buildings. It is always a mirror.

It’s like I don’t understand anything. Even though I shouldn’t have to, she is difficult to impress. My accomplishments mean little to her. I could do anything. I am not the one she wants.

Inside my head are boxes all empty some unfolded some stacked scattered corrugated honeycombs. I can only sense the floor.

She kicked at my shadow and my hand started to shake. I put it in my pocket. And she was starting to move her mouth, but there was no sound. Lips opened and writhed making shapes. I could feel a rush like stale air and fruit flies, but no words.

This is how we operate.

Do you ever feel sorry for clothes you don’t wear anymore. Do you ever feel like maybe you like feeling guilty. Do you feel the room get dirtier when someone else comes inside. The second you’re done. Do you feel like you’re always trying, always trying. All we have in common is decay.

alexandra naughton 13

I never know what to say. It’s not like we’re friends.

She made a beckoning motion. The word is special for her. It’s one I remember from stories about suspension bridges, death personified.

I turned to leave, fumbling over broken stairs and buyer’s remorse, remembering an appointment.

She followed, grabbing my bag, dioxin eyes splitting my ends.

15

C A R L Y H A M R H

TAPEWORMS

Hypochondriacs don’t necessarily fear death; they just believe everything is about to kill them.

Growing up, my hypochondria was the touchstone of my adolescence.

(Let’s just say puberty is a bitch, anxiety disorder or not. But for me, every time I witnessed a change in my body, from armpit hair to the inevitable menstruation, instead of chalking it up to the progression of life into adulthood, I freaked the fuck out and pleaded to go to the emergency room.)

Suddenly the emergence—how did I not see it before?—of my pronounced collarbone got me into a fit of terror. I run up to my mom, who is watching tv in the living room.

“What’s this?” I cry, using both hands to cover my chest area where the protruding bones appeared.

“I don’t know, what are you pointing at?” my mother answers, unaware that children can be so incredibly unaware of their own bodies.

16

I scrunch into a ball on the floor, hoping that tomorrow I will go back to the way I was before.

While my body was changing, seemingly overnight, I sought out answers in a creepy medical textbook my parents kept in a cupboard. No book jacket, just hundreds of pages enclosed in a navy blue hardcover. Along with a matter-of-fact, symptoms-and-diagnosis section for many common ailments, there was also a section that showed photos. Pictures of body parts covered in scabies, rosacea tinted arms and legs. Ringworm. Jaundice. The page I always, always turned to though was a photo of a black hairy tongue. Stuck out in defiance with a dark, thick coat of gorilla hair filling in the middle part of the tongue, it became a recurring character in my nightmares. As a child, even thinking about it now as an adult, I was horrified, yet curious. And while I didn’t understand the implications then, I vividly remember reading that one of the causes was masturbation. I vowed never to come close to masturbation, believing it might be a plant, or some sort of chemical kept under the sink.

The thing about hypochondria is that believing you have it is a symptom of the disorder. And the worse you think it is, the more you are proving the point.

Nights I would toss and turn, until my sister, hardly a year older, would come up to my lying body in the dark, and place her hand on my chest, breast buds

carly nairn 17

starting to form.

“Can you hear it?”

“Yeah, it’s ok.”

She’d sit there until I dozed off, hand gently resting. It went on like this for years.

In the sixth grade I went to an emergency room nine times. I didn’t attend school for a month and a half. It was one of the worst periods in my childhood, in an altogether checkered one. It started with a real, banal infection—bronchitis. Winter was particularly cold that year, and the Central Valley air made it difficult to breathe some days. Bored and alone, waiting for my parents to come home from work, I would read the medical textbook. Before I knew it, what became a small throat virus was first diagnosed by me as esophageal cancer. A headache was a brain tumor and a pain in the abdomen meant my appendix burst. My long-suffering parents tried to reason with me, but I would cut them off.

“You are not a doctor!” I would wail.

Not that I would always believe doctors anyway.

When I returned to school, my prognoses continued. I favored parasitic infections, the more exotic, the better. A bookishly shy child, it’s not like I exactly wanted to

18

acquire dengue fever, it was more like that would be a very good excuse for my introverted behavior.

“I’m sorry I can’t go play Skip-It with you today, I think I am coming down with Chagas disease.”

But one of my all time favorites, my go to, my old standby, was tapeworms. Every time I lost a few pounds, or my appetite, I believed a tapeworm was having its way inside my gut, its segmented body growing millimeter by millimeter as it consumed the nutrients that were supposed to nourish me.

Sometimes, late on a Thursday afternoon, alone in my apartment, I still Google tapeworms. (Not recommended.)

And it was tapeworms that got stuck in my head for most of my teenage years. They grew a mythological importance in my mind, and maybe, if I am going to be honest, substituted for other relationships. They were my tapeworms, and just like some people in our lives, I suffered with their neediness and came to regard them as another part of myself, especially after my sister left for college.

