The Things We Bury...Three to Four Ounces Spring 2025
The Things WeBury...
Three to Four Ounces Spring 2025
The human soul weighs
Don LeLillo, Americana three to four ounces.
Dear Reader,
In an age where we post everything from breakfast to breakdowns and broadcast our inner monologues in real time, secrets have become a quiet luxury. But even now, in this era of constant exposure, when privacy feels like a relic of the past, some things still manage to slip beneath the surface.
. Three to Four Ounces is no stranger to those buried things.
Three to Four Ounces proudly holds the title of “the oldest student organization in Wake Forest history,” with the frst issue of our magazine (then known as The Student) published in January 1882. It predates the university’s arrival in Winston-Salem, and in the 142 years since, the magazine has become a catalog of its transformations. Between the lines of our long-forgotten “Literary Gossip” column, anonymously publishedpoems, and meandering essays on people-watching in the city, Three to Four Ounces hums with the presence of the unspoken. It remembers what others have chosen to forget.
This Spring, as I was combing through the archives of Three to Four Ounces, I stumbled upon a poem in our ninth volume, titled “A Secret”. The frst stanza of this piece, originally published in 1887, reads:
‘Twas faint, so faint,—
But still, ah! still I feel its pressure. Like summer winds From budding pines, It wafts me treasure
- Flaccus
To me, this poem speaks to the subtle yet undeniable presence of secrets. Like the faintest of summer winds, secrets brush against us, carrying the weight of what remains unsaid, pressing into the pages of our magazine, much like treasure waiting to be unearthed. That this poem appeared in one of the earliest editions of our magazine is no coincidence; it’s a reminder that the presence of secrets has been with us since the beginning.
As I study the past of this publication, I can’t help but also look to the future. I am just as eternally grateful to the editors who came before me (thank you, Aine and Melina) as I am to the brilliantly determined eighteen board members who stand by my side now. In looking back on all that we have done, I’m reminded that this magazine will continue to evolve and work in uncovering secrets yet to be revealed.
For this brief moment in time, I invite you to sit down and enjoy our Spring 2025 edition, “Secrets: The Things We Bury,” and hopefully, you’ll leave with a treasure of your own.
Sincerely,
Bella Santos Chief Editor
Exec ive Board
Chief Editor
Bella Santos
Managing Editors
Aderinola Adepoju and Blythe Green
Graphic Designer
Breanna Laws
Poetry Editors
Carolyn Malman, Sally Pendergrass, and Isabella Romine
Prose Editors
Taylor Nisbet, Virginia Noone, and Olivia Sullivan
Art Editors
Caroline Gottsman and Ava LeBeau
Photography Editors
Miriam Fabrycky and Julia Smith
Social Media Managers
Caroline Bates, Catherine Burges, and Brooks Nuckols
Treasurer
Madeleine Bunnell
Event Coordinator
Emily Meinert
Table of Contents
5. Truth by Virginia Noone***
6. The Sun by Noah Brown
7. London by Sidney White
9. Pensive by Taylor Nisbet***
10. First Loves by JM Stowers
11. Reverence by Anonymous
12 Persuaded by Blythe Green***
13. To All The Girls That Didn’t Know I Loved Them Before by Sincere Fielder
15. Turkey Dump by Rowan Henchy
17. Epileptic Odyssey by Beckett Lindsey
18. Memory’s Current by Whitney Spater
19. Fragment by Anne Rack
20. Mapping Memory by Blair Newsome
21. Deserted Eden by Lucas Betancourt
22, Open The Sky by Minxing Liu*
23. A Stranger to Myself by Caitlyn Jeffrey
24. Behind Her Eyes by Claire Bedley
25. Life in a Northern Town by Carolyn Malman***
26. The Baggage We Carry by Olivia Sullivan***
27. “You tuck snow dust...” by Lucas Betancourt*
28. Hungry by Maureen Murray
29. Everything I write tastes like dirt by Christina Tran
30. See No Evil by Blair Newsome
31. The Water at the Bottom of the Tub by JM Stowers
32. Through the Pages by Claire Bedley
33. Magnolia’s Warning by Darby Slaughter
34. Fast Fashion Kills by Olivia Demarinis
35. Sitting Up by Tori Grasty
36. Biracial Ruins and Wonders by Madison Patel
36. Recordar es un acto de amor by Jayden Gonzalez Miranda
*Category Winners
37. Heaven’s Horns by Virginia Crooks
40. Paris Nightclub by Claire Bedley
41. Adopted Dreams by Andrea Novaria
43. The Hilarious Masquerade by Jay Doshi
44. Chandelier and her Marching Band by Kal Wuor
45 Too Big to Fry by Natalie Minnetian
46. The First Martyr by Aidan Lampe
47. Somewhere on a Street in Memphis, TN by Anne Rack
48. Passengersw by Minxing Liu
49. Half of Everything by Mia Bergier
51. Dig by Jack Perez
53. Burial Site by Indigenous Poet Za**
54. Worry Less by Minxing Liu
55. Lily by Molly Steur**
56. dark cloud by Christine Dudley
57. Rochester’s Wife by Blythe Green***
58. Pain Don’t Hurt by Sidney White
59. I know Why the Caged Bird Writes by Tracy Xie**
61. False Escape by Kal Wuor
62. New Year’s Eve Party by Melina Traiforos
63. Pandora’s Box by Aderinola Adepoju***
65. The Space Between... by Kimberly Nguyen
66. Betrayal from Within by Sincere Fielder
67. Seeing Clearly by Blair Newsome*
68. The Secret by Megan Zanni
69. To My Heart’s Hitman. Encase Me. by Sincere Fielder
70. Quest by Blythe Green***
71. Connection by Talia Austin
72. Touch Tunnel by Carolyn Malman***
73. God POV by Minxing Liu
74. Children of Quiet Gods by Christina Tran*
75. Daffodil by Emily Meinert***
76. A Secret by Flaccus
h Virginia Noone
Truths, secrets, and lies. They dance so gracefully, Intertwining and contorting, Refracting refections of each other.
Lies often fit through the air, Delicate as the wings of a butterfy. Too feeting to capture, Sometimes too pretty to destroy.
Seductively distracting to us, More comforting than truth. Expertly burying secrets, With sweet insincerity.
Secrets hide away, Buried in tangled knots In our woven souls. Firmly they hold.
The knot tightens around itself. Growing larger each day, It leaves only nearly enough room For a heart to beat or lungs to breathe.
Its heavy weight pulls you Into an unwanted solitude. Cursed to bury, unbury, and bury In an infnite loop.
When a secret escapes, We call it the truth. It scalds all with vicious force Leaving a barren, ravaged feld.
From the ashes and the hurt, We look around to fnd a root.
Ththis is how it hugs;
the trees, their leaves red and orange they imitate the sun’s color the sun was fattered, and it shined brighter this is how it blushes
i gaze toward the sky it’s blue as brilliant as the oceans of the earth not a cloud in sight just the sky and the sun together–in company of one another–for eternity
London
Ella Zedd
Somewhere in the heart of London, on the bathroom foor of a penthouse apartment paid for by the wealthy parents of a good-for-nothing boy, lay a 19-year-old American girl, who, after too many shots of whatever he had offered, was on the verge of blacking out.
“Well, this is it for me,” Madelyn thought, unable to pry her body from the cold tiles. The pale yellow ceiling was twisting around her and minutes ago, when the girl who’d brought her here left to stick her tongue down the throat of the prissy son, Madelyn had seen three heads when she should’ve seen one. She remembered begging the girl not to leave but it was to no avail. Madelyn was alone, pressed to the bathroom foor, convinced that after not even two decades of living, this was how she’d leave this world.
But maybe some deeper, wiser part of Madelyn knew that she’d be okay, that she would go on living past this night. She believed, for those who are lucky, that souls are dancing in the universe, souls hoping and praying that we always get home safe. And just when she’d about given up on her mission to get up off the bathroom foor, Madelyn heard familiar voices echoing in the room. They were voices she couldn’t quite place, but knew them still to be the sounds of rescue...of hope.
“Oh, honey.” The woman standing in the doorway sighed empathetically. She looked to be in her late 30’s with honey-blonde hair and a sweet, knowing smile.
“The amount of money you’d have to pay me to be 19 again...” Now stood another woman in the doorway. She appeared 10 years younger than the frst and in some ways rougher around the edges, but even so, beautiful.
The two women gathered on either side of Madelyn, who was still splayed out on the tiles.
“This is not where you want to be, Em,” said the older of the two. She ran a hand over Madelyn’s hair, smoothing out the static.
