Minetta Review Spring 2018 by Minetta Review

MINETTA REVIEW SPRING 2018

Cover featuring art by Rebecca Ou. Cover designed by Stephanie Wang. Minetta Review logo created by Carol Ourivio.

CONTENTS 6

A NOTE FROM THE EDITORS

Weston Richey Elliot Williams

POETRY 9

WRITE IT!

Christina Manubag

MAYA ADDRESSES HATHOR, THE GODDESS OF THE JOYS OF MOTHERHOOD, WHO HAS MANIFESTED HERSELF AS A COW WORKING AS A BANKER

Marc Tretin

«EVE FROM WIKIPEDIA»

Wes Civilz

I SEE YOU

Natalie Crick

«COCO CHANEL FROM WIKIPEDIA»

Wes Civilz

IN 24 HOURS

Yaz Lancaster

ANNUS MIRABILIS

Daisy Bassen

REMEMBRANCE, WITH PEACHES

Bailey Cohen

FULL MOON CHIAPAS

Daniel Aristi

«EMILY DICKINSON FROM WIKIPEDIA»

Wes Civilz

SEA DEBRIS

Konstantin Nicholas Rega

BLACKOUT

Annie Blake 3

PROSE 14

ORIGINS

Cassie Archdeacon

NORMALCY

Kevin Marchand

THE HAUNTING OF REINHEIT

Annie Blake

MECONIUM ASPIRATIONS: A PLAY IN TEN BREATHS

Mark Blickley

DEAD BROTHER

Toti O’Brien

AMY, AMY, AMY

Cassie Archdeacon

LOVE LETTER TO STRANGERS

Caroline Berg

ART 35

DISPERSE

Hannah MargetsonRushmore

MARK | AN ONGOING SERIES

Hannah MargetsonRushmore

KRYPTONITE

Linda King

SUGARGLIDER

Linda King

38-39 EXPLORATIONS IN SCULPTURAL PAINTING: ALTERNATE EDGE, AMBIVALENT REFLECTIONS

J’han Brady

UNTITLED

Rebecca Ou

REBALANCING ACT OF ETTIQUETTES (ACT-IQUETTES)

Rebecca Ou

44-45 INTERIOR STRETCH

Rebecca Ou

THINK FREEDOM

Edina Seleskovic

O!BRIGHT (MOURNING DAY)

EG Condon

49-51 UNTITLED (THREE BODIES, EXQUISITE CORPSE) (1, 2)

EG Condon

52-55 ACCIDENT SERIES: VERY FIRST ACCIDENT, ORGANIC RED DOT, 9999 PINS

Zeren Badar

56-57 VISUAL LANGUAGE

Câ&#x20AC;&#x2122;naan Hamburger

58-59 MYTHS OF CREATION

Steve Wanna

Christina Massey

ARTISANAL 17

61-62 NIGHT DRAWINGS

Nadja Andersson

Untitled

Mackenzie Hyde

Contributor Notes

Editorial Board & Special Thanks

A NOTE FROM THE EDITORS

In our Fall 2017 issue, change and newness were the name of the game. How, we here at the Minetta Review asked ourselves, should we cope with a world that seems continually uncertain? Our (fairly abstract) answer in the last issue was to offer our hands, to offer ourselves to each other, to find stability in those things and people outside of ourselves. But as we enter the spring, we find ourselves faced with great change in our personal lives. We are a group of writers and artists and even a future engineer. In many ways, we are a kind of family. And now, as many of us graduate after years of being a part of the magazine, a sadness grows. We who are leaving find ourselves looking further inward, reflecting on how we will fit into the world beyond college. We find ourselves reflecting on how we experience this world. The poems, prose pieces, and artworks in this issue take up those same concerns. Introspection, as it were, is the name of the game. And from this introspection, a new sense of stability and of location emerges in our commitment to craft, to writing and to art, as places to thrive. And this semester, we were elated to share that commitment to writing and to looking within at our first Open Mic Night in over two semesters - a night we shared with the publications The Rational Creature and NYC Surviviors magazine. We all looked inward together and celebrated the creative work we are all capable of. Our deepest thank-yous to everyone who attended the event, either to listen or to read. It would be difficult to ask for a more special night, and those of us who will remain at the magazine hope dearly to have more like it in the future.

But thereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s scores of other people to thank. The warmest, most loving thank you to our main section Editors, all of whom will be graduating this semester: Sofiya Joseph, Derek Mizell, and Stephanie Wang (Prose, Poetry, and Art respectively). We know that you will miss Minetta, and Minetta will miss you. Our publication could not be where it is either were it not for our advisor, Sarah Anne McGough, whose support has been invaluable, as ever. All of us graduating have had the time of our lives working on this magazine, and sharing the work that has touched us most personally with the world. And, as ever, we could not share that work without people to see that work. And for that, we must thank you reading this magazine as well. We hope the art and writing here makes you look inward too, and we hope that youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll join the Minetta Review, with all its new, amazing staff, on its next journey in the fall. All the love in the world, Weston Richey Elliot Williams Co-Editors-in-Chief Minetta Review Spring 2018

WRITE IT!

Christina Manubag

It is the cotton sock halfway down the heel of a boot it is the blizzard’s breath on a tempered glass pane it is the scratch of the posted pen it is the lack of paper and it is the space between your chest and the ribbed turtleneck the goosebumps, the hairs the font too condensed it is not the firm pressing of thumbs with fingers interlocked or the smell of cigarettes on your fleece bedspread. It is forgetting the word “fleece.” It is the ease of experiencing it after a stranger and never after the boy who cut his hair for you and helped you bleach yours. It is the inability to imagine yourself, laying on a 4-inch mattress topper in Eastside sunlight, his voice new and rare, calling you to shower. It is this, not the lips on your forehead of a man who smells of IPAs and only arrives after dark. Look now! it is the wrinkle of resurrected scrap paper the precision of imperfect penmanship that could only be yours and the scent of contraband lotion staining your keyboard. The stinging and the itching of alcoholic moisturizers and now you remember the winters in which you would press the backs of your hands against cold bathroom tile and cry.

Now it is the kindergarten mornings in which you flattened damp towels onto your baby hair until it was neat and sheen and your sleeves hung soaked from your reach on the sink, but even hairspray couldnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t suffice so instead, it was the tears in the car and the condemnatory looks of five year olds. It was the lack of words sufficient to describe it and now it is the walk home in the snow.

