California State University (CSU): Open Journal Systems

This paper studies the perception Queens Village residents have of the facilities created for undocumented migrants. After large anti-migrant protests filled the streets of Queens Village in 2022, this paper aims to understand why this immigrant enclave would express such hositility towards hosting these refugees. Through sixty in-depth interviewees with Queens Village residents, this paper dissects themes present in interviewees\u27 remarks and explores nuances in our understanding of urban policy and distributive justice

Shah, Parsva

English

Not So Neighborly: Analyzing Anti-Migrant Feelings in Queens Village

&nbsp;
many of my close ones know
i speak my truth
by letting my words flo
w.
poetry is so dense,
yet so gentle;
so vivid and unveiling,
yet so modest and fragile

Shahzad, Haya

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
i 
 
many of my close ones know 
i speak my truth 
by letting my words flo 
w. 
poetry is so dense, 
yet so gentle; 
so vivid and unveiling, 
yet so modest and fragile. 
 
i have people believing in me, 
and that’s all i can ever ask for. 
this issue is bigger than all, 
and will effect society’s core. 
 
i want to share how i feel; 
right now. 
 
i present to you my poem: 
 
the cost 
 
a beloved friend of mine reached out 
with her love and concern  
about my future. 
about how my reputation, 
and my degree are on the line. 
 
but what is a future  
at the cost of my Umma 
h’s blood. 
what is a future 
with no freedom for all. 
what is a social construc 
 
known as a “degree”  
compared to the degree of pain  
the palestinian bloodline has endured. 
 
ii 
 
i do this  
with the hopes of my Lord protecting, forgiving, and guiding me. 
i do this  
with the promise to our children of Gaza. 
i do this 
with the heart of my mother; 
with the fearlessness of my father; 
with the faith of my brother. 
i do this for the voices 
of every martyr that was taken  
before their time even started. 
 
these are, 
in fact, 
the children of light. 
 
the “W’s” on my record 
are a stain i hope lasts forever. 
 
the stain of these letters 
will never compare  
to the stain of blood 
left on the oppressors hands. 
 
from dropping my socially constructed  
courses  
at one of the top criminal justice schools in the country, 
in hopes of voicing the underdog’s speech, 
to the paint on my shirt; 
left from making the sign 
at the encampments; 
 
these are merely grains of sand 
 
in the quicksand of uproars happening  
in today’s dystopian times. 
 
“what if i look crazy.” 
iii 
 
my family used to say 
“haya doesn’t need a microphone. 
her voice..,” 
and they didn’t say “loud,” 
but they said “heavy.” 
 
“haya’s voice is already heavy.” 
 
and they’re right. 
my voice is heavy. 
 
you will feel my weight. 
you will feel the ummah’s pressure.  
 
Salam 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
iv 


The Cost

Darian, Morgan

26
8
D
a
ria
n
The Breaking of China Plates | Morgan 
Darian
Grackle noun 
: a large blackbird of the American family. 
: known for: bravery and resourcefulness. 
: sighting: things are not as they seem. 
Use in a sentence: The grackle soared high and 
low,  
finding no friends on the telephone wire.
I am ashamed of my grandmothers. 
Proud of 
grandfathers who broke the law, pirates of time and 
industry, willing to work towards death – 
their pictures make it to the mantle, while 
grandmothers fade forgotten, judged 
too shrill, to selfish, rude, mental 
health pushed to the back behind socks 
and journals worrying about husbands 
not coming home. 
I should be ashamed of my grandfathers, 
and maybe proud of grandmothers 
surviving, alone
raising handfuls of kids on 30 dollars a week,  
 kept safe in husbands’ pockets.
I am ashamed of my grandfathers, proud of grandmothers 
breaking white porcelain  
against farmhouse sinks,  
single mothers married to ghosts, married to men lost in 
secretaries and forests, 
young mothers fighting venomous snakes in the long 
grasses of Iowa,  
walking five kids to church down Chicago pavement.  
Pirates of education and self-reliance, 
a baby on one hip, a shotgun on the other when strangers 
roll down dirt roads.  
Gravediggers, buriers of wishes, laying hopes in co!ns 
along with The American Dream and what love was 
supposed to be.  
So manly, this breaking of hearts. 
So unladylike, this breaking of china.


The Breaking of China Plates

Barnes, Amy

34
Ba
rn
e
s
 I Would Not Be A Poet | Amy Barnes 
I would not be a poet  
If side-by-side we walked. 
Nay, I’d never pen a rhyme 
Were our fingers interlocked. 
The sky’s soft fade from pastels  
To Twilight’s speckled, navy blue 
Would sadly miss my eyes 
As they’d be fixed solely on you. 
Even my beloved moon and 
Orion’s thrice-strung belt 
Would stir no wonder in my soul, 
As I’d have grander feelings to be felt.  
So I suppose I love the fact 
That as the day yields its light 
‘Tis but one figure’s shadow 
That is cast upon the night. 
I cherish all the days that end 
With my entering my home 
And freely taking up my pen 
Because I am alone.


