Wherein I Talk About A Poem or Two, Terrible Poems

I’m supposed to be writing a review (that’s right, dear reader, I’ve been reviewing books at Horror Novel Reviews since January!  So far I’ve reviewed The Walking Dead: The Road to Woodbury and Cthulhu Unbound 3) but what better way is there to procrastinate than by plugging my own work?

James Ward Kirk’s anthology Grave Robbers is now available in dead-tree format.  Any guesses about the theme, dear reader?   That’s right!  Puppies.  And Jesus.  Jesus puppies.

Between the Grave Robbers‘ covers are poems I wrote, two of them, as you may have figured from the title of this post.  Why poems?  The first, “The Gallows of Perdition” is based on the rhyming scheme  I found in a Robert E. Howard poem, the name of which escapes me at the moment, featuring the consequences, both legal and unholy, of an act of necrophilia in the Old West.   The other “No Rest in Arkham Graves” an abortion of a poem with Cthulhuvian themes.   Really, they’re bad.  I should be too embarrassed to even admit to writing them.

And wow…sacrilegious and abortion jokes, and talk of necrophilia in a single blog-post.  Really out-did myself this time.  I feel like I should apologize to my grandma.

Despite my lack of talent whatsoever in crafting poetry, Mr. Kirk was kind enough to accept them.  It may have had to do with the hefty contribution I made to his PayPal account.  And the attached photo of me making puppy-dog eyes.  My cover-letter for the submission consisted of just one line, “Pretty please?”

And now that I’ve done a first-class job selling this work to you, go…read!

 

Bigfoot Terror Tales Vol. 2

Out now on the e-reader of your choice, Bigfoot Terror Tales Volume 2, sixteen stories of Sasquatch-inspired horror.  Included between those digital covers is my story “Incident at Hobb’s End”, the title lifted-with-love from John G. Fuller’s seminal UFO investigation classic Incident at Exeter (recently debunked by skeptic-extraodinaire Joe Nickell).   The titular town a reference to the book by missing horror-author Sutter Cane, itself a reference the classic Quatermass and the Pit.   All for $4.99 American.  You love me, you love horror, and you probably love Bigfoot.  You.  Want.  This.  Book.

Though, dear reader, I cannot allow you to purchase Bigfoot Terror Tales Volume 2 in good conscience without first making a confession.  I cheated.  You will not find a single Sasquatch in my story.  Sure, there are references to Bigfoot in “Incident at Hobb’s End”, but much like the TV series Finding Bigfoot there is not a single member of the eponymous species seen.

Fret not, I assure you “Incident at Hobb’s End” is heavy with the weird and paranormal, inspired by Hunt for the Skinwalker and the work of Phil Imbrogno (who was exposed as a fraud in 2011).    You’ll get Devil Monkeys, which according to the cryptozoologist Loren Coleman were responsible to the mauling of livestock in Kentucky in the 1970s.  These mysterious beasts once a starring role on an episode of the excellent but unnecessary Animal Planet found-footage series The Lost Tapes.  There are UFOs.  There is possession.  The Oz-Factor.  Men In Black, based on descriptions of aliens by Betty Hill and related by the aforementioned John G. Fuller in The Interrupted Journey, the book that created the alien abduction phenomenon.   Nothing in the story is made up, everything footnoted and referenced, a literary device I first encountered in Stephen Graham Jones’ brilliant, brilliant, brilliant Demon Theory.  I said I
didn’t make it up, but I didn’t say any of it is true.

And best of all, you see that quote from A.P. Fuchs, publisher and editor of Bigfoot Terror Tales Volume 2, at your right?  He is talking about “Incident at Hobb’s End.”   As I said, You.  Want.  This.  Book.

Esther and What She Brought Home

Last year, I placed a story in Cruentus Libri Press’ 100 Horrors anthology, a piece called “One Day, Tomorrow”.  The concept behind the collection is great, one hundred stories by one hundred writers, each story a total of one hundred words.  At Terrible Minds, Chuck Wendig issued a similar one-hundred-word story challenge for his weekly writing exercise.

