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9c381bf7-b3d4-41b8-892c-5c1b521c65f3 A Mother's Love by Chloe Robertson Oliver by Esmé DeVries At the first house I lived in, the backyard expanded into a lush forest. We had a freezing, trapezoidal pool and often found critters from the woods swimming or, more often, drowning in the icy blue. Because of this, my father taught my brother, Oliver, how to decapitate a rattlesnake far too young in his life, sparking our eagerness to explore the great outdoors. Oliver and I quickly got into the thrilling habit of exploring the woods behind our house, feeling that our youthfulness protected us from harm. During summer and on weekends, the two of us, intrepid explorers, would hike into the trees, following the thin, winding creek down the hill, where it fed into a lake. He would walk in front of me, being older and braver, leading the way into the dangerous unknown, past brambles and hedges that threatened to bar our path. Sometimes, we would bring fishing poles down, though it was more common for us to be found frolicking in the black ooze produced by the lake. We used to run across the banks when the water level was low, sinking deep into the sludge and quickly fighting to unstick ourselves. He ran first and he ran faster, but his feet got stuck in the mud more often than mine. Once, abandoning our rods and reels, we took to the mud again. Oliver, of course, tested the waters. About halfway across, his toes caught, and he fell face first into the soggy bed. I was too young to find this properly funny, especially when he stood up, coughing and sputtering, sporting only one shoe. He blew dirt out of his mouth and fell back to his hands and knees, digging for his other shoe, a pair of Reeboks he had had forever. I rushed to his aid and we both dug holes that refilled every other second, plunging our arms into the closing cavities, coating our skin up to our shoulders in mahogany slop. When the sky darkened and we waved the white flag, Oliver and I walked back to the bank, squelching and sticking, so that he could ceremoniously throw his remaining shoe into the lake. I remember taking off my own shoes as we headed back up to the house, whether out of solidarity or just so that I could run my dirt-caked socks through the cool creek water, it didn’t matter. It was all the same to us. Back at the house, Mom let us hear it. She wasn’t mad about the shoes, just about our late arrival home. Oliver didn’t speak to me much for the rest of the evening, though I couldn’t work out why. I reasoned that he was upset about the shoes or getting chewed out by Mom. Still, I wasn’t quite ready to forget our day. "I would burrow under my blankets and read princess books under the dim light of a flashlight. In that regard, not much has changed." Not long after this experience, Oliver began private school and by the time I had gained acceptance to the same institution, he had gathered a collection of like-minded friends. I had never had as many friends as him growing up. I still don’t, but back then it was more difficult for me to grasp that my older brother, who I looked up to, was able to branch out to people other than me. Once upon a time, I could slip into his room late at night to play with our stuffed animals. Then, he started having people spend the night or he himself would leave. I would burrow under my blankets and read princess books under the dim light of a flashlight. In that regard, not much has changed. He even got so bold as to bring his friends down to the lake, into our watery sanctuary. I, thinking they had just forgotten to invite me, would follow him down. We would circle the lake, clinging tight to trees and slipping on loose dirt, not daring to run through the mud as Oliver and I once had. These friends stuck with Oliver all throughout his formative years and as a result, he and I spent less and less time together. When he entered sixth grade and I entered third, we were blocked to share a recess period at school. It was the first time this had happened, and my friends and I were eager to play with the big kids and share a space with people we looked up to. But even then, we avoided each other. Perhaps it was a mutual effort. Over the years I had fallen in with a good crowd of girls and we spent the days playing a rather inventive version of manhunt, darting through the trees and under the slides. Oliver played as many contact sports as he could come up with. Most often he was found playing basketball, but once, the two of us had taken to hovering around the chalky red four-square courts. I was perched on the adjacent hill, giggling foolish. Presumably to get rid of me, Oliver called to get my attention and as I turned, he catapulted a maroon football into my eye. I thought for sure