Blacklist Volume III by Blacklist

BLACKLIST Blacklist Journal | Vol. 3

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VOLUME III

BLACKLIST Masthead

Victoria Xu

Visual Arts Editor: Poetry Editor:

Sarah Terrazano

Deputy Poetry Editor:

Cassie Schifman Tafara Gava

Prose Editor:

Sienna DeBenedittis Rachel Moore Ally Gelber Tiana Murrieta

Contributing Editors:

Nia Guzman

Treasurer:

Nyomi White

Publicity Chair:

Hannah Sussman

Outreach and Events Chair:

Yu Yan

Cover Art:

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Table of Contents Poetry

Balloons, Remembering, and the Uselessness of Cryogenics

My Mother’s Language

the flesh of my inner right elbow

Aubade for the Apocalypse

If You Are Looking For Her, Look For Me

Melanova

If You’ve Ever Felt the Wind You Know

Inevitably

You’re Hearing This Wrong

Agatha Christie

Cargo Pants

After Charles L. Worley

Stretch

Pisces

Because a man-boy.

Ladies’ Compartment

Jake Sibley

Sophia Cirignano Katherine Oksen Seth Wade

Alessandra Allen

Toi-Whitney Williams Gerardo J. Lamadrid Nicholas Conti Courtney Garvey Alina Shirley

Matilda Peck

Cori Bratby-Rudd Tomoki Williams Isabelle Cori Bratby-Rudd Payal Nagpal

The Individual

Prose

Ryleigh Norgrove

Beached

All Was Silent

Violet Fearon Jack Galati

Visual Art

Solitude

Aoye Yuan

Bathers

Oluchi

My Life in a Night

The Butt End

Child’s Play

Masked

Liv Molho Menat Allah El Attma Sarah DiMichele

Mairead Dambruch Menat Allah El Attma Lisa Trevino

Photos from the “Concussion Headpieces: Photo Series” 29 Keegan Barone

A Dwelling

Queen of the Damned

Density

Spaceships over Reykjavik

Harpoon

My Mother’s Kitchen

A Pair of Earrings for Grace Jones

The Night of Beijing

Static (Failed Imitation)

Pink Thoughts: Problem?

Sarah

Footsie

Menat Allah El Attma Jackson Ellis Lisa Trevino Keanna Flores Jake Sibley Vera Villanueva Yimei Hu

Aoye Yuan

Emily Melia Elin Kuo

Katherine Squires Katherine Squires

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Moving Pains

Sanika Phawde

Nostalgic Strangeness 2018 Ranxin Zhou

Figures

The Ghost Who Does the Most

Liv Molho Katie Kwak

Blacklist is a national, student-run journal based out of Brandeis University. blacklistjournal.com theblacklistjournal@gmail.com 415 South St | Waltham, MA 02453

Solitude

Aoye Yuan

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Balloons, Remembering, And the Uselessness of Cryogenics Jake Sibley

If you were to force a balloon approximately four-point-eight-five miles beneath the surface of the ocean, it would hang in suspension, the air within and the water without brought to square. Motionless and perfect. When I was a little younger than I am now, I would take dozens of balloons out to my friend’s pool, fill them with my breath, and try to force them under. Ah, those long days! He’d join me sometimes, the friend whose pool I was commandeering, and we, trying to create complete stillness, fought off the inevitability of our looming college educations. When the sun in its ever-present blindness would turn its iris to worlds beyond our backyards we’d trudge inside to warm beds and ticking clocks. Hours and hours spent with goddamn balloons, trying to drown them. I know it was ridiculous. But I just wanted them to hang there, silent and happy and grand. The more I think about it, those balloons with my breath in them always looked uncomfortably blue under the water, no matter what color they were when I blew them up. Sometimes, it seemed like they were freezing down there. Skin turns blue like that, after something dead has been frozen. Some rosy-cheeked romantic usually thinks they can bring something they once loved back to life when science catches up with death, and that the new life will be exactly the same as the last one, and that that would be desirable.

Bathers

Liv Molho

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My Mother’s Language Sophia Cirignano

In sixth grade, she didn’t let me grow my nails long or wear high-heels, trends fabricated to hinder book writing and a certain strut towards academic awards by women who speak multiple languages like five pm sunrays spattered on pavement. Regarding birthday candle puff, school dance prep pictures, she prefers the ones where I’m double chin, crinkle eye cracking up (“Well that’s what you look like!” she’ll say if I complain it’s an unflattering shot). Expect eyebrow elevation at all that’s not firmly fastened to truth. She’s the sort of person who has admirers and who will refer to someone inspired by her daily watercolor Facebook posts or how she presents Italian grammar to her students with a side of focaccia as just that, what they are: “My fan.” Often her hands press against her sternum—when Milva sings out the fatal nature of love and Kaveh Akbar mentions missing chunks of universe—like how bivalve mollusks clutch their soft parts so as not to spill.

Oluchi

Menat Allah El Attma

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The Individual

Ryleigh Norgrove

The Individual of or for a particular person; adjective The individual is best defined as the summation of one’s life experience; the dense, fibrous, inner workings of one’s mind, body and spirit. It is, quite simply, a tumultuous life sentence. The Spirit the quality of courage, energy, determination or assertiveness; noun The wall of our motel was covered with pineapples and tiki heads. I’m not kidding, the place was straight out of Blue Hawaii—containing just the right amount of kitsch. The stench pulsated. It was filled, piled to the ceiling with dirty towels, dirty socks, dirty sandals, restaurant menus, bathing suits, gift bags, scattered suitcases and a few lonely paperback novels, soaked in sun and salt. The mess pushed air out of the room, and the anger twitching in my father’s brow raised the temperature a few centigrade. Aching for breath of clean, cold sky, I sat, silent in the far corner of our cluttered chaotic. Stationed on the eastern wall, a large poster of Marilyn Monroe, lounging on a white sand beach in a dreamscape not far from our own veranda. She was, in those days, my perfect woman.

My father’s hands, white dinner plates crisscrossed with time and work, held my glasses. My very first pair—they were small. Small enough to perch on the end of my nose. I remember sitting in the back of Mrs. Thorpe’s fourth grade classroom mesmerized by the chalk’s blurry abstract. My teacher—the magician—wrote secrets in a sporadic swirl. Not long after this phenomenon I was fitted with fuchsia-pink cat-eye goggles. The very ones now curled around my father’s index finger. He thundered, crushing the will of my mother, who sat, wilting in the adjacent corner. His voice gobbled the remaining air, filling each crack in the ceiling, and stretching to each corner of the room. There were words, I am sure, though they are long forgotten now. Miss Marilyn smiled quite prettily into the infinite oblivion. She curved in at the waist, frozen, a captive to her beauty. My gaze caught the glasses, tiny, pink, frail, idle in his grasp. In the space between my heart and lungs, a crack of independence rose, coating my throat and encircling my tongue. It climbed, licking my ears and cradling my jaw, aching to breathe, begging to expel my misguided, teenage rebellion. I held it tight in my cheeks. In one motion, he shattered the frames, bits of glass splintering to the floor. I exhaled. It was silent. The room vanished in a technicolor-tiki-abstraction, the scene too muddled to see clearly. The Mind the element of a person that enables them to be aware of the world and their experiences, to think, and to feel; the faculty of consciousness and thought; noun I sat on top of my desk that day in English class. Blacklist Journal Journal It was strange, admittedly, butBlacklist my teacher didn’t mind.

