Saxifrage 41 by Saxifrage

S axifrage

Volume 41

2015

Saxifrage is an annual anthology featuring the work of students, faculty, staff, and alumni from Pacific Lutheran University. All submissions were judged anonymously by the editors and a group of student volunteers. Saxifrage was designed in Adobe InDesign CS6, set in Aparajita, and printed by Johnson-Cox Printing Company of Tacoma, Washington on post-consumer recycled materials. Cover art & flysheet designed by Kelly McLaughlin ‘14. “A Sort of a Song” by William Carlos Williams, from Collected Poems 1939-1962, Volume II. Copyright © 1944 by William Carlos Williams Reprint by permission of New Directions Publishing Corporation

letter from the editors This book is for you, dear reader. Put it in your back pocket. Place it on your coffee table. Read it in one night. Read it over five years. Dogear the pages. Keep it nice and clean. Write love letters in the margins. Tear out a page. Tear out two. Put them on your wall and paint over them. This book is for you to do what you will. But as you flip through these pages, we encourage you to feel the weight of each one in your hand. Feel how each image (flowers, waves, birds, candle flames, fields, spiders, night skies, ripped shreds of paper) echoes an intention, a deliberate actâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;the creation of art. Create. Meg DolDe anD Jakob Maier Saxifrage 41 Co-editors

tAble of Contents

The ripper SeTTer DanDelionS WheaT FielDS The lonelieST Whale in The Sea birDS anD STuFF eonS The lichen STory beFore FirST FroST cuero y cuervo painTing #1 naTure oF DiviniTy unDer The coSMoS Sleepy Squirrel neW beginningS youTh culTure

aMoa hoMe

8 11 12 13 14 15 17 18 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32

Kyle stoCKer Christopher W. holComb CAtherine grAhAm KAi mArtin russell AmAriAh Clift Kyle stoCKer Kyrie benson CAmeron W. Kobes sArA neWmAn dAnielle tWiChel mAddison brAy Kevin mAxWell lester frAnK l. edWArds KAtherine depreKer CArA gillespie rizelle rosAles CAris ristoff KAtherine depreKer

an elegy For a birD a Day in The liFe oF a level Five huMan FeMale haiku De Java TranScenDenceS ocean arMS blue Moon ranch roManian nighTS unTiTleD vicToria STreeT. inTaglio prinT, 2014 Wave breaker DreaM Weaver SelecTionS FroM “caTechiSM” Four July 4Th i Will never be aS SucceSSFul aS My SiMS ThaT reSonance i aM hoW DoeS one loSe a poeM?

33 36 39 40 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 61 62 63 64 65 67

luKe gillespie CAlley odum dreW Johnson Kyrie benson luKe gillespie lAuren leybA CArA gillespie sArAh Jung JAsper sortun elly vAdseth elly vAdseth sAmuel ryAn dAnielle villAnuevA AngelA shier AngelA shier siri WAldoW siri WAldoW KAi mArtin russell

a SorT oF a Song Let the snake wait under his weed and the writing be of words, slow and quick, sharp to strike, quiet to wait, sleepless. â&#x20AC;&#x201D;through metaphor to reconcile the people and the stones. Compose. (No ideas but in things) Invent! Saxifrage is my flower that splits the rocks. WilliAm CArlos WilliAms

the ripper Kyle stoCKer

“Alright class, today we’re going to learn about poetry. Now take out your scalpels.” Billy raised his hand. “Excuse me,” he said, very confused. Mrs. Butcher, the teacher, glared at him over her glasses. “What is it this time, Billy?” “I just…I thought you said to take out our scalpels.” “Yes, Billy, that’s exactly what I said. Now take out your scalpel.” “But…I don’t have one.” “You don’t have one?!” “I’m afraid not.” “All the other kids have scalpels!” “Well, you see, I’ve never needed one before.” Mrs. Butcher rolled her eyes. “Share with your neighbor,” she grumbled. Billy shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “Now class!” exclaimed Mrs. Butcher, “I’m giving you copies of some of the great American classics. Today we’re going to learn how to dissect them.” Billy jumped from his seat. “Excuse me!” he cried. “What?!” snapped Mrs. Butcher. “I just…I thought you said we were going to ‘dissect’ the poetry.” “Yes, Billy, that’s exactly what I said! We’re going to dissect them into little tiny pieces!” Billy gasped. “But…why?!” “Don’t ask questions! Now, everyone take your scalpels like this. Very good. Now place your scalpel over the poem, like this, and make 8

sure your hand is very firm and ruthless. Excellent! Now here’s the important part. Watch closely.” Mrs. Butcher sliced the poem in half. Billy shrieked. “Quiet!” She took the two halves and placed them neatly over her desk under the lamplight. “Now we can get a good look at it.” She scanned it closely with her bug eyes. When she found something interesting she ripped it with her scalpel, this way and that, like a wolf tearing flesh from the bones. When she was finished there was a mess of paper shreds on the desk and floor, and she was sweating almost as hard as she breathing. Billy was too horrified to speak. “Alright class,” said Mrs. Butcher, wiping her lips. “Your turn.” Everyone except Billy turned, without question, and started ripping away. Billy gaped at them in disbelief. They looked like savages, hungry and vicious, saliva dripping from their mouths. “Why aren’t you ripping?” said Mrs. Butcher. “I...I…” “Don’t look at me like that! Rip!” “But…” “But what, Billy?” “I don’t—“ “Spit it out!” “Shouldn’t we just read the poems?” Everyone stopped. Little white shreds fluttered across the room like snow. “What did you say?” said Mrs. Butcher, her eyes wide. Billy gulped. All eyes were on him. “I said, shouldn’t we read the poems? I mean, instead of ripping them apart, shouldn’t we just read them?” 9

There was a moment of silence. And then Mrs. Butcher cocked her head back and laughed. Everyone else laughed too, like a pack of hyenas. “Read the poems!” cried Mrs. Butcher. “What a notion!” “That’s right!” Billy cried, standing on his chair. “We should read them! They’re works of art, not dead animals!” But nobody listened. They turned back to the poems and ripped them apart with their scalpels. Billy watched in horror as the words of his favorite poets flew across the room in shreds. Meanwhile, Mrs. Butcher laughed. Laughed and laughed and laughed…

setter Christopher holComb

Across the fields, wading through the broken grass. I follow the prints, bloody and scattered in the grass. Rain falling heavily along my cheeks, watering the golden grass. Speckled white and black fur, laying broken on the grass. Wind tousling the now red and gold grass. A whistle carries out a last time, above the sea of grass. As I sit next to her, now cold in the red and gold grass.

dAndelions CAtherine grAhAm

Spring evenings they blossomed all at once camouflaged greens casting aside caution, blossoming brilliant, beautiful, bright across the grass. My mother took a spray to them and they faded with the sunset, yellow dropping to the green, green leaves shriveling to the ugliest of browns. The jagged lionâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s-tooth leaves, ruthlessly hopeful, appeared again a week later, and before we could think or spray the flowers returned, golden and glorious and glad, and I ran and danced through them because the flowers had won. Inside, my mother retrieved and redoubled her spray can. Flowers, she told me, are not always good.

