The Andrean 2023

The Andrean ’23

Works of Art

COVER SOPHIA MUÑOZ ’23

2 CORA BIRKNES ’23

7 CORA BIRKNES ’23

8 ANNA SCHNEIDER ’23

11 KATHERINE MEERS ’25

17 MASAI MATALE ’23

19 ANNA SCHNEIDER ’23

22 POPE BROWN ’25

25 SOPHIE MO ’24

26 DANNY YU ’24

27 EMBER THEEKE ’25

30 MASAI MATALE ’23

33 CATHERINE FOSTER ’25

35 CELINA BAO ’24

36 SOPHIE MO ’24

37 VICTORIA YIN ’24

39 ANNA SCHNEIDER ’23

40 AINA PURI ’23

47 JOHN TETI ’23

48 TONY JIANG ’23

51 CHRISTOPHER LEWIS

51 EMBER THEEKE ’25

52 WILLIAM LIN ’24

53 MASAI MATALE ’23

54 MASAI MATALE ’23

56 EMMANUEL APPENTENG ’23

59 SHAWN LI ’24

60 LILY MURPHY ’23

62 WILLIAM LIN ’24

68 ISABELA HERNANDEZ ’25

71 VICTORIA YIN ’24

72 SOPHIE MO ’24

74 WILL TOOMEY ’25

75 WILLIAM LIN ’24

76 HELEN HEUER ’23

CORA BIRKNES ’23

Dear Readers,

From the dining hall to dorm, St. Andrew’s fosters authenticity in everyday connection. The amount of submissions we received this year demonstrates students’ eagerness to take advantage of the chance to share their work with the community. The number of submissions is also a testament to our community’s ability to listen and appreciate students’ pieces with open arms and minds. For what do St. Andrean’s do if not celebrate each other’s ability to be vulnerable?

This year’s Andrean is a testament to the power of genuinity. Ms. McGrath often tells students to, “keep it simple,” meaning not to expend all of one’s time on many endeavors. However, we also believe it’s the ability to keep one’s work true to themselves. There is complexity in keeping it simple; the creativity and communication that comes with having to be authentically oneself. In this year’s Andrean, you’ll witness our peers break down their complicated emotions into poetry and prose that aids in displaying the complexity of the adolescent mind. We select these pieces in mind to highlight a St. Andrean’s not-so-simple ability to be true to themselves that we are fortunate enough to see every day.

It is our hope that this year’s edition of The Andrean inspires people to read, admire, and ultimately write their own forms of short stories or poetry that will not only help them, but also the people around them make sense of the world’s complicated dynamics. St. Andrew’s is a playground to explore this complicated world with a large network of love, guidance, and support. From “meant-to-be first” to “Selections from Variations on a Summer’s Day,” different perspectives are heard and new conclusions are discovered. Despite The Andrean not being written for you, the reader, it is about you. Keep it simple. Connect and engage with the literature. Allow yourself to dissolve into the world of St. Andrew’s, for we cannot help but connect. Love,

Clara Scanlon and Darden Shuman Editors

meant-to-be first

EMMA HUNTER ’25

Foremost: it was a gift

A belated gift that came right on time

It’s the meant-to-be first place

The reality second place

Because i had bought a waterbottle right before it came along

So, the odds were rigid against it

The base is unsturdy and narrow creating

Its impractical elegant shape

Painted black and white dogs

Following each other unable to see beyond its twin

I always was a cat person

My bottle frequently found itself discarded and lost

Despite its bright red brilliance

Oh the adventures it’s been on without me

Rolled across countless floors

Spent months in the bed of a pickup truck between tools and wood boards

Returning blistered and scraped

Leaving long matte silver trails

Forgotten for weeks with the same

Unexpiring water

The shoes it’s run into

Heels, sneakers—walks across the world

Dents from endless falling

One loud crying crash

Metal on school-hall tile

Smash

And in silence till the next

The bottle that’s visited the middle school locker room

Been lost in sweaty bodies, high ponytails

And learning what insecurity means

Gossipy whispers and whining blue lockers

Its silver lip holding back that stail sob

To mile run times and push-ups in a row

Washing that anxiety down

Washing each word into the pit of my stomach

It pinches my fingers with its small handle

It never quite fit in my backpack’s side pocket

It swings and hits against the soft spot on my leg

Attempting to bring me down

While lugging a large bag around that stupid field

Each foot step of my cleat numb-er than the next

Each field unique with its own divots and

Variation of bermuda grass

With its fresh lines or last month’s remains

And each plane utterly the same as the next

No matter how many times it’s lost

Somehow it always gets found

Found tightly between the hands of a little girl

Doing her best as a bench warmer

Whose eyes scan a familiar yet distant stand of bleachers

Searching for something that isn’t there

Found next to the treadmill

Gladly feeding into the euphoric feeling

Of walking atop clouds

Found in the pantry

Clean and broken

Ready to cure exhaustion

So when it got too rough

On the field or at your desk

Sniffles, searching for what isn’t there

And your drowning in all the unspoken

Take that sip swell—reality second place

wash the blood of the earth through you

Lift yourself up higher, happier, less thirsty

Make more room for everything

—Everything you won’t have the courage to say

Let Me Drown In Your Eternal Embrace

ANDREW CHEN ’25

I cried for an embrace but you were gone

Derived of a mouth when I needed to scream

The labyrinth consumed me and ate the dawn

I used to be elegant, a ballerina gliding above the surface like a swan

But ambition chipped away my toenails and cracked my bones

I cried for an embrace but you were gone

I used to be powerful, a God amongst my pawns

But hatred burnt my churches and slaughtered my cherubs

The labyrinth consumed me and ate the dawn

I used to be loving, a mother tending to her spawn

But neglect stole their youth and silenced their wails

I cried for an embrace but you were gone

I used to be brave, a conqueror proudly wearing his crown

But duplicity took my crown and kingdom

The labyrinth consumed me and ate the dawn

Where are you in my time of need

As I lie here, a graceless, weak, bitter coward

I cry for your embrace but you were gone

So I forsake the dawn let the labyrinth consume me

CORA BIRKNES ’23

ANNA SCHNEIDER ’23

Dig

SOPHIE MO ’24

My blood pumps to the same rhythm as the song you played for me— the thoughts of you unravel every time.

and every time the thoughts unravel, I am in the car driving to upstate new york to your childhood home, a naivety I didn’t know you could afford.

