The Scandal at Pebble Elementary

Ms. Stewart, our best fourth grade teacher, rushed to my office at Pebble Elementary School in the Bronx and stood in the doorway, a disturbed look on her face. “Ms. Zimmerman, I need to tell you something very important.”

The last time I saw her like this was four years ago when she learned that one of her student’s and the girl’s family had perished in their apartment. I looked up from my computer and gave Ms. Stewart my full attention. “What’s wrong?” I asked.

“Several of my students just told me that Ms. Raymond tried to get them to change their answers on the math test.”

I opened my desk drawer and took out the binder where I keep notes of conversations with staff and turned to a blank page. “Please sit down,” I said, motioning to a chair opposite me at my desk. “Tell me everything.”

“This morning when I went to my classroom, Ms. Raymond was there. I didn’t know why the other assistant principal was there. She told me that the principal had told her to oversee my students while they took the state math test. He’d also put in that teacher’s aide who always falls asleep as the second proctor. Got me out of my classroom by having me write answers for a student with a broken arm in Ms. Smith’s class. As you know, students usually test with their classroom teachers whenever possible because this helps reduce their anxiety, so I found my removal highly unusual, but I obliged, nonetheless.

“When the test was over and I returned to my room, my students were out of control, frantic to speak to me. Everyone began talking at once,” Ms. Stewart said, clicking the retractable pen in her hand. “I passed out paper and told them to write down what happened. Ifthey didn’t see anything, I said to write that. I wanted to hear from every student. In the meantime, I interviewed four of my most responsible students, one at a time, outside my classroom.”

I stopped writing and looked up at Ms. Stewart. “What did your students say?”

“Mohamed said Ms. Raymond told him to change question number four to C,” she said, pushing away her blonde shoulder-length hair from her face and reading from the notes on her yellow legal pad. “He said he didn’t do it because he knew his answer was correct. He said Ms. Raymond returned to his desk a few minutes later and again checked his answers. She pointed to additional answers and told him to change them, too.”

“Did Mohamed say Ms. Raymond told him which answers to bubble in?” I asked.

“Yes,” he said, “She did.”

“What did Mohamed do?” I asked, turning the page in my binder, and continuing to write.

“Mohamed told me he didn’t listen to her because he had checked his answers and knew they were correct. He’s an excellent math student. Always gets at least a ninety-five percent on all my classroom tests,” she said, proudly, as if he were her own son.

“Who else did you talk to?”

“I spoke to Samantha. This child is very smart, but she lacks confidence in her abilities. She said Ms. Raymond stopped in the aisle between her desk and Miguel’s, looked back and forth at both their answer sheets and pointed out three answers she said Samantha should change.” Ms. Stewart looked down and checked her notes. “Samantha said she was uncomfortable with Ms. Raymond’s help and re-checked her answers but didn’t change them.” When Ms. Stewart looked up at me, I could see the pain for her students in her bright blue eyes.

“Can you believe this? she asked.

“Did you speak to Miguel?”

“I did.” Ms. Stewart began to laugh. “I’m sorry, Ms. Zimmerman, but I found Miguel’s response quite amusing. He said he began to solve a problem in front of Ms. Raymond and explained his thinking, step-by-step. Ms. Raymond interrupted him and announced to the class that she hears talking, then reminded them that they’re in the middle of an examination and there should be absolute silence. Then Miguel resumed his verbal explanation, and Ms. Raymond put her finger to her lips to silence him.”

When Ms. Stewart finished, I shook my head. “As you know, this is quite serious. You’ve just brought an allegation of cheating against an assistant principal,” I said, standing up, trying to hide how upset I was, and walking her to the door. “Please leave the statements with me. I want to read all of them. I’ll speak to the teacher’s aide and get her testimony, too. Thanks for reporting this to me.”

After Ms. Stewart left, I reflected on what I had just heard. I don’t believe it! Cheating on a standardized test. This has never happened at Pebble Elementary before. There’s obviously no limit to what this assistant principal will do to see that our students score well. Now I know why the students at her former school were known for getting high scores on the state exams. Thank God Ms. Stewart has a conscience.

