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Clarity in Uncertain Times

Where We Stand as a Canadian and International Magazine

Edmonton, April 14, 2025: In light of the ongoing social and political challenges in the world, SeaGlass Literary reaffirms its core values and unwavering commitment to justice, inclusion, and human rights. As a platform dedicated to amplifying diverse voices and fostering meaningful dialogue, we believe literature is inherently political, and we stand firm in our responsibility to advocate for positive change.

We are proudly Canadian-born and owned and hold steadfast to our values.

We stand for equity, inclusion, and dignity for all people. We affirm the right to love and exist freely, regardless of sexual orientation, gender identity, race, or ethnicity. We believe in a world that is accessible for all. We advocate for bodily autonomy and gender equality. We uplift marginalized voices and reject all forms of discrimination. We actively promote diverse perspectives in literature. We support religious freedom, self-determination, and humanitarian causes. 

Our hearts go out to those in Palestine, Ukraine, and the rest of the world who are suffering in unjust conditions due to the egregious actions of oppressing nations. We recognize migration as a human right and believe that people cannot be illegal. We are against all forms of genocide and neo-nazism. We believe violence is never the answer and should never be used by a government for fear mongering.

We support facts, research, and public health initiatives. We believe in the power of knowledge and books and support everyone’s freedom to learn and read. 

We support the separation of church and state and religious freedom; belief and non-belief should never be weaponized against others. Empathy and ethics are at the core of what we do and hope to spread compassion and humanity throughout the world. Finally, we believe in the sovereignty of nations, which includes Canada, Greenland, Palestine, and the Ukraine as they are not for sale or taking.

We believe that writing is inherently political, and for many of our volunteers, authors, and readers, their very existence has become politicized. We refuse to be silent or neutral in times of injustice. Our commitment to advocacy, unity, and truth will never waver.

SeaGlass Literary will never be pressured into sacrificing the morals and ethics we have upheld since day one. We remain a space for open discourse, community building, and transformative storytelling—because literature is not just about escapism; it is a force for awareness, empathy, and action.

For more information, interviews, or inquiries, please contact: Makayla Anderson at pr@seaglasslit.org

This message has been approved by the board of SeaGlass Literary for public distribution. No contents of this letter may be changed or altered in nature. To view the full and original document, please use the button below.

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As the Silence Spoke

Written by María Juliana Ramírez Cabal

The moon hangs between us,
a pale wound that neither will name.
You stand with your hands behind your back,
as the night holds its breath.

Once, we spoke to fill the silence.?
Now, silence speaks for us;
gentler, but crueler.
Because it knows what we’ve become.

Two men, two ghosts, two aching shapes.

The moon does not pity us.
It only reminds me of your eyes,
And how they used to meet mine.
But now that distance has become our language:
One I try to speak.
But every word tastes like winter.
And the cold’s already at my feet.

You shift your weight
as if the ground itself were breaking.
So we stand there,
pretending the moon is enough;
pretending that wonder
can replace what we lost.

For a moment,
it almost does.

On Being 21

Written by Subhashree Pattnaik

Once, I was seventeen and young at heart, thinking that I would be young forever. But two years from now, I will be twenty-three and I always think of the feeling that lingers every now and then. I will never be young like that again, even though my youth – half wild and unregretful –  is not much aged. But I was seventeen once and invincible. I think now that when they say you can be eternally young at heart, they construct a collective myth.

That’s what I do: think a lot. My thoughts often dance along the terrible edge of adulting. Most of my independence is made up of this very process of thinking that keeps me stuck between the instant and extreme polarities of an adult life. Twenty-one is full of polarities. I know this because it is a shared experience among people of this age: you have just left your youth and the horror; a cloud of a long, consistent future floats in front of you. There is a contradictory urge to chase after it and then chase it away. They are both very different terms, you see. Impulses that reflect on the very polarity of the emotional experience. 

Modifying Shakespeare’s question – “To Be, or Not to Be”, I wish to ask “To Do or Not to Do”. From an exhausted heart and mind, I can truthfully say that my ability to do something is a dead lot of passion. A passion that once seemed possible to be effortlessly performed. I say I am passionate, but thing I have realized is that passion also requires an effort to keep oneself burning,p performing and doing what one wishes to do.

Doing something at this age, where I have free will and passion, does not come easy either. Am I lazy? Is it too difficult? No. The difficulty arises from the probability that something might go wrong. It is, in fact, too much to handle when you are just learning how to handle yourself in the first place. And am I too lazy to handle myself? Maybe. Sometimes. 

It is a subconscious fear that births itself as one’s teens fade away. Because when you turn twenty-one, you suddenly turn resentful and unable to forgive, not just others but also yourself. The harshest judgment is a result of your own mocking shadow and a questioning reflection. Their silent critiques just add on to the awkwardness of making mistakes at the grand age of twenty-one. At this age, you become more aware of the social conditioning that you had rebelled against all throughout your life. The past tense does not refer to the cessation of the subjective young force, but rather the fact that retaliation now comes in a different form. You retaliate against the very social forces that control you directly. You learn truths that undo your full understanding of a singular aspect. In the bustle of it, your innocence becomes used up and disappears

Sometimes, it becomes difficult to even make coffee, which was something that kept you going for a while back. Should I have this much coffee? Is this dependency an obstruction to the self;  a manipulation tactic and a romanticization of capitalistic consumption? Or is it a colonial habit I have inculcated through years of generational habituation? Or is it just coffee? Can I do it without coffee? But do what exactly? There is so much to do at this age, especially when I have just left the house of memories.