“Madelyn, you’re gonna be just fne,” said the other, but Madelyn could only give a faint nod. “We’re gonna get you out of here.” The darkness that had started in the corners of the room was now closing in under Madelyn’s eyelids, which felt so heavy that the thought of opening them seemed like a far-away dream.
The women looped their arms under Madelyn’s shoulders and in one slow, steady motion, lifted her off the ground. The girl groaned as she was held upright, but with a little help, she found her footing soon enough. Then, with a quick nod to each other, the women tucked Madelyn in closer and made their way out the door.
The three entangled girls walked slowly along the city backroads, their bodies swaying into one another with familiar ease. The damp London streets, which were sometimes known to smell of blank stares and gray skies, tonight smelled like green garden gates and remembrance.
“Should we get her some food?” asked the younger woman. Madelyn seemed more coherent by the minute but was still an arm’s length from sober.
“Let’s stop in a pub, maybe get her some fries and some water.” As soon as the older woman mentioned fries, Madelyn’s head lifted.
“Yes to fries,” Madelyn slurred. This made the women laugh the same sweet laugh they’d had their entire lives, one they all shared. It was a good sound, a hopeful sound.
The pub they’d stumbled into was appropriately flled for a 3am crowd and the old men at the bar hadn’t as much as batted an eye when the two women walked in with a drunken Madelyn under their shoulders. After situating themselves in a booth, and ordering two beers, fries, and a water, Madelyn slowly but surely began to come back to life. She lifted the cold glass of water to her mouth and drank until there was nothing left. The salty grease from the fries soothed her whirling stomach and after a couple of warm wedges Madelyn was fnally able to look at the women who’d saved her, really look at them.
“I think I know you guys,” Madelyn said, her face a mix of both amazement and fear.
“You do,” confrmed the older one. The two women watched Madelyn carefully and after a long pause, she spoke again.
“Am I dead?” Madelyn asked with such serious and earnest concern that the women couldn’t help but let a sweet and equal laugh echo through the walls of the
This is an excerpt. Read the full work online by scanning the QR code.
“Pensive” Taylor Nisbet
First Loves
JM Stowers
in ninety years, when someone asks, “who was your frst love, and why?” i’ll look on all the memories past, and squint as i begin to cry. that question’s brief, but it entails the rushes, crushes, blushes red, numerous answers and long-gone tales, all crammed inside my wrinkling head. it depends which of love’s ill-shaped forms we’re talking when we claim the frst, my battle scars from love, well-worn, recall to me love’s best and worst. with her i gradually fell in love but not with Cupid’s faltering bow, i found my soulmate, devoid of romantic feelings. now i know love can mean a multitude of things, not just pink-stained valentines. it can be fall or summer or spring, it hides in shadows, it casts sunshine. the frst time that my heart was broken, given, taken, shattered, smashed, i cried because of words not spoken, hopes discarded, feelings trashed. frst love he was, though now he lives far apart, with no strains of me. to think of all the world i’d give to he who’s forgotten my memory. if when they asked that complex question, they meant not what they said, not: “who was your frst love, and why?” but: “who did you love and wed?” i’d sit in silence for several seconds, and think of those whose threads i’d tied so close to mine. i’d merely reckon they’d all moved on while i had cried. that silly little question i’d answer then: “what is love, and where’s it been?”
Reverence
Anonymous
Far away, stands my altar
Its spires outstretch into empty space
Slender tendrils grasp at the architecture
Frail as it is.
The moisture and reality of any outside world
Would surely lay my gift low
Becoming all it once was Before I knew your name.
Hidden away, is my shrine
Sacrament staining the walls
Obsession ringing through its halls
Unheard by any, I hope.
Shine a beautiful sun!
Her warmth reminds one how cold Anything ever is And will ever be.
I am her hypothermic dog child
My bone church remains as testament Its pallid walls, its stained glass
Will never bear the weight of her eye.
I swear it.
“Persuaded”
Blythe Kingston Green
To All the Girls That Didn’t Know I Loved Them Before
Sincere Fielder
I wonder what it’s like to have that much power over a girl. I don’t think I’d want it; it’s a lot of responsibility to hold a person’s heart in your hands.
For years- ongoing at that... I have admired people who do reckless, Yet beautiful things for love. And I envy them.
I wish I could be a hopeless wreck to my friend group. I wish I could HAVE a friend group. I mean... I have friends- who’ve formed groups, so actually- never mind.
I’ll just stay out the loop.
And that’s what I do with love too. I choose to just fall in love with the idea. .
So I spend my free time writing love letters and sharpening my diction.
Wait! I won’t give you all their real names, because I’ve retired from love.
I fell in love with you the day my favorite teacher told me about you.
I’m not sure whether I fell in love WITH you or the IDEA I had of you.
We’d rather make up a fantasy version of somebody in our head, than be
But this time I had a valid excuse!
You were taken.
And I found myself taken aback. So yup, there’s that.
I won’t continue and talk about why you infatuate me because I have enough sense (for now. slowly losing my senses btw. I hope I go blind frst. Wait, technically i’m already blind. lolz) to not pursue nor introduce my feelings to someone who’s heart already belongs to another.
That’s one lucky brotha.
For this last one, I’ve already written poems for you. So I guess I really did like you.
Dear Cylah,
You were the quickest crush I’ve ever had. One interview with you doomed me, Your ideologies and aspirations for life post grad consumed me. I even caught me inserting myself into your life Daydreaming about what it would be like to have you as my wife. Loving you would consist of mending your wounded heart after a rough game. Losing my voice in a crowd of millionsJust because my jealousy convinced me I wanted to be the loudest to scream your name.
But I chose to stay sane. I may have saved myself the embarrassment, But don’t get me wrong... Not a thing has changed. When it comes to you, I am still that freshman that reached out to you, And requested you to tell the mic your name. P.S.
I hope Sandy and Pip have been well!
Turkey Dump
Rowan Henchy
October 28
We have this awesome Halloween party tonight. Molly and I are going as sexy chess pieces. Of course, it was her idea. She somehow turned my bishop costume into something with less fabric than anything I’ve ever owned, and her pawn costume is basically just a piece of string for a top. I didn’t want to do it, but I couldn’t come up with anything better, and Molly was very persistent, so I went along with it.
Molly and I call an Uber to frat row, already pretty banged up from our two-person pregame in our room.
We walk into Sig Kappa and immediately run into Molly’s sister, who grabs me, throws my head back, and pours some colored liquid down my throat. I choke, wipe my mouth, but laugh and make my way further into the party.
Molly and I make our rounds and run into a group of guys from our foor who we’ve been hanging out with.
Justin throws his arms up and waves for us to come over. He and I have become good friends. He had a girlfriend before coming to Michigan, so he’s been a great sounding board for my relationship problems.
He laughs and asks me what the hell I’m wearing. Once it clicks, his eyes go wide, and he asks if Molly actually dressed us up as chess pieces.
Molly overhears, fips Justin off, and downs another shot.
Justin quickly changes his demeanor and tells Molly he likes it but then turns back to me and starts dying laughing. He hands me a red Solo cup and pours a mysterious concoction into it. I stare down at the cup, then back at him.
He seems taken aback that I wouldn’t just accept a random drink from his cup. I may not be well-versed in party etiquette, but I do know that taking an open drink from a guy you barely know is No-No Rule #1.
He rolls his eyes and walks away to a cooler, returning with an unopened White Claw. He hands me a Lime one, claiming he knows it’s my favorite. I instantly smile because he remembered something I told him weeks ago.
Justin is a firt, but part of me doesn’t hate it. He laughs at my jokes, doesn’t take things too seriously, and yeah... he’s hot. Not Molly’s kind of hot, but the kind of guy your mom would fnd hot and want you to marry.
I take the drink from his outstretched hand and crack it open.
I walk away toward the backyard of the frat house. I feel Justin following me. We sit down on the stairs, out of the way of the drunk guys yelling at pledges to bring them more Zyns.
One White Claw turns into two, which turns into three, and before I know it, Justin and I are a few of the only people left at the party. I couldn’t even tell you what we’d been talking about for the past hour—all I know is that I felt a sense of relief.
I was so wrapped up in this conversation with Justin about something completely meaningless, and yet... it actually felt amazing.
I didn’t pick up my phone once.
I didn’t worry about whether my text to Anthony went through. And most importantly, I didn’t want to be anywhere else in that exact moment. I realize it’s late and that I need to fnd Molly. I begin to stand up when Justin suddenly grabs my,wrist.
I look down, and he immediately lets go.
His face turns bright red, visible even in the dim light around us. He starts stammering, apologizing, saying he has no idea why he did that. I shut him up by leaning in and softly kissing him on the lips.
