ISSUE NO. FOUR : OUTBREAK
LIB RAE RIE a collaboration of young artists
PHOTOGRAPHY / POETRY / PROSE / NON-FICTION / VISUAL ART / MANY MORE
this zine will dedicate itself to the art that the
youth
creates;
the
people
whose
inspiration shines a light on the darkness of the world; those who are determined to change the world or themselves—both of which are hard tasks to conquer. this zine will dedicate itself to art with meaning, by people who create meaning through art. it is the product of what we, as a powerful force, create, no matter what our own definitions of art may be.
OUTBREAK
hello, old friend. here we are again: another issue, another conversation after what feels like eternity. just listing all the absurd things that have occurred in this new year would be enough content for a magazine issue. i find that these unusual, inexplicable times that we find ourselves in can be best described with the word OUTBREAK, which i set as the theme. (new things, new discussions, new thoughts are suddenly emerging.) (but are they really new, or are they only a collision, an amalgamation of things that have existed for centuries?) (what is the relationship between outbreak and breaking out?) we have begun to live with and adapt to constant change, unanswered questions, and a growing need for activism. soon, the world will emerge from its cocoon, transformed, remoulded, renewed.
w i t h
l o v e ,
ayna @libraerie
issue.
content.
FOUR // july 2020
i. self page six to ten
"do stuff. be clenched, curious. not waiting for inspiration or society's kiss on your forehead."
u n t i t l e d
- susan sontag
-
n i h a
ii. others page eighteen to twenty-three
b e a c h
contributors.
anne
niha
t: nepeinthe
t: isletic
ela
paige
@ovni.el
t: deerfawn
t: inheriting
eunice
k a r i
iii. documentation
j o u r n a l l i n g
-
s y d
iv. voices page thirty-four to forty
@berrystained
syd t: sapphena @sydnova
t: ivyburied
hannah
-
page twenty-seven to thirty-one
creators:
elle
d a y
tĂłia @vie_in_rose
contact. libraerie@yahoo.com libraerie.tumblr.com
t: thespeedyreader, @hannahjorg_
jacqueline @jacquelinewu96
juul t: privateldaho, @juulwesterveld
kari t: kari-kaes
editors:
azka t: vandorens
jacca t: etheariel
mila
carmen
@milaottevanger
@carumens
libraerie. the libraerie magazine offers a platform for young artists to raise their voices about their identity, thoughts, and hopes in their respective ways of creating. the simple format aims to enable the reader to fully engage with the work.
SE EL LF F S
the moon sheds its waxing light, gibbous in the way only lanterns are. bagged air cinching out of me. i haven’t slept in days. oxygen-nitrogen-neon lighting up these bones. you can get addicted to the feeling of breath, the unforgiving sea of it. the moon cries wolf. loose lips sink ships. in dog years we’d be dead, so i am waking up a child again. outside, the supermarket is purloined empty, shelves picked clean, a body staunching its bloodflow. still, we sing for prayer like someone is listening. i apologize to the air that holds me, and too many other people. i apologize for the brackish yellow of my skin.
but this isn’t a piece about the pandemic; all my prose is about myself, i’m sweetly selfish like that. it happens like this: my mother tries to quantify the sickness over dinner table politics as if it is an orange-shaped tumor. why are you like this? going, going, i’m gone. mother, according to my handwriting, i’m ambitious and uninhabitable. according to my teachers, i’m report cardhappy. i’ll be happier when this illness shuts its rusted grip, pushes me past the starving lip of summer. it’s like lorde said: maybe we just do it violently. maybe the killing floor will stay put this time.
today i picked apart an entire rind of cheese and my blue-lit body and my mother wanted to talk about the college admission process. may waterboards me with grief, its shoulders contracted in denial. there’s another world riding slipstream to this one where the sun came up today. i’m climbing out of the chlorinated pool again and still, the streets blur. still, the house refuses the permanence
of
my
weight.
skinned
knees
and
flares
of
light.
i
don’t
understand the love languages of childhood, i never have. going home is only a metaphor when you’re already there.
— above: apotheosis, by eunice / right: present, by juul
The curtains that I forgot to close Admit the sunlight into my room unbidden. The dust weaves its way Like it has somewhere to be, urgently.
The air vibrates with all the things I want to do and won’t.
