Agave Review: Fall 2020

agave review

a Claremont Colleges literary magazine issue 4 • fall 2020

issue 4 • fall 2020

letter from the editor The past year has been a trying time, and it is hard to express how much the chain of events has influenced how we each view the world.

While the social and political atmosphere is different in all the regions our students have been dispersed to, I believe one sentiment remains true for all: I cannot wait to get out of my house again.

I am writing this letter on the desk in my room in Ilsan, South Korea. It’s a small, white desk, crowded next to the wall with a window that opens to the balcony behind it. Most of the desk is covered with books. There are more stacks of books near the foot of the desk, mostly Shakespeare. There is also a photograph of me and my middle-school friends framed in the corner. The desk has not been used since forever - I prefer to study outside my room - but recent events have forced me to reconcile with the desk. And now the end of the year is upon us. My work at Agave Review (previously Careless) has also neared its end and I cannot pretend there isn’t a bittersweet feeling in my heart.

Thank you to all the editors, old and new, who contributed to our weekly zoom meetings and helped to make this issue come through despite time zone differences and personal schedules. Thank you to all the students in the 5 colleges who have submitted to our magazine.

Thank you to you, the reader, who clicked on the button and opened the pages.

Agave Review hopes to bridge some of the gaps that widened since social distancing began. Many of the works selected for this issue were submitted before the campus closed in March 2020, many more were submitted after; some of these works reflect nostalgia for the past, others talk of jovial nonsense. We hope these works reflect some of the sentiments that have transpired throughout the year, that our readers may receive a piece of solace from works that speak to their feelings, and that the shared words can help us endure together.

Suh Won Chang, Claremont McKenna ’21 Editor-in-Chief

about Agave Review is a Claremont Colleges literary magazine.

Our objective is to foster the development of writers and artists, to promote a wider appreciation of literature and art, and to create a literary forum written and managed by undergraduate students across the 5Cs. We accept poetry, prose, and visual art on a rolling basis and compile them into a print publication once every semester.

The submission deadline for our fifth print edition is April 18, 2021. Please direct submissions and inquiries to agavereview@gmail.com, and visit https://www.agave-review.com/submit to view our submission guidelines.

st a f f Editor-in-Chief Suh Won Chang, Claremont McKenna ’21 Managing Editor Becky Zhang, Pomona ’22 Interview Coordinator Aditya Gandhi, Pomona ’22 Web Designer Ethan Widlansky, Pomona ’22 Layout Designers Charis Kim, Pomona ’24 Simi Sachdeva, Scripps ’23 Financial Officer Sridha Chadalavada, Pomona ’24 Social Media Managers Paz O’Farrell, Pitzer ’22 Megan Leahy, Pitzer ’22 Editors Layla Elqutami, Pomona ’22 Austin Kim, Pomona ’22 Katie Nguyen, Scripps ’24 Lillian Aff, Scripps ’22 Lucas Cunningham, Pomona ’22 Regan Rudman, Pitzer ’24 Carolyn Tung, Claremont McKenna ’24 Elease Willis, Pomona ’22

jump BRIAN J BISHOP

contents jump 7 BRIAN J BISHOP

Anniversary 10 TALIA R IVRY

Sanctuary (On Revolution) SARU POTTURI

11

wrinkle 12 BRIAN J BISHOP

Goat Gala!

13

Purples in the sky

15

Stories Within Us

18

Wildflower

19

SARU POTTURI LILY ROSS

LIZ JOHNSON

PATRICK LEWIS

Symbiosis 24 ANANYA GOEL

Hunger Below the World

25

Stained Glass

26

SOPHIA HABER

VICTORIA GOSSUM

Borrowing 28 TARINI GANDHI

Cleaning

TARINI GANDHI

29

Going 30 TARINI GANDHI

In Earth’s Diurnal Course, Rolling Round

31

Condemned to be Free

36

LEAH RIVERA

HANNAH FRASURE

i want to count time in the white black holes of my basketball 37 LILY ROSS

Portrait of a Woman in Shafts of Sunlight HANNAH FRASURE

40

My first year of college I wasn’t going home for Thanksgiving instead

41

relapse

42

ADDISON KAY

ALISSA MARTINEZ

spiderbirds 43 LILLIAN AFF

mind of smoke

44

Anxiety Before the Dance

45

Shrinking House

46

Closet Camouflage

47

TALYA KALTMAN-KRON HANNAH FRASURE SARA HEWITT

ETHAN WIDLANSKY

Laughter 48 PATRICK LEWIS

Forgiveness is a hell of a drug

49

deep blue

50

This Kingdom

51

Us Included

52

butterflyandbee.jpeg

54

ADDISON KAY

SRIDHA CHADALAVADA MIMI THOMPSON SOPHIA CLINE

VIRGIL MUNYEMANA

journey 55 LILLIAN AFF

i must, however, write

57

And it feels natural

59

An interview with Gracie Bialecki

60

An interview with Alison Saar

68

SARU POTTURI JACINDA LEE

ETHAN WIDLANSKY SUH WON CHANG

Anniversary TALIA R IVRY

How troubling it is that the leaves, scattering so sigh as you used to.

10 • fall 2020

Sanctuary (On Revolution) SARU POTTURI

Spurn me, and I will spur thee; Smirch me, besmirch me, unchurch me Splurge free on surgery—I urge thee!

A scourge I be, like ship scurvy; Hark thee, clergy!

See you your turgid liturgies Upon them ramshackle gurneys?

Hark thee, clergy!

Burn your crosses and flee!

Let thy feet carry thee out with utmost urgency!

I’ll purge the seas, the gurge and the lees And vultures will perch upon birch trees And insurgents will surge in upon dark steeds And urchins will merchant your gold capped knees And purchase dead spurges for your winding sheets The sky is blue And the pyre’s long due.

And if you can find me a place of sanctuary Then I promise to leave no ash in my wake As I torch my way out of this black-rose grave.

agave review • 11

wrinkle BRIAN J BISHOP

Goat Gala!

SARU POTTURI

Hooked nose, broken back The hag cuts up candy apples with a tack Gossip rag, and talking smack And her ribs splinter with a delightful crack.

Holy ghosts, come out and play Make the most of this pagan day String up the rats, a hangman’s game We’ll raise a toast to our loose-tongued dame.

Heavy footsteps, crunching glass Now here’s a doe-eyed lass With slits for lips, serrated mouth crass Splicing little promises, dead nails in her hands.

Holy ghosts, come out and play Make the most of this pagan day A heap of fingers, gnarly gray We’ll feast on venison tonight, laughing away.

agave review • 13

Crooked toes, wicked eyes The siren perfects her voice with a thick butter knife Mutated body, satanic cries Tongue darting out to pick at dead flies.

Holy ghosts, come out and play Make the most of this pagan day Sea-scented chords—the black ballroom sways A red lady’s apple is our special guest today.

