Towards the end of my senior year in high school, one of my assignments was to write a poem for my Literature class reflecting on my high school experience.
This poem, although pretty cheesy and a bit embarrassing, was a big mash up of all the emotions I was feeling at that time. It is simultaneously a celebration of recklessness and expression of the trepidation over what was to come. Although life was certainly complicated in its own way back then, my 17 year old self seemed to be very aware that the end of high school also signified the end of being a real kid.
The funny thing is, in reading this poem, I feel many of the sentiments in it still ring true today. I can barely remember what it was like to be 17 anymore – it was a time before 401ks and W-2s, bachelor degrees and bills- and I’ve definitely changed a lot since then. Yet, here I am at 22, and still feeling as if I am “spinning out of this curve we call adolescence”.
Anyway, as I am gleefully treading in the present and cautiously focused on the future, I though that I’d revisit the past and insert a bit of myself here.
Cheers to those individuals that inspired this back then.
“English Class- Poem”, 2004
you and i
we fell in like
for the first time
on the concrete bridge
atop the worn pavement
we started out like the movies.
cruising along at two a.m.
through the sleeping suburban streets
like half rebels
with ice cream resting on our lips
singing our souls out.
you and i
we laughed fallen on the tan bark
swinging into the sky on metal wings
screaming obnoxiously
like we had
purchased every minute and it belonged
to us
and only us.
the two of us
we drowned out our differences
in puppy eyed apologies
and make up dates where
your head sunk in my lap
on the greasy velvet brocade at
the newest romantic comedy.
our group
crammed into a small dive
on the downtown streets of San Mateo
bathed in pink neon lights
as two metal fans tried
to kiss our sweltering necks
and we were
longing for some cool relief .
and then it came
thick foiled pans of noodles
glasses of orange Thai tea
all soaking sensually in
early September heat
and we are
huddling around on sticky vinyl chairs
laughing and screaming
over every babbling detail
we are giggling to our
own language of inside jokes and immature memories
lounging lazily
in the baking sun
we are always laughing
at old crushes
old kisses
bad memories that were so bad
they became good
looking fondly over
glossy cheesy 8 by 12′s
sentiments scribbled on binder paper
it is with you girls
that teasing is breathing
and time is always frozen in our fun
and those were the times
that i scribbled entries
“dear diary
we are destined to live
our lives like a frosty fairy tale”.
making plans
seizing the moment
over salty stuffed burritos
from a dingy road side truck
and those were the days
of carelessness
when we were
watching the world
spin forever
and we would never get dizzy
because we were
essentially invincible.
and now,
we are slowly
spinning out of this curve
we call adolescence
sprinting over what they call
a milestone
you and i
we are standing at this road
and it is diverged
in ten million possible paths
so we are bound
to choose different ones.
we are floating through suburbia
car following car
the path forged by glowing cigarettes
passing around bottles of
beach glass liquor
so that we may
avoid the future.
but in moments of quiet solitude
i am slowly realizing
that you
are going to eventually
become shadows
and i really just don’t know what to do.
=)