Gina lyanda 53. Olivia O'Sullivan

THE 48-HOUR DAY

Night. My eyelids were wrinkled stone seduced by the heavy door. Then those nightmares pinched me wake 'til sunrise I dreamed staring.

Day. That delicate shock of smelling heat. A careful butterfly sat upon the screen, rays bled onto its back, velvety wings glistening beneath the light. I could feel molasses sweat. And from ice and stone, I melted with a butterfly on the floor.

-Ginalyanda

I AM MY MOTHER'S TENNIS SHOES

I am my mother's tennis shoes, worn like day-old pumpkin bread. In myyouthful days when the skywould stain rose pink my mother would keep us inside. Concealed to living room dance parties with Madonna We were light-footed and content.

Now, my mother's eyes are dull thrift store rings, cracking every time she hears contorted new music, swaying from mylips. I tell her I want to shave my head which dances into,I like...Emma.

I can see her ears quiver every time I whisper new lyrics into our family,

Make y our life simple, Olivia. Stop straining your vocal chords.

I've realized I'm the one leaving scuff marks all over the floor.

-Olivia O'Sullivan

I AM THE GARDEN

An untrimmed garden, soul soiled by hanging leaves, dead petals and twisted gray grass Weeds biting into my flaws to keep the scars on my soul, and trap me in shadow.

The call of crows nesting in thorned brambles, nettles of despair hooked into their aching wings. Such creatures oft lay silent; terror tying their tiny maws shut, and neglect begging their strife to fester.

An untrimmed garden, the storm cackling high above - growing louder, a shriek refusing to pass. Oozing, black sludge - pained rain feeding the unwelcome, spreading ireful ivy and malicious mallow.

Seeds have long been planted, specks of beauty lost to the depths with a hopeless longing to rise like kings. Like a smiling torch, you've begun to burn the hanging leaves, bringing to those kernels a taste of ardor.

The filthy muck dripping from the raging tempest turned glimmering pure, cleansing the morass. And despite uneven ground, your golden rays. pierce the stubborn surface and force my heart to glow.

A passion to rip out weeds and filI wounds, bask in your love and turn dying crows into grinning starlings. Paper-thin roots sliding from the seeds, cool stems of lush verdure spilling leaves of lilac luster.

An untrimmed garden, soil soon swimming with the sweet fragrance of nectar and sprightly green grass, Mind afire with color and dancing blossoms - filled with timid tulip, wriggling rose and alluring aster.

And to silently lay with you, staring at the now - clear sky without a whisper of doubt, is the wondrous dream I can't do without.

-Nick Mains

THE WORLD COLLAPSED

I shivered under the covers and held the receiver to my ear. "Do you really have to go so soon?" She said something about possibly being fired and something about traf6c, but I only thought about what it would be like to see her walk through my door again. She said she d be there in ten minutes. I hung up and walked to the window. Outside, I saw a dozen mothers in a dozen minivans, all waiting for their raincoat clad nine-year-olds to get in and soak the leather seats. When I looked for the horizon, I couldn't find it. The sky blended in with the black top, now spotted with puddles. The downpour couldn't drown out the thunder, and the thunder couldn't distract my mind from trying to make the hands on my wall move faster. Only eight more circles of the red one and she'd be here, wiping her feet on my welcome mat. Distraction. I sunk into my lazyboy chair and put my hand on the wall next to me. The eggshell finish wasn't enough to convey an implication other than 'padded cell.' I picked up a book. I put it back down. I went to the fridge. I wasn't hungry. Six more. Had my quest for companionship lead to a question of sanity? The furniture in my humble kitchen told me to calm down, to act more like they did. Peaceful. Comfortable. I considered walking outside and knocking on my own door; it would placate my nerves. I didn't have anything to serve. No time to run out. Time? Five more. Come on, Stanley, you don't want her to think you're desperate. I stood next to the window and leaned my forehead on the cold glass once more. Minivans drove off and through the sky's drippings I saw her in her carriage, being pulled towards my home. Her steeds stopped out front and she tied them up. Gallop this way, you angel,you. She was early. I was up on my feet, struggling to handle the break between seeing her outside and seeing her at my door. The pain would be worth it in a few seconds. She tried knocking, but I opened before the knock was finished. She smiled at me and I took off three of my layers. She walked in, brushed her wavy hair out of her face and hugged me. I withdrew, briefly, to turn the air conditioning on. When I returned, she was sitting on her throne in the foyer, looking down at me. "You have three hours," she said.

