Aura Literary Arts Review Vol. 50 Issue No. 1 by auraartsreview

NOTE FROM THE EDITOR Dear Reader, The phrase “like a moth to the flame” is a commonly used simile that brings to mind a moth being attracted to the very thing that causes its destruction. This can be interpreted as a commentary on personal struggles, temptations, and humanity as a whole. This volume intends to explore the faults, struggles, failures, and triumphs of people, no matter how big or small. Thank you to my staff for guiding me toward the flame, the spark, of this issue. I’m so proud of the magazine we’ve made together. Sincerely,

Caylin Kyzer Editor-in-Chief Front Cover Art: “Femme Fatale” by Izabella Janush-Hernandez

STAFF Caylin Kyzer II Editor-in-Chief Olivia Blanton II Managing Editor Yesha Vyas II Digital Manager Faith Williams II Submissions Editor Kaitlin Harris II Prose Editor Riley Donlon II Poetry Editor Savannah McCartney II Art Editor Bryce Hampton II Prose Copy Editor Audrey Womack II Prose Copy Editor Jamya Handley II Prose Copy Editor Crys McKissick II Prose Copy Editor Rachel Giadrosich II Prose Copy Editor Addie Knight II Poetry Copy Editor

Cheyenne Hollowell II Poetry Copy Editor Emma Lewis II Poetry Copy Editor Anmol Guard II Poetry Copy Editor Emily Stewart II Poetry Copy Editor Audrey Brown II Poetry Copy Editor Becker Barghothi II Poetry Copy Editor Lin Sanchez II Art Copy Editor Sophia Szulczewski II Art Copy Editor Tyler Walter II Art Copy Editor Jemi Weldon II Art Copy Editor Camryn Reese II Events Coordinator Hannah Grace II Social Media Coordinator Hannah Enskat II Social Media Assistant

TABLE OF CONTENTS Note From the Editor Staff Table of Contents From GRANATA

02 02 03 04

Somone’s Ghost

Red Vines Slop

06 07

Jaws of Deceit

11 11

The Art of Getting Lost

Dark Moods

Borderland Cellar

Muzzle 2

Hard Luck Alexa Lee

DeJuanay Hunter Jr.

Izabella Janush-Hernandez

Angelitos Negros Scene 1

Brennan Lein

Crys McKissick

I’ll be damned

Jonathan Bolton

Kara Theart

dialtone

Jonathan Bolton

Wes Ladner

Cardigan

Jordyn Lutzow

Gale Huxley

Compassion

Brennan Lein

Wes Ladner

Lesson from my Mother No. 1

Samantha Mendez

Script for a Famer (Reborn in Alabama)

Aisya Mooney

Sharon at the Airport

Ellie Usdan

Born Again

Lessons from my Mother No. 2 10

Jessica Harrison

Entice

Ligaya Gapud

Alexa Lee

Space Cadet

AV Vogt

Miles to go

Rochelle Germond

Abby Comey

Samantha Mendez

George Freek

the lord’s dried fruit salad topping

Alexa Lee

CHRONIC

WHY I READ POETRY

Jordyn Lutzow

Hannah Grace

Of Course

Kristy Bowen

Limited Edition Candle

The Memory Holds the Misery

Faith Williams

Contributors

From GRANATA by Kristy Bowen

The philosophers were your favorites. Bearded and wind-blown, they’d arrive, still mouthing for air for like fish. Still clutching tablets and busts. Their thrust for order and meaning unravelling in the underworld, where so much is gust and chaos. So much is chance. You could roll a die and it’d come up snake eyes. But you still couldn’t get anything to taste as sweet as your undoing. Couldn’t get anything to float intact across the river. You’d find them shivering on the banks and blinded like monsters at the bottom of the sea. Their ears hollow and howling with harpies. Better to be a fool, dumb to the world, than to try to understand it. To pry the fruit open with your poor, ragged hands.

Limited Edition Candle

by Jordyn Lutzow

You’re a salted butterscotch candle, making me cozy on rainy days. Your sweet smell brings back Autumn colored days at the apple orchard, and our annual pumpkin carving competition. I smile at your laughter that arrives with every crackle of your wooden wick. I’m caught up in your dancing flame that moves as smooth as the wind rustling the russet leaves of the aging trees. Suddenly, I began to perceive the lifelessness of the fallen leaves as your warm light of life started dwindling. I had grown accustomed to your sweetness without realizing I couldn’t smell it anymore. A salty air similar to part of your scent filled my nose as tears took over my vision. I was draining you for my own needs, oblivious of the empty glass shell I forced you into. I crumpled to the ground as your flame died out.

Someone’s Ghost by Alexa Lee

Oil on Canvas

CHRONIC

by Samantha Mendez

Graphite on Paper Collage

Red Vines

by Rochelle Germond

I brush twice before bed. The first time as routine, the second after eating Red Vines. On a diet of water and black coffee, I brush my teeth constantly: after eating something I shouldn’t have, to keep from snacking, to mask with mint the acids of an empty stomach coating my throat. Standing at my kitchen sink, I try not to notice the nutrition facts on the bag, but I remember the cost of all my favorite things. One twist is one-fourth the serving size, is one more mile I’ll have to run on the treadmill. Four is too many, four twists means no dinner. I throw the empty licorice bag into the trash and walk to the bathroom to scrape the color from my candied tongue.

