Kirkwood Cedar Valley Divide 2024

Kirkwood Community College’s Art and Literary Magazine

Dear Generous Readers,

Our deepest gratitude to you for picking up a copy of our literature and art magazine, The Cedar Valley Divide. Also, thank you for the overwhelming sea of submissions we received this year (125 to be exact). This magazine allows you to peer into the psyche of another. You could find a piece so relatable that you cannot help but connect with the creator’s thoughts as your own. You can hear from someone who comes from a completely different world with a voice and a story that needs to be shared.

For an hour a week, we presented, discussed, debated, and voted on every single piece of fiction, non-fiction, drama, poetry, and art. There were some very thought-provoking exchanges of interpretations and perceptions in that conference room that could have traversed time. If only we had an abundance of time to match our overflowing submissions, but, alas, we were not that fortunate. We had sharp eyes that appraised the most minute aspects of the quality of the writing and art. I commend the writers or artists whose crafts kept body and soul to the very end.

A couple of pieces that received noticeable attention range from almost every category. In fiction, a cup of coffee is held with unsteady hands in a home rupturing from the inside out. In non-fiction, we learned of a man. A changed man who was as we know a sunset kind of man. I believe we all wished we could meet Uncle Jon and see his paintings. In poetry, a mundane task, car radio, and a patient, destitute man give us readers something to chew on. In art, follow the white rabbit down his hole or through the looking glass because it’s almost time for tea. There are sandwiches, cupcakes, macarons, and a ferret to keep you company.

For all of you who dared to submit your stories, art, and pictures but were not accepted by the magazine, rejection is a great tool for any aspiring creative to prove us wrong in the future. Believe in your work and keep submitting your work to various places until you hear a yes. We hope you all keep dreaming and persevering.

Sincerely,

Student Staff:

Ollie Black

Alena Diercks

Wilsee Kollie

Jordan Peters

Jesse Schwiebert

Will Wetjen

Faculty Advisors:

Lisa Angelella

Danny Plunkett

Magic Moment

Hannah Schwickerath

Dark shadows caress the rippled velveteen walls.

The bright screen touches glistening eyes.

Decadent doors add to the mood.

Old theatre musk.

The yielding crunch of popcorn. Draped hidden lovers sink into seats.

Long awaited popcorn temptress. Tangy Jelly candy wrappers crinkle.

I look at you. You look at me.

I tremble at my question.

Goosebumps line my arms.

Whispers echo in the stillness. Murmurs of ahs.

Murmurs of oohs.

The concrete sticks to my feet.

The seat squeaks.

I gasp at the disturbance.

Everyone turns to look.

I flush a deep crimson.

My lips part.

My nostrils flare.

My hand reaches out.

My knees lean in.

“Can you pass me the soda, please?”

To Get Old

Kallany Mendes

She was sitting on the curb, raising her arms and moving her mouth violently. All my life, I remember her as always old, with a shuffling gait and a cigarette in one hand. She would scold me and my brothers when our ball fell in front of her lawn. I never understood a single word; perhaps the lack of teeth and hoarseness from smoking made her speech worse. Dona Genura, that’s what my great-uncles call her. My great-uncles are also old. My family and I have the habit of having lunch and spending the weekends with them, Christmas and New Year’s. I wonder where Dona Genura’s children and grandchildren are. We watch as she appears to swear relentlessly and fidget on the curb.

I wonder if Genura is her first name. Maybe she could be Elisa or Maria. Maybe people called her Mariazinha or Lisa when she was a child. Dona Genura had a husband. He was tall and thin; he was also the type that drank. When Dona Genura’s husband died, her brother came to stay with her; I think he was also the type who drank. I never saw him again. I’m afraid of Dona Genura, and I don’t approach her to talk; the strange screams we received as children with her crazy looks make me think she’s not quite right in the head anymore. The other day, she simply dropped her pants and peed in the street; I was speechless with shock, and when I told my mother, she merely shook her head and said a long and sad “yeah.” My aunt, also in her sixties, watched. Something showing on her face that I can’t describe. They said the family came to visit from time to time. Everyone seems busy with their lives most of the time, and no one can take care of Dona Genura fully.

Life, Death, Life.

My great-uncles had a life before being cast aside by the world, a world that no longer seems to accommodate them. I hear a lot of stories. In the end, all we really have are memories. They count with their eyes full of the days when they were young and got into trouble, of the old house where they spent their childhood. “I can find that place with my eyes closed,” my uncle says with a rare and complete smile on his face. My brothers and I laughed and asked questions. Before, the biggest news and fun were television programs. I understand now why, after lunch, when I’m settled in the living room with a book and my brothers are distracted by their technological devices, he makes a point of turning on the television and putting on some program or movie showing that day. He does this with enthusiasm, and we, somewhat awkwardly, pretend to pay attention to whatever it is. Young

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people no longer watch television; now, we have streaming services at our fingertips. My uncle is brilliant and affectionate; he planted a vegetable garden alone in a place where people used to throw trash. He dedicated all of his time to the garden, happy to have a purpose. My aunts were always equally caring, with their straight black hair and cinnamon-colored skin reminiscent of my great-grandmother’s indigenous ancestry. I love them deeply.

I keep asking myself, who listens to Dona Genura’s stories?

I know I don’t know much about her; the little I know, I tried to gather here. I always thought Dona Genura was beautiful despite being so wrinkled. I wish I could say that I’m sorry for all the times we played with our ball in front of her house and disturbed her afternoon with our screams. Children are like that. Even though I’m grown up and entering adulthood, I still feel like a child. Helpless and wishing someone would hold my hand and guide me down the street. Does this feeling change when you’re so old, or will a part of us always feel like a child?

The Art of Plating

Alice Blackbriar

The day my brother was born, I stayed with my cousins.

Curled into a pack of them like wet-nosed pups in the night.

Getting up to use the bathroom, treading carefully up carpeted steps so as not to rouse them.

Leaving their sleep-heavy breaths behind in the grainy dark of the basement we’d built a den of blankets into.

The rest of the house was completely still. Comfortable in the day, the late hour brought a beast that hibernated. Snoring rhythm held in the creaking steps and rusty pipes of winter.

I was coiled in its stomach, waiting to be able to move freely again, losing the careful slowness of night. A digestion that carried me to the porch door.

A mouse tucked into cluttered wall of familiar voices and watchful eyes and arms that cradled. Bare-footed on cool kitchen tile, when all the world felt asleep, becoming a worship of its own.

The Gaze of Uncertainty Haley Church

Strange Desire

Ollie Black

When I was four years old I lived in a little country house on a single acre in the middle of nowhere. My brother—older by seven years—would walk with my sister and me to the dry creek bed about half a mile down the road. He was careful, in the way only an 11-year-old boy can be, to tell us never to go walking in the creek without him: when it rained, he said, sometimes whirlpools would form and suck in everything around them, never to be seen again.

Seventh grade was kind of like that.

Every morning, a hundred or so of us would pack into the lobby and wait for the bell. It was hot, loud, and smelled like death. In the din, I would cast about until I found Hailey. She was my best friend: giggly, conspiratorial, dedicated. Hailey was the center of my life that year.

