Blue Rider 2025 : simplebooklet.com

Table of ContentsLetter From the Editor .................................................................................... 1Picking Movies by Marlow Darling .................................................................4Jazz by Kaelyn Gibson. ....................................................................................5Self-Reection by Kevin Witten ......................................................................6The Candler Tunnels by Andes Finch .............................................................7Taylor Swift by William Rudolph ....................................................................8Raven by May Seydel ..................................................................................... 10Venice Beach Skate by Oliver Gillett ..............................................................11No Last Stop by Calvin Jardina ..................................................................... 12Drip Drop by Olivia Colby ............................................................................. 13Resin Pendant by Ares Dekel ........................................................................ 14Improvement by Marlow Darling ................................................................. 15Railway Collage by Izzy Yepe ........................................................................ 169 by Kenzie Leanord ...................................................................................... 17Because One Time Someone Told Someone That All I Talk About is Boys by Lucy Rotenberg ...........................................................................................................18What is Written on Your Body That You See or Don’t See? by Daniela Elias-da Silva .......................................................................................................... 20Head in the Clouds by Luna Jerpe ............................................................... 21Bike by Mia Chihade ......................................................................................22Life Walk by Jasper Sibille ............................................................................23Divergent by Nayla Kanaan .......................................................................... 24Resolving the Dissolve of Trauma by Sienna Vanegas .................................26White Rabbit by CJ Crenshaw .......................................................................27Beats Per Minute by Rachel Ringstrom ........................................................34Haiku by Benjamin Moon-Chun ...................................................................35Tips on Removing a Ring by Mari Wu ..........................................................36Cup Set by Sisi Elkinson ................................................................................ 37

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Haiku by Benjamin Moon-Chun .................................................................. 38Painters by Josh Bethany ..............................................................................39Lessons Learned and Jackets Ruined by Elle Rose ..................................... 40A Runner’s High by Adonait Shewangizaw.................................................. 44Field of Dreams by Ryan Liu ........................................................................ 45I Pledge Allegiance to the Flag by Marlow Darling .......................................46Wedding Vows by Gabrielle Howard ............................................................47Geometric Box by Elyssa Golivesky-Bloom ..................................................48Passing Time by Gabi Fuenzalida .................................................................49Lost and Found by Zee Verani ......................................................................50Overgrowth by Finn Anderson ......................................................................53From the Bones and Worms, Bluets Grow by Sonia Alizadeh .....................54Haiku by Benjamin Moon-Chun ...................................................................55Brass Necklace by Lailah Muhammad ..........................................................56Charlie by Declan Johnston ..........................................................................57Multimedia Mill Collage by Karli Stemple ....................................................62Symbiosis of Life and Death by Addy Duitsman ..........................................63Centre by Jayden Clay .................................................................................. 64Kudzu by John Henry AhmannLloyd ...........................................................65On the Line by Izzy Wood .............................................................................67On Defense by John Henry AhmannLloyd ...................................................68Comfort in Company by Hannah Campbell .................................................. 71Soccer by Marlow Darling .............................................................................72The Cul-de-Sac by JW Pelessier .................................................................... 73Knit: A Haiku by Ella Dameron ....................................................................74Winter Wonderland by Kaitlyn Hilimire ......................................................75Ode to Snowshoes by Sonia Alizadeh ............................................................76Perfection by Suriyah Frame .........................................................................77Of Things Found Where They Are Not Supposed To Be by Zoë Daniel-Arillo ...........................................................................................................78Apples by Kayley Simmons. ..........................................................................81

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Window Washers by Sarah Abraham ...........................................................82Therapy by Marlow Darling ..........................................................................83Burn Academy by David Oglesby-Smith ...................................................... 84A Bitter Betrayal by Lauren Dixon ................................................................85Confrontation with a Melancholy Self by Isha Parashar ..............................86Burning Bridges by Hazel Hughes ................................................................87Reections by Katy Cywilko ..........................................................................89Walk Like a New Yorker by Alex Huynh ...................................................... 90Ode to Water by Katelyn Hatch.....................................................................91Hungry Hungry Turtle by Rei Henderson ....................................................92English by Marlow Darling............................................................................93Ghosts by Kathryn Hales ...............................................................................94Bang Bang by Kevin Witten ...........................................................................95Skull by Ava Miranda ....................................................................................96Haiku by Benjamin Moon-Chun ...................................................................97Metamorphosis by Madeleine Moon-Chun ..................................................98Ode to (Four-Leaf C)lovers by Lucy Rotenberg ............................................99Yushan and Taroko by Gabi Fuenzalida .....................................................100Life Matter by Ella Dameron ....................................................................... 101Night Sky by Ben Walton-Scott .................................................................. 104Leftovers by Caroline Grin .......................................................................105Dragony and Cardinal: Oil on Wood by Ella Kurzius ............................... 106In the Meadow by Elliott Mathews ............................................................. 107Fungi Ceramic Set by Liam Tang ................................................................ 110Swept Away by Mari Wu ..............................................................................113Haiku by Benjamin Moon-Chun ..................................................................114Under Surveillance by William Rudolph .....................................................115To the Son of the Wind-Swept .....................................................................116The Ship by Olivia Colby ..............................................................................117Wherever You Ngo by Audrey Ferguson ..................................................... 118Too Small Overalls by Kayley Simmons .......................................................119

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Why Do You Want To Be A Doctor? by Frank Yeboah ............................... 120Stitch It Back Up by Madeleine Moon-Chun .............................................. 125Garden by Madeleine Moon-Chun ..............................................................126The Savanna by Gabrielle Howard .............................................................. 127Vocabulary by Marlow Darling ...................................................................128Dune 3 by Alex Slopsema ............................................................................129

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1Letter From the EditorThis spring, Atlanta is alive with color: green leaves, pale yellow pollen, and a rainbow of owers. Maybe because it’s my last spring in the city before college, I’ve especially tuned in to my surroundings and the home I’ll be leaving behind. This experience makes me reect on springs that have passed by eetingly, and it makes me wonder about next year: when will the owers pop up in Michigan?There is a certain strength in the seasons. They’re steady and eternal, familiar, yet refreshing when they change. In this edition of The Blue Rider, the pieces are sorted into seasons based on color imagery, tone, and content. As a result, I am hopeful that the magazine will be reminiscent of seasonal qualities. Before this year, I knew Paideia students were talented writers, but I was astounded by the beauty and depth of each and every piece of writing in this edition. In fact, it was dicult to sort them into seasons because they were all so complex and multilayered. I loved reading everyone’s work, and I encourage the Paideia community to keep writing and being creative, an important skill in this day and age. I would now like to thank the individuals who made this edition possible. First of all, thank you to all of our fabulous editors! I am so proud of and grateful for all of you. A big thank you to our poetry and prose editors who worked extremely hard these past few months to improve and polish each submission. Thank you to our copy editors, who diligently combed through the entirety of the magazine. I would also like to thank everyone who participated in the layout process—this dedicated crew spent countless breaks and lunches in the computer lab crafting each page of the magazine. A huge thank you goes to Lucy Rotenberg, our incredible managing editor. Lucy, I couldn’t have asked for a better co-leader and friend! I am so grateful for all of the hard work and enthusiasm that you

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8Taylor Swiftby William RudolphTaylor Swift saved my life. She didn’t, but I was told to hook the reader.Now, particularly intrepid readers might be wondering: what does Taylor Swift really mean to me? Not much. I don’t listen to her. In this essay, I will use her to convey something bigger.While it is true that I probably haven’t listened to more than an hour of T. Swift in my life, it is false to say that she has had no impact on me. My younger sister and Taylor often deviously raid my Bluetooth speaker. My music taste is very rened—jazz and the like—so I get upset, and my sister apologizes. Band-Aids don’t x bullet holes, though, and I know it will happen again. As a result of this, I think a lot about Swifties. We know the type: pre-teen and teenage girls whose existences are so devoid of value that Taylor Swift’s similarly empty lyrics speak to them in a pervert-ed cycle that reects the mass commercialization of heartbreak……is what I might want to say. But I think doing so is about the most dangerous thing possible and should be avoided at all costs. That was hyperbole, yes, but in a sphere that prioritizes diversity and tolerance of thought, I am often surprised by our intolerance. So, when someone evangelizes Taylor Swift to me, I try to ght o the impulse to reach for cheap comebacks, and I instead ask what she means to them.Often, people will say that Tay Tay has guided them out of some of the toughest times of their lives–eating disorders, depression, friend drama. When I hear this, my response cannot and should not be “Well, her lyrics are shallow,” or “Have you seen how much she ies her private plane?!” Sometimes I still say things like this, but I

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9try to get smarter, get harder in the nick of time. Essentially, maybe Taylor Swift is a money-hungry-politically-calculating-PR-driven diva, but she still means a lot to people I know.This is the big idea she represents—simply the fact that she is im-portant to you means she is important to me. My favorite musician, Jacob Collier, has something to say about this. He says that there is no such thing as bad music, just music that feels right for you. And if it doesn’t feel right for you, so what? It feels right for somebody. I bring up this idea—compassion, tolerance, or whatever—because I think it is missed in my sphere; a super-educated, privileged subset of the population, ostensibly progressive. We preach tolerance and inclusivity, but in the day-to-day trenches of human interaction, we often miss the mark. I think this is because we sometimes chase compassion for the sake of winning the compassion game, as if to prove that we are not the problem with this country. What gets left out is what the Swifties taught me—the fact that someone is the way they are makes them valid.Remembering this is hard, but I try to force myself out of a certain type of default setting. Instead of lobbing a cheap insult at the ignorant family member espousing political craziness, I’ll ask them how they’ve been. Demeaning them comes at great peril, as does insulting the evangelizing Swiftie, because the moment you push someone away, it is impossible to bring them closer. Even though her lyrics don’t speak to me, I know they speak to somebody.

