ISSUE I: P(art) of the Soul

Santal. 

SANTAL MAGAZINE 

OCT 2018 

Issue to 

YOUTH

By JULIANA KOZOSKI

ISSUE I 

-I- 

-ONE- 

- 

THE GLOBAL YOUTH REVIEW

( P ) A R T O F T H E 

S O U L 

ISSUE I 2020 Y. 

T H E G L O B A L Y O U T H 

R E V I E W 

EDITORIAL BOARD 

FOUNDER: 

Sena Chang 

CO-FOUNDERS: 

Talha Hasan 

Helena V. 

Sanjana Rohra 

CONTRIBUTORS 

Sulola Imran Abiola 

Vinicius Amano 

Abdulmueed Balogun 

Dimitar Belchev 

Mario Calvo 

Arisa Chattasa 

Sarah Chaudhry 

Jake Colling 

Rodrigo Curi 

Jose Da Rocha 

Shaunak De 

Charles Deluvio 

Yang Deng 

Bruno Dias 

David East 

Hasin Farhan 

Kamil Feczko 

Victor Forgacs 

Kath G 

Mohammad Gh 

Joshua Hoehne 

Hwoman 

Richard James 

Alexander Jawfox 

Jr Korpa 

Juliana Kozoski 

Andraz Lazic 

Sunny Liu 

Jonathan Marchal 

Artem Maltsev 

Lorna McBain 

Nathan McDine 

Rosalind Moran 

Tim B. Motivv 

Will Moyer 

Jyotsna Nair 

Charles Nnanna 

Mike Norris 

Crossing the Ocean 

Mary Oloumi 

Jokob Owens 

Cristian Palmer 

Ashley Pearson 

Daniele Pelusi 

Cindy Phan 

Hanna Postova 

Laoise Ní Raghallaigh 

Dmitry Ratushny 

Tom Robertson 

A.R. Salandy 

Ilya Shishikhin 

Kelly Sikkema 

Alex Smith 

Samuel Sng 

Eduardo Soares 

Hennie Stander 

Mr TT 

Nota Vandal 

Mikita Yo 

For advertising enquires contact: theglobalyouthreview@gmail.com 

Copyright by The Global Youth Review 

Cover Image: Unsplash 

Magazine Designer: Sena Chang 

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CHAPTERS 

Table of contents and a letter 

from the founder -- 

1 

INTRODUCTION 

The Rationale: REASON-- 

2 

LOGOS 

The Spirited: HONOR-- 

3 

THYMOS 

The Appetite: DESIRE-- 

4 

EROS 

Featured contributors and 

acknowledgements -- 

5 

CLOSURE 

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C O N T E N T S 

P. 20 

(P)ART OF — 

— the soul 

Photography—Cindy Phan, Bellevue Botanical 

Garden 

P. 6 

On Self-Expression— 

Sena Chang 

P. 19 

spirited cloth — 

Sarah Chaudhry 

BMDDIGITAL.COM 

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P. 20 

P. 28 

P. 24 

i am tired — 

Kath G 

Keeping My Wits About 

Me— 

Rosalind Moran 

P. 34 

Censored in the 

Supermarket— 

Lorna McBain 

GYR 

NO. I 

Untitled — 

Alexander Jawfox 

P. 36 

P. 48 

P. 42 

Stork — 

Ashley Pearson 

Into Paradise — 


Power — 

A.R. Salandy 

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Self-Expression 

Sena C. as Founder 

By NOTA VANDAL 

Throughout 

human history, populations 

have been marginalized, oppressed, and 

chained from embracing their true identities. 

These themes seem to persist in modern society, 

with the unfortunate instances of police brutality making 

headlines these past months and trends such as the "fox eye" 

gaining traction in the media. Taking these happenings into 

mind whilst editing, creating, and revising, our editors have worked 

tirelessly to capture the essence of this very idea—one of a perpetual 

dance between a struggle and embrace of self-expression. Issue I of The 

Global Youth Review has prompted writers to take these ideas in mind 

when creating and to flesh out a story of one's struggles, joys, and victories 

with self-expression, as well as find their inner voice—itself a gateway 

into one's true identity. Without further ado, I present to you issue 

one of The Global Youth Review, a magazine dedicated to showcasing 

the voices of the youth. With over 20 countries represented and 

diverse voices speaking on behalf of the underrepresented 

and unprivileged, P(art) of The Soul is an issue that 

is unforgettable, touching, and insightful, but 

ultimately, one that captures the essence 

of what it means to express. 

Sena 


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Connect on 

Social — 

media 

By MR TT 

#GLOBALYOUTHREVIEW 

@GlobalYouthRev 

#GLOBALYOUTHREVIEW 

@theglobalyouthreview 

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CHAPTER 

logic 

LOGOS 

"The fact that logic cannot satisfy 

us awakens an almost insatiable 

hunger for the irrational." 

A. N. Wilson 


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By VINICIUS AMANO

By DIMITAR BELCHEV 

PROSE 

INSTANCES 

IN MIRRORS 

"I could invent a new self, one who 

wasn’t pre-stencilled by family or 

friends or shop assistants who knew 

my face. And I did." 

By Laoise Ní Raghallaigh 

I 

have a team of women to keep me alive and healthy and looking 

altogether well. I met my dermatologist about four years ago, when 

my sister began seeing her. I watched as her skin lost its redness 

and became smooth again, like a freshly resurfaced road. Months 

later when my own skin started to rebel against me, I went to the same little office 

in Woodquay, and within three months the worst of it was gone. My optician flips 

lenses and switches and tells me how she remembers the first time I came in to see 

her when I was eight, claiming triple vision. My doctor, who takes my bloods, and 

my consultant who analyses my bloods and prescribes me medication. There’s my 

dietician, who probes me about my portion sizes and exercise regimes. There’s my 

mother, who pays for almost all of it, and my sister, who drives me to all the various 

appointments when my mother’s busy. 


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S E L F 

. . . 

I CAN’T EXPLAIN MYSELF, 

BECAUSE I AM NOT MYSELF, 

YOU SEE? 

Lewis Carroll 

By KELLY SIKKEMA 

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By RICHARD JAIMES 

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PROSE 

I 

t’s only now, when 

I have medical 

professionals on 

all levels looking 

after me, when every step has been 

taken after all these years, that I’ve 

finally begun to feel like it’s doing 

something. Maybe it’s a reflection on 

myself, that I need someone to keep 

an eye on every errant body part. 

It has long been instilled in 

me by numerous sources - 

mostly the girls I saw around 

me - that my body was not 

what it was supposed to be, 

neither inside nor out. For 

years I half-heartedly tried 

this diet, then that. I dragged 

myself to the gym after 

school, I drank innumerable 

litres of water. My heart 

wasn’t in the effort to change, 

but it sank heavier all the time 

when it became clear that it 

wasn’t working. In around 

all this was secret trouble. 

Undiagnosed hormonal 

issues, potential infertility 

looming. I put it to the back 

of my mind, and there it 

stayed. Even when there were 

seventeen months between 

periods. I’d researched it, 

vaguely. I had a deeper voice 

than my friends in school, 

and between that, my volatile 

skin, weight retention and 

excessive hair, I concluded 

that I had polycystic ovaries. 

I mentioned it to my mother; 

she said we’d keep an eye on 

it. I did blood tests at the local 

GP’s office in early 2016, which 

came back normal. Two years 

later I finished secondary 

school, having had four 

periods since I’d first walked 

through the glass front doors. 

We were driving somewhere in July 

when my mother suggested that we 

try going to the doctor’s again. It’d 

be good to get this sorted before you 

start college, she said. I agreed. We 

made an appointment again with the 

local GP, who was a new lady. She 

had the gentlest voice of anyone I’d 

met, and cool hands, and she spoke 

to me like I was an equal rather 

than a child. It looks like polycystic 

ovarian syndrome, she told me. 

Or you could call it by its catchy 

initialism, PCOS. Good to know that 

my internet diagnosis was accurate. 

We did more tests - hormone tests, 

blood tests - and the little plastic 

tubes of red were sent off, with 

By KAMIL FECZKO 

‘‘ We did more tests...and 

the little plastic tubes of 

red were sent off, with all 

my hopes riding on them.’’ 

all my hopes riding on them. The 

diagnosis came soon afterwards, 

and I was referred forevermore to 

a well-respected endocrinologist. 

I was given a prescription and a 

dietician’s appointment, and my new 

life as a university student began. 

It wasn’t drastically different, 

medically speaking. I had to 

remember to take the bitter white 

pills with my meals, along with 

vitamin B supplements and vitamin 

D in my water. I had to keep a food 

diary. I had to log every bit of exercise 

I did, so that I wouldn’t end up looking 

like a fool trying to remember it all 

in my appointments with Elaine (the 

dietician). My portions were difficult 

to manage. I was supposed 

to eat granola and yoghurt 

for breakfast; for lunch, at 

least two eggs on bread, or 

two chicken breasts, or ham 

and cheese. Some kind of 

large protein for dinner. Cut 

back on fruit, double up on 

vegetable snacks. She was 

very specific, in fairness to 

her. No more than seven 

blueberries in the granola, 

and a strictly measured 

portion of any carbohydrate. 

Twenty-seven grams of white 

rice, thirty-five of pasta. I hit 

a little snag very early on; 

my food intake had to go up 

by a significant amount, but 

my prescribed medication 

has the unfortunate side 

effect of being an appetite 

suppressant. I often went 

for an entire day without 

eating anything, because I 

couldn’t stomach it. These 

days I kept from Elaine; 

she probably wouldn’t have 

approved. My mother would 

ring me in the evenings and 

ask if I’d eaten enough that 

day, and the answering sigh 

when I said no, probably 

not, grew louder all the time. 

The consultant, when I 

saw her in January, was 

immaculately dressed and 

her office had doors which 

went from floor to ceiling. Between 

snippets of medical jargon and 

terminologies she asked me about 

my college life, my aspirations, my 

friends, what I thought about the 

place I was living in. My answers 

for these were easily spoken, having 

been said a thousand times before. 

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PROSE 

By RODRIGO CURI 

When you’re eighteen all people 

want to know is what you think of 

college. I didn’t expect my doctors to 

be any different. 

‘‘ It was a dash of water to the 

face, sobering and electric. A 

failing on my behalf to perform 

basic bodily functions.’’ 

Then she moved on to discussing 

solely my biology, and there were 

eight seconds in which I was gripped 

with some unspeakable fear, which 

shot down to my marrow. At zero: my 

consultant said that PCOS would lead 

to infertility if left untreated. It was a 

dash of water to the face, sobering 

and electric. A failing on my behalf 

to perform basic bodily functions. 

