Drop Knowledge, Issue Zero by Monis Khan

drop knowledge

issue zero

drop knowledge

issue zero Nooks & Crannies 05 The Politics of Rhetoric 09 Stop. Look. Listen. 11 The Art of Tattoo Choice 14 What the F@#k Are These Scribbles on Trash Cans? 15 Leaving Urban Outfitters Behind 17 The Native 18 The Factory 19 The War on Ignorance 24 photo by Christian Dionne

a letter from our president

Drop Knowledge [drop nol-ij] - verb 1. To combat ignorance by contributing intelligent opinions, perspectives, or information to present discourse -noun 2. A magazine movement designed not only to inform the public about the people, events, and ideas that are influencing our cultural landscape, but also to inspire engagement in a greater cultural dialogue. Our perspective stems from the notion that knowledge breeds “coolness”. The mission of Drop Knowledge is not to define what is “cool”, but rather to encourage our readers to constantly challenge and reevaluate this notion for themselves.

Once upon a time, a crafty crew of young revolutionaries rallied around a common cause: to bring together the community—both local and global—by channeling their own diverse talents and interests to create a forum in which others could learn to celebrate the inherent beauty of expression. It was in the pursuit of this ambition that Drop Knowledge Magazine was conceived. Now, after a five-month gestation period, we are proud to share with you our publication. Correction: your publication. By the passionate, for the passionate. If our work and motives resonate with you, please join the cause. Rise up, spread the word, submit work. Drop Knowledge lives through your support and contributions. Thanks for downloading our first issue. Love, Monis

staff President Monis Khan Chief Editor Jessica Spraos Associate Editors Evan Friday Ariana Tobin Layout Editors Logan Alexander Austin Menard Publicity Makoto Chino Writers Dayo Adesokan Miki Carter Steven Flaig Kate Gaertner Daniel Harris Arian Hassanalizadeh Lucas Olivieri John Stanley Contributers Judith Ohikuare Sasha Odimar Noah McMillan Maddy Sembler Adam Wand

white flag projects

everest café and bar

4568 manchester ave

4145 manchester rd

saint louis, mo 63110

whiteflagprojects.org

everestcafeandbar.com

mon 12 - 7 sat 12 - 5

lunch buffet mon-sat 11:30 - 2:30

dinner mon-thurs 5 - 9 sat+sun 5 - 10

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photo courtesy whiteflagprojects.org

If you’re the type of person who wakes up in the morning and says, “damn, today I want to expand my mind,” don’t do drugs, head over to White Flag Projects. This not-for-profit ar t gallery hosts exhibits from some of the most progressive and influential contemporary

artists around the world. If you drop in before February 15th you can catch the exhibit One Loses One’s Classics, an exploration of radical methods and approaches to painting. The exhibit features sculptures and paintings from eleven talented ar tists representing styles

and perspectives from all over the world. An exhibition of ar tist Gaylen Gerber’s work begins on February 28th.

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EVEREST Café a n d BAR

White Fl ag Projects

photo courtesy everestcafeandbar.com

With a menu featuring the finest in Nepalese, Korean, and Indian cuisine, Everest Café and Bar offers one of the best restaurant experiences in the Lou. Aside from its brilliant array of healthy culinary options, the restaurant intrigues its customers with the inspirational tale of the executive chef/owner,

Devi States. After climbing Mount Everest, Dr. James States met the orphaned Devi working in a restaurant and decided to adopt him. Fueled with the desire to give back to others as his father gave to him, Devi opened Everest Café and Bar to offer healthier food options to an increasingly overweight community.

So, whether you’re feeling a great meal that won’t clog your arteries, or want to run into an accomplished chef that has a lot to say about life, Everest Café and Bar is an excellent option for any night out.

sel am ethiopian restaurant

the sci-fi lounge 6010 kingsbury ave saint louis, mo 63112

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the sci-fi lounge

selam ethiopian restaurant 549 rosedale ave saint louis, mo 63112

myspace.com/scifilounge

tues 8 - 12 thurs 8 - 12

mon (closed) tues-thurs 12 - 10 fri + sat 11:30 - 11 sun 2 - 10

photo taken by Jessica Spraos

Located at 6010 Kingsbury Ave, The Sci-Fi Lounge is the perfect place, to kick back, relax and relive your childhood. This place boasts one of the largest Star Wars toy collections around, hosts regular ninja vs. pirate nights and, despite what you may be thinking,

attracts a pretty cool crowd. On Tuesday and Thursday nights between 8 p.m. and 12 a.m. the owner, an ar tist who goes by the name of Coyote, opens the lounge to the public for free. Anyone is welcome to drop in, play some games, catch a movie or just chill.