I stay longer than I should.
But I have no desire to break away.
I move away and tell him not to worry about it. I look him in the eyes for what feels like an eternity, then walk back inside, thankfully fnding Molly standing on the kitchen table doing her signature hip-shaking dance.
Molly notices me at once and starts screaming my name. I laugh and grab her down from the table. I tell her it’s time to go. We leave the frat, and I turn around to see Justin watching as I leave.
I look at my phone, expecting to see a bunch of missed calls from Anthony. Instead, it’s just a picture of my dog in a pumpkin outft from my mom.
Epileptic O ey
Beckett Lindsey
A shift, a tremor, crackles of lighting in my mind
My body I can’t control, an unseen storm takes over
A tempest pulls and twists, all thoughts left behind A frantic dance, the world seemingly colder
I have been betrayed, but by who I do not know
My brain I cannot trust, my body helpless to its every whim A prisoner to the tide, caught in crashing waters below
A silent scream for solace, yet none comes within
Yet in the darkest hour, the storm starts to wane clouds recede, nature’s fury has taken its course
The sun will rise upon us once more, let us not be in vein And through trials strength endures, a slow and steady force
While the storm may leave its mark on my soul I rise reborn, saved by stars that make me whole
“MeMory’s Current” Whitney Spater
Fragment
Anne Rack
People ask me what I want to be when I grow up When I say, I don’t know, Will I ever grow up?
But the real problem is, One I could never vocalize transparently, Is which me do I appease?
The girl in the mirror looks tired and stoned, I guess she is me Anything else would be preposterous.
I hover three feet above her; A disoriented omniscient being.
Try as I might, I keep foating higher and higher. Her, a speck on the ground Me, a speck in the clouds Which are closing in And obscuring my view
Philosophers have debated for centuries Where the soul lies in the human body. A version of me prays they will come to a conclusion swiftly “There it is! Right between your knuckles, there you are!”
And if they need a body For research purposes, Please accept mine.
Tear me apart limb for limb, Look past no ligament, No muscle connection, Ravage all that you see, In the pursuit of knowledge.
Scream your answer from the tallest rooftop!
But please, Before you cascade my fragments aside, please,
Whisper the truth in my ear.
And then do not worry about burying me properly, Never say may she rest in peace, Because my pieces are scattered, In life as it is in death.
For a moment as small as an atom, We make eye contact in the mirror. Like two strangers who once knew each other inside and out, But now fumble around with a sheepish air.
In that brief moment I hope she understood That though I do not know her, I wish her the best.
Deserted Eden
Lucas Betancourt
I’ve felt you wandering in my mind plowing and scraping the dirt, a spade clawing delicately, so ly, slowly, slicing deep pulsating wounds into soil.
Your memory still sits here; a fossil print of your hand pawing mulch smoothly molded per your pleasure, ngers tracing outlines and fences as you favored.
Now roots and stems are wiggling out of those once sleeping seeds you sowed there; a landscape framed for oral co ers containing signals and cyphers cries out for quali ed decoders to comb through and cra of it some semblance of spring.
But since you le , bitter cold air seeps into open, shivering veins. ese rootlets of yours sting, palpitating chills of icy insecurity planted, abandoned to bloom blindly in biting darkness, to wither in a crippled existence.
“Open the Sky”
Minxing Liu
Myself
er the other hits my worn-out teal carpet. rst time,
Only they are still as blue as the Adriatic Sea.
Like a volcano resisting eruption.
I notice my blemishes
She notices her blemishes
Scars that will neer dissipate.
My clear, her pink
My dry, her smooth Surface.
I can’t help but wish I recognized you And not mask the unwanted scars within me.
Her volcano erupts
Mine barely stands.
She echoes, “You’re beautiful
And so are your battle wounds, Keep ghting, I believe in you.”
Raindrops drip down my fragile cheeks
Staring
At the distant girl detonating.
I blink
It’s me
I smile
And realize It’s 8:54
I have to get out the door.
“Behind her eyes”
Claire Bedley
Life in a Northern Town
Carolyn Malman
I got home at about 4 pm on a summer tuesday
The sun is low in the sky
I’m going for a drive.
I roll my window down
So this small northern town could hear my music
As if to say, “I’m home!”
Or in other words, “I leave my mark on this place.”
I drive past the same ten houses,
Some with signs on the front lawn
And even a fower stand opened up right next to my high school.
I slow down to make a left, when I almost miss it
A boys car that I know all too well
He plows by. Straight past me.
He does have the right of way after all.
I’m stuck in that moment, foot on the break, hand on the wheel, eyes wide.
But wait, that’s not him.
But the car…
It’s the same as it was all those years ago
When we would drive and drive to nowhere in particular
Until the song ends
Or the sun sets
We just wanted to go.
The transcendentalists believed that they could be free in the woods…
But all I wanted was four wheels and time.
The Baggage We Carry
Olivia Sullivan
“All wars are fought twice, the frst time on the battlefeld, the time in memory.”
- Viet Thanh Nguyen
A black quilted backpack rests in the back of a taxicab heading north toward Belfast, its presence as unassuming as it is ominous. The cab departed from Dublin at dawn, cutting through the damp Irish morning with no companion, no known owner, and no accomplice. The driver knows better than to ask questions. In 1972, ignorance is survival.
Sweat beads gather along his furrowed brow, carving slow trails through the grime of long days and longer nights. His hands clench the steering wheel, knuckles whitening, fngers locked like a noose around a lifeless throat. The route is familiar to him. He keeps his eyes ahead, searching for comfort and relief in the rolling emerald countryside. The land moves with him, ancient and indifferent. Rocky cliffs crumble into the North Sea’s relentless grasp, performing a captivating dance. A suffocating, boggy mist seeps through the air. The names of towns blur past, reading like those etched on Gaelic tombstones. Irish dwellings lie in uneasy slumber, wrapped in the fragile peace of an hour that may as well last a second.
A known checkpoint looms ahead, and with it, the intense, scanning eyes of the British soldiers on high alert. Just two weeks prior, a bomb hidden inside a van claimed the lives of two men in uniform, dismembering two others. The air on the border between the Republic and the North remains thick with suspicion. The driver swallows, but his throat remains parched.
A soldier steps forward, “Out of the vehicle! Now!”
The driver tries to move but fnds himself practically woven into the fake leather seats. Blood pools in his head while the rest of him starves for circulation. A baton jabs into his ribs. Weathered hands drag him from the car, forcing him onto the spongy, wet ground. The driver peers to his right and witnesses the soldier’s discovery of the backpack. Shouting erupts.
“Suspicious package in the rear!”
“Get down! Get down!”
Pinned to the earth, the driver closes his eyes. A soldier reaches for the passenger door. The weight inside the vehicle shifts.
A subtle click. Then, a fash. A war-torn sky engulfs any fnal breaths. The end is not loud – it is a quiet resignation.
Fifty years later, in a Belfast cab, a schoolgirl forgets her black quilted backpack in the backseat.
Elsewhere, it might be a simple mistake. But here, secrets kill.
You tucked snow dust beneath my socks to make sure every step I took shivered. Then you whispered a sweet song of sleet to match the freezing at my feet, and your cold tongue clawed at my ears until I waddled behind you trembling yet still.
But a warm breeze snuck up from below, it told me you heart was heavy and slow, then it melted the ice you clenched at my throat and whisked me back south in a sun-kissed sailboat.
Lover, the thawing crumbs of your words now food my lungs and crack my collarbone and shatter my ribs, and I gasp for the air you’ve lifted off my bruised and bleeding lips.
I miss my breath unsalted, I miss it seeping out like quivering smoke; when I wore your eyes as a winter cloak, when your judgement shook off my clothes, when skinned by your avalanche I froze naked in nothing but chilled bones.
In haste I hope to return to you, with extra scarfs and coats this time. Just let us share a fake of life, be it of yours or be it of mine.
Please, allow me back in to brave the brutal winds of this blazing blizzard; I simply want to return these swollen secrets I stole from the sacred storm of your soul.
- Lucas Betancourt
It is easier this way. You will learn.
Hungry
Maureen Murray
The Blessed Mother did not ask.
Hunger is holy. Silence is sainthood. Forget, and you shall be full.
Kneel.
Fold your hands until they crack like dry earth. Make of yourself an altar. Make of yourself a servant.
If you stray, you are lost. If you ask, you are wicked. If you starve, you are worthy.
I feel it thick in the air, the breath of ghosts pressing on my chest, the weight of a thousand swallowed screams.
I hear it in the slow drag of breath, the stairwell’s sigh, the hush of sins buried beneath foorboards.
