APIARY 9 Sanctuary

SANCTUARY

Founded in 2009, is a magazine of contemporary poetry and prose featuring writers from the Philadelphia diaspora. We publish work from writers of all ages and backgrounds, in print and online. is also its staff: we are a collective of Philly writers dedicated to championing and amplifying our city’s dazzling literary scene. Our mission is to further connect and inspire Philadelphians through the power of their own words, and to celebrate Philadelphia as a great literary city on the page, the stage, the screen, and in the street.

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LET'S CONNECT

APIARY 9 ONLINE

We work hard to produce a beautiful annual print issue, but did you know we’re online all year long? Visit APIARYMAGAZINE.COM to get the latest news on upcoming literary events in the city, interviews and features with our favorite local artists and organizations, a full online archive of every APIARY issue, and more. It's a great way to learn more about us and find out how you can get involved with our next issue. You can also keep up with the buzz on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram by following @apiarymag.

We are proud to feature two digital pieces on APIARYMAGAZINE.COM as part of our ninth issue: the audio poem Sanctuary by Beth Feldman Brandt, and excerpts from the multimedia poem Mother Internet by Elizabeth Baber. Beth and Elizabeth’s work will be published on our homepage at the time of this issue's launch, and you can also find them under ARCHIVE & ISSUES at the top of the page. These poems are made to shine online, so we hope you’ll visit them soon!

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4 Editor’s Letters

CONTENTS

6 Poetry, Prose and Art 28 Husnaa Hashim 36 New Sanctuary Movement 48 Sanctuary Directory Map 50 Workshopping Sanctuary 82 Lit Directory

TABLE OF 2

86 Author Bios 3

This issue means a lot to me, because of the people who made it and the people you’ll find in it. We received hundreds of submissions from authors in Manayunk and Malaysia, in middle school and middle age, in hopes of a first publication for an emerging voice, or in hopes of contributing still more to a community where their voice is already known and loved. A handful of Philadelphians got together this summer, read it all, talked about it all, pulled an obnoxious number of late nights, and chose a handful from these hundreds of voices to hold a conversation about sanctuary. The voices in this magazine hold the fear, anger, bitter humor and pain of knowing a safe space does not exist for you or your loved ones where it should. They hold the wonder and relief of finding refuge in another person, the power of finding refuge and resilience in yourself. They share the frustration of loving a city full of parched cracks and fatal blind spots, and the hope of filling those cracks with new spaces we must make together – where those falling through are held fast and pulled up, and those who were invisible finally hear an “I see you.” We tried to build this kind of space for our readers in this magazine. We hope you find it here, wherever you are.

—ALEXA Editorial Director Creating APIARY 9: Sanctuary has shown me that Philadelphia is both beautiful and tough as hell. Yes, Philadelphia is troubled, is tired, and historically divided. Philadelphia’s history has deep, damaging roots - ones that we are still learning to untangle. But Philadelphia is also hungry for better things; it is working to carve out a space to make that happen. The voices in this issue represent Philadelphia’s resiliency, its capacity for love, and its magnificent engines of change: namely, its people. In this issue you’ll learn about The New Sanctuary Movement, one incredible group of humans who have been fighting for immigrant justice, and a more equal Philadelphia, since 2007.

Blanca, Peter, Teresa, Gerardo, and all the APIARY authors, artists, and staff, thank you. You give me faith.

Working on Apiary 9 has made real for me the conceptual idea that sometimes, all we have with which to revel is our art. The voices selected across genres crystallize for me our chaotic need to make sense of the spaces around us, and the people that occupy those spaces – both as artists and as humans. – Amanda (Fiction Editor) We got a lot of beautiful writing that dealt with location and physical space, but a good bulk of the writing seemed to arise from the desire for a mental, emotional, or spiritual sanctuary. The poems in this issue are little sanctuaries in and of themselves. Some play with brevity and imagery in a gentle way. Some are more aggressive, and provide an imagined sense of protection. These pieces were a pleasure to read and I hope our readers enjoy the issue as much as I do.

—KAI Poetry Editor For me, this issue really unpacked the importance of sanctuary. We got a lot of great prose about internal sanctuaries coinciding with physical spaces. The use of sanctuaries to escape not only danger, but fear as well, became very apparent through our submissions. This issue was extremely challenging and more rewarding because of it.

—ANDREW Fiction Editor The idea of sanctuary, for me, has always Been deeply tied to art. Magazines like Apiary create spaces for writers and artists to share their work, and for readers to discuss. So talk about this issue!

Don’t just let it live on the page. We hope that you talk about this work and let it inspire how you move forward in creating your own sanctuaries.

—MIRIAM Poetry Editor

—STEVE Project Director

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SURVEY

Emily Thomas Growing up, did you always / sometimes / never have a TV? Was there anyone like you on your favorite show?

Have you ever been the only one like you in a room full of people?

You are standing at a body of water is it a river? an ocean? can you be more careful please the current Have you ever traveled internationally?

Whose debt were you born into?

When you stop talking and your eyes drift where do you go?

How free does our country make you feel?

Have you ever lived – even briefly – in a motel? Is it safe for us to hold hands in public? If no one is taking pictures how real is the day?

Are you hungry?

If everything that ever hurt you was a person how far would his voice carry?

Would you vote for him?

Are you nervous?

When will you cross the water?

When you need quiet is there a place you can go and can we go there now together?

When strangers decide the purpose of your body do you submit?

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LATER, BOYS

SHARK WEEK

After “August”

by Charles Bernstein

For most of my life, I thought all white people were sharks. I don’t mean cold blooded or bloodthirsty or sharp-toothed or strong swimmers. What I mean is simply resistant to frigid, icy climates. Example:

Jeff Chiu

For some it ceases to be a joke when it starts to feel threatening.

To others the threat starts being a joke before it can seize feeling.

Dave Harris

Mom why do I have to wear a winter coat outside? The sharks are still wearing shorts and flip-flops. or Look at that group of sharks headed to the club in nothing but crop-tops. How they not even cold?

Imagine a sea of pale, milky thighs cracking in the boney winds of winter fissures forming under jean shorts begging for the soft caress of lotion. Once a great white shark with waves of hair tapped my shoulder in line. Would I be a gentleman and give her my coat. The audacity of white people to not wear coats and then freeze. You out here looking like a snowman’s ghost tryna see Aaron Carter in concert and still there’s a whole week dedicated to sharks.

It’s called Shark Week. It’s really just a time to watch things die in their mouths. good home training: when it is coldest, I am always sure to cover my skin, careful to keep my blood from showing.

It’s dangerous and I know better.

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9

KENYA

Melissa Simpson Kenya turned off Hannah Montana and prepared for the day that was ahead of her. What stuck out to Kenya the most was the water. The water that she saw in her white fantasy world on television was crystal clear. The only time she saw water that looked like this was when it was being poured out of a 15-gallon jug. The liquid that escaped from the faucets at her house was brown. Kenya liked to do the brown paper bag test on the liquid that came from her sink. If the liquid was darker than the paper bags that housed the ham, cheese and wonder bread sandwiches of the white world, she could not bathe in it. If the liquid was lighter than a brown paper bag, depending on just how light, it was more or less safe to touch. Under no circumstances was the water ever safe enough to drink.

She decided to freshen up tonight. She called it freshening up because she never felt like she was getting clean. Tonight’s freshening would be significantly more troublesome. On this particular evening, Kenya had been watching Hannah Montana in order to get a deeper understanding of what it was like to be white. In the white world that Kenya saw, there always seemed to be an endless pool of money that allowed kids to own light-up sparkle Skechers. In the white world, there was always food on the table for dinner, and ham and cheese sandwiches in the brown paper bag for lunch.

There was always enough money for these kids to play elaborate pranks on each other. They could drive anywhere and everywhere as much as they wanted, never having to wait in the frigid cold for a bus that was already running 20 minutes late.

She had no desire to be white, but bright and early the next morning Kenya would be getting bussed out to a new school Blue Ridge, a neighboring township only about 5 miles from where she lived in Philly. Based on how her mother explained it, she would be one of only 3 other little black girls who attended Blue Ridge Middle School. In fact, 95% of the school was white.

“Girl, make sure that water ain’t too dark you hear me?” hollered Kenya’s mom from down the hallway.

“Okay!” Kenya hollered back.

She wondered why her mom insisted on always telling her to check the water. Since she was old enough to wash her hands by herself Kenya was told to check the color of the water. This was all she knew. Kenya assumed that since her mother grew up with clear water like the white people on t.v., the brown color was still a bit of a shock to her.

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Kenya’s mom had to spend the last of their money on uniforms for Blue Ridge Middle School. Blue Ridge was a private school but the administrators in the district believed that if everyone wore the same clothing it would prevent bullying and teasing so uniforms were mandatory. Since Kenya’s mom spent the last of their funds on the uniform, there was no way she could purchase this week’s water supply.

Thankfully there was enough left over from the prior week for the family to drink and cook with, but washing, that was out of the question.

Kenya went into the bathroom and turned on the sink faucet. There was no point in filling up the tub. There was no way she would soak in the liquid.

The water pouring from the tap was darker than the brown paper bag. She turned the water off and went back to her room. Kenya turned off Hannah Montana and read poems by Edgar Allen Poe until she fell asleep.

Kenya was baffled by her mother’s attempts to at least appear clean. Kids her age didn’t care much, but in her mind, the folks who grew up with clear water all acted like they had something to prove like they had to be clean and show it off. Sometimes her mom saved the drinking water in order to wash up.

By 8:15 the next morning, Kenya was on the bus to school. She absentmindedly looked out the window.

As the bus pushed on, Kenya saw her neighborhood, full of shoddy apartment complexes, stray dogs, and take-out joints, transform into townhouses and clean gutters. The houses stood two-by-two. Where she lived, each structure was touching the next. This went on for blocks. Ten minutes after the two-bytwo, Kenya witnessed three and four story houses, lush lawns, and fences. Small and dainty enough to be cute, but with a hidden message that read, “this is not for you”.

When Kenya emerged from the bus she felt nervous for the first time. At the points leading up to this moment, she felt prepared for this new school with older, different kids. She had been an outsider all of her life since she was so smart, so in a way, discomfort was comforting to her.

The first thing that caught Kenya’s eye was the sea of blonde hair. She had never seen so much of it in her life. The girls at Blue Ridge Middle School were drastically different from her. Kenya’s braids did not emote the same sort of effortless drama as the hair that belonged to the other girls. She noticed how

The warm water felt good on Kenya’s hands. She they could not stop playing with it. From Kenya’s perspective all the girls of Blue Ridge Middle School rubbed them continuously under the thin film.

Earlier that morning, she was not able to freshen where tall, with developing bodies. She, who had just turned ten a few months ago, still had no use for up, and she had no idea of the last time she actually washed. Kenya knew she smelled bad, all the people a training bra. in Philly smelled bad, that was just the way things The feeling that Kenya felt was not one of were. Kenya could tell that everyone here smelled intimidation, but of a rising curious fear. She looked like a rose, or better yet, nothing at all. She refused at her watch. She had a few minutes before class to stand out for something so negative. She was started so she decided to compose herself in the already one of the few black girls at Blue Ridge bathroom before she was required to mentally Middle School – she wasn’t going to be the dirty check in with her new teacher, classmates, and black girl, too. assignments.

Kenya grabbed a bunch of paper towels from the The first black girl Kenya spotted had long straight automatic dispenser, and began to run them under hair like the white girls but was of a medium brown the water. She began scrubbing her face, the back of complexion. Much like the water that she was her neck, under her arms, and her privates. Despite actually able to bathe in. not being submerged in a tub of water and bubbles, “Excuse me, can you tell me where the bathroom is?” she felt cleaner than she had in a very long time. asked Kenya.

For the next few weeks, every day before class, Kenya would wash up in the sink at school. She was “Yeah down this hall, make a right then make a left,” still being bullied for being young, smart, and black, said the girl. “I’m Peyton by the way but at least they could tell she was not dirty. At least - you must be new.” they could not make fun of her for doing the brown paper bag test at home.

“Yes, I am. How could you tell?” asked Kenya.

“Girls like us tend to stick out like a sore thumb,” said The school went well for Kenya. She was right on pace with the other students at Blue Peyton, flipping her hand’s palm down. “Things can get rough around here for us, they seem to like me Ridge. Socially, Kenya was a loner and she was okay here so let me know if you ever need anything.” with that – she didn’t like people much anyway. The closest thing Kenya had to a friend was Peyton. They “I figured as much. Thanks. See you around,” said didn’t talk much, only when Peyton’s white friends Kenya as she walked towards the bathroom. weren’t around. She would sometimes even urge her Luckily the bathroom was easy enough to find. It white friends to stop teasing Kenya. Overall Kenya was empty. Kenya was struck by how clean and enjoyed her time at Blue Ridge since she was finally modern it was. The stalls were made of fake marble getting a decent education. as opposed to splintered wood like the ones at her Only once did Kenya get caught washing up in the old school. There was no lingering stench of urine that burned her nose like at her old school. The sink bathroom. It was by Peyton. Kenya swore Peyton to secrecy, and for some time Peyton obliged. and mirror area of the bathroom looked like some sort of beauty vanity. The mirror was spotless. For Kenya had told her mom about the pristine quality some reason, she could not find the spout. She of the water and how she had been washing up in walked over to the sink area and waved her hands in the bathroom at school. She had offered to fill up the front of her right above the sink.

15-gallon jugs from home with water at the school.

Kenya’s mother was apprehensive about this, but Water suddenly spurted out in a thin but wide film considered how the family would no longer have to from under the ridge of the mirror. Kenya was so purchase their weekly water supply. She gave in. shocked that she screamed. It was not just the surprise of the water that freaked her out, but how For weeks, Kenya’s mother would drive to the back clean and crystal clear it was. Never in her life had entrance of the school with the 15-gallon jugs to Kenya seen or experienced such pristine water meet her daughter. Kenya and her mom would sneak escaping from a sink. According to her mother, folks in the school and proceed to fill up their jugs. They in Philly were doing the brown paper bag test to usually left with about five. their water ten years before Kenya was born.

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daughter to school every day with an unwashed On one particular day, once again Peyton caught body. She knew that this man who made six figures Kenya. This time it was after school when Kenya and her mom were taking the last jug back to the car. would never have to do the brown paper bag test, that his children would never have to steal. She saw Peyton was clad in her cheerleading gear. The Blue no empathy in his eyes.

Ridge Middle School football game had just ended and the cheerleaders were making their way back to The next day Kenya was the cleanest little girl at the locker room to change. Kenya and her mother Philly Elementary. She was teased for it. Everyone pleaded with the cheerleaders not to tell anyone. there was dirty and smelly and they saw her as In response, the cheerleaders laughed and teased uppity for attending a white school. So pretty that Kenya and her mother for stealing the water. Peyton she had to go and clean herself up and start thinking said nothing until one of the other cheerleaders she was better than the people in Philly. A week noticed that she was silent. Peyton immediately later, when the water was gone, she was just another started laughing. one of the dirty little girls.

Burdened with shame and a 15-gallon jug of fresh Blue Ridge Middle school water, Kenya and her mom stumbled back to their car, haunted by the laughs of the cheerleaders.

The pair rode home in silence.

Kenya awoke for school like she normally did. She boarded the bus at 8AM and made it to school by 8:30. As she was walking to her first class she felt a million piercing blue eyes attacking her existence.

Whispers of the brown paper bag test floated past her ears. After what felt like an eternity, Kenya made it to her first class. The teacher handed her a note and told her to proceed to the office and that her mother was on her way to the school.

Kenya and her mother arrived at the door to the principal’s office at the same time. They gave each other a knowing look full of dread. The pair let out a collective sigh as they knocked on the Principal’s door.

“I am going to make this short and sweet because I absolutely do not have time. What the pair of you did was deplorable, absolutely unacceptable. There is no room at Blue Ridge for such uncouth behavior,” said the principal.

“I assure you that nothing like this will ever happen again, Kenya has never been in trouble in school before and this will be the last time. She was just trying to help me out,” protested Kenya’s mother with an ashamed look on her face.

“Oh you’re right, it will never happen again. Kenya is expelled from Blue Ridge. If I ever see you or her on our property again, you will be removed. Lastly, you are a grown woman who should be able to provide water for her child. You Philly people are always looking for a handout,” said the principal.

Kenya’s mother no longer protested. She knew that the man on the other side of the desk would not understand what it was like for her to have to take that water, the shame she felt for sending her

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13

MOMMA

BOOKCASE

momma turns my back into a freckle of the milky way she is kind as my moving parts play patty cake with salacia the little mermaid behind the shower curtain, momma showed me where my body rose and fell her love, a magician tangled in a dozen arms her love, a mood ring elbow deep red with heat sometimes scalding thick dragon’s tongue sometimes sadness short circuits into a new face she teaches me young there is a certain dialect between water womanhood mental illness girls like us have to wash rinse and repeat ourselves often we have both met afternoons when the whole body is a letting wound an anguish spreads its legs anew but always punctures the same we have both learned that all we will ever be is not enough yet still, we love one another though we are the same flesh same fiend the miracle and the curse of it what is more profound than loving the daughter of your own death by making recovery necromancy by making survival heredity of lending me a body a pulse what is a heartbeat without its mother anyway I reimagine the bathing again a sashay of soap and washcloth to hold, touch and laugh above room temperature how that itself is a birth momma of dusk momma of the scorpion’s sting momma of hardboiled underskin and all things warm teach me how to love when the lights go out Teach me how to breathe underwater

After my last trip to Palestine,

how did we survive all this moving?

I sit in Philly staring

we are all trying my wife beside me,

at the bookcase in the living room,

telling me I have to

remembering mother’s lips moving—

while our daughter smiles at moving images,

Veronica Nocella

Ahmad Almallah

“You are all waiting for me to die” she said,

she tells me I need to see

“I want to go back to my mother.”

this picture. Where?

The world? The child’s

All memories lost, no calculation, pure emotion.

body lying on the shore, the waves rocking it

How did it all happen?

So quickly, how?

gently—

I sit in Philly staring at the bookcase, my daughter watching Arabic cartoons on TV, the wood collecting everything, not books: time, how many times did I pick up from the sides and the streets in America, books—

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I see the little dead boy sleeping, I see death seeping, mothers crying, the order, all things disappearing— all of us lining up, against the sea and the waves shouting: “You are all waiting for me to die, I want to go back to my mother.”

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MECCA

Katie Mitchell Daughter, Please understand why I couldn’t let you enter a world on fire through a body falling apart.

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UNFAMILIAR BACKS OF HEADS Terrance Greene

I was teaching a summer school class when I got a text that Clyde would be picking maman up, but he needed me to check on her throughout the week.

Clyde was my brother, and took up here and there jobs, and lived off his girlfriend in between jobs.

She loved him to death and maman would say I’aint never taught y’all to lay up on no girl like that. Livin’ off that girl. Trifelin’. But, if it wasn’t the girl it was maman— in the same way that the girl was much like maman and cooked the same, and had a relatively parallel upbringing. I thought about this on the train and found myself missing him, the times he’d picked the soggy cereal from the bottom of the sink when it was my turn to do dishes. And so, for the next week it would be work and then going to see maman. The first thing I did was send an email to all my supervisors. All I needed to do was mention surgery and the gravity spoke for the bereft explanations of my potential absences. [Surgery] The subject said. The reason I even bothered taking off was to make sure I had time to get water for the both of us. It was fine to grab my portion after work: I was registered at the school near my house which I could pick up by 8. And there was water at the school where I taught. When I got there, she was sitting on the couch watching a bootleg of the Medea movie the boy down the street sold.

“You talk to Clyde?” I asked.

“Yeah, he at home. He just called me talking about him and Kim goin’ down to get some crabs,” because it had been warm since February and the crabs were around at all the markets and they were bigger than normal, “he got approved for food stamps. You better call him and see if he got some for you before he gets them crabs. Shit, he should have left the card with me.” Then she stopped for a moment and sucked her teeth, “Excuse my tongue, Father.” Her eyes looked up at the ceiling and she raised her right hand as if pledging. She was talking to me again when she said, “You know I hate taking pills. These pain pills got me slippin’. I didn’t even do my devotions today.”

