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A Past of Protest

Sylvia's Lullaby by Jillian Flexner (New York, 34)

1/5/2025

 
        They were down to their last three dollars. They had sold everything they conceivably
could live without from their little cottage – even their tin silverware. Well, they called it a
cottage but it was really more of a hovel, left to only nature’s defenses. Now, they were
desperate. Sylvia stared into the near-empty jar sitting atop an old linen tablecloth in the middle of their kitchen table. Perhaps the harder she stared, maybe the longer she didn’t blink, more money would just appear in the jar. Not much, just a quarter or two, but if she tried hard enough, maybe she could somehow solidify the aching hope in her heart for just a few more dollars to make it through this dry spell.
       A solid kick in her womb pulled her out of her reverie. Sylvia looked down at her swollen belly and let out a long sigh. She felt a flutter, like bubbles popping inside her. The baby must bedoing somersaults, she thought with a tired smile.

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The Caged Bird by Phoebe Angaye (Texas, 25)

11/27/2024

 
INT. CLUB - NIGHT
Throngs of bodies move together on the dancefloor. Hot sweat
rolls down their skin. Techno lights flash all over. Music
blares over the speakers.
JULIET (18) is in the middle of the dancefloor. She’s your
typical girl next door. Except right now? She looks like a
vixen from hell with her cleavage-revealing dress.
ERIC (25) is dancing right next to her. Eric is like the
thick, slimy grease on a gas station pizza.

JULIET
(yelling)
Are you having a good time?

ERIC
A great time! Do you want to sit
down?

JULIET
Sure!
Juliet has to lean on Eric as they make their way to their
seats. Finally, they sit down. Juliet takes a DRINK from a
waiter who passes by. She drinks it almost empty before
sitting it down.

JULIET (CONT'D)
I was soooo surprised when you
decided to ask me out.

ERIC
Really?

JULIET
YES! I was like me? Me? He’s asking
me out? You’re like the hottest guy
I’ve ever met!
Eric chuckles.

ERIC
Thank you.

JULIET
And-
Juliet makes a gagging noise.

JULIET (CONT'D)
I need to go to the bathroom.

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It’s like: Ouroboros by Cathrina Jakeman (Colorado, 19)

8/11/2024

 
She fed on me; I fed on her.

It
         was
                      a
                                    Queer
                                              feeling,

                      Falling.

I tasted the fruit,
and
i
choked.
Is this how Adam met Eve?

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Inspiration Point by Jane Yevgenia Muschentz (California, 45)

6/22/2024

 
In this version of history, Marge
never went to college / Marge went to college briefly / Marge went to
an all-girls college in the Roaring 1920’s /
in pre-revolution Iran / in 2022 Afghanistan / in 2005 Harvard,
when the school’s President attributed underrepresentation
of women in science to:
​“...different availability of aptitude at the high end... a level of commitment
that a much higher fraction of married men have been historically prepared to make
than of married women.” 1
​Controversy arose
when Marge wore pants / rode a bike / drove a car / played baseball / practiced medicine /
Marge was jailed / sent to an asylum for reading too much and managing
her own finances / Marge was rich and White /
Marge was poor and White / Marge was rich and Latina /

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The Strong One by Danielle Altman (California, 44)

5/4/2024

 
           My sister’s hair, honeyed from the hair salon, fell between us. The tips of it brushed the
menu we shared. We sat side by side since the booths were comically huge, like everything else
at The Cheesecake Factory in Pasadena. I almost tucked her hair behind her ear, my older-sister
instincts rearing up even though we weren’t kids anymore and hadn’t been close for years.
​           Her lunch invitation hadn’t been unexpected. It was the summer of 2007. I’d traveled
from Florida where I was in graduate school to our home state of California to be the maid of
honor in her wedding. The event was three days away and there was so much left to do. Tanning
bed appointments, mani-pedis, a champagne brunch, bridesmaid dramas I’d been tasked with
diffusing via flip phone, eyebrows to be waxed into thin perfect lines. After we ordered our
salads, I thought we would talk about those things. Instead, she stared straight ahead out a picture
window that faced onto Colorado Boulevard and roped me into helping her reconstruct the plot
of One Magic Christmas. It was her favorite holiday movie as a kid. A father shot to death on
Christmas Eve. His children driven off a bridge into an icy river. A mother grieves. The angel
Gideon appears.
​           ​“I need to tell you something,” she said after the waiter left our salads. I perked up,
wondering if it had something to do with her fiancée. His favorite things were green smoothies
and making fun of ugly people and he always pointed out when my sister had seconds. I put
down my fork, hoping for a called-off wedding. She was a quietly intelligent nursing student. A
hot girl who had been getting into Jesus. She was only twenty-two.

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In The Name of Love by Briana Soler (Texas, 31)

4/10/2024

 
Women keep secrets all the time. It was my mom who taught me to keep my secrets. She believed we
women were meant to swallow our pain, our questions, our discomfort for men, for anyone really. When I
would ask her why she would answer, “That’s just the way things are.” She felt pride about how well she
could keep her secrets of unhappiness. But the truth was, it was no secret. It was written all over her face,
in her tone, in her living. The only ones oblivious are ourselves.

