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pitter patter

when childhood left,

we were still kids.


1 bang

i had my first active shooter drill

in middle school.

we had one every other month,

the same thing every time.

shut off the lights,

close the blinds,

cover the windows,

put the desks by the door,

don’t make a sound.

it never felt real, just another

boring safety thing we had to do,

just another just in case

that would never happen because

it’s safe here.

we would always whisper and fidget

and make all kinds of sounds.


the aurora shooting happened

when i was 9. sandy hook was

the same year. i don’t remember

sandy hook, but i remember

not being afraid. it felt far away,

like a distant tragedy in one of my books,

far away from me and my safe,

comfortable life in a new jersey suburb.

just another sad story on the news.


i was 14 when parkland happened.

it didn’t feel so far away anymore.

i read about the victims,

i read what their families said.

i remember one victim’s sister said

most of all he was my baby brother.

it was the first time

my best friend saw me cry.


i was 15

when my school went into lockdown.

we hid behind a half-wall meant

to keep us in line

for lunch, and i remembered

all those early childhood drills.

shut off the lights,

close the blinds,

cover the windows,

put the desks by the door,

don’t make a sound.

i texted my friends to make sure they were alive.

i wondered,

what good would any of this do

if someone really wanted to kill us?


2 huh

i was in elementary school, 4th grade,

9 years old, when i learned what to do

if someone tried to rape me. scream, run,

your elbows can cause the most damage.

a girl said she’d rather be shot than raped.

i didn’t really know what rape meant yet

but i agreed.


in 6th grade i rejected a boy

and for the rest of the year

he called me names in the hallways:

bitch,

slut,

whore.

my friends told me i should’ve just said yes,

because he really did like me.


i was in 7th grade when

the stanford rape case happened.

i’ll never forget the outcome:

my life is less important than his future.


in junior year, the burning sun scandal

came out, and it was just another day,

another story, i’m disgusted but

not even surprised.


for her 18th birthday, my friend got

pepper spray,

an alarm keychain,

and a window breaker

from her mother.

she was grateful.

i told my mother, she laughed

and said,

you don’t need that.

i didn’t know how to tell her that

sometimes it feels like the chances

of me getting raped

are less of an if and more of a when.


3 snap

i was 9 when i first thought

i want to die,

12 when i first made myself

bleed,

15 when i started to

drown,

17 when i could’ve

died.

i’m not sure when i started to

hate myself.


4 pop

let us have our moments,

let us have the childhood

we were never allowed to enjoy.

let us be carefree, let us have nights

talking and laughing like tomorrow

isn’t around the corner, like adulthood

isn’t creeping onto us like death

costumed in gold and lies.


we laugh with stars in our eyes,

scars on our skin, gouges

in our souls, our hands red raw

from clinging to the last scraps of

youth.

 

sooo i had something else planned because valentine's day and i wanted to put something a little lighter but. in light of some stuff i found out about my college, i wanted to post this one. i also wrote this one pretty recently so i'm a bit biased but i do like it. the section titles and stuff were fun to play around with and i liked how everything came together.

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