Insert Lit Mag Here- Issue Two

insert lit mag here

not looking For approval issue two//june 2014

our second issue comes to you in two parts First, we offer for your consumption our second issue, Not Looking For Approval. We figured we should clear the air. In case you heard any differently, I will be the first to burst your bubble.

We don’t make this mag for you. We make it for us.

If you like the art we make, thank you. If you don’t like the art we make, thank you. We’re still going to keep on making it. We’re still going to keep on writing, drawing, taking pictures, breathing, living, etc. We don’t care what you think. We have never cared what you think. We are never going to care what you think. We are not looking for approval.

Next, we are thrilled to announce that we will be releasing Peter Lusher’s novel, Artiste over the course of our next few issues. This novel, which follows one artist’s struggle between self expression and making a living, is told in a combination of third person present and memories. As readers, we get the stories about who he is, what drives him, and what he is thinking. You can read the first part of the novel beginning on page 69 of this issue.

Now I proudly present to you, Not Looking for Approval Julia Alexander The cover of this issue by Christina Scott.

I'm going to ride my motorbike down one of your three primary palmar creases.

Jo Coleslaw

This is not an exit, one of those best if you leave its, shrouded in some shit no one really believes in.

This is a we get it, one of those lest you forget its, housed in an eyebrow raised to the sky like only you exist for a minute in it.

This is some bravado, a bit of back chat riff raff chit chat back and forth shit chat.

I don’t know too much about hip hop; far more likely find me in a chip shop - using biro writing on the forks like can I get a poem with my sweet and sour sauce, mate.

All I know is passion’s not a lesson you can learn in a term, it’s a burn that you can’t stop looking at.

It’s a hole that you can’t stop picking at.

It’s an edge that you can’t stop staring at, running at, being at, hanging off the edge with your head like I wonder what’ll happen if I jump and that’s all you can think about, shout about, care about, everwanttodoafuckingthingabout, This is not an exit, one of those best to ignore its, powered by I’m not really sure if I want it.

This is a we get it, one of those bet if I let it flow I can go on and on, forward thinking marching to the beating drum, coming on stronger running on and on on and on on and on on and on, on and on.

Jo is looking to get her work out there more and more. In January she was invited to London to be filmed by a new company, The Unpublishables, as part of a series of web based short films on up and coming writers. She likes poems that rhyme and pulse and are dirty and dark and gorgeous. You can find Jo on tumblr http://writes-here.tumblr.com/

How many ways can you break before falling asleep?

Leah Ramillano 1. Forgive me. It is late and I speak like a fool when the night falls.

2. Forgive me. I speak like a fool.

3. The last ghost I kissed before you, told me that I was beautiful. We trembled together at how cold our lips tasted against each other. He built walls wider than the ocean that separated us – I know now that this is not love.

4. I know now that it is difficult to love someone with all the fear of them leaving you.

5. I cannot help but feel like you are somehow different. You are on a slow and steady path to hurt me, but I am too intrigued by how you command something cosmic within me to even stop you.

6. You’re an anvil in my stomach.

7. But you are also fireworks.

8. I want you to question me. I want you hungry and curious about how I’ve sewn myself together. I want you unfiltered, unedited, and uncensored. And I will be the same. Please invade my privacy. I want you in my space. I want you in my space. I want you in my space.

9. When I think about what darling, cheeky things you say to another girl while you two flirt and steal glances over drinks and bar music, I’m surprised that I am not angered. I am immanently jealous that she has a vast amount of your delicious attention and your sweet talking charm, but for some reason, I know that she does not have all of it.

10. No, she definitely does not have all of it.

11. We have created a fairly reckless makeshift romance – something that is meant to eventually fall apart – but tell me why it feels like my very bones quiver to be near you. A primal, gut feeling telling me that it does not end while I am here and you are there.

12. That somewhere there is a road where here and there converge.

13. Forgive me.

14. I am a fool for you.

Leah is a freelance scenic designer and poet from Los Angeles, CA. She tends to wear her weirdness and heart on her sleeve; all are welcome to come take a look at both on her tumblr: leahmichelleramillano.tumblr.com

I.

40 cigarettes can last 40 days if you want them to but i don’t want to last so they don’t last and i don’t last and this is the last one i’ll ever have until the next time i make 40 cigarettes last ten fucking minutes if you go real fast and fucking let loose and live free fuck fast come hard with 40 fucking cigarettes falling out your noses born of some amalgamation if self acceptance i accept i’m a smoker and I’m trying real fucking hard to make 20 bucks last the night anonymous

Kayla Savage

medium format film photo Kayla Savage is an art student from Connecticut who enjoys exploring, photography, and printmaking.

16 indigo Murmurs You are quite honestly the one person I wish I had never met.

As second semester passed I watched you blow those percs and we snorted adderral through that dirty pen.

You cried uncontrollably telling me you loved me as we came down after spending our snow day with Lucy.

Remember that time you ran away into the woods because you couldn’t remember who you were?

No one could catch you and your pupils were so so big.

You told me more than once that your thoughts never seemed right.

I told you there is no wrong or right.

On several occasions you were one of my best friends.

On others, I absolutely hated you.

There were so many sides of you and I could never understand, no matter how many times I remember finding you crying in a stairwell with blood running between your sweaty fingers.

‘I’ is Indigo Murmurs. ‘You’ are only fleeting memories and infinite thoughts.”

Majnun and Leila Hannah SofIa Ghani

Many years ago, when I was still a young boy something happened to me that changed my life forever. What was once simple and clear, became diluted with such horridness that it was venom to the touch. This story began just like all stories that begin and end- with a beautiful young girl. Only two things in this world can make simple-minded people delusional: vodka, and beautiful girls.

Franco, staggered a bit when he walked, and mumbled when he talked. His family had lived in the village for as long as anyone could remember, he was born in and bred Calabria. He hated new people, outsiders, the one’s that crept into his village and made themselves home where they didn’t belong.

I heard the strangest thing, coming from the via. Just behind the marble house. It was the soundof drums, in the middle of the night. They were unwavering, restless beats that shook the fabric of the quiet street. I felt almost dream like, or drunk at the very least, my mind was making up excuses to escape the reality of what my eyes saw. Now, that I think it about it. It was probably my subconscious warning me.

The inner voice in my being, telling me to run as far as I could. But still, still the devil on my shoulder told me to follow the beats of these drums. The steady thump, became smooth, and tambourines merrily joined there company.

It is judgment day. Do you hear the trumpet?

That angel of deadly persuasion was talking to me again. I was always playing his fool. My nonna told me, if I wasn’t careful he would steal my youth just as he did with her when she was young.

His voice, is always so sweet when you’re young. So alluring, so mysterious. He tells you things so softly, you repeat them back to yourself thinking they are your very own words. Mostly, you only

live once. Tomorrow you could die, not having drank that wine, kissed that boy,danced till the sunrise. Dance, dance, dance. And then you blink the dancing is over, you are old and feeble and he tells you, “You fool, you’re already damned now.”

Are you ready to meet your fate? Are you ready to see the path, written in your destiny? Walk. Walk forward.

The light glimmered from the pathway behind the marble house.

I heard applause, I heard laughter, I heard crowds of nonsense gathering, drinking, dancing. I heard whistles, then silence. Complete and utter silence. That was when, I heard the most beautiful voice I had ever heard in my life. Softer than a mother cradling her newborn child, more gentle than time itself. The voice, like a siren sang into the night, and I like a fool of a captain was guided by nothing but foolish will. The singing began again.

“Ams Intahena” What was that? That language. Not what the Turks spoke when they came through, but close enough. Nothing like anything, I’d heard.

Walk. Walk forward.

There were iron gates. This was a party. I had no suit. I had no shoes on even! They would notice me, a peasant boy from the town lurking in from the shadows. They’d probably glare at me for a half a second, before they beat me down suspecting I’d come to steal their silverware, or run off with one of their women. They were not Italiano after all, they wouldn’t even think twice before they did me in. I turned around, angry at myself for coming so far.

If you turn now, you will lose her again. Just like you did last time.

I ignored the angel. There was no way he could be sincerely giving me warnings. How could that benefit him? He was not a non-profit angel after all, he was after my soul.

I walked farther, humming along to the sound of that voice. That now sounded as if I had heard it before, like we’d met, and dined,

and danced. No, no. Madness. Think of the ocean. Think of how dark it is by this house, by this road? You’re all alone, walking in the dark. You should be afraid. The dark is the enemy of the light. You should have some sliver of fear. Unless, you are a creature of the dark. If that’s the case, fear yourself, and run as far as you can. Wait! Was that my voice or his? Hopefully, his.

You are not light. You are darkness. And you do not deserve to have your peasant eyes, even touch her aura. Go home, Coward.

To hell with you! I am light. I will see her. I will hear her voice again. Wretched demon. I ran as fast as I could. I could the power quaking inside my body, racing through me with the vengeance of all forsaken things. I pushed through the crowds, walked past so quickly that none bothered to look twice, and stood in disbelief at the grand ballroom I had almost magically appeared.

It was lavish, extravagant, rich, rich, and rich. Gold marble graced the floors, and ceilings. Chandeliers, champagne, golden trays filled with exotic delicacies, roses and white candles filled the room, with such excess that they were impossible to fathom, nonetheless count. Women with ball gowns made of the finest cloths I’d ever seen were holding small clutches and secret hatred, while men in suits smoked cigars, babbling about passion, and secret hatred.

I found her deep in the shadows of the room. I saw her shadow, beckoning for the sound of rhythm of Khaleeji music. She danced madly, the lengths of curves seemed as endless as the Dead Sea. Her body made waves to the beat of wooden drums , currents that were fierce enough to drown the greatest of men. Her golden tan arms swiftly graced the earth, then fled for seconds at a time. Her dark brown locks of hair danced as effortlessly as the rest of her body. Her smile was somewhat hostile, sometimes she smiled, but most of the time she gave stares that could devour the soul instantly.

Gold, and red fabrics barely clothed her skin, and the sound of the bangles, and coins she wore made a song of their own.

I looked into her dark eyes, lined with kohl, and feel a rush of madness in my veins. She touched my right hand if only for a second and gave me the smile. She snapped her hand, and two dancers appeared. She sat next to me, then inhaled tobbaco through the ornate shisha in front of me with wild eyes. “I’ve been awaiting your visit.”

She had deep voice that projected more strength than even a man. I look at her with wonderment. “Is that what you say to all the foreigners?”

“No, Yaacoub. I’ve been awaiting your return, to the city.” I glared at her, startled.

“My name is Franco.”

She laughed.

“That’s what you think for now, don’t worry, soon you will remember everything. Drink this.“ She poured me a small glass of mint tea. “It had a magic on your tea, I never forgot that.” She cupped my hand for a second, than ushered the drink.

“No, I’m not a tea person actually.” She glared at me fiercely.

“It was not a question. Drink this.” I sipped the tea and felt the warmth of mint and sugar on my tongue. She brushed her hands against my face.

“Does your soul feel enlightened?’

“No, not really.”

This woman maybe beautiful, but she’s completely mad.

She was wearing an orange dress with gold embroidery. It one was of those things I’d seen in photos of Egypt, Beppe had shown me years ago. She had to be one of those Arabs. It radiated outside of her soul, and into her physical nature. I was warned about those women from the Middle East, I was told they would smile at you one second, and then scream at you for having the audacity to smile at them the next.

But, then I always was drawn to wild things and wild hearts, just like I was drawn to the sea. She had the darkest eyes I’d ever seen. They were black. No brown. No

they were so dark that only from close you could see they weren’t black. The same color as long straight glimmers of hair that fell just inches past her shoulders.

Suddenly, I noticed her staring at me again. She sat against the corner of the room, alone. She looked at me, anxiety in her eyes, like she knew me from a long time ago, like we’d had a conversation years ago. There was nothing special about her face, nothing, she looks just like any other girl, I convinced myself, but somehow I was entranced. I let my gaze go, but I could still see her face in my mind. I was almost drawn to her subconsciously. I turned around but I was the only one there, for certain.

I kept walking, then suddenly she started following me. She started pacing towards me, adrenalin began to course through my veins. My heart raced, flares that screamed, You are in danger! I ran, I ran as fast as I could without looking forward or behind me.

I ran faster with each breath I took, until I saw nothing but cascades of blurs around me, green, black, brown, blue, green, black, brown blue.

The blurs entangled my mind. Suddenly my knees betrayed me, in half a second. I fell to the ground and only saw blackness. My eyes lost sight of everything, I was gone.

I woke up to those same, black eyes staring down at me. Why was she staring at me with such concern? Who was I to her? Nobody, not even a zio, and uncle, not even someone who once let her borrow a pen. And here she was looking at me like, I was her beloved, and I was in pain. They really were beautiful eyes though.

Dark, but filled with. What was the right word?

Light. Her eyes are filled with light. You stupid idiot.

Great, now even angels find me annoying. Creatures of God, with enough patience to fill eternity. And, I somehow managed to annoy them. Ha! I must be doing something right though if the demon is angry. You will never get me demon. Never!

That’s when she flinched like a startled bird out of her trance.

