Vicissitude: February-March 2026 | The Glass Lotus Soci

Poet Emily Dickinson’s house was not where I expected to find myself on a gloomy April morning last Thursday. The dank mist gave a sense of decay and disintegration that I could’ve sworn had lasted from the 19th century. The trees, I thought, certainly bore the same branches that the poet had sat beneath years ago. Standing in her room, within the walls she had locked herself in for over two decades, my heart broke over the size of her desk—one that her legs couldn’t even fit underneath. There, she would write over one thousand letters, and almost two thousand poems. Ironically, as she became more reclusive, she began to achieve some means of liberation. According to the Dickinson Museum, she had once turned the lock of her bedroom door and told her niece, Martha “It’s just a turn— and freedom, Matty!”

The pandemic saw a massive upsurge in my creative writing. When in quarantine, I was given endless time to write, and like many others, I couldn’t see my friends, teachers, or most of civilization. We were, effectively, locked inside. That was when I wrote my first poetry collection. I had mostly written stories (that I had taken the liberty to call novels) until that point, but I quickly found that novel writing was an unforgiving medium for a young child trying to capture and understand what she was experiencing every day in the strange world of COVID-19.

Re-reading these poems, I’ve begun to notice the amateur voice trying to strangle its way through the lines. I often scrawled melodramatic phrases on anything near me—an envelope, a receipt, a ticket stub, a clothing tag—a practice that is rather reminiscent of Dickinson. In fact, I was recently organizing some old sheets of paper to make way for my newer schoolwork, and a particular poem caught my attention. The pair of couplets were found in the corner of a forgotten geometry notebook, surrounded by triangle proofs I understood a few years ago.

My love for Emily Dickinson didn’t start with “Hope is the thing with feathers,” nor did it start with the Dickinson television show—the first TV show I watched on my own, for my own enjoyment. It was during quarantine that I found “To be alive—is Power—”. This is a poem I would then go on to recite together with two other Dickinson poems at a choral concert my sophomore year. This poem stands in stark contrast with many of her works. It is not centered on nature, and it certainly is not an exploration of death. She begins her second stanza with the line “To be alive—and Will!” It is then that we realize how our agency empowers us, and realize the weight of our decision simply to stay alive and survive this world. The very act of breathing is a revolution, and by simply being, we are a feat of strength.

I was on my way to Oxford for a summer writing program two years ago and had a few days in London that I spent in bookstores. There was one store that had an obnoxious bell that rang every time the front door budged an inch. The air had gone stale years ago, but thankfully the vanilla scent of old leather-bounds permeated the shelves and masked it, for the most part. I immediately went up to the balcony, where the poetry section was hidden, and found a massive book titled “The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson.” I struggled for a moment while reaching up to the top shelf, trying my best to take it out without dropping it on myself or anyone else. But then I sat down on that balcony and read. I tried to shield myself in my reading, for I thought I only had until the end of my time in the store to process and record everything she had ever written. It wasn’t a library, after all. It took some time before I acknowledged that I wouldn’t be able to get through it all that day (a fact that anyone could have told me when I first pulled out the book). I did end up buying it, and ever since, it’s been one of the few books that has secured its place on my desk, rather than my bookshelf.

We are always changing. We are never the same person we were yesterday, or this morning. And we will be a different person even tomorrow. With each experience, good or bad, and each memory, exciting or dull, we morph. Vicissitudes are often negative changes. A misfortune. An unwelcome metamorphosis of the mind or body. But really, the word vicissitude describes what no one can really explain. Something that we’ve given up on understanding and instead have just labeled as the “high and the low,” the “ups and downs” of daily life.

Our writers have done an excellent job spinning their own experiences into a thread fine enough to weave with, with the hope of drawing some form of understanding of themself, and imparting some form of meaning to the reader. Communication is, in and of itself, power. Listening to others—hearing their stories, dissecting their use of language. Speaking is power. Writing. Sharing your own voice. That is what we do at Glass Lotus, and what we encourage all other young writers around the world to join us in doing. But above all, as Emily Dickinson said, power comes from just being alive. Claiming space for yourself in the suffocating world around you.

I didn’t see any apparitions while in the poet’s house, though it is haunted with all that could have been. During her lifetime, only ten of her 1,800 poems were published—and even these were anonymously published without her consent. It is crucial to have a platform like the Glass Lotus Society where young courageous writers from entirely different backgrounds can publish their work of their own volition and engage in conversation with each other. And if anyone has ever wondered where my use, or perhaps overuse, of em-dashes came from, they can look at Dickinson.

Sincerely,

Ella Taft

Editor in Chief

Founder of GLS

SHATTERED PETALS

Poetry

poetry

Solar Devotion
BY NOSHIN SAYIRA

solar

The blue sky's hand caresses me.

The sun makes the brown of my eyes melt.

The moon turns away from my gaze,

she cries from betrayal.

Sunlight bathes me,

I shine from attention and radiance.

“You have me entranced,” I tell her.

She laughs, laughter radiates the air,

“ring my doorbell until the stars cry,”

the white sun says.

Do you ever turn blue oh Son?

Do the moon's tears break our Earth oh Sun?

Does the blue sky fight the midnight one?

Oh sun, do to me what you please.

Am I playing well?

Part my lips for me and let me drink,

drink your love, drink your poison.

Let me die with a shining soul inside.

Happiness
BY AOJIA WANG

happiness

I no longer feel

The need to be understood,

Such is happiness.

As I understand,

All happiness should be shared,

Laughter fills the air.

