ABOUT

CONTENTS

EDITORIAL

ARCHIVE

LAGNIAPPE

MAST

SUBMISSIONS

Poem
by Craig Morgan Teicher


Ten Movies And Books

1

She is searching for others like herself.

Little does she know. They
are all in the sea, cresting with the waves.
Then they are all set free.

That is the end of the story. I’ve ruined it.

And I will ruin it again from start to finish:
there are no other unicorns in her forest, or,
according to a butterfly, the world.

Then she meets Schmendrike the magician.

The unicorns were all driven into the sea.

*

How hopeful I am.
    How truly
vulnerable I truly am. What

a show I hope
    to put on.
How I hope you are

willing to believe it.
    I hope you
want to believe it

because you think it is
    useful to you. I hope
my hope puts on a good show.

2

The password is Fidelio. Tom Cruise

wants a more exciting life. He should
not pretend he is a part, or is meant to be

a part, of what is going on.
The men are masked. Nobody liked

this movie but me. The women are
beautiful and masked. Why am I the

only one who liked it? Nicole
Kidman says fuck and it ends.

*

One can interpret meaning
    in terms of
how well it speaks to

one’s experience of the world
    or how it enlarges
the world experienced.

If the former, then
    the world
stays same size, though

the colors change as if
    a set were
occasionally repainted.

If the latter, then the
    work at which
one is looking is does not

ultimately reflect him or her,
    meaning I
probably wouldn’t notice it at all.

3

The black man
shows Mr. Sammler his very big

cock. The subways are insufferable.
This is one of my favorite books. I think

the last words are that we know.

Mr. Sammler’s friend dies.
Mr. Sammler’s daughter is irresponsible,
unable to make it on her own,

like my aunt—my father’s sister—who killed
herself. Judaism is a theme.

4

Everyone is a parody
of a Star Wars character. Many of the jokes

are no longer funny. Is that because time
has passed and now they truly are unfunny?

Or because I am no longer 11
years old, and laughing at swear words

sitting next to my parents

is no longer funny? What now?

5

The author is Japanese. Like my
fiancé’s mother and half of my fiancé.

Why does everyone read his longest book
on New York’s subway trains?

They anticipate taking many trains in New York.

The protagonist’s wife leaves him.
He sits at the bottom of a well.
He has some kind of job involving psychic powers.

There is an oddly sexualized teenage girl

who lives near where the well is.
By the ending, I was disappointed.

*

Things turn out pretty
    much OK.
I try to tell myself my life

will turn out OK. Do I
    find that out
when it’s over? Or just before?

I often think that the
    net worth
of one’s life depends on

what mood one is in
    before dying.
I believe in books that end badly.

6

I haven’t read it, though everyone says
I should. I guess I think “Major Major” is

a funny name. I read the first 50 pages,

but I don’t remember what happens.

A lot of people with ridiculous names
running around and tripping.

Bells and whistles. I hate it
when everyone can’t stop telling me to
read a book. The more they insist,

the less likely I am to read it—ever.
And then how will they feel? I know—

they will feel the same as they do now.

7

Very few people I know of have read
these poems. Someone once told me

they are too abstract, but they’re not.
They’re little photographs of

a mind trying to look at itself

in the mirror, only the mind is both
the mirror and the thing that hopes
to be reflected. I can understand

why people don’t like it.
It won the National Book Award.

*

The above refers to Life Supports
    by the poet
William Bronk, who wrote,

You know, there are places
    so beautiful
we could almost be there,

as if we were.
    The lineation
is mine, not his.

8

He can’t let anyone know
he’s Jewish. He spends a lot of time
hiding his penis. But he has to tell

someone, so he tells a fellow soldier
who tries to grab his crotch from behind.

And he tells his girlfriend’s mom, who
holds him not unlike a lover would,
as he cries deep into her breast.

It is extremely well acted.

*

My grandmother’s story
    is true
and amazing. My grandfather

was helping people
    escape from
the Nazis into Switzerland.

That’s how he and my
    grandmother
met. Then they came

over to Brooklyn and
    raised a family,
which led to me being born,

which is how I am here before
    you, humbly
offering my wishes in a paper cup.

9

The twist is that, the whole time,
while he’s been trying to help
the boy, who is plagued
by his ability to see and speak with the dead,

Bruce Willis is dead. I’m sorry.

I’ve ruined another movie. But someone else
probably told you already. It’s still good, even if

it’s ruined for you.

*

Poems are meant
    to be read
in private, in bed, when

no one else is in the bed
    with you.
Never speak about poems.

Never tell anyone that you
    have heard
of them. Every poem

that someone discusses
    with someone
else disappears or breaks.

In fact, even reading a poem
    to yourself
hurts what little chance it has.

10

Holden Caufield
is pissed about everything.

He goes on and on.
Everyone just wants to make him better,
but he is too beautiful

for the world. Maybe everyone is
until they turn sixteen
or seventeen. After that,

maybe only some are too beautiful.

*

When all else fails,
    I think,
you’re one of those too-

beautiful ones. Like your
    aunt who
lived off your dad until

she shot herself in the
    bathroom, like
everyone who looked down

the long corridors of their
    eyes and saw,
instead of what was there,

a world made glorious
    by their own
stubborn sense of how unfair

it all is. No one
    expects you
to be able to handle a life.

I say that to myself now
    because it makes
for a good ending, and

in art, it’s the ending
    that counts.