New Voices 2021 by Lander University

Lander University’s Student Journal

New Voices

Spring 2021 Edition

New Voices is a publication of the Department of English & Foreign Languages Lander University 320 Stanley Avenue Greenwood, SC 29649 newvoices@lander.edu www.facebook.com/newvoicesLU www.instagram.com/lu_newvoices

Table of Contents

Student Editors & Faculty Advisors .......................................... 1 Awards ..................................................................................... 2 Tribute to Jackson Wise ........................................................ 3-7 Literature ................................................................................. 8

Fiction ........................................................................ 9-22 “All the Texan Poppies” by Amber Ballenger .................. 9-11 “Behind the Wall” by Bryce Myers ................................. 12-14 “How to Make Men Love You” by Lea Toby ........................ 15 “3:33” by Rebekah Smith ................................................. 16-22 Poems ....................................................................... 23-27 “W 42nd St.” by Angelina Vita ............................................... 23 “December 31, 2012” by Lea Toby ........................................ 24 “My Truth” by Lauren Talley .................................................. 25 “The Lament of Icarus” by Eryn Goudy ............................... 26 “Misdirection” by Jonah Mullinax ......................................... 27 Essays ....................................................................... 28-32 “My American Dream” by Angelina Vita ...................... 28-29 “Something Else” by Christina Aguayo ................................ 30 “Some Assembly Required” by Jamie White ................ 31-32 Art ......................................................................................... 33 The Studious by Joel Seymour ..............................................................1 A Woman of Trade by Audrey Poltrak ..............................................34 Beauty Is Pain by Jerusha Nolt .......................................................... 35 Bibaxi by Audrey Poltorak .................................................................36 Fairy Forest by Roxie Harris ............................................................. 37 Empty by Audrey Poltorak ................................................................ 38 Thoughts of Sweets by Elizabeth Cooper ......................................... 39 Tooth Express by Amber Ballenger.................................................... 40 Without Wisdom by Katie Newton .................................................. 41 You: An Analysis of the Human Condition by Rebekah Smith ..... 42

Student Editorial Board: Morgan Brown Angelina Vita

Art Editor:

Emily Smoak

Faculty Advisors:

Dr. Misty Jameson Dr. Andy Jameson Prof. Dusty McGee-Anderson 1

Awards: Congratulations to Amber Ballenger Winner of the 2021 Creative Writing Award,

Angelina Vita Winner of the 2021 Dessie Dean Pitts Award,

Christina Aguayo Winner of the 2021 Race and Identity Dialogue Special Recognition,

And

Jerusha Nolt whose artwork Fish of Fortune was selected as this year’s cover

*Award Winners are represented by Jerusha Nolt’s Fish of Fortune koi fish* 2

Tribute To Jackson Wise

Faculty Tributes to Jackson: Monique Sacay-Bagwell:

Jackson had a strong impact in our program. Not only because of his creative energy, and

thirst for learning, but because he genuinely cared about others. He was the kind of student who brought people together. He always clapped the hardest and smiled the broadest for every student who stood up to give a presentation in class. Even though he left us all too soon, he has inspired others to continue to live, learn, and love with a full heart.

Robert Stevenson:

I only knew Jackson a short time, but he was a genuine pleasure to teach. Transitioning to

fully online due to Covid was challenging, but Jackson continued to excel. He was very talented and loved learning.

Brittany Cuenin:

Jackson Wise was a dynamic, charismatic, and curious student. I had the privilege of teach-

ing him and training him as a peer tutor. As a tutor, Jackson energetically poured himself into helping other students with their writing. As a student, Jackson brought his curiosity and energy to each class meeting. Jackson was a great friend and student; we miss him immensely.

Misty Jameson:

I had the honor to teach Jackson his first semester here at Lander. He was immediately one

of my favorite students—I could always count on him to have something to say about every topic we discussed, every essay we read. And on top of that, he was a great writer; it was no wonder we published one of his essays in New Voices spring 2020. When we were searching for a new dean that same semester, I was able to count on Jackson again; this time, he came to every student meet-andgreet with the candidates,asking the best questions and making the best possible impression. He was such an absolute joy to be around—the truly rare combination of talent, kindness, and enthusiasm.

Student Tributes to Jackson: Joel Seymour:

There is much to be said about Jackson Wise and the impact that he has had on my life. But, suffice it to say for now that he was one of the people who could make me laugh the hardest, one of the collaborators I created with best, and will always be one of my friends that hold dearest. It’s hard to look back on the memories we made together now and not hurt, but at the same time, because of who he was, it’s simply impossible not to be filled with that joy that he shared so freely.

Thomas Histon:

Jackson Wise was my roommate during both of our years at Lander. I could tell about the weird stuff we got up to, like having a lightsaber fight in our dorm with umbrellas, or going several times a week to the 7-Eleven in the middle of the night, or starting our own cult...yeah, we were pretty weird. But it’s the little moments that make for fond memories, which makes it heartbreaking that we can’t make anymore little moments. The time for new little moments is up, but I think my memories of Jackson will continue as follows: I’ve heard it said that people pass when they’ve accomplished all that they needed to accomplish on this Earth. I have to believe that’s the case here. Jackson came into the lives of everyone he met, welcomed them, loved them, and made them feel better. And that’s what he was here to do. The only reason I know everyone I know at Lander is because he introduced me to them. The only reason I have this awesome group of friends at Lander is because he introduced us to each other. Jackson had the gift of being able to bring people together. Jackson made me feel like I belonged. Not only at Lander University but on this Earth. And for that I’m eternally grateful. It’s hard to say goodbye, but I can take solace in the fact this man made a more positive impact on me in the year and a half I’ve known him than anyone I’ve ever met. And that’s what he was here to do.”

Megan Higginbotham: “For You”

Alright, take 5,327.26 of trying to write this because this was never something I thought I’d have to write and I’ve been trying for the last week to figure out how to do this without falling apart. Let’s see how long I last this time around. Jackson, my little bird. Thank you. I can’t say everything that I’m thanking you for because then you’d hear things like: thank you for waving at me with enough force to blow a house down; thank you for keeping eye contact when we spoke; thank you for pointing out little things in the middle of nowhere; thank you for holding doors open; thank you for always giving me a laugh; thank you for being present. I can’t say everything I’m thanking you for because then you’d hear things like: thank you for making me believe I was important when I thought I was worthless; thank you for leaving a trail of magic wherever you stepped- I promise it left an imprint; thank you for meeting strangers and treating them like family; thank you for being passionate and driven and for sharing that energy with others; thank you for all the laughs-again-because I don’t think I can ever express how special those were; thank you for your curious nature that always inspired me to look for new ways to love the things around me; thank you for loving. Thank you so so much for loving. Today, “Love Swiftly” was said before we said goodbye to you, the best of us. Today, “Love Swiftly” became the most important thing to me because when you loved, you loved swiftly. Passionately. And so so genuinely. No one who so much as exchanged glances with you went without feeling loved. Today, “Live life as a piece of art” was quoted and became a new perspective of life because when you smiled, you made masterpieces out of broken hearts, melting and molding and piecing together the people who were content with settling for less of life. Today, “Come thou fount” was sung and it is my favorite hymn and it came into my favoritism again for a new reason because when you walked, you walked in faith and shared an excitement that made Heaven glow and as I prayed in the pew I felt you take my heart and seal it with a pretty ribbon to hand off to our God. When you walked you walked with grace, again I say, pouring out of your pockets. Jackson, today, I cried really hard. REALLY hard. I’ve cried every single day since you left and I’m still struggling between being angry with you and wanting you home. (there it is. Crying again.) The night you left was the worst night of my life and I pray nothing ever tops it. But today I cried alongside our family. Your family. People I have never met but am connected to through you (as you always manage to do) and we all cried really hard. Together. Over you. For you. And despite it all, with you. This week, we’ve tried to be more like you. To be thankful like you, to live like you, and most importantly to love like you. And I have to thank you for that. I love you, Jackson. Thank you

