Tag: poetry
Jamestown, VA
by Elizabeth McGinn on February 11, 2021
Poetry
by Angie Nguyen ’22
falling in love with someone you shouldn’t is like an ending is written before the beginning. you don’t listen to the bells, warning you of the heartbreak and the tears and the way the sparkle in his eyes dulls eventually because you’re so enraptured by the i-love-you’s and the morning kisses and the midnight adventures in his foreign car (a toyota is still foreign to me). we were only running on borrowed time.
how could i be selfish enough to lay claim on your eyes and their haunting depth—the way they changed with your moods. i never realized dark, brown eyes could hold so much feeling until i looked into yours. how could i think that a piece of your heart was reserved for me? that heart is as wild as a stallion, and i thought i’d harnessed you, put you into my stable. how could i even begin to think that laugh was meant for me and only me? you share your joy so effortlessly—i even envy you at times.
i know you said you were mine but that’s like trying to claim the oceans and its waves, the forest and its wolves. the way you move, the way you carry yourself, the way you think—it was never mine, always yours.
i always thought love meant surrender. but i’m so tired of trying to make myself a home in your amazon. i don’t want to be a colonizer of your lands. i cannot confuse breaking you with appreciating you.
but when you tell me you love me, when you kiss me and hold me, for a split second, in this wild world, you are mine.
Suicidal Love
by Elizabeth McGinn on February 4, 2021
Poetry
Trigger Warning: This poem includes
references to suicide and self-harm
by Toni Rendon ’24
Can we dance like Snowflakes?
Tumbling down until we hit the ground
Blood pooling around us
Scaring anyone who finds us
You should’ve known this love was suicidal
When I told you I’d die without you
Because I know the sun won’t peek past the clouds
If you’re not around
So, when you decide to step out on that ledge
Remember to grab my hand
So we can both greet death together
We agreed to “for better or worse and in sickness and health”
But what happens when the sickness and worse stick around
Like a generational curse we can’t break
Do we sit around and wait for the inevitable heartbreak?
Do we slit our wrists and stop our heartbeat?
Or do we pop pills and catch chills
As the world fades around us
We fell in love with broken people
The type who were labeled evil
Because we’re not afraid to watch the world end
We’ve already seen how the sky bends and breaks
And we’ve shed all the tears our hearts can take
So there’s nothing left to do
But dance hand in hand in the air
Like snowflakes until we hear the sound
Of our bones break
Poetry
by Elizabeth McGinn on February 4, 2021
Poetry
by Sarah Heavren ’21
What is it to write poetry?
It is more than merely meeting a meter
Or pairing words to form a rhyme.
I believe it reaches for something much deeper.
It pulls and tickles emotions.
It awakens them from a heavy slumber,
Suppressed by the weight of this world.
Poetry reminds us to pause and wonder.
It asks the challenging questions
Through imagery, metaphors, and examples.
Sometimes it’s passively active,
Sometimes quite concise, and sometimes it likes to ramble.
Some people don’t have the patience
To delve into the magical world of words.
They want things quick and straightforward,
So their innermost reactions go unheard.
To feel is really quite human.
It is inseparable from our being.
Poetry always calls us back
And puts words to what we are truly feeling.
Aggressive
by Elizabeth McGinn on February 4, 2021
Poetry
by Mariela Flores ’23
Today me and my peers were called “aggressive.”
We were given the title and told to bear the weight of it, the weight of the word, the weight of all our ancestors before us who had heard the same complaint by the same white mouth, we are aggressive.
We are aggressive when we write, when we sing, when we dance, when we laugh, when we cry, when we are angry, because an institution is spitting in our faces, it is telling us to hold back, to hold on, to wait.
We are aggressive, I am aggressive.
I am five feet tall.
A hundred and five pounds.
I struggle to open their doors.
My appearance has been demonized because my tone is not right, but I do not have the energy to police myself today, not today, not tomorrow, not again.
I am not aggressive when I am surrounded by a sea of white.
When this whiteness swallows me whole and I am left choking, spitting out a freedom I do not own, I am not aggressive when I am being told to stay shut.
I am not aggressive, I am afraid.
Afraid as I walk through the campus and they throw their words, their chants, “build that wall!”—it rings in my ears, my hands, my feet, I can feel their hate, it hurts me.
And I am afraid to let them keep hurting me, because soon I will be nothing more than a bruise on their campus, on their world, and nothing, no one will heal me.
I am not aggressive, I am tired.
Tired of holding up the image of someone I do not like anymore. The perfect image of the person “deserving” of a spot here. I keep trying to plant myself into their soil, but my roots will not grow.
I am not aggressive—I am kind, strong, brave, far too patient for my own good.
Today I will not apologize for the version of me you get when the patience has run out. I will not accept a title I did not earn, my humanity is not aggressive, my incentives, my motives, the dream I keep so close to my pillow, these things will not be tainted by a word from a mouth that does not feed me.
