The Morningside Monocle - Spring 2021 by The Morningside Monocle

The Morningside Monocle

front cover

Airbnb Views from Remote Life

Karen Kim

Monocle Staff Editor-in-Chief Rachel Rein Co-Copy Editors Noah Foster & Dan Cobourn Submissions Editor Lanlie Zheng Poetry Editor Brandon Weber Prose Editor Gersham Johnson Art & Layout Editor Congrui Lin Social Chair/Event Coordinator Sahana Ragunathan

The Morningside Monocle Spring 2021

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Editor’s Note “Every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end.” – Seneca As this year ends, let us reflect on our changing landscape. We have seen vaccines developed in record time, human connections retained virtually, and distant learning made fun. Well, that last one may be a stretch. In response to our return to some semblance of normalcy, this spring’s Monocle theme is New Beginnings. The issue includes pictures of the great outdoors, including one of Low Library, a sight many of us will see as we return to campus in person this upcoming fall. The poem y[our] Loss offers a window into grief yet ends in a message of hope. Butterfly (photograph) shows signs of springtime and life. As summer begins, my term as Editor-in-Chief of The Monocle ends. Thank you to this year’s editorial board: Dan Cobourn, Noah Foster, Lanlie Zheng, Congrui Lin, Brandon Weber, Gersham Johnson, and Sahana Ragunathan. You have all helped create an excellent literary magazine in undeniably difficult times. A special thank you to Lanlie Zheng, our graduating 3L. We are grateful for your contributions to The Monocle and excited for your new beginnings! Congratulations, Dan and Noah, for your new editorial board member roles on The Monocle this upcoming year. Congratulations to Nanette (Nani) Liu, our incoming Editor-in-Chief. I know The Monocle will be in good hands, and I cannot wait to read the next issue. To our seniors graduating virtually: we see you. To our rising 2Ls: we are here to support you as many of you adjust to a schedule full of in-person classes. To everyone: I am confident we have learned lessons about patience, resilience, and community from this past year that we can apply to our lives today. And I hope we will move forward with hope and joy.

Rachel Rein, Editor-in-Chief

Table of Contents photography 1 3 4

Goodnight, Manhattan! Wan-Ting Huang Foison Wan-Ting Huang These Doors Must Be Kept Closed Seth Glickman 6 Beautiful Afternoon-1 Wan-Ting Huang 7 Beautiful Afternoon-2 Wan-Ting Huang 8 California Livin’ Rachel Rein 10 Peek-A-Boo Wan-Ting Huang 12 My Love Wan-Ting Huang 15 Vote Congrui Lin 20 Blizzard Congrui Lin 21 Beautiful Afternoon-3 Wan-Ting Huang 22 Storm King Congrui Lin 25 Sunset by the Dock Congrui Lin 26 Low Library Congrui Lin 29 Legacy Wan-Ting Huang

30 32 35 36

Butterfly Wan-Ting Huang Forest View Through Fence Rachel Rein Central Park Congrui Lin Eagle Point Wan-Ting Huang

poetry 2 4 8 11 12 14 16 19 23 24 28 33 34

art [y]our Loss Brandon R. Weber A Shout Hannah Yindra Home Is a Place I’d Like To Be Lanlie Zheng Mockingbird Jessica Jin Rain Aubrey Kelley Pigeon Man Lanlie Zheng Untitled Sci-fi Poem Jonah Baskin Shape Memory Jessica Jin Twilight in the Fall Lanlie Zheng Spring Nights Brandon Vines Tell Me Where, in Which Country William Leo Fresh Ice in Spring Time William Leo The Busker Rachel Rein

cover Airbnb Views from Remote Life Karen Kim 18 Breathing Karen Kim

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Goodnight, Manhattan! Wan-Ting Huang

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[y]our Loss Brandon R. Weber

