Fall 2023 Mosaic by Marist Mosaic

www.maristmosaic.wordpress.com maristmosaic@gmail.com 3399 North Road Poughkeepsie, NY 12601 Cover Design by Kaitlyn Dugan, Christina Brown, and Abigail Koesterich Interior Layout by Ava Kaloz Cover Image: Self-Portrait, Jennifer Cabrera, 2026 Opinions expressed in Mosaic do not necessarily reflect the views held by Mosaic staff, students, faculty, or the administration of Marist College. © Mosaic 2023 2

Mosaic Editorial Board Editor-In-Chief Riley Mazzocco Art Editor Kat Bilbija Poetry Editor Evelyn Milburn Fiction Editor Cassandra Arencibia Nonfiction Editor Alyssa Borelli Design Editor Ava Kaloz Associate Design Editor Amanda Nessel Cover Design Committee Kaitlyn Dugan, Abigail Koesterich, Christina Brown Social Media Committee Kirsten Mattern, Paige Graff, Giulia Rufino Event Planning Committee Noelle Swift, Lily Jandrisevits Mosaic Advisors Mr. Robert Lynch and Dr. Moira Fitzgibbons 3

A Letter From The Editor The Mosaic Editorial Board is proud to publish the Fall 2023 Mosaic: a literary and arts magazine highlighting the incredible work of Marist College students. All Mosaic submissions went through a rigorous blind peer-review process in which student section editors evaluated submissions for publication. This was our most competitive selection process since our relaunch in 2021. I would like to thank all students who submitted their work to the Mosaic, and encourage each of you to submit again to our upcoming Spring 2024 edition! Your creativity, hard-work, and talent is what makes this magazine successful. The Mosaic Editorial Board would like to thank the Student Government Association for the time and effort they put into chartering our publication. We would also like to sincerely thank Mr. Robert Lynch for his unwavering support and dedication towards the Mosaic. Thank you to Alex Podmaniczky and the entire Digital Publications Center for helping us print the magazine. Thank you to Dean Martin Shaffer and Dean Jacqueline Reich, and the entire English and Arts departments for helping us find the accomplished students that are featured in this edition of the Mosaic. I would personally like to thank Dr. Moira Fitzgibbons for all that she does for the Mosaic. She is everything that you could ask for in an advisor; helpful, kind, supportive, and someone I have been honored to work with. Thank you Lauren Lagasse, the previous Mosaic Editor-in-Chief, for believing in me. I would not be here without you! The Mosaic means the world to me, and I hope this edition makes you proud. I would like to thank the Editorial Board for all of their hard work this semester; this publication exists because of their passion, commitment, and love for what they do. They were an incredible team to work with, and they made my first semester as Editor-in-Chief one I will remember fondly. And finally, thank you for reading this semester’s edition of the Mosaic! This magazine would not be what it is without the support and readership of the students, and we hope you enjoy this semester’s edition of the Mosaic. Sincerely, Riley Mazzocco Mosaic Editor-in-Chief 4

TABLE OF CONTENTS Self-Portrait Jennifer Cabrera Cover I Am a Boreal Beast Keira Carpenter 8 ***Swan Song of the Twins Grant Lenski 9 Growth Marisa Brown 10 Elio Kat Bilbija 11 Dark Ride Anonymous 12 il mercato Claudia Molina 14 Bread and Butter Charlotte Beer 15 ***Wednesday, 3:30 pm Rebecca D’Ambrosio 16 Northern Lake District Megan Byrnes 18 The Bend Gabriella Amleto 19 Love Letter to my Dad Kat Bilbija 20 Madison Abby Koesterich 21 broken windows Carly Andrew 21 ***Three-Dollar Poem Julia Konopski 22 Routine Anonymous 23 The Diary Entry of a Withered Spirit Laratee VanNieuwenhuyze 24 Skaneateles Kim Rosner 25 Men Used to Wear High Heels Anonymous 26 Mischievous Blueberries Eva Bonanno 29 The Driver Era Kait Dugan 30 My Lucid Dreams Kim Rosner 31 guitar hendrix Marisa Brown 31 Stupid Lindsey Clark 32 Fractured Luke X. Johnson 35 Bugs In Love Kendall Pastreich 36 Wishful Amnesia Kiki Wiehe 37 Beauty in the Slums Ava Kaloz 38 Envie (Beautiful Executioner) Lorah Murphy 39 Healing Christina Brown 40 ELIZABETH August Boland 41

*** = Content may contain themes of abuse, grief, death, suicide, war, mental illness, and body image. 5

Midfoss Iceland Savannah Pinto 41 Corrosive Conversations Adam L. Freda 42 Flowers on the Lake Lorah Murphy 43 Same Traditions, New Emotions Jordan M. Burwin 44 From Cupid Isabella Libreros 46 glowing hope Andrew Chiafullo 47 Mia Casa, My Home, Casa Mia Claudia Molina 48 Not True Lily Jandrisevits 49 ***it’s okay momma Luke X. Johnson 50 Rage. Marisa Brown 51 Regret on Lovers Street Yahenia Ortiz-Benitez 52 View from the Areoplane over the Sea Eva Bonanno 53 Beatlemania (’65) Margaret Batta 54 Capri Claudia Molina 56 Kintsukuroi Ferris Milinazzo 57 The Swan Hannah Gnibus 58 Vincent Van Gogh Adam L. Freda 59 there’s a light in the window Morgan Chambers 60 Carousel of Life Jillian Blaszko 61 Oh, That Bottle August Boland 62 CARNAGE Ava Kaloz 66 Today, like all days, but somehow different Kiki Wiehe 67 I don’t know how to describe it Sarah Gurskis 68 A Family Requiem Megan Byrnes 69 A Love Letter in Invisible Ink Margaret Batta 70 The Day the Bees Came Kait Dugan 72 Ink Abby Koesterich 73 balconies Bella Loiacono 73 Roots Jonathan Adu-Amanfoh 74 Plant Alyssa Borelli 75 Transform Kendall Pastreich 76 eggs Carly Andrew 76 A Walk Down Memory Lane Vanessa Hasbrouck 77 I am still there. Anonymous 78 Heritage Heartbeat Grace M. Hallinan 79 I Just Am Luke X. Johnson 80 6

Demonic Dive Bar Caitlyn Campo 81 Teenage Dream Cira Shaw 82 I Remember Florence Alyssa Borelli 86 Untitled Carly Andrew 87 quiet cat Bella Loiacono 87 To be impressed Kaitlin James 88 Great Men, Old Men, Dead Men August Boland 89 Changeling Gabriella Amleto 90 Athena’s Rock Christina Georgiou 91 ***Silverfish Caitlin Blencowe 92 Figurehead Sylvie Bell 93 ***PopPop Francesca DeRosa 94 get out. Marisa Brown 95 Fetters Kyle Neblo 96 Lecia Jenna Corrado 99 Untitled Megan Byrnes 100 A Goodbye to Summer Ode Channah Garcia 101 The Real Still Life Grace M. Hallinan 103 The Angel Lost in Hell Nicholas Ferrari 104 Innocence Megan Byrnes 105 The Red Beret Francesca DeRosa 106 Wires Ashley Laub 108 Life Imitates Art Jennifer Cabrera 113 Obsessive Compulsive Disorder Giulia Rufino 114 In Her Eyes Isabelle Erb 115 Skaftafell Glacier Savannah Pinto 117 being alive. E’mme Armstrong 118 The Seelie, The Siren, The Sea Francesca DeRosa 119 ***Night Dancer Sarah Gurskis 121 A Week in September Anonymous 123 Jazz Zine Jennifer Cabrera 124 The Child of Another Man’s Face Bridget McGuire 125 Sestina for Daniel Lily Jandrisevits 127 Serene Silence Luke Hamling 129

I Am a Boreal Beast Keira Carpenter ’26 First Place, Poetry

I am a boreal beast A woodland wyvern A cruciferous creature No one knows my form They don’t dare come close enough Even the leaves fear me Heehee! Have you ever been walking in the woods Late at night And heard a little sound you just can’t place? Perhaps a pitter patter Or a chitter chatter Or maybe even a skitter scatter? That’s me. Eeeeeeeee! Through the unending night I wander Nothing but trees are all I see Gives me endless time to ponder Each and every mystery Why do others cower in fright When I am coming near? I never dared approach the light It might reveal my sorry plight My image is far from a delight And so I hide among the night Alas, I remain a boreal beast A cryptic crawler An abnormal anomaly Everything runs from me Hehehehee! 8

Swan Song of the Twins Grant Lenski ’24

A dying man lay silently on the table of a long white hospital bed. He says nothing while the large analog clock ticks steadily across from him. He has laid there, exactly as he is now, for an extended period of time preceding this moment. Suddenly, a suit-clad man who looks exactly like him swings open the door to the room so violently that it knocks over the clock, hung so high on the wall of the stuffy room, causing it to hit the floor at such an angle to fracture the pane protecting its gears and hands into a thousand small shards of glass, each of which cascade brilliantly onto the bright tiled floor lined with grout. The man, whose face was already red and sticky from the streaks of glistening tears running down his face, flings himself to the other man’s bedside. The two look disjointedly upon each other for only a few seconds before the man in the bed bursts into a remorseful sob so loud it bounces off the walls of the room multiple times before escaping into the hallway. This was the first time he has cried since his diagnosis about three months earlier, when the doctor, during a routine checkup of all things, told him he was dying of an aggressive form of small cell lung cancer. The suit-clad man embraces the bed-ridden man in hopes of soothing him, and to distract himself from the tears which continue to stream down his face. He says “brother, why now do you cry?” “Because brother,” the man says between broken sobs, “I do not want to leave you!” The suit-clad man relaxes his embrace and allows the other to look him in the eye. This is the first time the men had looked upon each other in such a way since the diagnosis. The man on the bed continues to sob, and sob, and sob, until he suddenly stops. His body stops, his heart stops, his brain stops, his everything. It all stops. All at once. It all just stops. The suit-clad man holds his gaze on the bed-ridden man intently, as if he wishes time itself has stopped completely. Maybe this is his attempt to force the moment to never end and prevent the inevitable from ever happening. But even he knows... his twin has died.

Growth Marisa Brown ’27

Elio

Kat Bilbija ’24 touch me with your name draw each letter on my skin and pull me in closer syllable by syllable please speak slowly but caress me deeply get twisted up in my bed sheets as we’re late for dinner love yourself as you do me call me by your name whisper it to my lips howl it to the world tell me in print show me in signature and take me swimming after.

Dark Ride

Anonymous ’27 Second Place, Fiction I was born on a day where serial killers died, and so I find it in my heart to love just as intensely. I am a drunk when it comes to romance, stumbling around in the same directions over and over. Misinterpreting signs and digging deep into meaningless kindness is my specialty. It’s because of this habit that I find myself on this dark ride with you. The plastic seats smell like gasoline as I get into the boat and I almost feel sick to see your face beside mine. The ride starts with a jump and the outside world fades away. As the light is stripped away, secrets lay bare within the darkness. I look at you and you smile at me brighter than a mushroom cloud. Almost-human things entertain us in this tunnel of nothing, and I can’t help but wish I was hiding amongst them. But you’re different and so am I, so our boat keeps floating along. Empty ledges pass by as I look into your ear. Eyes facing front never looked so good on you. You could’ve seen all my teeth if you were looking. You could’ve had everything you wanted. But you didn’t and as the ride drags on I realize you never wanted anything. Whatever I am made of isn’t good enough for you and so you suggest we go on bumper cars next. The silence in my head feels louder than bombs even though my mouth is moving just as fast as yours. The ride ends with the taste of dark chocolate in my mouth and a flashbulb burning my eyes. The picture they took of our mannequin selves depresses me though you say we look great and we exit the ride just as quickly as we came. Whispers blaze in my mind like cherry bombs on my walk home from that carnival. You could’ve driven me but I couldn’t stand being stuck in a car with the windows up with you. Everything about you kills 12

me inside. You only hold my hand when yours are burdened by the bite of winter. I only see your face when there are others nearby. Even when we’re alone I feel like there’s nothing within you. I know this because I fell for you. I fell for your kindness and your humor and your smile. And there were moments where I was deluded into thinking it was love. Because you remembered my middle name and my favorite movie. But you never noticed when I cut my hair or when my smile faded, and it makes me feel like just another fool with a patchwork heart. I wish you would think about me day and night and hate me just as much as I hate you. And I wish you would love me like we were on a dark ride. I wish you would kiss me hard enough to burst my blood vessels and fry my nerves. Crush the bones in my hand and fill the blood in my heart with your own. Stain the collar of my T-shirt with your scent and brand my skin with the ridges of your fingernails. You already took my mind so take my body too. Kiss me, kill me, ravage me all you like because I’m yours in that dark ride. We could climb out of the boat and do whatever you want among its flickering bulbs and I wouldn’t care because even things I hate are wonderful when I’m with you. I’ll break my back on those concrete ledges if it means I get to lay beside you. Let me see the scars you have and the scars you’ve given. Let me see the real color of your eyes. Let me count the number of hairs on your head and the pores on your skin. Let you do the same to me, not because I asked but because you’re the same kind of a lover that I am. Because we are lovers in the first place. But that dark ride was too bright and you remembered gloves so we stayed two separate hearts for another time. One living on without a care in the world. Another that fell in that murky water lined with pennies and got caught in the gears of that dark ride.

