STORM WATCH CONTEMPLATION ON BREAKFAST (a hashbrown for the hollow guy) I looked down to my plate — Where the fried potatoes rested, Their skin so brown. Having been fried (they are dead). But their souls Still drift angrily about the kitchen. Some of them Are sucked through the fan Above the stove, Never to be heard from again. I smile in anticipation. Their aroma wafts gently to my nose In the steam That used to be their lifeblood. I pour on the ketchup It covers them in a thick red sauce — Cooling them and relieving their pain. The souls begin to scream, “He is burying us!” As they whiz about the room Like electrons in an atom. Rebounding wildly off of each other in their panic. I cover them With a delicate layer of salt And place my napkin Gently into my lap. (.haos and the void colliite The view hazes over, choked tvilh old pollen. Squirrels fussing corkscrews around an oak ignore the lowered sky, don’t feel the leaves and blades jump, can’t argue the heavy gray smell of rain. A faint thrumming on the roof, a pulse deepened in the gutters. The street goes rabid; curbsides froth and rush; hail salts the driveway with bluish stones, then relaxes into holographic silver. The street smokes with hot thoughts; the yellow-gray slant of sharpened sky, a distant, summer-slow ripping of thunder, the spastic, green-ragged lawn. Clean cells fisheye through beaded lenses, the new advocates of structure. Ken Chamlee They seem to be at peace now. And strangely so. They speak to me As I pick up my fork and smile. They tell me they are happy To be eaten by me — For they believe that I am a worthy god To end the life of a potato. Andy Valli I am a line in an ice cube- You can see me and I can see you, Yet we never understand why each other exists. I see your five strange tentacles Grasping me and pushing me toward my brothers- I never understood why they existed either. You hold me high and force me to Dive into a murky pool filled with bubbles, But I don’t mind because at last I know that I have a function to perform My nightmares begin soon after the descent. I’m able to remember that I once lived in a stream Many miles from this dark water. How did I get here though? My ideas proceed quickly, but Still I have no conclusion — my memories are faded. What’s happening to me? The shell which once protected Me is dissolving bit by bit — I’ll soon be completely exposed. Terror-stricken I try to fight, but it’s Already too late. I no longer exist. Mandi Ayers Photograph by Cherl Harrison

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