Writers Magazine 2005

University of Portland Writers

Define Editors: Sarah Bigelow Thomas Le Ngo Anne Richards Valerie Silliman Amelia VanderZanden Beth Watje Margie Young

Magazine Advisor: Dr. Masson

Published Fall 2005

Cover Photo by Jenni Kuk

“You know, art is the reason I get up in the morning, but my definition ends there, it doesn’t seem fair that I’m living for something I can’t even define” --Ani DiFranco “We write to taste life twice” --Anais Nin Welcome to Writers in its eleventh year of representing the artistic and literary talent of University of Portland students. Writers is organized by a group of editors in the English Society, a club for anyone interested in reading, writing, poetry slams, and the like.

This year’s edition of Writers, “Define,” highlights how we, as artists, poets, and writers, struggle to understand and explain our experience. Each of the sub-sections is given a run-of-the mill dictionary definition, but every photograph and poem, story and drawing portrays the dynamic life we lead and imagine.

If you would like to be involved or contribute, Writers welcomes your questions, ideas, and submissions to upwriters@yahoo.com.

The Editors

Dynamic Pertaining to energy force Or motion Variation of intensity

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Painting canvas of the hyper-real silent symbols out of time exotic tottering play of name dropping, name dipping deep runs the history: man, woman, woman, man, body, mind, body, body, but never mind, mind. always the body interferes. littered it is, damaged but not destroyed, not yet, not now whispered static voices of white noise skitter while screens wait: reality what reality show reality to reality be reality original reality eclipsed, if it was ever real show it, sell it, dramatize the very littered lives we seem to live: foreign, fremd, froid, fra, frère, terror dirty terror and terrorized —Amy Kintner

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Joeseph Ritter

A Way to Be Sitting on the dock of the marina Tom Doniphon felt the cold wind burn his back. The tide was coming in, foamy and soft beyond the pier, rising over the barnacled rocks toward the dried stain of salt. Beneath its cold clarity were the empty boiled white undersides of crab shells and the against the wind the smell of shellfish, an odor that would not go cold in the air and seemed impregnated in the green slime of weeds or in the brine stiffened ropes that held the crab pots. It was very clear and the sky was light blue. In the wind he watched the waves blue and white capped in the empty bay. He had stood unchanged through a set of academic lectures meant to teach him but instead were like the hint of light from a door propped just open, leaving him unmoved and with only the barest outlet. Working through it with a martial discipline he had slowed his ability to create and only when lying in bed on a May afternoon with the air cool against his face and sheet up did he feel a hint of the old talent.

On a cold fall morning he could still feel the bite in his thumb from the loading gate of the rifle.

A good gun was always somewhat stiff and the gentle throb focused you when it was cold and you hadn’t had enough sleep.

He had once enjoyed this town very much with the slightly decrepit buildings and the ceremonial, obligatory beer that was always drunk first upon sitting at the bar. But with an influx of people who came to view and admire the clean, beautiful pagan ideals had been lost and it had only taken time until he would not betray the old rules and he was forced to go after a solid and total defeat by a force he did not wish to understand.

But now he was back and it was four years later with new management and he walked, open collared unshaven and tanned with leather sandals on to the dock and looked to the things around him. It was a great error not to understand the value of objects. From the simplest to the most overlooked and crucial he knew that it was the things men made that told their story.

The old pilings still stood in the wash, splattered with white from the gulls, creaking wetly as the dock rubbed against them. With the folding knife he took a mussel from the soaked wood, pried it open and ate it raw. The salt water stung his lips and the taste was strong and as a little water pooled on the pearly inside of the shell there was a cloudy reflection.

Maileen Hamto

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Maileen Hamto

Deep Blue Deep Blue and my chaos subsides to you.

Blue like the waters I swam through, held me buoyant and then succumbed to.

Its nature intense, heats the sense to churn and cleanse, licking at my shore and drawn away just to crash once more.

The tide rushes and suspends my will, pushes gently and pulls me near says nothing and everything in its silken caresses and dull roars.

It recedes until only drops are left, falling, gliding down my body tickling and shivering in warm awe, at the power those eyes have over me. —Sarah Freelander

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The Recital One night in July you pulled me off the sofa and into the dinning room, where your mother’s piano squatted, a throne of tuneful oak.

Summer—a season of deceptive civility and ease, embodied by the potted shrubs on the porch outside, all curves and shadowed corners; cobblestones beneath streetlight shadows, steamy as a windowpane.

We were practically strangers, yet you must have felt something more than pride when you began to play that encumbered your fingers, a force out of sync with the civilized scene, Perhaps it was the music that impeded the easy grace I had seen, and nothing more, for as the sheen of your civility was spoiled by that flawed and frenetic recital, so did the end of summer’s natural civility bring about, so easily, the end.

—Sarah Elze

Jenni Kuk

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Music Box Strike a nerve I won’t curve but put the pen to the paper to the words.

Twist me grind me slam and chide me I’ll sing you a pretty tune.

Which would you like to hear?

Open me and search for something inside behind the chimes behind the rhymes behind the times…..

I cried and you didn’t know why my gears turned ground and churned but nothing was learned because my music box had lost its teeth and a silent smooth cylinder rolled in its place.

Twist me love me shake and hug me I’ll let you hear my gears grind and twist like it’ll never show in words or face.

—Sarah Freelander

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Forget to Dance Music shapes A sculpture of movement.

A dancer, Hollowed like a jack-o-lantern Pours a liquid flame Into a fleshy hull.

Simmering memories Steam away While a consuming blue flame Fuels her art.

Her footsteps, Young phoenix wings in flight. —Beth Watje

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Just Before Fire Just before fire It saw you She had ruby eyes, a killer conscience We creep Terminator style in your presence Bathtub gin in summertime Rosy cheeked and silly Some day it might rain again It got wet, fire Port wine It slid across her back like a soft cheek It languorously licked Its eyes were flame Its teeth were bone After the fire they came Out of the pods they groaned We creep Too many doggies Too many rides It slipped inside and planted She closed her eyes and prayed Soft wet warm touches Autopsy opens and removes Vital organs are afraid scream In through her outside Out through her belly Just before fire She flew over your deserts I saw the hot hot Red sand blue sky home Who are they that miss and watch and hope We creep Because Just before fire It flies —Ilsa Ludgren

Graphic written representation described in vivid detail graphic arts

Dave Butler

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on my own wall i'm writing on my own wall, so what if we were all meant to be here, what if you were meant to shed that tear, what if you and i were meant to fall apart, what if you and i were meant to restart, meant to take a pause, take a moment and break away from our fate, what if we changed our state, what if we thought outside the box, what if we turned back our clocks and started anew, what if we didn't receive what was due, what if it was just me and you, no timetable or destiny to follow through, what if we changed our reality one moment at a time, would it be a crime or would it be a sign, that perhaps we were never meant to live like we do, could our world blossom again like a once in a lifetime re-do, a chance to start all over, would we really be sober, would we experience life as we truly truly meant to, this message i sent you, will you read this and act, can we make a pact, or will this message drift to the back of your brain, will all these words be merely be for no gain, will these thoughts of living like i want just bring pain, will i only know what could have been, will i have the seen the light only to see it dim.... —Ronald Johnson

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For your poetic ambitions For my poetic ambitions you wished me well, on the first page of the poetry book.

I had rather you wished me well in life.

My poetry is flowing, As is the torment of love and lost love, deep sadness and fleeting moments of the glory gone in an instant from which all poetry is born.

Wish me well in life, so that I may never feel the need to write another word. —Author Unknown

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Digging Through a Drawer Memories flood back to my mind Reading over those familiar words Remembering those feelings Knowing they were pure in the moment Yet faded as our pasts I wonder what you are doing Where you are and if you are safe Your words seemed so full of passion, warmth, desire and hunger A hunger that no relationship could quench I wonder if you remember me as I was If I helped you at all in life I guess I am searching for answers to questions I am afraid to ask you Because they don’t really matter at this moment in time Yet they do so much now I re-read all your thoughts and I am surrounded by your feelings By your love By your fear of love By your anguish I wonder if you still write as your used to Fast and furious that your pen-marks blur Scrawling pen on paper so fast Ideas churning in your head Yearning to be written down on paper Dying to leap out of your mind and be documented I hope you still write And I pray that your words are heard, read and remembered as I cherish them —Courtney Lanahan

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Caged Langue-ge words in chains never cause havoc parole words better yet set them free— —C.J. Graves

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Cacophony you speak I hear your words break hegemonies

l.e.t.t.e.r.s like your ideas Individual so they become one sound —Valerie Silliman

Reflect To cause or undergo reflection An image produced By reflection

Dave Butler

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The Filipino Speaks of Rivers I’ve known rivers too, Langston Hughes.

I’ve known them to be deep and penetrating Separating land and lives Not caring which it divides. I’ve seen Whole lands gapped and gaped; Wholes into halves Halves into quarters Quarters into eighths.

Eight microcosms causing bewilderment and hate In the eight fledgling minds of the eight different states.

Eight special waves waved eight special ways— Shoulder, elbow, wrist, fingers More wrists, more fingers And everything in between— all trying, all waving Across your own tumultuous waves, Jointless, boneless, pointlessly distracting The octagonal signals of either pain or pleasure, But futile in all respects.

I’ve known rivers too, Langston Hughes.

I’ve known them to careen wildly like a drunk, So strong that though I only idly stare in I am consumed in its fiery motion Sucked in So violently I have to cry to know precisely Where up is. But the moment I do I am spun right ‘round like a top Breaking surface only to break ground, down To up, up to down The water so blue I start to see red, I’ve known rivers too, Langston Hughes, Though I’m dead.

—Julius Calasicus

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Evening Ritual Washing my face one evening I felt a subtle tingling in my throat like someone was watching me. I kept washing as if to ignore the threat of pain.

There was no pain.

I splashed clear the last remnants of a dirty day and my eyes rose to the dominant figure in the mirror: a face - minecovered in blood as if washed in it.

Not aghast, I studied the spectacle. How odd that the flow is unseen and now unfelt.

This horror fascinating because I, like others, dream that the blood has a purpose, or that it signifies something, or that it is really there. —Amy Kintner

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Mirror

Fake What do you want?

When you Look into the mirror?

Do you Want beauty?

Are you vain?

Is it Pride that you are searching For? What is it you Seek?

Can you Look into me And see yourself Do you see a mask?

Covered up with lies?

What do you want?

When you Look into a

Fake What do you want?

When you Look into the mirror?

Do you Want beauty?

Are you vain?

Is it Pride that you are searching For? What is it you Seek?

Can you Look into me And see yourself Do you see a mask?

Covered up with lies?

What do you want?

When you Look into a

Mirror —Chrissy Rasmussen

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Aaron Byer

Freedom from the moon outside My life was gray. To my left, right, the ceiling, floor: my room was gray. Next to nothing, not even my name, the only thing I owned independent of my body was the piece of gum I’d smuggled underneath my tongue. Of course, it too had lost its shade and become a tasteless and colorless mass. They say white is the absence of color, but I knew different.

