Dorothy Moore

ONE HUNDRED, AT LEAST

In fourth grade, the boys concuss the glass of our class' crawfish tank. Thistle the wet shells against palms until they go limp. Say they found them this way, ribbed and sweaty out of water. It is always an accident.

Our class goes through dozens of shipments that year. Soggy boxes stacked by the window, nothing left

when June came.

On the last day of school, I slosh into the kitchen. A ribless and sagging box in my hands. Its insides molding, a single crawfish curled to the side like a fist. I tell my mom I want to nurse it whole, I believe I can save it.

It stays in my room that year, under damp sod and fish marbles, I keep it in a shoebox hospital until it rots.

My junior year in high school, my grandma coils to the white-metal railing of her hospital bed. I have tried this before: I know how to cradle shells in palms, what bodies look like as they sink. She pushes my hand from her cheek, confuses me with her dead husband. When she gets like this, the doctors say we aren't supposed to stop her, she is too sick to heal but I want to coax her strong. I visit her every afternoon for the rest of the year, never leave her water glass empty, but I cannot keep her alive.

On the way to the funeral home, my mother's fingers are damp on her lap, still fisting the lilies from my grandmother's nightstand. I have seen this beforethe rot on the back porch, my hands scrubbed raw with burial dirt; we are all trying to save something.

I am sixteen and trying to hoist a body from bed sheets, still too small to stand without drowning, to squeeze between mourners and tissues and eulogies to cup my grandmother before she sinks into the ground.

Nothing to do but wait for the room to spill over like too heavy tanks, for the concuss of glass as the mourners leave.

-Dorothy Moore

AN ATTEMPT AT SECOND PERSON

I compare it to the resounding echo of a songin a cave, you explain. Your wording is not quite right, you cannot precisely pin down your feeling, but you have to try because he so badly wants to understand, and so

you try again. It feels like stomaching a mousse after fighting through a feast. Or the welcome sore in your legs once you stretch and run. You get a blank look. Blank faces are not like picture books, and you reaTize that you can't draw whatever you want on someone else's. This one seems an uphill battle, but you don't give up. /t's like dancinglike a naked idiot on a muddy bench in an abandoned park at one in the morning, wearing everything on chilled and sleeveless, flailing arms for no

one, no one watching. That hit him. It's that bad, huh? he says. He sounds like he knows. But he doesn't understand. You do. You try again.

It's worse than bad! lt's worse than the baddest. It's falling down after dropping a quarter. What? It feels like wadinginto hot water that burns you and scalds you as it soothes you. It feels like relief and it feels like torture because it feels like relief, you say, and it is so close to right. You look into his eyes and you will him to see it too. It is listening to beautiful music, so true and beautiful that it makes you cry. It is taking the bad things off your mind, speaking them to the world what you can't say to anyone else. You are alone, but you are with yourself. You say all that because you have to, and you know you've said it right. His face begins to color, a crayon in the hands of a child. Vaccinesarevirusesthatbringrelief,too,hesays. Andanyonewouldrotherhavethevaccinethanthereal

deal.

Itwillfixyou, he says.

He knows.

-Rachel Dranoff

INFANT EYES

Infant eyes, peering through roseflesh lids, roam, Exploring the cradle of childhood home: Resplendent dreams that can never be known.

-Tony Foley

LEAF ROBBERS

From the world's life preservers and parasols for the poor, outstretch rough, grasping arms, reaching towards the eternal light. Out burst an army of bright green newborn hands, suppliers of energy and pieces of art. Just as the humans who observe them, touch them, depend on them, no two are exactly alike. They are the teenage girl at the community pool, basking in Mother Nature's warmth. Tears of joy stream down the Earth's cheeks, feeding the green hands, now adults in their mortal existence. The tears stop, and the cotton balls of the sky begin to part. From the life preserver, now a glorious statue in the sky, comes a relaxed sigh. The statue's hands begin to dance. But in the dangers of the night, when the protective eyes of the Sun are shut, an invisible enemy attacks the statue, with unwelcomed hands and breath of ice. The statue, now alive, a furious man, desperately fights to stay alive. But he is no match for the silent attacker, who amputates his hands with a whistling saw. The once magnificent hands of the man, the colors of a crayoa box and providers of life, now resemble the skin of a decrepit creature submerged in a bathtub for hours. They plummet to the ground, skydivers without parachutes, people without hope. And as invisible blood seeps down to the ground, the attacker pulls out a white blanket and suffo-

cates the man.

-Dana Langhans

ABUELO SEVERIO

Summer of 1997. Star watching from the expanse of your lap. Scoping the skies with half-moon eyes because your fingers draw through my hair, and I love that. A warm mountain breeze apologizes for the heat rash that had subsumed our afternoon. But soon I, rocked by your laughter, drift to sleep.

