NEW TITLES
Dada East
"Today I asked
Myself why
She didn't hang herself
Lia, blond Lia
She would have swung
From a rope at night
Like a ripe pear
And dogs in the street
Would have barked."

The Volcano Adventure Guide
"There are probably
1500 volcanoes in the world,
including current blowhards, along with
those which are extinct,
at rest, on vacation
or just playing dead."

When the Impossible Happens
"Smoking dried secretions
of certain toads induces
a psychedelic state that can
be very psychologically challenging.
The Church of the Toad
was created to use liquids of
Bufo alvarius in religious services."

The Edge of Sadness
"Ultimately, we end up
wanting Fr. Hugh to blow his cool,
just once, please, but
his innate kindliness and O'Connor's
innate ability to keep the ball rolling
--- however otiosely ---
make this 600+ page tome
impossible, it seems,
to be done with."

Farewell to the Starlight in Whiskey
"A poet.
He's a poet!
Could it not be compared to being
a blacksmith in Milwaukee in 1920,
a streetcar conductor in Atlanta in 1940,
a windmill manufacturer
in Ohio in 1960?
Of all the dead end careers!"

Great Reviews of the Past
Serve It Forth
"Those of us
who were raised
in the depression had lots
to be depressed about:
bad economy,
bad world situation,
and worst of all ---
fried steak."

BRIEF REVIEWS
Gimpel the Fool
Dream Whip No. 14
To Have and Have Not

LETTERS
Bad RALPH
RALPH Goes Commercial II

MORE LETTERS
Geek Love
RALPH and Pornographia

EVEN MORE LETTERS
The Lusitania
Charles Krafft
My War Gone By
I Love It So

YET EVEN MORE LETTERS
Cryptic Letters of the Month
Stephen Hawking
Suspected Anarchy at RALPH
Gravity-Fed Water Systems

ARTICLE
Open When Needed
"After the funeral mass,
after the burial,
after the hoards of people
left him to himself,
Ray unplugged the ten foot
chest freezer in the cellar
and replaced the frozen food with
a hundred years of papers, diaries,
and cancelled checks. Then, he locked it,
closed the cellar door,
and never returned
to its dank space."

READINGS
Ángel
"The Mass was very noisy.
Next to the choir, there was
a ten-piece brass band complete with
snare drum and bass.
The choir would sing for a bit,
then the band would come in,
then the choir would sing some more,
then the brasses would let loose
with a blast of mourning ---
loud, discordant, wonderfully off-key."

Great Readings from the Past
From Versailles to Cybernetics
"These were phrases more thunderous
than any I might be able to compose.
One was: The fathers have eaten
bitter fruit and the children's teeth are set on edge.
Another was History is that nightmare
from which there is no awakening."

POETRY
Tradition
"My mother says      women were made to bleed
and the whole thing      takes twenty minutes.
She says afterwards      they'll wrap me up like a butterfly
for forty nights      and I'll drink only camel's milk.
My mother says      tomorrow
I'll be a little bride     hands red with henna."

Great Poems of the Past
Song of Welcome
"Here are your pills on the plastic tray,
Your disappointing, crisp X-ray.
You are welcome to pray.
Here's your cemetery, a well kept glen.
Welcome to a voice that says, 'Amen.'
The end of the rope, old man.
Here's your will, and here's a few
takers. Here's an empty pew.
Here's life after you.
And here are your stars which appear still keen
on shining as though you had never been.
They might have a point, old bean."

THE OFFICIAL RALPH
Paradox-of-the-Month

GENERAL INDEX
All the back-issues of RALPH,
including titles of books under review,
along with author, subject, and publisher,
plus links to readings, articles, and poems
that have appeared on-line
since 1994.

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

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