“What did you say?” Her soft voice, the same one she sang, sent a siege down my spine. I’ve already managed to make myself look like a lunatic. “Nothing. I’m sorry. I should go.” My face was red in surrender.

Coward. Coward. Coward.

I avoided eye contact, and walked out as fast as I could. “Wait!”

She yelled after me. I saw the curls of her dark hair running far behind her. “Don’t you remember me? “ she asked filled with hope. Hope, that I had no understanding of whatsoever. Why is she calling after the peasant boy? I humbly turned around, like the fool I am. She looked at me again innocently enough. She had a child-like smile, I might as well could have been melting.

Brown golden colored skin, like those girls of the enchanted Deserts all had. The lands where the prophets came, and the holy books, and seas parted. They left a magic in the air, that touched these people, and their children, and their children’s children. I could feel it. Like the rhythm of a tabla in their songs.

She grabbed me by the waist and put her hands on my face, and pulled me in closer “Look into my eyes,” She whispered.

I heard the distant whispers of voices everything. The lights blurred, and I only could see her eyes. There was nothing else.

I felt as if had I had been thrusted against a wall. I had no idea what was happening. Paralysis. I could barely breathe. Barely exist. I looked.

Those glimmering black eyes, with that one tiny almost nonexistent glint of blue. I saw the sea in that blue. That was when everything blurred away.

All of sudden. I was at the sea. The sand grazed against my feet, the sun hugged my skin.

I looked up to find I was surrounded by the coast of the mystical Desert lands. My feet moved, but I was not in control.

I could see myself in third person as if I was a soul without a physical body. My life had become a film, and I was motionless.

My role had just shifted from starring actor to stunned audience member.

“I love you Leila.” I said throwing my arms around her waist. She squirmed, trying to wrestle out of my grip. “I don’t love you. I don’t even like you. I hate you. I hate you. I hate you!” She yelled as loud she could.

Her anger was so sudden that I lost my grip, and erupted in laughter. “You think this is funny? You are filth!” She gave the most wicked glare I’d ever seen. She threw her arms in the air going in for a punch to my chest. I grabbed her hand before she was even half way there, I kept her in my clutch again. She started weeping.

“Why are you crying? Why are you angry? I did everything for you.

You have everything you wanted.”

“Qays, Let me go,” she whispered. She was trying softer pleas now. “I would, if I knew you wouldn’t do something foolish.” I pulled her in even closer, tighter, enough that it would be harder for her to breathe, and surely impossible to talk. She needed more air, she forgot to breathe when she was talking.“ Then, that means you don’t really love me.” I let go of her angrily, and almost tackled her by the sand. I grabbed her by the waist , put my hands on her face, and pulled her in closer.

“Tell me you hate me. Call me every word with a fowl meaning your ears have ever heard. Yell at me. Scream at me. Hit me.

Hurt me anyway you can. Take a knife, cut through my flesh, and kill me. I do not care. But, do not ever say that I do not love you.”

She stopped fighting me then. I could see, I had said what she needed to hear even if she was far too stubborn. “I don’t hate you.” She confessed quietly. And then confided herself back to my arms, that had been a prison only seconds ago. She never knew what she wanted, she always was chasing a thousand

and one dreams, each with as much passion as the next, from one cloud to another. But her face was steady when she talked to me. It wasn’t loud, her hands didn’t move unsteadily, and her eyes didn’t animate what she was trying to be, and what she thought she had to be.

She was just as she was when she was with me, her smile was real, and her voice was calm just as it had been when she was only a young girl. And that alone, gave me all the reason I needed to know how she felt for me. They could call me Majnun, the crazy one, they didn’t understand.

I had been branded since we were only children. I would wake up in the middle of the night in pain. Screaming for the beatings to stop! But, no one was ever even touching me. It was her. I was so connected to Leila that when her parents would give her thrashings, I would wake up with bruises.

They tried distancing me from her even at that age. They said, I was possessed by spirits. They said, I was insane. I couldn’t help it, for as long as I could even remember, she was a feeling that warped through me. She was in my very essence. I couldn’t expunge her if I wanted to. There was no me without her.

“The ship is coming now, and it’s coming for you. You are going to be onit. Even if you’re trying to run back home now, we are hundreds of miles of way. Leila, think this through. You will die in the desert, wandering aimlessly without water. You will die.”

“We are fourteen miles from the village, fourteen.” She said, with her smug smile. “So, you weren’t really sleeping. Of course. Well, at least you’re smiling.” He kissed her softly on the face.

She stared at him with empty eyes. “I have a husband now.” She saidquietly. More to herself really, than him. “But do you love him?” Her smile had now disappeared completely. “No, but what does that matter in matters of marriage?” He nodded, but could not accept this. This fate worse than death was not chosen by him.

“Why did you do this?” He looked at her with surrender.

“I did it for you, They were going to kill you Qays, what could I do?

Watch you be stoned to death? Watch you die in misery, while I just stood there? I had to marry him, it was the only way they would let you live.”

The rustling winds broke the silence in the air. And the thundering roars, of chains, and horses, and men with savage cravings of brutality entered their moment, before they could begin or end it.

The men arrived blood thirsty and searching for justice. They followed the lead of Leila’s husband Ahmed searching for the man who held his beloved captive.

“I will kill the Majnun with my own sword!” Ahmed screamed while staring directly at the illicit young lovers with murderous eyes.

Leila screamed and ran to push the blade away. But it was to late he had dug his sword straight through Qays’s heart.

Qays closed his eyes, and his last breaths said, “I pass by these walls, the walls of Leila.

And kiss this wall and that wall.

It’s not love of the houses that has taken my heart.

But the One who dwells in those houses.”

Next to him, was Leila paralyzed on the floor. Her dress red with stains, of the blood coming from her pierced heart. The men had never even touched her, yet the blade that sealed Qay’s death tore through the exact arteries as him.

Leila and Qays were always one being. They were born to this.

They had been ascribed in the tapestry of fate as kindred beings, but divine love was cursed in the wasteland of Adam and Eve. They tried calling her name, but Leila was already dead in his arms.

As the angels came for their souls, the men stood in utterly silent, and filled with horror and awe.

Hannah Sofía is an Afghan-American writer based in Washington D.C. She is currently studying International Affairs at the George Washington University. She has lived in Switzerland, Argentina, and the United Arab Emirates.

Tyler Derouin

Movement Series IV (Acrylic) Tyler Derouin is a multidisciplinary artist residing in Northern Connecticut. His work ranges from traditional acrylic and ink to sculpture and jewelry. In his time at the Mass College of Art and Design he began to delve into sound installations and interactive media.

Waiting on a Train PJ Carmichael She says that she got divorced a few years ago. My hand is broken. The cast is fresh; fiberglass protects the fractures, cradles them, sings them to sleep. She says something about her career. I’m having trouble focusing, not just on her, but on anything in particular because of a doctor’s prescription. I look in her eyes and I see the gateway to a soul. Tired. Fierce. Stoic.

She’s ready, but I’m not. Her stop is here.

I’m alone again.

Where is this train going?

PJ Carmichael is a young adult poet, journalist, author, speaker, skateboarder, and dreamer. He currently resides in Wakefield, Massachusetts, and has a small dog named Canela. He began writing at the tender age of 16 and has continued to improve his craft to this day.

Christina Scott Christina Scott (You can call her Tina) is a person who draws. She enjoys brush pen, comics, and printmaking. When she’s not making art, she’s probably curling her hair, writing haikus about people she’s slept with, or thinking about dead things.

17 indigo Murmurs I absolutely

Jealousy

love you.

I find it impossible to write about you because I cannot separate I’m jealous of the way myself from the idea of you.

Your blanket gets to hug you I cannot put all of my memories Before you fall asleep at night. with you onto pages because I am selfish I’m jealous of the way The wind wraps around your waist And I do not want to share them with these pages The way I wish my arms could. that will not do them justice like the interior of I’m jealous of the way my adoring mind will.

Your bedroom gets to greet you I cannot reflect on you In the morning.

Because I simply do not want to have to ever look back at you.

Most of all?

Dex Mason

I’m probably jealous of the way The cigarettes you smoke Get to taste your lips everyday.

‘I’ is Indigo Murmurs. ‘You’ are only fleeting memories and infinite thoughts.”

Dex Mason gets herself in trouble by excessively wearing her heart on her sleeve, and she just never seems to learn. All she’s hoping for is that her words will something to someone other than herself.

ii.

did you know you can overdose on acetaminophen? got a big fucking headache anonymous

Sarah VanTassel

photo Sarah VanTassel lives and photographs in Pittsburgh, Pa. She tells the story of her experiences, emotions, and relationships through photographs. You can find her online at www.sarahvantassel.com

Growing up

Eduardo Rivera

when I was a child I used to fill the gap under my bed to keep the monsters trapped even then I’d make sure to not let my feet dangle in case they escaped and dragged me off I’d keep my door closed more importantly my closet shut tight there were just as many monsters hiding in closets as under the bed

the nightlight in the corner was on because the monster you see coming is somehow preferable to the shadows that could be anything

as an adult I still keep my door locked if only to keep others out

my closet is sometimes open I don’t pay it much attention the skeletons escaped long ago how I wish I could have replaced them with monsters now I make sure my feet dangle I know monsters don’t exist but maybe if I believe something will drag me away from all this Eduardo Rivera lives in Miami, Florida and is not fond of the heat and humidity. He has a fondness for ghosts, especially the ones that haunt him. He once spent five minutes staring at a nickel because he thought it was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.

Kayla Savage

white line woodcut Kayla Savage is an art student from Connecticut who enjoys exploring, photography, and printmaking.

Sarah VanTassel

photo Sarah VanTassel lives and photographs in Pittsburgh, Pa. She tells the story of her experiences, emotions, and relationships through photographs. You can find her online at www.sarahvantassel.com

A Fierce Game Navin Enjeti Love, a fierce game A complex puzzle It reshapes us Filling our mind with jealousy Poisoning our blood with anger Wars have been raged over love Where friends turn foes Their weapons do not pierce the skin Where they cannot be found Who do not succumb But shatter the heart Scattering the pieces Victory to those Yet, still have love Kept at a distance Not allowing themselves to be consumed The fallen, and there are many Not chained Nor covered in cuts No fires that burn the body Yet, there are corpses Consumed from within Only the darkness remains Perhaps the light shall never appear This is a tale of the fallen Fighting the battle of love

This is not a game A fierce game A complex puzzle Consuming us from within Navin Enjeti is an author who writes about heartbreak and loss based on his own personal experiences from his childhood through to adult life. A firm believer in living life to its fullest, he draws inspiration from all that surrounds him.

digital photo

Colin Hassett

Colin Hassett lives in Portland, Maine with his girlfriend Katie Traver. His hobbies include music, photography, writing, and more.

Another Poem About Sunsets Dorian Hinkle

Spreading out Streamers of Sun’s last light, Glowing red beams Slowfade blues sink below the sky, Rising royal purples stretch fingers Stroking early stars, Orange painstrokes mingle with Red beams and paint their fire Across a fading canvass, White wavering wraiths of light Slowly slide away Across the firmament To be replaced later with darker shades, And at last the Sun sinks Sparking slightly green before Leaving lingering light By which we run and love upon the banks, Soon moon beams like Subtle spotlights of fading candles Shall spill upon the ground and collect and mingle With streetlights and breaklights Joining in the symphony of light.

Dorian Hinkle is just another poet. When not writing poems, he’s busy overanalyzing music. He doesn’t think he is very good at either.

Climate Change Jenna Rodrigues i.

She was an iceberg that melted one summer and never re-froze, slipped into the sea, washed up on shore two thousand miles away like message in bottle: too late. ii.

He was a hurricane that couldn’t stop spinning until everything sank, saturated, every branch broken down, every shore stripped bare.

He was Category Six on a scale from one to five: off all the charts. iii.

She was a drought the size of the Dust Bowl, a desert-drinker craving the driest of scotch, a hangover only cured by more alcohol, no chance of rain.

Jenna Rodrigues is a storyteller, scientist, and advocate for social change. Her poetry has been featured by Oddball Magazine and Hartwick College’s literary magazine Word of Mouth. Follow her work at jennarodrigues.tumblr.com.

Tyler Derouin

Movement Series IV (Acrylic) Tyler Derouin is a multidisciplinary artist residing in Northern Connecticut. His work ranges from traditional acrylic and ink to sculpture and jewelry. In his time at the Mass College of Art and Design he began to delve into sound installations and interactive media.

oh well Aria Daryadel

a cigarette dangles from my mouth. a five dollar bottle hangs from my hand. i walk this beat forever... alone forever, man. i forget what comfort feels like and the smell of your bedroom. to think i used to smell like it long after i’d leave you. i wish i could say that i’m glad you left but like most other things there’s just regret. i wish i could say that i’m hardly upset but just like with most things i am a wreck. i smoke too much and drink too much. i don’t know half enough about us and now i’m giving up. i talk too much and think too much. i don’t know half enough about us so i am giving up.

Aria Daryadel’s writing chronicles every bit of happiness, depression, and empathy he’s felt over the years as specific to his feelings as possible. In his twenty four years of being here he’s had every sort of feeling and anxiety imaginable and there is nothing he’d love more than to be a relating guide to anyone who may be struggling or feeling alone or lost in this gigantic, tiny world.