I could lament you,

But why hate when I can forgive?

Too much trouble there!

I would rather rest,

Sleep the day away till the next

Then wake to my rose.

My love is many:

My dear friends, my family.

A field of daisies.

Though you lie to me,

I don’t care, I have poppies.

I choose happiness.

I choose my love now

Nothing to your peonies.

It is not for you.

I forgive your pride

At the cost of my true heart,

For you took it all.

I resent your love,

And though I understand you,

I can’t defend you.

It is for me now

All the love and happiness,

My own memories.

Untitled
BY MIA GYANI

untitled

My mind’s a simulation

My thoughts are simply programmed

My words, an algorithm

And my friends, just holograms.

My life is on autopilot

And I’m watching from afar

Watching my world burn in flames

Watching as they close the door.

It’s not real I scream

You need to wake up

It’s not real I scream

But they say that’s enough.

They put me to sleep.

And it’s back to the simulation

Back to my ‘dreams’

Back to the manipulation

reprise

Reprise
BY ELLA TAFT

To be understood in the context of Rita Dove’s ‘Thomas and Beulah.’

Liza was young and warm as a bride,

Skin gleaming from throwing herself

Away to the music of summer and pianolas,

Her white laced wedding

Dress with shoulder pads, spinning.

Beulah’s hat blinded

Her with tulle and trim,

Enough for the occasion—

A day of remembrance for all her own life

Could have been.

You love him. Beulah assured her again,

As she practiced, pressing her daughter’s

fingers the way her own father—

half-Cherokee—never would.

Air dusted with July, and she still wore her

nice December gloves from back when

She was going to marry in Paris.

The wedding was a polite affair.

For better or for worse, for richer or for poorer,

in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish…

The birds sang over it all—she did not know the rest.

Pierced fingertips remember sewing that veil, cream

Melting like margarine, all while Liza packed

The last of the dolls into boxes

To await her own child. The now wilting

Bouquet fell from Liza’s shaking hands and

Beulah couldn’t help but look at Thomas to

See if he saw it too.

Then it was all dimming with the sun,

So she stood again, and smiled, clutching the

Handfuls of rice tightly into her palms.

between lines

Between Lines
BY SADÉ WILLIAMS

At first glance

structure and rebellion

do not speak the same language.

One writes rules

in careful ink,

stacking reason on reason

until the page feels certain.

One cuts through fabric

like a question,

turning tradition inside out

with the quiet pull of thread.

One drags color across silence

until feeling takes shape

where there was once only space.

They are told to stand apart

logic here,

creation there,

expression somewhere in between.

But individuality

is not built from one language.

It is the place

where the courtroom line

bends into a sketch,

where the seam

refuses to stay straight,

where color spills

beyond the edges

of what was expected.

To be an individual

is not simply to exist apart.

It is to gather

structure, rebellion, and feeling

into the same breath

and let them speak

in a voice

no rulebook, pattern, or canvas

could have predicted.

wishbone
BY VERONICA ROWNY

wishbone

I’ve always liked wishing on the little things:

Dandelions

Shooting stars

11:11

And pennies

Yet somehow

On my eleventh birthday

And every one since

I wish

And they never come true

I wish they had never met

I wish they were healthy

I wish they were strangers

Paths never crossed

Silent acknowledgement

No accountability

Yet somehow I love the cracked

hands, because they have hit

But also prayed

Worked

And loved.

I'm stuck in the current

Floating like a rock.

If my wishes come true

I'll never pray again

Will I then be able to yearn for love?

See what is right?

Or live in a state of wishlessness

Hopelessness

Hope is in Pandora’s box

Because we are never supposed

To let it go

Is that the same as a wish?

Do we let those go?

Does it ferment into a honey malt

Or into a vinegar of lost time?

If I stop wishing

It won't come true

Or perhaps stay the

same, but I’ll believe

Neither is true.

Wishes are mine

Pieces of our soul

My envious desires

To let it out of the gilded box

is to

Let someone else control

Something that is

Ours.

iceberg

Iceberg
BY ZOE COBB

I hope they see a unified body,

something

consistent,

something

durable.

I hope they can’t see

that I’m ever so slightly broken from the rest.

I hope that we loom so large,

pristine and polished

seemingly solidified.

I hope that I don’t look

any different

from them.

Every interaction,

The interior numbing pierces

The ice cracks

I can hear it,

even when it looks like we’re all together.

Every

inside joke

misunderstood

Every reference

misused

calving my center.

Melting, slipping away

inconsistently unstable

solid yet slippery

exposed

drifting in open water.

It gets to a point where you stop asking
what happened
and you just force yourself to laugh along.

metamorphoses

Metamorphoses of the diseased
BY ELLA TAFT

and your hands, too, shake with age—

not nerves, the catharsis after birth.

It is 6am, and you incense the sage,

then whisper your prayers—why does it burn?

Awake at 3 in the morning? Again, I carry you

as you once did my mother, as she once did me.

Now sleeping like a baby, barely through

the night. Here lies the curse of femininity.

I touch your scar—my aunt is to blame.

Do you not remember her? All upside down?

And you—left with skin pressed white and maimed

and gazing at a hazy ghost of ultrasound.

Holding me as I cry, you try to name me—again—

But now, is it because you simply forget,

and your hands, too, shake with age—

i hope that you

I hope that you
BY ZOE COBB

I hope that you look for the best in me—

the fantastic in the faults.