She pulled me into her orbit when I walked into math late on the first day of school. I stepped into the room. The lights were already off and the projector was on. There were no empty tables. The universe had, of course, done this to spite me: being the new kid for the sixth time in my life wasn’t enough of a social roadblock. As I hesitated in the doorway, Hailey waved me over to her table and whispered an introduction. There was no need for any fanfare. We became inseparable almost immediately.

The year went quickly. I was in Vermillion because my parents had divorced the summer before I began seventh grade. By April they had decided to give it another go, so I knew I was going to be moving away by the time Hailey asked me to come with her to Minneapolis, a weekend trip after school let out to celebrate her thirteenth birthday. She could only pick one friend, and, from our tight-knit group of six, she picked me.

The morning we left, my mom dropped me off with a backpack and a twenty-dollar bill and told me to behave. Hailey and I loaded into the backseat of her mom’s car and giggled like she couldn’t hear us for the entire car ride. We sang along to “Gives You ‘Ell,” chopping off a consonant under the pretense that Dana couldn’t chastise us if we didn’t technically say the word. I listened to “The Crane Wife”—all three parts—for the first time, with my feet tucked up on the edge of the seat, fingers interlocked with Hailey’s; years later, it would be the first song I learned to play on the guitar.

As we came into the city, Dana turned down the radio, and we tried our best to be silent. The other cars on the road zipped around us, weaving the highway into a fine ribbon that gleamed under the late afternoon sun.

Every time I looked left, Hailey looked right and our eyes met, and it was impossible not to laugh, and worse because we were trying to be quiet.

Dana checked us into the hotel and went to sleep early. Hailey turned on the TV and flipped to Ghost Adventures—a novelty for me, as my family had never been able to afford cable. We stayed up late, until maybe two in the morning, and fell asleep with the TV still on, curled up together in the queensized bed.

In the morning, we left the hotel. As Dana navigated the traffic, a giddy hum from Hailey and me in the backseat filled the car. When we arrived, the three of us entered the ground floor of the rotunda. Storefronts on every side advertised what seemed to be everything under the sun. People milled dizzyingly around and above us. Four stories stretched straight up, the smell of perfume and the low thrum of music drifting down from all of them–from the sky itself, maybe–all the way to us on the ground level. The Mall of America was a wonder.

I spent the morning following Hailey through the unfamiliar stores while her mom trailed behind us both, always present but never intrusive. I watched Hailey pick out jackets and bracelets, carefully tallying the total against her birthday gift cards. Twenty dollars burned in my pocket; I was determined to spend it and to own something that didn’t come from a thrift store. Hailey and I picked out matching necklaces from the sale rack.

We ate at the Rainforest Cafe, sitting next to a giant eel in a tank. He moved cautiously about the cylindrical tank, with a certainty that defied the slight spin of the water around him. Hailey named him Fluffy; I enthusiastically concurred. When his great grayish body slithered into view, we would squeal “Fluffy!” so fervently that every other memory of the restaurant was overwritten by the eel. Dana laughed, her amusement warm and genuine. At the end of the meal she presented each of us with a wristband to Nickelodeon Universe in the center of the mall, promising the luxury of unlimited rides.

We rode together, screaming and singing and laughing through the park. The line to the SpongeBob roller coaster became a temporary home for our very vocal delight that afternoon, probably to the dismay of the other parkgoers. The great appeal of this ride was the drop, straight down. Locked into our seats, barely able to look at each other, we fell together over and over again.

The enormous skylight atop the park slowly let in less and less sun, and the light inside the building became more artificial. As the sun disappeared entirely, the park began to quiet. We lingered for a while on the perimeter, walking through the brilliant flashing lights of the arcade and

through the sweet, acidic air of the candy shop.

And then the mall was closing soon, and Dana told us it was time to go.

At the hotel she again went to sleep almost immediately, saying something about not being young anymore. Hailey and I stayed up once again, Ghost Adventures playing in the background. We talked in hushed tones, unwilling to risk waking Dana. The conversation was too sincere, and too urgent. Hailey didn’t want me to move, and I didn’t want my parents to get remarried anyways, and then it was too hard to talk about the distance that would separate us so we talked about the distant future. Hailey wanted to go to art school, to have a cat, to see the world, to move to the city. “We could go together,” she said, “maybe to New York? I’d like to live together someday.”

I said, “I wish I was a boy so we could just get married.” The bubble burst; suddenly we felt all of the exhaustion of the late hour.

When I woke up Hailey was already in the shower, her things folded neatly away in her black and neon green duffel bag. On the way home there was very little talking; we both drifted in and out of sleep until the car stopped outside my apartment building. The good-byes were tearful, and permanent: a week later my family all lived together again, an insurmountable seventy miles away from Vermillion. I never saw Hailey again.

It’s been 13 years. Hailey graduated from film school and lives with her girlfriend in the city. I answer to a different name, speak with a different voice, wear a different face. That was the first night I said it out loud, earnest in the way only an eleven-year-old boy can be. Sometimes, when I’m feeling nostalgic, I wonder if she would recognize me. ♦

Happy Birthday

Ella Wade

In Answer to Your Accusation— No, I Do Not Think the World Revolves Around Me

Laura Felleman

Though I admit a younger self did believe a theory in that general orbit: That in a twinkling, the Universe would gravitate towards my every teenage wish. As if the planets formed a chorus line of cheering high kicks, top hats, canes, comet tails. It took forty journeys around the sun to unearth the actual time-space rupture: Whenever my kind ventures a new moonshot, a worm hole decays distant dark matter giving us a boost.

Eulogy to the Printmaker

Timothy Stammeyer

Uncle Jon was a man filled with folklore—stories of the top-shelf variety, the good liquor, a rich flavor that only comes with time. When he shared his memories, there was a change in the air, an invisible force that called you to listen. It helped, of course, that he could make waiting at the DMV sound biblical. His body was a vessel that seemed to only expand, always able to hold more—words, art, poems, songs, philosophies, relationships, and, natural, because he was Italian, sharp cheese and wine. Those tales were rooted in Iowa, among the tall corn, pathways of creativity curving like rivers. It was at his oversized worktable, nestled in the bosom of an ancient Victorian, stationed by a window peering down to the Mississippi River, that my uncle began a new and unexpected masterpiece. This prophet of ours had become an apostle of suffering. The diagnosis was clear: he had ALS.

Only in his 50s, my uncle met an opponent he would lose to. Ultimately, the prognosis was death, at least one in an earthly sense. It would be the death of the body, but not his spirit. That part of him would endure— alive in the breath of those who loved him, the people who would keep on telling his story.

Here’s what Uncle Jon figured out: his disease wasn’t going to take his lungs for a few years. Death, then, became less of a killer and more of a clarified destination. In a way, he figured, he had an advantage—a sort of timeline. If he only had a decade left, there was no need to save energy for the years that follow.

