R2!
R2! The River Rat
A student literary journal produced in the Writing and Humanities department at the Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design
spring 2026, vol. 2, no. 2
Masthead
Editor-in-Chief: CJ Scruton
Managing Editor: Ashley Luchinski
Guest Editor:
Diya Gitanjali Mark
Readers:
Royal Brevväxling
Leslie Fedorchuk
Devlin Grimm
Anna Hillary
David Lawson
Lauren Simmons
Donna Tanzer
Isabelle Von Sturm Day
Assitant Editors: Jamie Messerman
Sylvia Munoz
Layout and design: CJ Scruton
Cover art: Emma Perkins, “Interlocked”
Contents
Poetry
Vee Devendorf
Fig Frazier
Lauren Garza-Jones
Emily York
Dylan Rogers
Valentine Blackwood
Kate Pendowski
James St Surin
Anna Duncan
Emma Ericson
Lexington Berens-VanHeest
Vicky Jordan
Simon Brink
Apartment One
Time Machine
I Wondered Who That Little Man Was When I Met Him
Baked Beguile in a Basin of Blue
Dear Lord, Let Me Remain a Pacifist
I’m Sorry.
The Outlander
No Origin
Duty Bluing
How to Be a Good Daughter
Two Tigers. .
Sanctus Formicae .
The Grove’s Final Lullaby
August’s Dolphins
The Prytania Street Crows Call for You and Your Lesbian Longing .
Jaidyn Brink
Sylvia Munoz
Nonfiction
Tori Vaughn
Rowan Rohwer
Jamie Messerman
Behind the Ribs .
Lament & Rabbits
Just Two Blocks Away.
Harbinger
Sparks, Branches, Reflections
Abby Phillips
Prome Ferrebus
K.L.
Oakley Lopez
Visual Art
Ellie Burns
Greta Berens
Quirk
Henningsgaard
The Leaves Will Fall
Because You Left, Why Do You Leave?
NowHereseville, USA
Niigata, Japan 2025
APARTMENT ONE
Vee Devendorf
How I squat, to coat surfaces with rags and brushes and spur rickets with the underbelly of of my nailbed; there are a hundred coatings of soot in the crevices of palms.
Hmm, I wonder, how does one baptise this land when there is so much muck In the company of the grooves, in the wrapped and roiled?
THE LEAVES WILL FALL
Abby Phillips
TIME MACHINE
Fig
Frazier
It’s strange how being sick is a time machine. I wake up feeling ill and suddenly I’m ten again, or nine, or eight, or seven, or some other age. The years blend together a bit for me, and as we sit as this table, they might do the same for you. I nurse scalding tea and chicken noodle soup, you take drags of your cigarette with equal care and tell me about how you and your dad used to sit where we are now, spoon between your fingers cigarette between his.
BECAUSE YOU
LEFT,
WHY DO YOU LEAVE?
Prome Ferrebus
Winner of the River Rat Prize in Prose
The city was bright. It was hot, and dry, like most of the places in that small country in the corner of the world. The warm air seeping into her room made the sheer curtains float like spirits.
She had woken up hours ago, before the cracks in the wall made by the temblors were lit by the rising sun. She had not brought herself to move. She knew that once she stood the blood pooling in between her thighs and seeping into her white sheets would run down her legs instead.
She stared at the clock on her wall. An old thing that her mother had given her in a box full of trinkets a newlywed couple would need to start in the city. The seconds ticked by, steady, rhythmic clicks. She thought of herself small, tiny enough to climb onto the handles of the clock. She could live in time.
She stood, and as she predicted, there was a trail of blood from her bed to the bathroom. She saw the tiny world of her apartment, and it was hazy. She thought the specks of light and color in her vision looked like angels. Like small fairies that enchanted her life. She had to hold on to the sink, and looked up to see three of herself.
I remember I was around nineteen. I met Armando in school. We knew each other from the same Catholic charter classes. We both planned to go to the same university. But then
the recession hit, and we devised a plan so he could study agriculture and business while I worked.
“Think of the possibilities of the country, my love, the cities have gone to shit. All jobs here will be gone. I won’t study engineering so I can end up unemployed like everyone else,” he would say.
I did not know if I agreed. The party that favored the people had won. I knew soon enough food would return to the stores, and the men and women on the street would go back to work.
I knew a lot of things when I was nineteen.
She kept dragging the blood on her thighs upwards, back from where it came. She sat on the edge of the yellowed bathtub, the salt on her face mixing with the blood still dripping down the drain. No matter her efforts to push it back inside, so it could finish growing, her baby wanted to keep dripping down, out.
She hit her head against the tiled wall, multiple times. It throbbed sweetly as it bruised, and took away from the pain pulsating in her belly.
I remember it was past midnight, and Armando had not returned. Sometimes I would stay up late, waiting for him. But the day had been heavy, and the sleep got to me. I fell asleep on the sofa all the way until the next morning. When I woke up, I went to see if he had arrived late, and gone straight to the bedroom, but he was not there. It was then I began to worry. I went into the hall, to see if any neighbors had seen him. It was cold out, and silent. There were a few people smoking down the hall, near the barred window with no glass. It was Doña Ester and her cousin Belinda, alongside some
older women I had not met. They were whispering at each other, in their low calloused voices.
“Child, you cannot leave this building,” said Doña Ester. “They said the curfew is lifted in the day, but they haven’t let anyone outside.”
She saw my confusion, my hair that had not been brushed, the way I held my robe over myself. She took the cigarette out of her mouth, squishing the end on the concrete wall, “The militia, mi’ja. The militaries took La Moneda. No word from the president, dear.”
She spent the day scrubbing the blood from the floor. She thought about the eyes that her child would have had. Armando had these sad eyes, downturned like he was on the verge of tears. She always thought that if they had been in a fairy tale, he would have been the saddest prince in the world. His palace would have been cold and dark, to excuse those burdened eyes.
His young face had aged in the five years they had known each other. The lines on his forehead grew everlong on his face. Her child would have the same ones. The same, pleading eyes; autumn brown. Maybe the child would have grown up like his father, and the same lost look Armando had worn that day when he kissed her goodbye and left for the gathered student meeting would have been worn by that kid someday.
Sat on the floor, taking up space in the doorway, legs up and stretched against the frame. She stared into the light beaming from the window that revealed all the flying dust, and cried.
The voice of the president crackled through incomprehensible static in a clear stream. The radio was cranked in every home.
