1 Volume 33 • Spring 2018 2 The Gallatin Review. Table of Contents Poetry Managing Editors Prose Managing Editors Visual Arts Managing Editors Grace McGuan, Anaïs Kessler, Sarah Hahn, Daniels Mekšs 01 — prose 12 — visual art Lana Scibona Prashanth Moturi Ramakrishna Kindergarten Soup Two Wheels Visual Arts Editors Derick McCarthy Miguel Volar Poetry Editors Prose Editors Addie Walker, Dara Yen Emily Bellor, MariVi Madiedo, Julianna Bjorksten, Lauren White-Jackson, Lachlan Hyatt, Lezhou Jiang, PEP Editors 02 — poetry 13 — visual art Isabel Wilson Savannah Summerlin Keyli Peralta, Lana Scibona The Oak & the Vine Fulton Street Emilie Weiner Wenkai Wang Faculty Advisor Sara Murphy 04 — poetry 15 — visual art Designer Portrait in Dread Marble Gun Kyle Richard Emmanuel Carrillo Sam Cheng Production Editor Sam Patwell 05 — visual art 16 — visual art Modified Bone Canyon Lights Senior Director, Writing Program Harry Fink Jimi Stine June Foley Assistant Director, Writing Program 06 — prose 17 — visual art Allyson Paty Office #243 Sprawl Mark Etem Elaine Lo Prison Education Program Nikhil Pal Singh, Faculty Director Rachael Hudak, Administrative Director 09 — poetry 18 — visual art Raechel Bosch, Assistant Director of Communications Race-ism Bodysong Richa Lagu, Student Assistant Omar Padilla Harry Fink Alexis Myrie, Student Assistant Special Thanks To 10 — poetry 19 — poetry Susanne Wofford, Dean of the Gallatin School In Defense of Muzak What is America? Millery Polyné, Associate Dean for Faculty and Academic Affairs Henry Sheeran Rayvon Gordon Linda Wheeler Reiss, Associate Dean of Finance and Administration Patrick McCreery, Associate Dean of Students Celeste Orangers, Assistant Dean for Academic Policy Administration and Institutional Research 11 — visual art 20 — visual art Amy Spellacy, Assistant Dean of Advising Untitled Seasons of Love Eugene Vydrin, Faculty Chair, Writing Program Tejan Rahim Kylie McManus Professor George Shulman Professor Lise Friedman ii iii 21 — visual art 40 — poetry 61 — poetry 71 — visual art Oyëh Times Three Alternative Endings For Betty Priede Garkalnē / A Pine Tree Sally Yërin Oh Melissa Kalyoncu Annika von Grey in Garkalne (Longhill) Mikus Kannenieks 22 — visual art 42 — poetry 62 — visual art Piss-tol You Wouldn’t Believe Perspective 72 — visual art Scout Zabinski These Simple Tricks Emma Comrie A Beautiful Day Henry Sheeran Rosalane Chow 23 — poetry 63 — visual art 43 — prose Lungs Girls on Boardwalk, 73 — visual art Arjun Parikh The Herng-hummerngh Coney Island, 2017 Vision Davis Cloud Lexi Rottenstreich Iris Sang 24 — visual art 48 — prose Photo Series 65 — visual art 74 — visual art Kayla Herrera-Daya Half Home Reaching for the Wave Reaching Anaïs Kessler Grace Halio Blair Simmons 26 — visual art 49 — prose Surreal Swimmers 66 — visual art 75 — prose Matías Alvial Jeeping I May Be Younger, Vantage Points Hannah Benhamo But I Look After You Cassie Archdeacon 27 — poetry Sally Yërin Oh 55 — visual art 1959 81 — visual art Zainab Floyd Chinatown 67 — visual art Sam Cheng Beach 6 Millennials Emma Comrie 28 — poetry Matías Alvial Red 56 — prose 82 — prose The Myth of the Boy Who Aeri Hwado Kong 68 — poetry Defied the Sky and Escaped The Greatest Act Only with a Broken Pole A Study in Green Amber Salik 29 — prose Prashanth Moturi Ramakrishna Julia Williams The Box 87 — poetry Derick McCarthy 59 — visual art 69 — visual art I Have Transformed Black and Blue Lago di Como, Summer 2017 Khalan Pendelton 39 — visual art Rosalane Chow Mikus Kannenieks Great Wall Lezhou Jiang 88 — Contributor Biographies 60 — visual art 70 — visual art Fallen Woman Kerun Matías Alvial Wenkai Wang iv v Kindergarten Soup derick mccarthy t was mid-afternoon, but the classroom was dark. the hard part, the dumplings. It was always around IThe soft sounds of children’s snores filled the air, this time that Mr. White would appear like an evil with an occasional sniffle from someone crying. That teacher genie and say, “Eat it all. Then you can nap.” someone was me. I could taste the salt from my tears The dumplings looked like deflated basketballs, running down my face. All the other kindergarten denty but somehow not any softer after sitting in kids were napping, and I was the only one left at liquid. In order to consume them, I would have to the table with my bowl full of soup. I hated soup. break them into pieces. They were hard to chew My teacher Mr. White, who seemed like a giant to and tasted worse than they looked. With each bite, me, kept coming over to check on me, with his