A white wall, a white sock, even a white pillow case would have served to remind me that even there, then, some color was left. Instead, I stood up, off the only furniture of this new home, and lay one palm on either wall of the room. The ceiling was no different, arms reached it with little effort. No bigger, no smaller than it had to be; my room fit me as I fit it. One extension, one reach, one window, one light, one bed, one sheet, one blanket, one pillow, one toilet, one sink; one boy. Everything seemed to indicate that I was meant to be no other place than where I found myself.

I was singular, in a place of solitude, but far from alone. Toilet, bed, window, and occupant all formed one room. There was room enough for each piece, but any excess would have caused the space to break its bounds.

I wasn’t unconscious, I felt and moved, but for the first time in my life I was without control. Feet moved, I followed; head turned, I looked; eyes closed, I slept. Which was what I presently needed. I fell towards the mattress, heart slowed, and I was carried from consciousness.

When I awoke the room was darker, the light dimmed but still glowing, and my body screamed for water. The sink warmly obliged its tepid contents as I reacquainted myself with the surroundings. Left, right, floor, ceiling…door. The first time I hadn’t noticed it, or my mind hadn’t let me think anything of it. It too was gray, but of a darker shade, and seemed out of place in such a uniform space. I didn’t know what time it was, but I seemed to have barely closed my eyes before waking. The window confirmed my suspicion, delivering a sliver of freedom from the moon outside; it was still nighttime. I lay back down on the bed and tried to recall why I was there.

Stimulated by my pondering, my mind wondered from baseball to school work, and back to baseball. Pitch by pitch, batters retired and innings completed themselves. Sign, change grip, left foot back, pivot, leg across, arm back, drop and drive, hips and shoulder, release point…I jolted up in bed, images of fists and feet splintering a door crashed into consciousness.

Release, rotation; hands back, rotation; hips and hands, head down. I was at the plate, hips were committing but my hands wouldn’t move…I slammed back into the bed, seeing hands pinned behind a back, a woman and a man screaming, I couldn’t move. Tears streamed down my face but my entire body lay paralyzed. I wanted to move, run, scream, anything! Solemnity overtook as I realized I couldn’t; movement was out of the question. I braced my neck and glanced to my right, the door mocked any thought of motion; this was where I would stay.

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Eyes opened, this time to the dim glow of an industrial light which loomed overhead. Parched, my throat required attention. Muscles strained to raise my body from the bed frame, but managed to drag me to the sink. I turned the cold steel handle and moistened my lips as best I could manage, crouched over the facet. I splashed water onto my face and made back to the bed. Sheets were crisp and the mattress rigid, but they offered a forgiving refuge of thought. And though I couldn’t call it peaceful, the physical discomfort was minimized.

Sunlight from the window signaled afternoon; I had been there a full day and a half. I wasn’t hungry, nor significantly dehydrated, but the lactose built up in my muscles burned with every motion. Static, I wondered when and how my stay was going to end. Even more intriguing was the apparent lack of motion outside my cell. For brief moments I had ventured a gaze outside, but without acknowledgement. Two levels, though the number of cells remained unknown, and it seemed I occupied the space farthest from the stairs.

The first interaction came later that second night, as did the first meal. I later discovered that it was customary for new inmates to receive a 36 hour seclusion when first arriving in the compound. To cool down and to ponder the events that brought each resident to their present location, seclusion was only interrupted when meals were served. Even then, food was delivered to the inmate only if they showed signs of awareness and attention; I had slept for over 24 hours, facilitating a self-induced fasting.

My first meal was my first exposure to facility personnel.

A buzzer signaled his entrance and my attention, the door opened and closed within ten seconds, food was deposited at the base of the door.

Within seconds I devoured the sludge and cornbread, leaving what appeared a cross between asparagus and broccoli on the tray. Carbohydrates metabolized into sugars, consciousness and awareness instantly heightened.

Tears overwhelmed me and I fell back towards the mattress once more: this was prison.

My mind pieced events together soon afterwards. That week my parents had scheduled a counseling appointment, in an attempt to contain the anger I had been recently demonstrating. Our family was dysfunctional, as my father’s recent endeavor to quit drinking had created an overwhelming tension. Father vs. mother, mother vs. son, son vs. sister; repressed emotions escalated into physical violence. And, like any good American family, blame had to placed somewhere.

At school I was perfect. I swung varsity as a freshman in basketball and baseball, making friends with virtually everyone. Home was no different, at least my parents thought so. When I began to express disgust at the state of our family, my parents thought there had to be something wrong with me, as I had never acted out before. I knew it was more than my behavior, but parents chose to see anger without seeing causation. Thus, the recent appointment with a councilor. My parents wanted to correct my

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behavior, while I wanted them to know and understand my distaste, but the counseling appointment was for one.

I refused that Thursday, to see a psychiatrist for a problem I saw as a family situation. Commands and threats had no influence and I calmly delivered an ultimatum for equal representation. I locked my door and started my homework, consciously muting the screams of my parents. As I lay huddled and crying on that mattress, the door shattering beneath my father’s shoulder, I was thinking about the workout I had missed after practice. I hardly felt the hands that threw me against the wall, eventually carrying me down the stairs, even as my limbs flailed to free themselves.

Blood trickled down my forehead and splinters dug ever deeper into my forearms, and I thought of running poles after practice. My mother held me pinned face down against the cement of our garage, before her and my father tried to throw me into their car, and I was thinking of the extra abs I should have been doing. Arms and legs flailed, punching and kicking at nothing, as my mind carried me from the hardwood floor to the rim. I said nothing, felt nothing, while my parents strained to keep me pinned to the concrete. I remember the phone call, my father screaming, but I tuned them out, concentrating on nothing but my follow through. It had to be a game. Free throws, fastballs, screaming fans…and my sister in the corner of my vision.

Huddled, holding her face against the wall so as to hide as much of our violence as she could, an eight year old sat crying with fright and frustration.

In her face I recognized defiance and rage, even while her emotions forced tears from her eyes. Cold steel locked my wrists in place, rough hands forced my face against the glass of a window, and my sister crouched crying against the door of our garage. Frustration became hatred, hatred resentment, resentment disgust.

Police questioned me and I gave answers without hesitation, never thinking of legal council. What was the point? Nothing was going to change. I’d seen my parents ruin my older sister’s life, drive her so far into depression that she dropped out of school with a 4.0. They’d sent their own son to prison for thinking a family’s problems extended further than one person. And now, trapped between the parents who had raised her and the brother who hadn’t been able to protect her, I’d seen the same hatred on my younger sister’s face that I felt inside my own heart. Questioning, transport, and booking all transpired without realization. The last thing I remembered, before being sent to my cell, was the phone call from the booking officer to my father that Thursday night.

“Mr. Byer, we realize how painful this must be. And, considering the circumstances, we’re willing to let you pick up your son and drop all charges,” and my father’s subsequent response (which I heard the officer repeat, amazed himself), “He deserves it, keep him there.”

I walked from my cell down a long hallway towards the courtroom, shackled feet and hands bound with chains. I knew my feelings would never change. Four nights I had spent laying on a mattress, wishing not for freedom but for redemption. Would they understand now, would they

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Rebecca Palmer

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understand me now? Steel fell from ankles while a deputy opened the doors in front of me. Lights and voices overwhelmed my senses. Stunned, I stood motionless in the doorway, glancing from face to face. They both looked towards me, my parents, then to the ground, towards the judge. Did they understand? The deputy ushered me to a chair next to the county attorney who, without ever having met me, would attempt to present defense. I turned, hoping to catch my parents’ eyes, but they gazed elsewhere.

My arraignment was Monday; a Friday holiday had pushed the hearing over the weekend. What kind of parents leave their 14 year old son for four nights in a county jail? That weekend I had tried to understand them, their motivations. Would I have acted the same way, left my child instead of taking him back home? The judge read the charges, “harassment in the first degree, assault two in view of a minor, battery in the second degree…” I recognized him, he’d presided over the Mock-Trial district championship, though his words seemed less important then.

“Aaron Gabriel Byer, you stand accused of the preceding charges by the Deschutes County District Attorney. Young man, how do you plead?”

Plead? I didn’t want to plead. Do you know what pleading means? It means that you understand: you know why you are being charged and you either accept the charges or you refute them. But I didn’t understand. I hadn’t done anything wrong, I hadn’t done anything at all.

My attorney turned towards me and spoke, something. I tried to remember what I could have done to warrant the list of charges the judge had just recited, but I didn’t understand. I had made my stand, maturely, and held to it. My father had broken through my bedroom door, he’d thrown me against the bedroom wall, drug me down the stairs by my ankles. My mother had pinned me against the cement, thrown me against her car, then back onto the cement. I’d bled and bruised, and done nothing but try to free myself.

My sister had screamed, screamed for my parents to let me go. But they only pushed harder and twisted my arms with more force. The past weekend had been spent between solitary confinement and momentary meals with men who bragged of arson, relishing in their memories of mothers throwing their children from third story windows; freeing them from the flames even while they fell to their deaths. I turned and glanced towards my parents once more, wondering if they understood me now. I wondered if they understood what I had been saying all along. Families are never ruined by one person. In that courtroom, in front of a hundred faces I’d never seen before and never saw again, I stood up. My legs shook, my voice trembled, and I stared strait at father. The attorney grabbed for my hand, tried to pull me back into the chair, but I couldn’t, wouldn’t, move. I recognized the judge’s voice, heard the bailiff walking towards me, but I didn’t move. For one second my father lifted his head, his eyes meeting mine as the bailiff struggled to bring me to my chair, and I mouthed the most hateful, spiteful words I’d ever spoken.

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Perspective A mental view or vista The relationship of aspects of A subject to each other and to a whole

Spencer Cookson

28

Blair Tyler

Thomas Le Ngo

29

Spencer Cookson

30

Spencer Cookson

Brianne Hughes

31

Amy VanderZanden

32

Thomas Le Ngo

Dave Butler

33

Lisa Timbancaya

Jenni Kuk

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Dave Butler

Encounter A meeting, especially one that is unplanned To meet face to face Experience as a reaction

Amy VanderZanden

36

Valerie Silliman

The Broken Hand I sat at the table with a Priest. He was telling me about the Order of the Sacred Cross. We talked all the way through lunch. And then, standing but before picking up our cafeteria trays, he extended his hand, saying it was nice to meet me. My eyes followed the movement of his hands. They were large, the circumference of each finger impressive. His middle finger ended after the first knuckle in a scar. I shifted my gaze to his deep eyes. Nice meeting him too. I wondered where had he lost his finger? Was that part of his past? Part of his story? A common accident in his former trade? I imagined him serving the Eucharist, carrying the chalice in his worn and maimed hand.

