Amongst my happiest childhood memories are Friday nights spent watching late night horror movies with my brothers and sister in our family’s basement television room. Four decades later, I can still recall the smell of popcorn on the dank air and the flickering shadows playing across the walls. Films such as the Plan Nine From… Read more »
There was a time in my early twenties when I was convinced I was dying. There were unexplained bouts of dizziness while walking the dog, cruel pounding headaches in the middle of the night, and flashing lights in my head. I visited specialists, wore wired goggles, and stared at holographs and blobs of light. I… Read more »
I’m holding cotton candy in the circus tent. The fire-eater is standing in the middle of a garden of flame, her body covered with tattoos. Two years before her drowning, the German exchange student is on the roof of the cathedral in Normandy, balanced between gargoyles, staring out into eternity. Fifty feet below the surface,… Read more »
1. The taste of trout cooked in a frying pan outdoors. 2. Listening to Duke Ellington on a suitcase phonograph on the front porch. 3. Reading the sports section in the back of Caffe Artigiano while my daughter reads the Sunday comics section at seven o’clock in the morning when it’s a balmy 22 degrees…. Read more »
Monday We have a poltergeist in our house who randomly shuts lights on and off, hides batteries and undeveloped film, and changes stations on the clock radio. On any given day, I wake up listening to The Red Hot Chili Peppers or The Five Tops. This morning Kate Bush is weaving her way in and… Read more »
Last night, my daughter was reading aloud The Jumblies by Edward Lear (n.d.) while my wife was brushing her hair. They sailed away in a sieve, they did, In a sieve they sailed so fast When I was a child, I was convinced for years that I was adopted. I questioned my father over and… Read more »
bat haikus in the old black barn moondrunk negligence leaves us unprepared hanging from rafters on the night of the solstice we sway to-and-fro as albino cats walk through mercury puddles with pale pink blossoms draw close my love wrap leather wings about me sing me sonic hymns of cool, cool planets, ultraviolet lands and… Read more »
It’s 2:42 a.m. and I’m in my office — a hopelessly cluttered space sealed off from the rest of the basement by a large wood and paper screen. There are precarious hoodoos of books on every available surface, including an old ironing board that now functions as a sideboard. There are cobwebs, mouse droppings and… Read more »
When I was six years old, my mother started going for chemotherapy treatments. My father would take me out for Saturday outings to the pictures. The Caprice was one of those grand old movie theatres that would no longer be economically feasible. It had marble-tiled floors in the foyer, red crushed velvet drapes covering the… Read more »
We love to hear from you! Send your questions and comments to voice@ausu.org, and please indicate if we may publish your letter. RE: Pub night with Jack Layton (v13 i17) I would like to thank Mandy Gardner for her timely tribute (in light of the probable early federal election) to one of the few bright… Read more »