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2070
ejii
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Wandering nomad-
A letter to The Reader
I am a wandering nomad, a soul that can not rest. I am always seeking for
new adventures, for opportunities to grow my soul. Honestly nothing I do makes
linear sense in my life, yet I am overjoyed in my heart.
I believe it is due to me never wanting to grow old. I never want anything to
stick to my soul, I aspire to have my aura purified at all times.
This magazine is important because it is a celebration of art and life. All the
thoughts,words, feelings, visuals are things I have curated, and this makes this
edition of 2070 especially important to me. The creative direction of the magazine
was also under me, as I took all the photography except the photos taken by
other people of me.
Before reading I encourage the reader to “take off their shoes.” In other
words, step into this magazine purely. The fall edition of 2070 is meant to be
nothing more than honest and sincere, and an expansion of a young soul.
Divertiti!
All the Best,
ejii
(Ed•Gy)
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Ricks, Paige. “San Francisco Japanese Tea Garden” 2016. JPG
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RateMyProfessor. Com
Everyone tells me to check ratemyprofessor.com
Before enrolling in a class so I do.
Introduction to Modern Poetry, that sounds amazing
I think to myself.
Let’s check out this teacher.
I type the name in, no name found.
Must be a new teacher.
I’m a bit uneasy in taking this class as there is no record of this professor.
But hey I’m down,
And the teacher’s name looks like that one New Zealand Singer
No Royals
Though.
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Iban, Eme. “Commerce Township” 2016.JPG
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Seamus
I imagine how it would feel to find a dead body
Would it be so sweet to be able to gaze at the a body you didn’t kill
Never have I ever seen a dead body up close
Killing someone is a sin and no not I would do it
I wonder why Seamus chose to get so dark
Good people don’t kill do they?
Person walks past the bridge, looks down.
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Iban, Eme. “Self-Analysis Series” November 2016. JPG
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Seamus
I imagine how it would feel to find a dead body
Would it be so sweet to be able to gaze at the a body you didn’t kill
Never have I ever seen a dead body up close
Killing someone is a sin and no not I would do it
I wonder why Seamus chose to get so dark
Good people don’t kill do they
Person walks past the bridge, looks down.
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Iban, Eme. “Columbia” 2016. JPG
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Margins
teeth chattering drilling relentlessly
open up
Open Up
I’m not wet enough.
Improvement sorry learning drilling holes in my head.
English is something that hurts to come out
i am but a mere ocean with a damn
i'm scared to let it crack
for fear i will be swept under my delusion
swept under madness
forever bobbing my head above and underwater
the line between life and death
how many times has she beat her eyes into submission
To recognize margins,
Cutting the paper at one inch edges,
Her eyes had knives in them.
Eyes that had sliced through thousands of pages of comic books (2,000 to be exact)
Why does she see everything,
will i ever be the type of writer to recognize margins
english made ruthless
i like it
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She's a star
A woman made of millions of neurons,
That metamorphosed into a human being before the student eyes.
Office Hours you hear her tiredness,
She isn’t agitating like her classroom persona,
Her eyes are always so glazed over,
She should rest more.
Word Vomit. I don’t mean to ask but
It comes out of my mouth before I can stop it,
“You’re jewish?”
I’m christian but jewish people are the chosen ones right?
Why is race, religion, other stupid stuff always so important
In getting to know someone?
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Explanation of the Cover
The first day of school is always a mess for me
I strongly dislike it.
I always try to challenge myself,
High school I was an AP English Language Girl,
Now I’m Ivy League Girl doing English,
But here’s the catch
I’m always the only girl that’s black
In most of my classes.
It’s like I’m in the Olympics,
And Team Noir has one player,
And I’m terrified I’m going to lose for my continent.
Sometimes I feel like I’m talking to myself
That when I make a point the professor nods
And the air is so muted,
Can someone please say something?
Can we please turn the volume up?
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Ahmed, Shan E. “Talking to Myself” 2016. JPG
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Iban, Eme. “San Francisco” 2016. JPG
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Iban, Eme. “Volcán Tajumulco” 2015. JPG
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Chameleon
just like the green leaves turned brown,
So did his shoes.
I remember when my group thought that his green sneakers
Meant he was one of us
Until one day he hopped in front of the class,
And assured us,
That he was a professor.
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Gossip
we all gossiped about what we knew,
It is what us humans love to do.
One adds to the gossip pot,
Black cauldron holding immaturity and endless inquisitiveness,
that our professor has a facebook.
LETS LOOK
This is embarrassing
This is so messy
“He’s an Aries!”
“Is he dating the T.A.?”
