August/September 2024 Double-Issue

Dedicated to Anita Sullivan.

“Art is the final cunning of the human soul which would rather do anything than face the gods.” ― Iris Murdoch, from “Art and Eros: A Dialogue about Art,” Acastos: Two Platonic Dialogues (1986)

From the Publishing-Editor of Hubris: Our August/September 2024 double-issue, of which I am immensely proud, is dedicated to Archived Contributor and longtime friend of Hubris, poet and essayist Anita Sullivan. We open with her essay, “What, Pray, is The Heart?” (and I urge readers to read all of Sullivan’s essays on Hubris here).  A meditation on acceptance, aka amor fati, follows, by climate scientist Dr. Guy McPherson. Then, Poetry Editor Claire Bateman introduces us to the writing of poet John Pursley III. An essay on plein air South Carolina rock sculpture (or French-drain-making) by the Rev. Robin White comes next, with our newest Contributor Jenks Farmer in close pursuit with his disquisition on Deep Southern lawns. Helen Noakes encounters a desperate woman and a mysterious man on the Golden Gate Bridge; Kathryn E. Livingston also finds herself in medias res, if much more happily situated. Dr. Skip Eisiminger schools us re. matters superstitious and stitious. Michael Tallon files a joyous Pride Month anthem in cishet praise of gay rocker Tom Robinson. Ted Jouflas (avatar of that endangered species, Cartoonists), then tips his hat to, Crikey, a critic! Resident Hubrisian cartoonist Mark Kershaw has begrudged us seven cartoons (and as many guffaws), and photographer/multi-cultural life-coach Chiara-Sophia Coyle exhibits a portfolio of people immersed in their daily lives, all over the world. Travel writer and guide-to-Greece Matt Barrett, whose prose style is inimitable, and whose humor is indelible, contributes  a primer on dining out in Greek villages; and Publishing Editor Elizabeth Boleman-Herring closes out August and September with a remembrance of her mentor, Patrick Leigh Fermor.

About our Home Page Artist for the June/July and August/September 2024 issues of Hubris: British artist Tomas Watson (b. 1971) has consistently found ways to refresh existing forms and infuse them with the vigor of the ever-changing world, combining age-old mastery with an abstract aesthetic. A figurative artist not restricted by realism, he studied at the Slade School of Art in London and won the BP Portrait Award in 1998, but has lived in Greece for most of his career. (Why? “The Greek light,” he says.) Watson’s interest is in form, defined by shadow and light, which makes drawing the backbone of everything he does. Of his recent work, he says, “These paintings are about my life, not in a descriptive or specific sense, but rather in the form of observations that open up the possibility of a deeper, universal meaning.” The painter participates in international art fairs and solo exhibitions, and founded, with his partner, an arts-based educational program on the Greek island of Lesvos (where they and their toddler twins make their home): Sigri Arts Retreat. (Access Watson’s website here; enquire about Sigri Arts Retreat workshops here; and follow him on Instagram.)

On the Other Hand

“What, Pray, is The Heart?” By Anita Sullivan

EUGENE Oregon—(Hubris)—August/September 2024—Recently, I began a study of the spiritual practice known as the Enneagram. As with most spiritual disciplines, each session begins with a series of breathing exercises designed to slow and clear the mind and to focus attention on the immediate moment—what is here right now. This is called Mindfulness. In this particular teaching, it was called “Being Present with your Heart.” Unfortunately, no matter how much I trust and believe that focused breathing is a good idea, my quirky personal logic always reacts the same way to these exercises. Rather than bringing me, body and mind, into an emotionally neutral, open and relaxed state, the preliminary breathing ritual ramps up my attention once again to the odd fragility and raw uncertainty of this natural process. (Read more . . .)

Planetary Hospice

“Amor Fati & Memento Mori,” By Dr. Guy McPherson

BELLOWS FALLS Vermont—(Hubris)—One of the commands I give myself daily is the short Latin phrase, “Amor fati.” This phrase means “Love of one’s fate.” It’s an order from me to me. If you like, it can be an order from you to yourself. The calendar on my telephone reminds me twice each day: Amor fati. The reminder comes each morning and each afternoon. Amor fati describes an attitude of accepting and even embracing everything that happens in life. It demands that one must embrace suffering and loss, along with favorable events. Amor fati indicates that we cannot erase our past. Rather, we must accept the good and the bad. We must have the strength to handle the mistakes we make, along with our acts rooted in wisdom. (Read more . . .)

