Eire Duck's Collected Works

A Preliminary Collection of Storey Stories & Other Writings

I've updated the list, since many of the things I've written of late were not listed.  So here you go.  Same rules apply.  Still working on adding some actual PIECES, but it's so hard for me to get over my copyright paranoias.  Newly added stuff is in bold.
-SWC, Waltham, Massachusetts - 16 October 2000

I like to consider myself a writer.  Have aspired to be one for ages.  Not quite as long as I remember, but once I worked through the astronaut phase, the dino stuff (I still have a fascination, but I no longer wish to be a paleontologist), & a brief desire to sort mail at post offices &/or to farm (let's call that my boring phase), it's been all writing, all the time.  My favorite genre has always been the short story (yes, the pun's been made, more times than you'd ever dream), but of late I've delved more into poetry & even songs, which are really just poems that have chori (or should that be choruses?) & may some day be put to music.  I hope.  Either way, here's a list of all my stories, poems, songs, my play, & essays/musings, which is now limited to just 2 items because one doesn't fit anywhere else & is almost fiction & the other is actually viewable on this site.  Why haven't I posted the actual WORKS to this site?  Mostly copyright reasons (I know, I'm a dork), & because it's a pain, & because I'm not sure anyone would read or that I want people to be able to.  Or all people, I should say.  So, here's the deal.  If you'd like to read any of this, just say the word (via e-mail) & tell me why it interests you (unless I should know regardless) & I'll send you stuff.  At some point, I may break down & post things (or gradually fill in some stuff), but for now, I'm not prepared to.  Comments on additional works may be found below the lists.  All work titles accompanied by their completion dates (or months if dates are unknown).  & for the record, this whole page is as much (if not more) for my own record-keeping benefit than for any other purpose.  It's a good time to take stock of things.  But if you want to subject yourself to it too, feel free.  Just please be specific if requesting to see writings more directly.
-SWC, Albuquerque, New Mexico - 20 June 2000

STORIES

The Adventures of the Incredible Blue Pumpkin with Roller Skates
   (October 1992)
Friends, Romans, Countrymen
   (9 September 1993)
When Will They Ever Learn
   (27 September 1993)
The Year 2170
   (5 November 1993)
A Drought of Seven Years
   (23 November 1993)
Believe!
   (26 November 1993)
The Road to Maputo
   (10 December 1993)
One Day's Thoughts on a Million Days
   (18 December 1993)
The Proverbial Kitchen
   (28 December 1993)
And None Had Heard of Appomattox
   (9 January 1994)
As Rah Looks Over Us
   (23 January 1994)
Into the Beyond
   (3 February 1994)
A Perpetual Light
   (26 February 1994)
Six Legs Good, Two Legs Bad
   (4 March 1994)
Just Over That Mountain
   (23 March 1994)
One for All and All for None
   (23 March 1994)
It's Systemic
   (25 March 1994)
Out of One's Mouth
   (27 March 1994)
On the Other End of Yesterday
   (8 May 1994)
Don't Eat the Edibles
   (2 June 1994)
Not Unlike Previously
   (6 June 1994)
Same Difference
   (13 June 1994)
A Steppe Ahead
   (2 July 1994)
The Quadrillion Millennia
   (8 July 1994)
And the Goose Did Scream
   (4 October 1994)
Talk to You Tomorrow
   (16 October 1994)
Yes, the Rain Must Fall
   (20 December 1994)
Local Humans
   (26 December 1994)
Could the Grass be Greener?
   (23 January 1995)
Better Head for the Fallout Shelter
   (19 February 1995)
Misfire
   (6 March 1995)
Before They're Allowed to Be Free
   (19 March 1995)
Earth to Earth
   (21 March 1995)
A History of the Future
   (19 April 1995)
Not Quite Noon
   (8 May 1995)
The Sky is Leaving Us
   (17 May 1995)
As the Crow Flies
   (1 June 1995)
The End of the Rainbow
   (29 June 1995)
The Sound of No Hands Clapping
   (25 August 1995)
The Iceman Cometh Again
   (18 September 1995)
Doomsday
   (23 October 1995)
Once and For All
   (7 January 1996)
Out Like a Lion
   (24 January 1996)
Gazing Down the Narrow Mirror
   (29 January 1996)
Point-Blank
   (3 March 1996)
Half Past Saturday
   (27 March 1996)
The Day After Yesterday
   (25 June 1996)
Pocketful of Empty
   (11 July 1996)
Don't Look Forward
   (21 July 1996)
Needless to Say
   (29 July 1996)
Dehydrated Water Salesman
   (6 August 1996)
Ketchup Doughnut
   (17 August 1996)
Life is a Relative Term
   (27 November 1996)
Room 2307
   (September 1997)
Dead Letter
   (1 September 2000)

