Aurora 2026

Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College Presents:

Issue: 2026

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A Note From the Editor: Often, when we look at the world around us, the hate, the evil, the death, destruction, and violence, we can lose our hope. We lose hope in what is good and in the brightness of humans. It is hard to feel like there is a better future before us, when all forces are working against the people of this world who want to restore it.

You may try to cope, by any means necessary, but that temporary relief will never hold against the constant fight for joy.

You look into the past, through a rear-view mirror into a sunset. “It is beautiful,” you think, but it is behind you now, and all that lies ahead is a darkening sky. The blues fade to black and it seems like it might never end. Then what? You think back to that sunset over and over and wonder why the future can’t be as wonderful as the past. Why can things not be like they use to? Why would I try when all the good is far behind me now?

So, you sleep. You let your body recharge, you create stories in your mind, fly across oceans, fight the evil monsters, save the innocent people.

And when you wake up, the sky is bright again. The sun is shining and the birds are singing and colors fill the earth. You wonder why you ever longed for the sunset when the sunrise was more beautiful than you could’ve imagined. The sun will stay up forever and shine upon our faces if we work for it. If we fight for what is right, if we defeat the evil monsters, join together and help those in need . Create what they try to suppress. Create what makes us whole.

Art.

Allie Benson-Atterson, Editor-in-Chief

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Staff

Editor-in-Chief Allie Benson-Atterson Associate Editors Krislyn Moreland Autumn Downing Tyler Martin Cecilia Rowland Hailley Hellis Maggie Lawson

Faculty Advisor William Nyfeler Cover Art Call Box Library by Maylee Wenzel

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Contents

Poetry

Chamber Door

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Kyleigh Moore

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Evil Kids

Tyler Martin The Unwelcome Return of Richard III

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Anonymous

60

First Love

Emma Tomey

64

The West

Maylee Wenzel

Fiction

12

Are You Proud?

Krislyn Moreland

40

Organ Donor

Krislyn Moreland

48

Rot

Anonymous

Creative Nonfiction

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3 D B

Anonymous

4

Art

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Misty Highway

Krislyn Moreland

9

Rearview Approach

Krislyn Moreland

10

Old Barn

Guerin Cassel

11

Le Fer

Alexis Stump

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Call Box Library

Maylee Wenzel Moseying Down the Stream

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Maylee Wenzel

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Fire Storm

Anonymous

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Growth Adjustments

Jennifer Sykes Belonging/Journey of Resilience

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Jennifer Sykes

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Friends on Mushrooms

Anonymous Squirrel in the Sisters of Providence Convent Cemetery

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Guerin Cassel

32

Flute

Sydney Kaelin

33

Violin

Sydney Kaelin

36

Snail’s Pace

Anonymous

37

Copy, Paste

Anonymous

38

Bell Tower

Michael Munro

5

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Lake House

Anonymous

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Raised

Emma Newton

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Art Therapy

Christina Green

54

Church Steeples

Michael Munro

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Spring

Anonymous

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Corn Harvester

Pete Jackson

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Ocean Sunset

Andrea Perez

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Birds in a Post

Anonymous

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Monarch Caterpillar

Guerin Cassel Monarch Caterpillar on Milkweed

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Guerin Cassel Sun Shining Through Leaves

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Guerin Cassel

Music

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Resist

Gino Sigismondi (feat. Laura Clapp)

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La Providence (by Sydney Guillaume)

SMWC Chorale, Madrigals, & Alumni Conductor, Michael Boswell

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2026

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Krislyn Moreland

Misty Highway

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Krislyn Moreland

Rearview Approach

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Guerin Cassel

Old Barn

10

Alexis Stump

LeFer

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Krislyn Moreland

Are You Proud?

A short play

Summary Mariana, the only daughter of a famous fashion designer, tries to create something as beautiful as her late father did. Characters Mariana—a woman with brown hair in her late 20s or early 30s. Daughter of John, head of creativity at his fashion house Narrator—only a voice piped in from above, a manifestation of Mariana’s inner thoughts. A voice that should sound similar to Mariana’s, but not exact Cecily—a woman in her late 40s, very attractive. Second wife of John and stepmother to Mariana. Runs the finances of his fashion house. John (Papa)—only mentioned in memory but has a small speaking role similar to the narrator. Should sound old and wise. Came from an impoverished background and created his fashion house, LeBella, at 20. Handed creativity off to his daughter Mariana on his deathbed. Paramedic 1 & 2—interchangeable. Men in their late 30s in white medic outfits.

Time 1939, Paris, France

Setting The dark grey and dusty interior of a textile factory. We enter at a workbench made from simple wood with fabric scraps and crumpled designs strewn all about. The desk has a sewing

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machine on it and several pairs of sewing scissors, knives, pencils, and rulers all scattered around.