12 February 2014 Jasleen Sagoo

My Darling, I have written letters to people I know and people I want to forget.

I have written to inanimate objects – to a skirt and to my hair; I have written to winter, to sleep, and to myself. I have also written to you...

Today, I write to you because I want to tell you something that a few days ago I could not understand how to say – I want to tell you how I feel about fog.

No, I did not mistype that; I do actually mean to tell you how I feel about the thick clouds that get trapped in the trees. It must seem odd that I am writing to you not about my days or about how I feel about you, but instead about tiny white droplets in air pockets not too high off the ground.

I think of fog as a veil that the world uses to hide its sadness. It is beautifully saddening. At times, the world lets us see the road, lights and tree tops through the veil and other times it hides everything that is more than two meters away from us. Perhaps, Mother Earth does not want us to see her cry. Perhaps she allows us glimpses of her through the veil that she wears; simply to reassure us that she is still there... that she is still giving us grain and oxygen.

I like to romanticise fog. To think of it as a bride dressed for her wedding, with her head lowered and her eyes veiled from everyone else. I may have slipped back a couple of generations, to the time when Indian marriages were almost always arranged and the bride and groom often did not know who they were getting married to until the dupatta (veil, if you will) had been lifted. I say this because my grandmother once told me that when she married my

grandfather, she had no idea what he looked like – she lost him in a crowd because she had forgotten his face.

The bride’s face was covered for many reasons – most of which I do not know, but I am going to guess that one was to ward off evil and one was because the bride was upset. I may be making all of this up, who knows? But, it is what I like to believe. Which brings me back to why I like fog... I think it is beautiful how fog hides the true beauty of nature from us. How we notice every little leaf that flitters through the fog and into our line of vision. How when the thick cloud finally disappears into the atmosphere, we see everything more clearly than before, and with a new beauty.

Just as people hold their breath when a bride’s veil is being lifted to reveal her beautiful face, Mother Earth holds her breath when her veil is being lifted, for she is now naked before us. Next time there is fog, think of it as a veil. And each time you see something through the fog, think of it as a naked woman, slowly letting you see one little part of her body at a time, through a thicker muslin curtain.

I once told you of the beauty in rain; and each time water droplets fall from the sky, I know you know what I am thinking of. Today, I told you of the beauty in fog so that when the droplets are trapped in an air pocket a few feet off the ground, you know what I think of.

I tell you all this because I want you to love winter the way that I once said I would.

All my love, Jasleen Jasleen Sagoo is a writer in love with the simple things in life. She marvels at the delicate; and has an attachment to her words, which goes beyond the ink in which they are written

Kayla Savage

35 mm photo

Kayla Savage is an art student from Connecticut who enjoys exploring, photography, and printmaking.

Tyler Derouin

The Glutton (Acrylic) Tyler Derouin is a multidisciplinary artist residing in Northern Connecticut. His work ranges from traditional acrylic and ink to sculpture and jewelry. In his time at the Mass College of Art and Design he began to delve into sound installations and interactive media.

2002: A true Story Jesse Gebel

“Do you see it?” The one boy asked.

“You can see some of her, not much though.” The other boy said.

“Wow, she’s got some big balloons on her.”

“Hey let me see now.” the waiting boy said, pulling the little peeper’s shirt to get him to move.

“Shut up yah turd.”

These two boys were in the local corner store; they were both named Eric and were both aged eleven. They had gone to the corner store as always to go buy five cent candy. This time they had skipped the candy aisle and decided to look in the dirty magazine section. The dirty pretty bomb ladies were hiding in a four white wood cubicle, one of the boards would open but you had to go ask the cashier to unlock it. Still between the two boards you could put you eye against it and look into it. Seeing about half of the dirty magazines. The other Eric finally got his turn.

“You see it?”

“Yah I do, shit that blonde one looks nice.”

The one Eric who wasn’t looking at the pleasing naughty girls noticed something. He was looking up at what seemed to be an old security camera pointing right on them.

“Hey Eric, hey.”

“What?”

“Look, there’s a camera looking right at us. You think it sees us right now?”

“Don’t worry, that thing has been broken forever.”

“Ha, alright. . . Hey let’s go get candy.”

They left the cubicle and decided to buy a pack of chocolate cigarettes. They grabbed their Lucky Stars plus two bottles of coke.

They paid, went out, and started walking back home.

They unwrapped theirpacks of chocolate, took one out and started to pretend they were smoking. Both puffing and inhaling than blowing out invisible smoke. It was a ten minute walk to their home, they decided to sit it down on the edge of the sidewalk and talk.

“You know, when I’m older, I’m gonna’ just buy one pack of smokes, smoke one then throw the rest out.”

“Really? Just one?”

“I don’t know.”

“Hey, maybe I can try to steal one of my dad’s. We can try a puff.”

“Sure haha.” “haha.”

While still sitting down, passing by the little delinquents was a school bus filled with children. The two Eric’s stared at their tiny humble faces. As they were staring, a young boy on the bus noticed them too. The little boy saw the two Eric’s with what looked like cigarettes in their mouth. The little kid opened his mouth and gave them a shocked look. The two Eric’s saw him and laughed.

They then decided to eat their chocolate.

Jesse Gebel sits in night rooms and waits. He waits until the blood flows into the tips of his fingers, and that is what gets him writing. He has finished both high school and college, and now seeks a deadly publsiher that will publish his demented knowledgeable poems and papers of many topics.

Born Again Leah Lovett

Yesterday at noon you baptized me in my tears I bathed you in a sea of your own blood & caressed you with indignities You gave me a bouquet of despair, arranged so delicately By the evening you fed my ashes to the wind I closed my eyes and whispered your sins You cradled my skeleton and we danced with silhouettes We spoke with lovers from the past and their years of passion and chaos were lullabies to our wounded ears We traveled through storms and sunlight We wished on comets We listened to the noise of our minds and the slowness of our hearts You wandered through my soul and I traversed yours We drank the dew and met with God that night We slept under the oak tree &Slowly the dawn broke to release us We were born again as soulmates are each day We found where we began Leah Lovett is a very passionate person. She is a kaliedeoscope of emotions and thrives on poetry as well as the written word. She wrote this after a very tumultuous day, She had hurt and been hurt by the person that she loves the most. She hopes she was able to evoke the emotion that she felt during these moments and to convey the wide spectrum of feelings she experienced that day.

Find Leah on Tumblr meetmeinthemetaphysical.tumblr.com

xxmas

Eduardo Rivera

I got your package in the mail tonight. Of course I was drunk when I got home so I didn’t wait until Christmas or even Christmas Eve to open it. I saw a watch, a letter, and a picture frame with a picture of you inside. I gushed at how you said we now had identical watches and thus were instantly connected forever. The picture frame broke in the mail but fortunately it did not ruin the picture. As I grabbed it, I sliced my finger and thought that now something that you had touched and had specifically picked out for me was now inside me, a part of me forever. I thought about the microscopic shard of glass that went too deep and got into my bloodstream and how it may one day reach my heart and thrust a modest tear in it. And I will slowly bleed to death the way our love is slowly killing me. Or maybe it will drive a puncture in my lung and you will have taken my breath away for the last time. And it will be all worth it because either way, I died with you in my chest.

Eduardo Rivera lives in Miami, Florida and is not fond of the heat and humidity. He has a fondness for ghosts, especially the ones that haunt him. He once spent five minutes staring at a nickel because he thought it was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.

Promised Land Hannah SofIa Ghani The sea with all it’s beauty chose to be with the sand.

I wrote God a song about you, and named it, Promised land.

Hannah Sofía is an Afghan-American writer based in Washington D.C. She is currently studying International Affairs at the George Washington University. She has lived in Switzerland, Argentina, and the United Arab Emirates.

iii. haha this sheet smells like spoiled milk and sweat and probably something else y’know i don’t know why anyone would even touch me anyway going blind by the nighttime going out to a rock in the middle of the woods wack off, jackoff anonymous

Sarah VanTassel

photo Sarah VanTassel lives and photographs in Pittsburgh, Pa. She tells the story of her experiences, emotions, and relationships through photographs. You can find her online at www.sarahvantassel.com

nicotine kisses navin enjeti “Go on. Try some. Just one puff.”We bought the cheapest cigThat’s how it started. I held it be- arettes back then, without the tween my left index and middle faintest understanding of their ill effects or brand recognition. finger, just as I had seen in the movies. I held it to my mouth It was all about being one of the as the cigarette continued to “cool kids”; nothing more and burn, nothing less. rather slowYears ly. I was have fifteen passed then. since A brief then. pause You will eventunot find ated before I took in a drag. The me without a cigarette in hand. others laughed as I coughed, un- “That shit will kill you.” I know, controllably at first. Then anoth- but holding it in hand comer puff and then another. Before pensated for her absence. It long, I was buying packets for us tightens your lungs, but helps to share behind the red brick wall you cope. It helps you breathe. of the toilets. The teachers never No one else understands that. went there.

Smoked cigarettes spill out of She must have tasted it on my ashtrays, the ash falls to the breath as we came closer. Our floor before being carried by the lips parted ever so slightly, beforewind and rubbed into the floorcolliding. I could taste myself in ing underneath your feet. The her mouth as her tongue danced process becomes second nature and before long, you forget how with mine.

many cigarettes you smoke in a day and all because you want to be close to them; the love of your life, who now travels in different circles. It was more than a time filler. Smoking kept you company in the darkest of days and the loneliest of nights.

She walked the streets with him, hand in hand. Her left, like mine, held on to her cigarette. I never did see her again after that, and yet, I wondered if she reminisced about me; our first kiss. Did she look through the smoke as I do, to this day?

“Smoking; it will kill you.” I know, but it’s the only way I can be close to you.

Navin Enjeti is an author who writes about heartbreak and loss based on his own personal experiences from his childhood through to adult life. A firm believer in living life to its fullest, he draws inspiration from all that surrounds him.

23 indigo Murmurs I wonder why I never feel good enough.

I close my eyes as hard as I can to try to erase it all.

I open my eyes for just a second and society screams the answer at me.

I quickly slam my eyes back shut. “’I’ is Indigo Murmurs. ‘You’ are only fleeting memories and infinite thoughts.”

Hotel CavalieR Brian r. Strauss Take me and I’m breathing like a dog panting sweating brewing up my own idea of how this goes let’s have it filthy Darling, shall we? in the front passenger seat with your legs splayed upward and out in those awkward looking yoga poses you do while i’m gasping for air watching the windows fog up and the imprints on them become visible faint smell of cigarettes lingering on your hands as you run them over my face up in between strands of hair tongue in ear fingers in merciless cunt warm clothiness rubbing against my ass tender squeaking of suspension and romanticized visions of endless sexcapades endlessly coming, and coming, never going, only coming arch of your back pierced by two dimples just above your buttocks immaculate marble floors, i point out to her I don’t know shit about floors. our brown vintage luggage set was being rolled along on a cart by some poor brown boy with strong english through golden double doors leading to a service elevator we took our own, found ourselves in a room full of mirrors

cautious eyes all around, dubiously caressing our bodies and yet so sharply those eyes stung to express such frailty that feeling of the earth trying to pull us back as if we might have flown too far from the floor i’ve got my hand buried in her hair thick brown mane she has massaging the back of her neck she’s wiggling her ass by then she’s so excited gently squeezing at my hand with both of hers doors finally slide open, we’re showered by the sunlight that seems to pour through the windows overlooking the valley floor to ceiling a mural drenched in sea foam green fluorescent neon beams of electrified light fiery clouds splashed like paint across the sky everything beneath all of it all the people floating about on their two clubs of flesh that mingle with wandering sockets who illuminate visions of distress and of lust of hate of self loathing of premature comings and goings mangled in a tragic orgy of faraway gazes she clung to my hand, head resting on my shoulder as i looked out over that horizon a faint smile i managed to muster for appearances sake i don’t give a damn or i do and i merely feign indifference try not to think about it too much you’ve been drinking again, she says

face pressed against mine nose to nose sniffing me out like she always does i lightly peck her on her cheek don’t mind it darling the drinking never ends with you, as she walks into the bathroom. sigh and of course I’m following moping about like some lethargic caricature of a bloodhound you might see in cartoons surrounded by mirrors projections of her naked flesh the steam rising and clouding them slide my hand across the surface meet my own eyes haven’t shaved in a week i’m standing there, nude in need of a good trim genitals gleefully waving back at me get into the shower with her but it’s a sad sort of sensuality a disparaging tenderness that reminds me of a mother with a dying son or maybe something different, something in the way of a teardrop falling from the lips of a kiss.

Brian Strauss is a poet interested in exploring the emotional spatiality of poetry through the use of aesthetic narrative and metamodernist tendencies. His poetry is steeped in sincerity and detachment, oscillating wildly between the notion of self and implied author.

photo

Maddi Montero Amazega Maddie Montero Amezaga is a photographer from Donostia. She doesn’t know why, but she makes photographs.

Getting a stiffy for Jesus.

