Introduction
Foreword
Dearests,
Where do we fit in the world? What spaces do our bodies, minds, and actions occupy?
As we went through the submissions for this issue to curate a narrative, we asked, what are all of them saying simultaneously? Beneath a lot of these reflective pieces, there lies a strong undercurrent of angst. And it comes across unintentionally, or perhaps intentionally for everything is interconnected, a reflection of and conversation with the world.
The world is rife with manmade cruelty. russia’s war in Ukraine continues; it has been over 800 days. We cannot escape the genocide happening in Gaza, where lives are reduced to numbers. We cannot unsee protestors demanding basic human rights for Palestinians being manhandled by police forces. Not to mention university administration calling on police to brutally handle peaceful student protestors. This cruelty also sinisterly manifests in the cowardly game of definition, where people-in-power in various institutions refuse to call the genocide for what it is: a genocide.
Angst is a difficult term; we often think of it as a teenage phase, a misstep where our mind is confused in wanting more/better/other. Angst is scary; angst is consuming; angst is unpredictable. This issue disillusions us from these associations. Angst runs deep in all of us. It gives space to a difficult-to-define layer where frustration, mourning, disillusionment, love, and longing meet. It gives a loud voice to reach for empathy and true partnerships where they feel lacking or false. In wildly looking for spaces to belong, we might find agency despite/within our family histories, heartfelt and heartbreaking conversations, and perhaps even safety.
This angst reminds us of the sentiment that has intensified in us as cruelty unfolded. In an issue with so many pieces touching on the human condition, it simply does not feel right not mentioning the grotesque human condition inflicted on Palestinians by the Israeli occupying forces.
As you flip through this issue, we invite you to contemplate the world around you. As you spread a picnic, think of those you’ve loved and love now; as you drop your chin, look – perhaps they soak through your skin in tattoos; as you turn your cheek halfway to an early spring sun to taste nostalgia; as you move and wriggle your body, take your hands and press them firmly in a hug around yourself.
Angst is about being desperately human. It’s good to be angry.
Where do we fit in the world? What spaces do our bodies, minds, and actions occupy?
As we went through the submissions for this issue to curate a narrative, we asked, what are all of them saying simultaneously? Beneath a lot of these reflective pieces, there lies a strong undercurrent of angst. And it comes across unintentionally, or perhaps intentionally for everything is interconnected, a reflection of and conversation with the world.
The world is rife with manmade cruelty. russia’s war in Ukraine continues; it has been over 800 days. We cannot escape the genocide happening in Gaza, where lives are reduced to numbers. We cannot unsee protestors demanding basic human rights for Palestinians being manhandled by police forces. Not to mention university administration calling on police to brutally handle peaceful student protestors. This cruelty also sinisterly manifests in the cowardly game of definition, where people-in-power in various institutions refuse to call the genocide for what it is: a genocide.
Angst is a difficult term; we often think of it as a teenage phase, a misstep where our mind is confused in wanting more/better/other. Angst is scary; angst is consuming; angst is unpredictable. This issue disillusions us from these associations. Angst runs deep in all of us. It gives space to a difficult-to-define layer where frustration, mourning, disillusionment, love, and longing meet. It gives a loud voice to reach for empathy and true partnerships where they feel lacking or false. In wildly looking for spaces to belong, we might find agency despite/within our family histories, heartfelt and heartbreaking conversations, and perhaps even safety.
This angst reminds us of the sentiment that has intensified in us as cruelty unfolded. In an issue with so many pieces touching on the human condition, it simply does not feel right not mentioning the grotesque human condition inflicted on Palestinians by the Israeli occupying forces.
As you flip through this issue, we invite you to contemplate the world around you. As you spread a picnic, think of those you’ve loved and love now; as you drop your chin, look – perhaps they soak through your skin in tattoos; as you turn your cheek halfway to an early spring sun to taste nostalgia; as you move and wriggle your body, take your hands and press them firmly in a hug around yourself.
Angst is about being desperately human. It’s good to be angry.
Yours,
Miss Chia & Miss Panasenko.
Miss Chia & Miss Panasenko.
Art
When Spring Comes
Poetry
as May approaches
teases a flip
the cover just thicc
enough
to avoid spillin over
to avoid watchin words
turn wave to wisp
a wind
writes
in the empty
a blanket
beneath 2 feet
2 peaches, 2 pairs of hands
touching
parts
it’s warm, winter gone summer not yet
come
we just sprung
young flames
sippin
slowly
like sap
& time
sometimes
usually
this heemyhorchata
feels like heartbreak
over martyrs made in the modern age
over innocence lost
over the baddie who rested on my shoulder
speaking poems
on BART
home,
it was
long ago…
over broken hearts
& mums who can’t celebrate
today,
under an older sunlight
your tattoos soaking it in
this slightly watered down cup…
it’s giving…
… recharge
& be remarkable
the cover just thicc
enough
to avoid spillin over
to avoid watchin words
turn wave to wisp
a wind
writes
in the empty
a blanket
beneath 2 feet
2 peaches, 2 pairs of hands
touching
parts
it’s warm, winter gone summer not yet
come
we just sprung
young flames
sippin
slowly
like sap
& time
sometimes
usually
this heemyhorchata
feels like heartbreak
over martyrs made in the modern age
over innocence lost
over the baddie who rested on my shoulder
speaking poems
on BART
home,
it was
long ago…
over broken hearts
& mums who can’t celebrate
today,
under an older sunlight
your tattoos soaking it in
this slightly watered down cup…
it’s giving…
… recharge
& be remarkable
Poetry
(Untitled)
San Francisco sun burns you to your core
When it makes its way from your golden skin
Into your see-through vessels and faint veins,
The breeze clears your face from all doubt follicles.
It pushes life back
into your soul,
into your dead
body,
It refills,
Makes you forget wars fought back home,
“You are not your family,” it whispers
“Your past doesn’t define you,” it screams,
“Your mother is happy,” it lies.
For a moment you believe,
believe the sun,
You want to forget,
forget to forgive,
forgive
yourself.
San Francisco sun rules over you,
Disconnects you from your soil,
“Soil can be disjoined and rearranged”
It lies,
once again.
Eventually, it becomes impossible
to stand under the shade,
You are reborn,
start grieving.
They will rot,
but soil must reshape.
Take the sacrifice,
accept the fate,
or you will burn too.
When it makes its way from your golden skin
Into your see-through vessels and faint veins,
The breeze clears your face from all doubt follicles.
It pushes life back
into your soul,
into your dead
body,
It refills,
Makes you forget wars fought back home,
“You are not your family,” it whispers
“Your past doesn’t define you,” it screams,
“Your mother is happy,” it lies.
For a moment you believe,
believe the sun,
You want to forget,
forget to forgive,
forgive
yourself.
San Francisco sun rules over you,
Disconnects you from your soil,
“Soil can be disjoined and rearranged”
It lies,
once again.
Eventually, it becomes impossible
to stand under the shade,
You are reborn,
start grieving.
They will rot,
but soil must reshape.
Take the sacrifice,
accept the fate,
or you will burn too.
Fiction
Day of a Stupid Man
“I may wear the skin of an urbane sophisticate, but in this manuscript I invite you to strip it off and laugh at my stupidity.” – Ryūnosuke Akutagawa
Sneakily, the overcast sky sinks darker into the evening. On Fridays, the library closes at 5.30 pm, though he didn’t know. He plans to renew the book he still hasn't read for two weeks. Because a part of him ardently believes in a future where he would read it. After biking for twenty minutes and climbing up two flights of stairs, he stands behind the locked glass door, staring at the dimmed lights, abandoned books, and a deserted reception.
Perhaps this is arranged so that the staff can come home earlier for a hearty dinner? He thinks as he returns to his bike. Beef potato hash? Pork casserole with Worcestershire sauce? He makes random turns on his bike. Down the main street, left on an alley, and stopping before a crowd, he mindlessly ends up at Farringdon Station. Many are waiting outside. For their loved ones? For friends? He picks up a free hot chocolate, and stands in the chilling January wind. He too pretends to wait for someone.
2. Paralysis
Dreams – intense. Evil hours – sporadic. Mentions of her name – torturous and unbearable. It is day three since he has been constrained to the couch. His left ankle just could not bear any weight. Even limping to the toilet requires enormous effort. Worse, the sun almost never visits him. On rare days, it does so by reflecting off the window of the gray-walled hotel that towers over his apartment and blocks all sense of the outer world.
In his solitude, thoughts start to enter unasked for, dripping into his consciousness like tiny droplets. As the droplet lands, it splashes and releases a specific feeling, which he is simply incapable of keeping out. So he tries to tally them: sometimes the fuzzy warmth of a nostalgic memory. Other times the sudden sink into grief. But at the end always the piercing feeling of incompetence and powerlessness. Every drop is so small and brief, yet so gratifying and painful. And as they drip faster and faster, the pauses between each become shorter and shorter. Until they start to form a little stream, he can no longer tell apart the colorful autumn of Seoul, the lonely streets of Tokyo, and the shivering wind of London within it. At this point, he is allured to succumb to its flow. One question leads to one memory that leads to another question, he finds himself both enlightened and entertained in the spiral. The beauty of autumn, would he have still let himself be enamored by it, if he knew the winter would be so unforgiving? But the never-ending questions only blind him from the impending danger. Very quickly, the stream widens into a gushing river that swells and forms white caps. In no time, actual waves begin to rise and break. Anything disguised as rational inquiries previously crackles and shatters into its most primitive form – angst. It is too late. He is tethered by the chains of dread. Bigger, more ominous waves rebel against his will. He is rendered as a helpless creature tossed around in his own mindstorm, threatening to engulf him completely, like countless times before.
The sun seeps in for a moment. He shuffles and rolls his body over to receive its touch. He lies in wakeful silence and endures.
Soon the sun makes way for the moon and the sky dims into a deep dark navy. A train is snaking into Eunston station, hissing imaginary smoke out of its chimney. It’s been a week, though his ankle still will not budge. Today, leaving the apartment feels as if an overpowering necessity. After spending an afternoon at University College London, he limps towards Eunston station (no biking, of course). Amongst the crowd in the backdrop of a clear night, his eyes are drawn to an East Asian man alone, perhaps in his early 30s, stepping out of the station.
Mr. A’s hairstyle looks Korean, but he has the slow footsteps of a Japanese. To some, Mr. A can appear mechanical and rigid. But to him, Mr. A oozes a silent dignity. His gray suit is tailored perfectly to his skinny figure and his navy tie tightly hangs off the still-unbuttoned collar. Mr. A keeps his head low, fixing his gaze to the ground, as if on his shoulders carry an unknowable amount of weight. As he emerges from the shadow of the underground, the full moon, at an instant, bathes him in white light and grace, illuminating a face of sharp eyebrows and shallow wrinkles. It was a difficult day, wasn’t it. But you made it, didn’t you? A question for Mr. A that didn’t leave his mouth in time. And as they brush past each other, a loneliness he never knew of overwhelmed him.
He starts frequenting the piano whilst at the library. For this, he must give up his identity card as a collateral to the librarian in exchange for a pair of headphones. As for the headphones, they are to be connected to the piano (it’s electric). So that only the player can listen to his own poundings on the keys. And so that others in the library may not be disturbed.
For a while, he has been meaning to learn to play Un Sospiro by Franz Liszt, a piece that even he cannot believe truly touches his heart. But ultimately, he is a piano player of limited potential. His amateurism prevents him from perfecting his previous piece, Merry Go Round of Life by Joe Hisaishi, and proceeding from there.
He plays for twenty minutes. But he finds himself irritable and incapable of concentrating. So in dramatic fashion (no one is around really), he rips his headphones off and walks off. As the librarian returns his identity card, remarking how much he seems to enjoy playing from his constant swaying, a thought takes hold of him: no one could hear me.
The rain has been beating down all morning, making the day seem like it has barely begun. He is reading on his phone about a type of double suicide in Japan called Shinjū. Two lovers, at odds with the society, believe they’d be reunited in heaven if they kill themselves at the same time. Osamu Dazai, the writer he has been reading, did exactly that. Twice. Because he failed to drown himself in Kamakura, while his lover, tragically, succeeded. It’s not hard for him to reconcile that such an extreme act occurs in Japan.
He never thought of suicide. But for those who decided to end their lives, life must be so unbearable to live – a statement he has neither the authority nor the experience to back up. All he has is a glimpse. A glimpse so small of what true sadness is that he might as well keep to himself. At this point, the cream starts boiling. He puts down his phone and turns down the gas. As he stirs the carbonara sauce, the thought of curly leaf parsley comes to him. Its unique aroma releasing into the air when chopped, he tries hard to conjure up in his head. It is what the pasta lacks, but he cannot be sure.
Right when he rushes into his apartment, he scours the coat wardrobe, frantically searching for a cigarette. The truth is, he is not a smoker. He barely smoked the past few months. Like those who are generally content with their lives, he thinks smoking is unhealthy, expensive, and most importantly, not cool. Especially to the cheerful kinds of girls he likes. But in the evil knick of the moment, the idea of smoking suddenly feels like an overwhelming necessity. Though, the cigarette he thought existed is nowhere to be seen.
He musters up the courage to knock on his neighbor’s door for the first time. What an awkward request it is. Oh hi, nice to meet you. By any chance, do you have a cigarette? Because any more words will not add to his cause but unnecessary details. Oh no, sorry to bother you then. He stands outside of their door for a moment to collect himself. He ponders the possibility of just buying a pack at the store downs– Oh no I must not. I’m not a smoker…
At the store counter downstairs, his remaining dignity (very little at this point) has him make an incredulous request. Oh excuse me, can I buy… two cigarettes? The store owner only returns him a weird stare. Oh you only sell packs of cigarettes? The gazes of the other customers only further infuriate him. As he defeatedly makes his way home, he surveys the clear night sky. Oh lonely cloud, did we exhale you from our cigarette tips, out into this cold vast world? Just as he sinks on the couch to strategize his next move, his phone starts ringing in his pocket. No sooner does he glance at the caller's name, he runs uncontrollably out onto the street without picking up, ignoring the immense ache in his ankle.
The spring breeze blows crisply at his face, like Jack in Titanic. As he strides down the street, he notices the only cherry tree in full blossom. How beautiful and seductive it is! He pauses under it for a second, and announces to himself that now, more than ever, is a poetic moment. Not the poetic moment, but a poetic moment. He then drafts a haiku in his head (what the heck), as the words come to him like the slow and steady brush strokes of calligraphy:
“First cherry blossom
Tonight loneliness and him
Springs into deep dreams”
He employs the singular “springs” to imply him and loneliness has become one. He also chuckles at his cleverness with the double entendre. But the message is too overt and the tone too excited and positive. So he quickly dismisses it and drafts another one:
“First cherry blossom
Who on earth would just care to
Stop and look at him?”
Sadly, he is too self-pitying to consider himself a blossoming cherry tree.
He is hungry. Worse, he is thirsty. Usually hunger didn’t bother him so much. But thirst has made his mouth salivate for the past three hours. He starts to feel dizzy and achy in his forehead. Weirdly enough, his concentration is sharper than ever. It is the fourth day of Ramadan. He has been fasting in solidarity of sorts with his Muslim friends. Today though, he couldn’t wake up in time for Suhur at 4.30 am, the last meal before the fast begins, which made the day extra difficult. But what really challenged him was the constant low mood it has put him in. He can’t quite think straight. He entertains negative thoughts more readily.
The truth is, his mental and physical capacities have been on decline since he injured his ankle two months ago. And the fast revealed exactly that to him. Hunger can be satisfied and thirst quenched, but what of misery? He is too weak to soothe his soul, so let him eat and drink at least. On day five, he devours his first lunch, not without shame.