A silence filled the streets. His voice was steady, even through the words he sorrowfully said. He addressed them all as his friends, all the people — all the workers of the country. And he spoke with a voice in which everyone knew to be the tone of a dead man with a foot yet out of his grave. He told them of his refusal to resign. He told them of the way the Admiral had turned into the Commander, and the General had turned into the Chief of National Police. He told them all of the loyalty these had abused, and every word dripped with the stench of grief and acceptance. He named the positions of those he addressed: the campesina, the youth, the academic, the farmer, the worker. He told them that the radio would soon be silenced, and he told them, one last time, to take care of each other. To defend themselves, that fascism had arrived to our country a few hours ago. Goodbye, he said, that his sacrifice would not be in vain.
The radio went silent. I could think of nothing but Armando. I prayed to God.
I was nineteen, I knew I would never see my husband again.
It was ten forty-five in the morning, a Wednesday. The train station had yellowed walls and the smell of mold and cigarettes. There was a man there, with a balding scalp and groomed mustache, whose shoes were torn and suitcase was ripped. There was also a woman: thin and frail and blue around the eyes, with a child no older than nine months that she tried to shush. The small thing wailed and screamed, not stopping for a breath, and its twisted face turned a darker shade of purple every second.
She wanted nothing more than for it to shut up. Her head was pounding, and the smell of the mold made her dizzy.
“The train should be here soon,” her mother said. She had looked at her watch ten times in the past twenty minutes, and kept tucking her silvered hair behind her ears. It was driving her mad. “Did you pack food for the week?” she pressed. No, I had more important shit to pack.
“Yes,” she replied, keeping her eyes on the rusted tracks. There was a huge rat under a bench across from them. She thought about it slipping in front of the train- its little bones crushing under the wheels.
“Just remember you won’t have money for that, they could not get you the pass to Yaviza, you have to do it yourself.”
I know.
She smelled the smoke before she saw the train. All at once she came to realize the overwhelming feeling of her gut bubbling over and up. Her chest tightened, and her throat knotted. She wished the fairies would return, that her world would haze and she could be placed into a time where the national police had not exploded her husband into scattered bits across a field.
Leaving her mother behind, leaving the life she had never begun, she stepped onto the train.
I remember I was twenty when I first left Chile.
I WONDERED WHO
THAT LITTLE
MAN WAS WHEN I MET HIM
Lauren Garza-Jones
Grandpa preached look for extra money
So the ground was stared and searched
Hours
The sun went down
Bottles were collected like tiny bugs
Only in Detroit though but it was always wondered
Why
Money went and came went and came
Not
Me and the other kids that did the digging
Not Thanksgiving dinner which he was supposed to be It was only us on Fulton and that’s all it ever was
I ran away and only came back thrice
Grey hairs grew eyes turned blue
Grandpa left long before then
Ellie Burns
NIIGATA, JAPAN 2025
JUST TWO BLOCKS AWAY
Tori Vaughn
Do you remember how it happened? It felt so quick that to this day you don’t think about it too much. You were walking home when he stopped you and even then, you knew to be on high alert. You gave him your go-to response: “I’m sixteen.” No matter if it’s true or not, it’s always been your go-to when men get too close. But this one wasn’t deterred. That’s not supposed to happen. He was supposed to go away, not stick by your side even more. It was fine, you were a block or two from home, dad was there and he’d make him leave. Don’t you wish you’d called him sooner?
Just two blocks away and he’s pointed at his own house. He’s just two blocks away. There’s no avoiding him; you have to take that route to get to work. You can’t afford any other way; the bus is that way. He talks too much and asks too many questions. Don’t let him know you live here. You’re visiting family, just babysitting. He likes that, don’t you wish he’d stop talking? Just two blocks away and you’ll be free.
He’s moving closer. Grip your phone tighter, you don’t know what he’s going to do. He’s too close. He’s way too close. Touching. Now he’s touching you and moving lower way too low. Why is he touching you? He said he was well in his twenties and as far as he knows, you’re only sixteen. His hand is moving lower, and your heart is beating too fast.
Now he’s yelling. Wait, why is he yelling? You’re separated now and your phone is on your ear. I don’t even remember you pulling it out. He’s yelling about the police but that’s the last thing on your mind. It only rings twice before his voice comes through; it’s dad. You can barely say what’s happening, all you
ask is that he comes outside. The man is now backing away, mumbling obscenities but pay him no mind. Keep talking to dad.
He’s backed far away now, and you press forward, your eyes never leave his figure. Dad is trying to get information out of you; he can hear the tremble but what could it be from. Not what just happened. He thinks it’s about that dog. The one you complain about being fearful of, the one that has never attacked anyone. You always panic when you see him and tell your dad, maybe that’s why he moves slowly, but it’s different when you get home and tell him.
He’s angry. First, it’s directed towards you. Why didn’t you mention the man? He’d have been out the door sooner and protected you. Then, he apologizes. He didn’t protect you, he couldn’t. He assumed it was just a harmless dog and it turned out to be much worse than that. You, his child, his baby, left scared and alone with someone who had ill intentions. Someone who had rendered you speechless in the wake of such audacity to touch another in such a way. His child, he doesn’t know if you’ve been traumatized or if you simply blocked it out. What is he supposed to think when his child goes silent?
You were angry. His touch, while you couldn’t remember it, felt grotesque, like a monster dragging its claws along your flesh. He had rendered you speechless and took possession of your body, even if only for a moment. Do you remember how long you showered that night? You rubbed your skin until it was red and raw and even then, you didn’t stop. You thought shielding your body in longer clothes would make you feel safe. What a silly thought to have; you were fully covered when it happened, what good will it do now?
But you move on. You forget. It becomes just another story to tell. You’re cautious the first few months. The knife you kept in the pocket of your coat was uncomfortable, but soon you moved on to carrying pepper spray. He never showed his face again. He was just two blocks away. Life goes on, you move away, more men will do the same. But at least you can go home, far from their touches and voice.
At least they aren’t two blocks away.
Emily York
BAKED BEGUILE IN A BASIN OF BLUE
oh to do color me blue find a man call him fancy trust a man answer nicely be brand new — obsessive sharks, reticent water — aquamarine drip. drip. drip. drip. divination dew on tulips there’s a man! he doesn’t like you sink down... down... down...
yes please do and don’t call the devil to save me he knows your secrets, eats them too
a man!
he’s
so be find a man — call him heavenly trust a man — answer sinfully oh to do color me blue then drown...