At eight: she reassured me that my 

case had been caught relatively early 

on, and it was, in all likelihood, going 

to be absolutely fine, provided I did 

what I was told. 

In the car on the way home I couldn’t 

speak. I had never felt anything like 

those eight seconds. It was visceral, 

like being disembowelled. I have 

always wanted to have children, 

but I didn’t think that it would feel 

like that, to have one option 

potentially taken away. The 

one coherent thought in my 

head, for the hour’s drive, 

was of the note in my phone. 

The note I began when I was 

fourteen, the note that has 

been saved and uploaded 

and downloaded again with 

every new phone since then. 

Eighteen words - eighteen 

names, for my children. 

What would happen to those names? 

Would I throw them away on my 

children of ink and plasma, the 

children I wrote into existence? 

It was an absurd 

thought; mine is, by 

all accounts, a happy 

tale. It has a medical 

happy ending, at any 

rate, and I don’t take 

that for granted. 

I used to feel like 

parts of me were 

being stripped away. 

Maybe that’s still true. 

By JR KORPA 

But they are parts I have no use for, 

parts I would rather be without, even 

if I don’t know exactly what they are. 

I am being distilled with every ounce 

lost and every centimetre shaved off 

my hips. My orange pants no longer 

fit me, and the black floral dress is 

too loose across the chest. But I can 

wear the white blouse that belonged 

to my mother, which I had to put 

away into a vacuum pack when I was 

fifteen. I could take in the trousers; 

I am very fond of the orange ones, it 

must be said. A whole new wardrobe 

of possibilities lies open to me now. 

I can revert to the fashion choices 

of four or five or more years ago, 

embrace myself as I was in my 

angriest and most frustrated time. 

That girl is something of a stranger 

to me now, but I could get to know 


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PROSE 

By JOSE DA ROCHA 

her again, through the clothes she 

wore. 

Although maybe the past is better 

left undisturbed. I never liked the 

person I was during secondary 

school. She had a questionable taste 

in clothes, music and friends, and 

was altogether volatile and far too 

sensitive for her own good. It’s only 

in coming out the other side, as it 

were, that I can recognise how things 

were. My Snapchat memories show 

me photos of a girl whose skin looks 

swollen, turgid like an overwatered 

plant. Her eyelashes are long; 

obscenely long, my sister says, but 

the eyes look a blink away from tears. 

I can feel her weariness through the 

screen. 

There was a part of me for a long 

time which believed that my life 

would be better, in all ways, if I 

was thinner. I would be confident, 

I would be desirable, I would no 

longer worry about things because 

I would have far less to worry about. 

And I am more confident now. But 

the source of this confidence is a bit 

of a mystery; it has very little to do 

with my measurements. A lot of the 

time I don’t think about it. Strange 

now that I’ve ‘done it’, per se, that 

I’m a standard size 12, that I don’t 

care at all. Well, not at all, but far less 

than I thought I would. When I went 

up to a size 14 it was the worst thing 

in the world. When I went up to a 16 

it was worse again. Both my sisters 

have always been slim - slimmer 

than me, at any rate, which was not 

difficult. Neither of them was a size 

14. This meant the end of hand-medowns 

and signalled the new era of 

hand-me-ups. My sister, who is four 

years older than me, got my clothes 

when I outgrew them. I thought it 

was funny, and then I didn’t. 

My diagnosis was a relief; it wasn’t 

just me and my terrible eating habits. 

It was my hormones. It was beyond 

my control. There was something 

larger and more menacing afoot 

than the fact that I ate a frankly 

ludicrous amount of pasta. Now I 

can’t really eat pasta at all, which is 

perhaps one of the greatest tragedies 

of my life. I have no appetite 

anymore. There’s also the danger 

that anything I eat, which may have 

previously had no effect at all, will 

now trigger a migraine or nausea 

or both. I’ve never, luckily, been 

prone to migraines, but I am now. 

The nausea has gone down since I’ve 

gone off the pill, but the migraines 

haven’t gone anywhere. Nobody, 

not the doctor, not the consultant, 

not the dermatologist (although that 

would have been a very long shot) 

has anything helpful to say about it. 

It’s just a thing that happens to some 

people, said the consultant when 

I told her, and the medication can 

exacerbate it. You’ll need to watch 

out for triggers. Except that I haven’t 

the slightest notion of what triggers 

them. Maybe I should hire somebody 

to just sit and observe me for days on 

end, come to me at the end of a week 

with a notepad of comments and all 

my problems will be solved. Until 

then, it’s Minesweeper. 

Medicated weight loss is a strange 

and uncomfortable thing. Since I 

began taking Metformin I’ve lost 

over two stone. I fit into size 12 jeans 

again, which I absently thought 

would never happen. I probably have 

to buy a load of new bras. Nearly 

every tweak to my body has been 

for mechanical reasons. I got braces 

because my adult eye teeth grew in 

behind my front teeth, and I was 

going to end up with no canines 

at all if nothing was done. I'm on 

medication that causes me to lose 

weight because its main function is to 

lower the risk of developing type two 

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By SUNNY LIU 

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PROSE 

d 

iabetes, and I have a medical condition which means I am four 

times more likely to develop it. I am doing this because I want to 

have healthy pregnancies and healthy children, at some point. 

Living through the boom of body positivity has made it difficult to 

remember that I am not losing weight for cosmetic purposes. It almost feels like a 

betrayal to feel happy about the weight coming off. Like I'm somehow selling out 

because my body is shrinking. It’s a hard thing to bear in mind. I was ashamed of 

my body before, I admit. I didn’t take care of it, and I didn’t enjoy dressing in nice 

clothes or giving anyone any reason whatsoever for their eyes to linger on me. But 

I came to accept it. It was like a mantra, every morning while I got ready for school: 

my body does not have to be beautiful. It houses me and carries me from place to 

place. And that was good enough. 

The doctor’s appointments forced me to come back to awareness, to be cognizant 

of the body that held me. I couldn’t just be a floating mind; I had to take care of my 

organs, my skin, my teeth. If I wanted a normal life then I had to care. It was hard 

to reconcile with, that constant awareness of my body and what I did with it. In 

a time where I was frequently losing my temper, feeling trapped and lashing out, 

the last thing I wanted to be was aware. But in time it was less cloying. With the 

ending of secondary school and exams, it was college in my mind, and college only. 

September, when I would be moving across the country to Galway, that colourful, 

salt-sprayed city clinging to the rocks. I could invent a new self, one who wasn’t 

pre-stencilled by family or friends or shop assistants who knew my face. And I did. I 

became someone else, someone lighter. I went to class, I hung out with new friends 

who were smart and bookish and who genuinely liked me, rather than just being 

stuck with me. I don’t know that I had ever fully realised just how thrown together 

we were in school. The girls there had little, if anything, in common with me, and 

in my snobbery, I didn’t care too much to find out much more about them. They 

thought me strange, I suppose, and I was fine with that. But university was a new 

world. I had been a big fish in a decidedly small pond back in Meath; here, I was a 

sprat, milling around with all the other sprats. And it was wonderful. 

I’m glad that there was such a leap from my secondary school life to my college life. 

A cross-country move and diagnosis will do that to a person. It was good to see 

a difference in how I was outwardly, and not just be overwhelmed by the seismic 

rupture I felt inside myself. Everything changed within the space of a few weeks; 

everything I thought was permanent and unchangeable revealed itself to be just 

as passing as the rest of it, and there was suddenly nothing familiar in sight. New 

wardrobe, new room, new school, new friends. New me. In the beginning I shed 

weight like a snake shedding its skin, and my reflection looked wholly different 

to what I’d become accustomed to seeing. It was how an eighteen-year-old was 

supposed to appear: I looked fresh. My eyes were clear and alert, and I thought 

maybe, maybe, I could finally embrace my body instead of pretending it didn’t exist. 

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E 

Enigma 

By Charles Nnanna 

G 

Is a fact more unsettling than that the seed 

must first die to become tree? 

That the birds nesting under it are oblivious 

of the innocent little grain that died? 

What paradox is bitter as this: 

that the chick in order to live would have to break 

the egg, the generous house 

that housed it when it had no legs to kick? Or 

N 

that the woman must break in her own blood 

so she'd hear the cry of a joy indescribable? 

Truly a heart can’t know joy unless it's broken, 

just as a dream can’t know reality 

until it breaks many a bitter sweat. 

M 

I 

look at the world through 

a broken lens, not a magnifying glass. Helps 

me see myself as I really am before the mirror. A 

broken being 

in need of God's tool box. / And sometimes, verily, 

a thing has to be made very dirty before finally it 

becomes clean. The world, perhaps, is 

just a pile of mud every dreamer must first climb 

on before ascendency. 


Enigma 

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spirited 

cloth 

Sarah 

Chaudhry 

They decry at my hijab and see a threat 

I look at my hijab and see pride 

The hijab is a statement, not one of oppression 

or feminism 

But a statement of choice 

The hijab is my lifestyle, a silent gesture that 

spirited cloth 

speaks enormous volumes 

I am bound to my religion like I am bound to the 

black soil and the blue sky 

The hijab is not a mystery, not something arcane 

The hijab is eloquent, a source of pride and 

power. 

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By MILAD FAKURIAN 

BMDDIGITAL.COM

Poetry 

Keepin g 

My Wits 

ABOUT ME 

By ROSALIND MORAN 

By MIKE NORRIS

POETRY 

I 

like to keep my wits about 

me: 

yapping at novelty, helping 

me see. 

They run free through the house, 

scratching floorboards, doors – 

and though I keep them close 

when we go outside, I make sure to 

walk them on gold leashes, proudly; 

and let them run wild in empty woods… 

I like to keep my wits about me. 

A tangle of leashes, wrists bruised red; 

a mongrel pack, all shapes and sizes; 

snarling and arguing, sniffing out answers. 

I encourage nosiness, their taste for blood. 

Dragging the scarlet of falsehood fox 

along the ground to train them in tracking… 

Unpack strawman arguments; scatter them 

wide. 

I like to keep my wits about me. 

Gnawing on bones and peeing on newspapers; 

making them play ball in fields of thought 

though caring little whether the ball comes 

back… 

The chase is what counts. The hunt; the trail; 

the accurate sniff and wagging tail at the 

smell of 

a lie; a scare campaign; a slogan or a logical 

fallacy. 

…My pack is young, but learning quickly. 

I like to keep my wits about me – 

though many question if this is sage… 

In a time when words so often bite their 

masters 

is it wise to hone wits – and to rarely tell 

them off 

or nurture mongrel thoughts yet to debut 

in public? 

