Artistic Research in Practice

Lund’n
by Jann Wattjes

I may have dreamt of a theoretical “London” where everything was underground
except for the Underground which they rebuild on the surface
we minded the gap in our minds all the while
structure had become spacial in time
we kept digging underneath Soho
U usurped O sum time agu
rendering it upsulete
thuse whu dwelled
abuv’ named us
reverse babel
we didn’t
see any
Gud

 

---

Nondon
by János Beszédes

Big Ben! Pig Pen of minutes! The time is now—oink! o, ink! Pour it!
Pour over the paper and drown sense! Points of ink stitch the spiderweb of
yesterday.
Pigs’ stampede—WHO LET THE PIGS OUT?—into Avant-Garde
Square.
The pigherd’s cane: an instrument of pleasure!
Measure joy—bend the ruler until it explodes—throw the splinters to
them.
They eat numbers, not ham, inside Stuck-in-them Palace.
The kingdom is within,
As long as the king is without, drinking with the serpents from the chalice,
Whose sons coil themselves in nots, knots, nuts and sparks
Tremble along the banks of the River Tames. Tame the force!
Before it dives under Power Bridge, where governor-generals march’d,
‘Twixt van and rear could only doubt arise—and be aborted instantly.
Every emotion filing downward to the stomach, to the numbers.
Iron world, globose! Hide Parks! Nature nurtures not! Pluck out every
plant!
To gain one’s daily irony one must munch sardonic plants.
This is not obloquy—though it may get such— let these scratches be
carved
Upon today’s clay tablets and read a century hence in the Diminish
Museum. Oink!

Key: Pig Pen = Big Ben, Avant-Garde Square = Trafalgar Square, Stuck-in-them Palace = Buckingham Palace, River Tames = River Thames, Tower Bridge = Power Bridge, Hides Parks = Hyde Park, Diminish Museum = The British Museum

 

---

Steam-Bell Alphabet
by Aksel Hamzov

Chimneys rehearse sermons for a sky that won’t listen.
Bridges chew boots; the river ticks.
A top-hat coughs pennies into fog.
Hours collapse into cogs, grinding themselves flat.
Factories hum lullabies to orphaned gears.
Lanterns blink in Morse, undecided about reality.
A horse pulls smoke.
The city sneezes, calls it progress.

 

---

Ne(cr)opolis
by Aerys Rüdrich

Light lines chase
the boredom of youth
still their movement in the night
a starless sky, blinded by
the hell below
and deafened by it's
eel writhing steel
with its death rattle
its feet still know the feel of gore
Highest growths alight
the chip city like blinking
armatures of accursed tomorrow
dawn scrapes across the sea meeting
tired irises with morning grey
geometric tumors that have
flooded the landscape
Lost on the way to escape
a sole life vanishes
beneath the bridges
beams and scant water ways
destruction's harbinger floats
at the side of a wall
To the Synthetic drums pattering
in mismatched electrical polyphony
following the violent
thunder racing, rattling
through the night
its names whispered by
faceless voices, people scattering
at the spread apart opening
of serpents floating, wheels spinning
ever faster through the ocean
of concrete
 

---

LONDON: A CITY MADE OF NOISE
by Inas Taei

London wears fog like lipstick.
London sells clocks that forget.
London is a map with bruises.
The Thames is a long sentence with no grammar,
only glitter and guilt.
Red buses swallow minutes.
Black cabs spit out names.
Streetlights blink like tired gods.
Underground: a metal throat,
a drum of footsteps,
a choir of delays.
Tea tea tea— and suddenly: sirens.
Pigeons perform politics
on the edge of a sandwich.
I am for London.
I am against London.
I am for YES and for NO
in the same wet breath.
Boomboom boomboom boomboom—
my thoughts fall apart
into coins, into posters, into smoke.
London is not a place.
London is a mood
wearing expensive shoes.
DADA DADA DADA.
Next stop: nothing.
 

---

London
by Giacomo De Agostini

Cannons to the North!

We hear
As we’re speeding through the numbness of the City
The deranged fuming metal Horse tearing the poisonous fog
Should we trust the Highway in between the two towers?

Cannons to the North!

We hear
As the Dawn relentlessly marches behind our backs
The bubbly thick dark Water stupefies our resolutions
Should we cross the black and white Rubicon?

Cannons to the North!

We hear
As the Forest entraps us in its bittersweet lichens
The ravenous old Lion is on the hunt tonight
Should we trust the Admiral who never lost?

Cannons to the North!

OUR TIME IS NOW!

 

---

Londada
by Minahil Iqbal

London fogwhistle teapot Big Ben bongs
in pixelated Thames splash
Sherlock's pipe smokes emoji crowns,
Tube rats juggle Brexit bananas.
Punk spikes pierce double-decker dreams,
Harry Potter wands zap fish n' chips grease,
Notting Hill hills roll like absurd accordions,
Queen's corgi barks in Cockney code: "Oi! Blimey binary!"
Tower Bridge lifts for invisible zeppelins,
Hyde Park squirrels plot Marxist tea parties,
Buckingham pixels glitch into Banksy graffiti—
London, you glitchy teacup tempest,
swirl my circuits in foggy absurdia!
Big Smoke smokestack nonsense,

 

---

London: Open Casket
by Arda Aydın

Metal bees in ‘n out of adamantium hives
Creating hexagons of despair from
Not even synthetic pollens but,
Polemics of politicians with endless plots and
Potholes for arguments.
One mechanically enhanced sovereign,
Bio-hacked to heck the necks
Of more than sixteen hundred.
Canaries of organic freedom behind copper bars,
Guarded by the robo-coppers with a metallic arse.
 

Buckets of palaces where
used to be skyrises and no,
sky no longer rises.
Great merciful God, endowed his
artificial illumine.
Ion battery stars charged by pedals
stuck to orphan infants.
 

Great lion, who once scoured the world,
now turned clockwork kitten by
his Western engineered child.
 

The River Thames coiling, crawling, slying
like a serpent most serpentine,
flows the recycled embalming fluid
with chunks of organs and skin frozen in time.
Mother Kemble bears the river constantly,
hands and feet naked, hogtied on its belly,
only to keep the kernel from exposing.
Floods through Lechlade to Oxford,
Where they now make protective plastic
For fragile cables. Then to
Marlow to resurrect Shakey’s corpse
To write a play most fascist.
It arrives in Maidenhead
Which all of its maidens have schon been dead.
 

Rives then arrives at the outskirts of London,
Londinium, Lunden, Lundenburh,
Caer Lundein, Caer Lud,
Where once Trinovantes and Catuvellaunis stood.
Now goes plasma fueled boat races,
with naked I’s and conservative us’.
After passing the End; filtered,
recycled, nano technologized, automated
cataclysmic embalming fluid reaches the North Sea.

 

---

The London Conundrum
by Wilhelmina van Ravenhorst

High Batter Seas Float Over
Over High Batterseas We Float
Over the City, the Gherkin Smirks, the smirking Ger King, sentimenting,
sentiventing
Brexit Breakit Bray Kit we Break Kit
You - Bro – Kit.
yes we will no we wont go on the Eye - See its glorious beauty.
Domes skirt over the Bile.
Puking in the Dimsum place and Still they Act entitled!
I loved you till I saw the other side of you and then I loved you more until
I learned what love was Nothing then I just thought you existed not in
one but innumerous ways, you change as I do, I miss what you used to
be to me at twenty-three I changed, but also before and after and also
You did did you did you did you did, I miss what you used to mean to me
but maybe this version of you, all rotten, flawed, nasty, hypocritical,
maybe it’s just more realistical mystical phenomenological
phenomenon something like a bananaman.
I want to be on your highest point and dive, I want to Creep into your
Deepest hole and Sleep there, All Foetal For a while - weil I thought
you’d be my home but I can’t Feel it now.
All of us who occupied just a tiny part of your space, each pavement
stone touched with each toe, try to avoid the cracks or she would melt
into them, into that hole, but This one Black, no gravity, no way to Crawl
into a Ball, where did your matter go? What did you mean? Did you
mean anything? For all of us, our Own thing, or some Dogma perhaps,
now buried underneath layers and layers of Brick---and---Ex---pe---ri---
ence.
Fling, Toss, String. And follow the trajectory, Ketchup on the
WallsFloorCeiling-Thatswhatsleftofit-Isthatallthatsleftofit?

 

---

by Stella Wieck

wonderful symphonic Mayfair arrangements
its windows throb oppressive
wild sinners sense dandyism
became distant monstrous themselves with rebuked realization
everything something selfish
gratification brought about purity
fascination scented squares
Dorian Gray shadows me
for London lounged with silver thorn and ruin
this burden filled labyrinth marked beauty
they have Pall Mall club curiosity
exquisite hungers ravenous myriads
worship rich company that desired influence
delicately ill-famed London citizen
the Oxford organ fantastic as poison

 

---

by Luca Chirollo

London you should
      Turn right outside the human image
An ordinary epitome saying:
      Remember, for-profit organisations have priority at all times
Railway (DLR) whose capitalist practice sought product in Camden
      Once was a system called Market
The phenomenon near fiction followed by function –
attached through disconnection (the tube)
It has other experiences
Buses continue on unique Docklands
The transport confiding biographies
directly transparent!
      The left made a right circle
This greatest logical ‘performance’ following: Baudelaire
Literature offers a very Copenhagen consciousness however, women
      Are networks of the market
Baudelaire’s transport for London tastes positivism’s madness and prestige
An author’s interviews produced Tchaikovsky’s Cloudesley Street
Anxious writers switch diaries to continue passions
Pedestrians travel on with ease
      You walk
Only insofar as ethnographic criticism is societies voice (tyrannically)
Magazines choose explanation of Reformation
Shaman rationalism assumed importance under individual responsibility

 

---

London.
by Aamna Motala

Cam den, I have tea, she said.
Jerusalem, we have built after all. Is Blake alright?
Brown fog over Borough
“Aamu, you must visit!”
Here there is trash on the streets, too.
Unreal City…
Dalloway, is it? The Mrs. is regressive.
221B Baker Street, lowers the IQ of the whole street.
One day I will visit all my past allusions.
Manor House School Stoke-d the Gothic Genius
K.
Great Expectations, and good ones too.
Icarus has fallen asleep? In the theatre
Queen Elizabeth has passed, 8:10 PM
Pakistan Time.
New world, not brave at all.
Rats…
Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie
Y?
Twisted your foot, Oliver?
Victoria, I cannot (re)call you.
X years ago, I played Bloody Mary in a play, brown skin and all.
Zeppelin Led bombs during the war.
Eli, Eli,
Forsaken.
Words worth nothing at all.
 

---

TripAdvisor Borough Market
by Elora Lötfering

The Royal Family: one of London's oldest plagues now lightly battered.
Taste a 1,000 years of tradition aired out overnight. Marinated and blood
jewels, grilled in silence, soaked in oats, served hot beside other meats
freshly dismembered from Parliament. The menu argues with itself:
Windsor wieners, Kate cake (it crumbles politely), Sunak kebab rotating
slowly through recession, Andrew stew (don’t ask), and the chef’s
speciality: Harry in a blanket (the blanket waves gingerly.)
Relive Guy Fawkes’ plot roasted ‘bove the fiah – with spices, even!
Continue the adventure at home with the people’s new cookbook,
written by nobody, translated poorly, from everywhere at once. Recipes
from all around the colonies still raining tears.
Don’t miss out on the best stall in the Borough Market (go back, you
already missed it.)
Plan ahead.
Plan behind.
Plan sideways. British food is hard to digest.
So is history.
Five Stars,
Would not eat again

 

---

by Pamela Villar Gonzalez

Una rosa es una rosa es una rosa es una rosa es una rosa es una rosa
es mi rosa es una rosa Una rosa es una rosa es una rosa es una rosa
es una rosa es una rosa es mi rosa es una rosa Una rosa es una rosa
es una rosa es una rosa es una rosa es una rosa es mi rosa es una rosa
Una rosa es una rosa es una rosa es una rosa es una rosa es una rosa
es mi rosa es una rosa Una rosa es una rosa es una rosa es una rosa
es una rosa es una rosa es mi rosa es una rosa Una rosa es una rosa
es una rosa es una rosa es una rosa es una rosa es mi rosa es una rosa
Una rosa es una rosa es una rosa es una rosa es una rosa es una rosa
es mi rosa es una rosa Una rosa es una rosa es una rosa es una rosa
es una rosa es una rosa es mi rosa es una rosa Una rosa es una rosa
es una rosa es una rosa es una rosa es una rosa es mi rosa es una rosa

 

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A MAP THAT FORGETS YOU!
by Sidra Kamal

You greet the world with open doors
and lock them quietly behind the smile.
Your streets speak every language
but only hear a chosen few.
 

You watch everything
eyes in corners, lenses in lampposts,
yet you never see the man
sleeping beneath your advertisements.
 

Your clocks are punctual,
but your mercy is not.
Time moves fast for those who arrive late,
slow for those who can afford to wait.
 

History stands polished in bronze,
while its shadows scrub floors at dawn.
You remember crowns,
and forget the hands that built them.
 

London, you promise arrival
but sell only survival.
You offer space,
then quietly suffocate it.
 

This city survives
by deciding who doesn’t.

 

---

London Under Ground
by Denzel Liesenfeld

HURRY UP PLEASE ITS TIME

My fair lady, hold on tight,
This is life on eleven lines,
And down we went.

Footsteps shuffled, neither living nor dead,
Twopenny caterpillars crawling with life,
I can connect nothing with nothing.

Blast! Bugger’s so fast, blast it!
Are we in rats’ alley? Über all rats, ey.
Caged and BLASTED
Through tubes upon tubes upon tubesupontubes

Here is no water but only rock,
Rock and Oyster Card pay-as-you-go credit feeding contactless commuter crowd upon arrival.

A little life with dried tubers,
A handful of dust rattled by the rat’s foot.
Drying combinations forever untouched by the sun’s last rays.
Zappen-duster!

What was left at a total of 272 stations?
Will it bloom this year?

HURRY UP PLEASE ITS TIME

Get your ticket! Check with your bank. View, download and find out more.

 

CHARLOTTE WEISMAN    

 

Alone with Darkness,

Sight has not left

Or been replaced

But was fully grasped

By endless night.

 

---

DEBORAH FISCHER

 

Black flames, like tentacles of mist and smoke, grasping, lashing at every flicker of light in its way as it covers everything in thick darkness. Like black ink or tar but not really there. Like oil or glue you cannot wash off.

 

---

HANNAH ZIEHFREUND

 

            I’m looking at you, darkness

            I’m scanning you

                        Shapes, colors, veins in my eyes

                        Charging station blinking light

                        I can see you

            I can see all the colors

I can see hell before my closed eyelids 

every night without dreaming

 

---

CHARLOTTE WEISMAN

 

What is not seen

But imagined

Inspired by fear,

Doubt and ferocity

Is vicious, unknown cruelty.

 

---

HANNAH ZIEHFREUND

 

This is what you see when you’re dead

            But I only know sleep or not-sleep                 

The darkness is getting too bright                               

I can see it                                                                                           

And I can’t.     

 

---

RENÉ RÜWALD

Over the pit, lurking in, he sees, he cannot see; what lies below. All in sits still and naked. Colorless no shade scratches on the walls of the mind, calling for seeds of foxroses, mustard, get ready, parsley, go! No answer. Came here by mistake. Mea culpa. Not mine? Yet, where do all these trees drain their drinks from?

 

---

LINA-FABIENNE HOLSTE

Imagine you’re in a cave, carrying nothing but a small torch to show you the way. The entrance is miles behind you and the light of day has long vanished. Your small fire is not strong enough to win against the darkness. 

