Aftermath
By Tzipora Gordon
​So this is disaster
So this is catastrophe, is violence, is war
So this is disaster
So this is the way it goes
So this is destiny, is fate, is woven in the stars
So this is the way it goes
So this is how we heal
So this is exhaustion, is weight, is scars that never fade
So this is how we heal
So this is where we are
So this is temporary, is fragile, is uncertain
So this is where we are
So this is not the end
So this is the journey, a waystop, the pathway
So this is how we keep going
Auras Raven
A Poor Man's Fish
By Chaya Guttman
The wind blows harshly this frigid northern winter
It sends the falling snow rushing at record speeds –
Speeds fast enough to hurt
In his layers of clothing, Anatoly sits atop the lake, ice fishing.
Each day he carves a hole through the layers of ice and casts his line straight down.
It is never a large hole, for his expectations are never large.
He wouldn’t want his hunger to think it’ll be a big one today,
And it isn’t.
Neither is it the next day, or the day after, or the day after that.​​​​​​​​
And so he carves holes as big as his expectations and catches fish even smaller than that.
He sits at dinner every night with his meek haul plated before him, framed by candlelight;
Just to show him his poor luck.
When he cuts into the tiny creature with his heavy silver utensils, Anatoly is embarrassed.
Months of this have turned him into something bitter.
However, one day something changes.
While biding his time on the ice, his fishing pole violently shakes, jerking him forward.
He wrestles with his opponent through skilled tugs and bends,
But his line snaps. ​​​​​​​​​​​​​​
​
​
​
​
​
​
​
​
​
​
​
​
​
​
​
​​​
​
​
​
​
He tumbles backward onto his rear, losing his fishing rod down the hole.
Anatoly immediately sits up, rushing forward after the rod, and that is when he sees it.
Gold, shimmering scales slithering past the opening.
He looked into the blinding shine and saw everything he ever wanted.
The fish’s large head emerges through the water’s gap and stares at him.
“I have more food for you! Stay here.”
Anatoly reaches beside him for his tin can of worms, pulling out a juicy one and hovering it over the fish’s mouth.
It opens immediately at the sight of the worm’s squirming, so he drops it in.
This is what he has been waiting for,
This is what he has been slaving for,
But how was he to haul it out?
It was too big to make it through the hole.
Before Anatoly could make another move, the fish swam away,
Carrying off his spoils without Anatoly’s ever having touched it,
And all he could do was hold his breath and watch.
Alive
By Elana Algarin
Before you know it
You're in the car, and there's a scream
Almost dead, somehow alive
Same Old
By Chaya Guttman
For a little bit, you went away.
Coming back, it’s all changed.
You want to run back,
Back where you hid,
But something says, “Try to live.”
It doesn’t suit you – the way of hermits,
But you say transformative carcasses.
“I’m a walking zombie crisis.”
But wipe your tears, hold the fears;
Worms to butterflies, returning soldier.
Little Bella lost her eye.
Another cat took it out,
But look at her, she’s sunbathing
Like before on our couch.
Half the vision;
Same old Bella.
Half the vision;
Still our Bella.
The night it hurts you –
More than it should.
You lose your vision
And remember,
But my soldier, I see you
And you’re not so different.
Half the hope;
Still my love.
Half the will;
Always my love.
At Stake
By Elana Algarin
Compromise
Compromise
Their feelings
Not yours
Compromise
Compromise
Squash yourself
Hide your tears, what about them?
Compromise
Compromise
Crush your heart till it's no more
Deal with it, deal with it
Like you always have
Chaya Guttman
Gold
By Tzipora Gordon
I'm drowning in yellow
(And red, and black, and little silver squares)
I'm drowning in stickers on poles
Posters at bus stops
And yellow everywhere I look
I'm drowning in ribbons on cars
Polyester fence hangings
Little flags in windows
And massive ones off roofs
I'm drowning in the reality
That this is what a home front looks like
When so many are missing
And so many are in pain
I'm drowning in the sorrows
And the desperate hope and worry
And the desolate homes and fury
In stickers with favorite quotes
And things they once said
Stories, photographs and artwork
Little pieces of tape
Scattered on the sidewalk
With numbers of days gone by
435
423
459
475
I'm drowning in slogans
That I agree with and don't
Anger and hope and fear and certainty
But one sentiment overrides them all
Bring them home
(I'm drowning in gold)
Bright Blue Star
By Nava Chetrit
It is so hard
To stay on guard
Of my eyes,
Avoiding my prize.