We talked better than children do back then. I told you our minds were diseased with some illness diagnosed by the soil we grew from, and you won’t speak.

So we lay on the floor like toddlers, and back to the soil we went.

I finally understood the reality of recoil. Though who knows? we’re too far from upstate now— too far from the soil.

So slowly unraveling. So slowly digging.

Sundial in the late afternoon

CLARA SCANLON ’23

Hello 6:37pm sun, still air and warmth from above and around me around your arms loose, mine tight, pull away; go fourth from my hand on nape of your neck; its you I adore

I’m falling, the pit gets deeper and blacker I fear it'll never stop consuming me. my warmth reaches out but echos, I and you now I without you, back In my face, and I retain what it teaches.

I know I won’t feel you, your breeze, your soft 7pm sun and now I am alone and its early To early to be without you, I frown and you frost, harden, and turn to leave me without any mercy

I run and keep tripping and bleeding and I pray On the sunless earth for anyone (for you) to hear. You do, you won’t, you don’t turn, you won’t stay Just let me adore you, 6:37pm sun. At least let me hate you as you disappear,

White Fortune

CELINA BAO ’24

The other morning my grandpa passed away.

My roommate told me that I can tell the school to take a mental health day. Catch my breath, and drown my emotions like a cold rain. After a short daze, I rejected her offer.

I thought about a lot of things.

I remembered years ago when I walked back home with dad from elementary school. Vendors sold chocolate crunch sticks and bamboo cages of crickets among fallen piles of dusted bicycles. The little me held dad’s hand tight, as I staggered between the green grass and the gray gravel pavement. I watched my shadow gradually devouring the trembling reflection of autumn leaves. Somehow I felt a sense of delight.

My dad rarely picked me up from school. I didn’t know if he was looking at me when I stared at my shadow.

After a while, he said to me that my grandma passed away.

He rarely spoke like that. His tone felt like a metal-like cotton falling from high sky. It reminded me of the white smoke on the green tea he always sips on. Fog by a mountain on which god has hidden elixir.

I vaguely remembered that I nodded, but I didn’t cry. From the earliest time that I could grasp onto in my memory, my grandma was always on the hospital bed. I almost never talked to her. My cousin, uncle and mom would gather around her, smile at her, and tell her about the little gossips. Old Chinese people always called these things chicken feathers and onion peels. I never learned the reason behind it, but I believed in its wisdom.

And every time grandma would just lay there. Maybe she was listening. I wondered if she would curl her lips up a little bit for these things in the silent room after we all left.

Yet in the time of news, what I understood was my dad’s message to comfort mom after we got home. So as my shadow slowly treaded ahead, burying bouquets of sunlight, in my brain echoed this sacred mission.

Home. Mom hunkered beside the ground drawer in the bedroom corridor. It was easy to tell that she used a lot of strength to pull out pieces of clothes. She folded them meticulously. Almost too meticulous for packing a bag. Her fingertips trembled, pale like pear blossoms.

I ran straight to her. I didn’t need to kneel down to touch her shoulders. I mumbled that it is fine and don’t be sad, but mom didn’t move. Very soon, my words of comfort became broken strings of beads, as I started weeping. The very next moment I started howling and crying hysterically.

That was when mom finally turned around to look at me. Around her eyes were tints of rosy red. It was the first time I’ve seen her cry, so I cried even more aggressively. In the end, she was the one to calm me down. We cried forehead touching forehead. Sticky with little crystals of salty tears. Elixir on a mountain in the foreign west.

In retrospect, I still didn’t know why I started to cry. Certainly I didn’t understand death, and grandma was just a name. It was a weird sensation. When I saw my mom there, and when I opened my mouth to speak, my eyes just began to hurt and the next thing I knew they were watering like a dewed plant.

After I grew up, mom always mentioned about grandma: what she said, what she did and them. Mother and daughter. Since then, grandma has become alive for me. She felt real. There seemed to be a mystical bond that gradually formed between us and it fused into the lantern of my soul.

Before I didn’t understand what death was. I thought that when people die they would disappear, and the ones who survived would cry. Now as I think about it, maybe when people die they wouldn’t disappear, and maybe the ones who survived wouldn’t cry.

Or maybe I still don’t understand death.

But grandpa’s death was abrupt.

He only went into ICU the morning before, and he died the second morning. I saw a photo of him in the family group chat when he was sent into ICU. He rested on the stretcher, his mouth covered by a respirator. His white muscle fit was half lifted. He had lost most of his teeth and his eyelids feebly shrouded his eyes. I was shocked by how thin he had become: his ribs looked like carved structures on his skin and brown spots spread on his body. I told my roommate he seemed like those hospital people who were about to die in the news articles. Wretched and hopeless souls.

“That’s how patients always look like.” Channing said. “We were just used to how they looked before. We never thought that one day they’d be like that too.”

I realized that I haven’t been home for three years.

That I have been away from that gray apartment on the 18th floor amidst a restless city that proudly growls “Wuhan, everyday is different.” I thought about the pair of elegant antique redwood chairs that anchored on an especially elevated platform in the living room because they showed off the success of the homeowner without being flamboyant. We, an entire family of maybe twenty, gathered there to take a family photo with professional photographers when dad decided to spend

big bucks to take a set of wedding photos for grandpa and grandma on their 60th anniversary. They sat on the two chairs, wearing dazzling red coats embroidered with dragons and phoenix.

I thought about the green mahjong table in that room with French windows. We rarely played mahjong on it. Instead it was usually covered with snacks that grandma fried. I never learned its name. I always only grabbed one or two when she shook the container and handed it towards me with a wrinkled smile. I never learned its taste. I always took small bites. And grandpa would be sitting behind her in the chair by the television that was once the best television out there with a cigarette between his two fingers. Still like a background board that would chuckle from time to time.

I thought about this crowded room every new year. Dad, mom and I would always celebrate the Lunar New Year’s Eve in this apartment with the rest of the family before we immigrated to Canada. My dad, uncles and cousins would squeeze beside this tiny glass table that apparently doesn’t fit them, and take out a deck of cards to play. It has always been very entertaining to watch because as soon as they start playing, they would start yelling like they hate each other. “Why did you play this card?!” “No, it was your fault!” “Aiya, you suck at this game. You should have played this card...”. Between game breaks, we would take a few glimpses at the Spring Festival Spectacle on television, and chewing on melon seeds, we would comment on how much worse it had become compared to last year. Then somebody would pull out their phone and send a red pocket in the family group chat. It would turn into a streak. The room would be filled with peoples’ laughter and sighs depending on the random amount of money they received from the red pocket.