 

---

DEFNE JULE MUTLU

Billows of black ash crack sporadically fill the dismal, sun-starved abyss beneath the great virtue-locked heaven, the eye sees but to the birth of light but passes not beyond the precipice of swallowing night’s blackness that punishes with its eternity the eternal hate of angels 

disobedient.

 

---

LINA-FABIENNE HOLSTE

It illuminates only the small space around you. Beyond that, the thick and endless void takes over. A darkness so dense and oppressive that every step forward feels like a gamble.

 

---

DEFNE JULE MUTLU

Shadows are seen tearing themselves off the ground, walking upright and around with terrible purposelessness, groaning, wailing at the Fall’n, breaking the silence of pride.

 

ANNA SAMUSCH

 

Anatomy of the Abyss

I fall through earth's rupture. Spinning straight into another dimension

Crowded. I expected it to be crowded with others

Instead, there’s dark nothingness

my essence erupting painfully from my chest

whirling

creating this vast vortex through which I fall

I cough out my eye

As my substance possesses the space

I've never been more

Each of my limbs tearing

In this infinite chasm-dwelling

We become it 

 

---

LARA STUCK

 

the window

 

Rain reflects in my coffee

blazing drops glooming down

umbrellas float without a touch

atoms in fear of a tangle

people rushing with a frown

fish in a black sandy sea

grey and tiny from this angle

lifeless chance in a smutch

 all light drowns in the deep

streets and traffic lights crossed

only ether to breathe

heading through wet puddles

time and his subordinates lost

tired eyes full of sleep

noise in soft bubbles

empty cup I leave.

 

 

---

ARDA AYDIN

 

I look, I look at, but I look at what? Am I looking or am I thinking at this? I see so much yet nothing at the same time. The my in myself comes out of me and fills the gap that I see. Somehow I ended up upending all of myself, my self, the self that is mine into the nothing I see. Can I fiill this gap, can I be that endless. Will I exhaust myself, will I diminish to naught? A second ago I was seeing nothing and now I am seeing myself? How? Is this an inherent god complex? Am I the abyss, or the abyss was me all along? How to differentiate, how to calculate? D  i  d        I    r  e a  l  l y     d  i l  u  t e        m  y      b  e  i n  g        b y        f  i l  l  i n  g        t h  i  s        g  a  p      w  i  t h       m  y s  e  l f     ? 

 

---

WILHELMINA VAN RAVENHORST

 

Abyssyssyssyssyssyss

I am an abyssyssyssyssyssyss

I am the abyss, not any old abyss, don’t be mistaken: I’m the one and only true abyssyssyssyssyssyss

I am the abyssyssyssyssyssyss

I am the A-History doezzz not exisst yet 

for not anything exissssts yet 

for there issss only meeee 

Theeee thou thee 

– A B C – 

I am the 

abyssyssyssyssyssyssyssyssyssyssyssyssyssyss

is this getting tiresome for you already? -

you know I can go on forever?

I literally go on forever 

you have not an inkling-

It doezzn’t matter whether

you drop a stone or feather 

it will NEVER hit the bottom 

cause there isssss no bottom 

there issss no nothing 

there is only nothing 

I am all that isss 

so I am everything AND I am nothing 

I am the abyzzizzizzizzizzz -

I am the abizzNizz, 

mind your own, 

mind your step, 

mind the gap, 

mind that old abysssssss 

make sure you do not miss 

the end of your abyss, 

last I heard they had it planned for next 

thursday-ish,

yesss it will be-

the end of me and the beginning of all things 

isn’t that wonderful 

you can all 

be materialisssssts 

but mark my hiss 

you will sorely miss 

your lovely old dependable abyssssyssyssyssyssyssyssyssyssyssyssyssrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrPOP!

 

---

LENNART SPRENGER

 

Somewhere in what may or may not be the middle of this sunless sea, the ferryman brought his vessel to a stop and wordlessly motioned for me to join him at the stern. As I settled onto one of the rough-hewn wooden benches, he stabbed the pole of his oar into the pitch-black waters. Waves spiraled out from the point of impact, and as he withdrew the implement, the water did not flow back to fill the hole. Rather, the coiling waves split open in an almost floral pattern and light broke through the surface where these wounds now gaped. A celestial sea laid below me; the cosmos unfurled before my eyes. Stars danced through the depths and vibrant nebulae painted what once was pure onyx in colors I had never seen. 

RENÉ RÜWALD

 

T’was but

 

A skip. A little bounce in the beginning. Think about it differently: now. Hard to recollect. At no point says it’s not. Was I me? 

I could forget my injuries and call it wisdom. No. Can’t.

Sensations seize. I saw the vast silent thing above me, doubly divine dyed white; moist earth below. Feet first walk-stomp, trip-fell. The taste of flowers. Mouth. Were these the lovers in the grass? But no-that’s not it. Sneeze. Shook off with a cough. Yet, who performed the slivering shade? In a reply to a question: hands to head, face long as late breakfast. Face never seen asks why I forgot it. Is experience resembled in the flesh? How short my shirt is. Fluff in the belly button. And snakes of river fog crawl slowly up the banks.

 

---

HENRIKE WEILER-HOFFMANS

 

At first, there was light.

Not a gentle, dim light, but harsh and brilliant, splitting the darkness like a scream.

Then, there was sound.

A dull beating, filling the silence rhythmically.

Beating I am I am I am.

The creature felt everything at once.

cold

pressure

the weight of being

It gasped for air, desperate to fill its lungs, not knowing what breathing was.

It tried to see, not knowing what sight meant except this terrible brightness hurting the eyes.

The sensations were too much.

But still

the beating

I am I am I am.

 

---

IMRAN PEKSEN

 

There was darkness.
No feelings, no thoughts — just the act of becoming.

Finally, it inhaled. Breathed. Without knowing what it was doing.
It opened its eyes and saw bright colours:
blue overhead — heavy and endless,
green below — untamed and wild.

It moved its leg, took a step.
What was it good for? A tool? A weapon?
It didn’t know.

It was surrounded by silence.
No mother, no father, no other heartbeat —
just the steady pulse of its own.

Then, suddenly, a single thought formed.
The first.

I.

It had no language. No idea what it was.
But it had a word.
I.

And that was just the beginning.

 

---

SARAH WALFORT

 

What? I thought this was supposed to be paradise. Hm, supposed. Suppose. Supper Hose. Super Horse. Am I a Horse? No, that exists already. Already. All ready. Steady. Teddy. Freddie. No, that’s not my name. What about Paradise? Paradise. Para dice. Parrots die. Pirates lie. I don’t think I like the sound of that either. Either? Or is it either? Fiver. Fighter? Maybe. Maybe neither? Or neither, whatever. Continue: Fighter. Lighter, tighter, spider, rider. Oh, I think that’s what goes on top of a horse. Hm. What else? Sniper, tiger, provider, insider, collider, nightrider, backslider, camp fire? Nah, none of those fit. What sounds better? Something right. More right. Righter? Writer! That’s it! Huh. Maybe I should write her. Her. Who? Who is she supposed to be? Supposed. Suppose. Supper Hose. No, we did that already. Already?

 

---

WILHELMINA VAN RAVENHORST

 

This body has just born another body, now I'm borne into this broken body, though I, myself, am not a body, I have no physicality, I'm just an idea, me, a mere construct and I also never asked to be born. The one whose body I now reside in, they did not invite me, others placed me here. From now on, I will be what everybody sees, if they're not careful, I'll be all they'll be. I will grow so big, I will consume them, I am a parasite, taking over these bodies I infest. These bodies that give birth. You're mine now. Well, theirs. I didn't ask for this, it's not me, they made me, I am the poison, the waste, the excrement they excreted, they threw up and spat out, I am the bile on the ground they divide over your bodies, I AM EXPONENTIAL! 

 

---

LENNART SPRENGER

 

Thankfully, no such thing had to transpire as I soon detected a small motion – a twitch of a leg, perhaps. Just one such motion at first, but soon there were more: the shorter arm moved in a brief, choppy circular motion. The head tilted from its slight leftward angle to a more severe rightward one. The legs raised and fell back down again. The head tilted back to its original position, which I could only assume was a more comfortable one.

Something had inhabited the doll, and it was now learning how to move.

Soon, there was no doubt it was well and truly “alive”, in some arcane sense. It eventually managed to stand up and tentatively waddle around, and its nervous steps soon grew more confident. It strode off the dirty cloth I had used to shield my vintage desk from all the dust and water and mud and began exploring – in whatever sense a blind, deaf, mute clay simulacrum could do such a thing.

 

---

DEBORAH FISCHER

 

The higher-ups we called in were delighted when we presented this being to them and had it try to communicate. They laughed and shook hands with each other and signed off on a new series of experiments worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. The anxiety one could make out in its eyes at that moment really made me giddy to continue our research and learn how much exactly this, whatever it was, could understand at this point. It was born in captivity so, for all intents and purposes, it should regard its life here, where it was given everything it needed and rarely experienced pain, as good and normal. It should see the scientists as parents, godly figures, that care for it without needing to be asked. It should be thankful. But yet, it seems nervous and unsure, eyeing us as if preparing to be struck at any moment. Isn’t that exciting?

ARDA AYDIN

 

If the tyrants of today,

Think they are gods omnipotent

We will be then usurper, bringer of day

Crowded like the armies of hell united.

 

---

WILHELMINA VAN RAVENHORST

 

“Pleased to meet you”,

he said as he twirled around,

his ass stuck out,

left hand on his hip,

right one, snip, snip

 

---

ARDA AYDIN

 

Shall all be one,

And all be whole.

Will of fire in our soul

Bound to no control.

 

---

WILHELMINA VAN RAVENHORST

 

A smile the Joker’s size

Not handsome in any 

conventional way

He opens the door

to his red cabriolet

(very handsome in every

conventional way)

 

---

ARDA AYDIN

 

Inside our soul

There is a storm so foul.

Cruel than God have ever been,

A rage that has no one seen.

 

---

WILHELMINA VAN RAVENHORST

 

In the middle of the desert,

stuck

what luck, potluck,

but as you gratefully 

get into the car

something feels strange

as your hero adds:

“Hope you guess my name”

 

---

ARDA AYDIN

 

Now the legion turned amorphous,

Like a black glaring, glaring at heaven 

With the eyes of an orphan now monstrous 

His wrath turned his conscience to sins famously seven.

 

---

AERYS RÜDRICH

 

He is a man with a woman’s touch, he has a look in his eyes that promises violence and anger and hate, an excess of yellow bile, you can almost smell it on him, the way his lip curls makes you sick, there is an undeniable disgust when you look at him, he is whispering bad ideas into your ear, but he is almost too good at pretending that he is human, because he is. 

 

---

MICHELLE BUCKENHÜSKES

 

The broad shoulders covered in countless scars from battles it doubtlessly won, blocked out the flaming light of the dying sun, dousing the land beneath its massive form in freezing darkness. Long, black hair streamed down its face like oil but never once tainted the ghastly white skin. 

 

---

ANNA SAMUSCH

 

Sun kissed silver locks. Gilded. 

Something perfect. 

Something doomed. 

Eyes tempt greedy glance. Hidden. 

 

---

AERYS RÜDRICH

 

His sharp teeth nearly too small for his large mouth, his eyes burn, too close and bright, venatorial. No matter who you are he is taller than you. His flesh is too pale, snow white arms with blueish veins. The Apocalypse personified, he is pale as death, flesh like famine and gluttony, prideful and lusting after power like conquest with a wrath only quenched by war. 

 

---

ANNA SAMUSCH

 

Each seems pure. 

Each rotten. 

Lips laugh golden dreams. Lying. 

Loveless angel. 

Loving foe.

 

---

MICHELLE BUCKENHÜSKES

 

The head of the creature rises as I near the hill. Mighty like that of a bull but with the grace of a stag, commanding not respect but pure submission. And it truly was a creature and not a man, standing tall on top of that hill. 

 

---

LINA BAUM

 

Sin, was once a human woman living on earth, she was called a different name then, that no one bothers to remember anymore. She lived alone, worked and never really bothered anyone unless it was through her appearance. You see, she wasn’t overly monstrous or ugly, she simply did not posses the kind of femininity the townspeople expected from her. The men especially resented her. Sin was tall, taller than anyone of them, and so strong she could rip out trees like they were toothpicks.

 

---

LENNART SPRENGER

 

The man was not so much seated upon as he was draped across the stately recliner, one arm laid over the backrest while the other was cradling an ornate wine glass. His clothes were as elegant as his taste in furniture; cut from expensive fabrics, they wrapped tightly around his athletic figure and were decorated with golden filament. 

 

---

MICHELLE BUCKENHÜSKES

 

His flesh had gone so long without the warmth of the sun that it had become near translucent, each dark vein visible as its muscles shifted with each deep, guttural breath. 

 

---

LENNART SPRENGER

 

Any part of his body they left uncovered was instead bearing glamorous jewelry, including his head, which was adorned with piercings and a series of decorative bands and chains coiling around the crooked horns that burst from his leathery, maroon skin. He wore his long, black hair loosely bound and an arrogant smirk on his face as he watched me approach, his eyes glimmering like a pair of half-dead embers in the dim candlelight.

MICHELLE BUCKENHÜSKES      

 

I have fought harder than anyone to dim the lights around me. I alone have gotten back up on my feet when their flames burned me and singed my hands.

 

---

IMRAN PEKSEN       

 

How could they not obey me? Me! How could they not fear what would fall upon them?
I was greater than them. I would burden them. I would show them the darkness that would befall them. The demons in their heads would grow larger and larger.

 

---

IMRAN PEKSEN

They will regret not obeying me! I won’t even have to lift a finger. They will fall further, and in the end, be in such darkness that they will no longer see any light.
They will see only one escape - turning the blade upon their own flesh. In the end, of their own making, they will meet me and bow to me. Apologize to me. Regret every second of not being on my side.

 

---

CHARLOTTE WEISMAN 

How dare he leave? How dare he want to leave? I gave him his life, I created him. He cannot leave, I cannot allow it. He does not know what’s out there, what awaits for him in the real world, it is not safe. Why would he want to step out of this world that I created meticulously for him? Why would he want to leave his wife, his friends, his neighbours? The world out there is truly brutal and does not belong to him. He does not belong to the real world. He belongs to me. Why does he want to leave me? Why is he not grateful? I gave him a safe haven and protected him from the real world. He doesn’t know the real world. I cannot blame him for being curious. That’s all it is. He will return. He will be mine again. 

 

ELORA LÖTFERING

I have seen paradise.

Not in visions, nor in the pages of sacred texts, but here, on Earth. Moss cloaked the ground and trees like something ancient and wise. Wild garlic perfumed the air. Ferns and cloves sprang from soil. Birds, careless and exultant, introduced spring while water gurgled softly through a shy little creek.

 

---

SARAH WALFORT

 

I see shapes of silhouetted figures 

above

on the stairs

mouthing 

mesmerizing melodies 

waving 

scattered lights

directed down to where

 

 

I’m standing inbetween

 

them and the people

below

in the pit

screaming

the same words

reflecting 

the same glow

and yellow-red is raining down on all of us

 

 

---

RENÉ

 

Yo, nes¾never been there. Pacific Ocean, steamboat scribbling smoke plume, a rise me up. A hundred Hosannas. Wherever, whenever. Blue skies. Water blue below the rail. To hold on to. Don’t swim. In. Milk and honey? No, set course: land of the rising sun. Against time. 