I hope that you look for not

perfection, but progress

I hope that you see

the shapen and the shaper

I hope you know that I love you—

not now but forever

I hope that you see the dreams you helped

build, the laughs we will share

I hope that you know that we are bound

together not just by blood but by friendship

I hope that you see the infinite possibilities,
that lie ahead
because brothers build bridges

more than bugs

More than Bugs
BY JADEN LAI

All my life, I’ve loved many different animals

I played with dogs

I played with birds

I played with squirrels

I played with snakes

But I never liked bugs

Small, yucky bugs

They moved faster than I could

They saw everything I couldn’t

They had more friends than I did

They could do things that I didn’t

Small, scared, useless,

Trapped within that spider's web of my own threading.

They run around so free, living each day into the next,

With those terrifying legs, those terrifying eyes,

Mocking me with everything I’m not.

Perhaps that is why I still avoid bugs.

Perhaps that is why, even now, I so desperately try,

I so desperately try to become more.
I know I should be more than those icky little bugs

So why am I not?

REFLECTIONS OF LIGHT

Personal Essays / Journalism

reflections of light

What Makes Sex Good?
BY NOSHIN SAYIRA

good sex

If he wanted to shred my heart into pieces, he would go on and marry another girl. Leave me behind. Pretend it never happened. Do it all in front of me, in the community I was born into, the one he intruded on.

That is exactly what he did.

[X]

I saw the old version of him walking the new one to his seat. His ghost stayed behind his real body, the version that was in love with me, and promised me marriage, fading as he walked. The new him sat beside a beautiful Slavic girl wearing a blue abiyah trimmed with gold. Henna stained her hands, gold dripped from her wrists. They looked at each other and smiled. Already

married. Only celebrating again.

I’m not sure how he felt about me being there, but I wanted him to notice me. I wore the abiyah he gifted me. I wore makeup, and a glittery underpiece, all to stand out. It makes me a bad person to be at my ex’s marriage ceremony and try to catch his attention, doesn't it?

I caught his eye. He stared at me in shock. He took a minute to look at me, and I smiled. He didn’t. He lost his light.

[X]

He didn't know his wife had told me everything. How she didn't like him, and how she hated the sex. How she always had to do it in a way where she wasn't looking at him. How she didn't want his kids, yet they didn't use protection. How she complained about how religious he was, how controlling, and how lustful, how selfish in bed.

Give him to me, I wanted to scream. She has no idea who he truly was. She could never survive it.

[X]

I don’t know if it was inevitable, her interest in me. She made a move on me despite being married. I stood there, uninterested in this woman who thought she was sexier than she really was.

She invited me over once, and my head spun from all her audacity. She offered me her blunt, and told me to get ready – she was going to teach me how to suck a guy off. It all felt wrong. I wanted to leave. I didn't want to play along anymore.

When she finally let me go, I bumped into him outside, face to face. His face questioning whether to push the limits or not. He said salam to me and stayed quiet. His presence was big, and suddenly I couldn't move. Being so close to him made me want to run into his arms and kiss him, or run straight away. I don't know the difference anymore.

“Did you sit in my bed?” He asked me, staring intensely.

I stared at him weirdly. “uh, yeah I did. She was showing me something and told me to sit down.”

I got confused by the question, but still felt the need to show him I could open my mouth and talk. When he heard me, he started smiling.

I should've known.

He then told me to come back inside and let him feed me. He wanted to make me his own food and feed me with his own hands. He told me he misses me, and he wants to catch up.
His wife was waiting for him on the couch.

[X]

I wonder if they know that I had nightmares of them asking me for a threesome. I wonder if he closes his eyes and imagines it's me he's with. I wonder if she closes her eyes and imagines it's the men from Tinder she's swiped right on, wishing for better. I wonder what caused them to get together.

Wondering has taught me nothing. They got divorced shortly after.

[X]

What makes sex good? Maybe it's everything, every single factor. Or maybe it's nothing, maybe it's just a mindless entanglement of limbs. Maybe it's the third person who's watching.
Maybe sex is about the unsaid “please no’s” in the air. Maybe it's about the eyes shut, imagination getting you off. Maybe it's about being with your soulmate.

I don't know. I’m a virgin.

1: An abiyah is a loose-fitting, full-length robe-like garment worn by some Muslim women, primarily in the Middle East and North Africa, as a form of modest attire

2: Islamic greeting

hollow throat
BY EVELYN YANG

hollow throat

you lose yourself for the first time when you open your mouth and nothing comes out. you don’t believe in prayer, or that anyone out there is listening, but losing it—your voice, the timber and thrum in your throat, is the first loss.

it’s pulled out of your body, laid out to dissect and sell, a hot commodity. another way to be exploited. if you don’t speak, someone else will. over you, for you, and without you. who are you without a sound?

(we learn, from the beginning, how to take up space. or how not to. regardless, it’s in our nature to be loud. we want attention and confirmation. we cry. learn how to speak some convoluted language. press love between two embracing bodies. trace with our eyes.

we become experts at quiet signaling to be loud.)

“when the voice that links the body to the soul vanishes, there is no way to put into words one’s feelings or will.” - yoko ogawa, the memory police

but silence is never a choice. it is learned: to respect, listen, love. but also to cower, fear, and shrink. it’s love and fear.

(you know—how it falls onto your chest in the dead of night. a shared smile across the room. the response that never comes. biking down bumpy lanes while spring tangles herself in your hair. the news. hands that never touch. the sun sinking into the cradle of two mountains.)

and losing your voice is the first kind of silence you hear.

the sensation of nothingness curling and thoughts washing in and out of your brain. your hand cutting out your tongue or wrapped around your throat. silence is self-destructive; speaking with nothing to say, mouth faltering, everything but music falling out.

i lost my voice some time ago. i still want it back, without knowing why or where it’s gone.

