Mount Holyoke Review 03 by mountholyokereview

MOUNT HOLYOKE REVIEW the

ISSUE #03 SPRING 2022

Copyright © 2022 by the Mount Holyoke Review. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without prior permission in writing from the owners of the copyright. Mount Holyoke Review can be contacted via email at mountholyokereview@gmail.com. Submission guidelines can be found online at mountholyokereview.squarespace.com.

Cover art: “Blueprint #1” by Olivia Brandwein ’22

“Hope” is the thing with feathers That perches in the soul And sings the tune without the words And never stops - at all - Emily Dickinson

Masthead Editors Kylie Gellatly FP ’23 Ella White ’22 Poetry Editors Declan Langton ’22 Elle Provolo ’22

Prose Editors Rose Cohen ’22 Liz Lewis ’22

Layout Director Morgan Sammut ’22

Web Director Emma Nguyen ’24

Promotions Director Ava Provolo ’22

Business Manager Renee Russo ’23 Faculty Advisor Andrea Lawlor

Readers Maggie Barron ’25 · Olivia Brandwein ’22 · Sophie Dalton ’25 · Amandine De Simone ’24 · Marjolaine De Simone ’24 · Lila Goldstein ’23 · Bryn Healy ’24 · Rebecca Kilroy ’23 · Julia Moser ’25 · Vivien McCullough ’24 · Sarah Nealon ’25 · Sage Sanderspree ’24 · Hilary Vergera FP ’24 · Emma Watkins ’23 · Rachel Wood ’22

The Mount Holyoke Review would like to thank the Mount Holyoke College English department for their support and encouragement in our events, publications, and growth as a literary organization.

Letter from the Editors This issue is dedicated to the graduating members of the board, who initially launched The Mount Holyoke Review in 2020, and have seen it through its first three issues: Rose Cohen, Ava Provolo, Elle Provolo, Morgan Sammut, and founders Olivia Brandwein, Declan Langton, and Liz Lewis. MHR endured the remote year due to an overwhelming love for Mount Holyoke’s literary community, as seen in the enthusiasm of these members. What was established in this time was an infectious commitment. Coming back to campus this year, we wanted to honor the shared space with an inaugural print issue—one that can be handled, flipped through, passed around, and taken with you. As we hold this book—dog-ear its pages, break its spine, return over and over to favorite pieces—we are reminded of how grateful we are to our contributors, who entrusted us with their art; to our readers, who gave all their care and attention to these pieces; and to all of those who continue to keep this fire lit. With all of our love, Kylie Gellatly FP ’23 & Ella White ’22

Table of Contents Diary Entry 202: Does the Dog Die? / Regis Reed living room interlude / Lila Goldstein Back to the Basics / Amelia Ostling Choreography / Avery Martin catching flies / Elle Provolo Nightstalker / Sandra Grace Don’t Touch the Glass / Rebecca Kilroy dionysus / Elle Provolo prophecies / Ava Provolo Time & Mediation / Sunny Wei Missing / Olivia Branwein & Rua McGarry foster ghosts / Layne McArdle the procedure / Gina Pasciuto entre/e / Gabrielle Rodriguez Gonzalez abject horror! / Ava Provolo Which Horror Movie Trope... / Morgan Sammut Jello / Danyah Shaikh guilty / Grace McMurray on getting a tattoo / Halle Wyatt peachy clean / Layne McArdle Oil Paint / Lee Heintzelman #299 (Alma 36:18-28) / Midge Hartshorn Primaries / Liz Lewis A Trauma Song / Elle Provolo service / Lila Goldstein Louise / Danyah Shaikh Jenny / Declan Langton

11 15 16 18 19 20 22 29 30 31 32 33 34 36 37 38 43 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 54 56

Song for Goodbyes / Qiao Se Ong Coolit / Silvie Schlein Decades of Passing / Jen Thornquest cardamom / Jackie Hahn To my New / Jean Klurfeld The Remembered Dog / Will Conley Daylight saving time ends. / Lila Goldstein on discolored days / Lune Bush Orion / Avery Martin “This poem is perfect...” / Marissa Carl x-ed out / Oakley Marton Lunches in Hollywood / Madeline Grossman Sometimes I Sit And Think... / Declan Langton Untitled / Sunny Wei Blueprint #1 / Olivia Brandwein pyro / Gabrielle Rodriguez Gonzalez Black Skimmer / Sarah Smith we’re eating steamers / Declan Langton Open letter / Elle Provolo New Snow / Liz Lewis the endless skyway / Elle Provolo W 152nd Street / Sandra Grace [The Korean American who loved...] / Jackie Hahn Contributors

58 60 62 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 75 81 83 84 85 86 88 89 90 92 93 96 98

Spring 2022

Diary Entry 202: Does the Dog Die? Regis Reed

I want to write a poem about ideation. I want to write a poem about thoughts. I want to write a poem that makes no sense and makes sense and makes cents, because I’m poor and love word play. I am pausing this poem to make a dystopian playlist, so stop here. Get a drink. I have returned. You wouldn’t know either way if that was true. It is true. It is two hours and nine minutes long; it has thirty-three songs on it; when you were 33 I remember being so small. I remember being so small. And you were 33 but you have grown and I have grown and now I am so tall your little arms do not hold me like they used to. I want to write a poem about the grief of a child. I want to write a poem that captures all the wants I wanted in childhood, one that births dreams into realities. This is a dystopian poem. This is a dystopian poem because I am a dystopian poet and I am returned. This is diary entry 202. You should look up the other 201. You should look on ‘does the dog die.’ You should know the dog does not die but a funeral is still held. I want to write a poem in conversation. I want a conversation. I want to build a world out of words that fits all the things that don’t fit into this one. I want to fit in your little arms. I do not. I do not know what that means–for me, for us. I do not know. I do not know. I don’t know, but back to the playlist and the two hours and the nine minutes and the thirty-three songs. I am a builder. I am a creator–creature–crater. Space rocks are not special outside of our planet. When they hit the ground they are special. Do not read into that, it is not a metaphor.

Issue 03 You wouldn’t know either way if that was true or not. But you might think, huh, this poet has written that phrase twice now. You might think a lot of things about this ideation-obsessed-thoughtful-no-sense-making-sense-making-cents-(because-I’m-poor-and-love-word-play)-childgrieving-want-capturing-dream-reality-birthgiving-DYSTOPIAN-poem-(because-I-am-a-DYSTOPIAN-poet)-diary-entry numbered 202 after my favourite number, after that now-olderthan-33-year-old person’s birthday, after 201 dead dog entries, after it all. After it all. After it all. After. In this Dystopian poem–and I will pause here to tell you that I am capitalizing Dystopian simply because I can and not because of what you think and not at all because there has been a narrative switch, it’s just that this is my Dystopian poem and as a dystopian Poet I can make these language rules… (After a long-winded CONVERSATION between one person and no other persons, because I am a dystopian Poet and in this poem I get to choose who is speaking)... In this Dystopian poem I am back in the house that is not my house but might have been my house and, because a metaphor is needed here to keep the poetic sense, the house that is not mine is an ocean. Can you feel the beating of the waves? Let me take you there. It is: dark heavy, seal-skin clouds and eerie gray, the kind of brewing witches do–you get that, don’t you? That kind of beating? Black like you’ve never seen the surface, blue like the sky should be, like the sky isn’t. Like it might have been but who looks up, you’ll trip over your feet. Like it might be but we’re at sea now, we’re on the DYStopian ocean and– A quick interlude here, for the theatrics. The word dystopia is comprised of the latin root dys, meaning bad, meaning badbadbad, and utopia. Do you know what “utopia” means? I do. Do you know what a key part of the definition is? I’ll tell you. It’s an imagined place. And for my fellow poets, but not the poets of this poem, I’ll add that I used “comprised,” not “com12

Spring 2022 posed,” in my description. Look up the difference. I’ll wait. I’ll grab a drink. Nevermind, I’ll just tell you. Comprised conveys containment, composed referring to a combination. A mesh. Hold onto that. You’ve got to Hold it. I am a captain-captive-Poet and this is an ocean poem. There is no land, because the water loves poets and the land loves space rocks. There is a boat (and the boat is a bed in a small room, where the furniture is big, because the 33-plus-year-old picked it up on the roadside without thinking but with arm wrapping love). And the boat is safe on the ocean with its hissing spray and tear-salt showers, but the boat has long run out of fuel, and the boat-crewmen have all been eaten by the captive-captain-Poet. But where does the captive-Poet go when there are no boat-crewmen and the arms (the wrapping, the loving, the holding, the not-enough-but-enough-but-okay-but-tried-theirbest) arms arms arms…. When the Poet is all alone on the bed-boat in the house-ocean in a DYS-topian poem. When I am having one person conversations. Don’t you know conversations are between? How lonely. What a lonely-little-sad-grown-up-dream poem. What a dystopia, and I will pause here. I will say the dystopia is lowercase. We’re coming down, aren’t we? We aren’t space rocks. There’s formulation here. We aren’t special. The dystopia– It doesn’t know itself without pandemonium, that panicked sea.

Issue 03 You get, it don’t you? I want to write a poem that you get.

You get it, don’t you? Diary_Entry_202_Does_The_Dog_Die___End.

Spring 2022

living room interlude Lila Goldstein

trying to listen to birdsong, morning light melting into floorboards; interlude of chaos trilling on the same notes until my bones settle into resonance, indistinct from body, from bird, from house, from tree. my body theatres in this rest, it arenas, it reaches the nosebleed seats; star, spectator, chorus member waiting to break out. mind empty and loud; refreshing, as in dragging down and circling connections. as in taking a short walk and coming home to microwave and tea kettle. new times appear on the clock. humming, humming. background chatter and shock of a voice on the phone that evokes my own nasal and crackly texture, not unlike a slow and deep chirp. expecting the couch to absorb my embodiments of sighing, of humming, of holding and gathering sounds.

Issue 03

Back to the Basics Amelia Ostling

Flashcard, flash card, flip card flip flipping back and back over front ya and ye and yae and k, g,

In English class they’ve read The Outsiders Outsider she sits on the outside ring ring ringing in her ears the difference between ch and j between ya ye and yae her fingers flip flip flipping the flipping flashcards Outsiders unopened the cover she eyed the words but her head said it’s ya, ye and yae today Latin is

fourth block her notebook iacio, iacere, ieci (3) to throw

she wants

to throw the flashcards flip cards and numero, numerare, numeravi (1) to count she counts gae mari in her notebook she counts numbers to

counters bun

eight

thousand

Spring 2022 seven hundred and two she’s counted for weeks declension two with - us and - i and -o Haley, what is the perfect tense of bibo? Bibi, in her head. Bi. Bi, means rain. It’s raining today today is ya ye and yae Wait, what’s the difference? A bench seat at lunch she asks Google, what am I doing wrong? Google

‘Historically these two vowels had different pronunciations, but in the modern Seoul dialect they are practically indistinguishable’

she writes that: indistinguishable: she underlines once, word twice, then flip flips over the flipping flash (flip) ya and ye and yae and a and e and ae and,

a word card and

Goddammit.