I see it in the hollowed cheeks, the clenched jaw, the mouth sealed like a tomb.
I hold it deep, where even I cannot fnd it, where it festers, where it rots.
The walls drink secrets
and sweat them out in damp confessions.
The air is thick with prayers that sound like pleas.
There is no room for hunger, no room for wanting, no room for anything but submission.
Sacrifces are silenced. Ghosts forgotten. Wounds won’t speak, but still bleed.
She is burnt at both ends, doused in holy water, set alight again. She smells of candle wax and waiting, his breath soured with whiskey and rage. Nothing is enough. More.
A missing rib, a wound sanctifed, a giving without end.
Give me the apple. Give me the choice. Let me taste knowledge, not punishment.
Behind the locked door, a girl starves, knuckles pressed to her lips, swallowing the cries that will damn her. She weeps. She wails. She waits. She is never fed.
Everything I Wr e Tastes Like Dirt
Christina Tran
Everything I write tastes like dirt and I wonder if I’m fnally decaying.
If my body knows something I don’t, if the rot started somewhere inside me long before I noticed. I keep joking that my life is the stack of books no one picks up, dust thick in the creases of my spine, pages stiff, unread a story no one fnishes. My mother laughs when I tell her this, but she never asks why I never ask for food, why hunger feels like a waiting room, why I only eat when someone places the plate in front of me, and I wonder if eating should be this hard.
and my father jokes that I resemble the dog we have back home all quiet eyes and sharp edges, and I’m afraid to tell him how often men call me a bitch, not for my teeth but because I refuse to get on my knees.
and my ex wishes me a happy birthday every year and every year, I almost respond. Almost tell him I still see him in places he’s never been, that he still lingers like the scent of old books and unfnished conversations. Almost tell him I’ll never stop loving him. But I don’t. I let his words sit in my inbox, watch them yellow with time, a message unread, a door left ajar.
and my best friend keeps telling me I’ve changed, like a doctor delivering bad news. She means it like a quiet funeral, like a death she can’t mourn because I am still standing. And she stays. Despite the weight. Despite it all. And I think there’s something tragic about that kind of love, the kind that holds on, even when it knows better.
and I know my mom would never agree with the way I’ve been living my life and that’s why I stopped calling because how do you tell half of you that you’re devastated that you keep waking up in the morning, that waking up feels like grief that I am homesick for a version of myself I can’t get back to that I carry a kind of sadness she’s never been able to name.
and I know this sounds like a cry for help but I don’t have the voice for it anymore. I spent it all whispering to the plants I bought, coaxing them to stay, and they still keep dying. So I’ve resorted to writing this and hoping that somewhere between these lines, I will fnd something still alive in me, that if I search long enough, I will unearth something worth saving.
“See No evil” Blair Newsome
i am the water at the bottom of the tub.
i’m used, necessarily, but easily discarded.
i rinse right off your back and into the drain.
i linger briefy while you sing to your shampoo bottles.
i have my value, but it’s never recognized.
i pour out my love and its fows to the sewage.
i clean all your flth but the soap gets the praise. i can change from warm to cold to please you.
i am the water at the bottom of the tub as it sits and lingers and listens and leaves i may be the water at the bottom of the tub, but at least my journey was sweet. i am the water at the bottom of the tub.
i’m used, necessarily, but easily discarded. i rinse right off your back and into the drain.
i linger briefy while you sing to your shampoo bottles.
i have my value, but it’s never recognized. i pour out my love and its fows to the sewage.
i clean all your flth but the soap gets the praise. i can change from warm to cold to please you.
i am the water at the bottom of the tub as it sits and lingers and listens and leaves i may be the water at the bottom of the tub, but at least my journey was sweet.
“Through The Pages” Claire Bedley
Magnolia’s Warning
Darby Slaughter
Magnolia, Magnolia
Your light will be seen for miles
You will be tested, you will prevail
One day you’ll see Sophia
Shut your door to pain and vice
You must overcome
Trust the truth of your voice
Ready to pay the price
Promises, they are temporary Prophets, they preach false
Virtue, many have not Warriors, they fght unknowing
Through the blood, through the bruises, through all the wrongs
Oh, holy fower, you must carry on
Magnolia, Magnolia
Embody all that’s strong, make your light known to all
Fast Fashion Ki s
Olivia Demarinis
Editor’s Note: Watch this piece by scanning the QR code (right).
S ting Up
Tori Grasty
For the night we’ll sit
Together with Death
And let our communion stretch its Spindly fngers across Windowsills and over the pale Face of the midnight clock.
There is no elegance in this Sitting up
The vowels have been swallowed,
The words thick with some forgotten Remembrance
While the set spirals where beginning becomes ending.
Here I’ll divine some past or future
From the spirals of Infnite tree rings
That whisper lines of marginalia I am not ft to breathe.
All this glorious ephemera,
Names with no faces
Faces with no names
They exist only here
Between the tick of the clock And throb of the heart.
Teach me the old way of knowing again
I have forgotten
To look at the stars
When I plant.
I have forgotten
The songs that stretched
Across mountains and seas.
Turn your buzzard eyes
To your mousy-haired Eurydice
Let the dulcimer distract
As you take your steps into the cool
Dark water of some forgotten ancient place
e face beneath
I have seen this my grinning skull bleach white (from age or sun or chemical or beetle) behind the glass of the curio cabinet unlabeled or faded beyond cognition.
e panther is gone
And the catamount too
A new museum piece will follow in their wake.
Here your whistling girl
Will take her rest
Between fading hemlock
And faith healer.
All these ephemeral bones
Caught between the ensnaring tangles of Mountain laurel and rhododendron
icker than any shovel
Could cleave.
Here I’ll raise this Memory calci ed.
Place a coin on the eyes
And a da odil between e teeth of this your Favorite bastard daughter.
Upli your hands and eyes
Toward the heavens—
Has the river answered?
Have you divined from the leaves?
At night I will still dream of the Tuckasegee with its cold Languid water swirling
Far above my head
As the current pulls
Until all light is gone
Beneath undulating waves e earth will be made night again
And fox re will light the way back home
“Biracial
Recordar es un acto de amor
(T
o remember is an act of love)
Jayden Gonzalez Miranda
I rose alongside the sun
And even though it’s the same color as marigolds I forget...
I forget today is the day we celebrate you
You and all the buildings you’ve worked on
Brick by brick, you have built us high places
Step by step you have paved the way and yet I forget
How shameful that I have forgotten
Why I’m here
Who I am ... and
How I made it here.
ruins & Wonders”
Madison Patel
Heaven’s Horns
Virginia Crooks
How can someone so full us and our days. They constantly remind us of our alive-ness: belly-laughing joy that activates the abs, a hug that seems to pause the world when the tears are uncontrollable, being pulled to a new type of full moon we your mother saying she’s proud of you. These surely are times when I know I’m still kicking. But human-ing does not have to be something grand. I am me when I feel the bumps on my legs form as I sing a song whose lyrics are poetry. My tastebuds are mine when I make a smoothie with the exact right number of strawberries and bananas. The cold sweetness is perfection. I am me when I lay on my friend’s lap, curled up, watching episode twelve of an overly dramatic murder mystery. I love to curl up–always have. My brain is mine when I go into a panic about those I love being in danger. At all these times, I feel my body as my own. I am complete.
After Sickness
It occurred to me only after she died that a large part of my person hood was composed of someone else. For a moment, I was a ghost. That moment lasted approximately three months.
After Sickness
Fullness is a strange word, but it is Google’s chosen antonym of emp tiness, so it will do. I was informed she passed around eight that morning, and I went to work around eleven. Her three children were holding her hands early that morning, praying as she went on. full of love after a whole life of it. I went to work dressed in my all-black uniform and directed people to their seats, gave them whatever condiments or sides the waitress might have missed, and cleared their tables. ful. I wished them a good day in my ing of the fower-stained black dress me home, so I went to her house, one that used to be so full. ful. Now the homeowner wasn’t there. Her bed unmade. Her dog wondering whose side to reside permanently by now. The same feeling of ghostliness that swallowed me at work pervaded the walls. an absence. The largest I have ever felt.
Before sickness e music in her home is life-giving. We love to sit and listen to the classical piano pieces my sister masters; she and I agree the buttery smoothness of “Moonlight Sonata” is far more palatable than the ever-annoying “Maple Leaf Rag.” e rhythmic songs of a grandfather clock serenade the home every
hour, on the hour. Her orange-bricked porch holds countless concerts of various instruments: harmonica, guitar, banjo, cello, and even a washboard. My sister and I work together to belt out our favorite Lumineers songs. She always sits and smiles. There is no shame in our game. Only love. We drive in her dog-scented Lexus to each music lesson she pays for, usually a couple of minutes late. “What’d you learn?” “Some new notes and a song, I’ll show you when we get to your house!”