WheAt fields KAi mArtin russell

I would always return to gather more flowers and stones to add to my collection. Wheat fields and brick buildings. Lines that will always stay with me and new acquaintances. Pens and birds and ink statues, where a bell chimes. It is noon, now. The sun dances on green, and dark green chokes light green. It is a song of summery days and writing that flows in the stream. Betwixt mist and cirrus, the night would sing a wreath of melodies for me to grasp, string like origami, and weave as best as I could into my notebook.

the loneliest WhAle in the seA AmAriAh Clift

Her arms folded while she danced Around the sand covered glass sea floor Driving away the fish bones and sediment Ripples repelled off of her body She gasped, looked into a mirror and fell quickly She saw only herself that time Her dampened lit cigarette has become tired and lonely Her mouth only moves to allow swallows of milky air through her briny gums Justice sees her and turns its back Hues of voices, a vocal avalanche, taking her briskly by the ankles and toes The grasp of clammy hands and starfish fingers hold her gently; unwillingly Fear follows and hides away around the corner of the ocean She moves fiercely Creating wake and restless sleep The oysters stir in their shells as she passes by.

birds And stuff Kyle stoCKer

We tend to think of birds as quaint, quiet little creatures. They’re not. They are very loud and obnoxious. One morning I awoke to what sounded like a thousand sneezing trumpets in a middle school band. My God, I thought, have they always sounded like this? It was dark still and I couldn’t go back to sleep, so I turned on my lamp and just listened. One sounded like a cat had just been stepped on. Another sounded desperate for a female lover. There was one that screeched screw you early bird! One just laughed at them all. I couldn’t believe it— they were blasphemously loud! But, God, it was so wonderful… 15

I spent the rest of the morning listening to this obnoxious music. Which turned out to be quite peaceful for one who was all alone.

eons Kyrie benson

I was born, and I will die, and so will all the world, but I can find no sorrow in transience: I am the brief glow of a cigarette lit in a passing car, the water waiting at the lip of the precipice before spilling over, the firefly, the purple crocus, the raindrop hitting the pavement, the airplane ascending, lights flashing, into the fog, that becomes first distant lightning, then nothing. I dreamt this morning that I was silk shredded by a voracious wind, caught piece by piece like leaves on bare branches. Already the memory is fading. Leaf, birdsong, candle flame, rainstorm, birthday partyâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; These things pass, and are the more beautiful for passing. A mayfly is a miracle that lives twenty-four scant hours, a human a miracle that lives perhaps a hundred years, a cliff a miracle that water erodes in aching slowness, drop by drop over a thousand eons. One day the sun will expand, not in terms of inches or feet but in terms of astronomical units, ninety-three million miles, and the glowing, white hot giant will engulf Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars like crumbs. My dream this morning? I woke laughing. 17

the liChen story CAmeron W. Kobes

I don’t get a name in this story. Hell, why would I? I’m not the one having the dream. The one having the dream, he has a name. I’m just a freak his subconscious cooked up. How do you like that? I’ve got no identity; I’m just made of pieces his mind put together. You ask me, I drew the short stick in a bad way. But who asks me? I’m not even a character. The dreamer’s the character. He probably thinks this whole thing is about him. Damn him; he can think what he wants. I don’t care what he thinks, as long as he doesn’t do anything to me. It’s a desert, this place. Flat, red, dry. There’s an asphalt road going off into the distance both ways. Is it east and west? Is it north and south? Hard to say. This is dream country. There are no directions. Looking at a blue sky overhead, no clouds. He doesn’t dream about clouds, I guess. He does dream about gas stations though, that’s where I am. If you have a road in the middle of the desert, you need a gas station. I suppose that makes sense. But, this gas station is some kind of crazy! The gas pump here, looks like that rust on it’s a hundred years old. And this building, what kind of gas station has a building like that? Two-story-tall gas station, how do you like that? Up on stilts, with a set of stairs going up to it. Here I am, sitting on the stairs, just a character in somebody else’s dream. What’s this on me, on the building? I’m coated with this stuff, what is it? Oh, lord. Lichens. This whole building is covered in these glowing-green dried-up lichens. And as far as I can tell, I’m part of the building. My ass is stuck down on this step, and these lichens are coating every inch of my body. Am I even wearing clothes? I can’t tell. The lichens are on everything. Except my eyes, seems like they aren’t covered up. Shit. I can’t blink. The jerk didn’t think to dream me up some eyelids. What an asshole. Hey, here’s something. I can see really well, and I can just barely 18

move my neck to look around. It’s only a little, but it’s enough to see a bit more of the desert. Just the red desert, sand going on for miles and miles and miles. Not much help though. Look, but don’t touch, that’s what the dreamer’s given me. Damn. These lichens are starting to itch. Oh, hey, I think I found our dreamer. Looks to me like he’s in a town way down the road, outside the desert. Can’t see much of the town though, that’s all pretty indistinct. I can only make out the building he’s in. Looks like a cheap fast-food restaurant, people sitting at plastic tables eating burgers, everything is red and yellow, they’re giving cash to cashiers… That’s a lot of cash though. And there, under that golden arch, that’s a vault. What kind of restaurant has a vault? Oh, I get it. He’s dreaming about a combined bank and restaurant. Weird thing to dream about, you ask me. But what do I know? He’s calling the shots. I’m just here, living his dream. Here’s our guy. He’s at a table laughing, with a bunch of people staring at him like he’s a lunatic. No shoes, no pants, just a t-shirt and his undies. Can’t hear him, but I can read his lips. He’s talking to the people around him, saying to them: “What are you all staring at? This is how I normally dress.” That’s the dreamer. This jerk, dreaming me up so I can have lichens growing out of my skin with their stringy little roots going down into my pores and under my fingernails and up my nostrils and into my ears, goddamn, this itches. They’re watching him like he’s crazy, and he laughs it all off. He still thinks this is about him. The more I watch him, the more I hate him. Who are they to him? Who am I to him? We’re the thoughts he doesn’t want, he doesn’t need, he doesn’t care about. We’re nothing. We’re shit. He’s getting up, he’s on the road, he’s driving a car my direction. It’ll take him a while to get out here. If only he wouldn’t come here at all. I wish he wouldn’t, I wish he’d leave me alone. But he’s the one calling the shots. It’s his dream, not mine. Okay, here he is. Car pulls up by the pump, he gets out, still in his 19

