cold coffee magazine issue 1
TRANSCRIPT
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Brian Porter’s tenacious
work ethic and writing skills
have proven to be a winningcombination. In an exclusive
interview with Rachel
Brower, Brian talks about
his stellar novel and how he
found success.
Editors Pick
A Collection of poems
by some of Cold Cof-
fee’s best poets.
Twenty novels written
by members of Cold
Coffee Books.
M A
G
A
Z
I N E
YonderBy Ben Larkin
A Short Story about a
father’s undying love
for his daughter.
Cold CoffeeCold CoffeeCold CoffeeCold Coffee
“Your manuscript is both good and original, but the part that is
good is not original and the part that is original is not good.”
-- Samuel JohnsonNO. 1
P L A G I A R I S M
Editor and Columnist
RachelBlackbirdsong
shares her thoughts
on a literaryinjustice.
Words
Words
Words
Some of the finer
points that help good
writers become great.
J.M. Doslobos
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Page 12
Cold Coffee Magazine is a quarterly publication produced by members of the Cold Coffee Writ-
ing Community. It is dedicated to the voice of promising writers everywhere, writers who might
otherwise go unheard.
Each issue features an interview with a successful author, a short story, a number of poems, a list
of twenty books found in the CC Bookstore and several helpful articles on writing. All work pub-
lished in CCM was submitted by members of the CC writing community
(www.coldcoffee.ning.com).
Those writers interested in seeing their work published in CCM need only join the CC writing
community and read the submission process. All who submit will be considered but not everyone
who submits will be published. As compensation, those writers whose work is published willreceive an invitation to the online web site where each issue of CCM is produced.
Advertisers interested in having their company or their products represented in CCM or on the
CC community web site may go to the CC community and submit your interest to David Price,
creator of Cold Coffee.
Magazine Staff David Price – Owner, Designer, Chief Editor
Rachel Brower – Poetry Submissions Editor
Shannon Morrow – Design Specialist
ContributorsThe Perfectionists – Proof Reading and Editing
Members of the Cold Coffee writer community
Flikr community of photographers
CCM is available through Magcloud.com
What’s in Your Cup?
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Cold CoffeeCold CoffeeCold CoffeeCold Coffee Words, Words, Words by J.M. Doslobos
“… We as writers have our brains are cluttered with vo-cabulary and punctuation rules we learned in third grade.”
Yonder by Ben Larkin
A Short Story about a father’s undying love for his daugh-ter.
What is Cold Coffee? by David Price
The most interactive and quickly growing writercommunity in the world.
Plagiarism by Rachel Blackbird
Editor and Columnist Rachel Blackbirdsong shares herthoughts on a literary injustice.
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M A G A Z I N EM A G A Z I N E M A G A Z I N EM A G A Z I N E Interview With Novelist Brian Porter
In this interview Brian talks about his stellar novel andhow he found success.
Editors Choice Poetry
Cold Coffee Magazine accepts submissions from mem-bers of the Cold Coffee Writers Community and then
chooses the best for publication.
Editors Choice Books
Cold Coffee Magazine picks and features books mem-bers have displayed at Cold Coffee Books. These arethis issue’s picks.
Featured Writer Candice Geary
Candice is a glowing example of the blossoming talentone finds among the members of the Cold Coffee WriterCommunity.
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‘Words,
Words
WordsThe comment of course is
Hamlet’s response to a question
about what he is reading. When
asked, he seems to indicate thatthe comment is meaningless.
This is a situation we face
every time we sit down at the
computer for word processing.
Most of us, more’s the pity, no
longer use typewriters.
The pity here is that when us-
ing a typewriter, especially if
you write as a profession, you
have to think, think about the
words, before punching thekeys. With a computer it’s sim-
ple, too simple. The machine
will even go through your copy,
check spelling, rephrase sen-
tences and, if you aren’t alert,
may change the meaning of
what you have written because
the machine has a limited vo-
cabulary, and no brain.
However, writers, even this
one, have brains. If we are
readers as well as writers — andwe had better be — our brains
are cluttered with vocabulary
and punctuation rules we
learned in third grade. Most of
us who would someday want to
be writers, would fill our conver-
sations with what Robert A.
Heinlein in one of his books
called “‘intestinal’ Latin jaw-
breakers” as opposed to “the
gutty Germanic words.”
An old newsroom incident
comes to mind. The people had
better be nameless, but:
Our police reporter returned
from his rounds and set about
writing up the notes he had col-
lected from the police, the sher-
iff’s department and the state
patrol. These included mostly
petty crimes and vehicle acci-
dents.
I was slaving away at my desk
doing rewrites or something —
this was years and years ago —
when suddenly the night editor
who, at his mildest, was an iras-
cible (oops, one of those Latin jawbreakers) old tyrant, and
shouted at the police reporter,
“Jack, what the hell are lacera-
tions and contusions?”
The reporter responded, with-
out even turning to face the edi-
tor, “How the hell do I know?
You’ve got a dictionary.” Within
seconds, Jack also had one,
right between his shoulder
blades. He grabbed the book,
stood and glared at the editor.
“What the hell was that for?”
“Cuts and bruises,” the editor
growled. “Cuts and bruises.
Cuts and bruises.”
“The police report said contu-
sions and laceration.”
“Cuts and bruises.”
We were being taught to write
clearly and simply.
The problem with a word like
“obfuscate” is that it does. That
is, it may confuse, which is a
simpler term with the same
meaning. The fact that a word
like obfuscate exists, doesn’t
mean you have to use it.
Going a step further:
The hero in our story is looking
up at the blue sky. What? Not
only what? But why? The sky
is blue unless it is cloudy, foggy,
gray (smoggy), or reddened by
the rising or setting sun. If the
sky is other than blue there is
some point in mentioning it.
Tight, clear prose is or shouldbe the goal, even if the writer
for some reason wants a lei-
surely pace.
And speaking of pace:
As news writers, we were taught
to be terse (tight) for ease and
speed in reading. Short sen-
tences were the rule. Descrip-
tions were accepted only if
needed and were part of an on-
site report, for example a seri-ous accident, a fire or some-
thing really serious like a mur-
der. A little “color” was accept-
able, but only if it added to the
drama.
Hmm. Drama. Unless a football
game or something like it was
involved “drama” was another
no-no. Normally, if drama was
involved, it was supplied by a
witness.
But for fiction and often nonfic-
tion, dramatic elements can be
very important. But you really
can’t create drama. You have
only words, and words used
sparingly can create drama:
elation, sorrow, fear. But (there
are a lot of ‘buts’ here):
“It was terrifying!” is just a
statement. You have to, as
writer, supply the terror. Re-
member: you have only words.
You must create a situation that
is terrifying. To wit:
When he made her kneel she
began shaking. He walked
around, rubbing the muzzle of
the pistol gently across the back
of her neck. She gasped, twist-
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ing the hands bound behind her,
her eyes wide and seeming out
of focus as he moved around in
front of her, letting her see the
pistol. Her eyes, wet and drip-
ping, opened wider as she
looked at the gun and then at
the man who smiled and said,
“Goodbye bitch.” She closedher eyes as he put the pistol
almost against her face. She
took a deep breath and opened
her mouth and pistol banged,
sounding loud and flat. And she
fell, flat. Her legs twitched, but
she was dead with a small hole
in her forehead and cavity in the
back.
Some may not find this terri-
fying, but it is intended as an
example, however poor. It’sintended to show just what sorts
of things you can do with words.
Saying the one-year-old was
happy with the kitten is a little
flat. How about (about baby):
When the kitten stopped in front
of her and rubbed a velvety
head against baby’s knee she
gurgled and bounced and
clapped her hands.
When I was training peopleor attempting to, I would sug-
gest that they try to describe for
example a red sky without spe-
cifically mentioning color or the
sky, or to write (describe) blue
with out mentioning the word
color or the color. It can be
done and is a fun exercise.
Spelling is important, and the
spellers on most computers are
a little limp. There are too
many English words that sound
alike. Don’t trust it: Consult
Webster. Among things I have
found very useful over they
years are crossword puzzles.
Don’t misunderstand here.
Crosswords won’t do much for
your vocabulary but they help
develop the ability to find words
in you own storehouse, your
brain. Sometimes crossword
puzzle definitions are inexact
(often), sometimes wrong until
you get down to the least com-
mon definition and sometimes,
too, words appear to be mis-
spelled until you get down into
the “alternate spelling” part of the dictionary definition. For
me, they help, along with the
morning coffee, to get my brain
moving. And sometimes you
will find alternative definitions,
which often are archaic. Most
daily newspapers supply daily
crossword puzzles and of course
there are crossword puzzle
books.
And there is reading. We all
know that. I assume we wouldnot be writers if we were not
first readers. Leaving out
schoolbooks and assigned read-
ing, I suspect most of us during
our school days read a lot of fic-
tion, and some nonfiction, as-
suming we read at all. Televi-
sion has drastically changed
reading habits. So have school
curricula changed.
Some of the losses in educa-tion at all levels include poetry.
I don’t mean the blank verse
which passes for poetry, rather
the older poetry which included
blank verse as in Shakespeare,
but especially poetry that was
rhymed and metered.
For some reason, not under-
standable to me, poetry that is
rhymed is considered inferior,
even though a good rhymed and
metered piece is far harder toproduce. Still, it is pleasant and
often exhilarating to read, or, as
in Poe, can be difficult and an-
noying.
Believe it or not, meter in fic-
tion, if not overdone, can be a
very valuable tool. In fact,
whether deliberately or not,
much serious writing is me-
tered, simply because we tend
to meter our speech. For some
reason, we tend to speak in
iambic pentameter.
