PJAS Issue 1 - How to Let Go

PJAS

PENN JOURNAL

Summer 2024

Summer 2024, Issue No. 1

Issue No. 1: "The Art of Letting Go" Summer 2024

of ARTS & SCIENCES

Cover art by Lucy Caddel

ABOUT PJAS, established in 2024, is an arts magazine founded by students at the University of Pennsylvania. Recognized for its unique fusion of creative and scholarly works, PJAS offers a blend of print and digital content that celebrates diverse artistic expressions from Penn and beyond. Our digital home, pjasmag.org, is where we publish an eclectic mix of visual art, poetry, creative writing, and thought-provoking articles year-round. Additionally, PJAS releases four print issues annually, each showcasing a curated selection of works that reflect the vibrant creativity of our contributors.

How to Let Go

Created b Sophie Kadan

Quisque hendrerit tempor elit, eu suscipit nibh interdum in.

"Might Bea}t " b Elena An}fri e a 1

"Piscine de Re es" b Erin Kirk

2 "Call My Name" by Hiroi Sayako

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"Cordial" by Cole Cramer 3

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4 "Untitled" b Claire Lin

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"Unitled" b Claire Lin 5

6

Let yourself be carried away by the current

by Luciano Ca ianello

7

'We often let ourselves be carried away by events out of fear, out of hesitation and many other emotions, and in this forced oblivion the same actions are replicated with a predictable cadence, almost like a repetitive and reiterated programming. Thus, hope is expressed as a presumed certainty, as a truth addressed to a perimeter of presumed security without understanding that instead there is only the certainty that nothing is certain—including that sense of protection and safety in letting oneself be carried away.'

8 "Letting Go" b Peter Mendelson

"Release" by Alex McCauley 9

10 "Stef" b L}ck Un}

"Isychia" by Olivia Hicolaou 11

12 "Sequence" by Maelisa Singer

13

14

Lost Days

by Rowan Katzbaer Lost days— Lost days!

That I could trace what the wind erased, mountain worn to its base.

Precious— the stones to a heart blow open.

Into the gust— Into the gale!

Sheltering nowhere— Oh— the storm!

Might I remember tonight— only you.

"Let Go" b Shimm Baer 15

"Untitled" b Maria LaMont

16 "Untitled" b Andre Elsten

"Untitled" b Claire Lin 17

18 "Light from the Past" b Shanti Ranjan San al

"On Wa to School" b Shanti Ranjan San al 19

20

diminution

by Frank William Finney Sunset streaks the old guy’s eyes.

The boneyard beckons night.

The youngbloods with their maladies haunt all his daughter’s waking hours: She stays up late to hear them prate while he who trod the mountain tops shrinks shadows down the hill.

"Old Man Portrait" b Craig Brasco 21

22 "Self St}d " b Faith S cao ao

"Untitled" b Faith S cao ao 23

24 "2023" b Faith S cao ao

"Bet een the Flo ers" b Sih}a Li}

25

26 "Face to Wind" b Ernesto Beckford

"Vlada Roslyakova" by Jing Kong 27

28

"J}ic " b Jenni Belotserko sk

Growing Love b Chapman Hood Fra¦ier Pruned in love April blossoms urge forth pear and apple blooms delicate as lace on a bridal gown.

All desire ripens in time drops hard fruit in soft autumn grass something we’ll bring inside for winter place in the window to sweeten till its fragrance fills the morning kitchen with wanting.

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"Time Stand Still" b Elena An}fri e a 29

30 "DELTA" by Erin Kirk

"T}ber" b Li¦ Boma-Bloom 31

"Untitled" b Zor ana Khro}chtch

32 "FL AI Collect" b Tats}r} Arai Orci varius natoque penatibus et magnis dis parturient montes, nascetur ridiculus mus. Nullam pharetra tincidunt purus, vehicula sollicitudin massa facilisis imperdiet. Nunc eu nibh id dolor dictum tincidunt.

WHAT I THOUGHT

by Laine Derr and Carolina Torres

Mi corazón está con el tuyo.

En el otro seré joven otra vez.

