Portal 2023 by Portal Magazine

2023 W O R D S

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ALYSSA CORISTINE captures the beauty of a child in full Bloom BETHANY MORLEY banishes the devil and summons the Angel of Appalachia BRENDAN WANDERER immortalizes an unorthodox babysitter in Conrad Knows Best SAM BOLLINGER and TIANNA VERTIGAN listen to M. NourbeSe Philip Unspelling Silence RACHEL DAVIDSON rubber tramps to Slab City in the Portent-winning Free and Hard

2023 W O R D S

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We are privileged and grateful to be allowed to work and study on the unceded traditional territories of the Snuneymuxw First Nation of the Coast Salish Peoples and pay respect to their rich cultural heritage and natural environment each day we live and learn on viu’s Nanaimo campus. © 2023 by the authors, artists, and photographers Creativity that conveys, carries, and conducts. Explorations that elevate, enchant, and entrance. Prose that provokes. Stories that spellbind. Tales that thrill. Portal offers a gateway to accomplished short fiction, poetry, creative non-fiction, scripts, interviews, art, and photography by emerging writers. What makes Portal so portentous? It is a portrait of literary talent in the making, a portable guide to the view from here. Enter Portal’s literary universe and discover worlds and futures ready to unfold. Portal Vancouver Island University Rm 133, Bldg 345 900 Fifth St., Nanaimo, bc v9r 5s5 issn 1183-5214 viuportal@gmail.com portalmagazine.ca twitter.com/portalmagazine facebook.com/portalmag Portal is printed on 70 lb fsc-silva Enviro by Marquis Imprimeur Inc., 2700 rue Rachel Est, Montreal pq h2h 1s7.

Afternoon Ride Logan Crickmore

LETTER FROM This year, Portal celebrates its 32nd issue and we are thrilled to be entering this third decade with a return to normalcy after two years of producing Portal behind masks and through screens. Like the pandemic itself, the 28 works here remind us of what we can learn to live with, what we can escape, and what we must imagine. They span lifetimes, continents, and galaxies, sharing observations as true, or truer, than fiction. The issue begins in bc’s Cariboo country where a young tree planter faces a swarm of bees, an intrepid fox, and her demons in “Bushed.” From misty cedar forests to a trail less wild but more fraught, we meet a young child struggling with Mother Nature and their own in order to “Bloom.” Equally lost, two brothers in the poem “Cold Comfort” ponder what they’ve done wrong when banished to a wintery backyard, the sting of a spanking as sharp as the icy snow. In “Birds of a Feather,” a young girl embraces a flamingo lawn ornament as a surrogate friend, only to have it stolen as she finds her own wings. In “The Bone Thief ” a young Taiwanese boy summons a tiger cub believed to be the grandmother he can’t bear to let go. In another kind of haunting, a young child blames the “Angel of Appalachia” for the curse she believes stalks their family. We pause in the first third of the issue to shine our Portfolio Spotlight on: Brazil’s Festa Junina and a folk play that resurrects an ox; a humble market stall in Chile where

Tammi Carto In elementary school, I raced through library summer reading challenges with the added bonus of a prize for doing something I would have done anyway. Even then I relished the feeling of cracking open a book and imagining the same thing happening to my mind. I came by this love of books honestly. My mother, whose bookshelves brimmed with treasures, instilled in me the desire to read, while Aunty Shan, a writer herself, nurtured my desire to write. Like the authors who moved me with the sheer power of their words, I longed to create characters who would live on in the hearts of readers as they had in mine. Books offered me escape, adventure, solidarity, understanding; whether as a reader, writer, or editor, stories have led me everywhere I wanted to go. I am on that winding road still, the horizon distant, but with every mile underfoot I know the journey will be one of a lifetime.

a proud grandmother sell herbs; and the dark day Nepal’s earthquake levelled the country. These words transport us across the globe and speak of resistance, resourcefulness, and resilience. In “Would You Show Me How?” a young girl hunts elk with her grandfather, afraid to stand out in the herd, while lost innocence and miracles in our own backyard call another child in “Jesus Is a Water Strider.” In “Two Peas in a Pod,” three generations of women negotiate the shifting ground that is aging in this bittersweet comedy. Laughs are in the cards for “Conrad Knows Best” as well, as a memorable babysitter equips a teen boy to fend for himself. In our Portent Prize-winning non-fiction piece “Free and Hard,” a 20-something vagabond enters the lawless world of “rubber tramps” and lost souls in California’s Slab City. In a world where myths are re-invented and galaxies collide “Andromeda’s (re)Turn” charts a course from ancient Greece to a fantastical garden in “Nothing Is Cast in Stone” where two women are put under a spell only love can break. Love of a different sort is in the air as a son sees his father’s life go “Up in Smoke” when he takes his last breath. In the script “Slow Burn” another father and son confront death and addiction as the American dream turns nightmare. From domestic violence on the home front to yakuza gangs in Japan, we join an esl teacher who feels helpless

THE EDITORS in the face of charming criminals and homeless outcasts in “Shōganai.” From the beaches of Fujisawa to the ruins of Peru, “Forgetting Is So Long” follows a wistful husband longing for his absent wife from Lima to Copacabana. In “Right Turns” we take a long-awaited road trip with another couple only to see the magic crushed under the weight of regret and words unspoken. These fractured moments are all too pointed in “Shell Shocked,” a poem that reclaims power once shattered but never lost. Poetry’s power occupies this year’s Gustafson Distinguished Poet M. NourbeSe Philip who expounds on its ability to untell harmful histories, recall a mother tongue, and speak truth for those who no longer can. Poetry also imagines the planet’s “Magnolia Season,” a time when only the heartiest of plants will outlive human hubris. Plants heal body and soul for a woman in transition eager to turn over “A New Leaf ” and lay down new roots. That healing is in short supply in “Vilomah,” a tale of maternal loss and the need to mourn “the incorrect order of things.” From a nest of mourning doves to an ancient tree nestled in the Ecuadorian Amazon, we are reminded of the Earth’s power and need for protection in “Meeting Kapok.” Nature’s poetic pulse runs feverishly through the veins of “Vertebrate Heart” and the spaces between that makes us more than the sum of our parts or our separations.

Sunset Paddle Mick Sweetman

Severing bonds is at the heart of our final story, one that returns us to the tree-planters’ forest from which we began to wonder, as you might, “How Did I End Up Here?” Between these stellar works by writers on the rise and book reviews to help readers stay on top of tbr lists, we pause to recognize two trail-blazing alumni with newly-minted debuts: Délani Valin and Margot Fedoruk. Just as we acknowledge the writers, artists, photographers, advertisers, and staffers who make Portal possible we want to pay tribute to faculty at viu who have taught many of us the tools of our trade. This year we said farewell to beloved teachers Kathy Page, Bill Gough, and Dean of Arts and Humanities Dr. Marni Stanley. We wish them a tenfold return of the boundless time and gifts they have shared with us over their tenure. We also welcome Craig Taylor—New York and London’s loss is our gain. Finally, in October we relaunched our Portfolio Reading Series at the Black Rabbit Attic with Charlie Petch, Julie Burtinshaw, Margot Fedoruk, Frances Peck, Tawahum Bige, and a dozen student readers in four genres who shared their creations live. Check out portalmagazine.ca for these podcasts, interviews, reviews, and our Portent $500 fiction contest open to writers across Canada until Oct 15, 2023. It has been a privilege to chart the course with such a talented and dedicated team of colleagues. Bon voyage as you paddle out to a sea of stories, scripts, and poems just past the sunset—Portal 2023 awaits.

Jack Corfield As a child, my parents unschooled me. Amazingly, a radical blend of hippy home-spun wisdom and alternative education carried me to university without ever spending a day in regular school. Though I was slow to read, I was quick to embrace the spoken word, possessed as I was of a voracious appetite for speech. Audiobooks bridged the gap and instilled in me a love of storytelling that would last a lifetime. In between listening to stories, I told them, at first to myself, and then to friends through role-playing games. This collection of syllables and sounds transported me from my island beaches and forests to impossible worlds where I wielded driftwood-swords. Eventually I recorded my own stories and helped others share theirs. After all, there’s nothing more rewarding than saying, “I made this!” whether it be your creation or in aid of someone else’s.

MASTHEAD Managing Editors

Tammi Carto, Jack Corfield

Acquisitions Editor

Kirsten Dayne

Fiction Editors

Nicole Kaastra, Liz Baltzer, Barbara Burgardt

Poetry Editors

Sam Bollinger, Tianna Vertigan, Bella Hoodle

Script Editor

Joyce Smith

Non-Fiction Editors Copy Editors

Sam Bollinger, Tianna Vertigan, Kirsten Dayne

Gustafson Feature

Sam Bollinger, Tianna Vertigan

Graduate Feature

Sam Bollinger, Bella Hoodle, Beatrix Taylor, Nicole Kaastra

Book Review Editor Art Director Designer Portfolio Series Coordinators AV Editors Ad Team Social Media Team Web Designer Publisher

Bianca’s Toolkit Jayne Wright

Beatrix Taylor, Zeel Desai, Nittu Prasai

Taylor Iverson Seth Scott Chloe de Beeld Barbara Burgardt, Beatrix Taylor, Susan Garcia Seth Scott, Jack Corfield Joyce Smith, Zeel Desai, Rebecca Liu Barbara Burgardt, Liz Baltzer, Nicole Kaastra, Jayne Wright, Taylor Iverson Tianna Vertigan Joy Gugeler

FRIENDS OF PORTAL chly viusu viufa The Navigator viu Theatre viu English viu Bookstore viu Media Studies

viu Graphic Design The view Gallery viu Food Services viu Creative Writing Club viu Foundation viu Creative Writing & Journalism viu Arts & Humanities Colloquium Gustafson Distinguished Poets Lecture Series Vancouver Island Regional Library

Gail Raper Piper’s Pub Prime Golf LiveWire Catering Mary Fox Pottery Janet McDonald Art Aesthetics by Angie Common Foundry

Event Freefall Fiddlehead subTerrain The New Quarterly The Malahat prism International

Longwood Brewery Landmark Theatre Big Leaf Wood Works Creative Gardening Stones Dean Carto Distinct Financial Amanda Key Design & Illustration The Backyard Wildbird and Nature Store ub Wealth Management

Windowseat Books Touchwood Editions Nanaimo Arts Council Federation of bc Writers ubc Masters of Fine Arts sfu Masters of Publishing

TABLE OF FICTION 11 Bloom Alyssa Coristine 15 The Bone Thief Wayne Chang 22 Would You Show Me How? Ann Hoffmann 26 Two Peas in a Pod Kath Van Doorn 38 Nothing Is Cast in Stone Nicole Kaastra 46 Shoganai Liz Baltzer 52 Right Turns Alyssa Coristine 66 Vilomah Amy Mattes

SCRIPT 29 Conrad Knows Best Brendan Wanderer 41 Slow Burn Jack Corfield

POETRY 13 Cold Comfort Robert Bowerman 18 Angel of Appalachia Bethany Morley 25 Jesus Is a Water Strider Bella Hoodle 37 Andromeda’s (re)Turn Alexis King 40 Up in Smoke Gabriel Villasmil 55 Shell Shocked Tianna Vertigan 60 Magnolia Season Sam Bollinger 68 Vertebrate Heart Sam Bollinger

NON-FICTION 8 Bushed Jayne Wright 14 Birds of a Feather Yvonne Salsman 34 Free and Hard Rachel Davidson 49 Forgetting Is So Long Robert Bowerman 61 A New Leaf Tammi Carto 63 Meeting Kapok Taylor Iverson 69 How Did I End Up Here? Hannah Macza Vaporous Rock Jack Corfield

CONTENTS FEATURES 19 A Pocket Full of Promise Verioska Solano 20 The Roof of the World Nittu Prasai 21 As Strong As an Ox Barbara Burgardt 56 Unspelling Silence: M. NourbeSe Philip Speaks Truth to History Sam Bollinger and Tianna Vertigan

72 Shapeshifters Reviewed by Bella Hoodle

73 Taking Up Space with Délani Valin Sam Bollinger and Bella Hoodle

74 Cooking Tips for Desperate Fishwives Reviewed by Nicole Kaastra

75 Out to Sea with Margot Fedoruk Beatrix Taylor

BOOK REVIEWS 76 From Bear Rock Mountain by Antione Mountain Reviewed by Taylor Iverson

77 Modern Fables by Mikka Jacobsen Reviewed by Tianna Vertigan

78 Rachel Bird by Becky Citra Reviewed by Kirsten Dayne

79 All of Us in Our Own Lives by Manjushree Thapa Reviewed by Nittu Prasai

80 Beneath Springhill: The Maurice Ruddick Story by Beau Dixon Reviewed by Susan Garcia

81 But the sun, and the ships, and the fish, and the waves. by Conyer Clayton Reviewed by Sam Bollinger Astral Girl Jack Corfield

BUSHED Jayne Wright

was in the fetal position on the side of a dirt road,

hands over my eyes to block the unrelenting sun. Pain hammered my arms and legs like nails piercing my skin. I’d hit a nest, the first one of my treeplanting career. With one fell swoop of my shovel, I had destroyed the home a colony of wasps had spent the entire summer cultivating. Eleven wasp bites, ranging from my shins to my shoulders, suggested they were not pleased. Once I stopped screaming and adjusted to the pain, I took a deep breath and sat up. In the distance I could hear another tree planter’s speaker blaring Anderson Paak’s “Bubblin,” its rap ricocheting off the hills. Mosquitos and blackflies buzzed around my head and into the holes of my torn-up leggings. The sun was a scorching 30°c and it was only 2:00 pm. I wiped away the sweat dripping into my eyes with the dirt-covered sleeve of my men’s 2xl collared shirt. Three more hours. Fuck. I needed to get moving. My bags were still full of saplings and they needed to be empty before I could pack my gear into the helicopter. My assigned section of logged forest, my “piece,” wasn’t yet finished. Then I saw it—my bright yellow shovel against the dark greenery. It was still embedded in the wasps’ nest. In my panic I’d run away from it, and now angry wasps patrolled the area. I needed it back.

Non-Fiction

To plant a tree, you have to hoist your shovel high and allow gravity to take over, then push it forward and draw it back in the soil while releasing a spruce sapling (its roots covered in a pod of manufactured dirt) from your other hand. You punch the base of the tree with your fist as firmly as you can, ensuring a tight seal. You need to do this at least 2000 times before the day is over. I should have stayed in bed this morning. I had woken up exhausted, but if you took a day off for every ache and ailment, you wouldn’t plant even two days in a row. The season is approximately 65 planting days long, so missing one means missing out on hundreds of dollars. I was a rookie (first-year planter), but I wasn’t half bad—most days I averaged around $200. For a 19-year-old student, that’s a lot. I needed that money.

At each new campsite, the foreman and planters created a makeshift town: five tents of thick weatherproof canvas. The mess tent was also used for night-off beer pong tournaments, dance parties, fashion shows, trivia games, and “Plantapalooza,” the much-anticipated year-end talent show. The serving tent offered muddy coffee for our tin mugs. The first aid tent, eating hall, and dry tent (a communal closet housing heaps of sopping wet, dirtcaked clothes) completed the circle.

That morning, I’d left the campfire to stand in the breakfast line with my mug of shitty coffee. I needed it to convince myself I could get through the day. Each one that passed made the end of the season less abstract. Planters slowly rolled out of tents to join me in line. Some were still in the clothes they had worn the day before, some had matted hair tucked under baseball caps. “Mornin’,” Eric said, yawning. I could smell last night’s campfire beers on his breath. How could he stay up on a weeknight? I ate dinner and fell into bed immediately. Perhaps veteran planters could function with less sleep and a mild hangover. “Morning,” I said. “How was your night?” “Amazing! Slept like a baby.” Eric was always positive, as if others’ misery fueled his chipper mood. This was why I loved him. “Did you hear it’s a heli block today?” he said. This was the ultimate for a new planter. My morning commute made me a total badass, not to mention the videos I could send friends to rub it in. By the time our muddy truck rolled up to the helipad, our camp supervisor, Todd, was in a frenzy and chain smoking. The supervisor’s mood affects the foreman, which affects the planters. Everybody was on edge. Planting companies don’t love helicopter-access blocks. It costs them $60 a minute to be in the air, so there’s a sense of urgency and it takes a great deal of organization to make the day go smoothly. It was all calculated based on the crew size, sections of blocks assigned, and the number of trees needed. The helicopters can typically load just four to six planters at a time, depending on the model, so we sat around smoking, joking, and charging phones before taking off.

I hid behind a truck with my planting partner, V, while she toked weed from her pipe. As usual, her current camp lover was creating drama. “I just don’t understand. One second he wants to move into my tent, the next he’s barely talking to me, unless he’s drunk of course.” I was sympathetic, but it was the same old story, and this morning I didn’t have the energy. I hugged her and walked past the smoking circles and banter to stretch and centre myself for the day ahead. When I rose from touching my toes, Brayden was standing beside me. “Oh hey! How’s it going?” I asked. “Honestly, not so good. I haven’t been feeling too well these days,” he said. Tree planting draws in people from all walks of life: money-hungry students, tree-hugging hippies, oddballs, partiers, ballers (high-performers), and lifers (10+ seasons). The latter have decided tree planting is their career so they spend the off-seasons bumming around cities on employment insurance, itching for April. Then there were the strugglers, the ones who think planting will be a fresh start, an escape. They find their way to the job only to realize that it’s tough out here. Any experienced planter will tell you the job is all mental.

( Physically, people can push their way through a lot, but on the block it’s just you, the land, and the trees. ) Your mind will make or break you. Brayden, unfortunately, was a struggler. He had bi-polar disorder and had thought the bush would be a chance to connect to what was real. The look on his face told me that wasn’t the case.

Misty Morning Non-Fiction Emma Cannell 9

Bushed

“I feel suicidal. I want to jump out of the helicopter.” I pulled Brayden into my arms and held him as his tears dampened my shoulder. When I pulled away I asked if he’d told anybody else how he was feeling. He said his friend James, who was in management, knew. Before I could say anything else, I heard my foreman call, “Jayne, get ready! You’re on the next load!” The pilot doesn’t bother to turn the helicopter off when he picks us up. It’s all about timing. We crouched nearby, covered our faces with our shirts, threw our bags into the outside basket, and awkwardly crawled inside.

With each bag I finished, I was closer to tears, realizing it wasn’t my last. If I could stretch a round of saplings over two hours, that meant I only had to do five more bags. Today I didn’t care about money; I just wanted to survive. When I finally finished, I grabbed my shovel and headed back to the heli pick-up spot. There, the crew looked at me with concern; they saw my welts even if they hadn’t heard my screams. My hands swelled like inflated medical gloves. I missed my mom. Eric pulled me into a sweaty hug. “Rough day?” “You have no idea.” Back at camp, I saw Brayden around the campfire with James smoking and drinking Sneaky Weasels. After a cold shower in the rickety aluminum trailer, I went to bed. I was too exhausted to stand in line for dinner and answer everyone’s questions. In my tent, I lit a joint and opened my book. An hour later, I unzipped my tent flap to pee and found a giant plate of spaghetti, garlic bread, salad, and a brownie on a camp chair.

I was counting down the final two weeks of my rookie season when a freak end-of-July weather system brought seven days of sideways rain. I sat at the cache, gaping at the logged forest where I was expected to plant. I wondered if they had made any effort to clear the debris. I couldn’t even tell where the fallen logs ended and the ground began.

Non-Fiction

Our foreman, Geoff, had picked us up from the last piece and driven us in his heated truck for 10 precious minutes, only to drop us off again in even heavier rain. “Be at the trucks for 5:45 tonight!” Geoff said, throwing boxes of trees at my feet from the mud-caked tailgate. I tried not to let him see I was crying. My steel-toed boots grew heavier in the rain, making each step a challenge. I unfurled saran-wrapped saplings and stuffed them in bags I secured around my hips with shoulder straps. My bulky, useless rain gear only made walking with a full load more impossible. I could barely see V descending over the menacing downward slope. Most days V and I had each other’s backs and could joke our way through the comically brutal job that is tree planting, but it wasn’t one of those days. It was the third day of unrelenting, 4° rain. I took my first steps into the brush and failed to see a root hidden beneath debris. It caught my foot and I fell hard to my knees. It would take a lot of strength to hoist myself up with 30 kilos of baby trees on my hips. My eyes stung with tears and bug spray. In defeat I walked back to the cache, unbuckled my waist strap, and dropped my bags in the muddy soil. I lifted my face to the sky and let the rain wipe away my tears. When I opened my eyes, I met the piercing gaze of a fox three feet away. His black fur was spiky with rain. His eyes were shimmering flecks of gold.

( He was no bigger than a house cat, yet he stood with an assured presence. ) I knelt to his eye level. He didn’t move, didn’t even flinch. He just looked at me, knowing. I greeted him and he cocked his head in response. I have never been a religious person. I’ve always said my god is Mother Nature. That day, God was a fox. “Thank you,” I said, and with that he disappeared into the forest. I pulled my bags back on, determined to finish the day, finish the season, no matter how hard it got. It was a good end to a bad day in the bush. I thought about the pain and beauty and elation and absolute exhaustion of the job, and I thought about that fox, a messenger of hope. If I came across him again, I’d tell him I owed him one. ( )

BLOOM Alyssa Coristine

nce, when I was six, I got stuck in a prickly bush.

I was walking in the woods with my older brother and my dad who we visited every other weekend. There wasn’t much to do at Dad’s house because he lived an hour away from the nearest town and he wasn’t allowed to drive anymore.

The path was only wide enough for two, so they were side by side and I was a couple steps behind them. It was always that way—I was small and couldn’t walk as quickly. I was quiet, too, unlike my brother. He could talk and talk and talk and the only time I got a word in was when he paused for a breath. I was as silent as a shadow, so when I got stuck, they didn’t even notice. I didn’t call out for help because I wasn’t allowed to interrupt my brother when he was talking. That was the rule—he could interrupt me as much as he wanted and my dad wouldn’t say a thing. If I said something before he’d finished, I’d get told off. Usually, I didn’t have a lot to say, but this time they were too far away to hear me by the time he stopped talking. I couldn’t get myself free either because it was really prickly and I was wearing shorts. So, I just stayed where I was, watching them get farther and farther away until they turned a corner and I couldn’t see them anymore. That’s when I started to cry. I stopped that pretty quickly though because I wasn’t allowed to cry at my dad’s house. My mom didn’t mind so much, but my dad said crying was only for babies and girls, and since I was neither, I needed to toughen up. There were all kinds of things I did that he thought I shouldn’t, like playing with dolls. Those were for girls too. He said it was Laura’s fault I liked girly things, because I lived with her and didn’t have any men to be role models. He always called Mom by her first name. I wasn’t sure it was Mom’s fault. If it was, my brother should like girly things too, but he liked trucks and sports. Sometimes I wished I could be more like him.

Simplicity Sabrina Smith

I kept thinking my dad would notice I was missing and come looking for me. He’d be worried, crashing through the trees frantically, then he’d find me and scoop me up and hug me just like Kevin’s mom does in Home Alone when she finally makes it back to him, but he never showed up. After a while I heard something coming toward me and I could tell from the way it sounded that it wasn’t a person. Animals don’t move the same way people do. I thought for sure it was a bear or a wolf coming to eat me. I wondered how badly it was going to hurt. Instead, it was just my dad’s dog. Her name was Girl, because she was a girl. My dad wasn’t too creative when it came to names. That’s why my brother was named after him. I wasn’t named after anyone. Girl was an outside dog so her white fur was always covered in mud. She sniffed around me a bit, then flopped down close enough for me to pet her and didn’t move. She just stayed right there, keeping me company.

( I was a bit disappointed. If a bear ate me, my dad would definitely notice. ) He’d feel bad he hadn’t noticed I was missing, and my mom would be mad at him, and it would serve him right. I would have a funeral just like Thomas J. did in My Girl. I wondered if my dad would cry—I bet he wouldn’t. My dad’s girlfriend eventually found me. She’d come looking for us on the trail. He had a new one every time we visited; they never seemed to stick around. This one was called Crystal. She’d stayed for a few months, which was probably a record. I really liked her. She was kind, and pretty, and she let me try on her clothes when my dad wasn’t home. I heard her coming before I saw her. It’s hard to walk quietly in the woods, especially when you’re not used to it. Crystal was from the city. Girl started wagging her tail. If I had a tail, I would wag it too.

Crystal seemed surprised to find me there alone. I started to cry again, only this time I couldn’t stop. I tried to tell her I was stuck, but she must have understood because she scooped me up out of the bush with no trouble. She hugged me tight and it was nothing like Home Alone, but it comforted me all the same. Crystal carried me all the way home. I could tell she was having trouble because she kept tripping over tree roots and jostling me around, but she never complained. I tried my best not to squirm and I pulled out all the twigs that got caught in her hair. I loved her hair. It was blonde and silky and as long as Rapunzel’s. I used to want to have hair like yours, but not anymore. Why not? Long hair is for girls. My dad said so. If I was a girl, I’d want to have hair like yours though. Long hair isn’t just for girls. You can have long hair if you want to. No, I can’t. My dad won’t let me. Well, when you’re older, you can have long hair whether your dad says so or not. Can I wear dresses?

( She shifted me in her arms and smiled, but it was a funny kind of smile. She looked almost sorry, but what for? )

Really? I thought you were with us the whole time. You’re so quiet, I didn’t even notice you were gone. Then he laughed.