My parents are getting old and my family waits for me. At times,  conversations are full of love and other times, they are rather forceful moves so as not to appear distant and tired. There is a need to do something as soon as possible. Sitting idly is too much of a pressure when performance is more of a subjective than an objective demand. Some desires and yearnings dangle and dance. There are things yet to do, never finished, never on time. Being twenty-one is a state of emergency. To do or not to do? How to? When to? 

I was seventeen once and invincible. I wanted to be seventeen forever. Now, the hangover is gone.

Stuffed Duck On Trial

Written by alarminglytired

They sat me on the witness stand, 
a stitched-up beak, a cotton chest. 
A white duck held in trembling hand— 
the one on whom they blamed the mess. 

“You cracked the glass, you tore the thread, 
you watched the paintings lose their hue.” 
I blinked with eyes of black instead, 
too soft to fight, too small for truth. 

They said I ruined all they made, 
that I had danced through ash and flame. 
But I just lay there, gently frayed, 
a toy too still to earn the shame. 

They called me selfish, cold, untrue, 
a monster in a feathered skin. 
But I was made to comfort you— 
not wear the weight of all your sin. 

If this is what they want to hear,
then let them stitch the tale in tight.
Three years clean, but now I fear
they’d rather see me lose the fight.

If this is what they need to say—
that I’m the one who broke it all—
then let them throw my name away,
and watch me shrink, and watch me fall. 

I had a marvelous time, they claim,
committing crimes I never knew.
Now I’m the one who wears the shame—
a white duck, judged and blamed by you.

Hungry Ghost Part 3

Written by Holly Wilcox Routledge

T.W: Allusion to an animal injury and imagery of an animal injuring itself. Mentions of muscle and tissue.
You shouldn’t think I have this attitude because I hated working in hotels, or working with people. If I hated working with people (which, quite frankly, was just a way those who had a hatred of people outright attempted to disguise their true feelings) I would have chosen a field to go into that would keep me away from them as much as possible, and let me live a solitary existence. It’s an easy mistake to make. You’d be surprised how many people manage to convince themselves that their own reaction or discomfort with humans can be put aside to pursue something for the sake of money. I’d seen it in hotels, I’d seen it in cafes, I’d seen it in schools and hospitals and churches and homes; beyond all existence on the waking human world, I’d heard it, felt it in every dream, a visceral, bone-deep emotion that pulsated deep within, a wound that festered but was never given care, until it grew, open and rotten in the dark of night, letting me see what the sleeper wished they never could know. Or maybe, they did know; they just knew that they had to sit alongside it instead of revealing it. 

I went to hotel school after I graduated high school, a local one just forty-five minutes away from my parents home, which I could easily reach by bus and train. , It was the perfect location.  I didn’t need to worry about getting up too early and making a mad scramble to get a train that only came every so often, or run like hell once class was over to try and get on the last train of the day. I could, if I felt so inclined, go out to the pub near the school and enjoy drinks late into the night with my classmates and still be able to catch a train back home. If I brought my bicycle with me, I could bike—albeit, in a very wobbly line—to the bus station near my house. Some nights, I forwent public transport entirely and biked the full forty-five minutes back home. Sober, of course. I never bicycled whilst under the influence. I was sensible like that. 

The hotel school was relatively straightforward. We studied the basics of hospitality and hospitality management in a classroom environment for the first six months, before we started the hands-on part of the course. This involved working for a local hotel for twelve months, each of us being interspersed in one of four different departments before moving into the next after three months. It was supposed to give us a greater idea of the day-to-day goings-on  behind the scenes of a hotel as well as encouraging us to explore different options in the hospitality field. 

Maybe it was a nice way of tactfully telling those who wouldn’t make it to the back office that they and their talents deserved to be elsewhere; ‘Look, you don’t have the computer skills to go back of house, so you can kiss that dream away. But you’re much better working with people, so you should go into the restaurant side of the hotel, and you should get much more out of it there! What do you say we sign you up for all those restaurant courses once the year is up?’ 

There was an overall sense of illusion that most of our teachers wore when we reported to them during our time at the hotel, the kind of endless energy that came into trying to convince a bunch of teenagers that it would be oh so cool to become a restaurant manager instead of the high paying job they’d set their sights on. A kind of tight grin that they wore when we told them of our displeasure with the managers, supervisors and higher-ups in the hotel, who seemed far

more interested in making us squeeze money out of visiting guests than encouraging us to grow into the next generation of hoteliers. 

I was in my final year at the school, just two weeks shy of finishing off my studies, when it emerged that the teacher who ran the practical course was the adopted brother-in-law of the hotel owner. We were all paid for working in the hotel, of course, and had been constantly reassured that our work experience there would be well-paid for, since the hotel wasn’t going to risk officials getting involved and sniffing around; but, it seemed the teacher had been taking a nice little slice of our earnings in exchange for sending us to that hotel and that hotel only, starving any of the other hotels in the area of gaining any new workers, or possibly training reliable staff for themselves. 

People went ballistic, of course. People felt they’d lost out on opportunities elsewhere, with different styles of hotel management, with different experiences. The teacher resigned out of shame. But by that point, I was too tired to care whether or not I could have had a different experience at another hotel. I had wanted to snap and bite at anyone who came near, tell them to scram and leave me alone, so I didn’t raise too much of a fuss. I was already planning on leaving that town as fast as I possibly could and didn’t want anything that could possibly hold me back or draw the process out. I graduated, collected my diploma, and started to make my plans on which city I should move to to put my degree to use and start getting as much cash as I possibly could. 