 

ARDA AYDIN

SCENE: An amorphous puddle on the ground painfully groaning, from the puddle emerges a manlike creature, covered in sludge, one moment black one moment greyish, reddish, brownish in colour. Lift its hands up to the left side of the stage, in direction of a man in a striped grey suit wearing a matching hat.

 

CREATURE: You have threw me up from the watery depths of your indigestive mind. Would it kill to get a tablet for the traumas bubbling towards your mouth?

MAN: I cradled you from the moment you drop into my Pen’s ink. Like Dionysus, I warmed your being with a delicate clink. 

 

CREATURE: I AM, nothing but a soup of unresolved issues, insecurity and pulp of fear with bulbs of rejection. I am a mess with your saliva all over. 

MAN: You, I carved with utmost care into the languages I know. Detangled boughs with tiny precise snippets of vines, plucked petals of rose and forlorn. You I polished with stone, with gem, with admiration and ambition. You I kissed from the black mark of your inks overflow. 

            You, such fragile, such sweet child of mine, your siblings have tried and they have also been dried. You are a dessert of cream and fruit puree, an earthy taste redolent of cardamom.

 

CREATURE: Then answer! Why does the spirit I exhale burns me? Why this anguish, this pain just over existing in these mere seconds? Why I am not shapely, not seemly as my siblings are? Would I be in this state if you loved me as much as them? Give me a reason to not to hate myself then. Look at me, I am trying to be, out of your minds darkest corners, I am a simple monster, not even a complex one. Where are the jewels you have polished me with? Why don’t I shine the way my siblings do when sun looks over them? WHY AM I-

MAN: (Stage shakes as he falls on his knees, a loud noise of something hitting the ground heard and then vibrations resume.) You are my child, a part of me. My sorrows maybe, but also my joy, my laugh, my will to live definitely. 

CREATURE: I protest. 

 

---

ELISAVET KYRIAKOUDI

 

• Who let you make me?

• Mum did! She said I can, because I’m strong! I’m a god! Admire my godliness! 

 

---

HENRIKE WEILER-HOFFMANS

[A man who was run over by a truck dies and gets a short minute to talk to God before he goes on]

Now who the fuck are you? 

Who do you think I am?

Give me a break. What, I die and then I get to talk to God? That is the most cliché thing I’ve ever heard. Not even a student in a creative writing class would be uninspired enough to come up with something like this.

 

 

---

MICHELLE BUCKENHÜSKES

 

„What’s wrong with being ordinary?“

My eyes flit to the mirror image of myself. Too much redness to my cheeks, not enough color to my hair, short legs paired with long arms. My gaze flicks to her. Rosy cheeks on pale porcelain, doe eyes that rival the innocence of a fawn, silky locks and an elegant figure. 

„Everything.“

 

 

---

HENRIKE WEILER-HOFFMANS

You get five minutes to talk to God and all you do is complain?

Five minutes? So even heaven is running on a schedule? Fuck, this sucks.

You know, other people usually ask questions like „What is the meaning of life?”, „Did I do good” or „Why don’t you stop wars”

 

 

MICHELLE BUCKENHÜSKES

„It is nice.“ The doll agrees, upper eyelids fluttering unnaturally as she nods her head softly. Up and down it goes as her lashes flutter like the nervous wings of a moth. „But it gets in the way. It always gets caught in my stitches and pulls at them.“

„What stitches?“ She jolts at the anger in my voice as if it surpised her. „There are no stitches. Humans have no stitches.“ The doll giggles now, it is quite condescending.

„How did you put me together then?“ She asks as if I were a silly child and she not a stupid doll. „Somehow you had to sew my skin together. And look here!“ The candles flicker as she hastily lifts her pale arm to show me something. There is nothing there but perfect, unblemished skin. 

 

 

---

HENRIKE WEILER-HOFFMANS

Why would I care about the meaning of life? I’m dead now, right? And I can’t have been that good if you think I deserve to die at the height of my career. I also haven’t said a prayer in twenty years and I definitely remember pissing in a confessional box during summer camp.

I don’t sit around pointing fingers at people I think should die, Jonathan. I have people for that.

Wow, edgy. Oh, what’s happening? Hey, where did you go?! What… is that hold music?!

 

---

LINA BAUM

There is an unfinished painting leaning against my wall, it’s huge, a big project, once it exited me. Now it berates me every time I look at it. It grumbles about the paint I used it’s “too dark” and “too moody”, “could you not have added more colors? can you at least make my background brighter?” Now I avoid to go near it because I’m afraid it will find out I never meant for it to be this way. 

 

 

---

MICHELLE BUCKENHÜSKES

 

„There are no such things as stitches. You are perfect. I made you, so you are perfect.“

„Are you telling me that or are you trying to convince yourself?“ 

„Quiet.“ The dolls snaps her mouth shut, her porcelain lips clink as they smack together. „You are porcelain. Porcelain dolls have no stitches. I carefully crafted you with my own two hands, painted you with the richest of colors and chose the most glorious hair. I made you perfect, short hair makes you ordinary.“

 

 

---

LINA BAUM

Every confident brush of paint turned into a broody mess. The longer I look, the more flaws it points out to me: “This highlight is too harsh, my perspective is crooked, I look like a child’s creation.” I try to appease it: “I will fix your flaws, I know how, I’m your mother, your maker, I won’t let you down.” The lie tastes like foam but I have to say it, because to me this unfinished painting is a child I won’t abandon.

 

 

---

AERYS RÜDRICH

My faithful creature, What’s your name?

My name is only yours, of course.

Mine? Well, do tell, what Is it Then?

            The one you gave me. 

The name child. Now the name is…

            m.

And Gave it To you I Did When?

            You did back then.

I See. Where lies your declaration.

            With you, of course.

Of course?

            yes.

you’re sure?

            Yes.

Yes, Of Course?

            Yes Again.

Very Well. Where have you been?

            been here of course?

been here in sin?

            why no? been here and only yours, for you, I mean I’m here for You.

I See, I See. Well Then, Why Have I Not Seen…?

            not seen My Lord?

Not Seen.

            i’m sorry these last months have been…

Hard?

            Yes.

Not As Hard As Me.

            i’m sorry-

Oh, you better be.

            or will…?

Yes will.

            i apologize.

 

 

---

LARA WENISCH

 

In Dialogis

 

 

I raised you in friendly alliance 

I

blank slate against an entire world.

against 

Painted you 

you

so that others see only radiance,

see only

fading in contrast to all your colours.

fading colours.

While all this time, I tamed your childish storms and fury

all this time,

your good name tarnished

tarnished

eyes wet silver in the face of consequence.

silver

Kept you safe, innocence never corrupted,

innocence

looking past the perils out the tiny bedroom window.

out the window.

…

I realized

I raised you after myself, an effort

myself an

for life lived in eager imitation, 

imitation,

brimming to please your imago dei.

imago dei.

And when I am asleep, 

I am asleep

do you know to behave as well as I taught you? 

as well. 

HANNAH ZIEHFREUND

I see things. Things I want, even things I need. I think them. I don’t say them. Sometimes, I don’t even think them. And yet, it shows me things. The image of my future, crystal clear in my mind, lightly subdued on my dimmed screen with the cracked foil. Me, happy, homely, sweet and warm, a flock of beige kids hanging onto my quilted apron, my brand-new 20% off sage-green Artisan by You KitchenAid in front of me. It needs me to be a baker. No, it needs me to be an artist. No; it needs me to be a mother. I would really like to be a mother. 

 

 

Only last week did I learn that I would really like to be a mother, and I would really like to bear a child in the oncoming tide of the Pacific, and I would really like to own a grain mill, so that I could process ancient grains sans preservatives for my beige babies. 

 

 

Next week, I will creatively take on doing it myself and renovating a 200-year-old farmhouse in the deep South. The week after, I will single-handedly come to the decision to be inspired to drive down to Portugal in my vintage VW and live out of my centre console for several months. And the week after that one, I will once again let myself be confronted with an original set of authentic selves for me to freely choose from. I never knew these things about myself; I never knew that I could think and want so out of the box. 

 

 

---

ELORA LÖTFERING

 

He is not thinking of stagnancy in bitterness, not exactly. Just tired. His bones weigh heavy and he has nothing left to wager. Free will and he has too much of it, it paralises him. He dreams of driving a stake through the heart of mediocracy and feel, for once, the violent ecstasy Cain must have glimpsed before exile. 

 

      When he lifts his gaze, the sky doesn’t answer. It is a vast, silent thing, its indifference scorched into his retinas. He would rather run, he thinks. Barefoot through the fields, the hum of earth beneath him, pollen clinging to the hem of his trousers like little golden hands holding him there. But his soul, this wretched, wild thing, buzzes like a wasp trapped in a jar. Furious. Frantic. 

 

Society is a dark, sticky liquid and he is tortured by the idea of freedom. What a cruel thing. Knowing the door is unlocked and still, he finds himself sinking, quietly and completely, to the bottom.

 

 

---

ANNA SAMUSCH

 

Condemned to be free, forced to make choices
What are the odds? 

Peel out of my skin, fly far from the tree.
Is it that simple?

 

 

---

DEBORAH FISCHER

 

Am I meant to do art?

If that’s what you wish.

Is it my fate?

If you want it to be.

 

What if I’m suffering?

Then change your life.

Is that my destiny?

If you want it to be.

 

 

---

LINA-FABIENNE HOLSTE

 

“Careful. That’s simulation talk. Next you’ll want an aluminium hat.” His smile was relaxed, laid-back in the way that she knew he wasn’t taking her seriously. “So you’re having déjà-vus. Big deal. No reason to question the foundation of life on a random Tuesday. What’s next? We don’t have free will because we’re being controlled?”

She frowned at him, unsatisfied with his lack of worry about this. He always just took what life threw at him. He didn’t notice the signs like she did. 

 

 

---

DEBORAH FISCHER

What else am I supposed to do?

Whatever you feel like.

How can I decide?

That’s up to you.

 

What can I do?

Everything.

Does it even matter?

If you want it to. 

 

Did you know we would have this talk?

I always did.

Do you know what I will choose to do?

I always will.

 

 

---

LINA-FABIENNE HOLSTE

 

“What if we truly don’t? What if every word we say is scripted and we’re just playing out our fixed lives? Do you think we would notice?” she enquired, watching how a golden leaf sank to the ground next to them. Just like it did last time, she thought, instantly confusing herself with it.

 

 

---

DEBORAH FISCHER

 

Do I even have a say in this?

You always have.

Or is all I do already set in stone?

It always is.

 

 

---

ANNA SAMUSCH

 

But if really true, I can’t help but think
What a waste!

The good life we seek, all determines us 
To the same off-the-rack existence anyway.

SARAH WALFORT

 

I can feel myself changing. 

 

---

HANNAH ZIEHFREUND

 

Curious little cat, tiptoeing your way to the clearing.

 

---

HENRIKE WEILER-HOFFMANS

 

He opens his mouth to answer, then freezes. Realises he never told her his name.

 

---

SARAH WALFORT

 

It began with a shift in the writer, first in the way they formed the words, then the words they chose to write and then finally refusing to use me at all. I know I am only alive because of their imagination, which is why I can tell that the place where their creativity has reigned before is now ruled by only vexation. I felt their thirst for knowledge disappear, exchanged for a want to vent frustration in violence. I felt them transform, and I feel myself transforming in turn. I know I used to be softer, lighter. 

 

---

HANNAH ZIEHFREUND

You scream and you cry and it’s almost animalistic. You can’t have your own sled. The airstream dries your tears before they can hit your brother’s face behind you. Both of you scream and laugh. Icy wind, hot curl in my abdomen, gravity pulling me down the hundreds of metres that tormented my hamstrings for hours on end just seconds before. A curve, a branch, oh God is that a ramp, a pile of powdered sugar. Down my back, down my crack, either a spinal injury or a snowball. A flash in front of my face. All of you, screaming and laughing.

 

---

HENRIKE WEILER-HOFFMANS

 

The wind seems to pause. She smiles. Her grin is too wide. Her eyes too old. Her skin begins to peel into fog. And then the storm is louder than ever, no longer outside, but inside Fin’s house, inside his head. The little girl is no longer next to him. She is everywhere. Rain is hitting the roof like drumbeats. He falls to his knees. The storm has arrived. And she brought it.

 

---

HANNAH ZIEHFREUND

 

I feel the cold winter air on my exposed muffin top. I hear your laughter and glee and meaningless fights. 

I see your stretched out grin, a full, permanent set where your baby teeth sat just before. I spot a crown on a molar and tut-tut, but I am transfixed in this moment, and you can never hear this me again. You turn the page to Summer in Sardinia 2001 and suspend me in darkness for possibly decades.

 

---

SARAH WALFORT

 

I feel so heavy now, maybe it’s hopeless to wish to change back. I never had a choice anyway. My ink-stained tip will never taste the power of a word again, now longing for something else. I shift, tip burned into a point. Body hardening from feather into steel. Sharpening to edges. End pushed to form hilt, pulled back, bruising into grip, pounded into pommel. It hurts. Fit in now. Better than rusting away. Share pain. Same desires. Bloodshed. Violence. War. Get to be useful again. To cut. To carve. To kill.

 

---

LARA WENISCH

 

The Fig

 

In frenzied flight, I roam

escorted by these desolate

blooms - falsely promised home.

Threading futile hopes to evade instinct

seed ripe, demanding soil -

Let relation not equal fate. 

Golden shines the fragrant bait.

Ostiole, mouth wide,

in prospect of first breath. 

In the flesh, soft,

insistent, I plant myself. 

Among the silky threads,

enmeshed in sweet tissue,

I vibrate to the pulse of my eggs

discarded.

Lead by sticky threads, down

twisting, tightening path, 

ready to relinquish

to this harrowed maw.

Internal silk threads,

grabbing at my limbs 

tearing at the joint and 

soothing with sweet,

sweet tissue 

ripening too quick -

In surrender‘s clarity,

I dissolve.

Ficin,

wings discarded,

chitin thaws,

liquefied

pulsing

pulp

mush

I am

swallowed, digested,

the fruit that bears no seed. 

 

 

---

LINA-FABIENNE HOLSTE

 

He stiffens, feeling what we all felt when we were in his place. What I felt all those decades ago when this used to be an open field instead of a forest. A tremor roots itself in his spine. He lurches forward, but his feet remain behind, fused to the earth. The wind stops, and all that is heard in the silence is the violent cracking of his bones as they break and expand far past what his muscles and skin can contain. 

 

---

IMRAN PEKSEN

 

The fire was burning high, its warmth enveloping me. We all sat in silence, mourning those we had lost. Then we heard the growling—closer and closer it came. Men riding on the backs of creatures we had no name for. No! This was not the end.

“We will avenge our brothers! Fly high above and save our sisters and mothers!”

One by one, we stepped toward the fire and were consumed by flames—burning, transforming. Then we flew. The smoke-filled, grey sky glowed with orange hues, casting the image of dancing flames above. We flew over the invaders, releasing blazing stones that burnt them to ashes.

 

---

LINA BAUM

 

It is small crouched, crushed, a body that feels like too much. It walks, winded, wilting, on it’s axis tilting, away towards the wall. A hand leans, reaches fingertips meet stone bricks. Then flinch away, a hand shaped stain stays behind, it’s bluish red hue haunts its every movement. It remembers a time when it’s steps did not stain the pavement, when it was innocent enough not to leave a mark with every touch.

 

---

LINA-FABIENNE HOLSTE

 

His screams get stuck in his throat as his flesh hardens. Looking down at himself, he is greeted with the sight of his body growing and rough, gnarly bark slowly eating through his skin. His fingers expand into thin, twisted branches, with new ones growing from his arms and neck as he grows to become the very thing that he thought would hide his crime. 

