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Objet d’ArtMagazine of literature, arts, and culture

Spring 2014

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StaffEditor-in-Chief

Matt Tomasello

EditorsLisa Mathews

Justin RodriguezLucero Calleo

Sabrina RestivoNick Abraham

Table of Contents

Editor’s Note

Our small staff at Objet d’Art worked dilligently to assemble a magazine out of some of the best creative writing and artwork the Rutgers community has to offer. A big thanks to Lucero, Justin, Lisa, Sabrina, and Nick for all of the time and effort they put into making this, and to all the students who let us publish their work here. The submissions we received were poignant and thought-provoking, and it’s an honor to be able to include them in our magazine. And thank you for reading Objet. Maybe you’ll find a poem or a picture in here that you really like and that you’ll remember for a long time. Even if you don’t, just by picking it up you’ve helped us keep the arts alive here on campus.

Matt Tomasello

“Everyone should be able to do one card trick, tell two jokes, and recite three poems, in case they are ever trapped in an elevator.” – Lemony Snicket

Layout EditorLucero Calleo

Cover ImageEriko Takatsuki

Jonathan LeeVictor WongLucero Calleo

Kleptok by Anonymous 4Waiting for You by Jonathan Lee 5Dots by Brandon Robert 6PDA (“friend” watching) by Maxwell Williams 8Three Cups of Tea by Lucero Calleo 9Untitled by Victor Wong 10Little by Brandon Robert 11Lovely Tune by Alex Cruz 13Fantasy Portrait Color Sketch by Lucero Calleo 13Color in a Bag by Anonymous 14Confidence by Brandon Robert 14Untitled by Eriko Takatsuki 15Emma Watson by Brandon Robert 16Aqua Vitae by Rahul D. Ghosal 18Untitled by Eriko Takatsuki 18Styrofoam Cups by Anonymous 19Cherry Blossom Petals by Lucero Calleo 20A Blue Magpie’s Song by Rahul D. Ghosal 21Untitled by Victor Wong 22Untitled by Eriko Takatsuki 24The Dance of Lights by Lucero Calleo 25

Simple Math by Matt Tomasello 26

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KleptokThere’s an industrial meadow in Kleptokwhere men with castles on their backspass around a monkey’s jawand imbibe a lot of beerthe courtesan comes to summonthe last remaining manso the court can watch his castle meltinto clouds of mustard gasthe seeds burn in the soil growing clever tongues of flamethat wrap around our anklesand shout everybody’s nameand if I saw that you were choking I would hesitate to askif you thought that I was strong enough to wrap your head in bits of ice and steelso that the blood in your eye sockets would stop flowing down your facebut if I lack the muscle mass, just keep bleeding anyway

Anonymous

Waiting for You Jonathan Lee

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DOTSOur proximity is like two pinpoints trying to reach the same trajectory of a passionLike stardust sprinkles into my sleepless nights without you,

Or the way the wind tugs on my hair pulling each strand northboundSaying that you’re up there and I’ll be there soon,

Or the sun giggling its way down to me with a warm massage to my heartKneading through the doubts,

Or whispers in the meadows that listen to my mind as the wheat sways trance-likeAnd I listen for the answers.

Sometimes my stomach is like a harness attached to a bungee cordOf my intestinesAnd as I jump,It wraps around my neck binding the reality of my breath.

Look, I can sit here and write every thought of you down on paperBut postcards are just too small, and so is paper.

When I describe visceral fantasies of what we’d be doing right now,It’d be so different from our small talk sincerities.

I’m like a butterfly that continues morphing into myselfbecause as I grow,I want to grow stronger with you. I will flutter my golden wings, But they’re nothing without your breeze guiding me through,Helping me fly into your life with all of my words.

If we both aren’t perfect, then why do friends all tell us that we are?

I struggle with the day-to-day,The routine of “I-wish-you-were-heres”That reverberate through my ballpoint pen each time I try to make sense.

There is a boy far away who is sprawling you out onto paperTo solve the scramble of our futureAnd my poems can only do so much.

I can carve the wind like a sharpened blade on my motorcycle,Revv the engine, and leave a cloud of dust behind me,But we are on two different maps right now like two dotsreading, “YOU ARE HERE”

The gps is struggling to guide us through our separate routesAnd each time the wind speaks to me as I ride,I call on him to carry my message out to you.