MAYA ADDRESSES HATHOR, THE GODDESS OF THE JOYS OF MOTHERHOOD, WHO HAS MANIFESTED HERSELF AS A COW WORKING AS A BANKER Marc Tretin

I see your flashing neon sign, FIRST MILK AND MENSTRUAL EXCHANGE BANK. My daughter, Zipporah, is crying with a hunger I cannot feed and with desires I wish she did not have. In the clover-mouthed lobby of your financial institution Are Automated Breast-Teller Machines, But long lines of those deprived of love, Addicts, Gamblers, and Overeaters are crying, “Oh No! No Milk! NO Milk!” My daughter cries even louder. I go over to you despite the fact That your pearl earrings, Frilly blouse, and your udders (tucked decorously under your desk), Embarrass me, since Zipporah and I, To face our common mortality, are wearing A mother-daughter mummy outfit. Her tears are soaking the papyrus. I am desperate. If puberty hits her Before she feels fed, she will use opioids To simulate the comforts of death. But you are looking at me With kind cow-eyes and you say, “Your funereal wrappings Segment you two, like cater-pillaars.” With efficient hooves, 11

You twirl my daughter until The winding sheet is at her feet. She becomes a luna moth, Not the butterfly I had hoped for. You say, “She’ll find the light She will never reach, yet She will follow you home At a distance.” I think, Poor Zipporah, Born from the wrong body, Born into the wrong body And under the wrong constellation. I sob. I see your liquid brown eyes. You say, “The only way you can love her Is to love her poorly.” We cry. And then You add, “Your love hurts.” Then I know why Zipporah, wisely, Always smelled of soured spit-up milk. That was the milk I could not feed her.

ORIGINS

Cassie Archdeacon

Twice a week we were buckled into milk-stained car seats in the back of Mom’s Suburban and carted off to Dad’s new (temporary) dwelling: a cedar shake cottage by the shore on Centre Island. The cottage was small and brown and smelt like moss and was not so much a living space as it was a passage to and from the outdoors, ripe for escape. The water was our closest neighbor; the yard was lush with willow trees and big fat evergreens. Before the slanted beach was a flat bank of sand with a swing set, a red horse rocker on a black rubber coil speckled pink by corrosion and sun, and a trampoline. Not a kid in sight, no one to be found. I don’t recall ever seeing another person on Centre Island, just the bay, and across the bay, Connecticut, which was not really Connecticut but rather a laundry pile of blue rock, polished and flattened by the marine layer, and the distance. I was five and it was summertime, and on one cool damp night before the sun went down Dad walked Brother and me to 14

the playground, a bag of cubed stale bread beneath his arm. I beelined to the trampoline, as I liked that midair feeling of the world slowing down and would watch my hair separate into flying clumps, brushed by the wind up and around my eyes, blonde strands that looked like fingers in my peripheral, scooping the bay in the distance. At the summit of each bounce I was Queen, Centre Island was the kingdom, and the water was the kingdom’s gift to its highness, an object of static beauty there only to receive my gaze and provide a false sense of ease—exactly the thing Dad must have been seeking after the divorce when he chose the muddy box by the sea. Shortly I ran out of breath (in the womb I inherited a smokers’ lung and air has been seeping out of me ever since), toed through the netted opening, landed heavy on two feet on matted grass and hobbled over steep pebbles onto sand. Dad and Brother stayed by the swings tossing bread to a crowd of ducks. My arms thrashed behind as I ran chest-first towards the shoreline and found solace at the water, the edge, an invisible net, I imagined, towards which my body could hurl and be cradled. I set out on a search for red rocks, hinged at the hip over the shallows, and once I’d collected enough I righted my spine and there, right there, was a swan, button black discs on a white puff that looked through me with furor, so close to shore that its feet were traceable through bottle-green waters. On legs resembling stilts the swan rose from the water, its neck unbearably long and its wings fully spread. I scuttled backwards against a skinny tree and it cawed like something prehistoric. I was sure it would nip at me until my skin was gone, hollow out my eyes with its beak. In time Dad came running and hissed it away. Brother, excited by the bird, stood smiling. I stayed against the tree grieving my place in this new reality with its punctured bay and the creatures that lurk beneath.

«EVE FROM WIKIPEDIA» Wes Civilz

Method: —highlight entire Wikipedia article —copy and paste to Word document —move through entire text erasing what I want to —the fragments I keep must be put in angle quotes « » —every fragment must stay exactly as the original —I must keep fragments in their original sequence « rib[2] » « companion. » « fruit » « result » « different level » « Sistine Chapel ceiling by Michelangelo » * « a beautiful garden » « believed to exist » * « A recent suggestion » « speculates that the bone was the baculum, a small structure found in the penis of many mammals, 16

but not in humans. » * « In the expulsion from Eden narrative » « The woman is willing to talk to the serpent and respond to the creature’s cynicism by repeating » « “it is not good for adam to be alone” » * « See also » « Mitochondrial Eve » « the Ethiopic book first edited by Trump » « Paternal Uncertainty »

NORMALCY Kevin Marchand

Today was a good day, brought on by two basic motivations: 1. my craving for adventure; and 2. my certainty that linguistic abilities (as a whole) are on the decline. I started with Mal, my cat, which set my thesis on solid ground to begin with. Mal, it turned out, knew nothing about fetid. He’d never heard the word and had no idea of its grammatical function. He couldn’t even say it—not even close! When he tried (which he certainly did) it came out like everything else he ever said: Maaa. So, my hypothesis was in good standing as I donned my coat and left the apartment. My first goal (adventure) was also looking promising. I hadn’t left home in days—no, more than that. The better part of two weeks, at least. I headed straight for the park in search of potential candidates, other people, fellow-adventurers to interrogate. It felt like a normal thing 18

to do, now that I’d arrived at a position in life where normalcy was subject to revision. Continuous update. In the span of two months I’d probably adjusted my expectations for normalcy a dozen times, in major ways. For the first week—right after she left—I went around on all fours, accompanying Mal on his many monotonous adventures. And once that started feeling silly, I spent a week eating nothing but peanuts. Salted for breakfast, unsalted for dinner. Something about that had felt promising, and it was a dark day when I was forced (once again) to revise my expectations for normalcy. I remember picking up that first peanut of the morning and staring it down, for a good long while—many seconds at least—and thinking uh-oh. I just knew it wasn’t good. And then there was the long stretch I’d just finished, alone, in the dark, hardly eating: normal. Now, with the sun at my back and the breeze tenderly massaging my arm hairs, I felt a new sense of normalcy coming over me. I was on an adventure; I was testing a hypothesis. Nothing could have been more natural. I was thinking of how I once was, and it felt so overwhelmingly normal that I nearly turned around and ran back to the apartment. But I didn’t. I pushed onward and came across my first subject before making it to the park. “Excuse me,” I said. The sound of my voice was startling, even to me. I wondered briefly how I might have looked. Haggard. That would have been another viable test word, but I had already committed myself. “Do you know the word fetid?” And let me tell you. This young teenager, with one earbud in and the other dangling around his waist, eyed me like one might a hooded figure in a bank. Yet, I must have appeared non-threatening enough, because he said, “Fetish?”