underwear. He’s looking at me, right over at me. He’s coming to the bottom of the stairs, he stops, he looks up. He looks at me, sitting here with my ass stuck on the stairs because he put me here. This prick, this dreaming asshole, this fucker has the nerve to stick me here with no existence or identity of my own, and stare at me like he doesn’t fucking know me? Who the fuck does he think he is? He looks at me, and he’s scared. It’s all over his face, all over the way he moves. He’s tentative; his palms are sweaty, he’s afraid to speak. When he does speak, he’s got a weak quiver in his voice. “Can…can I buy food here?” he asks. Can you buy food? Can I have my own life? I don’t get what I want, why should you get what you want? None of us get what we want. But I can’t answer. All I can do is sit, lichens growing out of my skin, and stare at this prick. I turn my head slowly, so slowly, and the lichens on my neck just faintly crack. It stings. The effort is tearing my skin open. But is it my pain, or his? I hope to God it’s his. I’m facing straight at him, staring, just staring. All I can do is stare. He tries to look back at me, but he can’t. He averts his eyes and shudders. He’s terrified of me. He’s turning away. He doesn’t dare look me in the face. That’s right, you fucker. Be afraid. Be afraid of what’s in your head, you son-of-a-bitch. How hideous I am to him! But how hideous can I be, when he’s the one who made me? Did I ask to be made monstrous? Is any of this my doing? No, it’s this loathsome dreamer who’s done it! Damn this dreamer, damn him to hell! I hope he dreams of hell later. One can only hope. He’s getting back in the car. There he goes, he’s driving away. But I’m looking down the road that way, as far as I can see, and all I see is desert. Just the desert in his mind, going on for miles. He’ll wake up before he comes to the end of the road. And when he wakes up, that’s the end of me. No more existence for this poor soul with lichens on his body. I’m here for his night, and then I’m gone. Bet he won’t even remember me. But hey, that’s okay. I’m not bitter. The dreamer maketh and the 20

dreamer unmaketh. Sweet dreams unto the dreamer. Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m just gonna sit here, itching, and hope that he wakes up soon.

before first frost sArA neWmAn

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Cuero y Cuervo dAnielle tWiChel

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pAinting #1 mAddison brAy

Oil and Acrylic 25

nAture of divinity Kevin mAxWell lester

Acrylic on Chip Board

under the Cosmos frAnK l. edWArds

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sleepy squirrel KAtherine depreKer

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neW beginnings CArA gillespie

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youth Culture

rizelle rosAles

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AmoA CAris ristoff

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home KAtherine depreKer

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An elegy for A bird luKe gillespie

I stumble through a cemetery 1 hour before hour 23 Halfway warm and halfway cold, Autumn is here, from what I am told Tobacco lingers on my lips But my mouth tastes like salty chips I cannot sleep, I cannot dream So instead I bathe in the moon’s pale gleam The darkness is a welcome friend Tree boughs above both ache and bend I tread on cobblestones well worn Where countless others have come to mourn Gravestones to the west and east But forward, onward, I tread my feet Past deceased teen lovers and old age friends Life proves a struggle, but with death, all things mend A hollow ‘thump’ from a distance away Steals my attention away from the grey A solemn tune lodged in my mind, I trudge ever onward, dark and blind Within the path, not 3 meters ahead An unmoving object, my stomach drops like lead Sauntering forward, I adjust my vision To see something real, not a premonition

A lifeless bird with wings outspread Lies still and prostrate among the buried dead No comrades here to mourn this fallen flier No burial, no eulogy, no funeral pyre I whistle out my solemn tune With hopes it will carry the bird to the moon Or perhaps the stars, blinking above I turn, with one look, and backwards I shove. -

The morning comes, still without sleep In my bed I’ve given up counting sheep Outside the window, crisp and clear The sun appears, sleek and sheer Returning to the outside air I take each step down well-trodden stair Fasten each button and connect every clasp I head to the cemetery without looking back In daylight hours the stones look so dull Less allure, less luster, from when the moon was at its full The graves still lie to the east and the west But I continue forward at my own behest ‘Where lies my avian fellow?’ I think to myself Past the tenth or eleventh stone, perhaps the twelfth Yet no bird appears, its feathers have all gone The poor bird disappeared with the coming of the dawn Instead, in its place, an oak tree stands tall Not one meter to any side of this bird’s tragic fall A tree in its place, I gasp with such shock For a tree to grow so tall with only 12 hours of the clock

But there in its branches sits hundreds of birds Each blacker than the next, I struggle to find words With a loud distant â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;bangâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;, they take to the sky Above, blue turns to black, below, a tear escapes my eye I spot a young, frail bird, struggling to fly.

A dAy in the life of A level 5 humAn femAle CAlley odum

The morning begins by brewing the Potion of Awakening—soy, half-caf, hold the whip. After the potion has taken full effect, the Level 5 Human Female will peruse her armory. Because the average Level 5 Human Female takes ranks in bard and rogue, she is not proficient with heavy armor. Today’s choice is partly plate, but mostly ego. While this offers little in terms of protection, it does come with a pair of mysterious and powerful shoes. Their extra height gives her +5 to intimidation, and grants access to the “Curb Stomping” ability. If this ability is used, there is a 50% chance of the heel snapping along with the victim’s nose. This is generally accepted as a worthy risk. The level 5 Human Female also uses her pre-questing hours to apply her concealer. This grants her a +5 to disguise checks, though who the Female is hiding from has never been made clear. Some NPCs have suggested that the Level 5 Human Female hides from herself, but as these NPCs lack names, I think we can safely disregard both their importance and their opinions. Before advancing any further in her quest line, the Level 5 Human Female must choose the day’s weapon. Crossbows are a popular choice. The distance from battle suits her low health and self-esteem, while still allowing for the subtle but devastating sneak attack she gains from her rogue levels. Words are also a viable choice, for similar reasons. Armor donned, disguise crafted, and weapons safely tucked away, the Level 5 Human Female is ready to begin the day’s quest. A chance encounter with her email sends her scrambling to the aid of Generic Best Friend, level 3. “Come quickly,” it says, “I have information.” But curses! The path is besieged by a variety of Level 4 Human Males of the “Misogynist” subtype! Intimidation checks against this species are ineffective! In a furious onslaught of random encounters, the Level 5 Human Female uses all ammunition for her Words, and is forced to rely on the crossbow to remove the Generic Best Friend from 36

