Recess Morning at last giving way to mid- day hours when we descended onto the schoolyard like a squabble of greedy gulls in worn white shirts, clip-on ties and plaid suspenders. Solemn decorum of early morning mass, with its luminous vernal pools of stained glass, pasty amulets and cleaving scents, now set by, we worshipped, above all else, speed and the ability to elude capture, covering the tideless expanse of asphalt as if they were on a slip- stream to …
Tag: Blood
“Aunt Dottie I Didn’t Do It” * Short Story * David P. Stewart
The following story about watermelon baseball and other dangerously fun childhood activities comes from Cornbread and Lace: The Privileges of a Mississippi Farmboy, which was written by an author with both feet firmly planted in Mississippi. In David’s thought-provoking manuscript, the anguish of racism, classism, bigotry, patriarchy, war, segregation, and revisionist history are mixed with vivid stories about winged snakes, hot donuts, an old farting mule name Kate, and dinner on the ground. Thought-provoking wisdom from a loving grandmother and an …
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Leopold Bloom Dreams of Kidneys & Sausages & Warm Human Flesh * Excerpt from James Joyce’s ‘Ulysses’
A while back we published “Molly Bloom’s Stream of Consciousness Ends in Flowers & Perfumed Breasts,” the soliloquy which closes the epic modernist tale Ulysses, by James Joyce. It seemed high time then to give some space to her poor cuckholded husband Leopold Bloom who, unlike his wife who prefers toast and cakes, has a taste for “the inner organs of beasts and fowls.” The below section opens the fourth episode, what’s known as the Calypso episode. It is our …
Digging into the Chemistry of the Creepy Smells of Blood, Death, and Darkness
When we think of scary, we ordinarily think of the sights–dark hallways and spider webs, bloody masks and crumbling gravestones, and to a lesser extent, sounds–creaking doors and spooky voices–cue Vincent Price’s Witchcraft Magic!–but what about creepy smells? So many write about the nostalgic scents, the comforting ones of kitchens and gardens, lime-flower tea and madeleines, but what about those creepy smells we prefer to avoid or forget–those of blood and the grave, caves and decay? What makes them provoke …
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