Table of Contents : Crows Gunfire Bounce a twister Angels Exposed Dear Maple Grove, Truth Takin’ The A Train Cathy’s Corner Waking in Cuba Amen After the Summer Barbeque Public Catharsis Todays Lesson The Wake I Only Got Eyes for You The Savannah sometimes quiet Autobiography: After Frank O'Hara... Show moreTable of Contents : Crows Gunfire Bounce a twister Angels Exposed Dear Maple Grove, Truth Takin’ The A Train Cathy’s Corner Waking in Cuba Amen After the Summer Barbeque Public Catharsis Todays Lesson The Wake I Only Got Eyes for You The Savannah sometimes quiet Autobiography: After Frank O'Hara Brainstorm After Class Carlos Free at Nightfall Visions Galaxies Green with... Female Nudes Busby Eric Moen Rowan Smith Jayne Carlson Brianna Olson-Carr Laurie Akermark Bryan Rassat Steven Saari Michelle Devens Sean Evenson Judi Niemi Johnson Steven Saari William Trembley Judy Niemi Johnson Caitlin Wirth Megan Camacho Adam Shaw Drew DeGennaro Nicolette Albertson Brianna Olson—Carr D.E. Green Mary Stewart Anna Toenjas Nick Dahlquist José Alvillar Anna Toenjas Lizz Nelson Adam Spanier Nick Dahlquist Natalyn Flaten 20 21 27 28 31 32 33 34 35 37 38 39 4o 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 Murphy Square 3 Show less
doing drugs and getting in fights. It’s kinda sad sometimes and it makes me wanna stop hanging out with him but that's not something that is really up for debate. Me and Cory have been hanging out since we were kids, real little kids. We played on the same coed soc— cer teams, were in the same boy... Show moredoing drugs and getting in fights. It’s kinda sad sometimes and it makes me wanna stop hanging out with him but that's not something that is really up for debate. Me and Cory have been hanging out since we were kids, real little kids. We played on the same coed soc— cer teams, were in the same boy scout troop and celebrated our 8th, 9th, and 10th birthdays together cause they were both in the summer and it’s hard to get kids to come to your party when you’re not in school cause you’re too young to really have any friends. And it’s not only all that fun shit that kids do growing up that holds us together, it's all the crunchy insides too. The shit we don’t even have to talk about that’s understood. We got all that in common too. The other day we were talking about murder. Not cause it happened to somebody or anything, I don’t remember how we got on the topic, but we were there all of the sudden and before I knew it I was saying stuff I didn’t really think was true. We were sitting in his car, it’s a ‘96 Lumina with the long flat leather seats up front that make snorting coke and passing bowls so much easier cause you have a nice low surface for it, as opposed to the plastic mess of cup holders and center consoles in my car. The car was facing the police station, not cause we like being near the cops, but because if you drive to the way back of our school parking lot the only thing you can do is face the cops. Sometimes it’s nice to watch them, know when they’re leaving and when they’re coming back. You don’t really gotta be too paranoid cause if they move any which way, well you’ll see them. Their little white cars flowing in and out. They always leave calmly and then come back with their lights ablaze and sirens wailing so they can get through the light right before the turn in for the station. Every single one of them represents a crisis, a break in, a mugging, a car that flipped over on the highway cause somebody was too lazy to check their blind spot. Probably giant moments in all those people’s lives. But to the cops in the white cars it’s nothing. The same straight line they always drive, getting back to the station and getting off work to get away from it, that’s the real rush for them. That’s what makes their lights flash and sirens go whaa whaa all the way home, just like the little pigs they are. Cory was talking about how he could imagine himself doing it, that is kill- ing someone, and being okay with it. We could both imagine ourselves doing it, we talked about people we’d want dead, first joking about teachers or girls or the boss we shared at the golf course where we drove the carts back and forth so the golfers wouldn’t ever have to walk more than a few steps. I never understood why they didn’t have the course start and end in the same place, they shoulda known that woulda made it easier. But they didn’t so we got a job driving the golf carts back and forth in the same line and every now and then a slightly different one when we detoured through the sand traps or over the big hill by hole nine. But we didn’t get to do that too much cause our boss would scream loud as shit if he saw us cause he knew if the golfers saw him screaming at us, they wouldn’t tip us as well cause him and the golfers were all old white guys that looked out for each other when it came to screaming at kids like us. Which is why we talked about killing him. Then Cory started talking about people we could kill that would actually help us, like whose death would we benefit the most from. I said his dad, cause he‘d probably get life insurance money but he said his mom cause if she was gone his dad wouldn’t give a fuck what he did and would give Cory money as he needed 70 Murphy Square Show less
