Existence Natalie Als dorf Backs to the ground, swaying. Crimson and canary-striped hammock, cradling us three. Lilac’s ambrosial perfume fills the warm night. I am afraid to blink, waiting for a sole star to divide the sky. Why does the moon rest just above the roof tonight, but not tomorrow? The moon has its own routine. It, like me, has places to be. Dad tells us tales of his time in London. One scene plays in my head like an echo as if the memory were my own, or real. My visits are infrequent and long. And cut short every time. An ethereal glade, my father and his friends running from the ecotone through the rain to a bar, the sound of folk songs like mist in the air, asking for chips, and getting fries. A trivial locale in London, that may only exist in my mind. But it’s London to me. And now the celestial night holds in its merciful grasp– London, and rain, and the hammock. It holds the lilac bush past its uprooting. It holds the waxing crescent moon lingering forever above the church roof. It holds the anticipation of a wish and the warmth of summer. It holds loneliness and the reminder of how much we must mean to be this small and to still be loved. It holds the secrets of life and death, and the story of time. And I get to see it for a fraction of its existence, for the entirety of mine. Natalie Alsdorf I am currently 19 years old and have spent most of my life in western Colorado. Besides my time in Oregon the past year and a half (for which I am so grateful), I consider myself a Coloradan at heart and felt called to move back to the colorful, sunny state. Most of my inspiration for my work is derived from nature, my faith, and the human experience. I enjoy sunrise runs, cat snuggles, writing (and re-writing) late at night, and listening to audiobooks and music. I hope to become a published fiction author in the future and am taking my goal one day, and one word, at a time. @nataliealsdorf (Instagram)

Heat Poem Cat Terrell Cat Terrell My name is Cat Terrell, I am 21 years old, and I'm a poet, musician, mathematician, you get the idea. I like writing poetry that evokes very specific images, and I especially like it when the words I happen to choose have a lot of assonance between them. The poems published here are my first ever published anywhere, and most of them revolve around an incidental theme: growing up. When I'm not writing poetry I am spending time with friends, or going on a walk in nature, or reading. I am so grateful for the three poetry courses I took at PCC that expanded my poetry knowledge and subsequent worldview, so thank you to Van Wheeler, Mia Caruso, and Chrys Tobey for being excellent instructors.

Wishlist Poul Suero I wish I had a way with words Communicate through song, like birds Some way I could share my mind I wish that I could understand All the seas, the air, the sand crashing, swelling in my mind All I feel every time I stand next to you What I feel every time I walk away from you I wish I knew what it all meant To know what’s what and where it went And sort out what’s undefined I wish my heart would stay at rest Not try to jump out of my chest Can’t catch a breath, I’m out of time All I feel every time I stand next to you What I feel every time I walk away from you I wish I had a way with words I wish that I could understand I wish I knew what it all meant I wish my heart would stay at rest All I feel every time I stand next to you What I feel every time I walk away from you I wish I had a tale to tell That all worked out and came out well But all my thoughts are misaligned I wish that when I rang your bell You’d say hello and not farewell Life moves and I’m left behind All I feel every time I stand next to you What I feel every time I walk away from you

Waking up, Again Erin Clarke Pleasure is the wake-up call, The ding-dong come and play Edged with twinkling tingles Charged by leaned-in conspiring, It’s silky body butter Remembered right after the shower, Whispering sweet nothings with each glide To all your luscious landscapes, It’s donuts after sleeping in, Then lying flat to spot Constellations in the spackle– A galaxy of favorites tucked in rorschach ceiling blots, It’s warm slippers on cold toes And neck nuzzles at breakfast, It’s a ripe pear yielding To testing teeth and curious tongues, It’s walking for the sake of beats Pounding through concrete And the excuse to pull fresh breezes Into your restless cells, It’s absorbing all the string sounds Echoing through hollowed wood, Loving the hands deftly Worshiping their instrument, It’s celebratory wiggles because soft clothing Kindly hugs and your favorite mug is waiting To be cupped by grateful palms, It’s wearing sparkles with no agenda, and playing like you mean it, It’s Doubt shrinking into the corner Newly chastened, power waning, While the body sings YES in gorgeous chorus Forging intrastellar joy, Selene and other goddesses Can’t compete with my delight, I gush Disco glitter moonbeams wrapped in chuckles wrapped in rapture When the tendrils of depression finally slacken at long last, When I am unbound and once again awake. Erin Clarke Erin Clarke is a poet, copywriter, and linguistics nerd currently living in Portland, Oregon. In her work she draws inspiration from meditation practice, physiology, nature, motherhood, and her decades-long history with major depression. In addition to writing poetry, she enjoys tap dancing, singing, hiking, learning new languages, and watching anime. You can read more of her work at erinclarkewrites.com and on Instagram @eeclarkeish

