Friday, April 11, 2014

Cuban's Sweet Tooth by Maritza Soto

mr. Goodbar
At least in my eyes I’ve been conditioned to never taste his
bad side. The true richness of his soul and his chocolate
covered protection plan over the family always kept us alive.
Now we’ve let him rest in peace, expired May 2010.

Tic Tac

Was like a time bomb counting the seconds it would take my
father to split an argument with my mother. Walking through
the living room, you can smell the vents of an angry man mean
mugging while washing clothes. Exchanges of dirty words betw-
een him and them lasting minutes before they would take their
next breath, mint. 

Ice Breakers

Your undivided attention was all I needed to break that silence
between my mom and my sister. Little miss me governing the
post across our bedroom door, finally, to catch on to the
disturbing pauses of inflictions demanding love from her little
sister. Withholding a bond from a 3 year old baby sister causing
unwanted space to be broken. Healing was needed, and soon.   
 
Life Savers

Me and God restoring our custom made family tree from
destroying life boats. Sinking deep into depression, unable
to connect to their lack of motivation. Crossing from seas
far away, why allowing the waves along the way distance
a story that almost cost them their life? They’ve come a
long way from black destruction.

Atomic FireBalls
Communist presentations, advertising false declarations, all
to prove proper insanity. A country so far from its led, protesting,
pitching to leave. You got micro-managing favorites and women force
to give up their own babies. What’s the point of delivery if we can’t order
in self-made equality.  Sticky leaves and ditches, rocks and metal detectors
formulated together by innocent women trying to make a day. Time Is clicking.

Starburst

It’s my country crying out for victory, Por favor! Someone please come
help me. Screams of unfairness is under the tone of men and women
struggling. Volunteer to unleash those things that’s baking in my bones,
seeing my family without a home is bursting the blood in me. Roots
to vain, tears to pain are being built to re-create a history that’s misused
to gain burst of color entertained.

Twizzlers

My twist in pop culture. Magazines couldn’t describe the sounds of Latin
drinks. Mojitos, Cuba libre y café con leche is a mixer that no one can ever
forget. The music bouncing off your rear view mirror, a flavor to strong for
the beats to surrender. African drums with big cigars, only a Cuban man’s jokes
can make-up a song following the rhythm of Pit bulls international lyrics.
 
AirHeads

Free lancing in the drug business worse than Tony Mantana’s last history.
constantly tripling money exchanges overseas isn’t going to satisfy Cuban
refuges from smoking the dealers hand out of his last penny. Bills to pay,
houses to reframe before the government takes them all away.  There’s
too many airheads in this company to draw a case in Dade-county’s public
scene. 
 
LemonHead

Theirs danger behind the brains in Latin country compared to the way
physicians handle hard heads in America’s industry.  One thing this state
seemed to had caught on to was how immigrants with white coats manage
 to squeeze sour filled knowledge into America’s system, yet  who considers
their license to be revoked and out of date too. 

3 Musketeers

Siblings: Queen, King, and a princess. Amazingly in the same order
is how my mother and her mother birthed three children in this family.
often the order of reality never really mattered though, the respect
tended to follow the individual who had more taste in the work field. 

Milky [Cuban]Way

Are the ways of a Cuban, bad habits. Loud talks, “OYE!!! ACERE!!!! QUE
BOLA!!! While grocery shopping, kids along the waist and accompanying
slight comments about the woman who’s slowing pacing her way to the
next ale. Not to mention the priceless moments when mommy opens up
 a pack of Cuban crackers as she scratches out items off her list.   

Pop Rocks
Showing off our funky dance moves, eating pan con lechon y un batido
De papya con azuca, celebrating the days of the week is the energy we
Latin American family’s can relate to. Flashy thick 14k gold jewelry is our
Model look for most Cuban women who enjoy spending money on objects
That defines us. 

Gummy Bears

We stick together like glue and paint. Carrying each other’s
last name is a legacy never unclaimed. Though we fight and
fuss to steal the final word, the meaning of family is much
stronger than a trunk rooted in dirt. Mama bear, papa bear
and little bear is all who we got in our generation, so we must
fight the battle of our make-up against hatred people. 

Butterfingers
Deserted feet’s planted on a farm, unable to hold its balance
from its awful, painful stokes. It seems like every five minutes
the sun comes out, their hands melts down. Fingers to thumb,
all strengths are being used to eat one food. 