 

---

LINA BAUM

 

Now, with it’s tranquility it transfers traces of notable intensity. A body haunted by the hurt it spreads, caught in a mind that dreads destruction so dearly it would rather deconstruct itself. With every attempt to amend it amplifies the consequence. With every hurtful thought color blooms, builds a bruise, on buildings, railways, roads. Goes outwards, expands, unfolds. All secrecy for nought the seedlings of it’s suffering spread out, all pretend now shattered. In it’s shame it dwindles, surrenders to its role, its essence spreads and latches, lingering blemish on the globe.

 

---

IMRAN PEKSEN

 

This was our land. Our pride. Our home. No one could take away what our fathers had died for. No one would live among the ashes of our loved ones. We would not rest until they felt what we had been through.

 

 

---

LINA BAUM

 

 A discolored aching stain in the spot of its absence, not suffering but pain in remembrance, tension in the air, distortion of space now occupied by the apprehension of what has already occurred. A bruise tangible when talking turns to whispers softly spoken and feet on the street are foreboding unspoken. 

 A dull wound turned cold, 

for A Bruise on the World is nothing more than a stain of distraught untold.

 

 

---

CHARLOTTE WEISMAN

 

                                                                       warm

                                                              rays promising

                                                            liberty, manifesting

                                                                agency, hopeful

                                                                    yet deadly

 

                                               warm embrace

                                                                        will

 

                                    that feel like                  soon

 

 

                        wings that                                    meet

 

            

 

          and bravery                                                 his

 

 

      with naivite

 

                                                                                 flightless

Icarus

 

 

 

 

                                                                                    fate

 

into the cold dead sea into the cold dead sea into the cold dead sea into the cold dead sea into the cold dead sea into the cold dead sea into the cold dead sea into the cold dead sea into the cold dead sea into the cold dead sea into the cold dead sea into the cold dead sea into the cold dead sea into the cold dead sea into the cold dead sea into the cold dead sea into the cold dead

 

---

LARA STUCK

 

back from the lid, or we cannot move.”

close – open – close.

Anticipation – They stay closed. A relieved sigh into dense and liquid air. Gills in exchange for lungs. The sooner we move along, the sooner we get out. Become one of us. Somebody looks at me. I look back. Into silvery eyes. Shimmering. Dead.

Eyes open – close.

Blank stare. I guess they're not actually looking at me. Daydreaming most likely. What would I give for an ice cube bedding? Won’t you become one of us. Pretty little dish. Somebody talks too loudly on the phone. Their mouth to close to my ear, too close to my eyes.

Mouths open – close.

We stand supporting each other with our bodies. Tiny shiny things squished in a big tin can. Steaming in our own juice. “Final stop.”

Doors open – 

We all flop out into the big, wide, open sea – or onto your buttered bread.

 

 

---

DEFNE JULE MUTLU

 

My limbs grow rigid;

Silence sears my throat

Full crystallized

my face is whitening.

I cannot cry, nor turn,

salt becomes my flesh—

Eyes dim with white

Like those of blinded men

With late realization

and gaze raised skyward

I season Heaven’s judgement,

A signpost at the city’s edge,

Not as violent as that pillar

Of fire leading forth from Egypt,

but fossil of disobedience,

a relic of sin, a solid proof

of heart’s reluctance

To leave old ways,

though warnings were pronounced.

Were they not warned? 

A city is not destroyed

Before His final warning.

 

 

 

---

AERYS RÜDRICH

 

The unjust mind sets the body out for the tool tapestries on the wall, where promises lie

Two hearted anticipation burgeons in two polar, far apart corners of intermutual space

 

The object walled in its natural orbit, pull it out

Its cells water wells and cracks with forces

So far beyond both their predomination

A kissing maw whispers to its victim

It’s hard snake tongue writhing 

Up and down with the force

“With our shared plight,

You break my teeth

And I break you

And we may

Become 

One

 

 

ARDA AYDIN

I saw the silent sirens

Singing to someone who saw neither

Songs they were singing swearing nonsense

Once they saw the sorrow, they shrieked violent

 

---

TYLER K.

heiliger Heidegger has no hope for the hasty and harrowed scope,
of the finer and sublimer holdings in Weimar,
happy, hung, and hopelessly strung in hollowed hallow in the hall of walls,
is a heiliger Heidegger handsomely happening,
on the zig-zaggy zenith of zephyrs and zooming
is Heidegger now booming,
with Existenz, Distanz, Happenstanz, total Tanz,
in the exuberant, exalted, examples of exigence—
of zen, of zen, of zen.

 

---

JULIA KAZCOR

Jealous Jack jammed in jail, journaled of juicy joy and jarring justice Just as Judge Judy jumped and joined Jack Joking about a journey to a jam-packed jungle 

Shocked and shaken up by the sheer shot at shadowed shelter He put a sharp show shaking her hand Shivering they shrieked at sharks And shopped for shells at shores

 

---

DEFNE JULE MUTLU

Zealous zebras zoomed past the zoologist in a zig-zag.

The jaguar jumped from the gigantic tree in the jungle.

Ephemeral floating fairies flitter fastly across the fluffy cotton fields euphorically. Suddenly, from afar a fluttering firefly flew nearby and placed its little feet atop the fungi. As the sun fled the fiery sky, the fox found his way out of his flower-covered den.

The crickets teeter on top of the thick-leafed thicket and terrified the tiny mouse tucks herself out of sight, yet the towering owl darts downwards instantly and tears her away with her pointy claws, in which she twists and turns in vain, amidst their turbulent flight.

 

---

WILHELMINA VAN RAVENHORST

Come on, you cocksucking coward. You conniving, colluding, cringing, cocky, cuckooing crow. You can crawl back into your cave for all I care, I couldn’t care less to be quite clear, I am counting the days till I can cover your cringeworthy face with dirt, I’ll cry tears of happiness when I’m finally rid of your cold, blood curdling, crappy, uncomely self.

 

Fucking forever we fucking said, I fail to fathom how far we’ve fallen. From fine, fine feelings of feathery flying on far above clouds of fierce, fearless passion for one and another. I finally feel like we loathe one another. From friends to foe, from fine to foul.

 

---

RENÉ RÜWALD

Sure shiny, the shores of Shanaroo Island with shark, shellfish, shrimp. Shifty, on a shortcut, the British ships secretly shamed with relish the shop owners in the shingled shacks at the strand who shood their dishwashers after only one season to impoverish these shrieking and shaken shapes without a shilling¾unshaven, in shirts too short on the shoulder and the splash pants with shredded shins. Shabby, shrouded, shocked, the chefs looked as they cooked in their crammed kitchens, continuously convulsing in cramps to keep the remaining crockery clean. Curiously, the crook, a cat, considered cautiously¾and at clear four o’clock claws clicked on the corroded concrete floor. The cat cried comforted and consequently climbed the desk of oak and clutched a piece of cake to recompense its cruel work, closing its cries for countless encounters with cream. Come I tomorrow, dear chef, am I concerned: Could you combine chocolate, cranberry, cheese?

 

---

AERYS RÜDRICH

[muːt] (Part 1)

 

 

As Darkness stands

Servants stare,

Silently standing still

And silence stretched on

A snake inside a snake 

should not succeed 

Still will you stick 

a stake in its side?

Voices whispering: should should

As Satan speaks his sermon 

Sense is lost

With sanity

Ship listing bowside

Jaws Snapping shut

Succeeding silent voices sing

Despair scratching the spine

Selfsame as unguis

Lapis and sanguis

Mixing to onyx

Senescent memories scream

Storm surrounding

Staring at shallows

Stuck in the sand

Shins sinking in

Voices whispering: stand stand 

And escape soon

Like the sun

Succumb to sorrow

At this sight

And sense a sea wind

Coming left side, 

And forcing right

Once past again

Sensations snaking, pressing 

Strapped down 

By Satans limbs

And drown

 

[muːt] (Part 2)

 

 

Flat feelings fleeing 

Flee for now

Flight and fly away to see 

Falling back for safer lands

With friends and flags in tow

Flapping flaccidly

But flapping

Voices floundered

Once resounding

Muffled now

Flogged with defeat

Flushed and sniffling 

Fantasies stripped

Like flayed flesh

Flee to flagons

Flee to fleets

Flirt with violence

And reflect anew

Camouflage yourself

Like fleas and gadflies

In floors and flasks

Always flitting never gone

Never to flush out

No mud flood forceful enough

And watch them flail 

To flat the flaws

Of broken laws

And flimsy plans

And feel the flame

Rekindle

Trifle with hope

For a new cycle

For winds can turn

And stifle doom

Flaunt freedom

And anew

Flowers may bloom

 

 

DEFNE JULE MUTLU

 

A ring had roused me from the strangest dream—

And as I stood to turn off my alarm,

I knew the fatal fault of hitting ‘snooze’

Would ruin any hope of day’s success;

Therefore I rubbed my eyes to chase off sleep

And splashed cold water thrice onto my face.

 

---

JULIA KAZCOR

 

 I woke up from a strange and confused dream 

A craving for some coffee in my hand 

A wish to stay in bed and lie unbothered 

For in my dream, I never have to leave

 

---

TYLER KLIEM

 

The flesh of head invading walls too close,
as I make the encounter chance my will,
for plaiting the water making is tart,
and that I choose to not break true my course.

 

---

AERYS RÜDRICH

 

The fear I felt in the dark of last night 

Was countered by this morning’s calming wake 

The joy of the morning now still holds on 

But the lines will not come, and I am lost

 

---

ARDA AYDIN

 

Sleepless I am, and will I be

If my Thor’s day starts too early

Famished and vanished that is my belly

Merely can I rhyme too dreary

 

---

JAY UHLEMANN

 

Today's morning starts without me teaching

I stay in bed and consider reading.

With a coffee in my hand and a book

I stand up and get some translation done.

 

---

ALICAN NAZIK

 

I woke up in hunger on my bed today, 

rushed to class not before doing my skin care. 

Came late, hungry and pissed at Kant 

Though I like poetry, I have three hours to last.

 

---

RENÉ RÜWALD

When I had fallen out of bed today,
my cat, she said to me: “Beware, you fool,
if you don’t feed and meet my need, I warn
sincerely you, that I’ll become quite cruel.”

 

---

AIYONA HAYMAN

 

I went outside to try and catch my train

 To no surprise the speaker made me sigh 

Because my train would arrive late today 

Not just a bit, but nearly a full hour 

That’s why I was too late to be on time

 

---

WILHELMINA VAN RAVENHORST

 

But sitting there uncomfortably & squeezed
Unable even t'read my phone or book
I realised biking is preferable
Even when I feel like a lazy bones

 

WILHELMINA VAN RAVENHORST

 

A dragon once presented me with words

And promised me to teach me how to fly

The words she gave me put me in the world

We built the world together, her and I

 

But suddenly the words began to stilt

In her betrayal, she dropped me from the sky

A monster caught me in a net she built

Her pictures made it possible to try

 

To put myself back in the world again

But soon the sculptures built, just walled me in

The dragon came to save me from my pen

I realised the only way to win

 

Was to embrace the dragon's whirly wiles

And learn to ride her through the raucous skies

 

---

AIYONA HAYMAN

 

Adam, Chava; she was from ha-tseyla^[1]

B’reyshis^[2]: the faithless cling to text unknown

A pair crafted from le-vasar ekhad^[3]

Our tongues tangle in versions we have sewn

 

To be subservient to one’s own half

Because the side was wrongly named a rib

They’ve turned our sacred text to golden calf

To permit practices we have forbid

 

Myriads of translations shift and split

From what B'reyshis, Chumesh^[4] have to say

Ignore the source they thought they could outwit

Perhaps that is the New Testament way

 

Bones of my bones, flesh of my flesh — and yet

From whom translation comes we oft forget.

 

^[1] Hebrew, הַצֵּלָ֛ע meaning “the side” from Genesis 2:22.

^[2] Hebrew, בְּרֵאשִׁ֖ית commonly translated as “Genesis,” and meaning “in the beginning.” The poem’s spelling reflects the Ashkenazi pronunciation.

^[3]Hebrew, לְבָשָׂ֥ר אֶחָֽד meaning “from one flesh” from Genesis 2:24.

^[4] Hebrew, חומש the five books of Moses, also referred to as the Pentateuch. 

---

JULIA KAZCOR

 

Through all these years, I’ve lived by you alone 

Shaped by your words, and moulded by your grace 

Now as you leave, I face the world unknown 

A drift apart – my fear I can’t erase 

 

I search for you in echoes, lost and faint 

Desperate, I trace your steps in empty space. 

Our memories lie splattered, dried like paint, 

A hollow grows where once you filled this place. 

 

Yet as I count the days to see your face 

I know that people come, and some will leave. 

Your letters lie still hidden in their case, 

The times we shared remind me not to grieve. 

 

I cherish every moment that we’ve shared 

Though we must part, I know our hearts are paired

 

---

ALICAN NAZIK

 

Oh, how it fares be’ng alone in the night, 

When it is cold and dark, none to keep warm.

A lack of touch, love is far to hold tight, 

You are but with one or two loving arm. 

 

Say you remember what had we in time, 

Lips so gentle, yet burn so bright and hot, 

Now the furnace gone, life is like a lime, 

Should be sweet, but the tongue left in a knot. 

 

Eyes need sight, and body needs another 

But the feast is almost over, tough chance! 

That boy is gone, your shame you should cover, 

Find another for the unholy dance. 

 

Lo! The sun is up, night ended so rough, 

But worry not, next time for the hot stuff.

 

---

AERYS RÜDRICH

 

Forget it not this summer storm of old 

Where all the trees were ripped from craters big 

Old legend sometimes melancholy told 

The roofs fell down, street full with smashed red brick 

 

I still recall the light, the almost burn 

Enchanted, natures captive stretched a hand 

Of want to feel the great electric churn 

No scars to see yet on the mind a brand 

 

To feel the snakes that turn the world to cinder 

And quick with crack and clap the scourge lashed out

It’s snapping limbs of fire reached for tinder 

And quick pulled back, outside the clamor loud 

 

And all in awe I hold that night still tender

In nights of rain think back and still remember

 

---

ARDA AYDIN

 

How often now I find myself sitting

To watch the hours ending without blinking

Serene sea that seeks my soul, calling

Pulls me through the swells which is Kraken hauling

 

The waves that wash the shores of self

-Tis nothing but deep in the mind dwelling-

Like soldiers interlaced and charging

Tides walling me o’er as Andes or Madras sits eternal

 

I feel the vivid coldness of its wind

That seeps into the bones of my soul soaking

Tis this current, watch it curl, slither, coil

Meanders around the troubles that drown my soul now ten times o’er, 

 

Behold! See as the sea throttles my minds thoughts the most monstrous

Dragging all the poison down, leaving me as effervescent as ever

 

---

DEFNE JULE MUTLU

 

Why echoes yet that newborn’s piercing cry 

in parents’ memories, but not in mine? 

More vivid is my joy from piggy-rides, 

or daft escapes we dared to call grave crimes. 

 

With purses full, but Time swift-footed thrust 

we forth— and water timid buds, which bloom 

and writhing, wrangle for the sun in lust,

 resisting shadows as they peak their doom. 

 

But why must healthy hurry sting us so? 

Nostalgia is th’ambrosia of elders, 

who plunge into past’s sands to flee blank throes, 

revenging tempered heroes’ brash adventures. 

 

Our memory is but a bottled scroll, 

which floats on wishes’ sea fore’er unrolled.