I like one-hundred-word stories, both for the challenge they present in trying to craft a complete story with such a strict limitation and for the freedom it presents.  The economy one must work forces a subversion of the ideas of what a story is or must be, in the process liberating it. I love being able to able to play around with form and style.

Cruentus Libri Press has put out a submissions call for a follow up to 100 Horrors, so of course I’ve submitted another piece.  Wrote several in fact before settling on one to send.  Below is one I did not submit.  Enjoy.

Esther and What She Brought Home

My cat Esther, a tortoise-shell, brought me a gift from the overgrown field behind the house. In her jaws, a tiny man of tree-bark skin, wings like dead leaves and iridescent, compound eyes.

The man shrieked in cricket chirps, his wings buzzed angry. Esther squeezed the creature’s neck until it died. Beth, my wife, screamed at the sight.

I buried the thing under her rose bushes.

Insect songs and droning, and Esther’s agonized howls, woke us that night. We found her in the morning, hung by the neck from the porch light. Dozens of miniature spears protruded from her.

Wherein I Talk About Real Things

Today would have been my Grandma Shafer’s birthday.  The day she was born was also an election day.

To celebrate, three generations of her descendants will sit down at a kitchen table, playing Scrabble and eating ice-cream, two of her favorite things.  

No poll watching, no election results.  Those things are not real.  It’s sideshow.  It’s legerdemain.  

Your loved ones, family by blood or bond, is all that is real anymore.

Wherein I Wax Political, and Vulgar

Tomorrow is the most important presidential election in history, just like the seven other presidential elections I have suffered through in my thirty-four years.  And I’m going to sit this one out.

Why?

Because fuck you, that’s why.

Yes, I know, you have a multitude of arguments about why I should vote.  They are all fucking nonsense.  

Supposedly, it’s my civic duty to vote.  The fuck it is!  Fuck you and your sancti-fucking-monious Vote or Die and Rock the Vote bullshit.  My only arguable civic duty in regards to voting is to vote responsibly.  If you are voting for a candidate simply because of the fucking letter that follows their fucking name, you are not being responsible with your right to vote.  Or, if you are one of those fuckbrains who votes for any of the trivial fucking reasons that have nothing to do with the issues, like the candidate’s haircut or how much you’d like to have a beer with them, you are not being responsible for your vote.  If you are one of those above people, fuck you, you fucking fuckbrain, you’re one of the problems with this country.  

If you are voting and do not possess a working fucking knowledge of the issues of the day, fuck you, you are not being responsible with your vote.  If you do not have a firm grasp of said issues, your civic duty is not to vote.  Your civic duty is to stay as fucking far away from a polling station as fucking possible.  If you are un- or ill-informed about the issues plaguing this country, do your country and your fellow citizens a favor.  Don’t vote!

But I know what you’re saying right now, “Bruce, you follow politics, you follow the issues, you’re pretty well-informed, you should vote.”  Well, thank you for saying so, hypothetical reader.  I appreciate it.  However, just as it is fucking irresponsible to vote when you are not informed on the issues, it is just as fucking irresponsible to vote for candidates you do not agree with.  From my perspective, there is no daylight between Obama and Romney; no matter which of those fuckheads wins tomorrow, the United States will continue on a path of perpetual and aimless war, crony capitalism, crushing debt, eroding civil liberties, an imperial presidency, a drug war antithetical of our Constitution, lethal spending habits, a conflict with Iran, the assassination of American citizens without trial, and unrestricted drone warfare that is killing far more innocents than bad-guys.   

“But Bruce!  What about the wedge issue I care so much about!?” That’s all fine and great, and I appreciate that you are passionate about that particular wedge issue, and depending on the issue, I’m going to be right beside you fighting for it.  But that particular wedge issue won’t fucking matter if the Republic falls down around our fucking ears.

