BE ABOUT IT

ZINE #12
the LOVE edition

edited by Alexandra Naughton

Published by Be About It Press, April 2016

Cover art by Christopher Campisi

beaboutitpress.tumblr.com
@baipress

Valentine, by Jim Naughton

TAURUS

This is a new thing for me and Im only comfortable pursuing it

because Daniel Day Lewis is a

Taurus and because I feel really safe in your arms

Like I could melt into a warm pool of goo even after telling you
congratulations on getting me off

because I was convinced skater boys couldnt get anyone off but
themselves

So far youve been hippy jumping directly into my heart

- Natali Puga
FOG SALESMAN DEAD: BODY FOUND IN LIGHTHOUSE

LONELY has no value,

an Angel couldnt sell it
no-one even gives that shit away.
I became an allergy
Like a foreign object
when it gets rejected by the host.
A memory, like a hometown,
is somewhere left behind
Which,
disintegrates without you in it Walls
dissolve into a matrix.
When the goldfish blinks,
her matrix is in view.
(the meaning of) life
must of been something someone overheard somewhere and
then they promptly forgot it:
something so stupid and hollow and ruthless and true.
An unknown ubiquitous,
uniquely broken by design.
should come as no surprise then
PURPOSE is a priceless thing,
not even an Angel would sell that shit
no-one dares give it away.
~
- A. Winsom
SPAM.

One time we ate only canned meats for a week or close enough
to.
Do you really think theres anyone else on this entire planet
Earth who would voluntarily eat canned meats for a week? I am
certain that no one we know could stomach salt-soaked and
soggy animal parts, not even once, and I am certain that I hope
no one you ever meet can either.

It is important to keep truths like these sacred and ours, if we

are sharing your commitment with others.

It is important to preserve our favorite things harshly and

tightly. In a suffocating box they can last forever.

- Holly Meadows-Smith

photo by h.b. rubin

SPRING'S GLOW

I bummed a few cigarettes off a few people outside of

DIA. You'd kill me if you saw me smoking; I was afraid you'd
smell it when I got off the SuperShuttle to your apartment an
hour away. I stood at the very edge of the terminal's platform,
where the rolling land stood before me indifferently. There was
no way to comprehend this would someday be my future.

***

As the SuperShuttle inched up Wadsworth, under the

bridge and up the road, closer and closer to you, I kept thinking,
it's Spring Break. The sky was overcast in that Colorado way:
washed out watercolors on a white canvas, sunshine and
warmth comfortably on the horizon. I closed my eyes, then,
knowing your love was the same way.
***

It was your idea to go to the batting cages; you had a

game that night and wanted to loosen up. The attendant gave us
20 tokens for $5. My hits were low and angry, yours graceful and
high. The machine would sometimes stop working and the
attendant would come, apologizing the whole way, fixing the
machine and then going back to his chaw and magazine.

***

It seems like so much of our relationshipthe best part

of our relationshipis discovering together how
overwhelmingly insignificant we are and how overwhelmingly
significant our love is.

***
 Before there was furniture in your apartment there was
a blanket, a bottle of White Zinfandel, two glasses and the two of
us on a sea of carpet. Jurassic Park had finished buffering on
your Macbook Air. We were surrounded by clementine peels;
that was my fault. You asked me when I would clean up but fell
asleep before I could respond. Then I wrapped you tight in the
blanket.

- Hilton Hosannah

NINE

I was hypnotized by nine.

I met him in a back valley.
The cape he wore appealed.
I took his hand & followed him home.
Nine will never end.
An ally. We skateboard through the alley.
Our powder blue capes flying
through the valley of nine.
We did it nine times.
Capes flung on the floor. Caps
hung on the door.
Naples, Nutbread, Noontide, Nightcaps.
Nevertheless, nine is fine with us.
We swoop through space & time,
wild capes & caps, captivated.
Never ending valley of nine.

