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| << February16, 2008 - Dark Windows #12 - Feb 15, 2008 |
March17, 2008 - Dark Windows #14 - March 15, 2008 >> |
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DARK WINDOWS #13 - Mar 1, 2008 ===== ===== ===================> INTRO I just got back from a weekend at ConDor, a friendly little sci-fi convention here in San Diego. I was part of a fun 2-hour poetry workshop, the other panelists were Debbie Kolodji, Denise Dumars, J. C. Runolfson, Kendall Evans, Samantha Henderson, Christopher Vera, Billie Dee and Deborah Flores ... fans of speculative poetry probably recognize a few of this group. Between us I'd guess we've had 1,500+ poems published. And we all get along. A fun group. We got people writing some poems, and even Sheila Finch (friendly Nebula Award Winner) stopped in to listen and get inspired. I also did the usual panel on getting published, then a difficult panel about whether mass media desensitizes people to death, where all the panelists had recent or terrible losses of loved ones, and shared their personal views of how complex death and grieving is, how it can't be captured by any casual entertainment or 30-second news item, and how nothing can really prepare us for it anyway. An interesting direction was realizing that it's not so much "media" that has jaded us, it's how our new global awareness makes it hard for people to feel their lives have meaning -- whatever we're trying to do we know thousands of other people are doing it -- and if we have a hard time valuing our own lives, it's hard to care about other people. With our families mostly scattered, many of us have closer bonds to our pets than to "real" friends or family. All a bit creepy. Something big lurking in shadows. Too much reality for one day. Thanks to Deborah Ross for sharing her family tragedy. Also, the usual fun but quick chat with Jefferson Swycaffer; and Gerry Williams ("the Mars guy"). Even a brief but down-to-earth chat with Herb Jefferson Jr ("Boomer" from the original Battlestar Galactica) about the state of the so-called hospitality industry. Strangely, a lot of people I spoke to were either out of work or at their wits ends keeping or finding jobs. Very unusual, and a bit scary. Well, I just wanted to say thanks to all these people for giving me a good weekend, and letting me feel inspired (and briefly connected) again. = scott ===================> POEM FeverTalk -- Nevermind the thermometer! I feel them crawling in my blood. How I wish I could see them, or give them a chance, but my white cells are destroying our first visitors from the stars. --- = 2/87, published in Midnight Wine v2#4 (1992) ===================> ODD CLIPS: (clips from old "factual" sources) About a twelvemonth before my arrival [in Oct, 1790], the small-pox made its appearance and occasioned a terrible havock among the poor natives. It was truly shocking to find the coves of the harbour, which were formerly thronged with numerous families in tempestuous weather, now strewed with the dead bodies of men, women, and children. [1] The country people still believe that the Gipsies can, by means of magic formulas, extinguish fires and preserve houses from the flames; that they can discover hidden treasures and the sources of springs, and cure diseases. They are above all skilful horse-dealers, and understand thoroughly the art of restoring apparent strength and activity to a broken-winded jade. [2] In the midst of all the hunger and thirst, all the miseries and insults that a Gipsy has to suffer, he has never been known to commit suicide. One example alone is quoted of an old woman among them, who, to escape her persecutors, begged a shepherd to bury her alive. [3] 1. George Barrington, A Voyage to Botany Bay 2. Tissot, Unknown Hungary (2 vols) (Bentley & Sons, London, 1881), p. II.41 3. same, p. II.51 ===================> STORY Point of Exile (part 1 of 2) ----- Shreds unremembered of swordplays and mind duels. Exiled from the Kingdom of Kerala, two strong men traveled south into the Forest of Kishangarh, across a muddy mire, and into a line of low hills where they found an old, abandoned castle. Enlac and Kurle searched the ruins of castle with growing cheer, declaring the place their new home. Who needed that tyrant anyway? they joked, as they scouted the land and explored the waiting castle. Neither of them could remember precisely why they had been sent away from the lands they had once called home. They wanted only to rest, to get away from the pressure of rulers and pyramids. The citadel embraced them like children. The towers awakened as they passed from room to room, shifting as it sensed them, lighting at their touch. The dust evaporated as they wandered. The paintings which once were cobwebbed and unfamiliar, now showed the obscure ancestors of Enlac and Kurle, in colors fresh and comforting. They found beds with fresh linens, with a washbasin full of fresh water every morning. Enlac had his doubts. "If this place is