Ext . A beginning to seem run-down textile factory at night, with a yellow label on the side reading LeBella Int . We open as the lights on the stage begin to slowly illuminate. We see a young woman in her late 20s sitting at a cluttered workbench. There is a small lamp, but otherwise she is dimly lit. The noises of a busy city street play in the background. She is furiously moving from sewing machine to scissors to a drawing pad. You know you could sit at that bench till daybreak, and the morning light would still shine on the same mediocrity as the moon. Mariana (exasperated but sounding shameful. Speaks and then goes b‌ ack to her work) Hush now; I’m trying to concentrate. Narrator Oh yes, and look how far your “concentration” has gotten you. Sitting alone at 3 in the morning trying to persuade the scissors to work magic for you. Narrator (A voice piped in from above the stage.)

beat

Narrator You know Papa never had this problem. He could sit down for a single moment and have more sophisticated designs than you

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could produce in a week. What do you think he would say if he could see you now? Would he be disappointed?

Mariana He always said creativity bows to no schedule. No man can harness half of what he pretends to. He would see the struggle as proof of care.

Narrator Or as a lack of ambition.

Mariana He never said such a thing. Papa was always kind to me in all my ventures. He let me learn at his feet. Narrator And how disappointed he would be to see his tutelage wasted. Look at all the paper and fabric you’ve wasted just today. Trying in vain to impress the dead. He was a wise man and entrusted this to me. That must mean something. He wasn’t one to delegate responsibility for the sake of one’s vanity. Narrator Maybe not. But he might have assumed his offspring would care enough to inherit his genius. Mariana (doubt seeping into her voice)

Mariana (annoyed) What is that supposed to mean? Narrator

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He put everything he had into those designs. You saw it. The late nights, the falling asleep at the design table. The blood from the pins and hand cramps from the sewing. Mariana What he did wasn’t healthy. He was suffering, and that’s probably why he died before his tim HE DIED FOR ART. FOR BEAUTY. And what do you live for? These half-baked designs? It’s 1939, not 1890! Women can no longer skulk around looking pretty and fainting on couches. You come from a well of genius. USE IT. Mariana (crying now, voice shaky) I do not know how. He left me this place and this duty, and I cannot fill his shoes. (A beat and then looking around and up with fear, still light tears) I can feel his eyes looking down upon me. The same gaze he used to use when I’d misbehave as a child. Like he can see right through me. Does he do that now? See into my very soul and not recognize his own talent within? Narrator (cuts her off and begins yelling)

silence

Mariana yelling up to the sky, gripping fistfuls of her sketches

Mariana Can you see me, Father? Are you ashamed? Can you see your fingerprints in what I create? Or look upon me as the very incarnation of disappointment?

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Narrator He put everything… everything he had into them. You are a creation of his in a way. His traces must exist within you. Mariana (tearfully, now collapsed to her knees with drawings and fabric all around her) But how do I exercise it? What power of God can make me my father’s daughter? Narrator Give what he gave. All of yourself. (Mariana scrambles from her knees to the seat at the workbench and takes hold of a knife and scissors. The lights fade to black.) (We hear frenzied sounds of work along with some small cries of pain. The set is still in darkness as we hear small drips into metal buckets. This is when the outfit change and prosthetics will occur. We see the faint outline of the windows through the darkness and see the morning sun begin to rise. We stay this way for about two to three minutes. At the midpoint of this, the narrator speaks.) Narrator Hurry now; Cecily will be here anytime with the financial report from last week. Do you wish to see her disappointed look again?

Mariana (small, almost whimper-like) no no no no no

(A single spotlight hits the left side of the stage, still obscuring Mariana and the workbench. It is Cecily in a mink coat holding a manila envelope marked finances. She looks older than her years now, and her eyes hold sadness. She takes off the coat as she speaks, revealing she is impeccably dressed for a woman in the 1930s.)

Cecily

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(unhurried, slightly distracted, and yelling into the darkness) Mariana, are you in here? I need to go over the finances from last week. They’ve improved slightly, but we still need to make a change if we want to turn a profit.

silence

Cecily (slightly unsure) Mariana?

Cecily (slightly unsure, but growing exasperated)

Mariana? Mariana? Are you there? We need some new designs if we’ll manage to stay afloat! I know you keep late hours here, but you can’t go on like your father, falling asleep at the workbench! You and he are cut from the same clo- (The lights on the stage come up to reveal Mariana. The workbench has moved, and in its place are two buckets on their side, spilling out thick red liquid. Fabric and sketches lay strewn to the sides, but the knife and scissors from earlier are coated in this liquid. There is a dress manikin standing center stage with a gorgeous garment on it. It is a deep red dress with fabric that appears sheer but covers. Its skirts run down to the floor, and its sleeves bell at the end to give the appearance of blooming flowers. It is, by all accounts, gorgeous. It should be very obvious to the audience that the dress is dyed from her blood, still dripping on the stage.) (Mariana lies to the side of the dress. Her skin is an agitated pink color, and she has several visible gashes on her upper arms and other places. The cuts should not appear in the areas common for self-harm, as this was an act of devotion, not of pain. She groans weakly.)