I could stare for an hour,
It’s your body my eyes scour
But it would only feel like a glance
Oh, why am I caught up in this dance?
I would praise your beauty a million times
But each repeat could be considered crimes.
Though your laugh may be like an echoing drum,
My brain will recall it like a quiet hum.
I try to vocalize my thoughts,
But all I can think are little dots
Little bullet points I love about you,
For you are my bright star that only burns blue.
Endless Argument
By Nava Chetrit
It’s a battlefield
Words shot like bullets
Securities like dead bodies
Strewn across the desolate land
It’s an atomic bomb
Love destroyed like it’s instant death
And trust broken like it’s infinite devastation
Like nothing seen before
It’s an evil magic mirror
The image it depicts is not the same me
Scarred, worthless, helpless, nothing
I know I’m fighting on the right side
But how can you win in an endless argument with yourself?
Shout
By Elana Algarin
It escaped me, and wandered into the distance
Come back, I yelled
The Chandelier girl
By Gil Yarsky
In the core of the earth, at the end of every dark hallway in every empty cobweb-ridden room, there lives the Chandelier Girl.
The Chandelier Girl dangles from a string with her eyes closed, swinging back and forth. Sometimes so fast her hair blows. Sometimes so slowly, it’s like she never moves. It’s like a game, but she never laughs.
From time to time, she gets bored and tries to find playmates, bringing them down and giving them a rope of their own. They swing back and forth just like her, but they never talk or speak or laugh and she gets bored of them too and cuts them down. She doesn’t know where they fall down to. They never hit the ground.
The Chandelier Girl has almost forgotten where she came from, but she remembers a man. An angry man who cut her neck and left her there, on the Chandelier. But she sewed herself together, broken neck and all, and now she swings on her string.
The Chandelier Girl wants to see that man again, one day. It’s been a long while, but that’s all right. She has her darkness. She has her string. She has her playmates.
She can wait.
Standing
By Nava Chetrit
I'm standing
On the other side of the bridge
Looking at you
Happy with her
You don’t acknowledge me
But I guess the important thing
Is that I’m standing
Seams
By Elana Algarin
Broken
It lay there
Broken
The heart is broken
Torn
All that remains of it is smithereens
The heart is torn from looking out into the world
It couldn't take it
There was to much, it was to much
The heart is exhausted
It's done questioning the purpose of trying
It doesn't see a reason to go beyond the lines drawn for it
It wishes to be done
Yet here it remains at two in the morning
Looking out into the world with bandages covering its still-open scars
What's a heart supposed to do?
Broken from what it's seen. Embarrassed. Tired.
What's a heart supposed to do, when it's broken at the seams? ​
To Chip and Dipper
By Chaya Guttman
Can the faint of heart live contently,
Or are they too tired from constant fleeing to feel it?
Can the bold live freely,
Or do the dangers of not thinking twice leave too many scars?
I walked these two beautiful dogs,
brothers actually,
with an Achilles heel for dog-on-dog encounters;
One running toward, the other from,
And my arms outstretched on opposite ends.
I see them in my mind’s eye
As I prayed for the return,
And feared it at the same time.
What would happen after its arrival?
What would happen without it?
I am running away,
I am running ahead,
I am frozen in the middle.
He loves me, He loves me not.
By Nava Chetrit
He loves me,
He always looks at me when I’m not paying attention.
He loves me not,
He looks at her more intensely.
He loves me,
He talks to me with a pretty pink painted on his cheeks.
He loves me not,
He has a habit of blushing while smiling.
He loves me,
He is sweet, kind, and will always talk to me without judgement.
He loves me not,
He is too sweet to push anyone away.
He loves me,
He is perfectly fit for what I want and need in life.
He loves me not,
He is too gentle to voice anything, but maybe I’m the problem.
Love is an open door… Kind of.
By Nava Chetrit
You see, it’s quite funny.
He sees you, yes.