Slop

by Ligaya Gapud “I can’t believe you.” He stared, unblinking, at the last droplets of water as they fell from the lip of the bottle in his hand. Our last water bottle. It soaked into the filthy carpet, pooling around his feet and left a dark spot of moisture. He dropped the useless plastic husk onto the ground and looked up at me, cold death in his irises, no words on his lips. The loud buzz of the AC scraped my ears. The sun bared down hard through the windows. Sweat trickled down my head. There hasn’t been running water in our part of town for almost seven years, and this useless man just let our rations soak into his socks. The baby starts to cry. The baby I let him bring under my roof. The baby he had with his ex-girlfriend while I was at work. That baby is crying. Deep breaths, deep breaths. My face is fire red, and I know I look absolutely murderous. I stare at the man’s potbelly that eats the food I cook, all wrapped up in his tank-top like a smelly bandage. I stare at his dull eyes that I swear used to smile at me, his unkempt beard that he only grew out to spite me. His big left hand that dangles uselessly, no ring in sight. I turn my back to that vortex of a man and close my hands into fists. I feel my heart pounding in my ears. I briskly walk towards the door, pushing past empty bottles of water and particles of dust. He races to grab my hand, shouting my name, but I just burn past him, past the disheveled shoe rack that hasn’t been touched in years, and I fling the door open. My whole body is hit with a wall of humidity. The pungent smell of vegetation pools into my lungs and weighs them down, melting the redness from my face. Suddenly, I’m embraced by a thick and heavy fog. My eyes are filled with unbelievably big trees and hefty vines, all the deepest shades of green and brown. Crickets, birds, and toads chirp loudly like a busy city street. The sidewalk to my house extends far beyond my sight, winding deep into the misty swamp as if it belonged there. Dancing leaves beckon me forward. I turn around to see if my husband followed me out, but the door is held

shut by vines as strong as rope, dotted with pink flowers. I let out a laugh, and I push on forward, relishing the damp sidewalk bumps beneath my feet. As I’m wandering through the swamp, my eyelids nearly droop closed. The fog carries my legs through the foliage as the sidewalk trails into dirt and mud, disappearing in the underbrush. Huge lily pads the size of carpets dot the shallow waters. Pretty bright pinks and purples grin beneath hulking cypresses. Willow trees keep their sights down low, slouched with sorrow. Long-legged birds with graceful necks glide past me, leaving V-shaped trails behind them. Fat bugs dart around brown water for food. Mysterious crocodiles wade past to glare at me. I smile up at the bright sun winking through the leaves. The mist carries me deeper into the bog, enveloping my body in the water. I reach to pluck red cranberries from a vine and gather them in a heap on a makeshift pouch I made at the bottom of my shirt. My fingers are stained red as I savor the sweet juice. I lay back onto the fog, holding my fruity treasures close. I feel a thin layer of serenity wash over my body. I’ve been here forever, I grin to myself, what would my old life say if it saw me like this? As I pass by the fluttering leaves and buzzing insects, I imagine our drooping couch faded on one side. It heaves and sighs from his long hours of lounging there. I think of the paintings I pathetically hung on the wall to hide the aftermath of his anger. I smirk, picturing the cluttered restaurant tables I’m not cleaning, the patrons I’m not serving, and that ragged apron I’m not wearing… the child I didn’t name but cradled in cold hands. I cackled, popping berries into my mouth. I imagine the face my mother-in-law would make if she saw me floating around instead of taking care of her son. As if I’m little more than a housekeeper. How stupid.

You know, back in college, I was on track to accomplish great things in mathematics—honestly, I was! I lived for the thrill of cracking

difficult problems. I loved learning new theories and postulates; I drank numbers and smoked math equations. I wasn’t the best and brightest by any means, but I had grit! My professors foresaw great things for me, and I soaked up their words. I had friends, lived life, went to parties! I’d already gotten accepted for a paid internship. Things were really looking up for me…until…

I sigh, tossing a berry at the feet of a curious brown bird.

…Until I met my husband. He used to like my passion. He was nicer back then, prettier too. He and his full head of hair used to surprise me at my dorm room with my coffee order. He used to take me out on nice dinner dates and frolic about at amusement parks. We used to lay beside each other on my light purple blanket and dream about the future…however many kids and pets we wanted, our family cars, our ideal house: three bedrooms, four bathrooms, and a hot tub! He used to say my name so softly. He said it like music. He said it like— “MONA!” I hear it coming from my left. I don’t give myself time to think as I spring up from the mud. I crush cranberries beneath my soles as I slip and run away from the sound, ankle-deep in wet leaves. Trees loom closer and closer as I race past them, green, winding vines slither like snakes around my feet, I swear I stomp on a dozen salamanders. I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe, and then suddenly I can’t run. The mud is cool. Wet. So different from the hot, cracked dirt on my lawn. I’m sinking in it. My legs and the whole left side of my body are slopped up with mud, some got into my mouth. I can’t move, but you know what? Maybe that’s fine. This makes sense. I was stuck in that wretched place for years anyhow. I gave up my own stupid happiness for nothing. Now, I die for nothing—at least I can be at peace now. Yeah, at least it’s over. I let out my last sigh of relief as I close my eyes. I breathe in the heavy scent of wet dirt. I feel myself slip away, sinking, until the mud swallows the tip of my nose. All is still and calm,