But I’m talking about words,
descriptive words, words with
emotion, with temperature. You
don’t have to spend all yourtime reading, for example,
Shakespeare’s — or anyone
else’s — sonnets to see the way
traditional poetry can produce
temperature, emotion, mood.
Robert Service:
Service is readable, under-
standable and normally quite
entertaining. Almost everyone
has heard of the “Shooting of
Dan McGrew.” When I wasyoungster it was popular camp-
fire fare. However Service’s
poem most frequently antholo-
gized is “Young Fellow My Lad.”
Service in his writings called
himself a “mere maker of
verse.” Perhaps that was all
but, like Kipling (and many oth-
ers) the language and the beat
of his verse can be very excit-
ing, uplifting or depressing.
Even when depressing, the “music” draws us on.
Service could even extract
beauty from the battlefield:
Beside the dying and the
dead,
Where rocket green and
rocket red,
In trembling pools of poising
light,
With flowers of flame festoon
the night.
Or in another vein make it as
ugly as it really is:
… And you yourself would
mutter when
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You took the things that once
were men
And sped them through that
zone of hate
To where the dripping sur-
geons wait.
Perhaps — I certainly hope
not — no one will want a novelor especially a nonfiction book in
rhymed or even blank verse, but
a sound grasp of poetry and its
language and can greatly im-
prove a writer’s, any writer’s
output.
Too frequently when we
write, especially if we’re strug-
gling, we don’t listen to our
words, we forget about mood,
temperature and color. Yet in
our lives, unless we close our-
selves inside some light proof,
sound proof shelter, we are sur-
rounded by those things.
You find them in stories. If
you are writer of stories and you
feel the music and the color and
the temperature, then writing is
less of a chore and will be better
writing.
There is one more thing, per-
haps the most important thing I
have learned or been taught
about writing; and it was pain-
ful. It involved my first writing
assignment in college English:
I was, as are many fresh-
men, pretty full of myself. After
all, I was a top tenner in high
school, at the head of my
classes in a number of subjects.
I had helped other students.
My magnificent paper came
back with a pretty good grade
but with large red hand-written
notation: “If you can’t be very,
very clever, don’t be clever at
all.”
It hurt, but it was true. I
won’t say I’ve never violated
that dictum, but I usually catch
myself when I do and fortu-
nately for many years had
someone who would catch it if I
didn’t. But it is a potential foi-
ble for all writers, especially new
ones. I would say for inexperi-
enced writers, but all of us re-
main learners.
By: J. M. Doslobos
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My world could have beenseen as small by some. It was
me and Annette on our littlefarm, a father and a daughter in
a simple two-bedroom house.Yet it didn’t feel small. The
spread of the valley and the
height of the pines had nothingto do with that estimation. An-nette was enough for me, and I
reckoned I was enough for her.
I never caught her staring intospace searching for something
beyond the tree line. The lack of
a mother or siblings didn’t daunt
her. Annette was the only childof my wife, who passed while
giving birth. My daughter fig-
ured having one parent was theway it was supposed to be. You
see what I’m saying. The focus
was never on what she didn’thave.
And as I recollect, there was a
swell amount she didn’t have.We were out in the boonies, onthe ranch my pa owned before a
stampede overtook him in ’42.Fifteen years later society ain’tany closer to us. If you scaledthe tallest tree and used its
highest branch as a lookoutpoint, you’d see nary a chimneyor water tower. Heck, we ain’t
even got a telephone. This is
back country, and people wholive here don’t live here because
it’s fashionable or even reputa-
ble. It’s something you’re born
into, and if you don’t like it, you
pack up and head for morepopulated areas. To us, thereain’t no such thing as safety in
numbers. Safety is out here,away from the crowd. It’s that
feeling that someone bigger hasalways got His eye on things,
and since there ain’t so many
people, He’s able to focus rightin on you.
So it was me and Annette, our
horses—Ritzy and Willow, and a
mite over a hundred head of cattle. Most of my time was
taken up by the stock, but I let
Annette choose what part shewanted to play in helping. Some
afternoons she’d be out in the
field with me, not so muchworking as keeping me com-pany. Other days she stayed at
the house, cleaning up things in
ways I never taught her. Thatwas her mother coming out, I’msure. Every once in a while
she’d go roaming with Melissa,the only other girl her agewithin traveling distance. I
missed her those days, but I
never asked her to stay. Tomake her stay when she didn’twant to would only make the
times she was here less special.
And just about every day was
special in my book.
To say I loved the child is like
saying the Grand Canyon’s ahole in the ground. Words don’t
cover it. All fathers know some-where inside that anything that
matters nearly always crossespaths with their daughters’ hap-
piness. But I knew it in everybone of my body. She wasn’t a
part of my life—she was my life,
plain and simple, which is partof the reason I can’t compre-
hend why God made her up andleave.
Annette left last summer, yousee, to go yonder with her
mother. Her departing hap-pened in the snap of a bone—her spine, in this case. I found
her myself, though not withoutconsiderable searching. She’dgone horseback riding withMelissa, and they had ventured
back over to the ranch of
Melissa’s family. The ParcherRanch.
You could say they were our
next-door neighbors, but theylived a good five miles away.Most times Melissa came over
here, which her parents neverseemed to mind. I know now Ishould’ve made them play o’er
here every time, one of the
many things I loathe in hind-sight. Melissa’s a good kid, al-ways has been, but her parents
are as shiftless as they come.Daniel Parcher marks the timeon his porch, his feet propped
on the railing, swigging away on
his putrid homemade whiskey.The grass is always high in theirgarden, and it occurred to me
more than once that ten- year-old Melissa probably does mostof the work that gets done
around there, not by choice ei-
ther. That’s a frighteningthought, but as Annette onlyknew me, Melissa’s only known
the life handed to her, and she
didn’t know to be angry aboutit.
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These days, I make it my job
to be angry for her.
But I’m rambling. Annette and
Melissa set out early that morn-
ing, Annette on Willow andMelissa on the one old mare theParcher family owned. I don’t
remember if I told Annette to be
back by dusk, but I knew I did-n’t need to. She knew my short-
hand well enough, and I suspect
she shared an inkling of myfeelings about Daniel Parcher.Mary Parcher would be there at
least. I didn’t know Melissa’s
mother well, but from the fewtimes I’d seen her she seemedat least a hair more cognizant of
her surroundings than her hus-band. She had a quiet, fragileway about her, like someone
searching for a match in thedark. I don’t know if she everstopped searching. She ran off with some other fellow about a
week after Annette’s depart-ing—yonder in a different direc-tion, I suppose.
That day went by like anyother. I never thought to worryfor Annette. She was a good
three years older than Melissa,
and had more common sense
than the entire Parcher lineagecombined. When dusk set in, I
didn’t think much of it. Annette
must’ve gotten a late start back.I knew she’d explain it in a solid
way the moment she got home.
Maybe Melissa’d be with her,needing a place to hunker downfor the night. If Daniel Parcher
was having one of his moon-
shine parties, that wouldn’t besurprising. That girl had sense
to know when she needed to
steer wide of her papa. I’ll giveher a nod for that.
Soon stars were pricking thesky, and I wondered if I should
ride out to meet them. Annetteknew how to travel at night, but
maybe Melissa wasn’t used to it.I didn’t want Annette saddled
with a long journey and a little
girl’s sense of safety. So I
started for the shed, whistling toRitzy to let her know I was com-
ing. Then Willow wandered intothe path, her saddle as empty
as my suddenly hollow stomach.
Maybe at that point I knew. I
don’t remember. The rest of
that night is a smudge to me. Atthe time, the night and the
search seemed eternal. Willow
n’ I skinned out to the Parcherstead, and then all through itsovergrown paths, calling out her
name. I remember thinking that
infernal sun was never gonnarear up. At one point I passedthat doggery of a house the
Parchers called home, thoughtabout calling on them, but did-n’t. Melissa’s horse was bedded
down in the stable, which meantMelissa was bedded down in herstable, too. Calling on themwould only waste time and get
Melissa worrying. I headed backinto the brush, having neverconsidered asking Daniel
Parcher to help search. Some
things aren’t options.
Dawn had barely broken
through the trees when I found
her, her body sitting awkward
against a juniper trunk, hereyes staring dully into the rusty
light. She looked like a doll
waiting for someone to comeand play. I assumed without
question that Annette had been
on her way back when the acci-dent occurred. The fact that shewas on the wrong end of the
Parcher tract didn’t so much as
pierce my thoughts. Annettewas dead, and I was filled with
equal amounts exhaustion and
despair.
No, take that back. I had more
despair.
It’s strange how certain mo-
ments bring memories back to
the surface, bring ‘em up so fastthey don’t quite feel like memo-ries at all. More like re-
experiences, if that makes any
dern sense. As I crouched onthe ground, staring into An-
nette’s once vibrant but nowhauntingly still face, such a
thing came over me.
I was back in our house, a
year or more earlier, and I was
reading the Good Book aloud,like I did every night. Annette
was there, too, listening while
she did the dishes. It’d be easyto think Annette did the dishesso she didn’t have to listen to
me prattle, especially if you’ve
ever heard me stumbling clum-sily over every thee and thou Icame across. She was listening,
though. Her moss green eyeskept coming back to me, andthey were wide with wonder.
Another benefit of staying so farfrom other kids her age, Iguess. She didn’t know to bebored.
And so I read. “Forbear to cry,make no mourning for the dead,bind the tire of thine head upon
thee, and put on thy shoes uponthy feet, and cover not thy lips,and eat not the bread of men.
So I spake unto the people in
the morning: and at even my
wife died; and I did in the morn-ing as I was commanded.”
I paused to sip my tea, not
really contemplating what I hadread. Annette had, though, and
she posed a question.
