In every issue of Prime Number Magazine we feature two poets and two short story writers from Press 53, our publisher. Our goal is to introduce readers to some of the remarkable voices in the Press 53 catalog. If you like these poems and stories and wish to buy a book, use discount code P53D20 for a twenty percent discount on your entire order (discount does not apply to our already highly discounted Five-Book Bundle—five softcovers for $53).
Shivani Mehta
The Butterflies
You unzip my dress, a curve from the side of my left breast to the top of my hip. My body is a column of butterflies. One by one, roused by the light and cool air, they wake from sleep. One by one they open their wings, answering the instinct to be free. They scatter in all directions; I learn what it means to be in many places at once.
###
The Man
When I saw the little guy, nose pressed to the glass wall of his cage, I knew I had to have him. He was just what I’d been looking for, as tall as a ball-point pen when clicked open. He weighed no more than a sprig of black sage when I lifted him, placed him in the breast pocket of my shirt where he settled, nestled into the warmth of my body. I wondered if marsupial mothers felt like this, if they gestated their miniscule babies as I carried my little man, forgetting he was there until he moved, jabbed a hand or foot into the side of my breast. That first evening in my apartment we got acquainted over spaghetti and meatballs. I opened a bottle of champagne, poured him half a thimbleful. He ate five crumbs from my plate and a sliver of shaved parmesan the size of a clipped fingernail. I take him everywhere, dress-shopping, tucked into my waistband at the gym, on dates with other men. They never know he’s there, pressed into my cleavage. At the office, I set him in a glass jar on my desk. He naps for much of the morning, sliding between the folds of an old dishtowel. Every evening, after supper I sit on the balcony, let him perch on my shoulder. I’m so happy, he murmured once, his breath teasing my earlobe, his fingers tickling my neck like a cat’s whiskers.
###
Shivani Mehta was born in Mumbai and raised in Singapore. She moved to New York to attend Hamilton College and then earned a Juris Doctor from Syracuse University College of Law. Her prose poems have appeared in Narrative Magazine, Coachella Review, Cold Mountain Review, Fjord’s Review, Hotel Amerika, The Prose Poem Project, The Normal School, Used Furniture Review, Generations Literary Journal, Midwest Quarterly Review, and Painted Bride Quarterly. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband, children, dog, two cats, and several fish. Useful Information for the Soon-to-Be Beheaded is her debut poetry collection.
Richard Jackson
Easy
A few constellations begin to poke through the fabric
of the sky. Bits of moonlight rub against the water.
It’s easy to imagine how the leftover light at dusk
leaves us wandering through our own dreams
trying to pick out what’s real. It’s easy to see
the man at the railing of the Walnut Street Bridge as
a jumper. Just think of the way his lost past sits like
a squatter on his heart, how whatever he dreamt
has gone on without him. Is that why he has tossed
a few coins in the sax player’s case? Nightbirds in
the trestle above him keep repeating things he can’t
say himself. There’s the mold in the fridge, the shadeless
lamp. You can imagine the rest. There’s always a note
someone’s saved.
Do you think I am making this up because
it’s so easy? It may be that our words colonize our feelings,
that we know everything by its opposite. Why is there
something rather than nothing? the philosophers always ask.
We really can’t escape what we dream. I wish I could
know if the man were going to jump, but what would I do?
I’ve come here to listen to the music, not to write this.
Words have their own agenda and it doesn’t include us.
So it’s easy to see how our histories get lost the way
those plastic bags that were once filled with items we’ve
long forgotten accumulate against the chain link fence.
Each star we can name is surrounded by its own darkness.
There’s the river’s darkness in every history we know.
Not so many years ago they hung two Black men,
Ed Johnson in 1906 and Alfred Blount in 1893 on this
bridge continuing, as it were, after Columbus who
enslaved and let be raped, over a quarter million
Taino Indians in Hispanola. And now they are
uncovering another mass grave in Mexico, more
in the Sudan, opening like trap doors to the soul,
and it would be easy to file that away and write about
something personal and forget everything that’s happened.
It’s easy to stand by like the bystanders who recorded
the assault on Gilbert Estrada, aged 51, in San Diego
on their cell phones. In truth, they hovered over
their own shadows.
There’s a hive of stars gathering
above the bridge. I would like to find the words
to make sure the man only looks longingly at the way
night has begun to deepen itself in the river. It’s easy
to drown yourself in words that drift out of your past.
Don’t play what’s there, play what’s not there,
Miles Davis once said. And maybe that’s the answer.
We have our Being in others, Paul Tillich wrote.
