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Vol. 5, No. 1 Contents

Boule de Suif  by GUY DE MAUPASSANT

For several days in succession fragments of a defeated army had passed through the town. They were mere disorganized bands, not disciplined forces.

The Dead  by JAMES JOYCE

23 May 2005
fiction, short story, classic

Lily, the caretaker's daughter, was literally run off her feet.

To 42opus Editors on December 27, 2004  by JIM GOAR

15 April 2005
nonfiction, cover letter

Security alerts are not a western phenomenon; Seoul declared one yesterday. As of yet, they haven't given it a color, but when they do, I suspect it won't be pink.

To Benjamin Bailey on November 22, 1817  by JOHN KEATS

I am certain of nothing but of the holiness of the Heart's affections and the truth of the Imagination—What the imagination seizes as Beauty must be truth—whether it existed before or not…

To Charles Brown on November 30, 1820  by JOHN KEATS

14 May 2005
nonfiction, classic, letter

here is one thought enough to kill me—I have been well, healthy, alert, &c, walking with her—and now—the knowledge of contrast, feeling for light and shade, all that information (primitive sense) necessary for a poem are great enemies to the recovery of the stomach. There, you rogue, I put you to the torture…

To J.H. Reynolds on February 19, 1818  by JOHN KEATS

I have an idea that a Man might pass a very pleasant life in this manner—let him on any certain day read a certain Page of full Poesy or distilled Prose and let him wander with it, and muse upon it, and reflect from it, and bring home to it, and prophesy upon it, and dream upon it—untill it becomes stale—but when will it do so? Never…

To John Taylor on February 27, 1818  by JOHN KEATS

…but it is easier to think what Poetry should be than to write it…

To Richard Woodhouse on October 27, 1818  by JOHN KEATS

A Poet is the most unpoetical of any thing in existence; because he has no Identity—he is continually in for—and filling some other Body—The Sun, the Moon, the Sea, and Men and Women who are creatures of impulse are poetical and have about them an unchangeable attribute—the poet has none; no identity—he is certainly the most unpoetical of all of God's Creatures.

A Review of Ben Lerner's The Lichtenberg Figures  by BRIAN LEARY

Ben Lerner's first collection of poetry, The Lichtenberg Figures, winner of the 2003 Hayden Carruth Award from Copper Canyon Press, is a sequence of untitled fourteen-line poems (with one fifteen-line exception) that run on the collision, the violence, and the unresolved resolution of juxtaposition.

To 42opus Editors on December 6, 2004  by ANDREW LUX

17 March 2005
nonfiction, cover letter

Winter on the open seas is a grueling affair. Sometimes, the nets I haul up have turned to ice. I know this because the fish have begun to talk again. They say it was so cold…

Growing Pains  by C. L. BLEDSOE

9 May 2005
poetry, light verse

Mother lying on the couch coughing fire,

the death of applause. Father puddled on the floor,


paycheck spent on modeling glue. Sisters, brothers.

Burn the couch, the television…

Workers in Love  by ANNE BOYER

25 April 2005
poetry

I had three husbands, two of them ghosts.

If Chekhov Robbed a Bank  by CHRISTOPHER BURAWA

14 March 2005
poetry

He gets out, leaving the gun,

opens the back door. He slides the double-

bladed axe off the seat. This, he thinks, is

what happens when you put off business.

Wanda Landowska  by CHRISTOPHER BURAWA

11 March 2005
poetry

Her story involves some cow trading,

over hard drinks and

horded chocolates. It's about a harpsichord.

And a record collection…

Sun  by KEVIN CONDER

4 April 2005
poetry

…and you were told ever since you could walk

never to look directly at the sun

but you do

you stand on the rocks and do…

Page 5  by MALIA JACKSON

12 April 2005
poetry

The bed shuffled itself straight out the door,

little jerky movements on squeaky casters,

until one leg planted itself in the flowerbed.

Blue Bread  by CORK KYLE

29 April 2005
poetry

Scrape from the perfect sky

a pocketful of that sock-you-in-the-eyes blue.

Grind it and leaven it with life.

Alaskan Nightfall  by ELIZABETH LABORDE

7 May 2005
poetry

There is a lowness to this light,

how the sun barely scrapes

past tree tops,

where noon is dawn…

Latter-Day Geniuses  by ANDREW LUX

"Would you still love me if I were frozen?" my brother asks from beneath his covers.

"I would still love you even if you were an electric dog," I murmur from across the room; the room I hate to describe.

The Angler's Lot  by ANDREW LUX

8 March 2005
poetry, prose poem

We met in the apartment of accident. You carried weapons: a pen, plastic bags, a grocery receipt; necessary means of transience, unnecessary hubris. My tongue was barbed.

Hypnagogue  by PAUL MCCORMICK

25 March 2005
poetry

23:09:24 One forest says to another forest:


23:09:25 I wanna get some bees going back here.


23:09:26 What kind of beans?

What Zen Do with Whips, I Do with Willow  by PAUL MCCORMICK

21 March 2005
poetry

E. Unim didn't last long at the Met.

The chief folly being her melange piece, The Staccatoed Invertebrate—

A plastic locomotive duct-taped to a wheel chair.

The Into or On  by MAURICE OLIVER

1 May 2005
poetry

She thinks she's Harry Houdini's bathrobe.

To Somewhere or By  by MAURICE OLIVER

4 May 2005
poetry

Her spine curves into the turnstile.

He nuzzles closer, twice her size.

Language concealed in flashing signals.

There is rain on the rails.

Dialogue Heard with Steaks on My Eyes  by STEVE PRICE

17 April 2005
poetry

Don't be shaking people's hands with that fragrance.

You're not missing much, just a bear dressed like a bunny.

What's my best friend's name again?

It's all skin and no apple.

pocketbook on spook rock road  by STEVE PRICE

20 April 2005
poetry, prose poem

piggy has no basis for thinking it's his dog. #1: his dog died last summer; #2: it died of (once there was an indian princess) heartworms; #3…

Ice Chips  by L. B. SEDLACEK

12 May 2005
poetry

Canoes


and BBQ smell up

the faded metal…

two faux boho lechers walk into a bar  by MEGAN A. VOLPERT

20 May 2005
poetry

once i knew an old man who very much enjoyed falling in love

and given more or less whiskey

could affect a transylvanian accent with some precision…

There was a child went forth every day,  by WALT WHITMAN

28 May 2005
poetry, classic

There was a child went forth every day,

And the first object he looked upon and received with wonder or pity or love or dread, that object he became,

And that object became part of him for the day or a certain part of the day…

Who learns my lesson complete?  by WALT WHITMAN

2 March 2005
poetry, classic

The great laws take and effuse without argument,

I am of the same style, for I am their friend,

I love them quits and quits… I do not halt and make salaams.

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