elementia issue 18

Writing

Off to Prom We Go

By Peggy Yin

I tried on a mermaid dress the other day, and waddled two steps before stripping it off;
I saw how it snagged on my hips and clutched at my chest,

the same way I gripped the towels we tripped in so many years ago—
our hair, stringy and streaming from the community pool


AN AUTOMATON TEACHES YOU HOW TO CODE ANOREXIA

By Julie Pham

first; to detect a charlatan, check pulse.
             is it too fast? then it’s a fake.
                          body too fat? a fake.
                                         check body temperature. is the skin a frigid north pole, breakable like a stick?


The Beard

By Rachel Stander

You walked into class two minutes late.
I noticed immediately; you were freshly shaved.
From the top of your sideburns all the way down. You had a baby face.
You looked the same as the day we met, back in the sixth grade, when we were full of optimism.


31 lines for 31 days of knowing you

By Olivia Humphrey

i have never loved another in the way i have found myself to love you.
i have loved you the way the sun loves the dandelions
and the way the tides love the moon.
i simply cannot imagine a world where we didn’t save one another.


Life as a Forgotten Piece

By Savanna Bright

The cold gross floors
Stomp, stomp, stomp
Black tiny spaces
In shoes that stink
Im confined for hours upon hours
The rigid concrete tears holes in me
get lost in the bed sheets
The last thing to be grabbed from the bathroom floor


252

By Emma Anderson

The first time someone called me fat was in the 1st grade.
I have always been chubby, and I knew it.
Moreover, people around me never let me forget it.
The hollow shadow of my figure beckoned my insecurities.


I'm Balding

By Kechi Mbah

My reflection swallows round my eyes like twisted hair beads and pink oil
while the mirror leaks a frightening truth
that I go mad to.
I hold the wishing in my fingers
drenched in castor, tea tree, and peppermint
my scalp only blooms red


Body

By Elena Unger

What is a body but a cardboard box
smoothed over with wrapping paper?
A shiny exterior that beckons eager eyes,
and a sheen spiral of store-bought ribbon.


Venus's Apprentice

By Sarah Walker

she rocks on a satin sea
her crossbow jawline aimed upward
trained on the sun.

she shoots, trying to make
the sun sink to her,
make it fall
in love with her.


these ink-stained hands

By Kristy Kwok

there’s a galaxy, all ink and stars, that spins below your collarbone, 
and i can’t help but wonder who drew it:
did they see you as i see you? did they mean it to remind me
of the truth that other hands have gone where mine just dream they’ve been?


Waiting for Invisibility

By Avery Russell

The blood drips down my thighs in fighting harmonies.
Disagreeing on the weight in which to debilitate me, its desire to hurt me.
My body clenches, a shooting pain transforms me.
Demanding to immobilize me.


cheat codes

By Sofia Calavitta

she could’ve found
anyone, I know, the boys
who promised her better in the
beginning would be
baffled if they
knew because she
didn’t choose
anyone (she chose me)


the wind that brought my body back

By Eva Parsons

It wasn’t until I
could feel the wind
kissing my hand,
arm hanging out of
your old rusty van
that I realized that
I have a purpose
even if that purpose is purely
letting other people know
that sometimes
a little air is all you need


Reflections

By Callan Latham

I.
If we could be quiet in the small spaces,
maybe they would make excuses for us.
Our bodies, forgiven only once in a while.
We look in the mirror, see dualities of ourselves
and ask them to break. I like the glass between us.


inheritance

By Elliot DelSignore

i have my father’s temper, my father’s eyes.
i keep my bloody birthrights in a clear glass jar.
all the things i’ve laid claim to with my mother’s fingers;
long, pale, five on each hand, like real people have.


ice cubes

By Arden Yum

I rub ice cubes on my face in the morning

when it is swollen from soy sauce

or bad dreams or no sleep. The water beneath

my skin is thick like jelly, yellow & responsive

to touch. I lose track of the bones. I want the


goodbye

By Arden Yum

It’s one year later & I still feel you on my shoulders,

breathing vulnerability onto my tender neck.

Two bodies wrapped in desire,

like silver paper, on Christmas.

We breathe each other & call it air.

You say survival, I say


taxonomy of two girls

By Jessica Liu

  how everything had a name in the tender white light
                                fracturing over our pliant limbs, tangled
           against car seats saturated with smoke,
                            silence calcifying in the negative space of our ribs.


Comrades

By Lukas Bacho

To go outside I don a mask / the size of a human heart. / It’s become the law now. A turn in the wind / brings back Beijing: snow of pollen adrift, radioactive-yellow / cremation of God. In short, what you get / when too many boys love to burn.


Duplex: Headwater

By Lukas Bacho

After Jericho Brown

 

Like a good fisherman, I read the water.

I can’t afford to miss a ripple in the current.

 

            Past and future form ripples in the current,

            whirling turned leaves in a merciless circle.

 


男扮男装

By Lukas Bacho

After 《木兰辞》, first transcribed ca. 500 CE

 

translate: to carry from one state to another, as Enoch was translated, that is, carried to heaven without dying [1]


where sweat accumulated

By Olivia Williams

crest of my shoulder
fold of my thigh
my right collarbone
is stickier than my left

heather grey shirt
glommed to the small of my back
the armpits
always the armpits
advertising to all
“heat was here”


aunties' feet

By Octavia Williams

Bony fingers whipping, winding, wrinkling ‘cross my scalp
Heat near ears - don’t do it - yep, she’s scalded me
“Girl, don’t wail like that!” Popped with comb
Wince and whine, smile inside - aunties like this are rare
No they’re not, dime a dozen, priceless


Affidavit with Language from Whitman’s “Song of Myself” (Leaves of Grass, 1st ed., 1855)

By Lukas Bacho

I stop some where waiting for you…. Yet you pretend I have gone!

I’ve scattered my ellipses like breadcrumbs in a public park.

It is 7:32 p.m.… I take refuge in your neck, my ear pressed close to your apple,

Back when I yearn to scrape you clean of seeds.