2GQ ~ 2 Gyrlz Quarterly ~ Portland, Oregon arts, literature, & madness

DOMESTIC TERROR: "The Picky House Club" by Kristy Athens

2GQ continues our exploration of home and family with original fiction by Kristy Athens, a writer and editor based in Husum, Washington, also known for her work with Literary Arts.

Our Freezone is named after the creative writing and arts section of Signum Press, the dear departed Internet magazine I edited throughout the late 1990s and early aughts. The Freezone is open for fiction, poetry, performance documentation, visual art galleries, and multimedia extravaganzas. If you'd like to submit materials to our "Domestic Terror" feature, please read the submission guidelines. --TLB

THE POOL CLEANER: SHORT FICTION BY JOHN LONGSTOCKING

With short-short fiction by John Longstocking (formerly John Barrios), 2GQ kicks off our Domestic Terror series, featuring fiction, performance documentation, and other art that takes a challenging approach to the well-worn subjects of home and family.

We like Longstocking and his writing so much, in fact, that we've invited him to join 2GQ as a regular writer. Look for him on a blog post near you. And now, onto the story...

DOMESTIC TERROR: Freezone at 2GQ

We live in our bodies. We live in our little lives. We live in our homes.

Sometimes these realities are not reflected in the creative literature associated with taking risks, presenting challenges, engendering innovative fiction, and going out on the occasional experimental limb. Sometimes, we want our "edge" to be so "edgy" that it falls completely away from how we live. Sometimes we invest more inventiveness in form and style than we do in the emotional honesty of a work. As for subject matter: sometimes we're afraid to engage with the mundane truths of home and domesticity, fearing that our work will turn out like all those hyper-workshopped hausfrau short stories set in Connecticut, the ones you see all the time in New York magazines and Midwestern literary journals.

OK, there's definitely something to fear in that. But there's much to celebrate and explore, as well. Family and home are not the opposite of things fascinating, dark, gripping, hilarious, or glamourous. Hell, no. Family and home are the very source of the best neuroses, the kind that turn people into writers...

Welcome DOMESTIC TERROR. This series of short literature & other fun stuff will be published on the 2GQ.org Freezone throughout 2008. On deck we have Kristy Athens, John Barrios, Nora Robertson, and hey, I'll probably make an appearance myself. If you would like to submit material, which can include memoir, poetry, fiction, hypertext, visual works, comics, multimedia presentation, and documentation of performance/visual works, please READ THIS FIRST (www.2GQ.org/DT-submit.html). Thanks. --Tiffany Lee Brown

ONE HUNDRED DOUBLOONS... excorpse short fiction

Another of our Exquisite Language experiments; this one was published in 2 Gyrlz Quarterly #3 (our printed zine-journal).

by Paul Ash, Susannah Breslin, Farai Chideya, Trevor Dodge, Dave Eggers, Polyanna Fishwrap, Jemiah Jefferson, Richard Kadrey, Lance Olsen, Richard Peabody, Cate Peebles, Camela Raymond, Claire Tristram, and Vandoren Wheeler.

Early February. He has already forgotten the name of the last town. The moon is alarmingly full and bright.  He presses the accelerator to the floor.  Snow is plowed high along both sides of the road and he shoots through the barrel.  He has been drinking, although not to excess. That is what he tells himself.  The clock on his dashboard reads 3:00 a.m.  A dead deer passes through his headlights and then falls into dark once more.

AND SKY FUCKS TOBACCO... excorpse poem.

"Bored city, valentines day 1982.
I met a girl today...
I don't remember her name yet,
I'm calling her Halo..."

2GQ conducted a bunch of exquisite corpse experiments in 2004. The results were published in 2GQ #2 and in 2GQ #3, and were part of our "Exquisite Language" event at the Heathman Hotel as part of the Enteractive Language Festival.

Here's one by R. V. Branham (of Gobshite Quarterly fame), Mark Gunderson (aka ECC/the Evolution Control Committee), Joe Matheny (of STARE and other projects), Alaura O'Dell (formerly of Psychic TV, in another incarnation), Ninah Pixie (who produced the incredible 3-disc international collection, "Women Take Back the Noise," on Ubuibi Records), Julian Tulip (of Julian Tulip's Licorice and Cancer Fags), and dAS (of Big City Orchestra). Madness, I'm telling you, madness!

The Cardboard Sea: Fiction by Ovidiu Bufnila

I went to see Iris. She was chopping cardboard fish. The cardboard was stolen. It was clear as broad daylight.

"What do you want?" Iris shouted, watching me above her glasses.

"I am here."

Poetry & Reading by Jane Hirshfield

"Flowering Vetch" by Jane Hirshfield can now be read here on 2GQ. Jane recently appeared in Portland at Literary Arts' Poetry Downtown series.

Playing Ping-Pong in the Dark

Flash fiction by  Janice J. Heiss

Topless, I'm playing ping-pong against my anonymous, stranger-lover and one of his friends, two against one. From shot to shot, I can't tell them apart. Who cares as they are now the abstract other. We are playing in a neon-lit, pee-smelling labyrinthine basement, with no natural light like a Vegas casino, where I fear rats are scrambling at our feet. To get down here, we had to go through horrific slums -- Ethiopian? -- foreign slums always worse than American slums.

The Big Wave: An Original Work by Michael Kroetch

2GQ's Freezone is pleased to present the text/art piece "The Big Wave" by artist and writer Michael Kroetch, appearing thanks to guest curator Lidia Yuknavitch.

Click here to view the piece, or keep reading for more information about the artist, the curator, and the Freezone series.

The Bog by Jonathan Raymond

The Bog
Fiction by Jonathan Raymond
Originally appeared in issue #1 of 2 Gyrlz Quarterly

    Adam is the sexy one, who's driving, and Eric, the smart one, is in the back seat. It's his mom's house we're going to, out on the Olympic peninsula. Brad is the funny one, who comes up with most of our names for things, and finds most all of the music.

I'm not anything, really.

Haystack: Poetry by Joanna Rose

New poetry by Joanna Rose, author of the novel Little Miss Strange. Rose's short fiction has appeared in many fine literary journals; she also teaches writing at Haystack (the Oregon version), in Dangerous Writers workshops, and elsewhere. Rose read at 2GQ's "Language of Print" event at the Enteractive Language Festival in 2003.

What I Remember About Jarret

Poetry by Shane Allison. You really want to read this!

Greyhound Quean

2GQ is pleased to publish "Greyhound Quean," by poet and editor Louie Crew.

K-9 Inches

FICTION BY FRAYN MASTERS

Your dog has the biggest dick I’ve ever seen.

What? Have we met?...

Chance Meeting

CHANCE MEETING
                                fiction by Claudia Baskind

                              

OCTOBER 2002 MIDNIGHT,                                 Soccer Field,
                                South of Binghamton Senior Apartment Buildings                               

                              

You: girl                                 wearing campus patrol security jacket, carrying                                 maglite and 2-way radio.

                              

Me: naked                                 man bound with duct tape.