Ve a tu corazón hay fuerza – de luz, de belleza.

Aprovecha eso ama mi amor.

"Time Stand Still" b Elena An}fri e a 33

SHE SAID My Heart is with yours.

In the other I will be young again.

Go to your heart there is strength – of light, of beauty.

Tap into that love my love.

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34 "Clean" b Jade B}ta

Integer auctor convallis neque sed varius.

Maecenas massa sapien, tempus ac augue ac, rhoncus condimentum mauris. Sed posuere tincidunt lectus, vel finibus lectus condimentum sed. Orci varius natoque penatibus et magnis dis parturient montes, nascetur ridiculus mus. Nullam pharetra tincidunt purus, vehicula sollicitudin massa facilisis imperdiet.

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"Belmont High" b Jo Son 35

36 "The Footsteps He Left" b Damien Hellm}th

37

"Cujo" by Georgia Hinaris

"Drowning in Zeds" by Georgia Hinaris

38 "Smile!" by Ashley Gregorio

40 "Is It Lo}d Eno}gh?" b Nishal Polanco Cr}¦

Love and a Promise b Elli Sam}els When he asked her for a divorce she held her stomach in until she could breathe again as if some involuntary wish could bring softness back like nothing ever happened.

No fast forward or reverse could cancel the pause.

Was love even love?

That was all she knew about divorce.

"Don't Go" b Ze }an Jia 41

42 "Untitled" b I}lian B}dea

"Fragments" b Da id H}nter 43

44 "Eb}be" b Patrick Ch}ka

45

46

Left Behind

by Soha Azeen Budhani The rain pours on but here it pours in.

You smile and make snow angels, I shiver in the cold.

Sun’s rays tan you yet I hope for relief.

Your seasons are not mine A leaking roof Frigid air Collapsing heat.

It begins again each spring Renewal they say I fear I may die in another man’s land.

Let go, let go, let go I can’t be the only one left behind.

47

"Flo er Picking" b Seth Ellison

48 "Make Art to Forget Abo}t War" b Anna Rabko

"Mad Honey" by Essie Somma 49

50 "Untitled" b Andre Elsten

"Last Call" b Tet ana H}bska

"Angel" by Jing Kong 51

52

"'SW' Series" b Emma Carter

53

54 "Perception in Perspecti e I and II" b Jeanette Read

55

"Twin Flame" by Handowin HE

56 "Sacred Relationships" and "Lo e Heals" b Shafina Jaffer

Reposession

by Anne Mikusinski

The window opens Its soft hiss ushering in Unseasonable air And Fitzgerald's dark night A companion to my Restless lack of sleep.

Outside the street is quiet Inside my thoughts are active Crowded and awake An interior monologue Of loud uncertainty.

To drown it out I listen To someone else's story Told in a threadbare velvet voice Its timber, rising and falling, Soothes me back to sleep.

"Cact}s of Santiago" b Tian ing X} 57

58 "Shades of Green" b Tat ana Kondrashe a

"Bo}q}et of Pinot Noir" b Tat ana Kondrashe a

59

60 "The Metronome" b Kimi K}ni oshi

"Praise of Shadows and Trace" by Zan Wang 61

62

Nightmare City

by Ankit Raj Ojha

On my morning stroll to fetch the paper the town drunk stops me to recount one of his epic adventures where he stumbled upon an eerie realm with big-eared folk who would spread one to sleep on, draping themselves with the other.

I come home to the TV serving staple horrors, ranking tragedy as if lives could be measured on a scale of worthy to not.

At night I hunt for the drunkard’s realm in the atlas, only to discover it nowhere and everywhere, and that I, too, am a dweller in the nation of well-endowed sound sleepers.

