Kate 2015 by Otterbein University

W e are proud and honored to present thespring 2015 edition of

editorial STAfF

Editors Jess Campbell + Katy Major Secretary: Zoe Princehorn

Roxi Halpern

Courtney Getz

Josh Brandon

Marissa Gould

Amelia Gramling -t

• Vin ny'::J '-I o le nz. uelo

Amanda Ifanti iedes

Tim Warner

Lily Mann

Lydua Cran nel\ \

Sam Buganksi

Carrie Co lsman

Ally Hard

Calli W oodruff

Y iola Constable

CWRITING:

THE BODY OF A REBEL BY DANIELLE DOCKA-FILIPEK: 5 WHAT MANKIND CALLS FEET BY AMELIA CHRISTMAS GRAMLING: pg. 7

CALL ME A BITCH, CALL ME A REBEL, BUT PLEASE DON'T CALL ME PRETTY GIRL BY VINNY VALENZUELA; pg. 11 ( RETHINKING THE ROAD BY AMANDA IFANTIEDES pg 13

UNTITLED BY EMILY ENGLAND : pg.14

ON LAWLESSNESS BY TAMMY BIRK: pg.15

LOVE THYSELF BY T. MURPH: pg 23

REBEL, REBEL: IN PRAISE OF NOT SO FAMOUS WOMEN BY KATE CAREY; pg. 26

THE ART OF NOT SMILING BY KRISTINA FEDECZKO: pg 32

THE MOST BEAUTIFUL DREAM COMING OUT OF A NIGHTMARE BY KATIE MACKERTY; pg

ESCORT BY MELISSA GILBERT: pg 39

A VERTICAL MAP OF FLAT WORLDS AND WHITE LIES BY AMELIA CHRISTMAS GRAMLING: pg42

ROMANCE PART 2-THE SPIDER BY VINNY VALENZUELA: pg 49

THE DAY THE SUN NEVER ROSE BY JOSH BRANDON pg 5 1

LUNA DE SOMBRA BY VINNY VALENZUELA; pg 59

SOMETIMES REBELLION IS JUST WHAT IS BY SUZANNE ASHWORTH: pg 62

A LETTER TO KENDALL BY KENDALL COFFMAN: pg 64

ART:

LUCKY JOPLIN BY EVELYN DAVIS-WALKER: ON THE COVER!

HOUSEPLAN: HERS BY EVELYN DAVIS-WALKER: pg 22

UNTITLED BY EMILY ENGLAND: pg 41

SAUCY BY EVELYN DAVIS-WALKER: pg61

The Body of a Rebel

I rebel when I try to live my values everywhere, all the time, with no exemptions una o o e and without compromise, and when I recognize that sometimes I will not be able to, because I want to survive .

I rebel when I critically consider what it means to be "uncivil," and then I start to see incivility in forms of civility. many

I rebel when I feel the violence professionalism does to my body, and I refuse to be a "professional ."

I rebel when I refuse to believe that all of the freedoms and privileges I ' ve been granted have been earned solely by virtue of my own merit .

I rebel when I acknowledge that many others should

• occupy the privileged spaces I do, but they do not

because they have been disinvited, excluded , exempted, and worn down.

I rebel by making my classroom a more democratic social space.

I rebel when I change my evidentiary standards to something more holistic, less "objective," and stop searching for Truth .

I rebel when visceral knowledge meets my evidentiary standards.

I rebel when I interpret being tired as evidence of exhaustion and not laziness, anger as evidence of a slight and not pathos, and interconnection as evidence of interdependency and not dependency.

I rebel when I am vulnerable and powerful simultaneously , and I refuse to see any logical inconsistency .

I rebel when I love on myself, and when I reinterpret what it means when I hate myself , too .

I rebel when I try my best to experience fully what my body communicates to me , independent of ideological lenses .

I rebel by feeling entitled when my partner touches me and brings me pleasure , and when I bring myself pleasure , too .

I rebel when I interpret the parts of my body I have been taught to hate as evidence of , and a testament t o , my survival

I rebel when I make the conscientious choice to live

and thrive on a daily basis-even when I would prefer

do otherwise.

I rebel by loving my body when it betrays my intentions , and refuses to comply with my wishes , instead of succumbing to the impulse to subject it to further punishment . Killer

I rebel when I refuse to allow my body to be ground into dust .

I rebel when I talk about how my body feels , and someone else tells me their body feels the same way

What Mankind Calls Feet my dumb child, You are not afraid

Her eyes, Fractured like noon light rip tide high sun, finger shaded through 32 , 000 counts of pollution, dilute bobbing leather boots cloudless sheets, quilted Whale shadow, plastic reef

Balsa wing Windowed pains of Warped, bottle glass

Love letters smudged and swollen years fettered & thumbs pasted, prints along the throats of Thunder bloom belted, Bleed the ears of princes violet, banchee sinking bloated song no, from the belly this, the challenger

Her eyes< tide pools, Her eyes two competing moons; He sees, not the collection plate of Eden, Not the seedbed, the constellation of webbed drums,

Shallow, he says My dumb child, are you not afraid of the He sees aluminum worship, The mirror flat on its back, cheap and reflective, sees the waves as boiled sharp antiseptic clean, white, imported Egyptian sand dune she listens to his breath ebb and erode from the crack under the door he sees whale lung, , deflating beached, balled tongues tied and lolling, salted maggot wheeze, reads the horizon as a single, flat spine, like a book of stories she can't translate to the language of the way down washed under before the word there was the reader, and before the reader, the reef •

she once chased the sunset to Cuba, she knows history from the grandmothers, feel the rumblings echo 32 ,000 fins humming of mountains carved hollow, and generations splintered, brown hands wrung the sorrow of dehydrated creekbeds damned up streams she knows how quickly three hundred a spine picked fleshless by the, gull, the distendedtelescope, thrown and caught, and thrown and caught man's collapsible, man's squinting search light.

