Tag: poetry
Be Patient
by The Cowl Editor on September 23, 2021
Portfolio
by Grace O’Connor ’22
Being patient makes her head spin and her nausea take over.
Being patient makes her feel like she is locked in a small space,
With the walls closing in on her, darkness preparing to give her a suffocating hug.
Being patient leaves marks on her skin of irritation and fear.
Being patient leaves her forgetting how to breathe,
As she attempts to force air into her shallow lungs, her heart pounding for mercy.
Being patient makes her forget how to live.
Being patient makes her thoughts stab her brain like nails,
Piercing through soft tissue, paving the way for her lifeline to trickle down.
Being anxious feels more natural to her.
Being anxious allows her to give in to her own worst enemy,
Providing herself temporary relief and a quick moment to breathe.
What’s the difference between the two?
Being patient is how she is told to act and being anxious is instinctive to her.
What’s worse one may ask?
She doesn’t know, and will she ever?
She craves a quick fix, giving in to her inner vices,
As patience looms in the far distance, unreachable from darkness’s tight hug.
She yearns for normalcy,
Wondering day by day if she’ll ever feel that true bliss.
Every year she is one step closer in this taxing marathon.
She knocks down barriers that her mind puts in her way.
Stopping herself from giving in to temporary fixes,
Learning how to embrace patience despite how excruciating it may be.
Be patient.
Stop worrying.
Why do you care so much?
If only her overworked mind was willing to listen all the time,
This battle would be easy.
But does growth come easy? Never.
She will never stop fighting.
The Sims
by The Cowl Editor on September 23, 2021
Portfolio
by Toni Rendon ’24
Why can’t life be more like The Sims
Where no matter what day it is, we can always win
Strangers come over to celebrate your birthday
And people can empathize with you on your worst days
Let’s build our home from the ground up
A place where happiness can always find us
Where our depression doesn’t have to win
And if we get stuck with it
We can always go to Create a Sim
and re-roll our traits again
Here we have a pause button
So, we don’t keep walking around like we lost something
There’s no fear if our hearts collide
Because here there’s only you and I
The NPCs are insignificant
This is our world, they just live in it
The bad parts, use fast forward to skip it
So, the sad parts we don’t really live it
Imagination is king here, so sky’s our limit
We always know how we are
Because our relationships are tracked in a bar
If we take the modding too far
And our perfect world crashes like a car
Promise that we’ll “Shift + Click” reset us
We can always work out the extras
Maybe this time we’ll get lucky
And the update won’t make the relationship buggy
I’m not trying to be funny
I’m just trying to raise my skills
So, I have what I need to pay our bills
Let’s not get into semantics
Instead use the mischief skill
And let’s get into some antics
We’ll never be bored now
There’s a whole new 64-bit world
For us to explore now
a highway is no place for a deer
by The Cowl Editor on September 23, 2021
Portfolio
by AJ Worsley ’22
happier when i’m away, i do my best to keep a distance.
all i hope for is that while i’m away you forget my existence.
if that were to happen, i’d have no reason to return,
you don’t know what you have until it’s gone, a lesson you’ve yet to learn.
pick and choose between red pill, blue pill, but why pick one?
take it all for yourself, everybody prefers a purple tongue.
these things are never easy, and i don’t belong here,
this danger creates anxiety, like a highway for a deer.
i want off the rollercoaster, i’m nauseous and numb
these loops and turns have stripped me of sympathy and i’m not having fun.
it’s like a dwindling flame, and every time the fire wishes to die
you bring it back to life with some gasoline and a thoughtless lie.
always everyone else’s fault that you’re so alone,
God gave you a body but you just have to show bone.
i’m either selfish or depressed there is no escape,
in constant battle with myself where thoughts take new shape.
both parties can’t win, so who do i choose?
myself for the first time, or you? a lose-lose.
so tell me, why should i be your savior,
if there are no rewards for good behavior?
The Healing
by The Cowl Editor on September 16, 2021
Portfolio
by Grace O’Connor ’22
She slowly heals as time pulls her forward.
She holds tight onto the past like an old stuffed animal,
As she is afraid of what the future will hold.
The future is a sky stuffed with millions of stars.
She is mesmerized by the stars that look down at her.
She tries to connect how her past got her here,
As she connects the stars in her mind making shapes,
She tries to make sense of her life, her purpose.
Little does she know she’s a minuscule part of something much bigger.
Her voice is silenced in a large sea,
She can decide if she wants to make her voice count or be held back,
By her thoughts that glue her in place.
She lets the glue tear her skin as she pulls away,
It is painful and she is vulnerable,
But she needs to breathe.
She escapes from the glue’s tight hug, naked.
She’s been trapped in a glass box,
Put hate marks on her skin,
Been pinned down,
Blinded with rose-colored glasses,
Refused to swallow solid food for months,
A bubble stuck in time,
Unable to breathe,
Only comforted by string lights swimming through the air.
She always had the power to pull herself away,
From her own abusive thoughts which held her back
From true bliss her entire life.
She learns to love herself slowly, but hesitantly.
Her mind craves the comfort of the glue.
She craves infinite possibilities like the stars that glimmer in the sky.
She made her decision and it is to live every day to her its fullest,
Even when times get hard and unbearable.
She does this because she owes it to herself,
No one can replace her in this world,
Because she is not replaceable.
