Illumination Spring 2020

illumination

The Undergraduate Journal of Humanities

Spring 2020 / 1

mission statement The mission of Illumination is to provide the undergraduate student body of the University of Wisconsin-Madison a chance to publish work in the fields of humanities and to display some of the school’s best talent. As an approachable portal for creative writing, art, and scholarly essays, the diverse content in the journal will be a valuable addition to the intellectual community of the university and all the people it affects.

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@illuminationjournal uwilluminationjournal.com

the editor

As I write this letter, I sit in my apartment in social isolation due to the COVID-19 pandemic. During this uncertain and chaotic time I find myself wishing I could go back and do more when I had the chance: take more risks, meet more people, get more involved.

This feeling was coming anyway, pandemic or not. The end of my undergraduate experience brings all sorts of feelings: pride, excitement, and a little regret. I only joined Illumination at the beginning of this year, and I wish I had joined sooner.

Joining Illumination has been such an incredible learning experience for me, and I am so grateful for all the opportunities I’ve gotten and all the people I’ve met.

Illumination and WUD’s various committees are such amazing places to explore new passions, take on leadership positions and make amazing connections. I hope that everyone who reads this magazine - brand new to UW Madison, seniors and everyone in between - can feel inspired to reach out and get involved. Take it from a senior whose final year was cut short - don’t wait to get involved, don’t wait to do something bold.

Thank you to everyone who has submitted to Illumination. Your incredible art, poetry and prose is what makes this publication so phenomenal.

I want to give many thanks to Jen and Carlo for being so patient and encouraging as I learned to lead in this role. Thanks to Max for answering all my layout questions and being empathetic during crunch time. Thanks to my fellow team members for your passion, creativity and enthusiasm.

On behalf of the contributing artists, writers, poets and the whole Illumination team, we sincerely thank you, the reader, for taking the time to read this magazine.

All the best,

Eliana Wasserman

Spring 2020 / 2

team

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Eliana Wasserman Kayla Huynh Marissa A Beaty Adi Dina Kayla Wasserman Tori Tiso Dave Riser Madeline Rasmussen Emma Cooper Hannah Neubauer

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EDITOR-IN-CHIEF DEPUTY EDITOR DIGITAL EDITOR ART EDITOR ART EDITOR POETRY EDITOR PROSE EDITOR MARKETING DIRECTOR STAFF WRITER DIGITAL GRAPHICS

contents

ART 5................................Obsolete: Genevieve Vahl 7................................Flies That Bind: Calista Quek 10..............................Out of my head and into my arms: Kara Morris 11..............................Humanität: Olivia Keidl 13..............................Blackfin Returns: Sydney Widell 16..............................Endurance: Lia Vellardita 17..............................abstract 3D poster 2: Ellie Braun 19..............................Wer, glauben sie, bist Du?: Olivia Keidl 21..............................Generative Drawing 5: Ellie Braun 22..............................Trinity: Alex Elgas 24..............................The Chair: Calista Quek Spring 2020 Poster....Abstract 3D-1: Ellie Braun 25..............................Shifted: Olivia Keidl 26..............................Me and your old shoes: Madeline Rasmussen 27..............................Untitled: Sophia Abrams 29..............................Drain the pond to find the fish: Patrick Argue 31..............................Trash: Calista Quek 32..............................Fishing for an Answer: Mya Freund 33..............................Sunday: Celeste Carroll 35..............................Look Alive!: Eliana Wasserman 37..............................Breaking into the house: Madeline Rasmussen 39..............................Mind Control: Ellie Braun 41 .............................Giovanna: Chris Zak 42..............................Walking the Line for 48 Hours: Ryan Preharra 43..............................oysters: Ellie Braun

POETRY 12..............................Nestling: Tyler Moore 15..............................Sacrificial Offerings: Luis Cazarin Quiroga 18..............................Flies: Tyler Moore 23..............................ReconstrucciĂłn del Retrato de Pablo Miguez: Riley Preston 28..............................Flight Connections: Marissa Finn 30..............................Mushroom Man: Tyler Moore 34..............................South: Tyler Moore 38..............................When A Wolf Loses Its Pack: Ana Komro PROSE 6................................New Hope: Derek Wautlet ON THE COVER You were the constellation all along! I finally get it: Madeline Rasmussen Spring 2020 / 4

Obsolete: Genevieve Vahl

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new hope

e p o h w e n Ben’s teacher said this was going to be an interesting discussion about the different ruling styles of ancient Roman leaders. He couldn’t pay attention though, too focused on the wise and strong Obi-Wan Kenobi. The doodles littered his sketchbook already, but now had started to bleed into his school notebooks as well. His mom would kill him if she knew he hadn’t been paying attention in class. Oh well.

