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| CONTENTS |
| POETRY | ART |
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TIMOTHY MURPHY An Old Man Speaks ROSE KELLEHER Night School RISA DENENBERG About the body and what it needs MIA The Dog Lover NICOLE BROSSARD excerpt from White Piano MARTY MCCONNELL object LIV LANSDALE To the Fairest ANDREA DULANTO Dear Virginia NED BALBO Bronze Tableau A Giant of Ages Past MARYANN CORBETT Collaboration AARON SHURIN Bijoux MOIRA EGAN All the Old Weapons NAOMI REPLANSKY Sideshow JOAN ANNSFIRE Why is it so hard for lesbians in relationships? WILLIS BARNSTONE Letter for Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz SIHAM KARAMI Who I Am NAKED Selection | ROMAINE BROOKS Peter, a Young English Girl (1923-1924) NORMAN ROCKWELL Rosie the Riveter (1943) ANNE BENTLEY Looking For Mary Poppins (2007) HANNAH BARRETT Graf Bobbi im Damen Sattel (2012) MADY MARIE BOURDAGES Petit renard Roux (2013) LEAH DEVUN Joshua (2007) MERAUD GUEVARA Woman with Blue Eyes (c. 1935) LEONARD WOOLF Virginia Woolf and Vita Sackville-West (1933) PROFOUNDLY SUPERFICIAL PHOTOGRAPHY Karla Medusa (2010) ARTEMISIA GENTILESCHI Self-portrait as the allegory of Painting (1639) TINA FIVEASH Twilight Lovers (1994) LAWRENCE SCHWARTZWALD Tim Trace Peterson (2013) HANNAH HOCH Creatures (1926-1929) JEN P. HARRIS Untitled (American Kiss 9) (2009) MAURA MCGURK I Saw You, Sor Juana AMOS MAC Terry X (2012) BERENICE ABBOTT Edna St. Vincent Millay, New York (1930) |
“Wispy Guinevere” — I’ll take the name — enormous ring on my finger he kept remarking (a terror to gender) — swept through his sputtering brain so that his back stiffened and his eyes went dull — as on the raked stage of this announcement I rattled my earrings — bombardiers — splitting the evening’s thin serenity into “then” and “now” — flux you — or a muscular can-can kicking the footlights out — le Duc de Joyeuse — in the pure thrill of a serious affront to taste…! |
The sound of the trumpets died away and Orlando stood stark naked. No human being, since the world began, has ever looked more ravishing. His form combined in one the strength of a man and a woman's grace. As he stood there, the silver trumpets prolonged their note, as if reluctant to leave the lovely sight which their blast had called forth; and Chastity, Purity, and Modesty, inspired, no doubt, by Curiosity, peeped in at the door and threw a garment like a towel at the naked form which, unfortunately, fell short by several inches. Orlando looked himself up and down in a long looking-glass, without showing any signs of discomposure, and went, presumably, to his bath. We may take advantage of this pause in the narrative to make certain statements. Orlando had become a woman—there is no denying it. But in every other respect, Orlando remained precisely as he had been. The change of sex, though it altered their future, did nothing whatever to alter their identity. Their faces remained, as their portraits prove, practically the same. His memory—but in future we must, for convention's sake, say 'her' for 'his,' and 'she' for 'he'—her memory then, went back through all the events of her past life without encountering any obstacle. Some slight haziness there may have been, as if a few dark drops had fallen into the clear pool of memory; certain things had become a little dimmed; but that was all. The change seemed to have been accomplished painlessly and completely and in such a way that Orlando herself showed no surprise at it. Many people, taking this into account, and holding that such a change of sex is against nature, have been at great pains to prove (1) that Orlando had always been a woman, (2) that Orlando is at this moment a man. Let biologists and psychologists determine. It is enough for us to state the simple fact; Orlando was a man till the age of thirty; when he became a woman and has remained so ever since. But let other pens treat of sex and sexuality; we quit such odious subjects as soon as we can. Orlando had now washed, and dressed herself in those Turkish coats and trousers which can be worn indifferently by either sex; and was forced to consider her position. That it was precarious and embarrassing in the extreme must be the first thought of every reader who has followed her story with sympathy. Young, noble, beautiful, she had woken to find herself in a position than which we can conceive none more delicate for a young lady of rank. We should not have blamed her had she rung the bell, screamed, or fainted. But Orlando showed no such signs of perturbation. All her actions were deliberate in the extreme, and might indeed have been thought to show tokens of premeditation. First, she carefully examined the papers on the table; took such as seemed to be written in poetry, and secreted them in her bosom; next she called her Seleuchi hound, which had never left her bed all these days, though half famished with hunger, fed and combed him; then stuck a pair of pistols in her belt; finally wound about her person several strings of emeralds and pearls of the finest orient which had formed part of her Ambassadorial wardrobe. This done, she leant out of the window, gave one low whistle, and descended the shattered and bloodstained staircase, now strewn with the litter of waste-paper baskets, treaties, despatches, seals, sealing wax, etc., and so entered the courtyard. There, in the shadow of a giant fig tree, waited an old gipsy on a donkey. He led another by the bridle. Orlando swung her leg over it; and thus, attended by a lean dog, riding a donkey, in company of a gipsy, the Ambassador of Great Britain at the Court of the Sultan left Constantinople. Bath Amy Lowell (1874-1925) The day is fresh-washed and fair, and there is a smell of tulips and narcissus in the air. The sunshine pours in at the bath-room window and bores through the water in the bath-tub in lathes and planes of greenish-white. It cleaves the water into flaws like a jewel, and cracks it to bright light. Little spots of sunshine lie on the surface of the water and dance, dance, and their reflections wobble deliciously over the ceiling; a stir of my finger sets them whirring, reeling. I move a foot and the planes of light in the water jar. I lie back and laugh, and let the green-white water, the sun-flawed beryl water, flow over me. The day is almost too bright to bear, the green water covers me from the too bright day. I will lie here awhile and play with the water and the sun spots. The sky is blue and high. A crow flaps by the window, and there is a whiff of tulips and narcissus in the air. |