il mercato Claudia Molina ’23 Third Place, Art 14

Bread and Butter Charlotte Beer ’26

This summer runs hot like my breath So I’m switching between legs as I stand The pavement beneath ablaze in embarrassment And I take comfort in the ache At least I’m not alone in this feeling This summer is alive and young and breathing Peaches hard in a wrinkled palm Mosquito bitten bruises– an insect delicacy And everywhere you look is touched by green Eyes and earth and creek This summer is steeped in a searing quiet Scripts and magazine cutouts and small fears A shaky performance of an understudy She’s messed up the last line She’s restarted the scene This summer is an epilogue of adolescence Bread and butter on the table Water in my lungs and air between my teeth Words open and loud– tanned from their exposure Sitting on the dock and under blue street lamps naming trees This summer is an undoing A steady, slow, unraveling A small eager stone orbiting and summoning Tempting a stagnant peace Sometimes I hate it but in this moment I don’t I am standing knee deep in the garden on this autumn eve And have not yet become all that I wanted to be 15

Wednesday, 3:30 pm Rebecca D’Ambrosio ’24 Third Place, Nonfiction

The day my grandmother died was a Wednesday. The night before I had gone out with my roommates and was nursing a hangover by scoffing down a sausage, egg, and cheese from the Campus Deli. Around 1pm Dad texted my siblings and I a succinct Whoever would like to see Grandma lmk. Never would I have assumed she would be dead within 2 hours. The texts got worse as time passed. Starting with simple inquiries of when we should come, if it was worth it to come – we all assumed she’d be out of the hospital soon. This quickly devolved, Dad telling us Come straight here. It’s not pretty. I ran upstairs and called my mom, a mess. I was away from everyone I loved and had no idea what to do. I don’t want you to regret it if you don’t go, I decided I had to go. I moved downstairs in a haze, tears making a trail down my face where I sat at the kitchen table as my friends crowded around me. I wrote emails to my professors in a haze, preparing to miss my classes. Distantly I felt one of their hands rubbing across my shoulders, an attempt of comfort that I struggle now to connect with a face. I grabbed my keys and drove in a haze. I can’t name a single song I listened to. I only watched my ETA and tried to make the number of minutes left in my journey decrease with every tick over the speed limit. I walked through the hospital, door after door, a confusing maze, wondering the last time I’d been in a hospital was. The front desk made me check in and get my picture taken for a temporary badge. There were tears down my face and my hair was unbrushed and I couldn’t remember if I had put on deodorant. As they processed the information on my license the lady at the desk asked me about the T-shirt I had thrown on. “Stick season?” I was crying thinking about my grandma one floor away. “It’s an album. Um, a music artist, it’s his album.” I thought now was hardly the time to ask a young crying girl about her T-shirt choice but perhaps it was a distraction tactic, one that was unappreciated and unnoticed at the time. With my badge clipped onto my questionable T-Shirt I made my way to the ICU unit and there was my dad outside her door. “Let’s go see Grandma.” 16

My Pop was sitting in the chair across from her bed, he was crying. I’d never seen that before. My aunt was there too, and my stepmom. And Grandma, but it was as if she wasn’t really there. Her eyes were closed and she seemed like she was in a fitful sleep. “She’s on a lot of morphine, it’s making her restless.” I went over to her bed and gently caressed her hand, unable to reconcile the woman in front of me with the woman who’d cook a five course meal like it was no problem, who crocheted blanket after blanket for us kids, who would snark back at Pop like it was her job. “The youngest is here Mom, she came to see you, see?” “Hi Grandma,” It was all I could say. My face was snotty and I was dripping tears on her hospital bed as I ran my hand over her’s, mottled with dark bruises. An indefinite amount of time passed and she grew more restless. It was the morphine apparently, it makes patients itchy. I texted my siblings furiously, growing more and more panicked as time passed and Grandma faded away in front of my eyes. Hurry up. Just get here. Dad made me leave the room and my heart dropped to my stomach and then right up to my throat. I thought I would throw up. I paced in the hallway restlessly, I couldn’t stop crying. They were only five minutes away, surely Grandma could hold on. Dad poked his head out and calmly, oh so calmly, “She’s gonna go.” He had accepted it. He knew when Grandma made up her mind, that was it. “They’re only five minutes away.” And with tears in his eyes and despair in his voice he let out one simple “Fuck.” He went back in and I kept pacing. My siblings arrived at 3:32, rushing in with their work clothes askew, and we rushed over to the door, four pieces of the same person, a unit. Grandma left us at 3:30. It was too late.

Northern Lake District Megan Byrnes ’24 18

The Bend

Gabriella Amleto ’24 The bend is the part I admire the most the quiet suggestion of possibility where all may rest the sly remark of adventure awaiting a land beyond the known the flirtatious wink becoming one to become lost in the mountains curved outlines behind a dimming sky suggesting more than what meets the eye Painters gaze with envy on what nature lies upon in this bend all is seen as truth through silence and possibility endless

Love Letter to my Dad Kat Bilbija ’24

a boy runs away from home to the mountains warmly welcomed by racing dogs and homemade jam, he’s quickly taught fluency in carpentry, mechanics, footwork deepening the footsteps of those who came before him. a teenager spends his summers baking the sun unearthing magic alongside smiles beaming in honey, until paternal weight bolts his feet to the city grounds and fiery troops knocked down the doors the season after. a father brings his family back to the mountains where historical discourse left only foundation in its wake. his heart melts through his soles into each board and stone memories working tirelessly to keep the family home alive. a girl gazes at the overflowing stars her dad grew up under devoting her dwindling energy to each of his heartfelt stories. her own honey-covered roots finally relaxing in their home, she falls asleep between the mountains that carved her family tree.

Madison Abby Koesterich ’24

broken windows Carly Andrew ’24

Three-Dollar Poem Julia Konopski ’26

She is fed Given food to eat And to eat and to eat Bite Swallow She’s in bed Resting her feet And to eat She’s full To the brim Full to begin with She can’t eat anymore She’s fat with feeling To the brim cup runneth over Her head all over Specks Splattered Over.

her brain

Routine

Anonymous ’25 Every morning there are little bits of me On the bedroom floor and bathroom mirror Every morning I feel a little less of me And a bit more of someone else Every morning I am a little lighter Sometimes a breeze through my window Lifts me off my feet Every morning my reflection looks less like me And a bit more like someone else Anchored to the mirror he’s a heavy apparition Every morning I feel a little strange Like last night someone took me apart And put me back together differently Every morning he feels the same Nobody is taking him apart This is part of his routine Every morning he’s a little older And he’s planning for everything Every morning I’m a little younger And everything is passing me by

The Diary Entry of a Withered Spirit Laratee VanNieuwenhuyze ’24

Entry #11 I’m tired... So... extremely tired... How many days, months, years has it been since I’ve felt any sense of relief? How long has it been since the feelings of dread and solitude have enveloped me whole? Time seems to be moving at a pace so slow and yet insanely fast, almost as if I’ve become stranded in the vortex of a black hole in a remote sector of the cosmos, no one around to help me escape its gravity. Is this what the rest of my life is going to be like? Just an endless, desolate fall? I often wonder if the choices I made leading up to this point of seclusion and despondency are to blame, but their relevancy now seems to be of a trifling matter. All I know now is the longevity of time, and oh, how it can eat away at the human soul; how time has both the tendency and ferocity to pick away at what makes you you, leaving but just a frail husk in its wake when it has finished having its vulturous way with you. Will my mind never know peace? How much longer will my person stand to survive in this desolate wasteland that I have come to call home? 24

I’ve not been here long, but I’ve been here for an eternity.

What’s an eternity more? I have nowhere else to be. I can stand the test of time, no matter the ache inside my heart. No matter the yearning I have for companionship; confinement has not bested me yet. If I am to remain alone in the universe, this withered spirit will crawl across the celestial plane forthright.

Skaneateles Kim Rosner ’25 25

Men Used to Wear High Heels Anonymous ’26

I was told that androgynous wasn’t for girls. We could wear blue and greasy overalls, sure. But we wear makeup We like macho men We can feel comfy in our bikinis. Because being like the guys is empowering, Not liking either explicitly isn’t allowed. It means you’re something else. I was told there was another option. There are people who choose to be neither because they are neither. They know they are not a girl, they are not a boy. They also don’t feel comfortable with their breasts, They don’t need to wear makeup to be professional, They can wear unisex shirts without wondering if they’re just hiding a body that isn’t feminine enough. I wasn’t told about this until I was a teen. I’d heard of it, but it wasn’t something I really knew. A friend of mine actually talked about it for a while. But I’d never heard of it. I never felt it. I never wanted it because I didn’t know it was an option. Then last year happened. There were people who seemed so comfortable with themselves. They didn’t worry about being feminine, because they weren’t women. They didn’t worry about dolling up, because they weren’t women. They didn’t worry about being muscular because they weren’t men. They didn’t worry about expressing their feelings because they weren’t men. And that was the solution. 26

Of course I knew I was naturally a woman,

That’s impossible for biology to hide. But having the pressure away, Finally being able to be comfortable as neutral, That was my explanation. The one I’d been slammed down for since saying no to makeup when I was eight. I have the answer for who I am. Why some people can be androgynous. And it’s not women. How can I be a woman when a woman’s characteristics aren’t a staple to me? Why had someone not told me sooner? Why was I kept in the dark? How dare the world keep me from realizing who I was? ...In ancient times, the Persians invented high heels. They were for men on horseback. Practical, if you will, as they kept someone from falling off their horse in battle. The high boots made their way to Europe when the Persians were being threatened by the Ottomans. Boots for war and delegates. Noble men were entranced. They were so improper for walking, they became a symbol of not needing to. Aristocratic men traipsed around in them because they didn’t need to work. Lifted high, they proved this point. Royals adopted them, Louis XIV said that anyone who wore red heels like his could only be courtiers. Women didn’t wear high heels. Until they were universal among the nobles of Europe. Men and women both enjoyed heels for a time. Until the Age of Reason declared that men’s clothing would be somber. The mid-eighteenth century socially declared that embroidery and ornaments, all extravagance, would be taken from men. And women were given the sole right to high heels in the nineteenth century. Elevators for inches, 27

Cuban heels for saddles, Christian Louboutin went to court for his red soles, Platforms for men and women in the 70’s, And the last stand for the manly man and his heels today is the cowboy boot. A man wearing thin, gilded heels today is feminine. But if I was a woman in the time of Charles II, A daily two-inch heel boot Sewn on beads Painted flowers Polished buckles would make me entirely masculine, lest I genderbend in the Renaissance And how much more of me would be true if I didn’t live today? Makeup used to be only for aristocrats and wealthy. Small busts used to be demanded by society. Stick-thin women aren’t useful for farm work. Showing skin wasn’t required to be happy in your body. Dirty work was expected. There didn’t used to be medicine for your gross, drippy nose. ...So why did I need someone to tell me who I really was? I was never uncomfortable as a woman. Yes, I like dressing androgynous, but I’m still a woman. I never felt welcomed by women or men, but I’m still a woman. I genuinely wanted to be myself, but I’m still a woman. I read articles for people questioning this, but I’m still a woman. It just turned out, you don’t have to care about something to be a perfectly decent person. People don’t always find their conclusion is being a woman. But I’m scared of what would have happened if I’d told someone I was thinking about this. Apparently, according to the world, if you have to ask, you aren’t who you were born as. And I know I would have been told to, “Live my truth,” 28

Not argued against in any way. Why would you do that? Would I have been told I wasn’t a woman? Just because I decided I might have wanted to wear a suit to prom? It scares me how I almost lived my truth into a lie. Maybe if I was born a hundred years from now, men will have pink hair and wear crop tops like women do today. Maybe I’d be the pinnacle of femininity in my too-straight, too-wide figure draped with five dollar, unisex shirts. So, thank you, high heels. Thank you to your male-dominated history. A woman can learn a lot from shoes, even if she wants worn-in sneakers.