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His other students minded of course, but that couldn’t be helped. My fingers and nose were smeared with ink—the black pitch of creation dressed my wounds. I decided to write. After class, I bombarded my teacher with half-written testimonials and love letters to the sky and proud reclamations of identity and hate mail. It was grey outside. The clouds, sullen windows to the sky, framed my sullen existence. In his kindness, he urged me to continue. I had taken to poetry—see, I had learned you could whisper your secrets to universe in only a handful of words. Hence the black scrawl, racing across my notebook and lining the curve of my wrist. Cradled in my lap, the testimony of one man, poet-father, who inspired my odyssey—Mr. Allen Ginsberg. “I could get fired if anyone knew I gave this to you,” the teacher whispered. (The book featured some particularly graphic depictions of the male genitalia and tumultuous love-making.) I carried it with me, under the bleachers during our homecoming game (we lost 60-7), on the sidelines during my brother’s little league finale, and most notably, during Mr. Bernard’s unshapely geometry class. Swimming in the stories, swimming in my self-doubt, I worshipped the language and with the man who had flowered from madness. I was illuminated, in awe of his great, undeniable escape. A Creator. Perhaps like myself. The Body the physical structure of a person or an animal, including the bones, flesh and organs; noun The date is September 4; the time is approximately 1:37 a.m.; the year is 2016 I am awoken to the haunting melody of betrayal. My friend pounds the spirit, the tenacity, and the strength from the shell that remains of my body. His cold, uncaring fingers burn the pieces that remain. My tormented fibers freeze

in disbelief, straining for the finish. The moment stole my breath, continuing in its slow, methodical procession. It felt like ages. The date is December 22; the time is approximately 4:56 p.m.; the year is 2017 “You should be careful, those things are permanent you know.” My mother, voice laced with disapproval, sat across from me. She was, in those days, my perfect woman. Her shoulders were set, rigid and sturdy, against the wailing of my rebellion. Near the bend in her arms, hitchhiking soap suds settled—her blouse a casualty to the kitchen’s every whim. “You should take more care with decisions like that,” my father translated. Allowing my mother this grace, he had, in the previous evenings, given way to her in a loving stride. They spoke to my sunflower, etched into the garden of my skin. I was quite proud, the tattoo a permanent reminder of my perfect-excellent-lovely-sunflower-existence. “Tell me again why you did this to yourself?” she demanded. I was stationary, solid against the wall of words pressing against me. What were they going to do, wash it off? “It’s based off a poem. A poem about sunflowers, by this poet I like,” I said. Melting in my seat, I tried to tell her how this voice had breathed on the page, painted stardust in my hair, and saved me from an empty, bleak oblivion. That I, in a dress of dust, a veil of darkened railroad skin, had found salvation in the persistence of a sunflower, trapped in language and time. I had cracked open my soul, shown the grisly red to the stars, bleeding language and independence, twitching at the touch of a poem, dense in meaning and doubt. “How many flies buzzed round you innocent of your grime, while you cursed the heavens of the railroad and your flower soul?” asked the Creator, Mr. Ginsberg.

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“A poet, Mom.” “You did this for a poem?” “Yes.” “Why?” “Because those words are important to me.” “Will they matter in fifty years?” “How can anything?” She was silent. Light glinted off the grey in her hair. Time had dismantled her smile. In a single frame, she had chipped away at the woman-bravery I had claimed as my own. “Maybe that’s the point,” I finished. My stomach, rooted in misery, marveled at the miles between us. The Resurrection the revitalization or revival of something; noun On a fire escape—miles from my mother and the bay, and the shelter of familiarity, I am enveloped in the warmth of my city and licked cold by its breath. I am solitary, under the eye of the moon. My mind, like most, is fractured into bits of wonderment, violence, audacity and creed. So, tonight I’ll walk, voice of Creation in my ear and female-woman-madness in my bones. My reflections: 1. I despise this skin, this coffin of mine, holding life I try to worship. 2. Etched into my form, his thunderous hands. The Man who claimed me. Root-tipped fingers forever digging into my skin, hunting for bone—vines of flesh and madness and desire and need and sin and salvation and submission and solitude eternally encircle my spine, hand and tongue. 3. With a notion to drive and a pension for cigarettes, I am, in fact, a tightly shrouded mass of woman.

In conversation with the sky, I ask of its wisdom: Teach me to strangle this city, battered and strange, as it coaxes from within my throat canned music and horrible bouts of emotion. It replies: Fuel for the soul comes in the form of dark-eyed womanhood and knowledge and creed and cynical, thoughtful boys and madness and moonlight and the brazen ramblings of your pen, nearly out of ink. It follows in my wake, this frigid femininity, aching to know which direction to turn. Through its thin silence, I am forgotten, swimming in the luminous existence, marveling at the daisies, the Men and the sunflower all lining the battered tenacity of my path.

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My Life in a Night Sarah DiMichele 16

the flesh of my inner right elbow Katherine Oksen

do you know what the door sounds like when the nurse has to slam it for privacy so she can say all in one breath: thepregnancytestwasnegative weneedtotakeyourbloodnow areyouokaysweetheart

and with that gust of air I know she felt my life flash before her eyes, i know she saw us dodge a bullet together— a child-sized bullet with your green eyes so green it makes the both of us sick do you know how hard it was for her to see me, held together by scotch tape. have you ever seen a dam break? she has goddammit, do you know what the skin of my inner right elbow looks like? bruised and mottled like a purple crocus stepped on by calloused feet and shoved into its crook but that’s not all that happened that’s not what this is

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but that’s not all that happened that’s not what this is I felt a piece of my soul collapse and fly away when the needle pinched my flesh and two test tubes were filled in the search for any pieces or parasites you might have left inside me do you know how hard that was for my nurse? forced to watch me: rotting from the inside, scratching my own skin off how does it feel to know you made my poor nurse watch that with her soft hair and kind eyes, I can’t believe you’d do this to her

The Butt End Mairead Dambruch Blacklist Journal Blacklist Journal blacklistjournal.com | Brandeis University blacklistjournal.com | Brandeis University 19

Aubade for the Apocalypse Seth Wade

I can’t I can’t I can’t—such a tasty lethal jingle—this yellow April Jell-Oo bleeding a.m. hello out my ears, across your toes, syruping down our chins. Last night we snoozed under neon clouds, swallowed by city rot: licked brick, yogurt shells, sweet and salty wraps. Poking from the alley across Macy’s and a dive bar, we uncrust our eyes to see girl shopping. She begins to bouquet. She is walking when her legs twist, then twine, bundling like stems. Her torso flails and she keeps screaming, frightened by the petal tears. Tongue gunked in fig you spit are they dressing her up or stripping her down? Time yo-yos for me as well so I do not respond. I focus on the beasts trapped in stone outside City Hall. The deer, the lion—their fur starts splitting through. Lazed and laced in gutterblooms we rise and—I can’t help myself. If I asked you to marry me, would you? Somewhere someone’s someone was just shot by a cop while in London a boy’s doorstep package waits to explode and you lasso your dumpster boots, scoop Nutella from a jar, and say with sudden sorrow truth this is not part of a complete breakfast. Rhythm-snipped I go now diagnosed, still laughing at the things undone.

Childâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Play

Menat Allah El Attma

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Beached

Violet Fearon The whales had come in the night, like invading soldiers. At least, you think, they must have come in the night; you’d been at that beach late yesterday, watched the sunset with your mother and your plastic bucket, and the shoreline was distinctly whale-less. You’d wanted to stay longer, stay until the bats came screeching out from the damp summer fog, but your mother made you leave. You are 8; your mother can make you do lots of things. She can make you brush your teeth at night, and wash your face in the morning, and eat mashed up hard boiled eggs on toast for breakfast instead of the pint of chocolate ice cream that languishes unopened in the freezer. She makes you beat the sand out of your sneakers before you re-enter the little rental cottage, even though all efforts to exclude sand from the cottage interior are inevitably futile. She makes you set your alarm for 8 AM, even though it’s July, because waking up at a reasonable hour is, in her eyes, a year-round activity. The alarm, at least, turned out to be useful. You’d wanted to see the sunrise, so you had set it for 6 AM, then stashed it under your pillow so the ringing wouldn’t bleed through the thin walls and wake her up. It’s a half-mile walk to the shore, so you’ll need provisions. You try to tie your pillowcase to a long stick you’d picked up outside, to make one of those fabric-stick contraptions everyone seems to use when they’re running away, but you can’t tie the knot the right way, so you use your backpack. You pack the ice cream and, more reluctantly, a single hard-boiled egg. Lastly, you stuff a wad of toilet paper into your back pocket; you have a runny nose, which, like any sickness in summer, feels like an immutable rule of the universe is being broken, as all illnesses should be saved up for liberal usage during the school year. All of yesterday you sucked the snot back down into your nasal passages as loudly as possible, hoping to catch sympathy from your mother; she didn’t notice. You open the spring-loaded front door carefully, drawing out the rusty squeak. This early in the morning, the outdoors seems filtered through shades of yellow, like staring at reality through a glass of lemonade. It’s warm outside, too warm for 6 AM, a sign of the coming noon heat.

You don’t put on sunblock. Your mother is always putting sunblock on you, spraying it on with an endless supply of aerosol cans that sting your eyes and make the back of your mouth bitter. You don’t wear shoes; another rule, broken. The soles of your feet have built up summer calluses, wonderful calluses, thick orange-yellow splotches that mute the impact of the rough sidewalks and dried out grass. You’re proud of them; you’ve created your own protection. The only challenge is when the sidewalks disappear and you have to walk on the side of the road, burning tar that’s already soaked up the sunlight, or maybe still hot from the day before; you pretend you’re walking on hot coals. You’d seen a documentary on fire-walking, a bunch of old guys slowly crossing a bed of flaming coals like it was nothing. They said the trick was to keep your feet perfectly flat, to not curl your toes as you step and disrupt the surface tension – to stay calm. You place one foot in front of the other with utmost care, imagining red molten heat lying beneath the thin crust of dried tar. Your feet still burn, but it’s a pleasant sort of burning, like the lactic acid released from a muscle during exercise. Lactic acid comes courtesy of another documentary, vaguely remembered; you think it has something to do with milk. The informal entrance to the beach is a well-trod area between two massive sand dunes, topped with thirsty vegetation. At first you don’t notice the whales; you’re too focused on your feet, the transition between hot road and sand. The sand out here never gets touched by the tide, by any sort of water; it’s soft and dry, worming through your toes but not sticking to your skin when you lift each foot. They’re a distant vision, down near the water – black shiny masses that dot the shore, looking more like rubber than living creatures. Your first thought, for some reason, is that piles of tightly wadded seaweed have emerged from the ocean overnight, perhaps collected into heaps by some unusual tidal pattern. There are a few people around the black rubbery formations. They have buckets, and they’re filling them up in the ocean, then pouring them over the piles. You left your bucket at home; you feel a pang of regret. This looks like some sort of group activity you could help with, some exciting adventure, if only you had brought your bucket. You decide to eat the chocolate ice cream instead. Except eating chocolate Blacklist Journal Blacklist Journal ice cream in plain sight of people obviously doing something important seems

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wrong, so you decide to hide. The sand dunes provide the perfect shelter - you nestle into a crevice of tall, papery grasses, and reach into your backpack. The ice cream is the kind that’s packaged in cardboard, and you tear off the top flap. By now it’s more like a chocolate lumpy milkshake; you realized you forgot to bring a spoon. You use your hands instead. The brown cream turns translucent as it melds with your skin, coating your hands in a film of cocoa sweetness. A few brave rivulets snake down your forearms; you lift your arms into the air to make them drips faster, watching the two fastest, biggest droplets kamikaze towards the crook of the elbow in a sort of race. Kamikaze -– you picked up that word somehow or another, and you love the way it sounds – the short staccato syllables, the repeated, sharp K. You don’t know what it means, exactly, except that it has something to do with falling very quickly. You scream it whenever you jump into a body of water. This seems to make all the surrounding adults vaguely uncomfortable, which you also love. This moment, watching the ice cream dribble down your arms, feeling the stickiness of your hands and the sand around your body, hidden from the world, somehow feels like the safest you’ve ever been. You lie on your back and drop lumps of melted ice cream into your mouth, watch the pink traces of the sunrise be replaced with a roaring blue. You fall asleep. *** “Son?” You don’t open your eyes. Your tongue explores the inside of your mouth, the way the chocolate ice cream has made a sticky layer on the tops of your front teeth, the way it’s sealed your lips together, chapped them. Your skin feels tight, stretched taut over your body, like plastic wrap. “Son, are you OK?” It’s a man’s voice. The light is unbearably bright; you see a figure standing over you, blue, navy blue. A policeman. You are not his son. Are there policemen on the beach? “Where are your parents? Do you want me to call someone?” Your eyes adjust. This policeman looks pretty young. He has red hair, and a long neck that sticks out at an awkward angle, like a giraffe. He wears wirerimmed glasses. You’ve never seen a policeman wear glasses before. “I’m fine,” you say thickly, words ill formed and clumsy. You want him to go away; you want your hiding place back. “What time is it?”

