february 26th
hello loves! another week, another newsletter! here’s to a better march~
Poetry
Patrycja Humienik’s “i found a lover and we left the city” in BOAAT
“first
the alchemists: oysters we ate quietly as we could,
laughing, not saying a word, eyes full of language.”
Iman Mersal’s “I dreamt of you” translated by Robyn Creswell in The Yale Review
“How did his shoes get into my room and how could he have left for the big city in bare feet?”
Ezra Lebovitz’s “CD3 Gets Closer” in The Harvard Advocate
“Last week, scientists found a new moon:
a second one, peculiar and small.”Hannah VanderHart’s “Larks” in Up the Staircase
cw: sexual assault
“That bird is slang for a woman,
as well as any “man made object”
(aircraft, rocket, satellite) that resembles
a bird by flying, being aloft.
That “the bird” is an obscene gesture;
your finger practically raises itself.”Ana Portnoy Brimmer’s “Clementines / Mandarinas” in Pigeon Pages
“I pick two from the low-lying Tomo dos del cajón de frutas
crisper drawers of my fridge. de mi refrigerador.
Day mists through the window El día entra, llovizna cítrica”Alison Palmer’s “I Wish This Was Starry Night Over the Rhone” in The Night Heron Barks
“I hear absence, bitsy insides of honeysuckle.
Their yellows blossom into Van Gogh’s gold
gaslights.”Jenny Blair’s “White Bluffs, WA, 1943” in the Kenyon Review Online
“After asking for more sons
to slaughter, the government
needs our apricot tree”Ally Ang’s “Kuburan Cina Bintaro” in the Journal
“On the day of his death,
I snotted and sobbed my way through my college a cappella concert
even though he was, in effect, a strangerwhom I probably never loved.”
Shitta Faruq Ademólá’s “Reflections” in Jalada
“i was a torrents of coldness on nights
when houses failed to be birthed – a ton of shivers
weighing off thousand scales.”Maggie Petrella’s “Parkway” in Southchild
“bright daffodil edges
Dented dim by each driver who
Threw themselves blindly into the side of it—”
Fiction
Te-Ping Chen’s “How to Survive Underground” in Electric Lit
“That night they slept on coats at careful distances from one another, on islands spread of newspaper, heads pillowed on bags. The lights never went out. A baby made small keening noises through the night, but did not cry.”
Madeline ffitch’s “Skunk Cabbage” in Catapult
“Sam’s preschool was in the basement of a Catholic church, but they assured Kay that they didn’t try to convert the children; they just taught them the Lord’s Prayer, which was always good to have in your back pocket.”
Jimmy Cajoleas’ “Tongues” in Joyland
“Pretty soon the music quieted down into an ambient, drum-less shimmery kind of thing, and the preacher walked out. His name was Pastor Rob. He was a tall guy with a bald spot and a big smile. The music was still playing softly, just billowing guitar licks that sounded kind of like the ocean. Pastor Rob raised his hands up in the air and shut his eyes.”
Charles Yu’s “Problems for Self Study” in the Harvard Review Online
“Assume A is lonely. Assume A is leaving M (6,3) in order to find some-one who could possibly equal his love of pure theory. A says to himself, No one in a town like M (6,3) could possibly equal my love of pure theory. Not even P, his esteemed advisor and mentor.”
Niki Bañados’ “Return” in Granta
“We can’t really break the system when our own brain is in pieces, while our anxiety freezes our decisions and actions”
Nonfiction
A Tribute to Anthony Veasna So in n+1
“‘I pursued the arts because I want to never forget my own history,” So once remarked, “and I want to do my part in making sure this history is never lost for others. I want to pave new futures for my people.’”
Ruth Madievsky’s “Girls on the Playground” in Guernica
strong content warning: csa
“Years earlier, my mom said women became pregnant through prayer. After nine months, a woman’s belly button unraveled like a grocery bag, her baby tumbling into a doctor’s arms.”
Nell Frizzell’s “Surviving Your Thirties: AKA the Panic Years” in Lit Hub
“The morning of my 33rd birthday, I woke up in bed beside a man I love, with a two-week-old baby breathing so gently beside me that, for the 578th time in his life, I had to reach out a hand and touch his face to check that he was alive. My stomach was wet mud. My eyes were lychees of restless weeping.”
Jill Kolongowski’s “What Belongs” in Waxwing
“The bees in my father’s basement are probably carpenter bees, xylokopos/ξυλοκὀπος, Greek for wood-cutter, who tunnel into wood. In the winter, they don’t die. Instead, many carpenter bees will return to their childhood homes where they were born.”
Arthur Klepchukov‘s “Imperfect Balconies” in Nevermore Journal
“On move-in day, sunlight poured in through the glass wall panorama, golden and warm like a fresh cup my fingers could cuddle. This balcony glowed. A welcoming box that peeked out at hundreds of other balconies, possibilities, lives.”