“Pa?” she asked softly. “Did
you ever hate me for killingMama?”
My head jolted up so quick I
nearly forgot the mug on my
lips. Some tea sloshed my chin,but I kept my grip. “Annie,” I
said, unable to hide my shock.
“Why would you go thinking athing like that?”
She shrugged and turned back
to the dishes. “I wouldn’t haveblamed you if you had.” Hervoice was strangely calm, as if
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this were a fact she long ago
came to accept.
I rose from my chair in ahurry. “Now you listen,” I said,
suddenly angry for some reasonunknown to me. “Your mama’s
passing was not your fault. Youhave no right to bear such a
burden on your shoulders.” She turned then, and I was
surprised to see a faint whisp of a smile on her face. “I know,Pa,” she said, as if it were the
most obvious thing in the world.
“It’s not like I had a choice as tohow I was born. But still, youhad to send your grief some-
where. I just reasoned itmight’ve come my way.”
“Well, it didn’t,” I sputtered,
crossing my arms. “I never letsuch a thought even form in myhead.”
That faint smile disappeared
from her face, and Annette’seyes turned serious. “Did you
blame God then? Did you blameHim for taking Mama yonder?”
That caught me off-guard, and
I think she knew it. The angerfell from my face as I pondered.
“No,” I said, trying to retain myfatherly posture. “I never
blamed God. That’s the easyway out. You see, in the end
God don’t kill people. People
kill…”
I broke off, realizing what I
was saying. Annette nodded and
went back to the dishes. Itouched the back of her armdesperately. “It really wasn’t
your fault, sweetie. It weren’t
no one’s fault. Truth be told, Inever thought about it. I did mybest not to think about it, in
fact. Those thoughts only end inpain, and I had a new baby tosee to.”
She nodded again withoutturning to me. The silence hungover us like rain clouds waiting
to burst. I pulled my hand
away, knowing the conversation
was over. We could keep picking
at it if we chose, but there’d benothing new to say. I turnedand made my way to my bed-
room. What stopped me was her
sweet voice.
“You’re a good man, Pa,” she
said, and I could hear the smileon her face. “Not that I’ve
known many. Still, you’re a
good one--one of the best, Ireckon.”
Those words ran through my
head like a flood, and then Iwas back in the forest again,staring at moss green eyes with
no light in them. The eyes of mydaughter.
I buried her the next evening.
Some people came over,brought some food, tried tokeep me company. I didn’t ask
for them, but once I phoned the
sheriff to tell him the situationword got around. Old ladiesstarted showing up with casse-
roles. Widow Stevenson brought
the same potato salad she madeafter my wife died. I don’t mindsaying their presences unnerved
me. All these people with God intheir hearts, trying to let meknow I was loved. The problem
was they all looked like strang-
ers to me. Sure I recognizedtheir faces, but I didn’t knowanything about ‘em other than
their cooking abilities. And theysure didn’t know me. No andheck no. I was merely their no-
ble cause for a day. I stom-
ached their food and their com-passion, but Lord was I gratefulwhen the last one sputtered out
of my driveway.
The Parchers never showed upat all.
Weeks passed like nails on
slate. Every moment without
her wrenched my insides. But Iwasn’t allowing for despair. In-stead, I threw myself into
chores. The cows became my all
-consuming task. I spent most
of each day among them, fuss-
ing over any blessed thing Icould think to fuss over. I onlycame in the house to fall into
bed. The indoor parts quickly
fell into a state of befuddleddesperation, but the outdoor
parts looked better than they
ever had. The loose boards inthe fence were either mended orreplaced. The leaning mailbox
had a new post and a better
hole to prop it in. The yardaround the house had nary a
scrap of clutter in it.
Another thing left on my list of
time-passers was the stable.
One of the swinging stall doorshad hung by a single hinge for
the better part of two years.
And when was the last time Iraked out the old hay? It wastime, and I was more than will-
ing. Every task took my mind
away from that one big thoughtlooming at the edge of my be-ing. I’d heard the thought in bits
and pieces. Sometimes I even
shook my head to keep it fromcompleting. I knew it, though.
‘Course I knew.
How could I not? When the
tasks ran out, so would my life.
You probably think I mean sui-
cide, but you’re only half right.The truth was I never planned athing. I had a scattershot rifle in
the closet, but I wasn’t about touse it on myself. Maybe I’venever been the most sanctified
of men, but I had faith enough
to know that Annette still had aview from whichever perch shewas on. And I couldn’t stomach
the thought of her watching meblow myself apart. No, deathwas coming, but not from the
barrel of my rifle. There were
other kinds of death, kinds thattook more than a quick flash of thunder, the patient kinds, the
slow kinds. That was what I
had. The slow death had startedin the pit of my soul. I felt it in
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there, quietly gnawing its way
to the surface. Maybe cattle andbusy work were slowing it down
some, but that well I was draw-ing from—the well of purpose—
was gonna run dry eventually.And that gnawing in my gut
would get a whole lot worse
when it did. Maybe I’d never
hurt myself, but I was rapidlylosing the gumption to help my-self, too. I saw the future com-
ing, one where I’d wake onemorning unable to crawl out of
bed, or eat, or even drink. I’d
be trapped in a quarry of grief,and the final straw would be myability to breathe. The air in me
would go flat, simply because I
didn’t have the will to keep itmoving.
But I wasn’t going to thinkabout that. I had a stable to seeto.
Maybe I need to pull the reignson my storytelling. You see, itgets a mite strange from here.
And though I don’t mind telling
it, I ain’t about to suffer any eyerolls or mocking sighs. I don’tcare if you think me crazy, so
long as you don’t try to convinceme it didn’t happen. I know itdid, know it the same way I
know when one of my steers is
sick. I’m a granger, and I cantell when something’s contrary.My story comes from height-
ened awareness, not the lackthereof. Just so’s you know.
‘Cause that saddle didn’t crawl
up on Willow by itself.
I don’t know how long I playedwith that rickety door before I
noticed. Eventually I did, be-cause I dropped the hammerinto the hay and watched for a
spell, as if expecting it to move.There was Willow, her gray coat
almost blue in the early morninglight. And there was Annette’s
saddle on Willow’s back, beltstrapped around her belly, stir-
rups dangling in the light
breeze.
For a moment I wondered if Ihad left it there all that time,
even though I knew it weren’t
possible. Maybe I did all my rid-ing on Ritzy, but I tended toWillow, too. I usually let her
roam one of the fields for a
good part of each day. Iwould’ve noticed a saddle hang-
ing on her back.
As I thought about it, I re-membered taking the saddle off.I remembered how hard that
simple action was. Taking off the saddle kind of brought it allhome for me, forced me to open
my mind to the truth. Horrible
thoughts swirled through myhead as my fingers wrapped
around that stiff leather. Had asnake jumped at Willow? Or dida low branch knock Annetteplum off? These were answers
I’d never be privy to, and I think
that was the first moment I evertruly wondered. Was the BigBoss really watching us out
here? Or were we as alone asthe townspeople thought wewere? I wasn’t mad at Him yet,
or at least it didn’t feel like I
was. But the confusion inside
was dreadfully stifling. This did-n’t feel like the way it was sup-
posed to be. People have to die
sometime, I know. But not likethat. Not thirteen years old and
full of vigor. It wasn’t—it wasn’t
something I cared to thinkabout anymore. All the same Ihad tears in my eyes and a
sneer on my lips as I mounted
that saddle on the gate.
And now it was back on Willow
I made my way over to her andchecked it out. It was a slowprocess, you understand. I’d
take a few steps in her direc-tion, keeping my distance but
watching her to see if she hadany new marks. My mind kept
telling me that someone’d beenout here, maybe even took Wil-
low for a ride or two without
permission. The question there
was why bring her back? I don’tknow many horse rustlers--none
in fact--but I don’t reckon manywould steal a horse only to re-
turn her to her stable.
That is, unless they were just
about to do it when I got there.
That thought made me rigid ina heartbeat. I jerked around like
a deer sensing a predator. Sud-denly, it made perfect sense.The saddle was on, but not thebit and bridle. Whoever did the
dressing got interrupted, by aman with no greater ambitionthan fixing a broken door of all
things. That feeling of being
watched came over me like aheavy storm. Real or imagined,
it came on something fierce,and for that moment there wasno doubt in my mind.
“Who’s there?” I called out. Itwas a greenhorn thing to do,
but I couldn’t help it. “Come on,now. Show yourself.”
I waited with one ear cocked.
Seems like I heard every strandof hay bristling in the wind. I
couldn’t hear movement--nothing that would give cre-
dence to my fear. No boots slid-ing through grass. No whisper-ing breath. Just me and myheart hammering away in my
veins.
Then something did move, andI yelped before I could pull it
back. The breeze kicked up.
Kicked up fast it did. Drifts of hay took flight around me. Duststreamed through the stable in
a torrent. And yet even with all
the commotion, I noticed some-thing that made my neck hairs
stand on end.
The trees next to the stablewere still and lifeless. The wind
was only blustering inside the
stable.
“Who’s there?” I yelled, pray-
ing someone would answer.
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Someone did. I don’t know if
you’ll believe that, but someone
did indeed.
I heard a laugh—just a sliver
of one. It was on the wind andthen gone again before my ears
could really get a hold of it. Butonce I heard those sparkling
chimes, I knew. “Annette?” My voice came out
strange, like a person wakingup. “Annette, is that you?”