Jo Coleslaw When times are difficult; people are cruising ‘round with their heads up their arses, and you’re thinking “what the fuck’s happened to so-and-so?” and they holler back “oh go fuck yourself darling!”

Then think of that time when I took you to that bar and we sat in the corner and all we could do was just grin at each other and after that you took me home to get warmer.

Jo is looking to get her work out there more and more, and in January was invited to London to be filmed by new company The Unpublishables as part of a series of web based short films on up and coming writers. She likes poems that rhyme and pulse and are dirty and dark and gorgeous. You can find Jo on tumblr http://writes-here.tumblr.com/

This is Not a Love Poem Leah Ramillano This is not a love poem This is me trying protect the parts of my heart you still haven’t touched yet, But there are no sugary substitutes that can replace the words, “I miss you.”

This is not a love poem.

This is me wondering if you see city lights and you think of LA and you think of me sitting in a dark room, writing you this.

Or the constant hope that something animal inside you or something astral around you, makes your very atoms quiver and wakes you up the middle of night, clawing at you to let you know that I am thinking about you and how soft you look when you sleep.

This is not a love poem.

This is me lying if I said that there aren’t times when I wish that I was the calm you seek in a fury of storms.

This is not a love poem.

This is my third glass of wine and I never realized how much Cabernet tastes just like your lips.

This is not a love poem.

This me daring to forgive myself, But loving you is a sin that I would gladly walk through hell for.

Even the devils who hold my hands to lead the way wouldn’t understand the thrills I get when my feet burn.

This is not a love poem.

This is me swimming in a sea that promised me a thousand new fishes, knowing all the while that my heart is still anchored to your rib; That my body only knows how to ride the current that courses to you.

This is not a love poem.

This is my addiction of not knowing how to really let go.

I have loved so many men with broken and imperfect reflected parts of you that I don’t know who my poems are really about anymore.

I think that I still look for you on the tips of strangers’ tongues like a word that I know the meaning of but can never remember how to spell.

This is not a love poem.

This is a rumbling, repeating echo; This is the same story I’ve told before and the same one I will tell again: “I miss you.�

Leah is a freelance scenic designer and poet from Los Angeles, CA. She tends to wear her weirdness and heart on her sleeve; all are welcome to come take a look at both on her tumblr: leahmichelleramillano.tumblr.com

Land of Rage Girls Jesse Gebel

Shots of men bursting into laughter of fear.

They take their bones to make homes, take out their heart to keep warm, they cut off their legs to have something on their dinner plate.

The firm workmen cheating on their lives, mating with different wives, kissing the vibrant shadows of the night.

Girl giving her pose to death and the ghosts of endearment.

It makes her a sullen figure of rage and scattered hope.

Jesse Gebel sits in night rooms and waits. He waits until the blood flows into the tips of his fingers, and that is what gets him writing. He has finished both high school and college, and now seeks a deadly publsiher that will publish his demented knowledgeable poems and papers of many topics.

I Wonder?

Calvin Bland Can we meet again, Can we speak again, So I can breathe again, I still need my friend, What do you think of me, Do you still think of me, Would life be complete with me, Or better without me, Are you better without me, Is life no longer cloudy, Do you miss being around me, Do you miss our connection, Was I a miracle or a lesson, Or was I both to you, Will I ever get to be close to you, Or am I just a ghost to you, If so hope you remember me, My feelings for you have never changed, And I’m just wondering if you feel the same?

For Calvin Bland writing has become his passion. He is from Springfield MA, He has a published book called THOUGHTS OF A PURE MIND (Find power in your thoughts).

Now available on amazon.com and on kindle. He loves writing, and He just wants to share his writings with the rest of the world.

lowly habit Dan Wright I heard a ghost speak to me, I think. No sound. It was like deja vu; I was struck with the strangest feeling, as if I had suddenly remembered that a voice entered my head only a few moments ago. The sensation was nothing like words being heard. It was a bizarre acknowledgement. habits, habits, habits. those that guide the world strange and astray. what it must be like to stand atop and command them all.

I am no slave to you. Habit, you insufferable lowly creature! Stay in your place! Do not try and teach me right from wrong!

Dan Wright is a person living in Massachusetts. He will occasionally sit down with a fine point Sharpie and and write about the things he wishes he had.

Actions Jenna Rodrigues She says she’ll make you waffles, forgiveness in her gesture.

She means: ‘I will hold your head above water when you are too tired to tread.’

Jenna Rodrigues is a storyteller, scientist, and advocate for social change. Her poetry has been featured by Oddball Magazine and Hartwick College’s literary magazine Word of Mouth. Follow her work at jennarodrigues.tumblr.com.

New Years

Eduardo Rivera

On our first date back in August you suggested a Thai restaurant that we never ate at again afterwards we went next door to look at mattresses because I had been sleeping on a broken springless cot for almost two years

I brought you back to my room, my cot we smoked and floated so far above the ground we didn’t arrive at heaven, but it seemed like we had we kissed in the shadows, unhurriedly excruciatingly Friends was on and we laughed as if we had never seen it before and my arm fell asleep after you fell sound asleep on it New Year’s Day I woke up to the alarm on your phone with my hand under your shirt which was in reality my shirt you had to go to work that was the last time you enjoyed the mattress you helped choose almost two years ago Eduardo Rivera lives in Miami, Florida and is not fond of the heat and humidity. He has a fondness for ghosts, especially the ones that haunt him. He once spent five minutes staring at a nickel because he thought it was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.

Heart of Mine Rene Pellissier

I gave you my heart, but when you gave it back it still smelled like you.

It makes everything beautiful look like you, and everything I love reminds me of you.

My heart still misses the sound of your name on my lips.

My heart still thinks it belongs to you, but I don’t.

Rene Pellissier is entering her junior year at the New Hampshire Institute of Art. She writes both poetry and prose. Rene was raised in small town Connecticut, on sarcasm, and alcoholic cherries.

valuable dedications Luci Black I am dedicating my skin to the four year old girl that never wanted to play with dolls, the one climbing trees & getting home at night with skinned knees.

I am dedicating my time to the seven year old girl that saw things that made her grow up with a different view of the world than the rainbows & butterflies of youth.

I am dedicating my heart to the eleven year old girl that had no idea how to pray, but she prayed anyway, only to learn a hard lesson about loss.

I am dedicating my tonsils to the fifteen year old girl that didn’t know how to say no when a handsome boy coaxed her into saying yes - again and again.

I am dedicating my lungs to the seventeen year old girl that took up smoking because she couldn’t find her voice for a while and hid in the in crowd, pretending to be fine.

I am dedicating my hands to the nineteen year old girl that

had to receive a flag as a placeholder for her first love’s life in her arms as she watched his casket descend.

I am dedicating my liver to the twenty year old lady that found hard liquor to be the cure for sleepless nights and unsung melodies that haunted her heart and mind.

I am dedicating my hair to the twenty one year old, to the twenty two year old, to the twenty three year old, to the twenty four year old.

I am dedicating my spirit to the twenty five year old woman that had to find a way to rebuild a life after the reaper associated with her illness never came to collect.

I am dedicating the next part of my life to the twenty six year old that realized the things she had to go through only made her stronger and that she needs but to smile and breathe to find relief.

I am dedicating my future to the person this woman will eventually become after all the hardships are done, to the one who realizes it is alright to want, to need, to love someone.

Luci Black is a South African Alt Lit writer with a penchant for experimental writing. With a fine serving of sass and wit added to her afternoon tea, she rediscovers wor(l)ds. She writes and posts at lulu-llama.tumblr.com

You're My Favorite Cancer Dorian Hinkle I don’t know where you are right now and I hope I never meet you again because we both know how toxic we are together.

I hate the fact that I loved you once and you hate my indifference towards you and your racial hatred has always bothered me, And what’s worse is that in my head I still think that you’re the best I’ll ever have because memories of your screams scar my skin and my mind and I remember the good times we had in our little sad kingdom of hate and fake love and your toxic kisses upon my brow assuring you were the only one assuring me that only you alone loved me.

And it’s hard to tell anyone about the abuse because who would believe me?

And on some level I still love you because not just the abuse lingers because some days I think about you too much If someone asked if I was done with you I’d be lying if I said that I never think of you.

And I know that gives you power.

But on some level I’ve internalized you, your toxins are still running through my veins and my faltering love still stains your hands because we send sad messages on dark nights swearing that we still love eachother.

But today’s the day I end it

today’s the day I cut you off forever, I’m excising the tumors and I’m beginning chemo because while you are my favorite cancer you’re still slowly killing me.

Dorian Hinkle is just another poet. When not writing poems, he’s busy overanalyzing music. He doesn’t think he is very good at either.

FRAT PARTIES ARE FUN I GUESS Julia Alexander

instead of writing another poem about wrapping my shaking body around a stranger, stumbling across campus, and stitching together slurred sentences to explain the reasons my skin bruises so easily, i will only write poetry about paper, about the way you can always see the creases when you unfold pieces of paper i am starting to think that it’s the same thought anyway.

Julia Alexander is a part time poet and a full time cry baby. When she isn’t too busy putting the punk in spunk, she very happily edits this humble mag. You can find more of her work at juliaalexanderpoetry.tumblr.com

pAn( I )mosity Brian r. Strauss Ran the light, cop behind follows closely but after a moment airy (laps of fear) he speeds by on his great white bike on the prowl for some thing bet her something moore inte-resting thana couple of kids speeding pastal toes down Revolucion. Who are we but a couple of dumb foreigners feigning indigeny? Let the bar tender slyde the drink over to you with a cool confidence like you haven’t scene in a while accept from prostitutes in those sleazy backdoor hotels with the vi be r ating beds we all tried to use as kids (if you’ve ever spent your chiled hood in those types of places). Never really knowing what the hellis going on just that some thing is going on some ware... think about that necks time you are master baiting and I guarantee you something will stand erect. There’s probably some poor Dog s lie ding in N out of alley ways getting picked up in the mid dull of the after nuncas no one cares enough to say anything so they don’t even bother trying to hide it beneath the cask aiding dark Ness. wait in line wait in line wait in line wait in line wait in line wait line wait line wait in line wait in line wait in line wait in line.

Bye, the food, try to speak, he has no clue, only words he gets: Seen your buried toe? so he gives it to me and I realize I didn’t wash my hands after I got piss all over them in the street while I walked on the high way but traffic sso slow I’m walking and pissing beside the car as it rolls on Children holding pup/pies in the air trying to cell them, some one tells me the burrito I ate was made from cat or Dog meat.

but I don’t care much cause it was the best damned buried toe I ever had, I swear to God. Then I get to thin king bout the massage parlor I was in how cheap happy endings are there May be Eye lull go back. Not like I have the time to talk anyways, I’m busy doing other things, busy thinking a bout where I’ll be in 5 years. I used to think it was so stupid the way people could let themselves end up alone but now I just laugh cause it’s true how easy it is to end up 0n your 0wn.

That bar was real nice, some hotel my sister’s friend owns so the drinks were on him. absynthe, tastes like nigger babies.

Order a whiskey, stray tuh, the girl next to me’s gagging from the smell but I order her a Chivas anyways.

She smiles and her arm slides over my hand past my wrist up to my neck and next thing I know she’s on top of me in that sl-easy hoe tell down the road with the bed vye bray ting and now it all makes cents to me why it’s for ah dults own lee an eye-mm loving loving loving loving loving it all, absolutely.

Wonder if I’d make a good Fa(r)ther.

I burst i burst i burst i burst i burst iburst iburst eyeburst IBURST! Purl nek less. Dar ling let me inside again, but she’s tuh eye erd and drunk an passed out so I leave her there to pay the bill cause I don’t really

have the money. I go back to the bar and the tee veez are all on playing fu’tbol or foot-ball or what-ev-er the hell it is yore in tu.

They always love the ring, lotta Latin fighters in the ring and they love the anima(I)city that’s just how they are, how we are. They gotta throw sum blud into the micks otherwise things get terribly dull extremely fast, that s just the nature of things. Can- toh nuh gun, byuh .44 mag numb for shhh-its an gih guls, fire that sucker off and wah ch- the blue flame burst out the tip a that gat like a han tryna catch its seed be for it s outta reech.

Bursting bursting bursting bursting I wrote a letter asking her if she loves me, maybe she’d want to come with me, I haven’t heard back.

Fingers crossed, May be...It’s just blind hopefulness.

(I) can feel it already. This aint wormwood is it? He smiles and keeps cleaning his glass with that filthy white rag of his, or at least it was white, maybe, some time ago.

Say my name, whats my name, say my name, say my name, say my name what the hell is wrong with you, stop that relentless shaking it s freeking me the hell out I justw atnw a another drink for goodssenakesss.

Pleasurable pleasureable pleasure able? calm. calm calm calm Whiskey one ice cube. Shot of tequila with Tabasco in it. Burns so good.

Light a cigarette cause thank God you can still burn one here in the bars and restaurants. itsa fucking miracle I tell you. forget about it.. forget about it but that bitch from the hotel just came down and she’s pissed, how’d she know to find me- he(a)re?

i don’t trust a woman like that, where’s my wallet? front pocket who does that? intelligent people of course who wouldent like getting pickpocketed in this Godforsaken place. Thatid be just great. the rest of your family looks white but you’re the token beaner looking motherfucker. Those icey sonsofbitches will probably think iam being smuggled across the border. HA! I problee speak better ing lish than most of those motherfuckers!

