California State University (CSU): Open Journal Systems

Williams, Deborah

Deborah Williams 
I Used to Watch Westerns 
I used to watch westerns 
But I just don't anymore . . .  
Actually, it's gettin' hard to watch anything 
Like trying to watch luchas on Saturday night 
Papa's hollerin' 'cause he 's out of beer. 
Mama yells go get a job. 
My mea called three times to tell me she's  had no period for 
three months. And I 'm leavin' out the door to fmd someplace 
quiet 
just when Mad Dog Cortinas hammerlocks that white guy Pretty 
Boy George. 
My pants slide onto the sheepskin 
pointed patent leather toe spurs 
my short into a canter 
through the barrio. 
I pick up my carnal, standing on the comer. 
He's  packin' - A holster. 
He says, "hang left on Soto/park back/Danny's Doghut/ 
E Street clicka rounding up chevys." 
Mad chevys with their eyes on glaring us down 
My carnal says he could use a little music, turns up KRLA 
He says, "Jimmy turned Jesus/brother killed/couldn't take it." 
Little Richard wants his baby back 
I can't find a cigarette 
the vatos are getting out of their cars 
63 
Little Richard lays on the soul "ooooooooooooooooh Babeee . .. " 
Orale mama, they done it again. A 38 right into my chest. 
Lucky, I keep a spare to bite on 
when County Hospital is cutting a hole for a plastic hose 
saves my collapsing lung. 
A week later 
my carnal and I tum south on Brooklyn 
to the tattoo parlor 
past cringing houses, smoking like teepees 
to hang safe with the homeboys 
drinking, talking war 
My carnal says, "we're tough" 
md I say, 
"Ya, real tough." 
But I don't think I say it right. 


English

I Used to Watch Westerns

Seiwert, Ken

Coffee in a Styrofoam Cup

Lopez, L. M.