There was a three-year difference between me and home. Between me and grandpa.

In my impression, he was always laying on his bed. Sometimes he would cough, spit and even smack his upper lip with his lower lip. When I looked into his eyes, I always thought I could feel his breath and thoughts. His soul. Yes, it was still there. In that shell called body. In that state called alive.

No, I didn’t think he would die. I imagined that after a few days he would have been out of ICU and gone back to that old man peering at me on the snow white bed.

It was after I called mom that I crossed paths with reality.

She said, grandpa might not make it this time.

She said, in Chinese peoples’ minds there are two fortunes: one red and one white. The red fortune is seeing your kids get married, and the white fortune is seeing your old man die peacefully at an old age. It would be a white fortune in grandpa’s case.

She said, grandpa is lucky. When the emergency happened, dad was in China. It only takes an hour to fly from Shanghai to Wuhan. When grandpa was on his deathbed, his daughters and sons, grandsons and granddaughters-in-law, grand grandsons were all by his side.

She said, grandpa had enjoyed a fortunate life.

I listened to her quietly. Her tone felt like cotton-like metal falling from high sky. When I opened my mouth to speak, my eyes hurt again. They watered like dewed plant. It was the same weird sensation, but this time my wept didn’t turn into a piercing cry. I learned to be silent.

I asked her how dad was doing.

“He’s doing ok. They are all prepared in some ways, you know, after covid and other things. Your grandma and grandpa are both ninety-something. At this point it is a matter of time.”

On the second morning dad delivered the news of grandpa’s death.

He said to me, “Baihe, I have no dad now.”

Although he added a little crying emoji that has transformed to mean “funny” sarcastically now.

As my day went on, this sentence replayed and replayed in my mind in class. I wanted to cry every second.

I asked him if he saw grandpa for the last time. Fortunately he did.

He said he kowtowed three times for me in front of the altar of ancestors for grandpa. I should have done it myself, but I was not in Wuhan.

During lunch I FaceTimed dad. He had a blush. I didn’t know if it was because of the lighting. The familiar living room behind him was filled with new decors and an altar with a black and white portrait of grandpa. Red candles glared and flinched. Both of us didn’t really talk. I was scared that as soon as I spoke I would tear up. I also didn’t know what to say to comfort him.

“It is fine and don’t be sad.” How is it possible that he is fine? How is it possible that he is not sad?

How is it possible.

We chatted a little while about chicken feathers and onion peels. At the end I let out a “don’t be too sad.”

“Yes, I wouldn’t. But if you continue to talk about it, I will be.”

This time his tone was truly light, like a gentle breeze. He was comforting me. When my roommate proposed to me that I could take a day off. It unsealed a piece of memory that I never dared to open.

A few days after grandma died, I was in Chinese class. My teacher pointed at me to answer a question and I stood up. I blanked out as my thoughts had already drifted away.

She asked me why I didn’t listen to the class attentively and what I was thinking about.

“My grandma passed away. I am very sad.” I rightfully said.

In reality I was not sad. I tried to squeeze out a few drops of tears.

“This is not the reason why you don’t listen in class. If your grandma knows that you don’t listen in class, I bet she would be very sad about it,” The teacher responded as she waved telling me to sit down. She seemed to have fathomed my little tricks.

A sense of guilt arose as I sat down.

When I recall this piece of memory, I still feel guilty. The me now seems to go back to that time. I would stand in the middle of the garden on campus, the willow twigs brushing gently by my face. There would be white fog like the one on the mountain where god has hidden elixir surrounding me. I would watch this piece of memory rewind in silence. Its color diluted. The four sides of the frame faded.

But in a trance I remembered that on that campus, there was no garden, no willow twigs and no white fog.

I didn’t know how to feel. I was numbed. Strong feelings haven’t struck my heart for a long while.

I watched a reality show when I was younger. In the show the celebrities were challenged to tear up in five seconds. Ever since, when I cried, I would think that if I was doing the challenge, I would have won easily.

Although I stopped having such childish thoughts, I would have received a big win if I entered that contest that day.

I don’t know.

Maybe the next time when I go back home, when I don’t see grandpa laying on that snow-white bed or sitting on that wooden chair, when I don’t see his cigarettes burning its last breaths of life in the ashtray, I would be sucked into a world where I am infinitely sad. A world where there is elixir.

The new year that I look forward to would never come again.

MASAI MATALE ’23

Lacuna

CY KARLIK ’24

Last night I was with you under a dusting blue sky this tryst like so many before with rigid fingers felt like inky blots along a page, a familiar kind of agony.

you're just a special kind of absence that lives between stars and lines a crater or a hole, i don’t know how i’d fill you up.

you're that chill i get like a witch passing by my window why not come for a ride?

and how do i find you pin you down with definitions write your blackness in ink?

you're like a sun collapsing towards the center held to spin me in orbit until i pass through you; dark

ANNA SCHNEIDER

Mama Brain

(After Fra Angelo’s Annunciation)

CLAIRE LOUISE POSTON ’24

My girl, lost on your front porch like everybody

Sick with lost time

Something you told me last Tuesday, I think,

Is that everything we know about the ground we were told from midair, or does it go the other way?

The point is, Gabriel was talking with wings still on him

The point is, they were so real that you didn’t even hear him at first

He called you The Virgin Mary, and then just The Virgin once it got too lumpy in his throat

The point is, you’re so holy that you don’t get to hide anymore

Your love will be spread out in front of you and ironed and folded and stuck into little pyrex and big minivan trunks and it will smell like snot and tears and Green Bean Baby Gerber

and it will fall apart and you will stitch it back together again, again, again

And the whole time I will be looking over your shoulder, waiting to see the seams.

And even then, you are my girl

Especially then, you are all mine.

Ode to An Old Sweater

EMMA TANG ’23

I rummaged deep in my wardrobe, until I found you, the exact blue to match winter’s hue.

Snug sleeves, wide on the waist.

Wool-knit, warm enough to ward off chilly air.

I know you well along the crown of my head, strands of my hair, curve of my spine, and base of my back. I hold on to you, your scent, your fuzzy texture.

I press you to my pounding heart.

