Clamor 2024

CLAMOR UWB LITERARY & ARTS JOURNAL 2024

Clamor is the annual literary and arts journal of the University of Washington Bothell.

Copyright 2024 Clamor. All rights revert to authors and artists after publication.

The views expressed herein do not necessarily reect those of Clamor sta or of the University of Washington Bothell.

Clamor 2024 Editorial Board

Aisha Monet Al-Amin Mae Ellen Abu-Alya Natalie Alvis Naelia Carlile Mindy Chen Christopher Eastman Ousman Fatty Michael Gumayan

Reiha Ishijima Isaiah Kim Amaziah Martin Liyah Murry Kenny Phan Max Poklonskki Priya Rasal Jay Reyes

Bryan Saldana Andrew San Miguel Roswell Sass Ashley Shim Henry Strayer Jackie Susanto Vicki Thanhvy Tran David Vazquez

Faculty Advisor: Dr. Ching-In Chen Cover Image: Jerey Aler “The Gazing City (VII)” Cover Design Layout: Natalie Alvis & Naelia Carlile Mailing address: Clamor: UWB Literary and Arts Journal University of Washington Bothell Box 358651 18115 Campus Way NE Bothell, WA 98011 Email: clamor@uw.edu Website: http://clamor-journal.com Printed by Consolidated Press, 600 South Spokane Street, Seattle, WA 98134 We acknowledge the generous support of the Services and Activities Fee Committee, the Oce of Student Engagement and Activities, and Club Council at the University of Washington Bothell.

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Table of Contents Letter from the Editors

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Creative Writing

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Mae Ellen Abu-Alya ghost tape #10

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Aisha Monet Al-Amin Germination

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Elaf Al-Turfy My Sorrowful Heart Which I Have Named Layla

14

Noor Alnaaz Islam By the Coromandel Indian Sonnet

15

Elisa Balabram Absence, Presence, Abscence

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Belle Brandenfels Listen

21

Naelia Carlile From Shadows to Self

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Sarah Daly Portrait

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Tessa Denton I’m Not Locked Let Me Kiss

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Brennan Emerson Seasonal Resonance

27

Morgan Fu-Mueller honey

28

Phillip Gruenemay Lament the Fields

29

John Grey An Abandoned Country Graveyard The Chill Wind

30

Karianne Hornberger Dispossession Longing

32

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Akira Junyaprasert Somewhere, Sometime

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phoenix kai egg

35

Lindsey Keefer Catalytic Converter

36

Atlas Kairos Echoes and Reections

37

Nya Simone Maddox the cycle

40

Manuna Mady It wasn’t a dream

41

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Abigail Mandlin Fowl Creatures Joan McBride Nine Views of the Outer Gardens Searching Through Your Purse

43

Denise Calvetti Michaels I Remember Writing Sometimes We Forget Our Mother

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Alec Mullen-DeLand a windy day in spring

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Zach Kaeli’i Murphy The Mallards of St. Catherine

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Annie Nguyen Origami Paper Stars Youth and Dreams

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51 52

Joseph Niduaza Spaghetti: A Reverse Chronology

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Rose Rickey Bruises in Bloom

57

Elizabeth Salinas a sleeping beauty

59

Vanessa Sanders How Black Folk Eat

61

Terry Sanville Distractions

62

Michelle Schaefer The Evening of Our Discontent

68

Elijah B. Shaw Weaving of Memories, with a Line Borrowed from Fruits Basket 69 Yekyum Ashley Shim If Earth is a Mother, You are Not Her Child

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Henry Strayer Chimes

71

John Tavares Lady of the Lake

74

Cora Thomas Morels at Baker Lake

82

Kit Thompson A Letter From My Service Dog

85

Mia Isabella Trajano My Knight in Shining Armor

89

Ava Wahl Entanglement

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Celina Yu cigarette-kissed It’s the Thin Veil of White

93 94

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J. Yuen a pearl

95

Liyah Murry A Speculative Walk to Idun

97

Visual Art

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Natalie Alvis UNRAVELING I UNRAVELING II (ft. Ezra Jacob Bantum)

100

Jerey Aler The Gazing City (VII)

102

Cornell C.G. Space needle

103

Mindy Chen ME YOU

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Saskia Gottuso An Anticipated Breakthrough

106

Reiha & Sarah Ishijima Oni

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phoenix kai The Tool to Make a Brain

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Basil Mayhan Sphinx Eyes

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Alec Mullen-DeLand Urban Jungle Liyah Murry Lucas Collymore (ft. Niyah Murray) Mountain Drive-By

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111 112

Hong Nguyen Light

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Ashley Ziba Taherazer Philip Island Seagulls

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Marzeyah Topiwala Nature’s Mirror

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Mia Isabella Trajano Billiard Baddie Sinuous Sonder Son Vicki Tran replication

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Contributor Biographies

120

Online Exclusives

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A Word From Our Editors To readers new and returning, Welcome to the 18th edition of Clamor. This journal continues to provide a place to share and celebrate the artistic talents of our students and community members.

We at Clamor hope that this edition encourages its readers to reect and explore the world around us while fostering self-expression and the freedom of creative thought. Across all mediums, art is profoundly linked with how we interpret and perceive the world and has the power to shape our sense of community and self.

The submissions that Clamor’s editorial board reviewed this year were introspective, surreal, and at times, heartbreaking. They were capable of delving into the foundations of the human soul, to either tear it apart or restore it anew. The contributors this year have blown us away with the depths of their talent. We are proud to bring these works to light and thankful that the contributors were willing to share their art with the community.

A pen cannot be put to paper without a hand to guide it; in the same vein, Clamor thrives from the support of its editors, contributors, and readers. We would like to oer a special thanks to Clamor’s faculty advisor, Dr. Ching-In Chen, and Student Engagement & Activities assistant director, Pauline Tolentino.

Finally, we thank each and every one of you for an amazing 18 years of Clamor.

Sincerely, The Clamor Editors

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ghost tape #10 Mae Ellen Abu-Alya

may 4 1970 at 12:23 pm college kids so wide-eyed and hopeful and full of bright futures and the naivete of youth made signs with slogans like “war erodes the ‘great society’” and stood on their campuses and protested a war that was already lost and dragging its emaciated body around thick jungle sometimes on re sometimes crying out like operation wandering ghost and never admitting defeat because that’s not the american way hoo-rah even when their soldiers came back to hatred for the crimes committed under order of the american government sometimes coming home with eyes a dierent color or livers exponentially expanding because that same government let them breathe in enough dioxin to rearrange their dna and their babies and babies’s babies would still be born with dioxin eyes and when the average soldier in world war ii in the south pacic saw 40 days of combat in four years and the average soldier in vietnam saw 240 days in one and they were younger and hated and driven driven driven down to the bone till they were ground up and gone and blown away and no one even cared not the government not the people but at 12:24 pm those kids cared and they laughed when the national guard raised their guns because what are they gonna do, shoot us and in thirteen seconds four naive hopeful children were dead and when the world found out they asked why why why did you kill our babies and the ohio national guard lied and said the protestors were throwing rocks and they lied and said protestors were armed and they lied and said they were afraid for their lives but maybe they told the truth when they said they believed they were given the order to shoot or someone else shot so they shot too and the average age of soldiers killed in world war ii is 26 vietnam it’s 23 and kent state it’s 19.

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Germination Aisha Monet Al-Amin

Everyone is a servant to something: love, tradition, little spoons, expectations, glass jars, a yellow moon, an old boyfriend, bees.

I will not name my God, it is obvious enough. Me being what I am.

But building a shrine out of my body is tiring work. Religion is a promise I break every day.

Faith has always come to me in waves.

Sometimes it seems like the world is broken in so many small, jagged ways it is impossible to mourn all the cracks at once.

Last night I prayed for hours in my sleep— but the dead kept dying anyways, uncaring of my invocations.

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My Sorrowful Heart Which I have Named Layla Elaf Al-Turfy

Oh Layla, I return to the timeless gardens we once knew, where the fragrance of ivory roses and jasmine intertwines with the scent of sun-kissed soil beneath my footsteps.

Though time has elapsed between us, the landscape I traverse remains an unwavering witness, echoing not only the bygone days but also our shared experiences.

As the sun descends, I arrive at your dwelling, where we reveled in our most splendid moments. Our laughter resonates through weathered bricks and a corroded well, revealing remnants of a life now absent.

In a distant room, soft sobs draw me closer. Following the sun’s path, I enter the last chamber, where dust and rust adorn the oors and walls. My journey leads me to a weeping woman, bathed in the golden hues of the setting sun.

Her attire, a testament to freshly woven fabric, complements her radiant olive skin and captivating brown eyes.

Approaching her, I marvel at the beauty of a woman so enchanting in this ancient abode. My joy swells as I recognize her as my beloved Layla, thought lost in time. Tears glisten in the sunlight as she speaks, and I rush to embrace her.

In a heartbeat, the illusion shatters, and I nd myself alone, weeping in her stead. The sun’s rays, once deceptive, reveal the truth. I wander the house, kissing each wall, feeling memories disintegrate within my grasp. It is not for this dwelling that I mourn but for the soul who once dwelled within these ancient walls.

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By the Coromandel Noor Alnaaz Islam

I left my yellow heart in the promenade of a French colony called white town and heritage town both?

Question marks and I have a love-rage relationship The speaker never addresses the questions she raise My yellow heart ourishes in bougainvillea dreams Its colonial walls Chartreuse Cobalt Magenta knots in his long hair languid.

His eyes russet under neon pink of my dingy studio by the sherman’s wharf where smell of rotten sh mimics the clouds above delicious— One time one Amma making a Kolam

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In her front yard (my lane) stops me, in Tamil she asks where’s the other anklet maa? they wear anklets in pair I wear one on my left I gestured; a thumbs up hung midair ‘All good’ she understood You, never taught me Tamil we spoke sans words sailed without words never ate in one of those Cafes inside colonial walls tourists ock where on weekends On weekdays we devour each other ~ In your yellow town Halo of green graces the air, your ngers stuck in my curls, my ngers near your thighs tracing a map of your mango orchard

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A part of me still treads out on Sundays to unearth mirrors and terracotta cups from piles of pyramids in Marina market A strand of your hair still inside my copy of 1984 Heritage town; the Indian quarter was Black town until 1954 Why is your town still called French town?

Maybe I visit you someday now that I’ve learned to question.

Lips soaked in honey tongues swirled in whiskey You and me drenched in midnight dew Combusting Melting Disappearing!

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Indian Sonnet Noor Alnaaz Islam

(After Wanda Coleman’s American sonnets) I am not made of a golden childhood Sparkles and confetti crystal merry go Rounds chatty dinner tables, ruckus Puckus bonkers happiness crack hearts’ Portal, I don’t remember any of that!

All I do, a tormented mother forlorn Nor could leave nor stay. my kerosine Childhood akin dead doves on a broken Olive-branch Delusional defecation Buried misery It isn’t fair you say/splay I crisscrossed my misery on you My existence’s my despair/not fair I say. Serial killers rapists fascists In saron lotus ponds ai;t fair Not twelve-year olds with bleeding homes

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Absence, Presence, Absence Elisa Balabram

My dad used to say this expression, fala bolacha, when everyone was quiet in the car, at the dinner table, or when we were walking the dog. To break the silence, he would say, fala bolacha, meaning—say cookie. Usually, someone would be prompted to say bolacha, and a conversation would start, not necessarily related to cookies. As I grew older, I would respond, biscoito, another word for cookie or cracker, and he would comment on how it wasn’t the word he said. I’d often say that I liked being a contrarian, or we would simply start talking about something else.

A week short of the six-month anniversary of his passing, I happened to be in my hometown in Brazil. My husband, my mother, brother, his wife, niece, aunt, cousin, sister, and her husband were having lunch at my parent’s place on a Sunday. We were eating quietly, and I considered two choices to break the silence… I could say, que silêncio! meaning–how quiet! or I could say fala bolacha. I chose to say fala bolacha. While my cousin promptly responded bolacha, my sister-in-law explained that there—in the state of Minas Gerais— people do not say bolacha but biscoito. Bolacha is used in São Paulo. Afterward, I learned that several states in Brazil use the word bolacha, while many others use biscoito. I was not sure if my sister-in-law had never heard my dad’s conversation starter, if she always had this conversation with him when he asked, or something else.

It didn’t matter. We started a conversation about words that are used dierently by Paulistas than by Mineiros. Since my niece was attending university in the state of São Paulo, she shared her unpleasant experience saying a word that did not have the same meaning there as in Minas Gerais. Then, the conversation moved on to others sharing similar experiences while traveling to other parts of the country. I do not recall silence returning. There were many examples or other related experiences to share, and conversations owed with ease.

It warmed my heart that Dad’s strategy came to the rescue, and helped break the silence, as if he was present without being there. I don’t know if others were thinking of my dad like I was as that happened, yet it felt good to bring him to the lunch table. I wonder if he ever kept track of how conversations progressed. Knowing my dad, I imagine he didn’t. He may have held on to the satisfying feeling of the power a simple expression had, but other than that, Dad likely moved on to the next interaction without much reection on what was said or not said.

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It feels heartwarming to incorporate Dad’s way of being into our day-to-day lives. It seems, to me at least, a wonderful way to grow space around the heart and the grief. It gives breathing room and, in some way, minimizes the yearning for his presence, even if briey. During that trip, though, I chose not to take any family photos. The thought of registering any moment without having him present felt too painful.

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Listen Belle Brandenfels

Listen.

Songs about needing someone, keeping my eyes on the edge of the sun.

Poems for loving the air that you breathe and books about little towns by deep seas StayA word that I nd when I think of my body alone in the night.

Asking for someone, someone not to go, Knowing the next day I’ll nd me alone.

Ouch, but a pain I can’t nd I gure that I am just hurt by the night.

When plates are all empty and lights obsolete, my bed just a place to take weight o my feet.

Think.

I think I’m okay until I remember that funny word: Stay.