Speculative Friction

“The Poetry of John Pursley III,” By Claire Bateman, Poetry Editor

GREENVILLE South Carolina—(Hubris)—August/September 2024—John Pursley III teaches contemporary literature and poetry at Clemson University, where he also directs the annual Clemson Literary Festival. He is the author of the poetry collection, If You Have Ghosts, as well as the chapbooks A Story without Poverty, and A Conventional Weather, among others. In addition, he is an assistant editor of the South Carolina Review. His poems and reviews have appeared in Poetry, AGNI, Colorado Review, Kenyon Review, and elsewhere. Pursley writes, “As someone burdened/blessed with a heavily critical, editorial mind, I find that too much intentionality hinders my creative ability to generate new work, which has always been the story of my writing life. (Read more . . .)

Wing + Prayer

“Up a New Crick,” By Rev. Robin White

PENDLETON South Carolina—(Hubris)—August/September 2024—The ditch along the road in front of the house had been “landscaped” with gorgeous river rock. Those rocks, however, had become inundated with weeds over the years since the initial landscaper has done his work, and, since I don’t use chemical weed killers, I needed to find a creative way to approach the 3-foot-wide and 80-foot-long ditch of stone now knee-deep in tenacious and thorny weeds. Early in the spring of this year, I began digging out and moving, by hand and by barrow, those mud-covered, weed-entangled stones—some as large as boulders; others as small as quarter-sized pebbles. Our curving concrete driveway had never afforded vehicles a straight shot to the street. (Read more . . .)

Plant People

“Of Bulb Lawns & Fancy Grass: A Deep Southern Garden Designer Weighs In,” By Jenks Farmer

COLUMBIA South Carolina—(Hubris)—August/September 2024—“Stop. Take a break. You’ve been doing this for two hours,” Jennifer said. She wore a black dress and heels in the sweltering August heat. A new Southerner, a recent New Yorker, Jennifer was still adjusting to her new home. She didn’t quite understand this wake or reception—whatever you call the afterparty of a Southern funeral—or why it was held in the hot, crispy yard. Another mourner stepped up to shake my hand, but Jennifer turned him away. “He needs a minute. We’re going to get some water,” she said, leading me away. Head down, I watched my shiny black shoes crunching tan grass. (Read more . . .)

Waking Point

“Encounter,” By Helen Noakes

SAN FRANCISO California—(Hubris)—August/September 2024—The bridge shuddered beneath her feet. Leila wasn’t sure if it was the wind, the rushing traffic behind her, or her own heart that caused it. It was her third time standing at the rail, staring across the green waters of the bay at the luminous city beyond. My third and final time, she thought. But glancing down at the waves heaving against the carnelian buttresses of the Golden Gate Bridge, she lost all certainty. Tears stung her eyes. Was it fear or disgust at her cowardice? She shivered and drew her coat tighter around her thin frame. “Beautiful city.” Startled by the deep voice, Leila glanced briefly at the tall, lean man who stood beside her, his elbows propped on the railing, gazing out at the city, and quickly looked away, following the direction of his gaze. Perhaps if she ignored him, he’d leave. (Read more . . .)

Words & Wonder

“Looking for Lattes,” By Kathryn E. Livingston

FLETCHER North Carolina—(Hubris)—August/September 2024—The most expeditious way to get to Asheville, North Carolina from my home in New Jersey is a direct, two-hour flight out of Newark Airport. For some inane reason, however, my husband and I prefer to drive. Of course, we’ve been to plenty of places where this isn’t an option (Hong Kong comes to mind). But a trip to North Carolina to visit family in our RAV4 Hybrid seemed quite do-able. We know because we’ve done it before. It took two days there and two days back, due to the necessity of sleep (we are no longer of an age for all-nighters), with a number of stops for gas, coffee (decaf only; I’m literally allergic to caffeine), lunch, dinner, etc., but our journey to my sister’s home in Fletcher began auspiciously enough. (Read more . . .)

