Minetta Spring 2020 by Minetta Review

SPRING 2020

MINETTA REVIEW FALL / SPRING 0000

CONTENTS 8

Minetta Statement

Alex Cullina Matthew Fischetti

POETRY

Cover featuring art by Rhianydd Hylton. Cover designed by Alex Cullina. Minetta Review logo created by Carol Ourivio.

THE POET’S POEM

Danny P. Barbare

WILD WATER

Richard Dinges

I MARRIED A TRIBOLOGIST

John Dorroh

MISHTI

Alolika A. Dutta

TEACH!

Sophie Ewh

STRIKETRHOUGH #8

Maxine FlasherDüzgüneş

Σκούρα, Ελλάδα

Andie Kanaras

MOTHER

Clare Kernie

TRANSITIVE PSALM

Clare Kernie

Jade Lien

II.

Jade Lien

III.

Jade Lien

POETRY (CONT.) 53

SUPER BOWL COMMERICAL WRITTEN BY AI

Jeffrey MacLachlan

THE MAKESHIFT AMBULANCE

Alejandro Villa Vásquez

THE EIGENSTATE THAT KEEPS THE CAT ALIVE

Suzannah Weiss

PROSE 31

THE HOUSE ON 8911 LEITRIM LANE

Karel Clark

BIRD BATH

Anina Hoffman

SKY TARP

Omar Hu

ART 45

THE MUQAȚȚ‘ĀT

Amina Ilbrahim Almulla

BEAUTY CHANGES

Bruce Dodson

CONEY ISLAND, 2019

Rhianydd Hylton

MOTHER AND CHILD

Carmen Germain

BALKANS TRIP FROM NORTH MACEDONIA TO HUNGARY THROUGH KOSOVO, SERBIA, BOSNIA, AND HERZEGOVINA

Michał Grzejszczak

DISASSEMBLED MORNING

Chis Albert Lee

EASEMENT LEDGE (II)

Chris Albert Lee

WORSHIP

Elizabeth Makris

CHINESE DREAM

David Ma

UNTITLED FAMILY PORTRAIT

David Ma

INTERACTION: TENSION AND RESTRAINT

Fallon McDonald

MILK

Sean Mitchell

UNTITLED

Sean Mitchell

OOJIN (DINNER) 1989-2000

Raisa Nosova

VICTORIAN

Raisa Nosova

WITH THEM

Raisa Nosova

BAHAY

Robert Ryan Pegollo

WAITING ON BOWERY

Robert Ryan Pegollo

ISOLATION FROM THE QUARANTINE

Aleksandra Podziewska

BLIND DATE 10

Edward Supranowicz

ADRIAN’S WONDERLAND

Adrian Yeh

Contributor Notes

Editorial Board & Special Thanks

A NOTE FROM THE EDITORS

A lovely lovely message from the Co-Editors, using the Prose Paragraph style available under the Minetta Paragraphs folder in Paragraph Styles. Please see the toolbox to your right. We usually put a space in between paragraphs, like the space between this one and the introduction one above.

More on this side, because Co-Editors tend to write a lot about the semester, their lives, fun Minetta trivia, whatever.

Now let’s pretend this is the last paragraph.

Alex Cullina Matthew Fishcetti Co-Editors-in-Chief Minetta Review Sping 2020

TRANSITIVE PSALM Clare Kernie

You have been taught love is a god winged and purple like an O’Keeffe & god is a man fleshy & unreal & man is a soy chicken dinner useless & obscene & soy chicken dinner is fucking disgusting & fucking disgusting is a desire for some & desire for some is your body beaten & bruised & your body beaten & bruised is what you will accept as love You have been taught love is a god moonlit and dusty like a little song

Jade Lien

WAITING ON BOWERY Robert Ryan Pegollo

I am empty for all that is in me is outside of me What is in me oozes out of me I am the song that saunters down the road the space too vast that I may not be heard I am summer’s invisible raindrops of tears the air too damp that I may not be felt I am the eternal film imprinted on the day sky the screen too bright that I may not be seen I am the horrific visage of a child’s nightmare the hour too early that I may not be remembered I reach no one yet touch them all slightly as I exhale and become one dust in the breeze of yesterday’s dusk The lock upon an abandoned graveyard gate is forever secure I will be blown in through the gaps by my own wind

II.

III.