Gunfire Rowan Smith Gunfire from the north stops my breath. The dead leaves stay static as the wind takes a cue and drops. Digging into the dirt with the sides of my feet, I scurry diagonally up the hill cold steel and finished wood numb under sweaty hands. The scene is picturesque: Gun still raised... Show moreGunfire Rowan Smith Gunfire from the north stops my breath. The dead leaves stay static as the wind takes a cue and drops. Digging into the dirt with the sides of my feet, I scurry diagonally up the hill cold steel and finished wood numb under sweaty hands. The scene is picturesque: Gun still raised, smoke rises undisturbed like the soul escaping. Taking sight, I put training to use. Standing, watching him fall, the same picture as before. Then suddenly, Gunfire from the north stops my breath. Murphy Square 9 Show less
Santeria Elise Estrada The last time I fell in love it was with the weight of a train he said my name, “y ya esta", that was it. In one moment, a sucker punch caught off guard and unprepared, thrashing and crashing like Typhoon out of nowhere vision blurred and dazed. A halo of stars began to... Show moreSanteria Elise Estrada The last time I fell in love it was with the weight of a train he said my name, “y ya esta", that was it. In one moment, a sucker punch caught off guard and unprepared, thrashing and crashing like Typhoon out of nowhere vision blurred and dazed. A halo of stars began to orbit my brain A bad, bad love left me punch drunk and dumb blinded from staring too long at the sun. A Haitian love spell, so heavy and heated and thick as the fever of New Orleans in July. Deep summer when the air soaks into your skin sweltering from the inside out and crooked with thirst. This humid heart is about to burst He sunk my bones deep, a capsized skeleton ship submerged so many leagues beneath the swell of the sea but I love, I soak up the subterranean blue, a bottomless wound I want to bleed, and bleed, and bleed. Murphy Square 59 Show less
Autobiography: After Frank O’Hara DE. Green When I was a child, I played under the Steinway with my brothers and sister. It was our cottage. We lived there, orphaned but self—sufficient. We hid sandwiches and apples in its crannied underbelly. I did not tell my mother or father how we thrived in... Show moreAutobiography: After Frank O’Hara DE. Green When I was a child, I played under the Steinway with my brothers and sister. It was our cottage. We lived there, orphaned but self—sufficient. We hid sandwiches and apples in its crannied underbelly. I did not tell my mother or father how we thrived in this world without them. Nor about the food. And here I am, on the verge of orphanhood for real this time. Imagine! 'Thispoem borrows itsform and its opening line and thefirst and last lines oflhe Ias! stanzafrom Frank O’Hara’s “Autobiographia Literan'a." Murphy Square 39 Show less
stances, it wasn’t coming across that way. And that‘s the part in the story where everybody laughs real hard. And when I tell all these kids standing around Cory the story, they all do too. And he finally looks up too. We didn‘t speak to each other we just left. Back at his house and we were in... Show morestances, it wasn’t coming across that way. And that‘s the part in the story where everybody laughs real hard. And when I tell all these kids standing around Cory the story, they all do too. And he finally looks up too. We didn‘t speak to each other we just left. Back at his house and we were in his basement cause by now the shit we had taken was really kicking our asses and my head was feeling featherlight and I got worried it might get away from me if I didn’t rest it on something so I laid down and wedged it into the space between the armrest and back cushion. Cory turned on this music that was making my head feel worse cause it was shaking the couch and every time the beat dropped a little I thought the cushions would widen enough so that my head might float right off and up. And Cory was yelling about something over the music too, I figured it was the music he was yelling about but I couldn’t really make it out and didn’t care too much until I heard my brother’s name and I sat right up cause I didn’t like it when he talked about my brother since I was still sore about that