Sad Vacation Josiah Webster F ive thousand Hellobucks. That’s almost enough to buy a rocketship. You can pick up a few if you watch a 30 second ad, or if you complete the Daily Slog. But the real source is cold hard cash. Ħ100 for $2, Ħ300 for $5, Ħ1000 for $12. At the $50-$100 range you get loads of Hellobucks for free, but I can’t afford that right now, so I just buy them a few hundred at a time, slowly saving up to get that rocketship. I’m going to name it Glenda. Isn’t that pretty? But it’s only a game. I play it at night when I’m trying to sleep. When I’m too exhausted to move. When I am filled with the dread of sleeping because I know that it will pass too quickly. There are ads–they come in little batches of twos and threes, always at random, always too loud. They are always the same ads. For $10 you can turn them off. But if you turn them off, you won’t get any Hellobucks for free. I’m playing more these nights. When the light is off and I am lying in bed, so sapped, and stomach growling from noodles again. The screen is a pulsating spotlight, binding my head in its glow like a tractor beam. Blue beam. Reflecting off eyegloss, noseshine, and the matte white of my pillow. My eyes have been stinging, vessels distending. The sclera is red by morning. And there is seemingly endless game to be played. The numbers get bigger at each new stage. I was at one point grinding for a covered wagon–now look! Now the numbers are bigger. With glitzy cheesy sound effects through tinny-speakered phone, the vaguely wood- sounding tap of the fingers on plastic. Expert quick tapping. The screen with its slight pliability. The cachet of rewards, of boxes that glow when they open, momentously opening. Of course, you could beat the game without buying anything at all. It just takes time. These false currencies are used to buy skins and trinkets and great beauties like Glenda that would take so, so much longer to earn the old-fashioned way. The game is not designed to be satisfying that way. But if you grease it, it almost can be. You just don’t have the time to be that unsatisfied for that long, not when you’ve rent due and work in the morning and nothing in brain but the strained sub-emotion, the half-thought; the need for a moment to breathe or to wander outside yourself, empty with lightness and hope for a piece of the— peace of the mind. There is no time. No energy left. There is just enough to keep the eyes pried and play the game. Plugged into the wall all night as you play, because it drains your battery, because your battery’s never full. Because you’re too tired to get out of bed except when you have to in mornings on too little sleep after the long night up getting nowhere in particular except for maybe somewhere on a budget far, far from here that doesn’t exist. When I get my Glenda, she sits on the virtual property, unable to move. It isn’t programmed like that. I tap on her, furiously tapping, and numbers come out. They’re bigger than ever. Weighted to my mattress, I wonder where I would fly, if I could. Josiah Webster Josiah Webster's favorite place to dwell is the uncanny gulch between the real and the perceived. He also dwells in SE Portland. His recent publications can be found at Ergot Press and Figwort Literary Journal . You can also find him via @byzantine_dream on Instagram and Twitter.

Fiction Where There's Smoke Travis Erb When the Bough Breaks Alli Tschirhart The Butler's Dilemma Samantha Sampang Sad Vacation Josiah Webster At the Rooftop Garden Emily Miller

He Lived up on the Bluff Hunter Bordwell-Gray The bass on the wall croaked a twee song to electric perfection: Don’t Worry, Be Happy. Sheet metal cowboys swayed so sweet, languid in that summer heat, a kindly sight on June’s dreary eyes. And no ocean deigned to count itself so vast as the sagebrush flats on which they danced, innumerable, incalculable as nature is. Yet grander still was Grandfather’s study, filled to the brim with little toy tractors. His leather-bag laugh bound clear to the walls and back. Such sanguine warmth not made to be contained, like a desert wind. Hunter Bordwell-Gray I am a lifelong Portland resident and a first-year Creative Writing/Poetry student at PCC. I started my journey in elementary school, intricately crafting my first novel on a rundown laptop…as far as a 10 year old could stay entertained before chasing the next shiny idea. Since then, I have delved into the realms of poetry, tabletop campaign writing, and multimedia production. For me, writing is the only medium that allows me to clearly convey my ideas and experiences to other people where otherwise I sometimes struggle to express myself. I take much of my inspiration from a hodgepodge of nature, analog horror podcasts, and the roulette wheel that is my taste in music.