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18Because One Time Someone Told Someone That All I Talk About is Boysby Lucy Rotenberg“And then he was like ‘come here often?’ and then I was like, in a deadpan voice, ‘no what makes you say that’ and then he was like ‘I guess the uniform’ and then I shrugged in a really cool way and then he was like ‘so do you go to school around here?’ and then I told him I was in high school and then he was like ‘cool’ and then he all but sprinted away from me and exited the pool deck. I had no idea that he was so old; he looked around my age! He was beautiful, though; if only I were a little older.…” My friends, having already in-terrupted my teenage soliloquy with a few chimes of giggles, looked at me now. I assumed they were anticipating some witty remark, so I nished strong: “I don’t think I’d ever been prouder than when I got the attention of that college boy.” I can really tell a story. My body language, voice inections, and word choice made the somewhat false and most certainly performative tale wildly captivating to my small audience. My knee-jerk reaction used to be as follows: wow, what an attention whore, because in my public recollections, I always left out the fact that I knew he was in college long before he approached me because I overheard him talking to some friends by the diving board. No-body heard that every time I told the story I felt like a recreational sherman holding up a particularly impressive, half-alive bass and smiling awkwardly towards a camera— that I felt like it was somehow my fault when he approached me, that I had premeditat-ed the interaction. Horrible! The poor guy was oblivious to my age (fteen). He didn’t do anything wrong. I wish I could stop talking about it. I wonder why I can’t. I should not be proud to have gotten this guy’s attention. Is proud the right descriptor? Certainly fullled because of male attention but unable to determine the cause (ado-lescent desire or internalized patriarchal values) is a bit wordy…But I did wake up extra early every morning for my summer job to style my hair in pigtails and weigh my eyelashes down with

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19mascara, knowing it would melt in the heat and obstruct my gaze with drips. I used my favorite lip balm— Burt’s Bees g shimmer— because I loved how well the shade matched my mildly crisped July cheeks. Clearly, I wanted to reel in that guy’s interest, then display my latest catch to the masses later, not because of any genuine attraction to him, but because I felt the need to know that I could do it— that I could bait and hook him. I’ve read articles, stories, and novels that explore how a need for male validation can inform actions. The works of Joyce Car-ol Oates (“Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been”) and Jamaica Kincaid (Lucy) have particularly resonated with me. In other words, I can understand, at least from an intellectual stand-point, why I may have liked experiencing and talking about the interaction with the college boy whose name I never learned. The status quo expects me to crave attention without overtly being an attention-seeker (whore…), to feign ignorance without being overtly coy, sure. But what if I really do crave attention? And maybe I am coy sometimes! Now what? It’s rather troubling to realize that these theories have real, practical implications: that I can’t intellectualize everything in my wobbly young brain, even though scholarly works have buttressed my understanding of my perspective thus far.If there is a root cause of my tendency to seek attention, I doubt I will ever understand it to its full extent, no matter how much I may want to. That said, my awareness of and ability to articulate my fear of being a self-proclaimed attention whore for the wrong reasons has helped me feel reassured. Through lots of introspec-tion (and therapy), I have gained the tools necessary to identify moments of attention-seeking without automatically assuming I do so because there is something inherently wrong with who I am and how I act. I can now condently step into spotlights without shame on many occasions, but I can also recognize times where seeking at-tention is not productive nor in line with my morals, allowing me to occasionally step away from attention without attaching guilt over being an attention whore or an inherently awed person. Simply put, I wear what I want, but I have tried to stop talking about that tragically collegiate boy.

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24Divergentby Nayla KanaanOne of the fundamental aspects of being human Is your right to a voiceYou say you treat everyone with humanity But you don’t listen to voices who sound dierent And you live in a society Where if someone questions youYou ask “did I stutter?” As if that would have made it invalid Where people don’t consider themselves ableist If they can’t see what makes you disabled Where my headphones are seen as disrespectAnd people scold me to look them in the eyesNo, it is human nature to search for whom they are greater thanSo they can look down from a pedestal We are taught early to nd the distinct We spot the dierence Find which of the three doesn’t belong We transform special into an insultConformity is the backbone of society What is unique is by nature grotesque The rst bird cut o its wings So it wouldn’t be shunned By the beings still groundedWhat is not uniform is defective trapped at the back of the clearance aisleGiven at half price To whatever sorry soul will take itNo one remembers mutilation is the key to survival Evolution is born of changeWe try to make it great againWithout qualifying when it was greatSeveral of what we call disabilities Are evolutionary traits that haven’t left

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25We aren’t brokenYou changed the world and now we don’t quite tIn the depths of the ocean everything is blindYou grab a ashlight and call them disabledYou don’t call your ashlight an accommodationYou oer the ashlights to the shAnd claim it’s their fault they no longer tIn the world you broke and called improvedAbility doesn’t dene disabilityAverages dene dierenceWe use dierence to dene disabilityNone of us yOr breathe underwaterTo the sh and the birds, we’re brokenIt’s easy to be normalWhen you dene normalcyYou call my headphones an accommodationBut I wear them because my hearing Is sharper BetterMore sensitiveAnd the world you built is too loudI’m the one with the greater abilityYet you look down on meAverage is not the greatestYet dierence is detriment to valueMaybe the system is broken I’m not

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27White Rabbitby CJ CrenshawYou are considering hanging up on your best friend of twen-ty-eight years if she doesn’t stop talking about the time last week-end when she ran into Mia Hardwick at a Fellini’s and the two Hardwick toddler boys were watching Cocomelon on their iPads, and Kristy wondered what this world was coming to and if the kids of this generation would grow up and regret the fact that they had lost the best years of their lives, when they should have been roaming shoeless in the streets and eating wet cigarette butts and befriending rabid squirrels, or whatever, and she considered going up to Mia Hardwick and giving her a piece of her mind, but then she didn’t because she thought it would make her sound way too millennial, and you’re about sixty-ve percent sure she isn’t utiliz-ing millennial stereotypes correctly but what do you even care when you’re about to be so goddamn, humiliatingly, unforgivably late?“Oh my gosh, Kris. I’m so sorry, but I really gotta run soon. God, I have this stupid thing I have to go to…” You resent the fake chipperness in your voice—why do you have to do that female thing of always pretending like your needs are both silly and optional? It’s clear from Kristy’s silence that she doesn’t know or care what you’re talking about, but you go ahead anyway. “You remem-ber this guy I told you about? The one I met on the dating app Dylan’s sister told me to get?” Kristy makes a slight cat-hocking-up-hairball sound at the mention of your ex-husband, as is her MO, but you ignore it. After all, you hate the bastard too, but you can only focus on resentment for so long. “He wanted to go grab coee this afternoon, and I didn’t really know how to say no…I mean, if noth-ing else it’ll get me out of the house, right? I told him I’d meet him at 3, and the place is like in Buckhead or whatever, so—”“Totally, no problem!” Kristy makes a sound like a stied yawn and shifts around in her chair, her peasant skirt crinkling. “I’ll get out of your hair. Tell the girls I said hi, all right?”“Aww, I will!” Your ngers are actively itching with the desire

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28to hang up the phone and blow this popsicle stand, but no, control. After a solid three minutes of dancing around further Dylan con-versation, oozing politenesses and promises to meet for lunch soon when you’re both less busy—haha—you hang up and check the time. 1:30. Ten minutes behind schedule. As you search for your coat under piles of laundry that an actual adult probably would have dealt with long ago, you can hear Freya in the kitchen babbling along with her Thomas the Train DVD. Aster’s probably shushing her as she eats Cinnamon Toast Crunch and nishes her homework. You think about how good Aster has always been about homework—getting it done right after school, no stalling, and not stopping until it’s polished enough for her liking. You know it’s wrong to judge your child based on her academic achievements and intellectual self-suciency, like some kind of Stepford wife, but you can’t help it. You were never like that in middle school.A cry of “Mom!” erupts from the kitchen, slicing cleanly through your thoughts. You get up and hurry to the kitchen in case something’s wrong with the baby, but it’s just Aster glowering down at her Common Core worksheet like she wants to damage it in its very soul, CTC sitting soggy and untouched in the bowl beside her. Freya giggles at Percy’s on-screen antics, oblivious.“Is everything okay?” You’re already dreading the inevitable request for help. You know you don’t remember seventh-grade geometry well enough to make any dierence, and besides, you’re not naive enough to think you can make it uptown and nd a park-ing space in the time remaining after this mother-daughter study session. The guy won’t reschedule, you know—it was hard enough to settle on plans with him in the rst place.“I hate cylinders.” Aster slouches in her chair like a limp noo-dle, casting a forlorn look at her ruined cereal. You feel a surge of guilt for being a terrible mother and pull out a chair next to her.“What are you working on right now?” Her grimly functional worksheet is already giving you Proustian ashbacks to your ju-nior-high years. Oh, Jesus. Aster sighs heavily and points at problem number 9 with the tip of her pencil. “The problem is asking what cross section will form if this cylinder is cut at the base, but the options for A and B

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29look the exact same. Look at it!”Cross section? Math didn’t use to have cross sections, right? “Um…are you sure one isn’t a circle and one is an oval?” Aster sighs again and gives you the look you deserve. You take a deep breath, check your phone. “Okay. I have like fteen minutes until I absolutely need to get going to meet with this guy. Let’s start on ChatGPT, all right? They always explain things really simply.” The wheels in your brain are starting to turn, your parental-homework-help instincts clicking on after having been de-activated for a long hibernation. “Then if that doesn’t work, we can call Moira. I’m sure she’d be happy to give us an extra session—it’d be at extra charge, but let’s not worry about that right now—”“Who’re you meeting, Mom?” Aster peers at you, her hatred of 3-D shapes temporarily for-gotten, and you feel a dull thunk as the elevator in your gut drops three stories. It’s a normal question to ask. After all, Aster has barely seen you leave the house in six months except to drop her o at softball and make absolutely necessary grocery and pharmacy runs, and now here you are casually mentioning that you’re going to meet up with someone, a male someone no less. You really should have expected this, but for some reason it hadn’t occurred to you that your oh-so-carefully-planned escape out the back door might be interrupted, and now you’re both just staring at each other and you can’t, can’t look away from the faraway gaze in your daughter’s eyes. It’s the same one as what you would imagine a chickadee would have as they suddenly realized that they were ying right into a tor-nado. This look terries you, and oh, yes, you recognize it too: this is what it looks like when a girl realizes her mother could collapse and shatter at any moment.You look away rst. When the words nally come out of your mouth, they’re both a relief and painful, like the feeling of sucking cool water down your parched throat after a long run. “Danielle suggested this….dating app to me about a month ago—”“What, like Tinder?” Aster’s face just about pales in horror, which makes you laugh in spite of yourself. “No, not like Tinder. It’s for old people.” You take a dramatic pause. This is the part where Aster is supposed to say something

