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Art, Street Art

Art by Ryan Doran

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Short Stories

Breasts Like Death-Sacks by Jessica Bates

The clock said 5:32 p.m. It was Thursday, and I sat in a chair with my legs up in another chair, and my book was open in my lap, and I was writing. The doors to the gallery were propped open, and the sky was turning from blue/white to pink/yellow/red as the sun got closer to sleeping. The sky was a color that only Miami knows. Electronic music bounced off the walls in the background even though I was supposed to play jazz always, no matter what.

When she walked in I barely looked up, I barked out a hello and went back to my business. She moved around the gallery like a wound-up toy, spinning in no real direction, her teal top burning against her dark brown skin. I put my eyes back down to the paper. My body language said don’t bother me, and I concentrated my eyes while imagining laser beams. From the peripheral I could see her coming, shining, on fire—

VERONICA
(Comes up to Maggie, stands directly in front of her. Bends down and touches Maggie’s leg.)
Excuse me, I want someone to paint me. I want to be painted and I want it to be sexy, you know. I want women to see it and feel good about their own bodies.

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Poetry

Three Poems by Sushil Sivaram

Taxi Hears

Dogs have an acute
sense of hearing; Taxi
must feel sick
in war –
18, or 19 muscles move her ears;

the tear of rhythm, racket,
report of what, where:
Afghanistan, Gaza, Kashmir,
Dafur, Chechnya, in bed-
rooms and kitchens

where torn in wind, like flags,
paper cease-
fires rend, a topography
of skin, hair.
Mosaics of cities on fingernails,
carpet bombed,
she hides in cupboards, linen
bunkers –

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Poetry

Five Poems by Kenneth Kesner

i can’t wait here
her fate so alarming
whispers by every margin
origami in place
she statues lone where
i don’t know
where secrets come from
how they’re found
somewhere else
maps lie don’t they
hold a story
of the lost

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