I don’t believe Uncle Jon suffered to give glory to God or purify the hearts of men. I do believe that his suffering, in the end, purified him. It burned the parts that kept him from fully connecting, from loving the way we all want to be loved. It was a process, I’m sure, and he said until his death that my aunt and cousins kept him going. Of course, this admiration always carried the threat of my aunt setting his power chair to full throttle, watching as he rode down the hill outside their ancient house off into the sunset.

Uncle Jon was a sunset kind of man—a visionary who knew the Earth could paint the sky better than he ever could.

In both art and life, my uncle was brilliant. He was a professional artist who specialized in printmaking, an expert at chiseling truth on copper plates, images later rolled in ink and set to paper. During his time at and beyond the University of Iowa, Uncle Jon worked with world-renowned

printmaker Mauricio Lasansky. The work my uncle brought to life was eye-catching, broad in scope, beautiful in composition, and, to be honest, unusual, especially when I was young. Before he was diagnosed with ALS, I didn’t get his art, which is another way of saying I chose not to understand. Although, it was never his job to make me. Uncle Jon knew that art, and the act of creating anything, is vulnerable in that way. You draw your story and the paper becomes your voice. It speaks for you, often in unexpected ways, with the ability to divide and heal.

What’s so beautiful is Jon’s portfolio gives us hints into his mind, a philosophy that gradually narrowed on simple moments. Before his diagnosis, my uncle rarely used color in his work, and if he did, it was often subtle, muted, and moody. In the final days, his work burst with moments of color. On first thought, a cliché seems reasonable here—he went from an arrogant and self-centered world to one of abundant love and compassion. This makes sense to us. We’ve heard this story before. But this isn’t A Christmas Carol. God is not Charles Dickens. My uncle was not Ebenezer Scrooge, nor was his disease the chained ghost of an old co-worker. His moment of clarity was not a fat turkey.

When we simplify a life lived this way, we miss the point. People are messy, and they, even the best and worst, never fall into an all-consuming dichotomy of good and evil. The saint fails, and the serial killer, at least once, accidentally holds the door open for an old lady at the gas station.

So, why did Uncle Jon turn to color? I’m not sure. My guess is there are many reasons, many emotions, thoughts he didn’t even understand. Perhaps brushstrokes of vibrant paint were easier to control as the muscles in his hands failed. I know that by saying why, I give him a voice that is not his own. So, instead, let me describe a piece of his art that hangs in my home. Overlooking my kitchen table, it’s on sturdy, crafted white paper. There are intricate lines of ink that intimately swim across the surface like rivers. The line work is so moving in this odd way that’s hard to identify. After all, they’re just lines, right? They can’t have a deeper meaning, can they? And then, scattered atop these tightly woven, calculated lines are swatches of bright, colored paint. Their shape resembles, well, a worm. And because of the character he was, my uncle named the piece “Worm Germ.”

The artist coming to the last chorus of his waltz with ALS put colorful, abstract worms all over his art. To this day, that’s what looks over me as I cook and bake, as I grapple with understanding my own diagnosis. I’ve learned that in times of suffering, when the future is blurry, and the path forward is covered in fog, it’s best to add something unexpected, something unusual, curious, and real.

Some worms.

And what I know about worms is they come out at night after the sun goes down.

Uncle Jon was a sunset kind of man.

♦

Sublime Rose

Payton Schwiebert

Rim to River

Ryan Trumm

My headlamp’s illumination was steady, fixated on my small stove as the water began to boil. I’ve been staring with anticipation for a couple of minutes now. I quickly poured it into two bowls filled with instant oatmeal, shoving one into Westen’s face as he stared off in fatigued oblivion, eyes still filled with sleep.

“Here,” I grumbled, as I grabbed a spoon and shoveled the other bowl’s contents into my gullet.

I was cold, and the wind was brutal, but the pre-dawn sky boasted the remnants of the Milky Way Galaxy as we stood on the southern rim of the Grand Canyon. What seemed to be a billion stars twinkled as they dotted the endless black backdrop. Down the center was the smeared white streak of the galaxy’s thoughtful collection of dust and gases, attempting to provide a sliver of reveal into the secrets of the cosmos.

Although the Grand Canyon has been inhabited for over 12,000 years – dating back to prehistoric times during the Ice Age – its “first sighting” wasn’t until the year 1540, by the Spanish conquistador Francisco Coronado, while on exploration of what’s now America’s Southwest. Coronado’s crew landed in what is now northern Mexico and pushed north into Arizona. There, he merely glimpsed at the spectacle that is the Grand and proceeded to push east until he reached the prairies of Kansas.

As Coronado came from the South, Weston and I came from the north. Weston was enlisted to help me move from Montana back to Iowa; we were just taking a drawn-out scenic route and a sprinkled-in adventure or two. Arrival at the Grand was where we would theoretically meet Coronado and his crew. From there, we would trace their route northeast. Going through the desolate flats of New Mexico and northern Texas and up through the wind-swept prairies of Oklahoma and Kansas.

We had a little under twenty-four hours in the area, and we wanted to experience the Grand for everything it had to offer. Unlike Coronado and his group, we wanted to plunge headfirst into the canyon, going from rim to river and back to rim. This, we decided, would fulfill us with the Grand’s entire ecosystem that we could squeeze in within a handful of hours. The start would take us from old growth Ponderosa pines, descend the sandstone walls, to the desert floor filled with cacti and the raging Colorado River.

We had been on the road four days at this point, each night providing a fitful night of sleeping in the cold desert of early spring. But now we finally

Cedar Valley Divide

plodded along the dimly lit and lonely asphalt parking lot to the rim’s edge— a black hole.

“Extremely Strenuous” read the National Park sign. It had a cartoon of a man on all fours as he was projectile vomiting. As I shivered, I read the warning about the intensity of the heat: “120 degrees Fahrenheit.” Unfortunately, it was 100 degrees cooler.

Our timing was planned with anticipation of watching the sunrise as we made descent to the river. Halfway down, hues of orange and red began to blossom on the horizon of the canyon’s rim. In the canyon, the light left a defined line, between the dark of night and the glow of day as it crept down the walls surrounding us. Each passing moment the line fell a smidge closer to the canyon floor.

As the new day began, the canyon came to life, exposing the cemented walls of sandstone that date clear back to the Paleozoic period. Desert-hardened plants such as yuccas, agave, and prickly pear cactus now speckled in contrast to the orange walls. The light exposed the herds of grazing mule deer, no longer lingering in the darkness of morning. Canyon wrens began singing their songs, giving thanks to the morning, as the jack-rabbits and mice darted for the nearest tamarisk bush, eager to avoid detection from the two humans hurling themselves down the trail.

Westen—a legend in his own right—was off his game and eventually fell behind a few hundred feet, but I was more than happy to soak in the morning glory by myself. Though, I wished for everything to be sipping on a warm cup of coffee, with my feet kicked up as I took in the view. I suppose the Cliff Bar coupled with the quad-smashing descent did the trick.

The descent continued as I tried to stay present with the surrounding arrival of day, but our tight schedule to get back to Iowa meant that we had to be in Albuquerque that night. The thoughts loomed as we began to pick up the pace.