We make merry, blood on ice I pet my steed, twice and thrice We make merry, hazy eyes We make merry, limbs on fire Merry, merry, slit wings diced Merry, merry, crosses fly Merry—merry—forked tongues fried— Merry—merry—the mob’s alive— (The mob’s alive) (The mob’s alive) Holy ghosts, come out and play Make the most of this pagan day The scent of mutton lingers in the air Dinner is served, and my throne is a plate.

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Purples in the sky LILY ROSS

The mosquitoes lick my hairy legs with their yellow tongues when it’s golden hour and I’m trying to journal or some shit.

I itch my left foot on its left side and little white flowers drown in the sun’s wet skin.

Red shorts say bold, casual, unopposed to homosexual activity. Some trees look green and others look gentle, and my skin is peeling tik tac toes every time I lay outside for too long or think about the way your perhaps cooks itself into my letting go. agave review • 15

When was a poem supposed to make sense, when does personificatio n stink like my dirty kitchen– cleaned in the morning, soiled by 8pm.

There’s a spider in your fresh orange juice and it’s turning pale and pink by the minute. There’s a squirrel hanging upside down, blank teeth clacking in your stomach.

16 • fall 2020

Your stomach deep throats its own ah-hems every time a teenage girl fights a motorcycle in the hours before the wind takes shape.

Shapes shift from smooth circles to swift ovals, pouring cool sidewalk cracks in-between your eyes and stretching out towards the purples in the sky.

agave review • 17

Stories Within Us LIZ JOHNSON

Wildflower PATRICK LEWIS

When I was fifteen, my half-brother asked me to look after his dogs. He was going to a wedding in Michigan—which was two time zones west—and needed someone competent and reliable to make sure they were walked and fed. I was his last choice. He handed me their leashes with ill-concealed trepidation and a long-suffering sigh. He made polite, circumspect noises to the effect of “I’ll be back in a week; don’t screw this up.”

The dogs and I watched the tires of his old raised-roof pickup truck kick dust into the July afternoon as they spun away.

I was fifteen and spending a bored summer in rural Vermont, so I was glad of the company. I found fetch to be a wonderful antiseptic against midsummer ennui. The dogs were lovely. One was old, ruddy-coated and steady, with a tongue that hung down like a rusted muffler. He would plop himself down at your feet and make off-puttingly humanoid whining noises when you stood up, moved, or looked at him funny. This was Gus. Truly a man’s best friend, with all the exasperation that term implies.

But the other one was young—a bouncing, joyful thing, a gamesome furball in the prime of life. I would often find her aflutter in fields of tallest grass, bouncing above the verdant strands to view the path ahead, then bounding forth again. This land-dolphin’s name was Soma, and she quite stole the show from her companion, Gus. Vigorous and athletic, she would go tumbling off in pursuit of the latest smell, sound, or thrown object, before returning with bobbed tail wagging and face begging for approval. A princely dog this was, the proud scion of a noble doghouse.

Towards the end of the week I got them into the car and drove to a trail that ran parallel to a tributary of a larger river. I had a dog whistle and two leashes, which I fastened to their collars. I led them down the path into the woods. agave review • 19

It was sunny and green and pleasant under the trees lining the sun-dappled stream. A light breeze was blowing, and the treetops swayed softly, casting shifting patterns of shadow across the path.

The trees were sprightly and dappled with moss and the trail gently winding, rolling with the curve of the neighboring stream. The water made a sonorous gurgling which underlay bursts of scattered birdsong. In the shade, wild clover bloomed.

When the path dipped low I brought the dogs to the water to drink and cool off. I watched their long tongues lap crystal droplets into the soft red roofs of their mouths. The stream was cool and pebbly-bottomed, and the sun glinted across, long and yellow.

I didn’t see anyone, so eventually I let the dogs off the leash.

They ran ahead, charging up and down hillsides, sniffing at little holes. They looked happy.

Soon the path veered away from the stream and we came to a sunbaked clearing all warm and alive with summer bugs. Soma charged into the green, as she was wont, while Gus stayed near me and sniffed around the edges where the fresh grass bordered the path. I stood in the sunlight and watched soft clouds churn through the sky.

The scene was so idyllic—the sky so bright, the air so fresh, the river so cheerful and clear, every color crackling like fire—that I found myself wondering why. Who was it all for? Why such exquisite spectacle? It seemed utterly unnecessary. I was young; I was alone; and all around me streamed a torrent of bewildering, superfluous beauty. But what is the source that fed the stream? What can account for a flower?

By and by Soma returned and sniffed Gus, who sniffed her back.

I reached down and scratched their bony scalps where they met the soft, attentive ears. They beamed up at me; loyal, lolly-tongued, loving.

We reentered the woods on a ridge path elevated above the river with a steep drop down the side. The trees here were older and more gnarled, with here and there a system of roots or branches protruding from the slope or overhanging the water. Soft and pebble-smooth, the stream babbled on.

20 • fall 2020

Soon we came to a place where the ridge shallowed out and one could climb down to the riverbank. Soma jumped down and began sniffing around. I watched the clouds and dreamt.

But Soma didn’t come back to the trail, and I got tired of the clouds. I called a few times, but she didn’t come. I leaned over the ridge to see what the matter was. I saw a tree leaning out over the water. At the base of it, almost directly below me, was a little root-twisted hole at which Soma was sniffing diligently, like an appraiser inspecting a diamond. I’d seen her do this before and I wondered absent-mindedly what made this particular ditch so fascinating. I waited a few seconds and called her again. Then I heard a screech. I would remember it. It startled me into motion.

I scrambled down the slope. Soma was excited now and spraying dirt behind her as she clawed at the burrow. I pulled at her collar and said, somewhat sheepishly, “C’mon Soma. Get out of there.” I wasn’t used to owning dogs. I was embarrassed at having to yank her by the collar out of a ditch, and I still half-believed she would get bored of this in a moment. So I played it cool for my imagined observer.

She pulled a cat-sized groundhog out of the hole. When I whirled around she was shaking it by the neck. She was savage, explosive, but the groundhog was tough. It screeched and scratched and squirmed. The sound was like a lawnmower eviscerating a kitten.

I thought: “It’s too late; I can’t stop her now.” I also thought: “Holy shit.” Mostly I was glad no one was there to see what an incompetent dog owner I was.

The groundhog kept squirming and screeching and now it almost freed itself from her jaws, but Gus, catching up to her, barking like mad, grabbed the groundhog from behind, and now the creature, screaming, was caught between the two maws like a heretic on the rack. I couldn’t quite bring myself to look away.

But what I remember best is that first screech. Marmota Monax diverged from Homo Sapiens around eighty-seven million years ago. The common ancestor was some burrowing cynodont in the late cretaceous period. Eighty-seven million years of evolution separated me from that groundhog, and yet the second I heard that shriek I knew—I could feel—that it was a cry of mortal terror. agave review • 21

Soma ran up the hill and took off down the path, dragging the carcass like a wet towel. I stared. Then I fastened Gus’ leash to a tree and sprinted after her.

My boots clump-clumped as I ran. The sun shone on the river. I remembered the whistle in my pocket, brought it out, raised it to my lips, and tripped over a root. On the ground I felt the loamy path, cool and pleasant in the shade.