A few minutes later, the teachers’ union representative came in. I’ve known her for over fifteen years, when she was the union rep at my former school. Not only is she an excellent teacher and highly trustworthy, but she’s got a big heart, and advocates for the teachers and aides. She looked at me from behind her round tortoiseshell glasses, and I could tell from her facial expression that she was concerned about what she had to say. I watched her sit down in the chair in the corner, lean her head back and rest it against the wall.

“Ms. Stewart,” she said, “just told me what happened in her classroom during the math test. Wanted to know if she is going to be in trouble for reporting the incident to you. She’s worried about retaliation from the principal. I tried to reassure her that she did absolutely nothing wrong. Told her she followed protocol. You’re her assistant principal.”

“Well, we know Mr. Antonio’s going to be outraged that his name and school will now be under investigation,” I said.

“Since none of us are on the in with him, when he finds out we’re not letting this cheating allegation go away, I’m sure he’ll try to make our lives difficult,” the rep said. She reached into her shoulder bag and pulled out a bottle of water, unscrewed the cap and took a few sips. “I just got off the phone with the teachers’ union district representative. Said she’d inform the superintendent. He’s probably spoken to Mr. Antonio by now.”

No more Mr. Golden Boy

“Now what?” the rep asked.

“I’ll report the incident to the testing coordinator at the district. She’ll either tell Mr. Antonio to do an internal investigation, or she’ll report the incident to the Office of Special Investigations at the Department of Education, and they’ll investigate. But first, I must inform the principal. I’m going to his office now.”

As I walked down the stairs, Mr. Antonio came charging up with Ms. Raymond behind him. We nearly collided.

“Let’s go to my office, Ms. Zimmerman,” he said, turning around and touching Ms. Raymond on her forearm. “I’ll catch up with you later,” he said and continued down the stairs with me following close behind.

When we entered his office, Mr. Antonio firmly slammed the door behind me as if he were closing the cell door on a prisoner. He removed his grey suit jacket, loosened his tie, and rolled up his shirt sleeves. Then he sat down behind his desk and motioned for me to take a seat. He looked into my eyes, hard and cold.

“I heard you and Ms. Stewart spoke,” he said. “I talked to her, too. The incident ends here. Are we clear?”

“You know I’m obligated to inform the district testing coordinator of any alleged improprieties.”

Mr. Antonio sat up tall, elbows on his desk, hands clasped together hiding his mouth, and glared at me. “Maybe you didn’t hear me the first time? I am the principal. I said, do not call the district. Ms. Raymond said she didn’t tell the students to change their answers, and she doesn’t know why they made up those lies.” He stood up, walked around his desk to the door and opened it. “We’re done.”

When I returned to my office, I put a “Do Not Disturb” sign on my door. Then I sat in my chair and closed my eyes. This is huge. Why did the superintendent bring Mr. Antonio to this district? He has no experience in administration and only one year of teaching kindergarten. Wants Pebble Elementary to become a showcase school but has no idea how to make this happen, except through unethical means. Does the superintendent know this? Is he planning to coach him in every aspect of running a school?

A few minutes later, I got up, walked to the bookcase at the back of my office anddistractedly rearranged the framed pictures of my husband and children. Mr. Antonio’s only been at Pebble Elementary for four months and he’s already ingratiated himself with various groups from the school body. Got a lot of people to like him. Probably thinks if they like him, they’ll do whatever he wants. They don’t know what really goes on here. Have no idea how he’s segregated the staff and the administration into the “in” and “out” groups. Ugh.”

~

Later that afternoon, after dismissal, Ms. Stewart and the teachers’ union rep returned to my office to report that Mr. Antonio had spoken to Ms. Stewart’s class. “He told them he heard about what they said happened during the math exam,” Ms. Stewart said, reaching for the squishy ball on my desk. She squeezed it a few times. “He told them that sometimes people make up stories to get others in trouble because they’re mad at them for something. Reminded my students that Ms. Raymond recently gave many of them detention, and she had spoken to some of their parents because of the fights and bullying during recess. Told them that the things they said about Ms. Raymond could get her into serious trouble.” Ms. Stewart took a deep breath and continued: “He tried to suggest that the students didn’t really see what they claimed they saw.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“Mr. Antonio said he thinks it’s likely that Ms. Raymond pointed to their answers because she was trying to let them know that they skipped a question or bubbled in two answer choices for the same question.” She paused. “Of course, he shouldn’t have done that, either.”