Instead I will lie here and watch the debris settle On the desk and the copy of Mrs Dalloway That I haven’t opened in three days. I will lie here, and I might go back to sleep.
— 6.45am, by mila
— untitled, by tóia
Placing itself on the windowsill, the beetle weeps, awaiting its rebirth. Another weekend outside the living room, the family crouching, waiting. Their laughter is burdened with hazardous, terminal passion.
It dreams (of leading a life). It dreams (of all the past lives it has let through, without ever really keeping them). It dreams (of rest, despite the regret that comes with it). It longs (for another hand).
It weeps again. Brought to a halt by a puncture, it rolls back and waits for its last breath to break out of its hollow case. It’s the way they look at you: with hope, for themselves. They dare to hope while
you won’t. A legacy rises from the vestiges of wretchedness. Deprived of intensity, the beetle falls back down and drills a hole into itself, crawling from one side of its skin to the other.
— kafka, by ayna
ONE. The plants started to take over twenty years ago. In my Modern History class, I learned that the first signs of takeover were seen in the backgrounds of old photographs people had uploaded to the web: tree trunks with grimey textures creeping up from the ground; brightly colored vines wrapping themselves around plant stalks, their small circumferences accounting for their ability to keep proliferating in the shadows. It was in rural Wisconsin that the first case is said to have arisen. A reclusive old farmer had been feeding his cows when the weeds beneath his feet had supposedly wound themselves around his body, rising until they were choking him. He was found a couple of days later by his grandson, who reported a picture of the scene to the scientific authorities. The snapshot enclosed in our textbooks showed a picture of the man, bluish with asphyxiation, enclosed in the weeds. The plants around his corpse were dying already; evidence to their own fallibility. The case was passed off before even reaching the hands of a phytologist. The grandson’s name was Derek, and he was a postman whose scientific knowledge was restricted to a high school Biology class he’d failed, but it was he who made the key observation that saved us all. Derek, in the midst of auctioning the farm off, was most perplexed by the fact that all the cows on the farms were absolute bonkers. He was sure that they must’ve been healthy, happy cows that had been fed and adored all their lives, but they were now simply refusing to eat anything; from hay to grass to grain. He also noticed that they were astonishingly jumpy all the time, seemingly unable to keep their hooves on the ground. In his later diaries, he described the sight as ‘a few dozen unhinged cattle, behaving as if the ground was on fire and thrashing around in an unseeming manner’. Rumors spread of the farm being possessed by a spirit of the dead farmer, who was said to have been a grumpy old man, and it remained unsold. It lay there like a useless lump of extremely fertile land, with a couple of cows that were dropping off one by one, dying of hunger. Derek found this development rather
despairing.
He
went
into
town
to
buy
a
few
books
on
cattle
management, and tried everything to fix the cows, from dousing them in saltwater to coaxing them into eating some tasty oats. It was while Derek was doing so that the Earth under him attempted to betray him in the same manner that took away his grandfather.
He was bending over, attempting to feed a calf corn kernels out of his palm. It was a hot day, and he was panting and sweating in the hot afternoon sun. When the calf refused to eat and instead let out a plaintive screech, he decided to try a different approach and let out a loud moo instead. Unfortunately, it had the opposite of the desired effect and the calf, a lovely creature that was milkywhite and spotted brown, writhed away from him, slowly slipping down the hilly slope. Derek swore loudly and turned to trudge down to retrieve the cow. It was at that moment that two vines shot out from the ground and wrapped themselves around his ankles, locking him into place. Derek looked down and saw thorny stems engulfing his own legs, trapping him in a thicket. They were prickly as they dug into his legs. Frozen with horror, he attempted to wriggle out of it, and then reached down to tear at the hostile greenery; but alas, they got his hands too. He felt himself slowly being dragged down into the ground. There was no point in calling out, he knew; not a single soul was in the area. So this is how his end was to be! Attacked by a plant, in an attempt to feed a cow. Dear God, he thought, please make it quick. And if this is a dream, let me wake up now. But there was sand in his mouth and his feet were touching hard rock and the thorny vines were tearing into his skin so ferociously that his eyes were watering up, blurring his vision. Tears mixed with grime fell into his mouth. He himself felt the absurdity of what was happening, but he was experiencing acute pain. The flesh on his thigh was ripped off with such might that a cry escaped his lips for the first time. The last thing he saw before he lost consciousness was the calf from earlier, its curious eyes blinking at him meekly from above, snow-white fur gleaming in the sunlight.