L. M. Lopez 
White Radio 
I'll ask Felix to take the box out, she thought. The box in the 
closet. Felix should be able to do that. Where is Felix? Gone so 
long. He had beaten the avocados out of her tree with the bat. After 
enough time passed she'd given him the bat. A Louisville Slugger. 
He'd been glad to get it. When he smiled he had hardly a harelip 
at all. 
Anna Maria would be coming soon to clean out the drawers, the 
cupboards, the closet. Felix had to take the box out today. Maybe 
he would bury it. He is a good boy. Was it Felix or Anna Maria who 
found the pigeon chicks under the carport? One was smashed in its 
shell. The other, featherless and reptilian, the children carried in the 
cup of their small hands and fed dabs of rice from the tips of their 
fingers. 
Anna Maria. That she and Luis, in their plodding ordinariness, 
should have such a child was a miracle of Jesus and all of the saints. 
Luis was squat, rest his soul, with the bulging eyes and the fallen 
jowls of a toad. She was large-boned, tall and strong. Her mild eyes 
too small for her broad Indian nose. Yet, Anna Maria dazzled. Her 
face of ovals, her slender neck, the glossy black volume of hair that 
tumbled down to her waist augmented her astonishing beauty. 
Where could Felix be? Our Lady of Guadalupe on the bed stand 
held her ceramic arms out, the palms uplifted in supplicating 
inquiry. He didn't usually stay away this long. He came two, three 
times a day to press his small brown face against her window screen 
to ask for odd jobs to do for spending money. She kept some 
peppermint canes for him. She would give him two dollars to bury 
the box in the closet. 
WHITE RADIO 6 1  
He would bury the box without looking inside. Anna Maria 
would poke and probe and come away with the darkness of a storm 
on her face. Anna Maria always had to know and when she knew 
she became unhappy. Felix would smile, say, sure, and the box 
would be gone. 
Sometimes she thought she saw the cardboard vibrate with the 
lisping beat of a snare drum and the reedy whine of a saxophone 
wafting from sealed carton flaps. They called it, Swing, the music 
of the big bands. She should have taken it to the dump in the pickup, 
when she was able. She ought to have put it out with the trash long 
ago. But it was too much a trophy to throw away. 
Her grandfather had a broad silver belt with lightning bars of 
turquoise in the buckle. He 'd taken it from a dead Ute after a dance. 
He kept it all his life and wore it in his grave. She did not like to have 
the box buried, but it must be done for Anna Maria. 
Anna Maria was just sixteen when she returned from an 
afternoon at the library with a tall redheaded serviceman. Her large 
eyes had been moist and glimmering with pleasure. 
"Mama, Papa meet Cap." 
"Pleased to meet you folks." 
"He 's stationed at the base." 
"Had a forty-eight hour leave and decided to see town. Boy, 
I 'm glad I did." 
He smiled and squeezed their child around the waist. Elena 
could smell liquor on his breath. His collar was unbuttoned and a 
tuft of wiry orange hair sprouted from his exposed undershirt. 
Anna Maria had never held a man before and his meaty touch put 
her in his thrall. Luis squinted his distaste. 
Elena fixed dinner for them. Steaming platters were her 
strongest memory. She turned her attention to the meal and kept her 
eyes averted from her daughter in the arms of that man. 
"Is Anna Maria as good a cook as you?" 
"Anna Maria is a child." 
That was the only time Elena spoke to him that first evening. 
She would always remember the words she said to him as though 
they had been significant, or portentous. 
Luis never did a thing. It was his way. He kept his lips pursed 
and knelt to pray at the small shrine of plaster santeros in the 
backyard. He spent time in the garden, weeding his tomatoes, when 
62 NORTHRIDGE REVJEW 
Cap came to visit. He liked to find lizards under rocks and sever 
them neatly with his hoe. It pleased him to see the separated halves 
writhe away. Elena served food-rice, chicken, com, squash. 
Platter after platter emerged from her small kitchen, balanced on 
her uplifted, supplicating palms. Anna Maria smiled and blushed. 
Luis and Elena resolved to be tolerant, modem parents. They 
would not interfere with their daughter's love. They knew she 
would run off if they did. 
Cap liked to sneak up on people. He walked on the balls of his 
feet and approached silently from behind, not speaking until he was 
sure his prey would be startled. 
"Mama, I have wonderful news." 
Anna Maria no longer went to the library. She spent most of her 
time waiting at the windowseat or rushing off to the drugstore to use 
the payphone. 
"Mama, Papa, we have wonderful news!" 
Once on the porch Elena heard their footfalls as they returned 
from a movie late at night. Then she heard Anna Maria's angry 
voice and the quick, dreadful sound of a slap. She rushed out to her 
daughter. Cap disappeared soundlessly into the night. 
"Mama, don't tum the porchlight on." 