At that moment, the rep stood up and hit the dome-shaped gadget on my desk. The robotic voice blurted out, ‘that was stupid.’ She hit it again. Ms. Stewart and I laughed, and Ms.Stewart continued: “Mr. Antonio told the students he knows that no one wants to see Ms. Raymond lose her job. Asked them to rewrite their statements and make sure to write the truth.” Ms. Stewart got up and started pacing. “It infuriates me how he tried to blame my students, to make them feel guilty for being responsible.”

“I understand completely,” I said, feeling sick at the wrongness of this. “I shouldn’t be saying this to either of you about a fellow administrator,” I said, looking first to Ms. Stewart and then to the rep, “but what he did was inappropriate, totally unethical. I’m sure he and Ms. Raymond discussed that if he put her in your classroom, allegedly to oversee the test-taking, she could give students the correct answers. Figured if she could get a whole class of high scores, the percentage of top scores for the fourth grade would increase and his school would look good.”

“I’m thinking the same thing,” the rep said. “Afterall, the state looks at the fourth-grade scores to determine a school’s status.” She stood up, took a cup, and helped herself to some water from my cooler. “I wish this was stronger,” she laughed. When she sat down again, she asked, “What did the teacher’s aide say?”

“Claims she saw nothing unusual. Said Ms. Raymond was walking around and making sure the students weren’t looking at each other’s papers. The aide did admit that she dozed off for a bit.”

“You know the teacher’s aide is one of his people, right?” the rep asked, pushing up her glasses.

“Of course. She was on the committee that interviewed him for his position,” I said. “She was very pro Mr. Antonio. And I think I remember that she also came from his old school.”

“He came to us with a lot of baggage,” the rep said. “The teachers tell me that the three teachers he brought with him can’t teach, and our teachers are afraid to speak up during teacher or staff development meetings because they think his teachers are Mr. Antonio’s eyes and ears. Everything goes back to him,” she said, fondling her wedding ring.

“I feel the same way about Ms. Raymond,” Ms. Stewart said. “She’s always in his office. I’m afraid to say anything to her myself because I worry she’ll distort what I say.”

“He’s duplicitous,” the rep said, then turned to Ms. Stewart, cocked her head, and suddenly became very animated. “You should call the district testing coordinator. Tell her you reported the incident to the assistant principal in charge of testing at your school, but you thought you should inform her, too. Can you do that?”

“I don’t want to get fired,” Ms. Stewart said, clicking her pen. “Mr. Antonio intimidates me.” She was quiet. Then, “I’ll do it. I must. Afterall, Ms. Raymond wanted my kids to cheat on a state test.”

The rep got up and hit the gadget again, trying to reduce the tension in my office. ‘That was stupid.’ We all laughed

“What Ms. Raymond did goes against everything I’ve been teaching my students this year about being honest and taking responsibility for their actions. I’d be a hypocrite if I didn’t do what I tell them to do.” She clicked her pen again.

“Thank you,” the rep and I said, in unison.

“By the way, what did the district testing coordinator tell you to do?” the rep asked.

I looked straight into the rep’s hazel eyes. “Mr. Antonio forbade me to call her. Said he’d take care of everything.”

~

The next day, during her preparation period, Ms. Stewart entered my office and sunk into my couch.

“Mr. Antonio got to them,” she said, her head down so all I could see was her hair. “My students changed their statements. All but six.”

“Are those the statements?” I asked, gesturing to the papers in her lap. “May I see them?”

Ms. Stewart stood up and handed them to me.

“The six are on the bottom.” she said.

