July 9-15, 2001: Kevin Allen and Rachel Dyer

Bio (auto)

Kevin Allen was born in Gia Dinh, Vietnam in 1973 Adopted by an American family at 11 months and grew up in Rochester, NY Got tired of living by the rules, so moved to Seattle, worked for a dot.com, got laid off, and is now working for an adoption agency Plans to go back to Vietnam for the first time next April.

The following work is Copyright © 2001, and owned by Kevin Allen and may not be distributed or reprinted in any form whatsover without written permission from the author.

untitled cruel was when I told you I loved you and you nodded as if I would just go up in smoke leave you alone to blend back into your mother’s thigh drown cups of rice in a cooker until tender,  like the back of your hand the white of your teeth the afternoon we kissed was the vietnam I left thought I’d never go back without you by my side on the couch we sat you and your brother sang to vietnamese karaoke so similar to the songs you taught me the ones my mother must have taken to her grave untitled walking around the lake like we do the houses you plan to sell the cities I plan to move to kissing while twisting layed my hand on your stomach for love, I wondered to go back to how it couldíve been when in a second life without hesitation I asked for your hand instead of your hide It Would’ve Been Saturday man sits on a park bench bicycle by his side shot to death by another bicyclist the dead manís apartment goes up in flames left the stove on after cooking eggs too busy thinking about which book to bring to read in the park

Rachel Dyer
AnGsTp0eT@aol.com

Bio (auto)

i’m a sixteen year-old living in boston, and i’ve been writing poetry for several years, ever since i attended a summer writing workshop and understood that there are no limitations for the art, just the desire and drive to express oneself i attend boston latin school, i’m in my sophomore year there, and i’m hopefully college-bound, studying for a career having something to do with writing i mentor younger writers over the summer at the workshop now, and my work has been published in the school literary magazine, “the register,” and in the books produced by the workshop over the summer i try to keep writing, and hopefully someday i’ll develop the experience and a voice strong enough to be published.

The following work is Copyright © 2001, and owned by Rachel Dyer and may not be distributed or reprinted in any form whatsover without written permission from the author.

olivia the sister 1/15/2001 olivia Wed, 18 Oct 2000 as a leaf falls under my foot flaming and then going out like a crushed dream like life i hold you and contemplate your importance for the first time since before everything you are the incarnation of my father’s infidelity the infidel still unforgiven .he probably will remain unforgiven for years even in death unforgotten by my brother myself but especially my mother i’ve learned to look past this or over this or through this, clouded but not eclipsed i remember the first day i received the news of you growing in the womb of the bad-named one your mother toward whom my mother enlisted hate through us, the children-products of denial gone awry emotion based on little little else .other than my father’s inability to control himself because he lived in a bottle any bottle he could find or vial or syringe nameless things providing escape momentarily this was his excuse for living the pointless life that he did and still does execute in his every action i cried when i heard of you something welled up my mother’s wounding hate probably quiet hate-loud at times never accepting i felt the solidity of life as it settled around my shoulders even though it killed me and ate out my liver at specified times of day like when i would wake up in some pugatorial dream state in solemn remembrance of a pseudo past which was second -guessed and corrected after the initial shock of a fallen paternal deity i cried when i learned of you you meant something i wasn’t sure what you were significant it was wrong of them to invite you into the world maybe they cursingly tried not to forgot to but you came anyway my mother claimed that a baby or a child is a sure-fire way to keep a man around didn’t keep dad around i pointed out, embittered- and i’m sure she cried and resorted to her own bottle of liquid escape after that as i angrily turned back to reveries and in our household we were mad at each other for our emotions for days and we didn’t talk but we still hold the emotions stained memories in untrusting hands at first mother resisted outright denied that we should have absolutely anything at all to do with you my brother as a tree fell in the opposite direction of the chopping at all times he’s good at siding and knows when to side with whom i’m not, and i don’t my brother lay between as i strayed above conscience faded in and out like snowy reception after all you were just a baby i had seen pictures of you when unwilling pity overwhelmed me you were alive-i couldn’t pretend you weren’t and i certainly couldn’t hate a baby still ignorant of its own circumstances still ignorant of the circle it was perpetuating by no fault of its own then there were angry outbursts from mother who commanded the ultimate fidelity and obedience on the parts of her children whom she got to keep pending divorce like the house or this chair or that car we were objects whom she wore as badges of her ability to continue even as life cut the tendons behind her knees we dragged her by her arms but she dragged us by our loyalties and we suffered and we wondered about you and on quiet days-summer days mother would work to stretch ends and make them meet and my father unallowed unlawfully, in fact would bring you around at first he forced us by way of guilt took advantage of my good conscience but i gave myself the chance to know you you were named olivia and you had green eyes the very center of your life it was as if you breathed through those green eyes you aren’t yet capable of hate but now you have hair and can sit up and smile and make us fall in love with the hope-the new life that you represent i wish i could take you take you away from the atmosphere that i know will be your downfall i want to make you into a poet i want to make you brilliant i can see you would be- if not for what will happen to you in the future i see it in the green eyes innocently reflecting the fall clouds but you aren’t mine you belong to my father his committment to the bottle and to pain as much as i want to make it different for you my hands are tied and my eyes and my heart and my life so that i can regard you but not help you i’m fifteen you’re five months and our green eyes regard the leaves as they twirl from the trees and regard the wind as it reddens our cheeks and regard life from the same viewpoint for a harmonious moment and i feel the wisdom in you and the life that will be i can’t help but cry again as leaves swirl around and my heart aches my sister-i whisper your name and the fall winds carry it away along with my dreams the spicy smell of leaves and lives fallen but not wasted remind me that after rain there is sunshine and after winter there is spring