Trinity Review Spring 2024

The Trinity Review

Editors-in-Chief Lily Brennan Sandra Gurrola Editorial Azariah Anderson Urie Barro John Bieberich Alexandra Boza Catherine Carter Samara Gerstle Sophia Jowers Avery Letendre Keyla Limones McCaden S. McClure Anthony Rivas Martin Rosales El Stratton Serena Wadehra Kate Williams Faculty Advisors Jenny Browne Kelly Carlisle Andrew Porter Office Manager Sarai Santos-Valle

Since the 1980s, the Trinity Review, a journal of literature and arts, has been published in collaboration between students and the English Department of Trinity University.

The editors would like to thank the Student Government Association, the Art and Art History Department, and English Department.

Published bi-annually: Online in December Print in April Cover: Design by Lily Brennan Art by Samuel Vader https://trinityreview.org/

Contents Poetry Michael Ard The Marvelous, Stupendous, Tremendous McGee John Bieberich Ode to a Love Letter Written in Graffiti Ollie Bowen Here be Dragons Lily Brennan Interview in Pantoum Jake Bruce The silverside Cutter Canada From Your Touch, I Will Sprout With Leaves Arlo Castilan Heaven’s Brightest Star Paloma Diaz-Minshew Heart Shaped Hole Los Aires me Ilevarán /The Winds would take me Yes, i think Arden Haggard As Heard in a Discussion Based Class C. K. Hawley An ode to the second choice Bishop Jesko Maybe this would have made you feel better Chris Junginger Wedding Hymn to a Snake MJ Kriechbaum The Boy With the Broken Smile Dylan Lee Blue Eyes Wen Lee and the universe caught me

2 4 5 6 7 10 11 13 14 16 17 18 19 21 22 24 26

Avery Letendre avoiding bruises In the Headlights Permanence of a Moth Worthwhile Keyla Limones Café con pan No te pido mucho Cristian Martinez A House of Moments McCaden S. McClure It’s Right There Them_You_We Swamps Sean Michael Mitchell Barrio Salamanca, Summer 2022 I am always a visitor Prayer Flags Haniel Neves Lost Anthonia Ogbo a prayer to ears that are unwilling to listen these days, Maddy O’Neal Poetry is Impossible Lily Price Penelope, Raptured Rotten Clementines Sonnets on the Afterlife of the Dark Lady Anthony Rivas Machiavelli’s Mansion Traveler at the Gates of Heaven Jorge Romero The Traveling Florist Spencer Schyma Hawks are Here Why Aren’t You?

27 28 29 30 31 32 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 44 46 48 50 52 54 55 56 57

Heather Smith What is True About Decomposition Parker Snellgrove baptized in leftover water Daphne Face Turn/Heel Turn reflection in an image Strawberry Alex Therwhanger Star-child Ever Whitlock Crouching Venus Housed in the Palazzo Massimo Julia Williams However Eventually

58 60 61 63 64 65 66 68 70

Prose Jose Ayala Canas Daniella Canseco Lips or Slug?

Gabby Cohen Obsession Tucker Craft Tractor Samara Gerstle Settle Down Sandra Gurrola A Manic Pixie’s Manifesto Arden Haggard Writer’s Block Madeliene Hartman Eve Through the Window Jorge Larach The Outlaw

74 76 79 84 86 88 90 92 96

Adam Mann The Writing on the Stall Jaden Martens I Wish I Could Cry Unraveling Mylo Mittman Off-Balance Sophia Munoz A Hot Summer Night Martin Rosales The Visitor Parker Snellgrove The Body as a God Dean Zach San Pedro Springs Park, Late January

99 103 104 105 107 109 114 115

Photography Grace Alcocer Busy Bees Mirror Lake Multnomah Falls The Streets of Portland Lily Brennan Moving On Painter’s Apprentice Julia Carter Untitled 6 Tucker Craft Gothic Skies Long Day Haley Hamel Illuminated Moss of Punch Bowl Falls Tail End Y?

120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131

Spencer Schyma Inflection Deflection Late for Dinner Wemby the next next Katherine Wilcockson It’s only foggy when you’re not here Samuel Vader After Work Aztec Embrace

132 133 134 135 136 137 138

Visual Art Carolina Herrera-Favela Going through life I want a happy house It’s fun to glow Let’s meet people Naked colors Cam Kenefick i’m fine (i hope i bleed out) Keyla Limones Mood Core Fredric Marmolejo No.1 Tália Rangel Desired Sarah Syed Even Death Doesn’t Do Us Apart

141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150

Poetry

1

The Marvelous, Stupendous, Tremendous McGee Michael Ard Sailing through air, with a face full of glee Flew the marvelous, stupendous, Tremendous McGee “Woohoo! Whoopee! Three cheers for me!”

Yelled the marvelous, stupendous, Tremendous McGee. But as he fell closer To his ol’ town of Dover He realized his chute Wasn’t over his shoulder!

“By Golly! By Gee! What a pickle for me!”

Cried the marvelous, stupendous, Tremendous McGee. Yet deep in his pocket, quite stuffed and unseen Was a humongous balloon, from a fair he’d been seen!

So he blew and he puffed, till his face turned to blush, And with one last huff, the balloon came to gush!

“Why use a chute with THIS type of scheme!”

Laughed the marvelous, stupendous, Tremendous McGee. And down did he float, as swift as a flea, Over treetops and rooftops and wide-open seas “Look at me now! How lucky is me!”

Claimed the marvelous, stupendous, Tremendous McGee. As the sun dipped below, painting the skies with a glow, He drifted in peace, plotting his next great see.

“A bigger, a better, a grander new show!”

Dreamt the marvelous, stupendous, Tremendous McGee. So remember, dear friends, when life starts to spin And you’re left stranded or beaten or without a kin, Remember the tale of Tremendous McGee

2

Cause no matter what happens, just let yourself be For with every heartache, there’s a chance to soar A balloon in your pocket when you thought there’s no more!

3

Ode to a Love Letter Written in Graffiti John Bieberich On a bridge just outside of the city the graffitied words lie almost incoherent outside of the “I love you,” standing monolithic between Pac-Man and gang signs.

This is what love is, it seems, scented of spray can, hundreds of feet above the water on a train bridge.

A willingness to spend a lifetime together that transcends any county fine.

It’s the only art piece bearing no signature, and within a week, before I could capture it on canvas, it had already been taken down, a singular blank space, like love was far more profane than anything around it. Years later, this is still what I see when you ask me if I love you.

4

Here Be Dragons Ollie Bowen Though her masts hung uneven with a list foreboding ruin, I left the dock anyway.

The azure canvas the voyage flaunted meant more than the rot of her boards.

Spindly fingers of liquid salt caged my ship, licked her hull.

The dinghy, unused, stayed tied down as I watched her guts spill out.

A captain’s death, I’m sure: “Chased dragons ‘til the end.”

5

Interview in Pantoum Lily Brennan “What do you want to be when you grow up?”

“What do you want to do” I don’t remember how old I was when it changed, but my answer is still “throw up.”

Not what they expected, surely, but it felt true.

“What do you want to do?”

“About your shirt covered in vomit?”

Not what they expected, surely, but it felt true.

The nausea courses through me like a comet.

“About my shirt coated in vomit?”

Did I really say that!

The nausea courses through me like a comet.

“Sorry, no!” Is this a trap?

Did I really say that!

Everything is too much always “Sorry, yes, this is a trap.”

Now you're falling through all the open doorways.

Everything is too much always Never take your first steps, then they’ll expect you to gallop Now you're falling through all the open doorways “What do you want to be when you grow up?”

6

The silverside Jake Bruce What’s it mean to count dead animals on the side of the road as a way to pass the time?

You could call it for fun, like a game you played growing up on roadtrips this cemetery of dead trees sliced leads the way to a backyard where my friend and I buried a pigeon who broke its neck.

I have buried many animals in my time, instilled in my corner as a youth.

Think back to it reader— a soil length of our childhood backyard dedicated to final resting places for mice that our cats had toyed with to those same cats, those who shared our last name above earth for a time.

For my friend, the burial was a first a voodoo ritual of sorts, he said.

I guided him through.

We dug up dirt with a special pint sized shovel wet with the invisible oil of half effort prayers and bowed our heads in moonlight giving stage to the green and purple hues of its tucked feathers.

Afterwards we filled the dirt over the stiff-locked body –the head limp but cocked sideways all the time– with each handful of soil smothering the shame of our bodily guilt sourced from something beyond our prayer projected anywhere but in.

We spent the night howling questions to the moon and I too feel like that pigeon nights before its death yelling outside a window in the dead of the night

7

a ballad telling glimpses of its own flesh taking one final breath of unearthed air singular and sharp, calling out into the lamp shed trees masking hollow decayed light.

With that final breath told here on page, let me say this: When we drive and look out the window to see the cyan-blue tree line forging wrinkle lines into the horizon.

Like the hand of an elder too sweet for this world A horse peeks its wet snout out of the wind whipped metal bars thick with flayed rust and silver tinted shame.

The snout makes its way at seventy five miles per hour, due east to a well kept ranch where poultry and red meat is hauled off in 18 wheelers to be sold in the nearest grocery store.

Upon the horses arrival, sharper spurs greet its hind legs and a voice pats with the words “your new home.”

Who would have thought just seven weeks later the creatures leg would snap and become a statue exhaling its body into ashes.

The owner senses the death and finishes his meal with his family, whipping his mouth and excusing himself before walking outside to the red sun setting over the hills.

He makes his way over to the fading wails of the horses misery and scoops from the ash pile with two fingers, smears it on his face like war paint to feel pain and walks back inside for dessert deciding over apple pie to sell off the remnants like a good organ donor.

Hold the gasp just yet— I will remind you that the crosses with pretty flowers on the roads shoulder Are just the same as the decaying carcasses leaving behind rag-doll fur Folded and shaped delicately into its carpet self like something you’d see in a modern art museum.

8

We speak of shoulders in width and size but when owner and I cried in front of people, they were small and neck knotted.

And sometimes we feel all too strongly that middle ground between me and some friend we haven’t spoken to in years.

It's a whipped up space, thick with the weight of recollection and shouldered youth.

That much I know and this too.

The roadkill carpet on the side of the highway The pigeon blessed in feeble attempt The horse turned sandpaper scrap all these things are miles ahead of me and you when it comes down to the lives we leave behind.

We think our eyes are somehow different from the black orbs we bury but we won’t always live to see the ash piles left in the rearview mirror.

9

From your touch, I will sprout with leaves Cutter Canada from your touch, I will sprout with leaves sliding fingers up the side of your face, the stubble a garden with sweet peas I snapped them open to pull out the seeds love from my dirtied hands my ribs ache as they pull taut under the palms, warm flesh, that was what you fed the deer on the back porch and it ate, and ate until the curves of a forearm caught my attention I remember the way you burned so bright out there in refrigerator light I used to say that love was like falling but now I can only close my eyes and know that love grows like vines, like a garden. there is nothing that pries the ache from under my nails dirty but I found it to be everything

10

Heaven’s Brightest Star Arlo Castilan Every night, I find my neck craned upwards.

With my telescope propped up before my feet, my eyes looked for you Scanning the open sky with a desperate beating in my chest.

At long last, I found you.

I watched how you glimmered and flickered through the lens of my glasses, The horrid prescription opening the gate to your beauty And I laid down on the blades of grass that pierced through my shirt and crumpled against my back And I imagined their sharpened spines were your flares.

I yearned to hold and touch you, to feel you burn off my fingerprints and blister up my skin, But I knew that from where I stood I could not be hurt by your intimacy.

And I hated it.

Sometimes, you would be too hard to find through my telescope I often found it much easier to pick you out from afar.

I would look for you in every constellation, Not knowing where you were until my breath would stop And my soul would reach to greet you.

Sometimes I envy the fact that my heart finds you first.

I left my telescope behind.

I appreciated the work it had done for me Though I found it quite useless in the skill of searching for you.

But I found you were no longer in my skies

11

The smog of the city burdening my breath And your name now a useless taste in my mouth.

I called for you and searched for your radiance and prayed that you Would be sent from above But when I realized you could not descend into my palms They gripped the rungs of Heaven’s ladder instead.

Oh, how I reached! How my fingers seared and bled And my feet burned from your fire The skin boiling and peeling to give way to my flesh So the innermost parts of me could be held by you too Brightened star, I need no telescope For I will meet you in the sky.

12

Heart Shaped Hole Paloma Diaz-Minshew a stranger's name written in my blood stranger's name written in my blood, a name written in my blood, a stranger's written in my blood, a stranger's name in my blood, a stranger's name written my blood, a stranger's name written in Blood, a stranger's name written in mine a stranger's name, written in my blood two strangers -that's what we’ve become family reunion in an old coffee shop What's your favorite color? I forgot— I forgot.

I used to keep your face in a locket but the picture fell out, I didn’t use the right glue packed dust under my nails to find that sliver of you kneeled on rocky ground but could not get it back all I had was a heart-shaped hole shaped like tú

13

Los Aires me Ilevarán The Winds would take me Paloma Diaz-Minshew I try not to stand still in the winds for I know that they'd scatter me out from within I try not to stand too still in the wind and resist the warm air wrapping round my soft skin Calling me out from within Hair tickles my cheekbones Pointing to the sky but I want to stay here, frozen in time Stuck on a moment where I might take flight But the wind can’t stay still.

It must move Still wind is the dead air we consume.

So that warmth soon abandons me rustling through the trees and the leaves where mourning doves sing I hear the wind whisper Follow me, Pulling me to be free, It knows if I followed I might not survive Follow me, (would the world notice me whisper goodbye?)

