Today is Richard Brautigan's birthday.
In his honor, here's a link back to
an essay I wrote about him:
Thursday, 30 January 2014
The premiere book from my new press
is now available for purchase from
Amazon.com:
http://www.amazon.com/Saint-Lemonade-Allen-Frost/dp/1933964782/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1391091582&sr=8-1&keywords=saint+lemonade
Many thanks are due to poet Larry Smith
and the great artist Michael Paulus
who also did the amazing cover for
THE WONDERFUL STUPID MAN
Tuesday, 28 January 2014
Saturday, 25 January 2014
While the East Coast is all covered in snow
we're having a sunny day so my son
and I set up the badminton net.
He was Zaire and I was Zamboango
and I sang him the song of old
my grandfather taught me when
he was in the merchant marines:
"Oh the monkeys got no tails
in Zamboango
Oh the monkeys got no tails
in Zamboango
Oh the monkeys got no tails
they just ride around on whales
Oh the monkeys got no tails
in Zamboango"
Friday, 24 January 2014
I found this old book on the library shelf.
Interesting cover. But get a load of the
writing under the illustration.
It reminds me, I rediscovered an old story
of mine called THE HANGMAN CALLS
PARIS which I wrote in 1982. It was fun
to reread but one of my big mistakes as
a writer then, was something that
Stephen King also pointed out in his
ON WRITING book. It's best to keep
it simple and write a character 'said' or 'says.'
If you're not careful you wind up with what
happened below:
Thursday, 23 January 2014
The name of my new press
GOOD DEED RAIN
comes from a short story
I wrote many moons ago.
It was first published in
Tucker Katonah's magazine THE DECLINE
on Saint John Street in Portland, Maine.
Tucker Katonah's magazine THE DECLINE
on Saint John Street in Portland, Maine.
I guess that issue is from 1989 or so.
Good Deed Rain
The richest man in Sao Paulo had a magic umbrella.
When he opened the umbrella, an endless supply of money green
rain would waterfall out. He would let it pile up to his knees
then shut the black umbrella solemnly and put it back inside
the safe, on the shelf in there.
Nobody knew how he was getting all the money
he was spending. Before, he had nothing, but now he was
buying houses, land, cars, airplanes…anything that had
a pricetag he would buy. Except for an occasional loss of
peace of mind, the money gave him whatever he wanted.
Lately while it poured, he strangely wondered
why he had been so lucky. It bothered him and he dreamed
about buying the world and giving every person a
million dollars…Sometime with the morning sun dripping
his window panes and collecting in a glass of orange juice
his window panes and collecting in a glass of orange juice
on his plush carpeted floor, the richest man in the city had
a vision of kindliness. He would pour the money out overthe slums that surrounded him and seeped through the city
of Sao Paolo like cockroach dancing.
Feeling so benevolent (he even felt above his head
for a halo) he climbed into his distinctive bright yellow chauffered helicopter with his umbrella on his lap and commanded in a Moses-voice, “Hurry! Off to the slums!”
for a halo) he climbed into his distinctive bright yellow chauffered helicopter with his umbrella on his lap and commanded in a Moses-voice, “Hurry! Off to the slums!”
Minutes later. Hovering over the crumbling poverty of breakfast blue smoke fires and tin rust roofs. Cardboard walls and flies crawling the faces of children who stopped fighting only to poke their hands at the sky, to where the golden helicopter buzzed in place directly overhead.
He opened the umbrella, leaning out the door like Zeus with his thunderbolt. He smiled as money fluttered down, laughing for a moment at the thought that this act would no doubt buy him sainthood—picturing statues of himself in town squares strewn with flowers and humbling townsfolk kneeling before the altar of his image. He ordered the pilot to circle round and round while he shook the umbrella manna out of the sky. Closing his eyes he basked in the hot Osiris sun, the roar of blades overhead the roar of the faithful, and he slowly opened his eyes to see his pyramids below…
He opened the umbrella, leaning out the door like Zeus with his thunderbolt. He smiled as money fluttered down, laughing for a moment at the thought that this act would no doubt buy him sainthood—picturing statues of himself in town squares strewn with flowers and humbling townsfolk kneeling before the altar of his image. He ordered the pilot to circle round and round while he shook the umbrella manna out of the sky. Closing his eyes he basked in the hot Osiris sun, the roar of blades overhead the roar of the faithful, and he slowly opened his eyes to see his pyramids below…
Instead, he was horrified to see spluttering hundreds of rotten yams dropping Earthwards. Screaming panic, he wrenched at the umbrella trying to close it, but the mechanics of it were jammed with foul yam slime. He shook it, rammed it against the rocking helicopter, staining its bee-yellow hide. But the umbrella wouldn’t close and continued to spray its pestilence down on the poor people of Sao Paolo.
Frenzy seized, he edged too far out the doorway and tumbled out, gripping the umbrella pole, handled like a lifeline in the palm of the sky, praying in his leg kicking dervish freefall that it could somehow parachute him safely.
But rancid yams were pouring down over him, soft thousands sticking to his sleeves, shoulders and hair. He just fell faster to the ground, with the yams flashing by, the whole world looking brown and green. Instead of hitting the ground, he hit a mountain of deep vegetable mush and sunk. Down inside that gloom he waited two days to be mined out.
GOOD DEED RAIN
was also the name of a little
short story collection I made in 1990
stapled with a glued color cover.
You can read it here on my
June 2009 blog posting:
http://allenfrostlibrary.blogspot.com/2009/06/vic-shingles-ghastly-puppets-good-deed.html
Wednesday, 22 January 2014
Tuesday, 21 January 2014
Wednesday, 15 January 2014
Sunday, 12 January 2014
Saturday, 11 January 2014
Friday, 10 January 2014
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