"Natural Anointment," "Sweating Fruit," and "The Descent" by Aly Laube

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Illustration of two people embracing in bright colors

illustration by Matt Hanns Schroeter

Natural Anointment 

Your honesty is refreshing 

Like smelling rainfall in the forest 

And knowing it’s always been this way: 

Evergreen spitting from its tips 

So fresh and new, soil full

Of worms and beetles chittering with glee 

Seeds cracking from their casings with ease;

When there’s so much realness 

In the world, it makes me wonder — 

Why strive for anything else? 

Watching the current roll kelp 

Around silt and plankton I’m  

Sure would shimmer in another light,

Magic doesn’t feel so far away

Sweating Fruit

I come back from them,

Skin washed in sun and sweat

And warm wind carrying pollen

That made us crinkle our noses

And sneeze. Cute. When we

Kissed, did you also remember

It’s almost baking season on the shore?

With a sky so blue it threatens to

Fall over us like satin and cast the

Whole world in cobalt?

Heat ballooning around our ears

Roaring with blood too hot

To spill or keep inside. We

Could go to the water and

Live in coves meant to keep

Blood cool.

The Descent

As the ground bears its gnashing teeth

We wonder if we’ll drown or burn

And if it would be so bad, anyway,

To do things differently this time

But I think of the way you smell

While our plane flirts with the storm

And do little tap-tap-taps on the

Feeble wall of my shoulder

Warm spice and sleep

Musk and spring flowers and

Mexican vanilla in sugar

It doesn’t even come close

To the real thing

Aly Laube is a multimedia journalist and musician with a passion for amplifying underrepresented voices. She is also a genderqueer lesbian and mixed race autistic person living with invisible disabilities. You can follow her at @smallest_princesa on Instagram.

Matt Hanns Schroeter is an artist based in Vancouver, Canada, exploring themes of intersectionality, and how identity changes over time. Matt's fluid figures and organic shapes take the form of many mediums, including illustration, painting, textiles and wood. You can follow him at @matthanns on Instagram.