We at Drop Knowledge have made a habit of coming back every week, and we hope to see you there.

photo taken by Austin Menard

Full disclosure: we’ve never been to Ethiopia, but the country’s cuisine is quickly becoming the official food of Drop Knowledge. We recommend that you bring your ass down to Selam on Rosedale (never heard of it?), a side street off of Delmar, to try some excellent African grub. This place is about as authentic as you can get in the hear t of the Midwest, with the décor

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and the ingredients shipped straight from Ethiopia. For those of you who went to “silver spoon” school, leave your interpretation of manners at home. Silverware is not a part of the equation here (although they will supply you with some if you ask). Instead, diners eat with their hands using injera, a spongy bread made of teff flour, to scoop the food into their mouths. The menu boasts plenty of meat dishes, but for those disinclined toward

the carnivore lifestyle there are also bountiful vegetarian and vegan choices that even a committed animal-eater will admit, “are pretty f__kin’ bangin’ ”. Even when you think you’ve consumed all you can manage, a tray of the most amazing coffee you’ll ever sip will come your way. The bottom line? Nowhere else on the Loop can you get good food and a heavy dose of atmosphere for under ten bones.

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illustration by Adam Wand

The politics

of rhetoric by Kate Gaertner

We vote on message.

A trademark of the American party system is our reliance on rhetoric: each political candidate must prove himself not only in terms of his political achievements, but in his ability to craft a message that compels people to support a particular political doctrine. People voted on message when they rose in support of Thomas Paine’s “Common Sense” and Thomas Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence in 1776, and people voted on message when they voted for Abraham Lincoln in 1860. People voted on message when they voted for Theodore Roosevelt in 1904 and for Franklin Roosevelt in 1932. All of these politicians were also rhetoricians: their ability to sway the public depended not only on their ability to craft an appropriate political agenda, but on their ability to sell this agenda to the people via the power of language. As in 1776, 1860, 1904, and 1932, so in 2008. While the agendas of political parties have changed over America’s history, the public’s reliance on political rhetoric has not. In the elections of 2008, we were faced with two competing political ideologies, and these competing political ideologies were represented by competing rhetorical ideologies. In their convention speeches in August of this year, both Barack Obama and John McCain expressed rhetorical ideologies: stories of what in means to be an American, stories meant to compel people on emotion, rather than on logic. If we base politics on these stories – Obama’s story of hope and change and the idea that “I am my brother’s keeper, I am my sister’s keeper” and McCain’s story that one must live and die

at the service of his country – then we ought to examine the gatekeepers of the rhetorical fables that have shaped our political landscape. The men who write speeches for Obama and McCain are, in some ways, the most powerful figures in modern politics. Mark Salter, McCain’s speechwriter, has shaped not only McCain’s rhetorical message, but his identity. Salter, at age 53, has worked for McCain for twenty years and essentially holds the key to McCain’s political identity. Salter is the product of a working-class Iowa upbringing; his father was in the military, and McCain’s message of the nobility of sacrifice has largely been crafted by Salter’s worldview. McCain’s political rhetoric changed drastically under Salter’s direction: he has begun to give novelistic speeches with flowery language that speaks to a forceful, almost religious brand of patriotism. Together, McCain and Salter have written five best-selling books that embody this brand of patriotism. McCain’s literary message is a manifestation of worldly sobriety that stems on the tragic – it is the idea that we must act stoically in the face of a fluid and dark world, that our meaning is to be found not in victory (which is perhaps unattainable), but in the fighting for it. By contrast, Obama’s chief speechwriter, Jon Favreau, is twenty-six years old. He interned for John Kerry in 2004 after graduating from college, and began writing speeches when the office he worked for was short on staff. When Obama first interviewed him, Favreau confessed that he had no theory of speechwriting, and that he admired Obama’s 2004 convention speech because his story fit into a larger Ameri-

can narrative. Favreau does not shape Obama’s message, but reinforces one. His job is not to create new political rhetoric, but to strengthen existing rhetoric. Admittedly, Obama has a gift for political rhetoric that comes around perhaps once in a century, but Favreau is nevertheless the formal gatekeeper to a message that inspired millions of Americans to vote for Obama. If McCain’s literary worldview is essentially tragic, Obama’s is essentially triumphant: it is gleaned from the idea that our struggles will result in victory, that we can make the world a better place if we work hard. In the speeches crafted by McCain and Obama, by Salter and Favreau, politics is reduced – or perhaps enhanced – to the realm of literature, of worldview, of narrative message. The conservative view composed by McCain and Salter is no longer merely a set of policies, but a story of how to live; the liberal view composed by Obama and Favreau is no longer an agenda, but a message. In choosing their literature, people define their culture. Choosing Obama’s liberal worldview means that Americans have chosen the rhetoric of hope and change over a message of devoted servitude. By choosing this narrative, we have chosen the themes for the larger narrative of our lives, voting not only for a candidate, but for a philosophy.

