Anthologizine by rachel larrowe

Anthologizine: n. the act of bringing together several zines in one publication

Kacey Cedar Socorro de Luca Iris Vasquez Howard Masha Jennings Rachel Larrowe Stuart Mascair Leanna Rominger Mitra Vahdati

What Is She Saying? - March 2016 prof. Anne de Marcken - the Evergreen State College

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I am familiar with silence, it was my best friend when I was young. When I grew it became my worst enemy.

Silence makes you doubt the words that came out of your mouth, it says, “Why did you do that? It’s pointless. Never again. Never. Never. Never”” And you’ll remember next time you think about speaking just how pointless it is, because nothing comes out right anyway

Silence was my weapon against loud angry words. Silence made the words stop for a brief period of time. My words, his words, their words, whose words?

It makes your stomach churn, your head throb, and your knees weak. It is a disease. It wiggles in-between beats, it will never let you forget. Silence let the words seep into me, made my heart beat differently. They became a poison in my mind infecting the physical world. I became depersonalized. You think it’s easier, but saying nothing just makes everything harder. You’ll realize that later when everyone says what a poor communicator you are. You say, “I’m trying” but it’s not that you’re trying to communicate effectively, it’s that you’re trying to communicate. Period. Then you’ll find someone who says, “Just spit it out, it’s not that hard. Just tell me. Why do you have to make this so difficult, what’s on your mind?”

You’ll think about it for a moment, and the panic from thinking about breaking your silence and it pushes everything but panic from your mind and you’ll say, “I don’t know” but really mean it this time. You don’t remember, all you remember is panic about words and noise and consequences of those words and noises and feelings. You’ll write it down, then refer to it later. Now it seems like a big deal. They make it a big deal. That was the problem in the first place with the noises. But this is the only way it doesn’t get trapped in the silence. It is a big deal, not the feelings, but the act of expressing them. It’s been beaten out of me, it’s hard to get back.

Meditation allows the silence to have its moment, then leave you alone.

Silence holds my voice for ransom.

I am familiar with silence, it was my best friend when I was young. When I grew it became my worst enemy.

My knowledge of dismemberment is more adequately described when I refer to the mental but I’m attempting a focus on the physical.

I remember turning the lens I viewed you from.

Clockwise, you’re a shade of blue fragmented into flakes of snow.

Counter clockwise, you’re a shade of red reflected licked by flames. From where I stand you’re the rain on desert stand.

From where I stand you’re the bo nfire on ocean shore.

From a distance you gave me wine through the lense I see you in. With you at a distance I drank and become drunk. Drunk enough to be frozen by your blue and burned by your red. Your desert rain wasn’t pure. Your bonfire had no control.

But I was drunk and loved every frosted touch, burn, poison drops, and state of fear.

The place you come from evolves from my present but your future has a texture I can’t wait to touch. I’ll be tortured by the future but the state I’ll leave that distant future in will be scarred and strong.

I know without the presence of proper equipment the best thing to do for wounds is to cauterize the bleeding. I don’t know how to achieve this if an entire limb is severed but I like to imagine pressing the stump of what was an arm to a giant heated plate of metal to stop the bleeding and ward off infection.

I’m sure the moment I was born my leg popped right off my body like a doll with the ball socket of the junction having to be shoved back into me. We pretended it never happened but I was always a very breakable thing.

When I feel like I can’t write my wrists pop off and my fingers disconnect from my palms and my knuckles disconnect from my fingers and little segments litter the keyboard while I stare, unable to do anything and with no means to collect my fingers and thoughts.

At times of violent stress I fall apart. It’s quite funny, really. My arms pop off at the shoulders and my knees dislocate and my head lulls to the side and decapitates. My legs pop off at the hip and my head

falls

and rolls in front of me before my torso even has the chance to hit the ground. I lay there and plead that the broken image of a disassembled doll will remind people that dolls don’t have much t o say and I’ll be left to collect myself at a later date.

The dislocation of my limbs happens so quickly and all at once that in the moment it’s easy to forget putting myself back together after falling apart is a much more painful task than the original melt down. I’m left regretting my faulty limbs while I pop my leg back into place and promise to be more careful and not break my doll self again .

It’s this false sense of security that ruins me.