“3 PM. How long have you been here?” You shrug. You suddenly regret giving the man your phone number; you don’t want your mother to know where you were, don’t want to ever see her again – not out of dislike of her, but fear of the repercussions of your excursion. You had intended to be back before she woke up, wash the chocolate off your face and hands, settle into bed like nothing had happened. Now your skin has turned an angry pink, undeniable evidence of your sins. You sit up, and look at the shore. There are swarms of people; news vans, police cars, caution tape, ordinary tourists snapping pictures with their phones. The mounds are still there. For a brief moment, your morning journey and the commotion on the beach seems connected; the news vans and police are searching just for you. Your misbehavior somehow caused these dark lumps, like how banging your head at night causes a painful welt the next day. “What’s going on?” you ask. The policeman follows his line of sight. “Whales. A mass beaching. They happen every so often, out here.” “Oh.” All you know about whales is that one whale is five school buses long, and that a man once survived in a whale’s stomach for a year. These rubbery piles aren’t five school buses long. You squint out at the shore. Now you can pick out the fins and tails of each individual whale; they look more like sharks than anything else. “Are they going to be OK?” The policeman hesitates. “Maybe.” You look at him. “Probably not,” he admits. “Most of ‘em are dead. Tide’s too far in to do much about it.” Down by the shore, a man is going from whale to whale, crouching down and sticking a shiny metal tool into each whale. “That’s nature for ya,” the policeman says. He doesn’t seem to be talking to you anymore, just looking out at the sea. “That’s nature.” You close the empty ice cream container, and put it back in your bag. It trails brown liquid. At the bottom of the bag, you see the hard boiled egg, shell crushed, uneaten. Both of these items seem to have fundamentally transformed Blacklist Journal Blacklist since the morning, transformed in a wayJournal you are not sure you like.

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“You want to sit in my car or something?” the policeman asks. “You look like you need to cool down.” You shake your head. Normally you wouldn’t dream of passing up the chance to see the inside of a cop car, but for some reason you are loathe to leave this crevice of sand and dune grass. The policeman continues standing. You continue sitting. You both stare at the whales in silent vigilance. You try to count them. You don’t know why, but it seems important, like numbering them will help them in some way. You get up to 25, then lose count. You try again. Later on, you will read about beached whales. You will watch a documentary. You will learn that the five-school bus whales are blue whales, and that the whales you saw today are pilot whales. You will learn that the technical term for what happened is a cetacean stranding, and that humans have observed mass beaching for hundreds of years, and that some Maori tribes even ascribe spiritual significance to them. You will learn that scientists don’t really know what causes them, but they think it might have to do with the first beached whale sending out distress signals, calling all the rest to their doom. Whales are pack animals, and they always come when called. This will make you sad, but then you’ll learn that some other scientists think it’s because they’re following their prey, like dolphins, into shallow waters. This will make you less sad, because you like dolphins, and it seems like some sort of punishment for trying to eat them. But then you’ll learn that lots of whales are carnivorous, which means eating dolphins is the only way for them to stay alive, which will make you sad again. Later on, you will learn that the man with the shiny tool was puncturing each corpse to release air pressure building in their stomachs. You will learn that if you don’t puncture them, they explode. This will make you wonder if exploding is unique to whales, or if other creatures can do it too, like squirrels by the road, and supermarket chickens, and deceased pets, and humans. A breeze washes over to the policeman and you. It smells fishier than usual, but not yet rotten. You breathe it in as deeply as possible; you don’t know why. A car door slams. In the depths of your mind, you recognize that particular car door slam; that is your car and your mother. You turn around, and you see her, a shimmering figure in the distance. Her eyes are wide, her mouth hanging open, like she’s about to yell. She runs towards you, crouching down,

hands outstretched. You brace yourself, gripping your backpack tightly. That night, you will dream you are on this beach, watching the whales. Except instead of daytime, it will be night; the bats will be out, and the people will be gone, and reality will be constructed in shades of dark blue. None of the whales will be dead - they’ll all be flipping around on the sand like goldfish out of water. One by one, each and every one will flip back into the water, sending up mighty splashes as their tails propel them back into the depths. You will stand there watching them, warm water up to your calves, stuck in place. You will count them. Your mother runs quickly; one moment she’s a mirage hovering over the sand dune, and the next her arms are thin and taut, two thick wires wrapping you in a crushing warmth that smells like lavender soap. “Thank God you’re here,” she says, “Thank God you’re safe.”

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Masked Lisa Trevino 28

Two of five photos from the â&#x20AC;&#x153;Concussion Headpieces: Photo Seriesâ&#x20AC;? Keegan Barone Blacklist Journal Blacklist Journal blacklistjournal.com | Brandeis University blacklistjournal.com | Brandeis University 29

Left: Backlight Right: Portriat 30

If You Are Looking For Her, Look for Me Alessandra Allen

What of clocks of pearl, their unremitting structure? Why do they move me? The language of the hands, ancient to me since the fourth grade, blessing everything. A delicate homage to the Earthâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s rotation on its axis, as if I were watching the sun warp and ignite the carvings on the Ash tree. Watched from above, the trees are celebrating. I have a sister, her name is Adri. Together we watch a line dance in the park; Callery Pear shakes Red Maple until she gives birth in Spring. Sometimes only sisters see these things. When our beds are pressed together I whisper about the clocks and we laugh about the definition of eastward circular motionâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; a permanent love letter to the machine. We love oracle; we love blindly. I tell her to look for patterns if she needs me. A clock designed to tick in the opposite direction is unreadable. The rough lurches of our lives are scaring me. Adri,

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for as long as you’re hurting, I’m sorry. As long as I’m living there will be occupancy in our two-person community. I’ll keep the records of our lives in our secret signs, the violet ones only we can read.

A Dwelling Menat Allah El Attma 32

Melanova

Toi-Whitney Williiams A child of mahogany, Whose speech was brail, Walked down Earth’s altar, In a pale white veil, Caressing a box embellished in copper, Housing stones and gold within, A compass pointing north, Tourmaline and rose Quartz, And a crown engraved with “transcend.” With aimless stride she traveled, Numerous paths labeled “dead end,” Crying “Help!” to the wind, ‘Till a slithery friend, Voyaged root to spine, Spine to crown, For Kundalini had risen. The sun made its entrance, Pushing clouds away, As her center eye revived. A smile uncoiled through Twisted turmoil, And her box’s New home was the soil. She sprouted wings, Joined the Sun and the Moon, Now dancing with the stars, Awaiting the moment, Another brown Queen sought, The galaxy beyond afar.

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Queen of the Damned Jackson Ellis 34

Density Lisa Trevino Blacklist Journal Blacklist Journal blacklistjournal.com | Brandeis University blacklistjournal.com | Brandeis University 35

If You’ve Ever Felt the Wind You Know Gerardo J. Lamadrid

If you’ve ever felt the wind you know how it irons the fire, flattens it how it wrinkles the burn with its cold flames. And how it quiets with its noise how the wind knows what you don’t know you know. The windows down, the water from the asphalt lifted by airy tires on a hot winter morning if you’ve ever felt the wind you know these blind hugs, and how they hurt far away -

No fans and no trees, and the ocean still the kid and the mother and the dog and the sewage overflowed, and the wind overflown: a leaking ceiling and a concrete post knocked through it.

