New (Print) Issue Preview: Piaf and Roadkill

Yesterday we gave you a preview of our upcoming web edition and now it's time for a sneak peek at some of the content from our soon to be released print edition (vol. 9, no. 2).  Here is an excerpt from Edward Kelsey Moore's essay, "Piaf and Roadkill." Enjoy!

I got out of the car, opened the hood, and leaned in to get a good look. That was when I saw the dead animal. It was twisted around the fan and entwined with the fan belt. Its face was pointed up toward mine.
     I don’t recall running after I slammed shut the hood, but I must have because I was half a block away from the car, hopping from foot to foot when I clamped a trembling hand over my mouth so I wouldn’t hear myself shrieking. I hadn’t run far, but I had put enough distance between myself and my car that I could now see the hind end of an animal hanging from behind the grill onto the street below.
     I made the first of several increasingly strange phone calls then. I called my partner at work. Peter is usually a calming and comforting influence, and he has a knack for helping me see humor in even the worst situation. Squeaky-voiced and barely able to speak, I told him that I had just found some unfortunate creature wrapped around the front of my engine and that, when I came face to face with it, I had reacted by running, screaming and leaping up and down like a cartoon housewife who had just seen a mouse. He responded, “And you’re wearing that fuzzy, pink sweater, aren’t you?”
     That was the worst thing he could have said. From the moment I slapped my hand over my screaming mouth, a little voice I thought I had banished years earlier had started badgering me that a manly plan for dealing with this problem existed, and that I was uniquely unable to put it into action. I had thought that, after a lengthy and fitful coming-out process, I’d put to bed the fear that I routinely failed at even pretending to be a real man. But as soon as I slammed shut the hood of my car, I had been aware that the revulsion I felt was keeping company with shame. That harshly critical little voice was wide awake, and it wanted my attention.

We will let you know as soon as vol. 9, no. 2 is available, so you can pick up a copy to read the full version of "Piaf and Roadkill" as well as all the other great essays, stories, and poems in the issue.