Map Literary: A Journal of Contemporary Writing and Art
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  • Fiction
    • Rebecca Hannigan, "Little"
    • Rebecca Pyle, "Winter Solstice"
    • Martin Rutley, "Job Offer on Seventh Heaven"
    • Matthew Baker, "Superhighway"
    • Arkor Kolubah, "A Touch of Comfort"
    • Matthew Serback, "How to Make a Boulder"
    • Pavle Radonic, "The Laboratory"
    • Halsted M. Bernard, "Your Hands"
    • Justin Meckes, "The Gash"
    • Reb Livingston, from "Bombyonder"
    • Craig Foltz, "Without Stigma"
    • On Experimental Fiction
  • Nonfiction
    • Elena Botts, "Ode to Oceans"
    • Scott Wordsman reviews Petter Lindgren
    • Alexander Clark, "Postdiluvian"
    • Diane Payne, "3 micro memoirs"
    • Luc Sante, "Flesh and Bone"
    • Isobel O'Hare, "Failure: A Love Letter"
    • Melissa Wiley, "Barbed Wire Fence"
    • Ashley Wilkinson, "fractional distillation"
    • Lori Hawks, "The Fix"
  • Art
    • Keith Moul
    • Annabelle Schafer
    • Robin Schwartz
    • Billy Cancel
    • Bill Kotsatos
    • The Scientist
    • Tim J. Myers
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    • Jean Wolff
    • Matthew Rose
    • Jacob Spriggs
    • Koji Nagai
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    • Limor Sadot
    • Ark Codex
    • Dahlia Elsayed
    • Yuji Hiratsuka, "Beet Meets Meat"
    • Fabio Sassi, "Rusted Link"
    • Kasey Ramirez, "Edifice"
  • Archives
    • 2017 >
      • Fiction 2017 >
        • Kathryn Holzman, "Eating Meat"
        • Kaitlyn Burd, "Nature with You in It"
        • Katie Young Foster, "Promotion"
        • William Cordeiro, "Selections from Whispering Gallery"
        • Alexandra Renwick, "The Life of an Artifact in Duodecadal Glances"
        • Lizzi Wolf, "My Brother's Therapist"
      • Poetry 2017 >
        • Douglas Piccinnini
        • Matthew McBride
        • Jim Daniels
        • Sally Ashton
        • Raymond Farr
      • Nonfiction 2017 >
        • Charlie Moses, "Dear Friend"
        • Pamela Woolford, "This Is What Happened"
        • Jennifer Martelli, "Phobiacompendia"
    • 2016 >
      • Fiction 2016 >
        • Loie Merritt, "The Edge of the Sea is a Strange and Beautiful Place"
        • Mitchell Grabois, "i"
        • Kelle Groom, "25 Reasons to Attend the Gala"
        • Mike Shepley, "Killing Symbols"
        • Jody Azzouni, "Owning Things"
        • Dan Gutstein, "Like Airplanes and Stars"
        • Kate Imbach, "Diamondland"
      • Poetry 2016 >
        • Jeff Alessandrelli
        • Daniel Coudriet
        • Peter Leight
        • John Wells
        • Jenna Cardinale
        • Isabelle Shepherd
        • Michael Robins
        • Will Walker
        • Bridget Sprouls
        • Allan Johnston
        • Hugh Behm-Steinberg
        • Caroline Knox
        • David Dodd Lee
        • John Deming
        • David McLoghlin
    • 2015 >
      • Poetry 2015 >
        • Adam Clay
        • Kyle Hemmings
        • Matthew Henriksen
        • Megan Kaminski
        • Emily Kendal Frey
        • Noelle Kocot
        • Katy Lederer
        • John Lowther
        • Nathaniel Sverloff
        • Franz Werfel -- James Reidel
      • Fiction 2015 >
        • Erin Bedford, "Riesenrad"
        • James Braziel, "Jick's Chevrolet"
        • James Braziel, "Vittate"
        • Adrian Class, "Or Flights"
        • Erica L. Kaufman, "It Buried Us"
        • Nolan Liebert, "Gravity of Hearts"
        • Heather Noland, "Cosmic Slump"
        • Tom Whalen, "In the Cathedral"
      • Nonfiction 2015 >
        • Rebecca Cook, "What the Hammer Said When the Hammer Hit the Girl"
        • Margot Kelley, "Companion Species"
    • Fall 2014 >
      • Poetry Fall 2014 >
        • Stephanie Anderson
        • John Buckley and Martin Ott
        • Vanessa Couto Johnson
        • John Estes
        • Anne Gorrick
        • Henry Israeli
        • Keegan Lester
        • John Loughlin
        • Douglas Luman
        • Danielle Mitchell
        • Alexandria Peary
        • Marcus Slease
        • Georg Trakl / James Reidel
      • Fiction Fall 2014 >
        • Matt Rowan, "Dog's Best Friend"
        • Kelli Anne Noftle, "Before She Was Olive"
        • Chris Okum, "Ratatat"
        • Jon Fried, "Cashing In"
        • Lisa C. Taylor, "Visible Wounds"
        • Sarah Kahn, "Break"
        • Rebekah Morton, "Big Sis"
      • Nonfiction Fall 2014 >
        • Stephen Benz, "Night Then Morning: Elko, Nevada"
        • Joseph C. Jiuliani, "Of Stealing and of Being Stolen"
        • Lindsay Chudzik, "Jailface"
        • Robert D. Vivian, "Just After Rain"
    • Spring 2014 >
      • Poetry Spring 2014 >
        • Simeon Berry
        • Molly Brodak
        • Wyn Cooper
        • Brian Foley
        • Tim Kahl
        • Caroline Knox
        • Rob MacDonald
        • Benjamin Paloff
      • Fiction Spring 2014 >
        • Gareth David Anderson, "Cupcake"
        • Halsted M. Bernard, "Your Hands"
        • Patrick Cole, "Pick-up Lines"
        • Joshua Graber, "This Fine Experience"
        • Lola Grace, "Natural Birth"
        • Robert E. Tanner, "Non-Disclosure Disagreement"
      • Art Spring 2014
    • 2012 & 2013
  • Pedagogy
Picture
Shanna Compton

Rethinking Monster Island

But what will we do if affection
is discovered to be an untethered substance,
attaching at no point to thing
or person,
                a gauze or aura
or something we inhabit 
like a hoodie from H&M, hot yellow
and scored at a deep discount?

Tomorrow we may learn 
our varicolored states are nothing more
than commercials plotted to induce
our happiness, tinged with shame
for the sweetness in that contrast.

In acid green both cheery 
and a bit nauseating, alternating 
with intrepid stripes, here are my sullied edges, 
here I am being a woman 
amidst all this news.

I’m putting my hair up because I’m sick of this.

Lend me whatever you have left
that fits OK and is not too worn out?
Can you spare a claw, a tail, a fresh set
of rechargeable, satin-lined, swiveling ears?

Nobody offered me shots to sign this petition.





Picture
Shanna Compton’s books include Brink (2013), For Girls & Others (2007), Down Spooky (2005), Gamers (2004), and several chapbooks. A book-length speculative poem called The Seam is forthcoming next year. Poems have recently appeared in Poetry Daily, Verse Daily, Horse Less Review, Barrelhouse, and the Poem-A-Day/Poem Flow feature by the Academy of American Poets.


published by
The Department of English
College of Humanities & Social Sciences
The William Paterson University of New Jersey
Copyright  © 2012-2017 Map Literary
Map Literary

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