From the ashes of an alter­na­tive music com­pi­la­tion (GET BONED AND DO IT) from a well-respected record label comes this next issue. Our theme, Sex, is directly inspired by that ill-fated comp*. I am proud to announce that our col­lab­o­ra­tors worked hard to move past sex­u­ally explicit cliches in the cre­ation of their sub­mis­sions. Do not worry, this issue is sexy. Lest I need remind you, with­out Sex, not one of us would exist.

Matthew

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Table of Contents

1. ARIEL CLIMER
   When a Tree
2. WYNDE DYER
   The Sen­su­ous Col­or­ing Book
3. WAYNE FARRENS
   WSMV Chan­nel 4 Nightly News
4. ACTUALLY HUIZENGA
   School Nights in the Quartz Qube
5. WESLEY FRANCIS
   Spi­der Cracks
6. WYNDE DYER
   101 Sex­ual Positions
7. DASH
   SEX CYMBALS (FUNK UP IN DA HOUSE MIX)
8. RACHEL JENDRZEJEWSKI
   Il ne savait pas que c’était ma pre­mière fois
9. NICK RENNIS
   Sex
10. P.J.L.
    April 12th, 2006
11. ALISHA ADAMS
    Any­time, any­place: Miss Jack­son and the West­ern States
12. MATTHEW SPENCER
    “Where ten­der ferns unfurl in the ditches”
13. OREM (THE SINK)
    We Won’t Get It On

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ARIEL CLIMER

When a Tree

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WYNDE DYER

The Sen­su­ous Col­or­ing Book

This was my mother’s col­or­ing book when I was a kid. I’d steal it from her to color in. All the penises, vagi­nas, nip­ples, and mouths are scrib­bled over in red, and I wrote my name on every page with the Y’s back­wards. I wasn’t old enough to know what penises and vagi­nas were, but I was old enough to know they were impor­tant. The fly­ing sea anemone vagina draw­ing was my favorite.

(Click on image to see series)

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WAYNE FARRENS

WSMV Chan­nel 4 Nightly News

Broad­cast Date: Feb­ru­ary 22, 2019; 22:00 – 23:00

Seg­ment: “Purity Pill”; 22:23 – 22:31

Audio Tran­script

Teresa Yoo: It’s a prob­lem as old as time, but researchers believe they may have finally found an answer. A new study shows that despite Pres­i­dent Palin’s ambi­tious abstinence-only sex­ual edu­ca­tion man­date enacted in mid-2018, teen promis­cu­ity is still climb­ing at an extra­or­di­nar­ily ram­pant pace. Accord­ing to the study, con­ducted by Ameri­Teen Aware­ness, a non-profit orga­ni­za­tion which focuses on the dan­gers of pre­mar­i­tal sex­ual inter­course, 3 out of 5 teens have had some form of sex­ual inter­course by age 15 and 4 out of 5 have had some form of sex­ual inter­course by age 17. These sta­tis­tics, how­ever, could dras­ti­cally change thanks to a new drug being dubbed the “Purity Pill.” Dan Mason has more on this in tonight’s “You Decide” Editorial.

Dan Mason (voiceover): As teen promis­cu­ity con­tin­ues to rise across the nation, some par­ents are turn­ing to their doc­tors for the solu­tion. It’s called Agamisal, and it is being referred to by sup­port­ers as the “Purity Pill.” Agamisal has recently been approved by the FDA and has been proven to be extremely effec­tive at deter­ring pre­mar­i­tal sex. The pill, a once-daily cap­sule, dimin­ishes the desire for sex by reduc­ing hor­mone pro­duc­tion and tar­gets the areas of the brain which are respon­si­ble for sex­ual desire. These parts of the brain are tem­porar­ily “switched off” while leav­ing the rest of the brain fully func­tion­ing and unaffected.

The tiny pink pill is extremely pow­er­ful as proven in a recent double-blind study in which less than 1% of males con­tin­ued to have sex when given Agamisal while nearly 80% of males con­tin­ued to have sex when given a placebo. Though slightly less effec­tive on females, the results were still quite extreme, with approx­i­mately 6% of females on Agamisal con­tin­u­ing to engage in sex­ual inter­course com­pared to 63% of females on placebo.

Orig­i­nally cre­ated for the treat­ment and reha­bil­i­ta­tion of repeat sex offend­ers, the drug gar­nered national atten­tion after Pope Bene­dict XVI sug­gested on his offi­cial blog that par­ents begin using this new drug to keep their chil­dren from engag­ing in pre­mar­i­tal sex. The response from par­ents has been enor­mous, with over one mil­lion pre­scrip­tions filled in the first two weeks after Pope Benedict’s call to action.