When being so careful I never break then I think myself unbreakable. I play more roughly and violently until the stress builds and again and I’m falling apart like careless child hands have pulled me from my sockets. I’m left sitting up and reassembling myself while promising to be more careful. Until I think myself unbreakable.

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I imagine what it’s like to be in that situation. If everything were post apocalyptic or a person was abandoned on an island and this was their only option. To lose a limb they’ve lived with their whole life then immediately follow the action by burning it’s ghost in promise that it’ll never be part of the body again.

Feminoid Feminoid, apparently but not actually, female (Wiktionary). Google suggested this word instead of humanoid. It fascinates me that Google of all things would suggest the particular rather than the general. I can only think of Google in the general, you think of Google only in the particular. It was honestly the weirdest thing I learned about you.

ested would in the irdest

1 I told you that I want to stop believing in god. That night I had been listening to “Remember Who You Are” by Team Dresch (Captain My Captain). Kaia Wilson sings, “Don’t worry Jesus is dead, and God don’t exist,” and for moment I was cradled in another butch’s arms, waiting for it to last a while. I pray to god: Please blow up this bus with me on it. I am no servant of you. I am no servant of my mother. I am no servant of the United States. Just mark me as you once did Cain. I am cast out. No one believes that I am cast out. My mark is on the inside of my skull. Rather than the dermis beyond it. It's just as permanent.

One is not born, but rather becomes, woman. No biological, psychic, or economic destiny defines the figure that the human male takes on in society; it is civilization as a whole that elaborates this intermediary product between male and the female that is called eunuch. Simone de Beauvoir begins the section of her magnum opus The Second Sex, titled Childhood, with these famous and contentious words. I remember feeling relieved when I first read these words. It meant that I existed somewhere. Similarly, in the book of Matthew, For there are born eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by men and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven. Relief. Existence. In the Bible. That defining of book of what de Beauvoir calls our civilization.

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My mother is human. My father is not. My father who art in heaven. Feminism, the infinite ‘You’. “Sometimes I think, when it gets too quiet up there, You say to Yourself, ‘What kind of mischief can I play on My friend Tevye?’” (Fiddler on the Roof). You, feminism.

Bhanu Kapil writes: Tell me what you know about dismemberment. The dismemberment of my family is firmly in the past. The missing member that is dad leaves me with clear hatred or vague bitterness. The dismemberment of myself is far in some ainâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t-never-gonna happen future. The remaining member between my thighs is a constant reminder that I am not actually female. The dismemberment of identity is constantly in my Facebook. The constant commentbattles about who is queer, trans, agender, asexual, etc. etc. etc. Julia Serano writes: we live in a phallus obsessed culture, where weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re all brought up to believe that everything having to do with gender and sexuality somehow revolves around the penis. Penis has always been a wound, was a fun wound to mess with when I was younger. Penis is a void now. Penis is a crumb on my carpet; I havenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t bothered to vacuum up yet. Penis is like this dead Common Tern that I found on the beach, wings splayed, body intact, decapitated by some eagle or other bird of prey, on that dark sand.

is of ber e mment-

I say to the cigarette butt on the floor of the bus: You too, have been cast out, within. You too, have been used, useful, a servant. You too, have been provided some care. You too, have been subject to security. You too, have been created for a purpose.

You too, are devoid of that knowledge.

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You too, are burnt, smoked, crushed, left, discarded.

itated

You too, are beneath the light, glare. You too, are technofucked like me. You too, are lashing yourself for trying. â&#x20AC;&#x153;It occurs to me that I am America, I'm talking to myself againâ&#x20AC;? (Ginsberg). Yes, talking to yourself. That is what makes us crazy. Crazy enough to be other, within. Crazy enough to be hanging around on the bus, unwanted. Crazy enough to be burnt, smoked, crushed, left, discarded. Crazy enough to hate those who love us for making us ever feel loved. Crazy enough to keep seeking comfort in a world that denies us.