That was what it was all about, at least. Around a month after the scandal broke, they held the career fair in the canteen of the school. Usually, it featured table after table of hotels looking for others to join their ranks, with maybe a few other administrative businesses there to tempt any stragglers who weren’t feeling so optimistic about a hotel career into switching careers—and four months earlier in the year. As it was, due to what had happened, the overall attitude towards the industry had changed and the administrative staff decided that it was probably a good idea to give more opportunities to the students. That year, they had stalls for business management and administrative work alongside the usual hotel stalls, which boasted all the staff benefits and perks of choosing them above anyone else. 

I’d patrolled the canteen, eyeing up the offerings, weighing it all out in my mind. I’d joined hotel school for the express purpose of getting out of town, with money only coming in close second in importance. But after what had been revealed, maybe it was time for a change of scenery. Maybe go into another industry that would get me out of here. It could be anywhere else in the country, operating out of a shack and involved doing nothing more than watching paint dry, but so long as it was anywhere else, it would do. The weeks leading up to the fair had been nothing but disaster after disaster whilst I worked non-stop, and the more I had to think about the future, the more my mind seemed to turn in on itself, chasing the same thoughts over and over again, until every second thought was that I had to leave. Like an animal that had gotten a leg caught in a trap, with the only option left for freedom gnawing the limb off, I contemplated how I was going to leave.

At that moment, looking at the options, I was struck by an agonising wave of the realisation that  my dream was just out of reach unless I managed to make the right choice. I had thought I had done that a year ago when I chose hotels, but the revelation of the scandal only made the jaws of the trap sink deeper into the tissue and muscles. If it had snapped clean through bone, I would have a way to leave, albeit, in shock and pain. I’d have to start all over again, but I would be able to leave. But what would prompt the jaws to snap shut? Or would I have to chew and chew, around flesh, spitting out blood and tissue, to find my freedom? 

The thought of going into business administration or any other admin role made me want to scream. So many of them were in towns adjacent to my own and the possibility of being sent back because I knew the area better was high. I knew nothing about management or administration skills outside of a hotel environment, either. If I couldn’t find something here, I had no other choice than to go  to a hotel within the town, or potentially nearby. 

As I thought about it more, under the woollen sleeves of my jumper, the scars that ran up my upper arms seemed to throb with each step. The plasters I’d hastily put on just two days prior were catching on the fabric every now and again and the constant tugs were only adding to the overwhelming thoughts that were chasing after each other. 

I tried to focus on what I was seeing in front of me,on anything other than the small flashes of pain that fizzed with every step I took—anything other than the memories of the night before last, running through the stone path in the dark, running into the depths of the night. 

“If anything”, a dark voice said snidely, “That should motivate you all the more to find a way out of here.”

Where to next? Where to next? What would get me out of here? Which one of you in this room was going to help me escape? 

I scoured over the pamphlets for a computer software company that seemed to be stressing they would teach us any particular skills regarding development, giving a small nod to the nervous looking representative standing behind the table, before moving to the next one. It was covered in brochures for hotelier training and pamphlets for wine tasting and other luxury skills. I looked up to see who the owner of the stall was and was surprised to see a foreign man in a fancy suit with a pin in the shape of two golden keys on his lapel. 

Funny. We didn’t often get foreigners here. I barely knew anyone who talked about wanting to go overseas. If he was surprised by my staring, he didn’t show it. 

Instead he had beamed and offered a polite greeting and an enquiry about what it is I was looking for. He spoke with only a small trace of an accent and when he spoke, he pulled up different pamphlets and went through all the benefits on them. I could barely pay attention to the benefits as I thought about the situation I was in over and over and over. Did I go to another post-graduate course? Did I go to a university and study something there? And where was I

going to get the money for that? Where was I going to find the money to afford a place, what job would I have to work to get that? I already had a certain amount saved up, but would that be enough? How much longer would I have to work here before I could finally get out? 

And all the while, the scars itched and throbbed. 

The man was saying that my hotel background seemed pretty solid and the work experience I must have accrued here at the school would make it easy for me to get into any other major hotel. Though, given what he’d heard about what happened, maybe I wasn’t feeling up for a career in hotels; but, if I did, hospitality offered the chance to go around the world and work in any place that would accept me. This included places where I didn’t have to worry about visas. It was, after all, how he had been able to work and travel.It had given him the opportunity to explore the world, even though he had had to learn two other languages to be able to do it. 

‘Are you good at languages?’ He had asked. 

‘I’m okay with them.’ I didn’t really know it at the time, but I would turn out to be quite adept at languages. Then again, you probably become adept when they’re your key to getting the hell out of somewhere. 

He nodded and ran his hand through his hair, which was pulled into a small blonde ponytail, the end perfectly curved, so whenever he turned his head, the overhead light in the gym made it gleam like freshly washed wheat. ‘You should continue on with hospitality, I think. Learning a language is a great way to stimulate your mind, and you learn even better when you’re on the job and having to think on your feet.’ 

‘Uh-huh.’ It sounded an awful lot like the kind of stuff the language department at my old school had tried to shove down our throats every year to encourage more people to pick up an extra language, but I was feeling generous. ‘How many languages do you know?’ 

‘Oh, about three, fluently.’ He grinned and his eyes squeezed so tightly that crows feet spread out from their edges, even though he couldn’t have been older than his mid-twenties. ‘But I pick up more here and there. I think it’s something that happens when you get involved in other cultures in hotels, you start picking bits up here and there to make sure that you can communicate with everyone.’ 

‘I see.’ I looked down at some of the pamphlets that covered the table, showing smiling hotel workers in fancy blazers pointing out things on computer screens to smiling customers. They were written in English, Mandarin and Japanese. I picked up one of the English language brochures. ‘Whereabouts are you from? I can hear you have an accent.’ 