Mischievous Blueberries Eva Bonanno ’26 29

The Driver Era Kait Dugan ’25 30

My Lucid Dreams Kim Rosner ’25

guitar hendrix Marisa Brown ’27

Stupid

Lindsey Clark ’24 First Place, Nonfiction It’s a subtle betrayal. The girl I call on the home phone while we play Club Penguin, so that we can tell each other how many fish we’re catching from the comfort of our own computers. The one who I dance to my Take Me Home CD with on the carpet of my mom’s classroom after school. The one who has me stealing cough drops out of a jar in said classroom because the strawberry Luden’s taste like candy. The one I look up to because she was born in January and I was born in May, so she surely has some level of wisdom I lack. She is the one who says it. Those two abrupt words. To me, that part is never a question. What I want to know is how much she means it. It’s simple, outright, and not very strategic. “You’re stupid.” Maybe it’s her first time trying out the word like that. As a real insult. To hurt someone. Maybe she picked it up from one of her three older, football-playing brothers, overheard as they tackled each other in the backyard. I don’t know. I suppose it doesn’t matter, but maybe if I could recall hearing her say it before, testing it out on a few other targets prior to zeroing in on me, it wouldn’t sting so bad. I don’t know. Jade’s name is a precious gemstone, and her way of life relies on the assumption that everything aligns to work out for her specifically. She never says this to anyone, because she’s probably nine or ten years old, but you can tell that’s what she’s thinking. When she wears royal blue and navy plaid Bermuda shorts—boy colors only—paired with a lacy navy tank, she’s doing it because that’s the best way to dress. She’s a tomboy, but still a girl, and she’ll prove that to you in her unique balance between Justice and her cousin’s hand-me-downs. She’s the reason I start 32

shopping in the boy’s section of Kohl’s. Mrs. Williams is “cold just looking at us” on those mornings us faculty kids arrive at school in weather-inappropriate clothes just because we get dressed with Jade in mind. She gets a flip phone even though the iPod Touch has already come out, just so she has a number and the rest of us don’t. It isn’t even a Blackberry, there’s nothing to do on it, but it’s like she has something to prove. Her house is the best. We both get the log cabin igloo in Club Penguin to emulate her real-life home, which hits your nose with cinnamon oatmeal and Bath & Body Works pumpkin candles the second you walk in the door. Her dad owns the ice cream shop in town, so naturally that’s the best ice cream, too. All of it. The best. For the longest time I struggled to pinpoint my age here since I couldn’t fathom crying because of this girl calling me stupid when I was potentially ten years old. Maybe at this point I’m just sensitive for my age. Well, I know I am. I still am. The location and who we’re with is another thing. The older daughter of one of the elementary school custodians, Veronica, is probably middle school-aged here and a likely Avril Lavigne worshiper (at the time, so am I, because of Jade). A guy is there, too. Not memorable but is probably an added consideration when the words leave Jade’s mouth. We’re all standing at the playground, situated by the monkey bars, composed around this one horizontal bar Jade taught me to do flips on. Always a gymnast, always gravitating towards this one corner, eventually. You can tell what her after-school commitment is just in the way she composes herself. The way she walks on the wood chips, barefoot and unblinking. The three of them—Veronica, the guy, and Jade—are on one side of this horizontal bar, gathered in a half circle. I’m on the other side. A clear path for escape to my left, with my mother’s classroom door in view. The tears are almost immediate, threatening to push past my al33

ready unsteady defenses. I start to walk away in my charted direction. “Hey, what’s wrong?” I don’t know who says it. My face is turned away from them preemptively. “I have to go.” Then, a laugh. It’s hers. I can’t seem to make out what’s so funny. I don’t want to do something that they want to do, I think. Like, I chicken out. Or is it that I don’t know of some singer or show they’re talking about? I cannot for the life of me remember. But having my stupidity handed to me on a silver platter is my punishment. Another thing about Jade is that she always finds a way to make you feel bad if you won’t assimilate. She has curated, unknowingly, this whole ideological aesthetic, and she’s in elementary school. Break free from it, and she’ll let you know. She let me know. The hill isn’t very steep from the playground to my mom’s door, so I book it. A foggy, lime blur dominates my vision until my feet hit the asphalt in sharp thuds. The steel, chalky blue door is my saving grace as my fists pound on the granular metal. I wonder if they’re watching me do this. I wonder if Jade is talking about me, explaining away my behavior to her older friends, continuing to belittle me because that’s what she’ll do. I won’t be the last one who tries so hard to get on her good side that they end up, in some ways, doing the opposite. I’m sobbing into my mom’s arm’s now as she sits in her wheely office chair, my tears and snot leaving dark smears on her floral blouse. “You’re not stupid, honey. I’m sure she didn’t mean it. That was really rude of her. You’re the smartest girl I know.” By the time I get home, I get over it, like you do when you’re nine or ten. More importantly, I don’t punish Jade back. And I know this is not because I’m the bigger person, but rather, because I don’t know how. What can I possibly do or say to Jade that she isn’t already resistant to or expecting from me? My grades are better. I definitely think quicker on 34

my feet. But she doesn’t care. It’s never about that with Jade. Thinking quickly makes you a nerd, or someone to ask for the homework answers. So, she uses you. And when someone else takes your stupid place, you laugh along with the relief that it isn’t you anymore. When my mom and I tell him over dinner that night what Jade said to me, my dad says what he will continue to say about her until I graduate high school. “I’m telling you. That girl is no good.” For longer than I’d like to admit, I’ll nod my head, but I won’t listen.

Fractured Luke X. Johnson ’25 35

Bugs In Love

Kendall Pastreich ’25 Second Place, Poetry I want to be a bug in love, wrapped in soft fluffy pink moth wings. I want to be what I’ve designed, impossible love between impossible bugs. She wraps her girlfriend inside her wings, keeping her treasured beetle safe. She peppers her with soft moth kisses, covering her girlfriend’s hard mahogany shell. Moth paws rest on her back, caressing her elytra. The beetle holds her favorite moth close, standing on the tip of her tarsi to reach the moth’s thorax. Her antennae softly touch her wings, her mandibles clicking sweet nothings. Her claws reach up, embracing her face gently. I want to be a bug in love, small, but loved a large amount.

Wishful Amnesia Kiki Wiehe ’26

Oh come back to me, Darling Cross the rivers and the fields Climb the mountains and memorize the stars Sprint past every car you encounter So you can beat each one to me Oh Darling, come back to me When you come face to face With the final door to separate us I would be offended if you knocked Barge in, hold me, and tell me it’s over And without me asking, Promise you’ll stay Oh Darling, wake me up Shake these dreams out of my soul And remind me why these miles between Will forever remain Because I can not recall And I cannot accept But Oh Darling there is a reason Isn’t there?

Beauty in the Slums Ava Kaloz ’25 38

Envie (Beautiful Executioner) Lorah Murphy ’24

Maybe I know what it is like to be a man. Having you pressed on my back, I think I know what it is like to be taken over by A blood disease. You, innocent destruction,

Ache more sweet for your accident, and No force of nature, Brutal and unapologetic, No storm has beaten me as your skin has Devil temptress, that beautiful skin and then I can hardly bear to look into Twin stars, I wish I could choke on them. I feel possessed, A man possessed with dreaded thunderous hunger unquenchable It makes me beg for mercy, please, Look at me again. Look at me again.

Healing Christina Brown ’27 First Place, Art 40

ELIZABETH

August Boland ’24 IN YORK MINSTER, a statue there doth loom: Queen of the Angles, ELIZABETH named, For sev’nty years o’er her empire she reigned. The old dame now sleepeth within her tomb. Though queen, the fate of mortals was her doom: To die like any man, poor, blind, or lame. But to live eternal in stone the same Surveying now her kingdom in its gloom. How long before the ruler’s name doth fade? And some distant traveler doth wonder so: “Who was this lady in a statue laid?” How long until England becomes unknown? How long before a world anew is made? Where queens and kings and ladies doth not grow?

Midfoss Iceland Savannah Pinto ’26 41

Corrosive Conversations Adam L. Freda ’26

Here I am, once again From the blackened clouds I arrive I notice you on the rough, red leather Seat. Dim lights and the pink neon Provide calmness to us. So I talk, as your metal body Shines. As I breathe and bequeath Your metal body stiffens From my warm, harmless air And so you become frozen From me. My blood goes Cold, but I could walk away Swiftly. I never get the words right Before I run out of time At the 24/7 dinner with your Statue.

Flowers on the Lake Lorah Murphy ’24 Third Place, Poetry

Flowers on the Lake Everything is the most beautiful it has ever been. My Love’s letter arrived today in the wind And on the backs of cattail model ships, There are juniper berries under my nails and It makes me feel cleanSurprise juniper berries in secret gardens are the best confection. All of sensual July paints my lips and nose And I bury my face in its body, sweet notes Of that light-bodied peach or pear, Its perfume coats my tongue. To be in a garden is to be in with the angels Hip with the spirits Dancing with old luck sprites And at home in the footsteps Of people who welcomed more footsteps, Who planned for more Julys and Kissed in more Augusts than I and July? It is as beautiful as it ever has been.

Same Traditions, New Emotions Jordan M. Burwin ’24

I’m back home from my freshman year of college. My two brothers and I begin lighting the Hanukkah candles as my parents sing the prayer with us and take pictures. There’s off-key singing, smiles, and the crackling from lighting the candles. Our parents have the three of us get close together and smile behind the menorahs each of us lit as we do every year. Following multiple flashes we jump up and run to the living room couch, it has been tradition our whole lives, to light candles and eagerly go to sit patiently for our presents as our parents follow us with excited and nervous looks as they give us each a present. We tear through the wrapping paper and each gleam at our gifts! We take more pictures knowing they will show up in the family calendar or yearbook. We joke around with each other and decide to use my youngest brother’s present as a family. It’s a ‘The Office’ trivia game. As we play we laugh about episodes and give a good “Aaaahhh” when the correct answer is revealed. Toward the end of the night, we give extra hugs to our parents reaffirming our thanks. We give our Dad a hug as he heads for the front door. This was the first Hanukkah since my parents divorced and we were all excited to still be able to spend it together. Through the happy memory, I can’t help but remember the tears almost forming in my eyes during that night multiple times knowing that this Hanukkah was different than all the rest. It was strange for the first time. All the same traditions yet the emotions and energy around that night differed. However, it felt this way because 44

we all knew it wasn’t just a divorce. My Dad left us. He cheated on our mom, moved about an hour away, bought a two-bedroom house (he has three kids...), and has not made the effort to really see any of us since. That night I couldn’t help but remember that my mom told us he said if he left maybe he would miss us (the kids) more and want to spend time with us since he never really did for the past six years, and when we did he was not happy about it; and that he didn’t think he was a good father. It made me hope it would make him realize how much he missed being with us. That he would try to hang out more. Want to continue making memories together, better ones. This was the last holiday we ever did as a family together. We started having to make separate plans with our parents for each holiday since they no longer speak to each other unless they need to. Traditions in each house were still upheld. Holidays became a beautiful time with our Mom. We always feel comfortable, loved, and wanted. Holidays with my dad became a force. An uncomfortable time for us when it felt like even he didn’t want to be there. It feels like he just does it to have an excuse to claim he still sees his children. He’s able to bring up the gifts he’s bought us and the dinners he took us to. Though we all feel estranged traveling to a new house. It is not our home. We do not feel loved here but are reminded that he left and wanted a life mostly without us. My Dad did not become a father from him leaving us. He was always just a father that we were taught to call a Dad.

From Cupid

Isabella Libreros ’24 A scratch. A meaningless scratch. With my own arrow. That’s all it took. It only took that quick, Unforeseen, Scratch, And one look To fall And find myself In torment that is Loving Psyche. Here I find myself Laying next to her In the darkness. The ivy and silver walls around us They’re meaningless. Everything is, But her.

