Provincial Review
top row: Coleta Eck, John Pearson, Robert Seyendal
bottom: David Wright, Jim Lyle, Loren Frickel
About Provincial Review
In 1952, seven years after the end of World War II, the United States was experiencing an economic boom that promised a bright future. The nightmares of the Depression and the War were past, but there was a fear of what might lie ahead. The Atomic Bomb, the Cold War, the Communist Conspiracy, and the Korean War were an obsession. An instinctive demand for security, enforced through conformity, took over. Being normal, and happy, and unquestioning were necessary. Society wanted its youth to be “a Silent Generation” that would not rock the boat.
The Writers Club at the University of Wichita was an appropriately dilettantish, sanctioned, and “safe” organization that produced a yearly magazine of unquestioning fare that threatened no one. The magazine’s name, Carrousel, was quite apt: childish, colorful, and blandly entertaining.
A group of students, fledgling writers and artists, took over the club, installed its own members as officers, and set about putting together a publication of its own. The group had, however, inherited debts to a printer that would not be not covered by the standard grant from the Board of Student Publications. To cover the debt, the students sold most of the stacks of copies of unsold Carrousels and convinced the printer to take a loss on the rest of the bill; they then made advanced sales to true believers and applied for a loan from the Board of Student Publications to finance their own magazine.
But the Board was suspicious of the new group. They had “reputations”, and though the faculty sponsor vouched for their talent and seriousness, the Board wanted to see what was being published before it went to the printers.
Before this issue could be settled, various members of the group found themselves at odds with one another through a series of unfortunate misunderstandings, and the magazine, Provincial Review, was never published. By the next school year, some group members had wandered away, some had graduated--and the magazine receded from memory.
But Lee Streiff had kept the artwork and the bundled manuscripts, and 44 years later, he and Bruce Conner made the decision to finally publish the magazine after all. People were contacted, if possible; editorial decisions made, and appropriate advertisements of the period were included. The intent of this edition has been to reproduce the magazine as closely as possible to the way it would have been published in 1952. The typeface, page size (similar to the Partisan Review), format, ads, artwork, and notes on the contributors are a document of the times. Although the works published in the Provincial Review may appear mild and unassuming by today’s standards, it is, however, a rare re-creation of a “literary little magazine” which would have been a unique event outside of the East Coast in its time.
[NOTE: This page was a single sheet inserted in the magazine. The font of the printed magazine was Helvetica, but it has been changed for the most part in this electronic version to the more easily screen-read Geneva, and the size has been increased one or two points. The original page numbering has been retained. In the printed version, the 8 1/2 by 11 inch pages were folded in half and printed front and back.]
Provincial Review
for May 1952
Vol. 1 No. 1
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Editor: Lee StreiffxxxxxxxxxxCo-Editor: Bruce Conner
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[Click on the underlined author’s name to go to the selection:]
[Click here to return to The Wichita Vortex Home Page.]
Blue MondayxxxxxxxxxxxxxDon Duncanxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx1
Two PoemsxxxxxxxxxxxxxxMike McClurexxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx7
Three PoemsxxxxxxxxxxxxRobert Constantine Seyendalxxxxxxxxx.8
Five PoemsxxxxxxxxxxxxxxDavid Haselwoodxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx.9
CamillaxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxColeta Eckxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx...12
Four PoemsxxxxxxxxxxxxxxLoren Frickelxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx..15
Three PoemsxxxxxxxxxxxxBruce Connerxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx.17
TributexxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxJim Lylexxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx.18
The Arrow of Longing xxxLee Streiffxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx..24
Five PoemsxxxxxxxxxxxxxxDavid Wrightxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx30
Contributors
CoverxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxBruce Conner
DrawingxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxJames Stearns
MobilexxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxJohn Pearson
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Editorial and publication offices, 2328 McAdam Drive, Wichita, KS, 67218.
All Rights Reserved. ©1996 by Provincial Review. $5.00 per copy. All characters in stories and poems are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons living or dead is coincidental and unintentional.
[2001 Note: the original is out of print and is not being offered for sale.]
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1
Blue Monday
by Don Duncan
xxxxxRunning down an endless corridor I try each door I pass. All are locked. A feeling of intense horror pushes me on from door to door in blind panic. Behind me I hear the swelling roar of the mob, growing, growing...God, what a grating sound, literally grinding consciousness back. Freud would have loved that last dream.
xxxxxSing your stupid little heads off, you’re free. Monday again and back on the merry-go-round we go. If it was only raining or something it wouldn’t be so bad. A golf ball would roll a mile today. Play eighteen holes and then to the sessions this afternoon. Ted, no he would never get up before noon.
xxxxxBetter go to work anyway or there won’t be a job to go to. If money was only as easy to hate as it is to hate to work for it. It would be wonderful to be a kid again with nothing to do but lay out in the sun. The park was nice yesterday...Horns always sound so big and hollow out in the open. Those stupid funny people...They just can’t understand...’Play Star Dust, please’.
xxxxxJesus, don’t I have at least one clean shirt. Always hiding things...Why can’t they leave them alone? Starch, always starch...They never get it straight... Everybody always wants starch in their shirts...Ought to refuse to pay next time. Shave tomorrow. Better hurry now...Hurry, hurry, hurry, don’t be late or they’ll dock you. Get up by clocks, work by clocks, live like clocks, and think like clocks.
