THE SEA WITCH ZINE VOL I “What is the pursuit of love but the ultimate paradox? Love / Hate. Soft / Hard. Good / Bad. Me / Us.” Rachel Fannan | “Hopeful in September” Nora Toomey | “Principles of Science” Emily Ballaine | “Motel Love Story” Joanna Lioce | “Explaining Sight” CHELSEAXCHANG | “But are you a man?” Taylor Lissandrello | “The Game I’m Tired Of ” Lauren Espina | “The Moon and the Cycles of Love and Loneliness” All photos by Harland Spinks Layout by Matt Carney
February 11, 2016. Sea Witch Presents: Blue Velvet / Blue Valentine featuring Down Dirty Shake, The She’s & Rachel Fannan with psychedelic visuals by White Light Prism.
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Hopeful in September Rachel Fannan
I listened to your old songs while driving out to Reno Felt your coastal surf pressing me into my seat I heard you, your guitar your heart’s harmonies Drifting with the stars found inside your throat A young pounding grows slowly old unfolds like a cloud of smoke A voice shaking with love and scattered summer visits We could have been brothers valuing peace Wishing only to return to our worlds queen-high flush
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Principles of Science Nora Toomey
a windowless white cube an open shore developers want a campaign with bells indigenous religion lightning not rain *** first time she heard silence she was pheasant finger fell off in the door I know what you’re saying let’s crawl out of our bird forms *** once married, the voice dreams
in falsetto
becomes an accidental silence a full service white bloom it won’t understand what is native what is color or sky or eucalyptus by ordinance it will vacuum the same spot over
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Motel Love Story Emily Ballaine
He fumbled for the light switch. The combination of alcohol and the foreignness of the room made his movements erratic, panicked almost, as though he feared he may never find the switch, feared that the two of them would be forced to make small talk and awkwardly undress in the semi-darkness of the room, feared that he would not be able to see her pretty smile again, the smile that was really rather lopsided and yet somehow struck him as the most beautiful thing he had ever seen and reminded him, in an odd and distant way, of the girl who’d worked at the convenience store near his house as a child, the girl who’d always given him the expired food products that made him violently ill more often than not and yet which he always greedily accepted. The room was total shit and she knew it. It was the type of seedy motel that had “Express” in the name and in a way she liked this—the honesty of it. How it made no effort to hide the fact that it was a place for those lonely sorts of people who passed the endless hours of 2AM and 3AM and 4AM by staring at the ever decreasing shadows of passing cars as they swept across the walls and off into that attractive and unattainable space of some place else. He found the light switch and, for a moment, wished he had not. The room was total shit. Maybe it was after the last shot at the bar or the first beer on the corner, but somewhere during the night he had forgotten just how shit this room was, how all the memories of those other lonely people seemed to cling to the walls and the sheets. But the girl didn’t seem to notice, or, at the very least, she didn’t say anything but instead just dropped her purse by the door and walked over to the bed.
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She dove head first onto the mattress in a way that seemed more childlike than sexy and turned over onto her back, her hands threaded behind her head. She stared at him in a way that suggested curiosity more than anything and he began to feel as though they were teenagers again, felt again the uncertainty that seemed to seep into every movement and action, the questions one never really finds the answers to: Is this ok? Am I ok? Am I ok? Am I ok? She wondered, in an idle, detached sort of way, just what she was doing here. More and more lately things seemed to be going blurry and she had the distinct impression that she was seeing the world not as it actually was, but in a distorted, disorientating way as though she was looking out through a water stained glass. She supposed the reason behind the first drink at the bar and the eventual drunken stumble down the sidewalk and the inevitable fumble for the light switch and the sad room with bundled up sheets on the floor and this man who stood before her permeating a deep sadness that sucked all the air from the room, she supposed the real reason she had let herself be led to this place, with this man, was his eyes, a color of blue so light they bordered on translucent and which led her to think if she stared long enough she would be able to see all the way into the back of his head. She smiled at him and again he thought of the corner store girl. He thought of all the other girls he had loved and all the other lives he had lived and the people from those lives he had shed as easily and thoughtlessly as dead skin. What had become of them all? Where did they live now and who did they fuck and who did they love and who did they see cry and who did they let see them cry and who did they call in the middle of the night and to whom did they say the things that can only be whispered in those blue hours of the night when you lie next to someone in tangled sheets and say the things the sun would burn from your tongue? And why, he thought, did he have to think of these old lovers—the girls he had fucked and the girls he had
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loved—in this moment. Why, he thought, was it so hard to stay in this room, to stay in this life. Why, he thought, was it so hard to see a girl without seeing all the ghosts that clung to her eyes, her teeth. How they slipped over her tongue and out of her mouth and was that gasp for you or only echo from the past? She stood up and turned off the light and now there was this: And now there would only be this: And now there would always be this: a bed a body another body forget forget forget
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Explaining Sight Joanna Lioce
Which step made your bones start to ache What’s the last thing you’ll see Why does the sun turn us blind When our eyes can adjust to darkness You sat in there and held onto my knees I stood in there and held onto your shoulders Explaining courage Explaining sight The crutch of your imagination Still grasped tightly at your legs Keep me in that place with the weak and the damaged Your flawless lungs filled with fictitious disease Your eyes only look at the broken parts If I stand far away enough maybe you’ll no longer see them Maybe distance fixes memories But it’s too hard to breathe in hiding I’ll see you at our next death
