Views and Mechanics Publisher's Note Editor's Note Review of Language and Mind Review of This Is My Best Review of Lost in the Void Crossword (Solution Posted in September. Printable version in pdf format of journal.) May/Jun Crossword Solution Creative Nonfiction Puttin' on My Pearls By Cathryn Braswell My Dinner with Gacy By Andy Martello Mysteries of the Shenandoah Valley By Casey Clabough Getting Lucky By Dale Purvis Poetry Your Mind and You Are Our Sargasso Sea By Lita Sorensen Midsummer By Lita Sorensen Windows By Lita Sorensen Simple Man By B.K. Birch The View from Here By Mary Hudock The Dinner Party By Ruth Mark Fiction It's in the Stars By Linda Gallant Potts An Intimate Evening with Papa By Lance Garrison Ballard The Prank By Terri L. Knight A Pocketful of Starflakes By Leslie Wolter Cover Art Photography by Seth Brown About the Contributors © 2006, River Walk Journal and respective authors and artists. All rights reserved. Do not use or reproduce without permission. River Walk Journal, Inc. Board of Directors Chairman - Elizabeth Ross Vice Chairman - Joseph Koch Secretary/Treasurer - Geri Stock-Ross Editorial Director - Patti Kurtz, DA Literacy Director - Bill Mausteller Policy Director - PA State Rep. Jess Stairs Advisory Board Chairman - Patti Kurtz, DA Asst. Chairman - Dan Lachenman, PhD Samuel Hazo Christopher Leland Edwin Yoder Joseph Bathanti Journal Staff Publisher - Elizabeth Ross Editor-In-Chief - Joseph Koch Sen. Fiction Editor - Patti Kurtz Sen. Poetry Editor - Neeldhara Misra Sen. Creative Nonfiction Editor - Brenda Coxe Contributing Editor - Robert Dittman Publicity Director (PA) - Geri Stock-Ross For information about submissions, visit http://www.riverwalkjournal.org/submission.html. Questions about promotions, subscribers' services, and advertising should be sent to publisher@riverwalkjournal.org. River Walk Journal, Inc. is a non-profit corporation run entirely by volunteers. For information about volunteer opportunities and internships, visit http://www.volunteermatch.org/results/org_detail.jsp?orgid=58479. |
Editor's Note From the world of fiction we have Lance Garrison Ballard’s “An Evening With Papa” as well as Terri L Knight’s “The Prank,” and Leslie Wolter’s “A Pocketful of Starflakes.” Also in RWJ fiction you’ll find Linda Potts “It’s in the Stars.” Wolter’s “Starflakes”is a walk among the tall grass of a boy’s wonder and desperation. The grass is run over soon enough by reality in the form of a voice the boy trusts. Like the unmistakable rattling of a rusty red wagon, similar to the one in which his girl companion rides, the voice is impossible to ignore. Knight’s “The Prank” is a look at the strange forest of concrete, cliques, peers and choices that is inevitably high school. A moment’s decision becomes life changing, as another young man sips the heady brew of attraction of peer pressure. Pott’s “It’s in the Stars” is a quirky snapshot of faith and renewal, in which the zodiac takes on a new identity as a young woman’s beauty arsenal and wardrobe. “Stars” shows us how such simple or mundane items like cosmetics can actually act as agents of change for the better. Ballard’s piece is summed up succinctly in his own submission email when he says: “[the piece] . . . centers around Hemingway as he struggles with writer’s block while crafting The Old Man and the Sea.” Sacrilege? Not Likely. How dare anyone presume to know the great master’s thoughts? Any writer who knows they have a great piece inside them just clawing to get out, one that won’t let them be, knows exactly how he felt, scotch and all. Our creative nonfiction offerings for this issue are, as our readers expect, wonderfully varied. We have Cathryn Braswell’s “Putting on the Pearls,” Dale Purvis’s “Getting Lucky,” and Casey Clabough’s “Mysteries of the Shenandoah Valley.” The always controversial Andy Martello entertains us with “My Dinner with Gacy.” “Puttin’ on My Pearls” offers the eternal contrast of identity, between the traditional façade of the southern woman and the inner life of a young woman coming to terms with who she really is. “Getting Lucky” is, for lack of a better word—absolutely darling. I haven’t enjoyed an animal story in print this much since ”Lad of Sunnybank” stories in seventh grade. I enjoyed “Mystery of the Shenandoah valley” because I have both driven solo and with family through parts of the area he describes. However Clabough shows the area to us through the eyes of perhaps Louis and Clark or their counterparts—afoot and immersed in the areas sensory beauty, as well as its history. Martello’s “My Dinner with Gacy” was scary as only Andy Martello can be. Andy’s simple, yet starkly ironic connections between life’s ordinary details and this truly despicable man were unnerving. That should be a lesson, because all of us should be a bit edgy when confronted with the how close evil can be to the most ordinary and innocent around us. Our poetry offerings carry as much primal power as the rest of the issue. Mary Hudock’s “The View from Here” walks its’ determined way across the page, cold and sad, refusing to stop. Anyone’ who’s a fan of Sylvia Plath or Dickinson should enjoy Birch’s “Simple Man” and Mark’s “A Dinner Party.” Both poems evoke the gilded lilies, the beautiful people, and the glitz and the glamour of yesteryear that can’t be erased even by shadows of reality. Lita Sorenson’s three offering are all weather-related. “Your Mind and You are Our Sargasso Sea” is a thought--provoking look at the entitled body of water. “Midsummer” has the throbbing pulse of a held breath; the night’s darkness and the day’s heat and life, struggling against each other. “Windows” is the tense pressure of a clenched fist right before it opens like clouds before they dump the elemental powers of the wind and rain over the earth. Joseph Koch |