s, e-view r , s w e pre-vi

in the l o o c at ’s and wh

world

NINTEN

DO DS

Nintendo has revamped its incredibly popular handheld with just enough features to give it that cool factor they are so good at capturing. The major changes are an integrated camera, SD card slot, a larger brighter screen, and a built in web browser. However, they removed the GBA slot, presumably to make room for all the new stuff and to keep the DSi thin.

playback with on-the-fly manipulation capabilities, and an online store with the possibility of free game downloads. If you’ve been meaning to pick up a DS and see what all the hype is about then you should wait till this one comes stateside in 2009. If you already have one then there isn’t really enough here to justify buying another, unless you’re a Nintendo addict.

WATCHMEN?

Christian Bale as he appeared in the most recent Batman film was badass. Sitting through previews before The Dark Knight was not. Or at least I didn’t expect it to be. That was until a trailer for the highly anticipated movie, Watchmen, grabbed my attention. Originally published as a series of comic books by DC Comics in 1986, Watchmen is set in the nuclear age of October 1985, in a place where costumed super heroes are real and the country is on the brink of nuclear war with the Soviet Union. The plot revolves around a group of superheroes that take it upon themselves to save the world. But who will save them from the mysterious killers murdering members of their social circle?

The only graphic novel to ever win a Hugo Award for best work of fantasy or science fiction, Watchmen is a highly acclaimed piece of literature. Needless to say, the movie adaptation will have a lot to live up to. Faithful watchmen fans will undoubtedly flock to theaters with high expectations and preconceived ideas about how the film should play out.

READS LIKE A COMIC

The new additions all have really fun software to go along with them; an image editor, music

T E R C E OST S

P PostSecret is a community art project that encourages people to anonymously submit postcards with their best-kept secrets and expose them to the world. Frank Warren began this project in 2004, printing three thousand blank postcards and inviting people to share a secret. The postcards were left in subway stations, art galleries, and even in places as discrete as the pages of the books in local libraries. That same year, he created an art installation for Artomatic, a fiveweek, multimedia arts event held in the Washington, D.C. area, in which he displayed many of the secrets that had been sent.

Since then, Frank Warren’s PostSecret Project has become not only an art exhibit installation, but also PostSecret.com, what Time magazine describes as “…one of the world’s 50 coolest websites”, and also a series of books titled PostSecret: Extraordinary Confessions from Ordinary Lives, A Lifetime of Secrets, My Secret, and The Secret lives of Men and Women. If you want to read up on other people’s secrets or maybe reveal your own, check out the PostSecret website at www.postsecret.com.

While fans are anxiously awaiting the arrival of Watchmen, the author of the graphic novel, Alan Moore, is not. After previously disappointing adaptations of his graphic novels, such as A League or Extraordinary Gentlemen, it is no wonder he has taken his name off the film.

Although the movie will not premiere until March 9th of 2009, devout fans of Watchmen are already getting excited. This year at Comic Con in San Diego, thousands of faithful fans lined up to meet the movie’s cast and director, Zack Snyder (300, Dawn of the Dead). Here in St. Louis, hundreds of copies of Watchmen have been sold at Star Clipper, a comic book store in the loop. Even Apple is capitalizing on the Watchmen craze, releasing animated chapters of the novel on iTunes.

“I find film in its modern form to be quite bullying,” Moore told the Los Angeles Times. “It spoon-feeds us, which has the effect of watering down our collective cultural imagination. It is as if we are freshly hatched birds looking up with our mouths open waiting for Hollywood to feed us more regurgitated worms.” I don’t think I like the idea of eating worms, but if they taste anything like the adaptation of V for Vendetta, another Alan Moore film, then this March I am definitely willing to give worms a fair chance. the end?!

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N E T S I L . K O O L . P O T S

