Tag: Nathan Graziano

Nathan Graziano: “Stuck Inside the Supermarket with the Beautiful Blues Again”

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Stuck Inside the Supermarket with the Beautiful Blues Again

My wife told me to find the onion crisps
for a green bean casserole she was making
for Easter dinner at my parents’ house.
Perplexed, I confessed I had no idea where 
to start the search for the onion crisps 
and suggested we sauté a raw onion instead.
“Don’t be a smart-ass,” she said and rolled
her eyes and sent me on the quixotic quest.

So I roamed the aisles, Ancient Mariner-style,
and found myself behind a beautiful couple
in their late-twenties, olive-skinned and fit,
as they whisked past the chocolate cake mix
holding hands, their shopping cart filled 
with fresh vegetables and fish and goat cheeses
but no onion crisps or cream of mushroom soup
or any hint of the makings of a casserole.

Then Bob Dylan’s “Stuck Inside of Mobile 
with the Memphis Blues Again” started to play
in my head, entering like a silk-footed thief,
and I hummed it a decimal above the soft-rock
that fell like syrupy summer rain from the ceiling. 
The beautiful couple turned at the end of the aisle
and went on to live beautiful lives and birth 
beautiful kids, and I never found the onion crisps.

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About the Author: Nathan Graziano lives in Manchester, New Hampshire, with his wife. A high school teacher, he’s the author of nine books of fiction and poetry. Fly Like The Seagull, his most recent work of fiction, was released by Luchador Press in 2020. Graziano also writes a column for Manchester Ink Link and was named the 2020 Columnist of Year by the New Hampshire Press Association. For more information, visit his website: www.nathangraziano.com.

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Image Credit: Thomas J. O’Halloran “Shopping in supermarket” (1957) The Library of Congress (Public Domain)

Nathan Graziano: “Reading “The Metamorphosis” with My Daughter”

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Reading “The Metamorphosis” with My Daughter

After months inside the house, my body grows thick
with flesh and flab as I lie on the couch, feet kicked up
rereading the Kafka story my daughter was assigned

in her World Literature class, thinking it’s a good time
to talk about text with my sixteen-year-old first child—
we can make connections to current events in the news.

Halfway through, however, my daughter informs me
that it’s the dullest story that she’s ever read and nothing
happens except the guy turning into a bug on Page 1.

“What does this story have to do with anything relevant
to my life or the world? All he does is hide under a sheet,”
she says, tossing her battered copy against the wall.

Seeing it as a teachable moment, I take time to remind
my dear daughter that we’ve been confined to our home
for fifty-one days, losing our collective fucking minds,

and we’re still in human form without an apple lodged
in our spine so just maybe we can relate to the isolation
Gregor experiences—without Netflix or social media.

My daughter rolls her eyes, the totem of the teenage girl,
and leaves the room, the pages fanned out on the floor.
I stare out the window at a sky like a steel-gray sheet.

 

About the Author: Nathan Graziano lives in Manchester, New Hampshire, with his wife and kids. His books include Teaching Metaphors (Sunnyoutside Press), After the Honeymoon (Sunnyoutside Press) Hangover Breakfasts (Bottle of Smoke Press in 2012), Some Sort of Ugly (Marginalia Publishing in 2013), My Next Bad Decision (Artistically Declined Press, 2014) and Almost Christmas (Redneck Press, 2017). A novella titled Fly like The Seagull will be published by Luchador Press in 2020. For more information, visit his website: www.nathangraziano.com.  

 

More By Nathan Graziano:

Homework on Uranus

Explaining Depression To My Cousin

Punchline

 

Image Credit: “Abbildungen zu Karl Illiger’s Uebersetzung von Olivier’s Entomologie plates” Courtesy of the Biodiversity Heritage Library

Revisiting 2019: Our 50 Most Popular Posts of the Year

Posted on by asitoughttobemagazine

 

Dear As It Ought To Be Magazine Readers,

As we enter the next decade, I want to thank all of the writers and readers who have made our tenth year so successful. I take enormous pride in working with so many talented and inspiring writers. Without your brilliance and generosity of spirit and intellect, none of this would be possible. It has been a great privilege to publish your work on our site, and I hope to continue featuring diverse perspectives, challenging ideas, and unique voices for years to come. As a way to look back on what we accomplished in 2019, I have complied the 50 most popular posts of the year based on internet traffic and clicks.

Thank you again to everyone who wrote for, read, and promoted AIOTB Magazine in 2019. Let the 20s roar again!