‘Oh, I’m from Australia.’ He said, ‘But I’ve been in Japan for the last three years.’ ‘Where in Australia?’

‘I’m from a place called Brisbane, it’s on the East coast of the country. I came from a farm in rural Queensland, where my parents bred sheep.’ 

That caught my attention. I looked up at him. ‘A farm?’ 

‘Yep.’ He grinned. ‘Kind of like the ones you guys have out here.’ 

‘Did you leave Australia three years ago?’ 

‘No, I was in England before that, and I spent some time in Canada as well before I decided to come here. I’ve always liked Japan and Japanese culture though, so I knew I always wanted to live here. It took me about a year and a half to learn the basics of Japanese and get my writing up to speed, but wanting to be here gave me encouragement.’ 

My heart was beginning to race. England. Canada. Australia. They were so far away from here I couldn’t even imagine how long the journey would take. My hands were beginning to tremble. The scar began to throb. ‘What was it about Japan that made you want to come here?” 

How could you want to be here? How could you possibly want to live in this town? How could this world here be anything close to how wonderful the rest of the world could be? 

‘Well, I always wanted to climb Mount Fuji,’ he said, ‘And I’ve always loved Japanese food, but if I’m being honest, I think I just wanted something different, a different type of living, in a totally different country, if that makes any sense. I always just wanted to live anywhere other than home.’ 

It didn’t really matter why he wanted to come to Japan. I didn’t really give a shit about what he loved about it so much. He could have told me he loved Gundam, or Japanese literature, or geisha, or skiing. All I could focus on was that he wanted the same thing I wanted, and here he was; in the position I always wanted to be in. 

I could feel the jaws of the trap beginning to winch close. I didn’t need to chew any further. I could hear the machinations of it all beginning to slip into place. I had spent so much time in hotel school, through the industry, it would be a waste to go elsewhere, start over again from scratch when I could plow ahead with what I knew and take a risk to go abroad. 

‘Tell me how you did it.’ I said. ‘Tell me how I can do the same.’

hurricane haiku

Written by Zoe Younessian

i. rememberance

sky lurching closer
bleeds wine-dark sheets of rain 
impenetrable

ii. meadow’s gift

death floats to doorstep:
wind-nipped snow lily, bare now, 
indistinct from grass

iii. reborn

last spring’s river comes
brown-swollen, licks banks unthirsty,  
here, stick teeth and all

Step in Time and Watch the Mary Poppins UK and Ireland Tour

Written by Gabrielle Wilkinson

Braving the autumn and winter winds, Mary Poppins continues her flight into various theatres around the United Kingdom on her UK and Ireland Tour, which will come to an end on the 31st January. 

Starring Stefanie Jones as the marvellous Mary Poppins and Jack Chambers as the lovable Bert, the musical follows the arrival of everybody’s favourite unconventional nanny to 17 Cherry Tree Lane, the home of the Banks Family. Mary Poppins turns their world upside down with her magical mischief, accompanied by her dear friend Bert, in this enthralling spin on the classic story by P.L. Travers. 

Carrying on the legacy established by Julie Andrews and Dick Van Dyke in the globally adored Disney film is an immense pressure to live up to, yet Jones and Chambers deliver with ease. Jones embodies Mary Poppins through her strict but kind persona with every step calculated to perfection. Chambers is the epitome of Bert, a gentleman with an infectious and cheerful outlook on life. Featuring a mix of hits from Richard and Robert Sherman including ‘Feed the Birds’, ‘Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious’ and ‘Step in Time’, as well as new songs by the Olivier Award-winning George Stiles and Anthony Drewe, it is not hard to see why the musical is a smashing success.

‘Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious’ transports the audience from the gloomy streets of London to a picturesque park splashed with colour. A wide array of bright flowers and dazzling dresses lights up the stage, creating a truly enchanting atmosphere. Sipping tea and scrumptious cake, Mary and Bert engage in a charming conversation, before a glowing dance routine with the Banks children gets the audience clapping along to the hit tune. 

A London night sky illuminated with stars is the perfect setting to introduce the energetic ‘Step in Time’. With a haunting chorus of chimney sweeps, Jack Chambers shows off his tap-dancing talent before climbing up the stage and dancing upside down! Patti Boulaye also lives up to her reputation as a West End Legend as she breathes life into the beloved character of The Bird Lady. The soft melody of ‘Feed the Birds’ slows the chaotic fun of the show down to deliver a calming melody that teases with your heartstrings. 

Ending with the Banks Family flying a kite together, Mary Poppins’ job is complete and she flies through the crowd in a moment that can only be described as pure magic. 

After an entrancing experience, viewers can extend the joy and fly over to the merch table that is spoiling audiences with its selection. Whether it’s a replica umbrella, a makeup bag, a magnet, or your very own Mary Poppins teddy bear to remember the day by, there is something for everybody!

Tickets start from £20, and you do not need stall seats to have a practically perfect view. To book tickets, visit https://marypoppins.co.uk/. 

What are you waiting for? Spit spot!

The Woman In Her 20

Written by Tia

26 years ago, on that fateful day of July

someone I come from, 

turned 20.

A woman with burning ambition, vigour, and youth

With a mind of her own

and  dreams

and her views of the world.

Her wants and desires were kept inside her heart, shielded away from the noises of the world.

Someday she waited, someday she hoped 

that she would fulfil her dreams

with her knight in shining armour.

But didn’t the wise sages say,

those knights in shining armour 

only reside in fiction.

The real world does not have any.

She was young, hopeful, naïve

And wanted to escape her prison called family.