On a chilly drizzly morning, he visits the bookstore at University College London. He has been frequenting it for the past months, for its multi-storey selection and the prospect of being surrounded by people of his age. He took a particular liking for Japanese authors of the early 1900s, right when Japan was in her final empire days. Their misery and insanity comforts him, and in return, he wants to feel closer to them. In their writings, he gradually discovers what true madness can look like. Sōseki’s Kokoro made him yearn for a sensei in his life. Dazai’s No Longer Human made him ponder for the first time about suicide. And Akutagawa’s The Life of a Stupid Man simply left him incredibly empty.
As he reads, he wonders whether developing an emotional closeness to their writings might also drive him into madness. He asks the bookstore attendant for books by Sōseki. But without checking the online catalog, she shakes her head, as if she already knows they don’t have any. A missed opportunity. I love his books too, but it is just such a missed opportunity. Apparently, Sōseki lived his most insufferable two years just around the corner, on Gower Street, while he was studying in London. After he walks out of the bookstore, he decides to make a left unlike usual. In front of 76 Gower Street, he ponders what constitutes a missed opportunity. That we must take advantage of his madness, for the sake of literature?
On a rare April Sunday, the sun forgives and graces the people of London. As he arrives at a curve by the canal and enters a crowd, he slows down and sees a floating bookstore. His ankle is not fully healed, but nonetheless good enough to last him a few kilometers on his first run in three months. The sun is in his eyes. He feels a warmth that he had forgotten for a while. How cruel is the sun for making him feel so vulnerable!
Under a cherry tree, opposite to the bookstore, where people are gathering, a man in a navy suit is playing Un Sospiro on a brown upright piano. As he walks through and looks around, passersby also lift their heads to meet his eyes. Today, he feels inexplicably light. He thinks he knows why, but he dares not describe it, lest this lightness, not precisely understood, is ruined by the limits of his vocabulary. Afterall, most beautiful things can only be fully grasped in hindsight.
As he scans the book titles, he is surprised to find Sōseki’s Kokoro, lying face down on the far end of the boat. He wouldn’t have found it if it was upright, because he would have had to tilt his head. He picks up the book, an edition he has never seen before. It is hardback but with a leathery touch to it, and the cover depicts a violent wave in Japanese style. Kind of like The Great Wave Off Kanagawa, but not exactly that.
He turns the book around, and finds that it is a personalized hand-made, very limited leather edition, with a note by the cover-maker: The violent flow of water reflects the brutal, emotionally unstable, and dangerous periods of individual lives. And the high possibility of not being able to come out of it. I thought the image can be seen as an abstract reflection of Kokoro's theme. Later on, he will find out that this is the first and final time he will ever come across this edition in person. Because the cover-maker passed away a week earlier. In Kamakura, out of all places.
He puts down the book, letting the sunrays caress his face directly. He meditates on the beauty of where he is. Or more accurately, the beauty of where he ends up in. He lets out a sigh. Or un sospiro, in Italian. At which point, he picks up his pace once again, running, with less hesitation, towards a future that is no longer the here and now that he was for a while familiar with.
1. Longing
Sneakily, the overcast sky sinks darker into the evening. On Fridays, the library closes at 5.30 pm, though he didn’t know. He plans to renew the book he still hasn't read for two weeks. Because a part of him ardently believes in a future where he would read it. After biking for twenty minutes and climbing up two flights of stairs, he stands behind the locked glass door, staring at the dimmed lights, abandoned books, and a deserted reception.
Perhaps this is arranged so that the staff can come home earlier for a hearty dinner? He thinks as he returns to his bike. Beef potato hash? Pork casserole with Worcestershire sauce? He makes random turns on his bike. Down the main street, left on an alley, and stopping before a crowd, he mindlessly ends up at Farringdon Station. Many are waiting outside. For their loved ones? For friends? He picks up a free hot chocolate, and stands in the chilling January wind. He too pretends to wait for someone.
2. Paralysis
Dreams – intense. Evil hours – sporadic. Mentions of her name – torturous and unbearable. It is day three since he has been constrained to the couch. His left ankle just could not bear any weight. Even limping to the toilet requires enormous effort. Worse, the sun almost never visits him. On rare days, it does so by reflecting off the window of the gray-walled hotel that towers over his apartment and blocks all sense of the outer world.
In his solitude, thoughts start to enter unasked for, dripping into his consciousness like tiny droplets. As the droplet lands, it splashes and releases a specific feeling, which he is simply incapable of keeping out. So he tries to tally them: sometimes the fuzzy warmth of a nostalgic memory. Other times the sudden sink into grief. But at the end always the piercing feeling of incompetence and powerlessness. Every drop is so small and brief, yet so gratifying and painful. And as they drip faster and faster, the pauses between each become shorter and shorter. Until they start to form a little stream, he can no longer tell apart the colorful autumn of Seoul, the lonely streets of Tokyo, and the shivering wind of London within it. At this point, he is allured to succumb to its flow. One question leads to one memory that leads to another question, he finds himself both enlightened and entertained in the spiral. The beauty of autumn, would he have still let himself be enamored by it, if he knew the winter would be so unforgiving? But the never-ending questions only blind him from the impending danger. Very quickly, the stream widens into a gushing river that swells and forms white caps. In no time, actual waves begin to rise and break. Anything disguised as rational inquiries previously crackles and shatters into its most primitive form – angst. It is too late. He is tethered by the chains of dread. Bigger, more ominous waves rebel against his will. He is rendered as a helpless creature tossed around in his own mindstorm, threatening to engulf him completely, like countless times before.
The sun seeps in for a moment. He shuffles and rolls his body over to receive its touch. He lies in wakeful silence and endures.
3. Moonlight
Soon the sun makes way for the moon and the sky dims into a deep dark navy. A train is snaking into Eunston station, hissing imaginary smoke out of its chimney. It’s been a week, though his ankle still will not budge. Today, leaving the apartment feels as if an overpowering necessity. After spending an afternoon at University College London, he limps towards Eunston station (no biking, of course). Amongst the crowd in the backdrop of a clear night, his eyes are drawn to an East Asian man alone, perhaps in his early 30s, stepping out of the station.
Mr. A’s hairstyle looks Korean, but he has the slow footsteps of a Japanese. To some, Mr. A can appear mechanical and rigid. But to him, Mr. A oozes a silent dignity. His gray suit is tailored perfectly to his skinny figure and his navy tie tightly hangs off the still-unbuttoned collar. Mr. A keeps his head low, fixing his gaze to the ground, as if on his shoulders carry an unknowable amount of weight. As he emerges from the shadow of the underground, the full moon, at an instant, bathes him in white light and grace, illuminating a face of sharp eyebrows and shallow wrinkles. It was a difficult day, wasn’t it. But you made it, didn’t you? A question for Mr. A that didn’t leave his mouth in time. And as they brush past each other, a loneliness he never knew of overwhelmed him.
4. Lunatic
He starts frequenting the piano whilst at the library. For this, he must give up his identity card as a collateral to the librarian in exchange for a pair of headphones. As for the headphones, they are to be connected to the piano (it’s electric). So that only the player can listen to his own poundings on the keys. And so that others in the library may not be disturbed.
For a while, he has been meaning to learn to play Un Sospiro by Franz Liszt, a piece that even he cannot believe truly touches his heart. But ultimately, he is a piano player of limited potential. His amateurism prevents him from perfecting his previous piece, Merry Go Round of Life by Joe Hisaishi, and proceeding from there.
He plays for twenty minutes. But he finds himself irritable and incapable of concentrating. So in dramatic fashion (no one is around really), he rips his headphones off and walks off. As the librarian returns his identity card, remarking how much he seems to enjoy playing from his constant swaying, a thought takes hold of him: no one could hear me.
5. Imagination
The rain has been beating down all morning, making the day seem like it has barely begun. He is reading on his phone about a type of double suicide in Japan called Shinjū. Two lovers, at odds with the society, believe they’d be reunited in heaven if they kill themselves at the same time. Osamu Dazai, the writer he has been reading, did exactly that. Twice. Because he failed to drown himself in Kamakura, while his lover, tragically, succeeded. It’s not hard for him to reconcile that such an extreme act occurs in Japan.
He never thought of suicide. But for those who decided to end their lives, life must be so unbearable to live – a statement he has neither the authority nor the experience to back up. All he has is a glimpse. A glimpse so small of what true sadness is that he might as well keep to himself. At this point, the cream starts boiling. He puts down his phone and turns down the gas. As he stirs the carbonara sauce, the thought of curly leaf parsley comes to him. Its unique aroma releasing into the air when chopped, he tries hard to conjure up in his head. It is what the pasta lacks, but he cannot be sure.
6. Desperation
Right when he rushes into his apartment, he scours the coat wardrobe, frantically searching for a cigarette. The truth is, he is not a smoker. He barely smoked the past few months. Like those who are generally content with their lives, he thinks smoking is unhealthy, expensive, and most importantly, not cool. Especially to the cheerful kinds of girls he likes. But in the evil knick of the moment, the idea of smoking suddenly feels like an overwhelming necessity. Though, the cigarette he thought existed is nowhere to be seen.
He musters up the courage to knock on his neighbor’s door for the first time. What an awkward request it is. Oh hi, nice to meet you. By any chance, do you have a cigarette? Because any more words will not add to his cause but unnecessary details. Oh no, sorry to bother you then. He stands outside of their door for a moment to collect himself. He ponders the possibility of just buying a pack at the store downs– Oh no I must not. I’m not a smoker…
At the store counter downstairs, his remaining dignity (very little at this point) has him make an incredulous request. Oh excuse me, can I buy… two cigarettes? The store owner only returns him a weird stare. Oh you only sell packs of cigarettes? The gazes of the other customers only further infuriate him. As he defeatedly makes his way home, he surveys the clear night sky. Oh lonely cloud, did we exhale you from our cigarette tips, out into this cold vast world? Just as he sinks on the couch to strategize his next move, his phone starts ringing in his pocket. No sooner does he glance at the caller's name, he runs uncontrollably out onto the street without picking up, ignoring the immense ache in his ankle.
7. Blossom
The spring breeze blows crisply at his face, like Jack in Titanic. As he strides down the street, he notices the only cherry tree in full blossom. How beautiful and seductive it is! He pauses under it for a second, and announces to himself that now, more than ever, is a poetic moment. Not the poetic moment, but a poetic moment. He then drafts a haiku in his head (what the heck), as the words come to him like the slow and steady brush strokes of calligraphy:
“First cherry blossom
Tonight loneliness and him
Springs into deep dreams”
He employs the singular “springs” to imply him and loneliness has become one. He also chuckles at his cleverness with the double entendre. But the message is too overt and the tone too excited and positive. So he quickly dismisses it and drafts another one:
“First cherry blossom
Who on earth would just care to
Stop and look at him?”
Sadly, he is too self-pitying to consider himself a blossoming cherry tree.
8. Deprivation
He is hungry. Worse, he is thirsty. Usually hunger didn’t bother him so much. But thirst has made his mouth salivate for the past three hours. He starts to feel dizzy and achy in his forehead. Weirdly enough, his concentration is sharper than ever. It is the fourth day of Ramadan. He has been fasting in solidarity of sorts with his Muslim friends. Today though, he couldn’t wake up in time for Suhur at 4.30 am, the last meal before the fast begins, which made the day extra difficult. But what really challenged him was the constant low mood it has put him in. He can’t quite think straight. He entertains negative thoughts more readily.
The truth is, his mental and physical capacities have been on decline since he injured his ankle two months ago. And the fast revealed exactly that to him. Hunger can be satisfied and thirst quenched, but what of misery? He is too weak to soothe his soul, so let him eat and drink at least. On day five, he devours his first lunch, not without shame.
9. Madness
On a chilly drizzly morning, he visits the bookstore at University College London. He has been frequenting it for the past months, for its multi-storey selection and the prospect of being surrounded by people of his age. He took a particular liking for Japanese authors of the early 1900s, right when Japan was in her final empire days. Their misery and insanity comforts him, and in return, he wants to feel closer to them. In their writings, he gradually discovers what true madness can look like. Sōseki’s Kokoro made him yearn for a sensei in his life. Dazai’s No Longer Human made him ponder for the first time about suicide. And Akutagawa’s The Life of a Stupid Man simply left him incredibly empty.
As he reads, he wonders whether developing an emotional closeness to their writings might also drive him into madness. He asks the bookstore attendant for books by Sōseki. But without checking the online catalog, she shakes her head, as if she already knows they don’t have any. A missed opportunity. I love his books too, but it is just such a missed opportunity. Apparently, Sōseki lived his most insufferable two years just around the corner, on Gower Street, while he was studying in London. After he walks out of the bookstore, he decides to make a left unlike usual. In front of 76 Gower Street, he ponders what constitutes a missed opportunity. That we must take advantage of his madness, for the sake of literature?
10. Beauty
On a rare April Sunday, the sun forgives and graces the people of London. As he arrives at a curve by the canal and enters a crowd, he slows down and sees a floating bookstore. His ankle is not fully healed, but nonetheless good enough to last him a few kilometers on his first run in three months. The sun is in his eyes. He feels a warmth that he had forgotten for a while. How cruel is the sun for making him feel so vulnerable!
Under a cherry tree, opposite to the bookstore, where people are gathering, a man in a navy suit is playing Un Sospiro on a brown upright piano. As he walks through and looks around, passersby also lift their heads to meet his eyes. Today, he feels inexplicably light. He thinks he knows why, but he dares not describe it, lest this lightness, not precisely understood, is ruined by the limits of his vocabulary. Afterall, most beautiful things can only be fully grasped in hindsight.
As he scans the book titles, he is surprised to find Sōseki’s Kokoro, lying face down on the far end of the boat. He wouldn’t have found it if it was upright, because he would have had to tilt his head. He picks up the book, an edition he has never seen before. It is hardback but with a leathery touch to it, and the cover depicts a violent wave in Japanese style. Kind of like The Great Wave Off Kanagawa, but not exactly that.
He turns the book around, and finds that it is a personalized hand-made, very limited leather edition, with a note by the cover-maker: The violent flow of water reflects the brutal, emotionally unstable, and dangerous periods of individual lives. And the high possibility of not being able to come out of it. I thought the image can be seen as an abstract reflection of Kokoro's theme. Later on, he will find out that this is the first and final time he will ever come across this edition in person. Because the cover-maker passed away a week earlier. In Kamakura, out of all places.
He puts down the book, letting the sunrays caress his face directly. He meditates on the beauty of where he is. Or more accurately, the beauty of where he ends up in. He lets out a sigh. Or un sospiro, in Italian. At which point, he picks up his pace once again, running, with less hesitation, towards a future that is no longer the here and now that he was for a while familiar with.
Fiction
Notes of a Menstrual Cycle
Editor Zhi Zhi’s Note: Caya has created a scrumptious experimental performance piece here — you must listen to the audio!
or
Soundcloud
Transcript
DAY [DID-I-JUST-GET-MY-PERIOD?]
Iconic blotch of hostel-heat-dried ketchup
Flashing on-and-on-and-on-and-on-and-on-and-on the lighter
Was I falling into a Void of Anticipation and
Now Wonder If I Am Being A Burden
Is death a social construct?
DAY [I-FEEL-TERRIBLE-FOR-A-VALID-REASON]
your life poured out my eyes
[Em7] [??] [??]
The biggest regret of my life is that I have to look to the left to know what chords I’m playing, so when I record myself playing I am forced to look at the least favorite side of my face.
