Glass Kite Anthology :: Issue 1 by Glass Kite Anthology

Emerson Rivers

The Glass Kite Anthology was founded by Margaret Zhang and Noel Peng on July 9, 2014 in order to fulfill their goal of bringing public attention to literary works written by writers that they found to be extraordinary, yet undiscovered by most. A large part of our magazine is based on the premise of avoiding censorship. We want to ensure that every story gets heard, whether it be "taboo", "controversial", or "inappropriate" because we all know those words are just subjective. In the Glass Kite Anthology, there is no such thing as taboo, controversial, or inappropriate…just a story to tell. We're looking for fresh perspectives on what we thought had gone stale. We want work that makes us see the world in shades of sleepy periwinkle and tints of forest wildfire. We want the moving, the authentic, the raw; we want the powerful, the breathtaking, the invigorating. We want to feel alive, or like we were a corpse all along. We want your work uncensored. We want your work uncaged. We want the truth—your truth. http://www.glasskiteanthology.weebly.com | glasskiteanthology@gmail.com http://issuu.com/glasskiteanthology | https://www.facebook.com/glasskiteanthology

Contents Prose Pieces Ashley Campbell Jenna Stuart Kevin Chow Linus Lu Nicholas Sum Sho Sho Leigh Ho Somi Jun Poetry Pieces Alyssa Carlier Gwen Cusing Kaitlin Rhee Linus Lu Rona Wang Sara Bell

Cover Art preeya janakiraman Artwork & Photography Arya Natarajan Emerson Rivers Joyce Zhang Maggie Gray Melody Wang Michelle Xu

We’re All Macro Here Smoke and Lipstick Stained To Write a Good Story Cat Pink Lola Perdition’s Funeral

Chiaroscuro when you haven’t slept under your cover for days The Discarded Smile Beyond Summertime Melody Gone Kiss Domain and range mean nothing before 10 am

Untitled Piece Glass Kite Anthology You Are Beautiful Girl on the Beach Me and My Dog Red Ball Gown Sapphire Evening Liberty Rings

Smoke and Lipstick By Jenna Stuart I smell her before I see her enter my bedroom. The grey smoke always precedes her, announcing her presence like an old-fashioned gentleman. I don't move the comic from its spot in front of my eyes.

A long, heavy sigh. Another creak of rusty iron. Her tired voice, surprisingly substantial. "Please don't do this, Light. Don't shut me out again."

Maybe if I don't see her, she won't really be there. Of course, it doesn't work. There's a timid knock and a pregnant pause before anything else happens. "Light?" She says it like a question, like maybe it's not my name, like maybe I've been replaced. I don't answer. She moves across the room and sits on the edge of my bed. The springs groan in protest. "Light, honey?" she tries again. I wait for something more. This is where she usually gives up, sensing I want to be alone, and goes to light up in the kitchen or wherever. I wait for it to happen, as rehearsed. But there is no indication that she'll follow suit.

Melody Wang

Her plea falls on deaf ears. I turn a page without reading a single letter. 4

"This time wasn't my fault," she insists. "Jake set me up—he tipped off a policeman, let him know I'd be doing a job tonight. If I'd been a minute earlier, they would have caught me and you'd be visiting your Momma behind bulletproof glass."

didn't realize you thought that way," she whispers. She thinks she gets why. It frustrates me that she doesn't know at all.

"Wouldn't that be better?" I can't hold it in any longer. The book falls to one side, a page bending beneath the weight of it all. My mother is like that page, I realize. She's always bending.

"Pessimist," she teases, but we both know it's a weak attempt at humor.

I turn to look at the sorry creature that is my mother. She used to be beautiful. Her dark hair once curled and floated around her perfectly made-up face. Her skin kept a rosy glow, but still looked fair and smooth. Her jade eyes are faintly marked by the laughs of another time. A time when she was loved and knew how to love back. She used to be beautiful. Jake has ruined her.

"I don't," I admit. "But I'm being realistic."

I lean back against the pillow to stare at the cracked ceiling. Shapes jump out at me and I take absent notes of each one. It's a game we used to play, my mother and my five-yearold self. Not every memory is a bad one, I suppose. "I'll have to stay here a few days," she tells me. A star falling to Earth. A smiley face with one eye. "It won't be bad, really. More like a vacation. Just the two of us." I don't know who she's convincing.

She has ruined herself. "Better? Seeing me in prison?" Her mouth, carefully coated in glossy red lipstick, forms a scarlet O.

A lopsided heart. Spongebob and Patrick sitting on a hill. "This won't happen again," she promises.

I shrug, my eyes never leaving hers. She breaks the contact first. "I

An empty woman with tangled hair and dead eyes. A quiet boy sleeping alone in a broken house. "I'm sure it won't," I reply blankly. My eyes close and the pictures disappear. My mother smiles, relieved, and stands. "This will be good for us," she continues before leaving. "Give us a chance to reconnect. I've missed you, baby." I wait until she's gone to answer. "Miss you too. Mom."

My fingers lift the book. Underneath, a phone is already dialed, waiting to make the call it knows it must. I smooth the bent page as I listen for an end to the ringing. "911. What is your emergency?" The cracks form storm clouds made of grey cigarette smoke and glossy red lipstick. I breathe it in just one more time before letting them rain. "Hello, Officer. I heard you were looking for my mother."

6 Â

Summertime Melody By Rona Wang

I like to think the beginnings of June feel like a melody, something lyrical, something whimsical, cusp of vacation, and a prayer to the Final Exam gods. There are some things I wish not to understand, how time streams like honey during seventh-period Calculus and whistles by weekends, and Father at twenty-one, in the pressure-cooker turmoil of a revolution this month two dozen and some years ago underneath a smog-lit Beijing sky. July at night brings glittering pops of scarlet and cobalt, messy for peripheral vision: I fall in love with a songwriter who likes grilled cheese sandwiches, but only for an hour. Fireworks tint everything rosy. An hour thirty-five minutes away from Portland, the stars throb with a vitality I imagine might draw many moths. In August a rush of due-soon homework emerges mysteriously from a backpack forgotten underneath a pile of jeans, and instead of finishing history notes, I scrawl down whispers about summer, call it poetry.