story I told earlier at the party. I think I started yelling back at Cory cause his face bent inwards kinda, like it was folding in on itself from the force of my voice. It was like someone had put a great big dent in it and it kept bending more and more inwards until the parts that were still flat like his forehead and his chin start tearing, ripping the skin and bleeding from the angles that were being created as the rest of his face kept collapsing inward. Blood kept oozing out as more tears formed, like little cracks in his face or rips in the stitches of his skin and then those too would flush all red. I stopped looking at him and I think I stopped yelling too and we both sat back down on the couch cause I realized I was standing now and still worried about my head. Then while we were sitting back down Cory starts yelling again but this time I really wasn’t listening and then all of the sudden he put his whole face through the glass table in front of him. Or maybe I did it. Maybe I reached up and put my hand behind his head and smashed it in there for him, because I couldn’t stand listening to him talk for one more second about my brother or his father or who he wanted to kill or all this other shit that we couldn’t control anyway and none of it that he can control cause he can’t control anything in his life including himself and when he talks about my family and me and lumps me in with him I get so fucking pissed that I could, I really could slam his face into a glass table. So maybe I did, which is why he didn’t lead with his forehead and why I can picture his face all bent in and bloody like that cause that’s how it looked when it came up out of the table and I did that. But maybe not, cause that was before his face went through the table. Or maybe the glass didn’t break at all, cause Cory had already put his head through it, maybe he just put his head down and went to sleep. Or maybe they had replaced the glass already and he had re-broken it already. Maybe that piece of glass just pissed Cory off which is why he came up from the table mad as hell and charged his dad who had come downstairs to see what the noise was. Which was when I ran out the back door cause I couldn’t handle that shit. Murphy Square 73 Show less
Takin’ The A Train Sean Evenson “These tracks can only take me so far,” I say as I stagger on my way to the bar. I’m unsteady from the rock of the train. A few drinks are sure to roll the pain out of my mind. With time, I can find a way to get on track. But now I’ve found the sound is driving me... Show moreTakin’ The A Train Sean Evenson “These tracks can only take me so far,” I say as I stagger on my way to the bar. I’m unsteady from the rock of the train. A few drinks are sure to roll the pain out of my mind. With time, I can find a way to get on track. But now I’ve found the sound is driving me outta this town. The sound of time whistling by, It’s something you can’t control. So for now I’ll try to get by while the conductor takes a hold. I’m takin‘ the A Train. “It looks like I’m the only one here,” I say as I rummage through the bar for a beer. I’m uneasy from the black of the night. I hope to see the white of the light out on my own. I’m free to see what I want to see— no burden on me. Oh the key is to make good company With the sound of time whistling by, It’s something you can’t control. So for now I’ll cry “Goodbye,” While the conductor takes a hold. I’m takin’ the A Train. Was it wrong for me to leave you behind? I still don’t know where to go. The time is tickjn’ and I’m looking outside at the shadows on the road. And they’re telling me “You can’t go on when you’re thoughts are back home.” And they’re telling me “You don’t know how to make it own your own." I’m takin’ the A Train. 20 Murphy Square Show less
a twister Briarma. Olson-Carr how did we come to running through the poppies? and as the leaves brushed your ankles, did you begin to sleep? the hypnotic fairytale casting sharp shadows on your basement walls? i was cowarding in my ruby reds, clutching toto while you screamed disappointment.... Show morea twister Briarma. Olson-Carr how did we come to running through the poppies? and as the leaves brushed your ankles, did you begin to sleep? the hypnotic fairytale casting sharp shadows on your basement walls? i was cowarding in my ruby reds, clutching toto while you screamed disappointment. where the hell did i get off landing my house on the witch. who the hell asked me to free the munchkins. what the hell, good witch. wicked, you snapped away the Technicolor in one click. throwing apples, oil can, tossing matches, eating hot dogs, kicking down the cellar door, auntie em, uncle henry. a brain. a heart. a home. the nerve. i could've clicked my heels the whole time they might have brushed against one another during some polka, would have woken up from a coma back in black and white, but i had the power all along? why didn’t you say so in the first place. here. let’s take a shortcut. through the poppies. 14 Murphy Square Show less
