Magic: A Sole Collection

The fourth edition of our Collections series asks our staff writers to interpret the word “magic,” and all the memories, postulations, and emotions that come with it. From childhood wishes to peeling clementines to the process of illustration and design, our writers probe deep into their schema and produce exciting perspectives on the magical elements within our world. Porku - Maison Teixeira The small island of Brava goes completely dark every midnight, when the government shuts off all the island’s electricity—street lights, lamps, TVs and all. Ne walks home from work and checks his watch—it’s 11:57 PM. He starts to run, but doesn’t make it home before the lights go out on Brava. Luckily, the moonlight is just bright enough to see his path home. Ne keeps running, whizzing by the houses, trees, and bushes in his small, rural town. Then, out of the bushes bursts a PIG, fat enough to roast over a fire, followed by her six stumbling piglets. The mother pig hisses at Ne. He breaks into a sprint, then turns around to find the mother pig galloping behind him, her six piglets in tow. Ne tries to sprint faster, but the pigs always manage to catch up. Stopping to catch his breath at a tree, Ne has an idea. He grabs a branch from the tree and whips around to face his pursuers, striking them with his newfound weapon of choice. The pigs return to the woods, limping and whimpering. Ne 1, pigs 0. *** The sun shines over Brava. Ne walks the same path where his fateful standoff against the swines had taken place a few days prior. On the path is a lady who is followed by her six children. The lady has a sling on her arm, and her kids limp behind her on crutches. “What happened to you?” Ne asks her. She glares at him angrily and walks away, her kids trembling in fear as they stare back at him. Clementines - Sia Han I’m really good at peeling clementines. By good, I mean I can peel one in under 10 seconds and all the way around so all you’re left with is one long, winding spiral of peel. How do I do it? Well, first, get a good grip: dig in your thumbnail and carve out a circle around the little green knob. Make sure it’s wide enough, ’cause if your starting point is too thin, it'll tear. And to be as efficient as possible, peel using the blunt side of your thumb at a 45° angle as you turn the clementine in the other hand. To let you in on a secret though, I didn’t peel my own clementines until I was 15. I hated the way strips of peel and pith would lodge themselves into the crevices beneath my nails, how the smell would stain the tips of my fingers and linger all day. So I always got my mom to do it for me. It was like magic, how with one touch she could tell how ripe a clementine was and how, if she thought it was too sour for my liking, she’d wordlessly put it aside to search through the bag for a better one. How her thumb always seemed to know exactly how deep to dig before piercing skin, her thumbnail reemerging slightly yellow, stained by pith. And how she’d roll it, peel-pith-patches and all, back in one, endless, graceful brush of the hand. I’d watch, fascinated and wary. She complains to me now that her nails have lost the pinkish tint and slight curvature of mine, now yellow, opaque, and flat. It’s like someone squeezed each nail so hard, the edges have lifted and the color has been wrung out like a wet towel. I think I could reach over and just peel one off. Today I peeled a clementine. The skin was very thick, but it was okay because I cut my nails last night. And it ended up breaking three-fourths of the way done, but it was okay because the second piece kinda looked like Brazil. I shared halves with my mom and a bit of juice dripped down my palm, which I licked off. It tasted sweet and bright and good. Habits - Desi Silverman-Joseph Magical thinking. That’s what I heard it’s called. The twelve times I must jump and touch the ceiling when I get ready in the morning. The need to throw my socks onto the bed without them bouncing off before I put them on. The fact that I must put on my left shoe before my right, wipe my butt with certain hands in a certain order, soap up my body from bottom to top in the shower (yes, I know it’s gross). The way I cannot fall asleep without first cracking my back—folding my left leg ninety degrees over the right before reversing this position. It’s the doom I feel if I were to abandon these rituals. The slope between routine and superstition is slick as ice. What starts as an arbitrary habit to make a task automatic or avoid a decision can cement into a terrifying rigidity of mind—into a need that feels as vital as drinking water. What would happen if I forsook the twelve jumps or the sock game? If I put my shoes on right to left, soaped my body top-down like a normal person, violated the rulebook for wiping my ass? Lord, spare me from finding out. The stitches which hold the world together would surely disintegrate, the dams would burst, my downfall would be all but ensured. So please, let me work my magic. Hat Trick - Ina Ma I operate in extremes. It’s unsettling, to sit down with the midday sun hanging high in the sky then blink and find her setting, leaving me behind in the dust because I squandered the afternoon doodling. On other days, I can’t bring myself to open my drawing program lest the sight of the white and gray user interface makes me physically nauseous. The ability to create is as supernatural as any magic. Art is my magic, with shaky/uneven lines and disproportionate anatomy, but my magic. If I am a magician, then digital art is my hocus pocus. Like pulling a rabbit out of a hat, this is a trick I’ve done a thousand times before as my fingers slip over the keyboard, stabilizing lines, gradients, and fill buckets. When the rabbit listens, my flesh does not bind me. The nerves between mind and body are severed, gnawed through, no longer sending the signals requesting sustenance or rest. Every function within my body is working in tandem, synced in stable equilibrium solely to