When a fish splashes the water with light we want
to take it as a sign.
I’ve said about all I can.
I’ll keep watch until the Bridge is cleared.
Venus has sunk below the far hill. ’Round Midnight,
the sax player starts up again just to keep breathing.
Our own lives are littered with darkened voices.
Why Was I Born, played Kenny Burrell and John Coltrane,
and the night blows over. It’s a question you have
to answer on the bridge. It’s not easy, but it’s up to you.
###
Richard Jackson is the author of fourteen books of poems, including Broken Horizons (Press 53, 2018), Out of Place (2014, rpt. Ashland Poetry Press, 2017), The Hearts’ Many Doors (anthology, 2017) and Retrievals (2015), as well as ten books of criticism, anthologies and translations. He is a winner of Guggenheim, Fulbright, NEA, NEH, Witter-Bynner fellowships, five Pushcart Prize appearances, the Dane Zajc residency in Slovenia, and the Order of Freedom medal from the President of Slovenia for humanitarian and literary work during the Balkan wars.
Shuly Xóchitl Cawood
Lost and Found
Matilde was nowhere in the apartment, not curled atop the television, not crouched below the bed. Eleanor checked every kitchen cabinet and even the broken dryer, calling Matilde’s name.
The last time Eleanor had seen the white cat was last night when Matilde had scampered under the couch while Eleanor and Solomon argued about Arnie.
“Have you seen Matilde?” she asked Solomon now, standing in the bathroom doorway as he brushed his teeth.
He shook his head at her in the mirror.
He had gone to bed three hours after Eleanor. “You were the last one up,” she said. He had slept on the edge of their double bed that until three months ago had been only his.
Solomon spit in the sink. “So?”
“Did you let her out by accident? Will you help me look for her?”
“I’m meeting Jared in a minute.”
“For what?”
“You’re not the only one who likes to go out for breakfast.”
“Can’t you be late?” Eleanor asked. “Jared’s never on time.”
Solomon pushed past her. “She’ll come back. She always does.”
~ ~ ~
Eleanor thought of places where Matilde might be. She hoped the cat was not cold. It was so easy to get lost here.
Even though Eleanor had lived in the city for almost two years, she rarely drove and had to take out a map to get anywhere. Arnie’s conference was across town, and he had suggested a diner near his hotel that claimed to serve the city’s best waffles. Eleanor made three wrong turns and finally pulled over and asked for directions.
This never would have happened if Solomon had driven. He was of the city: He knew which deli made the best Reuben, which taquería served homemade salsa, which club was just enough on the good side of seedy to be hip. He knew the store that sold roasted, salted pistachios in the back, in hot paper bags. He knew what car mechanic to trust, and where to get the best coffee, at Wide-Eyed.
“Don’t drink it with sugar,” Solomon said the first time, taking the two packets from Eleanor’s hand.
“It’s too bitter.”
“Bitterness isn’t bad,” he said. “You’ve got to enjoy what things really are, not doctor them into something different.”
Eleanor took a sip and then set the mug down and slid it away on the table. “I can’t do this.”
He pushed the mug back. “I have complete faith in you.”
She took another sip, imagining what it would be like if she had no comparison. In the end, he was right. Everyone could learn to live with bitterness. It just depended on changing the notion of sweet, or forgetting it.
~ ~ ~
Last night, before the argument, Eleanor’s mother had called. “When are you coming home? Your father wants to know.”
“Does Dad need me to come home?”
“You know him. He doesn’t ask for much.”
“Mom, it’s hard for me to take days off,” Eleanor said. “I’m trying to save them for vacation next year.”
“Where are you going?”
“I don’t know yet.”
“So you’re not coming home?”
“I’ll be home at Christmas. That’s just two months. Is that okay?”
“If going on a trip with your new boyfriend makes you happy, then of course that’s what we want,” her mother said. “Did I tell you I saw Arnie the other day?”
~ ~ ~
The first time Eleanor saw Arnie was at the public pool, when they were both sixteen. A towel was flung over his legs, another over his shoulders, another over his head. He was reading a book. She had teased him about it endlessly.
Now, as Arnie emerged from the elevator in the hotel lobby, he opened his arms upon seeing Eleanor. He was so tall her face became buried in his sweater, which smelled, as always, of chamomile. She closed her eyes and held on.
“Hey,” he said. “You okay?”
Eleanor stepped back. “You smell like home.”
He laughed. “I hope that’s a good thing.”
Arnie had two hours before his conference started again. They chose a booth, ordered waffles with raspberries and extra butter.