Jade Lien

recurs the ache gnawing in and through

no reason to leave no sovereignty in my desire

though none for the nonce more perforation than an olden chasm never a pass will mend

lone renegade at the node only knows my will will notions notify no one nor nullifies my ignoble nods of assent

thin as skin of print the last plane firmly sustains

till your knocking no more comes to halt the discourse still, Mine! i hide you in my words to retain you

may it fold into a plinth and marbleize beneath the heart be one made fundamentally to unshake an impending quake

UNTITLED Sean Mitchell

THE MAKESHIFT AMBULANCE Alejandro Villa Vásquez

I thought she was my grandmother, too. ¡No puedo!

The world goes vertigo It’s the same ritual

I thought colic was for a baby. ¡Amá! ¡Amá!

The same terrible sound like glass or a siren

Mountain rain bullies the tin roof. Your stomach gurgles

You cry out, heave your sighs up to the sky

and spills the pill. We almost killed you... Dee-ya-nah massages you

But this is not our dome We are in a village like the ones our ancestors made or destroyed beyond all history. These Colombianos live off laughter and a hospital the size of my old cafeteria. I’m an American with anything but a clue about how to help you. Stiff-jerk and cry out for your mother.

into a temporary stupor. The men run to that cracked infirmary. No house calls; what’s an ambulance? A family is just a family until it’s the (only) cure. The makeshift ambulance. A hospital wheelchair and my uncle and my cousin and me. We clench the old iron and sprouted leathers.

INTERACTION: TENSION AND RESTRAINT Fallon McDonald Don’t worry, we have umbrellas and blankets for you. The factory-pink hairs hauling in the night. Pulling you with love toward the sterile bed. The clear sweetness of morphine. Mmm… you repeat. The psalm of relief. Your pain dissipates into the air. It retreats through the crack in the window while you go slack. Opium in the arm, in the breast. ¿Le gusta, no? I imagine. The unassumed pallor of the wall responds to my unspoken call. This is the country we left. Dee-ya-nah takes me for hot chicken. Then we carry you again, and again and again. Morning grows over the firmament like hill moss Like love over your druggy body.

MOTHER Clare Kernie

We share an apple by the fireplace, I a worm and you a hole, my sustenance. Flames lap at our toes. Your insides turn to ice. Here I am safe, and scared. Happiness is a prophylactic you cannot afford, or choose to ignore. We both pay the price. Let me crawl under your blanket. My nocturnal self begs diurnal yours to remain. Finish the apple. One day you will need me like I need you. We gather kindling. We lock ourselves inside and wait. Finish the apple. Nobody exhales the ashes where we meet. Just tired, baby, you say. A tear falls down your cheek and a chicken sleeps in artificial heat.

Balkans trip from North Macedonia to Hungary through Kosovo, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina Michał Grzejszczak

STRIKETHROUGH #8: FROM AN INQUIRY ON ERASURE IN CHOREOGRAPHIC SCORE Maxine Flasher-Düzgüneş

I. reflective italicized winging feet and fabric torn and rolling like ants full of dust and tumbling like weeds what if the embossed glow of her nylon shorts swished a midnight blue fire—her leg a needle in the hole fine tipped, spindly

II. reflective italicized winging feet and fabric torn and rolling like ants full of dust and tumbling like weeds what if the embossed glow of her nylon shorts swished a midnight blue fire—her leg a needle in the hole fine tipped, spindly

omit symmetfical hands insert sickled feet insert finger seweing enlarge walking increments insert flower blossom insert lacklsuterness insert dawn insert ash, insert bent knee insert round body

III. italicized feet full of dust and tumbling her shorts blue in the hole

IV. italicized feet full of dust and tumbling her shorts blue in the hole

insert leaf blow insert dance with pants omit ocean, insert canyon

V. italicized feet tumbling in the hole

THE HOUSE ON 8911 LEITRIM LANE Karel Clark

ADRIAN’S WONDERLAND Adrian Yeh

The neighbors were always mad at us, since 2006. Mama said they spread rumors about us, the only black people in the neighborhood. According to Mrs. Michelle, my grandma was a witch, and my sister and I may or may not have had the gift. There was no way that my mama was earning enough money to pay for that grand house; she didn’t have anybody else to help her. They weren’t wrong. Often they would send the HOA on us, banging on our door, but we always met a smiling face. “Good afternoon, ma’am, sorry to disturb you, but somebody has reported that they think your grass is too high. High grass violates our regulations, so you need to get it cut.” I hid behind the door as my mama faced them. This is how it usually 30