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30to the eect of, Oh, my dearest mother, whatever are you saying? You are truly the epitome of youth! but she’s still just staring at you, engrossed in some horrifying waking nightmare in which her mom has an interior life, so maybe not. “At rst it was just kind of sitting there on my phone, but then this guy from Roswell messaged me about Animorphs—”“Animorphs?”“Yeah, no, it was weird. I guess he likes the books a lot? He had Edriss 562 as his prole picture…anyway. We eventually started talking about normal things, and we just sort of…sparked, I guess.” What a cliché. Also, Roswell? Your daughter is judging you so hard right now. You hold your breath, waiting for the explosion of shock and anger and cutting, bitter comparisons between your date and her innitely superior father—I mean, you’ve seen those divorce movies. But Aster just looks down at the table. You glance and see that Freya has tipped her sister’s cereal bowl over, scattering the disintegrating squares across the table and leaving a giant milk puddle. You know you should clean it up, but you don’t move. Instead, you watch Aster watch it as it expands and seeps into the smooth blond wood, seconds from staining. Finally, she glances up and smiles. It’s just a touch too eort-fully genuine to be real. “I’m happy for you, Mom.” She takes a lock of hair between her ngers, twirling it rapidly before letting it drop against her cheek. A nervous habit—she’s had it since she was a tod-dler. “As long as you’re happy about him, that’s the most important thing, you know?”Oh. So she’s seen those divorce movies too. On the TV, the narrator chirps, “Now Thomas is as happy as can be!” and Freya giggles and kicks her legs against her highchair. You cannot think of a single thing to say.Finally, Aster asks, “Didn’t you say you had to leave at 1:45?”You whip the phone out of your pocket. Check it, then check it again.“Oh….honey….I’m so—” “It’s ne, Mom. I can go on ChatGPT by myself.” The words are gentle, with no hint of sarcasm or resentment, and you know, you know, you never would have been so forgiving of your mother when you were thirteen. A lump rises in your throat.

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31Aster gives her sister a sideways hug, ignoring her fussing as the episode’s credits begin to roll. “I’ll keep an eye on Ray-ray. The rest of the DVDs are in the cabinet upstairs, right?”“Yeah—on the top shelf. You might need to get the ladder.” Aster nods and turns to watch the credits scroll down the screen, leaving you frozen to your chair, just like Kristy’s beloved wet ciga-rette butt clinging to the pavement.* Forty-ve minutes later, here you are: at the baingly named Oceanview Coee Company, and having a mild panic attack. You park, which is its own odyssey (who decided it was a smart idea to replace old-fashioned parking meters with this ParkMobile garbage, and where can you hunt them down?), and walk through the ckle Georgia rain to the shop’s front doors. The business, of course, inhabits one of those former factory buildings that Atlanta gentriers apparently nd irresistible: exposed-brick walls, steel oors, ceilings rife with exposed wires that almost certainly violate multiple safety codes. You recognize the guy instantly—not from his online photos, because he doesn’t have any, but because he’s the only one sitting alone. You quickly catalogue the major details: he’s hunched over his phone, brown Carhartt jacket wrapped tightly around his shoul-ders, collar up. Flaxen hair pasted to his forehead, small, light eyes framed by horn-rimmed glasses, pinprick-sized freckles on his pale skin. You approach the table, and his eyes immediately snap away from the phone and latch onto yours.“Cora Elizabeth?” No.Did you ever tell him your middle name? Of course you didn’t, why would that even come up? Okay….okay. “Just Cora’s all right, thanks.” You can sense that he wants a bigger reaction out of you, but you force yourself not to give him the satisfaction. Sliding into a distressed-wood chair, you grab a menu, scanning the lunch options without really registering them. Eventu-ally, the weight of the silence between the two of you is oppressive,

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32and you breathe in and say, “You’re Alec, right?” From above the top of your menu, you see him nod.“How was the drive down from Roswell? I heard the trac on I-75 was terrible.” Jesus, you sound like seven rats in a trenchcoat cosplaying as an adult woman. Alec doesn’t respond.Your stupid, curious eyes want to rove over his face again, see if there’s anything about his features or expression that might give him away, but you yell at yourself to keep staring at the list of potential allergens in the vegetarian “BLT.” This isn’t a movie, it’s a meeting, a transaction, and he could have a million dierent faces and not a single one of them would stick in your mind for longer than a second. What matters is getting through this and getting out. If you make one wrong move, he knows you’re single, he knows you just got divorced and you’re struggling to make ends meet like you should have known you would with your useless little liberal-arts education….and he knows you have kids, too. Even worse than that—he knows you have—“I don’t live in Roswell.You open your mouth to speak, but he cuts you o lazily, like a knife sinking into a mushy stick of butter. “I have to be home in an hour and a half, so if you wouldn’t mind, I’d like to jump on into what you want from this session and how I can help you achieve your goals within the limited amount of time that we have to work together.” His voice has a Low Country twang to it, you’ve just real-ized, and it almost convinces you that you’re talking to someone like your grandpa or your uncle, someone who just wants what’s best for you, someone you love. “So can I start by asking what your primary goal is from our professional relationship? What would be the most fruitful topic for you to spend this time discussing? What do you want the most? We can go in any direction you please.” In the back of your mind, you are thinking of your children. It’s the worst cliche to be thinking of your kids at a time like this, but who cares, you might be making a decision you’ll never be able to come back from, you can think about anything you goddamn want to, screw clichés, and you want to think about your kids. You think of Freya, probably watching another episode of her favorite show by

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33now, happy and pigtailed and innocent. You wonder if she won-ders where her mother’s gone, or if she’s so used to seeing you be a shadow of yourself that the idea of “mother” is only a dim one in her head, an abstraction rather than a comfort.Then, you think of Aster, and it knocks the air out of you, rough and fast. She’s still at the kitchen table, mothering herself and her sister besides, struggling through her math worksheet, thinking her mother is on a date, God, she thinks you’re on a date. She thinks you’re moving on. Alec makes a short humming noise, equal parts encouraging and expectant, and you glance up. You realize you’ve dropped the menu. You’re without your shield, exposed. He gazes into your eyes. What do you want the most? And you know what the answer is. You might hate it, and you might hate yourself for it, but you know that there’s only room in your brain for this one answer.You take a deep breath. Since you’re not sure what the etiquette is when meeting with a hitman, you start by being as clear and explicit as possible. “I want my ex-husband, Dylan Mendoccino, dead.”

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40Lessons Learned and Jackets Ruinedby Elle RoseDon’t talk to strangers. Always tell the truth. They’re only mean to you because they like you. Why? Because I said so. We, as kids, are taught from a very young age to listen and trust our parents. We are told things over and over again, phrases and sayings drilled into our minds. We trust our parents with everything, wholeheartedly and loyally. They are our guardians, our protectors, providers, and role models. But, sometimes, they make mistakes that change the way we think about them, or the world, forever. I sit in the back of my dad’s old Toyota, also known as “The Stinky Car,” as we drive home from Winnona Park Elementary School. Phish plays through the staticky speakers, and my dad quietly sings along, performing a drum solo on the steering wheel. “John said my art was bad today,” I call out over the music, interrupting the private concert. Still tapping the wheel and bobbing his head, my dad calmly says, “Don’t let that bother you, Bellus. If boys are mean to you that means they like you.” He shoots me a sly smile in the ngerprint smeared rearview mirror, “Maybe John has a crush on you.” I nod, not fully understanding, but trusting him. What reason did I have to doubt what he was saying? He knows everything and would never lie to me. I get out of the car and run inside to see my mom and tell her about what Dad told me. “Mom! Guess what?” I yell as I run up the scued wooden stairs, my thick-soled light-up Sketchers producing a wild rainbow light show. My mom stands at the top of the steps, William propped on her hip and drooling (per usual). “Tell me,” she says as she takes my

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41backpack and pulls me in for a hug. “John likes me,” I say proudly, “He told me my art was bad because he likes me.” She shakes her head and laughs, “Well, it sounds to me like he does. Boys are weird like that.” The rest of the day all I could think about was that I knew John’s big secret. I knew why he, and other boys, were mean to girls—they liked us! I went to school the next day excited to see him with my newfound information. Throughout the next few months, John continued to tease me. He would comment on my frizzy hair, the way I held my pencil, and even my coloring skills. The relentless critiques only made me smile. I was certain that it was coming from a place of admiration. Eventually, the weather matched John’s words—cold and frigid. My attitude towards him, however, remained the same. I felt so much excitement going into the winter months because I could nally start to wear my favorite purple puer jacket. I wore it to school every day, ignoring a certain someone’s (I’ll give you three guesses who) comments about me looking like a grape. One fateful day, I stood talking to my friends on top of a dirt hill during recess. The hill was the place to be at recess. You could roll down it, race people on it, or, a crowd favorite, throw classroom items and watch them shatter at the bottom (a crowd favorite). I personally preferred the boring activities on the hill: making daisy chains and playing hand slap games with my friends. But this particular day, a brave third grader decided to let someone push him down the hill. In awe of his courage, everyone gathered around and watched as he did at least ve somersaults on his way down. I turned away, rolling my eyes and laughing with my friends. My hands sat in the pockets of my jacket, warm eece encompassing them in a fuzzy hug. Suddenly, I felt a strong shove right in the middle of my shoulders. Everything slowed down as the gray dirt ground moved closer and closer to my face. Upon impact, my legs ew up and I mirrored the third grader I watched moments before. When I nally stopped rolling, I lay there for a minute, looking up

