Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet No. 14 Read online

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  Small Beer Press

  www.lcrw.net

  Copyright ©2004 by Small Beer Press

  First published in 2004, 2004

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  NOTICE: This work is copyrighted. It is licensed only for use by the original purchaser. Making copies of this work or distributing it to any unauthorized person by any means, including without limit email, floppy disk, file transfer, paper print out, or any other method constitutes a violation of International copyright law and subjects the violator to severe fines or imprisonment.

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  CONTENTS

  fiction

  poetry

  nonfiction

  people* 65

  Music Lessons

  The Film Column

  Two poems by David Blair

  Diamond

  Sitting on a Bench in the Park

  Ragdog

  Two Stories by James Sallis

  The Museum of Last Week

  Pete and Earl

  A Conspiracy of Dentists

  Felix Soutre, Puppeteer:

  Projection

  The Half-Fey House

  Dear Aunt Gwenda Vol. 2

  Beer with a Hamster Chaser

  The Blue Period

  Sun

  Careless Liza:a fairy tale

  The Enchanted Trousseau

  People

  A NOtE AbOUt thE TYpE

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  lady churchill's rosebud wristlet

  14

  Kelly Link: I want to do right but not right now.

  Gavin J. Grant: I do want to write but not right now.

  Gabrielle Moss, Ariel Franklin-Hudson:Interns.

  Avenue Victor Hugo Books:Origin point for this zine and many other wonderful things, now closed. Owner will be selling books elsewhere. Our thanks to everyone there for 10 years (out of 29) of a good place.

  fiction

  Douglas Lain

  Music Lessons

  —

  David Nahm

  Sitting on a Bench in the Park

  —

  Susan Mosser

  Ragdog

  —

  James Sallis

  Two Stories

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  Richard Butner

  Pete and Earl

  —

  Jay Lake

  A Conspiracy of Dentists

  —

  Matthew Latkiewicz

  Felix Soutre, Puppeteer

  —

  J. Cox

  The Half-Fey House

  —

  Devon Monk

  Beer with a Hamster Chaser

  —

  V. Anne Arden

  Sun

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  Bret Fetzer

  Careless Liza

  —

  Deborah Roggie

  The Enchanted Trousseau

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  poetry

  David Blair

  Two Poems

  —

  Trent Walters

  The Coyotl

  —

  Sally Bayley

  The Blue Period

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  nonfiction

  William Smith

  The Film Column:Greaser's Palace

  —

  Matthew Latkiewicz

  Felix Soutre, Puppeteer

  —

  Christoph Meyer

  Projection

  —

  Gwenda Bond

  Dear Aunt Gwenda

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  L. Timmel Duchamp

  What's the Story?

  Reading Anna Kavan's Ice Online Extra

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  people* 65

  DAvId J. ShUUArtz

  A NOtE AbOUt thE TYpE 66

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet, No.14 June 2004. This basic unit of literature slips out the side door in June and November from Small Beer Press, 176 Prospect Ave., Northampton, MA 01060 [email protected] www.lcrw.net/lcrw $5 per single issue or $20/4. Apologies for the rising subscription price and slowing response times. Ignore anything you've heard from us or anyone else about a third annual issue. It never happened, you didn't miss out, and that review was no doubt product of some of that delicious unpasteurized cheese. Contents (C) the authors. All rights reserved. Submissions, requests for guidelines, &c all good things should be sent to the address above. No SASE: no reply. For external use only. Slimming, but in no way part of a low-carbohydrate diet. This issue extensively tested (read: read) on animals, particularly pernicious spelling-obsessed squirrels. As ever, thanks. Printed by Paradise Copies, 30 Craft Ave., Northampton, MA01060 413-585-0414 d.

  "We think it's so groovy now/that people are starting to get together."

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  Music Lessons

  Douglas Lain

  Psychiatric Session, Dr. William Howser, 11/2/98:

  Q: Tell me about the sound.

  A: I've given you the wrong impression. It wasn't a sound. It was more of a concept. I heard it inside my head. I didn't really hear it, but I thought it.

  Q: How old were you?

  A: I guess I was about four . . . three or four years old. I saw the gorilla, no, the man in the gorilla costume. He was standing in the doorway.

  Q: And he made this sound?

  A: No, he just stood there looking menacing; there was this gorilla man in the doorway, and there was fog throughout my room . . . I don't know, maybe I had a cold and the humidifier was on.

  Q: You were afraid.

  A: Yes. I pulled the sheets up over my head; I tried to go back to sleep and then wake up again. You know the trick? It was like, “This is a dream, I'll close my eyes and then when I open them the gorilla man will be gone and I can go tell my parents that I had a bad dream.” So I pulled the sheet over my head and I closed my eyes.

  Q: And when you looked out from under the sheet?

  A: He was still there, of course, only now he was in the room with me. And the smoke, the steam from the humidifier, was everywhere. I'd been holding my breath, and when I looked up again and saw him standing at the foot of my bed I let out a gasp and tried to scream.

  Q: Did your parents come to you then?