I hear people, like pigeons, cooing nearby The winds know If I took to their skies, the only thing to truly chase would be my mamí’s cries

14

I’d be like those women whose legends they tell Stories you know but don’t remember well My name'd be forgotten everywhere but the trees Where a mourning dove’s calling might remind you of me A Paloma’s cucurru carried on the breeze I move through the calling because I don’t want to leave

15

Yes, i think Paloma Diaz-Minshew I’d take you to the DMV Just to keep you talking to me So when the clerk did call my name I’d sigh and think it is such a shame That the clock hand had so quickly ticked Yes, I think that if you came Along license renewal day The only thing I might dislike Are flickering fluorescent lights

16

As Heard in a Discussion Based Class Arden Haggard yeah to go off that kind of going off that point speaking to that to add to that to your point to bounce off that to jump off that point to connect back to that point to go off that point taking it in a different direction kind of going back to that going back to the sexism yeah kind of off that just to kind of comment on that continuing the conversation based on what you just said on that note

17

An ode to the second choice C. K. Hawley Every time I find you in the dust of the pages of the story The idea of who you are is laid out to be one-dimensional It’s a sudden feeling that comes into my heart when I see you That never happens when the main character gets love You are left in the ink that isn’t quite dry.

But in my mind, you get the love.

The tears you spent in private to the reader’s eye are in my eyes.

The movies always leave you in the background of every shot, That love you think you deserve line plays out when you cry because of the value The black and white pull the red from your face that the viewer can’t see, But I see no less than the tears shed by the characters in the foreground.

You are left in the scenery that I wish I could hold when you break.

As the last chapter and the end credits roll, I see myself in a mirror These tears aren’t yours or the feeling of you, it is me and my own life.

18

Maybe this would have made you feel better Bishop Jesko And you come to me On that day You tell me what has happened and how things are going to be You finish your phrase And look at me And I see in your eyes that you are expecting something You want to me to say that perfect thing That will make this all blow over That will help you sleep at night That will make this day better But I had nothing to say I am a consumed man What I feel I feel with my entire heart And my whole being is still searching for my next word Does it make you feel better that I’ve never stopped searching?

Ever since that day I’ve taken up reading I’ve watched some movies I’ve gotten into ballet And I even went to see an opera I hope in every piece of art I consume That I will find what I should’ve said A perfect quote that would have put your fears to rest maybe I’ll never stop searching Or maybe this can be some sort of goodbye because All this time and this is what I have left to say to you?

Every morning I pray I’ll wake up in that bed on that day Maybe say something that would’ve kept you just one day longer?

God knows you’ve kept me for years on end Please just know that I wish I had the perfect thing to say to you

19

Couldn’t that just be enough?

All that I have been since that day Is consumed By endless thoughts Of what could have been said Does that make you feel better?

And I still don’t know how to end things Even with an end as final as yours I still can’t let it rest Of course I can’t write a good ending for a poem!

I couldn’t give you a happy one when it was all that mattered to me.

20

Wedding Hymn to a Snake Chris Junginger Tell me do your teeth ever get lonely Without a piece of meat or tendons weak?

Tell me, Do you mourn the heavenly feel Of feet in purchase on sands soft and sleek?

Would you ever stop if so I called?

Would your venom still, nature now appalled?

Or is cruelness your way, death your leisure?

Could you ever contain such a pleasure?

My body lies broken like a bottle On the shores of the long river Lethe And I die where I fall, sick and thought ill And yet I cry “why can’t you believe me?”

And to Hades I shout: “no it was me!”

“Please don’t take my darling Eurydice!”

21

The Boy With the Broken Smile MJ Kriechbaum the boy with the broken smile was the first person who asked questions the same way I did we spoke a language no one else understood that was made up of what ifs and maybes We painted pictures on sidewalks and sketched people into the streetlights Our art was unrecognizable to the people we came from but that never stopped us from making it the boy with the broken smile has no clue what life wants and his smile holds so many questions but his eyes have all the answers They dance over every face analyzing every mistake They can see your future and your past And if you ever asked he would say Nothing The boy with the broken smile only talked when he wanted to He tried to teach me how to swallow my words when people can’t bother to listen but the only thing I learned was how strong he truly is The boy with the broken smile has bandaids on every finger because he ran out of pinky promises So I gave him mine “I promise you will be ok” “You are strong, I promise you’ll be fine” “I promise, today, tomorrow, & tonight” The boy with the broken smile is too soft for this world He is malleable in way that I always wanted to be

22

people never stop trying to bend him to make their perfect star He cries out in protest but it’s no use And they bend him and mold him Into whatever they need him to be To the boy with the broken smile (If you’re listening) when you get where you’re going I promise I’ll send you a postcard of where you’re meant to be So one day we can visit together I can't fix your smile But I would never want to Because who else will ask questions with me if we made your lips the shape of every correct answer

23

Blue Eyes Dylan Lee Footprints in the sand, your guitar in my hand You’re looking at me like you want to be my Man I’m confused, it’s overdue, this conversation, this clarification Do you want me like I want you?

We’re in your car belting to your horrible Tunes You always know how to save my good Mood We are friends but in this seat you’re looking at me like I mean more Do you want me like I want you

htttps://lnkfi.re/bittersweetdylanlee

those darn big blue skies Baby you’re a dream Perfect at every seem And I’m wishing this could be Eternity

Cause baby I’m hanging on your every word just wishing time could stop at this turn

Your secret eyes, those big blue skies, you’re always teasing me You stop the car, you break real hard, and turn over to me

I see the light in your eyes and it matches

24

Cause times been wasted my love keeps chasin, my heart is racing What are you about to do?

Now baby I’m hanging on your every word just wishing time could stop at this turn I see the light in your eyes and it matches those darn big blue skies Baby you’re a dream Perfect at every seem And I’m wishing this could be Eternity Eternity Eternity You grab my cheek and suddenly it’s not a dream Now baby I’m hanging on your every word just wishing time could stop at this turn I see the light in your eyes and it matches those darn big blue skies Baby you’re a dream Perfect at every seem And I’m wishing this could be Eternity

25

and the universe caught me Wen Lee Slipping off the edge of comfort eyes closed The moon and the stars collapse into my chest And my head starts to spiral But the universe catches me mesmerized Counting the trails of constellations within its gaze I give into the gravitational pull And again I close my eyes And again, the universe catches me Vega etched herself under my skin And I’ve collected Lyra from falling so much the desire to bridge the Milky Way becomes indistinguishable Of whether it’s mine or hers But when I close my eyes this time, the universe had moved on.

26

avoiding bruises Avery Letendre it’s the kind of wind that makes me want to dance on the edge of the world, arms flung out and twirling through the grass as flocks of birds twirl round the sky, V-shaped wingspans spanning the sun as the sunshine sunflowers brush my thighs, faces turned up in laughing glee; the kind of wind that gives the weight that sits on my heart wings and watches it fly away, wheeling through the blue— lets the shadows at the edges of my mind dissipate in its shameless golden glee, beaming through the black— as I spin back and forth forever.

27

In the Headlights Avery Letendre It comes at three o’clock in the morning, predawn dark folded in on the edges of the hour as I grip the counter so hard it leaves scarlet lines scrawled across the pale and clammy skin, and I stare it down in the mirror, straight down, down the barrel of your shotgun, wide brown eyes that practically conjure fluffed-out fawn spots, fluff that sticks out every which way from clawed, red-lined fingers raked through and a gaping, stitched-up smile that pleads, pleads— if you wanted to shoot me, I’d rip my shredded heart, still beating, out from its rib cage prison bars and hold it up to your cold steel muzzle, just to make it easier on you— but the stitches are falling out faster than they can be sewn back in, even as I pick up the pieces of it and clutch it to my chest, such easily snappable legs crumbling beneath its weight, and the automatic light and the safety make the same sound as they click off— but I’m already bleeding.

28

Permanence of a Moth Avery Letendre Today I stopped to watch a butterfly land on the sidewalk, Because I had nowhere to be.

And its brown-gold dusted wings were so mesmerizing, So perfect, resting open on the cobbled, pebbly path, A spot of color, flash of life, Against its gray and cracking backdrop Its wings had eyes, and they watched mine, as I watched them Flutter and flicker and float in the breeze While it rested, perching, settling into place, And so we stayed, my feet frozen on the walk, Its smallness growing so very large, Its rest so gentle, so unperturbed, so subtle, Wings spread wide to catch the sun, Eyes meeting mine, Until at last— It flew.

I smiled to watch it go.

29

Worthwhile Avery Letendre The light as the sun sinks low into her pillow, yawning in the gentle warmth is soft, soft as a mother’s kiss, as a baby’s skin; And the distant ring of a baseball bat, connecting with a clink!— connecting as those far-away jerseys connect with themselves; And the lonely earbud, strangely cobalt blue, glinting dully from his seat propped on a short brick wall in plain view, where no one will see him; And the swish and flutter of my skirt, flurrying in the hurrying wind of my footfalls, one-two one-two ascending quick brick steps in a quick clicking step; And the clink of my key in the lock, held firm in my fingers so as not to jostle the gears turning in my skull, clink-clink-clunk in a halting, crackling sequence; And the way my voice breaks off and my tears run dry and I stand with my hand on the doorknob and nothing to say, nothing to think, nothing at all— The only way to waste your youth is to believe that you have wasted it.

30

Café con pan Keyla Limones I fall for you, El café de hoya con canela.

Love that meets my lips, Llenando mi alma de sabor.

Heritage and roots in bread, Conchas echas con puro amor.

Satisfacción en dos mordidas, Y un trago de café.

Burning my insides, Which alleviates the cold in My soul.

31

No te pido mucho Keyla Limones No te pido mucho, Solo un diploma en la pared Que dé validez al sacrificio.

En unos años, Cuando tu seas alguien, Tal vez algo mas.

Ya verás que todo saldrá bien, Si puedes, tu sola veras.

Pero te fallare si decido dormir, Que si necesito ayuda.

Tu pelo canoso Y tu figura ya chiquita a la vez Sirven de recuerdo de mi responsabilidad De tu vejez.

Perdon por no ser perfecta, Ni a la vez yo misma.

Yo sacrificio mi vida, Por la tuya.

Pero mami, Yo nunca te lo pedí.

Me llena el corazón de dolor, Agradezco todo en la vida Y tus ganas de vivir.

Pero que si yo prefiero dormir, Al no despertar encontrar paz.

32

Estoy haciendo esto y más Por ustedes.

Algun dia llegare a complir nuestros sueños Ya lo veras.

33

A House of Moments Cristian Martinez Our home of two, what will it be made of?

What measure of concrete and two-by-fours?

Strong beams or smooth seams for the ceilings above?

Plaster, brick, tile, wood; then, what of the doors?

I love to plan with you for the aesthetic, The kitchen, study, garden, and the bed, But, such plans are uncertain whims mimetic, And there is something eager to be said: A house means little to the moments with you, To coffee, breakfast, the rain storming, Us watching, or us scratching off our “to-do”, A kiss on my shoulder the next morning.

A house will change, place or style, like weather, And home will remain these moments together.

34

It’s Right There McCaden McClure (TW: self-harm) It's harder when it's your hand.

A knife can be hidden, kept from those that care A knife can be taken away, preventing further harm But your hand?

That's with you. No matter where you go.

Your hand is bound to you.

A constant reminder that you struck people You hurt people You hurt yourself A constant temptation Because you can always do it again.

After all, it's right there, isn't it?

It's not like you can cut it off Though sometimes you want to.

You want to cut off your hand And reveal the bone, the blood, the rotten decay seeping from your heart.

But your hand is there instead.

The same hand you write with.

The same hand you build with.

The same hand you fuck with.

The same hand you hold with.

And that is the hand that strikes you.

It's different when it's your hand.

After all, it's right there, isn't it?

35

Them_You_We McCaden McClure Them My cheeks hurt when I’m with them I’ve been smiling for hours on end Their embrace, soft and warm yet tight, Keeps the engine of my heart from stalling Even the coldest of feelings, the driest of subjects Seems ever so pleasant in their arms You You make my heart sing And you release ever-dammed floods of joy into my soul Your compassion, a salve to past passions combusted Your embrace, a nurturing soil for my coarse roots to rest May I ever rejuvenate you Never taint you And may the loam that we develop foster bountiful forests We Their nose crinkles when I call them handsome They’re flattered but something in them doesn’t quite believe it We are the same, as much as any two can be While we have different strengths, complementary We also share struggles and pains Neither believes in their own beauty or talent And neither believes in their own worth But we believe each other worthwhile And that means we can put our doubts aside

36

Swamps McCaden McClure I love the terrain of their face, The canyon of their smile, And the way their hills turn to valleys.

If rain flooded their skin would it change?

Would their face transform in a mudslide?

And what about a storm?

Would their face become a swamp?

Soaked in tears, Soft in all the strangest places.

And I fear that swamp, I love that swamp, I want to sink into that swamp.

Once I was chasing lights in a bog.

As I splashed around in the water A will-o-the-wisp led me into the fog.

Searching for something, anything, A sign that the flame I saw was real And not a mirage.

But instead I came to solid ground.

I found them, The hills of their face, And I felt safe again.

I love the terrain of their face, But if rain flooded their skin would it change?

37

Barrio Salamanca, Summer 2022 Sean Michael Mitchell Your life looked very different.

Somehow, despite myself, I was still smothering it. Like I had dreamed.

Like I had sung to the Atlantic.

There were bits of me in every corner.

It was you through my eyes, taped to the door of your bedroom.

A sexy gargoyle out of one of my high school notebooks, warning me of what lay inside. The painting I had made you from hopeless wanting that December. You and me and the dog in the red leaves under the park tree. I couldn’t have dreamed it.

You couldn’t look me in the eyes.