“You should get some rest mah.” I sat down on the floor cross-legged, “What are you watching?”

“I don’t know. Some movie. I been dozing off, picking at this chicken.” Which was on one of those Archie Bunker foldable tables.

“I have to get water for you down from the church. I still haven’t gotten mine. I need to go to the school by my house to get it.”

“Boy I told you to get it Frahdi when you got off. I was talking to you and I said go get that water because you not goin to get it over the weekend. See, you don’t be listening to nobody.” She tried to get up…

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“Maman, I’m going to get the water, stay there.”

I took the walk to the church. It was one of those yellowish-white-silver bright 4:13pm type of days. I could hear maman screaming about how I didn’t have no coat on. I still had a few hours to get back to mine which was good because I didn’t get paid for a few days and I couldn’t afford to pay the holding fee for my water. Maman lived in the same place since we were youths of about 8. Just down the street where I had my first fist fight was the church. I stopped by the papi store and bought a water for $4 which was fine since they’d distinctly declared the tap water undrinkable. It was worse than lead. Something else they said. They could doctor the lead, but whatever this was was uncontrollable. It wasn’t the initial consumption either. It just flash froze your immune system for 48 hours or so. The whole fiasco started in some small little pocket of Dallas, collapsed to some weird pneumonia. The state of emergency started in some little town in Florida when the entire outfield of the Jacksonville Gators missed the rest of the season and the first half of the next school year. The three mothers of the 8-10 year old didn’t have to foot the bill and caught the worst of some summer flu that started at some birthday party. Father God my mother said. She was on the phone, telling me about the whole thing. Father God bless those children.

The lines from the church went for a block and then curved around a corner. They had those blue wooden barricades, at the end they’d decided that caution tape would suffice for the rest. Sometimes people would take shifts and have one of their children stand in the line while they stepped off to smoke a cigarette or went to get sandwiches from the papi store. It was always better to use a child to take your place as opposed to your wife/husband/brother/ etc. for the imminent hey, get in the back of the line. You can’t cut.

My kids need water.

The line crept about 3 feet every ten minutes or so, with people lugging Deer Park containers in laundry carts. One lady put hers in one of those cheap strollers with a bunch of loose plastic containers in the bottom. She tilted it back and then lurched the stroller down the front stairs one at a time. At every plop down the next stair the water went careening in and out of the sanctuary of the cheap polyester.

On the last step, it hit with a big thud and the whole stroller titled forward and crashed onto the sidewalk.

All the chattering in the line halted as the woman looked around for a person to help her salvage the rest of anything from among the scattered pieces, but all time froze and the heat beat down on the entire line. The only thing moving was the woman trying to

gather the spilling water in some loose Tupperware she held under the cart before she tried to turn back and re-enter the church. Less than halfway up the stairs another young woman grabbed her by the arm.

“If you don’t let go of my damned arm so I can get my water” “You got your water, you need to move on so we can get ours” The day was starting to beat down and the line slowly started to come alive from the head to the back with all the people making a fuss about the hold up. Just along the line came a troop of young schoolchildren throwing a ball back and forth parallel to the line, moving fluidly throughout dense heat and the force that seemed to hold us all in that place, waiting for the fuse to fizzle down from the start of the line to the finish until it exploded into the— ——— She was obviously someone’s mother; she’d been waiting out there just as I was, in that pounding heat with her stroller and Tupperware littered and falling out here and there from the bottom carrier and her bending over to pick it up, and realizing that the line had moved on and then some fat man peeking around my shoulder to see what the holdup was and then her feeling that same vulturous pressure and then clumsily moving forward. But when the stroller fell I felt the tether between us break. She’d been someone’s mother but so was everyone else in the line, so was the fat man. In the moments after the children, there was a long line of mothers: the long row of well-dressed lunch ladies (in the matronly portly he-looks-just-like-you, way) that all started to converge on the place where the water had spilled into the sidewalk.

to back out of that line and run up the stairs before anyone got wind that I was not in some fashion of earth-toned shawl or head wrap, before they converged on me too. And that woman, she’d be eaten alive, and if I stayed I’d have to watch. She got loose for a moment and darted up the stair. Another one of the women grabbed her ankle causing her to fall with a hard thud up the stairs, the same tone and pitch as the tumbling stroller that seemed to be the universe.

The woman splayed out along the stairs and let out a deep scream, or yell with the face folding in ripples like a yawning lion’s. It was my time, to leave her there, to grab a container and another jug that someone had abandoned, and fill them up so I could avoid this next week.

I could not tell who had become who, but they all grabbed the woman as the sun had moved onto that tangerine-pinkish tint that was around 6:30, which meant I’d have to stay with maman a few nights this week so I’d have some water because I was not getting my portion on my end of town at this rate.

It was better for me to take a container and load up, and maybe sell a little so that way I could still get my portion and have enough for the late fee or just to grab a sandwich in the morning. I backed out from the circle and grabbed the biggest container with a handle on it. I also made sure it was secure so I wouldn’t end up like the woman. I could see her over the heads of the other women slowly climbing up the stair and then dragged back down.

The steeple stairs were thin and steep. I took one of those blue, five-gallon office water coolers and raced up before anyone could neglect the woman to grab on to me. I went up the stairs two at a time until, mid-stride, I felt my body falling towards the stair and the door getting further out of my reach.

It was the woman who lost everything, pulling me back into the crowd. My children my children please Another one of the women, whom I assume was previously the fat man, stepped around me knocking help— my children. She’d grabbed my ankle and on the way down, I hit my elbow which loosened the over one of the wooden barricades to get a better grip on maman’s jug. An army of arms were dragging eye on the scene. I tried to pick it back up but then another one of the mothers stepped off to the side the her down, and me with her. She would not let go. Just before she’d been fully taken her other arm shot out see the scene unfold. Makes no damned sense, one of them said, damned shame and it was too. Once the from among the swarm. I’d still had the one stolen post had fallen, the entire line dismembered, forming jugs in my hand and with the other I’d began to grab her and pull her up with me. In the same moment, the a circle around the woman trying to ascended the stairs. Aside from her, it was me and the other woman jug I’d dropped rolled down the stairs passing the same plane of grasp as the woman’s hand. I could feel holding her arm with a real persistent grip as to keep her disappearing into the abyss and the jug moving her from going back into the church. out of my reach. Before she could pull me down with “Would’ya’ll move” and every variation of the sort her, I pried her hand off with the sole of my work shoe came from the mouth of the woman, and the other and grabbed the jug. woman looking to the church only uttering “my ——— children, my children.” It would have been nothing

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After I returned from the inside of the church, the street was completely empty. I didn’t see any of the women come in or hear their voices. Going into the church all I could recall was the sound of the chaos disappearing as if I were sucked into a vacuum.

Outside it was dark and the air was stiff and nothing.

There was no wind and the night breeze blew with the air coming downward like misting rain. It was not just the street that was empty, but all the corner stores and Chinese stores and even the late-night laundromat, which were prime trapping spots. The walk to maman’s was only six blocks and there was only silence and the down pouring non-air, and from time to time, a sting in my joints or back from an abrupt bouncing of one of the jugs as I walked. After two blocks, I heard the faint snapping of someone clumsily walking through a forest. Blocks of row houses with square windows, casting yellow lights upon the brick. The soft reddish of 7:30, the silence.

The midground of houses between the projection of light and the sky that seems to bridge two worlds but only if you’re not looking too closely. Like when you think you’ve seen someone you know from a long time ago, but don’t care to look back, or look back too late and there is only the crowd of faces, and unfamiliar backs of heads. Like that. And then I smelled the smoke as if the still air was shedding its skin.

and sometimes like a familiar face but not his own. I wonder if he had seen me or someone he thought I was, or perhaps someone he didn’t know at all. Or in a moment, when we were both looking at the fire, if we looked the same.

Instead I said, “I didn’t see you getting water today.”

“I don’t be out there anymore.”

“How do you get water then? You have to get water.”

“I don’t drink it.”

“Water?”

“Not anymore.”

“How can you not drink water anymore?”

“I just stopped, nah mean?” He then took a pair of tongs and used them to twist one of the logs. He murmured something and the fire let out a large cracking sound. “I ain’t drink water in like six weeks.”

“Mr. James, if you don’t have water for three straight days you die. It’s science.”

“I’m tryna tell you, young blood, I don’t be drinking it.”

I took out my phone and showed him the Google write up. “See, 3 Days.”

“It says some people have gone 8 to 10 days.”

Mr. James was outside of Buy-it-Mart, on the corner, “But you just said six weeks.” with his smoker. The flames danced in the little “Oh.” He didn’t look phased; he was consumed with metal silo and when I moved closer I could hear the dancing fire. I could smell the fresh meat in the him speaking, not in the way that one speaks to red cooler next to him and there was steam from themselves, but as if in conversation, or some kind the ice breaking into the air. Once in a while a few of prayer. I stopped to see what he was making. Mr. cars drove by and there was a swell of sound that James always smoked meat when it was nice out and lulled back into silence. The fire kept cracking. “Six bought buns from Buy-it-mart. That was his side weeks.” He said, as if recalling to himself. He handed hustle, along with the car wash. There was very little chance that he’d slide me a platter on the house, but if me the tongs for a moment. “Hold that, I’ll be right I sat with him long enough he might offer me a corner back.” He walked to the curbside and then came back with two pairs of oven mitts. He took the tongs of brisket to test out. When I got closer I could hear back and put them into a pail of water to keep them the whirring of the smoker. It was under everything, clean.

I wondered why he didn’t do that in the first like the vacuum soundlessness of the church, or the place instead of handing them to me. He gave me a down pouring air. “Mr. James”, I said. In a childish pair of oven mitts and said, “Help me lift this grate.” It way, in part because I wanted him to recognize me, wasn’t heavy but the dragging metallic sound seemed and in part because how else does one say Mr.? to linger in the air for a while, the same way you bite “Young Buck.” He said, which could have been to your fork too hard and you can’t eat the same for the anyone. rest of the day, maybe a week. I didn’t want to talk.

“Six weeks,” he said again as if reminding himself. I “You smoking this late?” think he forgot that I was there. I turned to him and “Man I smoke all night, young buck.” asked him how it started.

“Hustlin’” “You know man. You got to. Stay up out here. Stay out the way.”

We were both facing the fire and the light moved across our faces and at some points he did not look like himself, but like someone I’d never seen before

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“What do you mean you weren’t thirsty though? Like, how are you not thirsty?”

“I don’t know. I forgot that I was supposed to actually drink water.”

“Mr. James, you’re fraudin’” “I swear of my aunt Berniece.”

Despite the flame’s light on his face I could see he was serious. He looked as if he were reflecting on it, the moments before he let it go. Around us was darkness and there another blush of light from the houses and street lights moving into the mini mart’s parking lot. The ring of darkness pulsed like the colors in a Rothko painting, and if I wasn’t looking it seemed to move in closer until it was just at the sole of my shoes. The fire was perfect, lying across the bottom of the grill like a fat cat. There was the low smoldering that moved so deep into my head, I suddenly realized how tired I was. I felt my body rocking while I was lost in my thoughts, that seemed to melt into dreams.

My limbs were heavy. I could feel the darkness encroaching from the parking lot.

Crack. The fire let out the loudest snap all night. My body shot from whatever dramatic physicality the darkness was lulling me to. I felt a coldness in my spine. “I love you!” I said. I hadn’t even felt the words in myself. Only lingering in the air like the resonating sound of the smoking grate. I picked up the water and walked away through all the streetlights and shadows of the houses.

I was turning the corner to maman’s house but the street did not feel the same. Something had pulled me but I couldn’t say what it was and I was just holding the water but I didn’t feel thirsty. Thinking of it suddenly made me sick. I thought if I brought maman the water she’d feel that same way. And I thought about Clyde and I suddenly felt a sadness like I had lost him. And then I thought about the crabs and how large they were, and this poem by Robert Lowell. At least I thought it was Robert Lowell. Nothin very bad happen to me lately it said. I remembered the next line and then that it wasn’t Robert Lowell but Elizabeth Bishop who wrote it. Before I could say the next words tears took their place. And the houses were all the same.

He told: “I was right here. And I just forgot to drink water one day. But then I thought if I got a good hustle on I could buy a few bottles or pay the late fee to get my ration. But I was out here selling so many racks of ribs, I wasn’t drinking no water. And then I just wasn’t thirsty.”

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HAIKU FOR THE MORNING AFTER Clarence Wright

First order of the day remove the yellow police tape from last night

some drugs tell you they love you then leave you in a pool of your own blood

gentle morning breeze blowing the shell casings left from the night before

this corner an intersection of crossed lovers collision at hand

eerie stillness the peace of knowing nightfall is 15 hours away

colonizing an inhabited land has deadly consequences

corner boys and construction workers walk to work down 23rd street

the blood stained pavement a tragic fresco depicting purgatory

at the 54 bus stop no talk of recent events life goes on

where was Jesus last night? it’s easy to blame God for human issues

2 nurses in blood red scrubs new patient this morning their neighbors’ son

7 shots rang out round midnight on the Monday side Sabbath ended.

sixteen, no candles no teddy bears or balloons not when you survive critical condition describes the neighborhood and victim alike “snitches get stitches” an incomplete hollow rhyme truth is they get shot no one wants to be shot speaking of shootings so stories stay untold shrapnel shattered windows rarely yield witnesses at least not for cops word on the street is it was over a girl turf wars aren’t just for drugs

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drums and choir Sun day morning same night Gunshotsan unholy cadence

STAY

Sanam Sheriff I am wanting for that grey husk of rain. A sky of bullets falling gently this time, and all the blood is just water.

For that car ride uphill; sunset tilted through the window, The pillage of an ocean and then Your hand on my thigh.

Such small gesture. A flap of wings in my throat.

I am thirsty for the slow drip of hours. That honeyed light. A syllable of silence between your lips to rest my name inside.

In an endless afternoon of skin, I ask shelter of arms and tomorrow of departure, Shield that which weds here to now— Your shadow and mine, tangled as the trees, as each drop of rain kissing the morning on its way down.

bullet scars on the church wall a reminder why it’s necessary where do souls go when they survive? resurrected Jesus had no home doubting Thomas unconvinced by his own scars returns to what he knows Fresh sirens heard crying in the distance it’s way too early for this

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EXPLAINING TO MY AUNT THAT JESUS WAS BLACK Dave Harris

You’re wrong to frame a white man for saving you. See his hair? His skin knows nothing of the sun and its burn. Don’t you know where Jesus is from? Don’t you know the cross he carried?

Boy, Jesus kept me clean longer than you been alive.

I met the devil in myself. I’ve mistook a smokescreen for a raincloud. I drank the whole flood because I was thirsty. Why else would the sun rise if not my Lord’s gentle hands carrying me to the light?

I’ve sat in enough classrooms, and prayed to cotton-skinned men.

Was told that they were responsible for everything that lived. I too thought they would save me from my sin. What we’ve been taught was a lie. Everything that was wrong is still wrong.

And you think you know the face of God better than I do? Child, I been God. I resurrected a body from its entombing.

You too young to get the cross we carried.

You can’t tell me nothing until you know what I know.

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TAKING DOWN THE STARS Alisha Berry I. I can’t afford to invite trouble, babe, she said. I’m all alone here. I reached under the white blinds of her apartment windows to do as she wished. Two blue and silver Stars of David made of tinsel, her holiday decoration I’d just hung to help cheer her. My mom’s birthday, a year and a half since her death. We’d been mourning together all afternoon.

I reached for the first star and paused. She let out a shaky breath.

Well, maybe one on my front door in a few more weeks, facing the hallway, she said. But nothing pointing out at the street.

I nodded. She was 94 years old, her family had escaped the pogroms in Russia, came to this country speaking only Yiddish, her daughter was gone and I could not be here every day.

What did I have to say to her about survival?

I reached under the blinds and pulled the star down.

All the bigots I’d faced in my life, the penny jokes, Jew bitch kike comments at kegs, rugby team singing at the top of their drunk lungs how Jesus can’t play rugby cause the Jews won’t pay his dues and I shrunk into my seat on the yellow school bus—all of them leered. Even as I’ve been working on standing up ever since, teaching young people to do the same, I reached under the blinds and took down the other star.

II. I sat down next to my Bubby on the couch. I took her hand and held it.

In that moment, all the people who’ve lived in fear for decades, centuries, who’ve come out anyway or haven’t, who’ve been beaten and gotten back up, or not, who’ve had to leave and cannot come back—I felt all of them sitting next to me. And nodding.

III. We may never be able to fully count all we have lost and are losing in this next great plummet.

We may never learn to navigate beneath the marred constellations of our one night sky.

We may not survive the next four years, or forty.

But it’s a story as old as any, setting courses for ships you thought you’d long retired, or have yet to build. Using old new compasses. Learning old new syntaxes.

Standing with.

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CAYETANA AT THE FIRST UNITARIAN CHURCH Alexandra Vargas

I came here to discard a woman inconvenient found I was inconvenient so long as I was a woman, a ghost I appear in the crowd sweat shaken to tell the band I won’t do it tell them I won’t make it easy the many gendered mothers of my heart sing for me scream for me our selves still smoldering so when I step back I melt into the men leaving

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SONG FOR A DARK GIRL Husnaa Hashim

Trigger Warning: suicide “Way Down South in Dixie (Break the heart of me) They hung my black young lover To a crossroads tree.

Way Down South in Dixie (Bruised body high in air) I asked the white Lord Jesus What was the use of prayer.

Way Down South in Dixie (Break the heart of me) Love is a naked shadow On a gnarled and naked tree.”

—Langston Hughes Malikah drags her bedsheet, climbs on tabletop, and laces the sheet around a hanging pipe The other end tied around her neck I scream.

Hope is the song resilience sings to a mother, as the graveyard acquires another soul Hope is peace.

Hope is morphing ashes into dirt, and planting a seed in them Hope is watching as the seedling turns into a tree, bearing strange fruits for consumption Hope is untying the noose from the one who hung herself on that tree Hope is screaming before it is too late Hope is screaming after it is too late and still believing that you will save her In this poem when I say “it will get better” I really mean I love you I really mean, just wait until tomorrow morning: Go home and shower, drink turmeric tea, take your meds, light incense and caress rose quartz.

Wash the face mask off then tell me how you really feel Hope is believing that things will get better Hope is here, filling every gap. Springing back to closed. Ready for tomorrow I saw it - bedsheet shapeshift into trampoline. Catching her as she falls My hope is that my screams are not hollow at all.

Hope is having faith in a god who does not look like you And expecting that you will be heard.

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Every year, one outstanding poet in our city is named the next Youth Poet Laureate of Philadelphia. This distinction is awarded to a youth poet whose work shines on the page and in the community at large, demonstrating excellence not only in their written craft, but in their capacity to wield that craft as a tool for leadership, connection, and positive social change. This year, our 2017 Youth Poet Laureate is Husnaa Hashim. We are honored that Husnaa’s poem “Song For a Dark Girl” found a home in APIARY 9, and we can’t wait to follow her work in this well-deserved new role. Get to know Husnaa better in our brief interview below!

APIARY: Congratulations on your new appointment to Youth Poet Laureate! We heard the Poet Laureate program recently moved its headquarters to the Free Library. Imagine you could create a display to go up at every library branch in the city, right at the entrance – the first thing readers of all ages see when they walk in to the building. The display would introduce Philadelphians to five poets, one book each.

Which books do you choose?

HUSNAA: Thank you!! it’s an incredible honor.

Having the program at the Free Library allows for fluidity and community engagement on a larger scale. If I could create a poetry display to go up in every library throughout Philadelphia geared towards all ages, I would choose to amplify the voices of Black womxn by including: “The Collected Poems of Audre Lorde” by Audre Lorde, “Brown Girl Dreaming” by Jacqueline Woodson, “Monk Eats an Afro” by Yolanda Wisher, “Citizen: An American Lyric” by Claudia Rankine, and “The January Children” by Safia Elhillo.

A: Besides being at home by yourself, is there a place or a person in this city you seek out as a safe haven or sanctuary? Has that place or person had an effect on your voice as a poet?