create. Hours are carved out of my day, waking up at five or retiring past midnight, skipping meals and events, to satiate the smoldering desire. I am only brought back to my body when the mental barrier is no longer strong enough to withstand the barrage of physical pain: bleary sight, deep aching in my back, an ominous pain in my wrist that says “impending carpal tunnel.” But sometimes, the rabbit grabs you by the ears. After these bouts of obsessivity, it spurns the suggestion of illustration, thumping its foot in my stomach at any hint of creative effort. It is a motion sickness where the motion is the firing of neurons in my brain. I have a playlist of songs that I would play on loop for hours on end for forays into animation, songs that I do not allow myself to listen to casually, in case the rabbit’s ears catch wind and it comes for me with disparaging rage, twisting knots in my abdomen. At the end of the day, I lure the rabbit back, not with a personal desire to draw or looming deadlines, but with gentle touch and promise of carrots and rest. As much as it wishes it could, the rabbit does not exist without me. It cooperates, and the cycle begins anew. Magari - Luca Raffa I dreamt about a prior life, a life I would not have merely existed in--a life I would have instead lived. I would probably be a peasant picking pears or peaches all day in the orchards; the limoncello sun would pinch me alive with the ripeness of passion and pride, and I would suckle the sweetness of life like the flesh of a persimmon, though my shadow might be my only companion. Or I might be nu piscaturi alone in the water, my golden face rough against the salty winds. I would whistle a charming melody about the fish that could fly across the uncertain sea. I would be as certain as the sun. Then I met you. I woke up, and your eyes appeared like the shallow turquoise waters I saw in my dreams and your hair appeared as soft as those peaches glistening in that sun. You make me see fish flying in the deep blueness of the sky, make my passion turn sour and my pride become mouldy. You make me want to dance to your drunken melody and nourish this helpless feeling. You make me ask God: “what do you call this magic? Love or Foolishness?”. For it is as perfect as lemon blossoms in the springtime. I Believe in Magic - Juliet Corwin When I say I believe in magic I mean I believe in evolution. I believe in growing out of our pasts, that we do not know how to stay still, that we build ourselves along the way. When I say I believe in magic I mean I believe in hands. I believe in skin, that we can touch in a way that does not hurt, that palms can hold all of this life. When I say I believe in magic I mean I believe in dancing. I believe in moving with our heartbeats, that we all have a bit of rhythm aching in our chests. When I say I believe in magic I mean I believe in scars. I believe in healing our wounds, even quietly, that we can create shields out of air. When I say I believe in magic I mean I believe in the big bang. I believe we are explosions, that we are made of stardust, that there is a drop of sunshine in each of us. When I say I believe in magic I mean I believe in sweat. I believe in salt, that we all can glisten, that we can melt and glide and shine. When I say I believe in magic I mean I believe in neurons. I believe that we are electric, firing across synapses, that we create our own sparks. When I say I believe in magic I mean I believe in ladybugs. I believe in wishes, that we make them just in case, and who’s to say they don’t come true after we’ve forgotten them? When I say I believe in magic I mean I believe in wombs. I believe in cradling close, that nests can be made of scraps, that we all learn a way of coming home. Desert Magic - Annabelle Stableford “Avada Kedavra!” Snape yelled, lunging out from behind the sandstone boulder. His black cape swirled in the red dust. Lupin, Ginny, and Hermione froze. The sky was a special kind of blue over the orange cliffs; the sand stung in their nostrils and watered their eyes; they did not know which of them had died. “No—wait—you can’t say that, it’s unforgivable,” I said, dropping Hermione’s accent to make sure my brother Sam, playing Snape, got the message. “Fine, but I’m still evil right now, okay?” Sam said. We all agreed, then kicked our feet in the dry sand as we wondered how to recover from our break in character. “Let’s go to Gringotts,” said Ginny, played by our family friend Liza. “I have a deposit to make.” Lupin, played by Liza’s brother Misha, jumped in: “I’ve heard rumors of a security breach. Keep your guards up.” Hermione, Ginny, and Lupin brandished their desert sticks as they turned to the pock-marked boulders, perfect for stashing gold deposits in. “Wait—and then how ‘bout I’m waiting there to attack,” Sam said. “And then how ‘bout I turn into a werewolf because it’s a full moon,” Misha replied. “And then how ‘bout you chase me and I have to retreat.” We “and then how ‘bout-ed” our way to our favorite boulder with large cubby-holes indented in the rock, where we took our places. As Ginny, Hermione, and Lupin deposited gold, Snape jumped out from behind a rock and yelled, “stupify!” Hermione fell back against the boulder, Ginny cast “expelliarmus!”, then all hell broke loose. Wands exploded, capes billowed in the wind, the battle raged. Darkness soon fell on the land of magic. Our shoes filled with sand and debris from the twiggy brush and our throats ached for water, but Hermione, Ginny, Lupin, and Snape carried on, riveted with adrenaline. As Lupin began writhing in the emerging wash of moonlight, a group of climbers walked down the path, heavy bags of rope and gear shouldered on their backs. They stared at us—our Crocs, our scraped skin, the sticks we clutched to our chests, the way we swished at cloaks they could not see. We took no notice, purposefully ignoring the amused glances the climbers exchanged with each other. “Muggles,” Ginny whispered to Hermione with an eye roll. They would never understand.