Cecily (Bloodcurdling scream and flees offstage)

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(We can hear Cecily’s frantic cries for help offstage, and two men in white paramedic uniforms befitting the time period run in with a stretcher. Cecily runs in behind them and stays several feet away. They put Mariana on the stretcher and lift it vertically so the audience can see that in producing the fabric for the dress, she has clearly skinned herself in most places aside from her face. Her dress is torn and bloodied. She smiles.) Paramedic 1 (frantically yelling in Mariana’s face) Mademoiselle? Mademoiselle? Can you hear me, Mademoiselle?

Cecily (sobbing, hysterical)

Her name is Mariana! She is my stepdaughter! I don’t know what happened! Please save her! I can’t lose her - she is all I have left!

Paramedic 2 Mariana! Mariana, can you hear me?

Mariana (weakly, with her eyes slightly cracked open) Papa?

Paramedic 2 Mariana! Mariana, tell me what happened. Were you attacked? Mariana, speak to me! Mariana, Mariana, Mariana… (The noise of the scene has faded away. We no longer hear the bustle of a city behind us or Cecile’s cries or the paramedics’ movements. They continue to move but with no sound. The paramedics begin trying to dress some of the wounds with Mariana on the stretcher.) (The voice of Paramedic 2 fades away and is replaced by the voice of an older man from above. Similar to how the narrator spoke from above.)

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John (a calm concern in his voice) Mariana? Mariana, what have you done? My child?

Mariana (elated and through tears)

Papa? Oh, Papa! Oh, how I’ve missed you. See what I’ve done? Just as you always had. I’ve put all of myself into it. The dress is a testament to you. You left your legacy here on earth within me, and I have freed it. John (solemn tone) You were my legacy, my child. You were proof of any genius I ever had. My greatest creation was always you. Mariana (looking down at herself and realizing she has mutilated her father’s favorite creation. She begins to weep with sadness. She looks over to the dress, still dripping on its mannequin.) Is it beautiful, Papa? Are you proud?

John Yes, my child. I am proud.

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Maylee Wenzel

Call Box Library

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Maylee Wenzel

Moseying Down the Stream

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Anonymous

3 D B

I saw three dead bodies today.

One of them stared back at me, but none of them cared. They have no more thoughts. No more worries. No more concerns about the world. They were all small animals. Each was stopped permanently on asphalt mere hours before I arrived. Now they are tiny corpses. They don’t care about seeking shelter. They don’t care about finding food. They don’t care about their little animal families. They are the dead. They don’t worry about dictators rising around the globe. They don’t care about due process and civil rights. They don’t care about the murder and desecration of people. They don’t care about the pain or the cruelty. They don’t even notice the glee with which those in power inflict unspeakable suffering. They are the dead. They don’t read. They don’t think about morality. They don’t feel empathy. They have forgotten all the lessons their mothers taught them about being good, respecting one another, and protecting the vulnerable. They don’t care about us. They are the dead. The rest of us see them. We see their dead eyes, their dead stares, their dead teeth bared. And we will never forget their selfish, hateful, blackened souls. They are the dead. They don’t care about genocide. They ignore humanity. Goodness doesn’t matter. Respect doesn’t matter.

They are the Dead. And they laugh as the living suffer.

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Anonymous

Fire Storm

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Jennifer Sykes

Growth Adjustments

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Jennifer Sykes

Belonging

Journey of Resilience

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Gino Sigismondi

Resist by The Sum (feat. Laura Clapp)

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SMWC Chorale, Madrigals, and Alumni

La Providence by Sydney Guillaume

Performed on April 27th, 2025, in the Church of the Immaculate Conception, by the SMWC Chorale and Madrigals, and by the SMWC Music Alumni

Conductor, Michael Boswell

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Anonymous

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Anonymous

Friends on Mushrooms

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Guerin Cassel

Squirrel in the Sisters of Providence Convent Cemetery

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Kyleigh Moore

Chamber Door

Once upon a midnight.

Over many chamber door.

In the bleak December, dying ember wrought its ghost to borrow sorrow for evermore.

Uncertain rustling, repeating.

Some visitor at my chamber door.

Forgiveness tapping at my chamber door, nothing more.