WarHeads

My brother and his selfish ways. The battles he would fight against
his PS games. Never understanding who was our enemy, him or the
strange looking animals on mama’s old antenna screen. Accidently
touching a button was like going to war.  

 Now and Later

Con el tiempo más tarde, el cariño de una madre nunca se pone vieja.
Su sueños se sienten como rosas y su ambiente como el sabor de una
fresa. Tranquilamente buscando el sol que alumbre su corazón. El amor
de una madre, un espacio sin límites.  

Mike and Ike

Come in a distinctive shape and sizes yet in different colors and flavors.
this too is to be expected in Latin culture. Although we are all Spanish
speaking countries with similar homes built in, what sets Cubans apart
from Puerto Ricans is our diverse language shredded into street Spanglish.
our shades in skin complexions can’t pole us apart if we head back to Africa
where our ancestors were originally from.

Red Hots

Impossible to disclaim this tropical environment. Less winters and long
summer is just about what you can imagine when you think of an island
that burns hot suns 95% of the day. Sweat that heat up double the temperature
of grandma’s easy oven bake. Take them out, hats, sunglasses and screens but it
will only do the bare minimum on a skin that’s not use to boiling.

Jelly Beans

Hard headed on the outside Lil Eli, ignores the cares of his steep falls but the softness
Of his insides triggers the deep feelings of his heart to cry. Quickly holding him by
A skin that’s only grown 6 months, hoping he soon understands the love of a
concern mother.

Sugar Daddy’s

Were more like cheap tricks on half Price books for dummies. Tendencies
of raggedy old men chasing after women with low-priced lipsticks last
only, but a minute while the women in my country learn how to switch
salsas with men whose pen no longer strikes zeros at the ends... 

-Maritza Soto

Sunday, March 3, 2013

Abandoned Train by Pamela Kaiser

An artistic photo taken by Pamela Kaiser. What do you interpret from this photo?


Wednesday, February 13, 2013

The First and The Last by Malcolm McFarlane

On streets made
golden by the broken boot-straps
of those under, stood upright he amongst the money plates
of such man’s lineage. Born into money,
work was a foreign concept; No need for righteousness,
for such was glory found in the hearts of men.


Beneath streets of gold,
sat fetal a man hunched over,
of no wealth or creed.
Humbled by life, but made
with eyes held low. Such man’s righteousness
was not enough, work that did
not satisfy. In something more
such a man’s heart rested in,
as he strived through rocks damp
with tears.


Times told in such men past,
rendered crucial in this coming age. Fortitude of class,
shrouded in clandestine servitude,
was now tarnished with the hoofs of Faithful and True.
A man of no wealth found stature in eyes aflame.
Inconceivable glory and beauty rested on this man of no appeal,
Left despised like the sun that seemed to have died. 


The last made to be first,
Spared from judgment and
Wrath. Trial had reached its end,
Suffering now made complete.
The man of no creed,
Inherited eternal wealth;
A heir to a divine dynasty, he was
Left upright by the treasures of heaven.

Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Call for Submissions

Greetings Ladies and Gents,

It's that time of year again! The "Call for Submissions" for our literary journal Cake!
Make sure to send your most impressive works that you would like to see added. It grants you a chance to be a featured writer or photographer in the journal! However, we would like to see one central theme for all the submissions. That theme being CULTURE! What does culture say to you? How does the society in which you reside affect you? Let your imagination blossom and let us know! For more details, take a little look below! :)

Guidelines:

Poetry - Submit up to five poems of your choosing.
Prose- Submit up to fifteen pages of prose.
Book Reviews- A minimum of 250 to 300 words.
Interview- A minimum of 500-700 words.
Photos- Black and White, send as JPEG.

Along with your submissions please send a brief bio, phone number and mailing address in which we can contact you. All submissions are to be submitted to cakepoetryandart@gmail.com.

Monday, November 28, 2011

Endure by Stephanie Baptise

Endure

"You are not good enough," he said.

An utterly grotesque submersion of my mind into the acid drenched memories made me cringe as the words stung my innocent insides. I pulled my frigid body away, turned and hid my eyes within pillows of hair. I stared at the morbid drawing which reminded me of the failure I subconsciously thought I was. The drawing was an insipid fruit; orange, lonely, inert in a dim light floating within the atmosphere of the canvas. Drawing and painting were a release for me. Strokes of divine colors interpret my emotions well. My delicate fingers at work filling each significant interstice on a barren canvas are exhilarating. But still the reoccurring echoed words, "you are not good enough" was heard.