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42at the dreary sky. A cloud of dust oated closely on the hill, tracing the path of my tumble. I felt like the cracked calculators that littered the ground surrounding me. I slowly lifted myself up, looked up, and gasped. John stood at the top of the hill, cackling like a villain in the Disney movies I loved. I began to cry and lowered my head to shield myself from everyone’s eyes when I noticed the dark red streaks on my jacket. Blood dripped down the front of my perfect, purple puer jacket. I touched my lips and saw crimson on my pale ngertips. Ignoring the worried voices calling after me, I ran inside to clean my puer.My father picked me up early that day. My father’s profanity replaced Phish as he told me to never talk to John again. I felt betrayed by my parents and by the boy I thought liked me. For months, I laughed o his destructive words, under the impression that I was special. I was told that he was only mean to me because he liked me by the two most important people in my life, and they were wrong. The reassurance and security those words once gave me now lled me with sadness and frustration. I didn’t understand. It was strange to me to know that my parents, the all-knowing people I once trusted with everything in me, had led me astray. This was the rst time I ever even acknowledged the possibility of my parents being wrong. Through my hurt and anger, I learned a very important lesson. I learned to question people and the things they told me without explanation. I learned that showing respect for someone is the ultimate form of admiration and appreciation. I also learned how to clean blood stains out of polyester. That day on the hill changed the way I heard my parents’ voices, but it also allowed me to discover my own voice and trust my own instincts. Looking back, I realize I should have known all along that John had no secret crush or hidden admiration; he was just an immature, insecure bully. Standing up for myself wasn’t something I saw as a possibility then, but I’ve come to learn that it’s not about confrontation, it’s about recognizing when someone’s actions don’t deserve my attention or energy. More importantly, it’s about

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43trusting myself, that I know the dierence between kindness and cruelty, no matter what other people may tell me. That moment on the hill taught me that no one else, not even my all-knowing parents, can always explain why people behave the way they do. I’ve also realized this moment wasn’t just my story; it’s a part of growing up for everyone. There comes a point when every child’s belief that their parents know everything begins to crack. It’s a disorienting feeling, but also a freeing one. My parents weren’t trying to mislead me; they were passing down the lessons they were, with the best intentions. But through that experience, I learned that sometimes even those we trust most can be wrong, and that’s okay. What matters is learning to question, reect, and ultimately build our own understanding of the world.

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50Lost and Foundby Zee Verani I was the one who found her, behind the couch. I didn’t know she was dead at rst. I crawled over the back of the couch and sat next to her, knees tucked in front of my chest. I ran my ngers through her fur. I scratched the crest of her head. I gently shook her body; she didn’t move. Still, I didn’t know she was dead. I knew what death was. I knew that when something was dead, it didn’t wake up ever again. I knew about the “better place” my grandpa had gone to last fall. My parents had talked to me before we saw him in the hospital. My mom said, “He won’t be the Papa you know. He can’t play with you or talk very much.” My dad said, “You don’t have to come with us.” I went anyway. I saw his cold, wrinkled skin. Almost turning blue, waiting for him to die. He didn’t say anything to us, and I didn’t say anything to him. Maybe I should have. He died that night. All this to say, I knew what death was. So, I sat on the oor, next to my dead cat who I didn’t know was dead. My knees rubbed against the back of the leather couch. I felt the leather in my hands. Dust clung to it; no one ever cleaned behind the couch. I drew a smile in the dust. I wiped my hand on my shorts. The dust had turned to dirt and left a dark smear. I was eight years old, the cat was 15. I didn’t know how old my shorts were. My parents had told me the story of how the cat had showed up one day on the patio and screamed to be let inside, like she already lived here. They took her to the vet, talked to the shelter and the neighbors and the internet. No one knew of a missing black cat with one white foot. The vet said she was seven, and then she was ours. Theirs. I wasn’t born yet. Six days after she showed up, they found out they were pregnant.

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51I was bored, the dust was gross, and the cat still hadn’t woken up. I counted the mosquito bites on my legs (7). I counted the clumps of dust on the oor (too many). I counted my ngers and toes (20, perfect!). I counted my heartbeats, feeling them thump quietly in my chest. On heartbeat 143, it occurred to me that my cat was dead. I stopped counting. I pet her, scratched her, shook her, more violently this time. Limp, eyes closed, fur soft and cold. Maybe I cried. Maybe I didn’t understand death well enough to cry. I rubbed my hands on the couch, the dust cleaner than the death in my palms. I couldn’t believe I had touched her body. I didn’t know what to do. So, I sat next to my dead cat and kept counting my heartbeats. Maybe I was bragging, showing o the fact that only one of our hearts was still beating. Maybe I was old enough to know death, too young to feel it. I don’t know how long I counted my heartbeats. Seconds or minutes or hours. At some point, my parents began searching for me instead of the cat. When I was ve, I got lost on a beach in Florida. It was crowded, full of families and umbrellas and towels and sun and sand and the occasional lost child. I had walked too far in search of the perfect shell to top my sandcastle. My parents found me, after thirty frenzied minutes, sitting in the sand half a mile down the beach. They had never lost the cat before now. They had brushed her and taken her to the vet and played with her and done everything right with her. If I stayed behind the couch forever, they would never know she was dead. If they never found me, they would never nd her. So I sat behind the couch, as my parents searched and cried and called and yelled.My hands moved her body under the couch: a foolish eight year old thinking she could hide. Hide her dead cat, hide herself, hide from death. Was this the “better place”? Underneath the couch, dust bunnies clinging to her soft fur. I pulled the cat back out. Her body traced a gentle trail in the dust. The smiley face I had drawn in

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52the dust grinned above her body. She had scratched me once, three years before. I heard my parents talking, considering giving her up for adoption. They couldn’t stand the thought of something hurting their baby. I had cried, begged them not to take her away. Told them it was my fault, told them I had scratched her ears (I hadn’t), something we all knew she hated. I had cried at the thought of her being gone. So why couldn’t I cry now? Maybe I never really loved her. She had scratched me for no reason, she had been my parents’ rst baby. No, I decided, I had loved her. I had played with her, pulled the fake mouse on a string behind me as I ran through the house. She had played with me, been my companion on our pretend journeys across seas and skies and worlds. How else could a child love, but by sharing the act of playing pretend? So, I tried to cry. I added tears to the smiley face, deciding it was as close as I would get. I was bored, I wasn’t used to hiding. I focused on my heartbeats and thought and sat in a fake world behind the couch. On heartbeat 817, I stood up. I don’t know why. Maybe 817 heartbeats was all it took for me to remember that a dead cat would smell, that they would nd me eventually, that I couldn’t hide from it forever. I walked into the kitchen and saw my mom, on the phone with my father. “I found her.”

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54From the Bones and Worms, Bluets Growby Sonia AlizadehFrom the bones and worms, bluets growIn the old graveyard within this wooded place.Was I wrong about death being the foe?Layers, layers of green and brown owOver headstones dotted with lichen’s lace.From the bones and worms, bluets grow. Souls rest in boundless bliss below,Snug in Earth’s cool embrace. Was I wrong about death being the foe?A doe emerges from the woods in slow, Slender steps to pay her respects with quiet grace.From the bones and worms, bluets grow.We all return to that rst worldly breath, that rst blowOf dust, of salt, of pollen oating into a haze…Was I wrong about death being the foe?I could not linger when I found the graveyard, thoughIts beauty has stuck with me so, that I must say:From the bones and worms, bluets grow;I was wrong about death being the foe.

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57Charlieby Declan JohnstonI nearly hit the guy. He’s lucky I popped that B20 pill some thirty minutes earlier or else I would’ve been so tired I’d have run him right over. It was raining hard too, comin’ down in sheets. And my wipers barely work ever since that nut in the pivot came loose. So I was real up close to the wheel, squinting through the windshield, when I seen this gure appear outta the dark… just standing there in the middle of the road. I ashed my brights a couple times but this thing wasn’t budging. Road was on a pretty long straight though, so I had time to slam on the brakes. But I was coming so fast I ipped the engine brake switch just to be sure. The Jake brakes made that loud ratatatatat sound like a—machine gun—crop plane starting up. I was sure I’d hit him. Came damn close too. By the time I came to a stop I’m pretty sure he could’ve reached out and touched ol’ Kathleen’s bumper without taking a step. Anyway, I’m furious. Here I am, haulin’ at double nickel, trying to make it to Milwaukee by morning, and some idiot in the pouring rain decides to make like Bambi and stand in the middle of the freeway. So I get out to give this guy a piece of my mind for almost getting us both killed. “What in God’s name d’you think you’re doin’,” I say as I’m climbing down the side ladder. He don’t respond so I step around to get a closer look at this guy. I can just barely make out that he’s wearing a black leather trench coat. But I’ve got my hand up to my brow and the rain is just dripping down, so I still can’t see his face. Then I get right up to him. “You hear what I sa-”I stopped myself. Now when I tell you I’ve seen some shit, I mean it. Hell, I was in ‘Nam. But I ain’t never seen someone who

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58looked as bad as this fella. It was as if his soul had left his face. His eyes bulged so much I thought they’d just pop right outta his head. And he had eye bags as big as skippin’ stones just under them. I could see the outline of his skull, his cheeks were so hollow. It was like someone had pulled his pale skin back from the bone and tightened it there. And he was all hunched too, had his shoulders right up to his ears. Didn’t even look at me neither. Just stood there, shaking in the rain. “Jesus, buddy, you all right?” I ask him, reaching out to touch his shoulder. But before my hand gets there he inches. Jolts upright all of a sudden. Lookin’ me dead in the face now, eyes wider than ever. He’s trembling so much I think he might be seizing. But then he says: “C-c-can I get a lift?”You believe that? Some nerve! Can I get a lift. Christ! He damn near killed the both of us. Standing in the rain like a fuckin’ zombie. Can I get a lift! Are you kidding me! What type of lunatic does that? I should’ve left the guy there and then. Got back in Kathleen and tried to make it to Milwaukee before breakfast. But I didn’t. I guess I was so shocked that my brain wasn’t really working. And part of me just wanted to get outta that freezing rain. If it meant givin’ some stranger a ride, that was okay by me. And I had my Beretta 70 in the glove compartment in case he tried something. Not that I thought he would though, not in his state. “Uh… yea…’ I say, walking around the front to open the passenger side door. “Yea sure, let’s just get you outta the rain.”He was so weak I had to push him up the ladder. Then I helped him into his seat and shut the door behind him, before going back around and climbin’ in myself. “I’ll grab you a blanket,” I tell him, as I step into the back of the cab to strip the small bed in the corner. When I came back he was slumped over, so I jostled him a little. Didn’t want him fallin’ asleep on me. Had too many questions I wanted to ask him. And I managed to get him stirring, but he was

