"The Streak," By Thomas L. Vaultonburg

I never had any real issue with Tiger Woods' personal life. None of that was any of my business. The only thing I resented was that they were portraying him as this great family man the whole time. Really selling it. Using that lie to sell consumer goods. And even after it was exposed as a lie people went on defending it until the evidence was so massive that no one could defend it anymore.  

It's taken until late Monday night for me really to put my finger on what I find distasteful about worshipping the "greatest comeback ever" from a man who is only 43, and caused almost all of the setbacks he had to "comeback" from in the first place. And it's this: every one of us probably has parents and grandparents who worked their entire lives, most of the time in pain and exhaustion, just so that we could have a chance to do the same, maybe even a little better. But we don't tend to show any damn respect for that, or heap the glory on  people who work harder and longer than these athletes ever will, and for no adulation, no fortune, no fame. 

The Streak is a poem I wrote for my book Flesh Wounds  It's an homage to all the members of my family who worked their asses off so I could eventually do what I love for a living. 

Lou Gehrig

The Streak 

   The announcer fawns 

   Over the Iron Man: 

  ` “Number 63 has played 

   In 120 straight 

   Football games, 

   An amazing feat 

   Of endurance.” 

   I do the math: 

   Sixteen Sundays a year, 

   Three hours a pop 

   For nearly eight years, 

   360 total hours, 

   Or maybe five or six 

   Weeks of my granddaddy’s 

   Life in the field and 

   The mill afterhours, 

   Covering the rent 

   2,750 straight months, 

   Playing hurt through three 

   Heart attacks, seven children 

   And five disbanded 

   Pro football leagues. 

   Now let’s talk about 

   A fucking streak.

-Thomas L. Vaultonburg

Book Book Book

I try not to use Zombie Logic Review to promote myself, Zombie Logic Press, or anything else I might be working on too often, but once in a while I just need a few extra sheckles in the coffer to work on my next project(s). This is one of those times. Sort of like a pledge drive. Let me pitch you two of my books.

Flesh Wounds is a book I wrote during my time in the service industry. The title reflects the toll working in that industry can take on one if you fall into the many pitfalls and temptations present, which I invariably did. If I may say so I really enjoy the cover I designed of me standing in for the apostle Thomas holding a can of Schlitz examining the wounds of Jesus.

I'm told this is probably the best poem I wrote for that book, and it's only saving virtue.

 Pinata 

 You were our first lesson 
 In rage and greed- 
 Possibly love. 
 Our smiling guardian 
 Put the stick 
 In our small hands, 
 Blindfolded us 
 And whispered that 
 Unspeakable treasures 
 Awaited us when we 
 Destroyed you. 
 Spun around and 
 Drunken with images 
 Of unimaginable trinkets 
 We became whirling dervishes 
 Of lust and anger, 
 Whacking and thumping away 
 At your broken smile 
 Way past nap time, 
 Until frustrated with 
 Our lack of killer instinct, 
 Our teacher sawed you 
 In half, spilling 
 Far less enticing bounty 
 Than we had dreamed of. 
 Some rushed forward and 
 Grabbed and devoured, 
 Others stood back and 
 Cried over the carnage. 
 Either way we all learned 
 Who we would be that day. 

You can buy Flesh Wounds here

Submerged Structure is a book I wrote that deals with suffering from a personality disorder but still having the desire to communicate and be present with other people. It's a struggle for many of us. 

Away Message 

I am away 
From my desk 
Right now 

I am away 
From the gravity 
Of lover's 
Embrace 

I am away 
From the vessel 
Right now in 
A geosynchronous orbit 
Around the lost moon 
Of Jupiter 

So leave me 
A message 

Because I 
Am away. 

You can buy Submerged Structure here 

Any spreading of the word is much appreciated. I'd like to keep doing this a little longer.

