Each to Each Literary Magazine (Summer 2024)

Each to Each Summer 2024

Cover Art Designed by Amber Nguyen

My heart leaps up when I behold A rainbow in the sky: So was it when my life began; So is it now I am a man; So be it when I shall grow old, Or let me die!

The Child is father of the Man; And I could wish my days to be Bound each to each by natural piety.

William Wordsworth

Editor's Note

Atoms: A Gallery of Vignettes

“23 Teacups” by Chelsea Grack

“The Staghart Hut” by Hannah Park

“The Pot Roast Incident” by Mason Conti

“The Monsters Under the Bed” by Sydney Harper

“Back in Your Day” by Mason Liger

“Where Light Became a Dream” by Keanu Perez

“On This Land” by Hung Nguyen

Editor's Note

I would first like to thank all of the individuals who contributed their time, support, and writing to Each to Each. Thank you, Mr. Lloyd, for giving us a space to gather, discuss ideas, and probe the boundaries of our creativity. Thank you, Mrs. Phelan, for advertising this opportunity to your students and helping us collect submissions. Above all, thank you to all of the students who bravely and graciously shared their perspective and work with us.

We curated the inaugural issue of Each to Each with the intention of demonstrating the complexity and density of the teenage experience. While compiling this issue, we aimed to extend that theme by selecting pieces that embody immaterial but critical elements of youth. The core argument expressed in Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s novella The Little Prince a book I read while editing this issue—is that children often have a keener understanding of the experiences and feelings that make life meaningful. “Les yeux sont aveugles,” the Little Prince declares as the book concludes, “Il faut chercher avec le cœur.” (The eyes are blind. We must look with the heart.) The eccentric and energetic pieces included in this issue bear out the novella’s conclusion that young people make themselves more available to opportunities for beauty, fantasy, serendipity, and potent emotions. By redefining the rules of space, time, and logic, the writing featured in this issue arrives at deeper, less concrete truths.

The issue begins with a gallery of vignettes short pieces designed to record a specific moment in time.

Chelsea Grack’s “23 Teacups” comically identifies a catalytic event in a young man ’ s life, Hannah Park’s “The Staghart Hut” illustrates a rare moment of communion and connection within a high-octane fantasy context, Mason Conti’s “The Pot Roast Incident” captures the joy and exhilaration of revenge, Sydney Harper’s “The Monsters Under the Bed” evokes the elemental dangers that emerge during moments of vulnerability, and Mason Liger’s “Back in Your Day” uses a tender intergenerational exchange to reflect on the peculiarities of our modern age.

The short stories featured in this issue, “Where Light Becomes a Dream” by Keanu Perez and “On This Land” by Hung Nguyen, employ vivid alternative realities to explore the contemporary issues of violence and emotional isolation. The poems, “Your Silence Enables Injustice” by Muska Momand and “The Rotten Voice Inside Your Head” by Sydney Harper, experiment with literary personas and excavate sensitive topics for psychological insight. Also included in this issue are an interview with Nick Oliveri, a Kirkus-recommended novelist, and reflections on activities completed within Fountain Valley’s Creative Writing Club.

As you flip through the pages of the magazine, I hope you acquire a more vivid impression of how youthful perspectives can reveal the wisdom, wistfulness, and wonder embedded within the fantastical fabric of our everyday lives.

Nick Oliveri on the Psychology of Genre Fiction

Throughout his literary career, Nick Oliveri has used the narrative space of genre fiction to communicate his perspectives on philosophy and human psychology. He is the author of eight novels and an ebook of poetry. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

NICOLE: So, I know that you're a writer mostly of transgressive genre-bending fiction, and I wanted to ask you about your opinion on how genre fiction, like horror fiction, can be a vehicle also for psychological inquiry and psychological discovery.

NICK: That is a really great question, and so what I would say about that is I wrote The Conjurer as my debut, and I wrote it to be very psychological, and I also wrote it to be philosophical, and I'm very humanistic in my approach to characters where I want to build real people. But it's packaged up. So Kirkus Reviews, for example, they gave it, it was in the top 1% of submissions for 2022 for Kirkus Reviews, and they labeled it as just, quote, fantasy. And on Ingram Spark and Retail Backend, it's labeled as ancient history fiction.

But in my opinion, it's incredibly psychological. To me, it's actually, genre fiction is a great way to package up psychological inquiry commercially and then give it to a reader, because the reader can still place it in a genre.

Say it's a murder mystery and put so much of either your own doctrine or important philosophical questions, or even you, if you're like a great propagandist, like you could put your own religious ideals in a mystery thriller that's super commercial, and no one knows, but you can lead them down a path and package it up commercially.

