Yellow Arrow Journal, Renascence: Vol. VI, No. 1, Spring 2021

By Yellow Arrow Publishing

Yellow Arrow Journal is a biannual literary journal of creative nonfiction and poetry by writers that identify as women. The theme for this issue is Renascence.

Featuring: Charlotte Akello, Raga Ayyagari, Adrienne Christian, Elizabeth Cohen, Ruth Dickey, Joanne Durham, Wendy Garnier, Christine C. Hsu, Tricia Knoll, Kai Leung, K

• Language: English
• Publisher: Yellow Arrow Publishing
• Release date: May 20, 2021
• ISBN: 9781087967080

Book preview

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Yellow Arrow

Vol. VI, No. 1

Spring 2021

Renascence

Yellow Arrow Journal

Creative nonfiction, poetry, book reviews, and cover art by writers/

artists that identify as women

Vol. VI, No. 1

Spring 2021

Renascence

Editor-in-Chief

Kapua Iao

Guest Editor

Taína

Poetry Editor

Ann Quinn

CNF Managing Editor

Brenna Ebner

Editorial Associates

Bailey Drumm, Kierstin Kessler, and Siobhan McKenna

Contributors

Charlotte Akello, Raga Ayyagari, Adrienne Christian, Elizabeth Cohen, Ruth Dickey, Joanne Durham, Wendy Garnier, Christine C. Hsu, Tricia Knoll, Kai Leung, Kim Berrios Lin, Chelsea Locke, Alison Akiko McBain, Michelle M. Mead, Gargi Mehra, Leah Myers, Jordan Nishkian, Melissa Nunez, Kathy Z. Price, Ellie Renae, Jennifer N. Shannon, Kaili Y. Turner, and Allison Whittenberg

Cover Art

Kalichi Lamar

PO Box 102, Glen Arm, MD 21057

[e-mail]

Yellow Arrow Journal - Renascence

Copyright © 2021 by Yellow Arrow Publishing

All rights reserved.

ISBN (paperback): 978-1-7350230-5-2

ISSN (print): 2688-3015

ISSN (online): 2688-3023

Cover art by Kalichi Lamar. Cover design by Alexa Laharty.

Interior design by Yellow Arrow Publishing.

For more information, see yellowarrowpublishing.com.

We prioritize the unique voice and

style of each of our authors.

Every writer has a story to tell and

every story is worth telling.

Yellow Arrow Publishing

~ Black ~

learn about your own culture as much as possible

The Black Voice

Allison Whittenberg

Beyond technique, it’s feeling

Low, warm, rich

Deep in the larynx

Has to do with the nasal cavity

Full of pain or rage or myth or something

Moon hits the trees like the twinkling of lights

in Old New Orleans

Nostalgic and comforting

Good for spirituals, but

In need of refined European training

Table of Contents

The Black Voice

Allison Whittenberg

Introduction

Taína

Flow like nectar

Raga Ayyagari

Papa’s Aftershave

Jordan Nishkian

Chinese Spoons

Ellie Renae

Mother Tongues of Confusion, Shame, and Love

Christine C. Hsu

Lincoln

Adrienne Christian

the harbour

Kai Leung

Brick Lane

Wendy Garnier

Beyond fiddleheads and flowers

Ruth Dickey

A Writer Who Can’t Read

Leah Myers

Askew

Michelle M. Mead

Random Selection

Tricia Knoll

I am We

Kim Berrios Lin

We Smile

Jennifer N. Shannon

For Keeps

Kathy Z. Price

The Cost of a Dime

Alison Akiko McBain

Immigrant

Charlotte Akello

Remember How We Fought

Chelsea Locke

Whiteness

Elizabeth Cohen

What is Mine

Melissa Nunez

BABY!

Joanne Durham

Striking the Right Notes

Gargi Mehra

Amerikkka the Beautiful

Kaili Y. Turner

On the Cover: Nature Springs From Her

Kalichi Lamar

Contributors

~ Higuayagua Taíno from Borikén ~

the Taínos are still here

Dear Readers,

I am a fervent worshipper of paper and ink. The written word, in all of its forms, has held me spellbound by its transcendent powers for as long as I can remember. Writing holds the power of naming, influencing public consciousness, exposing truth, and controlling historical narratives.

My story doesn’t start in 1492, but that’s the first time the Taíno people appear, scribbled into the journals of Bartolomé de las Casas, the Spanish priest on Christopher Columbus’ expeditions. In the history books of my late 1980s elementary school, they were referred to simply as indians because the colonizers thought they were in India. My ancestors etched declarations of their existence in stone on the walls of the caves on Isla Mona which survived through time as evidence that the Taíno people inhabited The Greater Antilles since the 12th century, but without the power of the written word, they wouldn’t enter the historical narrative for 300 years. This display is almost as impressive as the strokes of the quill that declared them extinct within the same span of time.

This pales in comparison to the fact that the period of horror, extermination, and attempted genocide of my people and a host of other indigenous peoples (extending in any cardinal direction away from Europe) is known as a renaissance throughout the Western world. An era so romanticized you can find a multitude of faires across the country unironically celebrating Elizabethan fashion and Shakespeare, speaking in Olde English, and vending various types of food on a stick with little mention of the atrocities that simultaneously took place across the sea. An erasure of indigenous people through paper and ink.

In the correct hand, however, paper and ink are tools of resistance. Of rebellion. Like my ancestor etching petroglyphs on the caves of Isla Mona, it is daring to make permanent a fleeting existence. The fuel which has ignited revolutions and birthed nations. In the hands of the silenced, paper and ink is a re-claimation. A renascence. It is ours.

There is no denying we find ourselves in another period of awakening, not terribly different from what the European Renaissance advertises itself to be: the end of plague, famine, and ignorance. Today, as