#utsq

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an ache that opens into you. like a mouth, or a room.

Caitlin Conlon, “/näˈstaljə, nəˈstaljə/” in Up the Staircase Quarterly #42.

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POETRY:

June Gehringer | "Jenny talks about massage.", "Riana Campground No. 34," and "The universe collapses" Fargo Tbakhi | "butterfly bullet" Emily Khilfeh | "Airport Poem" Wanda Deglane | "Lava Lamp" and "What is Not Lovely" Kai River Blevins | "All Animals are Trans" Quintin Collins | "The Difference Between Nigga and Nigger" and "Why I Just Say I'm From Chicago" Dorothy Chan | "At Ten, My Father Wins an Eating Contest" Michele Reese | "William Ellison" Tara E. Jay | "Major Depressive Disorder, Or" Shannon K. Winston | "When the Speech Therapist Told Me to Say the Letter 'S'..." and "Stories" Vivian Tsai | "Piano Lesson" Janelle Tan | "not just because it's almost cuffing season" and "Litany for the Living" ART:

Dania Strong Sofia Bachvarova Jing Lin Christina Heurig Marsha Solomon Jessica Cappelli

REVIEWS:

Heidi Lynn Staples | A***A* A* A Kristina Marie Darling | Fortress Emily Blair | We Are Birds Anne Elezabeth Pluto | Lubbock Electric

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Bless your tender                 fingers; a flood of want. Cheeks filled                 with bitter pith swallowed like fruit. Bless                 summer & spill its juice. The sheets we stain,                 we leave unwashed.

Duncan Slagle, “After, I Keep Everything that Reminds Me Of” in Up the Staircase Quarterly #41. 

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We could be two nervous creatures looking at each other. We could hold November between us like a bedsheet to be folded.

Anna Kelley, “Winter Hymn” from Up the Staircase Quarterly #39

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Happy Birthday to UtSQ!!!  

Celebrate with us by submitting your poetry, art, and photography to our 10th anniversary issue! 

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When the world throws us winter we become our garden beds, the hardiest blooms this earth has known. There has been enough war waged against us to fill a litany of herbicide: dioxin & steel-toed boots & locust swarms & trampled shoots, those who look at us like fuel for their own burning. & yet in all those days of degradation, no man has ever stood in the way of spring.

“Green Thumb” by Matilda Berke, Up the Staircase Quarterly #38

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Featured Interview: E.J. Koh

Poetry:

Kristin Chang | 2 poems: Churching and Blowjob Alaina Pepin | Loup County, Nebraska Brian Czyzyk | Hoarfrost Kimberly L. Becker | Ceremony in lieu of a Funeral Hali F. Sofala-Jones  | The Peep Show Sarah Feng | teaching my brother how to fin a fish: elegy to my home Daniel Jenkins | The Spreading Avens Anna Kelley | Winter Hymn Tyler Friend | In a minivan Mingpei Li | 2 poems: Finally and I Learned About Summer Camp from Reading Books Amanda Gaines | Talking to my Sister Elspeth Jensen | Pressed Rooms Parisa Thepmankorn: 2 poems: Body Drought and I promise I have never known a body

Art:

Yulia Terebunskaya | 4 paintings Jay Waters | photographs from the series Later than After Barbara Martin | 5 paintings Jasmin Bauer | 6 paintings ​Roz MacLean | illustrations from the series All Together Now

Submit to our 10 Year Anniversary Issue. Deadline December 31st.

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I was in middle school the first time I read Langston Hughes and I have this specific memory of being like 'Holy shit, poetry is so much more than I thought it could be'. Even more important than that, though, was how it made me realize that art is always political, always emerging from conditions it exists within—and I knew then that my investment in justice and liberation and my interest in literature could not be separated.

Joshua Jennifer Espinoza, Up the Staircase Quarterly #36