You couldn’t look at me at all. Only at your phone. At that fucking app.

I couldn’t eat. I fasted for three days at least. I don’t remember. Nothing would fill the vacuum anyway.

It was as if I had reached for the future and it had pushed my straining fingers off the hanging ledge. I was left to fall into an abyss so lonely it was almost eery.

It couldn’t be real life. And yet, there I was, filling every crevice of your room.

Learning your language in secret as you ran and ran from your desperate, deranged solitude. No one was allowed to see you, but I had. It was too late. I had seen you and I had loved you completely.

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I Am Always A Visitor Sean Michael Mitchell Red stone is blue in the just-after-sunset hue Of the evening swim before starlight.

Half-moon drizzle on the surface below me, I leap, fall, and the lake consumes me.

A breath of warm air and I float.

Barely kicking to keep my legs up, The familiar celestial neighborhood greets me.

I ask where I’m going, but the cliff doesn’t respond.

The lake laps against the muddy shore.

The turtle shell, a well-placed scarecrow of sorts, Commands the lagoon in dead silence.

I am always a visitor.

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Prayer Flags Sean Michael Mitchell Prayer flags.

Peaks are drenched with strawberry syrup somewhere in Southern France.

It’s the most beautiful place you’ve ever seen.

Two empty thrones rule the vast frozen blue kingdom in the sky.

It is a melting sea of ice.

There used to sit the Ice King.

There used to sit the Ice Queen.

It’s cold, but it’s not cold enough.

Dripping quickly into streams that flow to fill the trough that spills out onto us.

The Ice King wanders the city.

He drinks his weight and listless calls to us.

We are driving over empty rivers: gravel at the bottom of the valley.

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Lost Haniel Neves I can see him now, so beautiful and yet so far.

So far away, and yet here for me to see.

For me alone? For what reason?

Why must I see him?

His looks are so charming, a glance is all that’s needed.

Anymore, and surely I would be lost.

But is he really here?

I have forgotten myself and dreamt what isn’t.

Oh, it is disorienting!

I no longer know what is, and what to think of what is true.

Yet only him I want, and others such.

But to not be satisfied with him I see alone, Is it really true?

Is what I want at all any good?

I no longer know, and yet I can’t forgive myself, Because what is here must not be forgotten.

It must be satisfied, or else I’ll be empty.

No more will I think or want what is loving.

A craven will, is all that will be left.

If even one glance can satisfy by him, It says all and comforts.

If my lips can say nothing, then let me but look on, And be satisfied with what is.

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a prayer to ears that are unwilling to listen Anthonia Ogbo this morning i stepped into the shower and tried not to think about all the ways in which the world has been cruel the body lay crumpled on the side of the road – a once-living creature reduced to a state of half-chewed meat spat back onto the dirty asphalt the autumn leaves come down like lost pieces of sunlight but all i can think about is how guilt consumes me from the inside out cars continue to drive by and i watch as a woman steps over the carcass, the once-living now seemingly invisible after its encounter with death cruel hands, sharp teeth that sink into flesh and gnash against bone and pull and pull until the aching consumes me — it must have been a squirrel. or a bird. or a cat. i couldn’t tell. our insides all look the same: red and spilling and squishy and spilling and spilling here is my body, crumpled at your feet bruised beyond repair; life leaks out of me slowly, like it never wanted to leave at all i wonder if she felt it when the tires plowed over her back; i wonder if she heard the crack of brittle bone splintering apart under her skin dear skies, dear moon, dear twinkling stars – how often must you see me on the ground

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before you put me out of my misery? it must be a terrible thing, to die at the hands of a brutal machine — to be at the mercy of something that you can’t control i can’t feel my hands or my heart or my lungs and yes it is painful but yes i will go through it again and again and again, because all i ever do is endure but oh, at least it’s over — she is free from her suffering and the hardships of life can no longer reach her oh, i beg to be freed from this cycle of torture — but my pleas fall upon ears that are unwilling to listen, sadistic eyes that enjoy what they see free, she is free— when will i be free?

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these days, Anthonia Ogbo all i ever do is cry and beg the earth to swallow me whole, or at the very least carry me away to a body that doesn’t reek so badly of desperation. desperation for what? you ask, but i couldn’t tell you even if i knew the answer. instead, i think about how the moon feels lonely even when surrounded by stars and how the grass grows so big and tall only to be mowed down every other week. i think about how my heart hasn’t fluttered in months and how i’ve forgotten the way my name sounds through the lips of someone who loves me. just yesterday i fell onto my knees and pleaded for a sign that i’m still capable of laughter, because lately it has become so foreign to me, the sound so painfully hollow that it makes my bones ache. light no longer spills from the spaces between my ribs or the gaps between my teeth and i fear that i peaked four summers ago, back when i knew how to be happy. the world burns quietly around me as i remember that i’m no longer thirteen: girl in rapture, girl adored, girl who spun everything into gold. Where did she go? you ask, i ask, but again i have no answer. i wish my heart would beat the way it used to. i wish my sky was more blue than grey. i wish flowers understood me when i spoke to them. i fear i want too much and don’t

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value things enough and so i write gratitude lists in my journal, but i can’t tell if they’re helping or not. x marks the spot right over this hole in my chest – the place where i hold all my yearning, the place where stray zephyrs of melancholy settle in and make themselves right at home.

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Poetry is Impossible Maddy O’Neal I can’t write poetry.

Poetry means vulnerability and telling the truth; I am a famous liar.

But lying is good; it’s safe.

Lying is the fuzzy protective blanket, keeping me warm in the eye of the storm.

Lying is a comfortable mask that fits easily around my features and morphs perfectly.

Lying is smiling when you know the man speaking at you doesn’t respect you.

Lying is wearing your school colors cheerfully after being betrayed and told there was nothing the school could do after being called a racial slur.

You would be shocked at how many black women are famous liars.

Spreading an intricate web of lies to protect ourselves on both sides.

Being a woman is hard.

Being black is hard.

But being a black woman is… exhausting.

I can’t write poetry.

Vulnerability is dangerous.

Shedding my skin out like layers.

How my valves carry my secrets into my beating heart.

Opening my wounds, bleeding my experiences all over the floor for anyone to see.

Being vulnerable means masking anxiety.

Vulnerability means being able to breathe freely. without fear that my presence is too loud and takes up too much 46

without fear that my presence is too loud and takes up too much space in a room.

Saying the words that my inner voice keeps trapped inside my mouth I was…

He did… to me…

I hate my…

Why is the solution to our problems seem so easy but simply setting yourself free with just words is impossible?

I can’t write poetry, but I can try to tell my story.

Cope with who I am, hoping that honesty will become easier.

Shedding my mask away like sunburnt skin Choosing to wear vulnerability like a shield instead of symbolizing it as a sword constantly aimed at my throat.

I hope that someone can relate to my words and find solace that we are not alone.

I am not brave enough to be a poet just yet, But give me time.

Because maybe, just maybe I can try again tomorrow.

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Penelope, Raptured Lily Price I The ready loom at her fingers At which she has toiled for Twenty years, her work always Unfinished. She begins to weave: Looping wool around her fingers, A tapestry of her own design, A scene for her to know, No man shall ever see it.

Working slowly, steadily, slender fingers From the most precise forge of Hephaestus; Weaving melodies of tyrian purple, Dead mollusks with royal sacs.

Her mourning will not be for him, her fingers Labor for her own cause, a woman moved.

II My husband, he has found a new lover.

He will never come home to me: He has suffered the wrath of the gods, A curse upon his head, but he is a fool.

His wife has found a new lover, And she is more beautiful than him.

I love her more than I could ever have loved That selfish man who used me and left me.

She is kind. A delicate thread is my lover, Wrapped around my fingers, creating together

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A world of our own in her sighs. A world Devoid of what there is no need for, a world Made by my hands for me and my lover, A peaceful hillside on a tapestry.

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Rotten Clementines Lily Price I cannot speak the truth.

I present my thoughts like a clementine: Digging my fingernails into its flesh, Pulling back its skin carefully, The pulp is tender and bloody.

Pulled apart entirely, the inside is rotten.

What do you do when your core is rotten?

Do you even try to tell the truth?

When every thought is somehow bloody, When every fingernail-gashed peeled clementine You must carefully Keep far from your flesh.

They are right when they say the flesh Is weak, but I think my spirit is also far too rotten.

It’s the temptation that I avoid so carefully, The times I’ve had to ignore the truth, That mouthwatering urge when even a clementine, Sweet and easy, is too bloody.

When I admit that I’m bloody, That I dream of segmenting flesh, Not a perfect little clementine, They think I’m rotten.

Themselves, unblemished peaches who tell the truth.

They contort their cyanide pits and delicate faces carefully.

No matter how calmly and carefully They say that my bloody Nature won’t affect anything, I know the truth: It already has. My flesh

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Crawls when I see a rotten Clementine.

Clementine, How carefully Must you hide that you’re rotten?

When they push their thumbs into your bloody Flesh, They’ll know the tantalizing truth.

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Sonnets on the Afterlife of the Dark Lady Lily Price I My person shall neither fade nor be named.

A risqué memory, a black mistress: That is what I am now, I have no choice.

To most, I am the Dark Lady herself.

I lay in the wet earth, I rot alone.

I am fetid and maggoty, grotesque.

Death steeps me in myself, unbeautiful, Not unlike how I was described in life.

Yet, from you, from your ideas of me, I rise: I am a ghost, I haunt your words.

Let them, when I am called the Dark Lady, Know I am today that which you hath wrought.

You promised that I was, in your eyes, fair.

Swear! Now, paler than ever, am I still II Roaming the streets of London, I wonder: Who else is dead? Who else, resurrected, By your pen or by those of your fellows, Wanders alone in this very city?

I assume that there must be other souls.

After all, I was not singularly Your object of affection, of course not!

I knew that matter getting into it.

I do wonder if he is here, that boy.

You wrote much more favorably of him.

I was disgusting, a secret, a sin.

He was the light of day I never was.

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I seethe at you, hellish imprisoner.

Tell me if his fate is half as sour.

III Sometimes, a passerby will look at me.

They do not stare at me in disbelief, But, rather, with some curiosity.

For most, they soon look back away, passing.

I see myself in their faces. Old men, Who study me like a painting, judging.

Then young women, who look like me in life, Look up from my body and at my eyes.

When they leave me, they do bring me with them: A carved-off piece of soul which they imbue With their own struggles and with their own love.

It is comforting to be held once more.

You left me here, a damnation by quill, But she brings me forth to another life.

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Machiavelli’s Mansion Anthony Rivas In Machiavelli’s Mansion We’ve all settled down Safe and sound The princes laugh and share their cup A dazzling symphony of wine From the finest vineyard in Umbria Where Saint Francis made his signs In a time when miracles flowed frequently But now seem to hide in secrecy So we wait in Machiavelli’s Mansion Built from hands of men Begging to be seen again Waiting for that mystical memory to reignite

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Traveler at The Gates of Heaven Anthony Rivas Simon says: come forward Simon says: stop Simon says: take these keys Simon says: open the gate Simon says: look inside Now walk on in

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the traveling florist Jorge Romero He walks around the world with a bouquet in hand A bouquet of flowers from his garden.

Though they are a color not known And carry sharp thorns and a drooping stem With jagged petals and yellowing leaves He makes adjustments Straightens the stems, trims the thorns And dyes the petals to keep them bright.

But he often thinks about how easy it would be To walk up to a person and give to them A flower in its true form from the garden With uneven petals and sharp thorns Yellowing leaves and a drooping stem.

They’d admire its imperfections and observe its flaws Conclude that it’s their favorite of them all!

But he can’t bring myself to stop, no matter how much he wishes; The flowers can’t keep their raw form.

They’re not desirable, he concludes So he cuts and snips, Dyes and straightens, Suiting his flowers to whoever’s tastes.

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Hawks are Here Why Aren’t You? Spencer Schyma The hawks are here, why aren't you?

There's ole red eyes eating sunshine and a bright blue canvas to hang our clouds in No need to walk, no need to talk we can just sit and listen– full of empathy for the sad cricket with his lonely refrain The snakes are intertwining and butterflies dance in dappled sunlight the magnolias are jealous still months away from white petal exorbitance and the adoration of honey bees Why not drink tea and laugh with me til the sun takes siesta, then we can make sweet, sweet conversation, of course The grackles are here, why aren't you? hummingbirds are punching their bills into fat flowers, cypress knees are thrusting out of the waters and you're still not here

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What Is True About Decomposition Heather Smith imagine us dancing to the record player. imagine us bringing each other back to life, daily. when all the soft parts of us have dissolved, you’ll still reach through hardwood for my hand still climb through a coffin to help me up, and tell me i’m beautiful even though i can’t blush at your words anymore, you’ll say them. date night comes with a lot of advantages when you’re dead, when you don’t have muscles, when you’re nothing but bone, when you’re a skeleton date night comes with a lot of advantages like we can get in-to any restaurant we want, a witching hour reservation and a skeleton key open the door, and after dinner when the ghost of a band strikes up, and they start playing our song, you ask me to dance, so we wile away waltzing, so date night comes with a lot of advantages

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when you’re dead, when you don’t have muscles, when you don’t feel pain date night comes with a lot of advantages like your two left feet don’t stop us from dancing anymore. when we walk home you’ll kiss my cheekbone and i’ll hug your ribs and we’ll wait for tomorrow to start. what is true about decomposition is that i wake and i hold your hand i sleep and i keep you warm i wake up i sleep i love you again what is true about decomposition is that when all the soft part of us have dissolved, my bones will choose to love you. imagine us dancing to the record player. imagine us bringing each other back to life, daily.