NICOLE: I think it's really wonderful that you're using the vocabulary of genre to to carry out psychological conversations. I was actually reading recently Kazuo Ishiguro's Never Let Me Go, and I think he does something similar. He uses the vocabulary of sci-fi to carry out this really interesting conversation about what it means to be human and mortality and all of those themes that I think most people unfairly restrict to realistic or psychological fiction.

NICK: And I see the converse for me is I tend to stay away from certain genres because because I want that kind of inquiry, and I want that kind of depth in a novel where if I'm either watching a film or reading a book and I can't, I look at this character or person, and then by the way, I don't like to call my characters characters. I call them people.

I strictly refer to them as people, so if I find a person in fiction, any medium, and I'm not believing it, and they're not selling me on themselves, and I think their motives are too awry, unless there's some reason, it usually shuts me off.

NICOLE: Yeah, I love that you refer to your characters as people.

NICK: Because they live and breathe and laugh and cry just like us. I don't want to get too deep, but all we're doing, and I'm not like a solipsist really, but how we're interacting is through our own minds and our own imaginations. And so if you find a powerful figure, and I don't mean just powerful in a worldly sense, but if you have a character or a person cast into your head, and that author or filmmaker makes a great image and impression, that person lives. That idea lives in you. It's just what we call reality and what we call fiction.

NICOLE: I came across this quote recently, and it argued that reading a book is just one creative intelligence interacting with another creative intelligence. I also wanted to get your opinion on whether you think like the boundary between genre fiction and literary fiction has become a bit more blurry recently.

NICK: So, that's a really great one, cause I love exploring and now I'm not a fan, a huge fan of the word classics, because it just kind of more or less refers to the Western canon.

I would say absolutely, because I think that there is this confluence, and as we continue to communicate and connect with each other more, and the world becomes more globalized, and information gets out there more, I think even if we don't think so, like everyone is gaining a slightly better perspective of, or at least the creators of the fiction, who we are as people. Take one of the biggest genre fiction, and I'm gonna go to film here, but everyone's gonna know it, so it's a good reference, Star Wars.

When you look at interviews with George Lucas, he had metaphors in there, he wanted to make a statement. And then, I'm not sure if you knew this, but Charles Dickens was considered pop lit at the time.

So, I think the line is blurred, but I also think when you, and we're in a Barnes and Noble right now, so when you look at the figures of the frames in the wall, and if they're in black and white, we tend to lionize them, and say they had this deeper understanding. But, in terms of the industry, publishers, reviewers, and sellers need to package you up and put you in a box, even if your literature isn't in a box, which mine is never in a box. But, the retailers need it to say fantasy, or action and adventure, or psychological thriller, in order to sell it.

I love reading fiction and I love writing fiction, because if I had all the answers, I would just write essays. We need better questions, rather than answers.

NICOLE: Yeah, and I think in a way, genre fiction, good, really good genre fiction, is just asking the same questions that writers of literary fiction ask, but through a different mode, you know? But at the end of the day, we're still wondering about the same things. And I was also wondering, because your work kind of exists at this intersection, who are your influences?

NICK: So, I have this wide, wide, wide breadth of influences. I do absolutely draw from, I'd say, three or four writers, mainly, and then I've formed my own unique style off of that. I think once you write enough, you get your own, it becomes uniquely you.

My literary influences are, put it directly, Hemingway, Vladimir Nabokov, Stephen King, and Hunter S. Thompson. They changed lit in so many different ways, and I don't just love reading their work. I love studying them as people. Also Jean-Michel Basquiat and Vincent van Gogh, Napoleon Bonaparte as a historical figure, and I also love Lil Wayne in his individualism.

And if you actually go and, like, I think everyone has a philosophy, but the people that are aware of their philosophy go further, and they have a deeper purpose. Lil Wayne, say what you want about him, and I totally understand if, you know, people don't, some people don't want to listen, I totally get it, but he has his own philosophy, and he says, like, I'm me. I do me. My art is me.

I am really into, I love, like, some of the stoic philosophers, like Marcus Aurelius, Epictetus, Seneca -and Star Wars. So those are like the, it's that confluence of a bunch of them, and then, of course, my everyday life, too. Because what I feel, and how, what others are doing, what's going on, how I see systems in our world today, geopolitics, that will inform my art.

NICOLE: You talked earlier about how people who are aware of their philosophy and can articulate their philosophy tend to go a bit farther. Could you elaborate on that idea a little bit more?

