Poetry

Table of Contents

Hailey Barnes:

1. A Letter to Eve – Robert Halleck Poetry Prize winner

Alaina Beauregard:

1. Finite Infinities

Caitlyn George:

1. A Quick Google Search

Robert Nelson:

1. A Thousand Different Colors

2. Like a Vermont Dirt Road

Roree Stewart:

1. Secondhand Scars

2. Viv

Aidan Danforth:

1. Seasonal Work

2. The Psych Major

Joseph Rauch:

1. Staying Alive

2. Broken Promises

Jasmin Sackey:

1. Her Dance

2. The Confession

Andrii Shadrin:

1. You Were His Poem

2. Emotions

The Cinema of Isolation (Caitlyn George)

A Letter to Eve

Hailey Barnes

Dear Eve,

I feel you have been wronged,

Not just by the snake in the garden,

But by heaven’s convoluted plan.

In your hand and in your mouth,

An apple of contradictory narratives.

They saw only two paths for you,

The Madonna or the Mistress.

They chose for you.

I am sorry you were taken advantage of, subjugated, and punished.

I am sorry that you have been objectified and ostracized by your male counterparts.

When they should have been one with you, they rejected you and threw you down,

Tore you apart and left you.

I can feel the blood that pools from the bottom of your soul.

Dark and thick.

I can feel it.

They

Humiliated you time and time again

Mutilated your precious body

Drowned you in every lake

Burned you at the stake

Stoned you with every heavy stone

Used you until you were no more

For years, they forced you through the most horrible things…

Taught you to be less than what you are and to accept it.

Took everything away from you.

Your innocence

Your happiness

Your passions

Your rights

Your autonomy

Your humanity

Your reason to live

But even though they have forced you into

Submission, obedience, and self-hatred,

They will never be rid of you.

I know better…

For you are everywhere.

You are the most powerful

The most beautiful

The most feminine

The most talented

The most nurturing

The most empathetic

The most intelligent

The most passionate

The most divine.

You are within each of us,

forever stirring.

You are

A

Part

Of

Me.

A

Part

Of

You.

We are one and the same.

We will never be tamed.

Love,

Mary

Finite Infinities

Alaina Beauregard

We are all locked in moments we can’t forget. Songs, places, and people fused into our souls, each memory a brick mortared in place. Every person pieced together by a timeline capturing themselves in moments significant to their very being.

The time you experienced raw joy,

A moment when you were overwhelmed by happiness,

A second dragged down by grief that felt like decades,

A breath stolen, but giving so much more,

Each a badge added to your belt, a memory fed to your soul, digested, and absorbed to nourish who you are.

Your laugh given life when your father would throw you high above and asked to bring a star back for him.

Your fear an imminent obsidian being given life, escaping from the cracks under the closet the first night you slept alone.

Your wonder born from watching the bees mingle amongst the flora,

You swore they were sharing secrets with the flowers.

Your grief, an all-consuming cell, feasting, a glutton for the richness of soul.

Your optimism a beacon around your neck, a reminder happiness is a choice.

Your courage, anger, curiosity a seed planted by a moment in time. They vine and bloom and thorn, seedlings nurtured by kindness.

Finite infinities imprinted into your being.

A Quick Google Search

Caitlyn George

‘Definition of human?’

noun

a human being, especially a person as distinguished from an animal or (in science fiction) an alien.