Everybody turns to me,
Time to add my ingredient to the pot.
i added that i liked his hair cut-
That wasn’t spicy enough
We’re looking at his facebook page
And I don’t know how to feel about it
“Let’s look at the T.A.’s!”
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The Day English Gave Me A Second Degree Burn
I remember when it happened,
I was sitting in class,
Listening to my teacher ramble on and on about gwendolyn brooks.
I’m reaching into my backpack
To read the poems I printed five minutes before class,
And I hear her say the craziest title I’ve ever heard,
“A Bronzeville Mother Loiters In Mississippi. Meanwhile, A Mississippi Mother Burns
Bacon”
Sounds like a good recipe I cackle to myself,
Just another poem talking about the dirty south.
And then I see the photos of the infamous open casket,
That my classmates are passing around,
Emitt Till I know the story and I tell to my classmates with pride
I am the professor for approximately 1.5 minutes
Black History has been served.
The poem is explosive
And I can’t believe my senses have the honor to even take in what this poem is actually doing
Never did I know that it was possible
For a writer to become a magician.
The words blending together into a colorful inferno
Of literary excellence.
How did Brooks turn such an ugly story,
Such an ugly movement in history,
Such a story that prompted the start of the Civil Rights Movement,
Into a fairy tale?
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Iban, Eme. “Sister Sister”
1999/2016. JPG
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O’Hara
The guy reminds me of NYC,
The fast life,
Where you wake up with your friends in a different part of town,
He’s a fun guy.
I love how small he seems in the text sometimes,
my fellow Aries,
so sad that all he can look forward to is lunch.
Rockstar Hara
Hara was a rockstar poet
And I appreciate that.
He never really followed the rules,
And that’s why everyone respected him.
I wish I could be a rockstar right now,
But i’m in Ithaca.
Iban, Eme. “Gabby’s Room.” 2016. JPG
The Day Frank O’Hara Died
ARIES MAN
TAKE IT LIKE A MAN.
Of course he was walking somewhere
Us aries stand up to anything even death
When I die i better be standing up as well
And fucking applauding life
No sitting down
No lying down
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Iban, Eme.
“Boys” 2016.
JPG
Iban, Eme. “Andrade” 2016. JPG
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Oven Part 2
I was ecstatic,
Today in class we’re talking plath!
My professor bounces up
She’s always so happy sometimes
Then she asks the question that changed the course for me,
These caucasian people set ups,
Mouse traps snapping on my feet,
“What comes to mind when you think of plath?”
I AM BEYOND EXCITED
Finally i can shine
I can tell from everyone’s face in the class that nothing comes to mind
So I blurt it out
I say how I feel
OVEN.
I’m astounded that my teacher doesn’t say anything
Greek god speaks up, for the white people in the class
“I think it’s unexpectedly sad when when people think of plath they only think of her suicide
And she was so much more than that
But at the end of the day… she was a bit depressed”
Well thank you captain obvi-white
For saying what I said through a different mouthpiece
A different culture
The class laughs.
I’m done talking forever.
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Iban, Eme. “University of Michigan Plus Friends” Summer 2016. JPG
Oven Part 1
I would always see him in the dining halls.
Handsome greek god with muscles to match,
Latin flowing from his mouth.
Ain’t nothing wrong with being a cougar girl.
Everytime he would walk into the dining hall
I would ask with my eyes
Get an omelette
I know you see me working here
But he wouldn’t
And i realized that maybe what I thought i saw of him wasn’t what I should think of him.
That’s why I love plath
Who talks of the demons in human forms,
Are humans demons?
People say oh she’s obsessed with him
Hughes
That weasley devil who tore out the pages before her suicide
Was she obsessed?
Or was she just trying to rewrite their love story over and over again,
Trying to make it perfect,
Comparing it to everything,
Even a cadavers room.
People don’t love deep enough
Superficial love equals superficial sadness equals superficial life
She lived it raw
To me Plath’s writing is just talking about the moment
After you’ve had sex
And you’re sweaty and gross
*too much too much let’s take a quick breather*
And you’re trying to decide if it was good or a mistake,
And you see your lover walking out the door and you wonder
If it was ever real anyway
And then the tension comes and you want to scream
You don’t know what to do with the clothes on the floor
You don’t know what to do with the smell of fake love in the air,
What do you do with your legs now?
Plath’s writing is like that that moment when they call you a slut
And you don’t give a fuck.
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How can one call her evil for comparing love to a cadavers room
When love is put on sale on stale valentines cards,
rows and rows at cvs.
How can someone else write a card for your beloved
that you casually stick your signature on?