7 Maggie Gray

when you haven’t slept under your covers for days By Gwen Cusing

your eyes don’t see your house as home— instead they find solace in sleeping pills and NyQuil. your bed looks unslept in for the first time in years, preserved like a wednesday night crime scene. even the softest sighs disrupt the dust resting on your pillow. when you haven’t slept under your covers for weeks, you start to feel like a stranger in your own skin. bones protest bones, a war of attrition under the largest organ your body has to give. she feels like mother arms. her heart breaks like mother. you start to notice wrinkles in your skin where there are wrinkles in the sheets and you wonder. but even the ghosts don’t want you here. when you haven’t slept under your covers for months, you become the girl who says no. your hands and feet and hair have begun to fossilize under the chill of a threadbare blanket and nightmare ridden nights. you become the one night stand that wants all the lights turned off, the shamed wretch of a woman who crawls out from under unfamiliar turf at dawn. when you haven’t slept under your covers for years, your hands don’t look like yours anymore. instead you find them wandering strangers’ skin at night, trying to find a way home. you sleep with the stars and the grass now. your feet don’t feel like they used to, can’t support the weight of all nighters pulled before exam nights. and you wonder. but even the dirt doesn’t want you here.

domain and range mean nothing before 10 am By Sara Bell she made worlds on tuesday mornings, not bothering to listen or take notes but instead looking down onto the numbers and letters at her fingertips and drawing the square roots and functions up in her mind graphing virtual abstracts of you that her unsteady hands lacked the deftness to create in her notebook. she had tried a thousand times sharpening the pencil over and over and adjusting this exponent and that denominator to get nearer to your curvature in hopes of a more accurate depiction in hopes of a smaller margin of error but she ran out of lead faster than your face ran through her head and erasers and echoed lines are flimsy compensation for such an injustice to your irresponsible perfection. so she forewent paper instead latching tight onto the afterimage which contained a calm, unstirred world where the cream in her coffee spiraled into art and froze mid-oblivion where the clicks of locks on doors meant nothing more than solitude with her thoughts where your navy-and-bleach paragon was not defamed by her shaky grey mockeries of equations or by how she couldn’t hold her hands steady and think of you simultaneously. a world where you stood alone on the balcony next to her and leaned too far out on the railing in somnolent negligence, drawing in the frigid ocean air and exhaling in raw marvel that this tuesday morning could not be more perfect.

Pink Lola By Sho Sho Leigh Ho Lola has already abandoned her pigtails for unkempt, ratty hair pulled so tight on the top of her head, her eyebrows swoop upward and make her look eternally confused. She wears two piercings on each ear, clumsily-smudged eyeliner, and a mouth full of metal. And a fake chunky nose ring that drags down her left nostril. Lola tells me she loves those smirking boy-banders and their slicked-back hair, oily fingers, arching eyebrows, and she loves blinding bright colors and she has a beanbag that’s just for looking, no touching, understand. Lola is different, and different is fun, and fun is awesome, and awesome, is well, awesome. So I sit on the fluffy rug and sneeze and listen to her talk. And sneeze again. Nostrils flared, nasal voice pitching, didya know this piece is vintage, I totally cheated that old hag back in like Oregon out of it. Yes, I’m from Oregon and I like loved it but I like love being a Cali girl now you know what I mean? Yeah, I think so, I whisper, staring at the criss-cross scabs on my knuckles. A sickly patch of pink was all that was left of my right forefinger, the red flakes being crushed beneath my fingertips. Owl stare—abruptly, she stops, voice halting with a screech and arms flopping down. What about your room, huh? Arms spread wide, challenging gaze, me flinching from the intensity like a deer caught in headlights. I want to please Lola, I want her to know that I’m a Cali girl too, I want to giggle and paint each other’s toenails late into the night, and I want her to admire me the way I am in awe of her. So I tell her, yeah, I’m sure you may come? even though my heart is telling me no, my funny bone warning me that something is going to go wrong. Then she swings her hands up, a let’s goooooo up and down up and down, reminds me of Susan Boyle dreaming a dream. Your room is nice, frills are actually like, kinda nice here, cos’ like, 17 says it’s iiiiiin, voice sliding up, Lola hitting each note on the xylophone squarely as she ascends. Plop, down on my beanbag that is for looking and no touching, understand. For some unknown reason, I am glad that 17 says my room is an inn. But Lola is never content, she points to my book nook, ooohh a window ledge and makes a mad dash for the stairs before I can tell her no. no. no. This is my secret place, don’t go up. I follow her, light tiptoe strangely unfitting after Lola’s rackety run up the steps, my heart apprehensive. No, no, no don’t go up.

The nook is my secret place. It’s where I keep all of my worn favorites—the books whose pages have been creased and traced over and over again, spines kept together with hello-kitty duct tape. Raggedy, well-loved to the right, shiny smooth covers to the left. When I snuggle in my pink comforter and close my eyes and imagine hard enough, I find myself dashing off on heroic adventures with Hermione Granger, or laughing away with Anne of Green Gables as I narrate my version of the book: “Then Anne, dressed in a delightful white smock embroidered with pink and purple roses, linked arms with her dear playmate, similarly attired in a darling purple garb trimmed with gold, and they walked off to play dolls together.” The warm smell of old books, yellowed with age fills my senses and I breathe deeply, filling myself with stories and the tales of long long ago in a far away land. “As our heroine saunters up her turret’s steps to fish out that pesky intruder, she hears—” Pink? The one with the rainbow hair exclaims, scorn laced in her voice, scorn etched on her face. I am jerked out of storytelling mode and back into the canyon of reality. Pink? Her laugh doesn’t sound Christmas tinkly to my ears anymore. She sounds like Maleficent, a chilling cackle that echoes. echoes. echoes. At first, I feel shame, dark and sticky, pulling down my soul. But, anger burns through, red-hot anger for making me feel ashamed of what I loved and for making me want to shrink inside of myself until there is nothing left but a blob of saggy skin. “But the young heroine regains control of her onslaught of emotions, and holds her head up high, putting on a mask of one who is unruffled.” And the waterfall of pride douses out the flames, along with the clenched teeth. Yes, I say smoothly, pink. Pink, Pink, I am who I am and you are who you are. Pink, Pink, My room, is still pink.

Melody Wang

We're All Macro Here By Ashley Campbell “Earth to micro-Alice, are you okay down there? Kzzzt—n you hear m—fffffshh Alice? Come in, Pint Size!” The earwig squeals feedback until I turn the volume down manually. I press the call button and reply. “Yeah, Max, loud and clear. And let me just say that your aim sucks. How much were you off?” “Alice, look, I’m really sorry about the shrink ray.” He didn’t actually sound that sorry. He sounded elated, but it could have just been the minor distortion of his voice being converted to pitches high enough for my miniscule body to hear them. "Max, that didn't answer my question. How much were you off?" “I must have jogged the settings accidentally before I initialized the molecular scale conservation subroutines. I did get the MCS right, didn’t I? I mean, you’re breathing okay?” Good of him to start worrying now. Microbiologists: no bedside manner to speak of. “I’m breathing fine, Max. Answer me, already.” "I... might have been off by a factor of five hundred." I could hear him smiling again, completely unrepentant and unworried. "Wait. You're telling me I'm..." I did the mental math, "I'm about a millimeter tall?" "Yeah, that sounds about right. You'd come up to a housefly's knees, and you could have dust mites as lap pets. How does it feel being flea-sized, Alice? I bet that MSC is feeling really good right about now." His voice was definitely not apologetic, and I just wanted to smack the incessant grin right off his smug face. Molecular scale conservation was important, especially now that I was a thousand times smaller than normal, instead of half-size compared to normal; it meant that rather than shrinking every atom in my body to be smaller, the Downscale Device