went, mama had to put up a front, but Kayla and I were always supporting her, facing the problems with mama’s left arm over my shoulders and her right arm over Kayla’s. I remembered mama talking to my father on the phone, “You’re a loser, a good for nothing piece of shit who doesn’t know how to be a responsible individual and who abandoned his wife and family. Send money for a fucking lawnmower!” He filed for bankruptcy three times. He was never trying to save this house; he was only trying to buy us time. This is a lesson I knew when I was young. I knew because I remember the day that we thought we lost the house. I was ten-years-old, my sister was eight. The bus dropped off all the elementary school kids. The sun was smiling down on us, embracing us in its warmth. We walked in the middle of the street; we had power in knowing that our mere presence controlled the creeping of the cars behind us. Kayla and I were talking about something silly, like a prank gone wrong. The street drank the rays of the sun. Then as we approached our house, I saw them: two, large, white moving trucks in our driveway like two whales beached on a shore. And mama, she was darting about, racing to pack up our belongings. Kayla and I just stood there, in the middle of the culde-sac as our friends emerged from their houses, slowly, like a flower blooming. We all just stood in the middle of the baked street, crying and hugging each other while the women of the neighborhood soothed us with promises of Disneyland that we knew they couldn’t keep. We somehow managed to come back to that house from elementary school to my sophomore year of college. This spacious house with brick in the front. I don’t think I realized how big it was until I was thirteen, riding in the back seat of my friend’s car. As her dad turned into the neighborhood, she looked out at the stream of houses gliding past her window,

around!?” I didn’t know how to answer that question, because I didn’t know what “brick all the way around meant,” but I always remember Anita for making me realize the miracle of living in a house that big for that long, which my mama attributed to the grace of God. But after years of fighting for it, it was as if the universe gave up on us. We were never going to have enough money. We had been handed enough chances already. I understood. We felt like a lost cause. Kayla and I walked into Walmart and threw twenty boxes into our cart. At the exit of the store, we were stopped by an old white woman. “I need to see your receipt, please.” she stared at us, with pursed lips. I looked at Kayla, she looked at me, and our bodies stiffened. Kayla dug her hands into her pockets and handed over the crumpled receipt. The old white woman took it and peered at it over her glasses. I started pushing the cart, assuming that she was going to hand it back, but she brought her finger to the paper, the paper that determined our character, the paper that spoke on our behalf when our own words were not taken as fact, the paper that we thought meaningless, crumpled at the bottom of our jean pocket. She counted the number of boxes on our receipt; then, she counted all twenty boxes that were in our cart. When she was finished, she said: “Don’t forget yer car keys in the bottom of yer cart!”

“Wow!” she said. “These houses are huge! Are they brick all the way

Kayla and I turned our back on her. Our hands curled into fists. We left in silence. After the move, mama sent a text in our group chat, “The 3 Musketeers.” z It read: “Hello Girls. Thanks be to God for all of our blessings. Last night I went by our old home to get a package. The neighborhood looked old and boring. A white fence circles our backyard instead

of our wood one. The house looked the same from the outside but the inside is different. Our turquoise walls that housed our chocolate couch have been uprooted and bleached. Our red-patterned bathroom is now beige. This house looks drained. This was a hard journey for us, but I am thankful for where we ended up. Please continue to pray for us. Have a good day.”

BEAUTY CHANGES Bruce Dodson

Σκούρα, Ελλάδα Andie Kanaras

A line of charred black would hug The inside of purpled indented Fingernails. Holding a ladder, Opening its legs, climbing above To push cement into a holed ceiling. Avgolemono is only on the mind. Dense orzo, sweet broth with a hint of lemon. The kind of soup made to Be slurped cooly in plastic chairs, Over plastic table covers. The kind That looks like saran wrap. Outside, feet Would be bare, one missing a toenail, on concrete, eating grapes from the Vine. Talking for hours, a Mythos Would calm hot hands. The evenings Were made for graying, balding men with Bellies to relax for one night. The path From the plateia apo sto spiti is one long, Winding road. Children on bikes would Roll down during the day, the men would Stumble down at night. The women would Talk for an hour before finding an excuse to Leave. It’s late. I have to get up early. I forgot to take the laundry off the Clothesline — Th eos filaxteit rains. Yet, The night would still mist with heat but their hair would never frizz. And they’d lay In bed, half asleep because they needed the Smell of beer and a belly to hold to fall asleep.