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But are you a man? CHELSEAXCHANG
The doctor asked me on a scale of 1-10, how would I rate my pain I didn’t know you could rate the level of pain you’re feeling but I gave myself a 10 “But you look fine to me,” the doctor replied “What would you rate my pain then?” I asked “Well, no signs of scarring, bleeding or bruising so I’d say a 3, because you look sad.” I could tell this doctor I am in pain but I can’t tell her where it hurts My doctor would never be able to reach the word “Bitch” that is scarred in my memory of when I first learned it at 5 years old because that was what my father said I should call my mother No stitches could sew my heart that has been bleeding for believing so long that when someone told me “I don’t love you,” it just meant, “Not yet,” & if someone said, “I don’t love you anymore,” I was convinced deep down it was just, “For now” That’s what my mother would say when I would ask her about my father anyway I wish the world wasn’t so small and my heart wasn’t so big Maybe I’d feel much taller than the man my father tried so hard to prove himself to be
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His masculinity was so fragile he refused to show any affection to his wife & 3 children I made him a Father’s Day card, stick figure drawing of the family, house & all & he crumpled it because I colored outside of the lines. That bruised me for a long time Maybe I wouldn’t have gotten so bruised up that time I asked a girl what her favorite book was & she said she didn’t like to read My mom’s not a bitch, but that girl definitely is “You’re right. Maybe I am just a bit sad. I’d say a 3 then.” “Perhaps we should give you something to help you sleep at night?” I was given Zoloft & Melatonin that day My mother thought I was dying She was right “Do I not love you enough?” She cried. “I’ve tried so hard to make things normal again.” Normality is subjective because I’ve grown up for over twenty years to believe this life was completely normal for me Until one day, someone held me in a way my father never did One day, someone stroked my hair & scratched the back of my head in the way I only knew my mother could
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We were laying in bed--my girlfriend of two years & I--we tried having sex with a dildo for the first time. It was awkward. I could tell she didn’t like it. Maybe I didn’t know how to use it. It made me want to cry. It made her think I didn’t think she was sexy. She started to cry. “We don’t need that shit anyway. It’s expensive.” She laughed as she continued stroking my hair. “I still love you. Don’t cry.” But I wasn’t crying because of the expensive dildo I didn’t know how to wear. I wasn’t embarrassed because when I finally figured it out, I couldn’t get her to cum. I turned to the side, grabbed my Zoloft & Melatonin, swallowed it with a gulp of water & in that same moment, I swallowed my pride. “I don’t want to be like my father. I want to be the man my father never was.” “You’re not your father.” My girlfriend pulled me closer. “But are you a man?” It’s time to swallow this pill & accept the fact that I am.
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The Game I’m Tired Of Taylor Lissandrello
The men who betray their friends linger at the bar, whispering into her ear all the things she is ready to hear. A few friends stand outside but you prefer to go without the company of others. You think of your brother, and where he is, what he is doing, what he is brewing, Who he is hiring out to brew. There is a few that must be. Threw away the handbook, threw away the doctor. Threw away all the antibiotics. You wonder whether this is wise. Today you cried. Grandma’s got three months and you’re three thousand miles away. Three thousand three hundred and thirty-five. Folks throwing hip hop in the mix with their quick fix of fermented hops and wine. A little cafe on the corner, ornery bartenders have long since gone. Something along the lines of sex appeal screams from the replacement. Her friend is full of himself. Deep looks in the eyes between staring at his hand held screen. Nodding his head and changing the music to his naturally more sophisticated selection. He steps outside to take a call. The tension in the room is swept out, nipping at his heels. The bar tender leans back to the lap top. Resetting it to where it was. That or an overwhelming curiosity overcame her. He saunters back in, chin held high. He returns to deep gazes. She doesn’t pretend to be unfazed, Plays the game we all do. Plays the game I’m tired of.
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The Moon and the Cycles of Love and Loneliness Lauren Espina
To view the moon with a lover on a foggy night Is to witness the ever-turning cycles of love and loneliness. The moon and its unspoken luminescence Pours into you the secrets of the world, Harnessing the power of the sun So that we may bathe in infinite shades of light Without bringing harm to our human eyes. These pulsing moments, Your crystalline eyes, Nourishing, not satisfying And so willingly given, So consumed and consuming, Then the pull of tomorrow. Then the ache of our own undoing, And the fog rolls in, in, in, And our moon is no longer our moon, But a smear on carbon paper, An imprint of what we know is there but what we cannot see and what we cannot feel. We are isolated by the intangible veil of the clouds, The molten pools of desire, Of fear, of hate and of loneliness.
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And loneliness can be crippling, Like silent weights on each finger, On the corners of lips and behind both eyes, Pulling us down, down, down, Our unhinged imaginations. And how it burns. This rash that spells hold yourself dear. A note to self. A silent alarm. And just as the loneliness begins to consume us, To eat the light in our bones and in our hearts and in our words, It passes with the fog, With purpose But no destination. And you will find the moon, Seeking the flushed cheeks of lovers and other mad creatures of the night. The fog floats on, As loneliness floats on. As love sometimes floats on, Out of reach and into a world that’s incomprehensible to the one it leaves behind. The cycles of love and loneliness can rotate faster than the earth turns. And so they deceive us into leaving. And so they deceive us into staying.
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And so you must shake the glitter and filth. Forget the pretty words. Forget the voices that speak to you in the early hours of morning, That say you’re alone. You. Are. Alone. A silent drive, a salty walk on the shore, Compared to the loneliness we feel next to a lover.
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