So, she took the hand of the first man

who gave her the promise of another life.

Another life….

That life was oceans away,

far away from everything she had ever known.

But she took it

in her young vigour, zeal, excitement

and in the hopeful promise of a blossoming love

She took that chance of another life.

The day came, the wedding day.

and she was there gladly, stepping 

into that another world.

She took along her vigour, her passions, her dreams and desires

into that another life

with no guarantee or promise of her sustenance

from the people in her ‘new life’.

Those people…oh my word, them.

They were strict critics of anyone new.

With long noses and small minds,

the tongue was their weapon.

And my oh my,

they attempted to slash this woman

left, right and centre.

Gnawing at her dignity, her name, her self.

But she hoped for the arrival

of the one

of him

the man she married

who she believed

To be her knight in shining armour.

But henever responded,

to the slashes thrown at her.

Nor did he ever

defend nor stand in her name

in respect for another human,

for his woman.

She fought and fought

while he hid himself comfortably

in his cowardice, that bore so much strength

deep within his chromosomes.

You soon see that

as the years pass, 

he becomes the very culmination

of all the monsters

she encountered

at the beginning of her ‘another’ life.

But to expect her to bow,

to expect her to fight,

to stay kind

is too much of an expectation to keep.

When one is hurt, 

one becomes 

a mighty weapon that can harmt.

A weapon made with blunt force.

The pain that it bore

turned her into a knife

with real sharp edges.

And that brought

all of her demons to the front row.

So, when this woman

saw anyone

who resembled her,

another girl, another woman

of her kind

she unleashed her knives on this new soul

in her desperate struggle to quieten this little heart down.

Because she now believes

that her and anyone like her, 

is the problem.

She bled as the devil, and she made anyone bleed

who wanted to hold her with love.

She made bleed all the tiny little innocent souls,

searching for the sunlight and the warm summer breeze

of knowledge and kindness.

She became the captor and captured all these little hearts

under the single chained word of obedience. 

She churned agreement and unquestioned loyalty

and stripped off humanity and respect from all the souls she touched.

Her deed was to nurture

but she destroyed.

Because all those times when she needed nurturing

when she needed to be held

when she needed her innocent soul to be loved,

there was not one kindred spirit

who gave her the love she deserved.

So, she captured and unleashed her demons

onto anyone whom she believed resembled her.

What did she resemble, you may ask

Femininity, Girlhood,

a person with innocence, 

who once had vibrant dreams and aspirations.

Her humanity was simple, 

but her edges were made 

to be raw and undusted.

She fought and she killed.

She hurt herself and others.

She loved, and she didn’t.

She rose and she fell.

Entangled in the nerve endings of small minds

attempting to fit amongst them to ‘belong’.

But she entangled harder amidst their tongues

and turned her own into a deadly weapon.

That killed more.

Including the soul penning these words down…

As days passed on in a monotony,

her dignity was stripped away

in the name of love, in the name of home, in the name of culture.

By the painful phenomenon of Patriarchy.

As the demons she fought grew larger around her,

so did her own demons.

They engulfed any sense of humanity 

that remained in her mind, heart and soul

And she grew to become hoarser

crueller, unkinder, 

but most importantly

unloved.

She remains to be the woman

who still somewhere

seeks out  love, seeks out  someone 

to hold her,

to love her,

to see her as human.

Someone who could be the knight of her heart

Of her spirit.

But I wish

she had realised that she is

the knight of her own heart and spirit. 

It has been  26 years since..

And today,

I stand as the woman

who turns 20.

What will be my fate?

That of the woman I spoke of

Or, something else?

Will I break the chains of perpetual patriarchy?

Or will I too,

get stuck in the centre of this cyclone…

Will I be victorious,

26 years from now?

Will my spirit be as alive as I want it

26 years from now?

Or would I too, be stripped away 

of my dignity

of my voice

of myself

Would I be free from the chains of generational trauma?

Or 26 years from now

will I be

the very Demon,

I never wanted to be.

I am an Autumn

Written by Gabrielle Wilkinson


Gilmore Girls is a comedy-drama series by Amy Sherman-Palladino. The series follows single mother Lorelai and her teenage daughter Rory as they navigate the trials and tribulations of their lives and their seemingly perfect relationship. Set in the charming fictional town of Stars Hollow, the show ran for 7 successful seasons (2000-2007) and became one of the most streamed shows after its addition to Netflix in 2014. 

Rory specifically encapsulates the spirit of autumn through her sweet and often naive nature. More than 10 years since its finale, Rory has become a social media trend-setter with floods of reels dedicated to students channeling her work ethic in the back-to-school season. She was a walking Pinterest Board before anyone ever strung that sentence together. 

‘How can a person know everything at 18 but nothing at 22?’ If there was one song to describe the difference between the earlier and later seasons, ‘Nothing New’ by Taylor Swift would take the crown; this represents a shift from Debut Taylor, light and innocent, to Red, where complications of adult life are prominent themes. You can find autumn in every season of Gilmore Girls, but one of the reasons people obsess over the show in autumn is the cliche of the earlier seasons. Small town with a cosy dinner, picturesque houses and two best friends that happen to be mother and daughter? Yes please. 

So, picture this: it’s a crisp autumn evening and you want to transcend into another world. Maybe 21-year-old Rory and her realism is not for you tonight – what episodes should you watch? 

