Young Writers Society

Each poem will be a narrative poem, rather than something super cryptic and metaphorical. Well... I guess some of them will be metaphorical, but that's beside the point. My April is really busy, and narrative poems are outside of my comfort zone, so I can't promise there will be a ton of poems on here.

Update 4/4/2024: So I’m now realizing that there are a lot of poem ideas I have that don’t fit the theme, so I’m slightly changing the title (previous title: Stories of the Synapses) I still want to write those 15 narrative poems, but you’ll also find some metaphorical ones in between

Goals:
- Write 15 narrative poems
- Explore new poetry styles
- Keep up with other's threads
- Update my 24in24 thread when I meet the goal (I'll hit it more often with NaPo, but I'm really bad at logging my progress)

1. i remember the day i stopped being pretty
1a. Fingertips & the Lines of My Palms
2. I Have Given You My Heart
2a. Spectator
3. With & Without You
3a. still talking; 10:14pm
4. i'll tell you stories, if you ask nicely
4a.Glass Lies
5. Melodies on Growing Up and Getting Older
6. Part of Me Died That Day
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.

Total Poems: 10

i remember the day i stopped being pretty

i remember the day i started wearing mascara
to school. it was the first day of eighth grade,
and i didn’t even have an eyelash curler.
it was barely there and didn’t do much,
but oh boy did i think i was pretty.

i remember when mascara suddenly
wasn’t enough, when i didn’t feel pretty
even when my eyelashes turned dark and full,
and my eyes got bigger, and i no longer
had the urge to yawn or rub my eyes during class.

halfway through the year, i started
wearing eyeliner. just a little, just the
corners of my eyes where the mascara couldn’t reach.
and i knew i was pretty again, especially when
My friends said my eyelashes looked good that day.

i don’t remember when the small dots
in the corner of my eyes grew to wings, but suddenly
i was flying every day. oh, how i loved to fly.
how i loved being pretty, and how i loved being the only girl
in my grade who knew how to do her eyeliner.

i was late to school most days, because makeup and
painting over eyebags and making eyes look big and pretty
took time. being pretty took time. and i had
to be pretty. if i wasn’t pretty, what did i have?
i had to be pretty. i had to.

i don’t remember when i started fearing
my own skin. when makeup remover was no longer
a relief, but a dread. when trips to walmart required
mascara and concealer at the minimum,
when makeup wasn’t a want, but a must.

when i wasn’t pretty anymore, even when i wasn’t me.

/Encrypted/

Figertips & the Lines of My Palms

if hands are connection,
I am always grasping
at an emptiness I cannot feel; you’d see
my thumbprints in the context of
eternally numb & cold & dead,
etched into the possibility of nothing I can see.

I say ‘nice to meet you’ &
show you empty jars smeared with
my fingerprints & no one else’s. I hope
you can understand that I am
trying to hold on to you & trying to say
stay with me. I am trying to say hold my hand.

I search your knuckles for stars, but I only find
dried kiss marks that aren’t mine & will never be mine.
I show you my hands, then—the ones that haven’t
been touched. you wonder where the grooves
have gone & I tell you that I washed them away
when the rest of me died.

my fingers are nothing when you look at me
& you know that my hands are not meant
to be held. I am limbless when I
watch you walk away with the lines of my palms
& I die again, possibly for the thousandth time,
as if I had never brushed your knuckles with my fingertips.

I Have Given You My Heart

A girl walks to the altar,
clothed in shame.
The guilt she bears rests heavily on her shoulders,
a constant reminder of the crimes she's committed.

She's been told she is an outcast,
a sinner, a disgrace, dirty, unpure.
So she keeps her eyes down as she approaches,
hands hidden in pockets where their grime cannot be seen.

and suddenly the world comes crashing down,
right upon her shoulders,
just as she reaches the altar.
The girl collapses along with it.

her hands are covered in dirt,
knees scathed,
clothes torn,
she is not worthy of being here.

And yet.

A figure approaches,
a perfect picture of beauty,
love, patience, kindness, compassion.
and he smiles upon the girl.

A smile so bright it could melt the earth.
and he crouches down, down, down,
to meet the girl's eyes,
stoops to where her soul has died.

He takes her face in his hands,
bringing her back to life
and guides her away from the world,
where it lies crumbled in shards.

They walk to a lake,
two other men already knee-deep in the water,
smiles just as radiant
as the girl had seen before.

Together, they are three in one.
Together, they glow like the heavens.

And together still, they place their holy hands
on her head, speaking in tongues and fire.
Suddenly it’s raining, though there are no clouds,
a promise of never the same in the sky.

The girl is dipped into the water;
it’s warm like honey and
so thick it pieces together her soul
piece by pointed piece.

And when she emerges,
she is clothed in a white dress,
a crown of marigolds adorning her head,
a smile gracing her lips.

That smile fizzes and churns in her stomach
until it bubbles up in laughter and
hot tears that stain her cheeks
and she laughs and cries and dances in sunlight.

The man takes her by the hand,
Irises dancing in shared joy,
for he has found his lost lamb,
saved his child from self-destruction.

