Music
by Sydney Wagner
Humans, in our cruelness, do not deserve music. We devastate and destroy and take advantage of what others create. We stab it on a spit and roast it ‘til it’s crisp, drooling, licking our lips as we stare at it, scorched and overplayed, inattentive in our boredom until the salivating ceases once presented with a rare, beautiful creature, a beast that mirrors my reflection. Alive, it nurtures me with a tentative hand. How is it that my destruction and devastation, my cruelness is rewarded with medicine? I’ll drink myself sick on it.
15
Bipolar Kingdom by Priscila Flores
An amusement park exists within my brain. Some days I ride the rollercoasters, some days I stick to dark rides, pushed by a slow-moving stream of recycled water. I much prefer the rollercoasters. The violent pull of the wind, the stomach-churning drops inciting uncontrollable laughter, and that submission to the chance of being flung off the tracks, landing miles away in a heap of indistinguishable parts. But through the excitement exists that back-of-the-mind anxiety that it’ll all be over soon. So when I’m on that roller coaster and the opportunistic panic of making every moment last settles in, my neurons violently vibrate.
I’m on my feet. In the air. Outside. Inside. Outside. Inside. Jumping. Running. Screaming. Singing. I’m outside. Two miles away. Screaming. Jumping. I’m inside. Writing. Writing. Writing. Jumping. Singing. Screaming. I’m outside. Writing. Running. Writing. Jumping. The air reeks of word vomit. Running. Screaming. Writing. Inhaling, exhaling, or something in between.
16