Ben’s shoulders hunched over his notebook and his arm was crooked, feverishly filling Obi-Wan’s lightsaber with bright blue color. The teacher started talking about the cruel emperor Nero when he thought she noticed.

He heard her monologue stop and he thought she could see how he hadn’t been absorbing a word of what she was saying. His head slowly came up from the drawing, just waiting for his gaze to meet hers and the lecture about respect to greet him.

Luck was in his favor though, be-

cause her gaze was floating in a different direction. Towards the back of the classroom where Ben’s basketball friend, Tanner, always sat. The only reason, he told Ben, was because Sarah Silverman always sat back there as well. According to Tanner, she was “smoking hot”, but Ben failed to understand why.

Ben looked over in the same direction as the teacher was staring but didn’t see anything that would warrant her atteantion. He noticed Tanner and Sarah sitting quietly next to each other. Students rarely were quiet in Mrs. Patterson’s class, so Ben assumed this would make her happy. A shock went through the room when Mrs. Patterson screamed.

“What are you doing!? Stop that right now!” She charged over to the back of the room and grabbed Sarah’s arm, which was lying in Tanner’s lap, and pulled the girl out of her chair.

She grabbed Tanner’s arm as well and

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pulled them both out into the hallway.

Ben scanned around the room to see if anyone else was as shocked by the events as he was.

“Did you see what Sarah was doing back there?”

“Tanner is such a lucky shit.”

“I can’t believe she didn’t notice earlier.”

Ben’s mind swam in circles. But what were they doing? They didn’t seem to do anything to warrant Patterson’s distraction and outrage. Surely, they didn’t do anything to prompt the gossip of the entire 7th grade English class. Yet, they had it, and Ben’s curiosity gotten the best of him.

“But what exactly were they doing?” he asked, hesitantly.

A burst of laughter followed, being produced from most of the class. Even Cynthia June joined in with her thick white jaw lock extended to its maximum width. After the laughter came the disbelief.

Spring 2020 / 6

Flies That Bind: Calista Quek

new hope

“Do you really not know Ben?” He shook his head; he felt the tips of his ears getting red and a condensed knot rise up from his stomach.

“Well, she was giving him a hand job, and he really seemed to be enjoying it.” Troy said from the football team, his lips spread wide.

He had heard the word before and understood it had something to with sex. But that’s something only adults did. It’s something only adults were allowed to do. They didn’t have to worry about anything like that yet. Why would she do that? Why would Tanner let her? The knot spread out again and Ben just shook his head.

“Are you jealous Ben?” “Not at all, why would I be?” Ben put his head down and continued to doodle his book and hoped no one would bother him again. ***** Tanner didn’t join the class for the rest of the period but at the end of the day, he spotted Ben in the hallway.

He wore a big smile and skipped with excitement.

“Say hello to the new celebrity of Jefferson Middle School.” He said and 7

pretended to jump into Ben’s arms.

“I’m the talk of the class, all the guys think I’m such a badass now.”

“Mrs. Patterson seemed pretty upset.” It was all Ben could produce.

He didn’t seem to really know Tanner anymore.

“Oh yeah that old lady just overreacts to everything. Sarah and I had to find some way to make that class enjoyable for each other.”

“You mean you… did things to her?”

“Well yeah I’m not going to be rude!

Anyways, man, we’ve got to get you some action soon.”

Ben shook his head.

“No, I’m good. Really good.” Ben decided it was time he started looking for new friends. They didn’t enjoy the same things anymore.

Ben found his sister outside with her boyfriend’s arm draped around her.

They seemed to always be touching each other these days. He gave a small wave as he approached.

“Hi Ben!” Emilia said, she gave him a bright smile. “How was your day?”

“It was fine, nothing out of the ordinary.” She wouldn’t understand, girls never do.

“Oh okay, well that’s a good thing, I guess. We were waiting to see if you’d like a ride home from school today.”