Sprinkles of the first snow,

Coffee spilled on busy mornings, And the long, tight hugs with people I don’t wanna let go— you were torn, stained, compressed, and stretched, soaked up with memories. My mind is always on the run, yet I will never grow out of you.

POPE BROWN ’25

Virtue or: A Tiresome Lack Thereof

JOHN TETI ’23

In mornings, I’ve no trouble sleeping in, And still I have the dignity to speak. I lie, I cheat, I steal, I hurt, I sin, With years of cynicism, I’ve perfected my technique. I’m slow when I forgive, but I forget.

My levity is lavish and unkind.

I’m quick to anger, rich in leisure, yet I haven’t felt the weight of all the friends I’ve left behind.

My gluttony, my fear, my pride, my lack, I’m ignorant, I undermine, I want, The imp on my left shoulder’s growing fat, The orphan on my right is bound, and gagged, and frail, and gaunt. It’s not so easy, being such a jerk.

All my self-indulgence takes a hell of a lot of work.

A 13-year-old boy...

SHAWN LI ’24

through the clockwork motion of my life, you were my one light. the figurehead, extravagant centerpiece of my mental palace, your visage everlastingly kind and comforting, something I was always glad to look up to when life became smothering. But now, I see the cracks in your impenetrable armor, The material making up your spiritual body starting to rust, finally opening my eyes. Reluctantly, I see your imperfections with painful clarity. I see cobwebs forgotten and ignored, the shaky, unstable, unworthy foundation you were built upon, the hasty markings and measurements of the inept engineer, resulting in mangled limbs and mismatched chest hair. Mournfully, I collapse to the ground in disarray, as I realize in a sudden flash of mental agony and pain. You are dying.

I refused to believe in the possibility, as you have been in my life since my progeny, ruling my every action with your commands. I became used to the perfect idea of your glory, not understanding for a minute that you could be anything lesser, that you could ever be human like me. I remember gazing upon your infinite greatness, wondering, if, when I grew older and lived longer, could I replicate this? You were my one idol, the holy being I based my meager soul around, like MJ to Kobe, you were my inspiration, but, instead of equals, or opposites, I always pictured us on two different plains of existence, close enough to where I could always see you, chase after your fleeting figure, like Daedalus with Icarus over the icy abyss, never quite close enough to understand, never quite close enough to protect the image of you I had in my head. As, again, I realize, you are dead.

It’s funny isn’t it, how time manages to always get us all. No matter how persistently and obsessively I struggle, how fast I become, I can’t outrun the truth of reality, the numbing realization that you are no longer a part of me. Along my split identity, there are

two split meanings for the number 13. One promising growth and evolution, the other promising death and suffering. I was thirteen the last time I really saw you, in my big t-shirt that’s now normal size, and shorts I have long thrown away, I remember laughing with you, now I hang on to that day. 175 centimeters. Did you know that I’m now taller than you, no longer the little, naive boy enamored by you? So, I guess it’s time to finally live through the dual meanings of a number so damn important to me, leave behind the suffering, come to terms with your death in my head, and finally move on, evolve, and grow from the lack of your presence, as finally, I am alive.

SOPHIE MO ’24

“In my last hour of life, where are you, mother?”

DARDEN SHUMAN ’23

God, are you there? I fear my time is near. my life as a whole, what failure, what love. I would give so much, not to leave you, my dear, But the mirror is shattered, and I, shoved.

Not into the field of wildflowers, Sprawling with color, and fragrance, and life. No castle of sunflowers that towers, Over the kingdom. No, only a knife.

I fell and fell into the deep, dark, pit, Why put me here without even my mother? I landed on my back, on the knife, I split. What wasted life—there’ll be no other.

With pain in my red heart, my eyes, they close, But I feel her warm love, and so time—it froze.

DANNY YU ’24

No-Face

My body lurks through lands where secrets hold; My eyes on faces lined with fear and spite.

I have no name. My friend’s the dust-lit night. Laments of solitude, I leave untold.

I feed on willing victims, throwing gold along the bloody course of appetite. Amid their dreadful cries I dance despite behind the mask, my soul is icy cold.

Uproars of industrial breeze resound in waves. To dull formalities, my howls resign.

I put on gentle human skin that paves conceits and dreams on trivial storylines.

Would you befriend a monster? All he craves’ a string that ties his tattered heart to thine.

EMMA TANG ’23

A Five Dollar Bill Falls Out of His Pockets Shortly Before This

COLIN BRIGHT ’23

Why did the man enter the Seven-Eleven? Did he realize how his hand had balled into a fist before the pump gorged itself on his crumpled, torn dollar bills? Or even before he had stepped out of his Cadillac? Why had his hand, clenched as he stomped across the rain-slicked asphalt, suddenly relaxed as he pushed through the shaky glass entrance to the building? More importantly, why did he wait at the doorway, hesitating as fat droplets splattered across his back? Was it so that he could more reasonably shake off his blazer as he entered, cursing all the while? Why’d his eyes lock onto the clerk? Was he going to scream his frustrations towards him? Tell him how late he was? Tell him how much he had to be doing? Tell him how little time he had to waste on a man as pitiful as him? Why did he settle for simply curling up his lip?

When he began aimlessly browsing the candy aisle, did he think about buying an Airhead? Did he grab it, only to flip it over in desperate scrutiny? Did his eyes scan the nutrition facts? Did he scream in horror? Or, did he just let out a scoff, and look side to side for a witness? Did he wonder if the clerk had a full head of hair under his cap, unlike himself? Did his dulled anger swell up once more? Did it claw at his throat? Why didn’t he scream at him? Was it because of the clerk’s sudden and spontaneous movement towards the slushie machine? Why did the clerk pull a towel from his back pocket, and begin gently shining its dulled plastic casing? Why did the man, who had shuffled aimlessly into the chip aisle, only focus on the mixers, watching them spin around and around? Did he rip his gaze away, in favor of examining a bag of Cheez Doodles? Did he remember how he would, as a boy, smear neon orange dust against his lips, shoving puff after puff into his maw? Would he savor the taste, or swallow it down before it could even register?