Issue 03

Choreography Avery Martin Choreography

Ekphrasis on Dorothea Content Notes:Tanning’s “Still in the Studio” I. Body blushing knee cocked sideways a step forward in invitation join this striving dance

II. Light

spider-arm

light

round and solid

p o u r s in

stretch spine crawls forward across the table, an intake of breath

twist

a pounding bass line contracting contracting and shoulders roll back contracting adjusting ribs to hold color within forward

glow hovers just beyond

hazy

along grilles

an unexpected curve across the buttocks

elbow pulls away in languorous tension tinted angle strains to enter

blurred vibrations pulse across skull

haunt

sloughing esh in the acid of the city

sliding up the thigh hips announce birth

leaking

III. Decay

red halo blurs into the comfort of reaching reaching to forge

smears of body drip over the chaos of creation

ripe chest yearns

to light

Spring 2022

catching flies Elle Provolo

I stay awake until I hear the last fruit fly hit the tape and I wonder if its last thoughts were a memory of sweet flesh, the apple in a serpent’s eye. I watch my window draining light until it no longer speaks in the cool whispers of the moon’s secrets and it burns rose colored streaks on my walls, a reminder that its maker is made from fire. I call out your name I scream it until the room is engulfed in the flames of my own hunger but I realize I am a forest, a fallen tree is not heard if you aren’t there. I strip away my clothes my body’s vulnerability a shadow of the woman whose barren figure waits to be filled by a deity who knows only emptiness, I am no god, a fiend fueled by destruction.

Nightstalker Sandra Grace Content Notes: scary situations, horror, nightmares

The Nightstalker

For the past few nights, I have been waking up from a dream where I am falling and don’t seem to be able to stop myself no matter how hard I try, and trust me I am trying When I have these dreams, I wake up and find the only way for me to even be able to attempt to fall back to a peaceful slumber is for my face to feel the cool crisp bite of the 3 am air on my skin. When I find myself with my feet on the grass and the wind blowing against my face, I get scared that someone is behind me breathing deeply and darkly and I hear a small laugh and then I get scared I think someone is watching me and I worry that someone will take me so then I take myself inside and force myself back to my bed and fall back asleep but the dark breath creeps in my bed again. For the past few nights, I–

For the past few nights, I– I think someone is watching me and I worry that someone will take me so then I take myself inside and force myself back to my bed and fall back asleep but the dark breath creeps in my bed again.

When I find myself with my feet on the grass and the wind blowing against my face, I get scared that someone is behind me breathing deeply and darkly and I hear a small laugh and then I get scared When I have these dreams, I wake up and find the only way for me to even be able to attempt to fall back to a peaceful slumber is for my face to feel the cool crisp bite of the 3 am air on my skin. For the past few nights, I have been waking up from a dream where I am falling and don’t seem to be able to stop myself no matter how hard I try, and trust me I am trying The Nightstalker

Issue 03

Spring 2022

Nightstalker Sandra Grace Content Notes: scary situations, horror, nightmares

The Nightstalker

Issue 03

Don’t Touch the Glass Rebecca Kilroy

Timothy came out of the bath bright blue and shrieking, tentacles flailing like hysterical snakes. I bundled him into his favorite towel–the one with the duck’s face on the hood–and hugged him to my chest. “Shhh, it’s okay.” We rocked on the edge of the tub. I whispered soothing words as the blue ebbed from his skin, the tentacles shrank into chubby fingers, and the beak retracted into a mouth of crooked baby teeth. “There’s my perfect boy. It’s all done now.” I carried him across the hall to clean pajamas and a dry bed. He was asleep before I tucked him in. I stepped back and looked at him in the golden glow of the sailboat nightlight. A clump of blond curls fell across his face. His cheeks puffed out with deep, sleepy breaths. He looked like a cherub in a Renaissance painting, divinely untroubled. I risked waking him and pressed one last kiss to his clammy forehead. “Goodnight, my angel.” I could’ve collapsed right there on the floor and slept the night. Instead, I dragged myself down the hall. There was a crack of light under my door. Ian was waiting up. “How was it this time?” he asked, glancing up from his book. “Fine.” In the dim light of the bedside lamp he couldn’t see the wet patches on my shirt or the red outline of a tentacle across my cheek. “Don’t forget you’re picking him up from daycare tomorrow. He thinks you’re going for ice cream.” 22

Spring 2022 “Kim.” “What?” “This is crazy.” “Babe, I don’t have the energy to argue tonight.” “I’m not arguing. I just want to look at this logically.” Ian was always starting arguments like that. As if logic was his personal purview and I were incapable of it. I rubbed my eyes. This was what I got for marrying a data analyst. “Can we not do this now?” “You can’t keep arm wrestling our toddler into the bathtub. When he was a newborn we could manage, but now it’s just getting worse.” “That doesn’t mean it’ll stay that way. The terrible twos are a rough patch for everyone.” “So that’s it? We’re just going to wait it out?” I shrugged. “We’re doing everything we can.” We spent the first year of Tim’s life questing after solutions. I posted dozens of queries on anonymous message boards for everyone from first-time moms to cryptozoologists. Was it caused by lunar phases? Tidal shifts? Salt deficiency? We ruled out “proximity to water” as a cause when I made us move from Manhattan to Omaha. It didn’t help that we had no idea where it came from. None of our families had stories of cursed children or angry sea gods. As far as we knew, Ian and I hadn’t incurred the personal wrath of the Universe. And it wasn’t genetic. Ian’s one insinuation, two years ago, that I might have cheated on him had almost cost him his marriage. He wouldn’t make that mistake twice. “Babe,” I said, “look on the bright side. He’s healthy. He has friends. He’s smart. He used the world ‘quell’ yesterday in a sentence. I don’t even know how to use that word correctly.” “I’m sorry I’m not more grateful that my son is part sea monster.” 23

Issue 03 “Hey! What have I said about the ‘m’ word? You’re his dad! What will it do to his self-esteem if he hears you call him that?” “Like he won’t already know what he is.” “You don’t know that.” I’d never asked Tim what happened to him during bath time. Usually he fell asleep right after and woke up the next morning as if nothing was wrong. The being he turned into, whatever it was, didn’t seem to have much of him in it. “When he’s ready, we’ll explain it to him,” I said. “Maybe he’ll have more control over it when he’s older and he’ll be able to help us keep his secret.” “And if he doesn’t want to?” “What do you mean?” “What if he wants to go in the pool? Or have a water balloon fight? Or join the swim team?” “He’ll know that he can’t. Plenty of kids have limitations and live perfectly normal lives.” “Normal? Really?” A look of hurt crossed Ian’s face that I’d never seen before. “Is that what you call this?” This was my chance to give in, to tell him what he wanted to hear, to agree “yes, our kid is a Kraken and we can’t pretend otherwise so let’s just drop him off at the nearest beach and wait for high tide.” But Tim wasn’t any kid. He was mine. Before I got pregnant, I didn’t think I wanted kids at all. Truth be told, this was Ian’s idea from the start. But the first time I held Tim, I knew I’d been wrong. He was perfect. I shook back the damp ends of my hair. “Yes. We’ll keep him safe and make sure he has a normal life. You’ll see.” It came out sounding much more like a threat than I wanted it to. I was nervous waiting for Ian to come home the next day. Neither of us were very good at grudges. Our fights never lasted longer than it took the other to brew an apology mug of 24

Spring 2022 coffee. But he’d left that morning before I got up, coffee maker empty, and hadn’t texted all day. My worry vanished when Tim came bounding up the stairs. He trumpeted something about his teacher and a penguin and shoved a drawing in my face. His chubby cheeks were smeared with the remains of chocolate ice cream. I glanced up at Ian and grinned. “Sounds like you two had fun! What’s this?” I took Tim’s drawing and examined it: multi-colored blobs against blue scribbles. “Is this outer space?” “Noooo! It’s fish.” “Oh?” “Tim’s class is going to the aquarium on Friday,” Ian announced. “He’s very excited.” “Daddy says I have to ask you first, Mommy. Can I go? Please…” I kept my smile fastened in place while shooting Ian the glare that he’d once said could melt flesh. I could only hope. He was going to make me be the one to let our son down. “All the other kids are going,” he added. “But I told Tim we’d have to see what you thought.” It was too pointed of a challenge to ignore. “Of course you can go, sweetie!” I chirped. “In fact, I’ll go too.” Tim’s daycare teacher was surprised that any parent would voluntarily chaperone a field trip. But no one tasked with keeping track of children under four is going to refuse an extra pair of hands. If I’d been less worried, and less pissed off at Ian, he and I might have laughed about it. Taking our part-sea-creature son to an aquarium? It was top of the list of Scenarios We Never Thought Of But Probably Should Have, right up there with “can he eat sushi?” and “should we let him read MobyDick?” None of those would be disasters. I was getting way 25

Issue 03 more worked up about this than I should. After all, parents took their kids to aquariums all the time. “You okay?” his teacher asked me as the kids flooded into the cool lobby. They immediately scattered like distracted minnows. I combed the crowd to keep an eye on Tim. There, next to the gift shop, ogling a plush snake. Safe. “I’m fine,” I assured her. “Just want to make sure they all stay together.” “Don’t worry. Haven’t lost one yet.” I forced a laugh. The truth was, any of those thirty other kids could’ve walked into a shark tank and I wouldn’t have cared. But I watched Tim like he was a violent criminal out on parole. The slightest twitch in any direction away from the group and I barreled down to herd him back to safety. Like all the kids, he oohed and aahed over the swirls of colorful fish in the first tank and was bored with them by the second. An hour in, they were all whiny, tired and didn’t care about anything that didn’t have peanut butter and jelly on it. Educationally, a failure. But I was already imagining the triumph I’d get to tell Ian about. The last obstacle was the Touch Tank. It was a shallow pool populated with lazy stingrays who’d let toddlers poke at them. The kids shrieked and swarmed around the pool, splashing and sending water down their shirts. I scanned the room, hoping to see Tim hanging back (I’d been preparing him on the ride over with stories of stingray attacks and the lethal germs in sand). But he wasn’t on the edges. In fact, he wasn’t there at all. During our year-long search for answers, we once took Tim to a psychic who claimed that we were all part animal. This primordial self could come out in all of us, at any time. The only questions were when and why. I thought it was bullshit at the time. But I had never felt more like a threatened she-wolf than when I couldn’t find my kid. Everything slowed down and sped up and sharpened. Adrenaline kicked in like a second set of senses. 26

