June 2, 2021 - Letters from Roland-Garros - S. Williams over M. Buzarnescu: 6-3, 7-5, 6-1.
The third set offered teaching points on the art of defense from Mihaela Buzarnescu ––– returning Williams' baseline forehands with stabs that sent the ball soaring high into the air, requiring Williams to backpedal, take a breath, and wait to hit the ball on the bounce back to her opponent. This tactic, often, led to longer and longer points, which the two would bring to their close ––– at the net.
The biggest question driving the French Open is this: whether Williams, who has now reached thirty-nine years of age, will claim another grand slam title (she has twenty-three), and inch one step closer to taking the record of twenty-four from Margaret Court –––– the Australian, who won her last grand slam title in 1973.
In Buzarnescu, Williams faced a proven opponent; though currently ranked number one hundred and twenty-seven in the world, at thirty-three, she's a veteran who knows how to hang in matches, and as recently as 2018, was ranked as high as number twenty.
Watching Williams, it's easy to tell how much each match, each set, each game, each point means to her ––– as almost every grand slam tournament that she plays over the next year or two, may be her last. Against Buzarnescu, after a few longer, more challenging and entertaining points, on more than one occasion, both players looked over at each other ––– and whilst catching their breaths, smiled and applauded at their collective effort.
Shortly after the match, Williams was interviewed while still on the court, and basking in the glow of a match won and advancing through to the next round. The interviewer’s question, which he asked in both French as well English, matters less than Williams’ answer.
“I love my job” she said. “I don't smile very much, but I was enjoying being out here. It was kind of fun.”
May 31, 2021 - Bridges shaded by autumn, forever auburn / sunsets & oak. by Jordan Myers
Bridges shaded by autumn, forever auburn
sunsets & oak. In between roses & bouquets /
gifts of eternal oceans, which cross the coast
of September at night. Memories & waves
crashing into the shore and drifting out to sea.
A bird’s song at dawn; the quiet of morning light.
May 30, 2021 - Patricia Gordon’s “The Exposed Lady”
THE EXPOSED LADY
The most important person in my life passed away last year. My heart is broken. I can't hug, see, hear, or laugh with my deceased loved one anymore. Still I ride on an M104 bus one sunny, unseasonably warm day in February. I get goosebumps on my arms from the coolness from the bus’ air-conditioning.
When I look out my window, I see a woman walking down the street. Her hair is a messy updo of tangled black curls. She wears black baggie pants and black combat boots. She doesn’t wear makeup and looks like she’s in her late twenties or early thirties.
She doesn’t seem to be perspiring; though she’s slowing her pace. She doesn’t walk fast; or she can’t walk fast. There’s black fabric that may have been a shirt that’s hung over half of her upper body, leaving the other half exposed. Her right upper body ––– arm, breast, one side of her waist ––– is on display.
She doesn’t slouch. She doesn’t beg for money or say a word. No one says anything to her. Only a few people notice her, but they don’t speak; almost in shock.
My grief makes me give enough of a damn to pray. I say a silent prayer for the exposed lady, hoping that she’ll be all right; hoping that no one will harm her; and hoping that she’ll do no harm to anyone else.
- Patricia Gordon
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Patricia Gordon is a published New York fiction writer and artist. Some of her charcoal, pencil, ink drawings, watercolor paintings and collage works have been featured on the cover of and within the pages of Flashquake's literary and art journal. Her most recent illustrations can be found in her humor and fairy tale books (Funny?: a potentially humorous collection of writing and art and The Queen of Broken Hearts).
May 28, 2021 - A few blocks west of the Oculus by Jordan Myers
It was strange. I was having a coffee on a Thursday morning in September before work and sitting on a bench in Battery Park. The night before there was lightning and thunder outside my window, so loud and so consistent that it kept me awake almost until sunrise. I only slept a wink. The strange part wasn’t the lack of sleep followed by the coffee; and it wasn’t sitting on a bench in Battery Park before work. I started doing that all the time in July. Some mornings I’d have the lunch that you made me –––– ham sandwiches on gluten free bread with crisps and apple slices. Then later I’d have a bagel, plus two coffees with milk for lunch.
Battery Park wasn’t far from where you told me you wanted to meet me after work, the last Thursday of September. You had news and you wanted to share it with me and you wouldn’t give me any hint about what the news might be. I had asked and asked for a clue, but you wanted to keep it a secret; you wanted to make it a surprise. The strange part wasn’t how the rain from the night before was still in the morning air the next day. September storms linger; it happens all the time.
