Mosaic 2015 by Mosaic Magazine

Mosaic’s editorial staff would like to thank the Department of English in the College of Arts and Sciences at The Ohio State University for its generous support of Mosaic and this publication. More information about the Department of English is available at english.osu.edu.

Dear Reader, Thank you for supporting Mosaic in its 38th year of publication! The 2015 volume is the culmination of another year of hard work and excitement and celebrates The Ohio State University’s finest undergraduate art and literature. Congratulations to all of the authors and artists whose work has been included in Mosaic this year! Aside from continuing to produce a high-quality publication, Mosaic has hosted several events this year, including poetry readings, art workshops, our signature Professor & Protégé event, and the Unveiling of Mosaic 2015. Mosaic also co-hosted the second annual Student Film Fest @ OSU with the Film and Video Society. We would like to thank the members of our editorial board, art staff, layout staff, and literature staff for their enthusiasm and consistent dedication to Mosaic. In addition, we would like to express our gratitude to the Department of English, The Ohio Union, and UniPrint. Without them, the success of Mosaic’s events and the high quality of this publication would not have been possible. We would also like to thank our advisors, Pablo Tanguay and Ruth Friedman, for their support and guidance in all of Mosaic’s endeavors this year. Most importantly, this publication would not be possible without you—our readers, writers, and artists. Mosaic’s mission is to provide a platform for talented undergraduates to publish, share, and develop their work. Thank you for continuing to submit your work and support your fellow artists in the Ohio State undergraduate community by reading Mosaic. We hope that you enjoy this year’s edition of Mosaic and encourage you to get involved next year by joining a staff, submitting your work, and attending our events. For more information about our organization, please visit http://mosaic.org. ohio-state.edu, or email us at mosaic.magazine.osu@gmail.com. Sincerely, Ellen Milligan and Laura Novak The Editors-in-Chief Mosaic Magazine 2015

Table of Contents

LIT

ART

Highway 127 Yard Sale Day Anna Talarico

Palmer Valley Sleeps Dylan Ecker

The Dirty Laundry Laurie Hamame

Flamingo Land Jessica Williams

Why We Let Our Ducks Drive Samuel Fishman

Water Jessica Williams

Northern Ireland Coast Jane Lankes

Cartography Dylan Ecker

After Cezanne's Apples

The Fifth of July Dylan Ecker

Museum Man

County Antrim Jane Lankes

Mr. Roland and the Cat

Self-Portrait (If Rembrandt Had Found Cubism)

On Awareness 2.0

ART

Maya Gosztyla

Chichan Kwong

Samantha Finley

Genesis

Laurie Hamame

Untitled

ART

Laurie Hamame

Afternoon in Orton Bridget Cook

Identity Crisis Laurie Hamame

Perfume & Formaldehyde Samantha Finley

DC Drained

Jessica Williams

Diane Kollman

Rubik's Cube

LIT

Chichan Kwong

Anna Talarico

Bailey Martin

Constant

Priests in Black Gowns Paul O'Neill

Super Moon Laurie Hamame

LIT

Palmer Valley Sleeps Dylan Ecker

Gray clouds like everybody has seen. Like melting roof shingles poured slowly. Like sycamore bark plundered for new-world pulp. Like basilisk bones crawling under one foot loam. No picnics on rambling overgrowth or sparrow murmurs on sun-bleached branches. Dry acres shaded, pleading for whatever comes

Highway 127 Yard Sale Day Photograph Anna Talarico

next. Thunder is a mom pushing two children in a gray stroller down concrete, thinking â&#x20AC;&#x153;the grass looks horrid, when will it rain?â&#x20AC;? Leaves glass the nape of her neck. The neighbor closes every window because every goddamn channel is on flood watch and dinner is in the oven but the power goes out. Downstairs, kids stand by the screen door chanting suburban voodoo to liquefy hallways and failed spelling tests. A crack wriggles out, and somewhere a dog is barking.

The Dirty Laundry Laurie Hamame

will never end. We’re still driving from city to town, collecting dirty socks and hand-me-down jeans, soggy and sticky with our sweat. This evening hour, your nightgown is crumpled by a sleepless hotel party for two. Dry panties stay parched from all your fear that clings to the rear of the passenger seat—an unwelcome travel bug that bites. I can see its tight grip on your wrists. Though on my own, I go back home to wash and dry your month-old clothes. They thump on my bathroom floor like the steady beat of a drum. I swear I will come to you with suitcases full of fresh laundry, strip off all my clothes, pull the blinds, and scrub your body clean. I buzz like caffeine, but you keep counting your scars. I’m tired of loving you inside cars. Will you please put down the map?