NICK: Every action we do springs from something we believe. And I think a philosophy is something we believe. Part of my philosophy is I hold art in a very high regard.

So I'm willing to put in a ton of time, ton of effort, the ton of sacrifice, and money as well, into creating my art. If I didn't hold that in high regard and realize that, I wouldn't be doing what I am doing.

There are two characters among many, in, say, The Conjurer, for example. One of them, her name is Janie, and she has no idea why she acts the way she does. She's not self-aware, she's not self-inquisitive. She doesn't, she doesn't actually envision anything, and she never goes into herself. There's another character, his name is Keaton. He knows exactly why he's doing things, and everything he does is stemmed on some sort of focus, because one of his philosophies is, man, this kingdom should be so much better and easier and cleaner for everyone, but he's also very Machiavellian. One of his philosophies is the ends justify the means, and he never acknowledges Machiavelli, because it's fiction, but very Machiavellian, ends justify the means. Janie, on the other hand, the reader knows, or at least sees the reasons why she acts the way she does.She never acknowledges them, and she never pursues that self-inquiry, where she says, oh, this is why I do it. This is my why. Keaton always has a why, and therefore he's far more powerful.

He is able to bulldoze, or maneuver, or strategize, or sacrifice, whereas Janie is more reckless and aimless. And I think the sooner we understand, if Janie were to understand, oh, I was emotionally neglected as a kid, my dad worked too much, and he paid way more attention to all my older siblings, and that marked me forever.

If she just realized that, I think she would be a much bigger force of nature, but she's a little bit more aimless, because she doesn't quite self-inquire, and really take the time to reflect.

NICOLE: I think that's almost like the guiding principle of psychoanalysis—that healing and growth can be accessed through self-knowledge, and through selfinquiring. I won’t take up too much more of your time, but I was wondering if you could share some advice for students contemplating, but not yet committed to, a career in the arts.

NICK: I hope everyone in the Creative Writing Club, if they love what they do, just do it. Continue to do it because I think the work, if you care about it enough, is the ends itself. If you want to go out and sell and market it, it definitely is a different story, different skill set, but it's an end in itself. And just, if you love it, never stop. Never, ever, ever stop until ever anyone tell you no, because if they do, there are way more opportunities out there. There are way more windows to open. And that's just the next step to a yes.

Atoms

A Gallery of Vignettes

Drawings by Carly Nguyen

23 Teacups by Chelsea Grack

Alarm clocks have one job: to wake you up, not throw you out of bed. This earthquake must’ve been nature’s idea of a cruel joke. It struck early in the morning, earlier than Caleb wanted to be up, but just barely too late to crawl back into bed. At a time like this, there was only one thing to be done, which was to make some tea. As he walked down the stairs of the little house, Caleb pondered what he should have. Black tea? Green tea? Herbal tea? There were too many good choices.

Caleb was so deep in thought that when he briefly glanced at the china cabinet, he took a few steps away before having a double-take. He walked right on back to it, staring for what seemed like forever. When he had what seemed to be the proper amount of dread, he went back upstairs in a daze. Not to his room, but to Vinny’s, the one across from his. Unlike Caleb, Vinny was still asleep. But not for long.

Caleb shook Vinny’s shoulder, whining. “Vinnyyyy, I need your help.”

Something that sounded more like a grunt than speaking came back in answer. The entire exchange went something along the lines of that. But eventually, Vinny relented.

“Fine. Show me the thing fast so I can get back to bed. It’s my off day.”

And they were back downstairs, staring at the cabinet. Vinny gave it a good long stare and shrugged.

“I don’t know what you really want me to do about this.”

“Fix it?”

The ‘it’ in question was a result of the earthquake. Bone china cups and thin porcelain saucers all rested in a heap on the door of the display window of the cabinet. Each and every one sitting in the precarious pile, daring someone to open the door. There was nothing to be done. Nothing that could be done. Clearly, they wouldn’t be going anywhere for a time.

Caleb decided, for the first time in three years, to have coffee in the morning instead.

The Staghart Hut by Hannah Park

Lilian lifted the wool curtain, the thick, plush folds hugging her fingers. A frosty gust of air swept through the open window, a square of swirling white against storm-gray clouds. Stray snowflakes, borne on the wind, whooshed into the cabin and battered her tunic. Dancing and tumbling, Silver Snows’ namesakes filled the air and spilled over the earth. The glittering, silvery snowflakes enveloped the whole tribe in their embrace. Lilian’s gaze soared above the gray clouds, straining towards the night sky. As her eyes adjusted to the darkness, she made out the stars, twinkling like thousands of suspended ice crystals. She picked out her favorite constellation: a huge bear who always pointed north.