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From Shadows to Self Naelia Carlile

In another universe, you were the best mother I could have asked for. You would braid my hair, cuddle my curled-up little body while I fell asleep in your arms, and make me my favorite food, which was guacamole tacos, by the way.

You would choose me after a long day of work, not a Jack and Coke. But that’s not how the cookie crumbled, is it?

I get a whi of your perfume once in a blue moon, it’s comforting. Not because of you, though. But because of the potential of it. Sweet but subtle, like you could have been. But in another universe, you were. You cared for me, not because you needed me to stay around, but because I was your little girl—a perfect reection of your face on mine. Same soft brown hair and high cheekbones.

I am fond of the few memories that were good. I felt safe. Silly me though, right? How could I not, a mother is a girl’s best friend. I miss the innocence of believing you would always be in my corner. Now the only corner you’re in is with the other blocked contacts on my phone. I do miss you though, or maybe the idea of you. I sometimes wonder if it would be easier if you were dead so then I wouldn’t feel guilty spending the rest of my life without you.

But don’t worry, you’re still talked about. Maybe not in a way that you would want, but at least I have enough courage to say your name. Not mommy, like it used to be, but Jamie. Because you’re not deserving of the title you received when I was born.

In another universe, we would call ve times a day because we can’t stand a second without each other, send pictures of cute things we pass on the street, and share the best recipes from the week. You would tell me how much you miss me and that you’ll come to see Seattle soon, make a thoughtful and detailed post for my birthday every year, tell me how curly my hair has gotten, and meet my cat. But it’s okay because I get to do that with my dad now.

I sometimes wonder if you miss me, not because I care, or maybe I do. That you go to sleep thinking of my toothless smile as you picked me up out of my crib. That you too, wished things were dierent. That you too wish we could share recipes and call each other ve times a day. But it’s okay because in another universe we do all of those things and more. In another universe, our love is unbreakable, pure, and lled with joy, just not in this one.

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Portrait Sarah Daly

Painted, on glass, is her gure: delicate, pale, pleasing to the eye, yet aiming to please.

Chosen it was, for this lonely room, to be propped in a corner: sometimes admired, sometimes, not.

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I’m Not Locked Tessa Denton

A thin, tapered brush painted lines on your skin in all the places you crease and fold.

My own wrinkles are settled into age spots on wood and smoked glass panes, a tug on my handle shaking my lungs free to caress your cardigan.

My, how you’ve grown.

Screws in twos, bones rusted from the hinges of my sore joints, caught in the gaps of the porch, nearly pierce your feet.

The screen door is torn.

Hallway paper prints are peeling their oral strips in the humidity.

Don’t judge, I’ve been so tired.

You trace the banister, ngertips along the curve of my shoulder, perhaps seeking the grooves of eager hands now carved of the delicate webs in my eaves.

Your room rests inside my ribs,

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wall studs a brace, though what remains are but paint chips from the popcorned ceiling above your moonlight hair.

I powder you with dust as tenderly as I can.

Please, press a hand to my walls and feel the stillness of what was once a beating heart.

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Let Me Kiss Tessa Denton

Let me kiss the stains of death leave black streaks on my lips tears of oil down my throat and bruises on my hips Let me kiss between its eyes suck honey from my teeth string a trail of red between what I do and I speak Let me kiss the razor skin of eyelids torn in blood metal fragments lodged in lungs and hearts of helpless buds Let me kiss the face of war may its lips press to mine yield to my venomous veins and choke on my design

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Seasonal Resonance Brennan Emerson

Outside, it is summer a light breeze carries the scent of blossoms & honey the sun warms, imbibes hope sounds of laughter, splashing the dog asleep in the shade Inside my mind it is late October I feel the chill of frost & the gloom that portends months of sickness & indolence

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honey Morgan Fu-Mueller a worn wooden dipper drips with golden syrup: the promise of sweetness, a momentary joy. you feel like you should be better than this. you are not. you will never be strong enough to stop wanting to be happy. you spoon honey into your mouth, and it warms you for a day. you carry sunlight under your skin. the world as you see it glitters again. the romans taught us that honey sweetens and preserves everything it touches. it warms you. it coats your insides with sticky sweetness and reminds you of itself. of joy. always, you return. you know you can’t survive on just honey, so you balance it out. meals. cup ramen. tea. salad. unsweetened, when you feel strong. salty and savory and spicy and bitter andyou reach for the jar when your heart screams for the sun, and everything is golden again. must everything you love be an addiction? must every nice thing come with its cost? it’s all so sweet that you keep waiting for the other shoe to drop. not every sweetness comes with a sting. look up. there is no other shoe. you can see the world shining only if you sit up straight and look it in the eye. you make plans. you learn warmth again. you soak up the sun. you befriend your joy once again. keep that jar of honey in the larder. you’ll need it again when the bees go home for the winter.

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Lament the Fields Phillip Gruenemay

Lament the elds, as herbicides noxious destroys grasses and mosses alike, not sparing owers to make them all rot.

Plus, trees, be they pine or deciduous, must too deal with parasitic fungus – as creeks and streams with red algae bloom fraught suocate wetlands that sit on that plot, leaving all the insects there unconscious.

Starving the robins, starving the blue jays, leaving them, along with the ducks, the geese, and the crows, susceptible to bird u.

‘Ware rabid bats, crumb’ling packs into strays, Tularemia will make rabbits cease, and ticks from deer give Lyme Disease to you.

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An Abandoned Country Graveyard John Grey

Some crosses and stones survive, but, sadly, most of the graves are overgrown, yet weeds and wildowers don’t know from sacrilege, have their own ways of living and dying.

But there are names and dates still visible to the eyes and ngers, and lives lived, from two months to eighty-ve years, and near to the place where they happened.

From the darkness which is death, I rescue an image of somebody named Nathaniel, a woman, Elizabeth, a child Rachel, and a Samuel, a Ruth, and a Winthrop.

Many tracks, silent spoors, cloaked footprints, but all to a purpose of their own.

Before these pioneers were forgotten, something brought them where they are.

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The Chill Wind John Grey

I can easily imagine the dead whispering, that the chill wind is just subterfuge, and it’s the chatter of bones that moves the air around.

They hear my footsteps as I stroll the cemetery path.

They reect on who or what they think I am.

A squirrel or a mourner? Falling acorns or a priest?

My sky is their con lid. Are they ne with that?

I stop to read a tombstone. Do they recognize themselves?

Yet theirs is a contented susurrant.

They are aspiration without the need of object.

And they’re conned forever in their eternity.

Yet maybe it’s just the earth that speaks.

It takes on people life no longer has use for.

It can work with what’s left of them.

Now that’s a chill wind blowing. Or so I hear.

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Dispossession Karianne Hornberger

you speak of silence like a weight in the body; a blocking of the self. it lls every crevice, every valley, every hollow space. silence acts like water and sand, eroding the shape of you, and carving a landscape you no longer recognize. there is a sound to this silence. it is the sound of dispossession. the sound of those shadows, those boneless creatures, growing where forests lled with Jasmine were meant to grow. you did not choose this landscape. you did not choose to be dispossessed by possession/s.

These demons… they were never meant to be yours to carry alone. the hushed voice? those are the stars, calling for you. searching, for you.

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Longing Karianne Hornberger

at one time, I may have belonged to my body. the web of vines sprouted early, leaving traces across every surface. my senses are numb. the hollowness aches, like cold hands under warm water. once, these hands might have been able to do anything. they could touch and feel and express the way humanness was meant to be expressed. the way I was meant to be expressed. enriched by the stories and knowledge of belonging, by the feeling of safety in a home built with care. built with connection to parts of me I never got to meet and parts of me that were lost; now walled o by the mess of thorny vines. longing for what could have been. will the shadows ever speak the truth? will they ever let the stars in?

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Somewhere, Sometime Akira Junyaprasert My parents teach me words and I teach them patience They guide my palms together at and I hold them at my chest, The tops of my ngers looking at my chin I bow my head down, my nose grazing the tips of my ngers I am a manifestation of laughter and bitterness and hard work and anger and love and violence, Therefore, I am soft and I crease when I sit and slouch, My shoulders are broad, my back a table

In dreams on islands, I am liberated We will cook dinner for each other and crack each other’s backs You crush garlic and I’ll toss it in the oiled pan Food is an honor and a mother of mine My eyes have tails and my hair is black

I carve into a mango My left hand cupping one half and my right working the knife When its blood spills sweaty, sticky, and sweet I know I too am produce

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egg phoenix kai

can i oer you an egg in these trying times? ochre lled ellipse ------------------ lobbing downhill the most aerodynamic shape is egg-biologic teardrop. ---- over time cars will become more & more egg-shaped ----- space travel ---- carrying blood-lled silence in an egg

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Catalytic Converter Lindsey Keefer

I interrogate the composition of my exhaust.

My combustion is more internal than I hope, more of a compression than something that could produce even the smallest spark. In my anger, I shed moisture, and it dampens the heat of my rage. But steam, too, can be brutal. Steam carries what sparks cannot; our lungs magnetize it into themselves because they only want air and don’t heed the particulates. I pump my rage into the atmosphere through the small distillers of my tear ducts and only wish to make my fumes less toxic. Why can’t my rage have use? Why can’t it come with a user manual, and a toolkit, and a pair of kid gloves instead of with shaky hands and a whine-pitched voice?

I never know what to do with the propulsion of my anger, even less so with the modulation of all this love.

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Echoes and Reflections Atlas Kiaros

Celebrated was Narcissus, adorned with gold woven locks, His elegant frame chiseled by the nest of rocks.

Seed of Cephissus, Liriope’s pride, known worldwide, Fated with the melodious Echo, whose green eyes he made cried.

Neither empowered with redemption, merely cautionary tales, The unrequited and self-obsessed, but what if etiquette prevailed?

A eeting smile from Narcissus would ease fair Echo’s despair, Whose voice was angelic, sonorous without compare.

Here, on this muddy path where damp leaves lay, With Dryad laughter reverberating the foliage to sway.

The Oread, complexion milky white, crouched in a sun-kissed grove, The hunter, oblivious that Juno had stolen Echo’s voice from above.

By divine whim, the purple-clad gods also wove the fabric of Narcissus’s fate, Nemesis, in the shadows, compelled the alluring youth to self-inate.

This kosmos, a ruthless one with mercurial shape-shifting gods, Who maltreated humanity’s doe-eyed innocence, perennially at odds.

Mortals simply yearning for their dividend of ambrosial joys, Instead, the Olympians exploited and discarded the Hellenic denizens like a whelp’s wet mangled toys.

Yet, sealed in the winding labyrinth of Narcissus is a regard for others, A glowing gilded ower bloomed to symbolize what was covered.

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Rose-cheeked Echo regained her voice, sweet as divine nectar, Now liberated from the speechless hex, allowing her spirit to soar freer.

Mindful, they became immersed in the golden glow of the afternoon sun, They bathed in unison in the deep, serene azure of the still and calm lagoon.

Gazing at novel possibilities in this shining pool of liquid glass.

An innite reection of parallels that evolved to their eyeglass.

Glimpsing from yesteryear what was previously blurred, A glowing fondness for their human progenitors emerged.

Now, able to perceive the velvet cloak that is the cosmos, Their souls redeemed, no longer opposed.

Sharing communion in this secluded garden Of emerald and amber hues, begins their stardom.

The domed rmament erupts as glistening rainwater gushes eetly, Flowing freely, an opportune moment to rendezvous discretely.

Emancipated from their free fall into the pit of eternal damnation, Ignited like a phoenix, fueled by temptation and imagination.

Footnotes 1. Narcissus: In Greek mythology, Narcissus was a youth renowned for his beauty who fell in love with his own reection and perished because of it. Represents vanity and self-obsession.

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2. Cephissus and Liriope: Narcissus’s parents; Cephissus, a river god, and Liriope, a nymph. Their story sets the stage for Narcissus’s tragic life.

3. Echo: A mountain nymph cursed by Hera to only repeat the words of others, she fell unrequitedly in love with Narcissus, embodying the theme of unrequited love.

4. Dryad: Tree nymphs in Greek mythology, representing the poem’s deep connection to nature and the natural world’s witness to the unfolding drama.

5. Juno (Hera): The Roman name for Hera, the queen of the gods, who cursed Echo for distracting her as Zeus engaged in aairs.

6. Nemesis: The goddess of retribution, who led Narcissus to his reective doom as punishment for his vanity.

7. Kosmos: Greek for “order,” “beauty,” or “the world,” referring to the ordered universe and the gods’ capricious role within it.

8. Ambrosial joys: Refers to the divine pleasures and delights that mortals seek, “ambrosia” being the food of the gods.

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the cycle Nya Simone Maddox i’m drowning i can’t get in enough air i can’t get enough every time i try to breathe i just gulp in more and more of the brackish water my chest is constricting lungs lling up and i feel the heavy weight pushing every muscle in my body further down towards the muck at the bottom of the lake i don’t have a choice but to break its grasp and swim to the surface to emerge for school and work but i know i’m operating under borrowed time at night i have nowhere to go nothing to do and i slip it grabs my ankle it was waiting for me the whole time just lurking under the surface of my skin i try to separate myself from its crushing force but at the end of the day it’s the only thing that truly knows me i’m tired from ghting all the time i know everyone will be disappointed but beneath the muddy waves nothing matters i give in and let myself sink deeper and deeper into the muck until i’ve fallen beneath the earth’s crust but why stop there i keep sinking further and further down into the core until i get melted down and transformed into something new the next morning i claw my way out of the dirt pink and screaming i experience a few moments of sobering clarity as my fresh lungs ll with the crisp morning air then the weight nds me and slams its heavy hands onto my shoulders and shoves my empty husk of a body towards the lake to start the cycle anew

40

It Wasn’t a Dream Manuna Mady

41

Fowl Creatures Abigail Mandlin

Yesterday, I saw some ducks in the distance, o the far dock: mamas and babies, clustered around the shore.

I was up on the patio, munching on some pita bread, and instantly, I had the idea to share my score.

I waddled through the sand, came upon the birds— and found they were not ducks at all, but in fact, geese instead.

