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By Texas By Kansas, her neck sloped down to her shoulders as gently as the prairie rolled out and away from the road. By Oklahoma, her heart was a plateau she was ready to push everything over. By Texas her skin began to peel. She stopped for gas and almonds and sunscreen. She’d wanted it her whole life. She built it once when she was a child, and had been revising it in her mind until three days ago, when she signed over her Tercel as down payment. For that first draft, she’d collected wood scraps from the construction site next door – from the growing skeleton of a house that would soon harbor the freckled shit-wad who would publicize everything she wanted to keep from view, so that her life became a series of deeper and deeper retreats. Then, in a Dumpster behind the JoAnn’s, she found scraps of linen and burlap and vinyl that she used to cover the miniature windows, to upholster the tiny bench seat where she dreamed a real version of herself would read books while mountains rose up behind her, behind the glass. Always, she’d preferred gray days when the sky hung low and heavy, hemming her in. When she was twelve and needed x-rays of her mouth, they’d lain her on a table and spread a heavy smock across her body. She was disappointed the x-rays took only a couple of minutes. For the real Winnebago, an ’06 Voyage 34, she signed over her Tercel, and thought the chances were fifty-fifty that Jeremy would take care of the monthly payments as the statements arrived in the mail, until he heard from her. Did the hope in his brain make her love him more? The gas was cheap, the sunscreen was Banana Boat, and the almonds were dry-roasted. The boy who took her money had the same indestructability of her own son; she would have hated him before she became mother to a boy. Now all she had was her love and this other, aimless energy. The air outside was cool. The sky was wide and open and pink. The Winnebago ticked as it cooled itself and she counted off seconds between ticks to see if they occurred at regular intervals. Have the humility to learn from others. She did love her strange husband, who took so much more than he could ever see for granted. Her phone rang in the glove box. It hadn’t rung as much that day as it had the day before, or the day before that. And its tone had changed. She let it stop ringing then took it out of the glove box and turned it off. Either there were limits out there to catch her, or there weren’t. She watched the boy watching her through the window, though with the sunset reflected in the glass, there wasn’t much she could see about his face. by Meghan Gilliss  Photos & installation by Willa Rose Vogel
BREAK dusk separates night and light like spoiled milk with my bare-shouldered body—I am done our love an uneven table our love a pillow of soft mites by Meg Willing Plaster cast (of Heather's back), choreography, and video by Heather van der Grinten
Two Pictures Despite the elbowed exhaust pipe reaching for the sky on the outside of the trailer, the smell of bacon grease mixed with stale cigarettes hits the back of Cindy's throat the minute she walks in the door. Flimsy and crooked, the door swings out, and hangs opened behind her. She can see into every room from the doorway. No one is there. She takes three steps to the back wall and looks out the window above the frayed and flowered couch. But the backyard is deserted… Robbie's rocking-horse stands to one side, flanked by a broken stool. It feels like a sucker punch to the gut, how much she misses that kid in an instant. A few feet away, the welding torch sits on the ground abandoned next to a large metal storage tank. She thinks maybe that's a sign Ed will come back soon. But she can't stand the smell inside, so she walks back out the dilapidated door to sit on the cinderblock steps. She'll be able to see his truck the minute he turns on to the road. So if he doesn't want to talk to her, tough shit. He'll have to anyway. Ed shuffles along in the line of guys punching out. And like every other one of them, lights up a cigarette the minute he walks over the threshold. They grunt their goodbyes and fan across the parking lot, Ed in a beeline for his rusted out F-150. He doesn't bother locking it – who would steal this heap? But still, he's surprised to see the large yellow envelope on the seat. Left where he couldn't miss it. He picks it up, and swings himself in behind the steering wheel. He turns the sealed envelope over – but there are no markings on it. Still, he knows Cindy left it. Back in the good ol' days, Cindy used to leave him love notes, little presents – a handful of beef jerky sticks, once in a while a paper plate of brownies covered in aluminum foil. He always suspected the sweets were just her way of winning over Robbie. Ed rips open the seal, and finds an 8 x 10 photo. She's facing straight into the camera. But with eyes that seem to be looking inward, at her own thoughts, instead of at him. Her hair, her skin, her lips, all the color of honey. The image is nearly life-sized – just her head and strong shoulders – bare except for two flesh-toned spaghetti straps. Her hair is pulled back, but long loose strands frame her face like always. It looks like she posed in front of the blackboard in her classroom. He pictures her propping up the camera, then closing the door and taking off her sweater to stand there in her undershirt like that. He studies the way her one front tooth overlaps the other, just the tiniest bit, so that it almost shows between her slightly parted lips. And those pond green eyes, like summer calling to him after a long winter. She is daring him to still love her. And, the trouble is, he does. By Rhonda Morton by Christina Morris
