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Blue Marble Review

Literary Journal for Young Writers

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eating a three-course meal at a high school house party

By Grace Liang

the second boy i’ve kissed here with tongue has thinner lips
than the movie tickets i had cut my fingers on to watch

a coming of age flick rated 4.7 stars out of 10. maybe practice
makes perfect but the sessions sure aren’t. i duck into a

corner and hide from sharp eyes who know that showing up
uninvited is only for quarterbacks with skulls crushed into

medals of sophomore-year honor, senior girls with swaying
hips they’d promised a good time yet still deposited here,

shallow apologies shackling their hands. just a little bit of
aloofness is allowed, as a treat — an appetizer only

for boys wrapped in faux leather jackets and painstaking
nonchalance; meanwhile, being present at all makes

people recoil if you’re a negative space in the walls: a
ravenous phantom here to struggle — to sample a

rendezvous that you cannot pronounce, to taste mandated
teenage rebellion and sirens on a school night. and

no, you cannot just take two bites and leave. it’s rude to
the hosts who left before you. so tonight, while i find

crumbling convenience store lipstick to be the only thing
that tastes bearable with stolen alcohol in red plastic,

it kills me to ignore hospitality. i gorge on the tongue of a
third boy and call it an act of grace. serve him dessert

by leaving a crimson lip on his empty beer can. after all,
i can tell he’s starving just from the way he’s here.

 

Grace Liang is a teen writer from Toronto. She enjoys reading fan fiction, watching video essays, sleeping, and playing piano. Find her on Instagram at @yf.grace.

Filed Under: Poetry Tagged With: July 2021

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