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Sydney Kaelin

Flute

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Sydney Kaelin

Violin

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Tyler Martin

Evil Kids

Going through the park gates Lots of people enjoy themselves. Jogging, Sitting, Birdwatching, A shark jumps through the lake and eats all the ducks!

You didn’t see it, only heard its splash. The duckpond was now a pool party And the trees blocking your hill were gone And your picnic All of your friends and family Were able to see the birthday party. Soft, clean, fancy clothes Like those French paintings by a river Big, fun, happy smiles Like the ones TV characters make Quiet, hidden, meaningless

LEVIATHAN! ZOMBIES! OOOOOOZING TOXIC!!! LIKE THE ITTY BITTY GRASS AND LEAVES AROUND YOUR BLANKET!!! The trees were rotting The water was bloody Everyone was dead! You tried to imagine that birthday boy Between the Devil’s teeth, popped out of the park and far away… NO MERCY, he was like a squirrel in a mutt’s maw!

You pinched your arms with all your fingers As you cried at the apocalyptic destruction Globs of tears poked through your eyes

As the zombies launched themselves at your parents. You looked towards me when you opened your eyes You recognized me You didn’t say anything

No shaming, no shouting, no punishing All you did was choke and crumble and

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Tyler Martin

Hide inside your blanket. You quieted yourself. Your wish drowned out every last thing I did.

If I could grant you your wish When none of this mattered anymore Would you be nice to me?

In the toxic-waste blood river We swam into a bubble of air

It rolled with us until we reached the banks. The smell of blood attracted the zombies They ran up to you like pugs And only wanted to lick your face. The Earth was ruined with no hope of escape But the Sun still looked like a banana slice. We ran up the giant Leviathan And fell up into space. Everything went dark and cold You hugged me tightly when you began shivering. Then it got bright and hot. The last thing I felt were your shivering hands. The only words I heard were “Thank you.”

I woke up in my bed, somewhat guilty. Dad was still asleep in his, somewhat peaceful.

I brushed my teeth, got dressed, and grabbed a couple granola bars. When I got to the bus stop, you were sitting with your friends.

You took a glance when you heard my footsteps, And you immediately darted your head back.

Your face gave away that you didn’t understand yourself Truth be told, I couldn’t remember why you did that either. I stood beside the bench, quietly fishing into the bag. You pulled the folds of your coat close to you. “Here,” You said while your friends weren’t looking. 6 tiny, neatly-wrapped, chocolate-frosted donettes. They were the best food I ever ate!

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Anonymous

Snail’s Pace

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Anonymous

Copy, Paste

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Michael Munro

Bell Tower

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Anonymous

Lake House

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Krislyn Moreland

Organ Donor

I’m aware what I’m doing is wrong in some capacity. Not morally per se; they are mine after all, and as a part of my person, I have the right to do with them what I wish. That doesn’t mean I don’t feel like I’m committing a cardinal sin in this alleyway, though. Not economically because it’s not even for the money at this point. My retirement account is full to bursting, and I’ve got platinum card applications coming through the mail in bulk. I guess not even socially. I’m not hurting anyone besides myself. “Miss Jones?” I jump at the woman’s voice to the left of me. It’s hard to see her clearly in the dim light. She’s taller than me; that I know for sure, which lets me know it’s only Sally. Something about her makes me rethink this decision, but it’s the same strike of panic I feel every time I put myself in this position. I always end up in some back parking lot or pitch-dark park or, like today, a dimly lit alleyway in the middle of a bustling city. A good 45 minutes away from the safety of my warm bed with my phone at home and my name anonymous to this woman. “Yeah, hi Sally.” I greet as I step closer. I can see now her signature blond stringy hair that looks dry and greasy at the same time and a pacifying tight-lipped smile, juxtaposed by her tan pantsuit and handful of paperwork. Every time, she’s always in some color pantsuit with her hair slicked back into a bun so tight it must be cutting off oxygen to her brain. I imagine the hairstyle has less to do with personal style and more as a precaution for leaving any hair follicles behind. “Yes indeed, thank you for coming! We’ll have you step into this car really quick, and we’ll head out.” She started walking towards the blacked-out SUV at the other end of the alley. I blanched at the sight of the car, the coppery scent of blood filling my nostrils. I can feel my organs shift inside my body like they did that night and the hard screech of metal on metal. I can feel the steering wheel slam into my chest as the car spirals and hear the deafening crack from Lucy next to me. I remember thinking it