He smiles, blushes, and laughs.
But does he mean to walk into that swinging door?
Does he want to, or does he stumble in like a blind man over rocks,
Just hoping that wherever he’s headed doesn’t lead him to his end?
You see, he’s quite sweet.
He is kind, yes.
He nods, listens, engaged.
But does he mean to lead you on, through that swinging door?
Does he mean to bring you to that magical land of butterflies, tinted pink?
Or maybe he is colorblind - merely a clueless, colorblind boy.
Maybe all he sees are moths and gray rays of sunshine.
Maybe he doesn’t see the yellow, green, pink, and blue splashes you do.
Maybe he doesn’t mean to walk at all. Who’s to say he’s not asleep?
Evaluation
By Chaya Guttman
“What do you rate it?”
It is always the ratings.
Always the numbers and the theories
But it doesn’t mean anything
A three is the same as a four
A two the same as a five
A one the same as a ten
At the end of the day, it all just trickles down to pain
But a couple questions and a couple answers later,
They send me away with a guess and a prescription
And what else do I do but take it
Because
I am patient
I am following
I am descriptive
I am obedient,
But
I am pained
I am
I am in pain
Before the appointment, I picture myself every time
Screaming
Insistent
Demanding
“All the time it is like this! Help me, please!”
“Do something, anything for God’s sake!”
Begging
But my resolve crumbles with,
“So tell me, what is going on with you today?”
Because I know how it sounds
There is no direct cause
It didn’t start from anything
One day I was okay,
And the next it all went bad
The watercolors bled through every detail
And no one knew what to make of it.
No one knew what they were seeing.
Last Note // Clipped Wings
By Gil Yarsky
I am all that I am.
To be more than that, to dream of the unreachable star, would not be wise. Have you ever heard the tale of the taxidermied genius?
No? Well, perhaps that’s for the better. To take too much interest in the outside world, to fly too far, dear reader, would not be what I would consider ideal.
However… If you asked me what I would call ideal, I have little faith that I could actually produce what would be considered an ideal answer.
So… all I will say of my life is that it was not ideal.
Chaya Guttman
You Are What You Eat
By Chaya Guttman
In a flurry of wind and snow
Do you discern my silhouette?
I’ve been left long ago
Gone too deep this mountain trek
The way back down is covered
And I’ve lost all my features
But I’m best smothered
To avoid being found by the creature
​
​
​
​
​
​
​
​
​
​
​
​
​
​​
​
​
Constant stings tell me not to breathe,
For air holds a risky freeze
But your wooden cabin comes to me
Traveling on the rushing breeze
The home housing deep pools of pupils I’d swim in
And a voice of heavenly soft rhythm
Your dumb, little baby’s had ceaseless shivrin’
And a working overtime nervous system
But she sure clomped atop your wooden floors warm
Alas a beast’s belly is always amiss
Its howls through the night insist on bliss
It’s good, too good, at sniffing and picking out fear
And your dumb little sweetie’s as doe-y as a deer
–
Further up the mountain I roam
After this blundered job I’ve done
I climb, relishing familiar blood
On my wolfish tongue
The flesh is my own, painstakingly grown,
God, how I love the taste of venison
Eternity at the Desk - Chapter 2: Unsteady Persistance
By Auras Raven
Time passes differently here. However, he has spent so many eternities on this assignment; his jet-black hair that peeks out from his midnight blue cowl has begun to present streaks of silver, shining like the new moon through clouds. He continues with his work, spiritlessly, as the color of his hair continues to shift and his skin becomes more ragged and wrinkled. Yet he can never die. He can never move on, nor does he want to. This work is arduous, yet important. It never ends yet is ever-purposeful. He seeks his end no more than steel seeks to bend.
The endless line goes on, it was a day…year(?)...unimportant, it was ordinary. Everything remained unchanged, people stepped up, pleaded—or remained silent— and went on to the afterlife. Yet on this day, he came by. There is nothing notable about him. He has a common haircut and traditional features: a piece of straw in the haystack of eternity. He prepared his features, and stoicism permeated. However, this man was different, how? Unknown. But he was different. It was so easy to tell yet impossible to pinpoint. He had an air of confidence, happiness, and contentment. It's almost like he was happy with his life; as if he DIDN’T want to go back to earth. Almost like he longed for the cold, dark claws of the raven. It was almost scary, yet awesome. He marched from the back of the endless line to the front. He reached the Arbitrator, and the Arbitrator yielded once again. He spoke new words.