WHO WATCHES

A few weeks ago, I made a decision that changed my life. After months of research and secret, lustful gazes into store windows lined with erotically arranged mannequins, I decided to walk into American Apparel and purchase my very first Onesie. I bought the item, a grey tri-blend halter romper, without even trying it on, fearful that I would lose my nerve once I saw how ridiculous I looked in the very unflattering fluorescent light of the AA dressing room. I rushed home and removed my purchase from the bag, pulled it over my hips and, with extreme caution, turned around to face a floor length mirror. At that moment my mission in life revealed itself: I was a messenger. Jesus had God. I had the Onesie. A single piece of cloth strategically engineered to cover a woman’s body, the Onesie is, as far as I am concerned, the most incredible invention in the history of the universe. Its appeal is simple: it’s an ingenious combination of comfort and sex. It is suggestive, playful and insanely comfortable. Everything, lady lumps et. al, is tucked in. For those feeling modest, the look can be easily censored with a pair of sweatpants or loose trousers, turning that flashy, rump skimming booty short into a conventional and socially acceptable fully covered derrière. I am not entirely sure why one ever stops wearing the Onesie. It’s a question that plagues my soul. I suspect that somewhere between toddlerdom and now it became uncool to wear single colored one-pieces, at least it did for all of us who were too insecure in junior high school to rock the look. Now I sport mine proudly, parading around my house looking like an overgrown (and oversexed) infant. I have begun to build an Onesie wearing army amongst my friends and family and it has become my gift of choice for every female in my acquaintance. I am not trying to bully you into buying one (though I am always looking to recruit more soldiers into my Onesie reserve) but I do recommend that you try it. Worst comes to worst, you feel a little ridiculous and chide yourself for blowing 20 bucks at some hipster L.A. based corporation, but let’s be honest- you know you want one.

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preaching the onesie

The

Art of

Tattoo

by Jessica Spraos

Choice by

Dayo Adesokan illustration by Maddy Sembler

Having reached the milestone of eighteen years of age near the end of my freshman year in college (an unfortunate punishment for a precocious childhood), I was faced with a decision that many American teenagers must ponder. After years of experimenting with my identity, I felt that it was then time to attain the ultimate and indelible brand of self-realization: a tattoo. The idea had been in my mind for years, silently fermenting in a pool of pop cultural images of rock stars and prowrestlers. My elder brothers had both gotten ink shortly after their eighteenth birthdays. The first was able to conceal his rendition of Jesus from my parents for two years, the latter’s gory image of a heart nailed to a cross was discovered in two weeks. Neither are deeply religious. In the past, I believed my future tattoo would also take on a Christian theme, following my brothers’ assumptions that our pious parents would be forced to approve slightly of our “faith” upon discovery. Shortly before my eighteenth birthday, I received an impromptu, almost eerily perceptive, speech from my

father: “Do not get a tattoo. Just don’t.” I placed his request in the back of my mind and hoped that I would be able to hide the mark more craftily than my elder brothers’ had hidden theirs. Since, however, I refrain from entering a tattoo parlor simply because I have no idea what to get. I will often take hours out of my day to think of the one symbol or phrase that can paraphrase my message to the world and remain true to my identity for the remainder of my life. It is in these times that I discover the truly mercurial nature of human adolescence. How can I expect to choose one symbol to represent my quintessential being, when the me of today opposes the me of yesterday? Am I so arrogant, (or perhaps humble), as to believe that my current identity is as developed as it will ever be? That it is the ultimate culmination of a lifetime’s experience? Not quite. I am, however, arrogant enough to assert that my existence, our existence, is like that of a snow sheet, which is compounded annually by new layers of being, melting and blending into those of

years past. We are perennial symbols of growth and development, demolition and reconstruction. While we must embrace our identities without shame, we can never be resistant to change, or rather, improvement. A tattoo is then a mark of personal history, a graffiti image on a building in construction. Though many represent outdated expressions of the self, there is a certain draw to updating the self-brands as often as one sees fit; the chance to superimpose new ideas, new images over those now lacking substance. After consideration, I still see the appeal of getting a tattoo – so long as I make the personal pledge to remove or replace it as soon as it becomes outdated. More enticing is the thought of avoiding that hassle altogether and getting one tattoo to represent my final, cumulative self upon the completion of my maturation. The brand will be administered by a qualified tattoo artist/mortician of my choosing in the final moments of my life: a small autobiographical epitaph, simply reading, “Finished”.

by Lucas Olivieri

When do these mofos do this and why? To avoid attention and incarceration, graffiti artists often do large bombs at concealed spots during the early hours of the morning. Although graffiti is technically a crime, artists take their craft seriously and consider their work to be art. Like their more traditional peers, graffiti artists practice and sketch before they actually decide to go and tag or bomb a spot. Some artists fill pages of their sketch book with the same letter written over and over again, practicing until their style has been perfected. Bombs are meticulously designed before an artist goes out and paints a piece. For many, graffiti has become a legitimate form of expression. London artists D*FACE and Bansky have used their art to demonstrate their political and intellectual beliefs, making pertinent statements about society and politics in their pieces. While I do encourage you to check out some of the amazing graffiti St. Louis has to offer, I wouldn’t suggest trying to add your own work to a pre-existing piece. Writing on or over other people’s bombs or tags is considered offensive and insulting. This is not to say you shouldn’t give graffiti a shot if you’re interested. Start out by inventing your own alias and see where it takes you.