(could releasing this melody be so bad?)

corolla

COROLLA'S LOOKING GLASS

Flash Fiction / Vignettes

house on bway

The House on Broadway
BY ANONYMOUS

We have moved a lot over the years. Lispenard, Franklin, and now Broadway. Each time our home got bigger, and this time the house is ours. I like this house the best. I like the big windows at the front that peer out into the city. I like to see the big buildings towering above the clouds, competing with each other to see who will win. I like to see the world at my fingertips, because all that awaits is that one tiny step off the ledge and through the window.

We live on the second floor of our house, and I have my own room. Mirroring my room is my sister’s, divided by a wall. If you knock on the wall, you can hear the thud from the other room. We have our code: the knocking code. If you knock once, it means Are you awake. If you knock twice, it means Good Night. Our talking fills the night, as we knock and knock and knock.

This is my house. The one my parents designed from scratch. The one they worked hard to perfect and to seal the cracks that ran along the wall. I remember the steps it took to make this house. The mattresses on the ground. The tape. The dust. The dust. The saws and measuring tapes astray. But I also remember lying in bed with my parents. They are hugging me and hugging me. I hear the faint pulse of heartbeats, and as they fall asleep, I make up stories. Stories about the misaligned bricks against the wall. Misaligned with cracks. There, there is the woman with the cauldron making soup for her baby. There, there is the sun transitioning to the moon. There, there are my parents clutching me and clutching me. There, there is the warmth, the light from the windows, and the cracks on the wall. There, there is my house, my parents, and me.

devil music

My Father Played Devil Music
BY HENRY JOHNSTON

They call it graveyard love.

When a relationship is so intense it can’t end well

She says that angles whisper through my beige box

I told her no, it’s just

distortion.

***

Everytime I sit down with this worn leather, I’m grateful to Uncle Fredrick.

The diurnal cycle concludes not with the expected lassitude, but with a persistent, cerebral hum—a residue of this afternoon’s discourse on the Hellenic influence within the Carolingian Renaissance. It is curious how we flatter ourselves into believing our "modern" age is a clean break from the past, when we are, in truth, merely adding a fresh layer of varnish.

In sadder news, I must depart for Memphis on the evening sleeper. The prospect of returning to the Delta feels less like a journey and more like a descent into a humid, Faulknerian purgatory. I find myself already bracing for the sensory onslaught: the heavy, alluvial scent of the river, the cloyingly polite condolences of men whose world-view is as calcified as the limestone in their soil.

***

She told me she was sorry

but I don’t care. She didn’t spill pops’ guts

on the bar floor

like snakes,

slithering back to the garden.

***

As the train pulls away from the platform, I am struck by the irony of my own displacement. I am a creature of the high-minded North, yet my marrow is irrevocably tied to this sun-drenched, tragic topography. I shall spend the transit rereading Virgil; his Georgics feel like the only appropriate companion for a man returning to the red clay to bury his progenitor.

Walking past the neon-drenched facades of Beale Street, I am struck by the sheer, kinetic energy of the blues—that "sorrow song" which Du Bois so eloquently dissected, yet which remains stubbornly resistant to mere academic categorization. It is a music of the gut, a rhythmic exorcism. One hears the ghost of the field holler colliding with the electric aspirations of the era.

***

Today she was fascinated with the fingers

on my left hand

‘What happened to them?’

‘Why do they feel like that?’

I pointed to my six-string.

***

The humid lethargy of Memphis is a profound irritant to a mind accustomed to the crisp, vertical ambitions of Manhattan. I sit here, a displaced scholar of the Metropole, surrounded by the rotting finery of a father whose "Gentry" status was, it seems, a carefully curated fiction. My brother—who remained here in the silt and the shadow, cultivating a temperament as wild and thorny as the brambles along the levee—is the true scion of this decay. He moves through these suffocating corridors with a predatory grace that my own urbane sensibilities find both fascinating and deeply unnerving.

***

The moon’s cold greed is

Here.

By the cyprus trees.

I wait by the black water of the Wolf River,

where the cypress knees poke up like the ribs of the drowned.

***

I unearthed my old Gibson, its hollow body smelling of cedar and repressed humidity. There is a tactile, almost carnal honesty to the fretboard that my pursuits in New York had sought to sanitize. To play the guitar down here is not merely to perform; it is to engage in dialogue with the soil itself.

***

She can’t understand why I’ve been

so amused lately.

Watching the roots entangle him

like how she took hold of me when I came back.

***

My tie is undone—an unthinkable lapse in my Manhattan flat—and there is a bottle of Father’s hidden bourbon on the table, its amber glow the only honest thing in this room. Tomorrow night at "The Rusty Hinge," I have to step onto that riser, and quite frankly, the prospect has me rattled in a way a doctoral defense never could.

***

The crowd leans in, caught in the web of his restless grace,

while I slip through the screen door into the heavy,

weeping rain.

Moon’s greed is back,

waiting by the black mirrors behind the packed hall,

thinking he can trade a pop’s honor for a handful of lead.

The guitar wails—a long, shivering slide of glass on steel—

crying out for a man who died with a lie in his throat.

THE MIRROR'S BLOOM

Short Stories

mirror's bloom

Collars
BY CHASE AARON AGUDO

collars

A school is only as good as its products.