After descending nearly 3,000 vertical feet, we rolled into Havasupai Garden—a little oasis of cottonwoods and tamarisks, with a small creek flowing through, the same source that provided the natives with water for thousands of years—we dumped our packs for a quick break. We tried to remain ignorant of the giant wall of sandstone we just came down, knowing we’d have to ascend in a few hours. It was a challenge, the wall literally surrounded us, laughing at our fatigue, as we were trying to shake the 1,700 highway miles out of our legs.

We trudged on.

The wind hammered us as we left the shelter of the canyon’s corridor. We felt fortunate to experience that kind of raw power—it’s unpredictable at

best, loud and boisterous, free from blockades built by man and able to roam freely amongst its wild environment. You cannot see it coming, only where it’s been, the path of destruction it leaves—grass keeled over, leaves shaken loose, and the sway of standing old growth. The howl is capable of drowning out the loudest of cries. And the intensity is a constant threat of knocking your balance with every step. An element of grace and beauty but mad and destructive all in the same.

The little talking we had was now mute, with our hoods up, the only sound was of slapping nylon. The trail was smooth now, flowing gently over rollers peppered with sage and cacti. With full sunshine, we were provided a full panoramic view of the canyon walls surrounding us: north, east, south, and west. Westen pointed out a lone hiker far to the north. It was a realistic scale showing just how tiny we are amongst nature. The insignificance felt was unfathomable.

Plateau Point—end of the trail—arrived and we both devoured another Cliff Bar and thirstily glugged from our bottles. We opted for a sit to soak in the majestic beauty of the landscape and our halfway accomplishment. Silently, we agreed to give dozens of yards of space for each other, enough to provide adequate introspection.

On Plateau Point the Colorado River came into view. The river raged ferociously, battling the wind for the loudest roar. The two elements were caught in a battle that neither was willing to give up, resulting in a deafening peace. The emerald-colored water flowed from the Rocky Mountains in Colorado and Wyoming, and the Wasatch and Unita in Utah, to be funneled to this central location, through the canyon with such intensity. The same intensity that has been going for millions of years to carve out the Grand Canyon which we stood in.

The soft sandstone surface was no match for the Colorado as it laid the initial blueprint for the canyon, oh -so-long-ago, with the other elements following suit; wind, rain, drastic temperature ranges, and chemical erosions ate away slowly at the walls. A complex, drawn-out curation of these destructive natural properties is what gave the Grand its width. During this process the Colorado was busy digging the canyon deeper and deeper. No, the soft sandstone had no chance against the harsh elements the desert of the Southwest provides.

I stared hypnotized as the river moved through. Boat-swallowing rapids and waves gave proof of the “no mercy” rules that only Mother Nature can get away with.

The deafening roar of wind and water became soothing as I basked in the sunshine, paralyzed from the spectacle that I lay witness to. I wanted

Cedar Valley Divide to stay. Forget about where I was going, where I came from. Forget what I wanted, who I was. In that moment, all I wanted was to melt into the warm sandstone and flow with the roar of the clashing elements.

Westen nudged me with his foot, robbing me of the blissful haze I fell into. I checked my watch, grabbed my pack and made way back to the edge of the world. ♦

Honey

Emily Kelly

Dictation from Noise

Mackie Garrett

Dictation from Noise #14

Plug in, tune up, trance out, drop in, turn off, (standby, standby, filament glow, a hum is not silence).

& there’s tumble through a smudged porthole: know the shirts you’ve sweat through, recognize their spiral toward the next dot in cycle:

sensing, washing, rinsing, washing, washing, sensing, sensing like an eye.

Turn down, plug out, trance up, drop in (if you must), (standby, standby, standby, start walking), once you’ve found your ride

won’t start, again, standby, tune up or trance out, pay out, filament hum, a humming silence glows.

Dictation from Noise #15

Mystery ax, the one that sounds like none you’d noticed before you nearly fell for Telecaster cranked through your brother’s loaner, after you could fret that warped neck Papa brought home from Hong Kong, his last tour, dreaming of Mama’s fingertips, calloused & sure of a song she never got around to learning.

Dictation from Noise #18

A begging refrain, gradual rise from deep resonance, need to echoed question: “Spare change?” & a sun-bleached sign: “Anything helps.”

Here’s one who waits for pass by, wishing, wanting, broke & waiting in place, sure to be seen in awning shadow moving toward an automatic bank door, waiting, slower

than promised compensation, pay off for waiting, broke, open-handed,

within ear shot of those waiting to rack up & go broke in money’s cool, clean lobby, waiting & wanting, they give a dull eye to what was demanded.

Gravy Basket

Avery Clark

Blue Cotton Timothy Stammeyer

The kitchen was already burning by the time he came down the stairs. In the reddening room, she stood facing the wall, a towel fiery on the burner. A swatch of her shirt started to fizzle and flame. From the landing, he screamed at her to get out of there. Can’t you see the fire? The walls are melting. You’re going to melt. His frenzy became a sort of hum to her, something like the buzzing of bees. She thought of busy bugs, how they danced across the yellow flowers that embroidered her childhood home, how her son would have loved to smell them in the spring. Jesus, get out! Her mind wandered to wildflowers, ones she nicknamed with her mother— sunskirts and purple dancers. The sky was so lovely then, the birds drifting lazily over the lake, their blue feathers falling to the ground. Unlike her mother, she’d never know sticky toddler kisses or the squeeze of little hands. Listen to me! She glanced at the engulfed cupboards, making a grocery list in her mind. Do we have enough grapes to last the week? Enough sugar for the cookies? As he screamed wildly, she looked to the far wall, noticing a hole left by a feeble nail. We should fix that, right? Maybe there’s some putty in the garage. Straddling flames, the man stepped to her, arms outstretched to balance his body. It’s then she turned to him, a blue cotton swaddle taut in her blushing fingers. He extended his hand to her, yelling more intently, pleading with her to come, to let go of the shirt or they both would die. But she wouldn’t come, carefully lowering herself to the sizzling tile. He pleaded all the more, making promises he could never keep. It’s then the side door breezed open, shooting a fiery tunnel into the room. Desperate, he ran from the house, gasping and dizzy, the dim call of sirens echoing over the hill.

High All Day

Todd Case

When he’d bought the first bag in Moline, Blake intended to be judicious with the dope, only smoke a few times a week, after the kids had gone to bed. He’d done well at first, amazed not only his wife, Martha, but himself, too. It was nice exercising a little restraint now and again, just to prove he could do it. But now, a month and a half later, he’d smoked his way through nearly an ounce. He would wake up to the alarm, and before he’d even opened his eyes he was seeing a match put to the glass pipe. He’d bring his finger and thumb to his nose, and wake to the smell of it on his hand. It smelled to him like baked bread or some sweet fruit of which he could only guess the name.

Why was it so hard to be straight, Blake vaguely wondered as he fired up the bowl out in the garage. Martha didn’t want it around the girls, so he kept a stash in a wooden box with an Indian on it that his half-sister had sent him from New Mexico. He put a match to the bowl and the leaf cracked and glowed, the rich smoke slamming into Blake’s lungs. The wooden rafters, the oil stains on the cracked concrete floor and the curious smell of tools reminded Blake of his father. It took away Blake’s appetite to think about the old man that way, to remember him walking into the old farmhouse at dusk with manure on his overshoes and the jingle of the metal clasps as he kicked them off, heel to toe, when the evening chores were done.