I’m tired of leaving her side, Oh, what a sight I leave every night. Before sunlight gets to embrace

Her marble skin and carmine lips. I envy the sun. For he gets to love her in light And I don’t. My wings, body, and soul ache. For I am scarred for life By my arrow’s scratch. I don’t want more darkness. I’m tired of loving her in the dark.

glowing hope Andrew Chiafullo ’26

Mia Casa, My Home, Casa Mia Claudia Molina ’23 Second Place, Art 48

Not True

Lily Jandrisevits ’25 I remember it like something made up. You had what is called a nice dress, I had broad shoulders. You impressed The other people watching, red cups In hand, ready to be spilled. You make up Another. “This one’s too long, unless Everyone really wants to hear.” You bless Them with another line. There is a closeup On your face, the limited, flickering light Shines down from a lone bulb above, Illuminating and highlighting what might Be a freckle or, if lucky, might be a crumb. Though no one ever loses the lovely sight Of your imagined stories of would be love.

it’s okay momma

Luke X. Johnson ’25

“I’m gonna find you!” Max’s mom shouted throughout the woods. Giggling behind a tree trunk, Max poked his head out from behind to see her scanning the clustered forest from left to right, a big smile on her face, “Hmm, where could he be?” She rubbed her chin with her thumb and pointer finger while cartoonishly squinting her eyes and pursing her lips, continuing to look about. Tense with excitement, Max pushed his knees against his chest and wrapped his arms around them, pressing himself into a ball, “Oh, Max!” Her playful calls were closer now, moving towards him. He placed his hand down on the ground to shift himself, only to be met with a sharp poke while doing so. He swiftly retracted his hand to see a small drop of blood forming where he had been punctured by a thorny twig. After the jolt of pain it induced, Max’s eyes widened. He stumbled to his feet and turned around, seeing his mother now nowhere in sight. Beginning to run through the green and brown brush, he frantically looked all around through hurried breathing, “Momma! Momma!” He called out. No response, “Momma! Mo-” His cries were cut short by a collision that knocked him to the ground after about a minute of searching. Regaining himself and looking up, he sees his mother, back turned to him looking down at the ground in front of her. Max’s eyes relaxed and drooped into a somber tilt at an all-too familiar realization. Gently, he arose and made his way to her side to look down at what her gaze was locked on: A white rabbit, bloodied and torn open. Its fur was stained red and matted from its short struggle. The look of life had still not fully drained from its eyes. Max calmly slipped his hand into his mother’s, dripping with the same blood they watched spill out of the creature, until its eyes were hollow. She shook her head, “I-, I’m sorry, baby.” She said to him, Max looked up at her, crystal

tears sliding down her cheeks and mixing with the dark red blood splattered around her lips. She sniffled and fell to her knees, sobbing into her hands. Max stretched his little arms out and hugged her, one around her back and one across her chest, hands meeting at the shoulder while he rested his face on the one closest to him. He softly planted a kiss on her head as she cried, “It’s okay... I know you’re trying momma.” She spoke through choppy whispers and wheezes, “I smelt your blood. I thought you were hurt and I,” She leaned into him even more, “I couldn’t control myself.” She lifted her head out of her palms, revealing her true crimson red eyes accompanied by serpentine pupils. Max looked into them with a tenderness that should’ve been beyond his years. He plucked a small white flower from the ground beneath them and held it out for her to take, “I love you, momma.” He said. She smiled, “I love you too, Maxy.”

Rage. Marisa Brown ’27 51

Regret on Lovers Street Yahenia Ortiz-Benitez ’27

I would like to believe I would have turned away but his crooked little smile felt like an invitation to stay we strolled along the bay the night so cold, young, and free In his arms I just felt so glee maybe it was love at first sight or maybe he was just too cute to let my heart put up a fight there didn’t seem to be anything wrong we actually fit hand and hand and felt like we had known each other for long but boy was I naive if only I had known he fell for me to replace her I would have saved me from such a stir I saw things in her that couldn’t compare to me I felt trapped when I had just begun being free she was beautiful, she was kind her whole existence now seemed to define mine when you called me beautiful and sweet was it truly for me or were you thinking of her, the girl with blue eyes like the sea that only made my brown ones look dull when I had always thought they were lively and full every day the spark in me slowly died but you didn’t seem to mind at least there was someone there to mend your broken heart but who would be there for me and help me restart? how can the broken fix the broken? I know I should’ve been smarter 52

and not allow you to use me as a barter I should have just turned at the other end of the street and maybe life would have just been more sweet but I guess our eyes we’re just meant to meet though she would always be the lucky one making your heart beat you settled for someone that you believed was hard to love how smart of you to prey on the girl who was so sweet and innocent like a dove maybe if I had more respect for myself i would have left but now I can only wish about a night where we never met

View from the Areoplane over the Sea Eva Bonanno ’26 53

Beatlemania (’65) Margaret Batta ’27 First Place, Fiction

I fell in love with the darkness of your eyes. The swatches of Pompeii’s ashes that gleam as gems in the middle of your face. They shone black as the Mariana Trench, even through the technicolor hues of Hollywood lies. I threw my glasses in a ditch on the I-95 last summer and I haven’t missed them since. I can never truly see you when I’m with them. Your image isn’t meant to be sharp, but soft as the cherry blossoms petals that peppered the grass outside my English classroom that winter afternoon. It seemed impossible, those sweet buds flowering in the depth of snow’s maiden season. But it was, and as I recounted my walks with Dorothy in Tintern Abbey, I could only think of you. How even without my glasses, your eyes shone just as bright as before. Red cars are for summer, so I’ve been saving my gas until the days hit 90. When they do,the air will be far too thick to stay amongst the plaster buildings, so I’ll steal you in my car and speed down the parkway. We’ll visit the bay and have dinner with the seagulls. Complaints will get lost in the wind and we will just live like you’ve always wanted to. Your eyes will capture the sunset better than any camera I’ve ever seen, and in that moment I’ll say I finally know what it’s like to be happy. I’ll tell you my dream of living by the moors and you won’t laugh. You won’t ask how I’ll drive on the left after 17 years of having gas pumped for me. You won’t ask how I’ll ship my dresser over the Atlantic, and most importantly, you won’t ask why I want it at all. You’ll smile and nod and say your dreams, too. Even if I’m not there in your fantasies, even if I’m dead and buried, I’ll still say your dreams are wonderful. I’ll 54

still wish that they come true just to see that spark in your eyes. Once night covers the water, I’ll turn off the fan in the castle and ask you to run away with me. Shadow covers your face and somehow your eyes are still bright as you laugh. But I’m not a jester, and I would give anything for you to say yes at that moment. Say yes and we can take a jet ski across the ocean and under the moon. I wonder how far we’ll get. Will we get to meet Amelia Earhart? Or will we come across the Titanic? It doesn’t matter, because either way we’ll make it. I’ll make you a diamond out of sea foam, one that will last long after its band rots off your finger, and I pray you’ll connect it to the vein of your heart as the blue whale swims beneath us. When we hit land, we’ll live in a flat in the town where music was born. We’ll have a city life where you can sing and I’ll solve crimes, but through the cover of darkness you’ll hear the clacking of my typewriter under your pillow. People will warn you. They’ll tell you you’re crazy for marrying a regular Cathy Earnshaw, and I hope you won’t care. I hope you won’t mind having a wife who lives in the color of your eyes more than reality. But the illusion shatters like a prom dress in my hands and I’m back in the castle with you. And as the sun peeks in the blinds, your eyelids flutter open and there’s a stranger beside me. Because in the light of that aging goddess I see your eyes are green. Green as the faded cardigan I wore on All Hallow’s Eve when you crowned my head with flowers and told me I was truly someone. Green as the dying leaves on the plants in my grandfather’s strawberry field. Green as the eyes I use every day to marvel at yours. And suddenly I’m the fool; floating, aimless, stranded somewhere in the sea. I’m the fool who only saw darkness in your spring eyes. You see my surprise and I hope I don’t scare you. I hope the masquerade isn’t over and that you’ll still dream of me on sunlit autumn 55

days. I hope I don’t have to attend your wedding to another angel and see you grin at her with your eyes green as ever. White tuxedo on your figure, you’d look like a star fallen to Earth, and I’d look at your snowclad bride and smile as best I can. I’d do my best to forget you, but when spring comes around and cherry blossoms kiss my hair, my mind will turn the color of your sage green eyes. But you don’t question when I tell you not to worry. You smile your soft, perfect smile and suddenly it’s the start of yesterday. Our green eyes are the same, one forged of fluttering faded spring leafs, the other from shallow, treacherous streams. Suddenly my earrings are emeralds instead of obsidian, and love becomes an easy game to play once again.

The Swan Hannah Gnibus ’24 56

Kintsukuroi

Ferris Milinazzo ’26 I like to think of myself as fractured, not broken. Brokenness has a finality that fractured lacks, Like one day the pieces, chipped, jagged, cracked, Will return to grooveless and smooth, a pristine whole.

Because “How can anything broken be beautiful?” Is what we’re often told But truly, our brokenness is gold. We are not a rough draft or failed attempt, Our shards are not meant to be hidden and swept,

We’re a masterpiece, meant to be handled with care. When we aren’t it doesn’t degrade the beauty that’s found there. So wear your fractured shards in silver, in gold, For your pieces are more beautiful than any whole. 57

Capri Claudia Molina ’23 58

Vincent Van Gogh Adam L. Freda ’26

I would never do away with suffering for it is what makes artists express themselves forcefully. -Jean-Francois Millet Perhaps there is no pain to painting the perfection Of nature, as life looms as a sharp mimicry. History cannot not hold the pain of painting. Only one canvas can; one beautiful moment. Artists live their lives with their paintings. Each experience new brushstrokes Each heavenly handshake brings upon Belief for a new day of seeing the world. Often pain leaves one stuck in eternity With no key to open the gates, filled with pity. He knew to show his pain with his creativity, He knew the stars mold a key to serenity. Perhaps, we are all Vincent’s figures Two to three blunt brushstrokes Each with amazing, starry stories Each figure exists with enchanted lives. Even if we don’t see it, Vincent saw it for us.

there’s a light in the window Morgan Chambers ’25 Second Place, Nonfiction

London- May 25th, 2023, 2:40 AM There’s a light in the window. It flickers on the top floor of the building across the street. A warm, yellow glow. Not bright enough to strain the eyes, but enough to call attention. I lay awake, eyes puffy and half-swollen from a night of tear-stained cheeks. It’s my first time out of the country and I feel so alone. I try to focus my attention on something else and turn away from the fear that’s eating at my chest. I look back to the window. I wonder who lives in this welcoming place, so full of light and mystery. Maybe a writer, in her early twenties, working on her first novel and trying to get a start in the city. Or an old man who just lost his wife, sitting in a rocking chair with a cat by his feet. The darkness haunts him at night so he must keep the light on. I know that same feeling. I turn my head to the bathroom door, which I’ve left cracked open so the light can spill gently into the room. I could never sleep in the dark either. I stare for a while at this glowing window. It looks almost like sunshine. I hope there is love in this apartment. A newlywed couple sharing a bottle of wine and laughing the night away, losing track of time. Perhaps they’ll share a kiss in the lamplight or dance around the kitchen to their wedding song. I imagine they’re cooking their favorite pasta dish after getting home late from the airport after their honeymoon. She’ll sing and play piano, a wedding gift from her parents, and he’ll watch her, his eyes glistening with love. How nice it is to be in love. I hope it devours them, shrouds them. I hope this light is a metaphor for their love. A love that’s always been there but is now fresh, new, and exciting all over again. I smile to myself at the thought of being loved so deeply in that way. The sounds of London whisper through the window. It’s much quieter than 60

most cities, almost comforting. The light patter of rain on the rooftop, the tires of late-night cabs gliding over the pavement. The church bells in the distance chime, as if lulling me to sleep. My eyes begin to grow weary as I’m wrapped up in the hotel linens. I almost feel safe, knowing that I am not really alone here. I dream of all the endless possibilities of being somewhere new, and truly, I’m not scared anymore. There’s a light in the window, and it almost feels like home.