LIVE FAST DIE YOUNG
Greta Berens
DEAR LORD, LET ME REMAIN A PACIFIST
Dylan Rogers
Honorable Mention for the River Rat Prize in Poetry
Dear Lord,
I know you must be busy dropping church roofs on old ladies.
If you can hear me over the rubbled cries, pardon this iring mind.
I have not slept in months without wishing for blood on the White House lawn.
I ask for permission, to think cruelly of the cruel.
For forgiveness when bleeding those with bloodied hands.
Trust in me, Lord, that I know right from wrong. That I may be the gleaming, dripping edge of your sword.
Swing me, Lord, at their necks.
Close me as shears around finger, after finger.
Drag me as a razor, lay bare the inner workings of your most loved design.
Lord, I have led a life of peace. I beg, test me no longer.
Don’t you miss the Old Testament days?
I’M SORRY
Valentine Blackwood
Winner of the River Rat Prize in Poetry
I have been dishonest. I race to the confession booth of my bathroom mirror. I still see her in the frames of my glasses and it makes my stomach turn. The mildew-ridden shower beckons me inside— another atonement, another humiliation ritual. The tears stream down like the pounding cold water as I curl up on the tile floor. I contemplate shaving my legs. I pick my acne-stubbled skin until it bleeds, until the porch swing creaks under my low weight. Another mosquito-bitten night framed by a streetlight halo. I am hot and sick and my hair is matted; a cruel reminder that the Lord is negligent. My bathroom door doesn’t lock.
Kate Pendowski
THE OUTLANDER
I HATE MYSELF AND I HATE OTHER PEOPLE AND I HATE HOW MUCH OTHER PEOPLE MAKE ME HATE MYSELF AND HATE WHEN PEOPLE ASK ME TO DO A LITTLE DANCE OR TELL THEM A JOKE AND I DO NOT WANT TO DANCE OR TELL JOKES I JUST WANT TO SIT DOWN AND PAY ATTENTION TO CLASS AND WA IT FOR THE DAY TO BE OVER SO I CAN GO HOME AND BE LE SS OF A DISAPPOINTMENT TO MY FAMILY THAN I WAS YESTE RDAY BY HIDING SOMEWHERE WHERE NO ONE CAN BOTHER ME AND I CANNOT BOTHER THEM AND THEN GO TO SLEEP AND WAIT F OR THE SAME REPETITION AND SAME BOTHERSOME PEOPLE TO AS K ME THE SAME BOTHERSOME THINGS AND IT MAKES ME WANT TO KILL SOMETHING THE WAY THAT ANIMALS WHO LIVE OFF MEAT TEAR THE THROATS OF TH EIR VICTIMS BUT UNFORTUNATELY I WAS RAI SED CATHOLIC WHICH MEANS THAT I HAVE AN INGRAINED FEAR OF GOD DESPITE THE FACT THAT I HAVE BEEN OUT OF PRACTIC E SINCE I GOT TO COLLEGE AND REALIZ ED THAT I AM NEVER GOING TO MARRY A MAN AND I H ATE THAT I WAS GIVEN THE BODY OF A HUM AN AND NOT THE
BODY OF SOMETHING ELSE FOR I FEEL THAT IF I WAS BORN SOMETHING ELSE I WOULD NOT HAVE THE ISSUES THAT I HAVE TO DEAL WITH LIKE OCD AND SOME OTHER FUCKED UP SHIT THAT I D O NOT THINK I CAN PUT IN THIS POEM WITHOUT MY TEACHER PULLING ME TO THE SIDE AN D ASKING IF I AM IN NEED OF SOME M ENTAL ASSISTANCE OR SOME SORT OF BULL WHERE I THEN HAVE TO SAY THAT I AM IN THERAPY SO NO I DO NOT NEED HELP RIGHT NOW EVEN THOUG H MY CLASSES MAKE ME WANT TO TAKE ONE OF THOSE PAPER CUTTING BLADES THAT I SEE I N THE CD DEPARTMENT AND GIVE MYSELF A LOBOTOMY BECAUSE TALKING ABOUT MY FEELINGS HAS ALWAYS BEEN DIFFICULT AND ACTIONS HAVE ALWAYS SPOKEN LOUDER THAN WORDS
NOWHERESVILLE, USA
K.L.
Oh! Oh my god, Jesus christ, okay, Jesus, you have no idea how glad I am to have caught you. No, really, for real, I promise. Okay, so I just, um, well, it’s kinda weird to say out loud but, uh, I just—no I swear I’m not drunk, I get that you close in ten, I just need like a minute, okay? I just need to catch my breath, um, for a sec, cause uh, well...
Okay so. My sister’s in town.
Yeah I get it; who gives a shit, she’s just your sister, it’s not like she’s Bella Hadid or the fourth Jonas or whatever, but fuck, dude—can I vape in here? No, yeah, I get it’s a public library, but it’s ten to close and the window’s just over—well, you didn’t have to do that. That was my Minecraft Dirt Brownie cartridge, c’mon.
Well. Anyway. She’s in town. You don’t get it, my sister’s never in town. She’s like the modern day version of fucking, Christopher Colombus if he weren’t a piece of shit, like—like I’m texting her from my studio with the old lamp our aunt didn’t want and some shitty stained rugs from a yardsale where she got a cute top that like flounces off her shoulders and she’s not texting back and not texting back and then at 3:13 in the morning—Central Standard Time—I get a message that just says sorry I was in the catacombs :P and I’m thinking how and I’m thinking you get reception down there and I’m thinking what fucking catacombs? Where are there even catacombs?
I’ll tell you where there aren’t fucking catacombs; goddamn Waukesha County, that’s where. Only catacombs we’ve got
are the emotional ones riddling Germantown High School Marching Band. I’ve seen those; they’re cavernous.
Paris; there’re catacombs in Paris, I guess. They got all sorts of shit in Paris; until sometime before lockdown there was a bridge in Paris where all the couples in the world used to put actual locks in their spokes. Then it crumbled because of the weight; that’s the funniest thing I think I’ve ever heard.
Imagine being the last person to put your lock on that bridge? Just bright-eyed in Paris with or without the love of your life and you bring the special padlock you bought just for this—I heard they make ‘em now, heart-shaped brass-painted locks for you to buy and put on any old gate in europe, it’s amazing. Deluded tourists in their purest form—and you write out your initials in sharpie and you I guess put your hands around each other as you try to find somewhere to put this special lock while at least fifteen other people are doing the exact same thing. And then, as you and your beau are stepping off the bridge—crack.