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sounded like a bunch of popsicle sticks breaking all at once. “Miss?” I noticed I hadn’t yet moved, but she had made it halfway down the alley, her and those long legs. “Yes, sorry.” I moved to meet her, and she walked at my weakened pace to the car. I clutched the string of my cross-body bag tightly, hoping to enact some resistant part of my internal equilibrium. I wonder if Sally noticed how my walk has worsened over the time I’ve been with her. How my steps have gotten more unsure and my posture more crouched. Of course, it’s not always Sally who comes to get me. Hell, I don’t even know if her real name is Sally. In the beginning she said to address her as Miss, and I did religiously the first few times. Then, on the drive back one day, addled with laughing gas and a concoction of other drugs, I started calling her Sally as a nickname, and when I did, I saw her smirk a little from her passenger seat in the front. I’ve kept doing it ever since. Who knew I’d be calling her Sally for almost a year next week? The cars are usually the same. Always black, tinted windows to the point of blindness, and a leather interior. I guess for some kind of easy cleanup. The streak of nervousness had mostly gone by now. All I was left to do was clear my head until the procedure. In a way, I could pretend that I wasn’t in this car at all but back at that night, having chosen an Uber instead of driving myself and Lucy. We are both quiet and tipsy in the front seat, heading to my house to crash for the night. Lucy sits next to me, calm and quiet. I can feel her heart pumping. I can hear the quiet stream of blood move through her. Her cartilage makes quiet popping sounds as she adjusts in her seat; the soft flick of her eyelashes sounds through the quiet. The life flowing through her is deafening. In this moment, the silence I’ve lived in since her absence is filled, her heartbeat a crescendo, every breath a symphony. The car

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stops, and her song ends as I get out and directly onto a gurney. The first time I did this, it was bad. Grief and guilt were the twins I had lived with for three months since Lucy’s death. She needed lung tissue, parts of the intestines, some plasma, and more. I had a minor skull fracture, a concussion, and two broken ribs. The doctors told me and my recovery team to look out for personality changes, that sometimes injuries like this can affect the part of the brain where values live. No one noticed anything aside from me, but it was decided that gnawing guilt wasn’t grounds for a CT scan. Since I understood what was going on, I was looking up what I could have done for her. Intestinal transfers, lung lobe movements, and what the rate of survival was. I spent my weeks in that hospital bed calculating if she could have made it from what I could have given her. She would have. The understanding that my body harbored what could have saved her, when she was two rooms away breathing slower and slower through an oxygen tube, broke me. I could feel my very skin cells reject me at the thought. I was crawling out of my skin day and night. Having dreams of sewing myself into her side, our organs acting as one. I left the post-college house I had rented, moving into a small apartment closer to the cemetery. My days were filled with obsessive googling, my thoughts carving her name into my organs, and my veins rearranging under my skin to spell her name. Then one night, at 3:45, I saw it. My internet searches had gotten increasingly bizarre. Looking up old medical practices and stories of, albeit unethical, but successful rare organ transplants. I had entered a particularly sketchy website for one of these stories, and there, flashing with red letters against a white background, read the ad “Organs for harvest with financial compensation.” The username was anonymous enough to be forgettable, but the idea wasn’t. Because of my injury history and DUI, I couldn’t get approved for the hospital’s donor list. But I couldn’t just let what wasn’t rightfully mine anymore waste away in my tomb of a body. Once the first one came out and I was back home a week later feeling no

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different, it became an addiction, you could say. It felt like a part of me that no longer belonged was finally free. A part of Lucy I could give some peace. With every donation her voice in my head got quieter. I imagine it’s Sally who writes me the emails. I know, I shouldn’t be giving out my email on the dark web, but it requires one for the service. About a week or month or so after every donation, I get an email stating that my donations have been put to good use. I know it’s a form email because apparently, I’ve donated several different times to a Chad from San Diego who enjoys Paw Patrol, and I know he is living a very happy life after my donation cured his chronic something or other. They bring me into the familiar white-tiled operating room, where two people in scrubs stand waiting for my gurney and hospital-gown-clad body to be placed in front of them. One sits on a stool and places the mask over my face. “Count back from 10,” the man’s gravelly voice says. I hear Lucy’s voice doing it for me. 10, 9, 8, Hey, if you keep going at this rate, they are going to have to drag you into the van. 7, 6, 5. How many procedures is this now, 5? 4, 3. I wonder if you had had vodka instead of beer that night if you might have swerved in the right direction. 2. After all of these donations, what do you think will be left of you to bury when the lack of some organ finally kills you? Or maybe fate will pull a good one, maybe a car crash. 1. The first time I was terrified, as any rational human being would be. I shook the whole time we were in the car. Back then, it was a man I had nicknamed Sal (only in my head) who had collected me. Sal didn’t like to talk and didn’t bother to wear business professional clothes. He came in a black T-shirt and black jeans and said little more than three sentences to me. I like to think he’s how they weed out the crazy and uncommitted people. The reward for longtime service is Sally. I guess it was about the fourth time that when they dropped me off at the subway station, I felt the chill of the night air hit particularly hard. I felt like I had poured