“Henrik, come look! It’s finally started to snow.” Ducking her head back inside, Lilian met her friend’s forest-green eyes. She was staying with him for the night.

The Staghart hut was warm and cozy. A large fire crackled at the back of the cabin, where logs smoldered over bare earth. A crude, clay chimney ushered the smoke outside, and wilted but sweet-smelling flowers rested in every open vase. Faint, savory scents wafted from their long table; tiny crumbs, remnants of another delicious feast, were scattered on the log stools. Lilian wouldn’t have given this up for the finest hunter’s lodgings.

Henrik yawned, and he wriggled out from his blankets. He took the curtain, his hand warm from sleep, and lifted it a bit higher. A comfortable silence rested between them, broken only by the mournful howling of the wind. They gazed into the deepening night.

The cool, nighttime air filled Lilian’s lungs, grounding her. The mingled scents of the pine forest always held a hint of magic for her. They held the allure of the wilderness, the sharpness and the sweetness melding into the most wonderful smell in the world.

“The lake will be frozen over,” Henrik murmured. He squeezed the curtain, his eyes playful. “Maybe we can slide on it a little tomorrow morning.”

“Do you think there’ll be frost?” She looked hopefully at Henrik. He chuckled, pulling her back inside.

“Of course. The most beautiful frost this side of anywhere.”

“Aren’t you two the least bit sleepy?” Sigelac complained, poking his head out from the thick blankets. Her older brother made a show of covering his ears. “When you’re a bit older, you’ll want all the sleep you can get!”

The Pot Roast Incident by Mason Conti

Lewis fixed his eyes on the woman across the gymnasium, her luminous hair glistening like bronze, as she presented her cooker to the judges. She was easy on the eyes and visibly stood out from the rest of the room, and Lewis couldn’t shake the thought that she had recently ended a previous relationship. He couldn’t turn away as a pot soared over and emptied itself onto her, splattering the rest of her head in hot, soupy beef. Her entire person became the same color as her hair.

Pupils dilated, Lewis’ head wheeled around to another corner of the gymnasium, eagerly scanning for the culprit. Dashing through the huddles of people beholding the pot roast mess, sidestepping and maneuvering around tables set with various cookers full of other stews and concoctions, he picked up his pace as his search intensified. The bronze-haired woman blindly groped for a stable surface to help herself onto her feet. A man from the crowd around her rushed over to help. At last, Lewis spotted the thrower and, holding his own pot roast, zeroed in on him. He raised his pot in one arm and held out his other in front of him, almost as if to stiff-arm the man. Just then, his arm shot out at Lewis, who bumped his fist and continued his sprint, making his way to his designated spot. He furtively looked around, panting for a while, before aiming at the next target.

“Eat this,” Lewis smirked while lobbing his pot roast over the crowd. He stuck around just long enough to witness the satisfying slosh of molten meat pour over the man helping the bronze-haired woman, but no longer than that.

“Dude, did you really say ‘Eat this’?” Lewis and his friend burst through a set of double doors past a nearby banner reading, “STEW COOK-OFF TONIGHT!” to the parking lot, and Lewis nodded in response. His friend got into his driver’s seat and turned the key, visibly holding back a smile. “I worry about you sometimes. Well, anyway, thanks again for having my back here tonight. Couldn’t have done it without you.”

Lewis shrugged as the car rolled down towards the street, “It was no problem at all; did she think she could get away with getting that new boyfriend before breaking up with you?”

The Monsters Under the Bed by Sydney Harper

I can hear the rain dancing on the roof. It’s night and although I’m tired I still can’t sleep. It’s funny how a room can look so different in the absence of light. It’s not just the room. People are different too. Your thoughts aren’t your own after dark and it’s hard to recognize anything or anyone. It’s almost as if when the world turns dark it’s no longer ours. It belongs to those who sleep under the sun, and when they wake the sky has turned black and it’s their world, not ours. The rain is only getting more violent as I stare up at my ceiling. Anything can be manipulated by the dark. It’s dangerous. Figures formed by lamps and coat stands, shadows watching, waiting for when you’re weak. I’m not afraid of the dark. I’m not afraid but I’m not ignorant either. Children's tales are told for a reason. They serve as a warning for those who will listen, though it’s often only kids. We forget as we grow older, that or we brush it off. But the monsters are still there even if you choose to ignore them and they don’t just come out at night. Just as we can live in their world, they can live in ours, and just as they are our monsters, we are theirs. It’s only fair. The only question is what’s scarier? Should I be afraid of lying awake in the dark, of them hiding in the shadows? Or should they be afraid that I’m now in their world? Maybe they’re hiding for a reason. Maybe they tell stories about the devils of the sun. The monsters above the bed that if you wake, they’ll take you and you’ll never return. I guess everyone has a monster. The rain, the sun, and the moon at an eternal war. Our fears and our dreams control us all. I suppose that’s what keeps me awake, what keeps us all awake.