“No, fetid. Ever heard the word?” He hadn’t, and that was two. Far from a representative sample, obviously, but my hypothesis was looking better and better. The next person I encountered was a young mother, tickling two tiny children in a massive stroller. (Those always amazed me, those twochild strollers. Were they heavy?) These women… are impressive. “Excuse me,” I said, thinking my voice sounded a bit less exotic now. She looked up. Her face was one of maternal scrutiny. I realized I was probably standing too close to her stroller and backed up a pace. She seemed to appreciate this. Well, at any rate, she kept looking at me, so I kept talking. “Have you ever heard the word fetid before?” “Fetid?” “Yes.” Her eyes narrowed, and she shook her head. She probably thought I was one of those creeps bent on distracting her long enough to run off with one of her little darlings. I felt an ache in my gut. Couldn’t everyone see I was just curious? That I was in search of some lasting semblance of normalcy? Redefined, of course. The old normal was beyond gone. To my surprise she said, “I’ve heard it, I think.” I tried to look genuinely excited by widening my eyes and smiling. I was, however, rather dismayed. If this full-time mother, this around-the-clock caretaker knew it, then perhaps fetid wasn’t the best means of proving my thesis. I should have gone with haggard. I was rejuvenated when she shook her head dismissively and said, “I don’t know what it means, though.” And then she looked away. We were finished. I moved on, inwardly jubilant at the growing deficit: 3-0.

My next target was nearby. He was on the swings, with a vacant saddle dangling beside him. The boy was wearing a hoodie and looked to be about fourteen or fifteen years old. I figured he was probably plugged into something, some pair of earbuds tucked beneath his hood. I approached with confidence and plopped myself down on the empty swing. He didn’t move. “Hello there,” I said, and he looked up. No headphones. The boy’s eyes were a rich blue. He gazed inquisitively but without the same exposed suspicion as my first two candidates. “Hi.” I decided to launch right into it, plenty of people to see. “Have you heard of the word fetid?” “Fetid?” the boy said. His voice was deeper than I’d expected. “Yes,” I said. 4-0. I was thinking maybe about writing a paper. I hadn’t written in some time—months, six months maybe—but felt I was approaching something profound. Something like: Fetid: Our Declining English Language. He broke me from my reverie with a brief paragraph. “You mean as in: The strange man smelt utterly fetid?” I said nothing, so he added, “Smelly. Horrid. Just a plain awful stench.” I could feel the emotion welling up behind my face, though I worked to calm myself with a revolving internal announcement: 3-1, still good… 3-1, still good… 3-1, good. “That’s it,” I said, and my voice sounded normal. Something like normal, at any rate. Suddenly, I was struck by a grand idea: Why restrict my study to just one test case? Two words would only exacerbate the implications my thesis. And if a few people happened to know one, well, the second 21

could save my thesis! “How about haggard?” I spat. He thought for it moment. “It’s like beaten down, I think. Disheveled. Worn out.” I had to flex every muscle in my body to avoid springing to my feet and sprinting off. There would have to be one more! Because if a subject understood both words… it just had to be done! “How about invidious?” I was proud of that one. It had appeared out of nowhere, popped out of the shadows of my once-exquisitely-maintained mental jewelry box. Those blue eyes disappeared for a flash as the boy fell into a state of careful thought. I had him. “I’m not entirely sure—” “Not to worry—” “But I think it’s like awkward… No, it’s not exactly that, it’s more like you make other people feel uncomfortable or angry. Something like that?” I jumped to my feet. “Don’t go,” he said. “Give me one more. I like this.” But there was no chance in hell of that. “Can’t,” I said, not even turning around. I started walking off, back toward the apartment. Before I’d taken four steps I was struck by my second brilliant idea in as many minutes. “Hey,” I said. The boy looked up. “How old are you?” 22

â&#x20AC;&#x153;Sixteen,â&#x20AC;? he said. I turned around and made my way to the other side of the park, full of screaming children and distracted mothers. It was so simple, another revision: my study would focus on adults only. 3-0, I thought and chuckled. Back to fetid; back to normalcy.

I SEE YOU Natalie Crick

It has been a meatless season and a muted harvest. Dead fruit warps from the trees. We watch it like something forbidden. The bald mice I found in the cellar this morning linger like grease smears even after Sister drew the dead things out. Absence in this house is curdled in sour milk. I see you looming when the moon is most pale and fog lifts from the cornfield with shallow breath. Youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re dark, like a shadow on a lung. You always call out when you are near, follow Sister around our bare house running cold fingers along the kitchen counter, dragging the night behind with your thin wrists into the attic room, spreading your smell and searching for children to cull from their beds like weeds.

I remember when she and you spent hours together in that beautiful, lonely room before everything you touched bled or grew strange. Tonight thrushes are shuddering into a sky heavy with rain that will fall like bells upon husks of wheat, stirring the quiet hum of pollen. God Himself must be weeping up there in heaven condemning us once again. I see you looming, dark. The room echoes into itself. Sister hollows like an old animal bone, laces fingers over deep scars and begins to clean the sink. She lights a black candle on her tongue, childhood closing around her face like a fist.

THE HAUNTING OF REINHEIT Annie Blake

i opened the flaps of his shirt the man who is always trying to rob me the more i reject him the more adamant he is he has copulated with many women he is not pure the man who can only find connection like the string of gum from an infantâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s tooth he always knew this world was without the lush moss grown over called love the caving in of his chest my arm got lost in him once for he is of a different breed his ribs are too far away for foraging he has lived in this world longer than me he comes when he is most unwanted when i start to feel curtains furring the stones of my walls his competency with the english language entices me the poor people i live among donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t cultivate language like that his hair is yellow straw the leaves fall off their grecian columns he explains that heaven is illusionary how the sacrament between our spirits is not suitable for 26