H: A place I seek sanctuary in is the library. Any library - right now the CCP** and Wynnefield libraries to be specific. My whole life I have always been able to make a home out of being surrounded by words, and quiet time for introspection. My voice as a poet has been influenced by libraries due to the fact of physically being surrounded by words, and having the privilege of invoking the wisdom and knowledge of my WOC-writerfighter-unapologetic-ancestors.

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A: Your feature in the Inquirer mentions that you grew up home-schooled, and it was partly through finding online poetry communities and befriending writers on the internet that you started to realize you could be a writer, too. You’ve had support at home, school and PYPM* as you pursued poetry as well. What words would you offer a young writer who doesn’t have those voices of support – someone who writes privately and is afraid to share their work, or is unsure how to start submitting and performing their work?

H: I definitely have had a lot of support with my writing career. I would advise a young writer who doesn’t have that support to write EVERY DAY in the same notebook. Make it a habit. It can be a single line, a full page journal entry, etc. as long as you’re making it a part of who you are, stepping back, and utilizing this time for self-actualization.

Writing isn’t separate from everyday living, so when you create time for writing you are creating time to live authentically. Personally, I wouldn’t consider myself to be confident. I have gained the courage to submit and perform my work by writing regularly and actually just DOING IT. If you don’t submit to that anthology, if you don’t arrive to the slam early and register for that open mic, guess what? it’s not going to happen. And you’re not going to make it big because you’re not allowing yourself the right to make mistakes, and fail, and cry about it. After the tears dry up and its become a habit, you have the opportunity to try again and grow. *PYPM: Philadelphia Youth Poetry Movement **CCP: Community College of Philadelphia

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NO MISSED CALLS Tyra Jamison

“I’ll tell you what freedom is to me; No fear! I mean, really, no fear! If I could have that [for] half my life... no fear...” —Nina Simone It’s a school night. My homework is spread out on my bed, where I’m curled up under the blue flowers of my comforter. My room is decorated in shades of blue; oceanic cobalt covering one wall, a sky blue washing over another, and a large blue carpet with blue floral details stretching under my bed onto the dark brown floor. My room’s blues wash peace over me. When painting it, I felt ready to recline in baptismal limbo; a space of my own.

“Something about a kid tinkering with an escalator in the T Station, it doesn’t matter. They’re supposed to be trained to deal with that without hurting people” I say.

“You’re right, they are” my mom replies, pausing for a quiet moment between us. A subtle understanding. “Look young Sista Soulja, you should know I appreciate the little fighter spirit you got for your people. It’s put a strong mind in your head.”

I smile. “Sista Soulja” is one of the many playful nicknames my mother has granted me whenever I bring up anything in the social justice vein. The “...and you wouldn’t believe how they were acting.

Shouting, hitting nightsticks on mailboxes and light nickname often rings hollow to me, like some oversized Timbs my mom promised I’d grow into poles! Three men piling up on top of one kid about after a couple winters. my size!” I’m on the phone with my mother.

“That kid in the yellow sweater?” she asks.

“Yes, and mind you, these guys were fully armed.

I’m talking nightsticks, Tasers, guns, bulletproof vest, the whole nine,” I say.

My earliest memories with my mother are her eyes, large, dark, and stunning as New Moons, locking with mine when she tells me to keep my classmates’ hands out of my hair. I remember being my friend’s first grade cosmetology experiment one recess (she was undoubtedly practicing the braiding techniques used on her own head that weekend prior), and as a result, I came home with loosened plaits. In one impromptu midweek re- plaiting session, with yanking, parting, and a very close brush-up with the hot comb, mother teaches me that God created personal space to guard against enemies. She teaches me I don’t have to fear my own space.

At seventeen years old, I’m still unlearning the world’s doctrine of fear.

“But why were there so many police there in the first place, what started it all?” my mother asks, “Think about this with some common sense.”

I’ve spent too much common sense rushing past the canine cars patrolling downtown Pittsburgh.

I’ve spent common sense witnessing kids twisted up against storefronts for standing at their bus stop. I’ve spent common sense watching men with badges tackle children like a high school bully would. I’ve spent common sense biting my tongue, and I’m tired.

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“It just means you and Dad raised me right.” I say.

“I’m not trying to come off bitter or anything— “ “But you ever listen to how hard you talk sometimes?”

“What do you mean?” I say.

“You make these blanket statements about police,” my mother says, “How’s that any better than how they talk about us?”

“I only talk what I feel, Mom. I can’t sugarcoat that—” “Hey, I’m about to stop for gas, I’ll talk to you when I get home,” she says, “A cop’s parked here.”

“Please, just call me back.” It comes out of me like a cub’s whimper, a desperate plea. Not like the girl with a strong will and strong words about her. Not like a co-president of her school’s Black Student Union. Not like the girl who joins conference calls with a national network of student activists.

It comes out of me like the truth; that I’m scared.

“Okay,” she hangs up and I’m sitting alone in my blue room. The threat of death has a way of making the world shrink. It caps “see-you-later” with “be safe,” and can define the feeling of “disempowered.”

My room feels smaller.

A quiet moment rings with the fear that I am working to unlearn.

I grab a journal from the end of my bed and begin writing. If I can think about what I’m scribbling, then I can’t let my mind wander to the worst. I turn my music up as loud as my phone allows. If I don’t let it get too quiet, then I can’t mentally replay the incidents of assault from this week. Or last week.

Or the week before that. I start drafting plans and networks and examples of student action. If I can catalogue and control what’s in my room, then maybe it could extend out to the world. Try to breathe in the shades of blue, try to feel that peace wash through me. Perhaps the world where cops can snatch up me and my loved ones within their sadistic will could be dismantled.

As long as I’m not the only one working to get free.

A cop’s parked here.

I’m seeing Sandra Bland’s mug shot, cheekbones poking out of a face without a pulse.

A cop’s parked here.

I’m watching four of them downtown, pushing fourteen year olds around, wielding spite like nightsticks.

A cop’s parked here.

I’m eight years old again; sinking into silent panic after learning why Emmett Till’s baby face was beat to white meat.

A cop’s parked here...

“Mom, call me back when you’re done,” I say flatly.

“What you want me calling back for—” she starts.

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HIS NAME IS CORRUPTION, SAY HIS NAME

THEY TAUGHT US IN SCHOOL TO SING OF THE HUDDLED MASSES

So far away was he that he could have been replaced by a stand-in but no one would notice from this distance.

His wife too was a vision.

At least she did us some good.

I look back to his balding head of silvery hair I wonder how we let ourselves become so hopeless cursed.

I am forced to raise my colourful flags again then, dance as if it is alright.

It is not.

People suffer in the streets, dead people lay under sheets in his name that he chose to carry chose to bear yet he cares for none of it.

He splurges on all our misery, he cares not for the inclined minds.

My eyes crawl to meet the woman once again as I'm seated in the hopes she will see to it that we do not go unheard, for it is too late for us to go untouched.

And now we’re an odd and tuneless lot, crowded and waiting for a bus, or maybe some crazy ride at a run-down amusement park, tickets clutched in sweaty hands. It’s cold but we’re somewhere south. Or is it east?

Everyone’s trying to avoid eye contact or preserve their personal space or keep the children hushed.

None of it’s working. We’re over-warm.

Our coats smell of stale grease and coffee.

Someone in back lights up a cigarette, or maybe it’s smoke from a cross burning long ago. Or yesterday. A hazy stench first rises, then settles heavier than guilt.

A few people cough, and now someone hands to me a baby, swaddled and so small I know she’s starving, maybe even dying, and without a thought I lift my shirt, uncup my breast like a dove before her mouth.

My pale nipple has not nursed a child in twenty years. The body knows.

The baby latches on, weakly at first, then stronger, her nose so close to my flesh I worry about her every breath.

She suckles and the milk aches its way from deep within. I imagine it thick and gritty, but the body knows. Little as I have, it will be enough.

Komal Keshran

Kory Wells

Dark strangers. I know her parents when they come. I hand her over with a small, soft block of something white.

Maybe it’s goat cheese, or a too-obvious metaphor for grace, or manna in new convenient packaging.

Or maybe it’s an eraser, the kind draftsmen use to fix an error, leave fragile paper clean.

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ROMEO AND JULIET ERASURE Lauren Howton Scene V. Capulet’s orchard.

Enter Juliet.

Jul. The clock struck nine when I did send the nurse; In half an hour she ‘promis’d to return.

Perchance she cannot meet him. That’s not so.

O, she is lame! Love’s heralds should be thoughts, Which ten times faster glide than the sun’s beams Driving back shadows over low’ring hills.

Therefore do nimble-pinion’d doves draw Love, And therefore hath the wind-swift Cupid wings.

Now is the sun upon the highmost hill Of this day’s journey, and from nine till twelve Is three long hours; yet she is not come.

Had she affections and warm youthful blood, She would be as swift in motion as a ball; My words would bandy her to my sweet love, And his to me, But old folks, many feign as they were deadUnwieldy, slow, heavy and pale as lead.

Enter Nurse [and Peter].

God, she comes! O honey nurse, what news?

O Hast thou met with him? Send thy man away.

Nurse. Peter, stay at the gate.

[Exit Peter.]

Jul. Now, good sweet nurse- O Lord, why look’st thou sad?

Though news be sad, yet tell them merrily; If good, thou shamest the music of sweet news By playing it to me with so sour a face.

Nurse. I am aweary, give me leave awhile.

Fie, how my bones ache! What a jaunce have I had!

Jul. I would thou hadst my bones, and I thy news.

Nay, come, I pray thee speak. Good, good nurse, speak.

Nurse. Jesu, what haste! Can you not stay awhile?

Do you not see that I am out of breath?

Jul. How art thou out of breath when thou hast breath To say to me that thou art out of breath?

Or shut me nightly in a charnel house, O’ercover’d quite with dead men’s rattling bones, With reeky shanks and yellow chapless skulls; Or bid me go into a new-made grave And hide me with a dead man in his shroudThings that, to hear them told, have made me trembleAnd I will do it without fear or doubt, To live an unstain’d wife to my sweet love.

Friar. Hold, then. Go home, be merry, give consent To marry Paris. Wednesday is to-morrow.

To-morrow night look that thou lie alone; 34

Let not the nurse lie with thee in thy chamber.

Take thou this vial, being then in bed, And this distilled liquor drink thou off; When presently through all thy veins shall run A cold and drowsy humour; for no pulse Shall keep his native progress, but surcease; No warmth, no breath, shall testify thou livest; The roses in thy lips and cheeks shall fade To paly ashes, thy eyes’ windows fall Like death when he shuts up the day of life; Each part, depriv’d of supple government, Shall, stiff and stark and cold, appear like death; And in this borrowed likeness of shrunk death Thou shalt continue two-and-forty hours, And then awake as from a pleasant sleep.

Now, when the bridegroom in the morning comes To rouse thee from thy bed, there art thou dead.

Then, as the manner of our country is, In thy best robes uncovered on the bier Thou shalt be borne to that same ancient vault Where all the kindred of the Capulets lie.

In the mean time, against thou shalt awake, Shall Romeo by my letters know our drift; And hither shall he come; and he and I Will watch thy waking, and that very night Shall Romeo bear thee hence to Mantua.

And this shall free thee from this present shame, If no inconstant toy nor womanish fear Abate thy valour in the acting it.

Then gave I her (so tutored by my art A sleeping potion; which so took effect As I intended, for it wrought on her The form of death. Meantime I writ to Romeo That he should hither come as this dire night To help to take her from her borrowed grave, Being the time the potion’s force should cease.

But he which bore my letter, Friar John, Was stay’d by accident, and yesternight Return’d my letter back. Then all alone At the prefixed hour of her waking Came I to take her from her kindred’s vault; Meaning to keep her closely at my cell Till I conveniently could send to Romeo.

But when I came, some minute ere the time Of her awaking, here untimely lay The noble Paris and true Romeo dead.

She wakes; and I entreated her come forth And bear this work of heaven with patience; But then a noise did scare me from the tomb, And she, too desperate, would not go with me, But, as it seems, did violence on herself.

All this I know, and to the marriage Her nurse is privy; and if aught in this Miscarried by my fault, let my old life Be sacrific’d, some hour before his time, Unto the rigour of severest law.

Jul. Give me, give me! O, tell not me of fear!

Friar. Hold! Get you gone, be strong and prosperous In this resolve. I’ll send a friar with speed To Mantua, with my letters to thy lord.

Doth make against me, of this direful murther; And here I stand, both to impeach and purge Myself condemned and myself excus’d.

Prince. Then say it once what thou dost know in this.

Friar. I will be brief, for my short date of breath Is not so long as is a tedious tale.

Romeo, there dead, was husband to that Juliet; And she, there dead, that Romeo’s faithful wife.

I married them; and their stol’n marriage day Was Tybalt’s doomsday, whose untimely death Banish’d the new-made bridegroom from this city; For whom, and not for Tybalt, Juliet pin’d.

You, to remove that siege of grief from her, Betroth’d and would have married her perforce To County Paris. Then comes she to me And with wild looks bid me devise some mean To rid her from this second marriage, Or in my cell there would she kill herself.

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AN INTERVIEW WITH NEW SANCTUARY MOVEMENT Interviewed by Steven Burns Translated by Erlina Ortiz

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Gerardo and Teresa Flores offer me and Blanca Pacheco big glasses of horchata in their West Kensington kitchen. A crucifix and a collection of family photos decorate the walls.

When Blanca, Gerardo, and Teresa meet they instantly embrace each other. It’s the kind of love shared only between people who have overcome great obstacles together.

APIARY: What has the NSM taught you about connecting with the immigrant community on the local level?

Blanca is the Assistant Director of the New Sanctuary Movement (NSM), an interfaith multicultural justice movement that works to foster community and radical hospitality for all immigrants regardless of faith, ethnicity, or class. Gerardo and Teresa moved to Philadelphia after leaving New York City in 2001 and are two of NSM’s foundational members.

With Gerardo and Teresa by her side, Blanca has been fighting for immigrant justice in Philadelphia since 2007.

Their most recent accomplishment is breaking the ties between Philadelphia Police and ICE agents, who have separated thousands of families through mass deportation.

APIARY: What do you think has been your greatest achievements working with NSM? Was it working with a specific person, a piece of legislation, or something else?

NSM’s work, however, is not just about immigrant justice. It is about educating and empowering immigrant communities, promoting economic opportunity, and, most importantly, humanizing your neighbor. Thank you to Gerardo, Teresa, and Blanca for conducting this interview with APIARY Magazine. Thank you to NSM’s Director, Peter Pedemonti, for bringing us all together.

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Gerardo: Because NSM is a faith-based organization, we always talk with people based on faith. We learned that that was how most people communicate with us. The people do this work and are engaged willingly; they're not forced or pushed to it. It's a calling for them.

Teresa: One of the things it has taught us and that we have learned is to value ourselves as human beings. It has taught us to not be afraid and learn how to serve and connect with the community.

Teresa: The biggest accomplishment we had, working together, was ending the collaboration between Philadelphia’s Police and ICE. It was a long, hard campaign. We learned that no matter what was happening we had to fight with strength, no matter what was happening.

APIARY: What was that process like, disbanding that relationship?

Gerardo: It was sharing a lot of testimonies. When we told our stories to politicians who created the legislation we showed how it was wrong and would affect people. It was also a way to say that for politicians to understand us, they need to place themselves in our shoes. We did a lot of work building leadership in our congregations and that helped us strengthen our push and convince the mayor to understand the level of support and that the people we were engaging were people who are able to vote. The politicians have their ambitions.

They need to think about that, the next position they want to be in, and how our vote effects that.

APIARY: What is a Sanctuary City to you?

Is Philadelphia a successful model for what a Sanctuary City should be?

Teresa: There are different leaders and organizations who are doing the work to push politicians. Some politicians like our mayor have been helping and showing support. I don't think it's a perfect model, but the work has begun between the combination of people organizing leaders, congregations and politicians. One thing the government doesn't see is all the immigrants in the country; cities should become sanctuaries, all of them. The government doesn't see that they need to serve the communities that are in need. The vision of NSM as an organization is also bigger.

Blanca: We are organizing, educating, and engaging as many people as possible. Our vision is that people who live in the city who are not only immigrants but people of color and people who are poor see their needs fulfilled. What are those needs? It could be immigration status, it could be housing, it could be economic, it could be growth and opportunity for work. People are not only seen as someone who produces money, but someone

How do we humanize everyone? How do we share resources with everyone and not stay in this world of capitalism and work towards a vision where everyone in the city has their needs fulfilled? who can contribute and work together to create change. How do we humanize everyone? How do we share resources with everyone and not stay in this world of capitalism and work towards a vision where everyone in the city has their needs fulfilled? There is potential if organizations come together and build a message of, "What can we gain for everyone?" There is enough space, there is enough resources. We need to come from a place of abundance instead of a place of scarcity and working together to fulfill that. The city has so many abandoned properties, so many people struggling to make ends meet. How can those homes be abandoned when someone is sleeping on the street? That's not coming from a place of abundance. That's coming from a place of production and capitalism and self-interest.

APIARY: When Trump says, "America first," who is he leaving behind when he says that? How do you convince supporters of him, or that idea, that Sanctuary Cities are something that should exist?

That immigration is not a threat to the American way or lifestyle?

Blanca's summary of Gerardo: Whenever someone

asks a person who was born in the US, "Where are you from?" they say, "I am American." Gerardo might say, "I am Mexican, but I am American too and I might be more American than you. I am part of America because America is a continent.

Politicians who should be educated about this, are not.

Gerardo: We need to really think about the numbers. We have to think about production.

We have to think about how much someone in agriculture produces; how much people in hotels contribute. That's part of building the country. The politicians are not thinking about that. They're only thinking about money and how much they can put in their pockets. They're not thinking about people.

APIARY: Could you talk about your experience with NSM and how you got involved?

Blanca: Personally, one of the experiences I have gotten from working in NSM and working with many allies and different people from different countries with different beliefs and supporting different politicians, I think it's really hard to convince Trump supporters that we are here, that we are human beings. As we were saying, we come from a place of abundance and immigration is part of humanity. This is a personal transformation; people need to make that choice, instead of us trying to convince those people who hate us.

We need to work with the people who already understand and already like us. I don't know if a person is willing to be transformed and can support other human beings if they don't have feelings of love for immigrants. I feel like it's a waste of time trying to convince them. For us, we've been building on the people who support us and building the movement long-term because this is not something that we're going to win in one year or two years. We need to be doing the work, setting the example, with really rooted values. We need to show what we're working towards. We need to show, step by step, what community we envision.

I've been engaged with NSM since the beginning, since 2007. I engaged as a volunteer first and for a couple years I was doing Know Your Rights with different congregations because the collaboration between police and immigration was happening.

People were afraid. I was doing workshops.

Afterwards, I was on the board and five years ago I joined the staff.

APIARY: What is your official role right now?

Blanca: I am the Assistant Director and my role is to work together with the Director in doing some fundraising, but also helping to shape the vision and carrying that vision and making sure that lives

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in every step of the work we are doing. I also make sure we aim that vision and make sure the voices of immigrants and affected people are involved. We have to make sure we're responding to the needs of the immigrant community.

APIARY: How many members does the NSM have right now?

Blanca: We have congregations of different sizes.

We have 25 congregations and their visitation has 3,000 people; the other congregations vary from 300 to 500. I don't have a total number. We have congregations who are Catholic, Baptist, Presbyterian, and Jewish.

APIARY: Where are most immigrants from?

Blanca: Most are Latin American. We have a big population from Indonesia. We also have, in the last year or two, a lot of people from the Middle East. Also Haitian and African communities.

[W]e come from a place of abundance and immigration is part of humanity. This is a personal transformation; people need to make that choice, instead of us trying to convince those people who hate us.

APIARY: What do you think is the biggest challenge for NSM right now?

other, how we're building a different culture, and finding a new way of life.

Gerardo: One of the challenges we have now is that people are being affected whenever they're driving, they can be stopped and have their cars taken away. What we're finding out is the companies who are towing cars make a lot of money off of other people's backs, off of poor people. It’s a program called Live Stop. That's a challenge for us and one we're trying to win as a campaign. What we're asking is for the Mayor to give us 30 minutes to call someone with a driver's license, so instead of towing the car to a city property someone can come pick up the car and take it to our homes. The city is making about $7,000,000 off of this program, a program that is affecting poor people. We are sure we are going to win because have had challenges before and we have faith.