deep soup squeezed out them like spoiled bread-flavored trombone like voice saying the same thing each time starbursts. To this day, I can’t understand how he came over. “Finish up your lunch, then you can something made out of dough could be so tough, nap.” He sounded more sinister than sincere. like jerky. The same scene took place weekly. Before I would After I was finally done, I would show Mr. White see it, I would smell it, that repugnant aroma, and my bowl, and he would allow me to lie down. We know exactly what we were having for lunch. It slept on cots made of some type of funny plastic would fill the air like a thick cloud of smoke and my thread that was supposed to be easily wiped down if eyes would immediately start to water. I dreaded a youngster had an accident. Of course, since I was whenever soup was being served for lunch and the last one to lie down, I had the most out of shape everyone knew this. My classmates would giggle and cot. It smelled like bleach and urine combined. As say, “Eat your soup, Derick” in the singsong way that soon as I lay on it, I sunk in like quicksand. But kids do. I would just sit there while everyone ate their after my weekly soup standoff, I didn’t care—I just soup, staring into my red bowl of brown oily liquid wanted to close my heavy eyes and nap like the rest full of beige orbs of dough and flimsy vegetables. of the class. I would lie there smacking my mouth, Now here I was once again, sitting at the table trying desperately to get the gross taste of that with my back to the rest of the napping class, in sewer water off my tongue and before I knew it, I the dark, crying, sounding like a baby goat, hoping would fall asleep. someone would save me. But no one ever did. I had After I got out of kindergarten, I vowed never to eat the soup. to eat soup again. I am now 28 years soup-free. I despised cold soup, but I had to eat it quickly. However, I did learn something that year, one of Sleep was starting to come over me like a warm my first life lessons and probably one of the most blanket. If I closed my eyes before the soup was valuable. In life there will be things that you have to finished,slap ! I would get the ruler to my hand (this do that you won’t necessarily like, but you have to was Catholic school in the 80’s). A spanking was do them anyway. The world does not care if you cry worse than eating soup. I held my nose to escape the and complain about how much you don’t like it, it’s nauseating baby diaper smell of the soup. I shoved still going to give you soup. And at those moments spoonfuls of vile liquid and soggy vegetables into my you’re going to have to hold your nose and eat the mouth. No chewing, just swallowing. After that came soup. Only then can you take your nap. vi 1 in other terms, let me tell you about the tree: The Oak & the Vine there’s a beautiful oak with emilie weiner its roots buried beneath the country; she is tall and blooming and proud. but have you ever heard of the trumpet vine? it seethes and warps and curls its way around the trunk it will blare its brassy tune until the world collapses around its figure, using the magnificent oak for support, allows us to work from the ground up. taking and taking and taking all while killing her in process. i am watching them march, “no person shall be…deprived of life,” they say jeans loose upon their legs, but we’ve become lost in the law, skin stretched tight across their backs— stuck to the foundation instead of being scowls clinging to their faces willing to build. as if anything less than a grimace progress is not just repeating yourself. would account for peace. we may come back to our rudiments but never to begin again. “the right of the people is to be our buildings have fallen before. secure in their persons.” new york city has been brought aground, these are the words of our founding fathers but we must learn to take in the view. dressed head to toe in white privilege, behold the scaffold— without forgiveness, yielding sickness, persevere beyond preceding generations demanding a new world of evolution and learning out of one that has long been created. so we may see clearest. “the right of the people is to be it’s easier to say we the people. secure in their persons.” it’s easier to preach love but how can you expect this nation than to feel it on the bottom of to stand with their feet firmly on the ground your aching feet, when there’s a virus running rampant— at the tips of your finger, symptoms include knocking knees, even when they’re curled into fists.