I got up, bloody-kneed, charged forth once more, and gave the whistle a mighty blast. It didn’t make any noise. Because it was a dog whistle. This was vaguely disappointing.

Soon she swerved off the path and tore through a thicket of brambly undergrowth. Picking my way through, slowed to a crawl, I thought the world was strangely quiet. There was only my breath— labored, but steady and strong. The clean air stung my bleeding knees. I pushed brambly curtains aside. The thicket pricked at my skin. The sky was unspeakably blue.

But as I emerged from the thicket, I no longer noticed the sky. I found myself in a dark glade trellised all around by ancient, wizened trees. The ground was carpeted with systems of gnarled roots that crisscrossed like a weaver’s loom. Overhead, the twisting boughs knit an almost shrine-like enclosure. The light was filtered and patchy.

The silence was primordial.

In the center, as on an altar, lay a dead rodent. Its mouth hung slightly agape. Its belly was torn open. Shreds of entrails trailed like ivy on the twisted roots. Scarlet gouges scored its throat and chest. A crimson pool was blooming beneath. The eyes were inscrutable.

Above the gore stood Soma. She beamed up at me; loyal, lolly-tongued, loving, a strand of small intestine dangling from the lower incisors, face and paws spattered with blood. Her bobbed tail shook like an alarm clock.

Afterwards I led the dogs to the river to clean off. The red stains washed from their fur and melted into the current, swirling with the eddies, petals in the wind.

On the walk back I stared at the dogs. Gus stayed at my heel and 22 • fall 2020

panted, but Soma kept tugging at the leash, her nose to the ground.

She was lithe and lean. Her fur was long and soft. A beautiful dog.

So why the hell did she do that? How can a thing be so lovely and so violent? She was like a machine…

Now the day seemed so normal, the woods seemed so peaceful, that it was hard to believe it could’ve happened at all.

My god, but why? How can it be such a beautiful day?

I turned the events over and over in my head and got nowhere.

I told myself to forget about it, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that I’d seen something important—something I didn’t know that I didn’t know.

Well, I handled it OK. I think. Right? The best I could.

It seemed to me I’d done well. I’d acted decisively and I hadn’t panicked. I hadn’t flinched at blood and guts. So a part of me felt manly and strong and capable. Another part could still hear the groundhog’s screaming.

It’s not a big deal anyway; I should just forget about it. Just keep her on the leash and move on. Nature is beautiful. There’s nothing— “What is tha’, a terriah?”

“What?”

I was being talked at in one of those old-timey Maine-andNorthern-Vermont drawls.

“Shepard? Aus’ralian cat’le dog? Can de Chira?”

“Um.” “You hear me? I sayed: What breed is ‘e?”

“This one is a cattle dog, yes,” I said, pointing at Gus. “Oh yah, they can be a pain righ’ I’ th’ neck. You must be a real dog lover!”

“Well. Yes.” “I had myself a cattle dog once, and I tell you, he—” The brook babbled inanely.

But after I reached the end of the trail and found the car and got the dogs in I still had nothing figured out. I couldn’t untie the knot. After a while I turned the key and shifted gear and drove off, tires kicking up dust. agave review • 23

Symbiosis ANANYA GOEL

Hunger Below the World SOPHIA HABER

At the bottom of the canyon I dream of flowers, I dream of yellow-studded daisies and browneyed sunflowers dipping their necks into honey, but I do not dream of orchids who are manicured.

I dream of poppies and marigolds bursting into stars and Cassiopeia unsticking herself from the sky to tell me the secret I always wanted to hear: come hither, come closer, necks intertwining like Matisse’s girls. In my sleeping bag I touch my belly button and feel the gash, reminder that once I was a full Platonic person. But here we are far away from the blush of blood in bathtubs and yolky breakfast omelets and the profusion of accompanying imagery so instead I imagine that the gash in my stomach connects to a globe of untouchable sunlight always inside me, and also outside, like dreams. When I was a little girl I would sit before the mirror for days until my skin stuck to the surface, and soon enough I was a sheath of bones, soft hairs covering me like animal protection, the absence of desert flowers the least of my incomplete concerns. And I really did love it, the gilding of gold on my skin, the blue veins like water rivulets in a wasteland, the lust of an inflexible god.

Under the world I remember her, and then I let her go. agave review • 25

trigger warning

Stained Glass VICTORIA GOSSUM

there is suffering sunken into each frail wall of his aching house one carefully constructed by wooden boards, rottened and aged by streams of water emanating from the hearts of the broken. there is anguish weighing down on the tin roof warped and caving into itself, encasing its arms in welcome around him

while pressing downwards with vengeance on the back of his neck until he no longer responds to affliction when he forgets who he is

26 • fall 2020

he will rupture his soul and take pride in tearing each cell in his body apart to reach

to touch his memories made soft pink

and running scarlet down his back he makes them raw again he will crawl desperately to the mirror tracing his fingers along the broken glass of silver, finding beauty in each pattern he encounters

finding beauty in each patch of discolored skin spread throughout his body he opens his arms to the world and smiles at the man in the mirror. he is his own creation

agave review • 27

Borrowing TARINI GANDHI

28 • fall 2020

Cleaning TARINI GANDHI agave review • 29

Going TARINI GANDHI

30 • fall 2020

In Earth’s Diurnal Course, Rolling Round LEAH RIVERA

The wheel, the cornerstone of human invention, was first invented in 3500 BC. In the following 5,519 years it was perfected through both the reduction of friction and the addition of axles, all of this leading up to its ultimate function—transporting a sleeve of plastic cups, a pack of Marlboro lights, and a family-sized bag of tortilla chips through the dusty aisles of Big Ale’s Stop n Shop. Karina gripped her shopping cart lazily, pushing it forward. The mighty wheels turned, leaving squeaky scuff marks every few feet to mark their legacy.

She was looking for salsa, the last item needed to complete the world’s most boring scavenger hunt. Originally, Remi had assigned her a list of party snacks and supplies that would have required three different locations, an Excel spreadsheet, and the strategic planning of an NFL coach to complete. Through hostage-style negotiation, Karina was able to reduce her responsibilities to three manageable items; four if you count the Malabros, her consolation prize.

A part of Karina resented this compromise, knowing she could have haggled the list to zero. But she needed a stake in this party, a sense of responsibility. Because without the acute awareness that her absence would leave the good people of Remi’s girlfriend’s apartment without a pot to piss in—or rather, a cup to drink in, Karina knew that she would not show up.

The truth is, Karina was sad. She had been for a long time. As of right now, she was the only one who knew this fact. She avoided updating her friends on her emotional state because she knew the images that would come to mind—smudged mascara and staccato sobs, wilted roses scattered among the shards of a broken vase, Ophelia just before the plunge. Or perhaps it would be unwashed dishes, missed calls, wrinkled sweats and sitting with the lights off. But no, Karina’s sadness wasn’t cinematic. Her cheekbones weren’t sharp agave review • 31

enough for that zoom shot of a single, rolling tear, and she thought of suicide the way everyone does, in passing, with the morbid curiosity of a toddler whispering naughty words into the mirror and waiting to see if the floor will drop out from under him.