But that’s ne, I thought. And I threw in some bread.

Immediately, I learned the dierence between ducks and geese.

These beasts were savages, grabbing hold of their own kind, inging them against the rocks— and all for one measly piece.

It gave me pause.

These geese were not kind, courteous, nor grateful.

They fed like little egotists, more than willing to push their fellow creatures to the side for just one second of hedonistic bliss.

I stood there, holding a slice, at the threshold of a conundrum.

Because they were hungry too, just as much as any duck might be. They were living and breathing and wanting of food.

Who was I to pass judgement on their behavior, when life could be so cruel?

So I let go of my bread, and the geese lunged for it, pushing and kicking all the way.

And that’s when I realized, with a sudden clarity, as though looking through a thick fog: Ah, I thought, this is what is feels like to be God.

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Nine Views of the Outer Gardens After Rain Joan McBride Imperial Palace Gardens, Tokyo 1 Above the wide moats rise bouldered walls.

Price of admission: wings.

2 The koi know you won’t feed them, they swim near the bank to show o.

3 Small birds – prowl above the lawns – dots of punctuation in the sky.

4 In the Imperial Garden stand rows of pine trees – the army at rest.

5 Rusted ligreed water fountain – an empty champagne ute.

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6 Windblown rose petals in the Imperial Garden bright pink laughter.

7 Silent gardeners on knees along sacred Plum Path – reverence of turning soil.

8 Young girl dances in an empty playground – tenderness of seclusion.

9 In the light rain Old Heron’s feathers reect a blue sky long past.

44

Searching Through Your Purse Joan McBride

I. I remember the black patent leather handbag hung on your arm. Like the old English Queen, you were never without it. The bright shine of it was like a mini-TV screen into a dark world where I found my little girl face reected back.

You said I was not allowed to touch your purse — touching left smudges like bruises. And the golden clasp couldn’t be opened by a daughter’s inexperienced hands.

II. Still, sometimes I caught a glimpse inside: Coins for a cab  teleportation charm.

Pleated plastic rain hat — enchantment against the elements.

Red lipstick and eyebrow pencil — shapeshift magic.

Camel cigarettes and zippo lighter — conjure of incense and re.

Tiny wooden cowboy boot, talisman to protect family.

III. Many years later, while packing up the old house, I found the purse in the cobwebbed detritus of your long-vacant bedroom. The black shine of the leather was cloaked in light grey dust. Fissures riveted the outside — most of the luster gone. When I wiped away the dust to peer into the reected darkness of the cracked patent leather, I saw a shattered image, no charm could reclaim.

45

I Remember Writing Denise Calvetti Michaels

I remember writing in the margins, a bittersweet novel by a woman diagnosed with bipolar disorder, convoluted tale of collisions at midnight, train passengers asleep, dreaming.

I remember not nishing, leaving the manuscript behind on a park bench, a rst draft I carelessly forgot to save, like a town whose name I never learn.

I remember mill towns ripped from my spiral notebook, blue prints of taverns and greasy spoons scattered down wind, my third trimester infant waiting to be born, moonlight arcing steel tracks, river town to river town.

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Sometimes We Forget Our Mother Denise Calvetti Michaels

—Domenic Airaudi, 1882-1959 After the death of our grandfather, sometimes we forget our mother.

ephemeral, like bonre embers ung from the summit of El Capitan, rogue synapsis Dennis and I lasso that summer in Yosemite to void the gunshot

When she leaves on pilgrimage to the Old

accident.

Country, my brother and I will conjure razor-thin silhouettes of

After death of the patriarch liminal space is

pigeons embroidered between

cumulus between landscape and sky.

motets of dust, mauve wings veering above

By September, monarchs will pollinate

Piazza San Marco, though we

Tuolumne meadow before their migration,

weren’t there. Other times we will refuse to

a cormorant on the pier will dry its wings,

let go of her postcards,

and the tiny tracks of sandpipers wash to

clutching them close to our scapulae like

sea.

holy cards, imagining stray cat twilight, salt burning her lips, our eyes. Left behind in California, we roam coastal gray towns on separate continents, learning perspective through the lens of the Brownie black and white, given to occupy, maternal absence a ruby-eyed dragony, or, ruby-throated like hummingbirds shimmering in the laurel branches. I don’t know how else to say this—gone, for us, was never a slow-drying Rembrandt oil intended for permanence—rather,

47

a windy day in spring Alec Mullen-DeLand

Love is in the air, They say with a shrug, But I wonder why is it the start Of spring where I nd myself Again Beginning with someone new?

Is it the pollen in the wind or something about The residual snow nally melting?

The daodils blooming or the longer nights?

Summer will come.

I hope my love is tied down this time, and doesn’t drift away in the breeze; a lost balloon

48

The Mallards of St. Catherine Zach Keali’i Murphy

Stewart came from a town where the water was abundant but never clean. Lillian came from a town where there wasn’t enough water to keep the wildres at bay.

Every Sunday morning they’d meet at a lone, wooden bench by the secluded pond at St. Catherine Trail. In the middle of the pond sprouted a fountain. On those hot days, the wind-blown mist from the glorious spout would make them feel reborn again. A set of weeping willow trees stretched over the east side of the pond, their leaves always on the verge of taking a dip. Wildowers painted the perimeter, and sometimes, Stewart and Lillian were lucky enough to see a monarch buttery utter by.

A ock of mallard ducks made the pond their refuge in the warmer months. It was a frenzy of wet feathers, powerful splashes, enthusiastic quacks, and deep dives. Stewart and Lillian became so familiar with the mallards that they could point out the unique quirks of each one. There was the one with the white spot on its breast that looked like a cloud. There was the one that hopped instead of waddled. And there was the one that quacked in a remarkably deep pitch that always made Stewart and Lillian laugh.

When they sat on the bench, time seemed to halt and zip by in a ash all at once. Some days there were no words were needed, and other days all the words were needed. They shared what they wanted to share and left out what they wanted to leave out. Sometimes, they’d squint their eyes and see a pair of turtles poke their heads out from the pond and greet the sunshine.

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Stewart and Lillian thought about carving their initials into the bench, but they ultimately concluded that it would be too cliché. They never exchanged phone numbers, for fear that it would take away the magic of their time at their sacred place. Before the winter showed its harsh might, the mallards would disappear. Stewart and Lillian would say their goodbyes, retreat from the cold, and dream of meeting at the pond once again.

As soon as the snow cleared and the ground thawed, they’d be back sitting on their beloved bench together. Shortly after, the mallards would return. Stewart and Lillian always wondered how the mallards found their way back to the same little pond after being so far away for so many moons.

One sunny March day, Stewart showed up to the bench, his face glowing with a peaceful smile. But Lillian wasn’t there. He showed up the next Sunday, but she wasn’t there. April, May, June, July, August, September, and October passed, and she wasn’t there.

After the winter, Stewart came back to look for Lillian every Sunday. Years slipped by. The mallards returned every spring. And the weeping willows wept a little more.

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Origami Paper Stars Annie Nguyen The soft pastels, long strips of A4 paper, as she cuts, folds, pinches, and shapes them into stars, sprinkling them in a mason jar.

A new day, fresh message, hidden inside these strips.

The pencil rolling o the desk, elbows bent, head feels heavy in her hands, depleted of spirit, fear, anxious, exhaustion absorbs the color of her world.

The black and white, open up a lucky star, take in the words, written in graphite, A lm of memories, pours out the colors, celebrate the small victories, You’ve traveled so far, Remember, Don’t forget, Who you are.

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Youth and Dreams Annie Nguyen

Princess tiaras, Children’s makeup, Playing dress-up, Walking in my mom’s high heels, Placing my tiny feet into her gigantic shoes, Little stomps echo through the walls As I scurry onto the hardwood oor, I was young and carefree, Wishing I was older to become a woman like my mom, To have the freedom to make choices.

In the stages of my imagination, I’m playing dollhouse with my sister, A place where we could be anything and everything We ever dreamed about, When we had that childlike wonder, Not caring about the opinions of others, Our dreams were limitless.

52

Spaghetti: A Reverse Chronology Joseph Niduaza

32-years old

31-years old

On a cold fall evening in a classroom

Amerigroup Washington tells me my health

in Southwest Michigan, things take an

insurance can’t be used outside of the state,

interesting turn. I sit with nine other

save for emergency services. I tell them

English graduate assistants, and we discuss

I’ve been having an emergency for the last

possible dates for a strike. Our professor

three years and only physical therapy can

says, “You know, grad assistants used to get

solve the issue.

health insurance.” He pauses, contemplates.

“The Psychology department may have a

They ask when I moved from the state. By

number of willing protesters. Perhaps I can

law, they inform me, I am required to notify

put you all in touch.”

them within thirty days of the move.

“Let’s riot!” one classmate says. “Fuck it. I’ve

I tell them I’m on vacation. “I’m just visiting

got nothing else to do.”

family in Michigan. I might catch a Tigers game. I hear tickets are cheap.”

“Wouldn’t it be great if this became a nationwide movement?” another classmate adds. “What if we all walked out?”

29-years old The MLB season is canceled, and the

“Hell yeah,” I say. “Everything would

pandemic has shuttered all physical

crumble. We’ve got the leverage. Sure,

therapy clinics for the foreseeable future.

why not? Let’s do it. I’m in.” Suddenly I feel

Well, fuck. Atrophy in my quad, glute, and

energized, and I think of some friends and

hip is at a critical stage, in need of intensive

former colleagues out west I could rally. But

muscle-rebuilding therapy. The gyms are

then I realized the World Series is starting

closed. Good thing the bar is still open.

soon. Maybe we can strike after? I really want to see if the Phillies can win.

27-years and 312 days old Doctor says the surgical scar is healing quite nicely. He recommends immediate

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physical therapy.

27-years and 309 days old Early Sunday morning on a wicker chair

“But I’m moving to Seattle. I’m going to school. Classes start in six weeks, and I have Mariners tickets!”

He grunts. “Might wanna reschedule. You won’t be able to use your right foot to drive for at least a year.”

on the back porch. Sunlight slices through the redwood canopy. In the distance, a lawn mower buzzes. Crows caw. Coco, my roommate’s Rottweiler puppy, rests on my lap. I’ve had four beers, barely started drinking, when reality sets in: my last day here, and I’m sad to leave. Where did the last seven years go? Why the hell did I decide to go back to school?

27-years and 310 days old The MRI tech says the Achilles is fully ruptured. “It looks like spaghetti.” He laughs.

I don’t. “It almost looks like the frayed ends of an old mop. And you were able to walk on this thing?”

“Yep. Must’ve been the adrenaline, maybe some other things. Once my foot reached rst base, I really don’t know what happened. I thought I hit something. Heard a loud crack, like wood snapping, kinda like the sound of a homerun o a baseball bat.

You know? That *pop* sound.”

The tech grew queasy. “Nasty. Well, you’ll need surgery. How’s Tuesday sound?”

My roommate hands me another beer.

“You ready, man? One last game before you move! Can’t believe you’re leaving.” He grabs a softball and his glove, throws the ball. Coco howls, darts from my lap, and chases the bright yellow sphere.

“I know. I really don’t want to go. But I’m broke, and I think it’s time for something new. Now that pot’s legal, we’re basically out of business.”

My roommate shakes his head. “Yep. Those were the days. We had a great time though.”

I rise from the chair and nish my beer.

“Fuck it, dude. Let’s get hammered and play some softball.”

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buds to harvest, and game four against the 26-years old

Tigers is tonight—the Giants can sweep.

Well, fuck. California voters just don’t understand good business. I must be one of the few people who voted against marijuana legalization. Now that prohibition is over, I don’t know what to do.

Maybe a pint at the pub? I ran into an old professor. She buys me a beer. “What have you been up to?” she asks.

“Oh, you know. Little bit of this. Some of that. Working, mostly. I did just sign up for softball.”

“Have you thought about going back to school?”

“Not really.”

22-years old My professor asks me to meet at her oce.

“Your writing could use some work, a spell check too,” she says, “…but I like your ideas.

You want to be my TA next semester?”

“Wow, I don’t know what to say. Thank you!

Can I think about it?” In all honesty, school just isn’t on my radar right now. There are

20-years old My roommate sparks a blunt in celebration.

The San Francisco Giants have just defeated the Texas Rangers in the World Series, and my transfer application to Humboldt State University has been accepted. My roommate says, “Humboldt County has a 999-plant limit for medical patients. I got my card. If we can get a property, we can grow.” He tells me the black market of the marijuana industry is worth approximately $42.2 billion, and Humboldt County produces roughly seventy-ve percent of the marijuana in North America.

“How much would we make?” I ask.

“If we get 800 pounds, sell at $2,500 per, that’s $2,000,000. One harvest, man. That’s all we need. Think about it.”

On the television, Giant’s starting pitcher, Tim Lincecum, answers an interview question about the fans back in San Francisco. “I gotta imagine there’s a lot of smoke in the air right now,” he says.

55

I tell my roommate: “Sure. Why not? I can pay my tuition with that. Can you hand me a beer?”

56

Bruises in Bloom Rose Rickey

When I fell and banged my shin a few days ago, I could tell immediately that it was going to bruise.

Every day, I rolled up my pants to check the spot Excited to see how the bruise was progressing Sticking my leg out to show my girlfriend each time, Marveling at the blues and purples that would soon fade Into pale shades of brown and yellow.

I’ve always been this way with bruises.

I’ve always loved to watch them grow and bloom.

It’s a habit I picked up from my sister.

She would take daily pictures of any injuries she sustained With her silver Sony digital camera She kept record of every cut, scrape, and abrasion A whole memory card dedicated to those crime-scene photos Stitches, a split lip, two scabby knees.

At the time, I didn’t know why she did it.

But now, I think that maybe it was a way of knowing that the pain was real.

A physical representation that something happened here.

Evidence that cause and eect exist.

Bruises feel like a trophy.

They feel like validation.

I lived through it.

It happened.

It was real.