enchanted, what is its purpose? Is it good that it calls us master?" Kurle shrugged. "Obviously, there are spirits at play here. No sane man could deny it. But if they wish to take care of us, who are we to complain?" They went about their days, half-asleep, looking for clues, listening to the faint whispers within the deep stone walls. One night they heard a song, a soft woman's voice: "You cannot know how it feels to be built by hands planned and pursued praised for stregth and comfort then left alone forever "Do not fear whoever you are we welcome you we need to feel a part of the world again ..." They spent months at peace, listening to songs and stories. In a strange little room in the center of one of the towers, they saw a dozen strange pictures. Each picture showed the tower itself, but each with a different background scene. They wondered and argued about these images. Why would the builders and keepers of the castle want these pictures of fantasy worlds? "Maybe they just got tired of looking at the same old hillside," Enlac proposed. "It's not exactly exciting terrain." Back in the Kingdom, the oracles saw their progress, not as scenes but as a dim glow of activity over the horizon. The glow grew brighter and more pronounced as time passed. Eventually, the King had to be informed. But he had seen it himself, and he didn't like the feelcolor of it. The exiles were amassing powers against him. The King sent out his bombers to slay the offenders. The exiles had never even considered retaliations against the King, all they cared about was their freedom, and their strange new domain. It was the glow of the waking castle that the oracles had seen. (TO BE CONTINUED in #14) ===================> NOW AVAILABLE: "Peripheral Visions" - my 2007 chapbook from Assume Nothing Press. Poems about the edge of reality. Home page (with excerpts): http://tales.scvs.com/bk_pvisions.php ===================> DARKVISION: (captured dreams) Running/Falling Walls ::: Office work, office work! Then the day was over and I recalled shuffling the last of the papers into some semblance of order, setting myself through the door, down the long elevator, to begin my walk home. I talked to him on the way down; he was complaining about the city. It was a bright day outside, and he went down to the garage, I was alone. The street stretched straight ahead, a perfect demonstration of vanishing point principles. The buildings leaned drunkenly back and forth across the road, like so many half-fallen dominoes. Each was supported by some number (usually four) of y-shaped posts, enormous slingshot girders which stretched high to balance the structures. Each building support narrowed to a single point, and was delicately counterbalanced so that a single man at each point could keep the building steady. I looked back at my office building: it was a giant pencil, reaching far up and somewhat backwards, its top few floors a jumble of debris. Beyond, an ice-cream-conelike colossus laid at a nearly horizontal angle, its great supports cisible even from where I was. I had walked only a few paces when one of the support-holders called to me to relieve him of his senseless duty for a few minutes while he got some dinner. I, being the stupid sod that I was, agreed and set down my briefcase to grab onto the y-beam. The previous holder proceeded to indult me, jumping up-and-down, fingers in the corners of his mouth, pulling harshly, waggling his tongue at me. The sounds he made were too much to bear. I had to let go of the support to wring his neck. The building creaked and fell. It rose up from beyond the row of trilevel coffeehouses across the street, and crushed them as it careened to a diagonal, powderdusty rest, along with several hundred cars. Chunks of cardboardy sheetrock flew rampant in the browning air, to the sound of carbrakesqueals. Suddenly everyone was pointing to me, a copwhistle blew, and the real instigator was nowhere to be seen. Just then, my officepal pulled up to the curb, waving a solution to my plight. I jumped in and he crosslaned and plunged u-turning from the scene. (discontinuity) A red and white gate crashed across the hood of the car. Rapid burst gunfire erupted behind us as we crossed the border. The bullets starfished off the rear window. My friend was ecstatic over the excitement, still rallying against the city, spitting on the system. (discontinuity) Inside a building, with a general-security-breach claxon following us about. But there was no security after hours, so we encountered only confused labtechs in stained white coats. Winding hallway after winding hallway we ran, for they were releasing their inventions to hunt us down. A robot, all greencase and redhead, its arms not yet invented, charged at us, flashing stun colors all around. We dodged sideways through an open door, through the conference, into another hallway. Too many doors, but we found what we needed. This was our destination: a tunnel of glowing mists. Some techs watched us warily as we ran