APIARY: How does the NSM work within the legal process?

Blanca: One of the challenges is also building capacity to respond to all the newly activated people. How do we build capacity to respond to that? For example, the DACA situation. There are a lot of allies who want to help. There are a lot of young people who are saying 'What do we do?

How do we do the work?' The challenge for us is how do we build those spaces and how do we build those spaces effectively to be able to get more work done? We have to make sure we're carrying our mission and vision and keeping focused on the long term. It's a challenge that requires time and resources and focus. Our vision isn't necessarily, "We're going to get immigration reform" and be done or "We're going to get a work permit" and we're done. It's actually changing what the community looks like and how people treat each

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and perhaps support others. With other cases, we have relationships with many organizations in the city that we refer them to or facilitate the communication if that person speaks Spanish or another language.

APIARY: {to Blanca) How did Gerardo and Teresa discover NSM? Teresa: They discovered us.

Learn more about New Sanctuary Movement and how to get involved at sanctuaryphiladelphia.org.

Blanca: We have an accompaniment program.

There's a lot of people who have different needs.

It could be immigration related, it could housing related, it could be salary related. We have a big network of lawyers that we connect with. We don't hire lawyers. We don't have resources to have our own lawyers. That's not who we are. We have connections with different lawyers around the city.

We know they're credible; sometimes they take cases pro-bono or sometimes they will provide monthly payments when it's difficult to pay. We meet with the family, assess their needs, connect them with a lawyer and guide them in that process.

They have a court hearing; we mobilize about 200 people to go to court with them. The process of going to court with them is not to protest, it's not to scream at the court or scream at the judge, it's more to stay there and witness what's happening and show support and show the court that we're watching. It has done different things. Many cases where we go and the judge is watching, when one person leaves the courtroom twenty more people are standing up with them. It's really, really powerful. It makes people feel supported. That is also for lawyers to be accountable to their clients.

We see fraud happen. In a space that is violent, in a space that is destroying families, we show that we're watching and support the family. At the end of the day we do what the family needs.

Outside of the court, we're guiding the next steps, what they need support with, and empowering them to move forward and learn by themselves

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UNA ENTREVISTA CON NEW SANCTUARY MOVEMENT Entrevistado por Steven Burns Traducido por Erlina Ortiz

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Gerardo y Teresa Flores ofrecen a mi y Blanca Pacheco grandes vasos de horchata en su cocina de West Kensington. Un crucifijo y una colección de fotos de la familia decorar las paredes. Cuando Blanca, Gerardo y Teresa se encuentran, se abrazan instantamente. Es el tipo de amor compartido sólo entre las personas que han superado grandes obstáculos juntos.

APIARY: ¿Qué le ha enseñado NSM sobre la conexión con la comunidad inmigrante localmente?

Blanca es Directora Asistente del Movimiento Nuevo Santuario (New Sanctuary Movement, NSM), un movimiento interreligioso de justicia multicultural que trabaja para fomentar la hospitalidad comunitaria y radical para todos los inmigrantes sin importar fe, etnia o clase. Gerardo y Teresa se trasladaron a Filadelfia después de salir de Nueva York en 2001 y son dos de los miembros fundadores de NSM. Con Gerardo y Teresa a su lado, Blanca ha estado luchando por la justicia de inmigrantes en Filadelfia desde 2007. Sus logró más reciente es romper los lazos entre la Policía de Filadelfia y los agentes de ICE, que han separado a miles de familias a través de la deportación masiva.

APIARY: ¿Cuáles crees que han sido tus mayores logros trabajando con NSM? ¿Trabajaba con una persona específica, una legislación, o algo más?

El trabajo de NSM, sin embargo, no se trata sólo de justicia inmigratoria.

Se trata de educar y empoderar a las comunidades de inmigrantes, promover oportunidades económicas y, lo que es más importante, humanizar a su vecino. Gracias a Gerardo, Teresa, y Blanca por participar en esta entrevista con APIARY Magazine.

Gracias al Director de NSM, Peter Pedemonti, por reunirnos a todos.

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Gerardo: Porque NSM es una organización basada en la fe, siempre hablamos con la gente desde esa posición. Aprendimos que era la manera que la mayoría de la gente comunica con nosotros. Las personas hacen este trabajo y se comprometen voluntariamente; no son forzados o empujados a ella. Es una llamada a ellos.

Teresa: Una de las cosas que nos ha enseñado y que hemos aprendido es valorarnos como seres humanos. Nos ha enseñado a no tener miedo y aprender a ser capaz de servir y conectarse con la comunidad.

Teresa: El mayor logro que tuvimos, trabajando juntos, fue poner fin a la colaboración entre la Policía de Filadelfia y el ICE. Fue una campaña larga y dura. Aprendimos que no importaba lo que estuviera sucediendo, teníamos que luchar con fuerza.

APIARY: ¿Cómo fue ese proceso, disolviendo esa relación?

Gerardo: Compartiendo muchísimos testimonios.

Cuando contamos nuestras historias a los políticos que crearon la legislación, mostramos lo equivocados que eran y cómo afectarían a las personas. Era también una manera de decir que para que los políticos nos entiendan, necesitan ponerse en nuestros zapatos. Hicimos mucho trabajo construyendo liderazgo en nuestras congregaciones y eso nos ayudó a fortalecer nuestro empuje y convencer al alcalde a entender el nivel de apoyo y que la gente que estaba participando eran personas que podían votar. Los políticos tienen sus ambiciones. Necesitan pensar en eso; en la siguiente posición en la que quieren estar, y en cómo nuestro voto afecta eso.

APIARY: ¿Qué es una Ciudad Santuario para usted y es Filadelfia un modelo exitoso para lo que debe ser una Ciudad Santuario?

Teresa: Hay diferentes líderes y organizaciones que están haciendo el trabajo para empujar a los políticos. Algunos políticos como nuestro alcalde han estado ayudando y mostrando apoyo. No creo que sea un modelo perfecto, pero el trabajo ha comenzado entre la combinación de personas que organizan líderes, congregaciones, y políticos. Una cosa que el gobierno no ve es todos los inmigrantes en el país; las ciudades deben convertirse en

santuarios, todos ellos. El gobierno no ve que necesitan servir a las comunidades que están en necesidad. La visión de NSM como organización también es más grande.

pueden abandonar esas casas cuando alguien está durmiendo en la calle? Eso no viene de un lugar de abundancia. Eso viene de un lugar de producción y capitalismo y de intereses propios.

Blanca: Estamos organizando, educando y colaborando a tantas personas como sea posible. Nuestra visión es que las personas que viven en la ciudad que no son sólo inmigrantes, sino personas de color y personas que son

APIARY: Cuando Trump dice, “América primero”, ¿quién el está dejando atrás cuando dice eso? ¿Cómo podemos convencer a los partidarios de él, o esa idea, de que las Ciudades Sanctuarias son algo que debería existir? ¿Que la inmigración no es una amenaza para el estilo de vida estadounidense?

¿Cómo humanizamos a todos? ¿Cómo compartimos recursos con todos y permanecemos en este mundo del capitalismo y trabajamos hacia una visión donde todos en la ciudad tienen sus necesidades satisfechas? pobres, ven sus necesidades cumplidas. ¿Cuáles son esas necesidades? Podría ser el estatus migratorio, podría ser la alojamiento, podría ser económicamente, podría ser el crecimiento y la oportunidad de trabajo. La gente no sólo está viendo a alguien que produce dinero, sino que alguien puede contribuir y trabajar juntos para crear un cambio.¿Cómo humanizamos a todos? ¿Cómo compartimos recursos con todos y permanecemos en este mundo del capitalismo y trabajamos hacia una visión donde todos en la ciudad tienen sus necesidades satisfechas?

Hay potencial si las organizaciones se unen y construyen un mensaje de, “¿Qué podemos ganar para todos?” Hay suficiente espacio, suficientes recursos. Necesitamos venir de un lugar de abundancia en vez de escasez y trabajar juntos para cumplir con eso. La ciudad tiene tantas propiedades abandonadas, tanta gente luchando para llegar a fin de mes. ¿Cómo se

Blanca: (traducido de Gerardo) Cada vez que alguien pregunta a una persona que nació en los EE.UU., “¿De dónde eres?” Ellos dicen: “Soy Americano”. Gerardo podría decir: “Soy Mexicano, pero soy Americano y podría ser más americano que tú, soy parte de América porque América es un continente, y los políticos que deben ser educados sobre esto no lo son.

Gerardo: Tenemos que pensar realmente en los números. Tenemos que pensar en la producción.

Tenemos que pensar en lo que produce alguien en la agricultura; cuánto contribuyen las personas en los hoteles. Eso es parte de la construcción del país.

Los políticos no están pensando en eso. Sólo están pensando en dinero y cuánto pueden poner en sus bolsillos. No están pensando en la gente.

APIARY: ¿Podría hablar sobre su experiencia con NSM y cómo se involucró?

Blanca: Personalmente, una de las experiencias que he conseguido de trabajar en NSM y trabajar con muchos aliados y diferentes personas de diferentes países con creencias diferentes y apoyar a diferentes políticos, creo que es realmente difícil convencer a los partidarios de Trump de que estamos aquí, de que somos humanos. Como decíamos, venimos de un lugar de abundancia y la inmigración es parte de la humanidad. Esta es una transformación personal; la gente necesita hacer esa elección, en lugar de tratar de convencer a las personas que nos odian. Tenemos que trabajar con las personas que ya entienden y ya nos gustan. No sé si una persona está dispuesta a ser transformada y puede apoyar a otros seres humanos si no tienen sentimientos de amor por los inmigrantes.

Siento que es una pérdida de tiempo tratando de convencerlos. Para nosotros, hemos estado construyendo sobre las personas que nos apoyan y construyendo el movimiento a largo plazo porque esto no es algo que vamos a ganar en un año o dos años. Tenemos que estar haciendo el trabajo, dando el ejemplo, con valores realmente arraigados.

Tenemos que mostrar a lo que estamos trabajando.

Necesitamos mostrar, paso a paso, qué comunidad imaginamos.

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Me he comprometido con NSM desde el principio, desde 2007. Me contraté como voluntario primero y durante un par de años estuve haciendo Know Your Rights con diferentes congregaciones porque la colaboración entre la policía y la inmigración estaba sucediendo. La gente tenía miedo. Estaba haciendo talleres. Después, yo estaba en el tablero y hace cinco años me uní como personal.

APIARY: ¿Cuál es su papel oficial ahora?

BLANCA: Yo soy el Subdirector y mi papel es trabajar junto con el Director en la recaudación de fondos, pero también ayudar a formar la visión y llevar esa visión y asegurarse de que vivo en cada paso del trabajo que estamos haciendo.

También aseguró que enfocamos esa visión y nos aseguramos de que las voces de los inmigrantes y las personas afectadas estén involucradas.

Tenemos que asegurarnos de que estamos respondiendo a las necesidades de la comunidad de inmigrantes.

APIARY: ¿Cuántos miembros tiene el NSM ahora mismo?

Blanca: Tenemos congregaciones de diferentes tamaños. Tenemos 25 congregaciones y su visitación tiene 3,000 personas; las otras congregaciones varían de 300 a 500. Yo no tengo un número total. Tenemos congregaciones que son católicas, bautistas, presbiterianas y judías.

APIARY: ¿De dónde provienen la mayoría de los inmigrantes?

Blanca: La mayoría son latinoamericanos.

Tenemos una gran población de Indonesia.

También tenemos, en el último año o dos, mucha gente de Oriente Medio. También comunidades haitianas y africanas.

APIARY: ¿Cuál crees que es el mayor desafío para NSM en este momento?

Gerardo: Uno de los desafíos que tenemos ahora es que las personas estan parados cada vez que están conduciendo, que pueden ser detenidos y tener sus coches quitados. Lo que estamos descubriendo es que las empresas que están remolcando los carros ganan mucho dinero de las espaldas de otras personas, de la gente pobre. Es un programa llamado Live Stop. Ese es un desafío para nosotros y uno que estamos tratando de ganar como una campaña. Lo que estamos pidiendo es que el alcalde nos dé 30 minutos para llamar a alguien con una licencia de conducir en lugar de remolcar el coche a una propiedad de la ciudad que alguien puede venir a recoger el coche y llevarlo a nuestras casas. La ciudad está haciendo $ 7,000,000 fuera de este programa, un programa

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[V]enimos de un lugar de abundancia y la inmigración es parte de la humanidad. Esta es una transformación personal; la gente necesita hacer esa elección, en lugar de tratar de convencer a las personas que nos odian. que está afectando a la gente pobre. Estamos seguros de que vamos a ganar porque hemos tenido retos antes y tenemos fe.

Blanca: Uno de los desafíos es también la creación de capacidad para responder a todas las personas recién activadas. ¿Cómo creamos capacidad para responder a eso? Por ejemplo, la situación DACA. Hay muchos aliados que quieren ayudar. Hay muchos jóvenes que dicen ‘¿Qué hacemos? ¿Cómo hacemos el trabajo? El reto para nosotros es cómo construir esos espacios y cómo construir esos espacios de manera efectiva para poder hacer más trabajo? Tenemos que asegurarnos de que estamos llevando a cabo nuestra misión y visión y mantenerse enfocado en el largo plazo.

Es un desafío que requiere tiempo y recursos y enfoque. Nuestra visión no es necesariamente, “vamos a conseguir la reforma de inmigración” y se hará o “Vamos a obtener un permiso de trabajo” y hemos terminado. En realidad está cambiando la apariencia de la comunidad y cómo se tratan unos a otros, cómo estamos construyendo una cultura diferente, y encontrar un nuevo estilo de vida.

propios abogados. Eso no es nosotros. Tenemos conexiones con diferentes abogados alrededor de la ciudad. Sabemos que son creíbles; a veces toman casos pro-bono oa veces proporcionan pagos mensuales cuando es difícil de pagar. Nos reunimos con la familia, evaluar sus necesidades, conectarlos con un abogado y guiarlos en ese proceso. Tienen audiencia en la corte; nos movilizamos de unas 200 personas para ir a la corte con ellos. El proceso de ir a la corte con ellos no es para protestar, no es para gritar en la corte o gritar al juez, es más para quedarse allí y ser testigo a lo que está sucediendo y mostrar apoyo y mostrar a la corte que estamos viendo. Hacemos cosas diferentes. Muchos casos en los que vamos y el juez está observando, cuando una persona sale de la sala de la corte veinte personas más están de pie con ellos. Es muy, muy poderoso. Hace que la gente se sienta apoyada. Eso también es para que los abogados sean responsables ante sus clientes. Vemos fraude ocurrir. En un espacio que es violento, en un espacio que está destruyendo familias, mostramos que estamos viendo y apoyando a la familia. Al final del día hacemos lo que la familia necesita. Fuera de la corte, estamos guiando los próximos pasos, con lo que necesitan apoyo y capacitándolos para avanzar y aprender por sí mismos y quizás apoyar a otros. Con otros casos, tenemos relaciones con muchas organizaciones en la ciudad a las que nos referimos o facilitamos la comunicación con si esa persona habla español o otro idioma.

APIARY: (A Blanca) ¿Cómo descubrieron Gerardo y Teresa a NSM? Teresa: Ellos nos descubrieron.

Learn more about New Sanctuary Movement and how to get involved at sanctuaryphiladelphia.org.

APIARY: ¿Cómo funciona el NSM dentro del proceso legal?

Blanca: Tenemos un programa de acompañamiento. Hay mucha gente que tiene diferentes necesidades. Podría estar relacionado con la inmigración, podría estar relacionado con la vivienda, podría estar relacionado con el salario.

Tenemos una gran red de abogados con los que nos relacionamos. No contratamos abogados.

No tenemos recursos para tener nuestros

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Sanctuary Directory

LGBTQ Services 8. Attic Youth Center 255 South 16th Street, Philadelphia, PA 19102 atticyouthcenter.org (215) 545-4331 info@atticyouthcenter.org • LGBTQ • Youth homelessness

9. William Way LGBT Community Center

1315 Spruce Street, Philadelphia, PA 19107 waygay40.org (215) 732-2220 info@waygay.org

Immigration Services 1. New Sanctuary Movement

2601 Potter Street, Philadelphia, PA 19125 sanctuaryphiladelphia.org (215) 279-7060 nsm@sanctuary philadelphia.org • Immigrant community advocacy • Sanctuary in the Streets • Know Your Rights trainings

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3. SEAMAAC

1711 South Broad Street, Philadelphia, PA 19148 seamaac.org (215) 467-0690 • Refugee community support • Health and social services • Youth education

4. Nationalities Services Center

2831 North Hutchinson Street, Philadelphia, PA 19133 facebook.com/pg/ lgbtqhomeforhope (215) 867-8885 • LGBTQ shelter • Recovery center

13. Rapid Testing Clinic/Washington West Project

• LGBTQ • Addiction services

1201 Locust Street, Philadelphia, PA 19107 mazzonicenter.org (215) 985-9206

10. Mazzoni Center

14. Morris Home

Main building: 21 South 12th Street, Floor 8, Philadelphia, PA 19107 Medical Center: 809 Locust Street, Philadelphia, PA 19107 mazzonicenter.org (215) 563-0658

phlassembled.net #phlassembled #sanctuary

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12. LGBTQ Home for Hope

• Health services • Trans health services • Support groups • Family and individual counseling

11. Galaei

149 West Susquehanna Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19122 galaei.org (267) 457-3912 info@galaei.org • Latinx LGBTQ • Queer Latinx youth • Trans health services • HIV prevention

5037 Woodland Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19143 rhd.org/morrishome (215) 729-3045 laura.sorensen@rhd.org • Comprehensive assessments • Individual and group therapy • Psycho-education and relapse prevention groups • Hormone therapy • Residential housing • Connections with community resources for medical care, behavioral healthcare, advocacy, and job placement • Community-based, integration-focused case management • Life skills, anger management, and restorative justice training • Linkages to adjunct educational, vocational, and recreational services • Peer support group

ices

v

r e S on

MentalServices Health / LGBTQ Healing Spaces 21. A-Space

4722 Baltimore Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19143 (215) 821-6877 phillyaspace@gmail.com • Mental health • Homeless services • Art sanctuary • Incarceration services

22. Studio 34

4522 Baltimore Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19143 studio34yoga.com (215) 387-3434 info@studio34yoga.com • Yoga • Health • Mental health

23. CORA Services 8540 Verree Road, Philadelphia, PA 19111 coraservices.com (215) 342-7660 info@coraservices.org

• Child and family services • Mental health • Substance intervention and treatment • Student assistance • Afterschool and summer programs

24. Ahimsa House

5007 Cedar Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19143 ahimsahousephilly.org (215) 488-7772 ahimsahouse philly@gmail.com

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theicarusproject.net info@theicarusproject.net

Harm Reduction / Addiction Services LGBTQ Services

• Mental health advocacy • Peer support

Medical Services

26. Women Organized Against Rape

Homeless Services/Shelters



1537 South 6th Street, Philadelphia, PA 19147 vamosjuntos.org (215) 218-9079 info@vamosjuntos.org

• Immigrant community advocacy • Know Your Rights trainings

1216 Arch Street, 4th Floor, Philadelphia, PA 19107 nscphila.org (215) 893-8400 help@nscphila.org • Interpretation and translation • Resettlement and integration • English classes • Mental and physical health support • Employment support • Advocacy and rights

15. Art Sanctuary

628 South 16th Street, Philadelphia, PA 19146 artsanctuary.org (215) 232-4485 info@artsanctuary.org

16. Fleisher

719 Catharine Street, Philadelphia, PA 19147

(215) 922-3456, ext. 300

5. Broad Street Ministry

315 South Broad Street, Philadelphia, PA 19107 broadstreetministry.org (215) 735-4847 info@broadstreetministry. org

• General medical services • Psychiatric/behavioral health • • HIV/AIDS testing and referrals • Legal services • Dental services