- a

She sees the , color , of lost things black boxez caught in the endless whirl pool onenote echo Mayday, mayday, Amy I love you

Amy --· Mayday, Amy I may hiccupping grief

Swords washed shoreless sailors fists wind still clenched

Tattered flags of flattened empires the sea witch into a bed skirt , the eternal ebb and kiss thoughtless undreaming , seafoam rest

His eyes- his oil, spilt & spilling His eyes , bir c hwood buttons sewn in His eyes , dumb child, He sees her dainty , urchin toes

But not the red , rose leaf blessings she dances the pulse of the banquet hall , The field of dandelion cracked porcelain Gods , enshrined

He doesn't make out the depth rolling under every urgent gesture , Every open water gaze , dawn is coming , kisses her hunger on the forehead and puts it to bed

she stands, swordlike, On his wedding night, from the thighs down, poised with the fish-gutting knife that scalped her five sisters, bald and grasping, moan to tune of the anchored now the ship the heavy lashed bride, tucked under his armpit, hiding her perfect ground swell basins She just wants to carve her lost tongue in the sandstone of his murmuring, Do you not love me Best of all?

With one sharp intake, He exhales the name of his new, calm, un rippled queen. my dumb child,,

You are not afraid of the sea

me a Bitch, Call me a Rebel But please Don't call me Pretty Gir1

Ecause we are angry at a society that tells us Girl dumb, Girl= bad, Girl= weak ."

Kathleen Hanna, Riot Grrrl Manifesto

Night falls, and I get a call from the man, asking me if I'd like to see a movie, or if I need an escort walking home. I mumble and redress ; I have a bed and Netflix of my own. But he chatters and persuades along, assuming there's nothing I ' d rather do than be in his arms the whole night ong. I hang up, having failed his test; he is yet another stanza of a simple yet popular song.

Why is it that when I get up to leave, another man acts as if I need help getting home? I have two legs and two fists to protect me on a two-minute walk alone. I t 's not as as if I'm helpless . It ' s not as if I'm a child to hold. I'm a woman, and a soldier; autonomous and bold.

When night falls and I emerge at parties , I am no longer a person, but a body. I'm a small waist with big eyes and a certain look that attracts lust and hopes for paradise, whether I'm asking for attention or not . And my words, they sprawl in the neon lights, because they never land on hungry ears. Boys look at my lips as I speak them, imagining the fantasies they'd really like to hear.

And why must I be a fantasy? A Barbie revere? But never a woman and never m object, a conquest, a rear. Don't because I look as you want me to. lady, because it's not an image you think You want a fox that laughs everything a

pretty face to smooch on , and open legs where you lay. Stop asking me about my hometown and major; it's not like you really care. Unless I intend to make you feel good, you won ' t listen , you ' ll move on , and disappear. ~

The culture equates me with beauty ; not intelligence, not strength , not good . It ' s not the way I see me, and it ' s certainly not the way you should . The culturJ upholds your patriarchal power , and as you tower over me , I feel its weight You forget that I ' m more than mybeauty .

You once told me to make you dinner while you lay in bed with a drink. I told you I disliked your genderroles , and you smiled, and laughed , and winked . You forgot that I am a person , not your servant and not your obedient wife . Such bother this discourse fuels in me; how can I li y e this inhibiting life? I don't want to come off an angry but your "chivalry" is uneasy and uncouth. I thought you might revise your but now I see it is solid in your mouth.

Truly , I want to tell every boy the fuck off but that translates into playing "hard to get ." ough my comfort , my standards, my consent fall deaf , it's your sexist conditioning I really reject : a lifetime of myths and sexist riffs that make this an exchange I

And that bothersyou.

How are we to ever know ... what others may be thinking? What we think they ' re thinking . Could it be possible• that , within the mind , we t hink so far . . so off the grid , that it indeed isn ' t possib l e? The outcome you've been culminating in your head for hours ... weeks ... decades ... maybe even your whole life ... could not be true? ... al though you think it may be. To you it is , because • it ' s what you ' ve created to be your truth .. . at least the truth within the walls of your mind .

So why do we trouble ourselves with these hollow truths , while they suck the life out of our brain? • Why does our voice on l y screa m out loud strictly within our minds? Why is that the voice we listen to? Why don'tlisten and believe what others are telling us ? That maybe we are actually more valuable than we see ? • What wou l d happen if we took the risk and asked? What i f we go against what others tell us to do? They tell us to not ask questions , or risk our - relationships , or to be silent . What would happen if we asked those questions which haunt us as our eyes close each night and then they reappear when morning comes?? hat would happen if we revealed to the entire world • ur deepest fears? The darkest depths of our souls? I , ean , do people even do that? What if I asked them the question? What would happen if I was ... for once in my open? Completely honest? What if I was myself ... I am?

so you try and muster all courage within say , " Hey there ... can I ask you something "

ON

Sometimes breaking the rules is just extendin rules. (Mary Oliver)

I've never been able to define my relationship to the law. My guess is that I am stuck in some kind of co-dependent relationship to it, as I rely on its presence in order to make my violation of it that much more pleasant. And I cannot remember a time when I did not derive a clear and unmistakable pleasure from misbehaving, even though I can pass as a good girl when needed.