She took her daughter in her arms. "You must let him go. I 
know he is a bad one." 
II 
"Mama, we're married. See my ring." 
They had no money for rent or furniture so they moved into the 
quartito, a wooden shack, behind the garden. 
One morning, Luis would not get out of bed. He lay with his 
arm slung over his chest. When Elena shook him, the arm swung 
free and hung motionless over the side of their bed. A stroke, the 
doctor said. 
Cap liked Anna Maria to stay inside the small house. He did not 
like her to go to the main house. 
"Your mama don't like me none. She give me them hateful 
eyes and don't say a word. She like to kill me, I know." 
He did not re-enlist and could not find a job. The war had 
ended, jobs were scarce and often he drank too much to make it out 
WlllTE RADIO 63 
of bed. He lay in bed all morning and afternoon drinking whiskey 
from a clouded glass, smoking cigarettes and listening to the white 
radio. 
It had been her gift to them. It cost too much. The sales clerk 
eyed her old black jersey dress and black button-top shoes suspi­
ciously when he brought it off the shelf for her to see. 
Instantly, she loved the clean white sides and shiny metal dial. 
It was broad, modem and beautifully white. She could see her large 
pocked face in its milky reflection. She had it wrapped and carried 
the unwieldy box in her lap on the bus. 
Anna Maria delighted at the gift. It was the only valuable thing 
they owned. She glanced nervously at Cap before throwing her 
arms around her mother in thanks. Elena warned her daughter to 
keep the door and windows locked now that they had the radio. Cap 
rolled his eyes, picked up the radio and took Anna Maria home. 
They would not stay for dinner. Elena ate alone. 
Elena often heard the syncopated strains of big band music 
floating from the windows of their small house. Sometimes the 
music blasted forth at full volume to mask the smashing glass and 
shouting within. Elena knelt by the Lady of Guadalupe and passed 
the rosary beads through her fingers, but transfixed by the votive 
flames dancing in their beveled cups, she knew it was not enough. 
One late night Anna Maria thumped her fist against her 
mother's door. 
"Mama, don't tum the porchlight on." 
Anna Maria sobbed, hiccoughing convulsively, in her 
mother's arms. They sat in the darkness holding onto each other. 
Elena felt the wet stickiness of blood on her hands when she pushed 
her daughter's hair out of her face. She led her to the bathroom to 
clean up. 
It had been surprisingly simple from that moment on. She 
found Luis '  gardening gloves in the bureau drawer. She'd bought 
the bat for Anna Maria's birthday parties, when they would bring 
it out for the children to strike the pinatas. Elena pulled it out of the 
closet and placed it behind the front door while her daughter 
washed. She put her daughter to sleep in the big bed and crawled 
in with her. Elena waited until her daughter's breathing was slow 
and deep before climbing out of bed again. 
She put the bat under a checked dish towel and tiptoed out of 
64 NORTHRIDGE REVIEW 
the house and through the garden. The moist soil clung to her toes. 
She opened the door to the guesthouse with her own key. She 
waited, she had time, until her eyes could separate the shadows 
from the lumpish furniture. She crept slowly, on the balls of her 
feet, to the bedroom. 
The piggish noise of Cap's snoring filled the cramped rooms. 
He had passed out with an empty bottle of Dewar's in his arms. His 
face was disfigured by deep sleep. His upper lip receded, baring his 
gums and teeth. His eyes were squeezed tightly shut under his pink 
freckled lids. His boxer shorts split at the crotch revealing a 
darkness within. 
The first blow made a loud cracking sound. The next few blows 
thudded mutely in the fme pink mist. Then Elena plucked a 
cigarette from the pack on the night stand. It was difficult to 
manipulate stick matches �earing the heavy gloves, but finally she 
scraped a charcoal streak in the wall and a flame sputtered to life. 
She lit the cigarette and rested it in a glass ashtray. She reached to 
the window to grab the curtain. She dipped a fme gauzy corner into 
the ashtray. She lifted the radio from its table, wound the white cord 
carefully around its legs and carried it home with her. 
The fire ate through the small house in minutes. When the 
engines arrived only glowing fragments of the frame caged the 
rolling, lashing flames. Elena restrained the hysterical Anna Maria 
in her strong arms. Felix, who was then nine, laughed and danced 
and clapped his hands in the swirling veil of soot. 
When Cap's body was found it was no more than a fusion of 
charred bone on the steel bedframe. 
III 
After enough time had passed, Elena gave the bat to Felix. 
He'd been glad to get it. He was no longer a little boy, she 
remembered suddenly. She had seen him in a uniform. Vietnam. 
He didn't come home. His mother wept. Was it one, two, ten years 
ago? He had hardly a harelip, at all, when he smiled. 


