Healthcare System in the United States by Rida Hirani

The Clouds of the South By Alex Phillips

The people in the kudzu take trains that go nowhere and laze on lifeless porches waiting for the rain. Mythic giants smothered by endless green blankets are quiet under the sun, but whisper through the cicada rattle as you lay down your head. They are giraffes and dinosaurs and skyscrapers in the city streets, but old gods in the quiet sticks that only tell you of their magic when you are as still as them. They tell you the lives of the graves they’ve smothered and of the initial-carved trees that will never meet another pair of lovers, and of the overgrown paths that will never again feel boots stomp along its dirt. You hear the laughter of the schoolhouses enraptured by leaves and the bustle of the mill buried in vines. Old gods to whom you can’t pray. Old gods for whom no hymns are written. But old gods that watch over you, waiting for the sun to set, waiting to tell you “goodnight.”

Alex Phillips is a junior professional writing major from Greenville, SC. When she isn’t tutoring in the Lander Writing Center, she devotes her time to reading and writing Southern gothic and horror fiction. Through her work, she gives almost every ounce of glory to God, saving a few ounces for the teachers and professors that have inspired her along the way. This is her first publication in New Voices.

2011 Asia Childs

Asia Childs is a sophomore majoring in Digital Media Production and minoring in painting/drawing. She is a member of the Animeniacs here at Lander. A piece of her artwork has been featured in the 2021 Student Juried Exhibition and her piece titled 2011 currently hangs in Lander’s library.