my breath is gone. My fingers and toes start to wriggle, and with a few pops and cracks, they elongate, stretching through the muck to meet the gnarled roots of pond trees. My nails dig into bark, piercing both my fingers and theirs. My skin seals around the openings, my extremities inject into the veins of the bog, through water and dirt, past beetles and bugs. I feel through every plant and shroom, my bodily arteries and valves are synonymous with the roots of the swamp. Curious insects burrow into my hardening skin for sustenance, for, now I am bigger than myself—I am The Ecosystem. My eyes cannot see but my leaves can breathe. My mouth cannot speak, but fauna squeal and croak like fleshy trombones. Flowers and fungi bloom from my body. My skin is soil and bark, my limbs are the trees; I flex my fingers, and the willows sway. I giggle with the fleas. I drink the sunlight and dance with deer. What magic blooms from moisture? What life groans from death? I am the answer, we are greater than grand. We rise from my resting place, and the ground follows suit. Roots wrench free with a great heaving grunt. We cackle through the screeches of birds and sigh with the creaking of wood. We weigh down the skies with humidity and call down the rain to nourish the town. Water cascades down from a boundless bog body.

What puny life was lived before this, one where the chatter of leaves goes unheard? We proceed forward, plodding on immense globs of muddy feet, roots shoot out in all directions like prickly toes. We plow everything in our path to sprout flowers from our footsteps. There is no looking back.

An old ramshackle house lies crushed with great trees sprouting atop thick mud. They seem to have burst through holes in the walls and have crushed plastic water bottles beneath their feet. The only life there is that of the swamp.

Jaws of Deceit by Ellie Usdan

Colored Pencil on Paper

Born Again

by Samantha Mendez Transfer Monoprint

Script for a Farmer (Reborn in Alabama) by Brennan Lein

Handshake. Kiss. Handshake. Patting the back. Kiss him better this time. Make out now, eat from his mouth like a hungry animal. Let him reach over you, arm arcing like a tree, zipping itself into your shirt collar. Good, good. Pull into him, pull him into you, he will let it happen, he wants it to happen. You both do. Warp into him, dance fool, dance. You know what you’re doing. It’s written down. Pull his yellow hair, pull it better now. Harvester cutting wheat and brushing the grain. He lives off it, you live off this. Keep going, that’s good. You need him. He knows this. The sun is setting, you’re still golden. You look great. Hunter with a gun, pull his jacket off his shoulder. Slip it off, grasp it in your broken hand. Hold him and the gun. It’s loaded, it’s loaded. The color is great, it looks great. Keep smiling, you look great. He’s a happy valentine. Look at that ruby red face, screaming “I love you”. Look at the sun setting. Look at the wheat moving around your bodies. Look at my hunter. Look at his valentine. Hear the hum of cicadas. My southern stars, destined for greatness. Don’t think about the ruin that comes tomorrow. Live off today’s hunt, today’s harvest. Just breathe, keep breathing. You’re both so brave.

The Art of Getting Lost by Jordyn Lutzow

I meander down this dirt road, not keeping track

of the distance traveled or the turns taken. I focus

on putting one foot in front of the other, forcing

my mind into silence. I couldn’t stand its constant

interruptions during my moments of comfort. Your friends just let you tag along out of pity. You can’t believe your person is out there still.

I shook the thoughts away and started grounding

myself. That leaf is starting to turn yellow.

A squirrel just jumped from that shaking branch.

That cloud looks like a duck doing the splits.

A cardinal just chirped from up above, saying

hello for another soul. On and on, I made these

statements to myself as I traveled farther down

this unknown path. Each step erased awareness

of my own body. I was just a lost, observant entity.

The Art of Getting Lost by Jordan Lutzow

Dark Moods

by Jonathan Bolton

Ink on Paper

Muzzle 2

by Brennan Lein I lace up the leather shoes, now I do it with my eyes closed, without my glasses, hunched over guessing knots and tying my fingers together. Friendless and fresh from the night where I built someone to love me out of clay, the sweat slipping my glasses down my nose. I made someone to bloody me black and blue, blood flowing out my nose and smiling through it all. A cat jumped over the moon and knocked over a coffin, a bottle of pills, a cat jumped through the window and knocked me down. So sink into the clay. Delve into insanity, dance with your abuser, swing in the noose. Smile into the water bowl through the bloodstream, the water turning pink. Make sparks with a hammer and a rock, start a fire to keep your body warm. I have many names, but you tell me which, and I will go along with it. Tell me how to be, and I will smile through it all. Glasses cracked and crooked as a busted car door, smile as off center as anything, a real sad story. A virgin lays alone, a virgin vows for silence, a mousy haired virgin born a boy. This is not me, I finger clay and go insane alone, I cry white tears and I choke down my paintings, I lace up blind leather shoes. I lace up blind leather shoes, blindly, because I looked into the sun too long, and then I took one too many hits to the head. I lay on the floor in a blood puddle and I know what I am. I am falling off the deep end, so now can you love me to death? I think I can learn to live with that.