…And if I must own wits, couldn’t I at least 

make them 

bland yet fashionable? …Does IKEA massproduce 

a catalogue for ideas? I’d like to sink my 

teeth into it! 

I like to keep my wits about me 

in a time when we’re asked to keep them 

in cages, 

and some dump them quietly on the side 

of the road 

before starting their office job. Well – it 

may be easier 

to bury opinions, to avoid debate, to keep 

the peace; 

but when debate becomes hate and hisses 

at your door 

you will want your wits – eyes bright, ears 

pricked – 

ready to be set on the tongues of one’s 

enemies. 

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By CINDY PHAN

CHAPTER 

emotion 

THYMOS 

"To express the emotions of life is to 

live. To express the life of emotions 

is to make art." 

Jane Heap 

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POETRY 

i am 

tired 

By KATH G 


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By MARIO CALVO

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POETRY 

By DANIELE PELUSI 

BRAIN 

ROT 

By ALEX SMITH 

C 

rusty 

lids crest the sagittal hurting 

Grey weeps bleak come daylight 

flirting 

Professionally scribbled pages unintelligible 

to me 

Sat for wrong reasons underneath the Bo Tree 

Gummy fruit lips split cranberry jus 

Inkwell spill made the datum confused 

Low battery teaspoon stained in the sink 

Nothing done day night in a blink 

Flesh grips flesh 'til the flesh is torn awaystaying 

in bed 'til I gotta start the day 

Julienne talk leaves ribbons of my rye 

Grain turns to rot, phrenovoid like Dalai 


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PHOTOGRAPHY 

By HENNIE STANDER 

By WILL MOYER 

By TOM ROBERTSON 

By YANG DENG 

By ILYA SHISHIKHIN 

By BRUNO DIAS 

By MARY OLOUMI 

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POETRY 

C E N S O R E D 

SUPER 

MARKET 

IN THE 

Stemming from the ideas of exhaustion 

battling political and social problems, 

Lorna McBain artfully encapsulates these 

emotions in "Censored in the Supermarket". 

By LORNA MCBAIN 

E 

mpty aisles in a Supermarket at night 

Brash lights, hollow eyes, I’m exhausted too. 

Filled with freezing air that chills my bones 

And muted silence 

Feels like communicating with you. 

I’m speaking with a fist in my mouth 

Censoring the words, I mutter 

That I would rather shout. 

No use, we are silenced now. 

Why does no one listen to what I have to say 

They’re deaf! Deaf I tell you 

Deaf to the ideas I express. 

I’ll slip my neck into the noose of your hands 

And wait for you to let go 

So I can attempt to speak again. 

But in the meantime, I’ll hang here, 

Silenced by your ignorance 

Sickened by your fear. 


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By YOUSSEF NADDAM

P OETRY 

Death happens. / And 

it's usually no question of how, but when. A when 

that's independent of age & choice. 

The why question has long 

become a cup from which 

no one drinks — like it contains the water of 

insanity. / It could be a stone too heavy for 

anyone 

living 

to roll away. / Perhaps those who've 

spent their lives trying to roll it have successfully 

lived their lives rolling 

the stone 

that blocked their tombs. Death found them before 

I 

immediately 

collapsed on my knees while carrying a 

heavy heart on married palms facing the heavens. 

I 

immediately 

wrote this poem without bearing any pen to 

paint my anguish. / It's a prayer, it's a supplication. 

Lord, I haven't asked the what or the where question, 

'cause many things could 

end a man, and the globe 

is just too big a place to choose the perfect where, / or 

perhaps too small that the perfect where becomes 

overcrowded with grief. But 

I STILL 

IN 

BELIEVE 

miracles 

the answer came. So 

the question of why is no question at all. / Yet 

something hits differently when I see the flier 

of a life demarcated from death by 

only a thread. One could say everyone 

By CHARLES NNANNA 

a life of no more than thirty-seven lies in the hospital, 

looking death in the eye. Please stretch your arm 

and lift 

him from his sinking blue bed. / I still believe 

in miracles. 

is only a step away from oblivion in many different ways, 

but tonight I saw a flier that bled my heart. A young 

life lying on a blue bed just little above a sinking ground. 

Words read that he could finally sink 

without an urgent two million naira deposit so 

his saviours in white coat could do their saving. 

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POETRY 

QUESTIONS 

THAT LEAD TO 

nothing 

By HWOMAN 

By ARTEM MALTSEV 

«Her pain is mine; my pain is hers.» 

NDoor knocks 

Teardrops 

Visualizing buried circles that once 

were close to her heart 

But circles can no longer be lines 

Do you remember the first time your eyes caught the 

sea? 

Do you remember when you breastfed your firstborn 

child and named him happiness 

It’s hard to close your eyes every night thinking you 

have been abandoned when it’s just bedtime 

Tired of being in the same places 

Tired of seeing the same faces 

Home used to be in every room 

But now home can barely be felt in my mother’s 

arms 

Every time her arms open up and I get closer 

A sound a breath speaks up 

A very loud and strange voice pushes me away 

I think this is not my day 

But the days have passed along 

It’s been months it’s been years 

And I’m still falling into my own tears 

Tears of fear 

Tears of confusion 

You know what 

Sometimes I think this may just be an illusion 

I am no longer welcomed in smiles 

I am no longer seen in their eyes 

I am no longer mentioned in their hearts 

I am no longer that piece of paper that flew across 

the sky 

A piece of paper that wanted to deliver the truth on 

every roof 

Now they call me weakness under their night covers 

Now they call me sorrow but only when they don’t 

need to borrow 

My pencil has been borrowed just enough 

And I have never received it back just like how it 

looked like when it left my body 

My pencil always returns broken 

It’s like throwing a crystal on the floor 

It’s never broken into a piece or two 

It’s always broken into thousands and billions of 

pieces 

I feel like my heart is a crystal 

A crystal that can no longer be one 

My crystals now are circles 

Circles that can no longer be lines 

Opening the windows was my decision 


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POETRY 

Hw0man wrote this poem in 

2019 about the connection of 

feelings between her and her 

grandmother. Both her and 

her grandma feel some type of 

confusion with what they are 

around —the people, the energy, 

and events as well. 

I thought it’s a way out 

I needed light inside my darkroom 

I needed to breath 

But once you open up a window 

The wind will be welcomed 

Your crystals will break into pieces 

And your heart will no longer be one 

You ask people for directions 

They lead you to questions 

Questions that don’t even make no sense 

Questions that lead you to unexpected pain 

Tell me how do you feel again? 

I heard one plus one equals none 

I never understood this until he was gone 

Question 

What’s the reason behind our existence? 

We are born to build to love and create 

But instead, we kill we burn, and hate 

Comma 

My scars are opening-up 

Comma 

The paint inside me is turning into blood 

Question 

is this ever gonna stop? 

Comma 

The hardest loss is losing the memory of his 

existence when he still exists 

And no this is not some ex’s bullshit 

This is home 

Home is a cup, my body is water 

He taught me how to merge green and blue we called 

it “our land”. 

My home is a land, 

And home is not a home when he’s not there. 

A land is not a land when he’s not there. 

Jumping from a couch to another, we called 

ourselves heroes. 

We let our fingers dance through the strings of the 

guitar. 

We saw art in every move and touch, we sketched it 

on papers. 

A combination of sweet and sour. 

The white bed burns, walking hurts. 

Teardrops run down from his big brown eyes every 

time he feels us around. 

Coma is my brother’s new best friend. 

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By DAVID EAST

POETRY 

We've 

WCOME THIS FAR 

By ABDULMUEED BALOGUN 

We've come this far, trudging this sodded land, 

that renders the seeds of efforts dormant, in its 

soil. 

The cypress of dreams became blighted: 

when planted in its heart--- 

and budded caustic fruits. 

This land is a dimmer, it dims the glow of smile 

shimmering on our faces. 

We've come this far, 

treading the road of hope, but, our journey seems 

like an unending blues: 

our bones are now rusty and fractured, 

our hopes are dwindling into dust, 

our faces are powdered with the kohl of grief. 

We've come this far, 

hoping to find a light gleaming at the end of our 

journey, but, 

our journey when viewed from the lens of actuality 

seems to be a mere imagination--- endless in its 

exploration.

By MOHAMMAD GH 

Prose 

THE TRIALS 

of 

RITA FAHEY 

Exploring art as a 

form of catharsis and 

self-expression 

By JYOTSNA NAIR 

By SHAUNAK DE 

A 

uthor bio: Rita 

Fahey is a 

twenty -three 

year old mass 

of chaotic energy. She loves mango 

milkshakes, cups of tea and novels by 

Ernest Hemingway. She blogs at The 

Red Teapot. 

The above statement is not a lie, 

but it’s not the truth either. Rita 

is a blogger, an author — and a 

waitress— because you don’t get 

paychecks based on how many words 

you write a day , all for yourself. She 

deals with the dirty dishes and the 

dirtier words her customers throw 

at her the same way she deals with 

everything— a fake smile. She lives in 

a studio apartment she’s been living 

in since her freshman year of college. 

(Don’t mention the word college 

to Rita, though. She’ll start ranting 

about how she spent thousands of 

dollars on learning something she 

hardly gets paid for, when she could 

have studied finance or molecular 

biology instead. And then she’ll cry.) 

She mostly cries at night; on the 

rare days she falls asleep on her 

bed instead of her laptop. For the 

usual reasons— her inability to 

pay rent, her lack of social life, her 

recent weight gain. And she cries 

for the reasons only fellow artists 


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By HANNA POSTOVA

cry about—she has writer’s block, 

one character seems like such a 

Mary-Sue, her worry that her voice 

is too imperfect, too childish, too 

dull. Because sadly, Rita can’t just 

be a writer. She’d be fine if she 

didn’t have to 

worry about 

money and 

her dentist 

parents 

who’ve turned 

up their noses 

at her M.F.A. 

She’d be fine if she could just write 

and find satisfaction in the catharsis 

it brings her. But no, she is a human, 

which means she has to worry about 

‘‘ Yes, maybe she’d be fine if she 

was a robot—emotionlessfree of 

bothersome feelings.’’ 

a million other things other than 

writing. Rent. Friends. The aunt 

who has cancer. Inability to afford 

Netflix. Parents. Inability to afford 

Netflix. Mean boss. Inability to 

afford Netflix. 

Yes, maybe 

she’d be fine 

if she was 

a robot— 

emotionlessfree 

of 

bothersome 

feelings like self-doubt and sadness 

and anger. She could just write... 

and write...and write… (But what 

could a robot write about? Circuits?) 