6. Project HOME

1515 Fairmount Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19130 projecthome.org (215) 232-7272 info@projecthome.org

• Subsidized housing • Adult learning and workforce development • Healthcare and recovery services

Sankey

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7. Lutheran Settlement House

1340 Frankford Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19125 lutheransettlement.org (215) 426-8610

• Medical advocacy counseling for victims of domestic violence • Bilingual domestic violence program collaborates with other domestic violence programs and the City to operate the Philadelphia Domestic Violence Hotline • Senior community-based services, classes, and daily meal • Adult education and career development • GED prep • Counseling and assistance for elder caregivers • Urban vegetable farm

• Community Partnerships in the Arts for public and afterschool programs • Tuition-free classes • Workshops • FAMbassadors grassroots arts outreach

17. Media Mobilizing Project

4534 Baltimore Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19143 mediamobilizing.org (215) 821-9632 info@mediamobilizing. org • Free consultations • MMP makers help tell stories with impact in video, photography, training, and communications strategy

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18. Girls Rock Philly

1428 Germantown Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19122 girlsrockphilly.org (215) 776-5246 info@girlsrockphilly.org • Girl’s music summer camp • Gear loan

• Weekend camp experience for women and trans adults • Music and feminism resource library

19. One Art Community Center

1431–39 North 52nd Street, Philadelphia, PA 19131 oneartcommunitycenter. com (267) 475-9130 oneartcommunitycenter@ gmail.com • Community engaged/ involved entertainment • One Art Beat (music studio, theater production, and media internships) • Education integrating arts into math, literacy, science, social studies, parenting

20. Village of the Arts and Humanities

2544 Germantown Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19133 villagearts.org (215) 225-7830 info@villagearts.org • People’s Paper Co-op • Free arts education for children • Arts-based community economic development (Germantown-Lehigh Commerical Corridor) • PhillyEarth urban farm and environmental education • Community-responsive SPACES artist residency program

28. Prevention Point 2913 Kensington Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19134 ppponline.org (215) 634-5272

• Harm reduction • Streetside health project • Syringe exchange

29. Project Safe

projectsafephilly.org (866) 509-SAFE (7233) safephila@gmail.com

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1700 South Street, Philadelphia, PA 19146 puentesdesalud.org (215) 454-8000 info@puentesdesalud.org

• Medical • Comenzando Bien Prenatal Education Program • Routine GYN care • Dental (free for children) • Wellness • Education

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27. Therapy Center of Philadelphia

Philadelphia Building, 1315 Walnut Street, Suite 1004, Philadelphia, PA 19017 therapycenterofphila.org (215) 567-1111

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• Affordable therapy for women and trans communities individual and group therapy • Clinical advocacy letterwriting • Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) trauma therapy • Intersectional feminist approach • Holistic approach

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30. Sex Workers Outreach Project (SWOP)

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new.swopusa.org (877) 776-2004 swopphilly@gmail.com

• Public education • Advocacy • Awareness • Empowerment and leadership development • Peer support

• Harm reduction • Sex worker advocacy • Safer sex supplies • Harm reduction supplies • Bad date sheet

31. Puentes de Salud

Art Sanctuary

• 24-hour hotline for sexual abuse/assault victims • Hospital and court accompaniment • Sexual violence training • Bilingual (Spanish) counseling

ti a dd r A g i /  Art Sanctuary Harm Reduction /  m on m i I t Addiction Services c 18 edu R rm a es c H i v 18 Ser Q T  GB Homeless Services/ es c rs i L e v t Shelters r l 18 e he lS S a / s c i es e c d c i a e v p M S Ser g 18 s n i s al e ele H m  h /Medical Services Ho t l 18 a e lH a t n Me ry 18 a u t nc a S Art 18

2. Juntos

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Mental Health / Healing Spaces

One Penn Center, 1617 John F Kennedy Blvd, #1100, Philadelphia, PA 19103 woar.org (215) 985-3333 information@woar.org

nS o i t ic

• Yoga • Meditation • Mental health • Healing

Immigration Services

25. Icarus Project

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32. Philadelphia FIGHT Community Health Centers 1233 Locust Street,

Philadelphia, PA 19107

(215) 985-4448

• HIV and AIDS testing • Dental health services • HIV/AIDS education • Primary medical care for citizens returning from incarceration

Philadelphia Assembled is a project initiated by artist Jeanne van Heeswijk in collaboration with stakeholders from across the city and the Philadelphia Museum of Art. The views expressed by individual participants or in materials developed as part of Philadelphia Assembled are representative of the project’s collective conception and production and are not, necessarily, the views of the Museum or any other individual involved.

Philadelphia Assembled is made possible by the William Penn Center for Arts & Heritage, Wyncote Foundation, Nancy M. Lynne and Harold Honickman, Mr. and Mrs. Milton S. Schneider Williams, the Mondriaan Fund, and The Netherland-America.

Philadelphia Assembled is made possible by the William Penn Foundation, The Pew Center for Arts & Heritage, The Daniel W. Dietrich II Fund for Contemporary Art, Wyncote Foundation, The Arlin and Neysa Adams Endowment Fund, Nancy M. Berman and Alan Bloch, Lynne and Harold Honickman, Mr. and Mrs. Milton S. Schneider, Constance and Sankey Williams, the Mondriaan Fund, Lyn M. Ross, and The Netherland-America Foundation.

This map was created as part of Philadelphia Assembled, a project that works with over 150 collaborators across the city to amplify narratives of resilience, resistance and community building. This Sanctuary Directory is compiled from resources that collaborators shared in the Spring of 2017.

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Participants in the Workshop: (front) Rommy Driks, Cynthia Dewi Oka (facilitator), Karlamaria Alfonso (middle) Catalina Rios, Quinha. (back) Raha Rafii, Katherine Antarikso, Gemelle John, Sheila Quintana, Rosie Glade, Meera Jayaraman, Caroline Park Kim, Maria Sotomayor”

The Sanctuary: A Migrant Poetry Workshop was led by Cynthia Dewi Oka in March 2017 and brought together participants to study poetry arising from migrant traditions and write their own poetry exploring questions of belonging, safety and identity.

Here, two participants share their experience of working together: Katherine Antarikso: I expected to go into the workshop to write about sanctuary, I wasn’t expecting to find sanctuary itself, but I did. It was the first time in my life that I was in the same room with other poets of color who were exploring similar themes. We didn’t talk about who we were or where we came from, we got to know each other through our writing. To be understood without having to explain, to be embraced without sacrificing who I was. It was magical, and truly one of the most meaningful experiences in my life.

Catalina Rios: Our workshop was transformational for me. It provided a safe and nurturing space to reflect on our writing and improve our craft.The feedback and perspectives we shared with one another challenged our thinking, expanded our awareness and gave us fresh tools and approaches. I deeply value the wisdom and courage of these poets. Cynthia Oka is a gifted workshop leader who led with integrity, skill and heart.

We are excited and grateful to share Katherine and Catalina’s work with you in APIARY 9: SANCTUARY. Keep reading to meet their poetry in the pages ahead!

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ISLAND

Katherine Antarikso

my sanctuary is an island

the ocean is a mob of people saying

you don’t belong here

you are a criminal what was my crime? guilty

of thinking that i could be a part

of drops in the vast ocean guilty

of believing in The Dream

that it was offered to everyone guilty

of thinking that i could become human

i see its shores from afar in the ocean i am struggling

to swim

to be invisible

the island fluctuates

grows and shrinks based on the day

i sought refuge

in this city where a country was born and a Dream was formed on the island a door opened a wave of newcomers join the old

they stretch arms wide give me refuge i see myself reflected on the faces of the women dark haired, wild and brave there was something in their words that let me know they have been through the same journey as they spoke i found my voice

and i am

home in my island of migrants

sometimes it is there other times it vanishes the ocean is a dangerous place that is what the elders say they don’t teach islanders to swim i have no choice but to try where can I go when the madness spreads? when the sickness is everywhere? when the storm is brewing?

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A KIND OF SURVIVING

SANTUARIO

A MANGO GROWS

your blood pressure is good today your heart rate is a little high it’s decaf so must be the sugar i’ve been here a while now so everyone gives me their sugar and i wonder how i will do outside after this how will i fill these wells inside me all my life i have thrashed under lock and key but how i love these locks, these lifegiving locks but what about out there when those cars like glossy scarabs sang like mermaids will i give a new meaning to ambulance chaser, will the Hudson be the river where i waltz like Ophelia, wreathed in burnt rubber or will i be alright will i be alright will i rise like the moon who neither sets nor rises but remains fixed in orbit slotted neatly in the cosmos like a key prepared to tune the gravity of everything we know. i remember something i once read about how to survive stranded at sea using oneself as bait to catch a fish i’m dissociating

again. i imagine every word that speaks to the past as another strip of skin, every memory another pound of flesh lowered slowly into the blue deep hoping to lure something to save me from myself. each time i open my mouth to speak i see the blade, slice after methodical slice searing skin from flesh, flesh from bone, a leg no longer a leg. each time i open my mouth i want to feed upon myself knowing full well it will not sustain me and so into the ocean it drops marbling the water with reaching tendrils of red, spray of pink like a sunset. i wait. i am patient. i expect nothing.

No knife in my back No sting on my skin Only love, only love, only love I don’t need a guard in this room Sister welcome, here we grow poems together I trail, I dip and dive I claim my name and in naming am set free.

Solo amor, solo amor, solo amor.

A mango is hidden treasure in a paper bag on a shelf nestled between the Connect-4 box with all the pieces and the Monopoly box with none of the pieces here on the ward where everything comes wrapped in plastic but my good friend my brother here has saved for us this rare jewel from the natural world we have not touched in so long we break the fruit like bread (no knives for us here of course, of course) and hand out pieces to one another and the juices form sticky tributaries down our chins and arms as we suck the sunny flesh from our fingertips like the animals we are, toasting to the bright, stinging flavor of life

Theo LeGro

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Catalina Ríos

I walk through girlhood, womanhood, ghosthood In the scent of mangoes Fruit pleasure and salty air Hidden between layers of loss I dig, I scratch the earth fiercely, I filter Through bone fragments, stardust, suitcases Solo amor, solo amor, solo amor.

I take note and note and note I flip the switch, turn on the light I am seen, known, beloved My voice is my voice is my voice Home nests, heart doors Walls made of fresh open air I breathe in the ease of earned deliverance.

Solo amor, solo amor, solo amor And gratitude.

Theo LeGro

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STUCK

POLYVERSE FOR PHILLY

Meg Pendoly It’s April, the trees are new, they put them in overnight. Magnolia, cherry— they’re all decked out. Earlier, the woman on the radio told the host that when she stopped eating she leaned into the emptiness as if balloon. It was the only way not to feel stuck. Picture balloon and the even smaller woman now, ballooning smaller by the minute.

The host was very friendly. She looks very healthy now. I am late walking home from work. She said it felt like always taking a deep breath, expanding into the space between body and that other thing—light. And this is, yes, maybe what I’m after.

Down Baltimore Ave, sinking sun spilling slantwise down 48th street— think of this as a way to sink into your own body. Remember food poisoning from the sweet meat bun. How everything inside poured out. Incredible body. Other times forcing them out. A very real clean.

Picture bodies living inside your body.

It’s kind of intimate. That’s what I’ll call it when I talk to you, later. I have to remember to tell you this is how I think about that week now. Louse on my head, louse on yours, lousy perennial gift. I’ll tell you that last spring this ballooning lightness was a way to be part of one body—sharing meals, cheap plastic wrappings once or twice a day, filling gaps with sex or not sex, with walking inefficiently, molding something soft with our hips—a shifting center of gravity. The man on the stoop across the street from home is yelling FUCK YOU, CUNT FAGGOTS again. I salute him, fumble for the keys.

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Davy Knittle A heady floating. It is soft out now when dark, but the cat is hungry and already yelling out the open window. The woman on the radio said that sometimes the problem dissolves if you make food for other people. The cat doesn’t eat much, so probably this is won’t serve me. She described her slow, impractical meals—fermented, yeasted, rolled into tiny spirals and cut quickly with floss.

She doesn’t talk about this part of it, but picture the tedious and deliberate measuring, the cleaning up. Must take each ingredient out of the cupboard, measure, scrape off excess, return to cupboard, wipe the spills, stir. She described taking her rising sweet buns into bed with her in the morning for the second rise. This is also intimate and embarrassing, and I want to tell you that I can’t stop thinking about it—her, in her crummy sheets.

I brought you a specious mushroom and you made it a soup I brought you a dog we groomed with kitchen scissors when we brought our documents to the wrong office (now a school district building) they said get out and we did Michael Nutter, I dream of cutting your hair but it’s gone I wonder what keeps you occupied when Obama went back to Chicago

AND DO IT IN REALLY DEAD AMERICAN PLACES Annie Paradis

People should see how we are living biting a dog that they know.

I kiss her so other people can watch.

It is like a slow coming on how I have learned to relate my body to the world.

Emerge from the monument mossy and nationalistic.

Be teething: want the ice and want it shoving.

we remembered he’s the kind of person who can love a city Ed Rendell came home but went on a diet so there are fewer pictures of him with cheesesteaks from recent years I brought a letter to your office, Michael signed by forty-five residents of my block I brought you a spider plant you kept lit up all winter I sat up all night on Social Explorer dreaming of what Philly could do with its millions in unpaid property taxes when you were mayor you had to shake hands and visit baseball diamonds you had to share your weather half movie star, half priest you went to bed for the city and everyone in it

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ALL STARS Sara Sherr

I met Mary Lambert once, on the street in summer. It was a blazing hot day, the day gay marriage had been legalized, the day love among people of the same gender was made the law of the land.

nights. I knew that Diamond planned to go to Becca’s room this coming Thursday to watch “The Jersey Shore,” because Becca had posted about it on Diamond’s Facebook page.

I was rushing to get Yoga to the People in the East Village when, there was Mary Lambert, walking toward me on the sidewalk.

I went downstairs about the time I knew Diamond would be leaving.

“Are you Mary Lambert?” I said.

I said, “Diamond, what are you doing tonight?”

“Yes,” she said, smiling. I think she was both happy to be recognized and bewildered, maybe annoyed to be stopped. Regardless, I quoted a poem of hers, “Body Love.” I said, “I can split my wrists to reveal a battlefield too but the time has come for us to reclaim our bodies.”

She said, “I’m going to my friend Becca’s to watch ‘The Jersey Shore.’”

It was an inappropriate lyric to quote on the street. Mary’s face broke into a smile.

“Wow,” she said. “You’re legit.”

I handed my phone to the girl next to me on the sidewalk, a girl who was my girlfriend at the time, and asked her to take a picture of Mary and me.

When the camera flashed something ethereal soared upwards. Something about the moment, the day, the light on the street in the sun, became eternal.

I said, casual as fuck, “Can I come?”

Jump ahead an hour. I’m sitting on a bunk bed in a room full of sophomores, the only junior. I’ve just caught a glimpse of Becca’s gleaming tongue ring. She’s just said something about her “ex,” and I’ve pretended to know nothing about it. Forty minutes later, Diamond and I are alone in Becca’s room, Becca and I are exchanging phone numbers. We’re laughing about her giant Jamaican stuffed banana. Her brown hair is so pretty, her brown eyes are so large, her brown skin looks so soft.

Or maybe I just wanted it to.

I was a sophomore in college when I found out about Becca.

I was sitting at a table in the dining hall with my friends. The dykiest lesbian at our school, Morgan, sat down at our table and pulled up a picture on her cell phone.

“Look,” Morgan said. “These two girls on the soccer team are dating.”

In the picture, a tan girl with curly hair and moonlight eyes sat next to a blonde girl.

They were grinning, with their arms wrapped around each other.

Something in my heart changed irrevocably.

Maybe the way I stalked Becca on the internet at the end of my sophomore year is polemic to my generation. I checked Becca’s Facebook every day, my stomach dropping when it wasn’t updated, my heart pounding when it was.

There was a night all of the athletes stayed up in the field house to raise money to prevent cancer. We were playing a basketball shoot-out game, and Becca was behind me, shooting the ball, trying to shoot me out of the game and eventually, she succeeded. It was the only time Becca and I interacted that year. I remember when I finally became Becca’s friend, and I brought up that shoot-out game, and she said, “I can’t believe you remember that too.”

It’s not a metaphor, it’s just what really happened.

“Your life in this format?” Zadie Smith asks this of Facebook’s ubiquity, of its monotone blue, silly lack of art. My life, in this format. Pictures of Becca at the beach, in a pink bikini. Pictures of her scuba diving and playing soccer. Then sophomore year ended, and in the delight of summer, Becca and Alex’s relationship ended, and in the sweating joy of early August, I returned to college, determined to talk to her.

Because of obsessing over Becca on Facebook, I knew that Becca and a girl I lived with, Diamond, sometimes watched “The Jersey Shore” together on Thursday

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One night, at 4am, Becca texted me: “Want to meet on the steps of the English building?”

It was the night I came out. I was sitting with Becca on the steps of the English building across the path from the dining hall. It must have been just becoming spring. I wore a longsleeved red t-shirt that read Ursinus Cross Country.

“Are you gay?” Becca asked me. “You keep looking at my lips.”

I didn’t say anything at all for too long. Then, I said, “I’m not sure what to say.”

“This is like pulling teeth,” Becca said.

It was not unlike being on a very high diving board. You’re aware that you’ll be fine if you jump – it’s just that your reality will change. You will be in the water instead of ten feet above it. And, you’ll have to deal with the sickening helplessness during the fall.

“Okay,” I said. “I am gay.”

I remember Becca invited me back to her dorm to cuddle.

I remember I accepted, perhaps too enthusiastically. I remember she then rescinded the offer on the grounds that her roommates would think it weird she brought someone back so early in the morning. It was edging on 5am and the sun was rising.

It’s now five years later and I have no idea why I didn’t invite her back to my dorm room.

Are you tired of talking about this? I am too.

I remember the first time I knew I was gay was at night, in

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bed, in seventh grade. I had just found out what lesbian meant. Everything suddenly made sense, but this was a revelation that brought on panic. I imagined a girl in my class, Julia. I imagined kissing her and touching her face and eyelashes. The affection in my stomach surged. I wanted to kiss Julia. I wanted to touch her pale skin and rub her blonde hair between my fingers.

I remember thinking, fuck. Then, I repressed it for eight more years.

I want to meet the thirteen-year-old girl I was then and see her with different eyes.

I’m sure I was very pretty and very deserving of love, but I had no idea.

What is with the self-hatred fed to young girls. Are you tired of it?

Maggie Nelson has written that true queer pride is the refusal to feel shame in the presence of others’ shame. Perhaps this is what queer is, because you don’t choose to be gay, but you do choose to be queer. Queer is the refusal to feel shame for one’s gayness, amongst other things, namely the rejection of the gender binary and the patriarchy.

Last week I watched Andrea Gibson get onstage with Mary Lambert on YouTube.

Andrea Gibson performed her poem titled “Orlando” and Mary Lambert’s angel voice rose above, knotting us all together. Andrea Gibson used her poetry to rip open her soul, and then Andrea and Mary gave each other a hug onstage that made me feel like they were the only two lesbians in the world and the rest of this was all our fault.

After the massacre in Orlando I became obsessed with one girl killed, Akyra Murray. She was the youngest one killed. She was only 18.

The day after Akyra was killed her father was interviewed saying, “I know my daughter is in a better place now than America. You can’t even go on vacation.”

It’s hard to say what about Akyra obsessed me. I think it was the stunning openness, the vulnerability in her face.

Maybe it was because she was from Philadelphia, she had just graduated from high school and she’d earned a basketball scholarship. She’d scored 1,000 points in her senior year basketball season.

I read an interview with Akyra’s mother in which she described the night Akyra was killed alongside 48 other beautiful queers. She was on the phone with Akyra and she said “All I could hear was my baby screaming.”

Maybe it was because Akyra was black, and adorable, and it isn’t fair that her race had to be the recipient of so much unfairness and hatred, and it wasn’t fair that she individually had to be the recipient of so much unfairness and hatred. When I looked at the pictures of her on the internet, my stomach wrung in knots, all I wanted was to pass her the love in my heart, communicate the knowledge that there is love and good in the world and that the love and good in me saw the love and good in her.

