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The TravelerCentral Park, EmptyIn the brush we use methods of infantryCannibalUntitledA Grown-UpCeremonyBuenos AiresHe had the strangest collection of glass...Stolen TribeElk Dreamer’s DreamSkeletonKidan ode to poniesGraspPersonal TasteWedding NightWashed AshoreLittle FrustrationsAt the GymEleganceA toastMichael

Nora Landis-ShackSarah Madigan

Nora Landis-ShackMaya Nojechowicz

Nina LeonardKoreana Pak

Carman RomanoSam Fox

Noelia HobeikaCole Kawaguchi

Eva CollierJanela HarrisKoreana Pak

Dan WrigginsPaul Weichselbaum

Emily McKinstryNora Landis-Shack

Carman RomanoTatiana Hammond

Sarah MadiganDavid Robinson

Emily McKinstrySam Fox

Cole Kawaguchi

Dear Readers,

It’s been a wonderful year, and after a brief hiatus the Haverford Review is back in print and online. Thanks to your contributions, support, and enthusiasm we now pres-ent to you the Spring 2013 issue.

When I joined the Review as a freshman, I had no idea it would become such a large part of my life here at Haverford. I know that when I graduate in May, I’m leaving this magazine in good, determined hands, surrounded by a supportive and creative com-munity.

Thank you so much to the editorial board for all their hard work. Thank you contrib-utors for all you do; without you, we would have no Review at all. Thank you Student Council and the Hurford Center’s Student Arts Fund for sponsoring the magazine. And thanks to all the students and faculty who will continue reading, writing, and support-ing this project for each new class to come.

Nora Landis-Shack Editor in Chief The Haverford Review

Editorial BoardRachel Baron, Sam Fox, Noelia Hobeika, Sarah Madigan, Opeoluwa Martins, Emily McKinstry, Maya Nojechowicz, Koreana Pak, Carman Romano

The Traveler

Two discreet hands move the zipper like a train on its tracks.Mesh lining suspends ten pairs of matched socks:they shrink away from the angular spacearound the soap bar.Q-tips, dental floss, toothpaste, shampoo—all belong packed into three Ziploc bags.And the toothbrush takes center stage, slippingits mannequin body between two sealed spaces.

He would never pirate music from the Internetor share his germs with you.His heartbeat would crescendo with the rapof the deliveryman’s fist on the front door.Either he lacks the creativity or the nerve (or both) to lie.Put him through the X-ray: reveal his deepest darkest secrets.Find nothing, not even the glint of a belt (why would he buypants that don’t fit?)

He moves fluidly,tucks the suitcase up like a book in a library(with the expertise of someone who packed the trunks of family vans),quietly folds himself into a seat, all knees and elbows,immerses himself in cabin noise, braces himself with air pressure,and stares forward, aware of the seatbelt cutting intothe protrusion of his thinning stomach. And amongthis economy class hell, he settles his clasped fingers down in his lap.

Sarah Madigan ‘16

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Central Park, EmptyNora Landis-Shack ‘13

In the brush we use methods of infantry

First, the foot solider must lean in far too closecloser than any loving eye should ever look.Before invading the hills, the land must be stretched taut.Only the fingertips should be usedto pin down the tarp of the eyebrow,so that each hair bristles, vulnerable and exposed to the air.

The right hand should be used to dismember each stalkthat dares stray outside the smooth suburban lawnswift brushstroke appeal of tidy (green) grass.Once the risen landscape is raw, the soldier is to move campacross the shallow dip and to the next hilland upon arrival, repeat procedure.

In the following days the upper lip must be attacked by slash and burn,a swift and silent death for the overgrowth.In a successful aftermath the field should lie barren, no survivors.One must always remember to moisturize before bed, and hydrate.

Each week the stems peppering the legs should be raked with a fine blade.As the stems are severed from warm skin,it is acceptable to leave small red bumps in their wake.This infantile landscape is to be maintained in the warmer months particularly.

The grasses of the underarms should surrender peacefully in a daily ritual,requiring just a slight swing back and forth of a penknife to tame them.

Still the prized enemy remains,the brush foreign despite years of exploration.It is to be mapped, charted meticulously quadrant by quadrantso that the infantry is never caught unprepared.For there are stories of those who have been lost to the landunable to find their way back from daring to enter this moist, tangled depth.