Carousel of Life Jillian Blaszko ’26 61

Oh, That Bottle

August Boland ’24 The familiar ringing of the bell pounded through Diya Chakrabarti’s skull as her eyes slid open. Her fingers were stiff from clutching the glassy green bottle nursed in her hand, and she nailed the alarm clock with a slam. Her head ached as much as her knees, though the former pain would dissipate though the latter would not. Diya hauled herself out of bed, defrosted herself a frozen breakfast, got dressed, collected her toolbox and rapier, and beat a path to her truck. The rain was streaming down the white glass of the windshield as she picked up the black phone next to the driver’s seat and winced as her supervisor’s voice rang through her ears. “You’re three minutes late calling in, Chakrabarti,” he said with a snap. Diya made a note to complain to the union next week about him. “So I am. What’s my first today, boss?” He fed her an address, and said, “Careful with this one. He wouldn’t stop calling me ‘Kid,’ as though I didn’t know what he really wanted to call me. He’s complaining about putting his projector room in his kitchen, like we didn’t warn him. Idiot. Enjoy.” The man in question was a tall man who thought his silence was a personality trait. His projector was not working, and, horror of horrors, he was unable to watch his favorite dueling shows now. Diya explained to him that the heat from his kitchen would interfere with the projector and make it impossible to watch any films, by damaging the reels or interfering with the signal. What followed was a series of invective, ending in both nearly drawing their blades, before finally the man muttered he was going to move the projector to his living room anyway, and Diya scheduled someone else to come by later in the month—emphasis on the later—to disassemble and move it. Her morning was filled with similar customers over the course of the next five hours. A little after noon, she pulled off by the side of the road and lay back, and popped open a yellow bottle of soda and took a swig. Diya exhaled, and stared at the sun, fighting to peak through the sky; but not for too long. The truck sent a radio signal back to headquarters, and they would notice if she stopped 62

for long. She could always plead traffic, though. There was always that. The next customer was a working-class man. They were always an honest type. He had her come in through the main door, and had not a single leatherbound book, and even asked if she wanted water or if she wanted to use his bathroom. She accepted both offers, replaced a cable, and moved on. After that came a little teakettle of a man, whose projector had stopped receiving a signal. He expiated at length on the fact that the insides of the projector were the problem, and continued to explain as much as she checked his cables and power supply. Finally, Diya started taking apart the projector itself, and cursed to herself as she saw that one of the spoolers had come undone and set about repairing it. “Hey, you hear about this company, the Beacon Corporation?” said the little man. Diya tightened a screw and said, “The what?” The little man jammed a flyer in Diya’s eyes. She leaned back far enough to read it. The flyer showed a cubic man tapping a rotary dial, with the caption, “Watch what you want... anytime you want!” The little man said, “The way they say it’ll work is, is you just dial in a number based on a catalogue, and you can watch any show or film you want. No more waiting around for it. None of that. Nothing. Everything, instantly.” Diya handed the flyer back to the man, who snatched it back with a claw. Diya resumed adjusting the screws, and said, “What’s the point in that? I like watching Chariot of Cash at nineteen hundred every weekday, no other time. Why would I want to watch it anytime else?” The little man shoved himself back into her field of vision. “Well, maybe some of us don’t, but a lot of us do. Not that I watch Chariot of Cash. I’m more of a Mr. Kanav’s History Hour man, myself. I didn’t get into it until after he’d started covering the Arya dynasty, and I really want to see what he had to say about the Vedikas. Once I get this I’ll be able to watch all of it. Mark my words. When this—” he tapped the flyer—“takes off, people like you will be—“ he smacked his lips—“out of a job.” Diya tightened a last bolt and said, “The union will riot before that happens.” “Oh,” said the man, “but that’s so violent.” “It’s our constitutional right to be violent when necessary,” said Diya. She clicked the button on the projector 63

and the sepia image of a tardigrade up-close whirred into view on the screen, the narrator expositing their hardiness. “And, you’re good to go.” The little man continued to expound on the lowliness of the riot and the need for the future to be embraced, but Diya beat a hasty retreat. There were a few more jobs, and the final job of the day. Diya arrived at a decrepit house and was shown in by a small, mousy woman coated in makeup to a man marinating in his couch, staring sightlessly at a blank projector screen. “Hunting Dogs out,” he managed. “The favored political talk show of the oppressed and downtrodden,” Diya murmured to the wife with a smile. The wife did not smile back, she simply looked at her husband, nursing a red bottle of apo. Diya approached the projector and began to tinker with it. As she did so, she heard the man straining, and felt his eyes running along her back and further down. She sighed, and continued tinkering. The problem, she explained, was with the antenna. It would take two weeks before someone could come out and fix it. The man responded with a rambling chain of abuse, ending in, “And don’t let me see your flat carcass around here again, got it?” Diya gave a mock bow and took her leave. As she was putting her tools back in her truck, she felt a hand on her arm. It was the wife. “Two weeks?” she said. Diya nodded. “That—that’s forever.” Diya shrugged. “Please,” the wife said. “When he has the projector, he has the Hunting Dogs to watch. He can take his anger out with them on the Shinplasters and the Centralists and all the other parties and politicians I can never remember the name of but he keeps screaming about them. Without it—” she stopped, and mechanically rubbed her face, the makeup peeling off and revealing faint purple bruises. Diya inhaled and looked into the woman’s dark brown eyes. She shook her head. “That does it.” Diya walked back into the house, found the man, and drew her blade. “I challenge you to a duel to first blood for insulting my honor. I name the time. The time is now.” The man stared at her, eyes misted over with beer. “You what?” 64

“It’s our constitutional right. Anyone in this country has the right to challenge another to a duel, regardless of class or station.” The man’s nose twitched, and he rose, screaming for his wife to get him his saber. “Fine. Outside. Let’s go.” Calling it a duel was an insult. It was over within seconds. The man scarcely drew his blade before he was on the ground, swearing profusely, nursing a bleeding arm. “Do you yield?” Diya said in a bark. She took the man’s groaning profanity as a yes. She snatched the man’s blade from his hands and pressed it into the wife’s arms. She tried to think of something inspiring to say, but couldn’t, and drove home. Later that night, Diya reached into her fridge and wrapped her hand around the neck of a green beer bottle, and then paused, and looked at her dueling arm. She reached for an orange bottle of soda instead and walked over to her couch. Perhaps that man would be more courteous in the future. Perhaps he had been humbled. Perhaps he’d find more productive ways to manage his time. Or perhaps he’d repaid his wife ten times for the wounds he had received. What did she know. She was just a projector repair woman, after all. Diya reached for the projector and punched in a channel, and leaned back as the Chariot of Cash theme song began to play as the host’s face flickered into view.

CARNAGE Ava Kaloz ’25 66

Today, like all days, but somehow different Kiki Wiehe ’26

Anger is a child Red faced and desperate Shouting and lost Continuously forcing their eyes up To stop the tears from slipping outside their eyelids grasp Looking up as to show the distance in power Between the angered and the tormentor Because revealing sadness is angers biggest fear Anger would rather lose everything than forfeit their costume of strength Anger wants the same privilege as the others To simply be allowed and worthy of understanding To be a feeling that shouldn’t require immediate fixing A feeling that is determined and fragile A child Never taken seriously And always expected to be something more than what they are, Angry

I don’t know how to describe it Sarah Gurskis ’26

I don’t know how to describe it I don’t know how to describe it It’s like The first sip of coffee after a freshly brewed pot Cracking open a gooey honeycomb The washing relief of a shower when I’m feverish The crackle of a blossoming spark on a chilly night The release of that initial firework The feeling of a warm embrace after a long day. At least That’s what I think. But I don’t know. I’ve never been in love before, so I don’t really know how to describe it.

A Family Requiem Megan Byrnes ’24 I visited my parents’ grave today They have yet to be interred They have yet to leave I visited their parents’ grave today And the ones before them Do they know who will lie beside them? Do they know how many grains of sand will pass? My mourning is premature My grief is hasty The hourglass may very well shatter How does one set it on its side while on a sinking ship? There is no comfort in inevitability Just familiarity I am the one who will rot My anthology is within this plot of earth Here lies my cheekbones Here lies my stubbornness Here lies my joyous laugh How do I reconcile these pieces of myself When the sender is no longer the receiver Loss is inescapable Love is vulnerability Abandonment is commonplace What will I do When the people who never left are no longer here What will I do When that grain of sand returns to dust within my hand 69

A Love Letter in Invisible Ink Margaret Batta ’27

There is something so humiliating about having expectations. It is natural, of course. Routine is human, and with the routine and friendships of everyday life come expectations. They are not embarrassing at first, but it is upon reflection that they can be truly picked apart. Truly dissected and seen as almost disgusting. If you don’t catch them soon enough, then you are cursed with the misfortune of watching them shatter. Biting into a strawberry coddled by the warmth of summer sunlight and realizing that it didn’t taste like anything, and all that time you spent watering it was for nothing. Strawberries aside, summer is upon me. The heat of the world only seems to melt my wax-like heart. I have recently come to terms with the fact that I am unlucky, but these days it almost feels like stupidity. All I have is 3 minutes on the clock and 40 miles of gas left. Everything is either excruciatingly slow or slips away far too easily, but I guess that’s life. I still don’t know why I am alive, and I look to the moon for guidance. She’s seen man’s first step and Marie Antoinette’s blood stain the cobblestone of Place de la Concorde. Soon she will see my end too. I confided in a hound-lover and he said the moon was his love. He said she knew all the answers, and she knows life will work out for me, for everyone. We die when we please, not when we stop duplicating. But I tend to disagree, because I know the hound lover has a silver tongue and a love affair with Apollo. He will say what he wants to attract the golden sun, even if that means flattery of his carrier. I’ve run out of time and I should leave, but there is something fractured within me. Something so deeply wrong, so deeply human. I am 70

unable to let go. I cling to old memories and faded tear tracks on my face. I try to remember everything, and now my polaroid is out of film. Love letters written in invisible ink and the stench of lemon juice in the early hours of the morning. A corpse you can’t recognize and blue hair dye on your pillow. Everything is transient, at the end of the day, so what is even the point of holding on so tightly? Why do I even wear the scars on my hand as badges of honor? Maybe that’s just it. I’m just too human with too many scars and holes in my arteries. Maybe that tumble I took as the stock market did screwed something up in my head. Maybe that’s why I can only see myself through a silver screen in my mind’s eye. But I don’t know anymore. All I know is that as human as I am, I want to ascend. I want to live more than anyone else. I am tired of feeling everything, I want to BE everything. I want to find bones and minerals. I want to know the secrets only whispered between two friends. I want to know what’s at the bottom of the ocean. I want to dust the prints off the love letters carved in the walls of Pompeii. I want to be extraordinary, more than a dying star. But I am not. And I cannot be. And some part of me fears that maybe if I were a little less human and a little more devil then I could’ve been great. But I’m not. I’m a crack baby, a wishy-washy, shaking being cursed by my ancestors. I’m addicted to life, darling, and there’s no cure. So I guess I’ll start the long walk to my coffin, and my final thoughts will be how stupid I was to expect anything other than just existing in this world.

The Day the Bees Came Kait Dugan ’25 72

Ink Abby Koesterich ’24

balconies Bella Loiacono ’27

Roots

Jonathan Adu-Amanfoh ’25 I long for roots that anchor deep, The foundation of permanence Planted in rich soil. For most of my life, I’ve rarely felt ground beneath me, Every home alike to a forest Always fleeting. And when I’d have the strength to reach toward the sun, I’d feel myself pulled away, Ripped from the rot And left in rain. Through unchained legs And weathered knees, I have always found myself Longing for leaves.

Plant

Alyssa Borelli ’24 My boyfriend gave me a plant. Anything he gives me I treasure, But in all honesty I forgot what type of plant it is. It’s made of fat green pieces of grass. It’s the type of grass my cat used to eat and then throw up. He was a fluffy cat with fur the color of rust And his “meows” were breathy and sweet. He would’ve eaten that entire plant. That type of grass grew outside my childhood home, A pale yellow house sitting on top of a Connecticut hill. Barefoot, I’d walk up the driveway of hot, black pavement To be met by the soft blades of grass. I’d stare up at clouds that were close enough to touch. My plant sits on my windowsill His comforting presence reminding me of my childhood And the love I’ve found in adulthood I only hope to take care of him. 75

Transform

Kendall Pastreich ’25 I am not here I am changed Gone with the time I look in the mirror Watching Waiting Viewing Hating But time Will change I CHANGING IDENTITY BECOMING UNIQUE will Be OF MY SOMEONE Okay

eggs Carly Andrew ’24

A Walk-Around Memory Lane Vanessa Hasbrouck ’25

I walked outside with the intention to observe. I wound up chasing butterflies. I found some marigolds and a piece of gum. I smell the fresh-cut grass. I see a man on a bike and a friend with a scooter. I feel the wind. I hear the echoing voices in the tunnel. It reminds me of a playground. It reminds me of what it means to be six years old. I ran across the mulch. I felt the smooth bars as I ran up the stairs. I felt my breath as I climbed in the purple tunnel. I felt the comfort of loneliness. I heard foreign laughter entering the tunnel. I felt the ridges as I crawled to the sunlight. I smell the scent of youth. I taste a piece of childhood. I felt like a kid. I feel the sun hit my forehead. I feel the air conditioning. I smell the brewing coffee beans and stale clay. I see the sun reflecting on a shiny bald head. I see the chapel and smell dryer sheets. I see a running friend and smell warm, salted popcorn. I feel the fresh, trimmed grass and see a blue sun dress flowing with her stride. I see a smashed pinecone and hear excited crickets. I hear clanking heals. I see statues in worship. I see cock’s comb and smell Chanel No. 5. I feel the smooth gray stone and see overgrown red ivy. I see myself seeing the poison ivy invading my childhood deck. I saw myself putting on my shoes because dying wood causes splinters. I saw myself running so I could get to the grass before the deck came crumbling down. I felt my sneaker soles as I raced toward the fragile swing set. I felt my hands on the cold rusted metal of the swing. I heard my mom calling me in. I smelled salt from the sand box. I tasted the dinner cooking. I saw the poison ivy taking away my deck. I see an impatient butterfly. I see glistening confetti. I see kids in adirondack chairs; I see people seeing. I hear scuffing sneakers. I smell a freshly flipped hamburger with perfect grill marks. I smell smoke from a cigarette end. I hear laughter. I see a baseball cap atop a salmon collared shirt. I see my shadow glide along the crosswalk. I see a girl snow angeling in the grass. I saw a picture of a blonde girl in the snow. I felt the smooth Walmart sled. I felt the winter cold eating the tip of my nose. I felt a soft hat wrapped around my ears. I heard my sister’s laughter as we raced down a slight slope. I lived out a memory. I see the memories I lived. 77

I am still there. Anonymous ’25

5 minutes later and I would not be writing this. 5 minutes later and you would have received a note in your mailbox. 5 minutes later and you would have to wear an outfit of mourning. 5 minutes later and you’d have to face the people you broke as I am lowered. If he had gotten there 5 minutes later, I wouldn’t be. Yet, I am still there. Scrub your skin until you reach the fleshy muscle underneath, blow your nose until my smell is gone, never paint your toenails black again, feed everyone you know lies. I am still there. You will try to forget. You will try to leave my mangled body in the dirt. You will lie and lie and lie. I am still there. Your mothers, siblings, new friends, partners don’t know what you did. They have shooed me away from their minds. Oh but not in yours. I am still there. I am behind the screen your eyes focus on. I am woven into the threads of the clothes you wear. I am programmed into the games we never got to play. I am one with each eraser shaving on your sketchbook. I am mixed into the liquid of your dry shampoo. I am nestled in the crack in your glasses that just won’t stay fixed. I am crushed between the space in between each desktop key. I am melted into the dye you coat your hair with. I am stuck to your skin where I used to hug you. 78

I am shining in the reflection of your hair cutting scissors. I am underneath each note in the final duet. I am still there. No matter the lies you feed yourself, regurgitating false scenarios of your own creation; I am still there.