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baptized in leftover water Parker Snellgrove the vampiric curve of my neck and shoulder itches under the scrutiny of ragged fingernails. someone snickers behind me, raspy laugh growing into a cackle, and my veins tighten as one. the heaving breath in and out of my nose is the faulty record of a firework, bursting and bursting and bursting. male voices rumble low in my ribcage while female voices pierce high into my scalp. eyes around me sing psalms of lament, and i think they may be grieving for me, unspoken portrait of the disobedient child. blood solidifies across paper-thin skin, a pulsing barrier between me and the room’s freezing atmosphere. a rigid chair holds me in an almost-fist as my hands travel to my throat of their own cursed volition— and the mirror names me iscariot, showing my existence is inherent betrayal. holy hands lay upon me, drag me to be purified, and i find myself floating lightly atop tumultuous tension. the racket of the crowd quiets at last, and i am left to dissolve here, sacrificed.

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Daphne Parker Snellgrove I want someone to gently slide my heart from my chest, cradle it in cautious hands, and place a tender kiss upon the flesh of it, uncaring of my blood. I want my lymph to coat someone’s lips with a glossy, dripping sheen. I want to leave stains.

Apollo always catches me, no matter how I try to get away. I don’t want to claim him— but he always leaves his mark on me. He says look, now everyone can see you’re mine.

His carefully shaped nails bite into my arms.

He only knows how to play too rough with what he wants, then laugh off the pain of when it breaks.

When he reaches out and grasps my hand, I find I want something new: to be left alone.

He smiles around well-meaning teeth that I see puncturing my dry, cracking skin.

I tell him stop, let go, please you’re hurting me and he croons I love you, I love you, I love you.

The river roars behind us. He screams as if pierced by an arrow. I want to gasp but my throat feels fossilized—my father curses the name of his father.

I try to shake him off but my trunk doesn’t budge; a shriek tears free from deep within me:

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YOU’RE BREAKING MY BRANCHES YOU’RE BREAKING MY BRANCHES YOU’RE BREAKING MY BRANCHES He cries as if he has lost something, or had it stolen from him, arms looped tight through boughs. I know he has no right to grieve—I have never been his. The newborn tree rocks beneath the river’s stormy gust, casting him off at last.

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Face Turn / Heel Turn Parker Snellgrove It's emptier here than it should be— I know this is a punishment, my crimes clinging to my back, but the solitude makes sense.

Why shouldn’t hermitude be the answer to everything that tries to follow me?

Someone wails nearby, out of sight, high and thin like a coyote or a child. I can't bring myself to move.

The night sky hushes me, urges my head to turn to the wall and fall away from this moment.

Echoes flash around, colors flipped and sounds distorted, behind my eyes— slithering monsters of the past that I couldn’t stop, no matter how hard I tried, but did not deserve my displays of retribution.

I have no right to judge or execute, but this is what a creature like me does.

Blood drains from everyone I know, and my soul sinks deeper so my chest can still rise, so my heart can still pump.

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reflection in an image Parker Snellgrove i want to look you / in the eye and say / no / no you’re wrong / you’re wrong because you’re not / me / but i know you’ll point out / up and out / towards the sky and say / that’s something you’ll never reach / and you’ll be right / but i’ll try / not to let that change me / i turn away from you / from the silver of your room / and talk to other people / who i think might love me / there’s someone like a woman / and i ask / am i something? / someone? / she says / miss park / you’re inconceivable / and i want / to believe her / but am i something / someone / that trusts? / i deliver her milk / all the way across the street / and her baby looks like someone / something / i’ll never have / but i know / i must be known / and there’s a man / familiar / in a way that means / i need to ask him / sir / do you think i’m pretty? / he says / helene / you're the most beautiful girl / i've ever seen / i reply / i’ll be using this / to further prove all people lie / and you smile at me / like he smiles / like she smiles / like baby smiles / like i might smile / and my hands start to shake / and you point down / towards the ground and say / that’s where you’re going one day / you ready? / i want to say / no / no / no you can’t catch me / not like this / but you smile again / and we both know / you’re a real hunt woman

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Strawberry Parker Snellgrove Your teeth sink through skin, red and dripping with juice, trimmed leaves cast off, green and thin, bowl wobbling and hand dangling loose.

You grin with a seed-stained mouth and flick water out into the air.

The sun bears down on the south and stems grow heavy under its glare, waiting for you to come run your fingers through them and pick the fruits to succumb to your jaw, for you to condemn them to their purpose, their fate: to end up on your plate.

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Star-child Alex Therwhanger Star-child speaks without prodding.

Hundreds of thousands of words spill from her mouth, tumble over the valleys between missing teeth, unstoppable, immovable.

She thinks of herself as Sisyphus.

Her day-to-day life as the boulder.

Rolling, shattering, crumbling to pieces.

Star-child's small, chubby fingers grasp the surface of the sun, Become sticky with love and warmth.

She wipes her hands on her jeans, the fibers clinging to her, tinge her fingers a soft, wooly blue.

She flops back onto the grass, drinks nectar from the clouds.

Her skin glows, sickly, hot, feverish.

Sweat beads from her temple, travels down her spine.

She tosses and turns in the lush paradise she calls a home, paces, spins in circles.

She vomits stardust, pukes up galaxies.

Shivers, shakes, explodes.

Star-child is the center of the universe.

And for a brief moment, She thinks that will save her.

Star-child becomes star-girl.

Becomes star-woman.

Becomes star-person.

And is now finally just another beast, Another star, Dotted along the horizon, In a place you cannot see, In a place you do not pay attention to.

She produces her own light.

Twinkles.

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Orbits herself.

She does not need to touch the sun, For the love and warmth are already there, Within her, Residing in the souls of those splayed along the grass, Far, far away, Watching her.

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Crouching Venus Housed at the Palazzo Massimo Ever Whitlock Once you decorated a grand villa perhaps a centerpiece perhaps tucked away Now you grace a hall of statues with your presence. Beauty emerging from the bath.

Your picture I first saw years ago placed neatly online I loved you then as I love you now. No amount of pixels can compare to in person.

Tears danced in my eyes I gazed in reverence you were now mere inches away And I honored you. Blessed my body with your divine image hours after we met.

Did I bless you too? confinement of a single room to traveling along with me I gaze upon you now and sense familiarity. Your body a mirror of my own.

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Goddess of beauty ancient standards mark those rolls godly I must be gentle with myself. My body a mirror of your divinity.

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However Eventually Julia Williams She’s a poem that kills when written, kills me when forgotten A confusing choice I’m given to drink what has always felt like poison I’ll tell her I love her once I become whole, once the city and the country make amends in my soul I’m considering what could be a lifetime. A branch of hope.

A footstep forward into the vast unknown For twenty years I’ve distorted my manhood by accusations towards femininity So forgive me, my darling for I will not tell you I love you But, God, he looks so pretty.

However eventually for the soil takes nine months to blossom a rose and the night suffers a large amount to birth a star and humanity waits thousands of years to provide a prophet The silence for which I substitute my words, at least promises anonymity to this: let my rib become your prophecy.

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I’ll cover you when you fall asleep with sheets made of the fallen leaves, so why don’t you wait some time for you to become mine.

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72

Prose

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Canas Jose Ayala I don’t remember when they started growing in your dark brown, wavy, combed-back hair. Maybe it was when I was in Pre-K 4, playing with you on the playground at school—jumping off your knees as you held my hands and made me feel like I was flying.

I was probably too young to notice. It could have been when I was in 6th grade and I started hitting puberty—the start of my rebelliousness—while also dealing with my little brother’s recent birth and my sisters’ getting close to ending their time as teenagers, causing you to stress out. I noticed them more closely when I was in the 10th grade while we were getting our haircuts with our family friend at the hair salon down the street. I knew you were forty-five by this point, but who ever wants to believe their dad is aging? Who ever wants to see their dad age—skin sagging, hair turning gray, and moving slower?

I grew to appreciate them by my second year of college, your gray hairs reflecting the wisdom and support I needed when I felt like I was failing in everything and losing myself and everyone. You used to always tell me as a kid while scolding me, “Jose, las canas no son por gusto.” Well, duh, who would find pleasure in growing old and having their hair turn gray? But I get it now. Las canas, as you would refer to them, tell your stories without needing words. They tell of your journeys, immigrating to the U.S. at the young age of fifteen, moving around cities in the U.S. to find work, meeting my mom, and settling down in Houston. They are inscribed with the dreams you never got to accomplish—going to college or living in your old village with all the people you grew up with. The stressors of your lifetime scream out from those hairs—losing your grandma, having to raise four kids that are all completely different, and the worry that you could have raised your kids

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differently than you did. Pa, I hope you know how much we love you—with or without your canas.

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Lips or Slug?

Daniella Canseco When I was younger, I romanticized the thought of my first kiss.

I thought it would be the most extravagant thing I would experience with the most handsome boy ever. I wanted the whole shebang: a Zac Efron look-alike, roses, candles. When I did have my first kiss, was it like this? Nope. My first kiss was in a church parking lot after a musty dinner at the local food court. Just like everyone else, I remember the experience vividly, even though I try to forget.

The first red flag with this guy should’ve been the fact that when my mother Googled him, a picture of my last failed attempt at a relationship came up. They knew each other. Why didn’t I bail that very moment? Well, I was so desperate for even a hue of male validation that I put my blinders on for all red flags. I even ignored the fact that he had shirtless mirror pictures on his Instagram. How I cringe.

In my blue Mazda with the sticker “Let me see your kitties” on the back, I drove into the desolate Mission City Church parking lot, not knowing what fate awaited me. For about 30 minutes this guy showed me his entire music library, which consisted of subpar rap songs that his ex-girlfriend had introduced him to, and his entire camera roll, which was all pictures of him shirtless in front of a mirror, except for two, which were, surprisingly, shirtless pictures of him not in front of a mirror. So unpredictable!

A heavy rain started and, with each drop of water smacking my car, a loud slap would reverberate inside and inhibit our ability to hear one another. This unfortunate turn of events resulted in a conversation where the question “WHAT?” was said every other statement. We made small talk by screaming

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(well, him just screaming about himself at me) for about 10 minutes until the atmosphere in the car thickened with anticipation. “Have you ever been kissed before?” he asked, breaking the silence.

“WHAT?!”

“HAVE YOU EVER BEEN KISSED BEFORE?!” he howled at me.

Taken aback by this overwhelming question, I felt heat rush to my face as my body tinged with panic: Will he think I’m weird if I say no? Should I lie? I shouldn’t have eaten that Greek salad with onions.

“It’s OK if you haven’t.”

I pulled out my metaphorical white flag of surrender and admitted to my lack of achievement of this milestone. Suddenly, I saw his body lean over the dashboard that separated us; his hand reached for my cheek and, just like that, he started kissing me. The fumes of hot onion breath were shared between us as his wet lips slid against mine like a slug. This went on for a good three seconds, which really felt like a good three years, until I pushed him away, overwhelmed by the discomfort I had just experienced. My hand lunged for my cup of water as I attempted to wash down the dissatisfaction of something I had yearned for for years.

“Oh, are you OK?” he questioned, as I violently gulped down my water.

“WHAT?!”

“ARE!?

YOU!?

“OH! YEAH, I-I JUST NEED TO GET BACK.”

OK!?”

I drove him back to his house, the only sounds the ending of the once violent storm and his ex-girlfriend’s rap music playlist. The awkward end-of-date goodbye ensued, and I

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drove back home in silence rethinking what happened, my lofty expectations deflated. Most of life’s presumptions will not be close to reality, but that’s just how things work.

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Obsession Gabby Cohen Photograph-Based Writing Exercise: The following monologue was inspired by a Victorian-era portrait of a depressed and bitter looking girl NIAMH: Each day, I rise from my bed and I scold myself for waking again. Waking into another hapless, hungry day during which I will do nothing but yearn to be asleep once more. Mother tells me I have no reason to be as melancholy as I seem to be, but the woman has no understanding of how I toil and rot each day on this bitter earth. Mother wakes every morning with a smile on her lips and a song in her heart. She has no cares to give her pause and no direction to take in her life. She cannot begin to know my suffering. Father never wakes. He lies in his corner of the storm cellar day after day, night after night. Always. Mother does not have a clue, as usual. Two months ago, Father told everyone he would be leaving on a voyage soon and that he wouldn’t be back for some time. Mother will not sense anything is amiss until harvest, at the very earliest. If there is ever a need for us to occupy the storm cellar, I will volunteer to ready it. The rainy season shall not begin for a fortnight or two, so with any luck, Father will be naught but bones at that time. Bones and grit and dirty filth. I will merely need to sweep up his unseemly, rotten remains into an old potato sack and bury him in the woods. He will only rot further, with the help of the animals to banish his soul from this once-pure world. Perhaps I will first burn the sack, to ensure that the grotesque man is truly gone to the world before I disperse his ash into the dank mud. Then he will be wholly extinct. But until that time, I will rue each day that he resides on my property, delighting in what he has done.

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Excerpt From A Ten Page Play: The following scene was inspired by the monologue above.

Setting: CAOIMHE’s bedroom. A month has passed. A bed is in the upstage left corner. A wardrobe upstage left, one door hanging open to reveal a shelf of folded clothes, a few bonnets and hats hanging from pegs on the inner door, and a pair of boots in a cubby at the bottom. A writing desk with a wooden chair is down center. A large arched window with a window seat in the upstage center wall.

At Rise: CAOIMHE sits in the window seat, writing in her diary. She is wearing a nightgown and is barefoot.

CAOIMHE (She reads aloud as she writes in her diary.)

I wake each day, cold and alone. I long for your kind smile, your gentle voice, your delicate grace. The monster is gone now, but his horrid ways of seduction and treachery live on. I do not blame you, my dear Myrna. You were merely a mouse in a trap.