- Maw Shein Win

love macro by Sean Walsh
CHECK YOURSELF, MATE

Sure, okay, I see your move. Wait for me; youre for meclassic.
Meanwhile, how are all those women you hit up when youre
feeling like a purple jellybean, left behind in the bowl, or the only
kid in class not invited to Ellies end-of-school pool party? Some
of us know better; Ive been to the Edge of Earth for a match-
made-in-horoscope-hell whose excuse for failing to meet me
was sorry. Some of us have spent time at the Edge, hanging out
instead of off; weve met people who want to learn not only our
names, but also how theyre spelled. Gone are my days of
waiting to be treated like a human Im treating myself like
one. Youve got moves, sure. Me too. Watch as I swing my hips,
tap my feet, shimmy shimmy out of your reach.

- Sarah A. OBrien

LITTLE DEATH

Take my breath, my little death,

my wild honey, my secret fire.
Black suns burn through sulphurous winters;
their poison snowfalls stain the mire.
Whisper, serpents - well conspire
beneath our lies and glass umbrella -
swollen, silken pasteurella
beneath the skin. No love for us sinners.
Well meet like rivers; Salinas, Estrella.
Well smother what cinders are left at our depth.
Well sunder the leaders of lightning from thunder.
Our lungs fall bereft - little death, now expired.

- Angelo Colavita
ROBERTO BOLAO IS MY BOYFRIEND

On my first semester of college, Roberto Bolao was my

boyfriend. I wanted to see him brush his rock star hair and recite
poetry to me in Spanish. I wanted to go on a dinner date with
him with my hair in barrel curls.

I used to slather a mound of Johnson Ultra Sheen on my hair,

coating each strand and then melting it into my curls with an
iron. My hair was compared to one of my cousins. Who has the
better hair? Who is more worthy of passing for a better ticket?
Would you choose the pale Moon or the dark side of Mars?

Im tired of being the orbiting child that everyone questions, an

orphan of various galaxies. Youre looking up with wonder,
tracing my outlines, sampling my crust, coming up with new
names. Please, only give me one.

I would like to have an underwater tea party with Roberto

Bolao, but afterwards my hair will dry in the sun when we walk
home. The salt water seasons it, its no longer good hair. And
then I have to practice a thought routine of It gets better,
because not everyone will notice how your hair is sprouting and
breaking free from the sealants. You have nice hair. My hair
represents the turmoil of my being, as the ends split and crinkle
under the weight of the suns rays.

When my Singaporean aunt showed me the deserted train track

that led to Malaysia, I imagined two lovers on two islands
separated slightly by the ocean between them. As it gets peeled
off - since it was no longer needed - they stand there mourning
for a while, then they slowly forget each others warmth.

They sing a love song for those separated by the earths core.
They sing a love ballad for those drowning. And the waves carry
them on and settle as salt on my hair. It follows me everywhere.
My hair becomes a love cushion.

- Xian Xian
ME-SHAPED

I slept over at your place so much, you had a me-shaped

divot in your mattress. We had maybe 2,000 coffees together.
You didn't know what you wanted to be when you grew up, and
neither did I, and we were good together in our not-knowing.
We didn't want to make bad things or work for bad people or
put people in jail or cause suffering and misery. The pickings
were slim so we worked at the cafe while we decided. You knit
me a scarf and it was riddled with dropped stitches, but it was
the perfect scarf because when I wore it you noodled your
fingers into all the holes.
When the Others came and started recruiting people you
begged me to join with you. You said they transform your body
so you can breathe in space. You said the Others were trying to
create interplanetary unitya galaxy of beings all alike. Come
with me, you said, we can float in space together and create
unity. I believed in you like kids believe in things, but I told you
I wanted the body that you had, and the body I had, on the earth
that we lived in. I told you that this was the whole point. And you
went with them anyway. I wore my scarf to watch you go even
though it was July.
A year later you came back and this time there wasn't a
choice. There were so many of you and so few of us. You took me
to the big tents, you held my hand during the procedure that
made me able to breathe in space, you covered me in dark goo,
and we launched together.
It is so wonderful to float with you, if it is really you still. I
have to believe it is. It must have been you, it must have been
you who found me specifically. The sky is infinite black and the
stars are fixed fireworks and I will never get tired of looking at
them, or you. You made me a part of you, and we are a part of a
bigger thing, which is all I really wanted. I'm sorry I ever
doubted you.