Heritage Heartbeat Grace M. Hallinan ’24 79

I Just Am

Luke X. Johnson ’25 I am afraid I am comfortable I am lost I am found every once in a while until I am lost again I am the silence that falls the same as snowflakes when an utterly horrible truth is uttered, and I am the blaring noise of every drunken fool who dances until they collapse I am a violent, bloody rage I am a soft, mellow breeze I am a friend I am an enemy I am an adult who will soon be paying taxes and rent, and I’m still a little boy who checks the dark of empty rooms in his house to make sure they have no ghosts in them I am pain out upon my own flesh and I am the needle that sews this weary heart back into one piece I am the favorite color of every person I’ve shaken hands with and I am the worst nightmares of every person I’ve ever had the privilege of embracing I am the beginning and the end The infinite and the abyss A walking contradiction An empty box of everything with a beating heart I make no sense at all, and that is more than I will ever know

Demonic Dive Bar Caitlyn Campo ’26 81

Teenage Dream Cira Shaw ’26

Our toes ache from standing on their tips. From pushing pushing until maybe we’re just a little higher to the sky. Until we’re up in the clouds, and the possibilities are endless, and the make-up isn’t silly, and we aren’t cute for trying, and everything makes more sense. We parade around our dolls dreaming of the day we will walk in their path. or drive their hot pink car. And have their perfect, shiny hair, and perfect, body, and perfect clothes, and perfect friends, and what we say goes, and everything makes sense. Until the keys in our hands feel like a death sentence dangling on a chain 82

our makeup doesn’t look right our clothes don’t fit our body our body doesn’t fit our clothes we look in the mirror and are too big but we’re not on our tippy toes anymore. Barbie didn’t have to study or diet or fake a smile or lie or want to die or try so hard. To exist is hard but to be a teenage girl is impossible. destined to fall short in every way to never stop hoping doomed to always be disappointed but expected to keep gracing them with our pretty smiles. Is this the teenage dream? Sucking in our stomach suffocation more attractive than letting it show, teaching our bodies, that it can wait, food is not a priority, you are not a priority. We are most successful hungry, than ugly miserable, than happy dead, than alive. Frame me now, 83

in all of my glory! Without a wrinkle on my face or a meal in my body or a kind thought in my mind Ah, the glory days. Let me be forever immortalized in this self-imposed hell that is not self-imposed at all. You did this to me. Why are you crying, little girl? Is this black and blue, not the smokey eye you wanted? Is this shade of red, not the shade you would’ve chosen? The blood is on your hands. ...you’re shaking your head. Didn’t you choose this? To be like this? I didn’t feel like a choice at all. They celebrated when the cake cut pink. They’re cheering! (They’re laughing at me). Maybe I should listen let them slice me and inject me until I’m the plastic apple of their eye and can be put in a box sealed away, stored, and forgotten. 84

maybe if they paid women more or the same as men we’d be more capable of becoming their unrealistic-but-not-too-fake-looking canvas. Help me find my footing, this scale of expectations never settles, only shakes. Lend me your hand, little girl, I was like you once, taught to hate to being girly but also that I should stay in line because I am a girl and I must shave my legs and cover my face and fry my hair and never be rude and always wear a smile and help clean up and never complain and not ask questions and not make excuses and not be too easy and not be such a prude and learn to take a joke and god! don’t be such a bitch! Just be perfect, isn’t that enough to ask? Just be a teenage girl. Just be everything we’ve ever dreamed of.

I Remember Florence Alyssa Borelli ’24

I remember studying my reflection in store windows. I remember the Pointe Vecchio at night. I remember rose shaped gelato: mango, lemon, and blood orange intertwined. I remember buying a painting in front of the Uffizi for my grandparents who would never return to Italy. I remember the air combing through my hair as I rode on my cousin’s vespa. I remember sitting on my family’s porch eating pumpkin risotto. I remember sipping a cappuccino in a cafe, feeling so old. I remember the tattooed pizza man I saw every Tuesday and the way he once winked at me when giving me a dollar off. I remember all the boys, living regrets echoing many lies in their many accents. I remember the butt of a cigarette between my lips. I remember dancing under confetti. I remember a hand down my pants. I remember stumbling over cobblestone streets. I remember Mass at the Duomo, holding back tears in the pew. I remember a sunset in Piazza di Michelangelo. I remember drinking wine on my 21st birthday, feeling so young. I remember stairs: stairs in the Uffizi, stairs to class, stairs to my apartment. I remember the nights listening to a violin as I walked home alone. Those were my favorite nights. 86

Untitled Carly Andrew ’24

quiet cat Bella Loiacono ’27 87

To be impressed Kaitlin James ’27

I’d like to place my head on yours, to feel imprinted on your mind. You can rest assured; You’ve bled through every inch of mine. I forgot thoughts can’t be heard, and that I’ve slathered rose-tinged aloe on all your words so they won’t scar, just singe. But I hope I left scorches on your hands so when you hold them to your ears the ideas I never expanded unfurl in your mind where you can hear all the silent talks I had with you as we walked.

Great Men, Old Men, Dead Men August Boland ’24

Pocketa-pocketa Sir Isaac Newton The end of the world He did once predict Two-thousand and sixty Is the year he chose for Apocalyptical Pain to inflict. Jiggety-jiggety Ludwig van Beethoven The concerts of Europe He did once conduct. Though his hearing it failed him And his eyesight degraded him Audiovisually It did not deduct. Higgledy-piggledy Karl Marx, the Socialist Deep beneath Highgate His bones in a stash; Pay bread to see him, Ten pound to see him, Sociopolitically Raking in cash.

Changeling

Gabriella Amleto ’24 I dealt the beat of my breast for a babe exchanged to pointed tricksters who deal with boons and boon out deals They grabbed without care stuffed within their ghastly garbs t leaving my blood staining an ever-expanding red My babe doth cry shrieking Pummeling crimson in innocent fists clenched and yellowed I, in forever-pain mourn their sickly state Eyes bigger than our hemispheres but filled on the sweet broth of stardust they wanderlust in great forests, longing to run, run, run and thrash when forbidden My babe’s fervor 90

of sickliness and holy fire will scourge fields aplenty turning their eyes anew Mushrooms rounded-in still rotation are of their nature to sleep upon and lose within but never to tread upon the border for rule of nature calls but law of man forbids All beyond my purview for life newly touched causes, life old ceases

Athena’s Rock Christina Georgiou ’24 91

Silverfish

Caitlin Blencowe ’24 Third Place, Fiction I opened my underwear drawer to find a horde of silverfish shiny, slimy bodies weaving between the cotton fabric of my intimates. I reached for one, squashed it beneath the pad of my thumb, a silver sheen smearing across the wood of the drawer and my finger. I turned my thumb to see the remains, and I suddenly became grotesquely aware of my own naked body under the dim light of a dying bulb. Looking in the mirror, I thought for a moment that I could have been a silverfish; the luminous flesh of a body - head, thorax, and abdomen - squirming under the light. As my eyes raked across my figure, I grew keenly aware of the hair foll cles on my scalp, on my limbs. I could feel a ghost of an insect in my hair, its six legs planting themselves among the thick strands and extending to the length of my locks, becoming a part of me. I began to scratch, dull nails digging into my scalp, flakes of skin falling out with clumps of soiled hair. But the itch was insatiable – my fingers trailed to my arms, picking at the dry skin of elbows until blood trickled down my forearms and buried itself under my nails. I stared in horror, as the deep red took on the same silver sheen that marked my thumb a minute earlier, and yet, I couldn’t stop digging into the soft flesh of my body as the liquid began to drip down and pool at my feet. Metallic beads leaking from my open wounds, I looked to my underwear drawer once again, but no silverfish were in sight. 92

Figurehead

Sylvie Bell ’26 I carved a woman and placed her on the bow of a galleon, bestowed upon her substance, limited range of motion, a set of ideals, but soon observed her learn to resent her own condition and so invited onlookers to try to ease her wooden sadness, to take a sterile instrument and plunge it down her hollowed throat. I spun tales of a suffering that was pocket-sized, extractable– as though she hadn’t been built around it, as though its removal wouldn’t sink the ship. 93

PopPop

Francesca DeRosa ’27 I don’t remember that day--I’ve really tried. I don’t remember how it was pouring rain. It was another visit. We were saying goodbye, we were flying home. I remember that place, the way it looked; everyone was tired, wishing for youth. I can’t imagine that awful smell, the smell of old perfume and stinky socks. It made me seasick, like the ocean colliding upon rocks. I can’t remember the interior of his room: Was it plain? Decorative? Was there a picture of me in there too? Was he tired or lonely? Did he have any friends? I can’t recall the sound of his voice, or the wrinkles in his face; I can’t recall the last thing he said before he passed away. I can’t remember his little laugh or the way he struggled down the stairs. How many bandages did he have on his knees? Was he tired of fighting that god awful disease? I can’t seem to remember the date of that day, I don’t remember anything that I said. I don’t remember the last time I cried. I can’t remember if I said goodbye. Did I say “I love you?” Did I give him a hug? Was there even a moment when we talked about love? A love so strong that it would make me remember every little detail, even those that did not matter. Was there ever a time when I watched him stand, proud and tall? How could I forget the way he always made a mess. (Spilling wine on the carpet almost made Grandma go into cardiac arrest!) The way he scraped his knees or the gray fade of his hair-- everything seems so incomplete as if I do not care to remember him. I think of the last time he smiled; we were saying goodbye. Did he wish we could stay longer? What was our last supper that day? That meal--that day--those holy hours. Bits and pieces dragged and scoured. He used to paint, that I can confirm, his painting, his memories, everything that he was. He does not know that I painted him too. It was 94

almost tragic, the way I mixed orange and blue. Did he love the beach or did he always sit in the sand? Watching and waiting for us to come back. Were his knees always shaky? Was there ever a time where he climbed down those stairs more than one step at a time? The way he played piano, I know he was good. He’s the reason why I try to tickle those ivories, to play a merry tune, but sometimes I stop and wonder what good would that do? I try to remember that nothing feels as good as his hand in mine when he was still alive. And those precious moments where I had him near, are simply ghostly whispers that haunt my ears. Remember. Remember. I’m trying, I swear. But it’s harder to be forgiven when nothing is there.

get out. Marisa Brown ’27 95

Fetters

Kyle Neblo ’25 It was in bleakest midnight, when first your gentle hand grasped mine, driven, as if possessed by a force in which I do not believe, and yet still was a balm to me. Your clasp lent strength where little remained, certainty, where doubt held sway, Hope. Where hope dare not stay. Ever I sought to repay you: in gifts, in favors, in time, trifling feathers to balance the scales upon which all hearts are weighed. So, with the whole world imperiled and nothing yet known, you went forth: a quest all your own. And the indiscretions of others, for whom you held such care, brought your journey to its untimely end. Alone, I carry your memory forward, as much for caution as comfort. Lest I learn again to trust the hand of fate, 96

and be once more cruelly struck by its sick comedy – There it was, hope stricken from the record, face still wet with tears, heart heavier by far than all the works of man together, that we found each other. Utter insanity abating calamity, with all the real surety and false bluster of a passer-by tossing a ball betting upon the luckiest number of all. Never was there a greater joy than your refusal of my every grace; your arms a serenely apotheotic embrace. In you I invested such faith, your creeping mendacity was complete impossibility. On the eve of our potentiality, you tore with primal tenacity, rending me asunder, leaving me confused, broken, alone with a trinket, whose receipt did aid this future and engineer today – Who am I then, puppet, or puppeteer? Waxing and waning 97

with such great frequency no one living can hear. I am here before you, but truly, is it I? Or just an empty, six-sided lie? “Ālea iacta est.” I think as I rise each morn, or by noon, to be sure, as I reach for my poultice, my salve, or other such remedy for intractable malady. Hands aplenty reach down, All of them forsworn, while each could lift me up from the bank, the gentlest push could damn me forevermore. Up then! You, mourning fool. After all, Today must be another day simply ending in -day. Lest those you carry who’ve nowhere else to keep their soul from you drive the effort and the art that is to be alive.