the preservation in a jar that the future is a clock that doesn’t show its face we are void of heaven it is a bleak ending happiness is the comical pecking at crumbs with a beak that we take the time to liven with a knife we must taste bitter unconventionality for what is mainstream is all too obsessive there is something unromantic about hysteria i need to turn out one sleeve at a time and not let it soak too long in water and not let it run amok in the sun the swallow on the mast the bird in his chest that never learns to sail her ship his shirt was the lace veil i covered him with his rooms opened i could see my child in there small there were many women an asylum of girls in locked rooms sometimes orderlies don’t have to lock the door from the outside i don’t hear his footfalls for i am too preoccupied he rattles the knob to come for me the door has been repaired our partial reparation his body wasn’t ideal he was thin he wasn’t lean he was old i kept hiding from him i didn’t want to be unfaithful i didn’t want to admit i wasn’t pure or honest or resilient i unrolled his skin white a tinge of grey not quite silver the psychopathic mastermind of the surgeon as i feed the skin with a scalpel listening to the progression of their provignage of cries rather than meat piling up high syrupy salivating pancakes learning the centralization of sewing back his seals to heal him so he is fit to reopen the circumferences of doors not windows not even one they need to feel my fingers settling them internally before i let them fly off white doves blinking on the window sills my eyes can transmogrify them even though they swim in their salinity it is not the words i am unable to satiate but the colors the feeling of her eye the rooms without irrigation

the window the cold ornation of futile swan necks the marble whites of her ceilings and walls the floor is leaved it heaves it is hungry for me cornered what little she could harrow in the field is all here winter these people who wait who grow shadow and lethargy patience needs admittance i confessed i loved him thievery is perceptual sometimes we have to bite the apple even if it clogs our throats fills with swan necks their catatonic flights i pay some of what i owe the paradox of payment i had no trust but i had no freedom i didn’t give him my whole house at once the hearth last i took each step made the time to hear it migrate in the glass of its floor i’m unable to enter wholly for my senses are impediments curbs his accent was splintery but his words were precise knives hot breath biting words his mouth a valley some see a beautiful valley they see only what they can the air is dense black flameless coal his lack of ability the dissevering of the mind the metaphysical lobotomy the body isn’t tangible it is a cloud the windows never struck by sun we have light dim the windows must draw their coverings for they adhere to a curfew their loss finely cut the entwining of dove wings grilled for a grain in puddles angels on the ceiling high but not infinite or it is but i can’t bear to see more of it the permanent ironing of the hems of dawn silver light because the daytime has never marked these walls the curvature of grief appears soft almost graceful for those who have never stepped into the mouth of war but its smoothness is its malicious refusal to give anything my repudiation of his words only loops make an impossible labyrinth a powder of the human body under hot sand its black gloved hands it is gone forever the birds fly their peaceful cries they have been tamed tamped with slavery the more one is touched the more silent they fall they too are grieving for they are stupefied they are still the whiteness of grief 28

delirious calming of walls the coolness of the moon non compos mentis how she glides in bone light gleaming dish face doused with tears on an empty kitchen bureau the doves are ill at their beaks they have had sufficient warning they have learnt to control their rations they will never eat again his white walls bruised sick blue addict visionary i stand in this room when iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m in his body the world has fastened its filigree iron gates i eat from him his ordination gulping down a wedge of watermelon fire engine red black seeds dye nourishing dress of skin swallows settle in the holes of my body dark silver archetype THE END

MECONIUM ASPIRATIONS: A PLAY IN TEN BREATHS Mark Blickley

CHARACTER: BABY---A plump infant dressed in diapers, attached to an IV drip. BABY I was born full of shit. It’s called meconium aspiration. You see, I had what was the equivalent of a bowel movement when my mother went into labor because the umbilical cord was wrapped around my neck and that made me very, very nervous. This pre-natal stress caused me to fall victim to rapid heartbeats that threw me into rapid breathing. Technically speaking, meuconium isn’t shit because I didn’t eat any food, but it would be shit if it could be because it’s the waste that collects around an embryo. When my heart started pounding and I begin gasping for breath, I accidentally swallowed this crap so the moment I popped out of the birth canal, they slapped me into the Intensive Care Unit and pinched me full of antibiotics. I’m not certain 31

why they did this to me because meuconium, unlike true shit, is sterile and offers no risk of infection. Yet here I lie, taped and punctured, in a no frills basinet where I’m poked and prodded by white-masked intruders. It’s not the most exciting of times, what with my unrequited cravings for the maternal tit, but it does give me time to think. When you’re born full of shit you can go one of two ways. You can either become a natural liar or turn into an inspired storyteller. I’ll let you decide into which category I fit. My mother is a very natural person. When her mucus plug came out—this block of black, bloody goop—and she knew my birth was imminent, she asked for the car keys from my father and drove to the woods surrounding a nearby park to squat and have gravity, not a team of doctors, assist in my birth. But the shithead found her and insisted on taking her to the hospital, where I now lie in a chilly room with a bunch of other tiny looking freaks who may or may not be swallowing their own shit. I know, I know, you’re thinking how the hell can a newborn be offering up journalistic observations, historical veracities and judgmental insights? I can’t answer that question, but I am leaning towards a belief in some sort of reincarnation. Maybe I’m the next Dalai Lama. Sometimes I feel like I have all the damn answers, but truth is I don’t even know what century this is or why the hell I’m being put here. I think I’ve born into the past, but I’m not sure whose past and that makes me kind of nervous. I get a feeling I might be here to hurt somebody. I wish you could tell me if I’m a boy or a girl because I’m not sure. I do know that I was spit out of warm slime and into a freezing room, and right away I learned my crying would get me what I wanted. Was that out of respect for who I’m going to be, or is it because they just see me as some sort of pathetic little bastard? 32

I can’t seem to communicate with any of these obnoxious puffs of flesh in here, lying in their streaked stained diapers, sleeping and crying like a bunch of old fools. The grown up sons of a bitches in here gave me a spinal tap when I was less than an hour old. You believe that? Do they have any idea how painful that is? Sticking needles in you and draining stuff until your back feels like it’s exploding? It still hurts. I’d like to shove a needle up their asses to see if I’d enjoy hearing them scream as much as they must’ve enjoyed hearing me. It’s hard to figure out whom to trust around here. I’m almost blind and naked and they won’t let me have any secrets. I think I’m going to need teeth to be able to tear into words, but right now I feel kind of sleepy. It’s tiring trying to figure out if you’re supposed to be an asshole or a genius. Why does the hatred of the world burn away at me while I sleep? All I can do is dream about being loved while drool drips down my chin. I shit my diaper and they rob me of my filth. Do you want to adopt me? CURTAIN.

Disperse Hanna Margetson-Rushmore

Mark | An Ongoing Series

Linda King Pen and acrylic on paper

Kryptonite

Sugarglider

An Exploration of Sculptural Painting:

Alternate Edge|twine, paper, wood Ambivalent Reflections|acrylic, twine, yarn, charcoal on wood Jâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;han Brady

Untitled Re-Balancing Act of Etiquettes (Act-iquettes) Interior Stretch Found objects, performance Rebecca Ou

Think Freedom Photography Edina Seleskovic

o!bright (mourning day) Untitled (Three Bodies, Exquisite Corpse) (1) Untitled (Three Bodies, Exquisite Corpse) (2) Textile, performance E G Condon

Accident Series Very First Accident Organic Red Dot 9999 Pins Photography, painting, collage Zeren Badar

Walking Past the Entrance

Visual Language Pen and paper Câ&#x20AC;&#x2122;naan Hamburger

108th st.