Cr-ck-ck-ck-ckr-crack-crack-crack-CRUNCH. And then wave sounds.
Goddamn but I wish I’d been there. Funniest fucking thing. That’s the shit that cements a relationship; accidentally destroying Paris’ Love Bridge together. Bet they’d let you spend the night in each other’s jail cell.
Actually in seventh grade I bought—well, “bought”—a padlock. When I heard about the bridge. I kept it in my backpack all year, which is really stupid in hindsight because I needed a lock for my gym locker that year and eventually somebody stole my deodorant, except the joke is on them because I accidentally brought the empty deodorant container
I had been using to store old gum wrappers that I would use for origami, so really they just stole a packet of gum wrappers and also three of my pads which sucks but I guess not as bad as them not having pads would suck. Anyway. I gave my sister the lock at the end of middle school, because she needed it for gym next year and I wanted to help, a little.
When we were kids me and my sister absolutely destroyed our dad’s tv. Well, technically it was the family tv because it was the one we’d all get around at night and watch, like, the Spiderwick Chronicles, or whatever—’cause most of us loved fantasy—but it was his tv, y’know? Everything was his. I can’t even remember why we broke the tv; must’ve been a fight or maybe playing? And I looked down and there were glass shards all over the floor and my sister was barefoot and I wasn’t, I was wearing socks, and I was strong enough—Wisconsin built, huh?—so I just scooped her up. Got a funny cut on my fourth toe, what do you call that? Ring-toe? Well anyway it looks like a star if you really squint. The scar. We didn’t know who to call because Mom was at work and Dad was never not at work except when he was home which you’d know and we broke the tv. Man, he screamed. Man, we were kids.
Yeah, sure, sorry, I don’t mean to keep you or anything, you can just—I can leave? If you need? I know you weren’t like, itching for a rando to come in and babble at you while you’re trying to close, just—
Well, no. You guys were just the first open place that wasn’t a Domino’s I saw. I can’t go to Domino’s, I spent all of high school working there and crushing on the assistant manager who was in a relationship, of course. And he wouldn’t like me anyway. I don’t have enough experience folding the boxes.
We didn’t really go to the library growing up. No time, I guess. I loved to read, but we didn’t have library cards ‘cause what if
we got late fees, and then there were libraries at school, even if they didn’t have any of the good books. It’s all good. I had to take my sister to her swim meets anyway. You ever breathed chlorine air after working in a grease-drowned pepperoni factory for six hours? That’s heaven on earth, buddy. Gets in your nostrils, in your skin, could warm you right down to your bones in a Great Lakes winter.
Sometimes, when we were kids, we’d compete to see who could scream the loudest with their head underwater. Back when our parents took us up north to see grandma, and we got to go to the lake. We never went in normal summer, so the water was usually just melted, but we held each other’s hands. To keep warm. I counted her bubbles. She always had so many. We had to stop ‘cause our dad yelled at us about how we could’ve drowned.
I think all my screams drowned in that lake. I haven’t gotten properly angry in years. There’s no point, right? Screaming never accomplishes anything, except maybe putting lockbridges into rivers.
I never figured out what she did with my lock when she got to college. She had a year at Oxford, on scholarship; she’s so fucking smart. I dunno how she’s so fucking smart. Or, I guess I do; she got on Prozac when she was fifteen, and then off it when she was sixteen. So good deal.
Sometimes I like to pretend she put it somewhere in London, on a bike rack or something. Somewhere someone would look at it and wonder why it was there. Somewhere it would get noticed. But I think it got thrown out when she packed up for her second year. I wasn’t at home then, either—working. I, uh, I’m, I get to do secretarial stuff for the funeral home now, but—yeah, Morton Mildner’s Mortuary and Funeral Home, you ever heard a worse name? Used to be hell, trying not to
laugh while you’re on the phone with this poor widow and she asks, to make sure, you know? Don’t wanna be crying on the phone with someone for Mildred’s Mink Coat Credentials while you plan your husband’s funeral!
Oh, shoot.
Why didn’t you tell me the time? Oh my god, here I am talking your ear off and it’s two past nine! I didn’t even know libraries were open till nine. You, here, I’ll just—
No, it’s fine, I’m. I—you need to get home, I’m just—
I just—
When she gets to mine she’s gonna wanna—talk. Laugh, and she’ll wanna know I’m okay, because that’s. That’s how it works. I’m her big sister. I’m okay, so she can jet. She goes, I stay.
And I love it. I love her.
I just wanted a little bit of practice, first.
What? Ha!
Alright then, Mr. Librarian. I will come back first thing with my license tomorrow and get myself a library card.
And you’ll be there. And so will my sister. Good deal.
FAMILIAR COLORS
Shonchalai Quirk
UNDESCRIBED TAXON: “ECHO”
Oakley Lopez
Honorable Mention for the River Rat Prize in Prose
The following is the recovered text of a journal recently found by a member of Mount Rainier’s fire watch at the top of the Mount Fremont tower. Despite extensive water damage and general wear, some of the text was salvageable, though any name that could be attributed to the owner remains unfound.
September 21st, 1998
At first, I thought it was dead. It didn’t seem to be breathing, its chest unmoving. It was only a fifteen-minute walk from my camp, lying there on the bank of the river. But when I picked it up off the ground, holding it as one would a child, I felt something: a pulsing deep within. After bringing it to my camp, I wrapped it inside my sleeping bag as its skin was cold to the touch. For safety’s sake, I decided to lock it up inside the large kennel near my research station and retired to my tent. My own heart is still racing. Never, in all my time in the forests of Mount Rainier, have I ever discovered something so confounding... so new!
September 22nd, 1998
The specimen, pale-skinned with dark, almost coal-black markings around its eyes and hands, is about 140 centimeters tall, weighing in at around 36 kilograms. Regarding its appearance, it is almost certainly humanoid, however, lacking
any sort of mammalian hair or fur whatsoever. Despite its shorter stature, its neck and limbs are longer in proportion to the rest of its body. Its head, too, exhibits strange features — rather stout, with deer-like features and black, fearful eyes.
