~ Issue 10, January 2022 ~
Editor-in-chief Aya Whitfield (@avolitorial) Literary Editors Lau Bowcock (@smallepics) Kavi Kshiraj (@graharaja) Lianna Schreiber (@ragewrites)
Anatolios Magazine accepts submissions of poetry, prose, and visual art (including photography) during the open submission periods indicated on our site, anatoliosmagazine.wordpress.com. Cover Photo by Paul Gilmore on Unsplash
General Submissions Two Years in a Small Town by Bonnie Billet………………………………………………… 4 A Beautiful Summer by Michael Sajdak…………………………………………………… 5 Extra Growth by KJ Hannah Greenberg…………………………………………………… 6 White fish by DS Maolalai…………………………………………………………………… 7 Fata Morgana by Geoff Sawers……………………………………………………………… 8 Rosario by Alejandro Villa Vásquez…………………………………………………………. 9 Running Across The Dead by Cynthia Robinson Young……………………………………. 10 I know Where I am by Bonnie Billet………………………………………………………… 11 Financials by DS Maolalai…………………………………………………………………… 12 Sunset by Elizabeth Spencer Spragins……………………………………………………… 13 What One Does by George Freek…………………………………………………………… 14 Pond by KJ Hannah Greenberg……………………………………………………………… 15 December pisses into January by Bonnie Billet…………………………………………… 16 When a Gull Eats a Fish by Alyx Chandler………………………………………………… 17 Comorbid by Alejandro Villa Vásquez……………………………………………………… 18 The Echo of Joy by Edward Lee…………………………………………………………… 19 Points off by Bonnie Billet…………………………………………………………………… 20 This Literature by Paul Ilechko……………………………………………………………… 21 Are You My Brother? by Alejandro Villa Vásquez………………………………………… 22 Letting Go by Elizabeth Spencer Spragins………………………………………………… 24 Spooning in Rented Apartments by Bonnie Billet………………………………………… 25 Dates by KJ Hannah Greenberg…………………………………………………………… 26 Mita's Cachet by Alejandro Villa Vásquez………………………………………………… 27 Last to Leave by Alyx Chandler………………………………………………………………. 28 I lie in a hammock by Bonnie Billet………………………………………………………… 29 .oo .
2
3
Two Years in a Small Town Bonnie Billet winds breeze over blue green pastures uncovering rusty mowers unpainted chairs cows standing under trees so much crookneck squash growing up the grape arbor we took it every place we went unloading it in the front yards of strangers I rode my bike on back roads passing dairy farms painted barns until I was late for supper Trout’s Grocery was next to the turn onto the highway and bigger places the school was at the far end of town we read Romeo and Juliette out of comic books today kids are bused to other schools the grocery still open the house sold forty years ago nothing left of the garden all that beauty lost
4
A Beautiful Summer Michael Sajdak What happened to the days Of that long ago summer Of wasting on the beaches In the apple so far fallen from the tree In the world’s only city In the streets buried in sand and dust Falling this way and that Sensing in my blood the storm The purifying fire Round every corner Long, long summer A beautiful summer
5
Extra Growth by KJ Hannah Greenberg
6
White fish DS Maolalai a 3rd floor open window overlooking slow rivers and music falling hard on the heads of pedestrians, gone end by end by the way of the balcony or through the front doorway, collapsing half-drunk down the stairs. following it comfortable, less urgent, more tactful, the smell of white fish frying on a cast metal pan lemon juice, salt, good oil and white garlic. fistfuls of your favourite raw spice.
7
Fata Morgana Geoff Sawers superior mirage great haunted image before which we all take the knee concrete castles that flow like a burn through a light that snaps all we once loved, just overripe fruit hung on the wind's tree
8
Rosario Alejandro Villa Vásquez The houses, humming block after block on Long Island. The clock glows in the night. I rock back from slumber, black luminescence. I dream something the color of my sister’s ashes. My hair unkempt as a crown of thorns. Rosary whipping me as I carry this cross across suburbia. Plastic-white beads emboss my scalp, like papá’s nails, digging.
