Mark Hurtubise

TORTILLA

On stage, in a wine-red colored robe, a white ponytailed publisher shouts through a megaphone to a crowd of a thousand reaffirmation seekers, “Your max 20-word poem must be written on a corn tortilla. Red ink only. No cursive. I hated my third-grade teacher.” After standing in line for two hours, I ascend five steps onto the stage and offer my piece of poetry to a pudgy-faced, look-alike Elton John or maybe Honoré de Balzac my 19-word poem about soul:

My soul is a crystal goblet; its penetrating sound is maddening
until dulled when filled with Thunderbird Cabernet Sauvignon.

After reading it, he reaches up, pulls my ear closer and whispers, “Accepted but remember literature is not toasted loneliness, but the world’s nourishment.” He then places the tortilla onto my open palm, poem down. Returning to my seat, thrilled he understood I’m not simply a metaphor for cheap wine, I turn the tortilla over. Nothing! And I used an indelible marker. Remembering that “literature is nourishment,” I roll the tortilla into the shape of an enchilada and eat it.

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Mark Hurtubise believes if one accepts as truth that all time is now, then simultaneous worlds abound around and through us. They aren’t simply spaces defined by geometry, but energy with never-ending fusions. During the 1970s, numerous works were published. Then family, graduate school, two college presidencies, and a community foundation CEO. After four decades, he is creating again from the Pacific Northwest like a pregnant bird balancing on a twig. Recently, his offspring have appeared in numerous locales such as LIT Magazine (cover photo); Tampa Review; North Dakota Quarterly; PacificREVIEW; Stonecoast Review; The Vassar Review; Recognitions – MonoVision, Monochrome, New York Center for Photographic Art – Juror’s Selection, Aura – Artist Spotlight, Penumbra – Editors’ Pick; University of San Francisco, interview, Alum News; Bard College Center/Study of Hate, filmed interview; Aji Magazine, interview; and Stanford Social Innovation Review.