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By ALEXANDER BMDDIGITAL.COM JAWFOX 

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PROSE 

Some days, the 

words come easy. 

They flow out of 

her and onto the 

screen. Her fingers glide over the 

keys, as if they’re covered in butter. 

Hope is sickening. 

Her parents sometimes visit, always 

with casseroles and Tupperware 

boxes filled with food, certain she 

stories: her sister ‘s new car, her 

brother’s latest bonus. Their story 

about Rita is a tragedy; the tale of 

a girl foolish enough to follow her 

own dreams, only to be crushed 

under the weight of broken wishes. 

Most days, it feels like she 

has to physically pare off 

each letter, each space, each 

comma from her body with 

a knife, until she’s left with 

a pile of them. Most days, 

it feels like she’s pushing 

a boulder up a hill— only 

to have it roll back down 

and crush her on its way. 

Most days, her fingers are 

still and fat and hover over 

her keyboard until the 

screen flickers and dies. 

It’s not that there aren’t 

victories. After all, 

sometimes, she gets okay 

ideas. Her blog gets a few 

more hits. It’s just that they 

seem pathetic and small 

and insignificant compared 

to the glaring mound of 

failures she’s collected. 

Because of course there 

are the rejection slips. 

At first, she had kept all 

the letters , and had even 

faithfully archived the 

emails, believing (like the 

little naive fool she had been) 

that when she was successful, 

she could look back on them 

and smile! She’d mapped 

her life out like the plot of 

a bildungsroman: first the 

rejections, which were to be 

expected (they were part of 

the package, weren’t they?) 

Then she’d find hope and 

rise into the climax of her 

story, having triumphed 

over the odds, with several 

illustrious publications 

on her resume and phone 

calls from publishing 

companies begging to sign her on. 

Now, she trashes the rejection slips. 

By JAKE COLLING 

‘‘ Most days, it feels like 

she has to physically pare 

off each letter, each space, 

each comma from her 

body with a knife, until 

she's left with a pile of 

them.’’ 

must be starving herself to pay the 

rent. They sit on the edge of the 

sofa and relate to her their own 

Rita listens, and she wonders 

why the hell she does this, 

asks herself the same 

questions her parents do. 

Why she’s chosen late nights 

and unwashed hair and cold 

cereal as her staple meal when 

she could have had anything 

else. There are days when 

she wants to demand her 

seventeen -year -old self why 

she chose creative writing 

as her major of choice. She 

doesn’t realize that she knows 

the answer. The answer is in 

those moments when she’s 

trapped in a cocoon of her 

own words and dead to the 

world outside. When she’s so 

busy building an imaginary 

universe, letter by letter, that 

she forgets the one she’s 

living in. She doesn’t know yet 

that she’s chosen happiness, 

but she will one day. 

Because although on most 

days it sucks to be human and 

needy and full of feeling, there 

are days when she doesn’t 

smile fake smiles. Because 

although there are nights 

when her tears and her cries 

are her lullabies, there are 

also nights when she’s wide 

awake, and dancing to Kelly 

Clarkson, and from the way 

she’s waving those arms you’d 

think she’d won the lottery or 

something. But it’s not that— 

it’s that someone left a nice 

comment on her blog- it’s 

that a magazine accepted one 

of her short stories. Because 

right now she is human, 

and imperfect, and full of a 

happiness no robot (and not 

many other people) could 

ever understand, and that feels 

absurdly, ridiculously, wonderful. 

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5r7Sq5uBTlc 

can’t tell when the light begins 

I 

I can't tell where the journey ends Troubled waters behind me 

I had to leave to be free 

There's no place like home 

That's what they told me 

But what do I do 

if I am all alone 

Without a place to call my own 

To be safe 

I had to go 

I need a fail-safe 

not a happily ever after 

But maybe there’s some peace and laughter 

I am going into paradise 

Detrimental sacrifice 

But I gotta have hope 

for the ones I love 

paradise 

I have to take a leap 

The jump with uncertainty 

I can't weep 

There’s no sense of normalcy, normalcy 

Because I’m searching for paradise something you don't find twice 

To be safe, I had to go 

I need a fail-safe —not a happily ever after 

But maybe there’s some peace and laughter 

Paradise 

Can I escape away from this pain n’ fear—Paradise 

I'm letting go of the madness right here—Paradise 

Into paradise 

By TIM B. MOTIVV

Music 

INTO 

Paradise 

"Crossing the Ocean emerged out of 

a pursuit to inspire and support the 

community, and a desire for actions 

to speak louder than words." 


Youth Organization

INTERVIEW 

Featuring 

CROSSING 

THE OCEAN 

By CRISTIAN PALMER 

«Protecting and aiding refugees through their journeys» 

Near the end of 2020, The Global Youth 

Review was given the opportunity 

to virtually interview Crossing 

the Ocean, a youth-led nonproft 

organization dedicated to combating stigma 

against immigrants and to raise awareness about 

the refugee crisis. 

Q: Please describe the main missions and goals 

of your organization. 

A: Our mission is to protect and aid refugees 

through their journeys. To do this, we want 

to first inform people about who refugees are 

and the struggles they are facing. For example, 

in the United States, there is a misconception 

that the process of admitting refugees into the 

country is not secure and terrorists can easily 

enter the country this way, causing many people 

to be opposed to helping refugees. The truth is 

that the screening process takes 18-24 months, 

making it the most difficult way to enter the 

U.S. legally. I think if more people were aware 

of the facts, then they would be more inclined 

to help and support refugees who come to the 

United States. Additionally, one of the biggest 

struggles refugees face in any country is learning 

the language. I believe if the natives of those 

countries made a small effort, this is an issue 

that could be easily solved. To help refugees, we 

have to first learn the facts and how refugees are 

struggling to survive. 

What makes our organization different from 

others is that we organize numerous events 

throughout the year. For our first event, we 

produced an original song as a fun way to 

introduce the struggles of refugees to others 

who are unfamiliar with the topic. Right now, 

we are conducting interviews with refugees and 

organizations who help refugees to gain a better 

insight on the most effective way we can use our 

organization to help. 

Q: What inspired you to found Crossing the 

Ocean? Do you hold any personal ties to the 


P 

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INTERVIEW 

"Crossing the Ocean emerged out 

of a pursuit to inspire and support 

the community, and a desire 

for actions to speak louder than 

words. We are an organization 

driven by progressive ideas, bold 

actions, and a strong foundation 

of support. " 

mission of this organization? 

A: I became inspired to help refugees after 

visiting a refugee camp in Bangladesh. Refugees 

were receiving help from organizations like 

UNHCR and UNICEF, but there was still so much 

more to get done. For example, some of the living 

quarters were very crowded, and there was one 

where three families had to live together in one 

room, and some of the kids did not have clean 

clothes to change into. By creating Crossing 

the Ocean, I wanted to engage more people and 

publicize the refugee crisis more. Unlike issues 

such as global warming or poverty, I feel like 

so little people know what's happening with 

refugees around the globe. If they knew the facts, 

I think the public would want to help more than 

they do now, resulting in refugees being treated 

more fairly. 

Since we don't have to meet in real life, we can do 

all of our work online. However, there were some 

activities we had to reconsider because of the 

pandemic. We wanted to invite a guest speaker 

to talk about the refugee crisis at some of the 

schools around us, but because of the pandemic, 

the speaker was not available. 

Q: What do you feel is the greatest strength of 

Crossing the Ocean now? 

A: Our greatest strength is probably the 

members. We are all still young and curious 

about the world, so I feel like there is a lot of 

potential for us to grow from here. Everyone has 

new ideas to help our organization grow so we 

can help more refugees, and although we just 

started a few months ago, we made so much 

impact already. 

Q: How has COVID-19 impacted your 

organization? 

A: We actually started this organization during 

the pandemic. I think one good thing about 

having everything online is that our team 

consists of members from all other the world. 

P 

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Q: Is there any message you'd like to share 

with young leaders that would like to start an 

organization? 

A: Be passionate about what you do. If you want 

to start an organization, you should have a 

purpose. 

BMDDIGITAL.COM

CHAPTER 

appetitive 

EROS 

"There is no art without eros ." 

Max Frisch 


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By HASIN FARHAN

Prose 

STORK 

""Stork" focuses on the definition 

home, the disparities of childbirth, 

and discrimination amongst the 

world's most vulnerable population: 

babies. 

By ASHLEY PEARSON 


By ANDRAZ LAZIC 

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PROSE 

W 

ith its mammoth 

mouth and 

oversized wings, 

the stork has 

always struck me 

as a strange creature to represent 

birth. As a mostly mute bird, the only 

sound coming from a stork would 

be one of alarm, perhaps because a 

newborn has suddenly been placed in 

its mouth. I think of the stork cursing 

to itself, begrudgingly thinking, the 

universe has damned me again. 

It is not important to know who I 

am. I am but a mere observer of the 

universe, a passerby from below 

looking above and perceiving the 

world around me. All you need to 

know about me is that I know storks 

are carnivorous little bastards known 

to snack on a small alligator now and 

then. 

And storks have teeth, you know? 

They are as terrifying as geese 

teeth. Ragged, jagged, and all things 

terrifying and bad, the teeth line 

their mouth like tines to a fork. When 

storks carry little bundles of joy, do 

they cut the straps? Do the babies 

ever inadvertently fly on their own? 

Mortality rates are no kinder to the 

baby than they are to the stork. Storks 

are victims of predators, losers of 

bloody battles shown on Animal 

Planet. Once their legs are broken, it 

is as if they have been tied down to 

the ground. Unable to fly. Unable to 

take off. Another victim of the cruel 

mistress; Earth, or more specifically 

Mother Nature. She watches from 

above with her hands held up in selfdefense, 

as if to say, “You did this to 

yourself.” Mother Nature nurtures, 

but also controls the world with an 

iron fist. I think, in that sense, she 

seems lonely. I wonder if she thinks 

of her loved ones, or which she has 

few. 

I can’t imagine the sun, moon, or 

stars are great company. 

My company are the strangers I 

observe. I learned long ago that it was 

not worth my time to make friends or 

have lovers. All people, animals, and 


things pass me too quickly. 

Many times I also wonder, how often do 

birds think of their loved ones? Birds 

are quick and tricky creatures. Their 

lives are much shorter than mine. Do 

other storks ever cross their minds 

once they are gone, leaving them as 

lonely as Mother Nature or as impartial 

as I? I could sit at home and ponder 

these questions all night long. 