But I could do no such thing, because she was gone.

We both jumped up to catch the football at the same time, and wound up hitting each other with our elbows. On the way to the ground I said something like, “You fool!”

Which, I know, I shouldn’t have said. I was thirteen.

So there we were, muddy and on the ground, and Meghan sprang up and punched me in the face.

Quickly, two of her friends were holding her back. One of her friends was holding me back. Meghan was much more popular than me in eighth grade. One of Meghan’s friends said, to Meghan, “She isn’t worth it.”

She was talking about me. I wasn’t worth it.

Months later, Meghan and I were on the same all-star basketball team. We were wearing our blue mesh jerseys that said All-Stars on the front, and I felt like one. I felt like an all-star. It was before the game, and I was sitting on a couch. Meghan bounded over and sat on my lap. She held my face in her hands.

She said, “I love you.”

I said, “You do?”

A few months after that, Meghan was sent off to anorexia rehabilitation and she never came back to our high school. I never saw her again, but I did write her a Facebook message about my middle school crush and she never responded.

Maybe Leslie Jamison said it best when she wrote that anger is nothing but unacknowledged shame.

Once, in first grade, I said to my friend Lauren abruptly: “Do you like me?”

She blinked at me, confused. Then said, “Yes.” I think we both knew that her “yes” was the answer to a different question, one I hadn’t asked.

When I was in fifth grade, I was obsessed with my best friend, Christine. I wrote an essay about how much I loved her, which my teacher liked so much he read it out loud to the class. As he was gearing up to read, I left the classroom and went to the bathroom. I hid outside the classroom in the hallway, peering in the classroom window, until Mr. Schwartz put my notebook down and I could tell he was finished.

Only then, I walked back in, and the whole class laughed.

One day, after college, Becca left a message on my cell phone. She was obviously very drunk, but in the message she told me she’d figured everything out.

“I know exactly what life is for,” Becca slurred into my machine. “And I know what happens when we die. It has to do with tightropes, and balancing scales. Call me back.”

Heart racing, I called her back as soon as I could, but she didn’t answer. When I spoke to Becca the next day, she told me she’d been black out drunk the night before, and that she could no longer remember what life was for, or what it was all about.

She laughed, and then she said, “I can’t believe I said that.”

You should probably know about this day in the rain and mud. It was eighth grade gym class. We were playing touch football. Probably, I was in love with Meghan.

Probably, Danez Smith said it best in “On Grace”: “I stopped playing football because being tackled / feels too much like making love.”

Why did Meghan get so angry at me?

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EGGLESTON Jim Walls

You’re the type of boy the jocks call princess. If you are their princess then pretend the jocks are something like your knights and this pickup truck your royal carriage.

No one wears seatbelts as Brice plows his dad’s F-150 through the lima bean field.

You’re crumpled in the truck bed with Chasten fingering your duct taped lips. Your knights chug cans of Natural Light as your eyes widen at glimpses of armpit hair on white torsos in the dark. Miles knifes a hole in the tape and fills your mouth with light beer.

At the edge of the forest your knights haul your ass off the truck. You stare into the headlights as Chasten holds you gently. Brice nudges your stomach with his boot and says: “Ain’t we so good to our princess boy.”

And when it’s over they take you through the night drunk driving down country roads.

When you fall into bed at home tell yourself this town is a sour armpit stuffed with chicken shit and nasty people. Tell yourself that 10 years from now you will be 27 and in love in a big city hundreds of miles from here and that when you think back on it this will seem like some scary movie about some other kid from some other place.

Or maybe when you’re 27 you’ll be alone on a city bus. You’ll be on your way to your shitty job still watching that scary movie over and over because you can’t help yourself. When the skyscrapers start to loom over you like big ideas think to yourself: You deserve to exist dumbass.

And then go out to stand in dark rooms with blitzed strangers who act like they never tell themselves the same thing. A hot daddy at the bar will call you boy. Close your eyes and part your lips when he says: “You could do pornos.”

And then fall in bed over and over with meaningless guys until you almost forget you ever wanted anything to mean anything at all. You will feel broke in more ways than one so quit your shitty job and get broker. Then find a new shitty job that pays less than your old shitty job but be thankful at least you have one.

Save up for a shitty tattoo on your inner forearm. Learn to appreciate the tattoo as a representation of your mindset at a specific point in time and then never get another tattoo.

Spend your late nights walking home alone through the cement blocks of your ruined neighborhood feeling young dumb and full of other people’s cum. And in the morning on your way to your shitty job don’t forget to smile when you look your neighbors in the eye to say: “Hello.”

Because you will learn that in a neighborhood like yours it’s important to know who’s got your back. Eventually you will learn that this city is only beautiful when framed around the little people living up against the weight of 100 layers of oppressive systems trying to keep them small.

One night you will make eye contact across the nightmarish dance floor with a magic stranger with an evil-cute smile. In the morning go with him to go to the diner to eat bacon, eggs, and toast. He will smoke 3 cigarettes before noon and use the word: “Kismet.”

“Yeah.”

And then feel his hand on your dick and taste the eggs and tobacco on his tongue as you make out against the side of the diner in front of several strangers at 11:45am.

When you get home look up the definition of the word kismet and think to yourself: Alright.

A wart on your middle finger will appear and occasionally disappear but always return.

You will spend more days with this magic stranger than without until he stops being magic and starts being Luke. Luke will be a bit of a fuck up but you won’t mind because aren’t we all. He will smoke too many cigarettes and drink too many beers and play music too loud and then louder when the neighbors complain.

You will sit around Luke’s 1 room apartment watching TV until you’re talking more than watching, so you’ll turn off the TV and keep talking until you’re fucking. When Luke says: “Do you like it rough?”

Say: “Alright.”

And it’ll be the first time having sex will feel like having anything at all when you come up for air to say: “You can thrust harder if you want.”

As Luke’s evil-cute smile hovers above you on a hot night with the windows open.

Luke will cum on your face and say: “I like you. I really like you.”

And when you shut your eyes the humidity of the room will remind you of being on your back in the back of a bouncing pickup truck staring at the starry sky like a ceiling as the elastic of your underpants rips at your knees. You’ll dissociate and then rejoin your body while Luke is snoring into your shoulder blades.

Wake Luke up to explain why you’re uncomfortable and then say: “I’m sorry.”

And pretend to go to sleep.

You will start talking in front of the TV until you’re watching more than talking.

Luke’s favorite channel after midnight will be the one that plays nothing but old sitcom reruns and commercials targeted at obese shut-ins and people who are dying. There will be an episode of Roseanne in which Roseanne is standing over the coffin of her dead dad as she reads a note that says: “So dad I’m forgiving you, just because I need to move on with my life.”

And then Luke will say: “I’m in the mood to get violently mugged tonight.”

He’ll walk out the door into the night with no shoes on. He won’t come back until 2 reruns of Roseanne later.

You won’t know what kismet means, so say:

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In the morning you will wake up too early and then spend an hour or so staring at the uneven facial hair on his sleeping face. Think to yourself: The body of this messed up man has travelled 30 years to get here in bed next to me.

And as you’re thinking about all the years your body has been travelling too you’ll start jerking off. Remember how Luke makes you feel like your fucked up parts are all right after all and then cum on his leg.

Take a too cold shower and notice that the wart on your middle finger has reappeared.

On your way to your shitty job you will find on the sidewalk a water-damaged book of photography called:

“It’s boring.” say: “I know.”

And then focus on the metal pole next to the woman. A thick chain will be wound around it. Despite being 100% sober you will dissociate on this page until Luke shuts the book.

When light reflects off the gold letters that spell out: G-U-I-D-E think to yourself:

William Eggleston’s Guide

T-R-U-E

There will be a tricycle on the cover, and your 45-minute bus ride will feel like 5 as you get lost in the simple photos of simple objects and simple people.

Pinch your finger until Luke says:

Spend all day at work picking at the wart on your middle finger.

Buy nail clippers after work then go back to Luke’s place and snip off the wart. It won’t stop bleeding so lie down on the couch. Luke will hold the unclotting wart wound under his nose and say: “Your nails are short.”

Look into his eyes past your dripping hand until he smiles. Then look down at your dirty white sneakers and say:

“I’m going to smoke.”

It will be late spring and bright at 8:30pm while you sit with him on the stoop of the abandoned row house across the street. Stare at faded sidewalk trash and say: “I think I’m asexual.”

Try not to feel corny for the way that sounds out loud.

Luke will say: “Asexual.”

“I’ve been biting them.”

And you will say:

To stop the bleeding Luke will hold your hand above your head against the wall, but it will feel like he’s restraining you. A blood drop on his cheekbone will compliment a scary look that will make you laugh. He will say:

“Yeah.”

“Are you gonna tell me why you’re nervous.”

Try to lower your dripping hand. When he pins it back against the wall say: “No I’m not telling.”

Luke will think he can read you just because you’re the type to live through life with one and only one tattoo on your body.

He will kick off his shoes and his feet will stink, but you will like the sour smell of his body because it is his body and the stink feels like a signature. When he moves his mouth to the zipper of your jeans roll away and say: “I found this book.”

And then he’ll smoke his cigarette to the filter.

Recognize that people learn best from the silent moments and the not knowing what to say. Have patience for his straggling response.

When he says: “So you don’t wanna fuck anymore.” say: “Not for now.”

A neighbor down the block will be watering plants in plastic containers. Say: “You think I’m fucked up.”

Luke will punch your arm too hard and say:

He will let go of your hand and it will smear blood down the wall as it falls. Reach into your backpack, hand him the book you found on the sidewalk. Luke will run his fingers over the gold engraved title and the Bible-pleather cover.

“No.”

As he stares at the tricycle on the front say:

“I might be.”

“There’s this perfect dog.”

A kid on a dirt bike will blare past going 50 mph. Luke will say:

Turn the page to a photo of two shirtless little white boys walking down a country road. At the center a dog will smile mid-stride into the camera. Gulfport, Mississippi.

“I want to live the high life in 40 ounces.”

Luke will turn the page to a photo of a neatly dressed woman sitting on a parking lot curb. Her hand will blur, half-way lifted over her lap. Memphis.

“Do you think they sell band aids?”

Say:

Lick your wart wound and say: Grip his shoulder as you walk to the store.

When Luke says:

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65

HIM (SANS CONTEXT CLUES)

TO NEW JERSEY

Sitting / firm, yet soft where sunlight forgets / Today, not afraid to be held / And I hold him / In a snapshot of a peculiar gaze / Half out one window, still staring / The strange geometry of the jawline to lower ear / I meditate on the point of his nose / how it frustrates itself / to be upright for a smile / One day, there will be a hand / And its faces must to unlearn / the harshness of sculpting masculinity / in place / Other times, the palm gets it just right / uses its wiles to sweep the leg / and it rocks back and forth / like a blanket on a restless body / unhinging all the different pressure points / it will be thick / and unruly / a thousand temper tantrums / but then tenderness comes / like any cadence would / and he remembers how a mother’s love is supposed to feel / on the bones / it takes him a while / but I always have time. / Boy comes in every smell / stubborn, impatient / latching onto anything it can find / a sweater / a blanket / an entire afternoon / stay here. / Make time stop with me. / Let me breathe another bad lunch from your teeth. / a series of images that give me peace: / a porous sneaker fresh off the foot / a dissertation of an impromptu shirt stain / a backpack and other trinkets left out to thaw / tiny hairs that dance the delicate spaces of skin / a shy face highlighted by 8PM and a first date’s end. / Sometimes / boy wants so much in one place / because he never learned where to want / Often / boy cries so much in one place / because he never learned where to cry / I forgive it anyhow / Sorry, I don’t mean to stare / but I can’t stop noticing / when your eyes do that thing / where they turn into stray tulips in a fresh May / Yeah, that / Everything I love the most / has made a mistake / and still reminded me of spring / My arms are so small / but I love to make room / there’s an extra pillow here all of the time / Even when there shouldn’t be / it is not a crush / Nor Reconciliation / But maybe / a synonym for a thing / hugged tight enough / until it is what I want it to become / the art of praising fragments I choose / and making peace with them.

I flew to New Jersey over cardboard states and painted swimming pools, landed in your arms, naked, swore to never leave –

Veronica Nocella

Gina Tomaine

to live on trampolines and sandboxes, to watch you throw a football every day, to tan from all the love streaming down on a summer afternoon.

London and Nairobi, they felt far away, I’d lost sight of poverty and politics, literature and afternoon tea, crawling in your shelter, crying in spaghetti for my grandmother, who had held me, her papery hands filled with cancer, and told me that everything was not lost.

Time poured into me like melted butter when I touched your lips, I learned that love could be the blunt blade and the stitches after.

I counted days on a calendar composed of arms and hands, and hands and arms, the guitar-calloused fingertips and two-door car of the king of a fake empire.

The Iroquois were all gone, the land was settled into tight geometry, the shopping malls were closing in while the sprawl dribbled forward like a Stephen King novel thinny and the plastic death of everything that’s wild.

But God—all I wanted was you and your skin, the heat of the sun through the opening in the trees, the deck your father built, the pool I’d never swim in.

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67

HOW WE LOVE

David Satten-Lopez The garage door drones below, waking Anthony and Sydney from their naps.

Sydney lies on his back, with Anthony curled up by his side. Anthony’s head rests on Sydney’s chest. He caresses Sydney’s collarbone—washed in burnt brown skin.

He traces its outline, starting from the shoulder furthest from him.

Anthony’s called it “sharp,” “smooth,” “strong,” and “important.” “Collarbones are important,” Anthony’s said and will say again.

His finger takes its time to slide its way to the divot under Sydney’s Adam’s apple.

At this divot, between both collarbones, Sydney closes his eyes. When he opens his eyes, he looks down at the mess of Anthony’s hair. He smiles small.

The garage door drones again and the door downstairs slams.

“Shit, my mom.”

Sydney tries to spring out of bed, forcing Anthony off his chest. Anthony shakes his dark hair as Sydney raises his torso out of the sheets. Anthony’s head rises and the poof of hair at the top of his head rams into Sydney’s chin.

Sydney falls back against the headboard, gripping his chin, letting a laugh out through his grin.

Looking back at Sydney, Anthony says, “Shit. Shit. Here.”

Anthony hops out of his bed and grabs some of the scattered clothes on the floor.

He throws jeans and a dark tee onto the bed while Sydney fiddles with the window behind the headboard. He pushes on the dirty glass and the window opens out onto the city of North Las Vegas. The window is painted white but it’s chipped, showing brown spots. The window rubs against a large tree and the dark green leaves shake. Some fall. Behind the tree sits the Las Vegas Mountain Range. Right now, in a sunset of the South West, the mountains show in purples.

Sydney turns around from the window and stretches the pants on. He grabs the dark shirt on the bed and shoves part of it in his jean’s waistband. Then, fastening his brown leather belt, he makes eye contact with Anthony. He leans in and gives him a kiss on the cheek before bolting out the spotted window. Grabbing the nearest branch, he lets himself hang from it before dropping the rest of the way to the grass. Five feet. More leaves fall, following Sydney. Anthony watches him run away from his house in the warm winter sun.

In this neighborhood, the white sidewalks and white driveways are blinding against the black asphalt. Some lawns look a washed-out green with specks of dead grass— wheat colored. Some lawns are made up of dirt and rocks. Some rock lawns look a light pink. Some look white.

Anthony breaks his gaze and quickly puts on the remaining pair of jeans on his floor.

He goes for the dark blue top on the ground. Picking it up, it hangs long. He eyes the long sleeveless top for a moment before slipping it on.

“Tony!” a deep voice sounds from below.

Anthony exhales and says, “Coming.” He throws blankets that fell from the bed back on and exits the room. He runs down the stairs, booming with each footfall.

On the cool kitchen tile, Anthony sees his mother, Celia, loading groceries into the stained fridge.

She looks up from her work and says, “When did you get that tank top, mijo?”

Celia is doubled over, grabbing the brown paper bags at her black sandaled feet.

Anthony’s slender arms hang at his sides. He stares at the bags before saying, “Last

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weekend. Uh, when I went to that street fair, with Sydney.” He raises an arm to touch the low neckline of his tank.

Celia nods. “How is that boy doing? He hasn’t been over for dinner in ages.”

“Oh, fine. He’s just been busy with school, and some new girl.”

“Ah. I see,” Celia says. She lifts a carton of eggs out of the fridge. “Now, help me with these dishes. I’m going to start on dinner.”

Anthony moves his feet to the steel sink.

At dinner, Anthony’s father, Mason, wears a tight-lipped straight face with dark narrowed eyes. He still wears the button down and jeans that he wears on the factory floor.

Earlier, at the factory, they were loading jet parts from storage to the trucks that would carry the parts to the Dallas assembly line. Loading the jet parts required the use of a forklift. Mason stood near the jet parts, waiting for José. José’s stubby fingers lost their grip on the forklift’s steering wheel and before he managed to slam on the breaks, he clipped the corner of the lockers. The lockers lurched forward, on their way to the floor. Mason’s gaze snapped over at the sound of twisted metal.

The lockers crashed, throwing up a mixture of dust, noise, and personal belongings.

Morning jackets fell off metal hooks. Deodorant slipped out, clacking on the cement floor. Change and dollars alike found their way out of the bent and grated metal. Lastly, Javier Ramirez’s blood results floated down in front of Mason. They swayed left and right, in front of Mason’s dark eyes. The eyes blinked as he watched the paper fall. Left. The forklift stopped. Right. José stepped out of the forklift, wide-eyed. Left. “So much for beating our old safety record,” someone said. Right.

Mason bent over, the papers within reach. He picked up Javier Ramirez’s papers—a doctor signed, filled with acronyms and abbreviations, positive blood test for HIV. Before the end of the workday, Javier Ramirez was fired from his job.

Anthony sits hard in his seat at the kitchen table listening to his father tell this story.

Mason’s words are quick and rhythmic. There’re no usual breaks or odd breaths suggesting that this is his first time telling his proud tale. He ends with: “Got that faggot just where he likes it, in the ass. Who does he think he is, coming into to work all sick like that?

Nearing the end of dinner, Anthony gets up to wash his plate. Mason slaps his butt and says, “Tony. Here,” with a plate in his raised grip. Anthony takes the plate and then goes to sweep the food scraps into the trash. He takes the plates to the sink and runs the warm water. He takes the torn sponge from the sink’s corner and suds it up. Behind him, he hears the news run.

“The British have announced plans to perform a nuclear test. This will be another addition to recent nuclear tests from Europe following France’s test on Muruora Island in late November. This announcement comes just days after the Malta Summit. More details on the Malta Summit will be reported as they are released.

And up next in sports, our analysts weigh in on the upcoming fight, ‘Uno Mas,’ between Sugar Ray Leonard and Roberto Durán, at the newly opened Mirage Hotel and Casino. This is the third fight between the two and will air live, tomorrow, on pay-per-view and certain closed-circuit television locations.”

Celia bends over, her lips close to Mason’s ear. “Honey,” Celia says. “Please stay

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here tomorrow night. We’ll listen on the radio. Together.”

Anthony watches the grey water trail down the rusted brown drain.

“Honey. I got a good feeling about this one. Remember the last time there was an accident at the factory? You know; you remember.”

Anthony looks straight ahead, hot water pouring over his hands and the plates. His right hand, gripping the sponge, rubs in circles.

The next day, Thursday afternoon, Sydney and Anthony walk home from their high school. It’s quiet until Sydney says, “Hey, I’ve never been in the ocean before. I think I’m going to go tonight. Wanna come with?”

Anthony stops walking and says, “What are you talking about? What about school tomorrow?”

“Don’t you wanna go? C’mon. How much can we miss in a day? It’ll be easy. Viva Venice Beach! Plus, won’t your dad be out tonight anyway?”

“Hey. I don’t know if he will. Last time he was way under, and last night I overheard my mom tell him to not go.” Anthony puts his hand in his back pocket. “Anyways, like, I’ve never been either, but what’re we going to do? And where will we stay?”

“You knew I would come? You had that much faith in me?”

Sydney lets out a laugh. “I wish. That’d be cute, huh? I was next in line when you burst in here. Really can’t believe you missed me.”