How­ever, no great advance­ment in sci­ence is with­out its con­tro­ver­sies. The most notable has been the fact that Agamisal is the first pre­scrip­tion drug approved by the FDA that does not nec­es­sar­ily need to be pre­scribed to the patient. Instead, many phar­ma­cies have been issu­ing Agamisal to par­ents and legal guardians who achieve a pre­scrip­tion from the doc­tor for their chil­dren. Many of the mil­lions of teens cur­rently tak­ing Agamisal are unaware that they are tak­ing it. In fact, many par­ents choose to grind up this small, taste­less pill and mix it into their children’s meals. Other teens are aware of their pre­scrip­tion but are being coerced into tak­ing the pill daily, includ­ing threats of vio­lence or pun­ish­ment from parents.

Oppo­nents of Agamisal, who often refer to it as the “Cas­tra­tion Cap­sule,” are wor­ried about the health impacts that this new drug may have on teens, both phys­i­cal and psychological.

Jane Widall (Con­cerned Mother): Our kids are genet­i­cally wired to become sex­u­ally active at this age! What kind of irrepara­ble dam­age are we caus­ing our chil­dren by chem­i­cally chang­ing their desires? If we don’t want our kids engag­ing in pre­mar­i­tal sex, we have a respon­si­bil­ity to raise them that way, with­out drug­ging them!

Dan Mason (voice over): Psy­chol­o­gists worry about the emo­tional and social impacts that such drugs will have on the already frag­ile teen psy­che. They argue the drug is too new to be aware of its full impact and some sug­gest the Palin admin­is­tra­tion may have forced it through the FDA in order to dis­tract from the failed abstinence-only sex edu­ca­tion mandate.

Despite the dan­gers, some par­ents still believe they are doing what is best for their children.

Cathy Simp­son (Sup­porter of Purity Pill): You can try and try and try to set the right exam­ple until the cows come home, but some­times that isn’t going to work with teenagers. These teens need rules, and if it takes drugs to enforce my rules, so be it. It’s bet­ter than watch­ing your kids vio­late God’s orders! Let­tin my kids go to hell… now what kind of mom would that make me?”

Dan Mason (voice over): The debate over Agamisal shows no sign of calm­ing down any­time soon, with sev­eral states adding bal­lot mea­sures to next year’s elec­tions in order to out­law the drug. Sev­eral nations out­side of the United States, includ­ing Canada, have already banned the tiny pink pill and many more are expected to fol­low suit. As the Agamisal debate rages on, you can count on con­tin­u­ous cov­er­age right here on Chan­nel 4 Nightly News.

Teresa Yoo: Thank you Dan, what an eye-opening piece. Want to let us know what you think about Agamisal? Check out our online poll and dis­cus­sion boards at www.wsmv.com.

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ACTUALLY HUIZENGA

School Nights in the Quartz Qube

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WESLEY FRANCIS

Spi­der Cracks

there is a gash
on one lens
of my glasses
from the night we
rolled & thrashed
naked on the car­pet
now every­where i go
web-like spi­der cracks
spread across my vision
invad­ing bill­boards
or a books black print
like tiny reminders
like fault line frac­tures
threat­en­ing to spit

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WYNDE DYER

101 Sex­ual Positions

This is a prac­tice in fig­ure draw­ing made pos­si­ble by a book from the 70s called, “101 Sex­ual Posi­tions.” These draw­ings were pro­duced with white paper, a black pin, and a lit­tle sex­ual frus­tra­tion. Close your eyes and personalize.

(Click on image to see series)

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DASH

SEX CYMBALS (FUNK UP IN DA HOUSE MIX)

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RACHEL JENDRZEJEWSKI

Il ne savait pas que c’était ma pre­mière fois

I remem­ber putting choco­late can­dles on the kitchen counter but very inten­tion­ally not on the table.

I remem­ber fee­ble whomped-up spaghetti and edamame and ice water and two-buck-Chuck.

I remem­ber dis­tracted con­ver­sa­tion, feel­ing com­fort­able but overly self-aware in my no-clean-clothes bathing suit, yel­low tank top, green sweatshirt-material-skirt and dirty bare feet.  My hair was up.  He was wear­ing jeans, a white tee shirt, and a wide grin.  I remem­ber think­ing that Ten­nessee Williams might have writ­ten him into life.

I remem­ber dim light and peace­ful music and quiet strums on the gui­tar and talk­ing, talk­ing, talk­ing in cir­cles.  I was so sur­prised by his appre­ci­a­tion for din­ner and the way he insisted on wash­ing all the dishes.  I was so awk­ward about just dry­ing and get­ting in the way.  I remem­ber feel­ing lit­tle girl­ish in my hopes that I wouldn’t say any­thing stu­pid and that he would think I looked pretty.

