Creon Tells Antigone To Keep Her Arms At Her Sides When She Runs

small scales

through the window’s glass I catch the picture: blackberries cupped  in the inhale of a milky-ceramic bowl.

I spend a few seconds mistaking them for dots of caviar because this house is so nice, because they don’t seem to start or end but mill their dark globes across eachother’s chests — close enough together to trade bodies like clouds swapping weather.

I crack the black eggs and suggestions of fish flash in my head, a pocket-knife clicking open, flanks of silver slicks turning their skin to metal on the light.

then the glimpse of a sleepy blue sheen waking on the dark fruit drains the moment of its ocean; blackberries.

blackberries in the small bowl looking like fish coming on. from here, water is just another word for change. I put another shred of push into my bike and it goes,

away from the window’s false eye and I wonder what else in today could flash open with blue and switch its biology from behind the glass.

- c. essington

sleeping on it

everything about it goes around like a good story which takes a new room on a new tongue every night. I wish I could do the same but I’m not so good at convincing people to give me their time or their teeth or their mornings. 

the idea is that you drop yourself and then recover on waking to find that it all hangs different on the shoulders, is less pink, more amaranth, less the leaves of a turnip flower, more the hollowed chest of a cloud after rain—

go to bed across it, maybe its sheets will muddle into a word, maybe the goose feathers will conspire into a cotton-mouthed dictation, saying ah yes, the breakthrough, the meaning, the good. 

or maybe it’s just the time and how it drags through the dark like the cold body of a fish dragging through a mile of river: just about breathing without meaning to and surviving without intending survival until the thing that almost ate you the night before has starved to death, lost its ribs, its music its importance. or it could be

that you forget after you go under and come up, that if it hurts, it will have a place where it  can stop hurting, and a REM cycle is just a good way to buck the hours  off your nerves, not that it’s particularly curative,  just that it knows how to drown minutes

out of their bodies and yours.

         - c. essington

today the air is dim, oyster-shell dim cut through with sheens of rain, coming from far off, nearly off-screen, with cold signed at the bottom of every cloud-bank.

the sky is longer than the word it takes up or the words it takes down when snow happens in front of the billboards, the ads, going white.

                              - C. Essington

Those were people. They were targeted for belonging to the LGBTQ community. This was an attack on LGBTQ people, not an attack on “anyone trying to have a night out” or “anyone who’s offended by the shooting”.  

Edward Sotomayor Jr., 34.

Stanley Almodovar III, 23.

Luis Omar Ocasio-Capo, 20.

Juan Ramon Guerrero, 22.

Eric Ivan Ortiz-Rivera, 36.

Peter O. Gonzalez-Cruz, 22.

Luis S. Vielma, 22.

Kimberly Morris, 37.

Eddie Jamoldroy Justice, 30.

Darryl Roman Burt II, 29.

Deonka Deidra Drayton, 32.

Alejandro Barrios Martinez, 21.

Anthony Luis Laureanodisla, 25.

Jean Carlos Mendez Perez, 35.

Franky Jimmy Dejesus Velazquez, 50.

Amanda Alvear, 25.

Martin Benitez Torres, 33.

Luis Daniel Wilson-Leon, 37.

Mercedez Marisol Flores, 26.

Xavier Emmanuel Serrano Rosado, 35.

Gilberto Ramon Silva Menendez, 25.

Simon Adrian Carrillo Fernandez, 31.

Oscar A. Aracena-Montero, 26.

Enrique L. Rios, Jr., 25 years old.

Miguel Angel Honorato, 30 years old.

Javier Jorge-Reyes, 40 years old.