DAY [FOR-SURE-SENSITIVE-TO-MINOR-HURDLES-THAT-I-NORMALLY-WOULD-IGNORE-BUT-MAYBE-THIS-IS-A-REMINDER-THAT-THEY-DESERVE-SOME-ATTENTION]
the thought of writing about love initiated by a prompt in your handwriting despises me. i hope you never read this, and if you do, hope you understand that this is not me. also not about you. i need to stop judging and you need to stop taking things personally. or maybe i just need to stop assuming you do. ALSO the fucking audacity to put ‘love’ and ‘/(sex)’ on the same sticky note. maybe i should’ve kindly shown it the way to the trash. but i guess it serves this purpose now. sorry to disappoint.
DAY [HOW-THE-FUCK-AM-I-SUPPOSED-TO-KEEP-MYSELF-STANDING]
if i’m…
sick from three bites of flapjack
shaky from whatever the fuck is going on with my insulin levels
probably in need of protein, but since when has Minerva decided that cooking healthy substantial meals in a way that does not make survival without being on the brink of collapse the sole purpose of your existence a priority? right. NEVER.
but, oh well, here we are at Edeka, trying to [whilst sickened by flapjack, basically the opposite of wanting to buy the entire store while hungry] work with what we’ve got and keep myself afloat.
it was a spontaneous decision to prioritize my wellbeing, so my backpack was obviously not ready to carry two oat milks, a bunch of celery, a cucumber, a carton of eggs, two cans of chickpeas, two with tuna, two proteinbreads (i guess i really was convinced i was in need of dorm-room-appropriate-protein-foods), some blood oranges (might actually do my insulin levels good to have one now, I actually have no idea how that works).
[INITIATE EXPERIMENT: Independent variable → orange (blood), Dependent variable → mood, Confounders → frustration from peeling (it does not look like it will be easy), writing (might make me slightly less frustrated)]
So, I got all the goods, ready to check out, figured I’d grab myself a bag anticipating that not everything will fit inside this tiny backpack, not wanting to test my luck because today is not the day I’m gonna have the cashier realize I am not in fact German. Obviously take a paper bag because I’d rather stuff my groceries in my sweatpants than have my ego take a punch in the face for choosing a plastic bag. And, as you might have guessed, obviously, this fucking bag starts ripping on the side (THE SIDE WHERE MY EGGS ARE, LORD HAVE MERCY!).
but paper bags ain’t got nothing on me, except that even if i hold it like a teen mom holds her baby, my darn insulin levels won’t let me use my bicep for longer than a minute, then 30 seconds, then another 30, but eventually just 20 seconds at a time. and everytime i halt, adjust, rest, and continue, the bag rips further, now on two opposite ends. I CAN LITERALLY SEE THE END OF THE STREET I LIVE ON, but there’s no way i (or rather, my groceries, but at this point they have become me), will survive this last stretch.
so i stuff my pockets and my tiny backpack, hang the oranges (blood) to my handles, and cradle the rest.
i remember my noodles falling out of my pocket, running over them with my back tire. i picked up the bursted package with halved noodles (i had them later, it was like a bowl of mush), put it in my pocket, praying the crumbs wouldn’t fall out and stick to the fluff of my jacket. but… now i actually don’t understand why i was being so dramatic about this and i actually feel a bit better and more detached from these emotions. YAY for writing to process your feelings / eating blood orange to treat your hangry (awaiting conclusion from isolated variable testing).
DAY [MAYBE-THAT-WASNT-MY-PERIOD-CUZ-ITS-OVER-BEFORE-IT-BEGAN??]
I was quite happy biking home. The sun was setting and it had been an amazing day of card games, writing exercises, vitamin-D-upsoaking, talking to other Dutch people against my will, and lukewarm-white-wine-and-oat-chocolate-milk-drinking. IV → chillin’, DV → mood, Confounders → THE SUN!, Clue is also confused where the fuck in my cycle I’m at.
DAY [APRIL-18TH]
Het is ongekend hoe lekker ik ga op seksueel getinte muziek.
I now feel the need to apologize to any Professor reading this, but hopefully, their desire for emancipation is stronger than their reflex to report Duty to the Discourse.
(i cross my fingers and pray that using that word in this sentence made sense. it has only recently been added to my vocabulary.
and it is quite the [[massive] collossal concept to [grasp] seize]
colossal concept to seize (wow i made an alliter-
ation
(yes, i just did that
[insert picture of a 1L bottle of ATION])
and assonance (why do alliteration and assonance
alliterate but not assonate?
Sprawiedliwości stala się zadość.))
To conclude: it seems to have been exactly a cycle ago when I conceived of the idea to keep a cycl-y diary (like monthly diary, but more inclusive (i.e., acknowledging and embracing the variety of menstrual cycle experience) cuz very unlikely do many people have their cycles take exactly a month). I feel great. And I’m sure she felt great, too.
or
Soundcloud
Transcript
DAY [DID-I-JUST-GET-MY-PERIOD?]
Iconic blotch of hostel-heat-dried ketchup
Flashing on-and-on-and-on-and-on-and-on-and-on the lighter
Was I falling into a Void of Anticipation and
Now Wonder If I Am Being A Burden
Is death a social construct?
DAY [I-FEEL-TERRIBLE-FOR-A-VALID-REASON]
your life poured out my eyes
[Em7] [??] [??]
The biggest regret of my life is that I have to look to the left to know what chords I’m playing, so when I record myself playing I am forced to look at the least favorite side of my face.
DAY [FOR-SURE-SENSITIVE-TO-MINOR-HURDLES-THAT-I-NORMALLY-WOULD-IGNORE-BUT-MAYBE-THIS-IS-A-REMINDER-THAT-THEY-DESERVE-SOME-ATTENTION]
the thought of writing about love initiated by a prompt in your handwriting despises me. i hope you never read this, and if you do, hope you understand that this is not me. also not about you. i need to stop judging and you need to stop taking things personally. or maybe i just need to stop assuming you do. ALSO the fucking audacity to put ‘love’ and ‘/(sex)’ on the same sticky note. maybe i should’ve kindly shown it the way to the trash. but i guess it serves this purpose now. sorry to disappoint.
DAY [HOW-THE-FUCK-AM-I-SUPPOSED-TO-KEEP-MYSELF-STANDING]
if i’m…
sick from three bites of flapjack
shaky from whatever the fuck is going on with my insulin levels
probably in need of protein, but since when has Minerva decided that cooking healthy substantial meals in a way that does not make survival without being on the brink of collapse the sole purpose of your existence a priority? right. NEVER.
but, oh well, here we are at Edeka, trying to [whilst sickened by flapjack, basically the opposite of wanting to buy the entire store while hungry] work with what we’ve got and keep myself afloat.
it was a spontaneous decision to prioritize my wellbeing, so my backpack was obviously not ready to carry two oat milks, a bunch of celery, a cucumber, a carton of eggs, two cans of chickpeas, two with tuna, two proteinbreads (i guess i really was convinced i was in need of dorm-room-appropriate-protein-foods), some blood oranges (might actually do my insulin levels good to have one now, I actually have no idea how that works).
[INITIATE EXPERIMENT: Independent variable → orange (blood), Dependent variable → mood, Confounders → frustration from peeling (it does not look like it will be easy), writing (might make me slightly less frustrated)]
So, I got all the goods, ready to check out, figured I’d grab myself a bag anticipating that not everything will fit inside this tiny backpack, not wanting to test my luck because today is not the day I’m gonna have the cashier realize I am not in fact German. Obviously take a paper bag because I’d rather stuff my groceries in my sweatpants than have my ego take a punch in the face for choosing a plastic bag. And, as you might have guessed, obviously, this fucking bag starts ripping on the side (THE SIDE WHERE MY EGGS ARE, LORD HAVE MERCY!).
but paper bags ain’t got nothing on me, except that even if i hold it like a teen mom holds her baby, my darn insulin levels won’t let me use my bicep for longer than a minute, then 30 seconds, then another 30, but eventually just 20 seconds at a time. and everytime i halt, adjust, rest, and continue, the bag rips further, now on two opposite ends. I CAN LITERALLY SEE THE END OF THE STREET I LIVE ON, but there’s no way i (or rather, my groceries, but at this point they have become me), will survive this last stretch.
so i stuff my pockets and my tiny backpack, hang the oranges (blood) to my handles, and cradle the rest.
i remember my noodles falling out of my pocket, running over them with my back tire. i picked up the bursted package with halved noodles (i had them later, it was like a bowl of mush), put it in my pocket, praying the crumbs wouldn’t fall out and stick to the fluff of my jacket. but… now i actually don’t understand why i was being so dramatic about this and i actually feel a bit better and more detached from these emotions. YAY for writing to process your feelings / eating blood orange to treat your hangry (awaiting conclusion from isolated variable testing).
DAY [MAYBE-THAT-WASNT-MY-PERIOD-CUZ-ITS-OVER-BEFORE-IT-BEGAN??]
I was quite happy biking home. The sun was setting and it had been an amazing day of card games, writing exercises, vitamin-D-upsoaking, talking to other Dutch people against my will, and lukewarm-white-wine-and-oat-chocolate-milk-drinking. IV → chillin’, DV → mood, Confounders → THE SUN!, Clue is also confused where the fuck in my cycle I’m at.
DAY [APRIL-18TH]
Het is ongekend hoe lekker ik ga op seksueel getinte muziek.
I now feel the need to apologize to any Professor reading this, but hopefully, their desire for emancipation is stronger than their reflex to report Duty to the Discourse.
(i cross my fingers and pray that using that word in this sentence made sense. it has only recently been added to my vocabulary.
and it is quite the [[massive] collossal concept to [grasp] seize]
colossal concept to seize (wow i made an alliter-
ation
(yes, i just did that
[insert picture of a 1L bottle of ATION])
and assonance (why do alliteration and assonance
alliterate but not assonate?
Sprawiedliwości stala się zadość.))
To conclude: it seems to have been exactly a cycle ago when I conceived of the idea to keep a cycl-y diary (like monthly diary, but more inclusive (i.e., acknowledging and embracing the variety of menstrual cycle experience) cuz very unlikely do many people have their cycles take exactly a month). I feel great. And I’m sure she felt great, too.
Video
Looking Back
An exploration of how our present relates to our past.
The children we weren’t and the children we now choose to be.
The children we weren’t and the children we now choose to be.
Poetry
a scripture / dictionary
the heavens are bodiless
skytown is a heat-haze
beckoning,
self-deceptive,
uninhabited
the space is a traveling matter
with its stems inside you
roots — out
and you become a child of divorce
between
life & death
these walls hurt me more than your underworld possibly could
their hands constrain me
their demeanor shapes my response mechanisms
their remedy i seek
this city is my crib my playground
my bed my death row
needless to stand there:
if you don’t move, someone will move you
karma is the thin fingers of a woman
the rage in her honesty
the hatching words of her mind and faith
her stolen oaths she broke to reclaim
afterlife is acceptance of aberrance
the wrinkles on earth-touching skin
unfound path into the next moment of existence
blessing is the fire in the chest that doesn’t kill
it waters and soothes and wraps the roots
of body that are ribs into the armor of immortality
up until it’s taken
away
and it’s only a thirst for its return
scratching at the back of your throat
prayer is the poem merged with melody
their sinless union
seamless healing
shameless sentiment
absolution is the bare-handedly untied knots
the blood that starts to pump back into vessels
released noose around the reddened neck
and the traces of the plasma under nails
if i let the deity fill me
i know i will be gone that moment
losing everything my conscience is
stripping myself sky-clad of senses
of humanness
of world
of you
skytown is a heat-haze
beckoning,
self-deceptive,
uninhabited
the space is a traveling matter
with its stems inside you
roots — out
and you become a child of divorce
between
life & death
these walls hurt me more than your underworld possibly could
their hands constrain me
their demeanor shapes my response mechanisms
their remedy i seek
this city is my crib my playground
my bed my death row
needless to stand there:
if you don’t move, someone will move you
karma is the thin fingers of a woman
the rage in her honesty
the hatching words of her mind and faith
her stolen oaths she broke to reclaim
afterlife is acceptance of aberrance
the wrinkles on earth-touching skin
unfound path into the next moment of existence
blessing is the fire in the chest that doesn’t kill
it waters and soothes and wraps the roots
of body that are ribs into the armor of immortality
up until it’s taken
away
and it’s only a thirst for its return
scratching at the back of your throat
prayer is the poem merged with melody
their sinless union
seamless healing
shameless sentiment
absolution is the bare-handedly untied knots
the blood that starts to pump back into vessels
released noose around the reddened neck
and the traces of the plasma under nails
if i let the deity fill me
i know i will be gone that moment
losing everything my conscience is
stripping myself sky-clad of senses
of humanness
of world
of you
Poetry
***
look at me, look through your fingers
roll the anticipation of the coming waves between your quiet moves
for if you let your eyes see through, how ocean feels it
i cannot promise that you will let it to let you go
curls of azure hide back stretch marks of mountain ranges
moss patches up old rips, grass sews them into scars
and deep within wavelengths above our barren senses
they talk of things we could not ever see from where we are
i’ve gathered splinters of these trees within cloth of my pockets,
bodies of hills have held us in their rocky arms
they sent me back alive to bring the tidings over
they’d come for those who decimate their paradise
my hands are cold — that’s how wind likes it better
its breath gloved up my skin like it knew who i was
like i was meant to wear its trust over my soft demeanor
stumble through fields and streets, drag every sigh along
i, too, am patched
with stitches of oblations
i, too, am washed away with bitter ocean tears
when you put fingers in these waters and you feel vibrations
know it’s the last song of my voice that’s calling you to me
roll the anticipation of the coming waves between your quiet moves
for if you let your eyes see through, how ocean feels it
i cannot promise that you will let it to let you go
curls of azure hide back stretch marks of mountain ranges
moss patches up old rips, grass sews them into scars
and deep within wavelengths above our barren senses
they talk of things we could not ever see from where we are
i’ve gathered splinters of these trees within cloth of my pockets,
bodies of hills have held us in their rocky arms
they sent me back alive to bring the tidings over
they’d come for those who decimate their paradise
my hands are cold — that’s how wind likes it better
its breath gloved up my skin like it knew who i was
like i was meant to wear its trust over my soft demeanor
stumble through fields and streets, drag every sigh along
i, too, am patched
with stitches of oblations
i, too, am washed away with bitter ocean tears
when you put fingers in these waters and you feel vibrations
know it’s the last song of my voice that’s calling you to me
Nonfiction
Letters from Technovalley
Foreword
I needed a break.
Speaking without thinking is rare for me. Each word is a choice, a reflection of ego, a shield against imagined judgments that I fear and claim to be wounded by, yet ultimately serve to please me. I am made of contradictions. Words are how I tame my thoughts. I reject the places, situations, and people that haunt me to express my thoughts—I insist I am bigger than them.
Pangyo, known as "Pangyo Technovalley," bustles with activity. Capital and cutting-edge technology flow from Seoul into this valley, cradled by mountains on three sides. It sits in Korea's second-largest city, Bundang, hosting tech giants like Naver and Kakao. From a bridge, I would observe the cars streaming into the city each morning, and, every time, I was becoming embodied by a spirit—so elusive, but it would wake me up at 5:30 every day.
July 24, 2023 (Day 69)
At the Chinese bistro, a weekly gathering of athletes, private equity analysts, and aspiring professionals. The invitations were simple until I noticed his gestures—settling bills, the probing questions, the gentle "Let me know what you need." He stood at the center, drawing all the lines to converge upon him. So slowly, everyone leaned in, ambitions now threading through him. Our gatherings, stretching well beyond midnight (unpaid labor much?), were not just about the meal but about his presence.
My boss was a politician.
He was also 26 when he became CEO at Nexon, Korea's largest game publisher. Now he's just above my cubicle, balding. And below me sits a 27-year-old manchild with ambition etched into his frown and a venomous gaze in his eyes as he watches the hierarchy above him. So memories stir—of my previous boss, sharp, with a crying baby in one arm and a phone in the other at board meetings; of my mentor, his office filled with AI textbooks and discreet appointment slips with oncologists. My mother’s $COIN shares dwarf my earnings. Seeking wisdom seems more like vanity than truth—maybe it's all ego.
