Kyla Guimaraes

After R.L. Wheeler

On Saturday nights, my neighbors []. It floods my bathroom sink through the ventilation that
connects our apartments, curling in tendrils. The room stinks with []—that is, it smells like loss.

They’re violating the building’s policy: don’t [] on weekends, the children are sleeping.
But tonight the stars have crept into their eyes and distorted their vision, and they’ve lost

the ability to read fine-print regulations. I’m not surprised they’ve succumbed to the allure of [].
Winning all the time is exhausting; sometimes you need to set yourself up for failure. [ ]’s a losing

game, but with the room coated in the angry pant of [], it feels like winning the lottery. Their love
for the taste of yellow light and plastic utensils creeps underneath the closed bathroom door. Losers,

I think, as [] crawls over my pillowcase and steps carefully down the hallway, turning on the lights
as it goes, searing my pupils with ugly yellow love. I sleep on the couch, hiding from []. My loss,

I figure, when I fall off of the yellow cushions in the middle of the night and hit the floor hard. When I
brush my teeth the next morning, I end up swallowing lingering []. It is like drowning in losses.

It’s easy to mistrust people who try to overflow the bathtub every Saturday night. On Sunday morning my
mom and I air out my room with orange rinds. [] hovers in my gums, my throat raw as if I’ll lose

my voice. Between spasms of hate, [] teaches me guilt, in words.On Saturdays, it says, your
neighbors realize they don’t want to lose each other. They speak through []—through loss.

They don’t know themselves without []. [] suffocates because it’s love.

 

 

Kyla Guimaraes is a student and writer from New York City. Her work is published in or forthcoming for The Penn Review, Aster Lit, and Eunoia Review, among others, and has been recognized by the Alliance for Artists & Writers and the Young Poets Network. Kyla edits poetry for Eucalyptus Lit, and, in addition to writing, likes playing basketball and watching the sunrise.

age 7 / ski lift slick with frost / legs slid out / from under me / reached for father like a lifeline /

gloved fingers closing over nothing / but an open mouth / silenced screams / bruised back

 

age 8 / the smell of chlorine / feet kicked too fast / near sharp tile concrete /

red splotches in dark blue / goggles wet / not from pool water

 

age 12 / math test scribbled in burgundy ink / x after x / after x /

mother sits / with her head in defeated hands / wishes i were like her / top of the class

 

age 14 / recently / parents only seem to remember / how to shout / and blame /

and throw / do they still know / how to love?

 

age 15 / a total of nine / bruised handprints on my arms / for each time /

screams slipped from my chest / i only wore long sleeve blouses that summer

 

age 17 / crumpled over the toilet seat / hands shaking / because of two /

undeniable red lines / undeniable little stick

 

age 19 / muffled yells / don’t come back / suitcase wheels / scraping

chalk-covered sidewalks / bitter swipes at swollen cheeks / i just want to be free

 

 

 

Ashley is a high school sophomore in San Jose, California. Out of all the writing genres, she enjoys poetry and creative writing the most. Her work has been recognized by the Scholastic Art and Writing national awards, and she was the Grand Prize Winner of the Saratoga Loves Poetry contest. She is an alum of the Sewanee Young Writers’ Conference, the Kenyon Review Young

Distracted? Me?
“Drink – your – TEEEEEAA” (Eastern Towhee)
I’m trying to keep up with your conversation, you see,
“CONK – la – REEEEE” (Red-Winged Blackbird)
but the birds keep interrupting my thoughts.
“Chick – a – DEE – DEE – DEE” (Black-capped Chickadee)
Do you not hear them? I’m trying to listen to you,
“WhEEEP, whEEEEP, pew, pew, pew, pew” (Northern Cardinal)
but I am hearing a melody that would rival a symphony
“FLICK – a – flick – ER – FLICKY” (Northern Flicker)
if you’re willing to listen, too.
Ooooo – wHOOo, hooo, hoo hoo. (Mourning Dove)

 

 