Girl died not long after. I wasn’t supposed to know that— my dad told us she ran away, but I overheard him telling my uncle she was attacked by a cougar. He’d seen one wandering around a few days before. He told my uncle it was too bad because she was always good at scaring the coyotes away. I thought being killed by a cougar was much cooler than running away, like in Where the Red Fern Grows. Besides, if she’d run away, it would mean she’d left on purpose. I didn’t believe Girl would ever choose to leave me. This way, I knew she couldn’t help it.

A few weeks later, while my mom was cutting up vegetables for dinner, I told her I wanted to have hair like Crystal’s—long and blonde and silky. I told her it’s not just for girls, just in case she didn’t know about that. She just looked at me for a long time, like she was trying to solve a hard puzzle. I was starting to feel kind of stupid when, finally, she shrugged and turned back to the vegetables. It’ll take a long time to grow it that long and you’d better brush it yourself, because I’m not doing it for you.

If you want to. You can do anything at all.

Crystal was gone not long after that. My dad didn’t say why. He never did when girls left, like he thought we wouldn’t notice.

When we got back to the house, my dad and brother were in the kitchen. They looked surprised to see us. My dad had a beer in his hand, and an empty beside him.

Soon there was a different girl in her place. They were like the bouquets my mom had on the kitchen table and replaced when she got tired of looking at their wilted petals.

Hey you two. Where have you been?

My dad said the new one’s name was Ellie. She didn’t say anything at all. He looked me up and down.

I found him in a bush. A prickly bush. I got stuck.

Heaven is Home Ellen Addison

You need a haircut. You’re starting to look like a girl. ( )

COLD COMFORT Robert Bowerman

Two plump butterballs in yellow snowsuits stumble and spill onto a blanket of white. My brother and I stand, puzzled. Tears of shame freeze against our cheeks.

With a flicker of pink tongues, we taste the falling flakes, our stinging bottoms soon forgotten. Galoshes galumph and sink; warm woolen mittens mold a lopsided man with a crooked smile.

Exhaust burns, wheels churn un/stuck. The city intrudes, then retreats. In a moment of stillness, I wonder why it is so quiet, why snow sparkles, if hot cocoa awaits when we go inside— or must we still pay for sins not yet understood?

Robin Sabrina Smith

Poetry

BIRDS OF A FEATHER Yvonne Salsman

he summer before I started Kindergarten, my

mother took me to the local elementary school to get familiar with the layout. On the way to the playground, we passed the basketball courts. They were littered with a trail of ceramic shards, remnants of garden gnomes, and plant pots, the aftermath of hijinks the night before. My mother took my hand, shaking her head in disgust.

After an hour on the swings and monkey bars, my mother said it was time for lunch. We headed back to our burgundy Mustang in the parking lot, taking a short cut through a small grove of trees. Propped up against the trunk of a Douglas fir was a pink flamingo. His coral plastic body swelled in the middle with molded wings tucked serenely into its side and it stood on two metal legs. His long neck sloped gracefully upward. He had avoided the unfortunate fate of the other lawn ornaments and was in great condition. It was love at first sight; I begged my mother to let me bring him home. Amazingly, she agreed. She placed me in my car seat and lay the flamingo next to me, his eyes staring into mine. I named him Pinky, for obvious reasons. At the time, I didn’t have any friends my own age. I had never gone to preschool and the kids who attended my daycare were either much older or much younger than I was. I spent a lot of time playing on my own and had developed a vivid imagination. With Pinky, I knew I would never be alone again. In my adventures, our backyard—an unkempt mixture of grasses, reeds, and blackberry bushes—became a jungle that claimed anyone who dared enter. These grasses were so tall I could disappear in their undergrowth right before my parents’ eyes. Eventually, I wore out a small clearing there in the corner furthest from the house. It was our hideout in the wild, a

Flamingo Seth 14 Scott

place safe from the dreaded “Wall of Thorns.” Sometimes I imagined Pinky had been captured by a dastardly villain and only I could fight past the plant army to save him. Other times we lay in the grass, talking the hours away. It’s easy to keep secrets when your confidante is plastic. For those few glorious summer months, that yard was an oasis and Pinky my best friend. Autumn came and the change of seasons brought the first day of school. I started Kindergarten and spent less and less time in my imaginary world. Pinky stood guard against a backyard pine, patiently waiting for weekends when I had time to play. Although our adventures lessened, his loyalty never wavered. He was the yard’s proud sentinel. One Sunday morning, I awoke primed for adventure. I rushed downstairs and out the door into our yard. I came to a sudden halt in front of the pine. Pinky was nowhere to be seen. I raced around, hoping the wind had simply blown him into the undergrowth. I grew more frantic as I scanned the yard for pink. Had an animal dragged him off?

( Had someone abducted my best friend? ) I was devastated. I begged my parents to help me look, but they explained that by taking him home, we had likely stolen him from someone else. Maybe they had finally come back to get him. When we walked around our neighbourhood in the days that followed I kept my eyes peeled, but I never saw Pinky again. Eventually I made real friends, had new adventures. Still, years later, my fondness for lawn ornaments persists. My garden is now home to a family of ceramic gnomes and two lovely pink flamingos. A girl never forgets her first best friend. ( )

THE BONE THIEF Wayne Chang

a told me it would look like Ah-tso was asleep. She said we’d bring offerings of fruit, rice, and incense paper that looked like ancient Taiwanese money, offerings to make sure Great-grandmother had everything she’d need.

Other family members would be there too, keeping vigil by Ah-tso’s side to guide her. The spirit is easily confused when it first departs the body.

Xiao-lan had been trying to scare me, but his words echoed as I stepped forward. Her spirit will stay with you…. The monk handed me the black chopsticks and I picked up a piece the size of my knuckle. Before I placed it in the urn, I used it to nudge another smaller bone to the edge of the table. As I returned the chopsticks with my left hand, my right hand closed around the bone I’d pushed to the edge.

“I understand if you’re too afraid to see her,” Ma said. She was sitting beside me, at the edge of my bed. I wasn’t afraid, but the world of grown-ups and their rituals was strange to me. In a few months, I’d be starting school; maybe I’d understand then.

My heart pounded. I didn’t dare look at the monk. As soon as he took the chopsticks from me, I turned and ran to my parents’ side, hands stuffed in my pockets.

Inside the narrow white room of the crematorium, I realized the consequence of my decision. I could’ve seen Ah-tso’s face one last time if I’d gone to the service. Now, I only saw her bones and ashes laid out on a metal table before her urn. Maybe I am afraid.

After the crematorium, we gathered at Ah-tso’s home. Her small white terrier, Bao, ran up to greet me. I crouched down to pet her, but she ducked under my hand to sniff at my pocket. She yelped, backed up a few steps, and barked at me.

A monk stood by, head bowed and solemn. He handed a pair of long black chopsticks to my great-aunt who carefully picked up a piece of bone and placed it in the urn. One by one, from oldest to youngest, each member of my family did the same.

I stood up quickly and looked around, but no one had noticed. I nudged Bao away with my foot and she scampered away.

As I drew closer to the bones, I felt a hand on my shoulder and Ma said softly, “Don’t pick one that’s too big.” I nodded, but all I could think about was what Xiao-lan, my cousin, had told me yesterday. “Do you know what happens if you’re not careful and touch Ah-tso’s bones?” I froze and shook my head. “Her spirit will stay with you forever,” he’d said, grinning more widely the more frightened I looked.

The bone felt brittle and sharp in my sweaty palm.

My great-aunt stood and placed a stack of small boxes on the dining table. “These are from Ah-tso—keepsakes that will bring you luck.” I opened my box and inside, on a cushion of black velvet, was a tiny gold pig. A glimmering, pink gemstone was nested in its belly. It was just like the necklace Ah-tso always wore, except hers was a tiger—her zodiac sign. I glanced around and saw that everyone had been given a tiny golden version of their sign. Ma helped me thread a string through the hoop on the back of the pig and make it into a necklace. As I put it on, I felt Bao at my ankles again. I tried to nudge her away, but when I looked down, there was nothing there. Bao

Fiction

was across the room, lounging under Great-aunt’s chair. I shivered and tucked my necklace under my t-shirt.

As I lay in bed that night, I held Ah-tso’s bone in one hand and wished with all my might that she would come back to me. In my other hand, I held my necklace. In the darkness of my bedroom, I began to question what I had done. The shadows suddenly seemed unfamiliar and my heart began to race. What if it’s not Ah-tso that comes…?

in Ma’s hand if I told them what I had done. I won’t say anything until Ah-tso can speak to them. “Ma! I’m going to see Xiao-lan!” I shouted as I opened the front door. Xiao-lan lived a few buildings down the street, but I wasn’t headed there today. Instead, I headed for the convenience store by Da-an Park. I needed to find food for Ah-tso.

( Something brushed my leg. I whimpered and scrambled closer to the headboard. )

I had smuggled some buttered toast from breakfast back to my bedroom this morning, but Ah-tso seemed offended by my offering and refused to eat. She looked thinner with each passing hour.

There was a lump under my blanket, but it didn’t move. I took a deep breath and reached out with a shaky hand to throw the blanket off. Curled up on my sheet was a small tiger cub, fast asleep.

“We’ll find you something good, Ah-tso,” I whispered as we entered the convenience store. The tiger’s ears perked up and she looked at me as if in recognition.

I blinked, unable to believe my eyes. It didn’t seem capable of biting off my hand, so I reached forward to pet it. It looked up tiredly, then sighed contentedly. There was a thin, delicate chain around its neck. I picked up the sleepy cub to get a closer look. It was surprisingly light. I lifted the chain and saw a familiar golden pendant in the shape of a tiger, a pink gemstone embedded in its belly. I gasped. “Ah-tso?” The tiger looked at me blankly. I remembered what Ma had told me. Ah-tso must be confused. I hugged her tightly and buried my smile in her fur. I fell asleep with the cub in my arms.

I waited for Ba to leave for work, and for Ma to go to the kitchen, before I rushed to the front door with Ah-tso under one arm. I knew the bamboo stick would appear

I bought Ah-tso a hot dog and a small carton of milk. The bored cashier didn’t see her tucked beneath my jacket. We found an empty bench in the park and I placed the hot dog on a napkin and pushed it toward Ah-tso. She sniffed it suspiciously, but took a bite. She spat it out immediately. I poured a bit of milk into my cupped hand and offered it to her. She turned her head away. I sighed and drank the milk myself. I swear I could see her ribs through her fur.

Ah-tso felt lighter as I carried her home; her bones poked into my arms. My pace quickened and so did my breathing. As I turned into the alley that led home, I saw Xiao-lan kicking a soccer ball in front of his apartment building. He smiled when he saw me. “Xiao-lan! I need your help!”

“What’s wrong?” he asked, his smile fading. “It’s Ah-tso.” I lifted the tiger in my arms. “Something’s wrong with her.” He narrowed his eyes. “I know she doesn’t look like Ah-tso, but it’s really her.” He glanced at my arms. “There’s nothing there. You shouldn’t joke about things like that.” “You don’t see her?” Xiao-lan took a step back, eyes wide. “This isn’t funny.” “Please. I think she’s dying.” “Stop it!” He had grown pale and his lips trembled. “I’m telling my ma!” Xiao-lan spun around and ran back into his building. I pet Ah-tso as I hurried home. Tufts of fur came away in my hand.

Ma was waiting for me in the living room, the phone in her hand. Her mouth was pressed into a thin, angry line. “Why would you say those things to your cousin?” she demanded. “Apologize to him right now.”

I saw before me the large, imposing building where we’d been the day before: the crematorium. Out of the shadows a voice said, “Tigers aren’t native to Taiwan, child.” It was the monk who helped us with Ah-tso’s bones. He stood in front of the temple gates looking at Ah-tso. “You can see Ah-tso! Can you help her?” He shook his head regretfully.

( “Tigers don’t belong on this island. Spirits don’t belong in this realm.” ) “There’s nothing you can do?” “No,” he said, “but there’s something you must do. Return what you took so that your Ah-tso may move on peacefully from this realm.” I hung my head and looked at the skeletal tiger in my arms. I was deeply ashamed of everything I had put her through. I reached into my pocket and took out the small piece of bone. The monk nodded and entered the temple. I followed him inside.

“I was asking him for help!” I lifted Ah-tso toward her. “Look! We need to help her!”

He led me past wooden pillars and maze-like hallways. Eventually, we entered a dark room with a long stone wall and rows of square alcoves. We walked toward a flickering light; a candle lit the alcove with Ah-tso’s urn.

Ma looked, but her frown only deepened. She can’t see Ah-tso either. How could I make her understand? I held Ah-tso tightly to my chest. She seemed to be shrinking and barely responded when I called her name.

The monk removed the lid and stepped aside. I walked forward, one hand holding the bone and the other cradling Ah-tso. I gently placed the bone in the urn and set Ah-tso down in the alcove.

Hot, panicked tears welled in my eyes. I bolted from the house under darkening skies and ran without knowing where I was headed, I only knew that I had to find help for Ah-tso. I ran until I was gasping for breath.

The monk wiped my hand with a white handkerchief and stepped back. I closed my eyes and prayed she would find our offerings of fruit, rice, and money in the spirit realm. Ah-tso shuddered and sighed softly. She lay down and rested her head on her paws. Her eyes closed slowly and then all was silent. Ah-tso had fallen into a deep sleep. ( )

ANGEL OF APPALACHIA Bethany Morley

My mama tells me she saw an angel once, in her backyard in Tennessee. It was a slimy old thing, with hardly enough water to swim around in the drying mud. With three hands, four fingers each, it waved an unsynchronized hello. Mama asked what it was doing down there and it blinked 16 of its 39 eyes, then let out an unholy laugh—half jeer, half discordant scream. I ask Mama if she’d been afraid and she shakes her head, hands, body—shaking like a birch. “Of course not,” she says. “Nothing God loves need ever be afraid.” I wonder sometimes if my mama was lying. She’s never been one for darker things. When the spiders tangle their way into our home come fall, she knocks back their webs with a broom. When they return, she starts to scream, hands over her ears, curled up in a ball. My brothers and I beat them back again, checking outside for lingering silk. Daddy takes her shopping while we work, buys her a new dress and pretty shoes. When she comes back, her face is pink instead of that awful ashen grey.

When I ask Mama about it a few days later, she blinks like that angel and tilts her head, asks what I’m talking about. Then there are the times she sees spiders, sends my brothers and I to chase them, and we can’t find a thing. Daddy drags her from the house as she points to the mantel crammed with lumpy handmade angels, begging us to kill them. I ask her if maybe she saw the devil instead and she’s a birch tree again. Later that night Daddy yells at me for setting her off. One day Mama up and moves us to South Carolina. When I ask her why she says, “Babygirl, I know that angel will put up a fight when the rapture comes.” My mama says sometimes the angel visits her in dreams. I ask her if it shares its secrets and she says, “Babygirl, that angel’s wisdom is nothing you should be hearing.” Mama died four years ago. Daddy sent her body back to Tennessee. I don’t think she would’ve liked that, but he just couldn’t worry about her anymore. On my way to her grave, I pass what’s left of a withered old pond and in the mud I see an angel blink 16 of its 39 eyes.

Spider Web Poetry Sabrina 18 Smith

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A POCKET FULL OF PROMISE Verioska Solano

y life in Chile is divided in two halves: the

years I lived with my abuela from birth to age nine in Santiago, and the 10 years that followed. My early years tell a different, happier story, one full of images you might associate with my country, as I do.

My grandmother grew up on a farm in the Osorno countryside on the southern tip of Chile. When her oldest, Luisa, had escaped the debilitating limitations of a farmer’s life and secured a place to live in Santiago, she encouraged my abuela to move in with her. She left her overbearing husband and land behind and took a 15-hour train ride to Santiago, pregnant and with 10 children by her side. It was a tale repeatedly shared over Sunday dinner at her house. Over the years, Luisa and my other aunts and uncles moved out leaving only my single and childless aunt Mirta who was the cook and manager of the house; my teenaged single mother (abandoned by my father before I was born) who worked as a live-in nanny an hour away and only came home on weekends; my 15-year-old cousin whose mother had relinquished him; and me. We were a multi-generational, but non-traditional family. A household run by women meant everyone did their part. My abuela did not let her illiteracy prevent her from making a living as a street vendor in the loud and congested city ferias, markets held three times a week that took over a neighbourhood main street to provide suburban communities with fresh ingredients. The street closed for the day and self-made stands popped up with perfectly stacked fruit and vegetables to lure customers. Dry goods and meat vendors were at the top of this food chain, fruit and vegetable vendors next, and those who sold fresh herbs, used clothing, and miscellaneous household items were last. My abuela sold fresh herbs, the bottom of this pyramid, but what she lacked in wealth and prestige, she made up for in resourcefulness and pride.

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Going to work with her was an adventure. On cold mornings, the walk to the street market was long enough to warm my toes and allow me to ask many questions. “Abuela, why don’t you have teeth?” “I have teeth. They are in the glass by my bed.” “Why aren’t they in your mouth?” Silence. “What kind of question is that?” “Maybe, one day, you will grow new ones like me!” My grandmother’s 5’2 round figure was a comfort to hug. Her long braids rested on her chest and smelled of the lemon juice she used on her hair and my own every morning. She wore skirts that rested too high, defining a waist she didn’t have. On non-market days, I sat on the floor in front of her and piles of fresh herbs were organized to maximize the efficiency of making bouquets. Cilantro, parsley, and oregano were tied by her leathery fingers. At the market, a board was laid atop two sawhorses and I sat beneath it in a wooden box lined with a potato sack while she was busy with the customers above. As the number of customers behind me, and coins in my grandmother’s apron pockets in front of me, grew, I knew it wouldn’t be long before her hand would appear with a sopaipilla, deep-fried pumpkin dough. The routine sing-song and chit-chat of the vendors buzzed above as I put the coins in my shoebox cash register below. My frozen fingers handed my abuela the wrong change too slowly, but such responsibility came with its own high. At 3:00 pm, she packed up the unsold items and swung the sack over her shoulder, extended her other hand to me, and we marched home. The coins in her pockets sang a rich tune as we walked toward our future. ( )

Portfolio Spotlight

THE ROOF OF THE WORLD

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Nittu Prasai

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henever people ask me, “Where are you

from?” and I say Nepal, either their faces register recognition, or I’m met with a blank stare and I’m sure they don’t know what I’m talking about. My country is sandwiched between two of the largest and most populous countries—India and China. Some people think Nepal is actually a tiny part of India, rather than an independent nation. It has a population of 30 million (just 7 million less than Canada), but with a land mass of only 147,000 square kilometres. Strangers may not know these statistics, but how can they fail to associate my country with the majesty of Mount Everest or the bravery of the Gurkhas? While Nepal is known for the Himalayas, that’s by no means all it should be known for. There is so much more to its identity, and so much more it means to me. It is the top of the world and the bottom of my heart; it was and is my home.

At the time, all I could do was grab my parents’ hands, stagger down the stairs, and run out of the house onto the road. Through tears, I took in the devastating sight unfolding around me. Houses began to collapse, and with them people’s hope for survival, for a life after this. My country turned to dust in seconds. In its wake, people gathered, but felt helpless to do anything but pray. There were more than 25 aftershocks and the country was in chaos. People spent sleepless nights on the edge of the road while the death toll mounted: almost 10,000 people died, and millions were injured.

As one of the world’s 30 poorest countries, it is a nation known for its resilience in the face of hardship, perhaps never more than on that fateful day.

The earthquake shattered Nepal as we’d known it, but not our spirit. This horrific event brought all castes and religions together, rich and poor alike united to share their grief and rebuild.

On the morning of April 25, 2015 we were sitting on our terrace in Nepal’s central hilly region, enjoying the sunshine after lunch. Every day at noon a group of elders gathered in Bhaktapur’s Krishna Temple to listen to the Hindu priest’s prayers.

Whether people lived on the terai, in the mountains, or in the cities, they looked up from their own suffering to extend a hand and help each other. That was eight years ago, and my country is still recovering from this unimaginable loss.

Bhaktapur is a small city at only 191 square kilometres, yet it is one of the densest with 78,000 inhabitants, 15 temples, and many museums.

Nepal has more than 15,000 temples. They are sacred places of great beauty, places no one can forget after even one visit. People visit these temples at every phase of life, from birth to death. They are a second home where older people gather while their adult children go to work.

Watching them, I was reminded of how this temple has connected people of all ages for over 400 years. I said to my mother, “How would they kill time if it weren’t for this temple?” She smiled, but didn’t answer. A few minutes later the sky darkened and we began walking downstairs, anticipating rain. However, Mother

Nature had something bigger planned. Suddenly, the floor shook violently and an endless moment of silence, during which we all held our breaths, was broken by screams coming from every direction. We’d later learn that the earthquake was 7.8 on the Richter scale.

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Since 2015, these homes have been slowly being rebuilt, though perhaps without their original charm and beauty. The temples offer shelter, another roof here in the roof of the world, and perhaps most profoundly, they offer hope for my country and its people—people like me. ( )

Barbara Burgardt

very June, I woke up in the middle of the night to the smell of bonfires. For Saint Anthony, the logs were set up in the shape of a square, for Saint John a circle, and for Saint Peter a triangle. These happened every year as part of the Festa Junina, a celebration that was once a way for farmers to bless the harvest, pray for rain, and ward off plagues.

We dance the quadrilha, which presents a mock wedding to symbolize our marriage to the land and celebrate its fertility. In school there was a lottery to see who would be the wedding party, but I was never picked. So instead, I would join my classmates and dress in earth-toned plaid, draw freckles on my cheeks, and put my hair in pigtails, the traditional costume of Festa Junina. Accordions played as we joined in ring toss games or fished for prizes. We ate traditional foods like: cuscuz, made with steamed granules of rolled semolina; munguzá, a type of porridge made with white maize kernels, milk, sugar, and cinnamon; pamonha, a boiled paste made from sweet corn whisked in coconut milk; and canjica, a sweet made from the pressed juice of unripe maize with milk and sugar. My favorite, however, was simply corn on a stick. The city of Caruaru, in my home state of Pernambuco, and Campina Grande in Paraíba are rivals when it comes to Festa Junina. They each welcome over three million people annually, competing for the biggest audience. However, if you asked my family, we would say the state of Maranhão is a contender in its own right. In 2005, we moved to Maranhão’s capital, São Luís, and for the six years we lived there we celebrated Festa Junina with the Bumba Meu Boi, an interactive play that originated in the northeast region of Brazil in the 18th century and was inspired by the popular folktale O Auto Do Boi. Its plot revolves around an ox who dies and is resurrected, representing the strength and resilience of slaves in the face of persecution from tyrannical masters. In Maranhão it was

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prohibited from being performed between 1861 and 1868 due to its origins, but in the 155 years since it has become a fundamental part of the state’s culture. The clothes, choice of instruments, cadence of music, and choreography vary depending on where it’s being performed and the region’s history, the setting, and the sotaque, or accent, that the story is presented in. There are almost 100 different Bumba Meu Boi acting troupes in Maranhão, each performing in one of five sotaques: Matraca, Zabumba, Orquestra, Costa de Mão, and Baixada. The Bumba Meu Boi de Matraca is my brother’s favourite. We used to squeeze through the crowd to sit as close to the stage as possible. This performance was heavily influenced by Indigenous culture and two small pieces of wood, pandeirões, a type of hand frame drum, and tambores-onça, a friction drum with a bass sound, were played to accompany the dialogue. The story’s plot also changes depending on where it is being performed. When the pregnant Catirina demands an ox be killed so she can eat its tongue to protect her unborn child, some versions have her husband Francisco kill it. Others have the ox grow ill from drinking from the São Francisco river, (which passes through five Brazilian states, making it the third most important river in the country). Other characters include a master, a priest, and an Indigenous shaman. Regardless, all presentations end with the ox’s resurrection being celebrated with a huge feast, dancing, and folk music. unesco recognized Maranhão’s Bumba Meu Boi by granting it the status of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in December 2019. That year I packed my bags to leave Brazil for Canada. Though I wouldn’t wake up the following June to the smell of bonfires, I swear I tasted sweet canjica on my tongue and heard the sound of drums 9000 kilometres in the distance. ( )

Portfolio Spotlight

WOULD YOU SHOW ME HOW? Ann Hoffmann Content warning: hunting, animal-related gore

enore peered through the opening in the hunting blind, her gaze skating across the wintery fields. Solitary trees dotted the border between this field and the next one, little more than silhouettes in the dim morning light. If it wasn’t for the trees, there’d be a massive clearing that stretched into the horizon, blending into the cloud-covered sky.

“Are you warm enough?” Opa asked in German. He rarely spoke English when it was just the two of them. Lenore nodded, enveloped by her thick woolen sweater and puffy grey coat. She’d even put on her snow pants, which she was too old for, being in middle school now. Babies wear snow pants, she’d told Opa. That’s what Mara said. This morning though, it was so cold she had to wear them, baby or not. She watched Opa leave the blind and trudge back to the truck. She wondered how long this would take. Would there even be any elk this morning? Had they made the long trip to the Lonergans’ for nothing? Opa would probably visit with Ivan Lonergan, regardless of the outcome of their hunt. Lenore had spent many afternoons on the Lonergan farm in her childhood. Their kids were practically her cousins. Opa returned carrying two big woolen blankets. Lenore didn’t say anything as he wrapped one around her.

