Reading Series: South Bend Speaks!

Speak Michiana has launched an official reading series: South Bend Speaks!

It's time for Speak Michiana to expand its horizons. Therefore, Brooke Plummer, April Lidinsky, and

Juliet Barrett have teamed up to create a reading series to take place in South Bend, Indiana.

Get ready for the next artistic shift in our community: South Bend Speaks!

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Each reading will have a unique theme; material performed at each event will tie into whichever

theme is chosen. This method will help generate fresh and innovative ideas for whomever is

interested in performing.

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For the series, we are seeking works of poetry, short prose, fiction/nonfiction, personal

stories or essays, etc. Our objective is to connect people of the community through their writing,

stimulate creative growth, and expose the talent South Bend has to offer.

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LOCATION, DATES, AND MORE DETAILS TO BE ANNOUNCED

"Children of the Stars", by Analecta

Analecta is a two man, post-rock group from South Bend, Indiana.

Calvin Maloney | Bass + guitar
Patrick Quigley | Drums

"The Turning Point" by Lori Hicks

The Turning Point

            Dusk. Early July summer evenings are pregnant with possibilities. The heat of the day has faded but the cool of the evening hasn’t approached yet. This particular dusk brought my son, Chris and I closer together than we’d ever been.

*

We were sitting in the back yard, watching the sun turn from bright yellow, to orange, to a purplish blue color. The crickets were just beginning to voice their evening song. Here and there little flashes sparkled in the grass as lightening bugs frolicked. This was our quiet time, the place where we didn’t have to say or do anything, we could just be with each other.

We tried to spend an hour or two just being with each other each night. Some nights we’d talk, some he’d sketch whatever popped into his mind, and some nights we’d just sit and watch the world go by. That night, I knew something was on his mind, he’d been quiet though dinner. I waited until we were outside, watching the sun go down to ask him about it.

“Um, well. You see. I sort of have something I want to talk to you about but I don’t want you to get mad at me.”

I could see how nervous Chris was. His whole body was tense; his hands were clenched and he looked as if he was ready to do battle. He also had this horrid, haunted look on his face, as if he was waiting for something horrible to happen.

“Take your time, Chris. We have all night."

I could see him out of the corner of my eye, sitting just to my left in the green, plastic, lawn chair. He couldn’t seem to get comfortable and he kept crossing and uncrossing his long legs. He fidgeted for another ten minutes or so before he began again.

“Mom, you love me, right?”

“Yes, Chris. I love you with my whole heart.”

“And nothing’s ever going to change that?”

“Nothing ever could. Not in a million years.”

Another few minutes passed before he finally got up the courage to tell me. His voice cracked as he started – stopped – and finally started again.

“Mom, I think I might be bisexual.”  

For a moment I was taken aback. I was fully ready to hear, “mom, I’m gay.” I’d known for a couple of years that Chris was gay, but I figured he’d tell me when he was ready, so I didn’t push. Bisexual never entered my mind. The only thing I could think to say at that point was, “Well, Chris, you have a 50 percent greater chance of a date on Saturday night.”

The tension that had held him its grip released suddenly. He let out a breath that he’d been holding and stared at me for a long moment with a confused look on his face. Then he started laughing so hard his face turned purple and tears were rolling down his cheeks. For a few minutes all he could do was laugh. Some of it was a release of nervous tension. I knew that a part of him had been expecting me react badly and disown him or something.  Another part of him was probably reacting to the absurdity of my comment.  His laughter was infectious though, and soon I was laughing so hard that I had tears rolling down my face too.

I’m not sure how long we sat there laughing like fools. The fireflies had gone home and the cricket’s chirps had segued into frog’s croaking. Dusk was nearly over and full dark wasn’t far off. We sat quietly, spent after our outburst of laughter. Chris reached out his hand to mine and gently squeezed. Then he said the words that give me the most joy in life.

“I love you, Mom.”

Artwork by Bailey Ritsema

"Four Meditations on a Meta Gas Station", by Craig Finlay

1.


I had to get some gas before your funeral, not

that I really felt so enthusiastic about gas. I just

needed it, and wouldn’t you know it, cigarettes

and coffee and all the things people buy? Yes,

I saw people buying them in front of me and I

thought it felt so weird that people still need

cigarettes and coffee when you die and weird

too that their money would even work, right?


There cannot be one reason, one goddamn

reason why that should be the case, but speaking

about it now I have to remind myself it is not

like you weren’t so terribly important and alive.



2. 


3:57 at the Speedway on Ironwood
.
At the school after school they’re in the street
walking down the street forsaking sidewalks 
thin and
godlike and essential. I am trying 
to stick to my diet,
get home, cook my own meals, 
tend my own body and
they are in the street.

I wait for them to clear and they persist in walking

four abreast swaddled in backpacks and foreign 
fashion
and some of the girls are so beautiful 
and I wonder if I was
ever like any of the boys.  
All those other people in their other
cars honk 
and throw insults from their throats like handfuls of
styrofoam.  
They stay in the street and tell us of their flat stomachs
and good knees and lives they’ve not yet ruined.

We tell them we had life before they were ever born

that we have wisdom and we don’t say that we never
wanted any of this.

 Never wanted to grow old and heavy
but we never 
found a feasible alternative so we did it, anyway.
And now they move, slowly to the Speedway and turn
 as I accelerate
and tell me, we know, we know
,
we know, and I say, just don’t tell anyone,
okay?



3.


I told her the socks at a gas station

they’re really for huffing paint when

she bought socks at a gas station
the socks are for
huffing paint
 shoelaces are for shooting junk

Chore-Boy and those little plastic roses 
are for
smoking crack and she said

oh, I was going to use them on my feet



4.


Comfort and welcome of blanket light,

awning fallen at the closest gas station

deep tracks in brown snow shifting before tires

the certain red configuration of low gas prices
 an ice machine,
the improvised ashtray atop
where the thin employee in tight
black pants
 smokes Marlboro menthols and a tattoo
s
lipping down the flat of her hip, moving
 her knees alternating
double time and free hand
cuff-drawn tight under her breast. 

Now, the twins
 always arriving together for slushies,
Reese's, 
the teenage boy at the till his body like a blade
 the
broken bodied man with a voice like a saw
ancient, blue blurred
tattoos on papery skin
 who buys a pack of Cheyenne Little Cigars
and steps
into deep ridges of snow, like waves in paint by
number
 past the shivering, smoking girl whose ride is finally here

whose ride accepts her, and leaves a wake in the thickening
fall
 there until the stuttering work truck, the decaffeinated cop
y
yourself, on a weak willed pilgrimage to lights like stars