I flipped through the students’ testimonies. “I didn’t see anything,” one student wrote. Another: “I am telling the truth. I didn’t see anything.” “Some kids said Ms. Raymond told them the answers, but they just want to get her in trouble. I didn’t see her do nothing bad,” wrote another. I read aloud a portion of Miguel’s statement: “During the math test, Ms. Raymond told me to change some of my answers, but I didn’t. I knew mine were correct. I tried to explain to her how I got the answer to a question, but she told me to be quiet. I’m surprised she doesn’t remember you gotta solve what’s in the parentheses first, when doing order of operations. That’s why she got the wrong answer.”

I read aloud a portion of Samantha’s statement: “Ms. Raymond stood between mine and Miguel’s desks during the math test. She told us to change some answers. I rechecked the ones she pointed to on my answer sheet, but I didn’t change them because I knew I chose the right answers.”

I started to laugh. “Ms. Raymond wanted to give the students the correct answers, but she actually pointed to the wrong ones, and she didn’t even know it.”

“She’s not too bright. Mr. Antonio brought her from their previous school,” Ms. Stewart said.

I shook my head. “The dumb and dumber duo.”

~

The following morning after the Pledge of Allegiance and the announcements, the math and literacy coaches, the grade leaders--teachers representing each grade from kindergarten through fifth—and I assembled in Mr. Antonio’s office for a meeting. He sat down behind his desk and stared ahead, a despondent look on his face. He was wearing the same white shirt and gray slacks he wore yesterday and had not shaved.

I have some very disturbing news,” Mr. Antonio said, running his hands through his greasy spiked black hair. “The superintendent called me early this morning. The Office of Special Investigations will conduct a thorough investigation of the cheating allegation. Many staff members will likely be called in for questioning. Unfortunately, Ms. Raymond has been reassigned to the district office for the duration of the investigation. Until further notice, I will supervise the teachers of upper grades. Ms. Zimmerman will be responsible for kindergarten through second grade

At that moment, surprised by the news, the teachers whom I supervise turned to look at me questioningly.

Mr. Antonio looked past me with that same despondent stare. “Ms. Zimmerman’s office will be across the yard in the mini-building with the kindergarten classes,” he said.

I briefly caught his eyes, glared at him, and shook my head, as if to say, what gives? The teachers and I now understood what was happening. Retaliation. Not only am I being isolated from the school community, but I now need to run back and forth between two buildings to service the grades I supervise.

~

I heard Mr. Antonio stayed in his office for several hours that afternoon. Maybe he was strategizing. If Ms. Raymond was removed from her administrative position and assigned to the district office so quickly, certainly he knows he is next in line. Even though he initially had the support of the superintendent, I’m sure the superintendent told Mr. Antonio he couldn’t risk losing his own job. I know Mr. Antonio has a wife, young children, and a house on Long Island. Surely, he’s worried about losing his job and license. He should be.”

At the end of the day, Mr. Antonio sent home a letter to the parents informing them of the alleged testing improprieties, assuring them that the allegations against Ms. Raymond are false, and telling them that this incident will not affect their children’s high-quality education.

~

I settled into my new office and soon acquired respect for the kindergarten teachers’ pedagogical skills. Although I didn’t know the curriculum for kindergarten, I quickly familiarized myself with the state learning expectations for the grade. I purchased a few stuffed animals so that the children who were brought to my office would feel comfortable.

The atmosphere in the main building at Pebble Elementary was very tense during the next week. Whenever I went there to visit my first and second grade classes and passed Mr. Antonio in the halls, he lowered his head. He excluded me from staff meetings, but Ms. Stewart and the rep visited me during their lunch periods and kept me abreast of everything.

“Everyone’s so on edge in the main building!” they’d exclaim whenever they came over.

“The teachers’ patience has become short, and they’re snapping at their students,” the rep said. “The dean’s office is filled with students whom the teachers would ordinarily not send to him.”

Ms. Stewart added, “Cliques are springing up everywhere, and no one talks in the hallways, anymore. Mr. Antonio comes to my classroom every day, stays nearly thirty minutes, and is always taking notes.”