Spring 2022 I ran around the Touch Pool, checking the face of every kid that wasn’t Tim. I darted back into the room we’d just come from and then into the one beyond that. My mind was leaping over hurdles of mental arithmetic I didn’t have the formulas for. What was the average speed of a toddler? The surface area of the room? The percentage of children abducted from aquariums each year? I swung into a dark hallway and nearly tripped over a blond head that came up to my knees. “Tim! Oh my God. You scared me. Don’t ever, ever run off like that again.” “Sorry,” he muttered. He didn’t look at me. His chubby cheeks smushed against a dark tank built into the wall. His hands splayed out on the glass like pale starfish. I knelt and squinted to make out the deep sea gloom. There, in the corner, something fleshy and bulbous and pink peeked out of a cave. A bouquet of red tentacles blossomed from its base. It blinked at me, one black, empty eye that gave me the distinct feeling I wasn’t there. “Tim, let’s go, honey. Come on.” “No!” “Yes.” I peeled his hand away and gripped it in mine. He started to howl. His fingers left a sticky imprint on the glass. On the other side, like a row of white eyes, one of the tentacles peered at us. Ignoring Tim’s cries, I dragged him away and out of the aquarium. “It was fine,” I told Ian that night. “He wandered off at one point. I think he got bored.” “Really?” “Yeah. I don’t think we’ll go back.” I tried for a casual shrug. “He just wasn’t that into it.” Ian opened his mouth like he wanted to ask more but Tim’s thin “Mommy!” carried down the hall, summoning me to tuck him in. “Are we going to the aquarium tomorrow?” he asked. 27

Issue 03 “No, tomorrow is school, just a normal day.” “Oh.” His tiny shoulders slumped. “If you’d like, maybe we can go to the petting zoo this weekend,” I suggested. “It’s much more fun than a stuffy old aquarium.” “Ok,” he replied, sounding pleased with this compromise. Good. Land animals. Those I could handle. I knelt to flick on the sailboat nightlight. “Mommy?” “Yeah?” “How far away is the ocean?” “Really far, bud.” “Oh.” “Why do you want to know?” “My new friend told me I would like it there. That’s where he’s from. He said I should go back there too.”

Spring 2022

dionysus Elle Provolo

even if the peach tree does not bloom its pits will remain in the ground. walking barefoot over the weeds I avoid the fungi it reminds me too much of death a resurrection only to kill and I sink into the sweetness, a land soaked in honey. the ghosts of the fruit that never were haunt me, create a dull smog that never clears a humidity that feeds on the weakness of my own memories. I would cry for help but my voice is gone nothing recovers that shares the same breath as the roots a throat, sore and longing. God doesn’t recognize me anymore even though we share a name a hollow spirit, holiness.

Issue 03

prophecies Ava Provolo

the devil flows through my right hand as i write this down he wants me to suffer to bleed like the tiger and to moan like the abandoned child the land is wet soaked with the alcohol that burns down the throats of those who believe i am now on dry land he is here because he wants to embrace the flames as his only comfort but still, we shiver rotten is our breath but disinfected are our tongues i do not believe in god, i am her

“Time & Meditation” Sunny Wei

“Missing” Olivia Branwein in collaboration with Rua McGarry

Spring 2022

foster ghosts Layne McArdle [content warning: childhood trauma, disordered eating]

Content Notes: childhood trauma and disordered eating foster ghosts

a litter of homeless ghosts lying ‘tween kitchen tiles, curdling unopened milk, scalding your thumbs studding the flour jar with footprints tiny as ticks. borne from the pounds i’ve gained away from home: poltergeists migrating from mold to fondle the space under the tongue, to suckle from soft veins. you’ll find her under a sliver of linoleum that curls like burnt paper behind the knives and the oil (the landlord is sure to strip this clean for the new tenants) and yet i brood, ergo, she breed she sprouts from the detritus, among specks of dirt and crumbs of crackers and curses knit via friction: fuel to fire to grinding to groaning to rust to tetanus, to genesis as that blighted girl blooms unto expiry dates, after-school guilt-purges, spite-meals, to pools of cold fat congealing between unwashed pans, a slice of stolen lunchmeat, hide-and-seek in the oven, to dry faucets, to salted earth. you might settle with the realtor, hang some nice drapes, etcetera. but the stink of her rotting antibody will cling to the walls no matter how many coats of paint you slather on. she will sew glass into the carpets. she will pinch at your thighs while you sleep. bearing this, who would stay? who would reckon with the reality of the estate? who would recognize her gestures when they don’t splinter and sear, draw the curtains. let the light in. take the chicken out to thaw. who would watch spectral fingertips and know that she, too, must want

but instead

brush against their silk tablecloths a feeling so smooth, so fine.

Issue 03

the procedure Gina Pasciuto Content Notes: body weirdness and reference to potential assault

at the clinic, they weigh my bones, taking each one out individually with gloves the color of fresh air. they comment on the color, the size, congratulate me for all the milk i drank in my childhood. when they wring out my spine every nerve in my body sings. they ask me what i want done. a formality–my paperwork is in order and intelligible speech eludes the guileless slump of an empty jaw. one of the nurses guides the remainder of me back onto the table. the sweet kiss of anesthesia hits home. i laugh through the whole procedure, feeling nothing, only a slight pinch as they slot my skull back into place. later i will learn how they misplaced a rib that would end up at the lead surgeon’s house (his dog’s favorite chew toy).

Spring 2022 later i will learn the clicking of the new joints in each rainstorm. later i will learn that even built anew i still do not feel clean. now i am sitting up, flexing my fingers, reveling in the simple pleasures of form.

Issue 03

entre/e Gabrielle Rodriguez Gonzalez

After lines by Sandra Lim Some kind of belief still runs off me in strings; Breadcrumb meal leading to censored center Certainty pulled from your teeth; stubborn tongue turned interior Watch the colors out, incessant whirring within the skin, engine purr. Readymade religion, wrestle with me, directive clear. Sink into intestinal tract, guzzle mucus lining, let me in. Proclaim your pristine personhood, make trachea beg, bend-knee bird-like. Mercy is such, a warm weight, on the tongue. I think my interior, it must be a killing machine, Exploratory mecha clutching onto organic tissue, Fissured fluid shifting joints in place, hinging delicious opportunity. Welcome the organism in, feel warmth stretch along the spine, savor the sunspot vision.

Spring 2022

abject horror! Ava Provolo

i had a dream where i was scratching a poem into my fingernails, the skin underneath crevassing; not my hands though, i mean the ones doing the scratching but they came out of my stomach, covered in thick maple syrup so thick you might choke like the voices of the men in arkansas what happens in waco, stays in waco bullshit because as my not-hands came out to scratch away my fingernails a crew of ravaging spiders marched into my mouth, making a home in the gaps between my organs thank you for your service the phantom hammer that always lingers on my belt loop, weighing me down was nowhere to be found

Issue 03

Which Horror Movie Trope Are You? Morgan Sammut Content Notes: themes of violence and suicide

Take this quiz to find out which character you’re most like! (If this is your personal copy of the Review, feel free to fill it out in pencil! If this is a public copy or someone else’s, please fill it out in pen. Make your mark. Let them know who you are.) On any old Friday night, you are most likely: (a) At home with a book. (b) Doing improv with your friends. (c) Sleeping with your new beau of the week. (d) On your way to a party after working out. (e) At a friend’s house, watching a movie. You and all of your friends decide to go to a cabin in the woods! Why did you decide to go? (a) Your friends all said it would be a nice, quiet weekend together. (b) You don’t have any other plans, and this sounds more fun than staying home. (c) You were the one who suggested it. (d) You love doing water sports and making fires and all that stuff. (e) Your friends were going, so why wouldn’t you go with them? You’ve all come back to the house after a fun day out outside. After everyone has gotten ready for bed, you’re all sitting to-

Spring 2022 gether when you hear a loud noise in the other room. What do you do? (a) Explain to everyone that it’s an old cabin and they make these noises, or maybe a chipmunk got into the house. (b) Crack a joke. You’re scared, but you don’t want your friends to know. (c) Try and keep everyone calm. It’s probably nothing, and besides, freaking out isn’t going to help. (d) Go investigate. You want to make sure the rest of your friends aren’t scared, so you’ll go and make sure everything is okay for them. (e) Grab onto one of your friend’s arms. The lights go out. What do you do? (a) Grab your phone. (b) Scream. (c) Nothing. You are in shock. (d) Ask if everyone is okay. (e) Listen for more noise. You can definitely hear someone now. They are in the house. And then, someone comes into the room with an axe. They swing at one of your friends. You all scatter. So, in true horror movie style, you’ll need a weapon to fight off the killer chasing you. What weapon do you grab? (a) A broken glass bottle. (b) A frying pan. (c) The poker from the fireplace. (d) A baseball bat. (e) The long kitchen knife. You’re in the kitchen and find a drawer full of miscellaneous items. What do you pick?

Issue 03 (a) The phone charger. You’re practical, and come on, isn’t one of the biggest issues in modern horror movies that their phone battery is dead? (b) All the miscellaneous little things you can find, pens, pencils, erasers, anything you can throw in the killer’s face. (c) The flashlight. You’ll need to see where you’re going, and it’s already dark enough in here. Also, it’s heavy. (d) The utility knife. The blade is too small for it to be much of a weapon, but it might come in handy. (e) The lighter. You hear a noise outside the kitchen door and run outside. When you get outside, you hear one of your friends scream. ( ) There is no choice here. Your friend is dead. Where do you run? (a) Back into the cabin. You know the layout, and whoever is chasing you wouldn’t think you’d go back into the cabin, right? You could go back to the kitchen and get more supplies, couldn’t you? (b) You hide. It doesn’t matter where, but maybe you can wait them out. They could pass over you, convinced you’re out there running from them, and then maybe they’ll leave. You’ve gotten out of everything in your life by hiding yourself away, why wouldn’t it work now? (c) To the car sitting outside the house. You need to get out of here, and you know the killer has probably already cut the gas or whatever, but you’ll risk it. (d) Into the forest. It’s dangerous, you know, but at least this way you’re not wandering around that dark base of a house. You could face them out in the open, and without any of their tricks, you think you could take them in a fight. (e) You don’t. This is the end. You’re done. You are going to kill this sick bastard. 40

Spring 2022

If you got mostly As, you’re… THE KNOW-IT-ALL You’ve seen this happen before, you’ve read so many books where this exact thing happened, and yet, you’re still hopeless to stop it here. If you have all the answers, why didn’t that help you? You can read all the books you want, and yet, you’ll never really be prepared for what’s coming. You keep your head in those books, champ, keep it down so you don’t have to watch the knife come down and end you. Let the books witness your death rather than witness it yourself. Let them have your answers. If you got mostly Bs, you’re… THE FUNNY GUY Keep telling jokes, maybe they’ll keep you around then. You’re useless in this situation. You’re not particularly strong or smart, but you are witty. If you can laugh it all off, it’s all just one big joke that you’re in on, huh? No one can really hurt you if you hurt yourself first. But, besides your quippy one-liners, what else do you have to offer them? Nothing, and that keeps you up at night. Or, it used to, before you were killed, because after all, no one cares what happens to you. If you got mostly Cs, you’re… THE WHORE You’re sexy! You’re fun! Tell me, have you managed to fill the hole inside yourself yet? That’s the reason you’re doing all this, right? That’s the reason The Whore is always fucking all of these people—or you’re failing morally. So, which is it? Are you empty or are you missing a sense of morality? Actually, don’t bother answering, it doesn’t really matter either way. Obviously, you have to die. We can’t have our children thinking they can fuck around and still live. That kind of freedom is granted only to those who are doomed.