Similar: Relationships. Homes. Possessions. Pain. Pleasure. Pets. Jobs. Family. Laughter. The way the sun shines through the window in the morning and glints off the glass on the nightstand left over from last night’s two a.m. escapade into the kitchen. His practiced smile worn for that specific person, the only one who knows how to make him smile anymore. How she frowns right before sighing. The old man who owns the bookshop on the corner, lounging comfortably out front with a steaming cup of coffee and a plain donut, gleefully greeting everyone who passes by in the morning. Reaching into someone’s chest and crushing their heart with trembling hands. The familiarity of returning to a favorite book, the pages worn, and the words memorized, the story living within the soul just as much as it does on the page. Finding the perfect gift for someone special and feeling so giddy that it’s difficult to withhold presenting them with it immediately. Watching a good movie on the couch and munching on a handful of M&Ms. Crying on the bathroom floor in the dark. Making others laugh so loud the world begins to melt away around the edges of tears that escape, running away onto the floor. How to understand the lilt of loved one’s voices and how it changes with excitement, sadness, guilt, heartache, anxiety, ease. Comforting someone and knowing it makes a difference to them. Breaking a bone. Scraping a knee. Getting into a fender bender in a new car. Writing creatively. Going to college. Paying for college. Hearing a long-forgotten beloved song. The ability to learn. Losing a loved one, the grief nagging even years later. Smiling back at the old man who owns the bookshop on the corner, waving as he settles in contentedly out front with a steaming cup of coffee and a plain donut, merrily greeting you as you pass by on your daily commute. Knowing you’ll stop by later on your way back to see if he got that book you asked for.

A Thousand Different Colors

Robert J. Nelson

As I look o’er the leafy landscape,

A mass of flaming color meets my eyes.

It all looks orange and red and miles away,

I didn’t know it was a big disguise.

For when I stand among the falling leaves,

A thousand different colors surround me.

Yes, red and orange but also yellow peach,

The brown tones that I didn’t see before.

Sometimes I look and look, and I forget

That what you see and what is there

Turns out to be the opposite.

But I’m not asking you to share,

Your inner self, your feelings,

your thoughts—just know.

There’s more to someone

than they care to show.

(Caitlyn George)

(Dmitri Belyakov )

Like a Vermont Dirt Road

Robert J. Nelson

My life is like a dirt road winding along the hills of Vermont. I pedal my way up the long steep hill but don’t enjoy the view because I’m too worn out. The flatter stretches have just enough potholes and annoying ridges—bump, bump, bumpety, BUMP! It’s enough to keep me on my toes, but not enough to wear me out. I catch my breath going down the hill; it’s like swimming in the pond on long summer evenings and homemade ice cream shared with siblings. Vibrant green mountains dance before me, the wind whistling through my hair. Some days this journey is hard and others it is beautiful. And that’s okay. As long as you keep believing in yourself.

Secondhand Scars

Roree Stewart

Disillusioned loneliness, a perjured concept of love,

Bruises on my brain where you touched,

Scabs picked bloody by your breath,

A misconstrued love soured like rotting milk.

Trust which you read to me like a script from your palm, smeared and full of lies.

Lies.

Liar.

Lying, damnit.

You lied.

I…

I still blister at the thought of you doing that.

I can’t look.

I won’t look.

The chasm between my healing and my hurt too far to bridge.

But you still have your fingers dug into my flesh,

Pain dug into what should have been pleasure.

I can’t look at it without seeing that image,

Seeing what you forced on me.

The rips you left because you didn’t care about what or who or how I needed,

But that I was useful and hurting, and easy to use.

Scars you burnt, clawed, and drew on me because I wouldn’t, couldn’t say no.

Scars that I bear written on my brain, my spine, my heart.

Viv

Roree Stewart

Viv,

It’s an oddity that you come to me at night,

Because you are sunshine breaking through the clouds at dusk.

You are the remedy to the shadows that chase me to and fro,

A sweet taste to swallow.

You are unlike any creature I know.

A mystery, an open book, a paragon.

What would you say if I told you I think of you often?

That you are the first since I made the choice

To stand up…

Out of the darkness,

Gulping air from my drowning.

What light you bring despite your own darkness.

A little starlight in the sky that tells me I’m not free,

But the chains no longer bind me.

(Dmitri Belyakov )

Seasonal Work

Aidan Danforth

Living down the street,
On the other side of the freeway,
My heart beats, trampling through this Stockton heat.
To meet with you, for a fraction of your whole day,
Taking a road that is familiar yet deplorable,
Reveals the treasures of this frequent drive,
Seeking your sun-kissed skin, quite adorable,
Dancing in my chicken grease boots, jiving.

