EAST COAST INK, Issue 005: BONES

east coast ink issue 005 | bONes

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C O N T E N T S EAST COAST INK | Issue 005 | BONES

L E T T E r

f r o m t h e e d i t o r 2

P O E T R Y 4 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . T h e E a r B o n e s o f W h a l e s . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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The Builder Red Morning Solid Fading Gale Force Bones of This House Bruce Springsteen’s Guitar Jovibarba Globifera Mother and Child: New Bedford Whaling Museum Kafka’s Cane On the Bridge of Bones Onionskin Thoughts I Didn’t Say

F I C T I O N 2 8 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . S y n t h i a . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . T h e V o i d

.................. The Adventures of Slug

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Yo u r B o n e s A c h e w i t h I t s A c h e s

M I C R O F I C T I O N 4 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . T h e N i g h t A f t e r Yo u M o v e d . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . S t r o n g B o n e s

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . I H a v e L o v e d Yo u W r o n g

N O N F I C T I O N 4 5 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . C h i c k e n F i n g e r s

.................. Locus of Control .................. Bones on the Beach

B o o k R e v i e w s 5 8 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . T h r e e M i n u t e s i n P o l a n d b y G l e n n K u r t z

C o n t r i b u t o r s 6 1

ISSUE 005 EAST COAST INK Winter 2014― 2015

“bONes”

eci staff owner, editor-in-chief

Jacqueline Frasca associate editor

Austen Wright fiction editor

Erika Childers nonfiction editor

Jill Shastany

reviews

Laura Apperson editorial interns

Danielle Behrendt

Isabelle St. Clair

East Coast Ink Issue 005, Winter 2014―2015: Bones.

Copyright © 2015 East Coast Ink Cover image by Jacqueline Frasca.

Images inside front cover and on pages 14, 43―44, 48, and inside back cover by Jacqueline Frasca.

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East Coast Ink magazine is produced four times per year and is an individually owned and operated publication. For additional content , please visit ecimagazine.tumblr.com and connect with us @ecimagazine. Pitch us your creative nonfiction and submit fiction, poetry, micro fiction, book reviews, mixed media artwork and photography to ecimagazine@gm ail.com. Copyright of all materials reverts to the individual artists and authors. No materials may be reproduced under any circumstances without written permissions from the editorial staff.

letter from the editor If yo u ’ re anyth ing like me , yo u probably have m ore t han your fair share o f s ke l e to n s in th e clo s e t . T h os e who know m e will often tell others I wea r my h e a r t to o promine ntly on my sleeve, but I have c ollec ted piec es of myse l f tha t n e e d to b e ke p t b e ne a th th e s urfac e, just like everyone else. Winter take s me to ve r y d a rk p la ce s , a s it does m any, and som et hing about t he c old and t h e d a rk ne s s b r in gs o n a ve r y spec ific brand of “alone,” even when you’re s u r ro u n d ed by pe o ple . One th ing I ’ve been dwelling too m uc h on as the E a s t Co a s t h a s s e e n le s s a n d le s s d aylight is t his: I f I dig past t he exc uses I ma ke , a m I d o i n g my b e s t for o th e r people?

It ’ s a h a rd q u e s tion to a nswer for anyone, surely. While t here is n o d o u b t t h a t yo u mu s t ma ke e f fort s, every day, to tend to your happiness, I’m a f i r m b e lieve r th a t th e b on e s of my life are m ade of ot her people. The ve r y s ke l e to n of my eve ry move co nsists of those I c are about and what I c an d o fo r t h e m , with th e m, in th e ir best interest . This issue of E ast Coast I nk d e lve s i n to t h e i de a o f wh a t lie s b e n eat h—the bones, if you will, the very st ructure o f re l a t i o ns h ips , in te n tio ns , interac t ions. The borderline in m e is prone to ove ra n a lyze a n d , of te n , mis const rue these types of bones, despite being i n h e re n t ly h e s ita n t to reve a l my own.

I’ m h a p py to s ay th a t while I am no c loser to answering t he quest io n t h a t ’ s p l a g u in g me , th e a r tis ts who c ontributed to t his issue have t ruly o utd o ne t h e ms e lves a nd h e lp e d ma ke our fifth issue so gorgeous and diverse. I n s id e t h e s e p a g e s you ’ ll f in d th e works of sc ulptors, painters, illustrators and p h o to g ra ph e rs wh os e in te r p ret at ions of our them e “bones” went far beyo nd t h e l i te ra l a n d will re a lly ma ke you think. What t hrills m e is t hat we’re s e e ing mo re a n d mo re s tu d e nt work wit h every issue—t he writ ing, paint ing, and mu l t i m e d ia p ie ce s in th e ma gazine c om e from est ablished art ist s as we l l a s s t u d e n t s f rom Eme rs o n Colle ge, Vassar, Savannah College of Art and De s ig n, T h e N e w York Aca d e my of Art , Rhode I sland Sc hool of Design, New York Ac a d e my of Ar t a n d b eyon d .

A s we e nte r o u r s e con d year (I c an’t even believe it ), it bec om es mo re a n d m o re d if f icu lt to a r ticu la te my grat it ude for t his projec t . What st arte d a s a way to g e t b a ck in to th e art world has bec om e a forum for art ist s of a l l g e n re s , m e d iu ms , a n d nich e s . We hope to keep delivering them es t hat are b o th i n s p i ri n g a nd ch a lle n gin g s o we c an keep sharing artist s like these for ye a r s to come.

T h a n k yo u for re a d ing.

Jacqueline Frasca

editor-in-chief

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“Beston Beach,” 15”x22”, oil and crayon. Truro, MA, 2014 - Lorna Ritz

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[ poetry ] THE EAR BONES OF WHALES Elizabeth Schult z

among the stones along this beach I search for ear bones of lost pilot whales

along this beach wave upon wave the lost pilot whales sighed to each other

wave upon wave I hear echoes of their sighs to each other as they lay heaving

I hear echoes of their unknown desires as they lay heaving the sea bleeding

their unknown desires reduced to ear bones the sea bleeding their flesh dissolved

reduced to ear bones intricately realized their flesh dissolved these bones endure

intricately realized the whales whispering these bones endure hard and white

the whales whispering as I search for ear bones hard and white among the stones

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The Builder

Nicole Schonit zer I’m building a hut made of sticks Around an upside-down lawn chair stiffened with a weak plaster It was an assemblage It’s still an assemblage But now with windows Miniature people moved in I can hear them now Their little moans The far away yelps The smashing I like them But they often disturb dinner And I promised them I’d never knock down their house again Considering sending my own miniature to mediate If you bring nature inside Put it up against a white wall

I’m building a hat made of sticks Around an upside-down lawn chair stiffened with a weak plaster 6 feet 8 inches tall Can only be worn where the atmosphere can accommodate it I put on my cape and parade through the streets The wind blows The crown tilts, setting my body askew I’m the direction As the rain falls It drips off the branches and seeps into my eyes The colors invert and the textures pollute each other When it hails The woody container collects the white shards I throw the majority back to the sky and bury the rest If you bring nature inside And piece it together with wire And take it outside again Call yourself prince

I’m building a shrine made of sticks Around an upside-down lawn chair stiffened with a weak plaster The twigs inhabiting the upper sphere speak to each other Their language cannot be learned

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Their gestures complement those of their neighbors without error The branches of the base remain dutiful In their singular task of upholding Solidified by the thin metal strands that bind them Not once will they waver They provide the standard For those who prostrate If you bring nature inside Seek command no longer

“bathed in grass,� wendy vance

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Red Morning A. J. Huffman

From the rooftop, the mountains seem alive, throbbing veins raised to surface. I attempt to touch their breath. Caught in dawn’s chilled eyes, we fall across a lake, become broken blanket of fog.

solid fading

Samuel Augustine once in a while he felt the most believable silence without fear positioned close hot trembling it’s ok, whisper to it , slap it , wring it dry destroy its doubt all together. generations living deadly reign twanging against the next tin roof music to us, birds waken with us great ones live before our eyes you must worry at the disrespect with death expect love respect acceptance expect us we come swift like ones who set the late night fires floral paper burning tar, pearls, don’t melt our fire burns you do feel it accept it .