NOTES:
After writing Ketchup Doughnut in August 1996, I underwent a sort of literary meltdown.  Writing that story had been many years in the making, involved a lot of rather personal emotion, & ended up really messing with my mind.  After that, every story I sat down to write became a retelling of that one.  I managed to crank out a few more, & many many beginnings of others, but the short story would long be haunted by that particular piece.  Those who know a fair amount about my personal history will also understand the significance of August 1996 & its impact in my life... while the year that followed is not entirely to blame for my lack of short story writing since, to say that it wasn't a contributing factor would be absurd.  I still have many short story ideas, & several being written, but it's been a while since I've really focused on this medium.  It's still my greatest love in writing, however.
These stories, beyond friends & the occasional teacher, have gotten very limited exposure.  The Adventures of the Incredible Blue Pumpkin with Roller Skates took second place in some Halloween writing contest in Oregon in 1992, & was later partially reprinted as part of my weekly column for the Seaside Signal newspaper in Seaside, Oregon.  Half Past Saturday was printed in the 1996 edition of my high school's Other Voices literary magazine.  Ketchup Doughnut appeared in Other Voices in 1998.
I have copies of all of these, save for Room 2307, which seems to have gone missing.  But I'm searching for that, as well as any other completed stories nestled amongst the many unfinished that I have lying around.
POEMS

Dark Shades of Light
   (24 October 1994)
Colorless Pigments in a Black Rainbow
   (26 October 1994)
The Watermelon Crusades
   (27 November 1994)
The Making of Seven From Eight
   (15 January 1995)
Shaken Earth
   (21 January 1995)
Adam Atom
   (4 March 1995)
So They Told Me
   (4 April 1995)
T’sk, T’sk
   (5 April 1995)
The Woman with the Bag
   (6 April 1995)
Life is a Lemon Drop
   (11 April 1995)
An Hour After the End
   (16 April 1995)
Well Well Mr. Jones
   (24 April 1995)
Overthrow the Status Quo  [formerly titled Sick and Tired of the Status Quo (and Other Cliches Rephrased)]
   (23 August 1995)
Sorry
   (17 January 1996)
Screwed by My Own Mind
   (16 May 1996)
Emergency Exit
   (October 1996)
A Girl I Didn’t Know  [formerly titled Gwendolyn]
   (16 August 1997)
Autumn Rains
   (9 October 1997)
Artificial Reality
   (28 February 1998)
Evening Tide
   (3 July 1998)
Ping Pong
   (5 November 1998)
Charade
   (23 February 2000)
Change
   (28 February 2000)
Warning the Soothsayer
   (14 March 2000)
Choking Mist Absent Melody (A Pro Se Poem)
   (25 April 2000)
Another Rain Poem
   (23 July 2000)
Dealing (or:  Being Clever in Over My Head)
   (23 July 2000)
Cold Hands, Warm Heart
   (9 October 2000)
Branching Out
   (15 October 2000)