he had blacked my eye, and fled the scene in a hurry, rushing back into the school and to the bathroom that was farthest from the playground. This was back when school bathrooms had doors, so I was able to hide my shame in a secluded environment. I don’t remember returning to recess, though I must’ve at some point. I imagine that I spitefully concluded that my eye was fine, maybe a little bloodshot, and gathered my courage to return to my anxiously awaiting friends. It was likely that by the time Oliver and I shared a car ride home, we had both completely forgotten the incident. But I still wonder if he meant to do it. At the end of my third-grade year, my father announced that we would be moving to Florida. Oliver, from what I could tell, was very understanding about the whole thing. Our parents probably explained more of their reasoning to him than they did to me, providing him an opportunity to roll with the punches. I, however, had reached peak stubbornness in my ninth year of life and dug my heels in as much as was possible. Fortunately, I had no control over my own life and therefore could not do any lasting damage. We moved in June of that year and because of our different viewpoints, the stake that had been poking its way between Oliver and I plunged much further. My negative attitude coupled with his unfortunate seventh grade desire to fit in bore no healthy fruits. He made fun of me and I, deeply immersed in my sensitive stage of life, couldn’t brush it off until I too realized that bickering was the teenage trend. In our new house, Oliver’s room was upstairs and mine down, in complete opposite corners of the house. We had only ever been separated by a few feet of hallway, but now, there seemed to be a million miles between us. Half the time, I don’t even know when he’s home. Even such a small change forced us further apart. There’s never been a need for me to go to Oliver’s room and I haven’t exactly wanted to. The only time he ever comes to mine is to borrow my stapler or tell me dinner’s ready. We just don’t see each other much anymore. He’ll be going off to college soon and is making the most of his senior year with his buddies and his girlfriend. I hardly ever leave my room. To me, we’re on opposite sides of the hedge of protection that childhood offered. Oliver had already crossed it and stood proudly on the other side, waving at me mockingly through the leaves. I wondered if I would ever cross. When we had once been so close, so similar, now he stood acres away. Since moving to Florida and since Oliver began high school, the two of us have taken a pair of safety scissors to the hedge, clipping away at its leaves and branches slowly but surely. Occasionally, one of us will start watering the hedge, erasing our progress. It’s slow work and we may never get back to what we once were. It’s okay. I don’t expect us to. Return to Table of Contents

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11 Effete by Kylie Tanner For Naomi by Jessica Bakar The first time I lied about my writing, the line between truth and lie was a two-letter word. In a tense conversation with a friend, I found the fracture between my comfort and her curiosity irreconcilable. This essay she’d found had been recently republished in a regional magazine— a publication that, despite being known in my community, I assumed was rarely read. She dropped the bomb in a text. “Did you write ‘Legacy Ends Here’?” A text bubble accusation—a violation. My hands shook as I stared down at the screen in disbelief. She’d found, read, chewed, swallowed, and regurgitated something unintended for her eyes. Stunned by this impossibility, I barely found the strength to turn off my phone—to deny her question for another moment. My writing itself is denial. It’s pen names and anonymity in emails to editors, it’s changing my hometown in author bios. It’s staying in the closet. It’s telling nobody but my notebook about an eating disorder, the page watching me recover. It’s witnessing my life exposed on the computer screen, reserved for anonymous eyes throughout America. It’s assuming nobody in my personal life would ever read my work. ⁕ When my friend asked if I wrote that essay, I lied. “No.” I replied, then powered off my phone. ⁕ My writing isn’t Jessica Bakar. My writing is Naomi Carr. It’s 33+ Linkedin profiles, none of which are my Naomi. It’s the safety in knowing myriad Naomis exist, none of which are my Naomi. It’s the secure seat behind a pen name, the thought that my pen name can hide behind a number of real people who exist. It’s the sound assumption that nobody would ever draw a line connecting Naomi back to me. ⁕ I met Naomi the first time I was published. Molly Hill, Blue Marble ’s EIC, strongly suggested I employ a pen name for security. Even with