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“Barnett Bank, 2014,� charcoal and ink - Julianne french

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d o u g l a s b r e a u l t

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Gale Force Nik Way

A gust so hot to drive people into holes, melt color from hair and flags. Trash is easier to spot on bleached streets.

Singers silenced by storms too hot to touch, wielded with gloves. Used to deter other artists for their safety.

Heat disappears snow exposes bones buried, black as truth. Winds scatter charred ribs.

They built turbines to blow on towns across seas, I had to undress. Open windows let in the smell of burning.

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bones of this house Steve Klepetar

Remember the bones of this house, how solidly it sits, even as it seems

to fall away from the hill like a great stone, rolling. Remember how it

smells of baking bread on winter Saturdays, and pine-scented cleaner

the day company arrives. Remember how it looks among drifts of snow

before the plow comes through— orange chimney brick and trees bent ,

brown slush from your boots melting on bone-white tile inside the scratched

up door. Remember your aching legs, bone-weary fingers nearly numb

after shoveling, and how this house holds as you drink and burn your tongue.

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bruce springsteen’s guitar J.R. Solonche is is is

is is is

is is is

is is is

is is is

is is is

is is is

is is is

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white pure white pure dominant , pure tonic white snow, is ice a glacier glissando

white a swan a swan with a straight-as-an-arrow neck white lily white a lily pressed and dried in a book

white white whale white Ahab caught in the web of strings white white hot dead white, dead-center white white bridal gown white the bride of rock and roll white ghost white the ghost of a blue guitar

Jovibarba globifera Rosalie Smith

My sentences are always so precarious— Orchid face, Horse body.

Yours are strong.

“They are desert plants, They do not need water.”

We separate Hens from Chicks.

Orchid face, Horse body, Separate Hens from Chicks.

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“Today I was Best Man at a finnish wedding,” etching and chine collé, 12”x14” - Emma Casey

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MOTHER AND CHILD: NEW BEDFORD WHALING MUSEUM Elizabeth Schult z

Steadily and easily, huge with child, she navigated southward, swimming and grazing, her great mouth gaping, siphoning nourishment , spindrift whisking across her glistening island bulk.

Earlier this year when ice fringed the Bay of Fundy, the hot , old bull, horny with callosities, had held her amidst the swelling tides.

Ten months later, she felt her first calf twitching, belching.

Mildly and calmly, swimming and dreaming, the balmy waters, caressing, she moved toward destiny, imagining her calf, uncoiling, stretching toward the future, slipping from the womb’s warmth.

Off the coast of Virginia, the grey ship, unseen, unseeing, sliced off a fin and passed on, leaving her rolling with the waves onto shore, a bleeding hulk, lungs and heart ruptured, the calf unborn, tethered within.

Quietly and lightly, floating and hovering, their immense and intricate skeletons shadow destiny, mother and calf, their bones articulate in death.

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“ C o l u m n , ” N a y o u n g J e o n g

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Carina Allen

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Carina Allen

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Kafka’s Cane J.R. Solonche

No doubt he wanted it as a complement to his black suit and bowler hat , the ones he wore everyday, even in summer. Or maybe he wanted one because he recalled that Balzac inscribed the head of his, I crush all obstacles, which he could now turn into, All obstacles crush me.

What a comical figure he must have made walking to the workmen’s compensation office as, every few steps, crushed by all obstacles, he fell to his knees, or on his back, where he flailed about to right himself, the cane scribbling parables in the air.

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On the bridge of bones Steve Klepetar

My grandfather curses the bridge of bones.

His losses add up, his jackal howls injure the night . His thin face burns with the shadow of moon. All night he climbs across vertebrae and skulls, ulna, radius and lunate bones.

Refusing to say goodbye, he clings to girders, ropes his legs around guardrails and bars.

His fingers scrape bone rust , bones without a shard of flesh, piles of bones upon bones.

The bridge of bones creaks in the wind.

Bats wheel across the night sky, crazy and lost .

My grandfather’s eyes are pyramids of grief, he is drowned in a hurricane of frozen souls.

For a hundred winters, he has tasted salt and oil.

He has spit words into the crucible rage.

He has watched the adamantine world roll on across the gorge of plenty, the desert tracks of a thousand lies. My grandfather tears at bones made of iron, bones of granite and steel.

His voice has ossified into bone. Silent now, he rips the frozen air into his screaming lungs.

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onionskin P. I. Navarro

Common sense compels you to keep away from smoke hissing and sudden elevations in temperature but a sweet smell of hickory and the sound of bubbling flesh pull you toward the window as if dreaming of yourself floating toward a smiling moon past concrete and steel towers that catch at your clothes so that you must continue naked in your onionskin wooden bones, dead senses dry wires, and a pleasure that comes only from inertia.

If you fold us into pretty shapes maybe the sky will soften and we will stretch into skin constellations so fine that we all disappear.

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thoughts i didn’t say Nik Way

I want to eat your words before you speak them curl my tongue and roll them over my bare gums like spearmint that lingers hours after swallowing I want to break my finger bones knuckle by knuckle and reset them to better fit your elbows and knees I want to pluck the scab from your skin and hold it between us like a pendant

Without me you are unclean With me you will never be

“Mt. Norwuttock and Apple Trees,” 15”x22”, oil and crayon. Holyoak Range, Amherst, MA, 2014 - Lorna Ritz

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“untitled, 2012,” charcoal and ink on dictionary paper, 8”x10” - Julianne French

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�ribbons,� samuel augustine

[ fiction ] synthia

Chris Milam She would be there every afternoon when I drove home from work. Her feet implanted in a strip of dead grass, a chartreuse scarf tied delicately around her refined head. Hair the color of creamed honey rested on blade-thin shoulders. Cars headed in all directions, flickering traffic lights dictated flow, and construction workers fixed potholes while sucking on hand-rolled cigarettes. All oblivious to the melancholy girl hawking the wares of a furniture store’s liquidation. This angelic oasis in the middle of a concrete desert , a mirage of titillation that begged me to drink from its pool of splendor.

Her hand moved in tight circles, a rhythmic twirling, forcing the sign to spin in a continuous loop. She was a more exquisite version of a postman, she wasn’t deterred by bursts of heaving rain or the wail of an enraged wind. Her work ethic was to be admired, her dedication was to be envied. That elegantly sculptured hand of hers never failed to entice, never failed to bring the flock to the parking lot .

Two days ago I pulled into Handsome Hank’s furniture emporium. I wasn’t interested in a leather recliner, a burgundy sofa, or a faux-wood end table. I had to make her acquaintance.