xxxxxWhat clean orderly sterile kitchens the American housefraus have... Clean, orderly, sterile like their lives are. Jesus, don’t wake them up or there will be another lecture on sleeping. They want everyone to sleep life away too. How long does it take that thing to work? Go to work, go to work, everybody goes to work...Nobody takes time off to live. Feed those ulcers...Hurry, don’t be late. Margarine symbol of civilization...Eliminate the cow, install a machine and create a few more millionaires. Better get a move on someone is getting up.
xxxxxWhat an abomination these clanking, stinking things are. Yellow night-mares that stop and start their way across town in a never changing endless pattern. Each with its gentle effluvia of stockyards and sweating humanity. They all like their jobs but they live on the opposite side of town from them. Always room for one more...Get your dimes worth of room at the rear please.
xxxxxWhat is her name? Four years in school with a pretty thing like that and you don’t even remember her name, for shame. Turn off the neon she won’t bite you...Go on say hello.
xxxxx“Hello”...Sounded a little like a frog croaking but it didn’t hurt at all. She just smiled and no one else even paid any attention...What a fool you are. The starch is out of that shirt now. Read the ads. They’re always entertaining.
xxxxxEvery other ad is a half naked woman...They say Freud is over sex conscious. She’s lovely, she’s engaged, she must have B O because she has to use Lux to get that way. What stupid drivel. Whose idea was it to put radios in these things? Saccharine sweet strains of Guy Lombardo, gentle bouquet of stockyards and somebody standing on your foot...How comfortable...How convenient.
xxxxxBlind slaves endlessly recommitting themselves to subjection. Continually passing life by for a few empty promises...Security...A bigger car...A more potent whiskey. They call us neurotic, addicts...Just because we won’t surrender to their brand of escape. Death...They’re zombies moving through life in a continual dream of security. Security for what...From what...To do what?
xxxxxJesus, everytime anyone looks at you its as if you had been caught stealing from a blind man. You’re not handsome, admitted. Your clothes are clean...All right, so you need a shave. They can’t tell what you think of them by looking at you so stop trembling. Always exhibit A.
xxxxxSalina, Wichita, Lawrence, Topeka, Timbuktu, they all get the same things. Over and over, around and around...This job takes the mental capacity of at least a two year old.
xxxxx“Did you see Forest Tucker in that fight in ‘Ramrod’?”
xxxxx“That was a good one, he’s even better in this new picture that I saw.”
xxxxxGod, over and over...How many times have they told that stupid story? Detail by detail. They never have to go see a picture twice. They see it half a dozen times a day down here. If they tell me the plot to another detective story I’ll hit them with a crowbar. Do they ever see any thing except cowboy pictures? Do they ever do anything except go to the movies? Hollywood the great American institution. Life as you would like to live it.
xxxxx“Here comes Pat. Better get that Salina stuff next.”
xxxxxAlways sneaking around. Having trouble...Need some help...What are you looking for? If he asks me once more I’ll tell him to take this job and shove it. Sure I will, just like I’m going to the sessions this afternoon. Put that shackle on and just keep right on polishing it.
xxxxx“How you coming on that order, will you finish today?”
xxxxx“Sure Pat, easy, unless something is short.”...That’s it, apologize for not having it done all ready. What do they expect, miracles?
xxxxx“Let me know if you run into trouble.”
xxxxxTwo number J23485’s plus three number J23485’s makes five number J23485’s. You are a mathematical wizard. Now check those tags that’s how errors are made. There might be a J23484 mixed in that bin. Errors slow up production and production means security...that’s what the movie they showed you said. Security is bigger guns and bigger bombs and more dead people. Ten J33428’s and five TM29444’s...Keep it up and eventually you can retire and starve on your old age pension. How much longer is this day going to last?
xxxxx“Sure that was William Boyd he--”
xxxxx“--Bob you just don’t know anything.”
xxxxx“Who is William Boyd?”...Always the same thing. Don’t they ever get tired of those childish cowboys.
xxxxx“You’re kidding, you know.”
xxxxx“What does he write?”...That got him...He looks like somebody had taken his candy away.
xxxxx“Don’t you ever go to the movies?”
xxxxx“Tell us a story, you haven’t told one all day?”
xxxxxTell me a story...Tell another story you never did get around to writing. They live in one big story and you never finish any. All outlines...Nothing but outlines. If there was only time...Work, eat, sleep, round and round we go. Its hopeless.
xxxxx“Its too close to coffee time.”
xxxxx“Tell a short one.”
xxxxx“Let him alone Bob, you’re just trying to keep from losing the argument.”
xxxxx“Prove it wasn’t him.”
xxxxxProve it, go on I dare you. My father can lick yours, can not, can too. They’re just about the right age for this job...Nine or ten somewhere along in there. Everything is a movie. That’s one way out. At least they seem to be happy. God, how do you shut your mind off and not kill yourself? They’re dead... Just walking dead men with movies for brains.
xxxxx“Come on its coffee time.”
xxxxxThey’re dead...All of them are dead. A year, two years...each day dying a little more...”Fred is your old lady still working”...never wife, always old lady ...they’re old...old and dead...” should have seen his face when I went past” ...Faster and faster...bet your life on speed...what have they got to lose?...”told her to get out and walk”...very funny...laugh you poor dead...
xxxxx“Hey, wake up and live.”
xxxxx“What?”...Is he reading my mind...What with?