White Radio

Ferdman, Ida

Twisting the Knife

Pearson, Marlene

Marlene Pearson 
Passion in Santa Monica 
At this yogurt place I asked how many calories in a small? 0 not 
many the woman said not even in this Chocolate Passion. Passion 
reminded me of tropical beaches and I was at the beach, so I took 
one, sat outside on the aluminum chair, held my napkin from the 
wind, stretched out my legs, arms to the sun. A streetman came 
along 
asking for money. I didn't have much so I just gave him a little 
change. He said thank you 0 god bless you thank you. The couple 
next to me said NO NO. The man swallowed his caramel and said 
all these people just keep asking everyone for money. He wiped the 
syrup from his moustache. The woman nodded, crossed and 
recrossed her white legs while the man could not stop talking. He 
said everyone just keeps giving them money they don't have to 
work just collect from everyone I work for a living if ! just did what 
that man does asked everyone for, look he's asking and they're 
giving him a QUARTER, he's getting quarters from everyone he's 
going right down the line he must get 50 dollars a day if I did that 
I wouldn't have to work what do they think I am what is this charity 
I work for a yack yack · 
yack. I threw my dish in the trash. I walked past the two girls behind 
me who told the streetman NO NO iO give you my money I won't 
have money to buy the things I want to why should I give you my 
money. Then one said something and the streetman grabbed the 
pickle off her plate. He said thank you 0 thank you god bless you 
before he walked 
76 NORTHRIDGE REVIEW 
away. When I was crossing the street some other man with a green 
nylon pack on his back said hello what a nice smile. I didn't know 
I smiled. I was reading a book and thought how strange for 
someone to interrupt someone reading a book while crossing the 
street. He said not many people here in California smile I 'm from 
England and I give 
massages you sure need a massage why just look at your back and 
just look at your shoulders what's your name are you married want 
to have dinner tonight is that your car can't you at least drop me off 
at Santa Monica and somethingorother street. I said NO NO and 
made sure I wasn't smiling. 


Passion in Santa Monica

Renault, Adele

Adele Renault 
Lonely 
She is old 
like the telephone line 
she uses 
to call on. 
A new neighbor 
has moved in 
and I should 
t*e interest, 
she says, 
as he is of my race. 
Herson has 
left her for 
a younger woman. 
Men like money 
always leave her. 
She knows 
nothing about 
the sixty million 
dollar lottery. 
16 
Life is a 
dangerous 
open safety pin 
somewhere loose 
in the house. 
I break the line 
witll feeble excuses. 
She calls back 
with fables 
of her own. 


Lonely

Etchison, James Leishman

James Leishman Etchison 
At Home Alone While My Wife Visits a Dying 
Old Man 
He smoked Chesterfields. 
He blew big ZEROs of smoke 
Punctuated with pieces of pink. 
Lung. 
Hack hack hacked up with tired eyes. 
fathers are for catching 
He calcified for that long time in his 
Laz-E-Boy. 
He stared at The Machine, 
Vacant as a sea squirt. 
fathers are for saying 
"Run and fly! I will catch!" 
He squinted at his guests occasionally 
Through the dandruff on his glasses. 
He would say, "You want Lucy or Jackie Gleason?" 
fathers are for setting you 
one-handed on the gold-flecked kitchen table 
neverminding dusty Ked-prints. 
1 8  
H e  kept his fishing gear ready to go, 
In the trunk of his wheel-less Olds '98. 
fathers are for coaxing you, 
arms strong, callused, 
ready to catch you, 
fathers can be trusted. 
He grew on his arms patches of corpuscles like purple cabbage. 
fathers are for catching. 
you can run arms-out-a jet fighter­
you can fly. 
you can trust a father for a soft landing, 
ifyou are very young. 


Not a member yet

I Used to Watch Westerns

Coffee in a Styrofoam Cup

White Radio

Twisting the Knife

Passion in Santa Monica

Lonely

At Home Alone While My Wife Visits a Dying Old Man

Two Poems: "Jimmy\u27s Gone to Tucson, AZ" and "Ventura Blvd"

Three Poems: "...and Red Wine" "Natural Selection" and "December"

Florence Arquin: A Woman Lost in History

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