It was raining when [it happened/they buried her in my heart] In a moment, the world—once spinning—abruptly stopped, my head spinning in its place. Words in the background sounded like white noise, Peanuts trombone, reminiscent of the child who would not be coming home with us in May, or sleeping with stuffed animals of cartoon characters. Running on campus brick, leather boots in puddles, raindrops stinging my face but masking the rain coming from within. Whispering sweet nothings via iMessage, looking for bright-side thoughts in dark train tunnels, interrupted by loss of signal, heart pounding as I know you waited for responses; heart pounding as I knew hers no longer was . . . The weather matched the atmosphere [the writing cliché and too on-target] as I found you alone with soaked jacket, shirt, walking on Broadway from the hospital, ID bracelet still strapped to your wrist. "You're not alone," but you felt alone—lost in a world that refused to understand [y]our pain lying on the bed, slumped on your side, like she was; a Russian nesting doll of sorrow. I wished I could be there with you in that moment, holding you when you saw [y]our nightmare on the live screen, 2

Foison

Wan-Ting Huang

[the writing cruel and too traumatic] and laughter/smiles, echoing from the night before, not met by any joy in this moment. The mirror had no reflection: these moments, lasting hours, days, punctuated only by brief distraction; stark contrast in low light. There would be no graveyard, no tombstone, no smile on your face as I watched you struggle with [y]our loss, no comfort from the baby books, nor the magazine articles; no answers from the doctors. No one to soften this. Slowly, thunderstorms will turn to mists, as the world turned its back on [y]our pain, and [y]our only path forward would become as clear as the diamond on your finger: planting a new seed in the freshly dug ground and praying for a healthy flower

to bloom.

A Shout Hannah Yindra

There’s something wrong here. My world shrunk down to the size of my tenth floor manhattan apartment. My day is listening to the drivers. Now, I hear himangrily—lay on his horn. Again and again as nothing around him changes. These are not the “look out” honks, or the “hey, the light changed” honks, or even the “fuck you that’s why” honks. These are the “why am I here? What’s happening to me? Will I ever find my way out of this? I’ve been honking for five minutes and the issue is clearly not resolving, there must be something wrong, something preventing us all from moving forward—toward our collective goal of hitting the next red light. Maybe it is the next red light. But I don’t know. I don’t know what’s wrong. I just know that I’m sat here, and something is wrong and I want everyone to know that I know, and I’m not ok with it,” honks. The driver sings his anxiety into the sky. Though, he will move on soon; leave that honking place behind. When you live in the honking place—or at least ten floors above the honking place— Your day is punctured by drivers crying out.

You feel that—anguish, panic, desperate need to move—build in you too. I know! I hear you! Something is wrong! We’re stuck here and we need to go! We need to get out! But I don’t get to go. I never get to go out. I stay stuck, and I don’t get to scream. I cannot say, “Here I am trapped in the honking place!” I just have to listen, hearing the shrill panic of the people trapped in this place again and again and again. I know! I hear you! Something is wrong! I can’t get out either.

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These Doors Must Be Kept Closed Seth Glickman

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Beautiful Afternoon-2

Wan-Ting Huang

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Beautiful Afternoon-1 Wan-Ting Huang

Home Is a Place I’d like To Be Lanlie Zheng

When my parents packed their bags twenty-six years ago, To cross oceans they did not know the names of To give birth to a daughter they had wished was a son, To give life to their son who was dying, at barely one, 8

They took a look at their belongings, Renounced prized possessions, and their sense of belonging, In hopes that the grass was really greener on the other side, They left behind the only family they’d ever known, Trying to pave a new path home. But their hearts were always longing, For firecrackers at New Year’s dawn, For fried oyster patties sold on the neighbor’s lawn, For cooked clams freshly foraged from the sea, For motos humming, taking you wherever you wanted to be, They were always craving, For the new land was rich, but their hearts were sore, For the seabirds singing, from their homeland shore, They were always searching for something more, They said they were always craving, For a different place to be, They were always missing home, Until they met me. Small hands, and big yawn, my wide eyes kept their arms worn; They said they found home again, meeting me. Our home was the only place they wanted to be.

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California Livin' Rachel Rein

Mockingbird Jessica Jin

A mockingbird finds a seed, swallows it in a flash of white feather, a tilt of a gullet, This is how the world began. Safe in the belly of something smaller and larger than it, before sight, there was a beakful of sharp and bitter keeping the dark at bay. Inside, a berry reflective as an eye with all its people staring out at the dark nursing their ill, baking their bread, singing their songs, staring outwards and deciding, There’s nothing there. The mockingbird swallows another seed.