It wasn’t cinematic. It was all gloom, no doom, slow and constant. It snuck up her like the bag of kale she bought on a whim, rotting in the back of the fridge behind a tub of premade potato salad and some miracle whip. She didn’t notice the gradual decay until one day the stench smacked her in the face, embedded itself into the threads of her couch and the cracks of her plaster walls, demanding consideration for what had been ignored. She could throw the bag away, but what a waste that would be.

Karina did not tell her friends she was sad because everyone else had beaten her to it. Sad had been done to death. It had sequels and prequels and spinoffs, you could even get tickets to Sad: On Ice. Karina didn’t want to be caught with stale material. And how, exactly, was she supposed to let people she loved know that she was sad.

She had considered dropping it in conversation, a fun little tidbit to consider before moving on to favorite bands, weekend plans. Doling it out in digestible bits, hors d’oeuvres, a cheese plate of sad. Would it be better to formally sit them down in some kind of reverse intervention? I’ve brought you all here because I’m concerned about my well-being…Perhaps it would be best not to tell them at all, to let her sad fester and bubble until it seeped out of her ears into slippery puddles. She might consider investing in a yellow “wet floor” sign. She could write them a letter, and accidentally get the address wrong (the ZIP code was one digit off; anyone could have made that mistake).

Whisper it to them while they were sleeping, hoping it reached their dreams. Hire a skywriter on a windy day, watch the chunks of smoke disperse and remember how that one used to be an “A.” Karina’s sad was background noise, an ugly 70s wallpaper plastered onto the walls of her psyche that she no longer noticed when she walked past. It was inconspicuous. But a party would disrupt her adaptations. Each “how are you” felt like a challenge. If Karina wasn’t careful, the sad would start to leak—a rogue eye would start to twitch, lips would press together. The smart move might be to stay home, avoid a pipe burst in her brain. But Karina had a mission; she was a public servant armed with a bag of Tostitos.

32 • fall 2020

In the apathetic search for the final item on her list Karina traveled the length of the store twice, aimlessly weaving in and out of aisles, forcing Big Ale’s more focused customers to reroute and evade collision. On the third trip down aisle three Karina’s eyes landed on a shelf filled with jars of salsa, stacked like soldiers at attention. If only she had kept her eyes straight ahead, had not allowed them to wander to the colorful logos and promises of “more this” and “less that,” perhaps she could feign ignorance and continue her trek, maintaining her unfinished errand as an excuse for her prolonged absence at the party. But the army of salsa jars was a sight she could not unsee.

They stood at the ready in their red dress and branded insignias, demanding her attention. Karina sighed, conceding to the salsa battalion. Instead of grabbing the jar in front of her she reached for one three rows back, a small rebellion against the shelf’s uniformity.

Karina, the wheels, and the three (plus one) items on Remi’s list arrived at the counter, a merry band of misfits. The cashier was cheery, the scanner beeping in tempo with her friendly chatter. Karina nodded along stiffly, imagining herself unzipping her sadness and stepping out of it, handing it to the cashier to try on. She wondered if it would fit over all that cheer, if it was one-size-fits all, if it could be passed around like some sort of sisterhood of the traveling pants, everyone gets a turn. Probably not. Karina had a feeling it was tailor-made just for her, sewn with the utmost care, keeping in mind her body’s curves, divots, dimples. A staple piece, made to last.

Karina pushed her shopping cart to the car return, lifting her bag of purchases by its plastic straps. The sun beat down on the parking lot of Big Ale’s. Its rays had turned her car door hostile, and Karina pulled her fingers back from an attempt to grab the handle, cursing under her breath. The words felt good rolling over her tongue.

She let out a few more, swishing them around like mouthwash before releasing them into the air. Just as she was beginning to get creative, she noticed a subtle gleam to the left of her car’s front tire. A penny. Face up, 2005, Lincoln staring forward at the asphalt horizon. A sign! From God, or the universe, her dead grandmother, the grocery store clerk, who knows. But it was unmistakable, someone was trying to tell her…what? Karina wracked her brain. That…that she didn’t have to live like this. That she didn’t have to sit in her sad, bathing every day in a tub of self-indulgent Nihilism, that things could change. agave review • 33

That Remi and his party could go without chips, because adversity builds character, the lack of snacks will make them stronger. That she has a car, with giant wheels, pumped with air and history, that she can go anywhere.

Karina felt herself zoom out, her perspective shifting to a bird’s eye view of the parking lot. She saw her body reach down to pick up the magical coin. This penny, with its miraculous copper, its spectacular circular shape, an enchanted rust dotting its edges; this was the turning point, the catalyst, the inciting event in the film of her life. The actress playing Karina, her eyes sparkling and her dress a vibrant hue, lifts the coin to the light, displaying her trophy, her sign, to the audience. Their hearts surge. The actress playing Katrina hops into her car, possibility shrouding her body like an aura.

INT. KARINA’S CAR—DAY (The car pulls out of the Big Ale’s Stop n Shop parking lot, heading north.)

Karina zips through the side streets, eyes locked on the road ahead. The penny, her confidant, bounces in the cupholder with every speed bump. The next right is the on-ramp to I-85, her oneway ticket to freedom. She doesn’t know where she is going, but she knows it is going to be extraordinary.

(The car turns left.)

Karina cruises down Hawthorne Street, windows down, wind in her hair. The breeze on her skin feels refreshing, like when you splash water on your face to wake yourself up. At the light she will turn left into the round-about, and then her apartment will be a straight shot. It won’t take long to pack up her things, and she will call the landlord first thing in the morning. He will understand; this was bigger than him, bigger than her, bigger than all of us.

(The car continues straight.)

Karina slows the car to a halt behind the stop sign. She counts to herself out-loud before pressing the gas, one…two…three. She has 34 • fall 2020

always been one for the rolling stop, has never waited the full three seconds since driving school at sixteen, but what was three seconds compared to the rest of her life? She has all the time in the world. All she has to do is keep straight, and she will end up right at her bank.

She can’t believe she is minutes from withdrawing her savings, closing her account, starting over. She watches the horizon, feeling the beauty of a fresh slate.

(The car turns left. It keeps in the left lane, drifting over and clipping the rearview mirror of a parked Toyota before swerving back inside the white traffic line.)

Karina lets out a shaky laugh. She can’t believe she is doing this.

Never had she been so bold, so unafraid. It was an out of body experience, as if someone else had taken over. There is a foreign sense of daring pumping through her veins. She lets go of the steering wheel, hovers her hands above it, just to see if it is really her driving. She brings her hands back down, grabbing the wheel and quickly centering it before the car drifts into oncoming traffic. So it is her driving, this is really happening!