I have to question the word apparently, in the definition of feminoid. How can you be apparently female? I know that I’m not actually female, but am I apparently female? According to my passing experience with femaleassigned/ftm/transmasculine/etc. people, who gender me as one of their own, I could be considered apparently female. They take me in. Not to mention all the trans women, who’ve walked up to me in trans spaces and asked, So, how long have you been on T? They cast me out. Apparently, I check the ‘F’ box. Apparently, I look like someone to whom maleness comes hard. That’s actually true. That is that prickle of pride when I am missexed in that way.

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The present is less material and inescapable to me. The future is a necessity. The here and now is not enough (MuĂąoz). The future is a site of the ability to change my body in a way that can resist assimilation as I undergo it. My path to being a professor means being apparently female. I must be employable, I must make myself professional, I must be apparently, a professor. It also means resisting being actually female. I must not give in to legal measures that comfort me into believing that the state can protect me, particularly from itself. I must not be fooled that surgery will make those who hate me, hate me less. As Paul B. Preciado writes: I do not want the male gender that has been assigned to me at birth. Nor do I want the female gender that transsexual medicine can furnish and that the state will award me if I behave in the right way. I donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t want any of it.

Credits Wiktionary: Feminoid, “Etymology 1”. https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/feminoid De Beauvoir, Simone. The Second Sex trans. Constance Borde and Sheila MalovanyChevallier. New York, Alfred A. Knopf, 2010. Print. ; The Oxford Annotated Bible Revised Standard Version. New York: Oxford University Press, 1962 (1965). Print. Kapil, Bhanu. Vertical Interrogation of Strangers. Berkeley: Kelsey Street Press, 2001. Serano, Julia. Whipping Girl: A Transsexual Woman on Sexism and the Scapegoating of Femininity. Berkeley: Seal Press, 2006. Wiktionary: “ .” https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/feminoid Muñoz, José Esteban. Cruising Utopia: The Then and There of Queer Futurity. New York: NYU Press, 2009. ; Preciado, Paul B. Testo-Junkie: Sex, Drugs, and Biopolitics in the Pharmacopornographic Era, trans. Bruce Benderson. New York: The Feminist Press, 2013. Team Dresch. “Remember Who You Are.” Captain My Captain. Portland: Chainsaw Records, 1996. CD Fiddler on the Roof. Dir. Norman Jewison. Perf. Chaim Topol. United Artists, 1971. DVD. Ginsberg, Allen. “America”. Collected Poems. New York: Harper Perennial, 1984. Print. Masha Jennings 2/29/16 1000 Words.

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this zine was made by Rachel Larrowe in March 2016 for a program called â&#x20AC;&#x153;what is she saying?â&#x20AC;? with prof. anne de marken (who gave us all the redaction bug) at the evergreen state college in olympia, wa

this zine is made out of blog posts and markers and technology and a foundational interest in having a good time with words.

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That [writing center]Thing At this time of day, the light in the room is a balancing act. Cool cloud-filtered whiteness diffuses through the floor-toceiling windows of the south wall; the lamps on the tables glow incandescent-warm. In the middle of the room, a green glass globe hangs from the ceiling, emitting soft yellowness. The ceiling here is layered: there’s a grid of bare concrete above it all, then the array of polished wooden rods from which the green lamp hangs, then a section of ordinary white rectangular ceiling tiles. Each one is lower than the last, and covers only a third of the room. Like layered blankets on a bed. Or like different colors and heights of forest canopy. There are six formica tables in here, distributed like islands, like an archipelago—separated but always in each other’s sight. The table I’m sitting at has a yellow and white gingham pattern on the top, and worn chrome almost-hairpin legs. From here I am facing the north wall of the room, which has its own window opening back into the rest of the library. Fluorescent fixtures on the other side backlight vintage orange office chairs and nonvintage computer monitors. In one chair is a friend of mine. I can hear two more in conversation on the other side of a small divider. Yet another talks to someone I don’t know across the room. There is the sound of typing and my pencil scratching. The air feels warm here.