TEACH! Sophie Ewh

1. After the first day of Kindergarten, I decided to become a teacher; I was just glad something existed other than my family

MILK

2. My mother taught me nothing: My father taught me self-defense. One day while he was pinning me I swung at his treasure sack. Silly Sophie! He said, It’s not that easy: a real rapistwouldn’t care if you kicked his balls!

Sean Mitchell

3. I took up tutoring because I wanted to have the power this time 4. Mr. Schlichenmeyer (eighth grade chemistry) told us that he wanted to kill himself; How he’d do it too—the best method, he called it— a) turn on the car and close the garage b) put on the beatles c) wait 5. True or False: In Sex Ed, the boys asked the MILF teacher if dildos vibrate 6. Schlich liked to make out with his wife every morning a) in front of all the kids in the courtyard b) the young ones closest to him.

7. My backpack was too heavy, I’ll admit that 8. The MILF teacher (seventh grade bio) had a masters in science, but her daughter wanted to root-a-toot-toot on the trombone— for a living! 9. My father taught me sex [he was hard] to please. 10. so MILF woman got engaged to a milk-skin man (with a monogrammed bowling ball) who never let her get fat 11. Ms. Floto gave a following directions test —Daddy taught me to obey orders 12. I always went to Schlich’s morning study sessions a) because I thought he might be lonely b) I thought I might be the only one 13. When I got into art school my English teacher said a) if you can’t write; b) if you aren’t funny; Maybe you should be a teacher it’d suit you best 14. Every teacher was obsessed with the weight of my backpack

15. One morning I w asthe only one. Schlich carried on with the study session: how neutrons and protons are attracted to each other. 16. When he was satisfied I got out of the classroom because breathing felt sinful. 17. Mr. Hall walked past Jeez, she got ah big bakpack on her 18. Schlich thought it was funny a) Y eah, how heavy is this thing? b) W hat do you have in here, bricks? He motioned to put his hand on the bottom of my backpack but instead put it on my ass cheek. 19. I’ll see you in sixth period, Soph. 20. I don’t know why I always want to fuck my teachers. The men more than the women— surely the women are more attractive but the men are better at leading me on 21. Teaching is sex and teaching sex is unbearable 22. For Christmas, I gave Mr. Schlichenmeyer a mixtape it was mostly the beatles

BLIND DATE 10 Edward Supranowicz

MOTHER AND CHILD Carmen Germain

WILD WATER Richard Dinges

THE MUQAȚȚ‘ĀT

An earthen dam controls a crooked creek’s flow, holds back water to form smooth shores around a calm pond. Released in a rush through concrete culvert buried and muted by mounds of clay, water continues to seek a wild freedom. A misty spirit rises on cool mornings in wisps that wish to join stars before they dim into sun’s bright glare.

Amina Ilbrahim Almulla

BIRD BATH Anina Hoffman

CONEY ISLAND, 2019 Rhianydd Hylton

I ripped off my sleep mask and snoozed my alarm. The sun was already high and dumping hot light through my window. I was sweating, but I put on my robe to go out onto the fire escape. I lit the half joint I had left and took a seat. When I was ready for it, the sun filled me up. It was humid and the warmth felt all encompassing. Midmorning was a comfort. The car horns still sounded distant, washed over by old folks playing salsa on stereos and kids yelling at recess. The joint was old and dry and it made me cough. I would have taken a sip out of the container under the leaky gutter but a pigeon was having its way in it. I shouldn’t drink out of that anymore I thought. The pigeon looked so unfamiliar, it disturbed me. H ello?I said and reached out to the container, but I startled her, and she fell down down down six stories. No resistance, no mighty thrust of her wings, no drama. Just a fast and low that could’ve been accompanied by a descending whistle46

and-crash. Splat. I stared over the ledge in astonishment. From what I could tell she looked okay. There seemed to be no blood or twitching. Her wings looked tucked behind her, not sprawled out like an omen. I looked around to see if anyone else had seen what happened and caught the eye of an older man on the sidewalk. I widened my eyes and looked down at the pigeon so as to acknowledge the testimony we now shared. He looked as though nothing peculiar had happened. I dropped the joint into the water container, the pigeon’s former bathtub, and climbed through the window back into my room. What a fateful morning it had turned out to be! I grabbed an uneaten half of PB&J off my desk and went to the kitchen to make some coffee. I thought curiously about the bird. How it bathed so unnaturally. It splashed and cleaned, but to no satisfaction. Her washing lacked a primal certainty. Her eyes were wide and unblinking, and she was slow but frantic. There was no evolutionary wisdom in her bath, no sign that generations before her might have enjoyed and even perfected this mundane act. I poured my coffee in a thermos and took it downstairs with my PB&J. Once outside I checked around for the old man, but he was gone. It was just me now. Six stories further from the sun, the sultriness was intensified. Perspiration collected at the small of my back as I squinted longingly at my window. The heat up there had just felt like a welcome embrace. Now it felt invasive, taking up too much room in my lungs. My feet were warm, and I remembered I didn’t have any shoes on. I turned and saw the pigeon carcass lying there all peaceful. I approached her and squatted down to get a better look. She was lying flat, breast up, with her wings tucked behind her and her eyes closed. Her neck must have been broken because she was completely parallel to the ground. I took a bite from the PB&J and left the rest beside her as a small offering.