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To share this poem is much like showing o a bruise I point out my bruises to remind myself that what I went through changed me.

I write for the same reason.

Everything I’ve felt was real.

A bruise is a conrmation.

A bruise can’t be fabricated or exaggerated.

Something happened here.

I lived through it.

It happened.

It was real.

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a sleeping beauty Elizabeth Salinas

Sleeping In the evening of – I can do such thing, Like sleeping Till ve in the morning – Oh my!

I have become accustomed to –

Sleeping I ensure to get more than eight hours each night, and not feel any type of way.

About sleeping It knows my body and soul – Better than others – My equilibrium agrees!

Sleeping

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In the evening of – A sleeping beauty lies here – Rather than going out – she rests – For sleeping It calls to her, like a siren in the distance.

Sleeping beauty, play with me, play with me!

Until our eyes feel heavy – So, I woo – and I do – Sleeping It makes me the happiest, and the brightest, too – Zzzzzzz

60

How Black Folk Eat Vanessa Sanders

Candied yams, black-eyed peas, oxtails, and cabbage.

“Mmmm… soul food.”

Soul food, that’s what we call it.

I love me some soul food, yes, and all that it implies The contrast of soul food and southern cooking is self-explanatory Southern cooking with its biscuits and gravy lls the belly, but soul food with its collard greens and ham hocks feeds the soul Southern cooking was fashioned in Big City restaurants Soul food was conjured up in Big Mama’s kitchen Southern cooking uses measurements; a cup of this, a tsp. of that Soul food tells you to add a little of this and about a pinch of that Southern cooking would have you believe that a biscuit or a piece of cornbread is merely a complement to a dish Soul food explains that biscuits and cornbread are for soppin’ up the food on your plate I appreciate southern cooking, but black folk eating soul food is like going home after a long journey Soul food is our souls being fed and our hearts being lled.

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Distractions Terry Sanville

Walter groaned as he climbed from his Toyota, arthritis reminding him of his age.

He grabbed his knapsack and joined the other hikers at the trailhead. Walt hadn’t seen them in thirty years. Way back when,

“Like you did on the Bradley Case,” Walt said. “I still have the bus’s tire marks across my back.”

they all had been part of the same law rm.

Now with gray hair and artfully disguised

Linda continued grinning, but her eyes

paunches, including the lone woman, they

weren’t smiling.

sipped Starbucks coee and stared at Walt as he approached. Hey, I don’t look any worse than these fools, he thought as they exchanged greetings.

“So how often do you do these hikes?” he asked Chet, his former boss.

“Come on guys,” Chet said. “No talk about history until we have a few cocktails over lunch.”

“Yeah, that’ll make it so much better,” Timothy said. He and Walt had worked cases together with Tim doing the grunt

“Once a week. We hike for a couple of hours

work and Walt handling the trials and

then go out to lunch.”

settlement conferences. Walt liked the guy but didn’t think much of his legal acumen.

“Yeah, after arguing about which restaurant,” Larry piped up.

He stared at the mountainside trail that snaked upward across chaparral-covered

“This is my rst hike with you guys. So go easy on me.”

slopes, a 1,300-foot climb to the ridge top. The reward: spectacular views of the city, coastal valleys, and the blue-green Pacic to the west. He checked his glucose

Linda grinned. “If you can’t keep up we’ll just push you o a cli.”

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meter. His blood sugar level had risen after breakfast but stayed in the normal

range. As an insulin-dependent diabetic

he downed a can of pineapple juice, never

for close to fty years, Walt always worried

stopping, continuing to push forward.

about heavy exercise and the lows. Cans

Ahead, he saw Linda step o the trail onto

of fruit juice and granola bars lled his tiny

a at boulder and look back at him. Their

knapsack, there just in case he needed a

oce aair had been a cliché – sex in the

sugar boost.

supply room or in the boss’s oce on nights they worked late. She had been hot,

They started the hike slow enough and Walt felt his muscles loosen, his breathing regular. It felt good. The joint pain backed o, helped by the Norco caplet he’d downed before leaving home. Better living through chemistry. Walt laughed to himself

demanding, controlling. Afterwards, Walt felt as spent as he started to feel hiking the mountain. Is she throwing me under the bus again, with the old crew watching in glee?

Was I that arrogant? Were any of them really my friends?

at DuPont’s old advertising slogan. In the ’60s some of the hippies used it to refer to

Linda waved and hurried to catch up with

their drug culture.

the others. He continued plodding, one foot in front of the other. Fuck ’em. I’ve never

The trail steepened but Chet didn’t back o the pace. They traversed a series of switchbacks and continued on without taking a break. Bringing up the rear, Walt grabbed for his water bottle clipped to his belt and gulped a few mouthfuls.

The group pulled away and disappeared around a bend. He hurried to catch up but failed to close the gap.

failed to nish what I started. His sugarstarved mind thought back to his time in high school, running cross-country races, never winning but always nishing, just on the verge of passing out. He knew how to empty the tank and run on fumes. He’d felt that way when he’d quit the rm thirty years before. He had the best record of any of them, most favorable outcomes in court or out-of-court settlements. They despised him for it, for getting the good assignments

His glucose meter beeped a warning and

from Chet, for the annual bonuses, and for his dalliance with Linda.

63

boulders that straddled the trail. He But it had all come crashing down with the Bradley Case and he got sold out and quit soon after.

removed his sunglasses and stared upward.

The narrow path continued to climb, seemingly into the scudding clouds high above, a real stairway to heaven, or more likely to the deepest circle of hell. Wiggling

So why did Chet ask me on this hike . . . and

heat waves rose from its surface. Yet Walt

why the fuck am I here with these guys? What

felt a chill run through him. He checked his

did I think would happen – we all go o into

glucose meter, its screen outlined in red,

the sunset singing “We are the World?”

signaling a very low reading. He quickly downed another can of fruit juice, shivered,

His thinking about past messed-up relationships provided a momentary diversion from the pain. But the pain won out. Then a pebble worked its way inside

and sat on a huge rock, arms wrapped around himself. Nausea washed over him and he vomited into the bushes. His oldman bladder cut loose.

his left hiking boot. He tried shifting it to a position where it didn’t hurt, without

I’d better ask for help. He gazed up the trail.

success. It provided a new distraction

The group had disappeared, swallowed

from the way his entire body felt. He

by the head-high chaparral that baked in

remembered reading a story somewhere

the sun. He grew colder. Out of nowhere,

about a man who smashed his nger with

a thick sea fog rolled up the valley and

a hammer to distract himself from the pain

engulfed him – a genuine whiteout. He

of a fractured leg. That’s nuts. But maybe this

curled into a fetal position and squeezed

hike is my nger and my fucked-up history

his eyes shut. But the whiteness invaded his

with these guys is my leg.

brain.

The trail steepened yet again and Walt

He lay on the knife-edged ridge of a

struggled, placing a hand on a knee

snow-covered mountain. A gale-force wind

and pushing down when climbing over

threatened to push him o his tenuous

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purchase. Ahead, the crew of old retired

of juice to his lips. Walt forced his hand up,

lawyers stood on the peak’s summit. They

took it and downed the liquid.

passed a bottle of champagne between them while Chet took snapshots with his iPhone. The crew looked happy, jubilant at reaching the top. Walt lay in the snow unable to move, a failure. Maybe this is

“You scared us for a minute,” Chet said. “We got to the top and looked down and saw you curled up.”

how they felt about my successes. I had no idea how they felt . . . I never asked, too busy savoring the wins.

Walt raised an arm and waved but none of the celebrating crew noticed. He struggled to his knees and sucked in deep breaths that burned his lungs but did nothing to revive him. He checked his oxygen supply, the gauge showed it near empty.

He removed his mask to shout but the

“Yeah, and you were shaking, like you had some kind of seizure,” Tim said.

Walt sat up and shook himself, his clothes soaked in sweat. He checked his glucose meter; blood sugar levels were still below normal but climbing. The nausea had disappeared and the rubbery feeling in his muscles had slacked o.

blast of Himalayan air froze his lips and the saliva in his mouth. He forced himself up

“Thanks, guys. You really saved my ass. I just

and waved frantically. The crew stopped

couldn’t keep up with you.”

celebrating and stared but didn’t make a move toward him. He sank onto the hard snow. The light faded.

Tim smiled. “Yeah, well we’ve been hiking together for years, know our abilities, know when to slow down and when to press on.”

“Walt! Come on man. Sit up. Drink this,” somebody yelled at him. He opened his eyes. Four old lawyers surrounded him, his head resting in Linda’s lap. Larry held a can

“Chet wanted you to join us,” Linda said.

“He thought maybe . . . maybe you had

65

changed and we, I mean all of us might

expose blue innity.

reconnect.”

Walt pushed himself up onto wobbly legs.

The group removed their knapsacks and sat

“How far is it to the top? I’d like to see the

next to the trail, breathing slow and easy,

view, take some photos.”

waiting for Walt’s response.

“Forget that,” Chet said quickly. “I’ll email “Yeah, about that. It’s . . . it’s occurred to me

you photos. Besides, we’re ready for lunch,

that . . . that I may have been a real asshole

a nice place downtown that serves good

back then.”

wine and Italian food.”

“May have been?” Linda said and broke

“Not that place again,” Larry complained.

into loud laughter. The group joined in.

“I need protein, preferably a big ole burger

Linda continued, “I thought sabotaging

with cheese.”

The Bradley Case for you was the most righteous thing I did. And Tim taking it over when you bailed worked out for the client and all of us. But now it’s something

“Yeah, and with enough grease to lube your car,” Chet said.

I regret, because I became you for just a moment and it’s bothered me ever since.”

On the fast trek down the mountain the group argued about where to eat lunch,

“Yes, well one of me is enough.”

nally settling on a sloppy hamburger joint that had a full bar at the north end of town.

Walt stayed silent, thinking about what had

They sat in full sunlight, listening to

been said. Is everything better now? Have all

the sounds of the high chaparral. Red-

the loose ends been tied? Do these guys really

shouldered hawks oated on the thermals

want me to join their group? Or will we fall

as the mysterious fog cleared away to

into the old relationships? We can’t undo bad

66

memories.

Chet grinned and nodded. “Yes, you are.

But it doesn’t have to stay that way. Call me

In the parking lot they scattered to their

if you change your mind.”

cars.

Chet took him aside. “That was a killer hike.

“I will.”

Probably should have done something dierent for your rst.”

Walter climbed into his Toyota. His arthritis “No, that was okay. I’m just not in as good shape as you guys.”

pain had disappeared, leaving him to think about the broken leg and not the smashed nger.

“Are you joining us for lunch? Our next hike will be easier, I promise.”

Walt stared at his old boss and extended a hand. “Thanks for the invite. But I don’t think so.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah. You guys are a group of friends. I don’t want to intrude on that. I’m . . . just a sad memory.”

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The Evening of Our Discontent Michelle Schaefer

The rain is pouring tonight as though we will drown I get up to drink water in an act of deance taking in the deluge opening my throat to the ood It is low tide the beach is mine without feeling it go out the wash of rm sand remains a wide expanse glittering with glass Tonight we open the wine no time to breathe glasses are poured to our future We have been running since we met to and from and back again It seems comfortable to drink without thinking so much left unsaid we cork the bottle to keep for another day There is nothing about tonight that should be recognized the moon the stars all seem anew upside down and somehow backwards twinkling ever bright I take your hand under your skin the bones in place I hear them rattle when released no longer us are we the same?

Greeting each other speaking in the past each other’s words fall at nding our steps out of synch not knowing our choices we simply stand in place

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Weaving of Memories, with a Line Borrowed from Fruits Basket Elijah B. Shaw

Softly, longingly, I stare at the ceiling.

Silence, reminds me that there were Words spoken in the long distant past.

Nostalgia snows in my heart.

Coals quiet, had they once shined yellow?

Silence, reminds me that they were.

Hope, I can cling onto.

A calm ickering, whispering like honey, A bright stillness, layered thick.

Words spoken in the long distant past.

Hope, I can cling onto.

A cozy replace, to nestle up to.

Silence, reminds me that there were, Words spoken in the long distant past, Hope, I can cling onto.

A cozy replace, to nestle up to, Yellow coals, shine brightly, Like thickly layered honey.

A ceiling, that welcomes me with soft arms.

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If Earth is a Mother, You are Not Her Child Yekyum Ashley Shim

If it is true that Earth is a Mother, you are not her Child.

You are Man, whom she greets at the threshold after a day’s work maintaining the hearth. She takes your coat o of your shoulders and oers a smile, only to be met with the back of your neck. You are Man, who watched as she bore you this land from her blood and gave you the fruits of her labor. But she gave you her name, and so they are yours. All of it is yours. And so you raise them as your father raised you: you raise up that rst bone—up, up into the sky—only for it to fall back down and strike her through the heart. Now you watch, yet again, as she bleeds out in front of you, that same hopeful look on her face. You can’t bear it, can you? So you pull out your lighter and sit beside her on the reddened ground. The mixed scent of iron and Chestereld clouds her gaze, and you are absolved. Within her, the string snaps.

It was you who had demanded to have her down to her core, penetrating her until she was bruised—and she let you. Now, you insist on meeting God, arms linked, when you can’t even look into her eyes as her working voice calls your name in fury. Face her shamelessly as you have done all these years, or at least give her a cigarette.

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Chimes Henry Strayer

Sometimes when there’s nothing new to think about, my mind leaves the present, the here and now, the current. It takes a left-hand turn at the rst road it comes to, and meanders towards the past at a relaxed pace. It moves past the rocky rst few jobs, the awkward phase in high school, and eventually lingers for a while in the endless summer days, when you could count how old you were on your ngers and ‘future’ was a word that meant next week and no further.

The rocks of Wyoming are red. Not Crayola crayon red, or the red of a retruck or a stoplight, but a red that mixes in orange and brown and ecks of gray-tan of a hundred dierent hues that all change if they’re in shadow or in sun. The wind has a mind of its own in northern Wyoming, at times a gentle caress and others a piercing spear.

