Something

Posted bytheatalaPosted inUncategorized 
The mirror on the wall shows someone.
A person? A human being? A beast?
Something.
Maybe, it’s something.

Unrecognizable, the visage is a blur
Wavering each blink of the eye,
Constantly shifting and moving around with each breath taken,
Shuffling with blood flowing through the interior
Beneath the skin
The organs
The ugly organs that work overtime,
Working until the heart no longer feels it has to.

Exhaustion reflects in the mirror,
In the eye.
Exhaustion reflects in the tears,
The broken, tainted surface of skin.

Glub-dup, ba-dump,
Gushing around, flooded,
Wetness sloshed around, squishy, squelching
Panting, hot, heavy, pained,
Ba-dump, glub-dup, ba-dump, ba-dump, ba-dump.

And yet, inside is hollow and empty,
A living phantom unnamed.
It’s shuffling, wavering, staring into the figure
It can’t recognize
Itself.

Orwen Taleon is a graduating senior and a creative writing student at Pembroke Pines Charter High School. She’s an aspiring artist with a love for anything creative. Her poem “Something” won the Free Verse category at the 2024-2025 PPCHS Literary Fair.

Published by theatala

the atala is designed, curated, & edited by the Pines Charter Chapter of the National English Honor Society. It showcases original student poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction, literary criticism, and art. Like its namesake — the small, bright butterfly that grew from near extinction to rising numbers in our part of the world — this little literary journal aims to grow our love of writing and expand our community’s appreciation for the literary arts.

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