Young Writers Society

14
if i am beside myself, then there is no space on this bench
if i hold my breath, then sparks flicker across my vision

if a magpie lands on a lamp post, then it flicks its tail once
if it lands on a mailbox, twice

if you are finished eating, then help me with the dishes
if you are finished with me, then clear your plate

if the clouds are gray, then it is likely to rain
if the sky is red, then it is likely to rain

if a horse on another continent can run for a whole day, then what is stopping me?
if i leave now, then i could be untraceable by daybreak

if the trees knew how much joy their leaves bring us, they would still drop them
if the fire knew how much comfort it brought, it would still burn us

if you wanted me back, then you should have tried harder to keep me
if i wanted to be desired, then i should have tried harder to be desirable

if the snow comes, maybe it will bury me
if it buries me, maybe i'll never be found

15
Family Homestead in Eastern Arizona

We know how to cut ourselves off.

After passing through Show Low, driving through stands of ponderosa pine, kicking up clouds of red dust, pointing at specks of Harris’s hawks hanging up in the thermals, mile marker 372, turning off highway 60 onto forest road 117, wheels crunching, songs like “Red Wing” winding through our throats, horny toads flashing through the juniper and dry summer grasses, road bending, trunks flashing past…

We see the homestead sign and feel our blood calling to the dirt.

Our white skin does not belong here, on the homeland of Pueblo and Apache.

Sierra Trigo stands bare and bald. I hope the monsters in our campfire stories do not take up residence there.

Bryson got acute appendicitis on that trail once, and there was no signal to call for an ambulance. It wouldn’t have helped anyway.

We fill our mouths with imitation maple syrup from a gallon jug and pancakes cooked on the expanse of grill that moments before had been covered in thick pine sap. We eat and eat.

We feel snakes along our sides at night. We lay in skinny beds in ancient cabins under moldering quilts and shudder.

Rain comes and we are different. Opaque brown puddles swallow our faces whole.

We sing “Abide with Me” and listen to stories of cattle-wrangling and great, great aunts.

The children are wearing handkerchiefs around their mouths.

We throw horseshoes and heat up old cattle brands to burn into planks of wood.

We are sick of our blood.

We are sick and we want to go home.

16
Everything You Do Is a Balloon

Blue flare of sunlight on the floor after passing through a balloon
I am obsessed with the helium-filled globes, the tug upwards
on the ribbon tied around my wrist. I dream of being tiny,
floating down the hall in a tiny paper basket. The candy shine

makes my mouth water. I want to stick the balloon in my mouth
like I did when I was a child before my mom yanked it away
warning me I could suffocate myself, or my teeth could pop it
and the pieces fly down my throat and snap against my tongue.

The latex is pliant and sticky under my fingers. I remember twisting
balloon animals. The ketchup-bottle look of the air pump, the sad
farts of failure as the skinny tube flies across the room. The magic
of the flowers, swords, and crowns. The charisma of the dog.

You are just like these balloons in every way. I want to breathe
you in, feel the way you fill my lungs and make my chest light.

17
April Afternoon

The spots of April blaze
against Earth’s cracking.
Tulips lit like matches
held to cardstock clouds.

Pigeons hover in droves,
creating a crown in the air.
Their wings become eyes
that blink at me.

Windows line up in a row
as if emerging from the mason’s
careful brickwork.
Once I held something worth holding.

18
Lost in Thought

Out in the alley, dandelions shake
their manes of pollen and memories
hunt me. The icicles have left a jagged
emptiness on the jaw of the house.

Wind tousles the dust. A dark eyed
junco twists its drab head at me.
The neighbor’s dog chases something
around the roots of a buckeye.

My thumb rubs circles into the back
of my hand. I’ve wrecked my wrists
from too much grasping. I practice
holding nothing. As the sky wheels

above, I am uneasy. The ground
might tip too far back and send me
tumbling over the sharp edge
of the horizon.

19

AquariumTok

We’re discussing the shortform video content
that the Algorithms have been serving us
like some kind of soup or slop or stew
(we can feel our minds softening
into a kind of warm porridge).
One kind of video everyone seems to be watching
is rating the scoopability of fancy slimes. I can’t wait
for two years from now when no one will understand
what I’m talking about. Trends are so volatile.