Borderland Cellar by Jonathan Bolton Ink on Paper

Hard Luck

by Alexa Lee

Oil on Canvas 16

The Memory Holds the Misery by Hannah Grace

The minute your face flashes over my mind I am forced to think back to that beautiful time where we sat in the roses as they scratched up our legs, and this pain is what warned me that this would end bad. But the petals were lovely, and the sun was so warm. I dared to imagine we could last without a storm. But you left me outside and ran off into the light, so I figured you had to catch an important flight. And I met you there again on the day of our ending. You said something about how we were mending. I smiled and placed my hand upon your back. And it burned, but I did not dare to pull it back. Now the memory of your words pulls me in like a drug that I run to while knowing I should sweep it under the rug. But I cannot escape a desire to hold your hand, so I’ll think of you over and over again.

WHY I READ POETRY by George Freek

There’s a vacancy in my chest, where something else should be, like a clock, but its mechanism is tired and faulty, like dead leaves falling from a dying tree. The stars look down, in a deceptive sky, like false jewels shining on a false beach, and they mean nothing to me.

Of Course

by Abby Comey Teddy’s father is having a yard sale. He’s had one every July since I’ve known him, says he’s getting old and doesn’t want downsizing to be such a bother. I come to help. This help mostly consists of standing in the heat, saying nothing, and touching nothing. People show up all morning. They pull their cars right to the mailbox, tires tilted into the gutter so they stumble out onto the lawn. They run their hands over Ziploc bags of computer cords, glitter jack-o-lanterns on sticks, Slytherin scarves with the tag still on, an orange purse strap, Apples to Apples in a tattered box, a knit hat for a dog. They slide Teddy’s old t-shirts off a rack Teddy’s father made from two music stands and a curtain rod. They hold the shirts up to their children who stare straight ahead with big, glassy eyes. They open the mini fridge, the microwave, the duffel bag, the chest of drawers, as though each might contain something secret and evil. No one uses the Venmo username scrawled on a piece of printer paper taped to the garage door. They all pull bills from tired wallets, worrying the creases straight before handing them over in an almost-forgotten ritual so human and intimate I have to squint at it. I arrive at eight. Teddy’s father tells me a family showed up before sunrise. “It’s already been picked over,” he says over and over, gesturing toward a pair of pilled black leggings folded on a ping-pong table, a measuring cup with the handle half chewed off by Teddy’s dog. A woman hands over five dollars for the latter and tells me I can keep the change if I throw in the folding table she found it on. I look at Teddy’s father, who nods solemnly, like I asked him whether it was okay for the woman to pay her respects at his mother’s open casket. “It’s already been picked over,” I echo when Teddy’s father goes inside to use the bathroom. And still the people come. They buy everything without asking where it came from or why it’s no longer wanted. They dump the clutter into their trunks, climb

back into their cars, and drive away without telling us what they’ll do with it—whether they’ll sell the mouse cage or on the internet or give it to their niece who needs a home for a box turtle with a broken leg she found in the backyard. Some of them haggle for a dollar and walk away smiling, others shoulder a full-priced vacuum down the driveway like a colicky child we’d guilted them into raising as their own. No one speaks except to ask how much or how old. They come until we have to turn the porch lights on and customers still have to take out their phone flashlights to read the covers of Teddy’s philosophy textbooks. They come like they booked an appointment and we charge a cancellation fee. They come like an angry preacher promised hellfire if they stayed home. “How do people know we’re here?” I ask. “We put up signs. We post it online. Didn’t you ever watch your parents do it?” “My family went to yard sales, but we never had them. We just throw out old things.” Teddy’s father is back from the bathroom, wiping his hands on khaki shorts. At the same moment that it occurs to me to be ashamed of what I’ve said, I wonder if he’s heard. I hope he’s heard so that later he can tell his son it’s okay to resent me. With a cutting eagerness, he unfolds a lawn chair for me to sit on. He says I must be tired, asks if I want anything to eat. He has eggs from Trader Joe’s. Organic. He could make me an omelet. He has the good cheese. I accept the chair because I know people will be less likely to talk to me if I’m sitting. I tell him I’m not hungry. I don’t ask what makes cheese good. The people keep coming until there’s nothing left. They take the bins and the laundry baskets, the lawn chair and the lightbulbs from the porch lantern, the Sharpie and the roll of blue tape. There’s nothing left to mark. Teddy’s father counts the money. Seventy-seven dollars. I fell in love with Teddy in college,

which is to say he could’ve been anyone. Trees leaned over brick paths. On Main Street, porcelain dolls stared out of antique store windows. Classes had names like “Love and Dying” or “Spirituality in a Late Capitalist Society.” Of course, Teddy isn’t anyone. Teddy is smart and kind. Teddy wears flannel shirts with the sleeves rolled up to show vine tattoos that trace his veins. Teddy has major depressive disorder. Teddy presses flowers in a leatherbound notebook and tapes them to the bottom of the letters he slips under my door. Teddy helps his father with his yard sale. Teddy is sad, and it’s not his fault I fall in love with sad people, that I love them until their sadness becomes too practical, that I leave them for someone who is sad about mortality until that person is sad about their dog who keeps shitting on the carpet, then I leave that person for someone who is sad about something abstract and beautiful until that person is sad about something that reeks of mundane rot. I don’t speak in Teddy’s car on the way home. I want to be motionless when we have this conversation. Half of me expects the apartment to be a wasteland, but there are Teddy’s bar stools and Teddy’s Yankee candles. I heat up a frozen pizza. I cut it with scissors and set it on two of Teddy’s plastic plates from college. It’s like college, really, only there are no trees outside and the sidewalk is made of cement instead of bricks. All the shops are part of strip malls, so you can’t see in their windows from the street, just the bright signs with block letters. The only consolation is a stand-alone laundromat on the corner. I slow down on my way to work to watch strangers’ delicates ride the carousel. I wrap up the leftovers, wash the plates, wipe down the countertops, and then I’m still. I’m in the kitchen. These scenes always play out in the kitchen. I study the negative space—the headlights through the windows, the fake hardwood floors, the mismatched dish towels—so as not to weather the void of him.