her advice, the decision was unbearable--- hypocritical, even. I couldn’t separate myself from my work, from the experiences and pain that stained the page. That piece, like the rest of my writing, was a morsel of my life. It was me. To change the name attached to it, to would distance myself from my work, my writing, my life. I couldn’t reconcile how truth could become so untrue. It tasted like a lie, betrayal, sick denial. Amid my indecision, I texted my that friend— the one who would find this piece months later in another publication. I told her nothing. She did not know the name of my piece, the genre, the content, the publication— nothing. I simply told her my work was accepted, and that I didn’t know if I should publish under a pen name. I told her the thought of a pen name felt superficial, but I considered Hill’s advice heavily. I told her I couldn’t relinquish comfort, when really I meant safety. She told me to be authentic. She told me to own my real name. I didn’t tell her daring to write that piece was owning my real name. I didn’t tell her that attaching my “real” name to that piece would put a target on my back, would make me prey to four different people I call predators. She told me to be authentic, but I didn’t tell her that piece— each word handpicked at an ungodly hour— was the most authentic act I’ve ever committed. I didn’t tell her that maybe my essay didn’t need my real name in order to be authentic, that the absence of my real name made it any less true. Hours of internal turmoil ended in a reply to Hill, thanking her, and ultimately taking her advice. Naomi Carr was born. ⁕ My writing is creative nonfiction. CNF is the highest commitment to the truth. It’s bleeding my life onto the screen, ripping my heart out, stripping naked before a blank page, dismembering my body with my own hands. CNF writers are not always authors, but we are always entirely human. We are explorers of the self, reverse engineers of emotion. We understand how moths know of loneliness, how masochism and homesickness are the same. We know ourselves through the quiet contemplation of clattering keyboards. We know others through transposing the real world onto the page. We know that, sometimes, the most vulnerable moments are not with others but with pen and paper. We know that success is embracing vulnerability, reality, discomfort, pain. CNF is a commitment to myself. My writing is entirely me. ⁕ Naomi is my mother’s middle name. Stowed away between her first and last, the beauty of its Japanese origin always fascinated me. Carr is extracted from the second syllable of my last name—a familial sound carried across bloodlines from India to Trinidad to Canada before landing in California. Naomi separates Jessica from my work, but Naomi is still part of me. She’s my creation. She’s my own. She’s more experimental than any lyric essay or prose poetry or trilingual abecedarian. She lives with my essays and memoirs—in me, between my memory and unwritten words. Naomi’s name is a patchwork appreciation of those I love. Perhaps she’s an act of self-love—the acknowledgment that my work’s vulnerability, and my humanity, deserve protection. She’s a prayer that one day, those closest to me may linger over my words— that one day, the distance between Naomi and me will be nonexistent. ⁕ A week ago, I told my friend the truth. On an overcrowded bus ride home from school, she posed her question again, after months of living with my lie. It was abrupt but nonchalant, as if a conversation about college apps easily lent itself to inquiries about my personal writing. “So, did you? Did you write that piece in the lit mag?” She hesitated in a hushed voice, seeming to feel the gravity of her question this time. I hesitated. She did not have to specify which piece or which lit mag, but I knew. Smiling in discomfort, I made a futile attempt to evade her question with broken eye contact. “You don’t have to say, if you don’t want,” she reassured, staring straight at the side of my head while I looked for the answer outside the window. I took a breathe, stared back at her, and found the words to connect my writing back to me. “No, I did. I did write it.” The truth was just simpler than a lie. About the Writer... Naomi Carr is a young writer from San Francisco, California. She is an alumna of the Kenyon Review Young Writers Workshop and has found a home in creative nonfiction. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Blue Marble Review, Apprentice Writer, Aster Lit, Ice Lolly Review, and Pile Press, among others. When she isn’t writing, Naomi enjoys practicing photography and studying art. About the Artist... Kylie Tanner is a senior at Savannah Arts Academy, Kylie is an arts major who uses photography to capture unique moments and tell unique stories.

