Again 

…without you lying on the grass

next to me,

I can still hear your breathing

Next to me, the rustle of the leaves

matched against the sound

of children’s play,

she is in a dream world

a place I am not allowed to go,

the way his hand lays across his stomach

lets me remember a place

I will never go again.

The laughter of that child

is nothing without you.

“No expectations”

you once told me,

or perhaps that was someone else.

The whispers I hear

when the snow is falling.

I captured once, the image

of a blind man

tying knots into the world.

Sleeping now for six days

a spirit only wanders in his dream.

The steam, or fog, or smoke

wraps around daylight

attempting only to grasp a reflection.

I can see the world

falling between us;

the words dropping just short of…

sinking fever from meaning

tumbling gasps into my throat.

Commitment of our energy;

we are becoming…

Something tells me I should wake up

the ringing and ringing and ringing

clinging to my ears.

Can someone retrain this memory?

erase the roads I don’t need memorized anymore.

Erase how I used to trace into your skin,

erase this sight of you,

erase the once was,

once were, once because, once since.

I think about this once since.

Something’s wrong once since,

once words cease flow,

once my hand is not my hand.

Not the same moment.

Not the same since.

There is a distance between reflection

and true skin.

Depth perception makes things quite different,

Unrecognizable.

This is once truth.

- Pisarczyk

Pretzel

The satisfying crunch of the pretzels in my mouth sooths me,

Yes, its after 1 in the morning,

Yes, I had laboriously brushed and flossed my teeth earlier,

Taken pains to chew eclipse, believing them when they promised me immediate breath control to offset the smell and taste of the onions I ate on my veggie burger earlier this evening because I felt certain that the attention I had already given my mouth had not been zealous enough and a piece of gum was that extra bit of clean.

Yet I continued munching away. Letting every piece of salt and pretzel stick on my gums, lay between my teeth and negate the pains I had taken with them just some short hours before.

It was pointless now, I reasoned, and I had no cause to have minty, fresh, clean mouth because she didn’t come. She did not call. I wanted to pretend that I didn’t care at all cause I had better things to do like…check my email…every…two.. minutes…and complete a row of knitting… then get bored and put it back down…flip the channels over and over and .. over again cause I did not notice that I was alone. But frankly I wanted her here and it disappoints me she didn’t come or call and I don’t know at all what’s going on cause I’m in the dark and feeling not very smart cause I don’t like that my room is as clean as my mouth was just a few minutes ago cause she was going to call and come and sit on my floor which I had vacuumed, for the 2nd time in 5 months, so that we could play Scrabble and laugh and blast my mp3s but that’s not what happened…to me 

And I’m still chewing cause food is a comfort as much as we all hate to admit but I want to close the bag I just opened cause it was meant to be a snack for us both when she came over cause I knew I had no food in my room and pretzels then just had to do. They were meant to be a casual treat that would leave our hands clean to make letters into words that we would put on the board that you claimed was your favorite game of all. 

Perhaps flirting with As and Bs but I’ve opened the bag by myself and I’m not very hungry yet I keep munching away anyway cause I am alone and I thought tonight would map itself out differently and I’m not angry or hurt just disappointed and curious. She was the first in a while who I had yet to find fault with and it was a jolt cause I notice things quickly and she just seemed cool but I’ve only known her a second and though that second was brief, I managed to learn a thing or two about her. Enough that I could push through my nerves and insecurities to say “how about I kiss you” in that parked car where anyone could see and smiled when she surreptitiously replied “how about I kiss you back.” 

And we played with the black toy cat hanging from her rearview mirror unsure who should lean in first cause she still had her seat belt on and maybe it was I who made that first move, no…on second thought I recall it was mutual. [And] two things were certain afterwards she…did have a tongue ring and I would have to take pains to brush thoroughly the next night cause she were coming over. And I held up my end of the bargain…but she failed to arrive and fresh breath was for naught and as I sit here writing this, my carpet free of debris, I take another pretzel from the bag and crunch down on it, hard. 

- Sasha 

mlr 

Recognition, 

of my own volition, 

that I have privileges that are uniquely my own 

and I own 

that they’re not always earned 

and I’ve learned 

that others aren’t that lucky. 

Cause 

it’s all about luck and I have aplenty. 

I am privileged; 

society’s god-child. 

With a future as wide as the sunset. 

Coffee with a lot of cream; 

my color is a cup of Java half full of half ‘n half and I profit 

from the randomness of my birth and though 

I am not apologetic and will not 

be made to feel guilty

I have 

been made aware and 

I swear that I will not forget…

I will not forget and 

I will not stand blind, 

I have a mind to expand my comfort zone and 

let uncomfortable notions of white-privilege in, and 

though I’m not always a person of privilege being a 

‘not-so-straight,’ Jewish immigrant grrl. 

I am white and with that come advantages and I 

know that I can afford to be color blind cause I 

don’t have to stop and force myself to recognize that …

color is still an issue.

-  Sasha

Will she believe me

I cried a million tears

My stomach in knots, in my heart a black hole

But she won’t see me right

So long my wrong forced into this life

A prison of strife

I’m seeping out. Just seeping

But my wrong keeps holding tight

Fighting my right

Like an evil subconscious war

Staving off bliss long past due

Will she believe me

If I tell her I miss her

Will she believe me

If I tell her I care

Will she believe me

If I tell her for her I’d work a hundred jobs

That I’d always be there

To hold her all night

To make her happy and safe

Will she believe me

If I told her she would forever be alright

But she can protect herself

She’s tough, she’s strong, she’s hardly ever wrong

And she’s come a long way

I have no right to hold on too tight

So I’ll stand here, beside her, outside of her

Walking in time with her

Just in case

in case she needs me

In case

she believes me

-Sharon R. Cole

Sharon is a Philadelphia-based freelance writer serving the LGBTIQ

community. She has written for EDGEPhiladelphia.com, The Feminist

Review and other publications–online and off.

“Chichen Itza in Mexico” by Jenny Dugger