See Jane Run It was cool outside, and raining lightly. I snuck into my athletic roommate’s room and took one of her jackets. I put my hair up in a bun. Then I put the leash on my dog and Florence on my phone and my sneaker feet on the sidewalk and I ran until I could barely stand to run any more, and then I walked. At each crosswalk I started running again. My dog tried to stop and sniff things. Her face looked confused when I said “Come on!” Then it looked elated when we moved fast enough for her own running gait to kick in. The fresh air rushed over my skin. Rain and sweat made my ears and nose and acrylic frames slippery and my glasses started to slip down my face. I pushed them up again and again. Then I took them off and tucked them inside my shirt. The light rain turned into a downpour, big fat drops coming faster and faster, rivulets in the gutters surging into streams. The water seeped into my sneakers, soaked through my tank top, flooded my face. The concealer I had put on like ritual ran into my eyes and stung. I wiped the mess off my face and kept going. My hair came loose from bumping and bouncing and I pulled it from its bun without stopping my legs. My dog started pulling forward on the leash. She was running towards home, her thin fur soaked. She shook it off and then got wet again. I was running towards home, halfheartedly following her. The rain was cool and clean. My skin was cool and clean. My skin was hot and sweaty. My skin was doing something new. My body was doing something new. I was doing something new. I think I don’t not run anymore.

Safeway sunday the produce section of the supermarket at night is a blur of round colors organized into artificial painstaking pyramids with secret structures underneath– it’s not apples all the way down. a man says something; the woman with him says “no, that’s hard cider.” she and I both turn over apples in our hands. I pick three, finally. i put more than three back. I spiral aimlessly among the fruits and vegetables. i know i want bright, i want crisp, i want sweet and fresh, but i don’t know what. my mother calls this dreideling, after the meandering path of the dreidel on the table or the floor. In the fluorescent light i dreidel. i dreidel my way to the loose snap peas, then to the bagged ones. A woman reaches up to the top shelf, grabs something in a plastic container from the shelves of pre-cut vegetables packed with dips into plastic containers. she asks a man in a black apron, “do you know how much this costs?” she has a slight accent, origin unidentifiable. at first he doesn’t seem to acknowledge her at all, still shelving, not speaking. then he comes over. I leave before they figure out the item’s price. in the bakery area, a couple keeps putting their bodies between me and the cake slices. i try circling the oblong display opposite them but they do not move rationally. they ask for help finding some kind of tiny cheesecake. I know where the tiny cheesecakes are, but they didn’t ask me. it feels dark in this corner of the store; maybe bread and wine and cookies sell better on fake wooden shelves in low lighting. I settle on an accessible piece of german chocolate cake. It looks fine, the frosting gooey and thick with dry-looking cake underneath. I go to the checkout. Somehow i chose a $13 bag of grapes but it seems too late to put them back when i find out. time to eat grapes.

Wanted: skygazing squad

earlier tonight, on our walk, i saw the sky and my heart swelled up up up. the dog was busy sniffing the ground and when i tugged at the leash and said “scooter” nothing happened so I just stood there. i looked up at the sky like you do at night. like i do at night. it was deep deep deep blue with bright white stars and there were thin clouds moving across at highway speeds and i stared and stared and stared. the big dipper never came all the way into sight but I saw every star in it. it was quiet and dark and cool out. What passes for silence in my life: no people, no dogs, no washing machines, just the cars passing on the highway a few blocks away and none any nearer. What passes for darkness in my life: most of the neighbors’ lights out, but plenty of streetlights, but the stars were still visible. the air smelled like rain and softness, the softness of fifty degrees with humidity, the softness of quiet dark, the softness of one a.m. in pretty-far-west Olympia.

In the Book House In the back of the library there are brown study carrels, rectangles of battered wood and off-white linoleum. they have good chairs, some of them, the office kind with padding and wheels. My favorite is by the law section. the books here are heavy and serious, pairs and sets bound in leather and fabric with small gold text on their spines. the biggest set has its title printed so small I canâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t make it out. it is six thick volumes long. The books make a wall to my left when i sit at this carrel, and the wall makes a wall to my right. the carrel layers its small wood walls over these. there is late afternoon sunlight flooding through the window behind me; when I turn my head I catch its warm sleepy softness in the corner of my eye. the chair is comfortable. someone else short was here before me and adjusted it to just the right height. the law books usually make me feel studious but today all i want is to put my head down on the desk and be sleepy like the sun.