When the specimen finally awoke, it was almost certainly terrified. It had pressed itself against the back corner of the kennel as I approached, its body still, and its mouth and nose twitching. Getting closer, I attempted to calm it down as I would a wild rabbit, crouching near the kennel’s door and speaking calmly. Slowly, it warmed up to my presence, but it wasn’t until it was offered food that it decided to inch toward me. Interestingly, of all that I held out to it — granola bars, fruit, yogurt... it only seemed to be interested in the jerky. As it took the dried meat from my hand, it consumed it ravenously, clearly starved, its movements almost insect-like. That was when I noticed it. Its teeth, perfectly pristine, were almost certainly those of a human adolescent.
September 30th, 1998
The specimen — which I’ve taken to calling “Echo” as a placeholder name until I can determine its taxon — has developed cognitively at a rapid pace. In a little over a week, we’ve progressed from prey mannerisms to an almost child-like curiosity. Once I felt as though the trust had been built, and once my jerky rations were almost entirely depleted, I thought it safe enough to leave the kennel door open.
For the first day, it surprisingly opted not to leave the kennel. I assume that it grew comfortable with our arrangement. But then, it stood up and slowly walked out. Instead of fleeing as I had dreaded it would, it advanced towards me as I watched from my research station. Part of me anticipated some kind of
attack, and as I took a step backwards, so did Echo. I took a step forward and reached out slowly toward it, and it did the same. It was mimicking my movements! Since then, I’ve been taking it with me on trips into the forest. I still must conduct my field research, even if nothing will ever compare to the discovery of Echo. Still, observing it will be field research in its own right. Also... Echo must’ve come from somewhere, yes? Who’s to say that there isn’t more of it out here somewhere?
October 12th, 1998
Echo is not only mentally developing, but physically, now too. They’ve grown to accept my regular physical examination of their progress, behaving almost like a patient at the doctor’s as time has passed. As the autumn chills begin to descend over the mountain, their skin seems to now be growing short, sparse fur. I’ve even noticed that they now seem to be capable of sweating, a trait not present before. Incredibly, it also seems that the more they learn, the larger their head becomes — they even seem to be growing a few centimeters taller every week.
Despite the... similarity... I’ve attempted to do my best to refrain from viewing Echo as a human child, for the sake of the science of it all. However, as they continue to grow and develop new skills — astoundingly, including rudimentary artistic abilities — I can’t help but feel a certain kinship. It’s as if I can see a younger version of myself within the black pools of their eyes.
Together, we’ve cleared about a 2-kilometer radius around the river in which I found Echo. Nothing yet, even with Echo’s remarkable speed. In the lack of findings, I’ve taken to foraging for more rations, as I did not expect to be feeding more than just myself for the duration of my field research.
Unfortunately, the jerky was the first to go, as it was as much an Echo favorite as it was mine. However, despite their change in mannerisms from observation of my behavior, they seem to be a remarkable hunter and have managed to catch a few cottontails when they decide they can’t handle the granola bars and nuts I’ve fed them anymore.
I’ll expand my research site in hopes of finding more information about Echo’s origins, or better yet, something entirely new. If I had known that this mountain had fruit this incredible to bear, I would’ve camped out here many years ago! In just two months, my research period will come to an end, and I’ll officially be able to present Echo to my colleagues. What a day that’ll be!
October 15th, 1998
Echo spoke. They actually spoke. I had thought it impossible based on an examination of their throat, but they actually spoke! My excitement was difficult to contain. I had to document the incident immediately. Their voice was deeper than I would’ve expected, and garbled and gravelly, not unlike a radio with a weak signal. It was almost a familiar voice, too.
It was during our regular check-up. I was listening to its heartbeat, and as I pulled away to make notes, mumbling to myself, they placed their hand on my shoulder. They said, “Incredible.”
October 23rd, 1998
Echo is sick. I don’t understand how, or what exactly I’ve done wrong with their care, but they’ve grown weak. On an
excursion just a few days ago, I noticed a certain sluggishness in their usual quick movements but wrote it off. There had been heavy rainstorms, and yet, I had been pushing us to expand our radius further and further than usual. Now, their breathing has become ragged and heavy, and a thick, oily substance has begun to secrete from their skin, hardening into a crust around their limbs. They were learning new words every day, but now, the only noise they can manage is a high-pitched whine.
With their rapidly developing and changing physical attributes, there is only so much I can do by studying them directly. I’ve decided to leave them with half of my rations of food and water and explore the forest alone for something — anything that could help stabilize Echo’s condition. I’m bringing enough supplies to go out and explore for a few days. I know that my time is limited. I am determined to preserve this creature. To save them.
October 25th, 1998
Nothing. Just the typical hares and pikas preparing for hibernation. Nothing useful for Echo. I’ve noticed evidence of human presence — troubling. I must’ve explored over 15 kilometers outwards now, but I press on.
October 27th, 1998
Frustratingly, there is nothing to report, and dare I say, I am worried about Echo’s condition back at my tent. My supplies dwindle, but from the ledge I find myself on, I can see another campsite, likely just a few hours from my current location. I am trying not to lose hope.
October 28th, 1998
Something isn’t right.
When I arrived at the campsite, it was clear that it had been long abandoned and damaged from the rainstorms a week prior. From what little research was still intact, they were investigating the meteorological activity of the national park, specifically around the Bearhead Peak, where they were situated. Judging from the tents, it was clearly a team of at least three or four people. Going over the supplies in the tents and the research station, they planned to be there for a while. But now, they were nowhere to be found and left so much behind — except, notably, medical supplies.
I inspected the surrounding forest for any activity, hoping to find where they’d gone off to in such a hurry, but instead, about a 15-minute walk away, I found something strange. In a ditch just north of the peak was half of a large, speckled eggshell, far bigger than any bird native to the region.
Could Echo be involved?
October 30th, 1998
I’ve decided to stay to look over what I can discern from their damaged research and reports. I’ve replenished my supplies with what was abandoned and fixed up one of the larger tents to sleep in for the time being. Using their research station, I collected samples from the eggshell as well as the stones from the ditch it sat in. If it is in any way related to Echo, there might be some way it could help heal their current ailment.
October 31st, 1998
I’ve made a terrible discovery.
After scrounging their documents, I found a map that pointed to an outpost the Bearhead research team had further up the mountain. With how cloudy it had been over the past week, it would’ve been difficult to spot without being pointed in the right direction. Without any other leads, I decided to make the climb to see if anybody or anything remained. A rope tied to a post that extended upwards, past a steep cliff, and into the fog, told me I was headed in the right direction. With much physical exertion, I pulled myself up the trail, fighting the bitter cold of the increased altitude until I finally made it to flatter, solid ground. I saw it in the distance. Just past some jutting rocks of the cliffside was a large tent next to some sort of meteorological device. I rushed over and threw myself inside the tent.