Lauryn Young-Fenwick: “One Week and One Day” It’s been one week and one day Since you passed away And I still miss you It could be one year and one day And I’d honestly say That I’d still feel the same A decade could pass Since I saw you last And I’d still feel that same pain You’ll never be forgotten If anything you’ll be remembered more Because the day you left My heart became so sore The legacy you left Is more than just the memories we made

Literature 8

Fiction “All the Texan Poppies” By Amber Ballenger Creative Writing Award Winner The poppy field behind my house always seemed to cry out at sunset. Right when the last rays of daylight began their descent behind the hills in the distance, the poppies seemed to radiate the most brilliant shade of red a person could ever see. Mama used to say that the color red symbolizes change or even good fortune, but in my mind now, those poppies only remind me of fierce, burning blood—the kind so hot that it would stain anything it touched for years, the kind Mama left behind on the night of the accident. After she died, I wanted nothing more than to rip every last poppy from the earth; I wanted to shred every crimson petal into a million pieces, never to be seen again. I always think of the evenings we sat on the back porch admiring the poppy field together, soaking in the last bit of Texas heat before retiring for the night. With the dimming sun looking like the flickering embers of a dying fire holding onto its last breath, the world seemed to halt for us, even for just a second. It is not often the world grants such a gift, but our evenings admiring the field were just that: a gift. Those fond memories of what the field provided us at dusk were the last scraps I had of Mama left in my mind. When we learned in school that poppies were used as offerings for the dead in mythology, I imagined myself laughing in Mama’s face for thinking that they meant anything benevolent in the first place. After all, the Greeks and Romans must have known what they were talking about, seeing as they wrote so much. I really think she would have admired them if she got to know them—the Greeks and Romans. She always wanted to be a writer, and I’m sure she could have learned a lot from them—if she knew how to read, that is. Mama always dreamed of being one of those big-shot bestselling authors that travelled across the country peddling their books and signing copies for adoring fans. I remember sitting down with her at the kitchen table and showing her how to write her name, stroke by stroke, with Daddy’s old fountain pen. The black lines on the page seemed silly and wobbly, looping over themselves from her shaky hand, but it was close enough to make out that it wasn’t just an ink stain. Her eyes twinkled so bright after seeing her own hand write out her name; I could’ve sworn she looked at that paper like it was a million bucks just laying out on our oak table for anyone to see. Daddy never taught her simple skills like that, so I had to be the one to do it. He thought reading and writing were “sinful” for women to be doing, so anyone could imagine what a shade of purple his face turned when he found out she sent me to school. Mama grew up on a farm with a father who was the same as Daddy, a big, bludgering man who had little regard for the intricacies of the female gender. She never got a chance to go to school growing up, instead being forced to carve away her days for farm work and keeping up with the other children of the household. I think that’s why Daddy liked her at first; she was a woman who knew hard work and how to get things done, not a woman of silly fancies like the women from town. As soon as she dared talk about her dreams of being an author to Daddy, he got all kinds of twisted up and knocked her into next week. I could hear her sobbing into her pillow all night long, and when the sun had marched its way into the sky the next morning, he was gone. All of his bags had been packed, and there was nothing left behind to even hint that he had ever existed in our rickety farmhouse; he was a ghost that had just vanished without a trace.

That’s when Mama started going outside to look out over the poppy field. I think she did it at first so she could cry without me peeping on her, but eventually, she brought me out with her with the promise of a cold glass of sweet tea, a southern luxury that I was only allowed on special occasions. The first time I sat out there with her was the first evening she didn’t cry in secret, the first she didn’t shed a tear at all since Daddy up and left. Whether it was my presence that comforted her or that she had just ran out of tears, I’ll never know. All I knew back then was that I was happy sipping sweet tea and listening to her finally tell stories again, all while the crickets began their crescendo serenade. After that, we were like two peas in a pod, two halves sitting side by side on a splintered porch that split apart in such a way that you were likely to be pricked on the backside if you sat wrong. The porch taught us a lot about being careful where we sat, being careful what we did. Since it was just us two after he left, Mama was big about repairing the farmhouse and getting it shaped up for “new beginnings,” as she said. Despite her desperation for remodeling, I rather much liked the imperfections of the house, even if it did look like it was one second away from falling in on us. The back porch was splintering, the paint was chipping, even the floorboards were warping like ripples in a pond— and I liked it all the same. Sure, we had to be careful where we stepped, where we hung up our picture frames, but it was no different than how we were when Daddy was around—careful to step lightly, careful to display the wrong “picture.” In fact, I liked this imperfect version of our house even better since he had left; it wasn’t cold and empty anymore, only bright. It was like I was seeing the house for the very first time, so warm and inviting; it was perfect because of its imperfections. It was soothing to see Mama happy again though, so I helped her with repairing the house anyways, just to see her smile. The routine of me coming home from the schoolhouse, us putting our heads together on some far-fetched project to mend the house, and then trying to cool our sweaty bodies on the back porch by any fleeting breeze almost seemed like heaven to me. I think that if heaven really does exist, it would be just like that—just Mama and me working hard together and being able to hear the crickets call us back to the poppy field, back to a moment of rest. That’s what Mama deserved the most: rest. She worked her whole life from dawn to dusk from the orders of her father up until the orders of Daddy. And even after that, she still seemed to think that there was always more work to do, always something more important to do than take a deep breath. There was always some unfinished work to be done in her eyes, so when the men from town came looking for Daddy one afternoon and brought everything to a lurching stop, I wasn’t all too sure that Mama wouldn’t fall apart at the seams right then and there. Apparently, Daddy had skipped town all those weeks ago with one of the men’s wives, a spunky woman with a big wallet and an even bigger attitude, and now, her former husband had come to get even. When he and the other men found out that Daddy had been long gone, rage was the only emotion I could see painted on the crowd of faces peering in through our front door. Angry shouts and accusations mingled into a fuzzy fog of guttural echoes. The husband pointed his finger in Mama’s face and spit harsh insults at her, calling her a devil’s wife and saying that she was hiding the truth from him like a no-good, two-faced liar. They showed no sympathy that I was watching this take place from my spot frozen two steps behind her; if anything, it made them even more riled up to speak harshly to her, to degrade her in front of her own child. The meanness in their faces made them look even more like Daddy, at least the one I knew, the one that liked us enough to treat us badly. Now, Daddy didn’t even like us enough to stay, not enough to warn us of what a mess he left behind. That’s when I heard the loudest sound I had ever heard in my entire life. It was a sound so harsh and deafening that it made my ears feel hot and my head feel like it was whipped in three different directions at once. It made my face sweat so bad I couldn’t see for a second, and when I rubbed my clumsy hands over my eyes to wipe them dry, they came away red as red could be. Everything after that felt hazy and dull, but I remember seeing her slump over face-first right in the doorframe and the look of

