AT TARGET 
Adrian Korpel 

 When I enter the coffee shop at Target, a chorus line of fat, happy bagels and sinuous pretzels welcomes me. I choose a bagel studded with sesame seeds like a diamond-encrusted ring, order a double cappuccino, sit down, and look up at the commercial spectacle above me.

 From the store’s ceiling, gridded with fluorescent lights, posters hang down like banners for the Good Life, the Life you have a Right to, the life guaranteed by Mastercard. The poster closest to me shows a deeply contented pharmacist, smiling broadly while holding up a bottle of cough syrup. Close by hangs a paper housewife in a pink, subtly swelling tee shirt, also smiling and carrying a half-gallon milk bottle in each hand. She is using them as semaphore signs to signal the pharmacist, her paramour. They spell out my love, my love, my adorable apothecary, drop your white coat and run to me, drugged by desire. 

 But she is not the only one yearning for the apothecary. Another woman, much farther away than the tee-shirted signer, is running toward him along the ceiling. She is a lawyer in full stride, arms swinging. Her gray business dress is Simple yet Elegant, Sober yet Attractive, Prim yet Alluring. She knows that Great Design Doesn’t Have To Cost A Lot, as she tells me in three-inch bold letters beneath her feet. Will she reach the pharmacist in time before the semaphore siren has lured him to her grotto? It’s problematic, there are choices involved, arrows that point to other caves in the store: Jewelry, Cosmetics, Health, Beauty, Lingerie, Men, Women, Maternity. 

 I sip my coffee, bite into my bagel, and watch the drama unfold high above me in the cork-tiled heavens. There is nobody else around, there is only me and the ineffable universe of banners and bagels, pretzels and coffee, the sufficient metaphysics of my desire.

HANSEL AND GRETEL

Adrian Korpel
Digital art: Bob Grigsby


Hansel had wanted a magic wand for Christmas and Gretel a laser gun, but what their parents gave them was a dump truck for Hansel and two Barbie dolls for Gretel. So they decided to run away. 
 Running away was easy enough. They lived at the edge of a forest, and the only thing they had to do was to pack up and go. But Hans was worried they would never find their way back, and he suggested scattering breadcrumbs along their path.
 "Why would you ever want to come back?" Gretel said. "There is nothing for us here. And why bread crumbs? The birds would eat them all. Use your brains, boy! I think we should just go." 
 And so it was decided. They walked all day through the forest. When they were hungry they ate hickory nuts which Gretel cracked open with her Swiss Army knife, and to quench their thirst they drank from the creek that ran beside their path. And even though they had left their parents, they were very happy all day. 
 But night was a different matter. Gradually the sky darkened above the tall trees, and the forest filled with black hollows. Owls started to hoot, and they heard the rustle of small animals in the dead leaves. Hansel got very frightened and began to weep bitterly. But Gretel cheered him up saying, "Wait a little, Hansel, until the moon comes up. Then we'll be able to see again. Buck up, little camper!" 
 Hansel stopped crying, but said he was tired, so Gretel made him sit down, while they waited for the moon to rise. When it was light enough to see again, they continued their journey, and after a while they came to a clearing in the forest. In the middle of the clearing stood a small cottage It had a red, tiled roof and aluminum siding that gleamed silvery in the pale moonlight. Black shutters flanked the windows, and a green door was set between them. 
 The children went up to the door and Gretel knocked on it three times. From inside the house they heard a gravelly voice saying, "The door is open," and when they went in, they saw an old witch with a big wooden spoon in one hand and a butterfly net in the other, ready to pounce on them. 
 Hansel started to cry again, but Gretel said to the witch, "Are you sure you want to do that? I mean, did you really think this through?" 
 When the old crone hesitated, Gretel whipped out her pocket knife and stabbed her in the leg. The witch cried out, "You little ...," shrank down to doll size and expired. 
 Gretel said, "Hansel, the old witch is dead. See if you can find the kitchen. We need a large skillet, extra virgin olive oil, four eggs, mushrooms, and a medium sized onion."
Breakfast had never tasted so good, although Gretel had never cooked a witch omelet before.

GREEN GRASS

Adrian Korpel
(dedicated to Spring and April, poetry month.)

Sitting quietly, doing nothing: 

Spring comes 

and the grass greens itself. 

                                    Zen saying 

The grass greens itself? 
Come again?

I mean, think of the trips to the garden store,
your earnest questions made light of by
the green-aproned store clerk 
who severely skewers your skills 
with his aerated-soil prattle 
and his erudite pH babbling. 

The people behind you in line are snickering 
as your appalling ignorance 
of all matters yard-like 
is revealed down to the tiny taproot
of your tree of knowledge.

I mean what do you really know about grass, 
rye grass, fescue, blue grass, zoysia, bentgrass 
how and what it likes, sour or sweet, 
salty or bitter, 
tangy or tacky, 
and how much water, 
how much blood meal, nitrates, phosphates, 
carbon, photons, molecules, Miracle-Grow. 

Hard work is ahead, 
spreading, hoeing, edging, raking, cutting, 
cursing the crabgrass, the clover, 
the thistles, the wormy apples on the lawn, 
the rabbit holes, the fallen branches,
the stalled lawnmower, 
the sweat of your brow, 
your grass-clogged throat, 
your pollen-plugged nose, 
your stinging sides,
your achy-breaky heart.

When Spring comes: 

Sit quietly, Do nothing.

SNAKE

Adrian Korpel

"Snake !" Leonard yelled, jumping back hurriedly from the spot where he'd heard the rattling. The trail was narrow, and he bumped hard into Lisa who was following close behind. 

 "Christ," he said, " that rattlesnake almost bit me. Look over there, under the leaves. See the diamond markings on its back?" 

 "There are no rattlesnakes in Canada," Lisa said, "and those spots on his back aren't diamonds, they're ovals. You're panicking again, darling."

 "What about the rattling then; you think I dreamed that up?" 

 "Of course you did. You have a great imagination, especially when you're scared." 

 "I tell you, it rattled." 

 "Okay, so it rattled. What does that prove? A lot of snakes move their tail in the dead leaves to imitate rattlers. It's called mimicry. You can look it up if you don't believe me." 

 "Dead leaves? In the middle of summer?" 

 "There must be leaves left from last fall. And if it wasn't leaves, then maybe it moved its tail in the grass."  

 "That would make a swishing sound, not a rattling sound." 

 "Not if the grasses are stiff; they'd rattle." 

 " You mean if they are reeds, I suppose. But we're on the edge of an escarpment, Lisa dear, hundreds of feet above the level of the lake. Where in God's name would we find reeds?" 

 "Where you heard the snake rattle, I'd imagine. Why don't you look?" 

 "Thank you very much; why don't you look?" 

 "Oh, all right, I will. It's a perfectly harmless snake and has probably left now anyway. I don't see it anymore." 

 But the snake hadn't left yet. It had been listening with interest to the conversation. It had been remembering old snake myths, legends about the time that the first woman had framed the first snake for making her steal the apple of knowledge. When God had taken away the first snake's feet for punishment. So that from then on snakes had crawled on their bellies through hot sand and cold mud. Which made it all right for everybody to despise them and beat them up. She's got knowledge all right, the snake thought, boy does she have knowledge. She has come a long way. How could she be so wrong about snakes? 

 And when Lisa stepped closer to find the reeds that rattled, he bit her.