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a glass of ice water over my torso and gotten out into the snow. My body was already starting to shake, coming off so many drugs all at once, I suppose. I looked down and saw the dark spot blooming over my abdomen and thought I must have drooled all over myself on the way home. It was only after getting down to the subway and realizing everyone was looking at me that I actually took notice. Notice that the stain wasn’t water; it wasn’t even dark. It was bright red contrasted on my mint green shirt. I ran from the subway and staggered home after hailing a taxi. Turns out it’s a lot harder to see blood in the dark. It was only a few stitches I had popped, and with a few days off work, I was good as new. At least I know I put that leather interior to some good use. My route is riding the subway a few blocks, then up Fourth Street, then doubling back twice to make sure they aren’t following me. I’ve been working with them a long time, but I’d be a fool to let that build trust. I don’t know why I bother anyway; I already know they know where I live. It was before the first time, just after I had signed up for my first donation. I had gone out to buy whatever preservatives disguised as food that my salary as a customer service line worker could afford. I came back to find everything in my apartment slightly to the left. The air was heavy with someone else’s presence and stale in a way that told me they had already come and gone. Everything remained in its place, not that I would have cared or noticed if anything was taken. My laptop was still open, playing the same Sandra Bullock movie I had been watching on repeat for the last two months. Miss Congeniality, Lucy’s favorite. I walked through the whole house, and the only thing that didn’t match my less than encyclopedic memory was the bathroom cabinet. The apartment came with a small medicine cabinet in the bathroom. It was covered in a thick yellow paint that was obviously my building’s variation of the landlord’s special. The door was ajar, and my various colored bottles slightly moved. It looked like a rainbow in this cabinet, and I can only imagine the person who opened it must think I’m trying to make a collage out

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of prescription meds. We have the blue bottle for sleep, orange for anxiety and depression, and any hallucination I have as a side effect of the purple bottle for pain management. The only noticeable difference was all the bottles had been moved so their labels face the outside. My first rationalization was a burglar trying to score but deciding none of my drugs were good enough, which came with some strange pride for my medicine cabinet. The more reasonable idea was that it was someone from the service trying to see what my liver had been through so they could price it correctly. I started leaving my door unlocked after that. Sort of hoping they would come back and hoping someone new would walk in. I figured that the two options were that I would finally be put out of my misery, or I would have someone real to talk to for the first time in months. Typically, after my subway ride of shame and walk of regret, Lucy appears. Maybe it’s the drugs or blood loss or grief so strong it defies corporeal reality. Whatever the cause, I don’t care. I’d take a hospital’s worth of drugs if it meant she would walk me home again. She doesn’t always talk; sometimes the sound of her lavender high heels clacking along the pavement is the only thing that fills the silence. Other times she does. She talks about our time in high school together and cheerleading at the pep rallies. She asks about Lou and if we are thinking about tying the knot anytime soon. I don’t have the heart to tell her I left Lou when I left my old apartment. I can’t tell her that every time I looked at the face of my partner of almost three years, I saw the moment Lucy had introduced us. How Lou’s short cropped blond hair reminded me of Lucy’s flowing locks. I didn’t have the heart to tell her I had fallen out of love with Lou and in love with her memory. How do you tell a ghost you see them in everything? Show them that you’re sorry, that if you could trade fates, she would have a beating heart right now. How do I turn the sidewalk in the pouring rain into a confessional? I can’t. Some great poets or philosophers might have an answer, but I have nothing. So, until I am filled with the spirit of Socrates, I walk in the rain, leaving one set of footprints behind me and a trail of blood in my wake.

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Emma Newton

Raised

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Christina Green

Art Therapy

47

Anonymous

Rot

It might’ve been just yesterday that I realized I was the only person on this planet. The Earth, full of inhabitants, only contains one human, and I am sure it is me. This is the theory called Solipsism, a theory of which I only recently learned about. “ Solus ”, meaning alone, and “ ipse ”, meaning self, both derived from Latin terms, mean a position that only one’s mind is sure to exist. This is the case for me in my realization as of last night and into early morning. I am truly the only human on Earth. Bristly and cold was my awakening this certain day, a day I couldn’t pin if I tried, as it was all days and no days at all, and every day this week, and every day last month. It was hard enough waking up, let alone getting up, but every day for the past 20 years had been all but identical in difficulty (factoring in growth). After last night, I wasn’t positive getting up anymore would have much of a point. I was the only person on Earth after all. Before, I would get up, dress, eat, hydrate, clean myself, all the things that your average person would do. It was all very mundane and grey, the process. Far into the past, I would ask my mom what it was all for, as she was older than me, and would surely know the answer. But, would she really? Was she older than me? Is she real? I will be older than her. I am older than her, always was, always have been. If I have felt she was real my entire life, but really, she wasn’t. What does that make her? If I am alone here, don’t I make the rules of this game? I don’t know if I make the rules of this game. Anyway, my mom also did not know what it was all for, which I understand. How can any of us really know what it is all about? On that past day, she said, “Well baby, I guess that is for you to figure out as you grow up. You’ll learn new things and meet new people, and suddenly you’ll know right where you are and right