xxxxx“You better get some sleep kid, you’re going to kill yourself.”
xxxxx“Its only faster this way.”...What’s the use of getting old if you die young? Did he ever want anything out of life? Day after day the same thing...eat, sleep, work...And die a little piece at a time.
xxxxx“You young punks never learn, but you’ll get old and then see if you don’t regret it.”
xxxxxWhat emptiness. Nothing is as empty and haunted as a joint in the afternoon. Rows of tables still cluttered and disarranged from the session ...Ghosts of happiness. God, Jim doesn’t even have a good beat anymore. How low can you sink? If people would only leave you alone...He had so much promise. Parents...What insensitive stupidities they perpetrate on their children. They may mean well but what ways of showing it. Who is that tenor man? He should be ashamed to even be on the same stand that Alf has played on.
xxxxxNo one here now...All out getting on probably, I’m always just too late. That should be my epitaph. There’s Patty...That makes things look better. She’s a good chick, for a chick. Too bad she isn’t better looking...She could be singing with a good band.
xxxxx“Patty girl, how are things?”
xxxxx“Hi man, swinging session today, Alf and Frank were both down.”
xxxxx“That’s enough, and I had to make that stupid day slave.”...First time in months that they blew together and I’m beating my brains out on that stupid job. Its not fair...That’s kicking you when you’re down.
xxxxx“You’re eating regularly aren’t you?”
xxxxx“Yeah, but my back is aching.”...Sometimes she is just as bitchy as other chicks are. God, if only you didn’t have to eat.
xxxxx“That bum Jim, he was on the stand all afternoon.”
xxxxx“He used to be good.”...Jesus she hates him...”Can you pick up for me?”
xxxxx“Sure...Two caps, you must be flush?”
xxxxx“Hurry back girl my back is aching.”
xxxxxShe is hard as nails. No wonder, with her father calling her a good for nothing slut and all the guys in town condemning chicks the way they do. It must be terrible to be a woman...especially in show business. What a fouled up mess this whole world is. Makes you laugh so hard you get sick to your stomach.
xxxxxGod, what a foul rhythm section. Three beats all going in different directions. They all quit at the same time at least. Jim’s got that give me look in his eyes. If he would only change shirts or get his hair cut once in a while. He looks like somebody’s spaniel that hasn’t been fed regularly.
xxxxx“What’s happening Jim?”
xxxxx“Whose drink is this, Patty’s?”
xxxxx“Yeah, she said Alf was down.”...What difference does it make whose drink it was, he would have taken it anyway. He could at least clean his fingernails.
xxxxx“Frank too, sure was good to play with somebody who could really blow.”
xxxxx“I had to work.”...What a farce he is. At least he’s got guts enough to practice what he preaches. Suffering gives you soul...Maybe, but it sure doesn’t help his beat any.
xxxxx“How is the book coming? It should be the most authentic thing out.”
xxxxx“Still just outlines, I don’t have any time.”...Sure outlines...When was the last time you picked up a pencil? Its hopeless. You work to live and then don’t have time left to live.
xxxxx“Hurry up and finish it, you can use my name if you want to.”
xxxxx“Sometime.”...This must be the intro to the touch. What will it be...Haven’t had a meal...Want to buy a shirt? Or just, give me a taste?
xxxxx“Look could you loan me two bucks? I’ll pay you back tomorrow sure.”
xxxxx“Its a long time till payday.”...He probably owes more money than the First National. When are you going to learn to say no? Patty’s right you always cater to these guys...afraid to say no, they might put you down.
xxxxx“Please man, I’m sick, I need a taste bad.”
xxxxx“Okay, but I’ll need it tomorrow.”...And I’ll get it then too, just like I got all the rest. Sometimes it makes you sick to see yourself as a spineless jellyfish who just can’t say no. Have to get rid of him some way...Patty hates his guts.
xxxxx“Thanks man, see you later.”
xxxxxHe didn’t even pretend to make arrangements to meet me and pay me back. Patty’s right, he’s just a bum...He used to play good though. He lives for only two things now; to play and to get on. The one messes up the other. She made a quick trip this time.
xxxxx“That was fast, everything all right?”
xxxxx“Where do you want to go to get on?”
xxxxx“I don’t know, would Joe be home?”...The eternal problem. Damn all laws and all law makers...Talk about freedom. You can’t even be happy.
xxxxx“He would want a taste, the Street Hotel is the only place--”
xxxxx“--God I hate that scene.”
xxxxx“You want to get on don’t you?”
xxxxxGod, what a filthy dump...puddles all over the floor and not even a trash basket for the paper towels. I hate this scene more everytime I have to come here. Coming through that lobby is like running a gantlet. Everybody staring at you as if you were in a zoo...Expecting the long arm of the law to tap you on your shoulder every step. Patty is all ice. She always acts as if she owns the place. Cook it up faster girl.
xxxxx“You first, you look as if you need it.”
xxxxx“Thanks girl, save a good taste for yourself.”...She’s a good kid...too bad life has to be so rotten to her. God, that feels good ...Just like coming home. Flow heroin flow...Goodbye backache... Mouth feels like the Gobi desert.
xxxxx“Better sit down, this is good stuff.”
xxxxx“Jesus, You’re not kidding.”...If only there was some way to turn everybody on just once...That would slow things down. Delicious feeling...Every cell expanding and getting warm...Peace and relaxation. Off the merry-go-round now.
xxxxx“Let’s get out of here.”
xxxxx“Easy girl, easy. There’s no hurry now.”...Peace, its wonderful...If only everyone could find this out...Even this filthy hole looks all right now. Stare damn you...Stare you poor slaves. If they just knew what happiness is ...Wrinkled, dried up faces and minds. At least they aren’t running around in their circles quite as frantically as the whites. The air smells good...That damp dry smell that comes before a rain...Like musty hay in an old barn loft. Soft flashing neons and hurrying cars...The street is waking up for the night...People down here only seem to really live at night. What was it Langston Hughes called them? “Night people”...That’s them. That’s me too. People of the night...You can wake up and live at night.