This poem is not finished,Yet then again, neither is our story embeded in it.I know someday I will be writing about a poem that we both will share togetherIn the proximity of the same map in the same plain.

Brandon Robert

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PDA (“friend” watching)Your mouths locked together--

Slurping…slapping... probing...

(as I sit herewatching…)

Keep me locked out--invisible while barely feet away

Maxwell Williams

Three Cups of Tea

Lucero Calleo

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Lovely artistic rendering of the father from Malcom in the Middle

Victor Wong

LittleYep, I got you right in the balls, remember? right in the sweet spot,That spot that reminded you that your little nugget of a brother took karate,And that I knew how to make you sound like a pipsqueak as momWalked into the kitchen, surveyed the damage, and said,“You deserved it,” and then stepped over you to complete her lunch telling you about her day,While you lied on the floor heaving like a steamboat engine without the steam, Or a water filter that can only filter air after the last drooping drop.Call it an awkward beginning, but let me tell you Greg, That I don’t laugh like a girl,That I love eating peanut and butter jelly sandwiches, the ones I make you ALL the timeLike the one you dropped gently as you avalanced to the groundKicking and screaming as Oreo barked woofing down that sandwichFilling her tiny belly.

But I do know that when you called me on the phone the other day,and said, “Remember when we used to play tag?”I could feel the red free falling from my nostils and know that even though I tasted blood, I bled love,And even though I nosedived into the bed spring during that game of indoor tag, I could taste your innocence,that you didn’t mean it as you teared up and mom tried stitching us back togetherLike a quilted mattress you told me to bounce on so high that one jump brought me back to the present,And I tasted understanding;

And it was sour at first like the war heads we challenged each other to as the lime, lemon, and cherry mixtures multiplied and we continued double daring,

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Your face scrunched up while I thought, “What a terrible idea this is”And did we stop? Of course not.And it was salty like the popcorn you sold at all our neighbors’ doors for Boy Scouts with dad,I watched you sell them all within a week. It was sweet like the Gertrude Hawk chocolates I sold telling you how I waited for all my girlfriends to sync their periods together like an iPod playlistso that on box would vanish.

Growing up, my social security card might as well have read, “Greg’s Little Brother.”The attendance lists of all my teachers said Brandon in bold inkbut the teachers still called me Greg.It’s ok, “I’m his little brother.”

I met God, and I believed in God,Because God was a clarinet player. He wears glasses with squared rims, has a roaring laugh that makes mine sound like a whisper, resides in a small, Jersey town, and I want to be just like him.

When your little eight year old brother kicked you in the balls,It wasn’t to humiliate you, it was to let you know I was there.When you called me the other day, everything collided into a realizationThat love is all the flavors of good and bad, friend and foe,

And though our eight year gap was wide like the hole between my two front teeth,When you called me on the phone the other day,you said,”Brandon, I really love you.”It’s ok, “I love you too, Greg.”

Brandon Robert

Lovely TuneMiles away . . . far away.

A thousand miles away, there is a lovely tunebeneath the moonlight, it sings its beauty

And caught up in a tree, by the lovely tuneenchanted by the melody,

There’s a cute little bird, and it has taken the lovely tune into its beakbut last night, it took flight into the skylines, far away for those to hear

It flew and chirp away with great beauty And the nights, And the skies became silent, and the world became still

the lights went out, and the world got colder But then one night, all of sudden, the lovely tune returned back to the skies

It came from above, from the little bird that flew milesand miles, the one that spread its wings to sing the lovely tune to my soul

Little bird, sign to me, sing to me endlessly, would you?I would sing to you, endlessly.

Alex Cruz

Fantasy Portrait Color Sketch

Lucero Calleo

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Eriko Takatsuki

Color in a BagA bag full of colors reflecting your facereveals all the missiles your mother misledfrom the back of the scenery, the dirt and the greeneryhiding the battalion of plastic army menperfectly camouflaged, with toothpick-sized javelinsaimed at the eyes of the second-hand manswimming in rainbow paintwith eyes the size of the roomthat deflate with the breaths he takesand make the colors fade in and out.

