Love After Love

Chapter VII

After my daily breakfast with Deirdre and Kobra, I follow the swarm of students who are walking to their different classes until I reach creative writing. When I walk into the class, Mr. Wilson is already there, and an empty canvas sits on a stool in the front of the class. He is wearing that satisfied look that means he's had a good idea.

I sit down and take out all my essential materials for the class: my special notebook, my pencil, sharpener, eraser, and of course: post-its and highlighters. I open the notebook on the first blank page and await further instructions. Kobra rushes in and sits next to me, and her small body seems overwhelmed by her gigantic backpack. She is clearly stronger than she looks. Exactly in the moment the clock strikes 9:00, Mr. Wilson begins to talk. I can't help but notice he leaves the door open for late students.

"Telling stories to express ourselves is something the human race has felt the need to do since the beginnings of civilization. We have always had the need to communicate ourselves, to express what we think and how things make us feel. But there is a form of writing that is the purest and rawest expression of human emotion: poetry."

I write the title on the top of my page in capital letters and purple ink, as if to portray its importance.

"Today I do not want you to write a poem with a specific length or structure, just write everything the way you feel it inside yourselves. Do not think it. Just write about the emotions this" he points at the blank canvas "sprouts in you. You have twenty minutes, make it as long or as short as you want to, just make sure it has your feelings plastered in it. And that, my students, is what poetry is about. Now... go!"

It surprises me how easily the words come to my mind, how easily they appear on the page as I think them.

Blank Canvas World

Before poetry, my heart was a blank canvas.

After reading the great ones' words,

Colors started appearing, teaching me

About things I hadn't yet met.

I got a river for freedom,

And a mountain for growing.

Love came in the shape of flowers,

Heartbreak as the moon.

Hope in a sunrise,

Trust as the house I grew up in.

Every poem left a lesson,

Every poem painted something new

In my soul.

I then started to create poems myself

A desire to paint someone else's canvas

While painting my own filled my heart.

And though I'm still learning,

Maybe my words can touch one person's soul,

Add a little color to their world

That would be more than enough.

I edit it until it feels just right, and then reread it satisfied with my work.

"Time's up, guys. Who wants to share?"

"Moon wants to share." Before I realize what has happened, the whole class is looking at me, Kobra guiltily, as if she realizes what she has done.