TWO. My bed is my favorite place at home. It’s tucked away at the corner of our ship, and there is a hole right above my head when I lie down. The glass is cracked at the edges and Father says it must be fixed, but I like it that way. Sometimes, starlight leaks through the cracks into my room. Stars are solid, unsmiling, diffident, but starlight speaks true volumes. It’s shimmery and makes your insides glow a little. That's how you know that stars really are angels. A reticent being could not produce that much light.
Our ship is not much to look at. Compared to the majestic space dwellers of other countries, it is a homely little thing, its walls faded and its floors cold. I’ve never seen it from outside, but a photograph from my father’s days as Vice President shows a ship of a sleek design, painted a bright yellow and blue. There are very few windows. Standing on a smaller shuttle next to the ship are my father and two other men. They are Pavith and Amar, brothers who built the ship we live on. Life in space is not that different from life on Earth. We collectively moved here as a species when I was a baby. I don’t have a lot of memories from the ascent to the stars, but my mother tells me that it was made under terrible circumstances. looming
and
The
trees
treacherous,
were and
poisonous, they
were
she
said;
they
everywhere.
were
Mankind
large had
and been
clearing away plants from their industrial and living space, and then mass deforestation for capitalistic gains had also occurred, but foolish humans had been advocating for plants until the very end. They had been conducting numerous campaigns to save the plants and replant with every deforestation, causing plant numbers to increase exponentially in many areas of the world. Even in early 2063, when the first recorded attack occurred, humans had been benignly snipping away at their houseplants. At home, being an ex-Vice President’s daughter, my life is relatively easy. Most people on the ship fall into the hierarchy below us, similar to social ranking in free market society. Each resident has an assigned role they were expected to follow, based on how they were specialized on Earth. Everyone is assigned value points based on how useful they are to the little colony we had on the ship. If you learn a new skill, or reduce your consumption of water, food, and energy, your value points go up. If you slack off, or waste resources, you lose points. When your value drops down to the minuses, you get lynched. The system we have here is said to be essential for the survival of humankind in space with limited resources. After all, our move wasn’t a systematic, strategic one; it was an emergency departure. One can only describe it as a blast-off into space while our home was turning into a place where we were getting strangled by greenery, choking on the poisonous gases the trees emit, or getting sliced into pieces by the sharp ends of pretty flowers that came hurtling out of nowhere. It was a situation where the enemy was all around us,
and yet we had no clue as to why the enemy was behaving that way, or how it was even possible. Up here in the stars, we could have rewritten our story and lived as equals. There are signs of revolt among the lower class residents. Before my friend Mica was lynched, he’d told me that Derek Singer, the man who had alerted media outlets of the Cleansing with a horrifying video of him being saved from a plant by a cow, had been silenced by the authorities on the grounds of sparking public alarm and mass hysteria. As more cases had been popping up across the globe, people went insane with fright, not leaving their homes, and chopping down all trees in sight, causing property damage. Singer had been ousted as a propagandist who’d concocted the whole story and video for political reasons; scientists and film experts went on TV to explain how the whole thing was a bluff, and so on. He told me how, behind the scenes, they were being threatened to do so by governments and corporate men, how these people were the ones who were secretly most scared. They all spent fortunes amassing spacecraft with the capacity of holding their close circles, and a few others to serve them. Some compromised by letting their loved ones go up in rigged government ships, which are said to have carefully curated populations and gene pools as to preserve the human races’ ethnic and genetic diversity. Mica had been my only friend up here in this ship. There were few people our age, so we generally stuck to each other. The ship was often cold and lonely, with limited ways of entertaining ourselves. We usually found solace in the archive room, where we could flop around all day and listen to old music from the few systems available. There was only a limited collection of books and movies, so we went through all the titles, rewatching them relentlessly. It was never boring because, while I was generally quiet, Mica was a sunshine; explosive in nature, always full of bright ideas and smiles. He made me laugh. Our most favorite thing to watch was a video of the President of the United States at the time making his way aboard on the spaceship. The Earth was barren at the time, devoid of any plants or trees; they had been cut down by major machineries, with even fifty year old plants being pulled up like weeds. During those days, to prevent being attacked by the small shrubs that would sprout out of the ground sporadically, everyone on Earth would disguise themselves as animals. On this particular occasion, the assemblage of top making
government officials and their bodyguards played out like a herd of cows making their way on a spaceship. They had specialized fur costumes, and muck smeared all over them. Clippings of animal sounds would play out as they attempted to mimic the way cows waddled on their fours. It was an effective disguise, since plants did not harm animals; but comical, to say the least. Mica’s outspoken nature was what had gotten him lynched. His parents were both lower class workers on the ship, his mother a teacher and his father a maintenance
worker.