had maintained the size of 0.1 percent of my atoms and reduced the functional ‘number’ of atoms in my body. The other 99.9 percent of my atoms were all still there, technically, but the Device had shrunken them to the same scale my body had shrank, until the other atoms were tucked cozily inside the 0.1 percent, disguised as extra neutrons on their nuclei until it was time to Upscale me again. This was the work of genius we had been perfecting for years in this laboratory, but we hadn’t been planning on using its maximum Downscale setting today. The plan had been to shrink me down to half my size, to see if exactly half my atoms shrunk correspondingly or not, before attempting more drastic reductions in the mass of a human subject. We had already run countless trials with robots and animals, but only a human Micronaut - our word for a navigator of the Downscale environment - can provide the kind of personalized feedback we would need to determine if future micronautics study was worth the funding. Our grant was due to run out later this year; we had been pressed for time to produce something conclusive and practical. We had found it… apparently in error… when the Downscale Device reduced my size by a factor of one thousand instead of a factor of two. Oh, well. I was down here; we might as well make the most of the circumstances. We can just edit the research paper later to look like this was always our intent. I decided to start reporting back on the technology and the environment around me; I trusted Max to be recording everything. As absent-minded and clumsy as he could be sometimes, he was obsessive in his attention to detail. “The earwig is working great, too, Max; you have the frequency modulation spoton for this scale and the size of my ears.” “Well of course I did; scaling down sound waves was the easy part. Scaling them back up isn’t going as well. You sound like James Earl Jones on this end, Al.” “Good to know,” I replied. Then, with a grin, I added, “NO. I am your father.” Max must not have pressed the call button when he started laughing, but I could tell from the turbulence in the air that he must be in the room with me now. I certainly couldn’t see him; my eyes were too small to work with such long focal distances as the space between me and the laboratory door.

“Alice, can you report anything about where you are? I can’t see you, and I don’t want to risk stepping on you, so I’m not coming closer than the first row of desks until we have your position pinned down.” I started to look around at my environment, trying to figure out where the Downscale Device had dropped me, since I was clearly no longer standing on the lab’s grey vinyl floor. The ground beneath my feet had some kind of strange texture and irregular diamond-like pattern to it, glossy and smooth but very grippy under the soles of my shoes. “I’m not sure yet what I’m standing on, but there is something tall and completely black nearby. What’s black in the lab? Last I checked, everything in here is on a white or grey colour scheme.” “Well, there’s a lot of glass in here. My guess is you’re close to a computer screen or window, or some of the beakers and other equipment.” “Wait, glass? I’m missing something here.” “Alice, are the colours around you very strange? What do your clothes look like, to you?” He had that tone of voice he gets sometimes, the ‘you are being terribly dense right now, kid’ tone. I looked down at my bl- my orange dress? “Max, my dress has gone orange! It was blue when I came in here. What’s going on? All the colours are weird down here.” “The colours stayed the same, Alice, but now your microscopic eyes are receiving ultraviolet frequencies and translating them to your brain as though they’re part of the visible spectrum. Glass is opaque to ultraviolet light, so it looks black to you. Cotton absorbs or transmits the higher ultraviolet, but the low end of UV is reflected, so anything cotton is going to look reddish… or orange, like your dress.” “Oh. That makes sense.” “Alice, tell me what you’re experiencing biologically. How do you feel? Try jumping.”

“Jumping?” I felt silly, but I made a little hop, which turned out to be a much bigger hop than I intended. “AHHHHhhh.” I rose high into the air and then plummeted in a fast, graceful, totally uncontrollable arc back downward to the blurry rectangular-tiled pyramid-like structure below me. I would have blown clean past it and kept tumbling into the yawning void toward a floor too far away to see, but I managed to grab onto one of the rectangular tiles at the last second. The tile was vast in all directions except in thickness; it was little larger than my arm, and I was able to easily get purchase on it, pulling myself up to stand on it. The texture was the same as the ground I stood on earlier, but the patterns were different now, more rounded, and a different muddy colour. “You okay, Al?” “Yeah. Jumping is a little too easy at this size. I’m pretty sure I just flew several body lengths or something, but I can’t see far enough to be sure. The landing hurt, but not as much as it would have at macro scale.” “Yeah; your mass is a lot lower now in proportion to your volume. Any physical task should be a lot easier. How do you feel, though?” “To be honest, I’m a little light-headed. It feels like altitude sickness in reverse: way more oxygen than I actually need. I have a lot of energy right now, too. I was a little sleepy earlier, but I’m really alert right now. My metabolism must be working more efficiently than it’s ever worked in my life.” I stood still and contemplated for a moment. “I’m also feeling a little feverish and queasy? That doesn’t seem normal.” “C’mon, Al, look at the situation. Define ‘normal.’” “Hey, you jerk, you’re the one who asked me to tell you what I’m feeling.” “Yeah, yeah. I already wrote it down. ‘Queasy, not normal.’ Now what else can you tell me about where you are, since your jump? Remember, you’re still the size of a flea. I won’t be able to unshrink you until I can find you in the first place.” “I’m still close to the glass whatever, and I’m really cold now, and I’m standing on something rectangular and really thin and flat. I’m going to guess it’s paper in the macro.”

“You’re cold due to your size; the room is pretty balmy, with the server room next door. As for paper… there are a lot of open books in here. Can you get more specific?” “Um… hang on. I’m going to try some climbing. I think I’m pretty far from the floor.” I knelt and scooted toward the edge of the rectangle, gripped the edge, and lowered my body over the side. I’ve never had much upper-body strength, but the task was effortless, as if I weighed next to nothing. I looked at the space below my rectangle, and it was supported by a bunch of other similar rectangles, tilted on their sides. I could barely make out another flat rectangle far below me, maybe a hundred body lengths away. “Max, I think I’m going to really put my relationship with gravity to the test.” “What are you talking about?” “I’m going to try to get closer to the floor. If I go silent for very long, assume I fell a little too hard.” “Al… I would tell you not to do anything stupid, but I think we’ve already rendered that advice laughably meaningless, so… do what makes sense to you. Just keep reporting back. If I have to go over every book in this lab with a magnifying glass to find you, I will.” “I trust you. Time to see how well my shock absorbers work!” I exhaled and let go of the edge of the platform. An impossible-seeming amount of time later, I landed with a breath-stealing whump on the next platform down. I laughed as I picked myself back up. That had been too easy. I inched over to this platform’s edge, peered over, and saw yet another set of tilted supports, yet another platform many body-lengths below. I slid myself over the edge once again, landed once again and with a bit more grace. “Okay, that went well. I’m still not sure where I am, but I think I can get to the floor safely from wherever this is, if the rest of the structure is put together like the part I’ve been climbing on. At this point, I’m pretty damn sure it isn’t a book. Just… Max,

