Author: Joshua Halberstam

Anti-Genre #7 plays with the concepts of “Walk Ins.” Halberstam’s speakers often find themselves caught in the act of interrupting others who are doing something private that they would not want us to see. Other times, his “walk-ins” recall the new-age concept of a person whose original soul has departed his or her body and been replaced with a new, ostensibly more advanced soul. Weirdly philosophical snoops, Halberstam’s speakers give us the uncomfortable pleasure of interloping on fictional lives. *** WALK INS (And What Follows) He looked to his right then to his left and seeing no one he walked into heaven. A siren went off. An old woman came hurrying toward him. “Old face, younger legs,” the man thought. “Your ID,” she demanded. “My ID?” “I don’t see why I need to repeat myself,” the woman’s voice, like the rest of her, aged, but supple. “My goodness,” she sighed as an add-on. The man just stood there, recognizing his disadvantage.  He assumed she knew what came next.  His own best guess was no better than his worst. “Your name? What is your name?” she asked. She didn’t know his name.  So he relaxed a bit. “Alexander.” “And, dear Alexander, do you know into where you have trespassed? Or tried to?  Can’t you read the sign?” “What sign?” He turned and saw it clearly there on the side. In...