SWEETBRIARCOLLEGE 3 2449 0473214 7 Red Clay 2006 Spring "V i Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2010 with funding from Lyrasis Members and Sloan Foundation http://www.archive.org/details/redclay2006unse CoverArt by SarahAnsani, "Close pin" Red Clay Spring 2006 Editor-in-Chief Colleen Karaffa Managing Editor Kelsey Dellaporte Stajf Brandon Agnew Sarah Ansani Shavonne Clarke Kathryn Crittenden Angelica Guarino Ginny Lightfoot Julia Lockwood Amber Lubeck Laura Schaefer LauraTanner Julia Patt Celeste Wackenhut Art Editors Kerry Buxton KimWadelton FacultyAdvisor John Gregory Brown Publishedby the studentsofSweetBriarCollege inVirginia. Allworksremainthe propertyofthe author/artist. Copyright 2006. Printedby PIPPrinting. Lynchburg,Virginia. SpecialthankstoMiriamChoiforherpublication advice andtothefaculty members whousedtheircharismatic persuasiontohelpusgathersubmissions. TABLE OF CONTENTS Poetrv Jessica Baker Not a Place 1 Sarah Ansani One Last Time 8 Jessica Baker Japanese Beetles 19 Colleen Karaffa She Never Smells Like Rose 30 Brandon Agnew Letter to My Future Lover 38 Julia Patt Distance 40 Angelica Guarino Alive Again 41 Brandon Agnew Thoughts on Impending Death 54 Colleen Karaffa My Sister 80 Elizabeth Zuckerman The Thinker's Manifesto 94 Non-Fiction Miriam Choi A Tint ofYellow 20 Colleen Karaffa Coming Back 44 Katherine Beach Closing 64 Fiction Julia Patt Our Eulogy to the Grafitti Tree 10 Samantha Heckert Five Minutes 31 Ginny Lightfoot Wings 57 Julia Patt Insufficient Postage 82 Samantha Heckert Dem Bones 85 Ruth Mesfun Danausplexippus 91 Art, Sarah Ansani Indian Sunflower 18 Cara Cherry Untitled 37 Jadrienne Brown Graveyard 39 Karliana Sakas Closed 43 Angelica Guarino ItAll Goes So Quickly 56 Karliana Sakas Horse Park 63 Jessica Cornelison In the Eyes ofAngels 84 Lynnsey Kraus Untitled 90 Michelle Degnin StillLife 93 Jessica Baker Not a Place I live here, in dorm room 331, Where tigers and Chinese dragons Hang on the wall, facing a dreamcatcher Beside dried flowers that sit next to a Basil plant that keeps losing leaves Underneath a hammock - hung from the AC - That represents my hope ofone day Having a place to use it; Where my mini fridge hums at 4 am Until it wakes me up, alone, Without even a snoring roommate. I also live 3 hours north and a bit east, Where my once-blue room is now green, On the floor above the kitchen Where my smiling dog begs perpetually For food from my mother But runs barking when a child rings our doorbell and asks For my sister, who stole my place At the computer with the L-shaped desk. But neither ofthese places are my home. Home happens when Fm lying down On my friend's rug with a pillow, and I have A Fm book that not really reading because Fm listening to the sound ofher typing. Sarah Ansani One Last Time Nearly sixty, Buk is a simple man waking dry as gin at 2:36pm. He drinks flat beer as the sultry hips ofMarilyn Monroe curve beyond the edges ofthe frame on his wall. "She speaks to me," he says to the naked broad spread out like Jesus on his bed. "Am I more thanjust another stain on your bed?" the broad named Bonnie asks. Buk guesses a real man would blame the stains on love. Instead, he says, "No, no. You'rejust another babe full ofbeer." Somewhere a dusty piano displays the framed photo ofBonnie, as blond as fame, like Marilyn Monroe. Bonnie is envious ofMarilyn Monroe. Closing her legs and mouth, she rises from bed like a heavyjazz. The piano's dazzling frame never creaked beneath the weight ofthis sensual woman who sang "Happy Birthday" to men full ofbeer. She puckers her lips, squints and says, "It's not woman but womb that man craves." Buk says, "No," to the scattered clothes, to Marilyn Monroe, who sighs and shifts on a wall the color ofbeer. "We crave voluptuous vices that lead us to beds ofblankets or dirt—it's the same for all men," Buk replies as he winks at the vixen crawling from her frame, legs first, followed by hips. Bonnie stares past the window frame. Sometimes there is nothing more that needs to be said. Bonnie thinks ofher husband, a respectable man hunched over stiffened piano keys, as Marilyn Monroe, 8