EarlGrey
A Tea Literary & Arts Zine
Issue 2
© 2024 by Tea Literary & Arts Magazine
tealitmagazine.com
@tealitmag
EarlGrey is published on an annual basis in both physical and virtual formats, and it is accessible on the website above. The zine serves as an extension of Tea Literary & Arts Magazine and features a diverse collection of fiction, poetry, art, and photography pieces. The opinions expressed in these works are those of our contributors and do not necessarily represent those of EarlGrey editors, staff, or members. The rights to all content featured in the zine are retained by the writers and artists. For further details and information, visit our website.
Layout and design by Ian Jackson
Through me you go into a city of weeping; through me you go into eternal pain; through me you go amongst the lost people.
— Dante Alighieri, The Inferno
LETTER FROM THE EDITOR
Welcome dedicated reader,
With great thanks I write this letter to those who read the first issue of EarlGrey through unfettered eyes and said they wanted another. For the past year we’ve waited, lurking in the shadows, collecting pieces that are equally dark as they are gorgeous for this moment EarlGrey, The Second Coming.
The best of human art and literature isn’t pretty; it can be rough and terrifying, making it all the more moving. The pieces in this zine tell their unique stories, calling upon vastly different mediums and artistic styles, in an attempt to remind us that art and literature can work hand-in-hand. With every issue of EarlGrey, the staff finds it necessary to use a single word to describe the overall experience of the zine. When it came to this issue, the one word that resonated with us was sacrilege, which has inspired us to use religious symbols and imagery combined with those of disastrous times.
So, as I hunch over my computer’s keyboard, I hope this letter reaches you, my sacrilegious reader, as you explore all we have to offer in this Second Coming of EarlGrey.
Sincerely,
Ian Jackson Editor-in-Chief
Femme Fatales Alexandra Del Canal
i
He knelt, a mouse in a glue trap. His cockeyed gaze ascended sloped calves and the noble valley between breasts, cresting sparkling, china-blue eyes. Fastening the dainty heel around her ankle, his fingertips brushed hot skin the way a child strokes a monarch’s broken wing. With a wind-chime laugh, she flounced away, leaving behind the girlish scent of clove and carnation, the fragrance of love.
ii
I knelt, choking like a cat with a hairball, and projectile puked through the balustrade, bombing the frat boys below with vodka-soda vomit. You ushered me home, keeping streetside lest I whirl into blue-hour traffic. On a tipsy waltz down 13th, we spoke of hometown politics and dead friends. A streetlight flickered as we cleared the stairs to my apartment, where you knelt to untie my sneakers, placing them neatly on the rack.
Arja Rebecca Huaman
a southern summer Nithya
Kunta
to wash out vicious florida winds and the occasional tinge of boredom marbling my summer palette, i dream of golden mangoes on june evenings and to be drunk on laughter or earthy, red wine on the beach, i read a book about grief while listening to some blues and every year, our house blooms with bright orchids and affection as my brother and i race on rusty old bikes mostly i dream in color, of all the possibilities to occupy the warm days before i leave again and although i often wake up paralyzed with choice, i paint until the leaves turn amber
Maggie Kiley Us and Taco Bus
Porch People!
Sarah Henry
I like the neighbors who just moved in.
We sit across from each other on summer mid mornings and don’t say a word together.
Between us: the garbage man, yesterday’s spiderweb, our shared-custody stray, and the street I’ll tell people I grew up on.
Today, over breakfast, I heard them shouting—strawberried shouts and full-bodied foot-stomping.
We let the mosquitos have their way with us, let the swampy heat turn us inside-out. Front door open. AC off.
Rebecca Huaman Untitled
Tallahassee James Ivey
Miccosukee Road glistened, beckoning this deadhead traveler into the sullen evening.
My father pulled up and shoved my carry-on haphazardly into the car.
His silence spoke. As we passed Hopkins I wondered whether sleep was another casualty of grief.
In the shadows between street lamps, I saw where I never played with the neighborhood kids; never fantasized wargames, pausing for lemonade armistices served in Solo cups; or climbed treehouse ladders to protect a schoolyard love from dead harvestmen.
I chuckled as we pulled into the carport. What’s that for? my father sleepily asked. Nothing, I replied, it’s just a shit time for a funeral.