I eventually, through the discovery of sex—which has its own set of frightful diseases to consume my attention—let my tapeworms go. That doesn’t mean they finally came out—they were never there— but just like giving up that final teddy bear, I dewormed

carly nairn 19

the last remnants of my childhood.

Later in life, after out-of-state college towns and a meandering idleness, we find ourselves, my sister and I, in the same city and at the same time.

I get a call one night from the er. It’s my sister, she thinks she has a brain tumor, and I realize my hypochondria has jumped ship.

She calls it “brain pain” and doesn’t understand why the nurses are not immediately ringing up for an mri. We would later find out that it was nothing serious, just what amounted to a migraine. But now she is frazzled and scared, lying on a hospital bed, fidgeting with her phone. I place my hand on her chest and feel and listen.

Nodding, I say, “It’s ok.”

21

K R M S T M H A T E H

GOOD

the pavement was greythe pavement was grey and pinkthe pavement was grey and pink and crawling, and

in parts marked by colored chalk left by four sticky hands and a lemonade stand and a sunny afternoon, unsupervised just for a second and a child misspelling her neighbor’s name

the pavement was crawlingthe payment was in the misspelling the pavement was grey and pink and crawlingwhen the rain smelled good and the worms came up

so the rain smells good and the worms come upthe rain smells good, the worms come up

the rain was fallingthe rain was fallingthe rain was falling something strangethe rain was falling like a dairy cow milking, in fast

hard spurts and a little unwilling, with sad eyes and a body heavy from carrying whole conti-nents on its side, on its flank whole continents black and vast seas white

the rain was falling

22

with a bucket kick and a thunderclapthe pavement crawlinga tap left running, a running tap of squirming waterwhen the rain smelled good and the worms came up

when the rain smelled good and the worms came upthere was nothing she could do about her hairnothing she could do about her hairhaving used her smallest hair clips to hold up the

orchidsthe trouble was in the untangling in the heavy body, in the misspelling, in the many gods who can show up as just about

anythingas the rainor the wormswhen the rain smells good and the worms come up

the bandage was greythe bandage was grey and pink and redthe bandage was red on the child with dairy cow eyes

and braids tight to the scalp on the playground made of dinosaurs with the sandbox triceratops

the playground made of dinosaurs with the swing set hanging on a long neck

the worms rooting in the wood chipsthe wood chipsthe orchids bursting forth from the wood chipsthe child sliding down a hot tin tailstill slick from the rainand wet from the rain

Kristina ten 23

a sign warning don’t feed the animalswe all food for the animalswhen the rain smells good and the worms come up

the rain smelled good, the worms came upthe man walked the dog on the chalk colored

sidewalk, over the wormsnot stopping, over the worms, pink and crawling, not

sniffing the man said you walk the dog, the dog doesn’t walk

youthe man said i like your hair color the man said how muchthe rain smelled good, the worms came upthe man sent a text messageeight ha ha’s in a rowthe man sent a letterone thousand ha ha ha’s in a rowwhich is short for, of course, god can mean anything

the clouds would not partas soon as it started, the clouds would not partand the doorbell rang cruellyand the driveway was movingthe woman said i can’t get the door, i am a vessel not

a personwhat do you meani am a vessel not a person, i am a vasebody heavyhead like a neon sign with important letters missingpayment in the misspelling

24

body heavy body heavy from carrying the man in the mouth, the

child in the belly, the worms in the child, the milk in the breast, the world on my hips, whole continents black and blue and vast seas white

body heavy from catching the rain in my mouth, the rain falling, sweet like lemonade

sweet like an endingthe dinosaur’s teeth bared, the bucket tipping and

spilling

when the rain smells good and the worms come upwhen the rain smells good, the words come upwhen and rain smells good and the words come upgrey and pink and crawling

25

E M M L Y M M H K E R T O H

BIRDS

I.

The pigeon huddled in the drivewayhead buried into its chestmatted feathers puffed out,and I knew immediately it was dying.

I took two steps forward, stooped downas if to ask: how are you feeling? are you ok?As if I might pick it up and hold it in my handsto feel it shiver, to see if it was still aliveif I could help.

I reached down, saw its dried shit beneath its feetand knew. I didn’t want to touchsomething the life had already gone out ofso I walked away.

26

II.

I’m a different kind of bird.A lost magpie that smashes into the window

repeatedly, senseless and frenzied in flight,leaving blood and bits of feather in cobweb cracks in

the glass. I fly forward. I fly forward.Toward the horizon, evermore frightenedand absolutely certain that the way out is through,fixed on the horizon I cannot reach.As for the open window I flew in through:I’ll fly through this glass before I go back that way.

eMily PinKerton 27

OLIVIA ON A THURSDAY EVENING

A girl sitting on my stoop just moved herefrom the small town where I spent my childhooda place named after carbon and coalwe dug out of the muddy banks of the creekin Miner park as a summer pastime.She has the sweet moon-faceand eager voice of someone still naivein the face of hardship. I haven’t livedin that town for twenty years, haven’ttalked to anyone I left behind and stillthe dust of the town carries downto find me. Here. Here. Now, now.