How it was here just here, and over there behind, and in front of us how if it stays it dies, and only by leaving, leaving a printed skidmark of goosebumped potholes amidst the flags of our skin does it live, how it blows. If you’ve ever felt the wind - all gone, rip, missed call and lost jacket yes you – you know: if you’ve ever felt the wind you know.

Inevitably

Nicholas Conti This is the rounded blunt burned out chaos; vermilion paints an aspiring snowline. Between the full intolerable glare, valleys in a blue haze. Surface streaked with ash drift; black lava; hard leaves; dry lakes; steep rains heavy the dark bitter-rimmed deposits. The marsh wastes the wind on the sand. Saline hummocks rise: half-dead suns revel in the half-blood darkness. Sculptures of water are enough in this country. In this country, you will, at last, depend upon them, when they are but maddening dribbles in the hot sink of Death.

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High rolling frost on tilted mesas. Here devils dance, Here you all cry for bursts of violence. Land of lost love, land of lost land. But inevitably that love must come back.

Spaceships Over Reykjavik Keanna Flores 38

Jake Sibley

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You’re Hearing This Wrong Courtney Garvey

1. Suppose I tell you I have a chickadee in the second drawer down of my desk. It’s a nice desk, plastic wood composite with black finish that doesn’t chip easily. You know, professional looking. When I mimic opening the drawer, you hear a bird chirping, three light bleatings, because you want to believe that what I say is true. 2. How many things have you ever lost in a desk drawer? You probably don’t even know how many things you’ve ever lost. Sometimes, the things you put in the top drawer get attention and see the light of day, even when they’re mingled up in your mess of junk. Definitively, second drawers are for losing things. You must want to hide something away if you put it in the second drawer. You must not care if you forget about it. 3. When you imagine the song of the chickadee, you’re imagining something small and sweet. I know you are. 4. So maybe there’s a chickadee in my desk drawer. The second one down, to clarify. Maybe she pecks at the plastic wood composite. Composite, compost, scraps of something fresh. Sounds like I’m doing something right, doesn’t it? Chickadees sound like a malfunction, like some stale scratching; an audio box with water damage. Error, error, error. Imagine sounding like a malfunction. I imagine you’d want to hide yourself away. 5. Maybe the chickadee wants to get home because your errors don’t seem like errors when you’re in a group of creatures making them. But on the flip side, chickadees live in deciduous forests, and I’m sure mine enjoys the newfound stability of a squared-off room. 6. According to a children’s Audubon book I found at my local library, there’s a belt – the north of America and the south of Canada – where boreal chickadees can live. a. My desk says Made in Wisconsin on the packing slip. 8. What is that saying about not letting negativity build a home inside you? Or is it sin, is the saying something about sin instead? Well, is it? 9. Suppose that that chickadee I have eats so much of the composite, she creates a hole in the side of the desk. Or maybe she’s not working towards anything in particular. Maybe the thought of escape never occurred and she’s just

pecking erratically all over until she becomes fat from gluttony – plastic wood composite gluttony – and the bottom of the desk just gives way to her. What if I have a fat and malnourished chickadee in my room, and what if she knows what I did?* a. That I tried to hide her away.* 10. Maybe she’ll collapse in on herself, and I’ll have one less problem to worry about. a. I’ll have a dead chickadee, though. i. Some other beast to bury. 11. For the record, I never officially said there is a chickadee in my desk. I’m telling you I’m not that kind of person.

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My Motherâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Kitchen Vera Villanueva 42

A Pair of Earrings for Grace Jones Yimei Hu Blacklist Journal Blacklist Journal blacklistjournal.com | Brandeis University blacklistjournal.com | Brandeis University 43

Artist’s Statement: This is a pair of earrings for Grace Jones - an icon, art muse, and legend on the party circuit. Her stage image is futuristic and fierce, and that is how people remember her. Yet after doing deeper research and watching her documentary Grace Jones: Boodlight and Bami, I saw the other side of Grace: a Jamaican girl who wears colorful, patterned shirts from home, who jokes and laughs with her family at the dinner table, but also who has been raised under her grandfather’s abuse and has been struggling to hide the wounds. There was a scene from the documentary that became my inspiration for this pair of earrings: a shot of Jamaican jungle in a serene, misty morning, juxtaposed with Grace’s monologue on stage followed by the crowds’ applause and scream. This scene is an epitome of the duality in her life. The earrings therefore also have two sides -- the outer surface is reflective, symbolizing how Grace Jones presents herself on stage; the inner side is matte and soft, reflecting her natural self and her days in Jamaica. The earrings can also be worn like a pair of headphones, which produces a calm white noise, and hopefully, reminds Grace of that serene, misty Jamaican morning.

The Night of Beijing Aoye Yuan Blacklist Journal Blacklist Journal blacklistjournal.com | Brandeis University blacklistjournal.com | Brandeis University 45

Agatha Christie Alina Shirley

the train station is two miles north and down the stairs. the train is missed. in that you missed the train. in that no one on the train missed you because no one knew you were supposed to be on the train other than you. you want four children. you say four because you want three but you are afraid that one of them might die. horror novels used to terrify you but now you sleep soundly. you cannot remember the last time you screamed. the walk back to your house is agonizing. in that it takes you thirty minutes, and every twenty seconds holds another flaw that caused you to miss the train. you hold this embarrassment in your hands despite no one ever knowing you were supposed to get on the train at all. it’s a new callous on your palm like the blisters on your heels and you keep walking. the top shelf on the cabinet over the sink has twenty-seven different mugs lined up handle to shoulder. you spend twelve minutes holding each of them in your hands to see which one feels right. you’re still scared of the subway and deep dark tunnels but you no longer cry when you’re underground; to you the collapse is inevitable. you wanted to get on the train. every day feels like a compromise with yourself. you miss when you were nine and you ran around your kitchen seventeen sweet times. you miss when only four mugs fit in your hands like life choices, eeney meeney miney mo, eeney meeney— you knew flipping a coin was rigged before you knew what gravity was. your brother always picked first, and he always won. eight times out of ten. the train has left the station before you ever thought about getting on it.

Static (Failed Imitation)

Emily Melia

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Cargo Pants

Matilda Peck They were pants for a boy Detested by my parents Too militaristic Too baggy Too grungy Ugly Ugly Ugly I adored them Hanging around my scrappy legs Legs for recess games And climbing too high into trees Legs that loved to run And hide Feeling free inside The pants not meant for me Starry with pockets I counted thirteen Endless places to keep treasured Stones Chestnuts Crushed Flowers And pieces of myself Why is that cute little girl In such hideous pants? Sweetie, donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t you want to wear a pretty dress? My legs exposed then Vulnerable to my own hateful eyes

Unseemly pants concealed my own Ugly Ugly Ugly A daily costume of boyhood Grass-stained and liberated Everyone was fooled Sometimes Even me

Pink Thoughts: Problem?