Maya Nojechowicz ‘15

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Cannibal

When I first appearedbloody andscreaming (as most babies do),you cried: Ohwhat a miracle! Beautifulthing –Indeed

I grew and thatmarvel transformed as Idid (or so you thought). Andyou cried: OhCannibal! Strangething –Indeed

I preferred meat and youvegetables. I liked thedark grittyEarthAnd you the lightsky.My head said: this isnot wrong. ButYou cried: OhBad thing—Indeed

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Cannibal – my loveyou said. And astime went on (or so we thought),my love grew softer andCannibal!Louder.So Cannibal!I cried too(as most babies do).

I ate my skin and youvegetables. I found no home in thisDark grittyEarthBut you found one in your light sky.Cannibal – my love,You used to say.Love, no more.Cannibal! Wecry together –Indeed

Beautiful—Strange—Bad.

My head says: This is notwrong.(or so I thought)

Nina Leonard ‘15

UntitledKoreana Pak ‘15

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A Grown-up

She liked three things: polished shoes, the Old Testament, and escaping home on Sunday morn-ings. She could name every book of the Bible and could sit still throughout the whole sermon.

And the minister said, “God is awesome.”

Earlier she’d smeared scarlet lipstick across her mouth, on tip-toes at her stepmother’s vanity. She smiled into the antique mirror, her teeth smeared with orange goop. She dabbed her lips gently with a tissue, like her grandmother taught her, like a lady ought to do. She ground the tube of lipstick into the carpet.

“Do we even really know what awesome means anymore?”

Poppies bloomed behind her eyes, then night with its pretty constellations. Poppies bloomed on the carpet—a very nice carpet, imported, and colored eggshell. She felt hot. The room was hot, and the artwork her father liked was ugly, and the windows weren’t open, but even if they were it’d still be hot. She sat, and winter came and the poppies died and the sun rose.

“We say ‘awesome’ all the time. But do we really understand?”

She had brushed her teeth. With two kinds of toothpaste and three different toothbrushes; she used mouthwash and flossed. She had never had a cavity; she did not intend to ever have one. She heard they used Novocain: it numbed you so that you couldn’t feel anymore. You had to lie there, motionless, while a stranger fixed you.

“‘Yo, man, your sneakers are awesome!’”

She had touched her chest, staring into the bathroom mirror. She had begun wearing training bras; she liked them. They compressed her, held her ribs in place, held her heart in place. But she wanted more.

“‘Hey, man, your sneakers rock!’”

She’d wadded toilet paper and placed it carefully inside her shirt. The mirror told her that she was a grown-up now. It was right.

Her had father called up the stairs. His hand cupped her skull, stroked her hair. She said, ‘It’s 8:45’ and her father said, ‘I know’ and he gave his child back to their mother.

“We compare sneakers to God,” the minister continued, “But do sneakers die for us? Do sneakers suffer for us? Are sneakers the son of God?” She held her mother’s hand, long bereft of a wedding ring. Church elders began to circle through the aisles, balancing reverently cups containing the blood of sneakers, and trays displaying the sneakers of Christ. She stared solemnly ahead and her mother wiped the scarlet from her daughter’s lips. 9

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Her tiny hand snatched a plastic cup filled with Welsh’s grape juice and a square of blessed Wonder-bread.

She clicked her small black shoes, buckled at the third hole. She stood and belted hymns. When the babies left for Sunday School, she remained in her pew -- a grown-up. The congregation rose, sing-ing

“May peace be with you!”

and responding

“And also with you!”

Final hymn, benediction; the churchgoers began to bustle, gossiping and chuckling. She blinked hard. Rubies sparkled behind her eyelids, hung in the air like so many raindrops, then plummeted down into the mine that birthed them, a tarry blackness that clung to her skin and pulled. A hand gripped her shoulder, forced her body to sit. It spoke, the hand did. She sat and she breathed and her mother asked her questions. Was she okay? The church was silent and the woman’s voice echoed, fear reverberating from the organ’s pipes.

They stood and she held her mother’s hand as they paced down the aisle, and the pair mined the rubies again, dredging them up from the mine.

Her father waited in his car beyond them. Her mother did not look at him, nor he at her. But the girl stared accusingly at her father, and stared pityingly at her mother as the woman knelt and hugged her daughter tightly.

And the woman asked her daughter, “Did you stuff your bra?”

Carman Romano ‘16

Ceremony

Two young men are cruising Lee Street—it’s April. 1:00 AMand no street lights. Ties are loosened, blazers tossed in the trunk.Prom ended half an hour ago. They creak to a stop in front of 703 Eastcheck the mirrors, take turns crawling to the backseat. No one’s upexcept the dogs; no one’s outside. But inside:

Footprints and fog gray the windows. Gasps

break greedily. Trousers are shucked to the knees.

After two years waiting, toes curl.

