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ASTER(IX) JOURNAL NEWSLETTER | NOVEMBER 2018

ASTER(IX) JOURNAL NEWSLETTER | NOVEMBER 2018

Aster(ix) Journal

Aster(ix) Journal Newsletter | November 2018

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Dear Reader,

In our Fall 2018 Edges anthology, writers, both established and emerging, offer prose and poetry that embrace the theme of edges. These works explore the edges of cultures and country, the edges of language, the edges of space, the edges of gender, of the mind and body. They allow us to consider both self-imposed limits and externally-imposed limitations.

Nathalie Handal’s poem Edge, gives language to the heart of our inquiry.

“she stares at the world,
takes it to the edge of
all the words
men weren’t able to invent.”

An edge offers imagery of the margins, the fringes, the brink and the precipice. An edge also promises the vision of possibility, of what lay beyond the limits we would often rather not live within.

“if the dream is to go beyond empire
if the dream is to stretch our extremities
all the way thru…”

– Lucas de Lima, pinto (“chick” and slang for “penis” in brazilian portuguese)

The writers in this collection explore these possibilities personally, figuratively, and politically. In Andrea Jeftanovic’s short story The Disquiet of Being Anonymous, two characters struggle for intimacy in spite of walls, windows, and the loneliness of modernity. In Vi Khi Nao’s The Launch, womb and the word are blurred, literal and literary creation are interchangeable.

At a time where we seem to need so many boundaries—both as protection and to assert and affirm our agency—these works probe what it might mean to move beyond our limits. While we might imagine these boundaries as hard and inflexible, this anthology aspires to salve and inspire all of us who have—especially, lately—been on edge. Nicole Callihan meditates on softness, and Shay Lawz reminds us:

“A child is an open body”
and
“No woman should ever be ashamed.”

Contributors to Edges include: Rosa Alcalá, Laylah Ali (cover artist), Nicole Callihan, Nathalie Handal, Andrea Jeftanovic, Shay Lawz, Lucas de Lima, Leila Nadir, Vi Khi Nao, J. C. Reyes, Flavia Rocha, Malvinna Sammarone, Sue Scavo, and Olivia Walton.

We hope you enjoy.

With love,
Aster(ix) Journal

FICTION: The Disquiet of Being Anonymous
by 
Andrea Jeftanovic, translated by J.C. Reyes
That night’s darkness sliced by bedroom lights. A considerable time passed. I didn’t know what to do as you moved your lips into a cryptic appeal.

NONFICTION: Bad Muslim
by 
Leila NadirThe world was good/bad, moral/immoral, black/white. Afghan/not. Emotions, hopelessly, painfully bare. (Do you love me?)

POETRY: Three Poems: that I eat birds/
Soft Bodies/ Room for Rent
by Nicole Callihan
and even dreamed last night/ I had coughed the feathers up/ at the breakfast table/and Ella said/ daddy doesn’t eat birds/ and I said/ I know

POETRY: Three Poems: Edge/
Race Chronicle en Brief/ The Reservation. 

by Nathalie Handal
she stares at the world,
takes it to the edge of
all the words
men weren’t able to invent.

POETRY: Two Poems: You & the Pendulum/
You to the Future
by Rosa Alcalá
But, Future, let me tell you something truly remarkable: there were payphones on subway platforms, which was great when you needed one, but if you needed one, things were often not so great.

FICTION: Autumn Lessons
by F. Marzia Esposito, translated by Jeanne Bonner
I don’t know how to act in certain situations. Or maybe I don’t want to know how. I’m like a piece of frozen meat that’s been left in the middle of a glacier. It doesn’t break free and become unstuck – it thickens.

NONFICTION: Native Tongue
by 
Ola Osifo Osaze
“What do you mean you don’t speak Yoruba,” he asked, a shadow of pity darkening his face. “You should know how to speak your language. Didn’t your parents speak it at home?”

FICTION: Intruder
by Melanie Márquez Adams
Mortified, my self-pity unleashes. Do you see? That’s why he dumped you, because you’re stupid. I crawl to the bedroom and attempt to make the bed. Why are you cleaning up? Why bother? 

REMEDIOS:  once more, with feelings
by 
Mahwash Shoaib
let us give thanks this eid
to the erasing of raw aches of the body
the nightly chase of ellipsis to essence
the testing of boundaries of nerves and compassion

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