I saw her sitting slumped over on the ground. A woman, slightly decomposed and almost frozen. She had been gone long before I arrived. Choking back bile, I examined the research that this facility had to offer. Within a file, I found handwritten notes mixed in with insignificant weather reports, not unlike my journal entries. The woman had written them, I presume. There were writings about her fascination with insects. Writings about a particular insect she saw while setting up a rain gauge. She spoke about her husband, with whom she works in her field of study. She spoke of –
A photograph fell from the file and landed on the desk in front of me. I picked it up. A photo of the woman, her husband, and a baby. I flipped it over.
“Carter has started teething!”
I looked down at the woman’s body. Her arms, too empty.
November 5th, 1998
I didn’t stay long at the Bearhead research encampment. My legs nearly gave in, and I almost passed out from exhaustion, but I was determined to get back to my camp as quickly as possible. I could tell I was close when I saw the strange, milky crystals growing along the branches of the trees. The further I got to the tent I had left Echo in, the heavier and wetter the air, and the thicker and more frequent the crystal outcroppings became, reaching outwards in an almost star-like shape into the forest.
At the center of it all, I saw him. Encased in a thick, cloudy chrysalis, much larger than when I’d left him, was the silhouette of the Echo, his form breathing — no, pulsing from within his crystal prison. He wasn’t sick. He was evolving.
My legs were covered in cuts from the underbush and the crystals and burning from all the running, but I stumbled towards the Echo regardless. My hands moistened with the condensation dripping down his cocoon as I pressed my body against it. I thought, surely, it couldn’t be, could it? And yet, as I slowly dragged my arm across the foggy surface of the crystal and gazed at what remained, I saw my face staring back at me. Not on the surface, but from within.
The Echo’s face. My face. My body. My voice.
A loud, almost deafening crack emitting from the crystal brought me out of my stupor. My eyes, his eyes, opened from within, the black pools shrinking into pupils surrounded by a deep brown. The cocoon shattered into pieces as his body, my body, was thrown from within against my body, his body, as we both hit the jagged, shiny ground hard from the blast.
November 7th, 1998
I suspect it must be dead. It lies still on the ground, its chest unmoving. Pressing my ear to its chest, I hear no heartbeat. Whatever it was, whatever it was trying to do, it had failed somehow. Perhaps it was my doing. When I came to, the crystals that remained underneath our bodies were soaked in blood. As I collected samples from its body, I, too, collected samples of the crystal shards for study and examination. Although the research station has been damaged by the metamorphosis, I know that there is still something to learn from all of this. I’ve stowed its body away in the tent for the time being.
I am... still a scientist. There is still research to be done.
Jayne Henningsgaard
NO ORIGIN
James St Surin
Table contribution. Nothing more.
I did not cannot bring myself. Not an entity to hate. I don’t require chemistry. You were never asked to relate.
Only to begin.
DUTY BLUING
Anna Duncan
Why would I be anything but green
If we’re in the elevator together and you start dying
Yellow’s not enough
I’m going to tend to you first
Sometimes too much
Not the person dying on the first floor
Blue is never too much
It might be tempting to tend to the top floor
Anything but green bleeds
But I’m in the elevator with you
HARBINGER
Rowan Rohwer
Do you think that bad omens know they’re bad omens? Do you think a black cat knows it is a curse? Or does a mirror fear breaking, not in a fear of death, but in fear of bringing pain? Do you think coyotes fear crossing the path of one traveling north, or when it does happen, do they feel guilt? Or do they feel dread? Do you think good luck objects know they bring good luck? I wonder about subjects of curses, too, or bad fate. At what point is it reasonable or correct to draw the parallels between the bad things that happen to, or around you? Is it irresponsible to call it a delusion, or a symptom? How many times does something happen to the people living in a house that an owl flies over before the owl understands the correlation, and how many houses between then bring that fear from paranoia to unavoidable truth? I feel constantly as though I am the owl, and I am waiting for the last house that proves the curse is real.
I always keep, for this reason, a protection charm in my car. The road is an incredible, violent, explosive route through which fate can catch up to you. Time after time after time, I almost get hit, I almost run a red, nearly, nearly, nearly each time. It begins to feel like bad things are drawn to me, and I can observe them now as they smash their faces against my car window, against the barrier.
Sometimes I’m afraid I’m being sent messages I don’t even hear, and I missed the right path years ago. What if I was supposed to take that free online course on kickstarting my herbalist career. I was supposed to follow the call and train towards a new career writing books and making blog posts, which would pay for my big beautiful cottage. I was always
meant to be an herbalist, I’d say in interviews. I tried to pursue other careers but the universe called me to this one through an instagram ad, and I just knew. I have always known when to follow a sign.
I’d like to think that there’s a version of me, somewhere, in some universe, some possible iteration of myself, that knows how to follow a sign. Every single version of me, in every possible lifetime, sees omens. I hope one of us knows what they mean — and may he be less afraid for it.
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Sometimes, I look for answers on shelves. Used bookstores and libraries can function similarly to a tarot deck, if you go in with enough time to spare, and a tolerance for odd kerning and the moderately nonsensical. The Secret Language of Birthdays is an encyclopedia of personology profiles for each birthday of the year.
The writer of the book, Gary Goldschneider, born on May 22, began his medical career studying psychiatry at Yale Medical School for three years. He left that path behind and became a pianist. He gave marathon piano performances, where he would play long lists of works by a given composer in one sitting, over the course of hours. His interest in psychology brought him to his career writing books on luck, astrology, numerology, cosmic influences on the individual of varying sorts. His death was announced on twitter by the co-author
of his secret language series, Thomas Rezek, six days after his passing.
Every recurrence of a symbol, a happening, or a strange coincidence creates momentum, a snowflake becomes two becomes three becomes an avalanche. My first ticket was funny, a mistake I made. And then parking too close to a driveway, that was a mistake too, less funny but it rolled off of my shoulders. And then I was parked for over two hours in a two hour lot. And that was true, I did that, I broke that rule, but I had been parking there for hours and hours a day for weeks, as others I knew had been doing for over a year, so why now? Why today do I get a ticket, alone in the dark with sore feet, and then when the next comes within a narrow window, how am I not to feel targeted again? How can I not ask, why me?