Right now I’m lost in aquarium videos. Not your average
pretty goldfish or betta fish—though I’ve seen some
of those as well—no the rabbit hole I’m swimming in
is infested with “monster fish” over four feet long
that someone is keeping in a giant indoor pond
they built themself. Arowana and alligator gar
with their little whiskers. Fifteen-inch reticulated puffer
and four-foot electric eel in their own separate, massive tanks.
The fish swim fluidly and don’t know how strange
they look, what a surprise they’d be
to an unsuspecting burglar. If I broke into a home
during desperate times, and found a koi pond
complete with aquatic plants and frogs,
it would be difficult to keep from pausing
and trailing my hand through the water.
I want to feel their smooth and slimy scales.
I want to be arrested, taken aback, by beauty.

20

Anatomy Love Poem

I want to pour your smile across my skin
like the lotion scented with pear and magnolia.

Stay with me. Though I have nothing to say.
If I throw my arms wide and command,

Enter, would you let me encircle you
in my bones? Humeri, Radii, Ulnae,

and my skittering finger and wrist bones
with names like lunate, triquetrum, scaphoid.

All these bones given to me so I could
run my palm up you back,

lay my cheek (zygomatic bones)
on your shoulder (acromion)

and feel safe.

21

Indigo

after a while, indigo buntings
come to gorge on seeds. delicate
blue feathers coat their edges and their songs
are bright with anger, fear, and longing.
I’ll never feel joy like them. I could chip
at the sky and fill my belly with blue,
and still my bones will never be hollow,
still I will never sprout wings.

the huckleberries are blooming on the mountain.
little bells that the bees bumble out of with faces
covered in pollen and stomachs full of nectar.
soon the flowers will shrivel and leave a hard
green berry that will expand and redden,
soften and darken, as if taking one slow breath.
The mountainside will burn with purple fruit
and the bears will become heavy with joy
as they trundle from bush to overburdened bush.
I long to pluck one and crush its vibrant skin
between my teeth, taste its sweet juice
and wild-grown bitter seeds. But the mountain
wears only blossoms for now. All I have
are preserves, frozen berries, and a memory
of ripe, wild-picked berries from last year.
Maybe this year, if I eat enough, I too can learn
to resist cultivation.

22

Enter, Sun!

Enter, sun! Fill the window with light from your perch
93 million miles away. Warm the bricks of the house.
Bleed, bricks! Leech your heat into the wall, into the
room, the bed where this body lies on clean sheets.
Rise, spine! Click each vertebra into its place, align
yourself perpendicular to the floor. Hold this body.
Again, feet! Again you are tasked to bear without
complaint this body’s weight, the cold kitchen tiles.
Flow, water! From the tap into a glass, from the glass
down through the throat. This body is grateful.
Turn, O wheel of day! This body demands so much
from every minute. Keep turning. Keep the world
giving, stretching out each comfort, the ground
to walk on, the air to breathe, giving until the light
of the sun is devoured, at last, by the horizon.

23
For my superpower I choose pausing time

knowing I would screw everything up
if I were allowed to time travel.
But a pause feels innocent, innocuous.
I can nap every day with no guilt,
enjoy a sunset as long as I please.
I can catch up on all the shows
I was always too busy to watch,
play the entire trove of video games
I’ve collected and never touched.
I can travel across the world,
see every major city in a day
with no fear of visas or violence.
I can get all my chores done,
all the drudgery. Finally finish
those books I claim to be writing.
Get everything out of the way
so that while time moves,
I can spend those finite minutes
with you.

24

A Little different today! I turned my day 13 poem into a contrapuntal!
You can read it here: https://rookpoetry.wordpress.com/2024/0 ... other-way/

25

After Marosa di Giorgio

A ridge of pines overlooked the popcorned heads of bright green deciduous.
The pines were a gathering of mourners all in black; they wept flakes of birds, buntings plummeting like pearls.
In their forest, I hit rocks against rock, until I drilled a hole big enough to climb into.
Jewel-backed bugs formed orderly lines into earth burrows.
We awaited the vulture’s violet shadow.
When it came, the stream unstuck itself from the ground and wrapped around the throats of deer; then buntings descended, the tulip tree’s blossoms descended, the sparrows descended.
We lay where the river no longer ran, head to foot, shoulder to wing.
We paved the ground for the vulture who rode atop a black horse, with death in its mouth.

The variety within your NaPo thread is awesome rook! I am always a fan of color poems; and love huckleberries - so I definitely liked your "indigo" poem and the "if" poem 14 was a really excellent read too - some of my favorites so far.

if you wanted me back, then you should have tried harder to keep me
if i wanted to be desired, then i should have tried harder to be desirable

if the snow comes, maybe it will bury me
if it buries me, maybe i'll never be found

</3 These lines - simple on their surface, but their continuity with the rest of the poem, and the image of being buried in winter-snow is the perfect conclusion.