“Oh.” Anthony looks down at his watch.

“Right. Man, you cut it pretty close. Thought I was gonna be in it alone.”

Anthony shows him his smile and together they walk to the bus.

Anthony is cold by the time they leave. He sits cross-armed in the aisle seat, sweater on. Sydney sits by the window. The final passengers are loading on. Two men and a woman pass their aisle, followed by a man holding a child. The child looks to be about five and has his head on the man’s shoulder, eyes closed. Once the child and man take their seats, the bus doors close and the bus driver makes his speech. “Hello, I’d like to welcome you aboard. My name is Marty Yates and I will be your driver tonight. This bus will be making stops in Barstow, Victorville, San Bernardino, Riverside, Claremont, and El Monte, before ending in LA. I would like to remind you that no alcoholic beverages are allowed in this bus. If you would like to use the restroom it is located in the rear of the bus. Thank you for riding with us today, and have a pleasant ride.”

Sydney shakes his head. “I don’t know. Check it out. Walk around.”

“That’s it? All the way to Venice Beach just to walk around?

“Well I’ve always wanted to try surfing, too.”

Anthony looks at him silent and then says, “It’s December.”

“Wet suits? Listen, I’m going to go be at the bus station at eight thirty tonight. The bus leaves at eight forty-five. It’s Venice Beach or bust.”

Anthony opens his mouth to speak.

Sydney says, “Also, if you wanna come, make sure to bring a sweater or something.

The nights‘re getting cold.”

Anthony tugs at some facial hair and makes eye contact. Sydney’s eyes are a coffee brown and before Anthony knows it, they’re kissing on the side of the street. The passersby’s cars kick up the desert dust.

At eight pm, Anthony is sitting on his bed, rubbing his thumbs on the sweater he’s holding. Mason still isn’t home and Celia is watching the news downstairs. The TV sounds through the whole house. Shouts and shots ring through the house. “Yes Sharon, we’re here at one of the largest crack houses in Las Vegas. This is the end of a six-month-long investigation led by Las Vegas Police. They’ve just broken through the door with this tank-like vehicle. Let’s take a closer look.” Grunts and smacks from batons are heard.

Anthony stands up and looks out his window onto his driveway. It’s already dark outside except for the city’s lights. There are no headlights in sight. He gets on his bed and lifts a foot onto the windowsill. He jostles the tree a bit before his feet fall hard on his rock lawn. He begins to walk from the house and, looking back, he sees his window still open. Anthony turns his head to the cracked concrete and runs to the bus station.

Anthony pushes the glass door of the bus station and goes in. He swings his head back and forth, searching. Scanning the station’s chairs and lines, he ends by turning towards the restroom and entering. When he comes out, Sydney is outside waiting for him. “Here,” Sydney says, handing him a bus ticket.

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The bus gets on the I-15 at nine nineteen. The bus driver makes the merge onto a nearly empty interstate. Once comfortable in the right lane, he turns on the radio.

The boxing match is on. A fuzz of background noise is just below the announcers’ voices. Cheering. Commands. Clapping.

“Leonard has to know his legs are his big advantage over Durán.”

“You know, Matt, that’s right, and it raises the question how patient he can be. On both sides.”

“A left from Durán. Grazing. A counter from Leonard. A good shot to the body.”

“Leonard has been known to have a good body shot.”

“And Durán knows it. These two are well acquainted with each other.”

Anthony exhales and his forehead wrinkles as he leans back to listen to the match.

At seven years old, Anthony stands short in the recently mowed grass of left field in North Town Park. His father stands close to third base, twenty-five feet away. Little league season is coming up and they’re practicing. The ball comes from up high, finishing its arc. Anthony raises his baseball mitt and the ball lands with a slap. He turns the mitt towards his chest and takes out the ball, breaking into a big grin. He wraps two fingers at the red seam near the top of the ball. His thumb slips around the bottom seam. Anthony takes a moment to look at his dark hand. He turns his shoulder to his father, like he’s been told to, and takes a step toward him with his front foot. He raises his left arm, ball in hand, and throws.

The ball makes it a little over half way and his father bends down to ground the white and red ball into his glove. He stands up straight and walks over to Anthony.

Anthony’s arm hurts but he makes mock motions like his dad tells him to. “Follow through, alright. Lead with your shoulder and elbow.” His dad nods and smiles before walking back to his spot by third.

The ball’s arc is higher this time and for a moment, Anthony loses track of it in the sun. He squints. It comes down fast, faster than before. Anthony raises his glove again and slap. Anthony catches it with just the top webbing of the glove (later, his

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dad will call it ice cream cone style). Though caught, the momentum of the ball is enough to bend Anthony’s wrist back; the back of his glove whacks him in his left eye.

The blow to his eye is enough for Anthony to fall on his back, into the grass. He hears his father’s cries, calling him. “Buddy boy. Are you okay?”

Anthony says, “Yes,” and his eyes burn red. He bites his bottom lip and lifts his glove up in front of his face. The ball is still peaking over the brown webbing when his father arrives to take a look.

His father moves the glove from Anthony’s face and looks at his eye. He helps him up from the grass and brushes the grass off Anthony’s backside. Together they walk.

His father walks fast and Anthony struggles to keep up, taking two or three steps per his father’s one stride.

Once home, his father goes to the icebox to grab some frozen peas. He wraps the peas in paper towels and presses them against Anthony’s eye. Anthony shrinks back, hearing his father mutter something about decreasing the swelling before his mother gets home.

“Hold the peas tight, alright Tony?” his father says.

Anthony nods and takes the cold bag in his hands. His father ruffles Anthony’s hair and exhales. Anthony’s hands are cold, his smile warm.

“And that’s it for the sixth round folks. So far, Leonard seems to be in the lead. Durán will need to come out strong in the next rounds to change the momen-” An engine groans in its acceleration, causing Sydney and Anthony to look. It’s a white car—with Las Vegas plates—that’s beginning to pass the bus on the left.

Anthony leans forward to get a better look. Then, Anthony turns his head to look at Sydney. He’s looking out the dark window. The outline of the Las Vegas Mountain Range is still there. The lights of the city are still there. Sydney strains his neck, watching the car gain on the bus. In cursive lettering, on the trunk of the white car, it reads “Camaro.”

“Fucker,” Sydney says.

The car continues to flaunt its engine and soon enough the tones are waning.

Anthony says, “Yeah,” and closes his eyes.

When they get into Los Angeles, it will be five o’ six in the morning. The sun will just be peaking over the ocean and Anthony and Sydney will still have to find their way to Venice Beach. Mason will be stumbling home. He will be just about to put the key in the door. Celia will be asleep on the couch in the living room. The rattle of the key in the door will wake her up. Three hours after that, she’ll go check to make sure Anthony is getting ready for school.

For now though, Anthony and Sydney are asleep. They just left Nevada and Mojave National Preserve is on their left. It’s a vast waste in this dark. In the sun, it will be full of giant sand dunes and towering plumes of dust—winding in the air.

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73

FAMILY, GENUS, SPECIES

AUDREY SENIOR

Because I want to feel connected, show respect, I am trying to learn the names of all things.

Plant purple coneflower for tiger swallowtails.

Plant red clover for honeybees, local and those spilled across the highway from Florida to Maine.

After “Allowables” by Nikki Giovanni

Emily Thomas

There is a nightclub massacre – not even a new term – and when we hear the news, we are hung over from a nightclub. We let a blanket float down to the grass and lay on it all day in the shadow of the tree where we fell in love – some kind of maple silver or sugar.

I feel the loss unwind in my body, wires stretched taut across the country snap.

We hold truths non-negotiable as bullets as fear comes hammering.

We put our heads to the ground and the earth keeps going, beetles click, soil shifts, the pulse of the earth is steady.

Meanwhile, a song sparrow eats a caterpillar in Virginia a meadowlark eats a robber fly in Connecticut an egret eats a tiger moth in South Carolina we cling like gnats as the planet stomps and spits after the next great flood, the headline will scroll by in an empty room: hurricane season is just beginning.

The Ladybug

er skin was orangish-brown not red like I expected I was sorry I saw her crawl across the sheets the shroud and grabbed her between my monstrous fingers capturing her in my grasp inescapable drowning drowning in the creases that make me who I am who I expect myself to be I was not sorry I had the audacity to make her stand on the oily finger tip while I photographed her with no reasoning forcing her to stand still full aware the torture of being frozen and alone I was not sorry then I let her run, run, ran as fast as she could tiny feet scampering away as far away as she could get from her predator from her abuser I was not sorry I reached to grab her again but when she extended her brown wings to escape I feared—I flinched without thinking pushing my oily fingers together now she was mine forever but was no longer of value I was sorry.

I am sorry I did not understand you it was not my place to make you mine I do not think I am allowed to kill something because I am frightened she was harmless; she was pure; I was the aggressor I am sorry I am so sorry that you were not red like I imagined

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75

SELF-PORTRAIT Christy Lenzi

Silver maples and ash trees stoop like old women over the banks of the Schuylkill River. Beside them, the tulip poplars bend with limbs outstretched, seedpods open and cupped like withered fingers lifted to the heavens. All the pods are dried up and long empty.

It’s February.

I frown at the furrowed bark of the ash tree, which resembles aging skin. Irritated at the thought, I rub the deepening crease between my eyebrows.

When I see Boathouse Row from a bend in the trail, I pick up my pace. The sweep boats, like slender, oval pills, glide down the fat vein of the Schuylkill River toward the womb of Center City. I christen the boats in my mind as they pass. Medroxyprogesterone Acetate, Clomiphene Citrate, Metformin.

Godspeed.

By the time I reach the museum steps, it appears that everyone else in Philadelphia has the same idea on this gloomy Sunday. Against the gray sky, the museum’s stone facade bursts with color. A banner with Frida Kahlo’s name weaves through the pillars, and a giant image of one of the artist’s self-portraits hangs on the side of the entrance. She stares down her nose at us, her expression grave and calm, despite the vibrant background of lush and fecund vegetation, the flitting moths and winged flowers, and a lively cat and monkey who perch on her shoulders.

I start climbing the steps but something in the vivid image disturbs me like the deep creases of the gray ash tree, and my hand rises to my neck to rub the irritation away. I glance back up at the self-portrait.

A tiny, dead bird hangs around her neck. How could I not even notice at first?

A delicate brown lace-work of broken vines wraps around her throat and shoulders as well, their thorns piercing her skin.

Blood droplets glisten beneath them. But still Frida stares down at me, quite unmoved.

Dang, girl. That’s fucked up.

I join the line forming at the doors and follow the crowd up the stairs to the new exhibit of self-portraits, organized in honor of the 100th anniversary of Frida Kahlo’s birth.

Donning the audio tour headset, I let the recording of the guide’s authoritative voice escort me through the exhibition.

Something about the guide’s tone reminds me of my friend Priscilla’s voice: two parts helpful, one part know-it-all. It’s funny, because she’s the one who told me about the exhibit in the first place and said I should come with her and her kids to see it, but I pretended I’d probably be too busy this month.

Truth was, I wanted to come alone.

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“Too busy?” She’d given me a knowing look. “You two rabbits are having way too much fun following doctor’s orders, aren’t you?”

I’d put on my cheerful, playful face and giggled so she wouldn’t ask any more questions about the treatments. Or about his frequent and numerous late nights at the office. Or how I’m coping with it all.

I almost feel her lean in, her breath on my cheek, when the guide’s voice murmurs, “Notice not only the wounded deer, but the broken tree limbs as well. Frida is said to have had great empathy for damaged things. Once, when a servant brought her an old chair to ask if it should be thrown away, she took the broken leg and carved her own lips on it to give to someone she loved.”

Amidst a dead forest of grey, rotting trees, Frida’s stoic likeness stares back at me like a mask that has been placed over the head of a male deer. His bleeding body is shot through with arrows as it leaps over a fallen, leafy, tree branch. My guide lowers her Priscilla voice to share with me some intimate details of Frida’s private griefs—her injuries, miscarriages, her fierce but unobtainable wish to have a child, the frequent and numerous infidelities of Diego, the husband she adored.

I find I can’t quite look Frida in the eyes as the guide gossips her miseries into my ear. I imagine the Priscilla voice whispering the same secret tale to every museum visitor wearing a tour headset. I stare, instead, at the deer’s magnificent antlers, which extend out from above the human ears of the mask that cannot hide the deer’s much larger ones. The Priscilla voice has grown slightly grating. I feel the beginning of a migraine sprouting at my temples and shooting toward the top of my skull. The doctor says it’s a side-effect of the clomiphene.

a piece I’ve never seen before, very different from the others in the collection—a grotesque human creature with a small round face, purple hair, and a trance-like expression. At first its head appears to be drooping at the neck like a rag doll, but as I step closer, I see it is a mask slipping from a face. Frida’s ringed hand holds the mask, and her dark, coiled hair begins to show above it. The eyeholes look as if they have been punctured into the canvas, and the dark eyes behind them don’t quite match up. I step closer and squint through the eyeholes as Frida must have done, peering into her mirror as she painted.

It hurts my eyes, squinting that way, and the migraine slips down around my forehead.

Lord.

Pull yourself together, girl.

I return the headset and leave the museum without glancing back over my shoulder at the Frida stuck with thorns. I don’t think about the Frida pierced with arrows or the Frida bleeding from the chest.

I hurry along the river path, past the sweep boats, past the old, stooped trees, up to our apartment where I’ll shower, take my pills, and paint on my date night face before dinner.

What a great way to get in the mood on Ovulation Day. “Now this next piece,” the guide’s voice places her hand on my elbow, “is called The Love Embrace of the Universe, the Earth, Myself, Diego and—” I pull the headset down around my neck and stare at a Matryoshka doll-like image of mothers holding their children in their arms. The Universe cradles the Earth, the Earth cradles Mexico, Mexico cradles Frida, and Frida cradles her husband, a fat, naked baby Diego with pale greenish-white skin. Frida wears a face as strong and impenetrable as the Universe’s, but it can’t disguise the blood-red crevasse that cracks open her neck and splits her chest.

I think maybe I should go—soon. The air’s too close in the exhibit rooms, and it’s much more crowded than I expected. I don’t know why I thought I could fit this in with all I have to do.

As I turn to walk out of the room, a small painting catches my eye and makes me start like a small jolt through the chest. It’s

77

SANCTUARY Sam Gougher

“I talk to myself and look at the dark trees, blessedly neutral. So much easier than facing people, than having to look happy, invulnerable, clever.” —Sylvia Plath Yet again it was June in the woods.

The sky, painted in blues, whites, and every color between, deposited imprints of light upon the eyelids of all who dared to ogle it. The forest blossomed with bright green leaves, yellow clusters of wildflowers, and warm lively bark, shaking with the movement of birds from branch to branch. The air smelled of running fresh water from the creek, dewy green grass, and clean, unpolluted breeze. The ground seemed to almost sweat during the mild humidity of the day—a single step could not be taken without disrupting the natural calm.

June sighed and pulled her hair out of her face. It was hot.

The girl continued to walk alone on the forest path, thinking of nothing in particular besides the beauty of her surroundings and the sweat on her skin. She tried her hardest to imagine the chill of the winter, which just six months ago would have covered this entire area in snow, but the phantom sting of frost refused to touch her bare arms. All June could feel was the warm embrace of the sun, bringing her soul to life like a warm cup of tea.

She had some idea of where she was headed, but she wasn’t going to stress herself out with a map. As far as June was concerned, any small clearing would do.

June eventually came across a break in the thick pathlining bushes, seemingly put there by animal footsteps or a previously fallen tree. She winced as the prickly branches and thorns of the indistinguishable overgrown plants pricked her body as she made her way through.

Eventually, she found herself where she wanted to be. Lost, in the forest, alone.

June stood quietly in a private, almost dreamlike clearing, lined on all sides with dense bushes and trees. The sounds and the scents of the natural setting were only intensified by June’s deeper location within the park. This, she thought to herself, could finally be it.

The girl took a deep breath, dropped her backpack in the grass, and sat cross-legged on the forest ground. She did not close her eyes; instead, she looked back and forth from one side of the clearing to another, somehow seeing more than what was before her line of sight.

One tree in particular almost immediately caught June’s attention. It was a large, tall elm, bursting with bright green leaves and bearing a nearly geometric pattern on its bark.

June narrowed her eyes to focus on the towering plant, seeing only glimmers of the life that was contained within.

Minutes passed, then hours. At some point June reached into her backpack and took a long swig of water.

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All who are well-versed in dendrochronology are aware that the rings lying within a tree’s sturdy bark indicate the amount of years it has lived. Tree-ring dating has been a reliable manner of analyzing atmospheric conditions for a sizable amount of history—in fact, the oldest tree on record is nearly 13,900 years old.

Time became fuzzy to June after one month had passed. She no longer felt certain human urges, such as the need to eat or drink or sleep. She was a constant object, an upstanding marker in time. The only way she could tell that the world still turned was the passing of the seasons themselves.

June took a deep breath as she reached her fifth hour in the clearing. Within the ever-constant forest, time hung suspended in the summer air like molasses.

Eventually the snow melted away, and the grass stiffened in green attention towards the sun. Blossoms appeared on the trees’ branches and June enjoyed the glimmers of a rabbit frolicking with a bird. By this time she was sitting directly at the base of the big elm tree, tied up towards it with roots in an eternal embrace. June wished to join the glimmers again, but it wasn’t quite time yet.

When the trees in the clearing began to turn yellow, orange, and red, even more glimmers decided to present themselves June was a teenager, though, and therefore was by no means to June. A girl in colonial clothing, a bird and its nest of eggs, well-versed in dendrochronology. But she did not need a silent old couple with hands permanently bound. June advanced knowledge of trees’ inner rings to feel that the tall plants around her had lived long, solid lives—they had seen so wished to join them within the elm, but the notion of time still prickled at her neck; she had to wait. much, from violent storms to frolicking woodland animals to hikers’ camps of tents. They had watched the development of The leaves fell off the trees and the snow began to fall. June the land itself, from open woods to a battleground to a small could feel strong roots growing around her body, wrapping suburban state park. And yet the trees did not judge. They her up in a warm embrace. She was covered in powder but watched, and they listened, but they never, ever would rashly felt nothing of the frost—to her, it still seemed as though act. It was almost as though no time passed through their it was summer. Or, perhaps not summer, but just… nothing. hollow eyes.

Everything.

A tree was a being lost in the passage of time—it was the June began to inch towards the elm without consciously moving. sturdiest home that could resist the most destructive of The roots and branches almost seemed to pull her gently towards storms. Time passed, like streaks on an abstract canvas, their source, resembling a mother cradling her child. but the tree remained solid and sharp, only growing in size or width at a nearly indistinguishable pace. It paused time, A glimmer appeared to her in the snow, a middle-aged man in rendered it irrelevant, and offered no more answers than an old-fashioned suit. He held an extremely outdated camera it would have centuries ago. Inversely, it often implied the and took a fascinated shot of June before he disappeared. For fundamental questions that conscious beings had been asking some reason, a number made its way into June’s mind—that themselves for just as long. man was in the triple digits.

Night came and the sky shone with stars. June took another sip of water.

One week passed. June no longer felt thirst.

She had seen the first glimmer about a week and a half after she sat down.

A fox, old and mangy, semi-transparent in appearance, approached June and nuzzled by her side. After a few minutes it began to run around the clearing, as though energized by the presence of someone new, until it found its way back in front of the big elm tree. June blinked and the glimmer disappeared.

She had wondered if this was going to happen. There had to have been more conscious beings enthralled by the timeless majesty of the forest before her. The fox shared an important connection with June. She wondered who she was going to meet next.

One month passed and it was July in the forest. A glimmer of a boy, wearing a large sweatshirt and holding a cigarette in his hand, appeared to June. He smoked for a while, offering no affection or even recognition of the girl in the clearing, and then disappeared back into the elm.

The trees blossomed in pinks, yellows, and whites, and the glimmers were almost in reach. The smoking boy often appeared to June in the evening, the fox in the chilly morning.

It was almost time.

Green leaves burst from the blossoms and June was almost in sight. The glimmers continued to curiously present themselves, ghosts from years, even centuries, in the past. But the prickle of time continued to tether June to the ground.