Important Graffiti Terms: Tag:

When people write with a paint marker or spray-paint on something with stylistic writing it is called a tag. People use tags to publicize their names in a community, so the same artist’s tag may be found in multiple locations in one city.

Bombs:

Bombs are graffiti murals made with spray paint, often including the name of a clique or an individual’s alias.

Three letters:

Three letters refers to graffiti crews that usually have three part names represented by a three part acronym.

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What the F#*k are Those Scribbles on Trash Cans?!

It was a peaceful summer day on North Milwaukee Avenue in the magical city of Chicago, Illinois. With money in my pocket and fashion on my mind, I hit the state’s greatest shopping district with the intention of doing my part to preserve capitalism. As usual, I began this final stretch impatiently, having already exhausted my patience and debit account at the pricey State Street and Michigan Avenue. I visited the small boutiques on North Milwaukee, undergoing the same routine at each shop: I would express unbridled excitement upon viewing an item of interest, become disappointed after noticing said item’s price, attempt to negotiate with the small business owner, and eventually accept an invitation to leave the shop. “Try Urban Outfitters,” suggested one young manager, to the laughter and applause of his workers. I didn’t get it. Four boutiques into the hour, I decided to stop paying homage to the city’s fashionistas and set my sights on the true destination of my daylong exodus: Urban Outfitters, the hipster’s Mecca. I entered the megastore slowly, stopping at the entrance to take in the familiar layout and aesthetics. After a brief, envious look at the women’s Nike Dunks, I headed upstairs to the Men’s department. When nothing initially caught my eye, I made an optimistic second round, then a third, and a fourth… Was this the entire department? Was there another level? Disappointed, I headed over to the Clearance T-shirts rack. After chuckling at several ironic pictograms, I stumbled upon something rather befuddling. It was a t-shirt with a picture of the late Richard Pryor, arguably the greatest black comic of all time, contorting his face into a foolish, albeit amusing, expression. The shirt was

out of place in the store. Here, somehow, it was offensive. Upon exploration, I found a mind-blowing assortment of t-shirts and clothes that seemed to appeal to no one in particular, but everyone in general. Any other day I may have ignored this, but the way the boutique owners had looked at me earlier alerted me to something: Urban Outfitters was exploiting and successfully marketing the ideas of their competitors. The t-shirts that seemed so out of place at the franchise would easily have fit in at any number of smaller shops in the area. The jeans, jackets, shoes, and hats that seemed oddly in contrast at the megastore would have appeared at home in any number of individually-owned boutiques. The clothes, books, and furniture it would have taken me numerous trips to many different stores to find could all be found at one, and this, I knew, made them less special. It had finally dawned upon me that the chain is successful merely because it combines clothing deemed unique in many separate spheres of fashion under one giant roof, creating a bubble of the “faux-cool.” Urban Outfitters has in recent years developed a monopoly on individuality with skillful attention to subtlety. More ubiquitous franchises such as The Gap, Abercrombie & Fitch, and Express are often denounced for their mass distribution of unoriginal clothing. While UO manages to escape such attacks virtually unscathed. Urban has successfully distracted its consumers from the ironic paradigm that allows them to buy original clothing from an unoriginal source. By marketing the store’s eclectic selection to many esoteric divisions of fashion, the company has maintained the

BY DAYO ADESOKAN

false air of idiosyncrasy associated with its products. The shop I have spent thousands of dollars funding is employing a shotgun approach to sales; Urban Outfitters is essentially a trendy Walmart. While my inborn distaste of all things corporate hasn’t kept me from shopping at many other nationwide chains, my perception of Urban Outfitters’ treachery has since forced me to distance myself from the franchise. Not helping the chain’s cause is the fact that four years ago during a decidedly lackluster election, nationwide locations carried “Voting is for Old People” t-shirts, while during this year’s much more popular campaign, the franchise’s attitude regarding politics has changed to match current trends. Even worse, despite the financial contributions of its president to the Republican Party, most Urban Outfitters stores carry an exorbitant quantity of pro-Obama t-shirts. While said political affiliations are by no means a condemning trait of the company, they do serve to highlight how distanced its core of beliefs is from those advertised on its merchandise.