Why didn’t he think about how his mother would wipe it away, as he fussed and squirmed? Did he remember the frustration as she would run paper towels under warm water? Or had he mixed that up with his own? Would she press gently against him, mopping gently at his painted cheeks as he fussed and squirmed? Did he dislike the feeling of the water? If that was the case, why had he run through sprinklers as she hollered for him to have his lunch? Had he resisted, or run into her arms? Had his father scooped him up? Had he giggled as he was carried back to the screen porch? Or did he ignore her cries? Did he ask himself how he had found any piece of mind? Did the man even realize that he had stuffed the bag into his suit pocket? Did he assume he had put them back as he walked towards the refrigerators? Did he hear

the bell jingle as the door swung open? Why didn’t he turn around as the visitor began gently instructing the clerk? Did he hear the hushed argument whispered back? Did he realize their voices had grown louder? Why was he looking so intently at a bottle of chocolate milk? Why did he have trouble deciding whether he preferred Fairlife to Yahoo? Did he want to tell himself that he could buy both? Did he instead tell himself that, irregardless, neither would be suitable for consumption?

When he turned around, was he surprised to see that the visitor was pointing a gun at the clerk? Did he act surprised? Did he shout? Did he do anything at all? Did he pray, or did his mind default to a sigh? Did he realize that the visitor was screaming now? Did he realize what the clerk had done? Did he want to step in? Did he want to help him? Who did he want to help? What could be done? Would he be shot? Why wasn’t the clerk handing over the goddamn money? Why wasn’t the visitor wearing a ski mask? Didn’t he care about being seen? Oh god, was he going to kill them? Why? What was he doing now? What was the clerk reaching for? Why did the man call out? How did he know the visitor would look over, how did he know he wouldn’t shoot first, ask later? Why in god’s name had the clerk pulled out a phone, instead of something to blast that bastard away with? Did the clerk know he was going to die? Was he okay with that? Did he think the man would be, too?

But why hadn’t a shot rang out? Why had the man, slowly relaxing his furrowed brow, opened his eyes to find himself alone with the clerk once more? Where had the visitor gone? Why hadn’t he followed through? Did the clerk realize how lucky he was, as he blabbered into the phone? Did he know what had almost happened to them? What had happened? Why was he still talking into that phone? Why hadn’t he looked at the man? And why was the man already stepping out, damp blazer in hand? Couldn’t he put it on, at least? His tie was getting wet—did he know that?

Ode to Apples

SHANIA ADAMS ’23

Apples!

I’d eat six of you each day

When I was a child.

One by one; in twos or threes

Plucking out the imperfections. You were unchanging and sweet and I

Saw nothing but you.

Heaven knows what would happen if I

Turned away from you

Yet I turned away, There was no snake to tempt me

Yet I turned away

And I saw many things. I saw Pears and grapes and Bananas and kiwi at beck and call

And I saw your tree

All withered, and beat up and thought That was your tree

MASAI MATALE ’23

How can this be?

How can something so immortal, so consummate

Come from a diminished Tree? I turn back and see you. I see a gradient

From red to yellow and back again

Your flaws became flawless.

If you came from the tree, and The tree cultivates you

You, too must yield to the seasons

Soon you’ll be eaten, And your core will be thrown away Or maybe you’ll wither, Your core will brown in due time

Either way that’s okay

Evolution’s at the core of your existence

Or, it must be fine with me

My reality must shift

It must ebb and flow with the Gradient of perfectly changing Apples.

Ode to anger

HENRY ADLER ’23

Oh anger, nothing compares to the high I feel When pent up, that tension’s release makes me reel My eyes burning velvet, that rushing, driving force With things at its source, feelings lasting minutes or more

When I stubbed my toe on the table of coffee I fell and you were there to catch me

You are the beautiful bridge of instinct

Where the animal within breaks man’s brink

The Sea of screams are beautiful chorus

Like a wildfire of emotion in the driest forests

Because when you take over you consume

Then everything is left broken, raw, and crude

And in the calm before, glowing eyes of regret

When you consume me they leap from the depths

The savage beasts of unrest; they lurk and hide

So here’s anger, you splendid crimson high

The thing I know will stick with me

Up until I die

Peach Juices

DARDEN SHUMAN ’23

You used to wear smock dresses, And come home dirty and tired. After learning and playing and making messes, It was always a long bath you desired.

But now you think baths are gross, And you would never dirty your clothes, Because what would those folks Think? You know that they would have to oppose.

You used to eat peaches constantly, And let the juices run down your arms, And drip all over you and all on your honesty, You never considered it harm.

You used to read Mother Goose, And you mimicked the Little Engine that could, And you were always told by your mother and Dr. Seuss, Of all the places you’d go.

You used to wish on dandelions, blow Their seeds into the wind, before you learned that they were a foe, Not welcomed in the Garden of Eden.

And now I sit and wonder, just what this Life could be, Had the little girl chosen peaches and bliss, And decided not to leave.

CELINA BAO ’24

CELINA BAO ’24

SOPHIE MO ’24

VICTORIA YIN ’24

Faith

HANNAH GILHEANY ’24

we lie on our backs in a cool sand sometime between dusk and dawn and june and august and childhood and grown you ask me, do i believe in god?

i think of holy wednesdays my knobby knees sharp on the cold stone altar of lies, or truth, maybe, i don’t know but i know the words sin and judas and hell fit misshapen, stick against my teeth and i force them out as i look up to Nothing.

i think of the bishop’s hands gripping my head at thirteen, hastily composed yearnings, prayers, wishes, opening my eyes to no symphonies or heavens or clarity just my own pleated white dress and hands folded begging no Relief.

but i think of that spring day leaning out the big window to the birds’ choirs and the grass so green it must be somewhere beyond here and the girls who smell like lemongrass, vanilla know more about me than i have ever said aloud remember the touch of a baby’s hand soft in mine stinging tears that come to my eyes when stevie nicks sings when i walked into the sistine chapel your eyes on mine chills. some things are beyond Words.

whisper i don’t know and we are silent, you trace constellations on the backs of my hands paint me ancient stories, orion and cassiopeia and andromeda who lived back in a time when we did not know anything or maybe we knew more than we will ever know again.

maybe unknowing is knowing, maybe faith is the spaces in between.