danger. A fashion-tipped arrow lodges deeply enough in a Misogynist’s spine for the Generic Best Friend to pull herself to safety. This is, of course, only the beginning of the quest. The poor, blubbering Generic Best Friend tells her story: Generic Boyfriend Level 5 has done a Terrible Thing that is World-Ending. This is not an unusual quest line for the average Level 5 Human Female. Apocalypses are a common enough occurrence. But our Level 5 does not have the ammunition to deal with this efficiently. She must wait. Half a day stewing in silence ought to refuel her Words. Now properly powered by indignation and rage, our Level 5 Human Female is prepared for the boss battle. She meets him in the gazebo. He is talking on a cellphone, unaware, giving her access to the surprise round, and her Words a +5 to attack! She presses her advantage, takes the offensive, and strikes a blow! He meets with a parry, dodging the question entirely and fires back his own! But she recognizes the feint, and pulls back. He is fool enough to follow, and quicker than a die roll, she’s on to him! In a tangle of cheap shots and low blows, the Level 5 Human Female’s health drops below 20, her self esteem below 0. The Generic Boyfriend—now Generic Ex-Boyfriend, Level 5—is in no better state. As he makes his tactical retreat, the Level 5 Human Female struggles to her feet. She must move quickly or risk an encounter with plundering Misogynists, one she could not survive in her state. A hurried inspection of the battlefield reveals her loot: the Phone of Phrendship! This wondrous artifact acts as a shield. While speaking on the Phone of Phrendship, the Level 5 Human Female is immune to all attacks initiated by Misogynists and Street Hecklers (a branch of the Misogynist subtype). Reveling in her good fortune, the Level 5 Human Female dials up the Generic Best Friend Level 3. The battle is summarized, analyzed, and dissected—down to the last Word—for tidbits of vital information that may have been missed during the original encounter. Conversations between females such as these can last egregious amounts of time, but we can breathe a sigh of relief for our Level 5 Human Female, assured that any intelligence that could be known is known. The quest finished for the day, the female turns her attention to preparing for the next. She shines and repairs her armor—slightly dented

from swords and insults—and she strips the ego and disguise from her body. She tucks her new Phone of Phrendship beneath her pillow, in case any new quest line starts in the night. Before bed, she sets her four alarm spells—one for every 15 minutes, because she knows that the next morning, even a Potion of Awakening will not be enough to coax her from her blankets. As she lays her head upon her pillow, she reviews the day’s experience: 650 XP gained. With a sigh, she flips her pillow over and pulls her blankets to her chin—it will be not be enough to become a level 6.

hAiKu de JAvA dreW Johnson

The war is sacred. Softly, a man is being. Softly crying light.

The wind is sacred. Quickly, a light is helping. Blindly running war.

The book is quiet. Softly, a light is helping. Blindly being wind.

The rock is purple. Quickly, a girl is crying. Softly rushing girl.

These haiku were written by a computer algorithm. Due to the strict formal constraints of the haiku form (the first line is 5 syllables, the second is 7 syllables, and the third is 5 again), it proves to be a perfect poetic form for the computer programmer. With the ability to separate words based on usage and number of syllables, a program can then fit those words into a certain syntax and produce many short poems. Some are funny, some are sad, some are insightful, and some are pure nonsense.

Try out Drew Johnsonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s haiku generator Haiku de Java for yourself at saxifrage.plu.edu/haikudejava

trAnsCendenCes Kyrie benson

i. gustAv holst, The PlaneTS, op. 32, “Jupiter” It still seems remarkable: the universe was once a tiny speck in dark space, dimensionless. Galaxies still reeling from an explosion fourteen billion years ago. Black holes ingesting light. Meteors falling in bell-like arpeggios. The sudden bursting of a supernova in flourishing chords, the stately pavane of spheres through infinite emptiness. The planets are gods greeted with thunder and drum roll. And these hands that hold the viola, the trumpet, the piccolo: every atom in these hands, carbon, oxygen, iron, was birthed in the heart of a dying star. ii. Antonín dvoráK, symphony no. 9 in e minor, from The new world, op. 95, b. 178, lArgo Ominous. The screams that greet the overwhelming world. The minor chords that fade into sweetness. Look: there is more than can be said in the way a mother’s eyes meet her child’s. The tiny hand that instinctively grasps a finger. Until all that can be heard 40

is breathing, a sweet simple melody strung onto silence by violin and oboe. Skin smooth as music. Body that could be broken in a single accident. A sweeping exhaustion. An exhale. One who is nearly nothing. One who is suddenly more. iii. modest mussorgsKy, PicTureS aT an exhibiTion, “the greAt gAte of Kiev” Have you ever stood below a skyscraper? Gazed up at the dark reflections that dwarf the streets you walk? We march up in forte strides as though we can own what we put our thumbprint on. Have humans become tiny gods with this creation, this fascination with outdoing? Triumph. The pride of major chords, pouring one after another, heavy, like concrete from a dump truck. The ringing sweetness of brush in hand, words in mouth. And a strange sense, finding our distorted reflection in a thousand windows at once, hearing a brass fanfare: we are less than what we have created. iv. ClAude debussy, la caThédrale englouTie Morning sun streaks in through a thousand tiny panes of glass. Time laps at the cathedral’s stones, gargoyles glaring peacefully, no more than grotesque water 41

spouts. And bells, bells ringing, calling. This is the time, this is the place, it is coming. See this magnificence swirling about you? The clamor of the bells fills the head. It drowns out thought. And there is a sinking, a sinking into the embrace of belief. And God perhaps is a pianist, this his concert, the deep notes of early morning, the higher pitches of daybreak, at once a wildness and a safety. A soft drowning in the ocean that is faith. v. ludWig vAn beethoven, symphony no. 9 in d minor, op. 125, presto â&#x20AC;&#x153;ode to Joyâ&#x20AC;? There is joy here. But is there not also terror? Terror in the clear blue ice of glaciers, in the sharp spires of mountains that climbers scale like spiders, in the harmonies formed by voices that echo and overlap between the cliffs like a chorus, one sound repeated in bass, baritone, contralto, mezzo-soprano. The intimate sweetness of golden wildflowers, soon to be crushed by sudden rain that shimmers down over the landscape like soprano voices. The triumph of a peak that, suddenly seen reflected in a still lake, seems at once approachable and transcendent. 42

vi. JohAnn sebAstiAn bACh, ToccaTa and fugue in d minor, bWv 565 Night. The absolute minor-key chill of knowing one is completely alone. A wind in the hair. A jealous god. The forfeiture of desire. Clouds darting across a moon. This is a sudden falling, a tangle of black almost-screams, a sense of smallness. Can you hear the organ? There is something larger, and it knows you not. vii. WolfgAng AmAdeus mozArt, requiem maSS in d minor, K. 626, â&#x20AC;&#x153;lACrimosA dies illAâ&#x20AC;? Go. Slip with closing eyes, with a lightness of breath, and leave the others to weep, to light candles, to process in black, singing, o lacrimosa, day of tears. And if the sun rises, remember: matter is not created or destroyed. The molecules that were you will still glimmer in shafts of sunlight, and voices may sing in minor keys: you are everywhere.

oCeAn Arms luKe gillespie

blue moon rAnCh lAuren leybA

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romAniAn nights CArA gillespie

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untitled sArAh Jung

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viCtoriA street. intAglio print, 2014 JAsper sortun