Issue 03

If you got mostly Ds, you’re… THE JOCK Has the exercise made the pain stop? How long does it stop it for? It’s never long enough. And it didn’t even help you or save your friends this time. That’s supposed to be the whole point of all of this. You’re strong and you can protect them, but you failed at that. Guess you can’t just brute force your way through all your problems. But it’s okay, just do five more pushups and you’ll forget, and five more and five more until you can’t remember anything else. You’ll never stop, but by all means, try. If you got mostly Es, you’re… THE FINAL GIRL How does it feel to be the last one alive? Do you feel accomplished (is it like winning)? Everyone else is dead, and now you need to figure out how to live on without them. More importantly, you have to live on knowing that their lives were cut short. How do you honor them? Or, perhaps, do you feel vindicated? You’ve repressed yourself for so long and this is your reward. For being the smartest, or the most innocent, or whatever reason they offer, in some attempt to invoke morality, because it isn’t enough that tragedies just happen, there has to be a reason that you in particular are alive, right? It doesn’t make sense if there isn’t a reason, and this is a story isn’t it? Well, there is no lesson for you this time. Figure out your own reason for living. Hold that knife tighter to your chest, dear girl, see if it will whisper a new answer to you.

Spring 2022

Jello Danyah Shaikh

I took my time considering them all. When I decided to go to the beach I did not expect all of their half naked bodies to float through the stagnant air. It was pretty. They slammed into one another, heads bobbing. Minds meant for advanced placement are cleansed with salt water and sweaty soda cans. It’s probably idiotic, but I want some of them to talk to me. I wish I got to chew them, grind their attention between my molars. They slipped through my teeth, like the strawberry Jello I only ate when I was home sick from school. You can’t chew it, it’ll burst. You can keep it on your tongue, but that’s just sugar. I wish I had asked them what they thought of me. I can break through them with a plastic spoon, watch the muscles in their face tremble. It is still difficult to pick them up. My head casts a shadow over them, and far from the sun they become less transparent. So I held the Jello up to my eye, to see the water with a red tint. Their warped figures blocked my view, blending into each other until no one was left. Only rosy limbs wrapped around one another. I’d like to hear something from them.

Issue 03 I thought they might be at the beach, so we could talk. I’m sure I could have won them over if I had their attention for long enough. But that’s so silly. When we got to the beach they were busy acting like sluts. And I don’t even like New England beaches. The dirty water never cured my cough. I wanted something to eat. But my nails were cut too short to open the second cup of Jello I brought. They couldn’t open it for me. They never found me witty. They are turning from pink to red in the patch of sun, plus they’re all nail biters. I guess I’m stuck eating sand. At least I can grind it between my teeth.

Spring 2022

guilty Grace McMurray

it was only old shampoo that I poured down the drain. it wasn’t wasted potential rather, a complicated and messy dilemma, it clung desperately to the bottom of the bottle out of reach from my fingers. I could’ve found a way if I wanted to but would all the trouble be worth it to get the last inch of product? it’s easier to turn off your mind and not think about what could’ve been turn on the sink and watch the pretty bubbles form out of thin air in the crevices of your palms like magic. as soapy suds sink deep into a one-way tunnel, the only remains left are a defaced plastic bottle and my smoking gun: the scent of fresh coconut on my bloody hand.

Issue 03

on getting a tattoo Halle Wyatt

you trace your palms over my bare blank skin and you ask me how i’d like to decorate my body. i think about the tattoos i might get so often that when i close my eyes i see thousands of designs on thousands of different bodies. i think about imprinting the moon on my shoulder near my clavicle, or a yellow sunflower growing on my forearm. but i’m indecisive, not because a sunflower doesn’t fit me, or the moon isn’t special enough, because ink can’t glow like the harvest moon in september, and tattooed sunflowers don’t smell like rich soil or bend toward the sun as it rotates through the late, drought-strung summer sky. i think about what matters and i can’t carry the notes of my favorite song or the sound of your deep popcorn laugh or the feeling of my cat’s fur beneath my fingertips between the moles and freckles on my stomach. i can’t tattoo the feeling of your name as it tangles around my tongue, or the deep melt of warmth that pools in my stomach as i watch you snore beside me, your long gold hair fanned out across my pillow. you ask me where to stick and poke, and i can only show you by placing your palm over my heart. we can never be closer than this. i can never absorb you into my skin, my muscle, my bone. so hold me while you can.

Spring 2022

peachy clean Layne McArdle Content Notes: suicide attempt and sexual trauma

on my seventeenth: a ghost of me is perched on the overpass. this will be (over/pass) — she is making ribbons of herself, peachy tendrils peeling, chiffonade in the air. (now this is a girlhood. now this is a thing you can comb your fingers through, cradle a lack.) a traumatic past-ripe disorder. a pulpy mass, translated: an underbelly in my throat. i (dis/re)member seventeen: a peach. she wants someone to swallow her whole and choke on the stone. she wants to make ribbons of the body and dissolve in the wet aftermath, like sugar. she wants to taste sweet.

Issue 03

Oil Paint Lee Heintzelman

The December I was 19 years old I dyed my hair orange Bright orange Like bright fucking orange I think I forgot how to be me in my body How to wake up, step back into my bones Creaking and aching as they are My muscles have not welcomed my presence in years Regaining control of your body after time away from it Is something like painting over an already covered canvas I was beautiful already But now I will make something new Now I will make my body the canvas Paint bats on my arms and dragons on my legs Guard dog defense mechanism Sunset hair and metal in my nose My body will one day be my masterpiece I will step into my skin and know it as my own

“#299 (Alma 36:18-28)” Midge Hartshorn

“Primaries” Liz Lewis

Spring 2022

A Trauma Song Elle Provolo

A way for me to hold my breath when swimming is Too difficult to match the ocean’s fury. Remembering my own name just so I could choke on my screams As if the song of the waves didn’t erode the shore of my memory Unlike the desert which has been scarred by my cyclical pacing over its terrain. Maybe my mother will understand why I am afraid of the mountain’s shadows And my father will begin to listen to the hum of the creek. Salt lingers in the waters and my scars are bleeding again Only if I knew the fish intimately would I know how to let go None of my wounds can speak without whispering, I am a Goner

Issue 03

service Lila Goldstein

there are too many poems about oranges but split this tangerine with me and suck the pith and spit it out unless you want to almost choke because you hate to swallow it and let me wipe the juice from both our chins and let’s wipe our sticky hands on each other look away i’m talking to myself i get a bit carried away in my poems but anyway it’s been a little while since i’ve eaten any variety of orange not that it’s your fault and unfortunately working at home depot couldn’t expunge my new obsession with the color a customer came in to buy plants and soil late at night with her quiet adult daughter and said they spread 40 lbs of birdseed in circles all around the yard and all the squirrels and sparrows and cardinals came to eat to celebrate the end of chemo she has ten grandchildren to live for and it’s time to be happy again no stranger ever spoke to me like that 52

Spring 2022 what i want is only to be that open by the time i’m seventy i also want to have everything to lose and to wave it around in front of everybody’s bright faces i hate completing sentences i get a bit carried away in my poems my words got much stronger after meeting you i hope you didn’t realize they were yours and you’re right they were some good oranges but after you left they sat out and got moldy look at and listen to me when i’m talking to you here: i stole a lot of shit but you still kept it all i’m giving it all back but you won’t get any if this is all my fault then it’s my fault but everything ends and then keeps going

Issue 03

Louise Danyah Shaikh

Louise, I remember crumbs in the cupholders, a melted peppermint stuck to the dashboard. I curl my legs into my lap, accidentally knocking the glove box open. (It tends to overflow, even though she attached velcro to force it closed.) Crumpled Playbills, a Bible, a copy of Jane Eyre, Altoids, thick stacks of Dunkin Donuts napkins, and a purple Swiss Army knife, all fell on me. Louise let me move my seat belt behind my back so I could fix it. It doesn’t have to be an hour ride up, to drive through the Christmas lights, but she goes slow. Even with the lids popped off our styrofoam hot chocolate cups, and vanilla chapstick layered on my lips, her car smells like wet pennies. When I was little I slept over at Louise’s. I had to blow up my own air mattress. Seated on the living room floor with the plastic pump in my lap, I covered the bed with hand-me-down sheets, and homemade pillow cases. At night the Wizard of Oz played on a loop. 54

Spring 2022 Louise sat at her sewing machine, until she shu off the lights, handing me a purple flashlight to read. I shined it along the room. A glass cabinet full of fabric and yarn, my school picture hung up on the sage green wall, seven angels lined up on the mantel, looking me in the eye. They hold onto harps, books, and a few, each other.. The figurines always smiled at me. Once I asked her, “Why are your angels always white?” I stopped by her little house yesterday, to drop off her groceries and prescription. The front door is lined with orange marigolds that match her tinted pill bottles. I tripped over the boxes of Girl Scout cookies stacked on the mudroom floor, knocking them down. I scrambled to fix them and leave her plastic bags, along with a few balloons. They matched the shiny, red, heart-shaped one she used to buy me every Valentine’s Day. One year, I was quick to pop it. I cried, and she screamed at me, “Don’t you dare throw a hissy fit.” Sometimes Louise gets so angry, she doesn’t know what to do. I know I get that way too.