I want to be someone interesting.
August 29, 2023 (Day 105)
I became the team's first associate—at a firm where an outsourced workforce fills nine out of ten desks, interns assume leadership, and legal battles brew every month.
It's tough. Values crumble—"I can't work with dumb people," they say. Silicon Valley becomes the chorus of Phaethons, each steering their chariots wildly off course. And after watching Nolan’s Oppenheimer, comparing the CEO and my disgraced father, ousted from his hotel at 50, I confront a single question: What does ambition mean, really?
October 22, 2023 (Day 159)
Work remains as is. These past months, however, showed me how, even among giants, the small can ascend (correction: my boss isn't exactly "small"). I once thought I stood at a crossroads, able to choose hard work here over other opportunities. This year, each path I considered was tied to one man: the CEO. But what are accolades even worth before the actual test begins? The draft notice sits on my desk.
And in this haze, it's easy to lose sight of what matters. I've overlooked the need for self-reflection. A sense of isolation and a void that creeps in—the discontinuity of it all.
Everyone aimed to be in private equity or law, and I began to blend in until the memory of someone challenged me, asking, "You too?" My mother often critiques my peers for lacking a philosophy. Yet, I've come to understand that pursuing wealth might be the most straightforward philosophy.
The ambition to change the world often masks a more intricate vanity. One must confront and seek harmony with a deep-seated ego.
November 25, 2023 (Day 193)
I couldn’t turn off the heater.
I opened the door to my hotel room to cool off.
I let the cold breeze blow in.
I preferred harmony over conflict. It was rare to find a teammate, both sharp and thoughtful. As he grew into reporting to the CEOs—a role I gave him—he became indispensable. My first pang of regret hit when he left for military service on November 24. He was my "work bestie," and I claim to have graduated him.
I picked him.
But he smoked. I inherited a disdain for smokers from my father, and seeing someone I cared about choosing that path made me feel, unjustly, a notch above. His attempts to avoid smoking near me seemed more obligatory than considerate.
I crave solitude. A chance to sharpen the lens through which I frame life, myself. When I shared this with my boss, he said, "That's not who you are." As author Eun Hee Kyung describes, I live dual lives, balancing an existence between myself (私) and my persona (公). Now, the scale tipped too far towards the 公, leaving me with fading memories.
And a bit of eczema.
Interlude (12:00 AM the next day)
I ignored your cue to chat after dinner. Regret claws me. Your ear, always listening, holds the story I need. The silence is a chasm between intent and action.
Can I DM you next week?
December 25, 2023 (Day 223)
Brushed off Christmas one day, only to envy the snow-kissed-landscapes and champagne glasses flooding Instagram the next, I couldn't help but feel the irony. Blaming the app was easy. I recalled Jacques Prévert's "Cadeau D'Oiseau," mocking a bird's folly to scorn its sunflower seeds—mirroring my own tendency to blame everything but myself, as certain and naive as a 12-year-old proclaiming life's mysteries solved. Alone with a breakfast salad in a convenience store, comfort settled, then clarity. Then I decided it was Christmas, after all. I owed myself real lunch and dinner.
Two years back, I chased after Michelin-starred meals like a madman, my wallet nearly empty. Leaning on Michelin and Instagram was a compromise between my two selves–one yearning for an accessible understanding of culinary jargon, the other to "look good." Moderate self-indulgence is like sipping wine in broad daylight.
My weeks melted into a routine: Sinchon, work, Yeouido, work, repeat. Saturdays meant a limp mattress. Only Sundays breathed. I tutored in an opulent villa near a French gastropub in Seorae Village. The sourdough sandwich there became my favorite: crisp, tangy, filled with house-cured ham, Dijon, fresh vegetables, and sharp cheese.
To those young cheesemongers, the presence of an even younger man in the too-big gray puffer, reminiscent of a sleep-deprived traveler, always the same sandwich, should have sparked some interest. Their dinners, priced well into the triple digits, shooed away most of the young. So, as the younger man swept the shelves on an early Christmas afternoon, his pockets laden with corporate cash, that interest should have grown.
I head to Jinju tomorrow – my home town. A crypto ad urging me to buy their currencies caught my eye as I left the shop. I remembered how my company was accused of printing crypto just to liquidate it. Perhaps we scraped together some cash from the benevolent 50-year-old crypto investors, enough to afford at least a tomato slice for my sandwich. I vowed to leave.
In Jinju
Pursuing my inner depths seems futile. I once believed the truth existed only within my emotions. But when words beckon, one must heed, standing at a crossroads. Have I ever indeed given something to someone? My mother always said to give. Surrounding glances are tepid. I realized it was because of my own coldness. Crying is an action, a performance. Even if I want to cry, I cannot. What words or triggers do I yearn for? I only feel time flowing relentlessly. If only I could weave all the words and actions to express my heart.
I heard someone was attempting to model every problem in Korean society using data. A black-haired foreigner. All my conversations with you, and then I standardize space and your warmth, connect everything with the theory of relativity, and ensure nothing fades away with blockchain, forever circling a single heart, even after I die. It's just daydreaming, inevitably. Sam Altman said, "Intelligence is an attribute emerging in physics." The tiresome scent of Americans. All I know is the emptiness I feel.
Epilogue (Day 255)
Ambition and stubbornness tread a fine line. One of my final projects was a bootcamp for young talent, with all the proper approvals. The CEO said that in "this industrial era," people should seek knowledge on their own, and assistance for those in need shouldn't be offered.
Circumstances soured, and suddenly, ambition felt more like stubbornness. I couldn't shake the memory of my father, a hotelier whose dreams were dashed by reality. He never was an owner. Honor, politics, wealth, and power—all competing, like characters in a drama; it seemed complex and subtle then, but now, I try to appreciate it.
At an undergrad-organized startup event, I watched the CEO awkwardly trying conversations with founders in their 20s. In the quiet of a corporate restructuring meeting, I endured the tremble in the whisper of a colleague in her 30s, "Don't let the CEO know." She was just one of many targets. What was I working for? What part of myself was I protecting?
"He's not married, right? You have to experience having children to understand. The rebellious teenage phase, the disobedience," my mom told me.
Age conveniently became an excuse, both for me at 22 and my CEO at 50
Concluding
I wanted to live a cinematic life, not as the protagonist, but for the way every detail aligns to convey a profound message, like a grand denouement. Riding a Segway amidst Pangyo's glass skyscrapers isn't a standout moment; it's just how the average 30-year-old Korean tech professional commutes.
So, time and context are of the essence. I finally lived out my Pangyo semester.
I needed a break.
Speaking without thinking is rare for me. Each word is a choice, a reflection of ego, a shield against imagined judgments that I fear and claim to be wounded by, yet ultimately serve to please me. I am made of contradictions. Words are how I tame my thoughts. I reject the places, situations, and people that haunt me to express my thoughts—I insist I am bigger than them.
Pangyo, known as "Pangyo Technovalley," bustles with activity. Capital and cutting-edge technology flow from Seoul into this valley, cradled by mountains on three sides. It sits in Korea's second-largest city, Bundang, hosting tech giants like Naver and Kakao. From a bridge, I would observe the cars streaming into the city each morning, and, every time, I was becoming embodied by a spirit—so elusive, but it would wake me up at 5:30 every day.
July 24, 2023 (Day 69)
At the Chinese bistro, a weekly gathering of athletes, private equity analysts, and aspiring professionals. The invitations were simple until I noticed his gestures—settling bills, the probing questions, the gentle "Let me know what you need." He stood at the center, drawing all the lines to converge upon him. So slowly, everyone leaned in, ambitions now threading through him. Our gatherings, stretching well beyond midnight (unpaid labor much?), were not just about the meal but about his presence.
My boss was a politician.
He was also 26 when he became CEO at Nexon, Korea's largest game publisher. Now he's just above my cubicle, balding. And below me sits a 27-year-old manchild with ambition etched into his frown and a venomous gaze in his eyes as he watches the hierarchy above him. So memories stir—of my previous boss, sharp, with a crying baby in one arm and a phone in the other at board meetings; of my mentor, his office filled with AI textbooks and discreet appointment slips with oncologists. My mother’s $COIN shares dwarf my earnings. Seeking wisdom seems more like vanity than truth—maybe it's all ego.
I want to be someone interesting.
August 29, 2023 (Day 105)
I became the team's first associate—at a firm where an outsourced workforce fills nine out of ten desks, interns assume leadership, and legal battles brew every month.
It's tough. Values crumble—"I can't work with dumb people," they say. Silicon Valley becomes the chorus of Phaethons, each steering their chariots wildly off course. And after watching Nolan’s Oppenheimer, comparing the CEO and my disgraced father, ousted from his hotel at 50, I confront a single question: What does ambition mean, really?
October 22, 2023 (Day 159)
Work remains as is. These past months, however, showed me how, even among giants, the small can ascend (correction: my boss isn't exactly "small"). I once thought I stood at a crossroads, able to choose hard work here over other opportunities. This year, each path I considered was tied to one man: the CEO. But what are accolades even worth before the actual test begins? The draft notice sits on my desk.
And in this haze, it's easy to lose sight of what matters. I've overlooked the need for self-reflection. A sense of isolation and a void that creeps in—the discontinuity of it all.
Everyone aimed to be in private equity or law, and I began to blend in until the memory of someone challenged me, asking, "You too?" My mother often critiques my peers for lacking a philosophy. Yet, I've come to understand that pursuing wealth might be the most straightforward philosophy.
The ambition to change the world often masks a more intricate vanity. One must confront and seek harmony with a deep-seated ego.
November 25, 2023 (Day 193)
I couldn’t turn off the heater.
I opened the door to my hotel room to cool off.
I let the cold breeze blow in.
I preferred harmony over conflict. It was rare to find a teammate, both sharp and thoughtful. As he grew into reporting to the CEOs—a role I gave him—he became indispensable. My first pang of regret hit when he left for military service on November 24. He was my "work bestie," and I claim to have graduated him.
I picked him.
But he smoked. I inherited a disdain for smokers from my father, and seeing someone I cared about choosing that path made me feel, unjustly, a notch above. His attempts to avoid smoking near me seemed more obligatory than considerate.
I crave solitude. A chance to sharpen the lens through which I frame life, myself. When I shared this with my boss, he said, "That's not who you are." As author Eun Hee Kyung describes, I live dual lives, balancing an existence between myself (私) and my persona (公). Now, the scale tipped too far towards the 公, leaving me with fading memories.
And a bit of eczema.
Interlude (12:00 AM the next day)
I ignored your cue to chat after dinner. Regret claws me. Your ear, always listening, holds the story I need. The silence is a chasm between intent and action.
Can I DM you next week?
December 25, 2023 (Day 223)
Brushed off Christmas one day, only to envy the snow-kissed-landscapes and champagne glasses flooding Instagram the next, I couldn't help but feel the irony. Blaming the app was easy. I recalled Jacques Prévert's "Cadeau D'Oiseau," mocking a bird's folly to scorn its sunflower seeds—mirroring my own tendency to blame everything but myself, as certain and naive as a 12-year-old proclaiming life's mysteries solved. Alone with a breakfast salad in a convenience store, comfort settled, then clarity. Then I decided it was Christmas, after all. I owed myself real lunch and dinner.
Two years back, I chased after Michelin-starred meals like a madman, my wallet nearly empty. Leaning on Michelin and Instagram was a compromise between my two selves–one yearning for an accessible understanding of culinary jargon, the other to "look good." Moderate self-indulgence is like sipping wine in broad daylight.
My weeks melted into a routine: Sinchon, work, Yeouido, work, repeat. Saturdays meant a limp mattress. Only Sundays breathed. I tutored in an opulent villa near a French gastropub in Seorae Village. The sourdough sandwich there became my favorite: crisp, tangy, filled with house-cured ham, Dijon, fresh vegetables, and sharp cheese.
To those young cheesemongers, the presence of an even younger man in the too-big gray puffer, reminiscent of a sleep-deprived traveler, always the same sandwich, should have sparked some interest. Their dinners, priced well into the triple digits, shooed away most of the young. So, as the younger man swept the shelves on an early Christmas afternoon, his pockets laden with corporate cash, that interest should have grown.
I head to Jinju tomorrow – my home town. A crypto ad urging me to buy their currencies caught my eye as I left the shop. I remembered how my company was accused of printing crypto just to liquidate it. Perhaps we scraped together some cash from the benevolent 50-year-old crypto investors, enough to afford at least a tomato slice for my sandwich. I vowed to leave.
In Jinju
Pursuing my inner depths seems futile. I once believed the truth existed only within my emotions. But when words beckon, one must heed, standing at a crossroads. Have I ever indeed given something to someone? My mother always said to give. Surrounding glances are tepid. I realized it was because of my own coldness. Crying is an action, a performance. Even if I want to cry, I cannot. What words or triggers do I yearn for? I only feel time flowing relentlessly. If only I could weave all the words and actions to express my heart.
I heard someone was attempting to model every problem in Korean society using data. A black-haired foreigner. All my conversations with you, and then I standardize space and your warmth, connect everything with the theory of relativity, and ensure nothing fades away with blockchain, forever circling a single heart, even after I die. It's just daydreaming, inevitably. Sam Altman said, "Intelligence is an attribute emerging in physics." The tiresome scent of Americans. All I know is the emptiness I feel.
Epilogue (Day 255)
Ambition and stubbornness tread a fine line. One of my final projects was a bootcamp for young talent, with all the proper approvals. The CEO said that in "this industrial era," people should seek knowledge on their own, and assistance for those in need shouldn't be offered.
Circumstances soured, and suddenly, ambition felt more like stubbornness. I couldn't shake the memory of my father, a hotelier whose dreams were dashed by reality. He never was an owner. Honor, politics, wealth, and power—all competing, like characters in a drama; it seemed complex and subtle then, but now, I try to appreciate it.
At an undergrad-organized startup event, I watched the CEO awkwardly trying conversations with founders in their 20s. In the quiet of a corporate restructuring meeting, I endured the tremble in the whisper of a colleague in her 30s, "Don't let the CEO know." She was just one of many targets. What was I working for? What part of myself was I protecting?
"He's not married, right? You have to experience having children to understand. The rebellious teenage phase, the disobedience," my mom told me.
Age conveniently became an excuse, both for me at 22 and my CEO at 50
Concluding
I wanted to live a cinematic life, not as the protagonist, but for the way every detail aligns to convey a profound message, like a grand denouement. Riding a Segway amidst Pangyo's glass skyscrapers isn't a standout moment; it's just how the average 30-year-old Korean tech professional commutes.
So, time and context are of the essence. I finally lived out my Pangyo semester.
Written by Sun, edited by ChatGPT
Poetry
(illusion)
beautiful memories never grow old,
but we ain’t young forever.
wandering to the far north,
up the mountain, down the pass,
picking tea, weaving cloth,
wearing embroidered clothes and sedge shoes,
peaceful and leisurely days.
suddenly poured into the bottom of my eyes,
burning and clear sunlight.
ambiguity arises,
the nightmare seems too long,
so, therefore,
you haven't come back yet.
wake up hastily,
southern warmth caresses my skin.
in the oscillation of summer outside the doorway,
there is the sound of your constant turning books,
and our ten fingers, tightly interlaced.
"i'm here", you whisper softly.
frozen tears,
i stop crying.
;
but,
fissures in the chest cavity,
and pain to the point of paralysis,
all are real.
why. why so.
he smiled softly,
"just your illusion."