ART

Flamingo Land Photograph Jessica Williams

Why We Let Our Ducks Drive Sam Fishman

Last December I took a young woman to a French restaurant in midtown where we spent a splendid afternoon eating small plates of fingerling potatoes, liver pâté, and talking about my mother. I remember the waiter, who arrived only with bottle-in-hand. I remember motioning to her glass of wine and saying something about cul-de-sacs and the rest of our lives. She smiled, I remember. She nodded thanks to the waiter as he filled her glass, and then reached for her coat and said she would be only a minute. Moments later the waiter would be gone, and I'd look up from the table and out the window and happen to catch a glimpse of this same young woman, struggling with the arms of her coat amidst a dead-sprint round the corner of 26th and Park avenue. Perhaps it’s because of these sorts of afternoons that I was surprised, months later, at having managed to speak to a woman during a concert in a warehouse basement. We had the sort of conversation I'd heard about other men having with women, either through an anecdote told to me by a friend or in passing between a couple reminiscing in conversation. Those ones where nothing said is remembered and things just happen from there, two people meet somewhere and talk for a while and then they're together and when you ask things like, “what'd you talk about” or “how do I do it”, they just say “it was Love and that's all. We just danced—I would lower my hand and she would raise it.” I've heard people say that. I remember thinking they thought that was what it was, even though it couldn’t have been—that there must have been something more. And so when I tell you I don’t know what we’d done, that there wasn’t more to say than “sometimes two people meet”, I’m sorry, because I'd want to know too. We talked, and I asked her to dinner. We scheduled a date, at her place. I was told to bring nothing so I brought wine. When I arrived I recognized her, it surprised me that I didn’t assume I would. I'd actively replayed the scenario in my head: exchanging a polite hug and then retreating to the restroom, opening the bathroom window (it is standard practice for all bathrooms to have windows in daydreams), and leaving. To my surprise she was beautiful, with a smile that seduced even sober eyes. Why she let me in the front door, how I could have said anything in the thirty minutes we'd spoken, one cannot know. I wore my duck socks, she giggled when I took my shoes off. The house was decorated by an adult. It occurred to me that she probably decorated it herself, that I might have the chance to see an adult's breasts, something I had assume would follow logically by being alive long enough, but never actually understood on a deeper, cognitive, emotional level. Looking around her living room, at times I was brought back to my childhood, reminded by a certain album or film or book. At other times, in the dining room

and kitchen both, I found rooms I’d hoped to live in but didn’t, with posters of my favorite musicians and comedians on each wall. I remember one portrait in particular, of Andy Kaufman, a poster I’d seen before. I’d been at a corner store where I nearly bought it, but instead spent the money on a chocolate bar after I noticed another man who'd just wrapped it under his arm call the cashier ‘faggot’ and skip out of the place. She told me she replaced the wooden floorboards with her own, and added a beautiful finish that I would describe exquisitely and in informed particulars if I were a man, but I am not and know nothing of wood. The wood looked nice. Her dog licked my shins. It jumped up onto my lap and then gnawed on my bangs. One learns to be accommodating, one must, though a dog had never before lapped up my hair. It must have been what I’ve heard people call a moment. She stared at the ends of my hair, watched them split, moisten, and darken in the mouth of the beast. She could focus—I noticed this then and for the first time. If I had made a single move in protest, I was sure, I would never make it upstairs. I nearly said, "I love you," but did not. She threw a tennis ball and the dog chased it. After her focus weaned I remembered I didn't love her, though I could still remember what it felt like to. She brought over a chocolate mousse. "It's made with avocados. Could you tell it's vegan?" she said. I could, one always can. She fed me a spoonful before I could answer and took my hand and moved me towards the stairs. The notes of burning candles and ginger that smelled pleasantly vague from the kitchen turned combative as we climbed upstairs, scents struck with the incalculable quickness of daytime robbery. We reached the top of the stairs. "I hope you don't mind," she said. "Of course not," is what I have said to this question my entire life. I cannot recall a single instance where I haven't replied 'of course not' to this question. If it were a question, there would be a multitude of answers which psychologists would have documented and published in various works, available both online and in journals around the country. But it isn’t a question—it’s a demand, a phrase which can only mean: "This is a part of me, and if you’d like to be with me, date me, marry me, if you would ever like to lay in bed beside me, it's a quality that you’ll accept." Inside, along with the candles that I’d assumed would and did line the windows and bed, was a crib. I hadn't heard the cry of a baby, I was certain, (being wary of the sound of a crying baby in a house one is visiting for the first time is a lesson one either is forced to learn or does not learn at all) and so when she lifted the cover off of the crib and still heard nothing, I felt relieved. There was no mobile to be found, no chewed plastics. There was no scent of diaper, of wipes, of powder, not even a shadow of a crawling infant sprawled on a faux-bearskin rug. Then I looked up at her and saw it on her eyes, wearing moisture like devotion, love like she might cry. And I took back everything I’d thought. Not all babies, I supposed, have a mobile. She reached into the crib, damn near nestled