The Psych Major

Aidan Danforth

Within these encased walls I found my
Breakfast at Tiffany’s
between classes, without the distractions.
Discovery through the pages, innate like
A Clockwork Orange
Finding the voices of these authors.
Calling and whispering, admiring like a
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof,
Serendipity by the ending cover.
Chasing my next adventure,
A Streetcar Named Desire
the ride I’ll take next,
Before I have to return to ungodly studies.

Staying Alive

Joseph Rauch

Have you ever felt misunderstood?
Felt such immense heartache and pain that you didn’t think you could?
To walk around being yourself when the world said you shouldn’t?
To live in hell while you pretend you’re nice and safe in heaven?
People ask how you’re doing, but you know they don’t care, so you just say… good
Because if you tried to explain your pain, they would not be a counselor but a cold judge.
You know they would because your proof is a past of burned bridges,
So you deal with it yourself and you keep digging, turning your hole into an ever-darkening ditch.
In the end, you have a mountain of regrets and no one to talk you away from that cliff.
You don’t want to jump, you don’t want to overdose, you don’t want to cut your wrists.
You just want to get better; you just want to get to the light at the end of the tunnel.
But you can’t run, for attached like a ball and chain are all your troubles
You fought like hell; you ran, then walked, then crawled; God knows you struggled,
But it isn’t enough, and you’re tired of doing it alone,
So you cry out, but there comes no hand to pull you out of the rubble.
You give and give, but the world just takes and takes
You begin to break and break, more and more, day after day
With each day, louder and louder are the wicked whispers from the seemingly comfortable grave
For you’d rather lie six feet under than in a bed of snakes.
You’re so full of heartache that your only friend is pain.
You made mistakes, and so has everyone else.
You forgive peoples’ sins, but they remind you of yours, choking you like a rope around the neck.
You’ve been nice to people, but you struggle to keep your demons in check.
One can only be stabbed in the back so many times before you set up an unscalable defense,
A wall to keep the world away because your weary heart can’t take any more disrespect.
You tried your best, but your plans never turned out the way they should’ve.
So, then you go to sleep haunted by the same questions, thinking, “What if,”
Playing people’s insults over and over in your head, all lying to you that you’re not good enough.
But you are, you’re so special, just your life has been so tough.
They say the more demons, the greater things in which you are meant for,
And you’re tougher than most people could even dream of
For they don’t know what it’s like to walk alone
Because if they did, they’d take a minute to actually care rather than cast their stones,
Those very stones that leave scars that still show,
And those are nothing compared to the wounds they leave deep below,
But, still, morning after morning and night after night,
You just walk along, smiling, pretending to be all right
For that’s all you can do to stay in this fight, to live your life, to stay alive.

Broken Promises

Joseph Rauch

Trust is a sacred scarcity, hard to give and easy to lose
You know many but trust few
Your circle is tight ’cause you can’t risk the damage a snake may do
You’ve been burned before in relationships, causing you to do nothing but lose
In many people, you call your friends, but the only faithful one is the tomb
I know you know what I’m talking about because I see your wounds; just look at my heart
You can see it if I put down my guard
I walk around with an expressionless face, cold and hard
But, and I’m sure some can tell, those who understand, it’s all a facade
And underneath is a man with a life of broken bonds
Of people he called his friends who were truly his enemies
Some of which he regarded as close as family
He didn’t anticipate such relationships would be damaging
He didn’t expect all the laughing to turn into agony
He was just happy to be winning; he didn’t realize the games they were playing
But then the hard times came, and his friends were nowhere to be found
Everyone wants to be in the presence of the man with a crown
But will leave that same man when he has nothing and is broken down
It’s funny how the shedding of blood reveals the true colors of those around
How, when times get hard, their friendly faces turn to striking scowls
They’d say they’d be there for you
You said you’d be there for them, that, for them, you’d do whatever you needed to do
But words are one thing, and their actions are the proof
Talking the walk is for the false, but walking the walk is for the true
And in a world of lies, there is only the endless extinction of truth
So I get what it’s like to be so insecure because people are so insincere
To be so tired because you’re constantly crying tears
From what people have done to you over the years
But trust there are still good people out there
Do not give in to your fears
You may have a past of broken promises, but it doesn’t have to leave you broken
You don’t have to close your heart away; you can leave it open
You can be better than your past and take back what people have stolen
You can trust again; you can love again; you can take risks again
In the end, isn’t that the point of living?
For in life, you’re going to have people give you broken promises
You’ll have wolves in sheep’s clothing, devils wearing crosses
They just want to use and hurt you, but that doesn’t have to be what your story is

Her Dance

Jasmin Sackey

One step forward, two steps backward,

One step forward, three steps backward.