- Molly Mary OBrien

BECOME CONFETTI

I dont care about anything anymore. I want to eat

everything that isnt the clouds. I want to feast on all
the sea-life, swallow up the oceans and swell to a size
some-number-HUGE! Ill be all blue lagoon-like. You
can come to my dolphin show and swim with the dolphins.
Youll say Aint she neat? and like That! well evaporate.
It will be tea time and well be all crumpets and cakes. Ill take
two lumps of sugar and well swirl counter-clockwise into the
center of a magnetar supernova. Well break into a million
rainbow sprinkles and become confetti among the stars.

- Azia DuPont
artwork by Madeleine Buzbee
 1

you are the white sheets now

goodnight
white sheets

Kiss me until 90% of the workforce is

automated and there is no fresh water
and the oceans have reached Arizona.

Kiss me while my shower drains,

which takes approximately
an hour and a half
because maintenance still hasn't come.

- Elijah Pearson
JUST REMIND ME THAT YOU LIKE ME

the air plump in my cheeks like marshmallows and my nipple

burning. warm and windy, apples
make great company, and i scroll my fingers through stacks &
stacks at Whole Foods wondering which is the right one to steal
two clusters of granola from the plastic aisle & one
rose, which she bought for me from a dumpster outside of the
Safeway on College

and she was leaving and i said when are you coming back and she
said soon, just remind me that you like me.

yesterday: a sandwich in my fingers of ripped bread and cheese,

you made it for me and it tastes tough
sun glaring down, hand for a hat fingers i scoot
close to you cuz i hate not touching

& now we are sitting on a rock with the stars over the ocean,
night before new moon means everything is bright and
dangerous, and you say look see the big V shape up there, no, a
little more left, yeah, thats Taurus

thats me.

we leave the rock to fuck in the tent, loud & hard while everyone
is outside in their furry boots, us on too much whiskey to care &
i am grabbing at your dick, the chatterings outside a soundtrack
to the conversations i want to erase
from my mind, about who are we who are we who are we
how boring, to look at each other and ask for caring

how boring, to want you there tomorrow (but i do)

and then we fall asleep naked and wake up
cold pressed together.

our plan is: pee, shoes, dance.

so then were gumming molly and spinning in a Cold War
bunker: lackadaisical DJ playing slow three a.m. dub step with
casted lights and graffiti that feels unbearably White, up there,
in the hills of Marin. i smoke a cigarette while your are shaking
& i feel unbearably, in love.

we wake up again, this time the sun miserable on our cheeks and
in our mouths and
i feel nauseas cuz of the leftover pad thai and the unrefrigerated
egg and the i told you so
when i hold your hand i think about what it would taste like in
blood.