AINA PURI ’23

For My Mother, Before We Knew Each Other

EMILY FUNDERBURG ’23

I don’t mourn you

I mourn her

The little girl with brunette curls

Running away from her mother

Your words pierced and stung her skin

Like knives in the kitchen

Where you thought she belonged

With gin still fresh on your breath, Yet you were the one who felt wronged

Little did you know

She never stopped dreaming

For a life away from you

Was a life full of meaning

She never stopped running

It was her only escape

A means to amend

The ripples from your wake

Forty years later, her kids cheered her on

As that little girl crossed the finish line

The one you had drawn

For she would not be

The way she is now

Without the work of thee

You should be proud

Her love for us was imbued by the lack of love she knew

Wine Wednesdays

GLORIA OLADEJO ’25

The American dream seemed to have resided in Vallamont Hills. A perfect baby blue always painted the sky as towering houses stood side by side in the small community. These symmetrical towers could almost fool one into walking into the wrong home except for one. The Bradford residence had a bright wine-red door that contrasted against the white exterior of the house, a grand driveway, and freshly trimmed grass which glistened in the face of the bright sun. It seemed like any other day as Mrs. Bradford, with a wide grin, opened her door for her neighbor who held a bottle of Arles. The housewife strolled through the entrance into the dining room before looking at Mrs. Bradford again.

“Oh, darling! It’s felt like forever since I last saw you!,” said the housewife as she placed the wine on the exquisite train on the wooden dining table. “How are you?”

“I’ve been doing well. I’ve just been a bit busy recently,” said Mrs. Bradford.

The housewife looked around the living room as portraits of gap-toothed children smiled at the two women. “Oh, I love what you and Richard have done with the place! Oh. My. Goodness. Is this an authentic Van Gogh piece?”

Mrs. Bradford turned to notice the housewife recognized the piece’s intricate trails placed in a gold frame from the top of the staircase. “Yes, it is. I love his artwork,” said Mrs. Bradford with little excitement.

Mrs. Bradford grabbed two recently polished wine glasses from the cabinets of a freshly cleaned kitchen and returned to the dining room to the housewife.

“How are the kids doing?” asked the housewife.

“Oh, they’re doing good. Soccer season just started.”

“Oh, kids and their sports. I never used to do sports as a child, you know.”

“Yeah, they do love their spo– could you pass the wine?”

“Oh! Of course, darling!”

Mrs. Bradford poured the red wine to the rim, taking a quick glance at her wedding portrait before turning back to the housewife.

“You know, we should really plan an event for us Vallamont ladies. I’m thinking of Wine Wednesdays,” said the housewife, looking excitedly at Mrs. Bradford.

“Yes, definitely.”

“I’m thinking about your house for next week! You just have the most perfect home.”

“I’m not sure if I’ll be at home next week.”

“Are you going on a vacation next week?”

“It’s just a short trip.”

“I hope you’re going to Cabo. It was so wonderful the last time William and I went.”

“Maybe,” said Mrs. Bradford, pouring her second glass of wine.

“You’re going to have so much fun, darling! So that means you won’t be at the PTA meeting next week?”

“I guess not.”

“Hmm, that’s too bad. We’re doing a group vote on where extra funding should go to the school. I’m thinking another food truck would get the kids really excited.”

Mrs. Bradford stared into the picture-perfect family portraits on her living room wall. Her kids’ bright eyes shined through the canvas opposing her husband who carried a serious demeanor. Then she got to her place in the portrait. A blank stare turned into a melancholy look before reaching for her fourth glass of wine.

“So what has Richard planned for your anniversary today?”

“He’s working today.”

“Aww, that sucks. But I’m sure that the trip is making up for it.”

“I suppose so.”

“Oh, would you look at the time. I should really pick the kids up from school!”

Mrs. Bradford looked up at the passed-down grandfather clock facing the two. It was 12 in the afternoon. With her half-empty glass of wine and the housewife’s untouched one, she started walking towards the kitchen, ignoring the housewife’s tangent about one of the neighbors who copied her Christmas decorations from the other year. The echoes of glass shattering filled the entire kitchen. The redness of the wine resembled a murder scene as glass glistened against the once clean floor.

“Oh my, let me help you with that.”

“Thank you.”

“Darling, you must be a bit tipsy right now. How many drinks did you drink?”

“It was my sixth glass.”

“Well, no wonder you made such a mess. Sit down and let me clean this up.”

“I’ll be fine, you have things you should get to.”

“Are you sure, darling?”

“Yes, I am.”

The housewife picked up her purse, leaving the bottle of wine on the table, and walked towards the door. Mrs. Bradford, looking at the shining pieces within the red, ignored the housewife’s farewell. As the farewell echoed through the house, the wine-red door to the Bradford residence shut.

PABLO PICASSO BUST OF A WOMAN (DORA MAAR), 1938

LEASH

an ekphrastic poem in response to Picasso’s Bust of a Woman (Dora Maar)

CHRIS ONSOMU ’25

What have you done?

To her most elegant face

Lined with grace and honor

Now misshapen to fit what canvas?

What art is that important?

That you change one whole eye, which glances at me

And Gently flutters its beauty and freedom,

To one which preaches it’s distortedness

Morphed and bent by who

By what?

Not by you

For you’re the painter.

Saluted by all

Questioned by none

Except that eye you drew.

Judgement Day

JAMES OWENS JR. ’24

When you think of the color red

What might you think

Will you think of a velvet cloth

The thick consistency of blood

Or the smoothness of red wine

When you think of the color silver

What might you think

Will you think of a simple coin

The speed of a bullet

Or the shine on the chains

Of a brand new bike

I see the smoke as it passes

Faint but fast

Thick as the smoke from a cigar

The red burn from the tobacco

In this case so fast

Essentially non-existent

The crack of the gavel

Loud enough to cause

A ring in your ear

A shock causes the judge

To spill their cranberry juice

Causing the juice to drip down

From their desk up high

It is 11:59

They look at the clock in disbelief

The jury thinking

How unprofessional

The jury left speechless

The judge in shock

But no time to react

Before the red from the cup

Began to spill

It is now time for the judge to be judged

If they can’t clean up the mess

In a millisecond

The clock will ring 12:00

Their time is up

The juice continues to drip

Until eventually

The floor is soaked

JOHN TETI ’23

TONY JIANG ’23

Classical Antiquity

CLARA SCANLON ’23

With my sheets as my armor

My body slumped upon cotton like marble, my face turned, Eyes to the window as I lie poised, muse for Pygmalion’s marmor

I am no longer impenetrable, I am tainted, can I be a martyr?

Let me be a cheap greek statue, glue me together, merged With my sheets as my armor

I join the choir, I might not withstand, have I become the harmer?