After Sickness
What I really learned is that I was loved and cultivated so intentionally. The soul speaks through music.
After Sickness
My cousin asked if we could include her love for Michael Jackson in the eulogy. They listened to him each morning as she drove him to school. Roberta Flack put into words the feeling of her husband Danny’s touch in “Killing Me Softly,” which was the answer to the question of her favorite song. My sister sends me pictures any time “Come on Eileen” comes on the radio. The only ticket Marion got in her life occurred while listening to that song. She told the offcer, “Sorry Sir, I got carried away in the music.” My sister played piano songs for her in hospice. I like to think she was carried away by music for the last time. Heaven’s horns.
Before Sickness
All the meaningful meals take place at her house. We gather around her big wooden table, look at each other through the centerpiece, and share every Christmas Eve, holiday, and big birthday. Each meal is christened with chocolate pudding in a small amber goblet. Her fried chicken puts any restaurant’s to shame. On occasion, we get lucky and she wouldn’t be at church. That meant she spent all morning brining and frying, simmering hand-canned green beans, whipping up real potatoes that are peeled, not powdered. It is all a great show of love, really. Hours and hours into bringing us all together. She is the best cook I know.
After Sickness
My aunt lived with my grandmother and has continued to live in the home with her son. She invited me over a few times in the months after the death, but I made sure to see her at my house, not hers. The time came for a blackened chicken dinner at Nana’s. Her house smelled the same. All that was missing was a “hey Virginia” with the “V” sounding much more like an “F”. I stepped outside onto her orange-brick porch with tears welling. My aunt greets me there now with my name pronounced how I do. I never thought I’d miss “fuh-gin-ya” so much. I pulled it together and enjoyed Marion’s recipe in her absence. She is still the best cook I know.
Before Sickness
I ride by her house just to stop in. Perusing the pantry and turning down the volume of C.N.B.C., we start talking about our days. Maybe she took Alfred, her dog, for a walk or called her son who lives a few hours away. There was always some little piece of excitement. I tell her about my dates, school events, and classes. She invites such a warmth in conversation. She teaches me how to drive in the dog-scented Lexus. At frst, she’s happy with my speed but after a few months, I drive too fast just like everyone else. I invite her to go on rides and every time she is free the answer is an enthusiastic “yes!” We usually end up with some sort of little treat. Her favorite is a chocolate milkshake. The Lumineers’ songs fy out open windows and she tells me how fun it is to look around in the passenger seat because you can’t really do that when you’re driving. I smile and agree. “Yeah, that [sky, art, yard, house, family, etc] is pretty!” Noticing can be such a joy.
After Sickness
Inevitably, there is sadness within me pertaining to her death that will remain until my own. But the things that ought to bring her to mind are the joys we shared, not the brief moment of pain in my lifetime spent surrounded by her joy. I still see a well-fertilized lawn and think of all the work she put into soft, non-clovered grass. She would appreciate the landscaping. Sitting at “our” booth in Sakura, our favorite restaurant, flls me with some sort of complicated comfort. I wish her Bang-Bang Shrimp was on the table. But I enjoy the company of so many others who share her spot across the booth. Maybe we, too, can share her old favorite appetizer, the Sakura Flowers. I appreciate the beauty she taught me to notice. The splendor of the Blue Ridge Parkway. The talent of street-side musicians. Every art museum that decorates a city square deserves a visit. Little things of goodness are worth stopping to see. Sometimes I call out to the open air telling her I love her, hoping the message makes it to wherever she is in the universe. And sometimes, after doing it, one of her favorite songs comes on. Or her favorite fowers appear randomly on my sister’s doorstep. Or I see an old lady with an identical dog walking with an identical gait. I stop my car and stare and she just smiles at me. I think she can hear me through the angel’s trumpets.
“Paris Nightclub”
Claire Bedley
Adopted Dreams
Andrea Novaria
When I was 5, my mother gave me a picture: of a young woman with soft black eyes, straight, jet-black hair, and honey, neutral skin that glowed. I didn’t know it at the time. But she would be back.
On my sixth birthday, she appeared. She didn’t say anything. I don’t know why. Only I talked. I told her my fear of the dark. How I slept only with a nightlight on. I showed her my stuffed dog, Zoe. I whispered how my family gifted me it when they came to get me. Only then did she smile.
I saw her again when I turned 10. She spoke to me and asked if I knew about it. Of course I did. But, I didn’t want to talk about that. Instead, I told her all about my birthday trip. My face was still red from the wild, kind Chicago wind. She asked if I was happy. Of course I was.
I don’t know why I see her only on this day.
A few years rolled by, and I fnally saw her. She said my name quietly. I couldn’t help but cringe.
It was not my name. It was the birth name she invented. I didn’t want the moment to be ruined. So, I changed the subject.
I told her how I went to visit the home country, where banana trees stood at every corner. This made her happy. I’m glad it did. It was the last time either of us smiled at each other.
With each time we met, I saw it more. How she and I looked alike. But I hated it. Because I was the reminder of the thing she did not want. When she appeared, I would see her in the corner of my eye.
I didn’t talk to her. I could sense her motherly spirit had been destroyed. It was easier this way.
I stopped imagining her anymore on my birthdays. My eyes get blurry thinking about it. But I don’t want to further ruin this fantasy. This dream. This goodness. It’s all I have of her and me.
Hilarious Masquerade
, not truth nor lie A story proceeds in laughter and cry No Carnivals ripes where meaning cannot die
What joy displays by way of buried Weak! A truth reversed by laughters grand deceit A dance, a hymn, a drunk, or sheep In caves and States our Idols dance for weeks!
The poets a fool both doer and deed And under their mask a hollow of glede For perception is truth and truth misleads How the mask, a verb, both laughs and weeps
Lo! O’er the masks a carnival of fun Lo! The Chaos in truths that thrive as one
Chandelier and Her Marching Band
Kal Wuor
Editor’s Note: Listen to this piece by scanning the QR code (right)
“Too Big To Fry” Natalie Minnetian
The First Martyr Aidan
Lampe
I hear his guitar weeping. I hear him casting the lure Of his splintered rod, And cranking his reel With the plucking and strumming Of notes and chords. He is an old man Fishing in a sea of men.
His song is the envy of the sirens And with it he beckons sailors nigh Not to consume But to cleanse.
I see a drowned Phoenecian sailor, Engulfed by the ocean blue, With eyes like pearls And boney fngers. His neck is cocked and rigid, Swollen and stiff From swallowed tides, Frozen in the posture he once assumed in Spanish streets.
A martyr for his craft, He will not sink But will wash ashore another city Fit to bury him.
Somewhere on a Str t in Memphis, TN Anne Rack
On the city street
There used to be a trolley
Which I like to think was flled with orange light, But the blues had to come from somewhere.
The house stands grand and distinct, Its joints weary with age (was that a ghost) Its windows heavily armed Protected against the winds that never seem to tire.
History hunkers down in the basement, While the present remodels the kitchen. Its forgotten fngers clutching the wooden beam, Kept company by the secrets, Who hope to be invited up for a drink.
But despite all the changes that come with time, The structure stands stubborn.
As the spirits slip in and out, Stopping just long enough to leave an indent on the sofa, The house softly hums the blues, Its music the song of the soul.
“Passengers”
Mike Liu
Half of Everything
Mia Bergier
*** MARIANNE ***
My best friend of ffteen years stood at the front of the chapel, about to make the biggest mistake of her life, and all I could do was sit and watch. Twenty-three. She was twenty-three years old- too young to be this sure about something you can’t undo. This is the same girl who’s had a tattoo design folded in her bedside table for eight years and still couldn’t commit to it. Not that I was rooting for a lower back lotus, but still. She could say yes to this - to him - and not that?
My knee bounced beneath my dress, my blood boiling at the fact that I couldn’t be standing up there with her. She had asked - more like begged - Mrs. Lambert to let her maid of honor stand beside her, but no. My presence at the altar would’ve been “too distracting.” Her precious son would’ve had to share the spotlight with more than just Meredith, which was already a stretch.
I rolled my eyes as Owen gave my friend the slimiest grin. How couldn’t she see through that? I should’ve called more, visited more, done something so that she didn’t attach to this cocky piece of work. He’d shaped her into something I barely recognized. She’d let him do it.