Leica Jenna Corrado ’26 99

Untitled Megan Byrnes ’24 100

A Goodbye to Summer Ode Channah Garcia ’24

Say goodbye to summer, to the 2-hour flights from Florence to Paris, to the 9-hour neverending flight to New York City, and the 11-hour flight home. Say goodbye to the first time you held your precious sweet potato, pinching his chubby cheeks, chonky arms, and cheesin’ smile; to seeing his baby fat rolling out of his diaper and onesie like the Michelin Man - a sight you’ve only enjoyed through FaceTime before. Say goodbye to the melting heat and Hawaiian breeze, your sticky hands covered in liquefied shaved ice, dripping down your sea salt-covered arms. While you’re at it, say goodbye to the job you’ve been doing every summer since your junior year of high school, the splish splash of kids in the pool, the tweeeet of your whistle as you tell boys to stop running, stop running, stop running! on the wet hot pavement. Say goodbye to the humid morning air, the sweat collecting on your brow as you set your red tube down guarding your chair; to the beeps of cars rushing to work, the clanging of metal gates, and the laughter of the water aerobics ladies as they watch you and your coworkers jump up to dance to Village People’s “Y.M.C.A.” Say goodbye to summer, to the days so hot and long you felt like a melted red Otterpop. To the days you laid out in the sun for hours, upon hours, upon hours, until you were a cooked coconut. That’s what your mom would call you–a coconut– a gentle jab, a loving insult. A whitewashed brown girl, complete with the ‘basic white girl’ starter pack: baby blue Yeti covered in stickers to hide the dents. Much like your tattoos and what lurks underneath, black and blue dotting your perfectly tanned skin. If you had the money, your body would be a work of art. Good riddance to June and its neverending heartbreak and stupidity. Good riddance to June and your 2 a.m. cry sessions spent staring up at the ceiling, the moonlight on your face turning your tears into stars. Cursed is the hole in your chest and elephant-like memory, playing out the picture on his private story like a movie. Her hands tracing the same tattoos you did, wondering if that little action has the same effect on him with her as it did with you. 101

You wished upon every star, dandelion, and 11:11 that you would wake up with amnesia and forget the stupid little things, like the way it felt to fall asleep next to him. Say goodbye to the sand sticking to your legs like ‘opihi on a rock, immovable Hawaiian limpets, even among towering waves, to your sandy cheeks after diving in a game of spike ball with your friends, to Morgan Wallen on the radio singing “Last night, we let the liquor talk.” To your hot girl summer playlist you had on repeat, scream-singing to “Shout Out to My Ex” as you speed down H1at 1 a.m., windows down, hair tangling in the wind. Say goodbye to sunsets like a rainbow sherbert, coloring the sky pink and orange, lighting the beach aflame, and the waves crashing ashore, washing away your footprints and mistakes. “You’re insane,” your friends don’t dare to say out loud. “There she goes,” they say as they watch you offer your superglued and duct-taped heart twice more to the world, the same world that shattered it in the first place, leaving infinitesimal pieces of you everywhere. Say hello to fall and calls for better and brighter days. For moments with friends that end with a smile so big you forget summer. Say hello to grass-stained jerseys and bruise-ridden legs, evidence that you went to battle that only you and your teammates understand, comparing your surface-level injuries like trophies. The crisp fall air puts a pep in your step as you walk to your dreaded HR management class, in a room worse than a prison cell, no windows, no way to daydream about your upcoming wine nights or tequila nights where you end up on the floor. Say hello to fall and its changing colors, shedding the old and welcoming the new. Like the waves you jumped into at Ke’Iki Beach, you let the autumn rain crash down, tilting your head up to the dark, unforgiving sky, waiting for sweet relief as your perfect beach tan is stripped away, making room for new scars, new memories, new stories. Say hello to fall, for she calls you closer into her pumpkin spice and cinnamon-scented embrace, laying you down in her bed of wilted daffodils and daisies, enshrining you until next summer.

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The Real Still Life Grace M. Hallinan ’24

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The Angel Lost in Hell Nicholas Ferrari ’27

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The whites of his eyes darted about hysterically as his wings were seared with blisters from the flames. He hacked on the raging piles of ash which glided through the air like a swarm of locusts mercilessly munching away at the innocent flesh of the poor lost soul who trudged helplessly through the scorching wasteland. Looking past the starved demons who lapped at their lips with such loathsome intent, He gazed into the blazing sky with what little faith remained in that baron heart of his. And with it, he pleaded to The God who viewed him solemnly with pity pouring from his flesh. “Lord almighty, my only true savior in this beautiful world you have made. I deserve nothing but the most rancid punishment you could bestow upon me. And yet, I stand here and beg to you, my lord above. Grace me with eyes. Eyes immune to the fire which overtakes me in this place. Allow me to make my way to the other side of these hells, Lord. So that I may return home

and bathe in the light of your presence once more.” The God heard his prayer and knew what must be done. He tore off a piece of his flesh and molded it into a new demon which he sent down into the hells to guide The Angel. As he watched The Demon lift The Angel off the ground he whispered a prayer of his own. “Craft your own eyes, woeful one. You have all that you need to accomplish it.”

Innocence Megan Byrnes ’24

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The Red Beret

Francesca DeRosa ’27 She was in France again, looking for him. She didn’t know where he was. She didn’t care. She had to find him. She had to find him and tell him that she– The streets were getting more crowded. She grabbed the hat on her head with one hand and pushed people away with the other. Whispers of love and swing music haunted the streets. Flags of victory from the First World War still hung with pride. A sense of justice pushed her forward. Desperate and tired, she traveled on. The streets smelled like cigarettes, sweat, and alcohol. The game was exciting until she became the only one playing. Store after store. Restaurant after restaurant. She scoured the streets, eyes hungry for the sight of him. He left too quickly, her words hadn’t been fast enough. He would regret it now if he saw her. He would realize how much he affected her when he saw her standing on the street, beret in hand. This was not the life she had envisioned. Maybe she was crazy to chase him around the world, just maybe. The sky was getting dimmer. She clutched her red beret, pushing against the tide of people. When she found him, if she found him, she didn’t know what she would do. Hug him. Scream at him. Love him. Hate him. Maybe just say goodbye. The feeling that he gave her, it was more than she could deal with. She wanted this lung-crushing ache gone. This feeling that ran through her veins and invaded her heart. Colored her flesh and made her spine go rigid. June in Rome, 1937, he left her then. August in Paris 1938, she would make him regret it. How fickle he was to meet her and then break her heart in cities of love. She was afraid. What if she truly saw him? Her hands would go clammy, her mouthwould run dry. Every wall that she had built would be broken. She didn’t want to experience the hurt. The hurt was real if she saw him. The streets became puddled and her feet lodged into the potholes of the street, the air was thick with dirt and fog. She tried to think of the places he would be. He would be somewhere she hated. Street lamps flickered, and the signs of open bars hummed in the moonlight. Men of all ages stood on the corners, beckoning people to enter their establishments and purchase something. She felt encased in darkness. Aircrafts zoomed 106

overhead. Whispers about war with Germany careened in her ears. The sounds of laughter and melodies were too much. She clutched her red beret and continued on. Maybe this was supposed to happen. Maybe this was a part of God’s master plan. He hurt her, disrespected her. He ran away even when he promised he would stay. Here she was, fulfilling his promise: to never be parted. She wouldn’t just let him abandon her. She was running until she couldn’t anymore. In a world of disenchantment, she tried to have hope. She tried to remember the way he made her feel and tried to forget the way he hurt her. For him, she would go to the ends of the earth. For her, he would only run away. She clutched her red beret, regretting nothing. She needed to find him to say that she despised him. There. She had almost passed it. He was sitting at the edge of a bar watching the swing singer’s story unfold. How happy he looked. A feeling of doubt and longing cascaded against the shores of her mind. Maybe she was deranged to be this desperate. Maybe it was wrong. But he was right there... messy dark hair, white shirt rolled up to his forearms, a light smile on his disturbingly beautiful face. A freckle above his upper lip. Thick dark eyebrows, sharp nose. His eyes were a dark brown, sunken in his face. The sparkle of life still twinkled in his irises but his bone structure was almost skeleton-like. His features haunted her, everything was still the same as the first day she saw him. He looked ethereal as if he never ruined her life. For a moment, she thought she would just turn back. But then she looked back up at him again and saw how content he seemed. She felt everything all at once. Her eyes felt weary, she imagined how bloodshot they were. She could feel her hair sticking to the back of her neck, sweaty, irritated. How pale, unfortunate, and distraught she must have looked. The beret began to slide off her head and all doubts were erased. She grabbed her red beret from off of her head, looking down on it. Her hands delicately traced the inside seam, a smile playing at her lips. She moved her finger over, circling the small silver engraved pistol that rested in the middle. Her smile grew wider. He needed to know how much he hurt her. She wanted to show him just how much.

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Wires

Ashley Laub ’27 I’m not one to write about a person. I write about A system, or an item. Or a place. Thoughts, emotions. And if I’d write about someone There’s always a wall Of symbolism. Or imagery I hide behind because Talking about my person is too personal to begin to write. But you You are so important to me If I were to try to write honestly about a person, It would be about You. Dear Best Friend, No, Best friend won’t cut you for me. Friend? Girlfriend? Soulmate? Lifemate? Schoolmate? Roommate? You Could fit each of these descriptions and more. The only description I have seen that begins to burn down what you are to me reads: Our friendship is why I believe in soulmates. 108

Two broken pieces combined to look like a heart, complimenting each other and bound by a wire. We swore we would make our own necklaces Because how the fuck a system would try to describe you and me But we were so busy intertwining our own wires We forgot to create a piece of our bond we could see. The wires started Young and Shiny and New And I never thought wires could be pretty But god damn it if our wires weren’t the prettiest ones I had ever seen Silver and Gold Copper and Ivory Fused Together And intertwining Wrapped into neat-loose-braids That became tighter and tighter As time crept away I couldn’t tell you when our wires became chains. Dear Friend, I have nothing to say to you because There is nothing I can say to you Why speak When I can just look in your eyes And know, And why use words When my irises can speak 109

What my tongue could never accurately convey? Dear Girlfriend, Our relationship of wires Is the Longest and Strongest Outside of the wires From which I came, So when they became so tight They Looped and Wrapped around my Throat and your Waist What the fuck was I supposed to say? Dear Best Friend, They tell you Not to get your wires crossed But what if our crossed wires Was the most complex-beautiful-fucking thing I had ever seen? Maybe that’s why. It’s so beautiful And so mesmerizing No one can tell When the wires become chains until it’s too late. Dear Life mate I don’t want our wires to burn I don’t want to leave our wires behind 110

So here I lay Sitting on my bed With my head in my hands Still soft but cut red And my heart on our wires Hoping if I pour enough Blood, Sweat, and Tears Mind, Body, and Soul I could slip the wires free And once again We could be simply you and me. Dear Soulmate, I only wish to separate the wires But you say it’s not enough. You take out your knife and you try to only cut your wires away from me, But of-fucking-course You cut me too. How couldn’t you when we were so intertwined? My mind and body and soul are frayed beyond my belief And yet my wires are still intact, Your cuts make me wonder who was really you and who was really me? Because this relationship, This not-yet-codependent-but-a-little-too-dependent relationship, Was everything to me. I guess You saw the wires for chains quicker than I did. 111

After all, They were everything to me. To strengthen our wires, Ultimately I guess you had to cut us free. Dear Best Friend. The chains are gone, And our wires are frayed beyond belief. Because although I now have some of your wires It is so obvious you also took a piece of me. How couldn’t you when we were so intertwined? My Yours Our wires Are not chains But now a knot: The biggest-toughest-knot I have ever seen, In my stomach And in my throat And in my heart And I try to separate our wires My hands now bloody and calloused; In resignation, in vulnerability, in defeat, in faith; I pick up my lighter. 112