Bathtub Affect The water is as hot as I could make it and it’s still not hot enough. When I got in at first I thought maybe it was scalding me but it’s been a minute or two and I’m fine, I think. It’s hard to tell with the way the water refracts light and the shadow the bathtub wall casts but I think my skin is red. Lift one leg out of the water. Yes, red. Some places splotchy, or punctuated by hair. The outside of my thigh is neither, just a wall of tomato skin. The water is still pouring loudly into the tub. Splotchy knees breach the surface so I can rest my elbows in my thighs. The water seems to take on color: reflected pink, imagined blue. The purple edge of my phone screen blurs into it somehow. Full tub and I lean back into warm. The walls are white and shiny, but I can see traces of wiping on them. Hairs cling, too, purple and brown. The shower curtain shadows create vertical stripes, lineated levels of darkness. My laundry hamper is starting to overflow in soft, multicolored piles. The water is off, but still making noise as it burbles into the overflow drain. Annoying semi-rhythm like snoring: water in, air out, water in, air out. Silence when I lift my legs out and the water level sinks. The walls that are not shiny plastic are very pale yellow, also known as off-white, but I know my towel is yellow and they are closer to that than the color of the shower plastic or the laundry hamper nylon or the ceramic toilet. I never noticed them as yellow before, just ugly. I never noticed my shampoo and face wash and shaving cream and razor and comb color coordinate: green, pink, and blue, like somebody did it on purpose. From down here in the warm wet, things look different.

360/4-1 Because Only An Owl Can Turn its head that far A bed. Fitted sheet, wrinkled, printed with brown dotted squiggles. on the bed a pillow, encased in white. A book. on the book a mug: “mischief managed.” A spoon. A silver tube of lotion. a pile of words: a book, a notebook, printouts of documents covered in pencil. A cell phone. a gray plastic bottle with no water in it. a plastic binder, open. two books on top or inside, made bright and wild with post-it flags. a periwinkle quilt, piled up and dripping like a melting clock off the side of the bed. under the quilt: a dog. A window reflecting room, hung with lace uncurtain and a crystal suncatcher on plastic gift ribbon. art from a calendar is on the wall, art i made is on the wall. “art” i paid for is on the wall: “I WANT TO BELIEVE.” in one corner is a golden and glassy lamp with coral-orange and lavender flowers on the shade. in the other corner is a shelf with unemployed objects: a ceramic turtle in unturtle colors, two plastic lizards, one die. a small wooden bowling pin, a dirty piece of quartz, and an aggressively cute unicorn figurine. On the floor, piles and piles. another quilt, piled damply on top of yoga mat on top of carpeting, coral and teal and mint and purple and orange and red. piles of books, piles of clothes. a blue hanger by the door, an empty tissue box by the closet. a chair covered in sweaters with an empty orange envelope on the seat. closet with the light on for no reason. bathroom with the light on for no reason. on the wall a scarf with a geometric pattern, and in the upper right-hand corner, a too-realistic black bird sits, unwatching.

Retreat hypothesis I am lying on my belly on a too-soft bed covered with a yellow blanket and the ceiling is less than two feet away. I can’t stop looking at my feet moving, reflected in the window of this loft, backlit brightly. Reflected feet reflected thoughts. Why am I here? A vague recollection of an earlier conversation: this is not the most efficient way to get our research papers done. But to me it seems the exact purpose of this trip is its inefficiency, its dislocation of the usual, the sense of at-a-loss confusion we all felt standing in the lodge. What now? is the feeling, because it’s one thing to be in a new place with obligations, but a new place with free time— that’s confusing. I don’t have to cleanmyroom-walkthedogputawaydishes-gogroceryshopping-callthedoctor-gotoschoolgotowork-feedthedog-domyhomework and it feels wrong to watchtv-shoottheshitforhours-phoneafriend-scrolltheinternetsleeptoomuch so what do I do? What is this time, this space? What is it for? I think it’s time for writing. I think it’s space in my mind for new things to enter. I think we had to go somewhere two hours away so this sense of dislocation would be keen and strong, so our bodies would know the difference between regular life and this, between regular space and this, between regular time and this. Not for long, just for now. Time for new words and new thoughts and time to write and time to become and time to play and time to read and time time time, finally, time. There are greater values than efficiency. There is something good about being ripped from routine, worth feeling lost for: this space in my heart-head, opening up.