“I promise not to drive too fast!”

Her boyfriend, Felix, said. His letterman jacket seemed to be extra poofy today, and looked as if he had shined the pins the night before.

Ben dreaded these awkward rides, but he dreaded even more having to walk with some of the kids that had ridiculed him in class a few hours ago.

“Okay yeah, a ride would be great.”

“Sweet! Hop in!” Felix opened the rear door but realized the mess that was the backseat. He pushed the clothes and books to the other side and Ben got in the back.

Felix started the car and said in a very serious tone, “Houston, we have liftoff.” Emilia punched him, and then put her hand on his forearm. He drove down the school parking lot and Ben ducked as they passed a group of kids from history class. ***** They arrived back at home and Ben dodged his mother, who was sitting at the kitchen cutting up carrots. He rushed to his room, closed the door,

new hope

and sprung out on the bed. He wondered which Star Wars movie would be the best to watch tonight. It was Friday, after all, so his mother wouldn’t be after him about homework.

His mother would surely urge him to hang out with someone though. The last thing he wanted to do was hang out with Tanner after everything that had happened. He would call someone else from the basketball team, but they had probably heard about Tanner’s successes and it would be the first thing they would want to talk about.

So no, it would be Star Wars tonight, and that was absolutely fine by Ben. The only question was which one. The prequels had the best special effects, but they absolutely butchered the story. He decided to go with A New Hope, a throwback to the beginning.

Every time the opening credits came on the screen, his heart started racing and he felt like his feet were starting to float up, to take him away to another galaxy, on some new adventure.

He saw Luke take off the mask for the first time when he heard the first shout. He checked his Jedi wristwatch and it all made sense. Five thirty meant his dad was surely home from work. Which meant there would be at least an hour of disagreements and petty fighting. And then at some point the yelling would start. And at some other point, there would be complete silence. Ben still couldn’t figure out which was the worst between those three.

“No, I didn’t tell him anything, Maureen. I didn’t think it was that important.”

Silence.

“So, my feelings aren’t that important? I’m your wife, you know, Sean, in case you haven’t checked the hunk of metal on your finger in a while.”

The yelling continued and Ben turned up the volume six levels on the remote. And then two more just to totally drown out the sound of his parent’s angry voices. The blaster fire was a pleasant sound to his ears. The bullets always just narrowly missed Han and Luke. Even though he had watched the movie at least a million times already, he still was surprised every time they made it out ok.

After a few minutes, the usual events came. A loud crash came from

the kitchen and the voices were silenced.

“What?!” He heard his mother yell.

Ben denied his sisters rule and charged towards the door. He had to make sure that they were both ok. He hurried through the corridor but was stopped right before the kitchen.

“Hey Ben!” Emilia said in a casual tone. Her body blocking the entrance to the kitchen. “What are you up to?

Watching another Star Wars episode?”

She asked, nonchalant, as if completely oblivious to the events going on a few feet behind her back.

“Well, yeah, I just start-” “Felix and I were thinking of going to the event down at the library. It’s Sherlock Holmes night, I really think you’d love it.” She said, this time in a more hurried tone. He spotted the red splotches around her eyes.

“Oh yeah, well that sounds fun. I’ll just grab my-” “He’s waiting out in the car, why don’t we get going.”

She clutched his arm and guided him to the car. Felix greeted him and told him, as was the custom, to just push away anything on the backseat to clear a space. It was silent for a few minutes. Emilia just stared out the window, the sun dipping over the horizon causing the trees to be outlined with a fiery orange hew. She was absorbed in the peaceful moment of a fall evening.

Ben saw Felix glance at her a couple times but didn’t say a thing. The letterman jacket had been replaced by a dark red hoodie with a small emblem of Gryffindor on the chest. Nothing deferred the jock stereotype like apparel from everyone’s favorite Harry Potter house.

A few more minutes passed and eventually Felix looked in the rearview mirror. “Thanks for joining us Ben! It should be fun tonight, they’re supposed to be setting up some mysteries for us to solve and we’re going to get hints from ‘the ghost of Holmes and Watson’, so it should be pretty interesting. Are you a fan of Sherlock Holmes?”

“Well, yeah, I’ve -” Ben started.

“I just don’t get it. It’s so constant.