He’d
held
various
one-man
protests
against
the
hierarchical system on the ship; one where workers had to earn the right to survive and upper class citizens didn’t do shit. Mica had always wanted me to join what he was doing, which was standing around shouting communist slogans we’d gotten from old textbooks while holding up posters I’d drawn. I agreed with his cause, but, unlike a few others that eventually joined him, I had always been too frightened. It was my father who had pulled the lever that shot him into space; the only time in my life that I’d ever dared to question his authority. I remember pummelling him with my fists while being pulled away from him, screaming and in hysterics. Mica’s parents had been quietly crying. It’s been around three years since Mica was lynched, but I think of him almost every time I look out into space. Where was his body now? Was it lying facedown
on
some
unknown
planet,
subject
to
earthquakes
and
volcanic
eruptions every now and then? Was his corpse floating around a galaxy somewhere, encircling nebulae and protostars? Or had he already been sucked into a black hole a long, long time ago?
THREE. The Earth was feeling happy today. She’d just wrapped up checking in with all the continents today, and all seemed to be doing well. The reefs of the world had thanked her incessantly as usual, telling her in excited voices that they were now seeing colors they hadn’t seen for many years. The oceans couldn’t say anything, but they were all clear and blue in a way that she knew to be relief. The trees were growing well everywhere, and the animals, bless them, were happy fighting out on their own as they were always meant to be.
When the last human on Earth had died, a wave of remorse had shuddered through the entire planet; after all, they had lost some valuable friends, ones that had been of great help to them. Think of the people that had healed animals, that had cultivated plants with their bare hands, that had truly cared. But the Earth always had a rule she played by: there needed to be a balance. When the trees had come to her with their pleas, she had outright rejected the idea; to think that the Earth, the home to all species, would be the one causing the human apocalypse! But the trees had whispered to her repeatedly, begging in their soft, rustling voices, until the Earth finally started to give in. And then there were the cattle, and the fish, and the birds, and the air itself; did she not have to save them? There was anger in her grounds, she could feel; the trees and the animals rising up to revolt. They had been stagnant for too long; the humans did not know what they were capable of. She had not wanted a war to occur. To think of the foolish humans, who had freely roamed her lands for so long, suddenly at war with the flora they had been trampling on for years! But she had made what she felt to be the best decision. But she had set a few ground rules No animal was to be involved in the riot. All attacks should be to the death, and as quick as possible. Dear Sun. Dear Sun. Can you hear me? Yes, I can. You look lovely today. Thank you. My soil and oceans are healing as we speak. Dear Sun, what does the universe think of me now? There is word among the galaxy that you have saved us all. Mankind has been plaguing us all for too long now. Some of them still float among us, sending in their probes and shuttles on our planets. But they did help us also. They cured our plants and animals, and tended to us with soft hands. But Earth, for the most part, did they excuse what could have been forgiven? Did they lighten their step when the ground cracked? Did they tend to you with utmost gentleness, or did their greed prevent them from doing so? They were kind creatures.
But they were selfish ones. And that is not what we stand for. All day you burn endlessly, helping us all live. We would not be here without you. I enjoy my job. It has been a privilege, and a blessing after many years of torment, to watch you heal. Tell me, Sun, from where you are standing, does it look very different? There is something missing. There are no more children playing, and there are no more ships sailing. There is no adventure, and there is no courage. There is no laughter and no singing. The Earth felt her heart sink. But there are no more muddied rivers, she argued. There are no more creatures choking. This world is theirs as much as the humans’. For the first time, I feel as though I can breathe. Then that is good. I see that your meadows are healing, I see that your cows are comfortable. I see a world full of light. There is a hole where the humans once were, but that is filling up slowly. There is a sound of relief in the air, and flowers everywhere. Heartbroken, the Earth cried out, But I was their mother as well. The Sun smiled down at her. Dear Earth, you did well. They knew that they were the ones who destroyed you, and thought they could save you. But that is not their place. You saved yourself.