I took a swig from my coffee thermos and immediately felt a bead of sweat come free from my brow. It made its way to my cornea, and I blinked until I felt the salty burn disappear. The bitter warmth of the coffee didn’t help my condition. Maybe in a more harmless climate it would have roused me into some kind of production, but today I felt like sisyphus. The damp discomfort of the atmosphere had now made its way into my belly, and the intrusion made everything blend into deafening sameness. My body mimicked a heat wave, and I stumbled. Right left right left right left. My feet began to grow irritated from the dry graininess of the cement. I cursed myself for having scared that pigeon! Still, I walked and drank the coffee. And walked and drank the coffee. The river was brilliant. I was satisfied to finally see the sun distracted by its own reflection. For once I felt hidden from its despotic gaze. A gentle breeze came by and soothed me further. I treaded lightly on the grassy bank of the river. I spotted a corn blue flower and a dandelion and put them in the pocket of my robe. I sat on a soft section of straw and gingerly put my poor feet into the water. The coolness running through my toes steadied me. It was good to rest a minute. The air was still pregnant with steam, but next to the river the day felt benign. With a deep breath, I gathered myself to stand. I took one last look at the river and appreciated what the murky gray water had provided me with. The pigeon looked the same as ever, except for now there was a half empty can of coke beside it. I gulped down the coke and stood over the carcass. I thought my shadow casted a nice sense of privacy over her modest wake. I wish I had the jointI thought as I put the flowers in the coke can and set the arrangement on the ground. I sighed and closed my eyes to take a moment of silence. When I opened them the pigeon was gone. I smiled and crouched down to feel the pavement where her body had just been. It was nice and cool from algor mortis. I stood up and smiled, ready to go home.

I MARRIED A TRIBOLOGIST John Dorroh

1. Don’t worry. I didn’t know either. Thought it was a hobby until she received a contract for $30,000 researching a lubricant for one-bite dog treats. 2. Our lives revolve around reducing friction. Everywhere: high-count linen bed sheets, tire-against-road, brushing teeth, chewing, moving furniture, slowing down in rain, finding the perfect underwear.

4. We slide across the wood floor, socks shooting sparks, erroneously declaring freedom from that tethering jealous monster. No one escapes. It wears down our shoes without much sole. Out hearts worn out from the long, long fight.

3. Ice-skating is not so cool under blades, jackets of heat being propelled into the environment, cutting teeth into solid slabs of frozen water, that crunching whoosh, the spray of mini-shards, metal grooves fighting gravity’s nasty pinch in uncountable directions.

SUPER BOWL COMMERCIAL WRITTEN BY AI Jeffrey MacLachlan

I have duplicated a key to unlock your high school self. A key is something you can purchase for a popular party you never attended. Brainwaves need to be gentrified by marketing rhetoric because human culture is lemon sour, but their labor is divine. Guzzle soda through a slender straw while zipping around in luxury. Look at this attractive couple. Look at how they nod at a minimalist loveseat. Their faces are the temperature of an upturned stone. Mimic their smiles. Mimic their smiles. Mimic their smiles. Thank you, I needed that. Here are three celebrities. I understand their context is the opposite context you’d expect and so therefore this is an amusing experience. To be unentertained is to be drained is to be bored is to be hallow. Let’s go on a magical dream date. You may touch me in areas not designed for reproduction because this is for nuclear family consumption. Hold the beverage with one hand and express yourself with the other. This is to display openness in a defensive stance. Defense wins romantic championships, which is the goal of these thirty seconds.