The strange part was how after work I walked out of the office across the way from the Bowling Green subway station and went over to the park bench where we were supposed to meet at 7:00pm; and once I arrived you were already sitting there, very still. You didn’t get up to hug me or kiss me so I sat down beside you and gave you a kiss on the cheek; and you looked over at me and you smiled. You were carrying the tote bag from that vintage used clothing store that we went to all the time whenever we’d go to your parents house in Cleveland; and after a while you reached over and into the bag and pulled out a small box. The box was wrapped with gold and green wrapping paper with a bow and the bow was gold. You gave it to me and said don’t read too much into it, and I asked whether you wanted me to open it then ––– and you said, yes, you did.
I started by pulling the strings of the bow rather than ripping the paper open. It was wrapped so beautifully and wrapped so delicately. Inside there was a plane ticket. Round-trip, from New York to San Francisco –––– and it was dated for the last week in November; the 22nd through the 29th. It started to rain, only a little bit at first but then it really started to rain –––– and you didn’t have an umbrella, and I didn’t have an umbrella, so we got up and started running toward an awning across the way. We found one outside of a coffee shop across. For a while we stood there in silence; and then you spoke: I’m moving, you said, and I want you to come and visit me –––– you have to come and visit me.
The strange part was the confidence with which you spoke: you have to come and visit me. The rain didn’t let up but instead the opposite happened. It started raining harder -––– really beating down. Your favorite spot to walk by the water wasn’t far away –––– a few blocks west of the Oculus. The rain softened and when we walked out from beneath the awning the temperature felt twenty degrees cooler. I had left my jacket on the back of my chair at the office and all you had was a second sweater in the tote bag, which you offered to me, but I declined.
We walked south and then west and I thought about those first few years that we spent together in Cleveland, working in the same office park and seeing each other at the same four or five happy hour bars that all of our friends would invite us to back then. When I think of you and I think of those years I think of how aloof you were. Even if you were in the same room as everyone else and doing the same thing as everyone else and drinking the same drink as everyone else, you were still aloof ––– all on your own: an island, a lighthouse.
May 26, 2021 - Every moment engulfed / in a whisper. by Jordan Myers
Every moment engulfed
in a whisper. The night
so quiet, so dark, so clear.
At last I can hear, the sound
of my own heart / / beating.
May 24, 2021 - At night by Jordan Myers
At night we listen for the rustle of the leaves
of the willow tree, swaying and bending
with the wind and the rain until dawn.
May 23, 2021 - Gold by Jordan Myers
Gold sounds. Gold winter. Gold moments. Gold autumn.
Gold dusk. Gold like that summer we spent in Milwaukee,
running early in the mornings then going back to sleep mid-day.
Gold like almost yellow, gold like something to adorn around
a diamond. Gold like the bracelet around your left wrist, gold
like the morning light falling into our window after you open
the curtains and put on the kettle. Gold coins. Gold wishes.
Gold medals for saying whatever words are the most true
at the time; even if they’re lines, those lines are gold. Gold
foil around the neck of the champagne bottle. Gold metaphors
for the years long gone. Gold silence for the breath breathing
with the heart. Silence is gold. Gold silence, in gold, in gold.
May 21, 2021 - Forever Fridays. by Jordan Myers
At Fifty-fifth and Ninth, I wait for the light to turn green.
I like watching the brake lights turn on and off at sunset.
I like taking my time on a bicycle at night; forever Fridays,
letting the city direct my steps, keep my time, and fill in
the blank spaces of my mind. Every detour, a terrace, every
delay, a balcony. The view is Saturday. The pace is Sunday.
May 20, 2021 - From our archives - July 27, 2019 - Antonio Pietrangeli's “Io la Conoscevo Bene” [I Knew Her Well] (1965).
Adriana Astarelli (Stefania Sandrelli) moves from the Italian countryside to Rome with dreams of breaking into the movie business, or even, dare anyone say, becoming a star. When she's not in acting classes (working on her laugh with her colleagues and instructor); driving out toward the beach to go swimming with friends at night; dancing at parties by throwing her arms about and around her body with great zest and enthusiasm equal if not surpassing that of her fellow party-goers; or driving through the sun-soaked or night-brushed streets of Rome alone; she's getting dressed and not quite putzing but certainly not hurrying around her apartment. It's a one bedroom flat in a high-rise with a stunning view that looks out over a sea, or an ocean, I can't tell which one.
