DEFINITION-In chemistry, particle collision is the basis of reaction rates. According to collision theory, atoms and molecules must collide in order to react.
There's a chemistry lesson for you within this flash fiction piece that appeared today in Zvi Sesling's 10 X 10: Flash Fiction magazine. The above definition (in italics) is found in science, but my flash fiction is talking about the other kind of chemsitry, the kind that exists or doesn't exist between two people. In that kind of chemistry there is some jilting, stalking, interference, explosive events, which, in life, happens. (Not very healthy class-Study up!).
In the above video, pretend that the protons in the video are four human beings colliding at a certain location, let's say in Cambridge, Ma. (And then a kitchen sink and chair come out! Did you watch it?)
It starts
with hugs to people I’d not seen since last time. I say, “No shaking hands
on the first day,” knowing I've voluntarily let down my guard in the best
of ways. I am about to leave Earth as I know it.
The people
you love are the ones who, even after time apart, rejoin you like birds in
flight, without pause. Nothing has to be said. Everyone just flies with each
other within the V, within that wedge. We welcome the new birds and want them
to fly with us, then come back and join us again. Nothing is better here than the
“all” whether an outward signal, an aura, emotions or something not necessary
to say out loud. It shows up in vibration, in fact, showing love is revolutionary.
One thing I
love is you can do everything or nothing while you’re here. People can
participate in organized activities or walk around until they hear a voice
singing, or a guitar or mandolin playing. There's usually someone sitting on
the edge of a porch whose paint you can watch dry, or someone else to simply
sit and talk with. When there are people singing in groups with five to six in
perfect joyous harmony there is always a seventh to discover and contribute.
Some of the
brightest stars are the children of all ages who have come here as children and
they bring their own back here. If only these life experiences could be passed
on as part of our DNA. Unfortunately, genetics seems more likely to pass along
the things you'd rather it didn't (see epigenetics)...so, we pass things in
real-time and in our experiences here. Organic.
---------
Then, something happens. Sudden. The
week ends: Sunday, bags packed, the Laighton approaching from the distance to
bring us back to Earth. Nothing can be done about it.
We end with
hugs, eyes moistened. No crying until I’m on the highway, when I realize
I hadn’t experienced the emotion of sadness in seven days. Then, what I'd
fought off overtakes me. Suddenly I'm driving while sobbing.
---------
It only
takes a few hours back to fall into routine, and feel that I am not just a visitor
in my own house. I know I am no longer at Star. I am back on Earth, with the obvious reminders
of checking the mail, or the less obvious, like holding a paper towel in my
hand with a quick thought that “this is compost,” before remembering there is
not a bin for that here.
A few years
ago, on the island, a friend sat with a few of us and tried to come up with a
plan on how to bring the feeling of Star Island back home in some way, shape or
form. We discussed everything we do at Star that we can bring back and make it
feel like here. A few weeks later, from the facilitator of this casual group
came a two-word email:
In their Creators on Creating Series, my friend Meia Geddes, who I ran into at AWP in Baltimore, a great place to run into people who live 30 minutes from you, talked about interviewing me and it's an honor to be interviewed for her journal. When I get questions e-mailed to me, I like to answer off the top of my head....read the question and then, basically free write.
Poetry feels like one of the
few places where people are authentic these days.
Do you feel that way?
I do. Besides, words, meaning, craft is important and authentic as well.
Sometimes
it can be faux-authentic depending on how it plays on the page.
As
poets we are good actors, the challenge is the projection of the work
representing
thoughts and feelings. I try not to dwell on the mundane, unless
I’m being playful
with the day-to-day.
You write: “Can you hear me at this distance / saying, I don’t need people
/
I can stay in my room. / But I don’t have to be that person anymore.”
So
much of writing is solitary and language can keep oneself company so well.
How has the process of letting the world in more unfolded for you?
I think that it is more of a metaphor for isolation, and the wondering if you
are important
or just a tree in the forest, so to speak. My isolation now is
more to re-energize than
anything else, not because I’m depressed. I
appreciate my alone time, certainly stay
busy, but this alone time is also
for my spirituality and to stay “in tune.”
I so appreciate the vulnerability in your poems. How do you decide how
vulnerable
to be? Or is anything a go?
No decision to go or not go into vulnerability, but emotional vulnerable is
one thing for my
writing that is an open book. I may not wish to share
innermost secrets but rather innermost
thoughts. We are all vulnerable,
whether we like it or not, but how that plays out, and how
much you want to
show is the key. As they say, “you MUST go there.” I think I must be
vulnerable to be honest and take that leap because otherwise the extreme
opposite can just
be objects sitting on a shelf, which of course there is an
art in that too.
How do you decide whether something belongs in a prose piece or poem?
Most likely, I decide before I even start what genre I’d like to produce, but
maybe after the
first two lines or sentences I can go the other way
immediately if I see something in there.
If it’s not that immediate then it’s
going to be where it is at that moment, poetry or fiction,
or recycle bin.