Such was the attitude of the student body attending the prestigious Hamptons E. L. Lovemoney Academy. Indeed, H.E.L.L. Academy was the best (and therefore the only) school in the world for the rearing of young boys into men. If you had asked any student of the institution what gave the academy its reputation, they would happily point to an amorphous culmination of the school’s attributes rather than a single metric. You didn’t need to prove why H.E.L.L. was the finest school on earth, the academy’s students would tell you—you just knew. If there was one place every well-meaning parent wanted to send their sons, it was H.E.L.L.

Waking up on the morning of his graduation day, Icarus Goldston felt proud to have studied at such a fine institution. Ike (the nickname his mother gave him when she decided three syllables was, in her words, “such a mouthful!”) had started at H.E.L.L. in the seventh grade. He wasn’t quite as experienced as some of his peers who had attended the academy since kindergarten, but he was wise enough to straighten his back around students who had entered H.E.L.L. in the ninth grade—his “inferiors,” Ike began to call them. Preparing his suit for the day’s proceedings, Ike similarly reflected on the school’s faculty. His advisor, Mr. Bill Z. Pub, had checked his attendance every day for the past six years, while the class dean, Ms. Lucy Fur, would ensure his grades were commensurate with H.E.L.L.’s standards. Ike considered himself lucky to have never been in serious trouble; any student caught violating H.E.L.L.'s most treasured rules was subject to ruthless interrogation by the head of school, Mr. Cole Jiyat. Gratefully chained by such measures, Ike got along with his peers, did his homework, and—most importantly—never forgot to wear a collared shirt.

The collar. The greatest invention of mankind. The embodiment of civilization itself. The crowning achievement of our 7-million-year evolution into the sophisticated, bipedal, fully autonomous creatures we are today. Appropriately, H.E.L.L. worshipped the collar as the only object capable of cohering the academy’s students into a functioning conglomerate. The collar was the mark of a man, the prerequisite to his entrance into society. Failing grades, unpreparedness, even improper behavior—all of these could be rectified within academy walls. The omission of one’s collar was a death sentence.

So, as he nuzzled his necktie inside that beloved fabric below his chin, Ike was happy to have seen his education at H.E.L.L. to uninhibited completion. We must now understand that Icarus Goldston was not a “star” student by any means, certainly not like his best friend and class valedictorian Mefi Stopolise. Stepping outside his apartment door, Ike remembered how he had once submitted a paper (a creative story, as it were!) about the time a stranger had shown a kind gesture to him as a child. Ike could not remember what the gesture entailed, nor did he allow himself to ponder such a useless detail. He was only disappointed that, out of all the possible subjects and themes at his disposal, he’d written a story about kindness! Ike could still picture the red-penned letter grade and Ms. Belial’s written comment, which read:

“D. This is quite a dull story, Ike. Where’s the excitement?”

Ike never told anyone, not even Mefi, about that day. It was for good reason—while Ike was never the butt of jokes, he had never started any of his own. He wasn’t particularly popular, nor did he necessarily want to be known. He was content to have been relegated to a space of social normalcy, protected from the worst of evils by H.E.L.L.’s dress code. Collared legitimacy, Ike thought while walking to the subway station, was what really saved him.

As he boarded the train, Ike reflected on the graduation ceremonies of years past. Beyond the usual pomp and circumstance, there were important sights to see. Upon receiving their diploma, each graduate was suddenly haunted (or, rather, doted upon) by a deathly specter emanating from the backs of their collars. The students would walk up from the right side of the stage, receive their paper diplomas (at which point the “specter” would appear), shake hands with Mr. Lister, wave at the audience of grinning family and faculty, then finish their academic christening by walking through a ring of fire at the other end.

An important note: there were a few students in each graduating class who did not walk the stage accompanied by such ghostly emanations. These students were, as Ike told himself as the train reached his stop, the “meekest” of the graduating class. Ike observed that the specter-less students were always the ones who held doors open, who pushed their chairs in, who said “please” and “thank you” to the employees of H.E.L.L. When such students received their diplomas onstage, no entity appeared around them. Curiously, the ring of fire would also be extinguished at the same time, as if the source of fuel had proved incompatible with the flame’s intensity. The unaccompanied graduate would then walk, head lowered as if ashamed, offstage.

It is rumored (and therefore believed) that these specter-less students had failed a certain graduation requirement. When Ike asked Mefi Stopolise about this missed requirement, Mefi insisted that such information was always kept closely guarded by the administrators of H.E.L.L. He could only say that, whether such a secret was disclosed by a daring graduate or intentionally spread by the faculty to engender fear, the failed graduation requirement was always different for each specter-less student. Regardless, Ike had always worried that he would be one of these disgraced students on the day of his graduation. But as he turned onto the street outside Elise Tooley Hall, Ike assured himself that he, with his stellar attendance and strict adherence to the dress code, could not be compared to those fallen graduates.

Elise Tooley Hall. From half a mile away, the venue’s soaring roof and gleaming glass windows seemed to smile at Ike. He couldn’t help but smile in return—who could refuse the charm of such a stunning facade? As sunbeams glided off the walls of the hall and penetrated each thread of his delicate collar, Ike couldn’t help but feel an inexplicably warm joy radiate throughout his body. The ecstasy started at the back of his neck, danced along his spine, and centered itself firmly in his stomach. With glazed eyes and an open mouth, Ike heaved an indulgent sigh—in that moment, he wanted nothing more than to step inside the building.