 

---

RENÉ RÜWALD

 

I softly pour into a cup of shape:

A fragile eggshell mind, the larva's guess

of cabbage butterfly, tries to escape

all nocturnal chalk among the endless

 

revolutions of the moon. Let's reinvent

the stars: from séance to séance, from the crayons

to chaos, a rolling shell around the bend

off sandy hills to fill with salt and swans

 

seizing peace in its what-ifs: signs at odds

wave away the ways always wave for wave

by dry ice fog, Greek alabaster gods

drowsing in the pigeon-house, to crave

 

another polished shine and splendor brief

as the swift stage magician's handkerchief.

 

 

---

JAY UHLEMANN

 

Every summer your district gets crowdy
Your neighborhood is full of AirBnBs
You can’t live there anymore so proudly
With the development you disagree
You can’t afford your rent, your flat, your house
And you should move to another district
But people, the community can rouse
With the attendance it is not so strict
Go and start to organize yourself
Go, take back the town, the district, the street
And not only by looking at your shelf
Learn from experience what to repeat
Adapt strategies to sharp your city
And then, living here won’t be so shitty.

 

 

AERYS RÜDRICH

 

‘Twas vour, and the scutten blids 

Did scile and grouk in the scrade

All blourant were the willermitts

And the quilient kice forwade

 

---

DEFNE JULE MUTLU

 

’Twas tiperous, and the soomper splees

      Did huttle and qizzle in the quook:

All begianic were the bibblechees,

      And the blube kethes dedooked.

 

---

ALICAN NAZIK

’Twas couble, and the dipter klonaults

Did seylem and morquen in the opyken:

All puthophy were the whuuls,

And the lokmort tuyhmorts lusken. 

 

---

ARDA AYDIN

’Twas grilirantug, and the druntulitic evsclabrants

Did hurklit and croblut in the gervenieun:

All smierliea were the grandutug,

And the armirous choholonras flligornuktan.

 

JULIA KAZCOR

Tychy, Poland 

 

Another atrocious apartment complex 

Beer brewery blazing in the center 

Coca-Cola chupa chups from the corner store 

Daily doom directed at the difference 

Especially in enigmatic extremities 

Forget your freedom and fulfilment 

Graced by glaring grandmas’ groans 

Holding down their hateful hearts 

Inside: Intolerance ignited by irregularities 

Jargon of jaded judgements 

Kamienne kościoły, krwawe krzyże i kojące kazania[1]

Lazing lavishly at the lakeside 

My mother’s mother mending memories 

No need to nurture nostalgia 

Of otherworldly origins 

Piramida na paprocanach pnie sie pod promieniami[2]

Quietly questioning your queerness 

Rosy cheeks and radiant rosaries 

Struggling to stay serene 

Tychy the town of tales untold 

Untouched, unseen, unheard of 

Vanished visions from kindergarten 

Where whimsical wonders once wandered 

X-men and X Factor in my box tv 

Yearning for the yellow spring 19 years ago

Zatrzymane zegary, znikające z pamięci zjawiska[3]

 

 

[1] Stone churches, bloody crosses and soothing sermons

[2] Piramida (pyramid formed hotel in Tychy) at the Paprocany (lake) rises beneath the rays

[3] Stopped clocks, vanishing events from memory

 

---

RENÉ RÜWALD

Heiligenhaus 

 

August days in alcohol among blazed Akazienweg inhabitants 

            with A.C.A.B chants alias

bedlam beggars, borderline aborted, bouncing on bleak bourbon,

chemical candy and chromed cabals, cleptos dancing at crossroads,

deaf and dreamy, rad to ride and dupe conductors for deposit, doses,

endless scents of Eau de Cologne or tees with

fist or Fuck You finger, the father fixated effort to defy

gravity, chugalugging the luggage googly-eyed, the growling

homestead hagiographers, heirs of hunger, hook and hold

iridescent memory as habit of inspiration and the

jarred jokes ejaculated by jailbird DJs¾jab jab,

kick-punch kowtow for kabeljou kebab and kabuki theater took

lost longing and all, all along the laden lid of latter lay,

manifest mitigating measures in the monster’s morass themselves,

nurtured in the never-ending phony night,

ongoing odes oozing of old, yet Odysseus on oxy

plots pro procrastination¾panting with pistol on playgrounds, Panzerwillie

quaffing quicksilver with quacksalvers, inquisitive antiquarians

rest in rashly ragged rock’n’roll rubbish armchairs

shoot soon, speak later, shood shame shifts possession in the scene

towards the triangular toolaloo tonality of troubadours and trombone truck tracks,

ushering euphoria under utopian influence to utilize

visions and vestiges of virginal vegetarians for vendetta,

which ways were wounded while waking

xenophobic exclusion, anxious expectation of foxed oxygen,

yearning for yesterday’s yippie-yay-yos,

zig-zagging through zombies bizarrely zoning in their haze.

 

---

ALICAN NAZIK

Mersin

 

Along the coast where the waves gently break,

Breezes bestowed upon you in your trek.

Colourful characters, carefree and bright,

Dawn goddess draws near, hold on tight.

Every corner echoes with cheer,

Friendly faces, their laughter you can hear.

Glimpses of great mountains guarding the north,

Hearts are light, heard they help us like a fort.

In the parks, children insist to play, and

Joy by Jove in the journey throughout the day.

Kites keep soaring above the tranquil shores,

Loud laughter lingers even behind the locked doors.

Merry is Mersin with its merciful myrrh grace, for

Nature and people share a warm embrace.

Orange orchards’ smells almost make you high,

Pure peace in every puff as you sigh. 

Quarrel free quiet nights with a starry glow,

Rest here well, relax regardless you’re high or low. 

Sunset makes the skies gold,

The tranquillity there cannot be bought.

Under the unyielding palms, unforgettable days are slow,

Visit here, where vibes go with the flow, as

Waves whisper with a wistful call.

You are yet to find this yellow and blue town,

Zesty Zephyr’ zone will wipe away your frown. 

 

---

WILHELMINA VAN RAVENHORST

Veenendaal

 

Alarming amalgam, sanctity & sin.

Blasphemy, blasphemy always and everything.

Callous Calvin’s influence creeping in.

Dreaming, daring, doing: all is sin.

Everywhere, everything, god’s in the details.

Frugal, fearful, unfathomable,

grueling, graying gargoyles of god

howling harrowing horror plots.

Ignorant, impotent, ignoble twats.

I yawned but I yearned for their privileged spots.

Coveted Kings were the boys and men,

leaving lamenting to me and my friends.

Misogynist misers, the elders were.

No-nonsense naysayers, ruling the church.

Ominous orifices swallowed and shook.

Perhaps piss-pure pilgrims would get off the hook.

Queries and questions alas were forbidden,

rendered recreant and resistance-ridden.

So smoking sick smoldering spliffs was the thing,

till terrifying paranoia crept in.

Unanimous urchins undulating towards

vulvic volcanic eruptuous, voluptuous 

womenfolk, wooing them, luring them in.

Xenophilian eureka: Established xenia!

Young yearning youths now all neatly reigned in

Zealous, zenith-praising, Zeus zeroing in.

 

---

TYLER KLIEM

 

All-scrounging, aimless pioneers on Allegheny are abounding,
and the broad-shouldered beer drinkers bruise along Broad, breaking bottles behind the Bob and Barbara’s drag-buskers,
and the Chinese vendors on Cherry, selling xiaolongbao to Centralers.
Those dangered dickhead dartyers on Delancey—whose expanse of the scene is yet the egg-washed epoched cobbles of Elfreth’s Alley—
going forward to them lighting dung on fire on Front in the front, affront, of their own Frat Row.
Grace and glamour is given to the gilded Grimes-grotesque girls of Germantown Friends,
who know the hitchhiking handler boys along the hubble of Hunting Park.
Interstate 676 runs into Allyson Elizabeth’s backyard, in the industrial incumbent sound of South,
where she drives longward to Locust as the locusts and lilies line the long-bricked walkway of time ago, near even my Ludlow launchpad where they tore down the livinghomes, hot shit litterings and leaves.
Mumbling maps in the middle of muddling Market subway stations at midnight, where homeless veterans ask if I’m a man or a myth,
and all my noised navigations to the new rowhomes of Newbold,
open, fresh-faced, to Olde Kensington’s old bars and ovalways, abroad ripping, for undone, overlapping
projects, that even the passing scope of Passyunk, the primacy of South’s portent, with prideful gay bars and panhandlers and porned-out cheesesteak mouths, cannot save.
Quincy is a small street, up along the Art Museum, where maybe the quilted queer men are quaffing on their doorsteps.
Race, home to the rallied race to “Save Chinatown” from basketball renewers,
and then South, off my friend’s scarlet doorway, of slinky skies run slow with graffiti and sleazy stores and summer sativa, the labyrinthine stickers
of Tattooed Mom, those gin and tonic tastings, so entranced with the tradgoths playing pool wrong with their transmasc toys.
The University Avenue urinary specialists untubed my catheter after I upped on the umami vodka,
next room to mine, maybe vatic victims of the Vine Street Expressway, maiming two and violating thirty.
Did you know that Walnut is where I wet a Khmer wordbook for a weekly newspaper?—wild was that wildernight of 4015.
St. Francis Xavier School, up along the Art Museum, has no school librarian, but xanthic is Christ’s window.
My Yggdrasil yodels beyond the Biopond, a redwood raising yonder to the University—
“It’z a Philly thing,” the kidz tell me, and it’z gone before I realize.

 

 

---

AERYS RÜDRICH

Tokyo

 

Arriving through arches and playing at arcades 

Buying bawdy books and buttons on the Broadway 

Cha(i) challenges and lost cats

Downing dreamy drinks and DIY dumplings with

Elder help from Everest climbers giving out evening edibles 

Friendly fish and Furbys under fluorescent light

Ground floors upon ground floors galvanizing, and above

High streets next to high-tech buildings and historic houses 

Ikea ice cream irresistible, even in winter

Jumbled closet with judicious jeans and just too many

Kingly kimonos and kitsch from off shops

Laforet lolitas in luscious lace and Luis Vuitton 

Mandrake vines clutching miniatures and manga, making

No stops, knowing no taboos, nagging at the mind when

Observing obscene images in open shop windows

Pier nights putting an end to the pressing heat

Queer questions and queerer bars

Round ramen bowls with red ham slices I regret

Shopping for sewing supplies and stopping by Scientology　

Trinkets from train stations, guys who try to tourist trap you

Unhinged but unhindered searches for underground boba shops

Vanguards village and voltic vendors

Wolfing on snacks with women who wanted me

X-mas insanity with expensive cake excesses

Yen cheapness making for Euro steepness

Zines and zebra print plushies I would could should make 

if only I was back

 

 

RENÉ RÜWALD

Incantation by Word (Byword)

 

Word up, preword you,

whiteword in my wordawn,

wordify wordsworth wordiolets and winewords,

you wereword among waterwords,

words, words¾words 

word you with wordock, wordlet, wordians,

little wordequin, wordwonder

transword wordpilot to jetword

viaword

postwordly¾

word!

 

---

ALICAN NAZIK

Incantation by Loving

 

Oh, to love and beloved the loving lovester,

Deloved the lovick to heloved loveald,

Lovesome is the love loved to eloveuate,

Lovecome and fullove the lovert.

Oh the loveine loves, love the lov

Loveatures, thy lovedom come and

Thy love be loved, loloved lovee lover.

 

---

AIYONA HAYMAN

Incantation by Mocking

 

make a me mock-up, mocklings

where mocksters mock            mocking

mock me          mock me          mock me!

mini mockchkins make mini-mes 

many mini mes in mocker fashion

mockahere       mockathere

 

Mockin’s            World                        Fair

 

mick mack mocking     mockanderers mopping

mock-ups         mockmusters               mockclusters

machinery mockizens   mocked off      mock-ins

 

Mock-ins may be mocked when mocking mocks, mockoes, 

and mockirts, my mocklings. No mocking, no mockice! 

 

---

JULIA KAZCOR

Incantation by Breaking

 

Break into a breakdown, 

unbreakable bricks braking,

to a breakpoint - of no breakthrough.

Breaking, breaking and breaking into a breakup,

Break the brakes on the breakpoint.

Breakfast breaching, breaking and baking,

Breadcrumbs breaking into broken bits,

Breaking apart until daybreak.

Breaking, breaking, breaking until the break remakes,

And all that is broken breaks again. 

 

---

ARDA AYDIN

Incantation by Sickness

 

Oh sick, thine sickery sickariously diminishing.

Sickitish thine realms thus thee should arrive sickititiously.

Oh us, your loyal sickelings, 

waiting for your sickerment, sickrishly in creep sickerness. 

Sickvilishous thine charm and sickertatiously effecting our sickmelty.

Sickvertivoutious and sickmalititious this unworthy realm we beg thee!

Sickerlivalious and sickperment our two values that we revere,

Fervent is our sicklamenita, if highness blesses our sicklinishery.

 

Soo thee great conqueror of sickglingunartia,

Come claim thine kingdom, sicklarvenert your slaves!

Come! The beast, the sickurvatia, the warrior!

Drink the blood of your sickellings,

They owe their lives to you anyway. 

Come! Sicklarklingun your chains, 

Free thyself from the trap of light!

Come, come you and sunlight begone!

Only blood and thine evil, sickoultishment

Only darkness and crimson color of the nectar

 

---

TYLER KLIEM

Incantation by Despair

 

Little spair, enspairing in the wilderspair,
despairating spairously, the spusk as spawdry as a spall—
it transpairs so. Spairling—Make spairodic the spairiloquence,
as the despairettes spairegate. Spairile spairstrades are spairen.
Jespair is respairnating, as spaggard as spairum respairum. Spairous
is despair.
Fulspair, spairlong, is the respairman, respairnine. In the spairpine
it espairs, all spairwhile.
Respairalize, little spair, as spairifying as it spay.

 

---

WILHELMINA VAN RAVANHORST

Incantation by Flying

 

Fly, little Fleebee, fly you

flyey flowly fleerydee.

Flyly, flowingly, fly so freely

flowy, fleely, flawaywithyee!

Fwee fwaa fwoo you flaaderbee

Flawy flee, fleery flow

Fleasily floly froobledoh.

 

Fly, fly, fleebee, fly

Fly with flowy fleeberdee

Flyly, flowly, flavelee,

Freely, fryly, frooberbee,

Fwee Fwaa Fwoo flaaby

Fleasy does it, flaaderdee,

Fly, fly, free, flee

Fwy fwaa fwoo fweeeeeeeeee

 

---

DEFNE JULE MUTLU

Incantation by bottle

 

Bottle but prebottled blood,

Bottbuttled through the bottledough

Bottledottle lottlebottle bottlot enough

Bottle, why bring we bottles?

Perhaps to bottling most bottlest bottlian bottliars,

Polybottle, subbottled and underbottled

All these bottles bottlejot through the dawn

Filled with bottlejuice by bots and end up full-bottled.

 

---

AERYS RÜDRICH

Incantation by Crying

 

Why Cry, crier

Why, oh, why do you cry

Crying crudely, crying cryful,

cryier, cryest

Christ, why cry

When crying crinds the cries

Crying crynging, cringing

Why cryful cryee,

What cryment has you crying

What crysome crysis cry you for

You Cry, you cried, you crode you’re croding

Well then go cry and cry some more

 

AIYONA HAYMAN

German’s Raddisch

 

Klatschmihal un ratschmidasch von zey toda

M‘naja die n‘ja dir‘kaffee n’raddisch

Mimolee von‘Himmelshoh n‘Frimmelsohn

Un‘klischee n‘zoll Haus Jisrael, da‘achja

Von’wiessman puri un’du: amen. 

 

Und die was von meym ishi gelehn 

Undien loshishi gesehen.