Life Imitates Art Jennifer Cabrera ’26 113

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder Giulia Rufino ’24

Solitude is nice. But perhaps you and yourself make it too crowded. They say three is a crowd, but I’d argue that two is. Your mind and your body Permanently stuck together forever. My mind and body do not get along. They are forever sworn mortal foes with very little willingness to create peace amongst their two kingdoms. My mind is constantly trying to take over my body’s territory. Getting ready for battle, my mind makes my Thoughts zoom through my brain, I feel as if you are walking. no. Running. No. Sprinting. I am sprinting for my life, away from what is and what could be. Suddenly, as a soldier, the body and its army attempt to save me—but to no avail. I am trapped, claustrophobic, and scared that I won’t ever get out of my own mind. The mental walls are closing in. Stuck in solitude Suddenly, a tranquil tune plays as I place my headphones over my head. No more sprinting, just silence. 114

In Her Eyes

Isabelle Erb ’26 They’ve whispered, “Pretty girl,” to me, Yet sparingly, not often Leaving me to ponder why, Do they seek some hidden gain, Or simply extend a gentle grace, When words elude them? Their motives, veiled in secrecy, Forever shrouded in mystery. Smart, sweet, or stubborn, But... pretty? No. When they call me “pretty,” I reply with thanks, a mask upon my face Yet the mirror of belief reflects a void. For pretty are those who exude confidence, Born with grace upon their brows, Unburdened by awkwardness or shyness, They, like beacons, draw all eyes near. Pretty people, models in life’s grand theater, Actors, or voices on the news, Wed to millionaires or wealthy in their own right, Pretty people, their paths well-paved. 115

“Pretty people tread the path to success,” Echoed the words my mother bestowed, When she left me at life’s next doorstep, “Make friends with them, for you see, Alone, you lack the beauty to succeed.” Pretty are those who craft friendships with ease, No struggle to find their place, No pleas for love to quench the yearning in their heart. Seeking worth beyond these confines, In studies, talents, feats divine, Yields nothing of substance. For what holds significance, If not the visage, form, and thoughts, Fail to mirror her desired grace? I fall short of her standard, Inadequate, insufficient, In her eyes, beauty alone holds weight. “But you’re a lovely girl,” they say, I reply with thanks, a mask adorned, Those words not enough to change the thoughts That have been cemented in my mind Because in her eyes, I’m but a stain on her perfection.

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Skaftafell Glacier Savannah Pinto ’26 117

being alive.

E’mme Armstrong ’25 i love you. what was yours has since become mine. what is mine has become yours. i first realized when my hand lotion wasn’t positioned as i had left it, the scent of lavender following you around as you made dinner. the next time happened without any second thought, me pulling a stolen shirt of yours out of the laundry and tucking it neatly into my drawer. you once mocked my too-sweet coffee order, but now order extra vanilla in yours when you think i’m not listening. i listen to yacht rock now when i’m driving, ever since you told me it reminds me of your childhood. i love you. i can’t enter my home without flashes of memories flooding my mindyou watching seinfeld, donning a perma smile that always met your eyes. you on my bed, insisting i keep the thermometer too low, even though you overheat in your sleep. you in the bathroom, jokingly threatening to use my face wash if i touch your shaving cream. you discovering the shirt i had stolen and hidden away, chuckling to yourself and closing the drawer. you hold me, and kiss me, and step on my toes- and it’s suffocating. you remind me what it feels like; being alive. i love you. i love you. i love you. and i like you. i like you more than i’ve liked anyone. it’s a firm distinction for me. i’m unsure how many people i’ve loved, but i’ve liked very few. very few are able to see through my barriers and walls, many are the reason they’ve been built higher. but youyou make me alive.

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The Seelie, The Siren, The Sea Francesca DeRosa ’27

The Seelie, The Siren, The Sea are all connected, close your eyes to see She lured men to their deaths– “Come, come to me.” Entranced, enchanted, enslaved Dancing in starlight, she’ll take your hand, your heart And lead you to a world far apart It doesn’t matter if she cannot lie, she is all things golden, all things right She crafted from the core of the earth, hair wild as flowers, smile unmistakingly free Give her a minute of your time, though you will regret it You cannot help yourself, she is everything and more Her voice calls to deep, to the darkest parts of you Laced deep in her throat, there is a silent song It calls men like you along Her fingers run up your arm Dying and desperate, you f a l l Lines like lightning crack against her forehead but her lips are like honey, she licks them in hunger “Forever?” Silenced to her call, it must be love, “F o r 119

e v e r.” Oh, how foolish men can be. The Seelie, The Siren, The Sea, they lick their lips in glee And as the night turns sour, She turns to the sea, singing, “It calls, it calls, it calls to me” Roaring in reply, the sea reaches–pulling out her eyes Shattered is the beauty Swallowed by the shore Beauty nevermore Let her tummy fall, roles hanging out in relief Skin pale as the blue moon, salty as the sea Erased is the lines under her eyes Red mouth rubbed free Go back to bed–sleep Scales of lies dusted down on the planes of her back Hair replaced with rotting seaweed, black as tarmac Her stomach...it ripples in ocean waves, wrinkled, she is sour She loves to play with men, she loves to devour Restless as the sea, she breathes, finally f r e e

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Night Dancer

Sarah Gurskis ’26

“But I don’t know how to move on.” Glen glances at me, shoulders slumped. I hand him a mug of hot cocoa. “She’s gone.” “I know she is, but there’s only so much we can do,” I say, trying to soothe him. The rain outside gently tapped on the window, as if it wanted to join in on the conversation. I rub his arm, looking up at the ceiling. “It was so soon,” he whispered, voice cracking. “Too soon.” I lean against him, trying to get him to drink the cocoa while it is still hot. “It’s always too soon – it always feels way too soon. But you have to –” “Move on? You think that’s gonna help right now?” he says sharply. I close my mouth, the rain intruding on our conversation again. “Then don’t.” He wipes his tears. “What?” he says, almost in disbelief. “You think –” “Don’t move on! Wallow in your grief!” I take a deep breath. “There’s only so much I can do, Glen,” I say as calmly as I could. It was his turn for his mouth to close. He takes a deep breath as I stare at the dark TV in front of us. “If you wallow, don’t expect me to follow your lead,” I say. “Just... don’t destroy yourself. You’re welcome to stay at my place for as long as you need, okay?” He merely nods his head, taking a sip of the provided cocoa. “Thanks.” I watch him take my suggestion as he wallows. He brushes his matted hair out of his drenched eyes, sniffling in short intervals. I stand up to grab him some tissues, and watch him flop on his side like a dead fish. I hand him a messy wad of tissues, and he takes it with his sticky hands, blowing his nose. Sitting back down next to him, I push his slumped body back over, leaning him against me as I adjust the blanket over him. “Feel any better?” He gloomily shakes his head. “No.” I attempt to find any string of words or gestures of comfort in my head as he grabs the edges of the blanket and wraps it tighter around him. “... Casey May,” he mumbles. “When can I just get over it?” I put my hand on his shoulder. “You know it doesn’t work like that.” 121

“I know... but I wish it did.” “You’ll never get over her.” “I know. I wish I could.” “And you’ll never stop loving her.” He sighs. “I know.” He stares at his darkened reflection, wiping his eyes with the damp blanket. “I just wish that I could go back, y’know? Before the accident. It was just us two, in the living room.” He rises, the blanket leaving his body. “She took my hand. The needle falls onto the record. The music lulls. She spins me around. I follow her lead. Clumsily.” He spins around clunkily, eyes closing. “The music swells. We blend together. I take her other hand. I could drown in her smile. I could drown in our emotions.” He takes a shaky breath. “I take the needle off. Restart the song. I wanted to relive that feeling. I wanted to drown again.” His hand falls to his side. “It’s like she’s here.” A tear falls down his cheek. “Please, look at me again.” I stand up, wrapping the blanket around him, shrouding him back into reality. I hug him, staring into nothingness as I absorb his trembling. He sits down on the carpet, watery eyes held back by a dam of pride. “It should have been me,” he cracks. He wipes his tears away. “I should have died–” “Don’t say that.” I hug him tighter. “Never say that.” “It’s my fault–” “It is not your fault. You were not driving that car. You...” my voice cracked. “Dammit, I miss her too! And if it was you, I would not have you in my damn house!” I squeeze my eyes shut, attempting to control my ragged breaths. The muffled rain fills the sound of the house as we sit on the floor, listening to the night’s natural symphony of rain, as if the world mourned with our souls to create such a somber melody. “I’m sorry.”

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A Week in September Anonymous ’24

9/22/22 A Week In September Thursday:

This was the day I truly felt I had stepped on the pedestal of adulthood; wandering an almost abandoned department store parking lot with my keys clenched between my knuckles. For the first time, I was grateful for my acne-adorned face and the flesh and fat I lacked on my chest. I couldn’t find a birthday present.

Friday:

I woke up early with inspiration and ordered the perfect gift, hoping it’ll arrive on time.

Saturday:

Applause can make a person feel like they just walked into a castle with the head of the ferocious dragon they slayed. And it can make you feel like a gear in a clock, a part of a whole. But applause can also make you feel alone on an iceberg far away, either put there or wishing you could stay there because it’s better.

Sunday:

I spent today in rounds and repetitions of “Right this way,” “Would you like a receipt?” “Have a nice day!”

Monday:

Rainy days are perfect for planting yourself on the couch, soaking up sappy stories, and leaking salty droplets for problems that aren’t yours.

Tuesday:

I scour the closets and corners of my mind for something to combat the dreary monotony that school raids my head with. Nothing so far. I’ll look again tomorrow.

Wednesday: The sweet, melodic bells glide gracefully out of my phone and yank and tear me from sleep’s arms again. The gift should have come by now. 123

Jazz Zine Jennifer Cabrera ’26 124

The Child of Another Man’s Face Bridget McGuire ’26

When I look over my shoulder, I see a man with no strain on his face, no care with his hands. Cheeks blooming with ease, lips poised open by his words. He ignores the back of his head, he blesses his feeding hand The crown he bears was given by strangers, and the guilt he feels is quashed because of them. No one will remember my name. Not many people would choose to acknowledge it’s new. For we have so much in common, it dulls the sense we might not be equal. He is so much more than I am. He is older, revered, prodigious, happy, and I am far from his vice-like fingers. How naive you were to think you could paint the picture of my life. I push against the canvas to take your shoulders and shake them, screaming with a mouth dripping black words from your brush. They bubble from my throat and choke to kill. I am met with a stare that slips over my face to paint my hands. So what you touched turned to fool’s gold, You had only what could be bought with gold. And the coin flips. What I touch turns to lead,

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You would say I am poisoning my mind. Now, mirror, stare into my soul. The glass of a palace window is not as wise, As you may repel what I say and I see, The windows present a little world where he used to cry, “Defy me!” “Defend me!” Even as I watch him, he can’t move from my despair. I can hardly see myself, for he is doting and pampering my visage I feel the touch of his fingers against mine on the frame... And in fear, I mistakenly back away, as if his face doesn’t infect mine. What crime is this that we are so similar I have your eyes but not your smile?! “Give him the best of life for he will be great!” “Wipe his thoughts so they’re polished,” “Preen his body so he can express himself,” “Give him power to wield over those he loves,” “And tell him everything he has is his choice.” The choice he took led to such a burdensome path. Not for him, of course. But I remember when I found myself existing. And how terrible that birth needed to be. I turn forward again and walk away

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Sestina for Daniel Lily Jandrisevits ’25

I find it hard to write about For the very first time. The slope of your Nose, the edge Of a lip. It’s all I can bear to keep. I attempt to keep The moment in jar. To think about When we’re apart. All I manage is a moth. A short time Fluttering, patrolling the edge Of glass. A noise. It’s your Arm afterall. Your leg, your Eyes, arms, stomach, to keep Forever. At the edge Of it all. Standing, about To fall. Every time, Me on you. All Of it worth it. All The bruises and your Smile. Arms holding strong, time Flowing leisurely, then faster. I keep 127

A list. You keep talking about It. I want it too. The edge Of your eye meets mine. We edge A little closer. It’s all Crumbs and sugary fingers about To be licked. Your Hand displays an offering. I keep It forever, swallowed whole. Time Ticks, creating a beat. Time Stays with us. The edge Of your shirt is stained. Keep It there. For all To see. A mark on your Sleeve matching mine. You’re about To close your eyes. It’s about Time to dream. The edges of your Mouth quirk, reminding me of it all.

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Serene Silence Luke Hamling ’27 129