Back in Your Day by Mason Liger

Eddie was always pestering me, “Grandpa, was the 2020’s fun? What was it liiiiike” he would drag on and on, any time I visited him. I never really bothered, but realizing how little time I have left to tell him as I lie on this bright blue hospital bed, I think now’s the best time. I told him all about the fact that we had cars that were always on the ground. He always enjoyed watching flying car races. I told him about how we always paid with either paper, metal tokens, or with cards. He got so confused, when I told him, asking if his Uno Cards would make him rich. I laughed and patted his head. I told him how when I was younger, humans wrote all the meaningful stories and drew all the beautiful art, while robots were stuck doing menial labor in factories. That was something that surprised him so much. When Eddie was a toddler, he had a knack for art, creating really great drawings, for a 2 year old. He could definitely draw better than I could at his age, or any age really. I told him all about how there wasn’t any chance of dealing with aging, or anything to help old people with their own sicknesses. He kept asking more about that as I told him, and all the great medicines that he has nowadays that I didn’t have when I was younger. “But they still don’t have a cure for what I have, huh?” Eddie said with a slight chuckle, being the happy little kid I always knew him as. “No, kiddo,” I pat his shaven head, “not yet.”

Where Light Became a Dream by Keanu Perez

I don’t think I’ve ever seen a smile. I know what it’s supposed to look like; I can imagine dimples forming, how light creases the eyes, lips stretching thin. But for all that imagination can do, there are elements of something–maybe everything, which can only be captured once it becomes real.

Before today, I never knew what a pen was either. Thoughts, as lovely as they are, have no easy methodology for storage. The best way to retain them is repetition, thinking about these mind treasures with a single-minded focus until they become forever entrenched in the deepest pits in the head, or are eventually forgotten, torn like seeds from a dead flower. But this pen is a strange magic. No need to memorize the colors of the snake that smiles. Scratching down the scales’ hues in ink over the coarse skin of my palm suffices. Were this a decade ago, and I might’ve seen fit to call this pen heresy and burn it and its maker into the cracks above. Funny how desiring survival destroys the principles we once considered worth dying for.

I keep it tucked away over my breast. It’s wrapped in a dozen scraps of the finest quality I could scrounge from between the cracks, and packed into the pocket that stretches resolutely past my heart. Next to it is a tiny pebble that glows in the dark and a pin. It pokes through every once in a long while, but time has dulled its point so it no longer draws blood when it presses into gaunt skin. Just an uncomfortable sensation.

I had lost the pebble. On one of the rare days it was out of the pocket, it was alternating between my hands to give them something to do, and pressed against the inside of my cheek to keep the saliva flowing. The saliva made the already smooth surface, eroded by a thousand generations of wind and a thousand other pebbles a slippery fiend that I almost lost hold of twice before.

Had I been wiser, I would’ve given up the game. But I was never the smart one. The irony of standing while my supposed betters were 60 feet under was not lost on me. But it was of secondary importance as I fumbled, then watched the tiny pinprick of light ping and plink its way down. The journey ended in a small puddle, solitude banished by the outward sprays of water.

Not clean water, I mused on the way down, contorting a wiry frame like the monkeys of old. No water was clean now. Although…it did look remarkably pristine compared to the usual puddles I begrudgingly slaked my thirst at. Even from up here, I could see the silt at the bottom, the way the tiny waves from the pebble rocked drowned an equally tiny shoreline. Perhaps being so far down had spared it from a portion of the corruptive ruination above.

I was not careless, however. Not how I was with the pebble. Old remnants of buildings that were once rumored to scratch the sky littered the desolate landscape. It was a concrete jungle, trapping whatever was above out in the acid storms and sand scourges, and trapping those like me in a world of darkness, moss, and mildew.

And while standing the test of time was good enough proof to guarantee safety for most, I had seen too many floors of rebar and concrete go out from the weight of a child to continue offering this trust. So I stuck to the walls, or swung from ceilings, calloused feet slapping lightly.