We scrunched up on the couch and he tried to teach me how to whis­tle, say­ing that you just put your lips like you’re going to give some­one a kiss.  I cocked my eye­brow, and we busted up laugh­ing.  I’m glad we didn’t kiss at that moment.  But the antic­i­pa­tion was build­ing and we made lots of small talk, and finally later we gave in. I remem­ber want­ing to just squeeze him to pieces with my legs around his back, giddy and tipsy and com­fort­able.  I remem­ber his fix­a­tion with my bikini top and its com­pli­cated strings.  Messed up hair and bobby pins every­where and pil­lows on the floor and his con­sol­ing strength and smile – his wide, sweet, whole-hearted, safe smile.

And I remem­ber that turn­ing into more and more and more, and I remem­ber sweat­ing and feel­ing faint because we were right there but resist­ing and gig­gling over what would hap­pen if my room­mate came home.  I remem­ber get­ting spooked at sounds and jump­ing up and get­ting dressed over a false alarm.  And then think­ing twice, maybe, and get­ting seri­ous and quiet and not talk­ing for awhile.

I remem­ber cig­a­rettes and bubble-blowing out the win­dow, spy­ing on the neigh­bors, sit­ting across from each other with
thought­lessly inter­twin­ing legs.  I remem­ber gen­uinely not mind­ing that mine weren’t per­fectly smooth.  I remem­ber say­ing over and over, “You deserve to work some­where else, some­place where you’ll be respected,” and him going to the couch and say­ing, “Come here,” with wide-open sto­ry­book arms.

And I went to him and finally we plunged into the talk that had long needed to hap­pen, the talk that made us real­ize that nei­ther of us knew what we were doing and that nei­ther of us was look­ing for any­thing. But here it was and we both liked it and we both felt kind of lost. I remem­ber the pro­found relief in know­ing that’s where we were and him say­ing that he liked my com­pany.  I remem­ber soft lit­tle bisous in-between and ador­ing quiet eyes.

Then we said, “Let’s just go to bed,” except we didn’t even pre­tend to try to sleep, and this turned to that and “Should we?“
turned to “Yes,” and my breath went away.  And it was strange, and much sim­pler than I expected, and larger than I expected, and painful and dif­fi­cult and not very seam­less. I got ner­vous.  And we didn’t have pro­tec­tion, and all I could think about was babies.  And more, and fur­ther, and more painful, and fur­ther try­ing, and all the build-up, and all the heat and sweat and awk­ward­ness. It passed so quickly, and here we were, and it’s over just like that.  He was infi­nitely patient and kind. As our breath­ing slowed, I sud­denly both loved him and felt very alone. And I remem­ber think­ing, il ne sait pas que c’est ma pre­mière fois.

I remem­ber half-heartedly try­ing to keep up the mood but that it fiz­zled out. We started laugh­ing, and I was glad for that, and so
tired and sleepy and uncer­tain. I remem­ber feel­ing abnor­mally small, lay­ing there and won­der­ing what to put back on, and telling him,
“That’s not roman­tic,” every time he said some­thing embar­rass­ing. He some­times got very still, though, and sweet.  And I remem­ber ques­tions of what if, and what now, and what next, and what is going on, pass­ing swiftly and silently between our eyes.

I remem­ber crouch­ing there the rest of the night, him sleep­ing and me star­ing, my insides bewil­dered, know­ing some­one had been there and not want­ing it yet also some­how oddly non­sen­si­cally already crav­ing it all the more.  I remem­ber the sore­ness, and the shiv­ers, and my bathing suit bot­toms under the couch and him say­ing that our mutual best friend can’t know, at least not yet. I remem­ber the soli­tude of that.

And I remem­ber wak­ing up early, look­ing at myself in the mir­ror and hat­ing my face with its ruddy bro­ken out skin and sunken worn eyes.  I remem­ber the smell of bub­ble bath while he was still sleep­ing, and lotion and foun­da­tion and mocha chap­stick and fixed hair and a dif­fer­ent shirt.  The auto­matic abil­ity to look him in the eye again.  I remem­ber feel­ing like my mother as I offered him a good-morning cup of coffee.

I remem­ber our thought­ful, nearly word­less early morn­ing good­bye in the frame of my crum­bling Oldsmo­bile.  I remem­ber star­ing at his face and think­ing time had surely come to a stand­still, and wish­ing I’d brought a sweater out­side, and feel­ing
grate­ful that he’d stayed the whole night.

I remem­ber mouthing the word “goodbye.”

Los Ange­les was half under fog.

*

An older ver­sion of this story first appeared in 2007 at www.commonties.com.

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NICK RENNIS

Sex

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P.J.L.

April 12th, 2006

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ALISHA ADAMS

Any­time, any­place: Miss Jack­son and the West­ern States

(Click on image to see series)

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MATTHEW SPENCER

“Where ten­der ferns unfurl in the ditches”

(sur­prise)

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OREM (THE SINK)

We Won’t Get It On

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* DISCLAIMER: The exis­tence of this issue (Issue 3) does not nec­es­sar­ily negate the future exis­tence of such a comp.