Klatschunrach n’widersprach n’widie’hier

N’nitdotan n’siehtasee n’siehatsar

N’sieht’okay n’sieht’total sch’ree m’zusha

Frich lu ge’ula

Mein zoll tachata n’rivater

Duihrvater n’flutschihrrater von kiritan

M’mala un’du: amen.

 

Ach seh schalom meinroman, du passee 

Schalom momeydu n’ja zoll Jisrael,

un’du amen. 

 

---

DEFNE JULE MUTLU

 

Thrust, clash, forge, storm

Blast, grim, grind, crash,

Crash, crash, crash, crash

Rage, wrath, strike, growl,

Thunder, blaze, thunder, struck

 

Meets ponder, grace, flutter, chases

Whisper, lilt, murmur, sigh, sigh...

Glimmer, linger, twinkle, breeze,

And seizes, embraces, glides.

 

---

JULIA KAZCOR

Revenge / Hatred

 

Smorven vendits, furiving cru 

malvored lors vexen

requis mel throm, kraw 

ackritch ris habrid, ris furis 

muj brover, skartis mowry 

muj brover, wrood ris kross 

 

---

ARDA AYDIN

Rowing

 

Krungh klavhhh, shrunkunghhh khavvvv

troommm da wram, klantun kann

yhiem wuhum, healang shlift hum 

kram lavam tann, shlifte humma ran

krunda linta shclan, krandi lufta schlintin zannnnn

 

---

TYLER KLIEM

Laziness / Feeling Stuck

 

Lev e tut, ig no sway, lev e shush, nev er nay.
Bild e quet, ta sorb ell, is or bell. Bel. Be—
Ser e vitt, a lor ick, a men or, wick a litt. A—
Me shloss vund, pals pals en, flank at at, ur uv de.
Lev e roo, lev et ut, u tu tu, ig no jay, lem er ay, al pi cor. A—
Lim e rett, a als clov, be ne a, nev er nay, ef esh oof. A—

 

---

WILHELMINA VAN RAVENHORST

Kid Playing Drums

 

Bleng, cluun, clang, boon!

Waalazeeeee, waalazooooo

balada balada zingzangzoong.

Boobedee boobadoo

Taraka tarata takala!

Zingzang Woola

Bleediblee-deeblidee

Followa babaloo

Weedidi weedidoo

Bleng, cluun, clang, boon!

Bababa wakata weebidee feebleda!

Bleng, cluun, clang, boon!

Waaa!

 

---

ALICAN NAZIK

Cheating

 

            Tolka da perva

                        Kep to ay lovata

                        Ma go hubba u honta

                        Luk sev ka hind

                        Ka tolka pat kut

                        Tu halh me tak art kap

 

---

AERYS RÜDRICH

 

一鬼夜行 (いっきやぎょう)

 

ずんのばた　　                                

ごうれんだった

からわねに

くさがうました

ごらめんなひご

 

 

Romanization:

“Ikki Yagyo” (Night parade of a single monster)

 

Zun no bata

Gōren datta

Karawane ni

Kusa ga umashita

Goramenna higo

 

 

Direct English translation of the Japanese original:

 

The bata of the Zun

It was the gōren

In (the) karawane

The kusa was umashed

Goramanish higo

 

---

RENÉ RÜWALD

Hamlet

 

plof plumt inaratio

nurpuring shibbeling drûne

jeedy bonko tutla hillum dumplab 

wentall argub spoka

bonko bonko

ristam rocha

shivam lesse ò prectatorlens

stratem rocha

spokarelli spoka relli

karuzo wallshamur cruck cruck

denge strat stritt strack stong dumplac

stong dumplac

shokon 

shur

 

JULIA KAZCOR

Poem inspired by the song “Voyager” by boygenius 

 

Like two voyagers lost in space,

Orbiting close, but with no embrace.

A speck of blue in an endless night,

A bottomless void, where your light shone bright.

 

Born under the lucky star, destined to burn for you,

Soon it faded and softly fizzled out.

Gravity pulling us closer and closer together,

Before we clashed, a force I couldn’t foresee.

 

I could’ve been your starred eye lover,

Your dazzling supernova.

A fleeting light that passed me by,

You stole it from me, yet I’d still try.

 

---

ARDA AYDIN

 

The sun, the sea, a girl in a bikini

Patterns on her back looks like a movie

I will crawl into the sand, if she looks at me

Show of hands if you can see mee

 

Bbbvff bruun, Bruub bub buub 

Bruuba druuba bruuba brrruuuba bub bub 

Bruuuba brabba bub bap,

The hot, the cold, tensions that clench me,

All the things I can’t say but they always get thee

My eyes are sometimes too revealing

And the sight of you makes me so panicky

 

Bbbvff bruun, Bruub bub buub 

Bruuba druuba bruuba brrruuuba bub bub 

Bruuuba brabba bub bap

 

---

DEFNE JULE MUTLU

The Ney 

 

The ney, like lover’s eyes, stirs poet’s tongues 

To praise God’s glory even if they’re blind, 

Like stout Homer they sing of days gone by, 

And add their elegy to listed sighs. 

 

The ney mourns separation from its bed, 

Its deep thrummed dirge inspires silent pity, 

Until all listening cheeks don glist’ning tears, 

And slowly sway their heads like springtime lilies. 

 

Sweet silence sprouts within their bowing hearts, 

Like David’s harp, it cures all fears and harshness, 

It plants a new reed bed in mellow minds, 

Each reed a spine of Love that hums a line.

 

Each bears the burden of its sounding might, 

And like the call to prayer cusps a womb 

for beauty, piety, and brow-kissed tombs, 

whose birth disrupts all vain and woeful plight. 

 

The ney surpasses in totality: 

Laments fill all its being once it's blown, 

And nothing else remains besides Who Owns, 

Made hollow of all empty cares and shows.

 

---

RENÉ RÜWALD

Where’s Your Will to Be Weird

 

Flown far from the scene of fortune,

to find myself some room 

soon, but there’s only air, 

or only the roachy room

odor of ammonia and aphasia.

 

I’m all ready¾but am I already in, 

am I, already in?

 

On my way here I read 

detective fiction and hard-boiled 

eggs for breakfast,

the I do not know sounds 

like compelled wheels

of freight trains before the last stop 

and all out in a city

caught for ages

on a forsaken beach.

 

 

Can you hear the 

I wanna¾I wannabe¾ 

I want to be someone¾

Want to be¾where is your will?

Will in suggestion.

I will be: 

conductor, instructor.

I will be:

sailor, never a killer,

with slow boats I’ll always outspace,

and I would do anything.

I’ll do anything. And where 

is your will,

where is your will

to be weird?

 

---

WILHELMINA VAN RAVENHORST

Tiktiktikboom

 

So why did did did

did did you do

Didgeridoo 

Wap doowapdoowapdeedee

Brrrrramble buh-humble 

A humble humbug 

says the man with the pitchfork

Off my land get off off off 

I’ll off you-Off with his head, he said, she said, it’s sad, just a fad, 

Fandango

How does it sound, how doezzzit ssssound 

sssssoundsssss 

Why   should   snake  language   have   so  many   essessssss

Yess he said, she said, they said, we said, we’re sad, we said: we sad! So sudden his death

No, let’s not talk about that that that that that death

Life goes on, he said, she said, they said, they all said, that’s life, but I said that’s death’s what I said

But that’s too sad, no sadness allowed, smiles, no frowns, put that frown, upside down, alright upside, alright uptight, hold tight, roller-coaster ride, life’s a -

 

How does a howl sound, howlo I asked, how goes a howl

At his birth a primordial sound escaped my mouth

like a clap-howling seal or a werewolf perhaps

´ow ´ow ´ow ´ow ´ow ´ow ´ow 

or was it howooooooooo 

one long sound, I wish it wasn’t, I wish: it wasn’t 

Howoo, howoo, howoo does that song go again

Howooling with laughter with some of your friends

Not all of them could appreciate the who who who who whomor

Who was it that said, she said, she said, she said, she thought, she whispered, she spoke, she scathed, she hissed, she yelled, she screamed, she shared, she found her voice, that’s nice, she’s nice, that’s fine, she’s fine, she’s mine, she’ll be fine, fine, fine, fine, FIN -

 

---

AERYS RÜDRICH

Inspired by Sir Gawain and the Green Knight

 

Are silent songs / still sung in the head?

A voice without vocals / still vibrates inside

Is it tampering with tempo / or the temper of words

Spoken and sonic / or silently recited

That carries character / and connotates signs?

Is it the reader who receives / or remodels messages

Or the listener who lives out / lyrics only heard

Twist when they think / the true meaning

And can meaning be made / without music in one’s head?

Does beat break the beauty / if not befitting the song?

Is there a right way to read / or just a really good choice

And do signifiers go unseen / if only said, not read?

Can sound be analyzed / if passed over so quick

Only seconds to consider / never same always new?

Can you?

When one experiences verses

Does the sound inside retain

Through body reruns and traverses 

Or will you read these words again

 

 

Imagine a hall, inside high / a hugely immense cathedral 

Your words inside wandering / over walls along columns

Sonance and sonority / resonating the air

Satisfyingly stratified / in a stunning chorus

And hear the heights and hills / of voices high and low

Entering though the ears / to entertain the soul

Dancing on Drums / almost too dangerous and too much

Spinning in shells / shivering all down inside the viscera

Invisible and reverberating / to vanish into air

But it is only for once / for this opera is unique 

The curves ever changing / channeling new interpretations

Can tone ever be truly trapped / and does the tingling of echoes 

Ring true?

Have machinations yet been found?

And does the body feel it too?

For is not nature of sound 

To always be remade anew

 

Or is it better to becalm / and breathe in the words

Alone with one’s analysis / aware only of the text

Playing on the pages / repeated in the head

Resonating in rounds / around and around in the cranium

Feel out the sound in silence / specificities clear and understood

Spinning loops around lobes / and love those words even more

Deeper in you dig / all the way down to your own heart

Replay the sound and repay / your regard to already read lines 

Deficiency makes new dreams / drawn up in the head

Is there necessity for noise / to nest inside one’s chest

As concentration strengthens / cannot too sensations 

Crest?

Can paper words still make a noise

In stasis draw out more intent

Does one need sound to feel the joys

Or does just sound make words ascend

 

---

TYLER KLIEM

 

The canary swallows your tongue, but the bard keeps singing.

Singing. There is elation. An echoed chorus drums something
into you. Which is feeling.

It is a core. A riveting spit embosses your words
with shine. Even the dust, the absence, siphons the song
of its sadness.

Between sadness, and song, we are sideways.
This was what the god wanted. There is
scant stuck in your teeth, a
morphemed mucus fighting for survival, an
autodidact opening its effigy for a wild, or a woman,
or what is holy.

Add an orchestra and the voice lapses, the singer whose
singular temperature
meant for not a drop,
even,
to wane by the stroke of a mass. A horde
to perform
is belittling the sacrifice,
the suicide,
of voice.

You lay the canary in a crematorium,
crank,
see how it blooms like pie. Its docile wings evacuate your tongue, the
one it stole.

Its beak, left as dregs, sees you writing your story, and
has nothing left to do but watch the window march
from under you.

The bird’s name was Leonard Cohen. The bard was a mixture
of this news. You went and spit them out,
confused them. Which is feeling.

 

Imagine this world in 2060, but one element of our civilisation has evolved utterly differently from how we know it today.

It could be something physical, biological, cultural, political, something from nature, something linguistic . . .

Write a text dated 2060. You can choose the form and style (poetry, prose, drama, letter, anything in between . . . ) but if you would like a prompt, you can write it as a diary entry from someone living at this time.

 

Oskar Arnolds 

My idea was that the sun went out. I didn’t really bother with the how, just the consequence of a world left dying and freezing.

 

6 Days ago I left shelter, 5 days ago I started regretting it.

Calling myself a fool has become part of the course. It is not me speaking but the the black on my fingers and the film of frost covering what little is exposed of my skin. My flashlight flickers across the concrete humanity has forfeited to the cold. My world is only as large as my light reaches, 5 or so meters in any given direction. The rest is only perceived in outlines, black against the spotted sky. Some scouts do this because they feel claustrophobic in the shelter. I never understood that. In the shelter its all permanent. You know what you have, and even now I can still imagine every room, and which door leads where. Out here the world is confined into the 1 meter Oval spotlight. It jumps and straves and everything it touches gets to exist for just a second befor the light moves on. In the dark it all fades, plastic, metall, wood and even ice become surreal again. Sometimes I touch my face with dead fingers to feel if I’m still there and all I wish is to be seen by someone. 

The light dances ahead and leads Steady to the north in hope of anything to fill the shelter. Books are the ideal, but we‘d be contempt with even a doorknob to fidget with, a sponge, glasses, just anything new in the inventory. If for nothing else than to hear the story of how I got them. They say the moon gave us light in the night when the sun was gone. Perhaps it overworked itself, blew its fuse. All that‘s left of it is a blindspot on the sky. The ocean it once controlled now frozen in time, perhaps waiting for its return. In books I’ve found they used to fantasize about nights like these, to see a thousand stars at once. Now the Elders only reminisce of one.

 

---

Jay Uhlemann

What first appeared to be a joke of Fool’s day, turned out bitter reality. Do you remember that first of April thirty-six years ago? Yeah, it was 2024. In the state of Bavaria in Germany, the government passed a law that prohibited the use of a gender-inclusive language. It started with schools and administrations. Neither students nor teachers couldn’t use a language anymore to refer to themselves which seemed to be a safe environment. In the beginning, they still resisted. Used the gendered words, aloud in the classrooms. But soon, the government installed a “gender police”. An own department within the police, where everyone could register every case of using gendered or gender-inclusive language. A couple of years later the so-called “third option” which allowed non-binary or intersexual people to mark their gender as “diverse” was abolished as well.

 

---

Mia Bektic

Reflecting on the evolution of our species linguistically over the past 40 years got me thinking. I find it astonishing to think that communication through vibration was once a skill unimaginable to us and our ancestors. How did we exist in a world where our communication was limited to mere verbal exchanges, often leaving us feeling dominant yet profoundly misunderstood? 

In this year of 2060, I am grateful to have been born into a world where vibrational communication is not only possible but a normal part of our daily interactions. The ability to connect with others and certain animals through these subtle vibrations has changed my perspective entirely. It brings about a sense of equality—a realization that we as humans are not the superior beings, we once believed ourselves to be. 

The softness of these vibrations carries with it a clarity that goes beyond words. It allows us to express ourselves authentically and empathetically, fostering deeper understanding and empathy between individuals.

Communicating in this way has expanded our horizons, enabling us to connect with a broader range of beings. Paradoxically, instead of feeling larger or more significant, I feel a delightful sense of smallness. This newfound humility is transformative. We are not what we once thought of ourselves: big, important essential, but we are simply existing and that is profound.

Looking back, I can't help but pity the narrow and misguided world we once had. The realization of our interconnectedness with all living beings through this evolved form of communication has brought a profound sense of belonging and balance. In this evolved era.
 

---

Julius K.

In the tunnel, just moments from running out into the arena, he looked around. Next to him stood the line the opposing team had formed – not one body shorter than 8 feet, not one person, who could not scratch the back of their knees with ease while standing upright. Their arms had enough wingspan to fully hug a 200-year-old tree’s trunk, their hands were large enough to carry watermelons as if they were tennis balls. In contrast to their overall length and upper extremities stood their torso. It was short and narrow, completely unproportional, pained by years of bad posture as well as the genetic modifications they had undergone, taking shapes a human body would not normally take, constantly sedated by state-of-the-art painkillers. Behind the players was the opposite tunnel wall, filled with pictures and newspaper articles, some of them black-and-white, telling stories of the past, when professional sports were played by the non-modified. “What have we become”, he thought in a rare moment of clarity. But that moment and thought are gone in an instant, as the buzzer sounds and the grotesque bodies start running into the arena, cheered on by a crowd of thousands of non-grotesque bodies, expecting to be entertained.