fb5c9d25-b632-4864-9652-d26f258376fb Ave Maria by Vera Baffour Midnight Skin by Alexander Sayette I was fourteen & there was no light I had not managed to burst in the attic. So Sunday was black & silent & early in spring. & I was fourteen when I found my parent’s love story, all bundled up in boxes, tucked in 90’s sweaters. Beautiful & laced with broken glass. All flashlight & smiling eyes, I played archeologist, teased a skeleton from their folded skins. So I was fourteen & heartsick, leafing through a romance written in denim & black wool. My mother’s shorts. My father’s red windbreaker. My mother’s turtleneck. I bet he loved that turtleneck. I bet she loved him, too, felt the pavement in falling for him. All peach flushed & frightful. & so at fourteen, I took a gift from each, two bodies falling into each other. When no one is looking, I open their skins & dance. Return to Table of Contents

12 < Back now, with a son Sam Kats Mother by Ronni Ochoa now, with a son by Sam Kats 1. Mama lays in a white hospital bed. A crowded room of relatives push against one another, waiting for baby girl’s head to move. Ogling at her soft skin and pink lips, caressing her feminine cheeks. Grandma turns on the DSLR and snaps a photo to remember. It sits tucked into the pocket of a pale pink baby book. The bindings are worn in and the plastic inside is covered in smudge marks. 2. She races across a narrow hallway, the blue tulle in her dress scrunched in shaking fists. Soppy tears stain her dirty cheeks and she wipes them off in between hard exhales. She doesn’t mention how the dress prickles against her legs or that long hair weighs down her head. She just cuts big chunks of it off behind the couch a few months later. It turns into jagged lines and her dresses mend into dirty jeans. 3. Mama shakes in his arms. He whispers, “Mama, it’s okay, I’m here,” as she lays on his flat chest. He knows it’s because of him, because of whom he has become, but he is not sorry. "Five years of grief looks like it could heal,// but there’s no amount of time that// will replace a daughter." Five years of grief looks like it could heal, but there’s no amount of time that will replace a daughter. Still, life must go on, now, with a son. About the Writer... Sam Kats is a 17-year-old writer from Jacksonville, Florida. He is a junior at Douglas Anderson School of the Arts and enjoys realistic fiction. About the Artist... Ronni Ochoa is an art major at Savannah Arts Academy. They enjoy working with charcoal as well as digital painting.

< Back My Light by Daysha Perez Orbit By Allison LaPoint A celestial body in orbit of another—by definition—is in a constant state of freefall. Yet, they never touch, because there is just enough tangential inertia to keep them falling parallel to the surface of the other body. Always falling, but never connecting. You told me this as we sat on my roof, covered to our necks in wool. We gazed up at pinpricks of light, effervescent and shining through the dark ocean above us. I could barely see you in the dead of night; the new moon plunged the town into a pool of nothing. The world fell away around us, as it does when one is young and happy. It was us and the sky alone. Your planet is a swirling violet, I imagine. I see six rings, matching the ones you keep on your fingers. You and I were so far away from Earth and the rest of our galaxy. We were a binary planet system: you orbited around me, and I you. You reached your hand up high and made a cross in the air. Do you see that one? Yes. Cygnus, you said, your voice pensive. His best friend was thrown into the river by Zeus. Cygnus prayed to him, begging him to spare his friend, for he knew his friend would die if he didn’t save him. So, the god transformed Cygnus into a swan, and he dove into the river, pulling him out. The greatest sacrifice. The ultimate act of friendship. We were so young then, and your face was full of hope and wonder. Do you promise we’ll always be friends? You asked this with such fear, such anticipation of this future, this “always” that crushed all possible ulterior outcomes. The intensity of your gaze made me squirm, and the rough shingles of the roof scratched my bare shoulders. I said yes. What else could I do? I could feel it when our orbit broke, and you went soaring into the dark nothing of space. I didn’t realize at the time it meant that I would go as well and be lost and alone in the universe. We had been friends for so long, I had forgotten what it was like to not be a part of your orbit, or for you to be absent from mine. That night on the roof seems so far away now, and so do you. I find other beings and other ways of being. I become a part of something bigger, a system of planets like me, all orbiting around a commonality between us. Our star. "That night on the roof seems so far away now, and so do you. I find other beings and other ways of being. I become a part of something bigger, a system of planets like me, all orbiting around a commonality between us. Our star." I don’t know where you went, or where you are, but I hope you have a system too. About the Author... Allison LaPoint is a junior and aspiring artist. In her free time, she enjoys exploring various forms of creative expression, such as writing, visual art, theater, and music. About the Artist... Daysha Perez is an 11th grader at Douglas Anderson School of the Arts. She is a visual arts major. Her main medium is acrylic paint on canvas and also experiments with mixed media often. Previous Next