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Peek-A-Boo

Wan-Ting Huang 11

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My Love

Wan-Ting Huang

Rain

Aubrey Kelley That destructive fiend that drowns the earth, making rocks crumble, twist, conform, erode into streams, until mountains are dirt. And they know it.

It’s not the drops that get you, it’s the multitude of drops. The unrelenting baptism of liquid fire that beats against your skin and swallows the air. It leaves no surface untouched, soaking through your clothes, puddling at your ankles. All you can do is wait, wait or run back—and yet, aren’t the flowers lovely?

Pigeon Man Lanlie Zheng

What’s more New York than two pigeons fighting over the seat on my windowsill, over a piece of bread falling from my clumsy hand, over attention, we all crave attention. What’s more New York than hating pigeons that roost on the roof, that ravage the skies like rats ravage sewage, fly overhead way too close to you, all I ever wanted to do was to be close to you. What’s more New York than pigeons flocking to a singular man in Washington Square Park, than a boy and girl, hand in hand, with a plan to find so-called pigeon-man on a Fall October day, where the air smelt like pine trees and your breath tasted of mint leaves, and though “pigeon-man” was nowhere to be seen, the pigeons watched a her and a him, find a spot just for them in the park.

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Vote

Congrui Lin

And so we sailed out towards the sun Hearts hopeful for a home We knew we would never land on And so we sailed out towards the sun Lest we lose our lives as well as lands To the carbon excesses of our ancestors And so we sailed out towards the sun Already forgetting the fragrances of the flowers Our children would never see

And as we sailed on past the sun Our eyes burned and hearts churned and we wailed As we realized what was lost And as we sailed on past the sun Our parents cried and our children lied As they whispered to each other that it would be alright And as we sailed on past the sun The stars and Mars and the black tar of empty space Felt less and less like home

And when we sailed beyond the sun And we knew we couldn’t go back We took out books and photos and the artwork that had hung on fridges We made smells and dents and the imperfections of a place lived in We told stories and broke bread and sang the lullabies of our past Because we couldn’t do any more And any less seemed profane. 16

poetry

Untitled Sci-fi Poem Jonah Baskin

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Shape Memory Jessica Jin

That day you learned it could be as simple as placing a bag of green tea in hot water and watching steam curl upward as your mother coming in from the rain, holds two pears from the supermarket out for you to see, gold and rosy tiny beads of water still on their surfaces, ripe and unripe. Maybe it had always been this easy, the hands offering you the fruit the rain stopping just long enough the air just cold enough for the memory to crystallize.

art

Breathing

Karen Kim 19

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Blizzard

Congrui Lin

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Beautiful Afternoon-3 Wan-Ting Huang

Twilight in the Fall Lanlie Zheng

City of a million hearts breaking and all the love making holding us together With you, quiet by the lake on the soft green grass beneath the acorn tree squirrels sit cracking nuts like a child opening their first present on Christmas Day, and I, dreamt of handholding in public, and French-kissing at four, you’re pressing me against our hard-oak front door Twilight in the fall; Halloween decorations thread the trees, pumpkin-lined windowsills, houses filled of candles and dreams, and webs, and screams, my doorman says hello for the sixth time today, The warmth of my despairingly slow elevator hits me, Wrapped up in your fall sweater, There’s nowhere I’d rather be