- h.b. rubin

BAbaby love by Brandy Garcia

CUPID IS A SADIST

streetlights dance in the midnight void

and untouched shadows creep onto your jacket
like tired kittens

i can describe you using unused metaphors

if i do, you will probably appreciate me more

i love you and

the streetlights glow orange
like alley cats set aflame

we are holding hands for the first time

we are both carrying knives in our pockets

- Jordan Hoxsie
LIL TIMES

I liked the way Jarred banged his heads to the band

in his leather jacket and blue hair, he held my hand and I bolted.
I loved it when david scissored me
one time right as he finished behind me, I yelled shots fired! and
ducked for cover
it was so funny, we laughed forever
Some new girl thought his new hair looked hot
now she's his pair of scissors
and I'm in a different city,
looking for jokes to laugh at
Corey has a house by the river I dig the view,
Josh has a million mirrors on his wall I loved to dance in,
we've got a lot to say to each other.
The first time with Richard, he rolls over and says he lost his
gum.
My mom had to get it out of my hair with peanut butter.
Erika faked it when I went down on her,
but she screamed like a newborn I didn't get it.
Logan got the flu in the fort in my room,
he hurled in a bucket all day while I tickled his head.
Ally kissed Mario, but he kissed me after. We showed our tits at
his concert,
can't imagine what he thinks.
I replace the R on my hand with a B for benny in college,
Rich got real mad and left me.
I woke up to Ryan masturbating to me in the morning
at his cousin's who used to push me into lockers.
I pretended to not see it, I didn't want to make the super bowl
party awkward.
The first time I did mushrooms was with Angie
I told her she was a flower,
it had rained and the white petals from this shedding tree
were sticking to our faces. I got confused between time and
space
she let me row a boat in a river by her father's
My mother will always tell me when my birthday is
if I'm feeling afraid.
Shane followed me and Ally around with a guitar
we were barefoot and wondering,
Justin took me to a wedding I don't even remember.
I don't belong at open bars.
Amanda started to love me a little too hard,
I liked her butt but I hated her laugh.
California was a bust,
but Jason was a surfer and all he ever talked about
was everybody wang chung tonight.
What a motto I said, he said the only way to learn to surf
was at night when the oceans black,
then you are never afraid to surf in the sun.
I still said fuck no and buried my feet in the sand while they
disappeared.
Liquor helps, but if love is real
then tell me what's make believe.
It is all the same let's play house,
and I'll be the daughter.
You be the daddy, fuck me really hard.
Be disturbed, be excited, be tall and be hot,
be a man and be a woman,
have money and be careless, be lazy and keep moving.
Be darkness but be warm. I am waiting I am waiting for you to
be to be to be

- Olivia Gillingham
PATHS (TWO EXCERPTS)

im a bag of bones from a hundred different bodies. youre

carrying me over your shoulder and toward a cliff. whole, i
thrash like angry cats. id meant to ask you if you were more of
a cat or a dog person, but im afraid now it's too late. when we
get to the edge of the cliff i hear you say, there are too many
bones and not enough bodies, and i say but im a body, im a bag
and im a body and im made of bones but also of parts that you
can't see or maybe i don't know how to show you. when it's time
for you to swing me over your shoulder, im a basket filled with
fresh fruit.

i think it would be easier to talk to you if we were walking,

walking to a predetermined destination and talking about the
people wed see when we arrive. i would classify a tree
incorrectly and you would wonder aloud if we shouldve
stopped for beer, i will wonder silently how you said that just in
time to forget what i was really thinking.

- Ctch Bsnss
 -

love macro by Jordan Hoxie

BIOS

A. Winsom. Ontario. sion sono's love exposure.

Angelo Colavita. Philadelphia. Favorite love stories include, but are not
limited to, Leonard Cohen's Beautiful Losers, Lars von Trier's Breaking the
Waves, and Johnny Cash's Long Black Veil."

Azia DuPont. Southern California. Her favorite love story is a tie between
Emily and Oliver from the movie "A lot Like Love" (2005) and Leo Gursky
and Alma from her favorite book, "The History of Love" by Nicole Krauss.

Brandy Garcia. 956. \_()_/

Christopher Campisi. Oakland California. Terminator 2.

Ctch Bsnss. Denver. sun, moon, and talia by giambattista basile.

Elijah Pearson. Philadelphia by the time this is published. Their favorite love
story is Die Hard 2.

h.b. rubin. oakland, ca. lyra belacqua and will parry, from those philip
pullman books about life with animal souls.

Hilton Oliver Hosannah III. Littleton, CO. "Spring's Glow" is excerpted from
his upcoming collection, Everyone//Sometimes//Wants//Nothing. His
favorite love story is Wall-E.

Holly Meadows-Smith. Oakland, CA. The story of Corin Tucker and Carrie
Brownstein as depicted in Hunger Makes Me a Modern Girl.

Jordan Hoxsie. Burbank, California. Story of the Eye by Georges Bataille.

Madeleine Buzbee. San Francisco. I Love Dick by Chris Krauss.

Maw Shein Win. El Cerrito. Xanadu.

Molly Mary O'Brien. Brooklyn, NY. Norwegian Wood.

natali puga. phoenix. she is an aries. her favorite love story is wall-e.

Olivia Gillingham. Eau Claire, WI. Johnny Castle and Baby's, oh lover boy.

Sarah A. O'Brien. Boston, MA. R2-D2 & C-3PO ("There are as many forms of
love as there are moments in time" -Jane Austen).

Sean Walsh. Danbury, CT. Wristcutters: A Love Story

Xian Xian lives at New Jersey. Her favorite love story is the one that
constantly circulates throughout the seasons in many languages.

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