I would not be a poet

VanDomelen, Brianna

19
0
D
a
rle
ne
The Hounds of Hell | Brianna Darlene
Words that cut like a knife, 
are the ones I look back on, during sleepless nights. 
When my thirst for blood awakens—in the absence of light.
Bathe in my su!ering; 
clutch it close like a lover. 
Lovely, dark, and deep; 
the crimson waves pull me under
Plagued by visions of killing every false witness, 
as they beg on their knees for forgiveness 
But there is no absolution—for the unrepentantly wicked.
The hounds are coming— 
to drag us all to hell. 
I hear them scratching at my door. 
Locked in a maze of pain, it’s just as well; 
my soul lies in shreds upon the floor.


The Hounds of Hell

Braden, Kiara

Six Shots

Smith, Phoebe

9
 The world comes in all different shades of Blues. Some-
times they’re right there. Always common and obvious. Found in 
the bright blue of the day sky or within the cold and freshly 
fallen snow. Other times they’re more hidden. There are ones 
that have to be searched for to truly be seen, in the atmo-
spheric haze of distant mountain ranges and in the lightest of 
blues right in the split between the deepest dark of the night 
and the warm yellows in the break of dawn. A luminescent blue 
sign of life that glimmers along the edges of waves, the shim-
mering gleam of a butterfly’s wings, the twinkling highlight 
along a pair of lovers by the moonlight.
 But none are quite so rich, so beloved, as the Blues found 
within all the oceans and all its seas. A place of sapphires and 
azure flowing and tumbling along with white horses. A bright 
one for the calm waters of the Caribbean and the waves beaching 
with a softness found only within the earliest of mornings and 
latest of nights. The royal blue of the Pacific, the darkest of 
navy for the Atlantic, and the cerulean of the Indian are all 
found within the crashing crescendo of the Drake Passage and 
the North Sea, the solid stillness of the doldrums, the humid 
swirling storms of the tropics. 
 She sings and calls with a mouthless voice that leads 
travelers into waters that carry their ships and pull them down 
to her depths, in her grasp for then some, plus ever.
 
She has layers to Her, to the Blues of Her waters. The light-
est and the clearest belong to the ones touched most fully by 
the Light. Ribbons of it dance through the ever-flowing tides, 
drifting through to touch down on those who find their lives be-
low. As the depths extend farther and further down, the Light’s 
reach deteriorates–and the darker it gets. The cerulean fades 
away to navy, the navy to midnight, and midnight to black. 
 There are layers to Her power, to the pull and push of Her 
Blues. The calmest belong to the simplest and the most com-
plex of days, where the clouds drift more than rip through. In 
these moments of blissfully painful serenity is where man 
 AS ABOVE SO BELOW 
PHOEBE SMITH
10
is kept at bay with nowhere to go and nothing to take him away. 
The horizons and the Blues are all that keeps him company here. 
Until, of course, the raging Blues are inescapable. Mountains 
of waves swallow up anything and everything that dreads to 
cross Her; a vessel as large as had ever been seen by the heavy 
galactical waters and all its souls taken from the surface as 
instinctively as a bird takes to the sky. 
 All is where the calls of men and travelers alike are lost 
to the roaring waters, their secrets lay to rest and lost to 
these Blues.
it’s all su!ocating, almost is. the weight is heavy, weighing everything down–but the 
surface! it’s just above, within reach! the surface, with all its constellations of seafoam, 
only one more kick upwards–
Those that voyage, a people who aimlessly wander through the 
Blues, do so ferociously and fearfully. They seek naught and 
want not, launching themselves through the seam between water 
and atmosphere, allowing only life’s push and pull to take them 
wherever they may go, need to go, end up going. Where their 
hearts so decide, is where it leads them; they know not what 
they look for but know what it is when they see it.
 The travelers speak of a time it happens, the perfect split 
second when the waves pause their movement; they’re at their 
calmest, their stillest. Half a blink’s time when nothing is 
happening except the hope for anything beyond the company and 
the pulsing of the moon. At a point when every member of a ves-
sel’s inhabitants is on the very edge of becoming one with the 
Blues themselves; and yet still their foundations remain solid: 
untouched.
 Then, a flash of green; one step, toes on the edge; one 
step more, both feet in. Everything in–
feet drawn–stuck–to the bottom, walking but not attached: "oating. through forests of 
green, skies of dark blue, deserts, and clouds of white horses. splatterings of dancing 
stars and boiling bubbles. prickling and needling at everything; fear and relief, shaking 
and trembling. blind even with eyes wide open.
 