NOTES:
Before October 1994, I had never written a poem.  One night in said month, a poem decided to write itself through me.  To say that I have never really written a poem would be pushing it, but unlike stories, poems always seemed to write me more than I wrote them.  They happened to me.  That's the way it still is these days, with a handful of exceptions.  Seven poems (Dark Shades of Light, Colorless Pigments in a Black Rainbow, The Watermelon Crusades, The Making of Seven from Eight, Adam Atom, The Woman with the Bag, An Hour After the End) form a rather coherent series which I loosely refer to as Ghosts from the Future, & are the embodiment of poems that wrote themselves with very little input from me.
None of my poems were really destined to be printed, I fear.  Maybe they're too weird.  The editor of my high school's literary magazine, Other Voices, personally apologized for not printing Shaken Earth in the 1995 edition, saying they had deemed it "too long", but after considering the political significance, felt not printing it had been a mistake.  Inside sources on the Other Voices staff said the only reason A Girl I Didn't Know wasn't printed in 1998 was because everyone knew it was about a specific student & that made it too controversial to run.
Poems tend to be more emotional than stories.  Most of these have some value beyond my own inner monologue, but Screwed by My Own Mind & Ping Pong are the exceptions to that rule - they're terrible.  Furthermore, T'sk, T'sk & So They Told Me were written for class & are thus extremely forced... though the latter still has some value.  I have copies of all of these, save for Emergency Exit, which is probably not lost & gone forever, but might be amongst school papers from junior year somewhere.
Cold Hands, Warm Heart was written as part of a joint-project with M. McFeeley, D. Gray, & J. Quicksall to write poems as a collected work.  I feel compelled to list the work as a separate entity, but its presentable form will be in unison with the work of the other three.
SONGS

Dis Order
   (14 January 1999)
Closure. by Default
   (17 February 1999)
My Mile
   (8 May 1999)
The Meaning of Life
   (12 June 1999)
The Same Old Frontiers
   (6 July 1999)
Anti-Revolution
   (16 July 1999)
Timebomb
   (7 October 1999)
Hypothermia
   (11 November 1999)
L.M.B.Y.S.G.
   (26 January 2000)
Call Me a Human
   (27 January 2000)
Mean to Me
   (24 May 2000)
Turn Singal Light (in memory of Kevin House, 1980-2000)
   (4 August 2000)

NOTES:
Songs are a new medium to me, & are really just poems that I hope someday to be able to sing in a band.  It's a pretty unrealistic goal, but these works are some of my most meaningful & vibrant... they are the only thing of consequence I managed to complete in all of 1999.  Which saddens me, but helps illustrate what kind of year it was.
Closure. by Default turned out to be a really good way to get someone I cared about to stop speaking to me.  It is for that reason primarily, & my own paranoia secondarily, that L.M.B.Y.S.G., which DOES have a full title (that's the abbreviation), is not listed in its full title.  When one writes about people one knows, it's tough to be completely open about it.
I do have copies of all of these... haven't really had time to lose any.  This is also the first assuredly complete list, aside from parodies, of which I've written several, but none of those deserve much besides gentle laughter & rampant head-shaking.
PLAYS

Before They're Allowed to Be Free
   (writing completed 27 October 1997)
   (first performed December 1997)

NOTES:
So far, there's just the one.  I'm working on a couple more, but very sporadically at this point.  The process of adapting this work, which began as a story completed in March 1995, to the stage consumed most of my writing efforts in 1997.  Most of the work was done well before the October 1997 completion date, but that's when the script was last frozen - revisions were since made based upon the December 1997 performances at my high school.  The play starred Rani Waterman, Sam Winokur, Katie Chavez, Tim Taylor, Matt Frese, Shane Herron, & Jacob Goodman, among many others.  It was co-directed by myself & Matt McFeeley.
Not only do I have a copy of the script, but a video of the final performance as well!
ESSAYS/MUSINGS

And Time Can Only Continue
   (16 April 1994)
Ignoring the Fascist (The Appropriate Brandeis Response to Charlton Heston's Visit)
   (27 March 2000)
How to Throw Your Vote Away (or:  If I Hear One More Pro-Gore Sell-Out, I'm a-Gonna Shout)
   (8 September 2000)