Once she finds her internal confidence she will be unstoppable.
She is Grace, and she is no longer ashamed.
Succulents
by The Cowl Editor on September 16, 2021
Portfolio
by Taylor Rogers ’24
Green ribbons greedily grow,
Spilling out of their small pots
Like humans, they reach for the stars,
Traveling higher and higher
Diligently, I water these tiny ribbons,
Watching keenly as they grow
They steal from the soil below them,
Clinging onto miniscule buds of water
As they grow, they begin to invade my space,
Creeping over my shoulder as I read
The ribbons become darker,
Matching the color of the vivid forest outside
With my succulents, I grow,
Aiming for the glittery sky
The two of us grow together,
Continuously hoping that one day, we will fly
The Writer
by The Cowl Editor on September 3, 2021
Portfolio
When I should die, think only this of me:
That there’s some weathered notebook tucked away
Behind the dusty novels. My childhood reads
These words—these words my childhood shapes
From airy nothing into lines and scenes.
With ballpoint tip to page, with blue ink running dry,
I scratch and dot my i’s and cross my t’s,
Letters becoming words, words brought to life.
And think, these stories, inscribed on every page—
Reflections of my mind, blurred photographs—
Implore to be preserved eternally.
So let my work’s life last beyond my age,
Let it be more than just my epitaph—
My fount of youth, my immortality.
The Voice
by The Cowl Editor on September 3, 2021
Portfolio
Can’t See the flow of the colors
Stopped Feeling the breath of the wind
Hollowness calling your name
Do you fall back in?
Come to me
Looking around no one’s there
So back to the grind instead
Put pencil to paper and write beautiful words
But the creative voice can’t be heard
He’s not here
You hear it again, but no one’s around
So put on some music to drown it out
And maybe in the songs
There’s some inspiration to be found
Not so fast
Sweating profusely, droplets falling on loose leaf
Hearing voices when you’re home alone
Thinking about picking up the phone
But you don’t, at the risk of sounding crazy
Good Idea, they won’t believe you
The voice has started booming
The walls beginning to close in
Drowning you in insecurities
Thinking, “Am I really such a bad human?”
Yes, you are
Crying uncontrollably
Wondering how he got a hold of you
This feeling, who let him through
Thought he only belonged to the old you
Nah, me and you, we’re forever
When Your Body Was a Token
by The Cowl Editor on September 3, 2021
Portfolio
I was fifteen years old when I decided I could handle the weight of being “sexy” for their love.
I could put on the right clothes, give the right looks, say just the right things–––
until they couldn’t get enough of me, trapping them in my prose.
I was fifteen years old when I convinced myself I was ready to bare it all for their love.
They looked at me like I was pure Mayan gold, shiny new treasure they could break in, they could treat me like I deserved because I did not know the value of my body.
I was fifteen years old when they reached inside and took all that I had to offer them,
their hands were tainted red, blood trickling the sheets, blood trickling our time,
I tried to keep the noises down, the moaning––the pain, this was love, love, love.
I was fifteen years old when there was nothing left to keep us tethered.
There was something wrong––the only place they still told me they loved me was when we were entangled in red sheets and I was in the act of proving that this was love, love, love.
I can still feel the bruises on me.
The pain of fingers gripping onto flesh,
scraping walls, tearing walls, wounding walls.
But that was love, love, love.
I’m twenty now and I don’t know how to be “sexy” for any love.
I don’t know how to move my body––oh, how I hate to hate my body!
There are no right clothes, no right looks, no more sticky prose.
When your body was a token––a ticket to someone’s love,
it’s hard to remember how to be anything else.
It’s been so long.
I wish I could remember.
The Piano Jury
by Elizabeth McGinn on May 6, 2021
Portfolio
Bright, silent, daunting
Central to my narrowing vision.
The floorboards of all things taunting
My stare returning with derision.
Every seat with its front bare
No staring heads in sight
None but those that at me glare
Basked in blinding light.
Should I try to glance?
Dare I take that chance?
One with pad and pen
One with eyes so stern
Best to look back again
No, not heartburn!
Something was said
Is that the cue?
No only dread
One, two
Go!
GO!
Daily
by Elizabeth McGinn on May 6, 2021
Portfolio
by Taylor Rogers ’24
Exhaustion.
This is the only emotion I can feel.
Day after day,
I tiredly watch the news,
Where the same tragic story plays on loop.
Each day,
Another bullet tears through innocent flesh,
Causing red to tragically paint the streets,
Breaking the hearts of many,
This tiny bullet wreaks its havoc,
Destroying any hope for change.
Daily,
Innocent victims fall,
Unwillingly becoming yet another name on a never-ending list.
A family loses their anchor,
And is forced to move on with their lives, despite being lost at sea.
Every day,
I watch the news in fear,
Wondering if me and my family will be next.
Will our world be invaded by the color red?
Will we fall victim to performative activism and a lifetime of injustice?
Will we be reduced to a statistic?
Continuously,
Nothing around me changes.
More and more people fall,
Becoming yet another news special
Gaining fame in a way they would never wish to.
Routinely,
I ask myself, will this ever end?
Will we ever reach a true state of equality?
Or will I have to tiredly watch more people’s lives end for no reason at all,
And sigh in defeat as yet again,
My people fail to be treated equally in the “land of the free.”