The Art of Goodbye
The house is empty again. Empty, but not quiet, because my 13-year-old son has left the radio on in his bedroom and his Pandora station playing in the office. I can hear both from where I stand by the front door, a cacophony of nonsensical sound. With my hand still on the doorknob, I catch one last glimpse of him in the passenger seat as the car pulls out of the driveway, his wild curls reminding me he’s overdue for a haircut. I wave, even though he’s looking the other way, then turn to survey the mess left behind in his wake. Books and games and toys on the...
Read MoreOpere Roma
The Queen of Cups A few days after I was born, my mother decided to tuck me into a very crowded recycling bin outside of a Ft. Lauderdale firehouse. It was St. Patrick’s Day, and lucky for me the guys of Ladder 35 were trying to have a very eco-friendly holiday. Esperanza, my social worker, always loved to tell me that story whenever another set of foster parents decided that I was damaged goods. On the scale of adoptable and desirable children, being an antisocial prepubescent black boy always lands you somewhere between the crack babies and the kids that play with matches....
Read MoreFeatured: Week of Jan. 21 (The Movies)
As the movie award season begins, Wild Violet’s contributors goes to the movies: A poem by Lyn Lifshin, “Now Let’s Say,” pays tribute to the classic dance movie, “The Red Shoes” A poem by Michael Grosso, “How to Watch a Bad Movie,” provides a different way to look at late-night films. In the humorous essay by Peter Dabbene, “Life in the Movies,” he takes a look at movie tropes. In the short story by Victoria Large, “Analog,” a video store clerk who dreams of being a filmmaker reassesses his life when the...
Read MoreAnalog
It was a typical Saturday night for Arthur, the twenty-one-year-old clerk who was crouched on the floor behind the counter of Video Deluxe, sorting through a cardboard box of old promotional items – posters, yes, but also stickers, pins, hats, even a thermos – while his teenage coworker Delia stood poised at the register, ready to attend to the town’s video rental needs. Arthur was looking down at an enormous pin promoting a Jim Carrey movie. “Wouldn’t people be more likely to pin this to something if it were smaller?” he asked Delia. She smirked, but before she could respond, a...
Read MoreLife in the Movies
I’ve been catching up on movies lately, and found myself thinking about how much simpler everyday life would be if it followed movie rules. For one thing, it would be more convenient: in the movies, everyone speaks English. It doesn’t matter what area or era, though with older settings like ancient Greece or Rome, speech is usually delivered — strangely enough — in a British accent. If it’s a question of British English speakers versus American English speakers, then the British-speaking person is invariably either a boor, or evil. And if someone speaks in a non-English language,...
Read MoreHow to Watch a Bad Movie
There is an art to enjoy bad movies, A way to abstract perfect stills From tawdry plots and dead dialogue: Raindrops beating on the heroine’s face – You can bracket this, cut away the edges Of the hackneyed scene; you can travel far On the montage of a lonesome highway To the shot of the runaway lovers. The art is to detach from plot and words, The absurd clichés muted by the will, Life itself removed, a clumsy interlude. It’s all yours now, stirred in the alembic Of half-dreams, a movie within a movie, This fine art of late night...
Read More