I wanted to ask what her name was, but she wasn’t exactly a loquacious creature. Her face was a mask of fragile silence. Her eyes were painted with masterful brushstrokes, producing two orbs of cerulean glass. Her body was rigid except for that blur of a hand. I traced my finger in an arc from rouged cheekbone to rouged cheekbone. My touch didn’t elicit a response of any kind, but I like to believe that her manufactured flesh craved the warmth of human skin. That somewhere in her hollow chest , a solitary bolt of lightning was oscillating back and forth against the walls of her synthetic lining, searching for a way to jumpstart my fatigued heart . A fool’s delusion perhaps, but a fool always seeks the truth that hides in a place of ache, a realm where the answer is one of his own choosing.

Yes, she felt something for me, but her plastic lips refused to let her articulate her concealed desires.

I asked the manager, Larry, if I could apply to be a sign holder. He chuckled and explained to me that he used to hire homeless people to hold the signs, but they were either always late, complained about the underwhelming pay, or showed up drunk. He said the automatons only needed fresh batteries to keep their mechanical hearts thumping, that they were more efficient and trustworthy than humans. They never tired, they didnt require a fifteen minute break, they couldn’t speak about the poor conditions. Larry said that if he put a blonde wig

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on her, business would triple in a matter of hours. If he put raspberry lipstick on her, he sold more loveseats and coffee tables. I told him that I didn’t care about any of that , I only wanted to stand next to her in the grass, our hands lost in a haze of synchronized pivoting, sharing moments of tender solitude. I asked him if he understood what fate was, what destiny was. I will stand there for free, I will stand there and endure a catastrophic typhoon, I will stand there until we become tethered to one another. It’s kizmet , I told him. Don’t play God and deny me this sweet rapture of artificial hope. Give me a pen and an application immediately, good sir.

I’m banned from the property now. Exiled. I’m reduced to viewing the girl with the lonely face, this mute goddess created in a soulless factory, through a smudged windshield as I drive by at a respectable speed. I like to believe that she secretly waves to me, that her rotating hand is something more than a shiny lure to reel in the horde so they can purchase a fake Tiffany lamp. That she knows I’ll come back for her someday and place her in a shady spot in my backyard or maybe by the window in my bedroom.

If she could hear me, she would know that love doesn’t require a voice, flowing blood, or a skeletal foundation. A chunk of grey matter. A fiery spirit .

I will see you tomorrow, I want to tell her, when I drive home from work. My eyes will find you. They always do.

the void

Jacob Roundy I carve a hole in the earth with my gloved fingers. Each stiff finger is like a dull knife scraping against bark. Sweat inches down my temple. The resilience of frozen clay has replaced the soft soil I remember.

Clouds of ash float overhead. In the distance, an amber sun streams through the sky like the glowing embers of a fire struggling to breathe again. There is an absence here. There is a suffocating vacancy of color. There are no birds flying; their chirping sucked into a silent vacuum.

Lightning stretches out of the clouds and strikes a tree. The blast shatters branches, sending fiery smithereens down to the earth, where they sit and smolder like tiny smoke signals. I catch the glint of steel in a pile of rubble not far from my carved divot . I approach without caution. There is no danger of wild animals guarding their home. I am the only scavenger left .

Tossing aside the metal remains of a house, I discover a sharp piece of steel that fits perfectly in my palm. I return to the spot , marked with a stick, as if it were a place marker for the dead—a makeshift tombstone. With both hands, I plow the steel into the surface, and a crack about three inches long groans into life. The steel cuts through my gloves and slices into my calloused skin, but I’m so close now. The earth is giving way and crumbling into dust .

There is no pain, but the blood trickles down my fingers anyway, soaking the

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cloth of the gloves and dripping into the ground as a sacrificial offering. The steel crashes and cuts. I lift the blade above my head, both hands pressed against the back end of the blade, and gash the ground. Sifting aside layers of dirt and ash and sweat and blood, I feel the edge of a box.

I am the sculptor of this treasure chest . The steel is my hammer and chisel, and the Earth is my stone block. Finally, I discard my crude shovel and wrap my hands around the chest . With a strong yank, I wrench it free, and for a moment , I feel like I’ve torn the still-beating heart from Mother Earth’s corpse.

I want to carry the burden of this container to somewhere sacred, but there is nowhere unmarked. All is stained, branded with dust and dirt . The cobwebs had mutated into walking creatures with spiny legs, dragging a veil of filth over the brimming beauty of life.

I remove the key dangling from my necklace. I kiss it with my dry, stinging lips, and press it against my forehead. Eyes closed, I whisper a silent prayer. I fit the key into the lock, and the lid pops open like an old man sighing.

Yellowed, brittle papers and plastic photographs. Brimming false smiles and meaningless trinkets. Worn-away ink and invisible characters. Memories of a distant past , entombed in hazy sight and vestiges of avarice.

My fingers trace the girl in the photograph. She is barely visible, but I know her frame by heart . And there is an unrecognizable figure next to her. A person I used to be—me with the chubbiness of baby fat , now completely shed like the stale skin of a snake. And then I see the others. Their names lost , chronicled nowhere except in the dead spaces of my brain. But a subconscious part of me understands, and involuntary tears track down my cheeks and splat against the photograph and papers in the chest . I let them fall and watch as the liquid mixes with ash. I feel all that I am responsible for, and the withering touch of death beckons.

Laying down, I spread the memories on my chest and stare into the black abyss above. Gentle snowflakes drift downward. The cool touches against my wind-burned face are soothing, and I want to stay like this forever. I wish the snow would entomb me in a frozen sarcophagus.

But the memories burn with a sudden heat . It singes me awake, and I gather the flames into my hands and stand. Hope is a bright , white-hot star, and the others—the faceless ghosts of my past—scream, “Continue, live, and fight!”

Wrapped in my coat and rags with my backpack pressed tightly against me, I slip the fire into my pocket , burying it deep, and gaze at the horizon.

Somewhere, the land breathes for a revival.

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the adventures of slug Ethan Cohen

High, high up above the city a human man stands at a precipice. He looks across the black sky ceiling over the glowing lights.

My power is my limitation.

He shifts his toe over the edge of the pole, and feels the dry night wind, then he dives.

In water one can stand comfortably on one toe. See the superpower of Slug: the Hero of the Daytime.

Through the whipping wind, within the towering trees, into the networking neighborhoods, navigating the intricate interior, Slug flies.

Searching for dates.

She likes dates. A sweet fruit for a sweet girl.

A slash across the face; slippage due to crosswinds.

“Agh!”

Slug is blown toward a bank, pressed against a road sign; he pushes off with his feet and flies.

He arrives at the supermarket , and buys dates for $5.99. 1 All the capabilities of underwater motion are available to Slug above ground. But that is all—as a regular human, Slug must use a cane to fight against the pressure.

His muscles are so light that a homemade lead patch dwells on his chest in order to keep him grounded. As a superhuman, Slug removes the lead patch and rises in the air, clear in his invisible uniform.

The lightness of his muscles grants Slug smooth, quick, and agile passage through the air. His weapon is nature—the force of a great splash of wind.

How did such power come from such limitation, and such limitation from such power? The story is banal and secret .

Joseph P. Studd served in the United States Air Force straight out of high school. During his secondary education he won an award for an essay on English literature and played the flute in a local music ensemble. Upon graduation he said he had little sense of what he wanted and his parents did not have money. Joseph P. Studd was not the type of young man to have his feet strapped to the ground.

The Air Force was the place for him.

He trained faithfully and mastered the curvatures and rhythms of American air from behind a glass windshield. At the time of his prime there was no war at which to showcase his abilities. He trained harder.

