Young Writers Society

Sixteen

We wear our

Construction drip
Got the hard hats with the stickers on it
Buckle up your chinstraps just in cast you're fallin'
Things ain't going back to the way that they've been

Got the hi-vis vest with the pocket on your chest
Wear a little picture of the ones that you love best
You've gotta go home to the people in your nest
Gotta go home to the people you love best

Seventeen

Sorry. I can't abide
socks today. I can't abide
sweat today. I can't abide
screens or
solid food or
solitude today. Even the
silver-bell sound of my own
singing is a

caterwaul. I
can't abide
company either. I
can't abide work or
cooking or
calling my mom. I
can't

abide
anything
at
all.

Eighteen: Nice Things

Perfectly-flipped, one-turn-with-the-knife flan,
caramel moat exactly the correct color as it spills over cream castle walls,
silver spoon licked clean.

Spiffy new sweater, fleece still fuzzy, sleeves still soft,
no pilling piling up in the pits,
slightly over-sized (until I go up a size).

Friends fooling around on the phone,
giggling, gasping, goofing, going on and on,
accidentally planning sabbatical travel.

Single-task sticky notes, lined up single-file on my wall,
crinkling as I tackle each to-do and crumple each crisp, sticky page
and three-point-throw them into the trash.

Niu-rou-mian, mild and aromatic, thick and rich as you imagine,
neat wheat noodles nested at the bottom of the bowl,
bulbs of bok-choy and soft, stewed beef, bright in soy sauce stock.

Anticipation, pattering in my heart and my feet and my hands,
fluttering and flitting, flip-flopping to prepare,
the prophetic, patent promise of nice things to come.

Nineteen

Where are you going? Where have you been?

Where did you come from? Where did you go?

Where am I even going? Am I going at all?

Twenty

Mislead by Google,
I arrive thirty minutes before open.
A stranger directs me through the loading dock,
"-----------?" they ask, smiling.
I don't know what they asked but I think it's
"Art Museum?"
And I say
"Yes."

I'm not even confident.
I'm very confused; I am in a loading dock.
It's clean, but the metal floor grate groans as I walk,
Every wall is concrete,
the form tie holes unfilled.
I sign in at the security desk and the man there asks me
"-----------?"
I don't know what he asked but I think it's
"Art Museum?"
And I say
"Yes."

An escort brings me and the stranger through to the dim, dark lobby,
where the ticketing team is reporting in like soldiers,
and then up the stairs to an unfinished exhibit,
dark and plastered with signs.
And I say
"Art museum?"
and the escort, watching the stranger race into the exhibit space says
"......no?"

I stand there in my pink coat and prim black boots,
and the escort stands there in his old-man guard sweater and red lanyard,
and I don't blush hard because I'm tan,
but we are both as red as our clothes.
"I'll just go sit," I say.
"......please."

Twenty-eight minutes until open.

Twenty-One

There once was a poet named Vento
Who rhymed as she scarfed down her bento
She had this small quirk
where she wrote poems at work
And left her notebook when she went-o.

Sonnet Four

Two spirits, both alike in dignity,
In times too old to name we lay our scene.
From ancient grudge, now joined eternally,
Their icy rage turned icy cage unseen.

The huntress e'er eluded by her foe,
The great, white mammoth fighting for its life,
'Till misadventured snowbanks overthrow
And bury them, their unresolvéd strife.

But in obsession grows a strange-ish love,
Made true and deep by years enough attained--
Two souls so tight entwined, nought can remove,
Not e'en the single body that remained.

Though I'm no Ishmael, here narrates the tale
Of Ava and her snow-white mammoth whale.

Twenty-Two

empty car
empty apartment

i string words together--
i piece words together?--
i speak words and pray they fit
repeat them to myself
at the stove
at the sink
at the mirror
where my mouth moves
and i watch my face make shapes i've never seen it make

meandering things, words
i meant to say something to someone
but did they catch my meaning
or did i miss my mark?
did i make myself clear?
did my word choice work?

repeat repeat repeat
stove sink mirror
empty car empty apartment

say the same thing six ways
and pray something sticks
i'll meander into meaning
maybe

Twenty-Three: Unintended Career Choices

Three books and three languages not in the plan
Two years in this job and it's way out of hand
One piece of advice: they will pull you in deep
I signed up to build, not to code for my keep!