The house on Linn Street, where Blake and Martha and the two girls lived, was a rental. He was sick of giving his money to a landlord, over eighteen thousand dollars a year. All that money had come from the three jobs he and Martha worked between them. Didn’t that entitle them to own something? Everything he touched had been touched by someone else first. It wasn’t like the farm when he was a boy, the way you opened a pod and touched the pea and put it in your mouth. Be happy with what you have, Martha reminded him. She was tired of the griping. The girls have a right to their own dreams.

Blake could hear Sara coming up from her nap. She was hungry, and crabby, wanting to be held. Bake put fire to the bowl a second time. Bless us oh Lord and these thy gifts: that was the evening prayer, recited by his father at the supper table after he’d shed his coveralls on the back porch and hung them on a nail. At the sink, in the small room off the kitchen, his father washed his hands each night carefully, tediously, thoroughly, working the

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soap lather into the deep creases in the heels of his palms, into the cuts and cracks in his skin.

Blake wanted to move to Solon or to a big house in the country outside of Oxford, or south, near Sharon Center. He was thirty-nine, and he didn’t want to think about how his life would be in the future. It seemed to him the future had arrived years ago and he’d decided to stay behind.

He had found his father in the corncrib lying on the concrete slab next to the John Deere 4020. At eleven years old, Blake somehow knew enough not to be frightened. He stood there at the edge of a fallow cornfield, the harsh smell of silage in the air on an unusually warm day in early November. He listened but heard nothing: not the barking of the two farm dogs, Mutt and Jeff; not the cawing of the crows sitting in the cottonwoods along old man’s creek; not the sighing of the century-old outbuildings or the flapping of the shirts, his father’s shirts, on the clothesline, fresh, clean lightblue, cotton work shirts flapping in the breeze.

Now, remembering that day again, his father’s foot twisted at an impossible angle next to the tractor, it was like looking at the art in the university museum Martha had dragged him and the kids to see last spring. None of it made any sense, as though the slot in his mind where he was supposed to put that information hadn’t been invented yet. For weeks after the funeral, Blake didn’t say a word to anyone. It wasn’t until a month or so later, out in the machine shed and completely unexpected, that he broke down and cried, and for a long time after that he’d felt good for absolutely nothing.

Sara was crying for a cracker, and he envisioned Emily, her older sister, attending to her. Blake heard Martha call his name. He could smell the tuna and onion casserole she’d fixed for dinner. He’d have to head back to the hardware store after the kids were down for the night to finish counting inventory and stocking the shelves.

He put the dope and the paraphernalia in the wooden box and the lid on top. He had been high all day. He climbed the six foot step ladder and tucked the box on top of the rafters. When he opened the door and walked out of the garage, the leaves kicked up and lifted in the breeze, and it sounded to Blake like running water.

Milkweed in the Morning Frost

Jeffrey Sigmund

An Apology to Winter

Lauren Smith

The first snowfall I can remember, I had been peering through the crack in my curtains, my big, round eyes beaming at the wisps of falling snow. At the time, a blizzard to me was like a new piece of white printing paper: awaiting the bottom of my snow boots and my little gloved hands to color it anew, just as I would have with my snubbed crayons.

I had spent my childhood winter years waiting eagerly at the side of my window in hopes that I would catch a glimpse of just a snowflake or two, and then, maybe a couple hundred thousand more, until a fresh piece of white paper revealed itself for me once more. And then after the harsh winds would clear and the snow wisps had stopped falling, I would beg my parents to let me draw my masterpiece. Only after I had put on an impossible layering of snow pants, coats, and gloves, had I been allowed to ruin a perfectly good piece of paper with the dirty bottoms of my black insulated boots.

The winter, back then, had been nothing short of a wonderful, magical time for me. In early December, I’d wake up early in the morning and, with bated breath, listen for the familiar ring of the landline phone for a call from my school. And when those miraculous days came, I’d spent the day drinking hot cocoa and playing in the snow until I couldn’t feel my face anymore. I would lay coddled inside the warmth of my blanket and admire the way the icicles hung from the roof like winter’s natural holiday lights. And when it came time for lights out, I’d dream of what toys I’d find under the tree in just a few weeks’ time.

When I was a little bit older, maybe about eight or ten years old or so, my grandma would take me to see the holiday lights in the rich neighborhoods across town, the ones with two or three stories and the largest back and front yards I’d ever seen. I’d squint through the frozen glass window of my grandma’s old Mazda and try to catch a clear picture of the sparkling lights on the roofs and blown-up holiday inflatables before my breath could fog up the window. Seeing the different decorations and lights had been one of the best parts of the holiday season for me, and I remember thinking that I would never get tired of it.

When I was a child, the winter had filled me with such a warmth, that even the sloshing of wet snow in my boots—or the sensation of my skin, flushed and cold to the touch—could not have prevented this sort of feeling. This feeling, to me, had floated above any sort of tangible human affliction that I could possibly have. Neither a cough nor a runny nose could have

stopped me from playing in the snow or ruined the way I had looked upon the world in winter with a sense of whimsical wonder.

But things started to change when I turned thirteen years old. It had been during an already awkward period in my life, and I remember waking up early in the morning, just a few hours before school. I spotted something white in the corner of my eye and pulled the curtains away from the window to reveal the trees and grass had been wrapped like a gift in wintry blue, once more awaiting my touch. Yet, instead, I yanked the curtain shut, and the hands of the early morning light drowned in the fabric of my blackout curtains instead of reaching towards the cavity in my heart. I opted for an extra hour of sleep instead. After all, I didn’t want to get my hands cold.

When I woke an hour later, I pulled back the curtains again with an expectation of that warm, wonderful feeling I had felt last year when I spotted the first early winter snowfall. But, instead, I looked upon the sheet of ice upon my neighbor’s freshly shoveled driveway and shivered.

This new empty feeling didn’t go away. The rest of the school year I spent wintertime cringing at the feeling of cold, wet sheets of snow sloshing in my ratty old Nike shoes. School bus rides had once been a jolly sightseeing time for me, but all I could think about then was the brown sludge that pooled under my feet and the various bus seats. And when I would finally get off the bus, I would slip and slide on the ice until I had scampered back home with an ugly purple bruise forming on my back or other various places. And then I’d do it all over again the next day.

Winter had begun to feel less like a warm, comforting feeling and more like a sickly cold. I was not sure what had changed: was it me or the world? Maybe it was because my parents stopped putting the holiday lights up on the roof or maybe that I was no longer allowed to put on my snow pants to play in the winter snow during recess. My classrooms became less decorated during the holidays, holiday activities and parties replaced with homework on dividing fractions and writing essays about civil unrest or tragedies. Maybe it was the world that changed? I thought so, but when I looked around me and saw all my classmates enjoying the holidays just as much as last year, I felt as if I was the only one who had changed, who felt cold.