The Air Force grew monotonous. Every day Joseph P. Studd worked his muscles until he felt fire but this was not enough. Where was the frontier? He stole a plane and flew east . It seemed like the thing to do. He flew out until there was only blue 2

1 This is the American Conundrum: What do I do with the penny?

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2 The sky is blue in America.

and he, Joseph P. Studd, was truly alone. At the very moment that the idea of a beer crossed his mind, some oil-drilling crane somewhere malfunctioned and collapsed, and a sharp clang riddled our hero as though it had originated from the heart of the ocean, and Slug’s airplane tailspinned.

Slug cannot see in the dark. Too much staring into the sun when he was up in the air. It hinders his actions as a human. Sometimes he walks home at night and a friend says, “Hey, Joe!” He looks around. Slug does not see who is talking and he is not even sure the voice was directed at him. There must be a lot of Joes in the city. Either way, the footsteps have departed, and the friend is wondering why he or she was ignored.

This limitation comes without a power.

Joseph P. Studd suffered from extreme muscular atrophy as he treaded water, eighty-eight stories above the ocean floor, for eight weeks. The muscles were overworked and underfed and they decided to learn a new way of functioning. When he was lifted out of the water by a special Air Force unit 3 ,Joseph P. Studd fainted before he could be informed of his highly honorable discharge.

l a r r y h o l l a n d

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So he awoke kissing the ceiling and feeling entirely natural swimming through the air down to the kitchen.

He prepared one baked bean.

Slug could repair his muscles through physical therapy but that is not his destiny: His atrophy is his regeneration. Then again, ability is detrimental. It allows you not to achieve as a human because you are doing enough as a superhuman.

Slug removes the lead from his chest and rises invisibly. The sun grills his eyes now that it is late afternoon, almost dinnertime. Slug has not eaten food from a grill in years.

The cane lies beside Slug’s bed and walks with him everywhere. The lead is camouflaged skin-color. Slug avoids doctors and pictures. The hero wears thick clothing.

Slug lounges in buoyancy eighty-eight stories above the city.

Well, Joseph P. Studd kept watch for crime on the roof of a building. The police did a pretty solid job, though, and it took him a few weeks to find a good drug deal.

When he finally found the tableau of a woman crying for help and flew down to attack the man with marijuana and a gun, the flash of a camera disrupted his eyesight and he stumbled, realizing as he blinked around that he had interrupted the scene of a film shooting. The cameramen said Whew and fanned their noses. Who was this guy? they asked. Why hadn’t he showered?

The name change seemed like the thing to do.

I am Slug. I make people mildly discomforted.

The world is Slug’s swimming pool. He travels in uniform for his convenience. Slug can float over large puddles, speed through thick crowds, splash closed faraway doors, and travel among building floors. In intense social situations he can sneak out windows; he may survey events and decide whether and where to enter.

His toes clutch onto the American flagpole. He reviews the droning city lights and dives.

fpfhew / fpfhew / fpfhew / Falling, dropping, accelerating, the stories fly by– Splash! Birds are sent spinning. And slower and slower, and slower; and Slug lowers his toe to the ground.

A New York apartment ledge. Slug maintains his invisible posture and watches.

The girl does not appear for a few minutes but when she does Slug can smell her showered hair. She ambles around her room in a towel and eventually dresses. In the kitchen a boy steals the cereal bowl from her hands. She laughs.

By the time he returns home, Slug still does not feel hungry.

“Hi Mom.”

“Welcome home, Joseph.”

Slug removes his chest-plate, throws it on the couch, and breathes. “...”

He decides that the need to pee has been mitigated by the nighttime cold and that he can just sit at the counter and replay the images in his head for a while

3 See? They do good after all.

4 Slug, who in this scene would appear visibly upset, perhaps is unaware that the boy was the girl’s brother, who was visiting for the weekend.

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before relieving himself.

“What’s the matter?”

“Nothing.” 4

“Are you hungry?”

“No.”

“How about a glass of milk?”

“Okay.”

A tall, cool, hardy glass of whole milk.

As he eats the largest meal since his rebirth, Slug feels the cusps of his muscles curl in the first yawns of regrowth, and he feels his body relearn to weigh itself down without the lead chest-plate.

After all, no one can be a superhero forever.

“Is it good?”

Slug smiles.

“Mmmmm.”

“golden hour,” Wendy Vance

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your bones ache with its aches a novel extract S. L. Mernagh

When we saw the little wooden house buried deep in the trees, our hearts leapt to our mouths.

We could not speak. We were silenced by it; not choked, but so warmed in our mouths, so caressed and comforted by it in our mouths, that words were dimmed.

What would it sound like if sweat , caused by all this warm, pulsing feeling, came pouring forth from our lips? Would the little house feel that this is sufficient? And what would happen if, through all this excitement , we would bite down a little too hard on our hearts in our mouths? Momentarily halt their pulsing, hurt their feelings through this piercing of their materiality?

This is what happens, we learned, when something has mapped its history so deeply to yours it gets twisted up in your bones. Your bones ache with its aches.

Are we, then, approaching the little house in a way that belies the distance we have travelled? Our bare feet were brambled, stuck with gravel, torn by the long desert road. Now they are wrinkled, mud-ridden by the river. One of my legs was cut in a straight line, bleeding red like the road itself. Now the river has filled it with all kinds of life I cannot see. Our hair, with its trappings of burrs and dead insects, had been rough-handled by that particular desert wind that growls at dusk. But lately, it has been wrenched instead by the fingers of the river, leaving traces of its games in the reeds twisted in our strands. Our skin, once burned by desert sun, is stretched now over these tempered, river-aching bones, tightly tuned sinews in between. Her bones hum with the same tune as mine, and that of the little house. I can see that her eyes are distanced by her own physicality. Long forgetting her immediacy. Weeks of gazing from horizon to horizon, seeking out a fabled sea. She still believes it exists.

We stumble through the trees, barefoot , until we are in clear sight of the house. Our bones hum feverishly with recognition. Its structure, rough-hewn from the forest , is our structure. My red suitcase in one hand, her black suitcase in one hand. We are drawn to the promise of fireplace, hearth, inhabitation, skin shedding and becoming dust , falling hair, releasing waste.

The twin front windows wave greetings to us on the wind. The front door swings suggestively open. The one inside has left his dusty travelling case standing to attention on one side of the door. His black leather boots stand expectantly on the other. His weathered suit jacket has been flung over a broken wooden chair on the verandah, heavy with desert dust .

We keel forwards until our feet touch the pathway of our little house.

Instantly, the stillness of it is broken. He, inside, has awoken: I feel that he feels the hearts deep and warm in our mouths. And I see that we, in our anticipation and hunger, have bitten down too hard. He can smell it .

The little house bursts into flames before our eyes. Its fire rises agonisingly

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into the clutch of trees surrounding it . The one inside is trying to keep his secrets.

Do we hear the crash of sea in the distance, beyond the little house? Or is that the trees? Or is that the breaking of its bones, our bones, in the fire?

Blood pours from our hearts into our mouths, through our teeth, over our bursting lips and pours forth hot down our bodies as we arrive at the threshold of our little wooden house. And as we reach it , as our skin touches its skin, as our hearts’ blood trickles onto the threshold, the fire begins burning in reverse. It diminishes, quietens, shrinks to just a trail of smoke curling from the chimney.

The fire now gone, our little house remains before us, good as new.