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7
Two Poems
by Michael McClure
Ballad
My mother said to me tonight
That I am dead ten years
And bending o’er my crib she bled
A multitude of tears.
And yet I think that isn’t right
Oh mother you are wrong
Or ‘round about my bed would stand
Four angels deep in song.
For when the ground is white with frost
The angels fly and sing
But when the ground is wet with tears
The empty forests ring.
Oh mother, mother laugh for me
The earth is black and damp
And sing a final song for me
And light the final lamp.
Untitled Poem
What strange odors in this room
Of spices, thyme or bay?
A roll of lace with the womb
It is the heart’s decay.
Deal the angels in this hand
The marguerittes are dry
And at our side the Seasons stand
To stare with glassy eye.
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8
Three Poems
by Robert Constantine Seyendal
1.
April, like soft sandalroot;
With golden winds and
Doves rustling among roseleaves.
The trembling flowers,
Dew-jeweled cups,
Stain the hidden dust,
Like maiden’s lips.
2.
Lot’s forest strangely sleeps,
Hovering tears, prawn shadows;
Darkly glowing, floated fair death.
Wondrously, abandoned nightshade searched
The Sepulcher....
Calm echoes of nothingness
Pursue the delicate, amber paean.
3.
Paler birds crush her tresses,
The stream loses its blue
And dies unknown.
Bitter blossom dreams,
Light-mad,
Like fair lips are lily soft
And forget the sands and the seasons.
Together their green lips meet
And forget....
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9
Five Poems
by David Haselwood
Lament for Virtue Lost
Behind your eyes a great disgust
Grows in the morning light;
It was not there last night to blame
When eyes grown vague asked more than willingly you gave.
s it that you are disappointed?
Or shall I suffer for having done
What you no longer could resist?
Recrimination is a pleasure I’ll forego.
You may lament for what is lost
Forget what great sophistication gained;
But do not ask me to give more
Than one faint sigh in passing; nor sing a minor tune.
Tragoedia
My hair is matted and my flesh is torn,
No more my cleft foot pounding upon rock,
No more my long hair flying, borne
Upon the wind, proud grey eyed maidens mock.
For I am old and laugh no more
With wine stained lips, nor hold those bodies near
Which I was wont to hold before
Until they wielded to my thighs with fear.
No elegies shall grace my death
Nor coronals to wither on my tomb
But only summer’s weary breath
To sigh a dirge in passing for my doom.
The Moon Eye
Beneath the bloodless moon
Caught in a net of clouds like the eye of a fish;
In the slow wave wash of October wind,
I saw your face in light reflected on the sea,
Waver and spread in diamond fire.
It is the moonfish swimming in the waves
Which makes the flames leap in my mind,
Spreads fire into my fingers till they plunge
Into water. Crystal drops fall back,
Ring little bells in the face of the moon...
Cold, cold the water, and the vision fades;
The fish eye sinks beneath a darker wave,
Drowns in the frozen sea.
A great emotion dies with the dying of the moon.
Prologue for the Winter Season
I have seen the grey birds,
Winter driven,
Whirling on the wind;
Felt the wet wounds of last snow
Gather and disappear in the sun;
Have heard the breath of November weeds
Where snow rests briefly
And wind birds fall,
Laugh and rebuke the prodigal’s search,
Cry the last catechism.
Three in August
Toward August
The brown turning of weeds,
The falling of spores as we sat
Silently;
Watching the dust road,
The wind changed shadows.
The sun sank to the weeds;
Two remained.
I followed the path,
Dry,
Choked by pollen;
Felt the wrenching of old webs
And was alone.
By a shrunken pool
Pushed back thought,
Saw the live mud driven by primeval spark
Mate,
The eternal pairing of flesh.
The pool darkened
Trees shrank into shadow;
Driven,
I lay insensible
Upon dry ferns,
By the dark wound.
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15
Four Poems
by Loren Frickel
1.
The sages dance upon the beach
slyly glancing each to each
--have you read my last sensation?
did you catch its implication?
(with hopeful laugh and challenge-stare)
--I plucked it out of sacred air.
the non-elite find nothing there
save what to breathe and blow away,
an ancient dream an old cliché,
when they meet and love and play:
“we are part of something great
bigger than our simple fate.”
they are part of something trite.
when did you begin to write?
simon thinks he’s quite a wit;
simon is a hypocrite.
have you read my latest book?
how long did you have to look
before you spotted such acumen?
what a pity we are human.
the sages dance beyond the waves
singing while the ocean raves;
the sky’s what makes the earth a gem,
but all the world is greek to them.
2.
Ah! The world is big Again,
Bigger than all mankind again;
And the stars are little and pretty
And don’t belong to us.
3.