Only a dozen strides away from the entrance, however, a gaunt hand appeared in Ike’s periphery. Along with the waving hand was, Ike realized with dismay, a voice. It sounded decrepit, yearning, pitiful. How did the man appear? Ike hadn’t seen him at all!

“Hey, stranger,” said the homeless man, his tattered shirt sleeve hanging morosely from a limp wrist. “The name’s Lazarus. Could you spare me some change?”

Upon hearing the word “spare,” Ike felt the skin around his collar flash in red-hot pain. It singed off his neck hairs, it compressed his trachea, it dug into his flesh. Ike felt a tightening sensation just below his chin, and at once he realized the cause of the pain.

The collar! The collar! It was the collar!

The odor of burned epidermis infested Ike’s nostrils as he clawed hopelessly at his neck. Throughout this ordeal, Lazarus stood and watched Ike with the same tired gaze he couldn’t help but give everyone else who passed him.

“Make it stop! Make it stop! Please!” cried Ike, finally making eye contact with Lazarus.

All of a sudden, the pain dulled. It hadn’t disappeared completely, only subsided. The collar began to buzz with lively intensity, and Ike, with bloodshot eyes and blurry vision, saw in the sidewalk the shadow of some cloaked apparition looming over his head, the same one he’d seen above the students at the graduating ceremonies.

It spoke:

“Ike, give him a dollar.”

Ike obeyed. The second he reached for his wallet, however, an even more acute pain fired up his arm. It permeated every centimeter of skin until all of the blood vessels passing through his elbow threatened to burst. Desperate, he touched the black leather of the wallet; his fingertips withered on contact. Weak, he placed his thumb on the wallet to gain a firmer grip, and felt a more piercing, parasitic sting in every pore of his body. Sobbing, Ike took the wallet out of his pocket, and the fabric wriggled uncomfortably in the curves of his hand. Delirious, he begged his fingers to open the wallet’s fold and take out the first bill he saw, but it was at this final exertion of the hand that Ike’s body gave up.

“I—I can’t,” whimpered the little boy. “I don’t want to.”

Silence. Lazarus looked at him with eyebrows raised in an expectant, curious look. Ike’s collar, now drained with tears and sweat, seemed to stop its buzzing altogether.

Retreating into Ike’s collar, it spoke once more:

“Good enough.”

And, as quickly as the torture had started, it was over. With hands on his knees, Ike gratefully caught his breath. He had passed the requirement! That irking anxiety at the back of his mind had all but vanished! Pulling his tie and gently creasing his collar, Ike welcomed the scent of old mahogany seats and the glow of candlelights as he stepped into Elise Tooley Hall. No longer would he worry. No longer would he be haunted by the thought of inadequacy. No longer would he be counted among the meek.

Taking his seat amongst his distinguished peers, he noticed that they too were showing signs of struggle. One student had a cut on his ear, which he covered with the curls of his hair. Another had a bruise around his eye—no hiding that one, Ike thought. Still, they all seemed grateful to be there; the boys who’d clearly suffered (and, therefore, succeeded) before their arrival nodded to each other in sympathetic accord. To the boys who had no visible injuries, whose collars seemed untouched, Ike grimaced disapprovingly.

It didn’t matter now, Ike thought as he heard his name announced on the podium. He walked up from the right side of the stage, extended his hand to grasp his paper diploma (at which point the “specter” did appear behind him), shook hands with Mr. Lister, and waved at the audience of grinning family and faculty. Each step onstage was a revelation for Ike. All that was left for him was the ring of fire.

The fire flickered once. At first, it shrank; then it went cold. And as the smoke billowed inside itself, Ike realized with horror that there was a haggard figure amidst the smog.

It was Lazarus.

Ike’s eyebrows tightened. His vision tunneled. The previously clear and vibrant applause faded as if Ike had been pushed underwater. Hands shaking, he dropped his diploma; it made a hollow thud against the wooden stage flooring. The man stared at Ike, mouth slightly agape, his shirt molding against the contours of his skeletal frame.

When Ike tried to bring attention to the stranger onstage, he found with puzzled dread that he could not lift his arm.

“Look! Look! What is he doing here?” screamed Ike as he stared incredulously at the administrators. As if they were ignoring him, they just smiled and continued applauding.

“Can’t you all see? Why can’t anyone see him? Look!”

Ike looked at the audience; their smiles were just as big and bright as they always had been. The clapping continued. It was no use; nobody else could see the man in front of him.

The cheers were just as loud and raucous when Ike fainted. And when the paramedics tried to take his shirt off to conduct an emergency operation, his collar remained immovable. The doctors tried to unbutton it to no avail. A surgeon had even tried cutting into the fabric with a specialized handsaw; the device broke immediately. After it was announced that Ike had died from what doctors described as a “sudden panic of the heart,” the class decided to dedicate a sixth-floor window pane in his memory. Of course, visitors are permitted to come by to read and reflect on the words inscribed on the gilded plaque beneath the window. If you try to read the text yourself, however, you may be disappointed: the letters aren’t legible at all.

1: Joke (/jōk/), noun. A thing that someone says to cause amusement or laughter, especially a story with a funny punchline.

night shift

The Night Shift
BY AMY SMOUT

Where does the time go?

The argument was still bitter in Bobby's memory as he pulled into the quiet petrol station on the local motorway. Amelia’s stinging words clung to him like the scent of petrol and low-quality coffee clung to the station. Despite trying he could not make sense of her actions. What happened? He took these late shifts to clear his mind. He liked it there, too. Not many people came through, and hardly anyone stopped to talk at that hour. He needed time and space to mentally dwell in peace.