The winter only seemed to get colder.

When I was fifteen, I was sure that there had been a winter colder than this one. Certainly, there have been times when I awoke to at least eight inches of snow and a freeze warning. Surely I had spent more time outside shoveling the driveway and slipping on ice than I had this year. Even so, I had

Cedar Valley Divide never felt more cold.

That year, I woke up early on Christmas morning with no idea of what day it was. And when I turned on my phone to see the date, I waited for that familiar tingling, full-body excitement to fill my body. Instead, I lay in bed and stared at the ceiling, only able to remember a time where I’d jump out of my bed at 8 a.m. and wake my parents up so I could open presents. That feeling never came, but the coldness did.

I used to be unable to sleep the night before Christmas. I had, at one point, felt excitement and holiday joy burning through my veins in a way that could not be unkindled by one bad winter day, and now what? I couldn’t feel anything but numb and cold, and I felt awful for it. Where had the warmth gone? I was so cold. I didn’t care about presents, or family, or Santa. I didn’t care about watching the holiday lights or playing in the snow. And even when I curled up into a ball at night wrapped in my blanket, I was still cold.

At seventeen, I hated the wintertime for a different reason. I’d peer just outside that crack in my window and take one look at the snowy winterland just beyond with a sense of dread. Now, the wintertime came with a new set of problems—starting with the car keys hanging on the knob next to the back door. I’d have to leave the house at least ten minutes earlier than I usually had to, driving ten miles under the speed limit to avoid my car crashing into the curb or one of the lampposts. And on my way to school, or wherever I was going, I’d pass by at least two or three abandoned cars on the side of the road.

Driving in the winter made me think of all those poems I was forced to read in high school that compare the seasons to the cycles of life, with winter always representing death. And the winter had never sung death to me more than when I would drive my Nissan Rogue down the road and hear the songs of metal banging and clanging and cars honking their horns. And for a while, to me, winter was death.

I’ve now come to the conclusion that comparing winter to death is stupid and boring. Because death is something that is permanent, marking the end and legacy of another being. And winter is anything but permanent— it marks only a change in time. And you cannot have spring without summer, and fall without winter. Summer must end so the leaves can turn orange, and the autumn leaves must go so they can regrow and turn green once more, and so on. But the trees never die, nor do the clouds, but I guess humans tend to only focus on the leaves and the melting snow.

It had not been winter that caused the warmth in my heart to fade. It had been me, unable to cope when that tinted lens of childlike naivety and wonder faded. I refused to put on a new lens and instead blamed the winter

for the cold.

I think we owe an apology to winter. The two things humans tend to fear the most are change and the unknown, and I understand now that our perception of winter is just a projection of that fear. Winter, like all the other seasons, is just a part of the greater cycle. And even though winter has its ugly parts, it’s got some really good parts, too. I think we tend to focus only on the bad parts when we are afraid, as I was. And if you don’t embrace that change as inevitable, you’ll be stuck in a season that never ends.

At nineteen years old, I still do not spend the winter season waking up at 8 a.m. to watch the first snowfall or pulling on my snow pants and boots to play in the snow. I know I am too old to enjoy the things I enjoyed as a child—but I am not too old to enjoy winter. I look for joy in the little parts of winter—sipping hot cocoa in the comfort of my bedroom, wrapping up in a blanket and watching my favorite show. I have found that warmth again, on late night drives with my friends, laughing at the obscene amount of inflatables and lights in someone’s front yard, or pointing out the Christmas trees we find littered around Cedar Rapids in various strange places. Visiting my family, eating lots of good, hearty food, and buying presents for my friends and family and watching their faces brighten when they finally unwrap it—these are all of the parts of the holidays I can enjoy now more than ever.

Sometimes, I still find myself coming home with slush sloshing around in my boots and having to peel off cold, wet socks from bare red skin. I might slip on the ice trying to get back to my car, and I may even pass by one or two abandoned cars on the side of the road, but I just remind myself that spring will come—but not now, and not yet. For now, I will throw my soiled socks in the laundry and take a warm bath and enjoy what winter has in store for me today, the good and the bad.

The Garden I’ve Become

Timothy Stammeyer

The leavened bread is steaming now— Bits of risen dough scattered

Across my sun-clothed kitchen— I am as lovely as this room

Even among the soaking bowls— This mess feels wild and wanting

Waiting for the warm bread to crust— My counter fresh with crumbs

A reminder that something was made here— That something was good

This kitchen is a garden— Coarse flour turning to flowers

Sifted sweetly in their beds— Jiving among the milkweed

This garden is dusted with bumblebees— Look how beautiful I am

In the midst of all that is growing— Lazy leaves and restless vines

Stretching to the warmth of promised sun— Even they know what it means to be cold

When I die, I’ll rest here in the petals— My body feeding the ones who fed me

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In the stillness, you will see my breath— Dripping the dew from the plants

Watch the stems as they sizzle—

Baking in the heat of morning

Skylined

Jesse Schwiebert

Evening Tea

Hannah Schwickerath

Gentle painted porcelain clink into their places, Places marked by an indent in the saucers.

Saucers never misplaced, oh to be a Teacup, Teacups know their place, not only as a gentle carrier, Carriers of delicate handling and missed in death.

Death, split and broken, glistening in the evening sun. Sun never to be seen again, even if death wasn’t their fault. Fault is blamed on the Teacups just for being fragile.

Fragile a word with too many meanings, Meanings are the unsaid rules Teacups must follow. Follow the rules, hold the tea, look good doing it, don’t fall, Fall? For who? You?

You my hostile reason for my quick descent, Descent off the saucer, Saucer on the table, Table next to the floor, Floor where I lay broken, Broken in the evening sun, Sun setting ending this evening tea.

Dark and New Lenore Maybaum

This morning he does not bring her coffee.

Downstairs in the kitchen, later, she sees the oven mitt curled around the kettle’s hot handle, still in the shape of his hand.

For years she had chastised him for this, leaving the oven mitt over the kettle handle, even with the burner off. Once there had been a fire. She reminded him over the years of what was almost lost.

But this morning there is no fire in their quiet kitchen at dawn. Della tilts the kettle to hear the water’s muffled hiss, angry and impotent against the closed spout. No fire, only fizzle, too weak to make the kettle cry. She listens to its fading hiss, aware of her own feeble resignation, all that is left after pity turns to resentment and resentment turns to destruction and destruction turns to a vast and ineffable void of any feeling at all.

But the morning is dark and new. She will not remind him of the fire years ago, and he will not bring her coffee again. She will make her own.

For many years, before she stayed out through the small hours of the morning, before he slept in the guest room, he brought a cup of coffee to her bedside.

“Just this one little thing would help,” Della told him one morning in the kitchen, spent and milk-wet and overwhelmed after another night of around-the-clock nursing. Then, their first son, Jack, was a wild-eyed and spritely two-year old, and their second, Jasper, already a cherubic and shapely nursling at a few weeks old.

She pressed her hand against the small of her husband’s back as he stood over the sink looking out the kitchen window.