Elin Kuo

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After Charles L. Worley Cori Bratby-Rudd

Put in the oven, the dough, indented with mother fingerprints, pressed, Gays, I am by association, my bed across the hall, a quick yell for water away And my mother is there with a glass asking me about the nightmare Lesbians light the candle on my 1st birthday cake, I crawl over my presents In onesie pajamas, my receipt mother scoops me from the floor, we giggle Electrified, Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m flying an airplane hoisted on her toes Pen the grocery list, left on the fridge, C-section mom bought me Fruit Loops again To the drycleaner to pick up my receipt momâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s uniform, we tip extra Kill the spider above my desk, doing homework, I needed help with equations Them watching The Incredibles on repeat because my sister wants to be Dash Off at nine thirty, my mother yells from the kitchen, and I turn off my Dumbo shaped lamp

Sarah

Kathrine Squires

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All Was Silent Jack Galati

There was no sun. It was morning and the house was lit up by a warm glow but there was no sun. It was beaten by the rolling clouds, covering the sky in a sheet of grey which would, of course, echo a sheet of white onto the ground. No fuss, no storm. That was just the way it was; that was the way it always was. That was winter. She sat at the kitchen table with a cold cup of coffee and stared across at him. He fumbled in a loose pack for the last cigarette, which he lit in an air of relief. The smoke rose up in a cursive swirl. She watched the ceiling but it never got that far. She sighed. He exhaled. She tried to smile at him. She looked away as he stood to get ready for work. He wore only a loose shirt and boxers at night, no matter the season, and she hated the way his gut hung past his waistline. He would sleepwalk back into the bedroom and dress and she would sip at her cup. There was no joy in the drink. It was only a ritual, something she saw every wife on the television do in the morning. He emerged from the bedroom in what he called his uniform but what she called his clothes. She rarely saw him in anything else. He dumped his cigarette into the ashtray on the table and took his keys from the rack by the door. There was really no need for a rack, there was only one set of keys. He opened the front door and faced the still world for a moment. The snow was crisp and fresh. He wanted to say something. She tightened her robe around her neck and wished heâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;d leave already. He hesitated, but left, easing the door behind him. She got up and slammed it shut, making sure to lock it tight. From the other room, a baby began to cry. She cradled the child in her arms, reciting an off-pitched hum that only seemed to make things worse. She carried him out into the living room, bouncing him on her shoulder, and stared into her yard. A thin sheet of snow covered everything. It was quiet. She wondered how the grass was doing. Was it cold? Did it die in the winter? It was always there again in the spring, just as they had left it. Maybe it was frozen in time, saved for the perfect seasons. She never got to check the grass. She almost never left the house at all. Even if she did, even if she could, she would almost never test her theory. The baby cried louder. She undid her robe and stuffed the child inside. He refused to latch and insisted on crying. The little shit. A defect, possibly. She thought of whose genes were at fault. Probably hers, but definitely his. She sat back at the table and began to rock him, ever so carelessly, back to sleep. The morning was quiet again. She loved that he showered in the evenings. That was one thing she loved about him. It meant there was hot water when she finally made it to the bathroom in the morning. The water burned at first but soon it lifted the chill in her bones. She did not think that ten minutes was an unreasonable time to spend in the shower. Her husband and the water company thought otherwise.

Neither were here now though, so she decided to spend fifteen. The bathroom was steamed and clouded, divided. Getting out of the shower, the water mixed with new sweat on the brow, between the armpits, and under the breasts. She found herself tugging at her deflated stomach, lifting it and letting it sink. She imagined herself as a real person. She tried to look in the mirror but couldn’t make out much. In the bedroom she tucked into a small blue dress. It was a summer dress but the color reminded her of winter, so she chose it. She dug into tall wool socks and slipped back into her bathrobe. She was nothing to look at, but who was looking? She was comfortable. She wished she could tie up her hair, the way she did when she was young, but it was still wet. That would have to wait. The areas where her eyes used to be were pushed back and dark. Her irises were nearly black. Her forehead was long, her brow hung low, her chin turned down. She decided a lot of things were different when she was younger. On the dresser she saw a photo of them together. She was dressed in white, him in her dad’s old tuxedo. The photo couldn’t have been more than a year old but it didn’t look like them. They looked real, like the real people she saw on the television or read about in the papers. She tried to remember what it was like to be real. Her stomach was showing in the photos. Even if she couldn’t see it, she could feel it. She knew. Her mother knew. Her father certainly knew. They all knew. Then: a cry. Rocking, lulling, bobbing, and feeding. Nothing helped. She decided to draw the baby a bath. The kitchen sink was full from last night, and there was no time to empty it, the child wailing in her arms. Instead she turned on the faucet in the tub. He had warned her never to use the tub for the child. It was too big, too deep, too slippery. Most of all he did not trust her. She filled the tub, thinking of him all the while. The water was much cooler than when she had showered, partly out of respect for the infant’s fragile skin but mostly because she had taken the water for herself. She took the screaming baby and lowered him into the tub. He could not stand, but even sitting the water did not reach his chest. She knew not to fill it too high. She was proud of that. She was careful to wash the hairs off the bar of soap first before she began to scrub the child. He cried all the while. She slipped at one point and got soap in his eye. Cries of discomfort turned to pain, a burning pain. She splashed his face with water but this only made things worse. The soap spread. He yelled out. She dipped his head underwater and, for a brief second, the crying stopped. Shocked, she bobbed him back up. He wailed. She dipped him again. No sound. He emerged. Screams. She dipped him back, longer this time. There was no sound. He had been under some time and she wondered what would happen if she took him out now. He came: cries, pleas, loud and shrill. Her heart raced. She forced him under, angrily this time. He flailed wildly. His legs kicked at the surface. She held him down. Bubbles shot through the water as he rattled away at the base. In another minute all was silent. She let him go. He bobbed in the water, not deciding if he should float or sink. She wiped her eyes, she hadn’t noticed the tears, then walked into the bedroom and looked to the mirror on the dresser. Deep breaths. Her hair had Blacklist Journal dried, and she tied it up nice, just like she had when she was young. She wonBlacklist Journal dered about her husband, how he was doing at work. When he would be home, blacklistjournal.com | Brandeis University

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he was always home at the same time. She should make something nice for dinner. They could sit and eat together. They may even talk to one another. She may even smile.

Footsie

Kathrine Squires 54

Stretch

Tomoki Williams my lungs fill with the sunlight sifted through the needle-like leaves of the Western larch larix occidentalis, oxidation of my spirit the sound of greens whispering – can’t hear it, but the rustle of the restless carries beyond the auditory sense succumbs to sensuality sanity is not the same as sanctity – sacrilege seems to still have a stronghold here, back arched, I raise the heels of my hands to the blazing blue sky, fingers curling up and then unfurling, rolling backwards until there’s no more flexibility in the tendons to recline define what’s mine in this foreign, yet familiar territory tutorials never make it past the supposed close close enough to barely wedge into the misconstrued notions of proper storytelling a telling hint of a smile to solace the unnerved rambler respiring when photosynthesis has ceased, when the setting sun has disappeared from the trees Blacklist Journal

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Moving Pains, Sanika Phawde

Pisces

Isabelle Hahn Wretched freckles dot the horizon. I see them, I weep. For the impossible conquering splayed before me. Sometimes, I am broken by wishing my body parts unto others — cascading their nails around my shoulders. I kiss my own knuckles, pray on my elbows for skin to set the sun — instead they dent unset plaster, dipping into wet renovation. Time to start over. Memory of my mortal body blues and evaporates under hers. Like the house, turned to splintered wood and debris. Don’t sing for what’s gone — shoot tea from her collarbone, suck on honey soaked clouds brought to earth by her high-tuned hum. I find myself standing, croaking an elegy to the home my body crawled into. Imagine drowning in the middle of her river.