Chase Dimock
Managing Editor

 

Poetry

Jason Baldinger:

Ishrat Bashir:

Jai Hamid Bashir:

Luis Cuauhtémoc Berriozábal:

Jeffrey Betcher:

Ace Boggess:

Daniel Crocker:

John Dorsey:

Ryan Quinn Flanagan:

Tony Gloeggler:

Nathan Graziano:

Cord Moreski:

Jeanette Powers:

Stephen Roger Powers:

Jonathan K. Rice:

Kevin Ridgeway:

Damian Rucci:

Anna Saunders:

Larry Smith:

Nick Soluri:

William Taylor Jr.:

Alice Teeter:

Tiffany Troy:

Bunkong Tuon:

Agnes Vojta:

Kory Wells:

Brian Chander Wiora:

Dameion Wagner:

 

Nonfiction

Daniel Crocker:

Nathan Graziano:

John Guzlowski:

Cody Sexton:

Carrie Thompson:

 

Reviews 

Chase Dimock:

Mike James:

 

Photo Credit: Fire Works At New Year’s Eve via Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain

“Billy Collins Stole My Memories” By Nathan Graziano

Posted on by asitoughttobemagazine

 

Billy Collins Stole My Memories

You can have them. I won’t press charges. 
I won’t miss most of them—the church pews
polished with Pine-Sol, the blandness 
of the Eucharist, the briny taste of guilt;
the dope then Suboxone then withdrawals;
the suicide attempt followed by a week
in the psych ward staring out the window 
as the cops approached a trap house, guns
drawn; the warm flesh of my infidelities. 
This morning I made breakfast without memories
or eggs or butter or a block of sharp cheddar. 
My kids didn’t notice that I was barefoot 
and Billy Collins was wearing my moccasins. 
But this strictly a no-return policy interaction. 
Everything is yours now, Billy. Don’t fuck it up.

 

About the Author: Nathan Graziano lives in Manchester, New Hampshire, with his wife and kids. His books include Teaching Metaphors (Sunnyoutside Press), After the Honeymoon (Sunnyoutside Press) Hangover Breakfasts (Bottle of Smoke Press in 2012), Sort Some Sort of Ugly (Marginalia Publishing in 2013), and My Next Bad Decision (Artistically Declined Press, 2014), Almost Christmas, a collection of short prose pieces, was recently published by Redneck Press. Graziano writes a baseball column for Dirty Water Media in Boston. For more information, visit his website: www.nathangraziano.com.

 

More By Nathan Graziano:

Homework on Uranus

Explaining Depression To My Cousin

Punchline

 

Image Credit: Bainbridge Colby, silhouette from The Library of Congress. Public Domain.

As It Ought To Be Magazine’s Nominees for the 2019 Best of the Net Anthology

Posted on by Chase Dimock

 

As It Ought To Be Magazine is proud to announce our nominees for Sundress Publications’ 2019 Best of the Net Anthology.

 

Poetry

Ruth Bavetta “A Murder”

John Dorsey “Anthony Bourdain Crosses the River of the Dead”

Mike James “Grace”

Rebecca Schumejda “i don’t want this poem to be about the death penalty, but it is”

Bunkong Tuon “Gender Danger”

Kory Wells “Untold Story”

 

Nonfiction

Daniel Crocker “Mania Makes Me a Better Poet”

Nathan Graziano “The Misery of Fun”

 

Congratulations to our nominees and thank you to all of the writers and readers who have supported As It Ought To Be Magazine.

 

Image Credit: Henry Pointer “The Attentive Pupil” (1865) Digitally Enhanced. Digital image courtesy of the Getty’s Open Content Program

“Homework on Uranus” By Nathan Graziano

Posted on by asitoughttobemagazine

 

Homework on Uranus

I am washing the dinner dishes while my son,
shoulders slumped at the kitchen table, groans

about his science homework while my wife
waits with the patience of a beach stone

beside him, tapping a pen and pointing 
at his assignment. “Concentrate,” she says.

My son moans like a beaten dog then starts 
reading his assignment and begins laughing.

“Dad, this article says that Uranus is a ‘gas giant.’”
He buckles over, grabbing his gut, hysterical. 

My wife glares at me, a laser beam of derision,
hoping against hope that I’d be the father-figure,

explaining to my twelve-year old son that Uranus jokes
are sophomoric, that he needs to concentrate

on his school work and not succumb bathroom humor
or fatuous planet puns and concentrate, son. 

Concentrate. Instead, I drop the pot I’m drying 
and haw, a hearty guffaw. “Uranus is a gas giant!” I say.

My son blows a raspberry on his forearm, tears
streaming down his cheeks, and my wife stands up.

“I’m done. You help him with this,” she says to me
and leaves the kitchen, leaving my son and me, both

in middle school, giving wedgies in the locker room,
pulling fingers in class, laughing in the face of maturity.  

 

About the Author: Nathan Graziano lives in Manchester, New Hampshire, with his wife and kids. His books include Teaching Metaphors (Sunnyoutside Press), After the Honeymoon (Sunnyoutside Press) Hangover Breakfasts (Bottle of Smoke Press in 2012), Sort Some Sort of Ugly (Marginalia Publishing in 2013), and My Next Bad Decision (Artistically Declined Press, 2014), Almost Christmas, a collection of short prose pieces, was recently published by Redneck Press. Graziano writes a baseball column for Dirty Water Media in Boston. For more information, visit his website: www.nathangraziano.com.