(The car pulls in front of a beige apartment with rows of terraces down each side. Music, heavy with bass, drifts from one of the upper levels, although it is unclear which one. There is an attempt at parking along the street, but the nose of the car sticks out, forcing other vehicles to shift lanes to avoid it. A man, late 20s, shaved head, exits from the building’s lobby and greets the woman emerging from the car. She hands him a plastic bag, and they head inside, the building’s revolving door still slowly spinning long after they are gone).

agave review • 35

Condemned to be Free HANNAH FRASURE

i want to count time in the white black holes of my basketball LILY ROSS

when my mom talks loudly on the phone in the middle page of my book, i could kick her off the small overlook that’s to the left of my house — she wouldn’t die or anything, maybe break a bone or two and skim her belly when the cat cracks inside me and the goldfish whimpers that it’s time for his daily walk.

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i let plans for the day divide into other plans, confide in each other what they wanted in the first place out of life’s spinning cauliflower — but all i ate was roasted broccoli for dinner, which is actually my favorite.

38 • fall 2020

all of my dreams are too realistic, shaved heads and breakups on the living room couch and get togethers in shakespeare’s closet, while my dreams are dreaming for wolf-cat hybrids and school principalles covered in cannabis and apple watches counting time in the white black holes of my basketball.

the wind can’t take me down anymore like it did during that hurricane whose name i can’t remember —when the schools shut down and slimy candles slimed the house, and life felt less blinding and more temporary.

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Portrait of a Woman in Shafts of Sunlight HANNAH FRASURE

My first year of college I wasn’t going home for Thanksgiving instead ADDISON KAY

I went to visit a home-friend in Los Angeles who was staying in his dorm room at UCLA. An empty little city. We sat on Greed’s bed and used his new Oculus headset to walk the streets of our hometown. Or rather, our hometown does not exist on street-view maps. So instead we walked around the soundless suburban strip mall: the new Thai place, the gym the Subway the gas station, reminiscent for a Stop & Shop that Greed and I used to bike to, to buy candy and sit down by the train tracks and bite sour gummies and dream about how we were going to get out of here. Then the world ends. I will not cry. I tell him. But I am.

What do you want to do next? Greed asks me. I say Everything. So we blow cash on new pants and new shoes and scarf bean bowls in Westwood and visit his older sister, Faith, and watch her marriage fall apart, and at the end of the night Greed and I share a bed in a B&B where the sallow lights tingle and the fridge is stocked with warm beer. I am still hungry, so I bite his neck and we roll around and hope we never have to reconcile the repercussions of new morning.

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trigger warning

relapse ALISSA MARTINEZ

words have started to flow again from unseemly places, forgotten corners ones i hoped to abandon years ago but now they’ve returned to focus fueling voices familiar and foreign close approximations of my own in the dark you can hardly hear the difference, me and my memories echoes of strangers i used to be bodies i no longer see or seem one carved a star into their thigh while i only sat shaking with the knife all these whispered possibilities mistakes both made and unmade i bear, bare, bury them all struggling to hold this fragile form together, me and myself and i drown in the multitudes contained waiting for it all to come to past again leaving only me, now, breathless and awake and oh so painfully alive

42 • fall 2020

spiderbirds LILLIAN AFF

I watch the leaf stuck in circles, suspended like a mobile from a spider’s dusty web, a limited flight I conflate the sounds of the birds with a far-off helicopter until it fades off into the distance and I’m left with twinkling chirps and I’ve suddenly never felt more like forgetting myself wholly, completely so that I won’t be trapped in your suspension of my logic, restraint and movement I’m so constricted, jealous of the birds

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mind of smoke TALYA KALTMAN-KRON

mind like the midnight sky thoughts shout out no sound surfaces eyes dry, sleeplessness reeks from the room like spiders my stomach spirals dropping through the darkness, cold skin in the heat notice left and right fragrance of the smoke dripping through the walls trapped inside no movement stars may shine yet — night wears a coat that their light does not punctuate it’s just a mind of smoke.

44 • fall 2020

Anxiety Before the Dance HANNAH FRASURE

Shrinking House SARA HEWITT

“Come in, please. The windows are open.”

“Thank you.”

“Did the landlord send you?”

“Yes, ma’am. Could you tell me more about your issue here?”

“The house is shrinking.”

“Shrinking?”

“Can’t you see it?” She gestured, pointing to the obvious. “Look here, right in the entryway, where the hand sanitizer is stacked on the table. The foyer is shrinking. And look in the kitchen, behind all that extra flour and sugar. The cupboards, I know it, are shrinking.

And here! Here in the bathroom, where the toilet paper is stacked along the walls, you can see the bathroom is more narrow than before. No space to breathe, no space to get clean. The closet, too. Just push aside the boxes of gloves and soap and you can see. It’s just so much smaller now!

“The walls shake every morning with the steps of the kids next door that aren’t walking to school. They vibrate until they start to close in. My husband starts his work calls and the walls move faster.

Yes, every morning, right around breakfast time, the house shrinks.

“I’ve tried to find the wrinkles in the walls, to see what is causing the damage, but I can’t quite make sense of it. Can you tell? Is it pressure pushing from the outside? Or pulling from within? …Can you fix it?”

He adjusted his mask and slowly shook his head.

She knew it. She would disappear here, swallowed up by her shrinking house.

46 • fall 2020

Closet Camouflage ETHAN WIDLANSKY

I put the straight jacket on inside-out, holding my selves together to myself.

I am watching your face fade nostalgic.

You look back through mirrored glass, swirling with sand motes of memory that dot the bathroom’s waning shafts of light. How do I miss you?

I try to tune a psychic dial to white noise and drown out this past that I can’t want to know better. I left my new home for an old one, knotted by time’s tangled skein to the person I used to be. We talked and I felt my selves slip. Mom is sad I’m sad She puts her ear to the door to know me better. That’s mom’s love: ties criss-crossing time like gossamer, swaddling me to suffocation.

Phosphenes cloud your form with color, shocking your veil of silt with black and white and red.

It’s a scene of closet camouflage

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Laughter PATRICK LEWIS

I’m picking up the pieces of a broken mirror and scouring the bloodier corners of my room.

I find some dust motes, some fading light-rays, some stained-glass memories of scattered stars.

I wish I could show you all this shattered glass and the ways I’ve let you down: “Here are my hideouts. Here is the clockwork.

The moss-grown stones we stack one by one.”

But you have to keep screaming.

These shards will stay scattered across the sky, the moon will rise nightly like a headman’s axe, and it’s funny when you think about it— All of us dancing alone.

48 • fall 2020

Forgiveness is a hell of a drug ADDISON KAY

I’m too thin so the river runs icy. You pulled me out and set me on the rock to dry. Then kept swimming. I was astonished, for the first time you knew I needed something different. To be warm. I’ve been escaping every second of my whole life. Have you heard this before? At the five- year I’m drinking a shit beer and my friends and I are determined to be fake drunk enough to be real. I’m still frozen so you catch my hand in the parking lot because I’m breaking down and I tell you not to touch me. You’ve got a job in the city and I’ve got a job in the city.

That used to be enough, but Boston is a dreary town where people don’t even know their neighbors.

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deep blue SRIDHA CHADALAVADA

This Kingdom MIMI THOMPSON

A shooting star sprinkles cocaine above the ravine where a sack lies.

The wind rustles an afternoon by while I am tightened in dainty lace.