10:02: His trembling hands struggled with the keys as he entered the small shop. As the door creaked open, the silence hit him like a punch in the chest. It was almost relieving, yet he longed for better company than the hum of the fridge and the dull, flickering lights outside. He’d wanted that for a while, he thought. How did one do that, he aimlessly pondered. Reaching the counter, Bobby settled himself in the fragile swivel stool he seemed to live in these days. The dingy checkout had a familiar feel to it, and he’d always seemed to crave the long nights after arguments. He didn’t like it, but Amelia was so angry these days. Gazing up at the ceiling, Bobby couldn't help but acknowledge the all-too-familiar tightness in his chest. Has it been his fault all along?

11:47: Oh, how time flies when your thoughts are consuming you. Bobby knew that, of course. This wasn't the first time he’d taken the night shift, and it was his place to process and think. There were other tasks to do, so he set about completing them with whatever energy remained for the night. Restocking the fridge? Easy. He'd done it a million times before, and he could sit back down in a few minutes. Yet his head pulsed and ached thinking about every wrong he’d made. He stirred, yet it seemed the weight of his actions held him down with an unwavering grip. Why had such a mindless task become so laborious?

Amelia hadn’t called. Why would she? The argument was still fresh in her mind, and she was never as forgiving as her mother, Ariadne Woods. For such a blissfully long time, they were happy together . Memories came flooding back to Bobby, and for one blissful moment, it was as if time stood still. He could almost see it, her dark curls and jade eyes overflowing with joy as she pushed their daughter on the swings. Cancer took the life from her eyes long before it had taken the soul from her body. Amelia had that infectious smile, too, and it had pained Bobby every time he’d seen it since.

Amelia hadn’t taken her death well. She’d had such a promising future as an ambitious young lady with many talents. How could anyone turn that down? He never quite worked that out. Yet, Amelia had stayed home to help him recover. It was then, when she tucked him into bed or took the bottle out of his hands in the small morning hours, that he felt Ariadne most of all. It was something so sad yet so beautiful to see the eyes he’d once loved stare back at him with concern and sadness. Amelia was always too proud to ask for help; Bobby saw himself in that. Every time he suggested alternative arrangements, she got so angry. “How could you suggest something like that? After all I’ve done?” It didn’t make any sense to her how someone else could look after him. It was a touching sentiment, until it wasn’t.

With a jolt, he returned to reality, where a customer was yelling pointedly to give him his change. Something about deadlines? After much apologising, Bobby set out on other mindless tasks to keep himself awake.

00:32: Few customers came in, leaving an opportunity for Bobby’s mind to wander. Their tired stares offered little comfort (not that he was looking). Just as quickly as they’d come, the dwindling supply of his good memories vanished. A wash of guilt, self-loathing, and shame came over him, and he panicked. Normally, he’d drink to wash those thoughts away, but work beckoned. He reached for his phone, the only source of comfort in these long nights. He’d left it on the kitchen counter. Again. He took out his playing cards, yet even they didn't seem to satisfy him. He would have liked to have a sense of familiarity about tonight, as the feeling was lost on him more often than not. He felt tired, exhausted really.

03:17: “Excuse me, sir? Are you alright?” Bobby woke with a jolt and found a radiantly blue pair of eyes staring down at him, a familiar expression which startled him. For a blissful second, he thought he was admiring the face he used to love.

“Fine, fine, just thinking,” he seemed to mumble, unsure if he meant to speak. “Cash or card?” he uttered monotonously, ready to input the price of the chocolate bar in front of him.

“Here’s the money,” she replied, sliding a few coins across the table. “Keep the change while you’re at it.” She was made to leave, but something made her stop. Turning back to Bobby, she blurted, “Mind if I sit here?” pointing at the stool tucked clumsily behind the counter. The question startled him, but it also brought him a curious sense of comfort. “I could use someone.” She seemed carefree in her manner. But something was troubling her, too; he could feel it. Amelia also had that look when something was on her mind.

She took in her surroundings and remarked, “I like the way you’ve set this place up. It’s all so... neat.” Bobby must’ve had quite a puzzled look, because she added: “Something tells me you don’t get that much.” After a moment of heavy silence, he responded, “Not ever, really. My daughter did it—I didn't do much.” After a while, he added abruptly, “We don’t get along these days.”

Some strange emotion passed through her face, and she seemed to see him truly in that moment. The silence thickened, and Bobby found himself blurting, “Do you get along with your father?” Shame flooded his body, and his face reddened. He continued, “I’m so sorry, really I am,” as she thought about his question. After what felt like an eternity, she replied, “It’s complicated. You know how it is, right?” For a moment, a dark shadow passed over her eyes, and Bobby nearly thought she’d say her mind.

“Oh, I know how it is. You know, my daughter is this brilliant woman. Talented, funny, and smart, yet doesn’t know how to treat her own family.” He regretted those words the moment he said them, but he saw the truth in them all the same. That same puzzling expression returned to the woman’s face, this time a little longer. The silence thickened. “What did she do?” Everything and nothing, Bobby nearly said.

“She was going to be a doctor—a good one, too. But then her mother passed, and our whole world turned upside down. Instead of finishing her degree, she came to help out at home.” Quite suddenly, he added, “She threw away her bursary like it was nothing!” He didn’t quite know how to feel; it was as if an angry melee of emotions was happening, each one fighting for control.