It started small. If library books were due on a set date, I saw that date as arbitrary. If I was told to stop talking, I found a way to whisper. If a teacher was tyrannical, I became a counter-insurgent force in the classroom.Once, I refused to continue typing in a keyboarding class because the teacher was too excited about clocking our speed and something about it felt both appalling and sadistic. The nuns in grade school especially loved to take me aside, remind me of my God-given gifts, and beg me to tell them the source of my strange disobedience. 'Do you need attention?' one elderly nun asked me with deep concern In her voice and a death grip on my arm. Another one called my mother and told her that she was actively praying that I would spontaneously reform myself in an effort to raise my miserable conduct grades (which we received for every class, apart from our letter grades). My academic grades were usually A's; my conduct grades were always D's and F's. The incongruity was not lost on me, but I don't remember a moment of anxiety or worry that I was misaligned. I think that the assessment was actually fine with me,

many ways , the conduct failures were just as the academic successes .

Part of my youthful resistance , I can now see, was the product of a home life that was both hierarchical and despotic . My father ' s authority-grounded equally in insanity and cruelty-stoked a white - hot hatred for people who sought power in order to subordinate others. If I suspected that you loved your power a little too much or relished the task of law enforcement , I immediately set out to undermine you . And, for a child , I was surprisingly relentless . Sr . Gretchen, for example , was an unrepentant bully to my seventhgrade class , and I took it upon myself to organize an underground resistance to her rule. I rallied the troops at recess , and , together , we drafted a meticulous plan to chase her from teaching altogether. The master plan was foiled in a sense, as the principal compelled the entire seventh grade to sit on the floor of our carpeted chapel until we had publicly outed the perpetrators of the movement . Such an unprecedented interrogation effectively scared the shit out of most students , so the resistance lost a good bit of momentum . But , in another sense , the plan succeeded because not a single student outed me-and it was not because they were especially protective , but because I think that they knew that Sr . Gretchen had it coming. We were a group of morally cohesive twelve-year-olds that day, and I first fe l t the electric potential of the crusade .

High school was more of the same , but with slightly higher stakes . I went to a Catholic all - girl ' s school, so the law remained beyond question and reproach. In fact , it was possible to receive three-point demerits for something as vague as ins u bordination . Those

delinquency

demerits were clear markers of and if you collected enough of depravity They were not distributed very often, an a a kind of legendary quality about them. in fact, I wasn't even sure if they existed until I was iven one. To sa that that place was an Foucauldian is an understatement.

c,, \ , Object lesson: one day, Sr. Karla, my Religion teacher, had neatly written a syllogism on the chalkboard before we arrived in class.

Abortion is murder; some women have abortions·-----therefore, some women are murderers.

I don't remember taking a seat in class after I read the words on the chalkboard. I do remember raising my voice, asking after her logic and empathy, and feeling like the law, for all intents and purposes, was working its ass off to manipulate the young girls around me. Nothing felt so transparent and infuriating Sr, Karla was twitchy and unhappy with my chal l enge, and it took her less than one minute to pull open her desk drawer, whip out a demerit pad, and hurriedl write me a three point demerit for ·nsubordination. After she dramatically ripped the emerit from the pad, she announced with great gusto that I had just earned myself the three-point penalty for insubordination, and there was a collective gasp from the class. It was real; for fuck's sake, it was a real thing. For reasons that are still foggy to me, I did not sit down after taking the demerit. I don't know if I was surging with conviction or rage or adrenaline but I did not s i t down. In fact, I kept arguing-that her demerit was not going to be the end of this, that it was wrong to brainwash the class, and, inexplicably to me now, that no one had the right to

my response to any first - hand experience with unwanted pregnancy because I was not sexually active. In the minute that I was speaking , Sr . Karla's eyes had drawn into slits , and the class had entirely averted their eyes from the both of us . It was that moment before you know that your car is about to careen off the road , and all that you can do is wait out the .... gr i sly outcome . Sr. Karla opened her desk drawer , pulled out her demerit pJd , and , with more violence than gusto , wrote out a second demerit for me . While ripping it from the pad , she told me that I had now earned a second three - point demerit for insubordination and that now required my banishment from the class. To this day , I remember the word 'banishment ' because it felt both peculiar and medieval in a room full of white , plaid uniformed , middle - class girls in the middle of pastoral Geauga County I mean , banished to there? I had never ever heard of an in-school banishment before . And , to make things all that much more incredible , I had somehow acquired six demerit points in the span of five minutes--and even the girls .-~--~-who were caught having furtive sex in their parent's cars in the parking lot were only g i ven a single demerit for licentiousness . Now , of course , I can recognize that Sr . Kar l a was simply making up the rules as things escalated and grew ugly . And , without any knowledge of the deep dark center of the law , who in that room could question its logics or anticipate its surprises? It was Kafkaesque fuckery at its finest.

I was banished to the school library , a lifeless and colorless underground bunker with wall-to-wall tapestries of the Virgin Mary , for the remainder of that week in Religion class . And , at first , I thought that I might just do my own spiteful thing while I was But then it occurred to me that it might be

even more p l easurable to do s o me tac ti cal research on the relationship of the Catholic Chu r ch to abort i on . I

don ' t know why I thought that this mi g h t be a profitable thing , but I am guessing that I had some inkling that things were more complex than Sr . Karla had led us to believe . This is the g u t instinct of the subordinated . I went straight for Thomas Aquinas ' s mammoth collection of theological teachings , Summa Theologica , and hauled it down from its shelving . For days , I pored over the enormous relic (pleasing Sr , Karita , the head librarian , who had probably been waiting for such a reading scenario for the better part of a lifetime) . And it took me all those days to find my smoking gun: the fact that the early Church had , in fact, permitted termination of pregnancy before quickening , or the perceptible heartbeat of the fetus ( usually around 6 - 8 weeks) . Thomas Aquinas , the undisputed rock star of Catholic theology, had stated in no uncertain terms , that an early stage termination of pregnancy did not a murderer make . In a heightened state of ecstasy , I copied his words , line for line , as Sr . Karita and the other librarians looked on adoringly .