9
Running Across The Dead Cynthia Robinson Young - after Louise Gluck You’re stepping on your father, my mother said. It was then that I realized how many graves I had stepped on to get to him, not just this Veteran’s Day, but Memorial Day too, so twice a year we transferred from bus to bus, an all day excursion, leaving Black-faced neighborhoods to ride to white ones, just to arrive in the only place folks from Newark were reluctantly allowed. Now I take my granddaughter, and we drive, the only one in the family still alive who will go with me. While I talk to my dead parents, she stares at nothing straight ahead. Some say the Ancestors are still lurking around in spirit form, returning to tell us one more thing. I don’t believe in ghosts until I do. I have a friend who befriended the graveyard. It relaxes her to walk her dog among the tombstones, stepping on strangers, searching for departed loved ones just to tell them she is relieved they have avoided what life looks like now. And to ask if they are looking back, wondering how they got over? And to ask if they feel sorry for us? For, while they are in a great cloud of witnesses, we are still here running, still panting, still struggling to finish the race set before us, awaiting the day someone will walk across our graves on the way to find someone else.
10
I Know Where I Am Bonnie Billet I walk into the street double masked coat flying steps unsteady in my seventies
hair uncombed
stopped by spring everywhere first flowers swelling buds flowers opening in order Cornus mas before Cornus kousa before Cornus Florida on the day I get my second vaccination a few crocus flower in muddy fields of park skunk cabbage grows in wet woods spring peepers chirp while Georgia senators pass laws bringing back Jim Crow poised in the act of signing in front of a painting of a Georgia slave plantation will strange fruit hang from poplar trees I know where I am what comes next not how to stop it. spring holds while I plant Viola Midnight Flow and Viola Sherbet Ice blotch my fingernails black from working loose soil everything I thought I knew about this country erased will the beauty remain as long as the climate holds not dependent on how many see it
11
Financials DS Maolalai drinking black tea, matching invoice to pdf purchase order while outside the river bakes, walled by its bankside, like a toad on a rock by a road. we are close to ocean here – the liffey, fat as a ripened apple, swelling and diminishing and responding to the tides, as if days made seasons blossom.
12
Sunset Elizabeth Spencer Spragins the breath of horses warms this barn my father built— my day unsaddled paws through every wisp of hay and searches for the sweetness
13
What One Does George Freek (After Tu Fu) Apple blossoms fall silently in the dark forest, then quickly blow away. They said what they had to say. The stars look down from an insouciant sky. They will burn to nothing, but not before I die. I’ve lived sixty years. My wife was forty-five. I place flowers on her grave. It’s what she would have done for me. But it will also fade into eternity. Leaves fall on her grave. A spider emerges from an old hat, and struggles through the tall grass. I walk home alone. I must feed her hungry cat.
14
Pond by KJ Hannah Greenberg
15
December pisses into January Bonnie Billet my hands shake I go to a neurologist to see if I have Parkinson's I thought I'd ace this slide into home without a walker wheelchair nursing home my medical conditions pre diabetes psoriatic arthritis controlled by expensive medication coast to the end we drive through cold mist under a steel box grey sky the doctor watches my hands sees my neck tremor asks me to stand I don’t have the stiffness that comes with Parkinson’s my chances of getting the disease low he orders an MRI and some kind of nuclear test I don’t bother with either we order sushi from the expensive place
16
When a Gull Eats a Fish Alyx Chandler with a ring rusting its belly, I realize what’s there: living layers to what we can’t touch. Sky and deep sea—that marriage is over. Keeping a promise requires undoing, doesn’t it? Cracking open the mother daughter bivalve. Like that time a smack of moon jellies pedicured our feet in sting, how I welted up coral pink. Ouch, but what a way for bodies to perform pain, in an instant so inflamed. Between us: iridescence and tropical storms. Memories the distance of a wingspan. I want independence to be like the man o’ war, shutting down the whole damn beach with a purple flag. I think it’s one creature but it’s not, it’s actually an entire colony. Look. Our toenails polished violet as the creature before us. A warship under full sail—and here we are, bikinied, our tentacles beached.
17
Comorbid Alejandro Villa Vásquez My mother said that my grandmother would say “If someone is to die, but it is not their time an animal may go in their stead.” I look to the Moon’s mysterious complexion as it gazes the Earth with skeletal eyes. A confirmation that there is always something underneath the skin, the stone, the disease and malady. There may always be a knife in the sack, a thief around back — as much as there may be a cure a one-off of resilience, or even a noble goldfish to take death off our hands. And so, I wonder of my grandma’s folkloric beliefs and who gave them to her, or what. If she were here could she tell me how to skin a cat to save a soul? We could have boiled herbs and made egg baths had an animal not failed to die for her. I would find that creature that never was and flay it for supper. Lay it in front of a picture of my grandma and say “Here is the dog who orchestrated your cumbrous demise, your slow blow upward.” Its tomato-onion bed and pillows of meat unloosen a smell as old as this frame. I know its unctuous, orange style. But her picture goes still for a while.
