EPISODIC
ep•i•sod•ic [adjective] divided into separate or tenuously related parts or sections; loosely connected Some events are larger than others, fleshed with more details, seeming to inspire more intrigue, seeming more fit for a story; but when we focus only on those events we cheat ourselves of the fullness of our own lives. Dig in to the smaller events: those struggle to title, the experiences we tuck away into the corners, the images we witness and move on from in the same passing instant. There are jewels to be found there. As we collect them, we may find that every day is made up of a series of small, easily-missed beauties and insights threaded together by a common miracle: our lives.
Episodic
Issue 1
Episodic Issue 1 Copyright Š December 2012 by Episodic Magazine Artists All rights reserved Editor: Cheyenne Varner Cover Design: Cheyenne Varner Cover Photography: Cheyenne Varner Fonts (in order of appearance): Code Light, Goudy Old Style, Great Vibes Episodic Definition: Dictionary.com, LLC Design and Layout: Cheyenne Varner episodicmag.blogspot.com
Artists I. Lauren Kristin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 II. Emma Workman . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 III. Jessie Roth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 IV. Alyson Fraser . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23 V. James Goodwin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31 VI. Andre’ Wagner . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37 VII. Lily Cuyler . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45 VIII. Renia White . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
Lauren Kristin
2
Episodic
3
4
Episodic
5
6
Episodic
7
Kristin
8
Emma Workman
Wo r k m a n
10
Episodic
11
Wo r k m a n
12
Episodic
13
Wo r k m a n
14
Jessie Roth
Roth
16
Episodic
17
Roth
18
Episodic
19
Roth
20
Episodic
21
22
Alyson Fraser
24
Episodic
25
Fraser
26
Episodic
27
Fraser
28
Episodic
29
Fraser
30
James Goodwin
Goodwin
The Momentous
for Gertrude Stein
The momentous of wilted utensils thinks for us. Beyond likely eyelashes a bluebottle is more towards being too blonde. Too blonde long enough that I cannot wait to set the soles of shoes on fire. An adorning is twice an insurance policy, six times an explosion of yet more blonde petals of bluebottles of still water. Can a vixen become a nature of the tedious? Long is as long as long enough. The long is long enough. The long is long enough. The long is long enough.
32
Episodic
Partition Sometimes I think that water can be more ambiguous than my mother. The way she refers to me is like vapour, the condensation on my eyes chasing my life as if there is something she doesn’t want me to know or see. All I see are bridges in my head, dams against my skull, lulling me into the false assumption that I was cute as a baby, some woman in an elevator used to remark. I managed to encounter her for fifteen years. She sounded like my mother. I valued my privacy & this was a consequence of her. Eventually, I couldn’t identify with myself the more I went to the beach. If I could wipe away the shit from my eyes, I could be more experimental. What
33
Goodwin
was plain in the truest sense was that I was a baby when my mother’s voice & that woman’s voice felt like the company of a crosslegged jackal, with the haze from its Cuban cigar imperious to negotiating Christmas holidays in its study. It was a perfect representation of how I lacked fibre & protein & scope. An ominous glow is marching. It was respectful when my mother’s breasts used to ache. She got worse when I purchased a monkey.
34
Episodic
What is New If ever & when I am apprehend over the porcelain shoulders of original mini coopers, then how can I not be sure of how or if chickpeas will be the solution for iPod 4’s in drag. What is today if my cock becomes dismembered from the maritime arch ways of bronze electric toothbrushes, & some grand piano clutches a wolfs heart during a steeped prayer through an old film night with Alfred Hitchcock ovulating over my Doritos like tax evasion.
35
A Response to T.S. Eliot’s Cousin Nancy hasn’t she learnt to nakedly comport herself apathetically, the foul-mouthed grace of trampling her modern dances, pertaining to high irreverence & allegory.
36
Andre’ Wagner
Wa g n e r
38
Episodic
39
Wa g n e r
40
Episodic
41
Wa g n e r
42
Episodic
43
44
Lily Cuyler
Cuyler
46
Episodic
47
Cuyler
48
Episodic
49
Cuyler
50
Episodic
51
Cuyler
52
Renia White
White
bodies in love bodies in love gain the ability to count breath she claims 3,412 exhales since he last called he knows it true because bodies in love earn the ability to poetry themselves into closeness praying with questions about how the sky whispers stars across oceans and still an arm cannot reach through timezones bodies in love shout forget reverence and understanding only know the cold of a letter once warm with a lover’s touch say, “I can peer at your face in a screen but have you ever stared at an object until it looked like something else entirely? that is where we lose� the miles have swallowed magic so bodies in love quell themselves on kitchen counters full of meals they cannot eat with other bodies they do not love burning hands upon a stove all tired of waiting for the heat
54
Episodic Vocabulary Mother diminishes takes meals in her room lukewarm tea in a cold mug she is a minefield. grandma is a ball of sheets on a brick-hard twin parts her pillowcase lips and quells, “there is a word for things you don’t understand there is a word that tastes like ash looks like bastard hair in the bathroom sink feels like a bomb in your hand a hot potato in mama’s ovaries” I am a child in a way that I am no longer, asking, Do doctors get cancer too? Do they die from it? Does anyone ever tell them, ‘there is nothing more we can do?’ grandmother’s hand eclipses my warm-skinned mouth I held the bomb for too long and exploded like mama’s cells I have that word down now part of speech: noun second definition reads ‘you might die before you get your dreams’ there is a language in hugging your mother three times a day in hugging her body before it remembers that it can die I’d already known the word “dead” but never “death” tongue rejected the cluster mother carried her dead like a one-eyed infant
55
White