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WAve breAKer elly vAdseth

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dreAm WeAver elly vAdseth

Oil Painting

seleCtions from “CAteChism” sAmuel ryAn

our fAther In my home there is no “our father” or “our mother.” There are my and your and their but never our, at least not in this life. I am an only child; that is to say, I am my parents’ only son. If God has an only Son but many children, my parents have only me and many cats. My dad has told me dozens of stories about my origins, of where I came from, and none of them involved storks. If I am to believe anything he says, then I must accept that my mom’s involvement in a “Norwegian genetics experiment gone wrong” has resulted in the lives of both myself and my cats. “You have the same color hair,” he would say to me. “It’s because you’re twins. The test tubes were contaminated with cat hair; it gets on everything. We were going to wait to tell you until you were older, but this seemed as good a time as any.” My mother has consistently declined to comment, presumably due to the embarrassment of either the truthfulness or the absurdity of the possibility of having given birth to cats. The competing explanation is that my father had always been reluctant to have kids. Growing up with four siblings and two parents who all struggled to get along, and amidst the existential ennui and nuclear/entropic eschatology of the Cold War, the idea of children was perhaps not the most immediately appealing to him. This difference in opinion from my mother is believed to have put somewhat of a burden on their marriage until upon a chance clerical encounter with the late/great Rabbi Rosenthal of Tacoma’s Temple Beth El, his mind was swayed. “In Genesis, God said, be fruitful and multiply,” my father said. “The Rabbi told me that was God’s first commandment to man and that I ought to honor that, as well as your mother. Children are a blessing, but one is enough.” Even as a young boy I questioned how two having one is multiplication, but eventually reasoned that if one were to 52

multiply two by one half, they would still have fulfilled their divine mandate despite the reduced product. hAlloWed be thy nAme Most people who know me don’t know that I used to play in a Christian rock band. Though I’ve always envisioned myself as more of a frontman, the archetypal lead-singer/rhythm-guitarist type of musician, I reluctantly and with some difficulty took on the role of lead guitar within that group. I’ve fronted other bands and had the chops for this one, but I learned right away that I’m not cut out as a worship leader. I liked the people, the music, and the energy, but immediately had some hang-ups with the lyrics. The make-up of the band was multidenominational with strongly evangelical/charismatic leanings, traditions not entirely congruent with my own in terms of doctrine and liturgy. A product of the Jewtheran tradition, I was raised to revere the name of God, to never use it in vain, and in its purest form, to never say it at all. The Jewish Mishna declares the Tetragrammaton, the greatest of all names, to be unutterable, unpronounceable, so that one might never use it to curse or otherwise let it cross their lips with impure intentions. It was perhaps better for one not to know it at all. Any time one reading the Torah encounters the name of God, they are trained and indeed required to replace it with an appropriate title, most often The Lord or Adonai. As a child I learned the name from a televangelist left carelessly on T.V. one morning, and for months thereafter was terrified that it would cross my mind at the wrong moment or even without my consent. The first song the band wanted sing was a popular worship anthem that involved shouting that name—which I had been taught was so sacred as never to say—in the chorus. They were doing so earnestly out of their professed intimacy with their heavenly father, and perhaps with purer intentions than I with my reverence or reluctance. I froze up the first time I reached that chorus. My bandmates asked me what was wrong and I muttered, “That’s Adonai to you...” They didn’t understand, so rather than explain myself I suggested that someone else take over singing. I could not trust myself to hallow the name. Around the time I had learned the name of God, I struggled with 53

what I now understand as intrusive thoughts. My head was filled with incessant, unwanted, inappropriate blarings of ideas that I felt helpless to stop. Sometimes I thought of monsters, of disease, or of words that I was taught not to say, and I couldn’t stop them. They would pound in my head and I would try to pray to God to forgive me for thinking such things, but never to relieve them. I was scared that if I thought the wrong things around my grandparents and their elderly friends, they might somehow catch the ill effects of my psychically transmitted disease and drop dead. I remember pulling at my hair while on a hiking trip with my parents because I couldn’t stop myself from thinking bad thoughts about my classmates, as if I had the power to alter their fates: Tyler can go to Hell. Oh God I don’t mean that, it was an accident, I’m sorry, please don’t send him there. Tyler can go to Hell. Please God I didn’t mean it take me instead if you have to. My concentration on not thinking these wrong things kept me close to them always. The worst of these came at a time when I’d read a book in which the villain pledged her soul to the devil in exchange for the strength to kill Robin Hood. I was terrified that now that I knew God’s real name I might be able to more successfully, if inadvertently, disown him if my thoughts got away from me, that I might accidentally trade my soul away to the devil, and not even for something good like world peace, but for something stupid that I wanted for myself, like Pokémon in real life, or worse, nothing at all. thy Kingdom Come In 2001, radio-evangelist Herman Camping announced his prediction that the end of the world would begin on May 21st, 2011. Little did he know, he had double-booked his rapture with my Senior Prom. I have never been one to agree with John Darby, the theologian who first proposed the notion of Premillenial-Dispensationalism, the idea that sometime around the Y2K Jesus would return to gather up the best among his followers and save them from Armageddon. I laughed at the possibility from a scriptural standpoint, as Jesus himself said not even he knows when the end will come (Matthew 24:36). But this didn’t stop billboards from going up warning people to repent, and nor did it stop my secular classmates at my Catholic school from joking that 54

they’d be the only ones who’d get to enjoy the dance. It occurred to me that my girlfriend at the time hadn’t been baptized. I reminded myself that this didn’t matter, at least not in context, but I would surely hate for her to have to be alone on Prom night. But when May 21st came around, I was the one who was alone. A few hours before the dance, she appeared at my house and informed me that she’d decided to attend school out of state in the following year, and thus it would be best to rip me off like a band-aid before things got more complicated. That evening I saw photos of her and another boy at the Prom. Mr. Camping may have been wrong, but I was sure that my world was ending. leAd us not into temptAtion In the 1983 film WarGames, when young Matthew Broderick tries to pirate a videogame for his home computer, he mistakenly accesses the databases of the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) instead. Among their files he finds a list of games including checkers, backgammon, and Global Thermonuclear War. The last of these being the most appealing among the titles, he loads it up and decides to give it a try. To his dismay, he realizes that in fact he has not found a new game to play but has instead launched a simulation to see whether or not a preemptive, all-consuming nuclear strike on the U.S.S.R. is a good choice for the United States to make. Believing humans to be too morally fragile to effect Doomsday when the situation calls for it, NORAD had given control of all of its missiles to a semi-sentient super-computer (code-named W.O.P.R.), which once activated will make the final decision on whether or not to bomb the Soviet Union and launch the ICBMs itself. After running the numbers on several possible scenarios, it concludes that it may be advantageous to launch a first strike. Realizing this, young Matthew is able to make his way into the heart of NORAD’s hardened nuke-proof bunker in Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado, and convinces the United State’s senior-most defense officials to let him teach W.O.P.R. how to play Tic-Tac-Toe just moments before it prepares to launch its world-ending warheads. The computer finds the game interesting enough to put the launch on hold and decides to play a few games against itself, all of which end up as Cats-Games, with no clear winner. Suddenly gaining 55