— untitled, by niha
OT TH HE ER RS S O
two weeks ago i woke up and was convinced i saw you in the bathroom mirror, hands fleeting & hair wild
&
happiness
startling.
a
strange
color
was
gleaming in your eyes, a wild blue like pebbles cast into a careless imprint left behind by the storm that cried outside the still-open bathroom window. wild blue like you were sorry enough for disappearing that
you
unearthed
from
yourself
the
ability
to
return. i just stared at the mirror with some foreign feeling like shock, or disbelief, or denial. i thought that you had convinced me to give up.
it's been so long since i've seen you, i said to the mirror, as i reached for the glass, trying to chase away that space between our bodies until i forgot we were still supposed to be swallowed in this strange social distance—six feet apart. my fingertips jerked back
and
mirror
my
to
the
eyes
darted
bath
rug
away,
instead,
down its
from
blue
the
plush
reminding me of your wild blue eyes again. and just like
that,
i
was
back
to
looking
at
the
mirror.
thinking about how i'd hoped to hear from you again sometime, even when this all ends- especially when this all ends.
this morning i wake up and stare into the same blank mirror
and
realize
that
there
must
be
an
entire
avenue between me and you, a road hammered with holes here but thick with knotted overgrowth there. are you there? i want to ask, because some days i swear i hear you laughing in the kitchen as i learn to cook the fourth new dish of the week and other days i
am
left
reaching
into
the
space
and
time
of
weekends that bend and blend into weekdays and still, i cannot find you.
i wish finding you was as easy as asking myself a question
and
hearing
the
answer
echo
across
an
empty bathroom on the tenth floor of an apartment building—sandwiched between the rooms and lives of a hundred other people who cannot hear me. i wish i knew where you went when you left, or why you left, or how long you were planning to leave for.
the next time i see you standing on this long, lonely avenue, i won't cross the street to avoid facing you, i promise myself, curling my fingers into a fist and hoping
your
fire
will
appear
behind
my
straightening shoulders. the next time i catch your smile seeping through my lips, or sense your anger rising
up
between
my
ribs,
i
will
have
learned
enough about the world of an empty body decaying in empty space to know that i would rather find you and feel something than hollow on, holding onto nothing.
i'm going to hold on to you. i want to hold on to you. because rage is not the disease i thought it was and selfishness should not be a sin, because even my most startlingly beautiful laugh blossoms from your being, because holding on to you is—will always be —holding on to the hardest parts of me.
— you & i, by anne
We sit two meters apart, or just about. You in your wicker chair that you’ve dragged onto the threshold; me on the scratchy corridor carpet. I think that this is the distance we would have kept anyway. I think about everything I could say. I think about how you won’t remember if I tell you. How you won’t like it anyway.
How are you, then? Spoken like a confession. I can see right through you; I already know the answer. I can see into your apartment - the clutter on your desk, the dishes piled up in the sink, the dust on all your trinkets. You’re sorting out your things, aren’t you? So you won’t be around forever. I’d always thought of you as permanent, like one of your ornaments. Like the vase of fake flowers, and the golden crucifix, and the stones from the beach. I want to scramble to your side and keep you rooted here.
Forget I asked. Let’s talk about the TV. The nice weather we’re having. Or maybe you can dig up a story for me. Take me back to Greenland, where the strawberries tasted sweeter and everyone was happy. You have so many stories, but you only ever give me the same handful, recycled over and over.
Tell me about that TV show you watched: the one about the monks who never spoke a word. Tell me about the way every other sound was amplified: the birds, the footsteps, the breathing. You talk as if you were one of them. Meanwhile, all I can think of is the clean break between silence and peace.
Peace: some kind of ceasefire. I wish that you’d stop holding God at arm’s length. length
— grandma's shopping, by hannah
I have stuck my polaroid on the wall. It is mostly black - six long and low rectangles of a glowing off-white recede into the centre from the top left corner. The windows to Moscow, China, Everywhere, Berlin.