Early the following week , I returned to Re li gion')t new and damning information in hand . I class had moved on to some other dubious moral quandary , but I was out of my mind with excitement at the prospect of not only scrambling Sr , Karla but also the rigidity and anti-complexity of the c ontemporary Roman Catholic Church . It was a heady mix . Bef o re the conversation began , I dutifully raised my hand , and , once acknowledged , began to share the 1,(st o r y of my independent research into Summa Theologica. The girls were v isibly bored at first , but , once they und e rstood where this storv was going , they began to

For THE FLOWERs @

fidget in place and utter the tiniest strangest sighs. Sr. Karla allowed me to describe Thomas Aquinas's position on the termination of early pregnancy in full, but, as soon as I had rested my case, she moved over to her desk and drew out her demerit pad. It was like animal instinct. Wordlessly, she began to write, but, after ten seconds or so, she suddenly stopped, looked up at me in my desk, and, without explanation or warning, carefully tore the demerit from the pad and threw it in the wastebasket. She threw the fucking thing away. Our eyes locked for no more than a couple of seconds, and I felt a confusing rush of emotion: disappointment, pity, gratitude, bafflement. Perhaps she felt the same, because she taught a more subdued class that day, and, until the day I graduated, we never spoke of what had happened.

I suppose that it would be easy to say that my interest in-and attraction to-rebellion is the product of a home life and schooling history that rewarded compliance and, if not compliance, then quiet seething. I have no doubt that my oppositionality was fine-tuned in a world that kept insisting that the law was an incontrovertible and infallible thing. But I also like to think that, at some point, I chose to operate apart from the law in some regard. I like to think that, at some point, I began to recognize that there was a kind of freedom and pleasure that only became possible when I stopped taking the law-whether as normativity, as hierarchy, as moral imperative-so seriously. I like to think that the law is aware of its half-truths, its magic hat tricks, its need to deeply invest us in getting off on our own obedience. I also like to think that the law, like Sr. Karla, in over its head.

THAT HAVE YOUR

tl; dr: In work and relationship , in public and private, I always know what the law expects of me . But then I always and simultaneously know what I intend to do .

Love thy self

When I tell people I love myself they may think im conceited , or overly confident , or vain that this selflove makes me narcissistic but why are all these words associated with on another when they are totally different? Which begs the question , what exactly is self-love?

Well dictionary . com defines self - love as the instinct by which one ' s actions are directed to the promotion of one ' s own welfare or well - being , especially an excessive regards for one ' s own advantage .. .

Sorry dictionary.com , I don ' t agree , this definition sounds more like self - serving to me , this isn ' t selflove but it is what we understand it to be and I wonder why it is, that in our society my loving myself is considered vanity when really its just part of my humanity that keeps me from losing my sanity but yall aren ' t understanding me

Self-love is tricky , its not easy we tend to put all our worth in the words of others which in itself is damaging because when others control how you see yourself they can leave you broken , scrambling to put yourself back together but you don ' t know how because no one taught you how to

She wasn ' t taught how to love herself at a young age

She was taught to play a role , to shrink away She remained trapped in a relationship that didn ' t allow her to be • •

She didn't realize she had become a shell of herself , barely able to breathe

She was broken because she couldn ' t see her worth She was broken because she didn ' t know herself

She hid her strength because she didn ' t know it was there

She didn ' t use her voice because she felt no one would hear

But hear me when I say : I LOVE ME! !

Not out of conceit or vanity because I see who I am meant to be , I see the strength and potential within me , I realize I cannot let my self - worth be held by someone else because that gives them power over me and I have learned that in this life my happiness must come from me

I tell people , I cant love you unless I love myself, cant treat you right if I don ' t treat myself well, cant lock all my self - worth up in you because if I do that and you leave then what will I do? Who will I be? How will I live? How d I breathe? IF you hold my worth in your hands I cant see my own dreams because you'd take all of me if I let you control who I will be I wont be able to stand on my own two feet , it is hard to see your worth , your beauty , when someone else has torn it down , when your heart is broken , and your self-love wasn ' t strong enough , your world crumbles because your foundation wasn ' t sound

But today I am building up from the ground up and I will end this poem with the words I say when I wake up just this simple mantra :

I am beautiful not because others say so but because I found beauty within myself that exceed the boundaries of what society thinks is beautiful I am worthy not because other tell me so but because I no longer find C my worth in the words of others but within myself I am strongnot because I have always been but because I know what it ' s like to be weak and to find the strength to learn from my pain I am j o y ful because I have decidednot to dwell in my sadness anymore and I find happiness that is not based on the happiness of other people but based on what brings me joy and

smile. I ' ve come to realize that happiness is a mood not a destination and that my happiness should not be ., in the hands of others but in my own hands and in my own control and I found in th i s moment that I am worthy , I am b eautiful , I am strong , and that my happiness should come from me and things that bring joy not from someone else who doesn ' t know how to handle it I cando anything that I put my mind to not because someone tells me I can ' t but because I know that I can!