keep your eyes open. I’m on something with a lot of diagonal pieces holding up a lot of flat pieces.” “Okay. I’ll look around. Glad you’re still in one piece, Alice.” I descended two or three more of these platforms, wondering when they would end, and then suddenly the entire structure trembled in a rush of air. It trembled again in a returning vacuum of air, and I clung tightly to the surface of the platform. “Max, what was that? There was turbulence in the air.” “Oh, Al, that was just Docto-” “Alice? This is Jennifer Straylight. Are you okay? I heard Max talking to Darth Vader and came to see what was going on, and the Downscale is engaged, and… good god, what have you two gotten up to, now?” She spoke very quickly, as though she was always in a terrible hurry, no matter what she was doing. Doctor Straylight was the senior quantum physicist and microbiologist at the research facility where Max and I were junior researchers in her lab. She had put her faith in us and gotten us every grant to date. Now, she sounded extremely worried, and it wasn’t just a distortion of the earwig. “I’m okay, Doctor Straylight,” I responded, feeling sheepish about getting her so upset. She had been like a cool aunt to me, and she had mentored Max all throughout his master’s programme. If anything went sour in our experiment today, it was going to bode poorly for her, even disregarding whatever danger I was in at the moment. I tried to reassure her. “Nothing is going… badly, exactly… we just had a bit of a mix-up with the scale settings on the Downscale Device.” I could feel the turbulence of her exasperated sigh in the air. “How big of a mix-up? What was the factor of difference?” “Um. Five… hundred.” She didn’t push her com button, but I felt her outraged WHAT from across the room.

Her voice was clipped, too-carefully controlled when she spoke next, and I knew that something must be terribly wrong, just not what was wrong. “Alice, we need to get you back to macro scale now, or the dean is going to have my head for this. Where are you?” “We’re still figuring that out, Doc,” Max spoke up, at the same time as I said, “Not sure yet; why, what’s wrong?” “Oh, I am absolutely going to strangle you two, if you survive this. Alice, think about what you know of every animal test we have run so far. Think about the rabbits.” “Um… they’ve gone okay, Doctor Straylight?” Max sounded puzzled. “No, I mean, think about what happened to them afterward, especially the ones we have scaled below factors of ten.” This time, I caught on before Max did. None of our white laboratory rabbits had survived more than a few days after we had scaled them down smaller than a tenth of their natural size. We didn't know why, yet, but the current hypothesis was that the experience frightened them so badly that it damaged their hearts. Rabbits could die of fear like that; we hadn't thought much of it. “They’ve all gotten sick. Why?” “I figured out the reason just a few minutes ago, and I was going to come in here and tell you two, before I caught you both being completely reckless and irresponsible! The test animals below factor ten have all been getting sick with radiation poisoning. The molecular scale conservation allows you to stay alive and breathing at that size, but storing the surplus atoms as pseudo-neutrons causes your atoms to become unstable and radioactive. If you are scaled down by a thousand, then for every single atom in your body, there are nine hundred ninety-nine extra neutrons either floating around freely or bound up in those atomic nuclei, making your entire body extremely radioactive.” “Hey, guys, couldn’t we use a Geiger counter to find her?” Max still sounded unreasonably cheerful, considering the news that I might be doomed to a nasty and

painful death by self-irradiation. No wonder I had been feeling feverish and ‘queasy, not normal.’ Damn. “That would work normally, Max,” the doctor replied, “but this building is made of granite, and this room is full of containers of mildly radioactive compounds like elemental potassium. As small as Alice is, she won’t even register next to the background radiation of the room and the facility itself. We’re just going to have to find her the old-fashioned way, with careful reasoning. Alice, have you learned anything more about where you are, since we’ve been talking?” I thought about it for a moment and realized that I had learned something. The structure on which I stood was easily moved by turbulent air. “Max, Doctor Straylight, I have an idea. Keep your eyes open.” I walked along the edge of the platform where I stood, weaving my way through the maze of strange rectangles, until I found one of its angled supports close to an edge. I kicked it hard, and it budged only the tiniest bit. I kicked it again and again. Anything light enough to move in the wind wouldn’t be heavy enough to crush me if it fell, and a sudden movement would tell the others where to look for me. Maybe if I could cling to one of these rectangles, it would make me even easier to find. Finally, with a full-body tackle, I budged the support out of its position, and with a great swooping rush of movement, the structure began to collapse and fly out into the room. I grabbed the nearest rectangle and clung to it, feeling the air supporting it like a wide cloud. “Waahhhhahh! I’m flying!” I knew I was in danger; I knew I might get sick… but there was no beating the exhilaration of flying on whatever it was that carried me. I was standing on a flying carpet the size of a football field, with strange diamond patterns on it. I was in a land of wonder, a microcosm, the first human pioneer into true micronautics. What felt like full minutes later, my vehicle came to a rest on the ground. A vast black circle descended over me… a magnifying glass?

“Found her! She’s on the ten of diamonds. I’ll go get a potassium iodide drip prepared in the infirmary, Doc, if you’ll get her back to macro.” I felt the intense single and rush of air as the Device sent out a beam to Upscale me again, and in just a few moments I was my normal self, dressed in blue, feeling extremely nauseated and short of breath as Doctor Straylight escorted me to the lab’s infirmary for anti-rad drugs. I glanced back the way we had come, to see the red extinguisher in its wall niche behind a glass pane and a sign, Break In Case of Fire. The doctor checked her watch and quickly did some calculations to estimate how long I had been exposed to my own Downscale radioactivity. Max stood nearby, his perpetual grin never leaving his face as he stuck the intravenous tube into my hand. I wasn’t at all certain the entire event had been an accident, and I could tell from her reaction to his attitude that Doctor Straylight shared my reservations. “Alice, once we find out if you’re going to survive your little venture, I’m going to need to have a talk with my other graduate assistants.” She glared meaningfully at Max. “They really should know better than to build a house of cards in the middle of the laboratory. It’s most unprofessional, and it was right in the way of the fire extinguisher! What if there had been an emergency?”

Beyond

By Linus Lu

Beyond the mountains a a.) tree b.) bee c.) sea d.) a pessimist in a red t-shirt calling out: “you cannot you cannot impossible give up give up give (impossible) up cannot” The retort: (silence) and beyond the silence: endless waves…. they go up and down and farther down and still down splashing upon the cliffs below the soaring birds along the gusts of wind that blows up up up up “Beyond the clouds There, the colors The promise, long awaited Within reach! Hold out your hand. Grab it. It is your happiness. Do not let it go.” down down down falling back to earth and the fading hopes disappearing dreams but the rebound the scraped knees a paper + a tear the emphatic run and beyond the veil above the sky the gates to is it really? heaven paradise the stuff of fantasy….