The Pilot – Season 1, Episode 1 

The beginning is a very good place to start. From the moment you click play, you will be greeted with a scenic backdrop of Stars Hollow, before following Lorelai to Luke’s Diner whilst ‘There She Goes’ by the La’s teases the background. It is the perfect autumn setting. Everything about it screams cosy, and you might feel some resentment that you are not walking those streets yourself. The first episode is also where Rory meets her first boyfriend, Dean. Very few people work through the series and remain Team Dean, but in the first episode he is simply introduced as the classic small-town boy love interest – their interactions practically burst with innocence. 

Rory’s Birthday Parties – Season 1, Episode 6 

‘I am an autumn’ is plastered over videos of leaves falling and cosy fall decor on Instagram and TikTok. Even if you have never watched Gilmore Girls, you will have likely heard the famous phrase from this episode. Following the festivities of Rory turning 16, two contrasting parties by her grandparents and mother take place. One is poised, polite and littered with classmates she does not know; the other is cake and feather boas, surrounded by the townsfolk who raised her. During the latter party, Rory hands her grandfather a trashy magazine, and he later declares he is an autumn after discovering his colour pallet in the magazine quiz. Cheap cake, a birthday in October and Rory’s grandfather reading a magazine? If that doesn’t sell it, nothing will. 

They Shoot Gilmores, Don’t They? – Season 3, Episode 7 

The iconic dance marathon. 50s hairdos and a challenge you will only find in a small town. Rory and Lorelai partake in a 24-hour danceathon, and viewers are treated to awe-inducing autumnal shots of the town, before trouble in paradise when Dean breaks up with Rory at the dance after bearing witness to her feelings towards another boy. Stars Hollow dressed with autumn colours, drama and dancing – grab the popcorn. 

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So, what are you waiting for ?! Go grab some ‘coffee coffee coffee’ as Lorelai would demand, and transcend into the world of Gilmore Girls.

Withering Dreams

Written by María Juliana Ramírez Cabal

The wind, a composer of symphonies 
And Trees, pale actors in a drifting scene
Freedom followed me, an epiphany
My companion, wise-not, chasing lost dreams

We laughed at fear, no Tartarus in sight
Earth’s solid embrace, providing a hand
Oh right is the night, no light-damaged flight
There was no given, no lover so grand
A breath-taking view, the empire of lights
A safe haven, a cloak to all the land

But even trees must wither, fade, and die
Hide from the ugly truth and never fly

Tearing down my shelter, innate neglect 
I come back to the world, full of regret

Hungry Ghost Part 2

Written by Holly Wilcox Routledge

It was thirty minutes to eleven by the time Lydia, my front office manager, told us that we could start printing out our paperwork and prepare for the end-of-shift handover. It was finally quiet; there had been something going on near Esplanade that had drawn most of our guests out of the hotel for the afternoon and early evening. It had been about six o’clock when the first trickle of people started to make their way into the lobby, some choosing to go to the elevators, others going to the bar where their voices could be heard, echoing amongst the marbled walls, slowly going up and up until eight, when it looked like the vast majority of the people we had in-house had returned. Laughter and chatter boomed from the hotel’s bar and restaurant, heels clicked against the floors, tinny slips of music and audio floated over from where someone forgot to turn the volume down, so that at one point, if anyone came over to the desk, we almost had to shout at them to make sure they could hear us. 

It wasn’t like we would ever actually shout at a guest, however. It was hotel policy not to, regardless of whether or not they deserved it. The hotel was a luxury hotel, located neatly in the Marina Bay Sands area, only a short walk away from the Merlion and the harbour, and connected well to public transport. As such, it held itself tightly to the corporate standards for a luxury property. We had to address a guest by their first name exactly three times during the check-in process—and never any less, unless you wanted corporate sending you a tersely worded message asking why you were unable to provide a loyal guest with the service fitting our establishment. All the girls on staff had to wear chiffon scarves, done in such a way that the logo of the hotel could be visible to the guests over our computers; and the boys had to wear plain black ties, with a metal tie-pin depicting the logo placed exactly above the fourth button of their shirt, and if the pin was too far up, or too far down, or slightly wonky, you would know about it quickly. 

The hotel had a healthy rotation of around one hundred to one hundred thirty people per night on average, though the number dipped or swelled during certain times of the year. During busy periods, like the grand prix, or whenever big artists came through, we could easily be fully booked out, night after night, and then still have a steady turnover rate, with barely any time to breathe and let things relax; though, then again, with our location, that was unlikely. The building was constantly busy, with people always present, whether they were staying in-house, attending one of our three restaurants or two bars, or having high tea in the lobby. Energy lingered long after people left—in the lobby’s marbled floors, the carpeted lounge with its plush sofas, amongst the long hall that made up the biggest of the restaurants—until even the moments of stillness carried their own weight. 

Now, at least, there were a few stragglers lounging around on the sofas, cocktail glasses and beer bottles on the tables in front of them, voices low, and the last few members of the cleaning staff were carefully going over the lobby and lounge, vacuums strapped to their backs as they patrolled the room. A trolley containing cleaning equipment and supplies hung near where the lounge carpet ended and the white marble of the lobby floor began, the large yellow bag that contained dirty linen and other fabric items bulging. Everyone was getting ready to hand the hotel over for the night.

I’d spotted a dream wandering down the foyer staircase at around nine o’clock, sliding between people as they made their way up and down, before slipping away up the walls toward the ceiling. No doubt if I stuck my head over the desk and looked up to the ceiling, I’d find it there, clinging to one of the fan blades. Normally, I wouldn’t be seeing any dreams at all, given most hotels had the usual blessings and prayers performed each year to ensure everything was kept in order, but lately, I’d started to see one or two. Not a cause for alarm, certainly, but not a good look for a hotel providing luxury service. 

Then again, it was August. Maybe it was just this time of year. 

