Evil Eye

Evil Eye

by Daniel M. Shapiro

His parents full-grown humans, he had struggled through meadows, gray of sky rubbing out green. No one but parents wanted to listen, so he would run, would allow the armored ghosts to chase him, would weep at the sight of blackening lilac bushes. Right when the ghosts would extend their wispy fingers, he would let out a shriek. He could make the shriek last for minutes without breaths, his long hair blocking out deafness. Then the ghosts would leave like everyone else. He invited animals to run with him, yelling Look out! whenever he spied the unknown shadows. Look out! Sometimes he would sense terrible spirits, not like the playful ghosts, but the spirits that hold little people over fires until their flesh pops like a can of snakes. He would remember a hand sign his grandmother had used, middle and ring fingers held with a thumb, while pointer and pinkie climbed toward the sky. Grandmother had taught him never to trust, that no matter how sinister the hand sign looked, it could implant beauty in the most abominable creatures. First, he had pointed the sign at himself.

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Daniel M. Shapiro is the author of How the Potato Chip Was Invented (sunnyoutside press, 2013). He is a special education teacher who lives in Pittsburgh. His piece "The Axeman" also appears in this issue of Mirror Dance.

What do you think is the most important aspect of a fantasy poem?

I like fantastic characters or scenarios that aren’t too far removed from conventional life. These scenarios are more like magical realism, I suppose, where everything seems normal until an unusual phenomenon occurs. When I was a little kid, I would spend a lot of time imagining I had magical powers (typically X-ray vision and flying), so I’m drawn to poems and stories that suggest regular people might have those powers.

What do you think is the attraction of the fantasy genre?

The fantasy genre can make you forget who you are, where you are, and other important things when you’re reading. You begin to believe you’re in a place that wouldn’t really exist. I am more interested in writing and reading poems that use allegory (sometimes through fantasy) rather than tackling a concern head-on. I’m most influenced by writers who are able to transform important themes into a form of fantasy.

What advice do you have for other fantasy poets?

When you start to become uncomfortable as you write, you’re on to something.

The Axeman

The Axeman

by Daniel M. Shapiro

Barely into his double digits, he hid under a bed while Mom drove an axe into Dad’s chest. The kids would forever call it The Axe Murder House; grass gnarled as paint peeled. Moving from fosterer to fosterer, he would bring only a case. We all must face our fears, the last surrogate told him before he ran away for good, before he strapped the case to his back, the case that held a guitar with blades pointing north and south. When he played till his fingers bled, he could touch either blade to seal his wounds. At the end of the run that lasted seven years, he stood in a clearing. The howls of wolves ringed the surrounding forest, assuring him that no one would ever trespass. As the wolves rested their voices, he would solo, notes dripping like rain from pines. Each time he concluded a melody, he would drive the axe into the ground, causing a tree to spring from the spot, a tree impatient to rise.

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Daniel M. Shapiro is the author of How the Potato Chip Was Invented (sunnyoutside press, 2013). He is a special education teacher who lives in Pittsburgh. His piece "Evil Eye" also appears in this issue of Mirror Dance.

Where do you get the ideas for your poems?

I have always loved fairy tales, and I had planned on writing a series of poems influenced by heavy metal music. I wasn’t sure how to get the metal poems going, so I started to write them as fairy tales, and I went down a list of events and personalities. The poem Evil Eye is a tribute to Ronnie James Dio, who is credited with having invented the devil horns hand signal. I imagined him in upstate New York, where he grew up. (I grew up in upstate New York, too.) The Axeman isn’t about a specific person and also has an odd autobiographical component because there is a house in my hometown that’s known as “the axe murder house” because a woman was killed there, and the crime was never solved.

What inspires you to write and keep writing?

I write poetry because it gives me a way to communicate differently from how I would normally, and the process of creating a poem puts me in a mindset that’s different from my daily mindset. I feel like inspiration is similar to looking at pictures in those Magic Eye books: You stare at a bunch of seemingly unconnected shapes until an image jumps out at you.