decomP – August 2014

With a mix of flash prose, short prose, poetry, and book reviews, decomP delivers an online literary magazine monthly, with a fair tasting of good literature and samples of audio readings throughout. Adam and Eve’s marital and sex life comes to life in the first included piece, Adam Gnuse’s “Adam, at Night.” Although Eve is comforted by her child, Adam worries and is resentful about his eventual death, seeming to say that even in the beginning of life, the first man to live still questions life after death: “He wonders whether it will be like going back somewhere dark and warm, somewhere safe. Whether it will it be something like growing up. The thoughts don’t comfort him.”

With a mix of flash prose, short prose, poetry, and book reviews, decomP delivers an online literary magazine monthly, with a fair tasting of good literature and samples of audio readings throughout.

Adam and Eve’s marital and sex life comes to life in the first included piece, Adam Gnuse’s “Adam, at Night.” Although Eve is comforted by her child, Adam worries and is resentful about his eventual death, seeming to say that even in the beginning of life, the first man to live still questions life after death: “He wonders whether it will be like going back somewhere dark and warm, somewhere safe. Whether it will it be something like growing up. The thoughts don’t comfort him.”

Death is addressed again, this time in Amy Scharmann’s “Heart Attack” in which the narrator struggles to let her mother die and move on, even after she has in fact “left this earth”: “I don’t know what I thought I’d find, but I didn’t do myself any favors studying the dry and empty darkness she’d left behind—I knew her needs had been transferred somewhere else.”

Jonathan Kosik’s “Remnants” is the only longer piece, showcasing the life of the narrator who cleans the cabins in Gatlinburg and his visits from Sheryl, a woman from Knoxville who can’t seem to stand the heat or her visit. Sheryl’s character sketch was excellent; I felt like I knew her by the end. But my one complaint was that I was missing what the relationships were supposed to be between the characters.

Uncomplicated and short, Julie Babcock’s “Big Boy Ohio” was probably my favorite among the poetry. Playing off assumptions and illusions, it shows that the world isn’t so natural and put-together as some people may have you guess:

“Hey honey,” they say before they order burgers
so neatly she might be a virgin
who sleeps under a field of stars
and soothes cows for the dinner table.

decomP has perfectly sized issues for someone looking to squeeze in a little literature where there is time, and the audio recordings only enhance the experience.
[www.decompmagazine.com]