Me
my name
is Elise.
my eyes are an ever-changing grey, green, hazel, gold
my hair is the somber, uniform dark that most of the gang have
blends in well, I guess
it has to—
we are the discarded children,
the city spat us out, our parents—
what parents? most are dead, or whatever the emotional equivalent
we know nothing of shelter and cotton sheets,
only a dark warehouse
and the bricks that crowd the sky
and the dusty edge of the road where the city melts to swaying grasses
and the quiet crying before sleep
and the hopelessness that we are destined for
and a life where the only constant is each other
and the slowly kindling sunrise.
Pockets
the silver watch
is a pretty trinket, I must admit,
but it isn’t as fascinating
nowhere near
as the glimpse of a parallel life,
a foreign world next to us that I can reach out
and touch
the feel of rich plum satin hidden
in heavy black—
it is a very personal connection and
after all these years,
after I was roughly taught, and then refined by the monotony of every day,
it has become so easy it scares me.
pickpocket is an ugly word
and in the world of the people whose pockets I pick, beauty is worshipped.
Leaders and Midsummer
there are leaders,
of course there are…
older and rebellious.
they’re not like other kids of their age, who are on the cusp of adulthood,
here they were pushed into it quickly,
they tripped and scraped their palms.
they’re just… just more tired than they should be,
their eyes light up briefly when they see
the younger kids and the lives they lead
dreams not burned and
not tormented, not yet.
drained eyes watch hungrily
the yells and laughs and water splashing
of all the little kids at play
Hugh, the oldest,
opens his mouth as if to comment
tell the others to quit being so soft
and stop the nostalgia that he cannot stand
but all of them are cast adrift on thoughts of the past,
and he doesn’t want to break the spell,
because the future is bleak and fragile
because eventually, these glowing kids will break just like everyone else.
summer rain mists past dazedly and I scuff my sneakers on the curb
I’m observing them quietly as they watch their lives over again
see their mirror images
in the screaming kids.
I’m stuck in the middle, nobody accepts me
and it isn’t just my age. I see so much beauty in everything
in the dirt and the grime and the winding alleys of our life
I’m the only one who isn’t resigned to my future
I want to escape my fate. I refuse to be broken
and it scares them all so much.
it’s early evening.
we sit, drunk on contentment
everything is touched with gold silk
soft and wistful smiles replace the usual scowls,
we don’t worry about tomorrow’s haul, our deft fingers are well trained,
this second is an eternity
nothing but us and now and the delicately honeyed shadows.
Alone
sizzling pavements
in a grey summer haze
faint streaks of lightning
drip across soft,
dead sky
sky that is so far away and yet
not so distant as the thought of any other human being
outside with me on this choking day
I almost wish that for a day, just a day, I could go back to what I used to call home.
The marble and velvet and more money than anyone could wish for.
I try my best to hide any sign of where I came from. I have
since the day I ran off. The gang know
and they wouldn’t care
except it makes me different in the way I view the world.
the only thing I have never told any of them
is that when they picked me up and let me join, scraggly child that I was
I had just decided to go back
I had just decided to go home. And I would have if not for them.
because you can never leave once you join the gang.
I will always love them and always hate them for that.
the air catches in the back of my throat
mesmerizing and sickening. I’m
a lonely fly abandoned in the trap of buildings and sagging air
the cracks in the sidewalk holding their breath.
Shop
the owners of the little shop, not thinking that anyone would notice,
left books and books of thick cream paper
and bottles of ink
on shelves in the back room.
I am so enchanted
by the thought of this ink, this midnight liquid
forming sways and skims and glances
on the gently heavy paper.
this is what I miss most about my old life, I think.
the idea that there is more to life
than breathing
and eating
and not being caught…
the hope of leaving something in this world that is beautiful.
I hug the notebooks to my chest
and breathe greedily the sharp edge of nearing autumn.
Escape
the fluid, glossy smears of ink
forgiving as I guide them
and shape every aspect of my life on to smooth paper;
the entwining crowds, filling the pavement, bursting on to the road,
the squares of moonlight through the window panes
making a patchwork quilt on the worn floor as I struggle to sleep,
the expression someone wears as hunger claws at their belly,
the first blush of dawn that disrupts the flow of night,
the strict rules and aggression from the leaders that keeps us alive,
the buildings of the city climbing and sculpting, higher and higher
until you can only see strips and glimpses of the ripe blue sky.
…everything is given wonder and majesty as it is captured.
I crouch sheltered just outside the back door of the warehouse and draw and draw.
They think I’m hiding
out of loneliness
they are wrong. I am more free than I ever have been
cramped in the space between cardboard boxes
all I yearn for is someone to talk to.
but for now
my heart feels warm and I am safe
and I can escape the cawing laughter of my gang members
as it steams the waxy light
of a caged lightbulb.