He charmed you with his wiles to keep us apart. He knew that I would be too difficult to tame, so he went after you, sweet Myrna. He tore apart your virtue and made you promises he could not keep and you only listened because you had to. He washed your sensibilities from your precious mind and overwrote them with desires that were not your own to have.

Of course I do not blame you. Of course. I could not blame you.

For it was quite plain that he was manipulating you as he had done to many other beauties before. Alas! Why could he have not been satisfied with any of the others? (pause) I do know why. He was not only enchanted with your pretty face. He was also drawn to your exquisite knowledge. You behold the wonders of the world. But unlike my father, the bitter, soulless man, you shared your knowledge. (her writing gets faster and

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more crazed, frantic.) You desired to educate those not privy to such wonders. But my father, he was not like you, my wonderful Myrna. He saw something incredible and, instead of being content to share it with others, he staked a claim for himself. He regarded you like an animal. Some prized prey to be hunted and won. You deserved better. You deserved me. Someone to love and cherish every facet of your being. He wanted to have you and crush the wondrous out. I merely want to bathe in your glow.

(A long pause.)

(CAOIMHE rises from her seat. She throws down the notebook and speaks the next part of the monologue facing the window, her back to the audience.)

That last night. I did not sleep. I paced my room for hours, listening. Waiting. Watching. Until I heard his footsteps, loud and echoing and so man-ish. Hideous. I took my iron spade from beneath my bed and left my room. I followed him. Tiptoed down the steps and glided out to the garden. On tiny fairy feet. Dainty.

Determined. I crept along a few paces behind him. Tiptoeing.

Tiptoeing. Behind his hulking, bulging mass thundering all the way to the storm cellar. I hid, crouching behind the blackberry bushes, quiet as a snake, until he unlocked the door and clambered inside. He lowered himself in, dropping his massive feet one after the other down the creaking wooden ladder. I waited. I waited, patient as that clever serpent, with my iron spade in hand until his shiny bald head was the only part of him in sight. I crept to him, closing the gap between us. Quick and stealthy as that calculating, slithering snake. I gripped the splintering handle of my weapon, poised to strike that fatal blow.

And… (She whips around to face the audience, charging at them as if she is going to leap off the stage itself and kill the people in the first row.)

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STRIKE I DID! OVER AND OVER UNTIL I HEARD THAT CRACK! THAT SPLENDID SPLITTING SOUND OF A SKULL FRACTURING IN TWO! (A long pause. She schools her features, brushes her hair out of her face, etc.)

His body crumpled. It fell down the ladder and made a pretty crunching against the dirt floor. I followed it down. Delicate and beautiful as you, my love. I used my precious spade, all red with his vulgarity, to push and press his body. Rolling it and poking it into the far corner of the space. I laid to rest my exquisite companion, my favorite spade, lovingly buried in dirt beside his exposed body. (beat) Soon, my love. My Myrna. We will be together once again. I will discover your whereabouts and seek you out, my dear, my pretty one. And we can finally, FINALLY… be together. (She sighs.)

(CAOIMHE returns to her window seat and picks up her diary.

She continues to write, reading aloud again as she writes the following lines.)

But before we can, my love, my precious Myrna, I must wait to properly dispose of our enemy. Soon, when he is naught but bones. Bones and grit and dirty filth. I will sweep his unseemly, rotten remains into an old potato sack and bury him in the woods. He will only rot further, with the help of the animals to banish his soul to the depths of hell where he belongs. Perhaps I will first burn the sack, to ensure that the grotesque man is truly gone to the world before I disperse his ash into the dank mud.

Then he will be wholly extict. And we, my Myrna, my sweet one, my angel. We will be alive and well and happy because we will be… Together. At. Last.

(CAOIMHE stands and brings her diary and pen to her writing desk down stage right. She gently opens a drawer in the desk and places the diary and pen neatly inside it. She closes the

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drawer and walks to her bed. She kneels, says a silent prayer, rises, and gets into bed, pulling the covers up to her chin. She sighs lovingly and contentedly, as if she is perfectly and absolutely at peace.)

(Lights out.)

END.

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Tractor Tucker Craft “Tractor,” I uttered as the adults around me spoke.

It had been more than two years since my birth, my mother (and my doctor) were beginning to worry. Big words, like diagnosis, spectrum disorder, and learning disability were tossed around.

They said if I didn’t start to speak soon, I never would…

I would:

[grunt]

[point]

[wobble]

but I would never say my ‘words’ Some mornings, “Could I have some cereal please,” still translates to:

[that]

[in]

[bowl]

Of course, my first word didn’t happen when it was supposed to.

No one had prompted my first word. No one had even said it.

All I did was point at the tractor and name it, rudely interrupting the adults gathered around, skipping over both mama and dada

That was when I learned that words could get me attention!

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Once I started talking, I never stopped, is what my mother would say as a babbled on about some big recession. Language to me became a method of centering. I constantly added new -

words

-

PHRASES

-

Concepts

For when I spoke

I had the power.

Above everything, thank you became my favorite word. When I uttered it, I had signaled that I was done and in that brief moment before I said it I could feel the power in my hands.

Right before I said: Thank you

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Settle Down Samara Gerstle I walked lightly into the hospital room where my family was.

My mother sat next to my brother in the corner, her eyes glued to a laptop screen. My brother was bent forward on his phone, and he peered up at me briefly. My father was interrogating the nurse with jargon-filled questions about my grandmother’s state, and my grandmother laid on her side in the bed.

The room looked lived in – slowly growing in personality since I’d left months ago. Cards were taped to the bedside monitor, practically shielding the screen. My mom had a basket of books beside her; my grandmother’s slippers were placed neatly beside the bed. An old picture of my grandmother – one I had never seen before – was framed and placed on her bedside table. It faced my grandmother; she faced it.

My grandmother began to groan, and the bedside monitor beeped. She heaved herself onto her back, breathing heavily. The nurse escaped my father and calmly strolled over. My family’s eyes shot to my grandmother; no one moved. The nurse peeked at the monitor and crouched next to my grandmother.

“Can you tell me what’s wrong,” the nurse asked.

“Can’t quite breathe,” my grandma said.

The nurse nodded and walked toward an oxygen tank. She huffed as she lugged it over. She lifted and looped a mask around my grandmother’s head. A soft whir surrounded us. I turned to my dad.

“She’s just anxious,” he said. “As always.”

I stared at him. Yes, as always.

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My feet carried me from the doorway to the bedside table. I focused on the photo: my sixteen-year-old grandmother beamed next to her childhood horse. I looked at my grandmother on the bed. She twisted her body toward me. Her eyes glanced at my face. They settled on the picture.

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A Manic Pixie’s Manifesto Sandra Gurrola Manic Pixie Dream Girl /’manik piksē drēm gərl/ Noun ●

that bubbly, shallow cinematic creature that exists solely in the fevered imaginations of sensitive writer-directors to teach broodingly soulful young men to embrace life and its infinite mysteries and adventures.

Alternatively, a woman who, from the beginning, exists for others. Not superficially, though: at first glance she is free from society, from expectations, simply free. She doesn’t fit in, but she’s not an outcast, not really. She chooses to be an outsider. So enigmatic. She has life completely figured out at 16, a feat that the great philosophers could never quite achieve. But most importantly, she sees something special in what others don’t.

Isn’t that her whole purpose?

To see in the male protagonist what others don’t? She doesn’t need the rest of the world, but this male protagonist, often reserved and unremarkable, she decides is worth her time. Long enough to break him out of his shell, teach him that embarrassment is just in your head. Help turn him into who he was really “meant” to be, if only he could be more outgoing.

She guides him there, simply by being. Being herself with him.

Being what she is designed to be.

This girl, often a teenager, often shown as beyond her years, often dreamed of by men in their thirties. It’s not weird, it’s art.

Isn’t that the line they use?

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The excuse* It’s about how the nerd isn’t just a nerd. Really, if he was just given a chance, they would see how cool he could be. At least she does. And after she helps him, the rest finally do. And if they don’t, he realizes he’s better off without them. He knows what it is to live, at least what of it she shows him.

But it’s not about the author, no. Can’t you separate the artist from the art? Just because he was awkward in high school and felt misunderstood doesn’t mean that his identical protagonist is a projection of the self. That the author really does love his female protagonist. She’s a character. She’s not real.

She doesn’t exist beyond that chapter of the male protagonist’s life. Why would she? It’s just a book. Maybe there are men like him that exist, but we know that women like her don’t. Not like in the story.

Right?

We know how to separate fiction from reality, right?

We can see that others are more than characters in our own story, right?

You know that there is more to me than this stage of your life, right?

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Writer’s Block Arden Haggard There is a tiny little man living inside of my brain. I imagine him as a rotund, cartoon character, bustling around in the tin can that is my mind, flipping switches and pulling levers. Like the Doctor does in the TARDIS, in Doctor Who. That is what I’m picturing my mind to look like here. There is one switch that he very often refuses to pull, however, and that is my ability to write. You see, when I am writing, the concepts and the abstract shape of the sentences and paragraphs and words are floating around in the glass tank at the top of my mind in the form of colorful blobs and squiggles, and once the tiny man pulls the switch, all the blobs and squiggles go whooshing down into a tube that propels down my brainstem and down my arm and through my fingers and I am able to put words on a page. And they sound good. They all make sense. The words flow nicely from one to the next, and the sentences vary in length and structure and are intellectual and deep and make sense. And the words will keep flowing and keep going and I am able to write.

As long as the tiny man keeps that switch pulled. As soon as I take a break, as soon as I look away, as soon as I blink, the tiny, vindictive, little man giggles and flips the switch back up, and all the words and concepts and good sentences and my ability to write goes whooshing back up into the tube and back into the glass tank and dissipates back into taunting, horrible shapes and blobs. The tiny man rubs his hands together, pleased, and goes back to bustling around up there. And I’m staring at the computer screen, or the piece of paper, and I’m stuck. Each word is like pulling teeth. And they don’t sound good together, and they don’t make sense, and I’m trying as hard as I can to FORCE and PULL those horrible, horrible, colorful blobs down the tube and down my brainstem and into my hands and they just keep bouncing back up to the top of the glass tank in my

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mind, those stupid little antigravitational pieces of shit. And my hands are shaking and I’m staring at the too bright computer screen and the words aren’t coming and the document says “Last edit was 23 minutes ago” and I keep having to move the mouse so my computer doesn’t turn off and those colorful blobs are just floating around up there like they don’t have anything else to do but exist in that abstract form and now the document says its been 52 minutes, and then 2 hours, and I give up. I shut the laptop screen. Those colorful blobs stay floating, taunting me with possibility, and the tiny man keeps bustling around, pulling those switches and pushing those buttons and flipping those levers, all except for the one that I need, the bright red glaring switch that is my ability to put my thoughts into words.

Another word for “bustling” is scrambling. And maybe that’s a better word for what the little man is doing up inside my tin can of a mind. Maybe he’s not scuttling around like a little beetle, rubbing his little hands together gleefully as his plots to make me miserable succeed. Maybe the reason why the big red switch that controls my ability to write and put my thoughts into words is so scarcely flipped isn’t out of malice. Maybe the tiny man is scrambling around, sweating as he tries to fix the overheated, scrap metal, pieced together spaceship that is my brain, steam gushing from broken pipes and alarm bells ringing constantly.

Maybe the tiny man is so busy trying to keep me alive that the switch that I so desperately want him to flip just doesn’t have enough pressing concern for him to flip it. He’s too busy trying to keep me breathing, and eating, and talking, that he just doesn’t have enough time to flip the writing switch.

Tiny man just flipped the switch back. I just reread what I wrote up above and got down to the last word, “switch,” and now I’m stuck. My hands have been frozen on my keyboard for five minutes and I feel like I haven’t blinked. The thoughts go whoosh back up my fingers and whoosh back up my arm and whoosh back up my brainstem and whoosh up the tube and bounce back into the glass tank.

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Eve Through the Window Madeliene Hartman It felt safe there, pressed against her daddy’s soft belly. Even her tears, which pooled in the small space between her eyelashes and the work shirt, warmed her daddy up and comforted her. It was silent, all but for her sniffles and the quiet rustle of his calloused hands stroking her hair.

“It’s okay, pumpkin.” His strong voice vibrated through the round belly, protecting her from the blood that made her leg all tingly and wet. She didn’t cry until she saw it, when her eyes looked down and saw the deep gash and crimson insides, then her leg hurt. Her eyes made her leg hurt, until she saw the glass, then she wailed and wailed until her daddy’s belly caught her sobs and she was safe.

“It’s okay, pumpkin. I know you didn’t mean to break the window.”

The window? Is that what she fell through? Did she break it as she fell through it? She didn’t even realize that she was sitting on the itchy, green grass. And she broke it? Was that bad? This funny feeling stirred in her stomach, like something mean was pulling hard on her insides and stuffing them in her throat, strangling her, killing her. She felt sorry that she broke the window. She felt embarrassed for not knowing she broke it.

Suddenly, she didn’t want to be pressed up against her daddy and his belly. They were too soft and they were smothering her.

She pulled away and turned towards the broken window. It was very hot, and flies were lazily invading the living room. She remembered once how she left a glass of juice out on the coffee table and how a fly drowned in it, but she didn’t know that, so when she took a sip it touched her lips. That was a very gross feeling, how that black furry body and those pointy wings

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touched her lips. And now they were lazily invading the window to drown in whatever was left out, it was all her fault.

The feeling in her throat tightened, as if a great big snake wrapped around it, like in The Jungle Book when that silly snake with the swirly eyes tightly slithers around Mowgli and makes his eyes swirly too. Did she really break the big window?

