LETTERS
Memories of Radio of the 40s:
Bob Poole and Poole's Paradise

ARTICLES
Platform
For the Future Governor of California
"We will appoint John Ashcroft
head of the California Budget Department.
This will have a dual purpose:
it will bring a faith-based approach
to California's monetary problems
and at the same time will
get him out of Washington, D.C.,
a major relief for everybody concerned."

READINGS
Franz Kafka in Riga
"When at last I reached
the vantage point so laboriously striven for,
I beheld, instead of Riga and
the waters of the Baltic,
only unbroken fog,
as dingy as an old newspaper
under the clouded sky."

Autopsy
"There are no windows,
and the clever arrangement of
powerful white lamps and reflecting screens
and shades has the effect
of diffusing a silvery glare,
a brightness such as a full moon might project
upon a quiet lake on a cloudless evening. "

SPECIAL REPORT
Twenty-two Books on Disability
"A worthy writer must show us
the good as well as the ghastlies ---
infections, aging, the unexamined hostility of society ---
without getting maudlin,
without descending into fake heroics,
without the chill of unrelieved anger."

POETRY
Badlands
"the highway's jammed with broken heroes...
till these badlands
start treating
us good."
Cartalk: A Love Poem
"Both of us came as is,
with dented fenders, and random
detritus in the trunk, and I said,
'It's as if we both broke down
outside the some gas station
at the same time.'"

THE OFFICIAL RALPH
Paradox-of-the-Month

GENERAL INDEX
A complete list of all books reviewed in RALPH,
arranged by title, including author, subject, and publisher,
plus a listing of all readings, articles and poems
that have appeared since 1994.

A PITHY SAMPLE
of our most notorious reviews
as collected in the hard-copy
"FOLIO"

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