The little boy knelt at the altar rail, staring above his open hands, the right cupped in the left. A hand reach toward him, and it hesitated, saying the blessing “The body of Christ which is broken for you� and the little boy watched the wafer, held between the first and second finger. He watched the space. The space between the fingers holding the wafer, and the fourth finger wearing a ring.

The space of the missing finger. He’d been looking at that space, kneeling on his knees, every Sunday his entire life.

Receiving the broken body of Jesus Christ and looking at the broken hand.

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Valerie Silliman

The Man at 6th and Everett A young couple vacated a bench and I set my backpack down where they had been sitting and stood reading a vocabulary sheet while waiting for the bus. A man who had been leaning against the building stepped forward.

He paused several feet before me and asked “Do you mind if I sit on this side of the bench?” I looked up at him, a lean black man and smiled “Of course not.” He slid onto the bench with a easy movement that broke only when he became still. I continued to stand, looking at my sheet.

“Is that work or school?” He asked.

“School.” I said and smiled again.

We talked that way, an easy sentence now and again between my mental conjugating of German verbs. Other men stopped for a bus, or walked by and he said “Hello.” And once “Amigo” and a string of words my friends who all took Spanish in high school could have translated. I’d glance at him, while he talked. I couldn’t tell who he was looking at him. Something about his hair, that could have been a ‘fro but was too long and pulled back into a pony tail, wanted to tell a story that didn’t match his clean cut face and fresh clothing. “I used to play rhythm and blues on my guitar in a band.” He said, after I told him I was studying music.

We talked about church, he reached into his back pocket and opened the worn slick wallet and pulled out a card, reading the name of the church from it. “Only sinners go to my church.” He said. I laughed “Mine too.” I laughed again and said “I think most churches just have sinners, but they don’t all think so.”

A man joined us as the bus stop. “What’s up?” My bench companion asked. “Nothing, just staying out of trouble” the guy answered, showing that his front two teeth were missing.” “Good idea.” The bench companion responded. The toothless man shifted away from us, walking out to the curb. “I try to be friendly and I always get different responses.” The guy said. “Some people don’t seem to talk, but I always say hi anyway.” “Cool,” I say, and think about telling him how nice it is, that he is sitting here talking to me while I wait for the bus, and he waits to make up his mind as to what he wants to do next. He’d said earlier “I have to decide if I want to go to a bar or something.” But I know that I can’t say anything direct, or it might break this oddly comfortable companionship on the bench at 6th and Everett. My bus pulled up, and I didn’t let myself wonder the vague thought–that maybe he’d follow me back to UP– “It was really nice talking to you.” We say “nice talking to you” together and I’m not sure who started the sentence. I smile once more slinging my backpack over my shoulder and pull out my bus ticket.

On the bus, I watch as he sits there looking down the street. He looks as though he will keep sitting there. As my bag shifted with the bus I wonder for a moment who he is, and what he does, when not sitting on the bench.

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Morningtime morningtime lives lost in the night come away with us.

As we dance in mime we're waiting for the bus. promise of tomorrow feeds the hungry numbs the poor.

As we dance in sorrow, we're glancing at the door. we dance as one we dance as many we dance as two.

As the past is done, I turns into you.

Minds begin to shatter fragile as glass the earth is a dustbin and i'm the mad hatter, fate's standing kin.

—Anne Richards

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Sarah Bigelow

The Visit Dave recognized her voice before he actually saw her. He wanted to forget her, forget her voice, her face, her demeanor…everything. She spoke in hushed tones, obviously straining not to be overheard. He dreaded seeing her; he couldn’t forget her even if she was standing right there in front of him. And, of course, he didn’t want to hear what she had to say. He could imagine her words now: I’m so disappointed in you; I can’t believe you would do this to yourself… He didn’t want a lecture; he wanted someone to feel sorry for him. Nor did her want to see the one person responsible for all of this. His throat ached ad he tried to gather the courage to yell. “I DON’T WANT TO SEE YOU!!!!” and slam the door in her face. He never would, of course, but it was nice to dream.

And he knew it was her. Her voice was particularly distinct. A transplant to this part of the country, she still clung to her Bostonian brogue. The hard consonants and dropped “R’s” were unmistakable. Since he had been away from her, he had grown accustom to the soft, rolling Southern drawl that many of the staff members spoke and her voice assaulted his ears, headsplittingly novel in this world of routine.

She walked into the room at that moment, and she was stunning.

Dressed in slacks and a white halter-top, and wearing her dark hair up, she looked better than he remembered. He almost wanted to speak to her.

“Dave.”

“Gillian.”

She wandered into the room, not wanting to face him, trying to figure out where to settle herself without being completely in his line of view. But there was nowhere safe, so she eased herself into one of the leather chairs on the other side of the table. Under his eyes, she felt naked, embarrassed, and all she wanted to do was run as far away from him as she could get. Turn on your heel and go, she instructed herself. Leave, smile and tell the doctor that she was wrong – she didn’t know the angry man locked away in that room.

But that would be too easy. A cop-out. Instead: “How are you?” she asked. Her voice was soft, like velvet, but tired.

“Do you mind if I smoke?” he asked suddenly, picking up a half full cigarette box from its spot on the pool table. He must have been trying to avoid the question she knew were resting on the tip of her tongue, ready to assault him at any moment.

Her nose wrinkled automatically in disgust. “I didn’t know you smoked. When did you start?”

Her action caught him off guard and angered him. She could practically see the thought running through his mind: How dare you judge me!!

“Depends. Does it mean I’m an addict?” he snapped, his voice rough.

Gillian exhaled slowly, shaking her head. Dave was being irrational, jumpy, like a tiger in a restricting cage. The doctors had warned her about this – told her not to be insulted is he said something uncharacteristic or inappropriate. People at this stage, they said, were liable to be angry at the world and didn’t think about what they were saying. But Gillian – though she

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would never voice her concern – had to wonder if, after several months, he should still be this way.

She allowed her gaze to stray to the orange carpeted floor, and tried not to think about how out of date the carpet was or how Dave’s eyes were still bearing down upon her. Her thoughts were crisscrossing back and forth, and it was all she could do to keep herself from stepping away from them and allowing them to overwhelm her entirely.

Dave couldn’t take his eyes off of her. Now that she was here, now that he was talking – somewhat – with her, he wanted to impress upon her exactly what he was feeling towards her. Sadistically, he hoped that his last comment had hurt her. Good riddance, he thought venomously. Every moment she spent in the room made him even more angry and frustrated. He lit a cigarette, because he didn’t really care if she minded or not.

“You never answered my question,” Gillian said at last, the wispy, choking grey smoke drawing her back into the present. She got up to stand by the window. If he had given her a moment, she would have asked him not to smoke, it irritated her asthma. He should have known that, but he was angry at her – that much was obvious and not at all surprising. Truthfully, if she were sitting in his position she probably would have been angry too. But then again, if she couldn’t breathe, she wasn’t doing either of them any good.

At the window, the frigid air – a combination of the tension in the room and the air conditioning blowing at full blast – met the sizzling summer heat outside. She glanced through the open window – there were bars on the window, she thought with a sick sensation in her stomach – to the city below, bustling. Everyone hurrying about to do whatever it was they had to do. It amazed her. All these people, they might walk by the centre every single day, and never think about those people inside, closeted away, trying to piece together the life they alone had shattered. Gillian knew she would be the same way, had she no vested interest in a patient cloistered away behind these brick walls. Sadly, she turned from the window. She knew he would never answer the question. It didn’t matter thought, because she could guess how he was getting along anyway.

“How do you like Richmond?” she tried again, huddling into another overstuffed chair within safe proximity to the window.

“I’ve only been in the courtyard since I got here,” Dave replied, his tone icier than the room itself.

“Oh.” Gillian looked away from him again. She didn’t know what else to say, so she just leaned out of the window once more and glanced about her, craning her neck to see around the corner of the building. The centre was too white, and inside all the furniture looked out of place, like a dump trying to be the Ritz Carlton. She couldn’t figure out what the interior was trying to say about the centre – was it a hospital or a group home?

Someone close to her – though she couldn’t remember exactly who at the moment – had suggested the centre to her with florid recommendations. “The staff is the best in the country,” she was promised with a wide smile. But now that she was there, among the doctors and the patients – oh, screw it, they were druggies and she knew it – she felt as though she had thrown Dave to the wolves. She still hoped that maybe, just maybe, she had been wrong, that perhaps her eyes had been playing tricks on her. But there they were, in rehab of all places, and she knew she had done what had to be done. Dave

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needed help – the rest was just details.

“Tell me the truth, Gillian,” Dave began, jarring her back to the present. She looked at him then, the color draining from her face. She cringed when she heard him say her name like that. He spat “Gillian” out like it was some dirty and uncivilized word. “Don’t say my name like that,” she whispered.

Dave laughed at her silently, glad to have her attention. He held her blue eyes in his hard grey ones, translating the pain and rage he felt to her.

Maybe, finally, he could make her understand. He ignored her request. “The truth,” he continued, “did you come all the way from Atlanta to see me?”

He could tell that Gillian wanted to drop her gaze again, that the expression in his eyes worried her. But for some reason, she couldn’t. He eyes remained fixed on him, hardly blinking. “No,” she muttered finally. “I had a conference I was presenting at.” She paused for a moment, her eyes narrowing and becoming cold. She set her jaw angrily, staring at him darkly. “I wasn’t even going to come here,” she admitted brashly, as if emboldened by her truth, “in fact, I’m on the red eye back tonight. But something kept telling me that I had to come see you.”

“Guilt maybe,” he replied sarcastically.

“Maybe,” Gillian confessed contemplatively. “Maybe.”

They sat in silence, listening to the steady tick-tock of the nearby clock. Dave stubbed out his cigarette and lit another. Gillian returned to the window, her on breath of freedom.

Finally, Dave couldn’t stand it anymore. She had been here for too long, he had to tell her, let her know what she had done to him.

“I hate you for it, you know.”

“I figured,” Gillian replied, her back still turned.

“You didn’t have to turn me in. Could have been ‘our little secret.’ I had it all under control –” “That’s what I was afraid of.”

“You didn’t have to do it,” Dave continued, ignoring her, “but you did. I hate you.”

“Dave…” Gillian was forced to look at him again. It was obvious that his words hurt her. Sure, these bitter words were coming from a place in him that was angry with himself. Whether it was for getting caught with drugs or taking them in the first place, she didn’t know. But what she did know was that he was as guilty right now as she was.

“Don’t ‘Dave’ me, Gillian. You don’t understand the pressure I was under. I needed to sleep. I needed to relax. I couldn’t just sit there and act like nothing was wrong. I had to do something or else I was going to go crazy!”

“And this is better?!” she asked incredulously, hearing her voice go flat in her anger.

“I wasn’t going to get caught,” he replied flatly, as if this ought to be blatantly obvious to her.

“Oh right. Of course. How could I forget?” she replied sarcastically, fighting the urge to say something more volatile.

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“Who are you to be sarcastic?! Who are you to judge me? You who was born with a silver spoon in her mouth!”