Anonymous

CONFIDENCEThe clouds hovered, stretched like cotton candy against a twilight canvas.The sun yawned nestling to bed.In an opening of the cotton was a light.The star was lonely among the sky,Waking up and shining for nighttime.And as the sun continued to rest,The little ball awoke stronger and confident.The twinkle in the ocean blue, sparkled, while its neighbor awakened: glowing too.

Brandon Robert

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EMMA WATSONI found love when she entered the movie screen.She stole my heart the first time she spoke.From one small clip my heart melted like an ice cube sitting in sun-warmed iced tea.

Tell me that I were to meet Emma Watson,And I might think you were transfixed.I don’t think I can handle such a lie,For my body would shake like a jackhammerYou know, the one you hold for hours in construction.

I would fangirl like a baby that wants the comfort of a hug,Emma, I just need a hug from you.

When I sit at home with nothing to do,I forget about writing,Though I could write a poem, a short story, and a Novel all about her.When I go online, I go to the search barBrowsing images and interviews of my true loveBut there is never enough time in the dayBecause like a water lily she floats on water and ripples my heartbeats.

“You are a crackhead,” “She doesn’t know you,” “She’s a Hollywood Star,”My friends chronically complain to my face,And yes she is a star, a star I’m wishing on each night.

If I got to meet Emma Watson,I want her to know that she’ll never be alone,That I want to spend every moment showing her I care,That I would buy her the entire galaxy and then tell her she is the queen of my universe,

That I am quite alright with being Brandon Watson for the rest of my life,That I know just as much about Wizardy and as Hermione Granger,That when I go to the movies and she kisses another guy,I know she’s just acting and practicing for me,That in the confines my private thoughts there’s a “Stranger Granger.”

Emma, your accent has a rhythm that fuels my racing pulseLike a metronome clicking to a constant speed,Your acting is as captivating as the proposal I have written out and waiting five years.

Emma, you stunned a little boy who is now a grown man,And though friends doubt our love, Though I wish I can grab my wandand cast my love in a spell that you already know,Emma my love, we will meet on our wedding day,And although our ceremony will be far from traditional, just for you, I will switch quidditch teamsBecause the best man, who is my boyfriend, will just have to deal with the fact that the seeker finally found his snitch.

Brandon Robert

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Eriko Takatsuki

Aqua VitaeApplauding raindropsThe murmur of the oceanBaptismal solace

Rahul D. Ghosal

Styrofoam CupsIn her house in the middle of the oceanI slither like an earthworm on the pavement, tearing up my flesh everyone so far awayyellow rivers for her bleeding gumspush on her loose teeth with my tongueI rinse and spit into a cupwhile she shovels guts off her sidewalk

Anonymous

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Cherry Blossom PetalsWhen people look at the cherry blossom petals blowing in the wind, they think it’s such a beautiful scene.

But many fail to realize that before the petals came there, they were once part of a beautiful flower, snuggled on the branch of a beautiful tree. Then the wind snatched them away and tore them apart, seizing them from the love and warmth of their homes. They became separated, alone, tossed about by the furious wind.

Afterwards, when they reach the earth, they are only trampled by muddy boots, never to see the light of the sun again once the dirt closes in on them. Then they just rot away and are never ever remembered for the little bit of beauty they brought to the world.

But who knows. Maybe that brief moment of glory when they’re flying on the wind and fluttering through the sunbeams is worth an entire life of heartbreak and despair.

Lucero Calleo

A Blue Magpie’s SongDedicated to K.C.

Majesty heralded by a name—Fanfare accompanying Every phonetic breathThat composes its poetry; A syllable—an inchOf ceaseless silk damaskRolling off the tongue—The embroidery refines one’s tastes,As the linguistic threads dissolveAnd the violet dye spillsUnto one’s buds, Into one’s veins,Depositing in the leftmostVentricle.

A sonorous aftertasteOf that deceptive cadence—SuspendedDrifting And never settling.

Aporia.

Rahul D. Ghosal

22 23Victor Wong

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The Dance of LightsYour love is unmistakableOur bond, now unbreakable.I know now who you are,my beautiful star,brighter than a thousand suns,but the only onefor me.

I reached for You, but blindness reigned,engulfing every screamdrying out my flesh‘til it turned to crust and steam,crumbling, vanishing as the wind blew bylearning only how to die.