It beckons us in.

douglas breault

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“The hungry astronomer,” intaglio, hard ground, soft ground, and drypoint, 22”x30” - Emma Casey

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carina allen

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“vertebrae,” Dustin Schott

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[ micro fiction ] The Night After You Moved Danielle Behrendt

Later, on the Red Line back from Harvard Square, I’m too fucked up to look at anything. My eyes stagger from a Japanese newspaper stamped with footprints to the goose bump bristled legs of a girl by the door. Her feet blush pink with cold where her high heels bite into their sides, the skin over her bones translucent and veiny like something newborn. I want to touch them. At home, I will fall asleep in the tub and wake up, head spinning, in water like forgotten tea. A stripe of streetlight slides through the space between the shade and the sill and sleeps across my unkissed toes.

Strong Bones Lara Lewis

Wood shouldn’t have held this sturdy. Even though the storm had torn down most of the trees and rock formations around it , the thin wall supports of oak and rope stood still. Moss fell in patches from the wind tearing at them, and vines lay at the ground or dangled, ripped apart by the downpour. Even so, the entire framework of the old, forgotten building stood like it had been built the day before, not even slightly shaken in its foundation. The posts swelled in the rain, but did not splinter, and the rope did not fray. Worms crawled out of soil that washed down from the earth around, while a few birds flew at them as they tried to rebuild their ruined nests. Piles of waterlogged leaves lay scattered around. Snails inched up and down the posts, leaving shiny trails against the damp wood. Squirrels bounded across the upright posts, carrying the spoils that fell to the ground from the trees.

A single sound of human footprints could be heard, slowly walking through the empty framework of the halls.

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carina allen

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I Have Loved You Wrong Emma McPherson

The cat’s paw gently padded against the smooth, cool hardwood that nearly shone in the bright blue white balance of six a.m. Light elucidated every strand of fur lingering a few inches from its frail form, creating a soft evanescence of grey shades as it swiftly stepped in and out of shadows from the slider doors. The amber of the wood floor in the old refurbished townhouse contrasted against the azure hue of the cloud trick.

The thick bamboo in the terracotta planter at the base of the winding, wrought-iron staircase and the ivory and navy toile drapes in the adjacent guestroom had a kind of iridescence brought by the sunrise on the dew of the grass. It came upon the first step and sat , its deep amber eyes retaining their golden luster despite the wash out of the rising sunlight . It dolefully surveyed the potted bamboo as though seizing up an old acquaintance. First one paw and then another, facile in its advance as it steadied itself on its haunches and lifted itself up, sharing the dirt with the long hard stems of bamboo. Dampened with a recent watering and kept wet with the chill of night giving way to the proceeding day, the cat’s fur of its paws began to darken in color with the dirt . Rethinking its step up into the bamboo’s habitat it drew itself to full potential, sinking a few inches into the soil as it bounded forth from the pot and onto the next step. Recoiling from the force, the pot tipped over the edge of its stair and spilled its contents onto the hardwoods; the cat began to clean its soiled paws apathetically.

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[ nonfiction ] Chicken Fingers Ben Edwards

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In Jurassic Park, scientists extract DNA from mosquitoes trapped in amber and use it to reproduce the dinosaurs that the mosquitoes sucked on. Though I will defend my childhood favorite to the grave, this is obviously problematic. First of all, that is an awful lot of amber mosquitoes. But more importantly, as paleontologist Jack Horner puts it , if you were to pull DNA samples from thousands of mosquitoes trapped in ancient amber, “you’d have a room full of mosquitoes.”

This is actually the stated purpose behind Jack Horner’s genius grant research on chickens. If he can’t fulfill his childhood dream of having a dinosaur as a pet by actually reproducing dinosaurs, perhaps he can reverse engineer them. It turns out that , while in the egg, chicken embryos grow hands—much like those of a velociraptor—which, further along in the development process, get reabsorbed and replaced by a fused wing. Horner and his colleague Dr. Hans Larson are working to identify the genes responsible for reabsorption and inhibit them, so that they can produce “chickenosauruses.”

This process of activating ancestral traits through gene manipulation is called atavism, and it could have applications beyond giving Horner a pet . For one thing, flocks of roaming free-range chickenosauruses could add valuable awesomeness to the American countryside, making Iowa worth visiting. But to me, atavism illustrates the modularity of the Animalia corpus. Discovering and manipulating a gene for deletion is a relatively easy first step on the path to identifying genes responsible for growing these bones in the first place, and, by further abstraction, the genes responsible for developing any skeletal feature. This has some obvious medical applications, like finding and correcting deformities in-utero. But I believe we can take it beyond the purely utilitarian.

Application 1: Giraffeshunds Atavism does not allow for the replacement of skeletal features willy-nilly, but it could lead to further research on transgenesis: taking

a gene from one creature and placing it in another, the process that gives us glowing goldfish. The most obvious use here is creating a wiener dog with a giraffe neck, and though this concept should really justify itself, it’s worth giving a brief overview of the pros and cons.

Pro: They can look you in the eyes at all times.

Pro: They can get your kitten out of a tree.

Con: They will steal the cigarettes you hide on top of the fridge.

Application 2: Horses With Claws Instead of Hooves Pros: None. There are none.

Cons: This is an entirely horrifying idea.

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Application 3: Take A Beaver, Replace Its Mouth With A Duck Bill, Give It Poison Claws And A Kangaroo Pouch, And Make It Lay Eggs, Then Take It Back In Time With The Time Machine That Will Exist By The Time This Many Complex Genetic Mutations Are Possible, And Introduce It To Australia So That By The Time Europeans Discover The Continent , It Appears As Though This Creature Evolved Naturally Pro: The entire population of Earth is as pleased as it is confused.

Pro: Obviously feasible.

Cons: Creationists use this as proof that God has a sense of humor, when really Dr. Science Jeff has a sense of humor.

Though there are countless more applications for research on atavism and transgenesis, the deadline for this essay is impending. But if you’d like to see more, consider nominating me for a genius grant . The future spills roughly in the direction in which you kick the cup of knowledge.

All illustrations included are original works by Ben Edwards.

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locus of control Emma McPherson

I knew a ghost , once. Facing the mirror with hollow eyes, her lids narrowed slightly as her palms found her thighs. The smallest of motions, easily confused with a trick of the heavy fluorescent light around the vanity mirror. The concert beyond the painted brick walls of the bathroom went on without us. Sucking her bottom lip between her teeth, she spoke with a voice like a shard of glass, “I don’t think I deserve this.”

She operated on sickness and unkind thoughts about what it meant to be alive. When we met , I was assigned to listen and observe. She was on leave from the hospital, and I was part of a special new program called “Shadow.” The operative was to remind patients with a history of self-mutilation and destruction that there was always someone who wanted them to get better and feel positively about themselves. That recovery was on the horizon and very attainable. It coincided with their therapy, and many patients didn’t care to participate in it . When I was assigned to her, I became overly aware of my own body immediately—not because of our size difference, but due to her unforgiving scrutiny. The people in the room introduced us as we watched each other in silence. I searched her searching me, her hungry

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“Folding + Door,” Nayoung Jeong

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eyes peeling apart my arms and stomach, my thighs, whether or not my feet were hipswidth apart . If my hipbones showed. They didn’t .

My instructions were very simple: If I judged that a situation was dangerous, I was to call 911 to have her detained immediately. Other than that , I was to follow her around, not talk about myself, and listen to whatever she had to say about herself, food, sadness, anxiety, anything. Whenever she said something negative about herself, pulled at her skin, or was visibly upset , I was supposed to say, “You are beautiful and you are not alone.” I would go with her to the mall, her house, her friends’ houses, keeping a journal of notes on how many times she looked into reflective surfaces, picked at her body, insulted herself. If I found myself being negatively affected by this therapy, I was to terminate the experiment .