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59just sittin’ there, mumbling nonsense.Now, I’m not proud of this next part, but I needed answers. Figured this fella could be dangerous, or runnin’ from something just as bad. So I got him upright, grabbed my dopp bag, and took out the B20s.“Here, swallow this,” I tell him, tilting his head backwards and droppin’ a pill right into his mouth, which was just sorta hangin’ open, drool running down the side of his face. “It’ll warm you up,” I say. Which is true, y’know? Those B20s won’t just wake you up, they’ll make you sweat so damn much you’ll think the Devil is sittin’ next to you. Hell, I keep the AC on full blast even in the winter sometimes. But the pill wouldn’t kick in for at least another twenty minutes. So I got Kathleen started and made tracks. It was a little rough gettin’ her up to speed, but once I got it in boogie we were cruisin’. I did my best to ll the silence. And I talk a lot when I’m nervous, see, so I was just spoutin’ whatever came to mind. Somehow I ended up talking ‘bout the Apollo mission, and that’s when the guy started speaking:“Where am I?” he asks. “You’re on a one way trip to Milwaukee,” I tell him. “What’s your name, friend?”I gured the B20 must’ve hit him by then, ‘cause he was gripping the panic bar so hard his knuckles were turning white. And he was clenching his jaw, too, grindin’ his teeth something mean. I’d have given him some gum if I’d had any. Anyway, he wasn’t answering my question, so I thought he might be an amnesiac. But I guess he was just trying to get his thoughts together - ain’t exactly easy when your mind’s movin’ at full tilt - cause he turns to me all of a sudden and yells:“CHARLIE. MY NAME’S CHARLIE.”overThat’s when the storm picked up. It was rainin’ hard earlier, but now the wind was makin’ it so the rain was coming in waves.

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60Drops as thick as—bullets—my thumbs beat on the windshield. And usually Kathleen’s cab is pretty soundproof, but I could hear the wind howlin’ outside like—air-raid sirens —a train whistle. Seeing a storm this intense reminded me of being back in— the jungle—Gavelston in ‘59 when Debra hit. Now, I don’t know if it was the B20 or the weather, and maybe it was a bit of both, but the guy just went crazy. At rst he was just staring at me with his head tilted slightly down. A real nasty look. And his eyes weren’t wide no more, nah, they were narrowed, and I could see the whites below his pupils. It was like his head was somewhere else. And I’m getting a little concerned now, so I’m trying to keep my eyes on Charlie and the road at the same time, which was no easy task. Especially with the lightning. It struck about every four seconds or so, followed by a barrage of—artillery—thunder. Each time it hit, the lightning lit up the cab and Charlie’s face along with it, painting him a sickly white. That and the rainwater from the windshield reected onto his skin made him look like—the enemy —a drowned corpse. I couldn’t take my eyes o him. And it seemed he couldn’t take his oa’ me neither, so I knew he was gonna try and jump me at any given moment. And he soon got it. As I was watching Charlie, I guess Kathleen’s faulty alignment had been taking her gradually to the left, ‘cause Charlie cried out:“WATCH THE ROAD, MAN!”We were on the other side of the yella lines now, headin’ straight for a ditch. I jerked the wheel a hard right and we swerved

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61in that direction, barely missing the ditch. That’s when Charlie took his chance and threw himself on me. “GOD DAMMIT I’LL KILL YOU, YOU CRAZY BASTARD!”So I start ghtin’ Charlie o, left hand on the wheel hoping I can keep her steady, and my right just pushin’ and swingin’ at ‘em. And in between volleys I’m tryin’ to get the glove compartment open to grab the CB to radio for help. I guess I must’ve managed to get a few good hits on Charlie, or knocked some sense into him, ‘cause he wavered long enough for me to get the glove open. Gave me enough time to get a holda my—Beretta —CB and— *click*****click*Ocer Taylor shut o the tape recorder. “And? What happens next?” asked Ocer Walsh. “Jesus, Finn, you saw the body,” said Taylor. “He shot him. Charles Tanaka, Japanese-American. Born and raised in Minneapolis. Poor guy’s car broke down just outside of Melrose when he ran into our friend here on the tape.”“I know, I know,” Walsh said, taking a sip of his coee. “I was just sort of hanging on the edge of my seat there. Guy knows how to tell a story.” “Yeah, well, that’s probably all it is. A story,” Taylor said. “I doubt how much of it is true. Memory can be… selective.”“No kidding,” said Walsh, taking a deep breath. “Still no I.D. on the driver?”“Yeah, about that… I.D. came back this morning. Driver served in Vietnam for nearly a year. Assaulted an ocer about two weeks before his tour was supposed to end. Dishonorably discharged… under suspicion of insanity.” THE END

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65Kudzu by John Henry AhmannLloydYour savior arrived on a blue morning,no clouds but the grays of the Depression.The bleached envelope with stamp adorningheld seeds meant for erosion repression.Your father sowed them in the barren plot,the reddish-brownish, used and weary land.You will bring spring for us, he thought,and ten bucks per acre where you expand.They grew. Before long the hill was betterthan a cornucopia. The wool-sheepate and ate. They gave you your new sweater,and their blessings came with little upkeep.As you grew taller than him, father fellinto his ask, and wandered o for good.But your hands could plant and theirs could grow well,you thought. You could do everything he could.The fall was not easy. Two hands’ harvestcould not feed your ill mother. But the handsof the vines had grown to their farthest,since father took the two sheep from the lands.Leaf by leaf you picked, wading in green.Fearlessly you plucked; they curled on your feet.Tentatively you cooked, boiling them clean.She ate, and you felt its brous heart beat.

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66Come morning her bed lay neatly bare, window ajar. You slept by the vines that night.You kept your mother in your nightly prayersand went afar, to ght the oversea ght.In the bumpy expanse of green hardhats,you lost yourself in thoughts of it, of home.In the green-brown fray, you kept from collapsewith daydreams of your one love alone.Four years you were gone, for years it had grownand grown. You dropped your bags when you saw it.The consumption. The green march, all it owned.Draped out wraiths rose from the carpet, moonlit.Your house had been embraced too. You tramped throughthe crosshatching, pulled aside the curtain.Yearning coils crossed your bed, and you knewit had longed for you too; you were certain.You charged into the blessed blight, returninghome. But you felt a crunch under your stride.Like Orpheus you looked; stomach-turningblanched bones lay by your feet, father and bride.Sure of what to do, you lay down besidethose who begot you. The vines tucked you in,held you tight, your arms and neck tendril-tied.The kudzu cuddles you still, in sheepskin.

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68On Defenseby John Henry AhmannLloydIn that moment, my eight-year-old, four-foot-tall body was, at least in my eyes, comparable to that of some stalwart guardian, clad in scratchy shin-guards, secondhand soccer cleats, and too-high socks. It was the nal game of the 2016 season; it was tied up, and I stood alone, deep in our home territory as the ball awkwardly changed possession across the eld through wayward passes and shoddy dribbles. I must have been the most nervous out of anyone there, save perhaps the sorely overinvested parents yelling from the sidelines; I had decided that it all rested on me. If the enemy team were to get a sudden break, it would be up to me to save this game. Of course, the enemy team did get a sudden break. As the ball rushed down the eld, I stood my ground. As my adversary pulled his leg back to kick, though, I realized what had to happen. I will never be sure if things were moving in slow-motion because of the adrenaline rush of that moment, or because the ball actually just moved that slow (both seeming equally likely). Whatever the case, I was bounding across the twenty-foot gap between me and the goal I had promised to defend with my last breath, for the sake of my team. I wasn’t going to make it. The ball continued to roll towards our weak point, and I knew what I had to do. I ung myself toward the ball, putting my whole body into a last-ditch slide. As the ball teetered on the event-horizon of defeat, my leg, parallel to the goal-line, slid before it. I exhaled. I felt like the virtuous hero of one of my beloved children’s books. I was hooked on defense.From then on, I moved into goalkeeping. There, I eternally occupied the position of that nal defender. I stood, withdrawn, in heat and in cold, armored in a long-sleeve padded jersey and tightly bound gloves, observing and waiting. These memories of lonesome contemplation stand beside those of hot-blooded face-os: launching myself according to a trajectory calculated from a

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69moment’s perception, or rushing forth into the fray, bringing my face close to cleat. The goalkeeper occupies a curious position, entirely unlike that of their teammates. They wait, in goal, with no control over the game at large. When all else fails, it is their job to put their body forth in defense of their team. As Uruguayan writer Eduardo Galeano writes in his book Soccer in Sun and Shadow, “The goalkeeper awaits his own execution by ring squad.” This ring squad is threefold. Its rst aspect is physical, with the kicking feet of the opposition framed as ries. It risks physical injury through kicks to the face and balls to the balls, among other weak points. The second, more subtle side of the ring squad is social. The keeper is scapegoated by their team and its fans. Recall the story of Moacir Barbosa, the Brazilian goalkeeper who was awarded best goalkeeper at the 1950 World Cup but was ultimately and bitterly remembered for letting a goal through in the Cup’s nal match, giving Uruguay the victory. “I have never been forgiven,” he says. The third, most subtle ring squad is mental. The keeper’s responsibility is to their team, yes, but it is also to themself. The self-inicted ring of regretful neurons has greater potential to kill the keeper than nearly any kick to the head or teammate-casted blame. Yet it is the fault of the outeld players that the ball got far enough to be the goalie’s responsibility. The keeper is, then, if you’ll forgive the hyperbole, the team Christ, sacricing their body, social standing, and self-worth to atone for the sins — the shoddy passing and lackluster defense — of their teammates. While on death row, the keeper is given room for contemplation and daydreaming. Vladimir Nabokov, a former goalie, writes of “composing verse in a tongue nobody understood about a remote country nobody knew” while idling in goal. I have always had a tendency towards inaction, a tendency to be so locked in deliberative anxiety that doing nothing always seemed the safest option. The tendency is born of a fear of blame and rejection. How can one be blamed or rejected for what comes to them through