It’s the summertime, when the snow is banished for another year and the wide, long ranches that are so very scattered across the landscape slowly rise into a languid productivity. I’m hopping from boulder to boulder, the rusty rocks underfoot warm in the early morning. The stone hasn’t yet absorbed enough heat to be painful to the touch, that comes later. For now, the shoes have been abandoned on the back porch of my grandfather’s house, the rusty windchimes changing their tune every year as the wind tears them down or another set is carefully nailed to the large oak beam.

I know every curve and bump of

these boulders, which divots are home to gentle pockets of moss and dirt, which routes are the safest. I can tell by the position of the sun in the sky that I still have fteen, maybe twenty minutes before breakfast. The harsh concrete of nearby Billings, a city that I had thought at the time must be the largest in the United States, seemed intangible to me now. The only things that were real were the things before me right at that very moment.

The smell of cattle, heavy and thick after the herd had spent the night in the northern pasture. It was like a sweaty leather jacket and tilled earth and the more pungent tang of whatever my grandmother had made me spread around in the garden yesterday.

The sound of the windchimes, pleasant to me then but haunting now in my memory, a disjointed jangling that seemed to carry with it the voice of the wind, silent until it was given a mouth made of dusty silver tubes.

The taste of the dirt seemed to be nourishing in its own way, earthy and gritty and textured. If there was nowhere you could go where the dirt and dust of Wyoming would not follow you, you had to accept its presence as a fact of life.

All of these things were real, and nothing more.

They were still real ten minutes later when I had fallen and cut my elbow, my blood falling to the red rocks that thirstily

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drank it up. As I was being carried into the house by my worried grandfather, watering the backyard with my tears, I wondered if giants had once lived in the clis, and if their blood had once fallen like my own, staining the ground a burnt-umber red.

After my grandmother died in the autumn, I never returned to the ranch that my family no longer owned. But the windchimes never fell silent. They played their music when I was brushing my teeth in the cracked bathroom mirror at night, they played when I was looking out the window watching the streetlights burst alight one by one, they played in the quiet hours when no one spoke.

I made the mistake one day of telling my father I could hear the chimes.

Two days later I was in the clinic, watching the doctor with the kind of unbridled suspicion that a child has after being promised a trip to the park only to nd that there was an unscheduled detour past the place that stunk of watered-down oor cleaner and people smiled as they poked you with needles. The barren white oors were an oense to my feet, better suited to rocky boulders and wide-open grass elds.

The doctor’s eyes never left me, even as my father spoke in a dull, rumbling voice.

In Wyoming I had caught all manner of insects in glass jars, keeping them on the wooden rail of the back porch until my grandmother made me release them before dinner. I would study them through the curved glass, wondering if they knew

72

of television or hamburgers or the rockets we had sent to the moon and back. I always felt bad for the tiny little dots with wings, mourned their ignorance even as I watched them zip away into the sunset.

Now, in the doctor’s oce, I imagined I was in a glass bottle. Something had caught me up, taken me from where I had listlessly drifted and borne me away to some strange locale. I pretended that my every movement was scrutinized and examined by one of the giants of that lived in the hills, excitedly shouting to its friends that it had found some strange insect.

I was prescribed something that came in a bottle I wasn’t allowed to open.

On my grandfather’s ranch, there was no such thing as an injury that you had to heal from. I never had a fever, a cough, a cold. It would have meant a day inside, a day wasted, a day where the sun didn’t bathe your skin in a cleansing light. A day where the bloody rocks didn’t greet you like gentle giants, their ochre skin a bastion for lizards and beetles. The wind carried a healing breath, the food from the garden a tonic that didn’t smell of articial strawberries.

The pull of what was outside the house, four feeble walls and a roof that leaked a little when it was raining, healed you faster than anything. There was a world outside, that existed for the sole purpose of exploring it. It stretched from the creek across the road to where the rocks at the back of the house rose so high that no one

could climb over them, and was bordered by other, similar worlds all around us.

The chimes remain my key to these pockets of life, these secret alcoves of the world where you can stand still and see everything that’s important within a twominute sprint. Where whatever’s past the road doesn’t matter, and time itself pulls up a seat on the porch and puts its feet up for a while, content to watch the world slow to a comfortable stop.

73

Lady of the Lake John Tavares

I’ve always been a creature of fresh

or chief executive ocer of possibly the

water. I was born and raised in a small town

only Canadian company dedicated to

in Northwestern Ontario, and my parents

maritime insurance.

owned a lavish log home on the beach.

I’ve always swum, shed, canoed, boated, paddled on lakes, and even walked, hiked, snowmobiled, and driven across frozen lakes. I’ve taken risks as a youth on the lakes, swimming, boating, ice shing—so frequently and recklessly I often thought I’d perish on the lakes. I was a teenager when, one summer, I worked as a lifeguard and a commercial sher on the freshwater lakes surrounding my hometown. So, it surprised nobody I later worked for a maritime insurance company, MacDonalds Maritime Insurance of the Dominion of Canada, as the original incorporation papers stated— or Big Mac Daddy as I joked among girlfriends.

I proposed the cycling expedition around the city, even though I knew our vice president was scheduled for a quadruple bypass operation. I loved to stay in shape, and I loved to push the limits and boundaries. Bob, our vice president for eld operations, was up for the challenge.

That’s how he earned his promotions: Until his diagnosis of coronary artery disease, he was on the fast track to become president

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Bob was The Man I met at the clothing optional beach at Hanlan’s Point on the Toronto Islands. I was terminated from a previous insurance position, after being forced to take the fall for some hack statistician’s modelling error. Bitter, dejected, I spent the summer as a beach bum, stripping o my clothes and bathing suit, a naturist, reading trashy romance and erotic novels in the nude at the clothing optional beach. Charismatic Bob spotted me at the beach, wanting to pick me up.

When I discovered he was a high-ranking executive at Canada’s only publicly traded maritime insurance corporation, I gladly performed fellatio on him in the bushes. So, I was recruited to a product development position, but informally I was Bob’s executive assistant.

When I rst saw Bob at the clothing optional beach I marveled at the size of his belly, and he was such a charming man—the kind of executive you wanted to have telling a chief nance ocer her company owed fourteen million dollars in insurance premiums. We cycled around the city, chatting occasionally,

sometimes involved in deep discussions, as we peddled or pushed our bicycles, everyone in our corporate group marveling at Bob’s remarkable weight loss. Part of his cardiac rehabilitation and preparation for the coronary bypass surgery, he explained.

We cycled about forty kilometers

encouraged him.

Privately, I hoped some dire emergency would befall Bob as he journeyed towards cardiac intervention and normal health, and a sudden event of a critical medical nature was exactly what transpired. As Bob cycled, in slow

when my executive assistant expressed

and laborious style, with our team

concern about Bob’s pallor and shortness

maintaining a respectful pace alongside

of breath. Roxanne was diligent and

him, he collapsed from a heart attack,

procient, to a fault, but she was outgoing

not a block away from our national head

and liked to party; so, I hired her, hoping

oce on Avenue Road. Roxanne and I took

to bring out the extrovert in me. We

turns delivering chest compressions until

stopped at a grassy knoll and valley, with

the ambulance and paramedics, with a

a spectacular view of the city unraveling

debrillator, arrived, but our eorts were in

to the southwest from the gentle slopes.

vain and futile. Bob had passed away, and I

We had an unscheduled picnic, pizza, and

was quietly delighted.

soft drinks from a nearby pizza restaurant.

Not exactly the kind of food you’d expect someone scheduled for heart stopping surgery to consume. Bob ate a whole pepperoni pizza, but we burned about 1500 calories cycling during that epic tour.

Roxanne noticed his profuse sweating, grey pallor, shortness of breath, and blueness around lips and eyelids. She thought we should call o the remainder of the bicycle trip. But Bob bravely insisted we push ahead in the spirit of adventure and our corporate mission and teamwork, and I

There was the customary mourning period. There were interviews with board members and executive leaders.

After countless meetings, massaged egos, and a diplomatic campaign, I was promoted to the vacant position of executive vice president for eld operations. I was earning a million dollars a year, skiing in exclusive Colorado mountain resorts, surng on Hawaiian beaches. I bought a house in Rosedale just before the disaster struck.

75

A passenger ferry operated by

for insurance. Those emails and memos—

the city struck another passenger ferry,

that the barely seaworthy condition of

also owned by the city. Both ferries

the ferries was good business for the

were cruising in opposite directions,

company—came back to haunt me.

one destined for the Bay Street harbor terminals, one for the Toronto Islands docks, when they collided. The collision resulted in sunken ferries, hundreds of casualties, dead, drowned, wounded, and the loss of ferry service, a catastrophe for us since both ferries were insured by MacDonalds Maritime. The human losses and casualty and property damage was estimated to cost billions of dollars and could result in the company’s bankruptcy.

I started worrying about my position, especially since I had personally sold the insurance policies to the city, despite the concerns of our company executives, engineers, inspectors, adjusters, and actuarial ocials. They reported the ferries were aged, rusting, potentially not seaworthy, and overdue for refurbishment and replacement. I merely advised our frontline executives: no worries, big bucks to be made—a message I also conveyed to compliance ocers and company vicepresidents with emphasis on “no worries.”

We’d merely charge higher premiums, and indeed we charged them exorbitant rates

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After digesting reports about the collision and devastation, I insisted on personally inspecting the wrecked ferries and accident scene. First, I asked Roxanne to rent a boat. Roxanne managed the details of the boat rental and queried me about my boat license. I merely nodded and murmured, and when she insisted on seeing my boat license, she examined the ne print and realized my boat license had expired. So, we vigorously debated whether I should pilot the boat. In the end, I was the executive in charge and made no decision, so the debate was never resolved, to the consternation of Roxanne, and I drove the boat. I also asked her to buy Kentucky Country Road whiskey. Roxanne shared my love for the brand. To add excitement to our disaster tourism, and get her riled, I warned drinking aboard a boat was illegal. After she expressed reservations about the expedition, I laughed. I said I was joking and helped drag the case of whiskey aboard.

At the accident scene in the harbor, close to the island shore, I unpacked my camera.

I took photographs as I slowly steered the

cruise and drift close to the wreckage, but

boat around the wrecks, and methodically

we were insurance executives.

toured where two ferries collided. After one ferry sank, the other was listing and ready to sink, and inside these boats were dozens of human bodies.

When I dropped anchor, I was

Roxanne and I agreed we hoped the company found a loophole or noncompliance with terms and conditions of the insurance contract—an intoxicated ferry captain, for instance—so the

surprised at the relative shallowness of

company could avoid high payouts and we

the water. But Roxanne expressed concern

had a better chance of keeping our jobs.

about police, coast guard, and accident investigators, milling about in patrol boats, so I relented. As Roxanne reminded, from a corporate perspective, the tour served absolutely no function. It was disaster tourism. I wanted to see carnage, death, disaster. I even wanted to take pictures and secretly hoped to see drowned bodies, which I was assured were in the depths or even on the surface, oating bodies, bloating corpses, soaked in water, exuding organic gases, breaking free from the wreckage and submerged crypt. Drowning victims broke free from the places where they were trapped in the sunken or partially submerged ferries, oated to the surface, and washed ashore the islands or city. Since I was VP, I wanted value for the money we’d be forced to pay in insurance.

I was surprised police and investigators allowed us to tour the accident site and to

After the accident scene tour, we boated to Hanlan’s Point Beach. I ignored the KEEP OUT buoys, again to the trepidation and protests of my diligent assistant, but I observed no lifeguards on duty. As a Hanlan’s Point Beach veteran, I explained conservative rules, traditional norms, and social conventions were often suspended at this adult playground. It was the rst time I returned to the nude beach since I met Bob, oered him oral pleasure, and got hired during the summer of the sulk, when I became a beach bum, with a golden handshake from my previous employer.

Now, Roxanne and I marveled at the sizes of the crowds at the beach.

“How are they getting here without ferries?”

“Water taxis,” Roxanne said. “But

77

everyone’s been warned to steer clear

hilarity. Sputtering, she screamed she’d

of the accident scene. And the city is

nearly dislocated her spine laughing. Then

still running ferries to Ward Island, since

we sipped straight whiskey in red plastic

residents need transportation.”

cups as the sun set on the Toronto skyline.

“They’re still mostly insured by us.”

“I can give you the exact number.”

Roxanne waved her smartphone and referred to the data and spreadsheet she retrieved from corporate websites and databases and started throwing gures at me. Such prociency, I mused aloud.

I noticed these qualities when I rst met her; it was why I made her right-hand man, although she annoyed me with her constant chatter about her three sisters.

We drank whiskey and diet cola on the beach and discussed the drink’s taste and merits. I reminisced about the rst time I met Bob on the beach years ago, and how our encounter led to my hiring. Roxanne laughed uproariously.

“You, gal, owe your job to a blowjob,” I said.

Roxanne giggled and snorted. I realized the whiskey started to inuence her. She nally loosened her due diligence and even called me the Duchess of Disaster.

I took a swig of whiskey and retorted that I supported peace, order, and good government. Roxanne doubled over in

78

Darkness shrouded the shoreline when I nally piloted the boat with the outboard motor from Hanlan’s Point Beach back towards the marina near Ontario Place. Several years had passed since I last operated a boat. I wasn’t even certain of the direction as I motored across the vast expanse of water. I was surprised by how dark Lake Ontario looked at night, with the brilliant cityscape in the background and the clouds obscuring the moon’s shimmering light and round disc. We weren’t wearing life jackets because of the evening’s severe heat and humidity.

Roxanne asked me to slow down as we plowed across Lake Ontario, but I gunned the engine. In the obscure darkness, I turned my head to Roxanne, bragging about my college years, working summers as a lifeguard, joking about swimmers and sex on the beach. Then, our boat struck another boat, a sailboat, or the sailboat struck us, in the dark; I was never clear about that sequence of events.