Somehow at some point somewhere I traded my twenty for two hundred pesos and some drinks. Flashes of a man buying me a bucket of beer, every woman I met was named Guadalupe or at least I thought so and I may have been ripped off. Theres a chip in my front tooth and my family is absolutely furious.

What do they expect, young guy like me let loose in this orgy of hedonism.... (hee hee hee haa haa haa!)

ime bound tu mayk a few mis takes, orso ive ben tot thru my x ten siv life x peer ee inse. (hee hee hee haa haa haa!)

Doe nt stress a bout it thoe, giv em tie mmm, thay ll ferr get, or thay ull... or they’ll turn it into a joke and (hee hee hee haa haa haa!) all of a sudden you’re that hilarious sonofabitch

(hee hee hee haa haa haa!)

who does crazy shit like that.

Hee hee hee Ha

Ha Ha Ha HAAAA!

And I turn and say to mother, smiling as only I smile How bout that?

Brian Strauss is a poet interested in exploring the emotional spatiality of poetry through the use of aesthetic narrative and metamodernist tendencies. His poetry is steeped in sincerity and detachment, oscillating wildly between the notion of self and implied author.

Christina Scott Christina Scott (You can call her Tina) is a person who draws. She enjoys brush pen, comics, and printmaking. When she’s not making art, she’s probably curling her hair, writing haikus about people she’s slept with, or thinking about dead things.

yours.

Leah Ramillano I found you in the middle of the night

when my body was trembling and aching for the right hands.

I do not want to enter your space naked and bare, half prepared for your eyes to see me.

I want to approach you slowly, fully clothed with all my insecurities and broken baggage.

It is an immaculately different feeling to let someone else undress you.

Please undress me before I have time to paint a prettier shade over me.

Please undress me before I have time to cover up anything I do not want you to see.

Your skin melting into my skin makes a sweeter song than restless crickets at dusk; I come undone to your tongue far faster than a traveling secret.

I do not trust myself with you in the room and yet I cannot help but give you all of me.

Does your face light up when you remember that my spine is made of loneliness and old time blues, of constellations and dirty promises; because all I need is you breaking me in like a new pair of your favorite shoes.

Whether I wake up feeling like doves and warmth, and I whisper in your ear, “Make love to me, darling.�

Or whether I wake up drenched in carnal spirit and I beg you to fuck me until the world around me falls apart,

Baby, I hope you know by now: having you inside me feels more honest than prayer.

Should I be ashamed of how much I need you to destroy me?

Take me.

I am yours.

Leah is a freelance scenic designer and poet from Los Angeles, CA. She tends to wear her weirdness and heart on her sleeve; all are welcome to come take a look at both on her tumblr: leahmichelleramillano.tumblr.com

You've got to have somewhere for the helicopter to land.

Jo Coleslaw I do not want you like I want 6 pm, when the warm breath of freedom fills my lungs once again.

I do not want you like I want a cigarette; for a moment’s satisfaction leading only to regret.

I do not want you like I want that lemonade, for the sugar coated bullshit lasts a second then it fades.

I want you like a car crash.

I want you like a flood.

I want you like a fire fucking storming through my blood.

Jo is looking to get her work out there more and more, and in January was invited to London to be filmed by new company The Unpublishables as part of a series of web based short films on up and coming writers. She likes poems that rhyme and pulse and are dirty and dark and gorgeous. You can find Jo on tumblr http://writes-here.tumblr.com/

Gaseous Kevin Popovich I used to think that I could fart around you because I was comfortable.

I get it now.

Your love gave me gas.

I was too filled with your breath and your thoughts and your wants.

My own desires and needs and soul fell out of my ass.

You didn’t like the smell.

It’s my house anyway.

And now you’re just a poem about farts. lol suck it.

Kevin Popovich is a cook. He lives in Providence. He wries because he tried it by accident and it stuck.

Thrash Emma Hannan

when you told me you loved me as i walked away, i should have said “don’t.” you are the mountain i will never climb, cannot ever climb, and i am a tsunami - i am quiet until i’m not, capable of destruction without ever being detected. i want to hate you for making me think of you when he leaves the room, when we are driving, when i am alone, when i am not. i want to hate you for making the first poem i’ve written in six months be about you. you are a forest at 3 in the morning and i am barefoot and running in the black. i want to get to the very edge of you, but will always fall first, will always run out of breath. it is impossible to not be tripped by roots.

Emma Hannan began writing in 2009 and became a contributor and editor of her high school’s literary magazine, Scriptura. Post-graduation, she has dabbled in everything from short story to journalism, but her heart will always beat in poetry.

Her goal is to inspire art, create art, and to ultimately become art.

iv i thought i’d stop writing self depreciating songs when i stopped looking at myself guess i’ve given up on narcissism taken on vanity it’s a system of “i can’t get out” someone please abuse me love it like it more anonymous

For the Dead Jenna Rodrigues The dead leave legacy in the actions of the living.

I wonder: are we getting it right?

Does what I spend my time on today have any bearing on the beating of your heart in me?

Jenna Rodrigues is a storyteller, scientist, and advocate for social change. Her poetry has been featured by Oddball Magazine and Hartwick College’s literary magazine Word of Mouth. Follow her work at jennarodrigues.tumblr.com.

Artiste peter lusher

One: Getting Up Wind whistling and snapping made his ears pop. The pressure changes changed how he heard the world. The popping made him uncomfortable but only for a few moments. The snapping he heard was not the wind but in fact his hair. His hair was obscuring his vision, he wanted to remember the sky and the stars as they were at that moment. To see the lights twinkling merry in the velvet darkness overhead. His hair though persisted in making this impossible. For this he was frustrated.

There was no real way to keep his hair back, and so the enjoyment, as with all things, would have to be with a small fly in his ointment. Imperfect. But that was the way things were and that was just fine with him. There were sounds occurring to him, not only the snapping and popping, the sounds of sirens, car horns, music too loud from a car or an apartment. These are the people and the sounds of the place in which he lives. The sounds echo up to him blending and becoming new. The driving bass from some rapper here blends with the long suffering sounds of a string concerto. This is new. Would it have happened any other way? Would he have enjoyed it as much if it had been something that was not a blend? The sounds shook the windows, or his imagination made them shake as he listened intently. He listened to his heart and his body, the world seemed to be floating. The core of himself was somewhere else. His world was spinning above him and there was nothing to stop it. His life was not flashing before his eyes, only the things that he had left undone. The words that he would never say, things he would never get the chance to regret or enjoy were screaming in his head. He saw the world coming to embrace him over his left shoulder. He turned to face it and opened his arms to his mother, encouraging this embrace. The street was aglow with light. The milliseconds trickled past like hours. How long would this take? Why wouldn’t it just end? This falling was relentless.

It never wanted to end, and he never wanted it to end. Let it be like this forever. Trapped in between the sky and the earth. Let it be this acceptance and this clear thought. His watch beeped.

Oddly enough the sound was reassuring. Time was marching on.

The beep was his wake-up alarm, set for three a.m. A new day would dawn soon, into the early summer sky the sun would leap.

A dawn that he doesn’t get to see but a dawn that means all the world to him. His last sunset, his last dawn light. This was his long rest, early granted and unremarkable. Unremarkable except for the one thing that will be there forever. Unremarkable except for that one. Single. Thing.

Why was it always the first and last thought about watching the world spin? That we are not who we were and aren’t sure who we are, but certainly know what we want and what will be? Over and over the world turns, spinning away from itself. Once there was a time when we were brought together, slowly but surely, the infinite plane wrapped itself around some point and then there it was, a globe. Pick a direction, start hoofing it, you’ll get back to where we were. Except at the end.

The artist had been up early that morning. Thinking almost non-existent thoughts. His morning coffee and cigarette tasted just as good as they always had, but the crisp autumnal air had chilled the rooms in which he lived, giving them an extra freshness. Perhaps that was what brought his permanent idealism to the fore. Maybe that was what caused him to note that he doesn’t actually live in the world, but instead that he merely conducts it through his eyes and back to the canvas. He wanted his life to mean something and that was precisely why he did what he did.

Except that he didn’t do what he did. He did something else.

Something that was unpleasant and dull. A grind. Non-adventurous. A glorified clerk. An apprentice. He worked with art, sure. But it was art by committee and on commission. Antithesis to real

art in his own mind. Always the marketers, the demographers, the advertisers told him how to create. Non-creative people telling someone who could see form and color just being in the world trying to tell him how to see. His co-workers didn’t seem to mind.

The whole project started innocently enough. There was a client trying to capture the mood of the urban youth, and the affected urban youth.

Find us something that shows that we are cool and hip, but still take a lot of care and work into our newshoe, they had told the boardroom. The artist was there but was too low level to actually speak. We want something with artistic and yet solid fonts. We want something that is over the top. Something that loudly says, if you don’t want this you are not on the drugs that we are on, they had told the room. The artist listened quietly.

You mean like some kind of graffiti?, the lead artist asked.

Yes, exactly.

Why? Its cool. Its urban. It is the visual symbol of antiestablishment.

Its hard to work with.

Why? Because the graffitists are doing illegal things in the night, and we are not sure that we want to support it.

We want it. Toss in a small script at the bottom of the ads that states that we do not condone or encourage graffiti.

The ad that you are describing does exactly those things.

Yes. So? The lead designer and the clients closed the meeting and the apprentices, the work-horses were sent to their desks, out into the world, to their coffee-shops to research the images of graffiti.Find it. See what ideas it sparks in your mind, they were told. They went out to find it. They went to look for the answers written on the walls of the world.

His artistic training began at a young age. He was talented

but lacked both skills and direction. It seemed to be a re-occurring theme in his life. He was nine. How could it be a re-occurring theme? It was though. He had started little projects, hand made gifts for Christmas, usually encouraged and finished by his parents when something else caught his eye and he ran after it. It seemed that he was always running to something else, leaving whatever it was to catch up or fall behind forever. His tutor told him he needed to focus on the image in his mind. He did, and his hand created impressionistic and surrealist work.

It is too advanced.

But it looks good, and this is what my mind is telling my hand to draw.

You aren’t ready to really study these techniques.

But this is what I like.

You have to learn the basics first.

The basics are boring. I did good with my shading though.

Yes the shading is good. But it is still too far in front of where you should be concentrating your efforts. Why not try to copy this photograph? The photograph was of a land scape in the setting sun.

Its boring.

But it will help with your basics.

The artist went home after the board meeting and sat in front of his black-book. Then he went and found his other black books.

They were tucked away in a smallish backpack in the back of his closet. Long neglected, never forgotten. His sketches were all there, right where he left them. Each page a riot of thin lines and thick ones. Colors and black-and-white. Pencil, pen and magic marker decorated the pages with swift curves and slow lines. Fast sketches lived next to Polaroids of finished work. The artist had put these away, his then girlfriend had told him, This is great stuff, but you are a graduate now.

So?

So, you should be focusing on art that won’t send you to jail.

But this is something I like. And I have been breaking into something new. Work with more meaning than just a name on a wall.

It is for hoodlums and kids. You are neither. And she had helped him pack up is sketches, throw away the cans, toss his stained bandana and hoodie. And then convinced him to focus on real art.

They had been living together for quite some time. The nine year old that wanted to progress faster than what the system was prepared to allow had stopped trying that. He got focused on the goal others wanted for him. He got focused on making a life. He got a degree in graphic design in the hopes that this would help him feed himself. The world of street art and graffiti were officially gone from his days. His girlfriend helped him find ties to hid behind instead of the Guy Fawkes bandana. Had helped him find sport coats and dress trousers to replace the utilitarian carpenter’s jeans and baggy cargo-pocketed pants he wore with his paint splattered hoodies. Oxford shirts replaced t-shirts depicting everything from Che Guevara to quotes from the Buddha. Last to go were his foot fitting running shoe. He had told the salesman when he bought the shoe that he was a free-runner, and in a sense he was. When he was running he was free.

The sketches looked like someone else’s work. It had been years since he had gone over them. The girl had long since left, and he had never gotten the work back out. A life existed in between the tattered covers of these notebooks. A person. A memory. But not his, not anymore. He was disconnected from them.

They were who he once was, before he had let someone else take complete control of his sensibilities. He had become a different person to fit in with the world, and what the world had expected of a person like him. But these visual reminders were giving him a hint of what it was like to be himself.

He was only twelve and that was when the world truly changed, all around him things had gotten weird. His mother was looking for work. His mother didn’t work, everyone knew that. Mothers stayed home and made after school snacks. They helped you get to the art classes that you were disillusioned with. They encouraged you to go outside and play with the other kids in the neighborhood, and that while it is so good that you are reading so much but really playing outside would do you some good.

Why? Because that is what children your age generally do.

Why? What is out there that is not in here?

Kids. Sports. Games. Forests, lakes, creeks. Places to explore.