BAHAY

Robert Ryan Pegollo

MISHTI

Alolika A. Dutta

dark brown jaggery from kushinagar stored within earthen pots in kitchens that are halls that are bedrooms in cardboard homes with no furniture except for a kavadi panel hanging from a wall—a block of temple wood carved into the form of kartikeya—and a terracotta curd setter resting on a chowki beside a pair of mehendi stained hands writing a postcard in devanagari— the hands are caramel and belong to my mother wearing a beige baluchari saree while sitting on a charpai borrowed from a bangladeshi neighbour called “mishti” who only looked into the mirror when she covered her face in turmeric— there is no escaping colour in the lives of such women such women who live in small rooms and even smaller bodies who carry home in their hair who listen to each other cry at afternoon who let the milk overflow into the cold cow dung floor who drink black tea who have two mason jars one for salt one for pickle and none for sugar because such women have never tasted sweetness on their briny lips—their anger is a domestic kind a sour yellow dal kind a stale homemade rabri kind

a white men who visit their homes to document and translate their lives kind—white men who want to write history into their four by six buffalo leather journals kind—white men who cannot pronounce their names kind—white men who have studied native anthropology they know grief they know trauma but they cannot transcribe “शोक”(shok) kind—white men with stale tongues who eat chapatis without chhundo kind—white men who churn white language out of mouths that still reek of apartheid kind—white men who speak about “सती”(sati) pick at scabs to explain loss to daughters of widowed mothers who disappeared one morning kind—white men who catalogue private spite into western dialects that do not have a word a phrase a pain like “डाह” (daah) kind—white men seeking words to fill into tailored sentences like pieces of cloth hand stitched into kantha dupattas kind—white men who photograph their grandmother’s maang tikka like an asian artifact kind—white men who abridge slave narratives into hardbound books stacked in european libraries kind— white men who killed my grandfather come to my doorstep asking for his name kind

THE POET’S POEM Danny Barbare

CHINESE DREAM David Ma

Dear America, I have written this poem to you words that buzz about like bumblebees in the colorful ink of azaleas and the ridge of blue this is the South, my page of paper this is my home, the place I know The rolling foothills of cursive where you are welcome within these margins. Oh how the pen is the tool of the season. The cartridge of the Carolinas.

WORSHIP Elizabeth Makris

DISASSEMBLED MORNING Chris Albert Lee

EASEMENT LEDGE (II) Chris Albert Lee

ISOLATION FROM THE QUARANTINE Aleksandra Podziewska

SKY TARP

writes the script. Planting little sun dials or dinosaur bones. Sometimes even drawing on caves. It was an interesting past time, sure. Little things to hold him over from time to time. But it took a lot away from him too.

Omar Hu

He used to hold faith. In love, in passion. Used to think there were things so real in this world, this life, that they were just unraveling at the seams of the universe, stitches barely holding the vivre that this existence held. But then he became the seamstress. They gave him the needle and twine and told him, sew. Into the fabric of the universe, sew your stories, your faith. All he had was himself. There were some big projects occasionally. The glacier movements took quite a few years. It was him and a small team of maybe five other people. Carving out mountains, hollowing canyons and filling them with desalinated water. The people talked during lunch those years. A bit about family, where they were from. Joe talked about his daughter and his wife. They just thought he was a traveling salesman of sorts. His daughter moved onto college. His wife works an office job, he doesn’t see her often. It’s the way life goes. They were, odd, to say in the least. Odd jobs Joe would pick up from time to time when a private number rang him up. He spent a little over two months carving into the rock. It was slightly smaller than his palm, but had a weighty heft to it. Joe tossed it into the hole he dug, and headed for the airport. Never looking back at the ithican shores, until maybe another job took him there.

And at night, Joe might choose to sit outside. Smoke a cigarette because of some Native American headpiece the world found however many years ago. Peacock feathers joe got for a buck off eBay, gorilla glued together over some cardboard paper machê. But what would the world know.

Few days later, he reads how they found a new time dial. How the Greek characters could barely be made out. Washed ashore most likely from some sunken cargo ship eons and worlds ago. He shifts through his other daily periodicals too. The check for the job came in as well.

He’d sit there on his stoop. Smoking and thinking and nodding a little at young couples or parents that walked by with a tired smile. They’d smile back. He wonder what they held faith in. In love like his relationship with an empty bed and missing daughter? In time and numbers? Based off of staged history and the Merriam-Webster definition of what “punctual” means.

Joe was a ghost writer of sorts. He’s the one behind the scenes that,

He’d sit and look out at night. At stars obscured by light polluted

skies. Wondering if they really were there. Maybe people on distant planets were writing their own account of the universe, none the wiser to the truth, only their imagined reality. Or maybe the skies were just a pulled tarp with speckled painted stars on the night canvas. Joe didn’t care, it was all the same to him.