Our contagious laughter cracking my marble like skin, leaving me spurned, Eyes to the window as I lie poised, muse for Pygmalion’s marmor

Now I have skin of stone, silken without edge, I will disarm her Chisel painting my features with naturalistic agony, the brutality is unearned With my sheets as my armor

Finally assembled, ready for rebirth and thus I will charm her My porcelain smile bright, eyes glossy without tears, begging to show what I learned

Eyes to the window as I lie poised, muse for Pygmalion’s marmor

Breathe life into me Venus, Look! I am the Galatea you seek and he the harmer! See how I await you! In your silence I am new; resurrected and hellenistic I now stand with my sheets as my armor, No longer my eyes to the window as I lie poised, muse for Pygmalion’s marmor

Quarters

SHAWN LI ’24

the ever-present jingle as I walk, you fulfill what I lack, cause through time, you’ve become a constant in my life, as throughout all of the talk, you’ve always had my back.

I tend to get anxious most days, my life gets out of track you refocus me, help me re-gather my precious mask and disguise, the ever-present jingle as I walk, you fulfill what I lack

I turn to you when I know my psyche’s about to crack, when I’m screaming, crying, filling my head with lies, as throughout all of the talk, you’ve always had my back

But, however good you are to me, I’m a liar, a hack. In my twisted dreams, you are currency, so I use you to satisfy the ever-present jingle as I walk, you fulfill what I lack

So, I lose you, like a needle in a whirlwind of haystacks, Sobbing, and dying, I cry out to you, I obsessively apologize, as throughout all of the talk, you’ve always had my back

However, my grief is quick, I see your reflection on the rack, So, I gather one like you, one who listens to my life’s strife, the ever-present jingle as I walk, you fulfill what I lack as throughout all of the talk, you’ve always had my back

CHRISTOPHER LEWIS

EMBER THEEKE ’25

Inside Voices

CLAIRE LOUISE POSTON ’24

Worship of baby face wedged between fence posts

Barbed wire spun tight around playground antics

Back when we smiled just to show our teeth

Our hunger already shushed and swaddled away

We welcome fresh morning torture with limbs that already know

This heat hung sloppily, the worn blanket itch of shame

Blistered in the blistering heat, Our screams cut ripe

Bleeding out like raw yolk, Sick and heavy inside of you

Everything a blunt scratch to swallow

We’re given only the sting of the in between

Here and silent with a sore throat, We’re outlived by every single word

Truth still with us in our bones

But it was never even ours to say

When a Nonbeliever Prays

CAROLINE ADLE ’24

God, what makes a Nonbeliever pray? when They’ve never looked to You, from that, They do not stray You’ve never said You’ll guarantee, so what makes Them get down on Their knees? when They ask for deliverance, when They say good riddance to Their beliefs They’ve never betrayed God, You have to answer when a Nonbeliever prays

MASAI MATALE ’23

MASAI MATALE ’23

True Beauty

RYLIE REID ’24

Glowing is she, her rays that pour into their empty chalice. Inflamed in our hearts, she is the object of their roaming eye. They constantly search for her, a ball of burning wholeness in the sky. They climb to her heights and fall, the harm worth standing in her palace.

Burning is she, a radiance they made far too bright. Her light blinds them, a gaze they try to but can not break. They feed her fire and burn their hands, for they are hers to take. Never enough to foster the flame, too human to tame a perfect light.

She falls from their sky, nothing but a shadow left of her reign. In a darkened world void of her, their faces are but the same. Our head turns towards a crack in the heavens, illuminating not something missing but revealed. We need only lose her to find a string of stars we’ve yet to claim. Each a twinkling mirror of us, yet we did not know their flame. The starry mirror reveals our face, why did I let you go concealed?

I swallowed some bees

ZACH ATALAY ’23

I don’t quite know How to race a pair It feels odd Unsteady I wish I did. So I swallowed my pride And with it some bees. These bees ached to leave My throat’s cage, But they never tried The front door. So they stung my throat and poured honey All through my nose They refused me food And liked warm showers. My throat constricted And my heart sank As they stabbed holes In the future I designed. Amoxicillin came too late Exiling the bees after My tapestry was ravaged. Sometimes I think What might have been If those bees hadn’t come along And taken everything. Perhaps that pair Would have worked.

SHAWN

LILY MURPHY ’23

Visit Back Day

CELINA BAO ’24

For Mr. Porter who never taught me

The day starts with the death of my identity— as i lost my name tag and became Channing who would be an Asian American adopted by white parents if any bold souls dare to ask why my last name is Malkin.

But i am for sure not the biggest loser today: new minions of orthodox trampled into the temple of faith and learning let us mourn for the animals cold and dead in the wild! parents roamed through classes and stumble in between time let us mourn for the poor kids and the good o’ days!

If elegy is a poem of the dead for the living perhaps i am really the biggest loser today. Soon all of this will be a memory that hurts like a song i am ready to go but i am not ready to pack. Do i bring with me a bible or a secret admirer candy gram? God i am standing in front of a fleeting train and stuck in between time i don’t know which tense to use and i wonder if i will ever be entitled to speak in second person or the third.

One day the name tag will be found but this poet will be lost.

sense less

YEABI KEHM ’25

in the company of silent silk spinners and mounds of airborne feces a case of stairs climb up the wall made of stone and sweat, and shaded from the joy of the sun seldom noticed is a small window, right there

soft singing seeps through thick stained panes it settles over the steps like early morning fog the stone, impervious and imprisoned

also taking refuge, is the shy glare of incandescents it’s golden light straining for recognition the stone, reflective and rejected was it fate that put me here? just to smell, to see, to hear I wait and wonder if death is near as hymns are sung meant to soothe my fears

JOHN SINGER SARGENT SMOKE OF AMBERGRIS, 1880

Mirage

an ekphrastic poem in response to John Singer Sargent’s Smoke of Ambergris

FINN WATERSTON ’25

The alabaster model gently proves distinction from the surrounding slab

Cemented in cloth, she can hardly unveil,

A scanty stone step separates her from the useless, Hiding answers in her cave

Fumes float gently in

Esteemed to serve aphrodite

Drifting lazily up and up

Wisps dancing in their random manner

Relishing their short, aimless lives

Dissipating as they please

Death’s door inviting and wide

A luxury not found in caves

She’s entombed, the exit barely visible

Stalactite stands guard, shearing away what could be Barred, a begging finger reaches through, in hopes of a mate

An empty curtsy.