Next to me, the printer huffed to life and began to whirr out a pile of paperwork. Jac was leaning against the desk with a pen, a pile of paperclips and a sheaf of papers, her pen tip tracing over details. I eyed up the empty, open-air desk of the lobby and cracked my neck, rubbing a palm against the juncture where my neck and shoulders met. 

Jac winced. ‘Aiyah. That was damn loud.’ 

‘Sorry, I haven’t been sleeping well lately.’ 

‘Ah. Sorry to hear.’ She turned to her computer, her face suddenly awash with blue. ‘Nightmares again?’ 

‘Yeah.’ It was easy to pass off the unease I had around this time of year as just dealing with nightmares every other night. Besides, I didn’t feel like blabbing about personal problems, ghostly or otherwise, to coworkers. ‘I think it must be something I eat before going to bed.’ 

She kissed her teeth and shook her head. ‘You shouldn’t eat anything before bed. Eat in the morning.’ 

‘I’ll see.’ I pulled up my account on the hotel’s operating software and clicked through to my reports for the shift. There hadn’t been many rebates or refunds issued that day, thankfully. At least the night team wasn’t going to need a detailed list of things to correct overnight. 

Jac looked up and scanned the lobby. ‘Quiet. Finally.’ 

‘I know.’ 

‘At least it keeps us busy.’ 

‘Yeah, yeah. Do you know what was happening tonight?’ 

‘Eh. Something must be on at MBS.’ She looked back down to her screen. ‘Or people going to Gardens.’

‘People always go to the Gardens,’ I mumbled, and watched as the dozens of pages of my report popped up. I scrolled through. ‘Are you done with the printer?’ 

‘Yeah.’ She pulled out her paperwork and began sifting through it. ‘Go ahead.’ 

There was only one printer to be shared out at the front desk at the moment; there were two for the four computers we had stationed across the desk, but the second was down and it was taking forever to get IT to come in and organise it. 

I clicked through my report tab, opening up the correct links and editing the parameters to make sure I had all the information required to make sure the report matched up to my shift, selected print, and waited for the printer to whirr into action. There was already a small list of things I was going to have to go through with the night manager regarding guest experiences for the day, and I didn’t want to go any further than what I had to. The majority of the time, staying longer than I had to after my shift ended was a neutral feeling, bordering on irritating. I clocked in, did my work, and then left when my designated hours were up. But when it came to August, staying on longer only pissed me off, and every extended conversation I was forced to have with my coworkers only served to annoy me further until I was snapping my replies and practically gnashing my teeth to get out. 

As far as I was concerned, all I would be doing was delaying the inevitable. Why bother sticking around, trying to gossip and chat with people I would be seeing the next day and the rest of the week? There was nothing to be done on nights like these. It wasn’t like I did anything after work either—all I had to look forward to was dinner, maybe a drama, and then sleep. Over the years, I’d tried all sorts of tricks so that I could sleep through the nights without ever returning back to that place, but it never worked. There was zero point. 

It was never their fault, of course, and I knew, sulkily in the back of my head, that they had no idea what was going on. I knew they didn’t deserve how sharp I became with them, or how direct I was with what needed to change over the shifts to provide better service, but I didn’t feel particularly bad about it. It was better to keep coworkers at an arms length. 

There was the soft whisper of paper sliding on top of paper, before the machine whirring slowed, gave a last huff, and came to an end. I reached down to grab the reports before giving them a look-over. 

Jac said, ‘You doing anything after work?’ 

‘Nope.’ I eyeballed the negative postings. ‘I’m going home.’ 

‘Where do you live again?’ 

‘Near Chinatown.’

‘Ahhh. Expensive, issit?’ 

‘Yeah.’ I flipped through to the third-party payments. ‘Sometimes.’ 

‘Is that why you work all your hours?’ 

‘Sure,’ I said, only just paying attention to what she was saying. Her tone buzzed just beneath her words, but I couldn’t be bothered to try and investigate it. 

Jac tutted, but when she spoke, it sounded like she was smiling. ‘You must get a good paycheck for that.’ 

‘I do indeed.’ I stapled the report together and gave a quick look through the desk drawer.

‘Do you send it back home?’ 

‘Nah. I keep it all for myself.’ I shut the desk drawer and turned to go straight into the back office before Jac could ask me anything else. Or, rather, before she could ask me the inevitable question that always followed whenever it was implied that you sent pay back home. 

Prabhat was already leaning against the duty manager’s desk when I walked into the back office. He held a plastic bottle of coffee, nodding to something Lydia was saying as she stood in the doorway to her own office. The bottle was glistening with condensation, droplets running over the back of his hands, and he kept having to hold it with one hand so that he could dry the other on the knees of his work trousers. It was strange to see him this early, in uniform no less. 

Lydia caught sight of me with my paperwork and straightened up. ‘Paperwork?’ 

‘Yes, ma’am.’ I walked over to hand it to her before sitting down on the edge of the desk. 

‘Any rebates or negative postings?’ She asked as she flipped through the pages, pulling a pen out from behind her ear. 

‘None for today.’ 

‘Good job,’ she murmured, eyes darting across the page, her pen tip trailing behind. ‘It was busy this afternoon, you did well handling everything.’ 

‘Thank you. It’s going to be busy for the rest of the week, I think.’

‘Because of the school holidays?’ she asked, signing something at the bottom of one of the pages. 

‘Yes. I don’t think anything else will be going on this week beyond that. The next big concert is going to be happening in early September,’ I said. 

‘Do you know who?’ 

‘It’s a K-pop group. A girl band,’ Prabhat said, tossing the bottle between his hands. ‘My girlfriend wants to go.’ 