At first , she was completely silent around me, as if I was never there. As if I were the ghost . I would watch her push pieces of cereal around in the bowl of untouched milk and feel completely intrusive as she locked up whatever hell she was thinking behind her lips. Her hair was thin and short , every contour of her ribcage showed through every item of clothing she owned. I sat beside her in classes and counted the times she wrung her hands. She was always looking at the sky, particularly at night , no matter where we were or who we were with. At dinnertime, while her family ate around us, she would stare off out the window, counting stars.

But finally, doing homework on her bed one night as I drew a sketch of her on a blank page, she looked up suddenly and told me I had cheekbones like an anorexic girl.

I blanched and stared at her. One, two, ten blinks. Eyes locked on each other from across the room, I weighed my script in my head. That wasn’t negative against her. Actually, in her mind, that was a compliment . “So do you,” I said, going back to my sketch. The night at the concert , she broke away from her small friend group and fled to the bathroom with me not far behind. Her friends watched her go with long faces, feeling completely apart from her, watching a figment of their old companion flee into the crowd. None of them followed us. Watching her in the mirror, her eyes met mine angrily, expectant . I’d been with her for a month. “You are beautiful and you are not alone,” I said, calmly and loudly over the music. Her face was murderous, but her eyes held lakes.

We didn’t return to the venue. I followed her outside where she bummed a cigarette off the closest stranger. I did the same, and lit hers for her. I stood in front of her as she sat against the wall, staring hard, dragging too hard, willing her to acknowledge I was here. She was so far away, narrow slits staring off down the street at oncoming headlights. I repeated my line. She answered the road, “All I think about is food and my body. That’s it . That’s fucking it .” Then she looked at the sky and didn’t move until I eventually called her mom to give us a ride home.

After that night , she called her friends less and spoke out loud more. According to her, being amongst people felt like an unattainable thing—talking, sharing, listening, trying to pretend anything mattered at all if she wasn’t thin. Controlling what she looked like was easier, calculative, took a little bit of willpower and concerned only her. Hours spent pacing her room, moving things around on shelves, shuffling clothes in drawers and closets, a never-ending stream of talk about how something fit or didn’t fit , what she could feel beneath her skin, the differences from mirror to mirror. Whenever she gave pause, I said my line dutifully. I’d stopped writing notes and taken to sketching her exclusively. Sometimes I would offer more

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words than my single line, trying to breach her, trying to show her I was right in front of her, every day, listening and wanting to help. Doe-legged girl unable to lay on her stomach on hardwood floors because the skin between her hips and ribs was too thin, birch-tree girl wearing three layers of shirts to retain feeling in her bones on 50-degree days, fainting bird forced to sit and eat a plate of food like a toddler. Made of wisps of smoke, sitting with boney knees drawn to her chest , watery eyes endlessly flitting back and forth between the stars.

She told me she wished someone else wanted this for her. She wanted one other person in the world to understand how uncomfortable she was, to want her to succeed in being thin. She kept asking to see what I was drawing and I told her it was against the Shadow rules. One afternoon, side-by side in her bed, she lay on her back with both hands resting in the cavern of her stomach and told me I was her only friend and she knew nothing about me. She wore a bandeau and leggings and I was clinging to the opposite side of the bed. I kept my mouth shut and waited for more. When nothing else came, I asked if she wanted me to call her friends. She rolled over and waved me off silently, facing the window. A reflective surface.

All I could do was stare at her shoulder blades across the bed from me. She inhaled and they expanded as if there used to be wings there. “I can’t hold onto anything but weight anymore.” Reaching for her lightly, my fingertips brushed nothing substantial and I knew she was right . “You are beautiful and you are not alone,” I said to the curve of her spine. But she was too far away to hear.

Eventually she stopped acknowledging me again, and spoke less and less.

Fearing I’d missed my window, I offered more words. Her parents begged me to try and get her out , amongst people. I asked, “Why do you look at the stars when we’re all right here?”

Unmoving, her eyes never left the sky. “They feel closer.”

Bones on the Beach Barbara Hobbs

It has now been more than fifty years since this family adventure occurred and the events of the day have never been far from my mind. What we discovered that day left us with an enigma, a mystery that can never be solved. The events will stay in my imagination forever.

There were four of us, two couples each with our small children. We’d planned a trip to northern Michigan in search of lake front property. Not just any lake would do. Lake Michigan, second largest of the five Great Lakes, was our destination. Lake Michigan is a fresh water inland sea stretching 300 miles in length, north from Chicago and the Indiana Dunes and sixty miles east to west at its widest point . The beaches are wide and sandy, the water remarkably clear, and there is a chill to it even in the heat of August . After spending time on Lake Michigan, it is impossible to think that you might never return. As children, both my husband, Stu, and I had gone “up north” on summer visits to relatives living near the lakes and had wonderful memories of canoes, swimming, fishing and fun.

After we married, we envisioned a place for us to spend our summers soaking

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up the relaxing atmosphere and eventually sharing the time with a future family. The four adults decided to start the search near a quaint , old-fashioned resort , the town of Harbor Springs on Little Traverse Bay.

The first tourists there had begun to arrive in the late 1800s via steamship and then train from as far away as Chicago and Detroit . Over the decades, the town flourished and became a “destination.” Stu and I spent our honeymoon just north of there and so had an idea of where we might begin to look. Jack and Jane joined us enthusiastically. We were such good friends!

With the scene set , I will return to the unfolding adventure. The trip north up from Detroit was uneventful. The weather was perfect , bright and cool. Along the way, we stopped and ate our picnic lunch. The children romped in autumn leaves in “October’s bright blue weather.” Then again we were on our way. The countryside became increasingly rural as we passed through stands of hardwoods and then pines.

Lakes and ponds are numerous in Northern Michigan and the scenery whetted our appetite to be there as soon as possible. On the outskirts of Harbor Springs, we found a rustic, locally-owned motel tucked in the trees and settled in for the night . As we slept , it began to rain lightly and by morning, there was a continuing drizzle. No matter; after a quick breakfast , our intrepid band of moms, dads, and kids bundled up and struck out intent on finding our stretch of Lake Michigan beach. North of Harbor Springs there is still little development . To this day, people cherish their space and only an occasional side road intrudes into the woods.

The plan was to find property together. Each family would build its own cabin.

We would tailor our limited budget , perhaps sharing a well to ease our finances.

Locating the property was the first hurdle. About ten miles north along the bluff we found a gravel road leading down to the shore. Had we not known where to turn, we would have missed the cut-off entirely. Having checked with a realtor ahead of time, we searched for the “lot for sale” sign and found it deep down the trail. A small creek bubbled out of the hill side. Just what we’d had mind!

Released from the car, the older children bounded down the slope to the beach.

The shore was strewn with pebbles and driftwood. Everything was coated with a muddy residue that had washed down the sandy incline during the night . The weather and beach were grey but it was no longer raining. As we wandered the beach, the older children picked up stones and shells, tossing them into the waves.

I had noticed that our oldest boy held an odd shaped “something” in his hand and asked to see what he had found. On close inspection it was obviously a rounded section of bone, coated with the grey beach film and barely distinguishable from other litter strewn nearby.