Maggie Gray

Cat By Nicholas Sum I have to do it now. Tell her. It’s August 25. I sit on my bed, my feet on the floor of my room, wearing a light blue t-shirt and light brown khaki shorts. It’s hot but not unbearable, since the fan is running and the windows are halfway open. I fall down sideways on my pillow, and put

my feet and legs on the top of the blankets. I close my eyes to sleep. And it becomes black for only a moment. Color floods my eyes: the sun’s annoying rays have made it through the window and onto my eyelids. I put my arm in front of my eyes and sit up in my bed. The covers slide off my shirt I must have pulled on the covers during my sleep somehow. It’s 12:30. “I have to go,” I mutter to myself. I pull on a white cotton hooded vest over my shirt, and walk out the front door of the house. She must be around here somewhere. I walk around and up a set of stairs on a walking path over an empty street, slowly making my way around. The sun beats down on me so hard I almost feel sick. I stop and turn around. A crow atop a stop sign caws and flies away across my field of view. I turn around once again, walking again, on a sidewalk. Across the street is a park and I see her on the top of a structure in the middle of the quiet space. She wears a pink apron-like skirt and a black shirt with sleeves going down a bit past of the elbow. No one around. I take a breath and a step into the park, and a lazy wind blows, pushing a set of swings. I climb to the top of the structure where she sits. “What are you doing?” “Nothing, really,” she replies. She sits with her back toward me, and my back faces hers; each of our sets of legs hangs off the platform into the air. “It’s hot,” I say. “Yeah, it is.” “But I don’t really hate summer.”

“I do.” I turn my head around and see her petting a black cat that had appeared. She turns around to look at the cat and me. The cat swings its tail from side to side as its head bobs up and down from her hand’s weight. The cat runs out from under her hand, down to the ground and to the opposite side of the park where I had come in. It runs up the steps and stops halfway up, turning around, calling us to follow it. She stands up on the structure. “I have to go.” I look up at her standing figure, confused. She runs down the stairs, toward the cat, and my eyes follow her. I get up as well, and chase after her. The cat moves again, and darts through the entrance opposite from where I had arrived. It turns to the right and is hidden behind a fence. We chase after it. The cat runs onto a crosswalk, two strides ahead of her, five strides ahead of me. She follows it into the street. The walk light turns red. “Wait! No!” I scream to her. A truck appears in front of her and honks loudly. She stops, standing straight in front of the truck. She turns around and mouths two words that I don’t hear. My eyes open wide. I scream. A loud crunch mixes with the sound of the brakes. The color of the splattered blood mixes with her scent, choking me. I stand there. I don’t know what to do. The cat has arrived on the other side of the street. It licks its black paws. I stare up into the deep light blue sky. And then I close my eyes.

*** My eyes shoot open once more. I feel my bed under my back; I feel my pillow under my head. My eyes see the ceiling of my room. I sit up in bed. I walk outside and see the same stop signs. Two crows sit on one of them as well. They fly away. I continue on to the park. She sits on the same structure. There is no wind. I stand next to her. She sits while I stand. “What’s with you?” I sense two eyes watching me from behind and I turn back. The same black cat sits on the ground, hind legs up, tail swinging. I remember the cat, somehow. I stoop down and grab her hand. “It’s kind of weird. We were sitting in this same park. Why don’t we go back.” She turns to look at me. “Huh?” I lift her hand up as I stand up. “Let’s just go. Anywhere but here.” “What are you talking about?” I make my way down the structure and pull her along by her wrist. I take a right after we leave the park. I slow down to a walk when we reach the sidewalk. I pull her along. “Let go of me!” “No.” “I said, let go!” She pulls her wrist off of mine with the last syllable. My arm stays back and I turn around, my hand out. “Hey!”

The cat sits and muzzles its whiskers, its tail going from side to side like a clock. I turn to the street. She is across the street, under a construction site. All heads around look up in horror. Beams fall from the sky over her head and I run toward her, but it’s too late. “No!” She moves her mouth the same exact way as before as a beam hits her straight in the chest. My vision blurs, hot. Black. *** I open my eyes wide in bed and bolt upright. I take my vest and run out the door, to where she is. I run up the structure where she sits, her back turned to me, and grab her hand and run down the other side. “What’s your problem?” I take a left. We go down the sidewalk and up a flight of stairs. “Hey! Let go of me!” I refuse. “Just come with me! Please!” “You’re acting really weird!” At the top of the stairs I turn, and I see the cat. I stop dead in my tracks. She runs by me as I stare into the cat’s red eyes. My grip loosens and she falls out of my grasp. Down. Into the street below. I turn, mortified. The cat scratches its ear. I run to the edge of the platform, where I see her mouth the same two words. She falls into the darkness below. I scream. And I close my eyes. Darkness. ***

I open my eyes in my bed. I run out the door and slam it shut behind me. I wander the city and turn back only once. The crows have gathered now, about fifteen in all. I turn, not caring anymore. She sits on the same spot in the same way. I sit down behind her. “What are you doing?” “Nothing. Why?” “Nothing.” “It’s sure hot, huh?” “Yeah, it is.” “I don’t really hate summer, though.” “I think I do.” She pets the black cat, like before. It runs away once again. When it stops on the fifth step, I get up. “I have to go.” “Huh?” I follow the cat out of the park and she follows close behind. She runs out into the street. I see a truck. “Wait! No!” I run out into the street and grab her hand, pulling her back and me forward. She falls backward, out of the truck’s path, and I to the truck. I see her surprise. The cat sits behind her. It watches, patiently waving its tail. “Screw you, cat.” Darkness.

Gone Kiss By Rona Wang You told me once New York City was the color of scorched things, seeping at the seams with unswept streets and pretty twentysomethings who do not collect catcalls but receive them anyway, and this is what I thought about after your stickyelasticAltoid mouth, which tasted like yesterday's four-letter words and the dizziness of champagne, of promises unkept. Something electric, something crunchy, they say all that glitters is a knockoff made by six-year-olds in a sweatshop and that's how I remember your lips, salivashinyplastic.

28 Michelle Xu

Perdition’s Funeral By Somi Jun Paradise knelt by the roadside, Purgatory holding a blue plastic umbrella over her. “I think that’s enough,” Purgatory said. Paradise held two flowers in each hand. “Perdition won’t think so,” she said. “Perdition can’t care. I think that’s enough,” insisted Purgatory. Paradise looked at the four measly stems in her fingers. She sighed, but tucked them into her dress pocket, and stood up. “I hope you’re right. How embarrassing would it be if we showed up, and she didn’t even like the flowers? I wouldn’t be able to look myself in the eye ever again,” Paradise sighed. “I won’t be able to, either way,” said Purgatory. “I’ll never look in a mirror again.” Paradise stared at her blankly. “What was that, Purgatory? Purgatory shook her head. It wasn’t worth mentioning a second time. “Nothing,” she lied, and walked on ahead of Paradise. They were already late for Perdition’s funeral. *** By the time Purgatory and Paradise arrived, the chapel was packed with black-swathed bodies, their bloodshot eyes trained on the ground in front of the