;
is it.
but we ain’t young forever.
wandering to the far north,
up the mountain, down the pass,
picking tea, weaving cloth,
wearing embroidered clothes and sedge shoes,
peaceful and leisurely days.
suddenly poured into the bottom of my eyes,
burning and clear sunlight.
ambiguity arises,
the nightmare seems too long,
so, therefore,
you haven't come back yet.
wake up hastily,
southern warmth caresses my skin.
in the oscillation of summer outside the doorway,
there is the sound of your constant turning books,
and our ten fingers, tightly interlaced.
"i'm here", you whisper softly.
frozen tears,
i stop crying.
;
but,
fissures in the chest cavity,
and pain to the point of paralysis,
all are real.
why. why so.
he smiled softly,
"just your illusion."
;
is it.
Nonfiction
One Spring Night
Queen:
There was a restless buzz in the hive when I woke. I could feel it. The two attendants who brought me my royal jelly looked everywhere but at my face. Even Zoral refused to speak to me. Zoral, who fed me through my pupation in the cocoon. Zoral, who taught me how to end the high-pitched whining that had filled my head when I emerged from my cell.
Yesterday came crashing down on me. My sisters! After three days in the cocoon, with my new wings folded in a cramped position, I managed to chew my way out. Then, the shrill whining had nearly driven me mad. They had been the ones making the noise. Stripe, Pence, and Heavy-tail. Stripe was already navigating the catacombs heading towards my cell. Heavy-tail lay dying by the side. Stripe had attacked me as soon as we met in the hallway and very nearly killed me. But my stinger found the softness of her belly first as she tried to bite off my wings. The whining kept ringing in my ear, and only after I had stung Pence, who was still pupating in her cocoon, did I realize the shrill was coming from my mouth. Zoral, who had whipped me up to a frenzy as Stripe approached, stood to the side, watching me and smiling, her head slightly bowed in respect.
Drone:
Today is my last day in the hive. Last night, Mara had warned me that the workers were planning a kaban1 to chase all the drones away from the hive. They planned to cut down on food consumption, and we were deadweight.
Mara and I headed to the clearing just before the creek one last time. Hidden between two tree stumps was a smattering of hyacinths - a burst of color against the backdrop of grey barrenness of the now vanishing winter. The gentle wind rustling my antennae reminded me of many long nights spent here with Mara, talking about the hive, the Kiez2, and what lay beyond. It was in this patch that Mara had waited anxiously after my first congregation3. But tonight, I won’t be coming back. I’ll never see this place again. I’ll never see Mara again. It’s too painful to think about what I’m saying bye to.
Mara is perched on a purple hyacinth, her wings fluttering. She doesn’t speak as I come near. She rarely talks, but that’s her beauty - a quiet companion. Today, tears are in her eyes, and my resolve shatters with my heart. I fly into her arms and weep for my childhood that is now gone, for the hive I would never see again, for Mara who will have to live without me, and for my life that is about to meet its end. Mara slowly pushes me away, places a purple petal on my spiracle, and then turns away.
I sit by myself for a while. Eight weeks and two congregations, and this is the end. The worker bees will cut off my wings and throw me out of the hive if I ever return, and that’s if I’m lucky. A chill runs through my antennas at the thought. It’s time to go. All the drones from the 38 Kiezs in the neighborhood will congregate above Spreebogenpark.
Queen:
The signs should have been plain to see, but when Zoral showed up at my cell with sixteen workers, their wings buzzing angrily, stingers out, I was still caught off-guard. There was no room for misunderstanding. A group of workers never show up to ask how you are doing or negotiate. I scrambled out using the back door, knocking down the sentinel worker bee. She cried out to the other workers, and soon, a swarm was chasing me through the corridors of the catacomb and out into the field, nipping at my hindlegs when they got close enough. The chase continued to Springfield, where they retreated suddenly as soon as I crossed the hive territory borders.
I’m panting from the exhaustion of flying so fast and for so long when I hear the leaves rustling in the silence and notice movement in the bushes. I freeze and am about to take flight when I notice the furry whiskers. It must be a rabbit, I think. I have never seen one before. There are so many things I haven’t seen. I can’t believe this is my first time outside the hive. The rabbit doesn’t notice me and bounds away in short, graceful leaps. A butterfly flutters to my right, flitting to and fro the snowdrops that are starting to bloom. Its movements are enrapturing, and its coat a carefully crafted pattern of intentional colors. And oh! The stream! Zoral had once described them to me, but nothing she said prepared me for the mighty whoosh with which it went about its business. The lush green that borders the stream on both sides speaks of wildness enshrined in delicacy.
I give into the draft of wind that encircles me, lifting me higher and higher while wrapping me in a hug that smells of a millennium of toil. Soon, I see the whole neighborhood sprawled beneath—my hood. I see the birds so free in the air, high above the problems of the world. I see foxes trotting through the bushes, oblivious to everything else. The pinpricks of light to the east must come from the human settlement—humans with their terror machines. I fly forward, weaving in and out of the tall buildings and the hooting sounds of cars.
My mind turns back to Zoral and the hive. What could have gone wrong? Was Zoral punishing me for what had happened with my sisters? But she had been the one who instructed me on what to do. Perhaps we could talk the issue through if I go back— whatever it was. I’m sure all of this is just a big mistake.
On the other hand, I don’t know when the next opportunity to leave the hive will come, and something about the trees calls me. Their sway in the wind makes me feel calm and collected. I will explore the city and then head back.
Drone:
The boys chatter and fill the whole area with the noise of their buzzing wings and never-ending conversations. None of them seems to realize what is bound to happen by the end of the night. This is not the attitude of bees about to face certain death. The ones who seek glory tonight will die in its blaze, and those who don’t will face even worse death - the slow and painful death of a hive outcast.
I need time to clear my head, get away from this noise, and prepare for what comes next. I nod to the young bee from the Nova hive and fly up. That’s when I see her.
Queen:
He has an aura to him. Something quiet and intriguing, the makings of one who could be a sage if his fate will allow. And oh, his scent! It reminds me of the smell of the hive after the rain. It makes me weak in the wings.
Drone:
She’s beautiful! In a curious, bursting-with-energy way. She’s graceful, too, in the way of a person who knows the presence they carry, whose every foot placement and every rustle of their wings are intentional. It is understandable why so many drones will die for her.
Queen:
I fly closer. So does he.
Drone:
Does she see? Does she know? This will kill me. But isn’t it worth it?
Queen:
I circle him.
Drone:
It’s a tantalizing dance, wings beating in sync.
Queen:
We fly high and fast, way above the rest of the congregation. For a moment, we are alone above the rest of the world.
Drone:
The city is laid bare before us—a diagram of the many things that can be but never will.
Queen:
He’s momentarily distracted but looks even more alluring with the sun glistening off his back.
Drone:
I watch her watch me. She’s irresistible. I’m glad that if I must go, I at least die in the consuming fire that’s my love for her.
Queen x Drone:
We collide in that ancient rhythm of delight that many before us have danced to.
Queen:
Red. That’s all I see. There’s a high-pitched ringing in my head that is driving me crazy. A swarm of drones is rising towards me, but I can’t think. My heart is heavy.
He’s gone, and it’s all because of me. I saw his eyes glaze, the intelligence escaping with his last breath, carried on in the mist. His body plummeted to the ground with a million pieces of my broken heart.
A blur, that’s what the drones see as I fly at them, beating and slashing at anyone unlucky enough to fall in my path. I’m half hoping that someone - anyone - will retaliate and kill me. But they scatter instead, confused.
I fly past them, heading home. This is what the workers sent me to. To Kill! I hope they’re happy now.
Zoral:
I made a mistake. Choosing a full sister4 as a queen candidate is always risky business, and I overextended my hand for this little brat. When I chose her egg to continue to be fed the royal jelly after the queen died two weeks ago, I thought she would follow in the steps of our mother. I watched over her, increasing her royal jelly portion and closing her cell personally when she began to cocoon. I even helped her chew her way out of the cocoon when Stripe and Heavy-tail emerged first. They would have killed her without me. And yet, she repays me by refusing her duties as the queen. The spy worker bee I sent as the young queen’s tail reported that she had mated with only one drone and attacked the rest. How could she? Who will lay the eggs for the hive? Should the legacy of the Kiez die off because a queen found love? But now she must pay for it. As the Mother Nurse Bee, I already selected another brood of 5 bees for the nurse bees to begin serving the royal jelly. Surely, the hive will survive a few days without a queen.
Queen:
The swarm of worker bees came out of nowhere like a stream that suddenly found purchase. Zoral hovered at the helm of the group as they fanned out in a half-crescent formation around me, blocking my path. It signaled their intentions: their face would be the last I see.
The fight in me dies. I’m too broken to turn and flee. Too tired to stand and fight. I’m afraid of dying, but I have no will anymore. Somehow, they know. They know I mated with only one drone and rejected the others. They know I can’t lay many eggs without sperm to fertilize them, and so they’ll kill me. There’ll be no second chances. As if on cue, Zoral steps forward, plucks a tuft of hair from her abdomen, and scatters it into the air. It is the same ritual done at the burial of a queen. That must have been her signal as the rest of the workers rushed forward as one to attack me.
As the mandible of the first bee clasps around my wings while the other bee holds me steady, I can’t help but think about the egg they may already be feeding with royal jelly, preparing to become queen. She must also fight for the crown, killing her sisters and anyone in her way. She’ll never find love, and if she does, he’ll die before her very eyes. All as a sacrifice for the hive to stay alive. For her sake, I hope it is all worth it.
Honeybees operate on a caste system. There are the worker bees who are responsible for the day-to-day operations of the hive, the drones who are solely responsible for mating with the queen bee, and then the queen bee herself. Within this system is a lot of incredulous, theatre-worthy drama. The first is that there can only be one queen bee. All female larvae have the potential to be the queen bee. However, the worker bees select a few (say 10 to 20) as potential queens and keep feeding these eggs/larvae a special meal called the ‘royal jelly.’ The larvae go on to pupate, wrap themselves in a cocoon, and, after some time, develop into adult bees and chew themselves out of the cocoon. However, as we said, there can only be one queen bee. And so the first bee to emerge from the cocoon hunts down all the other potentials and kills them (by stinging). These potential queens find each other by ‘piping’ to each other. So an emerged queen will release a high-pitched sound, and all the other potentials must pipe back, even those who haven’t emerged from their cocoon—crazy stuff. If multiple have already emerged, they will fight to the death with each other until only one survives to be crowned queen. If the former queen remains alive, the new queen must also kill her (a process called supersedure).
The new queen remains in the hive for a few days (5 - 8 days) before the worker bees start chasing her around, nipping at her until she goes on her mating flight. The mating flight is the only time our new queen will leave the hive (except if the whole hive moves to a new location, an occurrence called ‘swarming’). Drones are the male bees. They have no role in the hive except to mate with a queen. During mating season, these drones hold a congregation where many drones from different hives gather together mid-air. The queen bee is attracted to their pheromones, and once she leaves the hive, she flies to such congregations. She goes to a congregation far from the hive to avoid mating with drones from her own brood. But the queen is not cheap, so she flies high and fast, ensuring that only the fittest drone catches up to her. Mid-air, they mate, and the drones that are unfortunate enough to catch up and mate die after the act. He falls straight to the ground, his endophallus ripped out from his body. Up to 10-12 drones will suffer this fate before the queen returns to her hive fully loaded with sperm in her sac and blood on her hands (metaphorically speaking). Once back in the hive, she settles into her lifelong mission of laying eggs. She produces different pheromones that control the behavior of the hive, causing the worker bees to feed and attend to her while repressing their reproductive behavior. The queen can also decide the sex of the eggs she lays, choosing to fertilize them (for a female larva that either becomes a worker or queen bee) or not to fertilize (for a male larva destined to be a drone bee). So she continues until she dies, goes missing, or becomes weak and old (leading to a new queen that would kill her).
As for the drones that do not manage to mate with the queen, they will also die. When they return to the hive, they will be kicked out (at some point, towards the end of the mating season). Their wings may be torn, and they will be abandoned, where they are easy prey for birds or starvation. The reason is that there is just not enough food for them, and they have no more purpose in the hive (they don’t work like the worker bees; they were just born to die mating with the queen). While all of these processes involving death and violence may seem ultra cruel, they are all necessary for the thriving of the hive. The worker bees cannot cater to two queens simultaneously, so only one must survive. The hive cannot support/feed drones, so they must die after fulfilling their purpose. Such is the way of nature.
Finally, if you are reading this piece in May or June, new queen bees are being born right now as you read this. They’ll fight and kill their sisters and possibly their mothers. Drones will literally die just to have sex with them, and they’ll resign to a long life of work, laying eggs. In less than a week, the youth of these bees will be spent in glory-seeking, and you get to live through all of it. These crazy, incredible stories happen everywhere around you, especially through spring and summer. Keep your eyes open - you never know what tale (not tail!) you might stumble upon.
There was a restless buzz in the hive when I woke. I could feel it. The two attendants who brought me my royal jelly looked everywhere but at my face. Even Zoral refused to speak to me. Zoral, who fed me through my pupation in the cocoon. Zoral, who taught me how to end the high-pitched whining that had filled my head when I emerged from my cell.
Yesterday came crashing down on me. My sisters! After three days in the cocoon, with my new wings folded in a cramped position, I managed to chew my way out. Then, the shrill whining had nearly driven me mad. They had been the ones making the noise. Stripe, Pence, and Heavy-tail. Stripe was already navigating the catacombs heading towards my cell. Heavy-tail lay dying by the side. Stripe had attacked me as soon as we met in the hallway and very nearly killed me. But my stinger found the softness of her belly first as she tried to bite off my wings. The whining kept ringing in my ear, and only after I had stung Pence, who was still pupating in her cocoon, did I realize the shrill was coming from my mouth. Zoral, who had whipped me up to a frenzy as Stripe approached, stood to the side, watching me and smiling, her head slightly bowed in respect.
Drone:
Today is my last day in the hive. Last night, Mara had warned me that the workers were planning a kaban1 to chase all the drones away from the hive. They planned to cut down on food consumption, and we were deadweight.
Mara and I headed to the clearing just before the creek one last time. Hidden between two tree stumps was a smattering of hyacinths - a burst of color against the backdrop of grey barrenness of the now vanishing winter. The gentle wind rustling my antennae reminded me of many long nights spent here with Mara, talking about the hive, the Kiez2, and what lay beyond. It was in this patch that Mara had waited anxiously after my first congregation3. But tonight, I won’t be coming back. I’ll never see this place again. I’ll never see Mara again. It’s too painful to think about what I’m saying bye to.
Mara is perched on a purple hyacinth, her wings fluttering. She doesn’t speak as I come near. She rarely talks, but that’s her beauty - a quiet companion. Today, tears are in her eyes, and my resolve shatters with my heart. I fly into her arms and weep for my childhood that is now gone, for the hive I would never see again, for Mara who will have to live without me, and for my life that is about to meet its end. Mara slowly pushes me away, places a purple petal on my spiracle, and then turns away.
I sit by myself for a while. Eight weeks and two congregations, and this is the end. The worker bees will cut off my wings and throw me out of the hive if I ever return, and that’s if I’m lucky. A chill runs through my antennas at the thought. It’s time to go. All the drones from the 38 Kiezs in the neighborhood will congregate above Spreebogenpark.
Queen:
The signs should have been plain to see, but when Zoral showed up at my cell with sixteen workers, their wings buzzing angrily, stingers out, I was still caught off-guard. There was no room for misunderstanding. A group of workers never show up to ask how you are doing or negotiate. I scrambled out using the back door, knocking down the sentinel worker bee. She cried out to the other workers, and soon, a swarm was chasing me through the corridors of the catacomb and out into the field, nipping at my hindlegs when they got close enough. The chase continued to Springfield, where they retreated suddenly as soon as I crossed the hive territory borders.