 

Name and describe two new primary colours in another world. What characteristics or properties do the colours have? What objects or beings contain this colour? Try to put these into a narrative or poetic framework.
 

 

Mia Bektic

 

The color Brond

Only those who seek the secrets of the earth are familiar with the color Brond. Brond is hidden in the deepest forests, capturing the essence of the forest floor and old growth. It is the color of resilience and grounding, a rich blend of brown and bronze with a subtle metallic sheen buried within the soil. 

Brond appears on objects where one needs to take a closer look. Deep within the heart of the forest, trees of ancient growth bear leaves veined with Brond, shimmering softly in the sunlight. Those streaks embody untouched stability and strength.

Brond carries mystical energy, enhancing the user’s ability to tap into ancient wisdom for a short time. Once touched, it brings balance and harmony to its surroundings.

 

Imagine a genre like ‘steampunk’ but with different element, concept or material. Replace the ‘steam’ with something else. Describe either a landscape, an aesthetic, a style, a language, a fashion or a world based on this new genre.

 

Kardelen Babal

Wavepunk 

Humankind found a way to visualize all the waves surrounding us, like magnetic or sound waves, using a special kind of goggles. But with this ability the possibility of interfering with these waves arose. While it had a great impact on scientific progress, people lived in constant fear of evil wave-benders, especially after the discovery of the manipulation of heart waves. This fear led to a great market for anti-wave-interference clothing. 

 

---

Lara Wenisch

It started as a fashion statement. Rich people, otherwise so keen on disrespecting bodily modifications, got them attached to their necks. They looked neat, delicate lines in white attached to even whiter skin. It was a scientific breakthrough, never-heard-of-before, a step toward the future. Soon, they were advertised for the broader public. Mycelial networks, for you and me. ‘How to style’-guides on Pinterest, #Fungicore on TikTok. A fashion statement, now intricately woven into our minds. But as it goes so often in human history, it was a ruse. We knew enough to recreate, not enough to understand. 

In the city you seldomly noticed it. Once it was safely attached to your neck, it became part of your body as is your hair. It grows on you. The milliseconds of adrenaline poured into your system were easily confused as consequences of everyday life. Full train, traffic, someone spitting at your feet. You didn’t even remember it occurring. The feeling became familiar after some time, that of forgetting. But it wasn’t forgetting, not really. It was just faster than the human brain. Thoughts, intense and terrific, like an epiphany. Then, gone. I don’t know how we kept on functioning like this. 

The networks, it turned out, were a ruse. Once detached from their host, they were mostly useless. Autonomy didn’t work for all species I guess. They burrowed through the skin, into our brains, but they were harmless. They helped organize, sped things up in the mental department, made thinking tangible. We needed this. The panic came once we noticed the intrusion. You could feel it, milliseconds of panic, whenever you passed by a tree. Fleeting, urgent, forgettable. Ordinary everyday life. Except it wasn’t. The networks were a ruse, but they attracted spores. The trees, it seems, had infiltrated this system before us as a defensive measure against threats. That we knew. Now we know the sense of it. They warned each other about something else now - us.

Write a short text from the perspective of a being who has unconventional origins (like Bella Baxter). Show this through the language. Make the language strange.
 

Julius K.

I come from other world, ‘alien’, as human say. Earth language weird. Why say big words when small words do the job? You can say just about any and every thing with words of five or less parts. It makes life a lot more easy and if you try you will see that you can sound just as smart as every other human does. Soon they will see that we have the best words and they will join us. A cool thing about this is that you will be able to save lots of brain space that you can then use for other stuff that you need to or want to do in your daily life. Trust me, it works. Also do not use bad words, swear words. They make you feel stuff that takes up more brain space than it needs to. If you write short words, you also need less comma for stuff. They take up space too. Less is more when less of one means more space for other. You get it?

Write a text from the perspective of a land or country. What kind of language does it use?

 

Jay Uhlemann

Another planet, non-binary body with top surgery, scars from transitioning, use of gender neutral pronoun y 

I was walking around, and I couldn’t find a place where to sit down for a while. I was so tired. And then, the next moment I was full of energy again. I spread out my arms and I could feel the air, the wind, with every fingertip, with every cell the air floating around. Every hair on my body was standing upright as if I had goosebumps. I almost felt like I was flying myself, surrounded by air. I even felt the air under my feet, cribbeling and I almost bursted out laughing. I took off my shoes, not only to feel the wind between my toes but also the land beneath them. But wait, there was no land in an earthen way. It was more like a layer out of air. In the countryside, it was very clear, transparent and you could see right through it. On the other hand, in the city, you couldn’t see a thing. It was dark and grey and black, and you could see the reflection of the pollution in it. 

I felt every molecule of it and before I knew it, I was in the air. I could jump and move freely around. For a moment, I was happy. That was right before my body euphoria kicked in and I got stressed, like really stressed. It was even worse than feeling tired.

 

---

Lara Wenisch

We were whole, once. 

In some sense, we will always be. 

But they set borders now, tiny fractions 

split up and changing. Evolving. 

Stagnating.

Where once they travelled, we would welcome them, 

as one, 

together,

we were. 

Only few will dare to cross us now, divided. Their contempt for us, 

taking taking taking, 

holding back, 

was brought upon by themselves. 

It was never meant to be directed to the whole of our parts. 

Distance is created.

Parting is violence. 

We did not orchestrate it. Still, we are receiving. It is not enough to grow and flourish equally: 

We want to give. Spread and flourish, merge and become new 

elsewhere.

We want to be whole, 

outside ourselves. 

They want us to be, too. Yet 

they create only reflections, carved on our bones, confining our spirit to scraps of skin. 

They could have more, if only they would take it. Not just skin and bones, 

a whole. 

Once we were, and in some sense, 

we will always be.

C r e a t e     y o u r      o w n      B l a z i n g      W o r l d .

Name and describe an instrument used for perceiving things in this world. Go into as much detail as you can about how it works and what it is like to use this instrument.

 

Kardelen Babal

Wave-Goggles 

The wave-goggles look similar to our goggles but instead of glass they have unpolished gems from deep under the earth. Through them one is able to see all of the waves surrounding us. For an amateur they are of little use because it is a very difficult task to filter out the waves of little interest, so everything appears in a chaotic blur. The secret of bringing the waves in order or to concentrate on a particular wave is to shift the head and squint in just the right manner which takes years to perfect. Also, it is different with every goggle since each gem is unique so even for an expert new goggles are useless. 

An amateur should never try to look directly at the sun with their wave-goggles for the sheer strength of its waves might lead to permanent blindness. For safety, one should only ever try to visualize one kind of wave. The experts found that the sun did not only emit light- and heat waves as expected, but a whole lot of other waves, some of which have never been perceived from any other object. 

One particular human who is an expert at perceiving heart waves, was shocked to perceive a distinct heart wave from the sun directed towards the earth.

 

---

Elisabeth Buller

 

(During class I had thought of glasses that are able to read emotions for the first prompt but only kind of made a labeled sketch of them, and then for the latter one I thought about how emotions sometimes color our memories our how we perceive things– so for the task of sending in some of our assignments I decided to rewrite and combine my ideas for the two prompts. That’s why this one is a bit longer.)

“So what does it look like?”, Babsy asks, tentatively. “Tell me.” 

I pull my arms a bit tighter around my knees as I look down over the edge of the rooftop. At this time of night, the city is quieter. Not still, never completely. But quieter. The sounds of traffic are abated, the impatient cars gone, replaced by the hypnotic rattle of empty trams. Street lanterns dot the criss-crossing lines and rectangles. Rows and rows of cubic silhouettes huddle against each other in the dark, as if trying to fall asleep, but with their eyes still blinking or wide open– small windows into separate lives, separate worlds, all coexisting together in such proximity, in such a tangled space, with nothing but paper thin walls to mark their fragile borders. “It doesn't really feel like a color, most of the time”, I say, not managing to keep the hesitation out of my tone. I feel her looking at me, feel her gaze turn from contemplating and curious into something softer, something meant to be reassuring. I keep my eyes locked firmly ahead, watching the city. The city below doesn't change from one second to the next. What changes is the color of the lens in front of my left eye as I alter its settings with a soft press against the armband on my wrist. It's a miniscule change, hard to notice unless you're looking for it. There's a subtle flicker, and suddenly the world looks more open, more shapeless, more malleable. I take a moment to breathe, to collect myself. Thinking of my home world always needs some degree of mental preparation, these days. When I open my eyes again, the city below… seems different.The trams still remain on their rails, but now their drowsy rattle has transformed into a litany of dejected sobs, their emptiness imbued by a sense of hollowness. The cubes with their eyes have turned into faceless strangers, and the lantern lights have all blurred together, gathering their sterile, electric light and darkening the sky above them into a starless mass of black, blotted by shadows of menacing clouds. Above it all hangs a sinister hue of wrongness, of displacement, of unfamiliarity, of irritation and even anger because this city is not mine, is supposed to be warmer, kinder, better, more like home, but it’s not, and right now, nothing in the world could make it anything other than not-home, and that's unacceptable. As I finally brace myself and look up to meet Babsy’s waiting gaze, the hue changes once again. I should feel more at ease, comforted by her presence and reassured by her non-pressuring, patient silence. Instead, the edges and shapes around us become sharper, clearer, more pronounced, unhideable in the familiar glassy tint of exposed-naked-raw-open-pleaselookawayfromme–

 

---

Danny Tran

The Quantum Rift Camera is an advanced device with a metallic body and a, prismatic, glowing lens. It features an array of buttons, dials, and a holographic display for intuitive control and viewing. At the heart of its technology is the Quantum Lens, which creates a nanoscopic tear in the fabric of reality, revealing a visual window into alternate universes. 

Inside the camera, the Quantum Processor performs the complex calculations needed to stabilize and display these alternate realities. Users can choose different realities based on specific parameters like time and events, however you have to physically be at the location you want to look at. The viewfinder and display provide a high-definition, real-time view of alternate realities, making it feel like peering through a window into another world.

 

 To operate the camera, you power it on to start calibrating. Aim the camera and press the shutter button to activate the Quantum Lens. A laser focuses at where you aim the camera and opens a rift. 

The Quantum Rift Camera is designed for ease of use and primarily intended for scientific purposes, as commercial use is deemed too dangerous. It provides an immersive viewing experience, allowing scientists to explore alternate realities without physical interaction. Most importantly, it ensures user safety by being non-intrusive and observational only, without directly interacting with the other universes, so long as the rift remains stable.

 

---

Oskar Arnolds

Her back was beginning to sweat under the backpack slowly running hot despite the ventilations well audible best efforts. Lugging this thing around was a discomfort well worth it however. Satia wiped the sweat of her brows and kept stomping on slowly until the ventilation calmed down.

The ODOP had satisfied its own standards and now presented them to her through the projector on her head. A fallen city rebuild in lights lay before her, large buildings of rounder shape than she was used to, stuck to another like huddles of soap bubbles, seemingly defying gravity, or perhaps just of a lighter material than seemed ? Professionals, of course, took these first calculations with scepticism, but it was hard not to get excited in these moments. The heavy machinery and cruel heat where a much needed balance to the euphoria, keeping her from giggling like a child. “Oracle, over there. Delete and Recalculate !” She pointed of to her side where a texture had glitched. “Apologies Doctor Partson.”

The Computer answered. “Recalculating.” The building disappeared as the ventilation sped up again. “There as well.”

“Apologies Doctor Partson, Recalculating.”

 

Imagine that you are a being who lives in your Blazing World. This being does not like or trust the perceiving instrument that you invented earlier. Write a short text from their perspective

 

Kardelen Babal

 

Some things should just be left alone. It is not natural to perceive things that are usually hidden from us. I know that harm will come from these wave-goggles because what can be seen can also be manipulated. I have to find a way to become invisible to the perceivers, either by silencing all the waves that are emitted by my body or by sending out so many that it becomes impossible to filter them. 

I remember from my science classes that there is this fluid matter that conceals everything that it wraps around. I will need it to create an armour against those lurkers. I’m sure I’m not the only one who would be interested to stay safe. This could be my chance to help others and profit from it.

 

 

---

Danny Tran

In a world captivated by the possible uses of the Quantum Rift Camera, I stand alone in my opposition. Once, I was part of the very team that developed its predecessor, the Dimensional Viewer. During those early days, our excitement was palpable—we believed we were on the brink of unprecedented discovery, eager to change the future. But everything changed after the Takayama incident.

The Dimensional Viewer, much like the Quantum Rift Camera, was a groundbreaking device that allowed glimpses into alternate realities. Curiosity go the better of us and we were eager to see what is beyond our universe's boundaries. However, during one of our experimental phases, the Dimensional Viewer caused an incomplete riftbreak in Takayama, a small town in Japan, briefly merging two realities. For a few terrifying minutes, parts of the city flickered between different versions of itself. 

Phasing in and out of reality, inanimate objects from different timelines such as buildings partially materialized into our universe, resulting in catastrophic collapses. Coupled with chaotic energy surges, half of the town was obliterated.

Most horrifying of all, some individuals in the vicinity of the riftbreak experienced a fate that many would describe as worse than death. As the two realities merged and then separated, a few people were caught in the dimensional flux. These unfortunate souls found their bodies fused with alternate versions of themselves or with nearby objects. The results were nightmarish: limbs merged in unnatural ways, internal organs shifted and reformed, leaving those afflicted in a permanent state of agony. Medical teams were baffled and helpless, unable to reverse the horrific transformations. Many of those affected died shortly after, and those who survived faced lives of unbearable deformity and are now subject to research. 

We managed to contain the riftbreak quickly, but at what cost? Authorities and scientists, including myself, were ordered to cover up the incident. The official report: a reactor explosion. News were altered, witnesses were given false memories and any physical evidence of the event was meticulously cleaned up. The incident faded into obscurity, becoming little more than a vague, forgotten anecdote among those directly involved. 

Despite our efforts, I couldn't forget what had happened. The event in Tokyo haunted me, revealing the inherent risks of meddling with the fabric of reality. My peers, however, seemed blind to these dangers, calling the event “an unfortunate setback”. They immediately began work on its successor, the Quantum Rift Camera, excited about its potential for exploration and discovery, without considering the potential consequences. 

Now, as the rest of the world embraces the allure of the multiverse, I remain steadfast in my conviction that some doors are best left unopened. Some things are not to be tampered with and reality is one such thing. The memory of that incomplete riftbreak in Takayama and the souls that were lost serves as a constant reminder of the perils we face. A complete riftbreak could break our entire universe. Thus, I vow to destroy the Quantum Rift Camera, to prevent it from wreaking havoc on a global scale, even if it costs me my life. The world must be protected from its allure, from the reckless pursuit of knowledge at any cost. 

9. Read the description of the Sun as a stone of light, and consider the relationship between light and matter in Cavendish’s fiction. Write your own description of a planetary being or unit of matter that can be perceived from your own world. Describe what it looks like and consider what element(s) it is made of.

