MYUZ

Abstract

INTRODUCTION One of the first things we agreed to as an editorial staff was that our university‘s literary journal needed an updated title. There was nothing inherently wrong with the name Island Fox, per se, but we preferred something that might better demonstrate the joie de vivre of writing. After batting about a few names, we settled on MYUZ – a nod of appreciation to the nine daughters of Zeus – the Greek goddesses of artistic inspiration. A muse is something (or someone) every writer needs – an inspirational influence to whisper in their ear, to help lift their words and voice above the mundane. During this past year, newspapers, television, and internet blogs have been filled with bad news – some of it terrifying. Here in Ventura County we were jolted by the huge loss of life in the Chatsworth Metrolink crash – the worst train accident in California history. We have decided to open our journal this year with a non-fiction piece by Joshua Bauer that deals with this tragedy. Bauer begins his first person narrative with a group of friends getting together for a few games of bowling. The Metrolink disaster, which had happened just two days before, is not really on their radar. The story takes a dramatic turn when Katie, a young woman who had been quiet all evening, suddenly reveals the news that a friend of theirs from high school was one of the Metrolink victims. Another short story you‘ll be sure to want to check out is Bishara, Avi, Always, Kristi Kellog‘s narrative of what happens when a conservative Hindu boy meets a worldly Indian girl hell-bent on winning a major beauty contest. Poetry is well represented in this year‘s journal, making up about one-half of the entries. Adam Piccirilli electrifies us with his love poem Arc Eyes, Sara Parker introduces us to the horrors of nursing home life in A Part of Adulthood I’d Rather Avoid, and Krista Wilbur, last year‘s managing editor, takes us into the dark, blood-stained alleys of poesie noir with Kaleidoscope. Current events were popular with our submitters this year; Sara Parker comes through again, delivering a sarcastic political elbow-punch with Hooray For Proposition 8, Chris O‘Neal tells us the advantages of pet ownership during a recessionary economy in Do Rabbits Dream of Electric People, and Sean Colletti‘s esoteric Now Serving Number 44 will have you puzzling over its meaning. Look closely – the clues are there. Our editorial committee offers up their own contributions, of course. MYUZ‘s mamma capa, Kellie Griffin, brings us into the lives of two young friends on their way to a blood test in Transposition, Julie Fontes shows us what can happen when you meet up with your past at a downtown club in And Hearts, and Guy MacLaury illustrates the perils of beachcombing after dark in Jamaica with A Walk on the Seven Mile Beach. In addition, Luis Maranan takes us into the gravity-prone forest of One Hundred Hills, there‘s the aforementioned reflective non-fiction short story from Joshua Bauer – Spared – and George Morgan squeezes in a few pages with a story about cul-de-sac culture, helicopters, and Polynesian cannabis in Where the Road Ends. We broke some new ground this year, using technology in innovative ways. This is the first time the CSUCI literary journal has been published by an online publishing company: lulu.com. This will allow copies of MYUZ to be available in perpetuity. All in all we believe our readers will enjoy the writing in this year‘s campus journal. It‘s been a pleasure putting it together. If you have any comments, or ideas to improve the next one, please write to us at island.fox@csuci.edu. The MYUZ Committee