vacant pulpit. Perdition’s closed, bleached coffin began where their eyeline ended. At the foot of the coffin was Perdition’s signature red dress and red plastic umbrella. The black bodies shuffled when they noticed Paradise and Purgatory’s presence among them. Quietly, they shifted against the chapel walls until there was a clear walkway from the girls’ feet to Perdition’s coffin. Paradise nudged Purgatory forward. Purgatory shook her off. Stiffly, hyperaware of the hundreds of eyes on her, Purgatory walked down the cleared path, kneeling in front of Perdition’s coffin when she was close enough to reach out and touch it. She didn’t. She stayed a safe distance away. So did Paradise, who stood close behind her. Purgatory could feel Paradise’s fresh morning breath creeping down her spine. “Come on,” Paradise whispered. The delay was making her anxious. “Come on. They’re waiting.” “Okay. Okay. Don’t rush me.” Slowly, shivering from the weight of the eyes, Purgatory pulled her dress over her head, and dropped it in a wet heap at her feet. Her fingers found the red fabric of Perdition’s dress and tentatively brought it towards her. She stared at it. Ten seconds. Twenty. Paradise coughed. The congregation stared. Purgatory pulled the dress on. The fabric clung to her still-wet skin, and she shivered some more. She realized that Paradise and the rest of the congregation had taken a step away from her. She reached for the red umbrella and brought it to her chest, clinging to it like a safety blanket. “Hi,” she said towards Paradise, the red plastic cool against her skin. “Hi,” Paradise said, nervous. “Hi, Perdition.” Shaking, Paradise pulled the four flowers out of her dress pocket and offered them to her red-clad counterpart. But just as their fingertips were about to touch, Paradise let go of the flowers. They drifted to the ground.

Perdition stared at those four pink blossoms, striking against a mourner’s carpet. She began to cry, because it had been a lie: she didn’t feel different at all.

The Discarded Smile By Kaitlin Rhee He walks with a melancholy mouth, turned-down lips, and teeth that weep; and when he meets another, he slips away, eyes averted and words scarce, to his floe. Once upon a warmer plane, he stood until he froze to an isolation he would not soften. Another chance of thaw, another back turned, each time a winter more away from melting polar ice. They say he is unhappy for his treasured cold, but it is not the cold he values most. He is the man who threw away his smile.

StaIned By Kevin Chow A soft warmth filters through the windows, casting a muted glow on the cool, marble floor. I sit with my back against the wall and watch the patch of light slowly crawl across the floor, which is a deep red. The blood doesn’t really bother me anymore. I stand up. Each step sends a biting chill running through my bare feet. Each step sends an echo deep into the hall that fades into the inky darkness. If I stop walking right now and look outside the window, and if I wipe the wisps of mist away from the glass, I can still see the old battleground, a plain of shattered earth. Even the spidering vines of bramble don’t dare trespass onto that mass grave. I quicken my pace. There are more ghosts here than I can imagine. It’s almost dark now, so I start to run, holding up the fringes of my nightgown. I’ve memorized every step, and I barely have to look down. I’m scared of what I might see. My eyes close and my heartbeat quickens. Splish, splash. Splish, splash. I stop running when I reach my bedroom. I don’t let my eyes drift even an inch beside the doorway. There is nothing to see. When I enter the room, my heart clenches. I sit down and bury my toes in the rug, and the tears start coming back. I try to forget everything, but it all returns with jarring clarity, all the blood-stained memories— *** When I was born, people wanted me dead.

Our kingdom was once at peace. The year before I was born, the thirteenth noble family cursed the royal line with the threat of death. Some nights when the sun had set, and the fireplace had thrown long shadows across the walls, I would bury my face into your chest, and you’d carry me all the way to my room in your arms, and you’d tuck me in and promise that you’d never let me go. One morning, through the little window of my bedroom, I could see knights clashing in the distance. I couldn't make out much else, but I could hear more than enough. You were gone for entire weeks, and sometimes I thought you would never return. Each time, I would press my nose against my bedroom window and stare across the land, until I could glimpse the glint from your armor. Then I would run down the staircase and sprint across the marble hallways and into the sunlight, and you would pick me up and spin me around. “Rose,” you would say, “I missed you.” Then one day you told me urgently to run back inside, and when I tripped on my skirt and fell on the marble floor, you picked me up and told me not to cry. You carried me back into my room and told me that you loved me. When the first screams sounded, I hid under the covers and tried to block out all the noise, but the sounds were already trapped in my head. Each scream had a name, I knew. Thump. At first I thought it was my heartbeat— Thump. I curled up into a little ball. Thump. The door flew open, and I closed my eyes. Each breath sounded too loud.

A whisper: “Rose?” I flung my covers away and you wrapped me in your arms. You picked the blankets off the ground and tucked me in while I cried. Your rough lips brushed against my forehead. “Daddy, what’s happening?” You took my hand in yours and let out a short breath. “Why does he want me dead?” I asked. Outside, the world still roared. Your voice sounded choked. “When the world conspires to take what you love, fury stains the marble floors with blood.” I saw the anger that swam in your eyes. “Rest, my sleeping beauty,” you whispered. I traced my eyes along the ceiling for a long time before I remembered anything. When I finally sat up, the blankets slowly slid off the bed, and suddenly everything felt cold. I took a step outside, and a sharp smell slammed into my nose, and my eyes watered. The marble floor was a sea of red. Each face was nameless, except for one. Beside my doorway—it was you. *** I said that the blood doesn’t really bother me anymore. But when I wade through the claret tides, each step stains the marble floor with red. And anger ignites. That bothers me.

Chiaroscuro By Alyssa Carlier White is the cleanest color of them all. It is the color of milk, the color of new-fallen snow. It is a warm blanket on a winter night, your mother's first and last kiss. White is purity so unsullied it begs to be tarnished. Red is the fiercest color of them all. It is the color of fire, the color of autumn leaves. It is a blooming rose, waiting to seduce its crimson partner by extending its thorn. Red is passion so intense it sets fire to itself. Brown is the warmest color of them all. It is the color of wood, the color of your morning coffee. It is your grandmother's hand-knitted sweater, trampled by the very people it nourishes. Brown is the comfort we always seek and never treasure. Grey is the coolest color of them all. It is the color of rain clouds, the color of dirty ice. It is the receding hair of an old man, cloth pulled over coffin despite a widow's sobs. Grey is the truth that no one wants and no one can avoid. Black is the darkest color of them all. It is the color of crow feathers, a starless night. It is darkness that engulfs half the world, abyss when your eyes close. Black is the sum of all colors. Black is the end.

36 Joyce Zhang

TO WRITE A GOOD STORY By Linus Lu “I was too weak to move myself, so I moved the world.” Hemingway told me that in order to write a good story, all I needed was one true sentence. -One true sentence? -Yes, just one. -And I’ll have a good story? -Yes, and it has to be the truest sentence you’ve ever written. -Truer than— -Yes, truer than— Timmy disagreed. -It also can’t be moral. -Why not? -Otherwise it’s not true. You have to be true. -But just one sentence. -No. -No? -It has to be beautiful. -And I’ll have a good story?