took up so much space in her arms that 15 pound person that 15 pound corpse I could no longer hug her for the fear learned the word “remission” same day I learned “abortion” she was going to let little sister go a stork flying backward come for what will die anyway remission was a promise jar that knew Shayla’s cheekbones knew she would be 13 when I write this poem that mother would have cancer as I dog-ear my organs that I’d look at my breasts watching for high-rises tossing myself from city to city hot potato ‘round a helix ‘round a cell ‘round a cosmograph that I would hold my dead on my lap tap my leg to make it dance and burn every dictionary in sight all the world got many words all the world got much to say their own sounds and speed to speak it and all the world swear they know it all and all the world got their disease got a translation for cancer got a sacrosanct cyclops of a word their dead on their left knee their disyllabic bomb their deep pocket mouths where words don’t fit can’t fit -- only disorder only symptom and then explosion only their dead with the cluster hanging from its tail
56
Episodic
lighthouse she says, “stop calling the man who doesn’t answer. don’t lie next to the man who doesn’t move you.” tell her that this is the poem here. you never sleep in a bra but you do tonight. don’t want to leave anything behind. count the hairs upon your head. remind him that his body is warm as if saying, “that is the only reason i am here.” he makes french toast. the dog lies on your bare legs. you ask why drink orange juice without the pulp. he looks at you like the sun, but what’s a star to a lighthouse? you call the man who doesn’t answer just in case he is lost. what’s a star to a lighthouse? just in case he goes searching, you want him to come upon you. the man who doesn’t move you is just waiting for your sea to part. you eat mango until your hands are sticky. he tries to taste. you tell him to go for the original fruit. he says he will not hold it against you. there is a man in a boat somewhere and you are hoping he finds you when the sea fades into one color and the sun goes black without the pulp. he says you eat pretty. you tell him to wade a little closer to shore. he wants to find himself where you meet. but he will never be lost, girl, you are one of many. the dog lies on your bare legs as if he has seen you before. there is another who looks just like you and you know, so you tell him to wade a little closer to shore. don’t find yourself here. and there is a man who never answers your calls but you do it anyway as if saying, “just in case you ever want to answer, look left and find this womanmade hand.” because, what is a star to a lighthouse? woman can’t blow a star to bits. and one day you have to destroy it all. but for now, you pray he finds you when he is lost, if he is lost. he probably will never be.
57
58
Artist Bios Lauren Kristin is a photographer/maker-of-things based out of Washington D.C. but chillin’ in N.Y.C. More of her work can be found at www.laurenkristin.com. Emma Workman is a high school senior residing in Florida. She plans to go to university in Canada for English, and she enjoys going to concerts, watching bad movies and daydreaming in class. More of her work can be found on her personal blog: skeletonize. tumblr.com. Jessie Roth is a sophomore-age liberal studies student attending college in New York City. Her major is undeclared, her passions plentiful and unrefined! She lives to immerse herself in all kinds of art but especially enjoys creative writing and photography. She is also intrigued by psychology’s take on how we grow up to become who we are. Alyson Fraser is an undergraduate student working toward a degree Leadership Studies with a concentration in Social Justice and Gender. When she has the free time, she loves photography and painting, and is inspired by the small joys in life. Andre’ Wagner is a photographer continuing to master his craft out of his studio in Brooklyn. Committed to breaking ties with the conventions of the day, Andre uses his camera to preserve sensitive moments of life while studying the richness of human interactions. Specializing in social documentary, portraiture, editorial, and various personal projects, he has worked hard to capture a universal truth that resonates in his work. In the past 3 years he has worked with various brands, been featured in magazines and on billboards. More of his work can be found at abstractelements.com. James Goodwin is a 23 yr old MA Creative Student at the University of Greenwich, London (UK). He is currently focusing his dissertation, the ambigously entitled Phenomenology of Poetry: A Hermeneutical Understanding of Intentionality in Virtue of the Poetics of Jean Toomer, Aime Cesaire & Bob Kaufman, on how living poetically is fundamental to our way of being. He enjoys writing jazz, blues, language & surrealist poetry. Lily Cuyler is a junior in high school from Eugene, Oregon. She hopes to remain in the arts field in and after college, as it’s her absolute favorite thing to do. To her, art is a wonderful way to express herself as well as reach out to others. Renia White studies journalism and English in Washington, DC. She believes in the power of high-rise views, mangoes, and James Baldwin. You can find more of her work at ledasoul.tumblr.com.
Editor’s Note I would like to thank each and every artist who has submitted to and been featured in this first issue of Episodic. To those of you I know, and those of you I have only just recently discovered, thank you. It has been a pleasure viewing your creations and I am so grateful for your willingness to participate. I could not have imagined the outcome of this document if I had tried. I have been so inspired and impressed by the creativity, depth of thought, and skill attested to in the art within. I would be remiss if I did not also thank Professor Henry for assigning this project and all of his encouragement throughout. I am very proud of the final product and I do not forsee this being the last issue of Episodic you may enjoy! Cheyenne Varner
Cheyenne Varner is an undergraduate student on the U.S. East Coast pursuing a self-made degree in Educational Activism through the Arts. She writes poetry, short stories and novels in her free time. As a writer herself, she finds facilitating and organizing others’ creative works both a joy and an honor.
To be continued...