Snowy River Seth 22 Scott Fiction

“Shouldn’t be too much longer,” he said as he settled into one of the old lawn chairs. It wasn’t much of a hunting blind really, just some tattered camouflage fabric tied to a few trees and bushes. “Ivan says the elk have come this way almost every morning.” “What if they don’t come?” Lenore asked in English. It was too early in the morning to string together coherent sentences in German. “Then they don’t. That’s just the way of things.” He pulled a thermos from his tall hiking backpack, poured hot chocolate into the thermos lid, and handed it to her. Lenore took slow sips, enjoying its warmth and sweetness. She leaned back in her chair and thought of the winter he’d built her a snow cave, a quinzhee. He’d crawled through the opening to bring them hot chocolate and peppernuts as she and Mara played. He had looked like Santa squeezing through a chimney with his beard, red cheeks, and round belly. “Over there,” Opa whispered as he pointed toward dark spots in the distance, maybe as many as 40. Lenore lifted a pair of black binoculars and searched the snowy fields. The elk were still far away, beyond the trees that divided the fields, but they were wandering in their direction. Lenore watched, transfixed, as the herd neared them.

Opa raised his gun, the stock resting above the crook of his arm, positioning himself to shoot a cow elk on the edge of the herd. Lenore focussed specifically on her. She had beautiful fur and a majestic form. Her breath made clouds in the cold air.

Lenore got out of the truck, but she didn’t follow Opa. The elk was still moving, her legs kicking in all directions.

She didn’t want to do this anymore. It wasn’t worth it. This was all a stupid attempt to make new friends because she was lonely without Mara. Of course, she couldn’t tell Opa that. Besides, even if he didn’t shoot this elk, he’d shoot another before the season ended. She lowered the binoculars and covered her ears. bang!

When the movement finally stopped, she trudged through the snow toward them. The elk was splayed on the snow.

The elk herd bolted toward the thin copse of trees to the east. They kicked up snow, barked, and grunted. Lenore looked for her elk and at first, she thought he’d missed. There wasn’t an elk lying in the snow, but one trailed behind the rest. “Come on,” Opa said, leading her out of the blind. Her legs shook as she tried to keep up. He helped her into the truck and was driving through the field before she had her seatbelt on. She tugged on it, but it was stuck. She held onto her seat as they made their way across the uneven ground. The field underneath the snow had been ploughed before it had frozen, creating ridges. The elk was slowing down, the distance between her and the herd growing. It had been a good shot. They followed her until she came to stop at the edge of the forest, still standing, but unable to go further. Opa pulled the truck to a stop, got out, and aimed again. Lenore watched through the window as though the flimsy sheet of glass would make this better. Wylie’s hunting stories hadn’t been like this. They’d been exciting tales about tracking wild beasts across rugged terrain, not a beautiful creature in pain, about to die. How could she capture their attention with this story if all she wanted to do was look away? How could she even tell the story when all she felt was guilt? bang! The elk fell.

“Just her nerves,” he said. “She’s dead. It’s alright.” He gestured for her to come closer.

“I’m going to need some help with this. You think you can do that?” Opa asked. Opa placed a hand on her shoulder. Lenore looked up at him and nodded. As he worked, he explained everything he was doing. She tried her best to listen, even though some of the German words were new to her. His voice was easier to focus on than the scene before her. Through her scarf, Lenore could smell the blood’s metallic scent.

( When he was done, Opa rubbed his hands in the snow, leaving them pink instead of red. ) Lenore remained in place, staring at the elk, as he walked back to the truck. This was all her fault, all because she wanted friends, because she didn’t have Mara anymore, because she’d told Mara she was gay. If she’d just kept quiet, this elk would still be roaming the fields and forests with her herd. Another elk might be dead, sure, but not this one. Opa got the large blue sled they used for firewood from the truck bed. They pulled the elk into the sled. Lenore tried to avoid the head and the blood. Opa didn’t mention it. “We leave what remains to the scavengers,” he said as they pushed the sled up a couple of wooden planks into the back of the truck. “Coyotes, ravens, maybe even wolves.” The drive to the Lonergans’ was a quiet one. Lenore kept glancing back at the elk, her lolling head.

Fiction

Would You Show Me How?

Ivan wasn’t home when they arrived. His grandson, Ezra, helped to hang up the carcass, before disappearing back into the barn to do chores. “Are you all right?” Opa asked. Lenore watched from the tailgate. She nodded, before shaking her head no. “Hunting isn’t for everyone,” he said. “But I’m glad you’ve tried it. It’s good to know where your food comes from, what’s involved.” “Do you like hunting?” she asked. This time her words came in German. “No, not really,” he said. Lenore tilted her head. “I don’t like guns. Taking a life, it’s not an enjoyable thing to do.” His voice was soft. “Then why do you do it?” “It reminds me of hunting with your Oma when we were young,” he said. “Did she like hunting?” “She liked the wilderness, but she preferred capturing animals in photographs to killing them. Her father liked hunting, and she enjoyed spending time with him.” Opa set down his knife. “It’s a tradition, a way to spend time with family away from the noise of the world.” Lenore nodded. “It’s also a way to know that the animal you’re eating had a good life, that its freedom wasn’t stolen from it before it had a chance to know something of the world.” He paused. “Neither of those reasons are why you joined me today though, are they?” She shrugged and knocked her boots together, clumps of snow falling off. “I thought the boys at school would be friends with me if I hunted.” “Why do you want to be friends with them all of a sudden?” “Mara doesn’t talk to me anymore.” “What happened?”

Fiction

“I told her something. I think I upset her,” she said. Opa watched her, waiting. “I told her I like girls.” The words were quieter than she intended, each one closer to a whisper than the last. For a moment, Opa didn’t say anything. Then he came over and sat next to her on the tailgate. He wrapped his arms around her. “You deserve much better,” he said. Lenore pressed her face against his chest, even though he smelled of blood. The red on his sleeves was surely getting on her coat, but she didn’t care. “You’ll have more friends, better ones. I didn’t have any for most of my school years, but eventually, I found the right people.” “I can’t imagine you without friends.” “I didn’t speak English when I came here from Volhynia. I was small, and some saw me as the enemy, one they could hurt.” He paused.

( “They didn’t listen, even when I tried to use the English words.” ) “Why would they do that?” “The war had only just ended. There was so much trauma, so much loss. It didn’t matter that I was a child, that I’d never set foot in Germany, that our family hadn’t lived there for many generations.” “I’m sorry.” She didn’t know whether she was apologizing for all he’d been through or how she had lied to him, how she hadn’t truly given this hunting trip a chance. “You’ll find more friends, whether you hunt or not,” he said. She felt the motion of his every breath, her head still against his chest. After a long moment, he let her go, and she hopped down from the tailgate. She stared at the elk and ran her fingers through the magnificent creature’s fur. Opa’s cuts were delicately carved, beautifully precise. “Would you show me how?” she asked. ( )

JESUS IS A WATER STRIDER Bella Hoodle

Ankles crossed, thighs pressed into the wooden pew, I spy the crucifix and pulpit below: a confident man shoulders the weight of an entire church. The congregation listens for the Word of the Lord, hushed so his voice reigns clear. My mother warns me to be wary of our holier-than-thou neighbours who count my sins, to see if I am worthy of divine grace. For all I know, they are angels in disguise, deciding my fate. In the sanctuary of the lake, among the reeds, I kneel to baptize a water strider. Long legs miraculously skim the surface, concentric rings radiate from each anointed step. The water stills, as though the insect had not been there at all. A proud daughter, I run to tell my mother I saw Jesus walking on water.

Desolation Sound Poetry Rachel Davidson 25

TWO PEAS IN A POD Kath Van Doorn An excerpt from Slipping Away

ednesday June 29th

Monday July 4th

My world has just exploded. Cassy, my best friend, told me she’s been accepted for a sixmonth term as a Grade 10 student in Milan, Italy. That’s 8500 freaking kilometres away (I looked it up)! Ever since “Ms. Cassandra” found out that Milan is the “City of Fashion,” she has been desperate to go there. She didn’t seem to notice I was quietly crying like a baby.

When Cassy left for the airport, I stood on the sidewalk and forced a smile while she hung out the window and hollered, “See you at Christmas!” I stood waving at the car even after it turned the corner, like a weirdo.

I knew she had applied in February but, I thought, ok I hoped, she wouldn’t be accepted. My bad. Honestly, I can not function without her.

Tuesday July 5th

Mom always says, “Erin and Cassy are two peas in a pod.” It’s embarrassing, but secretly I kinda like it. What kind of existence can one pea have rattling around by itself while the other pea parties in her Italian dorm? It’s totally unfair. Cassy is an optimist, and has creamy skin, and long luscious locks. I’m the opposite—antisocial with limp dirty blonde hair that hangs in my pimply face. What am I going to do? Saturday July 2nd I helped Cassy pack. She said she was worried about her nana, who apparently needs company when her Papa plays golf. Isn’t she worried, even a little, about her best friend? Cassy said she had something important to ask me. I hoped she was going to invite me to come to Italy with her. wrong. She wants me to visit Nana while she’s away. Why can’t Nana just stay by herself? Cassy said that her nana likes me (questionable), and it would give me something to do instead of moping around. How does she know that’s what I’ll do? Maybe I’ll find another best friend. Who am I kidding? I’ll mope. What the hell, I’ll be desperate by Christmas. I told her I’d do it. When Cassy hugged me, her cheek was wet.

Flower Power Fiction Emma 26 Cannell

I better get more notebooks and a few extra pens for my diary. This is going to be the longest six months of my life.

I had my first solo visit with Nana today. I could barely reach the doorbell thanks to the mass of flowerpots on the porch. What a stink. My nose started to twitch right away and, of course, I’d forgotten my inhaler and tissues. We’d met a few times before, but Nana pretended we hadn’t so I said, “Hi. I’m Erin, Cassandra’s friend.” Nana’s tall and slim with a silver bun. She insisted, in her cool Scottish accent, that I call her Catherine. Weird. She showed me her back garden, which had more stinky flowers and an obscene zucchini. I had to (discreetly) wipe my nose on the collar of my t-shirt. We had tea in her immaculate kitchen: Earl Grey with lemon on the side. The pot had flowers on it too (shocker) and matching teacups! She’d made homemade cookies, but as usual, I asked about nuts before having any. They were yummy! Strangely, Catherine called after me as I was leaving and said, “See you on Friday, Cassandra.” Whaaaa? Thursday July 7th I got an email from Cassy today. It included a picture of some massive cathedral (Excuse me, duomo) in Milan. She said she was having a great time with new friends

Author

she met at church. Since when did Cassy go to church? Maybe it’s a cult. Nice to know she’s already replaced me. She didn’t even ask about her nana! I tried texting her, but no answer. Mom wanted to know what my plans are for the summer. I said, “Reading,” obviously. The library is getting in the Shadow and Bone trilogy and I’m at the top of the hold list. I told Mom it was a project for school. She didn’t fall for it and told me to get a job. A job? Friday July 8th I met Cassy’s grandfather. He shook my hand and asked me to call him Dan. He’s tanned and fit, bald with wisps of grey hair around the sides, and he’s shorter than Catherine. Before he left with his rolling golf bag, he winked at me and said, “Thank you.”

“Yes, ok for nuts,” she said and smiled. Long story short, it was lucky I had my EpiPen with me and the er wasn’t that crowded. Tuesday July 12th Dan called to apologize about the cookies and asked if I could meet him for coffee tomorrow. I wonder what I did wrong? Mom said she saw a help wanted sign at the creamery and I should apply. She even offered to help me with my resume. What would I even put on it: student, good reader, has no friends? Since Dad took off with the tart (Mom’s word, not mine), I know I should help out—after all, I am almost 15—but I don’t want to.

After another garden tour (Yup, those flowers still stink), Catherine and I sat on the patio. Luckily, I remembered a tissue. The smell was overpowering and the tea today was bitter, with flakes floating in it and none of those tasty lemon slices. I dumped my tea into a flowerpot when Catherine went inside for cookies.

Worse still, I’ve gone off Shadow and Bone. Alina (who’s not a fool) got fooled by General Kirigan (hot, but e.v.i.l.), not to mention her lack of loyalty to Mal, which pisses me off.

I kept reminding her my name was Erin, but eventually I gave up and just answered to Cassandra.

Wednesday July 13th

I texted Cassy a few more times (37 in total). Still nothing.

I sent one last text: text me about your nana.

Mom’s nagging about the job at the creamery made me late meeting Dan. “Do you think a job will just fall into your lap?”

Sunday July 10

I picked up the first book of the Shadow and Bone trilogy and spent the day reading. It’s fantastic. I love the heroine, Alina, a fearless soldier who discovers that she’s a Sun Summoner. Her best friend (and maybe more) is the hottie, Mal. I found a secluded bench in the park to read, away from the “get a job” vibes coming from a certain someone who’s quickly morphing into a nag. It’s now 44 unanswered texts, but who’s counting? Monday July 11th Today Catherine’s kitchen was a mess. My bare feet stuck to the floor thanks to some spilled flour-and-egg mixture that might have been pancakes. The countertops were sticky too. The “tea” was just hot water and there were new cookies. I asked if they were ok for nuts.

Dan smiled and stood as I came in. He apologized again about the cookie incident. He thought Cassy had told me about Catherine, but clearly she hadn’t. He told me “his lovely lass” is slipping away. Catherine has Alzheimer’s. Yeah, Cassy should have mentioned that, say before i agreed to do this! Dan can’t leave Catherine by herself. She has good days and not-so-good days, which can be scary. Dan said that Catherine really enjoys our visits and asked if I would be interested in spending more time with her. I said I’d like that. Then, he offered me a lot of money. Hmm, a job just fell into my lap. Mom is ecstatic. Friday July 15th omg, Kirigan is only interested in stealing Alina’s powers as a Sun Summoner and she doesn’t see it. I put the book on the top shelf of the closet; I can’t read it anymore.

Fiction

Title

Alina, wake up!

Thursday July 21th

I sent a postcard of a killer whale to Cassy today. It said, alzheimer’s???

A postcard of another church, this time on a hillside in Milan, arrived. Cassy said she tossed her phone into the Po River. Her cult friends apparently told her cell phones were evil. No biggie, it’s not like she was using it anyway. At least she remembered to ask about Catherine.

Catherine and I walked to the grocery store. Next time I’ll bring a wagon. When Dan came back from golf, we had a tuna sandwich waiting for him. I like working. Who knew? Monday July 18th Mrs. Talon, the librarian, asked if I was ready for Siege and Storm, the second novel in the trilogy. I gave her the lowdown. She laughed and said Alina sees through Kirigan eventually and I should stick with it. When I got home, I got the book down from the top shelf. Forty-five unanswered texts is pathetic. I’m d.o.n.e. Catherine and I baked cookies. I was the nut police and in charge of measuring the ingredients. She couldn’t remember where her teapot was, so I opened every cupboard door with an arm flourish like Vanna White and we laughed. Afterward, we walked to the park and I showed her my secret spot. She liked it a lot and said next time we should bring our books.

I had the day off, but it was raining so I went to the library instead of the park. This guy from my school, Clint Something, came over and started asking questions about what I was reading. He has the weirdest hair—it sticks up in clumps. Let’s just say he’s not one of the popular kids either. Monday July 25th Catherine wouldn’t let me in this morning. She said she doesn’t open the door to strangers and told me to go away. I explained who I was, but she wasn’t having it. I even called myself Cassandra, but she yelled through the door that I didn’t sound like her granddaughter. I called Dan. He said he was very sorry and should have waited until I got there because Catherine was having one of those days (no kidding). He explained where the extra key was hidden. I found Catherine upstairs lying on her bed. When she saw me, she sat up and said, “There you are Cassandra. I was wondering where you were.” I texted Dan to let him know everything was fine. Wednesday July 27th Catherine and I read in the park yesterday, so she wanted to go again today. She spent most of the time watching the birds. Saturday July 30th I asked Mrs. Talon to show me books on Alzheimer’s. They have a ton. I took a stack back to my spot and, surprise surprise, Clint Something was sitting in my seat. He was reading Siege and Storm. I hissed through clenched teeth that I was the first on the library’s hold list for that book. I stared him down for at least a minute before he mumbled that his dad bought the set for him. He kept trying to flatten down his hair. He’d already finished the first book. I bet he doesn’t have a job. ( )

Fiction

Vanilla Petals Emma Cannell

CONRAD KNOWS BEST Brendan Wanderer

fade in: int. brendan’s house—living room—night (An 80s two-storey home, lights out except for

moonlight through windows. BRENDAN, 13, male, wearing only pajama bottoms and a fanny pack, hides behind the couch.)

CONRAD (O.S.): BRENDAN: CONRAD (O.S.):

I can hear you breathing. (Brendan reaches into the fanny pack, pulls out a bath oil bead, and fires it into the kitchen to splatter on a far wall. He’s hit in the face in retaliation.) Shit! Watch your language! int. brendan’s house—stairwell—continuous (Brendan’s opponent moves in the hall. Brendan runs and leaps parkour-style to the lower landing. Three strikes splatter the wall.) ext. brendan’s house—farm/yard—continuous (Brendan is out the front door, running over

wet grass in socked feet. He dives behind an oil drum in the yard.)

CONRAD (O.S.):

NARRATOR:

You can run, but you can’t hide! (Brendan hears an engine starting up in the garage then headlights of a ride-on lawnmower round the corner driven by CONRAD, 17, tall, lanky, with a mullet, and wearing a Def Leppard t-shirt.) Around the end of Grade 7, when my mother began dating again, she felt the need to hire a proper babysitter. What we got was…Conrad. int. brendan’s house—living room—next evening

NARRATOR:

Some of my friends were already babysitting their younger siblings at 13. I guess no one had thought to inform my mother. (Brendan plays show and tell with Conrad. He runs into the living room with an 80s robot.)

BRENDAN:

This is my Omnibot from Radio Shack!

CONRAD:

Rad.

NARRATOR:

Conrad was five years older than me, just out of high school. (Next, he runs in with a toy video camera.)

BRENDAN:

This is my pxl-2000 video camera by Fisher-Price!

CONRAD:

Gnarly.

Conrad Knows Best

NARRATOR:

Not the gold standard of care, but he did teach me a whole new vocabulary. (Next, an early 80s issue of Playboy.)

BRENDAN:

This is my dad’s old Playboy!

CONRAD:

Jugs! Fuck me! int. brendan’s house—kitchen—morning (Brendan’s mother, DOLLY, 48, curly 80s hair, in skirt and blouse, marks papers at the table. She notices splatter marks. Seconds later she drags Brendan into the hall beside them.)

DOLLY: BRENDAN: DOLLY:

Have you seen these grease stains all over the house? Oh yeah, those. So, you know how you never use those bath beads? Well, they were just sitting on the counter so…. Was this the other night with Conrad?

BRENDAN:

No…wait. It wasn’t Conrad. It was just me.

NARRATOR:

I didn’t want to get him in trouble. Besides, I’d been to his house and he had enough to worry about. int. conrad’s mobile home—hallway—day (A worn-down mobile home. Conrad’s mother, JILLIAN, 40s, off-centre bouffant, wearing a satin bathrobe, knocks on Conrad’s bedroom door. Conrad partially opens it.)

CONRAD: JILLIAN: CONRAD: JILLIAN: CONRAD:

What? Landon’s father says he’ll take you on at the plant. ok, maybe.

Maybe nothing! You need to get a job. Now. I have a job. (He opens the door fully, revealing Brendan sitting on floor, reading a comic.) I’m a babysitter. (Jillian, taken aback to see him sitting there, turns and covers up.)

JILLIAN:

I don’t care how much his mother’s paying you, it’s not enough to pay our bills. (She storms off. Conrad looks down at Brendan, smiles, and gives him the thumbs-up.) int. brendan’s house—living room—evening

(Dolly, Conrad, and Brendan are speaking in the living room, which is filled with boxes.) DOLLY: BRENDAN:

Conrad and I can do it, Mom!

CONRAD:

Sounds like a plan, man!

DOLLY:

Script

Please excuse the mess. Brendan’s new bunkbed arrived this afternoon and we haven’t had a chance to put it together.

ok, great!

Brendan Wanderer int. brendan’s house—brendan’s bedroom—later (Brendan and Conrad are sitting on

the top bunk.)

NARRATOR:

One bunk bed later, we looked out on all we’d accomplished….

CONRAD:

Rad view, man! (Conrad gives Brendan a high-five, then jumps over the railing.)

CONRAD:

jugs! (Close-up on the bedframe shattering under Conrad’s weight.)

SFX: BRENDAN/CONRAD:

crack!

Shit! int. brendan’s house—brendan’s bedroom—later (Brendan, Conrad, and Dolly stand

looking at the broken bedframe. Dolly is speechless.)

CONRAD: DOLLY:

I’m really sorry. I misjudged my own weight. I’ll pay you back. It’s ok, we’ll take care of it. I appreciate your honesty. (Conrad looks at Brendan, smiles, and gives him the thumbs-up as she walks down the hall.) int. brendan’s house—breakfast nook—next evening (Conrad and Brendan sit sharing the rotary phone.)

NARRATOR: VOICE (on phone): BRENDAN (into receiver): VOICE (on phone): BRENDAN (into receiver): BRENDAN:

Another babysitter would have told me what to do, when to do it, and steered me away from bad behaviour. Conrad’s style was unique, more laissez-faire. Red Deer Ford, Kendra speaking. Oh, hi. So, do you really have a red deer that farts? Excuse me? ok. You’re excused. (Conrad hangs up. They are both in hysterics.)

Let’s do Japan next! int. brendan’s house—dining room—later (Conrad, Dolly, and Brendan sit awkwardly

at the table, the phone bill in front of them, the total circled in red.)

NARRATOR:

Turns out the bill for the prank phone calls to Japan was the last straw. Conrad took the news like a champ.

DOLLY:

Conrad, I’m sorry to say this, but we’ll need to find someone else to babysit Brendan.

CONRAD:

I understand. It was a bad decision. I should have known better.

BRENDAN:

But it wasn’t all Conrad! (Dolly turns to Brendan.)

DOLLY: NARRATOR:

You’re right, it wasn’t. You should also have known better, Brendan. (Brendan sinks into his seat, ashamed.) Looking back, I realize she was teaching me about self-discipline. Sometimes you have to make hard choices, take responsibility rather than the easy way out. She was also showing Conrad leadership wasn’t just about being buddies. Script

Conrad Knows Best

int/ext. dolly’s car—driving—later (Dolly pulls up in front of Conrad’s home.)

NARRATOR: DOLLY:

Driving Conrad home that night, I felt a lump in my throat, I couldn’t swallow. It kept me from saying what I should have. ok, well, thanks Conrad. Good luck with everything.

CONRAD:

You’re welcome and thanks for the ride. (Conrad turns to Brendan.)

CONRAD:

See ya, pal.

BRENDAN:

Uh…bye. (From the back seat, Brendan watches Conrad walk to the door. He looks back and they lock eyes. Conrad smiles, shoots him a thumbs-up, and steps inside. Dolly pulls away and looks at Brendan in the rearview. His arms are folded across his chest and he is crying.)

DOLLY:

I’m really sorry, Brendan. (Brendan doesn’t reply.) Tell you what, let’s go rent a movie. Anything you like. (Brendan sniffs and wipes his tears.) I promise that whomever we get to babysit, they’ll be—

BRENDAN: DOLLY: BRENDAN: DOLLY: BRENDAN:

I’m old enough. Sorry? It’s ok to leave me by myself from now on. But you’re only 13. Exactly, I’m 13. I don’t need another babysitter. (Dolly opens her mouth to respond, then closes it. She pulls in beside the video view two in the strip mall on Main St.) int. strip mall—video view two—continuous (Brendan and Dolly walk in and Brendan picks Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure. She rolls her eyes but says nothing.)

NARRATOR:

Script

There were no more babysitters. Looking back, I was sure I’d see Conrad again; it was a small town after all. I tried looking him up on Facebook last year to see how he was doing, only to learn he’d passed away in the summer of 2021. ( )

Bam James O’Reilly

Poetry

FREE AND HARD Rachel Davidson

he first thing I notice is the smell: desert decay. It’s a combination of hot metal, dust, old oil, and a whole lot of bird shit, though I don’t see any birds. The ground is so beaten the garbage scattered across the slabs looks like delicate sterile art. They are remnants of the past, toxins leached into the cracked dirt long ago. The earth absorbs it all and what’s left clutches at my ankles. I wear thick socks and boots, despite the Californian heat, to protect myself.

For a girl who grew up in the rain on Canada’s Pacific west coast, there is a foreign magic in the desert. It is a stern teacher and I long to be free and hard like one can only be here.

In November 2019, I decided to go on an open-ended road trip to the us. I was looking for possible destinations when I came across Slab City in a book about “curiosities” around the world. It is a desert community of squatters in southern California living in what some coined “the last free place on Earth.” It is 230 kilometres from San Diego, behind the town of Niland in the Sonoran Desert, not far from the Mexican border. Slab City’s name came from the concrete slabs that are all that remain of an abandoned ww ii Marine Corps training base called Camp Dunlap. The land has technically belonged to the California State Teachers’ Pension since the 60s, but has been transformed into a makeshift town with a library, skate park, and an outdoor bar called The Range. Slab City’s claim to fame was being featured in Jon Krakauer’s book Into the Wild, later made into a film of the same name. It is a place without government, running water, or waste disposal, a lawless, off-grid settlement for those who choose to remain outside society. After all, there are different rules in the desert. I liked the idea of a community of nomads. I had been transient nearly five years and by 23 had been to as many Some Places Are Cooler Than Others Non-Fiction James 34 O’Reilly

countries, living and travelling in Australia, Asia, Europe, and South America. I was happiest exploring—I was always finished with a place before it could be finished with me. I hadn’t found anywhere I felt I truly belonged, so I stayed in motion. I was most at home when passing through. If I stood still, I would begin to unravel. I liked to consider myself a fringe-dweller, but I often felt more like an imposter. For the last year I had been living in the Kootenays, working at Red Mountain for the winter and doing the food truck circuit in the summer. When winter rolled around again, as much as I enjoyed being a ski bum, I missed the sun. It was time for a change of scenery. I turned my Kia Rio, named Louisa after Thelma and Louise, into a home on wheels and traveled south. Slab City sounded like my kind of place.