The wind went still just like
that. Like someone flicked it off.I stood there, frozen in myboots, waiting—no, praying I’d
hear her again. The seconds
went by. Bits of hay glided pastmy trembling eyes, headingback to the stable floor. Then
Willow whinnied, and I turnedand looked at her. She was bob-bing in her pen, her head sway-
ing excitedly. And it wasn’t un-
settled excitement, either. Wil-low was being playful, as if anold friend had popped in for a
visit. I gazed at her, realizing
she was probably right. Some-one had been here, someonewho knew this old stable a
whole lot better than I did.
I looked up at the tin roof, myvision fogging up. “I love you,sweetie,” I said, maybe knowing
that if anyone else had beenwatching, they would’ve thought
me crazy. I couldn’t have cared
if they did.
That night, I spent more time
than usual inside the house. Irealized I had been a fool to
stay out so much. There was so
much of her inside. I took big,
long whiffs and smelled herclean skin. I went in her room
and held the wooden horses I
had carved for her years ago. Isaw drawings on the wall, some
made less than a month before.
They were all pictures of treesand flowers—and Willow, of course. Lots and lots of Willow.
Maybe I had known it before,
but her skill with a pencil sud-
denly seemed amazing to me.
My Annette had real talent. Iheld one particular picture forwhat must’ve been an hour. I
stared at it the whole time with
a goofy grin on my face. It wasa drawing of the two of us—her
on Willow and me on Ritzy, and
she had gotten everything right.The colors were spot on. Thelines of the horses’ faces were
straight out of real life. If she’d
done any flubbing it all, it wasthat she made me more hand-
some than I could rightly claim.
As I lit out to dreaming, I still
had that picture in my hand. A
spark of hope crackled inside,and I had a feeling maybe
thing’s weren’t as drastic as I
first figured. Maybe Annettewasn’t on some far-off perch,twiddling her thumbs. Maybe
she was closer. Maybe she
never really left at all.
The next morning only con-firmed it. I woke to the sound of
horseshoes clumping. Stagger-ing to the window I saw Willow,this time with bit, bridle, and
saddle. She was out on the
south pasture, trotting merrily.
To the average eye she seemedto be running alone. But I knew
better. Annette was with her.She had led the horse from thestable to the field, and now she
was hitting the breeze, giving
Willow a better leg-stretch thanshe’d had in weeks. I went outon the porch and watched for
most of the morning. Any otherbusy work I had planned be-came a distant second to watch-
ing Willow prance across the
horizon. And something oc-curred to me that hadn’t ‘tilthen. I hadn’t been the only one
to lose a loved one with An-nette’s passing. Willow had losther best friend, too, and had
likely suffered greatly for it. I
was too caught up in my ownworries to notice.
But now—now she galloped
through the high grass, and my
heart galloped right along withher.
The rest of the day went bylike any other—that is to say,
any other before Annette’sdeath. I went about my work
with confidence and a gleam inmy eye, knowing come tomor-
row Willow’d be out running
again, and Annette would bethere, too. She’d always be
there, keeping me company inher special way. Maybe it was a
little different now, but in thebiggest ways it was like it’d al-
ways been. Everything on the
by and by. Come tomorrow, I’dbe a man once again content
with life.
Then tomorrow came, and Ifound out how wrong I was.
I went to the stable early that
morning. I didn’t know if An-nette would let me watch herdress Willow—didn’t even know
if it was possible to watch—but I
figured it couldn’t hurt to try.The sun was barely winking overthe spruces, and I had a bounce
in my step that might’ve comestraight from Willow. I swungopen the one-hinged stall door,
called out a loud good morning
to Willow, then got the fright of my life.
A young woman stood in my
stable, and she was screaming.
I don’t like to admit it, but for
a moment I would’ve sworn upand down that it was Annette
standing there. The sun was be-
hind her, and her hair was glow-
ing strawberry blond like An-nette’s. She had a bridle in her
hand, too, and it didn’t take
much guessing to know it wasWillow’s.
But then the moment passed,
I blinked, and realized it wasMelissa Parcher. I had startledher with my swift entrance. The
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poor girl was trembling all over,
and I could tell from the look inher eyes she thought she was in
trouble. I raised my hands tocalm her, but I didn’t speak
right away. I couldn’t. I wasstunned speechless. My heart
felt like it was teetering on a
barbed wire fence. Had it been
Melissa I’d interrupted the otherday? Had it been Melissa who letWillow into the south pasture?
These were questions I was cer-tain I didn’t want answered. But
they were about to be, whether
I wanted it or not.
“It’s okay,” I whispered, mymouth drier than a desert can-
yon. “I ain’t out to hurt ya.”
“I’m sorry,” the girl spouted.
“I know I’m not sposed to behere. I couldn’t stay away any-more. I had to come see for my-self.”
I nodded, finding it hard to
make my vocal cords work. Fi-nally I said, “Come on. I’ll make
you some breakfast.”
She came back to the housewith me. As I started working
on breakfast she sat down atthe table, in the same spot I
usually waited when Annettemade dinner. I got right to it,frying up eggs and bacon andflapjacks. Somewhere in the
darker regions of my brain I
knew the girl would never eatthis much, but it wasn’t about
Melissa’s hunger. I was back to
doing busy work. I was drawingfrom that well of purpose again.And it didn’t surprise me to see
it was almost dry. In fact, I
wasn’t sure it would last out theday.
“My pa didn’t want me coming
out,” Melissa said, her voice sosmall it barely registered overthe eggs popping in my frying
pan. “He said I had no businessout here anymore. He said he’dwallop me good if I disobeyed.You won’t tell him, will ya?”
“No,” I said, keeping my eyes
on the eggs. “We’ll keep it be-tween us.”
“Thank you, sir.” Melissa
stared at her lap the same way Iwas staring at the frying pan. “Ihad to come see. I heard she
died, but it didn’t seem possible.
Ann don’t seem like the type of person that can be killed. It’s
like she’s too strong for that.”
My teeth gritted hard, and I wasglad my back was to her. I knewthen. I did blame God. I blamed
Him completely. The surge of
anger that came with that reali-zation made my hands clenchup and start shaking.
“Yeah,” I whispered, my voicehollow. “I know what you mean.
This ain’t the way it’s supposedto be.”
“I thought my pa only knocked
the wind out of her was all.”
That comment made it out of
her without a hitch. Yet the mo-
ment I heard it my lungs seizedup as if full of gravel. I turned
around slowly, taking breaths sosmall they wouldn’t have blown
a feather off a mountainside.
“What?”
Melissa looked at me, saw thehardness in my eyes and stiff-ened. “It was an accident,” she
said. “Me and Ann was riding
the backwoods at my place. Andwe ran into him by accident.Usually, I know where not to go.
But he moved his shinin’ jugswithout telling me. We barreledin there, knocking his ale over
and spilling it everywhere.”
She gulped. Tears stood in hereyes. Part of her didn’t want to
finish the story. But I think
Melissa knew she’d really comehere for one reason, and thiswas it. She wanted me to know.
Couldn’t stomach holding it in-
side anymore. It was too big forsuch a little girl. She went on.
“Pa was there, of course. He’d
been napping on his hammock.And when we barged in he
jumped up, thinking we werepeople out to get him or some-
thing. He grabbed his rifle, butdidn’t have time to aim. Ann
was already too close. So he
swung out at her, and the barrel
caught Annette in the chest.She came down like a sack of flour.” Melissa sobbed. “Then Pa
pulled me down off my horse.He yelled at me and slapped
me, then made me go back to
the house. I kept trying to seewhat happened to Ann, but shewas back behind a bush, and Pa
wasn’t letting me get any closer.
I took off for the house, thinkinghe was gonna send her home. I
didn’t know she was dead. Ipromise I never…” She broke off again as her chin set to trem-bling.
“I know you didn’t, Melissa.” As I stared at her tear-streakedface I realized the tears were
gone from my eyes. They had
shored up, replaced by some-thing else, something a mitechillier.
Melissa struggled to get a hold
of herself. “So anyway,” shesaid, almost whispering. “These
last few weeks I’ve been shut
up inside the house. Like I said,he’d wallop me good if he knew
I were here. He only let me
leave because we ran out of food. The garden ain’t producednothing for a spell, and after
mama left there was no one left
to go to the store. So he sentme, and that’s where I was
headed. I kinda changed course
without meaning to. One mo-ment I was on the road to town,the next I was running my fin-
gers over Willow’s bridle.” She
dabbed her eyes with her sleeveas she turned to the window. “I
never knew how to put on a bri-dle right until Annette showed
me how.”
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She passed into silence, letting
her memories carry her on. I
watched her, feeling a hot brickin my gut. Finally I looked backat the burnt eggs and took them
off the stove. I turned the
burner off and walked out of thekitchen, into my room. When I
came out I had my coat and hat
on, and Melissa was now theone watching me. “Where yougoing?” she asked.
“To the store,” I said, not
looking at her. “I’ll be backsoon. Don’t go nowhere.”
I stepped outside and headedfor the stable. I felt Melissa’s
nervous gaze on my back, morespecifically on the thing in myright hand, but I paid her no
mind. I had something to do,and anything else--breakfast, arickety stable door, even the BigMan Himself--was beyond my
ability to care. Somewhere in-
side I knew I was drawing upthe last bucket from that well of purpose, but that was fine by
me. This last bit of busy workdwarfed everything that hadcome before. I wouldn’t need
purpose by the day’s end. I only
needed what I already had in
my hand.
My scattershot rifle.
I cinched Willow to the frontrailing of the Parchers’ front
porch (I almost took Ritzy, but
then decided Willow deserved tobe here for this, too. We both
had a score to settle on that ac-count). From somewhere inside
that gray box of a house DanielParcher called out in a boorish
voice.
“Melissa, get your rump in
here! You done been too long,
and I’m starving!”