Gillian chose to ignore this last statement, biting her tongue to keep from screaming at him with frustrated rage. “God, Dave, don’t you hear yourself?

What you did was wrong! Not only did you take to many pain killers and lie about it, but you also took advantage of poor Maude! You know that she loves you like a son and would do anything for you if you only ask! She TRUSTED you!! And what did you do? You took advantage of that, asking her for all those pills!! What if you had OD’ed, Dave? What about that? She never would have been able to forgive herself if that had happened. None of us would have been able to. Dave, how could you be so stupid?!”

Dave glared at her. She didn’t know what she was talking about. She had no idea about what he had gone through. “What do you know? Really, tell me. I would love to figure out what makes you so smart. Why is it that I always have to listen to you? What is it about you that makes you infallible?”

Gillian looked at him incredulously. “I know that there is a shit load of people in Atlanta who love you and would do anything for you. All you’d have to do is say the word, and we’d be there for you. We want to be here for you now! Everyone keeps asking themselves what they did wrong. What was it, what mistake did they make, what did they say – or didn’t they say – that drove you to the pain killers? Were we not good enough friends and confidantes? We want to know why you did this. Why didn’t you trust us? Jesus, Dave, if you had just asked, there would have been so many people right there, by your side, all the way. We could have gotten you the help you needed, Dave. We would have been there. Why didn’t you know that?” She walked over to him and looked him in the eyes for the first time.

He looked down at her. Her features were marked the pain that she must be feeling. He rolled his eyes. Gillian always had been overemotional, a quality that belied her New England childhood. “Ah… I see. You all were ready to help me. You have a funny way of showing you concern, don’t you?

You know what you did, Gillian? You turned me in! I would have gotten off them, in time. I knew when I was ready, and I was prepared to give them up when I was ready. If you had just kept out of it, everything would have turned out fine.”

Gillian left his side and reclined in a third chair, this one in the corner, under the clock. She was silent for a moment, perhaps reflecting on what he had just said. He could practically see the gears working in her head as her eyes widened with some sudden realization. She shook her head suddenly with disbelief. “That night,” she started slowly as if weighing each and every word for its importance. “The night you came to my house really late. I thought you were drunk when you started yelling at me and sprained my wrist. It was only a little while after…it…and I didn’t really think about it. I just wrote it off because I figured you were simple exhibiting some delayed reaction… I thought you were drunk. I hid in the downstairs bathroom. Did you know that? That’s where I went, after you threw me down half a flight of stairs. Didn’t really think about what was going on. I just dismissed it because of what you had gone through. I told the doctor at the hospital that I had tripped over my cat in the dark – he probably didn’t believe me, for what it’s worth… Anyhow, I should have seen it then. You were so screwed up

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that night, I should have seen it. You weren’t drunk, you were high. I’m an idiot, you know.” She sighed and stood up once again stood up, wandering around the room as if entranced.

“Sit still!” Dave yelled at her, aggravated by her motion around the room.

“So…” she began again, ignoring him. “So maybe the reason I turned you in was for my own safety. Next time it might have been an entire flight of stairs…or worse. If anyone should be feeling hatred, it should be me.”

There. That being said and done and with those feeling out on the table, Gillian felt much better. Her guilt had slowly evaporated as she spoke, and she was beginning to realize who really was at fault. She felt hot anger rise in her. Anger at Dave, for what he had done to everyone; for what he had done to himself. He was stupid and she was sick and tired of babying that stupidity. She wrung her hands for a moment and continued to pace the room, not meeting his eyes again.

“I’m changing the subject: what else are you on? I mean, were you growing weed in your flower boxes, or operating a meth lab in your basement? Do you have heroin tracks? If you do, I’d like to see them – I’ve never seen heroin tracks before.” Her voice dripped with her frustrated sarcasm.

“What are you saying?” Dave asked, frowning at her. Her words seemed to be confusing him. One minute she was playing the guilty one, and now she was seething with rage.

“What I’m saying is that and addict is an addict and I want to know what else you used.”

“Why are you treating me like this? No, of course I didn’t use anything else.”

“Why should I trust you?” she growled. “You lied to me, you lied to your best friend, you lied to your boss. What’s stopping you now?”

“You’ve got to trust me, Gillian.”

“I think it’s too late for that.”

Dave could only stare at her; he was at a loss for words. He couldn’t believe that Gillian, one of his closest friends, was treating him this way.

They were reduced to silence and sat staring at one another until the clock on the far wall struck the hour. Gillian glanced up at it, as if she had only just now noticed that it was there. A look of vague surprise washed over her face.

“Damn it, I’ve got to go. I’ve got some people to meet before I head off to the airport. I suppose I’ll see you when you get back, assuming you ever come back to Atlanta.” She shrugged at her own comment, as if she was denying ownership of it. And before Dave had a chance to respond, she swept from the room and was gone.

He wandered to the window where he watched her hail and climb into a taxi before speeding away. Her rapid leave-taking left him with a sense of dismay. It was one thing to argue with Gillian, but it was another thing to be left in her wake, discarded as if he were a piece of trash, not a human being. The room was heavy with her departing words. She seemed disappointed and angry, not only with him but with herself as well. Who cared? She was wrong. About him, about his emotions, about his reasoning, about everything… Especially about everything. He needed to believe that she was wrong. He walked away from the window and began to pace the path that

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Gillian had been trudging only moments ago. He marveled for a moment that there wasn’t a hole in the carpet where she had walked. He laughed to himself, thinking about how wrong Gillian was. She had certainly made a fool of herself, waltzing in here like the Queen of Sheba, trying to guilt him into repenting. Well, it hadn’t worked.

He lit another cigarette, gazing around the room. He hated it. It was too much, but of what, he couldn’t say. It was simply too much. He had grown weary of the place and now he simply felt like a caged animal. He racked up the colored balls on the pool table. Even the table was starting to drive him crazy. It hadn’t been varnished in years and the dull, warped wooden frame was nicked and scratched. There were even holes in the aging green felt that caught unsuspecting cues only to be torn larger. The table was just dirty, he realized, and that was the key. This room – ironic in its perfect order and hospital-quality sterility – made him feel dirty. Made him feel kept; John the Baptist awaiting Salome’s dance. At that moment, he wanted nothing more than to get out of the terrible building.

As if billiards were his exit, he played pool for a while, enjoying the muted crunch of the balls as they knocked into one another. But the sound wasn’t enough to drive his conversation with Gillian from his mind. It played itself over and over and over, as thought he had forgotten to turn off the repeat button in his mind. Each time, he grew more and more frustrated, imagining all the clever come-backs he should have used and all the ways – that now that he was again alone – he could have proved to Gillian that he was indeed correct. He even yelled aloud, pretending that she was once again sitting next to the window.

Since pool couldn’t drive thoughts of Gillian from his mind, he abandoned the game and wandered once more to the window. He leaned against the pane, realizing for the first time that there were actually bars on the windows. He leaned further out farther and looked from side to side – each and every window had bars on it. He had never realized this before, and it only made him hate the building more. He would have sold his soul to get out of the centre. He envied Gillian – she got to go home while he was stuck in this hell-hole for God knows how long. Below him, the steady stream of cars was tapering off as the sun set. But even these people, the stragglers, were going home.

Home. God, he hadn’t entertained the thought of home for a while now. Home. He said it aloud, marveling at how such a common word could sound gummy and thick in his mouth. It was a child’s word, not a drug addict’s. Home, home, home… Did he want to go home? Maybe he didn’t.

Maybe he would just stay here forever – no matter how much he hated it – just to show Gillian and everyone else. But that was childish and he had been so childish lately… He sighed, leaving the window and sitting down again.

He didn’t know what to do with himself. He was at a loss.

What was going to happen to him now?

45

Valerie Silliman

The World’s Most Beautiful Old Woman My music teacher closes her eyes when she talks. She wears bright pink, and her living room is filled with bright yellow and orange silk flowers.

She’s going to paint her living room in graduating shades of orange.

She loves to cook, and has recipes you didn’t know existed, and makes them with technique and passion. I need to take cooking lessons from her, because this is a real living art form like you don’t read about in any of those glossy magazines. This is the food that you learn to make from greatgreat grandmothers. Ugly old women who worked until the day they died.

She has turned her habitat for humanity yard into a jungle of plants and ponds. She takes delight in the daisies that grow in her uncut lawn and yells at her cats when they climb her little trees, saying she will kill them.

She helps her neighbors butcher rabbits, and listens to their troubles. She works with her hands—taking great pleasure in the product of her labor. She writes long neat lists of her goals and projects. She loves a good comedy, a good joke, a captivating book. She never eats dinner before 9, and often stays up till 3 in the morning, when the coyotes walk down her neighborhood street.

She’s shockingly honest, and I laugh, and she says “No it’s true.” And I say yes, that is why I’m laughing. She is so not American. Her life laughs in the face of the pettiness of unhappy women. She’s crazy-you know her and you must say this—with awe and with a shake of the head.

She speaks with an accent, and has an amazing English vocabulary which she expands by using Yugoslavian words. She says that her daughters speak English with a Yugoslavian accent, and the Yugoslavian they still remember (even their last name) with American accents.

She’s brilliant—in language, mathematics and music. She was a woman who wore high heels and played Chopin. And yet a war came, and she lost her husband, her soul mate, and had to sell things, working as a middleman on the black market, to provide for her two little girls, who’d wait for her all day on the 13th story of the building they called home. She’d come home, to find them sitting in the dark stairway, after an air-raid alarm, waiting for her to come home. And when I realized what that must have felt like as a mother, I realized what it means to be a mother. And I could have knelt before that image.

She calls her younger daughter, the one who will always be a child “mooch.” And I don’t know what this means, but she says it lovingly. She would die for her kids, and I believe this, and it is one of the most beautiful deaths you can imagine.

She tells her history, she tells her dreams, and then she tells her life.

When she left her country she brought her two little girls, her cookbooks, music, and photo albums. These are the things she now loves. She’s made new dreams for herself, and a new home in a country she had to flee to, and a town she did not choose. She never feels sorry for herself.

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She tells stories, and I feel like I am learning from her, (again and differently than I learned from my mother), what it means to be a good woman. How to live an excellent life, no matter war, poverty, separation and disappointments. She tells me her stories, and she is defining in my mind the strength and beauty that can be woman. She is giving to me an ideal of reality, rather than a dream of life as perfection (with superior hips.) This is sort of the life, the sort of woman, who becomes gorgeous with old age.

Connie Pullen

Borne To carry in the mind Harbor To endure

Blair Tyler

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A Room, Among Other Things Like my poster of Dali’s “Face of Mae West,” my own visage is empty but for the oversized sofa seat that is my lips, the art (off set) that are my eyes, and the odd-shaped fireplace that is my nose. The oily skin, I’ll pretend, is a polished floor. The bearskin rug, placed by the front door, is to face the world and greet it, like the fire Prometheus gave us to see the emptyness of life. But my actual room is set not like her beauty but like a throne, a seat For a god or a sinner. Much like the seat Of Prometheus himself; his skin, Chained to a rock, tendered by winds, is set for the liver-eating bird, though his face cringes in pain. Or else it’s the empty love of lecherous men, their hearts on fire, Too enamored to bathe. And as if fireworks went off in my room, I take a seat around papers, books, notes, pencils, empty bottles and cans. All I want is to skin the place clean, remove layers of shit, be face to face with the secrets beneath. I’m upset At my impotence to godliness. Upset at the gods and their greed of fire.