29

L A L R A L E W

ON GIVING REIKIWITH MY MOTHER

Our hands placed at the temples oftwo women shrouded in blankets,

light low in pools beneath our calloused feet,healing the cradled aches of those we might have called

sister, mother. Side by side in silence, we are two oak trees bowing over a breathing cemetery.

Your mother’s belly a swell of rain; a vessel filled with stories we may never tell; a collection of

gazes held one second into understanding. Can we be trusted to forgive

as readily as we trust our bodies to heal?And when the earth begins to call for you

how much of my form will take onall your wounds you never found time to mend?

31

A H H E L Y S E G E L M A H

The spiral on a spiral notebook’s sharp enoughto pop a water-wing. When the nurse unwound it my

whole lifefell out of order. Is it such a crime to cry in a

swimming pool?Do I have to wear this bracelet? Once you’re crazyanything you do’s crazy. One time I asked a blind

woman

what she saw. I was six. Was that crazy? What’s behind you?

she said. I don’t know. Exactly. In summer campbefore I knew what deaf meant I yelled at a boy for capturing the wrong flag. I couldn’t

understand why the grownups kept saying he’s death, he’s death.

THE RULES

33

M M H H E L A R L B Y

HOFFMAN

Philip Seymour Hoffman, deadsyringe and heroin found with his bodythe devoted father’s bodySunday morning, his kids went unvisitedA friend dispatched to the star’s apartmentconfirmed: something was terribly wrong

Broadcasters claimed the celebrity would never not show up to see those kidsSubsequent reports hypothesized doing Death of a Salesman on Broadwaybroke the newly-single actor downFirst he took to drink. Then worse

I fixate on the kids no longer living withPhilip Seymour Hoffman—that resonant nameMy deceased father was Philipmy doctoral advisor was Seymour Hoffman was the last name of a boy I loved at nine years old

There’s a photo of my childrenjust under and over nine years oldcuddling me from both sides

34

the three of us dressed in khaki and blueThe shot reminds me how safe I felt that day of my kid’s friend’s brother’s bar mitzvah

Raising sons armored me against life’s darknessbut, grown now, they peel off to separate lives In their absence, sometimes I feel at risklike Hoffman with no child at home that weekend to shield him from himself

35

C H R M S C A R O S M

FUNERAL

Hail allpens and paperall words in the throatall lasting when last

for now all blinka darkness out of the eye

all writing has been goodbut not the world and notjustice, not a word moreon the preparation of all bodies forall judges

really the sought has baskedin the core of these teethwill not grindoes not gainhas not been itself

36

FUNERAL

I was not seeming could not deny I was a flyat last a day I could sulk

me like combustioncompacted into enginea wristwatch

we burn okayif we sit the size of a stonein time

hand our love tobench in the morninghand our eyes tostigmatic men

both of itsit in the wormcrack and curla smile, smile

this hand I’m inordered a flower to kneelin order to smile

chris carosi 37

I still smoke out the windowwhen you’re not homeI don’t breathe fresh airwhen I am alone

39

H E M H M A H H R E A R E S T R E M O R H O H E SFOR THE BOY WHO WENTTO WAR AND CAME BACK FIRE,

For Jacob George, 1982-2014. And for all our lost.

I don’t know the names of all the boys who come home,

the fire in their eyes carrying limp babe bodieswhose light gone out, fire like stars want more for the

world,like rusty nails dragging under feet, if feet remain, or

one;

fire spit out like yesterday’s full metal storms,running blood and nightmemory askew,fire like what weighs, swells the heart, smells

burning ash in yesterday’s nostril,infects it with the halo of the moon, sign of the

unborn and gone;

fire like birth can’t undo rain, like rain not wet, like wet don’t tear,

like tear burn acidhole in stomach, cheek, the injured moralbone;

CAME BACK SONG

40

fire like song, like guttural wail, railing on the can’t no more,

song giving names to little ones on mountaintops dressed in infinite snowing questions, open fire sus-

tenance song,fire light world, world cannot hold: hold you, hold

fire, hold your treble,tremble, fire love blazing trail, fire marrow fighting

fear, fireshine, wildfire grave and stone;

I know fire fight, fire mourn, fire scorch the heart, it breath you in, it burn,

not fail, not under, not too much broken fire mad, you salty fleshly fire wonder, fire bird and ghost on

wing,I know fire cry, fire sweat up bedsheet, fire tangle

you, rise you up and boom your ear:you fire, you flame, you radiance, you star wishing on

home, you furnace choir D-string call,fire fall, voice like yearning thunder, strike, crack me

open, fire dark and done;

fire like morning want more for the world, fire out, you, spark remain.

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