Challenge 469

O Flight, Suspend Thy Time

1. In Shai Afsai’s “The Shomer”:

   1. In a frame story, readers normally expect the embedded story to reflect at least implicitly a reality in the opening and closing frames. Is that the case in “The Shomer”?
   2. How would the story be affected by shifting the opening and closing narrative from first to third person?
   3. The welcome message says that the story is about virtue. What is virtue? What is it for Josh Ganzenberg?

2. In John Stocks’ “Masada”:

   1. What contrasts does the poem make?
   2. The Roman besiegers are never mentioned. Why not?
   3. What part does God play in the fate of Masada’s defenders?

3. In Margaret Karmazin’s “A Sighting on the Blind Side,” why does the narrator, Phil, steal Frank Kipper’s spaceship?

4. In John Grey’s “A Man Waiting for Someone in the Park,” is the poem a joke about someone’s overwrought impatience, an expression of existential anguish, or something else?

Responses welcome!

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