18
The Echo of Joy by Edward Lee
19
Points off Bonnie Billet the bell rang I stood up and started unbuttoning my blouse I was in a daze I didn't snap out of until after high school they kept talking points off for spelling It didn't make sense and I didn't have the money to go to the one college I'd applied to so I took off as if the road were an Irish folksong . in Paris I learned French to prove the schools wrong I spent the winter under a grey sky . I left Paris and arrived in Florence without knowing the Italian name was Firenze I got off the train because it was the end of the line and walked until I saw El Duomo when I got to Katmandu my dreams exploded onto hotel pillows in brilliant bursts of color each lasting only moments
20
This Literature Paul Ilechko Tapestry window sways eerie sways golden absence in soft curl of daylight a collage of time and space a flash of glass given gleam a tonguing hiss of harsh the weaving of chainmail and black forest flowers beneath the matting canopy be partitioned be prepared be papered over forcing a literature of river sand caressing the quiet breath so sharp and quivered within this differential.
21
Are You My Brother? Alejandro Villa Vásquez Rain boils in the august street This frothy beltway, this sizzling balloon. Bubbling, nothing-white, watching
my walk; muscles wink. Delightful tendon glazed in vapor. I pass a Church and intercede for my mother,
“Visit her, Lord.” Cold wind processes from the mouth of the Church. One saintly breath
while the Earth exhales through grating iron teeth. Workers cook alive in the heat outside the entryway. I look
at their skins, sighing sweat. Red men, red men, you look like my brother, who died in thought.
The ground exhales a spoil odor. Pick strikes and pipes staunch but bent excavated in front of this spirited tunnel
22
They’re like two mouths and I have a choice. I choose not.
23
Letting Go Elizabeth Spencer Spragins a cool morning mist pockets every fallen peach— abandoned orchards cherish well-pruned memories rooted deep in perfect rows ~Gaffney, South Carolina
24
Spooning in Rented Apartments Bonnie Billet out in the world at seventeen confused acting out going off in all directions living in a single occupancy hotel above the tracks I didn't know who or how to love love a brass ring on a merry-go-round It took ten years and a failed marriage to avoid alcoholics to stop wanting men who didn't want me I tried to read men like mystery books but the clues wouldn't add up I rejected anyone who confused love and ownership I wasn't attracted to high maintenance I found you and we went off together spooning in rented apartments I tried to teach you the names of trees through the park but you told me you didn't want to be tested so I stopped
walking
we worked together on rooftops and terraces building gardens with Katsura trees Japanese white pines brilliant reliable flowers we made things grow and grew into each other we never discussed money didn't work on our marriage went along in the same direction from the start
25
Dates by KJ Hannah Greenberg
26
Mita’s Cachet Alejandro Villa Vásquez You knew the mountain when it was young with militia and ash. Was the war worth the history? What took your money? Should I sing your song? Mita, you died on the cot-throne. I was blind with childhood and perhaps so was your daughter. You were like sisters, ever since her first baby-sigh made the lore of us known to the Andino, stony side. For a moment, el Río Magdalena ran clean and nothing died like you, Paisa-headed under the sala light. Grandmother, mother, dama you are the martyr. I watch your daughter in your stead. Let the memory of your hospital home find peace in these letters. Let your black hairs find a home in your heirs. We rotate like ideas in the space between sight and its objects. I turn my bedded cheek away from you and sleep under guard of a promised saint, ignoring the angel come to take you up.