down into it, and held it up in front of me. A duck. A mallard. Two feet tall, white feathered with yellow bill, there did not exist a more duck-like-duck than this particular duck. "He eats strawberries and lettuce," she said. She put him down on the floor, said it like I’d asked, though it is possible that I did and have forgotten. Years later when I'm lying on a brown button-perforated sofa at the feet of a psychiatrist, I will remember having saved the memory of her face at that moment as I tell her—that I'd never felt more aroused than at that very moment, never in my life. I felt compelled, in a way so sincerely barbaric that charges would have been rightly pressed had I been moved to action, to throw her onto the bed in front of the animal company I was certain I’d never again have, and make love to her. “That’s a good duck,” I said. I said that instead. I almost fell down to pet the thing, and before I could reach out my hand she stopped me. “Don’t,” she said. “Ever since the surgery he hasn’t been the same.” There’s a certain point that things can come to when one is wrapped so tightly, where sighs become indistinguishable from laughs, routine hallway pleasantries like “hey how are you” seem enigmas to be solved. Producing a response becomes so futile an effort that, rather than respond, one might as well spend their time roasting flies by magnifying glass on the concrete heat of a neighbor’s blacktop driveway, shouting profanities at passersby. One is forced to think less or more of nothing. “He was in a car accident. Drunk driving,” she said. “That’s a shame,” I said. I’m certain this is what I said, without question. Another instance of tragedy by drunk driving, added to the list of the others. “He couldn’t see the road because he’s a duck,” she said. And then she picked up the duck with one hand and took mine in the other. She paused. She touched her nose to the duck’s nape. “Why do we let our ducks drive?” she said. She put him onto the floor. The dog entered the bedroom and fell to his back and his legs sprung into the air, beckoning the duck. “How much did he have?” I said. “Three slices of Wonder Bread soaked in Maker’s,” she said. I looked at her. “College kids, you know,” she said. And I felt I did. She told me to lie on the bed. Between quacks and snorts I made out her whispers: “You should have met him before the surgery. He was so good.” She unzipped me and grabbed low-down. “Tell me,” I said. And her hand moved up and down. “We used to go on walks,” she said. “They make leashes for them too,

but they’re expensive—we would just walk without one.” “I wish I could’ve met him then,” I said. Things were almost over now. She got up close, right on top of me, every part of her on mine. “Me too,” she said. When I went outside that night to go, I remember thinking about her mother and about my own mother. I was trying to remember something my mother told me, something about the night. The shutters on the houses of the avenue were all closed—two, three, four stories insides hidden from passers-by. An ice-cream truck crooned from ways away. I hailed a cab but let it go. I nearly crossed the street then didn’t. I sat down on the curb, saw water collect beneath a sewer grate. In my shirt pocket I found a petal of lettuce and held it for a moment, then let it sit on my tongue.

Water

Photograph Jessica Williams

Cartography Dylan Ecker

My mom sleeps in the passenger seat. Clunk, and loop, “Hands of Glory” goes for the 4th time. All I do is try to steer and go just above the speed limit. My feet moving inches but this car moving miles. Next exit: Rosy Stone Vineyard. Where the mayor doesn’t wear clothes and the grocers only carry papaya. There is a girl playing drums on the sidewalk. All the houses have chessboards for siding. Where do I go when I am not myself. Orange cones mean something is wrong. Machinery dig and sift the median. A sign says Ketley Avenue in 5 miles. A road with a singular coffee shop and wives smoking peach cigarillos because their husbands are working for scrap at the local sawmill and I think I see my dad standing in a puddle but it’s a statue of a fireman holding a dog. My dad taught me to drive. My dad drank coffee. My dad left my mom. The sun is coming up. Car navigator tells me arrival time is 6:01 pm.

Northern Ireland Coast Photograph Jane Lankes

The Fifth of July Dylan Ecker

When I can’t sleep I crawl out my window to the train tracks covered in thistle. I watch our three horses search the valley. Streetlights growl faraway. A violin plucks, stutters, jumps inside my ribcage. The dark is still filling with sprays of lonely color. The barn at Rosy Stone Vineyard is open. Lantern light spews into the corral. There is supposed to be a comet out tonight. My friends worry about me sometimes: wandering the streams at night, listening to frogs peep and plunder for minnows, they think I’ll never come back. I’ll follow the fish to the stubborn Gulf, eat moss and rocks, grow gills, talk in a patchwork of English and Fishlish, callous my fins on the return upstream, spawn with a mermaid mistress, get snagged and escape, teach my brood long division, plummet down the teaming throat of a grizzly. I whistle the horses in. Crickets snore and my radio plays static.

