Tag: ’25

Spiced Apple Cake

MACKENZIE DUNSON
The last thing my mother made for me was an apple spice cake. She always took pride in it because of the expansive apple tree that was the luminary of our backyard. It has always been the most beautiful thing about our house. The branches reaching for the sky, leaves and breath filling my own lungs, its fruit filling my stomach, and its blossoms filling my mind….Continue Reading Spiced Apple Cake

Christmas Gift

By SARAH WU
I learned to be wrapped from a young age. Underneath a Christmas tree, I sat below their pine bottoms. Dangling lights brushed my forehead. Taught how presents should be dressed in lovely colors. Taught to be an object, paper wrapping hiding the curve of the natural body within…Continue Reading Christmas Gift

Homecoming

TAPTI SEN
I taste dirt. I chew flesh. I pick at scabs. I gnaw at flesh like a dog that just can’t let go. I twirl my fork around tendrils of hair. I roll ice cubes on my tongue. I lick at my collarbones, prodding and probing like a—…Continue Reading Homecoming

I Write American

PRISCILLA LEE
Never in my life have I been on a road trip. That’s some American shit, and I’m not American, only read tons of American fiction, and I mean Oregon-to-Massachusetts-lorry-truck tons. Never been to America, don’t know if they use “tonnes” or “tons,” or if they call them lorries. …Continue Reading I Write American

The Things You Gave Me 

MACKENZIE DUNSON
The first thing that you gave me was a drawing. Scribbled in the margins of my notes, insignficant in theory, but boundless in reality. It was a figure, one that I didn’t know, maybe one that you had made up in that head of yours, maybe one that came from one of the many shows that you loved and I don’t think I’d ever me able to understand. …Continue Reading The Things You Gave Me 

Fools Taking Root

JORGE RODRIGUEZ JR.
Well, I figured I shouldn’t go alone. The woods grow too thick out past the first few miles. After them woods, it’s real tranquil. The sky grows arid, the world seems still out there. A fire goes nice, but too much fire runs the real big holes dry. If you look in the right spots, you can still find ones that light. Once it lights, it’s good for a night or two. That’s why we oughta head out early. …Continue Reading Fools Taking Root

Palm

a painting of an opened eye with a half crescent in the middle, surrounded by lovely pinks, oranges, and yellows

M. LAWSON
The assembly line continued: the other angels carded the wool, dip-dyed it pink in the great tin pot on their table, and fed it into the spinning wheel, which they wound on a cone that F— knit…Continue Reading Palm

Hymn

ELEANOR WALSH
And when I hear false my tongue twists G-o-d / But in street lights I see / The moons all around me / Foxes follow me home to you / I pull the Priestess / Your lips are red / The ring I lost months ago…Continue Reading Hymn