“Does he discuss with you what he observes?” I asked, trying to determine if he was rating her teaching ability.

“Nope. Doesn’t talk to my students, either. Just plops down in a seat in the back and writes. It’s nerve-wracking.”

“I’m sure that’s his intention,” I said. “Retaliation.”

~

In the coming weeks, all of the staff members and students involved in the investigation and I were assigned attorneys and our statements taken. The rep told me everyone was nervous and fearful about what to expect at the hearing. She also said Mr. Antonio told her to inform the staff that he continues to believe in Ms. Raymond’s innocence and vowed to stick up for her in court.

On the day of the hearing, the courtroom was filled with students and parents, district personnel, and Pebble Elementary School staff eager to hear the outcome of the charges against Ms. Raymond. The Office of Special Investigations found the students’ testimonies credible, and the judge deemed Ms. Raymond’s actions egregious. During the cross-examination, the teacher’s aide who was in the classroom with Ms. Raymond admitted that she napped on and off, and the few character witnesses who testified on Ms. Raymond’s behalf could not provide substantive testimony. Ms. Raymond lost her administrative license and was banned from ever again working for the New York City Department of Education.

To everyone’s surprise, Mr. Antonio was nowhere to be seen, and a few days later, the superintendent reported that Mr. Antonio had resigned from the New York City Department of Education. I was not surprised when I encountered one of his friends at a meeting, and he informed me that Mr. Antonio had taken a job as principal at a Long Island school. It seemed to me that Mr. Antonio knew what was in store for him and decided to bolt before the probe began. The Office of Special Investigations cited Mr. Antonio’s resignation in its written decision and noted that he, too, is banned from ever again working for the New York City Department of Education.

With the support of the superintendent, I accepted the principalship at Pebble Elementary, and Ms. Stewart became my assistant principal. Mr. Antonio’s three teachers and the math coach transferred to different schools, and Ms. Stewart and I worked hard to rebuild and raise the school morale. Together, we analyzed the results of the state reading and math scores and devised ways to address the students’ deficiencies. Within three years, Pebble Elementary became a showcase school and we were proud of it.

Map of Matter

I could talk about the past like anyone else
about surfing the winds of childhood
to get here and the things I remember
as if the limbs of earth can be owned
by reminiscence
but that’s someone else

I don’t have a story to go back to
or a scenario to play out Everything
I’m from was made up by the Shaw Brothers
and their starlets under dramatic lighting
cat-eyes tinted lips mansions cocktails

Those were not the days and I didn’t live
through them as much as I slewed
across the surface of their rotten skin
because the decayed hand of the past reaches
for everyone not one finger of truth

Don’t lie. Don’t lie. My memory speaks in sleep. But be
creative and quick about it. Soak in the salt
of the world’s illusion. Deliquesce. Be true.

I can reassemble the dismembered limbs
of the past by ingesting them
then making a new body of history
and pining for it like a farmer weeping
for her country lost to flood and fire

I have total recall of the Belle Epoque the Age
of Innocence the Age of Anxiety the turn
of the century the Ways of the Swanns
by demarcating the borders reconfiguring the atoms
of my birth I’m born again
and again

In the movies in the library I watched and read read
and watched until I was entombed
with recollection molecules degrading in travel
in moves
from East to West village to city town to town

The spaces between I lit with candlelight of nostalgia
to illuminate the path of sequined shifts beaded gowns
satin shoes I wore them over my tattered t-shirt dirty feet

Once I moved on a flat space a blank topography
a village for squatters the homeless
not worth visiting or revisiting
in the dark in my telling it transforms
becomes the enchanted forest apples snakes gardenias
a place I find myself time and time
again then again In my telling (tell and retell)
I redraw the geography of slanted truth
and an ending happy
enough to last forever and ever
after that

A Basalt Princess

Pacific reaches for the valley.
In side glances see-throughs
in fuchsia dawns and hell fire dusks
with a latent thrust of impudence:
outer space beckons to the sea trench.

This once was her isle -
with quenching guava scrub,
manioc, taro fields, mango orchards,
decorous breadfruit trees -
glugging the sky
between Capricorn and Equator.

