TODAY

Reading Joan Didion's oeuvre in an attempt to keep my own head together, or rather to acknowledge that it has also left my body, I came upon this, still relevant today--the opening of Slouching Towards Bethlehem:

"The center was not holding. It was a country of bankruptcy notices and public-auction announcements and commonplace reports of casual killings and misplaced children and abandoned homes and vandals who misplaced even the four-letter words they scrawled. It was a country in which families routinely disappeared, trailing bad checks and repossession papers. Adolescents drifted from city to torn city, sloughing off both the past and the future as snakes shed their skins, children who were never taught and would never now learn the games that had held the society together. People were missing. Those left behind filed desultory missing-persons reports, then moved on themselves.

"It was not a country in open revolution. It was not a country under enemy siege. It was the United States of America in the cold, late spring of 1967..."

We are now a country in open revolution. We are now under enemy siege. And it is the United States of America in the winter of 2016.

BLACK SCAT REVIEW--NOIR--AND OBSESSION

I've had the pleasure and privilege of appearing in a few lit mags over the years. Black Scat Review counts among the most exquisite in terms of its look and includes an unusually interesting cast of international authors such as Alphonse Allais, Adrienne Auvray, Paulo Brito, William L. Gibson, Agnes Potier, Douglas Skinner, Mercie Pedro e Silva, among others, in its current issue on "Obsession." The piece of mine that is included is titled, "A Play of Jeans," and pays homage to Jean Seberg as well as the art of cinema.

If you are a reader who is fond of noir, dada, surrealism, existentialism or radicalism explore Black Scat Review. And if you are a writer who is drawn to these realms, you have found your niche.

https://blackscatbooks.com/black-scat-review/

Here's an excerpt from The Obsession Issue #16:

"They sat together on the beach in silence. It was drizzling and he cupped his hands against the wind as he lit up. He had felt hungry before, but now all he wanted was the cigarette. She was boring a hole through his side, knowing he sensed it. He pretended not to notice, and continued to puff in silence. In the water three mallard ducks with shiny green heads were gliding past, bobbing in and out, filtering the briny food through their bills in the mud. She looked over at him again, and this time he offered her his cigarette."

--From "Out of Time," by Adrienne Auvray