County Antrim Photograph Jane Lankes

Mr. Roland and the Cat Maya Gosztyla

When I was little, there was a man living next door to me by the name of Mr. Roland. From the first moment I laid eyes on him, I felt an instinctive feeling of distrust, the way one would fear a dimly-lit basement or that never-used closet hidden beneath the stairs. He was entirely bald but for two scraggly chunks of hair poking out from his puckered scalp above each ear, like a pair of dead thorn-bushes. In contrast, he sported a badly overgrown beard and neglected sideburns, not to mention the long tendrils of prickly black hair extending from each nostril like the feelers of a beetle. It took only a single glance for me to decide that this man was to be avoided at all costs. However, at an age when I was deemed was too young to be left home alone, my mother decided to have Mr. Roland look after me while she was at work, despite my adamant protests. And so every day I'd trudge over to his house, and he'd be waiting for me on his front porch, his eyes squinting into the dim morning sun, a wooden pipe clenched tightly between his yellowed teeth. When I stepped inside his dank, dusty hovel, I felt that his rickety screen door was the barrier between me and all the happiness in the world, trapping me in a spiderwebbed prison until my mother arrived to reclaim me each afternoon. Mr. Roland’s cat was the only beam of light piercing the unending darkness that I had melodramatically resigned to become the permanent state of my childhood. The creature was always a delight to me, as cats are to any young girl. It was a small, gaunt-looking animal, much resembling its owner with its straggly gray fur and limping gait. When I asked my neighbor for its name, he only muttered gruffly, “Don’t have a name. It’s just The Cat.” Dissatisfied with my new friend’s lack of identity, but finding myself unable to think of any suitable name, I eventually became accustomed to the bland title. The Cat was a shy little thing, its wide eyes always darting around anxiously, jumping up startled whenever a fly landed nearby or a leaf fluttered by the window outside. Usually it cowered beneath Mr. Roland’s rickety old rocking-chair, its tail twitching spasmodically like a snake in its death throes. I tried countless times to coax it out, but the animal would only eye me distrustfully and knead its sharp claws on the dirty beige carpet, never venturing beyond its isolated refuge. The Cat only dared to emerge from its hiding place for food. Every couple of days, or whenever he remembered, Mr. Roland got a can of sardines out of the cupboard and worked the lid off with a pocket-knife. I could practically see tendrils of the fish’s rancid stench wafting over to the rocking chair. Unable to resist the tantalizing smell, The Cat slunk slowly out from under the chair, its belly pressed against the floor, ears flattened down on its head, eyes wide and alert.

Mr. Roland smiled sweetly at the starving animal, revealing sparse and rotten teeth. “Come on, you,” he cooed earnestly. “Come get the nice fish.” The Cat crept toward him, a thin line of hair sticking straight up like a dorsal fin off of its bony spine. Its whiskers quivered as it crept forward with claws extended, closer, closer, until its pink nose just barely brushed the jagged edge of the can, and then, very slowly, it opened its mouth and took a tiny bite of fish. With a grunt of effort, Mr. Roland brought his foot forward and kicked The Cat sharply in the ribs, sending the animal flying wildly across the room, its legs sprawling in all directions, awful shrieks tearing from its throat in fury and humiliation. It hit the floor with a loud thump and disappeared in a flash of gray back under the chair, shaking like a dried-up leaf in the autumn wind. A screeching cackle erupted from Mr. Roland’s mouth, resembling the ugly rasps of a crow. He put his hands on his knees and laughed and laughed until his face was bright pink and his breath came in wheezing gasps. When finally he deemed the hilarity of the moment to have passed, he summoned all the strength his thin, brittle arms could muster and hurled the can of sardines at The Cat. It struck the side of the chair with a clang and spilled out slimy fish and their foul-smelling juices onto the floor. He hobbled out of the room, still chuckling hoarsely. The Cat crawled ashamedly to the overturned can and began lapping up the fish. I heard the tiny bones crunching under its sharp teeth as the emaciated animal devoured its meager meal. How I pitied the poor creature. At least I got to escape from this horrible place each afternoon; for The Cat, this hellish existence was all it had ever known. It was on a day that I was in a particularly industrious mood that I decided it was my civic duty to free the animal from its life of torment, and release it into the wild. When Mr. Roland’s loud snores announced that he had fallen asleep in his recliner, I put my plan into action. Determination flashing brightly in my eyes, I crept softly to the front door and flung it open wide. Golden sunshine streamed in and brightened the dim gray room, and birdsong danced in with the shimmering rain of dust motes. Before my eyes, two worlds of beauty and despair melted into one. "Go on," I whispered to The Cat, visible only as a pair of shining eyes staring out from under the chair. "You can escape and live off the mice. You'll be free. He won't ever hurt you again. Run away!" But The Cat just stared fearfully at the open door, tasting the sweet spring air wafting into the room and crouching lower in its roost under the chair. I continued to call to it, but The Cat stayed rooted firmly in place. Frustrated, I grabbed an old broom, squeezed behind the chair, and gave The Cat a gentle nudge. It growled in annoyance but didn't budge. I tried again, this time with a quick swat. The animal arched its back, hissed ferociously, and moved a few steps farther away from me before sitting stubbornly back down.