Skip the B.S.

“Vital Fictions: Superstitions,” By Skip Eisiminger

CLEMSON South Carolina—(Hubris)—August/September 2024—From St. Augustine to Wallace Stevens, superstition has been variously defined as an excessive belief, a modification of an earlier belief, an error, or in Stevens’ phrase, “a necessary fiction.” I’ll leave it to you, Gentle Reader, to decide which of these four definitions suits the following story. During World War II, natives on the Melanesian islands of the South Pacific watched in astonishment as “silver birds” of debatable origins dropped all manner of useful goods on those below. Light-skinned “aliens” in green clothing and black boots collected most of the “cargo,” but the bundles that hung up in the trees or dropped in the sea were left for anyone who was desperate enough to retrieve them. (Read more . . .)

Fairly Unbalanced

“At the Top of My Little Cishet Lungs,” By Michael Tallon

ANTIGUA Guatemala—(Hubris)—August/September 2024—Back in high school, one of my best friends had an older brother with all the coolest music. While most of our peers were listening to Hall and Oates, Phil Collins, and Culture Club, we were off on a wild journey with Xavier Cugat, the Kinks, the Horseflies, the Buzzcocks, the Minutemen, the Sex Pistols, and various Brian Eno projects. When we’d hang out, the record selection would bounce from Donovan to Blotto, to the Velvet Underground, to Bluegrass, to Frank Zappa, to Punk to whatever else was on the stacks all inside a few hours. It was a brilliantly fertile way to crack open a skull and pour the larger world inside—and since the artist who most broadened my world is celebrating his 73 birthday this summer, I figured I’d send out some love. (Read more . . .)

Desperado Shindig

“The Less I Do, The Better I Get,” By Ted Jouflas

PHOENIX Arizona—(Hubris)—August/September 2024—My work in comics is very rarely, if ever written about. Not to say that it never is, but years can pass between mentions in the press, on websites, or in a tweet. I certainly don’t Google my name hoping to discover a buzz. That idea makes about as much sense to me as sitting down to a family dinner at 16 while peaking on a hit of Windowpane. This might be OK if you’re fairly immune to peer pressure, or if you simply must be certain that your sister really is a hybrid creature, part Bunny Rabbit, part Mariana Fruit Bat. (Read more . . .)

Addison

“Naked Came the Stranger & Stranger,” By Mark Addison Kershaw, Resident Cartoonist

ATLANTA Georgia—(Hubris)—August/September 2024—Cartoonist Mark Addison Kershaw’s getting off easy this summer: we’ve had two double-issues, and I’ve only managed to nag a total of seven cartoons out of him (for your and my viewing pleasure). I’ve titled this portfolio as I have because Kershaw does have a penchant for including appealing little naked individuals (usually soft-of-center and bespectacled) in his ‘toons. There are three of such featuring the unclothed in this late summer’s grouping, but my favorite portrays naked Kershawians in hell, one of them raising his hand and asking, “Permission to speak freely?” (Read more . . .)

Clicks & Relativity

“Impromptu Portraits & Shared Humanity,” By Chiara-Sophia Coyle

SONOMA California—(Hubris)—August/September 2024—This summer, photographer and multi-cultural life coach Chiara-Sophia Coyle, who has traveled extensively from her bases in Sonoma, California and Mykonos, Greece (which will always be, for her, home), has compiled a portfolio of people she has photographed, all over the world. As she says, “These impromptu portraits offer glimpses into the everyday activities of people of all ages, living in all the many cultures I have stepped into over the years. We are all unique and beautiful beings who embody and express the essence of our shared humanity, and my wish for the world is that we all embrace each other fully on all levels, appreciating how we make each other whole.” (Read more . . .)

Nothing At All to Write Home About 

“Simple Greek Village Life,” By Matt Barrett

CARRBORO North Carolina & KEA Greece—(Hubris)—August/September 2024—I am a victim of Greek Village Restaurant Syndrome. Anyone who has spent more than a week in a small Greek village knows what this is. You have three restaurants in the village, all in the square within view of each other. One restaurant is good, one is bad, and one is OK. Someone who is a tourist will find the good one, hopefully, and will settle on that and never eat at the others. For tourists, life is easy and they have no awareness of the complications that we “locals” must endure. But for us, we can’t just eat at the “good” restaurant because, in the village, everything is interconnected and everyone sees what is going on, especially in the restaurant of your competitor right next door. (Read more . . .)