The men in her life, and by extension, the men in the film have a way of appearing and granting great romantic attention and intention and adoration upon her; staying around for a few scenes; then disappearing. One leaves her in the morning, with a hotel bill that she's forced to pay for with a bracelet that he gave her, which he stole ––– very classy.
The film's trailer is short, fifty-two seconds, and is comprised of a foray between Adriana and a boxer who losses the fight in which Adriana is a part of the fashion show during the bout’s intermission. His name is Emilio Ricci (Mario Adorf), and he's incredibly likable; and carrying a briefcase which holds a photograph of a woman who Adriana presumes to be his girlfriend. It's not. "I can tell you the truth," he says to her, "I saw that picture in a photographer's shopwindow . . . and asked if I could have it."
The film nearly reaches the two-hour mark, and it probably won't grip you and keep you glued to your couch the entire time, as the plot, like Adriana, drifts and meanders. With that said, if you just want something beautiful and slightly tragic with a surprise ending to watch; and as a bonus, want to work on your Italian, then I Knew Her Well, unlike the men who dance into and out of Adriana's life, won't do you any harm.
May 19, 2021 - On 52nd Street there’s an ice cream shop / by Jordan Myers
Aching layers of dust and concrete slabs
surrounded by orange barrels. On 52nd
Street there’s an ice cream shop that sells
cones and two scoops for four dollars /
you can go there late at night if you want.
I went last week by myself and ordered
a chipwich with mint chocolate chip
& sat on a bench near a fountain along
Sixth Avenue. Pandemic Manhattan,
you move so slowly, you speak so soft.
May 17, 2021 - Wayne Wonder - “No Letting Go” (2003). by Jordan Myers
Here’s what I remember about Wayne Wonder’s No Holding Back (2003): driving to and from Lawrence Central High School in a 1998 Jeep Cherokee with Eduardo, our senior year.
The descent of winter and the windshield freezing over with ice and snow and the car’s wiper-blades trying to keep up. Listening to “Perfect Proposal” and feeling the subwoofer from the Jeep’s trunk beat against the car’s back seat. Eduardo leaning forward, looking out the windshield. and narrating along with the background voice in “Perfect Proposal” ––––- will you?
How light the Jeep felt, and also how quick. Driving fast down Fall Creek Road at night with “Glad You Came” playing through the car’s speakers. Soccer cleats in the backseat.
The CD that I copied the album onto: black vinyl with a green center and “Wayne Wonder ––– No Holding Back” written across the disc with a white sharpie. Loading the CD into the six-disc CD changer in the Jeep’s trunk. Walking around to the back of the car; opening the trunk; flipping through the leather CD booklet; and picking a few tunes for the drive.
May 16, 2021 - Revisiting Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard. by Jordan Myers
Certain avenues in Manhattan I only find myself biking every now and again –––– places where I used to live, which were once so familiar ––– that I now go back to as a different person, and see with new eyes. One of those avenues is Harlem’s Adam Clayton Powell Jr., boulevard. And the intersection I’m thinking of is ACP (or Eighth) and 125th Street (or 25th).
The first place I lived when I moved to New York almost ten years ago was Harlem: 148th and Malcolm X (or Lennox). Nearly a decade later, this morning, biking up Adam Clayton Powell and approaching 125th Street, I paused at a red light and looked across the intersection. As clear as day I could remember my twenty-four-year-old self, working as an administrative coordinator at Harlem Arts Alliance, and helping to set up for the tree lighting festival at the corner of Eighth and 25th.
I remember seeing the bronze monument of Clayton Powell Jr. for the first time; and thinking about how commanding, certain, and inspired he looks: bounding up a flight of stairs, with his overcoat flapping behind him like a cape in the wind. That was ten years ago. I was about the same height and weight, 5’10, 165. But everything else has changed.
May 14, 2021 - A signal malfunction on the uptown Broadway Express (Q), keeps everyone inside a train that sits still for twenty-five minutes. by Jordan Myers
A signal malfunction on the uptown Broadway Express (Q), keeps everyone inside a train that sits still for twenty-five minutes. After a while, each car begins . . . inching forward ––– then stopping again; inching forward . . . forward –––- then stopping again. Crawling along the tracks, the train at last, pulls into Thirty-fourth Street. The doors fly open; and almost everyone inside the train, sprints out, in flight. Only the brave remain on board, trusting that the next stop ––– Forty-second Street Times Square ––– will just be a few moments, tops. Eight block of prayers.