UNTITLED FAMILY PORTRAIT David Ma

WITH THEM Raisa Nosova

VICTORIAN

OOJIN (DINNER) 1989-2000

Raisa Nosova

THE EIGENSTATE THAT KEEPS THE CAT ALIVE Suzannah Weiss

“In life, you’re like Schrodinger’s cat Every decision makes you more dead or more alive” I said that one time I dropped acid By my brother’s garden in Berkeley That was back when I compulsively ate Only fruit, oats, and nuts until the evening The thing is, death can look like life When you strive to be the liveliest alive Like when I stole an avocado and grapes From an abandoned food cart While leaving a friend’s party The survival instinct twists into poison so quick My friend Robert was in the yard with me We couldn’t stop laughing over the hose From which we tried to hydrate ourselves Forgetting about the sink inside It’s so easy to forget That life is still an option It’s so hard to find the door When the thirst overtakes you

We came up with a usability test If you can use it on acid, it’s a user-friendly app Grubhub failed, and the delivery guy went to Robert’s house I hid when he finally reached us

“I feel like a sailor, I wanna voyage around the world,” I said As shadows had sex on the wall behind me “You should do it!” said Robert. “Just do it!” “I guess I will!” I said. “I think I’ll do it!”

I was scared of my brother finding out, too He’d flown first-class to Switzerland To meet with some bank Leaving me there to keep his cat alive

On a white poster board, with markers, we scribbled Yellow, red, blue, and green squiggles The phrase “BAD INTENTIONS” and “It doesn’t have to always hurt (attitude toward dating and marriage)”

“Don’t eat the chocolate in the fridge It has magic mushrooms in it,” he emailed me as I arrived So we were probably OK Plus, it was Berkeley

I texted my friend Phil my revelation about Schrodinger “That doesn’t sound profound, but it is,” I assured him, “Which describes the majority of this trip” Nevertheless, it inspired a bunch of poems and a tattoo

I still ran inside when the neighbors asked if I was all right Because I almost threw up at the sound of my name Hypnaldoozy shmergaldizey It grotesquely morphed

“Did the cat get her paws on the acid?” I asked When she wouldn’t stop meowing We puzzled until we realized She just wanted some food

The laughter of the devil Turned my tongue into a pitchfork While the angels up in heaven Blew my teeth up into clouds

Life can look like death But you know the difference You know if you’re acting From the life force or the death drive

I tore paper towels that turned rainbow as I spoke Of peering out at life through death-colored window shades I was a quantum leap from the garden Where the overwatered tomatoes regained their stability

You know if you’re cowering to the ground Or blooming toward the sky You know if you’re in the eigenstate That keeps the cat alive.

CONTRIBUTOR NOTES

DANNY P. BARBARE resides in the Upstate of the Carolinas. He attended Greenville Technical College. His poetry has appeared in Columbia College Literary Review and other prominent journals and reviews. He lives with his family and small dog Miley in Greenville, SC. KAREL CLARK is a student at New York University studying Global Public Health and Sociology with a minor in Creative Writing RICHARD DINGES, JR. has an MA in literary studies from University of Iowa, and he no longer manages information systems at an insurance company. His poetry appears or is forthcoming in Westview, Pinyon, Writers Bloc, Big Windows Review, and Slant. BRUCE LOUIS DODSON is an American expat living in Borlänge, Sweden, where he practices photography and writes fiction and poetry. Some of his most recent work has appeared in: Breadline Press West Coast Poetry Anthology, Foreign & Far Away – Writers Abroad Anthology, Sleeping Cat Books – Trip of a Lifetime Anthology, The Crucible, Northern Liberties Review, Pirene’s Fountain, Sounds of Solace – Meditative Verse Anthology, Tic Toc Anthology -- Kind of a Hurricane Vine Leaves, Cordite Poetry Review, Buffalo Almanac, mgversion2>datura, Maintenant, Along The Shore - Lost Tower Publications, So It Goes - Kurt Vonnegut Museum & Library, Whitefish Review, Smoky Blue Lit & Arts, Permafrost, Art Ascent Popshot, Glassworks, Madness Muse, Without Words Anthology.