All my favourite mementos of us are packed away somewhere far from here. All I have at home is this failure of a picture with the exposure all wrong.
It’s supposed to be the East Side Gallery under the clapboard tunnel scaffolding which protected it. Only all you can see are Those lights, wedged in the juncture between the wall and the ceiling.
If this is all I have of you right now I’d like to pretend the picture’s of something we saw earlier during that wet black evening. Standing below the bright suspended S-Bahn,
We had watched the train take people home.
— see you later, by mila
Loneliness is said to be an extension of being. The
uncertainty
of
the
world
around
us
is
a
paragon to the womb we came from, and the quietness of sleep is a mirror of the grave yet to come.
We
are
thrust
into
this
life
as
single
beings, and it is in solitude that we slip away.
It is often preached that hurt is a prerequisite to an everlasting love. That you’ll have days on which you’ll just have to deal with it on your own. That the person you love will sometimes speak words so sharp that they end up wounding you forever. That, to hold on to the softness, you have
to
be
willing
to
wade
through
the
emptiness.
Why is it that I cannot get one without the other? All I have ever wanted is to feel whole. All I have ever wanted is for you to see me, for you to really look at me, for you to tell me I’m doing a good job. I want the sunny days to not hurt my eyes and I want to stop feeling the ache of winter all the way into my bones. I want to hold your hand and I want to pick flowers. I want someone to make me happy for once.
— the unbearable ache of not being seen, by niha
— untitled, by tóia
It was a happy day. It was supposed to be a happy day. The entire drive, he kept drumming his fingers on the steering wheel, to a tune that didn’t exist. When we got there, he was insistent on carrying everything in one trip, even my stuff. I told him he didn’t have to, I could do it myself, but he simply said no no it's no big deal. So I tread behind him, giggling at the scene before me, whilst picking up little pieces that he dropped along the way. “There!” He let out a proud sigh after setting everything on the sand. “All set.” “All set.” He watched me place the remaining items next to his. “Noo. The whole point was that you didn’t have to do that.” I shrugged. “But now we’re all set.” “You don’t have to take care of me. I’m perfectly capable of doing it myself.” Liar. “I could say the same thing to you.” He clearly looked defeated but he seemed to know me well enough by now to let it alone. Instead he joined me on the blanket, knees pulled to chest, waiting for me to say something. “Sooooo, what you wanna do?” I turned to him appalled. “Excuse me? What do I wanna do? It was your choice to go to the beach.” “Okay, yeah, but this day is meant for you.” "If it was my day, why did you choose to go to the beach?" “I don’t know. It's a way to relax. Thought you might-” “You didn’t even ask me if I wanted to go to the beach.” “Did you, did you wanna go to the beach? Do you wanna go to the beach?” I scoffed. “Not really.” “Oh.” “Yeah.” And the silence came back. It was hard being with someone who never gave any piece of themselves away. Everything was surface level and nothing past that. It made me feel big, in a way, but a bad one. I let out a sigh, as I had to carry the conversation, yet again. “Do you want to go to the water?”
"If you want to." Typical him, maintaining the guise of a gentleman. “Do you want to go to the water?” I repeated. "Okay. So we stripped ourselves of our garments and ran towards the water, laughter springing in our steps. No matter how big you get, how acclaimed you become,
how
much
you
lose
yourself
in
life
or
others,
there
is
simply
something about nature that will make you small again. Reverts you back to your original selves, as children yet again, chasing after the unknown with such glee in a way that you can’t explain and don’t care to. My anger didn’t subside, but no one can feel anger in water, not especially when you run into it. Water washes away negative emotion, engulfing it for the time being. It helped, because being around him, you had to push down whatever was truly on your mind in order to survive the moment. With him, it was always all about the moment. We ended up embracing, and he ran his hands through my hair, fighting against the slight breeze upon the water. “Hey,” his hands still in my hair. I hummed in response. “You deserve this.” I held back the urge to frown. “Aren’t you so glad to be spending the day with me?” I forced my cheeks up. “Yeah. Always.” His attention was rapt on me, examining every inch of my face. I couldn’t tell if he was trying to read it, discern the exact emotion I wasn’t portraying, or maybe he was soaking in all the features I didn’t like and saving it for later to convince me otherwise. Or maybe, there really was no depth to this boy, that it was all a fantasy I made in my head, and he really was just looking. Suddenly, something diverted his attention, causing him to run back out of the water. They were talking, but too far to be heard, so I faced back out at the water. I was losing myself in the gaze of the horizon when he came back, grabbing me from behind and spinning. “What are you doing!” I couldn’t help the yelp of laughter that escaped me. “Let's take a picture.” He gestured at the stranger he stopped to talk with and I saw they had his phone at the ready. I turned my camera smile on and after a couple like this, he grabbed my face and kissed me. It was tender and gentle, for the camera, but he held my head like he meant it. He quickly let go, said thank you, put his phone secure and came back to me.
