On Ekphrasis & Revision A Markov Sonnet with Memory Leak The video game, Assassin’s Creed: Origins, follows an ancient Egyptian assassin named Bayak, and his wife Aya, who work to protect the people under Ptolemy XIII’s rule. Their son was martyred by the Ptolemic police state, and so the game follows Bayak & Aya’s quest…
Category: Issue Four
“Comrade Naomi Bye” by Cynthia Dewi Oka
“We’ve exhausted all other solutions,” my protégé, Naya, is saying through steepled hands from the top right-hand box of the Zoom gallery. I’ve known Naya since she was a gangly teen shuffling behind her social worker into CHANGE’s then one-room office in Philly, wearing a too-big Free Mumia T-shirt. I took her on as an…
Editors’ Note
Dear Reader, In May 2020, almost a year ago, the George Floyd protests began in Minneapolis, Minnesota then quickly spread across and outside the boundaries of the United States. We watched as protests took hold in other countries, as people around the world rallied against police brutality, white supremacy, and corrupt systems of governance. Bryan…
“Making a Rubbing” by Enrique Figueredo
In the summer of 2020, I was living in Richmond, Virginia. The city was busy boarding up business windows, taking down Confederate monuments, and residents were out day and night marching with demands for change. All of this happening in the thick of a pandemic. I wanted to contribute to the visual transformation of the…
“Sleepless Fantasy” & “3, 12, 8, 1, 10 from 2020 hand drawing series” by Hera HaeSoo Kim
나는 내가 사유하는 순간들을 특정 형태에 담아내는 작업을 한다. 내가 집요하게 모아온 순간이 하나하나 담겨있는 형상 혹은 이미지 들은 사유에 대한 나의 집착을 그대로 나타낸다. 나는 형상들을 그저 단편적인 이미지라 일컫기 보다는 시각화 된 감각들의 아카이브이자 단일화된 나의 감각체 라고 칭한다. “Sleepless Fantasy”는 내가 아이폰으로 촬영한 사진과 메모로 순간을 시각적으로 포착해내고 즐기는 행위에서 시작하며, 내가 희석에 놓은 선택된 나의 미시적 세계이다. 이 세계는 시공간적 체계가 각 이미지 군에 따라 다르게 적용되어 있으며, 시공간의 이동이 자유로운 타임머신처럼 존재하길 바라는 나의 염원을 담은 판타지 현실이다. 작품 곳곳에 나타나는 기호적 표현들은 나와 약속된 기호로써 이미지들의 지표 역할을 하며, 내 안에서 사유되고 있는 새로운 이야기가 창출된 나의 판타지 현실에 한층 더 가까이 다가가게 해준다. 이로써 의식세계라 일컷을 수 있는, 인간의 삶의 통제에서 벗어나 무의식과 의식의 틈, 그 중간 어디쯤을 침범하는 잠재적 감각세계를 펼쳐내보고자 한다. 그것이 한낯 꿈일지언정. HERA HAESOO KIM 2020. HERA HAESOO KIM is an artist living and working in NY. Her practice involves sculpture, installation, drawing, performance and creating VR. Hera’s works visualize the intersection between intuitive and cognitive experiences. Hera has exhibited works nationally and internationally. She has had solo shows in LKIF Gallery(Seoul), Dos…
“Contested Meanings” by Yazan ElHaj
In his address at a Sanitary Fair in 1864, Abraham Lincoln pointed out an oft forgotten dimension in wars. “We all declare for liberty,” he said, “but in using the same word we do not all mean the same thing.” If we brushed aside the thundering noise of arms and the suffocating clouds of smoke…
“First Sex Sonnet During the Pandemic” by Craig Santos
First Sex Sonnet During the Pandemic awkward my wife & i kiss undress inch slowly as if emerging from separate quarantines is it safe skin tensed at the vulnerable risk of reopening Craig Santos Perez is the author of five books of poetry and the co-editor of five anthologies. He teaches at the University…
“Prison Break” by Jennifer Sperry Steinorth
This work is excerpted from the forthcoming book, Her Read, a graphic poem (Texas Review Press, 2021). I began this make-over in the summer of 2016, in that pre-election heat. Finding myself otherwise unable to write, I set to work remodeling a seminal text, The Meaning of Art by Herbert Read. Though the maternal body appears with frequency in Read’s illustrated text which spans from…
Two Poems by Sam Preminger
Prelude Someone is trying out shiny soldier’s boots right now – right now. And don’t they look excellent? Reflecting the stern jaw staring down, un-scuffed. Without music, men set out to pain the night. There’s an allowance, always, for what fits tightly: the starched-white, fresh-pressed, machine-stitched lettering, like ice. Someone is sleeping outside. Someone’s slouched in the…
Two Poems by Michael Adam Carroll
Central American History Lessons If you can writeYour history Without The bodies… [redacted] And their survivorsWhisper of generationsDisappearedFrom their own soil Foreign to youSavage to youDistant from youThe truth sanitized for you In Kodachrome newsreelsWhere you’re The lead actorIn their oral tradition Webs of truthSpunFrom ear to earUnder the cover of night BecauseCentral to this country’s Intelligence is a…