They clearly aren’t in love anymore,” Emilia said, her voice muffled. She was laying her head on the passenger window. “Why don’t they just get a divorce already.”

“I’m sure there’s more to it than that. The fights are over stuff that matters, and once they work through it they’ll have a stronger marriage. That’s what my dad always tells me.” Felix said and looked over at her with a halfsmile. She kept her face smudged in the corner though.

Ben didn’t think there was really an alternative to his parent’s routine, it had been like this for so long. Fight and then apologize to him and Emilia separately, and then go back to ‘normal’ as if nothing ever happened. But then it would happen again, and they would apologize again.

“I haven’t even seen them touch each other in so long. It’s like they have to always be at least five feet apart.”

“Like that movie about those kids with that one disease.” Ben chimed in but it wasn’t well received. The car was silent for the rest of the ride.

The library was busy with the usual annoying kids his own age. None of which he got along with particularly well. Other than Archie who, in his own words, “Wasn’t bound by his wheelchair, just felt like a king when everyone had to push him around.” Of course, Ben knew this wasn’t possible, considering he had lost both of his legs above the knee in a car accident while he was a kid.

Three items were selected to be hidden somewhere in the library, and everyone was split into groups of two.

The reward for the competition was that they were able to keep the item that they found, all of which were Sherlock Holmes themed. The item that Ben and Archie were after was a deerstalker cap because according to Archie, it would earn them ‘premium bucks’ at the local pawn shop.

Ben was only in it for the adventure, however, and he excitedly rode on the pedals of the wheelchair and coasted down the mystery aisle. This made Archie laugh but Ben hopped off when they spotted Mrs. Ingle, the library attendant whose job it was to drain the fun out of any situation.

Ben crept down the aisle and waited for her to pass, then boosted along again. This progressed for a few more minutes until Archie got anxious, “Shouldn’t we be getting a move on Ben? Don’t you want this night to Spring 2020 / 8

new hope

be profitable.”

“Yeah, I guess so. Where should we start?”

“Well I doubt we should go back to the mystery aisle because they wouldn’t make it that obvious. I bet it is back in the old religious books behind the philosophy section. Nobody ever goes back there.”

“You’re so right. Should we do a wheelie on the way there?”

“Absolutely.” Archie said, looking back excitedly.

“Away we gooooo,” Ben said and tipped up the front two wheels of the chair and pushed Archie out into the main aisle and towards the back of the library.

“Woooohoooooo” Archie shouted and put one first up in the air.

“Hey! What are you boys doing over there?” The shock started in his toes and shifted up to his gut. Ben knew it was already over, so why not keep going? They were kids, after all, what could she really do to them? “You stop that right now Benjamin!”

Ben kept on course to the original destination, picking up speed now.

Almost at the back, the witch was on their tail and Ben held his breath.

They hit the wall at the far end of the library and the musty scent of the old religious texts hit Ben’s nostrils.

He glanced over and saw two objects stuffed against one of the stacks. The movements were so slow, and almost gentle. It continued for a moment and then the two shapes quickly pulled apart. One body dividing into two. It reminded Ben of his biology class, when an organism is growing, and the cells start dividing.

“Oh, Ben,” Emilia’s lips were red, and her hair had spread in all directions like the bristles of an old, overused broom. She wiped her mouth. “How is your search going?” She asked, wearing an overly bright smile. Felix stood back, unsure what to do with himself.

“Well, I didn’t know that you were back-” “You two have no business doing that here. That is ridiculous behavior for the library. Please leave right now and be grateful that I’m not going to report you.” Mrs. Ingle said, standing with her hands on her hips. Her eyes focused only on Felix and Emilia, as 9

if Ben and Archies actions were insignificant. ***** In the end they didn’t get the deerstalker cap. It went to the Anderson twins instead, who found it buried underneath some Agatha Christie novels.

Ben was settled that it wasn’t actually their lack of ability, but rather the disheartened mood after the interaction with Mrs. Ingle, and his sister, and Felix… Archie didn’t bring it up until they were outside.

“What was your sister doing back there, man?”

“I don’t know, it seems like what everybody is doing now. Something of that sort. And they are always getting punished for it. What do they get out of it anyways?”

“I couldn’t tell you, man. Hope you have a good rest of your weekend.”

Ben rolled Archie into the hands of his mother, and she gave Ben a quick hug around the shoulder and a “Thanks for taking care of my Archiekins” before they split up.