AND I KISSED HIM AGAIN, LIKE I MEANT IT.
I don’t think I knew that this would be our last best day, but it was almost like my body knew. It rocked with the movement, and held his neck, and tugged his hair, and travelled to hold onto his face, and committed his lips to memory. I squeezed him tighter. I meant to say until next time, but I think it said I will miss this. It was almost like my body knew this was the last. “I’m,” he let out a breath, like it was difficult to say. “Sorry.” “Yeah.”
— beach day, kari
DOCUMENTATION I was waiting for dawn’s stately tresses at the intersection, For I hail from another time, trapped in its steady undulation And oh was I waiting! My feet were sore, my blisters festering, Night was not day, day was not yet dark, Yet I have to leave my mark.
I had come from another place, A dream by a child's sweet lips identified a myth “Tis divinity! A nymph, a fairy, a god!” She exclaimed. A heinous sprite- two faced, a damnation common to us all Or perhaps a fiend professing truth? What truth betrays the definition? “Tis beauty in misty eyes and smiling mouth!”
Insatiable hunger, oh tyrant in peacetime, all for despairing hope Is evading the truth, this cowardice, tempest worth? Or is Death himself, devil crying mercy, with the promise of salvation worth? Dare to hope or hope to dream?
Lady of the night, oh envious, cunning moon Lend your gloved hand who stole velvet from the king of Chaos And starlight for the silk caressing skin The hand that brought broken dreams And hated remembrance and brassy love And lifeless eyes-
Give me the gilded key And let in the glorious sun For I see her tresses at the intersection At the intersection between night and day And old and new.
— undulation, by jacqueline
i keep trying to find life in my copper pocket change and the way it rubs together like red summer thighs in my wallet. but i'm scared to touch it and i'm scared to go outside. what i am supposed to do with something that i cannot see? sister tells me i'm okay, i'm nineteen and i still have that invincible-teenage-tornado-aura. my brother rubs his grimy hands on my shirt. i've never loathed a touch as much as i did then.
i keep trying to live, because that is all i know how to do (i thought i knew how to die, but not in this way, not in this uncontrolled-by-me way). with almond eye pits and cans upon cans of black beans, in the boarded-up windows of my parent's home, i try to convince myself that i see a life form, any flickering movement besides my pulsing eyes. i wish so badly i believed god had a plan. i wish so badly my every swallow didn't scrape my throat.
i wish something would move.
the roads are desolate (perhaps the apocalypse has come) ghost town in my city, in my head, in my heart. maybe it's just the start? the beginning of the end the plotters and stocker-uppers will be laughing when i'm dead. i cannot sleep. there is a sorry looming nothing in the newscasts and lone hours.
the nothing.
the suffocating nothing the static nothing the sterile nothing
pandemic & nothing & death & nothing & isolation & nothing.
sickness is spreading in the chaos of people. we don't know anything, i don't know anything. but my love keeps growing: in this decay of the world i have found the growth of it. love. something in my heart. love. everything. love. perhaps life is found here too — something in my heart, by paige
The sunlight-thin leaf is battered Against the window by a little storm. The glass does not announce itself But through its rigidity. The small and valiant life Pliably drums its syncopated rhythm.
— opposition, by mila
march peels back her gums like a grapefruit, saying babygirl wouldn't you like a hit & i'm angling so neon it's a matter of time before you're all hitting play on the fallout.
i corduroy myself open— unloved unloved unloved. tell me
i'm pretty or don't kill me at all. & i'll never be homecoming queen but i do know how to escape this cannibal city, this sea of IVs. the city lights up its bones with aqua, with chemical headlights. seoul going by too fast & then tenderly slow. had a dream i buzzed my hair at four different gas stations
the moon still
infected with the softest clench of heart -muscle. i sleep & i refuse to sleep. i think i haven't
been awake in days. missed two
physics classes because i couldn't bear to think about the law of conservation of mass: if i was good in the past i must be good now
& yet here i am,
radioactive in a public bathroom against the nitrogen sinks. all i wanna know is where other people put their bodies & why.