The star dusts my lips, an empty exchange, like a parrot On Repeat, On Repeat, On Repeat.

Lace does not accentuate curves. I do not have any to begin with.

He holds a pistol in his suit like a tree does to an autumn leaf.

The parrot wishes it were a butterfly to disperse like vapor into space, but it cuts the cake of sugar and fat.

When the bell rings, that’s when you go to your room, While you watch shadows fight under the door in shapes of scooters and bikes and planes.

This Kingdom is certainly sweet, there are trunks of stars and cakes and inducements for your ears, but every night, the parrot faces the fox from its window and harks to the ground: Lace is for a Saint, not for a parrot!

The jittering hawks slide mangoes under the door.

The lace veil is an anchor.

Sunlight promises make you dance until your kneecaps break.

To tan is to want home is to have the pistol pressed to your throat, and running through pines on mango scraps will trap you in the fox’s web.

A shooting star sprinkles cocaine above the ravine where I lie like a sack.

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Us Included SOPHIA CLINE

You can ask us now What you should do But we cannot give you the answer you want Leaving is risking Being caught in the storm Where all things, us included, are subject to change But before you leave There is this moment Where you can see the wind laid before you From that point, which many, us included, don’t notice You can watch the wind’s grooves, its rhythm and flux It is beautiful, but within it, every inch is an hour That is torn to pieces And thrown at your feet As you walk, the road you will take Will both lead and circle you Taunting that you may never go back the way you came Each step you take Will be another cut from the wind on your skin As its tender blades kiss your ears, kiss your neck

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Every hour after you have left Will be another bruise on your hands from the rocks As you scramble to grab hold, but only find gravel You will not fall Even if you want to You will boulder on, through the wind laid before you You, Kilimanjaro, will stand in its wake Bruises and cuts on a flesh like stone You, Kilimanjaro, will brave all storms Pass all tests, endure all trials, You will not only survive the pressure of an unforgiving Earth You will flourish in it Each crushing pulse propelling you Higher into an all-else-untouched horizon But you will stand alone And no one, us included, will see

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butterflyandbee.jpeg VIRGIL MUNYEMANA

journey LILLIAN AFF

there’s tranquility in traversing a great

expanse where all there is is you and the rattling of your small, sentimental vehicle you bought for two thousand dollars in July, maybe a couple clinking coins, some Oliver and Neruda, Stern and Dickinson too, and your few insignificant effects, collections of rocks and other shiny memorials

agave review • 55

and all of you are traveling in a line together with the past in the backseat spending the clinking coins on cold drinks to pass out to your objects in case they sweat in the Bakersfield sun, a break from motion but there’s a place for emotional arrival even if you’re not sure how to get there at first you skip past it because the road twists itself another motivator and another exit prove I exist instead of you

56 • fall 2020

i must, however, write SARU POTTURI

these keys, those keys, press into the hardened flesh of my fingers, rough from metal string and aching from nails bitten right down to the skin bird-like nubs deformed like babies set in baskets down the stream. but here’s a eulogy, as mama cries and pa pretends to grieve: you were meant for something greater, karna, moses of the seas. and karma’s got her vice-like grip upon my toes: my kafka on the shore; and all my lines and squiggles might be just that: glorified remnants of worlds that i’m no longer privy to. i prithee, let me birth you, half-formed baby splitting my skull; i’m not your home. i’m not your home, you overgrown child, like a canopy growing in me, rumbling my intestines to make room. and this, and this is why they sent their basket case down the stream: for fear and knowledge that if not you would never leave. my fingers are itching to cast you out; i’m witch as can be, stirring at cauldron and stewing in my resentment. these keys, those keys nothing’s enough for you, nothing’s good enough, nothing’s good. perhaps it is i who will not let you go i who keeps you in: for fear and knowledge that when sent out to the world, you will return unrecognizable or perhaps not at all. that’s what it means to be a parent, to know the kind of hell-scape you’re bringing that ball of skin and bone and brain into. but if i give you wings, will you mold into icarus? my fingers twitch at the thought, ever so slightly, stuttering upon the keys, and making a sound most unpianoesque. it’s

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a burlesque of sorts, the water-damaged wood jeering at technicolor screen: oh, i’m glitching, i’m glitching. these keys, those keys, endeavor to push you out, ghost possessing me, apparition playing my grotesque fingers like puppets on strings, hardened from string; if i bring my own hands up to my face and build monuments from rods and cones, will you leave? who will i be when you’re gone? will i be empty? are you the very intestines i thought you pushed around like a toddler does toy trains? a double suicide; make that double, please. if i die, will my words write me a eulogy, or will they suss me out, cuss me out leave my bones to rot? it’s karma at its finest. strings are bars and so are lines: still, however, i must write.

58 • fall 2020

And it feels natural JACINDA LEE

An interview with Gracie Bialecki ETHAN WIDLANSKY

After graduating [from Pomona], I lived in Brooklyn and worked at a fellow Pomona alum’s start-up for five years. During this time, I was also writing Purple Gold and acting as the assistant to a celebrated bookseller, Michael Seidenberg. Michael ran his bookstore, Brazenhead Books, out of his Upper East Side apartment, and it was a perfectly New York gathering place for writers, bibliophiles, and artists of all sorts.

In January 2018, I quit my job and moved to Paris where I’ve lived since. It was here that I finished Purple Gold, launched my literary consulting business, and embarked on many other writing projects. The city has an incredible literary and artistic community—I truly feel supported here as a writer and am grateful for Paris’s creative spirit.

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Unfolding across the freeways of LA, Purple Gold ­— Bialecki’s latest novel and the object of our discussion — follows a dreamy stoner, Alana, who falls for a weed dealer named CJ Smith. As their relationship unfolds, Alana spends more time cruising with CJ than she does at college, and soon she’s caught up in his smoke-filled world. Purple Gold is about losing yourself: thinking you’re going somewhere, only to realize the car is breaking down and you’re stuck in a place you never could have imagined.

Before we start talking about Purple Gold, I’m interested in your running career; I run for Pomona Pitzer cross-country and track.

Do you involve running in your writing process?

I love running before I write; it calms you down. I’m a morning runner now. I ran at Pomona and so we’d obviously had. I started just in track and then got into cross-country too and now, I ran a marathon two years ago, but I’m pretty chill now. I rock it with the Casio stopwatch, like no Garmin, no smartwatch. My first draft of Purple Gold was actually four different perspectives. Alana was one of the characters, there were three other characters, and one of them was a runner and the book went through her senior year. She finished school through graduation. CJ left the narrative when he went to jail and then there was this whole other thing... and then I reread the draft and 70 percent of it was Alana chapters.

You were clearly more interested in Alana?

Yeah, I was like: “This is clearly a story about her—I don’t know why I’m trying to make it a story about all of these other things.”

Did your scrapped characters make any cameo appearances in the final draft?

No. Her friends Lillian and Sienna are still in it, but all the things about running were cut. I would still like running to find its way into my writing—I’ve written some short stories.

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You mentioned that Purple Gold was somewhat autobiographical.