Enraged at the face of Mae West and my face too. Furious at the men who should be seated where Prometheus is; it is their skin that should taste beak and the cold empty Winds. My painting eyes drip until they’re empty but for the frames. I try to set myself together but my polished floor skin feels watercolors stream along the fireplace of my nose. The cushions of my love seat lips tremble until I realize it’s just my face.

Empty thanks for his gift won’t cure his skin so I take a seat outside, watch the fire consume her face, and finally I am set.

—Julius Calasicus

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Elegy Memories overlaid with Half-truths; second hand stories…

A cold, dismal reality meets My innocent eyes.

Forever— Eternity— Bleak, stark, REAL rhetoric Assaulting naïve assumptions.

I thought I could avoid this, Thought I’d never have to face The cruel gaze of certainty.

From the wails of the Lost Rises a new victim.

Stupidity, ignorance, desperation Demand a blood sacrifice.

Gone— Snatched away Before our very eyes…

Irony’s deadly game: Taunting a girl Not yet ready for reality.

—Sarah Bigelow

50

Never It’s never what you expect… the news, that’s what you expectbut the news, it simply draws a veil, tight around your mind and dulls the senses You hear nothingbut silence See nothingmerely a blur of incomprehensible motion Feel nothingaside from the wrenching of your heart Taste nothingjust your bitter tears Smell nothingonly her absence after the loved-ones all leaveafter lowering her into placeYou find It, that catalyst, and suddenly, every sense is a Sharp knife’s blade, Sharp as the moment before the news.

You hear her-hollow voice See her-empty face Feel her-cold hand Taste her-limp mouth Smell her-her, dead hair It’s never what you expect never her wedding band never a photo from your honeymoon It’s…

It’s her body lotionnever to touch her skin It’s the booknever to be finished It’s everything you’llnever do, never be, never havenever togethernever again.

—Eric Porter

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When will this insanity end?

When will life re-begin?

Is it only a memory?

Was it never meant to be?

My love for you will forever be But my heart is forced to flee And oh what a gasping flight That, sadly, must end tonight....

Life seems to never cease Humanity, one sick disease Fear of what is out there Leads me to be unaware —Jeremy Welburn

52

C.K. Egbert

Swimming It was one of those gorgeous summer days when the sky was Easter eggshell blue and sunlight seemed to radiate from every blade of grass with livid, ecstatic colors. My skin drunk in the sunshine like orange juice on a Sunday morning as my father and I took our boat out to the lake.

The wind caressed my body and I felt as though I had become transparent to the blueness of the sky and water. My father was silent at the rudder and I dared not look at him, his granite-red face crudely carved by the poor sculptor of time. He had said he was going to teach me how to swim today as I placed before him an offering of a cup of coffee and the newspaper. I had been praying for weeks that he would teach me to swim before.

My stomach started turning upon itself as I gazed at the water. We were far from the dock by now, farther than I had ever been out on the lake.

My father said he would teach me how to swim the way he had been taught when he was in the Marines. Sometimes he would have his old buddies from the Marines over for a beer and when I was little I used to kneel behind the couch, trying to discern the mysteries of their speech.

My father grunted behind me.

“You ready?”

“Yes, sir.” I had nothing on but my swimming trunks and as I spoke I was suddenly aware of how naked I felt before him, with my hairless chest and my ribs sticking out of my soft flesh. I took a deep breath, sucking in the blueness around me. I was determined not to show any fear or weakness; I knew how that would destroy me in the eyes of my father and I would do anything to avoid that.

He stopped the boat and the water rocked us gently, the waves singing a lullaby as they lapped against the sides.

“Okay,” he said roughly. I turned to him and realized that he was still fully clothed. Before I had a chance to ask the world was gone from beneath me.

The water was cold, terribly, horribly, inconsiderately cold. Somehow I had expected the water to be as warm as the sky and the grass and the air, but it was cold. It swallowed me up. I could see the blue sky above me through a haze like one of those surreal paintings. Was there another world?

Did it exist? Had there been anything but this icy and suffocating hell pulling me downward into the darkness?

My lungs started to burn and there were electric currents running through my veins and giving off sparks in my brain. I fought hard enough just to put my head out of it for a few vivid moments.

The sky was still there, the world was still there –it seemed like a painting now, a nice pleasant painting that existed in a different universe. I heard the engine of the boat in the distance and a faint hint of exhaust came into my lungs along with the blue sky. He had left.

I wanted to scream but my lungs wouldn’t allow it. The water was a cold steel press on my chest.

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Breathe, breathe, breathe. I hated my arms and legs at that moment because they didn’t seem to be able to untangle themselves. I desperately tried to coordinate them in some meaningful pattern, but there was nothing to grasp onto, nothing to keep me from the darkness. A memory popped into my head of one summer day when we had a barbeque and I saw a wasp struggling for dear life in an ocean of red punch. I had watched its pitiful helpless, spastic movements until it was a tiny black corpse, wondering why it was struggling when it hadn’t a single chance.

He’s just going to let me die here. The thought came to me without emotion, like the dull sound of the water in my ears. He’s going to go off in his boat and let me die here. Suddenly the nature of the universe was revealed to me in one single, great explosion in my head. The water didn’t care if I drowned. The universe was one great, vast, empty nothing that didn’t give a damn about me, that could kill and ruin and destroy me and there wasn’t a single thing that I could do about it.

The world disappeared again, along with my mind. There was only my body and my lungs being burned slowly to ashes. The desire for air became everything. By now the pain was mutilating every muscle with its sharp edges but the impulse to live was greater than the pain, a primal drum that pounded out its eternal cadence.

I kept struggling for an eternity in that icy hell –time no longer meant anything in the abyss –and then my hand touched something hard and solid.

It was the dock. I thought my weak arms would snap as they pulled the rest of me out of the water. I vomited and my body lay on the dock, shivering.

It was the same, gorgeous day but the grass and the trees and the beachside had fractured into a thousand pieces that no longer fit together. There was nothing anymore to make the picture make sense, just disconnected fragments. I was still breathing and I hated myself for having wanted so desperately to breathe. I wondered now why I hadn’t let myself go down into the darkness.

My father was approaching the dock with his boat. His face was nothing but an empty shadow. He didn’t exist for me anymore.

I got up on my trembling legs and turned away from him, walking slowly into the shadows of the trees.

54

Jenni Kuk

55

Pamela Singleton

The Family Legacy The room was brilliant with light. An expanse of floor to ceiling windows ran along the breadth of one wall, letting the July afternoon sun spread beams throughout the clinic. As she stood in the doorway, the first thing to catch Lynn’s eye was the jigsaw puzzle in the middle of the room, a mosaic of tiny squares of color awaiting someone to discover order and unlock their secret face. It was like the oversized 5,000 piece landscapes her grandmother put together while she digested nighttime serial TV programs and chain smoked Virginia Slims. Lynn had been in perpetual awe of how those curled, arthritic hands could move so fluidly over the puzzle board, piecing together the covered bridges of Vermont without ever flicking a single stray ash.

“Lynnie,” Gramma Duckie once lectured as they huddled together conspiratorially, “Crystal Carrington is the type of lady you want to be when you grow up, real classy, not like that horrible Alexis woman. She is evil itself. And don’t you worry about Blake, he didn’t kill anybody, that guy tripped. It was all an accident. They are just framing him, but he’s a good man and it will turn out alright in the end, you’ll see.”

The puzzle created a sharp, sudden ache in Lynn, missing the grandmother who had been taken from her twenty-two years earlier. Her maternal grandmother had always been the personification of everything magic to Lynn. The woman had a way of making the most mundane aspects of life exciting. A letter dropped into a mail box became a traveler on an exotic journey; an afternoon of mopping a floor miraculously transformed the two into a pair of wayward pirates forced to swab the ship’s deck. When her grandmother died, the magic of childhood in Lynn went with her.

Lynn took a cautious step into the room. The mild aerosol of ammonia stung her nose and her eyes wanted to water. She choked it down.

Nurses kept guard in sharp white lab coats, a flurry of action and efficiency.

Three of the four walls in the room were lined by chairs, a couple of avocado green Lay-Z-Boys and one oak rocker, but mostly overstuffed easy chairs, pillows of blue-gray Naugahyde. In between the chairs sat small side tables offering dishes of candy, innocent sour apple and cherry Jolly Ranchers smiling contentedly up at Lynn. Commandeering the center of the room was the table littered with the puzzle pieces. Four wooden kitchen chairs secreted their laps underneath it. At the far end of the table a proud veneer bookcase was overflowing with paperbacks, the kind that Lynn would have been embarrassed to be seen reading. She guessed they had been abandoned by previous patients, unwanted or forgotten.

Lynn allowed her eyes to skip over the other patients in the room; a plump woman with precisely coiffed hair, furtively clicking knitting needles and churning out an undefinable mass of lavender; a tall, lanky man with dusty Wranglers, old cowboy boots and a red ball cap pulled down to cover his eyes; a ghost of a girl, with skin stretched over her skeleton, her eyes sunken into her skull, a bright blue scarf over her head expertly knotted at the

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nape of her neck. A long, clear leash connected each of the patients to a fluid filled bag hanging from a steel pole that sprouted four stubby legs and grew wheels for feet. A cadence of “I am not one of you,” pulsed through Lynn’s brain with every heartbeat.

“Lynn?”

Her head snapped around to the nurse speaking to her.

“Good morning Lynn, I’m Karen. If you’ll go ahead and take a seat I’ll get you started with the IV.” Her brain was screaming for her to run, her legs would not respond.

Lynn smiled stiffly and said, “Oh, sorry, I...”

“No problem. Is anyone joining you today? Are you waiting for someone? A family member or friend?”

“I’m here on my own. I figured if I could travel all over the country by myself for work, I could make it across town without a babysitter.” Lynn knew she sounded shrill, but didn’t care.

Karen paused for a moment, opened her mouth as if to say something, her ruby red lips forming a perfect bow, but she closed it and smiled sweetly instead. She escorted Lynn to the far wall and directed her to take a seat.

“How are your veins today Lynne? Have you been drinking water?

Do you have a port?”

“No, Dr. McBride didn’t think I would need it since I’m only doing three, six week sessions. I started drinking water at seven this morning to get them really hydrated.” Lynn offered up her hands for inspection.

“Well, the doctors don’t see how hard it is on the patients as their veins start to get shy. You should really consider getting a port, it will make the whole process so much easier for you.”