Angered that The Cat was rejecting my act of kindness, I smacked the creature harder in the rump with the broom. It let out a squawk of surprise and darted out from under the chair, avoiding the open door and instead hiding in a corner. I chased the animal around the room for several minutes, while Mr. Roland’s peaceful stores drifted in uninterrupted from the other room, before finally managing to force it out the door. The Cat ran off into my mother's lush vegetable garden next door and disappeared, its tail vanishing behind it like a ribbon of smoke. I stared out after it and smiled with triumph. The next day, Mr. Roland once again scrounged up a rank can of sardines from his pantry and called out to his emaciated pet. The Cat did not appear. He called several times, his voice sugary and full of false love, but there was no movement from under the chair. I stood beside him wearing my best poker face, watching in silence. Scowling, Mr. Roland crouched down on all fours, his arthritic knees creaking in protest underneath him, and stuck his head under the chair. “Cat?” he called. “Come on, Cat, you under here?” He sat there for a long time, searching for a creature which was obviously no longer there, his eyes scanning the small dusty space under the chair as if The Cat was nestled somewhere between the carpet fibers. When he finally stood up, I thought I glimpsed an expression of genuine sadness hovering over his wrinkled old face. He limped on wobbly legs out of the room, more slowly than usual, his eyes cast downward at the stained carpet. He didn’t even seem to notice the slime dripping from the open sardine can all over his hand. For a moment, I nearly pitied him. “He'll be back,” I heard him mutter under his breath. “He can't survive without me. Probably be back tomorrow, all cold and scared. He'll be back tomorrow.” But The Cat did not return the following morning, and it did not return the day after that. The days turned into weeks and the weeks into months, and still The Cat ran free. “Probably starved to death,” Mr. Roland told himself with strained apathy. “Stupid damn cat.” I hoped The Cat was happy, wherever it was.

surge of bravery The Cat leaned forward into my hand. I stroked its soft head as purrs vibrated the animal’s body, not noticing the dark shape that had appeared behind me. “Well, I knew you'd be dragging your sorry ass back here one day, didn't I?” Mr. Roland reached out and snatched The Cat up by the scruff of its neck. It meowed angrily in protest. “Be quiet, you pathetic piece of shit.” He tossed The Cat roughly onto the floor and kicked it hard in the head. “Why'd you run off?” he demanded. “Why'd you leave me when I took good care of you?” His foot connected again with The Cat's small skull, and I saw a flash of bright red blood. “Stop!” I cried, tears spilling from my eyes. “Stop it, you'll kill him!” I don't think he could even hear me. His face was stretched taut and his eyes bulged from their sockets. Over and over he kicked The Cat where it lay helplessly on the floor, his lip curled up in a vicious snarl, and I heard the crack of fragile bones snapping in two. I screamed in horror, but his eyes never left The Cat's broken body, limp as a wet rag as it quivered beneath each crippling blow. With a final roar like that of some terrible beast, he threw The Cat against the wall and stormed out of the room, his breathing hard and labored. The shattered mass of bloody fur slid down to the floor, leaving crimson streaks on the wall's white paint. A puddle of blood oozed from its shredded skin and soaked the carpet around it. The Cat lay still.

And then, one brilliant autumn afternoon, The Cat came back. I could hear it meowing loudly from Mr. Roland’s front yard. I opened the door and there it was, perched on the tattered welcome mat like a king on his throne. The past few months had been kind to the animal, for it was now fattened up on plump mice, and its fur had filled in more and was carefully cleaned. It was no longer a mangy-looking bag of bones. The Cat was beautiful. Gingerly, I reached out a hand toward the rejuvenated creature. At first it shied away from my touch, its wide eyes shadowed by memories of a cruel past. But then some happier thought seemed to dawn upon it, and with a

On Awareness 2.0 Samantha Finley

1 Gray, the almost sunrise peeked 3 around the bedroom, slipping 5 to wake me. 7 Sticky from the salt-ridden tears, 9 stirring the faintest hints of smoke – 11 I’ve woken up without her long before 13 the absence was all the more 15 seeping from my fingertips. 17 Of the air conditioner humming, 19 breathing to its own slumber, 21 yellowed corners; 23 I thought, this isn’t so bad. 22 An ever-present innocence. 20 The wallpaper curling at it’s age, 18 its simple song, the cat silently. 16 I was more aware. 14 Tangible amongst the loneliness 12 now, but this time it was real – 10 and perfume from my clothes. I had 8 shed just hours before, I sat up, 6 with my cheeks still 4 under my swollen eyelids 2 through the glass, casting dawn.