Syrup Ty'ana Pope I could have killed him, that night in the woods. We were alone, no one around for miles, the silence between us filled with the crackling of the bonfire we had spent a near hour trying to figure out how to light safely. No one would have known what I did in those nights. I could have thrown him in the blazing fire, I could have impaled him like a finger brushing against old wood, I could have tied him up and left him under the dock at the lake for the leeches to feed on for all anyone would care. But I could not. I had done it so many times; I had chased people down for blocks on end, I had gutted people alive, and that is not even all of it, cause I had done so much more, and even better I had played my part to get away with it. I had been everyone’s worst nightmare. This should have been no issue for someone like me. But I just could not kill him, no matter how hard I tried, I could not. He was just too… something ? I do not think there is even a word to describe him. His voice played so soft and sweet, almost in a way that sticks with you like sap no matter how much you try to wash it off. His eyes never glowed, only empty, only ever filled with light hope and deep sorrow. His hair always seemed so unkept, but not in a bad way, but in a way that felt like he did not have it in him to maintain his daily appearance. He carried a familiar scent to him, almost like home, not the building, but the feeling of a long-distance family that have not been brought together for years, but are finally coming back with one another, at a funeral, not exchanging a word, the despair in the room saying enough and more than they ever could. Stupidly, I let the night play on, to give him a chance, to let his actions, thoughts, and words give an explanation to his demeanor, and with that the fire no longer popper over us, instead our voices echoed over and throughout our campsite. But soon the fire did not pop at all, and unexpected rain poured from the sky flooding the ground around, just missing us with the incline of where we rested our site. We spoke for hours in the tent, waiting for the rain to stop. Though rather uncomfortable, he made sure there was no space left for an awkward silence to refill the air, and instead he told me stories; ones from his past, ones he had never told another, ones that told me that he trusted me, ones that made me want to sob into the sky until the angels heard my cries to spare him. And I nearly did cry at one point, but he noticed me, stopped, and grabbed my hand; they were rough, yet soft. Nothing about him matched, I was sure of it then. Even his hands contrasted every other thing about him. He began to apologize profusely for saying too much and asked if I had anything to say, anything to change the direction of the conversation. I did not. So, the rain having stopped by then, we moved on. He brought me outside, the smell of petrichor filling the air, easing the atmosphere. And deciding to take advantage of the now clear weather, he started to teach me. He taught me how to fish, how to find poisonous plants and berries, how to avoid them, how to cure any illness with them, how to turn them into a bittersweet honey like syrup. That was my favorite part; mushing the berries and watching their rich nectar ooze out into the little bowls until it was nothing but, the skins of them being taken out to dry out by the fire for a snack later into the night. The syrup we made was put in these almost childlike cups, sippy cups maybe. It tasted like what I imagine Ambrosia from those Greek stories tasting like. By the third sip I felt my body glow down to its core; my veins felt electric, my eyes felt like they had opened a new color spectrum, my muscles could climb my way up to the top Olympus from the underworld with no assistance. But if this were a Greek story, I would be Paris; falling for a forbidden beauty unknown without thinking about the consequences, because syrup is still syrup in a sippy cup, and it is an even deeper cut when it is poisonous. I should have seen it; building trust with a sob story, it was such a typical move, one I had used many times myself, my own game used against me. I should have taken it as my chance to strike, I was stupid not to. But I just had to let the night happen, just I let him play his game. I should have gotten him first, remove this first story and I would still hold my title. I would not be dead right now. Return to Piece Selection

Collette Carlee Collette Carlee is a student at Douglas Anderson School of the Arts. She is the Junior Managing Editor of Élan Literary Magazine, has earned two honorable mentions from Scholastic Art and Writing for her prose, and is a WordPress Certified Editor. Her work combines satirical comedy and Southern Gothic literary elements.

