FUSION Magazine

Global Microjam - Shape of Jamz to Come?

by David Fiuczynski

A case for microtonality?

At the crossroads of African American rhythms, microtonal harmonies, and eastern melodic inflections and improv concepts - in other words all the elements that the Greater Boston area has to offer with Berklee as its base - new musical ideas are on the horizon. Read more »

One Winter Morning

by Kikuta Norihiro

Cold Bright day. White Breath. Beautiful low peach winter sun. Birds are singing in the middle of pale tree. Storm brought snowman to a new jacket last night. He is smiling with carrot mouth. Picked up the newspaper. Under the sunbeams, colorful advertisement becomes stained glass. Looked up the garden. Small playground is covering by decade of time and scent of snow. Read more »

Train

by J.T. Welsch

Characters:

STEVE: 30-ish, travelling businessman

SIMON: early thirties, academic

KATHRYN: university student on holiday

LISA: university student on holiday

HOSTESS: attractive, French

A train carriage, rumbling along at night, empty except for four passengers: a pair of female university students, speaking to each other quietly; a professional-looking man in his early thirties, reading a packet of papers in the row ahead of them; and another man of about the same age, slouched in the seat facing him.

Read more »

En La Republica Dominicana

by Hannah Ferber

I saw him there

Bare toes curled into black earth

Hunching over the infected gutter

Where water runs the color of injustice.

I saw him there, so small and beautiful

Eyes heavy as the stifling tropical air

So small and beautiful, unnaturally aged

Tiny fingers gripping the plastic cup

He knew he had no choice

But to drink

Hannah Ferber is currently a student at Berklee.  This poem was written for the Poetry Workshop .

The Sunset Tree

by Eric Bolton

It was during the summer in which I was 17 when I became the invisible boy around my house. It wasn’t so much that I had a bad home life. In fact, comparably speaking, I was raised pretty well. It wasn’t like something out of “Leave it to Beaver” where we’d all gather around the dinner table, eat a roast, and talk about our days. My parents were fairly hands-off. They never reminded me to do my homework, but at the same time, they never hit me for not doing it. Really, my childhood could’ve been a lot worse. Read more »

Questions

by Matthew Baamonde

EXT. NORTH BOSTON - BY THE WATER

JACK and LÉA are walking side by side through crowds of pedestrians along a breezy boardwalk. The remains of the summer sun reflect off of nearby buildings and light the bay in a red orange glow. 

Still uncertain if this was meant to be a date or just a friendly outing with a classmate, Jack awkwardly tries to find a balance between giving Léa room and being romantically close.

Léa, clearly a lover of conversation, is rambling as they walk, but focusing more on the beauty and excitement of the world around her.

LÉA

…so in realistic terms, we’re talking about a bunch of people from all over the planet pursuing a very expensive, emotionally draining… dream… that will ultimately not pay off for most of them. Read more »

Poems from the Chinese

translated by David Hinton

Listening to a Monk’s Ch’in in Depths

Carrying a ch’in cased in green silk, a monk

descended from Eyebrow Mountain in the west.

When he plays, even in a few first notes,

I hear the pines of ten thousand valleys,

and streams rinse my wanderer’s heart clean.

Echoes linger among temple frost-fall bells,

night coming unnoticed in emerald mountains,

autumn clouds banked up, gone dark and deep.

Li Po (701-762)

  Read more »

Word and Violin–Spoken Word Poems

by Pireeni Sundaralingam with accompaniment by Colm O’Riain

LETTERS FROM EXILE

These are the letters I leave behind me,

dull lines written for the censor’s eye.

There are no stories here, only headlines,

statements of fact, shielding the truth.

But how can I write my life without politics

when each word placed is part of an equation?

Talk of my income will be translated

into an exact amount for blackmail or ransom;

Talk of our culture will be interpreted

as a covert call to arms.

Read more »

Snow

by Parisa Roohipour

A torrent of white

noise affiliates,

Pressing firmly

against my

ears.

Feel the pressure as

silence floats

by.

Parissa Roohipour is a Berklee alum.  This poem was written for the Poetry Workshop. 

Ten Square Miles, Surrounded by Reality

by Abel McSurely-Bradshaw

Ithaca, New York has to be one of the strangest cities in America.  It’s most easily recognizable for its schools—Cornell University and Ithaca College.  It is known for its liberalism, its waterfalls and a nationally known music festival called Grassroots.  Much like Boston, most of its population consists of college students. Come summertime, half the city is empty.  Shortly after the students leave, they are replaced a couple weeks later with music festival hippies by the busload that pour in bearing tofu and non-conformity.  Many of these long time non-conformists end up loving Ithaca so much, that they stay. From these travelers eco-friendly communities are created, homeless populations skyrocket and a never-ending Bush protest begins.  It is a very liberal, very white place.  It is a place of acceptance of all ideas except the wrong ones, who are open to all cultures but will never change their own. Read more »