INTRODUCTION by whitney pastorek

My mother talks to people in service positions; she refers to them as nice little men. Hotel clerks. Policemen. Hot dog vendors. Deli counter boys. I used to mock the woman mercilessly, but the phenomenon seems to have trickled down undaunted to the next generation.

Whether it was the beer I'd been drinking or the fact that I've always wondered what makes people buy the minivan cabs, what's important is that I met our newest contributor, Elton James Owusu, as he drove me home late one night in his taxi. My memory of the specifics of that conversation is at best clouded, but his are not. Please welcome him, his remembrance of our chance encounter, and then stick around for a few of his paintings. We here at Pindeldyboz are extremely honored to present his work. -wp

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All by Elton James Owusu

Writers' Meeting - a reminiscence
"Three Wise Women" - a painting
untitled - a painting
"Miles Ahead, or Miles in the Sky, or The Davis-Evans Mission, or The Sound-Space-Eclipse, or All" - a painting

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Writers' Meeting
by Elton James Owusu

Rare it is, the instance
Where such a meeting
As one between a passenger
And her cab driver
Conforms to the way
Two writers meet.

But it happens.
Like at this instant,
As she, a writer in the business of writing
And I, a writer on the job as driver,
Meet each other,
By way of a yellow cab.

However, it is a bright fall evening
In New York City, and
As conversation between us begins,
Stories unfold naturally,
Like the one she tells me
As we head over the 59th Street water crossing.

It's about her most recent meeting.
A dull one apparently,
But it goes like this;

She attends a function
To support writers.
As one herself, she sees it
As an affair badly arranged;
Where the use of the word
Rests around cocktails
As the main subject.

No word on: Art and the word, nor
Love and the word.
No word on,
The art of writing.
And none whatsoever on,
The art of love.
No place for details as such
At this gathering.
Just empty spaces, through which
The disenchanted may escape

But she rejoices nevertheless,
Or so it seems,
And eventually, she leaves the place.
Exhausted, she hails a taxi.
Destination, Queens.