Home is a tricky word. It sits bitterly on 

my tongue, like a nest collapsing during 

a storm. It is a human’s natural instinct 

to look away from a trio of dead baby 

birds. They may feel sorry. They may 

even pout. Almost every human likes 

to gawk, whether it be in their own 

backyard or from behind a glass wall. 

Behind any glass wall of a hospital 

nursery lie hundreds of thousands of 

babies: squealing, gooing, crying, silent. 

Are they home? Why they have been 

dropped off with their families, haven’t 

they; cradled in the sterilized arms of a 

faint mother, ogled by a grandma with 

the camera flash on too high, serenaded 

poorly by an aunt from Louisiana. 

Yet, a number of babies, as many as 

those that lie behind glass walls, lie in 

plastic domes. 

A different kind of gawking occurs 

during an early delivery; one that is 

not so kind. Sure, some happy endings 

arrive later than expected; A gooing 

baby being driven away in a Blue 

Suburban, the mother riding in the 

back just to gaze fondly. Yet, it is the 

quiet pushing of baby-sized stretchers 

down hospital halls that I think of the 

most. The places where no stork is 

allowed. 

Like a stork migrating through the worst 

of weather, I find it hard to escape the 

West, the United States in particular. 

The ideal West. The ideal United States. 

The American dream land where all 

babies are heard and seen and dropped 

off. Where the storks are immortalized 

in announcement signs and banners; 

a pristine white stork, the vision of 

responsibility, cradling a grinning baby 

in its wake. A delivery man. A viral USPS 

worker. 

P 

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Glorious. 

Storks are good at keeping 

humankind’s secrets. Evil or 

sympathetic bastards storks are 

hiding behind dumpsters or landing 

at fire stations and watching the 

darkest underbellies of birth; 

accidental misfires in a bathtub, 

escapes from public restrooms. 

These birds are the ones you don’t see 

on signs. Dirty things, sad and tragic, 

no time for grand announcements, 

they are too busy in other places. 

Don’t even get me started on the 

flocks of storks. 

Flocks are no secret keepers, at least 

not in the traditional sense. Part of 

an open secret or scheme maybe. 

Certainly no Scorpio, Taurus, or 

Pisces. More of a fire sign, fanning 

the flames. The babies in the flames 

are loud and nasally, akin to braying 

donkeys. Desperate to make contact 

with others. Desperate for human 

touch. 

The bray is the noisiest at orphanages 

where babies are kept like donkeys; 

two to a bed, a group on the floor, 

all vying for the same attention. The 

cribs are lined up like stalls. Feed me, 

touch me, play with me, they say. 

And again, humans gawk as humans 

do, shoving a bottle in the baby’s 

mouths like it’s a carrot for a donkey. 

Haw. Haw. 

Westerners from thousands of miles 

away love to watch the flocks of 

storks go by. I think the storks are 

like airplanes to them because they 

always squint at them with their 

binoculars. Wait for them to pluck 

a passenger from a young, povertystricken 

mother’s arms after the 

mother has groggily signed a set of 

papers. Pay close attention to the 

color of the basket. Look for the 

perfect one and gawk at hundreds 

more. With that, the Westerners 

bring their tried and true traditions. 

They clap when the storks land and 

place a baby in their arms. They pay a 

pretty penny to fly home. 

No need for a stork in that situation.

PROSE 

By CHARLES DELUVIO 

Like storks migrating across the ocean, home is 

interchangeable for babies. Home is moveable, 

if you pay the right price and have the right 

resources, then home can be anywhere. Illinois. 

Maryland. Delaware. Ontario. And I have seen 

just as many successful adoptions as failed ones. 

I have seen just as many good storks as bad ones. 

However, no matter the outcome, the stork 

becomes a meaningless symbol to me, just a silly 

mascot to plaster on walls and cars. 

Like migration, the route of orphans also repeats 

itself. It’s a complicated path with more endings 

and beginnings than one can count and it’s a 

path storks stay on the sidelines for. 

Maybe a formation of a workers’ union is 

overdue because somewhere along the way, 

a stork confuses a nice two-story home in 

American suburbia with a crowded foster home 

consisting of a dozen starving kids. Another 

Another stork dies crossing a foreign border. It 

drowns, flapping its wings; a silent, desperate 

call for help. News consumers gawk at the sight 

of the scatterbrained bird. The surrounding 

storks gawk too, afraid of their own fate if they 

do not escape the muddy waters. Thousands of 

people share the video, once, twice, three times, 

before it enters the trending pages and leaves 

just as quickly as it was posted. Stared at by 

thousands, yet saved by no one. 

With its gaping mouth and beady eyes, the stork 

still strikes me as a strange beast to represent 

the arrival of new life. But, I suspect that the 

stork is not all at fault here, for it cannot help 

its funky looks and strange motivations. A stork 

can also not control its own destiny. It is another 

mere victim of the cruel universe, another victim 

at the hands of Mother Nature, humans, despair, 

and all terrible things in between, just like the 

baby it carries in its beak. 

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PHOTOGRAPHY 

Feature 

Lost in the Pangs of 

OUGHTS 

"Lost in the pangs of thoughts is a 

photographical representation of 

an average man who in the course 

of sailing through the storm of 

life came in confrontation with 

an 'iceberg'. To continue the sail 

became a hard decision to make; 

moving forward- a herculean task; 

retracting- seemingly impossible." 

By SULOLA IMRAN ABIOLA 

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By ARISA CHATTASA 


OW 

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PROSE 

W 

hite walls adorn the sparse compound where crisp leaves whisper 

sour truths along the opaque floor where sun dried feathers flutter 

in the morning air. But soon fiery skies will open to lambaste stony 

archways, barren and dilapidated. A place where radioactive ignorance left a human 

wasteland to grow unkempt and anomalous amidst stretches of lush scenery. 

This offshore land sat hidden amidst the façade of tropical splendor where new 

technology served to deceive the masses as memories sat as fallacies expunged 

from the great cannon of popular history derived solely from masculine arrogance, 

a device so easily weaponized by bureaucracies contrived and driven by inertia. But 

still in the memory of some sat this tragedy where thousands lay under tropical heat 

simply awaiting an eternal rest dignified. 

But this microcosm served as a constant reminder of the folly of men never 

quenched by enterprise and fiscal growth. For deep in valleys now dark and earthen 

could hollowed homes be seen amidst the decaying carcasses of trees beyond time 

and human exploitation, now left to die in slow rot amongst fields flattened by 

substances derived in some far off laboratory and maximized to ensure destruction 

fruitful to a victor callous and deluded. 

However, chosen spectators in suits white do venture to the cusp of this vast plain 

from time to time as vibrant wreaths darken over the spoiled ground, saturated 

by the slow descent of the departed into a place of rest adorned with the artifacts 

of the living. But this microcosm is no dystopia, nor no idle fantasy, much like 

history repetitive and molded by hands mischievous. For deep in the hearts of all 

intellectuals lies a stain of conceit guised under achievement where revenge and 

inflicted suffering serve only to bolster a hunger for power so insatiable that to 

destroy, is to truly live. 

By A.R. SALANDY 

ER 

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W O R T H 

M O R E 

POETRY 

M 

T H A N 

T H E 

W O R S T 

W E ' V E 

D O N E 

E 

R 

C 

W O R T H 

M O R E 

T H A N 

Y 

T H E 

W O R S T 

W E ' V E 

D O N E 

By DMITRY RATUSHNY

POETRY 

WORTH 

THE 

worst we've 

By CHARLES NNANNA 

MORE THAN 

DONE 

Inspired by Bryan Stevenson’s “Just Mercy” 

The humanity we share is but a stack 

of our brokenness. A thing 

that's better understood when the mind 

of mercy, & 

Yes, 

sees through the fractured perfect lens 

the heart beats from a temple stained colourfully 

by guilt & grace -- an unmerited favour. 

the whole world is but a long thread of brokenness, 

roped to a small 

steadily 

but mighty needle — mercy — patiently but 

carrying every heart through the soft silk 

of hope, fostering solidarity. 

a great warrior, 

breaking the lawless 

& fastening others to the 

trolley of electrocution. / But 

Justice, sure, is 

perhaps 

Sure, 

Guilt & Guilty 

aren't only found behind bars, they live in 

all our hearts, in all our homes. / But light 

doesn't care where the darkness has swallowed, 

it goes in all the same. So maybe 

we all need grace, 

the light of peace that penetrates even where guilt 

has consumed. 

she'll be strongest when she wields the sword of 

forgiveness 

yet without tilting her perfect scale. 

By MIKITA YO 

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By NATHAN MCDINE 

Prose 

SMALL TOWN 

SUMMER 

"Small Town Summer" takes 

inspiration from Ashley's hometown 

and is loosely inspired by the people 

and places she has encountered. 

By ASHLEY PEARSON

PROSE 

T 

he emo kids 

always bought 

Monster Energy 

drinks. They were 

the cheapest at your local Dollar 

General: $1.00. The drink was also 

$1.00 at the Aerco down the street, 

but there was a chance of being 

heckled by old haggard-looking men 

there. You did not understand why 

the darkly clad teens loved the drink 

so much. To you, Monster Energy 

tastes like Mountain Dew that has 

been left in the sun too long. You were 

always a tea person and that summer 

you were especially addicted to Gold 

Peak sweet tea, despite its sickly 

sweet taste. 

The emo kids stuck out like a sore 

thumb in your small town of 10,000. 

They huddled together like penguins 

under the light pole. On your 

way to work, you would always 

see them there; smoking a pack 

of swiped cigarettes, passing 

around a joint, or pooling money 

together for a Monster Energy 

run. 

In a way, they were cute, definitely 

endearing and some of your 

favorite customers. You became 

acquainted with a few of them 

over the long summer. You remember 

their youthful joy after coming back 

from Warped Tour. The group of 

kids had visited your workplace the 

day after they returned from the 

concerts. Apparently, seven of them 

had crammed into an old Honda 

Civic for the three-hour ride up to 

Chicago. They all rented one room 

out of a dingy motel and spent most 

of their money bribing managers 

to get backstage. One of the kids, a 

16-year-old named Jenny, came back 

with Gerard Way’s signature tattooed 

on her lower forearm. 

As a rising senior in college, you 

thought the tattoo was hilarious. 

Now, you wonder if Jenny ever 

covered the tattoo up, or if she is 

still crowd surfing at a My Chemical 

Romance concert. 

-------------------------- 

You were stuck in the small Illinois 

town for the summer against your 

will. One of your professors wanted 

you on campus for a research 

project; some outdated, outreach 

program about the effects of SARS. 