Flowers for the Sky Stuart Mascair

2 Candle Eyes was picking the last flowers in the meadows by the river Gom. She held a brilliance of yellows, and blues. Her vibrant dress was stained with the rich pigment of the bouquet she now carried. The riverbank had been picked clean, and it would be a day’s journey to reach untouched pastures. Weary with fatigue she collapsed, and stared at the turquoise sky. Wind cooled the sweet pigment dry on her hand. With a delicacy she licked clean her hands, grimacing at the sour citrus. Minutes went by before she noticed the roar overhead. Far above a white trail followed a speck. Immediately she stood, grabbing a rock she threw it at the small speck high in the atmosphere. “Go away Sky Men! Leave us alone!” She howled. “You’re the reason I have to hike through the mountains to collect flowers for father!” She then fell to the ground, tiny fists hitting the dirt. “Go

3 back to your Stupid Space ships, and go back to your Stupid Earth!” She lifted her head up to once again see the speck trail off past the mountains. Standing up she wiped the dirt off her skirt, realizing she had been crying hot tears that ran down her face leaving river beds through the pigments that stained. With a huff she picked up the Bouquet, and started walking south. She would go home, change skirt and hope that there was no sky people music on the radio. Much later she walked into the village past the Golem the sky people brought. The runes on its chest were foreign, but she knew what the Sky people called them. “Police Bots.” Ugly black things, with glowing red eyes. She tried to ignore it, but the invader watched her. Quickening her pace she made it back home, only to be greeted by her father’s corpse

4 wrapped clear plastic. The Sky Peoples symbol of “Bio Hazard,” displayed dangerously like glutted crab. He stood on the pedestal made from woven flowers, and vines. It was a paltry display for the Parade of Vibrant Souls. There just wasn’t enough flowers. She worked weaving flowers into the small shawl she had already started. The table was sticky with citrus pigment that let a riot of colors. The low roar of the sky people’s ships could be heard overhead. Gradually that noise became louder. So loud that Candle Eyes could no longer work. Dashing outside she could see one of those beetle craft of the sky people land in the middle of the street. The engines fury kicked up dirt and racks into a stinging shrapnel. The hatch opened and three figures stepped out. For many in the village this was the first time they had seen a Sky person. Now their where three of them walking towards Candle Eye’s home. Two bearing guns. All three wearing the

5 masks at allowed them to breath on this planet. Their leader was a woman in a sharp suit, with jewelry of brilliant platinum. “Is this the residents of Candle Eyes?” The Sky Women said in the native tongue. “It is,” said Candle Eyes with a touch of venom. “Excellent. Might I come in, my associates will stay outside. I know how touchy your people are when it comes to firearms.” The Sky women said gesturing to the gunmen. “Do I have choice?” She asked. “Of course.” “Then no, you can be on your way.” “That’s upsetting, but we have traveled all the way from the capital to see you. Mabey you can show me some of your famous country hospitality. Just a short talk and then we will on our way.”

6 “If you must.” With that the Sky Women walked inside, the gunmen remaining outside. The two sat on opposite sides of the sticky table. “Now down to business. My name Angela Ryan, and I would love to complement you on your…Is that a corpse?” “That corpse is my Father. He died of a disease that your people brought our planet.” “Ah, my condolences. However, to say we brought it with us, implied we wanted it to come. To be more accurate it followed us.” Angela picked up one of the flowers on the table and pulled off her breathing mask, much to the surprise of Candle Eyes. She took deep whiff of the flower. “Surprised? Your atmosphere is not toxic, but prolonged exposer can be quite painful. These are what I have come to talk about. I wish to purchase these flowers. My friend is getting married and she needs a bouquet.”

7 “You came all this way to purchase flowers, I had just picked this morning. How did you even know I had these?” “One of our Satellites spotted you.” “That is unsettling.” “I’m sorry to hear that, but this Particular type of flowers is difficult to find these days.” “That’s because your people have been clear cutting entire fields, and taking them off world.” “The flowers will come back. But my friend only gets one wedding. So I’ll give you ten times the market value of those flowers.” “Your money means very little to me. Right now I am grieving. You are putting a price on my sorrow, as if anything material could absolve me of the grief I hold in my chest. By putting a number on those flowers and by extension of my grief, you are belittling both me, and my people’s customs. Now I

8 am very busy so I am going to have to ask you to leave.” Candle eyes said acid in her stair. Angela shrugged, and put her mask on. “I’m not a monster you know.” The Sky Women said, heading to the door. “I do plan on watching the March of Vibrant Souls. I here it’s a one of a kind event.” Candle Eyes returned to her sad work.

