MASKS LITERARY MAGAZINE
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"Stretched" by Ashley Abigail Gruezo Resurreccion


​by Pamilerin Jacob


I’d like to be called a hole
the truth can drop into with
-out snapping its ankles, the soft

landing of the mystical, think how haloed
the entrance, light smeared like toothpaste

around the edges of the old
cold, obstruction—that doubt--
dissolved, can you imagine the fate

of the world in hands like that,
a life so riddled with unction it glints

like fireflies released from
a fist, charging towards the sky,
I’d like also to be called

my boy, the way my father does
whenever he remembers the Singapore
trip he took that year he thought

he was dying, I saw magic
he’d say, they turned naira notes

to dollars, awe and starlight, escaping
his warm mouth


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Pamilerin Jacob (he/him) is a poet and editor whose poems have appeared in The Rumpus, Agbowó, Palette, 20.35 Africa, Rattle, and elsewhere. He is the curator of Poetry Column-NND, a poetry column in Nigerian NewsDirect, a national newspaper. Twitter & Instagram @pamilerinjacob
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MASKS Literary Magazine is sponsored by the Columbia College Chicago Library and was founded as part of the Aesthetics of Research Program-an ongoing series of exhibits, events, and other shenanigans dedicated to exploring the role that libraries play in artistic process, creative community building, and resource-sharing in the arts. 
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  • Featured
  • Issue
  • Interviews
    • Natalie Arriola
    • Kim Chinquee
    • Melissa Meier
    • Miya Turnbull
    • Molly Yingling
    • Kate Wisel
  • Submissions
    • Guidelines
    • Contests
  • About
    • Masthead
    • Our Mission
  • Buy