an understanding of metaphor, W.O.P.R. deactivates the launch and tritely declares, “The only winning move is not to play,” canceling its salvo and returning the DEFCON rating to an acceptable level. The precocious Mr. Broderick is a hero. For some unknown reason, my 10th grade English teacher made us watch this movie after reading The Odyssey. Over the next few days I wasted my time in math class writing a program on my calculator called W.O.P.R., which, if you could order cheesy lines from the movie in the correct sequence, would allow you to play tic-tac-toe against it. In contrast to the W.O.P.R. of the film, it made no guarantees of peaceful rationality, nor platitudes with which it might hope to suspend annihilation. Dissatisfied with the ending of the film, with its pointed anti-climax in which an unfeeling computer program that was moments earlier justifying human losses in the order of hundreds of millions to ensure a victory, delivers a contrived and simplistic message of disarmament to the audience, I ensured that there would be no compromises. Indeed, in my W.O.P.R., the stakes needed to be real, as high as possible; that is, as high as they could be in a game of single player tic-tac-toe. The only real threat it posed was to my algebra grade, which as far as I was concerned, was an acceptable loss. On July 25th, 1946, my grandfather held a piece of smoked glass to his face as he watched the USS Arkansas, the ship on which he had served as an officer in World War II, summarily sunk by an atomic bomb test in the Bikini Atoll. Upon his passing decades later, he left behind a half-built bomb shelter beneath my grandmother’s house. I regret never being able to ask him what he saw. It is perhaps safe to assume that the dinosaurs did not know of, fear, or have any control over the meteor we believe to have brought about their extinction. They did not see it coming, as they had not created it. They made no efforts to stop it, nor did they take any precautions—no digging of shelters or fashioning of hides to insulate their coldblooded selves from the perpetual winter that is brought about when the dust kicked up from such a cataclysmic impact with the earth darkens the atmosphere. The only dread that the dinosaurs knew was that of an encounter with another, more ferocious lizard. Reptile on reptile violence was at an all time high, but its scope was limited. In that time only the 56

cosmos held the power to rock the earth. In the book of Genesis God destroys all of human civilization with a great flood: The Lord saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart [were] only evil all the time. The Lord regretted that he had made human beings on earth, and his heart was deeply troubled. So the Lord said, ‘I will wipe from the face earth the human race I have created—and with them the animals, the birds, and the creatures that move along the ground—for I regret that I have made them.’ (Genesis 6:5-7)

After the flood, God promises Noah, the man, whom with his family make up the sole survivors of the event, that he will never destroy the earth again. With God having rendered himself impotent to do so, we have taken on that responsibility. In our own time we have developed meteors of our own. We have tipped our arrows with them, filling the quivers of our submarines and burying them in our silos. We have equipped our aircraft to pour down fiery floodwaters onto the earth. The source of man’s eternal struggle seems to be the securing of one’s self through the destruction of the other. But when confronted thusly, humanity has made its choice: to pursue the ultimate assurance of its own end, and by that measure, its ultimate insurance against the implementation of those same means. This is to say that in its purest sense, the nuclear arms race is a good thing. If I were to rank different governmental systems, a sort of atomic/Platonic benevolent dictatorial republic, ruled with wisdom and justice and without need of force for having ultimate potential for it, would top the list of both most ideal and most improbable. A nuclear monopoly would not be a good thing for the world. Rather, the capacity for near-total destruction of civilization must be distributed amongst rival powers to balance the necessary equilibrium that assures and thus prevents mutual destruction. A dialectical relationship must be established between two parties or coalitions, each who views the other with equal contempt or wariness, which must then beget its own dialectic in which the knowledge of the certainty of one’s own anni57

hilation precludes the annihilation of the other, and thus secures the self. Nuclear parity must contain the fullness of its abjectness if it is to defeat it. Upon viewing the Trinity Test in Los Alamos, New Mexico, the first ever detonation of an atomic bomb, chief Manhattan Project scientist J. Robert Oppenheimer was left in awe of what he had created. Years later he recalled the experience, saying, “We knew that the world would not be the same. A few people laughed, a few people cried. Most people were silent. I remember the line from the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad Gita; Vishnu is trying to persuade the Prince that he should do his duty and, to impress him, takes on his multi-armed form and says, ‘Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.’ I suppose we all thought that, one way or another.” Living under the threat of the bomb, but also within its sovereignty and grace, the end of man is assured. But this has always been the case. The true threat of the atomic age is not the inevitability of death, but of its wicked, coordinated, and final simultaneity. Even if we are to make of men Death, destroyers, they can only become so in the sureness of their own destruction. Our only fear must then be that in which one of them might experience the temptation to know, for however brief an instance they are allowed, what it truly means to have brought about the end. but deliver us from evil I do not believe in Santa Claus. He never played any big part in my family’s Christmas celebrations, so it wasn’t too life altering when I finally decided I had lost faith in him. The coolest thing Santa had ever done was land in a helicopter on the roof of my mom’s office before stepping out to take pictures with us. He had his own song, Santa’s Coming in a Whirly Bird. Without any personal investment instilled by my family, I debated for years whether or not I ought to go along with the story my friends seemed to enjoy and sincerely believe in. Even when I had my doubts I felt as though I owed him some degree of loyalty for the socks and oranges he would sometimes leave in our stockings. I finally gave it up when I found the receipts in my parents’ 58

room. I have told girls I was interested in dating that I will refuse to try to make my children believe in Santa Clause to gauge their reactions. It makes no sense to me that if one wanted to raise children with some sincere spiritual dimension, one would also mislead them about something magical that they have no personal belief in—nor does bribing children with toys and an introduction to avarice and consumerism for their good behavior as a reward from an omniscient elf seem like a good moral system. There are good Santas in the world though. Santas who raise money for the needy and who donate toys to children who otherwise wouldn’t have any. But there are bad Santas as well. In Central Europe, children don’t get coal for Christmas if they’ve been bad. They get a visit from Krampus, a demon who eats them. I will not trust any Santa Clause I come across, as some regional legends say he may be Krampus in disguise. We spent Christmas in California in 2008 with my dad’s family. On December 24th, Christmas Eve, we went to my aunt’s house for dinner. She had gotten a new couch, a huge leather sectional that ran the entire length of two walls and formed a right angle in the middle. No one knew why her couch was so big, or why she went with leather if she insisted on keeping her dog off of it. My grandma and her 90+ year-old boyfriend Ed shuffled in and yelled at the dog as it jumped towards them in excitement. We sat around watching a video of a log burning in a hearth on her TV while we ate hot dogs and my aunt’s friend, whom everyone resents but is always present on Christmas Eve, made unwanted innuendos about them. Eventually, we said Merry Christmas and went home. We would see each other in the morning. Even without the deadline of being in bed before Santa arrives, I try to be asleep by midnight on the night before Christmas, though my uncle in the next room always leaves the TV on, making that difficult. This year, there were sirens all night. On December 24th, 2008 in my grandma’s neighborhood, a man named Bruce Pardo arrived at the doorstep of his recently estranged wife’s family dressed as Santa Claus carrying presents, at 11:30pm. (This sounds like it could be the beginning of a Steve Martin movie, where the recent divorcee shows up uninvited to surprise his kids and win back his wife in spite of any eye rolls given by the in-laws.) As the 59