I was stunned and thrown clear

from the boat into the water. Catapulted

fast through the abandoned grounds

from the speed boat with an outboard

of the Canadian National Exhibition.

motor might be a better term. As I swam

After resisting the temptation to board

in the dark, through the waves, circling

an empty streetcar, in the misty dusk,

the wrecked boats in the moonlight on

I agged a taxi. The cabdriver insisted

Lake Ontario, with the city lit harbor in

on taking me to a hospital emergency

the background, I attempted to rescue

department, but I promised him a huge

my subordinate. I shouted repeatedly

tip if he protected my privacy and drove

for Roxanne, but nobody responded to

me straight home. He kept turning over

my desperate, frightened screams. Dog

his driver’s seat to look through the sliding

paddling, I circled and weaved around the

pane of bulletproof glass at my bare body

oating wreckage and debris, through

in a skimpy swimsuit. I realized my bikini

the spreading smelly oil and gas slick, but

was more than a distraction. Still, to my

by then the wrecked speed boat sank.

relief, he quickly drove me to my Rosedale

The sailboat was listing and ready to sink

house, where I showered in steaming

and nobody responded to my cries and

hot water, still shivering from exposure.

shouts in the cabin of the sailboat, which,

I went to bed covered in blankets and

I perceived, was too dangerous to enter.

comforters, worried I suered a severe case

I realized the best I could manage was to

of hypothermia, but I was too afraid to call

rescue myself and swim to shore. Although

an ambulance or head to the hospital in a

I was a strong swimmer, the water was cold,

taxi, although I shook violently. After I took

and the waves were rough, impeding my

three antianxiety pills, I slept for twelve

performance. I struggled to swim across

hours.

the harbor through chilly water in darkness, illuminated by moonlight and then city lights near the lakeshore. I landed on the rocky shoreline near Ontario Place, which I last visited when I watched an airshow.

Wearing a bikini, I felt like I suered a case of hypothermia. Shivering, I strode

The ensuing scandal was huge.

Roxanne was missing and presumed drowned. The sailor, with whose sailboat my rented speed boat collided, a retired Great Lakes mariner, a drunk and drifter, was intoxicated and his lights were inoperable, even as he cruised at night

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around the harbor. He passed out in the

the church, over which jet airliners from

cabin of the sailboat, amidst beer bottles

around the world regularly ew at low

and salty snacks on which he subsisted.

altitudes as they landed and ascended from

This collision was merely another maritime

nearby runways. Decades ago, the church

accident he suered through recently.

was beneath the ight path of a crashing

Meanwhile, my boat license was expired,

airliner and barely escaped destruction

and police suspected I was legally

from a stricken jet.

intoxicated. But the investigators had little evidence to conrm this suspicion, except for the whiskey. Roxanne so safely stored and concealed a whole case of whiskey in the boat that the bottles survived the crash and police divers recovered them from the accident scene. The purchase of a case of whiskey mickeys was traced to my corporate credit card. City newspaper and television reporters and photojournalists followed and hounded me as I showed up for work at the company head oce, their bright lights and cameras ashing in my eyes. In a week I was forced to resign from Big Mac Daddy. Headlines even described me as the Duchess of Disaster, after a reporter quoted the nickname from a head oce executive, who spoke o the record.

I attended a memorial service for Roxanne, whose body remained unrecovered, at a Catholic Church near the airport in Mississauga. There was some odd connection of the international airport to

80

I assumed nobody recognized me, but I spotted insurance co-workers, who stared relentlessly across aisles and pews and gave me cold, hard looks. As I heard eulogies and memories at the service, I remembered regretfully the stories I told Roxanne about Bob. I realized Bob hired me aboard a ferry near the collision site. Was this synchronicity? Divine retribution? Fate?

It was beyond comprehension.

At the service’s end, I tried reaching out to Roxanne’s relatives to apologize, but a sister slapped me in the face so hard it stung my skin and broke my tooth. When I tried to slip through the back side entrance to my Porsche, another sister confronted me on the church steps. She seized me by the lapels of my designer coat, and wouldn’t release me until, as her salvia ew into my face, she extemporaneously delivered the best speech I ever heard about the morality and good conduct expected from leaders.

I concluded that after I watched the video

drowning; her body was recovered far from

on YouTube, after Roxanne’s third sister

the accident, so investigators surmised

captured the moments on video with her

she, not wearing a lifejacket, swam some

smartphone, uploaded the clip, and the

distance. I like to daydream we died in

video went viral.

each other’s arms, oating in the water

After I rewatched the videos and news clips, I felt thoroughly shamed and chastened. I didn’t leave my house for weeks that turned into months, as I gained weight, lost muscle tone, and became apprehensive and then panicky when I tried to leave my place. As I continued to refuse to head outside, and obsessively

peacefully, soul sisters, brothers in arms, until the end. But reality obtrudes any conjuring of grim romance: when the boats collided, the water was cold, the waves were choppy, and the immense body of water in the night darkness produced a disturbing disorientation and sensory deprivation.

rewatched television news coverage of the event I recorded, a home care nurse visited me with a psychiatrist. She diagnosed me with BDPD, PTSD, and agoraphobia, but I told the nurse the psychiatrist could shove her labels and ushed the medication she prescribed down the toilet. I started to drink liquor I had delivered to the house compulsively.

I realized I should feel grateful to be alive since Roxanne, younger, t, a practitioner of aerobics, Pilates, and yoga, was presumed drowned. Until then, I stayed in shape by swimming, cycling, jogging.

I speculated Roxanne was unprepared for Lake Ontario’s cold. Media reported a forensic autopsy revealed she died from

81

Morels at Baker Lake Cora Thomas

the smell of mushrooms earth wind and trees dirt ngernails sunlight slits leaves dead on the forest oor crunch as we make our way deeper into the undergrowth whipping at our shins closer to the cottonwoods as we approach the wise ones it’s hard not to look up but today we are looking down we spot morels poking up poking up through the mire heads up to the sky blue pushes through the gray well camouaged we study the ground a map that makes and moves then monster morels show their cards only for a short time are they pristine so we pluck them and tuck them carefully in the bag

82

that lls and lls leaves buckle under hiking boots sticks crack like thoughts of thunder behind the evergreen hills the sweet smell of cottonwoods ll my head the sweet smell of decay the path the sway this way and that grown over logging roads a little ditty lls my head We are o to see the Wizard, The Mushroom Wizard of Baker Lake…

as we pick we already taste the pop pop pop of the oil as we drop drip drop the mushrooms in the cast iron later that night already lling our mouths nourishing our bodies our hearts sing a love ballad of the earth we taste all that is sacred

83

if I was a mushroom make me grow up through the leaves in the April light where I am born soaking up warmth of sun and sky blue marvel and treasure as careful hands pick careful morsels of morels and me

84

A Letter From My Service Dog Kit Thompson

Dear companion, I remember the rst time I saw you. It was a beautiful clear summer day, I was racing around the dewy green grass with my littermates, rolling in the warm sweet scent of it, barely tall enough to see through it. But I saw you. You weren’t there to see me, you were just passing through.

You picked up my littermate, my sister, she was what brought you here. I ran up to you, hearing as the other humans reminded you that you were far from home, you weren’t here to take one of us, and my sister belonged to someone else. You set her down and she ran o, you watched her go and I could smell your sadness. I cried, and nally you looked. I already loved you. I knew I would never let you out of my sight again.

That rst night after you took me, I was locked in a plastic and wire box you called a “Carrier.” I couldn’t see you, and it was unbearable. I called for you until you came, you put me in your bed with you “just for one night”, and I was so thankful. I still smelled the sadness in you, deep down in the core of you. A thick, dark, stale scent. But it lessened a little when I kissed you goodnight. When the sun was up, we traveled further, it felt like forever, but I was held in your arms, so I didn’t mind. Finally, we stopped, and I heard you say, “welcome home.” Home. Home was dierent now.

Hotter, drier, the grass less soft and green, the soil beneath it dusty. I sneezed, and you laughed. The sky was darkening, and we gathered outside. Suddenly there was a sputtering hiss, a ash like lightning and a crack like thunder. You stared at it, happy?

You didn’t know to be afraid, I tried to warn you. There was another, and another, and another. You picked me up and held me against you. Why were you not afraid?

It was up to me to protect you. I would always protect you.

In the days that followed, you taught me new words. “Sit,” “Stay,” “Come,” “Down,” “Roll,” “Speak.” Every time I learned one, the sorrow in you shrunk; replaced by joy. I learned as many as I could, I would learn them all for you. We would play in the grass, I loved to run and there was so much room to run. I was fast, faster than you, but you chased me anyways. You called to me, I had run too far. The game was over, you said. I didn’t want the game to be over. We were having so much fun. The sky was dark, big heavy raindrops fell, petrichor rose to meet me. Thunder and lightning tore the sky open, water poured down — where did it come from? I was swept away, I couldn’t see you, couldn’t nd you. We were having so much fun. It stopped as quickly as it came, the stream that swept me away reduced to a trickle in a dark tunnel. I howled my regret, echoing o the dark walls, too scared to move. But you found me; you crawled into the tunnel and pulled me out, you carried me home. You were crying, coated in the thick stale scent of sorrow, and something else. A sharp scent.

Fear. It was unbearable. Do you know that I was sorry?

Our bond grew, you told me all your secrets, all your fears, all your hopes.

I listened to everyone and I told you mine too. I think you understood. I’ll never forget

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the rst time I smelled the sickness in you, a twisted, bitter, wrong scent. Something was wrong. Something was very wrong. You weren’t moving. The door stood between us and rescue; I had no other choice as I leaped for it, grasping the lever and pulling it towards me as best I could. I fell, hard, but the door was open just enough now. I pushed through and ran faster than I ever had. I reached the door to outside. I wasn’t supposed to go outside, but something was so, so wrong. You would have to forgive me. I burst through the door and found someone from our pack digging in the soil. Come! Come! Come! I shouted at them, pushing them with my paws, pulling them with my teeth when they wouldn’t move fast enough. Too slow they came.

Finally, nally they followed me back to where you were. Then they took you away.

“Good girl” they said. It was an eternity until I saw you again. But you came back. You smelled unnatural, strange, sterile when I saw you next. “Hospital” you called it. A word I didn’t like. For the rst time since you left, I could breathe again.

Home changed again. You were relieved, that ever-present sadness thinned further. Everywhere we went together I would show o the words you taught me.

“Dance”, “Hold”, “Crawl”, “Shake” many more words to learn. I told you I would learn them all. I learned “Seizure” too. That was a word I spoke to you, for you. The word for that twisted wrong scent.

Do you remember the day you tried to leave me? There was so much yelling, snarling, fear, pain, and that ever

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present sadness rose like a wave as I saw you thrown backwards. Glass shattered; I could smell the bright metallic scent of fresh blood coming from you. “Out” they said. And you went Out. Your things were dumped onto the grass. Shame, anger, and pain radiated from you. You threw things into your car, got in, shut the door. “Wait!”

I cried. “Home,” you replied. You are my home. I clawed at the door. “Bad dog” you ung those words at me. Bad dog? I chased you down the street, I was fast — you were faster. But you let me catch you. Your door opened and I ew into your arms. You pressed your face into my side, ngers gripping my fur, and you sobbed “Good dog”.

Good dog.

We drove for days, stopping places long enough for you to ask questions and a head to shake no, sending you back with your teeth clenched, driving away to nd another place to park for the night. You held my food in your hands for me to eat.

Where were my bowls? Why were we not home? Finally, we stopped, you introduced me to a man, a “friend.” I didn’t like him, didn’t like the way he looked at you when he opened the door and let us in. He took you away from me every night, I could hear you cry and beg, smell the fear, pain, and violence. I tried to get to you every time, you know that right? I always tried. Sadness melted into despair in both of us. That day he grabbed your arm to drag you away, I growled a warning, and saw him turn and his st y towards me. I didn’t inch, I didn’t have to, you got between us. Anger bit back despair, I promised to protect you.

We drove him out, together. Later the door rattled and shook, a repeated crashing and splintering as it started to give way. “Leave,” you screamed. “Leave,” I echoed. I stood between you and that door, even after the noises stopped. You spoke through sobs to someone I could not see, but I know the words “Help” and “Home.” Home? The next day we were home. I had to remind you; your mind gets stuck behind that bedroom door sometimes. I had to remind you we were safe, we were home. Night was the worst; I would lay in your bed beside you until you fell asleep. I would kiss you goodnight, just like that rst night, before going to my own bed. I will always protect you.

Home just in time for my tenth birthday, you said. It called for a special “Treat”. A bowl lled with cold, creamy, sweet ice cream. That rst taste sent me into a frenzy, I dove into the bowl, knocking it from your hands. I devoured every drop of the Treat and when I looked up at you there was laughter. When was the last time you laughed? You wiped the stickiness from my face (a waste). Slowly, so slowly, your mind came home to your body. More birthdays, more “Ice Cream,” more laughter went by. You once again chased me through the grass, when did you get so much faster than me? We collapsed in the shade, tired and happy, and as you stroked my fur your ngers caught on something painful on the back of my head.

A car ride later, we walked into a building. I knew this smell, this “Hospital” smell. A stranger led me away, they brought me to a dierent room. You walked

in and I was so relieved. The stranger looked at the spot and taught you a new word, “Tumor.” You took me home. Was it my imagination, or were treats more frequent after that?

I was wary when you introduced me to your new “Friend”. It didn’t last long though; I could tell he loves you almost as much as I do. Enough that I was okay when you told me we would have a new home again. “Friend” became “Partner.” It was so good to see you happy. I would do anything to see you happy again now. When he packed up and moved you promised we would be together again soon. There was more to do before we could go too. So, we stayed, just us again, but I knew I wasn’t the only one who would protect you anymore.

My world was dimmer, quieter, slower.

Prickling fear began to mingle with your sadness, why was it worse the more I tried to comfort you? There were denitely more treats. “Anything you want,” you told me.

I wanted to see you happy, but you must have misunderstood because you gave me canned tuna instead.

That last night together wasn’t your fault — you couldn’t have stopped it.