“I can do that.” Though expressionless, he was quick to accommodate Della. But he did not look in her direction.

“He’s up all hours. I’m not sleeping. Just a cup of coffee before I start my day would really help me out right now.”

“I know. I’ve heard him. I’m sorry.”

He turned his body away from her and toward the kettle on the stovetop, his broad back blocking her view of the flame. She never knew if the stoop of his shoulders was due to a minor case of scoliosis, or if, perhaps, it was his unconscious way of overcompensating for his 6’ 8” frame. He towered over everyone, especially her. But his bearing seemed to apologize for his height. Out of humility or dejection, she did not know.

The next morning he came to Della’s bedside with her favorite green ceramic mug of black coffee. Before opening her eyes, the rich, earthy smell pierced through her fevered dreams. She opened her eyes, watching the steam rise and swirl as he set the cup down on her bedside table.

“Thank you,” Della whispered over the head of her sleeping newborn. He smiled as he left, happy to make her happy. She wondered if it were so simple. Why couldn’t it be? Why wasn’t this enough?

That day and for many days after, nothing would taste so wonderful as that first cup of coffee that she drank from the warmth of her bed, her heart bursting with love for her baby and with gratitude, if not love, for her husband and his small kindnesses.

Long after those days of infants and all-night feedings, he continued to bring coffee to Della’s bedside. Even after she told him about the affair, for months she would wake to a cup there waiting for her. Many days toward the end it was the only gesture of kindness between them. But every day began in this small gift and acceptance of love, a reminder of commitment and a hope to rekindle what it was that was lost, a little act of faith.

Before the coffee, there was the fire.

Della had returned to teaching only days after giving birth to her first son, Jack. Her husband had been home with the baby, then taken him out while she taught. But as she returned that afternoon, pulling into her driveway, the black acrid smoke pluming from out the kitchen window, she only wondered if the baby was there. She left her keys in the ignition and ran.

Inside John had left a glass plate of naan bread sitting on top of a blue burning gas flame. Heart pounding, Della shut off the gas and grabbed a tea towel from the counter, swept up the plate of charred bread, and carried it out onto the sidewalk, far from the house.

It was a cool September that year, and as the plate of smoldering bread met cold concrete, it cracked at once, perfectly down the center. She should not have left the baby so soon. She should not have left the baby with John.

Over the years Della had reminded him not to leave the oven mitt wrapped around the hot kettle handle. She feared fires and destruction. But this morning she feels only the sense of him moving alone in their dark house, drinking his coffee in silence.

Alice Blackbriar

Contributor Notes

Alice Blackbriar is a Kirkwood student and photographer from Iowa City. Her works featured in this magazine include: A Corner Forgotten by the Show, The Art of Plating, and It’s A Real Exit, I Swear. She comes from a heavily multicultural background and espouses counter-cultural sentiments. As an artist, she is drawn to capturing ordinary and commonly disregarded moments and presenting them through a unique perspective. Like in the case of The Art of Plating, she captured culinary art students working: “I was moved by the sheer dedication I witnessed to perfecting their craft and wanted to highlight the beauty of it. Plating food is an art that most often goes unremarked on and underappreciated, particularly in commercial settings by the consumer.” A Corner Forgotten by the Show was taken while Blackbriar was photographing a local metal show: “I had just happened to notice that in the corner of the stage, an amp and guitar were stowed amidst an assortment of equipment. It stood out to me in a moment of stark contrast between the action in the middle of the stage and everything quietly shoved in a corner.” She also captured a “foreboding atmosphere” in It’s A Real Exit I Swear after coming home to her apartment one night and finding the corridor lights off.

Ollie Black is a cherished and valued member of our editorial staff and author of “Strange Desire.” They enjoy cooking, reading, writing, gardening, and hiking. They share, “I have a big dog and a daughter. I do not dream of labor :)” On writing “Strange Desire,” they say, “I probably think about middle school too much.”

Todd Case, author of “High All Day,” is a real estate broker in Iowa City and an avid reader of fiction.

Haley Church is the artist of the mixed-media piece The Gaze of Uncertainty. She is a first-generation college student at Kirkwood, majoring in art in hopes to one day become a tattoo artist. The Gaze of Uncertainty was inspired by Church’s senior year of high school when she wrestled with the decision of going to college. “I included a lot of symbolism. The holes represent me not being solidly set on my future. The girl represents me, and the hand lifting the chin, guiding me, is my mom, who encouraged me to attend college. The candles and roadway signs represent time and uncertainty…it was made layering tissue paper, wallpaper, acrylic paint, colored pencils, and pen.”

Avery Clark is the artist behind the piece Gravy Basket. He is often inspired by his favorite shows and books. As he states: “This piece was obviously inspired by Blackbeard from Our Flag Means Death, my favorite show ever. I drew it in clip studio paint with mostly a chalk brush because I needed to stay busy waiting for the next few episodes of season two.”

Laura Felleman is the author of “In Answer to Your Accusation, No I Do Not Think the World Revolves around Me.” She is currently a financial analyst at the University of Iowa but previously worked as a pastor and then a seminary professor. Her poetry recently appeared in Literary Forest Magazine, Feral Journal, and Skyway Journal. She is also the author of a chapbook titled The Length of a Clenched Fist. To give back to the writing community, she organizes a writers open mic at the public library and serves on the advisory council of Iowa City Poetry. On her poem featured in this issue, she says, “The form of the poem was inspired by the poet CAConrad. The content is a metaphor about privilege.”

Mackie Garrett is the poet behind “Dictation from Noise.” He is an English as a Second Language teacher based in Iowa City. He is also a poet and artist, and designs and letterpress prints zines, chapbooks, greeting cards, and posters as 508 Press. In addition to reading, printing, and writing, he enjoys playing music, taking photographs, hanging with family and friends, and sending mail. On “Dictation from Noise,” he says, “These poems are part of a sequence that I have been working on for a few years. I compose the early drafts on a typewriter and read them with experimental musical accompaniment.”

Kayla Hawkins, the poet behind “Cathedral,” shares, “I’m a nature lover who equally loves getting existential about the inevitable heat death of the universe. I’m working on a poetry collection that will be published approximately never.” On “Cathedral,” they add, “This piece specifically was inspired by surreal films like Where the Wild Things Are and Beasts of the Southern Wild. I think childhood isolation is an interesting theme. Childhood is one big liminal space, with us not at the heart but in the belly of it.”

Emily Kelly is the ceramicist behind Honey and Vase 1 and 2. She graduated from Kirkwood this past December and has since transferred to the University of Iowa to major in psychology and minor in art. Both pieces featured here are inspired by Greek pottery, in conjunction with glaze experimentation. In Honey, she finds: “the glaze reminds me of a honey color

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with a nice depth. There are sections of this piece where a light blue color shines through which is not commonly seen in this glaze. I think this piece is a testament to how variable the art of ceramics can be.” About Vase 1 and 2 she shares, “Throughout my time at Kirkwood, I’ve done different variations on this glazing technique with a white glaze layered over a black glaze. This results in a beautiful green color in the space where the glazes are layered. I enjoy how these vases are different in their size and shape, but are the same in their glazing which creates a nice duality between the two works.”