Lynn watched Karen as the nurse searched for the fattest vein to stick. Lynn had always believed she had lovely hands, unblemished with long, tapered fingers. Now her lack of bulging blue veins made them her enemy, yet another part of her body betraying her. Karen furrowed her brow in deep concentration and Lynn wanted to tell the dewy nurse “if you keep that up you’ll need Botox before you’re thirty.” Instead, Lynn closed her eyes, let her head fall back against the chair and waited for the sting to subside. She wondered if her grandmother had been forced to endure the insufferable condolences of child nurses too.

“You want me to call Dr. McBride and set up getting the port placed?” Karen asked after finishing her task. Once she got the “go ahead” from Lynn, Karen clipped off to her next pin cushion two chairs over.

Lynn’s head churned with a blur of words and color and black. She replayed the conversation she had with Dr. McBride a week earlier.

“Good news Lynn” he started. “Your tests show that we got it all during the surgery so we are only going to have you do chemo-lite, no radiation.”

“That is good news,” and it was, she didn’t want to lose her hair. She cringed at the term “chemo-lite” as if it were an exotic spa treatment to stimulate weight loss in chubby WASP’s.

“You’re young, you’re healthy, you will beat this easily Lynn. It’s

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all mental now.”

“Young and healthy except for a little cancer. I still don’t understand how a 32 year old woman gets colon cancer.” Lynn couldn’t stop the words, a burp of weakness through her placid exterior.

“Lynn, we’ve been over this,” he sighed, a father losing patience with a wayward child. “There is no definite answer, it’s always more of a combination of factors. Considering you live a healthy lifestyle, I attribute your illness primarily to heredity. Three grandparents having cancer certainly stacked the deck against you. Regardless of the why, you’re going to have to shift your focus from feeling sorry for yourself to fighting it and winning.”

Dr. McBride, the general in Lynn’s internal war, was done placating her fears and ran off to save another soul, leaving Lynn to schedule an appointment to wage a battle with her own body.

“Lynn,” Karen, the perky, red-headed foot soldier, placed a hand on Lynn’s forearm, pulling her mind back into the sterile oncology ward. “I’m going to change the bag now. You may get a slight metallic taste in your mouth. Help yourself to the candies next to you.”

Once Karen was gone, Lynn reached into her Burberry handbag, the leather straps cool and smooth against her naked leg, and pulled out the tiny porcelain frog her grandmother had given her. It was a charm brought back from Hawaii meant to be kept in a coin purse so it could magically multiply money. The trip had been the last of her grandmother’s life, taken when the old woman learned her illness was fatal.

“It won’t make you rich honey, but this little guy will make sure you always have what you need,” Gramma Duckie had whispered as she slipped the green trinket into Lynn’s hand.

Today, a lifetime later, Lynn pinched the frog between her thumb and forefinger, worrying she was going to use up all of it’s magic, but wanting to have her grandmother with her in some small way. She felt the smooth ridges of the bent legs, the tiny bulges of the eyes, the rough belly. Lynn felt herself beginning to break inside.

Soundless, hot tears carved a path down her cheeks and dropping off her chin to make dark wet circles on her cotton T-shirt. A soft pink tissue found its way into her hand and she struggled to regain composure. Lynn stood, then slowly wheeled the stand, tethered to her now too, with her to the bathroom. She didn’t know the face that stared back at her from the mirror.

She seemed to have aged 15 years in one month. Dark shadows haunted her eyes and lines she had never before noticed looked deep and craggy. Lynn felt her chest, above her left breast, and pressed her fingers into the spot Dr. McBride had told her a port would be placed if she decided to get one. That would make it official, the permanent conduit to her bloodstream would make her a real cancer patient.

As she shuffled back to her chair, dragging her tall steel companion and his bladder of doctor prescribed poison, Lynn cursed herself for not letting anyone come with her to the first chemo session. She had bristled at their pity.

“I am not old and frail and incapacitated,” reprimanded Lynne when her sister called this morning asking to accompany her to the appointment.

“I am young and beautiful and vibrant.”

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“For God’s sake Lynn,” Maria had countered, “no one is calling you an old shut-in. I’m just worried about you and don’t want you to go through this alone. You’re not alone. You have so many people in your life who want to help you, to be with you, support you.”

“And I appreciate that. This is just something I have to do on my own. No amount of coddling by you, or Mom, or anyone, will make me well again. This is my war.”

Hours later, the desperation around her was palpable and she was suffocating. Lynn’s proud facade of strength and power evaporated. The memory of her grandmother retching in the next room rushed to her ears. It echoed through her just as it had all those years ago when Lynn had sat planted in the hallway hugging her knees to her chest and quietly sobbing, afraid that if her mother heard Lynn cry she would be sent home and away from Gramma Duckie.

Lynn wondered how long it would take before her own vomiting began.

“Alrighty Lynn, looks like you’re all done for today,” chirped Karen.

“You did great for your first time. Next week will be easier now that you know what to expect. And once you get the port, it will be a breeze. You have your anti-nausea pills?”

Lynn popped a candy into her mouth, wanting to obliterate the aluminum residue of the therapy on her tongue. The sugary sourness washed over her and her saliva ducts poured open. The green plastic wrapper crinkled in her tight fist.

“Is there someone I can call to let know you are done for the day?”

The nurse’s genuine empathy registered on Lynn for the first time that day and she felt a twinge of guilt over her cynicism towards Karen. Lynn scanned Karen up and down, wanting to ask her how someone with so little experience in life made peace with an existence punctuated by so much death.

“No, I’m going to catch a cab. I’ll be fine.”

“You know, she didn’t want me to tell you, but your mom called to see how you were doing during the treatment.” Karen looked directly into Lynn’s eyes. “Seriously Lynn, you’ve proven to everyone that you’re a strong person, but let your friends and family help you. You will recover much, much faster if you allow yourself to take the time your body needs.

Sometimes it takes the most strength simply to ask for help.”

She met Karen’s gaze and didn’t let her eyes look away. Lynn knew the speech was practiced and frequently employed, but she no longer cared.

She was tired, worn out from fighting to continue the illusion that she had some semblance of control in her life.

Karen hugged her. Lynn stiffened and then, finally, she let herself sink into the embrace.

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Stains Washed Away How they beat you, oh how they beat you.

Every little thing you do, another beating.

Bruises—blue and black, a stain on your skin.

Welts—scarred and swollen, a stain on your skin.

How it must hurt, but your suffering I too can feel.

Your pain and anguish; seen in your stark eyes.

A pain felt with every tear that tumbles down your face.

Each drop falls, carrying the little life left within you.

Soon no more will you cry for all that you had, Can no longer supply the water that pours from your eyes.

So when that moment comes; when you leave this world, I will— I will cry for you; supplying your well that has run dry.

Until then, I will comfort you—hold you near my bosom.

Beneath my bosom lies the heart that beats for the both of us.

Your heart has given up, for it no longer knows love.

It only knows the hatred that flows through your veins, Poisoning all that was good, all that few took the time to know.

How could they beat you? How could they beat you?

How...?

Treated like a freak, a pariah from those who "loved" you.

They said they “loved” you, but each and every time— They put another bruise, another welt, another stain on your skin.

This time they have gone too far, they've taken you from me.

You were so fragile, like your momma's good china.

Already were you cracking when I found you.

I tried to stop you from shattering like the life you were living, But it was too late— You breathed your last breathe, You cried your last tear, You smiled your last smile.

Oh, how I will remember that innocent smile, Made to frown, by those beatings—whack, whack, whack!

I heard you cry, I heard you shout, I heard your silence.

Now I hold you against my bosom, while tears flow down my face, Falling upon your stains and washing them away.

—Will Acorda

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Photograph I count my blessings; I’m glad I’m not there.

Underneath an azure sky, Cruelly beautiful, are the ruins Of a village – A girl stands alone.

Her shattered world Only one of many Destroyed by iron birds, With hearts of steel.

Black shadows of ash Are painted on a broken wall Like the memory of flame Around her feet is the broken glass Of empty windows The earth is wounded By the agony of the dead And the dying, and those Who do not live.

The colors of her dress Are silenced by the dust Thin fingers grasp the fabric As if to keep Herself from falling apart Her family is all dead Their screams will echo Forever in the abyss Of every moment Her face is too young For this –but her eyes Are as old as the mountain In her eyes A thousand years of pain In the silence, her eyes Speak like thunder And all they say is; WHY? —C.K. Egbert

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Crayons Colors of the rainbow Representing sea and sky, Boldly stand out among tree, leaf and flower And among God’s children Under the African sun.

Young eyes watched helplessly, Their parents murdered by gunmen.

The price?

Broken families. Lost childhood.

Lost innocence.

Hearts black with misery Are unable to form the words To take away the hurt and renew the soul.

Colors of the rainbow Captured into neatly formed crayons Gone like frightened birds; No green grass, yellow sunlight or Red blood today, Just dark, brooding Charcoal skies.

What could be the price To allow these frightened children One safe glance Into the turmoil of their souls?

Colors of the rainbow A need proposed, a response given, Crayons sent across the ocean; Love written With a red crayon. —Kim Croy

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Brianne Hughes

Simplicity clarity of expression

Rebecca Palmer

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tottering in twos— they journey not travel every step a destination every sight one of wonder only on stairs do they give heed to their feet, to their unbalanced steps — —C.J. Graves

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Trees It sits and listens and thinks.

It cries, it’s peaceful It sings a lullaby To me.

The wind rustles through It leaves, Whispering secrets to no one in particular But me.

The joys and sorrows That fill my heart Are leaping out With feeling for this one lone tree And me.

—Jennifer Smith

Kristin Nicklawsky

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The Environmentalist The wheels under him require Only his feet, denying the Black dead remains of dark gold For sweat and love.

They turn without fail and He knows the greater good And would sacrifice convenience for it.

On top of a rock, he sits And writes poems on the back of leaves, Knowing the trees will read them, Smile, and fall back asleep.

Lyrical foliage then swept up in the air, Unable to catch them, float on and Mingle with its swirling brethren, A waltz of autumn, a dance for no man; He sits, again, and writes some more, Waiting for his muse to come. —Julius Calasicus

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Hair Cut Well, say goodbye to the topshag carpeting which kept me warm in the cold nights and tickled your face on the hot ones. —Eric Porter

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The comforting spice of the chai tea soothes all anxious apprehensions in my body. As lame as that sounds, it’s quite amazing and comforting to be eased by such a simple principle. I don't need extravagant supplements in my life. I just need the simple basics to be content. But what I need is unique. I am not like everyone else who needs money and a social life and love and family. I need those, but on a more specific basis. Sure, everyone needs food. All people need love.

But I need those specific factors that naturally cater to me.

I don't need the earth to grow or be in peace. I need the bright blue crisp sky in the winter time. I need the warmth of the sun shining upon my cheek while the winter winds cast a frigid wisp across my eyes. I need the feel of grass underneath my feet and the squishy feel of mud oozing through the cracks of my toes. I need life to be happy.