Only rarely did I press my toes into the floor, and it was gingerly so, waiting for the floor to bite me, or gravity to claim me. The pin poked again, drawing breath. I considered stopping to rearrange the pocket, but fear claimed me. Better to be on solid ground, or what counted for it before I rested in a single place between levels.

And so my plays of monkey perpetuated, down and down and down. Some part feared I wouldn’t be able to climb back up and remain trapped one section lower. I was always wary of leaving the small cracks of light that miraculously pushed past the sand and clouds far above for too long. It was a small comfort, one of the few that was not commoditized by scarcity.

And even then, the light could be argued as scarce. I once heard a tale, from a woman so old her skin was falling, peeling away from her temples, and she was moved around on the backs of others, like a baby monkey. She spoke twistedly of how our ancestors used to travel seas–those were large puddles, so large they couldn’t swim across, on constructs of wood, and later metal called boats. The mere concept was so alien to me I asked with no small amount of skepticism how far gone she was, to be spouting such fantasies.

She had gone on, waving it away with deafness as an excuse. She recounted everything these ancestors did on their boats at sea. They trusted those little pinpricks in a different sea of black to guide their navigation. I couldn't do that. I imagine most days that if anything, the lights are only there to silently laugh at me, their fluctuating intensities, some weak, others weaker, a sign of sinister mischief.

And as I slid down a pole penetrating the side of a concrete beast, the last of those precious pinpricks was gone. Only the pebble’s heat remained to guide me, and it did little to push back the shadows. I made cursory inspections of the space around the puddle, then shrugged and dropped the final distance. What would happen was what would happen. I could only do so much.

I flicked the pebble out of the water with a toe, wincing as the familiar burning from exposure to water enveloped it. But it was less concentrated, evidenced by the clarity, and I took it as a sign to fill my stomach. The days I had a half-full stomach were rare, so I didn’t underappreciate the moment, even while gagging on some of the silts that drifted in around the poor barrier my tongue constructed.

I pressed it down, wiping my mouth. Some of my hair had escaped its hold and draped into the puddle too. I flipped the strands, feeling the wet slap against my back. Now was as good a time as any, I reckoned. My hand dipped into the only other pocket on my person and wrestled free among the fuzz a piece of jerky, tougher than rubber. I chewed and breathed deeply. Back up to the light and the snake who smiled.

On This Land by Hung Nguyen

On this land, where only the grime and sand blew with each other, where the surroundings were covered in a simple pastels of yellow, orange, and red, where the sky was nothing but soft black(with one yellow circle), where there was no existence to remember here, there stood one rock, undivulged to itself, for it was only a rock. Nothing more. An object that existed only to exist was the accurate definition of this rock. It was a day like any day in its lifetime; the rock only stayed here and let the natural cycles repeat or enact on the objects from the native habitats through complicated chemical and physical processes. There was nothing for it to do. Perhaps, letting nature move on was the best way to experience this eternal nothingness on this land.

Another day that was like the other thousand of days started. However, something was coming. Up in the sky, light shone. A sense of heat was coming closer to the ground, and the rock could feel the intense burst of moving speed and acceleration coming from the particles around it. This heat finally got neutralized after reaching the ground. Above that heat was a giant–a giant alien out of nowhere. Unlike the rock and its companions, who had the unpredicted patterns of construction, this alien was clean and had a particular geometry, formed from a cylinder with a sharp head, that held itself distinguished from the rest along with the color. The rock had experienced nothingness, but this hue was different; it was not red, yellow, nor orange. The outer layer from this strange alien was also shiny, reflective of the light coming from the yellow circle in the sky.

Suddenly, a part of this alien opened out, and from inside, there came two creatures, who wore the same suits. These creatures performed odd voluntary processes of moving themselves, simply by commanding their bodies to do it. This discovery was enlightening. For many years of remaining on this land, the rock had never seen such great developments from a life form. Perhaps, they were the real living things, not the rock nor that giant cylinder. The contrast then sparked out a question inside the rock: What was the meaning of a living thing?

It didn’t know, but one of these moving creatures called themselves “humans”. That one then picked up the rock. It was then transferred into the cylinder and furthermore, the space which it occupied was a room. Instead of seeing the nothingness from daily life, it saw the wonders that could exist. In this room, different inventions, innovation, knowledge, and visions appeared and shoveled the rock a new feeling of transcendence. The unthinkable appeared from nowhere, and the sparkles of living regained itself in front of the rock. There were too many shapes, too many textures, and too many colors. Each discovery was a new amplification of both knowledge and curiosity. What mattered wasn’t their values but their identities. Those facts were what the rock wanted. Among these unusual things, there was one particular object that caught the most of its attention: a sphere with the similar color as the giant cylinder being held in a cube that was labeled “Ego”. What was that? The rock didn’t understand the word, but perhaps, it would someday.