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LEAVING URBAN OUTFITTERS BEHIND

The Native by Jessica Spraos

There is something to be said for being a native; a certain sense of pride you get from knowing that the Pizza on Main Street isn’t quite as good as at the place down the corner. A subtle and silent gratification when you remember that the usual route to school is under construction and taking the back way will save you 15 minutes sitting in traffic. The security of being a local can sometimes make it very difficult to travel to other places where you are forced to be a tourist and ask for directions, where you cannot discern between a good bar and a bad one, where you do not understand or appreciate the difference between rival sports teams. Being an outsider can be uncomfortable. Still, being an outsider has its advantages. As a first time visitor you get to explore a new city with an open mind. That clothing store down the street? It might carry the coolest kicks you’ve ever seen. It used to share the corner with an infamous coke dealer, but he got busted a while ago and since you don’t know any better you

walk down there and check it out. That fresh perspective is something the locals have a very difficult time regaining. Considering the native/outsider relationship has led me to wonder how much I have missed out on as a result of my prejudices, both founded or unfounded. What experiences have I avoided because I was too scared? What acquaintances have I failed to make because I was restricted by my own stereotypes? How has being a local inhibited my curiosity? The responses to these questions, I’m sure, are numerous, but dwelling on my shortcomings wouldn’t be productive. Instead, I would prefer to think about all that I could look forward to and anticipate if I were to live my life a little differently. What would happen if I didn’t always let my judgments, whether based on instinct or experience, get the best of me?

Though the store’s selection never ceases to amaze and entice me, I feel that purchasing even the most appealing clothes from UO directly contradicts my individuality. I refuse to purchase clothes from a franchise that bases its sales on a market analysis of what is ‘cool.’ Thus, I have decided that my most recent excursion to Urban Outfitters will be my list excursion to Urban Outfitters. My reasons are numerous and obscure, but above all I fear that if ever again I cross the threshold into that chic abyss, I will be conscientiously obligated to destroy it or allow it.

fact.

Bodiless by John Stanley God is a cripple Bodiless. watching the breathing bodiless.

Oatmeal Cookies by Steven Flaig Watching through America’s eyes this triumph of false prophets and unholy executives. Hooray! As you chase the dream of your neighbor with lawn and Lexus. Mushroom clouds of propaganda and Hate selling self esteem, enlightenment. Call now to receive a free gift. Indulgences sold at Starbucks. Half price. Like so many sheep, follow the herd. Alas, no Shepard, blind sheep following blind sheep. But the wolf laughs, he can see you’re all sheep. The machine an extension of the self. No deadline, but a cat on the wall ticktocking, crazyeyed. This god of yours must surely be somewhere. What then, can we rage against? The world hangs with showers of a million thunderheads. But don’t grab an umbrella, This pilgrimage is spiritual- the truly enlightened need no transportation.

He made the seas but was never tackled by the surf, never threw out a panicked hand beneath the saltwater sting. He made the mountains but never felt the peak ’s fear rise up in his chest, any shortness of breath. He made the moon but never needed a crescent’s quiet light in his omniscient glide. He made happiness? Life would be lonely when you don’t have lonely when you can’t make a mother.

They burn to live, jump when your god says “how high,” and seek to answer some questions he forgot to ask.

the factory poems, stories and nonsense 20

fact.

Her clumsy mistake made him smile again, and he fought the urge to suppress it.

Breakfast by Dayo Adesokan

She had fallen asleep on the kitchen

table by the time he arrived. The sound of him fumbling to open the three locks,

accompanied by his loud obscenities must have stirred her. She twisted the third lock and opened the door, widening a frame he should have seen for the last time several hours ago. He entered and surveyed the room as she slowly resecured the locks, uneager to confront him. “Everything’s clean,” he said to no one in particular. “Yeah,” she replied to the peephole. He had been expecting the act of several hours ago to leave an indelible stain on the expensive condominium. The previous day, he imagined the event being amplified months and years after his death, he envisioned himself as the mysterious protagonist of some modern ghost story. His twin sister would be forced to move out, unable to bear the memories, her every trip to the kitchen prompting a macabre phantasmagoria of his death. The suite would become inhabitable, perhaps even presumed haunted. “It smells like lemon in here,” he accused. He was speaking to her directly now, sole destroyer of his saga. He was infinitely glad he hadn’t left a note within reach—it would probably be in the trash by now, amongst countless blood-soaked lemon-scented Lysol wipes. Lysol wipes: Clean up death in a snap! The image of an executive at J&J proposing this ad-campaign made him smile briefly. “You want something to eat?” his sister asked from the door, unsure of whether he had smiled, but taking the invitation to speak. As if instantaneously realizing she hadn’t attempted to cook a meal in years, she quickly added, “Some cereal?”