He speaks first, and I’m almost angry at the presumption which is not presumption at all. “I don’t have anything poetic to say.” Picked over, I think. “I’m just glad you’re going to do it in the house instead of in the car. I don’t think I could’ve handled it in the car. Of course, I knew you’d do it eventually. I told myself I’d do it first, but I kept putting it off. You’d say something about the moon, and I’d tell myself, next week. I’ll do it next week. And then the next week you’d say you’ve always loved the way my aunt does her hair. You’d like to do yours the same way when you’re that age.” He doesn’t roll up his sleeves anymore. He doesn’t button the cuffs either. He just lets them hang there, limp and open like a phone off the hook. He says, “Should I cancel the Airbnb for Katie’s wedding?” He says, “I still need you to pay half the rent through September.” He says, “I have to get up early in the morning.” And I’m already imagining the next spread—A coffee shop encounter, milk foam clandestine. Orange pill bottles rent a space on my nightstand, their lack of opacity a kind of pornography. Plath penned on a gas station receipt. Ziploc bags of computer cords. Apples to Apples. A folding table.

the lord’s dried fruit salad topping by AV Vogt

cranberries are bitter. they’re nothing like craisins, with twenty six grams of added sugar per fourth of a cup but no one tells you that. craisins are sweet because cranberries are sweet is filed under lies i believed as a child but maybe lies is too harsh a word for dealing with the sugar content of cranberries. i’m sitting in traffic thinking about god, lowercase-g god who sits on a primary school cloud of cotton and the prayers of sweating old men in starched collars. he has a zip code and a beard. i once asked my teacher what was god’s favorite color. she said it was rainbow, because god loves every color he created equally, just like his children. i watch the taillights of a Honda accord and think about the beautiful butch built like a brick wall and a carabiner with six keys (i’d like to think there’s a key for each lover, a polyamorous weapon of defense in the event of a darkened gas station off 280). she pushes a shopping cart in the grocery store like a cowboy of creole tomatoes and nice white wines. i think i am twelve and i want to be her and god loves the rainbow but not that kind. i cut my hair for the first time when i was fourteen. i looked in the mirror and i saw myself even more when i heard the first whispers. I carried my book bag like a cowboy of catholic school plaid and communion wine. i ease into the left lane and choose to believe god- capital G God loves her cowboy butches in grocery stores and catholic schools. sugar is sweet. cranberries are not.

Miles to Go

by Alexa Lee

Oil on Canvas

Space Cadet by Jessica Harrison Little space cadet With your eyes bugging out tracking light from the moon.

Staredown between headlights. His car’s were the first eyes to blink.

Can’t quite go home yet Because it’s raining, but you’re getting there soon.

You just fly past Not heeding the warnings, crossing past sparkling ink, little space cadet

And it’s a long flight From the window sill and kitchen lights in your friend’s new apartment Tattered wings, Guess it looks like the end, but the Moon knows you’re just getting started, little space cadet. Hover past those old street lights In that park where that little boy skinned both his knees. Look down, by now his blood stain’s washed out of the six decade-old concrete. There are train tracks Where the counselor’s kid sat alone under starlight in wait.

You chase a beacon you can’t touch You crave that flicker in the flame. One bug cannot amount to much Crisp, crushed, it all looks just the same. You chase a beacon you can’t touch You know that light is not her own Her beams are blinding nonetheless Night makes your hungry eyes go wild You have no place to second guess. That moon, she’s scorching your bug friends They chase the same great highs you do Tiny moth, you hear that zapping? No heavenly body plays that tune.

Entice

by Aisya Mooney Digital

Sharon at the Airport by Gale Huxley

Sharon removes Velcro rollers from her hair and applies sheer lipstick that she doesn’t mind being kissed and she thinks her husband wouldn’t mind kissing. She puts on a cherry red dress and tells herself the dress is for her—that this act is the beginning of self-respect. Over and over again, she checks the silver watch on her bony wrist and calculates how much time it will take to drive to the airport, to park, and to walk to the partition that separates the travelers and those who are waiting for travelers. Sharon turns when she reaches the wooden front door. She scans the living room and sighs—an exhalation that curves her spine and brings her shoulders closer to her heart. It can be different, she thinks. This can be not a renewal, but a beginning. She runs to the desk in the office she shares with Kenneth and pulls a sheet of paper out of a drawer. With a grape-scented marker she writes on the clean page “Welcome home, my love.” Sharon walks to the car with an urgency that is not only motivated by the possibility she will miss Kenneth rising to the top of the escalator. She drives in silence and lets her mind wander as her eyes monitor traffic—the road slick with rain she never saw. The sky in her rearview is darkening into a purple bruise, but in front of her there is the golden sunlight of a dying day. In her mind, Kenneth is next to her in the passenger’s seat as they drive down a winding country road, past white-dressed ghosts and creatures of legend. She squeezes into a spot between a Ford Explorer and a Maserati. In the Explorer, two women sit next to each other, eating bagels. They look at each other and kiss with cream-cheese lips. A white chihuahua sits in the driver’s seat of the Maserati on the other side, watching Sharon, a paw on the steering wheel. The dog honks at her when she exits the Honda. Sharon pulls a receipt from her purse and writes down the row and level where she parked, then takes long steps