Turns out, a research project did not 

equate to an internship and despite 

spending hours going door to door 

with a SARS survey, you were not 

getting paid by the college. You were 

unemployed, 2000 miles away from 

home and your dad had just been let 

go from his job. You were broke. 

You applied for several jobs but soon 

found out that small towns liked to 

hire locals. It did not matter if you 

were older or more experienced 

than them. Even if the applicant was 

‘‘ One of the greatest challenges 

is being yourslef in a world 

that’s trying to make like 

everyone else.’’ 

sixteen and had just gotten their 

license, they were still preferred over 

you. Nobody knew you, and frankly, 

it did not seem like a lot of the locals 

liked you. 

Maybe it was your distaste for eye 

contact and verbal communication 

or your love for athletic wear. You 

had never met such talkative people. 

You had never seen so many people 

in button-up shirts in one place. 

It was astonishing. 

You ran into one of the emo kids, a 

boy named Andrew, during one of 

your job interviews. It was at the 

local Dairy Queen. You both stuck 

out like sore thumbs in your own 

ways. Andrew’s eyes were ringed 

with charcoal black eyeliner and had 

an eyebrow piercing. You forgot to 

wear slacks and a shirt that wasn’t a 

tank top. The manager, a well-known 

soccer mom in the community, 

looked at you both with disdain. You 

thought that maybe you had a chance 

at getting hired here. You even took 

out your ear piercings specifically for 

the interview. 

You both didn’t get far into the 

interview before being abruptly 

dismissed. 

Andrew shrugged at you and tried 

to scrounge up enough money for a 

small blizzard. You ended up paying 

for blizzards for both of you and he 

gave you a nod of approval before 

skateboarding into the afternoon. 

Dollar General became your safe 

haven. It was the town outcasts’ safe 

haven. The flickering yellow sign was 

the outcasts’ red light. The dingy, 

dirty building on the Southside 

of town rarely received any 

applications (or foot traffic) from 

high school students. The light 

poles surrounding the building 

only worked about half the time 

and local mothers did not want 

their precious children to walk 

alone near there in the dark. 

Even the emo kids’ parents were 

apprehensive of them being hired 

at the store, despite them hanging 

around the light poles almost every 

day of the week. It always smelled 

like a mix of marijuana, Monster 

Energy, and butchered pork in the 

parking lot. There was a cheap, dimly 

lit, deli next door. 

There wasn’t a lot of competition. 

So, you were hired on the spot. 

The store needed a lot of help. 

Despite being midsized, there were 

only a few other employees, all 

middle-aged white women with 

baby boomer names; Mary, Susan, 

Sandy, and Terri. You thought Terri 

was the store manager, but all of the 

women ran the store with an iron 

fist; sweeping every hour, making 

sure the emo kids and other local 

teenagers weren’t stealing candy 

bars, both check-out lanes always 

open, candy arranged by size and 

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By JAKOB OWENS 

brand, fake flowers arranged by 

color. Business came in waves and 

some days passed by with hardly any 

business at all. You often wondered 

how the Dollar General stayed open, 

‘‘ In a lot of ways, your baby 

boomer co-workers seemed 

like the only stagnant people 

you knew. " 

or if it was still open today. Before 

you graduated from college, a new, 

shiny Dollar General was being built 

on the Northside of town and you 

had not visited the small town in 

over ten years. 

By the end of your college career, the 

emo kids had migrated elsewhere. 

Some ended up going to college and 

others joined the workforce. They 

grew up. They went away. Maybe, 

they even went to work at the new 

and shiny Northside Dollar General. 

In a lot of ways, your baby boomer 

co-workers seemed like the only 

stagnant people you knew. 

You remember a regional director, 

a man by the name of Paul. He was 

a hot topic during lazy afternoons. 

Paul lived in a pretty, two-story brick 

house in a gated community 

a city over. He hardly came 

around and you only met 

him a handful of times. You 

remember his handshake 

being a little too firm and 

a little too sweaty. His 

mustache grew too long over 

his lips and his dress pants 

were around an inch too 

long. Mary said he owned all 

of the local Dollar Generals 

and was making a fortune, except for 

the one where you started working. 

And all he had to show for it was his 

allegedly beautiful home and leased 

new model Nissan. 

Susan said he was too 

busy in his in-ground 

pool to care about 

his pants dragging 

too low or a bunch 

of women making 

minimum wage. 

All of the ladies had 

pristine looking 

uniforms. The collars 

of their black polos 

By JOSHUA HOEHNE 

were stiff and their black Bobbie 

Brooks slacks were always lint-free. 

Terri even kept a lint brush from 

the bargain bin by the cash register. 

There was not a strict dress code at 

Dollar General; black shirt, black 

pants or jeans, and badge with your 

name. You had everything but the 

badge stuffed in your dorm closet; 

a plain black top from Kmart, plain 

jeans from Abercrombie and Fitch, 

or your sister’s slacks from her 

debate days. You received the badge 

from Terri on the first day of work. 

She pinned it neatly on your shirt. 

Terri shook her head at you when you 

clocked in for your first day of work. 

She let out a disapproving grunt and 

handed you a lint brush. She ordered 

you an embroidered Dollar General 


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By SAMUEL SNG 

polo from a crumpled employee 

magazine and took the money for it 

from your first paycheck. 

“You need to get an iron,” Terri 

grumbled on your lunch hour. “Kids 

these days don’t iron anything.” 

“I have a steamer,” you replied 

and Terri only shook her head again 

and mumbled something about 

“Californians.” 

You picked up a small, handheld iron 

from the Home Goods section that 

night after work. It was blue and it 

was cheap, but it lasted you until late 

last year. 

You remember Sandy saying “We 

don’t get a lot of people like you 

around here” when she bagged 

your iron. You were sweeping the 

yellowing tiled floor as she bagged. 

It was your third and last sweep of 

the day and you were relieved. You 

wanted to climb into your bed, turn 

on your television, and fall asleep, 

not think about your place on this 

Earth. You dumbly asked what Sandy 

meant and Sandy only laughed in 

return. 

You thought Sandy was talking about 

how Dollar General didn’t attract a 

lot of college students. After all, you 

were the only one you had seen at the 

store. 

That night, before falling asleep, 

you looked into the cracked mirror 

in your dorm and let out a long “oh” 

and tied back your long, black hair 

and sighed. 

Sandy hadn’t been talking about you 

being a college student. 

You looked at your desk. There was 

a pile of surveys stacked high on the 

right side of it. You sighed again and 

rubbed at your temples. You received 

an email from your mother that 

night. She asked how work was going 

and if you carried your pepper spray 

with you. 

-------------------------------- 

You looked a lot different from the 

people living in your college town. 

Your long black hair, tanned skin and 

deep brown eyes contrasted from the 

sea of light haired, light eyed, light 

skinned citizens. Your nose was a 

little too big and wide. Your eyes were 

too small. Your hair was too thick 

and coarse. Sure, there were people 

who looked like you at your college, 

but your campus was separated from 

the town. More separated than you 

initially thought. To you, the campus 

was a haven. It was its own little city. 

On every college flyer you received 

in the mail, the admissions office 

boasted students had everything 

they needed on campus. There was 

no need to venture off into the real 

world when there was a bagel shop 

next to the dining hall. 

You didn’t leave campus a lot during 

the regular school year. You had 

several friends who you liked to hang 

out with. You liked to grab coffee 

with them and study together in the 

big, old library. Occasionally, you all 

would venture off campus to grab 

McDonald’s, or, if you were feeling 

particularly rebellious, you would 

carpool to the nearest city. The city 

had a mall and a Walmart: every 

shopping essential a college student 

would need back in 2006. 

Looking back, you realize that a lot 

of your friends were sheltered. They 

came from gated communities and 

luxurious condos. They were afraid 

of venturing outside your college 

campus. It was their safe haven. It 

was their red light. 

Your college friends didn’t have a lot 

of experience with being outcasts 

or outsiders. Your college friends 

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couldn’t stand the thought of finding 

themselves on the “wrong” side of 

town. The summer you worked at 

Dollar General, you kept your mouth 

shut about where you worked. For 

all they knew, you could have been 

working at the local McDonald’s all 

summer, and even that disgusted 

them. Your friends were all from 

places where McDonald’s was a place 

you only ventured if you were drunk 

and wanted fries and your favorite 

gourmet burger place closed before 

midnight. It was never a place you 

went to if you were actually hungry. 

They weren’t used to working at 

all, aside from some small gigs on 

campus, but you highly doubted that 

working at the library in circulation 

was comparable to working in retail. 

--------------------------------- 

It was an early morning when Mary 

accused you of tearing down her 

parents’ home, her childhood home. 

“You tore down my mom and 

dad’s house.” She blamed you over a 

morning coffee (black and bitter, the 

only kind in the break room). She was 

only teasing you about your college 

buying up properties and tearing 

them down, but it was too early in 

the morning for you to recognize 

that and the caffeine had not entered 

your system yet (you were still used 

to caramel macchiatos). Instead, you 

raised your eyebrows in shock. 

“I’m from California, Mary,” you 

replied. 

She laughed and laughed. It was a 

hoarse, “rattle your bones” laugh 

that made the air smell like smoke 

and nicotine. Snorts came loudly 

from her nostrils, and she coughed. 

“I know that honey. Anyone around 

you would know that” She caught her 

breath, and wheezed “I mean your 

college. You shoulda’ seen your face-” 

“My college?” 

Mary let out an impatient sigh, 

and clambered for her inhaler, “Your 

college tore down my parents’ home. 

Built that nice science building 

where it was...didn’t have enough 

money to fight the bank for it even 

though mom left it for us kids, so the 

college bought it instead. You know, 

big bucks,” She made a big circling 

motion with her hands and handed you 

a broom. 

Before you could say anything she said, 

“Doesn’t matter now, get to dustin’ 

missy.” 

And you nodded and got to dusting. 

Andrew, Jenny, and their friends whose 

names you can’t remember, came in 

later that day. You were stocking shelves 

and they were buying copious bags of 

Doritos and Cheetos. You asked them 

about the college tearing down homes 

and reacted casually as if you had asked 

how they felt about a Billboard pop 

single from ten years ago. They told you 

it happened all the time. The college 

tore down a lot and their parents 

complained about it. They didn’t care. 

But, of course, they were just kids who 

hated their small town. 

“The college is rich and we aren’t.” 

Jenny shrugged and chewed at her lip 

ring, “That’s just how things are. That’s 

how they’ve always been.” 

----------------------------------- 

Sandy’s husband almost shot you in the 

head a month into your job. You were 

not at work, but instead doing door-todoor 

SARS surveys. It was a slow day. 