Far and distant within those tormenting thoughts, my husband comes to hold me and asks, "What’s wrong?"

I shook his hands off and with my all struggled to get the words out. I stammered in a low frightful voice, “You said ‘I'm not good enough.’”

I ran to the bathroom, my refuge. I slammed the heavy, pale blue door shut. My husband then came knocking on a barrier as solid and impenetrable as my heart's past. I slid down against the moveable wall, feeling vibrations down my back as my husband knocked authoritatively. I sat on the floor with my knees propped up, my arms resting on them and my hands on my face crying. His voice so transparent, I looked up at the rusty, golden knob to make sure the door was actually locked. His continuous knocking was annoying me to the point where I couldn't stand it anymore. I shouted through my young weak fingers, "What?!"

"What's wrong dear?" he asked soothingly. Suffocating silence answered him.

"Christine, if it’s what I said, I'm sorry, I didn't mean it."

Soft moans of hurt fought him, leaked though the other side and launched straight into his soul.

He pleaded with me, "Christine, please come out, you're a wonderful artist but it's just not what I was looking for to put in my presentation." Another pause. “I am looking for photography.”

I heard this and tried to register this information with my unbalanced emotions that I let take control of me. Pulling myself up I held my husband’s words into account. Russell listened to my timid movements. I took conscious steps to the sink, looked at myself in the somewhat dark clouded mirror. Pink eyes lined with red streaks leading to black pupils stared back. A round brown wet disgruntled face and a weak heavily breathing creature appeared as a result of my reflection. Astonishing it was that I was able to see myself without having to climb on the toilet. I flushed my face with water but my puffy red eyes stubbornly remained. Walking dreadfully toward the door with a posture stained with aggrievement I knew the meeting with his quizzical face was inevitable. I opened the door and slightly peeked through the space exposing the tip of my face and one eye. He stood there waiting. Thoughts of escape to my room and becoming lost within comforting covers entered my mind. He stood there and the memory of my room being his room was brought back. I slid the rest of my body, closing the bathroom door slowly behind me. My eyes concentrated on the suddenly interesting red carpet beneath my bare feet as I attempted to avoid his questioning gaze. Russell went up to me and without saying a word he pulled me into his wide chest and rubbed my back lovingly. His rhythmic strokes along my vertebrae temporarily melted away my tensed scared muscles. Submerged within his embrace I kept on reminding myself, it’s just Russell, no one else.
After those few moments, Russell had to leave. Alone again, haunted by the demonic thoughts of the past, lights off as I was locked up in the bathroom and thought about those memories. Memories of the evil manipulation I endured at the tenderly impressionable age of eight. I remember being attached to the wall by a leash around my neck. Like a harmless puppy in bondage, little Christine stood there nowhere to go and nowhere to run. My stepfather hated me, put me on the leash and I endured verbal abuse. He sent blows, punches, and slaps to my self esteem. I had no voice, I was unloved, a nobody. He said with his devilish shots of torment, things that would remain with me until I perish. My young soul bore the undeserved pain. Those words stayed fixated in my mind "you are not good enough" and "you are nothing." I pleaded with my all to use the bathroom; anything to get away from the immortal monster my mother married. I ran to the bathroom, my refuge. I slammed the heavy, faded blue door shut. My stepfather then came knocking violently on the impenetrable barrier. I slid down against the thick wooden wall, my whole body shaking from the deep and loud vibrations. My little body grew more and more afraid. I tipped into the cold, frozen like the blue tub, and laid there. I cried profusely but silently only hearing my own little echoes at the bottom of the drain. The hot tears ran down to my arm, then the tub, and traveled to the drain. In my memories, I fell asleep until my mother came home.
I was sitting on my bed, crying feeling abandoned and afraid. I got up, went into my tub. Feeling the weird comfort of the tub I fell asleep just as I did when I was a child. When I awoke, I was surprised to see my husband looking oddly at me; I thought to myself it used to be my mother I found. I opened my mouth and began to stammer out a lie.

But Russell helped me up and said, "We need to talk about you and I brought your mother." He paused and went on, "I spoke to your mother about what happened and she’s waiting out in the living room with someone else."

"Who?"

"You'll see." Russell whispered.

He brought me into the living room and there my mother sat with her hands shaky, looking in the direction across from her. I followed her line of vision, there he was, my stepfather. I ran back into the bathroom in confusion. This time my husband was there, sat in the tub with me, and held me as I cried.