Ben hopped in the car, his entrance seeming to pop a large bubble of silence and he wasn’t sure that words had been uttered in the Camry for centuries before his presence. Felix disproved the theory almost instantly, “Hey bud, your sister and I were just talking about how we were so sure you’d walk out with at least one of those objects. You’re way smarter than the rest of those kids, and you’re actually interested in things besides video games.”

Ben wasn’t sure this was much of a compliment because space fantasy movies and comic books didn’t seem levels above video games, but it didn’t matter. He wasn’t talking to Felix regardless. Not after what he did to his sister. Felix seemed to pick up the signal when Ben turned his head away and they drove out of the parking lot.

“Prepare for an even longer night, Ben. Hope you still have those earplugs.” Emilia said as they turned into the neighborhood. Half the neighbor’s lights were on, half weren’t. Most were probably full of happy families sharing a late meal together or parents sharing a glass of some adult drink since all of their kids moved away from home. Their house didn’t work that

way though, and Ben had started to come to terms with it.

As they pulled up, they saw that none of the lights were on in their house.

“That’s not a good sign. Either mom killed dad, dad killed mom, or they both left us. The last one would definitely be the best.” Emilia spoke morbidly.

Felix seemed to let a short laugh but stopped when he realized how cold her face was. She just looked over at him and shook her head. “I’ll see you on Sunday.” She told him.

“Please call me if you need it.” He placed his hand on hers right before she climbed out of the Camry. “And Ben, I hope you have an excellent weekend. I’m sure you’ll solve whatever mystery it is next time.”

Ben just gave a quick wave and he hopped Felix didn’t think they could just go back to being pals again.

Emilia opened the door and the house was so dark they seemed to be stepping into an abandoned mine shaft. She took out her phone and turned on the screen to full brightness.

They both walked down the hallway, Emilia to her room and Ben to get food. Nothing to forget about his troubles like a microwavable burrito.

Ben tiptoed but Emilia said in her normal tone, “You don’t have to be quiet; mom is probably on her nightly drive and dad is probably sleeping downstairs to avoid all contact.”

As they walked past their parents’ bedroom, they noticed that yellow light shone through the crack in the bottom of the door. Emilia took one step closer. Then Ben heard what sounded like animal noises. Like the high-pitched sound of a gazelle right before a lion jumps on top of it. Or the sound of a male baboon grunting to try and get the female’s attention.

Emilia took a step back and Ben prepared for the worst. She smiled though, a genuine smile this time, like nothing else she had given today. She put her arm around his shoulder and walked him into the kitchen. She said that she would have a burrito as well, to her, it was an excellent idea.•

Out of my head and into my arms: Kara Morris

Spring 2020 / 10

Humanität: Olivia Keidl

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t l s i n g e n By: Tyler Moore

And out of nowhere: like metaphor: pearly jasmine and marbled jam skies.

A concise infinity. Cheeky.

Our sterile and curious fingers concoct this desublimation.

Grooves of skin snapping into place with these imperfected stand-ins.

It is a holding on. An attempt to steer.

Where even a tired blueberry sky or, god forbid, even a crimson love sinks you in. Warm. Situated.

Spring 2020 / 12

By: Sydney Widell

2019 marked 50 years since Blackfin Cisco went extinct. Having grown up on Lake Michigan, it was wild for me to learn that the last sighting of these fish was in my own stomping ground. I tend to picture extinction as happening far away from here, but in reality, it’s happening everywhere, even our own Great Lakes.

There is this Jewish tradition I’ve always been captivated by - of leaving rocks in memorial of a loved one lost. In that context, rocks become a tangible representation of a community and its shifting collective memory - a way to grieve, remember and heal.

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In the time since our parents grew up, Lake Michigan has gone from being an ecosystem - a community - that could support Cisco to one that couldn’t. That means, if you, like me, grow up not knowing about Cisco, you never notice their absence: if you don’t know the lake once supported Cisco, a Cisco-less lake feels completely normal. It is these two trains of thought that became the foundation for why I wanted to paint a school and return it to Lake Michigan. In a way, it is my own way of contributing to the collective memory - to grieve, remember, and heal.

Spring 2020 / 14

By: Luis Cazarin Quiroga

Like your kin, Aztecs of old carve inward for harvest, the Diaphragm reap: take the breath first.

