Young Writers Society

Ah, senior year. And the final semester of senior year, no less. Still, that hardly thrilled Elias when he squinted closely at the schedule on his phone. Did he really sign up for a poetry class? He didn't really remember doing that... then again, the guidance counselor had yelled at him that he needed one last English credit to graduate on time, and apparently he had procrastinated on this so much, that he frustrated the guidance counselor to picking whatever was available.

Poetry, though? Hmm...

Eh. He'll be fine. He had made plenty of "roses are red, violets are blue, sugar is sweet, and so are you, boo!" poems to girls. Maybe he could impress the girls with his newfound poetry skills at the end of it? Maybe Mel would even want to get back together with him? The possibilities were endless.

Elias shuffled into the classroom right when the bell rang, noticing that the screen displayed an assigned seating arrangement. Blech, assigned seating! That made Elias scrunch up his nose as he tried to find his face and name. Oh well, it wasn't like he recognized anyone here anyways. He'd make friends anyways.

He noticed that the desks consisted of long tables with three desks on each one, and he threw his backpack down and sat right in the middle between two girls. He barely had time to look at them, nevertheless talk to them since he was already running late, and the teacher was already starting to introduce himself.

Elias dozed off, getting distracted by his cool plaid vest. So apparently their teacher's name was Mr. Yorkie. Elias couldn't help but notice that there was a picture on his desk of Mr. Yorkie grinning with another fun vest wearing a bowtie while holding a yorkie dog, also wearing a vest-shirt, and with its fur on its head tied up with a bow. It was actually super adorable.

"So introduce yourself, because you will be working with each other for the rest of the semester," Mr. Yorkie said, snapping Elias back to reality. "Remember, teamwork is key to the competition."

Uh... competition? What competition? Wasn't this a poetry class?

Elias blinked, realizing he probably should have paid attention. He quickly turned his head between the two girls. To his right was a freckly girl with pretty curly red hair that bounced around her face and the air, and even though she was sitting, he could tell that she was short. To his left was a girl who was fancily dressed with short floppy dark hair and big glasses that framed her eyes, and she already didn't look amused.

Elias didn't really know them, but he felt like he had seen them around before. Still, he didn't want to guess their names and be completely wrong.

"Hey," he said. "I'm Elias. What are your names?"

Lillian peered into room 217 and glanced down at her timetable one more time. Yup, this was the place. She was excited out of her mind for this poetry class, though by her serious expression and shy posture you'd never be able to tell.

She made her way into the classroom and slipped into a seat that had her name printed in tired grey italics: Lillian Leary. She was right by the window, and had a stunning view of the trash bins and broken-asphalt parking lot below. She could write a gritty, enjambment-heavy poem about that vista for sure.

As she waited for the bell to ring, Lillian took in the class. Watching her teacher get ready did not instill much confidence in her heart. He had written in big, loop-enthused letters on the board, "Welcome To MR. YORKIE'S Perspicacious Poetry Class", and was now straightening a yellow-and-red striped bow tie perched on his neck.

Just after the bell finished ringing, a tall boy squeezed himself into the chair next to her, dishevelled and out of breath. He seemed...carefree? He was certainly unperturbed by being late, and dozed off as soon as Mr. Perspicacious Yorkie started giving instructions.

Fancy cover slide: Intro to Poetry and Spoken Performance, accompanied by a stylized quill artistically splashing ink across the screen. "We will start this class off by spending some time exploring the different forms, themes, and styles found in the expansive world of poetry." Mr. Yorkie beamed at the class, blatantly ignoring the sea of glazed faces.

Dissolved transition to next slide: an image of a woman standing at a microphone, mid-dramatic gesture. "Our end goal, though, is to fearlessly conquer the art of spoken word poetry. You will work together in small groups to write and deliver a spoken word poem." Mr. Yorkie strode majestically to the window and then spun around dramatically. "Whichever group I deem strongest, will represent our class -- and school -- at a regional poetry slam competition."

Lillian glanced at the boy next to her. She doubted he was taking in a word that their teacher was saying; he seemed transfixed by the portrait of Mr. Yorkie's dog which stood front and center on the teacher's desk. Peeking past the boy, Lillian looked across at the other girl sitting at their desk. She had short dark hair and a short-tempered, dark expression on her face. Lovely.

"That being said, the people you are sitting with are your partners!"

Lillian inhaled sharply.

"So introduce yourself, because you will be working with each other for the rest of the semester," Mr. Yorkie proclaimed happily. "Remember, teamwork is key to the competition."

A boy who didn't pay any attention in class and a girl who looked fed up with anyone who dared to exist? This would be fun.