I didn’t respond, at least not
with words. I simply raised my
rifle in the direction of the frontwindow and pulled the trigger. Acrack like an earthquake rum-
bled the air as the window and a
good bit of the wall around it
blew to pieces. The man insidelet out a scream, one I was gladto hear. There would soon be
more.
I moved onto the porch at aswift clip, my boots clicking
heavy on the floorboards. Oneof those boots came up fast and
kicked the front door, and it
opened right up. Parcher hadn’tlocked it today. Didn’t know he
would need to. At any rate, Imoseyed on in, laying eyes on a
house more damaged and cha-otic than anything my rifle
could’ve done. Soiled clothes
hung over the furniture. Empty jugs were scattered about the
floor. Old vomit was caked on
the curtains, as if he had triedto make it to the window in timeand failed. I felt a fresh surge of
anger as I imagined Melissa liv-
ing in this squalor, and it got memoving again.
I heard him in the back room,
scrambling like a wolf in a henhouse. When I kicked in thedoor he let out a scream worthy
of a choirgirl. He had been
crawling through a window half
his size, but now he spunaround, stiff with fear. I took a
moment to get the measure of him and let him get the meas-ure of me. It’d been a good two
years since I’d seen Daniel
Parcher, and I noticed the dif-ference immediately. He wasthinner now—bonier, too. His
pasty skin hung on his face likea loose blanket. His light brownhair had no conceivable order. It
went where it went. His eyes
were the most recognizable fea-ture on him. I had seen thoseeyes in my shaving mirror over
the past month. They weredead, barony eyes.
They were filled with the slow
death.
“You took my daughter from
me,” I said, and as much as my
heart was racing, it was amaz-
ing how steady my voicesounded.Daniel Parcher said nothing. He
stared at me with those eyes,
knowing what was about to hap-pen. Maybe even thankful for it.
When the slow death has you, a
quick release starts to lookgood. I raised my rifle chest-level.
“You know you’ve got this
coming.”
“I know,” he said balefully. “Ihad it coming a long time.”
My finger nestled around the
trigger, done with the chatting.I had one purpose left in mysoul and I was bound to it.
Daniel Parcher knew it, becausehe closed his eyes and frownedmournfully. Dusty silver tears
ran down his cheeks. Maybe he
was grieving about the loss of his life, but I had a notion thathe’d been grieving over that for
a long time. My eyes narrowed
and my jaw stuck out.
The seconds passed.
Wind kicked up outside. Some-
where off in the woods, a dogbarked eagerly.
More seconds passed.
Slowly, quietly, I realized
something. I wasn’t born to this.I was a granger like my pa andhis pa before him. We spent our
days shepherding animals,keeping ‘em healthy, helpingnew ones into the world, tend-ing to their food, broaching their
trust, cleaning their coats, and
letting them live. Livestock wasour trade. Life was our trade—
and when you spend all your
days around life, the thought of death ain’t in your blood. TheBig Man most assuredly knows
what I’m talking about.
I lowered my rifle, my stom-ach clenching something fierce.
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A tear slid down my cheek, but I
barely even noticed. Parcheropened one eye, staring at me,
somehow even more afraid thanbefore. He thought I was gonna
make this slow and painful. Icould see it in that one quiver-
ing eye.
I cleared my throat. “Yourdaughter will not be coming
home…She’s bunkin’ at my
place now.” I propped the rifleon my shoulder, and he allowedhis other eye to open. “If you
have a problem with that, you
and I can augur about it at anytime and place you deem fit…I’llbe waiting.”
Somehow my feet got movingand took me out of that room. A
whimpering echo followed me, acoughing, pathetic thing thatfilled me with disgust. He wastrying to make words. As I
passed through the front door
he got something out.
“You were sposed to kill me,”
he said, sounding cheated.
I looked back and conjured upa stony smile. “Boy, you’re al-
ready dead. Your body justdon’t realize it.”
That was the last thing I ever
said to Daniel Parcher. It turnedout my words were true. Twomonths later the sheriff stepped
into the same house (to find outwhy Melissa was staying withme, ironically) and found Daniel
Parcher’s decaying corpse hud-
dled under the window, oneskeletal hand wrapped around amoonshine jug’s handle. “One
too many benders,” the sheriff
told me solemnly, but I knewbetter. The slow death got him,
plain and simple.
But that was still in the future.At the moment, walking out of
the Parcher shack, I only
wanted to untie Willow and re-move myself from that con-demned land. I climbed on Wil-
low and gigged her, and a misty
rain began to fall. I rode intothe forest with a cool chill on my
face. Water droplets like pearlscollected on every leaf and
flower, and it seemed like I no-ticed each one, noticed the
beauty of it all.
During that ride I noticedsomething else, too, but I could-
n’t tell you precisely when I no-
ticed it. For a spell it was Willowand I cutting through the brush.And then somewhere along the
way we added a member to our
party. I knew because I felt it—in the form of small handswrapped around my sides and a
small head nestled against myback. I felt her against me, andbefore I knew it the tears were
flowing. I kept looking forwardall the same. Part of me knew, Ithink, that this was a one-timedeal. By the time we reached
the house she’d be gone again.So I slowed Willow’s pace,closed my eyes, and tried to sa-
vor the feeling.
Behind me, I heard a softwhisper. “You’re a good man,
Pa—one of the best, I reckon.”
THE END
Ben Larkin
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What is
Cold Coffee? Cold Coffee? Cold Coffee? Cold Coffee? Cold Coffee began as an attempt to offer writers a more interactive writing community.
I was tired of bland post-and-read websites. CC was going to be warm, inviting andcomfortable. I wanted it to feel more like a home than a website.
The name Cold Coffee was derived from good conversations, warm chats betweengood friends where the coffee goes cold before it’s ever finished. Communication was
key to creating the environment I was looking for. Members had to be able to commu-nicate in real time. CC members enjoy two chat rooms, one that is exclusive to CC
members and another that is shared with other writer communities.
Aside from the warm colors and intimacy, members also enjoy the same aspects
they liked in other writing communities. They can post work not only in blogs or on dis-cussion boards but also in groups dedicated to specific types of writing.
CC is inviting not only to the up and coming writer but also the more polishedone. Writers who have books and want a community that provides them with a place to
display their art enjoy the Cold Coffee Bookstore - a free boutique where members canupload their book cover, blurbs and links to where their book can be purchased.
In an effort to offer the promising voices in the community a better opportunity
to improve their craft, CC offers workshops hosted by seasoned writers who want tohelp. An exclusive Events feature allows these workshops and meet-ups to be an-
nounced and/or scheduled.
Of course if you’re reading this, there is a good chance you’re reading it in CC’s
exclusive voice, Cold Coffee Magazine. Members of the CC community take pride inknowing they have a publication that caters only to them. In each issue, CCM publishes
the best of the best that the CC community has to offer in poetry, short stories, novel
and articles for writers.
If you’re looking for a warm, interactive writing community that offers the sameamenities other websites do, then Cold Coffee might be your home away from home.
The cost of membership is free; the friendships are priceless. What’s in your cup?
www.coldcoffee.ning.com
David Price
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Plagiarism
This is an honest article for
any who may have questions orare not sure what plagiarism
is. Let’s face it, we writers havea silent code amongst ourselves
in this and other writer’s com-munities, groups, clubs, and or-
ganizations, etc., and that
is: Don’t plagiarize my work.
Most of us don’t feel the need
to verbalize it since, as I said,there is a silent agreement, but
there are those who feel the
need to post warnings on theirwork, blogs or websites telling
would-be word thieves what willhappen to them and their vari-
ous body parts if it is discoveredthat their work has been sto-
len. The reason is simple -
there is a very real fear of beingplagiarized.
So the question arises: what
exactly is plagiarism? Manyhave opinions about what itmeans, and I could easily give
you a list of some of those, but
for the sake of not trying to con-fuse anyone or take up too
much of your time with this arti-cle, here is what plagiarism ac-tually is:
“Plagiarism is the practice of claiming or implying original au-thorship of (or incorporating
material from) someone else's
written or creative work, inwhole or in part, into one's own
without adequate acknowledge-ment. Unlike cases of forgery, in
which the authenticity of thewriting, document, or some
other kind of object itself is in
question, plagiarism is con-cerned with the issue of false
attribution.”
Notice I used quotation
marks? That’s because that
statement is not mine, but
quoted from another source;that source to be exact is
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plagiarism.
Here’s some more from thatsame webpage (mentioning that
this is from another source and
then giving that source’s infor-mation is called a “citation”):
“Within academia, plagiarismby students, professors, or re-searchers is considered aca-demic dishonesty or academic
fraud and offenders are subjectto academic censure. In journal-ism, plagiarism is considered a
breach of journalistic ethics, and
reporters caught plagiarizingtypically face disciplinary meas-
ures ranging from suspension totermination. Some individualscaught plagiarizing in academicor journalistic contexts claim
that they plagiarized uninten-
tionally, by failing to includequotations or give the appropri-ate citation. While plagiarism in
scholarship and journalism hasa centuries-old history, the de-velopment of the Internet,
where articles appear as elec-
tronic text, has made the physi-
cal act of copying the work of others much easier, simply by
copying and pasting text from
one web page to another.”
*The italics in the above para-
graph were added by me for
emphasis.I would also like to add that
you risk being forever black-
listed, which means that you will
not be able to publish your
work. How is that possible you
ask? Because publishers andeditors share information like
this amongst themselves. So if
one of them catches you giving
yourself credit for something
that someone else has written,
they are going to make it their
business to tell others about it.