‘Huh, I see,’ Lydia said, sounding like she wasn’t paying any attention. She signed down at the bottom of the page she was looking at, then another, then flipped the final page over. ‘Alright. Done. Put this away for the night, team.’ 

The file organiser where we dropped our financial reports was nailed to the wall near the communications desk, just below the CCTV monitors, and was brimming with paperwork for everyone who had been on shift for the day. I could make out multiple third-party payment forms held together with paperclips, Lydia’s signature a ghostly scribble through the pages, and dropped my paperwork in. 

‘Hey.’ A tap came at my elbow, and a sheaf of papers wafted up out of the corner of my vision. ‘Can you put mine in there too?’ 

‘Okay,’ I said, without even looking at the voice’s owner, plucking the paperwork out of a hand and dropping it into the organiser. ‘No reversals today?’ 

‘No. The phone was ringing constantly this afternoon, I didn’t get the chance to go over any payments or requests like that.’ 

Prabhat groaned from behind us. ‘More work for me, huh?’ 

‘It’s only because Aiping likes you so much,’ I said dryly, looking down at Aiping’s flushed face, the ruffled, frizzy-looking hair. ‘She wants to make sure you have something to do on shift tonight, so that you won’t be so bored.’ 

Aiping ran a hand through her hair—probably for the nth time that night—and sighed, visibly deflating in her chair. ‘No, lah. It was too damn busy this shift. There were so many requests for room service.’ 

‘There’ll probably be even more overnight, then.’ I leaned back against the communications desk and looked up to the CCTV and the empty lobby that appeared, captured in electronic squares. ‘Have fun, Prabhat.’

‘Don’t remind me. What else is there for handover?’ 

I pulled out my phone and started to go through the list I’d made in my note-writing app. ‘We had several complaints regarding AC and fans in rooms, as well as phone connection issues. Everyone knows that maintenance has already left for the night and they’ll be coming in tomorrow morning at six, so make sure when Hasim comes in he knows there’s six rooms he has to see first.’ 

‘Which ones?’ 

‘I’ll give you a list, I have a few other rooms to give you as well, but they’re not for maintenance issues.’ I looked down at the notes. ‘We had last-minute requests for cots and rollaway beds for the next three nights for four different rooms, so if anyone makes any requests tomorrow morning and they’re on a new booking and don’t have anything down in the requests—’ 

‘Let them know it’s subject to availability.’ Prabhat nodded. ‘Anything else?’ 

‘Not from me. Aiping, if you have anything, let him know. I’m gonna ask Jac. 

Aiping nodded and turned, launching into a list of requests and issues she’d had on her end. 

Jac was half going over her paperwork, half eyeing up the lobby as I walked out onto the front desk. 

‘We’re doing handover. You got anything for Prabhat?’ 

‘No. Did you tell him about the cots?’ 

‘Yes.’ I eyed up her paperwork stash. ‘Don’t forget to drop your paperwork in the folder for night audit.’ 

‘Will do.’ She snapped up her collection. She seemed closed off compared to before, her actions quick. I couldn’t tell if my previous comment had hurt her that much, or if she was just in a rush to go home. 

Either way, I turned back into the back office, where Prabhat seemed to be anticipating my return, judging by the way his eyes sharply turned onto me the second I stepped in, even as he was facing Aiping. 

He gave me a nod and then turned to face me. ‘Evening, boss,’ he said, unscrewing the cap of the coffee. ‘You got the list of rooms?’

‘Oh, yeah. Sure. One sec.’ I picked a piece of scrap paper out from the printer and started writing the numbers down. ‘How is it outside?’

He took a sip. ‘Busy. How are you getting home?’ 

‘MRT.’ 

‘Wah lao eh, it’ll be damn busy there.’ He set the coffee on the DM desk and slid into the seat. ‘Where do you live again?’ 

‘Near Chinatown.’ I side-stepped Aiping, who suddenly got up to make her way towards the corridor that led towards the back-of-house stairs, phone in hand. She was probably going to call her boyfriend to pick her up. ‘My housemate works near there.’ 

‘She can’t drive you?’ 

‘She doesn’t have a car.’ 

‘Do you have a car?’ 

‘Nope.’ I dropped the room list in front of him. ‘And I can’t drive anyways.’ 

He shook his head again and kissed his teeth. ‘Kids these days.’

At least she was going to be out of the house. She worked nights, stuck to her own routine, with her own friends and goals and idealisations. Occasionally, we intersected on days off, but nothing more than a nod across the kitchen, or small talk about the weather. It was just the way I had wanted it to be for the last two years whilst I worked here in Singapore. 

‘Sure. Anything else you need from me?’ 

He picked up the rooming list and eyed it up. ‘If that’s all I don’t think so. You covered everything in the handover, didn’t you?’ 

Well, alright then. There was no point sticking around if I could go. They certainly weren’t going to give me anything else to do when I was due to clock out, and this place didn’t do overtime. Hell, it didn’t even do it by the hour. 

‘Awesome,’ I said, going to where my water bottle was tucked away near the boxes of pens, and snatched it up. ‘Have a good shift.’ 

I headed straight down to the back of house stairs, not even bothering to check if any of them were following after me. 

The night air was cool as I walked out of the staff entrance, tugging my rucksack over my shoulders. Surprisingly so—I had been expecting a brick wall of humidity the second I exited the air-conditioned premises. A few members of the kitchen team milled near the staff exit, smoking as the end-of-day procedures in the restaurant continued, the main lights of the restaurant flooding out over them and switching off one by one, until all you could see were dark figures flitting amongst the large windows like moths.