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Nostalgic Strangeness 2018

Ranxin Zhou

Because a man-boy. Cori Bratby-Rudd

Continuous click of Jacuzzi jets I cradle the mess of bubbles warm water to my chest Nathan, eyes meeting my eyes for too long. I look down at my collection of popping things I am a child, non-child, this man, seminary man I know don’t know not man-boy mustached man-boy with thick brows clenched solving some calculus equation. I dare him to say it. I ask:

how do you feel about gay marriage

lengthen my spine, become taller as he folds into the water—finally looking away, deeper, dunking, hair stuck to his red face

well it’s just the kids

he mumbles, sinking further looking at his own hands

they might not turn okay without a mom and dad

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quick head underwater he knows who I am, redder eyes still stuck on his own board shorts. I stand, jets click off, push away my cradled thing knees straighten bikini standing up bubbles pop jump towel a man-boy looks at me for too long, soggy soft hipped child then he looks at his waist but in a new horror yells,

do not look down

& I know what he means so I do not look down & he watches as I swift walk inside, sit at the counter my C-section mother offers me bowled mint chip ice cream in silence. I cannot eat, & he walks past with a towel to cover it She offers him some, smile to the family friend polite decline walking, away drip drip drip

no thanks, I am going to go to head home

drip drip drip & I do not sleep this night, because a man-boyâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;because a man-boy, because a man-boy.

Ladies’ Compartment Payal Nagpal

New Delhi, India. Commonly known as the Rape Capital of the World. The City Most Unsafe for Women, where violence against women – both in domestic settings and on the street, is an epidemic. But there are havens here, like the Ladies’ Compartment of the Delhi Metro Rail. Every metro train has a compartment only for women – no men allowed, which affords women safe mobility, thereby creating opportunities for us and giving us a safe space. While the fact that women have to be quarantined so men cannot attack is us devastating, this is one of the only places we can exist without the fear of being assaulted. We shove each other into the compartment of exhalation, The Ladies from the Streets of Dilli, pepper sprays tucked into the corners of our handbags, holding umbrellas for protection from more than the rain. Here, we collapse onto glinting silver seats; our collective vigilance melts away. Aunty with jasmine braided into her hair sits, her legs spread, wider than ever before, testing the limits of her straining sari fabric. The lady in the speaker, announcing stops is washed away by the chatter, the wailing baby. Teenage Girl whips the rubber band out of her ponytail, shakes her hair out, side-to-side – I swear, she’s pretending she’s a head-banging rockstar. The air here is sweat and confidence and coconut oil. We push with reckless abandon. At peak hour, we are packed together, chicks in a coop, fingers graze breasts – a result of proximity, and just that. At some point, seatless women grow tired of standing, slide onto the off-white floor, sit cross-legged and read. The intern coming home from work unbuttons her collar. We breathe a little deeper on her behalf. Bollywood songs spill out of her earphones – that’s how loud music is here – and the little girl taps her golden shoes along to the music. Uninhibited. We are not choking on the smog anymore. For a few more stops,

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as the green lights turn phone screens, not in the Womenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s

red, we look at books and fearfully behind each Compartment, we

Figures

Liv Molho

laps and shoulder; breathe.

Contributor Notes Alessandra Allen, ’20 - Columbia University Alessandra is a junior at Columbia University double-majoring in English and Creative Writing. She has a twin sister, who is her best friend, and has grown up in 4 different countries. Her favorite color is yellow, and her interests include going on really long walks, eating good food, and poetry. Menat Allah El Attma, ’20 - University of California Berkeley She is a diaspora writer, photographer, and a Muslim North African immigrant. As a student in the Department of English, she is also concurrently working towards a minor in Creative Writing and certification in Global Urban Humanities. Her passions urge her to engage at intersections of disciplines such as language and the history, photography and the narrative, art and the theory, among other fields. The aspirations she keeps as fuel derived from an upbringing as a byproduct of Egypt’s impoverished demographic. Keegan Barone, ’20 - Carnegie Mellon University Keegan Barone is both a business student and conceptual artist. She creates work about the politics within sports/ athletics, as well as work about social justice issues. Cori Bratby-Rudd, ’19 - California Institute of the Arts (MFA) Cori Bratby-Rudd is a queer LA-based writer. She graduated Cum Laude from UCLA’s Gender Studies department, and is a current MFA Candidate in Creative Writing at California Institute of the Arts. Cori enjoys incorporating themes of emotional healing and social justice into her works. She has been published in Ms. Magazine, The Gordian Review, Califragile, among others. She recently won the Editorial Choice Award for her research paper in Audeamus Academic Journal and was nominated as one of Lambda Literary’s 2018 Emerging Writers. Sophia Cirignano, ’19 - University of Vermont Sophia is a Philosophy major with Writing and Religion minors, whose Italian blood and pisces sun sign have her often tearing up over fresh metaphors. Creative expression and moving to Paris are her primary focuses in life, but she also loves to dance, bake bread, and argue about ethics. She has been writing poetry consistently since it came out in the form of first grade flip books about raccoons and plans to keep exploring inner and outer worlds as attentively as possible through this medium. Nicholas Conti, ’20 - University of Massachusetts Amherst Nicholas Conti is a junior at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. He is an English major, minoring in Education and Psychology, and an aspiring English teacher. He has been writing poetry for a couple of years now, and has been published in his university’s undergrad literary journal. Mairead Dambruch, ’20 - Carnegie Mellon University Mairead Dambruch is a third-year student at Carnegie Mellon University and uses oil paint as her primary medium. She is interested in depicting power dynamics and indirect violence, as well as the effects of living and growing under capitalism. Sarah DiMichele, ’20 - Parsons School of Design Sarah DiMichele is an Illustrator studying at Parsons School of Design. She works in many different mediums but her favorite materials to work with are digital painting, ink and mixed media. Jackson Ellis, ’19 - Savannah College of Art and Design Jackson Ellis is a North Carolina-based illustrator and portrait artist. Fascinated by the old masters of traditional painting, he studies the techniques and styles they left behind in an attempt to improve his own illustrations and fine art. Jackson’s work is influenced by many different aspects of life, but he finds the macabre and grim to be especially compelling.

