No News Today - Guest Post - Edward Falco

Possum Dreams

                                                 

(JAN brings dishes out from the kitchen and sets the dining room table neatly for two.  WALTER enters when she’s finished setting the table and is in the process of bringing out the makings for martinis and placing them on the counter.  He’s carrying a full book bag.)

                                                            WALTER

These kids, Jan, they are totally––  These are English majors!  I’m: What universe is this?  You never heard of John Dos Passos?  Okay, you haven’t read him, fine.  Who reads Dos Passos anymore.  But you never heard of him?  (beat)  Where are the twins?

                                                            JAN

                        (carrying glasses and bottles for making drinks)

You were warned, Sweetheart.  You can’t say you weren’t warned.

                                                            WALTER

(emptying several books and a laptop computer out of book bag.  He powers up the laptop and appears to be looking through files.)

I was warned . . .  What did you do today?

                                                            JAN

                        (making a martini, for Walter)

I went in to see Mrs. Weestock.

                                                            WALTER

You went in to see Mrs. Weestock?

                                                            JAN

I went in to see Mrs. Weestock.

                                                            WALTER

                        (agitated)

I thought we talked about this.  You can’t keep running interference for the kids.  You’ve been doing this since they were babies.  It’s got to stop, Jan.  They’re 18.  Vivian got a bad grade?  That’s it.  It’s got nothing to do with you.

(JAN brings WALTER his drink and kisses him on the cheek.  He returns the kiss dutifully.)

                                                            JAN

                        (making a drink for herself.)

I just had a little talk.  It was nothing.  I didn’t make a big deal

                                                            WALTER

You didn’t make a big deal.  We talked about this.

                                                            JAN

Can we drop it, please, Walter, can we?  What about you?  How was your class?

                                    WALTER

Kid called me Wall today.

                                                            JAN

Wall?

                                                            WALTER

That’s what I said.  I said, Wall?

Playwright Ed Falco, the widely published author of literary fiction and poetry, is best known recently for his novel The Family Corleone, the New York Times bestselling prequel to The Godfather. The New York Times has favorably compared his short stories to the work of Raymond Carver and Andre Dubus, and The Notre Dame Review has called him "one of the most powerful short fiction writers of his generation." The recipient of the Robert Penn Warren Prize from The Southern Review, a NEA Fellowship, and two playwriting fellowships from the Virginia Commission for the Arts, Falco teaches in the MFA Program in Creative Writing at Virginia Tech. 

No News Today - Guest Post - Kassie Rubico

Day 7: Trapped at the Museum

We gathered
as four 
for the panda 
exhibit
but ended 
up watching 
Tamarins run 
through trees
Over 
then under 
limbs
scratching through 
coarse 
black and white fur 
scent marking 
their way 
through 
two hundred square feet 
of tropical forest 
behind glass,
caged in a see- 
through 
city.

Kassie Rubico is an essayist currently working on a memoir. Her work has appeared in Insight Academic Journal, Parnassus Literary Journal, the anthology, River Muse, Tales of Lowell and the Merrimack Valley, and Toska Literary Magazine. She has been a guest columnist for the Lowell Sun and a freelance writer for Coolrunning.com. She received a Master of Arts in Creative Writing and Literature at Rivier College and an MFA in Creative Nonfiction at Pine Manor College. She teaches writing at Northern Essex Community College.