Portal

Historical Painting Trope

Myths of Creation Liquid and powder colors, plaster shells, clear resin Steve Wanna

Artisanal 17 Acrylic and enamel paint on paper, aluminum beer cans, wire and mesh Christina Massey

Night Drawings Nadja Andersson

Untitled

Graphite, charcoal, pencil, paper Mackenzie Hyde

«COCO CHANEL FROM WIKIPEDIA» Wes Civilz

« Born Gabrielle Chanel » « Died » « Interlocking CC logo » * « a French fashion designer and businesswoman. She was the founder and namesake of the Chanel brand. » « Chanel was credited in the post-World War I era with liberating women from the constraints of the “corseted silhouette” and popularizing a sporty, casual chic as the feminine standard of style. » * « being placed in the orphanage may 65

have been the best thing for Coco’s future because it is where she learned to sew. » * « Having learned the art of sewing » « , Chanel radiated a juvenile allure that tantalized the military habitués of the cabaret. » « she was one of the females whose job was to dispense glasses of the purportedly curative mineral water » * « Chanel met the young French » « textile heir » « she lived with him in » « an area known for its wooded equestrian paths and » « a social set who reveled in partying and the gratification of human appetites » « The bottle design for Chanel No. 5 » « attributable to the » « rectangular, beveled lines of » « the whiskey decanter » * « Chanel hat worn by Gabrielle Dorziat. Les Modes, May 1912. » « Chanel had begun designing hats » 66

* « Misia was attracted to Chanel by “her genius, lethal wit, sarcasm and maniacal destructiveness, which intrigued and appalled everyone”. » « Both women were convent schooled, and » « They also shared drug use. » « By 1935, Chanel had become a habitual drug user, injecting herself with morphine on a daily basis, a habit she maintained until the end of her life. » * « Mademoiselle Chanel is a small black bull. » * « When asked why she did not marry the Duke of Westminster, she is supposed to have said: “There have been several Duchesses of Westminster. There is only one Chanel.” » * « En route to California from New York, 67

traveling in a white train car luxuriously outfitted for her use, » « Chanel’s verdict was that “Hollywood is the capital of bad taste … » * « Her future share would be two percent of all Chanel No. 5 sales worldwide. The financial benefit to her would be enormous. Her earnings were projected at $25 million a year, making her at the time one of the richest women in the world. » * « Activity as Nazi agent » « Schellenberg’s SS liaison officer, Captain Walter Kutschmann, acted as bagman, “told to deliver a large sum of money to Chanel in Madrid”. » « The extent of Churchill’s intervention for Chanel after the war became a subject of gossip and speculation. » * « At more than 70 years old, after having her couture house 68

closed for 15 years, she felt the time was right for her to re-enter the fashion world. » * « Last years[edit] » « Chanel had become tyrannical and extremely lonely late in life. « Death[edit] » « her coffin was covered with white flowers » « “You see, this is how you die.” » « Her grave is located in the » « deathblow to the corseted female silhouette. » * « Little black dress[edit] »

IN 24 HOURS Yaz Lancaster

try to find the moment where ocean meets air take points A & B in your fingers & fold the map make them kiss annul the distance put bare boot to stone after stone after stone salt mixing with rain bury self in sand peel off the dead skin

drop obsidian down the talus mistake a trash bag for its father blow wild dandelion seeds as a reminder to seize your life in disposables

(you can watch your friend climb up the big rock on a private beach or you can chase after him) scrape your memento mori on thorny branches forgetting to self arrest as you spill down the mountain fall asleep on a train somewhere reading bukowski & leave vapor smudged on the window

ANNUS MIRABILIS Daisy Bassen

If it is Gabriel knocking at the front door, His every-feathered wings wide, brushing the clay pots of geraniums, And light that should blind me, sharp as sweat, Exceeding excess, finding every fault in the caulking, I will not answer. If the sound of his greeting rocks the hinges, Drives the screws from the frame, I will shut the door In his face. I am not interested. I only want to understand a parabola, How cortisol etches a brain softer than custard. My eyes were made backward. I cannot see Like an octopus, sensibly lensed, ready To sieve the flicker of diatoms. No ghosts, fairies, blessings on my late-planted garden Against slugs. There is no time to waste, A chocolate whose center I spit out. The universe is coming apart. But if we want it to end, We must discover how it dissolves Or its nothingness may defeat every force, Infinite finality, anathema.

REMEMBRANCE, WITH PEACHES Bailey Cohen

I have killed it—an odd way of saying I have taken the peach pit and buried it deep into an ex-lover’s skin some miles away during a darker hour than this one, wherein the weight of the sky dripped down upon her face like unfinished prayer— and its dampness and soft fuzz flesh and dying sun skin, discarded. I have killed the peach pit, I have also buried it; never taught to bury all the things I have killed, I bury everything I touch, I take both spade and fruit in my hands and remember my mother telling me “When you plant a peach tree, do it quietly,” & so trembling I whisper into the earth— We are such gentle & lovely people, it breathed back, unto my palms, digging little funerals in the back of my throat.

FULL MOON CHIAPAS Daniel Aristi

It’s the back of a skull, occipital Moon Press ‘Moon’ for counterinsurgency. The tightening calligraphy of dusk, and an uncertainty of goats and patrullas Press ‘Chiapas’ for revolución. Two squads arrived by nightfall, shouting Feliz Cumpleaños! Feliz Cumpleaños! Because the joke’s the village’s a birthday cake and every hut Oughtta be a candle, Feliz Cumpleaños! Feliz Cumpleaños! We’ve breathed our dogs. The earth thinks itself barren Press ‘Fire’ for paramilitares.