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Violet Fearon, ’19 - Brandeis University Violet Fearon is a sophomore at Brandeis University; she likes tea and books, and aspires to someday ascend to the spiritual plane of a crazy old cat lady. Keanna Flores, ’18 - University California, Berkeley Keanna Flores is an Art Practice and English double major at UC, Berkeley. She hasn’t lived in one place for long, being born in Hawaii then hopping to Japan, California, Texas, recently to Scotland then to Berkeley, California. Besides writing and drawing, Keanna can be found walking and exploring nature. Jack Galati, ’21 - Arizona State University Jack Galati was born in Cleveland, Ohio in 1999. He lives in Scottsdale, Arizona and studies English and Creative Writing at Arizona State University. Jack has been published in Marooned Magazine, an Undergrad Creative Review. Courtney Garvey, ’19 - Brandeis University Courtney Garvey is a senior at Brandeis University, studying Creative Writing, History, and European Cultural Studies. Her work has previously been published in Peach Magazine. She is from Massachusetts. Isabelle Hahn, ’20 - Northeastern Isabelle Hahn is a journalism major and English student at Northeastern University. Her writing has been featured in Blacklist and Reverberations Mag. Yimei Hu, ’21 - Rhode Island School of Design Yimei Hu is a Rhode Island based jeweler and industrial designer who currently studies in Rhode Island School of Design. Standing on the fine line in between the two fields, her journey is a search for balance and reconciliation between fine art and design. Elin Kuo, ’22 - Rhode Island School of Design Elin is a freshman, studying in illustration major in Parsons School of Design. She is born and raised in Taiwan, Taipei. She created a series of simplified-line illustraions mainly focused on the reinterpretation of famous paintings and sculptures such as the portrait of Frida Kahlo and David, that build satire towards the topic of self-identity and body image in a humorous way. Katie Kwak, ’20 - Rhode Island School of Design Katie Kwak is a junior studying illustration at the Rhode Island School of Design with an interest in graphic design. Her favorite things include uni nigiri, Ratatouille, chocolate, and being at home (in California). Gerardo J. Lamadrid, ’20 - Vassar College Gerardo J. Lamadrid is a writer from Caguas, Puerto Rico and a third-year student at Vassar College. He is the author of the Spanish-language poetry books Retratos hispánicos (Poemas sin rumbo) (Madrid, 2016, Sial Pigmalión) and Yéndome (San Juan, 2018, Publicaciones Gaviota). His Spanglish poem “Pancho Marrón” was previously published in Blacklist Journal in the Fall 2017 edition. Lamadrid is also a contributor for the Buscapié column on the Puerto Rican daily El Nuevo Día. Emily Melia, ’20 - University of Maryland, College Park Emily is a nonbinary artist from Baltimore’s suburbs who currently studies Studio Art and Art History at the University of Maryland. In their work, they explore the confusion, disorientation, and alienation of being a nervous human in 2018. Liv Molho, ’20 - Brandeis University Liv’s work is an exploration of abstraction and color. Payal Nagpal, ’19 - Ashoka University, India Payal Nagpal is a student at Ashoka University in India, studying Psychology and Creative Writing. She enjoys writing humorous prose, and her poetry is often influenced by Sharon Olds, Rita Dove and Sylvia Plath.

Matilda Peck, ’22 - Colby College Matilda W. Peck is a first-year student at Colby College, originally hailing from Philadelphia, PA. After attending St. George’s School in Newport RI for high school, she considers herself an official New Englander. An aspiring writer, avid environmentalist, budding philosopher, and general tea enthusiast, Matilda can be found working in the library or on a long walk in the Maine woods. Sanika Phawde, ’19 - The New School Sanika Phawde is an illustrator and comix artist working between Mumbai and New York City. Her recent work explores the theme of processing and documenting human relationships through mix-media reportage illustrations. She is inspired by everyday life, instances of emotional connection between strangers, and the social systems we are contained in. She is also fascinated by the conversations people have over food. She is currently working on an autobiographical narrative about romancing New York, and the inevitable complications that arise from this courtship. Alina Shirley, ’19 - Brandeis University Alina Shirley is a writer and a senior at Brandeis University. She is a biology major and an aspiring physical therapist. She currently lives in Connecticut with her family. Jake Sibley, ’19 - Brandeis University Jake Sibley is a composer, librettist, poet, folk singer, and meme connoisseur based in Waltham, Massachusetts. Katherine Squires, ’21 - Colby College Katherine is a Bostonian-turned-Mainer studying Chemistry, Creative Writing, and Art at Colby College. Her primary concern is the telling of stories, which she does through photography and writing. Lisa Trevino, ’19 - University of Maryland College Park Lisa Trevino did not foresee herself as an artist, but chose to expand and grow her creativity and natural ability. She enjoys the process of making art; the task of trouble-shooting, shaping the composition or getting a specific idea across to the viewer. Lisa continues education to explore numerous medias, understand different processes, and create work that overlaps several disciplines. She finds pleasure in relief printmaking, photography, drawing, and painting. Lisa has no regrets regarding her art, it’s pure joy. Vera Villanueva, ’21 - Yale University Vera is from Blacksburg, Virginia, and is currently a sophomore at Yale. Seth Wade, ’21 - University of Vermont Seth Wade writes. Sometimes well enough so that his works published in places such as The Gateway Review and Infernal Ink Magazine. An ex-journalist and progressive nonprofit veteran, he now studies English and philosophy at the University of Vermont. He’s currently the co-editor-in-chief of Vantage Point. Toi-Whitney Williams, ’19 - University of New Orleans Toi-Whitney Williams is lyrical craftswoman from New Orleans, Louisiana. With a passion for all arts including music and literature, she has performed her works at various venues including House of Blues and News with a Twist. Aside from her love of music, poetry, and prose, Williams is an educator who teaches English and History at various elementary and middle schools across the New Orleans and Baton Rouge area. Tomoki Williams, ’19 - Howard University Tomoki is currently a senior at Howard University, majoring in Psychology with a minor in Swahili. He grew up in the Japanese community in Seattle, WA. He spends his time in Washington DC supporting local performance artists, going Blues dancing, and singing by himself constantly. He writes to write, experimenting with different angles and exploring languages.

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Yu Yan, ’18 - Smith College Yu Yan (b.1996) is an artist who lives and works in New York. She holds a B.A. degree in Studio Arts and Economics from Smith College. She is a co-founder of ArtMacro, a web platform publishing in-depth dialogues with people who have multiple careers in the art world. She is currently a work scholar at Aperture Foundation and an intern at Magnum Photos in New York. As an artist, she is interested in the interactions between human beings and the built environment. She creates images with an unusual and bizarre composition to challenge people’s perception of identity and culture. She is currently developing a project in New York Chinatown, documenting the changes in its landscape and community while incorporating her own perspectives in decisive moments. Aoye Yuan, ’22 - Connecticut College Aoye is a kind of person who can see the art beyond the mundane world, and he uses his camera to paint the world in his canvas, the Breast of Nature, Game under Snow, The Track of Children. Ranxin Zhou, ’22 - Rhode Island Shcool of Design Ranxin loves photography, film&video, 3d design. They intend to major in industrial design.

Katie Kwak