Doki Doki Isekai Club

Sharing Our Poems Part 2

Shinji then sauntered over towards Monika. Sharing poems was her idea, and she seemed the most excited about reading his poem, so she seemed like the next safest bet. This was just Shinji's way of not going to Natsuki yet. He didn't want to hear her complain again, and to Shinji, it felt like that was all Natsuki did: complain.

"Hi, Shinji! Are you having a good time so far?" Monika happily asked.

"Uh... yeah..." Shinji answered quickly, hoping Monika wouldn't try to peer more, thankfully she didn't.

"Good! I'm glad to hear it! Oh yeah, since you are new and everything, if you ever have any suggestions for the club, like new activities, or things we can do better, I'm always listening!" she continued.

Shinji avoided eye contact with Monika, "Yeah...I'll keep that in mind,"

He was not gonna keep that in mind, he was only here to keep Sayori happy, especially now more than before. Shinji also felt like he served better by just going with the flow rather than directing the sails.

Hole in the Wall

It couldn't have been me

See, the direction the sparkle protrudes

A noisy neighbor? An angry boyfriend? I'll never know. I wasn't home

I peer inside for a clue

No! I can't see. I reel, blind, like a film left out in the sun

But it's too late. My retinas

Already scorched with a permanent copy of the meaningless image

It's just a little hole. It wasn't too bright

It was too deep

Stretching forever into everything.

A hole of infinite choices

I realize now, I wasn't looking in

I was looking out

And he saw his out

"Well..." Shinji paused, trying to find the words to describe Monika's poem, "It's... very freeform, if that's the best way to describe it. Sorry, I'm not the best at giving feedback,"

Monika gave a saddened laugh, "That's alright... That form of writing style seems to have gotten popular here nowadays,"

She paused.

"That is, a lot of poems have begun emphasizing the timing in between the words and lines. So, when performed out loud, it can be powerful,"

"What was the inspiration behind this one then," he asked in a not so enthused way.

Monika looked like she had to think hard to answer that question, "Well I'm not sure how to put it...", she paused.

"I guess you can say I had an epiphany here recently, I guess you can say it's been influencing my writing recently,"

Shinji became interested in that for a moment, "An epiphany you say?"

She hesitates, "Uh... yeah, something like that,"

That hesitation was so obvious it hurt Shinji, but he didn't think it was anything too serious, he felt that if Monika wanted to say she would've.

She then continued her thought, "I'm kind of nervous to talk about deep stuff like that, because it makes me feel like I might be coming on too strongly. Maybe after everyone gets to know each other better," she rubbed the back of her head as she smiled to herself.