By the time I’d noticed the changes, it was already too late. No amount of rationalizing was going to pull her away from him; if anything, it only pushed her further away from me. So I stopped. I watched as my friend slowly morphed into Owen’s perfect girlfriend. I selfshly chose to shut my mouth, to keep her in my life, as opposed to fghting for her and losing her altogether. I couldn’t be the only one fghting. She had to want to fnd herself again, and after a while, it became clear that was the last thing on her to-do list.
But as I sat in the dark, stone chapel - a cold space that felt nothing like Merethe regret sat heavy on my chest. She knew how I felt; I’d told her again last night. But that didn’t stop the nagging thought that I should have pushed harder, recognized sooner. I hated feeling like I was wrong about us - like all this time our friendship was slowly unraveling. We used to swear nothing could touch us, that we’d always be part of each other’s lives, no matter what. But sitting there, watching her promise herself to a man that would never give her as much as she gave him, I realized the version of us who’d said those things didn’t exist anymore. And maybe hadn’t for a while.
*** MEREDITH ***
It had started.
Everyone’s eyes were on me, and I felt like I was disappearing into the gown that had looked so perfect a few months ago when I was dress shopping with our moms. She had said it suited me - the perfect balance between elegance and class, or something like that. And I had fallen for it. The dress was terrible. My mom’s hair was pulled back so tight it looked like she was about to have a stroke. And Zach - oh god, Zach. My brother had no idea how much would change as soon as tonight was over.
I would go wherever Owen went, which meant far, far away from that house. No more weekly visits - driving from my dorm to my childhood home to spend time with them, to console Mom as she cried herself to sleep. No more family vacations without Owen. No more homemade meals in the freezer. I wasn’t going back.
How they could stand it was beyond me. Eating at the same table where we used to have family dinners, watching TV on the same screen where home videos were once projected, listening to music from the same speakers that used to play his jazz - it was sickening.
God, I wanted my dad here with me. No matter how strained our relationship had gotten, it didn’t change the fact that I wanted him here more than anything. My eyes went to the ceiling as I attempted to keep the tears from falling down my face. Owen now had my hands in his; he squeezed, giving me the reassuring smile that always made things better. I was okay. He was here, and I was okay.
This is an excerpt. Read the full work by scanning the QR code.
Digging more and more, minutes started to fy by at an alarming pace, and my thoughts started to drift. Why hadn’t I found what I was seeking? Could I have buried it deeper? I didn’t think so, but thinking back to that whirlwind of a night that led me to this current predicament, I wasn’t sure if I was remembering things right. Now panic had started to inch its way from the back of my mind to the bottom of my stomach. I probably would have thrown up right there on the spot if I hadn’t skipped out on dinner with my family tonight, excusing myself with a made-up emergency at work. It was another lie to add to the pile of guilt, a pile that lay at the bottom of my stomach that had threatened to burst out every day for the past three years. If this plan didn’t work, if I couldn’t fnd the box, how could I ever go on like this?
Then I heard it. That wonderful sound of metal banging against metal. I suddenly felt so light that I could have foated out of that hole if I wanted. All I had to do now was dig it out; the last piece of incriminating evidence. After that, I could enact my plan to the letter and walk away with no one the wiser. I could fnally be at peace.
Suddenly, light fooded my vision as I tried to comprehend what was happening. Eventually, I made the connection that it was a car that was emitting the lights, but not the car I had arrived in. The panic seized my stomach in a vice, but I tried to calm myself before jumping to conclusions. Maybe I could talk my way out of this, as long as the people in the car were rational. Then the sirens screamed out in a dance of red and blue and any hope I held in my heart shattered. As I looked down at my black boots partly in shame, partly in anger, and entirely in defeat, I had a revelation. Asmy last conscious thought as a free man, which I would fnd funny in retrospect (a lot of things are after 25 years of refection), I couldn’t help saying it out loud. And why not? With no more secrets left to conceal, why not blurt my fnal blunder for all the world to hear:
“I dug my own grave.”
Burial S e Indigenous Poet Za
I was 16 when I buried my frst seed
And my tears weren’t enough to make your roots try to grow back
Maybe I should’ve planted you better?
Gave you proper nutrients instead of letting them girls stomp you to the ground
Maybe I should’ve protected you
Kept you indoors and forced myself to be the sunlight that helps you I could’ve done better
Stopped drowning you with my tears
I must not have given you a chance
But you
You’d be surprised if I told you I buried my baby
Locked them in a box and never opened the door
I cried on the baseline of the open feld I would’ve watched him play on
Cried my way to all the dance recitals I never got the chance to record her at
I still see you in places you were never supposed to leave
Thinking about those frst words I’m waiting to hear you speak
Maybe you would’ve called me Mama
I should be preparing to hold your hand on the frst day of school
Watch you pick your favorite backpack
And wiped your tears when the world felt too big for you
Would you have loved sports?
Would we have spent Saturday mornings fghting to get you out of bed
Watching you from the baseline as my heart slower started to cry
I must have dug the dirt up last week
Because my mind started spiraling and I wanted to be the thing I buried I think of you at every birthday I never got to throw
Every holiday that should have been flled with your smiles and laughter
At every scraped knee I never got to kiss
And the distant memories of your graduation I never got the chance to see
But missing you just means you’re missing from me
Not from them
No one else sees the space you were supposed to take up
Or hear your laughs in silence
Feels your presence in the dark and seldom shadows
My lover dug the hole
But I placed you in the dirt
And now I’m left watering a grave
Hoping something grows
Lord knows
The things we bury
This is an excerpt. Read the full work by scanning the QR code.
Lily Molly Steur
With every new day, when the sun streamed onto his pillow and woke him from the softness of an unreality, Tom absently, hopefully reached out to her side, his fngertips scrounging. He always remembered how her eyes looked in the morning.
But now, he had only the memory. His fngers would only ever feel cool sheets and never the softness of her hair, the smile in her skin. And just like all the days before, Tom stretched over like he’d forgotten — because, for just a moment, he had.
The hardwood foors were cold today. The house was so quiet.
“Is anyone sitting here?”
Thomas looked up. Sarah’s arms overfowed with papers and books and her bag was thrown over her shoulder, still open. He saw the mascara smudged slightly below her eyes, the silver necklace that peaked out beneath the collar of her sweater, and the way her eyebrows raised hopefully as she asked her question. He noticed the blue of the tie in her wild hair, the chipped purple nail polish on her fngers, and the dimple on her right cheek. But all Sarah noticed was that his eyes were warm and brown.
“Nobody.”
She sighed gratefully and dumped her armload onto the open side of the table, dropping her bag down beside the wooden chair. “Thank God. Nearly everywhere else is full. People just feel like they need to study here when it’s exams, but I swear I passed like three people sleeping in the Reading Room just now.” Her hands moved rapidly as she spoke.
He smiled.
“Just go home if you really need to sleep,” she continued, “Don’t take all the good spots. Don’t you just hate people like that?”
“I do.” He hadn’t ever thought about it before, really.
“Anyways, thanks. I just have to get through all this, so I’ll be quiet soon and let you get back to whatever it is you’re doing. Just stressed, ya know? And I’ve been studying all morning so I haven’t spoken to a soul. The words are all bottled up I think.” She leaned over to dig around in her bag. “Do you have an extra pen? Mine seems to have run away.” He offered her the one in his hand. He didn’t have any other pens, but it didn’t really matter. She took it from him with a smile. “Thanks!” He really liked her smile.
They didn’t talk much for a while. She spread out her notebook and books and papers all over her side of the table. She mumbled under her breath as she read, but it didn’t bother him. He was almost done with his work — he really only had to read the last half of this chapter. He tried to catch her eye, but she was too focused, so he stared at the open book without making any progress, the words becoming blurred and nonsensical. Conversations from surrounding tables had reached a height of sound, no longer a pleasant buzz, but a chattering stream of colliding voices intruding in the air.
He glanced back up at her, and this time, she was looking intently at him. “Are you okay?” she asked. He said he was. “You just looked super out of it for a second there.” “Oh. No, I was just thinking.”
“Oh.” She chewed on her lip. “Then what were you thinking about?”
“How you were right.” He smiled. “It is really crowded in here.”
“And loud,” she nodded seriously.
“So I guess I was just thinking,”
her eyes widened, warmed as he spoke
“Do you wanna get out of here?”
—
dark cloud
Christine Dudley
Can I borrow some money from you?
is the question I would get every month or so
And I said yes, every time
But one Saturday morning in September
The adrenaline led me to the kitchen table
The words tumbled out of my mouth
“I feel taken advantage of” He looked up from his crossword paused eating breakfast
And I could see how is he surprised?
“I didn’t realize you felt that way I feel like a dark cloud in your life,” I left to go see a movie, Hoop Dreams
And I thought about how good we used to have it When I was a toddler we’d go to our riverside cottage Eat fsh oysters steak and rice Eventually we stopped going Our American dream had died Before I even realized Since then he hasn’t asked me for money He just asks my sister.
“RochesteR’s Wife” Blythe Kingston Green
“Pain don’t hurt.”
Confusing, I’m sure from an outsider’s perspective. Personal ly, I have dedicated many futile years of my life to unpacking the grammatical errors that riddled most of my dad’s favorite sayings. Despite their grammatical shortcomings, his words of wisdom continue to carry me through some of the lowest points in my life.
He’d spout these sayings at me in nearly every instance, their applicability seemingly never-ending. Little league basketball games, diffcult math homework, falls out of trees, all struggles easily answerable by a quick off-handed remark.
I took his every word to heart, just as he had with his mother.
This was our inheritance, our only heirloom valuable enough to hand down. Instead of money, property, or jewelry, all we have is words and stories. We often joked about familial curses and blessings through habits that were mirrored in younger generations, although I have yet to fgure out whether I’ve been cursed
At my grandmother’s funeral, my dad stood strong, burying his sadness under a polite smile, a self-induced burden as no one asked this of him. His brothers and sisters had broken down already, I knew then they must have been deemed unworthy of what I now perceived as our shared burden. I thought grandma would have wanted us to hold fast, as only my father and I managed to carry out our mourning in silence.
It wasn’t until the next morning I saw my father’s swollen, red
I Know Why The Caged Bird Wr es
Xinqing (Tracy) Xie
When I was in middle school, I was defnitely not a fan of being tidy. My backpack is often loaded with exam papers, homework, and snacks that stacked on top of each other and contributed to the chaos happening in my bag.
And I remember, among all the chaos, in the very back pocket of my backpack, there used to be a suicide note.
You probably couldn’t imagine how and why a young middle school kid would write a serious suicide note. I hope you can’t.
I did write it. A suicide note. I recalled that I wrote it slowly, painfully. I carved the frst character, then the second, then the third. The pen impaled through the smooth fragile surface of the paper, I started, “to whoever fnds this note after I’m gone”.
...
I can’t forget how my muscles shivered and trembled. A despair soul, and a weird feeling of elevation. Adrenaline was coursing through my veins, and what my Mother couldn’t see was my fear -
I was afraid that if I died, I would have nothing to leave the world with. When the police and my classmates and my teachers and my family see my lifeless pupils, when I will never have the chance to speak again - what would represent me? Who would speak for me?
With these at least I was something. I was the soul buried in writings of sadness, hypered emotions, poetic language, and despair. I would see the dim light of the sun coming up and rimming the clouds with red and orange edges. I talked to myself, I asked myself, what do you want to write? Who do you want to be?
I want to be -
I started to see the little bird, the caged bird, who wanted to sing. She wanted to sing. I wanted to sing.
Taking care of a bird is not as simple as I think. You need to feed her, frst. And mental care is the most important.You need to talk to her, accompany her, parent her. Remember how weak a bird is, so don’t be rude.
Bipolar would probably stay with me, as a lifelong friend. After I recovered from that period, I tried to think about how I could befriend it. Looking back to those days that hurted me, I also felt like they nurtured me in some ways. The frst time in my life - I stayed with myself closely for months, tracking my mind, and allowing myself to speak.
In high school, I wrote about the caged bird in a narrative. I said she is there, even if I set her free, she would be there, with me.
And I realized I could write something even better. I could write, without crying, without unreadable syntax, and with the things I behold from my pain. I would remember that I could be dead tomorrow, and people will see these essays, these poems, this literacy narrative, as me. I took risks, even if I felt afraid that I would expose my traumas and embarrassment, I took risks to be me in my writing. I observe - in my writing - who I am, really, who I am. And I accept it. I accept myself to be helpless, to be kind, to be selfsh, to be angry, to be arrogant, to be me. I wrote them down, so that people could see - and so that I could remember. Every step I have been through, and I left this world with.
The things I behold from my frst suicide note.
Fly, my bird, y high away, never come back. Let that sky be below you, let that rain, that wind be behind you.
And I will y, too, because I know you are still with me. You are there, deep, deep, in me. I am not alone, the bird that I parent, the bird that I care for, the bird. But there will never be a birdcage for us again. Incurably, free, forever.
Every painful moments I would recall my rst ever suicide note - and write through it. I tear myself apart. I reach for my skin, my organs, my heart. I expose the most vulnerable but yet the truest self. I take every chance of writing as a suicide note. As if I would die in the next moment. Heart attack. Car accident. A bear ran out of the zoo. Suicide. Too many things can kill you.
So I write as if that’s my nal answer to the omniscient being, I write and write. Make the caged bird write. Make my words hit you. Make my words beat like a heart. Make my words grounded so solidly, that it could represent each grasp I had, near-death breath. Make my words live.
.........................................
Editor’s Note: This is an excerpt of “I Know Why the Caged Bird Writes by Tracy Xie. Scan the QR code (right) to read the full work.
“False escape”
Kal Wuor
New Year’s Eve Party
Melina Traiforos
How lucky is the year—
It gets to be new so often
Pestilence and plague and hurricane
Forgiven by the ball drop
Remade with a new digit and allowed to try again
At my aunt’s house
I nurse my champagne
Stuff hor-d’oeuvres in my mouth
Watch people sway drunkenly
What would they undo from their past,
If they could?
Here is my secret—
I envy the year
And its perennial absolution
For when the clock strikes and the sky explodes
I am still myself
Stuck in the kitchen with all the things I’ve done
Pandora’s Box
Aderinola Adepoju
Ripe with age, the wooden box seemed to glow brighter each day within her mother’s offce desk cabinet, yet neither of Beth’s parents ever felt the need to open it. To Beth, the little container was her own Pandora’s Box: with each passing day, her curiosity swelled.
And so, it became the source of Beth’s intrigue, an obsession sealed away by the golden lock that kept its lid shut. When Beth sat in her mother’s offce chair, peered into the cabinet, and stared at the wooden container, she felt as if the golden clasp bound its mouth shut, silencing its secrets.
For as long as she could remember, the box’s function had been nothing more than to sit—an ornament, like the centerpieces her mother displayed on their tables or the decorative candles scattered around the house. But a box with a lock is a box with a story to tell. That, Beth knew. It set this box apart from the open tales visible in framed pictures and carefully stacked books. The one time she had asked her mother about its contents, she had only received a cryptic response:
“If it was meant for you to see, you would have seen it.”
So Beth resigned herself to studying its exterior. The closest she had come to peering inside was running her fngers along the grain of the wood, scratching at the surface, pressing her thumb against the golden clasp. Once—as if the box had punished her for such audacity—she had gotten a deep splinter. It had taken her four and a half agonizing hours to remove the sliver of wood. She knew that if she asked her mother for help, she’d be forced to admit how she had gotten it. And Beth had never been a good liar.
But today, after years of speculation, she decided she was going to open that box.
She moved as she had many times before: stepping into her mother ’s offce, opening the sacred cabinet, and pulling out the chest. But this time, she did not put it back. Instead, she held it tightly, as if it might vanish from her grasp, and carried it upstairs. The wooden chest had become glass in her mind—fragile, precious—as she set it carefully on her desk. She pulled out her chair and sat.
Beth must have spent at least twenty minutes staring at it.
Again, her mind returned to Pandora’s Box. Surely, this little wooden chest couldn’t be responsible for the destruction of mankind. Pandora had already taken care of that. And besides, what was the world without a little confict? In Beth’s opinion, Pandora had done humanity a favor by gifting it the art of drama.
That thought was enough to steady her resolve.
She opened her desk drawer and pulled out the pair of wrenches she had bought for this exact moment. She had scoured her mother’s offce for the key, hoping for a clean break-in, but had come up empty. How would she return the lock to its original state afterward? She hadn’t thought that far ahead. But then again, neither had Pandora.
Beth hooked the open ends of the wrenches over the shackle and forced them together until the metal snapped. The broken lock clattered softly against the desk. She unhooked the shattered pieces and set them aside. I
t wasn’t as if a spider would jump out of the box, but the reveal felt just as dangerous. This was something that had remained hidden for too long.
Beth slowly lifted the lid.
The wooden box exhaled its secret.
Inside, there was only one thing: a folded piece of paper.
She hesitated, then reached in and pulled it out. The page was creased, worn with age. Turning it over, she saw faint pencil markings—some words crossed out, others smudged by a weak eraser. But the visible ones remained clear.
Her breath hitched.
The handwriting was familiar.
Suddenly, Beth was nine again.