Hapax Legoumenon

“On the Road, Again,” By Elizabeth Boleman-Herring, Publishing Editor

PENDLETON South Carolina—(Hubris)—August/September 2024—The essay that follows here was written upon the publication of Patrick Leigh Fermor’s Between the Woods and the Water, and was initially published in The Athenian: Greece’s English-Language Monthly; then collected in Greek Unorthodox: Bande à Parte & A Farewell to Ikaros. On the 8^th of December, 1933, Patrick Leigh Fermor, then all of 18 and characterized by his former (and precipitously ex-) public school house-master as a “dangerous mixture of sophistication and restlessness,” set out from Tower Bridge alone to walk to Constantinople. (Read more . . .)

Our June/July 2024/Book Excerpts Issue

Plant People

“Emotional Road Trip Back South,” from Garden Disruptors: The Rebel Misfits Who Turned Southern Hoticulture on Its Head,” By Jenks Farmer

COLUMBIA South Carolina—(Hubris)—June & July 2024—In Seattle, people hibernate in winter, but it’s the opposite in the South. Winter can be beautiful and active. Summer makes you stop, sit in the shade, go to a movie, or read. Or write. Covid Lockdown Summer turned the world upside down. Plant orders rolled in. But hypocritical politicians “streamlining” the US Post Office hurt our small business and made our work twice as hard. Writing time evaporated. The only thing sitting on the porch and relaxing around here was my book. As I worked, I tried to put the book’s arc and themes together. Driving a tractor ‘round and ‘round a field has always been good story-writing time for me.  Chatting while gardening is great too. I could test transitions and run ideas by Tom and our small crew in an informal setting—a hot, uncomfortable setting where honesty flows freely. (Read more . . .)

Waking Point

“The Goddess & The Knight,” from Living Dangerously,  By Helen Noakes

SAN FRANCISCO California—(Hubris)—June & July 2024—From Lycabettus, the second hill at Athens’ center, the view of the Acropolis is unobstructed. Crowning this promontory is a Christian church dedicated to St. George, The Dragon-Slayer and protector of virgins threatened by them. The virgin represented the church and the dragon, paganism. George, like Athena, to whom the Parthenon was dedicated, is depicted carrying a spear. An obedient knight, he used his in service of others, while Athena, an independent goddess, wielded hers as a symbol of her own power—the power of reason to slice through subterfuge. (Read more . . .)

Hapax Legoumenon

“My Athenian Tough Guy Columns,” from Greek Unorthodox: Bande à Parte & A Farewell to Ikaros, By Elizabeth Boleman-Herring

PENDLETON South Carolina—(Hubris)—June & July 2024—The four short (but dense) essays that comprise this Summer 2024 column were written with the help of “My Last but Not Least Greek Husband,” late, Cephalonian-Cairene-Rhodesian photographer Emil Moriannidis, who served as a patient and inspired Beatrice (though I am certainly no Dante) throughout the decade of the 1980s in Athens. Emil—a poet in black and white, as well as in Demotic Greek—and I laughed and scribbled our way through the composition of my four “Manghes (‘Tough Guy’) Columns” featuring the hapless Athenian duo of Harilaos and Lakis. (Read more . . .)

Words & Wisdom

“Yin, Yang, Yogini,” from Yin, Yang, Yogini: A Woman’s Quest for Balance, Strength, and Inner Peace, By Kathryn E. Livingston

BOGOTA New Jersey—(Hubris)—June & July 2024—Today, as if she knows I’ve been coming to Yoga for exactly one year, trying to figure out what it’s all about, Jill opens the class by saying, “Why do we come to Yoga? We are here to forget. We come to forget the chatter in our minds, and the doubts and fears and worries, and to put everything aside and go to a quiet place. And . . . we come to remember; to remember that we are perfect, that we are born perfect, without flaws and self-doubts.” She sums it up nicely, precisely what I’ve been trying to figure out this past year. (Read more . . .)

Skip the B.S.

