It’s the silly issue. Tamara Fairchild does her usual very silly thing, with her “as seen on TV” ad for Kodiak Safety Pumps, built to help the “ladies kick through those employment barriers.” Heath Carra does a silly little story about a lady who loses her labia and replaces it with a butterfly. The Morphealist Manifesto tries not to be silly — actually it isn’t all that silly, it’s just boring. There is some stuff in this issue of the Muse that isn’t silly at all. There’s a book review that’s astonishingly alliterate. And much of the poetry seems totally arbitrary. Take “The Quell” by Caroline Wilson: “An opened book/A bloody cudgel/The dulcimer silenced now./Roguish infinity/Shattered again./The freakshow is over/The people are gone/ Apocalypse/Genocide/ Juxtaposition.” But let’s get back to silly. Check out Gary J. Langguth’s poem, “Digital Death”: “I stare and stare/at glowing squares/that flash and hum/and mesmerize/ These screens, these screens/dehumanize./They steal our souls,/I tell no lies./My cursor bright/I analyze, I analyze:/a neon Hitler/in disguise./I hear it speak:/”I now arise./I will your lives/Computerize.” Or this beauty, “My Fish”, by Phillip Igloliorti: “I watch my fish/swim up and down/up and down/up and down/I watch my fish/swim up and down/wonder what he’s up to/I watch my fish/swim round and round/round and round/I watch my fish/swim round and round/wonder wear he’s off to/I watch my fish when food is there…” Okay, okay, I’ll stop.
litzine / 36 pages / publisher: Maritimes Arts Projects Productions / main creator: joe blades (editor) / $3, 2 for $8 (hello?) / Box 596, Stn. A, Fredericton, NB, E3B 5A6