She wanted to cry more but her throat was too tight. It was an awful feeling to be ashamed.

— “How did you get that scar, Eve?” Jason asked, laying on his side so that the desk lamp highlighted each divot of his muscles.

He was incredibly beautiful; the kind of handsome that made her nervous. Eve felt lucky to be there with him, but of course, she would always be intimidated. Even as she laid beside him, basking in his warm naked body. It intimidated her that he looked so firm and sculpted and she so round and soft.

“You can really see it? I thought that scar faded.” Eve answered with a forced giggle. She hated how she tried so hard to be cutesy around him, but for some reason she couldn’t help herself. Maybe it was something primal. If it was, then maybe it would arouse some caveman side of Jason’s man brain and make him like her more. She quickly forgave herself for the giggle.

“20/20 vision, baby.” He replied with a smirk. He lightly ran his finger over the scar. Even his fingertips radiated heat. Eve felt herself melt away into ooey gooey ecstasy. “Do you remember?” he asked.

Pulling her mind, which felt partially melted, back into focus, Eve tried to remember through the haze of the moment. “I fell through a window. Okay, wait, that sounds extreme. It wasn’t off a thirty foot building or something, just like through a window in the living room.”

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Jason threw his head back and laughed so hard that he turned pink. He looked so cute like that. The pink ran all the way to his scalp, making his blonde hair look almost white. Eve imagined how he must have looked as a baby, all pink and blonde every time he cried. Eve felt proud that she made him laugh so hard.

“What?” He said breathlessly between his laughing fits. “How the hell did you do that? What happened?”

“I actually don’t remember very well, but I think that I was playing…Oh my god, this is so embarrassing, Jason-” “Oh come on, you’re not allowed to be shy around me” “Okay, well. I was playing Barbies and I made Ken kiss Barbie, and then I took their clothes off.”

“No way, how old were you?”

“I don’t know, like five? Anyways, I got too nervous to do anything so I set them down and started hopping up and down, like I was trying to get rid of all the excitement that I got from it or something.”

Jason had an unreadable expression on his face. He smiled but it made Eve nervous. Should she be sharing this? She always struggled with these things because she could easily overwhelm people with her vulnerability, and she didn’t want to weird Jason out. She laughed nervously, cutely, and continued.

“I’m not really very coordinated, and obviously I wasn’t thinking about my surroundings-” “With Ken’s bulge on your mind?” Jason added coyly.

Eve’s throat began to tighten “Haha, yeah, with Ken bulge on my mind. I think I sorta just tripped over myself while hopping and fell through the window. I don’t know. Kids are dumb” She said, choking on her words. She hoped that Jason didn’t hear

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the cracks. Her melted brain pulsed nervously, everything looked soaked in green.

“Damn, that’s crazy.” Jason concluded, and then he just stared at the ceiling.

Eve felt utterly horrified. He definitely didn’t want to look at her because she exposed herself too much and exposure didn’t look attractive on anybody. People look much better tightly wound up in layers of skin, not red and pulsing.

She heard buzzing and saw a swarm of flies pressed against the window. Hovering over the black mass of their bodies, they carried, like a crown, a serpent dripping with blood.

“So do you got a snap? You’re definitely a freak.”

The flies hummed and buzzed and blackened and shrieked. Then the snake smiled and Eve knew that he had the same soul as the devil somehow. Her throat felt so tight. This feeling would kill her. It was an awful feeling to be ashamed.

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The Outlaw Jorge Larach As a child, Jack wanted to be a sheriff, like his father, and like his father before him. He was obsessed with the idea of preserving law and order and the peace within Tombstone, Arizona. Starting at the age of nine, his father would take him shooting in a field by his family’s ranch, and eventually he developed an affinity for the art of the firearm. His mother would disagree with his father about the amount of exposure Jack was getting to the world of crime and guns for his age, but his father insisted it was crucial for Jack to develop an understanding for these subjects at a young age, so when he was older, he’d know how the dynamics of how crime and justice work, and what side of the law he should be on. Jack’s parents would tell stories about outlaws and gunslinging cowboys, and how the fight to preserve justice used to be more intense than what it was presently. Nearly every day, Jack would be reminded by his parents about the horrors of crime and injustice, and how all lawbreakers were vermin. Upon first hearing of cowboys, Jack was repulsed and disgusted by them. He, and his family, were of the opinion that they were scum, and each and every last one of them should be hunted and brought to justice, despite there being so few in the year of 1881. But as he approached adolescence, the attraction he found for the gun began to be more tightly wound to outlaws than to sheriffs. He would find himself imagining the thrill of executing a stagecoach robbery, robbing a bank, and even escaping from the law in an epic shootout-chase.

One day, at the age of 12, when scouring through his father’s study for his model revolver that he so dearly loved, Jack came across a small, wooden box tucked snugly between two similar looking cigar boxes, seeming as though it was meant to be hidden. Reluctant to steal but overwhelmed with curiosity, Jack

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took the box to his cramped quarters only a few steps from his parent’s. Surprised to find the box had no lock, he opened it to reveal a collection of yellowing letters. Dedicating several hours to read the letters (he had only learned to read in consecutive sentences half a year before), he discovered that they were written by his grandfather, who had passed away in a shootout against outlaws before he was born. To his horror and surprise, Jack read about how, in reality, his grandfather Morrison was in fact a member of a now extinct gang of outlaws. The letters detailed how the botchery of a bank heist led to the fleeing from the law, and how they were being ruthlessly hunted daily for months. Each letter was written weeks apart, and were addressed specifically to Jack’s father, who at the time must have been around Jack’s age. Dizzy and disoriented from the revelation, Jack returned the box to where he found it.

The confusion and feeling of betrayal passed quickly, though.

As time passed, Jack began to idolize this cowboy, gunslinging version of his grandfather and his fraternal gang of outlaws.

When his father, who was oblivious to Jack’s slow mental shift from the law to crime, took Jack shooting, Jack no longer imagined he was killing cowboys; rather, he envisioned killing the sheriffs of Tombstone. Being too frightened to discuss this with his father, Jack told his mother about his attraction to the world of crime and outlaws, leaving out the letters he found. His mother reminded Jack that outlaws were a dying breed, and insisted that any attraction he found to that life should be severed immediately. Jack knew she was right, but his dreams of fighting authority only augmented.

When Jack turned 16, he became a courier. With his horse, he would deliver mail to whoever required his services. One day, as he was returning home from delivering a rather large parcel in a wooded area, he was witness to a stagecoach robbery. Having only heard about them in his parent’s stories, he watched in wild-eyed bewilderment from a distance as a small

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group of men, maybe five or six of them, dragged out the driver and passenger of a horse-driven stagecoach and threw them on the threw them on the ground, then tossed out bags and boxes containing things Jack could only guess were riches, or resources to obtain riches, from the back of the stagecoach.

After the robbery, the thieves leaped on their horses and rode away, some of them cackling wildly, firing into the air and twirling their guns on their fingers.

Jack, knowing this would likely be his last time seeing outlaws, furtively followed them on his horse, making sure to keep a safe distance. After some time, the outlaws turned off the main road into a smaller gravel path which led to a clearing in the forest.

Tying his horse to a nearby tree, Jack followed the gang to their camp in the clearing. As he crouched in the bushes, he watched as the gang celebrated their successful stick-up by dancing, drinking, and singing. Jack noticed that the members were mostly older, with most of them having long white beards and walking with a slouch. Jack watched in amazement at this slice of history, this fading culture of chases, shootouts, and unbreakable fraternal connections fighting and escaping authority. Knowing he would never have this opportunity again, Jack arose from the bushes and confronted his heroes. Upon seeing him, the gang all drew their weapons on him and fired, killing him instantly.

One of the gang members drunkenly slogged forward towards Jack’s body, and searched his pockets for any loot. Upon finding none, the gang happily returned to their merry dancing, drinking, and singing, oblivious to anything and everything that doesn’t concern them or their newly obtained treasure.

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The Writing on the Stall Adam Mann On the door, in black sharpie, are the words Beware the last stall.

I would know. It’s in my favorite stall: first from the door, second floor of the Clarence Darrow Middle School. It’s absolutely filthy, of course, but it’s not like sixth graders can be picky. I spend lots of time there, when people annoy me or I want some quiet. I put my jacket over the nasty toilet lid and close my eyes. Sometimes I read the scribbles around me and wonder about the kids who wrote them.

I remember the first time I read those words, Beware the last stall. They were so different from the rest of the junk written on the walls. Not curse words, not lewd drawings, but a warning.

That day, I thought I heard a groan coming from the furthest stall from the door. I walked over to it, banged on the stall, jiggled the lock. No response.

Since then, I’ve heard faint screams, humming, phantom flushes. I’ve tried the lock a hundred times. Nothing. Many times I’ve considered crawling under the stall door, which sounds like a good idea until I’m actually in the second floor bathroom and my resolve crumbles like a Chips Ahoy cookie.

There’s a reason no one uses it, except for weirdos like me. I should forget it.

I’m probably imagining things.

But someone wrote those words for a reason.

I can’t let it go.

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I have three whole friends. At least, I think I still do. Avery counts at least. I’ve known him since kindergarten when his mom and my mom organized a playdate. The only thing I remember from that day was that I thought he was weird. I still think that, but he’s also my best friend. My other friends, Jake and Michael, I never really see anymore. We used to hang out all the time together in elementary school, but not so much now. Sometimes I worry that it is my fault.

I may be too hard on myself. Jake joined the soccer team, and now his mornings, lunches, and afternoons are taken up by a sport I know nothing about. Michael is in mostly honors classes on the other side of the building, with a whole new set of smarter friends. The closest I’ve come to a new friend is the kid in my English class that asks me for a pencil every day. I forgot his name, and I’m too embarrassed to ask. Even Avery is doing better than me. He talks to so many people it’s almost like he’s everyone’s friend. So sometimes I feel like I’m alone, even if it isn’t true. That’s why today, one of the few days all three of my friends are sitting with me at lunch, I try to pique their interest.

“I think one of the second floor bathroom stalls is haunted.”

For a second I think they didn’t hear me, but then Avery points his spoon at me. “I think you’ve had too much Sunny D.” He hiccups. “Oh, wait. That’s me.”

Avery’s wearing a T- shirt, vest, and cargo pants, all in army camo. Camo is actually against the school dress code for some reason, but that doesn’t stop Avery. The school tried enforcing it earlier in the year, but they grew weary before too long. It doesn't hurt that Avery’s mom is on the school board, either.

I look at Jake and Michael, who like me, wear normal clothes and aren’t above the rules. “Haunted?” Jake says. Michael also

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looks confused.“What do you mean?”

Before I can say anything, Avery jumps in, much to my surprise. “I believe what Orion here is referring to is the famous bathroom prophecy, which goes like this: Beware the Last Stall.”

Michael frowns. “It’s famous?”

“Well, no. But it sounds better that way.”

“Avery’s right,” I say. “I’ve tried to open the last stall many times and it’s always locked. And it makes weird noises.”

“I think that’s called a fart,” Jake says, and Avery giggles.

“No!” I say, rolling my eyes. “Like groans. Or whines. Or whispers.”

I wait for them to react, to brush me off. But Jake just shrugs his shoulders, and Avery leans his head on an elbow, and they both turn to Michael, who’s messing with his hair. He puts his pick down.

“Well, there’s an easy way to get to the bottom of this dilemma. If it’s always locked, then someone should crawl under the stall and unlock it.”

He looks at me. Crap.

I have them meet me outside the second floor bathroom after the end of the last period. I can’t help thinking that this is the first time we’ve met up after school this year. I wish I could savor it, but I still have a bus to catch.

I take a breath. “Let’s do it.”

Like countless times before, I get second thoughts once I get eyes on the oddly stained bathroom floor, the harsh

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fluorescent lighting revealing every spot of gunk and grime.

Who knows how many diseases are residing there? I hesitate, and almost jump when I hear a strange creaking in the room.

The others seem unaffected. Jake gives me a pitying look.

“I’ll do it with you.” He drops to his knees and I’m forced to follow him, grimacing as my hand lands on an unusually sticky patch of floor. We move forward.

Something makes me pause, and Jake stops to give me a frown. The room has fallen silent. Then a gurgle reaches my ears. And a deluge of rotten yellow sewage pours out from under the stall door.

“What the hell!?” Jake yells.

I scrabble backwards as the tidal wave approaches, Jake moving beside me. My nose burns from the noxious smell. My eyes water. It reaches my shoe and I think I hear a sizzle. And then I’m screaming and someone is grabbing me and my right leg is shaking uncontrollably and then after an eternity the fluid stops. I look up at Michael, who pulled me back. Avery is clutching Jake’s shoulder.

The sewage oscillates menacingly.

“It’s haunted,” we say.

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I Wish I Could Cry Jaden Martens I believe crying is the most potent expression of emotion. All the feelings stored inside can be released—washed away, if you’re a romantic. It is a way in which you can prove to the world that your emotions exist. That they aren’t just a figment of your imagination. I wish I could cry.

Anger, joy, sorrow, all bring forth tears. People cry at weddings and at divorce hearings. Life starts in tears; it ends in tears.

Something pure is the water which flows from the eyes.

Everything, it makes anew. A symbol of rebirth, restoration.

Jesus wept for us. I wish I could cry.

Crying can be weak—a few gentle tears sliding down the cheek.

Sometimes it is raw, powerful. Terrible screams and clouded vision. Gasping for breath—your body forgets how to operate—everything is falling apart. Sobs are muffled by your pillow—you can’t be a disturbance. Shaking—uncontrollable shaking—there will be no coming back. No. Focus, focus on the breath. In. The stream of tears begin to slow. Out. Your mind returns to your body. In. Everything starts to go numb. Out. You lie there, system flushed, ready to move forward. Or so it should be. I wish I could cry.

