Simplicity

WARNINGS

Editors

Samantha Smithscsmith@loyola.edu

Annelise Furnaldarfurnald@loyola.edu

Design BySamantha SmithAnnelise Furnald

Editorial StaffMadelyn Fagan

Rebecca HeemannMarisa Massaro

Kathleen McGowanPetra Nanney

Sarah KarpovichChristopher Sweeney

Warnings is published periodically. All rights reserved. All content, unless otherwise noted, is the property of the author(s). Warnings welcomes and considers unsolicited manuscripts and electronic submissions are either kept on file for the annual writing contest, are available on warningslitmag.tumblr.com, or are discarded. For more information, e-mail warnings@loyola.edu. If works contained herein denoted as fiction or poetry bear any resemblance to actual events, locations, or persons, living or dead, it is entirely coincidental. Store in a cool, dry place not to exceed 72 degrees F.

Thanks to those who helped make this magazine possible: Education for Life, Doug Evans, Crystal Staley, Lia Purpura, Dan Schlapbach, The Writing, Fine Arts, English, and Communications Departments, SGA, The Greyhound Collective Poetry Revival, Anis Mojgani, Loyola University Maryland, and all those who support the arts and creative thinking.

WARNINGSLoyola’s Art and Literary Journal

Vol. 7 Issue 2 April ‘12

Dear readers,

The end is near! As all of those things that we seemed to have so much time for loom at us faster than Leo can shout “iceberg” (Titanic reference? yeah, we went there), we can’t help but anticipate the end of another glorious year at Baltimore’s finest Jesuit institute of higher learning. Whether this means you’re looking forward to a summer of straight chillin’ or a soul crushing search for internships and employment, there’s no doubt that the end of one chapter leads us straight to another.

But before things get too crazy, take a second to get back to the basics with us. No unnecessary confusion, no extra complications, and no added preservatives: only the good stuff. Our reflective contributors break things down for us with a collection of poetry, prose, art, and photography. Staff writers also help us simplify with K McGowan channelling childhood, Rebecca Heeman travelling into a future of the darker side of “simplificity” and Chris Sweeney capturing a snapshot of one man’s life.

So as the weather warms, take it easy, kick off your shoes and read on! And we know that if anyone could use a dose of simplicity, it’s our graduating seniors. Congrats and good luck to senior staffers K, Marisa and Sam as you move forward from Loyola! Don’t get too stressed out!

Your devoted editors,

Sam Smith and Annelise Furnald

front cover: Alex Metterback cover: Samantha Pessognelli

“Every time I write, every time I open my eyes I’m cutting out a part of myself to give to you. So Shake the Dust, and take me with you when you do...”

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Simplicityby K McGowan

If I were older, everything would be easy. I would be in school like my big brother and I would be making friends and learning to like the new place we just moved to. If I was older, my body would be bigger and I’d be able to pump my legs on two wheels instead of four. I’d be able to make it up even the steep-est part of the hill, and, if I were older, I wouldn’t be the least bit afraid to ride back down.

If I were older, I could do everything myself. I could walk up the street to get ice cream everyday, and no one would have

to hold my hand or pull me out of traffic. I could write my very own letter to Santa, instead of having my mom write it for me, and I could tell him that what I really wanted was to move back to New York, besides just a razor scooter.

If I were older, I would tell my brother that I detest his pedantic and insensitive man-ner…instead of hitting him with my weak little fist and crying to mom and dad. But if I was older, my punches would actually hurt.

If I were older, I wouldn’t cry to my parents because I’d be able to tell them I was depressed,

lonely, anxious or scared. And if I were older I’d be able to thank them for everything I’ve been give because I would know that every kid doesn’t get to grow up like I do.

If I were older, I wouldn’t be afraid of the dark. I would sleep with my closet door open, I’d go down to the basement by myself, I’d swim out until I can’t touch, and I’d ride the biggest rollercoaster in the park. If I were older I wouldn’t have a hundred fears anymore because I’d only have one like my mom and dad: old age.

by Kate Marshall

Growing up is getting motion sickness on a swing set. It’s when play-doh smells bad, and the idea of eating glue is nonsensical. It’s the day when swimming does not equal bathing.

When you are a grown up,you don’t pick a book just becausethe main character has your name, and your morality code is not thelesson that day from Arthur the Aardvark.

Growing up is drinking coffee,shaving legs and plucking eyebrows.Making time to exercise and worryingabout food groups.

When halloween costumes become slutty, instead of innocent.When baby talk becomesannoying, instead of cute.And when picking your nose,and throwing fits and crying in public become unacceptable.

Growing up is realizing that cooties aren’t the worst disease one can catch,and that people don’t live forever.

While children envy the old, the wise, the skilled, the professional, It is really us grown ups whoare jealous of the childrenand the time they have left.

We longingly stare at a baby pool,a dress-up gown with matching tiny high heels, a miniature motorized monster truck,Wishing we still fit into its youthful size.Wishing we still fit in our Parent’s arms.Wishing it would all go back to when the world was a great, wondrous, adventure, waiting to be discovered.Instead of the big, daunting, terrifying mountain life becomes, too high to be climbed, with crevices that twist your ankleand slippery rocks that cause you to tumble.

Wishing we could still Make Believe everything is okay.