Reach in, seek, the string seize.

Heart, a beating seashell, now.

Hold it by your ear.

Can you hear it speak?

Sometimes it whispers of ripe, avocado trees and lush, nopal Glades filled with a Cabin and the buzz of Bees.

Follow the gold string, now, entwined in you, to your olive, green-veined Arms suffused with craters, some housing full-grown willows, and some stygian seas.

Your own warding moons trying to shape shelter here.

Reach your implacable Legs, now.

They are far from Aztlán nomadic, restless. Shaking the table even when the rest of you is still frozen by the family phone.

Maybe if they shake hard enough you’ll pop through the wires and be home.

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Ahead your Head, now.

Your mother’s amber eyes preserving the Bee-loud Glade in their gaze, and your father’s tender frown that hopes the world is deep enough for you to fill every crevice.

Deeper, Brain ablaze, now.

Your sister in your wonder blooming like the willow, tall enough to reach the heaven’s flock and your brother in your nape that loves the graze of the wind and the sinking imprint of the sun.

Can you hear it? th-thump th-thump thump ...

Sew back, now.

Clear!

Some times some thing has to be dyed crimson cochineal for you to remember more than just your northern silhouette.

Endurance: Lia Vellardita

Spring 2020 / 16

abstract 3D poster 2: Ellie Braun

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F ll ii e e s s F By: Tyler Moore

Flies in line for coffee

Black, please.

Horrendous Buzzing clumps: Midday traffic

But such sticky noises cling to walls like camouflage.

Flies with cinched ties, brief cases dangling off hair thin arms, fly to the eighty third floor filtering blue light through thousands of geometric lenses as the click clacks sing from keyboards.

Little children flies play frisbee

All my fly friends are here, one thinks, vacuum mouth in to curled smile.

Tiny little birthday presents wait while the flies sweat

and eat boiled hotdogs.

Shriveled fly, swallowed in stiff green cloth and sepia air, shoestring hand holding his wife, gathering her all up, seeing if he can put her in his pocket and take her when he goes, she’s only a fly after all.

She holds him until his fly legs harden and rise as if gravity doesn’t affect the dead.

She cocks her head and thinks of a margarita, a large one no doubt, six straws splayed for some friends.

Her little fly stomach rumbles. Usually she’s hungry for garbage,

But a margarita is not much different, she thinks.

she should fit

Spring 2020 / 18

Wer, glauben sie, bist Du?: Olivia Keidl 19

Spring 2020 / 20

Generative Drawing 5: Ellie Braun

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Spring Alex 2020Elgas / 22 Trinity:

Reconstrucción del Retrato de Pablo Miguez inspired by the art of Claudia Fontes in memory of los desaparecidos By: Riley Preston

Standing on breaking waves amidst the brown sediment and the blue of the sun, Boy looks out onto nothingness. Whitecaps in the sky. Clouds in the bay. Boy turns away from somethingness. From ugliness. Boy can’t move into happiness. Can’t stray into hopelessness. Only sculpted into backness. Come-Backness.

Whereness? It litters the somethingness but Boy’s frontness reflects the emptiness. Boy can’t turn into somethingness. To Whereness.

Boy strayed far from put far from whereness. Boy taken from everywhere. Can’t hold his own hand, his mirrorness. His solidness.

Boy sees bodies bob on the surface of hereness from days of thereness. Boy wonders when his body will sink. Will resurface.

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The Chair: Calista Quek Spring 2020 / 24

Shifted: Olivia Keidl

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Me and your old shoes: Madeline Rasmussen

Spring 2020 / 26

Untitled: Sophia Abrams 27

By: Marissa Finn

Do you remember / when I kissed you / when the ocean met the shore / and left / but it always came back / when love was just a thing / that kept your heart from gaping / when every brush of our hands / was a whispered secret / and me clenching fear in my fist. / I used to wish I had kissed you more. / Home is a feeling I’ve lost / between state borders / and oceans / and the way you don’t text me back anymore / home is not a sickness / but an ache / home is the plans I made to leave / I was just trying / to escape / I was just trying / to run away / I was just trying / to be someone else. / I have crossed / all the borders / I have left the country / I have come back / I have tried to be a stranger / to myself / but I keep / bleeding through the mask. / I liked the person I was with you / I just hated the place. / I don’t know why I hated the place / when I liked the person. / It was never about leaving / It was never about being left / It was always just the part before the plane / the demolition of everything I could destroy / the rotting of everything I couldn’t / the belief that a town could change me / a city could change me / a place with goddamn public transportation could change me / the belief that if no one knows who I am / then I don’t have to either / but I’m never / ever / different.