Why can’t I cry?

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Unraveling Jaden Martens Breathless, I am, as a thousand screams are caught on the edge of my tongue held back by clenched teeth. Words spoken more times than time can tell are trapped in a mind too scared to mind its own business. Breathe less, I do, as the call of dreams pulls me in to hide me from the dreams breaking, breaking in the waking world where nightmares haunt my every day, and as day turns to night the screaming returns. Return to a world, I wish I could, that is not dead—accompanied by the song of silence and the dance of stillness. But. Sand cannot help but fall and so help me as the Fall falls behind, smothered by the ice, I cannot help but wish that Time were not real. And I am back to thinking words I’ve thought of over—over again. There is no use for such words in a world so unrelentingly sick of words; there are too many words to ever justify speaking—over again and again—why should I even try?

Pain is what it means to loose my tongue from its prison because I know that I will lose what I have worked so hard to find. What is it that I have found? For so long I have been looking, looking around and around—over and over—but what is it I actually want? Words can’t describe it, so is it real? Can you lose something that isn’t real? Or is reality what I choose it to be?

Over and over again.

Until everything Unravels And I fall asleep.

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Off-Balance Mylo Mittman After almost twenty years on Earth -or, depending on how you look at it, in Earth - I've grown familiar with the ground. I may not understand physics, but I do understand why things get pulled to the center of the planet. Down is the easiest direction.

The strongest pull on the weakest forces. Despite claims from well-meaning strangers and misguided teachers, I can’t defy gravity. Apparently, I can’t defy the call of the ground either. I want to lift myself up and out of it. I want to see if it knows me the same way I’ve come to know it. * This relationship is preventable. The key word is grit. It’s a young kid. It’s pulling and pain. It’s grit his teeth and he’ll turn himself off when he gets home. Back then, nobody could really tell him. They couldn’t speak his language. It’s not their fault.

He heard it with the deafness of a child’s ears. See the kid. See a planet. See that magnetism. See a crash. A meteorite falling through the atmosphere doesn't know it will crack open on impact. I don’t think it even sees the ground. You can’t differentiate between the meteorite and the dirt, at least, not after so many years and too many inescapable crashes. The meteorite becomes the dirt. I think that kid would’ve turned out different, turned out better. He wouldn't’ve collapsed in on himself like an old coal mine or a hemorrhaged brain. He would’ve seen his own cracking if he hadn’t resisted the pulling. I love and hate to think some alternate universe knows if that’s true. I know the dirt in that universe has never consumed a blind chunk of space.

I know that universe has never watched the pull of something called “up” crash into the push of that place known as “down.” *

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If gravity only exists in space, as science says, we must discover the force that pulls us when we do not take up space.

We all disembody ourselves at some point. In those moments, it is reasonable for us to think we fill the places between atoms, stars, and dust. Places that don’t really have space to fill. I do not know if I can ask the universe to evaluate the merit of this reasoning. However, I do know that my knees have come to Earth enough for the action to count as kneeling, even though I can’t kneel. I can beg the unknown for this unknown answer. I can pray for the meteorite I see coming. I can pray for a physics-defying bounce. Maybe meteorites can learn to see as I have learned to live in that space between self, ground, and Earth.

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A Hot Summer Night Sophia Munoz I found myself in your arms on a hot summer night. It was hot then, too hot to bear. The type of heat that makes the grass brown and life shrink back into the earth. Even in your flat, I couldn't escape it. That stifling heat pursued me at every corner, but you were insistent upon draping a quilt over our bodies, promising the fan would keep us cool. Sweat beaded on my lip and was lapped up by your tongue before it could escape down my chin and fall onto the bedspread. There were fireworks that night; I could hear them far away. As I lay there with you on my breast, I became aware of how heavy I felt on your mattress and how hot it was under that blanket.

I could hear every blood vessel in my veins, every beat of my heart, every thought in my head. For once, there was silence, undisturbed stillness safe from my usual constant chatter. I could feel her there, but could not see her; we both hid in the darkness that draped across the room. Her fingers snaked through mine, gripping them tight. More sweat fell from my brow.

"I don't think my body was made to feel how it should," I said. I felt her head raise slightly.

"What do you mean?" I took a shaky breath.

"No matter what, I feel nothing."

"There is nothing there, nothing there for me."

"I guess I'm just fated to live without experiencing that sort of connection." She said nothing this time. Her fingers grew limp and retreated beneath her pillow. Their heat was gone, and her absence left my hand cold. It wasn't her, it never was. I don't know what happened that night or every time before. I just know

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that it will always be like this no matter the time of day, no matter the occasion, no matter whose arms I lay beneath. The dark grew glassy behind hot tears that spilled from my eyes, mixing with sweat as they careened down my cheeks, soaking into her pillowcase. It was too warm that night, too hot to sleep against one another, too hot to fall asleep holding you, my head against your heart, listening to your thoughts fade away and your breath still.

I wanted to say how sorry I was then and how sorry I am now. I can't remember If I loved you that night, or If I ever loved you to begin with.

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The Visitor Martin Rosales He awoke with a gasp. Something was wrong.

Heart palpitating wildly, Pierce tried to roll over and found that he could not. Something had glued him to the bed — fixating him in place. He couldn’t so much as wiggle a finger; the adhesion binding him was so strong.

He was still under the covers. Feeling sticky and damp with sweat, Pierce opened his mouth to call for help and found that he could not open his jaw. Puzzled, he tried to swirl his tongue around in his mouth and found it suddenly turned traitorous.

Like a useless slab of meat, his tongue lay dead. He was utterly and inexplicably immobile save for his eyes. His frantic, rapidly shifting eyes.

Fear, icy and cold, suddenly began to work its harsh way into his body. It started from the extremities — the fingers and toes — and slowly worked up his limbs. He all but felt his heart freeze beneath the strain.

He looked around him wildly, thinking desperately as to how he could get anyone’s attention. Of course, he lived alone nowadays, and he didn’t share a room with anyone save for his faithful dog, Pepito.

Pepito! He thought to himself loudly. It was his only way out of this situation. If he could alert his dog as to his current paralysis, then Pepito could go get someone to come … do something. He didn’t quite know what they would do. He didn’t even know what was happening to him.

Pepito! He shouted in his mind. Pepito wake up!

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Pepito sat at the foot of his bed, curled up into a peaceful ball.

He was a miniature schnauzer, and his curly gray fur gently rose and fell with the even tidings of someone resting deeply.

Unperturbed and unruffled, Pepito lay unaware of Pierce’s precarious plight.

Pepito! Pierce groaned internally. Please, you’ve got to get someone to come! You’ve got to get help!

Pepito remained snoozing. One of his ears was flipped outwards.

Pierce sighed, resigned to the idea that he wouldn’t be able to get his dog’s attention. The useless freeloader.

Pierce’s eyes darted around the room. The early morning sun gently peeked through his tan curtains, casting a thin sliver of light that fell diagonally across the bed. His eyes followed the beam of light as it crossed over the bed and fell to the intersection where the corner of his room was. It was there that he spotted it.

A figure, shadowy and mysterious, stood just to the side of the light. Half concealed in shadow, Pierce’s eyes widened as he beheld the demon before him. It wore a dark trench coat and matching wide-brimmed hat, and though he couldn’t see it, Pierce knew that the skin beneath the clothes was red. Red like a freshly bloomed poppy. Or the same color as anger on a tranquil day.

Pierce broke into a tremendous sweat — worse than how he was already faring. It seemed like all the water in the world wouldn’t be enough to match how much sweat was pooling from his pores. Suddenly drenching the bed and worried that he would melt into the covers, Pierce stared intently at the demon.

It wasn’t moving — its eyes locked onto Pierce’s. It did not smile nor wave. It did not grimace nor snarl. It simply waited and watched. A tourist in a foreign place. A dangerous tourist.

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Pierce wanted to scream at it. Wanted it to go away and leave him alone. He continued to sweat wildly, and the run-off from his brow seeped into his eyes. He blinked angrily at the salty sting, desperately working to regain his vision.

It took a few painful moments, but he soon regained his sight — clearing enough of the sweat from his eyes to see the blurry world. With a start, he saw that the demon had stepped closer while his eyes had been closed. He wanted to jolt from the bed and run far, far away from the fearsome presence before him. It was standing just a few feet away from where Pierce lay.

Somehow, Pepito remained sleeping, blissfully unaware of the intruder looming right over him.

Pierce wanted to cry. He was lying supine amongst a pool of perspiration, and a demon stood just a few feet from him. More sweat got into his eyes, but he desisted from blinking. He continued to stare, red-eyed and fearful, at the demon before him.

One second passed. Then two. Two turned to three and still Pierce did not blink. The demon did not move. It hurt to a tremendous degree — his eyes seemingly melted into twin orbs of pain. Two tiny embers scorched his eye sockets, but he did not blink at the monster.

Until he did. The pain grew unbearable, and this time, Pierce shut his eyes and did not open them again. He might’ve thought he was dreaming if it weren’t for the mass panic flooding his mind and the undying certainty that a demon was standing next to him. A minute passed. Pierce knew that the demon was still out there, waiting for him. Staring at him.

Unable to take it any longer, Pierce opened his eyes and looked at the demon defiantly. The demon had moved and was now looming just above Pierce. Looking straight down, the demon matched Pierce’s gaze and raised an intelligent, bushy eyebrow

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in surprise. Pierce suddenly paused, taken aback by the demon’s … appearance.

Harboring a dignified red nose and chiseled cheekbones, the demon had the most attractive face he had ever seen. With a jawline sharp enough to cut through steel and eyes clever enough to unravel the secrets of the universe, the demon had the look of a marble statue. A real Adonis. The look of someone who Pierce would want. The look of someone who anyone would want.

Though the demon wore a dark trench coat that covered his body, Pierce still knew of the imposing musculature that rested below. Big, bulging muscles that rippled and stretched with every movement of that domineering body. The mere sight of him was fiery — melting away Pierce’s icy fear. His heart began pounding in his chest frantically, wild like the war drums of old.

The chemistry between them was electric. Eclectic. It was like every romantic trope possible had rolled into one grand experience. It was fascinating. It was love at first sight.

The demon blinked its deep, onyx eyes at Pierce, surprised to see such a radical shift in emotion. Suddenly, it looked unsure of itself. Uncertain of what to do next. What to do with the sudden influx of heavy, lustful tension.

It took a half-step backward, and Pierce suddenly found himself desperate for a touch of the demon. He began to thrash against his paralyzed limbs, first commanding, then begging his body to obey his orders. Pierce wanted nothing more than to be able to stand up and caress the beefy demon standing before him. No, he didn’t want it — he needed it.

Suddenly frightened, the demon turned and bolted for the corner of the room where the sun’s light did not reach. The darkness unreachable to Pierce’s watchful eyes. It blended into the darkness and disappeared, leaving not a trace of its existence behind.

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Now alone in his room, it was as if a spell had been lifted.

Pierce sat upright in his bed and glanced to the corner of his room where the demon had run off. Pepito opened a single eye at his owner’s movements, but then promptly closed it upon noting the lack of danger. There was nothing there. No hair nor hide of the beautiful beast that had visited him. Disappointment, heavy and burdensome like a chain, settled itself atop Pierce’s shoulders. His lover had left him in the night.

Unsure of what else to do, Pierce crawled out of bed and exited his room, getting an early start to his day. His mind felt hazy and difficult to think through. There wasn’t any chance in this world that he would be able to get any sleep after that. His best chance was to wait until sundown and hope to see it again tomorrow morning.

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The Body as a God Parker Snellgrove I am half-dead on the ground, impregnating myself, lungs quivering on the brink of collapse with every thunderous inhale and lightning-strike exhale. My screams add some sort of urgency to the scene, but I can’t rush my hands. I am well-versed in the ways these things have to work: every cell is a drop of divine ichor, and they have to move one by one.

Stardust leaves my body and collects into something also sort of like my body. I must continue my line. My skin is soft and malleable, white and shaded gray like the cratered surface of a moon. Thighs tremble under self-exerted pressure and throat gags around itself. My tear ducts are overflowing reservoirs; my pores are environmentally-friendly receptacles. Beams of light smile down upon me with burning brightness, and the wind pushes my near-corpse where it needs to go—my fingers are bloody and raw when they reach out, stinging in the bite of the sun. The hours have cycled and recycled by more times than I can count. Time doesn’t count in this moment, when I reach out and gather this piece of life or soul or space close to my chest.

I’ve reinvented what every mother has made anew in every moment of birth—this is me, in a way I’ve never existed before, in a way no one has. I hold the baby under baptismal waters, flowing freely from womb to font to sky, only to be drunk down again, easing the tight pain of my desiccated esophagus. I kiss the baby’s soft, malleable forehead; the baby blesses me with a smack of hand against cheek. The galaxy spins, milky and dripping—the universe continues to expand.

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San Pedro Springs Park, late January Dean Zach I have parked myself at a concrete picnic table from whose hard seat I have a good view of the center of the universe. The picnic table is covered with scrawled graffiti tags which bring to mind petroglyphs on a cliff face above a spring, but I do not investigate these further because I am looking at the center of the universe.

The center of a universe is a skate park, a rectangular slab of concrete embedded into the earth in such a way that it looks like the empty bed of a shallow pond. Drilled into the concrete are three features whose proper names I didn’t bother to research: a two-step concrete staircase and two iron rails, outcroppings in a sea of slab. Divorced from the landscape around it and the people within it, the skate park comes off as austere and blank, like the tornado-swept foundation of a house. Married to its surrounding landscape and people, it seems like a concrete oasis, a grayscale refuge from the sea of green provided by the larger park surrounding it—the grove of live oak trees to to the left, the meadow of soft grass to the right. And yet the park—San Pedro Springs Park, with its long storied history and its limestone ruins and mangrove-lined swimming pool and tiled bathhouse and tennis courts and playgrounds and other public amenities too numerous to fit in this clause—is itself an oasis, a green chip in the middle of San Antonio’s concrete sprawl, which coats the park in the quiet roar of ambient freeway noise.