'2:1:)

In praise of Rebel, Rebel . Your tore your dress mess... David Bowie

Well , hell yeah , my face is a mess . I passed 50 a couple years ago . What?

How did that happen? I swear I was downing tequila shots and dancing to Bowie last night and woke up this morning with " Grande " hair (Grande adjective. Hair that exhibits strands of both youth - color blonde , and maturity - color gray) .

I look in the mirror and see my mother ; my hands have beginnings of her raised veins , and my thighs are what we know in my family as Miller legs .. . peasant legs, given to us by our hearty German ancestors . Those ancestors , and my Irish ones , were women of substance and women of accomplishment They raised families and chickens , drove motorcycles and Model T ' s , flew planes and flew into rages . They taught school , wrote for \ I newspapers and published fiction , volunteered as EMS, and buried both children and husbands before their-

time. They were beautiful maidens. They were bentbacked crones.

JMy generation of women headed into college to find like-minded boys , experience drugs , and experiment with sex . Ultimately, we were there to get a de ree and / start When boys an rugs et us empty one we powere into careers that loved us, and wooe us with\ after- work drinks withl colleagues and seduced us with weekend policy retreats. We were women of ability.

We roared into the workplace believing we could have it all - bring home that bacon and fry it up in the pan. We built our work successes early and by our 30's we "married, and began birth those babies] After the mandatory six weeks ale- home, we headed back to work knowing that we were the generation to fulfill Helen Reddy and Helen Gurley Brown's promise. We arrived at the office early and left just minutes before Day Care closed. We made it through the grocery store lines and had a meal on the table by 7 p.m. We listened to emerging readers, helped with the bath, and tucked those little ones into bed before we pulled out and read until we climbed into bed exhausted.

The next ay, we pu on our panty ose, wore our navy, tan or maroon Dress for Success blazers with knee-length A-line skirts. We mirrore men as we carefully disguised our breasts with button-down collars and . nicely tied bows. We lined our eyes and lips and slipped into stacked heels that

Ilightly walking dow n the h al l from the boss ' s office to our own .

next 20 years, Every day for the we balanced the needs of children , employees , and graduate school as we moved through the work place . We gathered up car payments and home mortgages , baby sitters and beach vacations. Nights we spent away from our families at our volunteer jobs in PTA , church and the community helping with this good work and that .

As we our kids hit elementary school and spent their afternoons in school latch key programs , we chased up the next rung on the corporate ladder . We kept our pay-Timer ' s , Palm Pilots , and BlackBerry by our sides while watching Sponge Bob in the den . By middle school and prepubescent angst , digital devices accompanied us to soccer fields , ballet halls , and art studios. Our iPads glowed as we spent long slee less nights wait· hone call con firming our t the sex ).

Finally , the kids made it out the door and into adult life. Our important "careers " which once pointed up, now sagged in tune with our body parts . What have we taught our daughters and sons? Recently , my kid asked ;:!!--me why I got my Ph . D . and when did I know I wanted a career in higher education . My answers were vague and unsettlin l for me. My thoughts went back in

of wearing closed-toe-pumps and respectable little suits . I remember the anxiety ofthose first dinners wondering what fork to pick up

I lost my yearning in l meetings, and poor policies

30-something women J now, an different about them from my friends an me at their ages. I see home canners who worry about food security while buying fresh green beans at the nearby urban farm. I see dads staying at home, changing diapers, packing lunches, and setting play dates. I see moms who work part-time at professional jobs, but plan their lives around the family.

I see them buying less, and living on a lower wage, wearing more Thrift Store and less Department Store. They don't stop with one kid like we did; they have two, three and four. I see babies with all kinds of "Mothers' helpers' that didn't exist 18 years ago - three kinds of snuggle sacs (cotton has outplaced polyester), ergonomic sippy cups, and those little net - ike things that hold fruits for a toddler .

I look at them and smile. These women are politically active. They may live closer to the earth, but they remain tethered to their iPads and smart phones, the way we did with Palm Pilots They are just as neurotic years

of therapy. They worry about having "business relationships" with their husbands because the kids needs command the world. They enjoy a night out with the girls, but after the first drink they sneak looks at texts from home.

I am the generation that Betty Freidan ll Gloria Steinem_J and Norma Mc Covey l fought for. I am the generat i on that f o ll owed the rules, dressed for my success, and went up that corporate ladder, rung by rung. I am also the generation that paid other moms to sew my kid's tutu, bake cookies for the school sale, and watch my kid on summer break. Is it too late for this Rebel, Rebel to tear up her corporate dress?

I want to give these women some advice, but they seem so aware and on top of things, maybe they don't need it. I want to tell them it will all work out okay. want them to take a sick day when the baby needs you. Book a long weekend with your husband. Tell your boss what you really think-politely, respectfully, but honestly. Put your iPad away and watch your kid catch a firefly. Ignore your phone and roll in the grass. Life is messy - you might as well enjoy it.

As I leave academe, I fling open my arms to the freedom heading my way. I yearn again. I yearn for freedom from the clock, from meetings full of endless talk and empty of outcomes. Freedom from my own pettiness brought on by fighting over

overheard innuendos . Freedom to say , think , is right for me , and not do what keeps my life in

Each night as I count down my higher education career , I dream of my life beyond work . I know soon my days structure will come from the sun rather than the alarm clock . My emails will come from friends and family , not vendors and impersonal list serves . What I read will be dictated by my desire to have fun , and not by my need to be accomplished . I will make decisions. I will act on them the same day .