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Storm King

Congrui Lin 23

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Spring Nights

Sunset by the Dock

Congrui Lin

Brandon Vines

Tucked into the gentle, warm spring night and comforted by the cicada’s familiar rumble, I was seven years old, lazily chasing fireflies between the humble farmhouse and soft humming streetlight, when the call to supper came from the threshold. Inside, four generations gathered to hold our hands as the saline aroma of ham and collard greens filled the night. I can still see us gathering under the fluorescent kitchen light to say our prayers (accompanied by our stomachs' rumble) pulled from the age-worn, humble family bible, filled with as much memory as it is old. But there are memories far more old. Down the road, in 1919, a White mob came to take ahold of Rob Ashely from the humble county jail. They were stopped that night, by the snap-crack of firearms’ warning rumble issue by a Black militia, standing in predawn light. Tecumseh Sherman had marched through by torchlight, trying to purge original sin by burning away old whitewashed plantations. Six months later, the rumble of Jefferson Davis’ wagon, fleeing the stranglehold of the Union, crossed once-Muskogee land. The warm night is heavy with memories of faith, loss, and poverty that humbles. But our long history is not itself humble; those memories return with power to the modern spotlight. The relief of a blue Georgia on election night was defaced by the huge carving of Robert E. Lee still on the old, Stone Mountain. As abortion laws and Ahmaud Arbery’s lynching behold, history is not yet memory, even while MeToo and Black Lives Matter rumble. 24

My sense of home gets more complex as time rumbles on by. The remembered innocence of catching fireflies is humbled by the modern, belittling billboards I now see have taken ahold, besieging the sacrosanct land of grandma’s house. The light, comforting memories of being seven years old now share company with a longer history of spring nights. Reassured by the subway’s rumble, I glimpse city lights from humble New York tenements, as memories of old Georgia hold my thoughts, heavy in the spring night.

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Low Library Congrui Lin

Tell Me Where, in Which Country William Leo

Has spider season ceased In the intervention of a flame, A pillar of smoke and garbled wood The size of a people, a nation, a history? Has she stopped weaving silver Webs, touching every essential point As the atmosphere orangens into solidity And suffocation— They perhaps have known other infernos But the futurity of eggs and cinders, Muddling, resembles no soft snow Of years, seasons, days, hours— Tell me where, in which country, Weave white the weft of yesteryear

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Legacy

Wan-Ting Huang

Untitled William Leo

curling of purple flowers through the fence entwined in pattern the iron gate beyond the garden’s thin confines 30

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Butterfly

Wan-Ting Huang

To the street they turn, pucker, demur, shine assaying

Fresh Ice in Spring Time William Leo

it is romanticism, this geology of sounding uncongealed stone but efforts go deeper than a dram of hot whiskey on a pink tongue, swifter than a wind burst with the last cool of a dying year (much hated in mass murmuring); I can confirm, with little evidence, the clanging of great bells and colors against the eye voice imperfectly a tumult’s continuance. Being is only becoming, so What could the glamor of a midnight declare except the mouthing of something they thought they knew (naturally) and did not. Amid twisted sculpture the feet pass in a strange light of odd hues beginning to uncover the sweet ruse: This is nothing but what it has always been Except when it is not.

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Forest View Through Fence Rachel Rein

The Busker Rachel Rein

There is a man on the corner of 26th and Guadalupe Street who sings an old bluegrass tune. Songs from the lips of farmers tied to the land they tilled for generations. He has a hum like molasses: all honey and stick to the touch. You never quite forget it. 34

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Central Park

Congrui Lin

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Eagle Point

Wan-Ting Huang

The People Behind The Works Artists Seth Glickman was a software engineer in California prior to law school, and will likely be a software engineer in California post law school. This photo was taken at the defunct Old Taylor “Limestone Castle” distillery in Frankfort, KY (it has since been renovated and is now the home of Castle & Key). Wan-Ting Huang loves to capture every joyful moment in her life. She comes from Taiwan, and bubble tea is her favorite! Being on tiptoe with curiosity, she asks “why” over ten times a day. While walking on the street, Wan-Ting can always find something interesting! She is a big fan of nature, and her goal is to inspire admiration for the world we love! Karen Kim is a 3L, who has fully embraced the nomadic life post covid. She moved to Morningside Heights as a 2L transfer. The first five months on campus were pure bliss. She danced, imbibed, and made life-long friends until the pandemic hit in March 2020. She fled the war-torn scenes of New York and sought refuge in Seoul, Korea with her parents, where she attended Zoom law school out of a WeWork as a zombie. In January 2021, she returned to New York to live with two 3L friends. The living room of their Airbnb rental is set up as a karaoke room, which helps her forget about the pandemic sometimes. So the nomadic life has turned out well for Karen, who may or may not have ever attended CLS. Congrui Lin hails from Fremont, California. She enjoys capturing as many moments on her beloved film camera as she can.