You write in the Introduction to Best of Timothy Gager about
having an ego for many
years and then learning some humility. Could you talk
a bit about this phenomenon
of writers and ego?
Well, we are all pretty much self-centered sons of bitches, aren’t we? It’s
just a matter of
reeling it in. Self-centeredness, mind you, is just thinking
about yourself, which our mind
tends to do whether we like it to or not. I
learned humility in my recovery, and I feel the
best when after fifteen
years, when someone else in the rooms tells me, “I didn’t know
you wrote.”
There is a time and place for everything to be done or said.
Relatedly, and conversely, do you think art reduces ego? That is one of
the reasons
I think that art is of tangible value to the world, because the
act of creating seems
to reduce individual ego.
Today less so than ever. Social media is just ego, and one must promote, to
some extent there.
Who is the person always having a good time or succeeding
is all you see there.
We, as humans, seek and yearn for endorphins much more
than acts of philanthropy.
You’ve been sober for 15 years. How have your writing and life changed in
this time?
I mean I hope I would have naturally gotten better in fifteen years
organically, I know my
focus is better, and how I move through narratives or
how themes change and stay aligned.
How has having children changed you and your writing?
Other than having time to write when they were younger?
It gives me more to
write about, but also, they are now grown adults, so I feel that it is
their
story to write.
Are you always looking at the world through a poet’s lens? Or do you have
multiple
brain states? I know you work full time as a social worker which
requires a different
set of skills.
I have lenses to look through that’s for sure, and also wear many hats.
Social work,
podcasting, host of a literary series, performing solo as
singer-songwriting artist,
full-time meetings of recovery…so for writing.
It’s like I’m driving and a red car rolls
by, and I think, “Look, there’s a
red car.” For me, something strikes me and I can say,
“Look, there’s a poem,
or a flash, or a novel.” I don’t go looking for it, but it will always find
me.
Could you talk about the Dire Literary Series and your more recent
adventure
into podcasting?
Eighteen years live, and now six as a virtual series, which someone got me to
start up
again in 2020. I try to be of service to other writers, but I get so
much out of it. It’s amazing
talking to writers, sort of geek-tacular in many
ways. Now the podcast I started with a college
friend because we were talking
about dating and disasters which happen, so I do that too,
every week.
Disasters in dating are hilarious, and as my therapist says, “now you have an
outlet for your type of sense of humor.” Writer Jackie Dawes is now my
co-host and the
podcast is called Dean and Dawes: Dating, Dread and
Disasters.
It might be self-explanatory, but could you elaborate on what you mean by
“live 24/7,”
which you write in your book’s Introduction and when signing
books?
One Day At a Time. 24 hours a day for 7 days a week, then, for me life is
better.
I try to do that. Live for life to be better. It already is about a
million times over.
Meia Geddes is a writer, artist, and librarian. She has written a collection of lyrical missives addressed to the world, LOVE LETTERS TO THE WORLD, and a novella, THE LITTLE QUEEN. Meia was born in Hefei, China, raised in Sacramento, California, and lives in Boston, Massachusetts. She holds a bachelor's degree from Brown University and master's degree from Simmons University's School of Library and Information Science, and has been the recipient of a Fulbright grant to South Africa.
I'm grateful to have been accepted by Meat for Tea, The Valley Review. The journal, Meat For Tea, produced in central/western, Massachusetts is a labor of love, put out by Elizabeth McDuffie. I've had a flash fiction in a previous issue, but this issue the topic was "High." I few years ago I started a memoir, with short chapter length pieces. I may finish it at some point, but the pieces I submitted and were published seemed appropriate for this topic. Also for my own theme for that snapshot in time, they deal with addiction and beginnings of.
Purchase a copy HERE:and read, "Bible Study Reject" and "Well, About My Attention Deficit Disorder"
Last week I did a reading at The First & Last Word Poetry Series with MP Carver and Lawrence Kessenich. I read exclusively from These New Orbs---which deals with spirit orbs, celestial beings, ghosts, losses, or anything round. MP and Lawrence knocked it out of the park, and I'm kind of proud of how the book came out
To WATCH: Click the Pic
The First & Last Word Poetry Series
May 19th, 2026
Hosted by Harris Gardner and Steve Glines
Readers:
M.P. Carver
Timothy Gager
Lawrence Kessenich
Bios:
M.P. Carver is a poet and visual artist from Salem, MA. She is Director of the Massachusetts Poetry Festival, teaches at Salem State University, and co-founded the journal Molecule: a tiny lit mag. Her most recent chapbook is Hard Up, from Lily Poetry Books. More on her website: mpcarver.com
Timothy Gager is the author of 20 books of fiction and poetry, which includes his fourth novel, Shadows of the Seen, and his most recent collection of poetry, Almost Bluing for X-Tra Whiteness. He has had over 1000 works of fiction and poetry published and his work also has been nominated for a Massachusetts Book Award, The Best of the Web, and The Best Small Fictions Anthology.