Zoo I feel so small. Like a monkey in a cage. Like some extinct creature in a museum diorama. A passenger pigeon, a dodo, maybe a little sea mink cowering in a corner next to an extinct fern. I could make friends with that chubby pupfish over there. Or eat him. But I’m not. I’m human. At least the last time I looked. A human woman. This brief clearing in the woods was a discovery. A tin shelter. Whom it belongs to I’ve no idea, there is no lock. When the bright light comes I quickly evacuate, to hide myself, usually in the river, underwater. I can swim a long way on one breath. What I’ll do come winter I have no idea. I am braiding a rope from found remnants. When it is long enough, I plan to attach it high in a tree notch so that I might pull myself up in the foliage, hauling my rope up after me. Yes, in winter a thick conifer. Perhaps. When they leave again there is often something edible left behind. I don’t know if this is their carelessness, or if it is meant for me. It is difficult to surmise motives. When, if, I consume this—well, of course I do—I leave any remnant clawed, any bit of tin crushed, as if it was one of my near neighbors who devoured it. Scattered by wolves, bears, foxes, raccoons; those coyote, my vigilant friends. As I have no clothing I appreciate the offerings of these familiars. A scrap of rabbit fur, the discovered remains of a ravaged deer. If they had meant me no harm, you would think they would not have left me naked. Soon my hair will grow longer, long enough to afford me warmth, protection. Often now, I have moved on. Searching for the way free. I follow the river, or deer paths that might lead to the edge, but the woodland only thickens. The bright light comes no matter where, both here and there. Sometimes I just circle back to the tin house. Perhaps they are still searching for me. I vow to not be found. by Karen Alpha  painting by Edd Tokarz Harnas
Hi, Aaron. I’m sitting in our tent right now, camped outside of Devil’s Backbone Brewery in Virginia. They let hikers set up in the woods near their...well, I guess it’s a campus really. They have this huge brewpub and an outdoor stage with outdoor bars, small stone bonfires, and cornhole and horseshoe sets. There’s a “Royal Flush” pinball machine like the one you used to play at Mountain Fire Pizza, before they got rid of it.. After the past few days of hiking it was such a huge relief to hitchhike down here. There’s no shower, but I did give myself a towel bath in one of their outdoor bathrooms. The beer was great and I’ve never eaten fries so fast in my life. Some of my trail friends are camped around me. We wandered back here with our headlamps, fairly drunk (or at least tipsy), and crawled into our tents. One of them, See-More, just sleeps under his rain fly--he doesn’t even use the tent itself. I couldn’t do that. The thought of ants and frogs and stuff crawling on me at night gives me the creeps. I was long overdue in writing this. To tell you the truth, I have been so busy hiking North that I’ve rarely thought about you. That’s one of two things I hoped might happen with this trip; I would either obsess over you, or I would “forget” you. Of course I can’t forget you. It’s been over a year. There was a long time where I cried myself to sleep every night in our apartment. I don’t really know when that stopped. Months. Judy and Amos finally talked me into seeing a therapist. I know you aren’t haunting me, but I have been haunting myself. I felt like a ghost in our apartment. Around our friends. Around town. I clinged onto every scrap of you that remained. I miss your dark hair and how you would smile more with your eyes than your mouth. I always wanted to know what you were thinking--what was going on behind that hint of a smirk. I did leave my customer service job. That’s good, right? You hated how much I hated that job. I’ve been making ends meet by substitute teaching, dog walking/sitting, and a lot of freelance work. None of it pays particularly well by itself, but together it’s not a bad living and I rarely have time to be bored. What am I saying; “have?” Had. I guess I got ahead of myself. I’m on the Appalachian Trail right now! It just felt like the right time to do it, you know? We always wanted to go and I’m not chained down to my work, so. I thanked the landlord and broke the lease. Used our, well, mostly my at this point, savings to buy gear. Did the research. Talked to Cara about it. Your sister has been so supportive in general. She gave me her maps, loaned me her stove, and some other things that didn’t get trashed during her hike. I haven’t really used the maps because everybody out here uses this phone app called Guthook’s, but I still carry them anyway. I like to pretend they’re a protective totem or juju or something. Every single day out here is beautiful. Hard, but beautiful. Each step feels like a small triumph, in a