But You restore every piece of melike placing every leafback on a withered tree.It’s time at last for me to shine,morning star, celestial lifejoining in the dance of lights.I am reborn, whole againknowing now You are my friendknowing that I’ll never endbecause you live in me.

Lucero Calleo

(left) Eriko Takatsuki

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Simple Math Ollie Pak was good at math. He couldn’t dance or cook

or hold a conversation, but he knew Conic sections like a second

language. He understood complicated mulit-variable integrals,

knew how to calculate the rotation of curves around all three axes,

and could write out an entire advanced Taylor series in under a

minute.

The students in the General Pre-Calculus class he taught

didn’t try very hard. They were seniors who were more concerned

with organizing parties and coming up with a senior prank. They

didn’t know or care what a Taylor series was. That subject would

never be reached in a Pre-Calc course, and Ollie couldn’t have

explained it to them anyway.

When Ollie was in grade school there had been a daily ritual

where the teacher would select a boy to stand in front of the class to

give the morning salutation and lead everyone in singing Poland’s

national anthem. The day Ollie was chosen he rose from his seat

and walked rigidly like a wind-up toy to the front of the room. He

stood there ghostly white before his audience, stammering and

unable to speak. Four agonizing minutes went by until the teacher

quietly asked him to sit down.

“Okay, so uhh…” Ollie shuffled back and forth in front of

the whiteboard. He wrung his sweaty palms together. “So, when

we take the derivative of the velocity, the, uh, the… przyśpie…no, I

mean, the uh…przy…” The words choked him like thick tar in his

throat. He couldn’t remember the English word. “The…przy…uhh-

“

“Are you high?” called a student loudly from the back, and

the rest of the class screeched with laughter. Ollie’s face blanched.

“The uhh…uhh…the acceleration!” he finally got out, but no one

heard him over the ringing of the final bell.

Ollie gripped his desk tightly as students brushed past,

pushing each other savagely. He was a little boy, humiliated again in

front of the class. He stared at the ground and wished he was one of

the floor tiles.

He sensed movement in front of him and looked up to

see four of his students knock his file rack and all his folders off

the desk. Ollie immediately dropped to the floor to pick them up,

trying to grab them out from under the culprits’ feet. When he got

them all he got up and started to yell at the students, but the yell

was more of a squeak, and it was mostly in Polish, and the four

boys were already out the door and running down the hall before

he could translate himself to English. He slammed the folders down

on his desk with a frustrated grunt.

Ollie took a large gulp from his cup of coffee and sat down.

He rearranged the folders on his desk. He had a long night of

grading ahead of him. He knew he could do his work with the

rest of the teachers in the lounge, but decided that he’d rather be

isolated alone than where other people could see him. He drank

more of his coffee.

He looked at the first student’s paper. It belonged to Maria

Komito. Maria was seven months pregnant and being raised by a

single mother with a minimum-wage job. There was no way she

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could economically support the child, but she had lashed out at

every counselor and teacher that had reached out to her, and now

they hated her as much as she hated them. Ollie finished the rest of

his coffee.

He wondered what Maria’s baby would look like when

it came out of her. She was always chewing gum in class so he

pictured it emerging from the womb with a giant wad of Spearmint

in its mouth, just like its mother. Today he had watched her chew

three pieces in his class, sticking each one underneath her desk

when she finished them. He pictured Maria holding her screaming,

disgusting infant, plucking the chewed gum out of her own mouth

and shoving it into her child’s.

Ollie stared down at the bottom of his empty coffee mug. He

realized he’d been looking at it for a long time. He shook his head

as if from a trance and moved on to the next paper, which belonged

to John Dumont. John Dumont owned a switchblade. Ollie had

overheard him telling other students about it almost every day, and

one time he had even seen it. It had been tucked in the pocket of his

sweatshirt, and Ollie had caught a glimpse of it as the student had

passed his desk one day. He suspected that John had been trying to

show him it was there.

John was there, in the room. Ollie blinked. John moved

closer. Ollie stood up abruptly from his desk and John was gone.

He took a deep breath, suddenly feeling cold. He began to rub

his hands together vigorously, but he kept getting colder. He had

a fever of some kind. He breathed in again and the whole world

seemed to breathe with him. Every surface of the room seemed to

undulate toward him in one uniform motion, as if in one breath.