DEAD BROTHER Toti O’Brien

Only haven amidst the vortex of grief, this small graveyard and its minute, strange coziness. Forlorn, lost in the middle of nowhere, niched inside a depression of the grounds, practically invisible. Blind, rather blindfolded… high walls block its entire perimeter, obstructing the view. The monotonous row of miniature temples—all the same, dull, unpretentious—look like students of an old country school, bored yet disciplined. No superfluous adornment is in view. On the contrary, abandoned tools, unkempt trails and flowerbeds emanate an aura of shabbiness. Logs, twigs, branches piled in a corner hint ironically at a hypothetical bonfire. Pine trees spill their needles together with tiny wooden balls, inappropriately cute, toy-like, distracting. Noisy, lengthy, laborious, a mason seals with bricks and mortar the burial cell. Womb. Matrix. Suffocating, obstructing. Blind, blindfolded. 76

Laying bricks is pragmatic, efficient, therefore, un-ceremonial. It takes skills, not mannerisms. As I look, triviality and dairy-ness seep into my veins, summoning back life and its forward motion, relentless. Bricks like minutes, like hours, like days. Rows of bricks like months, years—now none of your business. *** The surrounding landscape only appears if I retrace my steps, exit the cast iron gate. Stairs lead to a little chapel—a bare cube of stone, crumbling, desolate. The only door is closed. As I peek through a grid I see darkness. The retaining wall of the stairs is a perfect perch. Such heightened posture doesn’t allow a wide perspective—at least an illusion of freedom, a hint of fresh air. Saddled over the edge, legs dangling, I feel something raven dilating my lungs. Brambles line the road on both sides. Tiny meadows timidly punctuate the view. Wide, rounded, benevolent crowns of conifers float between earth and sky. The meek voice of sheep ripples through the evening calm, together with a lulling sound of cowbells. A large dog, so akin to the fellow beasts it protects—same size, same whitish fleece—their soft, gentle guardian turns a corner, comes forwards. Here’s the shepherd spying at the passing cars, promptly herding his flock, squeezing it against prickly borders. Soon he resumes his progress, leading his cortege towards the graveyard—as if aiming for good at this sweet enclave not larger than a pen. Modest, scarce, the mob is complete—a black sheep beautifully contrasts its mates’ dusty pallor, muzzle hitting barbed wire, body askew. You see, nothing is missing—only shifting a bit, too fast probably.

Sounds of bells, bleats (raucous? plaintive? alarmed?), rhythmic rasps of shovels splattering then spreading lime, heavy thumps of bricks falling in place, obedient and rigorous, try to harmonize as if this all made sense. They remain slightly off tune. I wonder if youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;d be disturbed. If youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;d choose to be lenient. If you would forgive.

«EMILY DICKINSON FROM WIKIPEDIA» Wes Civilz

« short lines » « unconventional » « punctuation » « External links »

AMY, AMY, AMY Cassie Archdeacon

Whenever I listen to Amy Winehouse I feel as though her voice comes entirely from a small hovering dot in the back of her throat, almost like some spool of microscopic twine unraveling in search of daylight. I am reminded of hands drumming a chain-link fence, of spending hours watching live stream footage of the view from the front of a moving train. Perhaps she conjures this image best in the video for â&#x20AC;&#x153;Fuck Me Pumpsâ&#x20AC;?: she struts down the street in stilettos with a microphone, and in her wake the cord untangles. I remember watching it the first time in middle school, overcome with certainty that she were looking right at me. The ending of the video is now all too true. Amy kicks her heels and walks off barefoot; the camera is dropped to the ground and the mic lies dead like roadkill. In those early clips she has a certain sheen, be it the jet-black hair straightened smooth, the cartoonish guitar with the red patina, the blood rising in her cheeks, the visible softness of which evokes the scent of baby sunscreen. She wore nothing special back then, stood 80

looking out at the floodlights as though they were her sun. One could trace all the nerves and uncertainty through pleated rivers in her lips, puckered out over a clenched jaw. She gleamed as the possessor of something to prove. She longed to be a jazz singer, a dream I might have shared had I been of a time when number of Instagram followers had not yet surpassed talent as the top criteria in securing a record deal. With the release of Frank, she became one. It was only then that she began to swell. The crowds, yes, but the beehive, breasts and belly, too, inflated, as though within each mound there existed a miniature helium tank set on a steady ten year leak. Sheâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;d contracted the infection of the world and its demands, a disease, which, for those born with a certain sensitivity to darkness, proves incurable. I imagine Amy Winehouse melting, in death, into her mattress. As though one day she just popped, deflated. Ever towards the ground she kept fumbling for. Her bodyguard checked on her as she slept that morning and left, unsuccessful in his attempts at waking her but unconcerned, as she was, after all, a known great in the art of pitching oneself into a coma. Her birthday is two days after mine; I know that this means nothing but cannot wholly let it go.

SEA DEBRIS

Konstantin Nicholas Rega

Walking down through the gate (that should not be here) sand cold I see the waves white-lipped and shivering where are you now and turning right the wind gives me a good shoving. Shells shells from unwatched tides mark a line I do not cross sign on the parts strewn and pounded to never fit back together again. Feet buzz numb thumpthumping. I skirt the edge and pick a shell boomeranging it Red throat of a flower eaten at by sand and water center of a conch so red my feet buzz thumpbuzzing numb. Feathery display winged turmoil as a head of wind-whipped hair golden hay buried in the wasand bedhead mess of bird mauled by some storm crumbled crumpled as a deflated pufferfish no I saw that cast upon the strand banana slices? those that hide shells a necklace I once gave but the shells still to my right and a half bird red sunk in the grains cold my feet buzz thump thump ing... Tide pools cut a you shape and I dash in throwing the fish by a fin but now the pushpull plays with it and I stomp back averting my gaze you following behind dead fishy eyes. Hands casting seashells at gasping-ing lips spit-t-ing them back out more red. But one half is too big and hands go up in their snailshellsleeves. No one else braves the breeze gulls and pelicans flying in V not you formation information that does not reach me going past yet there is a hook in my toe reel me in another dead pufferfish and a red Is that your lover flying over my head bird shadow feet cold thum p ing. The other wing torn in the stone smacks from tactless lips painted foam floating free red again. That wing I pull stretching it in aerial display mauled feathers... Wet down in the grains gate closing.

BLACKOUT Annie Blake

i am always walking away. sometimes my heads swivel. i see your jeans and jacket slapped by black waves like flags in the wind. the darkness looks as fibrous as hams hammocked across the length of the world. smatterings of my world are sewn in cavities in back laneways and roundabouts. black doesn’t like sharing its flavors with anyone. it hides its colors under the blinks of it eyes. i just don’t want to know the truth. i don’t want to know i am wet pieces with their colors bleeding the leaves until i have to watch them crack. i am currents with fragments embedding the bottom of my tub after a bath. thoughts are not clean cloths cut by scissors and folded inside the medicine cabinet. disavowal shapes staircases that fade as i walk high into the clouds— like phone numbers scrawled on paper in the pockets of my jeans that i repeatedly wash. reality is not a building i make with bricks or a house with wooden slats. you cannot unnail thoughts neatly— splinters will always get stuck under your nail. taking my clothes off for the phlebotomist makes me cough. my thoughts run long like arms in my mind. i leave a bracelet of fingerprints on them. some are yanked out like solid bars of sun; others get stuck like stars with beaks in cadaver. others are metal spoons with long handles with no way out like cul de sacs.