I need my family to love me unconditionally. I don't need to get along with them every single day of my life, but I need to reconcile our differences of opinions. I need their support when I'm down or when I make the wrong decision. When I weep and suffer, I need them to embrace me. I need long family dinners around our beautiful oak table where laughter is served in a buffet. I need to tell secrets of glowing bliss to my sister. I need my mother's tears of pride and my father's smile of acceptance.

I don't need love from just any random guy. I need to feel the butterflies in my stomach when ever I see his face. I need the tingle that sweeps my body when he places his strong hand upon the small of my back. I need the leg pop when he kisses me. I don't need to have the guy sitting to my left think that I am pretty. I only need his words to soothe and flatter me. His sign offers the perfect amount of safety and relaxation that I must have when we are entangled in each other's arms. I need the tears that stain my face when I think about how much I miss his blue eyes and soft blonde hair. I need to hear I'm amazing from someone who is more amazing than the phenomenon of rainbows.

I need to believe that I'm amazing. I need the curves on my hips to be beautiful.

I need freedom.

I need adventure.

I need adventure with him. I need fantasy and desire.

And he gives that to me.

Which I love.

—Amie Danke

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Sunset: the sun drips low, melting across the horizon blending red and milk white wrapped in the covers of dusk the light layed out like pinkened skin bare to the night air blushed ever so slightly by the chill of waiting in a still empty bed— —C.J. Graves

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Winter: Winter, the mother, the protector that shields that covers in her blankets then quietly steps back and lets her children have their spring— —C.J. Graves

Jessica Dahmen

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Rebecca Palmer

Amy VanderZanden

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La Lune A chilled pane meets the pressed Forehead, nose, and mime-like hands.

The fingers curl around the temples like blinders On a horse As restless eyes sink.

The impatient pair perch and settle on the marble sill And the cold seeps upward to numb the marrow.

The outside glows with Caged lantern lights, Glassy reflections of silent forms Lurking in sidewalk puddles, A chalky, pastel moon, Sliding through Translucent paper clouds.

Sensation leaves like a glove.

And the palms wish to cup tea Made sweet By honey-comb from the moon.

A fading fantasy: Muted and swirling Lemon, brick, blues, and gray Beneath the cover of indoor fog In a still and shifting portrait Of night. —Beth Watje

Soul The immaterial part of a person The actuating cause of an individual life

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The Life of a Rose I, in the mirror of a king, am flawless; yet the flawless gives way to a smoking wick.

My soul failed me when he spoke, I sought him, but did not find him; I called him, but he gave no answer.

The freedom of life became the air, the air cushioning his feet.

A losing battle with the air, I fell through its promiscuous scent back to the desert, the valley of temptation.

I was a pawn in a plan, fate’s stratagem to test the hero’s wings.

I was covered in the shadow of his spirit as He sought sustenance with the breeze.

—Anne Richards

Blair Tyler

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Life is the Greatest Endowment Life is the greatest endowment that we posses, We try to control it and in that forget, That each year passes like our time here is endless, Yet the days that we know could end in an instance.

We take for granted telling our loved ones we care, All the while not knowing, if tomorrow they'll be there. —Maren Gilleny

Heather Douglas

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Jenna Finney

Jeffrey “A friend once told me that through the particulars of another’s story we find the particulars of our own.” – Mariah Neuroth I’m Jeffrey. I’m in the third grade, and I’m not cool. I’m not real worried about it, though, because all the cool people have something hidden behind their smiles that is really sad, and deep, deep down, they’re actually just as dorky as me. Or maybe they’re even worse, because I may wear big glasses, and my dad is what they call eccentric, but I’ve heard a couple of them snort when they laugh. They tried to stifle it and glanced around wondering if anyone had heard it. I laughed inside but pretended I heard nothing, because I never like it when I feel embarrassed.

I’m really scared now. It’s dark, and an eerie silence fills my house.

I feel safe here, but I know I have to get up. I’m gonna lift my head slowly out from under my dark blue spaceship covers. I do. It is not as dark as I thought. In fact, the sun is beginning to shine through he rain clouds. It is dancing on my comforter. It’s beautiful, but I know the storm isn’t gone.

Thunder scares me. It has been yelling at the stars all night long. That is why I am wet all over. It is really hot under my covers. When I count to ten, I’m going to run to the door and turn on the light, and then, I will be safe.

Okay: one, two; I can count in Spanish too: uno, dos, tres. Go! Phew! I wonder what time it is.

I can hear the rain starting up again outside. Sometimes, I get scared of thunder, but I still love it when it rains. I love the sound of the little drops on our roof. I love standing in it in my pj’s, and when it’s all over, I love the smell of the colors that it brings. When it fills all the gutters with water, I put my dinosaur toys in it and then run down to the end of the block and catch them right before they fall into the sewer. I almost lost one once, but it is worth it. You have to take chances like that sometimes.

This morning seems exceptionally quiet. I think rain does that. I slide down the stairs, bumping by butt on each step as I go. I pour Life Cereal out of the box and into my yellow bowl. The refrigerator smells funny as I open it. My hand shakes when I lift the gallon of white creamy 2% milk. I’m shaking so hard that the milk splashes all over. Damn it. I hate it when I’m so weak. I pour so much that it overflows. It’s like I see what’s going to happen, but by the time I tell my arm to tell my hand to lift, there is already milk on the counter making its way to the edge and forming a waterfall onto the floor. I’m clumsy like that and slow too. When I take my time, I enjoy things more. Like if you tie your shoe all fast just to get it done, you never realize how comforting it is to have your shoes fit nicely, and you never consider how nice bows really are.

I hear my spoon clank on the bowl as I eat. I enjoy eating.

Sometimes, I even close my eyes when I eat. You’d be surprised how much more you can taste when you close your eyes and take your time. There are disadvantages to my speed of life, though. Someone will say: “Let’s play tag,” and they’ve already yelled “Not it!” and are down on one knee by the time I even register what I just heard. I always end up being it. I don’t

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really mind, because I’m not a real competitive person. I guess its better if I am it and feeling a little bad then some other lad that is horrified by the thought of losing be it. But, if we are playing a real game like baseball, then I take so much time that I never end up with a position and they’ll say: “Sorry, Jeff, we don’t need anyone else.” So I end up walking down the dock by myself, kicking every small object I can find on my way down there Did you know, one time, they put a brick in a bag and put it where they knew I’d wanna kick it—right in the middle of the sidewalk. I did, and the bushes erupted into laughter. I’m dumb like that, but I just don’t think the way they do. I’d never guess they might do something like that. I don’t understand. My mom’s always told me treat others the way I want to be treated. I wonder what their mothers tell them. Maybe, they just don’t listen to their moms. I listen to mine. She’s almost always right, except when she says I’m wonderful. That’s wrong. I try to be, but I always forget something. Like the time I forgot where I put my dad’s keys and we were late to Easter Mass. My dad was really mad at me, and he yelled. I tried not to cry, but I did. I don’t want to be, but I’m sensitive like that. Afterwards, he said sorry, because Father gave a sermon on forgiving each other and being patient.

My mom asked me to put my dish away; so, that’s what I’ll do now.

My mom left my lunch box on the counter before she went to work. It has peanut butter and jelly in it with an apple and some carrots. I love peanut butter and jelly. Sometimes, though, I wish I didn’t have to eat it alone. I guess I’m not talkative enough—they think I’m not interested. That’s not it at all. I just like to observe. I feel like I get more out of it, and then, I don’t have the chance to say something stupid. Also, my glasses are so thick that I feel like I am separated from the whole world, and they make my eyes look really big. I’m ugly; so, the glasses don’t really help much. No one wants to have an ugly friend.

It’s about time to go. I’m gonna put my boots on and my raincoat too. I grab my lunch and step out into the thick air. I fight the key into the lock and turn it. Then, I pull as hard as I can and wiggle it a bit until it comes out. Man! It’s cold out. I’ll skip today. “Hmmhmhm today will be a good day. Laalala.”

As I said earlier, I love it when it rains. I’m not gonna try now because I have a brand new white button up shirt on, but on the way home I’m gonna splash every puddle that I can find. I hear kids coming up behind me; maybe they’ll stop and talk.

“Watch out! We’re trying to race!” The voices from behind me say.

“Oh, Sorry,” I say as I try to move out of the way. I slip on the slick grass and get my new khaki pants all grass stained and wet.

“Oops,” they say as they run past, splashing mud all over my shirt. I get back up and walk about 20 steps behind them trying to synchronize my steps with theirs and skip-hopping when I get off beat. I can’t hear much of what they say, but I know they are laughing by the way their stomachs move in a jerky motion. When I get to school, I hang my wet coat and try to dry my pants by rubbing my hands against them, but it is a hopeless cause, just like me. I’m a hopeless cause. I would be okay if I had some friends, but I don’t. Nobody likes me, and that is why I will never be any good. My daddy can tell me a million and one times that I’m sort of like Mary

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Poppins—practically perfect in everyway, but I know he has to say that.

Sometimes he’ll say to me: “Jeffery, why do I love you so much?” and I’ll reply: “because I’m your son.” I say that because it is the truth. If I were really something great like he is always telling me, then, I would have at least one friend.

I’m not trying to make you feel sorry for me. I’m just telling you the way it is. The way it has always been. Now, I’m sitting in my desk staring out the window, and Mrs. Rich is writing on the chalkboard. She has a light peach dress on, and her hair is curled at her shoulders. She is very nice.

She’s one of those people who always seems to have a pleasant thought in her mind, and you can see it through her eyes and her cheeks, and if she is having a bad day—which is very rare—then you know it right away, because it seems like every surface on her has taken a step back and it is all a bit dim.

You can tell when I am sad too—there is no hiding it for me.

I can try and try, but you’ll always know. Maybe it’s because I don’t see what is wrong with being sad if you really are. You might as well just show it. Don’t get me wrong though. I am not always sad. I’m usually a pretty happy-go-lucky type of a kid. I’m lucky too, and I know it. I have food and clothes and parents that love me, and when I sit down with my dad at eight when he comes home from work and we watch the news, I see that not everyone has a warm place to sleep. But, all the luck and blessings in the world doesn’t mean you are going to be happy all the time. You still have to have bad days like today. They’re good for you. Then when you are having a really good day, it makes it seem like heaven. Lately, I’ve been having a ton of these not-so-great days in a row, because I’m beginning to wonder why I don’t have any friends, and all this wondering has gotten me down.

“Jeffrey, are you with us?” Mrs. Rich’s voice is faint at first and then it comes into full focus.

“Oh yes, sorry,” I manage to stutter out. Everyone is looking at me and I hate that.

“So, do you know the answer?” Mrs. Rich persists in a kind matter.