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70no fault of their own? For the price of taking what comes to you, neither acting nor reacting, one escapes culpability, regret, shame, and guilt. Goalkeeping is passive in the sense that it does not require one to act but only react — the keeper is shot on; the keeper is forced to dive. Still, one cannot be locked in deliberation and inaction as a striker pulls their leg back in preparation for a blast. This is the greatest sin the keeper can commit. Despite the heavy weight of its responsibility, I was drawn to goalkeeping because I felt that I belonged. The guilt of other positions was perhaps too heavy for me–if I botched a pass or a shot, I couldn’t help but feel that someone else would have done better in my place. In goal, though, others complained or froze. Others wanted to score; I could not handle the guilt of failing to score. My love for goalkeeping was the love of the save. It was the love of the moment when I was torn from my pained and anxious consideration by raw bodily instinct to defend, the love of the moment when, according to no conscious thought of my own, my feet pushed me o the ground; my eyes tracked closely the turning of the ball; and my hands stretched out as if in jubilation. It was the love of the moment when I heard the thud and felt the force of the ball ying o my gloved hands to be cleared by a defender, or to be frantically pounced upon and pulled close to my loud-thumping heart.

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78Of Things Found Where They Are Not Supposed To Beby Zoë Daniel-Arillo“All this sound and fury, and it wasn’t destroying anything that anyone had cared about for a long, long time.” -Rayne Fisher-Quan Most bodies rot when they die. That is a gift. To know that one day there will be no reminder of the pain dealt to the dying, or to the griever. When Rosanna dies, her body remains. Saint Peter does not welcome her into his doors, nor turn her away. She lies there, feeling worryingly alive as ever. No spark to lose. Her head lies on the stage, still connected to her neck with embroidery oss. The Fates will not even do her the honor of fully severing the cord. She can hear voices, arguing and wailing over her fall, as she’s heard countless times before. Lines read at tables and nally on stage. As the actress monologues (the same voice that she has watched grow from mush to adolescent), she feels nothing. She worries only if she has ever felt worried before, which she has not. The play was not meant to kill her, just for Husband to throw swaddled cloth body from the window and spur on another monologue. So when neck splits open after one too many from the tops, and aged cotton spills out, there is no grief, nor blood to spill. Rosanna has never seen her name written down before, nor has anyone. Her birth certicate was a receipt. She knows what it sounds like, but never from her own lips, as they are plastered, not shut, but open, displaying a baby-toothed, lobotomized smile. Her fabric body and hard, molded, plastic limbs do not lend themselves to much movement, and her hair has held the same powdery smell for seventeen years. She was meant for a baby. She knows what it’s like to be cared for, or a childlike approximation of it, remembers

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79sitting slumped over and spineless while adults researched a doll hospital states away. The tab is eventually forgotten, as are most things requiring more eort than previously assumed. Once the baby was old enough for Rosanna not to be a liability, they were presented to one another. Collagen eyes looked into plastic ones, skin reminding silicone of its strict connes. Silicone presented skin with a perfect representation of eeting youth: short coils of hair close to the head, gaping mouth with two visible teeth, and an uneeting powdery smell that does not dwindle with age. The doll knows the opposite, too, sitting in a dark theater, watching through the folded seat until the lights come on. Feeling hopeless, if hope was a feeling she’d ever known. Her abandonment was an accident, which is a rare kind of abandonment, the kind perpetuated by a child too wrapped up in the moving lights in front of her to remember a lifelong, lifeless friend. And eventually, Child rushing to retrieve the thing that is now too small to have ever seemed in her image at all. Often, older children feel what they can only understand as neglect when a new one pushes itself to the forefront of everyone’s attention. Rosanna was incapable of aging, of ever being older, only in the sense of becoming more decrepit than mature. She was incapable of accepting, and therefore receiving, love above that of a possession as the child gained the maturity she could not. When new plastic arrived, it was innately more human. Even its name: Baby Alive was an assertion of much stronger ties to humanity. Where this new thing lacked Rosanna’s softness —carved hair instead of bers and a hard shell of a body—it made up for it in bodily function. This new arbiter of attention could eat, drink, and then pee and poop it all back out. Its food needed to be refrigerated in its own separate refrigerator with special separate food, and diapers were replaceable, but more importantly, buyable. Rosanna determined that a better baby meant more moving parts, chewing, moving, depleting, nanceable parts. To love something lifeless takes insanity. Or a bigger heart

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80than most. Big hearts are an easy feat for little kids: their smallness makes everything around them huge in comparison. Kids can love anything you put before them: can love spoons—the one with a dierent handle than all the others—worms drying on the sidewalk, people they’ve just met, pieces of plastic, things that once were theirs, things that are not and never should be. They have a boundless capacity to love before it is attened out of them. In this way, a child has so much to grieve, their love lost along with the capacity to feel all of it. To be gifted all these never-alive animals and babies to love, only to be robbed of the understanding they were once graced with. Rosanna goes unloved because no one is allowed to love her anymore, because all the heart space she took up must now be replaced with the real, with the nanceable. Rosanna has never taken up much space. Even on her current shelf, her cloth body is squished between other relics of sentimentality, a vintage trinket away from unnamed hoarding. She is used to being habitually replaced: by a Rainbow Dash gure, the Remnants series, Gak, a talking cat that can read your mind, a furby. Until it all became a bit more esoteric, based less on a compelling Hasbro ad. A bass guitar, horror movies, Garbage Pail Kids. Rosanna sat, still, her body too timid to inconvenience anyone with her decay. Everything stays, but it still changes, the only mark of age a light discoloration where the big light cannot reach. Real bodies wilt once they’re done. It seems weak, withering away while your hair and nails continue growing. At least the real dead have the agency to make a stink about being gone.

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85A Bitter Betrayalby Lauren DixonThe frost dares to bite, sharp and severe,Painting the rooftops in winter’s veneer.No howling nor rage—just a hush as it falls,Soft as the stucco that clings to the walls.Icicles glisten on archways so bright,Children declare, “It’s frozen just right!”Their laughter rings clear in the hollow, cold air,While I stand betrayed by a season unfair.The wind, once a whisper, now wicked and gray,Steals every ember then carries away.Winter may dazzle, but I see its guise—A thief dressed in silver, with ice in its eyes.For the sun, now a stranger, hides from my gaze,Shrouded in veils of the cold’s cruel maze.The trees bow in silence, their boughs bending low,Under the weight of the whispering snow.The laughter of children rings sharp in the air,Yet I shiver, unwelcome, untouched by their cheer.For winter has stolen the warmth from my veins,Leaving but echoes of autumn’s remains.Still, I wait for the thaw, for the light to return,For embers to glow where the frost chose to burn.And though now I tremble, both bitter and worn,I’ll bloom when the frost yields to spring, reborn.

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87Burning Bridgesby Hazel HughesI could end it all here. One easy move, and I would be free. We would be free. “I’m confused,” my sister asks. She always asks questions. I never really answer them. She’s eight now, in her bright green T-shirt with mud-stained jeans on. She’s sitting like I am, with her legs swinging over the edge of the wooden bridge. We used to al-ways sit here and throw rotting pieces of the bridge into the rushing water below, cheering as they raced each other out of sight. I loved watching them fall for those few fragile seconds before the water would sweep them away. I stop swinging my legs and let my feet hang limp over the side. I grip the edge of the bridge, pressing the weathered wood hard into my hand, and close my eyes. “What’s in that box?” she asks. I almost forgot about her. Ashes. I know she knows what ashes are, and her blue eyes grow concerned. I trace my thumb over each engraved vine on the lid of the box. My nails make a soft scratch down the wooden grooves. It used to have a silver necklace inside, with a mirror under the top lid. Now a small plastic bag encapsulating an entire life sits stued inside the only box I could nd.“That box is pretty. I like it,” she adds. I know. She always has.“What are you doing with it?” I don’t know yet. I want it gone. I remember the day she came home late one night, jeans dirty with mud, eyes unfocused, words slurred. I tried to ask her what was going on. When she looked at me, her eyes were red and angry. When she yelled at me, I smelled it on her breath for the rst time. When I went to bed that night, I was afraid of her. I turn the box over in my hand. “Remember when we would play pirates with that?” she asks. “I would steal that box and run away and you would chase me and then you’d get the box and then I’d chase you.” I remember chasing after her. I found her in my room,

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88crouched over my broken piggy bank, shoving my money into her bag. She ran when she saw me staring, and I yelled after her until she got in the car and drove away. She came back a day later, eyes glazed, purse full of small translucent orange bottles with white caps. My money wasn’t in her purse anymore. I still haven’t found it. I open the box, half expecting to see the necklace sitting inside. Instead, the small plastic bag lies there, holding the last remains of her life. I wonder what happened to that necklace. My gaze returns to the water, which is looking more and more inviting. “Remember when we would race little pieces of the bridge down the river? I always threw mine farther so they’d win and you and your friends never gured it out.” I remember her friends. When she was 20 she brought them over to our house. Six tall men with scratchy voices and heavy boots. They saw me peering at them from my doorway. There were red and brown footprints on my oor when I woke up. My room smelled like her breath. My breath curls in front of me, and I can barely see myself in the foggy mirror. I close the box. It feels too light in my hands. Too light to hold a mother, a sister, a friend. “Remember when we would lie on the rocks and nd shapes in the clouds?” I remember her lying in the bathtub while I shook her and yelled her name. Her lips were blue. Her eyes were closed. The or-ange bottles were empty next to her. I didn’t go to sleep that night. If I do it, she’s gone. She’s gone from my life: my house, my room, my bathtub, my memory. But then I’m alone. I hold my hands over the edge, cupping the box. “Whose ashes are they?” my sister asks. I know she knows. “They’re yours,” I tell her. I let go. The box falls silently, and the water buries it. My sister won’t ask questions anymore.