So, let me ask you then, how would it be responsible for me, not agreeing with fuckface (R) or fuckface (D), to cast a vote for either of them?  It wouldn’t.  If I stepped into a voting booth tomorrow and cast for either one of them, I’d be no different than all the other fucking assholes who aren’t voting responsibly. 

“But Bruce! Third Party!”  Okay, you kind of got me there.  I definitely agree with third parties are the way to go.  As a digression, if you are one of those dumbfucks who says, “If you vote third party, you’re wasting your vote,” fuck you.  You have been fucking brainwashed by the Republican-Democrat duopoly that is crushing this nation and you are as big as fucking problem as the duopoly.  No, the only way to waste your vote is to vote for someone or something you don’t believe in.  

But let me ask you, what’s the fucking point?  No third party is going to get the 5% of the vote on Tuesday to qualify for public funding in 2016.  It would be a waste of time and resources to drive to my polling station just to cast a vote that will not fucking matter.  My vote, your vote, and anyone’s vote is worth, at best, around $4.77 x 10 to the −2,650th power.  Just from a pure economical and environmental standpoint, how would it be responsible for me to waste the gas necessary to cast my vote?  Just starting my car spends more money than my vote is worth.    

So, we come to my favorite stupid fucking canard thrown around every four years.  ”If you don’t vote, don’t complain.” Fuck you in your fucking neck.  Here is the text of the Constitution.  Show me where it says if I don’t vote, I can’t complain.  I’ll save you the time and trouble.  It doesn’t say anything fucking thing like that.  My right to complain and bitch and moan about anything I fucking want is completely unrelated to voting.

Besides, I don’t remember signing on to that particular clause of our social contract.  You think I shouldn’t be able to complain if I don’t vote?

Yeah, try to fucking stop me.  

Wherein I Brag, Like I’m in a Weight Watchers Commercial

I wasn’t joking with the title.  This is going to be like a Weight Watcher’s commercial.

See that guy over on the left, very excited to hug a very uncomfortable Santa Claus?  That’s me, 24 December 2011.  See the sweater I’m wearing?  There it is, stretched all unsightly around my bulging gut.

Now see the guy on the right?  Yeah, that’s me too.  18 October 2012, wearing the same sweater.  Now it’s baggy around my middle, I had to pull it back to show the difference.

A rough 10 months and almost 20 pounds separate two Bruce’s.  That doesn’t sound like much weight, but what I’m dropping in fat I’m gaining in muscle.  There’s actual definition starting, in my legs, my arms.  And most incredible, as my gut shrinks, I’m starting to see a tiny bit of definition there too.

How did I do it?  We all know the answer.  I won’t go into specifics about what I did to lose the pounds, but yes it involved diet, and yes it involved exercise (boxing conditioning), because what worked for me may not work for someone else.  More important were dedication and hard work.  Worst part is my clothes no longer fit; good problem to have, though.

And I’m not done yet.

 

Good Dogs

Out today, in both Kindle and print editions of the British magazine Morpheus Tales, my weird-fiction semi-autobiographical short piece, “Good Dogs”.

Semi-autobiographical because almost everything in “Good Dogs” is true.  Roscoe and Jazz were real dogs.  The best dogs.  Sure, there will be other dogs, and they will be good dogs, but few of them will rise to that place along Roscoe and Jazz.  And yes, they were.  Roscoe’s been gone four years, Jazz three.

The people in the story are real, or at least are based on real people.  The conversations in the story happened at one time or another, in one form or another.  Mostly at a Christmas party, I think.  Or it was a graduation party.  It may have been both, at the same time.  

“Five weeks” is a significant period of time for me too, diagnosis to end.

And the real Roscoe found his end much the same way as it is in the story.  He knew it was not the end, but the very end.  He did what he could to spare the family the heartache.  But we knew what happened, why.  It was the wrong side of November and he was too old.

Still, he did what he could.

Because he wasn’t a good dog, he was the best dog.