toward it. One even mentioned shutting it off, another differed, playing with a computer and pulling his beard. We jumped into the tube and hiked its indeterminate transspatial length in only a few prolonged heartbeats. We stepped into a room where everything was shadowy, the air was breathable but a frightful grey with blue shafts piercing it near every window, yellow from every round dim overhead bulb. There were noises upstairs, but they were not threatening, so we approached. Stair after creaky stair, it felt like an overdone movie effect, that light. At the top were some rooms. We followed the voice to see a woman and a girl, both with lean, crazed Shelley Duvall features. They stopped their sign-language discussion to stare at us hollowly. The stairs creaked behind us. We knew it was a whitecoat ...panic. There was only the window, and not much time, but the window was barred so we had to trounce the medtech. I took his jacket and my comrade frothed and rolled his eyes for me. Now we were doctor and patient. I led him by the hand, down the stairs, past the desk and out the front door. Some dissent of non-recognition stirred behind us, in the form of a chase. We ran across the grass. It was contoured as a golf green, but covered with billiard balls. As we ran, more balls flew rolling in from somewhere/nowhere. Looking back and seeing no pursuit, we slowed, but then the balls began to get thicker, clunking about dangerously on the astroturf. We rounded a corner of the bin, and there was the source: a small, soiled girl with a dumptruckfull of poolballs. Even as we sighted her, a bright yellow one whizzed past our faces. She had quite an arm. When he saw my white coat, she fell to her knees, begging forgiveness. We ran toward the woods, my friend stopping briefly to dump the truck. The girl was crushed and buried under the gumballish onslaught, the hill became impassable. We took our time getting through the electric fence. Beyond the fence were trees, nicely brambled and without paths. We picked our way through their wherever, steadily uphill, then stepped over the guiderail and onto the pavement, and everything was familiar. It was Nicolls Road, Northbound. An old man met us there, and told us we were late. (captured 3/4/86) ===================> MY NEWS: My story "Lugosi Rock" was just posted at Postcards from Uranus: http://postcardtales.blogspot.com/2008/03/lugosi-rock.html I sold two haiku to Scifaikuest New book cover designs for SamsDot: - Family Tradition, by Dev Jarrett - Jane Doe Discovered, by s.c.virtes (Art & Design) - Tarantula Stampede, by Tom Galusha - The Poetry Workshop & Beyond, by Terrie Relf - Little Creatures, by Michael McCarty Otherwise a quiet two weeks with a few rejections. ===================> POEM racing --- the differences between start and finish are: ego, glory one syllable and a random amount of kinetic energy. tempers stilled, we can brush past one another without splinters. --- = 2/87, unpublished ===================> STORY BITES: (clips from old fictional sources) "There once was a poor man, who had nothing in the world but his wife and an unhappy son Joe." Opening Line from "Fisher Joe" [1] "A lad married a lazy rich girl, and he made a vow that he would never beat her." Opening Line from "The Lazy Cat" [2] "PASA ANTU!" "A spirit hath passed!" and Malita's agate beads rattled to her trembling, as something swift and silent brushed past her little brass--burdened ear. Again it came, a wavering shadow in the moonlight, and now Malita laughed: it was only a big brown goatsucker, after all! [3] 1,2: Kriza etc, Folk-Tales of the Magyar (Folk-lore Society, London, 1889) 3: story: "Her Father's Head: A Bornean Nightmare", in Alexander Montgomery, Five-Skull Island And Other Tales of the Malay Archipelago ===================> POEM all that Matter --- I have always seen cobwebs cast shadows, I have never glimpsed the makers; I have watched rocks crumble, I have searched many riverbeds for the miracle. We are alone, then confused, then together at last, in nothingness. --- = 2/87, unpublished ===================> ABOUT THE AUTHOR Scott Virtes has had over 400 stories & poems published since 1986. Look for them in Analog, Space & Time, Ideomancer, Dreams & Nightmares, Cafe Irreal, Planet, and more ... My Home page: http://scott.virtes.com?inw=dkw Notice: Odd Clips and Story Bites all come from original sources in the public domain, or are brief clips in the spirit of fair use (a.k.a. free advertising for the source). All other sections of this newsletter are copyright (c)2008 Scott Virtes. All rights reserved. Please don't grab chunks of my work and post them all over the place. If you ask permission, you'll find that I'm pretty easygoing. ;-) ===== this issue: 2,320 words cumulative: 27,420 words |
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| << February16, 2008 - Dark Windows #12 - Feb 15, 2008 |
March17, 2008 - Dark Windows #14 - March 15, 2008 >> |
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