"Il-p:n4.n.lamnz :o— 1“] ni-n ‘ ‘ AUGSBURG COLLEGE LIBRARY . lm Ill 3 0510 021471505 thLu near to stay the paint peeling the sun. The aromatic acid spurting down like rain tartly tasted onyour lips like lethal lemon weapons, .rts. He wants to go to Mecca. The l 1086 battered bodies onl stand so... Show more"Il-p:n4.n.lamnz :o— 1“] ni-n ‘ ‘ AUGSBURG COLLEGE LIBRARY . lm Ill 3 0510 021471505 thLu near to stay the paint peeling the sun. The aromatic acid spurting down like rain tartly tasted onyour lips like lethal lemon weapons, .rts. He wants to go to Mecca. The l 1086 battered bodies onl stand so like some y squirrel corpse; stiflC in i ' exposed aft thaw, like most manne was a good . Desperate, hot bees. If “gay” means happy, tell re is the love? I waited for my life to blow up, but it did not. The plates became a ‘ symbol of bitterness and the spoons angst; it’s the story of bears and Jews. Thirty lions to our three gazelles. And you can’t let the blood stay all 2 sticky warm on your hand and you can’t ple but you know you need -and that it’s just the drugs. Back pocket sandwich, in the pocket, in the poc the back. I’ll never forget coming down those sta Chr' 1y and spottingrthat curvy outline un - tree, m rig blue bow attached. Who was the p and $10 8 the child? The air around the pla tang I$1212 gy with horse excrescences. Their be . They whisper their “nevermore’ H heart is about to burst, curled u . babyinthewomb,hetho ' ' ‘ ‘ Show less
was no way. In the black light, barely able to see, he pushed through the snow from the deck, way down the back of the hill, to Kathryn’s old greenhouse. The hinges scraped and whined as he pulled open the door, pushing the snow drift out of the way. He wedged the rickety door shut from the... Show morewas no way. In the black light, barely able to see, he pushed through the snow from the deck, way down the back of the hill, to Kathryn’s old greenhouse. The hinges scraped and whined as he pulled open the door, pushing the snow drift out of the way. He wedged the rickety door shut from the inside with a plank of wood from one of the plant beds. Lying down in the lonely frigid darkness, curled up like a baby in the womb, he thought of Kathryn, and he thought of dying. How could it be almost twenty years? It had been the winter of 1993, one squalling cold night lying in bed, when Kathryn had grabbed his hand as he read next to her. His head swimming a little with drink, more common than he’d like to admit in those days, the words drifting and spacing on the page. “Here, feel this." Kathryn had pressed his fingers up on the underside of her breast. “What?” he had said, half-annoyed, her forwardness breaking his concen- tration. “Just feel it.” “What—what am I looking for? I don’t even know.” She guided his fingers, pushing them into the soft flesh. “Here.” He had felt it then, a pebbly round lump beneath the skin. It had be— gun the process of doctor’s visits, initially to Jim Klaiber, the local M.D., then they were referred on, venturing from Canby into the gray windswept streets of Minneapolis to get a biopsy done, driving the long drive into the city, Bill trying to make nervous light talk. Kathryn quieting him with a silent finger to her lips, turning up NPR and gazing back out the window to the snow humped in great sad piles on the roadside like mounds of dirty sugar. The evening after the first hospital trip Bill had made Kathryn a late- night cup of tea, stumbling around the kitchen and down the hallway to the bed- room, his head buzzed again. He sat next to her on the edge of the bed. He smiled at her. He reached for her hand, placing his on top of hers. She looked at him. She had broken into soft laughter, her body shaking, slops of hot tea spilling lightly onto the bed cover. “Christ, Bill—you’d think someone was dying around here." Her laughs had been silent hiccups of mirth. She had slid the wet cup on top of the books on the nightstand, and pulled him to her. Undressing her, drunken and clumsy, hovering over her naked body beneath him, Bill strayed his fingers over the gauze underneath her nipple where they had cut whatever it was out of her. Kathryn opened her eyes and looked up at him, a gentle grimace across her lips. She pushed him off and turned over, her ass in the air, face buried in the pillow. She pulled him back to her, pressing herself up against him. Afterwards, puffing heavily, he collapsed onto the bed, next to Kathryn curled on one side, her eyes closed tightly, arm wrapped around herself protec- tively. Before Bill knew what was happening she began to cry the breathless cry of a child, her naked body rocking slightly, a helpless inconsolable cry, softly chok- ing on tiny gasps, wailing a muffled broken sound against the flowery bedspread. “It’s okay. It’ll be okay," he said, stroking her wet cheek and hair. But he really had no idea; he just needed to say something. That was the last time they had made love. Bill now had forgotten what Murphy Square 81 Show less