NOTES:
This section will be expanded soon, I'd like to think.  Right now it contains the 2 works that were basically essays that I didn't write for school.  They don't fit into any other category & you can actually READ one of them just by clicking!
Actually, now it's 2 that you can read & 3 total.  More will follow on this, I promise.
ADDITIONAL WORKS

NOVELS:
I've attempted three distinct novels, two of which are possibly salvagable.  There is no way in which The Legend of Enutrof was ever salvagable, though it took me about 150 pages to realize that.  While I learned a great deal from chugging out said "Legend", it now strikes me mostly as a profound waste of time.  I will never again write about talking badgers & hamsters.  Much of 1993 & 1994 were spent on that disaster.
Blatant Contrast, my second attempt, was begun in 1998 as part of my senior project.  This actually had a plot designed PRIOR to writing much of it & now, at about 75 pages, strikes me as still having a great deal of potential.  I'd like to get back to work on that.
My third effort has yet to find a title, but is a barely-fiction work based on the lives of my high school friends & I.  I enjoy dabbling in it, but I don't know if it'll ever get anywhere.  Begun in earnest in 1999, I still haven't gotten over the desire to leave the names unchanged, since many seem essential to the story.  But that might render the whole project moot.

NEWSPAPER COLUMNS:
I spent much of the early '90's, prior to moving to New Mexico, writing a column for the weekly paper, the Seaside Signal in Seaside, Oregon.  Somewhere, my parents have a scrapbook of all (or nearly all) of these pieces in their original form, complete with a mugshot of me when I was 10 or 11.  It might be fun to display them here, but also depressing, because so many of them were silly.  They mostly took a social interest vein, discussing the county fair or a local museum or a timely holiday.  I learned an immense amount, got a fairly substantial readership, & improved my writing vastly.  This experience might not have yielded much lasting quality work, but it helped me advance my understanding of the writing process by leaps & bounds.
My high school also had a paper, but "monthly", & possibly distributed to more homes than the poor old Signal.  This fishwrap is called the Advocate & ran several of my opinion pieces from 1994 until I quit the paper in the midst of my senior year in 1997.  In 1996, a piece on Bosnia earned me the Albuquerque Tribune's "Lighthouse Award" for best column in a New Mexico high school paper.  These might also be fun to display & a couple of them are even on the now defunct Advocate website, whose link can be found on my homepage somewhere & might get posted here eventually.

ESSAYS:
If there's one form I think I've truly mastered, it's the school essay.  I can now crank out these puppies at an alarming rate, but never before I'm within 24 hours of the due-date.  While I know what it takes to get an A from a college prof (usually), these rarely become works of lasting value outside achieving that end.  However, there are a number of essays (especially pre-college) which did have redeeming value & might be worth displaying here.  Even more likely to be worthwhile are the truly amusing essays, like the history essay where my thesis argued that had the Erie Canal not been built, European powers would have reconquered the USA by 1850, or my All the Pretty Horses analysis which I wrote after falling 75 pages short of finishing the novel & had lost my copy of the book (both of these travesties received A's).  My personal favorite, though, will always be my "personal essay" disproving my own existence.

JOURNALS:
Prior to this March, I'd never been able to keep a running dated track of anything, besides e-mail, longer than a week.  I have several journals which I wrote in once every six weeks, or every day for five days & then gave up on.  None of the early stuff will ever be displayed here, but you can always head to the trusty Introspection page for the current journalesque update.

DEBATE CASES:
You may laugh, but these have been an integral part of my writing effort for the past 7 years.  Old LD cases might be especially fun to display, especially for use of the phrase "Because I completely agree with [person quoted], I feel firmly compelled to [affirm/negate] the resolution which states...".  Someday, I might enshrine the parli' lottery case here too, but I don't think I'd call it retired yet!

 Yet More Words...