Buried, she adorns herself

Wishing so so hard

Deep down in that cave

That it wasn’t so lonely.

Almost Not Ugly

LEAH HORGAN ’25

Oh, it’s in the way! —to see this sunset, to capture this moment, lines slashing through the sight, cutting out the beauty. Dark like a silhouette, birds perched wanting to share the view.

As I drive, I wait and watch out the window, for this wire and pole to end, knowing it never will. A pole every 4 seconds—no escape, Country, city, neighborhood, or my backyard, Constantly in the way.

As we play wiffle ball in the yard, He yells “Interference, the wire was in the way!” The once soaring ball drops dead to the dirt. I try my best to ignore this inconvenience, but it just won’t leave me alone.

So I drive, and this never-ending line watches me, no matter how many city turns I take. Rushing with my dad late for school, hoping for the next green light, Watching the clock wishing it would just freeze, for us. Cutting it so close almost every day, a rhythm to it.

In the city, something changes. We ignore the suffocated pole, with staples and holes and more and more until it can barely breathe, And is that dog even still missing? It is hurt and punctured yet still alive—just barely.

Holding up the wanted signs and “Homeless, please help, God bless,”

Waiting for someone to notice and stop, connecting us as if the power it provides isn’t enough. The colors of the signs blend together into one and Get passed by hundreds every day not even a second thought.

But above that pole, you start to notice the rhythm Of the ups and downs, and ups and downs until you fall asleep watching out the window, almost soothing. It almost isn’t ugly.

It carries these calls that keep us together like glue No matter the distance. Like a friend, always there, won’t leave you, Connecting us with communication, Connecting us with power. How can this be blocking something beautiful when maybe it is itself?

Looking out the window to the birds perched, Above the danger which rests upon civilization. Safely they rest, together. Preparing for their next endeavor, you may never see them again. Each wire has seen thousands, yet not one the same as the last. Maybe one day we can be like those birds, high enough from problems and the freedom to escape.

ISABELA HERNANDEZ ’25

I Didn’t Know it was Valentines

SHANIA ADAMS ’23

I woke up in the morning in silence

Sun shining in the window, it’s quiet.

“Good morning me” I say with intense Focus. I speak love into my climate

I put my clothes on, wore some golden hearts

I am in no rush. I take my sweet time

And I walk out the door and my day starts Ms. Tammy tells me “Happy Valentines”

“Happy Valentines?” “Happy Valentines?”

The happy greeting comes as a surprise

I have not yet asked someone to be mine

Yet, in such a moment I realize

I have spoken love into my climate

It’s my essence, I won’t try to hide it

Like the bee’s honey, smooth and vibrant

My words hold power even in the silence

Knowing the divine being that I am

Basking in my own sweet, serene presence

I must root myself in the brown and tan

Speaking words of love as light as incense

For love surrounds me in my darkest days

For life- For my life I give love the praise

Yellow: Decomposing

ZACHARY MACALINTAL ’24

You are a banana peel

Nothing but a clone

Because apparently your ancestors have been raised

To fail, to not have a seed to plant

You are a banana peel

A dying species, a disease is coming for you

You have been made susceptible to its rot

You were born in an experiment

You are a banana peel

Picked, transported, shipped off

To some odd high school

Placed in with other clones in a white bowl

You are a banana peel

Pretend to be a phone

Talking at you, with no one on the other end

You’re nothing but something to hold in someone’s hands

You are a banana peel

Snapped at your end, or your beginning

Your skin peeled away, as they eat whatever you have left

The thing you held onto is being digested

You are a banana peel

Nothing but a husk, a skin

That once held a story

You are a joke people slip on

You will be thrown out

You are a banana peel

Nobody cares when you’re in the trash

You belong there

Left to turn brown and slimy

Til all that is left is dirt

VICTORIA YIN ’24

Self Portrait

CY KARLICK ’24

Cigarette ashes splayed like roots

Along a fat-lipped glass, A Neon buzz as bees and honey dripped from oil tanks and slick like grease. The incognito wasteland of Jungle wire and bird toys lead smelted Paint cracked floors, Rubbish heart

In world of words-Black little raindrops Dripping through the porous felt and grubs.

The Macaw ribbon winged, Green on Gray drab corduroy.

Lone primate screams, jabber nonsense And fight.

I am cy

How else to describe?

As if, say, a novel might fill pages

Of renderings thick with light.

I think it would only bleed Like makeup under stage lights.

It sits there naked

Translucent

A pale little figurine of marble With phallus.

Frankenstein cracks ribbed with glue Along ribs and glue.

Thoughts while falling backward out of my chair

HENRY ADLER ’23

All hairs sticking up straight my eyes wide open, Coursing through my veins, blue chills up my spine, That sudden rush of cold adrenaline, giving me this feeling that I may die.

Stand still! this moment has slowed down in time, The cup, knocked over by my flailing hand, As beads of sweet tea continue to climb. I stare. Falling through molasses, God Damn

I feel like I’ve been falling forever, Pushed past 45, mocking the maker. Thinking, I was fine, and I would never, Be the one stranded, in times thought chamber.

So here I find myself resigned to fate, Hoping it won’t hurt too much when time breaks.

WILL TOOMEY ’25

Selections from Variations on a summer’s day

CELINA BAO ’24

II

On my way to the Ascension Hall there is a white tree and a green tree. The white one mists on top of the green one like the immortal mountain under the quill of an emperor that lives to seek the elixir. A blue breeze approaches with a waking stroke

The white tree and the green tree rustle with a few regrets and a few resentments to speak. The green tree looks up, sighed “you are so white.”

The white tree looks down, sighed “you are so green.”

Beside my feet, There lays fresh a white leaf and a green leaf.

WILLIAM LIN ’24

HELEN HEUER ’23

Andrean Staff 2023

EDITORS

Clara Scanlon ’23

Darden Shuman ’23

ASSOCIATE EDITORS

Shania Adams ’23

Henry Adler ’23

Celina Bao ’24

Colin Bright ’23

Andrew Chen ’25

Emily Funderburg ’23

Shawn Li ’24

Kim Murrell ’24

Rylie Reid ’24

Emma Tang ’23

John Teti ’23

FACULTY ADVISOR

Will Torrey

DESIGN DIRECTORS

Sophie Mo ’24

Amy Kendig

The Andrean is supported by the Amanda Leyon ’95 Memorial Fund for Creative Writing.

School

Middletown, Delaware 19709