-No. -No? -It has to be ugly. -And I’ll have a good story? -No. -No? -Maybe. As long as it’s true. *** They wouldn’t believe me. They were adamant. There’s no way this is real, they said, you can’t lie like this. But I’m not. I know I’m not. It’s true, all true, I say. Every word. Every word? Yes, every word. Even the part about the red grass and the sun rising from the north? Yes, especially that part. The sun did rise from— They were skeptical. They shook their heads and sighed. -Is it a good story though? -I—I have to say that— -Why not? -It’s too real. *** Joyce told me that in order to write a good story, I had to write dangerously. But…how dangerous is dangerous? He smiled a mysterious smile, and then bade me good luck in his thick Irish accent.

-Yes, writing is an adventure. He smiled. -An adventure where? -Yes, you shall find out when you get there. Yes. He smiled again. *** A big oak tree, and blazing sunlight streaking through. Laying on the blanket, staring into her dark, beautiful brown eyes, and her staring back, transfixed, everything still, and in slow motion, our faces inching closer and closer… *** -You need a strong foundation if you want to write a good story. -A strong foundation? -Yes. Something to ground you into, an idea, or place, or—or a person. -A person? -Yes. Do you love anyone? -Myself. -Then ground yourself. -How? -You see the big grey building over there?

-Yes? -Remember to ground yourself. *** Consistency is important, but contradiction is more important. I learned that in school, that two truths is always better than one, that when someone asks, “What does this all mean?” you can point to left and then point to the right and you’ll always be right. You have to always be right. Otherwise all you’ll be left with is the left. And that’s just not right. Consistency is important. It’s true. It’s right. It’s wrong. It’s left. Faulkner told me that in order to write a good story, I needed peace. -But I’m writing a war story. -Doesn’t matter, you need peace. -Peace of mind? -No, just peace. -Where do you find peace? -Out there. He pointed towards four o’clock. -What does it feel like? -Huh? -What does peace feel like? - It sucks. ***

[insert silence] [add slow breaths, inhale and (wait for it) exhale] [add crickets chirping in the distance] *** Kafka told me that in order to write a good story, it needed to wound us. “A book must be the axe for the frozen sea within us,” he said. -It can’t be happy. It has to be dark. It has to be felt, deep within us. -And I’ll have a good story? -It has to penetrate the soul. -Penetrate…okay. -Yes. -And does it have to be true? -If you believe in it enough, it will become true. -Even if it’s not true? -But it will be true. -But not yet. -As long as you wish it to be, it will be true. -And I’ll have a good story? -Yes, that’s true.

*** I came across an old friend the other day. He was old and walked slowly, taking each step carefully and deliberately. He was in no rush, and had a warm expression on his face as he waved at me. I waved back, not sure whether or not to engage in conversation with him. But I guess I never needed to decide, as he turned away and slowly walked into the distance, not looking back. *** Beckett told me that in order to write a good story, I needed silence. He said, softly, “Every word is like an unnecessary stain on silence.” -I can’t go on. -I’ll go on. *** Vonnegut told me that in order to write a good story, I had to want something. Really badly. Even something small, “like a glass of water,” he said chuckling. -I want a good story. -So write about that. Let the reader know that.

-But what is there to write about writing a good story? -Make bad things happen. -How should I start? -Uh…perhaps a quote? -Yes? Ok. And so? -So it goes. *** And so it goes. I think I should start. There is much to be said, but nothing at the same time. I guess a story shouldn’t try to be good in the end. Goodness, I think, doesn’t have a point. It just is. I need a lot of things. Some I have, some I need, some I want. I want a good story. I want to tell a lot of things. I need a beginning. I need an end. I have nothing. Yes. Nothing is good. Nothing is true. The best story is the one not told. My lips are sealed. I say nothing. One true sentence. The unspoken sentence. -

Editorial Board Editors-in-Chief / Founders Margaret Zhang didn’t always love to write—in preschool, her teacher told her to write about the weekends, and this is what she came up with: "On Monday, I go to school. On Tuesday, I go to school. On Wednesday, I go to school. On Thursday, I go to school. On Friday, I go to school." (She didn't know what a weekend was.) It was the belief that she had superpowers which first sparked her interest in storytelling, and her life has revolved around creative writing ever since. She has been recognized by the Scholastic Art & Writing Awards and The Poetry Society, and her work appears in Creative Kids, Parallel Ink, and a few smaller and local publications. At this point in her life, she is a Holden Caulfield trying to be an Atticus Finch. Noel Peng is a 2014 California Arts Scholar in creative writing. In the first grade, she plagiarized her first short story unknowingly after hearing her sister tell her the tale of "Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs" and decided it would be a great idea to write it down and call it her own. While she no longer plagiarizes, Noel enjoys strange habits such as people watching, and giving herself unhealthy doses of old Disney animations. She is a sophomore who attends Castilleja School. She lives in Palo Alto.

Prose Readers Ashley Campbell is a linguist, classicist, and piano teacher from southern Illinois. In her free time, she deconstructs media, studies several fictional languages and a couple real ones, reads science fiction and urban fantasy, and writes for Everything2. She lives in a small rural town with her husband, their cat, and too many musical instruments. Kalyn Josephson is a senior at Santa Clara University, double majoring in English and Biology. She spends her free time writing, reading, watching movies and sports, and hanging out with her friends. Her ideal day consists of sitting by the fire on a cold, rainy day with a cat and a book, and she has a soft spot for Pit Bulls and absolutely anything Irish. Stephanie Stott is a slightly reclusive, book-loving junior at Osceola Fundamental High School. She usually busies her mind with fantasy worlds and anime characters. For two years, she served on her school's award-winning literary magazine, the Oracle, and though she's a bit wary of the future, she plans to make a living off of writing. She resides in Largo, FL. Nicholas Sum is a lowly 10th grader at Saratoga High School. He enjoys writing, and editing stories and other written works. He hopes to contribute to the Anthology and have fun while he's at it. When he is not writing or editing, he's usually doing his 10th grade homework, playing video games, osu! most of the time, reading, watching videos, or doing what other normal 10th graders do. Nicholas currently resides in Saratoga, CA.

Poetry Readers Samantha Jensen is an art-loving junior at Castilleja School in California. She is obsessed with anything French and couldn’t live without coffee. Her favorite place in the world is anywhere near the ocean. Her first word was “blue” (which is now consequentially her favorite color) and her love for poetry began when she attended her first Oakland poetry slam. Stephanie Lu lives in the Bay Area and specializes in writing awkward kiss scenes because that is the only kind of kissing she ever does. She forgets to do many important things (like change the cat litter or cut her nails) but she can skateboard, as well as read very fast. Unfortunately Stephanie is not very good at skateboarding.