Spring 2020 / 28

Drain the pond to find the fish: Patrick Argue

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, ink lips p l l a sm ith the hame” w n a em ink, “s It is th you th

By: Tyler M

oore

bones r d u e o t y c i d in ard pre g, humming z z i t: l b et a ca it is a rollin p r y l a l e u h f e u o grac his tire s that yo h , t y l a l e a n fin be ho has e flattened w n a ob em it is th l promised t arned, d a g m i n i n d an a ay, nee w a t u ry p tapest ason t e a r h t a s r i o t i n it f ing ski ou wa t y u o r p s

hroom eir dirt taste s u m h it th man w at despises e h t s i th it alright family e b e l h l i t w d , an breath t everything p s i r c , father, in tha r day a a d t e r n l e a c c t n a a or it is th en a m onsibility’ n say f e a c w t u e o b y p n of ‘res where tinctio n s i o i d t i , n e fi ks , so blu n on the de n e d ne loo d o u o i s o s n e u f h nd on it is t tures a dden c c u i s p e d l h o and t hrough t r u o p en you d h w s i e dread ember m e r u o how y

Spring 2020 / 30

Trash: Calista Quek

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Spring 2020 / 32 Fishing for an Answer: Mya Freund

Sunday: Celeste Carroll

33

:T

By

yler Moore

Days when serotonin chirps in the head. Write it down.

Like a bird song.Refuge the notes. Shelter.

Propped in a holy cage. Drag them along with a hum so there’s a lottery chance the melody ghost will haunt once it’s wings, alive, do what wings must do.

The daily grocery trip: I’d trade the milk and apples for those funerals. Every goddamn time.

Casket: The dead body of flashed yellow synapses injecting madeleine memories of those birds. Chipchipchirp.

But they say there is no Next.

There is no staying. No sun behind your lids.

Breakfast ends at 10:00.

But I reject nature. I disagree.

Because who will eat these worms?

I need banshee birds, guards of pink and lily.

And there is mildew too.

Spring 2020 / 34

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Look Alive!: Eliana Wasserman

Spring 2020 / 36

Breaking into the house: Madeline Rasmussen

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WHEN A WOLF LOSES ITS PACK By: Ana Komro

“Summer will end soon enough, and childhood as well.”

- George R.R. Martin

No one told her what revenge felt like. The fire in the belly that stoked flames like a dragon’s breath. No one told her to look away until the rain fell red in the afternoon sun. She tastes its saltiness when she bites her tongue to stifle her tears. No one told her how to cut her hair, and she cuts her cheek instead.

Someone taught her how to thread her blade through skin.

When winter comes and the rivulets of her palms turn to ice, she remembers fire, and steals the face of a dragon to wear as her own. The sea roils in her belly and salt water burns in her lungs. She realizes the world is more water than earth, and wonders why she wasn’t born with gills. Someone taught her how to swim from the wreckage of the boat of her old life, to leave the masts and the flag behind. No one told her how revenge lasted lifetimes. No one told her that a dragon is never satisfied, and the fire will eat her away until there is nothing

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Mind Control: Ellie Braun

Spring 2020 / 40

Giovanna: Chris Zak

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Walking the Line for 48 Hours: Ryan Preharra

Spring 2020 / 42

oysters: Ellie Braun

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Through the publishing of our seven student-run journals and magazines, the Publications Committee of the Wisconsin Union Directorate provides a creative outlet for UW-Madison students interested in creating poetry and prose, reporting on music and fashion, or delving into research in science and public policy. We celebrate creativity on campus by providing handson experience in publishing, editing, writing, and artmaking.

Thanks WISCONSIN UNION PRESIDENT Tanvi Tilloo

@illuminationjournal

PUBLICATIONS COMMITTEE DIRECTOR Carlo Romagnolo

uwilluminationjournal.com

PUBLICATIONS COMMITTEE ADVISOR Jen Farley CREATIVE ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR Max Homstad Spring 2020

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