Issue 03

Jenny Declan Langton

When I think of her, Jenny she’s not sure of the time. Out by the watering hole we call a lake, Jenny sunbathes until her skin turns red. In a golden bathing suit she dips her feet into the water, never above the ankles, skin glistens — not a hair in sight. All out of place. When I look at Jenny, I focus on her blonde hair. I think of when she was sixteen and I, fifteen. When I look at Jenny, I get so nervous. If anything touched that blonde hair it wouldn’t be me. At sixteen Jenny likes to run. At fifteen, I have a broken hand. We lay together in the sun. At the lake, I keep my hand in a rubber glove, fastened with electrical tape like a cast to my arm. It’s of its own creation. Jenny watches me swim. Diving into the weeds the glove holds tight to my hand. I feel temperature but not space. There are few fish here.

Spring 2022 Back on the shore the sun will set but I won’t return. Jenny calls from the shore. Wearing my sweatshirt, she’s the last on the beach. Holding herself in a loving caress, I think, It wouldn’t be me.

Issue 03

Song for Goodbyes Qiao Se Ong

The room has started to swell up with all the things I keep saying i’ll pack. contact lens solution the 5 posters i worry are too pretentious (even for me) to put up on the new college dorm walls There is a lot of sunscreen, and a lot of notes from all the people I cannot take with me. Soon I will have to bring down the luggage, curse how close the fan is to the highest shelf, how heavy the bag is In my small arms. In farewells, they have proven to be much stronger than they are in pools of uncertainty Even in the muddy, unkempt arena of the written word It has fared far better. i detest all the ways I cannot be A friend to change. But when Sabrina tells me that an end is also a beginning, that when I leave a place I am also arriving Somewhere, I no longer feel as though I need to swallow A tsunami and keep quiet about it. It’s no secret that I’m leaving — all my bags seem to whisper it when I sleep Every red dotted line headed elsewhere knows it, too 58

Spring 2022 There are songs for goodbyes, like there are hands for gloves letters for mailboxes and kisses for cheeks and lips and I think this difficulty breathing, this inability to zip the bag and this letter I keep writing and rewriting, this must be mine.

Issue 03

Coolit Silvie Schlein

This one is going to be about how things move from very fast to very still. This one is going to be about how surprising that realization is, and how Coolit wanted all of her thoughts to be beautiful. Coolit was big but she seemed small. She knew that she was big, and she wished that she seemed big. She wanted to be seen so bad it hurt, but even when people saw her it wasn’t enough. She saw an old man (old because that’s how he seemed to her) eating a bagel in a pink hat one day. This was a big moment for Coolit because, in that moment, that man was very beautiful and big to her. She wasn’t sure if he felt big or beautiful, but she could see that he was. After that, Coolit would walk around and stare at things very closely and make them big. If Coolit walks by you, this is what it feels like: it feels like that shrinking is gone. It feels like that wall you were just staring at is full of soft speckles and shadows. It feels like “holy shit, did you see that? That makes me think about how I felt when I jumped into cold water last summer, that makes me think about how I felt when I realized that I was making things all the time.” But also it feels like “I am doing so much while I do nothing, if I stand really still can I watch things change?” and “I saw a shooting star and you missed it, I wish you had seen, I wish I could share that with you.”

Spring 2022 Coolit is wonderful at telling stories. She tells stories about now (here) and about sometime soon. Sometime soon! Those are Coolit’s best stories. When she tells these stories, Coolit gets bright and confusing. Her eyes meander and close and sometimes she looks at you so hard that you grow. And when you grow then you say “Coolit, I think I know what happens next!” and you tell the story with her and it’s a together moment where anything is possible. And sometimes Coolit is absolutely too much and it is horribly distressing. Very freezing then and confused and lost and wondering and falling. These times are hard, and she knows it. However, Coolit has decided that these moments are also necessary. This is when things are simply out of control. It’s honestly pretty fucked, and not everyone will understand her which makes it harder. Sometimes this makes you feel like you’d rather not even think at all, even about how big things are because you see things are shrinking all around. That’s when you could lose what you have so you’d rather not have it now so you don’t get upset later when it is taken away/goes away of its own accord. Coolit says this: “better to have things to lose.” I want to lie down and watch a bird fly so that when my eyes suddenly see the tree the bird is flying to, I am confused that the tree does not move as well and suddenly I am aware that I am still and I can feel the grass against my back and realize that I had been flying too just then.

Issue 03

Decades of Passing Jen Thornquest

“You’re wonderful.” As I looked over the receipts fastened to my daily server report, I slowed down for a moment and grinned. Scribbled at the top of ticket number 18 were those two words. As I read them I remembered the coy woman who autographed the ticket and my stomach fluttered. The fluttering in my stomach began earlier in the brunch shift when I remembered her subtle hello and eye contact over the top of her horn-rimmed glasses. Now that I think of it, her knees swayed gently as she asked how my morning was going. And my morning was going. Spilling over in a hustle and piping hot brunch plates. In the flow of drink deliveries, I made a point to slow as I approached her table and let the slowness allow me to notice how nicely she smelled. The fragrance of her perfume mingled with fresh fruit crepes and lemon curd. I felt a little dizzy. So I went back to the hustle. A catalog of warm emotions flipped in my belly: playful flirtation and misplaced confidence danced together with nervous wondering and doubt. Emotional rolodexing: first, it was doubt that asked me to the dance floor. Second, fear. Catalogs stacked as high as the ceiling could not begin to hide the decades of passing, covering and denying my tender attraction to the soft eyes and gentle curves of a woman. Did she think I was attractive? Was she hitting on me with her inviting conversation and charming compliments and does she really wonder where I purchased my silk neckerchief ? 62

Spring 2022 Today’s busy lunch rush kept me from having to answer my mind’s wanderings and I instead simply asked if I could warm her coffee with the local drip. She nodded, flipped the page of the Boise Weekly, and requested a little more cream. Cream and sugar and oh, the sweetness of her compliments soothed the flutter in my belly and confidence took the lead. Yes, I do look and feel rather beautiful today and my nude lip color probably does go well with the blush in my scarf. But no, a woman would not be inviting me into the scandal of public flirtation. After all, how does she know I delight in women? Is it now obvious that I am attracted to women? This is an abrupt catalog-page-turn to the deepness of fear. This was a hurried jig and I am sure I practiced enough to avoid the dance floor altogether. But perhaps passing has eluded me and I didn’t even notice. Now that both the receipts and the shift were logged away for the day, I took time to pause. If the fluttering of nerves were indeed pages of my catalog of feelings, then 12 o’clock sharp chimed the time when doubt took me under her arm and turned to the page of questioning. Did today’s lovely lunchtime customer really hope I would share why the Chicken Curry is my favorite dish on the new menu or was she simply enjoying my company? Where is the page with coquette charm and welcome, wandering eyes? Did I dog-ear the page that reminds me to smile back with rosy cheeks when fragrant figures pass by and remember to stop? Nude lips and blushing silk could be partners in a new whirl on the floor if I can remember those feelings too. Does this dusty paperback of protected emotions have room for a new chapter? Yes. Yes, it does. It begins with the words, “you’re wonderful.” 63

Issue 03

cardamom Jackie Hahn

You nip it at the bud to expose black seeds. Eat the insides you say. I smell spice in the air. I taste it in your breath. I like it. Cardamom: third most expensive spice in the world. Nothing beats the taste of you exploding in my mouth. Our fingers and lips have been exposed to this type of Careful pulling. Excavating. The type you wouldn’t get Given you grew up here. Green exposes black, aromatic seeds. Ease your tongue. Your lips expose your teeth as you chew. White enamel Which threatens to throw light. Soft crackle of the initial Exposure. Breaking open all that you wish to consume. A burst of flavor coats your tongue as you chew. I smell It all over you. Tastes like medicine, like healing over, like home remedy. Tastes like long love, getting better, becoming stronger. Tastes like home, tastes like get better soon, tastes like I love you. I watch as a small pile of cardamom husks accumulate. Small green husks make up a little mountain.

Spring 2022

To my New Jean Klurfeld Content Notes: body horror

Take off my skin when I get to you take it off like an evening coat after a long day and I am oh so tired and you want to take off everything that covers me take it off because you know how badly I need to feel clean again, I need to feel new again take off my skin when I get to you and give it a bath, godly and tremendous in golden light, and anoint it with oils scrub me down, my arms and my legs and my tits and my fingers, thirsty my body is (though you will never understand this) (you do not have to) take off my skin when I get to you let me curl up and watch you with the rest of me, I want to see someone else with me instead of taking part, for once kneel down and worship my skin, clean smooth holy, clean smooth holy, and let me be new with your touch

Issue 03

The Remembered Dog Will Conley Content Notes: animal death

You see, he should have died a long time ago. So I should not have expected a goodbye, should not have hoped that my hands would remember his last shuddering breath and the clatter and collapse of his ribs, shaking themselves into silence beneath a blanket of October-colored fur. I should have known it would happen how it did. I know I still would have cried if I had seen the final tremble of his paw. What I don’t know is how my tears would have tasted if I had shed them into his fur, or his water bowl, or the linoleum floor instead of letting my sorrow drip into the dirt at the county fair. All I had was the whisper of him through a screen, and all I could do was tell him: My grief will always be unfinished and your teeth will always be crooked but I will remember, always, the color of your fur.

Spring 2022

Daylight saving time ends. Lila Goldstein

We are both in our classes discussing extraction, like skin of my thumbs flicked onto the living room rug, and what stings like a burn. On our walks we always talk about the houses, what it would feel like to own one. Warm stairwells. You name colors. The frogs at the park pond must partially freeze in the mud, not able to cook and eat dinner for roommates, not able to fuck either. Asking: what if one day in spring you wake up as a baby, never sleeping again? A croak. A low hum. Asking: Alexa, what’s an allegory? And an absence of voice. A nonanswer. Dangerous to go places, especially in dark times. But Stop & Shop is open until midnight. Great houseplants there. Just exciting enough to come down super late for. Then the open of trees without leaves; guitar, pick, capo. Still air in the streetlight; dew, an ear for white noise. The fog of short days always spent on our knees.

Issue 03

on discolored days Lune Bush

i’ve tried romanticizing i’ve tried simplifying and tea and coffee and crayons. love and fights and blueberry cake. notebooks and lace and flowy skirts. i’ve tried bookstore jobs and cafe jobs and colleges in the new england fall with red leaves and gold leaves and crimson. i’ve tried prozac cymbalta and ativan. driving and listening to birds and songs and voices and eating lucky charms. but still it funnels back to a discontent. a melting grey into grey and no matter how hard i try to color the days with anything: kisses, music, crinkled up newspapers, it all just fades away into impatience. waiting. i feel as though living is just waiting. until suddenly—one day— the apples in the autumn, melted candle wax dripping onto the desk fades away into what it always was: a facade for better days. here i am again. i always am.