Sam Fox ‘14

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Buenos Aires Noelia Hobeika ‘13

He had the strangest collection of glass containers. Mustard jars and mason jars,antique bottles and vials of perfume. They lay around the house like vagrants,sleeping in the cupboard, gazing out the window, blank eyes. Once he found aline of them marching up the stairs as he went the other way. Highball glasses,squat pickle jars and fluted vases. Somewhere in the world, there were unbottledships, and orange-flecked salamanders climbing out of a river.

Cole Kawaguchi ‘13

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Stolen Tribe Eva Collier BMC ‘14

Elk Dreamer’s Dream

Here is a manwhose painter handssmell like breadroot,and who feels timepassing in his limbs.He praysto an Elk Godwho is strong in an old way. His ancestorsgave him red and goldand disappeared.Sunsets, they taught him,and riverswere parts of the originalearth. Mountainsand rain, dust, fireelk, caves, horizons. Here is a manwho understandsthat when you say largeyou don’t mean the largestof everything, everywhere.He paints at nightlistening to the windand wait up fordisaster. Hungry visitorssee this landbarren.With covered headsand shaded eyesthey stride pastthe elksaying dust.

Janela Harris ‘14

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SkeletonKoreana Pak ‘15

Kid

We didn’t drink or light up or even sit on the floor at your apartment in Freeport in August. We ate crackers like reasonable adults who’ve got things figured out. Nine-thirty and it was time for bed. I probably drove home, had some cheerios, smoked one and reminisced.

When I was six and you were seven we’d climb around on tables and couches because the carpet was hot lava and touching it meant losing. We still cling to the bookshelf and wedge our toes against the baseboard, anything to keep from burning alive.

Dan Wriggins ‘14

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an ode to ponies

I like ponies, do you like ponies? no. are you a pony? yes.

This poem expresses the nihilistic aspect to human (or pony identity) as manifested as spe-cies-wise rejection of physical, tangible identity. It is unclear if the first speaker is indeed a pony, or perhaps a human addressing his pony anthropomorphically. The poem takes on a far more complex tone in the third line, when the accusatory narrowing of the discourse to a more reducible, concrete statement takes the narrative in an entirely different direction.

It is not unreasonable to suggest that this third line derives from the anticipation of the first speaker experiencing the pony-ness of the second speaker visually—thus line three takes on a slightly surreal quality as rejection of the self struggles mightily with the tangible comprehension of the organic form of self as pony. We must however note that the fourth line—beautiful in its’ binary simplicity—does not attempt to contend the statement of the other speaker in line three. This also presents the possibility that the two speakers are one and the same; the pony is merely participat-ing in an internal dialogue, which resolves the question of how a pony might be talking (we may also cite the historical example of ponies and horses taught to stomp their feet to answer questions —this is not an unreasonable leap). If we take the first and second speakers to be one and the same, we are presented with two possibilities.

The first is that we are participating in the internal dialogue of a self-hating pony—mani-fested in the form of this rhetorical angst. The second, perhaps more intriguing possibility, is that the crisis of the poem takes on an added dimension of complexity; the speaker of the poem is not a pony and aspires to be a pony. He wishes to be a pony, identifies himself as a pony, but tragically i sable to ultimately recognize what separates him from ponies—thus the implicit rejection of identi-ty in the first two lines. In this interpretation, we may see for the first time, the possibility of a much more optimistic interpretation of the text; the speaker is affirming his pony-hood even in the face of rejection. However, in this case, we must still confront the avowed hatred of ponies—his self-defini-tion as what he claims to hate is puzzling.

Ultimately, this is among the most complex poems of the post modern era. The minimalism, ambiguity, and universal themes of experientially formed, shifting conceptions of identity are par-ticularly relevant in our modern era of displacement.

Paul Weichselbaum ‘14 19

Grasp Emily McKinstry ‘15

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Personal Taste

AYou were the first taste, hesitant and delicate, the first sip of alcohol. Your skin waswarm and soft and you always tasted like sunshine, the long months of summerwe drank in before you left. You smelled like grass and fireflies, like hot pavementcooled off from the rain, the thickness of the air before a storm mixed with the potyou said you’d stop smoking. I tasted it on your lips the night I let you slip yourhands under my shirt, in the hallway outside Theo’s apartment. You were late nightice cream on the phone, grilled corn on a Cape Cod beach, salted lips from oceanspray, green apple. When you called it off, I didn’t eat for days.