terror on that husband’s face when he realized the gun in his hand was still warm and smoking. The other men bolted and yelled in fear all the way back to town as the husband begged them, pleaded, that it was an accident, that he had only intended to scare her, not kill her. He flashed me the most haunting look I’ve ever seen a man contort his face into and then ran far away, legs kicking like he was running the most competitive marathon of his life And there I was, standing frozen two steps behind her as she lay sprawled out in the doorframe, half outside on the front porch and half inside the house. I’m not too sure what happened after that, but the police officers said that when they finally arrived at the farmhouse, I was cradling my mother with her blood splattered on my face and wailing something about painting the house. The police chief later told me that that incident was one of the most shocking moments of his career—him showing up to see a young girl covered in her mother’s blood, to know that I witnessed what happened so closely without the grace of a blind eye. I couldn’t remember much of her funeral, only the warm hands that patted my back in sympathy and handed me stale cookies when they lowered some box in the ground. It was the only moment of my life that I ever wished Daddy was near. I wished so badly for him to be one of the men dressed in black that would melt out from the crowd and wrap me in his arms, safe and secure. There was no security for me after Mama died. Daddy was not at the funeral either, no matter how much I longed to wish his presence into existence again. There was only the house left at that point with its splintered porch, chipped paint, and red stained doorway. When I returned back to the farmhouse under the care of a distant aunt, I got on my hands and knees and scrubbed away the red by the doorway until my hands blistered. When I finished with that, I began picking up where we left off on fixing up the house, taking the time to scrape the paint off the outside of the house real gentle like she always did. After hours of toiling in the heat while my aunt cozied up with her prized liquor for the night, there was only one thing left in the world that felt right to do in that moment. I was hesitant to sit out on the back porch again without Mama though, almost afraid of what the emptiness in her usual spot would do to me. Sitting with the splinters grazing me just so, I curled into myself as the crickets cried quietly for me, for Mama, for all that we had lost. I gazed out at the poppy field that stood unwavering, proudly waving the same color that took Mama away from me. I learned in school that, sometimes in mythology, poppies can symbolize rebirth and resurrection too. Perhaps the poppies will always remind me of Mama; they will be the reminder of her that I see in everything for the rest of my life. If so, no matter how much seeing the red hurts me, I will gather all the Texan poppies I see and kiss each of their petals. The poppies will revive her memory, and maybe, just maybe, she will be reborn into something as beautiful as them.

“Behind the Wall” By Bryce Myers My father always put up walls. He was good at it. It seemed to be just about the only thing he was good at. So much so that when I got a call from his lawyer to tell me that he died, it was a genuine shock. Of course, the bigger shock was that I would be inheriting his house. Always figured the old fucker would just burn it down when he finally croaked, take it and everything inside it with him. But no, I got it all, which put me in my car at 4:00 in the morning, on my way from Lake Norman to Minnesota. Nearly an entire day’s worth of driving to sift through all the old man’s shit, probably just to throw most of it out. Just as I was beginning to think I was going to pass out behind the wheel, I saw the all-too-familiar entrance to my old neighborhood. I made the turn and looked at houses that used to be occupied by neighbors and friends, several of which now stood abandoned. To my tired mind, it was almost funny. The neighborhood was a lot like the old bastard. Falling apart and probably ready to go, but just too stubborn to do it. I came to a halt outside the house that had once been somewhere I called home. It was no more welcoming now than it had been back then. I parked the car and waited for amoment, the long drive making it hard to think straight. I stepped out and pulled my suitcase from the trunk. I walked to the door and looked down at the key that had been mailed to me, along with the legal papers for the house. It slid into the lock and turned with a bit of resistance. I pushed the door open, and the hinges groaned. Seemed like they hated opening up the door as much as I did. The first thing I noticed was that smell of age. It smelled like any house that’s sat for a time—not in any particularly disgusting state, just dormant. It was musty, mostly. I dropped my suitcase at my right and shut the door behind me. I flicked the lights on, and the dim light bulb came to life. The barely functional bulbs painted everything in a sort of sickly, dim pallor. Very welcoming. Right off the front door was what we’d made our living room. In the middle was the same leather-covered recliner he’d been sitting in since I was a kid. It was worn down, and the stuffing was coming out all over. Newspapers were stacked on the small end table beside the chair, most of them having been tossed there haphazardly. I picked up the one on the top, and the date was only a week beforehand. I dropped it back on the pile, and it jostled a few beer bottles. They clinked together. It was a familiar sound. I made my way to the kitchen, which was surprisingly clean compared to the living room. Nothing on the counters, nothing left in the sink. No dirty plates or even food stains. Guess I couldn’t be too surprised, though. The old man had shouted me down enough times about leaving forks in the sink. I made my way through the house and down the hall to where the bedrooms waited. I pushed open the one door I was more familiar with. My own. The sight I was greeted with wasn’t very surprising. The bed frame had a single, uncovered mattress on it that probably hadn’t moved since I was born. Everything else that had been in there had most likely been taken apart and sold or packed up in the stacks of boxes lining the wall. I approached them and picked a random one from the top. Prying it open through the old tape sealing the flaps together, I looked down to inspect what was inside. The first thing my eyes lit on was the old, dirtied baseball mitt I’d worn a hundred times and never enjoyed. I reached in, pulling it out, and looked over it. The lacing was coming undone, and the leather had started to crack and come apart. A thick layer of grit and dirt covered it. I tossed it aside, and it hit the floor with a dull thump. I clapped my dusty hands together. 12

After brushing off most of what I could on my jeans, I delved into the box once more. This time I produced a notebook. Unlike with the baseball mitt, I actually smiled. I flipped it open, looking over the faded pen writing carefully. The notebook had been a gift from my mother; I still remembered getting it. She’d popped into my room like she was hiding a secret and just handed it to me. My father was the source of the baseball mitt. I’m a writer now, so if that doesn’t piece things together, the simplest I can put it is that my mother and father had differing expectations of me. Still, I guess I wasn’t quite enough for my mother, either. I shoved the box shut and turned around. I’d have time to sift through it all later. I went back to the hall and looked down towards the end. It hit a dead end, a single small window covered by ruffled blinds taking up half the height of the wall. I looked to the door at the end of the hall, on the opposite side of my own old room. I felt a painfully familiar, childish dread in my stomach. I pushed through it and forced myself to walk down the hall. I reached out and took the knob. I twisted it slowly. It squealed lightly, like it was yelling at me. Cat’s away, my little friend, the mouse will play. Actually, the cat’s dead. So, the mouse will do whatever it wants. I pushed the door open. It drifted on its hinges as more of the room was revealed to me. I flicked the light on. The shit bulb in the overhead light once again covered the room in that dim, depressing light. I walked in, looking around slowly. Against the same wall as the door was the dresser, the top bare and untouched. The bed was against the opposite wall, in the direct middle. There was a small nightstand on either side of him. Guess he’d never bothered to get rid of the extra. On the one that had belonged to him were two pictures: one of me when I was a kid, and one of him and my mother. I’d almost forgotten what she looked like when she smiled. As always, I wondered where she could have been. My own picture wasn’t as fun. It was just me, in my small jeans and a Star Wars shirt. I was smiling, but it wasn’t a genuine smile. I looked sad, lonely. I just didn’t want to be there. I tipped it over, placing it face down so I wouldn’t have to stare at my own depressed eyes anymore. In front of the pair of pictures was a small, black notebook. That was probably the biggest surprise. The old man rarely saw the benefit in reading anything but the newspaper, so the idea of him taking the time for any kind of writing beyond his name on a check he needed to cash was hard to grasp. I picked it up and sat down on the bed with a box spring that groaned. I opened it up, and almost dropped it when I saw dates and journal entries. The old man put up walls. Even the smallest personal details were a shock. Guess it was easier to write all your shit down in a journal than bother sharing it with your family. I skimmed over the entries thoughtlessly, taking little in and instead just muttering over the shell of a man I’d lived with for years. I finally fell on the words “She’s gone.” “That’s your own fault, isn’t it, you old fuck,” I muttered. I read closer. Something began to feel wrong. “She’s gone. I’ve lost her, but I’ll always know where she’ll be. Close to me, and close to Alex...” I stopped a minute at my own name. Surprised he knew it. “...I’m not sure I could stop it. But it happened and it can’t be undone. Gotta be careful now. Lot’s gonna change.” It was strange;something just felt wrong about it. I turned the page and it was empty, but tucked between the pages was a folded slip of paper. I took it out and unfolded to find the blueprint of the house. Against one of the walls was a circle. I lowered the paper, trying to suppress the dawning thoughts in my mind. I knew it was a ridiculous idea. But what if it wasn’t? She’s gone. I’ll always know where she’ll be. I dropped the journal and got up quickly. I hurried out and looked carefully at the blueprints as I rushed back into the living room. My breathing got faster as I tried to match it to the room. Once I finally got it oriented, I passed my father’s chair to the opposite wall. I moved along it until I was at the right spot and looked at it. I dropped the blueprint and attacked the wallpaper.