A Recipe for Disaster Amy Smith A RECIPE FOR DISASTER Makes one absolute catastrophe Ingredients Alcohol —6-7 hours’ worth of tequila shots, in a dark strip-club, to be exact One Birthday Party – the use of the word “party” is a stretch An Ex-Boyfriend – the one you invited in an attempt to be the “bigger person” 1 One Bicycle – the blue-and-white Fuji that everyone calls a fixed-gear, but is really just a single-speed. She has a free-wheel & both of her brakes Rain – the Pacific-Northwest-in-March kind of rain 2 3 Preparation Weeks Prior: Before leaving for Peru, mom calls to say, “I already told this to your brother, but neither of you are allowed to injure yourselves while I’m out of the country.” Set this tidbit aside for later. ----------------------------------------------------------------- Despite what we’ve been taught by fables and proverbs, being “the bigger person” isn’t always beneficial, karma’s not always a bitch, the golden rule doesn’t apply to everyone, and sometimes selfishness serves you better than the alternative. Two brake s won’t save you in this situation, but a helmet would sure help. The kind of rain that soaks the edge of the street in gravel and miscellaneous debris and makes it treacherous to ride a bike, hike, drive, or exist outside in any capacity. Next: Run into the ex-boyfriend at the local dive bar; the bar you still frequent when you want to risk seeing him. Be sure you’ve had enough to drink, so that his advances are well-received, rather than met with your usual, bitter sarcasm. Once you’ve drunkenly spent the night and he’s insincerely said he loves you, invite him to the friend’s birthday. The friend the two of you once joked was your son, because despite being a grown man, usually behaved like a stoned teenager. The friend who tried to remain neutral after the breakup, but skewed towards you, and may have recently developed something resembling an Oedipus complex. Step One: Because cooking with fuel is so efficient, it's time to add alcohol and a strip club to this already zesty mix. Alcohol is a great emulsifier when you need to combine two things that no longer blend well. Round of shots. You’ve orchestrated this event, and you’ll be in control—until you’re not anymore. Round of shots. Once the boys are at the rack, you’ll get to watch the ex toss dollar bills at naked women. Women with long, lean muscles, capable of acrobatics, and who possess a level of confidence that you can’t even buy with liquor. Round of shots. Anger. Jealousy. Once you’ve brought all of your ingredients to a rolling boil, turn the heat down and let things simmer. Go outside and smoke a cigarette. Throw yourself at a stranger. Anything to play it cool. Step Two: Vignettes. Between the alcohol and the head injury, all you will have from the next few hours are fuzzy vignettes, gently folded into everyone else’s account of what happened. As far as you will remember, it's still light out when you unlock the sleek little bike that is your daily commuter. But that can’t be right, because it will be cold, and dark, and wet, when half an hour later you slide face-down along the unforgiving pavement. How will this happen, you may ask? You will break away from the ex and the birthday boy, as if you’re in a bicycle race, a fiery rage sizzling within you. You’ll take that soggy corner a lot too fast, and in your inebriated state, you’ll be unable to recover. Step Three: Do you remember anything? Or will you hear the story so many times that your brain has to fabricate something to make sense of it all? You will have no real recollection of the impact, but you’ll have the scar to prove it happened. The ex’s backyard—the house you once shared. Flashing blue and red lights and the obtrusive wail of a siren. Despite marinating in tequila all day, you’ll still have the wherewithal to tell the paramedics you can’t afford an ambulance ride because capitalism has ruined healthcare, and you’d rather take a cab. They’ll convince you to go with them only by threatening a DUI, which will seem like a stretch, but you’ll be in no condition to argue. Or maybe you are, being so full of liquid courage. ----------------------------------------------------------------- You can get a DUI on a bike in Oregon. The paramedics would have had to call the police to issue that DUI, and sober-you thinks they may have been bluffing. The paramedics will insist on strapping you to a backboard despite your obvious mobility; it’s protocol for a potential head/neck injury. Because you’re strapped down, the hospital will cut off your clothes, your pathetic protests falling on deaf-ears. This will include your favorite black skinny-jeans and a new, expensive bra–quickly reducing any residual dignity to despair, dredged in shame. A faceless doctor will pick finely-chopped-asphalt out of the ground flesh that was once your forehead, and close the gaping wound with a combination of sutures and glue, because neither would have been sufficient on its own. When the nurse wheeling you from the ER to a recovery room asks what you were doing when this happened, you’ll dryly reply, “Probably going to my ex’s house, to make poor decisions.” At least your sense of humor is intact. Although she’ll try to suppress her laughter, a chuckle will echo through the deafening silence of the otherwise empty elevator. You'll flirt shamelessly with the other nurse, in a desperate attempt at validation, but he’ll awkwardly mention his wife enough times for you to get the not-so-subtle hint. Step Four: Everything will hurt. The styrofoam donut, used to keep your neck immobile while reviewing the spinal x-rays, will feel like a torture device, and you will have never been so stiff in your entire life. Your left shoulder will scream at you with a searing pain emanating from the depths of the muscles, and the attached arm will be cradled in a soft, black sling, against your battered body. The ex will spend the night curled like spaghetti into a chair that is impossibly small for his six-foot frame. His presence will bring you little in the way of comfort though, at least until you realize your phone is dead and you’re reliant on him. As morning rolls around, a new nurse will bring a stiff pair of thin scrubs as compensation