Fall/Winter 2021 Cover Art: Ephemeral by Jayci Bryant Table of Contents Connect to "TOC Art Title" Connect to "TOC Title" Connect to "TOC Art Title" Button Saltwater Escape Nico De Guzman Small Title Elizaveta Kalacheva Small Title Small Title Connect to "TOC Title" Connect to "TOC AUTHOR" Connect to "TOC ARTIST" View

541a1371-2508-48aa-9d08-613f36b1a509 My Inner Brewing Conflicts by Alana Guifarro motherland by Evangelina Ariana Thornton your eyelids slope like yunnan’s mountainous horizon; your skin is the pale- yellow of your grandparents’ love letters; the bridge of your nose, the peak of a muddy shallow gorge; your hair is woven from the wooden silk loom. Child, curve your pink lips like the weathered moon gate in darkened gardens, to form the vowels that don’t exist in your second language. This is how we say go and collect , the steamed fish of spring festival feasts and the lush-green rice paddies you have never seen. Your tongue flounders like a foreigner’s; your muscles strain in international waters. Sleepless, you bend over your bathroom sink, excavating your reflection. Your irises are the black ink of pine resin soot, bones exposed like unraveled handscrolls. You toil with your mouth until your cheeks sting and thighs twinge, staying there until the moon rises in that distant country, struggling to speak to the origins of your body and to enunciate your motherland. Return to Table of Contents

Inocencia by Ian Castro Soto Worship/War by Su Thar Nyein 2019, Shwedagon Pagoda. I sleep a little when my mother tells me to pray. I close my eyes. I dream. Child-like. I call her over. Hey, look. The grass is growing. Sometimes I think each blade is a small god: proof of survival. strength of breath. I say a prayer. Not scripture or ancient writing, but a hieroglyph of my hope. A wishbone. A miracle. A mouth in a drought. Mumble in the silence, in the serenity, “သာဓု သာဓု သာဓု ” 2023, Shwedagon Pagoda. I’ve wanted to pray for a while. My eyes can't close. The smallness of a person in an earthquake. A home in a tsunami. A drowning deity. Prayers stuck in my teeth. Gums uprooting. My dog tongue. Sometimes, I cling onto life like death. I meditate, hands poised on my lap as tightropes, floating like Buddha with the world below me. I am touching the sky. Raindrops or bullets. A mouth of ashes. Unsaid and undone. Whispering under the melody of a bomb, “သာဓု သာဓု သာဓု” "သာဓု သာဓု သာဓု," a phrase said after finishing a prayer, pronounced “Thadu, Thadu, Thadu," meaning “well done." About the Writer... Su Thar is a Literary Arts student at the School of the Arts, Singapore, set to graduate in 2025. Her work has placed first in Singapore's 2022 National Poetry Competition (Senior Category) and York University’s 2023 YorkIASG Competition. She is also an alumna of the SUNHOUSE Summer Writing Mentorship. Her favorite part of writing is explaining her work to her mother in broken Burmese. About the Artist... Ian Castro Soto is a senior at Savannah Arts Academy. He specializes in graphite, pen and ink while always doing his best to experiment with different mediums.

Jay Lechwar Jay Lechwar is a Senior studying Creative Writing at Douglas Anderson School of the Arts. They are the current Junior Layout and Design Editor of Élan Literary Magazine as well as the Manager of Hours of their school’s Literary Arts Honors Society. Presently, they are focused on finding more opportunities to interact with their local community through their art.