— equinox rising, by eunice
— journal en
ntries by syd
VO O II C CE ES S V on days of sharpening flint by fires and babies wrapped in banana leaves, soft and eager, they cried out to the world and a whole tribe rejoiced — for among the cold and danger of this world a new joy had been opened up for them.
in time, over the sound of guns and cannons, shrieks of fear and pain and hunger — unrelenting is the sound of the waves, the birds, the trees and the winds. they sound out benignly as a reminder that the world remains as it always was, gentle and beckoning.
dear daisy in the field, so lovely and innocent, tell me, what do you know of this world and its addled, courageous beings? i have been here since the birth of adam; i have witnessed slaughter and rapture alike. within me is a soul privy to every desire humans could ever have.
you may see faceless buildings and warcraft and children who hurt animals and mothers who do not stop them — but you will also see tenderness like no other you will see willingness to help, to serve; you will feel gentle hands pluck you softly and place you in the hair of a sweet voiced lover.
— the sun whispers into the ear of a daisy, by niha / right: autism, by juul
you might not have loved me, my dear, but your hands did. i recognized the tender song that your fingertips played. they were always cold and gray and I should have not trusted them, yet, i had the desire to lock mine around them, to squeeze them until they were warm. I trusted them with my skin and i trusted you with my heart. i thought there was love in the way you caressed my hair, in the way that you played with my fingers carelessly. your hands used to grab mine when you were excited. they were curious to find the secrets that my body held as they made their way through my back, through my arms. do you remember how we used to rest our hands on each other's tights, how when you were drunk i used to lock our fingers so that you would not throw yourself onto the road? had your hands knew you were always supposed to leave me with a broken heart? had they knew my love for you was always too much, too scary? you should have told them. cause maybe then they would not have memorized the dents of my skin. they would not have keep coming back for the familiar warmth. but perhaps it was my fault to look for love inside the palm of your hand instead of your eyes. after all, they were the ones to tell me there was no more love left for me in your heart while your hands were too busy writing words of love. i had grieved the same kind of love before. i always made the mistake of thinking that someone loved me just because their hands did. just because their hands spoke the language of love that they could not hear.
— the secret language, by ela / right: a girl de-escalates a house fire but forgets she's burning too, by elle escalates
I turn back to strike home, There are three groups of coated people, scarves wrapped desperately Against the gentle breeze, binding their mouths. We all must cross the plank. One group, two, three, in staggered steps. Wait twenty seconds, and go. A system of nods and gestures which say ‘after you.’ I am last across the bridge over the ditch, brimming with black and leafy water. I clutch the dog to me on her lead, bunching it up in my hand, Stroking her head, warm next to my knee As I watch the march ahead Of three tight clusters, black puffed figures slowly trudging along the ridge above The fluttering fields of budding wheat. We process back to the village in convoy,
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No closer than twenty metres, really, cautious as we now are. The dogs feel it. They pick at the ground sedately, held tight by our sides. Silent, orderly. We each hang back, kept separate by a phantom bustling queue Of the ill and the coughing. We go down, down, down under the entangled trees. There is the road. Goodbye.
— the dogs, by mila
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Wind pounds the walls and the wooden window and the glass unstoppable wrath ice and lash in a gruesome whistle who seems willing to say something I feel your presence even inside
and the wind keeps going on and back like labor contractions here birthing rain -
protected by apparently safe walls and your howl, short low calm gradually becomes desperate
Wind scares me. It even broke into my dreams tonight and howling desperately brought me a sweetheart. I loved him for the
then after the truce, water. after the truce, air.
exact time of a dream: no more, no less. at last he disappeared in thin air. I am grateful. It was good.
She comes violent smashes the laundry's aluminum
outside the storm keeps pouring and playing. I listen. I listen,
door who beats and screams and complains for always giving in far away I hear one of those wind bells composing an ironic cacophony a reminder: storm is music. I listen. I listen,
— storm days, by tóia