Daniela Bendo Shadow and Mist
Selenophile
Laura Newman
the backseat holds my body they're talking in the front about other dimensions he holds her hand I feel someone watching who else but the moon. bright full assertiveI point it out they say "waxing gibbous" It looks so full to me. I think about you for the first time in so long I try to read your mind and feel the little things I once loved to notice. like if you know the moon cycle or if you've seen the movie we're on our way home from. the moon seems boastful. I watch him follow me home and wonder if the sun gets tired of giving her light to his skinthey cross paths every dawn.
does he ever thank her? maybe you never really saw me and maybe that's ok all I know is you looked better the farther you seemed to be away. the movie talked about dimensions, about parallel lives that go on and on foreverI pray in one we get it right. I can feel you reading this somewhere out in space and time and I know you know it's about youyou never had to read my mind.
Penance Alanis Gonzalez
r e a p e r ! [ A l b u m C o v e r ] 2 m a n y m a g z
Untitled Briya Patel
oranges Samantha Bernstein
tell me, lover all your dreams tell me what you want from me you want the sun?
i’ll bring it down you want my heart?
i’ll rip it out
i taste your sweetness from miles away the sugar on my tongue for days lavender and cherries, too i cannot help but think of you and in my dreams you’re here with me i peel you oranges while you sleep the juice is running down down down.
i smile at the love i’ve found
Restless Mouths
Celina Azebeokhai
We were cattle then, and one of old cows began to low— loud and sick. There was a sad, empty hunger amongst us that hung in the air like grief.
The old cow sensed something— perhaps she feared the dogs that protected us from ourselves. We were wild once.
The mule was braying. Love is the language of the conscious, and we knew nothing then.
Our restless mouths knew only simple prayers.
Eden Jenna Bartkovsky
when i was a girl, i thought that i had found God in the garden section the strawberry seedlings were mighty the finches swooped toward heaven, their song a choir God, a pile of river rocks on my father’s cart his face reflecting mine
I am my father’s daughter, through and through a deep-seated solemness and a sinful streak a certain reverence for all that is truly good with a taste for temptation we see the snake everywhere wrapped around the fruit the mind the soul the garden section of Home Depot
i watch it contort its body around the monkey bars at school, my father finds it wrapped around the handles in the liquor store
we’re escaping our bullies the garden, our Eden
the snake finds its way through the tall grass through the mulch on the playground through the ice frosting the freezer doors
in the garden section it makes its way toward us slowly, steadily neither of us are safe familiar with the serpent defenseless against temptation we look our fate in the eye without recoil river rocks for the taking strawberries for the picking commandments to be broken temperance is unattainable
we were never granted an Eden if the snake had already laid claim
What’s Underneath? Caroline Emmerich
Lost my Keys in a Storm Drain
Jupiter Jones
Pick the lime out that rum and coke, darling. Collar upturned, I’ve left the bar alone.
Dismal decor assaults my eyes. She sings, spinning her dress, I watch the clock at home.
My belt goes crack. His hands lifted: hiding; a kid curled up beneath my weak cologne. Hear now: his screams as I send him flying.
Mistress knows no backhand like his, I hope.
She’s kept and chaste. Her book, no names showing. Hand me tithing, I’ll light the rock, get stoned.
He’s dead, so hush, I can’t stand your moaning. Come here and sleep. Your skin’s so soft, I know.
He spoke and felt my boot, at last. Blinding. A roach. I dig a tooth from my rough sole.
I stare at her bare breasts while we’re fighting; the clock has stop’t. All’s left is her soft groan.
Curtains are closed, the moon sits in knowing. Bar lights go dim. I hear iron on bone.
I won’t turn back lest the wind stops blowing. Deep veins run straight; leading to the black holes.
I take her out. Seagull shit and kindling. We watch the waves turn sand from ash to coal. She tells too much. Her eyes well up. I sing mutely as the sun sets. Forgot which song.
within you...
Mehak Sandhu
THE END
l unar c ycl es , Mom & Dad , th e movi e Dirt y Danci n g , Nick & Mik e o f th e Sl 8 Gal l er y , and a bunch o f oth ers .
Jones , Rud i Lark i n , Al e jand ro A guirre , G re gory Charlesti n , Alani s Gonzal ez , Brianna Bates , th e Moon and al l i t s
pSecial thank s to: Garr y Boulard , Dari en O ctave , J u pi ter