I’m panting from the exhaustion of flying so fast and for so long when I hear the leaves rustling in the silence and notice movement in the bushes. I freeze and am about to take flight when I notice the furry whiskers. It must be a rabbit, I think. I have never seen one before. There are so many things I haven’t seen. I can’t believe this is my first time outside the hive. The rabbit doesn’t notice me and bounds away in short, graceful leaps. A butterfly flutters to my right, flitting to and fro the snowdrops that are starting to bloom. Its movements are enrapturing, and its coat a carefully crafted pattern of intentional colors. And oh! The stream! Zoral had once described them to me, but nothing she said prepared me for the mighty whoosh with which it went about its business. The lush green that borders the stream on both sides speaks of wildness enshrined in delicacy.
I give into the draft of wind that encircles me, lifting me higher and higher while wrapping me in a hug that smells of a millennium of toil. Soon, I see the whole neighborhood sprawled beneath—my hood. I see the birds so free in the air, high above the problems of the world. I see foxes trotting through the bushes, oblivious to everything else. The pinpricks of light to the east must come from the human settlement—humans with their terror machines. I fly forward, weaving in and out of the tall buildings and the hooting sounds of cars.
My mind turns back to Zoral and the hive. What could have gone wrong? Was Zoral punishing me for what had happened with my sisters? But she had been the one who instructed me on what to do. Perhaps we could talk the issue through if I go back— whatever it was. I’m sure all of this is just a big mistake.
On the other hand, I don’t know when the next opportunity to leave the hive will come, and something about the trees calls me. Their sway in the wind makes me feel calm and collected. I will explore the city and then head back.
Drone:
The boys chatter and fill the whole area with the noise of their buzzing wings and never-ending conversations. None of them seems to realize what is bound to happen by the end of the night. This is not the attitude of bees about to face certain death. The ones who seek glory tonight will die in its blaze, and those who don’t will face even worse death - the slow and painful death of a hive outcast.
I need time to clear my head, get away from this noise, and prepare for what comes next. I nod to the young bee from the Nova hive and fly up. That’s when I see her.
Queen:
He has an aura to him. Something quiet and intriguing, the makings of one who could be a sage if his fate will allow. And oh, his scent! It reminds me of the smell of the hive after the rain. It makes me weak in the wings.
Drone:
She’s beautiful! In a curious, bursting-with-energy way. She’s graceful, too, in the way of a person who knows the presence they carry, whose every foot placement and every rustle of their wings are intentional. It is understandable why so many drones will die for her.
Queen:
I fly closer. So does he.
Drone:
Does she see? Does she know? This will kill me. But isn’t it worth it?
Queen:
I circle him.
Drone:
It’s a tantalizing dance, wings beating in sync.
Queen:
We fly high and fast, way above the rest of the congregation. For a moment, we are alone above the rest of the world.
Drone:
The city is laid bare before us—a diagram of the many things that can be but never will.
Queen:
He’s momentarily distracted but looks even more alluring with the sun glistening off his back.
Drone:
I watch her watch me. She’s irresistible. I’m glad that if I must go, I at least die in the consuming fire that’s my love for her.
Queen x Drone:
We collide in that ancient rhythm of delight that many before us have danced to.
Queen:
Red. That’s all I see. There’s a high-pitched ringing in my head that is driving me crazy. A swarm of drones is rising towards me, but I can’t think. My heart is heavy.
He’s gone, and it’s all because of me. I saw his eyes glaze, the intelligence escaping with his last breath, carried on in the mist. His body plummeted to the ground with a million pieces of my broken heart.
A blur, that’s what the drones see as I fly at them, beating and slashing at anyone unlucky enough to fall in my path. I’m half hoping that someone - anyone - will retaliate and kill me. But they scatter instead, confused.
I fly past them, heading home. This is what the workers sent me to. To Kill! I hope they’re happy now.
Zoral:
I made a mistake. Choosing a full sister4 as a queen candidate is always risky business, and I overextended my hand for this little brat. When I chose her egg to continue to be fed the royal jelly after the queen died two weeks ago, I thought she would follow in the steps of our mother. I watched over her, increasing her royal jelly portion and closing her cell personally when she began to cocoon. I even helped her chew her way out of the cocoon when Stripe and Heavy-tail emerged first. They would have killed her without me. And yet, she repays me by refusing her duties as the queen. The spy worker bee I sent as the young queen’s tail reported that she had mated with only one drone and attacked the rest. How could she? Who will lay the eggs for the hive? Should the legacy of the Kiez die off because a queen found love? But now she must pay for it. As the Mother Nurse Bee, I already selected another brood of 5 bees for the nurse bees to begin serving the royal jelly. Surely, the hive will survive a few days without a queen.
Queen:
The swarm of worker bees came out of nowhere like a stream that suddenly found purchase. Zoral hovered at the helm of the group as they fanned out in a half-crescent formation around me, blocking my path. It signaled their intentions: their face would be the last I see.
The fight in me dies. I’m too broken to turn and flee. Too tired to stand and fight. I’m afraid of dying, but I have no will anymore. Somehow, they know. They know I mated with only one drone and rejected the others. They know I can’t lay many eggs without sperm to fertilize them, and so they’ll kill me. There’ll be no second chances. As if on cue, Zoral steps forward, plucks a tuft of hair from her abdomen, and scatters it into the air. It is the same ritual done at the burial of a queen. That must have been her signal as the rest of the workers rushed forward as one to attack me.
As the mandible of the first bee clasps around my wings while the other bee holds me steady, I can’t help but think about the egg they may already be feeding with royal jelly, preparing to become queen. She must also fight for the crown, killing her sisters and anyone in her way. She’ll never find love, and if she does, he’ll die before her very eyes. All as a sacrifice for the hive to stay alive. For her sake, I hope it is all worth it.
**** Commentary ***
Honeybees operate on a caste system. There are the worker bees who are responsible for the day-to-day operations of the hive, the drones who are solely responsible for mating with the queen bee, and then the queen bee herself. Within this system is a lot of incredulous, theatre-worthy drama. The first is that there can only be one queen bee. All female larvae have the potential to be the queen bee. However, the worker bees select a few (say 10 to 20) as potential queens and keep feeding these eggs/larvae a special meal called the ‘royal jelly.’ The larvae go on to pupate, wrap themselves in a cocoon, and, after some time, develop into adult bees and chew themselves out of the cocoon. However, as we said, there can only be one queen bee. And so the first bee to emerge from the cocoon hunts down all the other potentials and kills them (by stinging). These potential queens find each other by ‘piping’ to each other. So an emerged queen will release a high-pitched sound, and all the other potentials must pipe back, even those who haven’t emerged from their cocoon—crazy stuff. If multiple have already emerged, they will fight to the death with each other until only one survives to be crowned queen. If the former queen remains alive, the new queen must also kill her (a process called supersedure).
The new queen remains in the hive for a few days (5 - 8 days) before the worker bees start chasing her around, nipping at her until she goes on her mating flight. The mating flight is the only time our new queen will leave the hive (except if the whole hive moves to a new location, an occurrence called ‘swarming’). Drones are the male bees. They have no role in the hive except to mate with a queen. During mating season, these drones hold a congregation where many drones from different hives gather together mid-air. The queen bee is attracted to their pheromones, and once she leaves the hive, she flies to such congregations. She goes to a congregation far from the hive to avoid mating with drones from her own brood. But the queen is not cheap, so she flies high and fast, ensuring that only the fittest drone catches up to her. Mid-air, they mate, and the drones that are unfortunate enough to catch up and mate die after the act. He falls straight to the ground, his endophallus ripped out from his body. Up to 10-12 drones will suffer this fate before the queen returns to her hive fully loaded with sperm in her sac and blood on her hands (metaphorically speaking). Once back in the hive, she settles into her lifelong mission of laying eggs. She produces different pheromones that control the behavior of the hive, causing the worker bees to feed and attend to her while repressing their reproductive behavior. The queen can also decide the sex of the eggs she lays, choosing to fertilize them (for a female larva that either becomes a worker or queen bee) or not to fertilize (for a male larva destined to be a drone bee). So she continues until she dies, goes missing, or becomes weak and old (leading to a new queen that would kill her).
As for the drones that do not manage to mate with the queen, they will also die. When they return to the hive, they will be kicked out (at some point, towards the end of the mating season). Their wings may be torn, and they will be abandoned, where they are easy prey for birds or starvation. The reason is that there is just not enough food for them, and they have no more purpose in the hive (they don’t work like the worker bees; they were just born to die mating with the queen). While all of these processes involving death and violence may seem ultra cruel, they are all necessary for the thriving of the hive. The worker bees cannot cater to two queens simultaneously, so only one must survive. The hive cannot support/feed drones, so they must die after fulfilling their purpose. Such is the way of nature.
Finally, if you are reading this piece in May or June, new queen bees are being born right now as you read this. They’ll fight and kill their sisters and possibly their mothers. Drones will literally die just to have sex with them, and they’ll resign to a long life of work, laying eggs. In less than a week, the youth of these bees will be spent in glory-seeking, and you get to live through all of it. These crazy, incredible stories happen everywhere around you, especially through spring and summer. Keep your eyes open - you never know what tale (not tail!) you might stumble upon.
1 Kaban: An event where some residents of a hive are chased out (not a real word).
2 Kiez - neighborhood
3 Congregation - A gathering of drones to mate with the queen bee.
4 Full sister: Two bees are full sisters if they are fertilized from sperm of the same drone by the queen bee.
2 Kiez - neighborhood
3 Congregation - A gathering of drones to mate with the queen bee.
4 Full sister: Two bees are full sisters if they are fertilized from sperm of the same drone by the queen bee.
Poetry
Hey God, it’s me, humanity
24/7
I feel torn,
24/7
I feel wrong,
24/7
Ttime’s ticking,
24/7
I’m not doing
anything.
anything useful,
anything purposeful,
anything helpful
for our nature,
or even humanity’s nurture.
24/7
Why am I here?
24/7
Why do I breathe?
24/7
I want to scream,
but I’m left speechless,
stuck in time,
like Sisyphus uphill,
forced to move,
but never to fulfill
the task.
The crime
humanity commits onto each other
knows no limit,
I’m in its bind.
My generation seems lost,
we need “an adult”
to tell us what’s wrong.
But then we hear some of them speak
and realize that no,
this is not the authority we seek.
Is this the reason
why people choose faith?
Because no one listens
to what they have to say?
And so they pray,
hoping there’s someone above
who can hear them out
and maybe grant them
some reassurance
they’ve been craving thus far.
We all need guidance
that no one living is able to provide.
We want to rely
on some rules
to know what’s right
and what’s wrong;
but all the rules
I’ve known so far
were more than biased,
sometimes misused,
and just
weren’t right.
So tell me, God,
are you for real
or are you just a fraud
trying to steal
the last piece of humanity I got?
Are you my guide
or merely here just to soothe
my conscience
that’s trying to justify
the wrongdoings I keep seeing around me.
Please, God,
don’t make me carry
the weight of responsibility
for my own beliefs.
It’s way too heavy
and my back is bent
underneath the crimes
that would fall on my head,
were I to admit
that my beliefs
were complicit
in someone’s death.
Please, God,
I’m just a human
and tend to believe in
what I’ve been taught;
even when I know
it’s somewhat wrong.
Please, God,
they say I cannot question you.
Tell me why.
Are you scared I’d find out
that you can be wrong too?
I feel torn,
24/7
I feel wrong,
24/7
Ttime’s ticking,
24/7
I’m not doing
anything.
anything useful,
anything purposeful,
anything helpful
for our nature,
or even humanity’s nurture.
24/7
Why am I here?
24/7
Why do I breathe?
24/7
I want to scream,
but I’m left speechless,
stuck in time,
like Sisyphus uphill,
forced to move,
but never to fulfill
the task.
The crime
humanity commits onto each other
knows no limit,
I’m in its bind.
My generation seems lost,
we need “an adult”
to tell us what’s wrong.
But then we hear some of them speak
and realize that no,
this is not the authority we seek.
Is this the reason
why people choose faith?
Because no one listens
to what they have to say?
And so they pray,
hoping there’s someone above
who can hear them out
and maybe grant them
some reassurance
they’ve been craving thus far.
We all need guidance
that no one living is able to provide.
We want to rely
on some rules
to know what’s right
and what’s wrong;
but all the rules
I’ve known so far
were more than biased,
sometimes misused,
and just
weren’t right.
So tell me, God,
are you for real
or are you just a fraud
trying to steal
the last piece of humanity I got?
Are you my guide
or merely here just to soothe
my conscience
that’s trying to justify
the wrongdoings I keep seeing around me.
Please, God,
don’t make me carry
the weight of responsibility
for my own beliefs.
It’s way too heavy
and my back is bent
underneath the crimes
that would fall on my head,
were I to admit
that my beliefs
were complicit
in someone’s death.
Please, God,
I’m just a human
and tend to believe in
what I’ve been taught;
even when I know
it’s somewhat wrong.
Please, God,
they say I cannot question you.
Tell me why.
Are you scared I’d find out
that you can be wrong too?
Poetry
Feeling
I have a dream
to be a bit
resilient,
flexible,
productive.
And maybe a little less
reactive,
emotional;
a depressed mess.
Yet, I am not.
I do feel lost
in this world
where you are expected
to know your purpose,
your life projects,
your mission statements.
And then sell them
to attract customers,
to earn a living.
And yet we are told
that sex work is bad
But why?
Who defined it that way?
Why is it okay to sell your soul?
we would hear
the cry
of the child
inside us
that carried too much weight
for too long,
handcuffed by social norms.
We’ve been told we’re wrong
before we even spoke.
First memorizing facts about the world
only to realize we know nothing at all
about the place we call our home,
Do you ever want to get into a spaceship
and leave this world?
I don’t.
I’m terrified of loneliness,
darkness,
and confined spaces.
I am not the perfect human
that is needed
to be shot out
of the atmosphere
of hate and greed,
of superficiality,
of addiction to power,
and control.
Do you also fear
losing control?
Would life then feel too real?
I don’t know.
I feel lost.
what that even means.
I just know
how it’s supposed to feel.
Is that enough though?
Would I ever feel found
in the world
built on creating unmet desires
and spurring greed?
It helps to handle
this world and its burden.
So we just numb ourselves
to survive long enough
to not die young.
to be a bit
resilient,
flexible,
productive.
And maybe a little less
reactive,
emotional;
a depressed mess.
Yet, I am not.
I do feel lost
in this world
where you are expected
to know your purpose,
your life projects,
your mission statements.
And then sell them
to attract customers,
to earn a living.
I am a human being,
not a product to be sold.
not a product to be sold.
And yet we are told
that sex work is bad
But why?
Who defined it that way?
Why is it okay to sell your soul?
But don’t you dare
trade your body
for the money,
you dirty wh*re.
Maybe if we’d slow down,trade your body
for the money,
you dirty wh*re.
we would hear
the cry
of the child
inside us
that carried too much weight
for too long,
handcuffed by social norms.
We’ve been told we’re wrong
before we even spoke.
First memorizing facts about the world
only to realize we know nothing at all
about the place we call our home,
Do you ever want to get into a spaceship
and leave this world?
I don’t.
I’m terrified of loneliness,
darkness,
and confined spaces.
I am not the perfect human
that is needed
to be shot out
of the atmosphere
of hate and greed,
of superficiality,
of addiction to power,
and control.
Do you also fear
losing control?
Would life then feel too real?
I don’t know.
I feel lost.
I need to build my own home.
Yet, I still don’t knowwhat that even means.
I just know
how it’s supposed to feel.
Is that enough though?
Would I ever feel found
in the world
built on creating unmet desires
and spurring greed?
“Rest is what you need,
come on, get some weed.”
come on, get some weed.”
It helps to handle
this world and its burden.