to enter the airport. There is a festival of humanity inside Terminal B. A group of people cheer when a young woman emerges from the bathroom with her luggage. Children run towards parents they haven’t forgotten in the intervening days, months, years. A family eats pizza while sitting on the edge of an unmoving carousel of luggage. They don’t notice when the belt begins to move, and their baby is carried away. People walk alone, their eyes wandering, searching, even though there is no one there for them. Lovers meet with flowers and passionate embraces. Sharon’s eyes fall on the lovers. A space opens for Sharon to stand at the barrier of welcomers, and she fills the gap. She holds the paper to her chest. It is wrinkled from being gripped in her damp palm. She looks around, then unfolds the paper, as if she is flashing an audience. I’m wild. I’m silly, she thinks. Minutes pass. She doesn’t see the thin, tall figure who is always wearing a pageboy hat, rising to her. Instead, a man who is thin and close to her height, approaches her. He opens his sweatered arms. Sharon turns around, then looks to each side of her. “My love,” the man says. He embraces her. His hold is tight, and it feels like the result of longing. “Let’s get out of here,” he says. He releases her and cups her heart-shaped face in his hands that feel rough to her intensely moisturized skin. Then dropping his left hand, he interlocks his fingers with hers. Sharon feels a silicon ring on his finger. She leads him to the Honda. The Ford to the left has been replaced by an empty minivan with a stick family on the back window. The Maserati remains. The chihuahua now sits in the lap of an old woman wearing a hood and dark glasses in the dimly lit parking garage. Sharon gets into the passenger seat while the man places his luggage in the trunk. Her eyes slide over to him when he gets into the passenger side and closes the door. “Kenneth?” she asks.

He slaps his thigh, then looks at her. “You’ve always been funny,” he says, laughing. “Call me what you want, but I love the way Roy sounds coming out of your mouth.” He places his fingers on her lips. Airport germs, she thinks, but she kisses his fingertips. “Do you want to go to that new restaurant? The Mexican restaurant on 10th that I’ve been wanting to try?” Sharon asks. They share chicken fajitas, and each have a mango chile margarita. Roy offers to drive. Sharon accepts, carbonated energy moving through her torso. Roy pulls into a stone cottage in the part of town she walked through as a young woman at night, looking into open curtains that revealed expansive libraries or theatrical murders, with a certainty of her future, fused with wonder. There is another car in the driveway, a green Volkswagen Beetle in the model Sharon’s mother drove before she was born. Sharon had seen pictures of it when she had gone through her mother’s things as a child. In her favorite Polaroid, her mother leans against the car and looks to her left, probably at the person attached to the outstretched hand floating at the edge of the film. Roy sees her eyes linger on the Beetle. “Why did you take my car?” he asks. Sharon shrugs. “I thought you’d miss it.” Roy laughs. I’m funny. I knew it, she thinks. The inside of the house is bright. There are pink walls, a blue couch, and green shelves in the living room. The kitchen is red, down to the refrigerator. All this color. She wonders if it’s tasteful. She’d recently added green pillows to the neutral-palette home she shared with Kenneth. Kenneth had told her they were fine, but she put the pillows in the hall closet after a week. There is an aged acoustic guitar leaning against the wall by the fireplace. “You play?” she asks Roy, walking over to it and brushing her fingers over the chords. She likes the roughness of the wires. He cocks his head. “You do,” he says. “But I have no musical talent,” Sharon

responds, her voice more biting than she can understand why. Roy smiles. “You play anyway, and you get better all the time.” Sharon continues through the house as Roy empties his suitcase. There is a bedroom filled with figurines of birds. Blue Jays and cardinals frozen on branches or caught in mid-flight look at her with eyes that seem alive. “Roy,” Sharon calls. Roy walks into the carpeted room. He rests his fingertips on a sparrow. “You dusted them while I was gone,” he says. “Thank you.” So this isn’t me, Sharon thinks. She finds life-size reproductions of horror icons, like Creature from the Black Lagoon and Elvira in a room that functions as the library. Though she can’t imagine being such a fan of anything, she sees herself in that space of terror and books organized by color. Before going to bed, Roy put his arms around Sharon. “Roy,” she hesitates, her voice drifting off. Roy opens his eyes. Sharon looks at the light of the moon reflecting in them. “This may sound silly, but am I good at my job?” Roy closes his eyes and rubs her back. “Painting is your job. Mowing lawns is something you do,” he tells her. “I work for a lawn service?” She intends this as a question, but Roy doesn’t answer it this way. “Let me rephrase,” he says. “You mow lawns for money, but your passion is painting.” Sharon thinks of all the half-finished canvases in the garage of her former life. Mowing lawns seems like it would be hot, but nice. “What I love about you most is that no one believes in yourself more than you do.” Sharon accepts Roy’s words, then falls asleep and dreams of a hummingbird drinking