There’s a lot, I hardly need to remind you, going on in this text.

What, if any, emotional processing purpose did your writing serve?

Maybe I misphrased it—inspiration came from personal experience, but I wouldn’t say that it’s heavily autobiographical. It’s a work of fiction. I took a lot of elements that were close to me and also came from other people and other ideas, and then I wove them all together.

For me, it’s a lot easier to make a work of fiction than it is to make the events of your life fit into a narrative arc. The idea of two different worlds being so close to each other—the world of Mission College and the world outside of L.A., also the idea that you can inhabit a space but do you really belong there. At the end of the book, that’s what Alana’s thinking about. She went so many places with CJ so she feels like she’s part of that world (CJ’s), but was she anything more than an observer? Was she a participant? I think the book helped me process those questions, but I don’t think at the end I was like, “Here’s the answer, I figured it out!” I was just like, “I thought about that for a while, uh...”

Absolutely! It feels a lot like, especially on some runs, spectatorship. Like we’re there for eight months out of the year and then we leave and our experiences “in” L.A. have no real purchase on our lives. It feels like a simulation. And I feel like the virus has only made that feeling more pronounced.

We used to run the bike trail that goes toward Upland—like how many kids at Pomona have just never been on that trail before? Or have never even seen Upland? I love, too, that Pomona is on the county line and you can just cross into San Bernardino. And then you just go back to campus and leave and forget. There’s so little interaction—there can be so little interaction with your surroundings.

What prompted you to choose CJ as Alana’s guide to the outside world? What was the motivation behind his character?

He had just been a character from earlier. I had mentioned that I started writing a version of this story as a senior and that just kind 62 • fall 2020

of came to me naturally—it was an interesting story and one that was close to me. Have you heard of the book Rules of Attraction by Bret Easton Ellis?

No, I haven’t.

Rules of Attraction takes place on a college campus and I was like, “Okay I can just write a book like Rules of Attraction. Just about some kids at college— nothing crazy.” But at the same time, it felt like it would all just be melodrama. Only taking place in that microcosm.

So CJ was also a way of expanding outside of that world.

Feeling like there were real consequences as opposed to…

Oh you’re gonna get a B—I don’t know. And also I love the idea of Los Angeles as a character.

Like a Dickensian deal?

There’s also so much—the weed culture—there’s so much texture to the way the city looks and feels. There’s so much atmosphere. You’re able to get those L.A. moments.

You can taste it. The weed being so prominent definitely gave an extra sensory dimension to the novel. As you might imagine, cross-country runners don’t smoke a whole lot of weed. I can certainly imagine it being a big part of L.A. culture, I just have to look for it next time I get back, whenever that might be. The whole time I was pretty mystified by CJ. On one hand he was the most interesting character, but I also feel like I never learned anything about him. I feel like you’re putting the reader in the place of Alana, you get so close in proximity to this enigmatic figure and yet you never really get close.

You wanna know what the deal is.

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Yeah! It felt like metafiction—a fictional character in a fictional novel. Was that intentional?

I do have a backstory. I wrote it like that because there are certain people that you meet and that you know and your perception when you first meet them is like so; it’s almost like they’re a cardboard cutout. You’re like, “This is a glamorous figure.” And as you learn more about their lives, it feels weird or more like wrong to actually discover that they have a messed up family and all of these other things and you have all of these quotidian problems. I think there was a part of Alana that didn’t want to know or was afraid to ask because that might ruin the illusion, but also she didn’t feel like she had the right to know.

Because she was a spectator and not a player?

Yeah. And she was really taking what she was given at that point.

In my mind, and I don’t know how much of this became clear in the final draft, but in my mind he was an R&B artist and had been part of a group that had ultimately broken up in hostility. It hadn’t been an amicable business breakup and then they had taken the rights to his music, so he lost money and then because of that… I think he probably had always been dealing weed. He’s just like the kind of person who has been doing it for so long. But he had to go back to that because he was in a difficult financial position because of the breakup of the band. It was also kind of about if you’re coming from a precarious financial position to begin with and you make it as an artist and you suddenly have money, that can quickly go away again. And you’re not in a position where you can bounce back from that. CJ was kind of screwed by that and society, but also Alana was also not the kind of character to say, “Okay, we’re gonna sit down and talk about it, tell me everything.” He was so caught up in it, not talking to her about it and kind of dealing with it but not dealing with it.

What’s your feeling around memory? There was this kind of nostalgic component towards the end of the novel when he was looking back. The reason I ask is because one of my friends, sobering up now but he still deals a lot, had memory problems for a solid two years and never slept because of weed. His case is very 64 • fall 2020

physiological, but I wonder if weed and memory were things you were thinking about and tensioned in the book?

Memory is so subjective. What Alana is getting at at the end is: “I need to go home and tell someone what happened because I’m the only one who knows what happened.” But what really, actually happened? You need another witness to verify it. It’s unclear if she’s going to see CJ again or what the trajectory of their relationship will be. None of her friends even met him. Memory is so unreliable, and if you’re only going on that it’s almost like none of it happened.

Did that have something to do with your choice to use the second-person narrative? That was what struck me at first because I don’t think I’ve read anything with the second person. It felt almost accusatory.

To me it was adding a layer of recounting and memory between the actual events and the remembering of them. If you just say, “I walk down the street to go to the store” that’s very much something happening. But the “you” was as if Alana were telling the story to herself.

You walk down the street-It’s like a self-affirmation? Convincing herself, “This happened to me.”

Exactly. And actually at the time I had the first draft with the four different characters, it was in third person so it switched around.

Then when I cut everyone else out, there was a draft where it was still third person and all Alana’s perspective. But it was kind of stiff, because third person is a bit distanced, you know, it’s not even a close third. I thought, “Well, why is this?” I had been journaling a lot and writing in second person just to myself. I have no idea why; I just got in the habit of doing it. So when I decided to rewrite it, I made a decision at a certain point to rewrite the whole thing from scratch and did that in the second person. I finally knew CJ’s character a lot better and developed the plot arc, so I knew exactly what I was writing toward and had an ending so that Alana didn’t finish the rest of her college career. I was able to rewrite it and let it flow. agave review • 65

You mentioned in your written responses Professor Lethem.

What role did he play in all of this? I guess this is more “Pomona student interviews former Pomona student!”, but how did your experience at Pomona play into writing this novel?

I wrote a draft of this-—it was 40 pages and none of the plot, I think the characters were similar. None of the plot in that story made its way into Purple Gold. But in the workshop environment that year, a lot of people were taking it seriously and working on novels. It was very much “this is a thing that people do,” it felt a little bit realer than a thing like, it’s just another class where by the end of the semester I read some books and wrote a paper. At some point I decided, “I’m gonna stop waiting around and write a novel and I already have 40 pages, so I probably just need to write another 100 and I’ll be fine.”

I forget when I told Jonathan that I was working on it. He was super nice about it! He read one early version and now I’m appalled that I let him read it. I was like, “Wow, I totally wasted your time. I hope you didn’t spend a long time reading it,” but he was nice about it and gave me some helpful feedback. He was also really positive which at that point was great to hear because I was like, “I have no idea what I’m doing,” and he would say, “You’re doing a great job!”