Outlaw Poetry By Paul Tristram

Paul Tristram is a Welsh writer who has poems, short stories, sketches and photography
published in many publications around the world, he yearns to tattoo porcelain bridesmaids
instead of digging empty graves for innocence at midnight; this too may pass, yet.
Buy his books ‘Scribblings Of A Madman’ (Lit Fest Press)  http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1943170096
‘Poetry From The Nearest Barstool’ at http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1326241036
And a split poetry book ‘The Raven And The Vagabond Heart’ with Bethany W Pope
at http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1326415204
You can also read his poems and stories here! http://paultristram.blogspot.co.uk/

Party Gone Bad

I was walking out of Neath General Hospital,
one cold, wet miserable Saturday night,
with a busted right hand and fractured cheekbone
from fighting some other drunken arsehole in town.
When an ambulance screeched to a halt in front of me
and they wheeled out a woman on a stretcher
who had both hands up tentatively touching at her face,
which was covered and running with blood
over a complexion which resembled chopped liver.
She was screaming “I can’t see a fucking thing?
She glassed me in the face, this is a nightmare!
Why won’t someone please tell me what I look like?”
I turned and walked away as they wheeled her inside
with her friend who was walking silently beside her.

© Paul Tristram 2015






I’m A Lover And A Fighter

“I’m a Lover and a Fighter!”
she said, half-cut and smiling
through the smoke of a Marlboro Red.
Wearing brass knuckles 
with kisses stamped into them
upon her scuffed and bloodied fingers,
where lesser mortals balance under
engagement and wedding rings.
“I’d go 5 rounds with you, no problemo 
but then there’d be nothing solid
left to fuck afterwards!” she winked, wickedly.
“You’re both erotic and unsettling
at exactly the same time!” I stated, fascinated.
As she mouth-opened two more beer bottles
and slid one over to me whilst slipping 
the Barmaid her number with the tip.
“Go buy some rubbers and grab your coat
you’ve pulled…you lucky Bastard!”
She said with a cock-sure growl
as she finished off both our bourbons.
I smiled and to my own amazement
I got up and did exactly as I was told.

© Paul Tristram 2015





Sleazy Low-Life, Gutter Street Punk

She had scraped those letters painfully
into her own 17 year old forehead
with a ‘I Dig Drunk Chicks’ pin badge,
after first shaving herself a Mohawk. 
Then walked to the pretty Church
where her older, respectable Sister was 
getting Married…they never forgave her.
Now, she’s 49 years old and lives alone
with her 2 cats ‘Flotsam & Jetsam’ 
in an old peoples Council bungalow.
Stuck often to a kidney dialysis machine,
has part brain damage from a decade
of glue sniffing, which has also left her
almost blind and taken away completely
her sense of smell and she migraines always.
Her Carer comes at 10 and then again at 5
and she is not looking forward to Christmas.

© Paul Tristram 2015




Meat Cleaver Decision

“I left the house party around 1.30am,
I was absolutely tamping.
He was necking Tania,
everyone knows how much I like her,
she’s not my girl, never has been.
She’s never led me on in that way at all,
only ever been friendly
but all the same, you know?
Him, well, I’ve hated him since school,
always had girlfriends 
whilst most of us others went without.
good looking, sickeningly interesting
and cool (Whatever the hell that is?)
I did the right thing at first,
stormed back to my bedsit,
layed down and chain-smoked 5 cigarettes.
But I was climbing the walls in torture,
wide awake and brutally naked and exposed
upon the wrong side of God.
I went to the kitchen and picked up
the heftiest knife almost without thinking. 
Sprinted the 3 streets in a blur,
thinking over and over in my screaming head
‘Make a cunt out of me will you?
I’ll show you who’s the cunt, cunt!’
I burst in the front door
and found him dancing in the living room.
I hit him exactly 7 times in his beautiful face, 
I had to hold him up after the first 2.
The last blow finished him off
and at the exact moment that it happened
everything changed, I went deaf to all
but a eerie mocking laughter coming from within.
My anger vanished immediately, 
along with every nice part of me that had ever existed, 
it was like finding your soul suddenly burgled.
And I knew emphatically 
that I had made the biggest mistake of my life
and that all the sorrys  and prayers 
in the world were never going to fix what I had done!”