nectar held in her cupped hands. Not a drop falls through the cracks. Sharon and Roy are watching the news while eating crepes for dinner three nights later when her face appears on the screen. Kenneth stands on a podium asking for Sharon to be returned home safely, tears choking his words. Her parents stand behind Roy, separate and holding themselves. “We just want to know you’re okay, Sharon,” Kenneth pleads, looking into the camera, and so, into her. “Poor man,” Roy says, shaking his head, béchamel sauce on his chin. Sharon places her plate on the sea-horse shaped side table, then stands. “They’re at the park on the east side of town. Let’s join the vigil.” They are amongst the crowd of people thirty minutes later. Children dart around. Couples clinging to each other as they hold fake candles. Kenneth stands in the center of a tight crowd. Sharon makes her way to him, though people gasp and murmur as she pushes their shoulders aside. “Incredibly rude,” she hears a woman with red hair say. Kenneth holds a stack of fliers in his hands. She sees a picture of herself from last summer, along with her age (34), height (5’2), and her weight (143). “I’m sorry,” Sharon tells Kenneth. He smiles at her, then hands her a flier. “Thank you,” he says, staring at her for a moment before looking through her, then beyond her. “I hope you find your Sharon. She pauses, giving him a chance, then she turns around and leaves with Roy.

Read the rest of the piece by scanning below:

Lesson from my Mother No. 1 by Wes Ladner Screenprint

10/24/23, 9:36 PM

Theart, 'Compassion', ink pen, 20x30", $1400 - Kara Theart.JPG

Compassion

by Kara Theart

Cardigan

Ink Pen on Canvas

by Crys McKissick I Am surprised by your anger, taken aback by your rage. Confused Because it wasn’t my intention to offend or cause pain. Yet here we stand with a wall of hurt and grievances impeding communication And accusations flying like some sort of weapon. My apologies and clarifications bounce off the barricade erected between us. Standing there baffled, I pull my cardigan around me closer As if the knit fabric could possibly create a shield to protect me from Your insults and accusations hurled at me with the intent to cause injury. As if this garment I wear everywhere could metamorphose into armor to protect me From your outrage, from our misunderstanding, from the feelings of confusion, regret, and hurt flowing around me. I Am shivering with feelings that make me feel small. But that simple, protective act of wrapping myself up in perseverance Triggers my recollection of who I am, my intentions, my value, and my worth. And I realize that if you can ascribe such negativity to my actions then clearly You don’t know who I Am, my intentions, my value, and my worth. 1/1 Howhttps://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1wTLF6OBYCXMVTbWq81I4pFLqbVRKNj6W is this relationship? Then it occurs to me that if you are so enraged you have to call me names, tear down my character, and shower me with insults without giving me the space to speak, explain or clarify Then what’s the fucking point?

dialtone

by DeJuanay Hunter Jr.

when my throat is too ashen to speak how can I call out your name call you with only zeroes and ones on the pinpad of an otherwise blank mind call it this can’t be all that there is promise I do not live here I’m just renting call a spade by a different name call me you tried to call me in between cups of coffee tied by a string too slack with my ears full of everything that I could want never need I am not needy I just need you to call me down to the lake where we drowned our innocent selves thrashing beneath the weight of a world so small do you think you could call me out for being such an ass and never picking up the phone

I’ll be damned

by Izabella Janush-Hernandez Oil on Canvass

Angelitos Negros Scene 1 by Faith Williams Collage

Angelitos Negros Scene 1 by Faith E. Williams Collage

CONTRIBUTORS Abby Comey is a high school English teacher from Washington DC. Her work is featured in Honeyguide Magazine, Flora Fiction, Aura Review, The Arcanist, and Dawn Review. She’s penned essays for The New York Times and The Washington Post. Aisya Mooney was enamored with putting her pencil to paper from a young age. She grew up in Mobile, Aabama where she spent most of her days in between in and out of school drawing. Wanting to expand her horizons, she came to the UAB where she is now a junior in Biomedical Sciences. Alexa Lee is a painter and ceramic artist based in Birmingham, Alabama. Her current work consists of narrative figure paintings that explore memory and how it imbeds itself into the body and mind. She is a BFA candidate at the University of Alabama at Birmingham and has been featured in multiple juried exhibitions across the southeast United States, including the Montgomery Museum of Fine Art and the Meridian Museum of Art. AV Vogt is a UAB Creative Writing student currently writing from Sydney, Australia, where she can be found backpacking in the Blue Mountains, swimming in the ocean, riding trains, exploring, making peanut butter banana toast, and generally making her mother slightly concerned for her safety. Follow her on instagram @itsannavogt. Brennan Lein is a student at UAB in the studio art department. He enjoys listening to music, hunching over his artwork for hours, and writing the occasional poem. You can find him either in his house with his best friends/roommates watching a movie or somewhere in southern Alabama searching for inspiration, or just some cool trash on the side of the road. Crys McKissick is a graduate student studying English Literature. She is passionate about literacy and the power of a story. After completing her MA she intends to pursue a MLIS with the goal of becoming an academic librarian. If she’s not at school or hauling her children to their various activities, Crys knits compulsively, consumes too much coffee, and is diligently making her way through her towering TBR list. DeJuanay Hunter Jr. is new to UAB, but they are not new to the South. Having spent half his life in Buffalo where he was born, and half in the South, he considers himself a “dual regional citizen.” She chose to major in sociology due to a lifelong passion for studying and challenging the world around her, inciting others to do the same. Their work often explores themes of identity and personhood, and asks more questions than it answers. Ellie Usdan is currently a Sophomore at UAB majoring in Art Studio with a minor in Creative Writing. Her favorite mediums include pen, colored pencil, and watercolor, with a recent interest in graphic design. Within her artworks, she draws most of her inspiration from childhood memories and the natural world. Faith Williams is a senior majoring in Biology. She wishes to pursue a career in medicine one day. In her free time, she like to create art, read, and watch anime.

