Wednesday, February 24, 2016 // The Statement
Wednesday, February 24, 2016 // The Statement
4B
5B
Bywater Squabble
Eliza Cadoux
Excerpted from Call Your Mom’s upcoming performance
This Close
Blanche hollers
thinking I let the place go? I let the place go?
Only it’s me
And this isn’t Scene 1, and we are northerners
In this humid city
And I say
thinking I’ll let you go? I’ll let you go?
We rode bikes over
And over
Dark rings under your eyes
I equated myself to a flame
dancing wavering-nearly-going-out
And you
the wind
Let’s fight and dance until
the stubbornness of New Orleans saves us
Little Sh*t
By Adam Depollo
Daily Arts Writer
It was fifty degrees in Orlando today, so every smart
person stayed inside. Bob sat in his room watching a news-
man stand in the snow. I sat in the hotel lobby watching a
middle
aged man watching a newsman stand in the snow.
I’m not sure if either of us enjoyed ourselves, but my sen-
tence was longer.
Later that afternoon, I sat in the jacuzzi reading “The
Library of Babel,” which ends like this:
I venture to suggest this solution to the ancient prob-
lem: The Library is unlimited and cyclical. If an eternal
traveler were to cross it in any direction, after centuries
he would see that the same volumes were repeated in the
same disorder (which, thus repeated, would be an order:
the Order). My solitude is gladdened by this elegant hope.
Mar de Plata, 1941.
And so I turned to Jorge Luis Borges, who had insisted
on wearing his three piece suit in the hot tub, and said
—Jorge, didn’t you know that if you spent all day in the
library, everything you wrote would come out covered in
dust with a Dewey Decimal number?
Borges pulled the Aleph out of his pocket and held it in
front of my face, driving me insane for a moment until he
placed it gingerly back into his jacket. Borges was blind,
you know, so that was a fun little game he liked to play. He
went back to making little splashes with his cane.
—Adam, he said, I remember once walking by your
father in a hallway at Michigan State — this was long
before he had ever thought about having you, of course —
and thinking to myself ‘I wish I had a little shit hanging
around all the time to let me know when my prose gets
dusty.’
The world certainly is an interesting place, wouldn’t
you say? One never knows who’s listening.
I started to get out of the jacuzzi, and Borges added —
Little Shit, didn’t you know that if you spent all day in your
own head, everything you wrote would come out covered
in blood with a bit of brain attached?
He started laughing, and I put my shirt back on.
—You should probably take that off, he said. I think you
need some sun. I can see you’re whiter than me!
I walked away, and Borges shouted after me —And Lit-
tle Shit, stop pretending to be Roberto
Bolaño!
Most Downloaded Woman of 2000
Eliza Cadoux
LSA Junior
48K12.JPG, she’s a charmer she holds
a pixel grin pixie limbs frame
pink pearlescent nylon bikini
fingers wrapped around her thong, she pulls up the sides
to show that crook place between hip and leg
this is why she is in demand
downloaded in 2000 to the graces of laptop
computers on which child plays on Microsoft paint
and mother looks up shelters and motels
and teen searches instructions for apple pipes
48K12.JPG, boxed
looks over the boxed people and grins
ad infinitum
OK
By Cammie Finch
LSA Senior
When you ask me “Are you OK?”
you haven’t really asked me
anything.
What exactly are you
implying? I wonder
without asking
because
I’m too far lost
in your
tangled wood of
acronymbleness.
Am I …
an ornery kid?
(don’t sit me in time out
this is our time now)
an original Keats?
(that’s right, bright star,
I dare not breathe without you)
an occupied kangaroo?
(I’ve found my pouch,
my cradle, my comfort -
I’ve zipped it shut)
an oceanic kebab?
(substance disintegrating downwards,
yet my skeleton structure floats on the surface.
the shriveled remains of memory go along
for the ride)
an orangutan king?
(crown of thorns
eyes of wild
heart of flaming orange
spirit)
an orbiting Kepler?
(my head circles like Saturn circles
around like Saturn circles around
like Saturn circles around like Saturn)
an omnipotent karma?
(my presence tips the paint into your lap,
swerves cars into your lane.
my presence can make you rich,
can make you pay)
an obliterated kayak?
(the rapids have gotten too rough,
can’t you feel my plastic splinters digging
into your hands?)
an obdurate kazoo?
(my mouth is plugged to spite you
that’s what we instruments can do)
an Orville kernel?
(i’m ready to be transformed
under pressure, watch me -
i’m about to explode)
I can be any OK you want me to be.
I’m an overloaded kaleidoscope,
twist me to see my colors
change before your monochrome eyes.
I can be any OK you want me to be -
that is, with the proper specifications.
OK?
Nucleus
By Katarina Merlini
LSA Sophomore.
I’ve grown weary of my treacherous heart
for too long it’s sat vapid in my breast
a thankless burden I could do without
like a scythe cutting silk it whispers in the night
the truths wound deeper than the lies
with yellowed nails I dug in deep
cracked through my ribs and slipped through sinew
I pulled it out with an old coat hanger
cleansed the wound with warm watered wine
and sewed it closed with willow vines
I’ve kept the withered thing in a mason jar
filled with formaldehyde
it’s grown an eye and watches me sleep
sometimes I ask him what he’s called
he has yet to answer me
Mindfulness
Cammie Finch,
LSA Senior
inhale
…
open your thighs wide
like the pages of a book
yawning their language
into your head
drink in the stillness
lift your spine taller
and
prepare for the backbend
(you are stronger than
you think you are)
envision the full moon
washing the back
of your head with its
silken fingers, dripping
its nectar down your
vertebrae until your
seat is warm in thought
align your sacrum
to this intelligent
edge of backlit
realism (it’s magical)
breathe deeply into
the beauty of
asymmetry and
savor your perfect
state of being
vulnerable
(because i do).
be aware of your breath: think -
and then let it pull,
like an unknitted cloud,
away
with your
…
exhale.
ILLUSTRATION BY KELSI FRANZINO
ILLUSTRATION BY KELSI FRANZINO
ILLUSTRATION BY
EMILY WATERS
ILLUSTRATION BY EMILY WATERS