Never again will I take a hug for granted. Here’s hoping you’re holding your loved ones and beloved activities tight in this wild and weird time. For me, that’s my tiny circle of VIPs, puzzles, poetry and occasionally a wrinkle in time where I stare at a wall.
Poems in particular are expressive nuggets of emotion, of which we’re currently feeling many of them simultaneously. Here, a series of three poems I wrote at the beginning, beginning of the end and then the end of the end of a different turbulent time of my life. Perhaps you’ll relate. 
It’s hard to write poems in the middle.

Good thoughts,
Megan

All talk
So good, no good
Gimme half that pill
You're trouble, you say
But you can't stay away
Let's go to hell together
Wake the neighbor's baby first
Touch me there
Touch me everywhere
Because the rent is paid
And the gloves are off
So shh, no more talk.

11/26
You think I’m kidding about moving to Montana
To stare at the sky and
Try to forget that you never said sorry
I’m such my mother
Running out the door with my hair on fire
Moving around but rarely moving on
 
I chipped a tooth chewing too hard
On my misspoken words
But you don’t care and I can’t not
Let’s admit our love’s not enough
 
Pack our bags, split the bills
Tell everyone we tried
Just don’t think I’m kidding about moving to Montana

Lost or found
If love, so often, is lost, 
how come nobody ever finds it? 
You never stumble across it on a street, 
like a penny Lincoln side up. 
Maybe it's not lost. 
Maybe our verbiage is all wrong. 
Love could run away, I suppose, 
or
if it's a living thing, 
love could die. 
What if love’s like dogs
– you know, those scraggly country dogs still in tune with nature –
who limp away from home to die alone. 
Maybe your love, my love, our love
walked away on its own accord and
we didn't even notice until
we combed through the woods by the creek
and found it lying there lifeless. 
Things are lost out of carelessness,
a lack of attention.
Things die from neglect. 
So which was it? 

Treasures for those you love:
Rainy Bra in Baji Burgundy
Ma Cherie
White Catherine Hair Clip
Maia Top
Aster Skirt
together

Discover more of Megan McCarty's work HERE and subscribe to her newsletter, Night Vision, HERE.

The fourth annual Apartamento cookbook, an homage to eggs, compiles favorite egg recipes and the stories behind them from 16 of the world’s best chefs, food lovers and culinary taste makers, from Tokyo to Tunis.

DYLAN WATSON-BRAWN - Fried Eggs

"I don't like fried eggs very much - only if they are done in one particular way. This technique is based on a classic French recipe I read when I was a kid, from Fernand Point, the chef behind La Pyramide. According to him it's the only way to cook fried eggs. Point drank a magnum of champagne every day; he lived a very good life. I only cook fried eggs when I am feeling very ambitious and I have an ample amount of butter on hand." 

INGREDIENTS (serves 1)
1 egg
100g butter
1 sprig thyme and some picked leaves
1 garlic clove
Salt and pepper
2 pans (one non-stick or cast-iron pan and one saucepan)

METHOD
First, you need a very good egg and very good butter to make this recipe. In the restaurant we like to use butter made from the milk of a Jersey cow named Ursula, and the eggs come from the chickens of the Maran breed. 
Heat up about half of the amount of butter in a non-stick or cast-iron frying pan, then warm the thyme and the smashed garlic clove in it. When the butter sizzles- the pan needs to be quite hot- crack the egg into the pan and cook it on one side. Simultaneously set up a small saucepan to heat the rest of the butter. When you start to see some caramelisation on the edges of the egg and the white is still not set, pour the hot butter over the white and finish with some over the yoke. Immediately remove the egg from the pan and dress with salt and pepper. Finish with some of the pan butter.  

Buy Apartamento Cookbook #4 HERE.

BOOK
Hood Feminism by Mikki Kendall
"Through her prose, Mikki Kendall exposes the egregious blind spots of the feminist movement and gave me a better understanding of how to fight for the rights of all women, not just the ones who look like me. To gain equality for all, some of us, myself included, will have to swallow some difficult truths—this may be inconvenient and uncomfortable, but this is precisely what it takes to stand in solidarity and to listen to the voices of the women who have been oppressed by a movement that should’ve been helping them all along.” — excerpt from Kirsten Miller in Idun’s recent journal post of must-reads. Order Hood Feminism from Semicolon, Chicago’s only black woman-owned bookstore HERE.  
 
ART
Artist, Kenesha Sneed
L.A.-based designer, art director, painter, and ceramicist. Working between two worlds; the digital and the natural Kenesha Sneed's art is one of form, function, and expressive colors. Discover her work HERE.