EDITOR: Tom Chandler
FICTION EDITOR: Thom Bassett
MANAGING EDITOR: Stasia Walmsley
ASSOCIATE EDITOR: Lucie Koretsky, Tom Roach
STUDENT EDITOR: Krissy Aucoin
ASSISTANT STUDENT EDITORS: Matt Veves, Kevin Javier, Allyson Lagasse
DESIGN & LAYOUT: Chandler Design
Editor’s Note
Our nation and the world as we know it are changing. We live in a time when jobs are diminishing while the pursuit of wealth remains out of control. Our days are darkened by the perils of global warming and the threat of terrorism, alive and lingering in the minds of every citizen.
But despite these challenges and hardships, the world pushes on. There is still a light that shines through int he importance of creativity and the imagination. We see this in the thousands of submissions we receive each year to the Bryant Literary Review.
On behalf of the entire BLR staff, I would like to thank Bryant University for its continued support, and for the emphasis it places on the importance of the arts in our lives. We are especially grateful to the College of Arts and Sciences this year for coming to our rescue and securing our funding. I’d also like to personally thank Professor Tom Chandler, Tom Roach, and Thom Bassett, as well as our Managing Editor, Stasia Walmsley, and our Associate Editor, Lucie Koretsky. It has been a pleasure working with you to create this wonderful collection of literature.
Despite natural disasters and economic recession, a passion for the arts remains. We must look inside ourselves to keep creativity and the human imagination illuminated in our lives. For if we spend a few minutes each day enjoying the creative work of others and embracing our own creativity through writing, we will make light in these dark times.
May these poems and stories spark a passion in you.
Best wishes,
Kristen Aucoin
Student Editor
Table of Contents
Editor’s Note / 5
The Palm Reader is Packing It In, Richard Luftig / 6
Confidence, Laura Buermann / 8
Tierra Blanca, Andrea Lewis / 10
Children at the Wake, John Grey / 26
You and I, Gregory Sherl / 28
Without Breath, Michelle Soucy / 29
I Killed a Bug Last Night, Carol Hamilton / 57
Dedication, Charles Harper Webb / 58
Traveling Alone, She Fell into the Sistine Chapel-, M.G. Iuppa / 60
Pages from the Textbook of Alternate History: Plato, King of Syracuse, Phong Nguyen / 61
36., Sean Lause / 73
Bee Lust in Manhattan, John F. Buckley and Martin Ott / 74
On John Coltrane’s “My Favorite Things”, Nathaniel Lee Hansen / 76
The Aloha State, Adam Berlin / 77 A Map for Students, William Jolliff / 99
A Bullfight, C.W. Owens / 100
On the First Morning, Patsy Anne Bickerstaff / 101
Doing the Math, Martin Cloutier / 102
He’s a Thief, Eliza DeMarseilles / 116
Peace, Jack Granath / 117
Secret Lives, Mary Elizabeth Parker / 118
Sonny, R. Steve Benson / 120
To Be So Dead He Sure is Big, Phillip Gardner / 122
43rd and Main, Linsey Morse / 129
I have already thrown this poem away, Buff Whitman-Bradley / 130
Light, Extra Sugar, No Patsy, Nancy Lee Craven / 132
A Dissertation on Rhymation, Evan Wallace / 137
Chain Smoking Mavericks at the Crestview Center for Health and Rehabilitation, Brent Taylor / 138
We and the Joneses, Robert Laughlin / 140
Pretty Ballerina, Kerry Jones / 141
On the Pardoning of Two Thanksgiving Turkeys by the President of the United States of America, Jennifer Perrine / 159
At the Harbor, Martha Christina / 160
Art of the Bardo, Robert Haynes / 161
The Place of Literature, Paul Hostovsky / 162
Contributors / 163