But those are in my books. And besides there isn’t anywhere left to explore its all been found hasn’t it?

Has it?

The child looked up quietly questioning. Trying to determine if he was being teased like the kids at school, or like the family he wasn’t close to did. He was not sure. His class had just learned all about Magellan and the explorers. They went everywhere. And now you could open an atlas, one of his favorite books, and see the places. You could even see how high they were from the sea if you could decipher the color codings. He had once drawn his own map, depicting his walk from school to home. He had even put in the trees and the bushes that he imagined stories around.

He left out the place that had his fort. Instead he had put in the words, Here Be Monsters. He had learned about that when his geography teacher had showed the class a picture of a very old map and the words were in one of the blank places.

The young man found an even older sketch-book. The one from his years in highschool. On the cover were the words, Here Be Secrets. They weren’t. Not really. They were just sketches. But they were his. His work was different from the stylized forms he had created in college. There was no specific style here. There

were influences of grandmasters, influences from his art tutor, from his history teacher. There were more than just a name in them. There were sentences. Here Be Secrets indeed he thought.

He went out to play, to find the blank places in the map. He was distraught that he couldn’t find any, but he did play with the neighborhood children and learned their names. They played from dawn to nightfall in the summer, and every spare moment they could get their hands on when in school. And all the time his mother looked for work. Until one day she stopped. That night she told him why, We are moving.

Where are we going?

Your father got an offer to move for work.

Ok. So we are going.

Where are we going?

His work needs him in New York.

That’s far away.

Yes it is.

He continued to look at the notebooks containing sentences and pictures. A small feeling inside him stirred. It had been locked away so long he had forgotten what it was. It had shriveled up, where once it was a great stag leaping through the forest, now it was a frightened mouse. Backed into a corner and shaking, but there. He nurtured it, leafing through this book again. There were notes in the margin. There were questions about art and why did it not move people the way that he thought it should. He had asked what would Picasso do. The small furry feeling was taking a larger shape as it was fed these questions. The shell of other people slowly fell away from the mind of the artist.

His family had moved to New York. They still had a yard, although in comparison to what they had back in Ohio it was nothing. Their yard in Ohio was big enough that they could play

soccer in the backyard and Dad could still grill. This they did on summer nights when the neighbors were out and came over with conversation for the adults, sometimes with lemonade, occasionally with beer or wine. Convivial. Unabashed. They were neighbors and that’s what neighbors did. In New York there was a big fence between them and their neighbors. The yard was too small for soccer, but a grill would fit. The street had more cars than trees. Even so young the boy recognized the artificiality of the place. It was not fun. At least his mother didn’t tell him to go out and play. He was allowed to sit inside with his books as much as he wanted, and on the weekends he even played videogames.

His mind raced as he thought of an interesting solution, an experiment. The small fury creature that was locked away was gone, in the few hours that he had spent going over his old books it had metamorphosed into a large aggressive animal. They were working in unison, goading each other into this crazy thought.

His art tutor no longer around to guide his explorations into the world of paints and canvas, the archipelagos of pastels and chalks, the floating space station that was pen and ink, he sought out what he wanted. The students in his public high-school boastingly informed him of their nightly forays into train yards and rooftops. With great hubris they showed off their polaroids of completed burners on train cars, billboards. Showed off sketches of tags they perfected. Bragged about being able to put a throwup, over six feet tall and four wide in a mere sixty seconds.

Argued and challenged each other about who could or could not do one better. The teenager listened from a distance. He tried to work up the courage to go over to them and just listen. He listened for months, months became a school year. He started to look for their signatures around the neighborhood. He saw some, never saw others. He continued to sketch. A few weeks into the school year he walked over to the group, heart pounding, to eat lunch and share their conversation. He had his sketchbook

under one shaking arm.

Hello.

Hey man. Whats up?

Can I sit with you?

Can you? And they laughed.

Ok. He walked away.

The question on the artist’s mind was whether or not he was willing to go through with it.

The teenager packed his bag for school. Sketch-book, pens, homeworks. He went outside to catch the breath of stale breeze that blew through the neighborhood. His father was waiting on the steps finishing a foul smelling cigarette.

Ready for school?

Sure.

Well lets get on then.

Ok. They walked together to the train that would take his father to the office in mid-town, and him less far to his school. His mother didn’t let his father smoke in the house and the stress he was under with the engineering projects was driving him to smoke more and more. There was stress, there was hurry, but his father always waited for their quiet walk to the train every morning. Cold and wet mornings they took a cab to the station, but his father was always waiting for the cab on the steps with those foul cigarettes.

Hot and humid days they walked slowly trying not to sweat.

Rarely did they talk.

Dad? Yea? I wish I had some friends.

Well make some.

It is hard.

I know, but it isn’t impossible. Just start talking.

It’s not like home.

I know.

The artist was walking down the street returning from the art supply store. The sky was threatening rain, but it hadn’t yet. A good night for a hot meal. But with a sketchbook under his arm and a bag of markers and pens clutched in his hand and a head full of ideas and a strong beast growling at him to stay focused and get moving he knew there would be no time to cook. Perhaps a delivered pizza would do the trick.

The teenager was prepared this time. He had his book in one hand, a finger holding the place of one of the sketches.

He walked over to the group sitting there. His eyes took in their clothes. Scarves, bandanas, hoodies, baggy cargo pants, boots untied, baseball hats turned at all the odd angles in the onehundred eighty degrees available, the one or two girls wore fingerless gloves. He heard them laugh, heard them chortle, heard their accented and staccato speech and stopped his shaking and his worrying.

Hello.

Hi. What’s up?

Can I sit with you?

Can you?

Yes. Then you probably should.

He was nervous and worried. He sat down and introduced himself. They introduced themselves. Toad was on his right, he wore overalls over a lined pullover sweater. His boots seemed enormous. Jazz was next to him, she was wearing a bubble vest and a tight long-john shirt, drawing quite a bit of attention. P-Funk was flipping a lighter end over end in his hand. His bandana was around his neck and his coat looked like something a mechanic might wear, his t-shirt had the face of a bearded man smoking.

Two-Way was fiddling with his phone and trying to hide it from the lunch proctors, and his overtly stylish dress seemed out of place.

Giant’s tiny hands were incongruous with her tall body and boyish hair, but her t-shirt sported a unicorn, under this was a turtleneck. Kay and Sa were the same size, broad and heavy with oversized hoodies and monstrous headphones. Trane was sketching and barely looked up. His hands were stained by paint and oil, his glasses flecked in metallic colors and his watch was scratched and looked like it would barely run. They asked him what was in the book, so he showed them the page he had kept his finger in.

Coffee had taken the place of food. Parliaments had taken the place of water. The smooth grating sounds of the marker on the page had taken the place of a movie. The music had taken the place of the Famous Grouse he would have had. His too big for the room dining table had taken the place of the desk. The growing sense of enjoyment and excitement took the place of the feeling of drugged drudgery.

They asked him to come hang out with them after classes. They asked him to go to the park. They let him know that he was welcome to join them whenever he wanted to. He sat with them. Went out after classes to coffee-shops with them. Bummed cigarettes from P-Funk and Trane. Flirted with Jazz and nothing ever came of it. He went with them to the park and froze to the bench in the October winds. He flirted with Giant, until TwoWay mentioned that Giant had a thing with Kay. He showed them other sketches. They showed him sketches. He found that he didn’t laugh as much as they did. But he found himself comfortable, even with their teasing. It was all in good fun they told him, they were just ragging him. He remained quieter than most, only speaking when he really had something to say or when spoken directly to. He did learn, albeit slowly, to smile more, to chuckle at a joke some. It wasn’t that he didn’t like them, but it was that he hadn’t learned how back in Ohio. Back home. But he was learning.

The massive grandfather clock that the artist had purchased

the year before for his girlfriend, but never had given to her because she left, tocked in the corner. Counting the time until dawn. Marking the moments, marching slowly. He listened to it with half an ear. The music had stopped, it had reached the end of its playlist. The sketch-book under his hands had his attention.

It demanded it. It reached out and grabbed him holding his eyes in place, holding his hand to the page. Page after page, sketch after sketch, idea after blast of idea. A kaleidoscope of color and images. Blurring together as the stars whipped overhead and the nightingale sang a song.

Where did you learn that?

What?

That.

I’m not sure.

Yes you are.

I see it on the subway all the time.

So you are doing this now instead of using the training that we paid for you to have.

I am using the training you gave me. See? He showed his mother the composition of it. The colors. The color scheme he used had a point. It was a language he explained. He was exploring something new. He was combining the old with the new. He worked through sketch after sketch explaining each one, showing her the lines, the vanishing points, the techniques he had used to create it all. She made him show his father. His father said he understood but that he didn’t care for it.

He wanted his son to focus on the more conventional and less on these scribbles.

The lark came on and relieved the nightingale. The grandfather clock tocked. The artists hands were still even after so many cups of coffee. The ashtray was full of butts, the pack was empty of cigarettes.

The sketchbook wasn’t full, but it was growing. Notes were in the

margins. His back was sore. The artist decided to take a walk.

Can I show you a sketch?

Sure.

I worked it up last night.

Well let me see.

The artist found himself walking into a corner store what must have been seconds after the owner unlocked the door. He discovered that he was buying another pack of cigarettes. He had smoked more last night than he had in the years previous. His ex-girlfriend had gotten him to break that habit. He found himself outside the store lighting one up and marching off to the bakery to buy a bagel. He decided he didn’t want one as he reached the door. He had seen something that drew his attention instead. A sticker, a name-tag sticker. It had a word on it scrawled in over worked letters, love. He smiled.

Sitting in the park, his first ever purchased packet of Parliaments in front of him with his lighter resting on top of it, his coffee sitting quietly next to that, gently cooling and steaming into the cold November, his sketch-book closed in front of him covering the etched and ballpoint doodles and scars on their table the teenager was lecturing expressively and animatedly. The cigarette ember punctuating and jamming the full stops. Not being smoked, it was forgotten in his hand. It was a prop. Art is anything that moves you. Art is aesthetic. Art is a creative universe.

The grandmasters of the Renaissance borrowed colors and ideas from their predecessors. They created realism. Invigorating.

Exacting. Perfectionism. Scenes were depicted in detail. In graphic detail, in exacting detail. No brushstroke was allowed to be out of place or out of touch.

Perfectionists.

Yes they were. But that happens to be what their patrons wanted. They wanted to be transported into the place. They wanted to see a place recreated but Monet never made anything

exactly like what it looked like in the real world. No, he made it so that your mind would create it. He decided not to force feed his viewer the emotion, but instead to let the viewer go where he would with it. He gave an impression of the world.

Hence the word.

Exactly. Picasso took it several steps further, and gave the raw emotion. The emotion would distort the image, and the image distorts the mind giving it back the emotion. Dali went beyond them still, he created landscapes of emotion. A place where the mind might travel freely through and over and under the feeling.

Escher wanted to show that math was art, literally. He wanted to play with the idea of paradox.

That’d be the stairs going in a circle right?

Right.

Why? Why not? Warhol wanted to prove a point about the silliness of the world, photographers wanted to give the impression of the emotion by giving the image of the emotion. Then the abstracts come and do whatever they felt like. Literally. His cigarette went out so he took another one out and lit it, taking several fast and deep drags. There are other influences that enter at random.

Japanese or Chinese woodblock, porcelain from China, ink paintings, the concentration on the use of the negative space and not being afraid to use it. Zen. Tao. Arabic mosaic, indeed Islamist portraiture. The modern world of art has any number of influences and to actively ignore any of them is to limit the artist.

Instead of returning home the artist went to an office supply and got a package of Hello, my name is... stickers. He also selected a mini-clipboard and a black marker. Outside on the street he opened the package of name badges and put them on the clipboard, pitched the wrapper. He clipped the marker to his shirt collar. He started walking looking for a likely place to start.

His friends had gotten him a Christmas present. The first he

had ever gotten from someone not directly related to him. It was a backpack. Dark in color with no reflective surfaces. It had only two pockets, one large and one small. In the small pocket were a package of large-ish blank white stickers and two markers. A small chisel tip and a fat chisel tip. It also contained a small Polaroid camera. The larger pocket held ten cans of spray paint.

Red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet, white, silver, black.

There was a collection of tips to match each color. Folded neatly there was a keffiyeh next to a black knit cap with a brim. The collection was in a brown box with his name on it waiting on his stoop when he got home, the box had no postal markings on it and no from so-and-so. But he knew where it came from when he opened it and looked at it all in his room that evening. He smiled.

The artist walked the town. He moved through the city. He felt its ebb and flow. Felt its pulse in the people moving around him on the street. Saw more faces than he would have cared to with their eyes down and their cell phones out. His eyes were playing across the street-scapes in front of him. Looking for more targets. He got on a bus, got off. His stack of stickers was running slowly. But with ease. Nothing forced. Just a slow campaign to reassert a certain feel. He felt it was a good beginning. He thought about the start as he wound his way back to his street and back to his apartment. It was noonish and he decided to take a nap, if the caffeine still slamming through his system would let him. As he stretched out on his couch he thought about his city, the sketchbook, the markers, the stickers, the excitement, and the feelings and thoughts that had taken shape as the large aggressive animal living in his brain. He dropped off to sleep with his mind racing.