I am the master of my fate . I am the captain of my soul

William Ernest Henley , Invictus

- -

. And just maybe, my aging rock-and roll husband will sing to me "Hey Babe, your hair is alright Hey Babe" let ' s go out tonight" :••• • • -

THE ART OF NOT SMILING

said the check out clerk at Trader's Joes thought he has a right to tell me to smile

I 'm was too young for this kind of harassment I was just a child but already it was beginning

1 . but nt this out

I was too young to formulate a response I ignored him at least I did not submit and outside the store my dad told "You should smile at inside my brain I was screaming why didn't you defend me I was already coming to the realization that my body is display every time I walk out the door for the first time it felt contrite

old man he was old enough to be my grandfather

I was just on my why do I have to walk around with a smile on my face

I said nothing

men think they have a right simply because they are men yet you don't see a man telling why do men get a pass when woman must turn up their lips into fake smiles that kills them inside my body statistically men smile less then women yet we are the target of the harassment as a man you do not have the right to tell me to smile

last week I was told "smile" by a man twice my age I stared the man down I surprised myself as

"The most beautiful dream coming out of a nightmare ."

- Nancy Wood

I had never felt so scared in my life Depress ion , anxiety , fear of rejection Coming

Bisexual

Demi sexual

Couple

"I don't believe in gay marriage."

"Who all have you told?"

Biblical lines recording my damnation

"You're going to hell."

"Is it something I did?"

Three days of silenc

"It just makes me uncomfortable."

A stranger catcalling from his car and his look of anger when we held up our hands joined together Another man cheering us on as we kiss at streetlight like we're zoo animals a

That makes me uncomfortable.

"You don't know what you want because you haven't had sex with

"You can't have

just a phase.

" Please don ' t put it on Facebook , some things have to be kep t pr i vate ." " There ' s no need to announce it on social media , keep it to yourself ."

And the praise we got made i t all worth it . " I ' m so proud of both of you ." " You are brave , you are beautiful , you are perfect ."

"You , my friend , deserve so much love . It feels good don ' t it? "

\ \ I "B eing yourself. "

" Normal is being happy , you ' re happy , I ' m happy ."

" All that matters is you found someone to ma k e you happy ."

High five from my dad

"I just didn't want you to be alone, I'm glad you found

"You will always be someone to make my daughter."

Then he was silenced by my mother

"When two spirits connect with love it matters not the wrappings . Cherish the love." you."

"You deserve all in the world . " "Congratulations!" into classrooms together support

Holding hands around campus

Our love existing in plain

My great uncle and aunt unfriended me because they didn ' t want to see my relationship on Facebook . best friends ignoring because they didn ' t want to hear it . I am not allowed to publically happy High be school

"It would be better if they "'°"' Well thought you were our friend

Es cort

The concrete sidewalk broke under her feet . Bits of scattered rock to kick as she quickly paraded toward the indifferent ' door .

Lost in memories of flesh teasinguntil the strollers assembled , constructing barricades , of tethered children .

The police officer yelled to clear the choked path; She didn't see the other man , until his damp smacked her cheek .

Busy squeezing her eyes shut , shutting out the miniature replicas on their posters , when he bumped into , tangled up in her decision .

The kicking came as a surprise . Swelled up, pressed in ;

One foot to his shin, but he was solid , unmoving , too stuck .

Sticky young thighs were glued to the vinyl seat of the Cop car moments after all hell broke loose.

"You can 't go on kicking them like that,

no matter what they do to ou ," he heard him say o e

no matter what they do to 'it'I

I I

UNTITLED

Vertical Map of Flat worlds and white

tell Lee his rust - colored hair, freckles, pale olive eyes come from a shamrock his mother planted in the kitchen window three years and nine months to the day East

facing Green river , Hummingbird feeder , Peek-a-boo

Leather , soft bread bellied

Womb

I tell him my grandmother ' s grandmother sproutea , dirtless but for the eyes , from a primordial seedbed , bred already buried , beneath the holler ' s shoulders , behind the mountain ' s ribs . My grandfather ' s grandfather could hear the echo of her song for centuries in any direction , see Appalachian, see lonesome doves see how we hate to fly

Driven mad -- -

Pockets full of dead Canarys heavy

He grew weary of digging , So he blasted her wide Athena like , martyred in what he mistook as armor

Ash-Did she collapse before or after she whispered forgive me to the moon

3. That is the story for how the mountains lost their peaks.

4. My grandmothers are still bleeding - first gold , then black , now cream

5. I was fifteen when Moses held up one long trigger finger , dark as oil , spilling this is all it takes to make a white girl cum .

6. We white girls tell lies about where and from what we come

7 Moses told me I was the only girl he ' d ever slept beside through the night without

9. Mosesdrankneverwhiskey and said the sun hurt sometimes .

10 Lee says the Chinese wear somewhere behind the eyes

Americans laugh , synthesis is a myth for paper dragon for balsa dolls cave paintings for multiple gods This country was found by their hearts out Through the sinus canals

Fastening them badge-like to their chests , war weeping,

the of holied ships

people of many nations, ancient islands, pockets, different kinds of trees , the color of fire in hearth of cave in continent of sunrise intents would hear the tick tick ticking

Through the fog, across the straits

A warning the wind carried: a countdown begins .

11. We call this the age of the mechanical pendulum

12. Columbus landed in "The First Island That [he] found" Haiti. 1493.

He wrote to King Ferdinand:

Your highness "I shall forget sleep"

Your highness "I shall work in the business of navigation ."

"until the service is performed."

Your highness "[The natives] brought us parrots"

Your highness "the natives have no iron."