That’s evil
Not plath.
Iban, Eme. “Campo de Guatemala.” 2016. JPG
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Oven 3
The word buzzing around my ears
I can’t believe my professor said it,
It’s a word I’ve read in textbooks,
Heard in documentaries,
Schwitz
sounds like an offl brand sandwich restaurant,
But this isn’t delicious.
She is Blinking blinking back tears that had been cried out many years before.
When I think Jewish
I think of volunteering at The Jewish Aging Home
and making sure rich Jewish people have their cookies with the dairy-free chocolate chips,
and that meat and milk and cheese don’t mix (that’s not what’s poppin).
When I think Jewish
I’m thinking of my brother learning how to swim at the Jewish Community Center,
My sis and i tried to learn but we were never successful.
When I think Holocaust,
I think of myself being the only person who didn’t go on the 8th grade field trip
to the Holocaust Museum-
I didn’t want to see the pain put up on walls on pictures.
I think of my German friend who told me in hushed tones
almost as quiet as the concentration camp grounds she visited,
how she could never imagine this actually existing.
But baby girl you actually were standing on the camp grounds,
You were in that place,
In that space,
In that-
How must it have been for my teacher to never be able to leave this place,
Found in a family member,
At every holiday, every graduation, every visit-
Abuela por favor, no llores.
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Eternal
Power
To
All
Whom
Survived
Auschwitz
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WE REAL COOL; Nah Gwendie You Real Cool
We real cool,
We skip school,
Leaving people so dumbfounded,
All that comes out their mouth is drool,
I’m a cool cat
That likes to relax
If the snow pitter pats
on my window
Of this cadillac
Imma snap
Iban, Eme. “Los Angeles” 2016
Agua
I always like to get a drink of water before class,
I had just talked to my friend about Plath,
And I think about Ariana Reines and how all the girls in the room
are so uncomfortable
As our male teacher keeps screeching out the word vagina
in his hipster voice,
and then I thought of Ariana reines and the way she says vagina
a lot.
It made me think of mine.
Iban, Eme. “Thank you Roommate” 2016
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Iban, Eme. “Clarion Valley.” 2016
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Sob
I am in the library
typing up a response paper
and I'm crying
"You're not good enough"
go to sleep baby bird you’ll feel better in the morning,
yet I must stay awake to type this paper.
All day people constantly scratching my ears,
hello what's your major
hello what's your year
hello what's your life story
all the while circling around me,
dragging me down to the pits of their fiery pit,
i don't trust anybody
And i can't stop crying.
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MIke. “Bronx, NY” 2016. JPG
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Seeing God
My stomach is in knots
As gnarly looking as that Ithaca pizza place in the mall,
I can’t believe this,
I’m typing up my essay
And it deleted!
Finitio,
Bye,
Why did it delete?
I worked so hard,
At creating the perfect sentences,
I was so proud of my diction,
And now it’s gone.
I walk home,
I’m tired of being at the library,
I can’t believe this.
I go on my balcony and scream,
Howling to the moon,
So primal i lose myself in it,
God please help me,
I’m just trying my best,
To past all these tests,
Please just let me rest.
I’m trying to be a good citizen,
I keep my hoodie at home not to scare
Any concerned neighborhood watch,
God I know you hear me.
And then I see God
My eyes saying it’s just the trees you always see,
Off your balcony,
But my soul is saying God is here
Ask him again for help.
I plead with God to make things better,
And then I get so overwhelmed I walk back inside and go to sleep.
*************
I wake up and go to the library
3 hours before class
And it’s there on my desktop.
Miracles do happen.
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Iban, Eme. “Ocean Beach” 2015. JPG
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Black Girl Turned African Turned Human
I was so used to pain that
I thought my body had become a permanent vessel for it.
Deep down we are all matter right,
we all matter
What is matter?
I heard it can’t be created nor destroyed,
So are we all being recycled?
My matter fights against being good,
The person who used these molecules before me must have been a real badass,
And I’m trying so hard to be good,
Trying to make it easier for the next person,
To be a better person.
Some people choose to be demons,
Donating flesh to the core of the earth
Firey hell
Demons.
I want to transcend into outer space
or be a mermaid
The coolness of the ocean so appealing,
The blackness of the milky way so unrevealing,
So what do you choose?
To what cause;
Yin yang
Evil or good
Love or hate
Power or meekness-
do you donate your matter?
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Keating, Maggie. “Eme Revealed.” 2016. JPG
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Iban, Eme. “Selfie in Brooklyn” 2016. JPG
Mike. “Bronx, NY” 2016. JPG
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Mike. “Bronx, NY” 2016. JPG
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Trump
The day after the 2016 presidential election,
I stood outside of the classroom,
Talking to my mother on the phone,
I didn’t want to go into class, not really.