way, and it seems like the most successful hikers (or, at least, the ones most likely to complete the trail) have the mantra that; “There’s one way out of this, and that’s to finish. One foot in front of the other, keep walking north.” I’ve relied on that, and them, a lot. We all have trail names at this point, if we’re going to. There’s See-More, of course, which is a play on his name (Seymore) and the fact that he frequently struts through camp in his underwear. I have become pretty close friends with Way. She carries a copy of the Tao Te Ching and talks about this trail being her Way, and “infinite mysteries this” and “unknowing that.” You would have gotten a kick out of her, if her woo-woo talk didn’t annoy you too much. Camped across from me are Ted and Young Ted. They’re brothers. The older one’s name is Ted, and I don’t actually know Young Ted’s name but somebody called him that and it stuck. I cheated and gave myself a trail name. It’s not really a big deal if you give yourself one, but I didn’t like a lot of the names people were suggesting for me. I thought a lot about it through the Smoky Mountains and decided it should be Hummingbird. I hum, you liked when they’d migrate through our backyard, I don’t know. It works. And there hasn’t been another Hummingbird this year yet, so people know it’s me (if they know me). My gear is too drab to really stand out. You know at least half the guys hiking out here wear girl’s shorts in the most ridiculous colors? I’m talking hot pink booty shorts. Nobody really cares. It’s obvious who the hikers are, and when I go into town it’s impossible to blend in even after a shower and stowing my pack somewhere. I had been so focused on my own physical pain and struggle as I hiked through the cold southern states that I didn’t think about much. I either tried to push the thoughts out, or think about my next week of hiking and plan it out in my head. I’ve been snowed on three times, thought for certain I would freeze to death one night, and though I haven’t had any bear encounters yet, I have nearly stepped on two huge rattlesnakes since entering Virginia. The weather is hot now, and the trail is full of flowers and shady green leaves. The past couple days were really intense though. I came down off a mountain into a two-story shelter next to a waterfall. Spent the night there with Way and a few other fast hikers we had caught up with. Then, I had the long trek up The Priest, a mountain I’d been hearing about for weeks. The first 4k footer for a long time! When I got near the summit there was a shelter (also called The Priest shelter) where hikers confessed their “sins” to the mountain in the trail log. Some were funny, some were sarcastic, some were heartfelt and sad. A lot of confessions were about not burying poop properly or hanging bear bags right. I picked up the pen to write something funny, but I just...started writing. I wrote an entire page of all my regrets, all my anger that you left me alone. My frustration of being unable to move on, and my disinterest in seeing other people while our friends would hint at; “how long it’s been,” in their loving but tone-deaf way. I wrote about how I just want you, and our future, back; and how I don’t want a new future without you. It came out very real, and very sudden. I lost myself in my writing. Way hiked into the site and set her backpack down next to me on the picnic table. I realized I was crying and I tried to hide my face so she wouldn’t see; regardless, she could definitely see that my hand was trembling over the page. When I had finished writing, I moved to rip the page out. She placed her hand down on the log so I couldn’t lift it. “I had no idea,” she said. She had been reading over my shoulder. I hadn’t told anybody on the trail about you. I’d avoided talking too much about myself anyway, but I didn’t want to invite your ghost to follow me. You left for work one morning and there was a snowstorm and you never made it home. I was alone. “It’s nothing,” I told Way. She nodded. “Everything is Nothing,” she replied. Her matter-of-fact nature combined with the absurdity of everything she says is probably my favorite thing about her. She gently took the shelter log and pen from me to write her own confession. I sat there and ate a flavorless granola bar. The oats rolled around on my tongue and felt like lumps going down my throat. The more I thought about Nothing, the more hollow I felt inside. I wanted to shred that page up; not to prevent others from reading it, but to somehow get rid of all of those feelings that were tormenting me. Way’s voice interrupted my thoughts. “Would you hike to Devil’s Backbone Brewery with me?” “You know I hike slower than you.” “That’s fine. The beer will wait for us and I’d like the company.” So here we are. The hike down here was silent until we got to the road and hitched in with a friendly, local trail maintainer. We met up with the Teds and a few other members of our extended trail families, drank our beer, and ate fried foods and fresh salads. Everybody acted the same toward me because, of course, only Way knew now--but I felt different. That entry in the hiker log had been the first time I had opened up about my feelings. I hadn’t even done that with my therapist, really. I felt quiet and exhausted. Laying down in this tent--our