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91Ode to Waterby Katelyn HatchWe underestimate the power of water;we forget that you’re beautiful and detrimental,that you can embrace and you can slaughter.Your ocean is both rough and gentle;The rain as your curious daughter,often misunderstood as incidental.Your job is just as consequential as any high government position.Providing shelter and potential,but without a crave for recognition.Your tides are residential,though we ruin the condition.They paint you to be reprehensible,as waves wreck our shores.But your use of power is sensible,as we’ve poisoned your poreswith damage that is irreversible.We’ve taken for granted that beauty of yours.

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99Two innities combine, centered as if a pair of roller-skaters danced their gure-eights, then turned their heads, then danced again. No, wonder: we call this lucky? Some roughness traces each leaf, leaving all four spiky, but only those that can crawl or look closely see; it’s one natural feat to keep this small secret enclosed. The stem swirls down, merging warm crawling earth with breathing plant. The roots, concealed, too breathe; how else could leaves utter, much life bequeathed for spring? We always come back to dancing– don’t we? Most drawings distort the shape from Love to hearts, Earth Green to emerald. The hum of Trueness hides beyond the page, in some vast eld of threes, concealed but worth the search.Ode to (Four-Leaf C)loversby Lucy Rotenberg

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101The green and blue ballooncircles the Large Star.The Large Star, who gives herselfto Life Matter. In our deated balloon,misery remembers to memorizethe linings of rubberdone and llsthe spaces we cannot see:The uncuttable bits of bad thatstay inside and surround us allover. They drip from the Heat,the searing Heat that beats heavyo the Life Matter, and brings oceanto Earth, the sweltering sound of sweat.The Large Star,and her creations, lose their placein the Explosion.The exposition of what once was is now what is not,because we forgot to give thought to redeeming our helium for years ahead. Caught up in the change and the Exchange of time for highs, we may never knowLife Matterby Ella Dameron

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102Exchange of time for highs, we may never knowThe lows that lurk in the corners of our sphere(s).The rivers of wet regret run dry and gasp in a crispt below earthcrust, and the last liquid in the Heat-ridden rock of rubberdips down into ravines and grooves of the brain.Hotwatersteam slips into Gray Matter and heads rock back with a grimace.Hotwatersteam into the backs of skulls,and like mushroom, it mutilates—crumbling cortex, timbering thalamus.Life Matter, Gray Matter, everywhere is hot, and still, and silent.Brainstem to root, root to core, human to land, sun to earth,connection means nothing amidst dry dust and dirt.But listen to the Large Star!She kept another kingdom in case, and sent ten Billion subjects of Life Matter to runover the ravines we once had called done. They have hammers and drills and Robots they madewith the grooves of their Gray Matter in dread of today. Imprisoned in the rubber are beloved limbs.The subjects can hear the screams from within.

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107In the Meadowby Elliott MathewsShe made quite the pretty picture, lying there in the sun. Her curly red hair deed its green ribbons, splaying out over the verdant grass. She watched a buttery utter far above, her brown eyes darting back and forth. The blue dress she was wearing left her arms and legs exposed to the warmth of the sun, and she could hear the ambient noise of the river roaring far o in the woods. A creeping sensation tickling her leg startled her out of a lazy daydream, and she sat up to see a fat, lime green caterpillar crawling across her calf.“Hello there, little fellow,” she said, tilting her head to the side.“There is nothing little about me,” snapped the caterpillar, quite taken aback by the rude remark. “Well, I’m sorry to inform you, but you are quite little indeed,” said the girl.“The youth always think they know best,” said the caterpillar, despite only being sixty days old, for that was considered decently old by caterpillar standards. “Have you considered that you may be the one who is big, as opposed to me being the one who is little?”The little girl furrowed her brow and decided that he must be right, for she was the one lying in his grass. She said, “I do believe you’re right! Funny thing, that.”“Perhaps next time you may think before you speak,” snied the caterpillar, quite haughtily.“What’s got you in such an irritable mood on such a lovely day?” the girl asked.The caterpillar sighed again and decided not to take oense at her rude tone, for he was old enough to know it grew from ignorance and not ill intentions. He admitted to the little girl that it was time for him to build a chrysalis, and he could not nd a proper spot. In response, the young girl beamed and said, “Well, if that’s

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108all, I can certainly help you search!”She oered out her hand and the caterpillar, only somewhat dubiously, climbed aboard. She leapt o the ground, her red curls bouncing, and surveyed the sunny clearing. It was busy, as it usually was on a ne spring morning, and she could hear toads croaking in the distance, pleased as they were with the recent rainfall. It was a very beautiful meadow, although a bit lacking, as far as a place for a chrysalis was concerned.“What about that tree?” she said, pointing to an oak sapling that was quite sturdy, despite its short stature. When the caterpillar nodded his approval, she ran to the tree, for girls of her age were bound to run whenever allowed, and she very much enjoyed the feel of cool grass under her bare feet.But when she arrived at the tree, the caterpillar said, “Wait a moment! I’ve just remembered that the robin lives here, and she is not afraid to eat a fellow like me, especially with her eggs about to hatch.”Sure enough, the girl peered through the tree branches to see a circle of twigs nestled next to the trunk, and laying inside were three astounding blue eggs.“They’re beautiful,” she said, taken aback by the vibrant color.“Thank you very very much, young missy; we happen to think we’re quite the eyeful, if we do say so ourselves,” said one of the eggs. The caterpillar restrained himself from rolling his eyes at the vanity of young creatures.“Oh, well, you’re very welcome,” replied the little girl. “You wouldn’t mind moving trees, would you? My friend here needs somewhere to build his chrysalis.”The eggs, despite seeming rather charming, said they couldn’t possibly move trees because their mama wouldn’t be able to nd them if they did. The little girl admitted that this was a good point and resigned herself to sit at the base of the tree, feeling awfully disappointed that her brilliant idea hadn’t worked. She said, “I’m sorry, friend. I really thought this tree would be perfect.”

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109“Well, do not tell me you are giving up already!” said the caterpillar, a little oended by the thought.“No, of course I’m not! I simply don’t know where to go from here,” admitted the girl.An acorn piped up from the ground beside her and said, “Well, I’ve got a few ideas myself if you’re all out!”The caterpillar peered at the acorn from his perch on the girl’s hand and said, “Well, spit them out. We haven’t got all day, you know!”“I’m dreadfully sorry about him,” said the little girl, “but we would appreciate any help you can give us.”“I’ve heard there’s a beauty of a peony down by the stream. I myself have always dreamed of moving there,” admitted the acorn. “I hear the soil quality is simply divine!”“That’s a wonderful idea!” said the girl. “Would you like to come with us? I could nd you a nice spot to settle down.”“Why, that’s awfully nice of you. I’d very much appreciate it,” said the acorn.So the little girl gently picked up the acorn in her empty hand and made her way to the opposite side of the clearing, where a small stream trickled out of the hillside. Beside it, on the very edge of the clearing, stood a towering peony bush, adorned from root to leaf with owers. As the little girl approached, her feet sank into silty red mud, and she did not care in the slightest. How could she, when she was staring at such a majestic sight? Even the caterpillar gazed in awe at the peony, sighing in satisfaction instead of annoyance.“What do you think?” asked the girl, startling the caterpillar back to his usual mood. “It’ll do,” he said. “Would you put me on that branch up there, with the particularly bright ower?”“Of course,” said the girl. Both she and the acorn quietly agreed that he had chosen the right spot, for it was indeed the most beautifully pink ower of all of them. The ower seemed to primp and preen under their praise. She was very grateful to have a

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111caterpillar settle on her branch.“Thank you very much!” the caterpillar called down. “I think I shall like this spot!”The little girl beamed at this compliment, for they were very rare from the caterpillar, and even the acorn seemed to take on a golden hue. Now that her rst companion’s fate was settled, the little girl turned to the acorn and asked, “Where to now?”“Well, if it’s not too much trouble, my dear, I think I should like to grow on the other bank, for this side looks to be mostly red clay.”The little girl agreed that, yes, the soil quality would be much better on the other bank and said she did not mind at all helping the acorn. She crossed the stream in a single large stride and sat down on the other side to begin digging a small hole. As she did, the acorn said, “I really do appreciate this, you know. I don’t know how I might have gotten here without your help.”“Well, of course. It’s no trouble, really,” replied the girl. “And besides, without you, the caterpillar wouldn’t have found a place to build his chrysalis and without the caterpillar, my day would have been very boring indeed.”This comment made the acorn chuckle and caused the stream to decide that it was time to speak her mind. Her voice was low and melodious as she asked, “Whatever are you doing here in the rst place, my dear?”The little girl took a moment to admire the crystalline water of the stream. It made a low bubbling sound as it rolled over pebbles and reected rays from the sun to create a sea of dancing colors. Inside the stream, dark brown tadpoles darted back and forth, rippling the water ever so slightly. “Well,” she said, “I decided it was time for me to run away.”At this, the tadpoles chimed in, their voices high pitched and somewhat painful to the ear. “Run away! Why ever would you do such a thing?”The little girl was done digging, so she took a moment to gently place the acorn in its new home. The two of them exchanged the

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112appropriate pleasantries, and she covered it with soil before turning back to the tadpoles and the stream, her brow furrowed in thought.“I suppose I hadn’t thought of an exact reason,” she admitted. “I simply gured it was time.”The tadpoles chittered and laughed at her response, in a manner that felt distinctly unfriendly. “Don’t be stupid!” one of them chided, and another called her a “silly girl!”The stream hushed them, and, very kindly, asked the little girl if there was any purpose to her leaving home, if she was not running away from something dangerous.“I suppose I simply wanted an adventure,” said the girl, feeling quite silly indeed.“It seems to me,” said the stream gently, “that you got quite the adventure. Is it perhaps time for you to return home now?”“Why, you’re right! I don’t think I could’ve thought of a better adventure if I tried,” said the little girl.And with that, she took o running through the woods, as little girls are bound to do. Her clay-red hair ew in the wind, barely constrained by caterpillar-green ribbons. Her acorn-brown eyes darted like tadpoles, scanning the ground before her to avoid especially sharp rocks. Towering oak trees stretched above her head, and their branches whipped at her robin egg blue dress. Despite her smile, crystalline tears streamed down her peony pink cheeks, reecting the rays of the setting sun.