I’m confused so I look up at the board and see seven minus three with an equal sign, and by her gestures, I figure that’s the question. Man, I hate subtraction. I get addition easy I just don’t really understand taking things away that well. So, under my desk, I stick out one whole hand of fingers plus two more, and then, I begin to put three fingers down. I have the word “four” right at the tip of my tongue when Mrs. Rich points to Molly who has calmly had her hand up for at least 15 seconds now, and “It’s four” comes coolly rolling out of her mouth as if it was as easy as playing hopscotch. I know everyone is snickering at me, because, well, if I were them, I would too. The rain is calming now, and I can hear just a few sporadic clinks on the roof. I sit by the window, and I can see a robin outside. It has a nest with three eggs in it on the windowsill. The robin sings, and I feel better. I like school, because sometimes, we learn about astronauts, and I think I might want to be one someday. My grandma is always sending me things on spaceships and stuff. It is lunchtime now; so, I grab my lunch and walk outside. Everyone else is running, but I like to walk. I figure if you’re always in a hurry then you miss everything you’re looking for to begin with.

I sit by the fence and watch the cars drive by the schoolyard.

Sometimes, people walk by with their dogs or their cell phones, and I wave

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at them. They wave back, and their foreheads become less scrunched up. It seems like they’ve just had a revolution of some sort; their eyes light up a bit and they wave back. One time, an old man came by in a scruffy looking outfit and it seemed as if he had all the time in the world, because he stood on the other side of the fence for at least five minutes and talked to me about his kids who were all grown up. His eyes even got a bit glassy, but I pretended not to notice. Sometimes, people just want to talk. I understand that. Today there aren’t that many people out. I guess, because it is still a little wet all over.

A ball just hit me. Hmm, maybe they want me to play. I jump up, grab the ball, and throw it right back to them with the best arm I’ve got so that maybe I can impress them a bit. What I don’t know is that I’ve got really good aim, and I hit this short kid right smack in the center of his forehead. He almost falls down and is grabbing his head.

“I am so sorry,” I say. It was an accident. He knows it, and I know it.

“It’s alright. Don’t worry about it.” I can tell he really isn’t mad.

His name is Jeremy. There is a bigger kid who I don’t know his name, and I don’t really care to know it, and I could tell he needed a reason to fight. Smack! He turns and hits me as hard as he can across my face. I can feel blood coming to my nose, and I can taste it. I know they all expect me to fight back, but I just don’t see the point. I wasn’t made to fight. I feel a little angry inside but not enough to punch him back. He must be having a bad week at home. I look at him in the eyes, and he looks at me—not in a mean or aggressive way—just understanding. I can tell that he knows he shouldn’t have done that, and by his silence I know he is sorry. I blink really slowly like I saw my baby nephew do once. I figure, this is a sign of love.

At that moment, it all came to me. You know that point when everything becomes clear. I don’t know if it was the punch in the face that did it or just the mood of the rain, but I realized that he was hurting inside just as much as I was, and it isn’t the friends that make that hurt go away.

It’s got to be you. I’m not as stupid, slow, clumsy, ugly, dumb, or weak as I thought I was. Now, I turn to walk away. I can feel them all stare at me.

That’s okay, because I feel like a man. Maybe the bravest man alive. Blood drips from my nose into a puddle. As I look at my reflection, I see what I needed to see and figured out what I couldn’t figure out all along.

Kristin Nicklawsky

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Grandpa Play With Me Grandpa, you don’t know me The way that I know you So I think I’d better warn you I’m like the other two But God has made me perfect now With cool angel wings A halo and a gown of white And other special things I know you’re in a lot of pain But God will get you through Just keep your faith, and trust in Him He knows just what to do And when your pain is over How happy I will be ‘Cause I really need my Grandpa Up here to play with me I’ve been watching Tim and Lig Have all the fun with you And I’ve been waiting patiently Planning things for us to do So when the going gets too tough And your soul begs to be free Tell Mommy everything’s okay You’ve gone to play with me I love you, Grandpa Johnny —Connie Pullen

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Jessica Dahmen

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The Tastes of Love His fruit was sweet to my taste and he frequented our banquets night after night with a hunger that was instantly filled by the sight of me.

Though my lips distilled nectar, nurturing him with the closeness of a shared womb, memories of past life transfers strung like golden threads came alive as woven crimson lips, and built a wall around my garden of love.

Awake, O north wind, and come, O south wind!

Blow upon my garden that its fragrance may be wafted abroad.

Let my beloved come to his garden, And eat its choicest fruits. —Anne Richards

Amy VanderZanden

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Artists at a Glance: Sarah Bigelow is a paranoid conspiracy theorist who stays up way too late at night writing fiction and the occasional poem. A former resident of Missoula, Montana and studying English, Communication, and German, she devotes much of her free time to analyzing the mysteries of the universe and re-reading her favorite books.

Aaron Byer loathes authority, religion, and all things conservative; pride, steroids, and small-man syndrome.He believes that the next person you meet could be the most important of your life, and that all should be treated as such.He leaves you with the two truest things he has ever heard: "The difference between philosophy and religion is that philosophy endeavors to ask questions, whereas religion presumes to know the answers" Gabe Rybe; "Spending a day alone is a waste, but wasting a day with you is perfect" S.P. Spencer Cookson is a second lieutenant in the Army, and is attending the Engineer Officer Basic Course at Fr. Leonard Wood, Mo. He keeps in mind a quote of Walden’s: “Heaven is under our feet as well as over our heads.”

Chelsea K. Egbert continues to harass the UP community with her poetry.As yet, no one has taken legal action.

You may get to know Jenna Finney, a Spanish and Political Science double major, more than even she realizes when you read her story. c.j. graves is an aspiring, if hopelessly distractible, writer who is unable to keep a schedule or appear in class. He is most notable for his first semester record setting performance in his classes, either that or celebrating his scottish/irish cultural heritage. In the future he fully intends to be starving somewhere in a cheap apartment, selling all his furniture and probably a fair amount of blood in some foolishly romantic notion that he may actually manage to succeed as a writer. Donations of paper, ink and wine will be appreciated as he'll likely run out of money to buy them himself. Every little bit helps.

Maileen Hamto, an MBA student, considers her Canon EOS 300D as the best toy ever since Cabbage Patch Kids dolls. When she's not studying or shooting photos, she's a marketing communications professional who consumes poetry, subscribes to the Wall Street Journal, and shamelessly Googles everything. She credits JRT for inspiring her to display her photos in various public domains.

Brianne Hughes likes words.(Funny, she didn't submit any written work.) She wants to do terrible things like take Latin and work for the Oxford Dictionary. She knows noneher linguistic pursuits will end lucratively, and will then fall back on her plan of taking over the moon and spending her hours hopping around, playing music loudly in her headphones and making fun of earth.

Ron Johnson, man or machine?That is the question.call him 'clutch' for his ability to mess up only the most important situations.He doesn't tend to clean his room because he knows it will only get dirty again.If Ron Johnson wasn't committed to this world financially he would most likely bein the march of the penguins.Since he can't make it to the march, he instead chooses to write, because though writing is free, it's still worth a fortune.... ha ha ha, a splendid use of words indeed.That's something Ron would say, because he is a great man.A great man that has never talked about himself in the third person.

Jenni Kuk likes cake.

84 Courtney Lanahan belongs to the senior class of 2006. She is further more claimed by the School of Education. She writes poetry to cleanse her thoughts and hopes that critics of her work will be gentle because it's not easy to submit something that could potential be read and judgedher peers. She does so, however, because she believes in the power of words and seeing name in print is pretty darn exciting.

Ilsa Lundgren is a fun loving intellectual with literature on the brain.She hopes to be featured some day on the cover of a fashionable magazine, or potentially the stage of Oprah on a freebie day.She is an English major with minor interests in a variety of other subjects.With Utah as her native land, Ilsa enjoys a good geological formation and flash floods.She is happy to be featured for the first time in the University of Portland Literary Magazine, and hopes it bodes well for her artistic career.

Kristin Nicklawsky is a wanderer. Shea degree in biology and theoutlook of an ether induced artist. Sheattempting to lose herself in an organized multidirectional explorationthe while contemplating if the hokey pokey trulywhat its all about.

Thomas Le Ngo is a sophomore political science major.He considers photography a hobby among many others, such as playing the guitar and being a general computer nerd.

Eric Porter: A senior wanna-be-writer in a pair of social science majors. He doesn't so much write as jot down the random, dizzying array of words which he finds screaming around his brain from time to time. An RA in Christie Hall for the second year and absolutely terrified about the prospect of entering the real world. So don't be surprised to see him around campus next year, trying to get that whole, "life," thing figured out.

Connie Pullen, a vivacious sixty-three-year-old Psy/Soc double major, and a fifth-year senior, teases, that after waiting forty years to go to college, it will not be easy to get rid of her.

She loves photography; and, with sixteen grandchildren, is seldom at a loss for subjects.

Connie will be working as a photographer for The Log this year, and would eventually like to combine her love for photography and writing to author inspirational books for children.

Anne Richards: the first Anne in her family, she is a sophomore with English and German swimming in her head accompanied by a love of fried zucchini and ice cream sandwiches (but not together). She appreciates the beauty of penguins and cathedral ceilings, and though an Ohioan for life, believes that writing is “the heart of it all� as well.

Joseph Ritter began writing because he realized that he is far too offensive to ever actually get any one to listen to him.It is the most courteous thing he has ever done.

Valerie Silliman, a sophomore, doubling in Music and English doesn't dream of writing the greatest novel of the 21 st century or composing a ground-breaking piano concerto. She dreams of writing a book that at least one person who doesn't know her will love, and of helping kids learn to love to create and consume literature and music.

Turning 30 inspired Pamela Singleton to turn her favorite pastime of unapologetically nosing around in other people’s business into a new career and she promptly returned to university to earn a degree in journalism. Until she takes over as host of Fresh Air on NPR, Pamela continues to work as a management consultant because she loves being paid for telling people what to do.

Jennifer Smith is a sophomore student who dances when no one is watching, sings when no one is listening, and loves as if she's never been hurt. she's not pursuing those interests, Jennifer finds time to look at the stars, feed her ravenous mind with books, collect quotes and put them into scrapbooks, play some instruments, write, and enjoy the little things in life.

85 Blair Tyler is a fun loving, polka-dot obsessed junior who loves to laugh. She also enjoys the simple things in life such as singing in the car and dancing in the rain.

Sophomore Beth Watje is studying Secondary Education, English, and French. After working with her high school literary magazine, The Outlet, she realized that publishing creativity is like laughing in the rain, something she has a passion for.

Amy VanderZanden would like to work for National Geographic someday, but as she has no plans to study journalism or photography, the likelihood of her getting published is about nil. Instead, she satisfies her soul with looking at pictures and reading stories that others have created, and plans to someday, somehow become the subject of an entire magazine spread.

Jeremy Welburn is a boring individual who hasn't quite figured out the purpose of college.

He usually spends his time in class writing poems or drawing pictures rather than taking notes. A former President of Christie Hall, the highlight of Jeremy's college career was having his face put on a black-market "World Domination" t-shirt that was sold around campus.

Definitions inspired by the Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary.