Aerie InternationaL - Missoula County Public Schools

Aerie InternationaL
Volume 2 2009

Aerie International
a literary arts magazine edited
by young writers and artists
for young writers and artists

aer♦ie(âr’ē) noun, 1. The
lofty nest of an eagle or other
predatory bird, built on a cliff
ledge, mountaintop, or high in
a dead snag. 2. An elevated,
often secluded, dwelling,
structure, or position. 3. A
home for exceptional young
writers and artists from around
the globe, providing publishing
opportunities, literary prizes,
and cross-cultural connections.
4. A place where the
distinctions and connections
of culture, language, peoples,
and environment are nurtured.
5. An innovative new journal
edited and published by high
school students for high school
students.

AdvISory boArd
eric abbot
sandra alcosser
coleman barks
dana boussard
david cates
david james duncan
contact us at aerieinternational@gmail.com
www.aerieinternational.com
We InvIte SubmISSIonS of
innovative poetry
short stories and flash fiction
brief non-fiction
lyrical essays
short drama
foreign language poetry and translations
visual art and photography
CongrAtulAtIonS 2009 AWArd WInnerS
rIChArd hugo Poetry AWArd
wynne hungerford, greenville, south carolina
JAmeS WelCh fICtIon AWArd
alexandria kim, allendale, new jersey
normAn mACleAn nonfICtIon AWArd
emma lucy bay pimentel, jacksonville, florida
rudy AutIo vISuAl ArtS AWArd
austin j. noll, lawrence, kansas
lee nye PhotogrAPhy AWArd
iida lehtinen, suavo, finland
debra magpie earling
carolyn forché
tami haaland
ilya kaminsky
robert lee
naomi shihab nye
caroline patterson
prageeta sharma
m.l. smoker
robert stubblefield
renée taaffe
r. david wilson

edItorIAl boArd 2009
edItor
katie degrandpre
Poetry edItor
kiley munsey
ProSe edItor
jenny godwin
Art And PhotogrAPhy edItor
hannah halland
CorreSPondenCe edItor
caitlyn brendal
WebSIte edItor
ryan casas
hIStorIAn
hanley caras
mAnAgIng edItor
alissa tucker
ASSt. Poetry edItor
dove ashby
ASSt. ProSe edItor
caitlyn brendal
dIgItAl edItor
lori krause
SubSCrIPtIonS edItor
dove Ashby
ASSt. WebSIte edItor
tessa nobles
AdvISor
lorilee evans-lynn
Aerie International is published annually by the students of Big Sky High School in
Missoula, Montana. Subscriptions are $12 to U.S. subscribers, $15 to friends outside
the U.S. Sample copies are $5. Subscription forms can be found at the back of the
magazine. Exchange subscriptions are encouraged. Aerie International is supported
by Big Sky High School, private contributions, and sales of its magazine. Aerie International
accepts poetry, fiction, nonfiction, art and photography submissions from
September 1st through February 1st. All work is submitted electronically. Potential
contributors should send no more than five pieces. For full submissions guidelines
and all other correspondence, visit our website or inquire through email.
aerie.international@gmail.com
www.aerieinternational.com
© 2009 Aerie International
Rights revert to the author upon publication.
Printed on recycled paper with recyclable ink at Gateway Printing

friends of
Aerie International
the following individuals and organizations have made it
possible for the Aerie literary magazines to continue and grow.
Thank you!
SPonSorS
Anonymous Donors
Paul Johnson, Big Sky High School
Mike Peissig and Donna Elliott, Gateway Printing
PAtronS
Coffee Cart, Big Sky High School
Dudley Dana, The Dana Gallery
Gerald Fetz and Family John Lynn
Scott and Mary Meacham, Montana Claims Service
Laura Parvey-Connors, Loose Leash Marketing
Renée Taaffe, Missoula Art Museum
donorS
Nancy Aitken-Nobles and Buddy Nobles
Lela Autio Phillip and Melodee Belangie Judy Bullis
Clayton Devoe, Hellgate Elks Lodge
Dr. Brian Diggs J. Robert and Dorothy Evans
Paul and Susan Fredericks, Mineral Logic
Bridget Johnson and Henry Ward Nina Johnson
Dr. Mary Kleschen and Thomas Michels Robert Lee
Mike and Ann Munsey Dr. Charles and Kathy Swannack
SuPPorterS
Butterfly Herbs
Dr. Ken Fremont-Smith and Dr. Barbara Wright
Robin Hamilton and Peggy Patrick, The Shack
Steve, Sue and Jim Ledger Candice Mancini
Partners in Home Care Frank and Beverley Sherman
Linda Rayfield Barbara Theroux, Fact and Fiction
Byron Weber Hans and Barb Zuuring
Thank you for your support!
Sponsors $1,000 +
Patrons $500-999
Donors $100-499
Supporters $50-99
Parents, Past & Present: Priceless

Highest Award 2008 National Council of Teachers of English
Program to Recognize Excellence in Student Literary Magazines
Dear Reader,
It seems we have tried to define our mission thousands of times. This
magazine just doesn’t seem to fit in any one category.
For me, Aerie International’s meaning changes on a day to day basis. Some
days, it is an object floating up in the clouds somewhere. I know it’s
important, but I can only catch glimpses of it. Some days it’s stacks of
papers, overflowing filing cabinets, and massive digital files that are
never quite organized. Everyday, however, when I walk in our classroom
door, or open up our email, the world feels real again. I am reminded that
there are other people, other lives, and other stories that exist outside
my own immediate surroundings.
I think the beauty of Aerie International as an organization with a mission
and a literary magazine, is that it allows students around the world to
share their experiences with others. That in itself is empowering in a
world where it seems that no one is actually listening, despite the many
new technologies which are supposed to help us communicate.
If Aerie International were an annual summer camp, this year’s theme
would be sharing stories. All we would ever do is sit around a campfire
with hot chocolate and s’mores listening to each other’s thoughts,
fictional and non-fictional. I believe my experience would be a great deal
less had I never had the opportunity to hear the stories of people like
Emma Pimentel, Romanius Eiman, Alexandria Kim and Jake Ross. Each
submission I looked at and each bio I read made my world bigger as each
person’s ideas, thoughts, and personalities came alive through his or her
art. I feel truly privileged to have been able to work on this magazine.
We have many hopes for the future. We hope to make Aerie International
sustainable when elective classes are too often on the chopping block.
We are always looking for new awards and new ways to give a voice to
more students around the world. We also hope to honor the writers and
artists who have come before us. We have learned so much from writers
and artists such as Richard Hugo, Rudy Autio, Norman Maclean, James
Welch and Lee Nye.
We have many people to thank for helping make our dreams with Aerie
International possible. The first is our international Advisory Board
whom we were fortunate enough to meet with this year. They are our
ultimate support group, inside the classroom and out, who prove to
us that what we are doing is real and good. We so appreciate their

feedback and support. Thank you to our design and print gurus, Laura
Parvey-Connors with Loose Leash Marketing as well as Donna Elliott
and Mike Peissig of Gateway Printing. We learn something every time
we meet and our magazine truly depends on you. Our teacher, Lorilee
Evans-Lynn, and all teachers around the world deserve a standing
ovation followed by a day of rest and ultimate pampering. It is teachers
like these who inspire us to do more, to dream, and to achieve. Thank
you to Dudley Dana and the Dana Gallery for hosting our ridiculously
complicated fund raiser and our Advisory Board members for supporting
us through your readings and your presence. Thank you to Chelsea
Rayfield, who was not only a teacher, but a big sister and a friend to
us. A final thank you to our wonderful parents and Cathy Marshall, our
ultimate Aerie Mamma, who comes in and feeds our cranky souls early
on Sunday mornings. All our parents deserve trophies and a multitude of
thanks.
Finally, thank you readers for supporting us, believing in us, and hearing
the stories of all these outstanding people.
Katie DeGrandpre, Editor

To the Reader:
As we neared production of this, our 2 nd issue of Aerie International, I
couldn’t help but reflect on our aspirations for this magazine. One was to
establish a legitimate journal for young people, a journal of writing and art
that young people could claim as their own. We wanted it be one of beauty.
We hoped to make connections, not only for our editors and the people we
were fortunate enough to encounter on and off these pages, but also to offer
the means for young people far outside our sphere to meet. Having pen pals
is great, but what if we could give young people the opportunity to share
their art in their own magazine?
It is a usual day for me to enter the classroom and find Katie, our 2009
Editor, sitting cross-legged on a table, reading from a manuscript or waving
one in front of my face (I mean that literally), usually accompanied with the
command: “Lorilee, this is AMAZING. You HAVE to read it.”
She is usually right.
That’s how I first came to hear, “Worker Bee,” a story about what might
be described as a very conventional narrator and his obsession with an
equally unconventional young “antagonist.” Jake Ross manages to take
on environmental issues, high school, middle America, and its fringes.
His characters are whimsical and delicious and irreverent, at once both
fantastical and oddly real.
In her memoir, “Navy Blue,” Emma Pimmental speaks of visiting a
hippotherapy farm in Sudan for children from underfunded hospitals. These
children have been abandoned by war, disease and poverty that is nearly
incomprehensible outside the developing world. Emma walked to Jane-
Ann’s farm twice a week all summer in the Sudanese heat and dust to help.
“I learned more about love and humankind that summer than I ever have
before or since,” Emma writes.
I don’t know that I could have picked two pieces from the magazine less
alike. And yet they are about what the entirety of this journal, all of art,
perhaps, is about—coming to the center of a thing and laying it bare, first
to discover it for oneself, and then, if we are very lucky, to share it. This
magazine is full of those kinds of moments, in image and in word.
Many pieces poke fun at our cultures and who we are. Annie Chang
writes about growing up Asian-American in central Oklahoma, “where just
five minutes from my home are real cattle farms and horse ranches.” She
says she likes to laugh at herself, and in so doing, gives all of us permission
to laugh, not only at her, but at ourselves as well. Her story is part memoir,
part fiction, about shopping trips to Wal-Mart where her mother insists,
over her daughter’s protestations, to buy soymilk for the family “primarily
because Oprah Winfrey tells her to.” Her story is hilarious, a convergence of
cultures and coupons.
Whether visual art, photography or writing, the pieces are about longing
and love, about society, about what we accept and what we do not. In
“Killing Beauty,” photographer Gabriella Otero formally poses two young
girls in party dresses in a field. They are focused like manikins on an
electrical power station in the distance, their backs to the viewer. Austin

Noll, whose self-portrait wraps the cover of the 2009 Aerie International, has
superimposed newspaper articles and obituaries across his very elongated
frame, a cut out cityscape in the background and what might be paper
waves rolling in the space between the city and the figure. The visual artists
and photographers are doing the same thing the writers are, discovering and
sharing their images and comments on the world.
I wrote an article earlier this year about the effect of publishing on
student writing. I asked my own students for their thoughts. Katie brought
home the public nature of art and what it does for all of us: “Getting
published is one of the most empowering things in the world. We all write
secretly in journals at night about our lives and what’s happening, but when
that writing gets published, you just know that someone else out there
understands and believes in what you are feeling or saying or thinking.”
In retrospect, perhaps it is that notion more than any other this journal
hopes to offer. A place where art can explore and affirm who we are and
who we hope to be. When we have the opportunity to share those things,
how can the world grow anything but a little closer?
We have many people to thank, people who have transformed this effort
into helping build a literary and art community among far ranging youth.
First, thank you to everyone in my immediate radius who picks up the
pieces tumbling from my hands as deadlines and fund raisers and readings
approach—that includes my family and friends and my teaching partners,
all of whom are exceedingly generous with their assistance and their
indulgence. Thank you, too, to the families who support the giving of our
awards—we are proud to continue a tradition of such remarkable writers
and artists. We can only hope to pass on some of what they have offered
us. Thank you to our Advisory Board, which convened at school this spring
for our first formal Advisory Board meeting. For the Aerie students, these
writers and artists are rock stars. Not only were our editors honored to
be meeting, but the board was incredibly supportive of what the students
have accomplished and equally ready with fantastic ideas for the future.
Thank you as well to all who have supported us financially. The reality is
that money makes it possible to do this sometimes overwhelming, always
inspiring work. Finally, thank you to everyone who has submitted and
everyone who subscribes to Aerie International. It is critical that we support
what we believe in with our time and our money. Poetry and art are not
inherently lucrative endeavors. They exist because we deem them essential
and because we support them. Give subscriptions for Aerie International to
your nephews and nieces and grandparents. Encourage your high school
and local libraries to subscribe. Pass the word. We want Aerie International
not only to be about the students who are published, but about sharing the
art and writing created by young people with as wide an audience as we can
possibly reach. Help us make those connections.
Thank you!
Lorilee Evans-Lynn, Advisor

To the Reader,
Aerie International is housed in Missoula’s Big Sky High School, across
from and ironically contrasted to nearby Fort Missoula which served
as a detention center for Italian nationals and Japanese-Americans held
prisoner during World War II. Aerie International represents a peaceful
and celebratory step in building relationships across international
boundaries. It is visionary, communal, and brilliant.
You should see the classroom where it happens. It’s a workroom with
tables layered in images and writing that have come from the United
States, England, Thailand, Turkmenistan, Russia, Japan, Namibia, and
Finland. This is a place where students can sit together, seminar-style,
to converse with each other, with board members, and supporters.
Presiding over it all is their magical teacher, Lorilee Evans-Lynn, the
originator of this vision, the elegant orchestrator, promoter, fund raiser,
supporter, and the encouraging voice that allows Aerie International, and
its sister journal, Aerie Big Sky, to move systematically from conception to
print. It’s an honor to serve with the other advisory board members on
this amazing journey that is Aerie International.
Youth have frequently been leaders in peace efforts, and I believe Aerie
International contains elements important to a peaceful future. The
editors have the good fortune of communicating with global youth,
and the readers have the good fortune to encounter visual and written
work from many continents. In each issue, Aerie’s expert editors conduct
interviews with several contributors which give readers a glimpse of the
many conversations going on behind the scenes.
The work of Aerie International is created, selected and published by
young people whose futures and whose memories will be inextricably
tied to this experience. Rather than seeing themselves primarily as
separate, they will be part of a cooperative whole, a group who has been
able to communicate actively and effectively in spite of physical distance
and in celebration of cultural diversity. .
In January, I wrote a note to Lorilee about an Iranian friend whose
husband had been arrested for his participation in human rights
work. The story is similar to many other arrests in various regions,
some well-publicized and many which are not. He was fortunate to be
released after two months of detention, but not everyone is so lucky.
In this context, where people can be arrested for their beliefs and
where information can be easily manipulated and censored, journals
like Aerie International are essential. It is my hope that Aerie International
will continue to be a fine example of cooperation, artistic vision, and
inclusive thinking for years to come.
Tami Haaland, poet and Aerie International Advisory Board member

sumi selvaraj lilburn, georgia, usa
flight of the shadow | digital photography

tAble of ContentS
Chemical Bonding
myrah fisher
Roses
alexaundra swann
A Watermelon Defeat
jennie lee
Home
mercy ndambuki
Kenophobia
kathleen harm
I Am a Street Kid
romanius eiman
For Five Hundred and Forty-Three Days
jennifer giang
Haiku
yuka tsuruyama
Fish-Fry
taylor nicole marlow
Psychology
jonathan o’hair
Worker Bee
jake ross
Interview
jake ross
Imitating Kerouac in the Summertime
allison lazarus
One Day in Future
ayna kuliyeva
The Army
obaid syed
Haida Statues
marquette patterson
Winter
shapovalova victoria
1
2
4
6
8
10
12
16
18
20
22
30
34
36
38
43
44

Coloring You
michele corriston
Fish
alexandria kim
How to Make Kimchi
alexandria kim
The Two Sides of a Name:
Alexandria Song-Hwa Kim
alexandria kim
We Were so Wise
jamie pisciotta
Dubai
nadia qari
He Breaks Another Bottle, I Go For a Walk
deborah gravina
Echoes of Alexandria
maria nelson
Conversations About Love
natasha joyce weidner
Speech
kelsie corriston
Dressed in Navy Blue
emma lucy bay pimentel
Interview
emma lucy bay pimentel
Greenworld # 1
daniel alexander gross
An Immigrant’s Guide to Colorado
melanie brown
Caretaker
wynne hungerford
The Milkman
annie chang
Sky
amelia parenteau
Rudy Autio Visual Arts Award Winner
Cover Art | Self Portrait by Austin J. Noll
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50
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53
54
56
58
60
64
68
71
75
82
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93

ChemICAl bondIng
The luster of the elements
Has made mountain ranges of your acids
And exponents out of my wings.
The scientific notation expands; the phoenix burns.
I’m wandless and bare-brained
And all operational thinkings have ceased.
You, I can make no thesis,
But your shimmer-swept eyes and
Melting point blush are enough to form a hypothesis.
Maybe we can experiment—you, my constant variable,
And me, the dependent value.
As different as the front and end of a chimera,
But still undeniably one mythical beast.
You’re pulling me into your orbit, an aesthetic satellite,
And soon I’m circling you through light years and solar flares
And you’re keeping me close, stopping me from soaring away.
myrah fisher
jacksonville, florida, usa
But the dragon inside overwhelms,
You eclipse me and I’m abandoned in the vacuum of imaginary numbers.
1

alexaundra swann
roswell, georgia, usa
roSeS
We were laughing.
No one told a joke but
we laughed even harder.
We were kids
barely in seventh grade
taking a night stroll around
the biggest lake I had
ever seen.
We passed
a bright pink Spanish home
we swore one day
would be ours.
We sat on the dock
catching turtles,
examining them
and throwing them back in the water.
We held hands
and prayed that we
would be together
forever.
We passed the home
of an elderly couple
who had a yard full of rose bushes.
The man said, “Would you two like a flower?”
and the hearts of two anxious girls
could not turn him down.
We tucked our roses
behind our ears
and we were happy.
2

samuel j. willger
lawrence, kansas, usa
painted landscape | oil on canvas
3

jennie lee
norman, oklahoma, usa
A WAtermelon defeAt
The dress already lay out in front of the door that morning. I ate a
Korean breakfast, complete with kimchi, rice, and tea, and sat quietly while
Mommy fixed my hair into a ponytail and a bow. I must have been around
four or five, and as I recall there were not many kids who looked like me.
All the other children were pale and big-eyed. My parents worried about
me because when I was younger I always used to follow this Chinese girl
around in preschool. I didn’t know English and attempted to talk to her in
a language foreign to her. I identified with her dark hair and small eyes, but
that feeling was not returned; only now I know she dodged me and thought
me strange. Even at a young age, I detected that I was different.
Being accepted didn’t come to me as naturally as it did for most of my
peers. This coupled with the fact that though I was born in the U.S., I had
only learned Korean and couldn’t communicate well in English, which
heightened my anxiety. I was unaware as to what I should expect in
kindergarten but hand in hand with my mom, I timidly wandered in, my
mother already having fussed over me as any typical parent would do on the
first day for his or her offspring. Adorned in my watermelon dress I noticed
my surroundings: the glaring fluorescent lights, impersonal white walls,
the carpet with a unique, foul odor. The windows of the classrooms were
decorated with tacky plastic things like smiling flowers in an attempt to
seem welcoming. The truth was the school could swallow me whole, and
me, I was helpless.
Doubt hit me in waves and sudden thoughts rushed over me. What if
nobody likes me? What if they think I’m weird? Would I play alone? Would
I be left to try and push myself on the swing? I looked about, searching
for a target; anything to hate to get my mind away from being at school.
Violently, while hunting for the object of abomination, I located a victim:
the red quarter-oval shape speckled with black dots on the neckline of my
A-line dress, complete with thin green and white vertical stripes. Everything
became clear to me; I knew instantly what I should do. I reminded myself
that I had declared to my mother that morning, “The dress is ugly. I don’t
want to wear it.” Her reply: “Look at it. It’s so cute – you’ll be the cutest in
your class if you wear it. Remember, we were at Dillard’s and when I picked
it out for you, you were so happy.”
4

Then, I was content. But now – now things were different. People would
judge me by that dress. I was wearing a watermelon! Mommy deserted
me, leaving me with my teacher and a few boys and girls my age; we were
the early ones. Nobody else was a fruit. I didn’t see any oranges or apples
anywhere. As I defensively observed the environment, I wrung the melon in
my fingers. I twisted it around my neck, wrinkled it underneath my palms
and managed to mangle the stiff fabric momentarily: I did not want it to
surface again. On my first day of school, it was my worst enemy. Though I
saw a girl wearing a dress, it was nothing like mine. I observed the boys: one
was wearing t-shirts and cargo shorts, and another wore jeans. Compared
to the other children’s clothes, mine stuck out like a sore thumb. I did not
even mind my dress if not for the crescent shape on the neckline, but that
neckline was so undismissibly hideous. The watermelon was my problem,
and if only I could hide it from everyone inside my fists, nobody would
know. Nobody would know I was different. Nobody would criticize, “What
is that little squinty-eyed girl wearing? Why does she have a plant around
her neck? Why isn’t she wearing blue jeans like me?” With my little hand I
frantically tried to scrunch my adversary up into something unrecognizable.
Kids started pouring in, and again I didn’t see anybody who looked like me.
When the teacher ordered my class to do activities, I had to admit defeat.
With one last-ditch effort of squeezing my limbs a bit more, I finally opened
my hands, palms up; I could no longer continue strangling my enemy. The
little piece of cloth had beaten me, and dismayed, I participated in the
games, the watermelon wrinkled but vivified again, taunting me out of the
corner of my eyes at every second.
I could not look anyone in the eye. Not only did I forfeit, but I was
wearing a fruit. And not only was I wearing a fruit, but I was wearing
a wrinkled, ugly fruit. The rest of the day commenced and I remained
ill-at-ease and self-conscious.
As I reminisce about that memorable day, I recognize I was too young
to learn that lesson. I did not even know the source of my anxiety. As I
matured, I realized it was not about the clothes I was wearing; it was about
being comfortable in my skin – my skin that has a slight tint distinct from
most.
On one particular trip to the bank, I miraculously spotted a blonde girl
wearing an almost exact replica of the watermelon dress. She donned it with
such nonchalance it would have put my self-conscious, five-year-old self to
shame. Her bearing convinced me to search for my old outfit in the corner of
my closet shelf, and after I lay it on the floor neatly – much like my mom did
for me my first day of kindergarten – I called out a realization to my mother,
“Mom, you were right! I must’ve looked adorable that day.”
5

mercy ndambuki
norman, oklahoma, usa
home
The drops beat fiercely on the tilted window panes
Ripping through the gutters of the roof
They attack the red soil
Soil that bears a few new huts.
It has changed so much.
The rumbling chatter bursts out of the thatched kitchen
With delight, hiding the silence.
Astonished I glide to the source
And watch from a distance the unending folktelling
All of them, grandma and her young granddaughters,
Cornering the scorching flames
With arms stretched out.
6

mackenzie enich
missoula, montana, usa
market in arusha | digital photography
7

kathleen harm
ho-ho-kus, new jersey, usa
KenoPhobIA
My keraunograph records a thunderstorm today.
A stranger walks in with his beat-up kennebecker on his back;
a brown kausia on his head—
he’s beautiful but when I hear his voice, there’s kalon.
He prepares a thick kava from a Polynesian plant;
I keck at the smell coming from the olive-green jug,
but he becomes the kelpie and speaks to me softly,
and suddenly, that scent from the kalpis seduces me.
I take a sip and I’m in kef:
the colors of the room swirl into kente—confusion; euphoria.
But he drops the kedge and the ship rocks.
I hear a clamor through the fabric;
my head hurts from the katzenjammer.
Around his thin waist is a keister;
he takes out a screwdriver and opens my heart.
I try to kep the blood;
it flows until the organ is empty, and no keloid forms to cover the hole,
but I have kenophobia, so only he can fill the void.
Keraunograph: instrument for recording distant thunderstorms
Kennebecker: knapsack
Kausia: Macedonian felt hat with broad brim
Kalon: beauty that is more than skin deep
Kava: narcotic drink
Keck: to retch; to feel disgust
Kelpie: mischievous water spirit
Kalpis: a water jar
Kef: state of dreamy or drug-induced repose
Kente: hand-woven African silk fabric
Kedge: small anchor to keep a ship steady
Katzenjammer: hangover; uproar; clamour
Keister: burglar’s tool kit
Kep: to catch an approaching object or falling liquid
Keloid: hard scar tissue which grows over injured skin
Kenophobia: fear of empty spaces
8

austin j. noll
lawrence, kansas, usa
wrinkly face quartet | digital art
9

eiman romanius
southern africa, namibia, otjiwarongo
Tita ge a!gan/gôa
Ā, mû ta ge ra âitets tasa
/Apoxawaba xu ta ra ‡û // aeb ai
Sa ui-uisa aisa ti !oa
Tsî t’ra // nâu sa uixaba
Sa !oa ta ge / apob hîa / apoxawab !nâ ao‡gāhe hâb khemi ī.
Xawets ‡an tare-i !aroma ta !gangu !nâ ra hâsa?
Tare-i !aromab !ganna ti //khā//khā!nā-omsa?
‡Âi!gâre!
/Khowemâb ai ta ra ûi!kharu, aodo mâ!khaigu tawa !nari-aoga nape, audode//ā.
/Gui// ae ta ge /on-e ūhâ i – ti ‡hunumasa.
Nēsisa da ge tita tsî /hosan tsîda /gui /onsa ūhâ - !gan/gôan.
Ti în tsî / aokhoen xa ta ge //orehe
HIV/Aids xa ta de !guni/gôa tsî huisen//oase !hūbaib !nâ
//nāxūhe.
/Gâb, /khurub, dâu!khūdi, /û/khāhes !ganga !oa //garite.
Ûib /ūsa ‡gās ai xūmâite.
/Hōsana ta !gangu ai ūhâ.
‡Gui xūna da ūhâ /goragu da rana:
!Âs, !aob, hâ!khai-osiba,
/Khai!nâ kartondi !nâ //omma.
//Khore t’ran ge, /gamsa !anu kharob, /gamsa ‡û-i tsî ti ‡hunuma
/ons /namma.
//Khore ta ra in tita /kha âi, âi‡uis ose.
Tari-e !ganga xu nî ū‡uite?
‡Âis !nâ ūhâ re, //aris ‡gae‡gui-ao ta ge.
//Îta, tita ûiba !ganga xu ge //khā//khāsenta.
Tsî nēsi !gan‡an hâta.
10

I Am A Street KId
romanius eiman
otjiwarongo, namibia, southern africa
Yes, I have seen you laughing at me as I ate food from the dust bin.
I have seen your look of disgust and even heard you say yuck.
To you, I am like litter thrown in the dust bin.
But have you thought about why I live on the streets?
Why the street is my classroom?
Think about it.
I survive on begging, waving motorists into parking areas, washing cars.
Once upon a time I had a name, my own one.
Now me and my friends have the same name – street kids.
I was abused by parents and relatives.
HIV/Aids left me an orphan, defenseless against the world.
Poverty, drought, floods, neglect, led me to the streets.
Life has left me nowhere else to go.
I have friends on the streets.
We have lots of things we share:
Hunger, fear, lack of shelter, sleeping in cardboard boxes.
I long for a warm, clean bed, warm food, love of my own name.
I long for you to laugh with me, not at me.
But who will lift me off the streets?
Remember, I am tomorrow’s leader.
I, who have learned about life from the streets,
And having become streetwise.
My poem is written in English and Damara Nama, my mother tongue. Damara Nama
(Khoisan group of languages, also used by the San Bushmen) is a very old language that
involves clicking sounds and is only spoken in parts of southern Africa. In order to write
it down, it involves four different symbols, one each for where the tongue is placed in the
mouth in order to make the correct sound. - romanius
11

jennifer giang
lilburn, georgia, usa
for fIve hundred And forty-three dAyS
I. Photograph
I don’t wait for Mom to stop the engine, just open the door and run
outside, not even bothering to slip on my sandals. The grass is rough against
my feet, and I probably just stepped on an ant pile, but I don’t care. All I
care about is the heat, and smell, and feel of the June sun burning through
my shirt, melting me with its buttery rays. Everything looks the same. The
rusty makeshift watering can is still propped up by the dead stump, and the
wild shrubs are still spreading their arms out, greedily taking in the dusty
concrete.
I nearly trip on the pile of shoes that booby trap the entry as I follow
Jane, my sister, through the doorway. Aunts and uncles crowd around us,
and we grimace as Mom prods us towards them. The ritual begins: an holá,
cómo estás, quick hug, air kiss on both cheeks. We get to my abuelita—
my grandma—and she smiles and envelopes
me awkwardly with her left arm. “Mira qué
hermosas están poniendo.” Look at how pretty you
all are becoming. I kiss her, wishing I could say
something, but the Spanish limits me to this
small greeting.
Soon, everyone begins shuffling towards the kitchen, grabbing plates and
plunking down food onto their dishes. The smell of piquant enchiladas is
just beginning to tickle my nose when Mom calls at me to come eat. I grab
a platter and stand in the corner next to the air vent so the cool air can slap
my legs.
My abuelita laughs from across the room, and her gold tooth glints under
the harsh glare of the light bulb. She reaches over to eat but as she begins to
pick up her fork, her smile fades. The fork doesn’t want to come up and lays
there, stagnant on the table, as if that piece of Dixie plastic were the weight
of a whole sea. Her gold tooth disappears behind her lips now, and she grabs
the fork with her left hand instead. No one notices.
I watch her from my corner, and get dizzy, as if something was pulling me
out of the scene and framing my abuelita’s crippled right hand into a distant
snapshot.
12
The ritual begins:
an holá, cómo estás,
quick hug, air kiss on
both cheeks.

II. Spying
Mom calls it “showing houses.” She drives around for hours, opening lock
boxes and showing people their future homes. She likes having us kids in
tow: Catalina squawking in the baby seat, me and Jane breaking the law by
sitting on the floor near the back. That annoying T-Mobile ringtone sounds
again—probably the tenth time in the last twenty minutes—and she juggles
the clamshell phone between her ear and shoulder, while she pulls up into a
cul-de-sac. She talks—whispers— to an unknown face for fifteen minutes.
The three letter acronym
stands for sitting in an
ugly blue sofa-chair for
one year with nothing
to do but memorize the
shapes of the blemishes on
the wall.
Jane pokes at me to watch a baby getting
burped by her dad in a driveway.
The cell finally snaps shut, and I hear
Mom tossing it to the passenger’s side.
She’s upset, and the phone falls to the
ground. I peek at her through the gap
between the car seats. Her head is resting
on the wheel, nestled in her forearms.
“Abuelita has ALS,” she murmurs into the
leather. Jane and I glance at each other.
ALS. What is that? We wonder what could be giving her a headache. And
making her cry. I see her trembling through my peephole.
III. One Year in a Blue Seat
It takes me a year, but I finally figure out the meaning of ALS. It means
falling straight backwards onto the garage floor and getting stuck in a
wheelchair. It means rolling to a million doctors and losing all sense of
privacy. It means getting hand fed oatmeal for every meal, then switching
over to a stomach tube. It means breaking out into raw red sores. But worst
of all, the three letter acronym stands for sitting in an ugly blue sofa-chair
for one year with nothing to do but memorize the shapes of the blemishes
on the wall. At least, this is what it means to my abuelita.
IV. A Routine
We go to Abuelita’s house almost every day: after school, on the
weekends, always during the holidays. Only the ritual’s changed now.
When we arrive, there are no lively greetings, just a quick hello then off
to work. Before I see my abuelita for the first time, I’m not sure what to
do. Wave? Give her a kiss? A hug? I awkwardly make my way past the
hospital-like-bed and grey portable potty to her chair. She doesn’t look at
me—she can’t, so I stand off to the side and try to smile. Mom’s already
sitting next to her, rubbing her back and hands to make the blood flow. I
feel guilty for holding back a gag, but the room smells like a disinfectant
someone scrubbed a million times to get rid of the smell of chilies. There’s
13

something strong that makes me want to sneeze, too. Probably some
medicine. Mom glances at me and nods her head, so I grab Jane’s hand and
try to situate myself on the large armrest. As I reach down to hug Abuelita,
she starts as if she were going to talk. But I know she won’t, so I burrow my
head into her braid and whisper.
Afterwards, I back away towards the kitchen, the perfect view, and
pretend I’m minding Catalina playing with our cousin on the floor. Mom’s
giving Abuelita a rinse now. She dips the
rough washcloth into a bowl of hot water
and rubs it onto her twisted arms. Mom
laughs, telling Abuelita about the time
Catalina threw a fit at Target because she
saw a girl wearing the feathered tiara she
wanted. Even though I know Mom wants to, she can’t cry. Abuelita will see
her. I walk to the refrigerator, open it, feel the rush of cool fall over me, and
cry for her instead.
V. You Are My Sunshine
I call Mom’s cell frantically, wishing she would pick up her dumb phone.
She’s been gone all night—on New Year’s Eve, too. Jane, Catalina, and I sit
on our knees next to the window and peer through the blinds, watching the
fireworks in an attempt to entertain ourselves.
Catalina hears the rumble of the garage door first, and we all sprint down
the stairs. “Where were y—,” Catalina starts irritably as the door opens, but
I shush her. Mom’s holding a small mountain of tissues in her hands. There
are deep nail marks on her arms, as if she’s been clutching herself, and sticky
tearstains on her cheeks. We follow her quietly to Catalina’s room, and the
bolt clicks when Jane closes the door.
“Did she…?” I falter, before I see Jane’s glare. Mom gives a half-nod and
doesn’t bother wiping the tears that are starting to run down her face again.
Her body gives a massive heave, and she speaks with a halt. “She died crying.
She died crying! Ay, dios mio, oh my God, oh my God.” My vision blurs, and I
lie on the floor, mimicking my mom with soft shudders. Catalina doesn’t
know what is going on, so she pets Mom’s head, her small fingers running
through the stiff knots. I can’t breathe; my tongue feels heavy and there’s a
kink in my throat. “Mommy,” I plead and turn to face her. “Mommy, maybe
it was better for her to go. She was suffering so much and—and, now she
doesn’t have to.” I don’t think she hears me.
VI. A Nap
Everyone around me is praying, fingertips touching their lips, mouthing
Ave Maria in unison. I clasp my hands together, but don’t say anything. I
just listen to the soft Spanish tongue cradling my abuelita as she sleeps.
14
Even though I know Mom
wants to, she can’t cry.
Abuelita will see her.

jessica byrne
carlisle, cumbria, uk
country lane | traditional black and white photography
15

tsuruyama yuka
japan, kumamoto
16

taylor nicole marlow
norman, oklahoma, usa
fISh-fry
Grandfather pulls the white glass plate from the fridge with a swish.
He walks out the back door—through the kitchen and into the
garage pantry hallway.
Atop the massive deep freeze filled with frosty
quail pastries hamburger
he builds his station—
a plate of fluffy flour, corn meal, and crimson spices
a vat filled with already crackling oil
and
the crappie
caught fresh from Uncle Tony’s pond that early morning.
I sit on the step behind him, the heavy concrete floor beneath me.
My hands on my bony seven year-old knees, I lean forward to watch him
dip pat sprinkle
the powder onto each thin filet.
He is quick but skilled as he lays the fish into the
pop and sizzle
with his freckled leather hands.
He
batters fries retrieves
until the stack of golden brown is high enough for eleven hungry mouths.
Behind me, I hear the
chime and twinkle
of glass-wear and silver touching tablecloth.
I hear the
laughter and happiness
flowing from the nine other bodies.
It is almost time as Grandfather turns around to find me
the youngest
watching patiently, my eyes wide and excited.
Hey, baby Taylor, ready to eat?
He chuckles heartily and wraps me up in his bear arms as I stand.
Then, I open the door to the rest of our family.
The rest of Thanksgiving.
18

sophie howell
carlisle, cumbria, uk
sunflower city | acrylic on canvas
19

jonathan o’hair
norman, oklahoma, usa
PSyChology
Everything psychological is simultaneously biological. In our bodies,
there are chemical reactions to literally every single emotion we have.
Pain, frustration, anger, boredom, anticipation, joy, relief, empathy, and
wrath are all triggered by a biological gun. Science can’t tell us all of the
secrets of the mind, but it can shed some light on the mystery that is our
very own emotional balance.
What most people don’t know is that there is a steady truce between
the biological functions of the body and the mental responses of the
mind. Even though I hate scientific explanations as much as the next
guy, I paid close attention to what that balance literally means in
common language. That balance is the main driving force in whether you
are happy or sad. Even though we can’t literally measure those levels of
happiness, science can still pinpoint one of the main outlets of function
starting at the different nervous systems. If you’ve ever played a sport,
been in a car wreck, or even pumped yourself up for a job interview,
you’ve experienced the effects of the sympathetic nervous system. You
know when your heart rate speeds up and your blood pressure rises,
time literally slows down. And if something alarms, challenges, or
threatens you, the sympathetic nervous system is there to allow you to
be at your best physically. Unfortunately, going back to the balance,
there also has to be a physical reckoning for every action our mind takes.
The parasympathetic nervous system is that tired feeling after your
sympathetic stress. The crash at the end of a sugar rush, if you will.
But what does that have to do with our emotions, and our happiness
level. Sadly enough, the basic principal used in the sympathetic and
parasympathetic systems is used in our emotional outlets. With every
single feeling of happiness, there will be a different but proportional
feeling of sadness. So the true culprits behind the frustration at
stoplights, the anxiety in airports and elevators, and the anger at an
insult is not the outside stimulus so much, but rather that our bodies
are compensating for previous emotions. It is the same when you laugh
at something you didn’t think you found that funny or when you enjoy
a movie you know you don’t like. If external conflicts are a fire, then our
biological functions are the match, and the phrase “Don’t let that bother
you” never seemed so impossible.
20

worapan kongtaewtong
bangkok, thailand
retrospective | colored pencil on paper
21

jake ross
greenville, south carolina, usa
WorKer bee
The way River walked made me have to cross my legs sometimes, if
you know what I mean, and I think you do. She wasn’t like most girls,
with dark denim jeans hugging like a second skin and over-exaggerated
mosquito bites pressing out of low-cut polo shirts. River was different;
she was – what’s the word? – unconventionally sexy, like straight out
of the movies, with her flowing skirts and tennis shoes made out of
recycled tires and bouncing,
brick-colored hair that fell
down to where I imagined
the crack of her ass to start.
That may not sound so hot to
you, but I swear it’s the way
she walked that got me going.
That walk, it could kill a guy.
She walked real aggressive, like if you got in her way she’d slam
you against the lockers and verbally assault your character until you
realized you’d been wrong all your life. She was a real hippie, see, but a
smart hippie, up on all the current events and all that. River was fiery,
and she openly hated stupid people. She regularly destroyed dunces
and left them floating in her wake. Once, in history class, Football
Bobby made this comment in favor of the president, but he didn’t have
the facts to back it up, see, so River took him out in front of the whole
class, proverbially tackled him on the fifty-yard line of Debate Stadium,
knocked his helmet off and left him for dead. For the rest of the year,
Bobby was real quiet in history class.
But maybe that was a bad example; maybe a better example would
be Fresh Out of Home-School Susan, who felt the need to give her own
opinion on stem-cell research in the middle of a biology lecture, and even
Professor Whitaker couldn’t quiet River down then; she stood up and
yelled until Susan shrank into her turtleneck like, well, a turtle, a few
wires anxiously escaping her normally perfect brunette bun. After that,
Susan moved from the front row to the back one. She knitted. Sometimes
River would shoot Susan a look, and Susan would start knitting like the
craziest son of a bitch I ever saw. Her face would scrunch up and redden
out of anger and she would start knitting so fast that you could hear her
22
River was different; she
was – what’s the word? –
unconventionally sexy, like
straight out of the movies.

little sticks clanking together from the front of the room. You know,
those little sticks girls use to knit. I don’t know what they’re called.
How can you expect me to know what those stupid things are called?
Anyway, it was the walk, I swear to God it was. My words can’t even
do it justice. That strong, powerful walk in contrast with all those
flowing dresses and that flowing hair, it was just beautiful. All that
contrast, it got me excited. Shut up, you know what I mean. Maybe you
don’t. Whatever.
Me, I’ve never been savvy like River was, but I wanted to be on that
like a duck on a June bug, so I figured maybe I could trick her into
thinking I was smart just long enough to get that flowy skirt up over her
head. I don’t think she really noticed me, see, it’s easy for me to hug the
wallpaper, and our eyes would never meet even if I stared at her for a
whole class period, even if I sent all kinds of vibes her way. I was always
on the lookout for something interesting I could say that would make me
look smart in her eyes, in those fiery green eyes that she batted when she
did that strut. Hot damn, that strut.
I knew I’d found my chance when I called Time and Weather one
morning. Time and Weather is free, you know, or at least it’s free where
I live, and before they tell you the time and the weather they always
play an advertisement, usually for a chiropractor or Meals on Wheels.
It’s in my interest to know the time and the weather, because I’ve got
to ride my bike to school and back, come hell or high water. But when I
called on this particular morning, the ad was for Bill Maloney’s Custom
Honeybee Removal. Hold on, let me think of what it said. Got bees in your
Apparently, because we
pollute the air, the worker
bees can’t smell right anymore,
and they get lost and die in
the woods or whatever.
trees? That was the first part. And
then: When it’s warm, those bees will
swarm! Call today! Real cutesy,
real stupid, but that was my
chance.
All the honeybees are dying,
see. A third of them are already
dead. We studied them in
biology, after the River-Susan Battle Royale. Apparently, because we
pollute the air, the worker bees can’t smell right anymore, and they get
lost and die in the woods or whatever. And because the worker bees die,
the rest of the hive dies, including the queen. This is some kind of big
deal, because honeybees pollinate our food, and if they go extinct we’ll
have to do it ourselves. Some kind of suck job, huh? With my luck and
my grades, that’s probably what I’ll wind up doing – squirting pollen
onto buds, or however the hell that works.
So I called the guy. I felt like a regular secret agent then, and maybe
23

I got a little too excited; you know how I get sometimes. But I was real
good about it; I got control of myself and caught my breath, and when
the guy said, Hello? I said, Is this the bee man? and he said, Yes, and I said,
My granny’s got a bee problem, how do you get those bees down, do you cut down
the hive and then transport them somewhere? and he said, No, we just gas them;
they drop dead within twenty-four hours, guaranteed, and I said, Isn’t that bad
for the environment? and he said,
Son, which do you care about more, the
“environment” or your granny being
stung by a bunch of insects? and when I
didn’t say anything, he said, Where
does your granny live? and then I got
nervous and hung up.
That may sound like a failure
to you, but I’m not James Bond, so
get over it. There are other ways
to find out about honeybees. On
the internet, I found out about
the worker bees. They do all kinds of stuff you wouldn’t guess, using
processes you wonder how they set up without talking to each other,
without signing a constitution. The worker bees are the sexual misfits.
Some of them go on errands, some of them guard against intruders, some
of them tidy up the hive before the queen does room inspection, some of
them carry out the dead and injured. They’re all little humans in little
palaces, and I guess we’re killing them all, and I knew that would set
River ablaze.
I made my move before history class started. I didn’t want to do it
in front of the chemistry teacher; I just knew that crazy Whit would
overhear me and compliment me for being “well versed,” or some crock
like that, make me sound like a geek, a bozo. I knew the history teacher,
a coach who didn’t know the difference between Cleopatra and Reagan.
I knew he wouldn’t give a rat’s tail. He was the kind that went home and
learned from the textbook along with us, and if you asked him a question
he didn’t know, he’d go into a class-long rant about Bonnie and Clyde,
just to avoid answering. He said that when they robbed all those places
during the Great Depression, Bonnie never fired a shot. Did you know
that? During the shoot outs, Clyde fired and Bonnie loaded.
Anywho, that day I took a deep breath and dove in with both feet;
I marched straight up to River and told her about the bees and Bill
Maloney. I could tell this surprised her enough to quell her rage some,
but I realized I needed to have a reason for striking up a conversation, so
I said, Wouldn’t it be funny if we found out where this guy lived and, say, egged his
24
On the internet, I found
out about the worker bees.
They do all kinds of stuff
you wouldn’t guess, using
processes you wonder how
they set up without talking to
each other, without signing a
constitution.

house? and I could tell that was the turning point, where she would either
take the bait or bite my head off, and holy mackerel did she ever take
it. She said, I like your style, and her slender white fingers slithered down
into her blouse and emerged with a slip of paper that had her number on
it, like it had been waiting for me there, since forever. She said, Call me,
we’ll talk.
We talked. Our conversations were pretty one-sided. River would
cram information into my ear about politics and the “E.P.A.” and some
bunch of yahoos that protect animals, “Petta” I think it was, as in “to
Petta dog,” I’m guessing. Sometimes I’d have to think of hitching that
skirt up, just to keep sane. Her pet name for me was Honeybee, which
made sense and wasn’t so bad. It was just her talking non-stop, and
when she’d go hoarse, she’d ask me a question. Once it was, How do you
feel about nature, Honeybee? and I almost groaned out loud. I told her about
the big oak in the forest behind our double wide, how it used to be nice
but now it’s infested with all of these little white bugs that attack you
when you go near it, fly at your eyes and mouth and nose, like little space
ships protecting the Death Star. She didn’t say anything, and I said, I
don’t know, nature is kinda just a backdrop for the rest of life. And she said, No,
you’re such an idiot, life is just the backdrop for nature; humans are just reckless,
unstable weaklings teetering on top of magnificent organic and non-organic processes,
or some crap like that, and then
But now it’s infested with all
of these little white bugs that
attack you when you go near
it, fly at your eyes and mouth
and nose, like little space ships
protecting the Death Star.
she hung up.
I thought that was curtains for
me, but it wasn’t. River called
back and apologized, and a few
weeks later, she invited me over
for dinner with her father. She
picked me up in her white van
and drove me to their cottage
in the mountains. There was
wilderness everywhere, but it wasn’t po-dunk or anything. It was
classy looking, it had electricity and running water, and there was some
expensive furniture inside.
Before going inside, we ran around in the woods, chased after each
other and then collapsed in a random spot. She was panting, and I would
have been panting too, but I was too focused on her heaving chest to
make a sound. There was silence, and I thought, Is this it? Is this the day?
but no, she started talking. She said, You know Honeybee, everyone in the
world is stupid except you and me. Maybe my father, but he’s gone soft. Everyone
else, they’re destroying the world, and it’s not even on accident anymore. I said, I
don’t know, it seems to me that maybe God and the earth are going to do what they’re
25

going to do, and I instantly wanted to catch those words and stuff them
back in. She turned all the way over and I could see her coiling up, about
to strike, but she stopped herself. She smiled and patted my head like
a dog’s. That’s cute, she said, but you trust me that I’m right, don’t you? and I
nodded, of course. I realized that it must be pretty lonely for River, up
here on this mountain where she knows everything and the view looks
down on the people who don’t.
Before dinner River ran up to her room to check her email, and I
followed her upstairs to size up her bed. I noticed that she had to
use a lot of passwords to get on to her computer, which I knew was
weird, because I’d used computers in school before and they weren’t
that complicated, weren’t that secretive. I didn’t say anything about it
because I didn’t want to sound simple. The conversation at dinner was
pleasant; River’s father, Wayne, was a nice guy, even though he was
divorced.
After dinner, we sat in front of the television in the living room and
watched an old episode of Wayne’s TV show, Wayne’s Wonders. It used to
be on public television, apparently, and it was a show about nature, big
surprise. Wayne explained that the show used to focus on local
scenery, but when the show got more funding the crew went on more
exotic trips, like to the Grand Canyon. On the screen, a much younger
Wayne and a woman stood beside a bush and talked. The cameraman
slowly zoomed in on the bush until you could see a praying mantis
perched between the leaves.
River went up to her room again, to check something on her
computer. The tape ran out. I asked Wayne why the show was canceled,
and he said, Aw, people just don’t care about that stuff anymore, and most people
didn’t care even then. His eyes kind of
lost focus then. I’m not a relationship
expert, but I couldn’t help but wonder
if the woman in the show had been
his wife; she struck a keen likeness
to River. Maybe she’d left because
Wayne got too caught up in his work; maybe it’s possible to love nature
too much and a person not enough.
River came back downstairs with an unnatural smile on her face. Pops,
I’m taking Honeybee and we’re heading out, she said, and I mouthed, We are?
and she punched me in the arm. Wayne laughed. Watch out, my River is a
firecracker, he said, and I said, Yessir, how I know it, and we left the cottage.
River walked me to the van, and we got inside and drove for a long time.
I could tell she wasn’t taking me home, or to the movies, or anything
like that, but every time I tried to ask about it she would turn up the
26
Maybe it’s possible to love
nature too much and a
person not enough.

my ngoc to
lilburn, georgia, usa
radio, even
if it was a
mindless
song I
knew she
didn’t like.
After
awhile,
River got
this look
on her face.
She was
squinting
in the dark,
trying to
read the
street
signs, being
real careful
of where
we were
going, like
it was some
secret.
Wouldn’t
it be funny
if we had
wound up
on McBee
Street, or
some crap
like that,
but no, we
were on
transcriptions in time | pencil drawing
Wilkinson
Avenue, on the opposite side of town from where I live, and on the
opposite altitude from River’s cabin. We parked and River killed the
engine and the headlights and everything fell dark, and I thought Holy
mackerel, this is it, this is it. She climbed into the back of the van and I
jumped back there like a bullfrog, and I was kissing her and I grabbed
27

her thigh. But I guess I was biting her lip and maybe I was grabbing
a little too hard, see, you know how excited I get sometimes, and she
pushed me off and wiped her mouth and said, No, Honeybee, that’s not
what we’re doing, and I realized we were sliding around on something
uncomfortable. She lifted up a canvas sheet and lit up a flashlight and
shined it on a bunch of metal canisters.
I said, This doesn’t make much sense to me, and she said, This is the stuff
Maloney uses to kill the bees; his house is
right there, and I said, I don’t follow,
but by then I figure she’d already
left me behind, in her head at least.
She pulled her skirt up over her
head, but not in any way that I liked,
because she was wearing black
sweats underneath. She whipped out
this black knit cap and slid it over
her face, and every bit of that brickcolored
hair disappeared. It wasn’t
two seconds before she had gloves
and a ski mask on me, too. As we walked up to his house, it seemed to
me that it didn’t look like the house of anyone evil. River walked around
and looked in all the windows until she found the bedroom, and she
jimmied the window open real quiet. She walked over to me and handed
me the canisters and said, He’s in there asleep, throw them in, and I said, No, I
can’t… your walk is different, and she said, What are you talking about? and then
she said, Never mind, just throw them in. You want me, don’t you? Throw them in.
Even in the dark, even through the slits in her mask I could see those
green eyes, so I figured there was some hope. I pulled the tabs on the
bombs and started throwing them in, one by one. Those things don’t
explode, you know, they just fog up the place, so we had to stand there
for a long time and wait. I started getting nervous. We have to stop it, I
said, he’s asleep and he’ll just breathe it in until he’s dead. She said, Shut up, and
not much after that the upper half of Bill Maloney exploded out of the
open window, red-faced, drooling, wheezing, sputtering. River grabbed
my arm and said, Let’s go, but I didn’t follow her. I looked straight into
the face of Bill Maloney as he hung there. I don’t know who he reminded
me of, maybe Wayne or my own father, maybe the coach or Professor
Whitaker, but he certainly did not have the dead eyes that a murderer
should. On the contrary, his eyes were teary and wild, like something was
being robbed from him but he couldn’t comprehend what. I walked over
and hauled Bill Maloney safely out of his house, and I had to run all the
way back to my double wide on foot, see, because River was already gone.
28
She whipped out this
black knit cap and slid it
over her face, and every
bit of that brick-colored
hair disappeared. It
wasn’t two seconds before
she had gloves and a ski
mask on me, too.

I guess I blew it on that one.
Maloney didn’t die. I think the police went to his house, but nothing
came of it. He picked up and moved further south, and I felt sorry for any
man who has to move constantly to make a living, one step ahead of the
knowledge that’s trickling down, state to state. River left, and not even
Wayne knows where she went. He hired some geek, some bozo to crack
open her computer and under all those passwords he found out River
had joined some kind of organization, a bunch of
Even if she’s
in disguise, I
can spot that
walk from a
mile away.
environmental freaks with their morals in the wrong
place.
I reckon that’s the most interesting thing that
happened to me all year, what with bombing a guy
and finding the love of my life and all. I don’t have
the money for a car, but every weekend I search a
different area with my bike, like a detective, looking
for River. You can come help me look one day, if you want, but I’m the
only one that can spot her. Even if she’s in disguise, I can spot that walk
from a mile away.
See, I’ve got this feeling she’s in the wilderness.
29

jake ross
greenville, south carolina, usa
IntervIeW mAy 2009
Jake Ross was one of those persons who stuck out right from the beginning.
On our first Sunday workday, we lounged around reading piece after
piece of writing when we happened upon Jake’s story “Worker Bee.” At
first, we didn’t quite know what to make of it. Hesitant giggles escaped
our lips as we tentatively read the first few pages. We decided to call in
reinforcements. Katie, the editor, was outside the room at our computer
lab, so we called her into the classroom. She sat on the table, and as her eyes
scanned the pages, a smile spread across her face. She proceeded to read the
whole story aloud. Belly laughs erupted when Katie got to the parts where
the narrator described River’s walk, the way her hips swayed, the narrator’s
quirky descriptions and the truth of being in love with someone who just
doesn’t love you back. River may not deserve it, but we were all just as
smitten with her as that blindly loyal and sexually frustrated narrator. We
found ourselves quoting it in class daily. We knew we had to meet the man
behind the story. So, without further ado, Jake Ross.
-hannah halland, art editor and ryan casas, website editor
AI: We noticed right off the bat that you had a very particular tone of voice in your
writing. Can you give us a little information about how you developed that voice?
Have you always been set in your style and known that was your voice? Or did it take
time to develop?
JR: Everyone likes to talk as if they understand it, but the concept of
“voice” is pretty elusive. My teacher defines it as “a stew of everything a
writer has read.” I have no idea how to describe my voice, but my advice
to anyone trying to develop one would be this: read a lot, but read what
you know is good. When a famous writer says, “I used to read anything
I could get my hands on,” I don’t believe him for a hot second. What was
he reading? Travel brochures? Dr. Seuss? Twilight? If someone stewed
those together and wrote a novel, I wouldn’t want to read it. Surely, to
develop a respectable voice, you have to focus on quality literature.
Tone, in comparison, is simple. When I start writing something, I
think: Would anyone take this situation seriously? If so, I forget about
punch lines and tell the story. If not, I work in some humor. I switch
back and forth, but I do get a kick out of making someone laugh. Besides,
a good joke can make people pay attention. They want another joke.
Even if you don’t give it to them, even if your story or essay ends on a
serious note, at least they’ve paid attention.
30

AI: What are some techniques you use to develop plots and characters in your short
stories?
JR: I revise constantly as I write, because I’m always asking myself
questions. How would he describe this? How would she react to that?
Whenever possible, I take out something generic and replace it with
something unique. I was almost laughed out of the writing room when
someone looked over my shoulder and read the first line of Worker Bee,
but eventually everyone understood that I was writing the way my narrator
might talk. I imagined this sexually repressed country boy who
was still humble enough to devote his entire life to an undeserving girl.
It was fun. I got to use those weird colloquialisms.
Again with my teacher. He quotes James Joyce: “A writer should
know how much change a character has in his pockets.” I think this is a
little ridiculous – after all, I keep my change in a jar on my desk. And I
firmly believe the penny should be taken out of circulation. The nickel
could be the lowest denomination if we changed the pricing system a
little bit. The penny, after all, is annoying and useless. Just think of all
the natural resources – and time – we would save. I used to work in retail;
I know how long it takes to count out pennies, then pick up the one
you inevitably drop.
But anyway, I’ll shut up; I guess I’m revealing character.
AI: What made you write this story? You mentioned it began with an insect-removal
jingle. Could you elaborate on this? Are you particularly concerned with decline in
honeybee populations around the world?
JR: Just like the narrator in “Worker Bee,” I called Time and Weather
one morning and heard the Bee Removal advertisement. I called over and
over, trying to get the same ad to play, but I never got it again. So I wrote
down the jingle and telephone number as best as I could remember,
then called. I got the guy’s answering machine. Later that day, he called
back and left a voice mail. I remember he called me by my first name,
which he must have heard on my greeting, but it was still kind of creepy.
I assumed a full conversation would just result in an argument about
conservation, so I dropped the notion and started writing about him
without any further investigation.
Yes, the honeybee decline scares me, if only from its sheer rapidity.
Because we sit around and argue about everything, most environmentrelated
issues seem to have left us in the dust, outpaced us. Interestingly
enough, the suspected cause of Colony Collapse Disorder (the bee
problem) has shifted a few times since I wrote Worker Bee – from air
pollution to global warming, then to runoff of super-pesticides, then to a
particularly potent virus.
31

AI: What are some other concerns you have for the world? Are there any world
issues or beliefs that are particularly interesting to you? (i.e. issues/ideas that are
political, environmental, religious, ancient, philosophical etc.)
JR: There’s a recent article in the New Yorker. Apparently, animals in
Florida zoos escape every time there’s a hurricane. Most of them are
rounded up or killed, but a large population of exotic reptiles consistently
avoids capture. The boa constrictor, especially, seems to have adapted
well to Florida as a natural habitat and is multiplying rapidly. According
to some experts, boas will inhabit most southern states within a few
decades. My mother is terrified of snakes. I think this prospect scares her
more than the duck-and-cover drills she did as a child.
We like to think that, if we all got on a space ship and left Earth alone
for a while, the planet would heal itself. And it would, but it would
look different from the way we found it. After all, we have caused the
extinction of many species. We have imported foreign plants and animals
that killed native plants and animals. I don’t think most people realize
how far we’ve already overstepped our ecological boundaries. For further
reading, I recommend The World Without Us by Alan Weisman.
So yeah. I think about that too much.
AI: In Montana, many of us go on hikes in the mountains or walk by the rivers to get
in touch with nature and fuel our creative fires. Do you ever do anything like this? If
so, where are some places in South Carolina that you go to do this?
JR: In this, I envy Montanans. I know there are plenty of cool nature
spots in the rural areas of South Carolina, but not so much in a city like
Greenville. Our campus at the Governor’s School does overlook a
beautiful park that we spend a lot of time in, but the river that runs
through it – the Reedy – is polluted to the point of Swimming Advisory
signs. In other words: look at the pretty river, but don’t touch.
AI: You mentioned doing a research paper on Pablo Neruda and that you read
too much of his work for your own good. Who are your favorite poets or short story
authors? Why?
JR: I don’t read as much poetry as I should, but overall, Neruda is a
front-runner. I’m not a fan of his love poems, but his odes to everyday
objects are amazing. Plus, the man took so many risks for his beliefs and
his writing – you’ve got to respect that.
Fiction: Flannery O’Connor is the supreme. Charles Baxter, also great.
My favorite short story to date is “Hidden Meaning: Ain’t Gonna Bump
No More No Big Fat Woman” by Michael Parker. Nonfiction: writers like
Tobias Wolff and Susan Orlean are staples. I’m interested, obviously, in
environmental writing, so Rachel Carson, Lewis Thomas, Rick Bass, Bill
Bryson, and Barry Lopez are all currently being added to my “stew.”
32

AI: Before attending South Carolina Governor’s school, what did you want to be
when you grew up?
JR: We had to answer this question in kindergarten, and on my slip
of paper I wrote “ventriloquist.” It would probably take a psychiatrist
to figure out why. Other than that, I thought seriously about being a
marine biologist. Then a lawyer. Then anything but a lawyer.
I still don’t know what I want to be when I grow up. My ideal:
someone walks up to me and says, “Hey there, kid, we would like to pay
you money to travel around and write about the environment, and maybe
some other stuff, too, if you get the urge.”
If you know anyone like that, call me.
AI: In Montana, we have no schools that are dedicated specifically to the arts. What
is it like to go to an art school? What is the atmosphere like? How are your classes
structured? Do you prefer going to an art school, if so, why?
JR: As conservative as South Carolina once was, it’s a miracle that any
old philanthropist thought to give money to the arts as opposed to, say,
the Governor’s School for Hunting Woodland Creatures, or the Governor’s
School for Absolutely No Gay People. Luckily, by some freaking miracle,
Greenville wound up with a few really great art schools. I’m not really a
self-made writer; I’ve been in creative writing classes, in some form or
another, since seventh grade. Each consecutive program has been more
intense than the last. I don’t take the opportunity for granted.
The South Carolina Governor’s School for the Arts and Humanities is
a state-supported school. Kids from all over the state audition, and they
take the best ones for each department. You live on campus. Unlike most
residential art schools, there is no tuition; we have a whole team of people
who are always trying to get money to keep the school alive. A student has
academic classes until lunch, followed by arts classes (dance, drama, music,
visual art, writing – whatever you auditioned for) until four thirty.
Yes, I prefer my school to a normal high school, because it serves as
an example of what every school should be like. My school is both a
prototype and an endangered species.
AI: Your bio states that you enjoy “wearing sweaters designed for old
men.” Is this a new fashion for you? Is a fluke or will old man sweaters
continue to be must haves in your wardrobe for years to come?
JR: Just today, I was sitting across from one of my friends at dinner
when I realized something. “If I go to college in California,” I yelled, “I
can’t wear sweaters anymore! It’s too hot there!” It was a devastating
moment. There will, I believe, come a time when I have to choose
between my sweaters and my future. Who knows what will happen?
33

allison lazarus
terrace park, ohio, usa
ImItAtIng KerouAC In the SummertIme
1. there are a lot of halves of me floating around as specters where would they go
would they live in gardens and adorn themselves for parades?
i think that they would like what i do they would eat spaghetti
and throw pebbles and go to amusement parks
but then they would go back home and throw up because specters and ghosts
can’t eat and they can’t keep pretending that they’re more than half of anyone
2. i think like salt when you pour it into the shaker and it kind of tumbles over
itself in a race to fill the corners—the desired spots.
i remember when we went on vacation with dad to Michigan and we climbed on
the world’s biggest sand dune i don’t remember the name now but
it was beautiful and there anytime you stepped the sand rushed to fill your
abandoned footsteps and i wondered why
it didn’t just keep going the whole dune with the same
eagerness and make
a whole new mountain right where you had stepped because it
was so excited its piling just disrupting the laws of gravity and
physics because it wanted to touch you even if indirectly for just a second
34

sarah stern
lawrence, kansas, usa
the road ahead | digital photography
35

ayna kuliyeva
ashgabat, turkmenistan
one dAy In future
In far future when I am 30
I will remember the thing that I wrote on this paper.
Maybe feelings that I have now and there is good weather over the
window.
Maybe the bird singing and it is wonder magnificent landscape in my yard.
Maybe the dog who is barking over the fence,
And my mother who is cooking delicious food in the kitchen
Maybe sound of washing machine.
And the program that I’m watching on TV
Maybe only leaf, which occasionally fell in the window-sill
Who knows maybe I won’t remember anything
And it will be a simple day
If it’s there I will be happy to have every day.
36

ella carruthers and hollie milburn
carlisle, cumbria, uk
old and new | mixed media on paper
37

obaid syed
norman, oklahoma, usa
the Army
It was getting late, Nimbuk observed, as the sun reached its
destination on the horizon. “Goodbye, friends,” he said to his teammates,
and began the race against the sun. He ran through fields where farms
should have been, threatening the sun from going farther with his stare.
At least the wind was supportive, he thought, as it blew in his direction. He
almost enjoyed the rush invoked
by his procrastination, because
it made him feel like his energy
was being channeled throughout
his body, giving it the ability
to produce whatever action he
willed it to produce.
He reached the depreciated
apartment building and sighed
in relief. He wasn’t going to be too
late. He walked toward the house, climbing the torn stairs skillfully,
remembering which plank was safe enough to step on. He knocked
firmly, and waited. The usual welcoming creek of the door was absent
today, it seemed. He resorted to plan b, which required him to jump on
the side railing, hop on to the wide windowsill two floors in the air and
carefully slip the thin metal plate inside to open the lock. He tumbled in
with a crash loud enough to wake anyone in the house. Yet no one came.
He found no signs around the house explaining his parents’ sudden
departure. This never happens, he thought. They always inform me before they
leave. He looked more closely at everything around him – the sofas sat,
the ornaments hung, and the books lay the same way as they had this
morning, before he departed. His eye fell upon something he had given
little importance to earlier – the carpet bristles were inverted, making a
path pointed toward the door. Immediately, he left the house, planning
to ask his neighbors. His plans changed, however, as he saw five grey
overcoats and one outstretched hand, displaying a police badge.
“Where are my parents?” Nimbuk demanded, knowing to be direct
with these officials.
“All I can say is this: your parents are traitors against the sovereignty,
and must be punished accordingly. Be quiet and come with us. Asking
questions would only make the situation worse for you and your
38
Immediately, he left the house,
planning to ask his neighbors.
His plans changed, however,
as he saw five grey overcoats
and one outstretched hand,
displaying a police badge.

parents,” the one on the left replied.
He stayed quiet, no matter how much curiosity clawed at him. He was
put in an old van containing other children, mainly from the lower class,
all of whom where just as inquisitive and terrified as he. “Do you guys
know anything about this?” he asked.
A skinny boy on the right looked at him. “Do you know about the
Army Expansion Resolve?” he asked. He received only blank stares.
“Well, it is something passed by Jinba, our dictator. He wanted to
challenge other nations, so he decided on building an army twice its
original size. Due to the lack of adult recruits, he resorted to a cruel but,
for him, effective method – an army of children,” he ended, with a solemn
sigh on his face.
“Are you suggesting that he wants to make us part of the army?” the
boy of the left asked. Nimbuk immediately recognized him – Tink was
his charismatic classmate.
“You must be kidding me. I know he’s dumb, but I didn’t know he
was that dumb,” Nimbuk said.
A few hours and a few children later, they reached a debilitated
building complex labeled “Army Training Center.” The 42 kids stared
at the barren gray walls and wondered how long they would remain
inside its parameters. Every muscle in their bodies instinctively resisted
“Are you suggesting
that he wants to make
us part of the army?”
the boy on the left asked.
heading toward the place, but the
atmospheric pressure, shaped by
threats and orders from the angrylooking
men, overruled them. They
took their shoes off at the gate,
following an order from the gate
guard, and continued walking on the hot concrete until they gave up
restraint and ran to their destination to keep their feet from getting
burnt.
The inside smelled of sweat and felt like a stove, most likely due
to the lack of windows. The ceiling allowed in some refracted light
through which objects were given surreal forms, like when one looks
at the sky through 50 feet of water. The new members walked in a
broken up line to their assigned sleeping spots. They found a huge
room assigned to them, the size of an auditorium, piled with thin
mattresses and wispy blankets along the walls, reminding them that it
was heavily shared. Dropping off the little they had there, they joined
everyone else at dinner, observing the food to be just as bad as the rest
of the dreary place. Nimbuk tried to inquire the kids around him, but
received no more answers deviating from what the boy had said earlier.
He eventually gave up. His parents were in god-knows-where, he was
39

alone in this prison, and he knew things were just going to get worse.
His thoughts pained him. Sitting on the rock bench, he ate the supply of
what was called food and headed to bed, trying to get his thoughts away
from him.
He woke up the next day, surrounded by hundreds of people lying
around him, some asleep and some unable to sleep. The training had
begun.
They woke to run miles, to practice combat, to do assigned labors,
ranging from washing dishes to manufacturing explosives in the nearby
factory. Every day, they mechanically went through the same routine. At
least, they thought, they were alive.
The physical movements within themselves weren’t harsh, but the
fact that they were doing them against their will made them feel as if
they were less than human. On every push-up, every gunshot, every
mile, they were burdened with the knowledge that they were being
manipulated. Yet they continued on,
doing what they could to pass the time
with as little pain as possible. As the
beads of sweat fell from their faces, the
hope for a better future became bleak.
Water. Never before had it been of
greater value to Nimbuk than now.
Food. What an imaginary concept!
Free will. There is no such thing. The
colors became undefined, the people indistinct. Life retained no meaning
but to war. Everything he was taught made him a tool to be used of and
disposed at war. He called out for war, if only to break the monotony,
and, to his horror, war heard his call.
The dictator Jinba, in the all too common quest for power, decided
to take over his neighboring country, Maylei. “For the defense of the
nation” he went on an offensive that called all the training institutes to
release its children to go to war.
Nimbuk and his friends went there, via rusty school bus, loaded with
weapons and harmful intentions, but glad to finally have some change in
their schedules. Upon reaching the area, they passed by an army of men
looking warrior-like, and the army of boys,
looking like sheep to be slayed.
Weapon ready, Nimbuk started the march, almost excited, for
reality to bear too much horror if confronted. Around him was a
similar attitude, arising from the fiery spirit of war. They marched on,
awaiting battle, until they reached the capital of Maylei – the City of
Reuk. Looking upon the massive wall that bordered its surroundings, a
40
On every push-up, every
gunshot, every mile, they
were burdened with the
knowledge that they were
being manipulated.

alex welcher
lawrence, kansas, usa
grim attitude
overtook
the warriors
and children.
They realized
the sacrifice
necessary to
even get close
to the fortress
walls would
be too great.
Confirming
their fears,
the dictator,
as chief
commander
of the army,
announced
that the battle
must go on.
He said the
‘little warriors’
should go first.
Anger
spread through
the group of
‘little warriors’
like brush fire,
but compliance
was necessary.
They began
their death
march, being
drowning dreams | traditional black and white photography
open to the
arrows and gunshots of their enemies. At first, it all seemed customary,
since they were told of death and trained in ways to deal with it on the
battlefield. However, when the first boy, who was a good friend to all,
was shot down, chaos spread through the group. They suddenly came
back to their senses, after months of getting them dulled by the institute,
and remembered the atrocity of which they were to partake.
41

There were few options available to them though – defying Jinba’s
orders was instant death for the dissidents, no matter how many there
were. So they did the only thing they knew: they kept marching on,
looking at their friends die beside them, and awaiting death themselves.
Blood gushed everywhere; the field had turned red. The army protocol
was still followed.
Nimbuk had just about had it. He lost his parents, he was forced
into training, and now this. He wanted something to be done. He
turned around in a semi-circle from the marching warriors, something
that soldiers were taught not to do in any situation, and he located the
dictator, sitting in his plush tent. He ran against the flow, hidden in his
chosen path, and reached the army’s base line again. Jinba had built an
impressive army – it easily spanned a few leagues. He shuffled through
the crowd like a lion running through the forest, skillfully dodging all
the armed battlements, until he reached the spot where the dictator
should have been. The tent had no one inside now; the surrounding
people had no information about his location. He decided to wait in the
tent with his weapon ready. A few hours passed, and each minute, he felt
the pain his friends experienced on the field. Yet, he could do nothing
about it…yet.
Jinba arrived. He along with three guards, armed to the teeth, walked
into the tent. Nimbuk realized that these might be the last moments of
his own life. I’ll take one for the team, he decided. He leaped out from
underneath the table, simultaneously driving his knife into Jimba’s heart.
Yet, they both felt the pain. Nimbuk’s grip on the knife slipped, and he
let the light enclose him and carry him to his parents.
You have made us proud.
42

hAIdA StAtueS
Totems stand tall with great depression
Because they’re so tired and old
Each animal has a spirit that never dies
But worn colors, cracks, and crevasses
Of the eagle, raven, frog, and bear
Are signs that nature never rests
They tower over us with respect and pride
But day after day as time continues
We go about our business
These totems feel no appreciation
Someday someone will stop to glance
And that glance will last forever
marquette patterson
hydaburg, alaska, usa
43

shapovalova victoria
russia, tatarstan, kazan
Зима
Кругом зима.
Шумит метель; хрустят снега
И ель своею красотой пленит.
Шумят ветра,
Лишь только слышен треск огня,
Пылающего вдалеке.
Сижу я тихо у окна,
Любуясь молча на узоры,
Что тонко лежат на холодном стекле.
Давно не веря в Дедушку Мороза,
Жду с нетерпеньем я тот час,
Когда все стрелки на часах замрут,
Шепча, что полночь наступает,
Что новый год свои владенья обходя,
Дарует радость нам.
И обо всем вдруг забывая,
Из дома выбежит народ.
И фейерверки зажигая,
Любуясь на небесный свод,
Все люди вспомнят уходящий год,
И не броня его, без зла - проводят.
И встретят с радостной улыбкой на устах
Год приходящий, новый, долгожданный.
Лишь только малыши,
В кроватках засыпая, не заметят,
Что старый год уже прошел,
А новый только наступает.
44

WInter
victoria shapovalova
kazan, tatarstan, russia
Winter is everywhere.
The blizzard rustles; snow crackles
And a fur-tree captivates with its beauty.
Rustle the winds,
And only the crash of fire flaring in the distance is audible.
I`m sitting silently at a window,
Admiring silently the patterns
Which are on a cold glass.
For a long time without trusting in the Father Frost,
I`ve been waiting impatiently for that hour
When all hands of the clocks will stop,
Whispering that midnight comes
That New Year its possessions passing by,
Grants pleasure to us.
And suddenly about everything forgetting,
From the house the people will run out.
And fireworks lighting,
Admiring a heavenly arch,
All people will recollect the expiring year,
And without harm will accompany it.
And also will meet with a joyful smile on lips
The Year coming, new, long-awaited.
And only kids, in beds falling asleep will not notice
That old year has already passed,
And new one only comes.
45

michele corriston
allendale, new jersey, usa
ColorIng you
The air above my bed
whispers lies;
it flows into my ear
and paints you.
They say we dream
in black and white,
that our minds put
color where color belongs
when we awaken,
but you were red last night
and I was blue-green and
we were all soft and
and iridescent.
We had texture and shape and heat,
oil, water, form, contrast,
glaze, symmetry, and rhythm—
the beat of each stroke
against cold canvas.
Last night,
I saw you in full chroma,
a glittering lie.
46

laura elder
carlisle, cumbria, uk
decorative glory | textile and mixed media
47

hannah lodwick
lawrence, kansas, usa
48

the naked lunch | painting
49

alexandria kim
allendale, new jersey, usa
fISh
During a time of turmoil on a small peninsula in East Asia, before it
was crowned a country, there was a shanty. In its single room, a mother
peered over the half-empty, splintering bowl of rice. She sucked in air
with relief. Her three sons, however, impatiently pounded on the
furnace, demanding, What about the pan-chan*? and rattling their
empty plates.
Their mother blew out despair and pulled out a bony flounder. Its
frugal aroma carved famish already engraved in the boys’ stomachs.
They cried with excitement. But the mother shushed them and walked
to the center of the room, carrying the toasted fish. She stepped on
a stool and with a long piece of thread, tied the fish to a hook on the
ceiling. The flounder swung back and forth like a child pushing on the
swings, swinging steadily like a pendulum in a grandfather clock. The
fish seemed to mock the mother with its steadiness. The mother quickly
stopped the swaying piece of light meat.
My sons, this is how to eat a meal.
The mother ordered her children to sit around the table as the fish
quivered with each of the boys’ steps. She backed away, observing her
giggling boys who were jumping and reaching for the fish, like Jindo
dogs anticipating a tasty treat. She blinked back despair and set the halffull
rice bowl to the table. The mother pointed upwards.
After every spoonful of rice you eat, you will look at the fish and imagine that you
ate a piece of fish with it.
So the boys ate like this until the fish decayed in a week; the gnats got
to it first. These three boys who ate the tepid, stale grains of rice dreamt
of silver slivers of smoking flounder dancing on their tongues. The taste
was so close and the smell was so alluring, but the children would
eventually learn that satiation was a luxury fit for an emperor.
* pan-chan: a Korean term for the side dishes eaten with rice
50
James Welch Fiction A w a r d W i n n e r

olivia dykes
lawrence, kansas, usa
table top stain | traditional photography
51

alexandria kim
allendale, new jersey, usa
hoW to mAKe KImChI
Go to the cheapest market you can find
and ask for the crispiest cabbage.
Then don’t believe the sellers’ words;
instead, open the cardboard box
and look for brown colors –
aged spots and soft bruises.
Wash the cabbage tenderly;
fingertips for sponges,
kosher salt for soap.
Mix a scarlet sauce of
scallions, onions,
and pepper powder.
More pepper awakens
the taste buds.
Spread the sauce on each leaf
evenly and lightly.
Fold the cabbage into a tight ball
and compress them in a bowl
with marble.
Keep it away from
the scathing sun.
Let the leaves soak in spices
in damp air.
Wait for a day.
Then
Unwrap
Unfold
Cut.
If the kimchi pricks your tongue,
if its tang tickles your nose,
and if its painful taste is soothed by rice,
you made it right.
52

the tWo SIdeS of A nAme:
AlexAndrIA Song hWA KIm
Song-Hwa:
Vowels of the English alphabet are novice.
Humored foreigners do not understand the
rich, tunneled “oh” and the lingering roll
of the tongue, emphasizing on the exhale
with a tickle on a quick widening of the lips.
The blow on the “h” masks a precise, tidy
whisper that precedes the tidal wave of
a satisfied “ah.”
The two syllables connect in one breath.
Names represent the beauty of sound that
is reserved for distant brothers and sisters.
Alexandria:
But here I am defined by accomplishment,
a name used to label passports and bank cards.
The name is a jigsaw piece that was
wedged into the wrong grooves;
I am drowning in this melting pot.
My mother does not know how to spell it,
(let alone pronounce it),
unable to find the rhythm of this name
of forbidden five syllables and dribbling English,
like raw grease dripping onto her lap from
under cooked, bleeding Big Macs.
My mother was dust in the tumbleweed
of desperate dreams –
masking identity, embracing
“ass-imilation,”
fleeing in shame when they
scurried on the streets of gold and dollar bills.
53

jamie piscotta
layton, utah, usa
We Were So WISe
I wish I could go back
and not just to my childhood
I mean all the way back
to that day we reached the moon
and came back for a lunch picnic in the forest
and after we built a castle
then chased the clouds
but just before it all ended we found Africa
and we stopped at the watering hole
we squished the dark mud through our toes
of course we made mud pies, and we sold them to the zebras and giraffe
with our skin still covered we climbed out and laid on the driveway
you said you liked the way it felt as it dried
the way it got hard and tightened like armor
I liked the way it looked
you seemed 100 years old
(and I believe you had the wisdom to match)
with skin like the elephant, baked in God’s oven
the African savanna
we found the fountain of youth that day, too
the green hose washed away our cracks and wrinkles
but we were still wise
we knew the meaning of life
we traveled the world
our castles were made from blankets
and were still strong enough to keep out dragons
a steep hill was the only rocket fuel we needed
and a good pie would only cost two smooth stones
54

evelina shakirova
kazan, tatarstan, russia
loneliness | photography
55

nadia qari
allendale, new jersey, usa
dubAI
If mangos suddenly started to grow on these big metal pillars in the airport
and thick grape vines wrapped all over the doors and signs
and there were red birds sitting on every newsstand;
everyone’s phones were oddly replaced with green and yellow bananas −
maybe the wrinkles on this city wouldn’t be so heavy.
56

déla breyne
lawrence, kansas, usa
windmill | digital art
57

deborah gravina
allendale, new jersey, usa
he breAKS Another bottle, I go for A WAlK
White glass shatters differently than clear glass;
clear glass scatters into tiny, invisible pieces,
while white glass breaks into frosted chunks.
A sword gets pulled out of a stone by a flimsy boy,
and the girl made out of stone falls in love.
Cows walk on just their two back feet when farmers aren’t looking.
They play chess, and read novels on split tree trunks.
Book discussions occur on Sundays.
There’s a partridge in a pear tree by the bus stop where I wait
for the sunset to drown arrogant trees
and wonder what lies under the orange seam,
and how exactly I can get there.
58

paul edmondson
carlisle, cumbria, uk
present | pen ink drawing
59

maria nelson
helena, montana, usa
eChoeS of AlexAndrIA
I would have found you.
Too-old and not-so-young and flame-flickers-nearer person. A
mistake of the refractions of light. Superconductor. Misplaced
moralities, realities, neutralities.
Would you have heard me?
Too-quiet and not-so-loud and
purple-blue-any-color fingernails,
person glowing in afternoon light.
Reality that flickered with
uncertainty and things that were
never near and could never be
reached.
Walking away is so easy to do,
easier still to walk away from you,
to tell me and myself “I never really cared,” when caring is all that I hold,
when the signs I used to read in the sky can only tell me how wrong I
was and have always been, how waterfalls cannot be made of fingers,
how your eyes can never have brimmed with things nearer to life than
tears.
You can’t cross bridges without looking twice, without thinking of
Billy Goat Gruff, without looking for demons under the bridges-youreally-will-never-cross.
Umbrellas will keep the water off like raven’s
wings, but you’ll never know the warmth--as long as there’s no focus, or
determination, or glow in your eyes (glows like you’re not-good-for-theenvironment
bulbs) like mercury that broke in chemistry--silver rolling
on the floor (sweetness that may never be broken). Your world is the
same, and it’s always the one of falsehoods and “I’m all rights” and “it’s
okays” and perfect faces, being perfect, burning memories to the ground,
polishing silver in the dead and the heat of the night, pretending that
there are prophesies written on the mountains outside your front door.
It’s a total lie that I’m telling myself, that the world is, was, real and
that I ever knew that colors danced in the northern sky, that colors
danced in the crowded gym of drunks and adolescents (was there a
difference?), that colors danced on the beach on the day the sun
drowned. Who saved the sun? Nobody. So who was there to save you?
60
When the signs I used to read
in the sky can only tell me how
wrong I was and have always
been, how waterfalls cannot be
made of fingers, how your eyes
can never have brimmed with
things nearer to life than tears.

Who indeed. The sun had already died, and we could not see to find you.
Perhaps that’s the end then? That you seclude yourself in yourself, that is
to say the yourself that you will never show.
You’ve never seen your own beauty, painted in paints of every color
imaginable, paints that bleed out in the water, swirl against silver then
drown in the sun. You know themes of madness painted in hues
unimaginable and you’ve never seen my eyes to touch the themes I hold.
Chinese food-corset-quetzal-Buddha girl lost in the smokes of divinities,
You’ve never seen your own
beauty, painted in paints of
every color imaginable,
paints that bleed out in the
water, swirl against silver
then drown in the sun.
incenses and distillations of
never-really-happened dreams.
Keep loving your love that has
never loved you, in the way that
friends could love you more, in
the way that a simple flower may
conceal grandeurs greater than
known in Xanadu, that place
you and us and we and they and
everyone may never see, and will never see. Starbursts of color flashed
before your eyes, you saw your soul given up to eternity hundreds upon
hundreds of times but you never saw the realities of those visions, and
with every foretelling you etched that
writing deeper, gave of yourself further, fell into madness faster.
And faster faster faster faster faster.
Now there is nothing left. Do I have to be with you to know you in the
ways I never really knew you, or can I see the end of your final memoirs
in the light behind your eyes, the lack thereof and the blue thereof. Short
white dresses, chunky orange shoes and camouflage jackets that you cast
away as you cast away yourself in the ways that you are not seen and
cannot be seen, and the veils that swirled to the floor when you danced.
Nothing left. Because the soul dies a slow death, and you have to only
stoke the fire, higher and higher, until it is so great that the very ghost
of the sun has been extinguished and you no longer see into the eyes of
those who once cared, cared beyond imagining and beyond hope, cared
for and about you until they were left after the storm, trampled into the
pavement like petunias secluded in their terra-cotta pots.
Ensconced in gold, you’re a nightingale of the river, ragged and
tousled with fading gold plumage, nearly white with harsh and flashing
lights.
I would have found you.
I would have walked through the snow you threw to blind the
heaven’s eyes, but I could not see through the shield of yourself, and
now there is left only adjectives to describe you: just a little too mad for
61

a world of sanity, lonely beyond imagining beyond feeling beyond hope,
hopeful beyond the abilities of children whose huge eyes pierce through
paper to enter the hearts of those who never knew a thing at all of
starvation or deprivation or need.
I cannot be what you need. I
fear nobody can. I fear the wolves
at the door who howl for your
soul and your health and your
heart, the wolves you go with and
dance with and burn with and
twirl with. So twirl, twirl through
whatever you ever knew. Twirl
past those who once knew you.
I know you are losing control. I know you are losing me, and you
never even held me with your soaked, pale fingers. I know I am losing
you and I never really had you, I never really knew your beliefs.
So now what are we left with? The ones who would know you and
care for you; the ones you push and rail against and tear with your
sharpened words.
We are left with an echo in the corners of minds that dreams and
hopes will never fill; an echo in those parts of our minds reserved for
ideas and imaginings of what you had the potential to be. And that’s an
echo of a name you never became, and a dream that you never believed.
Destruction is the echo that rebounds within our minds; fires, like the
ones to ravage your namesake, to destroy that knowledge of all the
knowledge carefully destroyed by the ramblings in the dark, by the slots
in your sunglasses, by the kites you speak of when you are lost to us and
you speak of nothing else.
You are lost to us,
you and your echoes of Alexandria.
62
Hopeful beyond the abilities
of children whose huge eyes
pierce through paper to enter
the hearts of those who never
knew a thing at all of starvation
or deprivation or need.

gabriela otero
lawrence, kansas, usa
killing beauty | traditional photography
63

natasha joyce weidner
san francisco, california, usa
ConverSAtIonS About love
1.
Graham sells
lavender and strawberries
at the farmer’s market.
One day he told me
he planned to drive
a diesel-powered RV
through all the national parks
because that was his dream
and dreams
are the best plans.
I replied,
my heart is a silent
redwood forest,
growing upwards in my chest.
And I don’t know what it wants.
2.
Why am I not in love?
I asked Naomi.
I mean, I might be
a tender nectarine
almost past ripeness.
Natasha, she said,
your skin is not the limit
of your self.
There is love
in other places.
You are inhaling it.
You are growing it
in your garden.
The two of us
proceeded to make calzone
in the warm
pink shell
of our home,
while outside,
cold rain fell
fondly
on the welcoming black earth.
64

3.
When my grandma asked
what she should buy me
for Christmas
I said,
how about
a cowboy
on the back of
a horse
riding endlessly over
a flat country
so I can hold on to him
and let myself be carried
in pouring sunshine and under
full moons and through
flat fields of wheat?
To which she replied,
that is not a thing.
I want you to ask me
for a real thing.
4.
I have been told
the ocean is dangerous.
I have been told
to balance carefully on the shore
in pretty, airtight shoes.
But I have also
dived off a fishing pier
to feel my skin shrink
against my bones
and let the salt settle
in my lashes
and let my blood
race bluely through
its riverbeds.
In conclusion, I have
the white foam in my hair.
I have
the curling current in my stomach.
I refuse to fear anything
I do not understand.
65

5.
I am putting myself
in the cold blue light
of my kitchen,
near the teapot.
No one is in the house;
the ground outside
is green and swollen
from rain.
I am putting myself
into the bed
of a pickup truck
on a Hawaiian highway.
In a jar
of honey,
slow and golden.
In a tidepool.
Where I really am
is unmentionable;
let us only say
I am curled behind a desk,
cold-boned and meek.
Naomi
sits at the desk
in front of me.
To the back of her head
I whisper,
I am putting myself
on the hot slats of the pier
where we once lay
our wet bodies
and grew golden watching
the dudes
ride their bicycles into
Lake Tahoe.
She says,
You are so fortunate;
you are in the exquisite condition
of desiring.
66

chase hoag
lawrence, kansas, usa
i wish | digital photography
67

kelsie corriston
ho-ho-kus, new jersey, usa
SPeeCh
When I was a child I lost
my r’s, th’s, sh’s,
and so my tongue hung
loose inside, as I spoke too fast
in a British accent –
or so they told me –
and walked the halls
with lips that would laugh
but not speak or sew sounds–
and so I molded my tongue,
tight into a boat,
the way I’d squeeze my fists
to catch the R-AIN off my hair,
in TH-E SH-OWE-R
in which I scrubbed off the DI-R-T,
because I couldn’t pronounce it
or count the days that passed
like SH-EEP
as flashcards whipped
and tore me from first grade math
to play a game of Chutes and Ladders,
neither of which I could say
and not spray,
or even say at all –
say car, say race, say the, say them, say they
who I make crave to lack what I lost
on the roof of my mouth, in the hole in my tongue,
in between my loose lips
that they say couldn’t keep a secret,
but what could I tell
with no verbal coordination
to SH-A-R-E a R-UMO-R
but what if I could, what if the tale
I heard could be spun
without the forbidden consonants –
if you were allergic to strawberries,
and left alone,
would you squeeze the squishy juice
68

on your tongue
to not taste but to feel
the forbidden motion
that must be good
like the way my tongue learned
to lift itself
and touch the roof of my mouth,
sculpt around a word
that I can feel
now and forever
I keep my consonants close and ask
shoot, car, race, the, they, them
Listen –
did
I
stutter?
69

iida lehtinen
sauvo, finland
the 4 o’clock tea at covent garden, london | traditional black and white photography
70
Lee Nye Photography A w a r d W i n n e r

emma lucy bay pimentel
jacksonville, florida, usa
Norman Maclean Nonfiction A w a r d W i n n e r
dreSSed In nAvy blue
Thirteen long years of frittered experience and unrequited kindnesses
had unraveled themselves behind me when I met Jane-Ann and was
introduced to her cause. We had recently moved for the fifth time in my
life, to the third continent I’d ever been on. Having sneaked past
calculating Sudanese officials in
Jane-Ann was a sweet little
lady in her forties, who had
devoted her life and her own
personal farm to what she
called “hippotherapy.” Two
days a week, children from
underfunded hospitals enjoyed
the open air, horse riding,
and the love the volunteers
showered upon them.
Cairo who had denied us visas, we
somehow managed to gain access
(after, that is, quite a bit of money
had changed hands) to a smelly
airplane destined for Khartoum’s
diminutive, three-gate airport. It
was summer, hot and dry in the
Sahara desert, and we had covered
most of our bodies in deference to
Sudanese culture. It was
sweltering. Yet in the early hours
of dawn that first morning before
the sun had hit the peak of its
arch, when the whole world seemed
so bright that even shadows could find no place to skulk, we got up and
walked down dusty dirt roads and under parched palm trees to Jane-
Ann’s. Jane-Ann was a sweet little lady in her forties, who had devoted
her life and her own personal farm to what she called “hippotherapy.”
Two days a week, children from underfunded hospitals enjoyed the open
air, horse riding, and the love the volunteers showered upon them.
I remember most the tortured appearance of the children. Most were
diseased, and many were missing body parts. They lacked even the will
to brush away the flies that whined around their ivory eyes and rested
on their bristly hair. These children were silent, terribly silent, empty
shells next to my rambunctious two-year-old sister. They sat, a few
crying softly, but none expected comfort. On my first visit, the disgust
and horror of the sight nearly overcame me. I looked around and saw
innocent children in pain, helpless children hurting, undersized infants
who did not know affection. I had absolutely no idea what to do; such a
sight was so far beyond my ken that I found my heart beating out a
solemn rebellion against its very existence. Jane-Ann saw me at a loss
71

and placed a reassuring hand on my trembling shoulder. “Just pick them
up and love them,” she said with an encouraging smile. “Just pick them
up and love them.”
Gathering the tattered shreds of my spirit, I nodded and scooped up
the nearest child, a faintly whining
little boy, dressed nearly in rags, ribs
protruding from his stained, navy blue
shirt. He fastened to me like a barnacle,
his tears and mucus running together and
soaking through the sleeve of my white
shirt, coating my shoulder with a thin,
liquidy goo. I held on though, rocking and
soothing and crooning simple songs. It
was as if I had finally grown into myself.
A fullness enlivened my spirit, and I felt
a completeness that I had never before
experienced. I knew that these children needed me. I looked around at
the tiny, underdeveloped boys and girls. Most of them were destined for
an early death. Others would be hurt and abused beyond comprehension.
But, in that moment, I was helping them, and perhaps just a few would
be bolstered by the memory of a strange, pale-skinned girl who had held
them in her arms and sang to them in a language they could not
comprehend.
A haboob roared its thunderous way to our sanctuary one day, and we
all clustered on the reed mats under the makeshift shelter of old, patched
tarps and bent metal poles. Dust storms, or haboobs, are common in
Sudan, the fierce wind stirring up the brown-orange dust that coats the
entire country and whipping the sky a dirty orange. Breathe too deeply
in a strong haboob, and the dust will rob your throat of liquid coating
and close off your voice for a week. The dust tears at your eyes, invisible
but present, suspended in the air as if part of some giant science project.
The children showed no reaction to the change, pale ghosts haunting
their deserted eyes as if they were cemeteries, already losing their faith
in life. Jane-Ann fretted, though not about the storm, instead worried
that they would not have the emotional release we usually provided in
the form of small trips on horseback. Every week, the gentle, long-haired
horses trotted obediently over hoof-hardened dirt, past the
multi-colored, wheel-less, decrepit remains of a minibus and over the
single patch of yellow grass that still waved under the dehydrated gusts
of air that swept mournfully across the desert. I was at home here,
though the sun beat at my back and the dust cloaked my form. I found
children who needed me, and for the first time I realized how much I
needed what they taught me about love.
72
It was as if I had finally
grown into myself. A
fullness enlivened my
spirit, and I felt a
completeness that I had
never before experienced.
I knew that these
children needed me.

Often I wondered what sort of parents would abandon their child to
a terrible life such as I was seeing. I knew the children were maltreated
and starved. I knew that there simply were not enough hospitals to
support the demand of the community, and not enough orphanage
workers to give the basic emotional support every young child needs. It
was not self-righteousness that spurred me, but the stirrings of a perfect
sorrow that
convinced me to
help these
children. I
always had the
choice. No one
dragged me
out of bed each
morning, forced
me to travel
mile after mile
to the deserted,
harvestless farm
and teach these
children
humanity. Yet
twice a week all
that summer I
found that I was
awake, dressed
and aching to
aid the poor
unfortunate
souls, my
spiritual
brothers and
sisters who had
no parents to
hippotherapy | traditional black and white photography
love them, no
relatives to raise
them, no friends
to accept them. I knew that Fate could just as well have chosen me to
be in their place, all the sparkle of youthfulness drained by a childhood
that was not childhood but a life of misery and pain and little chance of
survival.
I learned more about love and humankind that summer than I ever
have before or since. It was a rude awakening, a cruel reminder that
73

privilege is not universal. A few months later, a Sudanese friend of mine
was questioned about his opinion of Sudan’s overall state of being. He
responded in honest belief, his wealthy head resting on hands the exact
same shade as those of the orphans, “Everyone in Sudan is rich.” I saw
then the ignorance of humankind, the denial we entertain despite the
obvious suffering surrounding us. Before that moment, I had not noticed
the maturing effect hippotherapy had on me. No other experience
I learned more about
love and humankind that
summer than I ever have
before or since.
74
could have taken me past that awkward
phase of life characterized by extreme
embarrassment and self-consciousness
than this. Those children taught me that
self-actualization comes only through
others. I can never again be satisfied
with my own accomplishments but with
generosity and the way I affect the lives of others. I want to be a savior to
a people who have never before understood deliverance. I want to show
them the goodness of a human heart and most of all I want to see these
children, young and silent, almost inhuman in self-perception, become
the backbone of their land, the strength of their country and the pride of
their own lives.

IntervIeW mAy 2009
emma lucy bay pimentel
jacksonville, florida, usa
We received Emma’s first submission early in February of this year.
Like all of our submissions, her work sat in our filing cabinet while
we prepared for our annual fund raiser. We finally started reading
submissions on a quiet Sunday morning, each of us at a table with a
stack of poems, fiction and nonfiction. I happened upon her poem which
immediately set off my good-poem-sensor. After reading it, I flipped
to her bio. All I could utter was an astonished “Woah...” I immediately
wanted to know more about Emma’s childhood and about her travels. I
hopped onto our email and fired off a few questions. A week later, the
answers to my questions were waiting for me as well as the essay, “Navy
Blue.” She described living in Bosnia and walking across a minefield.
She talked about living in Cairo and about her favorite food, “Koshari.”
She discussed being proud of her younger sister’s attempts to prevent
malaria. Needless to say, her writing charmed us and her life beguiled
us. We thought her story was important to include in the pages of our
magazine. A few emails and a couple weeks later, this interview was
aching to be read.
-Katie DeGrandpre
Editor of Aerie International
AI: Why did your parents decide to move to Bosnia when you were little? Do you
remember feeling any specific way about the move? Once you were there, why did your
family decide to move again to Romania and the Netherlands?
ELP: At the age of seven I already considered myself a seasoned traveler:
I had lived in three different states and visited relatives in a few others.
Moving to Bosnia wasn’t a step I was quite prepared for, especially on such
short notice, but, as a second grader and the fourth child, I didn’t have
much say in it. My father was offered a short-term job he hadn’t applied for,
assessing the needs of post-Communist courts in Bosnia, and our family
packed up and moved out, leaving all of our furniture as well as our dog
behind, the former in the care of a storage unit, the latter with relatives. At
the time, we thought it was for just three months. It was a chaotic time for
me – while excited to ride in an airplane and live overseas, I hated the idea
of leaving my comfort zone. At that age, I hardly knew that Europe existed,
75

and Bosnia itself seemed the equivalent of Narnia or Neverland to me. In the
end, though, I decided that having a great experience to lord over my friends
was worth it and promptly tried to pack all of my stuffed animals into my
suitcase. By the time my father’s contract had extended to nine months,
my whole family began craving the taste of travel, and job searches became
more extensive, leading us to Bucharest, where my father worked with a
nonprofit judicial reform organization, to the Netherlands, where he worked
for the War Crimes Tribunal, and finally to Sudan, where he was with the
United Nations Mission. My mother was a stay-at-home mom of four, then
five, then six children. Of course, “stay-at-home” is not at all descriptive of
her life, or ours, during these years.
AI: How did you learn to speak the Bosnian language and languages like Arabic when
you did not even have a teacher that could speak your language?
ELP: Our family always hired local tutors who spoke English to teach us
privately in our home, but that wasn’t necessarily where we learned the
most. Bosnian was the language I learned best, maybe because I was so
young and my mind was still close to the stage where it soaked up language
and made it usable. A tutor came often to our house to teach my siblings
and me nursery rhymes and short Bosnian songs, but mostly I learned out
of necessity. I attended a Bosnian school with children too young to speak
English (my older siblings at least had friends who spoke their language)
and had to learn to understand my teacher, who knew little more. Day after
day, arriving at school, the other children would practice their English on
me. As we untied our tennis shoes to put on the slippers we wore inside
the classroom they would ask me over and over again my name, my age,
and my state of being. I would respond to their English questions with the
few Bosnian words I knew and then the next child would arrive and I’d tell
them again my name. There was one memorable moment when the class
bully tried to blame one of her pranks on me. Incapable of responding to
this accusation in a language my teacher understood, I repeated again and
again “ne, ne, ne.” I think it was at that point that I decided I would become
expert at the Bosnian language. A few weeks later, I realized that I knew the
word for “sun,” without ever consciously learning it.
Learning Arabic was a very different experience. I was much older, and
I didn’t understand the Arabic alphabet and the sounds that accompanied
each letter. My family bought a computer program designed to teach Arabic.
I painstakingly memorized the name, sound, and shape of each letter, which
I promptly forgot when I moved on to the next. I learned short words
and phrases – how to say hello, how to introduce myself, and how to use
numbers. These last were the most important, as I’d use them when buying
produce from the outdoor food stalls that swarmed with flies. I learned that
the most important thing in speaking Arabic was knowing their slang and
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their common sayings. My older sister, the language prodigy in the family,
when buying bread, pronounced perfectly the side comment used often with
greetings or farewells: the Arabic equivalent of “God bless you.” The man
across the counter looked up in shock and proclaimed in quick, loud Arabic
that she spoke better than his grandmother.
AI: You recently mentioned becoming a part of wherever it was you were living. Have you
taken a part of all the countries you’ve lived in with you? If so, how does this translate to
your everyday life in the United States?
ELP: While leaving America was hard, coming back was harder. I had
shed that skin of stereotypes and generalizations that so frequently clothe
the American race and understood more about other countries than about
my own. Bosnia, for instance. left me with a stubborn paranoia of walking
across open grass. My family had once walked inadvertently through a
minefield, managing to make it back to safety by following a path my dad
said he saw but which was invisible to my eyes, and the memory has stayed
with me. The sense of adventure and success that comes with experiencing
new things enfused my soul until it was more a part of me than my original
patriotism. All the places I lived slipped memories into thin sockets along
my flesh until I felt as if my skin was made of the dust storms of Khartoum,
and my soggy clothes after a rainstorm seemed to be soaked by the drizzles
of Holland and the icy puddles of Romania. When I taste a food, it recalls
meals I’ve had overseas. When my family went to an Outback restaurant,
we hung around outside chattering in a strange mixture of all the languages
we knew and chortled internally when a man remarked in a Southern
accent to his friend as they passed by us that he “thought it was Chinese
or sumthin.’” To this day, I find myself using a phrase of Dutch or French
in my conversations without realizing those around me won’t understand
it. When I walk the streets I hear people chattering in English and my
first impulse is to whip around and point them out to my family – we
had become used to singling out Americans in crowds, as seeing other
Americans in some places was very rare.
AI: Why did you and your family decide to go to Africa?
ELP: There’s a certain rite of passage within the United Nations: to
spend at least a year in a “mission.” When my father got the opportunity to
take the mission in Sudan, helping to structure the legal system of newlyautonomous
South Sudan, he snapped it up. Africa was a place of great
mystique to me. Even after having mental image after mental image smashed
during my travels, I hung pig-headedly onto the vision I had of my family
living in a tukul (a small round hut) in a small town stranded in the Saharan
desert. Khartoum, of course, was nothing like that. We didn’t get to travel
much within Africa but the time we spent in Egypt and in Kenya were great
awakenings for me. Although our initial reasons for going to Sudan may
77

have been purely job-oriented, its repercussions reached into every corner
of my life and scraped it bare so it would have room to reshape my existence.
AI: You mentioned riding a felucca down the Nile in your bio. What is a felucca and why/
how did this occur?
ELP: Feluccas are small sailboats that are frequently used as a tourist
attraction in Cairo. My family took the opportunity when we were stuck
there for nearly a month to visit the sites, and the Nile, of course, was one
of them. We paid a small fee and a grinning Egyptian spun us away from
shore. The river is beautiful there, reflecting the sky into itself and turning
everything a rich, thick blue that looks like you can sink your teeth into it.
It was a warm day, and the cool breeze was refreshing when the sail would
whip around to catch the wind. It was a short ride, and not as majestic or
awe-inspiring as the pyramids or the Sphinx, but it was a beautiful moment,
one that has stuck with me over the years.
AI: What is your favorite memory from living overseas?
ELP: In Europe the countries are so close together that it is quite
common to take a day trip to France or Germany. My family frequently
took advantage of long weekends and empty Saturdays to explore the
continent, and these travels often took us up in latitude. My father is a
skier and insisted on taking the family skiing quite regularly. We may not
be particularly proficient at it, but at least we enjoy it. Although it is hard
to choose a favorite, one of the happiest moments of my life was also one of
the simplest: a three-day skiing trip in the French Alps. We rented a tiny
apartment (we needed one, to house my entire family), and we’d spend
all day on the snow, crisp edges biting nicely against our skis. Soon after,
we’d make the daily hike to the local boulangerie for fresh croissants and
baguettes. It was a great family bonding time, and the hours we spent
closeted in the apartment were so full of fun and joy and games I frequently
felt as if I might have all the breath squeezed out of me. Despite the fact
that I spend so much time with interesting people in interesting places
doing interesting things, the best times of all were when we took the
extraordinary qualities of a place into stride and enjoyed each other as a
family.
AI: You mentioned eating camel in your bio. How did you adjust to eating strange foods?
What is the grossest food you ever ate? What was the tastiest food you ever ate?
ELP: I have enjoyed a wide variety of food from my travels, including
certain ethnic meals besides the typical fried squid rings and alligator.
Eating other foods has never really bothered me; I have always been able to
stomach everything I’m given and find its good qualities to focus on. There
are only two exceptions to the rule, both of which may be surprising in their
simplicity. The first is cevapi, a small sausage served with pita bread, onions,
78

and a thin yoghurt-like drink. The rest of my family adored the cevapi, and
ordered it often in restaurants. When that happened, I would take a tomato
salad and pick at my fresh mozzarella while my family dug into their meat.
The other exception is an unnamed stuffed pepper that was served to me
when my family was having dinner with our landlady. Having been raised to
eat everything on my plate, I managed to get the entire, spicy, painful pepper
down my throat. Seeing I had finished, I was promptly furnished with a
second. Needless to say, I ignored the eat-all rule and didn’t touch that one.
Visiting a Parisian café, no one in my family could pass up the chance
when we noticed escargot on the menu. It came in a circular orange
container dotted periodically with holes. In each a snail floated in garlic
sauce. Except for a certain chewiness, they were delicious, and are by far
both the most outlandish and the most delicious meal I had overseas. Of
course, I may have been predisposed toward adventurous eating. When we
lived in Louisiana before going abroad, I, at the age of six, was one of the
few in the family who took to raw oysters with horseradish and Tabasco. It
was a point of pride with me that I had managed to down six or so in a row
when grown men beside me couldn’t swallow a single one. I suppose the
snails may have reminded me of shucking and sucking raw oysters down on
the bayou.
AI: In reading your non fiction piece, “Navy Blue,” some of us had feelings of guilt for
being unaware of other people’s suffering or of being born privileged. Do you deal with
guilt on a daily basis? When you returned from your travels back to the U.S. were there
any overwhelming feelings that existed for you?
ELP: Living in war zones was by far the most unsettling thing I have had
to do. As I mentioned before, I attended a Bosnian school for a few hours
every day as a second grader. To get to school, I’d go down our street, notice
the bullet holes in our wall, cross a Sarajevo rose or two (the imprints of a
mortar shell explosion that was later filled in with a red paint or resin as a
memorial) and pass the remains of a bombed building. My family walked
through the tunnels that the Bosnians dug in order to receive supplies when
they were under siege, and returned home to listen to our landlady tell us
stories of going down that tunnel nine times, each time loaded down with
50 kilos (110 lbs) of basic survival supplies on her back..
In Sudan it was even more direct. All around me I saw beggars in
the street, people making do with nothing. My brother always tried to
give money to every person he saw was in need, but when we moved to
Khartoum, if he took out a coin he had twenty children under the age of
eight clinging to his pant legs, pleading with him for food. Walking home
from school, we’d kick dust up into our eyes, pass a monkey tied to the
stunted palm tree across the street, and wave the flies away as we entered
the yard. We bowed our heads while we entered because soon after we
79

moved in there was a death in the landlord’s family and a several-day-long
funeral was being held in the front yard. We’d step out onto the balcony
and hear the women keening below us, decrepit buses trundling past on one
of the only paved roads in the city, and the squabbling of shirtless children
from around the corner.
That was part of the reason that moving back to the United States was
so difficult for me. I could not believe the smug indifference of the people
around me. It felt unnatural to walk into a sterile supermarket because no
disease-carrying insects swarmed around the produce. I tried not to breathe
when I crossed the road because I was used to inhaling sand if I did, and I
hated that there was nothing to worry about but gas fumes. There is always
that something that reminds me how forgetful we as humans are, and how
uncaring. After a couple of years back in the U.S. I find myself lapsing into
that complacency, and I have to remind myself to care about the things that
happen around me, whether or not I can do something about it, whether or
not it affects me. I like to think that that is the reason that the human race is
dominant in the world – not because we were smarter, or fitter, or stronger
—because we knew how to care for each other. Ignoring those who suffer—
worse, blaming the poor, the illiterate, the immigrant, for their problems—is
so offensive, yet so easy in the typical American life of ease and privilege
(and believe me, the poorest of Americans is highly privileged compared to
the Sudanese). I refuse to believe that we can so easily forget to love and
protect the people around us.
AI; Why is writing special to you? What do you get from writing poetry and non-fiction?
ELP: I was five years old when I got my first cello. It was an eighth size,
barely bigger than a viola. I played for nearly ten years, every year improving
and beginning to put more of myself into it. I found that when I was upset,
I could play a slow, mellow song on my cello and restore peace and order
to my world. I was in fourth grade when I complemented my music with a
second art. My teacher told me I could write, so I did. I wrote all the time.
Now I can find that same peace by writing a melancholy poem or a sad
scene in whatever narrative I’m currently focusing on. Of course, I was a
storyteller even before I was a writer – with myself as my only audience.
As long as I can remember, I’ve told myself the story of my life in my head
while it happened. I’d make myself a peanut butter sandwich, and through
my head would come the narrative: “Emma Lucy made herself a peanut
butter sandwich, with just a little too much peanut butter because she likes
it that way.” Writing lets me take my emotions and those thoughts and
express them so that I can learn to understand what I’m trying to say. In the
end, I suppose it’s little more than basic instinct: a survival technique on a
raw, caveman level, a level that insists I recognize what my being tries to
express, When my stomach snarls at me, I eat. When my throat scratches
80

me, I drink. When my brain turns into a slushy pudding of mixed emotions,
I write.
AI: Do you have any advice to give to students who wish to travel?
ELP: To students who wish to travel, I say enjoy yourself. If you’re
hankering after museums and tourist sites, by all means follow the crowd up
to the Louvre or Stonehenge. As a traveler, however, I like to venture off the
beaten path, actively seeking an encounter with the culture. I like the rural
and suburban areas. Instead of taking the Sound of Music Tour in Austria,
I wandered through a neighborhood and walked along the river. When
visiting the tiny fishing villages of Cinqueterre, I enjoyed the scenic hike
that sweating tourists swarmed along, but I loved sitting in the middle of
the town square and watching the little children from a local school conduct
their Carnavale parade. Do what you will enjoy, but don’t cheat yourself of
the real country. There is more to France than Paris, and there is more to
Paris than the Eiffel Tower.
AI: What is one thing that traveling has taught you about the world?
ELP: The world is going to look after itself. Whatever we do, the world
will straighten itself out. What is important is not saving the world, but
saving ourselves. When you see a recycle bin, throw your Coke bottle in
there, not because it will save the environment, but because it’s one step
closer to you getting where you want to go, to being who you want to be.
Traveling, I’ve seen third world countries and I’ve seen the world powers,
and, from what I can tell, the main difference is the kind of humans that live
in them. Of course, there are other factors. There’s technology availability,
and resources, and all of the history book answers that will get you a five on
your AP. But beyond that, there is something with human nature that makes
us want to improve, and the best way to improve ourselves is to improve the
things around us.
81

daniel alexander gross
long beach, california, usa
greenWorld #1
There is this place I know,
he tells me, where
you tread on tree roots,
not concrete,
and you count flowers,
not miles,
not dollars.
In my eyes
he reads my curiosity.
It lives on love,
he says.
The words you speak there
are pure poetry.
There is something magic
in the landscape.
A tender canopy,
a green glass sphere,
where the delicate form
of the pain you cradle
falls from your shoulder,
and you are encircled –
not by walls,
but by branches.
I know this place,
I say, though
I don’t know where it is.
Well,
he tells me,
you can find it
on midsummer’s night,
among the fairies
and the fireflies,
or, he says,
you can find it
riding a bicycle
to a far-off horizon,
with a pretty girl
and a weightless heart.
82

erin eifler
lawrence, kansas, usa
a midsummer night’s dream | traditional black and white photography
83

melanie brown
centennial, colorado, usa
An ImmIgrAnt’S guIde to ColorAdo
I was promised horses. I remember this distinctly.
My dad knew as well as I that moving isn’t easy, especially to a place
so very far away, so he would cushion it with promises such as these.
Thoughts of horses and mountain ranches made the process of tearing
away from my homeland all that
more bearable, so I complied. My
visions were of a log cabin situated
on the hips of the foothills, with
gentle mares that would lean their
heads in my window in the heat of
summer mornings. Of dirt roads
and tractors, of cattle and barbed
wire. But mostly horses, of course.
Colorado is not all horses and
ranches. Our house turned out to squat in a quiet patch of suburb that
seems a subtle copy of the very neighborhood from which I had come.
It is a pale ivory and not made of logs, and the grass lives in trim, green
patches like quilt squares, not in long stalks that whisper to my elbows.
And the mountains? Well, I see them. They loom in the distance like
storm clouds held forever at bay. They are dark and brooding as they
sit there, their tips just visible above the houses in front of ours, and I
wonder daily if they might be up to something.
There are no horses in suburbia. As I dreamed on our migration west
of this new home, my head vibrating against the window as plain after
great plain slid by, I could see horses trotting even through
neighborhoods, even through towns and cities. I imagined taking my
gelding to school to pick up groceries. Who needed a license when I
could ride The Black Stallion, Strider, Trigger? Hell, even Mister Ed
would have worked. But there were no horses, no such luck. It was not
the Colorado I was promised. The wilderness, the cowboys, the romance
of wind and weather—where were they? The rivers of concrete, the
herds of houses and brittle street lamps had herded them off, perhaps
into the folds of mountain. Beyond my sight, in any case. I received a
bundle of letters from my old Girl Scout Troup asking what I had named
my horse, what color it was, how fast it went; they had been well
84
My visions were of a log
cabin situated on the hips
of the foothills, with gentle
mares that would lean their
heads in my window in the
heat of summer mornings.

informed of my fevered excitement. I didn’t write back.
Clouds hang in the sky with that awkward presence of not belonging
and knowing it. They have stretched themselves at breaking points into
feathers. You always expect the sunlight to burn them away, but it can
never succeed. They have been prophesized by farmers and weathermen
to always drift in feathery complacency from sky to bleached-blue sky.
If I press my cheek against my window and look to the side, I can see
Denver hunched in the distance, stewing in the crowd of brown smog
that sticks to the tips of building tops. We have two great pine trees
in our backyard, and I used to climb up and whisper to them that they
might perhaps work harder to make the air clean, because the brown is
rather ugly.
And yet… There are no horses, no ranches, no cowboys or ragged cliffs
on my way to school, no romance of logs and tumbleweeds and wolves
like smoke, but that does not mean that the wild has not found its way
into my home.
We have two great pine
trees in our backyard, and I
used to climb up and whisper
to them that they might
perhaps work harder to
make the air clean, because
the brown is rather ugly.
In winter, when the snow
gathers the nerve to crawl in
battleship clouds from their roosts
in the mountains and blast at our
houses, I can feel the warmth and
rush of nature pressing flush against
my bones. It drifts and packs
against the deadened blades of grass
and concrete rivers so that one
cannot discern what is of man
and what is of nature, what has been poured from trucks and what has
crawled up through the dirt. Some days, when I am alone in my
beautiful beast of a car, I pick up speed and grind the brakes so I slide
along the snow-packed road just to surrender to the power of ice and
snow for a handful of small moments. Come spring, when the wind
begins to get a hold on its fury and sends jet streams and gales to gasp
and roar between houses, and I lean into them like the arms of a lover. It
streaks in from the plains and yanks at my hair, my jacket, howling in my
hears that I am small and unaware of most things. By the time summer
rolls over and up against the mountains, the ice has melted away from
the street, leaving gouges in the asphalt that bounce us out of our seats
and test the reliability of seat belts. On one hotter day, I spent a whole
three hours at a friend’s house watching a mother hawk find food for her
children, and the bear sightings get closer and closer with each summer.
When fall reasserts herself, she grips flaming fingers around the land
and washes saplings and giants in reds and yellows. On mornings, it
85

is not cool, but bitter and invasive of even the finest, state-of-the-art
coats. These seasons crash together, quarreling over whose time it is to
go, fleeting by and bleeding together with all the beauty and violence of
time, all the wild rush of horses.
And that is how my people and I live, in this balance of nature and
man, of summer and winter, of wilderness and
the cool calm of suburbia. We will never
stop trying to do our righteous battle with
the miraculous aspen saplings that find their
ways into the creases of sidewalks, with the
snow that pays no heed to grass or street,
with deer that pace in and taste at the leaves
of rose bushes. We push Nature, and she
pushes us, and we hang there together,
suspended and whole in conflict and unity.
There are few horses here. But I think I will ride out my life between
mountains and city just as well, watching the wilderness trickle through
the concrete cracks.
86
We push Nature,
and she pushes us,
and we hang there
together, suspended
and whole in
conflict and unity.

sumi selvaraj
lilburn, georgia, usa
if only | digital photography
87

wynne hungerford
greenville, south carolina, usa
CAretAKer
My grandfather’s afterthoughts are slung over the fence, his damp
laundry forgotten
as he begins to plant another crop of Japanese Maples behind his house.
Using rusted
tools, he turns the earth again and again. Splinters from the shovel's
handle burrow
deep into his skin and no amount of plucking retracts them. That's just
how stubborn
some things can be. He tells time by the amount of sweat soaked into his
shirt
and the shape it takes. A ring around the collar is mid-morning, a
triangle suction-cupped
to his back marks noon, and winged stains wrapping around his body
like birthmarks
signify quitting time—that hour when things are left in places they don't
belong,
shoes under the porch, sun behind the curve of the earth's back and
shovel on the dining room
table beside tarnished heirlooms. Loose dirt falls into a pyramid on a lace
placemat
that his mother once adored, yellow stains where perfume rubbed off
her wrists still
reeking generations later. Because of his refusal to prick blisters bulging
on the pads
of his fingers, my grandfather wakes before dawn to pray for calluses,
nourished roots,
and light frost, tipping his hat to enemies. He spends hours dousing each
plant to its
88
Richard Hugo Poetry A w a r d W i n n e r

temporary content with a snake-hose writhing in his grasp, and learns
hydration is a rumor,
how twilight colored saplings can be heard gulping insatiably, not a
phase grown out of,
but into. I wonder if he waters the plants or drowns them, how easy it
would be
to deceive the trust between root and rain, how all caretakers are merely
proof of
another thing's existence. Rebelling against gravity in perfect rows, the
comrades sprout,
lurch, and shake their leafy fists, nature never content with the length of
its own neck.
rachel cin
lawrence, kansas, usa
delicate life | traditional photography
89

annie chang
norman, oklahoma, usa
the mIlKmAn
Mom and I were at Wal-Mart, otherwise known as an Asian woman’s
paradise. It was just another one of those lazy days during which I had
nothing better to do than to shop for groceries with my mother. As
always, her inherent money-saving skills had brought us to the
Wal-Mart on Interstate Drive. “Their selection is better,” she would say.
Mom had heard from Oprah and Dr. Oz that soy milk was better for
one’s health than regular milk, and was therefore convinced that the
Chang household should only drink soy milk in order to stay cancer-free.
I, for one, could not stand its taste. So, when we approached the milk
cooler, I decided to put up a fight.
“What are you doing? Grab the vanilla soy milk. No, not that one. The
soy milk,” Mom persisted.
“Mom, no. I refuse. I refuse to drink that stuff. It is disgusting,” I
snapped from the open cooler door, grabbing a glorious and
much-desired half-gallon of two-percent.
“Annie Chang, you put that milk right back where you got it. We only
drink soy milk now.” She continued to rattle on about its many health
benefits, and then we began to bicker at a level that only a Chinese
mother and daughter can, in a noisy “Chenglish” spat. Middle-aged
passersby glanced at us and nodded in sympathy for my mother.
It was after a few minutes of arguing with my mother that I began
to hear snickering behind me. Fearing that the milk had suddenly come
alive, I whipped around to find there was someone behind the shelves of
milk, on the other side. He was struggling to stifle his laughing while he
loaded cartons of chocolate milk onto their shelves.
I was absolutely appalled at this gentleman’s eavesdropping and
had half a mind to tell him so but then realized that he was not terribly
unfortunate-looking at all, and probably not too much older than I was.
Milk Guy looked me in the eyes and smiled. His teeth gleamed with
an impenetrable whiteness that I could only guess came from the strong
calcium found in milk. My heart burned with an immediate and
undying love for him. Never mind the fact that he worked at Wal-Mart
and I didn’t know his first name. These things would all be worked out
during our three years of dating and one and a half years of engagement,
followed by a beach wedding in North Carolina.
“Hi, how are you?” he asked, still trying to stop chuckling. His voice
was soothing, like a mug of warm hot chocolate on a winter’s day.
90

“I’m…I’m fine, and how are you?” I replied in a way that I hoped was
calm and collected but probably wasn’t.
“Kinda cold.”
“Oh.”
And then the conversation died.
“Well… have a good day,” he said, tipping his hat in a chivalrous way,
causing me to have a slight heart attack of passion.
Sadly, I closed the cooler door and turned to look for my mother, who
had begun calculating just how many cents we would save by buying
a six-pack of yogurt rather than buying two three-packs. She seemed
oblivious to the fact that I had just walked away from a potential great
love. As we left for fresh eggs, I tried to go back to him.
“Mom, let’s get some chocolate milk. Oprah likes chocolate,” I added
hopefully. She stared at me wordlessly before pushing the cart past me.
I gave one last, longing look towards the milk before following her, my
heart ripping further like a paper milk carton with every step.
The next morning, my family sat down to breakfast.
“I think I need a little bit more milk in my coffee,” my mother said,
rising from her chair to open the refrigerator.
“I’ll get it!” I cried, springing from my seat and swiping the keys off
the counter. The garage door had never creaked open more slowly.
Every traffic light was red and there seemed to be twice as many stop
signs that day. I finally pulled into the parking lot of the Wal-Mart
Supercenter and spilled out of the car.
Trying not to look too desperate and perhaps even a bit nonchalant, I
decided not to sprint to the milk cooler and settled on a light
power-walk instead. As I made my way to the lactose lounge, adrenaline
and romance made my heart beat at an unhealthy pace. Can you believe we
met in the milk aisle? I would say sweetly at our wedding, before bursting
into blissful laughter with a flute of champagne between my fingertips.
I flung open the sticky, glass doors vehemently. “Hello?” I called in a
way that I hoped was demure but probably wasn’t. “Anyone?”
The shelves of milk were silent.
I held the cooler door open for ten minutes before realizing I could
no longer feel my face. Sadly, I shut the door and accepted the fact that
I would probably never see Milk Guy ever again. I played all of our one
memory in my head again and again; I recalled all the good times we had
had.
It was time to let go.
As I walked out of the Wal-Mart on Interstate Drive, I realized that
other great loves would come along. Like that guy pushing carts down
the parking lot.
91

harriet milbourne
walton, cumbria, uk
92
lanercost priory in the evening | ink emulsion on paper

SKy
amelia parenteau
north stonington, connecticut, usa
The first time I saw the Milky Way I was at a slumber party with my
three best friends. We had just learned about identifying
constellations in science class, and I was proud to be able to pick out
Cassiopeia without a moment’s hesitation. The grandeur of staring into
the Milky Way struck me and all of a sudden I grasped the infinity of the
universe. I was truly looking out into space, and wondering what my
significance could possibly be as I sat here, upon this earth, one
The grandeur of staring
into the Milky Way
struck me and all of a
sudden I grasped the
infinity of the universe.
fourteen-year-old girl among a
preponderance of stars?
My next interaction with the Milky
Way came when I was visiting Crater Lake
in Oregon with my family over a summer
vacation. We had read the guide books’
accounts, certainly, about how magnificent
the stars were at Crater Lake, but we had
no real concept. After dinner, we stepped out onto the balcony at the
lodge, and it was like stepping out of a space shuttle into the cosmos. It
sucked the breath out of me. The stars were so bright, so perfectly white
and brilliant and twinkling and dense that I was too overwhelmed to
think of anything besides their blinding array. There it was again, the
Milky Way, cradling me in this net of a universe.
All the stars have stories behind them. Greek and Roman mythology
lend greater meaning to the twinkling heavens. In my studies of Latin,
I have internalized these stories so that viewing the splendor of the
constellations from my backyard is akin to returning to the pages of a
well-loved child-hood book. The stars map eternity. What will my story
be, my contribution to the sweep of the stars?
The sky does not only speak to me at night. It is equally splendid in a
richly colored sunset or sunrise. I witness these on evenings at the beach,
or across my snow-filled yard, when the last rays of daylight streak the
glittering vastness before me, a dazzling tangerine and pomegranate and
raspberry sunset. Language can hardly document the celestial display,
but the enticement of a sunset makes it impossible not to try. The
science is lost on me – I do not need calculated explanations for the
array before my eyes. The sky conjures words, not equations. Poetic
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inspiration pours from the heavens.
Dramatic late-afternoon light offsets the movie set facades of
buildings, the quivering leaves, the
birds’ silhouettes. Clouds swirl in and
out, a panorama of theatrical drama.
Dark, light, puffy, and ominous, all
types scurry through our atmosphere
as the cycle of life marches on. The
arching, radiant beauty of the sky
reminds me of my doll-sized proportion
to this enormous earth. No matter
what ails or excites me today, there are
millions of other players on the stage
of life marching about their everyday business, without an inkling of my
existence.
This is the same spread of a sky that our ancestors gazed upon in their
finest moments, in their tragic moments, in their poetic moments, in
their vehement moments. Jane Austen, Eleanor Roosevelt, Shakespeare,
Berthe Morisot, Harper Lee all gazed out upon this very same expanse. I,
too, want to make my mark beneath this sky. The ether quietly shines on
above, promising something more just out of reach. It lends ambition, it
crowns the earth. The sky is a limitless limit.
Yet, there is versatility, adaptability. The sky knows how to change,
how to adapt itself and put on its finest array on any occasion. I too,
know how to live, to adapt. Or at least, I am learning. Looking towards
the sky, with my head in the clouds, there will be no stopping how far I
can go.
94
Jane Austen, Eleanor
Roosevelt, Shakespeare,
Berthe Morisot, Harper
Lee all gazed out upon this
very same expanse. I, too,
want to make my mark
beneath this sky.

Aerie International
is published by the editors and is printed
in Missoula, Montana, USA
by Gateway Printing
95

ContrIbutorS
dela breyne, 17: I was born in New Orleans, Louisiana in 1991. My dad, a nuclear
systems engineer from Aurora, Illinois, served in the Peace Corps in Liberia following
college. My mom was a public interest lawyer for the state who
grew up in a small oil town in South Louisiana. I spent my early
years being cared for during the day by my step grandmother, a
loving but no-nonsense woman from the hills of West Virginia.
In 7th grade, our family needed a change of pace and we moved to
Lawrence, Kansas where I attend Free State High School.
melanie brown, 18: I lived the first half of my life in Richmond, VA, and am spending the
second half thus far in Denver, CO. People really do drive cars here, but during our Western
Stock Show, they parade herds of longhorn cattle through the middle of the city just to keep
things wild. I spend my days plowing through high school, crocheting hats, laughing with
my dearest friends, and writing words and phrases in the margins of my math notebook.
I am a writer, a musician, a conductor, a runner, a driver of loud and rusting trucks, and
above all things, a creator. My writing is always inspired by truth.
I have learned that only when I write about things I know do my
words live, so I make a point of finding inspiration in each day. I
write about my joys so I may cherish them, my uncertainties so I
may understand them, and my fears so I may conquer them.
jessica byrne, 18: My home life has contrasting influences of rural and urban shape.
I live in the outskirts of Carlisle; buildings spring up in clumps and are surrounded by
countryside. In my photograph, “Country Lane,” I have captured
the tranquillity and stillness of Cumbria. “Country Lane” shows
soft curving lines in contrast to the linear shape of a city street.
Carlisle depicts an idyllic atmosphere with the influence of man in
the form of structure. This is the place I call home.
ella carruthers, 13 and hollie milburn, 13: We got the idea for our picture from the
place we live, Carlisle. The centre of our picture is Carlisle castle. We
chose this as the centre because it reminds us the most of home as we
pass it on the way to and from school every morning and afternoon.
Carlisle castle is one of the oldest buidlings in
Carlisle, along with the cathedral. Carlisle is a
border city, near the Scottish border, and it was
constantly in the middle of battles and wars fought
between England and Scotland. It is full of history
and Mary Queen of Scots was held here once. As you
can see we created a border around the castle for our
interests and life today.
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achel cin, 18: With English my second language, I often
have a hard time describing myself. By taking photography I
can describe my feelings without having to say a word. I am
usually shy and Ms. Perkins, my art teacher, calls me the quiet
creator, because I have difficulty writing or speaking my ideas.
Since last year, I have gained a lot of confidence and now talk to
people who I would never have talked to before.
annie chang, 18: Both of my parents are from Taiwan, but my brother and I were born
here in the United States. As a result, my personality and character
have been strongly shaped by the Chinese and Taiwanese cultures.
It is interesting to be an Asian-American living in central Oklahoma,
where just five minutes from my home are real cattle farms and horse
ranches. The two cultures seem to contradict each other, but I have an
amazing life that can only come from the welding of two such different
places. I speak Mandarin at home and I love country music. I teach
Chinese folk dancing lessons, and I am also a member of the Norman
Ballet Company.
kelsie corriston, 17: I live in Ho-Ho-Kus, the only town in America to have two hyphens.
I have a twin sister. Sometimes I hate her, but she’s my best friend.
Every weekend during the summer we go to my grandparent’s
house at the Jersey shore. The house is right on the beach of the
Matedaconk River. Often we go tubing or crabbing. Mostly I
just read on the deck that overlooks the beach, an iced glass of a
Stewart Root Beer on the floor next to me. In the evenings we sit
outside and have appetizers. Perhaps the best taste in the world
is a fresh crab dipped in mustard and mayonnaise sauce.
michele corriston, 17: My name is Michele Corriston. That’s M-i-c-h-e-l-e. One “L.” A
few weeks ago, someone told me he “didn’t know if I could rock the one “L.” I told him I
try. And I do. I try to meet the expectations I set for myself. I try to make myself known in a
school where anonymity is heresy and new people approach me everyday, calling me by my
twin sister’s name. I try to break out of my shell, crack by crack, line by line.
olivia dykes, 16: I’m the daughter of parents with rhyming names and the older sister
of a set of twins. Make that two sets of twins if you count the dogs. My grandparents
have to be the cutest couple I have ever seen and when I get older, I would kill to have a
relationship like that. Not to mention, go parasailing off the coast of Bermuda and visit the
moon someday. Sometimes I can be too concerned with my image and I can be indecisive.
I’m really quiet when you first meet me, but if you get to know me, that will change very
quickly.
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paul edmondson, 17: My student life at the moment is spent between two cities, Carlisle,
where I was born and have lived all my life, and Glasgow, where I would like to move to
attend university. Up until last year I have always considered Carlisle to
be where I “belong,” but after some friends moved to Glasgow to study,
my regular visits on the train have made me challenge that. The piece I
submitted is the outcome of my architecture project based on that idea. While
exploring different viewpoints, I decided to observe an older, historic part of
my school through the window of the school dinner hall, showing some of the
interior of the dinner hall and also the façade of the old Devonshire Hall. This
piece shows my ties to Carlisle.
erin eifler, 18: Hi! My name is Erin Eifler. I have spent most of my 18 years traveling the
world with my family while my parents do their biology research. Nature
is important to me, and I enjoy it through scuba diving, hiking, mountain
climbing, and photography. Mangoes are the most delicious fruit in the world,
and The Lion King is the best movie I have ever seen. I am my daddy’s little girl.
Before I start college this fall, I will go skydiving. Speaking Spanish is really
fun, but sometimes I forget and mix Spanish and English together when I talk.
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romanius eiman, secondary school: I submitted a poem that I wrote
after some huge changes in my life. I lived on the street, just as in my poem,
from about age 7 to 12. I was then taken into an orphanage, where Auntie
Muriel helped me turn my life around. I am now working hard to make it
up and hope to go to college and help put an end to HIV/AIDS. I wrote this
poem in order to deal with all the memories from that time. The picture
shows me as I am now at the bridge we lived under. There were about 25
of us.
laura elder, 18: I worked from a photograph of a recent trip to Prague to create a textile-based
piece focusing on ornate carved columns. I used a range of media- mono print, paint, gutta,
appliqué, hand and machine stitching to create a vibrant, rich representation
of the textures and details within the architectural details, but using unusual
colours and materials to bring life to these columns. This was something which
I first noticed and appreciated in my local Cathedral and town buildings of
similar style, and became the inspiration behind my project.
mackenzie enich, 16: I was born in Minnesota and moved to Missoula, Montana when I
was five. I have pursued many sports and activities, but found my true passion lies in the art
of photography and filmmaking. The natural beauty of Montana
has inspired many of my photos as well as the people around me. I
recently had the opportunity to experience a photographer’s dream,
traveling with my family to Africa. Many people travel there to
experience the wildlife of Africa, but I found the Kenyan people more
interesting. I found myself inspired by taking photos of the people
and culture, and the everyday life in Africa.

myrah fisher, 17: Myrah lives in the ultimate state for biking, (the ever-sea-level Florida), and
greatly enjoys going on rides during the hours when most decent folk are dead asleep. She also
likes procrastinating, baking, listening to bad music, and, of course, referring to herself in third
person. She dislikes people who are unnecessarily loud, hates having her name misspelled/mispronounced,
and is really bad at staying angry. Myrah Fisher is a firm believer
in the wisdom of “write what you know,” though she does think it is fun to
learn new things. Her favorite poets include Charles Bukowski, Billy Collins,
and Jeffrey McDaniels because they tend not to hide their intents under fancy
words and flighty symbolism. Myrah Fisher also admires David Sedaris, but
she has no hope of pinning down a list of favorite fiction writers that wouldn’t
be the length of her intestines stretched out.
jennifer giang, 16: I live in the small suburb of Lilburn, GA. There, I immerse myself in my
multiracial roots while listening to stories about my dad’s native Cambodia and my mom’s
Mexico. Along with writing in my notebook, I also take photographs of random things and
landscapes. When I’m not writing blurbs, I enjoy talking with my
friends at the local Pizza Café. My grandmother’s year and a half
fight against ALS, also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, inspired
my piece. Although these events occurred four years ago, they are
still fresh in my mind. Initially, my essay was a struggle to write
because of the emotions that I thought had tempered with time. In
the end, I was able to craft this small memoir in honor of her.
deborah gravina, 16: My name is Deborah Gravina, and I live in small town Allendale, New
Jersey. Allendale is a total of one and a half square miles and has three
schools, a library, a lake, and a town hall all on one street. Nothing happens
here. The town joke is calling it Actiondale. We do have a center of town,
on the “other side of town” that has three nail salons, two coffee houses (one
taken over by all those over the age of 50 and in order to really spend time in
there you must be a regular, if not you can go when it’s empty), three Asiantype
food places, two fast food places, two fancy restaurants, two laundry
mats, two gas stations, and four churches of the catholic faith. My parents
and I used to change it up and go to a different one every Sunday, life on the
edge.
daniel alexander gross, 18: Daniel is a high school student in Los Alamitos, CA, who likes
to be nice to people. He dreams - which will someday become reality!
- of bicycling down the coast of California and living somewhere far
away. The concept of a “green world” refers to a literary setting named
by Northrop Fyre - a location originally from Shakespearean comedy
in which things can happen that would, in society, be impossible.
Especially love. He writes: “Shakespearean comedy illustrates, as
clearly as any mythos we have, the archetypal function of literature in
visualizing the world of desire, not as an escape from ‘reality,’ but as the
genuine form of the world that human life tries to imitate.”
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kathleen harm, 17: My name is Kathleen Harm, 17, (my family calls me Kat), and I’ve lived
in New Jersey all of my life. Currently, I’m living in Ho-Ho-Kus, which is
the smallest town ever; many people don’t even believe that it exists. There
isn’t much to do, so I find myself reading and watching TV a lot. So many
solo activities have made me a tad loony, which would explain my udderly
odd poetry.
chase hoag, 18: My name is Chase Hoag. I was born in Lawrence, Kansas in the United
States on September 22, 1990. I have lived within the same square mile of area pretty much
my entire life. I started school when I was six and plan to continue on at the college level. My
grandmother was really the one who got me into art; she is a magnificent artist. My junior year
of high school I really started getting into the arts, and I took a class called Humanities, which
is where I draw much of my artistic inspiration and knowledge from. I am now an Advance
Placement Art student in my school and love being involved with the arts.
sophie howell, 17: I live in Carlisle and have been at Trinity School for 5 years. I am lucky to
live in such a green city with two beautiful parks close to my school; one has
sheep and cows wandering around the entire stretch of the river on one side
and the other park is very cultivated with special garden areas and walks.
My friend Bethaney and I go for picnics in the parks and enjoy the summer
sun. I love sunflowers. It is a sunny, happy flower and that is how the parks
make me feel.
wynne hungerford, 17: My name is Wynne Hungerford and I am from Greenville, SC. I
attend the South Carolina Governor’s School for the Arts and Humanities for
creative writing. Living at school is great because it only takes a few minutes
to walk to class, and I really get to focus on writing. I enjoy whitewater
kayaking, Woody Allen films, and reading. I normally begin writing poems
with an image in mind or a single event. Jorie Graham and Martin Espada are
great influences. In my poetry, I try to present specific scenes or characters
that lend themselves to larger ideas. I challenge myself to show natural
images in an eerie light.
alexandria kim, 18: My name is Alexandria and I am from Allendale, NJ, a very small
suburban town. My town is a little boring sometimes so I like to drive to the
mall and watch a lot of movies. I am a seventeen year old Korean-American
and a senior in high school (I am excited to go to college). I enjoy reading
on Sunday mornings and sketching portraits of famous people. I spend a lot
of my time tutoring middle school students in English, math, and spanish.
worapan kongtaewtong, 17: Sawasdi Kha! This means “hello” in Thai. Worapan
Kongtaewtong is the name of a 16 years-old girl who lives in Thailand – that’s me! My nickname
is Bew. My family consists of my dad, my mom, my older sister (Bim), and me. We live a very
simple life. I am a Mathayom 3 (Grade 9) student at Yothinburana School. My hobbies include
reading comics and novels, playing sports, and creating artwork. Sometimes I feel
joy when watching the sunset or listening to good music. About my piece: It is
a common experience for all humans to be sensitive to the sounds and sights of
their memories. We acquire them naturally and we all have them. Unlike so many
things, the possession of memories doesn’t divide us into different classes, age
groups, or positions. The beauty of our memories is that no one can steal them.
In some ways, memory is the water that maintains one’s life until the last breath.
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allison lazarus, 17: I was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, and continue to reside
here, though I hope to move abroad when I’m older, probably to either France
or China. I love playing tennis and rowing. Beyond that, I love to read, and feel
that I’ve been most influenced by Hemingway, Marquez and Tolstoy, but you
could just as easily find me reading Seventeen magazine. At my school, I am the
editor of a page in the student newspaper, a co-editor-in-chief of the literary
magazine, InWords, and my class’s representative on Honor Council. Outside
of school, I have been learning Chinese for three years through a tutor, and
teach preschoolers at my synagogue every Sunday.
jennie lee, 17: I was born in Metairie, a suburb of New Orleans. I moved to South Korea when
I was two, then came to Norman, Oklahoma at the age of nine and entered
the fourth grade. Differences in cultures and acceptance are abstract to
explore, and are difficult work for anyone, especially a child. These issues of
differing values, expectations, and appearances among societies are a part
of my life. In “The Watermelon Defeat,” I describe my young self being selfconscious.
When I was little, I didn’t understand that that uncertainty was
not because of a dress, but because of my identity as a foreigner to others.
It’s a hard and ongoing struggle, but not impossible to overcome.
iida lehtinen, 16: I’m Iida, a 16-year-old high school girl, who lives with her mom in a quite
small town in southern Finland. I’m in art oriented high school in Turku, where you can study
media (photography, radio, video, journalism) and theatre among
the normal high school studies. In my spare time, I photograph,
write (mostly in Finnish), watch much movies, draw and paint
and blog. (http://running-from-the-rain.blogspot.com) The biggest
influence in my work of any kind is people, movies, music and
the life itself, especially like black and white photographs with
a soul and story to tell. I photograph mostly people and I love
photographing kids, because they’re so changing and you can ever
know what they are doing next. Fortunately I’m an auntie for four children, so I’ve pretty many
child models to use. I like staged photographs as much as unstaged ones, so personally I do both.
ayna kuliyeva, 16: My name is Ayna. I’m 16 years old. I’m studying at school. This is my last
year here. I live in Ashgabat. It is a capital of Turkmenistan. It is a very
beautiful city with luxuriant green parks and high marble buildings. In my
free time, I like listening to all kinds of music, watching movies (especially
comedy and fantasy), writing poems, and reading books. I have a big family.
It consists of five members: me, my mother, father and two old brothers. I
think that I have a really friendly and harmonious family.
hannah lodwick, 18: I’ve lived in Lawrence, Kansas my entire life and I
feel that much of my work embodies my surroundings. I recently created
a concentration on William Burroughs, a beat writer who lived in my
hometown. His abstract work has influenced my style and made it looser. I
spend my free time outside, exploring the country and taking photos. The
flat horizon line enters into my work through background and composition.
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taylor nicole marlow, 18: I was born and raised in Norman, Oklahoma. There are two high
schools in my town; each school has around two-thousand students. Here
in Oklahoma, the horizon is incredibly flat, which makes the sunsets
absolutely breath-taking. I love the state I live in because it is always
changing, but still always the same. My poem was inspired by a memory
from my childhood. I write about my grandfather often because he was
such a dynamic individual. Also, the topic, cooking fish for Thanksgiving,
is not very common. It is a tradition in my family and I wanted to share it
with others.
harriet milbourne, 17: I live in a small village called Walton. It’s just me and my mum at home.
We have a cat and a hamster called Bella and Napoleon. We don’t have a
television so I like to read a lot, we also like to go on walks and swim. When
I leave for university I want to take a course in teaching and eventually
become a teacher. My piece, “Lanercost Priory in the Evening” is based on
the priory in the small village of Lanercost which is just down the road from
Walton. This is where I spent a lot of time when I was younger as my dad
held toy train meetings in the small hall attached to the priory. It was here
that my dad’s funeral was held, so this also has a special meaning for me.
mercy ndambuki, 17: I was born and raised in Kenya and moved to the United States
when I was fourteen on December 24, 2004. I speak four languages:
Kiswahili, Kikamba, French and definitely English. On a typical
weekend, I play tennis, go to Edmond to visit my family friends, do last
minute homework and watch a lot of television. My favorite hobby is
drawing because it gives me the chance to express my emotions and
imaginations through pictures and color.
maria nelson, 17: My name is Maria Nelson, and I am a junior in Helena, Montana. I grew up
in the mountains near Yellowstone National Park. I had a huge imagination as a child, some
of which has stuck with me as I grew up. I believe that there is no greater way to express
oneself than through writing or the arts. “Echoes of Alexandria” holds great
personal import for me. While it is now a fictional cross-section of lives
and relationships, of hope and hopelessness, of drifting and loving and
dancing in the haze of adolescence, of the secret maturity that hides itself
in the minds of the young and can be interpreted in several ways, it began
far differently. I have lost friends to drugs and alcohol. Not by death, but
by their choice, by slow erosion of ideals. I have felt a need to save these
friends, to save them from themselves, and this feeling led to one of the
hardest realizations of my life: that I cannot protect anybody from herself,
that life has twists that nobody can see or foretell.
102
austin noll, 17: My name is Austin Noll and I was born in Lawrence, Kansas,
where I have spent all seventeen years of my life. My first artistic aspirations
began at age two with my life size Clifford drawing and I have been drawing
ever since. Past Clifford, I am now inspired by Lucian Freud, Vincent Van
Gogh, and Sebastian Kruger. When I am not drawing or painting, I like to
play music, basketball, watch movies, and eat cereal (preferably Cinnamon
Toast Crunch.) While I plan on being an artist and attending art school, I
would also like to play in a band, and learn how to surf.

jonathan o’hair, 18: Hello my name is Jonathan and I am a senior at Norman North High
School. I do competitive debate at contests, as well as recreational golf and basketball. My life
is pretty ordinary but one interesting thing about myself is that ever since I was nine I have
tried to learn a skill every year that I could take with me throughout my life. This year happens
to be guitar.
gabriella otero, 17: I wake up in the morning and get ready for school. I only make it through
the day because it leads to fifth and sixth hour, which of course is photo. After school, I
sometimes stay for soccer which is something completely new for me! Or I go home where I
enjoy taking pictures, reading, or eating. I eat Mexican food everyday. Lucky!? I think so, but it
may also be because I’m Mexican. I was born in Chihuahua, no not the dooog. When I was five,
I came moved to OOOOOOOOklahoma, and then when I was thirteen I moved to Kansas. After
doing what I need to do everyday I go to sleep and have the weirdest dreams.
amelia parenteau, 17: I am a seventeen year old senior at the Norwich Free Academy. I
live with my parents and my younger brother in a rural town in
southeastern Connecticut. I am involved in the theater program and
the newspaper at my high school. I love to travel and I bake excellent
chocolate chip cookies. I will be attending Sarah Lawrence College in
the fall. I wrote my essay when I was on the long path to composing
my college essay. It was one of many that I discarded. However, I
enjoyed the imagery and language in this piece very much. The sky
continues to captivate me.
marquette patterson, 16: I was born and raised in Southeast
Alaska from Juneau to Hydaburg. I care deeply about my cultural
background (I’m Haida and Tlingit). Haidas were known to be one of
the toughest tribes of the Southeast and sometimes had confrontations
with the Tlingits. That makes it difficult for me now, dealing with my
inherited double identity. In my spare time I like to play basketball,
read, and surround myself with family and friends. When I’m older
I want to pursue a career in studying different cultures and travel.
emma lucy bay pimentel, 15: According to the law and my birth certificate, I am a Californian.
Whether you choose to take that to mean beach bum, blonde, or surfing chick is your choice,
though I can tell you right away you would be wrong on all accounts. I left
California when I was three, traveled around the United States until I was
seven, then moved over to forge new territory overseas in Bosnia, Romania,
the Netherlands, and Sudan. I have studied seven languages, lived in war
zones (in constant peril of my life, whether the death stroke be that of a land
mine or a mosquito), and eaten camel - stringy stuff, can’t recommend it. I
have attended music camps in Austrian castles and ridden a felucca down
the Nile. I have swum in oceans from the Gulf of Mexico to the North Sea,
and skied in the Swiss Alps. Needless to say, I stopped thinking of myself as
inherently American years ago.
jamie pisciotta, 18: Jamie was born in California and was raised in Utah.
She is a senior in high school and is the Editor-in-Chief of Judge Memorial’s
literary magazine Catharsis. She used to make art in the form of visual
mediums, like painting and sculpture; this is her first year using the written
word as her medium. She plans to attend college at the University of Utah
and graduate with a major in Chemistry and a minor in English.
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nadia quari, 17: My name is Nadia. I’m Pakistani-American and my parents immigrated to
America 25 years ago, but my dad still gets lost when speaking in English sometimes. I speak
fluent Urdu and by now I’ve watched so many Bollywood movies that
I am also confident in Hindi. I like to drink chai with my mom and we
always joke about how I have to marry a rich Arab sheikh to pay off
my student loans after college. I listen to classical sitar ragas and I like
to read translated works by Farsi and Arabic speaking poets. I always
remember my dreams and I’ve recently acquired a taste for spicy tuna
roll sushi, it’s delicious.
jake ross, 17: Jake Ross is a junior at a residential high school for the arts
in South Carolina. Jake Ross enjoys reading, writing, watching good movies,
and wearing sweaters designed for old men. Jake Ross is not actually sure
whether or not he was supposed to write this biography in the third person.
Often my stories are the product of my noticing an interesting detail in reality,
something that would be fun to work characters around. I heard the jingle for
an insect-removal company, and “Worker Bee” spiraled outwards from there.
sumi selvaraj, 18: My name is Sumathee Selvaraj, but I prefer to go by the name of Sumi, which
I will probably end up legally changing my name to one day. I am South Indian (from India), and
I was born and brought up with South Indian traditions in Atlanta. I am currently a senior at
Parkview High School in Lilburn, Georgia. I enjoy singing, taking photos, and dancing. Unlike
most dancers, I learn a classical Indian art form called Kuchipudi.
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evelina shakirova, 15: My name is Evelina. I am fifteen years old. I live in
Kazan. I love my city very much. I like to photograph, to sing, to dance and to
study English language! I think, I’m very cheerful and nice! In my future I’m
planning to learn French and German languages.
victoria shapovalova, 14: Hello! My name is Shapovalova Victoria. I’m 14
years old. I live in Kazan (Tatarstan, Russia) and I love my city very much.
My hobby is music and I love to sing very much.
sarah stern, 17: I am Sarah Stern, age 17, born and raised a Kansas girl. I have a huge mane of
curly blonde hair and a laugh that can be heard a block away. I’m a shrewd bargain hunter and
a passionate photographer. I started my own business at fifteen and
enjoy spending time exploring fields in warm weather. I love to salsa
dance and play classical piano music. While I know I’ll be attending
college in the fall, my only other definite plans include joining the Peace
Corps upon graduation from college.
alexaundra swann, 17: I am from Atlanta, but when I was very young I moved to Texas: I
spent five years of my life there, learning and growing up. I began my poetic expressions in the
first grade. I live with my mother, father, sister, and brother, and our
pride is in our family values. I write simply to let out feelings that
would stay bottled up otherwise. Freedom is my greatest possession
when expressing exactly how I’m feeling. My piece “Roses” is meant
to portray the innocence of young girls. It is actually a true story of
my best friend and me walking on a lake in the back of our apartment
complex.

obaid syed, 16: Ever since I opened my eyes to the world, I have been riding a cultural roller
coaster. I was born in Karachi, Pakistan. When I turned four, I was living in
Saudi Arabia, learning to read and write Arabic. At age nine, I was required to
take Gaelic in my school and all of my friends were Irish. At eleven, I made an
A in Texas’ history. By the time I was thirteen, I had moved nine times, living
in four different countries on three different continents. The main inspiration
for my story is Ugandan children who are forced to join the army. As we sit in
comfort, people suffer in extreme distress. I hope that raising awareness for
these crimes against humanity would help resolve the issues on this planet.
my ngoc to, 17: My name is My Ngoc To, and I am a seventeen year old junior at Parkview
High School. I was born in Vietnam and immigrated to the United States with
my family in 1993. I visited Vietnam in 2005 and returned to America seeing
my life in a completely different perspective. Until then I had I never really
appreciated the daily parts of my life, such as having multiple working toilets
in the house. I am very proud to be a Vietnamese American because in learning
to grow up in two different worlds I have developed a very unique way of
thinking, of piecing things together, and I like to carry this thought process
into my writing and my art.
yuka tsuruyama, 17: I live in Kumamoto, Japan. I go to Daini SHS. I belong to the school brass
band. I’m very interested in English and Japanese. My piece is about Obon, which is a Buddhist
festival for the deceased that is celebrated in Japan every summer. We visit a family tomb during
this period and light paper lanterns in front it. Then we return home
carrying the burning lanterns with us. It is said that the light of the
paper lantern guides the souls of the deceased. In this way, we invite
our ancestors into our home. The lantern light always reminds me of
happy times with my grandfather. The light warms my heart and brings
me joy. I wrote this Haiku when my heart was filled with the warmth of
the lantern light.
natasha joyce weidner, 17: Natasha is a senior in the Creative Writing Department at the
San Francisco School of The Arts, a public high school. Her poetry
recently won acclaim from the California Coastal Commission and the
National Foundation for the Advancement of the Arts. As well as being
an avid reader and writer, Natasha is a classical guitarist, samba dancer,
open-water swimmer, camp counselor, yogini, and aspiring sustainable
farmer.
alex welcher, 17: My name is Alexandria Welcher but I go by Alex. I am very shy unless you
talk to me first. I love to laugh at silly things. I think of myself as being sweet. I hate thinking of
new ideas, because I suck at it. I get easily confused. My family is my world; I love hanging out
with them more than anything. My mom is my hero. My favorite color is red. I am super duper
loud, well I can be. My new favorite word or saying is super duper. I chew gum every second of
my life. I would love to travel the entire world but would be afraid of the different environment.
I have a dog named Odie. My favorite number is two.
samuel j. willger, 18: I grew up in a small town in Iowa that had only
had one stoplight. Later my family and I moved to Kansas while I was
in middle school. I feel that Lawrence is an accepting town that made
the transition for me very easily. After moving I quickly joined the track,
cross country teams, and a variety of clubs. My step father and sister are
both in the creative field and I hope I can do the same.
105

Thank you, Teachers and Schools
If I’ve learned anything in my tenure as a board member and advisor to several
literary magazines, it is the critical role of the teacher. Should anyone wonder, many
of the students represented in these pages share the same teacher. The students may
have been gifted writers or artists at the outset, but after many years of reading and
enjoying student submissions, it is clear that there is a force behind the best students.
At the core, teachers are urging, supporting, perhaps cajoling, and likely pushing
students beyond their comfort zones. Those teachers are involved in their students’
work at a dynamic level, offering them new ways of viewing the world and new skills
with which to render what they see. In a time when teachers, particularly teachers of
the arts, live too closely to the vacuum that can become standardized testing, please
applaud schools, administrations and teachers who understand and validate the
absolute need for the arts in our young people’s lives. This magazine exists, certainly,
because of students and their work. It would exist in a far different way without
the teachers who foster, guide and give voice and substance to that work, and the
administrators and schools that make it possible. Thank you. LEL
Students of the following teachers were selected for inclusion in the 2009 Aerie
International.
Angelia Perkins of Lawrence High School, Lawrence, Kansas
Anna Grehova of American Councils, Ashgabat, Turkmenistan
Anna Skinner of Yothin Burana School, Bangkok, Thailand
Brenda Graham and Jane Giles of Trinity School, Carlisle, Cumbria, Great Britain
Carolyn Berry of Lawrence Free State High School, Lawrence, Kansas
Ealene Anderson of Otjiwarongo Secondary School, Otjiwarongo, Namibia
Fujiwara Masayuki of Daini Senior High School, Kumamoto, Japan
Geoffrey Serra of Norwich Free Academy, Norwich, Connecticut
George Singleton and Mamie Morgan of South Carolina Governor’s School for the
Arts and Humanities, Greenville, South Carolina
Heather Woodward of San Francisco School of the Arts, San Francisco, California
Jackie Jones, Liz Flaisig and Will Napier of Douglas Anderson School of the Arts,
Jacksonville, Florida
Janine King of Los Alamitos High School, Los Alamitos, California
Jean O’Connor of Helena High School, Helena, Montana
Joel McElvaney of Roswell High School, Roswell, Georgia
Judy Nollner, Mary Lynn Huie and Susan Henderson of Parkview High School,
Lilburn, Georgia
Kathy Woods of Norman North High School, Norman, Oklahoma
Kelly Hammond of Cincinnati Country Day School, Cincinnati, Ohio
Kim Lucostic of Big Sky High School, Missoula, Montana
Lary Kleeman of Arapahoe High School, Centennial, Colorado
Linda Simpson of Judge Memorial Catholic High School, Salt Lake City, Utah
Nataliya Yegorava of Secondary School 40, Kazan, Russia
Stuart Merchant of Hydaburg High School, Hydaburg, Alaska
Svea Barrett of Northern Highlands Regional High School, Allendale, New Jersey
Ulla Kudjoi, Juhana Herttua High School, Turku, Finland

Aerie International
announces
Richard Hugo Poetry Award of $100
James Welch Fiction Award of $100
Norman Maclean Nonfiction Award of $100
Rudy Autio Visual Arts Award of $100
Lee Nye Photography Award of $100
deAdlIne: 1 februAry 2010
Please include no more than 5 pieces per individual per year. Submitting
student must be 13-19 years of age or in secondary school at time
of publication. All submissions will be considered for our awards.
Examples of the kind of work we hope to receive can be viewed, along
with full submission guidelines, at www.aerieinternational.com. Look
for Aerie International under the publications link. Contact us at
aerie.international@gmail.com.
subscribe to:
Aerie International
one year/one issue
$12 – U.S. Subscribers
$15 – Friends Outside the U.S.
Name: ______________________________________________
Address: ____________________________________________
City, State, Zip: _______________________________________
E-mail: _____________________________________________
# of copies ordered: ____________________________________
Amount enclosed: _____________________________________
Please make check payable to Aerie International.

allendale, new jersey
ashgabat, turkmenistan
bangkok, thailand
carlisle, great britain
centennial, colorado
cincinnati, ohio
greenville, south caolina
helena, montana
ho-ho-kus, new jersey
hydaburg, alaska
jacksonville, florida
kazan, russia
kumamoto, japan
lawrence, kansas
lilburn, georgia
los alamitos, california
new orleans, louisiana
norman, oklahoma
north stonington, conneticuit
otjiwarongo, namibia
roswell, georgia
salt lake city, utah
san francisco, california
sauvo, finland