October Collection of Student Poetry

A Nation Dies Upon My Tongues

I am the failure of a beautiful culture.

The amalgamation of mispronounced words and forgotten history, a mere fragment of what I should be.

I can’t bear the image of myself in the mirror 

All I can see is the person who destroyed what I could have been.

The person who pinched and pressed at the bridge of her nose, 

who wanted so desperately to push down

Her family’s face.

I can’t bear the reminder of idiocy, 

The person who pulled at her tongue,

And then cut it off out of stubbornness,

All too eager to forget my mother 

I am the one who cried at night and wished to wash away my ancestor’s skin,

My ancestor’s body, my ancestor’s hair,

And now?

I lament not being enough like them.

Mira

Hauntings on a Minuscule Scale

The Ghost haunting my doorway looks so familiar,

gaunt, harrowed, pale, and silent

This is not my first haunting

I know what it wants,

and I know what it costs

How do I pay when I’m broke and broken?

Why do I fix myself just to give myself away again?

The Ghost stands and watches me,

Black holes betray their bandaged brain

Blood pools and pours from every orifice, staining my door knobs red

My heart beats a foreign tune within my chest,

drowning my thoughts in fear and arrhythmia

I try to leave and my hand is red.

I try to scream and my tongue is blood.

I try to exist,

And I am the Ghost

 Faith Baltgailis

 

A Heart Made of Hellfire

The words in my mouth taste like ash, when it’s my heart that’s burning

My body burns from the inside out,

hellfire consumes my heart,

My bones are bludgeoned and blackened,

Smoke fills my lung, breathe in death and exhale life, your life, my life, our life

Why is my skin so cold when flames feed upon my flesh? 

I was taught that flames were hot, fire is warmth, coals can create civilizations,

And ashes, 

Ashes are the outskirts, are the lost and burnt and forgotten

There are ashes in my mouth 

And I am angry, I am mad, I am livid 

I am burning up upon entry

I am forgotten.

My words are meaningless,

My heart, 

Is Frozen

Faith Baltgailis

Autumn in this House

autumn in this house smells like memories I can’t remember

and the  leaves out front dress the ground like dirty laundry

clothes that fit too small

hair cuts cut too short

yellow lights at 5 pm

fights fought too often and

good nights sleep spent too sleepless

in bedrooms too cold

under a roof like soggy cardboard

in a house that smells like memories I don’t like to remember

in a house that maybe one day, 

will smell like home

Danica Wilson

I Don’t Write About You

I like to write about what I love

about a ladder to the stars 

and forests

and neptune in my palm

and oceans

but I don’t write about you 

I don’t write about you because I’m bad at spelling

well, that’s a lie, I’m quite good at spelling,

I don’t write about you because I don’t write in red ink

and the doodle of cupid in the margins shot his arrow but it got lodged in my electric fence before it reached my heart

I like to write about what I love but I don’t write about you because I write in black ink which flows from the paper cut on my hand but spills over the page until all that is left is oceans 

and neptune in my palm

and forests

and a ladder to the stars

but not you

I don’t write about you because I have you and black ink is permanent

and I’m so scared 

I’ll spell it wrong

Danica Wilson

Possession of a Familiar Feeling

Sometimes I think

if I draped the bedsheets just right

my limbs might forget to stay solid.

That maybe

if I lie here long enough 

I’ll misplace my name somewhere between dreaming and waking

and the walls will let me drift through.

I wonder 

if you would notice me behind you in the mirror

I wonder

if the doors really do close by themselves

I wonder

if a haunting is still a haunting when you invite it in

Grace Taylor Tunski

Letters

She and I intermittently correspond.

One day she sends me a moth, the first I am able to hold on my own

A week later, I respond by naming the crow that sits on my back porch.

I receive wild raspberries and a sunrise painted in gossamer strokes and in turn

I let the water soak through my clothes every time it rains.

I don’t read the next letter she sends:

summer is ending and I am too busy stuffing as much August into my pockets as I can to notice.

She promptly sends a wasp nest my way, along with hail in September:

I take care to pick wildflowers in her name the next day.

Back and forth we write, 

in dragonflies

and careful steps around slugs

and branches sheathed in lichen.

Love letters tucked into every shaky breath.

Grace Taylor Tunski

My Sewaddle: A Story Poem

Ever since I met you, you brightened up my life.

I’d never felt that much at home until you came along.

You made my home feel more homey.

You truly were the best birthday present a 5 year old girl could ask for.

All my friends and classmates may have had Meowths, Eevees, and Lillipups,

But I wouldn't trade you for anything.

You were the daisies on my bedside table in the morning.

When I was happy, you were happy.

When I was sad, you’d sew me heart-shaped pillows out of leaves.

When I was tired and needed rest, you’d make sure I could sleep through a tornado.

When I was scared of the thunder crashing, you’d snuggle up to me and make me feel less scared.

When the sky suddenly showered us with its tears, you’d sew together an umbrella for us.

After all these years together, you’re still as sweet as Halloween candy.

I’m now 30 years old, married, and have kids, but you’re still so precious to me.

You’ve been with me through good times and bad, and never left my side. I never would have become the Rosa Brown I am today if it weren’t for you.

Adelaide Randall