She delivers the shadows of her house to me.
Looks me up and down until
I ebb into remoteness.
Ninety years have streamlined
her down to timelessness.

Crowned with island rose and ivory.
Porpoise teeth inter-woven with buds
gleaming like mortuary relics.
Glory still nestles in the furrows
of her face smoked in tattoos,
a Brueghel blue of soot and thunder
from head to toe.

Her voice, a blast of surf,
a dark inclusion in a storm’s crystal.
I can see her as then,
draped in royal tapa,
one splendid smooth arm
fanning the dormant air.

Then my own time topples
when, suddenly clairvoyant,
she predicts that money
will devastate the world.

Luxury

Before the Florida roads were
bleached whale bones for barons
to pick their teeth
we had the luxury to flick
the fucking matches.
We stole fruit from laden
branches and stars
still tipped scales. Remember
the luxury of disconnected everyone.
Remember the luxury to walk where birds
hid in their tiny rooms singing. The luxury
to joke with clowns driving
tinkling trucks. The luxury to stand
on a beach without fish hooks
in our knees. Remember sticking
out your thumb because you could.
Remember when no one prospered.
Remember never knowing
who we might become.

Where Nobody Is

Last weekend, a friend asked to go for a walk—
somewhere without people, she said
She doesn’t want to see people:
hiking trails are packed,
so I suggest our town’s cemetery.

There are people, you know, but not really.
She agrees.
We meet at the entrance.
What a beautiful place to be put to rest—
overlooking the pacific.

We walk up and down the hills,
reading tombstones, sharing stories.
It’s all too familiar. I spent my childhood there:
my Austrian mother obsessed with death.

My friend spoke of her mother’s passing,
and her ashes are in the closet
under a fake candle, and how each day,
she whispers good night.

No wind in this cemetery; trees are still.
Something in the distance beside a gravestone
caught our eye—a balloon on a stick in ground,
gently swaying back and forth. flowers beside.

We glance at one another and walk in its direction.
We arrive to gravestone of Jose Garcia:
January 13, 1989 - April 1, 2016.
A photo of his truck in the lower corner:
gone but never forgotten. joined the twenty-seven club.

I glance at my watch.
It’s his birthday.
He called us to sing to him and we did:
we wished him a peaceful journey

I still ask if a cemetery
is really an empty place.

The Gasconade

— for M

---

We make Southern Missouri by dusk,
arrive at your river, park, & walk
along your shy, thin corpse.
I come to you by firefly tonight
to do what children do with mothers
and rivers: to take from you
without asking & have you pass
again from my life. You will not
remember that you are dead.
That your body & blood went bad
on alcohol & grief. But this is before
all that. Before recompense &
Lethe, & your final command
that we not do as you had
and carry it with us like a glacial pressure
and wound. This is what the dead know.
Do not tarry on the two miscarried &
the one child taken by fall. I will not so much
as whisper it in the eddy of your ear.
For I come to you now before that agony.
Even before I was born, when we met
in that neither space, when your heart
stopped for minutes during the final push.
As if you or I or something could not decide.
This time, it is before I existed, unless
we always are & were & will be again.
The river seems to imply. You may not
know me. But you will know my voice
because you live within it. It is before
your courtship with the boy, my father,
who would take you off the farm to Chicago
and Palo Alto, the unenvied edges
of the world. Before even the trip to Tulsa
or your wedding in the little Chetopa church
or your honeymoon at the Bob Cummings
Motor Lodge in Joplin. Before your sister
introduced you to the river that would change
your course. The transaction of rivers is
transactional. One becomes another.
They are less noun & more verb. Such that
the plate-on-plate New Madrid quake
caused the Mississippi to run backwards
for three days straight & reversed time.
I come to you now by broken light.
By the heather atop a field of wheat.
By the immortal moan of cicada.
By shadow of the co-op grain elevator.
By the last cow into the barn for milking.
By the kittens drowned in a burlap sack.
The little skip in your heart when you ran
too fast along the irrigation ditch.
That was you, or me, the voice inside you.
The Irish in the wind & the expanse
of the large that pares us down to seed
and lifts us into confluence. Though
I am doubtful you found peace,
frantic as you were in the letting
and the loss & cautious not to offend.
I want to tell you what your river says to me.
It boasts of nothing or grand nothingness.
Fanann muid. We wait.
Leanann muid ar aghaidh. We abide.

