In-house Interpretations

               Struggling and surviving are unfortunately common ways of living in today's world. So many of us only have hardly any or just enough resources to get by. It can feel overwhelming and quite challenging at times. But small gestures can go a long way, and in “An Orange Matters" by Chainka, it's the random act of kindness that makes all the difference in someone's life.

               Our speaker describes a girl who shared ‘a twin-sized mattress' with her mother; it's all they could seem to afford on her mom's waitress salary. On top of that, they couldn't stay in one place; “...they had to constantly pack their bags." (line 5) Always moving and uprooting one's life can make a person feel as if they don't belong anywhere. Nowhere feels like home to them. All they really had was each other; her father wasn't in the picture, which doesn't seem too concerning,…

Both Isabel Gan’s “Quadripartite Chronicle of Self Expression” and Mehreen Ahmed’s “Flamenco” show how art—whether music or dance—becomes a lifeline for personal and cultural identity. In Gan’s piece, playing the piano is about rediscovering the voice within. In Ahmed’s, flamenco dance is a fierce expression of a people’s long and painful history. Both works show that when spoken words fail, art steps in to say what must be said.

In “Quadripartite Chronicle of Self Expression,” the narrator’s journey with music starts in early childhood: “I was four when I fell in love for the first time.” This love is not for a person but for the piano — a simple wonder that once held every possibility. The narrator recalls pressing the keys “tentatively, hesitantly,” learning to understand each note’s meaning. Yet as the years pass, self-doubt creeps in. The piano stops “singing,” and the young musician turns away. Eventually, she…

(This essay was pulled from our Sep 2024 Artist Spotlight digimag)

Mia Soto’s short story "Why Did You Stay?" and her poem "Troubled Eye" both explore the emotional and physical toll of unresolved trauma, focusing on characters who are trapped by their own pasts. In "Why Did You Stay?", Mammilyn reflects on her abusive marriage to Jim, struggling with the conflict between her love for him and the pain he caused her. She admits to her daughter, “I loved him and I still do” (p. 15), even after his death. Despite the years of abuse, Mammilyn remains tethered to him, illustrating how trauma often binds us to the very things that cause harm. As Soto mentions in her interview, “Survivors of abuse are often blamed...but as time proceeded, I’ve learned not to” (p. 24). This insight deepens Mammilyn’s complexity, showing that her inability to let go is not about weakness,…

Life is a repetitious cycle, spinning from one generation to the next. In A.R. Tivadar's "Mother-Daughter Duties," we explore the relationships, patterns, and financial challenges of not just a family but of the strong women who take charge of running it.

Early on in Tivadar's poem, we're introduced to a speaker who heeds her mother's advice. She describes that her mother is encouraging and proud of her achievements in graduating from a university but, "She tells me none of that matters / So long as I have a job and a salary" (Lines 5-6) Right away, we can gather that while receiving a higher education is important to her mother, the ability to make a living and afford life's day-to-day essentials is just as significant if not moreso. Considering that so many graduates often find themselves buried neck-deep in student loans and debts straight out of college wit…