At least four doors had been slammed 

in your face and only one person had 

not been reluctant to give you data. It 

was Jenny, the emo girl who frequented 

the Dollar General. Jenny was a minor 

and you were not supposed to gather 

data directly from minors, but sixteen 

rounded to eighteen and, as Terri would 

say, you were up shit creek without a 

paddle. 

Sandy and her family lived up the street 

from Jenny in a tan double-wide with 

baby blue shutters. She had flowers 

planted out front: blue and white 

Hardys. There were hanging baskets 

of pink petunias on metal hangers, 

rainbow-colored spinners, and stone 

statues of little girls. Dandelions 

intertwined with overgrown grass and 

windchimes blew gently in the wind. 

What you did not know was that Sandy’s 

husband kept a shotgun 

next to the front door 

or how “weary” he was 

of solicitors. He saw 

you walking down the 

street and watched you 

through the bedroom 

blinds as you walked 

up his porch and 

knocked three times. 

He watched from the 

kitchen as you tapped 

your foot impatiently 

and opened the 

unlocked screen door 

to knock on the front 

door. 

He stared you down 

and pointed the barrel 

of the gun at your 

temple. 

You dropped your 

survey papers. They 

scattered around you 

like a herd of doves 

escaping a bullet. You 

raised your hands, 

high, and dropped 

to your knees. You 

squeezed your eyes 

shut and could feel the 

world spinning around 

on its axis. 

The bullet never came, 

of course, it didn’t, you 

were still alive after all. 

Sandy’s husband 

dropped his gun and 

stared at his hands. 

Before he could say 

anything to you, you 

took your chance 

to run. Jenny saw 

you running. You 

remember seeing her 

blank stare and tiny 

o-shaped mouth. She 

looked down the street 

and back to you and 

shut her blinds. She 

never mentioned the 

situation directly to 

you, but when you saw 

her again she stared at 

your forehead like you 


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PROSE 

had a third eye. 

You locked yourself in 

your dorm for a few 

days. You called sick 

into work and emailed 

your professor you 

caught the flu and had 

a fever of 103 degrees 

in the middle of 

summertime. 

You didn’t do doorto-door 

survey testing 

after going to Sandy’s 

house. Out of sheer 

luck, your professor 

assigned you to do 

lab work instead. God 

forbid, you cause a 

flu outbreak in the 

small town. To you, 

the flu was the least 

of your worries. But, 

you supposed that a 

flu outbreak would be 

disastrous to a small 

town where half of its 

population couldn’t 

afford a general 

checkup. 

You never told your 

professor what 

happened at Sandy’s 

house. A little voice in 

the back of your head 

told you if the college 

knew about Sandy’s 

husband, they would 

tear her house down 

too. You never told 

anyone, although you 

suspected all of your 

coworkers knew what 

happened. Their once 

nosy questions about 

SARS and surveys 

ceased to exist once 

you went back to work. 

You noticed on your 

next paycheck that you 

were paid for your sick 

days. 

You did not tell 

your parents either. 

According to your 

father’s monotone 

voice and your mother’s overly cheerful 

tone during phone calls, they had 

bigger problems to worry about. 

You never called the police. Something 

in your stomach told you that it was 

wrong to. Maybe it was liberal, big city 

thinking, but you thought the police 

could not solve this type of problem. 

And maybe it was dumb, but you 

could not stand the thought of hurting 

Sandy’s feelings. You had to work 

at Dollar General for the rest of the 

summer after all. 

And who knows, maybe your dad 

would commit tax fraud in the future. 

Anything to meet ends meet, right? 

----------------------------------- 

You found out you were almost shot 

by Sandy’s husband the next day you 

showed up to work. Sandy apologized 

to you profusely as soon as she saw you 

walk in the door. You were confused 

at first, but things quickly clicked 

together. Between her choked sobs, you 

could make out the words “husband” 

and “sorry.” You hugged her tight. She 

handed you dozens of crumpled SARS 

survey papers that you later recycled at 

your dorm. 

Sandy took you out to dinner that night. 

She took you to the nicest restaurant in 

town: a small steakhouse bordering on 

the city limits. You knew she couldn’t 

afford to take you there on her minimum 

wage income, but you let her take you 

anyway. You ended up paying for half of 

the meal after seeing Sandy was paying 

with a tattered credit card. You slipped 

a $20 bill to the waiter while Sandy was 

in the bathroom and the waiter knew 

what to do with it. 

You both looked terribly out of place in 

the steakhouse in your Dollar General 

uniforms. You ordered fettuccine 

alfredo with some kind of fancy steak 

and Sandy ordered Top Sirloin. You 

remember how tickled she was that 

they put chives and green onions on her 

side baked potato. 

You guys made small talk. You mainly 

talked about the bread basket between 

the two of you. You both weren’t used 

to eating sweet buns. 

After a while, you learned that Sandy’s 

husband had PTSD from the Vietnam 

War. He was off his medications 

again. He was off of them frequently 

due to how expensive they were and 

how inflated the costs have gotten 

over the years. The nearest veteran’s 

hospital was over one hundred miles 

away and their car, a beat-up Honda 

Accord, only worked on certain 

days. Carpools were easy to find in 

town, but carpools up to the nearest 

micropolitan area were much harder 

to come by. 

She thanked you for not calling 

the police. Sandy feared them. As 

unhappy as she was in her marriage, 

she could not bear the thought of 

losing her husband. She feared him 

being whisked away to a psych ward, 

or even worse, jail or prison. 

She said you reminded him of the 

war with your long black hair and 

wide black eyes and you just nodded 

your head and chewed your sweet 

bun thoughtfully. 

--------------------------------- 

You spent half of your paycheck 

getting your hair bleached, cut, and 

toned sometime after your dinner 

with Sandy. You felt a little guilty 

afterwards. You could get your hair 

done, but your parents were not 

sure if they could replace the broken 

microwave or fix the leaking roof. 

In one email, your mom had put in 

between sparkling cat pictures to live 

a little. 

So you did. 

You don’t remember specifically 

when you got your hair done, but 

you remember your hairdresser. 

Ironically, it was Andrew’s mother 

despite Andrew being the only kid 

in his friend group with natural hair 

color. 

She had his pictures taped up to the 

big lit-up mirror and tsk’d when you 

said you knew her son (the eyebrow 

ring is removable). 

CHAL 

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"H 

e’s so smart. He’s 

a good kid, but 

all he wants to 

do is leave town 

since he opened up a My Place,” 

She sectioned off another chunk 

of hair, “Every kid’s been 

leaving town or cooping 

themselves up on that 

goddamn college campus 

and the town’s left with a 

bunch of nobodies like me.” 

“You’re not a nobody.” 

“Oh, baby, I’m a hairdresser. 

I know that I mean somethin’ 

to people, but you said, 

you’re what pre-medical? 

Look at where you’ll go and I 

love it here, but, I’ll be here 

forever.” 

-------------------------- 

Your dad was hired for a 

new job in August. He made 

more money than he had in 

his entire life and the first 

thing he told you was quit 

your job. He wanted you to 

focus on your studies and 

go into a stable career, one 

where you’d never be fired. 

And, you did quit. At the end 

of the day, you were a college 

student. You missed having 

fun on campus. You missed 

not knowing what you 

learned over the summer. 

And things worked out for 

you like they always did. 

You tried to keep in contact 

with your co-workers, 

but there was a divide 

between you after you quit. 

Even with Sandy. 

You were a regular college 

student again and they were 

just a bunch of southside 

townies. They noticed your 

new purse when you visited 

and you noticed the dark 

circles underneath their 

eyes. Sandy dropped off treats 

outside your dorm a couple times. She 

stopped after a few months though. 

You never found out why, but you 

suspected it was because you lived 

with girls who got gourmet cupcakes 

delivered to them on their birthdays. 

You watched the emo kids leave one 

by one from town. Potential going to 

cities and states around the country. 

By VIKTOR FORGACS 

‘‘ And at the end of the 

day, you feel nothing. 

And at the end of the day, 

you can still do nothing.’’ 

And you were proud of them. You 

still are proud of them. You sent a 

friend request to Jenny and Andrew 

on Facebook and was glad to see 

they are doing well. And you tried to 

ignore the dilapidated states of their 

parents’ houses and the clean floors 

of their apartments and houses. 

You lived in a clean floored 

house yourself, located in a nice 

neighborhood just outside 

of a big, liberal city. Your 

parents lived in a nice 

neighborhood too. They 

lived in a condo in a nice 

little retirement community 

in Florida. You think that 

in a lot of ways, money 

bought happiness for them. 

------------------------- 

Sometimes you feel guilt 

in the pit of your stomach. 

There are nights where you 

lie in bed and think of why 

you couldn’t have paid for 

Sandy’s hospital bills or built 

houses around the college. 

But, you were just a kid and 

there’s nothing you really 

could have done. And, still, 

there’s little to nothing to 

do. You are a doctor now, but 

it’s not like you can treat the 

entire town for every illness 

and disease free of charge. 

You have to live too. 

But, still you feel guilty. You 

make the occasional donation 

to the local public school. You 

send over toys and books 

for the annual Christmas 

donation drive. When you 

come back for class reunions, 

you try to host some sort of 

free clinic. You’re an alumni of 

the college now. You allocate 

your money to the town and 

college connections and 

pray it actually goes there. 

And at the end of the 

day, you feel nothing. 

And at the end of the day, 

you can still do nothing. 

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IS T 

GEOME 

OF T 

SO 

P L A

ING 

HE 

TTRY 

HE 

UL 

T 

O

ISSUE ONE 

Contrivutors 

CONTRIBUTORS 

We are beyond honored to 

showcase the work of many 

talented photographers, artists, 

and writers in our inaugural 

issue. 

Over 20 countries are 

represented in our magazine, 

including Ireland, Japan, and 

the U.S. 

POETRY 

LAOISE NI 

RAGHALLAIGH 

Laoise Ní Raghallaigh 

is an Irish writer 

living and studying in 

Galway, Ireland. When 

not writing she enjoys 

playing music, reading 

and walking the Salthill 

promenade. 

"Instances in Mirrors" 

was written to reform 

incoherent thoughts 

about living with 

polycystic ovarian 

syndrome, and to 

provide a perspective for 

other girls and women 

who live with the same 

condition, so that they 

may potentially see 

themselves and their 

struggles in a piece of 

writing. 

Laoise has previously 

been published in 

Perhappened, Vox Galvia 

and Reflex Press. 