Why you may ask? Because pla-
giarism is considered to be the
lowest thing one writer can do
to another. But more impor-
tantly for the publication, they
risk being sued by the original
author if they publish plagia-
rized material and worse than
that, they risk being blacklisted
themselves. And in a businesswhere reputation is everything,
that is everything. Besides be-
ing extremely unprofessional on
the part of the writer, it breeds
an atmosphere of distrust, since
when it is discovered, no one is
going to feel able to trust that
you won’t do it again.
Some may argue that thereare no original ideas anymoreand my opinion of such an argu-
ment is that whoever thinks that
is probably someone I shouldwatch out for, because there areoriginal ideas and ways of tak-
ing something such as a lovestory and putting your own par-ticular stamp on it.
Examples:
Anne Rice took the age-old
story of the vampire andmade it uniquely her own.
How age-old is it? Well ac-cording to the information
found here: http://
www.chebucto.ns.ca/~vampire/vhist.html, vam-pire myths go back thou-
sands of years. So even
Bram Stoker, the author of “Dracula,” which was pub-lished in 1897, was borrow-
ing the idea for his bookfrom a legend. Did he pla-giarize it? No, and neither
did Anne Rice.
“Star Wars,” and “Lord of theRings,” along with quite a few
other books borrow from thesome of the oldest themes inwriting: the hero on a quest, the
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romantic couple, the wizard, the
dark lord, etc. But each of
these stories takes those famil-iar themes and then does some-thing completely different with
them. If you want to read more
about these other archetypes inliterature, and also some basic
literary elements, there’s more
information about them here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Arche-type#Archetypes_in_literature
http://
www.orangeusd.k12.ca.us/yorba/literary_elements.htm
I’m sure that after readingthese lists you might be able to
think of other examples in lit-
erature and movies that also fitthose ideas. I’m pretty sureeach one of us could come up
with something uniquely our
own using this page as a guideand create something that could
only come from our imagina-
tions and abilities.
But the bottom line is still this:
There is no reason why you oranyone else who claims to be awriter can’t do the same thing.Which of course is what any
writer who has the capacity andthe imagination to write shouldbe able to do. If you still want
to argue that there are no origi-
nal ideas and use that as an ex-cuse to steal work and ideasthat aren’t your own, then per-
haps writing isn’t the field foryou. Seriously. Try something
else.
So the next time you want to
quote a song or words from a
movie or borrow anything from
another writer’s work, give the
original author, composer,
movie or whatever it is their
due. Use quotation marks,
mention the author’s name, use
citations, but for God’s sake,
don’t pretend that it’s your own
original work. For those of us
who are poets and fiction writ-
ers, the same goes for you,
too. We aren’t immune from
being blacklisted and publically
heralded as thieves.
I hope now it’s clear what pla-giarism is, so for those who
weren’t sure, you now have anexplanation and to those of whoyou are doing it, you have awarning. You will be found out,
because sooner or later thesekinds of things are always foundout. You will ruin your reputa-
tion and any hopes of having awriting career of any kind. So
you may want to ask yourself afew questions:
1. Is the momentary attention
that I’m receiving really worth
losing my reputation as not onlya writer, but also an honest hu-man being, really worth it?
2. Do I really want a writing
career, which means not onlythat I’m a serious writer, but
also that I’m willing to live up tostandards of journalistic profes-
sionalism?
3. Why am I doing this in the
first place? If I’m a creative per-son then surely I must be able
to come up with ideas of myown which come from me, my
experiences, my abilities andmy craft.
In the end, it’s up to each oneof us to decide what we want to
do. Ignorance isn’t an excuse -there is no excuse for plagiariz-ing someone else’s work.
Rachel Blackbirdsong
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Interview With
Brian Porter
What goes through the mind of a serial killer? What makes them tick? When RachelBrower from Cold Coffee Magazine set out to find the answer to these and other ques-
tions,Brian’s book, A Study in Red, is a magnificent journey into the fictionalized accounts
of world famous serial killer, Jack the Ripper. Rachel recently sat down to find out moreabout Brian and what readers might dare to find within the pages of his novel.
CCM: Hi Brian, Welcome To Cold Coffee Magazine. Thank you for taking the time to join us and talk about your success.
BP: Hello Rachel, thank you for the opportunity.
CCM: Some congratulations are definitely in order. From winning cover designs to new publishing con-tracts and now a movie deal with Thunderball Films, I guess you have every reason to be, as you said,
“Over the moon.”
BP: Definitely. I’m certainly grateful and if you will allow, have some exciting, ‘Hot off the press,’ news. ‘A Study in Red’ recently made top honors in ‘The Predators & Editors Best Thriller of 2008’ readers poll,and subject to scrutiny will soon have another award added to its growing list of accolades.
CCM: So how did ‘A Study in Red’ get picked for a film? Did you submit the manuscript or did your agentset it up?
BP: To be honest, the whole thing came as very big surprise to me. Shortly before Christmas, I receivedan email from Thunderball Films to say that they were interested in obtaining the Motion Picture/TVrights to my book, which they had been tracking for some time and felt would make a successful transi-
tion from book to screen.
CCM: What are negotiations like bringing a book to film?
BP: I’m not sure. I would guess every situation is different. My literary agent was unavailable so I en-tered into negotiations with the Executive Producer of Thunderball alone. I must have asked him a thou-sand questions, all of which he patiently and professionally provided the answers to. After three days of
almost non-stop e-mails I received a draft agreement. Thunderball is currently producingan early trailer to help promote the film and the book.
CCM: Your book is fantastic but it takes more than being a good writer to become commercially success-
ful. Competition for publishing contracts is fierce and as a result, self-publishing is on the rise. That beingsaid, how much of your success can be attributed to your tireless self-promotion and would you agreethat being proficient at self-promoting is a much needed skill?
BP: Self-publishing is an option for many writers but for me being traditionally published was important.That’s why it was very exciting when Double Dragon Publishing picked up ‘A Study in Red’.
I do agree that self-promotion is a vital element in a modern-day author’s portfolio of skills.
Most small publishers simply don’t have the advertising and promotional budgets of the larger publish-
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ing houses and it is generally left up to the author to promote their work. I promoted my book to the
best of my abilities and doing so has brought a great deal of success to the book.I’ve looked for any and every opportunity to spread the word about my book and from time to time have
encountered animosity for such self-promotion but that has not dissuaded me from my path. Thankfully,the vast majority of people have been only too pleased to hear and share in the good news.My advice to
any author, either traditionally or self-published is, “Promote, promote, promote!”
CCM: I don’t think anyone would argue that part of the reason your book shares such high visibility is a
direct result of your promotion work. What specifics can you share with other writers that might point
them in the right direction?
BP: For one, become a member of any organization that is concerned with the subject matter of your
book. Doing this will increase the potential readership and fan base for your work.
Writers must display a professional attitude toward their work and the marketing side of the business. I
learned to treat myself as a ‘product’ as much as the book. In effect I became a ‘brand’ and worked hardto make the name of the book synonymous with mine. When people think of Brian Porter, hopefully theythink of ‘A Study in Red.’
I make sure that when anyone contacts me about the book or my work they receive a reply! So manypeople tend to forget the personal touch in marketing their work. I don’t care how many emails fill my
inbox. If someone has taken the time to ask me a question or just to say hello, that they’ve enjoyed thebook, they get a reply. Writers who build a relationship with their readers unquestionably build a strongfan base for their books.
CCM: One of the things that makes ‘A Study in Red’ so fascinating is that the story is chockfull of inter-
esting facts. How much time did you invest in research for this book?
BP: The truth is that I first became interested in the Jack the Ripper killings over 35 years ago and I have
studied the case ever since. Those thirty-five years of research have gone into the creation of ‘A Study inRed’. I spent nearly six months of nonstop reading and re-reading of my research material before com-mencing the book.
CCM: Are you involved in your book’s conversion from novel to screenplay and if so what challenges as a
writer does that bring?
BP: Thunderball Films intends to use me as a consultant. What exactly that means, I don’t know, butwhatever my role, I’m sure it will present me with new challenges. I hope they employ a screenplaywriter who sticks to the essence of the book. After all, it was the storyline that they wanted in the first
place.
CCM: Editing can be a chore for even a short story. To edit an entire novel must have seemed like amonumental task. How difficult was it to edit your book?
BP: I was relieved of the task of editing by my publisher. I had, however, self-edited the book twice andthen had it proofread twice before the manuscript reached the publishers. It took almost as long to do
that as it did to write the book (well not quite). The editor from the publishing house was superb and
worked closely with me in fine-tuning the final manuscript.
CCM: Is it true that this book was originally based on a poem of yours by the same name?
BP: Yes, Rachel, that’s true. A few years ago I wrote a poem that I entitled ‘A Study in Red (An insightinto the mind of The Whitechapel Murderer).’ I tried to place myself inside the mind of Jack the Ripperand wrote the poem as though in his own words. When a publishing friend of mine read it he said it was
so intense and powerful that if he ever wrote a psychological thriller he would love to use that poem ashis introduction to the book. Of course, he never got the chance, because his remark actually kick-
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started my novel into being, and that poem now forms a part of the Ripper’s fictional journal in the
novel.
CCM: One of the appealing aspects of this book is the nonfiction feel about it. Did you lose any sleep orhave nightmares as the book took shape?
BP: Actually, I did. At times I was so immersed in the world and the characters I’d created that I woulddream of the scenes in the book as though they were happening to me. I had a few nightmares and
also a few good ideas as a result of those dreams. My wife was often worried that I was spending too
much time on the computer as I became totally obsessed with finishing the book, much as the centralcharacter in the novel becomes obsessed with completing his reading of the journal. It’s probably trueto say that ‘A Study in Red’ completely took over my life during the time spent in creating it.
CCM: With all you’ve learned in researching and writing this book do you think you know who JTR reallywas?