As I walked outside, I tripped on the single stair, you tried to catch me- but for a brief moment I was faster than you, again. I tore that ever-growing “Tumor”. You didn’t notice at rst, it was dark, my fur was black and you don’t have my senses to smell the trickle of blood. When we came inside, the taught skin split. I shook my head in shock and blood sprayed everywhere. I heard you scream as you ran to help me the way I

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always did for you. I tried to clean the blood o the walls, the oor, myself. You pressed gauze to the wound and gently wrapped it in place. I had never seen you more scared; I crawled in your lap to comfort you. You stayed there all night with me, holding me, telling me everything would be okay. In the morning you had someone from our home drive us to the Hospital again. You carried me inside, the stranger who looked at me said something that made you panic. I heard you beg and cry, and no matter what I tried you wouldn’t stop. The stranger left us alone in the room. “Fifteen years” you told me. Fifteen years was half your life.

Fifteen years was not enough. They pulled you from the room and put a needle in my arm. They let you back in to hold me as they told you it was time. You wrapped me tightly in your arms as you taught me one last word.

“Goodbye”.

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My Knight in Shining Armor Mia Isabella Trajano

my knight in shining armor me, a damsel in distress in need of a place to bid a good night “your majesty, i will protect you will all my might.” a high-class steed, in need of approval approval for my safe travels? little did i know, the following sequence of events would begin to unravel a distressed princess, drowning in distraught one too many glasses, intoxicated and upshot a food for thought? he says “i’ll be her Sir Lancelot” the guards took o the lights shut o a low-class individual revealed a masked miscreant, how dare you you have violated my temple you weakened these walls and sought out an opportunity an opportunity to prove yourself noble? is this my heroic prince coming to save the day? or was it just a way, in my moment of weakness, an opening for you to stay the guards were asleep you trespasser, you decided to creep to creep into these chambers to claim it as your own to skip all the stages of hierarchy, you snuck your way to the throne a throne for which you did not deserve this temple of mine, for several months I tried to preserve, to preserve someone worthy, someone capable of loving this temple in all of its glory a wicked beast, you displayed in predatory what a plot twist you were

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a savior by day, an unmasked villain by night a daylight socialite, a scoundrel hiding in the moonlight a means to consent? to which I did not fucking invite.

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Entanglement Ava Wahl

They say, write what you know.

But the truth is, a writer knows all Knows no connement, No denement For she colors the words her own.

In a rainbow of complexity, With brevity She tells of the brutal truth of the human condition: Our disposition, acquisition, and the competition of man Against his home, his horrors, and Oftentimes, his own kind.

A writer’s eye bears witness to these speakable crimes, And each word she dares write carries the weight of the world, tangible, palpable, powerful, A testament to those that have gone A warning to those yet to come Or, perhaps, a promise.

You decide.

How are we meant to take this charge and leverage This lettered load?

These buckled shoulders can only take so much before they,

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too, Splinter like a piece of broken lead.

Who else knows the plight of the writer, that sinister loneliness, everlasting?

From our sewn stories bleed The tears of humankind, its fantasies and Follies spilled, stripped naked For all to see.

It is possible that every writer knows the same pain The pain that comes with everything we’ve ever wanted, dreamed of, hoped for This creed, this need to capture humanity in a marble And study its swirled surface with nought but a quill and ink To shed light on such entanglement.

In the heart of every artist, entrapped in their struggling Soul, is the notion that not all which is seen Can be described, That in every microcosm Of a life there is something, someone, That must die.

To be a writer, then, is to hold every memory Ever made on display, In disarray we discover that not every face can be drawn by These ample hands, No matter how hard we may try.

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cigarette-kissed Celina Yu your scent lingers in places you’ve never been in the corners of rooms you’ve never touched a cigarette-kissed peeling wallpaper towers over.

it’s your doing, so witness me.

it’s unpleasant. the crystalline sugar in my hair, pearls adorning my neck the red on my hands and knees and face undeniably your doing, yet it’s not your fault.

your eyes are on me; look away

you’ve left me drenched in a sickly teal, the grasping at my throat, building up babble with no vividness. do you tear at me? rip me to shreds? do you tear up at me? cry for me?

heaving over the void, your nger beckoning. i follow the magpies and cross the room.

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It’s the Thin Veil of White Celina Yu

It’s the thin veil of white, That covers my face and separates you Mummy-gauze to eye, that distinct Meshwork of nely knit toe-trodding.

I look dierent, sobered up Funeral doll without will.

Obedient. Mollied.

Do you hear my pulse?

Your heart is as pale as my hand.

It takes a special kind of lonely To make me alone in the midst Of many people.

You do it so well: Unwittingly, pure intentions Paving the path for my descent Euridice anew, ower crown falling, The mention of it all.

Surely you sense it. I am sleeping awake, Longing for someone else, I make it, Barely conscious. Buried. Crying out.

Maybe the rain will fall strongly enough To unearth my rotted esh and bones.

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a pearl J. Yuen after Anne Carson’s “Short Talks” & Mitzkis “A Pearl”

pearl, buried: a woman with a lithopedion is an average of 55 years old at diagnosis. they used to bury dogs in the eld behind my house: the one with the cherry tree, the driftwood swing. I hated that the owers caught bugs. I hated the rot. all those old bones; I could be Frankenstein, or Shelley, or anyone remembered for more than a shadow of hair against the grass. wide-eyed, opening to it like a ower. when I look at the cherry tree, I want to be there with an axe. when the ood comes, where will the dogs go? overboard, away.

pearl, rooted: “if you want the tree to stop,” the doctor said, “you need only nip it shut.” bud by bud, with my hands? bud by bud, a thousand branches and endings, a forest of thorns with inverse purpose. don’t laugh at me; don’t make me laugh. there’s a fairy in my ear crying about the beauty of life, all around us, starting from stamens and pits. I’ll cut it o, uproot it. even the axe will not be enough. one day, I will pick up the shovel. I could point it out, or in.

pearl, held: a woman with a lithopedion is, sometimes, already dead. because it is ours, we cherish what we own. no cargo limit, no hold for next sailing. the stone on that weary hill is ours; the stone by the small intestine is ours; the stone of the unbloomed ower is ours. it goes all the way to the stone of the grave. not everyone beats the odds. mostly, it is about letting go, or nding someone who loves you enough to take it away.

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A Speculative Walk to Idun Liyah Murry

My mom, little sister, and I were whisked left and right at the edge of the trees near the parking lot; Multiple trails combined into one and confused our phone navigator.

Kind locals set us in the right direction, and we trekked, Our dog tugged us through dirt and gravel, pinecones, reeds fallen from trees, sning.

Growling. Barking.

Many parkgoers cooed at him And many were joined by their own furry companions.

Liyah Murry. (December 2, 2023).

Photograph of Idun The Northwest Troll. [photograph].

Dirt becomes concrete, and we follow it down a hill near the water, Tree trunks upon rock bedding bordered the path.

Signs along the way warned of seals and poison oak, Some urged us to protect the forest.

Branches and trunks constructed obscured tents along the wooden border — Who or what made it was unknown.

Around the corner, beyond the closed indoor pool, was where we saw her.

Idun.

Crowded by a small group of people snapping pictures of her. Observing her.

She was beautiful.

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Out of all the Northwest Trolls, I thought she carried the most interesting story after reading her online bio.

She sang to the whales.

I imagined a chilly breeze whistling past her wooden body.

Crackling the shells that adorned her neck, And rattle her twiggy mane and surrounding foliage.

With her cedar ute, I could hear melancholic harmony.

I could see her eyes shut in concentration as she stretched all her senses.

Beyond the humans that danced about her feet and awed her presence.

Beyond the beach, the woodland, and the tall and vast cities, deep diving into the dark waters.

The breeze probably carried salt and sh to her nose, but more and more, it began to mingle into something foul.

She probably grew worried.

Her pen pals called the ocean home and used to answer her with a symphony, But as the sun and moon rose and fell, Their musical responses denitely got quieter and prolonged.

Frightened and mournful.

“Food is scarce, and pods are separating,” they might tell her.

“The water thickened and suocated,” they might say.

“Humans fault,” they denitely claimed.

Blubbery gray pen pals washed ashore, she saw.

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But she must have loved humans.

They comforted her lonesome with visits, having no other trolls to play with.

Listened to her songs — Though I bet, she thought they could be more attentive to the meanings.

Let her live freely among the wildlife.

And although they sometimes cruelly teased her, waking her from a slumber by painting over her wooden physique, she must have hated to think that they were behind her pen pals’ pain.

So, she probably didn’t think about it.

Hoping that one day, her whale song was met with a chorus of cheers after rebuilding what they once had.

And never met with silence.

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UNRAVELLING I Natalie Alvis

if i pull hard enough

will i

untangle

the

seams

of

myself

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UNRAVELLING II Natalie Alvis & Ezra Jacob Bantum Photography 101

The Gazing City (VII) Jefrey Aler Photo Collage 102

Space Needle Cornell C.G. Digital Photography 103

ME Mindy Chen Photography 104

YOU Mindy Chen Photography 105

An Anticipated Breakthrough Sasika Gottuso Painting 106

Oni Reiha & Sarah Ishijima Digital Art 107

The Tool to Make a Brain phoenix kai Letraset on paper 108

Sphinx Eyes Basil Mayhan Digital Art 109

Urban Jungle Alec Mullen-DeLand Digital Photography 110

Lucas Collymore Niyah & Liyah Murry Colored Pencil 111

Mountain Drive-By Liyah Murry Photograph 112

Light Hong Nguyen Digital Illustration 113

Philip Island Seagulls Ashley Ziba Taherazer Visual Art 114

Nature’s Mirror Marzeyah Topiwala Digital Photography 115

Billiard Baddie Mia Isabella Trajano Oil on Canvas 116

Sinuous Sonder Son Mia Isabella Trajano Oil on Canvas 117

replication Vicki Tran Digital Art 118

Contributors Biographies Mae Ellen Abu-Alya is a second year student in the Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing & Poetics at UWB; her undergrad was in applied computing. Her favorite genres are surrealist ction, weird stories, and warped feminism. When not working on her thesis, she can be found attempting to partake in one of her million hobbies, trying to understand her step-cat, or being generally overwhelmed.

Aisha Al-Amin is a mixed race Black girl living in Seattle, WA. When she’s not at school or working in the philanthropic sector, she can be found reading.

Elaf Al-Turfy is a 20 year old Iraqi-American artist who portrays her emotions through her work. To most, a painting is no deeper than its surface, but to those who are like Elaf, they understand the owing memories and emotions that intertwine each artwork that existed.

Noor Alnaaz-Islam is from Assam, India currently pursuing her MFA in Creative Writing and Poetics at University of Washington, Bothell. A performing poet who aspires to be a Meta Philosopher.

JC Aler’s (they/them) most recent book of poetry, The Shadow Field, was published by Louisiana Literature Press (2020). Journal credits include The Emerson Review, Faultline, New York Quarterly, Notre Dame Review, Penn Review, Southern Poetry Review, and Vassar Review. They are also an artist doing collage and double-exposure work.

Natalie Alvis, 25, from Seattle, has embraced art of many disciplines. After being recognized for excellence in Fashion Design, she became a classically trained pastry chef. In studying culinary arts in East Asia, she experienced a shift in focus towards visual art. Currently, she is exploring the connection between creative writing and visual art, producing works on a multidimensional level.

Elisa Balabram is an artist, lecturer, and the author of Ask Others, Trust Yourself: The Entrepreneurial Woman’s Key to Success and Mending a Broken Heart: Lili’s Magic Journey.

She wrote a case study published by Emerald Publishing and coauthored the academic book Concise Introduction to the Family Firm published by Edward Elgar Publishing. Elisa is a second-year MFA student in Creative Writing and Poetics at UWB, working on her transmedia ction thesis. Her blog about self-love, business, and creative writing can be found at askotherstrustyourself.com.

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Ezra Bantum, 23, based in Seattle, began exploring visual arts through self portraits and surrealist photography. Through working as an assistant for Anida Yoeu Ali, he has rened his techniques in the visual arts while simultaneously writing and producing his debut album ULTRA\VIOLET. Using his multidisciplinary skills, he has successfully directed multiple short lms and music videos within the past year.

Belle Brandenfels is a senior at the University of Washington Bothell. She is in the Law, Economics, and Public Policy program and will graduate March of this year.

Cornell C.G. is a Black and Filipino, casual photographer who enjoys the beauty of art and nature.

Naelia Carlile is a fourth-year student at UW Bothell majoring in Communications & Media studies with a minor in Diversity Studies.

Mindy Chen, a visionary in portraiture, is renowned for her ability to capture compelling narratives through photography. In “YOU” she artfully distorts perceptions, inviting viewers to break free from societal constraints and embrace their individuality. Mindy’s work reects a deep belief in the boundless potential within each person. Her portfolio is a testament to defying expectations, encouraging others to see themselves beyond limitations. Through her lens, Mindy invites the world to recognize the power of uniqueness and the limitless possibilities that lie within the self.

Sarah Daly is an American writer whose ction, poetry, and drama have appeared in twentyfour literary journals including Two Hawks Quarterly, Triggersh Critical Review, A Thin Slice of Anxiety, Ibbetson Street Press, and The Seraphic Review.

Tessa Denton is a graduate of the University of Washington, Bothell who majored in Culture, Literature, and the Arts and in Gender, Women, and Sexuality Studies. Tessa loves to write, read, spend time outside, thrift for knickknacks she doesn’t need, and spoil her cats.

Morgan Fu-Mueller is a silly little guy, a Psychology major, an aspiring law student, an artist, and a writer. They work in the Writing and Communication Center, and on the UWB CROW Board. Their work focuses on love, and love, and love. They’re a bit loud, and have been really into One Piece lately. Find them on Instagram @gaming.phd. Peace and love forever!

Saskia Gottuso is an alumnus of UWB. She graduated in June 2022 with her bachelors in environmental studies, as well as majoring in society, ethics and human behavior too. As well as a minor in gender, women and sexuality studies. She’s currently doing ABA with autistic

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kids as her full- time job, and dedicates many hours of the evening to her canvases. She nds life whimsical and confusing; and hopes that shows itself somehow in her art.