These little worlds
All are springs
of an old tattle-tale bed;
with bored little squeaks
the universe lies waiting
in the night.
4.
The black dunes loom above me now
And they alone are near.
Behind them and above them and around them
Spreads the distant sky--
Far and cold and sparkle grey
With something in it shouting,
“You’ll always be alone!”
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17
Three Poems
by Bruce Conner
25.
...the
........stars
so brightly on your brow
..move
..one
..glows in
......my hand
like the sapphire
26.
ashen eyes
gently the arch of
your lips
a darkness in
the
night-sky
bursts
27.
a
white
.....dark
shape
.........brushes the blood
.........from my eyes
I
see
the throbbing
breath
of
.....the waves
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18
Tribute
by Jim Lyle
I
Senseless as two playing cats the hands of my clock chase
............each other around a pole of no existence
Yet tonight in flickering madness i must come to bear your
............gifts for these no entities
..........................these seconds
....................................minutes
....................................hours
.......................................tonight
I give to you for they are yours
Some say that only history is real but i say that they are
............fools that only the future is real and yet on this night
............your night
............i would fill the coffers of your heart with history for
............running out of its many cracks and seams come jagged
............fragments and shreds to clutter up tonights consciousness
............my consciousness
............your tonight
But i bring no future
............no realities
............promises bind me and so in fear i bind them
Senseless as two playing cats the hands of my clock chase
............each other around a pole of no existence
Yet tonight i must speak to you
............tonight i would speak to you because i cannot hold you
............and i cannot hold you because i cannot speak to you
Or is it because you cannot speak to me
............i never can
............remember
Senseless as two playing cats or a score my thoughts chase
............themselves around the cavities of my mind yet with these
............phantoms riding ghostseconds i would comfort you if only
............i were their master long enough enough to muster them
............for rank and file of audible tongues
For when i do not speak these specters do my bid until such
............a time as passion or emotion or care or yes
............even hate should call for...
............wisdom it would do
............but even words might help
Senseless as two playing cats the hands of my clock chase
............each other around a pole of no existence
But tonight i must speak of things of no existence and offer
............reasons unreasonable and comfort which burns because
............remembering things which are gone is senseless and i
............guess it is my lot to be
............senseless
Still i bear no promise
............no realities
............promises enslave me i have claustrophobia of the soul
II
The part can never contain the whole some worthy philosopher
............must have said that but he was wrong because how many
............hours are handled tonight in the space of only seconds
............and these seconds pregnant with hours are placed them
............selves again in microseconds until my brain whirls
Whirlpools by their very nature always contain refuse and look
............here at parks and combs and buttons and buildings and
............golden hair and memories and silken hose all spinning
............intruding because they never let me alone how many times
............i have pleaded to be let alone i cannot count
Yet tonight for it is your tonight you must understand
............these things that understand not themselves as tributes
............to you
............little golden intangible idols to you
............i think that existent in even my cosmos of possibilities
............are things otherwise you are more wont to have but please
............take these things which no other can give that are yours
............anyway and dont think them less that have not conventions
............and promises
For i bear no promises
............no realities
............i have claustrophobia of the soul
You must i think i hope forgive me when i remember you for things
............as worldly as flesh and blood and warm ripe laughter
............but these things i understand and i touch and i taste
............along with the heathen
But being animal and i am i know nothing of spiritual realms but
............maybe ghost icons of dim awareness springing wraithlike
............from nowhere like the very gifts i bear you
Forgive me if i forget intelligence which i know is there i think
............but melts just as soon as flesh and lunatics sooner and
............i find it not half so warm so forget as i forget your
............thinkings which live in a world apart to themselves that
............i cannot speak to
Or is it because you cannot speak to me i never can
............remember and if you cant
............could you or didnt you bothers me
And if again i should come to you weeping remember and forgive
............reasons unreasonable and comforts that burn in fiery
............memorial
And also forgive this night your night which in weakness i would
............use to barter should we meet again for this is seduction
............most damnable
However if you should forgive me for desire and aspiration then
............i will not forgive you who would judge to forgive the
............one thing for which i am never ashamed but listen and
............i will give reasons unreasonable yes even mad but cursed
............in their logic
Tonight as time is consumed in your honor i must speak to you
............that i cannot hold in my arms and therefore need speeches
III
In gods country there is a hill
............there i stand after an evening shower when the
............mountain wind sweeps the air clean and little
............trickles crawl moonsparkling down the hill
In gods country on this hill i stand because there with something
............that i dont know what is i am filled
Where newly washed stars hang in blackness to dry by
............carefully adjusting themselves to rub not against
............each other i feel the presence of do you know what
............i dont know what
It comes from these stars and smells like the wind and chills
............slightly but i like it
Because there...