children ran to greet Santa Claus arriving at their home, he pulled a gun from his suit and began shooting at them. He executed many of them, who were sitting down in the living room, before they could move. When his gun was empty he unwrapped the present he carried under his arm and produced a flame-thrower he had made himself. He sprayed the inside of the house with burning, high-octane gas before running out of the door. He drove his rental car to his brotherâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s house across town where he reloaded his gun and took his own life. He was found with $17,000 in cash taped to his inner thighs and a one-way plane ticket to Canada, as well as a bomb designed to destroy the car if disturbed. It is believed that his plan was to flee the country with the money, but the heat of the burning house melted the Santa suit permanently onto his skin, and he was unable to remove it. Ten people in that family died that night. Three days later, after the human remains had been removed and the evidence had been collected, my mother and I walked down the street to see where it had happened. There was only black where once that house had stood.

four dAnielle villAnuevA

Four pm is when they notified me I was clipping coupons Four is how many years we were married It wasn’t long enough Four equals two plus two a nuclear family gone wrong Four is an unlucky number in Chinese It sounds like “death” in their language Four is the number of years you’ve been gone (not that I’m counting) Four is how many semesters it’s taken Are you proud of me? Four is how many eyes I have now The surgery didn’t work after all Four is how old your daughter is next month She’s four going on eight Four is the number of seasons I wait to be reminded again Four is the number of years you’ve been gone. (not that I’m counting)

July 4th AngelA shier

I attempt to climb into my laptop but spill a glass of water onto the keyboard in the process. The neighbourhood has become lit up by fireworks purchased from a nearby tribe to celebrate the achievements of dead white men. I cry a little and open a 12 pack of hotdog franks purchased for $1 from the local supermarket.

i Will never be As suCCessful As my sims AngelA shier

I jump around next to you as you catch fire making cereal on an electric stove. I want to message you to tell you about the lives Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve created for us on the Sims 3. But you have died.

thAt resonAnCe siri WAldoW

In the early evening, it seems the evergreens explode with gold light. If you wander below where the warm earth and fallen needles give beneath your feet, the sun bursts at once both between them and through you. The crests of each fir are gilded with clear bells of metallic dew. Everything rings. Each branch a string of a piano, each trunk a pipe of an organ. You have never been more aware than now, staring up at these glaring trees, the brisk, woody air reverberating in your chest, everything bursting with yes, yes. Yes, you were surely meant for this. Each breath of it calls: You’ve restored yourself—now transform yourself. Can you really say you know yourself until you’ve been exploded from the inside out, as the firs are? Now you—yes, you—can imagine the sunrise, because it is you who can create this bright ringing in the fir trees, this bursting moment before dusk.

i Am siri WAldoW

I have never received a revelation from God. They say that kind of thing doesn’t exist, anymore. But when I was first starting to discover myself again, sprinting barefoot across the warm grass field near the place I was born, thighs and lungs burning for more of this wonder that keeps us here, I felt like a prophet—because I had finally unearthed the story only I could write, just the way someone digs out a potato from deep in the earth and gently brushes off the dirt. My parents planted a lilac tree beside our garden at my birth. They don’t speak now, but it still blossoms beneath the reaching cedars in spring rain, where my dad held me in one palm, on April 14th, 1994, and said: Welcome home, Sigriðr. In kindergarten, on the nights I could tear myself away from my pencils and my storybooks folded from scrap paper, he would play his guitar and sing “Puff, the Magic Dragon” with laughing eyes while I twirled in circles, my sheer white slip dancing at my knees. This whole thing of living is a kind of dance, or a song—a search for elation. I cried when we sang Kyrie elaison in winter vespers at Holden, as people prayed by candlelight, kneeling with the hands of villagers touching their hunched backs. And afterwards, hiking in the silent mountain snow, with gossamer breaths, treading feet, thinking here, in this rhythm, prayer could be real—or at least you could pretend that God can hear you. You might be right. Sometimes I wonder why we need the bible when we have the earth. These are the things you must do. You must know yourself in order to live outside of it. Ever since Jim Farrell read “The Summer Day” 65

to us only months before his death, there has been a story growing inside me. I am Sigriðr: “the wise and beautiful woman who leads you to victory.” And while I may not be a prophet, I know I could stay at home and write all day, can look for little revelations in words, and lilac buds, and in that wild light between the cedars—stretch deep into the grass to imagine better, asking: Dear God, what is it I will do with my life?

hoW does one lose A poem? KAi mArtin russell

It was a passing thing, but in the end, she knew that she had lost something. It wasn’t a memory or a possession; it wasn’t money, it wasn’t time; it wasn’t an opportunity or even a loved one, but it left her with a feeling of rain on February sidewalks and lachrymose blackbirds. The morning brought sun through crystal and gently arranged teacups on the windowsill. No tea was poured and the sky was clear and the wind waltzed across the dew-dressed grass. Every blade was tickled but she stood in the field. And something stirred or lay down to die and she could not swallow it. And February passed into March and the blackbirds took flight and the sun was at high noon and a teacup fell and though it was broken, tea was still shared, and a cloud appeared and she stood in the field. A barn swallow zigzagged through the air, glittering for a moment, then gone in the woods. Still, it could not be swallowed. Perhaps though, maybe just chewing it was enough. And she left the field and, in the end, she knew that she had lost something. And in the end, perhaps she had gained something, too.

