I am a child,
Writing through eyes of
Innocent gleam.
This vast world— we sleep
At its heart, where the steady pulse and thrum
Of a billion dream-filled gaits
Cocoon our infant race.
We are swathed in our youth and beginnings,
And from the first cries
We carve our stories in tender stone.
I am a daughter,
Writing through eyes of
Hopeful truth.
This golden world— we fall
At its spine, where a waterfall of opportunity
Cascades down its diamond back.
Like light through a prism,
We sweep through the rapids and burst
At the foam pool, iridescent
In our shrewd purity.
I am a mother,
Writing through eyes of
Healing scars.
This scaffolded world— we devour
At its stomach, where the iron bars of its rib cage
Crack beneath our beating.
Our young race, growing, when we cannot tell
If the fingers come from the same body;
Painting this pallid shell crimson, when
One eye turns against the other.
I am a grandmother,
Writing through eyes of
Hungry surrender.
This caving world— we stand
At its feet, where an ocean of abomination
Weigh down these cruel, waxy-blue toes.
Take your aim, emerge the victor,
We have diverged into strangers;
Firing at one another, we are
Firing at ourselves.
I am a human,
Writing through eyes that
Long to heal.
This story-teller world— we stand
At its hands, where each pen stroke
Patches another inward wound.
The pages will not end, ink will not still,
Until every last shadow of hurt
Is stitched and blackened. Until these thousand cuts
Have been written away.
——
I am a skeleton,
Bones creaking,
Bleeding bandages of words
Even when the flesh
Has long since left.
Sarah Sun is a writer, musician, and high school freshman from New York. Her poetry has been featured in the Fall (Top 10 Winner) and Spring Editions of Creative Communication’s “A Celebration of Poets”, and her work has been recognized by the Scholastic Art and Writing awards, L. Ron Hubbard Writers of the Future Contest, and Up North Lit magazine, among others. In her free time, she enjoys playing saxophone, piano, and reading.