Editor’s Note

This inaugural issue comes a full five years after The Headlight Review was first created in 2017 by Dr. Loverde-Dropp and her students in the Master of Arts in Professional Writing program at Kennesaw State University. The students opted for a hands-on approach to learning the ins and outs of literary publishing rather than navigating a traditional seminar-style course. Since then, the hard work that many staff members, directors, and others involved have contributed towards reaching the goals of uplifting emerging artists, establishing an internationally recognized literary journal, and pursuing knowledge outside of the constraints of a classroom setting have paid off. In those five years, THR editors, KSU community members, readers, and contributors around the world have traversed what, for many of us, felt like lightyears—through political and social turmoil in our homes and communities; through viruses that invaded our lives and took the lives of many; and through a rapidly changing publishing landscape that continues to ask us to navigate the uncertainty that comes with new technology. We as artists and consumers of art have often been left grappling with questions about the future of our industry and what we should do next.

Though the journey has often felt as if there are monsters waiting around every turn, potentially threatening our very life or livelihood, the light that illuminates the journey for manyof us—those of us for whom art is not a choice, but a reflex much like breathing—has continued to guide us on this path, becoming brighter with each turn, as it brings us closer to each other. By continuing to create and share with each other, we have combined our light to forge a beacon that leads us back to one another, as well as back to the tools that we may have at one point thought we didn’t have the strength to use.

Just as each of us has a journey we must follow, we also have a collective journey as artists, writers, and human beings that requires us to turn to each other again and again. Just as one may interpret upon viewing Issue One’s cover art, titled, “Journey,” by acrylic painter Marvin Hollman, we may find ourselves tossed about in the currents that push us, unconscious to the many obstacles and rewards that lie ahead, struggling to remember the parts of the past that can sustain us and motivate us to action, rather than tell us lies about ourselves and hold us back—much like that which these lines from “Map of Matter” by featured poet Joanna Sitt remind us of: “Those were not the days and I didn’t live / through them as much as I slewed / across the surface of their rotten skin / because the decayed hand of the past reaches / for everyone not one finger of truth.”

Luckily, we’re not riding this wave alone, and our community of artists, writers, and readers has taught us that as submissions from around the world continue to draw us into conversation, reflection, and inspiration. For this issue, we received 120 fiction stories, 273 poems, 39 creative nonfiction stories, and 23 art pieces from an amazing list of creatives and storytellers. THR would like to thank everyone who considered our journal for publication, as well as our amazing group of contributors who unveiled themselves and asked us to come along on their journey. We would also like to thank Chioma Urama (our featured interviewee) forspeaking with us about her poetry collection, A Body of Water, her process as a writer, and why we must hold tight to the ties that bond us together, throughout this great journey.

Special thanks to our amazing editorial team who worked tirelessly to finish this issue and to ensure the journal’s success in so many ways this past year. We couldn’t have done this without all of you and your contributions are what make The Headlight Review such a joy to continue creating.

We hope you all enjoy the issue as much as we enjoyed curating it. Happy reading!

Warmly,

Sam Casto and Tyra Douyon
Co-Editorial Directors

decant desperation

there are no words for
a mother in mourning
her cries are
swans’ calls
seeking swift shelter
no bonfire can warm her
she floats,
aimlessly
as wayward winds transpire
to annex all that is stainless,
and wide-eyed
and safe
we sully each strand of sureness
delegating those who wish
to wield walls
of lax laws
as paragons of purview
whilst those who hold tender
the prospects of purpose
the benign benefactors
vying for vicious venom
of the ravenous rabble
are swayed into
submission
as if one could
defeat despair
why must we wield wounds
as weapons?