Yet again it was June in the woods. And time had finally stopped.

The teenage girl joined the glimmers, now glimmering herself, inside the heart of the big elm tree.

Within the bark of the elm, another ring appeared.

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ELEGY FOR PHILLY Nick Stanovick

August has come, cloaked in the stress of leaving the geese calling you to follow them south the skyline already a forgotten shape lost to a skirt hemmed with cloud. no stranger ponders this unfairness, the city ripped from you like a necklace from a damsel’s throat your sanctuary rendered useless a voice bled of sound you unsnarl the house key from its chain scratch your initials into dirt finally acknowledge the beggar’s hand what is it you must not forget? the dandelions crowding the papi store’s stoop ready to lose their heads the basketball gate braiding itself with honeysuckle the wavy summer heat keeping the asphalt quiet until twilight calls the boys from their rowhomes still, the final hours chew through you like maggots through sour meat. remember the dragonflies wiping fountain from their wings, the park dog nuzzling your arm? remember the pier— the slow tide of love, the weightless feel of skates, the river silvered by moon?

Isn’t this what the leaving do— hoard a timeline’s worth of memory into one last golden hour? then, sudden as a sickness, city in the rearview horizon napping above the dash, each breath putting another mile between the two what other option is there but to go and leave the sorrow to its work

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A PLACE OF SANCTUARY L’tajh Carter

Sanctuary is a fortress, more solace than solitude with crystal-like decoration, somewhere to lay your hat Sanctuary is somewhere to hang out ​with family and spend money until you’re broke Where passion is served on platters and ingested, Where happiness and joy reside, Where relaxation becomes more than electric This is a vacation that isn’t short Sanctuary is weekdays at a prison, opposing anything involving you The land of the free is the home of the oppressed People seek refuge in historical lies or fabricated truths The comfort sought after is hidden beneath subliminal prejudice and bias This is not paradise, constantly adapting to be fit, yet you’re not calculated to survive This doesn’t have to be home, but that’s what its residents made of it Sanctuary doesn’t have to be home, yet that’s what you can make it become

GHAZAL: FOR AUGUST IN PHILADELPHIA

52ND ST

A blazing inferno, burns bright, in this city A break from the darkness of night, in this city

The vendors with pop-up card tables blue and green body oils scarves and tunics colors like water in a warm place I’ve only just left elsewhere the ice spreading from the blocked inlet on the corner into the heart: where I’ve been, where I’m going the need to vanish from solid objects.

Flight seems most likely in these months.

52nd Street—glow of tax offices man in a Statue of Liberty balloon costume Al-amanah Islamic Place, open late— stands between me and emptiness, lights the walk home.

And the KicksUSA on the corner where glossy Jordans aren’t the only thing you can buy with a night off and a roll of cash.

And the ragged protest with boom box and flag the leaving and coming from the elevated train station where, walking home from work late I find safe passage again and again.

Clarence Wright

Impromptu block party with no city permit Celebration goes on in spite, in this city Cars blocking each corner, a stereo, a grill But the moon bounce is the highlight, in this city Corner store cheesesteak with a fifty-cent soda A Day’s lemon lime never Sprite, in this city Water plug unleashed on a scorching August day The fast-flowing rapids of white, in this city A bird sings, perched on the blocks’ last remaining tree Prepared for a solitary flight, in this city Hidden soundtrack for summer, louder than sirens Cicadas remain out of sight, in this city Sundresses matching butterfly’s apricot wings Vibrant native colors shine bright, in this city We stay lookin’ fly, facade of fresh clipped edges Barbershop stays open all night, in this city Natural beauty salons, free of all burnt ends Twists, locks and braids woven tight, in this city Row houses rub shoulders, intertwined lives within, Hear neighbors make love, hear them fight, in this city Block by block a new story, some best left unread Explosions ready to ignite, in this city

Lia Mastropolo

Walk straight past that house, like you don’t know what’s inside A roadmap of land mines in the blight of this city The beauty and malice sustaining each other Masochistic tension stretched tight, in this city A complicated love affair, drawn to her scars A match made for life, Mr. Wright, in this city

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PHILADELPHIA WRITING DIRECTORY Listing your organization, reading series, bookstore, or workshop is easy, affordable, and open to all members of the Philadelphia literary community. Email APIARY’s Project Director, Steven Burns, at steve@apiarymagazine.com for more information.

LITERARY ORGANIZATIONS

READING SERIES

LITERARY PUBLICISTS

BOOKSTORES

Philadelphia Writers’ Conference Inspirational & Aspirational: we welcome all genres and all levels. PWC promotes and encourages writers to reach their full potential. We bring writers together and put them in contact with writing professors, published writers, agents, and editors so that writers not only can perfect their craft but also gain key networking opportunities to provide encouragement and maximize their exposure for publication.

All But True

Since 2011 the All But True series has brought together some of the best fiction writers in the region—and several from beyond. Now located at Mighty Writers West (3861 Lancaster Ave.), the events each feature two authors who read from their works and engage in lively discussion with the audience. Upcoming, Nov. 16 at 7:00 p.m.: fiction about immigrant families from Rahul Mehta and Annie Liontas.

Celina De Leon: Book Publicist Social Media Strategist Based in Philadelphia, Celina De Leon earns press and social media attention for independent authors across the country. She strategically promotes authors’ books and launches and manages authors’ social media pages to boost their visibility. Celina loves getting the word out about writers with an important message about our world. She offers sliding rates.

Philly AIDS Thrift @ Giovanni’s Room We pride ourselves in being a unique and friendly neighbourhood store that has something for everyone!

While we continue to be your #1 source for new and lightly used LGBTQ fiction & nonfiction, we have expanded our selection to include: music, artwork, comics, Grussvom Krampus, clothing, and much, much more!:

pwcwriters.org

newdoorbooks.com/allbuttrue allbuttrue1@gmail.com

celinadeleonpr.com deleon.celina@gmail.com

Working Writers Group. c/o New Door Books, 2115 Wallace St., Philadelphia, PA 19130 215-769-2525

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/celinadeleon Twitter / Instagram: @celvoz

Facebook: www.facebook.com/ PhiladelphiaWritersConference Twitter: @pwcwriters

Women's National Book Association, Greater Philadelphia Chapter We are a group of women and WORKSHOPS men dedicated to promoting the world of the book locally The Erotic Literary Salon and through our national Serving writers since 2008, organization. Our members a safe and comfortable space are writers, educators, to share your steamy words publishing professionals and (NO CENSORSHIP). book lovers who meet on a Participate as a writer, regular basis in the Collegeville area to network, reader, storyteller, (fiction & learn, socialize and support literacy efforts. Events nonfiction) or just come to include Story Jams, author panels, socials and listen, enjoy and applaud.

Adult Sex-Ed Q&A prior writing-related workshops. to readings. “This is the most fun I have had for the wnbaphilly.org least amount of money.” Every 3rd Tuesday of the wnbabooksphilly@gmail.com month. Guidelines for reading and details on the website.

Facebook: www.facebook.com/ WNBAPhiladelphia/ theEroticliterarysalon.com Twitter: @wnbabooksPhilly TIME (The Bohemian Absinthe Lounge) 1315 Sansom St., Philadephia, PA PCSalons@gmail.com

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queerbooks.com Philly AIDS Thrift @ Giovanni’s Room 345 S. 12th Street Philadelphia, PA 19107 215-923-2960 Twitter: patgiovannisrm Instagram: patatgiovannisroom

Molly’s Books & Records We are a small but mighty mom-&-pop brick-&-mortar second-hand book & record shop in the heart of South Philly’s historic Italian Market. We specialize in literary fiction and poetry along with other subjects in the arts and academia. We’ve recently opened the back room and filled it with the city’s best selection of cook books & food ephemera. We also have a strong selection of vinyl records, and we are ALWAYS looking to buy more! mollysbooksandrecords.com mollybookstore@gmail.com Molly’s Books & Records 1010 S. 9th St. Philadelphia PA 19147 215-923-3367

Thirty West Publishing House (Thirty West, TW short form) Thirty West, founded in November 2015, is a traditional publisher of firsttime and established authors.

Sporting limited edition and standard prints, we value our authors’ creativity and wish to expand on their dreams. We publish works of cerebral, critical, and inventive prowess, with allusions to the de-stigmatization of mental illness. We also host a poetry reading series, ‘Thirty West Presents’, around the Greater Philadelphia region. thirtywestph.com thirtywestph@gmail.com Twitter/Instagram: @thirtywestph Facebook/LinkedIn: Thirty West Publishing House YouTube: Thirty West

SMALL PRESS Empty Set Press

Empty Set Press publishes chapbooks of conceptual and experimental poetry by writers who challenge the functions of language, form, and imagery, producing work that is innovative, new, and exciting. Based in Philadelphia, ESP strives toward a synthesis of local authors, visual artists, print shops, and venues within the city’s thriving literary landscape to broaden the horizons of the greater artistic community as well as the community at large. emptysetpress.com Facebook: facebook.com/emptysetpress Twitter: @emptysetpress Instagram: @emptysetpress

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POETRY Ahmad Almallah Ahmad Almallah grew up in Bethlehem, Palestine and moved to the U.S. when he was 18. A poet, scholar, and translator of Arabic literature, he currently lives in Philadelphia and teaches at UPenn. His poems have appeared in Jacket 2, Track//Four, All Roads will lead You Home, and forthcoming in Making Mirrors: Righting/Writing

by Refugees, and Supplement.

Anthology, KidSpiritOnline, and RookieMag, among others. She enjoys making flower crowns and cuddling with her cat, Maya (Angelou) Luna.

Lauren Howton Lauren Howton is an MFA candidate at McNeese State University in Lake Charles, Louisiana. She is the managing editor for The McNeese Review.

Katie Mitchell Katie Katie Mitchell Katie is a writer and public health Katherine Antarikso professional. Katie's public health focus is Katherine Antarikso was born on the island of Java, programming and communication, and her writing but does not drink coffee. When she’s not writing, focuses on race, social justice, and feminism. she works as an architect and enjoys taking walks Her work has been featured in Bustle, Rewire, around Philadelphia. She also collaborates with the Afropunk, and other publications.

Sanctuary Poets, performs traditional Indonesian dance, and volunteers with New Sanctuary Komal Keshran Movement. https://trinil.weebly.com/ Komal Keshran is a young, passionate, nonconforming creative. Her talents include being able Alisha Berry to rap at LaFayette's speed in Guns and Ships as Alisha Paige Berry grew up in the Philadelphia well as an immaculate Stitch impersonation. She area and has lived here most of her life. A math has an undying love for her family and friends, and English teacher, activist, and writer for the language, dancing, Joshua Hong and Sherlock past twenty years, she currently directs Camp Holmes.

Sojourner, a nonprofit organization providing affordable summer camp and year-round Davy Knittle leadership programs for Philly girls.

Knittle is the author of the chapbooks "empathy for cars / force of july" (horse less press 2016) and L'tajh Carter "cyclorama" (the operating system 2015). He lives L'tajh Carter is an artist of multiple mediums. Born in Philadelphia, where he curates the City Planning in Baltimore, moved to Virginia, then Philadelphia.

Poetics series at the Kelly Writers House.

Philadelphia Youth Poetry Movement (PYPM) is home. Most of my art is posted on social media.

Theo LeGro Avid gamer since the age of two. Thank you to Theo LeGro is a Vietnamese-American writer in everyone involved in the creation of this magazine, Brooklyn, NY. Her poems have appeared in Third thank you, and enjoy.

Point Press and Noble / Gas Qtrly, with more forthcoming in Juked. Her work focuses on the Jeff Chiu intersections of trauma, memory, mental illness, Jeff Chiu studied literature at the University and dreams. She lives for a high, sweet bluegrass of Washington in Seattle and has served as a fiddle.Sometimes she is on Twitter at @theodorka. poetry reader for The Literary Review (TLR). He currently works at the University of Pennsylvania Lia Mastropolo Libraries. Lately he has been making more of an Lia Mastropolo has lived in West Philly for the past effort to venture out from West Philly. nine years. Her poetry has appeared in Folio, Salt Hill, decomP, Bird's Thumb, Specter, and APIARY. Dave Harris Dave Harris is a poet and playwright from West Veronica Nocella Philly. His work has been featured at Huffington Veronica is a short, Aquarius, femme poet Post, Rattle, BOATT Press, Black Napkin, amongst hailing from Philadelphia. She began writing in others. He graduated from Yale University in 2016 high school and joined the Philadelphia Youth and is a candidate for the MFA in playwriting at UC Poetry Movement (PYPM) at age 15. In 2015, San Diego. she competed on PYPM's championship team representing Philadelphia at Brave New Voices.

Husnaa Hashim Her work can be found in Bryn Mawr College's Husnaa Hashim is a dual-enrolled senior and the Nimbus Magazine.

2017-2018 Youth Poet Laureate of Philadelphia.

Her work can be found in the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards, "Voices of the East Coast"

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Annie Paradis Annie Paradis' work has appeared in Packet BiWeekly, LUNGFULL!, Fence, Drunken Boat and elsewhere. In 2016, TXTbooks published her chapbook, LOVE POEMS. She lives in Philadelphia where she performs and teaches improvisational comedy and sketch comedy and hosts The Slam at Good Good Comedy, a monthly poetry based comedy show.

Catalina Ríos Catalina Ríos holds a B.A in Latin American Studies from Wesleyan University and a M.A in Spanish from Middlebury College. She is a recipient of a Leeway Foundation Harmony Grant and has attended the Bread Loaf Writer’s Conference. Catalina is a trained S.E.E.D facilitator (Seeking Educational Equity and Diversity) who is deeply committed to social justice, cultural awareness and respect for diversity in community.

Audrey Senior Audrey Senior lives in Newtown Square, PA, and is a rising senior at The Baldwin School. She enjoys writing poetry, prose, and everything in between.

Outside of creative writing, she loves to sing, perform, help others with their writing, bake, and read.

Sanam Sheriff Sanam Sheriff is a poet and writer from Bangalore, India. She currently resides in Philadelphia, PA where she is pursuing a degree in Creative Writing at Bryn Mawr College. Her work has been featured on Button Poetry, The Shade Journal and The Academy of American Poets, among others.

University, and earned her MFA from Emerson College. She has been published in The Boston Globe, Painted Bride Quarterly, Whirlwind magazine, Entropy magazine, and The Philadelphia Inquirer, among others.

Alexandra Vargas Alexandra Vargas is a writer and a waitress, and yes, she is listening to your conversations.

Alexandralives in Philadelphia, PA, and has been published in Turtle River Magazine, Revolver, Right Hand Pointing, and tenderness, yea.

Kory Wells Kory Wells lives in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, where she was selected the city’s inaugural poet laureate in 2017. Author of HEAVEN WAS THE MOON (March Street Press), she curates a local reading and open mic series and advocates for democracy, afternoon naps, and other good causes.

Find her online at korywells.com.

Clarence Wright Clarence E. Wright is an international poetry slam champion and Callaloo creative writing fellow. He is also the pastor of the Love Zion Baptist Church in North Philadelphia and a doctoral student at the historic Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School, he lives with his wife and kids in Cherry Hill, NJ.

FICTION Samantha Gougher Samantha Gougher is an eighteen-year-old Professional Writing student at Champlain College in Burlington, Vermont. She is the adoring wordmother of two novels, a novella, and several strange short stories. She also enjoys political and pop culture journalism (local Bucks County Courier Times) and writing for the screen and stage.

Nick Stanovick Nick Stanovick is a Temple grad, a Babel Poetry Collective alumni, and a member of Temple’s slam team that won the 2016 College Union Poetry Slam Invitational. His poems have appeared in Vinyl, Rising Phoenix Review, Drunk In a Midnight Terrance Greene Terrance Greene is from Philadelphia PA, Choir, and SickLit Magazine among others. He and a graduate of Olney High School and the loves grilled cheese.

Community College of Philadelphia. He is now Emily Thomas at Temple University studying Health Education.

Emily Thomas is a non-profit grant writer, When not in school, he is either writing or working environmental activist, birder, and occasional as a personal trainer. His literary influences include ballet dancer. She has a B.F.A. in Writing from Chinua Achebe and Arundhati Roy. Pratt Institute, lives in West Philadelphia with her wife + cats, and works as the grant coordinator for Christy Lenzi Lenzi’s fiction has won the Eldin Prize and Hunger Community College of Philadelphia.

Mountain’s Katherine Paterson Prize in its Gina Tomaine category. Her debut, Stone Field, was published by Gina Tomaine is a Philadelphia-based writer Macmillan/Roaring Brook, 2016. and editor. She has lectured in composition and literature at Rosemont College and Saint Joseph’s

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Meg Pendoley Having lived in Philadelphia in the 1990's, Lenzi now works at California’s University of the Pacific and is pursuing her BFA in Studio Art.

MULTIMEDIA

Beth Feldman Brandt Beth Feldman Brandt is a poet, performer and avid collaborator. She is the author of Sage David Satten-Lopez (2012) andSolace (2014). For “RetroLove”, Beth Satten-López is a student of the End of the World, New Historicism and Gorgias; he likes cooking and conceived, wrote and performed with musical taking walks on the beach. He hates Enlightenment collaborators resulting in an evening-length show, book and album. Beth is Chair of the Philadelphia’s humanism; he loves cats. A formative moment for his writing is listening to Max Roach’s and Abbey Lincoln’s Poet Laureate Committee. More at www. brandtwords.com.J “Triptych.” Follow him on Twitter @pocospeed.

Elizabeth Baber Melissa Simpson Elizabeth Baber is a poet trying to be a poet and it’s Melissa "Lissa Alicia" Simpson, is a 27-year-old hard. You can find her work in Bedfellows Literary freelance journalist, blogger, writer and student.

Journal and Open House Poetry Journal. For more The Philly native began her freelance career in 2012 and has since written for XPN The Key, Jump information on her project “Mother Internet : Blessed Virgin : a Coming of Age Story” visit Magazine, PhillyVoice, and Technical.ly Philly. http://motherinternet.tumblr.com/ Currently, Melisa explores her creative writing skills through prose, short stories, and creative non-fiction.

Jim Walls Jim Walls is a South Philly-based writer of gay fiction. His work can be found on websites such as Shabby Doll House, Alien Mouth, and Potluck Magazine, and in print via Dostoyevsky Wannabe.

NONFICTION Tyra Jamison Tyra Jamison is a writer that sits at the intersections of Black, woman, young, artist, student, Pittsburgh born, and Hill District raised.

She is now pursuing her Creative Writing BFA at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia."

NEW SANCTUARY MOVEMENT INTERVIEW

Erlina Ortiz Erlina Ortiz is a Dominican- American writer and theatre-maker. Her plays have been presented

by Power Street Theatre Company where she is resident playwright. Erlina believes being an artist is a superpower and she wants to use her powers for good. Up next: Las Mujeres at Taller Puertorriqueño, March 2018.

Sara Sherr Sara Sherr is a writer who teaches high school English in her spare time. She's been published in Metazen, Corvus, and The Lantern, as well as written episodes for P. King Duckling (Disney Jr.) and Super Wings (Sprout). She developed into a human being in Philadelphia, and now lives in New York, where you can probably find her doing yoga.

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OUR MISSION New Sanctuary Movement of Philadelphia builds community across faith, ethnicity, and class in our work to end injustices against immigrants regardless of immigration status, express radical welcome for all, and ensure that values of dignity, justice, and hospitality are lived out in practice and upheld in policy.

OUR VISION We work together to bend the arc of the moral universe towards justice and transform our communities into a place where immigrants, families, friends, and neighbors are safe, respected, and welcomed; where economic, spiritual, and emotional wholeness are realized; and where borders and divisions disappear as we build a community welcoming to everyone.

OUR WORK Through grassroots organizing led by affected immigrants, we fight and win immigrant justice campaigns with our members across nationality, faith, class, and immigration status.

Our community organizing in Philadelphia builds power in immigrant communities to alter the power imbalance, organizes direct action campaigns, builds the individual and collective capacity of the immigrant community and brings immigrant and ally communities together in solidarity to work for change.

sanctuaryphiladelphia.org