............did you ever climb a hill after a rich young nighttime
............rain and perform a ritual crazy sticking ones chin
............rock jutting
............into the wind daring it to erase you from the hill
Knowing full well that it cannot because
Because just by looking at stars the blood of destruction burns
............coldly in your veins and carries insane knowledge that
............all things work together for them that love the lord that
............you also are one of the elect that is given to know is
............beyond............good
....................................and
...................................evil
............to know that it can be fully moral to
....................................have cheered for the villain
....................................understood dictators
....................................willed with egoists
....................................slept in your mind with vileness
............knowing that black is white if you make it so
Despairing suddenly one dark cool night to find that you were
............free to make your own tinsel world but sickening in
............your stomach at the horrible aspect of freedom
For freedom is a drug
Freedom is an enigmatic efflorescence increasing in direct
............proportion to the size strength number and of yes we
............must not forget particular gender of chains or so
............traditional religions politics governments and people
............would tell you but have you ever
Watched roses smell as sweet by any other name while freight
............trains run backwards upside down to prove freedom
............only comes in institutional chains
................................................Roman
................................................Democrat
................................................Buddha
................................................English
............or maybe even............Southern Baptist
............sizes
IV
In gods country is also a desert and i live there because in
............the mountains there are cool streams and green valleys
............where condescending pines balm and towering ridges
............protect from the sun which flows against their sides
............but which hold me down by protecting me and enslave me
............when i eat green grass and drink cool waters
So in madness i chose to starve in the desert which extracts
............life itself for its freedom and i am bound because i
............would be free
And at times i am a coward and again look longingly and do run
............sometimes for the mountain but again
............i turn
............running
............screaming
............crying
............again
............afraid to be bound
But when night comes with a jutting chin feel power by looking
............at blazing stars which tell that virtue and values rise
............and fall as the size of men
I fear the dawn
V
Senseless as two playing cats the hands of my clock chase
............each other around and they have several times caught
............fought and began again since i came to you tonight
............your night
For tonight in the echoing canyons of my mind tributes
............sadnesses bright passions and dull memories of you
............pass the point of my awareness
And how many times have i thought of you i cannot remember
............or how many times i have longed to speak to you but
............then i cannot speak to you or is it that you dont speak
............i cant remember
But most horrifying i fear of the times to come when in my
............mind i shall fold you in my arms
............and shall put to bed you
............and shall touch you
............and for a time find some value and some agonizing comfort
............in passionately dissecting the anatomies of cell like
............memories only again to fear that i have
............................................................touched of things untouchable
............................................................dreamed of things not mine
And ever again and again to be ashamed of being ashamed
Two playing cats chase each other and the only gift i bear to
............you was eaten in their play
But know this
............tonight i watched for you
............here tonight
............they play for you
And for things done undone and to be done
............tonight i offer reasons unreasonable and comfort which
............burns
Like the desert burns for on the desert there is only
............suffering
............fellowsuffering
............rebellion and if more than one
............fellowrevolution
But no love like love in the mountains pinning down
............binding
............balming
............securing
............satisfying
The desert bears no promises
............no realities but
............heat
............promises enslave me i have claustrophobia of the soul
[Return to Menu.]
24
The Arrow of Longing
by Lee Streiff
xxxxxWe spend a lot of time waiting. We wait for the stars to come home, and for spring to come, and for night to come, and for death to come; we are waiting for a lot of things if you only knew it.
xxxxxWe are waiting for love.
xxxxxThe moon is rising in the misty forest, and a shedding star can be seen, falling from lighted arrows, now flung into the sky....
xxxxx“We feel as though women from downstairs; outside, should come up to us, softly, on sandaled feet, and sit beside us, with their white breasts hanging fully, and clothed in simple skirts that hang straight and pleated from their hips to their calves, and are held by broad leather belts.
xxxxx“We would take their golden or brown hair in our hands and kiss their lips, and they would stay till night.”
xxxxxBlunted bubbling and silver strained; and smoke circled, and feinted up.
xxxxx“And yesterday would have never been; for yesterday we thought spring had come, and we went out to meet it; and found a lot of trees, now leafless in the autumn.”
xxxxxDave watched the smoke from his cigarette.
xxxxx“It is a dream that we will dream always, and never realize.”
xxxxx“Dreams are never to be realized, Dave,” said Stephen, “for once they are real, then they are no longer dreams; and are no longer of use to us.
xxxxx“We are never sure of reality; we are always sure of our dreams.”
xxxxx“And the dream is a dream without love,” said Mary.
xxxxx“Oh, yes; and love. The earth is a song, and the sky is a song; and love’s sweet voice can sing them.”
xxxxxAnd all the things he left unsaid. The thick crunchy, smell and walk of a forest. A love of the smell of fresh earth and rocks; of feeling the cool summer evening on your hands. Of the mid-afternoon sun, and small slivers of brilliant life in the reeds of the shallow water, moving from one cattail to another.
xxxxxOf all nature; love.
xxxxxIt was long of midnight, and the blue haze filled room sparkled with the flash of glasses, and spoke with many voices. Dim lights were concealed, reflecting the deep green of walls and chairs.
xxxxxAnn was her name. She was seventeen; and the people were like none she had ever known before, and were so sure of themselves, and each other. They had an awareness.
xxxxxShe heard the names of people she had not known to exist. Names and Ideas, and Names of Ideas. They were moving in shadows that seemed more real than the spoked wheels of the sunlight. They were male and female; with long and short hair; there were full beards, and filleted hair.
xxxxxShe did not know if they thought like she did; or know if the night meant as much to them.
xxxxx“As a pure idea it has its faults; but it presupposes an idea of things as they really are; a realization of the Universe, a conception of the physiological and psychological factors that influence us.... And a discarding of those supernatural doctrines that are made of words without referents.
xxxxx“Once we have these, then we can proceed to ‘create ourselves’, but until we have this background, we might as well not bother.”
xxxxxDon sat on the floor; his black, full beard contrasting with the wall.
xxxxx“But what about Kierkegaard’s existentialism?” asked Charles.