Contributors

kyrie benSon is a senior Psychology and Writing major. She knows it’s essential to sing in the shower, she thinks it’s healthy to decorate maps of places you have been and places you want to go, and she believes it’s good for the soul to dance in the rain. MaDDiSon bray I am a junior at PLU who is studying English Writing. I’m not a habitual artist, but every now and then an idea comes up and I feel like I have to do something about it. I love deserts, horror movies, and a good Bildungsroman novel. My name is aMariah cliFT. I enjoy cooking breakfast foods, reading Tom Robbins, drinking wine, napping, and taking scalding hot bubble baths, though not always in that order. kaTherine Depreker has always loved making pictures, so much that a house in Snohomish County still has hieroglyphs penned into the walls thanks to her desire to create things. She never outgrew drawing on walls, and after a five year break from college, returned to study photography and painting. Katherine now exhibits her work locally and can be reached through her web page, TheOtherKatie.com or by phone at 253.571.9433. Fourth year student Frank l. eDWarDS is a psychology major working towards a career in medicine. His hobbies include backpacking and amateur photography. cara gilleSpie is a sophomore Communication major with a concentration in Public Relations and Advertising. She plays for the Lutes volleyball team and is active in student athletics. She loves travel, photography, and change. 68

luke gilleSpie is a senior Environmental Studies major. He likes to eat burgers, listen to Missy Elliot, and garden. He is always looking for a new dog to pet. caTherine grahaM rejects the ideal of the “manic pixie dream girl” and is trying to make “manic plus-size nightmare woman” a thing. In her spare time, she teaches second grade. chriSTopher W. holcoMb I am a senior and have been wrestling the great beast of writers-block since I was a little tyke. I come from a family of storytellers; if we aren’t telling stories we are out there in search of the next one, so there really wasn’t any choice but for me to learn the family trade. I hope to continue to work on my talent until I reach the marvelous day where I can get paid for it. DreW JohnSon is a senior with majors in Computer Science and Computer Engineering and is interested in intersections between technology and art. He has also been hosting a radio show, Madrone, on LASR for the past four years. i

Sarah Jung’s creativity is inspired by art, animals, traveling, and food.

caMeron W. kobeS is a senior English major with additional minors in Religion and Philosophy. He is originally from Toppenish, WA and enjoys distance running and very large books. He does not enjoy writing realistic or believable stories and will only do so under extreme duress. kevin MaxWell leSTer is a junior Oil Painting major with a theme of portraiture and nature in his work. He is an avid photographer and naturalist, focusing on finding and photographing rare animals in the wild. His hopes after graduation are to pursue nature photography full time and write a book about environmentalism on the places he has been to.

lauren leyba has been pursuing photography for the past 4 years and hopes to one day make a career of it. Much of her work is inspired by the natural and diverse terrains of her home state, Colorado. Lauren will be graduating from PLU in Spring of 2016 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree concetrated in Photography. Sara neWMan I am a first year student at PLU, a member of the track and cross-country teams, and a Biology major with a Hispanic Studies minor. If we lived in a society where money was no object, I would pursue art as a career, but as we do not, I hope to unravel the secrets of the brain with a career in neuroscience. calley oDuM is currently pursuing the elusive BA in English, with aspirations of becoming something other than a teacher. This is her first published piece, but it will not be her last. cariS riSToFF is a Sophomore at Pacific Lutheran University majoring in Environmental Studies and Global Studies. Caris enjoys burgers and those who make them. One day she will learn to make them on her own. kai MarTin ruSSell, a writer since elementary school, is deeply attached to the trees, clouds, and hills, story and song. He takes comfort in people, human or not, though also dark corners and the night sky. He adds quirkyness, fun, energy, and chaos where he can. rizelle roSaleS is a freelance teengirl with a film camera she bought for $3.99 in Canada. She is a strong advocate of intrinsic motivation, fluid identity, Blackberry cell phones, self-expression via the Internet, 90s R&B, impromptu haikus, Red Lobster cheddar biscuits, and staying gold.

SaMuel ryan intends to say, “See ya later haters,” as he crosses the stage this May. He studies English, History, and many other things. angela Shier is a Senior Anthropology major. Angela likes petting cats and eating burgers. She runs The Mall, a DIY online art and literature zine. To check out more of her work: angeshier.tumbler.com // @angeshier JaSper SorTun I am a junior majoring in Graphic Design with minors in Studio Art and Art History. I eat my breakfast in bed pretty much every single morning and I have no idea what I’m going to do when I graduate, but I’m excited to find out. For now, I like printmaking, videography, homemade apple crisp, and Lytton Strachey’s irreverent wit. kyle STocker is a sophomore Theatre major/Music minor. When he’s not performing he loves to read, write, and explore the universe with his lovely girlfriend. Forth Eorlingas! Danielle TWichel is a first year student pursuing majors in Studio Arts and Hispanic Studies. Her favorite mediums include charcoal, marker, and henna. She has a strong admiration for art in culture and looks forward to exploring those themes while studying abroad in Granada, Spain. elly vaDSeTh I have for as long as I can remember been a dreamer, a believer in magic and possibilities. Through my paintings and photography I attempt to invoke in the viewer feelings of wonder, energy and movement that are created when one steps out of one’s comfort zone. Danielle villanueva is a Senior at PLU completing her undergraduate degree in Chinese Studies. She is a US Navy veteran, an Afghanistan war widow, and the mother of two children. 71

Siri WalDoW has decided to be no one else than who she is. (She is finally listening to Dr. Seuss, Shakespeare, Emerson, Socrates, and Winnie-the-Pooh.) Siri hopes we all realize that this is the only place we have—and that we need to make it healthy together. eDiTorS: Meg DolDe is a senior English Fiction Writing and Norwegian language double major. Next year, she hopes to spend as much time outside as possible. She is a huge fan of short stories, Nordic skiing, and Celine Dion. Jakob Maier is a senior English Poetry Writing and Philosophy double major. In the fall he will be attending Syracuse University’s poetry MFA program. He loves cats, and you can read some of his work online at iammaier.tumblr.com. aSSiSTanT eDiTor: kelSey barneS is pursuing an Art History and Anthropology double major and will graduate in May of 2016. The creation of her own artwork and her studies in these disciplines sparked her interest in the concept of art as a mode of communication, which was fueled by her position as an assistant editor of Saxifrage. She was delighted to explore what PLU’s artists expressed through their work and thanks everyone for sharing!

thAnK you There are numerous people who we would like thank for their generous help and contribution to Saxifrage 41. First and foremost, we would like to thank all of our readers and contributers, without whom this book would have no reason to exist. We would also like to thank our community volunteers who assisted us in the exciting process of sorting through the many submissions we received. Kelsey Barnes and Cole Chernushin are rock stars. We will never forget sifting through past issues of Saxifrage with you. Thank you for your time and hard work. It has been a pleasure to learn and grow with our fellow Media Board members: Olivia Ash (LASR), Angie Tinker and Laura Johnson (The Matrix), Reland Tuomi (The Mooring Mast), Allie Reynolds (Mast TV), Naomi Bess, Kelly Breland, Rachel Diebel, Hai Doan, Genevieve Williams, Art Land, and Cliff Rowe. A special thanks to you all for allowing us to attend AWP 2015! That was pretty awesome. We would like to thank our advisor Jason Skipper for his sage advise, enthusiastic support, and insider knowledge on mutton bustinâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; at the Washington State Fair. Nate Schoen and Jennifer Arbaugh, it was a blast co-hosting this yearâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Writing Competition! May Pete Carroll forever massage your chiseled shoulders. Last but certainly not least, we would like to extend a huge thanks to Kenny Creech of Johnson-Cox Printing Company for his invaluable input, lightning-fast responses, and for helping us bring this beautiful book to life. Meg DolDe anD Jakob Maier Saxifrage 41 Co-editors 74