We gathered the others and began a search for other bony shards, anything that might help with identification. You might think that such a find would be threatening or extremely scary. Whatever the source of the bone, it was extremely old and there was no evidence of foul play. No need to call 911 at this point . All of the adults were teachers, so it quickly became a learning experience.

The bone suggested a piece of skull, human perhaps or maybe part of a deer, weathered and with an aged, eroded texture. Within twenty feet or so, I came upon another fragment and recognized it as a broken fragment of human jaw bone, complete with molars. Now, we were onto something! Rather than being alarmed, our inner

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Sherlock Holmes kicked in.

Up the slope that we had just descended, looking closely, we saw what seemed to be a clavicle jutting out only a few inches below the surface. This was a burial site!

Time and erosion had long ago reduced the soil cover to a maximum of six to eight inches. No recent burial would ever be so near the surface of the ground. We were all excited, curious and in awe of our find. We decided to carefully excavate the shallow grave.

With fingers and a pocket knife, the sandy soil was gently removed from what was an almost intact skeleton. The children stood by as amazed as we by the find.

Never disrespectful, we removed the sandy soil, leaving the bones unaltered in their position. Perhaps the way that the person had been laid to rest , however long ago, would give a clue to the identity. The bones seemed lovingly arranged with the left hand across the chest and the other arm down to the side. No clothing, fabric, or other material was apparent . We sifted the soil, finding something foreign only under the pelvic area. With less drainage there, we guessed that the fibrous material might be all that remained of a pine box, another clue to the identity of our new found friend. Deductive reasoning at full speed, we surmised that a large tree nearby had come along much later. Large roots wound around and through the grave site. No doubt , a very old burial. The tree would have been a sapling at that time.

Jack, the other dad, had brought an excellent camera and after the burial was completely open to view, he captured the site. Would the arrangement of bones be another clue to the person’s identity? We hauled an old army blanket from the car and reverently removed the remains, sifting again with our fingers so as not to miss a single digit or vertebrae. All pieces of the skeleton and scrap of fiber were wrapped in the blanket , bundled, and taken down state.

The University of Michigan Dept . of Anthropology would be our next stop. After some discussion, we’d decided that , given due respect , the remains could properly be taken there. What would be revealed about the “someone” we now regarded as a friend? Shortly thereafter, the department sent a lengthy analysis of our find. She was of Caucasian descent , roughly twenty-nine years of age at the time of death and had never given birth. Only an estimate could be made as to when she had been interred, due to soil composition and drainage concerns.

We cared about her. Our friend died, we don’t know why. So many years ago she was lovingly buried facing the setting sun on the beautiful shore of Lake Michigan.

Her final resting place is now at the U of M. We felt alright with that decision given that she could not be returned to her original resting place. The soil was too shallow and the sloping bank left her no room. Foot traffic would make reburial risky.

To fill in the gap between then and now: Settlement began when the Michigan territory was opened to expansion after 1825. That far north, this young couple, settlers with a land grant , would have staked their claim in the late 1830’s or so. Life was difficult and often short . Winters long and bitter near the lake shore. We can only guess at the “rest of the story.” We had gained a deep fondness for the young woman that we could never know.

Eventually, we found and built our special home on the “big lake” and all of our children and grand children cherish the gift we have gained over the past half century. The kids are grown now. We have a deep and abiding love for Lake Michigan, its history and its heritage.

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“In nature,” wendy vance

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“Jaw,” Dustin Schott

[ book reviews ] three minutes in poland: Discovering a Lost World in a 1938 Family Film THREE MINUTES IN POLAND

by Glenn Kurtz 432pp. Farrar, Straus and Giroux. $15.95.

Review by LAURA APPERSON What if finding an old home video—created by family long before you were born— helped you discover the lost history of a town that was almost entirely changed during World War II? What if it introduced you to the realities of Nazi-controlled Poland, told from the mouths of those who lived it?

Inspired by an unlabeled three-minute clip of a small town in Poland—sandwiched between shots of London and Paris—Glenn Kurtz sets off to find out more about this village portrayed in his grandfather’s 1938 home video of a trip to Europe found in his parents’ Florida basement . The video shows a vibrant , thriving community of children and townspeople welcoming the Americans and leaving cheder ( Jewish elementary school) to investigate the excitement . After much investigation and many questions, Kurtz discovers this is the town of Nasielsk, Poland, shown in that video only one year before the beginning of the war and the destruction of almost all of the town’s predominantly Jewish population.

The book takes readers through Kurtz’s step-by-step process as he sifts through public records in New York, attempting to find names and contact information for any survivors that may have known was Nasielsk was like firsthand. He visits the Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C. to submit the film as well as restore the original strip. Perhaps the most exciting moment is when he travels across the United States to meet a survivor whose memory gives him many names, places, and details about the town that , in turn, leads him to find other

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“You’ll have a new name. You don’t look Jewish. Your Polish is excellent. Try and be that person.”

- Three Minutes in Poland

by Kurtz

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survivors, photos, and important facts.

In the process, Glenn learns about life in a small, Jewish town preWorld War II; life during the war as Nasielskers fought to survive as Germany fully occupied Poland and as the Soviet Union forced those who escaped from Poland into forced labor camps; and, finally, the intricate and fascinating history of his own family, and how that fits into his life today. It’s a story about Nasielsk, but , perhaps more importantly, it’s the story of the survival of a people, their love for their hometown, and their desire that their history be shared and celebrated.

Rich in history and detail, Three Minutes in Poland reads more like a fastpaced mystery novel rather than a non-fiction narrative. Kurtz is an expert storyteller, and his passion for Nasielsk’s history jumps off the pages and he walks readers through interviews with natives, his personal research, and his travels to Europe and Israel. He meticulously organizes the information, accumulating the names, places, and stories told by those who lived in Nasielsk, making them his own memories, and, in turn, the reader’s memories.

Towards the end of the book, he sits with two survivors who were friends as young boys. As they talk, laugh, and reminisce, Kurtz guides the reader through their conversation, clarifying each person to whom they refer—and sometimes, he participates in the conversation himself. It is this moment when the reader realizes how deeply Kurtz cares about this town, its people, and its history.

Three Minutes in Poland looks at the horrors of the Holocaust in a totally different way—it celebrates the life that existed before the war and shows how truly beautiful it was. Today, Nasielsk has changed—what was a primarily Jewish town before the war has become almost entirely Polish in the modern day—but there are still traces of the community that used to thrive there.

What Kurtz has done here is give that memory a true heartbeat .

In the process, Glenn learns about life in a small, Jewish town preWorld War II; life during the war as Nasielskers fought to survive as Germany fully occupied Poland and as the Soviet Union forced those who escaped from Poland into forced labor camps; and, finally, the intricate and fascinating history of his own family, and how that fits into his life today.