A dwarf standing on the shoulders of a giant sees the further of the two.

Does he indeed?

Yes he does.

And what?

Lets stand on the shoulders of giants.

The artist tossed on the couch. His dreams were filled with music, the trance and electronic music of his youth, running through yards filled with scarred train cars, was being blended with the jazz, classical and standards he had learned at his father’s knee. The images were molded by the envelope pushing artists he had had to study. He flew over a landscape made of paintings, sculptures and gradually through the box cars. Blending into one beautiful arpeggio of images. He heard the colors and was seeing the music. A sticker leapt out at him and enveloped him and he was flowing into the black-and-white curves of the letters. Slowly the dark engulfed him and let him rest peacefully.

They borrowed the art room after school now. The aging hippy of an art teacher was happy to let them. He was happy to advise them, perfectly ok with letting them smoke with their bodies hanging out the windows. He encouraged them. Got them art-history books and catalogs. Showed them how to use the Google image search engine. Went over their sketches. Even helped them find massive sheets of paper or cardboard to work on. They didn’t tell him that the paper and cardboard were just to practice on. Didn’t tell him that they were in fact iHAD, I Have A Dream crew. But, he didn’t ask either.

Working on what felt like borrowed time, the artist leapt from his couch fully clothed and bolted out in the gathering sunset.

The bus seemed to take forever to get him to the second hand clothing store. He had to get some very specific clothes. Dark colored jeans, shirts, hoodie, and a bandana. He managed to get them with plenty of time. He paid the bored teenager at the desk and was on his way out the door, already he was planning his first excursion. He left a sticker on the pole outside the second hand shop. The sticker clearly stating, Hello, my name is...Artiste.

For their first group project iHAD decided on a pretty specific image. A crowd in silhouette on a road. They were marching with fists in the air. The background would be a Dali-esque interpretation of sunset with more than a little modern graffitists’ flair. There would be a figure slightly in front of the crowd carrying a flag. The word Lead would be stretched out underneath the crowd. Done in an easily legible style, the colors in the word a reflection of the sunset. They thought it appropriate. The plan was to sneak into the Eighth street station after it had closed and paint it on the wall facing the platform. They crept from their houses after dark and met at the park to walk north toward the station. They skulked along when they were close and jumped onto the rails to walk into the station. This would also be their way out. The station was closed but not dark. They pulled bandanas up as if they were outlaws in the wild-west. Breathed deeply. Looked at one another.

Ready?

Yes. Steady? Nervous chuckles greeted that.

Yes. Here we go.

And there they went. Slipping into the station like a lumpy line of ghosts. Time was not on their side, but they felt confident and excited. They made their first foray into a morally shaky world. The artist awoke. It was late. Well after dark, frustratingly so. Fortunately his job was only to do research, the office could wait. It waited. He shook the dust from his eyes and the cobwebs from his mind. The detritus of the previous night, the wake up call, littered the rooms. Cigarette ash floated in the air currents of the drafty apartment. The scent of burnt coffee lingered in the kitchen, the smell of moonshine accentuated the living room. The taste of excitement huddled, furtively, afraid to show itself, over the table full of sketch-books, markers and a half packet of used

stickers. The artist grinned through his aching head.

A young man woke up. The night had been long, his fingers hurt. His shoulders were over worked. His throat was raw from paint fumes and cigarettes. His nerves were still shaking from the excitement. In the top of his bag was a Polaroid, his friends in front of their mural. His father was staring at him from the door.

What is that?

What is what?

That.

It’s a picture.

Yes it is.

His bag was ready to roll. His shoes were tied on right. Fully prepared and completely nervous. The duality of things was with him as once it was years ago. The plan was crazy. But this time no one was there to tell him to stay home. He didn’t stay home.

The locked snicked shut with a mighty click.

There was a minor miracle at the school. He made it through another year. Was totally blown away by this, didn’t really remember going to class. Did remember cold nights and windy ones. Raw fingers from hanging onto the edge of whizzing box cars. Remembered the way the stars seemed to race toward him as he climbed the sides of industrial buildings to spots way up. All by himself or with his crew. From winter through spring and now it was summer. The breathless stilted heat and drowning humidity of the city strangling him. Night was the time to do anything now.

And he was used to thenight. Loved it. Folded it into his arms as if it were a long lost brother. Or a hurt puppy. It held him just as tightly. His feet made their own paths. The sidewalks were crowded and hotter than necessary, he ran over rooftops. The subway stations were hot and miserable, he waited till the trains left the stop and jumped on board. He put his name up in as many places as he could. That summer iHAD learned that it had a fearless leader. A leader who ran as if floating on air. A boy-man

of letters and training. Man-boy of action and gruff voice. Boy that liked to play long into the night, man who wanted to make jaded adult jokes to teens. His pack had a stencil on the band, Hello, my name is... Artiste.

The city floor dropped away from him as he leaped up the scaffolding. Foot to hand, chasing one another up higher and higher. Eyes locked on the top, never once bothering to check the grip. Slow down and stop, keep moving keep moving keep moving. He thought I am a shark. If I stop then I die, I keep moving.

He had been stagnant too long and he knew that. Stopped moving forward. Stopped circling. Stopped side-stepping. Was just living someone-else’s life. His life was free, free to run, free to paint, free to play. To make things, to break them. His daily world was a prison to him. It consisted of locked doors, cubes in which to sit, desks that held the legs in, ergonomic keyboards that told the user how to hold their hands, said so loudly and all day. You are controlled here. Domesticated. Filler for the statistics of the machine. Well.

The city floor kept dropping, his feet kept moving, oxygen, free fresh wind blasted around him. No air conditioning he could smell the world. Trees, trash, flowers, food, refuse and beauty.

The smell a city makes when it is operating. But there was a stale air as well. Nothing to break into the cycle and give it a goose, a giggle, a something to make it feel ok.

Ever notice that when your world view changes, that the idealism of a younger person fills your mind. Passion, fire, a new idea! You think to yourself, I will pursue this until my heart completely falters. I will fall for it, fall head over heels in love with it.

Stars, not many but some, were more visible from the top of the scaffold. The roof-top had the look ofa playground. Pipes and tubes of unknown origin or destination like balance beams and low hanging monkey bars. The boxes for air conditioning units

were like the platforms to jump into ball pits. And there. That was exactly what he wanted. The sign that had been bugging him for months. So dull and so self assured. Blocked out. Neat.

I’ll show you Mr. Sign.

A breeze buffeted the sign when he approached. Made it billow and bloom. Ripple in the constant breeze up here. The artist tied it down a bit tighter. Didn’t want it to blow down on anyone now would he?

There were no lights aimed at the sign but the city itself provided enough light for him to work quickly and assuredly. It also helped to hide his activity. The outlines went up. Fast. Strong.

Bold. Spray can in each hand. The hiss unheard over the wind and moving cars below. Faster and faster the massive signature went. Faster and faster the paint droplets from the cans found their marks. He was moving further from from the world. Or maybe he was just blotting it out. It seemed to drop away as he but black in the outline. The stars watched all in a curious titter. The moon peaked out from around its shadow ever now and then to see what he was up to. More lines, more stretches of color. Carefully now, carefully. A loose board sighed under his weight as he shifted. He couldn’t see it all from this vantage. He could only really guess. But the guess was good. It was going swimmingly.

He smiled under his bandana. It looked just the way it should.

Another color went up, then another. A dot there, a line here. He kept at it. All through the floating night. The first step was almost done, and it was a big one. The gray dawn was beginning to inch over the horizon. Shedding more light on his nights activities. He finished as calmly as he could, making it right.

Almost done.

Just a few more sprays and almost there.

One more bit of color.

Oops! Missed that spot there, get it quick. Got it.

This needs to be smoothed out a bit.

There that’s done. Anything else?

Nope?

Nope.

Time to go.

He grabbed his bag and scrambled to the rooftop. Ran past the monkey bars, walked along a balance beam. Found himself faced by the slide. The long construction dump tube. The artist looked around and decided to take that hat off and put on the man-of-action hat, and jumped in.

Before heading home he scrubbed his hands at the site’s wash bin, and walked calmly to the fence, clambered over it, and walked calmly to a certain street vendor and bought a coffee. One hand holding a cigarette, the other a coffee, he strutted, strutted, unabashedly, to a particular bench on a particular street. He waited for the light finish coming up. He drank the burnt, bitter coffee and let the sharpness wake him up as the warmth relax him from the inside out. There was no tension, no fear, just a soreness from flexing against the wind and the way he arched his back to get some of the lines just so. Just so.

Ah glorious, the warmth of the sun helped to soothe his muscles, and lit his sign almost as if he had been in a studio with the lights under his control. He waited a few more minutes. A few more sips of coffee. His phone was in his lap. It made him chuckle to think that his camera phone was technically a better camera than his camera. The lights went up. The curtain finally drawn away from the sign that he had repainted. True to form, he had covered all of the existing work there, it was part of the rule, and it was just the way he wanted it. He took a picture before stopping to admire it. The colors were appropriate, the same palette van Gogh used in Starry Night, the same swirling in the body of the letters, textured to look like monster brush-strokes. The sign now proclaimed, Hi! My name is Artiste.

P-Funk and Trane were waiting for him at the park table that had

become their de facto HQ. Their spot. They waited until he sat down to talk to him.

Artiste?

That’s the name you want?

Yes. Its hard to call you that man.

Why? Because it sounds, well, silly.

P-Funk offered a parliament to Artiste. Lit one himself and turned to blow the smoke away into the winds keeping it from getting in anyone’s eye.

Its the name I want.

But it doesn’t suit.

It does.

Don’t you guys call me that while we are planning? Sketching?

Whenever I go off on a rant about how we need to incorporate some classical into our group projects? Isn’t it what I’ve been writing all summer? Isn’t that my section on skribble magazine’s website?

Yes. Yes. So what’s the issue?

I am not going to call you that to your face.

I call you P-funk.

That’s because it sounds cool.

Call me A. All right.

That works.

The snap was uploaded not only by himself but by many others to certain internet graffiti forums. Not only for its form and artistic content, but for the sheer daring of it. It was commented on a great deal in the forums. The plan that he thought might work while constructing it in his apartment, that first night,

over coffee and cigarettes, it just might pan out. He hoped.

The next group project was plotted out in the same art room.

The aging hippy gone, but a new young hipster of an art teacher continued to let them work. This teacher knew that the teens were not just painting on paper. She knew that they would go out into the night, to steal over fences and through train yards. To whisk through the shadows in strobing chemical lights. Hopped up on youth and danger. She asked them Are you planning your escape route?

They looked to her with a question in their eyes unasked.

The previous teacher might have thought that you weren’t vandals but trying to keep it on the paper.

But I live in the neighborhoods you lot write. I recognize the work.

The horror in their eyes palpable.

Its ok. I am not going to report you. I don’t know that you are doing anything when you leave the classroom, and lets keep it that way. With one rule. Only write on things that don’t cost some poor shop keeper or family to have to clean them off, only people that can afford the clean-up.

A chorus of nods greeted the statement.

Now, look, plan your escape routes, not just the piece. You can’t afford to get caught. Not if you plan on university. Or any jobs after highschool.

More nods.

Ok. I’ll leave you to it then.

The artist was sitting high on a platform. He was looking at the city. Certain lines were evident to him. Like he was the can’s nozzle, planning on how to make a line visible in the city. He took off. Light bag of cans, just a few colors and no plans slapping against his back, a tiny little jockey urging him forward, driving driving driving, and then a leap, a massive jump into turbulence blowing up the alley that he had just leapt over. It shook him up as he flew, a few seconds of complete weightlessness, a few

hours in transit focused on his landing and thinking only about the freedom of motion that he was rediscovering and wondering why he had left it all.

Why was it that thoughts of freedom only occur when we are about to die? Or caused some sort of stunt that surely will cause eminent death?

The landing that he had picked was coming up slowly and filling his vision fast. It was the only thing that his eyes could see.

His was the only view in the world and his thoughts were the only compass.

This feeling, this freedom. This is why he had gone to school, this was why he had learned and practiced his art. To know this feeling all the time. To be floating forever on the currents of his city. To feel them. To know them. To make them his. This was the promise of the educational system that he had grown up with and never had achieved. Why hadn’t someone told him that this was what it was like? No-one had ever mentioned that this was supposed to be what getting a good job was.

His legs reached out, toes like antennae, searching the eddying winds for the ground, guiding his calves to brace just this much, adjust their angle only so. Conserve energy, conserve momentum. Focus on the forward motion, millimeter by millimeter the roof moved up. Millisecond by millisecond he moved down.

The landscape was his canvas, and the landscape to be altered was laid out in front of him. He was the ultimate revisionist and expressionist. He would revise the landscape which was his canvas to fit on to the landscape that he was expressing. The world at this instant was his.

Toes feeling the first impact of asphalt papered roof.

Thoughts gone and time moved faster, faster,faster, the jockey giving the horse his head. His weight moved forward throwing itself over his hips and curling toward his toes. Snapping his weight forward and over the center of motion so that his ankles wouldn’t

shatter from the fall. Rolling one shoulder down to dissipate the weight throughout his core so that his spine wouldn’t crack like dry kindling.