Gale Huxley is a writer from Atlanta, Georgia. She graduated from the Savannah College of Art and Design with a BFA in writing. Her work can be found in The Dawn Review, Daylight Zine, and 805 Lit + Art Magazine, among other publications. George Freek’s poem “Enigmatic Variations” was recently nominated for Best of the Net. His poem “Night Thoughts” was also nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Hannah Grace is a communication studies major focusing on Journalism. She grauduated from Corner High School and is now a junior at UAB. In her free time, you can find her listening to music or playing the piano. Izabella Janush-Hernandez is a junior at UAB, studying psychology with a minor in studio art. Izabella is an oil painter who focuses on figurative subjects, largely inspired by classical art movements. Dabbling in surrealism, Izabella’s work portrays the female experience. Jessica Harrison, coming from Millbrook, Alabama, is a recent graduate of the University of Alabama at Birmingham. She earned her Bachelor’s degree in English with a concentration in Literature. Her writing aims to simultaneously evoke feelings of nostalgia while using refreshing language in order to inspire and breathe life into audiences. Jonathan Bolton has exhibited work in solo, juried, and curated exhibitions across South Carolina, including ArtField’s 2023 Competition, The Arts Center of Greenwood’s 2022 and 23 Festival of Flowers Juried Show, and Artisphere’s 2022 Artist of the Upstate Juried Exhibition. His work work was recently exhibited in Manifest Gallery’s DRAWN 2023 in Cincinnati, OH. His work is featured in regional and international publications including Manifest Gallery’s upcoming 15th International Drawing Annual. He earned his BFA from Winthrop University and his MFA from Clemson University. Jonathan lives in Greenville, SC and is a drawing instructor for Clemson University. Jordyn Lutzow lives in Columbia, Missouri, where she spends her time tutoring the athletes for the University of Missouri in English and other writing-intensive courses. She received her B.S. in Marine Science with a minor in Creative Writing from Florida Gulf Coast University in May of 2021, and received her MFA with an emphasis in Poetry from Lindenwood University in March of 2023. Jordyn hopes to continue her education to achieve her goal of teaching Creative Writing at a college or university. Kara Theart is a young emerging artist in Birmingham, AL, creating work that expresses the shared vibration of life between the ideas of earth and humanity. Her drawings consist of a merging between the figure and landscapes. Kara works as a metal artist and social media manager at Sloss Furnace, and uploads her art to her Instagram @karathe. art. Kristy Bowen is a writer and book artist who lives in Chicago. She’s published a number of zines, chapbooks, and artists books, as well as several full-length collections of poetry/prose/hybrid work, including the recent COLLPASOLOGIES and AUTOMAGIC. She is a freelance lifestyle & culture writer and runs dancing girl press & studio, where she sells art, paper goods, and accessories as well as curates the dgp chapbook series. Website. www.kristybowen.com

Ligaya Gapud is a freshman psychology major at UAB. He has a string of hearts plant named Barbara and a snake plant named Kevin. He likes making art, but spends most of his time being 5’4”. Ask him to read one of his poems to you, he’ll be literally elated. Rochelle Germond holds an MFA in poetry from North Carolina State University. Her work has appeared in Hunger Mountain, Gulf Coast, and The Coachella Review, among others. Originally from Florida, she currently lives in Raleigh, North Carolina with her husband and their extensive collection of coffee mugs. Samantha Mendez is an Alabama native and BA candidate at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. She is a mixed media artist who specializes in digital and pencil drawings. She was featured in both the 46th and 47th Annual Juried Student Exhibitions at AEIVA. Her artwork often recognizes political issues and Latino queer culture. She is the owner of her own small business where she sells her art and handmade jewelry and accessories. Wes Ladner is a senior BFA student at UAB. Their work focuses on collections and generational trauma. They are a multidisciplinary artist, but gravitate towards ceramics and printmaking. They also do art markets around the Birmingham area. Their instagram is @ rolipolied.

Special Thanks to: Jackie Alexander UAB Department of Art and Art History UAB Department of English UAB Division of Student Affairs Ashley Frith

Copyright 1964-2023 Aura Literary Arts Review. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any way, shape or form without the express written consent of the artist. All rights to the work revert to the original creator after the publication of this magazine. To reach an artist regarding republication of material, contact the UAB Office of Student Media, HSC Suite 130, 1400 University Blvd, Birmingham, AL 32294.