Issue 16: Home and Away

INTRO: The best way to enjoy a summer in New York City is to leave as often as possible. The second best way is drinking at KGB.

In Ross Barkan’s “Tad,” our protagonist wanders the United States, trying to escape himself, drawn along by the receding tide of the American century. Jesse Salvo’s pathetic David hopes to transfer to the Indian state of Goa so he can be closer to the casually cruel boss he has fallen in love with. And both Sophie Madeline Dess and Madeline McFarland take us on a trip to Madrid.

Who are we when we’re away from home? these writers ask. If travel changes us, do the changes stick?

Our poets, on the other hand, don’t want to stray too far from the nest.

Ari Lisner’s “Summer,” Mormei Zanke’s “Eating a Sandwich in Tompkins Square” and Matt Proctor’s “Scenes From A Life” are all about city life, though you might not recognize the subject from one poem to the next. Lisner is romantic; Zanke is reflective; Proctor is positively chaotic. Even Aristilde Kirby’s “²d - Baetylus [Side A, Scoubidou Suite],” as much a wormhole as it is a poem, spits the reader out on DeKalb Ave. Sooraz Bylipudi’s “The Errand for Infinite Saturday” is about finding belonging within oneself, while in his poem “The Big E 2023,” Anthony Haden-Guest wonders about the future of the planet Earth, the home that we all share.

- Carrigan Lewis Miller, July 19th, 2023

Fiction:

Tad - by Ross Barkin, journalist, author and contributor to the New York Times Magazine

Goals for Growth - by Sophie Madeline Dess, writer and critic living in New York City

In Session - by Madeline McFarland, writer and a professor of creative writing at New York University

Honest Broker - by Jesse Salvo, writer and editor living in Santiago de Compostela, Spain

Poetry:

The Errand for Infinite Saturday - by Sooraz Bylipudi, poet and biotechnologist

Rimes - by Anthony Haden-Guest, renowned poet, journalist, critic and cartoonist

²d - Baetylus [Side A, Scoubidou Suite] - by Aristilde Kirby, poet from the Bronx, NYC

Summer - by Ari Lisner, poet, journalist and researcher

Scenes From A Life - by Matt Proctor, poet and musician

Eating a Sandwich in Tompkins Square - by Mormei Zanke, poet and journalist from Alberta, Canada