Winter of 2007 , Time has rounded off your rigid shoulders. Drilled holes into you, so your voice flakes and your hands shake. Age nibbled at the lines that connected you to this world, and now the light behind your eyes seems to flicker on, flicker off. Little pieces of you drift in the silence; settle at our feet, on our laps, in our hair. I grip your hand and assure you that it's ok. We don't have to want to talk.

Spring of 2011,. She's neglected to turn on the kitchen fluorescents. Shadows bleed into her hair, and pool under her eyes, and stain her lips from cherry to black. I wonder if death has sucked your colors in this same way. Cast in monotone and still as a painted funeral we grieve, together yet alone, between the pepper shaker and the sugar jar.

Winter of 201L. A silent chair looks lonesome without the burden of your presence. It waits. Metal arms speckled with chipped paint may have grown as cold as you must be, yet the burnt-orange leather still seems to hold your indent. A lingering memory of your musky soap smacks me in the chest. I'm as reluctant to accept your absence as the worn lawn furniture. We wait.

-Paula Stocco

QURBANI

And it's the glare of the path passing Ttrrough other, clear bodies reaching For absolute relief, that's holding Us in place so our body's failing To continue advancing

We encroach slowly on each day. Mounds of tentative dreams when I Purge myself from your life, Ereeze in flickering screens anything we don't share

Your laughter heaped in my mouth, Seeping from the cracks in our smile Salt coats our tongue, as a sea ofwords Dives into the fishbowl we clutch tightly to our skin

Where did you go? I've been dancing on swings, Puppeted through the glare, Thawing time capsules that explode And sear flavor into my flesh, Just waiting, anticipating your condensation Onto the glassy people that separate us

-RuchaMehendale

MY GRANDPA TOLD THE STORY

My grandpa told the story like raindrops hitting wind chimes As frustration and anticipation made my hands quake Under the weight of burnt dish towels and uncooked pasta For me, it is possible to burn water To disrupt a long line of culinary geniuses

He told me about the man who grew figs on a half-dead tree He said they would be the sweetest figs of all, the ones grown to defy obstacles Mixing Italian with English Lilting with every uncertain consonant that dove from his cheeks Dropping vowels until they splashed at my ankles

Like the fig tree, his old knobby hands, stunted from arthritis Formed protective cages around my spider-web fingers As our complexions matched and our blood ran parallel Me, a small girl of logic and he, a man of faith Don't worry, he said, the figs will fall

But at the funeral, my aunt tried to replicate it As her hands sketched in the air Betraying his inflection that we all knew perfectly well But could not replicate

Now the story is told like sick eulogies dripping from cracks in the ceiling With sweet fakeness that grinds against my ears On his birthday, at family dinners or when my mother starts to cry But it's there every time my brother looks at me with slideshow eyes and says Zoe,what do you remember?

I fichi sempre cadono The figs will always fall.

-Zoe Kovatchis

EDITOR BIOS

Tony Eoley, better known as $36-TFolly, is a pinkle. He beat that aah with his sporcle skills, but the same can't be said for his "KOBE!" shots. The administration is after the key to his code, but even he doesn't know it.

Carrie Peterson, the calming, sober, realistic, eloquent, charming, magnet of Crest, still puts up with us, especially Tony. After 3 years of good impersonations and wit she's the reason we show up every Wednesday. She speaks slowly without being patronizing.

Rucha Mehendale, not to be confused with Tony, is our favorite Crest child. Don't let her size deceive you; she will eat any and all food in the vicinity. Give her crayons and she will be content, and hopefully one day her doodles will turn into skyscrapers. Next year, she'll build Crest even higher.

Franka Del Santo scares us. When she's not watching Twin Peaks or listening to obscure bands, she's frightening us with her plans for future fetus tattoos and pictures of doll masks. She breathes art, and has had as many jobs at Crest as she has hair colors.

Rrap Kryeziu's soul is vegetarian (technically). You may know him around the halls as the Mr. OPRF of Kosovo and no picture can do him justice like his modest self-portrait. We'll remember him by his catchphrase: "No."

Celeste Erickson burps. A lot. Without her no one would laugh at our bad jokes, and we wouldn't have a moral compass. She is the sunshine of our group, and we're sad she couldn't be with us for longer. We know where she lives.

Elon Sloan is the serious side of Crest. Between her vegetarian club meetings and her feminist agendas, she still has time to leave her damn tissues everywhere. Crest is just the beginning of her budding literary

career.

Ms. Lee is our fierce defender and caring mother. Although she's always rushing out the door, she rushes right back to us. She's always willing to provide us with the things we really need... like food.

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