Clara Johnson ’26

by Clara Johnson ’26 on March 19, 2026

Staggering wildly to the corner
The two girls giggling in the dark
Yesterday on the run from the party
Small hands pressed into my own
The room is caught in the summer’s warmth
In the linoleum walls of the church basement
With folding chairs
We dance in Sunday shoes the whole night long
To upbeat songs and the light’s buzz leaves
Us cast in gold
Echoes of yesterday haunting
Empty chairs
Staggering drunkenly in the corner
I shiver with cold and tears collect
My skin goes pink from the drink, imitating
The youthful flush of yesterday
The tile is stained by the leaking roof
On the linoleum walls of bar bathrooms
The fan is rustling the stagnant air
10 years gone, I’m lonely
Echoes of yesterday haunting
On the concrete the wheeled bag rumbles
The red truck idles on the curb
Standing there with her arms wide open,
My smile cleaves old familiar lines
The juice of peaches, the ivy fence and the tangling roots
Of the old oak tree
The giggling girls with their golden curls in the basement
Of an old white church
Echoes of yesterday haunting
Empty chairs
Echoes of yesterday haunting
Echoes of yesterday haunting