ART

Self Portrait (If Rembrandt had found Cubism) Oil on Canvas Chichan Kwong

Genesis

Laurie Hamame A single dandelion sits in a pot of rotting leaves, pressing lips into the skin of the earth, but the carcass doesn’t return the kiss; instead, it decays, continues to rip, to pluck, to split, to…

we left because the house was shaking it’s fists at us. vines of melancholy coil their stems around my throat and sit

heavy on my tongue. I wake up and greet these wounds. I can’t speak because words give them weight;

they are already too heavy for my shoulders to carry. I locked myself in that bathroom. Your fists kept pounding,

and even full boxes with an empty house, our things packed in a stranger’s truck, couldn’t keep them from plucking, from ripping, from…

You release. I am carried away by the wind.

ART

Untitled

Photograph/Photoshop Laurie Hamame

Identity Crisis Laurie Hamame

Some nights I wonder if God is sleeping. I am constantly crowded. I’ve never stopped a nosebleed. Since 2012 or before, I have hunted a nook where I can recite poetry in peace. Space. If the states rearranged and I was in New York, I’d go to an art museum tonight. I can’t look at a star-filled sky without wishing I saved Van Gogh. I couldn’t even save myself. Fear, heavy body. Stop. Do not touch me. Fast forward. Still alive and wasting time to find a job that won’t make my eyes bleed. I’ve seen people die of greed. I’ve seen people die before looking at the clouds and wondering what they taste like. I wish, like ants, we never had to sleep . Last night I stood in the middle of the Sahara. No, within the shadow of the Eiffel Tower. No, under a bridge in Mexico. My hair was dyed bright purple. Shorter. It was only a dream. I am one in a billion. My tears occupy more than two-thirds of the Earth’s surface. Long, long ago my mother wanted to name me Alexandra. I was too small for the name. My father calls me Baba. To tell the truth: in dog years, I am.

Afternoon in Orton 26

Photograph Bridget Cook

Perfume and Formaldehyde Samantha Finley

We were supposed to go to dinner Sunday evening, but my grandfather died at church.

I can just picture it: his old-and-haggard body hobbling down the marbled aisle of St. Michael’s. And me, still in bed as he knelt alongside the wooden pew in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Then he was gone.

I spent the evening wondering why he looked like a yellow doll against the plush interior surrounding his corpse. It didn’t make any sense to me. His mouth was in the same straight line I’d always seen, and his forehead still held the same wrinkles I’d known.

But his hands were too polite in the way they were wrapped under a tarnished rosary and gently folded beneath his chest. I knew him in the opposite way.

I’d only been to one funeral before this – I can’t take the feeling of permanent nonexistence heavily lingering between the scent of antique women’s floral perfumes and formaldehyde. I couldn’t even look at my grandfather because I purposely didn’t wear my glasses. Though, I did peek once, just to make sure he was still there, even in his heavy absence – he was.

DC Drained

Photograph Jessica Williams

LIT

Rubik’s Cube Diane Kollman

What will be your life’s greatest disappointment? Take this quiz to find out! 1. How would you describe your travels? A. Admiring snow shaped like Dippin’ Dots sprinkled around yellowwalled palaces, wanting more. B. Tolerating constant ear-popping in economy class seats, while watching the horizon burn orange behind waves of white. C. Masquerading as an authentic Dubliner, as a person of faith, in a foreign pew as sermons ricochet between stone walls. D. Outlining I-270 on a napkin, small lines extending each direction, like branches, like veins, as if it contains 197 countries instead of 88 counties. 2. Where do you see yourself in five years? A. Writing recruitment materials for ExxonMobil or General Electric and sorting mounds of résumés, but planning to become a beloved author. B. Writing advertisements that gush with overexcitement or insincerity and smothering strangers with spam, but hoping to publish a novel. C. Writing syllabi and lecturing to a sea of blank stares, but still working on that book, kind of. D. Yeah, you wrote that book, but now you need to write this other book. 3. When did you begin to feel old? A. So she’s written how many novels by the age of 22? Twenty-two, you say? Are you sure you don’t mean just two? Really? B. When writing “How Satire and Sensibility Intertwine in The Man of Feeling” for English 4590: Ultimately, the intimate relationship between satire and sensibility encourages the reassessment of the moral standards and traditional class distinctions of eighteenth- century Europe in order to offer a blueprint for less polarized class differences. C. Age 26: Frame graduate school diploma. Age 26: Better put a ring on it. Age 26: Fill uterus with babies. Age 26: Forfeit all dreams unrelated to a cubicle. D. The sharp whine of dial-up Internet, sifting through a rainbow of floppy disks, the sweetness stirred by a bowl of French Toast Crunch — kids these days.