I raked my fingers across the wallpaper, tearing it apart in strips. I exposed a considerable amount of the wooden planks behind, and I nearly staggered away as I dashed to the garage. I flicked the light on and rushed over to the line of tools stacked against the wall. The shovel and rake clattered against the floor as I shoved them out of the way, grabbing a crowbar up. I crashed through the door, leaving it open. I jammed the crowbar into the slats between the planks. The aging wood snapped and bent as I violently levered the crowbar. It dropped against the carpet with a muffled thump. A jagged gap in the wall was now in front of me. There it was. It was almost hard to discern at first; I think my own mind just didn’t want to admit it. A garbage bag, matte black, pulled tight over a distinct form. Black electrical tape was pulled around the form, keeping the bag tight around what was within. The form was unmistakably human. A round head, thinning to a neck that then widened into shoulders. My small window just barely offered me a view of the shoulders, but the head, and where the face most likely was... almost like it was waiting for me, centered almost perfectly. I went to the kitchen and pulled open every drawer until I found the knives. I took one, carrying it back to the living room. I stood there for what I would guess was almost fifteen minutes, staring at the form behind the wall. I knew what it would mean if I cut open that bag and looked inside. Knew what I would see. All these years, I had believed my mother had abandoned me. She was right here. But I had to see her. I finally forced myself to step forward. I pushed the knife through the back, and it pierced with a light pop. I drew it upwards, slicing an opening just big enough to look in. I took in a breath, the smell already churning my stomach. I parted it, and immediately recoiled. I doubled over, my hands on my knees as my stomach began to roll. I felt everything rushing up through my throat and vomited onto the carpet. I hadn’t been prepared. The bulging eyes. The pale, clammy skin. The decomposing flesh. Most of all, what I truly wasn’t ready for, was that it wasn’t my mother. It was a man’s face, broad and round. I forced myself to look back and analyze him. I didn’t recognize him, but I knew he had been there for a while. I looked and saw beside his own, decomposed form, just a small corner of another garbage bag, peeking out from the space behind him. I didn’t even bother with the wallpaper. I just took the crowbar and attacked the wall. I felt savage, but I had no way to slow myself. Bashing, bashing, bashing against the wood paneling. I dropped it again, cut open the second bag. A woman. Not my mother. I bashed against the wall again. Another bag. Not her. I spent hours tearing the walls to shreds. I sat on the old man’s easy chair, torn wallpaper and smashed wooden walls scattered across the floor, dead eyes staring out at me from sliced open trash bags as sirens got closer in the distance. I still hadn’t found her, but I hadn’t searched the whole house. The police would do a better job and identify all of them. I knew she was in there somewhere. She had been his first. But not his last. He had always put up walls. Little had I known the real filth he hid behind them.

“How to Make Men Love You” By Lea Toby Make sure your foundation matches the rest of your body—do you want to look like you’re covered in Cheeto dust?; pinch the balls of your cheeks so that they look naturally rosy; straighten out your hair; no, leave it curly—men like curly hair now; learn to giggle in a cute way, not to laugh like a donkey getting whipped; go to the store to get teeth whitening toothpaste; stop drinking coffee; no, drink more coffee and just get more toothpaste—drinking coffee helps you go to the bathroom so you lose weight faster; jog, but don’t lift weights because that’s what men do; get your nails done, toes too; wax your lip; wax your eyebrows; get a Brazilian while you’re at the wax shop; go get a new bra, push up with lace; get new panties and not ones you don’t mind getting your monthly in. I’m talking silk; more lace; more silk. Have you considered a thong? What about nothing at all? Breast implants? Fine, no breast implants; too expensive. A man talked to you! Did you show your tits? We bought the bra so you can show your tits! Lean forward just a little when he talks to you again, just a peek! Not the whole show! So he didn’t like the tits? Must not like women then. You got a date! No soda, no messy food; water and a salad, no fried pickles; cross your legs like a lady; touch his thigh; give him only a kiss goodnight – you’re a lady. How did it go? Sis, is this really necessary to get a man to love me? Baby girl, you are gonna have a husband in no time if you keep doing as I taught you.

“3:33” By Rebekah Bailey Smith Her name was Mary Michaels: a little ditty that rolled off the tongue, hellbent on dancing around your head for as long as it pleased. She had a gap just a little too wide between her front teeth and a face full to the brim with scattered freckles. Her hair was a disaster—a crow’s nest with all the twigs and shiny little trinkets of trash included. Her breath stunk every time she laughed, and she always complained about her chilly feet no matter how many pairs of socks she wore in those ratty old boots, three sizes too big. She was the embodiment of Baba Yaga’s house but, for all that, I’d never seen so much joy in a soul. She’s dead, now. I don’t remember what room I left her in anymore, but I know I locked the door so she couldn’t get out. She screamed and screamed the first few days, begging me to open the door. But with time, the screeches eventually faded to mumbling moans, and then it was quiet. I don’t know what I was so afraid of; I think I was scared that, somehow, the clocks would wind back the time on her life just enough to rouse her from the bonds of mortality. I was scared that I’d be alone in this old house with the shadow of a friend stumbling along in the dark behind me wherever I went, moaning and groaning and staring up at me through wet, lifeless eyes. Not the eyes of my Mary, but pools of dishwater blue, beyond time and life itself. I knew she was dead before I left that room. Mary was gone. Whatever had stolen her voice to tease my mind afterwards came from the damned, cursed clocks. They laugh at me incessantly, every second of every moment of every hour of every day. It had always been just me and Mary. We both were swallowed up by the house, though at first it was just a single room with that single, porcelain clock. It did have a window, which was nice. Mary said that it was a liar, that the window didn’t tell the truth, but it didn’t matter. It didn’t last long anyway. She loved that clock with all her heart and could spend hours and hours cleaning each little gear and knob, supremely careful so as to never trip its metronomic beat. The clock once belonged on her mother’s mantle, a family heirloom. I couldn’t be bothered with it, the window held much more interesting curiosities with which to spend my time. “You know it’s not real, Gideon. There’s nobody outside, nobody. Nobody’s coming.” “I know.” “Well, then why the hell do you bother with it?” “Why do you bother with the clock?” We’d have the same conversation every morning, and it always ended in stiff silence. Then I’d watch Mary, and Mary’d watch the clock, and the clock would tick. Every hour, a little metal bell would sing out the time, and then it was back to ticking. It was a stupid little clock, a tiny, chipped, ancient relic that had no sense being so tenderly handled. The window held no sense either, but in the end, what does truth even mean? The fact is, there was a window, and I liked imagining being on the other side of it; that’s all. That’s the truth. “Why do we keep having to do this?” She glared at me down her nose before pulling the old radio onto her lap, nestled in-between her crossed legs like a protected little baby. Resting her arms on top of its old frame, she returned her attention to the little clock resting in her hands. “... you know why.” “It’s stupid.” “You know why, Gideon.” 16