“The Blind Pig Who Found a Truffle: Chance,” from Der Liebesbrief to Ingrid, By Dr. Skip Eisiminger

CLEMSON South Carolina—(Hubris)—June & July 2024—In 1961, shortly after I arrived at Heidwinkel/Bahrdorf, my “permanent” duty station in West Germany, I wandered into the company day room where Stan Sanders was showing anyone who was interested in them photographs he’d taken at a recent wedding reception. I knew that our company clerk had married a local woman, and the two were enjoying their honeymoon in the south of France, but I didn’t know either of them very well. Having nothing better to do and thinking I might pick up a few pointers in the dating game, I took a seat and asked, “Who is this, Stan, seated beside Lt. Pfister?” (Read more . . .)

Planetary Hospice

“The Great Dying,” from Killing the Natives: A Retrospective Analysis, By Dr. Guy McPherson

BELLOWS FALLS Vermont—(Hubris)—June & July 2024—“For people who hate to learn the names of things, the world is getting better every day.” With this minor exception, there are no advantages to extinction. In contrast, there are plenty of disadvantages and, big-budget Hollywood movies notwithstanding, extinction is irreversible. Earth is experiencing its sixth great extinction event, the first one precipitated by the actions of a single species. The great biologist and philosopher Edward O. Wilson said it best in 1992: “Humanity has initiated the sixth great extinction spasm, rushing to eternity a large fraction of our fellow species in a single generation.” (Read more . . .)

Speculative Friction

“The Poetry of Jennifer Schomberg Kanke,” By Claire Bateman, Poetry Editor

GREENVILLE South Carolina—(Hubris)—June & July 2024 —The creation of poet Jennifer Schomberg Kanke’s multi-part long poem “Scenes from the Flood,” about the Ohio River Flood of 1937, involved “a balancing of the scholarly and the spiritual,” as the poet describes her writing process. Her goal with the poem was to make readers feel as though they were emerging from a time machine rather than reading a poem, a process that relied heavily on immersing herself in as many stories as possible. (Read more . . .)

Imaginations Flavors

“Goat-Leaps,” from From the Cyclops Cave: A Braided Memoir, By Don Schofield

THESSALONIKI & ATHENS Greece—(Hubris)—June & July 2024—No one’s here./Hills, stones, paths—all sleep to the breathing/sea. A place, just a place:/no meaning, no wisdom, no secret loves/or unrevealed purpose. You/an absence. Walking the beach, I feel waves wash over my feet, wet sand press between my toes with each step. In a couple minutes I’ll let them draw me into the water, knee-high, chest-high, then give my whole body to their warmth. I’ll swim out toward that rocky islet beyond Náoussa bay in leisurely sidestrokes, maybe try to reach it, maybe not. (Read more . . .)

While I Draw Breath

“The Goose Tree,” from Understory: An Ecologist’s Memoir of Loss and Hope, By Kevin Van Tighem

HIGH RIVER, ALBERTA Canada—(Hubris)—June & July 2024—When we lived in Waterton, our children’s teacher, Lisa Lenz, used to take her students to the story tree, a wind-gnarled poplar at the edge of Waterton Lake where they could look across at the mountain I now try to know by its Blackfoot name, Sakiimaapi, but that the maps call Mount Vimy. Vimy is in France. Sakiimaapi has always been here. While she read them stories they felt God’s breath on their faces, though they didn’t know that’s what it was. On weekends we often drove north, past Pincher Creek and Cowley, to our property beside the Oldman River. There was another story tree there, but I can’t recall ever telling stories beside it. (Read more . . .)

Fairly Unstable

“The Step-Down Unit,” from Incompatible With Life, By Michael Tallon

ANTIGUA Guatemala—(Hubris)—June & July 2024—At midday on March 4, I was transferred to a Step-Down Unit, so named because it was “one step down” from Intensive Care. ICU patients are often intubated or on advanced life support. They are classified as critical or likely to become critical without warning. I was neither intubated nor on advanced life support, but I was on the crumbling edge of an acute crisis. Whether I belonged in an SDU or an ICU is debatable, but a bed became available in the Step-Down Unit first, so that’s where I went. In our SDU, there were four patients. (Read more . . .)