She could almost feel the warmth of the blanket draped over her as she fnished her book—a children’s retelling of Pandora’s Box. She could feel the thrill of discovery as she tossed off the covers and padded barefoot to her brother’s room, eager to tell him about her latest literary adventure.
She remembered smiling as she twisted the golden doorknob, pushing open the door to share her excitement.
And then—
Editor’s Note: Continue reading this work online by scanning the QR code (left).
Tien KN
Yesterday night, I lay restless, Beneath the veil of what he spoke. A feeting glimpse, a feeting touch, It was that thought —
Restraint lingered in his breath. His face pressed against the sheets, Arms around me, frm yet light, His restless feet in silent fight.
If just one touch could fracture time, Dare I step beyond the line?
Those eyes: a nameless hue, Unravel me, yet pull me through. ...
Say that a single kiss could leave me drunk, Would I dare to drink my fll? ...undefned.
My pulse betrays the silent tide:
“I crave the touch of reaching hands, Yet silence seals my yearning lips...”
Brayal From W hin
Sincere Fielder
Dear Heart,
I have a confession.
I’m an idiot?? I know, I know.
I learned my lesson.
I owe you an apology. You choose to reside in me, And I, willingly, Gifted you to another.
I wrapped you in beautiful promises, noble sentiments, and chivalry. I devoted us to them and polished our vessel for them diligently.
I even placed you on a pedestal with such assurance, Assurance that this heart was worth the investment. And that it would always beat for them.
I should’ve buried these feelings like the others and kept them in letters.
It was better when my feelings were a mystery.
To this day, you and I are still affected by my decision’s history.
I hate that I didn’t ask for your permission.
I didn’t inform you that you’d be working overtime.
I didn’t caution you about the possibility of skipping beats.
I didn’t care about the risk of us going into cardiac arrest anytime our eyes were able to meet.
Because to meit was worth it...
There is no denying that I was a slave to my greed.
I guess you could say, to me
She was everything I’d ever hope for.
And I was willing to give her ANYTHING she needed. Including you.
Sincerely,
Your good for nothing owner
The Secret
Megan Zanni
They approach me in black,
Some offering condolences,
Some offering embraces.
They tell me they are so sorry for my loss
But they do not know my secret. They say I am too numb to cry,
I have been through such a terrible shock, I must be unable to feel anything at all.
They consider that a blessing, though temporary
But they do not know my secret.
They offer me words.
They offer me warmth.
They try anything to fll the silence and the cold
That will surely break me.
But they don’t know How he broke me.
How he crushed me, How he caged me.
How I finched at every shout, How I wept at every blow.
If they did understand, they would know that
The silence is a gift.
The cold is a breeze
Dancing across my skin and whispering, “You’re free!”
Absence is space, Space is liberty, and Liberty is joy.
And therein lies my secret.
Deep in my heart, Right where the crack should be, Instead of a hole, There is a stitch.
I did not kill my husband.
But the truth is I am happy that he is dead.
To My Heart’s H man. Encase Me.
Sincere Fielder
My confdence isn’t there when it comes to these things, So please bear with me...? I refuse to let my feelings for you manifest itself into limerence. And for that I am writing this, Miss [redacted]. Miss [redacted], you have become the hitman that has assassinated my defense mechanisms on love. It is because of you, that my heart is under new management. And I, fnd myself in support 100%
After several trials of denial, I have come to terms with the fact that-my heart yearns for you.
By “you”
I’m referring to the essence that has crafted your very being. I wish to be a part of your world and embrace all that you are, Because I must admit Your unintentional charm has bested me. Defeated me and my pessimistic belief in love. Before you, my pedals withered and wallowed in an abyss of unforgiving memories.
But now I I often fnd myself bewitched by your voice which is quite heavenly. Your smile that levitates me. And your alluring eyes that I have been blessed to meet. Your essence is indeed a treat.
Though I must confess that I detest the actuality of not knowing a lot about you. but I seek to.
So i’ll leave you with this: My pedals bloom out of admiration for you. Therefore, encase me.
Immortalize these feelings I have for you, and maybe, just maybe, Consider me.
Sincerely,
Your potential Valentine, [also redacted]
Connectio
n
Talia Austin
We could have made a connection by now, a connection by now.
I thought we would have met by now. We don’t have to form nun deep. Do you even know I exist? You no longer live with your mama, so there are no more reasons you can postpone our meet.
Did she taint my name with lies, so you no longer have the desire to get to know me?
Where’s our connection right now? Nowhere to be found. I could use you here right now, but we have no connection.
The only image I’ve seen of you— is your old basketball photo Man, you could have been a LeBron, Shii, or Kobe, haha. When I frst saw that picture, I imagined myself in the crowd, cheering really loud, pointing and yelling at everyone. That’s my big brother right there. But you probably wouldn’t see me or even care, ‘cause we have no foundation— just another stranger.
The only thing that connects us for certain is our blood.
Urges to reach out, but I don’t have your number.
I looked you up on social media— no luck there either. Can’t nd a user with no IP address.
But in the end, this makes no di erence, because if you wanted a connection, You would’ve reached out by now. Do you even know my name?
I’ve dreamt of you for the last few nights; I woke up drenched in tears. How could a stranger have so much impact on my life?
We are lacking a connection right now. It might be better o , instead, to kick you out of my head and let the image of you in my brain die.
But instead, I’m yearning for a connection right now.
Don’t know where to go from here— so a question mark is what I’ll write next to our connection, for right now.
You could pass me in the street, and you probably wouldn’t even know who I am.
Carolyn Malman Touch Tunnel
I fear settling like I feared the dark. The dark is quiet and unknown. As a child, I brought fashlights And left the bathroom light on with the door open a crack.
I faced the unknown by igniting the light. A touch tunnel Stumbling, suffering, the lovers move through Hoping they make it out. I watch the process of falling out of love with each misunderstanding as a silent disappointment. It makes me wonder if all could have been avoided If they didn’t settle. If they came out of the static dark, And found someone that ignited them.
“GOD POV” Minxing Liu
Children of Quiet Gods
Christina Tran
When I was a child, the nights were violent and the words were sharp. They cut through walls, through doors, through the fragile belief that home was supposed to be safe. I used to imagine God standing in the corner of the room, silent but protective, watching everything unfold with some unseen purpose.
A witness, if nothing else.
I did not know God then. I do now.
Or at least, I know the shape of Him, the weight of His absence, the way belief clings to the places where certainty used to be. But the part of me that is still small, that still seeks something larger to feel less so, wonders why He was so quiet when everything else was so loud. If He was there, why didn’t He move? Why didn’t He still the shaking doors, soften the words, make the nights less long?
And then guilt comes. Guilt like a tide, seeping into bones that still rattle at the memory of footsteps pacing behind walls too thin to keep anything out. I wonder if maybe my cries weren’t loud enough. Maybe I wasn’t the right amount of desperate. Maybe I shouldn’t have cried at all.
But the feelings fade into silence, just as the cries once did. Until I ask myself what kind of father doesn’t listen to the cries of his children and I don’t know if I’m talking about God or a locked door.
Children of broken homes learn to pray to quiet gods. We learn to fnd love in the silence because there is nowhere else left to look. When love does not arrive in words or hands, we teach ourselves to seek it in the absence of harm, mistaking quiet for kindness.
I spent years searching for love in silence. By the time I realized that real love is loud—that it does not sit still in corners and watch while doors shake and voices rise—the doors that might have held it were already locked.
But the part of me that will always be small screamed, and in doing so, was no longer small.
Now, I drown again and again in that silence, in the echoes of nights when I convinced myself that quiet was a kind of mercy.
But I am not God. And nothing has ever been so loud.
Da odil
Emily Meinert
Underground —
A blanket of earth envelopes me as I sleep.
Dark, quiet, rest
Breathing deep and slow in a soft, thick nest.
Warmth —
Is near to me now.
Slowly, gently, I reach for the light
Stretching out as my roots hold tight.
Above —
A bird hops along.
Pure delight is to be so close, yet concealed, A waiting sprout in a lonely feld.
Breaking —
The surface, bursting forth into dazzling day.
A bright herald seeking the touch of the sun I proclaim
In the newness of spring, nothing stays the same.
A Secr
Flaccus
‘Twas faint, so faint, —
But still, ah! still
Like summer winds From budding pines,
Here while I sit Before me fit
And still I fainForgotten swain-
How may I not?
Her face forgot,
While in me bides, What knows no tides, The ceaseless ringing
Of one rare hour,-
One brief, glad hour,When, ere my leaving, Upon my cheekAh! shall I speak?My bosom heaving,
Broke waves of breathSoft, fragrant breathAs near me leaning