Gemma
Of course Hugh is tough. You can’t be leader if you aren’t tough.
and yet he smiled
…smiled! Really and truly smiled, and grinned, and it lit up his rough face!
as a little wisp of a kid, Gemma,
sister I think,
9? 10?
she finally ran away to join him. Finally left her home.
the same way I did. Well, not quite.
the flowery, privileged air
that I have lost
still hangs like fresh perfume around her,
chocolate ringlets
frame milky skin and faint freckles
her eyes hold wonder and vulnerability and silver flecks
swirled into a blue,
a blue that is shallow water on a June midday
to be sheltered
and loved like no other, and
that’s what we all decided to do.
A part of me still questions
why it is different, why they love her
and not me.
But her eyes are like cardboard cutouts to something splendid and radiant and azure
who could not love her
when she is the only lovely thing left in your decrepit world?
Gemma… Again
Gemma… well, she
wouldn’t make a pickpocket, because
she didn’t think I’d watch my paper pile, didn’t think
I’d realize that more
and more and more ink was missing, from behind the cardboard that slumped and melted in the hypnotic November rain,
didn’t think I’d see her, shoulders hunched, scribbling away,
and couldn’t have ever imagined
that
I smiled to myself,
and my heart felt burning warm with youthful hope.
Caught
Wow.
The word escaped me, a breathless whisper, but too loud.
Gemma whipped around,
clutching her sketch to her chest,
her surprise reverberates through the air and
seems to shake her frail figure.
What is it? Were you watching me? I’m sorry I took things! You should be glad I didn’t tell Hugh!
I feel the walls of defense rising around her,
the hardness in her little voice.
No…
I catch sight of a lovely drawing, a scraggly girl
with bright eyes.
That’s amazing.
Elise… that’s you.
I see the dark, ragged hair falling about my face,
the way I gaze into the distance with mistrust
and hope, so much hope.
it terrifies me the way she caught me in that moment, shoulders thrown back,
as if I haven’t a care in the world.
what a sick joke.
I know. I can tell.
bitterness rises in me, but I push down my resentment.
Show me how to do that sometime,
I wink.
her cherry mouth twists into a smile,
and the walls fall as quickly as they rose.
Endless December Days
We draw together, and it frees us.
We are so young, and it hurts us more, this street life.
But the tickling warmth
of the sun on skin on snow
is something to be shared. And so is her radiant smile
when you tell her how impressive
her drawings are. And so is
laughing with abandon
and feeling yourself fill with crisp, biting air that snaps at your lungs.
Flame
Deana’s voice slices the air.
Why was this not in the pile to sell? What idiot would steal paper?
The luxurious creamy paper scatters around the filthy alley
Gemma and I visibly cringe.
Was it you? Quick to accuse. But Hugh never liked me.
Little freak can’t help it. Cooper spits the words at me.
Then they find my drawings.
And Gemma’s.
I hear a heart-wrenching rip.
Her tiny hand slips into mine.
We can’t say anything. We just can’t.
And then suddenly, the smallest
and most dangerous
click in the air, of a cheap lighter
and the faint smell of gasoline.
I can, I can say something. I must.
Guys.
Guys, stop.
I push through them. There is a fiery fist clamped on my heart
I feel it beating fast.
Stop it! I grab Hugh’s shoulder and wrench him away from the limp flame.
His hand stings across my face.
I grab the best pile, the recent pile, Gemma’s work. Mine can burn.
Give that here. There is a low menace to his tone.
Leave her alone. The quiet treble of Gemma’s voice
silences us all, stops everything.
No, Gemma, you don’t understand. She needs to be punished. This is all useless.
She stops him in the middle of his reasoning. Those are mine too.
I glance at Hugh’s face. I see everything hurtling through his mind
and for a moment I know we are going to be ok,
he forgives us, he will put out the fire, maybe even look at the sketches.
The silence is thick enough to cut,
And his voice is sharp enough to razor through it. He looks at Gemma.
I wish you’d never come. You’re just as bad as her. You should have stayed home.
then
I
snap.
I grab some more of Gemma’s pictures and run.
I don’t look back at the flames that consume every last one of my sketches.
Museum
I have to do something.
Something to show them.
Something to save her.
An idea that has been growing at the back of my mind bursts and fills my head…
The shining museum in the middle of the city
the crumbling lot out back
rings of barbed wire curl lovingly
against a ragged door
falling off its hinges.
As I push through,
tears streak my face,
hot and fast and sticky.
My desperation is all I have
and it is working. Caution
is so abandoned that I fearlessly stomp down the dazzling white halls.
I have a faint idea as to where I should go, and
I see what looks like an important office. I push through the glass door
and shove the papers into the largest desk
I turn and an arm clamps on my shoulder.
an icy thrill
frosts instantly across the base of my stomach.