“If you don't mind me asking, why are you angry your daughter chose family?” enquired the woman, eerily calm after Bobby’s outburst. It was her turn to go red now, but she persisted. “I don't mean to pry, but I’ve got nothing else to do. I like helping people, and I’m something of an expert in this field,” she added, chuckling softly. It astounded Bobby how familiar that laugh was. Every second he looked at her, Ariadne jumped out at him even more. From the little freckle above her brow to the lines when she laughed, it was a startling resemblance. However, there were differences, no matter how small. He tried to answer her questions, but he could only manage a halfhearted “I don't know.”

Reading off of his nametag, she continued, “Pardon me for saying this, but you seem like an angry man, Bobby.” He wanted to take offence, but something within him knew truer words had never been spoken. Something about this woman made him listen. “I’ve met many angry men, trust me on that.”

“I get so angry sometimes, at my daughter, Amelia. My sweet girl, I never wanted it to wind up this way, you know? I’ve seen so many friends turn old and bitter, and I was always determined never to end up like that.” Where was this coming from? Why did he trust her so much? “Amelia was always the best of both of us, that poor child. See, her mother passed away when she was young, and she didn't take it well.” They were silent for a while after that, and the woman stared at her feet, shifting in her seat. Her eyes were wandering and fell on the bottle on the window with a heavy realisation. She broke the silence, voice cracking, saying, “My dad was a heavy drinker before he died.” Her words hit him like a punch to the gut.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” he muttered, not sure how to talk anymore.

“Don’t be.” She shrugged lightly, tracing the grain of the wooden countertop. “It happens more often than not, blurting it out like that.” He pitied her—how lonely must one be to be so comfortable sharing that? “I asked him to stop,” she added, “so many times.”

“And did he?” Bobby somehow knew the answer, but he hoped he was wrong.

“He promised, but I stopped believing promises a long time ago. Did your daughter ever ask you to stop?”

A moment. Bobby shifted in his seat. “More times than I can count.” The humming of the fridge seemed to roar in his ears.

“Then why didn’t you?” Her ocean eyes had lost their anger; there was another, sadder emotion creeping in. Bobby noticed everything now: the flickering light, the burnt coffee, the petrol smell, and the shattered mirror in the corner.

“I tried, okay?” he replied, but it sounded weaker than he meant. “God knows, I tried so hard for my girl.”

“But is ‘trying’ actually ‘doing?’” The words stung, but something agreed with her. He’d tried, tried, and tried again, but nothing he did ever quite worked for them. The woman’s head tilted slightly, as if she was reading every thought and feeling he’d ever known. There was something so inquisitive, so harsh, so blunt yet so beautiful about her, and it enchanted him.

“I thought I had time!” he blurted, startling even himself. “I thought I had time with my little girl to work things through!”

He hadn’t startled her at all. “Loss changes people,” she said, so quietly he almost couldn't hear. “Pills, drink, drugs, they don't work. They cover the wound.Yet it festers, infects, and poisons every part of your life until the person you thought you were is dead too.” She even had the decency to look pleasantly surprised. “Take it from me: your daughter would far rather see you sober, alive, and depressed than drunk, dead in a ditch, and bitter,” and without another word, she left the station.

5:18: Light in the sky was always a welcome sight at the end of the night shift. Bobby couldn't care less even if he tried. He was desperate to get home for the first time in a while. How could he have been so blind to Amelia and how Ariadne’s death had taken everything from her; to how he’d been such a burden. He knew it now, and he was desperate to tell her.

His heart hammered as he was cleaning the station. The mop shook violently, but his mind was racing just as fast. As he cleaned, he noticed the woman’s stool from earlier tucked neatly behind the counter. He had no recollection of moving it. Then again, he didn't remember much anymore. He was going to make things right, and he’d never felt better. A strange sense of anticipation foiled his chest as he began the short journey home. As desperate as he was to make things right, he had to stop by the shops to pick up a few essentials and something extra for Amelia. She deserved it, after all.

The shops weren't busy at that time; just a few early birds and night workers, all looking equally glum. It was as if they shared the same ailment, which Bobby could only put down to tiredness.

The cashier was a glum lady who looked as if the ends weren't even considering approaching one another. In a half-hearted attempt to cheer her up, Bobby asked: “Anything happen last night?”

“Not much, just that car crash down south.” The station was south, and he hadn’t heard anything. Odd. “Yeah, one driver, they said. A woman” Bobby didn't want to press further, so he left the shop hurriedly and set off again back home.

As he drove past the police car opposite his house, he braced himself for the talk. How was she going to take it? This sudden change might be quite jarring. Jarring might be what we need, Bobby thought to himself.

He nearly dropped his groceries when he saw the police officers on his sofa with pitiful expressions on their faces. It took him a minute, but the world shifted when he found out. The car crash. She was on her way to him at the station when it happened. He couldn't breathe, he couldn't think, he couldn't stand without her.

Bobby had found the words to say.

Yet he’d run out of time.

comments

Issue 5

Vicissitude

March '26

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

A Letter from the Editor in Chief

SHATTERED PETALS

Poetry

Solar Devotion BY NOSHIN SAYIRA

Happiness BY AOJIA WANG

Untitled BY MIA GYANI

Reprise BY ELLA TAFT

Between Lines BY SADÉ WILLIAMS

wishbone BY VERONICA ROWNY

Iceberg BY ZOE COBB

Metamorphoses of the diseased BY ELLA TAFT

I hope that you BY ZOE COBB

More than Bugs BY JADEN LAI