“I see your parents all the time,” he said. “Sometimes they stop by the office to ask a legal question.”
“I’m sorry—I’ll ask them to stop.”
“Don’t do that,” he said. “It used to be hard, you know, at first, but now I like seeing them.”
They talked for the next hour, and the room embraced them with light and warmth. Then he signaled for the check. “Hey,” he said. “I have news. No, it’s good. I wanted to tell you before your mom found out and told you first.”
Eleanor squeezed her napkin with both her hands.
~ ~ ~
When Eleanor walked into the apartment, she called out for Matilde, who sauntered from the kitchen.
“I told you,” Solomon said, splayed out across the couch, holding the remote, the television silenced.
“Where was she?” Eleanor rubbed her face against the cat’s.
“I was thinking.” Solomon sat up and motioned Eleanor to sit down, but she remained. “How about we go someplace special for Christmas.”
“I’m going home. You said you had to work.”
“What if I told you I talked my boss into letting me off, and I found tickets to a place you’ll want to go.”
“Where?”
“Vancouver. Paris. Guadalajara. One of those.”
“My mom would kill me.”
“You’ll be far away. She won’t be able to kill you.”
“Solly . . .”
“You don’t have to decide now. Just think about it. Please? It’ll be our first real Christmas. I want us to remember it. “
Christmas seemed easier than so many other things he had asked.
“By the way,” he said, “she came home because of me.”
“What?”
“I canceled with Jared, and I walked around with a damn can of tuna. When that didn’t work, I put the can on the front steps and sat there and waited.”
“How long?”
“Until she came back.”
“Solly, you didn’t have to.”
“It doesn’t matter who gave her to you,” he said. “She’s ours now.”
###
Shuly Xóchitl Cawood grew up writing stories on her father’s blue Selectric typewriter. She is the author of A Small Thing to Want: Stories (Press 53) and three other books: The Going and Goodbye: A Memoir (Platypus Press, 2017); 52 Things I Wish I Could Have Told Myself When I Was 17 (Cimarron Books, 2018); and Trouble Can Be So Beautiful at the Beginning (Mercer University Press), winner of the 2019 Adrienne Bond Award for Poetry. Shuly earned her MFA from Queens University of Charlotte, and her writing has been published in Brevity, The Rumpus, Cider Press Review, and others.
Robert Scotellaro
What Are the Chances?
Let’s say, the skateboarders were back again, scraping up and down the empty swimming pool next door. There was the sharp, skunky scent of pot in the air, and we were on the deck watching the lemons on the tree yellow.
Let’s say, we just got back home and the jewelry was missing, the window jimmied, and that large kitchen knife we kept in the drawer was on the bed. Our bed. That whoever took our stuff didn’t need to use it. But held it just in case. It was still there. A shark in the waves of an unmade bed.
Let’s say, I was more than a little annoyed that Camille was taking so frigging long picking through the aisles at Safeway on a sunny Saturday. Filling the cart, when I wanted it shallow. And what the hell was this thing about timing and luck anyway? A butcher knife in the hand/in the sheets/in the belly? The neighborhood kids on the other side of the hedges, oblivious—scraping, scraping…
Let’s say, cancer never came at Kay Ballenger like a boulder down a mountain. And Joe didn’t lose his job—everything—and he was out there, instead of these rowdies, blackening barbecued ribs like he always did on weekends. And his wife, Kay, was by the pool in that blue sundress or on an inflatable in the water with a drink, her straw with lipstick at the end of it, her/our favorite shade of red. How it might have been different with their dog, Bruno, barking.
Let’s say, that mockingbird was back in the poplars making a fuss with a throat full of stolen music, but I hardly heard it as we stared off, saying we needed to call the police. Needed to talk. One of the rowdies just said, “Fuckin’ A!” after some kind of tricky maneuver, banging the hard wheels against the Spanish tiles Kay left wet butt prints against, I never forgot, just before she got up to dive back in. When the pool, so much, hadn’t yet been emptied.
###
Robert Scotellaro has published widely in national and international books, journals and anthologies. His stories have been included in Best Small Fictions (2016 and 2017) and Best Microfiction 2020. He is the author of seven literary chapbooks, several books for children, and five full-length story collections: What Are the Chances?: Flash Fictions; Measuring the Distance; What We Know So Far (winner of the 2015 Blue Light Book Award); Bad Motel; and Nothing Is Ever One Thing. He has edited, along with James Thomas, New Micro: Exceptionally Short Fiction published by W.W. Norton & Company (2018). He is one of the founding donors to The Ransom Flash Fiction Collection at the University of Texas, Austin.