  A: No. I tried to scream, but I couldn't do it. I opened my mouth to scream, but instead of sound this bubble came out of my mouth. I screamed and screamed, and when there should have been noise there was only this inflating bubble. And then it popped.

  Q: It popped.

  A: And that's when I heard the noise. Not the screaming noise, but the sound I was telling you about before.

  Q: The sound you say had such a big influence on your music. The sound that wasn't a sound.

  A: It was just an idea really. It was what you'd hear if you could hear between the notes.

  Q: Silence?

  A: No. Something. A sort of deep hum. I got close to it with my tape music.

  Q: Why did you think of this today? Last week we were talking about your mother's illness, and today you tell me about this sound. How do you think these two things relate?

  A: I saw him again.

  Q: Who did you see?

  A: The man in the gorilla suit. I saw him when I was in Pittsburgh on Friday.

  * * * *

  Monday was a day plagued by bees. I woke up in my work studio, lying by an open window, to find that a crown of bees, half dead and dawdling, had converged around my hair.

  I couldn't remember how I'd arrived at the studio apartment from the Symphony Hall, and I had no idea why I'd chosen to spend the night
on the floor of my little room rather than at home and in bed with my wife.

  "I'm all right,” I told Meredith.

  "You're in your room?"

  "Yes,” I said.

  "I thought so, but when I tried to call last night I just got your machine."

  "I'm okay."

  "That's good, but where were you?” she asked.

  I squashed one of the bees with a paper towel. The insects were so dazed that all I had to do was lean down and pluck them up one by one.

  "I was hanging out with some bees,” I told her. “I'll be home soon."

  There was a bee in my car, buzzing around the windshield. I drove slowly, thinking about the sting.

  It was mid-afternoon by the time I got home. I walked into the highrise, crossed the lobby, and entered the elevator. The sound of the leather soles of my loafers crunching insect shells, a repetitive popping, distracted me from pressing the button for my floor.

  Dried dead bees, perhaps a thousand of them, carpeted the floor of the elevator. I glanced at my watch and noted the time. It was 2:15 P.M. which meant the drive from the Hawthorne district to downtown Portland had taken four hours. I hadn't driven that slowly.

  "Where have you been?” Meredith asked.

  "I'm not sure."

  "Well, I got Jacob down for his nap without you. It took forever,” she said.

  "I'm sorry. I must've lost track of time."

  My wife and I rely on each other. She helps me keep the noise out and the sounds in, and I try to do the same for her.

  Both of us are essentially cowards, and little things will set us off . . . send our heads spinning. A psychological study on the effects of television on children, a plague in Bangladesh, the death of a colleague or a distant relative, these things can have long-lasting and detrimental effects on one or the other of us. And when this happens the other person's job is to stay stable, to hold onto the earth. We can't both break down at once.

  "I've been sitting at home nurturing an anxiety attack,” Meredith said. “I've been reading about the corpse print again."

  Meredith isn't particularly religious, she's an agnostic really, but around that time she was reading about the Shroud of Turin. The Shroud is this sheet that covered Jesus after the Romans killed him, and what's significant about it is that it has this image on it. There's no paint on the sheet, the image seems to be a discoloration of the fabric, and nobody can say how or why it's there.

  I hung up my coat on the rack by the door, and went to peek in on my son while he slept. I sat by the side of his bed, a small twin bed shaped like a cello, and watched him breathe.

  Meredith stood in the doorway and whispered in at me, “He was floating. That's what they think."

  "What?"

  "The corpse. We're talking about a floating corpse,” she said, holding up her book and pointing at the shroud. “What if they're right? Not the medical experts, but the Christians. I mean, what if he comes back.” She moved over to the side of the bed and sat down next to me. I put my arm around her.

  "That would be good, right? We're talking about Jesus after all."

  She shrugged my arm off her shoulder, and turned to face me. “The man is dead. What we're talking about is a zombie situation. I don't want a zombie in the apartment."

  "You think He'd want to visit?” I asked.

  Jacob stirred and kicked off his sailboat blanket. He turned his head away from us and a matchbox truck slipped out of his hand and onto the floor.

  "He fell asleep while playing?” I asked.

  "No, I rocked him to sleep but he wouldn't let go of that car."

  I grabbed the toy off the floor and stood up to leave, waiting for Meredith to follow me out into the hall.

  "What are you really worried about, sweetheart? Maybe you shouldn't keep reading that book."

  "No, I want to know about it. But, my life is complicated enough. I don't need gray corpses floating around the living room,” she said.

  "You're really afraid?” I asked.

  "You didn't come home last night and I know you were just working, but I've been reading this book and when you consider what else has been happening,” she said.

  "What. What's been happening?” I asked her.

  "I don't know. I mean look at him,” she said, holding up her book again.

  I took the book away from her and tried to smile. With all the sincerity I could muster I told her, “Jesus loves you, Meredith. He won't hurt you, even if he is a zombie."

  "Great."

  "I'm serious."

  "But, how do you know. How do you know what they're up to?"

  "They?"