Lawrence Kessenich won Strokestown International Poetry prize in Ireland in 2010 His poetry has appeared in the Sewanee Review, Atlanta Review, Poetry Ireland Review, and many other magazines. He has published five books of poetry, three novels, short stories, essays, and has had short plays performed at many drama festivals.
Eileen Pollack, George S. Peterson, Ellen Kombiyil, M.K. Jackson, Chad Parenteau, Kerry Beth Neville, Lawrence Kessenich, Linda Carney-Goodrich, Amy Alvarez, Kurt Baumeister
Doug Crandell, Mathew Olzmann, William Orem, Martin Ott, M.P. Carver, Phil Temples, Mag Gabbert, Robert Fleming, Danielle Legros George, Michael Keith, Mark Wish
Marianne Leone, Tiffany Davenport, Jennifer Friedman Lang, Ray Guidrox, Gary Grossman, Elizabeth McKim, Carla Panciera, Dr. Dannagal G. Young, Ellis Elliot, Enzo Silon Surin, Josh Barkan, Laura Zigman, Tom Laughlin
Suzanne Frischkorn, Kim Addonizio, Thomas McNeely, Jenna Le, Sarah Bridgins, Lee Matthew Goldberg, Lise Hanes, Dr. Paula Perez, Michael Mark, Maya Williams, Hannah Sward, Caitlin Avery, Carla Swartz, Stacy TenHouton, Donna Spruijt-Metz, Morgan Baker
Jonathan Papernick, A.K. Small, Aaron Tillman, David Rockland, Kimberly Ann Priest, Sain Griffiths, Harris Gardner, Lisa Taylor, Michael Keith, Jim Shepard, Zach VandeZande, Rusty Barnes, Daniel Nester. Kurk Lovelace (reading from Annemarie O'Connell's book), and Nina Shope
Sara Lippmann, Robin McLean, Gregory Orr, Rich Murphy, Diane Suess, Ron Tanner, Aleathea Drehmer, Christina Adams, Sharon Applegate Greenwald, Lucas Scheelk,
Joseph Milosch, Barbara Legere, Ellene Glenn Moore, Vincent Cellucci and Chris Shipman
I've been published here four times previously, and this time I'm in the issue with Huina Zheng, Eileen Tabios, David Henson, Swetha Amid, Pablo Libedinsky, Debra Myers, Robert David Garnham, Austin Alexis and Joan Leotta. I've embedded it here for your convenience.
The story itself was a nice break from the serious true crime writing I've been working on of late. Back to the odd, strange and bizarre world flash fiction allows, and I often use. The main character wears a rubber koosh-ball suit. Why? Read by scrolling below it to find out!
To win your bracket it involves getting people to vote for you as your opponent is doing the same thing. It feels weird. Begging people to vote for you, by flooding their social media feeds with this request so you can win lacks integrity, and my feelings are the over-and-over begging can come across as pathetic. Usually friends, who won't even read the piece will click it because it's as easy to do as a 'like'. These contests play like a high-school popularity contests and less about quality of he work. That's my head talking.
In reality, the concept itself is very cool and a blast, and I had fun writing about recovery through the lense of the the Chili Peppers song.
I didn't post like a maniac and beg for votes, so I lost. More specifically, I forgot the competition was running and my game happened on March 4th, without me mentioning it at all and I lost. If I had only remembered, I would have been begging to the devil.
I forgot because I was at AWP in Baltimore in the middle of a book tour, where hawking books somehow showed much more integrity. The elevator pitch, I repeated over 5,000 times really sold Shadows of the Seen.
"Shadows of the Seen is a novel dealing with the gun issue
written in three distinct narratives. There is a politician who is actually a liberal
in beliefs who runs on right-wing gun talking points to have a career. There is
a mass shooter, and finally there is someone with nothing to live for who
breaks up a mass shooting, but of the two, you don't know which is
which until the end."
Then I weaved my way home doing a reading in Philadelphia for the Philadelphia Writers Circle hosted by the wonderful Jane-Rebecca Cannarella and Alex DiFrancesco. The event was held at Ray's Happy Birthday Bar, a remarkable dive that removes the Bathroom Out of Order Sign for use, but it also has a sign in the bathroom that reads, Hand Towels Available at the Bar right next to the sink.
The next night, I went on to Mid-Town Manhattan, to read for The Italian American Writers Association, who also hosts readings in Boston and Philadelphia. My co-feature, Tony Gloeggler was a poet I had a lot in common with professionally Tony ran group homes before he retired, and some of his poems about his job were gut-thrashing realistic and sweet.
I left with 3 boxes of books, and came home with a handful. I didn't beg for your votes, but read the essay anyway. I'm so very grateful to have been on a successful book tour, where, fool that I am, secretly fell in love a bunch of times, but I won't bring that up, the same way I won't bring up voting for an essay in order to win. What I will bring up was the support, the purchases, the friends I ran into, the old friends I met with, and the folks running these events were all simply amazing. I also found 5 nice recovery meetings in all these cities, which keeps me from being under a bridge.
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