Nadia Farjami (18)
Trapped
when my mouth is tangy,
and my teeth taste of
molten metal, i’ll know that i’m dead
i’ll be wearing dusk and
dickinson’s stanzas;
my flesh will be sticky with
mourning dew
do not undress me
i’ll search for my umbilical cord,
pull my grey string out of a dumpster’s jaw
if i cannot
find my mother, i’ll stick my cord into
a fox’s
protruding stomach, and
i will be born neon, acidic
for years, i will curl
my tongue around
frogs’ bodies,
swallow their oozing slime,
let their salt tint my teeth
and when
my growl becomes withered wind
and my body,
a fading ember, i’ll know that
i’m dead
again
Nadia Farjami currently attends St. Margaret’s Episcopal School. Some of her favorite authors are Emily Dickinson, Ernest Hemingway, Jodi Picoult, and Charlotte Perkins Gilman. She is the Co-Editor-in-Chief of her high school’s newspaper and a Genre Editor for Polyphony LIT. Her work has been recognized in The New York Times, the National Scholastic Art & Writing Awards, Polyphony LIT, Marmalade Magazine, The National Nancy Thorp Poetry Contest, The Youth Poet Laureate LA Contest, and more.
Trapped
when my mouth is tangy,
and my teeth taste of
molten metal, i’ll know that i’m dead
i’ll be wearing dusk and
dickinson’s stanzas;
my flesh will be sticky with
mourning dew
do not undress me
i’ll search for my umbilical cord,
pull my grey string out of a dumpster’s jaw
if i cannot
find my mother, i’ll stick my cord into
a fox’s
protruding stomach, and
i will be born neon, acidic
for years, i will curl
my tongue around
frogs’ bodies,
swallow their oozing slime,
let their salt tint my teeth
and when
my growl becomes withered wind
and my body,
a fading ember, i’ll know that
i’m dead
again
Nadia Farjami currently attends St. Margaret’s Episcopal School. Some of her favorite authors are Emily Dickinson, Ernest Hemingway, Jodi Picoult, and Charlotte Perkins Gilman. She is the Co-Editor-in-Chief of her high school’s newspaper and a Genre Editor for Polyphony LIT. Her work has been recognized in The New York Times, the National Scholastic Art & Writing Awards, Polyphony LIT, Marmalade Magazine, The National Nancy Thorp Poetry Contest, The Youth Poet Laureate LA Contest, and more.