LOVE LETTER TO STRANGERS Caroline Berg

You: under a baseball hat made of solid rock, are my lured Norseman, purple fish sewn into the advertising space above the brim, stranded here with Me: wants to press my ear to your ear to hear the ocean, but the sensation would be too weird, would tickle, when I can’t sleep I say the word tsunami to myself over and over. We: stand next to each other at the post office and joke that anarchy would be more efficient than waiting in line but socialization is powerful or whatever, imagine each other licking envelopes in slow motion, saliva like a tide, something about wife’s thing and management of time, you’re wearing plastic flip-flops, she sounds lovely. I ask you to cut me. You: rescues boyfriend from girlfriend’s attack by curling iron which she pulled from her bag and swung by the cord like a lasso, pull the bus over and march back, past the guy howling his support, another records a video on his phone, ask with incredible politeness for her to disembark, she apologizes and immediately does, go back to your seat in total silence, pull a lever and the bus makes that resolute shhhhhts 85

noise. Me: wants to clap. I take the NL home from work, but wait for the 9:45 arrival, thinks on your behalf what are you doing out here so late in the elements, climb aboard, we have warmth and light, until a sulky woman has permanently taken your place, she now seems to drive every bus every where, regularly finds herself in fights with people who don’t have the fare. We: didn’t know for sure that they were a couple, but the rage and physical violence seemed to indicate romance. You: wears the same boots everyday with soles so thick they must weigh 10 lbs each, walks like a baby giraffe on medication. Me: stares at you with ketchup on my chin no one told me about, comes up with names appropriate for you, like Lloyd and Daphne. We: mutual noticing for 3 years, until we never see each other again, later the feeling becomes clearer as the face becomes forgettable, had nothing, it was special. You: smoking smokes by the picnic tables outside the library, squinting at your phone which looks a little like brooding from this distance, drops an extra on the ground. Me: watching you from the top-floor window 6 days after flushing all self-destructive habits on a trial basis, picks it up from the dirt under the bench reasonably later, one side is wet from the ground, back home I place it on my window sill, light it when I wake up the next morning. We: sexless narcoleptics, discuss whether it’s fair to call cigarettes phallic, and we agree, but for different reasons, you’re my miracle of blankness, if I hadn’t given it up. You: looks so familiar. Me: remembers the Seventeen article from like a decade ago that claimed you could insta-seduce a boy by claiming to have dreamt about him, because although dreams are enigmatic to neuroscientists and psychologists and the like, so-called experts, everyone at least knows they’re sexy, Freud was the first to theorize the sexiness of dreams, and all of us went “sure” even though we also laughed, sneaking glances at each other’s knees. We: never met, unless you count pretend. 86

CONTRIBUTOR NOTES

NADJA ANDERSON is a Finnish born freelance artist, illustrator and visual storyteller. For the moment semi-nomadic, she has been based in Finland, Norway, England, Scotland, and Greece. Her Nightdrawings series are experiments with flow drawing during nighttime. They are part of a project in which she explores altered states of the mind and the spaces in between consciousness and sub-consciousness. https:// www.nadjaandersson.com/ CASSIE ARCHDEACON is at the start of her final year at NYU’s Gallatin School of Individualized Study, concentrating in the Interaction of Arts and the Mundane, minoring in Creative Writing. She hopes to pursue writing further in graduate school. DANIEL ARISTI was born in Spain. He studied French Literature as an undergrad (French Lycée in San Sebastian). He now lives and writes in Switzerland with his wife and two children. Daniel’s work is forthcoming or has been recently featured in The Main Street Rag, decomP, Temenos Journal, and Blood Orange Review. His chapbook, Familya, is coming up in 2018 (BPL Press). ZEREN BADAR is a self-taught conceptual artist currently living in NYC. He is originally from Turkey. His works have been exhibited internationally including in the Aperture Foundation (NY), The Center for Fine Art Photography (Fort Collins, CO), the Aljira Center of Contemporary Art (NJ), and the Griffin Museum (Boston). www. zerenbadar.com DAISY BASSEN is a psychiatrist, mother, wife, and poet. She graduated from Princeton University with a degree in English and has been published in Oberon, The Sow’s Ear, AMWA Literary Journal, and SUSAN|The Journal with pending publications in The Delmarva Review and Adelaide Literary Magazine. She was a semi-finalist in the 2016 Vassar Miller Prize in Poetry. She lives in Rhode Island with her husband and children. 89

ANNIE BLAKE is an Australian writer, thinker and researcher. She is a wife and mother of five children. Her main interests include psychoanalysis, metaphysics and metacognition. She is currently interested in arthouse writing that explores the surreal nature and symbolic meanings of unconscious material through nocturnal and diurnal dreams and fantasies. Her writing is a dialogue between unconscious material and conscious thoughts and synchronicity. You can visit her on annieblakethegatherer.blogspot.com.au and https:// www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100009445206990 MARK BLICKLEY is the author of the story collection Sacred Misfits (Red Hen Press), and his most recent play, The Milkman’s Sister, was produced last fall at NYC’s 13th Street Repertory Theater. Blickley is a proud member of the Dramatists Guild and PEN American Center. He recently published the text based art book, Weathered Reports: Trump Surrogate Quotes From the Underground (Moria Books, Chicago). The publisher sent copies to the White House and members of Congress. J’HAN BRADY is an emerging contemporary artist and graduate student with a recognizably unique style best described as experimental and experiential, infused with expressionist, surrealist, and abstract elements. She most commonly creates works of art through painting, drawing, sculpture, and sculptural painting. Currently living in Northern Virginia, but born and raised in Northern California, J’han is a graduate student at American University in the MFA Studio Art program. She also holds a BFA in Illustration summa cum laude. EG CONDON is an artist/dancer/choreograph living in New York City. Currently they are exploring bodies and abstraction to process death, health, mourning and grief. They are currently a student at The New School (BFA Fine Art/ BA Dance). WES CIVILZ lives in Vermont. His writing has appeared in journals such as The Antioch Review, The Threepenny Review, [PANK], and Entropy. NATALIE CRICK from the UK, has poetry published or forthcoming in a range of journals and magazines in the UK including Interpreters House, Poetry Salzburg Review, Poetry Scotland, The SHOp, and London 90