"Hey," the boy introduced himself, "I'm Elias. What are your names?"

"I, um -- I'm Lillian," she responded with a timid smile. She extended her hand for a handshake and immediately regretted it. That was definitely not how people introduce themselves to class partners.

Elias blinked as he flicked his eyes down at Lillian's hand, and then he grinned and slapped her hand for a high five.

"Cool, can I call you Lily?" he asked as he pulled his hand away like this was a normal thing he did everyday.

Lillian was too formal, anyways. Like a grandma name. Lily was shorter. And cuter. Like a flower. Because it was a flower. Maybe he should ask if she'd ever written a poem about lilies? Seems like a genius idea.

Lillian scrunched her nose momentarily in confusion before breaking into a quiet smile. Low five. That worked too.

Lilli? Only her mom called her that. But -- this was the last semester of her last year of high school, so why not. It wasn't like she'd ever speak to him again after this, so what did it matter. "I mean, sure. As long as you spell it L-L-I in your head."

She paused for a moment, then raised her eyebrows. "Can I call you Elli?"

Hazel tapped her pencil to her agenda book impatiently, noting from her watch that it looked like class would start two minutes late, and hoping it didn't end two minutes late the same way. She needed to get to calculus early to ask Ms. Witte about scheduling extra practices on Tuesday / Thursdays with the Math League because they were woefully underprepared for districts and someone needed to teach Eugene about polynomials. Hazel couldn't say she enjoyed math, but as her dad would say, "Colleges aren't looking for more kids with participation points" if they weren't even going to place, all that time would be wasted and it wouldn't even be worth adding to her college apps. And Hazel didn't have any time to waste.

She watched as Mr. Yorkie signed the board with an artistic flourish and turned to greet the class. Despite his slight tardiness, he seemed quite enthusiastic, Hazel smiled slightly, as the man began with excited exaggerated gestures to introduce the course subject, "~Painting is poetry that is seen rather than felt​, and poetry is painting that is felt rather than seen!~" he said quoting daVinci. Hazel jotted the quote into the margin of her calendar for that day, glancing up as the boy next to her did a head-bob fighting sleep.

You like poetry, Hazel. Lighten up, this could be fun. This is supposed to be your chill class. Her parents didn't exactly believe in "chill" but Hazel had told them it would make her seem more well-rounded to have an additional English / Fine-Arts flex credit. And Hazel had always liked poetry. It seemed like the only place in the world where time actually did stand still, or at least could be preserved for a moment. And you could say what you actually thought, and felt, and dreamed.

She tuned back into Mr. Yorkie's opening monologue as he said the words, "regional poetry slam competition" What?! Who said this was going to have a performance element? The syllabus didn't say anything about out-of class work needed for this, she grabbed at her bookbag and flung open her course folder. Shoot. She hadn't read the back-half of the syllabus at all, and the details looked extensive, there was no way she was going to have time for this.

"That being said, the people you are sitting with are your partners!"

Hazel put down the now slightly crumpled syllabus and looked over to her table-mates to really take them in for first time since the class started. She thought she may have had the girl with the curly hair in a class before, but wasn't sure they'd ever spoken. Hazel was quite sure she'd been in a class with the boy before, and recognized his name when he introduced himself, "Elias" - like the Aristotelian commentator I suppose. She wasn't sure what to make of the two. She watched as they exchanged a somewhat awkward high-five and then asked for nicknames and wasn't sure how to follow up. Hazel considered for a split-second offering an additional awkward high-five to the mix, then decided against it.

"Hi there, um Lillian, or Lillie and Elias, or ... Eli? I don't think we've met before, I'm Hazel, I don't really do nicknames. And it's great to meet the both of you, but I'm not so sure I'll be doing this poetry competition thing, my schedule is pretty tight right now. Have either of you done much poetry?"

Elias was really thinking about this. Lillian-slash-Lily wanted him to spell her name as.... L-L-I...? Lli? Maybe she meant L-I-L, and he should call her Lil? Yeah, okay. He could do that.

"Uhhh, no," he said when she asked if he could call him Elli. Blech.

But it seemed that it didn't really matter, since the other girl - Hazel - picked up on his not-nickname.

Elias squinted at her. He was sure he'd seen her before...

He casually leaned back, peering at the back of Hazel's head for a second while she droned on about poetry. Yep. He had definitely seen her before. At least, the back of her head. She was the girl he copied off of a math test once and got an A. It was pretty legendary, but he was sad when the Mr. Markson made them all switch seats the next day.