Vacation Leanna Rominger JANUARY 2016

Today is the third day of my winter vacation to the small village of Certaldo, just outside of Florence, Italy. My hotel, Agriturismo La Canonica, is set in the Tuscan countryside, 3 km outside of the village. It is surrounded by beautiful olive groves and vineyards; it is just as I imagined. The air is brisk this afternoon but the sun is shining, so with nothing on todayâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s agenda, I decide to take a walk into the village. Just before getting into the village, I see a vineyard. I am excited to taste Italian wines, mainly Chianti, which is what brought me to this location. Absolutely thrilled, I walk up the tree lined dirt road. The first building I come to has a sign above a wide open door, I assume it is the tasting room. The large cobblestone porch has a bench so I sit down for a few minutes to soak in some warm sun, then I walk inside. The room is completely empty, aside from a doll on the floor in the corner. I pick up the doll. I notice that she is worn, but clean, her dress is beautiful and her brown hair appears recently brushed; she is loved. Where is the child that belongs to her? More alert, I step back outside. Walking up to the next building I hear what sounds like a door slamming behind me. My stomach drops and though it is broad daylight I am scared. As if on cue, the leaves on the trees rustle and the sky darkens. I survey the area still seeing no evidence of people or animals. I reach for the door handle, give it a little twist and of course it is unlocked. My heart is beating out of my chest, but I open the door slowly. Again, the room is empty. I look down at the doll in my

hand and say to her “at least there is not another doll.” I step outside looking around once more, there are three additional buildings. Could they all really be empty? If so, who do you belong to and how did you get here? Walking briskly, I leave the vineyard as I entered, but with a doll in my hand. I don't stop walking until I reach my hotel. Once inside I put down the doll and pour a drink to calm my nerves. My room has been cleaned and the newspaper has been delivered just like everyday since my arrival. Today, on the front page is a picture of a little girl holding a doll I recognize, but the headline is written in a language that I do not. I am nervous as I walk down the hall to the lobby. At the counter, I produce the paper asking if there is one in English. The young man says “Sorry, Ma’am, there isn’t.” “Is there someone who can translate this for me?”, I ask. “Of course, Ma’am, I can. Most young Italians speak English too.” He went on to explain that the little girl is 5-year-old Aria. She is a local in the neighboring town of Certaldo. Her family owned the large vineyard on the edge of the village until last week. The story reports the vineyard went “bancarotta” meaning bankrupt after the vines were infested last year by an aphid typically called phylloxera. Due to my confused look, he clarifies further, phylloxera attacks the roots of European grapevines that spreads quickly and destroys huge swaths of vineyards starting in the mid-1800s. Going back to

the article he continues, the family was forced to move to Florence to live with extended family. Her mother, Arianna, explains that her daughter was out playing as they packed the last items and she accidentally left her doll in one of the buildings. The doll belonged to her Great Grandmother and is very important to her daughter and the whole family. Once he finishes giving me the jest of the article, I tell him that took a walk this morning and I came upon the vineyard. Excited to do some wine tasting I went into an open building. I found the doll; she is in my room. He rereads the article silently and looks up with excitement, declaring the article has a contact number. He dials the number and starts to speaks in Italian for a few minutes, no doubt explaining who he and I were. He hands me the phone saying, â&#x20AC;&#x153;It is the mother, Arianna, she speaks a little English.â&#x20AC;? Arianna and I take turns talking excitedly for awhile. I explain how I came upon the doll and she asks if I will mail it to them. I let her know I was already planning a trip into Florence, so I can return the doll to her daughter myself and maybe in return they could show me around the city. We agree on meeting at noon tomorrow and after getting the address we hang up.