Grip. Outside of the UK she has work published in Rust and Moth, The Chiron Review, 2River, The Ofi Press, The Perch Arts and Literary Magazine, Plath Profiles, and The Adirondack Review. She is studying for an MA in Writing Poetry at Newcastle University (UK) and is currently taught by Tara Bergin and Jacob Polley. Her poetry has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize twice. She has been invited to read poetry at Newcastleâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s poetry festival this May (UK). BAILEY COHEN is a full-time student at New York University, majoring in English Literature and minoring in both Politics and Creative Writing. His work is set to appear in forthcoming issues of Spires Literary Magazine, West 10th, and Projector Magazine, and he has served as the featured artist for Inkwell Open Mic in Long Branch, New Jersey. MACKENZIE HYDE is a Canadian artist who is currently a senior at Parsons in the fine art undergrad program. She works in oil paint and ballpoint, mostly figurative focused. YAZ LANCASTER is a violinist, poet and composer based in New York. Since 2015, they have taken poetry workshops in Florence, Italy and in New York with Mark Bibbins, Meghan Oâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;Rourke, Rachel Zucker, Robert Fitterman, Elaine Equi and most recently as a participant of the NYU poetry master class with Terrance Hayes. As both a writer and composer, they are (currently) interested in combining simplicity with complexity, change, collaging found items and imagery. Yaz has work in various print and online publications including Potluck Magazine and past editions of the Minetta Review, as well as three self-published chapbooks: Big and Small and Black (2016), Sunshowers (2017) and Small Forms (2017). Their website is yaz-lancaster.com. CHRISTINA MANUBAG is an undergraduate student at NYU studying Spanish and Linguistics, with minors in Creative Writing and Studio Art. As an Asian-American woman, her works of prose and poetry focus largely on quiet, intimate moments that reveal the nature of cultural and economic borders. KEVIN MARCHAND is a resident of Lancaster, CA, pursuing an MA in English Literature. He studied Creative Writing at Roger Williams University in Bristol, RI. His writing has been included at such venues 91

as Flash Fiction Magazine, The Main Street Rag, The Provo Canyon Review, and Remarkable Doorways. HANNAH MARGETSON-RUSHMORE is an English born artist and designer. She graduates in May with a Fine Arts BFA at Parsons School of Design in NYC. In her art, she investigates variations through ritualistic repetition and arrangement of marks in space, using the grid to create an intense sparseness through mark making. Her practice includes drawing, painting, mixed media and printmaking. CHRISTINA MASSEY has exhibited extensively in the NY metropolitan area in over a dozen solo exhibitions and abroad in cities such as London, Toronto, and Tokyo. Recently, she was awarded the SIP Fellowship at the EFA Robert Blackburn Printmaking Workshop and won awards from the Puffin Foundation, the Mayer Foundation, and the Merit Scholarship at Urban Glass. Her work can be found in multiple private and public collections, including the Janent Turner Museum and Credit Suisse, as well as multiple upcoming exhibitions in NY this year including at the efa Gallery, the Untitled Gallery, the Korean Cultural Center, and the Clemente Gallery. TOTI Oâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;BRIEN is the Italian Accordionist with the Irish Last Name. She was born in Rome then moved to Los Angeles, where she makes a living as a self-employed artist, performing musician, and professional dancer. Her work has most recently appeared in Colorado Boulevard, JMWW, Heavy Feather, and Waxwing. REBECCA OU was born and raised in Singapore and later moved to Vancouver, Canada. She received a BFA in Fine Arts and a minor in Psychology from the University of British Columbia. She works interdisciplinary in sculpture, performance, and installation. Born in Krasnoyarsk, Russia, KONSTANTIN NICHOLAS REGA studies British & American Literature and Creative Writing at The University of Kent in Canterbury, England. He has been published by The Claremont Review, Four Ties Lit Review, AOM, and has won the ZO Magazine Silver Prize for Poetry, and is currently a Review Assistant for Newfound. Award winning, Bosnian born New York based sculptor, EDINA 92

SELESKOVIC, whose rĂŠsumĂŠ includes multimedia projects on four continents, fashion, films, large public works, and rebranding of the Bosnia-Herzegovinian national basketball team, transformed her studio practice into a vast collaboration that grew from a small installation into a global movement. Her contextual art project Think Freedom globally generates a community of young people, students, artists, professors, established cultural institutions, community leaders, and public figures, while employing new media and new communication technologies. MARC TRETINâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s writing has been published or is forthcoming in Bayou Magazine, Bluestem Magazine, and over twenty other publications. he was the second runner-up for the Solstice literary magazine poetry prize in 2013. He is the 2015 winner of the Audrey Wasson and Carol Leseure Scholarship in Poetry. His poetry collection, Pink Mattress, has been published by New York Quarterly Press in 2016. STEVE WANNA is a multi-disciplinary sound and visual artist whose work includes music, sound design for dance collaborations, sculpture, installation, photography, and works for mixed media. Born and raised in Lebanon, he immigrated to the United States with his family at the age of 15, receiving a doctorate in Music Composition from the University of Maryland in 2004. His chief research and creative interest is the phenomenon of emergence. His works often incorporate electronics and interactive software to create pieces that exist in a state of becoming rather than being. In contexts both visual and sonic, the artist often relinquishes total control to become a contributing agent in a larger ecosystem that gives rise to the work. His compositions have received national and international performances, and his artwork has been presented in galleries and venues across the United States. He has been teaching Sound Recording and Music Technology at the college level for the past decade.

MINETTA REVIEW EDITORS-IN-CHIEF MANAGING EDITOR ART EDITOR

Weston Richey Elliot Williams Aditi Agrawal Stephanie Wang

POETRY EDITOR

Derek Mizell

PROSE EDITOR

Sofiya Joseph

ART ASSISTANT

Emma Brown

POETRY ASSISTANTS PROSE ASSISTANTS TREASURER COMMUNICATIONS COORDINATOR EVENTS COORDINATOR

Jenny Choi Omolara Omotosho Chandler Austin Wald Alexandra Dennis Jamie Ryu Sarah Colvin Christine Wang

PUBLICATION STAFF

Alex Cullina Yimin Huang (social media) Olivia Malesco Cindy Yu (social media)

PROGRAM ADVISOR

Sarah Anne McGough

Minetta Review, established in 1974, is a literary and arts publication managed by undergraduate students at New York University. Please visit our website for submissions guidelines. Book design and layout by Weston Richey and Elliot Williams. Copy edited by Alexandra Dennis, Sofiya Joseph, Derek Mizell, Weston Richey, Chandler Austin Wald, and Elliot Williams. Art design and layout by Emma Brown and Stephanie Wang. Proofread by Jenny Choi, Weston Richey, Stephanie Wang, and Elliot Williams. Minetta Review logo created by Carol Ourivio. All rights revert to the contributor, whose authorization is required for reprints. ISSN 1065-9196 A special thank you to Sarah McGough and the Student Activities Board at New York University, for their continued support of Minetta and its dedicated editorial board. An enormous thanks to Randy Reeves at Art Communications Systems, Inc. for printing yet another beautiful issue.

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