BP: I’ve had my own theory as to whom Jack the Ripper really was for some years. Having said that,
my personal ‘prime suspect’ wouldn’t have fit into the character I wrote for my fictional Ripper. I usedmy second ‘favorite’ suspect as my book model Jack. As no one knows who the Ripper was, it’s quite
possible that any of my suspects could have been Jack.
I’d like to think I know who he was, but then that is the dream of every Ripperologist and there are somany suspects that it’s unlikely we’ll ever know the truth.
CCM: Is Jack finally out of your system or is there more of his story to be told?
BP: I don’t think that Jack the Ripper will ever be totally out of my system. In fact, I’ve almost com-pleted a sequel to ‘A Study in Red’. ‘Legacy of the Ripper’ should be finished in a couple of months and
Double Dragon Publishing has already offered a contract for its publication. It should appear later this
year I hope.
CCM: Do you have a favorite writer or book?
BP: If I had to narrow it down, I’d say that I have two favorite writers. Firstly, Tess Gerritsen, whose
medical thrillers, ‘The Surgeon’ and ‘The Apprentice’, are second to none. She was also graciousenough to bestow me with encouragement and good wishes while I was writing ‘A Study in Red.’ In fact
she gave me permission to place her message on the cover of the book, an act that served to make meeven more appreciative of her work.
Secondly, I have to say that I love the work of Jeffery Deaver, who for me is the ‘Master of Misdirec-
tion’. His books are awesome and again he took the time, when I contacted him, to wish me luck andsuccess with the book. Both he and Tess appear in the acknowledgements of the book.
CCM: You’ve released three newer books: The Nemesis Cell, Purple Death and Pestilence. Do you feel that any of these books
will see the same success ‘A Study in Red’ has?
BP: Yes. In fact, The Nemesis Cell was released as an e-book by Stonehedge Publishing and will soon
appear in paperback from 4RV Publishing LLC. Both Purple Death and Pestilence will also be publishedin paperback by 4RV, and Pestilence has just received an absolutely awesome advance review, whichI’ve included here. I sincerely hope they will emulate ‘A Study in Red’ success. My other e-book re-
leases include ‘Avenue of the Dead’, ‘A Binary Convergence’ and ‘Dracula Doesn’t Live Here Anymore’.
CCM: In relation to writing, do you have any special or unique habits that help you find your muse?
BP: I would have to say no to that one. My mind is in a constant ferment, with ideas and plot scenarios
constantly popping into my head, which is probably why I have four novels on the go at the same time!
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CCM: The party’s over, the band has gone home and aside from some lasting memories, the cleaning
crew is all that’s left from your recent triumphs. What’s next? Tell your growing fan base what they canlook forward to from Brian Porter.
BP: It’s exciting, really. I’ve already mentioned Pestilence and Purple Death, coming soon from 4RV Pub-
lishing. They will also be releasing more of my work in the next two years, with Glastonbury, and a pa-perback version of ‘Avenue of the Dead’ also under contract to them. Of course I hope to see the sequel
to ‘A Study in Red’, ‘Legacy of the Ripper’ appearing in print as well.
I should also mention that I write children’s and young adult works, under the pen name Harry Porter.Once again coming from RV Publishing, ‘Harry Porter’s Dog Tales’ will tell the remarkable survival stories
of the pack of rescued dogs that are my constant companions. The first of these, ‘Tilly’s Tale’ will be re-
leased in May 2009, a month after ‘Alistair the Alligator’, a short illustrated story book for younger chil-dren.
CCM: In closing, what words of advice do you have for the ambitious and hopeful writers of the world?
BP: Rachel, the only advice I would give to any aspiring writer out there is to never, ever lose your self-
belief. If a writer doesn’t believe in his/her own work, it’s a sure thing that it will be hard to find anyone
else who does. Rejections may flow into the letterbox like confetti, but should be treated as occupationalhazards, and not taken to heart.
If you’re lucky enough to find a publisher who believes in you and wants to work with you, then do your
bit by helping to promote and market yourself to the best of your ability. Many fellow writers have said tome “I’ve no idea how to sell myself,” and yet there are so many simple ways to go about it. All it takes,
like writing a book, is a little research and application.
Nothing is going to come easily in the cutthroat world of publishing, and any author who wants to ‘makeit’ has to be prepared to push themselves to the limit in order to get their name ‘out there’.
*****
Cold Coffee would like to thank Brian Porter for his time and valued insights. His work ethic serves as a
great example to all writers who hope to see similar success.
Rachel Brower, for Cold Coffee Magazine, conducted this interview. Editing provided by ‘The Perfection-ists’
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So I Write
The keyboard sits in front of meWaiting for the words that will be;
Glimpses of hidden parts of meFeelings and logic that disagree.
Sleep eludes me in the night And so I write, so I write.
Pondering things that don't make sense
Clouds of confusion thick and dense A need for understanding so intenseMy only salvation to abandon pretense
The answer still not in my sight And so I write, so I write
Somewhere in my quest for clarity Somewhere in my quest for clarity
If approached with pure sincerity I begin to reconcile the disparity
Acceptance of the irregularity
Only then can I see the light So I write, so I write.
Cold Coffee Magazine Featured Writer
Candice Geary Candice Geary Candice Geary Candice Geary Artist not a poet
He is a quiet man
doesn't say mucheven when
you ask him directly
deep and still in his thoughts
guards them
like a sentry
shows his love
with his handsbig calloused hands
cut and scraped
rough from work
with cherry and hickory that keep him company
in his wood shop.
Day after day,he silently retreats
to craft his giftsof love for her-
an artist not a poet,
too few words for that.
Glimpse
dew drops glistening
in morning sunentangled in a spider
web
creating fragilebeauty lasting only moments
my watchful eyes
glimpsebrief existence
unravel too soon
gone.
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Kisimu
It is still with me
As if I brought it back in my luggage.
It lingersalmost like sadness
but this is different; An indescribable
longing to return.Homesickness for a place
Not my home.Or is it?
I have never been happier than I was
during my days in Kenya.
When I close my eyesI can drift back
on the breezeof a memory.
I see their faceslittle children's sunny faces
surrounding me
six deep.Music of their laughter
tinkling like tiny bellsso infectious in its charm;
my own laughter joins the happy chorus.
Each child lines upto shake my hand
and ask me questions:"Where do you live?"
"Did you fly on a plane?" "What is it like in America?"
"Do you know Obama? His father lived here."
"Can I touch your hair? It's so soft."
Little did I know
when we visited the museum in Kisumu
I would bethe most popular exhibit.
They followed mein a tight circle
eager to share with methe history of their culture
Showed me the snake exhibit Thought it was funny
I was afraid of snakes About to take a step
when I saw something
black and yellow in the grass.
I let out a surprised screamas I jumped over the snake.
All the children erupted in laughter as I looked back to realize
I had just saved myself from a garden hose.
I could have stayed there
playing with my new friendsbut their teacher called to them
The school field trip was over It was time to leave.
They will probably never know the incredible joy
they gave me that day or that I carry it
in my heart still.
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Mind, Body, Soul The poet’s eyes can captivate; so soft and kind
are they.
His lips can craft the sweetest verse and lift your
soul away.His fingers weave seductive tales; in ink and fire
they weep.His mind is full of love and passion, intricate and
deep.
The eyes, however long they gaze into the starlit
night,
Enchant the soul forever when his lover holds himtight.
Down into the darkest depths, he sees you from
within, And savors all the secrets hidden deep beneath
your skin.
The lips can reach and touch the heart whenever he may speak,
But silent they caress it, leaving knees and eyelids
weak.Your skin beneath his lips is tender. Trembling, it
cries, And brings itself to life to know a wanderer sowise.
His fingers move with grace and fashion, inno-
cence and pride,But find themselves seductive in his lover’s sweet
confide.
So smooth, they wander through your hair and
feel your mortal form,Entrancing you and loving you as softly they per-
form.
His mind encompasses your whole and cherisheseach day.
The flesh, the eyes and innocence he loves in
every way.Your soul forever his, he holds you sweetly as you
sleep,
His body full of love and passion, intricate and deep.
Robert "Spindle" Beard
Dusk
Dusk settles through the land, And cool winds blow, soft but brisk.
Colors paint the soft white sand,
From blue, to red, to amethyst.
Birds embrace from evening flight,
And bring their melodies to end.Closing blooms prepare for night,Until the day again transcends.
A gentle mist greets the sky, And wisps so softly through the trees.
With the darkness now so nigh,
Daylight whispers final pleas.
Pleas to have another chance,
To let the land seem bright and new.
To watch the rivers’ graceful dance, And bless the seas with heavens hues.
The emeralds dance upon the seas, And softly float themselves away Red and turquoise bless the breeze As evening twilight fades away.
Robert "Spindle" Beard
Editors Choice
Poetry
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This is how the horses screamed
We were chosen by a ceremony beyond our understanding picked from a field of uncertain poppies
swaying inside a marblemoment
perhaps the graphic innuendoes fell uncer-
tain from the bowl of the seraph
but I believed in himand I will tell you why;
he captivated me with the rule in the bend of
his wristseach time he pulled me up out of the sands
onto the waves
to spin strands out of sunlight and play cats cradle with me until the
wounds inside my body were just bruises without a memory to pon-
der
They locked up the wrong moment
when they bent low above my lips with their
whisperskissing my mystic oracle pulses;
there was a man in particular I remember
his eyes were the color of amaranth
and his mouth tasted like scornand his hands felt like clenched beauty
as they divided my corset to a lullaby
playing on the victriola down the hall and I remember him the most out of all the
monsters
because he never left me in the perfumed
silks of the night stayed until the dawn to oppress my flesh
with a songover his coffee and buttered rolls
as I watched him from beneath my lashesclenching my fists into the future.