Abby is a Canadian writer of fiction, poetry, articles and essays. Her work has appeared in publications including Love Is Moving, Keys for Kids, and Reclaim Today. When she’s not holding a notebook, you can often find her playing with her camera collection or exploring nature. She is currently studying Media Production and Writing at Redeemer University in Hamilton, Ontario, and you can connect with her online at @abbyciona, abbyciona.com, and abbyciona.substack.com.

i unzip my great-
grandmother’s black-
and-white lips and
reach down
to grab

the pit of
her stomach. her
eyes: panes of glass
birthed from the
mercy of stones.

the child of language
and English is
languish. i
languish
in a language

that never put
me in a chokehold, that
never slid the cold
metal coin of want
in my shoulders.

the tongue, a
hammer. i hammered
my great-grandmother’s
photograph into a word
i could not pronounce.

i pulled out
the strips of hangul from
her chest and hammered
them into the trolley tracks
next to her shadow.

her face, a
sentence in which
each period
is a bullet hole.
her face, a sentence.

she hammers
her knuckles into the
sign for
let me go
but we both know

that every butterfly
leaves a shadow of
its wings on
its chrysalis. a
reflection is never

honest in a soju
bottle, you say, and yet
we keep trying to
read it. i touched
my hand to my face

in the swollen glass
but the summer heat
wept my name away.
teach me to read
my own flesh

was what i said,
and she took the tie of
her hanbok and wrapped
it round and round my
eyes and ears before

screwing my jaw
shut. under my fingers
she laid pomegranate
seeds in bruised Braille
bodies. this is the only

way to learn. write
something on the wall
in unfermented
pomegranate juice, great-
grandmother. send me

plummeting into
the summer heat so that
i won’t have to intoxicate
myself on what i’ll throw
up later. all i ask for is

my name, next
to the little sun on
the lip of every soju bottle.
an apostrophe at the
end of every world.

 

 

 

Rina Olsen, a high school junior from Guam, is a fourth-generation zainichi Korean-American and the author of Third Moon Passing (Atmosphere Press, June 2023). A 2024 alum of the YoungArts program, the Iowa Young Writers’ Studio, the Adroit Journal Summer Mentorship Program, and the John Locke Institute Summer School, she has been recognized by the John Locke Institute, Sejong Cultural Society, Walt Whitman Birthplace Association, Carl Sandburg Home, and Guam History Day. Her most recent work has appeared in The WEIGHT Journal, The Round, and Milk Candy Review. Find out more at her website: https://rinaolsen.com.

After “Woman Catching Fleas” by Maestro Jacomo

She gathers her materials: canvas, acrylic, brush.
Loneliness has never been a friend,
still she can’t help but love the tremendous
way it makes her feel: aching, cold, unloved.
A one-sided relationship is still a relationship, right?
So she writes love letters back and forth to herself, of dreams,
of promises, of a dead fly she suffocates
in an empty paint water cup. She uses the cup later
to paint a scene all in red: mountains
and clouds and hearts dripping with
catalysts.

The painting is melting, eyes running
like candle wax down an immaculate cheek,
the flame that once cast it in shadow now flickering
in heat radiating from canvas.
Soon it will be gone. For now,
it has only become something else. Something
more lovable than the original,
because flaws are what make us human and humans
are what make paintings
and even if it will someday dissolve, it hasn’t vanished yet.

When it’s done melting she starts anew,
laying canvas with brick to create something more permanent:
a ruin.
The brush dips in the paint, but the water
is too cold so she adds more white, for warmth.
Fanning across the painting it runs like an avalanche of color,
drowning out the canvas.
The white screams too loudly so she covers her ears with paint;
when that isn’t enough she breaks the paintbrush in half
and plugs them.
She still sees screaming.
She throws the palette at the painting and it muffles everything for a second but when it slides
down there is more white falling
and she no longer can carve out
a bubble to breathe in.

 

 

 

Julia Volpp is from the San Francisco Bay Area. Her work has been published by The Alcott Magazine and has been recognized by the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards.”