Spring 2022

Orion Avery Martin

Orion water runs in rivulets through my belly hair

howling

air awaiting

wavy distraction from cold

treetops no one else out

in the cold

punishment inter—

burnt marshmallow

air

run uphill to Orion

over a bank of

dark

interstices askew treetops

howling from the woods

are there wolves frozen in

my breath ghosts punishment

in streetlights

in western Massachusetts?

uphill bow forever

drawn

to Orion above the shadows—

Issue 03

“This poem is perfect. You’re never gonna hear it for the first time again.” – Hannah Thukral Marissa Carl

the tent is down, the Green is brown. it’s foggy today, the Green is grey. it snowed last night, the Green is white.

Spring 2022

x-ed out Oakley Marton

i am sitting in my childhood bedroom, but i still miss home. i miss the sounds of my roommates tip-toeing around before their early class. i remember hearing the sound of hair being brushed that first day, from my halfasleep state, just hearing the noise like waves falling over me with my eyes still shut (sometimes it felt right to pretend that i was unconscious, especially when hoping for a return trip, that soft peek at morning before you sink back deeper in the covers), the sound grating in my ears & the pressure raising with whatisthat whatisthat whatisthat & oh & realizing & recognizing & remembering. that sound i used to know so well, used to fear, scream & dodge out of my mom’s arms [deadname!!] just let me get those awful tangles out! i guess i forgot. i forgot between impulsive quarantine haircuts, three late nights of sharp staccato clarity between the obscured & indistinguishable months wielding blue elementary school scissors in our upstairs bathroom, first down to my elbows, then cut to my shoulders, at last up to my chin, until professional clippers cut it all away. 71

Issue 03 & i can breathe a little bit more, even in my childhood bedroom. i miss hearing my other roommate on the phone, speaking in vietnamese to her mom, in quiet familiar tones, her words easily blocked out in ignorance as the other two of us page through papers & books, studying domino effects, how long can your roommates study in symmetry until you guiltily pick up a pencil how neat & well made are their beds before you start throwing your comforter haphazardly, like it’s straight, like you’re trying, how long does it take you to just check something on your phone but lay on the bed for an hour instead, or to doodle in the margins & over friend’s willing hands & hide inside notebooks & spill unsteady ink over your veins she hangs up. & looks over to the bed across from her & they talk about their computer science class & their exchanges softly inform me of another language i can’t understand. i miss my soft green comforter, i miss the blow-up narwhal they let me place on the top of their armoire, i miss the scattered origami she has on her desk, that one slip that at least i’m not always the messy one, those band posters littered with fairylights and the love worn rabbit stuffed animal propped on the window. that time on her birthday we played lift-the-balloon between conversation & licked chocolate frosting off our fingers like sweet winter melodies. I miss overheating dorm rooms & overhearing snarky facetime 72

Spring 2022 conversations with her brother & then, like a flash, the high, sugary voice she would dip into when her dog was in view. i miss having people who tell you “you need to get food,” certain & steady & like clearly they are factual reasonable stem majors, like they didn’t sit awkwardly in the dining hall with me that first day, where i was the one out of the three of us who had to break out the lame icebreakers. & i was the one who got the courage to open the window to yell to the loud freshman to find somewhere else to talk at midnight on a thursday. (& they were the ones that helped me adjust my alarm schedule so i had even a chance of coming to class on time, who helped me find my phone when i quite literally accidentally threw it away, who stayed within arms reach from orientation to movie nights to mountain day hikes to finals.) these are the people who watch you, even if they don’t mean to. people who approximate & calculate & equivocate on your daily goings-on like sticking notes in a kid’s lunch box. (a lot of the notes are just to pressure you into watching squid game.) i feel back-to-the-beginning. we went to school. we were there. (weren’t we there?) we went through stages, from first day rapid tests to wasp73

Issue 03 filled social distanced picnics to slowly opening up the dining room, the oak room, the beacon, & tranquility. (that one i don’t remember that berit calls the yellow room.) the first time i saw a student sitting at an outer booth in the open it was a revelation. & now we tip the clocks back, with good reason, we will grab takeout in cold hands & wipe sleepy schmutz from our eyes during a 10 am zoom class, sinking deeper into the sheets. (even still.) i still try to remember that first collection of sounds in the morning, it’s embarrassing now, to try to hold it your hand like bits of cloud, like recalling a long-gone dream and coming up emptyhanded. all that’s left is the quiet, consistent fall of hair through the brush, the pair of them tip-toeing on creaky floors … and something else. a short, intentional red X my roommate struck on the fall calendar. it was only september but she was counting down the days to reach home. when i am sitting in my childhood bedroom i imagine her outline tracing over mine & I reach out & do the same.

Spring 2022

Lunches in Hollywood Madeline Grossman Content Notes: addictive behavior & allusions to eating disorder

I was suffocating inside, hiding from the chaos which had ensued just days earlier from the announcement of a nationwide COVID lockdown. The week before, I had been in Massachusetts, immersed in college life in the Berkshires until we were told to return home for our own safety. Home was Richmond, Virginia: former capital of the Confederacy, sliced in half by the muddy James River, home to a mediocre minor league baseball team, five universities, giant sycamore trees and craft breweries. Everyone knows everyone in Richmond, people say. But I’m not sure that anyone ever knew me. When I was 15, I spent my lunch periods running in a cemetery. As soon as the clock hit 11:55 a.m., I was rushing to stand, to shove away my books, and get to the door first. I would drop my bag in the basement, slam my locker shut and rush outside, dodging teachers and students. I was racing the clock, my hands fumbling to tie my shoelaces and pull my hair back, knowing that if I made one wrong move, if I lingered for one too many seconds, then catastrophe would strike. So, I would hurry down the sidewalk, resisting the urge to break into a sprint because I knew people could still see me from the first floor classrooms. Upon reaching the corner of Idlewood and China, my feet, seemingly of their own volition, would begin to strike the ground in the familiar pattern: left, right, left, right. Keep your legs light and fast. You can fly, if you put your mind to it. My mind would relax, the fear and pain not gone but instead pounded into the pavement until they were too tired to fight back. I would pick up the pace, heading up the hill on 75

Issue 03 Cherry, then making a sharp left turn down the path to Hollywood Cemetery. Past the old undertaker’s house, a creaky Victorian dripping with cobwebs and peeling purple paint. Past the cars parked on the hill, waiting for their mourners to return. Past office workers on their midday break, thinking to themselves, “What is she running from?” That first hill was always the best, its sharp descent filling me with a strange power. And I’d run on in silence, gripping my phone tightly in my right hand so that my index finger fit perfectly in the groove on the side. I’d run on, up the hill, past the train tracks, until I crested the bluff overlooking the James River. I would think to myself, “Most people would stop to enjoy the beauty here, I’m sure. But I don’t have time for that.” So I would continue, dodging bikers and walkers and funeral processions, past the mausoleum, cool marble filled with lives half-forgotten. I would force my eyes down, arms tightly tucked to my sides as I passed the construction workers, making my way down the hill past the Smiths and the Donovans, past the statue of a beloved dog, and the stone tree trunk marking the death of an infant. I would double back at Jefferson Avenue, retracing my footsteps of the past 10 minutes, fearing the wrath of some greater power if I skipped this ritual. And I’d make it all the way to the Confederate Pyramid, a huge stone structure commemorating a lost cause, and all I could think about was how I only had two hills left. I would wind my way to the sunken field at the base of the hill, running under the oak trees withered and dark, not stopping to wonder what things they’d seen. I would attack that final hill leading back up to the street, thrusting myself forward, just one more step and then another. And I’d sprint back to school, head down, slowing to a walk at the corner of South Pine and Spring to avoid suspicion. I would wipe the sweat from my face, dart inside, holding my breath, waiting to be questioned about where I’d been. But the questions never came, although I’m sure peo76

Spring 2022 ple wondered what exactly I was doing during all those lunch hours. I held the secret of Hollywood Cemetery in my heart for years, never wanting to expose the inexplicable drive I once had to run, run, run while my peers were busy eating and flirting and crying and living, not dying. At 18, I resented being thrust unceremoniously back into the place where I’d been a moody pre-teen, a volatile adolescent, a problem child, a silent shell. I didn’t want to relive my parents’ divorce, didn’t want to chat with neighbors who had watched through the kitchen window as I screamed my throat raw, protecting myself from that slice of bread, that spoonful of peanut butter that would ruin everything. I just wanted to stay in Massachusetts, safe in my anonymity, safe in the knowledge that I wasn’t that sick person anymore. I had gotten myself out; that had been my goal for the 10 years I’d spent in Richmond. Just get out, I’d think, it’s the city that’s causing this. We wouldn’t have lost everything if we had just stayed put in Boston all those years ago. But here I was, in Richmond for the foreseeable future. I was sad and lonely, scared of getting sick, and I didn’t know what to do with myself. I found myself trembling with the need to get out of that house, away from those choking walls. So one day, I started to wander. I roamed the city, starting from the Fan and moving through the Museum District, down Broad Street past the banks and the hookah lounges, across Monument and into Shockoe Bottom. I searched for alley gardens, pockets of green in the midst of concrete, with benches and roses and early lettuce crops. I looked for cats in windows, making up stories about them, naming them Chloe and Patrick and Jimmy. I found a chalkboard on Floyd with a different question every day: What is your biggest fear? Who makes you smile? I waved to people on their porches, always checking over my shoulder, crossing my fingers and praying that no one from high school would see me. 77

Issue 03 One day, I walked down Randolph and, on a whim, took a right on Main Street. I turned left onto Cherry and continued straight for a few blocks. I was studying the irrational pattern of chipped bricks in the sidewalk, admiring the way the weeds pushed through the smallest of cracks, when I glanced up. A massive wrought-iron gate stood in my way with the words “Hollywood Cemetery” arching over the top. I stopped, feeling the weight of memory crashing over me. My breath caught as I remembered the never-ending panic at the thought of being caught running instead of eating lunch. I remembered the sweat dripping from my hair onto my neck, felt the scar on my knee from the time I tripped and fell, sprawled in front of the World War I memorial. I stared at the sign, at the path before me. And then I walked forward. At first, I followed the same path I had always tread on those desperate midday runs. But when I reached the bluff overlooking the Hollywood Rapids, I stopped. I watched as a kayak the color of the sun drifted almost lazily down the river. I noticed the way the water curled around the boulders, the way the silty shallows almost let you see the bottom. A raindrop landed on my wrist and I watched it slide down my arm. And I walked on. This time, I took a right at the mausoleum, continued up the hill and stopped again to read the names of the dead buried there: Charles and Frank, Sandra and Adam, Sarah and Louise. I continued on, singing to myself as I walked. I heard a train pass the cemetery behind me, and wondered where it was going. I meandered my way through paths I’d never encountered before, greeting the squirrels and the souls of people long gone. When I finally reached the bottom of that massive entrance hill, I was overcome with a strange desire to sprint up it. I started to run, feeling that old burning in my chest and my legs, climbing my way out of the cemetery one step at a time. When I reached the top, I stood panting for a minute, staring