Half an hour gone by. Her clothes found their way to my floor. She found her way to my sofa and held me in her arms. I sat their immobile and gave a look to my kitchen furniture. I wasn't going anywhere.

She brushed a hand through my hair and for a moment I looked away, quizzically distracted by a noise I heard from across the room. I saw myself, standing there, looking at me. I stood there, holding a bucket, laughing at me. As I lay in her arms, I walked to the wall, reached into the bucket with a paintbrush, and began splatter painting the walls with every color in the spectrum. I turned around and looked at me, laughing even harder.

She leaned in and kissed me as I watched myself be an artist. I accepted it but soon looked back and saw that not only the one spot was painted. The entire wall was. The colors ran back and forth, up and down, and across the room. Some of it landed on my sleeve. I wiped it on her arm and it spread lethargically across her entire body. She became those colors and I leaned into kiss her again, blinded by the reflection of the light from my ceiling fan off of her body's saturated canvas. Pollock on my love. When I looked back, I saw myself again, sitting across the mom drinking wine with my father. They kicked over my coffee table and my father scoffed, "Here, sport, come sleep with us tonight. It wasn't reaI." I pleaded with her, "Please don't leave me here by myself."

An hour and a half gone by. At this point, I could no longer recognize the residence I had occupied before her arrival. Outside of my window I could no longer see the usual maple that greeted me every morning. It just stood there, starting at me with its beady eyes. Around it, nothing was stationary. Either the wind blew stronger than anything I had ever seen or the world was spinning off its axis. It made the exterior view from my place into a blur of bluebirds, back packs, and bondage kits. Next to the beauty that lay before me, I saw the colors from the walls collecting on the floor. On top of that, the fridge in the kitchen opened its doors and began pouring out what looked like a cross between milk, vanilla extract, and blueberry jarn. The liquid combined with the colors from the walls and formed a mass pool of hyper-colorful swirls. My closet doors then burst open and from inside, five little kids from my second grade class swam across my living room in inner tubes, splashing each other in bliss She looked at me and wanted to know what I kept looking at. I didn't bother beginning to explain. I closed her mouth with mine and heard the belittling comments coming from the chairs at my dinner table. Two of the kids were now sitting there. I thought they were talking about me but it turned out that they were fighting with each other. They got up and started wrestling each other to the ground. Eventually, the second one drowned in the pool on the floor. The first one ran around my place, high-fiving the other little kids and now the walls, which had morphed in large faces with arms. Everything was laughing. I looked at my love and pleaded, "Please don't leave me here by myself."'

Two hours gone by. Had I reached the void yet? Cabinets in my kitchen were flying open, spewing out sprays of a red liquid that, when coming into contact with itself, burst into a cloud of contemporarily unbashful music. She stopped our activities for a moment and I could almost see the original color - or lack thereof - of my walls. She looked at me and smiled. She told me that she loved me. The front door burst open and an immense wind tumbled through my apartment. Everything fell off the walls, the kitchen turned into

mayhem, and we were almost knocked off of the sofa. Eight more versions of me rand in through the door, waving guns in the air, protecting each other from the storm that was brewing. The tried to sit down and play cards, but on top of the wind and turbulence that shook my place into oblivion, they were now being curse at by Just Smitheson, my third grade crush. She told them they never really meant it. I tried to ignore her and pay attention to the first woman in the room. I looked at my love and pleaded, "Please don't leave me here by myself."

