The Foil Pamphlet by Steven Paul Lansky

When you get as hungry as a bear do you hear the bear? If you do hear the bear, do you hear it from the inside, or from the outside? Does the bear speak French? Do you think French cuisine is the answer? The chemistry of cuisine may be your friend when it comes to suppression of appetite. An appetite for cuisine is not the same as an appetite for junk food. Suppression of the hamburger drives in men and women are not equal. If the bear is speaking French, is it Canadian French or Continental? When you hear the bear, do other people hear the bear also? Have you figured out that you can make friends with the bear? Does the bear shit in the woods? Is the bear Catholic? Is the bear brown?

When you see the bear in the rearview mirror, are you convinced that the bear is behind you? Do you fear the bear more than the bull? Is that a drunken excuse for stock market anxieties? Do you believe that a need for appetite suppression is a high-class problem? If you couldn’t afford to eat, what would you eat? Have you ever survived on cornmeal mush and powdered eggs? Do you think you could if you had to? When you were living on cornmeal mush and powdered eggs, how much money did you spend on beer, wine, cigarettes, and marijuana? Does this seem to really be about appetite suppression?

When you get the munchies can you still unfold the foil pamphlet and wake up in time to read the fine print?

Does pollution have a qualitative relationship with appetite suppression? Have you ever eaten White Castle hamburgers after a night of drinking? Was this before or after you considered appetite suppression? Did tobacco keep you from eating? Could you legitimately smoke away your hunger?

If you had to stop unfolding this pamphlet you are reading now, and learn nothing more from it than you have already learned, how would you summarize your lesson so far?

Are gurus that guide every move you make the only solution to waking you up to the struggles of your addictions? Please refold the foil so that it is restored to the state you found it in. Do not hesitate to share it with someone else. It is no longer useful to you.

Fold out brochure on phenomenology. What sort of things happen to you that seem to be out of your control? Did you have a car accident? Have you lost things that are important to you?

Steven Paul Lansky wrote Main St. (2002) and Eleven Word Title for Confessional Political Poetry Originally Composed for Radio (2009), two chapbooks published by Seaweed Sideshow Circus.  His audionovel Jack Acid (2004) is available (2012) as a digital download: Jack Acid.  His novel: the citizen, has excerpts published in The Brooklyn Rail (2005), ArtSpike, CityBeat (online), Streetvibes and Article 25.  For his animated videos: Bratwurst (with Leigh Waltz), Exit Strategy, Harvest, and The Broken Finger Episode A-8 or the Cigarette Break see: youtube videos.  For more see: Cosmonauts Avenue, Whole Terrain, Black Clock 20, and St. Petersburg Review Issue 8.