She was much more fun before the clock. She used to laugh and laugh and laugh. She couldn’t sing but tried to anyway; her gangly feet always got tangled up while she chased after me around town, before time caught up to us. We were neighbors, once. I pulled her pigtails, and she left dog shit on my parents’ porch. We’d bike around the neighborhood and harass the old geezer down the street. The town was small, dull, hot, and dusty, but it was home—a haunting ground for our games. But she changed when the blight came, and the room swallowed everything up. It stole her innocence, her childhood. Her skin got pale, and her hair got long; her eyes got dull, and her mouth turned sour; I think it was from how she furrowed her brows while she concentrated. She was always concentrating, at the end. Always looking at that little clock like her life depended on it. The radio signal was weak, but it could still supposedly pick up the local train system’s schedule, or what was left of it. The world had died long ago here, but she still believed in the hope of getting out. The room was small, but neat; we had the old radio, a stack of cans of mostly expired beans, a lantern, and that tiny porcelain clock. Every day at 3:34, somehow everything fit just right for air waves to make it to our little bunker and light up that radio like a signal. We got 15 seconds of static screaming usually; Mary’d bolt up and rip away at the knobs, turning this way and that along the frequencies. Then, silence. Her wails filled the room after another wasted day before she’d return her gaze towards the clock, her eye riveted on each passing second. Tick, tick, tick. There was no real reason for either of us to still exist. The fact that we lived to this day was a fluke, a losing lottery with two tickets. Mary’s prize was a slow descent into miserable insanity, and mine was to watch it happen. The days grew longer, time twisting and tangling along its path. Her mind travelled down the road with it, succumbing to thoughts left far behind. Soon, nothing mattered but the clock. She spent every waking moment scrutinizing its little body, turning it this way and that, flicking away invisible specks of dust and tightening gears already far too strained. Time moved on and left us there, alone in the dark, with nothing but an old clock, a closed window, and a girl who believed in fairytales. . . . “Dammit… Dammit it all to hell…” She scrubbed its back more roughly with every passing second. Her fingers were white from the pressure she put on the grubby cloth, her knuckles cracked and raw. Satisfied for only a moment, a switch would flip in her mind, and she’d jerk back out the cloth and begin all over again, and again, and again. “There’s still a spot, oh God, it won’t come off…” She began mumbling incoherently; violent, incomprehensible syllables tumbled off her tongue as she shook harder and harder, tears beginning to leak from the corners of her eyes. The rag grated against its delicate mechanism, crushing it. Over and over, she scrubbed at some invisible blight. A crack rang out in the room, then silence. She froze as the clock shuddered to a stop, its face forever labelling the present as 3:33. All life in the room fizzled into fear. I could see the hysteria rising in her eyes until the tiny contraption let out another quiet, hiccupping thump. For her, all was well again; she deflated her overfilled lungs and settled back against the wall, absentmindedly stroking its cracked face with her left thumb. Her porcelain clock, however, was dead. The rhythm was gone. “Tick tick tock… tock tick tock…” It still stubbornly turned its gears, but it was sporadic and unpredictable. The hands on its face were petrified, shuddering every now and then with the thump of its tiny chest, but they remained steadfast at a moment away from redemption. Mary didn’t care or hadn’t noticed. She was stuck, like the arms of the clock in her lap. Four times, the radio crackled to life, and four times she ignored it completely, glued to what laid between her hands. She wasn’t here anymore, not really. With eyes rimmed in encrusted red, lips mouthing words from silent thoughts far away, she, along with her porcelain treasure, were left behind at 3:33. Over the course of three days, she contorted into someone that resembled a stranger.

Over the course of four, the “she” became an “it”: unresponsive, almost catatonic, clutching the broken clock like it was the last strand of hope between sanctuary and obliteration. Mary was gone and dead, and a Thing had stolen her shoes. I sat there for days in silence, praying she’d look up, just once, but she never did. “Mary…”, I whispered softly, knowing she’d not respond. Her hair had grown limp and greasy, and her skin pruned on itself like a raisin as what little fat she used to have melted away. I broke the silence once more, filling the room with an irritated sigh before shifting towards the window. The window was a storyteller, a way of escaping the room that held us so tightly inside. I’d put my hand against its cool, metal frame and imagine what it’d be like to pass through to the other side. A silly thought, of course. Windows are only meant to show you things, not pave the way towards them. It was closed anyway. Today, though, something was different. I blinked, and tried again, peering deeply through the panel. There was nothing. No white, no black, no figures, just nothing. I was peering out into complete and utter hideous nothingness. I jumped nearly out of my skin when the Thing’s voice snapped through the quiet, croaking behind me. “I told you. It’s not real. It’s lying.” I whipped my head around to scrutinize the nearly mummified form of Mary before me; she hadn’t moved a thing, nothing at all but her eyes. Her face was still glued to the clock, but her pupils were twisted just out of normality to directly rest on me, glassy, wide, and red. “It’s lying.” I shuddered. I needed to leave, I needed to get out. Mary was gone. This was just an illusion, a monster in my mind. She followed me with her eyes as I clamored into the corner of the room, praying she remained still and hoping the beans would protect me if she didn’t. I couldn’t stop shaking. I was so concentrated on my own convulsions that I didn’t notice the tremors birthing around me. Then the rumble hit. Up above, a crunching howl let loose, bringing all of hell with it raining down on our tiny bunker. The ceiling shrieked in agony, its blood-soaked dust and wood chips drizzled onto the floor with a deluge of ash and chalk. The floor rose to meet the chaos with fury, writhing in its crippled, newfound life. The cans around me jumped from their neat stacks, crashing to the floor below. But the Thing, she remained still, just staring at me through those dead, unwavering eyes, clutching her precious clock that still ticked away its erratic beat. The lantern tipped over, spilling oil onto the floor and fire licking along after it, greedy to eat us alive. The puddle of flaming grease soaked the wooden floorboards, running along each crack and crevice until it caught light to the hem of the Thing’s dress, Mary’s dress. I don’t really know what compelled me to do it. Fear, probably. It all happened so agonizingly fast. She just sat there and let it burn. It licked along her legs until her flesh peeled away, cooking the raw muscles and tendons beneath. It rose to her waist, her arms, her face, roasting her alive while she slit my soul and sanity in two with those eyes, steadily transfixed on mine. I grabbed the closest thing to me and threw it at her with all the force left in my trembling arms—a can of long expired beans. I just wanted her to move, to finally react to the world so distant from the present in which her mind remained trapped. It crushed the clock between her brittle fingers, smashing it into a thousand porcelain shards. Tiny metal gears and cogs rolled along the floor in all directions. The broken clock, her hypnotic curse, was annihilated. The Thing that used to be my Mary let out a blood-curdling screech. She gurgled out of her skinless mouth, her teeth charred and blackened against her melting flesh. The mumbling bubbles spilling out of her eventually became garbled words: “WHAT HAVE YOU DONE.” It dragged itself towards me with sickening agility, a flaming skull with flayed skin, organs spilling over the floorboards. I retched, screaming and flailing backwards into my refuge, the corner.

The room began to spin from the fumes. I threw can after can after can at her writhing carcass until it moved no more, now just a heap of bones and charred flesh. Smoke billowed from every corner; the toxic cloud slowly sunk from the ceiling, the roar above growing louder with every second. My skull pounded. I screamed and screamed and screamed from my bloodied throat, but I couldn’t hear myself above the blast. The deafening silence rang in my ears like cannons. Bomb. Bomb. Bomb. The pulsating thrum of broken gears and spinning cogs endlessly shrieked, like shattered glass in my soul. The walls were melting, sucking me down into a vortex of molten metal and charred wood. Paint began to peel off the walls, curling inwards and ripping away every opening, every means of escape. The frothing sea of time yanked at the boards beneath my feet. Any sense of reason was gone; the floor slipped away and down I went, left at the mercy of lawlessness. . . . “Tick, tock. Tick, tock. Tick, tock.” Blinding, abysmal darkness. Darker than the deepest cave, a starless, endless night. Down, down, down. A lantern, a match, a grubby, hazy glow. A wall. A clock, two, three. Along every wall, thumping faces displayed histories long gone and futures yet to come. Beyond my asylum of light, ink-engorged chasms filled with clocks rose to meet my path. Mary’s screams echoed behind me, and I ran for all my life’s worth, or what little it had left. The hall just kept going and going, growing into a room, then a set of stairs, another hall, a place of nonsensical torment. Rows and rows and rows of clocks lined the walls, mismatched and jumbled. I wanted to lose myself in this house, I wanted to be anywhere but here, within reach of Mary’s screeches. With time, though, they faded. All things do, and I found myself the keeper of times long lost and yet to come, banned to an eternity trapped in a present existence with no creature but myself. Years, decades, centuries, they’re all the same. Over and over and over again, I clean the clocks, the clocks tick, the lantern flickers, and the house grows. . . . It was quite a lovely morning, on the day everyone died. I certainly didn’t expect it to lead to that afternoon, but it did. The town was already sick with the blight. Shops were boarded up, houses abandoned, and the rest of us were left alone, just waiting for the inevitable. The damned little spot that rotted away not only innocence, but life itself. My family was away from home when the sirens started. I made it to a bunker, but I don’t know who else did. Time has stopped for me, life has stopped, the world just stopped. Everyone’s gone and dead, and, for some Godforsaken reason, one of the few idiots left behind, maybe the only idiot left behind, is me. Over and over and over again, I clean the clocks, the clocks tick, the lantern flickers, and the house grows. The thing I least expected was the silence and how deeply I ache to fill it. Sure, cars squealed, buildings crashed, people screamed, but it all got quiet with a little time. That’s all we have now, isn’t it? Time. What an absolutely revolting thought. Over and over and over again, I clean the clocks, the clocks tick, the lantern flickers, and the house grows. I missed them all for a while, but you learn that missing people doesn’t bring them back and there are far more pressing matters upon which to spend what little time you have left. My dog is dead too. His name was Zeke; he was brown, and he snored like hell in his sleep. I try not to think about him either. Over and over and over again, I clean the clocks, the clocks tick, the lantern flickers, and the house grows. Time has moved on without me, leaving me in this hellish purgatory between the past and a future yet to come. Over and over and over again, I clean the clocks, the clocks tick, the lantern flickers, and the house grows. Until the day the clocks went silent. . . .