I have secrets of how I lost my virginity. There was coaxing, manipulation, and the giving of Xanax to
help keep me quiet. Most of my sexual relationships have been pills to swallow, both literally and
metaphorically. Lies, abuse, and manipulation from boys led to the constant stream of pill-taking, to
normalize all the things I had to keep secret. Friends would talk about their first times, and I would make
up some story so as not to get asked, “Are you okay?” I had no idea if I was okay, which is what the pills
and all the drinking were for. I didn’t want the question in the room, so I made up a normal story, a story
anyone could believe. Shame comes with secrets, and eventually, shame eats us all whole. You start to
feel disgusting that you have things to hide. Not because you did anything wrong, but because they
happened and you regret them, hoping they would go away forever.

––––

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A Good Summer by Hilary Shirra (France, 27)

4/10/2024

 
The room was tiny. $975 a month, and yet my suitcase just barely fit into the open patch of floor
between the bed and the desk. Jumbles of my clothing covered every available surface, half
sorted into piles. It was small, but it was home. Or rather, it was going to be. 

Despite the muggy heat of the Toronto summer, the first thing I had done upon entering the room
was rush to the window. Cracking it open, I was accosted by the clamor of the city. Car horns
honked, and street cars rattled. People in expensive suits scuttled below me, eyes scanning their
phones, hands clutching their lattes. The skyscrapers across the street appraised me from beneath
scrunched eyebrows, their roofs stretching up to touch the cerulean sky. 

Climate-controlled air rushed out and in crept the smell of grease from the corner hotdog stand,
woven together with the nauseating stench of the subway. It was all so overwhelming. So loud.
So foreign.

What an adventure I told myself, pausing to look in the closet mirror and bare my teeth like a
used car salesman.

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Declaration of a Goddess by Lee Butler (Pennsylvania)

4/7/2024

 
In the name of Jesus the Messiah,
I declare that I am born out of God,
Carved and painted with the envisionment of evil.
Black hair runs down my curves and red lips, sweet with sin,
Make me a victim of temptation and vengeful lust.

Father forgive me for the falsehood
Of desecration of holy marriage unions
And Adam's taste for the Apple-
The truth is choked in his throat
and in the blood of the first murder on record.
​
In the name of Jesus the Messiah
I declare that I have never harmed a child-
My spirits find safety under my wings and wisdom in my fall.
I embrace the moon and it's four stages,
worship my dark, inner feminine energies, and Her divine manifests.

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THEY SAY CROWS CAN REMEMBER FACES by Warren Benedetto (California, 47)

4/7/2024

 
Content Warning: This short story includes scenes of bullying, violence, and slight gore


          The stone hit Ava in the back of the head. She stumbled and fell, spilling her schoolbooks
out of her arms and onto the dirt road in front of her. Gravel dug into her palms as she threw out
her hands to break her fall. Her knees skidded painfully across the ground.
​          “Have a nice trip!” a boy’s voice called out from behind her, to a chorus of laughter. “See
you next fall!”
​          Ava brushed her long, black hair out of her face. She was hollow-boned and delicate,
looking far younger than her 11 years. Her dark eyes welled with tears. She quickly wiped them
away with the frayed cuff of her sweater.
​          A chilly autumn wind blew across the Kansas field, causing the corn stalks lining the
road to whisper in the breeze. Somewhere in the distance, faint and far away, a gas-powered
tractor growled. It was probably from Mr. Conklin’s farm – he was the only farmer in the area
who was wealthy enough to own a tractor – but it didn’t matter. He wasn’t close enough to help
her. Nobody was. She was on her own.
​          A group of kids about her age, two girls and a boy, ran past her. One of the girls stuck out
her tongue. The other laughed. Their shoes kicked up clouds of dust into Ava’s face as they
passed.
​          ​The girls were sisters, Sarah and Beth Winters. They were pretty and clean, with crisp red
bows tied in their flaxen hair. They were the kinds of girls who had everything they needed and
got everything they wanted; they never had to ask for anything twice. They wore matching blue
dresses with warm red sweaters that looked like they were bought from a department store. Not
handmade, like Ava’s shapeless brown smock. They weren’t twins – Sarah was two years older
than Beth – but they were inseparable. Even now, they held hands as they skipped away into the
distance. Ava hated them both, equally.

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The Cinderella Effect by Jeanna Ní Ríordáin (Ireland, 34)

4/6/2024

 
Yeh-Shen’s golden slipper kept shrinking one inch
Smaller until it found its rightful owner

When footbinding was in vogue in China, the most
Desired shape was the three-inch golden lotus

It took two years to achieve this revered shape, girls
Had their feet bound from the age of five or six

Sometimes binders opted for a slightly softer
Shape – the butterfly or cucumber foot

Read More
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