  "I just want reality, that's all."

  "That's a tall order,” I told her. “Reality? What is that exactly?"

  She smiled. I'd done my job without faking it too much. I held her in my arms, and stared down at my hand on her back. I looked at my son's toy truck while trying to make everything all right.

  "Jesus loves me?” Meredith laughed.

  "Sure. Yeah. That's what they say."

  "All right."

  "I'm fine. Everything is fine."

  But I wasn't.

  My son's truck was yellow, and painted on the side, for no good reason that I could discern, were two little bees.

  "It's fine. I'm fine,” I told her. But I was staring at my son's truck, at the words printed beneath the bees.

  "Join Us,” the words read.

  Jesus.

  * * * *

  Source Unknown, Date Unknown:

  Q: How do these separate ideas connect?

  A: It's a sampling, not a map.

  Q: Johnny B. Good is quite enjoyable. Mozart is interesting and also quite enjoyable. But I don't understand. Explain please.

  A: Chuck Berry composed and performed Johnny B. Good. He's a rock and roll star. It's a rock and roll song.

  Q: Will you please hold the baby bear?

  A: That's not a real bear. That's a cartoon bear. How can I hold that?

  Q: Will you please hold the baby bear?

  A: No. That's just a picture, that's Boo-Boo. There's no baby bear here.

  Q: What is rock and roll?

  A: It's a popular musical form derived from blues and jazz.

  Q: Look at the screen. Don't worry about that, you don't need to think about that. Look at the screen. What do you see?

  A: It's just a bunch of waves, some red waves and . . .

  Q: Do you hear that?

  A: What is that noise?

  Q: Please tell me about Mozart.

  A: What do you want to know?

  Q: What does Mozart mean?

  * * * *

  I was maybe seven years old, and while the violin was not new to me, I was not a prodigy. Out in the backyard there was plenty of room, plenty of distance between me and anyone who might be trying to listen.

  I sat on the root of the maple tree and looked up at the apartment house that I lived in with my parents. My father owned the house and while there were several other families who lived there, we didn't really interact with them.

  I was alone in the backyard. I was bowing back and forth, doing variations in the key of C, when I spotted the bee.

  It was huge and at first I thought it was a hummingbird. But, as it circled around my head, I spotted the yellow and black fur and I jerked back, falling onto the grass and letting my violin slip gently to my side.

  The bee came down, hovered right over my nose, and then lifted up and to the side. It didn't fly away, but just hovered about two feet to my left. After a few minutes I decided there was nothing to do but ignore it.

  I improvised in the key of C and I saw the bee bobbing in the air, moving up and down to the music. I'd let off a long high note, and the bee would jet off, up into the air. I'd sound a low note and the bee would sink. A quick burst of a song, I tried Mozart's “The Magic Flute,” and the bee was everywhere; weaving up and back and darting all around.

  I played for hours, bowing along t
o a dancing bee.

  I don't remember when the bee left, I don't remember how long I was out there. All I remember is that when I came back in it was dark. My parents were furious, hysterical. I'd been gone for eight hours, they said, and they were on the verge of calling the police.

  When I told them about the bee they just looked more angry.

  "Don't lie to us,” my mother said.

  "What, do you think we're stupid? I looked all over the backyard for you. You think I didn't look in the backyard?"

  "Where were you?” my mother asked. “Why did you scare us like that."

  All I could do was tell them about my bee, and tell them my violin playing had really improved. Eventually my parents stopped asking me where I'd been and started examining my head, my arms and legs. Suddenly it wasn't anger, but stark fear, that moved them.

  "How many fingers am I holding up?"

  "What's the last thing you remember sweetheart?"

  "I was with a bee. A huge bee. And we were dancing."

  * * * *

  Radio Program, Talking Music, 11/5/98:

  Q: Do you envision yourself ever returning to your work with machine music?

  A: Well, I never was much of a tech junkie. I mean Steve [Reich] worked on those electric circuits and channel selectors . . .

  Q: The phase-shifting pulse gate?

  A: Right, and he did those pieces with swinging microphones and feedback.

  Q: What did you think of those pieces?

  A: Well that stuff was interesting . . . I mean that was interesting to me because we were both working with tape loops in the sixties, and phase shifting was important to both of us. But, overall I think I moved back to instruments, back into the concert hall, faster than Steve did. I never really left the orchestra, because I was always conducting.

  Q: What is phase shifting about? What is it that you and Reich were up to?

  A: I guess it was Reich who really discovered the technique, and it was a very simple thing really. He was trying to line up these two tracks of tape, two loops of the same sentence from a sermon about Noah's Ark, and he wanted the two tracks to line up just so that they overlapped. He was working with these two tracks in a fairly ordinary and predictable way, but he didn't get it right. So, what he heard when he played the two tracks together was this slowly progressing phase shift. You know, one track was running slightly faster than the other. The two tracks started out the same, started out as one pattern, but when they got out of synch the sound started to wander. Finally the words became unrecognizable and you had this rhythmic thing happening and a creeping, wandering sound.