“ n i g h t , ” s a m u e l a u g u s t i n e

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[ contributors ] bONes, WINTER 2014 ― 2015

CARINA ALLEN

LAURA APPERSON

SAMUEL AUGUSTINE

Samuel Augustine, a contemporary American artist, works across many disciplines including illustration, sculpture, audio/video, painting, and poetry. A graduate of Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design, Samuel has shown work in various group shows and solo installations while juggling nomadic tendencies and working various jobs. Samuel likes to live out of his van, skateboard, sleep outside, and disappear with his lovely fiancé for extended adventuring. Samuel’s art is a product of life, believing decisions and circumstance are great mediums of creation. strangepagan.com

DANIELLE BEHRENDT

Danielle Behrendt has her BFA in Writing, Literature, and Publishing from Emerson College. She currently writes book, film, and music reviews for edgeboston.com, thecriticalcritics. com, and listenstereo.com, respectively. dmfbehrendt.wix.com/portfolio

DOUGLAS BREAULT

Douglas Breault is a fine artist who lives and works in his studio in downtown Providence, RI. His work challenges the notion of permanence in photography, creating dark room prints as the base for mixed media paintings. The photographs deviate from documenting a representational subject once they are ripped and painted, and become an object of embodied thought that influence the overall painting. doug.breault@ymail.com

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EMMA CASEY

ETHAN COHEN

Ethan Cohen is a New York-based avant-garde author and playwright whose guilty pleasures are anti-art and Cosmopolitan magazine. He studies English, history, and Hispanic studies at Vassar College and spends his free time performing standup comedy and jazz guitar. @ethanhcohen

BEN EDWARDS

Ben Edwards is a man who wears a lot of hats and doesn’t look good in a hat.

He lives with a cat and likes snacks. He might have a cursed notebook, but who knows. You can find a link to his website IN THE FUTURE!

JULIANNE FRENCH

Julianne French, artist and art educator, received her MFA in painting from The New York Academy of Art and her BFA in painting and art history from Jacksonville University. Currently her artwork focuses on syncretism and how architecture establishes cultural identities. French has received several awards including an artist residency at the Hermitage Artist Retreat in Florida, a Career Teacher Fellowship to study art, literature, and history at Cambridge University, and an Art Ventures Individual Artist grant from the Community Foundation in Northeast Florida. Her work can be viewed at juliannefrench.com

BARBARA HOBBS LARRY HOLLAND A. J. HUFFMAN

A. J. Huffman has published eleven

solo chapbooks and one joint chapbook through various small presses. Her new full-length poetry collection, “Another Blood Jet,” is now available from Eldritch Press. She has another fulllength poetry collection, “A Few Bullets Short of Home,” scheduled for release in summer 2015, from mgv2>publishing.

She is a Pushcart Prize nominee, and her work has appeared in hundreds of journals, including Labletter, The James Dickey Review, Bone Orchard, EgoPHobia, and Kritya. She is also the founding editor of Kind of a Hurricane Press. kindofahurricanepress.com

NAYOUNG JEONG

Nayoung Jeong is a ceramist, sculptor, and painter whose work takes form as performance and installation. Exploring identity rooted in heritage and uprooted by globalism, her process-oriented work evokes memories and questions to make the unfamiliar closer to familiar.

Jeong was born and raised in Korea, and currently works and lives in Providence, RI. She received her BFA from California College of the Arts, and MFA at Rhode Island School of Design. instagram.com/ nayoungjeong

STEVE KLEPETAR

Steve Klepetar’s work has received several nominations for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net, including three in 2014. Three collections appeared in 2013: “Speaking to the Field Mice” (Sweatshoppe Publications), “Blue Season” (with Joseph Lisowski, mgv2>publishing), and “My Son Writes a Report on the Warsaw Ghetto” (Flutter Press). An e-chapbook, “Return of the Bride of Frankenstein,” came out in 2014 as part of the Barometric Pressures series of e-chapbooks by Kind of a Hurricane Press. sfklepetar@ stcloudstate.edu

LARA LEWIS

Lara Lewis is a writer-in-training and full-time creative mind. Originally from Houston, TX, she has uprooted herself and resituated in Georgia for school,

where she spends her days chasing buses and looking for writing muses in thrift stores and sandwich shops.

When she isn’t creating stories with words, she’s populating them with her drawings. “Strong Bones” is Lara’s first piece published with East Coast Ink, and she looks forward to seeing more of her brainchildren off into the world.

EMMA M C PHERSON

Emma McPherson spends entirely too much time in the past, which can make the present relatively impossible.

She has approximately 20 half-filled notebooks and won’t be found without something to physically write on. Her ideal form of escapism is a bottle of wine and a good book, a.k.a. someone else’s life. Ultimately, she aims to work in children’s book publishing. emcfearson@gmail.com

S. L. MERNAGH

CHRIS MILAM

Chris Milam is a voracious reader with an affinity for the prose of Donald Ray Pollock, Khaled Hosseini, and Cormac McCarthy. He is a consumer of sweetened coffee and a diehard baseball fan. His stories can be found in the Molotov Cocktail, Firewords Quarterly, Dogzplot and others. @Blukris

P. I. NAVARRO

P. I. Navarro is a writer and drummer living in East Atlanta, GA. He runs the writing workshop and collective Aleph with Kory Oliver. His poetry has appeared on Everyday Genius and in Loose Change Magazine. He also edits the fiction section of killbot86.com.

LORNA RITZ

Color is the universal language that reaches across culture borders where she has taught/lived/visited. Ritz lives in the world of her travels, landscape, books, and color. She reaches for the inaccessible, referential to landscape.

Her painting process is always

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unsettling, completely passionate, radical, and driven, but it is the paint itself that guides her to a place of wonder, just as an improvisational musician finds “lines.” lornaritz.com

JACOB ROUNDY

Jacob is a freelance copyeditor and proofreader. He recently graduated from Emerson College with a B.F.A. in Writing, Literature, and Publishing.

When he isn’t reading and writing at work, he’s reading and writing at home for fun. Jacob is the epitome of an introverted hermit, surrounded by tomes in his private cave hidden in the mountains of East Boston. He’s an unapologetic lover of fantasy and is working on a novel in the same genre. jacob_roundy@emerson.edu

NICOLE SCHONITZER

Nicole Schonitzer is a junior at Vassar College where she is majoring in English and minoring in studio art. Her written and visual pieces are often closely connected and in dialogue with each other. She regularly returns to her hometown, Chicago, IL, to stare at the lake and attend grimy concerts. Soon, she will be dropped off in London for a semester where she will attempt to survive and continue producing poetry and art while drinking more beer than she could ever imagine. She expects this experience to be fruitful, as her shenanigans frequently influence her work. nschonit@gmail.com

DUSTIN SCHOTT

Dustin Schott received his BFA in Painting from the University of North Florida in 2005. He completed a one year sabbatical at the New York Academy of Art, the Graduate School of Figurative Art in 2006. Schott is currently completing his MFA in painting at Savannah College of Art and Design.

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ELIZABETH SCHULTZ

Following retirement from Kansas University’s English Department,

where she was known as a Melville scholar, Elizabeth Schultz became a dedicated advocate for the arts and the environment. She continues to write about the people and places she loves and has published two scholarly books, five books of poetry (three in 2014: “The Sauntering Eye,” “Mrs. Noah Takes the Helm,” “The Quickening”), a memoir, a collection of short stories, and a collection of essays. Her scholarly and creative work has appeared in numerous journals and reviews. eschultz@ku.edu

ROSALIE SMITH

J.R. SOLONCHE

Four-time Pushcart Prize nominee as well as nominee for Best of the Net, J.R. Solonche has been publishing poetry in magazines, journals, and anthologies since the early 70s. He is co-author of “Peach Girl: Poems for a Chinese Daughter” (Grayson Books) and author of “Beautiful Day,” forthcoming from Deerbrook Editions.

WENDY VANCE NIK WAY

Nik Way writes, acts and directs, occasionally doing some work for his degree. He has been known to shave his head for a part and undress during poetry readings. In 2013 he was shortlisted for the Young Poet Laureate of London. He is currently a member of the Roundhouse Poetry Collective 2014/15. Broadway Baby described his play “Last Supper” as “thought-provoking and poignant.” @NikWay

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