Running
I wrench out of the grip and
race down the hall,
Thief! Thief!
the cries echo behind me
my torment of leaving Gemma alone with the gang hits me
rises up in me
like bile, like acid, like liquid terror.
But I force it down and run and run
until I can’t tell if it is panic
or exhaustion
that chokes and burns in my throat,
and I feel my shirt being yanked backwards with force
and my hair being grabbed.
I kick out my leg as hard as I can
and it catches him in the shin
just as I bite hard into his hand. He recoils in fury
and is not nearly as hurt as I’d hoped
my fists barely affect him
though I am frenzied and livid,
and Gemma’s lost, abandoned face
flashes before me
imprinted on the inside of my eyelids
the last thing I want to think of.
Then suddenly my sharp knuckle smashes into his ear
he yells in pain and drops me,
the polished grey marble
hurtles towards me.
My wrist catches underneath me
an ear-splitting crack
white-hot pain shoots through me just as his knee slams into my forehead
a burst of shining spots
then endless dark.
A Haiku
feverish darkness
distress as my raging fight
is with nobody
Hospital
taunting layers of white,
white,
white,
I’m drowning in sagging sheets
drenched in an absence of color
the peeks of glowing skin
are so fascinating
I’m trying to shift this cast so I can see
the flushed inside of my wrist
the blossoming rosy tints and delicate veins
these hands were always a tool
never a thing of beauty
never a comfort in a world
that is white and clean and menacing.
It is all I can do
not to think about Gemma
not to think about how she might never know
her sketches are in the hands of a museum curator
I can’t handle the thought
that I deserted her
when she needed me most.
Bath
foamy white smashes gently down
a rush of giggling bubbles
melting
into
clear
warmth
weaving and sweeping
into a
quiet
calm.
it is so much more beautiful in this joyless hospital.
I immerse myself in this water touched with luminescence.
The Beginning
yes, Gemma was fair and charming and they let her visit me
though they shouldn’t have,
because technically we don’t exist.
we are, as the nurse delighted in telling me,
Damn street rats.
yes, there was fear and hope on Gemma’s face,
yes, there were bitter tears falling against both of our wills.
yes, I wasn’t in the system, or registered for anything
yes, the officials in the hospital were discussing my fate and yes they resented me;
Children’s home? Boarding school? She needs a home. If we keep her in the city she’ll just run. It costs less to send her away. But still, who will pay?
there is nothing more chilling
than knowing how little your future affects the people who control it.
But it isn’t about me. Not anymore. I realized that
as soon as I took her drawings and not mine.
Her eyes are so blue
beneath the flow of tears.
Listen to me. Go to the museum. Through the front door—don’t sneak in.. You have to talk to someone there… get them to listen and show them what you can do. Do you understand me?
the tiny choking sob that escaped her was raw and scratched deeply into me.
Elise…
Gemma, you have to. You have to. Promise me you will.
her chest heaved with uncontrollable sobs.
I shook her. Hard.
Promise me.
She swallows and blinks for what seems like an eternity.
Of course. Of course I will.
my throat feels strangled with loss
.…I so wanted to watch her grow.
hopefully
we’ll see
each
other
again?
and we know we never will but it would have killed me to admit it.
Another Haiku
betrayed by a glint
of blue, she didn’t want me
to see she looked back
Epilogue
VIEWING
AT THE MUSEUM OF UPCOMING ARTISTS
Gemma Blackett is a new discovery in the world of contemporary art. Her paintings often reflect an ugly and dark world. Many question this at first, but as they stare at it longer, they see that her subjects seem accustomed, even happy in their situation. She conveys that it is the only world they have known, and that one of the greatest gifts of childhood is finding beauty in everything. Critics were enthralled by her talent in capturing movement and shadow, obviously practiced from when she was young. She uses very simple materials—it is rare for her to use anything other than ink and paper—but she has an ability to make them outstanding and eye-catching. One of her most riveting works is a simple sketch of a pretty but worn girl, staring into the distance and not knowing she is being drawn. The same girl appears in many other drawings—she is easily identified by an eye color that none of the viewers could quite describe. She is often seen in the pieces with a younger girl who mysteriously resembles Blackett herself as a child. Despite a lack of education prior to her late teens, she studied art for 4 years, with a scholarship from this very museum, and is already a well known name at many prestigious institutions. Gemma currently resides with her husband and three children, Leo, Marta, and Elise. She and her family hope to open an orphanage for underprivileged children with the profits she has made, and she is currently working on another eagerly awaited exhibit.
Now showing at Gallery 5, the East Wing.
March 4-31
11:00 am-9:00 pm
Eleanor Miodownik
Age 13, Grade 8
NYC Lab MS for Collaborative Studies
Gold Key