© Paul Tristram 2015





Short Sharp Shock (Detention Centre)

My mate Skin came out of Husk D.C.
back in the late 1980’s.
I met him in the shelters
of Castle Gardens in Swansea,
to share a flagon and a catch up.
He was fit as a fiddle
after 3 months of physical circuits,
he stopped smiling and gave me a warning.

“One of the top Screws up there
is waiting on you coming in,
he’s got something special planned for you.
Claims that when you were running
with ‘The Melyn Bootboys’
his son was in ‘The Cimla Casuals’
And the two of you 
had a cricket bat disagreement,
which left him in traction for six weeks,
during that infamous Gnoll Gate Gang Riot.
That’s all he ever talks about, man,
I’m serious, he’s a-gunning for ya
and he’s a right Bastard and all!”

“Fuck him and his son!” 
I spat, cocky as ever.

A year later I was in a prison bus
pulling into Husk D.C.
dropping off prisoners 
on my way to the more notorious,
higher category,, Portland Borstal.
I looked through the window
and found the Screw
with the grey handlebar moustache
and waved two fingers as we pulled off,
he couldn’t touch me,
I was someone else’s fucking prisoner.

© Paul Tristram 2015




That’s Not The End Of The World You Can Hear,
It’s Just The Sound Of The Tristram’s ‘Kicking Back Drunk’

“Jesus Christ, was that a shotgun I just heard then?
It’s 2am and this is the 3rd night in a cowing row now,
I’ll be on valium at this rate, I swear to God, I will.
My poor John’s got work at 6am in the morning,
I keep hearing and seeing police and ambulances
but this horrible drunken debauchery is still going on, 
what’s that all about, eh, why can’t they stop them, Dai?”

“I know, Phyllis, one of the Fathers came out of prison
a few days ago and apparently it’s the only time 
that all of the males in the family have been out together 
at the very same time in over 2 decades or more.
The police keep telling them to keep the racket down
but they don’t, so they’re pulling out the most drunken 
aggressive ones, taking them to the station for an 8 hour 
sober up, then letting them go with cautions and warnings.
If they go in heavy-handed they’ll need the riot squad, 
there’s about 50 of them in there all together and being fair
the only violence that’s being caused is what they’re doing 
to each other, the only complaint really is the noise issue!”

“But that Christmas party they had a couple of years ago
went on until nearly May. They were throwing axes 
around in the back garden as the school kids came home
this afternoon and Stan at No. 43 said he saw 2 prostitute
looking rough skanks squatting down and peeing
in the middle of the street last night as he put the cat out,
it’s a disgrace, I need a bath just looking up the street!”

“I know, that’s why I’m out here smoking my Woodbines,
you never know what you might see and it’s much better
than watching TV, that’s for sure, it’s like Beirut out yuh!”

© Paul Tristram 2015

Poetry By Gene McCormick

Gene McCormick has had fourteen books published: non-fiction, fiction and poetry. His most recent short story/poetry collections include Rain On The Sun (2008); Tanya, Queen Of The Greasy Spoon, (2009); An Ice Axe At Dusk (2011, March Street Press); poetry chapbooks, Lives Of Passion: Edward And Antoinette, (2013, RWG Press), Livin’ The Blues At Cranky Jack’s Bar & Grill, (2010, BoneWorld Publishing/MuscleHead Press), Naked Skeletons (2010, Pudding House Publications) and a series of self-illustrated broadsides. His writing and art regularly appear in select literary publications; a number of his poems have been converted to music and performed professionally. McCormick lives in Wayne, Illinois.

Cold Coffee

1.
There is a man sitting over in the corner by himself watching as I count out thirteen dollars to myself, all I’ve got today. A ten, three singles. He’s not a threatening presence, just there maybe verifying that all I have is thirteen dollars—as if that needs verification. Sure as hell don’t need a money clip to hold thirteen dollars, four bills. Have a money clip back at the house, gold-tome-plated metal with the head of the racehorse John Henry. Don’t use it because even there were a need for it, it is clamped too tight to easily slide bills in and out. It never really loosened up but probably would if it got used more. As things stand, it is like brand new, waiting for new money. Well, I have enough money to buy a cup of coffee; two cups and a decent tip. Said she’d meet me here at nine-thirty. It’s just past that now and it’s not like her to be late though I don’t really know that for a fact and as a matter of fact it’s not like me to be early.

