Elegy
(Scholastic Regional Honorable Mention 2014)
for my best friend
I think by now your time has stamped me out and
thrown me into the sand and the
Water we used to splash at each other, two
four-year olds with bulging brown eyes and
Skin thickly coated in layers of sunscreen. But that was
then and our youth swam out further than we could;
The current struck it away with the plastic sandcastle pails and
the jellyfish that so tormented our nightmares.
And now it’s not me chewing on your toys or you
mispronouncing my name, but a competition;
A war we fight with each other--who will care less? Who will
drop further and away from the other, the sadistic
Sunny memories tarnished and burned--but the smoke
lifts around us and all we do is blow it
Away. Three years ago you proclaimed yourself an addict,
and I the villain for not stopping you before you could
Begin. Because life is like that. People come and happiness goes but we
aren’t just friends and I and you know that.
Now your low-tide is lower and you don’t want to see the
waves we used to play in. You run on and the sand
Burns your feet; you reach for the dampness and the foam but it
stretches beyond you--the needle in your arm and I no more.
thrown me into the sand and the
Water we used to splash at each other, two
four-year olds with bulging brown eyes and
Skin thickly coated in layers of sunscreen. But that was
then and our youth swam out further than we could;
The current struck it away with the plastic sandcastle pails and
the jellyfish that so tormented our nightmares.
And now it’s not me chewing on your toys or you
mispronouncing my name, but a competition;
A war we fight with each other--who will care less? Who will
drop further and away from the other, the sadistic
Sunny memories tarnished and burned--but the smoke
lifts around us and all we do is blow it
Away. Three years ago you proclaimed yourself an addict,
and I the villain for not stopping you before you could
Begin. Because life is like that. People come and happiness goes but we
aren’t just friends and I and you know that.
Now your low-tide is lower and you don’t want to see the
waves we used to play in. You run on and the sand
Burns your feet; you reach for the dampness and the foam but it
stretches beyond you--the needle in your arm and I no more.