Your highness "[the natives] do not bear arms" "They do not know them."

Your highness "let us in the name of the Holy Trinity ... "

Your highness "with fifty men we could subjugate them all" than fifty followed : followed boot tip over closed fists . Followed the holy trinity of plotless winds.

14:: A foot soldier wrote to Columbus: "I captured a very beautiful Carib woman."

was filled with a desire " "I whipped her soundly " "I was filled with a des i re " "you would not have be l ieved your ea r s " "a desire "

"She let forth such incredible screams " " .. .I was filled ..."

15 A priest wrote of Columbus ' Invasion of Cuba:

" ... [the Spanish soldiers] snatched [babies from their mothers ' breast] and threw them. into the Rivers roaring 'Boil there you offspring of the devil ... ' "

" ... the S panish] cut off hands And hung them round neck

16 ' go now. carry the

17 Wednesday night , NBC split its screen For breaking news :

On the Left white Mayor of NYC De Blasio said : "The weight of history can ' t be our excuse."

On the right: a black man in a sea of time ' s squares protesters bears a sign "No justice for Eric Garner : No justice for mike Brown . We cannot breathe.

We cannot breathe . We cannot breathe.

I closed my eyes. Took a breath .

18 My highschool text book defined lynching as execution without due process (see evolution, migration, see the holy trinity, manifest destiny , How many lovers dreamt in Spanish in English before 1493 : (rinse wash

19 repeat)

crop circles and ten commandments, nuclear fission due process plantation earth spins round the sun except for when we sung it off its axis , flat when a half a world of people , stories, grandfathers wrote and so it is six hundred years ago washed over the edge

20 history is authorless .

21 My blonde haired blue eyed niece tells table at Thanksgiving dinner

This year her class is learning about imperialism. "mine too. "

My sister says "See Emma if you College will be a breeze. It ' s just the same shit over

and over again."

22. Your highness. I shall sleep to forget.

23. No boy has ever traced my nipple with a chapped knuckle humming "your skin is beautiful, baby, because it is h . t ,,

24 This is like saying reminds me THE BATTLE OF how everything tastes GETTYSBURG PE

SHOWING POSIT! After I've bitten my HELD JULY @ND Tongue

This map, by prol 1 war artist and Un

Army cartograph

Private Robert Kt We avoid reminders. Strangers. Compulsively Sneden, shows ti bleach our fingernails bedless, sprinkle salt 1ocllions of spec every window ledge. units during the Battle of Gettysb Red arrows indic movement, such

26 I lost my virginity directlon of charge assaults. Landma To the grand son of a grand wizard such as Culp's Hil On an air mattress Cemetery Ridge, I remember a slow leak .ittle Round Top, beneath ndicated, as well ocations of hospit the sound of his roommate's hindheadquarters humidifier, Color coding indica . the overhead fan the location of U nion (purple) and Contee a

(red) forces. whisper or a

hiss

and so it is

There was something fiery on his palms . I didn ' t say : hold on a sec

28. I didn ' t say : I feel like I ' m coming undone.

19.Moses held me parked on the hill o verlooking Bowling Green his last night

Before heading North , seminary school

I would later hear, We ate stolen candy bars and he smelled like sweet pickles and coconut oil. when his lips parted Sea - like , salty I turned my head

Across the sky line Due West

I ' m sorry It ' s not you

His palm , a brown map of you are here could have pulled out the emergency brake could have covered the moon.

At HER!!

Roman ce Part 2 -- The Spider

Down the hall ,

And at the end of the rtiling

It stood

Eight long legs, Hairy and black ,

Attaching themselves

To the back of the door .

My two eyes

Conjure ' a brew of fear

Does thid spider here

Glance at me as well?

His eight eyes take me in And choose which girl to see

Divided, and static

With uncertainty

Each eye provides

A different script For me to follow .

I b i te hard and swallow

A little piece

Of a temporary me . It rattles under Translucent skin.

Works for now, but then tomorrow I know I'll soon forget

Perhaps , then , what you see Is not always what you get.

Tall boy, ~,

And I ' ll reciprocate with mine, They are vague enough to make you And share a drink and a line.

I wonder if you never doubt That when you shout to me I might not want to stay .

How soon we fall in love

With imaginary persons

Whose names we can never recall . I fall into a slot , as that hot girl You met last week .

Dear spider , Why so sincere?

You sit as I contemplate Where I am going And who I shall be.

You're really not that scary

Though eight eyes Are a lot to please .

The Day t he Sun Never Rose

The day the-sun

[never rose] was the day I dropped her off for another destination far from this place . When she gazed up at the heavens and wondered why the sun couldn't find its way past the other side of the Earth . Was the day in which my arms dipped into a well of impalpable , abysmal , destructive, beautiful, chaotic , worthy , lonelyasingular well.

[Sometimes, my vision wanes] because what I've seen takes on the form of unwantedunguided hands thrusting into my clothes not just in childhood where I thought those memories would stay, but

March of 2014 as well .

"Paranoia is a thought process believed to be heavily influenced by anxiety or fear , often to the point of irrationality and delusion ."

Some months after expectation rose to survive I awoke in a cloud a haze of delirium and [I couldn ' t speak] so I took a shower to wash off the fog in my eyes ... The shower door approached me it flew out at my face without me touching it and I was immobilized [but then I heard voices outside my door] and thought they wanted to kill me . If not them

someone else who I heard moments later f and if not them, then

SOMEONE ELSE

[Someone is I , I always out to get me] I

And the sun has not risen since the day I took her to the airport . " Paranoid thinking typically includes persecutory beliefs, or beliefs of conspiracy concerning a perceived threat towards oneself (e . g . " Everyone is out to get me") . "

Since March I've outstretched my arms between mother and step-father [I call him Jerry]. He fears for his very life with every step he roots into the earth . His collection of things that [no one in my family finds value in] crowd the garage meant for cars not to hoard whatever it is he picks from the sales in garages lots flea markets.