Truth Michelle Devens ....And then there was Truth Sometimes I wonder if beneath this beautiful moonlit sky, if a dome will ever appear and awaken me with a freeing spotlight I'm sick of being my only supporter. Endlessly striving to pick up any voters. I ache for my voice and words to be heard... Show moreTruth Michelle Devens ....And then there was Truth Sometimes I wonder if beneath this beautiful moonlit sky, if a dome will ever appear and awaken me with a freeing spotlight I'm sick of being my only supporter. Endlessly striving to pick up any voters. I ache for my voice and words to be heard from the mountains, cascading down in riches and falling into deep, six feet under ditches. I feel like a body comprised of ashes. I see a broken reflection of a girl scarred with the whips of tongues and their lashes. I hate myself for hoping for the possibility of tomorrow because tomorrow for me brings nothing but sorrow. I scream for a God who never responds not even in those little quiet works that Sunday pastors are so keen to speak on. I bleed venom that clouds my clarity, leaving me with nothing but a daunting disparity. I search endlessly into the consolations hoping to be swallowed up and spit back out with some phenomenal revelation. I search for a definition for who I am and whom I want, but the difference between chromosomes leaves my heart in a knot. I don’t fit within societal confines, so I run into the darkness to find gems in the mines. I liquefy the gem’s potential and steal their rhymes. I hate myself most of the time because I can’t answer the questions that dangerously bind. Sometimes I want the buzzer to sound on my heartbeat and my journey to be complete. I melt when any form of criticism shutters into view. I feel my wounds reopening and thick skin starting to unglue. Never did I think I would end up again in this position. I can’t seem to locate the shovel or a ladder to pull myself from this labyrinth I’ve thrown myself in. I breathe in the fumes of my living hell while fire erupts from my chords. I’m no longer a small, blonde, canary but an out casted phoenix with burnt wings so I can no longer soar. I can’t look into the mirror because the glass shatters and scars me with my cut up and distorted reflection. The shards of my image melt and slice open my skin. They write hateful names on my flesh. They say I’m too hideous for boys to love. They say I’m too obscure for anyone to understand me. The things I thought I could do have left me undone, so I cling to things others have done and claim some familiarity. I label myself with names that give way to a fatal and mysterious attraction while I’m constantly falling and no one but my mother seems willing catch me. 18 Murphy Square Show less
From Another’s Lens Whitney Blount Smith Who are you to tell me that my “choice” is wrong? I didn’t wake up one morning and decide that I want to fight a battle long with no real purpose other than destruction. What is it to you who I’m attracted to, and who I’m lovin’? Yes, love. Contrary to... Show moreFrom Another’s Lens Whitney Blount Smith Who are you to tell me that my “choice” is wrong? I didn’t wake up one morning and decide that I want to fight a battle long with no real purpose other than destruction. What is it to you who I’m attracted to, and who I’m lovin’? Yes, love. Contrary to television and stereotypes that promote my damnation lust isn’t the only variable in my body’s equation There’s a heart that beats sound, and pumps blood the same as you, I bleed red too and don’t deny that I do when it has been shed quite literally physically, po- litically, and religiously with no intent to let up, but the more you press down on me the more I push up. I am not sin, mankind is. Why else would Jesus have had to die for our sins? Show me the mirror to my damned soul, keep eye contact don’t move the same sin you say I live in is the same sin in you You promote it in school, and churches using God’s name for your own hypocritical reasons. If I am a heathen it‘s because the will of that creator gives me nothing to believe in and everything to doubt, but unlike you my faith has no ties to man so my blessings I count; and holding onto who I am, never givin up. If “gay” means happy, tell me where is the love? 62 Murphy Square Show less
