Sophomore Slam Poems
Poems from runner-ups
February 2, 2018
Eternal Gray
by Jalen Daniels
Grey is the stay-at-home rain dropping color
Grey is the funeral, memorial sky when the clouds seep in blocking out the yellow eye
Grey is that “Shhhhhh” that you see on the television
A mix of black and white that grabs attention like a fight
Grey what you see when you envision the past
Take a trip down memory lane think slow not fast
looking at these grey pictures wondering if life was colorless cause earth ain’t hitting no more it just seems like another miss
Factories polluting all the air we breathe in and dudes beating women that their child’s conceived in
The earth is getting more grey by the day or by the hour
It’s been months since that hurricane, does Puerto Rico even have power?
Grey is what I feel when I wake up to the news
Just to see another tragedy that seems to always sadden me, cause what’s a good news story if it ain’t about catastrophe
These days get more grey than my camoflauge jacket
And there’s more hate around than high school homework packets
For now, this earth and probably our eternal stay
And if we don’t fix it now
We’ll be living in Eternal Grey
Rainbow
By Declan Collins
Red
The bright lettering on the back of his coat that I stare at.
The colors intimidating me, the brightness unapologetic.
But the room explodes with color when our eyes meet from across the room.
I had never seen a sweater with orange stripes before.
But he owns the exquisite pattern
Walking with him, my hands restrained to my pockets when I want to be grabbing his, I notice yellow flowers.
He would love them.
But I do not pluck the pigmented petals out of the ground, for fear of his refusal outweighs the possibility of his admiration.
Green was his favorite color.
And it became mine too.
But he never knew.
I feel his hand latch onto my shoulder and I spin around.
I’m too focused on falling into his blue eyes to hear him.
Violet
The ink that marked the Birthday Card I write him.
The folded piece of paper featuring a lyric yanked from an Andrew Lloyd Webber songbook
My hand keeps moving, even when the card is done.
The feelings tumble out of the swirls of the pen gliding across the note.
I watch as the letter is shredded by my fear and then my hands
The pieces of paper that I make with each tear drift into the recycling bin.
We’re just friends.
Nothing more.
A letter to the only shade of red I care about
by Bridget Pierce
DEAR RED DOT,
Okay but seriously
did you really have to splatter yourself across my face
like my favorite strawberry skittles right in the middle of 6th grade
when I had that crush on “you know who”
The crush that made me use the revolutionary technique
Of imaging a stop sign in front of his face
before I could say anything that would leave me cut up
and with a river of wine colored embarrassment
DEAR RED DOT,
You did not help the situation
I should have decided not to count how much I am worth
by the spots and specks on my face
Instead, I got bangs
you know so that way people can’t see the puberty pixels on my forehead
in the end, those bangs made me look less like Zooey Deschanel
And more like Spock
But that could have made me radiate like someone
who falls in with the Nebula, and
Twirls into planets only dreamed up by NASA
But I was just sad
I let an hopeless standard of beauty blister into my mind
Beauty is a zombie
It eats your brain until there’s nothing left
But your ugly body
Or maybe it’s easier for magazine covers and beauty supply stores
To simply say
Being imperfect is a parasite
and the first sign you’ve been bitten are red dots
Glittered across your face