It is just getting dark when I arrive at the Salton Sea, a shallow, landlocked body of water about an hour from Slab City. I follow a dirt road and come upon an abandoned shack by its muddy shore. I park Louisa to sleep for the night. I awake in the pitch black to the sound of a helicopter hovering above my car. Heart racing, I peek out from the thin airplane blankets covering my windows, but see only darkness. I open my window a crack and listen to the whipping of the blades. A minute feels like a lifetime as it hovers before flying away as if it was never there. Early the next morning, a Wednesday, I put on an oversized grey Coors Light t-shirt and loose faded blue shorts. I ruffle my sticky hair before donning a toque. I can smell myself—I am ready. I cruise lazily through Niland, a little town with a dirt road at its backside, which leads to what is left of the Wild West. I drive toward empty desert, past a phone booth with an old dial phone sitting next to a tire that says free weed, until a smattering of trailers appear.

I feel like an interloper. I decide to park and walk so I can take it all in. Salvation Mountain is a colourful landmark off on the horizon near the entrance of Slab City, an impressive structure that looks like a massive painted sandcastle. It is adorned with slogans proclaiming god is love and is topped with a cross. Leonard Knight built it over the 20 years he lived here, but he has since passed away. As I stroll into the lot, I take a deep breath to ground myself so I can be open, but shrewd. There are two types of people who roll into Slab City: tourists, who visit under the safety of glaring sun to take photos before quickly returning to their cars; and the residents, who bear witness to the night. I strike up a conversation with Wolf, the caretaker. When he realizes I’m just passing through, his whole demeanour shifts. He tells me about the music nights and weekly talent show at The Range, and most importantly where not to camp. He leaves me with a warning about the “inner slab.” “People who go there come out with a lot less than what they went in with.” I meet a nice older couple, Jamie and Rob, who live in a converted school bus and give me the lay of the land. We’re in the outer slab where the “rubber tramps” hang out, nomads and snowbirds who live in their vehicles.

( If the outer slab is inhabited by people who reject society, the inner slab is for people rejected by society. ) I am told that in the day it is safe to wander about freely, but as soon as night falls I should only go out if I’m looking for trouble. Jamie and Rob offer me their patch of desert to camp. Between their bus and a few trees, I would be hidden from the road. I tell them I’ll think about it and keep walking. Past the inner slab, the main road ends and a back road runs perpendicular to it. To the left is East Jesus, an artist’s collective that transformed the Slab’s old dump into a Mad Max-style outdoor art gallery. To the right is a community library. Past it, the smell becomes sharp and acrid, warning of something cooking in the distance. At the fork in the road is The Church of Enlightenment. Nobody sneaks by there without getting nabbed by The Doc, a man born to be a cult leader, but try as he might, a man without followers. He does have an impressive set up though: a giant workshop, three trailers, and a lush garden complete with a pond. I have to respect someone who can grow food in a desert with no running water or electricity. The Doc comes out to greet me like he’s been waiting for me all along, eager to share his philosophy and give me a tour of his compound. He eventually sends me off with

Non-Fiction

Free and Hard

some fresh veggies and tells me to come back and work for him in exchange for food. I am walked and talked out by noon. I take Jamie and Rob up on their offer and go to bed so I can wake up with the sun.

On my fourth day, just as the sun is setting, I drift toward The Range to check out the local talent show. At the bar I meet Julius, a man a few years younger than I am, with piercing hazel eyes. He tells me he is poor and left Florida to create a new life for himself. I like him, but I trust no one. Julius and his friend Kris had also been passing through when their car’s engine blew at the skate park (once the military pool) in the inner slab. They stayed because they were broke, without wheels, and had nowhere else to go. Behind the Chocolate Mountains in the distance is Camp Billy Machen, a Navy seal desert warfare training facility. Planes fly overhead and I can hear artillery and bombs exploding behind the mountains. Sometimes they fly low over the slab as an exercise. The residents sit and watch, imagining the soldiers above them looking through their gun sites and putting targets on their foreheads. I spend the day with Julius in the wasteland skate park, smoking on a couch made of garbage. The way he looks at me melts my cold, untrusting heart.

After a week in the slabs, I realize it’s been over a month since I have showered. There is a small hot spring near the slab’s entrance where residents bathe and wash their clothes, but it is a futile endeavor in the murky water. The Doc, however, has a solar shower and offers to let me use it in exchange for work. I tell Julius where I’m going and that if I don’t show up at his camp by 4 pm, he should get his gun and find me. I dig a trench, then take a shower with my knife and pepper spray close at hand. Doc naps outside. When I arrive at Julius’ camp, he’s waiting with a gun on his lap. That night, Julius makes me a fire. He spends hours inching closer to me until finally brushing my cheek with his lips. We share soft kisses in the night as bombs drop in the distance and the full moon glows. Afterward, we walk back to my car, he kisses me goodnight, and leaves. It is something pure and sweet in this dirty, irreverent desert. I move to the skate park. We set up my tent by a tree and sleep with a gun by the door. I am happy.

Non-Fiction

One morning, while eating peanut butter and apples, I see eight men and a woman walk toward us, wearing shirts but nothing else. One carries a bow and arrow, another a brick, others have sticks or bottles. They are from Pirate Camp, a place I do not go alone, even during the day. They are aiming for our neighbours: Skate Camp. Julius and Kris calmly walk to their car and each grab a gun. Kris tucks his lazily in his pocket, while Julius casually leans against the car, his shotgun beside him. Kris remarks, “Good scare tactic. I wouldn’t want to fight a naked dude.” The Pirates are accusing Skate Camp of stealing their alcohol and demand they pay up. There’s no truth in it; they’re just bored and looking for a fight. An arrow gets pointed at a girl and in the resulting scuffle, Skate Camp’s tv gets smashed, someone gets thrown in a garbage pile, and I drive Kris to the hospital to have his lip stitched. The next day, I make the executive decision to move camp. The three of us throw everything in my car, drive out of the inner slab, and head off road into the desert. We are still within walking distance of the skatepark, but our spot is out of the way and hidden in the bushes. Just before five in the morning I wake to the sound of what I think is a train, but it’s not; it’s a raid. We poke our heads out of our tents to see military vehicles, swat vans, ice trucks, and sheriff cruisers driving into the heart of Slab City. We find out later the skate park was the first to be hit. Our neighbours had woken up to guns in their faces. The police are looking for known pedophiles in the area, but they have a book of wanted criminals the size of an encyclopedia. The inner slab is a ghost town while the rest of us stay quiet in the outer crescent. Anyone walking around is questioned by authorities. The desert is still, if only for a day.

A week after the raid, I tell Julius it’s time for me to leave this strange world. I will drive to San Francisco to pick up my cousins and then head out on the highway to Vegas and Mexico. For the first time I am not ready to leave. I give Julius my favourite blue stone, which reminds him of my eyes, and promise him this is not the end. I yearn to be with him—and will be for the next year and a half—but it is time. In Slab City, a place hard, but not free in all the ways that count, I have been an imposter. Yet, that no longer matters. For in the desert there is a man who holds my heart in his dirty hands. As I drive the eight hours northwest, Louisa’s wheels rolling beneath me, I crack open the window and smell the desert’s musk grow fainter on the wind. ( )

ANDROMEDA’S ( re )TURN Alexis King

On a moonless night you can find me in Andromeda —the cannibal galaxy, a nebulous smear— cosmic halo upon my ashen locks.

Far from the city lights in an umbral winter sky, look for a smudge of red between titan galaxies. Catch me when they collide, slipping through silhouettes like ghosts.

I gnawed through golden chains, slayed Poseidon’s dragon— Perseus too— sent his head to Medusa, a thousand serpent tongues pressed against my porcelain flesh.

In the milky Messier mists we’ll trade stellar secrets, (re)arrange the universe to form new myths. I am no passing singularity; I am matter

I am no mortal sacrifice; I am Ruler of Men.

—and I must be (re)leased.

Mount Washington Poetry Seth Scott 37

NOTHING IS CAST IN STONE Nicole Kaastra

he rain bounces off my arms as I stand in the garden in a sun shower. The air smells like spring, fresh and crisp. The screen door bangs against the frame and I realize I’m always listening for her.

“Some things are not for sale,” Belinda said definitively.

“I hope you don’t mind the rain,” says Belinda.

“Finely carved rock I’m not willing to part with,” Belinda said, her smile tight. “Let’s move on,” she said gesturing behind me. “This is an original by Leo Vanguard from the early Renaissance.”

The stone path from the house curves in front of me and circles the fountain. The spitting angel at its centre makes a soft trickling sound that can lull me to sleep. Belinda is following the path, dragging a bird bath of solid concrete. She fills the bath with water and looks at me. Her olive skin and dark lashes contrast her emerald headscarf. I told her I like the jewel tones the best. “Thought you could use some company while I’m out,” she says leaving it in my line of vision. “I have to attend the meeting tonight, otherwise they’ll approve that horrible cellist.” He was the one I voted against—thank you for listening. “I shouldn’t be too long,” she says. The swirl of her long skirt disappears in a streak through the garden gate. I listen for the click-clack of her heels, but hear only birds.

One Sunday afternoon, a few weeks ago, Belinda brought three men over for tea in the garden. They sat at a small table, looking clumsy in delicate chairs. They were interested art collectors she’d met through an orchestra fundraiser, one I’d had a part in organizing, but could no longer attend. Belinda gave them a garden tour in hopes of selling a few statues. They were suitably admiring and paused within earshot. “Sorry gentlemen, she’s part of my personal collection,” she said. “Ah, but everything has a price,” the fat one said. “Name a number.”

Fiction

The professor type, with a beard and elbow patches, said, “It’s finely carved rock.”

“That’s correct,” one of the men said. I would have rolled my eyes.

The sun sinks lower on the horizon and the birds head for warm nests. I think about what I used to be: a storm of worries, deadlines, and bad hair days. I miss that chaos. I remember the first time I noticed Belinda. It was at an orchestra committee meeting during which someone made a crude joke about a flutist and blowing. I always laughed when a man tried to be funny; I honestly thought I had to. Belinda did not. She simply waited for them to get over themselves, like a teacher waiting for misbehaving children to settle down. “I didn’t mean to upset you, Sweetheart,” the man said. He was clearly used to being tolerated. “I’m not upset. I’m patient,” she said. Her composure was a revelation.

The first time we had tea in the garden, my tongue slipped. “You’re so perfect,” I said, because it was true. My cheeks flushed; I was mortified. We were such fresh friends then. “I’m not perfect,” she said covering my hand with hers, “but I’m pleased you think so.”

Author

When we came out of the movie theatre after one of our first dates, I asked her what she thought of the film. “It was a bit ridiculous,” she said.

Belinda, please! “Gentlemen, I wasn’t expecting you,” says a voice near the gate.

“You don’t believe in ‘true love’s kiss’?” I said and swooned with my hand on my forehead. She smiled at my theatrics. I wondered if she would let me kiss her? She would.

They drop me in their surprise. I fall, my face half pressed into the earth.

Then there was the time I came through the garden gate and saw more than I should have. I was uninvited, but not unwelcome. She had said I could “come over anytime, day or night,” but must call first. Why hadn’t I? I hadn’t meant to see, but even a peek had been too much.

“What’s good for me?” Belinda says, unwrapping her headscarf. “Men say such stupid things before they die.”

The sun has long since set, and I enjoy the nighttime breeze. It cannot sway me, but I feel it still. I turn to more recent memories.

“Look what I found,” Belinda said not long after. Her brow was scrunched as she held the newspaper in front of my eyes. Above the black print was a photo of a familiar face, one I barely recognized as my own. I should have been more upset than I felt. I knew, in a vague way, I was losing myself.

“I didn’t want this,” she said one evening. She was in her usual chair in front of me in the garden, wine in hand. “You caught me off guard.” She stood and looked at me, her eyes reflecting the moon. “I wish I could take it all back,” she said, crying. I wanted it to rain, so I could cry too.

The gate opens now. Three figures emerge from the darkness, wheeling a dolly and carrying straps. They wear ski masks and stop directly in my eyeline. They’re here for me. They rock and wobble me from my pedestal. I feel a panic I cannot express. I know when I leave this garden, no memories will come with me, nothing beautiful will remain.

“Get inside if you know what’s good for you,” one says, holding a gun.

A dark tendril falls from the green fabric, with more spilling onto her slim shoulders. They cascade down, black scales glinting in the moonlight, colours like an oil spill. “You’ve overstayed your welcome,” she says. Rising of their own accord, the black vipers surge into the night air, each swaying and writhing as they focus on the three trespassers. There’s no time for them to scream. “Sorry you had to see that,” she says and tucks away the snakes I’ve seen only once before. “I’m sorry I didn’t get here sooner.” She picks me up with effortless strength. We are eye to eye now. I see her, all of her. She is terrible and beautiful. She wipes dirt from my face and cups my cold cheek. “I don’t think I could bear to lose you again,” she says, tilting her forehead toward me. Her lips press chastely against mine. It feels too much like an apology—I can’t stand it. I close my eyes and press my lips to hers. She inhales sharply and pulls back. “How?” She grabs my arms, runs her hands up to my neck, my face, checking to see I’m flesh, no longer stone. I grab her shaking hands and bring them to my heart. I’ve never seen her so rattled. I think of our first kiss. I think of true love. “Is it so ridiculous?” I ask and kiss her again. ( )

Moon Fiction Mick Sweetman 39

UP IN SMOKE Gabriel Villasmil .

My father is down to his last cigarette

x dwindles to its en His lifetime in a bo

er cylinders

That first pack of 20 slend

drag now stolen seasons, wasted days, the sweet

of nicotine’s nostalgic haze. Tobacco

finely

cut into seconds, minutes, (h)ours…lost. Down on the corner those cocky kids

, flick

reach into their shirtsleeves

the lid, pluck a smoke, light up

on Government Street, inhaling as if they’ll never run out—of air, of choice, of time. Why savour this smoke when you can bum another? Eager to breathe in as lungs give out

’til nothing is left but ash on a tray, in an urn. I long to loan him my breath, offer stolen time,

give it back. Instead, we sit here, somber, as my father asks for a match to light

his last.

Inhale, exhale, ’

’til it all goes up

Pack of Cigarettes Seth 40 Scott Poetry

in sm

oke.

SLOW BURN Jack Corfield

int. suburban family home—bedroom—present—dawn (A smoke detector light blinks. On the

vanity is a 1970s family of three, stiff and unsmiling: RICHARD, 18, between his parents mid-40s).

int. suburban family home—dressingroom—the night before (TERESA, 32, wearing an unzipped beige gown, leans on her vanity, and applies foundation to her left eye.)

(cut to: Richard, 35, steps behind her carrying unlaced dress shoes and rubs his socked foot against her bare calf.) TERESA: RICHARD: TERESA: RICHARD: TERESA: RICHARD: TERESA: RICHARD: TERESA:

The stakes are too high. The kids…. I don’t need to go back again. You scared me. Again. (Richard’s knuckles whiten revealing broken capillaries, then soften allowing the bruise to swell.) First strike. I’m sorry. (Richard’s fingers drift up Teresa’s spine to her shoulder. She pivots in his grip. They kiss.) This is just like the last time. Teresa, I’m better. I came back. (Beat.) I love you. I know. I hurt you. I thought after rehab, that was it. (Richard’s voice catches in his throat.) (Tears run through her makeup revealing the bruise.) We’ll be ok. (cut to: A bottle of Valium made out to Ricahrd Quain on the vanity.)

RICHARD: TERESA: RICHARD: TERESA: RICHARD: TERESA:

(hyperventilating) It’s so hard. You know I try. You take too many. But I can’t have just one. Richard, please. I know. I have to do this, not just for you and the kids. I know you can. (Richard and Teresa lean into each other, forehead to forehead.)

Script

Slow Burn

smash cut to: int. suburban family home—dining room—present—day (Richard sits at the head

of the table. The kettle hisses and meat sizzles in the kitchen. MICHAEL, 13, head down, stares glassy-eyed at his phone flashing red. LISA, 8, is obscured by a colouring book, scribbling loudly.)

RICHARD: Do you have practice today? (Michael says nothing. Richard knocks his phone to the floor.) smash cut to: ext. tennis court—a week ago—day—continuous (A pickle ball strikes a nearby

wall. Michael stands at a podium between a pair of empty bleachers receiving a bronze medal from his coach. He stands next to two similar-looking boys. Their disappointed parents clap. Michael steps down to walk with his parents.)

RICHARD: You’ll get the gold next time Son. You just have to work harder. MICHAEL: (deadpan) Yes Sir. TERESA: Let’s go get some ice cream. RICHARD: We practice every day Teresa, you know that. TERESA: Yes, and you both deserve a break. RICHARD: He’s warmed up now, aren’t you Son? What do you say to another round before we go? MICHAEL: No thanks Dad. I’m good. TERESA: I’m going to frame that medal when we get home. RICHARD: Right, let’s reward him for getting third. More sugar, just what he needs. (The family steps into their white y2k Dodge Caravan, shutting their doors simultaneously.) cut to: int. suburban family home—dining room—present—day (Richard sits at the table. In

silhouette behind him TERESA is hunched over a smoking stove.)

RICHARD: Everything all right in there Dear? (No response.) Lisa, did you finish your homework? (No response. Richard rolls his eyes and sips his coffee.) cut to: int. museum—exibition hall—three days ago—day (Richard and Lisa hold hands blocking all but white canvas of Al Held’s The Big N.)

RICHARD: What do you think? (Lisa looks down at her shoes and kicks the carpet.) Don’t you want to be an artist when you grow up? LISA: I don’t know. RICHARD: You could be a very good artist. All you need to do is practice. LISA: My feet hurt. RICHARD: It’s hard work, making something of yourself. LISA: I’m hungry. RICHARD: You’re a blank slate, Lisa. You can be whomever you want to be.

Script

Jack Corfield

cut to: int. suburban family home—hallway—the night before (The framed medal is hung above a cabinet of antique guns. The couple are talking upstairs, snippets of their previous conversation reverberating through the house.)

TERESA: RICHARD: TERESA: RICHARD:

—know you can. I want to stop, but every time I tell myself, “I can’t do this” or “I don’t want this,” it’s like saying I’m not allowed. I know it’s hard. But not being allowed just makes me want them more. match cut to: int. suburban family home—dining room—richard’s youth—day (The scene shifts to black and white, save for the red of the ribbon. We turn around to watch Richard’s mother enter the same dining room and sit across from Richard’s father, already eating. He scrapes the fork tines on his teeth. Young Richard, 18, sits where Michael did. Dressed in their Sunday best, the family says grace.)

RICHARD’S FATHER:

(Forking rare steak into his mouth) How’s that girl?

YOUNG RICHARD:

I asked her today.

RICHARD’S FATHER:

What did you say?

YOUNG RICHARD:

I said, “I’d be a fool not to marry you.”

RICHARD’S FATHER:

Good boy. I said the same to your mother. (Richard’s mother smiles, tight-lipped, and takes a bite.)

RICHARD: RICHARD’S FATHER: RICHARD: RICHARD’S FATHER: RICHARD:

She said yes. Of course she did. Good girl, that Teresa. Yes Sir. Man wants a family, he ought to have a good job. I’m working on that Sir.

RICHARD’S FATHER:

Working on it?

RICHARD’S MOTHER:

His grades are improving Dear.

RICHARD’S FATHER:

You need a real job Son. Come with me to the factory tomorrow and I’ll show you around.

RICHARD’S MOTHER:

I don’t want my boy breathing in those fumes all day.

RICHARD’S FATHER:

My son will have a good job to support his family. I built Americanum from the ground up—20 years of blood and sweat. Smoke alarms are a good business. It’s all about safety. Who doesn’t want to feel safe?

Script

Slow Burn

(Richard’s mother glimpses herself in her husband’s glasses and dabs at the red juice on her chin.) RICHARD:

I’ll give notice at the school in the morning. (Richard’s father is pleased. In the kitchen, smoke rises from the stove. Meat sizzles, a kettle whistles. Colour returns—the red light of the detector is seen through the smoke.) fade to: int. suburban family home—master bedroom—the night before (The king bed

is mussed, the white duvet on the floor has two droplets of blood on it. Richard and Teresa embrace.)

RICHARD: TERESA: RICHARD: TERESA: RICHARD: TERESA:

(under his breath) Every day I pray this hungry ghost will stop haunting me. You are not your father. He’d know what I should do. He’s gone now. That’s why I need you. I don’t always have the answers, Richard. This choice is yours to make. int. suburban family home—dining room—present—day (A smoke alarm blares from the kitchen.)

(cut to: Richard chews. Smoke billows from the kitchen. The dining room alarm chirps. We pull back, revealing the uncanny stillness of Lisa and Michael’s bodies. Michael’s phone on the floor is flashing red—911. He’s slouched in his chair, a broken racket hanging around his neck, gasping. Lisa’s head lies on her colouring pages, red marker mixes with pooling blood from her forehead. In the distance, we hear sirens.) int. suburban family home—kitchen—day—continuous (Richard rises from his chair and walks into the kitchen. Teresa’s body is slumped over the kitchen counter by the stove. The dented tea kettle next to her head runs out of steam. Richard turns off the burner. A fire smolders out of frame as he walks back out of the kitchen. Through the window, we see firetrucks pulling up on the front lawn.

Richard moves through the dining room and into the hallway. The dining room windows show a pair of firefighters running a spool of hose toward the front door. Richard reaches into his gun cabinet for an automatic shotgun in a hidden compartment behind the antiques. He checks and loads it.) FIREFIGHTER:

Clear the door! We’re coming in. (Richard takes aim at the door.) Three… two.... (Through the window we see firefighters approaching the front steps. Richard turns and sees the framed bronze medal hanging above the cabinet. He smashes it with the butt of his gun.) ( )

Script

Primal Scream Brendan Wanderer

Author

Script

ˉ SHOGANAI Liz Baltzer

t was 41°c in Fujisawa; Lisa felt the oppressive heat even more relentlessly in the train station elevator as the speaker played a happy melody and a familiar voice told her to be careful while exiting. She turned quickly toward the shops and ticket gates, accidently stumbling over a disheveled man lying in the fetal position just to the right of the doors. He’d spread out a piece of tarp and lay on it with his eyes closed. Lisa was taken aback—she rarely saw homeless people in Japan.

Their tattoos had given them away. All over Japan, hot springs, swimming pools, and public bath houses had no tattoos signs to prevent yakuza from entering their establishments. Yet anyone who didn’t know better would mistake these men for a company picnic—hardly a threat.

She bent down to see if he was still breathing; his moustache hairs bristled. Out cold. Next to the elevator was a small 7-Eleven kiosk.

“Are you coming?” Yuka called as she ran toward the water with Jun.

“Irasshaimase!” called out the shop staff as she walked inside. Lisa had learned to ignore the greeting. When she had first arrived in Japan five years-ago, embarrassingly, she used to bow in response. Lisa grabbed some items for the picnic: an iced tea, a small bottle of sake, a rice ball, and a hand-held fan. She walked up to the counter to pay. “Is he ok?” she asked the cashier, gesturing to the man outside. The cashier frowned and looked annoyed as he handed her the plastic bag with her goods. “I’ve tried asking him to leave, but he keeps saying ‘tomorrow.’” Lisa took the bag and went back to the crumpled figure on the tarp. She placed the cup of sake, rice ball, and fan next to him. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the cashier glowering at her with his arms crossed. She shrugged and made her way to the train station. At least he’ll be comfortable when he wakes up.

Yuka and Jun were easy to find at Zushi Beach as it was nearly deserted except for a group of men barbecuing nearby. Yuka whispered that they were yakuza, the Japanese mafia.

Fiction

One man, with Hokusai-esque waves drawn down his arm, stabbed his grilled fish with a knife, stuck out his tongue, and licked the blade. The hairs on the back of Lisa’s neck stood up.

Lisa shook her head. “No way! You go ahead, I’ll watch our things.” “Suit yourself! Jun and I are swimming to the rocks.” “You’re crazy!” Lisa pulled a romance novel and the items she bought at the train station from her bag and settled in. She had just gotten comfortable when she heard a deep voice behind her ask in English, “Want to have a drink with me?” Lisa looked up into the eyes of one of the yakuza. He extended a beer toward her. His arms and chest were covered in an elaborate tattoo of Raijin, the Shinto God of Thunder. “Sorry, I’m here with my friends. Thanks though,” Lisa answered in Japanese. “That’s ok. Can I sit down for a moment?” He was sitting beside Lisa on the blanket before she could answer. He extended his legs so that his feet were just touching the sand. He had thick, slicked-back black hair and wore aviator-style sunglasses. Had it not been for his tattoos, he would have seemed like an average guy. “Can I ask, are you—”

Author

“Yakuza? Did my tattoos give me away?” “Yeah. Sorry. It’s just odd to see yakuza having a barbecue I suppose.” “Team building.” “Team building? Really?” He laughed and took a sip of his beer. Some of the men looked in their direction, but no one else approached. “Even yakuza need to relax and get along,” he said. “My name is Yusuke. What’s yours?” “Lisa,” she said, suddenly nervous. She wasn’t sure if it was attraction or anxiety. “So, you work together?” “Not all of us. Some of them are from other sections or prefectures. The guy working the grill is from Nagoya. Sometimes we do business with him.” “I guess it would be rude to ask what type of business.” “I’d rather know what you do. You speak Japanese quite well.” “I’m an English teacher in Fujisawa.” “Ah, I thought so, but I didn’t want to assume. We all judge each other by appearances. It’s the same, is it not?” Yusuke lay his head down using one of her folded towels as a pillow. He was oddly comfortable with her given they had just met. “I suppose we shouldn’t judge at all though, should we?” “Shōganai,” Yusuke said.