An artifact doesn’t tell you about the time it’s from. A secondary source, like a textbook, or a paper or something, will interpret primary sources for you. A primary source, however, makes you interpret it. A poster from a period in time in a place won’t give you information about what that time and place in history was like. You look at characteristics of the thing — the size of a font on a poster, the material of something, the imagery in the needlework of a game table, and you infer what these traits can tell you about the object, and what objects of similar kinds or from the same contexts have in common, and you have to just make connections and try and find a story. History is not an objective truth, it is a possible story constructed with what information we do have until better information comes along.
Is this so different from superstition, from omens? If I encounter circumstances and events that form patterns, how is
it any less factual for me to believe in divine punishment than it is for a historian to “discover the truth”?
I was born on June 24. According to my personological birth date profile, I am to be consumed wholly by my vocation, and if I am a “highly evolved” type, I am to be fixed on manifesting “divine love.” I am to have “religious fervor” for my calling, and these fixations are capable of getting in the way of my health and balance. I am likely to have a mid-life crisis in my 40s.I was born two months early. I think about this a lot. If I had been born on time, would I have been a different kind of person? Or maybe, I was fated to be born on a specific day, and my early arrival caused some kind of disconnect. It is also possible that I am fated to be a discalibration. I could only have been born early. Maybe there is not a version of me that did not require alteration to become fully realized. It is hard to get over, or to work past — the distinct feeling that there is something wrong, misaligned, unnatural about your existence.
I wonder about Gary Goldschneider. I wonder, if he was born a week earlier, if he would have pursued psychology, or if he would have pursued a more traditional pianist career. I wonder if he would have written more books, or less, or if his books would have made more sense, or if he would have been an herbalist, or an artist, or a librarian. I wonder If he believed in omens, too, or just birthdays. I wonder who or what he blamed when he fumbled at the keys.
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Glasses chain broken, beads falling into my hands, my anger and fear and despair bubble. Why does everything fall apart in my hands? Why can’t I keep anything together? How do I make everything break, and how do I stop, tears threaten to fall into my hands to join the beads that I pour into the cup holder between drivers and passengers side. I flip on my lights and prepare to rush home, I am already making the man who made my deeply cherished glasses chain late, and all I do is make people late and break things and what could I possibly try to change the way I operate and why am I always in a rush and I know why but I can’t fix it and then I am struck with deep deep shame and knowing as I park and turn on my hazards to get out and retrieve the thing that stopped me. Red and white, flickering in the wind, pinned under my wipers. Too damn close to the fire hydrant. Why now. Why today. I’ve parked this close. I thought it was 4 feet, not fucking 9. I’ve parked closer. Why today. Why now. Why not last time, or next time. What did I do to deserve this, I ask rhetorically in anger, and then, what did I do to deserve this, I ask in fear and guilt and despair in the face of whatever is haunting me. I drive home. Whatever follows me slides into the back seat. I think my protection jar has expired.
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An event can feel like a bad omen without repetition if it is shocking to your core and coincides with anything you feel bad about. If you have been using your boyfriend’s likeness in your mind to fight with all day, if you have been swinging between being mad at him, feeling guilt for being mad at him, and hating yourself for the way you are, anything horrible you happen upon will feel like a last warning before a dire punishment, or like a dire punishment itself.
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This is a warning, or a punishment, but what on earth for? I did the right thing. I asked to talk about it, and I’m going to, and I’ll be honest. Do you want me parking on the other side of the street? Why? I can’t do what is right if I don’t even know what I’m being punished for. Do I need to stop driving? Is this about the new ticket, when I forgot to pay for parking? I don’t know. No one tells you what to do about an indecipherable omen. In stories, everyone always knows what they mean, or it becomes revealed with time, but I am deeply afraid that it is too late to destroy whatever is settled into my ribcage.
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Sometimes, I wonder what happened to me. I wonder why I have become so superstitious and so wary, and I think I might know. I think some things that happen to you are so unbelievable that there’s no way to accept that it just happened because things happen. I think some things that happen to you are so unbelievable that others can’t accept that it just happened because things happen. God has a reason for everything, God has a plan. I heard that one a lot. How do you even start to unlearn that? I was so stubborn, so outspoken. How could you say that, that’s unrealistic, it’s not fair or kind or compassionate to say everything happens for a reason. That’s really, really fucked up to say to a child.
Before that though, even, I was always scared of stepping on cracks. I didn’t want to hurt my mother. I didn’t really, truly think she would break her back if I were to misstep, but I was horrified of being the kind of person that didn’t care if she did.
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I feared lack of guilt. I feared being cruel, I think. I still do. People joke about not being able to kill a fly, but I held a funeral for one that I swatted by mistake once, and I cried, and although I don’t believe in hell, or choose not to believe in hell, there was a small part of me adding a tally to a
chalkboard in my brain, adding one more grain of sand’s worth of weight to the scale measuring the lightness of my soul.
I am very afraid of death, for many reasons. My fear of death is, in many ways, a combined effort of all of my fears — either that or it is the root cause.
Searched for is my loved one in heaven 12:53 AM • Details is stephe| is stephen rohwer in | is stephen rohwer in is stephen rohwer in | is stephen rohwer| is stephen r| is ste| is | | | | how to kn| how to knwo if som|
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I am scared of dying soon. I am scared of dying too early. My constant fear of being on the wrong path makes me feel rushed — I am scared that I will die before my work is done, before my divine purpose has been fulfilled, before my midlife crisis, and how do I do that if I don’t know what I’m making, what I’m supposed to be doing. There is a debunked “statistic” about the average age of transgender people, giving us a much shorter lifespan than is accurate. I know it isn’t true, but part of me thinks that reading that fact and fearing it has given it power over me, and part of me is the child that heard it when
I was half that age and bracing against the waves of grief and anger crashing into shore in the wake of my late father.
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Across the universe, I let go, and my head drops to the desk in my home office with a thud. What am I even doing? How on earth do I know for certain that this path is the right one, or if it will work, or if I’m going about it all wrong? I could’ve been an artist, I could’ve been a librarian, something that matters. I guess some people really need an herbalist, but I can’t help but feel that all of this doesn’t mean anything. I feel like all I do is beg for people to join my courses, or to meet me over zoom for consultations. All I do is market online and help people who can pay for something like an herbalist’s consultation. How did I even get here? A sign? An Omen? In another life, I am an archivist and artist. I spend my days filing, organizing, conserving important information and
documents. I help researchers in a real tangible way, I give them the information they need. The money I make teaching and handling sources and protecting information goes towards the artistic practice that I keep. Maybe I have a studio. I learn things at my day job through exposure to the world of information and they influence my work. I am not necessarily famous, but people know my name. I organize DIY gallery pop ups and community events and collaborative projects as well in my spare time. I was always meant to be an archivist and an artist, I’d say. I tried to pursue other careers but the universe called me to this one through that visit to the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Special Collections my junior year of college and I just knew. I have always known when to follow a sign.