“Wheaties, the breakfast of suicidals,” he remarked acerbically. They were both slightly surprised by the joke, but eager to laugh. “Now with more ricin,” she added nervously. He laughed aloud now, granting her permission to join in. Their similar senses of humor and ability to find it in such subjects had brought them together for years. This was on a very short list of “Cons” he had composed when originally considering the action. He walked over to the kitchen cabinets to retrieve two bowls and noticed the knife lying on the dish-rack, clean. He reached for two spoons in the drawer, his laugh ending abruptly. “How did your little test go?” he asked, pouring skim milk over two small mounds of Lucky Charms. “Stop calling it a little test,” she protested rather rudely, he thought. “The MCATs,” he revised, placing a bowl on her side of the table and moving over to his. He had chosen the side of the table facing the television set the day they moved in and found he couldn’t bring himself to sit anywhere else, even when the TV wasn’t on. Any other chair was uncomfortably foreign, distant. “I didn’t finish,” she mumbled over her first spoonful. Until then, it hadn’t occurred to him that she was probably contacted about the incident during the examination. He imagined her checking her cell phone during a test break, only to find a voicemail from the hospital and wondered

if the caller ID would have read 911. It was unlikely, but the thought brought him to a grave silence. “Why like that?” she interrupted, a loud clang announcing the arrival of metal upon ceramic. “Why would you try that in such a painful way?” He thought of an incident in his childhood when he accidentally experienced the guilty pleasure of cutting. He had been rifling through his parents’ drawers and came across an old razor blade. Without thought, he removed it from its paper sheath and began tracing the creases in his left palm methodically. It was only when finished that he opened the hand to reveal the work of his craft, a trio of crimson streaks racing to the border of his palm, single-file. He hadn’t intended to draw blood, but the innocent procedure had all taken place so painlessly. “What might you have suggested?” he asked curiously. “Well, I wouldn’t have used a knife,” she pondered aloud, “or a gun, maybe pills.” “Pills,” he whispered, slapping his forehead and feigning sudden realization. “Maybe next time,” she joked along. He didn’t laugh. Laughter might indicate an agreement that he was not going to try again, a concession. She didn’t notice. They sat quietly and conscientiously ate this peculiar breakfast, the most important meal of the day.

Lanterns for Old Men by Nasmo Nasmo He set the sun and the moon to be earth’s lamplight, lanterns for men. He is too kind. For now we can see the prowler through the dark. We look at the moon and see as the ghosts descend on man’s faults, illuminated in the shadows. I wanted you to know of my unsubdued elations when the forest blooms at night. Now we are forced to slowly tug at existence to pick us up before it falls aimlessly to the sea of unfathomable milk idiosyncrasies. I clutch at your ragged holes to take me back to the edge of darkness so I can live constant, teetering on the crest of your eyelashes like I used to. I’m tired of always knowing danger, always vigilant of conditional love of the bursts and raves of the river. Please take me back to the dark silence where I listen hard for solemn harmony as if silence and solitude were a vacancy. I like your eternal mind wanderings falling beneath your underwhelming swells bobbing like an underweighted ocean buoy.

Smoking by John Stanley A true breath held, ballroom dancing twirling in last year’s icicles ’ sloppy drip on the front porch. Look upon a sapling with as much hope as a weed’s next breath or a spider’s next place behind the evergreens or the intersection dream of moonshine lemonade, and I can taste them all.

I remember the sweet dreamless sleep that slid tangential to your inaccessible tranquility. Hold your unessential lullabies for an easier time. The frenetic multitudes just don’t seem right anymore. I told you it was a bad idea to let stars loiter wasting energy on understated beings. We were to be anointed monarchs, but that was before the poppy seeds grew. Let the lantern burn your hands red until you drop the flame. Thank you for your kindness, but we were not ready. We were better off reveling in self-generated ignorance.

Pockets

Dayo Adesokan

by Arian Hassanalizadeh

Maternal Blankets by Nasmo Nasmo The everlasting universe of things emerges in window cracks like morning dew that flows through the mind, and rolls its rapid waves, undaunted by the precipitous steel now dark-- now glittering—now reflecting gloom— the face of my mother scolding me. In the wild woods, among the mountains lone, I step, careful not to drip into a crack and fall where waterfalls around leap forever. And as I look up to you dearest mother thou many-coloured, many voiced vale, the depth deplorable in your face, I only see fast cloud shadows and sunbeams: an awful scene. Forgive me mother, I only intended for the ethereal waterfall, whose veil robes some unsculptured image, to caress your cheek with a disillusioned hand wrapping all in its own deep eternity.