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116To the Son of the Wind-Sweptby John Henry AhmannLloydYou lie in, dolent, wax to waste, you pine.Baseness controlling as spirit twists and turns.You waste your father’s mind, atrophy earned.Gorging, content, you dine on bread and whine:“You think you can squander what’s rightly mine!The Gods will take revenge, the king return.So just you wait, by blood and bow you’ll learn:Don’t cross gray eyes, you hundred-eight foul swine!”But while you laze, they leech and desecrate.So rise to your feet with your own decree.Bring justice with your will, don’t wait for fate,And sail, spry youth, across the wine-dark sea!Become his son, and lord of your great state!Never now is never ever! Break free!

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120Why Do You Want To Be A Doctor?by Frank YeboahIt wasn’t until I stood under the bright uorescent lights of a trauma room that the word “medicine” transformed from a fantasy to a reality. The room was like a sci- lab, with machines and gad-gets designed to sustain human life. My thoughts became complete-ly consumed by the charge nurse’s orders: “Stand in the farthest corner possible and don’t get in the way.” I watched a tall, lanky African American man with a bullet hole in his chest and a broken, ailing arm, strapped down to a hospital bed. “I can’t breathe! What are y’all doing to me?” he exclaimed to the small four-eyed lady wearing powder-blue sterile gloves. “Well, if you’re screaming this loud then you can breathe,” she retorted. “Now lay still, I’m trying to put this IV in you!” This was organized chaos, like a concert tech crew backstage, prepping the stage for a musician’s life-changing performance. But the melody was a dying man roaring for his caretakers to help. In a grotesque, growly way, the man’s words slurred as he slipped into a deep, paralyzed slumber. Throughout the chaos, I had failed to notice a 6’4” white man, no younger than fty, slither into the room to administer a cocktail of drugs. Speaking to his residents, who looked stoically at the man’s limp body, he listed the medications: “Fentanyl, propofol, midazolam.” Suddenly, I found myself stand-ing at the head of the unconscious man, observing his powerless-ness as a tube was placed carefully into his mouth. Standing there, what I had once known as a “doctor” became more grotesque than I could have ever fathomed. I was three years old when I had my kidney transplant. One of my rst memories is lying still in a dark room, under blankets and hooked up to machines, watching the movie Cars. My focus

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121was broken when a young nurse opened the door to my room. “Hey sweetie, we’re going to move you to another room,” she said in a calm, soothing voice. In a ash, I was in another room with fewer machines. The smell of alcohol and stainless steel seared into my mind as I watched the nurses operate the machinery and change my dosage of medication. Waves of anxiety overwhelmed me until one doctor asked, “Hey Frankie, do you want me to adjust your pillows for you?” Exhausted from the medication and recovery process, I addressed her question with a weary “Okay.” The woman’s cold, slim hands brushed my neck as she moved the pillow up from the bed and lay it near my head. She gave me a warm smile, and the healthcare professionals left as quickly as they had arrived. Though many years have gone by, the physician’s features, along with the smells of alcohol wipes and new needles, have never left my mind. For years, slim hands, a warm smile, and aged features dened a physician for me. It wasn’t until later that I understood what being a doctor truly entailed. I was introduced to what surgery looked like while staring at my TV in my home’s living room on a Thursday night. By the age of six years old, I was already used to being told, “You need to be careful, you’ve undergone surgery,” time and time again. Being as young as I was, I didn’t know what it meant. One night, while scroll-ing through television channels, I landed upon reruns of earlier Grey’s Anatomy seasons on ABC. The screen suddenly displayed a middle-aged woman with slim hands and focused eyes holding a steel scalpel and a needle driver, quickly maneuvering through a red opening surrounded by blue blankets. I sat up on the couch and locked my eyes on the TV. It wasn’t until a character named Mer-edith uttered “surgery” that I realized what I was looking at. The surgeon working on the television spoke of feelings and smells that I was familiar with: anxiety, uncertainty, the metallic smell of blood, the exhaustion from hours in the hospital, and the need to under-

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122stand more. The world of surgery became not just a topic of dis-cussion at clinical visits, but rather a visual and sensory event that could be experienced. As I watched the scene unfold, the once-ter-ried patient awoke, smiling through tears of joy and exclaiming, “Thank you for making me better, Doctor Grey!” From that day on, I began treating my stued animals with extra care. I grew more fascinated by the mysteries of science and dreamed of one day wielding a scalpel to save someone’s life. I also wanted to have the intellect and courage surgeons carried every day to save someone’s life. I had not realized then that the life of a surgeon wasn’t just full of healed patients and daily medical mysteries. It was also a more human experience, lled with tears, blood, and shit. The slow and mundane ritual of medicine began at 1 p.m. sharp. I had signed up for a rotation in Grady’s Marcus Trauma Center through a summer program. It was a slow Saturday after-noon for a trauma center, which was a foreign concept to me. TV dramas like Grey’s Anatomy and The Resident led me to picture the emergency room as a nonstop rush of shocking traumas. As I watched a surgeon shop for furniture on Target, the fantasy of shad-owing the next Meredith Grey slowly faded away. “You can always nd the same furniture on Target that they sell for way higher on IKEA or some other expensive stores,” she said with her eyes glued to the computer screen. “Are you moving soon?” I asked, hoping the stereotypical depiction of adults scrolling through furniture websites at work wouldn’t apply to a doctor. “Yeah, I’m moving for an attending position at a trauma center in Utah. I’m moving in a week.” I realized that she had dedicated the past seven years to training as a surgeon. When combined with her years in undergrad and medical school, she had spent the equiv-alent of my entire lifetime striving to reach where she is today. She turned her chair to look at me, her dark brown eyes pierc-ing into mine. “So why do you want to become a doctor? You do know this process is long and tiring, right?”

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123“I want to help people,” I answered, oblivious to the depth of the question. She smirked at my child-like ignorance, retorting, “You know you can do any job and help people. The mailman helps people, and if you want to work in a hospital, you can become a PA or NP. They do the same things and more as doctors for less school and less money.” Her response shocked me. It seemed as if she was trying to talk me down from becoming a doctor. “Well, I’m interested in surgery,” I said self-consciously. “Well, then I guess you need a medical degree for that.” She turned her chair back towards her computer. I heard the voice of a young man I had been sitting with. “Hey, do you want to come watch a debriding?” I got up from my stool and stretched, excited to be in an operating room. The young resident I had spent the last few hours sitting with stood up, and I walked with him as we talked about the program I was doing. He mentioned he had been at the hospital for the past 18 hours.“Is it legal to work that much?” I asked as we went up an eleva-tor. “Yeah, it used to be a lot worse,” he said while responding to a page. When we reached the oor of the operating room, he quickly disappeared to scrub into surgery. I went to the front desk and acquired a bunny suit and a surgical mask. As I walked into the operating room, I saw a large at-screen TV displaying a playlist of classic hip-hop and rap hits from the 2000s and an old woman sitting on her phone by the anesthesia machines. Shortly after I walked in, the scrub nurse, the resident, and a man I assumed to be the resident’s senior pushed an intubated pa-tient into the OR. The old man rested with an unkempt appearance that reected his comatose state. The two surgeons ipped him over in a synchronized motion to reveal a large bedsore on the man’s

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124tailbone. My body shook at the sight of the injury, and I couldn’t help but open my eyes wide. I turned my head to the medical sta, who remained unfazed at the sight of this injury. The man had a colostomy bag attached to his side, bandaged ankles, and dam-aged skin. Watching the men debride to the song “Victory 2004,” I found myself wondering what truly denes a doctor. As a child, I believed doctors simply comforted patients in times of darkness, but growing older revealed a far more hands-on and academic role. Through transitioning between the trauma center and the operating room, I saw how doctors interacted with patientws both physi-cally and socially. The work of a doctor became more than simply adjusting medication or telling a family about the condition of their loved one. It morphed into a duty to serve and protect both the physical and mental well-being of the people around them. When the debridement was nished, the resident I had been shadowing dismissed me to go home. The surgeon’s question followed me as I left the hospital, challenging everything I thought I knew about medicine: “Why do you want to become a doctor?” I realized the answer isn’t just about helping people. It’s about embracing the profession’s challenges, sacrices, and humanity. It means facing the chaotic experience of human life with resolve and bringing light to the darkest moments. I want to be a doctor not for the fantasy shown on television or my childhood experiences, but for the reality—one of hard truths, quiet triumphs, and an unwaver-ing commitment to healing.

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126Gardenby Madeleine Moon-ChunBy the end of winter, the only plants that have survived in our house are the cacti and plastic roses in the kitchen. We have about ten tulips in our front yard and proudly call it a garden. All autumn, my dad lovingly sculpted the gentle earth into an armory, front-line shields of pine straw on dusty white bulbs. Still, the raiders fool our hands, an earthy trap. Survival worships the hungry, chasing striped tails into the wintery bushes near the sidewalk. Meanwhile, a resplendent display of soldiers rots in the ground. Bite marks plague instead of bullets, but I suppose I can’t begin to equate the two. Somewhere, the ground is wet and fertilized with blood. Feign ignorance and wait for spring. Rivulets of melted snow carve the hard dirt into valleys, into trenches. Peace is in burned trunks and stained grass. In the still-smoky air above the what-was garden. In the dirt, whose ravaged body becomes a mosaic of boot prints. Peace in pieces at our feet. Memory of marches, biting into bulb / bursting breast. If not graveyard, say memorial of just-barely survivors. After the gelid air subsides, the womb of the earth erupts. And our tulips shake their heads free of dirt, already bowing to the next rain.