xxxxx“Kierkegaard was guilty of wishful thinking,” said Don. “His intelligence told him existentialism; his emotions, religion; his synthesis was not worth the effort. Sartre realized this.”
xxxxxMary broke in. “What I feel most wrong with the whole idea, is that you, in avoiding a religion, have made more of a religion out of your ideas than you ever could have done with Kierkegaard’s concept.”
xxxxx“How?” asked Don.
xxxxx“The essence of everything is contingent upon the existence of man. By making man something unique in the Universe.”
xxxxx“Want one?” asked Dave, offering a cigarette.
xxxxx“Thank you,” said Ann.
xxxxxHe lighted them.
xxxxx“Do you go to the University?” he asked.
xxxxx“Yes,” she said, feeling the loss of words, which they spoke so easily.
xxxxx“What do you think of the group?” he asked.
xxxxx‘Group’; said, almost, like ‘home’.
xxxxx“It’s hard to tell you,” she said. It is as though I have walked into a room, and have come in time to hear only the echo of the voice that just spoke. We reach back to that time when men heard the voices of their gods in the hills, and slept with their gods, and walked in the silent streets with them.
xxxxxAnn watched these people.
xxxxx“It’s so different from all that I’ve ever known.”
xxxxx“You are pretty,” he said.
xxxxxShe knew slowness, and night.
xxxxx“Some things are so beautiful that we think we might die for them, and know we won’t; not ever,” Dave said.
xxxxxShe looked at him; gentle and soft, he was. And she did not stop him when he kissed her.
xxxxxThey opened their eyes, and looked into each other’s.
xxxxxKen held his guitar, and touched the strings.
xxxxx“A chord; and I traced my love in the shining dew; another and I sang of blossom bells, and my true-love’s hair; and finally I sang a song of a starry sky, bright and clear.
xxxxx“No, forget it; forget and never remember. Forget it now, because I am drunk. Because I have traced a scar, and held a star in my hand, and I have paid for it.”
xxxxx“Is the wind forever?” Ann asked.
xxxxx“Perhaps. But how can we know? Whatever forever may be; and whatever we may be; and maybe the wind is forever. Perhaps the wind will blow between the stars when the world is gone.”
xxxxxAnn and Dave walked hand in hand down the dust turned road. The sky was brilliantly blue with streaks of frost-clouds high, and the golden trees contrasted, and repeated themselves into a forest.
xxxxxThey sat down in the grass, and she smoothed her blue skirt about her hips, and straightened the folds around her legs.
xxxxxThey lay on the soft grass, and gently he curled her ringleted hair with his finger, and the tiny wisps of hair on her neck.
xxxxxDave sat up. He pulled his knees up and put his arms around them, and resting his chin on them, he looked out over the hill slope. Ann scratched his back.
xxxxxHe kissed her. So fragile fair, it all is, and fleeting.
xxxxx“What do lovers talk of?” she said.
Of see of clouds, and feel of hands, and touch of lips, and warmth of tears. Wisps of windblown hair, sadness, and in the heart a hunger. We do remember now....
xxxxxShe closed her eyes, and felt the summer green grasses, turned into autumn.
xxxxxThe blued in evening mistily spread its shapes over the lanes and paths. The birds are taken in flight, or dead.
xxxxxThey stayed in the wood until the sun had begun to set; and the sun moved redly into the trees’ browning branches. And they made their way down the hillside and into the town.
xxxxx“We know how artificial it is; and yet we make up to it. We entice it and laugh with it.”
xxxxxIt was Stephen, as he sipped Chianti.
xxxxx“I remember, as though long ago, three crows beating southward against the chill and pale morning sun of a snowless winter day. Calling their harsh calls, they blackly passed.”
xxxxxHis words, to Ann, were words that she had heard before, and words that sometimes seemed so true, but which were not true. Stephen was not real, and he didn’t want to be real; for being real would mean that he would have to live. She did not believe in him.
xxxxxThe room was bright and artificial. A painted room of a painted life. Bright and artificial, just like the people who lived in it, and would die in it.
xxxxxDave came up softly behind her.
xxxxx“What are you thinking?”
xxxxx“I am remembering,” she replied.
xxxxxI am remembering a dream. The sea--the memory of rain falling into water--of fairy horses, riding white on the foaming wave crests--of their hooves pounding up the enchanted littoral sands--the shell scattered beach impressed with the vanishing tread of a transient water bird that has flown far out to sea. Wings rise as webbed feet splash--and wings fall, and it is launched, like an arrow against the moon; a dreadful arrow of longing....
xxxxx“History is full of dreams,” he said, “And all of mankind’s life has been spotted with men, and their ideas, and what they drempt.
xxxxx“Binding times past, present, and future, they make a ribbon of dreams, that stretches far across the night.”
xxxxxJerry came up to them. He had a glass of wine in one hand, and a cigarette in the other, which he flourished when he spoke.
xxxxx“That last poem of yours was fine, Dave,” he said. “Quite well done; but you know you could have been a little more esoteric. If we don’t watch out the common herd will be understanding poetry some day, and then where will we be?
xxxxx“The day that art become exoteric, I quit!” he said with a short, nasal laugh, and wandered away to another group.
xxxxx“Why are you so tied up in art, Dave?” Ann asked.
xxxxx“Do you want me to be a football player?”
xxxxx“No, of course not, but isn’t there a middle course?”