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Anonymous

where you wanna be.” “Will I?” I shot back, unconvinced. I would’ve been even more unconvinced if this conversation had happened today, or the night before. “You will, baby. Now head to school.” I was dismissed. That was a long time ago. I’m in a school building, the one here today, the day that is any day this week and last month and no day at all. That one, yes, it is also grey and bland. The floors look like water, but only when they are freshly cleaned. Otherwise, they look like mud. But this building, these buildings, were actually yellow, and in some places blue. The walls, I mean. In them were a thousand, two-thousand more of the people that aren’t real because I am the only real person on Earth. They ignored me, dismissed me too, like my mom did those years ago. This school had a small cafe. It was blue, just like the school, but grey now, just for me, and the students of the school would go up and grab whatever they wanted. The staff would get stressed, and I always noticed that frustration on their faces. They tried not to let it show. They tried to hide it, but I always noticed. I would’ve offered to help, I had experience. But I didn’t. I didn’t offer my help. I didn’t do much of anything in school. That made me a bad person, maybe. Maybe. After all, I don’t know the rules of the game. Eh. It didn’t matter. It is not like they were real. The frustration. They didn’t even have real jobs because they didn’t exist. No one existed. I was the only real person. The only real person on Earth. The cafe was packed today, the day after last night and no day at all. I just walked by. No one looked at me, no one stopped me. No one said, “Come to the cafe! Get a drink!” Or maybe they did, but I surely wouldn’t have cared. Why would

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Anonymous

I care what someone who doesn’t exist has to say? I was the only real person. So no. No one said to go to the cafe. No one has ever looked at me, close, no one has ever stopped me. And thank God for that. Thank God . It was fine. I didn’t want anything. Though it had just been a night, I wasn’t hungry, I wasn’t thirsty, and my body felt as if it hadn’t been thirsty for anything in months. A year? I hadn’t felt the need to eat anything for how long. At least as long as today and last night and this whole week and 2 weeks from now. I wasn’t hungry, so I didn’t stop at the cafe. No one stopped me and said come to the cafe, so I just went to class. Class was the same way it had always been, the same way it was when I was a kid, a teen, an adult. The teachers didn’t call on me; I didn’t raise my hand. In middle school, the teachers didn’t call on me; I didn’t raise my hand. In college, the teachers didn’t call on me, and I didn’t raise my hand. I only found out recently this is because I am the only person on Earth. I left the classroom after a full hour and a half of not talking, not listening, and not learning. “Why do you bother going to class then?” someone asks. “Well, because that’s what I’ve always done. That’s what I’m supposed to

do. To get my degree.” “Oh,” they said, “Okay.” No one actually asked that.

I wondered if getting my degree even mattered, since I was the only person on Earth. I was hoping it maybe would’ve all been for something, but if all is for nought, then what’s the point of trying? Should I just give up? Have I given up? What was giving up? Was giving up dying? Can you even die if you’re not real? Can you even die if you are real?

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Anonymous

What is dying?

Is it lying in a garden? Is death sleeping? Is death the opposite of life? Is it the continuation of the soul? Is it the resting place? Is it the Consequence of living? Is it Hell? Is it Heaven?

Where is Heaven? Is Heaven a place on Earth? No. Surely not.

I went home and lay down. I didn’t get any water to drink, or any food to eat. I wasn’t hungry or thirsty. I hadn’t been hungry or thirsty for as long as I can remember. At least since today and last week and 2 months ago and a year from now. Or somewhere around that time. “Mom?!” I called from my bed. “Mommy?!” I screamed and screamed and screamed and screamed for my mommy. She didn’t answer. She was gone. She was dead. She’d been dead since yesterday, and the day before, and a long time before that. “Oh right. Mommy is gone.” I turned over away from my grey wall and put my face into the grey pillow, and tried again, “Mommy? Mom?! Mom, where are you?” Maybe that would work. There was but one problem I faced in my new, grey, lonely, lonely world. What was it, you ask? Well, I don’t know. I have never known, I will never know, you’ll never know. If I could jump back in time before I knew I was the only real person on Earth, before I even knew what Solipsism was, I would, but it wouldn’t matter. And you see, this is because this is always the way the world has been. Dark, grey, lonely, quiet, dead.