4. When did you feel that you were not old enough? A. “Would you like a kid’s menu?” As long as crayons are included. B. When writing “A Social Psychology Perspective on Self-Esteem” for Psychology 3325: You constantly imagine your future happiness as a novelist — the adoring letters from fans, glowing reviews from critics, money raining down upon you like confetti. C. 2 Seconds: I still have time to load the dishwasher, do the laundry, iron my dress pants, and make that doctor’s appointment. 2 Days: How was work? Same old, same old. 2 Years: How was work? Same old, same old. 2 Lifetimes: Is it the sapphire year or the ruby? Or diamond? D. The rhythmic pounding from the bedroom next door, mothers guilting daughters into 9AM yoga sessions, the roadkill aftertaste of blacker-thanblack coffee — you’ll understand when you’re older. 5. What is your riskiest achievement to date? A. “THREE!!!” Rippling panic, eyes squeezed shut, catapulted sideways into a patchwork of grass and wheat speckled with people. You want that view from 10,000 feet up, able to see all the vibrancy of what is and what could be laid out before you, seemingly within reach. B. $20k, $40k, $60k: The numbers should matter more, but how can you live without the smell of freshly printed pages? C. Dark-haired stranger, tried-&-true love letters, tasting fondness through the tang of A1 Steak Sauce. D. You thought you were the type to take chances, to relish in the flush of the harsh spotlight with prepared, string-bound fingers, savoring the expectant silence with eyes squeezed shut. 6. What is your safest regret so far? A. A nudge, no a bump, no a crunch—a crashing of aluminum foil. Metal gouging metal beneath headlights. Empty parking lots and smooth steering wheels and distortions. B. 20y, 40y, 60y: Waiting to breathe Mt. Fuji’s impossible summit air, but will you or won’t you? C. Shamrock-green ink, Ham & Cheese Hot Pockets, lying on Wellness questionnaires about weekly cardio expenditure. D. You regret nothing, not even the paralyzed, string-bound fingers that endured a silent auditorium, spurred to life only by the rustle of pencil-marked sheet music.

7. What is the best gift you’ve ever lost? A. A thin, golden-chained necklace of rubies, sapphires, and diamonds vacuumed into nonexistence without a flutter of remorse; it was attached to no time, place, or person. B. “You two look so cute together! Can’t wait to meet him. See you Saturday?” C. And Then There Were None (Don’t loan things to friends.) D. High-stakes Bananagrams, trashcan espionage, nightly rituals of sweaty-handled racquets and coarse yellow fur, words and words and words and words— 8. What is the worst gift you’ve ever received? A. A Christmas-themed garden gnome with wide, electric blue eyes shoved into a closet corner with a fleck of doubt; it was attached to a time, a place, a person. B. “You’re ditching our plans again? You know, a few years down the road, you’ll realize that the relationship you have won’t always be perfect. The honeymoon will end.” C. How to Win Friends and Influence People (Don’t borrow things from friends.) D. Perfume-stained ticket stubs, half-faded Post-it notes, glossy reminders of strained smiles and blurred scenes, paper and paper and paper and paper—

10. How do you want to live? A. With the rough feeling of wet cement under bare feet, hopping over happy worms that inch along the pavement. Midnight conversations around the cul-de-sac after a thunderstorm. B. With footsteps hovering gently, lightly above quick breaths, dipping down and above and below. Tumbleweeds of curly hair spin across tile floors, where bare feet startle against the cold ground. Silence creeps in, but a voice trembles and climbs, BURSTS. C. With a winter chill and an ode to chicken spätzle, warm to the touch. Murmurs of a twinkling, soft sort of song. Jeans soaked with cold, but the night is beautiful. The words of a stranger looping around the mind, replaying, always replaying. D. With the hackneyed pitter-patter of crocheted toes in bubblegum pink and summer sky blue. The hands and the body drum and sway. Twist, turn, 4.3×1019 combinations. Passion climbs and dives, falls, soars. Please wait while we process your results.

9. How do you think you will die? A. Slowly, like a jailbird trapped in a cage for vehicular homicide, wasting away on metallic bread and Dial soap. B. Suddenly, like bones and blood splattered under a vending machine. C. Dramatically, like dismembered limbs in GLAD Odor Shield trash bags, the tall kitchen size. D. Plainly, in some bland, unspectacular way, like cancer or boredom.

After Cezanne’s Apples Oil on Canvas Chichan Kwong

LIT

Constant

Bailey Martin i was always the girl to be touched; my father, a man of physics, taught me how bodies should move according to theory; be the constant, he said, be the same, and it was only natural that i should fall onto men, the law of gravity, the law of women who were never bred to say no, but were instead told to hurl forward, calculate over resistance, head for direct collisions and straight distances, lean towards the concrete and lick cement as your fingertips catch tar beneath your nails, keep the traces of their hot breath in your ribcage, the hair stuck to their wrinkled foreheads, until you are breathing in the taste of the dried sweat on your skin, until your lungs have memorized how pressure feels, until you canâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t remember what it felt like to have your own body burst towards the sky and burn, what it felt like to have oxygen feeding fire in your blood (and not just the leftover steam he leaves when he turns away beneath the sheets), what it felt like to not need foreign hands on your foreign skin, and somewhere someone is saying a house is burning, and you wonder if it is simply a girl who found friction.