Life had turned into a dance for her,

With the melody of the music unknown to her,

The instruments hidden in the background,

And the music instructor a mystery to her.

Despite all this, she moved in response to everything around her,

Letting the music take control, whether slow or fast-paced.

She did not have it in her to stop and process it,

She just shifted in tandem because her body wanted to.

And, so, on and on she danced to this tune,

Growing weary of the way she could not control what was happening,

And feeling dizzy by all the circles she twirled herself in.

She was lost, that much she knew,

In a world that was fixed, one that blurred past her.

Day in and day out she longed for a reprieve,

To form her own steps, to move at her own pace.

But, alas, the dance was already set;

One step forward and one step backward,

And it seemed she was never going to escape from it.

The Confession

Jasmin Sackey

So, this is an apology, one that has been long due;

A cacophony of words I should have spoken a long time ago.

And I am sorry that I am late,

That this took as long as now to realize that you are beautiful.

I’m sorry that I took your flaws and projected them over your talents.

I apologize greatly for not seeing your worth, for belittling you every chance I got.

I’m sorry that I made everyone else seem perfect apart from you when truly you are one of a kind.

I’m sorry that I was never content with how you were, that I constantly needed to change something about you.

Dear, I’m sorry that I put you last when you should have been first.

I sincerely regret allowing your fear to stop you from growing, from doing what you truly loved.

I’m sorry I let others dictate how you should live your life when you knew best about yourself.

I’m sorry this spirit of indecisiveness consumed your thoughts, that I let anxiety in to be a daily companion.

Yes, this is an apology,

One due to myself because, hey,

We all need one of those.

You Were His Poem

Andrii Shadrin

Huddled by the hearth’s warm glow,

His hands found solace from the snow.

Gazing into dancing flames,

Burning eyes mirrored passion’s claims.

Roused by dawn’s gentle caress,

Nature’s rebirth he’d witness.

Radiant light graced his sight,

As a new day banished the night.

Crimson lips, a rosebud’s hue,

Smiled at the world made anew.

He gathered blooms from field and dell,

Fragrant gifts for his love to dwell.

Gently brushing her shoulders fair,

He tucked chamomile in her hair.

Two souls entwined in nature’s embrace,

Love’s tender blossoms graced her face.

Babbling brooks now hushed and still,

Rains could never their ardor chill.

Amidst the park’s golden plumage,

Crisp leaves danced to love’s sweet gage.

Emotions

Andrii Shadrin

Ranging from “I’m perfectly fine”

To “Death seems the only design”

An abyss lies between

The extremes I’ve seen

Leaving me questioning your truth’s confine

Who are you? What haunts your soul?

A mere facade, emotions untold?

Is the psych ward your place?

Suicidal songs you embrace?

Or sad anime leaving you cold?

Unsure if knowing you brings joy or pain

Your treatment so cruel, scorning my name

If crumbling worlds give you bliss

Wipe those rose-tinted glasses, dear miss

Soon nothing will of your world remain.

No more will I linger in sorrow

No more will I wait for your morrow

Like a phoenix reborn

From the ashes you’d scorn

A new self from your fires I borrow.

Should gratefulness be my emotion?

For this tumultuous, stormy ocean

Of loving your warmth

To feeling love’s dearth

“Thanks” seems a word lacking due notion.

You never struck with your palm

Yet it ached, my body’s full qualm.

More than all, I craved you

Your presence, my only view

But tears fell, grief became my psalm

Now a scar brands where you pierced.

How wonderful when the aching’s been pierced

The wound has found its healing

A lightness I’m finally feeling

Trust me, this freedom’s the purest.