You and I are both dead, somewhere in the future. Somewhere in the past

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Anonymous

we never existed, could have never existed. One day we will both be gone from the memories of anything living on this planet. We will be forgotten. Even if I am the only real person on this Earth, maybe you’re the only real person on your Earth. And what do you see? Color? Life? Or do you see death? Do you see darkness? You do. You see our people dying in our streets. You see humans killing humans. Red blood, grey blood pours from their bodies. Red blood, black blood pours from a murderer. Then that murderer gets killed by another murderer, then that one by another and another and another and then everyone is dead. Everyone is dead. Everyone. Then you’re the Last Person On Earth. Everyone else has died and you’re the Last Person On Earth.

Can’t you see?

Can’t you see them around you? The Bodies? There’s one there, and another behind you. There’s some on their feet. You’re stepping on their skulls, their eyes. You just kicked the sand into her face. You just broke his ankle with your boot. Can’t you see them? Can’t you see? Why aren’t you looking at them? Why aren’t you looking at them? At The Bodies?

I see.

I get it.

No, really, I do. I understand. You see, I have actually known all along. Looking through this screen. Looking at the blinking line of the, the Caret, the insertion point, whatever you call it. I have known all along that the person reading this

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Anonymous

isn’t real. I have always known. I can see you, and that must be why you can’t see Them. You’re not real, that’s why. I’m sorry. It’s just, sometimes I get carried away when I think there is someone else. When I think someone is listening. I just… start to run off with myself. I’m sorry. I really am. I hope I didn’t scare you.

But, I guess, you can’t get scared. You’re not real.

You’re not real. You’re dead. The Bodies are rotting.

Everyone is dead. Everyone. You’re the Last Person On Earth. Everyone else has died and you’re the Last Person On Earth.

Everyone is dead and I am the Last Person On Earth.

You can’t see.

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Michael Munro

Church Steeples

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Anonymous

Spring

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Anonymous

The Unwelcome Return of Richard III

Now is the winter of our discontent…

And all the clouds that lour’d upon our house In the deep bosom of the ocean buried, Now are our brows bound with victorious wreaths.…

But I… that am rudely stamp’d, … so lamely and unfashionable That dogs bark at me as I halt by them.…

And therefore… since I cannot prove a lover… I am determined to prove a villain.…

Plots have I laid, inductions dangerous, By drunken prophecies, libels and dreams, To set my brother(s) … In deadly hate the one against the other…. As I am subtle, false and treacherous.

And you voted for me.

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Pete Jackson

Corn Harvester

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Andrea Perez

Ocean Sunset

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Anonymous

Birds in a Post

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Emma Tomey

First Love

It wasn’t so easy, not at all

The way you caressed me, and the look in your eyes.

Your words made my heart flutter, and I just knew

Either this would be the person I’d be with,

Or the person who completely broke me.

Months in, I knew I would stick around

No matter what, this is my dynamite, the excitement, and utterly consuming

Until he took me to that room,

That room was dark, filled with memories and sayings of love

But he didn’t come with me.

He left me there, just abandoned me.

The key he had for that room was used to lock me in,

I didn’t see daylight anymore; I didn’t see light anymore.

The light I once had in my eyes for all the things I loved

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Emma Tomey

Utterly diminished.

It was almost like I had just been ripped out of my home,

The one that was perfectly curated and comfortable,

The home that I believed I would always have even throughout the worst times,

That one home, the person I threw myself into and lost myself in the end to.

He, that man I was so in love with, left so quickly and without a word locked me in.

A huge hole in my heart began to erupt,

As the person who I felt was my everything completely uprooted me from my safe space.

The person who I trusted with my life,

Completely threw me and that room away without regard for how I was stuck.

Stuck in him.

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Guerin Cassel

Monarch Caterpillar

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Guerin Cassel

Monarch Caterpillar on Milkweed

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Maylee Wenzel

The West

somewhere serene, full of deep green,

tall trees inviting you in, long droopy branches ensuring solitude.

This place has many hidden beauties, hidden trails,

concealed from those who might blemish it,

where the forest and the sea collide, creating a beguiling sight.

Though as the sun rises, it casts an array of warm rays,

and a low tide, revealing the hiding places of those below.

Those who are incapable greed, whose only worry in the world is dawn,

when alas, they are exposed to a species who taunt and gawk at them.

A species that is blind to that which is right in front of them,

heaven on earth, this place, this hidden beauty,

Is my heaven.

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Guerin Cassel

Sun Shining Through Leaves

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“The world has achieved brilliance without wisdom, power without conscience. Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethical infants. We know more about war than we know about peace, more about killing than we know about living.”­ –Omar Bradley

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