( Shoganai, that common Japanese phrase loosely translated to “It is what it is,” or “It can’t be helped.” ) Lisa looked more closely at Yusuke’s tattoos, the arm design blending into Raijin on his back. “The style of your tattoo is quite unique.” Lisa paused as two of the men beside the barbecue raised their voices. “Are they ok? The guy next to the grill seems to be arguing with the guy from Nagoya.” “They’re probably not ok. This barbecue was not what the guy from Nagoya had in mind. Here we are though, drinking, eating, and making friends.”

Late Night Journey Home Fiction Logan Crickmore 47

Shoganai ˉ

“I’m sure strangers don’t often talk to you.” Yusuke turned to Lisa and smiled. Lisa looked out over the water to her friends. They were treading water and looking in her direction. “Are those your friends right there?” Yusuke asked. He had propped himself up on his elbows. “They probably don’t want me—” Before he could finish, the man from Nagoya crashed into the barbecue. The man who’d been beside the grill punched him, knocking him to the ground. Yusuke jumped to his feet, ran over, and pulled the man up from the sand.

man sat upright with his legs crossed. She nodded at him, and he nodded back. Lisa went into the 7-Eleven kiosk and bought the same items as the day before. The cashier again looked annoyed. She snatched the bag from his hand and approached the man, taking out the bottle of iced tea and then placing the bag in front of him. He slowly met her eyes. “Thank you,” he said in English. “Do you speak English?” she asked in fluent Japanese. He shook his head. “What is your name?” She crouched to his eye level.

When he came back he said, “I apologize, Lisa. It seems my coworkers have had too much to drink,” and then walked back to the rest of the group.

He replied in a dry cracked voice, “Sakamoto Takumi, Takumi is ok.”

The day after the barbecue, coming home from work, Lisa again took the elevator to Fujisawa train station. This time when the elevator doors opened, the homeless

“Did you give me the same thing yesterday? Thank you.” Takumi bowed his head. “You are kind. I was injured at work, so I live outside now.” Takumi pointed to his head. “I have head trauma.”

“I’m Lisa. Please, take this,” she said gesturing to the bag in front of him.

“That’s terrible. Is there no shelter you can go to?” Takumi shook his head. “Shōganai,” he said.

Zushi be

ach to in

troduce

no tatto

o policy..

Zushi be a no tattoo ch to introduce member policy after yaku fatally st za abbed

( Hearing Takumi say it made her resent the phrase even more than the day before. ) Lisa looked up and saw a police officer walking toward them. She turned her head toward the 7-Eleven window, but the cashier avoided her eyes. He must have called. The police officer said, “You can’t be here. Please leave peacefully.” Takumi raised his hands above his head. “I’ll leave! No trouble please!” He jumped up and moved his few possessions and the food bag off his tarp. He rolled it up and tucked it under his arm, lifted the bag in the air towards Lisa, and slightly bowed his head in thanks. After the police officer and Takumi had left, the cashier came out of the 7-Eleven and stood next to Lisa. “Why did you help him? He is so shameful living off others.” “He’s not shameful, he’s just unlucky,” Lisa said.

An aban don the popu ed Zushi Beach aft lar destin ation and er police invest iga declares it a crim tion clears BY LIZ e scene. BALTZ ER Fiction 48

Lisa found a seat on the train and settled in for the ride home. She opened The Japan Times app to catch-up on the news. Today’s headline: zushi beach to introduce no tattoo policy after yakuza member fatally stabbed. ( )

FORGETTING IS SO LONG Robert Bowerman

1. Lima

October 3rd, 2016

October 2nd, 2016

In a restaurant in the old quarter near the cathedral, two fat businessmen elbow an elderly couple out of the way and take the last table. I invite them to sit at mine and we all eat el plato del dia, four courses, wine included, for five bucks. They eat with gusto and when the husband bites into his steak I see his crooked yellow teeth.

My wife and I have decided we need a break from each other, so I wait alone at the airport. I ignore the taxi touts outside—a friend of a friend was mugged at gunpoint by one of them on his way into town last year. Forty minutes later my ride comes and takes me to Miraflores, but it could be anywhere. I don’t see any brown people except for the crosswalk guards and an Indigenous woman who sits on the curb with a baby on her back and begs for money. The luxury condo where I rent a room for $25 a night has a concierge and a room for Maria, the maid, who’s stayed with the family who own it for over 30 years. She raised the two brothers who live there now. They bear the same surname as a brutal Spanish conquistador, but they are gentle and one lives with his Brazilian boyfriend. That night I eat at an empty Burger King around the corner. The next morning, I walk on the boardwalk along the cliffs to cheer myself up and take in the view of the sea below. I pass young women in Lycra outfits warming up, one even smiles. A gray veil hangs heavy over the city and I think it will really pour, but it doesn’t. I’m told that this fine drizzle lasts for seven months.

His voice cracks and his hand trembles when he tells me about his days in the army fighting El Sendero Luminoso, the Shining Path. It all started when they woke up one day to find dogs hanging from lampposts. In my dreams that night, I see those dogs with their tongues hanging out and flies on their eyes. I wake up in a cold sweat, but when I reach to touch your warmth, you aren’t beside me. First, they killed the dogs and then they came for you: 70,000 dead. October 5th, 2016

In the evening, I take an Uber to Larcomar, an upscale shopping centre, and sit down at a Michelin star restaurant. I figure this is the only time I’ll ever be able to afford one. It costs $40 for ceviche and a glass of white wine and it’s worth every penny. Sadness stabs me—you are not here.

In the basement of the Lorca Museum, I am struck by a graphic display of explicit erotic art that somehow survived the Catholic priests. Couples in an astonishing array of positions explore every manner of congress and something about how these clay miniatures catch the light reminds me of languid afternoons in a sun-filled room, our skin slick with sweat and the smell of desire. I wonder if, through cosmic osmosis, you feel it too.

Dark gray skies bring death by a million pinpricks. My soul slowly shrivels.

Tortured by eros, I long for your caress. How far away you are.

LIMA

Non-Fiction

2. Night Bus from Lima October 7th, 2016 I’m wrapped inside a cocoon of light issuing from tv sets inside the night bus as it snakes up the Andes. To my left sits a bespectacled middle-aged man with a neat moustache. Across the aisle to my right, a plump older woman wears tight jeans and too much make-up. I nod to each.

On that day, did you see the sun rise one last time? Were you proud to play your part, grateful for the chance to live forever in that distant heaven? I think of her life, cut so short, and what she missed. How lucky I am to know your love.

On my tablet I read Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter, a novel by the Nobel prize winner Mario Llosa Vargas. My eyelids start to droop just as Mario tries to fondle Julia. I turn off my device, recline my leather seat, and try to sleep. With every twist of the serpentine road, I leave deeper fingerprints on the vinyl armrest.

The ice maiden sleeps, a gentle smile on her lips that touches my heart.

I awake from an erotic dream when the driver hits a bump at speed and my forehead smacks the luggage rack above. My right arm flops across the aisle and lands on something soft. I hear a shriek of terror and realize it’s my own voice. Everybody else had the foresight to buckle up. I reel in my arm; I don’t want to know where it may have been.

October 10th, 2016

Fifteen hours later, in the early morning light and thin cool air of Arequipa, I run to find a bathroom. I will never take another night bus I lie to myself. Long night’s journey, dawn’s early light. How I miss the comforts of our bed. 3. Arequipa, Museo Santuarios Andinos October 8th, 2016 They called you Juanita, but nobody knows your true name. You lie garbed in the finest weave, perfectly preserved inside a temperature-controlled, hermetically-sealed glass cage. If I didn’t know better, I’d swear you are deep asleep. Just 14, pampered and prepared, you ate the choicest morsels, a maiden without blemish, a gift for the gods.

A P I U Q ARE

celebrated a death for the greater good, a death to renew. They kept you doped up on chicha and coca to soften that final blow with a club. You died six kilometres up in the Andes where there’s only ice, snow, and wind.

Non-Fiction

Five centuries ago, you marched slowly from the old Inca capital of Cusco, a procession of priests and porters hundreds strong. Along the way, joyous festivals

4. Colca Canyon

Ten years ago, maybe even five, I’d have relished this challenge, but I was fitter then. Two hours in, my back and calves ache, and my boots catch every loose stone along the dusty trail. My socks chafe and I know I have blisters. There’s still three hours and thousands of metres down to go. I lag behind two German triathletes who are far too cheerful. I’m even jealous of the condor carving lazy circles high above me. I remind myself to cherish the journey, but why does it have to be so damned tough? I sit on a rock to rest and stare at the village nestled in the valley below, an elusive Shangri-la that taunts me. Our patient guide, Luz, hangs back and sits with me. Her name means light and she really does brighten the day. Gently, she encourages me and I am ashamed because I know her life is much harder than my own. Down in the valley, I strip to my underwear and lie in a thermal pool. When Luz comes over to tell me it’s time to go, I smile, hold up my hands in surrender, and say, “No puedo mas,” because the way up promises even more pain and I want to stay right here. The next morning, I learn not to sneer at mules because I take one from the lushness of the terraced gardens, past slate gray slopes, to the top. Sometimes the mule puts one hoof on the edge of a ledge and the first time it does I shout, “Tengo miedo!” because I’m scared shitless. A thin blue ribbon of a river lies far below. One false step and I’m a goner. The mule driver who brings up the rear laughs and tells me the mule knows the way, says he hasn’t lost anybody yet. Up top in a café, I run into my hiking buddies and its all very jolly. Half an hour later, at the Cruz del Condor, we stand at 4200 metres surrounded by volcanoes, one of

CUSCO them smoking. A condor swoops close to me and for just a moment I turn to call you over. Old bones creak, my legs buckle, and I wonder why my path is so steep. 5. Cusco

Later, at the Temple of the Sun, I watch a column of tourists winding their way up, ant like. Across from me and to my left, the green finger of Mount Hyanu Pichu reaches skyward. There, in the Temple of the Moon, I imagine high priests adorned with precious stones and gold lifting a chalice of chicha to greet the dawn. Two months before, on the treacherous path up to the temple, a German tourist tried to take a selfie and plunged 150 metres to his death. For a moment, I feel a frisson of schadenfreude, but then I remember I have done things just as foolish. Late that afternoon, I follow an ancient stairway down through the cloud forest to the valley below. At the bottom I find a small museum with a deserted botanical garden. You would love it, but instead I wander the grounds alone until the caretaker kicks me out. I’m dwarfed by greatness. I try to grasp it, but it slips through my fingers.

October 13th, 2016 I take a bus to the end of the line with Richard, an American expat who is my Airbnb host. We hike and chew coca leaves to help with the altitude; I feel great. We follow the old Inca highway past gurgling creeks and stone granaries with grass growing on their rooves until we get to excavated walls and altars.

7. Copacabana Bolivia November 7th, 2016

It’s only the two of us and a few women with their children and llama herds. It’s all wonderful until Richard starts to natter on and on about how the us is going to hell in a handbasket. I think how much quieter it would be if you were beside me.

Leonard Cohen died today. You and I used to listen to him when we made love. This morning, just after dawn, I climb a path high above Lake Titicaca. I pass short women in puffy petticoats and bowler hats who tend grazing llamas with sweet soft eyes. Up top, I sit alone behind a stone portal, an ancient observatory that frames the blue below. I listen to those songs I know so well. Leonard and I tread the well-worn pathways of our hearts.

Just walk along this cobbled path into the past; don’t spoil it.

Another piece of me falls away. A quiet voice whispers in my ear.

6. Machu Pichu

8. At the Airport

October 21st, 2016

November 29th, 2016

I stand at the entry jostled by hundreds of others waiting to get in. I imagine visiting here with Pablo Neruda in September of 1943. His words would float above these great stone ruins, and he’d say, “Here we are at the high roof of the human dawn,” or maybe he’d stroke his chin and take out a notebook and scribble, “Mother of stone and sperm of condors.” I’d tell him about my aching heart and he’d smile sadly and say, “Es tan corto el amor, y es tan largo el olvido”/ “Love is so short, forgetting is so long.”

I sit on a hard plastic chair at the gate, waiting. My cell phone lights up and buzzes. The incoming text says: miss you. Another heart calls. Lonely nights, hard lessons learned. Together again. ( )

MACH U PIC HU

RIGHT TURNS Alyssa Coristine

e’re less than three hours into this road trip and I’m already regretting it. I press my forehead to the cool glass of the window and close my eyes. Not a word has been spoken since we pulled out of the Tim Hortons drive thru. There’s no music either. James hates to have music on while he’s driving, says it’s distracting. Personally, I would rather be distracted than suffocated by silence.

to me, but they’re all important. James used to tease me about my inability to get rid of things, back when it was a source of endearment rather than exasperation.

Neither of us likes Tim Hortons. We only went because I said we had to, years ago, when this trip was a gold-plated dream. “We’ll get up at five,” I said, “and stop at Tim Hortons on the way out of town, because a road trip isn’t a road trip without shitty coffee.”

“Up to you.”

He laughed and asked why we couldn’t just make our own good coffee at home and I told him it wasn’t about the taste but the experience.

The light turns green and he pulls the car forward with a jolt. I hate it when he does that. “We’re getting food,” he says, “and some decent fucking coffee.”

Now, our shitty coffees sit cold and untouched between us, and the experience feels just as stale.

At the gas station, I move to the driver’s seat while he goes in to pay. I see him through the window, laughing with the cashier like they’re old friends.

“Are you asleep?” There’s an edge to his voice. Suddenly the silence doesn’t seem so bad. I keep my eyes closed. He sighs sharply through his nose, the kind of sigh for when a full one isn’t worth the effort. I hear the familiar click of his wedding ring on the steering wheel as he drums his fingers. I know what he’s thinking. Unbelievable. I was the one who insisted we get up before sunrise, and now I’m asleep while he has no choice but to stay awake and drive. I can feel waves of resentment coming off him. There’s a vindictive sort of pleasure in knowing he is as miserable as I am. It’s two more hours before we reach the next stop, a small prairie town that looks exactly like all the others this far north. I’ve been on my phone for most of the drive, scrolling through Pinterest and flipping through my photo gallery whenever I lose service. I have too many pictures, but I can’t bring myself to delete any. I know I should only keep the ones truly important

Fiction

“We should probably get gas,” he says when we stop at a red light. I shrug, eyes still on my phone. “If you say so.” “Do we want food?” His ring clicks again.

Sigh. “Are you hungry or not, Maggie?” “Not terribly.”

He can strike up a conversation with anyone. I’ve always admired that about him. I don’t remember the last time he smiled at me like that, though. It feels strange to see it, so I look away. He’s still smiling when he slips into the passenger seat. “I asked the cashier about the best place to get coffee. She said there’s an indie place a few blocks away. Do we want to check it out?” I love local coffee shops. I love the smell, the coziness, the music. James knows that, and part of me wonders if this is his attempt at a peace offering. Then I remember his face the last time we argued—cold and devoid of emotion, a state worse than anger. If he had been livid, at least that meant he cared enough to feel something. Hate and love go hand in hand; lose one, and you’ve lost them both.

Stop Sign Kashmir Lesnick-Petrovicz

Author

I shrug, noncommittal. His ring clicks against the console, and I know I’m in for another six hours of stifling quiet. The thought makes my heart sink. This trip was supposed to be fun. It was supposed to be an escape. Instead, it feels like a prison. I turn the key in the ignition. “Coffee sounds great.” Our first date was at a coffee shop. We were 20 and still getting to know each other, and he asked me questions like he really wanted to know the answers. He ordered black coffee. I wanted to impress him, so I ordered the same and tried not to wince at the taste. Now, I order a white chocolate mocha. “To stay or to go?” the barista asks. “To go,” James says as I say, “To stay.” The barista glances at each of us in turn, her black lip-sticked smile faltering. “To go,” James repeats firmly.

We get lost looking for the highway on-ramp. I signal left and James waits until I’ve completed the turn before saying, “You were supposed to go right.” “You could have said so sooner.” “You could have paid attention.” I don’t bother to reply. I pass a stop sign without pausing, just to get on his nerves, and look for somewhere to turn around. When we’re back on the highway, I try to drown out his quiet with my music, but I can still feel the silence. It permeates the car like a noxious gas, filling every crack and corner from the ground up until there’s barely room to breathe. I turn up the volume and sing along. I drive the speed limit because I know James hates it when I go over. I pretend that I’m happy, and that he is too. Everything is almost alright.

Fiction

Right Turns

Then James turns down the volume. “Can I talk to you about something?”

the first one he ever sang for me, the one I listened to on repeat for months afterward.

I want to say no. I want to turn the volume up as loud as it will go and keep on pretending. Instead, I lower it further and say, “Fine.”

I made it the first track on the cd I burned for him for our first anniversary, the one I titled For When You Miss Me. He laughed when I gave it to him. I was hurt until he handed me his and I realized he’d done the same. He’d called his Our Soundtrack. We’d chosen all the same songs.

There’s a long pause. Every breath sticks in my chest, tightening and swelling like an overblown balloon. Then, “I got a call from Dave the other day.” I know where this is going. “Oh.” “He wanted to know if I’d reached a decision.” “Right.” “I told him I had.” I can hear it in his voice, see it in the set of his jaw. He’s accepting the position. “I thought we were still discussing this.” My voice is flat, robotic. “It’s not that big a deal,” he says. “It’s only a year.” Just a year at a financial firm in Sao Paulo, 10,000 kilometres away. One year analyzing investments and he’ll be too busy to call—first an hour a week, then half an hour a month. One year he’ll spend hating me for not coming with him. One year I’ll spend hating him for not asking me to. No, not a big deal at all. He reaches for my hand, but I wrench it away. I glance at his face, hoping to see a flicker of hurt there, a trembling lip. Nothing. “It could be good for us.” His voice is hopeful, almost pleading. He wants me to agree, to prove he made the right choice. But I don’t. I can’t.

( How could leaving be good for us? ) I keep my eyes on the road. The highway stretches ahead of us, blending with the distant horizon. These roads could lead us to infinity if we made the right turns. I turn the music up.

At the hotel, steam follows me out as I open the bathroom door. James is on the bed, hunched over his guitar. It’s been ages since I’ve heard him play. He doesn’t like doing it for other people, but he still used to play for me all the time. I’m not sure when that changed. He finishes a song and I expect him to put it away and go for his own shower, but he doesn’t. Our eyes meet, and suddenly I recognize the song he plays next. It’s our song,

Fiction

I sit beside him. His eyes don’t leave mine as he sings and his voice sounds like gold melted down to watercolour. I’m reminded of a night 10 years ago. I was sitting beside him on the couch in the shitty apartment he shared with a classmate from economics. We were sharing a blanket because the heater was broken, and his arm was around my shoulders. He asked if he could kiss me. I’d been flirting with him for weeks. The fact that he asked even though he must have known the answer made my heart swell with affection. All I managed to say was “Please.” Now I feel the stirrings of that old affection, but it’s twinned with something else, something sad, weighed down by 10 years of growing up and growing apart. I loved him once—maybe I still do—so when he strums the last chord I ask, “Can I kiss you?” He smiles with sad eyes and says, “Please.” So I do, gently at first, lips barely brushing his as if it’s the first time. It feels like kissing a stranger, until he makes a small noise in his throat like he used to, and I smile against his lips the way I used to, and that is all it takes. He sets his guitar against the nightstand and then his hands are on my face, warm and familiar. I feel the calluses on his fingertips, and I remember the way I used to kiss them. I’m crying, so he pulls me closer, and I realize that he is too. In the morning, this will be gone. His eyes will be empty and mine will be cold. We will dress without speaking and eat stale muffins from the continental breakfast in silence. Nothing has changed. He’s still leaving, and I’m still angry, and we still have nothing left. For the moment, though, I can forget that. He is warm and his hands know my body better than anyone, and his touch makes the world melt away until it’s just me and him and the calluses on his fingers. For the moment, we are 10 years younger in that tiny apartment with the broken heater. He looks at me like I’m treasured, and I look at him like he’s the world. For the moment, that is enough. ( )

SHELL SHOCKED Tianna Vertigan

You don’t think I walk on eggshells a round you? Oh please, you explode as I pick ’em up and toss ’em out, crawl from under your battered yoke. Those shells are shards, broken glass sc a tt e r e d in a room that narrows

every time I swallow your sharp tongue. They are false fragments, serrated reflections that distort like the filthy mirror mirror on your wall hissing you’re the fairest of them all. You don’t think— so I’ll tell you: you can’t break my heart, nor make me scramble for your scraps. Seven years on, I still see through you, but nothing’s ever over easy. Keepcrushingme, and I’ll cr a ck. Waves of Abundance Ellen Addison

Poetry

UNSPELLING SILENCE: P

G ai l N

yoka

M. NOURBESE PHILIP SPEAKS TRUTH TO HISTORY Sam Bollinger & Tianna Vertigan

s viu’s Gustafson Distinguished Poet, M. NourbeSe Philip delivered the lecture “What Happens to Poetry When” exploring gender, race, and the mother tongue. Her presentation drew particular attention to her seminal work Zong!, which was one of World Literature Today’s 21 Books for the 21st Century.

np: Having read that poem today, having everyone join in reading it with me, I understand something now. Maybe my mother tongue is poetry. I didn’t think that when I wrote the poem. I don’t have a mother tongue, other than English. I’m not English in race or ethnicity. I’m African descended, and I don’t know what language my people would have spoken.

Zong! is a groundbreaking book-length poem that dissects a two-page legal text to give voice to 150+ African slaves who were drowned at sea on the Atlantic slave vessel of the same name in 1781. In it, memory corrects recorded history to resuscitate the men and women whose cries of resistance rise up like breath from the bottom of the sea. “Zong! tells the story that cannot be told but must be told. Equal parts song, moan, shout, oath, ululation, curse, and chant….”

When I was working on the last section of Zong!, “Ebora,” where language really degrades, I felt that was my mother tongue—this sort of broken fragmentation, part grunt and groan. I felt I had come close to something that was mine. I’m thinking now that the language of poetry helps us to contain and transcend. I don’t see it as static; it’s rhythmic. Maybe poetry allows us to say the unsayable. Maybe this is my mother tongue.

Philip was born in Tobago and moved to Ontario in 1968, where she studied political science and law at Western. She practiced law for seven years before becoming a full-time writer and independent scholar. Her 14 published works reinvent the genres of poetry, drama, novel, and essay. She is the recipient of a Chalmers Fellowship in Poetry and a Rockefeller Foundation residency in Bellagio, Italy. Her recent awards include the 2020 PEN/Nabokov Award for International Literature and the 2021 Canada Council for the Arts’ Molson Prize, a lifetime achievement award for her “invaluable contributions to literature.”

There is a desire and longing to take up space in the world as a woman. It’s important to challenge the systems of power that attempt to control and silence women, systems embedded in the language: “English is my father tongue.” Father tongue originally referred to Latin, the basis for the European languages. It was the language of the upper classes, the people who were learned. For me, working with English and the legal language of Zong!—words like logos, speech—is a subversion of that patriarchy.

Before delivering her lecture, she read her seminal poem “Discourse on the Logic of Language” to an audience of students, her voice and those in the crowd creating a cacophony of sound. In the poem Philip writes: “English is my father tongue. / A father tongue is / a foreign language, / therefore English is / a foreign language / not a mother tongue.” We began by asking her about both patriarchy and the mother tongue in her work.

Feature

sb: You explore the meaning of language in She Tries Her Tongue. Language is a living and evolving entity so how have these changes in language shown up in your work? np: In each work, I explore a new aspect of language. In She Tries Her Tongue, I work with language at the micro level, and in Looking for Livingstone, I work with silence. Both of these play a part in Zong!, where there are holes of silence on the page and language is

Author

Kenya Sunrise Feature Seth Scott 57

Unspelling Silence

fragmented and fractured. It looks at the phoneme, the syllables. There is a sense of bravery in continuing the exploration of language in this way. tv: You have written poetry, novels, essays, and plays. How do you choose the medium for a project? Do you move between genres for the practical affordances they offer the subject or are there other factors that influence your choices? np: Some projects come to me and I know this is a poem. There’s one play that has to do with living in Tobago and a coup that took place in Trinidad. We were under curfew and I got information only through the radio, so I knew when I wrote about it, it had to be aural as well as oral. I’m interested in blending genres. I’m working on a manuscript now that I think is a memoir, but it is also a poem. Poetry works with repetition, by leaving certain things unsaid or saying them in a way that allows space for reader interpretation. So, I’ve been playing with bringing the resources and the gifts of poetry into the essay form. I love writing and I love making an argument, and over the years I’ve become more interested in challenging myself and blending the forms. sb: In an interview with World Literature Today you discussed how your essays draw on your previous studies in law to formulate an argument. In what other ways has your life as a lawyer continued to influence your subjects or approach to writing? np: I often bring to bear my legal training as both a reader and a writer. I would say that apart from Zong!— composed entirely from the words of the Gregson vs. Gilbert case report—and the essays, I can’t point to any area where there’s a direct connection. Law is excellent training, particularly for women, because you really get a sense of how power works, the power of the stage. You are taught to think like an academic. You learn the importance of a process and how to make arguments in a dispassionate way— not that emotions don’t come into it. It changes your thinking profoundly, and I don’t think it will ever go back to the way it was before. That’s both a positive and negative. sb: Your lecture explores the difference between untelling and not telling. Do you see your own work as a vital addendum to history or an untelling? np: I think what I do is in the untelling, telling a slant, telling stories that haven’t been heard before,

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imagining a story because our histories have been lost. If we can imagine and allow ourselves to listen to what has been told to us by our ancestors—all of us, all humans—we can tell stories that add to history. This is the beauty and genius of the human mind. Yes, there are certain lies that have to be corrected, but I don’t want to be locked into their system, simply correcting what they said. I want to be telling my story, my history, and they can do with my story what they will. I have to trust the work sufficiently, that the work will amend what is broken, address what needs to be addressed. tv: Some of your Zong! dramatic readings address this by embracing not only words, but dance, and musical instruments. Some last longer than six hours with those in the audience participating in various ways. You write in Salmon Courage: “If no one listens and cries / is it still poetry / if no one sings the note / between the silence / if the voice doesn’t founder / on the edge of the air / is it still music.” Why is this expression so essential to you? np: There is something of supreme importance in the creative act, in writing that poem, in making that piece of art, in singing that song. With She Tries Her Tongue, even though it was complete as a published book, it needed another kind of completion that would take it off the page and into performance. Stanley Burnshaw (1970) said, “Poetry begins with the body and ends with the body.” When we read “Discourse,” something happens in that cacophony. We’re all saying different things, but we’re also listening to each other. When I do dramatic readings of Zong!, it’s honouring. I’m trying to untell the way things are told to us, undo what was done. So much of our history is told by people whose ancestors carried out the massacre. The performances honour the lost voices, the people we didn’t even know were lost until we found their remains. We’re remembering and acknowledging that they once lived and were subjected to this horrible death. The untelling presents a challenge to the dominant narrative: We’re still here. We still remember. We will honour our dead. sb: Critics have said your work is “essential for anyone hoping to decolonize their bookshelves.” What authors can you recommend who have informed your own work? np: I understand how a critic would say that, but I don’t think my work is essential, I’m just grateful when people find value in it. I want them to live with my work in a different way.