Two and a half hours gone by. My place was filled with people. Th"y all sat in a circled around my love and me, smoking tobacco products, blowing smoke in our direction until the cloud grew so thick that it solidified and blanketed us. A man sitting near the sofa pulled out a saxophone and started plalnng as quick as the devil would allow him. He didn't make a sound, however. The noise from the horn travelled out of the bell and into a series of cups surrounding the sofa. When the cups were filled, everyone in the room grabbed one and took a sip. When they did, the sound of the saxophone multiplied until it was the sound of twelve saxophones, all soloing to whole-tone scales in every key. The sound was beautiful. The people fell to the ground, cryingbecause it hit them so hard. Their cries built into screams and I pulled the blanket of smoke over the two of us. We were sake inside. I looked at my love and pleaded, "Please don't leave me here by myself."

Three hours gone by.

The world collapsed around me. Lying in her arms, I looked up and drifted away as all of the Impressionist works that had been created on the walls melted downward into a large, culturally-eclectic puddle on the floor. The ceiling fan spun until it was no longer clearly visible; it detached and flew out of the window, which was now morphing into crystalized shapes that refracted the scarce sunlight into every visible color.

The colors were cast across the room. The walls became less concrete and my previously familiar room became a kaleidoscope. The colors cast on her face made me want to reach out, grab some, and taste the abstract result of our chemistry. I decided, instead, to cut the middle-hand and imply taste the rainbow of my companion's smiling face. The clock fell from the wall and sprayed the room with its shattered glass. The sofa opened its cushions and spoke to me. "Stanley, you know what time it is. You knew this was coming. Get off of me, fluff me, and open the front door. She doesn't want you. She never wanted you. She never wanted you in the least bit. Give up. Why do you think she's leaving? AII you are to her is a schizoid. Give up, Stanley. Open the front door. Give up, Stanley. Open the front door!"

I screamed. I screamed for minutes. I put my hands to my ears and blocked out every sound of it talking, but its voice echoed in my head. The screaming wouldn't make it go away. I looked at my love and I saw that she too was lying there laughing at me. I stumbled to the front door while still trying to block out all of the noise in the room. It was pandemonium. When I opened the front door, I saw my father standing there, Iooking at me. He pushed me out of the way, hurried to the sofa, and grabbed my love. He dragged her across the floor, out my place. Before he left with her, however, he looked at me and said, "Go back to sleep. Stay home from school tomorrow. No, you can't have friends over when you're staying home from school. Play in your room. Just go play in your room."

With that, he slammed the door closed. I turned around and tried to ignore the ringing in my ears. My place was how I remembered it. Grey walls. Nothing in the fridge. Water on the window. When I crossed to the window and looked out, I saw one minivan waiting outside. It waited in the rain for one last child to come out. He came out, afraid of the water falling from the sky. When he opened the door of the car, I saw that it was me. I kissed my mother, and she drove off. Homeward.

-Max DeGenova

-AdrianaMiranda

HALCYON

As I sit I stare into the infinite azure I have been accepted and labeled, Rejected and set free, And set on a path With an end I cannot escape But I can still feel the taste Of a time when I did this before. I am so pleased to know That the sky is the same color With the same ambitious depth As when I was a child.

-Elon Sloan

DUCT-TAPE GENERATION

Flowers weave in this dining room, hunching over and weeping on our walls. My mother and I shower them with water. Trace our fingertips over the vines realize why the petals in our house are lowered in prayer, we are depleting. There is a chandelier drooping in that room.

It's coiled with glass, glittering, grunting. It stems out, eyes our family from the canopy on our ceiling. I believed it was the trophy of our house. When you walk in, you can see it is shattering light. I used to think it was made of gold. Now its limbs are writhing snakes, the lights flickering like tongues. It dangles

on a strand of a Home Depot rope, plasticchalked. My mom and Dad both lost their jobs in 2009. When I askwhy our chandelier is hanging from rope,

my father says, "Because without it, it would fa11." Clear as his stare. We are balancing on stigmas of flowers and empty checkbooks, wet checkbooks. My mother and I look into the vines woven

on our ceiling. There is something dripping on her checkbook. Blunt as writing. We're learning to drain swamps hold our lights up with ropes. Fix this drooping house. We are grown to be mended, maybe with duct-tape or a balance.

-CamaraBrown