"Hey," he said as he leaned forward again, suddenly enamored by her eyes behind the big glasses. "Your name is Hazel and you have hazel eyes. That's pretty cool. We're like, matching."

Elias grinned, pointing at his own hazel eyes as if she needed an extra cue.

Hazel raised her eyebrows at Elias' comment, "Poetic continuity you could say, I suppose," she said, trying to bring the topic back to poetry. She shook her head again - on one hand she knew she absolutely did not have time for this sort of poetry contest whatever it was, on the other hand she was curious what writing and performing poetry with a team might be like.... it had to be more interesting than Math League. @_@ But her parents for sure wouldn't let her get out of that. She was also annoyed that she just couldn't manage to remember where or if she had met Elias before. Hazel made a mental note that maybe he'd be good with imagery or observational poetry because he seemed to have a knack for random observations.

"I think this should be an interesting course, I don't know if you all had a chance to read to syllabus yet - but it looks like Mr. Yorkie has a pretty packed semester for us." She glanced up at Mr. Yorkie who was making his rounds between the different class groups, alternating between bits of Shakespeare quotes and big guffawing laughter. It looked like a few of the groups had people that knew each other, but for the most part it looked like people had been mixed up pretty well. Hazel turned to Lillian, "How about you Lillian? Have you done much poetry before or new to you?'

Lillian watched their interaction, amused. Was Elli really flirting with Hazel two minutes into introductions? Or was he just cluelessly saying whatever popped into his head? Either way, boys.

Hazel asked her whether she'd done much poetry. Lillian shifted in her seat to face Hazel but didn't actually look her in the face -- Hazel had an intimidating face. Intimidating everything, really. "Oh -- I, I mean I really love poetry. I don't, I don't know if I'm any good at it or anything, but I have written lots." The words seemed to trip out of Lillian's mouth like timid, bleary-eyed kittens. Although, that was a rather nicer image than the reality of Lillian just being straight up awkward.

Mr. Yorkie bounced towards their table as she finished saying this. "Music is the food of love! Teamwork is the food of slam poetry!" He cooed happily. "Have you all introduced yourselves?" Mischievous pause. "Hmm, let me test you. Tell me each one fact that you've learned so far about your other two partners!"

Lillian could practically hear multiple exclamation marks dripping from his voice. He was just -- too enthusiastic about everything. Too much bouncy energy. It was exhausting just to listen to him speak.

Elias was sad that Hazel seemed to not think about how cool it was that Hazel was hazel-eyed, and so was he. They already had a lot in common... or so he thought. She seemed to say something-something poetry, something-something syllabus. Honestly, her voice was like ASMR. It made him want to go straight to sleep. Had she ever considered a career pathway in lullaby storytelling? Maybe audio books meant to put people to sleep?

His thoughts were interrupted when he realized that Lil was talking next, and his eyes brightened a little because she was kinda adorably shy. She looked like one of those crying cat memes.

"Aw, I'm sure your poetry is great. Can I hear some?" Elias asked with a genuinely curious smile, but then was cut off by Mr. Yorkie saying something about two random facts about their partners.

"Oh! I'll go!" Elias announced without hesitation as he eagerly raised his hand and kept talking before Mr. Yorkie could say yes or no. He grinned and gestured between Hazel and Lil. "This is Hazel and she has hazel eyes and is very good at math. And this is Lil, aka L-L-I, and she's the best poet I've ever heard."

Mr. Yorkie stood there unmoving for a second, only blinking in response like he wasn't expecting these facts at all. But then a happy smile spread across his face, and he placed his hand on his sweater-vest chest, looking proud.

"That's fabulous, Elias!" he said, not even hesitating with his name, like he had practiced going over the class rooster a million times. "And what about you, Lillian? Hazel? What random facts have you learned?"

Elias was sweet, in an over-stimulating and chaotic way. Although now he had switched to referring to her as "Lil", which confused Lillian -- but she couldn't be bothered to correct him. Besides, one syllable was more efficient than two, she had to give him that. Not that he seemed like the type to care about efficiency; she was willing to bet a good bit of money that he was an it's about the journey, not the destination type.

Elias boldly announced to Mr. Yorkie that she was the best poet he'd ever heard. Lillian blinked, confused. "But--"

She was too quiet to be heard between Elias and Mr. Yorkie, though. "And what about you, Lillian? Hazel? What random facts have you learned?" The teacher inquired, almost hopping from foot to foot like an overexcited toddler.

Lillian scrambled to think of something to say and blurted out the first sentence that popped into her head. "I, uh, I learned that Elias is flirty and Hazel is busy?"

Crap. She had not just said that.

Elias took a second to absorb what Lil said.