Suddenly he was choking. He couldn’t exhale, as if the air was

trapped inside of him. He pounded on his chest until finally the

air dislodged itself. His breathing returned to normal but the

classroom continued to undulate, pulsing back and forth like the

sea. A million different curves rushed toward him in waves, there a

cosine wave, followed by a quadratic, followed by ones he had never

seen or calculated before, mathematical monoliths he had never

come close to dreaming of. He was fascinated.

He sat down at his desk, straightened his papers, and looked

up to see his entire Gen Pre-Calc class sitting in their seats in front

of him, pulsing gently. Joyce texted passively, John fondled his knife

openly, Maria rubbed the top of her belly. Her stomach seemed

to be swelling, like a balloon being inflated. “What…” Ollie was

at a loss for words again. His class was here, the day hadn’t ended

yet. He rose again. The students were changing. The pigments

that made up their skin and clothes were simplifying, factoring

themselves down. They were cartoons now. Maria’s stomach had

grown to twice its size. She rested her head on it, using her own

bloated body as a pillow. Cartoon John had wild hair like a current

had been run through him. Denver William’s face had become

elongated, making him look like a something between a horse and a

baboon. All around the room the students were changing. Some of

them became cross-hatched comic book characters, others turned

into shapeless lumps. Vanessa Buyers had merged with the steel

radiator her seat was next to. There was a sharp metallic taste in

Ollie’s mouth.

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Without warning the students began to scream. They

unhinged their jaws and tore apart the skin on their cheeks as they

all filled the room with noise so loud it could be seen and felt. Ollie

made to scream as well but no sound came out. The ghouls’ cries

were so forceful that it pushed him backwards, as if he were being

buffeted by a howling wind. Ollie closed his eyes but the shrieks

shook his skull, making him see throbbing light on the backs of

his eyelids. Suddenly a tremendous ripping pierced the screeching

typhoon. Ollie opened his eyes and saw that Maria’s stomach had

burst. She looked down at the torn remains of her womb and began

to cackle like a hyena. From the bloody, pulpy mess rose an infant-

like demon. It had claws that were six inches long and eyeballs that

dangled from their sockets. Its head was bulbous and deformed

on top of its small torso. It pulled itself from its wrecked mother

and started dragging itself toward Ollie, hissing and gurgling.

With horror Ollie saw that its skin was made of tiny numbers, as

if written on paper but cut out and woven together. He tried to

back away from it but felt his back hit the whiteboard. He turned

around and discovered that it was rippling like water. He screamed

and turned back to see that the baby had gotten closer. There was

nowhere else to go. He shrieked and covered his eyes as the demon

lunged at him.

The fire alarm was screaming; a routine drill had been

scheduled for this time. One of the assistant principals was sent in

to check each room to make sure everyone had gotten out of the

building. When he found Ollie Pak his body was splayed out on the

ground behind his desk. The papers he had been grading lay in a

messy pile next to his empty coffee mug.

The nurse came into the hospital room at 8 AM to bring

Ollie his breakfast. She set the tray down on the table next to the

bed and looked at him nervously. He lay in a reclined position,

staring steadily at the ceiling. He didn’t move or look at her.

Ollie’s doctor entered the room. He peered over his glasses

at the man in the hospital bed. “Anything?” he asked.

“No,” the nurse said. She shook Ollie’s arm gently. “I don’t

think he’s moved all night.”

The doctor was not an expert on drugs. He knew the three

tabs of LSD that Ollie had taken would be considered a lot, but he

doubted the students who had slipped it into his coffee had meant

to mentally damage him. They had probably meant it as a prank. He

also knew that LSD didn’t inflict brain damage, not the kind Ollie

was apparently exhibiting. He studied the lifeless look on his face.

“What do you think the problem is?” the nurse asked.

“I don’t know,” the doctor admitted. “On the outside he’s

fine. He’s just…catatonic.” He glanced at Ollie’s blank expression

again. “If he doesn’t eat anything by tonight then put in a tube.”

“Okay.” The doctor left the room. The nurse adjusted the

bed sheets, then took a step back. Ollie continued to stare at the

ceiling. “Please let me know if you need anything,” she said, her

voice faltering a little. There was no response. She left the room and

quietly closed the door.

Matt Tomasello

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