xxxxxDave smiled. “If you want to experience an emotion, you must do it right. You must subjugate yourself to it. It must be you. You cannot catch a falling star with your eyes; you must catch it in your hands, cupped in the night.”
xxxxx“That sounds pretty, where did you read it?” she asked.
xxxxx“What do you mean?” he said.
xxxxx“Exactly what I said. I think that all of you people,” indicating those in the room, “have lost your real and true emotions in a lot of nice sounding words. You are tired and sick of yourselves. You hide your sorrow in cynicism that has gone mad.
xxxxx“Dave, you know that; and yet you sit here with these people. You can free yourself if you want. They have taken art and made of it a thing with which to stimulate their lives to a high point, which falls short of what really waits for us to be felt.
xxxxx“You have misused art, and made it try and make you experience everything, without the heartbreaks and the joys that really come from living. You have lost yourself in this group, that has lost itself in its own dreams and halting desires.”
xxxxx“Is that what you believe?” asked Dave, “Am I that wrong?”
xxxxx“I am in love, because I am alive. I am in love with the universe, because I know it is going to end. The whole thing is here. Why wander the world over trying to find it? It’s here! Around us. It is life and existence! That’s what we’re hunting for.
xxxxx“Yes, Dave. You have never been in love with anything, not me. When I die, I shall die as myself, and not an imitation of what I wanted to be.
xxxxx“I believe I am right, and you believe that you are right.
xxxxx“Good-bye, David.”
xxxxxAnd she went into the raining night.
xxxxxThe room was cool and shaded, and David could hear the tinkling bells that dangled from the limbs on trees next door, or down the block, or a thousand miles away.
xxxxxThe soft decadence of night; and the trees, and the rain again returning.
xxxxxThe splattering rain and streets shining.
xxxxxAnd so she walked. In the rain, through the cold streets; through the long rows of trees with their dripping branches. She walked; not in space, nor in time. From one dream to another. Through darkened streets, and once, by a street lamp, moving slowly in the wind; its light, holding back the gathered night.
xxxxxOh, vanished love. To press warm lips together, and cry because of our love; and know that the world is dead--and the black suns that once shone, are gone.
xxxxxWhere are all the littler gods? Where is the pomp of swaying litters and incense? Of gold and red carpets, and sandaled feet? Of men on a wooded mountain side? A past time of great beauty--
xxxxxThe shapes of familiar things, that rustle in the night--and lightning flashes bright--and skin with its own certain color. The wind has risen, and clouds closed in, and far off I can hear the trees....
xxxxxA star seen, then gray again. Do we really live here?
Passing
by Lee Streiff
A tiny voice of tiny fear,
That did not know the day,
When creatures strange and laughing,
Pranced through woodland chambers,
And passed along their way.
A nostalgic echo of hidden hooves,
Still sings along the way,
Where creatures strong and deathless
Loved and slept and sang their songs
And watched the end of day.
[Return to Menu.]
30
Five Poems
by David Wright
1.
The dark man
Dodging swiftly, dancing smiling
Thru the trees,
Racing Autumn to my grave.
The laughing man thru the trees,
The smiling death thru the leaves,
Falling
Falling
Falling.
2.
I see Autumn
Waiting around the corner of my grave
Standing expressionless.
He only waits
Growing taller as chimney smoke
Curling into a sly smile.
He shall make me forget
But his drugs are painful.
Why must he come so eventually
As death?
3.
Seventeen seas and a pair of skys,
All I need,
See the bursting signs in the
Bawdy burly streets,
Featured more like the dream I had
Than your breasts, your thighs,
What else to lose
4.
Some summer
quiet evening
long ago with
your thighs
softly radiating the
burning sun’s
descent
thru the horizon’s
delicate trees
I kissed you
5.
Come on kids, don’t wait
Swing it, beat it, defy it,
Wait!
The music says dance
Let’s have it, let’s do it
No now is going to be more.
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the contributors
Don Duncan is a part-time student at the University of Wichita. He is a Korean War veteran.
Bruce Conner is a freshman in the College of Fine Arts.
Coleta Eck is a sophomore in the College of Liberal Arts. She is from Mount Hope, Kansas.
Loren Frickel is a summer school student. He is majoring in Mathematics.
David Haselwood is a senior in the College of Liberal Arts. He has appeared in the Wichita University Theatre productions of The Miser and The Ballad Plays.
Jim Lyle is a junior majoring in Philosophy. He is a member of Kappa Pi, national Art fraternity, and the Campus Religious Council.
Michael McClure is a sophomore in the College of Liberal Arts. Last year he appeared in the Wichita University Theatre’s production of The Ballad Plays.
John Pearson is a junior majoring in Art.
Robert Constantine Seyendal is a junior majoring in Drama. He is from Elyria, Kansas. He appeared in the Wichita University Opera Theatre’s production of The Magic Flute.
James Stearns is a graduate student in the College of Liberal Arts. He is the author of The Ballad Plays, and has designed costumes and sets for numerous University Theatre and Opera Theatre productions.
Lee Streiff is a sophomore in the College of Liberal Arts, majoring in English. He is President of the Writers Club.
David Wright is a sophomore majoring in Sociology.
Special thanks to Joan O’Bryant, English Department Faculty Sponsor of the Wichita University Writers Club.
[Return to Menu.]
Drawing by Jim Stearns
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Mobile by John Pearson