God, I hate to wait for people.

2.
She isn’t shilly-shallying, no shilly-shallying going on at all as she stands staring in the bathroom mirror, thighs flush against the sink ledge, moving small pastel-colored bottles and jars of creams, gels and liquids about, thoughtfully, preparing a composition as though setting up a chess board. She stares at the bottles, shakes her head almost imperceptively and shifts them about again and again, faster, and then still faster like a terrier with a toy mouse. Finally, squeezing some cream onto the tip of her index finger, she writes to him, to each and all, a message on the mirror.

“It doesn’t matter if I’m late.”

3.
He looks at the clock on the wall, then at the man sitting in the corner who looks back at him.

4.
She lays flat on her back on the cool bathroom tile floor, eyes open. It’s uncomfortable.

5.
Okay, he decides she’s had enough time to get here. He pats his pants pocket, feeling the dollars and heads across the street to the Super Walmart.

6.
Against all odds, she falls asleep on the bathroom floor, the tiles now warm to her body.



Tuesday Is Trash Day

Because it has a short, strong spring,
every time someone pushes through 
the screen door it slams twice:
bam, then bam again, bouncing off
the door jamb emphasizing a 
coming or going—one of the few
things around the house that 
works well, if at all.
But her, her leaving…
Saying goodbye to her was like
taking out the trash and the hell with
the screen door banging twice.



Sunny-Side Up

Laying about, a red pajama sleeve 
bunches about the crook of her elbow,
its folds mimicking petals and leaves
of, say, a rosebud or chrysanthemum
made of 60% polyester.
Momentarily gazing at her floral elbow,
Della straightens the sleeve and resumes
staring at the ceiling, one hand resting
on her inner thigh.
Her bed partner is immobile, turned away
as early morning school busses rumble by
and as she begins to move her hand.

Twenty minutes later in the kitchen,
she cracks eggs on the edge of the skillet
and fries sliced potatoes for her man,
slouching at the table.
“Working a split shift today, hon?” he asks.
“Yeah, breakfast for you and lunch at the diner.”
“Just asking.”
“Screw you.”
“Don’t break my egg yolks.”
“Screw you.”

Della reaches for the coffee can of tip money,
counting exact change for bus fare.
“I need beer money,” he says.
She tilts the entire can of change into her purse.
“Screw you and screw your damn beer,” she says,
slams the screen door, heads to the bus stop.


Jazz After Hours : Jammin’

In a retail storefront, rented space just large
enough for an afterhours jam session, two guys, 
day jobs done, chill, make small talk and ease 
into after dark jazz improvisations.

The taller dude stands as erect as a bugler at revelry,
trumpet in hand, spitting some “April In Paris”
while the sax shoves his glasses up his forehead 
and goes with some mellow testing
and then, seamlessly, it is a jam, an oblique riff
with the trumpet on top of the sax, backing off
as the ax starts flowing tamped velvet, 
the sax guy into it, grinding the balls of his feet, 
closed slits for eyes.

Easing off the horn, the trumpeter sits cross-legged 
on the floor pulling myriads of musical instruments 
from sacks and wicker baskets: harmonica,
a children’s xylophone, cow bells, chimes, 
a baby blue kazoo, a penny whistle, ping pong balls
all the while rocking side to side mix-managing 
musical tools while the sax man contributes 
African skin drums and a kalimba. 
They are their own audience; a half hour, an hour 
passes blowing-pounding notes that don’t bounce 
or reverberate around the empty room; 
the essence of cool, they breathe and slide.

Two animated young Latino girls pass by outside,
hearing the blues from the shady storefront.
They try the door, holler Yo! It rattles but is locked.
(The door is an old wooden one with chipped and 
peeling white lead paint, warped from tens of years 
of Midwest weather but still able to keep 
things out and things in. A shade covers 
the window portion). The girls shrug and move on, 
unnoticed. The music continues.