It started like any other. I walked down a hallway, like any other, passing a corridor to enter a small and dusty room with a door on the other side, like any other. I twisted the handle, like any other, but it did not open. It was locked. A rattling breath from lips pressed against the other side of the door faintly echoed in my ears. Mary. All the blood in my body drained to the floor below, leaving me a frail sheet of skin and bones, my heart shivering and chilled. I yanked my hand back from the handle as though it were molten, and my body froze to a still silence only broken by the clocks ticking up and down the hall. I slowed my shaking breath until it, too, was almost imperceptible. Silence is invisibility and awareness. I caught myself leaning forward, straining for any other sign of life. “Tick, tock. Tick, tock. Tick, tock.” A loud thud yanked the very soul out of my body, and the lantern out of my hand. It crashed to the floor, landing in a thousand, miserable shards shrieking across the hallway, thrusting me into a damned, infernal blackness. I’ve always thought that anything would be better than the ringing ticks, bells, and gongs that filled my mind. Now, I only prayed that they’d come back; I was afraid to be alone. Simultaneous with the fading echo of the lantern’s dying breath, every clock known to man screamed once in unison, and, for the first time since I entered that tiny bunker so long ago, the house was hideously silent. It was the loudest sound I’d ever heard. “You know it’s a lie.” I screamed and ran, smacking into a wall. The silence was too much. I needed to fill it, somehow. I punched the cool wood, rough beneath my knuckles. It landed with a loud thwack, good. I did it again, and again, and again. Not enough. I needed to drown it out, drown her out. “It’s a LIE, Gideon.” Her voice rose to meet mine. I didn’t realize that I had started wailing. Mary spoke in my mind just as clearly, regardless. My ears didn’t seem to matter anymore. The wails grew to an endless roar. Get out of my head, oh God, just shut up and leave me alone. The voice remained indifferent, disturbingly calm. I ran the other direction, the lantern’s glass crunching beneath my feet until the floor itself splintered apart, tossing me into ceaseless oblivion. The clocks might have gone silent, but their carcasses slid off the walls to fall with me, down down down in a pitch-black nightmare. I might have run away, but Mary followed, calling after me, “You know it’s not real.” Gears and cogs swirled around me, melting onto my flesh and nicking my skin as we all tumbled down to the pits of Tartarus. “Tick tock,” I said with a giggle. “Tick tock, tick tock, tiiiiiick tock tick, tick tock…” So many clocks with no voices to sing. Poor things, they needed help. “Tick tock! Tick tick tock!” “Gideon.” Mary was dead. Mary was gone. Mary was gone and dead and had no reason to change her mind about it. “Tick tock tick tock tick tock!” Nobody’d ever want this. All that was left was time, the clocks, and the promise of one day joining everyone else that had already stepped off its wheel. “Tick tock tick tock tick tock!” I still hadn’t landed. The ripping corpses of gears and cogs whipped around my broken soul in a whirlwind of times gone by. It was so terribly, terribly dark. I never liked the dark. I was afraid of it, though I’d never tell anyone. No one was here to tell anymore, though. How sad. War kills everything; it doesn’t give a damn about moms or dads or brown little dogs.

Tears started dribbling from my eyes as my jaw clenched, a little egg of loneliness growing in my throat. Time is funny that way, always guaranteeing goodbyes without ever promising another hello for your whole miserable life. I missed my dog. I missed my mom. “Ticktockticktockticktock-” “GIDEON.” A realization sharper than the thinnest blade sliced through my bitter heart. Mary never made it to the bunker. The floor rose to meet my snotty, wet nose with a painful crack, smacking to the floor and crushing all the air out of my lungs until I thought I’d never again suck another breath into this miserable body. The bunker. Cans of beans, oil, a lantern, and the old radio. The lying window. I crawled, fingers outstretched until they brushed against its cool metal, not glass. A handle, not a window, a hatch. The illusion faded before my eyes as I struggled, chest heaving, to calm down the roiling tidal waves in my mind. Mary and I were outside together, scratching doodles into the wooden post of someone’s mailbox when the bomb sirens started. I wanted her to come with me. I remember the look in her eyes. She was scared shitless too but, for some godforsaken reason, turned around and went the other way. “The clock!” She had said. “I have to get the clock!” It was her mama’s clock, the one that stood beside Mary’s cradle as a baby, that sat on the mantle and witnessed her first steps, her first words. Its face witnessed the funeral of Mr. Squib, and the day she worried herself sick over failing a test. It witnessed her first kiss, some kid named Thomas, quick and clumsy like they all are when you don’t really know what you’re doing. It witnessed arguments between her and her mother and the quiet, snotty tears that followed as she tiptoed to her parents’ room after a bad dream. It witnessed dinners, hugs, Christmases long gone, and books rustling page after page beside the sooty fireplace. It was her childhood, bequeathed to her at the end of her mother’s youth, and her mother’s before that. It was their capsule to times long gone, to innocence. Before I could pull her back, she was already out of sight; those skinny little chicken legs ran as fast as they could towards death, and I never saw her again. I waited until I saw the planes above before I closed the hatch. No one ever came. Bomb. Bomb. Bomb. Tick, tock. Tick, tock. Tick, tock. “You know it’s not real, Gideon. There’s nobody outside, nobody. Nobody’s coming.” My head bent under the weight of a world that I didn’t deserve to carry. A wracking sob ripped from my lungs, coming out as a wet, mumbling choke. “I know.” The hatch shifted back to a window, then nothingness. I sunk to the floor, hugging my arms tightly, trying to convince myself that it was my mother’s embrace, holding me close and keeping me safe with the promise that everything was going to be alright because she was there. But she wasn’t, and I was left alone with nothing but the rusted stains of time and tears on the front of my shirt. You can’t go back in time, you can’t take back goodbyes. The room was too small to contain the grief pouring out of my chest. It was the loneliest sound in the world. “I want my mom... I want my mama...” I just wanted one more hug, one more smile. I wanted to say goodbye and not have to live the rest of my life knowing that the last thing I said to her was “five more minutes” before I threw a blanket over my eyes to hide the blaze of early morning light surrounding her silhouette in my doorway on that morning so long ago. That’s all I want now, just five more minutes. Five minutes to say goodbye to a face and not a memory. It’s not fucking fair. It’s not right.

