Founded in the fall of 1991, Laurel Moon is Brandeis' oldest, national literary publication. Each issue we publish features original work from undergraduate students.
The cicadas’ alarming, their circuited songs thin and acid
green where they bunch up against my ears and ankles.
Their glow-in-the-dark eyes watching at night, the slight
badminton-birdie bodies that fall from the sky like rain.
The trees and bushes are draped with drones, branches
bowing beneath the weight. Every day I listen to alarms
on the walk home, wondering if each burrow leads
to a bomb shelter. A cicada crackles underfoot. In its
radio static, I hear a sigh that echoes my own breaking.
Stella Stocker is a senior at Bradley University studying English, Creative Writing, and Ethics. Her work can be found in journals such as Folio, Broadside, Violet Margin, and Loomings Literary Journal. She loves to spend her spare time writing, painting, and baking.