But I didn’t want to be on the phone with my mother,
Constantly asking me “how’s school”,
Like mother Cornell is 151 years old,
Cornell Good,
you mean how I’m doing at Cornell,
That’s good too.
But back to what I was saying
I couldn’t be in class,
I couldn’t let the people who had voted for Trump see
my face break,
I couldn’t walk my pain into class,
It wouldn’t stay on a leash,
I never let them see me sweat.
Why I ate Chinese Food on Thanksgiving
#nodapl
#nothanksgiving
I wanted something normal on Thanksgiving Day,
Because it was a normal day,
You see I’m trying to be a silent activist,
I’m sticking it to the man.
No thanksgiving for me no ham.
I’m not celebrating a holiday
built on genocide
People will cry about trump,
And how they can’t believe that so many people wen with the flow and
voted for him,
Yet still act like sheep and follow tradition.
This thanksgiving I was thankful for me!
I wanted to be as strange as the poets we were reading in class,
By not going home.
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Transcend
One of my english professors,
Told me she corrects her books ten times,
To ensure it’s perfect.
At first I didn’t understand,
How she could look at the same body of work ten times
And not want to vomit.
Then I realized does anything ever stay stagnant?
Even writing?
I remember that I was walking on the beach one day,
And I saw a couch.
And I wondered who put it there,
And why it looked so beautiful,
This man made thing on an earth made beach.
I kept thinking about this,
Until I begged my friend,
To do my first photo shoot.
Maybe ideas are constantly being recycled,
Or maybe work can be
transcended the more you
hack away at the
Fat surrounding it,
Until it becomes lean?
Sorry to ramble,
But it was so beautiful,
To hear that someone cares
enough,
To look at the same thing
ten times.
Brigantti, Brian. “Queen.” 2015
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Baptism
I moved to Cali because I didn’t want to be on autopilot,
Most people don’t live life anyway.
Everybody secretly feeding their pain;
Eat the pain away
Drink the pain away
Smoke fuck lie steal kill
Ignore people solely focus on you.
I just wanted to be pure,
To be the egg without the sperm,
To be reborn.
I look around and for the first time I’m surrounded by love,
Amniotic sac containing belly-busting laughs, good food, good conversation,
How beautiful it is to make yourself a child again,
To be completely free.
To realize no one is my worst enemy but me.
Iban, Eme. “The Boys Wanted A Jumping Photo” 2015
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Grateful
I am grateful for everything I have in life,
Wait that makes no sense.
Can you truly ever have anything in life?
Do you own anything?
I remember as a kid watching
Church sermons on tv with my mama
Because we didn’t go to church that Sunday,
And the pastor said,
The only thing you’re promised death in this life is death.
I thought,
And thought,
And thought-
What else are we promised in this life?
Surely it can’t be as cruel as only obtaining death.
But I realized that maybe death is beautiful,
Because it challenges us to be greater right now,
Not right there over there
In the future somewhere.
And do we ever truly die?
Our matter being reused
To make a plastic water bottle
For the CEO of Target to drink,
Is that type of ending bleak?
I’m grateful that I’m getting an education,
For the drilling,
That now new infrastructure has been implanted in my psyche.
I’m just grateful.
So grateful.
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Iban, Eme. “Hermano de Guatemala” 2015
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References
Heaney, Seamus. “Punishment by Seamus Heaney - Full Text &Amp; Analysis.” Creative Writing
Guild
, 23 Oct. 2015, creativewritingguild.com/sl/analysis/punishment-seamus-heaney-full-text/.
Hunter, Gwendolyn Brooks - Poem. “A Bronzeville Mother Loiters In Mississippi. Meanwhile, A
Mississippi Mother Burns Bacon Poem.” PoemHunter.com
,
www.poemhunter.com/poem/a-bronzeville-mother-loiters-in-mississippi-mean/.
O'Hara, Frank. Lunch Poems
. San Francisco, City Lights Books, 1964.
Plath, Sylvia. “Two Views of a Cadaver Room.” THE BRITISH LIBRARY
Http://Www.bl.uk/Copyrightstatement.html, 13 Oct. 2009,
www.bl.uk/learning/langlit/poetryperformance/plath/poem2/plath2.html.
Brooks, Gwendolyn. “Poets.org.” Poets.org
, Academy of American Poets,
www.poets.org/poetsorg/poem/we-real-cool.
Reines, Ariana. Mercury
. Albany, NY, Fence Books, 2011.
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