 

More By Nathan Graziano:

Explaining Depression To My Cousin

Punchline

 

Image Credit: Photo of Uranus from NASA. Public Domain

“Punchline” By Nathan Graziano

Posted on by asitoughttobemagazine

 

 

Punchline

Here’s a joke in a loose poetic form.
Let’s be honest, people like reading
jokes more than they like reading poems.
In my older age, I’m becoming a realist,
like my father warned, only he used
the word “conservative.” Which I’m not.
At one time, I sat at this same desk
and believed that a poem could touch
the world and make the smallest dent
in whatever armor protects us from us.

So a poet walks into a bar with a parrot
on his shoulder, and the bartender says,
“Hey, where did you get that thing, bub?’
And the parrot says, “Starbucks. There’s
a ton of them.” Funny how that turned.   

 

About the Author: Nathan Graziano lives in Manchester, New Hampshire, with his wife and kids. His books include Teaching Metaphors (Sunnyoutside Press), After the Honeymoon (Sunnyoutside Press) Hangover Breakfasts (Bottle of Smoke Press in 2012), Sort Some Sort of Ugly (Marginalia Publishing in 2013), and My Next Bad Decision (Artistically Declined Press, 2014), Almost Christmas, a collection of short prose pieces, was recently published by Redneck Press. Graziano writes a baseball column for Dirty Water Media in Boston. For more information, visit his website: www.nathangraziano.com.

 

More By Nathan Graziano:

Explaining Depression To My Cousin

 

Image Credit: “Wallace & parrot, 2/29/24” (1924) Library of Congress

“Explaining Depression to My Cousin” by Nathan Graziano

Posted on by asitoughttobemagazine

 

 

Explaining Depression to My Cousin

 

It’s melodrama shot execution-style on a sidewalk.

It’s a pit in your stomach stuffed with fluff.

It’s two a.m. with morning’s foot pressed to its throat.

It’s me grabbing your hand and crying on your shoulder.

It’s words desperate to find a sentence that loves them.

It’s an airless dream then waking, suddenly, suffocated.

It’s not losing a job, a loveless marriage or the desertion

of a childhood dream that once made you smile.

It’s the pill you have to take twice a day, knowing

it’s not resolved with exercise or diet or thinking

the positive thoughts that positive people think.

It’s mustering the courage to wake up tomorrow and dress,

one stupid leg after the next laborious leg, and press on.

 

About the Author: Nathan Graziano lives in Manchester, New Hampshire, with his wife and kids. His books include Teaching Metaphors (Sunnyoutside Press), After the Honeymoon (Sunnyoutside Press) Hangover Breakfasts (Bottle of Smoke Press in 2012), Sort Some Sort of Ugly (Marginalia Publishing in 2013), and My Next Bad Decision (Artistically Declined Press, 2014), Almost Christmas, a collection of short prose pieces, was recently published by Redneck Press. Graziano writes a baseball column for Dirty Water Media in Boston. For more information, visit his website: www.nathangraziano.com.

 

More By Nathan Graziano:

“My Bipolar Ex-Love”

“The Misery of Fun”

 

Image Credit: “Nos” by Ismael Nery Public Domain

“The Misery of Fun” By Nathan Graziano

Posted on by asitoughttobemagazine

 

The Misery of Fun

 

I was holed up, purposefully, in my basement—the place where I hermit when I’m not obligated by work or another adult responsibility to leave and confront the outside world—when my wife came down the stairs, her heels clacking against the hardwood. She was holding her phone, staring at the screen. “So,” she said.

I knew that “so” and something was coming that I wasn’t going to enjoy hearing. “What is it?”

“So my dad texted me, and they’re planning a trip for next April and inviting us and the kids,” she said.

“Tell me it’s not Disney World.”

“Disney World isn’t that bad,” she said with a lilt in her voice. “It’ll be fun.”

My head dropped into my hands. My wife was going to use the kids, who are now teenagers, to try to convince me into willfully entering the lost circle of Dante’s Hell.

And all of this would be done in the name of “prescribed fun.”    

At the risk of sounding like a curmudgeon—-which I probably am—-the idea of Disney World…hell, state of Florida alone, is enough to induce an anxiety attack. I’d rather be strung up by my toes and beaten with a broomstick than to stand in a 45 minute line next to a family of sunburned and overstuffed Midwesterners. There will be thousands of people with the same expectation: to have “fun” on the boat trip through It’s a Small World. Hop on, everybody, it will be a blast, everything you’ve waited to experience, so much fucking fun that you’ll pop like a fun-sucking tick.

“I’m not going,” I told my wife. “I don’t have enough Ativan to make it through a week there.” Continue reading ““The Misery of Fun” By Nathan Graziano” →