A couple of authors have been with me throughout my life. The author who broke things open was a Creole poet, Saint-John Perse. His work has been vital to me. Edward Kamau Brathwaite’s work is crucial, as are some of the Russian poets—Vladmir Mayakovsky and Anna Akhmatova. sb: Much of your work depends on reading widely and research, but also on precise language and form. Is this a central preoccupation both in your own editing process and relationships with publishers and editors?

Bibliography:

np: It’s not a central preoccupation, but it’s important to me. I think of form as a container and my goal is to listen to what the work is saying to me about the form. For “Discourse,” I wanted to destroy the lyric voice and put the poem back in history, so I constructed a container that would hold that. I’ve been lucky in that I’ve had publishers who have been willing to follow the form and haven’t fought me. You have to physically turn the book to see the text; the point of the poem was that it takes effort to read.

Salmon Courage (1983)

tv: The unauthorized Italian translation of Zong! has been controversial. Can you contextualize this public struggle?

Frontiers: Essays and Writing on Racism and Culture (1992)

np: In 2015, someone contacted me from Italy and expressed interest in translating Zong! At the time, she didn’t have a publisher and I thought it was just a passion project. I didn’t hear from her again until 2021.

Thorns (1980)

Harriet’s Daughter (1988) She Tries Her Tongue, Her Silence Softly Breaks (1989) Looking for Livingstone: An Odyssey of Silence (1991)

Showing Grit: Showboating North of the 44th Parallel (1993) The Redemption of Al Buman (A Mortality Play) (1993)

The translators didn’t respect the form of Zong! It’s a pneumatic text. There’s an architecture to it. The way the words are placed on the page has to do with the fact that these people were drowned. The idea was that no line was abutting—no line could come directly under another line—because the words have to be ascending into the space in between, so the words are breathing for those people who died.

CARIBANA: African Roots and Continuities – Race, Space and the Poetics of Moving (1996)

The translators said that couldn’t be done in Italian. Well, then they needed to switch up the Italian—if the phrase is longer, you have to break the phrase. It might look different, the book might be longer. I am not tied to that. What I am tied to is the space. The text is breathing, working like lungs. It’s the one rule that I will fight for.

Harriet’s Daughter (2000)

Genealogy of Resistance and Other Essays (1997) Coups and Calypsos (1999)

Zong! (2008) Bla_K: Essays and Interviews (2017)

tv: What advice can you give new writers who want to fight for their work? np: Find people who love you, who love your work and who will—lovingly—make critiques of it. Be passionate about your work and fill your life with love.

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MAGNOLIA SEASON Sam Bollinger

The best time to plant magnolias is a century ago. Forget young saplings, with their ignorant, untested branches. Give me ancient roots, stretch-marked bark, evidence of unapologetic growth. The forest is a cemetery. Deciduous monuments bloom amid decay as beetles crawl over fossilized flower heads buried in the soil. Honeybees are dying, and magnolias mourn abstractly— the way we hear news of distant wars and wildfires, extinctions we don’t deserve to survive. In the time before bees, magnolias were giants among giants and dinosaurs drifted to sleep with pollen on their tongues.

Poetry

A NEW LEAF Tammi Carto

stood at the desk in Kristalynn’s two-room condo/

massage studio waiting for my credit card payment to go through. While she stapled my receipts, I glanced around the sunlit room, my relaxed body and mind appreciating the calm atmosphere. An abundance of houseplants in all shades of green stood in large pots, draped over shelves, and hung from the ceiling in macramé slings.

“Your plants are beautiful,” I said. “They really add life to this space. It must take a lot of work to water them all.” She smiled, her expression a mix of satisfaction and pride. “When I moved my practice here to my home, my collection grew. I maintain them between clients and spread the watering out over the course of the day. It doesn’t feel like work at all.” I have always loved plants, but I’ve never been good at caring for them. I was too busy to tend to them, so the few I had over the years grew dry with neglect, or moldy from overwatering. I had worked as a pharmacy assistant for 15 years, but in 2018 a random accident compressed the ulnar nerve in my right elbow, causing burning pain in my wrist and the last two fingers of my right hand to curl into my palm. Worse, the discomfort made it impossible to do my job— my hand had become a useless claw. Initially, I enjoyed the novelty of having so much time off work. I slept in, had leisurely reading sessions in the sunshine, practiced yoga, took my dog for long walks, and became a “lady who lunched” with friends and family on their days off. I thought it was just a matter of time before I could go back to work; surely the pain would ease up soon. It was impossible for me to do basic daily functions like brushing my hair, chopping vegetables, or folding laundry. To treat my injury, I had endless therapy appointments— acupuncture, massage, physio—and visits to an occupational therapist who specialized in hand ailments.

I spent much of my time alone with my thoughts, struggling to know what to do next. I drove to the beach, book and a coffee in hand. I listened to podcasts as I rattled around my quiet house while my husband was at work. It was as if I had been forced into retirement two decades early. About four months post-injury, and after two failed attempts to return to work, I had to confront my new reality. What would I do if I could not return to my career? One practitioner told me that a nerve injury like this might take up to two years to heal, and even then perhaps not fully. I was in a state of limbo, soul searching, and looking for a meaningful future. I had practiced yoga for years to maintain my mental and physical health, so when five months into my rehabilitation the local yoga studio I frequented offered a 200-hour teacher training, I decided to go for it. The instructors assured me I could adapt poses around my injury and model these modifications to others. At the very least, I would deepen my own practice, even if I never planned to teach. The experience had a profound effect on me, spiritually and mentally. I began to teach friends in my home, but was not motivated to teach public classes. I continued to question how to move forward. I’d often thought about writing a novel, so in the fall of 2019 I went back to school as a part-time student to improve my creative writing. I used dictation programs to write assignments and began taking classes in fiction, poetry, nonfiction, and publishing to expand my skill set. This too had many benefits. That day in Kristalynn’s office, I felt a yearning to try one more experiment. I went down the street to Little Tree Garden Centre where I met a kind-faced woman wearing a red apron. In my mind she was affectionately dubbed Plant Lady. “I’m looking for a plant that will bring good energy, but not die if I accidently forget to water it.” Aglaonema Tammi Carto

Title

She walked me to a display of plants with wide, variegated green-and-yellow blades that stood upright. “These snake plants could work. They thrive on neglect.” “Perfect.” After doing some cursory research, I learned the snake plant provides several health benefits. It’s supposed to filter toxins from the air and is said to increase feelings of happiness and overall well-being. Sign me up! I placed it on my bedroom dresser, hoping to maximize its effects. Buoyed by my success with the snake plant, I bought two Buddhist pines and put them in my yoga room in the basement. They oozed positive energy. Unfortunately, they would be the first victims of my horticultural experiment. They ended up being too demanding and eventually died. However, they taught me to match plants to spaces with the right moisture, light, and temperature. Next, I got a money tree. I read somewhere that a flourishing money tree brings prosperity to your home. Perhaps it’s a myth, but I get nervous whenever its leaves turn yellow. I wonder, if it dies, does it take prosperity with it? I work hard to keep it alive just in case. I found the next plant in a small nursery in Errington. All alone on a high shelf, its emerald leaves looked like elongated hearts with a vein running through the centre and out to the corrugated edges. I loved her right away. It is called an African Mask, but I named her Hearts and she’s my favourite.

Gradually, and with some patience, I understood what they needed. I strolled around with my watering can, snipped off dead leaves, and vowed 27 was more than enough. My yoga and schoolwork were keeping me busy, so I decided I had to cut back: no new additions to my plant family. The next day I pushed my cart into Country Grocer, only to be greeted by a bushy umbrella tree. She was as tall as my shoulders and cheap! I had vowed to stop, but knew I had the perfect spot for her. Who was I kidding? I giddily lugged her to my car.

I told my friend Shawna I talk to my plants. She gave my husband a sideways look and said, “Hey Deano, keep an eye on our girl here, ok?” I just laughed; I know I’m not crazy. Plants can sense positive energy. Living things are energy after all. I consider my friend Heather to be my plant guru. She managed Mother Nature Garden Home & Pet in Powell River for 15 years. When I have questions, I ask her. When I buy a new plant, I Facetime her to show her my new find. I usually follow her advice, but not always.

Late in 2019, as Hearts and I went into our first winter together, I noticed that three of six leaves were droopy—a sad sight. I took it personally, as though I had failed her.

“Your plants like to have moisture on their leaves. The next time you have a shower, take your plants in there with you,” Heather said.

“Listen Hearts, there will be no dying here,” I said.

“In the shower?” I wasn’t sure I’d heard her correctly.

I went to Plant Lady and learned this type often goes dormant in the winter months and may even die. What? No!

“Yes. Let the spray give them a good soaking, then leave them in there for a bit to dry off.”

Luckily, as old leaves died, new ones sprouted, unfurling into fresh, healthy hearts! “Dean look! I didn’t kill it!” I said to my husband.

Heather laughed. “Fine. Spritz them with a water bottle now and then instead.”

Watching this turned out to be therapeutic. Returning to pharmacy wasn’t an option. I had to let that go. Sometimes we must release what no longer serves us to make way for new growth. Like plants, we hibernate or wither, old parts of ourselves drop away so that we can bloom anew. What had begun as a hobby had led to a collection of 27 indoor houseplants. Watering was now a serious time commitment. Initially, I thought a blanket-method would

work, say, every week or so, but I was wrong. Every plant had its own personality and liked to be watered on its own time. Succulents and snake plants like to dry out a bit. Umbrella and Hearts like their soil to be wet, but not soggy, and the rest fall somewhere in between.

Non-Fiction

“I’m not going to take my plants in the shower!”

“I’ll think about it,” I lied. Today my plants add beauty, balance, and life to our home. I am grateful for that first conversation with Kristalynn, and the joy and peace nurturing these plants has brought me. Their needs are modest and easily met and they remind me that we are not so different. Give us water, proper nutrients, sunlight, and a few kind words and we will thrive. ( )

MEETING KAPOK Taylor Iverson

rom my vantage point on the boat, I watch the

water and realize it is foreign—like us, it flows from afar. Here in the Ecuadorian rainforest we are just floating on its surface, tourists passing through villages where the Seikopai and other tribes have lived for thousands of years.

Our motor hums, but the Amazon sings louder. Deep inside her belly an orchestra of birds harmonize while insects keep the beat. An array of verdant palm trees and other boisterous plant life knits the sapphire water to the shore. Wooden stalks and lush green leaves reach into the air flooded with the scent of rich soil, moisture, and decay. Jose chuckles and I see he’s looking at a textured wall of green interrupted by a splash of colour. “Toucan Sam” is perched on a branch, just as Jose is perched on the bow of the boat, legs hanging off the edge. He is a lively man with a passion for ancient medicine, permaculture, and shamanic mysticism. I met him during my 6-week yoga course in Tumbaco when he taught Andean cosmology. He has spent almost 20 years working and living with the Seikopai, safely bringing in tourists to witness the wisdom of the Amazon while he advocates for its protection. Sam, Mish, and I eagerly said yes when Jose issued the invitation. Sam, my roommate during the course, left her job as a personal assistant in the entertainment industry in London at 30 to take a break and “find herself.” Three months later she had a work visa, an affinity for “fiery Latino men,” and plans to live in Ecuador forever. Mish is an artist, a frequenter of festivals, and a free spirit. He is 22—only a year younger than I am—but he has never worked. He travelled to Ecuador on a family inheritance. He unintentionally speaks in poems, quietly attentive to the subtle beauty of this place. I had landed in Lima, Peru a few months earlier before heading to Tumbaco to deepen my yoga practice, but now I saw I was looking for something more.

Leaving Red Kirsten Dayne

A week ago, we had all spent 12 hours on a bus, five in a pickup truck, and two on a 3-metre tin boat to get to our host family’s home in the Loreto region of the Amazon. The house was a simple wooden structure with no power or running water, just a creek to bathe in and a rain barrel for drinking water. We were greeted by laughing children aged two to 13 with smiles as bright as the freshly picked fruit they offered. In the days that followed, the family showed us how to make pots with clay from the bottom of the river, or bags woven from palm leaves. They taught us about the food and medicine they harvest from the forest and how to make chicha, their traditional beverage made from fermented corn. At the end of these days we retired to hammocks in the shade to escape the Ecuadorian heat. I turn my head and look back at Marcelo, our guide and one of the members of our host family. He’s in his mid40s like Jose. They have a brotherly bond and I am drawn to their camaraderie and Marcelo’s pensive connection to this place. He is a melody in the song of the Amazon I am only starting to hear, a line in one of Mish’s poems.

( Marcelo’s comfort here makes me wonder where he ends and the jungle begins. ) Sam sits in front of us and pulls her camera from her backpack. The boat turns right and the five of us pull up to a muddy opening in the grasses on the bank. We fumble and my gumboots make a sucking sound as we make our way up the small slope to drier ground. Marcelo leads the way and we set off into the thick forest. The walk isn’t gentle. We trudge through undergrowth, watching the shifting patterns of the canopy overhead. Small streams of sunlight and congregations of mosquitoes find their way between the branches to our skin. The heat and humidity render us as damp as the forest floor.

Non-Fiction

Title

Non-Fiction

Taylor Iverson

I get a glimpse of it up the path and to the left, hidden behind dense flora. Our footsteps slow and the animal sounds seem to quiet. “We’re here,” Jose says, needlessly. The Kapok’s trunk spreads at least three metres wide and reaches up into places invisible from the ground. Two giant roots create slanted walls big enough to tuck into. I press my palm against the bark and I feel small, like a frail leaf that will soon fall away. I glide my fingertips across the deep crevices, then look up and see how they trail skyward and disappear into green, pathways telling stories I cannot yet hear. “Marcelo’s going to tell us about the tree,” Jose announces. We form a circle with Kapok, turning our attention to Marcelo, who speaks in Spanish while Jose translates. “The people of the Amazon have been learning from Kapok trees for as long as we can remember. This tree has been with the Seikopai for over 500 years. Some come to sit here during vision quests because it is a portal to the spirit world. There is a story that a man went inside for 30 years and when he came out, he knew the secrets of the Amazon.” I’ve never considered trees somethng to be entered. Marcelo continues and I hear the distress in his voice. “These trees are slowly disappearing. Logging companies and farmers have been destroying our homes and culture. If we lose the rainforest, we lose our stories and our wisdom.” The words echo for a moment and then he looks toward Kapok with the eyes of a young boy gazing at his dying grandfather. “I am afraid these trees will be gone one day. I don’t know what my family will do.” We stand quietly for a moment, in awe but also acknowledging our guilt. Nothing can be said to comfort Marcelo. “Now, I will sing a song to wake it up. Everyone should find a place on the tree to stand alone and listen.” I walk around the base and find my spot, step closer, and rest my forehead against its bark. Marcelo starts to sing. Deep strains hum and shake their way out of his throat, evaporating into breathy, lighter

Myra Falls Logan Crickmore

beats that resonate under my skin with every repetition of the chorus. This giant has witnessed 500 years of life, its trunk wide with rings too numerous to count. I am merely its bark, a thin and recent layer in its long history. I close my eyes and imagine what Kapok has seen in the last five centuries, the people who have stood where I am now, singing with their own voices the song Marcelo sings. Their faces are so vivid. My heart beats faster and I feel blood rush to my face.

( Standing here, the soft skin between my eyebrows pressing into the tough, thickened flesh of the wood, I begin to wake up too. ) This ancient tree has been a member of every family who has lived alongside it, its branches a web embracing generations through time. Births and deaths, events that tumble into one another down a long trail of cause and effect, ripple across the land and eventually touch my fingertips. I see that I am ancient. The Kapok whispers, “I am sunlight, soil, and the sounds that surround me. Like you, I am bound to forces beyond myself. You are a part of me.” Why have we forgotten your magic? I remember hearing my Anishinaabe grandmother’s stories about her spirit helpers and when I shared them, they were dismissed as signs of mental illness. When I was younger still, I watched Pocahontas speak with Grandmother Willow, those stories for children “made up” too. These tales hint at knowledge hidden deep within the earth, and like those of this mighty Kapok, our roots must stay intact for us to grow. “Come on Taylor,” a soft voice says behind me. Jose takes my hand and leads me back to the trail where Sam and Mish are standing, bewildered. Marcelo is sitting off by himself, looking into the forest. The four of us lean into one another, cheeks pressed into shoulders, breath and limbs entwined. Our feet are planted in the Earth; our branches reach for the sky. ( )

Non-Fiction

VILOMAH Amy Mattes

hy hadn’t she looked up? The mourning

doves nesting in the willow tree in her backyard left scat and feathers on the grass below, but she hadn’t seen the nest until now. Her oldest son, James, mowed the lawn. Charlie, the youngest, used to love the tree house, now vacant and rickety. Gail knew she hadn’t quieted her mind enough to hear their coos, hadn’t slowed the daily pace to really listen for birdsong. Suddenly it was too late; life hadn’t waited for her permission. Now, she would notice everything. Her tea sat cooling on the railing, forced on her by Brenda, her doting sister. She was shuffling around the kitchen as though the situation called only for duty, for movement. Gail leaned against the railing and dipped the teabag into the mug. She held the flimsy paper tag, tightening its string as though her fingers were a tether for the muslin sachet; she saved it from going under each time she pulled it taut. “What does it feel like to drown?” she whispered to the birds. “Did they struggle?”

The deck of the house offered a view of the sandspit where Gail often watched the boys play in the shallows of the lake. She would glance up over the rim of her novel to track their lean bodies splashing on the shore. When they grew older, she was no longer allowed to drink in the warm, sun-kissed smell of their necks. The night before the boys had taken the canoe out without life vests. One of the paddles was found down by the bridge, and then the canoe upside down at the cove, its red tips pointing upwards like the peaks of a sagging tent. She wished their stupidity angered her, but she was numb. Her skin felt heavy. Gail let go of the tea string, watching the bag bloat into an inflated pontoon. She closed her eyes for respite, but saw instead the submerged bodies of her sons, arms splayed overhead, arched torsos floating upward, a million tiny bubbles clinging to their clothes like a quicksilver Milky Way.

( She knew James would have tried to rescue Charlie; he was the stronger swimmer. )

“Do you see the doves?” Brenda asked, appearing in the doorway, wiping her hand on her apron and then across her forehead.

“Doves bring peace,” Brenda said, appearing again to interrupt.

“I didn’t. I mean, I do now, but I hadn’t noticed them before. How did I miss them?”

Gail blinked and pulled the tea bag to the surface, golden camomile spilling in its wake.

“You know, it’s a message. The boys are here with us.”

“They’re glorified pigeons,” Gail said, turning away from the doves, annoyed at her sister for thinking a calming drink and shit-covered birds could make sense of this tragedy. Two of the birds flew from the tree, their feathers catching the wind behind them. “Some omen.”

“I thought they were called ‘morning’ doves until we moved in here. My whole life I hadn’t known it was ‘mourning,’ with a u. Then I painted the boys’ bedrooms and the colour was called Mourning Dove. I guess I’d never seen it spelled out.” Gail dipped the tea bag under again and let it twirl. They should be home, eating out of the fridge, reading comics, teasing each other about girls, slam-dunking their sweaty socks into laundry baskets.

Her boys knew better. They knew that the drop off came quickly and the current pulled more like a river than a lake where the passage narrowed. She had given them too much freedom, and the guilt took her breath away. “There are no names for a woman like me,” Gail said. Surfer Kashmir Lesnick-Petrovicz

Author

“Vilomah,” Brenda replied. “You’re a vilomah.” “A what?”

The branches of the willow tree lifted in the breeze. Gail sighed. She abandoned the tea and bundled her long skirt in one hand, descending the deck stairs in bare feet.

“A vilomah. It’s a mother who buries her children. It’s a Sanskrit word for the incorrect order of things. I heard it on the radio once. I think it was being added to the dictionary.”

She went to the outside door of the basement cellar, turned the knob, and ducked under its frame. She searched the shelves of the cement room until she found it.

“It’s beautiful.”

Still holding her skirt like a sash, Gail traipsed upstairs and hoisted the can of paint onto the railing, intentionally knocking the teacup to the ground. The mug broke, scattering ceramic fragments among a pile of tiny gray feathers.

“So are the mourning doves.” Gail ignored her. The oven timer went off and Brenda retreated into the house. “Does it burn when the lungs fill up? I’ve heard it can burn.” Silence.

( It was a feeling known only to those who survive, when the instinct to breathe is stronger than the instinct to let go. )

“See, Mourning Dove, right there.” “Gail, what are you doing?” “Vilomah. Mourning Dove. These names are too beautiful. This is the incorrect order of things.” ( )

Fiction

VERTEBRATE HEART Sam Bollinger

There are closets in my

skeleton

little doors

I open with

baby teeth

keys

cartilage collagen calcium

I burrow

my marrow

of carved

warm and soft unshed

in the embrace of a

tears

I am a parched siphoned

inside

out

my organs

bleached and

salted

wrung dry

ventricles

in desperate need of

the bones

of my

distal

middle

proximal

of family

of species

a silver minnow

hundred

Freedom from the Pain of the Past Ellen Poetry 68 Addison

and

behind

from the

I count

two

I am tired of hiding

that drown desert

veins

mother

six

fingers

a vertebrate heart

the metacarpal phalanges belly up

bones

fracture

the anatomy

a hook beneath

the

its

in its eye skin

HOW DID I END UP HERE? Hannah Macza

ear spray in one hand, air horn in the other, I high-stepped over tent lines that crisscrossed the mossy ground. Ducking under a canopy of branches, I walked out of the forest. The moon was still full despite the morning mist and a soft pink hue streaked the sky. I checked my watch: 4:03 am. Usually by this time I’d have hash browns in the oven, but today something felt off.

I came around the corner and saw Rosie hunched over the generator. That’s it, it was too quiet. “Genny” powered the kitchen and her soft hum was the soundtrack to camp life—when she ran out of fuel, it was the cook’s job to hoist the yellow jerry cans of diesel and fill her back up. Our camp was in a gravel pit 45 kilometres down a logging road in the Cariboo, a two-hour drive from Prince George. The mosquitoes were so huge and rampant that bug spray did little to hold them off, but we used deet anyway. The best defense was a getup that looked like a hazmat suit. “I knew something was wrong when I woke up,” I said. Rosie splashed diesel on the apron she was wearing under her bug netting as it glugged into the machine. She had long blonde hair swept off her freckled face into braids. She was 30 and had been in the food industry for seven years; this was her first season as head cook. She had funky clothes, cool tattoos, and a sweet demeanour. She yawned. “Yeah, I guess we forgot to fill her up last night. Do you remember which buttons turn it on?” I said yes, but I didn’t have a clue. I pressed a series of buttons and turned the knob to start it up. The generator turned on and shook violently. Rosie quickly pulled the key out to stop it. “You said you knew what you were doing!” she snapped.

On my second attempt the machine shook, but sparked and roared back to life. We jogged to our stations, already late for work. In the kitchen, we cranked up the music and began preparing breakfast for the planters before they headed out. We packed their lunches and would have dinner ready for them when they returned, dirty and exhausted at the end of a long day. Once a week, a food service truck unloaded pallets of food to form small mountains of meat, milk, yogurt, dry goods, and vegetables ready to refill our four ducttaped fridges. Between food orders, on our “days off,” we shopped for groceries in Prince George, pushing three carts through Superstore. Fellow shoppers couldn’t help but comment, “Where’s the party? I’m coming to your house later!” Sometimes we ran out of water, or a windstorm would blow the cooking tent off into the bush.

( Sometimes we had to drive ourselves to the hospital in town for stitches. ) This morning though, we only had one calamity. As Rosie scrubbed a pot big enough to crawl into, we apologized for snapping at each other and laughed about the ridiculousness of our first fight, wondering how we ended up here. That night, as I lay like a caterpillar in the cocoon of my yellow sleeping bag—exhausted and covered in bleach, grease, and deet—I asked myself that very question. Isolated from society in the middle-of-nowhere bc, never having cooked before in any professional capacity, I’d somehow entered the strange world of bush camp life. How the hell did I end up here?