Joel Rayon Paniagua, 32 years old

Jason Benjamin Josaphat, 19 years old

Cory James Connell, 21 years old

Juan P. Rivera Velazquez, 37 years old

Luis Daniel Conde, 39 years old

Shane Evan Tomlinson, 33 years old

Juan Chevez-Martinez, 25 years old

Jerald Arthur Wright, 31

Leroy Valentin Fernandez, 25

Tevin Eugene Crosby, 25

Jonathan Antonio Camuy Vega, 24

Jean C. Nives Rodriguez, 27

Rodolfo Ayala-Ayala, 33

Brenda Lee Marquez McCool, 49

Yilmary Rodriguez Sulivan, 24

Christopher Andrew Leinonen, 32

Angel L. Candelario-Padro, 28

Frank Hernandez, 27

Paul Terrell Henry, 41

You will not be forgotten. 

werkloos spring 2016

werkloos mag's second issue, "in limbo"

I've got a piece published in the second issue of werkloos, an online journal. It's a flash fiction piece starting on page 17 called “Red Velvets”. Give it a look if you have a moment and a speck of interest, thanks! 

PS I adore hearing what people think, so feedback is uber welcome. 

(https://issuu.com/werkloosmag/docs/werkloos_spring_2016?e=22031949/36085278)

- c. essington

from here, the metal of the sink trips the bright of the afternoon into one blot of silver  just thick enough  to get dim on.

from here, sleep is below us like a manta ray is below the water. we feel wings, slick and cousined to a shark, slip across our eyes. we fall in and out of ourselves, hands very close to not touching. 

from here, I’ve caught the picture of your eyes closed across the pillow, brain still shadowed, leg twitching  on the rim of a dream. I woke up before you to find the world soft, to find a privacy, the bed dented lightly with the girl of it. 

        - c. essington

What are some of your favorite things about Kenyon?

- Class sizes: the largest class I’ve been in, as a freshman, was about 25 students. This is seriously such a big deal for me, it makes the class relations much easier and peer conversation much more possible. The professors know your name, recognize your participation, and are much more likely to empathize if you have a sick day/ need to take a mental health day.

- The people: Everyone is interesting in one way or another. I’ve gotten to meet a lot of people and gotten to know several of them in a fairly significant way. It’s a small school so running in to people you know is not hard to do. This is a bit of a personal preference, but I’d rather really know five people than know the names of fifty.

- Professors: So far I’ve had no TAs teaching courses and all my professors have held office hours that are accessible to me and or have been willing to schedule time outside of them to meet. The professors I’ve had are invested and interesting and encourage students to come to their hours just to discuss the subject they’re teaching. I had a friend go in to speak to a professor about multiple-worlds theory in literature just for kicks and he responded by giving her more resources and ideas. 

I hope that helps! All of this is of course purely based on my experiences so far and certainly does not reflect everyone’s opinion of the institution. But I love it!

Please feel free to send in any more college/ kenyon/ writing/ publishing questions! I have a lot of time today.

hey just really fast because tomorrow in america, things are occurring, this is a queer-positive, and in general, queer blog that’s safe and small and mostly words. you can send me asks, I can try to offer support as best I can, I’m always willing to attempt to direct people to resources and hotlines. I hope everyone can find safety and comfort, you’re beautiful. we will exist tomorrow and on other days and we’ll be breathing and laughing through the terms of other leaders to come.

feel free to reblog if desired.

best,

c. essingotn

sleeping on it

everything about it goes around like a good story which takes a new room on a new tongue every night. I wish I could do the same but I’m not so good at convincing people to give me their time or their teeth or their mornings. 

the idea is that you drop yourself and then recover on waking to find that it all hangs different on the shoulders, is less pink, more amaranth, less the leaves of a turnip flower, more the hollowed chest of a cloud after rain—

go to bed across it, maybe its sheets will muddle into a word, maybe the goose feathers will conspire into a cotton-mouthed dictation, saying ah yes, the breakthrough, the meaning, the good. 

or maybe it’s just the time and how it drags through the dark like the cold body of a fish dragging through a mile of river: just about breathing without meaning to and surviving without intending survival until the thing that almost ate you the night before has starved to death, lost its ribs, its music its importance. or it could be

that you forget after you go under and come up, that if it hurts, it will have a place where it  can stop hurting, and a REM cycle is just a good way to buck the hours  off your nerves, not that it’s particularly curative,  just that it knows how to drown minutes

out of their bodies and yours.

         - c. essington