2021 Student Poetry Award

               i like the idea
of being concept
               conception. glory
     aubade: the parting
          of two lips.

     when i say i want
out, i mean that i
          want            to learn
     how to move like fishbones
          across your tongue

sunset on the
     closet doors, light
upon yew. upon your
shoulder-blades
           moldable in my
                hands.

     i think i understand
               what’s missing
          it’s caught between
          bars of light:
             gaps between
      world and windowsill.

the gold trimmings fall,
       sunflakes to the floor
       lapis and sandalwood
             and the shape
                  of time. the

       sound of flesh:
palm on cheek. what does
       love look like to you?
               the sound of porcelain
       shattering, white noise
       into nothing.

               some things, i realize,
are phenomenal
       and inconsequential.
                     say petals, dewdrops
                          and the tension
                               they share
                     “weight of beauty,”
                          you call it

               say auroras
               and snowfall,
the wind whispering ice
                     like folklore in
                  your ears.
               “sometimes,” i remind
               myself, “you don’t have
               to be useful to be loved”

     but i still wanted you
               to hold me
                     like i was dangerous,
                     one of the wild things
to tell me
          i     had
                           gravity,

               learn me like you’d
                 face consequences.

i wanted you to explain:
     what you meant in saying
     i tasted like mirrors.
          all opaline, echoes
          and strawberries
     i was asking you to
          see me, then
               reach through the
               shards anyway
     to prove you weren’t afraid,
          with your flesh and blood
               lotus buds and iodine.

i grasped the window-frame,
words shattering like       ritual
                            like   scripture.

     in the end, tears mixed with
          blood. the ratio
          was enough—
               pretty pink, like
               watercolors
              & the sunset.

     i’d rather be concept
          than conclusion,
               product.
     i’d rather
               be, and
               nothing more.
     gentle glow
and the softness
of this world.

oh,
to be chrysalis,
to be daybreak
     to be soft and
     whole once again.

           to find closure
     in remedies and rain
           to stand under the
           sun and be known
    in this lonely survival—

perhaps not perfect,
but openhearted. not
     mirror, but melody:
          freedom through
           rainfall, exodus

        when my name speaks me
     i will speak in stars, huddled
  under candlelight
                               and empty sky
   giving you all of me in these hands

           sometimes, we be
              and it is enough.