for the clothing the others destroyed. She’ll also hand you some individually packaged saltines, so the pain pills have something to tear through other than your stomach lining. When you try to choke down the soft, dry cracker, you’ll also bite down on something hard. It will take a moment for you to comprehend what’s happening, but once you realize it’s a piece of broken molar, you’ll be inconsolable. The uncontrollable sobbing will probably occur because both your serotonin and dopamine have bottomed out with the metabolization of the booze, but the tooth won’t help matters. Step Five: The ex will call a car, on account of your phone being dead. You’ll wait thirty minutes shivering in the wafer-thin scrubs before he’ll lose patience and try again. You’ll be humiliated, exhausted, freezing, and all around miserable. But wait. There’s more! After forty-five minutes you’ll finally climb into a warm, idling cab, only to discover you know the driver. He’s a regular at your bar and friends with your boss. Wonderful. You’ll look like a monster, with yesterday’s makeup smudged across a face that is swollen almost beyond recognition. Almost, but not quite, because he’ll know it's you! The small talk over the next fifteen minutes will be more painful than any muscle, tendon, or bone in your body. ----------------------------------------------------------------- Years from now you’ll find yourself in the apartment of that same bar-regular-cab-driver for a one-night stand that he wants to be more, and when he reminds you of the day he picked you up from the hospital, all of the shame and embarrassment will come flooding back. The ex will see you to your door before walking the fifteen blocks back to the house you once shared. You’ll ask him to bring you food from the barbeque restaurant where he works, but he’ll tell you that he has tickets to a concert, and needs to clean up before meeting his friend. Your friend, actually. The friend that you’ve known for more than a decade, who you introduced to the ex, and who tried to remain neutral after the breakup, but skewed towards the ex, because time doesn’t necessarily equal loyalty. You’ll be more ashamed of your appearance than you are hungry, and so instead of trying to find an alternative food source, you’ll head straight to bed. Somehow you’ll manage to make it through the common area and into your room without alerting the roommates. This will be a relief, given that you won’t yet be prepared to explain why it looks like someone took a meat tenderizer to your face. You’ll collapse into the surprisingly comfortable, oversized air mattress. It will have been five months since the breakup, but you’ve taken zero steps towards a more permanent sleeping arrangement. You will be out cold for god knows how long, but wake up in the same nightmare you fell asleep in. To make matters worse, you’ll have a text from your sister-in-law, informing you that your brother is in the ICU. Not because he’s a reckless idiot like you though; because he lost the genetic lottery, at least as far as his guts are concerned. He will be suffering from a dangerous flare up of his rare stomach condition. ----------------------------------------------------------------- Your older brother suffers from something called Meckel's diverticulum, a congenital intestinal abnormality that was originally misdiagnosed as appendicitis, before an emergency appendectomy turned into an exploratory surgery, and led to the discovery. It has been the cause of multiple bowel obstructions that have required numerous hospitalizations, spanning decades. The new girlfriend, who everyone seems to have really liked, is short-lived. He quickly trades her in for his 21-year-old-coworker, someone eight years his junior. As far as you know, they’re currently engaged. Step Six: According to Instagram, the ex will have a new girlfriend in a matter of days. The dental receptionist, the motherly, middle-aged one named Midge, will burst into tears at the mere sight of you. You’ll be reminded of a Chuck Palahniuk quote from Invisible Monsters, one of your personal favorites: “...if I can’t be beautiful, I want to be invisible...” Although the swelling will recede relatively quickly, your face will remain hideous, as the rich dark blues and purples of bruising fade to a sickly chartreuse. You’ll still want desperately to be invisible. Finally, you’ll be left with a scar that looks like an angrier version of Harry Potter’s lightning bolt. At some point, one of the men who own the bar you work at will assure you that incredible things can be done with plastic surgery nowadays, and that there are plenty of treatments to diminish horrific scarring. Not only is plastic surgery a financially unviable option for you, but this advice will come completely unsolicited, from someone who you barely know, and with whom you have an entirely transactional relationship. Fantastic! You will quickly come to appreciate the scar as an intimidating facade you can hide behind, but the shoulder will be the real issue. You won’t be able to manage the time off, so you’ll be back to work before you can lift the mangled arm that remains cradled in the sling. Luckily it’ll be slow season, and the lack of business means you can afford the speed you lose by bartending with only one arm. The sympathy tips won’t hurt either. After another surgery and a brief stay in the hospital, your brother will be fine, but you will both have the gnarled white scars, as a reminder of the time the two of you did exactly what mom asked you not to. 1 2 3 Amy Smith Amy Smith is a thirty six year old woman, originally from Utah, but has lived in Portland for about fifteen years. Amy has been a hair stylist, a bartender, and is currently deciding what she wants to do next. Her time at PCC has really helped her rediscover how much she enjoys writing, as well as build confidence in her own work. Most of what Amy has written is personal narrative, but she really likes being able to combine research and experience, and playing with creative structures. A Recipe for Disaster was a way for her to write about something that was both traumatic and embarrassing, in a way that was fun and a little more light-hearted. Instagram handle: @boozy_baby