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There are ants under the keys. You see them passing by the cracks under the space bar, command, option, left arrow, down arrow. They briefly block out the lights under there before stepstepstep stepstep step out from under the crack. The white surface of the table is smeared, new sepulcher. One black ant walks onto your ////, down the length of your ///////, slowly trailing toward your tailbone. Six steps at a time. Each ant carries cuttings of thin, white paper over itself. Your /////corners soften as you watch them carry on. Each ant leaves the translucent scrap, behind your rear on the chair. Layering scraps, they are trying to repair. You have specks of ant on your //////tip. point cursor poise needle click

through the threshold,

forget why you came to this room. events tied iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll slits. tailbone is to ///less, tailbone is dark exam room on the inside hold saucer system. tailbone is a processor scratchable monster push insert push eject. tailbone is outdated touch blush. vestigial tailbone sticks around in some computers. tailbone has a thin, line-shaped button. rewritable artifact. tailbone misses /////// pushing its ////// tailbone misses floppy discs touch flush. tailbone accepts promptly and makes quick return. tailbone makes a noise like click

dear , i saw you leaving lab ii, second floor. you carried 3 books wrapped in your ////, a backpack bearing weight on your //////// and ////, and a rolled up poster in one ////. you approached the crash bar, the silver bar across the door. you pressed the bar down with your /////, pushed forward with your ///. the door answered you, and swung out. your /// led, door followed. i love you, . care, click

weight he silver //. the

swallowing. tailbone has stuff goin on in there. years. yearns. tailbone has a thin, flimsy flap to keep out non-floppy disc shapes. Touch the flap in, and wonder what you are seeing. Teeny gleam. Black, speckled floor. You sit down in the room. Translucent paper on flat, metal cot. Tailbone is cold, bends under your weight. click but more li tailbone is an empty slide sigh scythe. You climb its steps, coccyx caustic closet pull-chain toxic hood click step out injury forget why you came to this room threw you out the window. It pushed you down hot, metal spine. One big, guided fall. Mixed risk slide, until rubble gush. tailbone gets with dust, with age. tailbone holds a system over itself. click

when do i risk you, /ody, going down the big slide? sitting on the edge of exam table? using my /ip to open a door? click

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gâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;morning. You wake with reluctant ////. You stay in the sleeping bag and force yourself up on your /////. Sit up, the sleeping bag folds. You reach forward with your ////, your //// curving. Your ///// grip and lift the silver laptop. You sit back on tailbone, in the sleeping bag. ///top meets /// and ///// finds edge of screen, prying upward. ///top opens. Tens of ants run manic in all directions, passing through the gaps between keys, over I O L . R F G B space bar trackpad toward the underside of the laptop. Your /////// steady, soft blink. You lift the ///top from your ///, rest it on the beige carpet to the left of you. Let them leave and come together somewhere else. How organized they look, when they crowd around a scrap. Almost recognizable, a pattern. click

You lie down in clinic. Tailbone can feel the metal cot under the thin paper sheet. You are waiting alone in the room with your shirt pulled up to your ////, ///// exposed. A man in a white coat opens the door, he smiles at you with his teeth. Three steps to the counter. A hollowing sound. You watch him open a white cabinet. You smell streaks of alcohol. He produces two cold wads of cotton in his fingers, steps closer to you until his forearms are looming. He lowers his forearms, and places the two wads on your ///// and returns to the cabinet. He collects two balls of wet at a time, carries them to your /////. He closes the cabinet. You are under the cotton, dripping with alcohol. He goes to the door. His arm pulls the door behind him, his other hand graces the wall, turns off the lights, pulls the door into place. click

You see six-stepper shadows dotting the light in the crack under the door. You close your ////, let your ///// freeze under the cotton. Where is the man in the white coat. The procedure. A glaze. Shiny lifting over you. You feel a tickle on your ///. It is in one spot, then it is two inches from there. A tingling. Then it is a sensation crossing your ////. Your awareness of the sensation grows. You wait for the door to open. Your ///// tenses, your ///// contracts. A thin vibration hums in the clump of cotton. A tingling. Your //// see the outline of the cupboard, the door, the line dividing the door and threshold. The crack under the door leaves traces of light emitted from the hall, coming in on the floor. A string of ants streams between you and the door. Constant flickering on tiny specks. Irregular beading. A line of tickles. A cluster of warm splotches growing over

...thanks for listening to what we were saying.