I am not aggressive, you are.
the Power of Her Thoughts
by Elizabeth McGinn on February 4, 2021
Poetry
by Grace O’Connor ’22
She feels stuck at the moment like glue
Unable to escape her internal misery.
Oxygen barely fills up her shallow lungs,
As her glassy eyes are begging for relief.
White dots start to blur her vision,
She tries to remember how to breathe.
Her head feels heavy like an oversized bowling ball,
Falling over from her weak grip.
In moments like these, she craves comfort
Not feeling suffocated in open space.
She feels the most alone during these times.
Her body becomes her own worst enemy, but
The only thing keeping her alive.
As her nervous impulses floods through her body,
She starts to doubt any progress she has made.
Trust.
She does not trust herself or the world around her.
Isn’t this where worry comes from?
She is wary of every fleeting thought,
Fighting it every step of the way.
Fighting every tiny detail.
Fighting life.
Her brain is her rival.
Forming and reforming every rash thought,
Her brain is the gatekeeper to happiness or misery.
It is her brain’s default instinct to hold her back,
From pain, hurt, disappointment.
Six
by Elizabeth McGinn on February 4, 2021
Poetry
by Ellie Forster ’24
Lying on the pavement
My leg tickles as my sister
Traces the shape of my fidgeting,
Six-year-old self.
She connects the line to its beginning,
And its end disappears.
The chalk brushes against the side of my knee
And I giggle in discomfort
I stand, take a breath
And attack my chalk silhouette.
Clothing myself with a rainbow
Red skirt
Orange and yellow striped shirt
A green necklace with a heart charm (for flair)
Violet sneakers on my feet
Blue eyes
Pink lips
And brown hair
My back, preheated by the pavement of our driveway,
Is cooked by the sun
As I trace my sister.
The moment I finish she leaps up,
And dons a purple chalk dress and blue chalk glasses, to go
With her yellow chalk hair
While I plant a chalk flower.
Before we’re done our other sister ambushes us,
Spraying wildly with the hose
We chase after her in soaked cotton,
And as our mud- and color-covered feet
Leave the heat of the pavement,
We’re washed away.
Him and Her
by The Cowl Editor on November 12, 2020
Poetry
by Toni Rendon ’24
She’s so beautifully broken
So softly spoken
Hurt in the moment
Lost in the commotion
He’s entirely hopeless
Drowning in emotions
Needing a connection
This empty bed leaves him restless
Both clumsy and reckless
Living with a death wish
Helping pick up the pieces
Trying to make things even
They give each other meaning
Tryna make up for love’s past treason
All their hearts’ bleeding
The heartbreak seasons
And missed out dreaming
Knowing there’s a reason
For them finally meeting
They fall in love no matter how hectic
A couple of kids
Young
Dumb
And reckless
Lost at Sea
by The Cowl Editor on November 12, 2020
Poetry
by Taylor Rogers ’24
Her ocean of tears is quickly overflooded,
Anxiety, Depression, and Anger blending in with the fish.
Big blue waves crash and fall,
And as she is stranded on her tiny island, she makes one wish.
A ship pillages her terrifying ocean,
Taking anchor in the center of her heart.
A pirate steps out of the boat,
His sword safely hidden as he watches the ocean’s waves tear the girl apart.
Once he enters the heart, the pirate begins to strike,
Brandishing his sword and cutting down the stubborn seaweed.
The girl’s fears begin to wither away,
Saving the heart from the terrifying depths of the sea.
The last weed distengrates,
Allowing the pirate to return to his ship, the girl in his arms.
Slowly, the ocean of tears finally stops flooding,
And the girl wipes away the stray fish, finally safe from harm.
Block
by The Cowl Editor on November 12, 2020
Poetry
by Ellie Forster ’24
I’m going to write something
Today.
A story, of just the right length,
With just the right balance of righteousness,
And questionable morals.
A song with the duality of a woman,
Sung to the heartbeat in her chest
A novel that eats at you like a hunger,
Stripping you bare as you stare into its mirror
An essay exposing some great truth,
Shared with a fervor
Or at the very least,
The poem of a hopeful no one
Who longs to reach people
With the words
Too stuck in her head
To escape
Today.
Ode to Practice
by The Cowl Editor on November 12, 2020
Poetry
by Matthew Ciesla ’24
At times, progressing as if by force,
No enjoyment found therein,
And then as if a steady course
Pushes one to further strive.
So monotonous these tones seem,
Repeated once and then once more,
Yet those well versed continually deem
Their value beyond measure.
O may you, repetition’s dearest friend,
Grant this undertaking some ease.
And allow that these here harmonies blend
Seamlessly as if by chance.
To mastery lead me thus
For crowds and praise unmet, unseen
So that meeting me they see us
And envy deeply our bond.
Of such greatness one can dream,
With such persistence few can clash.
Yet with you it all may seem
Obtainable with passing time.
But such thoughts are only thoughts,
Meaningless on my seat here.
Meaningless to these damn dots
My stare returning fiercely.
So to reality must I return
And leave behind the grandeur thence
And with each bar so deeply yearn
For thy gifts to be bestowed.