 A constant pressure, a smooth glide through the space 
around them. Kicking and propelling, swinging and maneuvering 
through the darkness. The Blues fade from the brightest azure 
to the darkest of midnights. Everything threatens to compress 
!their entire beings and bodies.
 The cool of turquoise turns to a pale teal; the nee-
dles prickling along skin becomes a permanent resident in the 
marrow of bone. Stuck forever and forgotten never, that feel-
ing. 
 Found within the darkness—a heavenly warmth. The freeze 
disappears. A thrusting of hot air scalds the space around it; 
burning the power of a dying star and boiling a scar into the 
mind. The smoldering smoke follows like a cloud preparing to 
cry.
this is not something to escape. there’s a thundering. somewhere far away. somewhere 
up above? farther below, perhaps? it’s somewhere, can’t quite #nd it–
 The Blues yell and gasp and proclaim and speak, screaming 
and whispering for it all, yet. 
Deeper and deeper, darker and darker. A constant pressure push-
ing and pushing and pushing. Everything threatens to compress 
their entire beings and bodies. Layers upon layers with every 
fathom and league, sinking deeper and further. 
 The dust clears, not settling–disappears. Nothing for it 
to dance in any longer, no light and no shine. Deafening si-
lence echoes and abounds through, what else is to hear but the 
thump of an erratic heart and the cracking of bones succumbing 
to something not even the sun and the moon can reach.
through the clouds and clouds of dust. the light is gone, the pressure is heavy. di$cult to 
see. di$cult to breathe. there’s a pulsing here. 
 Chests threatening to cave in, lungs burning like a star’s 
explosion contained within them. No muscle strong enough to 
fight it off, no will or strength powerful enough. All that’s 
left to do is to sink further and farther. Deeper into the mid-
night and dark, not even an arm’s length away from the navy, 
and the cerulean, and the seafoam.
 No crashing waves or stormy turquoise in sight. Looking 
up, down, twisting and turning to nothing and no one.  Then–
there. Just there.
12
a glowing spec. then more. "ying just by. little bits of dancing and glittering starlight. 
rivers and streams of them, swirling and crashing along together. 
 Sinking and drifting, lighter and lighter. Floating into a 
something. 
 
the dark is still here, but the pressure–the pressure is gone. it’s weightless. there’s noth-
ing here, like ti’s been sucked up and removed. just "oating.
 Then–
glowing ribbons. bits of shimmering and "uttering refractions.
 Waves of cerulean and seafoam, royal blue and murky tur-
quoise waving and rolling to the moon’s beck and call. A place 
of sapphires and azure flowing and tumbling along with constel-
lations of seafoam.


As Above So Below

Lee, Jason

NR
Temple of Crows
This wrought-iron bird searches,
its unblinking black
marble gaze
plows the cloud-cluttered sky.
Its cold, dull wings
flat against its sides. 
No perfect wire feather
ruffled by the coming storm.
The crows mill 
beneath the windowsill,
revering its majestic stillness.
They offer prayers,
rattled knucklebones in a lacquered cup,
to the sentinel staring defiantly up
at the roiling heavens.
Rain pocks the dust at their feet.
In ones and twos, they cast
their fragile bodies into the wind.
Their silent iron idol
searches between the raindrops for their return.
Jason
 Lee
12


Temple of Crows

Khanfucious

Face Your Fears

Trowbridge, Terry

30
 
The plumber diagnoses a leak as human error, 
but there the humans weren’t there to err. 
Invisible puzzles can do that on the second floor, 
especially when they drip into the kitchen ceiling. 
The pipes form a stack of crossroads and elbows. 
Space is pressurized, time is compressed. 
Even years of sedimentary layers can create 
unexpected eruptions around fossilized flotsam.
 
Plumbing, the profession, is an archaeology 
of the opposite of knowledge: studies the unshared, 
the occulted remains that were not meant to remain. 
Sometimes privacy is meant for what we discard, 
and plumbers intuit the designs of those hidden pathways.
 
“Tampons and condoms are the most likely…” 
the plumber explains, and I desperately think, “Don’t I wish!” 
but how are we supposed to evaluate stained drywall, 
human behaviour, chthonic hard water minerals? 
I disagree, try to rule out the diagnosis, ask for differentials.
I try not to make this house into an episode of House. 
I try not to argue, but the plumber wants to speculate 
and I can’t tell how important that is.
 
“I could tear out drywall all day, for days, chasing the leak,” 
(there are so many House puns, e.g. Chase), 
“but your goal is to sell this place,” the plumber reminds me. 
We return to problem-based diagnostics. What is the problem: 
in or out, up or down, stop or flow, sink or sell? I suppose 
I am stuck on the problem of the maze, and 
while the plumber analyzes the mind of the previous owner. 
Both of us make inferences, and leaking takes time. 
 
 
 THE PLUMBER DIAGNOSES A LEAK
TERRY TROWBRIDGE
A


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