Poetpourri (multiple authors)

Blind man Painting

Owen Benkowski
Undergraduate/Biology

The voice I imagine cursing this broken utensil I’m using

to scratch out these lies in my head makes me smile a little.

Then I forget how to think; I’m at the beginning

and all at once my thoughts come back but only for a blink

before the wave of happy insanity takes over again and I wake up on a couch.

The room I’m in has no corners and I can turn it into any shape you’d like;

We let a blind man paint the walls until they couldn’t hold more paint.

Empty except for a beating heart displaying a true show of endurance, time will bring this good thing to an end.

Robert E. Lee

Liz Babler
Undergraduate/Spanish

This is how the south was not won:
if you ponder on mr. lee, in general,
you can certainly say that he was a granted failure,
and not a big fan of james joyce.

To love something you have to let it die:
this, oh this, old bobby lee excelled at.
that battle was doing its death rattle
as he charged up on his horse.
pennsylvania soil was free but not free enough:
the price must’ve been unlisted
(inquire inside).

Well, you really have to give him credit:
ulysses always was a dense book,
and it hit him right in the heart,
so hard he coughed up a goal for the other team.

Even football was different back then,
with mr.’s grant and lee playing opposite.
mr. grant’s foot in mr. lee’s balls:
sorry, ref, said mr. grant,
guess i’m a slave to my instincts.
and he clapped mr. lee on the shoulder--
better luck next time, bob-o,
remember:
the cause is only lost if you can’t find it.

Split-Level Heart

Amber Reed
Undergraduate/Creative Writing

Stuck, completely trapped
like a fly caught in Amber.
No the irony

won’t be lost on me.

There’s a steel cage on my voice box
stopping the words,
blocking my thoughts,
squeaking it’s best not
to be heard.

It tastes like bile,
when I sit and try
to choke back the truth.
And the only thing I’m smelling
is the fear, and that’s proof

that the hardest things in life
are most likely what’s right.
But how do you win
when it’s just you in the fight?

The sting in your eyes stops you
from seeing what’s clear,
don’t wanna stop to listen
afraid of what you might hear.
Afraid of what you’ll say to yourself,
cuz the nicest thing you got
is you’re going to Hell,
and that you ain’t worth a shot

in the dark. And it’s midnight,
in the garden of evil,

where the bile-tasting truth
has been flowing like wine,
dripping from your lips
and exposing the lies.

I’m splitting in two;
I’m going my separate ways.
I want two different things,
and it just hasn’t paid

to sit alone on this fence,
hoping and wishing to gain
enough common sense
to open my mouth
and just let it all out.

The Bear inside us all
growls to be unleashed,
ready to feast
on what we started
but were too afraid to finish.

I don’t know how to end this,
don’t know how to make
it work.
I’ll keep hiding under
this bur-

qa of guilt
and pretend that I feel safe
in this glass prison I built.

Falling Asleep

Owen Benkowski
Undergraduate/Biology

And here it is; time.

The only indication that something is actually happening.

Laying, waiting to fall asleep; reality shifts to a new level like an elevator.

When it comes to a sudden stop and the doors ding, reality slips back subtly

yet it feels like an electrocution.

Eyes forced open only for a blink, because there’s a dream waiting.

Down the elevator is the only way; accelerating downward,

the elevator disappears. There’s no more air. No more gravity than in an unimportant situation.

As the abyss fades into a new scene, suddenly the wait is over for the dream.

Doors

Katie Johnson
Undergraduate/Psychology & Women’s Studies

No one door is identical to another. Each has something unique that separates it from all others. Maybe it’s the color, the size, the shape, the doorknob, or the noise it makes when opened.
We don’t get to choose the doorway we go through, they’re all pre-assigned.
Each has its own path and a different ending.

We can all sit back and be complacent with the path along the way or we can work and create a new path, a more interesting path, a better path.
Through our journeys we become equipped with all the necessary tools; we just need to use them.

So here’s the choice:
Do we take the path pre-cut because it’s easier or
do we utilize the tools that life has given us to be the change in our own paths, to merge with others’, and all end up with a better final destination?

I’ve always been a bit of a rebel at heart and I’m not one to leave a challenge untouched.
I know what I’m choosing.
What about you?

The E.N.D.

Matt Novacek
Undergraduate/History

when given the choice
you’ve chosen wrong
you came up short
and fell so far

the pain, the shame, the hate, the guilt
look back at the wrong and lies you built
you failed and lost when the game was done
you thought you were alone, you thought you were one

the end is something we want to pretend
E is for every lie you built
N is for never knowing the truth in life
D is for death which is inevitable for you and i

but when given a chance
to right your wrong
you’ve passed
and accomplished so much

the joy, the care, the laughs, the smiles
look forward to the road that’s left, all those miles
now you succeed and throw your hands in the air
you smile and know what’s right and what’s fair

the end is something that we can bend
E is for everlasting life
N is for now you accept the power of grace
D is for determining your own path and how your life plays out

Some Black Memoirs

Charles Liedl
Undergraduate/Undeclared

Despicable talents
shade all of what´s
created

A turn blow from being complete
Til the show is stripped
to broken shadow

For once on stage in stone-
A parody grown from
some black memoirs

Uneven in its build, quilted
face and burning crown

As the tome feels a shield
and the laughter brings a frown

Lolwat?

Drew Briski
Undergraduate/Geography

End of semester got you down?
Don’t worry, it’s got me too
I don’t even know you

But you probably don’t care
Who even reads this stuff?
Well there was that one guy, who got upset at poets,

The other who called out Christians,
Nick Warren for sure reads this
What I’m really trying to say is
I don’t have much to say

I’m wasting my time writing this
Or am I

Because if anyone knows what’s fun
It’s me.