So we just numb ourselves
to survive long enough
to not die young.
Art
The I of the Eclipse
Poetry
Line/Linia/Linea/Linie
there is a thin
thin line
between the english word anger
and the german word “angst”
there is an even thinner line between the polish words “złość” and “strach”
there is a multiplication of lines protecting
the delicate, fragile balance of all words ever created
how would you ever know, what anything means?
you were taught
you were told
powiedziano ci coś
ale czy coś wiesz?
erzhäl mir von
notti in cui non riesci a dormire
you were told, but what do you “know”
the line, the thin thin line between italian sentence
“cosa ti piace”?
and polish “czemu ty płaczesz”?
i learned so long
und ich habe verstanden
aber what?
nic nie rozumiem
potersi ripetere
when i look at you
there is only the line between your—eyes—and—my—eyes
no language
nie mówię po polsku
i can’t speak english
non parlo italiano
ich spreche kein deutsch
when your eyes meet my eyes
the thinnest lines become thinner
thin line
between the english word anger
and the german word “angst”
there is an even thinner line between the polish words “złość” and “strach”
there is a multiplication of lines protecting
the delicate, fragile balance of all words ever created
how would you ever know, what anything means?
you were taught
you were told
powiedziano ci coś
ale czy coś wiesz?
erzhäl mir von
notti in cui non riesci a dormire
you were told, but what do you “know”
the line, the thin thin line between italian sentence
“cosa ti piace”?
and polish “czemu ty płaczesz”?
i learned so long
und ich habe verstanden
aber what?
nic nie rozumiem
potersi ripetere
when i look at you
there is only the line between your—eyes—and—my—eyes
no language
nie mówię po polsku
i can’t speak english
non parlo italiano
ich spreche kein deutsch
when your eyes meet my eyes
the thinnest lines become thinner
Poetry
the nature of leaving again
four postcards scattered around the walls
scattered
around
the walls
of my childhood bedroom
all my visible proof that I have left and left again
measurable number of sunsets
until the smell of air will change again
and I will be saved once again by your desperate hug
my only real proof
my nature of leaving again
three sweaters holding the ocean breeze between the knits
slowly replaced by the sweet sound of bees
visiting green fields beside my old house
wondering where you sleep this night
two empty hands covered with warm kisses of the sun
one promise
your nature of not saying “goodbye”
scattered
around
the walls
of my childhood bedroom
all my visible proof that I have left and left again
measurable number of sunsets
until the smell of air will change again
and I will be saved once again by your desperate hug
my only real proof
my nature of leaving again
three sweaters holding the ocean breeze between the knits
slowly replaced by the sweet sound of bees
visiting green fields beside my old house
wondering where you sleep this night
two empty hands covered with warm kisses of the sun
one promise
your nature of not saying “goodbye”
Poetry
furring out
I was five chasing you around the garden
picking up green sour apples bruised on one side
I was seven splashing water in a tiny yellow pool
holding your paw like my best friend
I was twelve and did not care
rejecting all invitations from your eyes
I was fourteen learning how to walk again
healing with your head on my wounds
I was sixteen fighting for my dream
crossing the ocean but you remembered my smell
I was eighteen holding you during storm
knowing you can’t see my face
I was nineteen and you were gone
crying because you died when I was away
picking up green sour apples bruised on one side
I was seven splashing water in a tiny yellow pool
holding your paw like my best friend
I was twelve and did not care
rejecting all invitations from your eyes
I was fourteen learning how to walk again
healing with your head on my wounds
I was sixteen fighting for my dream
crossing the ocean but you remembered my smell
I was eighteen holding you during storm
knowing you can’t see my face
I was nineteen and you were gone
crying because you died when I was away
Poetry
animals of the last kind*
* Winner of the “Climate Week Poetry Writing Competition” 2024, organized by Writing Peer Tutors.
thorns thorn through old fabric
leaves show their pale faces between the rusty metal wires
birds with their chemically infused breath
and squishy high note split in two
by sharp dirty glass
from a broken window
slower, slower my heart is still beating
slower, slower
white powder, since your lips never felt
the spiking pain of freezing water falling from the puffy skies
lizards crawling between the rotten ribs
of the last animal of the last kind
choked on soft tissue of plastic
slower, slower my heart is still beating
slower slower
warm nights disturbed by loud cry of strom
empty sound of thunder stabbing the
darkness of the morning
that never came
slower, slower it does not matter
we die like animals, animals of the last kind
thorns thorn through old fabric
leaves show their pale faces between the rusty metal wires
birds with their chemically infused breath
and squishy high note split in two
by sharp dirty glass
from a broken window
slower, slower my heart is still beating
slower, slower
white powder, since your lips never felt
the spiking pain of freezing water falling from the puffy skies
lizards crawling between the rotten ribs
of the last animal of the last kind
choked on soft tissue of plastic
slower, slower my heart is still beating
slower slower
warm nights disturbed by loud cry of strom
empty sound of thunder stabbing the
darkness of the morning
that never came
slower, slower it does not matter
we die like animals, animals of the last kind
Nonfiction
Grains and Grapes
In an ocean of sensations, we are trapped in the Freedom of the seasons.
After a tiring day at work, there was nothing more than calluses on my soft hands. You loved them, kissing them because you knew that from them would come the wheat for our bread, and the grapes for our wine.
Have you ever asked yourself why you cannot stand still with your feelings the way they are? It seems as though something is off and is not right. In a monoculture, only one crop is produced during the whole year. When stuck in the same old patterns, we have the same fate as the monoculture. Our soils eventually break down, and pesticides and chemicals are consequently needed. But why do we need a monoculture in the first place?
After my third year at university, I still do not know what life wants from me and what I should give her back. I am trapped in this cycle of producing value and being happy. Or at least pretending to be happy enough so that others trust me to produce value for them. But if education is the water with which we irrigate the seed, how are we certain that the plant will flourish if the soil is already depleted? To flourish, we also need several amino acids, minerals, and vitamins that are not provided by one single plant or organism. The resistance of success demands the surrender to diversity.
Positivity is a growth factor for plants – widely overused as a chemical in monoculture crops. It is sold to us as a groundbreaker for a copious harvest, but what we produce is chronic sadness and alienation. Depression and anxiety are the co-results of an industrial revolution that successfully produced its own reserve army of labor. Pills and diagnostics are the solution to our despair. Brand-new psychiatric and cognitive impairments tag us because we were unable to fight a war that was not ours in the beginning. We could not fit in. It may seem contradictory that happiness is the norm and sadness is the result. But in this logic, nothing is by chance. Monoculture is profitable, resultful, and impactful. But monoculture does not rest. It does not question its existence. It does not allow bugs. It takes chemicals and keeps working soullessly. Until one day, the soil that sustains it can not hold it anymore. It is dead if it already wasn’t before.
Byung-Chul Han has already made it clear we are a performance-obsessed society. The discipline was replaced by positivity. Unhappiness is not allowed; otherwise, you become in need of urgent treatment. The categorical imperative is replaced by the order imperative. We became foremen and henchmen of our subjectivity, producing and consuming in a never-ending pattern. We have solutions for problems yet to exist.
There is non-stop information, content, and distractions everywhere. Our attention is broken, torn apart. Multitasking is the way. Resting is for the weak, and no weak are allowed. In the end, emotions are not truly experienced, but an existential void is created to obviate confronting our mind. Sadness is guilt, and joy is insufficient. Prevented from embracing negativity, we are left with chronic despair and misery. Reality is distorted and the indulgence of having a manifold variety of feelings is bypassed. In the sea of our lives, our waves are being prevented from destroying the rocks that contain us. We can only harvest sweet fruits from the bitterness of the growth.
One needs courage to live. Farmers’ resilience creates a polyculture. We can still survive this dangerous race for value if, instead of running against time, we walk alongside it. Instead of producing non-stop, we inquire for more quality time with friends, family, and ourselves. Observing any ecosystem, we see diverse species intertwined with each other. In the milpa – or three-sisters –, corn, squash, and beans are grown together. Learning from nature, Mesoamerican pre-Colombians saw that this combination yields more than when planted separately. The corn provided support for beans, squash covered the soil and the beans’ bacteria fixated nitrogen that helped everyone in its interconnected root system. The whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Synergic behavior can be seen everywhere, from the altruistic, reciprocal, and interdependent, to the mutualist of our connections. However, we easily forget how to do so. Not because of our nature but our condition. Then we need to remember that a good harvest requires sharing space, soil, and resources. I do not want to survive, but I want to live. Life with dignity. Their greed is the cause of their death and forgetfulness.
One day I will realize my roots need to be deep, but not so deep, so there is space for others to coexist. The care of my neighbors is sufficient for me to thrive, so I make sure to in turn care for them. And only then can we knead our bread and ferment our wine in our ancestors’ land.
After a tiring day at work, there was nothing more than calluses on my soft hands. You loved them, kissing them because you knew that from them would come the wheat for our bread, and the grapes for our wine.
Have you ever asked yourself why you cannot stand still with your feelings the way they are? It seems as though something is off and is not right. In a monoculture, only one crop is produced during the whole year. When stuck in the same old patterns, we have the same fate as the monoculture. Our soils eventually break down, and pesticides and chemicals are consequently needed. But why do we need a monoculture in the first place?
After my third year at university, I still do not know what life wants from me and what I should give her back. I am trapped in this cycle of producing value and being happy. Or at least pretending to be happy enough so that others trust me to produce value for them. But if education is the water with which we irrigate the seed, how are we certain that the plant will flourish if the soil is already depleted? To flourish, we also need several amino acids, minerals, and vitamins that are not provided by one single plant or organism. The resistance of success demands the surrender to diversity.
Positivity is a growth factor for plants – widely overused as a chemical in monoculture crops. It is sold to us as a groundbreaker for a copious harvest, but what we produce is chronic sadness and alienation. Depression and anxiety are the co-results of an industrial revolution that successfully produced its own reserve army of labor. Pills and diagnostics are the solution to our despair. Brand-new psychiatric and cognitive impairments tag us because we were unable to fight a war that was not ours in the beginning. We could not fit in. It may seem contradictory that happiness is the norm and sadness is the result. But in this logic, nothing is by chance. Monoculture is profitable, resultful, and impactful. But monoculture does not rest. It does not question its existence. It does not allow bugs. It takes chemicals and keeps working soullessly. Until one day, the soil that sustains it can not hold it anymore. It is dead if it already wasn’t before.
Byung-Chul Han has already made it clear we are a performance-obsessed society. The discipline was replaced by positivity. Unhappiness is not allowed; otherwise, you become in need of urgent treatment. The categorical imperative is replaced by the order imperative. We became foremen and henchmen of our subjectivity, producing and consuming in a never-ending pattern. We have solutions for problems yet to exist.
There is non-stop information, content, and distractions everywhere. Our attention is broken, torn apart. Multitasking is the way. Resting is for the weak, and no weak are allowed. In the end, emotions are not truly experienced, but an existential void is created to obviate confronting our mind. Sadness is guilt, and joy is insufficient. Prevented from embracing negativity, we are left with chronic despair and misery. Reality is distorted and the indulgence of having a manifold variety of feelings is bypassed. In the sea of our lives, our waves are being prevented from destroying the rocks that contain us. We can only harvest sweet fruits from the bitterness of the growth.
One needs courage to live. Farmers’ resilience creates a polyculture. We can still survive this dangerous race for value if, instead of running against time, we walk alongside it. Instead of producing non-stop, we inquire for more quality time with friends, family, and ourselves. Observing any ecosystem, we see diverse species intertwined with each other. In the milpa – or three-sisters –, corn, squash, and beans are grown together. Learning from nature, Mesoamerican pre-Colombians saw that this combination yields more than when planted separately. The corn provided support for beans, squash covered the soil and the beans’ bacteria fixated nitrogen that helped everyone in its interconnected root system. The whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Synergic behavior can be seen everywhere, from the altruistic, reciprocal, and interdependent, to the mutualist of our connections. However, we easily forget how to do so. Not because of our nature but our condition. Then we need to remember that a good harvest requires sharing space, soil, and resources. I do not want to survive, but I want to live. Life with dignity. Their greed is the cause of their death and forgetfulness.
One day I will realize my roots need to be deep, but not so deep, so there is space for others to coexist. The care of my neighbors is sufficient for me to thrive, so I make sure to in turn care for them. And only then can we knead our bread and ferment our wine in our ancestors’ land.
Nonfiction
ALL MY SELVES
All of my selves are sitting on a balcony, passing around a joint.
There’s San Francisco, Berlin, Nairobi, Buenos Aires, Hyderabad, and Dallas.
Dallas summoned them. She takes a hit.
“Nice to see you again,” she says to Berlin. “You’re the one we never talk about.”
Berlin tucks her red hair behind her ears. She smells like vanilla-scented candles and freshly-baked frozen pizza. Her toes are frozen and she’s drunk off cheap apple-flavored vodka and the chaos of a first queer lover. She thinks every night will be as perfect as the night she watched Sauti Sol perform in Berlin. She’s so cute, she’s so dumb.
“Because I gained some relationship weight?”
“Naah bitch, you were never in a relationship!” Nairobi shouts. Hyderabad chuckles in the corner.
“Well, actually…” Berlin starts.
“Come on, babe. Come on.” Buenos Aires says softly.
Berlin hesitates, before dropping her shoulders. She gets it. She thinks she’s happy but she’s making questionable emotional choices, starting a domino effect of broken connections she can’t see yet. At least she’s alive though. She’s here. She’s going to sex clubs and shit. Berlin is watching this nomadic life, this promised land, finally start to happen.
“Y’all can’t blame Berlin too much, you know?” SF chimes in.
SF is wearing a hollow girl’s body with shifty eyes. She’s a patchwork, remembering how to breathe after trying to die, trying hard to stay alive. She’s putting together a solid list of things to keep living for, ways to keep fighting the assassin in her head. She’s leaning on everything and everyone she has. SF is fighting to leave and make it to Berlin, where she doesn’t have to watch shootings from her bathroom window. SF has something to prove, that she’s worthy. Of a second life, a second shot at this college thing, a second shot at queer love, a second shot at friendship, a second city. SF is thirsty for a do-over.
“All these selves are…do-overs.” This occurs to Dallas.
“Lazarus syndrome? Isn’t that too basic?” Dallas asks, disgusted.
“Uhm, we were raised in the church??? You know we love a good clean slate, nice little rebirth story,” Nairobi deadpans.
Nairobi is snarky, ill-tempered, and dangerously close to SF’s tipping point. She’s sworn not to return to Nairobi next summer. She’s heartbroken, she’s lonely, she’s frustrated, and she lives in her mother’s house. Nairobi is slicing off chunks of her identity to survive living in that house. She’s worn out from defending her identity, she feels like a child again, powerless, helpless. She’s remembering why she flew halfway across the world for a silly little degree. Nairobi can’t envision a Dallas self who voluntarily visits a church with her summer hosts. Nairobi gags. She hates the visceral feeling the memory of being forced to go to church evokes. Instead, she distracts herself chipping away at the encrusted paint underneath her stained fingernails. She spends a long time painting that summer.
“It makes sense to me though. I mean, we keep going to different places, so it makes sense to become different people,” Buenos Aires declares.
Buenos Aires is dangling a cigarette in one hand and a chilled glass of cheap box wine. Her palms are bruised from holding on tight to the rope by which her mental health dangles. She’s carrying out a consistent workout routine for a behavior change program assignment. She’s destroying her lungs but she’s shaking her ass often to reggaeton in clubs which is a healing ritual. Buenos Aires has made local friends to watch the world cup with. Buenos Aires has the highest gpa in our academic history. Mum and Dad love her. I mean, she’s a podcaster, and she went skydiving! Buenos Aires is shamelessly brave. We summoned her, and she came. When BA talks, all my selves listen.