The Boys of Kenneth Street

We played mumbletypeg with jackknives.
We stole Playboys from the first 7/11.
We played corkball and kickball
and football in the street. Cars
interrupting a game were given a
raspberry. We weren’t really hoodlums—
we were too timorous—but we liked
the new rock music and, given the chance,
we snarled like Mick Jagger. Kenneth
Street was base and our peregrinations
took us to the drugstore or the woods.
We strutted and talked about girls as if
we knew the secret thing. Our world
spun only one way. The 60s passed and
we moved around more. The connection
remained. I still count on these boys,
who taught me nascent masculinity,
and what the world was like beyond our
neighborhood. Those times we ran
together, so long ago now, took place in
an America that is gone. Gone too
our innocence. And the need, which burned in
us like holy fire, to be more than what we were.

EXCEPT YOU

What gets archived
a song in November
a psalm in the fields
chants around a fire?

Wearing their good shoes
huddled up the earth is heated
and scraped off the next morning.

Nobody will remember
except you
who swept the floor
and kept love.

shyness can stop you

this little silver instamatic camera shoots panoramas.
fits in your pocket, if there's no chewing gum or keys in there. it’s no
picturesque paul simon kodachrome.
more like a drugstore analog fix, but in-disposable.
she's reliable—she's well-traveled—she's seen the empire state, all
over the east coast.
she's had redondo to san pedro in her sights, too.
no, she's not fancy, she doesn't have flash, yet she lets me see the
world through 5 x 6 matte, avec sloppy borders.
she's visited thousands of unique daffodil faces.
some in-focus, others blurry, caught in a distorted blizzard dream.

one face i wish she got a better look at:
a nameless piano player near the sunnyside playground. he was
magnificent: his own skyscraper, his own ocean: an eighth wonder.
no frills, no tourist traps, pure & free.
a spotlight shone on him and him only, casting every pair of
untrained eyes and ears into blackness.
i hoped for some discreet profile of his sweaty, barechested,
maestro frame, jerry lee lewis-ing, leon russell-ing his way into my
celluloid memories.
so humble yet so good—fingers and sensibility unencumbered. i wanted to
go up and ask him if he could be my sierra nevada, if he could be my
superstar.
instead, i took a hazy, distant snapclick from the steadfast
streetcorner.

shy, introverted, bashful cole just didn't have it in him.
though, i know she did.
there was a sentry blocking those palace gates.
a detached receiver in that telephone booth.
then: the most intimate question.
now: my devastation, my missed shot.
he might’ve even been flattered, chuffed, pleased at the proposition.
instant regret filled my fluttering, i didn’t catch the 10:05 bus,
conflicted, crushed, anxious thundercloud torso, now squeezed tight in the
station between my toes and my socks.
a falling, stillborn feeling.
a stomach dropping out of its highwire act.
above all, the real misfortune was felt by my pintsized photographe. her blank,
idle 35mm film only gets old, languishes, and expires.

Unarbitrary Definition for The New Concise Modern Dictionary of Synchromysticism

because · /bɪˈkɒz/ · conjunction. 1. Because the limited, dual nature of the human mind necessitates the illusion of cause and effect. 2. Because all things connected must be understood conjoined, conjoined and ever changing. 3. Because the wings of butterflies cause hurricanes. 4. Because A must equal B, & B must equal C; A must also equal C; so you were wrong, Siddhartha: to eliminate desire is to eliminate all life. 5. Because I need you like the island needs the ocean, deluded in the isolated joys of boundary. 6. Because Time is Space & Space is Time, and both constructions of the bodies (see also: celestial, solar, heavenly, physical, and divine). 7. Because we conceive of Incarnations, conceived in concepts from the moment of conception. 8. Because we ask the question, “Why?” 9. Because the Postmodern has fallen upon us; and the Continental Philosophers all were French; and the French have always had it written in their language: the answer to pourquoi? is just pourquoi. 10. Because we always need a reason. 11. Because explanations make us feel profound. 12. Because I held you, I will someday lose you. 13. Because we love, we all will suffer. 14. Because we all do suffer, we must love.