Gwen Cusing is a sophomore in high school. She enjoys chasing ducks at parks and making faces behind strangers' backs. Her dancing skills are lacking but what she doesn't have in technique she makes up for in enthusiasm. Gwen is not a poet yet, but she will be someday. As for right now, she likes to think of herself as a poet-in-training. Kusha Gupta is a sophomore at Castilleja School. She loves the smell of the first rain and sitting by the fire with some hot chocolate on a cold, rainy day. Her hobbies include playing the classical Indian instrument sitar, listening to old music on a record player, and watching The Lion King (and many times crying while doing so). Kusha currently resides in Los Altos Hills, CA. Ashley Campbell see bio above

Visual Arts Editors Arya Natarajan is a very nerdy, slightly quirky, hermit-like sophomore at Aragon High School who spends the majority of her time doodling, eating, and scrambling to finish homework. In her spare time, she likes to play the violin, take photos, and write crazy stories with even crazier characters. She happens to be severely addicted to bad jokes, Disney classics, and old hippie music, and she thoroughly enjoys learning useless facts about the world. Michelle Xu is an introverted, socially awkward Youtube fangirl who still happened to be honored with multiple awards in her life. While she has excelled in multiple subjects including synchro, science fair, and speech and debate, she now finds herself in her room experiencing an existential crisis. She enjoys taking/editing photos, making graphics, watching YouTube, and sometimes writing adult fan-fiction. She currently is a student of Saratoga High and, unsurprisingly, lives in Saratoga, CA.

Our Writers & Artists Alyssa Carlier is a high school student in Hong Kong. She doesn't have a day job, but at night she breathes ink and paper and Kindle. In between bouts of writing, she dabbles with laboratory bacteria and blogs at randommorbidinsanity.blogspot.com. Arya Natarajan see editorial board Ashley Campbell see editorial board Emerson Rivers is a self-proclaimed philonoist and an ambivert who dreams of becoming a professional musician someday. When not busy fiddling with her instruments, she's usually binge-watching on tv series, reading, writing, listening to music, learning computer programming, or pondering about truth, ultimate reality, lies, and human nature among other things. Gwen Cusing see editorial board Jenna Stuart is a cynical art-lover who has tried her hand at writing, acting, and singing. She loves writing first and foremost and has been working on her stories for nearly a decade. She is into fashion and the dark, Edgar Allan Poe and anything steampunk-related. She can usually be found on a computer or in the mountains, and always with a book on hand. Joyce Zhang is a student at Saratoga High, where all her blood, sweat, and tears reside. She loves eating food and seeing people smile. In her free time, she enjoys trying to find something that yields only one Google result, blasting guitar music, dying in video games, and doodling all over the homework she doesn't understand. Kaitlin Rhee is a 9th grader at Castilleja. She enjoys analytical, persuasive and creative writing; she contributes her creative writing pieces, primarily free verse poems, to Caledonia, her school's Upper School literary magazine. She and a friend published HAZE, a teen fiction paperback, in September of 2014. Kaitlin most enjoys writing poetry and short stories, and her favorite genres are fantasy and historical fiction. Â

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Kevin Chow lives inside the safeguard of a storm-weathered aria, a shard of folly aimed straight for the sun. The previous sentence is a prime example of his silliness. Linus Lu is a senior at Saratoga High. He is a Gold Key and Silver Key recipient of the 2014 Scholastic Art & Writing Awards in short story and poetry, respectively. He is an avid musician, enjoying both playing music and composing it. He’s taking 5 AP's, including both AP Lang and AP Lit. He just enjoys writing, the process, the pride, the rhythm, and the release. Maggie Gray is 15 and goes to Castilleja School. She started taking photos at age 13 and has continued taking photos ever since. At the moment she is doing a 52 week project, a project where the photographer takes at least one photo per week. She enjoys posting her photos on Instagram and Flickr. Her favorite food is pumpkin pie. Melody Wang is currently a sophomore who attends Monta Vista. In a way, she doesn't know what she is doing with her life because she plays volleyball but doesn't actually enjoy it. However, she does like to spend her free time drawing, listening to music, and watching TV. She can usually be found sleeping or doodling in class. Michelle Xu see editorial board Nicholas Sum see editorial board preeya janakiraman wishes she could be a professional dancer for the rest of her life, but as a slightly pessimistic realist, she plans to pursue a career in film or architecture. In her free time, she enjoys trying to make her friends laugh with dry sarcasm and arbitrary statements. After reading the beautiful work in this publication, she advises you to cup your hands over your ears and listen to the oceans within your body. Rona Wang is sixteen years old and a junior living in Portland, OR, an artsy city full of vibrant people whom she draws inspiration from. She has been recognized nationally by the Scholastic Writing Awards. Her writing has appeared or is forthcoming in The Best Teen Writing of 2014, Canvas Lit Magazine, Brouhaha Magazine, and others. Sara Bell is a 15 year old lemon-bar-lover from Campbell, California with purple hair. Her pastimes include being late to everything, missing second serves in tennis,

shrieking at the unexpected, and making unnecessary and irritating noises with their feet. She switches back and forth between two states: avoidance of homework and panic about said homework, all of which result sometimes in poetry and sometimes in cold coffee at 2 am. Her favorite vegetable is Brussels sprouts, and all she really wants in life is a leather jacket. Sho Sho Leigh Ho is a 13 year old girl who writes. And writes some more. When her nose is not buried in some book, or when she is not weaving stories in her head, and eventually on paper, she can be found playing squash, singing, or debating. Somi Jun is the human form of the candy Necco: "coagulated blob of dust." She is pretty functional though, despite being dusty and sometimes pastel, and really happy about her recent bouts of treat yo'self. She likes lattes, but is sorry she can't say, "Oh, I take my coffee black" because that phrase is reserved for the sophisticated and welldisciplined. 'Tis da hard lyf. She also runs an online artzine called Tunnel with some nice people aka friends (???!??!) on tunnelzine.wordpress.com.

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©ｩ Glass

Arya Natarajan

Kite Anthology

Issue 1 | Fall 2014

Want to submit? We are the Glass Kite Anthology. Dedicated to the mind-bending and completely original literary works by people of all ages. We're looking for work that surprises us, inspires us, and makes us think. We want pieces that transform us, voices that leave footprints on the bedroom windows, words that live on even after our eyes have left the page. Most of all, we want original work: creations that come straight from the heart, with distinct voices that defy the mundane. If you think your work fits this description, we would love to review your submission. Submissions are open all year round and reviewed on a rolling basis. The cut-off for our second issue is January 31st. If your piece doesn't make the cut-off, we’ll consider it for the future issues. Visit our website, look around, learn more about us. And when you’re ready, don't forget to submit. http://www.glasskiteanthology.weebly.com | glasskiteanthology@gmail.com http://issuu.com/glasskiteanthology | https://www.facebook.com/glasskiteanthology