A Feeling that Was Later Described as Jazz

Bean Newton

Issue 21 * Fall 2007

In this brief work, Bean Newton created a quasi-philosophical, yet arguably psychological and physiological set of statements all roughly amounting to, from a purely rationalist perspective, some kind of headache.

Newton, of course, being a self-described "Grumpascetical," called it jazz. Despite appearances, this was not considered a slight.

The work emerges from Newton's stint in 1997 working at a used record store, Slipped Discs, during the day and at a grain elevator at night despite the fact that Newton was dangerously allergic to grain dust and was plagued with sinus headaches and tortured by inflamed boils almost constantly. Despite the oozing pustules that covered much of his body, he managed to date Purewater, Kansas' notorious cake-maker and soup-specialist, Charlotte-Anne Emilie, during this time.

Emilie's memoir of this period is forthcoming from Turkish Armadillo Press. -- E.W. Wilder

A Feeling that Was Later Described as Jazz

This is a particular idea that is about bluegreen. It is sort of a color that reminds one of what advertisers use to remind us of the ocean. That's about as well as I can describe it, but suffice it to say it is neither blue nor green, not factually.

And it's stationed right above my hippocampus, exuding vacuity, a somnolence to the rest. The only thing that keeps thoughts in motion in the rest of the head is the gentle, almost tidal, sway of the idea.

This idea is nothing like liberty. It's less militant for one, but more insidious. It is beginning to gel, the tidal sway becoming a sort of pulsation. Later, now, it warms, an inside-outside womb.

The down side of succor is suffocation.