Cagibi Literary Journal Issue 1

Cagibi literary journal Issue 1—welcome! Let this letter be your guide, or skip to the table of contents below.

It’s the Issue 1 of Cagibi we’ve hoped for and have been planning for years over dinners, cocktails, backgammon boards, and pool tables. Cagibi’s future is bright. Keep following, and reading. We plan to knock your socks off.

With great pleasure, we feature poetry from Matt Pasca and Terri Muuss, to whom we were introduced in 2017. Pasca and Muuss are a literary power couple based in New York, and together are writers, performers, teachers, and more—also, husband and wife, and parents. Their poems, here and elsewhere, are some of the fiercest and most vulnerable that we’ve ever seen.

Also featured: a story by Elena Georgiou, an excerpt from her forthcoming collection, The Immigrant’s Refrigerator. Georgiou, originally from London, is now based in Vermont and directs the MFA creative writing program at Goddard College. She’s the author of two previous books of poetry. As the author Aimee Lu writes, “Elena Georgiou’s exquisite collection could not be more timely. At a moment when America’s political response to The Other is triggering a national crisis of conscience, these poignant stories remind us of the vital role that human compassion plays in bridging ethnic, cultural, and socioeconomic divides.”

We couldn’t agree more. Compassion is more necessary than ever.

Many of our contributors happen to be born abroad or happen to live abroad from their country of origin. At times we found a piece from abroad to be edgier, more raw, or more challenging to grasp. We feel strongly that these voices are worth hearing. These voices and experiences accompany our own on this planet, our planet, blessed with so much and yet at risk and vulnerable like never before. The world is calling us. The world is calling on us. Are we hearing these voices?

Warmly,

The Editors.

Issue 1

January 2018

Stories

Burning Bridges, Breaking Hearts - by Kate McQuestion
Penned In - by Gail Wallace Bozzano
Lecture #2: Guests at the Hotel des Bains - by Seth Rogoff
Goodnight My Angel - by Y. Marcos
Eight Legs - by Riva Riley
Regrets @ 21 - by Jamie Stedmond
Subtle Foes - by Nedjelko Spaich

Book Excerpt

The Evolution of Beauty (book excerpt) - by Elena Georgiou, from her forthcoming story collection, The Immigrant’s Refrigerator

Essays

My Life with Fonts - by Klancy de Nevers
How I Am - by DW McKinney
Día de Los Gatos (a Bedtime Story) - by Marisol Cortez
My Redneck Umbra - by Jackson Lassiter

Poems

Four Poems by Terri Muuss - I Admit That While You Are Gone // Los Barrios // Poem Found in an Email from a Colleague // Flight To Albuquerque
Four Poems by Matt Pasca - In the Cemetery of Defense Mechanisms // Pedestal // Of Fish and Smoke // On Being (Reminded)
In Translation: Two Poems by Ximena Gómez - Last Day // Último día | Thursday // Jueves
Marco Polo, 1969 - by Lisa Fountain
Orison for the Dead at Deir ez-Zor - by Madison Semarjian
So, In the Beginning - by Carly T. Flynn
Classical Mechanics of Materialism - by Alexis Petri
Red Delicious Apple - by Juan Chemes
Poem For All That Is Wrong - by Rob Cook
Milan - by Amie Sharp
Wintry Liberation - by Suzanne Cottrell

Another Way Through the Cagibi

Not sure where to begin reading this issue? Here’s another way through the cagibi. Skip around, find your own reading path. Discover a work of prose or poetry you’d like to sink down into.