"The Violinist" b Regina Ra 63

"M}ses" b Ed ard Michael S}prano ic¦

64 "Deus Ex Machina" by Liz Bomba-Bloom

"Setting S}n at the Old To n Sq}are" b Shanti Ranjan San al 65

64 66 "Untitled" b Reggie Da is

31 65 67

68 "Untitled" b Shir Beck (top)

"Echoes of Gi¦a" b Dr. Lo l (bottom)

69

"Soft Hair" b Essie Somma

70 "Arlecchina al mare IV" b Gabriele Art}sio

"Absence:Presence" by Joseph Laurro

71

72 "Ghost Variations" b Ann Calandro

"Ho to Let Go" b L}c Caddel

73

74

"Grace" by Samridhi Sharma

75

"DSC" b Etan Ben-Ami

"The Bea}t of S mmetr " b Gar Leschinsk

76

Stars Wish Upon Me

by Laine Derr and Carolina Torres Carrying me to the blue, Don’t shoot, she screams.

Young when she had me, her first, her heart, men stood in her vision, ready to kill the light.

But I am the sky, eyes that cut through flesh, I cry.

I’m of an age when people speak of saintly hawks stealing dark-brown babies, but I’ve not come to lie.

Gifts of gravity, she was (I was) an illusion of the fall –

"1068" b Matt Gold

"After the Storm" b Diamante La andar 77

"Dissol ed" b Baco Velibor

78

Maiden, Mother, Crone

by Mindy Halleck As a sun-kissed Maiden she clung to love Smiled at flirtatious glances But soon learned to avoid the male gaze And to stop giving men second chances.

She loved with the slender body of youth–– and birthed from her swollenness.

She experienced the deep crevice between the Devil’s lies and the gospel truth in all its god-forsaken unholiness.

She tried to hold on, break the descent soften the sorrow of her own fallenness–– The agonizing plunge from a youth spent echoes with the sound of hollowness.

As a mother, she loved that child born like a pearl from her iridescent shell–– birthed again and again.

––One child calm as a sunrise The other A wild child with curious brown eyes.

––and she somehow survived the octopus-like limbs of her children.

That slender body lost and found only to be lost again …

She was no longer what she’d once been. … And woe the betrayals of men.

She learned to let go of things she once clung to To rebuff what she once allowed in Wicked things that seeded and then crawled under her skin.

79

As a Crone she has moved beyond her Maiden tears Forgotten men’s lies And has conveniently unremembered her childbearing years.

She knows that discovering a good soul is like looking for a lighthouse in the darkest of night It’s only through the pupil in his eyes–– where you see true light.

As Crone she enters a period of insightful wisdom innermost strength and spiritual renaissance.

She develops an air of nonchalance.

She bears scars from the stages of her woman’s life proudly They healed her blindness; birthed like pearls without them she couldn’t see.

The wicked things that once crawled beneath her skin Are denied their ravening.

She sheds the caterpillar husk freeing the girl for her final awakening.

Crone knows her hands are probes from the soul Giving and searching for love–– The Maiden’s embrace–– Lover’s caress–– Mother’s touch–– Crone’s grace ...

Always seeking to give and receive love Familiar, recognizable as the coo of a mourning dove.

80 Crone’s weathered hands are now those of a gardener.

Fully alive with rich soil beneath her fingertips She heals Restores.

Aware of her life’s looming eclipse.

She plants for a tomorrow she may not see. … casting a long shadow for those who follow Photographs of love, fruits, veggies, a tiny house by the sea.

Long gone is the slender body of youth–– Crone embraces her wrinkles and widening hips Afternoon tea and enthusiastically values good fish-n-chips.

She dons her crown of seashells Each shell a treasure from her grandchildren laced together with a golden strand of love.

She sits on the seawall Dangles her bare feet Nods to the dark-skinned Selkies who have kept her company since her one good man The lighthouse in her darkness Died.

The Selkies bobbing, floating on gray-blue waves nod back.

Crone knows she once swam with them and soon she will again.

81

When her time comes, her personal apocalypse she’ll undergo the life review.

She’s lived many lives Been many women … Worn the many faces of Eve. Made so many mistakes Learned to love Learned to grieve.

She’ll give herself grace saying I was once a maiden; I didn’t know what to do.

Then as mother I birthed life and began again.

And now as crone I see the futility of my journey and yet the beauty contained within.

I now see myself as a fat happy butterfly.

Eating fish-n-chips by the sea waiting For God to remember me.

How to Let Go

Cover art by Erin Kirk