As days passed by, many humans came around the rock to examine it, and it was kept near the sphere. During this period of time, the knowledge of technical advances such as machines, mirrors, guns, or wheels were acquired unconsciously by the rock. Each moment of seeing their functions was a moment of automatic thinking and learning, yet it still didn’t understand that word called “Ego”. Each day was the same as the ones before the arrival of these strange creatures. However, there were always small differences between each of them, and the rock was happy to experience these changes with its friend, the sphere. Perhaps, these days didn’t get nothingness anymore. However, something finally changed.

One of the humans suddenly grabbed the rock. Being held as a possession, it got carried away from the friend, reaching a destination, where it remained near its old companions, the other rocks. The rock then glanced at the new nature, where the new great blocks with complicated standard structures. These changes made this land more lively, but such transitions from nature were unnatural. For that reason, there was no way for the word “nature” to exist anymore. The fact was proved to be correct; among these tall blocks, there was one big square, showing the other companions from the exteriors of this area who were being cut and burned, receiving deaths after long lives.

The rock had no need to be alone, yet, that sense of nothingness came back. Perhaps, the reason was despite the close distance between it and the new companions, there was still an invisible long road that kept them apart.

They couldn’t move on this road, for they were only pebbles; they could never move. However, the most important reason was the lack of that old sphere, who taught the rock what real beauty was.

Each day passed away, not getting any mark from the rock itself nor anybody else, until a heavy sphere appeared from the sky. This unfamiliar and unseen obstacle fell onto the ground. Upon the moment of touch was a flash of light, spreading energy out in a burst, exploding everything, and destroying them.

That attack injured the rock deeply. The old layers, which had been preserved carefully, disappeared in an instant. It finally received abnormal changes: deformed and broken.

After that was the loud sound of shouts such as “Attack” or “Run”. Above, down, right, and left. All sides that it faced possessed the same features of one inevitable lord: death. From the sound of fired guns to the spreading blood from the ground, nothing from this miserable experience ended. Each human above it only argued; there was no discussion nor talk to resolve conflict–only fight. As the days went by with more bodies of them laying on the ground increased like a pile of trash, which never seemed to stop, and nor was there a delay of one second. Even when this madness ended, the pain was still there, floating around everyone, not slowing down to let the torment end.

There was nothing–nothing again on this emptiness, and this simple fact could never change, no matter how much the other beings or entities endeavored to change it. For that reason, the rock was forever alone, letting itself get kicked around by different obstacles without ever responding. This repetition was, by far, the best solution.

When time passed by like the period before these beings’ arrival, a new incident, a young human, appeared. As the feet of this human finally got near the rock, he then picked it up, holding and contemplating something on the surface. There was nothing, yet this creature, who carried a small toddler’s body, still smiled. This little angel also laughed.The rock was moved by this reaction but surrendered itself to whatever destiny might come, for the predestined cycle of destruction was inevitable. The human then got to the shelter where he lived. There, those old inventions, innovations, and pieces of knowledge from that giant cylinder appeared again. There was no expectancy of this surprise. These familiar objects appeared to be contorted due to the old age like the rock, but their presences were enough to bring back a feeling of nostalgia. At last, the young human put it on a counter, and near it was a great additional surprise: that cube labeled “Ego” and the sphere. The joy of living appeared again, instead of that anxiety on the regular battlefield. Great memories from that cylinder slowly returned through a flash of glimpses and visions from the past. They and this moment were the happiest seconds of the rock’s life, and there was nothing more valuable than it. Finally, it could be with its old friend again, and although the days remain to be the same as each other, and the rock still couldn’t understand the word “Ego”, they could also remain to be valuable time to appreciate through each second of a new experience to discover more. In the end, after every suffering, living was only good, when it was on this land.

