“Tragicomedy for the Fallen: Part I” by Kurt Baumeister

“Odin’s spear struck Valhalla’s golden floor with a mighty thud, silvered veins of sorcerous power erupting from the point of contact, energy flying electric and jagged to the four corners of his vast throne room. This was One-Eye’s signal for quiet, and I went along. We all went along….”

—Kurt Baumeister, “Tragicomedy for the Fallen: Part I,” Eckleburg No. 22

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Kurt Baumeister is the author of the novels Pax Americana and the forthcoming Twilight of the Gods. His writing has appeared in Salon, Guernica, Electric Literature, Rain Taxi, The Brooklyn Rail, The Rumpus, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, The Nervous Breakdown, The Weeklings, and other outlets. An acquisitions editor with 7.13 Books, Baumeister holds an MFA in creative writing from Emerson College, and is a member of The National Book Critics Circle and The Authors Guild. Find him at kurtbaumeister.com.

The Editors

Eckleburg was founded in 2010 as an online and print literary and arts journal. We take our title from F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby and include the full archives of our predecessor Moon Milk Review. Our aesthetic is eclectic, literary mainstream to experimental. We appreciate fusion forms including magical realist, surrealist, meta- realist and realist works with an offbeat spin. We value character-focused storytelling and language and welcome both edge and mainstream with punch aesthetics. We like humor that explores the gritty realities of world and human experiences. Our issues include original content from both emerging and established writers, poets, artists and comedians such as authors, Rick Moody, Cris Mazza, Steve Almond, Stephen Dixon, poets, Moira Egan and David Wagoner and actor/comedian, Zach Galifianakis.