To conclude their experience interning for The Southeast Review, Diana Calderón, Arissa Cushnie, and Grant Wendt searched the archives for covers and writings they thought best represented SER before we changed our name. The following pieces are from our years as SUN DOG.
From SUN DOG, Vol. 5, 1983
"Blowing Up"
by Barbara Hamby
Tonight she was going to blow the whole place, herself included, straight to hell. Dynamite. “I need dynamite,” she thought as she stretched to zip the period costume she had to wear. A nineteenth century barmaid, she pulled the decolletage up. No cleavage from her. No siree bobtail. Nitroglycerine. She put on her right show with Dr. Scholl’s arch and metatarsal supports. Mr. Papadoplus disapproved of her sturdy shoes. Not sexy enough for his dimly lit, hideaway lounge. The left shoe. That wasn’t the only thing about Mr. Papadopolus that was dimly lit. “Why do you girls go to college? Marry your boyfriends. Let them take care of you.” Yes, I will marry Tolstoy right after I blow up Mr. Papadopolus’ Casa Athena Restaurant and Lounge. Tolstoy will take care of me. Since he has never had a job for more than two weeks in the two years I’ve known him, it will be a good trick. But miracles happen every day. Ka-boom. She turned over the ignition of her 1964 Volvo station wagon. Ka-boom. She would blow up his porky little bleached blond wife with gemstones on every finger. Enormous encrustations at the base of each digit. She was the brains behind the operation. Who would not institute mandatory fifteen percent tips on prom nights. Who stole their charges if they were not quick enough. Who told her husband not to let them sit down in the kitchen. The list of rules had grown like the plague lists. Every night a new restriction appeared: No knitting in the kitchen. No herb teas in the kitchen. No reading in the kitchen. No health food in the kitchen. No playing musical instruments in the kitchen. No exposed toes in the kitchen. Do not eat the desserts. Baklava that his mother made. She was from the old country. Dressed in black, she was like the dark secret of another century walking through the Casa Athena. Dark scarf, dark crumpled face. “Why do you girls go to college?” I need a fuse. She pulled into the parking lot. I need a match. She walked through the door. “There’s my girl. The one with the beautiful smile,” he said to the alcoholic cousin who managed the lounge. She smiled. The explosion ripped through her and pulled the building and parking lot up into a fiery mushroom. Diamonds, iced tea glasses, banquet chairs, whole flounders were blown into the next country. She walked back to the kitchen, put her purse into her locker and checked her station. She struck a match and began to light the candles on her table.
"The People Who Eat Light" by David Kirby
The ship is transparent and seems to be empty, but suddenly there are beautiful shapes everywhere:
pale iridescent ovals and annuli that hover just above the trees, gemlike and frail.
It is The People Who Eat Light, and as the world begins to disappear, as signs fade and cities grow dark, a decision is reached:
someone must speak to the visitors, reason with them, tell them how we live.
So a delegation is sent. A man speaks haltingly, but The People seem to understand, for the lights come on again
See, says the man, laughing, they were merely hungry, they meant no harm.
From their ship, The People Who Eat Light look down at the earth. It shines like cut glass.