Billy tried often to quit, inevitably failing and rationalizing his decision the same way This shit is just too easy, I’m never gettin’ caught. Everything Billy saw he had to have. Packs of gum, lighters, pens, pencils, keychians, and any other trinkets he saw on store counters or hanging from his classmates’ backpacks found their way into his pockets. Once again he swore off stealing, but not before one last heist. At the mall he bought a belt from Hot Topic and asked for the biggest bag they had, all the while chatting the clerk up about all the Christmas gifts he had to buy that day. Armed with his oversized sack he headed to American Eagle, picked out three pairs of jeans and wrapped them around his left forearm. Without letting anybody see he grabbed six striped button down shirts and draped them over his forearm so as to conceal the jeans. He stepped into the fitting rooms where the young clerk stood poised to grab a number. “How many do you have?” she asked. “Just these six shirts,” he said and smiled. He noticed her eyeing him as she led him towards the fitting room, but he knew better than to mix business with pleasure and kept from starting a conversation. Upon entering the fitting room he laid the clothes out on the ledge, checking the price tag of each one. Hmm, Seventy bucks for pair of jeans and 15 bucks a shirt? He thought to himself I love that clearance rack, I’m about to walk out of this place with four times the clothes I paid for. He rolled the jeans back up, stuffed them in the bottom of the bag, took all six shirts under his arm and walked towards the cash register. He handed the cashier the clothes. “How do you wanna pay for this?” he asked. He reached in his pocket and produced John March’s credit card.

feat.

fact.

THE WAR ON IGNORANCE Billy always wondered why John’s wallet was so fat, and one day in the cafeteria he decided to find out. Billy watched as John paid for his meal and noted carefully the pocket in which John kept his wallet. Luckily, it was in the back pocket of his cargo shorts. The flap was unbuttoned and wide open. Nonchalantly, Billy reached for a banana to distract the lunch lady and pilfered the walled with his other hand. Smiling, Billy headed towards the bathroom and thumbing through the wallet he found over 12 credit cards. No way in hell is he gonna notice one of these missing, Billy thought to himself. Three weeks later, the card still worked. A good thief picks his targets wisely. Billy passed by the main office later that day and dropped the wallet in the lost and found box. “Credit or Debit?” asked the cashier. “Credit,” answered Billy.

Every day, without fail, we vacate our personal dwellings and are forced to bear arms as either attackers or victims in the War of Ignorance. The assailants are keenly disguised and seemingly no different from you and I. Beneath their tightly wrapped cloaks lie stocked arsenals of trickery and deceit. With booming loudspeakers, they assert falsities and lay claim to sources unseen, facts unread. Their objection is the destruction of information, the ostracism of those who seek it. Leading the ranks are media mavens and government officials who stand united in the legitimization of each other’s lies. In the front lines of their infantry stand leagues of paperboys, tossing black-and-white grenades of misinformation at poorly battered residences. Their generals are broadcasting bombardiers, concealing switches labeled “fire” behind barrages of insurmountable news desks—dropping ignorance every hour, on the hour. There is a deliberate air of conflict amongst their factions, a playfight in which the lazy fists of social dogma pretend to combat lackadaisical legs of liberal platitude. Reserves upon reserves of soldiers are ubiquitously present in the general populace, impossible to identify upon sight alone. They recite their leaders’

calls to arms and attempt their best impressions of these godless governors. These are the most dangerous of all. Their pretension, like their ignorance, knows no bounds and they grow stronger without constraint. However, you and I are not without defense. With our hands, we may shield our ears from the orders of the antagonist armies; to those we cannot hear, we cannot be expected to acquiesce. With our eyes, we may examine and molest the flaws and blatant errors in the enemy’s weapons. Information, in the hands of the protagonists, is evidence to be exhibited before the masses, not hidden in secrecy. The greatest weapon with which you and I are inalienably armed is the nose. It is feared greatly by each attacker, from the highest-ranking government official to the lowly, pretentious student. It has led to the downfall of regimes and is the key enzymatic component to any coup attempt. For as long as this war has been waged, no adversary’s weapon or enemy technology has been able to defeat the most formidable attribute of the nose: its ability to detect the pungent smell of bullshit.

He scribbled a signature on the receipt and took his copy. As he approached the exit, Billy noticed a security guard scowling at him. “How you doin’ sir?” Billy said cordially. “Good,” replied the guard with a nod. He’s oblivious, Billy laughed to himself. F@#kin’ Rent-A-Cop. Billy strutted toward the mall’s exit, all the while contemplating how well the outfits he just bought matched the plaid DC fitted hat he stole from Pac Sun last weekend. “Freeze!” he heard the raspy voice of the security guard scream. Billy snapped his head backward. Nobody. A couple walking by gave Billy a strange look, and shook their heads. Shit, my f@#kin’ mind’s playing tricks on me. Billy took a deep breath and resumed his stride. He quickly put the foreboding thoughts out of his mind. Like that would ever happen? This shit’s too easy. I’m never gettin’ caught…

illustration by Adam Wand

Xlthlx and the entwined seaweeds by Zoe Hillenmeyer

For the Longest Time I Made Up Legends About Myslef by Andrew Chu