Your Silence Enables Injustice by Muska Momand

I remember it all too well

Carrying back flour for my family

Then I heard the sounds of bombs

All so I can see that my house fell

My husband under the rubble

I think my daughter was martyred

Only thing I saw was a watermelon

The smell of sweet juice was subtle

Maybe I should plant its seed

So that it can grow life again

Its colors flow in our blood

“You might be our last hope” I plead

Everyone is watching the terror

The politicians are useless

Unless everyone stands for justice

So shame on the silence wearer

The Rotten Voice Inside Your Head by Sydney Harper

I think we need to talk take a seat take a breath take a walk is this too much for you am I being too loud am I helping you I'm the rotten voice in your head not accepting you

You're too much too little losing touch with the people who made you but maybe it was time and maybe you made the right choice But maybe you screwed up you're out of luck

cause one day you'll see all the time that you wasted you'll be what you created because you listened to me

The rotten voice in your head that said maybe you're not enough if you don't call my bluff you'll only be what I say day after day unless you step up turn cons to pros and bronze to gold

I am the rotten voice in your head but I could be good instead It is up to you to choose how you see yourself how you make yourself I say you'll lose but you choose and maybe we can make a truce

So hold your head up high because I am the rotten voice in your head but maybe you should listen to your heart instead

Creative Writing Club Reflctions

Muska Momand

Creative Writing Club has helped me find tools for finding inspiration for my creative writing and how to improve small parts of writing like the first and last sentences of the vignettes we worked on. I enjoyed doing those mini writing practices like writing about a specific moment, talking about the moment and recording yourself, and then writing down what you said in the recording.

I also loved the atmosphere of this club: chill and fun. Everyone here is nice and this club isn’t stressful at all. It’s the only club I go to consistently.

This club helps you specifically with creative writing, whereas English classes may not focus as much on it. And it personally helped me to be more particular with what I write.

Joey Hester

Creative Writing Club has helped improve my writing through introducing new techniques to add, for example, adding a lot of specific details to capture a small moment for the vignettes.

I really liked that one session were we where planning out the college essay and how many directions you could really go with it

I think the opportunities that this club offers that English class does not is that the space is more freeing. For an English class you have to read books that you have to analyze that you have to get tested on and overall an english class is for a grade and there are answers that are right. Meanwhile, in here you can actually interpret things how you interpret them and this was more for fun than for something serious.

This club has helped me personally because I’m always looking forward to going with my friends and getting out of writer’s block.

Katie Ngo

Creative Writing Club has encouraged me to see the world and my writing in new ways. It pushed me to write on a more consistent basis with intriguing prompts and writing tools to add to my arsenal. It allows me to explore interesting topics and ideas in a supportive environment that I might not have the opportunity to write in English class.

Mason Liger

I joined CWC in the second semester, and I enjoyed every meeting I went to. It’s given me tips on how to write stories better, such as adding lots of detail, and drawing the reader’s attention in just the first few lines. It also introduced me to the concept of vignettes, and I’ve really enjoyed writing my own. The club itself was quiet and relaxing, a great place to relax and write at the end of a long week.

Mason Conti

I wish I knew about the Creative Writing club sooner than second semester this year because it has been a great place to learn new ways to improve, namely in writing vignettes and other short stories. I didn’t learn until quite late that taking notes would be most helpful, but what I’ve retained since I began actively taking notes has definitely given me a new perspective on how to turn the most basic of ideas, even just a simple title, into an intriguing piece, as well as tips I haven’t seen before on how to add personality and dimension to my writing.

Keith Le

I’ve learned some neat writing tips and tricks in this club. The most enjoyable session was where we created a story through democratic process and ended up with a Cinderella Empress in Egypt. I think it was nice of you to create the Creative Writing Club in the first place, since I found a place to interact with fellow writers.

Keanu Perez

The Creative Writing Club was a real delight to be a part of. Lot’s of clubs promise a nice community and engaging activities, but Creative Writing Club is focused more on ensuring we enter and leave with something new in our heads, something we enjoyed learning. Every lesson is followed by a writing prompt where we use what we learned, and this has contributed to large advances in my own individual writing skills.

James Nguyen

Being part of this club actually aided in knowing what a certain narrative’s message is trying to convey. I would say the one activity that I find most enjoyable is particularly when we would try to know part of the other participants like what is most important to them so that others can understand a little more about them. Something about this club that my English classes don’t offer is that we actually don't need to follow much on a certain unit for the entirety of a month. Nicole is quite a good leader and I find the club very delightful to be in.

Chelsea Grack

Creative writing club has helped me to become better with making first lines to my stories and with making concise descriptions for my scenes. The club had a very pleasant atmosphere, and was a very nice place to be during lunch. :]

One of my favorite activities is still exquisite corpse; a game of telephone on steroids. Unlike my English classes, I can really focus on creative writing throughout the whole year, rather than just one month-long unit in class.

Nicole has been a really awesome leader in this club, and I’m honored to have been able to be in this club.

Cover Art Designed by Amber Nguyen