And then onto his feet, momentum conserved, angle of velocity preserved. Newton would be proud. The artist smiled to himself as he took off, leaving the edge and the moment of clarity behind him in a blur of sound and flashes from the soles of his shoes.

Jazz and Giant were waiting for him at the train yard. Their piece tonight was an homage to the mayor, Rudy Giuliani. Some of the ideas put forth by the mayor had frustrated the group. To say the least. There was a plan, a vision, a message. The crew was together on this one. Trane and P-Funk were working with the school newspaper and had managed a tag-team interview with the mayor earlier on the week regarding some of his new policy and the actions of certain members of his staff. The answers they were given were obviously intended to brush them off.

Kay and Sa met them at the next platform. The five trudged through the tunnels under the cover of darkness to where the rest of crew were waiting a few blocks from the site. An ambitious idea but one certainly not to be lost on the staff in city hall.

They worked through the night, burning the midnight tobacco until they were all bumming papers and cigarettes from P-funk.

Two-Way had put down his mobile and focused. For the first time ever. They had laughed and prodded until he got sharp and snapped at all of them. Then work went on in a clean and focused manner, get it done fast, get it done right. A massive burner stories above the street level. But in full view once the dawn lit them up.

The light would be perfect when they were finished. Something that would prove a point. The city was theirs in the morning, they all knew it. The other crews would leave off, hell they might even want to help. An apple. A realistically depicted apple. Two stories tall with a glossy finish. An apple that you would love to eat. An apple

that makes your mouth water and drives you to need. A few letters stamped on the apple. A classic old-English script underneath spelling out, ‘Every action has an equal and opposite reaction.’ - I. Newton.

They scrambled on the finish, rushing to get it done. The sun was coming up. They could feel the gray dawn on their backs more than they could see it. The empty cans rattled about their feet. They made an interesting alarm clock. The window washers’ platform on which they stood swayed side to side. The daily breeze was kicking up as the streets warmed up and created their up-drafts. The only thing left to do was sign the piece. A silent consensus was reached and they instead winched themselves up, reaching their roof, collecting their empties and flying back to the stair well that would take them to a parking lot, that would let them disperse into the early morning crowds and buy coffee. The polaroids of them in progress were tucked away. The light come full up and eight young people dispersed. The crowd looked up.

They witnessed the sun lighting their work as it was expected it to do. They oohed, and aahed. Trane pointed. A few heads looked up, a few more, then many more. Some pointed. Some oohed.

A few scoffed. They went on to work. Eight young people walked to eight train stations, and went to eight homes, to sneak through eight windows and don eight new sets of clothes to go back to one school.

The artist skidded to a stop. He had come to the perfect place to get started this night. A blank billboard. A canvas large and dark. He grabbed his cans. The words were not there. No words came, but an image arose. An image that was just the right depth. It was art.

In their literature course, A and P-Funk were assigned to read a collection of the great speeches. It had in accompaniment a CD of same. The recording of one, powerful, timely, ever brilliant was attributed to Charlie Chaplin. It was the monologue from “The

Great Dictator”. It was genius. It made a mark.

The first swipe of the can, the second, third, strung together.

The piece was painting itself. It was his mark on the soul of the city. The strength of his conviction seemed to interact with his chosen canvas. A sketch appeared, a portrait. White on the black billboard. Scratchy and honest. Influenced by Toulouse-Lautrec the image shaped itself in the gusts of wind. It was forming itself into a man in a bowler hat with an umbrella. Feet splayed and eyes downcast. The man looked contrite, apologetic. A youth caught between the need for fun and adventure and getting caught doing something naughty. In his head justified for climbing the tree and tearing his clothes, but understanding that tearing the clothes was the problem not climbing the tree. Prepared to leave it at that, the artist started to sign his name, high above the whirring lights of the free-way. But instead other words came from the can. The words read “The way of life can be free and beautiful, but we have lost the way.” In searing statement he left this work for others to see. His name affixed to the work below the attribution to Charlie Chaplin.

The young men read these speeches. They listened to them together. Debated them with anyone that would listen or talk.

Argue over oration style. As if the Victorian legacy of lecture halls and salon discourse had come back to life. The others didn’t quite understand the fire in the young men. Their leaders and artistic mentors had gone off the deep end. Preferring the word to the painting. They felt lost. Kay and Sa were torn by this apparent betrayal. Artiste and P-Funk still painted with them, and painted alone. Getting their names up as much as possible. But they pressured now, pushed for more. Eventually the group read the speeches, just to be able to stay in conversation with the young men. They respected the orators, but the power of these words was almost lost on them. Feeling was not the same as living.

He ran on into the night. Two cans still had paint, the dawn

was far off. He wanted more canvas. He needed to write more.

Finding another space came an hour before the dawn. Exhausted from running and climbing all night, he finally found it.

There came a night when P-Funk couldn’t be got hold of.

They had planned a piece of beautiful simplicity, eight names linked in a ‘wild-style’ chain. Their bright colors and the combination of organic lines with sharp points and geometric angles interlinking the artists for the world to see. A classic burner-style. But with only seven members present, and the night drawing on, they couldn’t do the piece as planned. So elected to edit it slightly and paint in a proper chain link to represent their missing partner.

The work went on through the night in silence. Quietly. The only sound was the wind and the hiss of compressed paint through nozzles.

The artist looked down on the abandoned factory. Standing on the roof he looked over the edge trying to find handholds to pull off the piece. There were none. The windows themselves were cantilever openings that he couldn’t use to hang out of either.

He wondered how he could pull off the stunt that now was fully affixed in his mind. The night was wearing away quickly and he simply could not wait anymore. He found some electrical cabling and tied it to the rusty iron supporting the cistern on the roof.

With trembling hands, uncertain of his support; with legs that felt like limp noodles, uncertain of their path; with toes clenching and unclenching, unable to find their purchase; he stepped over the edge.

The spraying had stopped, and the giant burner that had gone onto an alley wall was finished. It looked good, but it lacked...intensity. They were linked, but they were not a chain.

The depth and vanishing points in perfect harmony, but unconnected. No part stood out from the rest, it was a riot of color. It was drab to them. A beige feeling had taken over the night. They went home to think and to send messages to their friend.

Nervousness crept into their lives, all from the unsettling feeling that they were not a chain anymore.

The artist repelled by way of the cable. Linked to the building. He sprayed a line on the way down, swung to the right and sprayed a line as he climbed. Over and again, up and down. Taking a shape that he couldn’t see for being too close to the work.

His eyes only saw the individual lines. Deep down he knew that as he backed away the image would become clearer, would resolve into a coherent piece.Finally the group managed to link up with P-Funk. They asked him where he had been.

Where were you last night?

I was at a coffee shop.

We were supposed to paint.

I know.

Why would you bail out on us?

There was something that I needed to do.

And you couldn’t take us with?

I couldn’t.

We are a team, we are friends.

I couldn’t bring you along with me.

Why not?

I just couldn’t.

The artist swung into a window. The piece was finished. His feet, thinking quickly, just missed a homeless man sleeping under the window. The man didn’t wake as the artist walked through his squat. He had been there for a long time it would seem. A semi-permanent stove had blackened the roof and walls around.

There were scrounged chairs, books, even a few scraped up paintings. The man had a pantry. The artist moved off, feeling as though he had been a part of a home invasion.

Where were you the other night?

I was at a coffee-shop.

Funk. Tell me where you were.

At a coffee-shop.

Why? A. I was meeting a few people there.

Which was more important than keeping a promise to your friends?

Yes. How is that possible?

My friends are my friends, this was about more than just getting our names up.

And what was that?

There is something coming down the pipe that you will have to see.

Funk, just tell me, yeah?

I will, if you promise not to try to get involved.

Why would I promise that? If you are my friend, and are doing something that will get you in trouble or in danger, what kind of man am I to not get involved to help?

I might need someone to post bail?

And you think that I would get arrested with you? How many times have we gotten away?

Look this is my thing.

Hey wait, just come back. Talk to me.

The artist walked away from the building. Wiping his hands with a turpentine soaked cloth, he looked ahead not back. He walked further and further away. Finally getting far enough away to feel comfortable to look back, he took out his camera. The sunrise was painted a bright riot of color. There was nothing muted about it this morning. It was bright and sharp. The abandoned factory was cut away from that. A silhouette, sharply edged. The artist couldn’t have planned this dichotomy better. The stark darkness of his massive canvas against the color and light behind. Six stories tall, the letters proclaimed ‘Artiste’. Black, white and gray were the non-colors created by man, juxtaposed to the

screaming palette behind them created by nature itself. It said something, as if he was signing his name on the skyline and sunrise as if he had created it. Pride infused the artist.

His research project for the firm was drawing to a close, and many of the shots in the research collection were of his own work. From the tiny stickers to the massive piece on the abandoned factory. The local news talked about his work. The internet forums were buzzing with the name ‘Artiste’. The other designers were suggesting that this was the style to be used. They discussed it at length in terms generally used to discuss the masterworks in high art. The artist was pleased.

A phone call came in the late afternoon. It was a collect call from P-Funk.

I am in the 110th precinct.

Why? I was at the protest today.

What protest?

The one in front of city hall.

What did you do?

I threw some bricks.

Did you hurt anyone?

I don’t know.

Did you get hurt?

No. Why did you throw bricks? Why not just stand and be counted?

I was angry and wanted to make a point.

I suppose you want me to come get you out?

If you can.

I can.

I’ll be here.

The research end of the project completed, management called together the designers and outlined the design parameters based on the research.

Thank you for all your hard work and beating the streets for us.

The designers nodded.

We have decided on a general idea.

Another round of nodding from the designers.

Actually its pretty specific.

Blank stares.

We are going to use the style of Artiste.

Nods. They had all seen the research images and were in support of the decision.

You all have a description of these parameters in your inboxes.

So get back to those desks and lets get this job done so that we can get paid.

The designers all get up to leave, the sound of chairs rolling on carpet seemed like hisses.

Stay behind will you?

The artist stopped and waited for the others to slip out.

Who is this guy?

Why do you ask?

Because you happen to have gotten the most pictures of his work. Therefore you must know him and be following him around to get these shots.

Well. I might know him.

Know him well enough to deliver a message?

I can definitely do that.

As you know I sit on the board and of the Contemporary Arts Center.

Yes. The committee voted to have an exhibition of street art, and I’d like to use your photos of his work to get them to decide to put his work in the show.

And? And if they agree he would submit original pieces of art based on the committees parameters.

I see.

He would be paid for his contributions.

Mmhmm.

And if he is uncomfortable coming to the meetings you could act as agent and intermediary for him.

There would be a percentage involved for you as such.

Hmm. Do you think that he would be interested?

I’ll ask.

P-Funk successfully bailed out and the two young men headed for home, quietly riding the subway side by side. Close to each other, but for the first time since he was accepted into the group, extremely distant. Almost as if they didn’t know each other at all.

The train pulled into a station.

Thanks.

Yea. The artist walked home. Puffing away on a cigarette. Art by committee, he wondered. Committees controlling expression? He questioned himself. This is what he wanted isn’t it? To be recognized, even though he couldn’t admit to it. To be shown in galleries. To be an artist again. But a committee controlling what he did, how he did it, how it would be displayed. No. That is not what he signed up for. He did get his recognition. His work would be used for the project, the contemporary arts people saw and respected what he was about, but art by committee is no better than the work-a-day design job that sucked his soul away. No. This is not what he wanted. He wanted to exhibit beautiful work to people that would appreciate the beauty. That would be accessible, and be the art that he chose.

P-Funk wasn’t at school for the next few days. And then the next week. The week after. The group was losing one of its founding members and couldn’t figure out why. Days and weeks went by and then he just wasn’t a part anymore.

They stopped painting as a group, and slowly stopped even hanging outtogether. The picnic table in the park finally got a fresh coat of paint and there was no one to scar it with doodles.

The year drug on and the teens started thinking about universities. They didn’t question each other about where they were going, or if they were staying. They weren’t a team, crew, group or even a collective anymore. The end of the year found them separated forever. The last time they were together was graduation day. P-Funk was there, allowed to walk with his class even though he had come within a hair’s breadth of being expelled and not getting to graduate at all. They took a picture. All eight, for the last time. It was an awkward picture. They hadn’t spoken in a few months. They didn’t know how at look at one another. Arms were not thrown over shoulders or interlinked. Artiste’s parents waved him to the car to go out for their celebratory dinner, he looked back as his one-time friends scattered to the winds. He nodded at their backs, the nod saying all the goodbyes and the thanks for the memories that he could come up with. Fond memories, but just that now, memories.

He got back to his apartment. He made a decision. No he would not exhibit his work for the committee. He would exhibit his work his way. He would remember the aging-hippy from highschool reminding them that art was all about beauty, and that it was for all the people to enjoy.

Insert Lit Mag here is looking for submissions for our August issue. we want to see work that throws a punch. we want to see work that will knock us on our asses. the deadline is july 15. keep reading. keep writing. keep submitting.