27
Last to Leave Alyx Chandler the spine of the Cahaba River muddy and glistening as it empties out of paddlers 15 more minutes mom yells and I slink into watersound up and under flatten out on a greened rock mossing my palm as kids hop in truck beds they fume g’bye I like to wait till it’s a lick too dark to see water moccasins ropes on water but I can still hear them or maybe just my fear of their thick bodies listening less of a good habit more of a reaction for when my feet no longer feel like mine transformation takes time I am the spitting image after dark of her sun bitten persistent and saving us from another dry evening I swim into the snake side of myself atop water inching out of my skin and moms everywhere listen for me to emerge
28
I lie in a hammock Bonnie Billet between pines frightened by what I've forgotten not tied to dates which I don't remember or names which I never knew which day was best? this afternoon sitting in the spring sun? in half moon bay until I saw the giant turtle? watching my dog jump into the lake for the first time on his very best day? everything drowns in the past
snorkeling
we've shared our lives but not our memories not what my brother said or what it meant what the movie was about or why we fought in Barcelona if there is a path between us I didn't see it in Paris my memories tumble toward the apartment I lived in as if I'd never looked around on Second Avenue I search out what's still there a diary restaurant I can't picture what's gone because I have the old maps I can count some of the borders crossed I want to tell my story but I don't have the facts
29
a polish butcher
Author Biographies BONNIE BILLET wrote into her early thirties and was published in Poetry and other journals. She started writing again after retirement and in the last three years has published 59 poems. Including in Rhino, Dunes Review, Gyroscopic Review and Entropy. MICHAEL SAJDAK lives in Chicago, Illinois, where he attended the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. His poems have appeared in such publications as Hobart, Thought Catalog, and Danse Macabre Magazine. He can be found, and followed, at @plumduck1 on Instagram. KJ HANNAH GREENBERG tilts at social ills and encourages personal evolutions via poetry, prose, and visual art. Her bold, textural, colorful images have appeared in various places, including, but not limited to: Bewildering Stories, Foliate Oak Literary Magazine, Kissing Dynamite, Les Femmes Folles, Mused, Right Hand Pointing, Stone Coast Review, The Academy of the Heart and Mind, The Front Porch Review, Tuck, and Yellow Mama. Additionally, her art is featured alongside her poetry in One-Handed Pianist (Hekate Publishing, 2021). DS MAOLALAI has been nominated nine times for Best of the Net and five times for the Pushcart Prize. His poetry has been released in two collections, "Love is Breaking Plates in the Garden" (Encircle Press, 2016) and "Sad Havoc Among the Birds" (Turas Press, 2019). Twitter: @diarmo1990 GEOFF SAWERS’ books include ‘Scissors Cut Rock’ (Flarestack, 2005) and ‘A Thames Bestiary’ (with Peter Hay, Two Rivers Press 2008). His most recent academic publication is ‘Before and After Oscar Wilde: Life in the Berkshire Prisons 1850-1920’ (in The Wildean 2021). Born in 1966, he was only identified as autistic in his fifties. He lives in Reading with his disabled son. ALEJANDRO VILLA VÁSQUEZ holds a Bachelor of Arts in English with a minor in Creative Writing from NYU. He was born in Medellín, Colombia, and grew up on Long Island. He has bylines in Washington Square News, Poetry Society of New York, Classism.org, Latino Book Review, and elsewhere. His inspirations include midcentury design and RPGs. He lives in Brooklyn, New York and hopes to publish a book of poems someday.Instagram/Twitter: @bettyelfeo CYNTHIA ROBINSON YOUNG lives in Chattanooga, Tennessee, where she is an adjunct professor in nearby Georgia. She is the author of the chapbook, Migration (Finishing Line Press). Her work has appeared in anthologies, journals, and magazines including The Amistad, Across the Generations, The Writer’s Chronicle, and Freedom Fiction. Instagram: @cyndigen ELIZABETH SPENCER SPRAGINS is a fiber artist, writer, and poet. Her work has appeared in more than 80 journals in ten countries. She is the author of three original 30
poetry collections: Waltzing with Water and With No Bridle for the Breeze (Shanti Arts) and The Language of Bones (Kelsay Books). GEORGE FREEK is a poet/playwright from Illinois. His plays are published by Playscripts, Blue Moon Plays, and Off The Wall Plays. His poem "Written At Blue Lake" was recently nominated for a Pushcart Prize. ALYX CHANDLER received her MFA in poetry at the University of Montana, where she taught rhetoric and poetry classes. She is a publicist for Poetry Northwest, a poetry reader for Electric Literature and former poetry editor for CutBank Literary Magazine. Her poetry can be found in Cordella Magazine, Glass House Press, and forthcoming in the Greensboro Review. Currently, she lives in Missoula with her cat and serves as the Americorps VISTA for two Montana-based creative writing nonprofits. EDWARD LEE is an artist and writer from Ireland. His paintings and photography have been exhibited widely, while his poetry, short stories, non-fiction have been published in magazines in Ireland, England and America, including The Stinging Fly, Skylight 47, Acumen and Smiths Knoll. He is currently working on two photography collections: 'Lying Down With The Dead' and 'There Is A Beauty In Broken Things'. He also makes musical noise under the names Ayahuasca Collective, Orson Carroll, Lego Figures Fighting, and Pale Blond Boy. His blog/website can be found at https://edwardmlee.wordpress.com Poet and songwriter PAUL ILECHKO is the author of three chapbooks, most recently “Pain Sections” (Alien Buddha Press). His work has appeared in a variety of journals, including The Night Heron Barks, Rogue Agent, Ethel, Lullwater Review, and Book of Matches. He lives with his partner in Lambertville, NJ. Facebook: pilechko / Instagram: @njscattista
31