POETRY 

CHARLES NNANNA 

Charles Nnanna grew 

up in a humble space 

somewhere in Abuja, 

Nigeria. He has always 

loved that amazing 

realities could be created 

on paper, thus for most 

part of his life he has 

aspired to be a writer, or 

a storyteller as he fondly 

calls it. He still has the 

aspiration. His writings 

primarily aims at 

provoking introspection 

— as evident in the 

three poems written 

by him — about mercy, 

supplication and the 

irony and/or paradox of 

life. He's either sleeping 

or reading if he isn't 

scribbling. Sometimes 

he's doing all three at 

once. Let's holla on 

Twitter; @runnyink_ 

POETRY 

SARAH CHAUDHRY 

Sarah Chaudhry is 

a Pakistani Marvel 

enthusiast who lives in 

New York. Besides her 

love for watching The 

Avengers over and over, 

she loves to listen to 

music, read YA novels, 

and write poems and 

stories of her own. She 

aspires to become an 

author and publish a 

novel. She is a feminist 

as well as an advocate, 

and “spirited cloth” is 

an example of that. She 

has work published in 

Cathartic Magazine, Ice 

Lolly Mag, and IRIS Mag. 


P 

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CONTRIBUTORS 

POETRY 

ROSALIND MORAN 

Rosalind Moran is a 

British-Australian 

writer of fiction, nonfiction, 

satire, reviews, 

and poetry. Her work 

has been featured in 

Prospect Magazine, 

Meanjin, Overland, The 

Lifted Brow, Rabbit 

Poetry Journal, and Kill 

Your Darlings, among 

others. She received a 

Highly Commended in 

the 2019 June Shenfield 

Poetry Award and is 

currently a postgraduate 

student at the University 

of Cambridge. Her 

favourite poems often 

involve political allegory. 

@RosalindCMoran is her 

Twitter handle. 

POETRY 

KATH G 

Kath G is a Filipina 

writer. She is a full-time 

editor for an educational 

consulting company. At 

this time, she dedicates 

her writing for herself. 

She likes to be reminded 

that writing is not all 

corporate work. Her 

writing has appeared 

in Unpublishable Zine, 

amongst others. You 

can follow her through 

her Twitter account: @ 

KathG_writes. 

FEATURED ARTIST 

CINDY PHAN 

Cindy Phan is an ice 

skater, inline skater, 

and outdoor adventurer. 

She prides herself in 

being that one friend 

you’ll never get bored 

around, as she's full 

of ideas, and always 

tries to get people out 

of their comfort zone. 

Photography, horror, 

heavy metal, wine, and 

animals are a few of 

Cindy's interests, which 

are ever-expanding 

because she literally 

aspires to do everything. 

Cindy's only fears in life 

are losing the people she 

loves, and leaving this 

world without satisfying 

all her curiosities. 

POETRY 

ALEX SMITH 

Alex Smith (he/him) 

is an anxious and 

depressed Brit with a 

penchant for expression 

through writing. He 

studies Psychology 

academically and 

Philosophy in his free 

time. He gets inspiration 

for his writing primarily 

through his own 

mental health, but also 

through spiritualism, 

existentialism and 

horror. His writing 

frequently plays with 

cryptic messaging, 

subverting expectations 

and personifying 

symptoms of illness. His 

piece here, Brain Rot, 

reflects a typical "down 

day" experienced by 

many, especially in times 

like these. You can find 

him on Twitter here (@ 

asardonicspirit). 

POETRY 

LORNA MCBAIN 

Lorna McBain is an 

English young poet 

who has previously 


RISEN Magazine, Ice 

Lolly Review and Love 

Letters Magazine. After 

developing a love for 

writing, it slowly became 

Lorna’s passion. Despite 

writing as a child, she 

never realized how much 

she adored writing and 

how natural it felt. When 

she's not writing Lorna 

can often be found 

reading, watching old 

movies and listening 

to an eclectic range of 

music. 'Censored in the 

Supermarket' stems from 

the idea of exhaustion 

after sociopolitical 

frustration. 

POETRY 

HWOMAN 

Hwoman is a young 

female creator and 

writer based in Saudi 

Arabia. 

She is mostly inspired 

by her circle, from 

its people, languages, 

culture, and music. 

Art has been around 

her since birth which 

gave her an opportunity 

to get to express and 

experiment from a very 

young age, later then, 

after high school, she 

decided to proceed 

with her education 

in art by majoring 

in Architectural 

Engineering. 

Art was introduced to 

her in a lot of great ways. 

She learned to see it and 

feel it in the simplest 

details that she grew up 

around. Hw0man is the 

story of a human woman. 

Most of her pieces talk 

about how she perceives 

her feelings and energy 

she’s surrounded with as 

a woman and a human. 

“Questions That Lead 

to Nothing” is a poem 

Hw0man wrote in 2019 

about the connection of 

feelings between her and 

her grandmother. Both 

her and her grandma 

feel some type of 

confusion with what they 

are around, the people, 

the energy, and events 

too. 

The only difference is 

that she is still growing, 

learning and questioning 

while her grandma 

is just getting older 

and the symptoms of 

Alzheimer’s starting 

to show more clearly, 

it made her question 

a lot of things she had 

already been introduced 

to. From faces to places 

and events. The writer 

felt connected to her 

grandma based on this 

new chapter she entered 

in her life. Everything 

sounds confusing and 

different. 

As the writer says the 

piece connects her with 

her grandmother since 

it speaks about their 

merged emotions and 

their strong relationship 

since she practically 

grew up around her 

grandmama. 

(Her pain is mine; my 

pain is hers). 

POETRY 

ABDULMUEED 

BALOGUN 

Abdulmueed Balogun is 

a Nigerian, and currently 

an undergraduate 

studying Medical 

Laboratory Science, 

University of Ibadan, 

Oyo State, Nigeria. 

Writing poetry is a 

dream come true for 

him, and every day he 

strives to stretch his 

poetic wings. Poetry had 

changed his perspective 

of life, and to him, poetry 

profoundly is a blessing. 

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CONTRIBUTORS 

PROSE 

JYOTSNA NAIR 

Jyotsna Nair is a 

seventeen-year old 

currently living in 

Kerala, India. She mostly 

writes prose fiction, and 

her work has previously 


Canvas Literary Journal, 

Cathartic Youth Literary 

Journal, Ogma Magazine, 

and The Apprentice 

Writer. She is a firm 

believer in the power 

of banana bread, and 

has been known to 

consume copious 

amounts in alarmingly 

short intervals of time. 

In her free time, she 

enjoys exploring real 

and imaginary worlds 

with her writing. 

MUSIC 

CROSSING THE 

OCEAN 

"Where Shall We Flee 

To Now?" An everyday 

phrase for the refugees. 

Life as a refugee is 

characterized by 

uncertainty. Often even 

family members get lost 

on the journey. In order 

to avoid human rights 

violations and abuse, it is 

sad and ironic that most 

refugees flee, yet their 

precarious situation 

as refugees exposes 

them to more violations 

of human rights and 

violence. Walking away 

from danger with one's 

valuables makes a 

refugee vulnerable to 

robbery from armed 

marauders. Occasionally, 

refugees often have 

trouble accessing food 

and water since these 

services are mostly in 

short supply and are 

the key targets of armed 

groups. 

Crossing the Ocean is 

a group of determined 

high school students 

aiming to raise 

awareness for those 79.5 

million refugees- unsure 

of their destination 

or whether they will 

ever return home from 

a war or oppressive 

government. It’s a 

collective effort. We 

need your support, your 

generosity to save those 

innocent lives. These 

days, many of us feel 

as though everything is 

out of our control. That 

may be true, but we are 

reaching out to see if 

you would be interested 

in coming together 

to do something that 

is possible even now: 

helping and caring for 

refugees around the 

globe. 

FEATURED ARTIST 

SULOLA IMRAN 

ABIOLA 

Sulola Imran Abiola 

(The official Sulola) is a 

Nigerian photographer 

& poet, a lover of art 

& a public servant. He 

his passionate about 

telling stories in a 

dynamic & compelling 

way—ways that lead to 

same conclusion. His 

works have appeared 

or are forthcoming in 

The Quills, Undivided 

Magazine, and The 

Best Of Africa amongst 

others. If he's not 

scribbling on pages of 

square sheets, he's either 

savouring the sounds 

of camera shutters 

or savouring mama's 

delicacy. 

PROSE 

A.R. SALANDY 

Anthony is a mixed-race 

poet & writer whose 

work tends to focus 

on social inequality 

throughout late-modern 

society. Anthony travels 

frequently and has spent 

most of his life in Kuwait 

jostling between the UK 

& America. Anthony's 

work has been published 

86 times internationally. 

Anthony has 1 published 

chapbook titled 'The 

Great Northern Journey'. 

'Power' analyses power 

and mechanisms 

of societal control 

through a narrative 

arc that questions the 

detrimentality of nuclear 

weaponry. 

Twitter/Instagram: 

@anthony64120 

PROSE 

ASHLEY PEARSON 

Ashley Pearson is a 

Creative Writing and 

Pre-Med Biochemistry 

double major at Knox 

College. Adopted from 

South Korea in 2001, 

Ashley has spent the 

majority of her life 

calling Monmouth, 

Illinois home. Currently, 

she divides her time 

between Monmouth 

and Galesburg Illinois. 

Her short story 

"Stork" focuses on the 

definition home, the 

disparities of childbirth, 

and discrimination 

amongst the world's 

most vulnerable 

population: babies. 

"Small Town Summer" 

takes inspiration from 

Ashley's hometown and 

is loosely inspired by 

the people and places 

the people and places 

she has encountered 

while growing up. Ashley 

values bringing light 

to important issues, 

realistic relationships, 

humor, and iconic 

one-liners. Her love 

for writing stems from 

a vivid imagination 

and encouragement 

from friends, family, 

professors, teachers, and 

peers. 

A SPECIAL 

THANKS TO: 

Iris Fu, who has united 

our staff together during 

the COVID-19 pandemic. 

We would also like 

to acknowledge that 

the pandemic, while 

devastating in its effects, 

has been a source of 

constant inspiration and 

motivation for our staff. 


P 

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ABOUT US 

THe global youth review IS A literary 

and arts MAGAZINE THAT is dedicated 

to amplifying the voices of the youth, 

especially those that are traditionally 

marginalized. 

THE 

G L O B A L 

Y O U T H 

REVIEW 

Founded in 2020, we use words as a vehicle 

with which we unify and empower young 

voices. Our mission is to combat divisive 

narratives and bridge cultures, people, 

and ideas together. 

P 

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BMDDIGITAL.COM

THE GLOBAL YOUTH 

REVIEW 

ISSUE I 

JAN 2021

ISSUE I: P(art) of the Soul

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