Authors Jonah Baskin is a 1L JD student. When he is not overwhelmed with school work, he enjoys reading genre fiction, hiking, and cooking. Jonah hopes to use his law degree in the fight for climate justice and universally respected human rights. Jessica Jin is a 1L from Arcadia, California. She writes poems about family, belonging, and identity in the notes app on her phone and hears that all the really great writers do this too. One time a woman who sold tarot cards told her that anyone who writes poetry is a poet, whether or not they show their work to anyone else. She carries this in her heart alongside the famous words “Anyone can cook” from iconic film Ratatouille. Her favorite poets include Ocean Vuong and Mary Oliver. Aubrey Kelley is a 1L from Somerset, Kentucky. Before coming to CLS, she graduated from Western Kentucky University with majors in English and political science. At CLS, Aubrey has participated in CLWA and DeVinimus, and she is excited to be the incoming poetry editor for The Morningside Monocle. In her free time, Aubrey enjoys yoga, hiking, and reading for fun. William Leo was born and raised in Oregon. He moved to New York in August 2020. WC Williams once said, “A poem is a small (or large) machine made out of words.” William says that one truth in this statement is that a poem, like a machine, is composed of many internal relations and associations which operate by the stable laws of a language. He says however, unlike either prose writing or analytical writing, the meaning of a poem is more varied; it is undetermined by any single set of denotations. He says the beauty of poetry, aside from metrical rhythm, is often in the fluid capacity of its meaning to overflow boundaries, to depart, to alter. Rachel Rein is a Texan 2L who has gratefully served as The Monocle’s Editor-in-Chief this past school year. She does not have a Southern accent but does say “y’all.” She wonders why her high school English teacher never taught her that Hemingway’s The Sun also Rises is a gossip piece about Hemingway’s friends and associates. She is unashamed to say that her high school English teacher did play a large role in her adolescence. When she is not Bluebooking citations for the Columbia Journal of Gender and Law, she practices yoga and seeks out scenic spots. She hopes to continue writing and editing after law school and thanks The Monocle’s wonderful readership and contributors for their support.

Brandon Vines (JD ‘22) is a first-generation student, Georgian, and sailor. As a public interest student, he is aspires to challenge state violence, capital punishment, and mass incarceration. In his poems, Brandon is interested in the complexities of identity, belonging, and memory. As a cook, he makes a mean chicken fried steak, sourdough bread, and bhindi daal. Brandon R. Weber is a second-year law student at Columbia and has proudly served as the Poetry Editor for The Morningside Monocle during the 2020–21 academic year. He is also a member of the AIPLA Moot Court leadership team and a Managing Editor of the Columbia Law Review. He wrote this poem, [y]our Loss, for his wife after she suffered a miscarriage. The title is deliberately stylized to note the distinct— yet intertwined—nature of his wife's personal loss (“your loss”) and the combined loss and grief that the couple share (“Our Loss”). He thanks the readers for their support of The Morningside Monocle. Hannah Yindra is a graduating 3L from Vermont. She is looking forward to leaving Manhattan and rediscovering silence and sanity after law school. Lanlie Zheng is a 3L, and being originally from Auckland, New Zealand, the resident Kiwi at CLS. She is an avid traveler with a love of experiencing new cultures and has lived abroad in the UK, France, Colombia, and China. She loves ‘love’ — reading, writing, singing, dancing, hearing about it. In her spare time, she enjoys going on runs with her dog (Roo), doing bedroom yoga and pilates, curating funky playlists, eating food till she can’t walk, buying coffee to have something warm to hold, and binging the latest tear-jerking series on Netflix. She has an inability to keep the same hairstyle for more than 6 months, and is passionate about domestic wildlife in America, specifically, raccoons and groundhogs.

About The Monocle The Morningside Monocle seeks to enrich student life at Columbia Law School by sharing poetry, prose, art, and photography. The Monocle is published twice a year. The content and opinions represented in this magazine do not necessarily reflect those of the law school, administrators, or student body. For more information about the literary magazine, please visit us online at themorningsidemonocle.com. Additional questions, concerns, and submissions can be directed to themorningsidemonocle@gmail.com.