He has to lock the door behind him everywhere he goes he had to move us to a gated community in the country to [escape a large populous]

[to escape the unknown dangers in suburban Ohio]

For even more precaution, an alarm will sound at night

if a door

or window is

He has a nightly ritual of checking that each and

is locked is by grabbing the handle and pulling with all of his strength towards himself.

And then he has to do it again. Then, finally, sleep. [Someone is always out to get me]

Going to Extremes

"Paranoia is distinct from phobias , which also invo l ve irrational fear , but usually no blame . Making false accusations and the general distrust of others also frequently accompany paranoia ."

Five years in the past and my her Naval base home and we sit in my living room school without the school bus

[I was being called a faggot everyday]

My sister suggests I walk home Mom suggests it's dangerous. Says indirectly aiming to kill me. The conversation escalates . [It always does with them] to the point where the lampshade is

droplets of water are scattered across our clothes and mom ' s water bottle is empty plastic and j my sister is infuriated and starts packing and I hear them screaming at each other in the next room and I hear her say

[NO ONE IS OUT TO GET YOU]

" For example , an incident most people would view as an accident or coincidence , a paranoid person might believe was intentional ."

It ' s the fact that mom has to make everything spotless.

It ' s the fact that Jerry has to have clutter .

It ' s the fact that I was told to call mom after high school classes let out one day it ' s the fact that she matter-of - factly said grandpa Rod is dead , it ' s

[the fact that we spent weeks cleaning his house]

it's the fact

were soup cans that had expired decades ago and car parts-much like the Jerry ' s-littering his lawn it's the fact that Rod ' s paranoid schizophrenia distanced himself from us it was his violent misogyny and

[that he felt a right to beat his wife] it's the fact that I can already hear the voices it's the fact that I hear voices and think they want me to die it's

when I know that they probably do want me to die and they've been graying my hair since sophomore year of high school and they make me forget to eat and It was when I heard a live rape joke on my birthday and could feel the comedian's eyes on me while I sat in the dark corner getting drunk while I told my family it wasn't okay while they didn't care and I lost control of my body alone in my room and remember regaining consciousness under a shelf in my closet after hiding because [I thought my rapist was in my house]

Of all the tracks running through my mind I still can' t help but remember that it's been three long days and [the sun still hasn't risen].

Luna de Sombra

Green, enchanting green .

How I long for you to appear

How I long for you to pick me up

And empty me of my tears.

Green, such loving, green .

How I desire to feel your pain

How I desire to wash it over me

So I'd forget what I can 't explain.

Two sisters sit

On the roof of the moon

One crying tenaciously ,

One petting the Loon .

And the one sways unsteadily

And the other dives endlessly.

Neither knows just how easy

Life can be when one learns to let go .

"Bitte, meine Freunde, let me

Give you both my hands 0

Let me carry your burdens to the shore

And bury your tears in sand."

* OJ

Green, my healing, green. rn

How I wish for you to bind me

To wrap my woes in tightened bounds

To seep into the blood that blinds me.

Green , with clarity , green .

How I hoped to uncover the sky

But found no glimpse of sunlight

But found no hope in her eye.

The Loon dives out of the sister ' s arms

Disappears into the Mother ' s eye

She winks , and the roof shakes tenderly

Shakes the sisters back into the sky .

The first falls down to the earth

And cracks her jaw on the open cliffs

The other , made entirely of shadows

Scatters among the rifts .

Green , everlasting , green!

Can ' t you free me from this house of jade?

Can ' t you point me toward the anxious trail

Whose directions are pointedly made?

Green , such loving , green!

How I desire to feel your pain

How I desire to wash it over me

So I ' d forget what I can ' t explain.

THE BEST THINGS IN LIFE

sometimes rebellion is just what is

I have been a lover of lawlessness. Twin, partner, and mother to it .

Rachel, my sister, was the wild one. The thrill seeker. The runaway . The drop out . o pening herseli to drugs, to sex, to unruliness. She strained against the straight, unyielding boundaries of Illinois cornfields.

I went to swim practice . And took my books to the creek bank to read beside the earthy water. I smoked ettes in my car with the windows open. I made sure the door was unlocked for her at night, evenif she told me she wasn't coming home.

My rebellions weren ' t rebellious. Not deliberate, not purposeful. They were simply dimensions of myself that

REEuQabided - incorrigible - despite a scarcity of sunlight and oxygen. Cross-dressing. Boy clothes . Intense, silent crushes on girls. Queer infellectual passions.

I tried denial and sublimation. It ran me into anxiety, depression, an eating disorder . Something in me

repelled. Rebelled. But that wasn't the plan.

All my life, I've struggled in contexts that require surface-existing or insincerity . Small talk; forced enthusiasm; scripted performances. I shut down, I go quiet. I can't hide my restlessness or distraction. I

- ---

I stay close to people that breathe free. That free me.

He is like that; she is like that . And I have birthed an outlaw. Jake defies authority , breaks rules, refuses obedience. He takes consequences over compliance.

I've made queer choices, shattered structures, entered there wasn't another way to But

be Thoreau once wrote : "I am under an awful necessity to be what I am. " Sometimes rebellion is like that. It ' s just what is. Or who is