“Thanks for being here,” Nairobi says softly. She takes a drag. Passes the joint to BA.
“Anything for you,” BA coos. Nairobi rolls her eyes back. All the selves laugh. Nairobi is so prickly. But you have to be prickly to survive Nairobi as a soft bag of flesh. Some people wear armor to protect themselves in Nairobi. Money, sex, power, drugs. Some people grow thorns and become prickly. It’s cheaper. You just need enough anger and sadness.
“You know I had a shit time too, right?” BA says. Hyderabad stirs in her cushion on the floor.
“Did someone say a shit time?” She asks, yawning and stretching like a cat from a nap. Her hair is a chameleon, a transition between multiple colors. She smells like Vick’s vapor rub and ginger cookies. She spends a lot of time in bed, fighting the assassin and contemplating the meaning of home, love, and family. She barely makes it to class on a good day. She took an expensive, innovative electromagnetic depression treatment but the assassin is still lurking. And she can’t leave her queerness packed in the suitcase if she goes home because her mother might go through her things again, and then what?
“Yeah, you had a rough time. I like how you handled many things, though. You had…optimism. Drive. Strength. Grit. All things I am searching for here, but I can’t find in myself,” Hyderabad says.
The selves nod slowly. BA passes Hyderabad some wine.
“This is some good stuff. I know I used to make fun of the high sugar content but I miss this cheap nice wine.” Hyderabad admits.
“Ayo, you got into yoga?” Berlin interrupts, eyeing Hyderabad incredulously. Unrelated. We aren’t surprised. We know how randomly the thought trains stop abruptly in our head, how they change course, how often they collide, how difficult it is sometimes to trace the origin of a thought.
“Yeah, I did! I was stretching and lengthening, all of that!” Hyd says. “Also, I did a brief stint on YouTube as a food vlogger. And, I connected with some queer Africans in the diaspora!”
“To trying new things!” Dallas yells.
“See who thinks they’re an adult now because they went to a strip club,” SF jeers. There’s a slight, playful twinkle in her dead eyes. All my selves turn first towards SF, then to Dallas. If Dallas hadn’t tanned so much, she probably would be turning red.
“I know you’re just jealous,” Dallas counters, lowering her voice and meeting the twinkle with a smug smile.
“Oh my God, just tell us about it!” Hyderabad begs, inching closer to Dallas and sitting at her feet.
“Naah, in fact, let’s get down to business.” Dallas asserts. She sits up straight. “I called you here for a reason. I called you because I was drowning and I wanted to know how you kept swimming to the other end of the pool. Sometimes I’m swimming but the end of the pool keeps shifting, even though I know there is an end and it’s coming. I want to get better at swimming to the end of the pool.”
San Francisco hits the joint. She remembers the sound of sand crunching underneath her boots as she walked away from the beach, waving goodbye to the ocean before overdosing on her meds in her college dorm. She looks up at Dallas, who recreated and rewrote the beach memory with a lover this summer. There’s a silent thank you there, to SF for fighting enough to bring Dallas to the beach, and to Dallas for reframing our favorite place on earth. And to the unsung lover. And to the ocean. To all bodies of water.
Water.
All my selves are fluid like water.
“Maybe that can be it. Actual swimming.” BA chimes in.
“Say more…” Nairobi eggs on.
“The day I went swimming in Bellini, when I was still living in Palermo, at the height of the horrible shared living situation, the water just cleansed me. It can be spiritual. Or it can be practical. Or it can be recreational. Exercise. Hot water, freezing water. Didn’t matter. My body was just riding the waves. And when our dearest friend taught us to do handstands? When was a time before that when we had just….played? Had fun with our bodies like kids do?”
Dallas is following the suggestion. She has some experience with swimming. It’s the only recreational activity she can do here in the suburbs, and even then, only in the evening when the sun isn’t frying humans. Nairobi still doesn’t understand how the sun can set at 10 pm. Neither of the selves do, but Berlin would much prefer it to the freezing cold. She thinks these others are mad, honestly. Swimming? In this weather? She tucks a strand of red hair behind her head, reaches for a chocolate croissant, and moves closer to BA.
“I see what you are saying. I think it’s also a lesson in surrendering and riding the wave. This summer I have learned breath control and muscle control so I have a better understanding of how to move through water. Plus some kids taught me how to cannonball which was initially terrifying and then eventually fantastic. Though I’ll also say that sometimes I have gone to the pool and I hated it that day. What does that mean then? Is the pool not enough?” Dallas asks. She folds her knees to her chest, and looks up at BA.
In fact, all my selves are looking up at BA.
“What?” She exhales casually over the joint. SF reaches out and takes the joint.
“We are waiting for you to tell us! What if the pool isn’t enough?” SF is especially invested in the outcome of this conversation. SF is desperately looking for a reason that will be strong enough to fight if the assassin comes again. Or when the assassin comes again. She wants to know if keeping on fighting is worth it, or a waste of time and energy.
“Sweetie, I don’t have answers, only more experience.” BA says.
“More experience,” Nairobi rolls the phrase over in her mouth.
“More experience?” Berlin struggles.
“More experience.” Hyderabad sighs.
“More experience!” Dallas exclaims.
“More experience…with fighting the assassin?” SF asks.
“More experience with fighting the assassin. I have more experience. Each self has more experience. Different battleground, different characters, different missions, same goal. Defeat the assassin and collect gems along the way. Enjoy the battle. Or just fight it. Or just show up. Each self you see here has finished a level of the game. They have experience with the assassin, yes, but also they have more experience enjoying the alive moments, and collecting gems.” BA says.
All my selves are pondering the experience. We just got here, we have little experience. The battlegrounds are different externally, but there’s an eternal internal battle between my selves and the assassin. The more experience we have, the better we get at fighting. Or the more experiences we have, the better we feel about having stayed here this long before the assassin catches up.
“So if the pool isn’t enough we find something else. We build experience. Or we stick it out with the pool until it works. Something. Anything. Everything.” Dallas concludes.
All my selves nod quietly. They let their gazes wander to meaningless things around the balcony.
All my selves are passing a joint around. Dallas has called them here. Dallas is preparing to summon Taiwan and prep her for battle and joy. She wants the strength and wisdom of all the selves. And she can’t wait to sit down with the other selves someday soon and see how many more selves join the table.
There’s San Francisco, Berlin, Nairobi, Buenos Aires, Hyderabad, and Dallas.
Dallas summoned them. She takes a hit.
“Nice to see you again,” she says to Berlin. “You’re the one we never talk about.”
Berlin tucks her red hair behind her ears. She smells like vanilla-scented candles and freshly-baked frozen pizza. Her toes are frozen and she’s drunk off cheap apple-flavored vodka and the chaos of a first queer lover. She thinks every night will be as perfect as the night she watched Sauti Sol perform in Berlin. She’s so cute, she’s so dumb.
“Because I gained some relationship weight?”
“Naah bitch, you were never in a relationship!” Nairobi shouts. Hyderabad chuckles in the corner.
“Well, actually…” Berlin starts.
“Come on, babe. Come on.” Buenos Aires says softly.
Berlin hesitates, before dropping her shoulders. She gets it. She thinks she’s happy but she’s making questionable emotional choices, starting a domino effect of broken connections she can’t see yet. At least she’s alive though. She’s here. She’s going to sex clubs and shit. Berlin is watching this nomadic life, this promised land, finally start to happen.
“Y’all can’t blame Berlin too much, you know?” SF chimes in.
SF is wearing a hollow girl’s body with shifty eyes. She’s a patchwork, remembering how to breathe after trying to die, trying hard to stay alive. She’s putting together a solid list of things to keep living for, ways to keep fighting the assassin in her head. She’s leaning on everything and everyone she has. SF is fighting to leave and make it to Berlin, where she doesn’t have to watch shootings from her bathroom window. SF has something to prove, that she’s worthy. Of a second life, a second shot at this college thing, a second shot at queer love, a second shot at friendship, a second city. SF is thirsty for a do-over.
“All these selves are…do-overs.” This occurs to Dallas.
“Lazarus syndrome? Isn’t that too basic?” Dallas asks, disgusted.
“Uhm, we were raised in the church??? You know we love a good clean slate, nice little rebirth story,” Nairobi deadpans.
Nairobi is snarky, ill-tempered, and dangerously close to SF’s tipping point. She’s sworn not to return to Nairobi next summer. She’s heartbroken, she’s lonely, she’s frustrated, and she lives in her mother’s house. Nairobi is slicing off chunks of her identity to survive living in that house. She’s worn out from defending her identity, she feels like a child again, powerless, helpless. She’s remembering why she flew halfway across the world for a silly little degree. Nairobi can’t envision a Dallas self who voluntarily visits a church with her summer hosts. Nairobi gags. She hates the visceral feeling the memory of being forced to go to church evokes. Instead, she distracts herself chipping away at the encrusted paint underneath her stained fingernails. She spends a long time painting that summer.
“It makes sense to me though. I mean, we keep going to different places, so it makes sense to become different people,” Buenos Aires declares.
Buenos Aires is dangling a cigarette in one hand and a chilled glass of cheap box wine. Her palms are bruised from holding on tight to the rope by which her mental health dangles. She’s carrying out a consistent workout routine for a behavior change program assignment. She’s destroying her lungs but she’s shaking her ass often to reggaeton in clubs which is a healing ritual. Buenos Aires has made local friends to watch the world cup with. Buenos Aires has the highest gpa in our academic history. Mum and Dad love her. I mean, she’s a podcaster, and she went skydiving! Buenos Aires is shamelessly brave. We summoned her, and she came. When BA talks, all my selves listen.
“Thanks for being here,” Nairobi says softly. She takes a drag. Passes the joint to BA.
“Anything for you,” BA coos. Nairobi rolls her eyes back. All the selves laugh. Nairobi is so prickly. But you have to be prickly to survive Nairobi as a soft bag of flesh. Some people wear armor to protect themselves in Nairobi. Money, sex, power, drugs. Some people grow thorns and become prickly. It’s cheaper. You just need enough anger and sadness.
“You know I had a shit time too, right?” BA says. Hyderabad stirs in her cushion on the floor.
“Did someone say a shit time?” She asks, yawning and stretching like a cat from a nap. Her hair is a chameleon, a transition between multiple colors. She smells like Vick’s vapor rub and ginger cookies. She spends a lot of time in bed, fighting the assassin and contemplating the meaning of home, love, and family. She barely makes it to class on a good day. She took an expensive, innovative electromagnetic depression treatment but the assassin is still lurking. And she can’t leave her queerness packed in the suitcase if she goes home because her mother might go through her things again, and then what?
“Yeah, you had a rough time. I like how you handled many things, though. You had…optimism. Drive. Strength. Grit. All things I am searching for here, but I can’t find in myself,” Hyderabad says.
The selves nod slowly. BA passes Hyderabad some wine.
“This is some good stuff. I know I used to make fun of the high sugar content but I miss this cheap nice wine.” Hyderabad admits.
“Ayo, you got into yoga?” Berlin interrupts, eyeing Hyderabad incredulously. Unrelated. We aren’t surprised. We know how randomly the thought trains stop abruptly in our head, how they change course, how often they collide, how difficult it is sometimes to trace the origin of a thought.
“Yeah, I did! I was stretching and lengthening, all of that!” Hyd says. “Also, I did a brief stint on YouTube as a food vlogger. And, I connected with some queer Africans in the diaspora!”
“To trying new things!” Dallas yells.
“See who thinks they’re an adult now because they went to a strip club,” SF jeers. There’s a slight, playful twinkle in her dead eyes. All my selves turn first towards SF, then to Dallas. If Dallas hadn’t tanned so much, she probably would be turning red.
“I know you’re just jealous,” Dallas counters, lowering her voice and meeting the twinkle with a smug smile.
“Oh my God, just tell us about it!” Hyderabad begs, inching closer to Dallas and sitting at her feet.
“Naah, in fact, let’s get down to business.” Dallas asserts. She sits up straight. “I called you here for a reason. I called you because I was drowning and I wanted to know how you kept swimming to the other end of the pool. Sometimes I’m swimming but the end of the pool keeps shifting, even though I know there is an end and it’s coming. I want to get better at swimming to the end of the pool.”
San Francisco hits the joint. She remembers the sound of sand crunching underneath her boots as she walked away from the beach, waving goodbye to the ocean before overdosing on her meds in her college dorm. She looks up at Dallas, who recreated and rewrote the beach memory with a lover this summer. There’s a silent thank you there, to SF for fighting enough to bring Dallas to the beach, and to Dallas for reframing our favorite place on earth. And to the unsung lover. And to the ocean. To all bodies of water.
Water.
All my selves are fluid like water.
“Maybe that can be it. Actual swimming.” BA chimes in.
“Say more…” Nairobi eggs on.
“The day I went swimming in Bellini, when I was still living in Palermo, at the height of the horrible shared living situation, the water just cleansed me. It can be spiritual. Or it can be practical. Or it can be recreational. Exercise. Hot water, freezing water. Didn’t matter. My body was just riding the waves. And when our dearest friend taught us to do handstands? When was a time before that when we had just….played? Had fun with our bodies like kids do?”
Dallas is following the suggestion. She has some experience with swimming. It’s the only recreational activity she can do here in the suburbs, and even then, only in the evening when the sun isn’t frying humans. Nairobi still doesn’t understand how the sun can set at 10 pm. Neither of the selves do, but Berlin would much prefer it to the freezing cold. She thinks these others are mad, honestly. Swimming? In this weather? She tucks a strand of red hair behind her head, reaches for a chocolate croissant, and moves closer to BA.
“I see what you are saying. I think it’s also a lesson in surrendering and riding the wave. This summer I have learned breath control and muscle control so I have a better understanding of how to move through water. Plus some kids taught me how to cannonball which was initially terrifying and then eventually fantastic. Though I’ll also say that sometimes I have gone to the pool and I hated it that day. What does that mean then? Is the pool not enough?” Dallas asks. She folds her knees to her chest, and looks up at BA.
In fact, all my selves are looking up at BA.
“What?” She exhales casually over the joint. SF reaches out and takes the joint.
“We are waiting for you to tell us! What if the pool isn’t enough?” SF is especially invested in the outcome of this conversation. SF is desperately looking for a reason that will be strong enough to fight if the assassin comes again. Or when the assassin comes again. She wants to know if keeping on fighting is worth it, or a waste of time and energy.
“Sweetie, I don’t have answers, only more experience.” BA says.
“More experience,” Nairobi rolls the phrase over in her mouth.
“More experience?” Berlin struggles.
“More experience.” Hyderabad sighs.
“More experience!” Dallas exclaims.
“More experience…with fighting the assassin?” SF asks.
“More experience with fighting the assassin. I have more experience. Each self has more experience. Different battleground, different characters, different missions, same goal. Defeat the assassin and collect gems along the way. Enjoy the battle. Or just fight it. Or just show up. Each self you see here has finished a level of the game. They have experience with the assassin, yes, but also they have more experience enjoying the alive moments, and collecting gems.” BA says.
All my selves are pondering the experience. We just got here, we have little experience. The battlegrounds are different externally, but there’s an eternal internal battle between my selves and the assassin. The more experience we have, the better we get at fighting. Or the more experiences we have, the better we feel about having stayed here this long before the assassin catches up.
“So if the pool isn’t enough we find something else. We build experience. Or we stick it out with the pool until it works. Something. Anything. Everything.” Dallas concludes.
All my selves nod quietly. They let their gazes wander to meaningless things around the balcony.
All my selves are passing a joint around. Dallas has called them here. Dallas is preparing to summon Taiwan and prep her for battle and joy. She wants the strength and wisdom of all the selves. And she can’t wait to sit down with the other selves someday soon and see how many more selves join the table.