Museum Man Photograph Anna Talarico

Priests in Black Gowns / The Garden (An excerpt from a WIP novel) Paul Oâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;Neil

She brushed the hair from her face, sweeping the shadows and tufts of blonde from her cheeks. It was the prime hour of the afternoon, and the sun stared at her skin. My phone rang in my pocket. Not now. I sat on the bench smoking a pen and staring at two ocean's blue stars; golden curls and copper shades created a veil around the pale of her face. Her lips pursed then opened slightly to reveal deeply bleached, winter white teeth. We looked up and down, copying out the visions before us, inscribing them into memory. The flowers had bloomed. Bees burrowed into the wooden seats and buzzed moodily. Erin knelt to touch the soft daisies, bone colored petals between her fingertips. She seemed a ghost. I inhaled the air from around my pen and exhaled in her direction. "Look at me." Two minutes the two of us took as a challenge to lock eyes, orbs to be disassociated from their fragile frames. I recounted it with symbol yet draped it in the most frank language I could bear, the most shocking flesh I could muster. "I was the daughter," she whispered without a blink or break from the shared trance. Another drag from my pen. I still didn't see her full form. â&#x20AC;&#x153;Where are you going? My back hurts." Disbelief was my faith in her. Our gaze broke and we looked away to mourn each other and our own senses of naivete. With them were interred the most aged ashes of romantic speculation. "What are you smoking?" A shade. A spectre. A haunting vision. I will never believe in you. Finally, I responded. Want a drag?

Super Moon Photograph Laurie Hamame

Artists and Authors

Diane Kollman Nope.

Bridget Cook I have always enjoyed wandering the campus and discovering stillness and unexpected places. I love that about Ohio State and I am always slipping into different buildings to see what I can find.

Chichan Kwong: I’m interested in bringing art theory, logic and philosophy into my works as well as transforming spatial art experience into time art experience. I believe in creating positive art that is both funny and educational. I consider the methods, which I used to create my works are more important than the finished pieces.

Dylan Ecker I like pineapple. Cantaloupe is pretty good too. Don’t even get me started on watermelon. And I’m particularly fond of sentences that end. Samantha Finley My name is Samantha Finley and I’m a 3rd-year English major. I enjoy writing poetry and fiction. The poems I’m submitting have a chronologically consistent theme of loss/void, and conclude with a more positive tone when read in order. Sam Fishman I am a young boy studying Philosophy and Creative Writing. I like to read funny prose, listen to Bob Dylan and Elvis, and spend time with my buds. I love the Midwest. Maya Gosztyla I am a first-year Neuroscience major with minors in Molecular Genetics and Creative Writing. I’ve been writing short stories and poetry for as long as I can remember, and it’s always been a passion of mine. I would one day like to become an Alzheimer’s researcher and also a published author. Laurie Hamame I have been writing for as long as I can remember. Stories, poems, journal entries, blog posts, half-baked thoughts on the backs of receipt paper… if it has words on it, it’s my kind of thing. So yeah, I write a lot, but mostly I just eat nachos.

Jane Lankes I am a senior majoring in Sociology and Psychology, and plan on attending graduate school next year for Sociology of Culture. I’m also on Ohio State’s varsity rifle team, which is probably my favorite part of my day. In my spare time, I like to draw, paint, travel, and take photographs! Paul O’Neil I am an aspiring fiction writer and activist who just quit smoking cigarettes. My work grapples with subjects including addiction, language, longing, and art, and I do my best to avoid sounding pretentious. Bailey Martin I am a second-year English major who enjoys lifting and baking. Sometimes I even read and write for fun. Anna Talarico I am a History of Art Major from Charlotte, North Carolina. My work was featured in the 2014 edition of Mosaic, and I was featured in The Wescott House’s Autumn 2014 “House of Photography” exhibit. I am still finding my creative voice and searching for what inspires me to explore and develop my passions. Jessica Williams

Mosaic Editorial Board

Mosaic Staff

Editors-in-Chief

Literature Staff

Ellen Milligan Laura Novak

Alli Cadle Gian Fiorenzo

Amanda Gaglione Kory Smith Bri Forney Liz Lyle Malerie Holte Karim Ragab Lindsey McHenry Kevin Knipe Alyssa Davis Robin Iritz

Layout Editors

Art Staff

Literature Editors Emily Sisco Christina Szuch

Art Editors

Adam Wintz Bobby Lowery

Treasurer Lavinia Xu

Rebecca Weisshaar Julie Morell Alejandra Timmins Andrea Oh Anne Hohler Michaela Cunningham

Layout Staff Olivia Hessler Kaiti Burkhammer Andrew Janos

Special Thanks to Our Advisors Pablo Tanguay Ruth Friedman

Get involved with Mosaic Magazine Apply for a staff or editorial position, come to our poetry readings, participate in a workshop, attend Professor & Protege, or submit your work for publication!

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