Spring 2022 vacantly at the faded sign painted on the brick building across the street: Van’s Laundromat, 5 a load! I remembered how I used to feel, after that mad dash through Hollywood Cemetery. I remembered how I used to feel, being 15 and obsessed, obsessive–my whole world revolving around the completion of this run. The gravestones, weathered and worn, heavy and somber in their reminder of what I would inevitably become–and I ignored them. It’s curious, really, to think of how much time I spent in that graveyard when I was so far from alive. At the time, I would have argued that I was alive; after all, couldn’t I run seven miles during lunch? Couldn’t I feel my heart beating, too fast? Couldn’t I see my chest heaving? But, living is more than existing; it requires awareness, demands it. Living is savoring colors, watching people love, touching, holding, tasting wine. Living is watching the stars flicker and hearing the caw of a crow and wondering who he’s calling out to. At 15, 16, 17, I was so confident in the staying power of my youth, so confident that I wouldn’t regret wasting my life on numbers and times and miles run because life was infinite. I was infinite. But somehow, some day, I can’t recall exactly, I must have stopped running. I must have rested my head against the wall and thought, maybe this body deserves to sit. I must have taken a good look at the night sky, or a tree turning scarlet in October, or the way my sister’s eyes crinkle when she laughs, and thought to myself, oh how lovely that is. I must have realized that I’d been running so fast that I had left myself, my body, in the dust. At 19, I left Richmond for good. I backed my white Subaru out of the alley behind Grove Avenue, cautiously edging my way around parked cars and creeping out into the narrow street. I had pictured this moment for so many years, had scoffed at the idea that I could ever be anything but overjoyed to leave. After all, what had Richmond ever done for me? But 79

Issue 03 that was before I was 18 and living, really living, in Richmond for 16 months. That was before I let myself be curious about the city, before I laid on the river rocks and pretended to be one of the art school kids, high on life. That was before I took sunset drives across the Belvedere Bridge, before I did my homework in Scuffletown Park. That was before I confronted Richmond, before I confronted myself and who I used to be, before I stumbled upon Hollywood Cemetery for a second time and rediscovered what it is to be alive. I glanced at my sister in the passenger seat, then to the cobblestones quickly fading behind us. And then, I drove on.

Spring 2022

Sometimes I Sit And Think And Sometimes I Just Sit Declan Langton

After and for Courtney Barnett When the sun shines in Newport, it makes me nauseous. Eighty-degree day, I’m thinking about guitar strokes. I passed out watching the band of brothers — two banjos on stage. The manager brought me water. “Redheads shouldn’t be out in the sun.” My face flushed and my hair just barely red at the time I accepted the bottle and sat with my back against the fence. Men crooned on stage. Later, a woman donning guitar and two men behind her. Drums flaring. Instead of lyrics she screams poetry. Brown bangs pasted sweaty to her forehead. She’s the kind of performer who jumps from ledges. Courtney, I wanted to tell you about her. In my more aging days I want to ramble like her. Each feeling is encased in place. I think I spiral as she does. With Courtney, I get to walk down roads we’ve all seen and tell you about the strip malls that we all know. The coffee shop on the corner where people like me go to romanticize ourselves.

Issue 03 There’s a radiator that clangs in the winter. In the summer, an air conditioner that pushes through its grates poisoned, green air. Follow the road and one day you’ll find my house. There isn’t much to know, beyond the ghost of a mother and child that wander the rooms. From the stereo emerges words and worlds I used to know nothing about. Muttering: crunching guitars. These old thoughts grow strong through art and visions. I sit with the ghosts on the couch: We listen, carefully — Courtney, I wanted to tell you that I like your voice. They way it floats against the walls. Running up them, a hand dancing over a fretboard — like pulling a pair of too-tight shoes over socks with holes in the toes. Courtney, you make me want to pull plants from their roots and run down the street in the summer, no matter how hot. In Newport, those roads are narrow, but I think they lead to places where heat won’t make me faint.

“Untitled” Sunny Wei

“Blueprint #1” Olivia Brandwein

Spring 2022

pyro Gabrielle Rodriguez Gonzalez

Mollusk pulls in the lips swallows the syllable coats the orifice before emerging set down. feel sun stick to skin, feel oxygen fill water-less lungs. light the match. swimming push prehistoric ocean past pressurized prison calciumed coating cracked open quiet down. open the body, feel the warmth, settle into antiquated allegory. Primordial puddle traded for landlubbing Evolutionary spit up.

Issue 03

Black Skimmer Sarah Smith

The ocean feeds you fills you to the bleeding-red gills with hurricanes during nesting season. The lower mandible of your obsidian-capped lower beak, long and bleeding-red, gouges the surface. The glowing water and silver coast is cut by the vertical slit of your pupils.

Spring 2022

The sky can’t hold you forever. The steady beat of long wings carries you over the storm and the phantom sandbank, the sea of your heart surging. Where will you go?

Issue 03

we’re eating steamers Declan Langton

In our final memory of him we’re eating steamers. Each of us, with a teacup of hot salt water; she leans over to open the shell but he’s already digging for its seam. Slip a nail between the halves and pull — steam erupts from the inside. We smell the sea. “I didn’t know you’d remember,” she says. He doesn’t look up — conversation was hard then, but seafood was easy. Tide charts were read with ease that morning. Fresh bass baked in the oven. He cleans the sand from the clam and drops it in his mouth. A smile spreads across his face and she sips spiked orange juice. By then, we had only a hundred days left. We broke shells and piled them on the table.

Spring 2022

Open letter Elle Provolo

How dare you mistake my words for poetry I am simply mimicking the song of the cardinal, her voice, a remembrance of a mother. Its feathers bleed into the snow desperately seeking the refuge of spring. How dare you take away my anger I am a companion of the lightning that guides me home when my vision is blurry save for the caked dirt underneath my fingernails from digging through a soil that isn’t mine. How dare you underestimate me I am the flag, stained white with surrender who flies bravely alone amongst a field of loss and collapse. I absorb the pain of destroyed earth. How dare you love me I am a child born with two names, a woman burdened by nothingness. I am the seeds who refuse to grow, their whispers of life, sweet and ephemeral. I know only myself, static and greedy.

Issue 03

New Snow Liz Lewis

New snow has made a desert of this field. It fell for hours, from late last night into this afternoon. The dusty, powdery kind. Great for skiing, fine for sledding, awful for making anything (balls, men, angels). Never packs, never unpacks, never settles in. Always on the move. Each flake retains itself, tiny boundaries holding firm, refusing to release into one another. They insist on form (individual). They resist form (collective). It makes sense for a traveler’s lifestyle. Desert winds exchange grains of sand, passing them, scattering them. Winter winds, in these conditions, do the same. There is a gust whipping its way across the north end of the field. It whisks the flakes into its dance, swirling them to their next temporary place. This is one of those rare times when wind is visible — it has a color, a shape, adopting the likeness of the snow it carries. You can see how it pulls from the land, toys with this flexible new layer. Maybe this is more of a sandbox than a desert. The trees at the edges of the expanse — green and brown and now white — are the playspace’s plastic barriers. The wind is a child with power. What remains, once the wind has dispersed or slowed or left entirely, is this landscape’s version of sand dunes — shallow stacks of layered powder. They’re about two snowflakes thick, visible only by their faint, squiggled edges. A baby step towards form (collective). Picture a topographic map that’s been granted no more than a centimeter’s worth of depth. Or that watery

Spring 2022 acrylic paint they sell to kindergarten teachers, layered on top of itself until it rises incrementally into the third dimension. Now make it white, decorated with evidence of motion.

Issue 03

the endless skyway Elle Provolo

this is not an american love affair, i tell you. you shake your head as if the founding fathers have told you profound secrets of the invention of baseball and the sweetness of apple pie during the cruel summer. i ask you to look at your reflection and see the stars in your eyes, feel the way the fireflies see you as an open jar, while i sit alone with the crickets. the only red white and blue i know are my skinned knees my numb lips and the way the sky stares at me through hidden clouds; this country was made for you. pledges are affirmations for a man that doesn’t exist, pleading for a relief from borne destruction, an abuse of freedom.

Spring 2022

W 152nd Street Sandra Grace

“my DNA not for imitation ……… your DNA an abomination” – Kendrick Lamar born in 1947 she would sit outside on her broken-up stoop of the Harlem projects– she lived in a constant war zone. the police sirens wailed through all hours of the day, searching. searching for the dark man in a hood, searching for the dark woman with tight braids sandra would later bring a dark girl with tight curls into this world, 1966, alone and scared–the two secretly spent their nights atop an old Chinese restaurant somewhere in Manhattan.