John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident, recently published in New World Writing, California Quarterly and Lost Pilots. Latest books, ”Between Two Fires”, “Covert” and “Memory Outside The Head” are available through Amazon. Work upcoming in the Seventh Quarry, La Presa and Doubly Mad. Phillip Gruenemay is a senior at UWB who is majoring in Media & Communications Studies and will graduate at the end of Fall Quarter, 2023. A lifelong resident in Bothell, Washington, he loves to read, watch movies, and play video games.

Karianne Hornberger is a senior at UW Bothell, majoring in Psychology with a minor in Gender, Women, and Sexuality Studies. She is passionate about mental health advocacy, disability justice, and talking about her cats. She believes art and creative writing are powerful outlets for self-expression, imagination, and connection, and they should be accessible to all. Through her creative endeavors, she hopes to show vulnerability as a strength and inspire creative expression as a way to connect with and care for ourselves and our communities.

Akira Junyaprasert is a Thai American artist. Last night (the night of 2/6/2024) they had a dream that there was a two inch wide hole beside their bed and ants kept streaming out of it so they got a vacuum to suck them up but they actually turned out to be cockroach-larvae hybrids and got clogged in the vacuum because there were too many and they kept crawling out. It was horrible. Akira likes cats and dancing and the people in their life and strawberries dipped in chocolate hummus. Akira also likes dishes with savory yogurt like Çılbır. phoenix kai (they/them) is a queer poet, writer, and multimedia artist located on the unceded Indigenous lands of the Coast Salish peoples in Seattle, WA. Their work has appeared in the Henry Art Gallery Interpretive Guide, Beyond Queer Words, Sweet: a Literary Confection, and elsewhere. They are currently fascinated by queer belonging, identity, speculative futures, and mythological retellings. In their practice, they strive to do the undoable, to laugh in the face of human conception and frolic among the stars.

Lindsey Keefer is a second-year candidate for the MFA in Creative Writing & Poetics at University of Washington Bothell. She was born and raised in Portland, Oregon, and uses novels and poetry to interrogate the machinations of human lives and bodies.

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Atlas Kairos is a senior at UW Bothell, double majoring in Global Studies and Culture, Literature, and Arts. Deeply engaged with the complexities of the human psyche, Atlas is an aspiring artist captivated by psychology, history, astrology, mythology, spirituality, the occult, and the taboo. His academic and artistic pursuits are driven by a desire to explore and express the intricacies of human experience through various genres, including non-ction, fantasy, poetry, sci-, and post-apocalyptic stories. His work often delves into interpersonal relationships and personology, reecting his broad range of interests.

Nya Maddox is a freshman at University of Washington - Bothell. They have held a passion for reading and writing since their youth.

Manuna Mady is an Egyptian-American student at UW. She immigrated to the U.S. at age seven where she faced racism from other children in her school. She was stereotyped for being a Middle-Eastern-Muslim. When she moved back to Egypt she was also stereotyped by her own people for being “too American.” Manuna Moved back to the U.S. to start high school and there she started the rst culture club in her school district to spared culture awareness. Even though Manuna is considered part of a minority group in the CS eld she decided to challenge her self and major in it.

Abigail Mandlin is a University of Washington alum with her master of ne arts degree in creative writing and poetics. She currently works at a ne arts school as their program coordinator and writes pieces on the side that she hopes will invoke critical thinking and inspire.

Basil Mayhan has done a lot of digital art but prefers working with markers.

Joan McBride has been published in Sky Island Review, Raven Chronicles, Clamor, and Nightshade. She is currently an MFA student at Spalding University and a former elected ocial. She lives in Kirkland.

Denise Calvetti Michaels teaches Psychology at Cascadia College in Bothell, WA. She earned an MA in Human Development from Pacic Oaks College and an MFA in Creative Writing & Poetics from University of Washington, Bothell. Denise’s poetry is forthcoming in the 2024 Paterson Literary Review. Her new book, North Creek, scheduled for publication in early spring by Cave Moon Press, compiles her previously published poetry along with poems by local poets Joan McBride and Sue Selmer.

Alec Mullen-DeLand is a senior at UWB and former Clamor editor. He loves expressing his creativity and nds joy in creating through many dierent mediums including photography

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and painting. He has recently focused on capturing beauty in human stories and the natural world. He shares photography, zines, and art under @AlecExplores and @AlecMDArt on social media and Etsy.

Zach Keali’i Murphy is a Hawaii-born writer with a background in cinema. His stories appear in Reed Magazine, Maudlin House, The Coachella Review, Raritan Quarterly, Another Chicago Magazine, Flash Frog, Still Point Arts Quarterly, and more. He has published the chapbooks Tiny Universes (Selcouth Station Press) and If We Keep Moving (Ghost City Press). He lives with his wonderful wife, Kelly, in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Liyah Murry is an Interdisciplinary Arts major at UW Bothell who hopes to break into the book publishing and scriptwriting industry one day. Writing YA ction is her passion, but she also enjoys creating art in other mediums in her free time.

Annie Nguyen graduated from the University of Washington, Bothell, in the Spring of 2023.

She majored in Health Studies and minored in Health Education and Promotion. She is passionate about serving her community and self-expression.

Hong Nguyen is an engineering student at the University of Washington (Bothell) who loves art. She enjoys creating art that has multiple meanings and touches deeply into others’ feelings. She believes art and science are correlated elds and when combined together, they form a beautiful world.

Joseph Niduaza is a writer and an English instructor at Western Michigan University. He was raised in Salinas, California and now resides in Portage, Michigan by way of Blue Lake, California and Seattle, Washington. He holds an MFA in Creative Writing and Poetics from the University of Washington Bothell and is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Creative Writing at Western Michigan University. His work has appeared in Clamor and The Homestead Review.

Rose Rickey frequently wrote poems in high school to cope with all the confusion she faced. Ten years later, she is nally picking poetry back up as a creative outlet! She would like to thank her two baby cats for helping her with the creative process by waking her up at ungodly hours of the night and leaving her with no choice but to write.

Elizabeth Salinas is a Creative Writing major with the College of Liberal & Professional Studies at University of Pennsylvania.

Vanessa Sanders, Almost 52 years old, Vanessa is a fairly new Washington transplant who hails from Southern California. She is a GWSS major, but creating artistically is her passion.

Vanessa writes poetry, prose, as well as sings.

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Terry Sanville lives in San Luis Obispo, California with his artist-poet wife (his in-house editor) and two plump cats (his in-house critics). He writes full time, producing short stories, essays, and novels. His stories have been accepted more than 550 times by journals, magazines, and anthologies including The American Writers Review,Bryant Literary Review, and Shenandoah. He was nominated four times for Pushcart Prizes and once for inclusion in Best of the Net anthology. Terry is a retired urban planner and an accomplished jazz and blues guitarist – who once played with a symphony orchestra backing up jazz legend George Shearing.

Michelle Schaefer is a past Clamor editor and alumni of UW Bothell. She is retired and spends her time writing haiku poetry and has been featured in Frogpond, Modern Haiku, Kingsher and Acorn poetry journals. She enjoys living in the PNW and nds inspiration for writing in the small details of life.

Elijah Benjamin Shaw loves to run and feel the breeze. Board game fanatic, who also enjoys playing Minecraft and watching cartoons. Treasures their dog and family dearly.

Yekyum Ashley Shim is a freshman at the University of Washington Bothell. She believes in the separation of art and the artist.

Henry Strayer, a CLA student with a focus on anthropology and culturally-signicant literature.

Ashley Ziba Taherazer is a marketing student at UW in her senior year. Ashley appreciates all mediums of art, but prefers creating portraits, sculptures and knitting. When she’s not diligently studying at school, you can expect her to be on her bedroom oor trying her hand at a new craft Marzeyah Topiwala, a dedicated student at UWB studying applied computing with a minor in visual and media arts, brings a unique perspective to her artistic endeavors. Seamlessly blending technology and creativity, Marzeyah’s work reects a harmonious synthesis of computing principles and visual storytelling.

John Tavares, Born and raised in Sioux Lookout, Ontario, John Tavares is the son of Portuguese immigrants from Sao Miguel, Azores. Having graduated from arts and science at Humber College and journalism at Centennial College, he more recently earned a Specialized Honors BA in English Literature from York University. His short ction has been featured in community newspapers and radio and published in a variety of print and online journals and magazines, in the US, Canada, and internationally. His many passions include journalism, literature, economics, photography, writing, and coee, and he enjoys hiking and cycling.

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Cora Thomas is a proud sta member of the UWB/CC Campus Library where she leads and mentors extraordinary student employees. She is also the Executive Assistant at the Skagit River Poetry Foundation supporting the mission of buiding literacy and community through poetry. Cora is the rst in her family to earn college degrees, a published poet, an avid hiker, and her love language is baking.

Kit Thompson is a recent transplant to Seattle from Atlanta, they are a psychology and neuroscience student with a passion for writing, whether it’s short stories, poems, or Dungeons and Dragons campaigns. Other passions include embroidery, cross-stitch, and continuing to collect more college degrees.

Mia Isabella Trajano is a 19 year old UWB Student, with an associates arts degree in Fine Arts persuing an Interdisciplinary Arts Bachelors Degree. She’s passionate about creating art.

Vicki Tran is a UW Bothell student and a Clamor editor.

Ava Wahl is a Running Start student at Cascadia College, and hopes to pursue a career in education, English, or politics. She fell in love with writing poetry and ction ever since a pencil was rst placed in her small hands. As a student with immense interest in history, pop culture, and social commentary, Ava strives to create meaningful conversations and emotional connections with a range of important topics. She also enjoys reading and watching historical ction in her free time, and can be found writing melancholic, dramatic songs and playing guitar in her studio.

Celina Yu is a student at UW Bothell.

J. Yuen (they/them) is a psychology major at UWB who enjoys reading skillfully, writing poorly, and petting their two cats at home.

Reiha Ishijima and Sarah Ishijima are a collaborative artist duo. Reiha is the mastermind behind the ideas and Sarah helps bring them to life. You can see more at @oni_suke_ on Instagram.

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Online Exclusives Visit our website for additional digital content: clamor-journal.com Tobi Aler,

Slices of Mae Part I, II, and III, Creative Writing

Natalie Alvis,

Healing, Visual Art

Mae Ellen Abu-Alya

On the Nature of Mirrors, Creative Writing

Dante Amada,

Dionysus, Video

Waleed Badri,

[Drowning in Labels], Visual Art

Elisa Balabram,

Finding Harmony Amidst Chaos, Visual Art

Ezra Jacob Bantum,

Echo Chamber, Video Code-Switch, Visual Art

Belle Brandenfels,

Reect Me, Creative Writing

Jacob Butlett,

Androids of the Metropolis, Creative Writing

Rex Correa,

Unplugged, Visual Art

Romina Dadvar,

Vivid Imagination, Creative Writing

Sarah Daly

Youth, Creative Writing

Tessa Denton

When Silence Speaks, Creative Writing

Christopher Scott Eastman, Digital Descent, Visual Art Trailing, Creative Writing Chuck Frickin-Bats,

A Career Criminal is Born, Creative Writing

Keng Fong,

Cle Elum Lake, Visual Art

Morgan Fu-Mueller,

anatomies, Creative Writing feminine necromancy, Creative Writing

Karianne Hornberger,

Seeing Through Mirrors, Creative Writing

Ellie Llewellyn Hudson,

A Dog Experiences the End of Days, Creative Writing

Isabella

Mad Business I, Visual Art Mad Business II, Visual Art Mad Business III, Visual Art

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Mariko Islas,

Automated Human, Creative Writing

Atlas Kairos,

To Innity, Creative Writing

Hannah Kemp,

The Kill, Creative Writing Fremont Crossing, Visual Art

Brian King,

Frail, Visual Art

Jose M Cuervas Lopez,

Vegas Lights, Visual Art

Nya Simone Maddox,

i’m sorry, i’m sorry, i’m sorry(i love you), Creative Writing

Alec Mullen-DeLand,

Taking Pride, Visual Art

Nicolette Natividad,

Charged, Visual Art Family Ties, Video Always There, Video

Annie Nguyen,

No More Disguises, Creative Writing

Maksim Poklonskii,

Unrequited Love, Creative Writing

Jay Reyes,

Skykomish Mist, Visual Art Season of Sickness, Creative Writing Victoria Way, Visual Art

David Romanda,

Respect, Creative Writing Up Into The Mountains, Creative Writing

Preston Sanders,

The Balance From Which Weight Never Ceases, Creative Writing

Vanessa Sanders,

Ode to My Backscratcher, Creative Writing

Michelle Schaefer,

O the Clock, Creative Writing Truly Delicous, Creative Writing

Parker Dean Smith,

Ode to Aurelia aurita, Creative Writing Ode to Glaucus atlanticus, Creative Writing

Henry Strayer,

This is Fine, Creative Writing

Jackie Susanto,

A.romantic, Creative Writing

Caleb Tarleton,

Clutter Child, Visual Art

Kit Thompson,

Who is responsible for the suering of your mother?, Creative Writing

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Clamor cla-mor | verb | \’kla-m r\ 1. to make a loud uproar, as from a crowd of people; popular outcry 2. to publicly express (as of support or protest) 3. to make a vehement expression of desire or dissatisfaction Clamor is the University of Washington Bothell’s annual Literary and Arts Journal, representing the best creative practices in literacy, visual, and media arts from across our campus and surrounding community.

Our goal is to support and promote captivating, inspiring, and lively art in the forms of visual, literary and media work. We provide artists and authors with publication opportunities through our print edition, media publication platforms, and website. We foster community by reaching beyond UW Bothell Campus borders for creative works and by oering audiences quality recording, viewing and listening experiences.

Staed by an editorial board of current UW Bothell Students, Clamor accepts submissions annually in Autumn & Winter.

Visit clamor.submittable.com to learn more.

We are graciously supported by the UWB Services and Activities Fees Committee

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