Growing Painsby Kate Tafelski

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by Rory NachbarHow Many Licks

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by Kelly Gieron

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The days narrow, And the hoarfrost settles, White and crunchy on dead grass. Trees cut a naked swath against a dim horizon, Above which the Sun begins its slow, Cold, Reluctant, Winter climb. The Earth tilts on its axis, Away from the Sun’s warmth. They say the Big Bang just shot out star-stuff, Every which way. I guess enough particles of it, Paused and interacted with each other just long enough, And in just such a way, That I’m standing here, A buzzing cacophony of star-stuff. Soon they’ll bore of their association with one another, And continue pinging their separate ways, As the universe expands. So what then is love or hate? But arbitrary electrical firings of synapses in the brain. Far be it from me to impose my hopes and dreams, On those poor particles. Carry on your way star-stuff. Speed on in your casual chaos.

The Big Bangby Tony Levero

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The future seems to be entwined with ease.simplerfaster!better?

Recently, I, too, have been sucked into the vortexof circuitry and livewires.

There is a white brick sewn to my hand,and it’s taken over my mindlike a pincer parasite from some 80s sci-fi flick.

The other zombies around me reactto simple dings and tonesas if they are indications of something of actual significance.

This brick is not my lifeline!

I’ve lived about a thousand lifetimes so farand I’ve seen where this one is going.We are all immortal, I’ve found.And this is our curse.

The Aliensby Rebecca Heeman

by Alex Metter

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An empty passenger trainscreams byhurling supersonic pings,flashes of sparks and subterranean flame,a blind tunnel worm witha reflective hide,blank panes,a hot dark gut,a hollow belly;we climb through its shattered bulk.

One Stop Before Union Stationby Christian Rees

by Mary Holmes

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by Alex Met ter

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Greyhound Collective Poetry Revival Spotlight

the way the house feels

with every closed door

without an open window

how sometimes

vacancy ultimately leads

to isolation

the way a wine glass looks as it falls

off a kitchen table

almost in slow motion

before shattering on hardwood floor

the way an eye of a hurricane must feel

silently submitting to the need to destroy

Emptyby Sarah Nielsen

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In years past, I began to study the flight patternsof the common male swallow. Wings, wind, and all. For warmer weather they will fly away south,when the winter comes and ice freezes the soul.

“Keep things simple” he suggested, and I said “Okay” Coastal wind touched my lips like feathers and thestars, oh the deceitful stars, made me say “Yes, let’skeep things light”. Drunk on sweetness from summer air,hadn’t I realized how heavy gravity is, pushing myskin, my organs, my very human body into the ground?

North I stay while the birds leave, as did a swallow I knew.I’d fly away as easily, I thought, if my bones were hollow too.

Flight Pat ternsby Carol Chanik

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by Gabrielle Caponigro

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by Mary Holmes

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by Chris Sweeney

Living

This morning is one of those mornings when he is caught by his own reflection, locking eyes with himself in the bathroom mirror. The longer he stares, the less his eyes seem to belong to him. They become bright globes that occupy their own uni-verse. If he kept this up long enough, he might be able to discover the source of all life. Each second that the deep, black space in his eyes engag-es itself brings him closer to the totality of all that exists. But he begins to feel empty inside, as if the self were dis-appearing. Breaking free from this illusion, he turns both the hot and cold knobs an equal rotation and plunges his face into the sink. Upon applying water to his face, his fingers find themselves behind the ears. Eyes closed, he traces the veins and bumps in this mountain range with his index fingers, rivers of warm sink water running down to-ward his chin. When he picks his face back up, his eyes taunt him again in the mirror, giving way to the idea that

there is something he does not know, some key to exis-tence that he lacks but might not even be able to bear were he to obtain it. He turns off the water and heads down-stairs. Quiet inside the house. The air is thin and lifeless and as he walks down the stairs, he feels no obligations, no laws governing his exis-tence. The floor creaks in re-action to his step but it makes no promise that it will creak again on the next. His coat hangs by the door, his keys sit on a table below. The sight of them makes him wonder if he could exist anywhere else in the world. Could he be the same person in a different house, different coat, differ-ent keys. If he opened the door to find a world unfa-miliar, would he still know himself, would his eyes speak to him in the same way they do now. The sounds of the cosmopolitan world seep through the edges of the door frame. He loses the hope of stepping into a different reality. But he opens the door

regardless, believing that it still may be possible. Light and sound push their way into the house like putty over a crack in the wall. He steps out the door. The porch sits a few inches lower than the threshold and as his feet dip down toward the warped wood, it feels, for a brief moment, that he has stepped off the edge of the Earth. But he survives the fall and walks carefully down to the sidewalk to find, with some disappointment, a familiar world: cars, noise, smoke, time, other people. The Earth greets him with a red sky speckled with black birds flying in no particular formation. The air outside is alive with biting wind and it paints his ears pink. As he looks at the street along which he is about to walk, he sees dozens of people walking up and down, carry-ing newspapers, briefcases, coffee. They make no notice of him. He walks forward, makes a right turn, and enters the flock of individu-als with somewhere to go, somewhere to be.

“...so when the world knocks at your front door clutch the know tightly and open on up, running forward into its widespread greeting arms with your hands before you, your fingertips trembling, though they may be.” - Anis Mojgani