tent--and writing this by headlamp has been the catharsis I’ve needed since you died. I’ve thought a lot about you, and why I’m hiking this trail, and what will come next for me. I think a part of you is all over this trail, but in that, “we are all made of starstuff,” way. I don’t think there’s life after death. Your brain stopped working, and “you” are gone, and you couldn’t possibly care about me or if I date again or move across the country or anything like that. If I go back to Gorham, I’ll just be haunting it as a surrogate for you. Maybe I can crash with my cousin out in Oregon for a while. I need a new start, something to let me get over this monumental sadness that I carry everywhere. I know, intellectually, it’s not what you would want for me. We had a great life together but it’s gone. Now, I hike every day, sometimes in excess of twenty miles, and eat noodles mixed with instant potatoes, and dig holes to poop in the woods. I hike like it’s my job, but I hike because it’s my life, and that’s enough for now. I think the only way forward, for me, is one footstep at a time. Ever northward. Katahdin awaits! After that, I’ll see what comes. It felt good to get this all out. Maybe it’s the exhaustion or the booze or something else. Maybe I’m just ready to finally start talking about this. I feel like I should burn this letter, somehow, in some special place. Maybe when I hike through NH. I’ll stop by our old apartment, swing by the fire pit in the backyard, and light this on fire to send it to you. Everything is Nothing. I’ll say one last goodbye to our apartment, our town, and our life. Then, I’ll keep hiking. I loved you, I still love you, and I will always love you. But you knew that. Happy trails, Chris (“Hummingbird”) by Joe Noel   installation, trail journal, and trail snacks at the event by Jenny Wittmaack
Twilight at Dawn 1. Late Night Letter Jay, you know I never watched the news —Afghanistan, Iraq, I couldn’t point either out-- so when you went, it’s like you were lost. Or no, it was like I couldn’t follow. No, I was lost. I can’t write it all in one place so I spread it out and know it less. Do you think your mother thinks I’m dead? Even if she’d give them to me, any stars of yours would be dark-- dark stars are useless. I want to shine. 2. At the Laundry Heavy load of sweatshirts and stuff rolls up; eventually though, they tumble, the basket turning, working and working just to dry the clothes. And I watch the whole pointless cycle start again. Then it stops, jeans soaked. No more quarters. I never have enough. They gave us grades all through school-- math, social studies, even gym. I mean, there’s got to be a way to know, now, as adults, if you’re doing it right. Even how straight our letters were got grades. 3. Another Letter We had extra-curricular priorities, you and I; Elle’s almost twelve, proof of that. We had to hide from your mother back then; even now, she can’t seem to find me. Reality star, Elle says. Or some days, Engineer for NASA. So I’m taking classes on loans I might not ever be able to pay back. Now I get what a thesis is, and I’m learning elementary algebra. And what I’m made of. We do homework in sync, mother and daughter, each in silence, becoming what we can’t yet know. 4. Cleaning Up and Homing In The laundry’s in its basket still, days later; heaped up junk mail layers the kitchen table. Elle’s shoes make walking the hall a hazard. Yelling does no good. I begin with the clothes then work my way back to the table. Then sit. Objects finding their place eases me, even if order’s hard to achieve and doesn’t last long. Kitchen ready, I put on the pasta water. Home, the fact and feeling of it, is a softening I can make for Elle. It has to happen every day. Memories, mom used to say, won’t cook the sauce. 5. Starting Homework in the Gloaming I tower my textbooks against the window. Sunset’s long over, fireball gone, but above the black bulk of the hills yellow highlights the important edge. Gloaming, my new vocab, refers to being in-between. One word embodies many meanings. Twilight, on one hand, is darkness shouldering into day; on the other, light blooms on the stem of night-- betweenness means living the transition. You can’t trust words. So I start with math. Equations. Proofs. Let’s see what x is this time. 6. Last Late Night Letter In the small quite hours, I wake, and, magically, feel cozy in my trailer, in my life. Elle snores, but gently, the sound a comfort. Let me go, Jay. Let me live, and I’ll, I’ll, I will let you die. It’s been eleven years, eleven years, six months. Through my window a star I think is Venus gleams like a jewel. Night-time is becoming my friend again. Daylight’s no longer drudgery. I whisper Move on, move on, only partly to you. Embraced by star-shine, I snuggle in to sleep. by Edward Dougherty "Desperation" by Mary Weatherbee
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66 OURS - Collaborative Writing ProjectStarting with Phase 1, writers had 66 days to base their writing on 1 anonymous person & 1 vignette, dutifully and judiciously assigned to each writer by Amelia. Photos given to the writersEach writer was given a combination of 1 person + 1 vignette from the following:
Person 1
Person 2
Person 3
Vignette 1
Vignette 2
Vignette 3
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