Flirty? He was flirty? ... Huh. Yeah, he could see it.

"Oh my bad, I didn't mean to flirt with you," he said with a little smile as he scratched the side of his cheek to silently apologize. "I just think you probably make some sick poems. Hey, have you ever wrote about little lilies before? I feel like that would be really fitting."

Lillian blinked, unsure how to respond. He obviously hadn't been flirting with her. Oh gosh, now he was going to think she was overreacting to him complimenting her. "I didn't think -- I mean, I didn't mean you were -- Hazel -- hazel eyes..."

Before she had a chance to string together enough coherent syllables to address the little-lilies inquiry, Mr. Yorkie interrupted once more with his seemingly infinite enthusiasm. "Ah, teenage romance! A wonderful theme to consider for your slam poem!"

On that note, Lillian leaned forward and buried her face in her hands, fully mortified.

Hazel watched as awkwardness ensued between her two assigned partners, and was grateful for the distraction from the "what do we know about our partners" question. What could she possibly know about Elias or Lillian yet? They'd barely had 15 minutes together! She wasn't sure she was following, but she thought that Lillian had accused Elias of flirting with Lillian - this was certainly going to be an interesting semester!

Mr. Yorkie mentioned romance being a wonderful theme for poetry, then launched into another of his poetry recitations - "Who plead for love, and look for recompense,
More than that tongue that more hath more express’d.
O, learn to read what silent love hath writ:
To hear with eyes belongs to love’s fine wit." spinning in a circle with arms outstretched as he recited Shakespeare? Donne? Hamilton? Hazel wasn't quite sure. A few of the neighboring tables held back stifled laughs, and Hazel thought she saw one student take out a camera phone to try to get a video.

"Now class, your first assignment will be to do some introductory poems - the twist of course is your poems will have to introduce each other! Team work makes the dream work as they say! I recommend acrostics, but shoot for a sonnet or something else if you're feeling ambitious! Good luck, and may the verse be in your favor!"

Hazel looked back at the other two, and noticed Lil's face was still hiding in her hands and Elias had a huge smirk on his face - he seemed more excited than horrified about the prospect of introduction poems. Interesting.

Hazel flipped her notebook open to jot down some notes, "Well... I can start I guess - I don't know how long I'll be in this class because like I said, I don't think I can make that slam poetry thing work with my schedule. But we might as well try this first assignment. Uh... I'm Hazel, I don't usually do well at these "fun facts" sorts of exchanges. I'm part of a few academic clubs - Mathletes and the Science Student Association. I don't know if you follow those, but our teams are abysmal this year honestly. That takes up a lot of my time right now. I'm interested in getting into the Archeology program at Blaring Bluffs University to study the impacts of the Sarcosuchus Dinosaur in the prehistoric food-chains, but my application still needs a lot of work. I like olive green, brown, hazel, heather-green, you get the idea. I've got a great carrot cake recipe, if you're into that... And that's probably enough for an acrostic?"

Hazel paused to see if she'd lost the other two - it appeared their eyes weren't glazing over with the mention of the Archeology program, which was a good sign, since it seemed like that was the typical reaction among peers.

"So what about you two? Any important life details you'd like to be blasted out to the whole class? Lil.. Lillian... how would you prefer that we spell your name for acrostic purposes?

Hazel got ready to take notes for anything that might work in for an acrostic.

Lillian slid her hands down so they propped up her chin. Were they going to have to read these "introductory poems" in front of the whole class? Oh gosh, she couldn't -- no, it was okay, she could do this. It was poetry, after all, and she loved poetry. She squeezed her eyes shut tight for a moment and, after taking a slow breath, opened them again as Hazel began to preface her ramble with the pessimistic statement that she might not even finish the course. Hazel sounded very...booked up. Let's see, H-A-Z-E-L: hectic schedules flutter on the / air she stirs up as she flies from club to club. Zed though, that would be a toughie.

"Hazel, you don't happen to spell your name with like, an 's' or something, do you?" Lillian inquired quickly, and then realized in embarrassment that Hazel had just asked her and Elias about themselves. Whoops. "Oh, uh, my name is spelled L-I-L-L-I-A-N. And, um, about me. My favourite colour is light blue, um, and I have a cat named Pandora and a zebra finch named Zeborah. And you might've noticed -- actually you definitely have -- but I'm not really a people person. I'd much rather be snuggling with Pandy or Zeb and reading a book than be here. Not that I don't like you guys or anything, just..." Oh no, she had been so close to getting through that delivery without saying anything hugely awkward. So close, and yet so far.

"Anyway, Elias! What about you?"