I let myself weep until all I could muster were shallow, wet hiccups. I could feel the patchy, swollen redness on my face, and the room bent its head to the sound of quiet sniffles. I sat there for who knows how long, blubbering alone in the dark. At least until some clock above silently struck 3:34. My head snapped up and my breath caught in my throat. For the first time since I hid away from the sun, the radio crackled to life with the staticky sound of a voice on the other side. A new hello. “... Train will arr...boar… promptly at 4:45…. St. Willisboro…” And then, silence. It’d been an eternity since I’d felt rain on my face or the warmth of daylight. The window so long ago would tell me stories of such things, but I never got to feel it for myself after the room swallowed me up. The house didn’t have any windows to tell stories; it was just dark. There was no outside. Windows are nice, pretty little things, but the thing about them is that they’re only good for looking at stuff; you’re not meant to go through one. I leaned over and let my hand rest on the handle once more, feeling the cool metal beneath my fingers. The lies began to fade, if just a little. This wasn’t a window; it was a hatch, a door. And it wasn’t locked. The hesitation lasted for just a second. Then, my hands moved with a desperation one must feel when breathless at a thousand feet beneath the sea. I needed light. I needed air. I needed out. Fumbling with the handle, I jiggled the latch free from its setting and heaved upwards with all my might, coming face to face with a cloud of ash and debris. It fell into my eyes and down my throat, baptizing me with the burnt memories of a life now gone. I choked, coughing and hacking until I could somewhat manage a shaky breath, and I peeked open my eyes. Sunlight. There was sunlight. It burned my eyes and my face with its brightness, but the sky was a brilliant shade of blue, bluer than any blue I’d ever seen before. I glanced back behind me, but I found that, after having adjusted my eyes to the light above, I couldn’t see through the darkness in the hole below. A life stuck in time is a life already dead. So, I stepped up the little rungs, out to the bright desolation above, closing the hatch behind me and locking it closed. Then, I moved forward.

Poems “W 42nd St.” By Angelina Vita music box city playing songs it’s been taught W 42nd St. always the same yellow taxi, yellow taxi and above the scraping buildings conspire blank windows stare across a blank city beneath them rushes Lonely Man rushing for no reason yellow taxi, yellow taxi, turn right killer and judge in the same back seat throw the dice and throw the switch start the party before they arrive New York is a child’s toy a glass ball of games yellow taxi on a tipsy street and scribbles on the walls

“December 31, 2012” By Lea Toby Ash falls like snow on the country side of town smoke and fire reaching a darkened hand to the winter sky. Firetrucks, wailing in the streets matching my mother’s cries, heartbroken, as the house that raised her starts to come down. From the flames, memories turn to goodbyes and the shell of a childhood home now stands desolate. We plumage through charred remains for what could be left. We don’t know yet that you are sick, and that cancer doesn’t wait as it suddenly, yet slowly, makes its introduction. I remembered this, on the day that you died. I still remember, forever living in my soul, the date of the day that made me feel true sadness and hate. A day that showed me the monster named destruction.

“My Truth” By Lauren Talley I was judged for missing the deadline of my growth. Then I was judged for speaking my truth Just because it wasn’t under oath. Your judgements act like a mirror, Sound like an echo to my ears… Mistaking victim for villain Instead of facing your fears. I was not asked to share my story To put my heart out on the line But the longer I wait, the more I’m just wasting time Coercion is a sick game to play— but you did You’ve done it once, done it twice Now you’re doing it again I made many mistakes, though none that justified How your selfish wants outweighed the needs of mine Every. Single. Time. I picked myself up when everyone thought my deadline had past And, though you stole my dignity, I made a life that could last I won’t credit you for changing me Stop looking at me like I plagiarized this change of heart Like I stole it from you, and I’m just playing a part I didn’t get this from you; I got this from me Feel safe in the fact— no one else sees A result of sick fate— no one believes But I won’t credit you for changing me

“The Lament of Icarus” By Eryn Goudy On broken wings once trusted, through words heard but not obeyed, I find myself now falling, towards the ever-expansive sea. The sun’s heat at my back, the waves reaching to claim me, regret filling my mind. Hubris has become my killer, the sun its weapon of choice. My trusted wax wings now molten, as the feathers float on the salty breeze. I look below to my fate with fear, as my certain demise becomes ever so apparent. The waves cradle me, as siren songs calm me in my final hour. Thanatos now watching, his scythe poised and ready to send me to the Acheron’s gray shore. Into the depths I sink, my wings now all but lost, and my father— a figure I can no longer see.

“Misdirection” By Jonah Mullinax We live in the age of a dead god. Religion still prevalent, yet no talk of the Spirit. They talk of him in masses, fools rejoicing in inclusive practices. We live in the age of a dead god. In a shanty slum, a pauper gives to a bum. Love in the eyes of the Spirit. Some will childishly call that others, to hell will fall. If their faith be not of the right god. But dirt is dirt. Religion, a misjudgment of worth, equal in the eyes of the Spirit. It lies in all faiths’ perspectives. How can a figure be ever-present? We live in the age of a dead god, but one with unrecognized Spirit.

Essays “My American Dream” By Angelina Vita Dessie Dean Pitts Award Winner Last week, I texted my Grandma Terry a selfie of me on campus, carrying a massive stack of books and papers. I laughingly told her that college was too much work. She sent me back a news article. It started with the sentence, “The American Dream is a joke.” The author cited statistics for crime rates, poverty lines, and racial killing as reasons that this so called “dream” does not truly exist. Grandma Terry was furious. “You’re living proof of the American Dream,” she said, “This entire family is proof.” I had never thought about it before. I followed popular media’s narrative like any other kid, reading headlines in between classes and agreeing with whatever my friends agreed with. I thought of myself as yet another slightly dumb, slightly boring member of Generation Z. But, as Grandma Terry railed against the claims of the article, I started to see it from a different perspective. My paternal great-grandfather, Giuseppe, came to America from Italy as a fifteen-year-old boy. He arrived entirely alone, destitute, and speaking no English. He struggled to learn the language and spent years working in a factory with no ability to understand the world around him let alone stand up for himself. But, when the United States entered World War I, he signed up without question and served with distinction throughout the war. He married my great-grandmother and namesake, a girl who came to America as a sixteen-year-old fleeing starvation in Italy. She was also alone, also thrown into the wildly confusing world of New York City and expected to adapt and survive. She did. They both did. By the end of their lives, Nonno Giuseppe and Nonnie Angelina had built a well-known sixty-acre horse farm on the outskirts of Hartford, Connecticut. Their oldest son, my Nonno Hal, followed in their footsteps. He served during World War II, married my grandmother, and then returned to enlarge the family business. His wife, my Nonnie Francis, carried her own American history which included ancestors dating all the way back to service in the Revolutionary War. Together, they poured their heart and soul into the family farm. The businesses amassed millions and grew in popularity. Their oldest son, my father, followed in their footsteps. He travelled across the country as a respected equestrian trainer, receiving notes of distinction from several European countries. By the time the farm was eventually sold a few years ago, the legacy of two lonely, desperate Italian teenagers had become one of the most influential businesses on the eastern coast. The maternal side of my family tells much of the same story. My great-great-grandparents arrived here from Ireland as young people. In the face of severe discrimination towards Irish immigrants, they stood strong and refused to give up their American Dream. My great-grandmother, Grammy, still jokes that, even amidst the rampant hatred and abuse suffered during her lifetime, her little immigrant family was still the most patriotic house in the state. Even still, the Great Depression nearly ruined them. Grammy frequently speaks of the soups her mother made using boiled chicken feet. They persevered, endured World War II, and finally settled in Cincinnati, Ohio, where they worked to the bone to survive. They built houses as a family, living in the unfinished pieces until each was ready to be sold. Then, they would move to a new street and start the whole process again. It was grueling and often demeaning. They did not receive the notoriety my paternal family received, and their struggle never made it to the papers. Even now, the abuse meted out to Irish immigrants is often ignored or ranked as second tier to other issues. But I have never heard a single word of complaint from them. Instead, they worked harder and better than everyone else around them. 28