2022 Theme Meet the 2022 Editors Fiction Nonfiction Poetry Scripts Art Bellwether Review 2022 A Search for Meaning This year, we discovered that many of our submissions related to a search for meaning throughout year two of the pandemic. This search manifested in a cycle of experiences, as shown below. Experiencing Loss and Injustice Finding Strength and Surviving Discovering and Creating Finding Strength and Surviving A Cycle Feeling Trapped and Imprisoned Finding Strength and Surviving Finding Strength and Surviving Finding Strength and Surviving Works Browse our wide array of stories, poetry, and art. View all

the forget-me-nots keep wilting, keep blooming Natalie Alsdorf tiny blue petals / my gold they are stolen by the wind faster than i can collect them faster than i can tuck them away in my bag, keep them safe. i wish to dry them in my flower press, pin them in my journal preserve their hues, their satin surface but so many are missing, i let them go, didn’t i? perhaps one day i’ll see one dancing in the wind while i run down 3rd avenue. perhaps they will surround my canoe on swan lake- one for each note. perhaps even the wilted ones will find their way back- diluted, precious. perhaps the september rain will bring more- this time i won’t let them go. this time i’ll hold on tight. Natalie Alsdorf I am currently 19 years old and have spent most of my life in western Colorado. Besides my time in Oregon the past year and a half (for which I am so grateful), I consider myself a Coloradan at heart and felt called to move back to the colorful, sunny state. Most of my inspiration for my work is derived from nature, my faith, and the human experience. I enjoy sunrise runs, cat snuggles, writing (and re-writing) late at night, and listening to audiobooks and music. I hope to become a published fiction author in the future and am taking my goal one day, and one word, at a time. @nataliealsdorf (Instagram)

Plastic Sandcastle Hunter Bordwell-Gray If you could trace the outline of a mirage, there Las Vegas would be. An approximate paradise served on the rocks. All magic, no tricks. No substance, just sin. Sin is just the luster of a land with no tomorrow. Where sorrows drown like flies in a pesticide of gin and rum. You can barely hear those sirens past the siren song of vice, only to covet life like diamonds from the stomach of an ambulance. Hunter Bordwell-Gray I am a lifelong Portland resident and a first-year Creative Writing/Poetry student at PCC. I started my journey in elementary school, intricately crafting my first novel on a rundown laptop…as far as a 10 year old could stay entertained before chasing the next shiny idea. Since then, I have delved into the realms of poetry, tabletop campaign writing, and multimedia production. For me, writing is the only medium that allows me to clearly convey my ideas and experiences to other people where otherwise I sometimes struggle to express myself. I take much of my inspiration from a hodgepodge of nature, analog horror podcasts, and the roulette wheel that is my taste in music.