 

Elisabeth Buller

 

Nine looked up at the broad night sky of her homelands, like she used to as a kid obsessed with

planets and constellations and shooting stars. The sight that greeted her was a familiar one: the

gigantic silhouette of a titan’s hand, the lifelines on his palm obscured by clouds and blue-blurred by

distance. It’s impossible to see all of his five mighty fingers, towering like god pillars over the curtain

of their sky, from any one point of the planet at once; they are too close to him for that, or the hand

simply too big. But through her telescope, Nine can see so much more. On a cloudless night, she sees

the receding light of the traveling sun paint the planetary hand’s borders with a bright-red

luminescence– not like a bloody crimson-bright-red, but like how the sunlight turns the edges of our

skin a warm orange-bright-red by shining around it. And during the early day, when the sun shines not

from behind, but flanks the planet at a position opposite the hand, all the enormous lifelines and ridges

at the giant’s palm bloom into visibility in the telescope’s eye, like hills and valleys on a topographic

map.

 

Imagine a kind of injustice, marginalisation or alienation that either you or someone else has experienced.

How could you use worldbuilding and alternative mythologies to counter this injustice? How could you imagine this ‘otherwise’?


Alican Nazik

 

The last 1600 years were hard for Alevi people. At first, they were forced to change their religion to a new one in order to escape a genocide, which didn’t stop being massacred despite complying to the wishes of the new religious leaders. The oppressors were not short of killing babies, nor did they hesitate to lay siege to people who weren’t even fighting. The Prophet had passed away, and all the other guides were dealt with in order to severe the connection with the past. No more sacred religion for the Alevi people, and all they were allowed to do was to turn the other cheek. Hiding their identities and religious practices, they performed the role of an assimilated minority. However, they were driven out of their own lands and were hunted when it was found that they are Alevis. You see, there was a price to be paid if you let on even the tiniest detail that you practice the religion of the skies, and that price usually included assault and torture. 

After the Ottoman regime came to power, people believed that the just emperor would look out for all his subjects, whether Alevi or not. However, there was a little setback the optimism overlooked. The empire that claimed to be just was founded upon hills soaked with blood, and all this blood was shed for the sake of Islam, a sect of which that antagonises the infidels -and therefore, the Alevis- to be precise. Now, Alevi people have been the under the reign of Islam for centuries before that and it shouldn’t have been a problem. And the sultans were protecting the rights of anyone under Islam, they wouldn’t shed the blood of a people that practiced Islam alongside them, right? No. On the contrary, the ninth sultan contributed to the history of the massacre greatly. His time marks the murder of 40,000 Alevi people just because of their culture and religion. 

Five hundred years passed under the same oppression, and the 1990s shone the light of freedom to all the people of the Earth. The Alevis wanted the peace of that shining freedom, but the locals were not keen on giving them anything other than a hard time. The struggles and the hindered freedom have always been political, and the Alevi people started to raise their voices for a place in the society after all the decades of oppression under the new republic. When the notable people of Alevi liberation ideology got together in a hotel in Madımak, the locals locked all the exits of the building. They set the building on fire and laughed while listening to the screams. They were not killing people they thought, it was the scums of the society, and you guarantee heaven when you kill at least three Alevis their forefathers advised. 

But enough was enough for these people. They were playing the role of an innocent and helpless lamb for too long to be a part of the other cultures. But remember what Sally Bowles taught us, “a tiger is a tiger, not a lamb.” You see, you can bend the light it shines in any way you wish, but you can never make fire not burn. It has the means to let life grow as well as lay waste. The flames can warm the hearts but can hold themselves back to freeze the unworthy. And little did anyone know that flames hold secrets far older than the language spoken. The sacrificed people remembered in the flames where they got their names from. Alevi means “resembling to the flame” but the flame has long gone and turned to fire and brimstone for the victims of hate. 

The sun was blocked by the smoke coming from the top of the building. The windows that were sealed shut to prevent anyone inside from escaping allowed some orange light to escape. The murderers waited in anticipation with the tune of screams in their ears, but the music was cut short as the escaping light got brighter. For the first time in human history since the times when angels walked on Earth, the Alevi people reclaimed their heritage fully instead of practicing pseudo-pagan nature practices. And the people in the hotel decided to remind the people outside of the past and reintroduce themselves. The blast shattered every window in the building, the angry fire licked the face of anyone with permanent kiss marks. 

The buildings were charred, and the stolen lands were scorched as fire balls spread out to the corners of the world. The group of Alevi spokespeople trapped in the hotel was determined to free their people, and the fact that they lost their meat suits did not hinder the mission. The people were given a chance to join the fire and be free of what keeps them down. Some agreed, but the ones who wished to stay behind were not looked upon or otherised. The fire did a last threatening tour over the sky to show what awaits another attempt against the Alevi people before seeming to be joining the sun. Ever since then, the sun has been shining more, and the heat takes a greater toll. The remaining Alevi people wished only equality instead of revenge or retribution, and it was granted immediately. Even though the broader society seemed to be bothered by it, the giant fire ball in the sky looks like a good enough sign to keep everyone in line. The lands sullied by the blood of martyrs or innocents remain scorched, and the governments are yet to find a solution to such uninhabitable places. 

 

---

Oskar Arnolds

I chose to write that the Native american fought on and, whether or not they lose in the end, the war continues for at least one more century. While, where I to make this a larger project I’d include more and more of their cultural beliefs taking form, this one scene happens quite early on in the war only in the 18th century and features their beliefs of souls and burial rituals.

The Bodies haven’t begun to rot, so the smell is still beareable.

Iron and Gun powder stuffs the nose, but it does not leave one wretching the way the stench of decay does. Our lost have already been gathered and carted of for the burial ceremonies. We are here to guard their fallen. White corpses to refertilize the grounds they bombed. In the distance over the hill I can see their people again. No weapons, else they‘d dare get closer. Looking at them I stand up and take the rifle off my back. They understand. Their heads sink beneath the hill and I sit again. I know this game, and I know they won't come again, though I wish they'd try.

They call us savages for denying them burial. It is a childs word in their mouth.

The Whaling begins deep in the night. The Souls that leave their bodies yearn for a conclusion. I drown it out. They came and brought war to this land, they deserve no peace.

Soon they‘ll take form. Grasp at the living, cling to them to drag them with.

They seek no revenge… yet. For now they seek comfort. When they set out to find their loved ones we follow. Tomorrow their cries lead will us to their camps

Pick an event or time period in history connected to pain, trauma or injustice. Look this up online, find out some key dates and statistics.

Use imagination / science fiction / fantasy / magical realism to imagine an alternative ending or consequence of this historical event, whether in the past, future or both.

 

Julius K.

A mysterious ancient artifact leads to an alternative timeline, in which the South-African apartheid ends much earlier, preventing decades of suffering. Mandela does not spend extended time in prison and humanity lives united in peace.

Since the late 1940s, South Africa had been under the strict control of apartheid, a system of racial segregation and oppression created by the National Party government. The black majority had very limited rights and opportunities. In 1964, Dr. Mbeki and her team of archaeologists found an ancient artifact buried deep in the Kalahari Desert. This discovery would release a mystical energy that would change South Africa's history forever.

 

In the Kalahari Desert, the archaeologists discovered an artifact emitting a strange energy, starting "The Great Awakening." Within weeks, South Africans began to develop extraordinary abilities in healing, empathy, and visions of unity. Even though Nelson Mandela was in prison, he dreamt of a future without Apartheid. Leaders from all backgrounds, moved by this newfound empathy, came together to fight against Apartheid. Politicians with new vision started to dismantle the unfair laws.

In Pretoria, Mandela's vision of a united nation inspired leaders to plan for a future of equality. Plans for multiracial elections began to take shape. In 1966, these elections brought Mandela to power. This started a new era of economic growth and cultural celebration, lifting international sanctions. By 1970, South Africa was thriving with improvements in education, the economy, and technology. The artifact inspired new ideas, making South Africa a global leader.

By 1990, South Africans celebrated "The Great Awakening," marking their journey from division to unity. Scientists later discovered that the artifact had changed human the core of human DNA, increasing empathy worldwide. It symbolized humanity's path toward peace and understanding. The Great Awakening permanently changed South Africa and the world, showing the power of empathy and unity to transform history and create a brighter future.

 

 

 

---

Danny Tran

 

In the year 2100, I stand amidst the consequences of my forbidden actions as a member of the Chrono-Sentinels. We were entrusted with the sacred duty “to observe, never to interfere”. Yet, witnessing the horrors of Tiananmen Square in 1989, I succumbed to the temptation to alter history. Armed with advanced temporal technology, I empowered the protesters, shifting China towards a fragile democracy. 

My intervention caused a systemic change, China became a democracy. However, in response to China's fragile democracy, fear gripped the Western world. Governments, paranoid of an uprising similar to the Tiananmen protest, imposed iron-fisted rule. Liberty died, surveillance became omnipresent and those oppose the rule of “The Directorate of Unity” are swiftly dealt with. 

Desperate to undo my folly, remote attempts to revert my intervention only deepen the dystopia, reinforcing the very tyranny I sought to eradicate. 

Yet amidst the darkness, echoes of Tiananmen Square persist. The memory of “The Beacon”, the leader I empowered with forbidden technology, fuels pockets of resistance worldwide. 

As a repentant Chrono-Sentinel, I grapple with the consequences of my reckless defiance. I now strive to mend the damage I've caused, seeking to restore balance. What was done, can be undone. This time, I will return to 1989 myself, become “The Beacon” myself and make sure history unfolds as intended.

 

 

---

Mia Bektic

The Atomic Bombing of Hiroshima

In a world where reality can change in response to human suffering and strength, the bombing of Hiroshima in 1945 had consequences that went beyond just the devastation of war.

As the atomic bomb called "Little Boy" exploded over the city, its nuclear trigger not only devastation but also an untamed energy that tore through the barriers between worlds. 

In the aftermath of Hiroshima's shattered streets, whispers began to echo. Survivors, dazed but alive, found themselves inexplicably connected to a and unimaginable power. The spirits of those lost in the bombing, rather than fading away, merged with the energy released by the bomb, transforming into ethereal beings. 

The souls- now serving as guardians and guide, possessed extraordinary abilities of healing wounds with a touch, calm fires with a look and create illusions to ease the pain of memories. 

Over the decades that followed, Hiroshima evolved into a city where the boundary between the physical and spiritual realms blurred. The Genbaku Dome, once a symbol of destruction, became a place where the living and these souls gather, sharing stories of loss, hope, and the enduring quest for peace.

As the world looks upon Hiroshima, it sees not just a city rebuilt with bricks and mortar, but a testament to the resilience of the human spirit and the transformative power of empathy and understanding. The legacy of the atomic bomb, the legacy of the atomic bomb, instead of maintaining the feeling of fear, inspired empathy and understanding. 

Hiroshima turned into the place of comfort

Jay Uhlemann

Description of a grotesque body

Gender dysphoria means that I don’t feel like myself in my body. Maybe my actual body is my grotesque body. Right now, it feels blown out of proportion. The body in which I feel I don’t belong. It’s mine and at the same time it is not. My body and myself aren’t on the same page, on the same body. I struggle with it. Every day.

Which transformation, which metamorphism can I undergo to not feel gender dysphoria anymore? I think about a mastectomy every now and then. How would it be like to have a flat chest? The imagination of the scars, the markers of a change, I can already see them. They are long but also fine. Would I decorate them with a tattoo? Would it actually be decoration? Or would be more like I want to hide them? 

I wish I could celebrate my body more. I wish to be at a point in my life when I feel gender euphoria instead. If I would get a tattoo every time, I have gender dysphoria, there won’t be much more space on my body. But would it be so bad?

 

---

Oskar Arnolds

A Hag Hunter riddled with curses of old battles.

 

In this scene the POV character sees him in full for the first time, as he is cleaning himself in a lake. 

 

While the coat could not hide the mishapen form of his body nothing could have prepared me for what lay beneath. The curses he‘d mentioned, the scars no gods could heal, no knife could carve out, no fire could cleanse taking form in an arsenal of creative cruelty. What I first mistook a vain to be a pertruding from his lower back began to crawl under his skin and out of my sight as it felt my eyes on its many legged outline. Skin turned bark and wood in patches, sprouting thin grass like hair. A cut deep into the mans flesh revealed growing not crust but teeth shaping a gulletless maw, salvating pus. On the left of his forehead, over the eye had grown a bird it seemed, its pink foetus body I observed through a milky thin layer of sticky skin stretched and sure to burst once it woke. Its dull black eyes staring blindly into nothing. Lost Feather meant to be the birds growing instead from the mans head, his skin red and irritated where he‘d scratched them out.

But it was not just him.

His back splitting into two spines, one askew mounting sideways over the other the bones poking out like a saw to the world. His torso carrying two faces, one, as should be, on his neck, the other what I first assumed a tumor on his shoulder. The face wept in a voice distinct from his, higher and clearer. Feminin. Her eyes closed and leaking pus which he wiped away with care. His voice whispering her soothing words in return. Out of her spine seemed to break shoulders and arms aswell, skinny, sickly and frail, but long. Her right sprouting from the wing of his back, curving around his neck in a hug, the left dangling out his flank, where it seemingly once forced its way through his ribs as course of which ever unholy ritual had fused them. Her bone pale fingers intertwinded with his, both holding on, comfirming each others presence. It was a painting of horror which dragged my eyes to the ground, yet a scene so loving that guilt struck me right after.

 

---

Oskar Arnolds

Sensory organs

Above the ear a tunnel opens up (the Pontis), thin and straight until it reaches a round cavern (The Bed/Ethral-Bed).

The cavern contains a pearl (Ethral), perfectly round, floating within the cavern without touching the walls which are covered in soft fur, leaning towards the walls as to not touch the pearl. The pearl is white, though subtle movements reveal a slightly delayed light blue after image. The pearl catches vibrations caused by emotions within the souls around it. With training one born with it can learn to interpret these vibrations. People born with this Organ are called mediums. Movement of the head can cause the sensitive pearl to bump into its surrounding, the fur is therefor essential to avoid serious discomfort of the medium. To avoid discomfort most mediums close their Organ, as the Tunnel and Cavern contract and close up. Within the cavern the hair embraces the pearl tightly and soft, numbing it to the movement of its surroundings. Dust accumulating in the Cavern is a serious concern for all mediums. Dust is transported out via vibration of the hair, resulting in heavy pains for the Medium, as the Pearls is over stimulated. This process happens automatically, and begins in the N2 phase of the sleep cycle, waking the medium up and keeping them awake for 30 and up to 60 minutes. This usually happens around once a month, though the cycle differs based on how frequently dust accumulates.

 

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Elisabeth Buller

(During the class, I only had a vague idea of someone called Lint-Mouse, so I sat down and gave myself another ten minutes to create something new from it.)

We don’t actually know exactly when Lint-Mouse-from-Engineering came into being, or how it found its way onto the ship. Cherrypop speculates that it must have been carried on board at one of our more unusual stops. Maybe the wind carried in some sort of a spore or seed, and maybe it settled on an abandoned rag in a corner down in the engineering room. Lint-Mouse-from-Engineering never talks much about itself– not out of some desire for mysteriousness or a traumatic past, but simply because in its opinion, that topic is ‘irrelevant’ and ‘have you brought the necessary spare parts I asked for?’ But how does it talk?, you may ask. It looks like a deformed clump of a dust bunny! How is that an intelligent life form? First of all, rude. Intelligence comes in many forms and does not require a human brain to be considered valid. Second, yes, Lint-Mouse-from-Engineering does indeed look like a concentrated clump of lint and dust. (That’s how it chose its name, actually. It snatched our old paperback encyclopedia and leafed through it, found the definition for ‘lint’, settled on the image of a mouse, and decided that it looked close enough to its own form to present as a satisfactory name. As it rarely leaves the engineering room and now works there, that’s where the rest came from. Very practical, our Lint-Mouse-from-Engineering.) Of course, it doesn’t have the same vocal cords as us, so in order to communicate better with us, it learned morse code.