From the picnic table I watch the park go about its business in the dying light of a too-springlike winter evening. The skateboarders go around and around, whooshing their wheels, clattering their boards, chatting off to the side, connecting their speakers to Bluetooth, playing a rap song with a percussive tick-tick-tick-boom beat.

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Park visitors, or maybe residents, enter and exit the bathhouse-adjacent bright-red Port-a-Potty, inconveniently conspicuous in my field of vision. The blades of grass vibrate in the soft sunset breeze, blissfully ignorant of the Arctic air mass soon to punish them for their tendency to live. In the canopy of the live oaks, scattered across the park, the line between shadow and alpenglow rises like a sea level. The lamps which line the sidewalk flicker to life. A city bus, plastered on its side with an ad for the “Law Guns” Villarreal & Begum (Lesionado?), stops at a green bus shelter a couple hundred yards to my immediate west. The accordion door opens, then folds closed, no one entering the bus or exiting, and its wheels carry it northbound on Flores. I consider getting on the bus but do not.

Buses, skateboards, streetlamps, speakers, people, blades of grass—to the untrained eye all of these things have come alive only at sunset, setting themselves or being set in motion, whether they know it or not. And through it all the skateboarders at the center of the universe go around and around, occasionally taking a turn to venture into the center of the slab and conquer one of the strange structures which jut out of it. As the streetlights reack peak luminosity and the sunlight slips away the skateboarders come to seem like men in an arena—people in an arena, though all except one are masc-presenting, and though many have ponytails or long curly hair reaching the shoulders.

All, without exception, are wearing tops in grayscale—white hoodies, black tees, light gray beanies. A bald man in a black top stands in the corner of the slab, bottom cut off from my view, arms akimbo, staring at a rail as if it’s a bouldering problem.

Suddenly he starts rolling, then emerges into the center of the slab and jumps front-board first onto the rail. He gets halfway across the iron before his board ejects from his feet, like a bucking bronco, and clatters to the ground while he lands on his feet. He picks his board up and retreats to the corner.

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Some skateboarders flee the arena while others join it; some stay on the side and chat while others remain consistently flying. I never got any of their names; I never get a good look at any of their faces, all I was able to absorb from being in their presence was the fact of their warm motion. Two days later, the Arctic air mass blew in from the north, and everything froze.

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Photography

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Busy Bees Grace Alcocer

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Mirror Lake Grace Alcocer

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Multnomah Falls Grace Alcocer

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The Streets of Portland Grace Alcocer

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Moving On Lily Brennan

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Painter’s Apprentice Lily Brennan

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Untitled 6 Julia Carter

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Gothic Skies Tucker Craft

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Long Day Tucker Craft

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Illuminated Moss of Punch Bowl Falls Haley Hamel

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Tail End Haley Hamel

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Y? Haley Hamel

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Inflection Deflection Spencer Schyma

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Late for Dinner Spencer Schyma

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Wemby the next next Spencer Schyma

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It’s only foggy when you’re not here Katherine Willcockson

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After Work Sam Vader

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Aztec Sam Vader

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Embrace Sam Vader

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Art

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Going through life Carolina Herrera-Favela

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I want a happy house Carolina Herrera-Favela

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It’s fun to glow Carolina Herrera-Favela

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Let’s meet people Carolina Herrera-Favela

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Naked colors Carolina Herrera-Favela

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i’m fine (i hope i bleed out) Cam Kenefick

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Mood Core Keyla Limones

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No.1 Frederic Marmalejo

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Desired Tália Rangel

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Even Death Doesn’t Do Us Apart Sarah Syed

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About the Contributors Grace Alcocer is a sophomore Biochemistry and Molecular Biology major with a passion for photography. She loves capturing memories of new adventures and nature. When she's not at Trinity, she's in her small hometown in South Texas driving past the fields and stopping to take pictures of any livestock she comes across.

Michael Ard has never written poetry before but decided to try it after rereading many of Shel Silverstein's works.

Jose Ayala is a third-year computer science student minoring in creative writing from Houston, TX. During his free time, he loves to use his creativity to write stories or poems based on his own experiences or fictional concepts like superpowers and AI-sentience. His love for writing derives from a simple desire—the desire to maintain his imagination even as he gets closer to the real world.

John Bieberich is a freshman English major from Austin, TX. He is a lyricist, musician, and short story writer who has been studying poetry and trying to write it.

Ollie Bowen is the author of “Here be Dragons”.

Lily Brennan is a junior Communications major and Creative Writing minor at Trinity University. She has loved writing for as long as she can remember and has recently started doing photography.

Jake Bruce is a senior majoring in English with a Religion minor. He plans on writing his way into the Appalachian mountains after graduation.

Jake would like to thank those who have pushed him to grow creatively, academically, and personally during his time at Trinity.

Cutter Canada is a Senior English and Communication double major who loves animals and searching for the right words but never finding them.

One can often find him discovering hope in hard-to-reach places.

Daniella Canseco is a second year English Major History minor from San Antonio Texas and her passions include writing and art. Daniella often intertwines common themes of life within her pieces, exemplifying the beauty, humor, and raw truth that life brings. Daniella believes in finding a meaning in everything and this is embodied in her works.

Julia Carter is a digital and film photographer from Austin, Texas.

Arlo Castilan is a first year Neuroscience Major and Art/Art History + Astronomy double minor. They express myself through many creative outlets, such as writing, painting, film, and animation! Castilan gathers lots of inspiration from the mystifying elements of space and nature, but also loves to read and will often pull ideas from the literature they consume.

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Gabby Cohen is a first year at Trinity University. She is currently undecided on her major, but they know they want to minor in creative writing. They will probably also end up having a theater minor because of how many classes they’re taking. Gabby is excited to have her first fiction story published.

Tucker Craft is a senior double majoring in Global Latinx Studies and Spanish. This is his first recorded photograph. You can find him cleaning at the fraternity house of Iota Chi Rho, of which he is a proud member.

Paloma Diaz-Minshew is a Senior double major in English and Global Latinx Studies. She is an intern with TU Press, a member of TULA, and has conducted research on borderlands Shakespeare appropriations with Dr. Vomero-Santos. She has been writing poetry for about a decade and is a long-time lover of John Keats and black cats.

Samara Gerstle is a sophomore English major. At Trinity, she is an editor for the Trinity Review and the news section editor for the Trinitonian. She spends most of her time writing fiction, prose, and poetry.

Sandra Gurrola is a junior English and Computing major from Lubbock, Tx. She has conducted research on the negative representation of disability in fairy tales. She writes in her free time focusing primarily on prose.

Arden Haggard is a senior English major who enjoys writing both prose and poetry. When she's not writing, she's probably reading. Or playing Stardew Valley. She has a cat named Soccer Ball, and loves to spend time outside and go thrifting on the weekends (iced coffee in hand).

Haley Hamel is a junior majoring in Environmental Geoscience and minoring in Biology She takes photos to share the special things she finds beautiful with other people.

C. K. Hawley is the author of “An Ode to the Second Choice”.

Madeliene Hartman is the author of “Eve through the window”.

Carolina Herrera-Favela is a Senior biology student that likes to draw.

Bishop Jesko is the author of “Maybe this would have made you feel better”.

Chris Junginger is the author of “Wedding Hymn to a Snake”.

Cam Kenefick is a sophomore mathematics and theatre double major.

They are involved in TUPS, TUMS, FTO, IXP, and work as a peer tutor in the QRS. MJ Kriechbaum is the author of “The Boy With the Broken Smile”.

Jorge Larach is a Spanish-American computer science junior minoring in creative writing.

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Dylan Lee is a sophomore Marketing and Communications double major with a minor in Theatre. Outside of school she is also a musician and a singer/songwriter. She’s been writing songs since she was seven years old and has utterly fallen in love with music, songwriting, and performing. She is based in Fort Worth, Texas and performs frequently on the weekends at local venues in her area. She prioritizes authenticity over all else and has made it a high priority to follow her dreams in all things.

Wen Lee is a senior majoring in Computer Science and minoring in Political Science. She is the president of ACM. Avery Letendre is an undeclared first-year, and this is her first year working with the Trinity Review. She primarily writes poetry and short stories.

Keyla Limones is a first-year who intends to triple major in International Studies, Political Science, and English. She is part of the Trinity Review, Treasurer for TU Progressives, and ITS Assistant Worker on Campus. Some additional facts about her are that she loves prose & poetry, reading, admiring art, cafe con pan, and trying new things.

Fredric Marmolejo is a sophomore double majoring in Art and Communications with a minor in Sociology. He loves taking photos of people and nature. Find more of his art on instagram: @realgromitmug.

Adam Mann is an Environmental Studies senior graduating in May 2024.

He works with the University’s Tiger Network, broadcasting Trinity sports and events. He enjoys reading fiction books, especially fantasy and science fiction. He wrote this story for a creative writing class in the Fall of 2023.

Jaden Martens is an aspiring author and full time worrier. Writing is a way for him to understand the world and himself, and he owes so much to the craft.

Cristian Martinez is a sophomore chicano poet, writer, and homecook.

He loves poetry as a mode for processing his internal and external world.

McCaden S. McClure is a sophomore English major with a Linguistics minor. They may be a fool, but they like to think they're a lovable one. They like to go through life with a shit-eating grin on their face, hoping everyone around will have enough patience with them to maybe possibly see how much they care about everyone else.

Sean Michael Mitchell is a singer-songwriter, poet, and visual artist from Kenosha, Wisconsin. He's released one full length, self-produced and published album, as well as an EP and a number of singles that are available on streaming services. He's graduating this year, in May of 2024, with a Degree in Environmental Studies and Spanish. His work is often focussed on the environment and tends to blend environmental and personal subjects.

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Mylo Mittman is a sophomore majoring in Communication and minoring in English.

Sophia Munoz is a freshman from Austin, Texas who loves to run and paint in her free time.

Haniel Neves is a junior organ performance major also pursuing harpsichord and piano accompanying studies. He is also a member of the Trinity Chamber Singers and the Handbell Ensemble, is the organist at the historic St. Joseph Catholic Church on the Riverwalk, and recently joined the St. Mark's Episcopal Church choir. His many musical and artistic interests have been lucky enough to converge more often than he expected when he first got to Trinity, and he would love to get to know even more people here at Trinity in his field.

Anthonia Ogbo is just a girl in the world. Besides visual art, writing — specifically poetry — is one of the many things that she is passionate about, and she loves reading others’ works just as much as writing her own. Her other hobbies include borrowing grief from the future, finding heart-shaped objects in nature and staring at the moon.

Maddy O’Neal is the author of “Poetry is Impossible”.

Lily Price is a senior English Major and Creative Writing Minor from Austin, Texas. Her literary interests include Shakespeare, myth retellings, and speculating wildly about John Donne. She is also Vice President of TriniD&D and an avid tea drinker.

Tália Rangel is from South Central Los Angeles.Tália loves painting, specifically with watercolors and gouache. Most of her art is centered around her own body and directly reflects her headspace. She uses painting to process and channel her emotions, especially when she finds them difficult to talk about.

Anthony Rivas is a sophomore philosophy major from San Antonio. He enjoys reading poetry and philosophy in his spare time. Anthony likes to work out, play tennis, and go on runs along the River Walk. He plays the guitar, drums, and keyboard and collaborates in songwriting with a lifelong friend.

Jorge Romero is a first-year student intending to major in Global Latinx Studies and Spanish with a minor in Linguistics. When he’s not busy working on assignments in the library, Jorge enjoys communicating his thoughts and feelings through music and the occasional poem and spending time outside on campus.

Martin Rosales is a first-year English and Psych major who also hopes to minor in Creative Writing. Martin loves stories in all forms and aspires to be a proficient storyteller one day.

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Spencer Schyma is from Houston if he is from anywhere. He is a graduating senior and an Environmental Studies major.

Heather Smith is the author of “What is True About Decomposition”.

Parker Snellgrove is a junior English major from Birmingham, Alabama. He is also minoring in French and Film Studies. He is a Creative Writing graduate from the Alabama School of Fine Arts, and a longtime reader, writer, and lover of poetry. All his work is dedicated to his two cats, Freya and Persephone.

Sarah Syed is the artist behind “Even Death Doesn’t Do Us Apart”.

Alex Therwhanger is the author of “Star-child”.

Samuel Vader is a sophomore Computer Science major and Ethics minor from Denton, Texas. He's also a hobbyist photographer, experimenting in both analog and digital mediums (sometimes overlapping). When he's not knee-deep in code, he enjoys reading, watching pretentious movies, and picking up new hobbies for a week before dropping them for something new a week later. If you're interested in more of his work, he posts occasionally on his Instagram, @flickdbysam.

Katherine Wilcockson is the photographer of “It’s only foggy when you’re not here”.

Ever Whitlock is the author of “Crouching Venus Housed in the Palazzo Massimo”.

Julia Williams is the author of “However Eventually”.

Dean Zach is a senior English major and creative writing minor. He is from Pearland, Tx, a suburb just south of Houston. While he’s on campus, he copy edits articles for the Trinitonian and serves as treasurer of the Trinity University Film Club. While he’s off campus, he spends most of his time inside watching movies and stuff like that, but he also enjoys running, hiking, and going on road trips, especially in the Mountain West.

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