BYou were too much alcohol and not enough food, a dizzy cocktail of vodka and beerand whatever mixed drink you pushed into my hand. I thought I knew everything ateighteen. It took me 7 ½ minutes, exactly three songs, to get to your apartment. Yousmelled like beer, like chips and spiced rum when we sat laughing on your floor. Wenever ate a meal together. I should have known it wouldn’t have worked.

CYou were a sad girl’s attempt at something simple. You tasted like the country:bread and butter in the hot summer sun, warm liquor, ham sandwiches andstrawberries. You smelled like the hay, your blond hair still wet and cold from theriver. Every night we got high and made frozen pizza, watched Planet Earth until3 AM and fucked ourselves to sleep. I swallowed up my words and cried in thehammock out on your front yard. I gained ten pounds of poison, our bodies werefull of pot and energy drinks and Benadryl and vodka. My mouth tasted like vomitfor days.

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DYou pushed my hair out of my eyes, asked me to stay a bit longer, made mebreakfast. You made eggs and toast, bacon, and bitter coffee. Sitting on yourbarstool was a bit uncomfortable . But you made a killer gin and tonic, so I keptstopping by. We sat on the porch and watched the world go by instead. If I cameby late, you’d still always smell like limes and gin and we’d share another drinktogether.

EI made you a grilled cheese sandwich at 3:30 in the morning, and sat next to you.Daft Punk in the background. I dug my fingers into the couch to keep from kissingyou. When I finally did, you became late night nachos, coffee and bagels the morningafter, fried tofu and rice we cooked together. You became peanut butter granola andchocolate chip cookies, pina coladas, beer after a long day. You became dinners inyour studio apartment, steak and zucchini and ice cream cake, trips to Chinatownand noodles in the rain. You are sandwiches in the park, long candlelit nights,exploring our city through food. You are marrow and juicy burgers, soup and salad.You are sweet words, a soft hand through my hair, the taste of salt and sweat onyour skin, mud on our ankles, cheeks flushed red. You’re a fancy night out and aboxers night in. You laugh when I suck up too many bubbles in my tea, smiled whenI learned to slurp my soup. You still kiss the back of my neck when I cook for you.

Nora Landis-Shack ‘13

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Wedding Night

Her hair was gold,the grass was green,the sky was black with smoke.On the ground she lay,in this ground she’ll stay,she screamed before she spoke:“What will you do,for when you’re through,you’ll be as dead as I!”She took my hand,I took her head—“you’ll be as dead as I!Her hair was gold,the grass was green,her dress was splattered red.On the ground we lay,in the ground we’ll stay,alone in our marriage bed.

Carman Romando ‘13

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Washed AshoreTatiana Hammond ‘15

little frustrations

can I have this last one?you wave at me a jelly donut with a crescent-shaped bitealready oozing.

my eyes linger on the newspaper between uslike i’m in a staring contest with faces that smirk back up at me.one of them looks like a friend

who would drive with one arm out the windowand occasionally catch her hair in her hand while agonizing,‘just so indifferent.’

just so indifferent,like the arbitrary drip of a shower with no pressureor coffee’s tepid midmorning remnants.

Sarah Madigan ‘16

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At the Gym

You took a tumble off the treadmill, and everyone around you came with utmost sympa-thy to see if you were alright. But I know you lost balance when you turned to look at my girlfriend’s ass. I hope your scrape gets infected.

Every time I stare into your beautiful eyes, I thank the fates for that chubby kid and his mother on adjacent treadmills. It was really me that farted, but his mother thought it was him, and yelled at him for his poor manners. Had he not been there, I would have been too embarrassed to approach you at the water cooler.

David Robinson ‘14

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EleganceEmily McKinstry ‘15

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A toast

From here you can see the Santa Ritas—at night,their silhouette. Your backyard’s got a cabanabut the last owner let all his chickens die under it.It reeks. The ice in my drink

catches the pool lights and a few gnats.And for a moment—yes,just this once…

Arizona’s one-hundred; we’re twenty.Cheers, my friend, to being hungry.

Sam Fox ‘14

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Michael

Michael wants to be a tree. I long for it, his face told the faces of his parents. But did they understand? He wants to write a poem about trees.He wants to write about fall and tire swings and wood fires, which also comefrom trees.Michael thinks the poem will be about childhood. Maybe it will be about hischildhood.Then he thinks. No, this poem will just be about trees.

Michael walks outside. He digs a small hole and stands in it.I am a tree he saysHe holds his arms up like branches

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The minutes are long for trees Michael thinks

His nose itches

A neighbor passes by the yard.Such nice weather! isn’t it little boy?

It is winterIt is spring

The televisions are talking

Michael, of course, is a treeand holds himself very still.

Cole Kawaguchi ‘14