“Why?”
“What do you mean?”
“Why are you happy? You know you’re dead, right?”
“Yes,” he responds in his hoarse fading voice. It was weak, yet also, his voice was powerful. It was strong. It was confident. And, above all else, it was content!?
​
“I may be dead, but what more must I live for?” he continues. “I am satisfied with my life. Is there more I would have done? Perhaps. But I am content. I need nothing more from the world of the living; I am ready to move on.”
The Arbitrator takes the man's slip and stamps it.
“Right,” his voice wavering while saying it.
Door in your Heart
By Nava Chetrit
There’s a door in your heart
It opens, it closes, in a rhythm.
You feel it now, huh?
It’s quite funny, this door.
It seems to sense your wishes.
That is, and then grant them backwards.
The door seems to move rapidly;
Open… close…. Open! close!
Right when the room is silent.
It’s like hearing a million pins drop in a courtroom.
Well, if you call a classroom a courtroom
And a boy a judge.
It seems you would though.
After all, aren’t we already comparing our heartbeat to the rhythmic noises of a door
Note
By Elana Algarin
What can you even say
When someone says their depression won
And you know they're gone
All of them
Their yellow shoes
And rosy cheeks
The brightest smile you could have ever seen
Their rich green eyes
And ginger hair you used to ruffle
What do you even say
As the last thing they left you was a short video
What can you say
When they wrote, “I told my parents…I left them a note”
Now that you're gone
Now that you're gone
Now that you're gone
How can I look your pictures in the eye, knowing that’s all that's left of you
When you said all that remains of me is this video
What can I say
What can I say to you
I know words aren't always enough
Or may never be enough
Please know
In my deepest of hearts
With your presence somewhere near
In a garden filled with beauty, where peace is forever and there is no more pain,
I hope your soul rests. That heaven is real, and you will no longer have to suffer. That you can be happy, and they will greet you with a smile, ruffling your hair, our creator hugging you tight. Snug and safe, you will be comforted and know no more pain. The smile I've always cherished firmly planted on your face.
It's a gift to make people so happy by being yourself
Thank you for…
Elana Algarin
Auras Raven
.png)
Elana Algarin
Auras Raven
Softly, Slightly Rabid
By Chaya Guttman
When does suspicion morph into paranoia?
When do my thoughts resemble those of an accusatory man backed into a corner;
His flighty eyes and pointing fingers assume the worst intentions.
When am I seen as an accusatory man, rather than an apologetic one
Who covers his constant lapse of judgment with a sheepish, soft smile.
A man you can forgive.
He is meek; enough so that you think he’d sob at the look of conflict,
Not resort to aggression.
When do the hairs on my arm thicken and extend to every inch of skin;
Every follicle of mine raised on ends, my pupils shrinking down to pins, and I arch up on all fours ready to pierce flesh.
When does man become an animal,
And I am something needing to be forced into a carrier for the safety of others?
I will not crawl in of my own volition.
It will be through trickery and force.
I have pride, after all.
I have so much overflowing, stubborn pride.
When the time comes, expect fangs to gnaw on the bar in protest – a refusal to submit,
But don’t flinch away, please peer through the gaps with a pained smile,
And pity.
Do not leave me in the black void, confused with my horrible, punishable thoughts.
Talk to me.
I’ll shriek and wail, but coo at me nonetheless.
Explain things to my primitive mind as if I’d understand.
“You’ll feel better soon. You’ll be better soon. I promise. We’ll get you the care you need.”
Chaya Guttman
Auras Raven
A Daily Consolation
By Chaya Guttman
Early in the morning, the crickets sing,
For they are not scared of anything.
They do not fear the hour of dogs —
Of the food chain’s functions and cogs.
The joggers pour out their toxic sweat,
Filtering the body’s flowing regret.
And every morning we are birthed by the sun,
Given a new start, and told, ‘You are not done’.
…
There is hope for us yet.