And he says, “Child, you have never been too far gone.
You have always had a pure heart,
because I have given you mine.”

And the girl breaks and mends again in an instant.

/Encrypted/

Spectator

I peek through the curtains at dawn;
I can’t feel my fingers. I am a spectator here,
I watch & listen & stay quiet in a place
Of silence. This room is melancholy, it is nostalgia.
All I see are fireflies and begonias,
held in clay pots and mason jars with gingham caps.

Light is filtered in through slow blinks
and twiddling thumbs. I am blind and numb but I
see and feel more than I ever have, a juxtaposition
of stay and leave me be.

I’m told opposites attract and I’m not surprised,
this has always been a place of slow decay
before I reform in an instant. And I may never understand
what this place is and what it will be,
so I’ll listen to the buzz and watch the flowers bloom.

With & Without You

Last night I had a dream where we
were floating and holding each other.
Our chests were pressed together,
our fingers intertwined.

I remember how warm everything was,
(with you) how joyous I felt because I finally
got to hold someone and someone was holding back,
my yearning heart finally put to rest. (because of you)

The funniest part is that I don’t even like you,
and I still don’t and still never will.

It’s easy for me to fall for people who love me,
(you) even if it’s not the romance kind of love,
even when I know there is nothing to grasp,
even if I know I can’t love back.

And when I woke up, everything was cold,
(without you) and my hands felt empty.
(without yours) and my yearning began
eating away at my heart again.

I’m sorry I yearn.
I’m sorry I fall, even in my dreams. (for you)

/Encrypted/

still talking; 10:14pm

it’s when we’re in the car,
playing wistful music & swearing
in between muttered stories & loud laughters
in the parking lot after church,
but it doesn’t even matter because
i’m having fun & everything is
warm like orange street lamps.
that’s when it’s nostalgia and memories.

i'll tell you stories, if you ask nicely

if you ask me why i’m sad,
i’ll lie and tell you i’m happy.
but if you ask again, maybe i’ll tell you a story.

i’ll tell you the story of a girl
who liked to dream of unicorns and fairies;
she was very adamant that they were real.
she had this friend who she met on the bus him one day,
and wouldn’t you know it,
soon enough they became best friends.
and soon enough the girl realized that she couldn’t trust this friend,
and maybe it was time to leave.
so she did.
she walked away and never looked back, not once.

then i’ll tell you the story of a girl who
always felt lonely.
who always wondered if she was liked by her friends
and didn’t like sitting alone
and always tried to stand out
so that people would take notice of her and maybe
fall in love with her for just a little while.
i’ll go on to say that this girl
never found what she was looking for,
and i’ll tell you a new story.

this girl was left by many friends.
she stayed loyal to those she loved,
but it seemed everyone left so quick.
she tried and tried again,
but no one liked to stay for long.

and maybe i’ll tell you of the girl who
watched her brother fall in love three times,
and then her sister, who did the same.
and when she asked her mom and dad,
they whispered secrets of past lovers
who didn’t seem to work out.
and by the time this girl was old and gray,
she still didn’t get a turn to fall in love.

and i’ll tell you that all of those girls
are really just me, and there are more lost girls
within her who seem to yearn for the same thing,
though i’ll never tell you if that’s true.

and i’ll ask you if you could love me,
since you were so kind to ask why i was sad.
but i would know your answer before you opened your mouth,
because i always knew that
the love you could offer would never be enough,
simply because there wasn’t much to begin with.

/Encrypted/

Glass Lies

would the cracks of my soul whisper
all my secrets under their breath if I let them
be seen? would the dust I placed on the windowsill
unveil the carefully placed lies I’m so fond of using?
I’m partial to half-truths and fragmented stories,
it seems—they tend to fog reality quite nicely.

I am made of glass shards and mirrored attributes,
I take each lie and glue them to my body
because maybe I can become something worthy,
maybe I can rid myself of the imperfections in my skin,
but every word leaves a bitter taste on my tongue
and every thought drives me further and further to sublimation.

and although I pretend I am stone, really all I am
is a glass box. you can see right through me;
watch the swarm inside me consume all that I am;
watch the bees hum and sting,
watch the honey drip from gold to silver to ash.

I try to wash my sins away, but I am
still stained glass. I am lying to myself
every time I smile and say "hallelujah" because I am
wreathed in guilt and I am still a pretender
who pretends to be vibrant when I am nothing
more than a fabrication of sharp edges and rotten honey.

Melodies on Growing Up and Getting Older

Enspoilered due to swearing and implied sexual content (it's, like, one stanza, but still-) Stay safe out there, kids.



Below is the censored version :]

Part of Me Died That Day

When the girl was told she was soon to die,
she never thought it would be by the hand
of her lover. Yet, here she is,
and here he is, and here she is standing with
glass under her skin and betrayal lodged in her throat.

And on that day, the girl surely did die,
though her body still breathed and
her heart still beat and her brain still thought.
but she was killed that day, oh on that dreadful day,
when she was betrayed, and true love became a fairy tale.