I barked back, “i’m trying!”

Non-Fiction

How Did I End Up Here?

It was 3:00 am when I stepped off the plane in Brisbane, Australia, 18 and full of independent spirit after backpacking across Southeast Asia alone. I had a holiday working visa and planned to make some money.

We were staying in Saskatoon, my hometown, and on a cold Monday in October it suddenly came to me. I stopped, bent down in the snow on one knee, and cheekily asked, “Will you marry me?”

I burst out of airport security, everything I owned stuffed in my red backpack, and into the arms of three Australian friends hosting me. We’d met in Canada working the slopes, so the reunion seemed like old times. After hugs and tears they parted like the sea to introduce me to our fifth roommate, Yoshi.

That Sunday, I put on a silky white grad dress/wedding dress from my aunt and prepared for the big day. My mother had braided my hair the night before, so when I pinned it half up, golden waves curled down my spine.

He was 22, tall, covered in tattoos, and wearing sunglasses at night. He stood there as if in a spotlight, looked down at me, pushed his sunglasses up, and flashed a gap-toothed smile. He said, “Come here,” and pulled me into arms that instantly felt like home. A week later we whispered drunken “I love yous” on the back porch. Yoshi had stayed close to his hometown of Lismore, but always wanted to travel. It was as if he’d been waiting for me to show him the world. A month later, we bought an suv and drove around the east coast of Australia. We worked cash jobs picking fruit, skateboarded in sleepy towns, slept on beaches, and watched lorikeet parrots cluster in gumtrees. We lived in Melbourne for a few months, working side by side at a café downtown until my visa ran out and I had to return to Canada, this time with Yoshi in tow. Yoshi had always dreamed of living in a ski town, so we moved to Nelson and became ski bums. We worked in restaurants and cafés, snowboarding in the Rockies between shifts. The next summer we conquered the mother of all road trips, touring our Mazda 5 from coast to coast. Our first couple of years together were spent in a sea of love. We poked our heads up, gasping for air, only when we realized Yoshi’s tourist visa was running out.

Non-Fiction

I walked into my grandparents’ living room, in front of a few friends and family, to say my vows. A Buddhist woman we’d hired on Kijiji, in honour of Yoshi’s Buddhist parents, was officiating. We had video-called them that morning and toasted with champagne. Yoshi, his moustache waxed, wore his father’s colourful checkered shirt, the one he always wore for special occasions. My grandparents had offered their wedding rings to us, a symbol of holy matrimony I wasn’t sure I was ready to accept. The ceremony took all of five minutes. My little brother missed it entirely because he was in the bathroom. I barely remember whispering “I do,” only coming back into my body after sealing the promise with a kiss. Holding Yoshi’s hand in mine, we laughed and grinned like children sharing a secret. Yet, despite the happiness of the day, I had a nagging feeling that something wasn’t right. Were we actually husband and wife? According to the law, our friends and family, and of course Yoshi, the authenticity of our marriage was indisputable.

( Yet, when Yoshi introduced me as his wife, I punched him in the arm. ) I heard a voice in my head that grew louder with each passing day until it became a scream I couldn’t ignore.

Hannah Macza

A year later I knew I had to leave. Yoshi and I sat on the couch in our rented home with our legs intertwined. I covered my face with my hands, unable to look into the deep pools of his eyes, and wept. “I’ve lost myself, Yoshi. I need to leave to figure out who I am. I can’t ignore it any longer. I’m suffocating.” Softly, he asked, “Why can’t you find out who you are and still be with me?” I didn’t know the answer. A friend had offered me her job as an assistant cook at a tree planting camp that began in three days—I knew this was my chance. Yoshi begged me to stay, but I tore away. The separation was painful, emotional Velcro. He would remain in Nelson, but we agreed to get divorced.

When a cook arrives at camp, she is instantly on the job. The endless stream of kitchen tasks and the pressure to deliver three meals a day to 70 hungry tree planters was just the distraction I needed. The life I fled slipped farther and farther away. I missed Yoshi, but was relieved to throw myself into something new and buy myself some time to figure out what I really wanted to do, who I really wanted to be. Rosie helped with that. We worked 12-hour days so we had plenty of time to talk about our lives. Over breakfast prep, music blaring, we picked up the conversation where we’d left it the night before. She taught me how to use a knife and that it was ok to say goodbye to one version of yourself in search of another. Rosie and that outdoor kitchen were my safe place to land, a new home away from old feelings. During rare moments to myself, I biked down the logging roads, took a midday nap, or jumped into the

river to shower. I thought of Yoshi often and wondered what he was doing. I wanted to call him, but I had no cell reception. He was the safest, most loving home I had known and I wasn’t sure I had done the right thing, but I pushed on as I settled into camp life. By the time I’d been in camp for a month, dinner had become my favorite part of the day. I’d crack two beers, hand one to Rosie, set the mood with music, and dance around the tiny kitchen. We laid out enormous bowls of salad, massive pans of Rosie’s freshly baked-and-buttered bread, and 14 kilos of mashed potatoes. We honked a work truck’s horn and the planters lined up outside the kitchen. We passed plates loaded with food into their dirty hands and hoped to be greeted with grateful faces. Some looked at it and then at us with no attempt to conceal their disappointment. No matter what you do, you cannot please everybody, and we were ok with that. In the golden hour, planters shared stories of their day and Rosie and I tackled the dishes and packed up leftovers. At 9:00 pm, we’d crawl into our tents, pass out, and do it all over again seven hours later.

Three months later the season was over and July was just beginning. As I left the camp for the last time, I dodged potholes and blasted music in celebration of sweet, sweet freedom. The job had been a gift, an escape from the real world. The slow and monotonous routine was strangely comforting; you knew what was expected of you and you did it. I had fled my life for the bush, and camp had been the first step in reclaiming my independence. I thought of Yoshi and knew I’d been right to leave the “we” to become “me” again. I had ended up here, following a road opening up before me, trusting my heart was leading me somewhere I needed to go. ( )

Old Growth Non-Fiction Kashmir Lesnick-Petrovicz 71

Shapeshifters

truths that are both revelatory and revolutionary. Stuart Ross calls Valin’s work fearless, precise, complex, and startling, noting her poems range from the “lyric to the surreal, the pop-culture monologue to the extended confessional.” In Valin’s most personal poems, she adopts magic to survive—portals, flight, telepathy, and incantations make an inhospitable world more manageable.

Shapeshifters Délani Valin Nightwood Editions, 2022 96 pages isbn: 9780889714281 $19.95 Reviewed by Bella Hoodle

In the first section, “The Giantess” ends with the line: “she became a landmass, / grew forests on the convex curve of her belly.” In “Michelin Man” she writes: “I am Mars in furs—this is fullness: tenderness and force against / your unbound body.” In the second section, Valin begins to subtly unravel. The first two poems are letters. There is still a wall between the poet and the reader, but it’s crumbling. These are not love letters; they are words that cannot be spoken.

Délani Valin adopts a variety of unique personas—from “capitalist mascots” like the Starbucks’ siren and Barbie to the Michelin Man—to tell her own complex and multi-layered story in her debut poetry collection, Shapeshifters. Valin voices the hopes and frustrations buried beneath the icons’ “relentless public enthusiasm” as a means of vicariously expressing her own challenges and outrage.

In “No Buffalos” Valin writes: “I drink drops from blackberries / picked behind seedy strip malls. I eat / soup with corn, squash, beans. / Vegetables are easier to mourn.” Later in this poem she says: “I struggle for words. I fear the violence / of pipelines, and other warped definitions / of progress. Is it possible to change and protect? / Ancestors say I should never fear a good fight.”

Valin is Métis and neurodivergent and adopts personas in part as an act of resistance, gaining confidence in the masquerade until it comes at too great a cost. Her poems are about hypochondria, autism, depression, and weight obsession, but they also use personification to speak

The collection’s third part increases intimacy still further. Valin’s word choice is sharp and intentional, honest and shocking.

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“Tacit” begins with the line: “There are no safe spaces—there never were.” It end ends with: “Come and

fade from the endless grasping / the compliments / the catcalls / the vi / ol.en / c / e.” In “Hypochondria” Valin writes: “Scrapes can be washed, bones can be reset. Repeat the mantra: I’m in / good health.” The fourth section contains the single poem “Storytelling.” This connects all four parts in just seven pages, like the seven blackbirds on the cover. Valin writes: “three hollow-boned girls baptizing / me with spit and slurs. / The eagles / would save me with some word / or sudden wit, right? Later, / I would recreate everything / with barbies, finding strength / in the plastic postures, the stiff / countenance. Narrative shift.” Adèle Barclay describes the collection as a “mutable, kaleidoscopic experience… a stunning poetic tapestry that welcomes every stray strand.” Shapeshifters doesn’t document what has happened, but rather what is happening just as we adopt and explore different identities that inform an ever-changing self. Eventually, we recognize oneself that feels true or that we can embody as true. Valin has Nehiyaw, Saulteaux, French-Canadian, and Czech ancestry. She is taking her Master’s in Professional Communications at Royal Roads and has a ba in Creative Writing from viu. Her poetry has won The Malahat’s Long Poem Prize and subTerrain’s Lush Triumphant Award. Her work has appeared in prism International, Adbusters, Room, and in the anthologies Those Who Make Us and Bawaajigan. She is on the editorial boards of Room and The Malahat and lives on traditional and unceded Snuneymuxw territory (Nanaimo, bc).

TAKING UP SPACE Sam Bollinger & Bella Hoodle

bh:

What do you wish you had known before submitting your manuscript to presses?

dv:

That the book will never be finished. I sat on a manuscript for a while before submitting it because I was holding on to the idea that it had to be perfect, even before the editing process. I would tinker with it, change things and then change them back. It wasn’t productive and I think that was a sign I needed to let it go. Shapeshifters is something I have accomplished, but I’m going to keep growing as a writer and a person so it’s ok to move on. I wish I had given myself permission to do that sooner.

sb:

How did the experience of being edited in-house at Nightwood Editions compare to how your work was edited by professors and peers as a student?

dv:

When I was edited by Portal and workshopped in class, there was a lovely attention to detail from peers and professors. Each poem was regarded as a stand-alone piece and edited line by line. Nightwood introduced me to the unfamiliar world of structural editing. My editors Silas White and Emma Skagen had the whole manuscript to work with, rather than a single poem. When I submitted, I ordered the poems chronologically to show my growth through the years. My editors pointed out that by beginning with the persona poems and progressing into more confessional pieces, the speaker could remove these masks. Nightwood allowed me to see the bigger picture.

bh:

As you note, you embody different personas in Shapeshifters from Barbie and Betty Crocker to the Starbucks siren. How has poetry allowed you to explore these other voices while defining your own?

dv:

When I was in viu’s Creative Writing program, I wrote poetry similar in style to the poets I admired, such as Sylvia Plath. My own voice began to emerge, but I felt trapped in sad, heavy subject matter. Marilyn Bowering suggested I try writing from the point of view of different personas. It’s fascinating how these characters can hold up mirrors to our own experiences. Working through another voice gave me access to new

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WITH DÉLANI VALIN

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perspectives and the confidence to explore personal stories from a safe distance. sb:

“No Buffalos” is a long poem in the collection that explores Métis identity. What are your observations about how Métis and Indigenous voices are represented in the Canadian literary landscape?

dv:

Lately, there’s been a rich interest in Indigenous voices and stories, which has been a long time coming. As much as I’m heartened to see this, I’m wary of identity becoming a marketing tool and exploited by the industry. Indigenous writers are often told to write about the experience of being Indigenous—and my Métis identity is integral to who I am—but I want to explore all aspects of my creativity. Everyone should be able to access the fullness of their personhood without being reduced to a label. It’s also important to acknowledge the diversity of perspectives within the Indigenous community; I can only be a voice in conversation with rather than for.

sb:

You are on the editorial board for two literary magazines, Room and The Malahat. How did your experience as a Poetry Editor for Portal 2014 prepare you for these roles?

dv:

Portal taught me to appreciate a variety of styles and genres that aren’t my own. This has been particularly helpful in my role at Room. I look at how successfully a piece conveys its message. What is its emotional heart? Did it surprise me? I started asking these questions in Portal and continue to. At Malahat, I participate in round-table discussions and vote on the accepted pieces. In this collaborative process, I’ve drawn on my experience at Portal to articulate my thoughts and champion pieces I’m passionate about.

sb:

What advice can you offer new poets who are working on their first collections?

dv:

Start putting work out there, whether it’s just with friends or in workshops or submitting to magazines. Don’t be afraid to take yourself seriously as a writer. If you have drive and passion, no one needs to validate that. Don’t be afraid to take up space.

la n

Cooking Tips for Desperate Fishwives: An Island Memoir

alcoholic father and increasingly aloof mother makes her determined to create a different story for her own children. Though she sought refuge in the arms of her Jewish Russian and Ukranian babas, who had fought wars of their own, she never stopped looking for a bond that wouldn’t break.

Cooking Tips for Desperate Fishwives: An Island Memoir Margot Fedoruk Heritage House, 2022 256 pages isbn: 9781772033953 $22.95 Reviewed by Nicole Kaastra

Moving chronologically, she charts her first escape from Manitoba in her late teens, leaving her young sister just after their mother dies of cancer. She heads for the bc wilderness to tree plant, where she meets Rick on the side of a mountain. “The trees were taller, the flowers more vibrant …. The clouds touched down on the curve of the highway, our truck hurtling through the layers of stratosphere.” Throughout courtship, marriage, and parenthood she reaches for Rick through the phone lines to find him in marina ports and seaside hotels, the dangers of his job only exasperating the heartache. “Each time he called to say that it was stormy, I said, ‘Take care,’ meaning your body, your soul, meaning come back alive. We need you.”

Margot Fedoruk’s island memoir Cooking Tips for Desperate Fishwives is a deep dive into an uncommon life and love that traverses provinces, conventional expectations, and the better part of 50 years. Fedoruk shares the yearning, frustration, and melancholy of loving an urchin diver and sustaining their long-distance relationship while raising two daughters. Her sly humour, bracing candor, and healthy dose of fighting spirit are addictive. The dysfunction of Fedoruk’s childhood in Winnipeg with an

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Fedoruk shares her experiences of partnership, motherhood, and sisterhood, navigating stormy weather to get to smoother sailing, food as her compass. Each chapter features mouthwatering recipes from Fedoruk’s inventive and resourceful kitchen. They have been collected over the years in a cherished and spattered cookbook, their origins touchstones for the stories that fill these pages. Each ingredient is scavenged or grown from the wilds of forested coastline. Fedoruk connects land, food, and home through blackberry bramble, nettle, mushrooms, herbs, and seafood.

“I love the word ‘wildcraft’; uttering it makes me feel clever and witchy. I imagine crawling among the underbrush, inhaling the sweet scent of the rotting berries.” Like the Killer Lasagna on page 4, this book is also layered; hope and grief and grit transform her from Prairie girl to islander to Calgarian and back again, ending up on Gabriola Island where she takes to the Pacific coast like a salmon upstream. Fedoruk winds through family lore and odd jobs and scenarios too bizarre to invent, each chapter as compelling and delicious as the last. The stories are uncommon, each anecdote of her remarkable life unexpected and completely authentic. We are in her kitchen kibbitzing as she confides a secret over Russian Pelmeni or Baked Oysters. Reading on an empty stomach will make you long for Big Baba’s blintzes and respect for Fedoruk’s many and varied money-making schemes (from soap-making to house-cleaning to wily librarian), colourful neighbours, and treasured friends. This book, as most things in her life, is clearly a hard-won but rewarding labour of love. Cooking Tips for Desperate Fishwives is a satisfying and delicious read. Margot Fedoruk is a writer, book reviewer, and entrepreneur. Her Starfish soaps are legendary market fare and her work has been published in the Globe and Mail, Quill and Quire, bc Bookworld, Portal, and more. She has earned a ba from the University of Winnipeg and one from viu and is completing a Masters of Library and Information Studies from the University of Alberta. She authors two blogs; Death Defying Acts of Living and Wash Rinse Repeat and continues to live and work on Gabriola Island, bc.

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WITH MARGOT FEDORUK Beatrix Taylor

bt:

At what point in your life did you imagine writing a memoir?

mf:

I always kept a diary when I was young and knew I wanted to write, I just didn’t have the confidence. I thought it was something magical you had inside of you, something perhaps I didn’t have. I realized one day that I was always telling stories to friends, and that I should write those stories down. I don’t know when I knew it could all be one book.

bt:

In Cooking Tips for Desperate Fishwives you talk about a dream you had in your youth in which you were living a rural life and making soap. Are you living that dream now?

mf:

I guess so. I used to say it jokingly, but I think I knew deep down that I craved nature after growing up in a city. When I was a tween, I read adult books like Robinson Crusoe. It’s funny, I loved the idea of surviving on an island even then. I was trying to imagine how I could realize that dream, and somehow making soap on an island really appealed to me. This is as close to that imagining of my life as I can get.

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Rick has not read it because it’s too personal for him, and that’s true for my youngest daughter too, which I totally understand. She’s still proud of me. Still, I thought they’d come around. I think I was gentle with my children. Rick I was hard on, and myself. My older daughter and I haven’t really discussed it. Some parts of the book are hard for them and I worry they’ll get mad at me for sharing too much. That’s how we are in our family; we don’t filter a lot. bt:

Do you have any advice for young authors who are feeling discouraged about the writing and publishing process?

mf:

Don’t ever be discouraged. Go for your dreams while you still have the energy and good things will come of that. When I was younger, I would do things without thinking. I never considered the consequences. Don’t overthink it, just throw yourself into it. If you’re already on a boat heading out to sea and you’re pregnant, it’s too late! You can’t turn around.

bt:

Have your daughters read your book, and if they have, were they surprised by any of the stories you chose to share?

Of course, you might have to be a content writer to pay the bills while you’re working on your art, but I think if you have the fire in you to create art, just do it. It doesn’t matter if you don’t get published this year, next year, or in the next five years, you’re going to be learning and those skills will come in handy one day.

mf:

One daughter read the book and one chose not to. I asked other authors about this and it’s a common theme. They’d say, “Oh yeah, my wife never reads my work, even the fiction.” I was surprised, but it makes sense because even in fiction you might borrow from your life stories, and maybe the character will have traits you see in yourself, so it’s too hard to read.

If it’s daunting to sit down and write a whole book, just say, “I’m going to write this 2000-word essay for the cbc contest.” It forces you to do a chunk of work and then you have a chapter of your book. That’s how I did it; I wrote a lot of chapters while I was at viu. You can’t censor yourself. If you’re writing a memoir, the best stuff comes when you’re open and honest, so just get it out there.

BOOK REVIEWS that “everything in Dene culture reinforced the concept of the group.” By opening with the Dene creation story rather than his own, and often using the word “we” rather than “I,” Mountain makes it clear he is representing the Dene people, not just himself.

From Bear Rock Mountain Antione Mountain Touchwood Editions, 2022 416 pages isbn: 9781927366882 $25.00 Reviewed by Taylor Iverson

From Bear Rock Mountain is the playful yet impassioned journey of an inspired Dene artist, activist, and residential school survivor. Poetry and traditional teachings are embedded in Mountain’s reflections on cultural loss, reclaiming identity, and a web of historical events that tie his personal story to the events of the larger world. Though the tales are told from Mountain’s perspective, readers learn

Book Reviews

Mountain was born in 1949 in the community of Radelie Koe, now known as Fort Good Hope, in the Northwest Territories. Grit, hard work, and an innate connection to the land kept his family alive during long cold winters in this remote area. “We were money poor, but we never lacked for any food…or love,” Mountain writes. He recalls passing around a tobacco pipe while his grandmother told stories. When the “Mola” or white people moved onto the land for the fur trade, Dene culture was threatened. After an oil company sets up shop, Mountain’s community sees its first cases of cancer and land pollution. At nine years old, Mountain and his younger sister, Judy, were sent to Grollier Hall residential school in Inuvik. Their mornings began with oatmeal in sour milk and nights were haunted by the muffled cries of hundreds of children. Mountain was banned from speaking Dene and forced to endure a Western education. He tried to please authorities so he excelled in classes, skiing, basketball, and as the lead singer in a rock band called “Electric Storm.” Mountain does not hesitate to say how much he enjoyed school activities and even some of the staff members, so the contrast is jarring, yet authentic, when he draws parallels between residential school and Nazi-

death camps throughout the memoir: “My snap out of this church-and-state imposed slumber began with the book about a Jewish prisoner at one of the places for Hitler’s Final Solution.” When he returned home, he tried to make up for the many winters of learning and Dene tradition he had missed, but Radelie Koe was also experiencing colonial trauma. He struggles with ptsd, “that demon alcohol,” and bouts of homelessness, in which Mountain compared himself to “a canoe someone set adrift, heading any place the current went.” Eventually though, Mountain found a passion for painting that leads him to art schools in Toronto and Italy. Today, he’s working toward a doctorate with a focus on helping young people realize their Dene identity. Mountain transforms intergenerational pain into paintings that preserve the Dene culture. The book is broken into five parts, titled to describe the stages of Mountain’s life using heavily symbolic phrases like “Rough Water, Tippy Canoes.” Short sections wander through time to relate milestones, inner musings, and even a retelling of Martin Luther King’s assassination in the work’s nonlinear structure. For readers interested in northern Indigenous communities, and both Dene history and the history of residential schools, From Bear Rock Mountain guides you across this terrain with a charming narrator despite a dark past. Mountain has managed to find personal and creative success despite the horrors visited upon him and his people. It is a story of resilience, reflection, and more than one or two rambling but fascinating detours.

Modern Fables Mikka Jacobsen Freehand Press, 2022 240 pages isbn: 9781990601217 $22.95 Reviewed by Tianna Vertigan

Mikka Jacobsen’s Modern Fables has been touted as a book about love, but it is so much more. With six previously published, and four new, essays bookended by contrasting events—a funeral and a wedding— the collection provides a middle ground where love as feeling and

concept meet. At its heart, though, Modern Fables explores belonging.

demonstrate that I understood the complexities of the task at hand.”

As she navigates being raised in conservative Calgary, grappling with misogynistic attitudes and beliefs, Jacobsen admits she is “forever careful to protect a man’s feelings.” She has room for growth, but this self-awareness and humility is precisely why Modern Fables belongs on feminists’ bookshelves.

Clever quips like this one stud a discussion on nudity and shame as uniquely human traits. Jacobsen announces that her cat’s name is “Micah Junior.” She follows up in a footnote: “Yes, we share a name. No one bats an eye when human babies are named after their fathers. Besides, we spell it differently.”

Modern Fables doesn’t promise the narrator will find her other half or a seismic transformation. Although her shift in self-image from a girl who “was portly and moved about in a shy, marsupial-like manner,” to a confident woman who let lettuce hang from her mouth on a Tinder date, Jacobsen’s progress does not eclipse her darkest desires.

“By Hook or By Crook” introduces textile work and a discussion on sexist attitudes within the creative sphere, acne, Jareds, and winecoolers. Her titular essay is a fable using catfish to present lying as folly.

Rather than discarding her formative experiences as relics of a raunchy teenage past, she is honest with readers in her search for love. In fact, she embraces this part of the search by refusing to equate maturity with settling down and woman with tame. However, while romance (of some sort) is anecdotally present in each essay, Jacobsen’s true gifts lie beyond her dating life. In “Promotional Material,” an essay about the female body on display, Jacobsen discusses its power and complicated relationship with control. Her dry humour is particularly evident as she chronicles her time working as a (seasonal) Mascot Assistant: “I was told that children, near mascots, have a tendency to punch, which I said I knew all about, having once been punched back by a Dairy Queen cone. ‘Neither the child nor the cone’s fault,’ I added, wanting to

Occasionally, Jacobsen corroborates her stories with personal photos. While readers may feel privileged to see the author dressed as Clifford the Big Red Dog, there aren’t enough throughout to justify their use. Despite Jacobson’s relatable blunders and self-deprecating humour, Modern Fables is not a feel-good self-help book for lonely middleaged women, nor a warning for 20-somethings of the horrors to come. It is an invitation to question a society that makes women question themselves and their place in it. Répondez s’il vous plaît—the response is overdue. Jacobsen’s essays have been featured in Prairie Fire, The Fiddlehead, Lit Hub, and The Puritan. Her fiction appeared in Joyland, Canada and Beyond, The Anti-Languorous Project, and Luma Quarterly. She was the winner of subTerrain’s Lush Triumphant Award in 2017, and her titular essay has been longlisted for The New Quarterly’s 2019 Edna Staebler Personal Essay Contest. Book Reviews

Becky Citra’s 23rd ya novel, Rachel Bird, features a 15-year-old girl separated from all she knows during a summer on a remote ranch. Rachel and her precocious six-year-old sister, Jane, are even closer now after their mother’s death, especially as they face family they didn’t know they had.