I remember the horses screaminginside the epic night the manor was filled
with blazing company waltzing to candlelight Strauss melodies
the wolves stalking the edge of men plumped out with gold
and liqueur highs
nibbling the underside of a lady's alabaster chin
as she reclined in the music and drunken
laughter
delighted by the company of wolves who were in actuality quite something else
indeed;
I was the only one who heard the horses
above the music and the drunken blaze I remember seeking out old Enkielle's eyes
and he didn't move
and he didn't sound an alarm we both knew there was no point
when it was monsters like the ones ripping
through the night
who came at the will of the captivating shiver of my shoulders
I bent into that night like a naked arch of
back my hips against the bone balcony edge
wondering what color my sound would be
what light my fall would be
what sin would crawl out of the laurel leavesbraided around my head if I were to tip just slightly into the dawn
and scatter into the marble tiles below; the horse came screaming out of the mist
the wolf ate the darkness off my mouth withhis sentence of love
I flew through the flex of a moment turned
inside out into the futuremy silks like rose pleats
streaming past the dying and the blood in- side the manor
as I fell across the sweat and heat and mus-
cle of the stallion to sooth the screaming horse below
with my thighs firm about his belly with my hands in the longing of his mane
with my body pushed deep into his sweat and carved inside his need
for the human girl with the evergreen eyes
That night
the horses screamed I became a monster
wounded
inside a glass of spiritual suicide; and so I simply became
the monster body of them all.
Victoriaseleneskydome
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These Eyes
don't let
these eyes fool you,
for they've seen
a million wrongs...
and wept rightfully.
James K. Blaylock
I Didn’t Write
This For You
I didn’t write this for youIt was not my intention
That to you I dedicateThis writing of my inventionI did not aim to please you
With words I write here now I only did it because I wanted to
With or without you, anyhow You may not like my rhyming
You may not like its flow
I only write my way It’s the only way I know
I don’t do it for the glory I don’t do it for the art
I do it because it’s what I think
Or feel within my heart I know this may sound selfish
But it’s something that is mine And somewhere in these writ-
ings
The real me, you may find
No need for lies or falsenessOr any dishonesty
It’s just some words I write
With a truth that sets me freeI may not be poet
I may not be very good
I may be overlooked
Or misunderstood But still, I keep on going
Doing as I canDoes this make any sense to
you? Then maybe you understand.
James Takeo Panton
Wings of Pearl
hey there, being of obilvion,come take me far beyond...
or are you somewhat more,
with wings of pearl, I'd figure,
you were herefor higher purpose,
and as for us, we're just wast-ing time
on petty things, and viced in
shameful lust.
James K. Blaylock
The NeedleHums and Sings
And zips across the skinIt draws its lines across them
And marks them deep within A pattern is created
In flesh, it stands apart
Some have simple meaningsSome, deep within the heart
Steady, wincing, buzzingPulling, drawing blood
Colours sweat and glistenTrickle in their floods
Ringing, stinging, cutting
Marks and meanings I createEverywhere that I am drawn
I find this to be my fate Just a little picture
I place upon the skinNo mind to their own senses
Or to reasons there lie within
I just watch the needlesPuncture every pore
And turned what’s there into
something
That it will be no more.
James Takeo Panton
The Color of Roses
Love is a blackened rose
Once wilted, it never grows.Black hearts filled with deception.
Hard to tell what’s up from what’sdown.
A purple rose seems full of hope,But can meet doom at a mo-
ment’s spell.Loving it seems cruel and unreal
like a movie that’s still.
The heartache inside is unbeliev-
able, like an
Unsettled windstorm. Why can’t
it just get Done and be over with?
I am that midnight flower,
wilted to the world.I know I can never be a purple
rose.Gloom follows me to and fro.
Ready
To pour sorrow all down around me.
Love and roses go hand in hand.
It’s only the color they don’t un-derstand.
Dawn M. Olexa
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Gravity’s Embrace
Navigating through traffic and aMorning thundershower,
listening to him explain
from his school book,
countless galaxies, stars,quasars, black hole..
Touchdown.The drop-off lane at
St. Michael's Elementary School
“Mercury is closestto the sun
but Venus is hotter”, he says.(I didn’t know that)
He hops out. I blow him a kiss.
He slams the door and
a family of rain dropssplatter the seat where he sat
moments ago describing
a shift in distant orbital
relationships. "Neptuneis farther out than Pluto now.”
(I didn’t know that, either)
He bursts through the rainwriggling into the shoulder
straps
of the backpack he will
jettisonupon entering the school’scavernous main hall.
Clouds separate like gently-
teased
white cotton candy andthe sun pushes pinpoints of lus-
ter
into a world glistening wet.
Wiper blades catch
the last of the rain and
hurl it from the windshieldin droplets that arc skyward
then fall toward the earth
like twinkling glass meteors
caught in gravity's embrace.
Dennis Fleming
That it hurts to hear
Such other than our minds
Taunting usPlaying with our fingers to touch
ourselves
How we do lust
Like roses and flowers yearn for water
And a tree for children called
leavesYet we do whisper
Like the wind whips against the
masts
Blowing them in their vast stateLife without lungs
Without brainBut just a cardiac organ
Fusing blood through our veinsLike words taunt our nerves
wherever we yearn
The minds that taunt give us
our divine desire.
Netti Mulima
Desire
The desire runs from our finger-tips
Only holding us to not speak our
words
Just hide them as tear behind our eyelids
Holding the last breath
As it burns to come out Crawl out in dire importance
The meek eyes looking with
thorns as eyelashesThey called us rose's people
Our blood red brilliance
White purity
Hold me as the rain penetratesthe bare skin of me
The flesh that holds those petals
together Desire at your feet
I crown you not the belief
But that they call us sins
Full of our immorality
It itches to remove that veil fromher face
Take that cloth from his eyesIt runs in our fingertips
But do not dare caress
For it is not implacable
To display such affectionOr such infatuationThe sudden thought that it means
not to be wrongBut of the sarcasm
Our words are being called
It stands with a stroke of livingWithout breathingLife without breath
Rose without petals
The veil is tornThe crown has been worn
And yet we the people are broken
Yearning for that desireLying in our minds
How they make us smirk
And yearning for that touch
That feel and caressSkin upon skin
The departure from our innocenceBut our rebellion
Ringing in our ears
Surfaces
Along a dirt path of subcon-
scious
I stumble alone between
weedsovergrown around these
dreams,tangled and unreleased.
They lie, fragile petals
torn beyond valid reasons,left simply to rot beneath
demented thorns, unforgiven
and stabbed anew with ugly
truth.
This love was pity, freed now
and glad to be forever gone.
A smooth patch of numbness
is just another wall;
narcotic echoes that block and camouflage the road .
Rachel Brower
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Son Of My Soul By Debra Welch
An autobiographic journey through a life of neglectthat led to a vow to save a child’s life through adop-tion.
Fresh Frozen By Darden North
A young policeman and his tormented wife are granted
one last hope when they hear about a catalogue of hu-man egg donors.
The Making Of Tibias Ivory By Doug Jenkins
In the small town of Principle, everyone has a role,knows their place and is content for things to remainthe same…..idyllic.
The Tension Reliever By Dominique Watson
The Tension Reliever is a collection of poems, inspira-tional thoughts and short stories.
The Chosen Few By Matthew Simon
In an investigation that takes him through theneighborhoods of Boston, private investigator MaxLovely finds himself entangled in an expanding web.
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Irretrievably Broken By Irma Fritz
This is a haunted, funny and heart breaking account of German ex-patriots, Nora, Ruth, and Bettina Alder.
For Love Of Teddy By Jo A. Fulkerson
When teenage drug dealers threaten his younger
brother, Teddy, Michael Kirkpatrick goes after them.
Beaufort Falls By Mari Sloan
A determined little ghost avenges her death, protectsher living children and finds her lost child in BeaufortFalls.
Pure Of Heart By A. D. Smith
A fabled story of two wrongs don't make a right. Whenthe son of a king is killed, the royal family seeks re-venge.
Nora’s Soul By Margay Justice
A woman who lost her faith in all things angelic withthe death of her brother, must learn to reconnect withher faith when a series of events test her beliefs.
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The Fallen By Alexander Quinn
The Apocalypse has been averted, but at great cost.One girl gave her life to save the world, but her soul
was cast into Hell.
Silent Scream By Yvonne Mason
Gerard Schaefer shattered the lives of the families of
these young girls and destroyed the faith of the publicin law enforcement.
Pit-Stop Grill By Ben Larkin
Welcome to Pit-Stop Grill, a roadside attraction alongArizona’s Route 66 where travelers kick up their feetwhile sipping a nice cup of joe.
The Rose Petal Murders By David Price
When rookie detective Mary Archer gets a break in acold case file, She follows the lead to Boston where shepicks up the trail of a young hit– man.
Chronicles Of The Undead By A. F. Stewart
This Vampire horror novella is written as the personal journals of Samuel, Edmund, and Charlotte Harrington.
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A Book Inside, How To Write, Publish, And SellYour Story By Carol Denbow Whether you’ve already written your book or have abook inside, putting it all together can seem like a
challenge unknown to most.
Living The Thin Life By Elle Meyer
Creative ways to maintain your weight for life, pro-
vides tips and stories about healthy eating.
The Gate, A Journey By J. M. DosLobos
The gate is the story of a man and his loving memo-ries of Rosa.
Let Freedom Ring By Ernie Johnson
Four Cheyenne Braves advance to warriors in theirtribe.
The Ezekiel Code By Gary Val Tenuta
2012 is coming...The clock is ticking...The code mustbe deciphered.
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