THIS. FIGHT. ISN’T. OVER. THIS–FIGHT–WILL–NEVER–BE– OVER

Issue 03 1966, my mother flourished into this world. she would grow into an amazing, charismatic, loving, and broken young woman. told she was never smart, never good enough never pretty enough –or she was told she was smart for a little black girl she was good enough for a little black girl she was pretty for a little black girl “for a little black girl” “your hair is nice for a black girl” “your lips are nice for a black girl” “you speak so well for a black girl” Nina Simone and James Brown blared from my mother’s record player “SAY IT LOUD! “I’m black and I’m proud”

There is nothing white people hated more than a proud black woman. “If I were starting off today, I would love to be a well-educated black, because I believe they do have an actual advantage.” – 2016 President Elect

Spring 2022

FIGHTING UNTIL OUR SKIN TURNS WHITE AND OUR BONES ARE BEATEN

REMEMBERING HOW EXTRAORDINARY WE ARE E

AND HOW MIGHTY WE ARE XHALING THE BREATH THAT WE KEEP DEEP INSIDE OF OUR CHEST

EMANATING LOVE AND RADIATING LIGHT DEMANDING CHANGE NOW, WE WILL NOT WAIT ANOTHER 400 YEARS RGANIZING A REVOLUTION AND SHIFT IN POWER, THEY WILL NOT WIN AKING THEIR NAMES HEARD, THEY WON’T FADE INTO THE ABYSS

Trayvon Martin, Eric Garner, Sandra Bland, Breonna Taylor, Michael Brown, Walter Scott, Tamir Rice, Emantic “EJ” Fitzgerald Bradford Jr, Chinedu Okobi, Antwon Rose Jr., Bettie “Betty Boo” Jones, Aiyana Mo’Nay Stanley-Jones, Elijah McClain Sterling Lapree Higgins, Walter Lamar Scott, Phillip Gregory White, Meagan Hockaday, Natasha McKenna, Rumain Brisbon The silence is deafening as my family hears another name placed on the ever-growing list. Hear the names, hear the cries, hear the wounds cutting deep, hear the screams, hear the–

Issue 03

[The Korean American who loved Buddaejjigae so much he married it] Jackie Hahn Content Notes: racial slur

This is home food from outside Or bunsik or hangover food or Lunch. Funny then, how it comes from a war, from pulling Trash out the back end of the US Military base. Funny how, I grew up in the States without a taste For Heinz Baked Beans, or Spam from a Can, or American Cheese. Funny how, they praise him so much we adopt him as Korean, while the rest of the American people have only just made Gooks publicly worthy of sexualization. Funny How he looks just like the white guys in the military base. Funny how it upsets my stomach. Funny how they call him an American who is so Korean He’d marry Budae Jjigae. Funny how when its translated It sounds like Korean American. Funny how it’s suddenly Cuisine instead of Garbage. Funny how, He will teach his students at hagwon how to receive men like him. How to take in a boot whole, how to wrap your tongue Around the language. How to spit the words, how to orate well, how to pronounce Coke. 96

Spring 2022

Issue 03

Contributors Olivia Brandwein is a senior art studio major and French minor. Her work often includes unconventional materials and humor. Lune Bush is a queer, nonbinary writer from Los Angeles County. They’ve previously shared their work through attending open mic nights, most memorably at the Last Bookstore in Downtown LA. They combine personal narrative style with short poetry in an attempt to express the nuance of daily life. Marissa Carl is a junior double majoring in psychology and Spanish. She has read all of the Pretty Little Liars books and is currently in the process of re-reading them. She hopes her silly little poem will make you smile :) Will Conley is a theatre and English major with a longstanding passion for poetry. Their work has appeared in the Mount Holyoke Review once before, and they have performed in numerous poetry slams. They are grateful for the opportunity to share their work with everyone. Lila Goldstein is an English major with a notorious track record of not turning in writing assignments. Her poetry has appeared in Open Call Magazine and the first issue of the Mount Holyoke Review, and she is a playwright for the MHC Student Theater Festival. Lila is also a proud member of MHC Glee Club and MHC English Handbell Ensemble. Sandra Grace is a senior who has been writing ever since she can remember. She is studying English and sociology and is a member of the varsity lacrosse team. Sandra hopes once she graduates in the spring that she can transfer her love for writing and creativity into a full-time career.

Spring 2022 Madeline Grossman is a junior studying Italian and psychology at Mount Holyoke. Her interests include Italian literature and history, along with the psychology of development and adolescence. In her free time she enjoys spending time with her dogs and embroidering whales. Jackie Hahn is a critical social thought and English major at Mount Holyoke College. She is interested in exploring the intersections between her Korean identity and her sexuality. She likes cats and coffee. Midge Hartshorn is a queer, disaffiliated member of the Mormon church who turned to the medium of blackout poetry as a method of reclaiming the religious texts and iconography that shaped their early life. This piece is composed of pages torn out of the set of scriptures they used personally as a teenager. Midge is currently studying mathematics and astronomy at Mount Holyoke College. Lee Heintzelman has been writing both poetry and prose for as long as they can remember. They are an English and film media theater double major, and love anything to do with storytelling or words. Rebecca Kilroy is a junior double majoring in English and Spanish. Her work has appeared in previous issues of the Mount Holyoke Review as well as Laurel Moon, Capulet Magazine and The Copperfield Review Quarterly. She is the co-president of Write Here, Write Now, an on-campus writing group. In spring 2021, she was a Prose Editor for MHR (which is how she knows they’re awesome).

Issue 03 Jean Klurfield is described by her sister as a lover of words (soft or harsh as long as you’re good with them), old things (antiques that transport you), her hair (she sees her own heritage in every twist and tangle), the outside (only when it is not real, rather magical and sunlight), and ladybugs. She sees sweetness in scraped knees, rosy cheeks, and a hot chocolate to warm you up. Declan Langton is a senior (2022) English & French major at Mount Holyoke. They grew up in New England and write about small towns and small spaces within expansive landscapes. Currently, they are working on a capstone project about lighthouses and serving as Editor-in-Chief of Mount Holyoke News. Liz Lewis is a senior English major at Mount Holyoke. In addition to being a Prose Editor at the Mount Holyoke Review, she is Managing Editor of Content for the Mount Holyoke News. In her free time, she likes to draw, write, and make mac and cheese. Avery Martin is a senior at Mount Holyoke College as well as a runner, a climber, and a maker of many things. They like to write about the complexities of living in a body in the world. Oakley Marton is a first year at Mount Holyoke College. They have also contributed to De Paul’s BlueBook of Best Illinois Highschool Writing and Hey Alma, the Jewish feminist news site. They’re involved on campus with the Gaylord Book Club, the Neurodivergent Student Association, and also occasionally run their own book review blog, https://justaddbooks23.wixsite.com/ oaktreereads/blog. Layne McArdle is a senior at MHC studying philosophy. She has been writing poetry for years and this is her first time being published in the MHR. She loves Ditto and cooking for her friends.

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Spring 2022 Grace McMurray is a first year at MHC and started formally writing poetry in high school as a therapeutic practice to express her thoughts and feelings. Her work is heavily inspired by the little things hidden in everyday life and the emotions that they evoke. Qiao Se Ong is currently a first-year student and is passionate in using the arts to capture the complexities of the relationships we share with people and places. Amelia Ostling is a third semester senior at Mount Holyoke College with an ever-looming graduation date: December 13th, 2021! *cue suspenseful music.* She dreams of publishing a graphic novel, adopting a cat, buying out her entire Etsy wishlist, and traveling to rural Texas to see the stars—she just has to pass her classes first. Gina Pasciuto is a junior studying English and theatre arts. Her work has previously appeared in journals such as Snapdragon and Lemon Yellow Press. When not writing poetry, they can generally be found on stage, in a practice room, or on Twitter (@spockshock) having funky little thoughts about Star Trek. Ava Provolo writes poems, as well as dabbles in writing comedy for television. She can usually be found talking excitedly about music or embarking on another cooking/baking adventure. She is motivated by the alluring quality of parmesan cheese. Elle Provolo has enjoyed creative writing since her third grade teacher told her she had potential as a writer. Her poems, in many ways, are attempts to explore her complex feelings. She loves dancing in her room and the simplicity of a plain cheese pizza. Regis Reed is a graduating senior of Mount Holyoke College, currently finishing his degree in English. Though published previ101

Issue 03 ously in the Mount Holyoke Review, this is his first time submitting prose work, and he is excited to be branching out from poetry. He thanks Morgan for telling him to submit, as he has a terrible memory and forgot the deadline. He hopes you enjoy this collection. Gabrielle Rodriguez Gonzalez is not a poet. They’re trying though, and they hope you like it. You can find them on instagram @bittersweetbratt. Morgan Sammut is an English major and computer science minor interested in interactive fiction. They love weird writing, fencing, & crocheting. They also did the layout for this lovely magazine you’re currently reading! Silvie Schlein is a junior at Mount Holyoke College and was born and raised in the upper west side of NYC. She is currently studying English and chemistry and squeezes in art classes whenever possible. She doesn’t have much experience with creative writing, but recently discovered a passion for short fiction. Danyah Shaikh is a first year student. This is her first publication in the Mount Holyoke Review. Sarah Smith is a Frances Perkins Scholar at Mount Holyoke where she is studying music. She resides in Easthampton with her roommate and their two cats, Earnie and Gilbert. Jen Thornquest is a Frances Perkins Scholar attending Mount Holyoke College as a returning student in the “great do-over” of 2021. Previously a DJ, the microphone was her favorite power tool to engineer social settings, but without large group gatherings, Jen’s days are full of collecting 40 years of lost thoughts, as a writer.

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Halle Wyatt is a first year student who grew up on an island in the Puget Sound. She spends much of her days reading and writing stories about love. Qingyang (Sunny) Wei was born and grew up in Wuhan, China. She is a mixed-media undergraduate artist currently studying art and psychology at Mount Holyoke College in South Hadley, MA. She works with various artistic mediums including painting, multi-media sculpture, collage, digital art, printmaking, and more. Sunny had worked on metal sculpture with video projection and had collaborated on the exhibition Citing Memory: Reimagining Archives Through Art with ten other Five College artists last December.

Mount Holyoke Review 03

Articles inside

“This poem is perfect. You’re never gonna hear it for the first time again.” – Hannah Thukral / Marissa Carl

A Trauma Song / Elle Provolo

prophecies / Ava Provolo

Orion / Avery Martin

Choreography / Avery Martin

Contributors

The Korean American who loved...] / Jackie Hahn

New Snow / Liz Lewis

W 152nd Street / Sandra Grace

pyro / Gabrielle Rodriguez Gonzalez

the endless skyway / Elle Provolo

Open letter / Elle Provolo

Black Skimmer / Sarah Smith

we’re eating steamers / Declan Langton

Sometimes I Sit And Think... / Declan Langton

Lunches in Hollywood / Madeline Grossman

on discolored days / Lune Bush

Daylight saving time ends. / Lila Goldstein

x-ed out / Oakley Marton

The Remembered Dog / Will Conley

cardamom / Jackie Hahn

Coolit / Silvie Schlein

Decades of Passing / Jen Thornquest

Song for Goodbyes / Qiao Se Ong

Louise / Danyah Shaikh

Jenny / Declan Langton

service / Lila Goldstein

peachy clean / Layne McArdle

Oil Paint / Lee Heintzelman

guilty / Grace McMurray

abject horror! / Ava Provolo

on getting a tattoo / Halle Wyatt

Which Horror Movie Trope... / Morgan Sammut

entre/e / Gabrielle Rodriguez Gonzalez

Jello / Danyah Shaikh

the procedure / Gina Pasciuto

Don’t Touch the Glass / Rebecca Kilroy

Back to the Basics / Amelia Ostling

foster ghosts / Layne McArdle

Diary Entry 202: Does the Dog Die? / Regis Reed

dionysus / Elle Provolo

living room interlude / Lila Goldstein

catching flies / Elle Provolo

Nightstalker / Sandra Grace