Rachel Bird Becky Citra Second Story Press, 2022 289 pages isbn: 9781772602432 $14.95 Reviewed by Kirsten Dayne

The central mystery of the book lies in why their mother Layla left her parents in the first place, and why she stayed away for so long. The girls stay with their Uncle Rob and his wife Aleksandra for a while before being sent to the ranch. The couple has just returned to Canada after leaving Aleksandra’s homeland, Poland. They aren’t particularly equipped, nor inclined, to look after two surprise nieces. When they get to the Bird family’s ranch near the fictional community of Aspen Lake, bc (not too far from 100 Mile House), Rachel is already thinking about executing “Plan A.”—She will bus back to Vancouver as soon as she’s sure her sister will be safe. However, the longer they stay there, the more Rachel learns about their mother. She rode horses and liked origami, so Rachel takes up these hobbies in an effort to feel closer to her. Both her skill and confidence progress as the story does, and Rachel’s escape plans descend through the alphabet, never quite leading to departure. When Rachel discovers a name on one of her mother’s origami butterflies, Stephanie, it begs a series of questions. Who is she? What really happened to their other uncle who died about a year prior? Why did their Uncle Rob leave Aspen Lake as soon as he graduated, and was it the same reason their mother did? Does it have to do with the secret their grandparents, Margaret and Wayne, are obviously keeping? How much does she trust the grandparents she grew up without?

Book Reviews

The answer to the last question changes day by day. Rachel is lonely, with only Jane and her therapist, who she started seeing after their mother’s death, as part of her circle. As she warms up to their new-found grandparents and the idea of living in a small community, she makes new friends in Jason and Cody and their friendship helps her branch out further. In the process, she stumbles upon family secrets and clues to solving the mystery. This novel has short five-page chapters, something younger or reluctant readers might appreciate. Citra uses texts, handwriting from their mother or second uncle, how-tos, and Jane’s growing list of favourite foods to differentiate them from the main text. Rachel’s close narration of events invites empathy with her struggle. Rachel Bird is a book about death, loss, and grief, parentification, secrets, and guilt. It talks about these subjects without coddling either Rachel or the reader, but also without going into great detail. Rachel reveals information slowly because of her own repression and in order to prioritize Jane, so readers have to piece the story together. Despite dealing with heavy topics, this multidimensional story also includes light-hearted moments that round out a reading experience we highly recommend. Becky Citra lives on a ranch in bc, obvious inspiration for the setting of Rachel Bird. She spends winters on Saltspring Island. As a retired schoolteacher, she enjoys connecting with children through library and school visits. Her recent titles include Murder at the St. Alice, Duke’s Den, Finding Grace, and The Griffin of Darkwood. Awards for her writing include the Moonbeam Children’s Book Award, SYRC Willow Award, and Red Cedar Award.

with different characters connecting with one another in unexpected ways. The interconnectedness of the strangers shows how easily they can relate to one another and impact each other’s lives, despite having different upbringings. Nepal has gained attention from international aid organizations since the devastating 2015 earthquake. That same year, the Nepalese government drafted a new constitution.

All of Us in Our Own Lives Manjushree Thapa Freehand Books, 2018 315 pages isbn: 9781988298344 $21.95 Reviewed by Nittu Prasai

Inspired by true events, All of Us in Our Own Lives is a story that deliberately intends to expose the issues of a social exclusion, patriarchy, and loss of identity. The novel begins with the tale of Ava, her cynical work life, and her marriage in Canada. Ava leaves her corporate job to trace her roots in her motherland, Nepal. One of the story’s main characters, Indira Sharma, is a leading gender advocacy expert who aims to be the first female Nepali leader of an ngo. The two meet and resolve personal and professional issues in the process. We also meet Sapana, an orphan who, driven by loneliness, crosses the Indian border with the support of a women’s organization. This is a bold move even though she is joining a friend working as domestic help near Delhi. Her brother, Gyanu, has moved to Dubai, working in a restaurant as one of many migrant workers. Gyanu returns to settle his sister’s future after their father has died, as is the son’s responsibility in the family.

All of Us in Our Own Lives is a compelling and thoughtful novel that explores Nepal and its people, with special attention to its diverse array of cultural and ethnic backgrounds. The work is written from an observer’s point of view,

Thapa employs numerous Nepalese dialects, which might not be heard by international readers, and uses her position as a Nepali woman to show her sisters’ struggles. Like her most prominent characters, Thapa was raised in Canada and the us.

Thapa’s themes of identity and displacement suggest Nepal is a transitional country, with most residents living there only temporarily before moving on. She writes “This isn’t a poor country, what it needs is a redistribution of wealth. Aid is preventing Nepal from having a proper revolution.” Thapa also exposes government corruption and its impact on youth fleeing the country in search of positive change for their families. Her authenticity and heart make All of Us in Our Own Lives a captivating and unforgettable read. The book might be of particular interest to women, international students, readers of colour, and others from Nepal. Manjushree Thapa lives in Toronto. She is the author of three other novels—Seasons of Flight, Tilled Earth, and The Tutor of History— and four works of nonfiction about her homeland—The Lives We Have Lost, A Boy from Siklis, Forget Kathmandu, and Mustang Bhot in Fragments. She is the first English writer from Nepal to get published internationally. Her essays and editorials have appeared in The New York Times, The London Review of Books, Newsweek, The Walrus, The Globe and Mail and elsewhere. Her reportage on women in Nepal’s Maoist war have been published in Despatches from Grey Zone by the Centre for Investigative Journalism in Kathmandu. She has edited and introduced a selection of Nepali literature for Words Without Borders. Her column “Nepaliterature,” introduces and translates the works of Nepali poets and writers in The Nepali Times. She has also coauthored A Translation Manual to Bring English Literature to Nepali Readers. Her full bio is available at www.manjushreethapa.com.

Book Reviews

produced by Firebrand Theatre in January 2014. The play describes one miner’s heroic acts during a coal mining disaster in Springhill, Nova Scotia on October 23, 1958. Seventy-five miners were killed and 99 survived when an earth tremor (the “Bump”) collapsed the infrastructure of a large coal mine, trapping men hundreds of metres beneath the earth, some for nine days.

Beneath Springhill: The Maurice Ruddick Story By Beau Dixon Lyrics and Music by Rob Fortin and Susan Newman J. Gordon Shillingford Publishing, 2021 91 pages isbn: 9781927922767 $15.99 Reviewed by Susan Garcia

A note in the script states that “although the play is the author’s fictionalized account of the events… he has used the actual names of the miners and others affected by “the Bump” in tribute to their humanity and resilience.” The full names of the surviving and deceased miners are listed in the dedication. Members of Ruddick’s family were interviewed by Dixon for his research. In her Foreword, Ruddick’s daughter Valerie recalls what her mother was watching on tv when a whistle announced the disaster. Ruddick was a third-generation miner of African-Canadian heritage. He worked in the Number 2 mine as a labourer. When he went to work on the day of the disaster, he left a wife and 12 children at home, with a 13th child expected. Economic necessity forced all the coal miners to take on dangerous conditions to feed their families.

Beneath Springhill: The Maurice Ruddick Story is musical theatre for young adults in book format. It was originally written and performed as a one-man show by Beau Dixon and

Book Reviews

The story begins with Ruddick’s prayerful song when he is trapped underground in the dark, explosions crashing around him. Dixon creates a cbc reporter, Jack, who gives a play-by-play of the disaster. It was the “first major international event to appear on live television broadcasts (on the cbc)” in 1958. Ruddick sings: “Number Two Mine is where I’ll live and die, and never

see the sun shining in the sky. I’m in the devil’s debris from noon to night, but coal provides people with heat and light.” Ruddick loved to sing and in this revisiting of the fateful day, he sings after the mine collapses to keep up the morale of the trapped miners. When Ruddick’s own physical health deteriorates due to lack of food and water, he recalls the lullaby he sang to his children. As the seven key miners await rescue for almost nine days, most embrace Ruddick’s leadership and optimism to stay alive. The dialogue includes a number of miners’ perspectives, as well the voice of his wife, Norma. At first, the direct address to the audience seems awkward, but Dixon imagined one actor playing all characters in all settings. The racism Ruddick experienced is skillfully acknowledged without it overshadowing the heroism of the main event. A miner, Frank, says to Ruddick on the eighth day underground: “You’re just some odd looking coloured that chirps like a twisted canary.” Dixon uses a mining metaphor to characterize racial difference and his importance to everyone’s survival. A 12-page Study Guide compiled by the Firebrand Theatre concludes the book, offering an introduction, a synopsis, scene descriptions, questions and answers, a glossary, and resources. The book also includes sheet music and lyrics for all the songs, plus full- and half-page photos of the Ruddick family. In 2015, the writing team of Beau Dixon, Susan Newman, and Rob Fortin won a Dora Mavor Moore Award in Toronto for Outstanding New Play/ ya Division. Beau Dixon has also won many awards for acting and production.

But the sun, and the ships, and the fish, and the waves. is a brave exploration of memory, grief, addiction, and trauma that begins with a dedication: “For anyone with dark dreams and questioned memories. I believe you.” In Conyer Clayton’s second book of poetry, the narrator struggles to cope with cptsd (complex post-traumatic stress disorder) and questions both her memories and reality. This dream diary is composed of 72 poems that move toward truth and survival. The reader’s introduction to the dreamscape is both a warning and a comfort: “It ends with our lips pursed upward over slow-rising lake water.” But the sun, and the ships, and the fish, and the waves. Conyer Clayton Anvil Press, 2022 96 pages isbn: 9781772141924 $18.00 Reviewed by Sam Bollinger

The prose poems get lost in dreamy tangential details, conflicting imagery, and unexpected humour. In expansive vignettes, the dreamer visits sunglasses kiosks, scrolls through Instagram, and takes her pet pig to the beach. Her body is “sprinkled across the world—picnic blanket, towel, a shell in a jar on a desk, the bottom of a man-made lake.” Yet with Clayton’s sharp language, the poems always find their way to the surface, often ending with a question. In this way the dreamer’s haunting uncertainty resonates onto the next page: “Am I to blame for not saying something sooner?” “Is this what swallows me in the end?” Water appears in nearly every poem and is a conduit for Clayton’s lyrical prose. The dreamer finds herself in waterfalls and waterparks, still ponds, and deadly oceans. Through careful repetition, the narrative crashes over itself in waves, simultaneously washing away the dreamer’s pain and threatening to overtake her. As she copes with the loss of her mother, the dreamer slips through

time to revisit her youth: “My sisters and I are children, playing in the empty lot. I recognize our hair in the tall grass. I’m your future self, I yell.” Her stepfather “crouches in the living room. Light avoids him… He stands strangely still and his eyes don’t leave us. A threat in his posture.” Clayton does not hide from the consequences of unearned trust in “Transmission”: “The animal is translucent, his veins mapping poison….” The dreamer wakes in untitled verse poems that interject with fragments as she tries to make sense of the distant memories that pull at her subconscious. As the speaker voices her fears, Clayton revises her statements, striking through the text in a powerful rejection of her doubts: “it was my fault… no one believes me.” It is the poet and not the dreamer who speaks in the collection’s final poem, “Brand.” Here, Clayton grapples with the separation of herself and her persona: “You must put the words inside, but you cannot go inside yourself. You must stay out here.” But the sun, and the ships, and the fish, and the waves. is more than a monument to healing. Poems from this collection first appeared in Clayton’s chapbook Trust Only the Beasts in the Water as well as in numerous literary magazines including The Capilano Review, BlueHouse Journal, and Augur. Conyer Clayton’s debut collection, We Shed Our Skin Like Dynamite, won the 2021 Ottawa Book Award and was a finalist for the 2021 ReLit Award for Poetry. She won The Capilano Review’s 2019 Robin Blaser Poetry Prize and Arc’s 2017 Diana Brebner Prize. She has released two albums and eight chapbooks.

Book Reviews

CONTRIBUTOR Ellen Addison is completing a double major in Creative Writing and Media Studies. She is a painter who enjoys using discarded materials. Her chapbook Poems of the Heart was published in 1998. “Waves of Abundance,” “Freedom from the Pain of the Past,” and “Heaven is Home” are her first publications in Portal. Liz Baltzer is a fourth-year Creative Writing major. She earned a ba in History and English in 2011. In 2012, she moved to Yokohama, Japan for seven years and returned to Canada in 2019. She is a Fiction Editor and on the Social Media team for the 2023 issue of Portal and her short story “Shōganai” appears in this issue. Sam Bollinger is a third-year Creative Writing and English student. She is a Poetry and Copy Editor for Portal 2023 and co-interviewed M. NourbeSe Philip and Délani Valin. Her poem “Burials” appeared in Arc. Her review of But the sun, and the ships, and the fish, and the waves. and two of her poems, “Magnolia Season” and “Vertebrate Heart,” appear here. Robert Bowerman is a part-time Creative Writing student whose work has appeared, or will appear, in The White Wall Review, The Anti-Lang Project, Sea and Cedar, New Reader, The Navigator, and on the Nanaimo Arts Council (nac) website. In 2022, he won the Islands Short Fiction contest, and in 2018 and 2019 received honourable mentions. In 2022, he won second prize in the nac Ekphrastic Poetry contest. He received the Meadowlarks Award for short fiction and the Bill Juby Award. His poem “Cold Comfort” and his non-fiction piece “Forgetting Is So Long” both appear in this issue. Barbara Burgardt is an aspiring Latin American writer and third-year Creative Writing student. This is her first year working on Portal as a Fiction Editor, a Portfolio Series Coordinator, and as a member of the Social Media team. Her work “As Strong As an Ox” appears in this issue. Emma Cannell is a second-year student with an interest in Psychology, Language, and Hospitality. She has been an artist for more than 20 years and in more than 20 media. Her photographs “Flower Power,” “Trestle Trekking,” “Vanilla Petals,” and “Misty Morning” appear in this issue. She was chosen to be part of the Youth Outreach Program for young artists in the Cowichan Valley, providing access to a mentor, art shows, and venues. Since then, her work has been shown in the Ladysmith Art Gallery, and for sale in markets in the Cowichan Valley and in Chemainus. She has been commissioned to do portraits and to create miniature plush foods. Tammi Carto is a third-year Creative Writing student. This is her second year working on Portal, this time as Co-Managing Editor after being a Fiction Editor and on the Social Media team last year. She is working on a collection of linked short stories called Left Turns. In 2022, her poem “Inter/section” was published in Portal and she won the Bill Juby Award. Her non-fiction story “A New Leaf ” is included in this issue. Wayne Chang is a digital illustrator in the video game industry. In the fall of 2022, he began studying part-time to pursue his passion for creative writing. “The Bone Thief ” is his first publication. Jack Corfield is a third-year Creative Writing and Media Studies student. He is Audio Editor at The Navigator producing podcasts, and is President of viu’s Salmon Run Logan Crickmore

BIOGRAPHIES Creative Writing Club. His script “Slow Burn” and digital artworks “Astral Girl” and “Vaporous Rock” appear in this issue. He is Co-Managing Editor for Portal 2023 and was Poetry Editor and av Editor for Portal 2022. Alyssa Coristine is in their fourth year as an English major. They attended a writing workshop with Kelly Armstrong in 2016 in their hometown of Grande Prairie, ab. Their two works in the magazine, “Bloom” and “Right Turns,” were developed with the support of the viu Creative Writing Club. Logan Crickmore is a second-year Media Studies and Journalism student. His photographs “Late Night Journey Home,” “Myra Falls,” “Salmon Run,” “Afternoon Ride,” and “Lonely Sailboat” are his first publications. He also has an interest in videography and acquiring the tools and experience to tell stories across media. Rachel Davidson is working towards her ba in Geography, with a minor in Earth Science. She is this year’s Portent prize-winner for her non-fiction story “Free and Hard” and an essay contest winner in the first-year category for English 125. Her photograph “Desolation Sound” also appears in this issue. In the last five years she has lived in and traveled to 24 countries. Kirsten Dayne is a Creative Writing major in her fifth and final year, an aspiring novelist, and a sometimes-artist. Her photograph “Leaving Red” appears in this issue, as does her review of Rachel Bird. Her short story “Only Human” was published in Portal 2022. She is the Acquisitions Editor for Portal 2023, and was a Fiction Editor and the Book Review Editor for Portal 2022. She studied fashion design before realizing writing was her true passion. Susan Garcia is taking classes in Creative Writing, History, and Indigenous Studies after earning a Social Services Worker Certificate from College of the Cariboo, and a ba in English and a Liberal Arts Certificate from sfu. “Homestead Murder” and “My Mysterious Great-Great Grandma” were published in The Trail of 1858: British Columbia’s Gold Rush Past and the article “Upriver Captain, Downriver Family Man” was published in the journal British Columbia History. Her non-fiction work “Wrapped, Unwrapped, and Wrapped Again” was published in Portal 2022. This year, she was a Portfolio Series Coordinator for the fall of 2022 and reviewed Beneath Springhill: The Maurice Ruddick Story. Ann Hoffmann is a Computer Science and Creative Writing student. Their writing has appeared in In Our Own Teen Voice 2019 and 2020. Their short story “Would You Show Me How?” appears in this issue. Bella Hoodle is a second-year English and Creative Writing student. Her poem “Jesus Is a Water Strider” appears in this issue as does her review of Shapeshifters. She is a Poetry Editor for Portal 2023, Arts Editor for The Navigator, Editorial Assistant for Wordstorm, and Vice-President of viu’s Creative Writing Club. Taylor Iverson is a third-year student majoring in Creative Writing with a minor in Liberal Studies. She is interested in environmental issues, literature, and arts and culture reporting. She has published with YogiTimes, and was the Book Review Editor and on the Social Media team for Portal 2023. Her non-fiction work “Meeting Kapok” and review of From Bear Rock Mountain appear in this issue.

Nicole Kaastra is a queer writer from Manitoba in her third year studying Creative Writing and History. She is a Fiction Editor for Portal 2023, as well as part of the Social Media team. Her short story “Nothing Is Cast in Stone” appears in this issue as does her review of Cooking Tips for Desperate Fishwives. Alexis King is a writer, poet, and student getting a ba in Creative Writing. Her poem “Andromeda’s (re)Turn” appears in this issue. Kashmir Lesnick-Petrovicz is completing a ba in Visual Arts and Global Studies. Her work has appeared in Progressions 2019 and other art shows at viu and the University of Guelph. She won the Photography Award of Excellence in 2019. Her photographs have appeared in Portal 2020 and in 2021, when she was Art Director. Her photographs “Stop Sign,” “Old Growth,” and “Surfer” appear in this issue. Hannah Macza started her Creative Writing degree at Selkirk, where she developed stories under Leesa Dean and Almeida Miller. At viu she is majoring in Creative Writing and Journalism and has had the play Life is Ridiculous performed in viu’s 2023 One Act Festival. Her non-fiction piece “How Did I End Up Here?” is in this issue of Portal. Amy Mattes holds an Anti-Oppressive Social Work degree from the University of Victoria and is pursuing a ba in Creative Writing. Her essay, “How my ‘Furbaby’ became a Postpartum Support Dog” was published in The Globe and Mail, and her debut novel Late September is forthcoming with Nightwood Editions. She is represented by Chelene Knight of Transatlantic Agency. Her short story “Vilomah” appears in this issue. Bethany Morley is a second-year Bachelor of Education student, focusing on English and Biology. They are a recipient of a viu President’s Scholarship and their poem “Angel of Appalachia” in this issue of Portal is their first published work. James O’Reilly is pursuing a ba in Graphic Design. His work has been published on the cover of Portal 2022 and his photographs “Bam” and “Some Places Are Cooler Than Others” appear in this issue. Nittu Prasai was born and raised in Taplejung in the Himalayas of Nepal. She is now in her third year at viu, majoring in Creative Writing. She has attended several workshops and readings around bc. “What Kind of Mother” is part of a memoir in progress and was excerpted in Portal 2022. This year she is a Non-fiction Editor and her work “The Roof of the World” and review of All of Us in Our Own Lives appears in this issue. Yvonne Salsman is a returning viu student, currently in the Early Childhood Education program. Her non-fiction story “Birds of a Feather” appears in this issue. Seth Scott is currently completing a ba in Politics and Journalism. In 2021, he received a scholarship to attend the Photo Evidence workshop in southern France. He has traveled to over 80 nations, and extensively in Lebanon, Iraq, Afghanistan, Egypt, Somalia, and the Sudan. He also completed The Mongol Rally, a charity intercontinental road trip from the United Kingdom to Mongolia. His photographs “Afghan Swan,” “Flamingo,” “Snowy River,” “Mount Washington,” “Pack of Cigarettes,” and “Kenya Sunrise” appear in this issue. He is the Art Director and an AV Editor for Portal 2023. Sabrina Smith is pursuing a ba with a major in Philosophy and a minor in History. Her photographs “Spider Web,” “Robin,” and “Simplicity” appear in this issue. Verioska Solano is a second-year mature student in Creative Writing. She works as a neonatal nurse at Nanaimo Regional General Hospital and was born in Santiago, Lonely Sailboat Logan Crickmore

Chile, where she lived until immigrating to Canada at 19. She is writing stories of life here and abroad in a memoir-in-progress. Her non-fiction piece “A Pocket Full of Promise” appears in this issue. Mick Sweetman is pursuing a ba in Media Studies and History. He is President of the Photography & Videography Club and won the L.C. Parkin Memorial Award. He received an honourable mention for Volunteer of the Year by the National Campus and Community Radio Association. His photo was a finalist for the John H. McDonald Photo of the Year Award, and his labour reporting was shortlisted by the Canadian University Press and the Canadian Association of Journalists. His photographs have appeared in rabble.ca, Toronto Life, and This!, and he has written for Briarpatch, Canadian Dimension, Clamor, The Dialog, and Vox. He currently works as the Western Editor for Politics Today, covering the bc and Alberta legislatures. His photographs “Sunset Paddle,” “Moon,” and “Whale Wave” appear in this issue. Beatrix Taylor has taken classes in viu’s Visual Arts, English, and Creative Writing departments. She has hosted improv shows and is a Non-fiction Editor for Portal 2023 and a Portfolio Series Coordinator. Her interview with Margot Fedoruk appears in this issue. Kath Van Doorn is a second-year Creative Writing student studying fiction and poetry. “Two Peas in a Pod” is her first piece published in Portal and is part of a longer work entitled Slipping Away. Her work “Barriers” appeared in the poetry anthology Alone but Not Alone: Poetry in Isolation in 2020, and her work “In Sickness and in Health” appeared in Sea & Cedar in 2021. Her writing often focuses on people living with Alzheimer’s. She is currently working on a YA novel. Tianna Vertigan is a fourth-year Creative Writing major and Studies in Women and Gender minor. She is a Poetry and Copy Editor and the Web Designer for Portal 2023. In addition to this year’s co-authored Gustafson Feature, her poem “Shell Shocked” and review of Modern Fables are her first publications in Portal. She is also the current Copy Editor for The Navigator. She has received both the Barry Broadfoot and Meadowlarks Awards. Gabriel Villasmil is a Latinx and queer actor/drag queen/writer who has been published in The Ants of the Elves Hotel anthology and contributed to the Portal 2020 issue as a Script Editor. Their film and tv credits include: The Informant (2023), Butterflies (2022), Lover (2022), Cuello (2021), Imaginary Mary (2017) and Minority Report (2015). They also produce a monthly poc drag show in Vancouver that focuses on the history of poc communities in Canada. Their poem “Up in Smoke” appears in this issue. Brendan Wanderer is a fifth-year Creative Writing and Visual Arts student. He previously attended Nova Scotia Community College, graduating with an Honours Diploma in Screen Arts. His short film Leave Pizza Here was a selection in the 2016 Atlantic Film Festival. His artwork “Primal Scream” and script “Conrad Knows Best,” appear in this issue, the latter adapted from his graphic memoir Dads R Us. His script “The Talk,” photo “Electric Neuron,” and visual art “Now/Then, Now” appeared in Portal 2022 for which he was Art Director and a Non-fiction Editor. Jayne Wright is a third-year Creative Writing student at viu after focusing on journalism at Kwantlen. She was the recipient of the Meadowlarks Award in 2022, has had several articles published in The Runner, and an essay published in The Octopus Spirit Journal. Her non-fiction work “Bushed” and her photograph “Bianca’s Toolkit” appear in this issue of Portal. She was on the Social Media team for Portal 2023. Whale Wave Mick Sweetman

It starts with a submission All the Quiet Places A Novel by Brian Thomas Isaac

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CONTRIBUTORS Ellen Addison

Alexis King

Liz Baltzer

Kashmir Lesnick-Petrovicz

Sam Bollinger

Hannah Macza

Robert Bowerman

Amy Mattes

Barbara Burgardt

Bethany Morley

Emma Cannell

James O’Reilly

Tammi Carto

Nittu Prasai

Wayne Chang

Yvonne Salsman

Jack Corfield

Seth Scott

Alyssa Coristine

Sabrina Smith

Logan Crickmore

Verioska Solano

Rachel Davidson

Mick Sweetman

Kirsten Dayne

Beatrix Taylor

Susan Garcia

Kath Van Doorn

Ann Hoffmann

Tianna Vertigan

Bella Hoodle

Gabriel Villasmil

Taylor Iverson

Brendan Wanderer

Nicole Kaastra

Jayne Wright

Band-E- Amir National Park, a chain of six lakes in the Hindu Kush Mountain range, became the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan’s first and only national park in 2009. In August of 2021, after 20 years of Western occupation, and nine months after this photo was taken, the us withdrew the last of its troops and handed Afghanistan back to the Taliban regime. It then seized $7 billion from Afghanistan’s central bank and many ngos left the country. These actions plunged Afghanistan into humanitarian crisis. unicef estimates 24 of its 38 million citizens are currently in need, half of which are children. Afghanistan is also now the world’s most oppressive country for women. In December 2022 the Taliban officially prohibited 2.5 million women from pursuing education beyond Grade 6. Portal, as a university-based magazine, stands with the women and girls of Afghanistan in demanding their full equal rights be recognized and reinstated. To learn more, protest, and contribute please visit: Malala.org, Human Rights Watch (hrw.org), WomenforWomen.org or Canadian Women for Women in Afghanistan (CW4WAfghan.ca).

Cover Design by Chloe de Beeld Afghan Swans by Seth Scott

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