Do you wanna talk about the title a little bit? There was that roll-credits moment at the end when the phrase “Purple Gold” comes up. What’s the idea?

To me it’s supposed to be the moment, that L.A. sunset moment where you’re driving and it turns from that 4pm afternoon light to the evening light and the hills start go get purple but then you still have the sun catching in the dry, dusty bushes. I had also originally thought of it because I was like I wanted to call it something that sounds like weed, like “Blue Dream,” but that was too obvious. Then I thought of “Purple” and the rest is history.

I like that! And I was thinking gold as in currency.

Exactly! And then I hadn’t even realized it, but I was talking to an editor and they said, “Yeah! Those are the Lakers’ colors.” But I’m not-66 • fall 2020

I didn’t even think of that either.

Yeah. I’m totally not one to get a basketball or sports reference, but I was like, “That works really well!”

What a great coincidence. Do you want to talk more about your experience with editors and what that was like? Getting this from a manuscript to its published form?

It was a long process. Usually you sell a book to an agent or you get an agent to represent you, and the agent sells the book to an editor.

Actually, Jonathan put me in touch with an editor who had asked him if he knew anyone who was working on new stuff. So I had been directly in touch with this new editor from Simon and Schuster, and he didn’t read the whole thing; he just read the beginning and gave me some feedback, but it was not super helpful for me because it was kind of just spitballing ideas, like I know you probably haven’t read the whole thing and I don’t think you know what I’m doing here.

It was more like “If I were to publish this, maybe I would do these things.” And I was like “Hm, I don’t know.”

I spent a lot of time revising it myself, especially going through all those rewrites. I had a friend who was also a writer, this British man in his 60s who read through the entire thing and really helped me with it: “This is too long, this is dragging on.” So I did a lot of selfand peer-editing. And then my final publisher sent me back edits, and I would read them and respond like “Oh my God, you’re totally right—I do need to fix that.” One of them was the first time CJ and Alana sleep together and then it just skips to a new scene and didn’t talk about it. He said, “This is a big moment, can you talk more about it and just like expand it? This feels like a bait and switch.” You’re working on a book and you’re so close to it, and you’re working on individual chapters and then I felt the need to stop and read the whole thing and see how it was all fitting together. And even though I’d done that, there’s still a moment where you just have a different set of eyes on it and you’re like, “You’re totally right.” ​Thanks Gracie! agave review • 67

trigger warning

An interview with Alison Saar SUH WON CHANG

Alison Saar, Scripps ’78, is an artist based in Los Angeles. Her work in sculpture, printmaking, and other multimedia art makes use of distinctive materials in order to touch upon topics of Black female identity, mythology, and alchemy. Her exhibitions Mirror, Mirror and Of Aether and Earthe are featured ​this fall at Scripps College and Pomona College respectively.

Content Warning: mentions sexual assault

68 • fall 2020

Are you in your studio right now?

Yes, this is my print studio. I have a plank behind me, and… mostly junk. This seems to be the dumping ground for everyone in the family. They just dump all their stuff in here, so…

And then you make them into art pieces.

Yeah! (laughs) How did your time at Scripps influence your artwork and how you came to view art?

Well, I grew up around artists—both my mother and father are artists—so I was always involved with the arts from early on. But when I got to Scripps, I worked with Dr. Samella Lewis studying art history. She was actually a doctor on the art of China, but she is African-American, so I took African-American, African, and Afro-Caribbean art classes with her. That really influenced a lot of the themes of my work. Another big influence was the core curriculum at Scripps, which looked at world history through arts. I was really influenced

by Greek mythology and Greek literature.

As in your upcoming exhibition, Of Aether and Earthe.

Right. A lot of my works are related to mythology. The title of that exhibition is spelled the way it would have been spelled in alchemic writing, so it’s got a lot of e’s and a’s and r’s and th’s. I like the idea of making art as a sort of alchemy, that you take some base materials and then you transform them into something that’s meaningful or spiritual.

Do you have a preference for the kind of base materials you use?

I mostly end up using whatever is lying around. Materials like found wood, or found ceiling tile, or tar. Things like that, which are really worthless in their own right. When combined and put into these forms, they sort of become valuable in another way. I like that idea of transmuting something to another. agave review • 69

Have you always worked with a variety of media, or did you have a breakthrough moment when you decided to change your style?

Because my mother did a lot of assemblages, we were always going to state sales and flea markets. We were always fascinated with used and older materials. Also, where we grew up, in Laurel Canyon, just north of Hollywood—that’s where I live now—was an area that had been decimated by wildfires in 1958. So when we grew up here, we were surrounded by burnt-down houses and I would find all these cool little melted pieces of glass, things like that. You find something like an old, melted horse, and you get to wondering who it belonged to. I got really interested in the history of objects in that respect.

But I guess my epiphany moment was becoming a sculptor. Even though Scripps had a great ceramics department and a great sculpture department, I never took any of those classes. It wasn’t until my last semester that I started making sculpture. I made two sculptures, and I never went back.

Since you brought up sculptures, I was curious about the extensive use of female bodies in your work. What kind of message do you want to convey to viewers by portraying both the fluid and the grounded elements in a female body, when the conventional manner of thinking tends to relate fluidity to women and groundedness to men?

In my early work I did some male figures every once in a while—I have a son, and he’s reflected in my work whenever I’m frustrated with him. (laughs) I guess I really became interested in the female body because one, I am a female, and two, I think it became a real focus of my work after I had my children. Pregnancy is a kind of alchemy, the magic of childbirth and all of that.

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But historically, female bodies have always been portrayed in certain ways, and usually by males. That lends a very different way of looking at the female body, of portraying and presenting them. I grew up in a family with very strong, powerful women. My mother and my grandmother are both survivors. Just to see the strength of them holding families together, and working, and surviving their spouses, and just being real powerhouses... so instead of the way women are always on the fainting couch or being raped or being subservient, I was really interested in portraying women that are closer to the way I identify and the women that I have known in my life, and so many of the powerful women out there in the world as well.

Even though I look like I’m white, I identify as African American and by race; my mother is African American. In our upbringing, my mother was very much involved in the Black Arts Movement and very militant in her work during the Civil Rights Movement. That was what I was weaned on. So then I wanted to focus on the Black female body, the history of what the Black female body has experienced, and what Black female bodies are experiencing here and now in terms of the media and all sorts of… you know. It’s all still pretty twisted.

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Contributors Jacinda Lee Ethan Widlansky Patrick Lewis Sophia Cline Lillian Aff Ananya Goel Victoria Gossum Talya Kaltman-Kron Lily Ross Alissa Martinez Virgil Munyemana Brian J Bishop Saru Potturi Tarini Gandhi Sophia Haber Talia R Ivry Leah Rivera Mimi Thompson Liz Johnson Hannah Frasure Sara Hewitt Sridha Chadalavada Addison Kay

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agave review

Printed in China

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74 • fall 2020