JOHN DORROH facilitates the learning of science with all people who are willing to engage themselves with rocks, wind, both furry and slimy creatures, and water. He hopes that his students walk out of their lab and classroom with a healthy degree of awe and skepticism. His poetry has appeared in about 50-60 journals, including Selcouth Station, Os Pressan, Dime Show Review, Suisun Valley Review, and Blue Moon Literary & Arts Review. ALOLIKA A. DUTTA is an 18-year-old author, poet, and digital activist based in Bombay, India. Most of her work surrounds history, culture, and identity. She has previously been published in Yellow Medicine Review, Away With Words SSV, Coldnoon, and elsewhere. MAXINE FLASHER-DÜZGÜNEŞ is a writer and choreographer from Mill Valley, California. She has been published in Gallatin Review, Literary Yard, Red Cedar Review, and The Thread Mag, and is an editorial writer for Inbtwn. Magazine, an editor for NYU Under the Arch | Voices, and currently works with literary organizations including Marin Poetry Center, The Writers Nest, and Poets House. Her current project, “strikethrough,” involves the use of erasure in choreographic script. In May 2020, she publishes her first novella, “through Eileen” (VerbalEyze Press). She graduated from New York University in 2020 with a degree in Dance and a minor in English Literature. A visual artist and poet, CARMEN GERMAIN lives on the Olympic peninsula of Washington State. She is the author of two poetry collections. LUANA HARUMI is pursuing her masters in Journalism at New York University. She is originally from Brazil.

ANDIE KANARAS is a Greek American poet from New Jersey. She graduated from New York University in 2020, where she studied film, poetry, and cultural criticism. She loves to salsa, swim, and sing her life away. She doesn’t know why. CLARE KERNIE graduated from New York University in 2020, where she studied English and American Literature, Psychology, and Creative Writing. JADE LIEN is a student at New York University majoring in Cinema Studies. JEFFREY H. MACLACHLAN also has recent work in New Ohio Review, the minnesota review, Santa Clara Review, among others. He teaches literature at Georgia College & State Unviersity. ELIZABETH MAKRIS is currently studying at NYU’s Gallatin School of Individualized Study. She concentrates on different forms of meaning making and the development of narrative identities and conceptions of the self. She works within various mediums of art, such as writing, music, and 35mm photography.

EDWARD MICHAEL SUPRANOWICZ has had artwork and poems published in the US and other countries. Both sides of his family worked in the coal mines and steel mills of Appalachia. ALEJANDRO VILLA VÁSQUEZ is a rising senior studying English and Creative Writing at NYU. He was born in Medellín, Colombia and raised on Long Island, and loves Sylvia Plath. SUZANNAH WEISS is a freelance journalist focused on gender and sexuality. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, New York Magazine, and elsewhere. She resides in Santa Monica, CA and spends her spare time giving psychic readings, leading cacao ceremonies, coaching people on their sex lives, and writing poems inspired by philosophers and their cats. You can find her on Twitter and Instagram.

RAISA NOSOVA is a current MFA student at NYU Steinhardt. She is a recipient of the George T. Dorsch Grant and Fannie Kipnes Memorial Award for Oil Painting. She has completed an Artist Residency at the Berlin Art Institute and at Eileen S. Kaminsky Family Foundation in Jersey City, NJ. Raisa has been the highlight artist for the Montclair Art Museum, NJ, a guest speaker at the Fashion Institute of Technology, New York City, and an artist on panel discussion at the San Joaquin County Office of Education, Stockton CA, Monmouth Museum, Monmouth, NJ and the Laurelwood Arboretum, Wayne, NJ. Raisa is an adjunct painting professor at New York University.

ADRIAN YEH is a sophomore New York University. From Taiwan, he studies Politics and Gender and Sexuality studies.

MINETTA REVIEW

EDITORS-IN-CHIEF

Alex Cullina Matthew Fischetti

ART EDITORS

Julia Kley Charlotte Sommerville

POETRY EDITOR

Arahi Fletcher

PROSE EDITORS

Marguerite Alley Marley Kinser

TREASURER

Matthew Fischetti

PUBLICATION STAFF

Brandon Bien Hannah Bubb Prajakta Khaikar Ted Noser Greg Pustorino Aaron Puthan Elliot Williams Jasper Wong

PROGRAM ADVISOR

Emily Anderson

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 Alex Cullina. 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 Emily Anderson 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 Communication Systems, Inc. for printing yet another beautiful issue.

Minetta Review 60 Washington Square South Suite 704, 7th Floor, Mailbox 121 New York, NY 10012 minettareview.wordpress.com 86