My great-grandfather, Pop, eventually controlled the building of several beautiful apartment complexes in downtown Cincinnati. Today, Grammy lives on the ground floor of one of Pop’s most beloved retirement homes. Her youngest daughter Terry married my grandfather, a man who felt the sting of carrying German heritage his entire life. He was denied the opportunity to serve during Vietnam due to genetically inherited damage in his legs rendering him unfit for duty. This hidden shame only served to drive him forward. Today, they live in the center of Cincinnati in a beautiful home with gardens that are the envy of several streets. They call many city leaders and heads of state personal friends and are well known across the city that once scorned their families’ heritage. The stories my family tells of the dark days they endured seem surreal to me. Then they don’t. Grandma Terry does not throw food away. If it’s edible, she keeps it, just in case. Nonno Hal tried to stop my father from naming me Angelina. He had named his children simple American names like Joe, Frank, and Sally. He was terrified I would be held down by the Italian connection and begged that I be named something safe, something that wouldn’t hurt me later. But here I am, living the life Grandma Terry calls her “American Dream.” She reminded me that my great-grandparents on both sides never finished eighth grade. She reminded me that my grandparents only made it through high school and that my parents were the talk of the family for having snatched time for a couple of college courses over two decades ago. Then there’s me, the first-generation college student with an Italian name and Irish skin. “You are what we’ve been working towards,” Grandma Terry told me, “you are living the life your Nonno Giuseppe wanted all the way back in Italy.” Grandma Terry said that the idea of the American Dream’s ceasing to exist feels like a slap in the face to the people who gave everything to build their own dream. I’ve decided I agree with her. Every generation of my family realized a piece of it. The American Dream is often seen as some impossible moment of perfection, some miraculous step from abject poverty to complete success that can only be found in the United States. This rarely happens, if ever, and the jaded nature of our society seems to say that the Dream is all or nothing. If it doesn’t happen immediately, the American Dream is considered to be a lie. Immigrants come to America with the dream of becoming a better version of themselves. They want to live in a world better than what they’ve had before. My family has proved, at least to me, that the people have taken back the Dream. Nonno Giuseppe arrived in NYC as a penniless and uneducated teenager, and I am now living the opposite life, the life he was promised in Italy over one hundred years ago. It’s slow, and it takes unimaginable labor and sacrifice, but I know the American Dream still exists. I wouldn’t be here without it.

“Something Else” By Christina Aguayo Race and Identity Dialogue Special Recognition What happens when a people are not only discriminated against but forgotten altogether? During the Presidential election on November 4, 2020, a CNN exit poll listed respondents as White, Black, Latino, or Asian but did not give a listing for Native Americans, classifying them as a race or ethnicity of people; instead, there was only a spot saying, “Something Else.” A brave woman named Rainy Dawn Ortiz fought back against the injustice of being called “something else.” She posted a poem speaking out and proclaiming that she and her family are more than “something else,” and the poem received national attention. Since the mid-1800s, when the Native Americans who had lived here for centuries were moved off their land by settlers and forced onto reservations, they have been forgotten by the United States. The act of being forgotten has slowly taken away the identity and individuality of Native Americans, and that has been magnified by the coronavirus pandemic. When the United States forgets about the Native American people, it causes them to lose the individuality of their indigenous tribes. First, because they are grouped together as “Native Americans,” they lose their identities. Instead of identifying them by their tribal name–Navajo, Zuni, Apache–we group them all together simply as Native Americans. Also, the languages of the native people have started to disappear because they are not being taught anymore. Indigenous people must now speak English if they want to survive. There is no benefit for this generation to speak their native languages. Moreover, when people are forgotten, no emphasis is placed on giving them opportunities for an education. Evidence of this lies in the fact that Native American reservations in New Mexico and Arizona continue to place last on standardized test scores. As this situation continues from generation to generation, these people begin to lose hope of having a better life and rising out of the poverty that is often common to life on the reservation. The fact that indigenous people are being forgotten by the United States has never been so evident than in the last year when coronavirus hit the United States. First, there are very few hospitals on the reservations—or even basic supplies—so all residents must go to the nearby cities to get food and health care. In a Native American home, it is not uncommon to find three generations living in one household. When COVID hit one, it hit all of them. Also, COVID had a severe impact on Native American reservations because of the lack of sanitation and immunizations available to them. The lack of running water, medical supplies, and hygiene products made it easy for the virus to spread quickly throughout these reservations. Lastly, the surrounding cities were rising in the number of cases of coronavirus because, when the residents of the reservation came into the cities, the population almost doubled, so it was difficult to keep track of who had it. It wasn’t until this made national news that the government was able to work with the Navajo Nation to lockdown entire reservations and surrounding cities. Native Americans are people, this is their home, they are American citizens, and they deserve as much help as everyone else. Losing the identity and individuality of a people causes them to ultimately lose hope in a better future. It becomes difficult to believe things will ever change. Even though COVID hit the reservations hard, it might have woken up America to see the effects of what ignoring a population of people can do. Rainy Dawn Ortiz is fighting to be recognized and addressed these issues in her poem. Her people are more than just “something else.” Her children, and all indigenous children, should have the opportunity to be anything that they want—anything that any child born in America would want to be. 30

“Some Assembly Required” By Jamie White With this pattern, you can make your very own child using leftover traits. This mixed-up child has lots of opportunities to disappoint, confuse, and bewilder the maker when it doesn’t turn out quite right. Since they need more help developing than the last two children you’ve made, be sure to ignore it as you create it. When left alone, it will still develop, just not quite right or how you wanted it to. No matter what you do it will love you. Makes: One female, genderfluid child that dates either gender and hates its body. Can range from 5’3’’5’4’’ and weighs about 90lbs. Difficulty 7/10 The hardest part of this child will most likely be making it fit into society and communicate with others. Does best with those of similar pattern. Skills used: • Thickly applied glue to keep the child together under pressure. • Ladder stitching to hide its distress. • Matching notches and points to have it fit into society. • Darts to keep it in place. Materials and Tools: • 11 yards of self-raising. • 4 yards of bullying. • Optional: a mainly absent parent to add variety. • 6” x 8” of self-taught knowledge. • 3” x 4” antisocial trait. • Stuffing full of knowledge from books. • 2 grey buttons that stay aware. Step 1: Trace and cut out your yards of self-raised child. It has the police number memorized and a few burns from failed attempts at cooking lunch, but that’s okay. Step 2: Create patches to attach to the pattern from the bullying at school. Who cares that the child now prefers books over other children that are cruel? It needs to socialize.

Step 3: Here you can add the mostly absent parent. Though not necessary, it adds more trauma to the kid’s creation such as anxiety and low self-esteem. Step 4: Add the 3” x 4” of antisocial trait, leaving the child quiet and unwilling to talk back, which makes adults look and state, “What a mature child that is” and expound upon how this child is somehow the smartest of three before going back to berating the child for its B in math. Step 5: Add the 5” x 8” self-taught knowledge found on the internet. This will allow the child to gain names for its wrongness. It finds biromantic and asexual and gender fluid and dysphoria. The child will then become itself. Step 6: Stuff the child with the information that comes from books. Books are always more reliable. Be sure they contain recipes and facts and adventures for the child to escape to. Step 7: Attach the two grey buttons, so that the child may see and comprehend everything. Step 8: Assemble everything in steps 1-7 together, until it resembles what you want this child to look like. Be aware of minute differences from the example to the pattern.

ART 331

A Woman of Trade by Audrey Poltrak

Beauty Is Pain by Jerusha Nolt

Bibaxi by Audrey Poltorak

Fairy Forest by Roxie Harris

Empty by Audrey Poltorak

Thoughts of Sweets by Elizabeth Cooper

Tooth Express by Amber Ballenger

Without Wisdom by Katie Newton

You: An Analysis of the Human Condition by Rebekah Smith