Dr. Lenore D. Maybaum is the author of “Dark and New” and the photographer of Brothers. She is a writer and former professor of English living in Iowa City. Of “Dark and New,” she says, “I wrote this at the outset of my divorce, a time when the slightest change in routine suggested a seismic shift in the life of my family moving forward.” Brothers “captures the magic” of her sons’ curiosity and joy while also illustrating the positive relationship between neighbor children, and their mothers: “During a particularly idyllic time in my life, my neighbor and I were both stay-at-home mothers during summer months. My neighbor, the mother of three girls, and I, the mother of four sons…regularly relied on one another for childcare or a cup of sugar or an egg.”

Kallany Mendes is the author of “To Get Old.” She says the piece was an observation of those in her life whom she cares deeply about, and she would like to share their story. “I first wrote this essay in Portuguese, my native language. The memories that I tell happened in Brazil, in a small city where I’ve visited my extended family since childhood.” In regards to her writing, she says, “I will always see the world through the lens of literature. I read and write to understand myself and everything else around me. This is how I’ve been living, and this is how I will live for the rest of my life.”

Andria Pic, photographer behind Destination Unknown and In Bloom, is a Kirkwood graduate. She earned an associates degree in health information technology and enjoys photography, particularly landscape and nature, in her free time. “My passion for photography was ignited when I enrolled in a photography class as an elective in high school.” On Destination Unknown, she says, “I shot this photograph while on vacation at Colorado National Monument. I was fascinated by the mystery of where this road led.” About In Bloom she shares, “I’ve recently expanded my hobbies to include gardening. This year I planted several varieties of lilies, and this is a photograph of one of them in bloom.”

Hannah Schwickerath, writer of “Magic Moment” and “Evening Tea,” is an agricultural business major who has always loved writing: “I started writing when my mom told me it is the best way to talk about feelings and emotions. She is the best storyteller and can change a room with just one story.” “Magic Moment” is about how “some moments aren’t always what they seem…every place in the world comes with some very special moments.” In regards to her other poem, she says, “‘Evening Tea’ is about the feeling that comes over you when society has set plans for you that they think will lead to your best chance of success when, in truth, following the rules of society too closely can lead to a fulfilling and early end.”

Jesse Schwiebert, another wonderful member of our editing staff, is the photographer behind Skylined. The photo was captured quickly at Disney World, putting Schwiebert a little behind in the line of people waiting for the very skyline he was photographing, a “now or never” situation, but it was worth it. “Right time and place,” as he says. He has been learning how to multitask in his photography practice: functionally moving in the present, but stopping to grab snippets of beauty that last far beyond that moment. He also recently published a book with his brother, Payton Schwiebert, titled City Kids Don’t Look Down, which is a collection of stories from the life of their grandfather.

Payton Schwiebert, artist of the painting Sublime Rose, graduated from Kirkwood in 2022 with an associate of arts degree. He went on to receive a bachelors of art degree from the University of Northern Iowa. Now based in Mount Vernon, IA, his current work is inspired by personal identity: “As a member of the LGBTQ community, most of my recent drawings illustrate how it feels to be considered undesirable among the majority. My work expresses life as your true self by bringing these feelings to light.” On Sublime Rose, he shares, “This painting is a study of sublime realism, rendered in oil from an original photo I took of a rose from my mother’s garden. This painting is on gessoed artist paper to give it a smoother look.”

Jeffrey Sigmund is the photographer behind Milkweed in the Morning Frost. He has been photographing “on and off” for 30 years. He is inspired by wildlife photographer Jim Brandenberg, documentary photographer Danny Wilcox Frazier, and his wife Deb. Of this particular piece he says, “The way the morning sunrise was hitting some trees, I grabbed my camera and went to see what I could capture and came across this seedpod with the sun lighting it up.”

Lauren Smith, author of “Apology to Winter,” is a freshman at Kirkwood. After receiving her associates degree, she plans on transferring to the University of Iowa and continue studying computer science. She has been writing short stories and non-fiction since she was about nine or ten years old. On “Apology to Winter,” she says, “I was driving down a neighborhood in Ely with one of my friends when we came across a neighborhood just full of holiday lights… I remember thinking, ‘When was the last time I actually looked at the holiday lights like this?’ I couldn’t tell if I had really not seen any lights in years, or if I just hadn’t noticed them. I guess this story was my answer to that question.”

Timothy Stammeyer is the author of “Blue Cotton,” “Eulogy to the Printmaker,” and “The Garden I’ve Become.” Hailing from Iowa City, he is a writer “for the page and the stage.” He wrote “Blue Cotton” “as a way to explore grief and the limits of human understanding,” and “to craft a story that communicates not just through what is said but also through what is left unsaid.” “Eulogy to the Printmaker” is a piece about Stammeyer’s uncle Jon: “one of my most influential mentors…He was a man larger-than-life. I learned so much from his outlook on life and illness. He left a beautiful legacy and was well loved by our family and our community.” In “The Garden I’ve Become,” he explores “the intersection between nature, baking, and people.” Baking and gardening are grounding for him. As he states, “There is something special and spiritual about being among the flowers and creating food for friends to share.”

Max Studier, ceramicist behind Teapot, is a liberal arts student at Kirkwood. He has been making pottery for a couple of years and has taken three ceramic courses at Kirkwood so far. He says, “I am inspired by a lot of the people around me including classmates, my professor and even some people in my personal life. One of the nice things about pottery is the community aspect and the ability to bounce ideas around with other people.” This piece was his first attempt at a teapot, but it was one of many: “Making a teapot is one of the more difficult things you can do in pottery so it was for sure a goal for me to make one.” He says this particular teapot has Japanese influence. “Almost all components were thrown on the wheel. It was then put through a woodfire for its final firing. The handle was put on last and is just a bamboo handle.”

Ryan Trumm, author of “Rim to River,” is a self-described curator of adventure, preferring adventure that is “human-powered.” His inspiration behind his work, as well as general thoughts and lifestyle, is pulled from his experiences in nature and wild landscapes. On his piece, “Rim to River,” he says, “This micro-adventure was three years ago and still plays in mind in crystal-clear detail. When I was doing an outline, I found myself wanting to find and share a little trivia on the canyon.”

Ella Wade, the artist of Happy Birthday, was inspired by how she felt about turning 20 years old. On her work, she says, “I’ve always had an interest in art and am currently majoring in art. I currently have a little business at The Rural Canvas where I sell my art at farmers markets and other craft shows. Art pretty much consumes my whole life, and my parents have always inspired me in what I do.”

Brooklyn Viall is the artist of Crystalline Hour. She is majoring in graphic design, and finds it important for herself to “practice traditional applications that can also be rendered through the advancing digital realm.” On her piece Crystalline Hour, she says, “This is a multimedia drawing that is inspired by time, and how time creeps upon us. Eventually the crystal half would consume the entirety of the display, symbolizing that its beauty and shape will be preserved. Many have the perception that beauty tapers as you grow older, but in reality, it’s always within us.