I’d like to think that there’s a version of me, somewhere, in some universe, some possible iteration of myself, that knows how to follow a sign. Every single version of me, in every possibility, sees omens. I hope one of us knows what they mean — and may he be less afraid for it.
Once, a long time ago, I had promised myself that if I ever hit an animal on the road, I would kill myself. Somehow, observing the likely reality, that the animal had probably already passed on due to its stiffness, felt like a cheat. I do not want to kill myself, I am not looking for that. I am looking for something to pin on myself, wood from which to build a cross to carry. how t| how to| how to
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I don’t think I’m special. I don’t think I have a special magical skill.
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I roll over onto my right side, sheets tangling uncomfortably around me — I’ll have to readjust in a moment. I have been tossing and turning and turning and trying not to move.
“How do you even know,” I ask in a tone at once airier and heavier than usual, “if you’re going crazy or if an Angel is trying to contact you for real?” His shoulder does not muffle my voice as I had hoped.
“That’s the thing, I think,” he tells me, “is that no one can really know. That’s part of it.”
I don’t say anything, or maybe I hum in response. I’m not sure which is better, or worse. Maybe it doesn’t matter which is true, if I can never know.
HOW TO BE A GOOD DAUGHTER
Emma Ericson
TWO TIGERS
Emma Ericson
I knew you as a tiger, fiercest fangs, sharper tongue
You spoke with the softness of a studded leather belt
Loved me like a shovel striking the back of my head
Lying wounded in the garden, helpless like prey
Soft grass of spring cradling my dirt-smudged cheek
Never the supple touch of soil-stained hands
I loved you as a bird does fluttering in the wind
You hoped I would carry the beauty of a phoenix feather
And you shed your blood for me like a pelican in her piety
But I was born of mongrel blood
Not like the girl who visited your dreams
You called me halfbreed once
It’s true, I am no better than a mutt
Sneaking second servings, scraps beneath the table, licking honeyed crumbs from the floor
coveting whatever sweetness I could find
At night, I howled prayers to the moon
So I would come to be the morning light
And you would wrap your arms around my wings and weep
But I was born burning, you could not bear to hold me
I was desperately flailing as I sank into this flesh
Nauseous fettid flesh
Drowning in a pool of sanguine shame
I learned sorrow as you did when the tiger swallowed you
There is a beast who writhes in my belly
She crawls beneath my skin, leaving silver stripes in her wake
Digging up hollow bones in my flesh
The tiger will eat me, and I will be a tiger too
SANCTUS FORMICAE
Lexington Berens-VanHeest
we are ants marching to see god a backyard pilgrimage across picnic blanket plains our mandibles quiver for ambrosia, sweet victory, the phantom of a promise our ancestors prayed in stridulation. if we return triumphant, atlas bearing the weight of sky, our descendants will feast with sticky maxillae for generations so we hope that god is kind, and that we will be spared from the wrath of giants from the maw of the carapaced hunters and the webs of the shrouded from the suffocating snow and the sickness it brought with it bless our holy mission, god of all within our grasp— may our path be gentle and our reward be sweet, let our return be swift and away from gnashing claws and beaks through our dedicated march we etch our one-voiced dotted lined prayer.
THE GROVE’S FINAL LULLABY
Vicky Jordan
lullaby gnarled roots of ancient times hear my pain in evergreen night the crazed blaze returns to haunt my lineage falls as one.
AUGUST’S DOLPHINS
Simon Brink
It is estimated that Ocean Springs, Mississippi, got nineteen feet of water in Katrina. Biloxi, as high as twenty-eight feet in areas near the Bay and Biloxi River.
nineteen feet i was not yet conscious when the nineteen feet hit ocean springs my home, the people the ocean swallowed in the mississippi sound what it calls its mouth i do not remember their screams, do you think i cried that day in august? the hot tears from my eyes as hot as the muddy salt water and august air and the trees that became dolphins do you think all those people that died became those dolphins? trapped in the mississippi sound
THE PRYTANIA STREET CROWS
CALL FOR YOU AND YOUR LESBIAN LONGING
Simon Brink
my dear—
how i wish you would come out of great prytania street with its immortal live oaks
the crows would sing your name and i may actually believe it for once your sticky air would touch my skin and wrap around me through my clothes and you’d lay me so gently in your waxy nostalgic hammocks and bathe me in the magnolias’ midday warmth
the door could be painted a lovely shade of violet and the porch banisters green and i would become something not a falsity but something only you could whisper
BEHIND
THE RIBS
Jaidyn Brink
Take the blade and shove it deep. Right between the aching place, And what used to be so sure.
The forgotten love clings to it, Like sticky bubble gum— Leaves a bitter taste between ribs.
Reach in between the second and sixth With a pair of pliers; Gently eased out from the corner which you sit.
Can we dance again?
Watch static flicker under the blankets in a dark room? Keep the fireflies in the jar and hope they stay alive till morning, Just so you’re not alone at night.
Stay on this nightstand. Please?
Let the sticky residue solidify Back into an organ shape.
Little love do not worry, You will not be forgotten again.
LAMENT & RABBITS
Sylvia Munoz
if i am not sick anymore will i still be a poet do not answer like someone who loved van gogh truer than the swirl of sunflower mystique someone who held paint-kissed knuckles to their breast and did not begrudge the stain do not answer like someone who has felt the weight of every painting he did not make
if i am not sick anymore, will my writing still be beautiful do not answer like someone who’s seen me sleep late into the morning in the dead of winter someone who has shook me awake in a nightmare and held my reaching hand feared too the dog that bites at my heels unceasingly
if i am not sick anymore will i have anything worthwhile to say do not answer like you love me—no answer as the starstruck gallery walker reverent, holding hands rigid to resist the urge to touch answer
like someone brought to tears imagining that pain could birth something so beautiful answer as the historian convinced its worth lies in this traumatic and bloody birth
if i am not sick anymore will i lose what gives me purpose do not answer like you have touched me and i was warm please, answer like the awestruck reader in a hundred-odd years who will love me cold
SPARKS, NERVES, REFLECTIONS
Jamie Messerman
